Free Dangerous Games by Victor Milan, Clayton Emery Page A

clothing, ripped and ragged, work boots and clogs, though two were barefoot. They were tough as rawhide, sharp-boned and skinny as starved wolves after a long winter. They’d probably never had a decent meal in their lives. The fops had brocaded shirts, silk neckerchiefs, small, elegant hats with feathers or pearls, satin capes, tight breeches made of some material with a high sheen, and hand-crafted shoes of red or yellow leather. Perfumed, painted with eye makeup and face powder, with the softness of baby fat still upon them, they looked like mischievous children dressed up and let out to play.
    Not everyone was upright. One thug lay on his back, his neck sheared by Harvester’s tip, his life’s blood a pool on the cobblestones. The drunken fop, the poor swordsman, lay groaning and clutching his chest where the girl had accidently punctured him. She squatted to comfort him, then nagged him for getting in her way. Others had walking wounds. Sunbright had scored half a dozen hits.
    Yet the tundra dweller still couldn’t understand. Why would privileged brats hang with footpads? Surely they didn’t need the money: their clothing could have bought out a marketplace. Was this some perverted sort of bounty hunt?
    The six city guards wore polished lobster-tail helmets, blue-green tabards, and metal breastplates adorned with the fancy K sigil. They carried short swords on their belts and silver-tipped clubs in their hands. Nor did he miss the braided red cords tucked into their belts: lashings for recalcitrant prisoners, no doubt.
    “Weapons down, or you’re dead!” the captain of the guards bellowed. Clubs and knives clanked. But as the gasglobes illuminated the street, the officer refined his manner, became almost gentle. “Now, then. What’s all this?”
    A fop in a yellow shirt and red cape spoke right up. “This beast attacked us! Look here, he’s stabbed Jules!”
    The bald lie stunned Sunbright. He should have run when he had the chance. The guards surveyed the damage, dismissed the dead thug with a sniff, helped stem the bleeding of the punctured boy, and sent a young guard running for a stretcher. The captain stamped a foot on Harvester, studied Sunbright curiously, so much so that the barbarian wondered how many of his kind they saw in Karsus.
    “You were just out walking with your friends,” the captain stated as if from memory, “and this rogue jumped you. Is that it?”
    “Yes, exactly,” lied the boy. He sniffed, drew his cape closer, which made him sway drunkenly. He added, as if by rote, “We’d be obliged if you’d handle the matter, captain.” With no shame at all, he handed over a fat purse of blue velvet.
    “What about these?” asked the captain, nodding at the three remaining thugs.
    Another sniff. “Never saw them before. They were probably helping him, lying in wait for us, to rob us.”
    “You hired us!” objected a scar-faced footpad. “You needed muscle for your hellraising! You ordered us to kick that bloke to death, and knock down that gnome—”
    His words cut off as a silver-tipped club smashed his teeth in. He staggered back and another club crashed above his ear and felled him. Other guards waded in, taking turns smashing him down as if threshing wheat. The thug’s face was pulped to bloody gobbets. A fop turned and puked up her ale.
    “Keep your place! Don’t argue with your betters!” chided the captain, though the thug was long dead by then. As he pocketed the purse, the officer addressed the fop. “My apologies, young master….”
    “Hurodon,” snapped the lad, “son of Angeni of the House of Dreng in the Street of the Golden Willows.”
    “Oh, yes, sir. I know that neighborhood well. Fine people live there. But down here the streets aren’t as safe as they should be, and it’s our fault. We’ll redouble our efforts from now on. Please don’t let this unpleasantness spoil your evening.”
    “Certainly not!” laughed the fop. “The night is young, and