Tooth and Nail

by Chris Underwood

  With all my weight behind the blow, the head of the truncheon connected with the inner edge of Holdfast’s ankle. Bone crunched. The sickening sound was drowned out by his scream. His leg buckled.

  He flailed wildly as he began to topple to one knee. But I was still moving, getting behind him once again. He planted his left hand in the dirt to keep himself from falling flat on his face. With his right hand he waved the hammer clumsily at me.

  I brought my truncheon down on his wrist once, twice, three times. More bone snapped. The hammer dropped from his grasp as he pulled his arm close to his chest to protect it.

  I thought that would be enough to get him to sit still. I was wrong. With desperation and disbelief both burning in his eyes, he pushed himself up onto his knees and lashed out with his left hand. I stepped back from the swing, let it whip past my head.

  Then I raised my truncheon in both hands and smashed it into the stupid bastard’s face.

  30

  Holdfast toppled to the dirt with a groan, blood streaming from his nose. I stood over him, panting. I became aware the crowd was no longer cheering. It was so quiet I could hear every creak as uncertain ogres shifted in their seats.

  “I told you to listen,” I muttered to Holdfast. His eyes swiveled toward me, but he seemed to be having trouble focusing. He said nothing.

  I staggered back a couple of steps, wiping blood from my broken nose with the back of my sleeve. Holdfast lay there groaning. Both his wrist and his ankle were bent at unnatural angles. Dark blood was smeared across his face, dripping into the dirt. He looked miserable. Pathetic.

  Several long seconds passed in utter silence. Then, up on the platform, Lockhart stepped forward, her voice ringing out.

  “Mr. Turner,” she said. “Finish this.”

  I spat a glob of blood onto the dirt. “No.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “No,” I said, loud enough for the whole arena to hear.

  The vampire raised her chin and glared down her nose at me. “The combat can only end with the death of a champion.”

  Bounding Rabbit was staring at me as well. Her eyes were just as steely as Lockhart’s, though the corner of her mouth twitched in quiet disbelief. As for Early, he wore his incredulity a little more openly.

  As did most of the crowd. Even the vampires seemed to be surprised I was still standing. Only Lilian was smiling. It was a smile of relief. She didn’t understand what had happened. She didn’t understand that she’d just helped me beat Holdfast. But she would. They all would.

  Meeting Lilian’s gaze, I gave her a small smile I hoped was reassuring. I imagined the blood dripping into my mustache made it less so. Holding her gaze, I raised my truncheon high in the air.

  Then I dropped it in the dirt at my feet.

  There was a ripple of muttering from among the vampires and swains. The ogres remained silent.

  “Turner!” Lockhart barked.

  “Bounding Rabbit,” I said, ignoring Lockhart. “What was One-tusk doing at Doyle’s Reach? Do you know?”

  The ogre matriarch’s lips tightened. She said nothing.

  “What about you, Sonja?” I said. “Do you know what Eventide was doing there?”

  “Selene Eventide was protecting—”

  “Yeah, you told me that before. It smells as much like bullshit now as it did then.”

  “Mr. Turner, this is not the time.” Her voice became a threatening hiss. “Finish the challenge.”

  I glanced back at Holdfast. The injured ogre was trying and failing to roll onto his side. He coughed, then cringed in pain and clutched his broken rib. I turned away.

  “No one’s going to die today. Not for this. I know what One-tusk and Selene Eventide were doing at Doyle’s Reach. They didn’t just happen to run into each other. They—”

  A roar split the air. I spun to see Holdfast pushing himself to his feet. He was putting weight on his broken ankle, but that didn’t stop him. Pain and fury burned in his red-rimmed eyes. With blood and spit spraying, he threw himself toward me, fist clenched.

  Before I could move, I glimpsed a dark shadow at the top of the arena, clinging to one of the poles supporting a spotlight. A slender, humanoid shadow. One I recognized.

  A drop of the sense-enhancing potion must’ve still been working on my eyesight, because despite the harsh light from the spotlight, I caught sight of something no larger than a pencil go flying away from the shadow.

  The thing zipped through the air, down into the arena. As Holdfast hurled himself forward, the tiny thing punched into his side, where the skin was broken.

