Lair of Killers (17 page)

Anders twisted his knife. The man’s body was struck by a spasm, and he turned away. Anders tried to move fast to the outside, but the security men were already running towards him, so he went inside the warehouse and shut the door.

It had a latch-a wooden board- and Anders slammed it in place, and he leaned his battered body against it. They pounded on the other side and shouted. He tilted forward a few inches and then snapped back, putting his legs into it. The board could not have lasted long.

Anders heard the groans of the man behind the door, and some shuffling as they assisted him. Strong cursing followed. Anders looked around at the room. On the other side, where the crates were stacked, was a closed door. His nose was bleeding somehow; he had no idea how it had happened.

The door was unlocked, and the wharf greeted his tired eyes. Various people went about their business.

“There! Get him!”

Anders hesitated, thinking to jump back inside the building, but at that moment they bashed open the door he had propped shut with the wooden latch. He cursed and ran the opposite direction, but men were already there, and they swung at him with clubs. Ducking away, he tried to sprint, but he was too tired and too slow.

Someone smashed a long wooden board into his face. It did not quite knock him out, but he felt his consciousness slipping and his vision dim. Anders fell to his knees as they kicked him. Someone shouted for them to stop, and they proceeded to tie him up. The thief was caught.

* * * * *

A group of men walked down the street towards city hall. They were large and strong, armed with steel and muscled enough to use their weapons to great effect. They wore dark clothes, black tops with thick leather over that and dirty pants. They had masks over the lower portion of their faces, having discarded the full executioner masks in favor of better vision.

Jerrod had never liked the full masks anyway because they interfered with fighting. Still, they had the extra benefit of intimidation. Men were cowards to let something like a stupid mask make them fearful.

Their orders were to kill as many of the police as they could. The police were rounding up thieves by the dozen, and soon they would turn their attention on the wealthy quarter. Zandor did not want that. Neither did Jerrod. The brutal man never thought he would be helping out the scrubby thieves in any capacity, but killing people held its own source of joy, and truth be told he would have killed cops for free if given the opportunity.

The pigs were all over the place at the moment. There were only about four score in an entire city of tens of thousands, but they were supplemented by private security on loan from the merchants’ guild, and it was difficult to distinguish between them and the police. Except the cops wore their riot helmets and carried short swords and clubs while the private security had a variety of equipment.

It mattered little to Jerrod because killing was easy. Dead was dead. Maybe it was better to charge Zandor by the body. That would’ve been more than a flat rate and give them some extra incentive to kill more.

Some of the police in front of them down the street were busy roughing up some young men, boys really, and the officers had them down on the ground ready to be put in irons. Jerrod and his group came up behind them.

There were only four cops, spread out as they were around town, and two of them glanced his way as they neared and slowed. Jerrod eyed them with disdain.

“Off with you now,” one of the police said. “We don’t want any trouble.”

Jerrod scoffed and pointed to the young boys. “You know, that used to be me down there. Yeah, got my ass kicked a few times when I was kid, roughed up by pigs like you even when all I wanted was food. Can you believe that? Beatin’ up a hungry kid? I betcha all they wanted was the same.”

The other officers noticed the conversation and quieted. The original speaker stepped closer. “Move along!”

Jerrod chuckled as he waved his men forward. The officer kept his bluster even when faced with two dozen rough looking men in masks. Fool.

The cop pulled his sword and held it in front of Jerrod’s face. “Get outta here! This has nothing to do with you.”

“You givin’ me orders? You seein’ the same thing I am, fella?”

The other officers got up to stand by their fellow, leaving the street urchins to glance around and squirm face down. Jerrod pointed at them. “You kids get goin’ now. I wouldn’t want to get blood all over your clothes. Cleaning costs money.”

The brats ran off, ducking underneath the stunned officers, who were beginning to understand the dire straits they were in. “Now, hold up here! You can’t do that.”

Jerrod hacked at his face, and the man tried to dodge away but took a nasty cut across his cheek that bit deep enough to reach his teeth. He fell, stunned and bleeding on the ground. The other officers reacted by shouting. They tried to draw their weapons, but Jerrod and his men were too fast.

They had them backed up against the building behind them and cut them down in seconds. They bled, screamed, and died.

“Nice work,” Jerrod said and shook his blade clean of blood over a twitching corpse. “I hope your arms are warmed up, boys, lots more ahead. You ready?”

They were.

* * * * *

Initial reports were positive. The police were working hard to round up the thieves on the streets with small pockets of City Watch and private security assisting when and how they could. It seemed to be going well, but Becket was concerned. The Watch had been slow to move and standing with Cubbins and several other senior officers inside the precinct meeting room did not make him feel any better.

“We don’t have enough men,” Cubbins said and not for the first time.

Becket frowned. “I told you, captain. The Watch is mobilizing. It takes time, so I would ask you to be more patient.”

Cubbins looked back at the maps they had spread on the table. “I’m not impatient, only stating a fact. There are not enough men to cover the whole city. So we must concentrate on two key areas: the southern docks and market square. We’re coordinating with dock security, on loan from Muldor, and as many private security as we could get from merchants willing to volunteer their men.”

“It behooved them to do so,” Becket said. At the moment they had a full one hundred and fifty men to use, but once the Watch were called up, that number would have been more than triple. That was good.

In the meantime, the jail was filling up more and more, and as time went by, things should have gotten easier. Thieves and ruffians were being brought in by the dozen, yelling and fighting all the way. At the same time, more men would join in helping them continue the round up.

