Daygo's Fury (32 page)

A red hot rage overcame him as he watched a well-built man grasp her and spin her laughing away. He looked back across the bonfire but the youth and his girl were gone. He strolled away, watching the man raise the woman’s bare leg as he pushed her against the wall of the nearest building, pressing his tongue against hers. He felt like stabbing him in the back and taking his place, but who knew how many friends he had out with him.

He strode down the boardwalk, scanning each face as he walked, looking for a whore or a woman as good as. He knew his arousal was showing but he did not care, nor would anyone even notice. The air was hot and humid. His tunic felt clammy against his skin.

He slowed, catching the eye of a woman lurching at the edge of an alleyway. She glanced his way, catching him watching her. Her eyes flickered downwards and she smiled invitingly. He returned the smile, the muscles in his face still tensed with anger, and walked over to her. She would not get what she bargained for today.

******

He remembered watching Racquel, her smile lighting up the boardwalk. He remembered the joy within himself, unadulterated, undeserved, and the sickening feeling as he realised it, turning his stomach. He had lost himself momentarily. He had forgotten what he was. Yet his stomach was full, his clothing warm, Racquel was at his side. She seemed happy and he couldn’t help but return some of that. Despite the crimes that he committed every day.

He thought back to when she had bathed and bandaged his foot months earlier. He didn’t know why his mind wandered to that moment, but it often seemed to when he thought of Racquel. It was a cut from a fight, across the top of his foot, from about halfway down to the top of his ankle. It wasn’t deep but was seeping blood nonetheless. He had limped back to the house. She had rushed across to him as he entered, all concern, her hands gentle and caring as she ushered him to a seat in the corner. She had hurried away to find some spare cloth that she could use as a bandage and had come back with that and a bowl of water. She used a piece of cloth to clean the wound, soaking it up with the water and wiping away the blood, carefully trying to find the cut. Her movements had been so tender, her eyes so focused on the task at hand. She had never thought to ask what had happened, she had only seen the blood and his limp and had begun to act.

Liam sat still, daring not to move, for perhaps she would take his foot from her gentle embrace if he did. Her hands were soft, somehow. How they had remained so, he did not know. Her touch was so gentle, so tender. She splashed the water over his foot from the bowl beneath it, washing it with her hands, her fingers trailing over the humps and bones. She was careful around the wound. Liam did not wince as she cleaned around it tentatively, then dabbed at the cut itself with the damp cloth.

He watched her as she worked, her eyes focused completely on the job at hand. She had told him of her dreams of becoming a nurse, of helping people. There was a strange joy brought to her from working on Liam’s injuries, as though, in a small way, she was succeeding at that dream.

“You’re good at this,” he had said.

“My aunt taught me.”

“Have you done it before?”

“Not really, not for anything as bad as this. After your fight. When you were unconscious. I bandaged your wounds then, but …”

“I know.”

“ … it was a bad job, I didn’t clean them or anything. I don’t know how you survived …”

“I have a knack for it, I think.”

“My mother worked in an infirmary.”

“I know.”

“She died … I don’t really remember her … Do you … remember your mother at all?”

“No.”

“I remember her … her presence. I remember her being there. I remember … it being warm beside her, warm and safe. Cosy.”

“My mother died in childbirth, I think. They used to say, back at the orphanage, that I was a miracle child. That I had been born dead and then come back to life.”

“It’s happened a few times now, hasn’t it?”

“What?”

“That you’ve been dead and come back to life.”

“I guess. Didn’t have much to do with it, though.”

“Who else does?”

“Dono. You, maybe.”

She dried his foot and wrapped it in clean cloth, tying off the end of it carefully.

“Does that hurt?”

“No. Thanks.”

“No problem!” She had smiled up at him, her hands still gently held over his ankle. He had wished for her never to finish.

Remember Racquel. Just her.
Without her there would be nothing. A hinge would come loose in his brain.

His blade was bathed in blood. He crouched down and wiped it on the tunic of the merchant at his feet, drying it as best he could, lest it rust. He looked down at his bloodstained hands. How long could this go on? How long until the gang found out? Where was the end? Perhaps they should leave, move onwards again, before he was found out.

He stood up. They couldn’t buy anything with the money he had stolen. They couldn’t start anything. How could a boy and a girl of their age come across so much wealth? The gang would hear of it immediately. Liam didn’t even know how to use it. He had never had more than what he needed for food. What … it seemed like a waste to him, to spend it on anything. Why buy something, pay for something, when it could be stolen? How much money was in his pocket now? How many klats worth? Was it worth three lives?

He looked down at the ten-year-old boy, lying at his feet beside his father. The look … as he had fallen. He looked away, upwards at the blue sky, clean and clear; beautiful, outside of this world, away from the slums, untouchable by it. Untainted. If he could fly, leap into the air, be surrounded by that blue, have nothing else to see.
Racquel wouldn’t be there. She’s down here.

He took a few steps away from the bodies and scrubbed his feet clean of blood on the dry soil. The boy had been the merchant’s son. He had been waiting at the house down the street for his father. When he had seen Liam attack, he had charged out in defence of his father and he had died at his side, sharing his fate. The merchant, blood seeping out from between his fingers, had reached out, his palm open. His eyes seemed to widen even further as he watched his son die. It had seemed … it had seemed that his own death was nothing by comparison.

Liam turned and walked away and stopped, a few yards on. He looked back for one moment, then turned his eyes downwards, onto the shaking hands upturned to his face. A single tear fell from his hanging head onto the hilt of his dagger, to mix with the merchant’s blood, that of him and that of his son. He turned and left, his limbs stiff and resisting, his movements strangely jerky.

