away, bowing and scraping as they left her presence. She watched them go until they were gone, and then she spoke another word of sharp command. Other shadows vanished from the area, more Goblins running to follow the retreating group.
The angle of view changed as Birgitte turned and walked back the way she’d come. She looked just as good from the front as she did from behind, outside of her ever-present scowl. Millicent followed her carefully, the video shutting off just as Birgitte started climbing the high walls that would take her back to Aegis.
We were silent for a moment as we stared at the screen. “What do you suppose all that was about?” said Fraser. “Because, gotta say, that wasn’t an encouraging video, known language or not.”
I looked at Virgil. “Are there any Goblin tribes around here that are allied with any Humans?”
He shook his head, his eyes wide. “I don’t think so. They try and eat us when they can.”
I nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. We can’t get in there tonight unless one of you can climb like she can. Looks like the best thing to do is have some dinner and get some sleep.”
I wanted to get rid of Fraser but I couldn’t figure out how to say it. After all, he’d been extremely helpful with his camera and information. Finally I said, “You’re welcome to stay the night with us if you don’t mind sleeping in a chair or something.”
He shook his head. “Floor’s fine! I grew up sleeping on the floor, totally used to it, never even use a mattress if I have one. I lost a vicious battle with two mattresses once, got PTSD, doesn’t work. Very sad.”
Unlike Virgil, I had a hard time getting to sleep. My main problem was Fraser: I didn’t know anything about the man. I couldn’t quite banish the image of the Naga falling dead before me, followed by Fraser’s innocent smile and shrug. He’d done something to it, something fast and silent, and I wasn’t sure if I could trust him.
Eventually I slid into slumber, though. Try as I might I couldn’t think of a reason for him to kill me. I had no doubt that there were many in the shantytown that would have killed me for my clothes and supplies, but I didn’t think Fraser was one of those. I kept dreaming of Birgitte slashing at me with her slim blade; each time, I’d start and find myself staring at the ceiling.
The end of the long night came with someone pounding at the door like they had a personal grudge against it. I got up and went to it, unslinging my shotgun before I opened it a crack. Raine stood there grinning at me, and I put the gun away to open the door.
“You found yourself quite the shithole,” he said cheerfully as he entered the room. Between the four of us, it was a much smaller room than I’d thought it was. Raine looked at Fraser and lifted an eyebrow before he looked back at me. “Didn’t know you swung that way, newbie. Where’d you find a male prostitute in this place?”
“Documentarian, I think you’ll find!” said Fraser, apparently taking no offense. He held a hand out to Raine. “Fraser Blodwyn. I’m guessing by the armor that you’re part of good master Ward’s Breakers, right? Charmed. This is Millicent.”
Raine gaped at Fraser and the sphere, and then he guffawed. “Millicent?Documentary? Good lord, newbie, what did you do?”
I spread my hands. “Life happens, man, that’s all.”
Raine nodded. “Came out to see if you guys were okay so far. The others are recovering from the party last night.”
I tried not to sound bitter. “Yeah, heard about that. Listen, I was wondering about something that we saw happening last night, thought maybe you could shed some light?”
He shrugged. “I could try, I guess.”
We did a little bit of maneuvering and closed the door behind him, putting the four of us in the small room. Fraser sat on the chair, cheerful as usual. I sat on the edge of the bed where Virgil still slept. Raine was content to stand. I said, “We, ah, we saw something last night while we were out here, and I thought you would want to know, maybe pass it on to Ethan.”
Raine nodded and made a get-on-with-in gesture. I said, “Okay, last night we saw Birgitte climb down the outside of the wall. She went out to a dark corner of the shantytown and met with a group of a half-dozen Goblins. I’m not sure what she said, but they were definitely meeting and taking orders from her. And then after they talked for a little while she just climbed back up the wall. I figure she’s trying to create an alliance with the Gobs, maybe screw us all over.”
Raine looked grave for a moment, and then gave me his big, open smile. “Gotta be a mistake, man. You must have seen someone else. Not even ‘Gitte can scale that wall.”
