Dragon-Ridden (10 page)

“Get bent,” Bones gasped, kneeling
by his friend.

Tate rolled her eyes and shoved him
back into the water. These guys really weren’t quick learners. Dewdrop stared
at her wide-eyed. Perhaps there was hope for one of them.

“Now, Dewdrop, I’ll ask again. What
exactly were you trying to do?”

“You’re wasting your time flappin’
your jaws at him,” a voice said behind Tate. “I’m the one you’re wantin’ to
speak to.”

Tate planted a foot on Dewdrop’s
chest, holding him in place while she focused on the men who’d gathered behind
her. She hadn’t even heard them come up.

There were three of them. The one
in the middle was the one who had spoken. His thin brown hair was slicked back
away from his face with a gold stud sparkling from one ear. His forearms were
heavily muscled and sported several faded tattoos.

The companion on his left was a few
inches shorter than him but equally as intimidating. His jet-black hair was cut
short and close to his scull. His features were as sharp as a knife and his
eyes pure black. Like Umi’s eyes had been.

This one, he was a killer. She’d
bet everything she had on it. He put Tate in mind of a blade, lethally sharp
and deadly silent.

The last was a giant of a man. Taller
than Danny, he was as wide as the other two put together. His pants ended at
his anklebones and his shirt ended on his forearms.

Tate named him Behemoth. She was on
a B theme today. Blade, Behemoth, and well she couldn’t think of a name for the
leader.

These three were the types Jost
would send after her. The question was did he have time to set the hounds on
her before he sailed? She’d waited until the last minute to disappear for this
very reason. It was slightly possible he’d sent someone after her. He had
contacts everywhere.

“And what business do you have with
me?” she asked politely, not moving her foot from Dewdrop’s chest.

The three had spread out making it
impossible for Tate to slip past. Between Blade and Behemoth, it would be a
tough fight. One Tate wasn’t entirely sure she could win. Add in the two kids
as distraction and she was reasonably certain she wouldn’t make it far without
being over powered.

“You stopped the lads from
completin’ their job yesterday, and we wanted to know why.”

Jost hadn’t arranged this then.
Thank the Saviors.

Tate narrowed her eyes. She still
was in trouble. Just a different kind than she had thought.

 She curled her lip. Figured
these two were working with a crew. Most low-level pickpockets did. She hadn’t
even considered that fact when she had interfered. Most times, she wasn’t in
port long enough to have to think about the consequences of her actions.

From the corner of her eye, she
checked out the water. She could always take a morning swim. It’d be cold, but
it’d be a better prospect than getting her ass kicked by a bunch of thugs.

“Ah, before you go thinkin’ to take
a swim, I’d best warn you that my boyo over there is a half,” the man said to
the one she called Blade.

Huh? She’d never heard the term
before. “Half? Half what? Half brained? Half angry?”

Blade’s lips twitched slightly, but
other than that his expression remained smooth. The leader just looked baffled.
He’d never before had to explain the meaning.

“Half Kairi.”

Ah. No wonder his eyes reminded Tate
of Umi. Though Tate was still a little confused. What did that have to do with
anything?

“So?”

Leader’s jaw dropped and he stared
at her in dumb founded amazement. Blade looked a bit more interested in her.
“So? So he’s practically half-fish. Don’t you know anythin’?” Leader waved his
hands through the air cutting off Tate’s next response. “It doesn’t matter.
You’re coming with us.”

“Why?” Tate cocked her head to the
side.

She didn’t want to go with him. His
way probably meant no food and she was hungry.

“Doesn’t matter why,” Leader
snapped. “Get movin’.”

Tate turned her options over
carefully. There weren’t many.

No way she’d be able to get passed
the three, not without taking a lot of damage. They knew what they were doing
by paring Blade and Behemoth up. Focus on Blade’s quickness and Behemoth would
clobber you. Try to do something about Behemoth and Blade could dart in and
kill you. Leader could be bluffing about Blade’s quickness in water, but if he
wasn’t, Tate would be out matched even more so there than she would be on land.
The only real option was to do what they wanted and look for an opportunity to
escape.

