Shadow and Flame

by Gail Z. Martin

  A few streets over, the clang of swords echoed from the buildings, along with the shouts and curses of fighters. Munn was the ward leader for this part of Castle Reach. So far, the invaders had been kept to the edge of the city, just inside the ruined wall, but without reinforcements, that would not last for long.

  “What’s your name?” Folville asked.

  “Hugh, sir.” A wicked knife was thrust through Hugh’s rope belt, and a scar on his cheek told Folville that the boy was no stranger to the rough streets.

  “Report.”

  Life on Castle Reach’s streets had never been easy. Skirmishes between the Curs and the Badgers broke out every so often, flaring into blood and flames over a house or a street corner. Residents who stayed in the far edge of the city knew how to take care of themselves, a necessity because until the very recent help from McFadden’s soldiers, no one official had previously been willing to lift a finger in their defense.

  “We don’t know how many Badgers managed to get past the wall,” Hugh reported. “We’re going after them, but it’s slow going. The Young Pups are out in force,” Hugh reported. “The Old Dogs rallied with the first attack. We’re going house to house, looking for Badgers.”

  “Our teams got dice?” Folville asked.

  Hugh nodded. “Yeah. Munn hands them out to every new fighter.” Folville had organized the Curs into teams of six men, each with a single die and a set of six possible actions they had to memorize by heart. Depending on what the die rolled, they chose the corresponding action, guaranteeing random, unpredictable responses to attacks. It meant that neither Folville nor Munn needed to be in constant contact with the teams to get results.

  “We broke out the weapons as soon as we knew the Badgers were serious,” Hugh said. “Woke up the women and got them busy filling oil bombs. Everyone’s armed.”

  “Street snares?”

  Hugh nodded again. “First thing Munn did, and he sent the Pups to snare all the way back to Potter’s Plaza.”

  Folville glanced around in the near dark, squinting as he scanned the buildings for snipers. Hugh chuckled.

  “They’re there,” he assured. “Roofs and basements.”

  “Tell the others I’ll make sure there’s extra food and fresh clothes when this is over, if we drive back the Badgers.”

  “And good ale?” Hugh’s eyes narrowed.

  “And ale,” Folville promised. “Now, get going, and make it fast!”

  Folville moved forward. He had already sheathed his sword. It was too long a blade for the narrow alleyways of the Lower Ninth. In its place, he held a hunting knife in each hand. Knives worked much better at close quarters. He had been street fighting since he was younger than Hugh. This he knew how to do.

  Attacks by the Badgers and the Red Blades had been happening for as long as the three gangs had existed, long before Folville’s time. Before the Cataclysm, the wars between the gangs waged relentlessly, invisible to outsiders until they spilled into such violence that the king’s troops grudgingly became involved, which was rare. No one else wanted the run-down sections of the city where the gangs fought for scarce resources, so outsiders left it to the residents to sort things out among themselves.

  Folville had watched and learned. As a boy, Folville had been a scout like Hugh, learning the tunnels that ran beneath Castle Reach, a mapless warren prone to flooding at high tide and after sudden storms. As a teen, Folville had been in the teams that laid traps in the streets, set trip wires and garrote ropes, and threw burning pots of oil to set invaders on fire or light debris in a stone cul-de-sac. Later, he had been a decoy, offering himself as bait to lure angry rival gang members into dead-end streets or houses filled with hidden allies. He had plenty of scars to show for his time in the streets, but the experiences taught him as well as any military service.

  Betta and the others moved cautiously in teams of two, alert for danger. Hugh and the Pups had already extinguished the street torches, so the dim glow of lanterns through slats and shutters were all that lit the way, along with the pale light of the waning moon. Folville’s concentration was on the next few feet, the next doorway. He took nothing for granted. That caution had kept him alive this long. A rat squealed in the gutter, and Folville flinched. He let out a breath when he saw the creature scuttle away.

