Chapter 4
For several days, I slipped in to watch the fights that all criminals knew went on near the dock, but the redhead I was looking for was never there.
The fight ring was hidden in the shadiest part of the city, located at an abandoned warehouse along the riverbank where all the windows were boarded up.
Lanterns swung from iron hooks suspended from the ceiling, casting swaying halos of light over the packed dirt floor where blood had stained the earth a permanent rust-brown.
The scent of sweat mingled with smoke hovered in the air, and most thankfully, there wasn’t a single member of the Nightsworn to be seen.
No one who was the least bit respectable would ever be caught here.
I wasn’t sure this morning would be any different from the last several days, when I hadn’t seen my target despite waiting through all the daylight hours and once late into the night.
Men crowded around the makeshift ring, from dockhands with split knuckles to thieves who kept their hoods low.
Coins clinked from palm to palm and wagers were shouted to drown out the ugly sound of knuckles meeting flesh, which rang out regularly, most often from the ring but occasionally on the sides as men drank too much and decided to settle their squabbles with their fists.
At the far edge, a narrow table groaned under ledgers and stacked coins, overseen by a heavyset man with a scar splitting his lip. I recognized several people here whose wanted posters hung on Ambrose’s office wall, but none had bounties large enough to be tempting.
Just as I had done for the past several days, I slowly scanned the faces in the crowd, and this time, my patience was finally rewarded.
A young man with red hair was climbing into the ring, facing an opponent somewhat larger and heavier than he was.
The familiar redhead had packed on more muscle in the last several months since I’d seen him, but that mischievous, freckled face was unmistakable, and he was still wearing the same shade of dark green I remembered so well.
“The boy has no chance,” one of the spectators said, sadly shaking his head. “No chance at all.”
Other spectators agreed, all placing bets against the younger man.
“Wagers! Final call to place your wagers!” the man at the table with the split lip shouted, and I approached him.
“I’ll wager fifty gold shillings on the man with red hair.”
There were barks of laughter as the men around me shook their heads. “This isn’t a place for a boy,” the man collecting the bets said. “Go home to yer mam.”
“I’m good for the bet,” I said, pulling out my leather bag of coins. “Gold shines no matter whose it is.”
“Does your pa know you have all that?” the dealer joked, taking the bag.
“He won’t know because it’ll be back before he misses it,” I quipped. “Along with extra for myself. I think that boy will win, and I want to bet on him.”
“You’re thinking wrong, lad. But some lessons need learned the hard way.” The dealer took the bag and marked down my information before raising his voice. “Fight’s about to start! Gambling is closed!”
The officiant in the middle of the ring raised his hands, and the swell of conversation grew to an eager roar.
“Listen up,” he called, voice carrying easily over the din.
“There are no rules in this ring, save that you don’t kill each other.
Anything goes. You fight until one of you can’t stand or taps out, but if you kill your opponent, you’re on your own and the rest of us will all deny all knowledge of being here when the Nightsworn come for you. ”
Dark laughter rippled through the crowd.
The officiant continued, “We’re not responsible for broken bones, knocked-out teeth, or bruises to your body or pride. Whatever happens in this circle belongs to the men inside it.”
His gaze swept over the gathered gamblers, all of whom were eagerly bouncing on the balls of their feet, waiting for the fight to begin.
“In this corner,” the officiant began, waving to Peter’s opponent, “is our reigning champion, the Dockyard Devil!”
A roar of approval came from the men, all clapping or punching the air with their fists.
“And on this side comes a new challenger”—the officiant gestured at Peter, who was grinning lazily—“the Flying Fugitive! Challengers, are you ready?”
Both Peter and the other man tensed and raised their hands.
“Fight!”
Peter’s opponent advanced and began swinging his giant fists. Peter ducked and dodged, nimbly sidestepping and weaving in and out without returning any blows of his own.
“This isn’t a dance, boy,” the larger man grunted with another furious swipe. He aimed a kick at Peter, who caught the extended foot and gave an almighty wrench so the man was pulled off-balance and crashed to the ground.
Immediately, Peter pounced, driving his knee into the fallen opponent’s stomach while also delivering a volley of rapid punches to the man’s throat and face.
A scream of protest came from the crowd as all the men leapt to their feet, grabbing onto the ropes surrounding the fight and stamping their feet as they shook the ropes.
The Dockyard Devil threw Peter off and jumped to his feet, blood streaming from his mouth and forehead, and glowered.
As he went to wipe some of the blood and sweat out of his eyes, Peter attacked, feigning a punch before dropping and sweeping his leg.
The older man went down with a crash and aimed a kick at Peter that connected with a heavy thump.
Peter winced as he took the blow, but sprang into action, pummeling the other man until he curled up, then jumped onto his back and looped his arm around the man’s throat. He squeezed until the Dockyard Devil slapped the floor with his hand to surrender.
The fight was over.
The crowd gave a thunderous cheer, and Peter held out a hand to help his opponent to his feet.
“Good fight,” he told him. “You almost had me several times.”
The Dockyard Devil shook his head. “I was overconfident. You deserved to win that one. You could’ve pulled your punches a little more, though.” He gingerly touched his temple where blood was still streaming down his face.
Peter rolled his eyes and let out a crowing laugh. “No I couldn’t have. If I had, you would’ve had me on the ground in a second and you know it. Weakness is never rewarded in the ring.”
His opponent grinned. “You learn quick.”
Peter looked up, caught my eye, and his entire face lit up. “Gil!” He ran over to see me.
