Bo spat.
Erik watched helplessly as slavers dragged most of the young men, now incapacitated, away, some bound in nets, others trapped in those clawed contraptions, others simply pulled by their limbs.
“Do we do nothing?” Erik cried.
“Slavers are opportunists,” Bo replied, eyes trained on the chaotic commotion happening around them. “They prey on the weak. But they misjudged the Ion Gypsies, for we are anything but weak.”
With that, he glanced over at Marcus who chose that moment to let out a resounding cry, his falchion raised high in the air. Now, all the gypsy men, including Bo, charged from their hiding places. They crashed into the oncoming slavers, who had advanced on the circled carriages. Erik watched the slavers stop, not expecting such a furious defense from the gypsies.
From what Erik had heard and experienced, it seemed to him that most gypsies proved peaceful, if conniving and deceitful, and he figured that’s what the slavers expected. Most of them held non-lethal weapons, their cudgels, and nets. Marcus met them first with a mighty swipe of his sword, removing one man’s head from his neck. His sons, Mardirru and Max followed their father, Mardirru with a sword of his own and Max with a woodman’s ax.
What first seemed a one-sided routing by the slavers turned to a fight for life and liberty. Both sides clashed violently, while the slavers still sought to extricate their quarry. Erik saw Fox carry away another woman while another man, heavy robe and cowl covering his features, bound another one of the young men and dragged him into the forest.
Erik, still stooping behind a wagon with his brother and cousin while the fighting raged on, saw a thin man, an oily, black beard hanging from his chin and with black hair slicked back and pulled into a tight tail, directing the attackers. He ordered some of them into the fight with the gypsies, while he commanded others back into the forest, newly found slaves in tow.
He, himself, stayed away from the fight, but expertly conducted his force of slave traders to collect contraband while holding off the gypsies. Yet the gypsies pressed harder, and the slavers’ leader found it impossible to ignore them. With a shrill, voice, he cried, “Kill them!”
The slavers stopped trying to collect more victims and threw themselves into the defending travelers. With over half the slave traders worrying about smuggling people back to the forest, it seemed the gypsies had the upper hand, outnumbering the attackers two to one, but once the remainder of the outlaws gathered with their fellows, the gypsies were truly outnumbered.
A group of half a dozen slavers turned their attention to the wagons and the women and children huddled in the back of the circle, protected by only a few men. With Marcus and his followers to the front, fighting off the main force, they figured these folks easy pickings.
One man, a tall, gray-haired Goldumarian, leapt over the wagons first, right next to Erik, long-bladed knife in one hand and club in the other. The women screamed, and the children cried, the man standing there with devilish, dark eyes and yellowed teeth bared. Erik slid underneath the wagon with his brother, but before the man could act, Bryon brought a fist hard across the man’s face.
The Goldumarian slaver stumbled back, and before he could regain his footing, Bryon struck him again until he fell. Another man jumped the defenses, and Bryon spun, club in hand. He instinctively brought the cudgel up, blocking a quick slash from the slaver’s short sword, and returned the favor with the piece of thick wood across the man’s face.
As the man collapsed, Bryon dropped the club and bent down to pick up the attacker’s sword. He caught Erik’s blank stare from under that wagon.
“I’ll not sit here and become someone’s slave,” he hissed. “I’ve already had my fill of that.”
“What are you going to do?” Erik asked.
Bryon picked up the Goldumarian’s knife, holding the sword in one hand and the dagger in the other. “Fight.”
Chapter 18
MARCUS LED MORE THAN A dozen gypsies, including his sons and Bo, into the fight, at least two slavers for every one of them. Bryon saw some gypsies die, but it looked like the slavers took the brunt of the beating, limping away bloodied and bruised, or trampled underneath feet, mortal wounds stealing away their final moments. But the sheer number of attackers—at least two score—slowly pushed the gypsies back to their wagons, and at every opportunity, they dragged some hapless victim back to the forest.
Trying to decide where best to help, Bryon watched some of the miners and their families run about in chaos, many fleeing north. Those that didn’t run found themselves killed or captured. Decision made, he lowered his shoulder and rammed a man with a thin wooden rod raised and trained on another’s head. Bryon heard the satisfying sound of cracking ribs as they both fell to the ground.
The man—looking not much older than Bryon—wheezed, lying flat on his back. He struggled to get up, but Bryon kicked him in the head, and his body went limp. Bryon looked at the prostrate man briefly and then at his own weapon, the short sword he stole from the other slaver.
“You would do it to me, wouldn’t you, you bloody sheep tick?”
The blade hovered above the unconscious man’s neck, but Bryon shook his head.
“I may no longer be a farmer, but I’m no murderer either.”
Just then, he felt a slight tug on his ankle and instinctively pulled his foot up hard. A net slid under his boot and along the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust. The netter, a tan-skinned slaver with an oily beard growing on his chin, growled at the near miss. His dark eyes settled on Byron as he twirled his net over his head, ready for another attack. As the man licked his lips and sneered in anticipation of his catch, Bryon rushed him, swinging wildly with his sword and dagger.
