Sieged

Chapter Four

Spit flies in my direction. 

Is that their attempt at intimidation? Disgusting is all it is. Did I arrest one of them in the past? Or possibly all of them? I don't recognize their faces. 

After skirting around a tented camp bursting with the overflowing population, screams and terror emanating from within, I find myself within a cluster of mud huts. The abodes soon change to stone and start closing in on me until I'm shuffling through a space no wider than myself. I step over dead bodies, drunks, and countless more rats. 

Everything then morphs into a set of descending crumbling steps, a flickering light at the end. When I reach it, a burly man perched on a stool awaits, a wooden door behind him. 

The man, his face bloodied, flat like a pan, glares at me with his good eye, the other closed, puffed and bruised. 

'Win the fight?' I ask. 'I bet the other looks worse.' 

He just groans. 

'Let me in,' I demand not too forcefully yet sternly as if I was speaking to one of my men. 

The man keeps seated and curls his mouth. 

'Let me in,' I say more loudly, showing I'm not to be taken lightly. I open my coat to show him my sword, the blade glinting in the light. 

This man could kill me with his finger no matter what weapon I had, but he knows who I am and if something happens to me, he knows a public death is in his future. But maybe he doesn't care. 

His callused fists tighten but he does as I ask. He wheezes to his feet and pushes the gate open. 

Down a tunnel I go. And a long one at that. I hear a faint sound of cheering. It gets louder until I can't hear myself think. I turn a corner and see countless people screaming at the bloodied fighters brawling in the middle. Fists are flying, fingers are gouging, teeth are gnawing and legs are kicking and restraining. 

The Pit it's called. It's one of many places where people come to waste their days away. 

Too enthralled with the fight, nobody notices me. I make my way to the other side of the chiseled-out hall of a cave and to another entrance way. I shift through and into a dimly lit tavern, the aroma of firewater immediately singeing my nose hairs. 

It smells stronger than the stuff Seamil gave me. 

Several people sit separately at their own grungy tables. They look at me, and so too does the haggard-looking tavern maid at the bar, a long dagger sheathed in her apron. 

One person in particular scowls at my presence. 

I knew he'd be here. Like stink on shit. 

The puny, gaunt-faced man moves to get out of his seat, to slink away, but I shake my head steadily. He slumps back down into his chair and mouths a curse. 

I walk over and ask, 'May I sit, Leech?' 

'Do I have a choice?' the man squeaks with a high-pitched bray, combing his greasy hair with his hand. 

'You do,' I reply back, 'but there's only one right answer. May I?' 

The man nods eventually and I take a seat, quickly calling the tavern maid over. 

'What do you want?' she says in a not-so-friendly manner. 

'Nothing for me, but get this man another of what he's drinking?' I reply. 

The maid waddles off back to the bar. 

'So,' I say. 'Have a nice little night out last night during the attack? Get something you wanted from the apothecary on Tinney Street.'