“You can go hungry if you wanna. You ain’t gonna starve,” the woman said.
The injustice of this whale calling him fat and the impossibility of doing much about it paralyzed Kip. He gritted his teeth, glaring around the fire, and handed over the quintar.
The leviathan took the quintar and held it between her teeth, bending it slightly. If it were a counterfeit, tin coated with silver, it would give the curious crackling sound unique to bending tin. Satisfied between the weight and the texture that it was real, she tucked the coin away. She took a swig from a glass jug, set it down, and then sawed a leg off the javelina. While she was working, Kip noticed that some of the men around the fire had disappeared.
No doubt he was going to find them in the spreading darkness, waiting for him. Orholam, they had seen the rest of the stick.
Nor were the remaining men and women looking at him in a terribly friendly manner. They sat on their bags, on stumps, or on the ground, mostly watching him quietly. A few drank from wineskins or aleskins, murmuring to each other. A glassy-eyed woman was lying with her head in a long-haired, balding, unshaven man’s lap, stroking his thigh. Both were staring at him.
The whale handed Kip the javelina leg.
Kip looked at her, waiting.
She stared blandly back at him from beneath her layers of blubber.
A few weeks ago, Kip would have backed off. He was used to people treating him like dirt. Ignoring him or bullying him. But he couldn’t imagine Gavin Guile being bullied, not even when the odds were stacked against him. Kip might be a bastard, but if had one drop of the Prism’s blood, there was no way he could knuckle under. “I need my ten danars,” Kip said.
The drunk woman across the fire laughed suddenly, uncontrollably, until she started snorting and laughing harder. Not just drunk, then.
“Do I look rich enough to have ten danars?” the whale asked.
“You can cut that danar in half.”
She drew her knife and shrugged, stepping close to Kip. She reeked of grain alcohol. “Sorry, got no knife.”
Kip understood instantly. Several of the men were sitting up, not only paying more attention, but getting ready to hop to their feet. They weren’t waiting only to laugh at him, knowing this whale would cheat him. They were waiting, knowing the whale would cheat him, to see if he was a victim. Would Kip meekly accept being cheated? If he was a victim, he was a mark. If he had one quintar, he might have more.
But what could he do? Give back the food? No, she wouldn’t give him the quintar back regardless. If he left, he’d confirm his weakness. Someone would be waiting for him in the darkness. What would they do if he attacked her? If, without warning, he punched her in her blubbery face as hard as he could?
They’d attack him, of course. And after they beat him, then they’d rob him.
If he ran away, even if he got away, he’d lose his horse, and he had too much trouble mounting the beast to leap into the saddle and ride away—even if it hadn’t been the most placid creature on earth, unlikely to gallop even with hell on its heels.
“Fine,” Kip said. He turned as if to go, but instead grabbed her glass jug. “I’d like to have a drink with dinner. You keep the rest. For the great service.” He smelled the jug. As he thought, it was grain alcohol. He took a swig to look tough and had to school his face to stillness when it set his mouth on fire. Then his throat. Then his stomach.
The men who’d been shifting to get up settled back down.
“Mind if I sleep here tonight?” Kip asked.
“It’ll cost you,” the man who was balding up front and had hair halfway down his back said.
“Sure,” Kip said. He wasn’t nearly as hungry as he’d been a few minutes ago, but he forced himself to eat the greasy javelina leg. As the rest of the javelina cooked, the other men and women came and took slices.
As Kip finished, he sucked his fingers and walked toward his horse. He got far enough that he began to hope that they would simply let him leave.
“What are you doing?” the balding man demanded.
“I need to rub down my horse,” Kip said. “It’s been a long day.”
“You don’t need to go anywhere, and I don’t want you near my horse.”
“Your horse,” Kip said.
“That’s right.” The man bared blackened teeth at Kip—not quite a smile, not quite like he was going to bite him—and drew a knife.
“We’ll be needing that coin belt, too,” another man said.
The women around the fire simply watched, impassive. No one moved to help. Several other men joined the two already facing Kip. Kip looked into the darkness, his vision spoiled by the fire, but still he could see several dark shapes waiting for him.
Give them what you have, and maybe you’ll escape with a beating, Kip. You know you’re not getting out of here with everything. Stall for time, maybe there’s some kind of camp guards here who might save you.
“Evernight take you,” Kip said. He smashed the top off the jug of grain alcohol on the edge of a wagon wheel.
“Fool boy,” the balding man said. “Most people keep the handle if they do that, not smash it off.”
Kip lunged, splashing grain alcohol over the man. The balding man grimaced, rubbing stinging eyes, switching his knife to his left hand. “You know what? I’m going to kill you for that,” he said.
With a yell, Kip charged.
It was the last thing the man expected. He was still rubbing his eyes. He raised an arm to fend off a blow, but Kip dove at his stomach, past the knife, spearing the top of his head into the man’s gut. With a whoof! the man staggered backward and tripped right at the edge of the fire.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then the grain alcohol on his hands ignited. He lifted his hand with a yell, and his hair ignited. His beard ignited. His face. His yells pitched to tortured screams.
Kip bolted, straight past the flaming man.
No one moved for a blessed moment. Then someone dove for him, missing his body but clipping his heel. Kip went down heavily.
He hadn’t even gotten three paces from the fire.
Some run, Porky.
He rolled over in time to see the flaming man, still screaming, run straight into the fat woman. She shrieked, an oddly shrill sound to come from such a big woman, and started whacking at him with her big knife.
Then three men were on Kip, the fire behind them making them huge grotesque shadows. A kick caught Kip in the shoulder, then one from the other side hit his kidney. Pain lanced through him, taking his breath away. He curled into a ball.
Kicks rained on his back and legs. One of the men was leaning over him, punching his hip, his leg, trying to hit him in the crotch. Someone stomped on his head. It was a glancing blow, but it caught his nose. Hot blood exploded over his face and his head caromed off the dirt.
Only a single thought won through the fog suddenly wreathing Kip’s brain. They’re going to kill me. This wasn’t going to be punishment. It was murder.
So be it. They’ll have to kill me on my feet. He struggled to all fours.
That opened his ribs to attack and a kick hammered his side. He absorbed it with a groan.
Three grown men, attacking a boy who’d done nothing to them. Something about the injustice of it tapped an iron reserve of will. No, not only three now. More had joined. But the additional numbers only infuriated Kip further. He hunched into his own bulk, gathering his strength, tucking his head between his shoulders. Burn in hell, I can take it.