by Nelson, J P
Foljur was a good sized town trying to grow into a city and had anything a sailor might need or want. It was built on the side of a large hill and many of its streets were stair-cased, resembling a long saddleback maze. There was a large native population there as well, and you could buy anything from juju medicine to feathers for your hair.
To be honest, I wasn’t in the best of moods when I walked from the palm forests and into Foljur. Perhaps I crawled out of my blankets the wrong way, or maybe it was just the bad dreams I sometimes had, and it could have been just simple contrariness. Hiking the island was nice, but it wasn’t the same as the big mountains I was used to.
I didn’t really want to talk with anyone but missed the company of people, and coconut milk was no longer a novelty with a small fortune in my magic handkerchief. I wanted a meal I didn’t have to cook for myself, I wanted a bath with hot water and real soap, my sleep was restless, and I kept fighting people who wouldn’t stay down in my dreams … Like I said, I wasn’t in the best of moods.
The tavern I wanted to go to had burned down and a diner I had eaten at and liked had closed. The Whiskin Boot was a famous tavern all across the Gulf of Gahrbrondi, and I had put down a couple of tankards there before. So it was off to the Whiskin Boot for me.
First I checked into the Har’Nona Princess, arguably one of, if not the finest, hotel in all of the Kadmus Isles. For one, I just wanted to enjoy a nice place to stay. For two, hot bathes were available in the room. For three, I had always wanted to pull down on one of those ropes I had heard about and have a suited up fellow knock at my door and say, “May I help you, sir?”
Walking in past a couple of stiff looking, suited gentlemen, I went to the clerk and said I wanted a room. Sailors didn’t stay at the Princess, captains and dignitaries did, and I looked like neither. But when I put down some serious gold coin and explained I wanted to pay in advance, you should have seen how happy that clerk was to see me. I went up and settled in, locked my door with a real door lock key as I left, and hiked to the Whiskin Boot for a mug and food.
Upon returning I met some new door guards who frowned at my buckskin garb, but the clerk remembered me, and I realized I would need to change up my appearance. Walking to the clerk, who met me with a friendly smile, I asked if I could get a bath drawn. Just like that, the clerk said, “Certainly. Would you like fragrances, an attendant, perhaps a bottle of wine to enjoy?”
I don’t know, the thought of someone watching me take a bath didn’t excite me, but the wine and … what was that … fragrances … sounded nice, so I said as much. As I started to go up the staircase I had a thought, “Could I get some cigars as well?”
“Certainly. Is there something you have in mind?”
‘You know, I might could learn to like this,’ I thought. Answering I said, “I like a rich, yet mellow flavor, and a slow burn. Surprise me.” And then I walked up the stairs. I did that every day for about a week.
One day I finally pulled that rope and had a tailor come up, measure me for some new clothes, and ordered something more city-ish to wear. I also ordered a formal suit. As to eating, the Princess had fantastic dining and I luxuriated myself with it.
Calculating my finances with the town, I figured I could live like I was for maybe four months, or as a common sailor for four years in Foljur. Neither choice appealed to me. What, I wondered, did I want to do? As towns go, Foljur was a nice place, but I found myself already feeling closed in.
One night I had a severe nightmare and woke up drenched in sweat and breathing really hard … but couldn’t remember my dream. The third night afterward, it happened again. By the end of the week I had made no friends, began feeling paranoid for no reason at all, and finally started having my dinner served in my room.
Eating a fine swordfish steak, sautéed in garlic and butter sauce, served with perfect vegetables, a baked potato swimming in butter, and a chilled bottle of aged Vambrolini wine on the table is one of those experiences you must try at least once. If you have never heard of Vambrolini, it is one of the finest wines you can find and comes only from Lh’Gohria, and expensive. The taste is smooth, crisp with just enough fruity sweetness to make it stand out. But be careful, it has a really high alcohol content. It is great with fish and poultry that has been broiled or baked, but not with fried anything. You can sip on it, too, just for the flavor, as I found I liked doing.
