Outrageous Fortune-Errant Freight Book One

Chapter 19

Lost in the long ago, Eitan was unaware of himself, kneeling in the gutter.

He did not know his skin dripped with sweat as well as rain, his body shook with unspent adrenaline, his face twisted in a snarl of pain and hatred.

Nor did he notice the small group growing around him on the street, each member of which seemed to have their own opinion of what they witnessed.

"Look at that, will ya'?" a woman with the burn-flecked skin of a smith spat into the street. "That's a bad Spike if ever I saw one."

"Then you ain't seen one, friend," the grocer, drawn out by the crowd in front of his stoop, leaned over, shielding himself with an empty fig box. "Look at them eyes, black as a no-moon's night, they is. That's Milk'n'Honey."

"Will ye look at that, Sadie," an elderly auntie nudged the more elderly auntie at her side as a trail of spittle fell from the man's lips. "Time was them's as were usin' kept to Wolstonecroft and no bother to anyone else."

"I see's 'im, Ronette," Sadie replied. "Pity, though. He'd be right handsome if he weren't fume."

"Excuse me," a young woman with a brisk Ford accent pushed through to the front of the little crowd. "Coming through, thank you, excuse me..." With some effort the newcomer burst between the smith and the two aunties.

"Have a care, Miss Jinna." The grocer looked at the visibly pregnant young woman from under his fig box. "This 'ere fella could be dangerous."

"I'll be fine," she assured the grocer, at the same time leaning in close enough for her red-gold hair to fall over his dripping black ponytail. "Eitan," she spoke his name softly. "Can you hear me? It's Rory's friend, Jinna Pride. We met a few months back."

Not a muscle twitched.

"Mebbe we should call the coppers..."

"Or a cog."

"Or the Keepers."

"Hold off a second." The order snapped with martial authority and, combined with a sharp glance out of storm-gray eyes, stilled the tumbling suggestions. In the fresh silence, Jinna took a deep breath and, before she thought better, placed her hand over the sensitive's cheek. "Ei..."

* * *

...tan's left hand clenched and pulled at the chain anchoring him in the middle of the arena—a handicap to raise the wagers—while the gate creaked open to reveal this night's opponent.

He did not know—never knew, before the match—who or what he would face. Not until they, or it, appeared.

But he was thoroughly unprepared for who he saw walking into the arena, moving with care, as a woman in her condition might.

He blinked away the sweat already slipping into his eyes but still they showed him Rory's friend entering the arena, her body more rounded with pregnancy than when he'd seen her last, and her expression filled with concern.

Except the little mother had never set foot in the Illyrian cages. He hadn't even met Jinna Pride until a few months past, when Rory brought her around the Errant.

Yet here she was... which could only mean...

* * *

"Whoa! Easy! Easy soldier," Jinna jumped back, her umbrella glancing off the grocer's box as Eitan erupted, going from his knees to a fighting stance fast enough to leave her breathless (and the two aunties as well, judging from the way two brown wrinkled hands fluttered against two wool-covered chests at the same time).