Brian McClellan - The Girl of Hrusch Avenue

Vlora missed the man's introduction, but she heard what he said next:

"I'm here to ask about a girl."

"A girl?" Amory echoed with some confusion.

"Yes. She's about this tall," he held his hand up, "ten years old, with dark hair. A friend of mine informed me that she is under your care."

Vlora felt her heart skip. None of the other girls her age had dark hair. He could only be describing her.

"You couldn't possibly mean Vlora?"

"That was her name, yes."

Vlora tried to recall giving her name to any strangers and remembered that there had been a man with dark skin and a reassuring smile that had spoken to her in the street outside the school. He'd asked for her name, and where she lived. That had been months ago, though. Were he and this cold-eyed gentleman connected?

Amory waved her hand as if Vlora were nothing of consequence. "She is my ward, sir. A ward of the state, really. Her father was a na-baron from the north of Adro. Her mother died in childbirth and her father died earlier this year-a pauper. None of her family wanted her, and the crown was loathe to send a child with noble blood to the orphanage. I am granted a small monthly pension in order to see to her education and upbringing."

Vlora knew that Amory had a self-pitying smile on her face. She always did when she spoke of Vlora.

"She has no one to take her in?" the cold-eyed gentleman asked. "No one at all?"

"None," Amory said. "I suppose she has me, but she's an ungrateful child and so…"

"I'd like to buy her."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I can tell that you love the girl dearly, but I'm certain that for the right price you'd be willing to part with her." The man pulled a cheque book from his breast pocket and flipped it open.

Vlora tip-toed back to her room. She'd heard enough. The man meant to buy her, and she knew what that meant. The abbess at the Kresim abbey where her mother was buried had told her to avoid old men and their perversions.

She gathered her few toys-a wooden horse, a picture book that had belonged to her grandmother, and a ball made of Fatrastan rubber-and folded them into the sheets of her bed with several sets of clothes. It took a few moments to open her bedroom window without making any noise. All the while the drone of the adults' voices were coming through the wall.

One of the other girls lifted her head from her pillow and asked where Vlora was going. Vlora told her to hush.

She slipped out the dormitory window, sack over her shoulder, and climbed down into the street.

Vlora's mother was buried in the cemetery of Talien Square, an abbey in the district across the river, just north of Hrusch Avenue. It was not the first time Vlora had run away from the school since her father died. The priestesses at the abbey there were always very kind, giving her a cot to sleep on and warm bread in the mornings. When Vlora explained the conversation between Amory and the cold-eyed gentleman to the abbess, she was told she could stay for as long as she needed.

The abbess had never much liked Amory.

Vlora began spending her mornings with the abbess, studying the Kresim gospels, and her afternoons on the rooftop of the smithies in Hrusch Avenue, watching the gunsmiths test-fire their muskets.

Less than a week after she'd run away from Amory, she was in her usual spot, keeping an eye out for the opportunity to steal a pistol, when she spotted the Bulldog Twins skulking their way down Hrusch Avenue.

She saw their target immediately. The boy looked to be ten or eleven. He had black hair and a somber face, and he was walking alone down the raised walks in front of the smithies with a pair of books under one arm. He wore the uniform of a schoolboy with short pants cut off at the knees and long socks that almost made up the difference.

He seemed familiar, and Vlora thought she might have seen him once or twice before on Hrusch Avenue.

She shouted a warning, but it was lost in the noise of the city and the boy seemed deep in thought.

The Bulldog Twins closed in on him from behind. Each outweighed the boy by at least two stone, practically towering over him. Trigger came in from the right, smacking the books out of the boy's hands, and then slapping him across the face. Laughing, Bullet took the books and tossed them into the street.

The boy whirled, a look of horror on his face.

Vlora knew that look, having seen it on so many one-sided fights. She anticipated what would come next: his face would scrunch up and he'd begin to cry, and the Twins would push him down into the mud and kick him until they grew bored of it.

But the boy cocked back one fist and punched Trigger in the nose.

Trigger reeled back in surprise, clutching his face. The boy stood his ground, hands held at his side, his teeth set in anger. Bullet leapt at him, grabbing him by the waist and throwing him to the ground. The boy kicked and punched, but he was outmatched.

Vlora couldn't believe it. Someone was standing up to the Bulldog Twins. Not an adult, either, but someone her own age! She shimmied down her drainpipe and took to the street, only stopping long enough to snatch up a splintered musket stock from where it had been discarded in the mud.

Trigger watched while his brother wrestled the smaller boy, egging them both on. He turned toward Vlora just in time to take the old musket stock in the middle of the eyes. He crumpled in a heap on the porch.

Vlora planted one foot into Bullet's ribs. It took two more kicks to get the other twin off the boy. Vlora grabbed the boy by the hand and helped him to his feet.

"My books!" The boy pulled away from her and ran into the street, dodging traffic, to get his books from the mud. He returned just as Bullet was picking himself up off the ground.

"Come on," Vlora said.

They left Hrusch Avenue and lost themselves in a myriad of side streets in High Talien before Vlora felt safe.

"Why'd they attack me?" the boy asked as they stood gasping in front of a baker's shop.

Vlora wiped some dirt off the hem of her skirt. "Because you're smaller. Don't you know about the Bulldog Twins?"

The boy shook his head.

"What's your name?" Vlora asked.

"Taniel."

"I'm Vlora."

He was a little taller than Vlora, with a thin face and hair cut short in the fashion of a soldier. She saw that his knuckles were scuffed, and he had a black eye that had been there long before the Bulldog Twins got to him.

This wasn't his first scrap.

The boy wiped his bloody nose, and Vlora immediately noticed that the moment of excitement had seemed to pass for him. His eyes were calm, and his breathing, while heavy, was measured. He glanced back the way they'd come as if he contemplated going back for another fight.

"The Bulldog twins are in charge of Hrusch Avenue," Vlora explained. "They pick on anyone smaller than them. Except for the gunsmith apprentices. They know better than to do that."

Taniel snorted. "No one's in charge of Hrusch Avenue," he said. "Not even the army. That's what my dad says."

"Well your dad is probably much bigger than the Bulldog twins."

"He'd whip them even if they were adults." Taniel lifted his chin. "My dad wins all his fights."

Vlora smirked. She'd heard that claim before.

Taniel kept his chin lifted, his eyes daring her to question his word. He held her gaze a moment, then looked down at his books. They were covered in mud, and the cover of one was torn. He leafed through them sadly, and Vlora caught sight of practiced arithmetic and charcoal drawings of trees and animals.

"Sorry they got your books," Vlora said.

"It's not the first time someone's thrown them in the mud," Taniel sounded glum. "I'll have to clean them up before lessons tomorrow." He suddenly perked up. "My dad gave me money for dinner. He's-" Taniel paused briefly to roll his eyes, "having a conference with my latest governess. Do you want to share a sweet roll with me?"