Cryptic

by DA Chaney

  Most of the gangs ranged with children easily between six and eleven years old, and they learned from each other. It was hunger and desperation that made the kids a dangerous bunch, using anything sharp or crude as tools to take whatever they wanted from their victims. If they could eat it, sell it, wear it, or make something from it, they considered it all in a day’s work. No remorse. If they were lucky enough to kill a victim, they’d haul the body in for the coin—dragging the sorry corpse shamelessly along the street—each child with a handful of whatever the poor sod was left wearing.

  Ed nodded at the boys, hoping this exchange wasn’t going to result in a fight. The elder of the two boys pushed a lad forward no older than six, his face smudged with so much dirt it’d looked as if he’d been eating a pile, nose first.

  “Have some coins…to spare for our hungry stomachs?”

  Carefully, she regarded the young face and turned out her empty coat pockets in a slow deliberate move. She’d managed to spend what she had on the ale. “Nothing.”

  The elder boy grunted and pushed forward in a jerky move elbowing the little one aside. “Bollocks you have nothing. You’ve been in there all bloody day. That’s as good as yelling to the rooftops that you’ve got deep hidden pockets as sure as anything I’ve seen.” His speech was broken as he talked

  Whoops. “You’re wrong. Shove off.”

  “That’s as grand as a pretty gold coin! I’m the one wrong? Your arse barely left the table the entire day. We seen you.”

  “I drank one cup the entire day. Tavern isn’t happy about it neither. You can ask them.”

  A look of uncertainty graced the face of the youngest but the eldest was determined. “You gotta give us something. We’ze starving.”

  “There’s nothing to give.”

  A rock flew out of nowhere grazing Ed’s ear, narrowly missing her swollen cheek. She swore and jerked a hand up to hold her wounded ear. She glared into the darkness where it’d come from. A second one, smaller than the first, was launched from the right, striking her above the knee and bounced off into the dirt. Clenching her teeth, she watched a scattered band of boys emerge from both directions. “We be Jack’s gang.” One boy boasted proudly.

  “I have no trinkets, coins, or shiny stuff. Clothes is it.” She pulled at the fabric of her pants trying to reason with the boys again and sighed. “Let me see Jack and I’ll have a go at him.” Nothing about the last few days had been easy. Her body hurt enough already with all of the wounds she’d collected. She didn’t understand why she couldn’t get a break. This was a perfect example of why she needed Brock’s bulk to ward off trouble. She was too small and skinny and looked the perfect victim to mess with.

  A few of the boys laughed in unison at her response. She knew that the safest thing to do would be to go back inside and await her escort rather than fight these boys. One or two, maybe. But not a gang. As she turned to go back inside, she noticed two dirty boys with thick clumps in their hair had snuck up behind her. Bold as anything the shortest boys fist punched her in the crotch.

  The pain was jarring. Regardless that she did not have the necessary parts, the unexpected jolt to such a sensitive area was truly stunning. She had a fleeting thought of so this is what it’s like. It was as if a musket had gone off in her pants. The sucker punch to her jaw came from the other kid and, as she fell backwards, a hand went for the dagger. All that she had, all that she owned, she wore. She wasn’t about to let these small thieves take what she had easily. Last time was bad enough and the little shits would quickly find out her gender if they stripped her clothes as well.

  Several boys jumped at her immediately as she fell. Her cap fell off as she landed. She could feel rough little hands patting her down looking for pockets. Bloody blooming flaming Hell. Throwing an arm over her face, she felt new kicks to her ribs along with a few boys who piled onto her legs to try to immobilize her. Flailing and rolling, she pinned a few of them to the ground, using her knife to make her point known. More kids leapt onto her back trying to hold her down. As she made hers, they also made theirs with sharp objects of their own. Was that a needle weapon? Ed winced feeling the thin edge slide in and out of her legs as she struggled against them.

