by Andy Remic
Dek’s straight left split the man’s lip, his right hook broke his jaw, and an uppercut elbow sent him spinning backwards where his blood washed the floorboards. He scattered tables on his way down, where he stayed down.
Dek lifted his head, and suddenly Narnok was standing behind him, axe in both fists, beard bristling something horrid. And behind Narnok came Trista and Kareem. Trista held two blades, and Kareem had drawn a short sword which he brandished in his swarthy fists. Mola snored in the corner.
“You see,” said Dek, turning and looking down at Salt, “if there’s something I can’t fucking stand, it’s being ignored, brushed aside like I’m some little fucking girl with spots and a funny skirt and hair in pigtails.”
“Do… do you know who I… am?” Apoplectic rage.
Dek squatted, and looked into Salt’s face. “Yeah, cunt. Red Thumb. Debasleazy Twat, or something. Can’t say I give a fuck. Now, do you know who I am, because I was skewering fucking mud-orcs through the eyeballs and sending a hundred corpses a day to the Chaos Halls whilst you were sat in your pantry stuffing juicy pies down your fucking throat. My name’s Dek. You might have heard of me.”
Salt gave a chuckle. “Yes. Yes, I’ve heard of you. And you might think you’re the hard man of the Fighting Pits, but I’ve got fifty like you all willing to die for me.”
“I’m not willing to die for you,” said Dek. He grinned, a particularly nasty grin. “But I’m certainly willing to kill for you. Or more precisely. You.”
“Wait, wait!” said Kareem, coming forward. “Dek, please, help Debanezeer stand.” Grumbling, Dek did so, grunting and straining at the immense weight. Salt brushed himself down, and looked around the group, then back to his bodyguards, including the unconscious one bloodying the boards. He made a mental note to fire him. Then amended it. Fuck it. The bastard would be fed to the dogs.
“Kareem Maff.” Salt smiled, but the smile was with his lips, not his eyes.
“Yes.”
“I am confused.”
“How so?”
“I thought we’d made an agreement. That you would leave Vagan forever, and leave my daughter Tatanya alone, or I would have my men do unspeakable things to you. And then you would die. I thought it a particularly simple concept to grasp.”
“I love her,” said Kareem, teeth clenching.
“You love Tatanya?”
“Yes.”
“Then leave. And cause her no more heartache. I will not stand for it. I am a respected businessman in these parts, and you have taken my young sweetheart away from me… no, I won’t allow it. Leave, Kareem; leave or die.”
“Look,” said Narnok, stepping forward, and Salt glanced down at the axe.
“Narnok the Axeman?” said Salt.
“That’s me,” said Narnok with a grin, bristling, happy his reputation had preceded him.
“You smell worse than they say.”
“Eh?”
Debanezeer Salt smiled, and his men were shuffling forward so that Dek turned, and scowled, and they stopped. “Gentlemen. And ladies.” Salt tipped a wink to Trista. Then suddenly hoisted an uppercut that caught Narnok by surprise, lifting the axeman into the air and sending him sprawling backwards, his sheer weight and flailing size sending Trista and Kareem crashing to the floor. Dek whirled on him, and Salt lifted his fists. “Come on, Dek. Let’s see what you’ve got, you ugly fucking son of a whore.”
Dek lifted his fists. Glanced at Salt’s men. Scowled.
“You really want to fight me, fat man? I’ll fucking eat you!”
The left straight skimmed past Dek’s ear, a fast punch he’d hardly seen coming. It was followed by a right, that he blocked, a few jabs, then a thundering right hook that dropped Dek and left him sitting there, feeling like he’d been hit by a sledgehammer.
Salt straightened his jacket as his men came forward. More had entered The Fighting Cocks. And these carried loaded crossbows. There were fifteen, maybe twenty. It was a crowd of muscle. An orgy of weaponry.
And it all seemed to happen so fast…
“You see,” said Salt, bending to whisper his intimacy in Dek’s ear. “All you see is a fat old man before you. And yes, I have partaken of the pie and the wine flagon these last ten years. But in my fucking day I was champion of the Fighting Pits. Ask your little friend Weasel. He knows my name.”