In any case, by day ten I was going crazy.
It was my third dinner in my room, alone, that I just couldn’t take it. Halfway through my meal I summoned the bellhop to clear away my things, and after he left so did I. Dressed in a brand new black silk shirt with ruffles up the front and on cuff, as was the gentleman’s fashion of the time, and black breeches topped with a sky blue sash, I made my way to the Blushing Sonja. I was loath to get rid of my fringed top moccasins and knee high boots were in style, so I wore my moccasins. I also carried my dagger in my sash, which was not at all unusual, therefore I basically looked the well dressed young businessman and not out of place.
The Sonja was an establishment for gentlemen, and ladies too, for that matter. No ruckus, brawling or what have you. As often as not it was a meeting house to discuss shipments, business deals, politics, local news, all sorts of things. People traveling by ship from all over would meet there. You had to pay a nominal fee to get in the door, but it kept the riff-raff out for the most part.
No sooner than I paid my cover fee, walk in and locate a place to sit down, than I came face-to-face with the rascal who contracted me for that Sea Marshal job. When he saw me his face went from disappointed to all smiles, “Hey-ya mate. Am I glad to see ye. I have another -”
“No,” I said. Turning around I headed back through the door. The man followed me outside and grabbed my arm with the intent of saying something. Whirling around I put the dull edge of my blade to his neck and with fire in my eyes said, “Back off. Do it – NOW!”
His eyes got real wide and his hands came up. Slowly backing up he said, “Saimea … Saimea … I understand. Ye don’t want the job. No worries …” Stumbling on something on the road, he turned and recovered himself. As he walked away the door guards watched me, I guess to see if I were going to press the issue as dueling was common, but I simply returned my blade and walked off. I would go to the Whiskin Boot.
Disgruntled and with an ill disposition, I went in and found the place to be packed. The bar was long and I found a place on the far end where it took an L-shaped turn in design. I ordered a Condroy Tea, which was a large, fruity drink with a rum base served in a pint and a half tankard. Typically it was known for being strong in alcohol content, but I liked the coconut, mango and other fruits and how they mixed with the rum flavor. And since I couldn’t get drunk I would sometimes drink two or three or more. I guess you could say it had become my favorite drink, of spirits, that is.
With the cold drink in front of me, I closed my eyes and relaxed a moment. Taking the handle in my hand I reached it up for a good sip and this huge seaman bumped into me, knocking the drink all over my new shirt, in my face, and all over the bar. This fellow turned, stared for a moment, pointed his finger and looked at me laughing said, “Ah me, look at the dapper dandy. Are ye wet Mr. Dapper, sir?”
Setting my empty tankard down, I just looked up. The clod was nigh to seven feet tall. Why didn’t anyone smaller than me ever try to cause a problem? Under careful appraisal I noticed he was definitely not an iron ball trainer; his belly was round, chest sagged a bit, and although his arms were huge they lacked any real shape.
Mr. Clod was to my left, so I hooked an angry right upper-cut to the soft point just under his navel and into the curve of his belly. When he buckled forward, his face registered total shock that I had hit him. I levied a left cross to his chin, followed by stepping in with a right-left combination to his solar plexus. As he again bent over low I kicked him under the chin with my right foot and follow the momentum of my kick into a full back-flip, landing on my feet into a ready postu
re.
Big boy staggered backward, but still didn’t go down … so as he turned around to get his bearings I charged into him, lifting what was well over three hundred pounds and carried him crashing into a table. I did a roll over him, and as he thrashed about the broken wood to get up I tore my ruined shirt off and waited for him to get up with my hands ready ... it was my first time starting a bar fight, and I was mad.
Chapter 60
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ANY OTHER TIME and at any other place, I might have just brushed off the fellow bumping into me. The big ox didn’t do it intentionally and he was just short of drunk and having a good time. But the rudeness of it, him laughing at me and calling me Mr. Dapper just didn’t sit well, what with my dark mood and all. And that pointing of his finger at me, well, it simply caused something inside to snap.