  Holdfast didn’t seen to notice. He threw his fist toward me, still bellowing a roar.

  I dodged backward, easily avoiding the punch. Holdfast crashed back into the dirt. He started to get up again. Then he suddenly tensed, confusion breaking through the pain. His hand went to his side and he pulled out the thing that’d struck him.

  It was a dart. The same kind of dart I’d recovered from the vodyanoy’s cave after the goblin attacked us.

  I looked back up toward the spotlight. The shadow that had fired it was gone.

  Holdfast stared at the dart in his hand, then looked at me, puzzled. He opened his mouth to speak.

  Then his eyes slid closed and he collapsed to the ground. The dart rolled away from him, plain for all to see.

  For a moment there was silence. Then the arena erupted.

  In an instant, all the ogres, vampires, and swains in the audience were on their feet. Shouts of “Cheat!” and “Poison!” rose up from the ogre side of the arena. Weapons were being pulled on both sides.

  Up on the main platform, Bounding Rabbit had rounded on Lockhart. Lockhart had one hand raised as if to calm the ogre, but her other hand was behind her back, pulling a stiletto knife from some hidden fold in her clothes. Early stood between the two, hands holding them apart.

  “Early!” I yelled, then I pointed at Holdfast. “Lover’s Embrace.”

  I saw understanding in his eyes. With one last glance at the two leaders, he grabbed his bag and jumped down from the platform into the stands. The spot where he clambered down was largely empty, since neither ogres nor vampires had been interested in sitting near each other. As vampire and ogre hurled shouts at each other across the arena, Early lowered himself down to the dirt of the arena floor.

  “The assassin?” Early asked as he ran past me and knelt at Holdfast’s side. “Where is he?”

  I pointed where I’d last seen him. “Gone.”

  The shouts of the audience were rising in intensity. Booker and his friends were making their way around the side of the stands to head off a couple of incoming ogres. Isaac was shouting orders at the other swains, while another couple of ogres went running out of the arena shouting for reinforcements.

  “This place is a powder keg,” Early said, pulling vials from his bag.

  “Let me worry about that. You just keep Holdfast alive.”

  I wanted nothing more than to go chasing after the goblin that’d put a poison dart in Holdfast. With every second he was getting further away. But if I didn’t act now, this whole place would explode.

  “Listen to me!” I shouted. “I know what One-tusk and Eventide were doing at Doyle’s Reach!”

  I was shouting into the void. No one paid me any attention. A female ogre ripped a piece of scrap metal out of the stand and hurled it at Booker and his buddies. The vampires darted out of the way. Baring their teeth, they flew toward their attacker. Other ogres formed up shoulder-to-shoulder, planting their feet to withstand the assault.

  Growling to myself, I snatched my truncheon out of the dirt. I glanced around until I found Lilian in the swirling crowd.

  “Give me a hand up!” I shouted to her.

  I wasn’t sure she could hear me over the noise, but she seemed to understand. She shoved a few swains out of the way, sending them tumbling away like bowling pins. Then she darted to the edge of the arena, crouched down, and put out her hand.

 
; I ran to her and put my hand in hers. She tugged so hard I thought she was going to rip my shoulder out of its socket. With my stomach still on the arena floor, she launched me up into the stands.

  I landed hard, the scrap metal structure groaning in protest. It shook concerningly under the weight of dozens of stamping feet. As I picked myself up, I shot Lilian a look.

  She gave me an apologetic smile. “Don’t know my own strength.”

  “Come on. With me.”

  A metal pole slammed into the stands a foot away from me, like a hurled javelin. I froze and looked across the arena to see a young male ogre with a large nose ring pulling out another piece of the structure’s metal frame to use as a weapon.

  Lilian growled and started to pick up the pole in order to hurl it back. I grabbed her arm. “Forget it. Come on.”

  I clambered up the uneven stands, feeling the structure tremble beneath my weight.

  Up on the main platform, Lockhart and Bounding Rabbit were nose-to-nose. The ogre matriarch was pointing a thick finger at Holdfast’s unconscious body while she growled something I couldn’t make out. Lockhart met the ogre’s tirade with a stiff neck and a sharp glare. Her hand was behind her back, clenched around the hilt of her stiletto.

