Joshua Simon - Forgotten Soldiers

He stood. “It probably will either way. You never could hold your alcohol. Be careful standing up.” Dekar slapped me on the shoulder and went upstairs.

I made quick work of the remaining ale, slapped money down on the bar, and rose to my feet. The room spun a bit, but a deep breath slowed it considerably.

Then it hit me. At some point, and I couldn’t say when, the background noise had faded to nothing and the room had gone quiet in the sort of way that happens only when something ugly is about to go down. Blasted alcohol.

A sudden fear pushed aside most of my drunkenness.

My left arm grabbed the bar, which I used to steady myself as I spun around, right hand moving to the hilt of my sword. The entire room had cleared out. Six men approached, passing between the empty tables in the common area. Four carried clubs of various shapes and sizes. Two others held old swords.

Not a good sign of things to come.

They slowed when I faced them, coming to a stop four strides away. It would be tricky trying to draw my sword in such a tight space while inebriated. Still, I openly left my hand on the hilt. They didn’t need to know my concerns.

“Is there someone you’re looking for,” I asked, putting as much grit into my voice as I could manage given the ale sloshing around in my gut. I learned a long time ago that a confident man can bluff his way out of a lot of situations he might find himself in. Unfortunately, I never had put that theory to the test when facing six-to-one odds.

“You,” said the man in front. I took him for the leader in part because he spoke first, but also because he carried himself like a man in charge. I guessed him to be a few inches over six feet, which meant he had me by at least three. What he had over me in height he lacked in weight. A decade of marching, digging, chopping, and fighting kept me in better shape than most.

“Me? I don’t know you.” I made an exaggerated effort to scan the faces of the others behind him. “Or your friends.”

“Well, we know you, or at least your type.”

“I doubt that. Because if you did, you’d turn back around and hit the streets.”

The man laughed. “You’re pretty cocky for a drunk.”

“Especially for one without any friends,” said another in the back.

Everyone but me found that funny. I kept wondering what was taking Dekar so long to get downstairs.

“My friends should be back any moment,” I said, hoping that was the case.

A series of loud crashes intermingled with the screams of women came from upstairs. Sounds of wood splintering preceded glass shattering. Three heavy thuds outside followed.

The leader of the six chuckled. “Not anymore. That would be your friends taking a trip out of the third story windows.”

I chose not to respond so as not to betray my emotions. Inwardly, I cursed every god I could think of on the inside. When I finished with that, I began cursing myself for drinking so much.

Even sober, taking down all six would have been a heck of a challenge, but with luck, possible. Drunk? No way.

My jaw clenched. I knew better than to let my guard down so completely. Since I was back in Turine, I had allowed myself to get comfortable because I was back on Turine soil.

The leader started to take a step forward when footsteps pounded the stairs to my right. Dekar came running down, sword drawn. Hamath followed, half-dressed. Ira brought up the rear, still wiping the sleep from his eyes. They all breathed heavily, looking as though they had been in a fight.

Hamath spat. “Told you there were likely more.”

I took advantage of the distraction and drew my sword. Armed and with three friends at my side, I liked the odds much better.

“Count ’em out, Ty.” said Ira. “Idiots woke me up.”

A strategy we often employed in certain situations was numbering each of the individuals standing against us, always starting from the left. A person, usually me, assigned who should take which numbered men. The tactic gave everyone a good starting point on the fly.

“Wait.” I looked at the leader of the six, who appeared less sure of himself. Something the man said earlier nagged at me. I took a chance to see if he’d talk. “You said you knew my type. What does that mean?”

“We heard the war is over.”

“So?”

“So, that means soldiers who haven’t been around for years are going to come home and try to take our jobs.”

“We aren’t settling here. We’re just passing through.”

“Maybe so, but there’ll be others who think they can just pick up the lives they once had before like nothing has changed. Well, a lot has changed and we don’t want people like you screwing up what we’ve got. We’ve heard all the stories about the war.”

The men behind him grunted and nodded in agreement.

I wasn’t sure what that meant, but decided not to take the conversation in that direction. I chose to come at him from a different angle, hoping he might see things from our perspective.

“You know, most of us didn’t volunteer for the army. The king pressed us into service. And now that the war is over all we want is to get back home.”

“And disrupt everyone’s lives by pushing yourself back into them.”

“That’s not fair.”

“I don’t care what’s fair. Just like I don’t care if you volunteered or not. Makes no difference to me how you joined,” said the man shrugging.

“You pieces of garbage,” Hamath muttered.

“Count ’em out, Ty,” said Ira, louder than before.

I swore. “Dekar, one and two. Hamath, four. Ira, five and six. I got three.”

“You sure about three?” asked Dekar. “I can take three and two, and give you one.”

“I’m fine,” I said. Three, meant I’d be taking the leader. Sober, Dekar wouldn’t have asked me if I was sure about him. He didn’t know how focused I had become in spite of the alcohol.

The group had the same reaction as most did when I counted. Pure confusion followed by sudden realization that things were about to get ugly. The leader picked things up first. He raised his sword with both hands, yelled, and charged right at me.

He closed the distance between us faster than I had expected him to. He swung wildly, but with plenty force. Chaos erupted all around me. A chair sailed across my vision. Somewhere, the distinct sound of a table breaking resonated. Groans, moans, and whimpers followed as bones crunched.

I parried several of my opponent’s blows while turning him away from the others and giving me more room to maneuver.

Clear of the fallen stools at my feet, I made my move. Rather than parry his next clumsy strike, I side-stepped it. My sword came up against his unprotected lower arms, cutting into the flesh and stopping at bone. He let out a wail and lost his sword. Blood spurted from his forearms. He fell to his knees, tendons severed and hands unable to put pressure on the pulsing wounds. I shook my head, angry that the idiot had forced me to act. The man collapsed to the floor, losing consciousness from loss of blood. He’d be dead within moments.

I swore, killing my own countrymen had not been on the list of things I expected after being discharged.

The room had grown quiet with the exception of heavy breathing and a gurgling whimper. A sword silenced the whimper. I looked up as Ira withdrew his blade.

“Everyone all right?” I asked.

“I’m good,” said Ira.

“Fine,” said Dekar.

“Idiot got lucky and sliced my arm, but I’ll live,” said Hamath, tying a makeshift bandage around his upper arm.

“Based on some of the looks we got coming in, we’re probably not the only ones who were attacked,” said Dekar as he helped Hamath with the bandage.

“Probably not,” I admitted, staring down at the man who had charged me. Blood spilled from his arms, pooling on the floor. “A city this big has got to have more than these idiots in it.”