No deaths had been reported thus far, but many of the police officers and security were injured. The thieves fought hard when cornered, but most of them ran if they could have. Chasing them down became the most difficult part of the whole enterprise. But the whole town knew it was on notice. The police were back to work.

Dillon came running in, his bearded face flushed with exertion. “The cells are full, captain. We’ll have to use the yard from now on.”

Cubbins nodded. “Good news and bad news. Do it. But get some extra chains from the storage rooms. We don’t have enough men to spare guarding the yard, and I don’t trust that gate to hold fast when it gets to overflowing. Then we will stuff as many of them in there as we can. Reinforcing it should be fine.”

Dillon nodded and ran off.

Such strong and capable men. Cubbins was smart, smarter than most on the council and anyone Becket worked with in the Guild, with the exception of Muldor. The police captain was exacting and direct. They could win this thing and take back the wealthy quarter.

Time passed. Becket grew more and more confident as additional reports came in, all positive in that they were getting the job done. Even with the minimal assistance they had from the slow moving City Watch, it was only a matter of time before the streets were under control. Then they could have turned their attention towards the insurgence in the wealthy quarter.

Becket could go home again, once again safe and secure from this strife.

Dillon came in again, and this time his face looked worried. “There’s trouble.”

Cubbins glanced at him, for only a moment. He moved, and the two of them rushed out of the room, leaving Becket and the other senior officers, Sergeant Bigus among them, to stare at each other. Bigus was an average sized man, close to thirty-five, with a large mustache. He sniffed and looked ready to run after his superiors, but Becket hoped he would stay.

They heard shouting from outside, and curiosity got the better of all four men, and they scurried outside. There, Becket saw shifting bodies caught in a vicious melee.

The steps to the precinct were slick with blood. A slain officer laid prone, a black garbed thug next to him, holding his chest. Blood pumped out of a wound there, dripping through the fingers.

Becket almost slipped and fell down the steps when an officer behind him charged past, but he caught the rail. The officer stabbed the thug in the throat. He died gurgling. Bigus and the other officer from the war room ran by him as Becket swooned. The smell of offal and blood hit him full force in the face.

‘This isn’t happening,’ he thought. ‘This is a nightmare. So much blood and pain… people can’t do this to each other.’

Becket looked out around the front of the jail and regretted his request to take down the barricades. They could have used them at the moment.

A massive fracas had broken out in front of the jail and to the side where the holding yard was. Several thugs were attempting to open the gate to the yard, hacking at the chain with axes. The chains were thick, but the detainees on the other side, thieves and miscreants of all sizes, pushed on the gate as hard as they could have. It would not have been long before it gave, and the police would’ve been overwhelmed by their foes.

Becket stood shocked. How could this all have gone so wrong so fast? Maybe the thieves would run away when they broke free. The detainees looked pissed and wanted revenge. “Master Becket!”

Becket flicked his eyes to the side of the stairs where Sergeant Stirling stood with three other bodyguards. Becket blinked. He had forgotten about them.

“Master Becket!” Stirling waved him down to the bottom of the stairs. “We need to leave. It’s not safe for you. We must get you away.”

Becket hesitated before stepping down, the fear of being killed or mangled slowing his limbs into action. He looked around as his guard stood in front of him. More thugs in black masks came towards them, at least two dozen, and soon the problem with the chain around the holding yard gate would be academic.

Becket took a deep breath and shook his head. “No, we can’t leave. We have to help the police. Cubbins, he’s… he’s important to this town.”

Stirling frowned. “That is not our job. We were hired to protect you, not fight some war with the police.”

Becket licked his lips and looked around on the ground for a weapon. He found a sword had slipped out of the grasp of a fallen cop. He steeled himself and looked at Stirling.

“Then I’ll trust you to do your job,” he said and jumped into the fray.

* * * * *

The cops died easy. Thus far, none of them could have fought well enough to withstand Jerrod’s attacks. Pathetic slugs. His strong arm and long sword swept away their tiny short swords as if they were children’s toys.

It was enjoyable to see their looks of shock when they tried to block his swings and their arms crumpled under the powerful swing of his sword. Sometimes they dodged away from his next blow, sometimes another cop stepped in to try and help, but most times they died.

None could have stood against him. They hit several cops outside the precinct near the holding yards fast and killed three of them before the rest had a chance to respond. They freed two thieves before more cops came, and all of a sudden a huge fight broke out on the streets in front of the jail. The thieves went towards the yard to try and free their fellows, and Jerrod thought that was a fine idea.

Reinforcements for the police came fast and furious which only made things more interesting. There were a couple that looked like they might have been real fighters, men that knew how to handle themselves. One was young and bearded with dark blonde hair, almost as tall as Jerrod. He grimaced and came his way, perhaps because he recognized the biggest threat on their side or at least that Jerrod was the leader.

And speaking of leaders, Cubbins came side by side with the tall man. The police captain was someone Jerrod had always wanted to have a fight with, and here was a chance to size himself up with the famous man. He was known as a skilled fighter.

Killing Cubbins would have given Jerrod incredible street credential, and he could have coerced Zandor into paying them more if he brought Cubbins’ head back. But the blonde fellow became a pest, relentless and strong. Under any other circumstances, he would have made a good tough, but instead he decided to be a scag. There was much chaos to contend with, and some on his side were down, but there were far more police and security bleeding and dying on the cobblestones.