  “You!” Bounding Rabbit growled, staring over Lockhart’s shoulder at me as I pulled myself up onto the platform. Lilian climbed up next to me, but the ogre matriarch didn’t pay her any attention.

  “Me,” I said.

  “You have broken the terms of the duel,” Bounding Rabbit snarled. “You have poisoned my champion.” The ogre shoved past Lockhart, reaching for me.

  Several things happened at once.

  Lockhart jerked her stiletto from its sheath. I caught her by the wrist before she could bring it to bear. The vampire hissed at me, fangs extended.

  Bounding Rabbit stretched one meaty hand toward my throat. Before she could reach me, Lilian appeared beside me and slammed the palm of her hand into the center of the ogre’s chest.

  The ogre matriarch staggered back, gasping for air and nearly tumbling off the platform into the stands beneath.

  “Get your hand off me,” Lockhart hissed. I knew she had enough strength to shake me off, but I guess that wouldn’t be dignified.

  “Shut up and listen.” I pointed at Bounding Rabbit. “You too. You want to act like squabbling kids, then I’ll treat you that way.” I gestured to the fights beginning to break out across the arena. “Stop this. Now.”

  Bounding Rabbit showed me her teeth. “We invited you here to put an end to this! But if it’s war you want…”

  “Jesus Christ,” I breathed. “Will you please shut up? Sonja, you’re going to tell your people to get back in their cars and go before someone else gets killed. And Bounding Rabbit, you’re going to let them. I didn’t poison Holdfast. I didn’t need to. I kicked his fucking ass. You saw that. You’re being manipulated, both of you. Tell me you’re not too blind to see that.”

  Lockhart narrowed her eyes at me. “What are you talking about?”

  “It wasn’t a coincidence that One-tusk and Eventide were both at Doyle’s Reach. They were there together.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” Lockhart snapped. But there was something in her eyes. Some flicker of understanding buried deep.

  “Yes it does,” I said, releasing her arm. “And you already suspected it, didn’t you?” I looked at Bounding Rabbit. “Both of you did.”

  Bounding Rabbit scowled at me and said nothing.

  “One-tusk and Eventide weren’t enemies,” I said. “They were lovers.”

  31

  There was no shock on the faces of either Lockhart or Bounding Rabbit. Just tight lips and hard eyes. I was right. They’d had their suspicions already.

  Would have been nice if they’d shared them with me.

  “Eventide and One-tusk were running away together, weren’t they?” I said. “There was a bag in the crashed pickup. One-tusk’s clothes.”

  Lockhart and Bounding Rabbit said nothing. Shouts and snarls filled the air around us as ogre and vampire clashed. I couldn’t see anyone dead yet—both vampires and ogres were damn hard to kill, and so far the swains were hanging back, securing an exit. But it wouldn’t be long until heads began to roll.

  I spoke quickly. “One-tusk couldn’t just run off, though, could he? Not if he wanted to make a life for himself anywhere else. He needed glamours. So they went somewhere they knew they could get them. Eventide had a standing invitation for Whitworth’s trailer, so she broke in and grabbed enough glamours to last One-tusk for a while.”

  “Even if this is true,” Bounding Rabbit snapped, “it changes nothing. The line between love and hate is thin. Clearly their relationship came to its inevitable end. The vampire attacked One-tusk, and he was forced to defend himself.”

  “If Selene attacked your ogre first,” Lockhart said, “he wouldn’t be alive now.”

  There was a pained snarl from the stands. On the other side of the arena, a bloodied ogre fell back behind his friends as Booker’s pack of vampires surged forward with eyes wide and teeth extended.

  “Shut up, both of you,” I barked. “We don’t have time for this. They didn’t have a fucking marital spat. They were attacked. Attacked by the same person who just put a poison dart in Holdfast.”

  Bounding Rabbit narrowed her eyes at me. “Who?”

  “A hit-man,” I said. “A hired killer. One who knows what they’re doing. Have your people search the scrap yard. Maybe you’ll catch him. I doubt it, though.”

  Lockhart eyed me. “Can you prove any of this?”

  I hesitated. “No. Not yet.”