Bones had made it back onto the
dock while Tate decided what to do. He rubbed at his chest and glared at her as
he edged past, keeping a careful distance between them. He joined the other
three almost at a run.

Tate sighed and removed her foot
from Dewdrops chest. He hesitantly got to his feet. When she didn’t make any
threatening moves, he straightened and walked speedily to join the others.

“Let’s get goin’, girl,” Leader
snarled.

She gave one last lingering glance
at the harbor behind her.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Leader
shouted, spittle flying. “I said get moving, or I’ll send someone to make you
move.”

Tate gave him a slow look, the kind
a predator gives its prey when it’s wondering what it’ll taste like and how
much effort it would be to catch it. Just because she was doing what he wanted,
didn’t mean she was prey. He paled slightly and took a small step back, before
remembering he had her outnumbered. With a stubborn jut to his jaw, he
violently motioned her forward.

This time she obeyed.

She walked purposely towards the
city, her head held high and on guard for the slightest possibility of escape.

Leader led the way while the others
surrounded her, hemming her in. They were careful to not draw attention though
Blade kept a knife touching her back and maintained a grip on her arm. There’d
be no escape as long as he kept that knife against her. Still, Tate remained
alert and watchful. You never knew after all. Opportunity came at the strangest
of times.

By this time, people had begun to
fill the streets in a thin trickle. Despite the festive air hanging over the
city, men and women hurried to put in a days work. There’d be time later to
play.

Nobody spared a glance for Tate’s
gaggle. Why would they? Her escorts’ clothes were neither too fine nor too
ratty. No one looked overtly threatening except Behemoth whose size was enough
to persuade others from looking too closely. For all intents and purposes they
looked like every other group going about the day’s business.

Got to love city anonymity, Tate
thought wryly.

There was no talking as they headed
to the eastern side of the city. Before long, buildings showed slight signs of
wear and tear as they made their way into the poorer section of town. Trash
littered alleyways where the collectors hadn’t come and paint peeled from
shutters in little curls. There were few people here hurrying to work. From a
stoop nearby a trio watched Tate’s party pass with hostile boredom.

“How much further?” Tate asked
inserting a slight whine into her voice. She wanted to sound annoying. “I’ve
got things to do today. I don’t have time to be traipsing all over the city
with you.”

Leader pulled to a stop, his
shoulders tightening as he bowed his head. From the right angle, it looked like
he had no neck. The rest of them stopped too. Tate hid a satisfied smirk as he
strove for patience that was quickly slipping from his fingers. Besides giving
him a nice beating for the irritation he had caused, annoying him into doing
something stupid took a nice second place.

“First you drag me away from
finding breakfast; then you make me walk for hours in the shady part of town.
Do you even know where you’re going?”

His shoulders tightened even
further to the sharp tenseness of a violin’s string. Tate had been told she
could annoy even the most patient of men, and Leader didn’t strike her as
someone who went through life turning the other cheek. She didn’t like him very
much and that made it all the more fun to drive him crazy.

With her stomach still growling for
food and a headache winding its way down her neck, she was in a nasty
mood.  All she needed to do was needle Leader a little further, just get
him to snap.

“Bet you don’t like having to
follow someone who can’t find his ass, even with shit dripping from it,” Tate
told Blade.

With an incoherent cry, Leader’s
control snapped with an almost audible ping. He whirled, pulling a dagger from
his waist and rushed Tate headlong.

Blade let go of her arm and stepped
to meet him.

“Are you crazy? He wants her
alive,” Blade said coldly knocking him back.

It was the chance Tate had been
looking for. She dropped into a low stance, joined her hands into one fist and
punched with all her strength into the side of Behemoth’s knee. It crumpled
under him. With a cry of pain he tilted to the side and fell, barely catching
himself before he face planted into the street.

