Firewind

Chapter 34-Zander

"Let her go," I said.

"Oh yeah?" said the one that was holding Kathra against the wall. "What are you going to do about it you little punk?" He spat at the ground just in front of my feet.

His companion stood directly in front of me, blocking my view and standing a good half foot taller than me. Which was pretty impressive since I was well over 6 feet. He was pretty intimidating with reddish-brown hair cropped short and scars crisscrossing all over his arms and face. His biceps were thicker than my head. He frowned down at me without saying a word.

I tried to shoulder him out of the way but he just shoved me back.

"Brutus!" The one holding Kathra exclaimed. "We must be careful with his royal highness."

I knew he was mocking me from the sneer on his face and in his voice. His face was less intimidating. He didn't look much older than me. His face was chubby and his dark bloodshot eyes were droopy. He was shorter than his companion and shorter than me. His arms were crisscrossed with tattoos, rather than scars, written in a different language than the two I knew.

Kathra was silent and looked more disgusted than scared. She looked at me with a pleading look in her eyes that seemed to say: whatever you need to do just do it. She was trying to reach for the dagger hidden under her cloak undetected but the shorter guy was paying too much attention to her. I understood what she meant. She wanted me to distract them.

"What do you want with us?" I asked as casually as possible.

Brutus, who I assumed was the redhead just shrugged. He didn't seem to talk much.

"I heard there's a reward for whoever finds the prince," said the chubby-faced one. "Now I couldn't pass up a bit of free money eh? I saw yous buying your little dinners and had to follow. And here we are."

"Who's giving the reward?" I glanced at Kathra. She was just pulling the dagger out but he didn't have his full attention on me yet.

"Now it's..." He stopped himself and facepalmed. "Now Kai you can't say that." He muttered to himself. So his name was Kai, I noted.

"And who are you?" I asked.

He chuckled. Then saw that neither Kathra nor I were laughing and looked astonished.

"You don't know who I am?" He asked.

We shook our heads.

"Kai Neero? Bounty hunter extraordinaire? And his faithful companion Brutus?"

"Nope," I said.

He was fully paying attention to me now and had stopped holding onto Kathra. Brutus was standing off to the side. Kathra successfully unsheathed her dagger and had angled it at Kai's back ready to strike.

"Great," I said. "Now that we're all properly introduced, I'd like you to kindly let us go and no harm will be done to you."

At this, it was Brutus's turn to laugh. He swiftly disarmed Kathra with his knife and took her blade hostage. He grinned, which was the only expression the stone faced redhead had made before it was returned to an unreadable expression.

How could I be so stupid? They still had their knives and now we had lost the only weapon we had between the two of us. Kai's boasting air faded into fury. He threw Kathra against the wall and her head hit it with a resounding thunk that made me cringe. She slumped to the ground. The back of her head was covered in blood and her dark raven hair was dripping with it.

Brutus gripped both of my arms and threw the hood of my cloak over my face. I couldn't see anything but from the feel of it, I was being led (harshly) out of the alley.

All at once, Brutus grunted beside me and I felt his grip loosen. I shook him off and pulled my hood back. At the same time, Kai let out a cry of outrage and I saw him crumple to his knees, holding his stomach. Althaea stood over him, sword in hand and Enialis was tying a knocked out brutus to a nearby unlit lamp post. Althaea dropped the pommel of her sword on Kai's head for good measure and Kathra started tying him up as tightly as possible.

All of this happened so quickly that by the time I had gotten out of my stupor, the thugs were in their rightful place: snoring peacefully in bounds at our feet. Kathra whispered to Althaea for a few seconds then stormed off with her chin held high and her glower prominently on her face. Which just made the blood on the back of her head look black in the lamplight.

"Well, it looks like the two of you had an interesting evening," Enialis observed.

We all trudged back to the Vard and found the Innkeeper tending to Kathra's head. She told us that Kathra had fainted when she got here and had just woken up. She said that it'd be better if she rested for a few days.

"You are all welcome to stay as long as necessary as long as you are willing to pay," the innkeeper said. Enialis had told me that her name was Kava.

"We don't have enough money," Althaea said. "But I'm sure we'd all be willing to work to earn our keep."

Enialis looked less than pleased at the idea of mopping and sweeping but I just shrugged. How hard could it be? Kava nodded.

"I'll have no goofing off from any of you," Kava said, leaving the room.

As soon as she left, Kathra burst into laughter but cringed and stopped. I assumed it hurt her head. I can't imagine the pounding headache she must have right now.

"What's so funny?" I ask.

"It's just that I can't for the life of me imagine Enialis sweeping and cooking and doing housework!" She said trying to restrain her giggles.

Enialis snorted and rolled his eyes, clearly offended. Althaea and I exchanged glances of concern.

"I think that you should get some rest," she said as gently as possible and shooed us all out of the room.

"Have either of you ever worked at an Inn before?" I ask.

They both shook their heads. Well, this definitely won't be boring.

"Who's hungry?" Althaea asked.

"I could definitely go for some food," I answer. I completely forgot after my 'interesting evening' as Enialis called it. The sandwiches Kathra and I had bought weren't missing a single bite out of them.

"Hey, speaking of food," Enialis said, a frown scrunching his features, "where's Scymitar?"