  Bounding Rabbit scoffed. I ignored her.

  “Sonja,” I said. “Listen to me. Every step of the way I’ve been trying to find out the truth. You know that.”

  I dragged my hand across my upper lip and turned my bloody palm toward Lockhart. Her nostrils flared and her eyes dilated as she took in the sight of the blood. Behind me, I felt Lilian stiffen at the look on the vampire’s face. I waved her off.

  “I bled to try to bring us peace,” I said to Lockhart. “I’m asking you to trust me. Pull your people out of here.”

  Licking her lips, Lockhart tore her eyes from my hand and glanced about the arena. “My grip is slipping, Mr. Turner. Booker has been speaking against me. My list of allies grows smaller, while his increases. If I retreat here, without even a shred of evidence—”

  “Tell them I’ll get the evidence. I know a witness who saw what happened at Doyle’s Reach. I’m going to find him. How long do you think you can keep the brood from rioting?”

  She hesitated. “Until dawn, perhaps.”

  I turned to the ogre matriarch. “Bounding Rabbit, I’m asking you to show me the same respect you’ve always shown Early. He’s down there trying to save Holdfast’s life. I’m going to try to save everyone else. Order a ceasefire. If you want to keep your people busy, set them searching for the assassin. In the meantime, I’ll get you the evidence you need. Just give me until dawn. Please.”

  Bounding Rabbit stared at me silently as if she was trying to see inside my skull.

  “Sonja,” I said to Lockhart. “Pull your people out.”

  Lockhart cast her eyes over the arena again. She closed her eyes, opened them again.

  “Isaac!” Lockhart called down to her swain.

  “Yes, mistress?”

  “Gather up the swains and get them to the cars. All of them.”

  “What? What about you?”

  “The vampires and I can make our own way out of here.”

  “But if we leave, we won’t be able to return. The invitation—”

  “Spread the word, Isaac. No arguments.”

  He bobbed his head. “Yes, mistress.”

  With one last side-eye at me, he holstered his gun and started barking new orders to the swains.

  Lockhart turned back to the ogre matriarch. “What say you, Bounding Rabbit?”

  Bounding R
abbit frowned deeply, then exhaled. “You have until dawn, cunning man.” She turned to Lockhart. “After that, there will be no more ceasefires.”

  Lockhart nodded curtly. Bounding Rabbit stepped to the edge of the platform and stretched herself to her full height.

  “Enough!” she bellowed. She had an impressive set of lungs on her. The whole arena shook with the sound of her voice. “Grayblood, pull them back!”

  “We’re through here,” Lockhart shouted to the vampires. “Carlotta, stand down. You too, Booker. We’re leaving.”

  Slowly, uncertainly, the two sides stopped hacking at each other and separated, pulling their wounded with them. Isaac was already ushering the swains out, despite a great deal of protest.

  “What are you doing?” Booker’s voice rang out. “We have them!” His allies snarled in agreement. While Atwood and some of the other vampires backed off, Booker’s group held their ground.

  “New information has come to light.” Lockhart’s voice was even. “You will heed my orders, Booker. Stand down.”

  Booker bared his teeth. Several of the ogres on the other side of the arena seemed equally reluctant to give up the fight. Grayblood was arguing with two ogres at once, his chest puffed out.

  I leaned close to Lockhart and whispered in her ear. “Listen. I think the assassin who killed Eventide was hired by a vampire.”

  She shot me a hard stare. “Who?”

  “Booker, maybe. Or one of his friends. I’m not sure. Could be you, for all I know. But you can’t trust anyone.”

  “I haven’t trusted another vampire in a long time, Mr. Turner.”

  “Booker doesn’t have a standing invitation to your house, does he?”

  “No vampire has a standing invitation to any of my residences.”

  “Good,” I said. “I’d keep it that way if I were you.”

  I glanced back at Lilian and jerked my head toward the middle of the arena, where Early was still working on Holdfast. Lilian nodded. Together, we jumped off the platform and headed back down the stands.

  The swains were filing out of the arena, while most of the ogres and vampires were pulling back to their respective sides. Booker’s friends and a cluster of ogres had remained where they were, though, still spitting threats at each other.