“We have it on tape, actually!” said Fraser, sounding delighted with himself. He fumbled with the box on his belt and then turned it around to show the video. Raine watched for a while until he saw her meeting with the Goblins.
He frowned. “Okay, I gotta admit, not quite what I was expecting out of her. Okay, newbie, you’ve got a point here. Ethan needs to know about this.”
I nodded, relieved that he believed me. I felt a sudden grand affection toward Fraser and Millicent. Raine went on. “I’ll give him a call, you guys wait here.”
He was already pulling the little radio out of his pocket as he left. I was nervous, sure, but it felt good to be believed. I said, “Fraser, is there any place around here to get a decent breakfast?”
“Nope! But I know a few places that can fake it.” He had already put his screen back into its box. I wondered what else was in there. Outside of the camera and its box he didn’t seem to have any supplies on him. Not my problem.
“Breakfast is on me, then,” I said.
“Smashing! Let’s wake up the kiddo and we’ll go have some rat gumbo.” He seemed perfectly serious, and I just shrugged. I’d eaten worse things than rats.
Virgil didn’t want to wake up but once he was awake he didn’t seem to be inclined to fall back to sleep. The idea of breakfast caught his attention in a big way and soon he was standing at the door waiting for me to get through my morning equipment check.
Everything was in order, so I opened the door just in time to keep it from being destroyed by one of Raine’s hammers. The hammer clipped my shoulder, sending me staggering back into the closet-sized room. The stagger was a good thing, causing me to stumble out of Raine’s line of fire. He followed the hammer blow with a couple of shots from his pistol, one of which struck me in the same shoulder and knocked me down. The shot pinged off of my shoulder armor but there was a hell of a lot of force behind the bullet.
I lay there wondering what had happened while Virgil screamed somewhere nearby. I didn’t have time to wonder for long; my field of vision was suddenly full of Raine. He aimed the pistol at my face and I kicked out with both feet. I hit his knee and there was a crunching noise. Raine screamed and fired but by that time he was falling. He stitched a line of holes in the wall and ceiling before he hit the ground with a thud that shook the badly-constructed building.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw that Virgil had ducked under the bed and was huddled up in the farthest corner. He had crunched himself down into a space about the size of a basketball and he stared at me with terrified eyes. I didn’t know what had happened to set Raine off but I wasn’t going to let him kill Virgil. Or me.
Fraser was simply gone. I hadn’t seen him move, had no idea how he got by Raine, but I was glad that I didn’t have that little detail to deal with as well. I struggled to my feet. I was dismayed to see Raine doing the same; apparently his armor had absorbed enough of my kick that I hadn’t broken his knee. He was limping and looked pissed, but that was about it. I had time to notice that he had three more bleeding cuts in his left arm. It looked like he’d jumped the gun and marked himself for our deaths before getting the job done. The sight of the wounds made my anger surge, and I charged.
I rushed him as he pulled out his other hammer, simply plowing into his midsection like an angry wrecking ball. I caught him just right and blew him back out the door. I carried him across the common room, slamming him into the low
bar on the other side.
There weren’t many patrons there this early in the morning, and Otto wisely just sank down behind the bar. I took a swipe at Raine with my axe but he turned so that the armor on this upper arm deflected it. Then we were facing each other, panting, and I knew I was in an amazing amount of trouble. Raine was at least two feet taller than me, with a proportional reach advantage. My axe was longer than his hammers, but he had two of them. “Raine!” I said. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Snap out of it!”
He took a couple of swipes at me with his hammers and then grinned. “Sorry, man. I promise that if you just put the axe down I’ll make it quick. For all three of you.”
I opened my mouth to say something else, I had no idea what, and he swung again. He beat down my defense with one hammer and landed a blow on my left arm that made it feel numb and distant, as if it belonged to someone else. My axe was a wonderful weapon but it took space to swing and I was too crowded in the cluttered common room to use it effectively.
While he got ready for another swing, I dropped the axe and pulled a pair of pointed metal rods from the back of my gauntlets. They were machined from aircraft aluminum and weren’t sharp, but the tips were blunted spikes about two inches long. I carried them like small daggers. They let me focus the power in my thick arms down to