Брайан Макклеллан - Sins of Empire

“You the one who wanted to meet a dragonman?” Happy asked.

“I am,” Styke said.

“You don’t look like a historian.”

“Funny. You don’t look like a dragonman.”

Happy spat on the floor. “As if a dragonman would bother with the likes of you. We’re here to tell you to mind your own damned business. Nobody – scholars, historians, or whatever the pit you are – better come looking around for a dragonman unless you want your head staved in.”

“Says who?” Styke asked.

Happy puffed out his chest. “Says me.”

Styke eyed Happy’s three companions. They weren’t professionals, but they weren’t fools, either. One of them examined the room, making sure Styke didn’t have any backup, while the other two kept their eyes fixed firmly on Styke, their hands ready to move toward weapons. They expected to be meeting with some spectacled pipsqueak, but they had come ready for anything.

“Is there a dragonman in Landfall?” Styke asked, trying to sound only mildly curious.

“None of your damned business, you ugly bastard.”

“Now, now. No need for name calling. I’m just asking questions. Asking questions never hurt nobody.”

“It’ll get you hurt real quick,” Happy replied. He drew his pistol. “We’re here to give you a message and it was supposed to be all gentle-like, but if you’re gonna insist on being inquisitive I can give you a message you’ll remember.”

Styke sighed. Stupid kids. Too high on their own sense of… something… to look around them. There wasn’t anyone to impress in this little place. It was neutral territory where they could have a frank discussion in private. Instead of taking a moment to wonder why a single old cripple seemed completely at ease being outnumbered four to one, Happy was posturing like an idiot.

In a slow, deliberate movement, Styke reached into his pocket and drew out a roll of krana notes. He peeled off a handful and laid them down on the table. “I’m just curious. Tell me a little bit about this dragonman and you can walk out of here with a pocket full of cash. I’ll go on my merry way and nobody gets hurt.”

Happy glanced over his shoulder at Soot incredulously, then toward a dark stall in the opposite corner of the room and back at Styke. “Who the pit do you think you are?”

“I’m just looking for a little information. Who’s this dragonman? Why’s he in Landfall now, when they haven’t been seen for decades?” Styke spoke quickly to keep Happy on his toes. Five minutes ago he wouldn’t have believed there was a dragonman in Landfall. But someone had sent these four.

Happy put one hand on the table and leaned forward, his pistol inches from Styke’s cheek. “You don’t get to ask questions, ugly. In fact, I think I’m going to ask them myself. Why do you want to know? Why do you care about the dragonmen? You better spit it out quick, because I’m losing my patience.”

“You hear what I said?” Grandma Sender demanded from behind the bar. “I speak enough of your bullshit language to know you’re getting your spirits up. No fighting in here! You five have trouble, take it out to the street.”

“Shut up!” Happy yelled. His voice cracked. Something was off here and he knew it. Styke wasn’t intimidated by four thugs or a pistol in the face, and that just didn’t mesh with Happy’s normal experience.

“Mind your manners,” Styke snapped. “Answer my questions and you can walk out of here with two hundred krana and all your limbs.”

Happy’s finger twitched to the trigger of his pistol. “I will take that money and I’ll shove this pistol up your –”

Styke snatched up his knife and bolted Happy’s wrist to the table with the blade. “Never reach for the money first,” he said, jerking the pistol out of Happy’s hand.

Happy and his cohorts stared at the blade sticking out of Happy’s wrist for several long seconds, then Happy began to scream. There was a mad scramble as the other three went for their weapons, and above it all Styke could hear Grandma Sender yelling, “No fighting, no fighting!”

Styke threw the table – and Happy along with it – at Soot. They both went down in a pile of limbs while the other two Palo leapt for Styke. He came off his bench and sidestepped a knife thrust from Cheeks, dropping the Palo with a punch to the temple.

Freckles managed to coldcock Styke in the jaw with the knuckledusters. Styke shook off the pain and leaned into another punch to his stomach. He grunted, then caught Freckles’s arm and twisted hard. The sound of snapping bone was followed by Freckles’s scream.

Cheeks recovered from Styke’s punch and barreled back into the fight knife-first. Styke sidestepped the thrust and wrapped one arm around Cheeks’s waist, pulling him close like a woman at a dance, and slammed his forehead against Cheeks’s nose. The Palo slumped to the ground.

Styke strode over to where Soot and Happy were still caught under the heavy table. He righted it, then jerked his knife out of Happy’s wrist. Soot scrambled toward his own knife, but Styke stepped on his arm. He leaned over Soot, taking him by the throat, and squeezed till he felt blood. Soot twitched several times and then was still, and Styke had to wipe the blood off his ring so it wouldn’t slip from his finger.

The whole fight had taken less than twenty seconds, and Happy’s face was frozen in terror as he crawled through a smear of his own blood, cradling his wrist, trying to reach the pistol Styke had taken from him. Behind them, Grandma Sender screamed obscenities at them all. Styke picked the pistol up and checked the pan. “It’s not even loaded, you asshole.” He raised his knife.

Happy rolled over. “By Kresimir, don’t do it! I’m not the one you want. He is!” He thrust his finger toward a dark corner of the room. Styke hesitated, suspecting a trick. There was nobody in that corner.

The hairs on the back of Styke’s neck suddenly stood on end as the very shadows themselves seemed to move. A man stood up, appearing as if he had emerged from nothing, adjusting the cuffs of his fine black suit. He was squat and muscular, with short, fire-red hair and a tuft of beard on his chin. Black tattoos snaked onto his wrists and neck but otherwise he might have been mistaken for a Palo businessman having a drink in the pub.

Grandma Sender, her arms thrown up over the mess of bodies on her floor, paused mid-tirade. “Where the pit did you come from?”

The stranger ignored her. “Why do you want a dragonman?” he asked. The words were strangely thick, like he had a mouth full of molasses, and it took several moments for Styke to realize why. He wasn’t speaking Palo.

He was speaking a sister language, one so close they could be mistaken for the same; Dynize.

Styke forgot Happy on the floor beneath him. A killer knew a killer at first glance, and this one had a lot of blood on his hands. He held himself confidently, head slightly cocked, his body relaxed but his attitude screaming imminent violence. Styke turned toward this stranger – a dragonman – and held his knife out to his side.

“Just looking for answers.”

“Well,” the dragonman said. “You won’t find them. Not here.”

Styke had always been good at assessing a threat. He knew when to push and when to retreat and it had made him an unbeatable cavalry commander. But he couldn’t read the dragonman at all, and that was disconcerting. “I think I will. Might have to pry them out of you, though.” He gestured to the bodies of the Palo kids he’d just torn through. “These are yours, aren’t they? Didn’t even step in to give them a hand.”

The dragonman’s eyebrow twitched slightly, an arrogant tic that said it didn’t matter much.