  A streak of silver in the torchlight was his only warning. Folville felt the blade slice into the sleeve of his coat and skid down his vambrace. He blocked and slashed. One of his blades dug into his attacker’s skin, and hot blood spattered his hand. In the half-light, Folville caught a glimpse of his attacker, a flat-nosed, broad-faced man twice his size.

  The man was big and fast. The knife slashed again. Folville blocked the blade with one knife and struck with the other, scoring a cut on the man’s forearm. Murder glinted in the man’s eyes and he grunted in anger, coming at Folville with a series of powerful strikes that could have cut to the bone.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Folville could see that Betta and the others had attackers of their own. Big Guy and his friends had slipped past the defenders, and now it was up to Folville’s crew to keep them from moving farther into the city.

  Feint, dodge, strike. Repeat. Fighting with a knife was faster than with a sword, rough and brutal. It had come easily to Folville when he was in his teens. Now, a decade older, he felt slow and sluggish.

  Big Guy’s blade sliced into Folville’s shoulder just below his leather pauldron, and warm blood ran down his arm. Folville kicked hard, getting Big Guy in the knee, and while he was reeling, Folville went for the kill. He slashed his blade across the man’s throat. Big Guy thrashed, and his huge fist caught Folville hard on the side of the head, knocking him backward, dazed. Blood sprayed as Big Guy’s mouth worked, unable to draw breath. His eyes widened in shock in the instant before his body crashed down to the mud.

  A battle yell echoed down the alleyway, and another man came at Folville. Still dazed from the blow to his head, Folville tried to get his bearings. He braced himself, knives raised to block the worst of the attack. The attacker ran toward him, shouting curses, closing the distance fast. Large knives glimmered in the man’s hands, more formidable weapons than those Folville held.

  Just as the man was nearly on him, a stout pole slammed end-first out of a nearby doorway, catching the attacker on the elbow with enough force that Folville heard bone crack. He saw his opening and went for it, landing a blow with his knife that slipped between the invader’s ribs and into his heart as the old man in the doorway rocked back and forth, steadying himself on his staff, cackling in laughter.

  “That’s the way to do it! Get the bastards.”

  Folville came up in a crouch, only to see Betta finish off her attacker with a blade plunged hilt-deep into his belly, pulled up to the ribs like gutting a fish. She gave the dying man a kick and he fell backward, hands grasping for his bulging entrails. Emery and Droyan were holding their own with attackers, but before Folville could circle around, both had downed their opponents.

  Folville turned to see the old man joined by several other residents. Old women and worn-looking younger women emerged, armed with staves of wood or heavy pots. Some held slingshots, common in the ginnels for hunting rats. Old men clutched staves, some with knives bound to their ends to form homemade pikes, along with battered scythes and stolen swords.

  “Go on, lad. We’ll hold the street,” the old man with the staff assured him. “Ain’t the first time, probably won’t be the last. Send them all to Raka.”

  Folville grinned and gave the man a rakish salute. “You heard the man,” he shouted to Betta and the others. “We’ve got Badgers to fight!”

  They stopped long enough to bind up the worst of their wounds, then kept moving. Folville made it his business to know his territory. He had roamed these streets when he was one of the urchins like Hugh, picking up a coin or two for odd jobs, no questions asked, stealing when he couldn’t, freezing and starving, running and hiding. As he rose in the ranks of t
he Curs, Folville had been in Munn’s role, a quadrant leader, responsible for first a block of buildings, and then several blocks, with teams under his command. Even now, when Folville had gained leadership of the Curs through a mix of ruthlessness, luck, and street smarts, he made it his business to walk the streets he owned often, letting himself be seen, handing out food and clothing, bringing along healers with far more skill than the local hedge witches to treat the sick. That firsthand knowledge paid off under attack. Now, even in near darkness, Folville wound through the narrow streets, sure of his course.

  Along the way, they could see evidence that Munn’s men had done their work. Barrels and overturned carts blocked some roadways. Tangles of washing lines and fishing nets barricaded others. Snares of thin rope at ankle height in places could lame attackers, while loose rocks, dumped from conveniently waiting bins, covered streets with shifting, treacherous footing. The Curs were on their game.