The moment I slugged him I knew he was more than a tall, overweight human. He would have never been mistaken for T-bone and his perfect proportions, but this one fellow was definitely laden with muscle. Although unwieldy from the alcohol, I could also tell from the way he was getting up he was probably good on his feet. No matter, as emotionally left of center as I had been, I needed this.
What I hadn’t counted on, and should have known better, was that this was a tavern … and the moment I took big boy into the table a bar fight began.
The Whiskin Boot was a tavern run by a former sailor, just for sailors. And sailors need to let off steam. The place was well built and built big. There was lots of floor space for dancing, cavorting, and fighting. The ceiling was high enough so it was hard to reach beams to swing from and the lights not put out so easily. There were also ceiling fans, carefully rigged from special wind mills above the roof to circulate the air well, and those fans weren’t intended to be broken frequently.
An often overlooked fact is that; just because you can fight well one-on-one, doesn’t mean you can handle two or more opponents easily. They are totally different fighting styles. When fighting only one-on-one, you can roll around on the floor or ground until one person is knocked out or submits to a locking-hold. Try that in a two-or-more-on-one fight and you can get killed, I’ve seen it happen.
In my case, I had been well trained in heavy multi-man combat, so the reflexes were there. Still … I was way out of practice. For years I only had to worry about the one opponent, and although there had been a few occasions where I had to go it against several, I still needed a lot of work. All that being said, my *Awareness* started screaming, but my reaction time was off enough to get clouted by a huge fist just as I ducked from another.
I wasn’t standing by the bar on the outside of the fray, I was in the middle, and it took only a moment for it to get really wild. My *Awareness* was warning me all around, and if we were to arms I could have started slicing right and left. But we weren’t, as rough as it was, these men, and some women too, were actually having fun. In fact there was a beautifully painted sign when you came in of a big, black, house cat with white feet, long whiskers and the caption Keep your Claws in your Paws.
My attention was still on my chosen mark, but I had to smack a jaw here, duck a chair there, roll under this man and leap roll over another just to reach my quarry. His back was turned to me when I got to him, and he picked up a man and what I think was a woman and threw them over backward before turning around. I was set to wallop him a good one when someone grabbed my arm, spun me around and cracked me on the chin. The blow was solid and I was about to return the favor when a bottle smashed against my head. This wasn’t turning out so well.
Hands strong enough to crack coconuts then grabbed me, and next thing I knew I was flying across the room, over the bar, and into a stack of bottles that shattered all over me drenching me in liquor. Big boy was quick, I’m going to give him that, and before I could get my bearings and the alcohol out of my eyes, I felt myself being lifted up and hard wood slammed into my chest. Next thing I knew I was sliding down the length of the bar faster than I could have imagined, and a row of fellows leaned back out of the way with their mugs and tankards and watched me go by.
Sliding right off of the bar and face first onto the floor, I managed to get up in time to see big boy lumbering around the corner. He was wasting no time reaching for me, so I grabbed one of his hands, scooped down and threw him over my shoulder. He went down hard, but he was prepared this time. I was setting up to do a step-in corkscrew lock around his arm, and I’ll be jiggered if he didn’t get both of those giant legs up, feet under my ribs and pushed me up into the air. I reached for a rafter and just missed it, coming down astraddle of someone’s head, who in turn pushed me off, landing me onto a table which held just long enough to think it would hold, and then collapsed under me.
I could have done a healing, but somehow I wanted no magic involved in this. I was venting some steam of my own and no bones were broken. I was starting to change my mind when he scooped me up like a baby and prepared to power slam me into another table, but I used the momentum of his lift to throw myself over his shoulder and land behind him on my feet.
Wrapping my right arm around his waist, my left hand cupping the under part of his left thigh and getting my head under his left shoulder, I lifted him up off of his feet. Holding him lateral to the floor I picked my moment and dropped back and down to my right … putting all of our combined weight on his shoulders in what is called a Back Suplex. You could hear the wood of the floor crunch and for a moment he was stunned.
