Shadow War: Book 3 of the Shadows Rising Trilogy (WIP Rough Draft)

38. Surprise

27th of Thema, Continued

It was well after curfew. The curtains were drawn over the narrow windows, and barracks 52 was quiet, the lone gaslamp snuffed for the night, the girls bedding down with the sun. My feet came to a halt on the stoop all on their own, so I stood there, staring at the door. Maybe Rushidi would be sleeping. Maybe I would be able to just walk in and get what I had come for. And maybe I would grow wings and leave all this behind.

I shifted my weight, still reluctant to go in, but the signal rags wouldn't hang themselves on the clothesline. That, and I had nowhere else to go. The high general hadn't actually assigned me to the headquarters staff, so I was still technically stationed in the Red Sector.

All I wanted was to lay my weary bones on something flat and stop moving.

Which would have to wait because the Illyrians needed to know I was translating their conversations.

Exhaling on a long, drawn-out sigh, I finally eased the door open and slipped inside, trying to be as quiet as possible as I headed for my bunk, moving more by memory than sight in the near-dark.

Barely two steps in, there was a snick of flint meeting striker, followed by the pop of the gas catching spark overhead. Sickly yellow light illuminated the room, casting murky shadows beneath the top bunks and revealing the women gathered in the center of the aisle.

Rushidi and six of her enforcers were waiting for me.

I came to a halt, glancing warily around. The rest of the girls were lying low, trying not to attract any attention to themselves.

Rushidi gave me a cool once-over. She sucked her teeth for a moment, shaking her head. "See... Now... You cost me money today, Newblood. I really wish you hadn't done that." Then she lifted a hand and twirled her forefinger in the air. "Get it over with, girls."

Meera pushed her long frame away from the bunk she was leaning on, rolling her shoulders and cracking her knuckles as she started toward me.

I watched her with dull, exhausted eyes. I had taken a beating before, I could do it again. I told myself to let it happen, even tried to brace myself for it, but when Meera reached for me, something snapped. Something primal that I was too tired to fight anymore. Meera was big and brutally strong, but she wasn't a trained fighter, and she was certainly not used to meeting any sort of trained resistance. Her attack was sloppy, a 'rush-to-crush' that probably leveled most of her victims. But I wasn't going to be one of her victims. Not today. I reacted without thinking, grabbing her wrist in one hand and planting the other on her shoulder, then using her arm as a pivot while I hooked her weight-bearing knee with my foot and jerked her leg out from under her. She wasn't as tall as Arramy, but she still landed hard, hitting the floor with a loud grunt. She lay there, blinking up at me, her mouth a perfect oval of surprise.

For a breathless second nobody moved.

I wasn't sure who was more shocked, the rest of them because I had just tossed Meera on the floor, or myself because all of that training really did work on regular people. For half a second I felt a rush of almost giddy release.

Then Rushidi gave a little whistle, and the other five enforcers came at me at once.

Cursing under my breath I spun to face them, backing toward the door. This was going sideways fast, all of my hard work blowing up around me, but I was just too tired to make myself care. Tired of hiding, tired of groveling, tired of trying to appease everyone. I made a weak attempt at reminding myself to stick to the plan, but it just wasn't happening. The second woman to take a swing at me wound up slamming face-first into the wall, helped along by a savage knee to her belly and an elbow to the side of her head.