  The edge of the city had been dark when Folville and his team approached it, but now fires lit the night. We can thank the Badgers for that, he thought sarcastically. The Curs could move through these narrow, twisting streets with minimal light. They knew the tunnels and the ‘mouse holes,’ passages that opened from one tenement to the next through the walls of buildings so that defenders could run entire blocks without having to go outside. Rooftops, too, had their bridges and paths, if one knew where to look and had sufficient nerve and agility.

  Warily, Folville and the others stuck close to the walls of the old buildings, hugging the shadows. Nearby, they heard shouts and the sounds of scuffling, and to their left, the pounding of running steps echoed in the darkness.

  “This way,” Folville said, gesturing for the others to follow. In a few turns, they reached the city’s edge. Once a high stone wall had marked the borders of the King Merrill’s palace city. Now what remained of that wall was blackened, blasted by the Great Fire. Vandals and storms in the year since the Conflagration had knocked down more of the old stones, leaving gaps in some places and mere rubble in others.

  Cur archers were ducking behind the portions of the wall that remained, firing at the Badgers. Several of the city buildings rose two or three floors above the wall. Archers dodged back and forth at the empty windows, shooting down into Badger territory. Badger bowmen fired back. Rocks flew with deadly force, launched by slingshots or thrown with dangerous aim.

  “We’ve held most of them back,” Munn reported as Folville neared the Cur line.

  “We met some of them on our way here, and took them out,” Folville replied drily.

  Munn nodded. “The Pups and the old ones will deal with the attackers that slip through, if we can hold more of them from getting in.”

  Folville took up a place on the ruined wall. Smoke roiled through the air, making it hard to breathe. The Badgers were lobbing bundles of oil-soaked rags that burned with heavy, dark smoke to make it more difficult to see. Torches and small bonfires dotted the night.

  “There!” Betta shouted as shadows dodged in the smoke toward the city.

  “On it!” Folville said, signaling his team. They ghosted after the invaders, knives ready.

  Maybe to the Badgers the darkened buildings looked like easy pickings. Folville knew better. Doors would be barricaded, gates roped shut. Entrances held nasty surprises for the unwary. In these first blocks nearest the wall, make-do reinforcements had fortified the lower levels, reinforcing the walls and doors with whatever debris was handy. The Badgers would not take Cur territory without blood.

  The first block of streets had no visible snares, giving attackers the belief that this ground would come easily. Folville knew that they were being herded, as surely as cattle to the slaughter. And when the Badgers figured out their mistake, it would be too late.

  “Soon,” Folville murmured. He had fought beside Betta and the others long enough that they knew each other’s movements. The Badgers might have been trying for stealth, but to Folville’s eye, they were clumsy and noisy, making it simple to follow them down the path the Curs had blazed for them.

  That path led right to a dead end. Flanked by two buildings with the ginnels fenced closed, the street ended against the side of a third, hard-used tenement.

  The Badgers slowed as they neared the end of the boxed-in street. It was the opportunity Folville was waiting for. On his silent signal, the Curs attacked. Betta slipped a knotted length of rope over the head of one of the Badgers and pulled hard, knocking him off balance as he struggled for breath. Folville lunged into the nearest Badger and shoved him hard against a nearby ‘door.’ The wooden panel gave way easily, opening onto a drop to the basement and jagged debris. They heard the Badger screaming all the way down, until the cries ended with a sudden, abrupt thump.

  A second Badger came at Folville, knives ready. Folville blocked the slice meant to cut him open chest to gut, and thrust with one of his own knives. The Badger eluded him, only to dive toward Folger once more, and this time, his thrust scored a gash on Folville’s upper arm. The Badger was bigger than Folville, but Folville was wiry, and he knew the area.

  Above them in the wafting smoke and darkness was a pole sticking out from the wall, just over the doorway. Folville leaped straight up, grabbing on to the pole, and used his momentum to land a hard, solid kick right to the Badger’s face. Bone smashed beneath his heel and blood flowed as the Badger let out a howl of anger and pain. Folville swung back before the Badger could get him in the legs with one of his blades, and took the opponent’s momentary bloody haze to try to slide by, hoping for a clean strike at the man’s back.