He had no training in the use of blades, no training in any weapon for that matter save a boar spear, but he figured well enough what to do with them. His long-bladed knife scratched across the netter’s ribs, and the man howled in pain. Dropping his net, he threw a punch, and Bryon dodged it, but then the slaver brought his elbow down hard on Bryon’s head as he ducked.
Bryon didn’t have time to notice the pain and brought his head back up and hard into the slave trader’s face. The man’s nose erupted in blood, and as his hand automatically went to his face, Bryon kicked his feet out from underneath him.
The netter tried scooting away, holding his nose with one hand and pushing against the ground with the other, but Bryon stepped smartly forward, meaning to stab the man in the chest with his short-bladed sword. But then, from the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of a fiery-haired man running with a little girl under his arms. The red-headed slaver yelled at the crying, squirming girl. Her kicking and fighting only made him squeeze harder.
“Fox.”
With his teeth clenched into a grimace, he kicked the tan-skinned slave trader onto his back, still at his shattered nose. Bryon ran hard, splitting the air, pumping his arms until he thought he was close enough. He had never thrown a knife, but nonetheless, he gripped the long-bladed knife’s handle hard and heaved it toward Fox’s left side; he carried the girl on his right.
The weapon wobbled haphazardly through the air, but luckily the blade turned just slightly enough to graze Fox’s arm. It left no more blood than a skinned
knee, but it was enough to make Fox flinch, and his hold on the girl loosened.
She fell from his arms and ran, and the fire-haired man looked as if he would chase after her until he saw the lean-muscled farmer, towering head and shoulders taller than him, barreling toward him, red-faced and seething. Fox grinned maliciously.
“That’s right, you pompous dung scooper. Come and get some.”
When only a hand’s reach from Fox, Bryon felt a sharp pain in his ribs and then jerked sideways when another slaver’s shoulder crashed into him. His head hit the ground hard and, for a moment, everything around him went black.
“Don’t kill him,” he heard a voice say. “He’ll fetch a fair price in Saman.”
Bryon’s eyes shot open. “The hell I will.”
He kicked out hard, catching the second man—a tall, emaciated man with stringy gray hair and sunken, piggy eyes—in the shin. He screamed, and Bryon rolled away just as Fox’s spiked club sunk into the earth where, just moments before, Bryon’s head had been lying.
Bryon, on his feet now, jabbed at the gray-haired man with his short sword. The slaver easily swatted the blade away with his own and returned the favor. Bryon sidestepped, but the iron sword scraped along his ribs. Bryon grunted and looked down at his side, a growing stain of red wetting his shirt.
Now Fox attacked, but Bryon caught his arm with his off hand and shoved him away only in enough time to dodge the gray-haired attacker again. Gray Hair swung up hard, the wind from his sword brushing Bryon’s cheek. His swing, however, left his side open, and Bryon jabbed again. His sword hit home.
The attacker’s eyes went wide, and blood spurted from his mouth as he gurgled an incoherent curse. Bryon retracted the sword, and his victim jerked forward. Hands now shaking, Bryon brought his sword down on the man’s shoulder. Shaken, it proved a weak blow, but it was enough to break skin and snap the man’s clavicle. The slaver fell to his knees, clutching at his stomach and shoulder, face hitting the ground, gasping for the final breath that was leaving his lungs.
Bryon turned back to Fox, but he was already twenty paces away and running hard. Bryon looked down at the dead man, and then at his blood-covered sword. His hand still shook, and he gripped the handle of his weapon hard, knuckles turning white until it fell still.
Chapter 19
BEFEL WATCHED IN HORROR, HIS cousin on the ground, seemingly unconscious, and two slavers—one he knew as Fox and another, gray-haired man—standing over Bryon, weapons at the ready. He saw a crudely fashioned club lying on the ground and picked it up.
“What are you doing?” Erik asked, still huddled behind a wagon. He had a look of fear on his face that Befel hadn’t seen since his brother was a little boy.
“I can’t just sit here while our cousin is out there.” Befel gave his brother a quick smile and leapt past the protective circle of carriages, rushing to his cousin’s aid. He stopped, however, when he saw Bryon leap to his feet, ran again when the gray-haired man raked his sword along Bryon’s ribs, and then stopped again, mouth agape when Bryon plunged his own weapon into the attacker’s stomach.
Then he heard a mighty cry coming from the head of the fighting and turned to see Marcus, surrounded by a half dozen slavers. The giant of a man looked fine, directing his gypsies, but then the early morning sun glimmered against his beard, normally black, but now it glistened crimson in the bright, dawning light. His vest looked all but tatters, merely hanging on his body by the sticky wetness of blood.
“Marcus,” Befel muttered in shock and rushed to the gypsy’s aid.
