The Infiltrators (28 page)

Righty stomped on the man’s right foot
and then stepped out into a wide, low stance, simultaneously
bringing the tip of his sword down into the man’s right calf,
piercing all the way through and then slicing a chunk of it
off.

He then stepped behind the man with his
left leg and twisted his own body into the man, knocking him off
balance. He plunged his sword through the man’s heart on the way
down.

Righty instinctively ducked, a movement
he had often found beneficial in the ring whenever he was unsure of
the next attack but knew it was coming.

A sword whistled over his head, and he
then brought his sword across both the man’s legs at the thighs
slicing them off. He then rotated around and thrusted at a man’s
gut who was charging him.

The man succeeded in parrying, but
Righty quickly rotated his wrists, went with the momentum of the
parry, brought his sword up over his head, and then brought it down
at an angle across the man’s neck.

The man saw it coming and had his sword
in the process of coming up to meet the attack, but Righty’s sword
landed one second too early for the man’s defense, and he cut
through his collarbone and down another foot or so diagonally,
slicing multiple arteries.

Righty saw a moment’s hesitation in the
attackers’ resolve, and he went charging towards the door. He
leaped into the air and gave it another thundering kick. The top
hinge came off completely, and the door tilted inwards even
more.

Righty immediately turned around with a
vicious horizontal slice and disemboweled two men in the
process.

When the men retreated slightly, he
again turned and kicked the door as hard as he could.

The lower hinge cracked but didn’t come
off, and the door tilted inwards even more.

He spun around with another slice but
cut only air, as the men were still keeping a respectful distance,
fear plastered all over their faces.

He was so taken off guard when his eye
caught something falling from the sky that he couldn’t help taking
a step back and flinching.

Though his antagonists were jumpy, they
thought it was a trick and grinned sarcastically at him, murder in
their eyes.

Harold’s talons plunged deep into two
men’s backs at three hundred miles per hour, and as he sent them
flying towards the jail they collided with several of their
compatriots.

Righty fell to the ground as the
projectiles went flying over his head and smashed against the walls
of the jail, their bodies exploding like pumpkins.

One man helped accomplish what Righty’s
now achy right foot could not, knocking the door off all remaining
hinges and sending it flying into the bowels of the
jail.

Righty didn’t waste a moment. He
sprinted inside, alarm bells now reverberating throughout the
street.

The deputy he had bribed yesterday was
there trembling almost to the point of convulsions.

“I had no part . . . none!!”

“Take me to Pitkins . . . NOW!!” Righty
bellowed.

“Yes, sir. You’re a reasonable man, and
I’m a reasonable man,” he said trotting down the
hallway.

Righty was close behind him.

The deputy shoved a key into Pitkins’
cell and opened it promptly.

He looked at Righty and again said,
trembling, “I had no part . . . HONEST!!”

Righty hesitated for a moment, unsure
whether to kill this quivering weasel.

“Rucifus might spare you if it looks
like you went down fighting,” Righty said calmly, sheathing his
sword.

“No . . . PLEASE!”

Righty planted a quick jab and then a
right cross against the man’s eyes, hard enough to seal them shut
for a few days, followed by an uppercut to the chin that sent the
rascal onto his backside and sound asleep.

Righty turned his back to go into the
jail cell, but then a frightening vision came to his
mind:

Yes, sir, I saw him come
right into the jail, covered in blood. He whacked me upside the
head several times and then freed the prisoner.

Can you point to this
man?

Yes, sir.

As Righty saw the now emboldened coward
pointing towards him while he sat in a defendant’s chair and
Rucifus sat mockingly in the gallery, every person from the deputy
to the judge in her pocket, he sighed.

“Sorry, pal.” Righty lopped the man’s
head off with a quick overhead swing.

Righty ran into the jail cell,
expecting the same pulverized heap that had been Pitkins the last
time he saw him.

He lost his breath from the surprise.
He was sitting on the edge of his bed, and while he certainly
looked worse for wear, he looked more like a man who had taken a
bad four rounds in the ring, rather than a man whose face had been
used for target practice by an angry bull’s hooves.

His face was still covered in bruises,
but where two small boulders had once rested underneath his swollen
eyes there were now two baby mice.

“Feelin’ a little better
there?”

Pitkins nodded with a sobriety that
conveyed he was far from completely better. He stood with only
great effort and shuffled rather than walked towards
Pitkins.

“We’ll catch up on a lot soon enough.
Right now, we’ve got to scoot, so don’t you dare argue with me,”
Righty said, bending down and scooping Pitkins up over his
shoulder.

As Righty sprinted down the hall, he
said, “Oh yeah, you’re gonna have to forgive my untraditional form
of transportation.”

Chapter 38

In spite of the warning, Pitkins
momentarily screeched to a halt upon seeing the monstrous bird but
then kept going after seeing Righty fearlessly hop on the back and
place a strap over his legs.

Pitkins belted himself in, Righty let
out a whistle, and off they went.

In spite of the Spicy Green he had
helped himself to once he heard the pounding on the door begin,
Pitkins was still partly delirious from his recent
beating.

“Biggest one I’ve ever seen,” Pitkins
remarked calmly, once they were at cloud level.