  The Badger moved too quickly to let Folville pass. Blood flowed down the man’s ruined face, and his eyes burned with fury. He had lost one of his knives when Folville kicked him, and he grabbed Folville with a meaty hand.

  “Not so fast,” he grated, words slurred from his rapidly swelling lip.

  Folville took a fast, hard step toward the man, putting him off balance, and got in a kick to the man’s groin, then brought the knife in his pinned arm down point-first into the Badger’s arm.

  The Badger went down hard, moaning in pain, and Folville got in the strike he had been waiting for, slipping his blade between the Badger’s ribs from behind. The attacker gasped, then fell forward, splayed on the filthy street.

  Betta had finished her first attacker, and was backing a second man against the wall. Just as the man took a step toward the gutter, Betta danced backward, out of the way of the hot water an obliging resident stood ready to pour from the upper window. The Curs expected the move and stayed out of the way, but boiling water poured over the Badger and he screamed as his skin began to blister and peel. He never saw Betta’s blade going for his throat.

  The darkened windows hid more Cur fighters. Rocks pelted the Badgers from every direction, hurled hard enough by slingshots and angry residents to open up bloody gashes. One rock struck a Badger on the temple with a wet crunch, lodging in the bone, and the man dropped to the ground, still. The remaining Badgers rallied with a bellow, rushing toward the Curs, who blocked the alley’s only exit.

  Rocks pounded the Badgers, hitting hard enough to break bone. Beaten, bruised, and bleeding, the attackers made their last rally.

  Terror and rage filled the Badger’s eyes as he came straight at Folville, intent on getting to freedom. Folville blocked him with his knives.

  “Get out of my way!” the man shouted, brandishing a short, thick staff. Folville fell back a step and grabbed a barrel, hurling it at the Badger and knocking him to his back. Pritcher, one of Folville’s team, drove his sword into the downed Badger’s chest before the man could make a move to get back to his feet.

  When Folville was sure his enemy was dead, he looked around to find only the Curs in the alley. Their supporters behind the darkened windows had melted into the shadows.

  “Leave the bodies. We’ve got work to do,” Folville ordered.

  When they wound their way back toward the wall, Folville and Betta found the Cu
rs shouting and whistling in celebration. The smoke was clearing, and while a few arrows and rocks still soared through the air toward the Badger side of the wall, no return fire answered.

  “We drove them back—this time,” Munn said, meeting Folville as he approached the wall. “They’ll be back, I’m sure.”

  “Good work,” Folville said, wiping away the sweat and blood that streaked down his sooty face with his sleeve. Munn and his fighters were bloodstained and dirty, too exhausted to join in the victory catcalls.

  “It ain’t over,” Munn said. “I know because the Badgers had better weapons than they’ve ever had. By the Whore! Most of the time when they’ve tried to take ground, they’ve come at us with broken boards and rusty lengths of iron. This time, they had proper knives and swords, lots of them.” He shook his head. “Someone’s giving them weapons, and we’d better figure out who and why before they come back.”

  Folville stared out through the clearing smoke, past the wall and toward the dark horizon. “It’s not the Red Blades. And there’s no other gang in Castle Reach better equipped than the Curs.”

  Munn met his gaze. “Maybe you’re not the only one to draw the backing of a lord who wants you to do his fighting for him, think of that? Don’t need to be one of our enemies. It’s enough that it’s one of his enemies.”

  Folville had already considered that possibility. Holding Castle Reach against the Badgers and the Red Blades had not seemed like an impossible task when McFadden had offered soldiers and supplies for additional protection. Even rebuilding the city’s defenses and its wharf had seemed a good bargain. Until now, the Curs had benefited from the alliance with food and weapons, hard-to-get supplies, and extra, trustworthy manpower. Now, the full price of allegiance started to become clear.