Groggy, Dek swayed where he sat, like a drunkard; a Honey-leaf abuser.
“Surprised, motherfucker?”
Dek groaned.
Salt leaned even closer. “Your little friend here, Kareem, came to you to see if you could persuade me to let my only daughter bed him, like a fucking whore. What drugs is he on? What fucking continent? And you, oh yes, the Iron Wolves, so hard of reputation, you thought you could stand against the Red Thumb Gang?” He laughed, a sickly, mocking laugh. “All I can say, is… ”
Dek grabbed his head, headbutted him with force, breaking his nose, headbutted him another four times, then dragged him into a bear-hug. Crossbows wavered, but Salt’s men could not shoot, for their master’s huge body lay astride Dek like some bloated lover as Dek headbutted and punched. He reached down, grabbed Salt’s bollocks, and squeezed hard. Salt screamed like a woman.
“Tell your men to lay down their weapons.”
“Never! I’d rather die!”
“Or be a eunuch?”
“Lay down your weapons!” screeched Salt.
“Fuck that,” said one big bodyguard, and triggered a bolt. It whined across the tavern, skimming Kareem’s ear, drawing blood. Kareem touched his raped earlobe, frowned, and leapt at the man, launching a ferocious onslaught of punches which battered the large man backwards until his back whacked against the bar, at which point the feisty landlady reared behind him with a flagon of wine and smashed it over his head. But still he didn’t go down, until Kareem took several backward steps, ran and leapt, both boots connecting with the man’s jaw. Down he went, crashing through the bar, splintering the wood, and tangled up with Kareem and broken shards of flagon. Kareem kept punching. It was all he could think to do.
Trista launched herself at the bodyguards. There came several clicks and whines but like a ghost she danced through the enemy, small knives slashing left and right, no killing blows, not yet, but opening arms and legs and chest muscles, more than enough to sting, enough to slice muscle, sever a few tendons, disabling but not life threatening… and all the time she imagined the men to be wearing smart formal wedding attire, a white rose in their buttonholes, their boots polished and shining, and she screamed, “You bastards, you dirty fucking cheating bastards,” as they dropped to their knees, wondering what hit them, wondering how she’d dodged crossbow bolts and carved open their flesh with fruit knives like a dancer in a dream of death.
Narnok was not so forgiving. He didn’t like being punched. He particularly didn’t like uppercuts. And he certainly didn’t like being laid out on his back like a stranded kipper by a fat man with no dress sense and a name so stupid it belonged in a poetry pamphlet. His axe sang. There came a crunch. A head sailed across the tavern, spinning, pissing droplets of blood in its wake.
A sudden hiatus, a hush, descended on the tavern. A seriousness. A bar fight was one thing. But severed heads?
“Come on, you fuckers!” roared Narnok, brandishing his bloodied axe, as more of Salt’s bodyguards piled into the tavern and one frightened customer backed into a flagon, knocking it over. Whiskey flowed over a wooden bench, and onto the floorboards beside the roaring fire. An ember, drifting gently, touched down. There was a soft whoosh as flames journeyed along the fireboards and onto the fire-dried bench, which started to burn. The fight slammed forward, punches and kicks, thrown stools and smashed tables. A man staggered past with a blade in his eye. Trista followed him, coolly, and retrieved her dagger with a schlup.
“You’ll see your bitch in hell,” she said, eyes glazed, lips moist, tears wetting her cheeks. Bottles smashed, crossbow bolts whined, and Debanezeer Salt crawled through the
sudden mayhem, trying to find the door.
He came up against some legs. They wore boots. They were thick, but not like his own, like barrels of pig offal, but heavy with muscle. He looked up. It was Kareem. A bottle sailed past his head. A stool crashed to one side. Smoke billowed through the tavern. The ambience changed, for fire had taken hold of various benches and tables, and climbed to the rafters, cackling. The roof began to burn, fire screeching like a live creature, a demon in a cage as the fury quickly escalated.
“Ahh. Kareem.”
“You dirty, miserable bastard.”
“What do you mean?”