Tate didn’t wait for Blade or
Leader to recover from their shock, instead spinning and sprinting back the way
they’d come.

She nearly ran Dewdrop down in his
surprise. She shoved him out of the way and dodged Bones’ scrawny arms,
ignoring the cries to stop.

Her legs pumped as she widened her
stride, fighting for every inch she could. Should have taken more time to run
but being on ship wasn’t the best place to train. You could only run around the
ship in a big circle before you felt like your head would spin off. Air burned
her lungs as her chest heaved. They pounded after her. It wouldn’t be long
before they caught up to her.

“Stop her,” a man, Tate thought it
might be Blade, shouted behind her.

The men on the stoop from earlier
watched the crazy redhead pound down the street toward them. They straightened
slowly as she neared. One ambled into the street carrying a wooden beam.
Several others joined him.

No way she’d make it through all of
them, not while being chased. Cursing under her breath, she darted down an
alley, barely evading one of the men.

She hurtled over trash and dodged
obstacles, not daring to look behind her, afraid if she did, she’d trip, and
they’d catch her. It was hard to tell how close they were with the adrenaline
pumping through her system and her heart a deafening beat in her ears.

She fought not to slow down, pushing
herself even harder as she broke onto another street. She darted around the
corner almost crashing into a couple. She didn’t pause to apologize instead
rushing past them amid cries of anger.

Seconds later the lady screamed as
Blade bowled her over in his rush.

Another alley opened up on her
left, and Tate flew down it.

Her luck ran out when the alley
dead-ended into a brick wall. Before she could back track, Blade ducked into
the alley behind her.

It was over.

Tate bent, placing her hands on her
knees as she sucked in breath after ragged breath of air.

Blade stopped too.

She was trapped.

Still, she looked around hoping to
find a door or window she could climb through. No luck. Nothing was in the
alley except the two of them and a pair of trashcans.

“What are you?” Blade asked, his
breathing not nearly as ragged as Tate’s. “You’re not Kairi, you haven’t the
coloring. Silva?”

“I don’t even know what that is,”
Tate said. “I’m me and as far as I know, human.”

“No,” he shook his head
emphatically. “No human could have out run me as long as you did.”

Tate had maybe ten feet before she
would feel the wall at her back. She licked her lips nervously. Something told
her meeting their boss wouldn’t be a good idea. Anybody who’d send thugs to
arrange a meeting was not someone she cared to know.

“It’s time to come along now,”
Blade said moving slowly towards her. “There’s no sense in you getting hurt, so
just give up.”

Tate flashed him a brilliant smile
filled with wry humor and a little bit of wickedness. “That’s the thing. I’m
not so good at giving up.”

She spun and barreled towards the
trashcans as a muffled curse echoed behind her. With a leap she landed on the
cans and then planted a foot on the wall and launched herself up even further.
She gripped the edge and pulled herself up with a grunt throwing one leg over.

It worked.

She was a little surprised at her
success. It was a good thing she’d learned to climb a mast with no handholds.

With a smooth grace Blade followed
her same path.

Tate squeaked and planted her hands
on the roof of the next building, leveraging herself up.

Blade missed the wall’s edge by a
breath and fell back to the street.

Tate allowed relief to course
through her as he colored the air with curses. Shouts signaled the arrival of
his companions.

She stepped back, turning and
running carefully across the uneven tiles as she took the sky path away from
her pursuers.

Looks like she wouldn’t be making
that meeting after all. Too bad.

Tate covered quite a bit of city
before she was ready to stop running. During her journey, she’d only had to
touch street level twice and instead made good use of narrow ledges and long
roofs to find her way across the city.

The tantalizing smell of food and
her own lightheadedness from hunger finally drove her back to the streets.
Otherwise she might never have come down, content to pass her time with the
wide-open sky and amazing views of the city and harbor.

The alley she dropped into was
thankfully free of people. It was cramped, narrow and if she held her arms
straight out she could almost to touch either side. She hesitated at its mouth,
watching the fury of movement outside. She needed food. Now.