Any ordinary human would have stayed down after that, as I had done it perfectly and it was one of my specialty moves. I rolled quickly to my feet, only to see this jiuk slowly getting to his knees and shaking his head. ‘What was he made of?’ I thought.
The wind was washing out of me and I knew it was time to quit living so soft. It was time to start getting back into serious physical condition. And then I heard them all yelling at him, “Get up Tiny! Don’t let the dapper cut ye’re lashings.”
Tiny? They called this fellow Tiny?
From halfway down the bar I saw a face, a face I was sure I had seen before, long ago, but where? He slid a mug my way down the bar and I caught it. Taking it up I saw it was cold, full, and frothy. I had never really liked the taste of ale until then. Catching one good swallow and another mouthful, my *Awareness* started singing again as I saw my opponent setting down a tankard of his own, wiping his mouth and after a moment’s hesitation start coming at me.
I got mad all over again, swallowed my mouthful, and as I sat the mug on the bar I went ahead and *Self Healed*. Slinging the sweat from my hair I said, “Alright bugger, you want to fight? Let me show you how it’s done.”
Turning on the speed I rammed him with combinations into the midriff and kidney. Spinning him around I hooked into the face and jaw and the midriff again. He had no hand-to-hand training, but he was game. A well scored shot to the solar plexus made him bend over and I placed a hard hooking cross-kick into his jowls. It spun him around as I followed the movement with a spinning side-kick into the ribs that knocked him backward.
Staggering into a post, my opponent regained his bearings and turned to me with battle lust across his face. As he got set to charge me, I leaped against the bar into a coiled perch, and then catapulted myself onto him cross-body style … taking him over backward as I targeted the momentum onto yet another table.
Tiny, who would name someone this big Tiny, wouldn’t stay down and as I came up on my feet he surprised me by catching me low, lifting me up in a bear-hug and carrying us both through the window, sill and all, and out into the hard packed dirt street. We came down hard on my back, but I used the force to continue into a full backward roll. I came out on top into an immediate triple flurry of downward cross punches. The Whiskin Boot clientele poured into the street and were all yelling as they moved around us forming a big circle.
Tiny managed to brush me off and tried to roll on top of me, but I wasn’t having it. We both managed to come to foot at he same time and he led o
ff with a wide, lumbering swing. He was done but didn’t know it. I wanted it over with now, fast, finished, but I honestly didn’t want to kill him. I felt like a mongoose fighting a sluggish constrictor snake many times my size, but what was it going to take?
He was walking like he was out on his feet, with every strike I landed he wobbled back and into another … and then from nowhere a hand touched my arm … I spun around and saw another man in a fighting posture.
I swung hard at the new man, but he brushed my blow like it wasn’t there. Again I struck, at any moment expecting Tiny to come at me again, but this new adversary countered my movement again with an almost effortless motion. I began to throw all manner of combinations at him and he kept moving away. He countered with techniques I hadn’t seen in years and I found myself getting tossed about.
He wasn’t manhandling me, mind you, but he was meeting my aggression with redirection … where had I seen that? I threw an assault and this time as he redirected, I countered his counter and he went into the dirt, but with a beautiful roll of his own he was on his feet. We began countering each other’s counters and as we fought we learned each other. A couple of times I made solid contact, but he then moved as to absorb the blow. He made contact with me as well, but not a punch and the blow came from nowhere.
We seemed to be embroiled in some kind of pugilistic dance, rather than a slugfest. I was remembering nine animal combat, fire against water … No … fire AND water … Yin and Yang … Tai’Jhi, this sailor was using Tai’Jhi.
Forming my hands into tiger claw fashion I managed to land a hard blow to his torso with my finger tips, and then a follow up to the kidney that I knew hurt. But he absorbed the strike and whirled to strike me a wicked elbow to the side of the head, followed by a punch into the floating ribs, and then something I remember called a Palm Press-Strike which lifted me off my feet and into the side of a building.