  Ed stabbed one boy through the hand and he gritted his teeth at her as he slapped the blade from her fist and then slugged her in the stomach with his uninjured hand. Another boy had some kind of heavy object and was banging at her shin with it. His thin, tan face grinning wickedly showing off his missing bottom teeth as he continued making a solid bruise on her. When she felt the tugging on the coat, she swore and struggled to stop them from taking it. Not the coat!

  Arms and legs were everywhere as a flurry of punches and kicks came from all directions. Surrounded and overwhelmed, she grunted and swore loudly, pushing against her small assailants from the ground. Her movements were not helpful to her cause as the boys managed to peel the coat down and off her arms as she flailed. She felt the cool air replace the lining of the coat and she made an angry noise. They ran away with it, snickering as they went. “Little stinking bastards!” She’d really liked that coat.

  A new boy, with skin so dark that he didn’t look real, parted a sea of flying elbows and legs and came to sit on her chest, his bony butt cheeks digging into her. She stopped struggling, gasping for breath as he grinned maniacally into her face. A gleaming straight edged blade in his small hands. “I’m Jack Baker. These are my boys. I like your coat.” He spoke with an accent that she didn’t recognize and leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees pressing his buttocks deeper into her chest making it hard to breathe. Jack stared down into her face, rubbing the edge of the blade in front of her eyes with his the pad of his thumb. Beads of blood welled up and he showed it to her, leaned forward and smeared it on her forehead. Ed swallowed staring up at Jacks knife.

  Then suddenly, bodies began disappearing. She tensed, raising her arms bracing for a fight and almost slugged her savior. He stood above her frowning down as he shucked each wiggling boy from her, throwing them wide like sacks of wheat. She balled her fist and punched the last boy that lay on her, but he wasn’t Jack. Jack had darted off into the shadows. Protected and watching. For the last lad, the man gave an extra shove with his boot. “Bunch of hooligans. What is this area coming to?”

  Leaning down, Swicker extended a hand and grabbed Ed under the elbow and pulled her up as if she weighed nothing. The fresh blood and bruises protested as she leaned over and snatched up her cap that had ended up beneath her.

  Grimacing, she inclined her aching head, acknowledging his assistance. The new blows to her head were not helping the ones she’d already had. Small white spots were forming before her eyes and she grabbed a hold of her inner elbow through her shirt and pinched hard to avoid flatly passing out and humiliating herself further. She was going to get a reputation of an easy mark if this kept up. Well, easier, any way.

  “You seem to attract trouble, my young friend.”

  He didn’t know the half of it. “Bloody kids.”

  “I should say. That band of misfits should all be hanged.” Albert looked around and saw the kids staring from the darkness and they snarled back at him like a pack of wild dogs. “Be off with you!” He flicked his hand in their direction as if they were servants that would listen, but the children stayed and continued to watch them with eerie quiet, teeth bared.

  One boy held up the stolen coat by the collar with a finger and redness stained her cheeks as she intended to advance on him. Swicker grabbed her arm by the elbow before she could take two steps. Perhaps it was fortunate that the sound of horses approached when they did because Ed wanted to get her coat back. The tightening of Swicker’s hand did little to squelch her inner most thirst to get it from the kid. Blast it all. From the darkness of the lane, a black carriage sporting lanterns emerged in front of the tavern.

  Swicker withdrew a handkerchief from a pocket and passed it to Ed. “Normally, I’d ask a personage like yourself to ride up front
with the driver. But seeing as though you’ve been attacked in the dirt, I’m feeling a bit soft knowing you were mauled and robbed on my watch. Seeing as though I am yet again empty handed anyway. I’ll allow you ride inside the carriage with me.”

  Ed made a rude noise, took the extended cloth, and wiped her forehead with it. “I don’t need no special seats, Mr. Swicker.” She handed it back to him and he frowned down at it and let it fall to the ground. She started to walk toward the front of the carriage when Swicker picked her up bodily and all but tossed her inside the carriage.

  “Stupid stubborn child.”