“My only guilt is to love your daughter. But you come here and threaten me with death.” Kareem’s eyes held a wild dark gleam. There was a flicker of madness there: a man pushed too far. His back against the wall. Shit out of luck and with no fucking options. And what happened when you pushed a man? Pushed him to the brink of the mountain ridge? To the precipice beyond?
There was only one way to fall.
And if you’re going to fall, then you fucking take your enemies with you…
Kareem’s boot found Salt’s head, and he stamped down, and down, and down, bludgeoning the man into unconsciousness. Then he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, and spat at the father of the woman he loved. He gazed around, a dreaming man in the midst of a tsunami. Fire roared through The Fighting Cocks. Men brawled, and fought with knives and swords. Stools and tables were smashed, and bottles sailed through the air. What had been a peaceful drinking establishment was now a riot.
Something hissed, and whistled, and howled through the roof. Thick plumes of smoke charged in waves through the fighting throng, so that the brawlers suddenly forgot their issues, clutching at stinging eyes, burning hair, demon-licked clothes. One stocky man went up in flames, screaming suddenly, clutching his face and burning hair with burning hands, and another, as an act of empathy, threw a tankard over the man… only it was full of spirits, and more fire screamed up towards the burning rafters…
The brawl forgotten, everybody staggered for the door, and there was a sudden bitter fight to get the fuck out. The door was pretty much kicked from its hinges. Smoke poured out of The Fighting Cocks as men and women and drunks staggered onto the cobbles. The roof went up with a boom. Sparks fluttered up into the heavens. Smoke billowed high in the sky, pulsing in great rhythms like some great, black heartbeat.
Narnok staggered out, and dropped to his knees, choking up vomit onto the cobbles in the courtyard. He choked, and coughed, his one good eye red-rimmed and streaming. Dek came out behind him, hands on knees, taking great gulps of air, fresh air, oxygen.
“Did somebody get Mola?” choked Narnok.
Trista emerged, supporting the narrow but heavy compact weight of Mola. Through the shouts and roar of burning timbers, a great cacophony set up as three huge dogs came pounding across the cobbles. They were all ugly brutes, scarred and vicious and brutal, bordering on rabies, crossed with wolfhounds, their eyes crazy, their coats tufted, their bodies scarred from numerous fights.
“Down,” murmured Mola. “Down, bitches.”
Still the dogs barked and yammered, until Mola gathered himself into some semblance of consciousness and bellowed, “Duke! Sarge! Thrasher! DOWN YOU FUCKERS!” upon which they obeyed their master, and lay, heads on paws, licking their fur, chewing at one another, and snapping at sparking embers that were falling all around like muted fireflies, their eyes fixed on their one true love, their one and only, Mola. Their Master.
Kareem staggered out, and behind him he dragged the titanic and unconscious bulk of Salt. Kareem dumped him down, the man’s head slapping off the cobbles like a steak on a block, and he looked around, face smudged with soot, eyes narrowed, then looking back at the burning building.
“What the fuck happened in there?”
“Come on, lad,” gestured Narnok, still choking. “Come over here in the fresh air. And why did you bring that dead cunt out?”
“Because he would have died,” said Kareem, meeting Narnok’s gaze.
“And?”
“He would have died in there.”
Narnok fixed on Kareem a brutal look, with only one eye and the savage scars marring his face. “And?” he said.
“You want him to die?”
“Natural causes, ain’t it?” rumbled Narnok, and lifted his axe, resting it against his shoulder. “Some men, well, they deserve to live. But other cunts?” He fixed Kareem with a beady eye again. “They deserve to fucking burn.”
“He’s the father of my true love.”
“And?”
“I couldn’t let him burn,” said Kareem, and his mighty shoulders slumped a little. “Maybe it’s a weakness.”
“It’s not a weakness, son,” said Dek, placing his hand on Kareem’s shoulder. “Is humanity, is what it is.”
“What do you know of fucking humanity?” said Narnok, kneeling on the cobbles, drool pooling from his jaws.
“I know enough,” said Dek, eyes hard.
“What? You pulp men into gristle in the Fighting Pits.”
“So?”
“So, you break their spines.”
“Doesn’t mean I don’t have no soul.”
“You don’t think of their souls when you break them over your knee and take their fucking monies.”
“Look, Narn, stop fucking with me.”