******

The sun reflected off the ground, making it bright beneath their feet. A cool breeze brought respite from the early summer heat. A pair of stray dogs padded past Liam and Racquel, their tongues lapping out over their jaws, their breath consistent, audible pants.
Just like us, a pair of stray humans.

They walked side by side on their way home from the marketplace. It had been an average day on the take there. He still spent most days with Racquel as he had used to spend them with Calum, running scams, one distracting while the other stole, keeping an eye for easy targets. Their takings were small in comparison to what Liam took from the dead bodies of merchants and their guards. On their own they would barely feed them each day.

But Liam couldn’t track merchants every day. There was no reason to, no need to and a good reason not to. The more merchants found dead on the streets, the more likely the gang were going to take decisive action against it. Already Liam was puzzled that nothing seemed to have changed since he started after the merchants months ago.

What he took with Racquel was insignificant compared to the cache of money and jewellery that he had accumulated from the merchants. He only showed Racquel some of the haul, fearing what she would think if she realised the full extent of his exploits. He had found a place to hide the rest underneath the stones of a collapsed cellar, ten minutes’ walk from the house in which they lived. Enough for many rainy days, and perhaps something more, something of a future.

They had discovered the abandoned building a month and a half after they had moved to the riverfront, east of the Great Road. The front walls of the building had given way, the upper story collapsing in and over the front door, making it inaccessible. Racquel had found a hole in the side wall, just large enough for them to crawl through. Within was the main room of the house, mostly still intact. It was now the only room in the house. Rainwater leaked in a thick stream through the roof and trailed its way through the damp wood and dust to pool on the floor, where it eventually found its way into the soil underneath. Racquel had built a bath-like structure using the spare timbers and blocks to catch the pool of water. She used dust and debris to seal off the cracks. The water lasted for days now before it sank away. They used it for washing their clothes and themselves.

Racquel had two dresses now, both new. She still kept the torn and ripped dress that her aunt had embroidered back at the house but never wore it. Now she wore a simple dress of faded blue. She had asked for Liam’s favourite colour before she bought it, and he could think of none other than the blue of the sky, so that is what she bought. She looked pretty in it.

“What are you looking at?” she smiled across at him.

“You.” He returned her smile. Meeting her eyes for a moment, he felt an urge to lean over and kiss her. “You look good in that dress.”

“I know, you’ve told me before.” She leaned against him, her hand clasping the side of his arm as she did. He tried to hold his stride against her weight, as ever not wanting to give her any reason to let go.

They turned a corner and Liam felt a sudden urge to look up. As he did so, he caught a flicker of movement to his left. A man stood there, lounging against the wall of a house, and Liam got the distinct feeling that he had been looking in their direction a moment before. At first glance he appeared relaxed, but there was something about his manner that led Liam to think otherwise.

“Do ye wanna get some food before we go home? I’m kinda hungry.”

“Ya, sure.” Liam responded by rote. His eyes were focused on the shadows at the end of the road, on the right side. It was hard to see within them from the sunlight, but he thought he saw a shape at the end of the street. Then it moved, taking form, as a man stepped out from his place of seclusion and placed himself in the centre of the street ahead of Liam and Racquel.

Were they going to take him here? Liam wondered. It seemed a strange place. There were others around. An old woman was carrying a bucket. There were two bums sitting side by side on the ground to his right, chatting together quietly, a couple of children at play at the end of the street, another man standing in a doorway. Was he with them too? But then the gang never liked to hide their activities. Why would they? Who had they to hide from?

They were on to him. This was where they were caught out. Liam’s hand fell unconsciously to the pocket at his side, feeling the imprint of the dagger there. Racquel looked at him.

Liam slowed his pace, his gaze roaming the street.

“What’s wrong?” There was a note of worry in her voice. She had slowed with him and now looked up into his eyes imploringly. He glanced down at her. He couldn’t protect her. He pushed her off him quickly, taking a step away. His heart broke at the hurt and confused expression that appeared on her face.
Don’t look at me like that!

He looked at the man in front of him. His hands were by his side, there was no weapon in them yet. He seemed content to wait.

Racquel turned and looked around the street, glancing forwards and backwards. Her face filled with anxiety as she saw the man take position behind them. “Liam?” she whispered.

The third stood out from the doorway. She looked back at him sharply, looking for answers, looking for reassurance. Liam knew that often she didn’t even bring her knife with her and, more than this, he knew that she would never use it. He looked sadly into her eyes. He couldn’t live without her. Without her, he was dead already. Fear started to squeeze down around his heart. “Run,” he whispered in return.

“What’s happening? Who are they?” There was no time. Liam had to act fast. He glanced down the street. The man had started walking towards them. He noticed the one in the doorway join him. He looked back down the other end. The third man advanced from there, timing his walk with the other two. They were being careful, which was a bad sign. He needed to get Racquel out of there. But they would be too smart to let her go. “Run,” he whispered once more under his breath.

“Liam, who—” He punched her hard across the face, his fist landing perfectly against her jaw, even as his mind rang out with the wrongness of the action, a shriek that shivered to his core. Her last word ended in a gasp as she went sprawling into the air.

He ran after her and took the small purse of coin from her pocket with an expert flick of his hand. He dropped it into his own pocket, trading places with his knife. He turned and ran from Racquel in the direction of the single man. The other two had stopped mid-stride, surprised at his action, but now they shuffled towards him quickly. Liam needed to take the third out fast.

There was little he could do for Racquel now. He didn’t know if they would be fooled by his ploy. All he could do was try to kill them all. He charged towards the single man, who seemed taken aback by the speed of his attack. He pulled a large knife from a scabbard at his feet and held it ready above his right shoulder, his feet spaced out.