“Biggest what?”

“Pholung,” Pitkins said, pointing to
Harold. “You might be surprised to know this isn’t my first time
doing this.”

“Oh?”

“That’s a story for another day
though.”

The rest of the journey was silent,
which was okay with Righty. He had his mind on bed like a runner
eyeing the finish line towards the end of a grueling
race.

When Pitkins realized Harold was
starting to lower his altitude, he said, “I’ve got something I’ve
gotta ask you. And if you refuse, there’ll be no hard feelings.
You’ve already done enough to indebt me for life.”

“Shoot.”

“Well . . . is there any chance you
could help me go look for Donive tomorrow? Again I—”

Pitkins’ voice started to
crack.

“Donive?!” Righty said, feeling like a
fool and just now becoming aware of the extent of his exhaustion,
having failed to mention her. “Heck, you’ll see her in about five
minutes!”

“WHAT?!” Pitkins shouted with both
enthusiasm and terror, something Righty attributed to a fear this
was some twisted joke.

“Or three minutes, depending on how
fast Harold flies,” he said, giving Harold a playful pat on the
back.

“What . . . you . . . ?”

“We’ll have an awful lot to talk about
tomorrow, friend. As for right now, I’ll give you the basics. We’re
headed to my house. Donive’s there. Your dog’s there. You’re gonna
have the happiest reunion of your life. I’m afraid I won’t be much
of a host. The second I lead you to her, I’m headed to bed and plan
to sleep for half a week.”

“Sleep half a century, if you want! If
you speak the truth . . . .” His voice broke off. “WHOOO!!!!” he
shouted with the wild enthusiasm of a teenager. “I’ll be indebted
for two lifetimes!” Pitkins shouted.

“Pitkins?”

“Yeah?!” he asked
enthusiastically.

“There are some things I’m going to
have to tell you by tomorrow at the latest that . . . you’re not
gonna like. In fact, you’re probably going to despise me. The way I
see it, if I tell you now, I ruin your reunion. If I tell you
tomorrow, you’ll think I’m a liar and a deceiver. I’m damned if I
do, damned if I don’t. So let me just ask you—do you want to know
now or tomorrow?”

Pitkins’ face grew somber, and then his
eyes turned into demon-like slits the likes of which Righty had
never seen and didn’t particularly care to ever again.

“Was . . .
how
. . . is she?” he
asked, the concern in his phrasing of the question revealing the
unspoken questions.

“Do you want me to shoot straight and
true with you? I’ll do it, but you’ve got to tell me.”

Pitkins closed his eyes for what seemed
like a minute and then slowly nodded his head.

“She was tied up and as naked as the
day she was born when I found her. Some fella was off in the corner
hitchin’ his pants up, but I don’t know what all transpired. Don’t
really care to, to be honest. But he’s a couple body parts shy of a
man now, and it was with your sword that I took care of
him.”

Righty could see Pitkins was seething.
“But . . . Pitkins, that wasn’t what I was referring to . . . not
in any way, shape, or form. What I’ve got to tell you has really
nothing to do with that.”

Pitkins looked at him for a long time
and then said, “You’re a drug smuggler.”

“How did you . . . ?”

“I was growing increasingly suspicious
by your obsession with security. The bandit threat to your ranch
was feasible but never felt quite right. While your skills with a
sword gave you the tools you needed to rescue me, only a man with
some significant prior combat experience could have pulled that off
under pressure.

“Killing’s never easy the first time. I
still remember my first battle,” Pitkins said with a shudder.
“There was a saying in the Sogolian army that your first battle
gives you new eyes because they’re never the same after your first
kill. I’ve certainly seen an evolution in your eyes long before
today,” Pitkins said looking directly at him.

“I reckon if it had been bandits trying
to rob your ranch that you had killed, you wouldn’t have had any
trouble telling me. So, it seems the fights you’ve been in were of
a different nature.

“And then there was your reluctance to
approach the day Rucifus cornered and threatened me. You arrived
late that day to your lesson—first time ever. You know each
other.”

“How much of this do you think you can
keep to yourself?”

“Every last detail,” Pitkins said,
looking him straight in the eye.

“In fact,” Pitkins continued, “I have a
proposal I’d like to make that I think you’d be very interested
in.”

“Oh?”

“But not now. You need your sleep, and
I need my wife. We’ll talk after a good rest.”

“I like the sound of it,” Righty said
sincerely.

Harold came to a stop in the
woods.

“Why here?” Pitkins asked.

“Janie—my wife—doesn’t know about
Harold here. I think I might like to keep it that way for a while.
Truth be told, I really don’t like anyone to know about Harold,”
Righty said, an edge in his voice. Pitkins nodded
somberly.

“Donive knows . . . but only if she
remembers. She might just as easily think she got here by horse and
dreamed about flying on the back of a bird. She was out almost the
whole time.”

“I’ll keep it secret until you say
otherwise,” Pitkins said. “As for now . . . I just want to see my
wife.”

Pitkins insisted on walking without
help, though it seemed he had to concentrate to avoid stumbling
over.

Moments later, they were in front of
Righty’s house.

“Wait here just a moment,” Righty
said.