“Why? You think because The Cocks is burning to the ground I’ve forgotten about your injustice?”
“Here we go again.”
“Meaning?”
“You’ll never let it lie.”
“Let what lie, Dek?”
“Fuck off.”
There came a roar as part of The Fighting Cocks’ roof collapsed. Sparks rioted into the evening sky. Beyond, the sun was dropping low over the horizon, casting a deep red glow over every building, every wall, every cobble.
The fire burned, crackling through wood and thatch.
Men and women stood on the cobbles, stunned, staring upwards.
And then, through the pulsing waves of smoke, there came a song. It was long, and haunting, and beautiful. It reminded one of long-lost lovers, dreams of hate, of lives that might have been, of world’s end, of dead children, of dying babes, of long hard regrets, of dying, of death. It came through the smoke, through the world, beautiful, and terrifying, and eternal.
“What is that?” said Trista, dropping to her knees.
“Music,” said Dek, rubbing his red-rimmed eyes.
“It’s beautiful,” said Kareem.
“It’s death,” said Narnok, and staggered, pointing. “Look!”
And they looked.
Through heavy coils of surging smoke, black and grey and pulsing like oiled snakes, they could see Isvander’s Folly. The Tower of the Moon. Glimpsed in shadow. Glimpsed through smoke. Glimpsed as the blood-red sun set beyond the world.
“What am I looking at?” said Dek, tilting his head, battered face crushed into confusion.
“There’s something up there,” said Narnok.
“What could be up there?” whispered Trista, and even though her voice was low, it cut through the smoke, the fire, the confusion, like a razor blade.
They all stood, staring.
There was a shape. A dark shape. Atop the tower.
Salt suddenly coughed, and was born into consciousness. He writhed around for a bit, but the men and women on the cobbles ignored him. They knew he was Red Thumb, but recently the populace had turned. Whereas once the Red Thumb Gang had been seen as saviours, robbing from the rich to give to the poor, recently, recently perception had started to shift. They were no longer social terrorists intent on saving the world. Now they were seen as what they were. Criminals out to fill their own pockets. Which was why, in his hour of need, Salt found nobody willing to help.
He sat up, and snorted blood and snot onto the cobbles. He scowled, looking around, trying to catch somebody’s eye. None gave it. He got to his hands and knees, and wobbl
ed to his feet.
“You! Kareem!”
“Fuck off.”
“What’s wrong with you all? What are you staring at?”
“We’re enjoying the smoke, idiot,” drawled Dek.
Salt turned, and squinted, and focussed. Salt had good eyes. Very good eyes. He might have been fat, and decadent, and evil, but his eyesight was impeccable. Better than anybody he had ever met.
“The Tower of the Moon,” he said, words a murmur.
“Give the man a chocolate,” snapped Narnok.
Salt chuckled. “Do you know what you’re looking at?”
Dek, Narnok, Kareem, Mola and Trista turned and stared at him. Hard. He felt the animosity of their gathered looks and cringed.
“I meant, do you comprehend what you see?”
“It’s a fucking tower,” snapped Trista, and a blade appeared in her hand.
“No,” said Salt, his voice dropping low. “Look.”
And they looked.
And they frowned.
And slowly, slowly, an impossible reality started to sink in.
“It’s a dragon,” said Debanezeer Salt.
“Horse fucking shit,” said Narnok.
They stared.
The song filtered down, coming through clouds and layers of smoke. It was beautiful. It was deadly.
The shape, the body, the creature, lifted from the summit of the Tower of the Moon, and there came a whump as heavy wings abused the air. The creature described an arc, then dropped towards the burning carcass of The Fighting Cocks.
“What’s it doing?” murmured Narnok, scowling.
And the dragon turned, and fell, and glided in silence. A terrible silence.
They watched it. Like some huge bird.
“I’m confused,” frowned Trista.
“Don’t be,” said Salt, a strange look on his face, and he hit the ground and covered his head.
Everybody looked at him.
“What the fuck’s wrong with him?” scowled Kareem.
The dragon came screaming through the smoke. It was a perverse act. The Fighting Cocks was already burning, already destroyed. This was an act, as if to say, you call that fire? I’ll show you.