  “I—”

  Swicker waved a hand in her direction to silence her, climbed inside, and closed the door behind him. “That’s settled.” Dropping onto the opposite seat, he stared out of the window. “If I never see this place again, it will be too soon,” he muttered, resting his back against the rich red color of the seat and closing his eyes. “The seats aren’t overly comfortable, but the ride is a bit of a stretch…so feel free to catch some sleep. Don’t bother pick-pocketing me. I am armed and I won’t hesitate to use it if I feel the slightest of movement of my clothes, is that understood?” He cracked open an eye to look in her direction.

  Ed shifted on the seat hiding a wince at the new injuries. Swicker was right. The seat was hardly better than the inn chair she’d sat in all day. The biggest difference was the red soft covering. It didn’t do much for comfort though. Her buttocks still protested as she tried to find a spot left that didn’t make all of her injuries ache. A few moments later, it turned out just as well that she was inside as it started to rain again. If nothing else, she’d be dry for the trip.

  She looked at Swicker and shrugged. What did he expect her to say, that she planned on robbing him blind and leaping like a lunatic from the moving carriage? “Sure.”

  He nodded, rested his head back, and seemingly fell asleep. Exhausted, but not yet willing to let herself trust a man she just met, she stared out the window without seeing anything as her mind began to go over the events of the past few days. She wished that she hadn’t lost the goddamn coat. The knife was gone too, but the coat had been extra nice. She shifted on the seat, folding her arms over her stomach, and listened to the raindrops fall against the roof.

  7

  Esther carried her shoes close to her bosom with a bag of food over her shoulder as she ran down the hallway. The food bumped and shifted against her back as she moved.

  The night that Richard had killed Molly had been the longest one of her life as she waited out the screams and moaning sounds starting to come from the courtyard. Her stomach had begun to make hungry noises long before the screaming had stopped. After a while, everything had gone eerily silent and she waited there formulating a plan.

  She was awake when rays came through the window announcing that dawn had arrived. By that time she’d ruled out trying to climb from the window unless it was a last resort. She may be rich by association, ergo on the naive side, but she wasn’t a stupid woman. She knew her limitations and needed to compensate for them. Any scenario that she envisioned, the idea of climbing out of it ended up with her in various stages of falling from the rain-soaked eaves, either to an immediate death or falling and her broken body being discovered by Richard and eaten alive in the mud. She wouldn’t have believed it if she hadn’t seen it with her own horrified eyes, but that’s what he’d done: eaten someone alive. Esther shuddered, remembering the expression she’d seen gleaming from him. He’d enjoyed it, which sickened her even further. She had started to imagine Richard’s deranged face on each monster that would come at her.

  In her mind, she knew that Richard was safely locked away in their bedroom, but there was no mistaking the sounds she’d heard through the night. There were more like him out there. More sick people. It made her feel miserable that she’d laughed about his illness to his face. Whether it was being bitten or an infection from something else, he was truly sick and she had mocked her own husband.

  Esther knew that she had to do something instead of sit and wait it out until someone showed up with food so she began looking for some kind of weapon. There were no traditional ones to speak of since Richard made sure that guns and swords were locked away in the armory on the lower level of the estate. Her gaze shifted to ornaments, bottles of various shapes, to bowls and a water pitcher. There were plenty of bobbles that she might be able to throw at an attacker, but she rather doubted that it would slow them down for long. Not with the determined madness she’d seen in Richard’s eyes.

  If only the room had a fireplace, she might have been able to take a poker from it to wield, though the idea of her striking out with one seemed more a comedy than reality. She had no real strength to fend someone off. Muscles on a Lady was considered unattractive and unnecessary. It didn’t matter, seeing as this room had been deemed far too small for a fireplace anyway.

  Scanning the room, her gaze fell upon the matching candleholder set. She didn’t know where they’d come from, probably a previous wife judging by the rose pattern engraved into the sides, but they were made of heavy silver. They were thick at the base and skinny at the top, and if pressed to, she might be able to use one as a makeshift club. It would have to do under the circumstances since there was little else to rely on. She was confident that could always upgrade if she found something better to use instead.