“Peter Pan!” I grasped his hand, grinning ear to ear. “It’s been forever! Last I saw you, you were rowing away into the ocean all by yourself. I thought a shark or a siren might have eaten you before you got to land.”
“It’s only been about a year,” he answered, pulling me in by our grasped hands to clap me on the shoulder. “And no shark would like the taste of me. I’m too gamey. How’ve you been? Did you find a new position as a cabin boy?” He looked me up and down. “Still haven’t hit your growth spurt yet, huh?”
“Not yet. I can’t very well work for Captain Tyrone anymore, and Haven Harbor’s navy is policing the seas a lot more now. There are fewer pirates, which means fewer cabin boy positions.”
“You could come work with me,” Peter offered.
I eyed the ring. Hustling fighters wouldn’t help me track down my family. “Nah, I’m not as good a fighter as you are, Peter. I didn’t realize you did this all the time.”
“No, no, this is just what I do for fun when I have a day off. This was my first time at this ring, actually. I can’t stay in one place too long or they’ll recognize me. But I need to get back. Come on, walk with me.” He collected his substantial earnings and I was handed a payout as well.
Peter eyed the bag in my hands with a grin. “You thought I’d win, did you?”
“I remember your fights aboard Tyrone’s ship. I wasn’t about to bet against you after that.” I jingled the bag’s cheerful-sounding contents as we ducked out of the dim warehouse and blinked in the bright sunshine. “So, what do you do when you aren’t hustling fights?”
“Oh, trade, mostly. We could always use a trustworthy errand boy.” He turned down an alleyway leading to the town market.
“We? It’s you and who else?”
“I work for one of Tyrone’s former associates,” Peter said, nimbly sidestepping giving a name.
“I’d need to ask my mam first,” I said, pretending to chew thoughtfully on my lip. “I think she’d like that better than me being a cabin boy, though. Then I wouldn’t be at sea for so long.”
“Ask her,” Peter urged me. “If she says yes, then find me and I’ll—” He broke off and ducked down behind a shrub. “Get down!”
I copied him, crouching next to him in the bushes. “What?”
Peter’s eyes were locked on a tall, dark-haired pirate strolling next to a… I shut my eyes hard and opened them again, sure I had been hallucinating. The pirate was holding hands with a graceful woman who had golden, glittering wings sprouting out of her back.
“Is she a fairy?”
“A pixie,” Peter corrected in a low hiss.
I watched, mesmerized, as swirls of golden glitter floated off the pixie’s wings on the breeze.
“She’s just wasting it,” Peter snarled under his breath.
“Wasting what?”
A crafty look spread across Peter’s face. “You like making money, don’t you, Gil?”
“I like it just fine.”
“If you collect a bottle of that glitter from her wings, I’ll give you a hundred gold shillings.”
It was impossible to hide my shock. That was more than many bounties, and just to collect some glitter? My jaw dropped and my eyes widened. “A hundred? How big of a bottle?”
Peter mimed out a bottle the same size as my hand. “I’ll pay the same anytime you get me a bottle like that, no questions asked.”
“For every time I get a bottle filled with that dust, you’ll give me a hundred gold shillings? Gold?” It seemed too good to be true. He might as well be just as wealthy as the Employer. “How do you have that much?”
“No questions,” he repeated. “Nosy questions always lead to dangerous answers.”
I was looking back at the pixie, already planning out how to extract dust from her, when she turned.
Her wings had distracted me from the rest of her body, and now the bulge in her abdomen became painfully obvious.
She trailed her slender fingers across it and smiled at the man, who looked just as elated and placed his hand over hers.
Peter wanted me to rob a pregnant woman? I opened my mouth then remembered what Peter said about nosy questions and clamped my jaws shut, feeling rather like Ambrose when he nearly asked me about the bounty I wanted to place.
So instead, I tilted my head to the side to consider. The dust was just swirling away, lost to the wind. Peter was right; she was wasting it. I wouldn’t be doing anything wrong to collect something she was just throwing away, whether or not she was carrying a child.
The man turned, and something metal at the end of his arm caught my eye. “He only has one hand,” I mused. “I wonder what happened.”
Peter didn’t answer. I looked around to see that he had locked his jaw, staring hard at the hook that replaced the pirate’s left hand. There was a strange look in his eye, like a mix of anger and immense sadness all at once.
“Are you okay?” I asked, reaching out to nudge his elbow. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Peter hadn’t taken his eyes off the couple, who were browsing through booths set up in the market. The woman had picked up a tiny, crocheted baby hat and showed the man, who promptly paid the shopkeeper without even haggling over the price.
Peter gave an odd jerk of his head. “I’m fine. Just thinking is all. So do we have a deal? A hundred for each bottle of her dust?”
“Sure, if I can find a way to get it,” I told him. “Can’t you just ask her, since she’s throwing it out anyway?”
“No. I promise if you ask, they will immediately become uncooperative and hostile. Don’t let them know you’re collecting it.
” Seemingly without realizing he was doing it, Peter reached up to trace the scar on his face, still fixated on the couple as they moved on to another booth, unaware that they were being watched.
“If I get some, where would I find you?” I asked him.
Both Peter and I slowly stood up and he nodded to the side. “Down that dirt road over there. Walk for about an hour and make a lot of noise. I’ll come find you.” He threw another shrewd look at the couple slowly becoming lost in the crowd. “The offer stands for any of her dust.”
“See ya!” I said, waving to Peter as he started down a lonely-looking path in the forest. “Hopefully I’ll come with it soon.”
“Stay out of trouble, Gil,” Peter called back. “Or else you’ll end up like me.”