The din of battle almost deafened Befel as the young man closed in on the fighting. From the corner of his eye, he saw the flashing of metal and instinctively ducked when a sword hissed just above his head. Again, instinctively, he swung out with his club, catching his attacker in the arm. The force with which Befel swung his weapon, his well-worked shoulders and arms lending to untapped power, snapped the man’s bone, and he went down. As Bryon had done, Befel’s boot sent the man’s eyes rolling to the back of his head.
Had his mind been right, he might have stopped, but adrenaline propelled him on toward Marcus. He felt blood coursing through his neck, thumping so hard drums rang through his head in a synchronized beat to his breathing. His strong, farm-worked legs carried him faster and faster until he collided with a fat slaver, his face all pockmarks and scars.
The ugly man had already hit Marcus once in the ribs with his long-handled hammer and was preparing to do it again when he turned into a head-over-heels ball of fighting flesh as Befel crashed into him.
Befel felt breathless for a moment, and then a barrage of fists began thudding against his face as his assailant straddled him. He felt blood flow from his mouth, cheeks, and chin, and dropped his club. He covered his face with his left hand and punched hard with his right.
He caught the fat man in the jaw, heard the snapping of his teeth and the mumbling curses as his assailant wobbled backward. Befel retrieved his weapon and slammed the thick piece of wood down hard against the face of the slaver, who slumped to the ground, dead.
As Befel tried to roll to his knees and stand, a brown-haired, blue-eyed slaver tackled, swatting the club away. The two wrestled while the boots of the other fighting men trampled all about them. Befel could tell that this man, surprisingly strong for his spindly arms and thin frame, meant to subdue him rather than kill him. The thought of being taken made Befel fight harder.
His fists thudded into the man’s ribs as the slaver’s elbow slammed into Befel’s cheek. Still, Befel proved relentless in his defense. Befel covered up, withstanding a barrage of fists and elbows, and then returned the favor. Then Befel remembered the homemade knife in his boot, with a deer bone handle and an iron blade honed and sharpened enough to skin even the thick hide of a bull.
His fingertips tickled the end of the handle, all the while fists colliding with his face. Befel felt pain race through his body, felt his head throb, felt consciousness threatening to leave, but finally, he caught the handle and gripped it hard. In one movement, he yanked it from his boot and sliced its edge along the slaver’s leg. The attacker instantly let up, squeezing his thigh as blood seeped through his fingers.
“The Shadow take you,” he hissed, drawing his own knife.
He lunged at Befel and brought his knife down hard in an arching motion. The blade dug into Befel’s left shoulder, and he cried out, his screams at first silent, and then deafening. Now anger pushed away the pain, and he brought his own homemade blade up and into the slaver’s gut. The man heaved, vomiting blood all over Befel, but still Befel pressed his knife up, rending flesh and cutting innards until the man fell limp across him.
Panting, Befel lay on the ground, the lifeless body of his attacker pressing against his. The man’s face—eyes still open, and mouth wide in a silent scream—rested only a finger-length away from Befel’s own. The slaver’s bloody and yellowed teeth seemed to sneer at him as Befel closed his eyes, feeling the tingle of sleep.
With pain throbbing at the back of his head, the blood rushed from his face until he looked a ghost of who he had been moments before. Then, just before he fully passed out, he felt a hand on the collar of his shirt, felt the ground move under him. Trying to steel himself for another fight, he looked up to see Bo
, nose broken, and lower lip split and bleeding.
The gypsy had a broken arrow shaft protruding from the right side of his chest, but still he managed to drag Befel toward the wagon circle, somehow with a smile still on his face. As Bo let him rest on the ground, Befel closed his eyes, and all was darkness.
Chapter 20
AS ERIK HAD WATCHED BEFEL heading toward Marcus, he saw a little girl running toward the wagons. It was the one that reminded him of Tia, and a slaver was eyeing her, a wolf tracking an unsuspecting hare. Erik scrambled from underneath the wagon and sprinted in her direction.
“Run girl!”
She keyed in on his voice and ran hard toward him, arms stretched out, but she was just too slow, her legs too short. The slaver, a malicious smile spreading across his face, was almost upon her, and now Erik had to move, fast. He ran for the terrified girl and reached her just in time, pushing her behind him. The slaver skidded on his heels.
“Move,” the dark-haired man hissed.
Erik shook his head. He stood a little taller than the slaver, shoulders certainly broader, chest and thighs thicker, but this man didn’t care. It seemed he knew Erik was an inexperienced fighter, and the slaver licked his lips.
“Move or die.”
As the slaver moved in closer, part of Erik wanted to obey, to move, give the man his quarry, and be done with the matter. He knew this man was an experienced fighter and that, despite his smaller stature, he would be more than a fair match for Erik. The dark-haired man breathed hard, his rancid breath beating against Erik’s face even from three paces away.
A Chance Beginning Page 10