  A petite bloodstained figure standing in the middle of a child’s guest room, she knew with striking clarity that she didn’t qualify as someone who could defend herself very well, but she’d simply have to try. Esther’s sense of dignity reminded her that she just couldn’t be seen running around in her unmentionables doing it either. Heat raced across her cheeks burning a path down her neck knowing that she needed to rectify her clothing situation. Her gaze traveled along the room looking for something to use. Quickly, she crossed to the bed throwing back the blanket. She pulled at the bedding feeling the muscles in her arms strain to extract a sheet from the mattress. Then she grasped a bed sash. Wrapping the sheet around her form, she tucked the edges into her corset and secured it at the waist with the sash. It wouldn’t do for the High Ladies of court, but in a pinch, it would have to do.

  Satisfied that she was modestly covered, Esther stepped over to the large ornate dresser and removed the candle from a holder, setting it down where it promptly rolled off and onto the floor. Shaking her head with annoyance, she picked the holder up by the thin end and began making experimental test swings.

  Yes. She’d do it if she had to.

  She’d have to be practical, of course. She certainly didn’t want to die, so she’d do what she had to in order to survive. If she could run instead like she had before, she’d take that option, instead. Given the success of her escaping her mad husband before, running certainly seemed less difficult than if she’d stood there and beaten him with a candle stick holder.

  She moved to the door and pressed her ear to the wood to listen if anything lay beyond it. Hearing nothing, she unlocked it then pulled it open and peered out, candleholder ready to be swung. The hallway seemed empty. All the doors still appeared closed.

  Relaxing her arm, she opened the door wider, satisfied that she wasn’t stepping into a crowd of sickly madmen. She rotated her shoulder to relax it from the weight of her weapon born of circumstance and then reached out to pull the door closed behind her. She didn’t want any nasty surprises inside waiting for her when she got back to the room.

  Esther walked forward on the tips of her boots like a cat walking on soft paws. The hallway looked much the same as it always had, but she knew behind some of these doors, things were less than the normal. Eyeing a particular door, she crept past where Richard was captive. She was startled to feel a sense of pride in herself, knowing that she’d managed to keep him behind a closed door even in a panic like that. At the time, she thought he’d just pull open the door and continue coming at her, but he hadn’t. It seemed as if he’d forgotten how to use the door, which was more
than fine by her. She doubted she could have outrun him beyond the hallway.

  She noticed that as the shouting had gone on earlier, she’d been able to hear Richard banging against his door trying to get out. As if he wanted to participate in the human hunt going on around him. He’d always been a big hunting fan. But now with things quiet around the estate she hadn’t heard him for hours.

  Was he dead? Sleeping it off? She hesitated for a moment, but couldn’t take a chance on checking to see how he was and moved on. She’d need protection before she would have the courage to look him in the eyes again. She couldn’t risk that he might be sitting on the bed staring at the door waiting for it to be opened. Shivering at the thought, she knew it was better to wait for some strong men who could overpower him if he was still not himself.

  If it was a sickness, perhaps there was a cure that would return him to health. The whole incident would have to be covered up of course. He’d attacked and killed at least Molly, if not the unfortunate soul in the kitchens. The estate would be lucky to get staff after an event like this if word got out.

  A lot of money would have to exchange hands, but it could be ‘swept under the rug’, as they say. The Lockette estate was well out of the view of the courts and they might slide by without notice. If the past night’s transgression was found out, she wasn’t sure what would happen to her then.

  For now, she just had to wait until the men she’d called on for aid arrived. Which she hoped was soon. She was a Lady and was certainly not used to any of this mayhem. It was beneath her and she wanted someone else to come along so that she could tell them what to do for her.

  This time when Esther reached the stairs, there were no sounds coming from below. Hesitating for a moment, she glanced back at the room at the end of the hall that she’d found safety in. If she only could just hide there until help arrived. Her lips tightened at the thought. It was the safest idea and the urge was strong to go back and hide. But then, so was the urge to eat.