2

Rufi was welcomed back to consciousness with a deep chesty snort accompanied by a dry hack. He blinked heavily, spikes of light jabbed into his swollen brain. Murky memories swirled dizzyingly around his head as he tried to pry his eyelids open and take stock of his surroundings. With an almost audible creak, his right eye opened a fraction while its companion remained stubbornly shut. He took another deep breath. The iron taste of blood was so cloying on his dry, sticky tongue that he almost wretched, a thin line of sticky saliva dribbed out the corner of his tender lips. He tried to raise a hand to wipe it and found two heavy metal manacles tethering him to the floor. The realisation he was being restrained snapped him out of the thick fog of possible concussion, his one good eye bright and alert darting around the dim room he had awoken in. He saw a chipped and scarred table in front of him and the bare, unadorned walls of the little box room. He relaxed and sank back into his chains. Rufi knew a police interview room when he saw one. Another shuddering sigh racked his bruised ribs, and his back cracked as he fought to sit up straight from the pathetic hunched over position he awoke in. He straightened his broad shoulders, his thick muscular chest puffing out, as his neck groaned and popped.

Fighting through the mammoth hangover that had snuck in behind the cloud of possible brain injury, Rufi put together the pieces of how he had wound up in chains. Flashes of memory tumbled over one another like rats in the sewer of his mind. An image of an ugly Troll with a nasty scar running vertically across his forehead popped up. Followed immediately by another flash, this one more of a feeling than an image, that feeling being the Troll's huge boulder smashing fist crunching into his face. That explained his headache. Bits and pieces of the ensuing chaos bounced around his aching head. Tables, chairs, glasses, lamps, plates, and smaller creatures flew through the air as they brawled around the packed pub. There was darkness for a few moments punctuated by an involuntary groan from Rufi, and the next thing he could remember was standing over the behemoth of a Troll, bringing the hard edged seat of a bar stool down on the Troll’s thick skull again and again. Even in the red fog of intoxicants and wrath, he could still remember the dull thud it made as he hit the Troll. A few hits later, the thud became a wet squelch. Blood. There was blood everywhere, creatures screaming, a Gnome clutched at his awkwardly hanging, and very broken, arm moaning piteously. Then came the shouts of the blue clad officers as they tried to restrain him. He groaned again and blinked slowly, his bloodshot eye focusing wetly on the large black rectangle of imbued glass, enchanted to be able to see through only one way, and cursed.

“Fuck.”

*

“Looks like your boy's awake,” Murphy said, yawning and scrubbing at his unshaven face, stubble crackling under his rough hands.

“You owe me a silver,” Blake said, as he sat up straight and surreptitiously folded the newspaper he had been reading. He lit a smoke and barked at a passing officer. “Find Detective Finn and tell him the Goblin’s awake.” The officer nodded and scurried off, with Blake yelling after him. “And get us some coffee!”

Murphy finished off his face rub with a quick chin scratch and a rub of his eyes; the bags beneath them were dark purple and puffy.

“He looks like shit,” Murphy remarked after surveying their captive through the one-way glass. “Did we do that to him?”

“He went toe to toe with a bloody Troll, I’m surprised he's alive,” Blake said with an indifferent shrug.

Murphy laced his fingers behind his head and whistled through his teeth.

“From what I hear, the Troll’s the one who came off worse for it,” Blake added.

Murphy raised one of his thin feline eyebrows in surprise. The Goblin was big, no doubt, and well built too, he had to be at least six and a half feet and north of three hundred pounds, but to take on a fully grown Troll empty handed was unheard of.

“Is he from up our way?” Murphy asked as the door opened up behind him.

“Not one of ours,” answered the man behind them.

They turned in their chairs to face Detective Finn, a hard nosed detective with a shock of fiery ginger hair and a matching slug of thick red hair for a moustache. He had the beginnings of a middle-aged gut and the sallow, unhealthy skin of a man who subsisted on tobacco, caffeine, stress, and chronic sleep deprivation. He threw a manila folder down on the desk between them and eyed the Goblin with undisguised loathing. Blake spun the folder until he could read it comfortably.

“Ruf’gar Chaw’Drak.” He read slowly phonetically, pronouncing the foreign name with obvious derision.

“Chaw’Drak?” Murphy said. “As in Sam’Sun Chaw’Drak?”

Finn grunted in acknowledgement and lit a smoke, his eyes never leaving the battered Goblin in front of him.

“He’s Uncle Sam’s nephew.”

"Well, aren’t we lucky lads, blessed with the presence of villainous royalty?” Blake said. His tone suggested amusement, but the dark turn of his eyes said otherwise.

Murphy picked up the folder and began flicking through it.

“So what’s he doing this far North of Houses?” Murphy asked, looking at the almost comical, if it wasn’t for the serious nature of some of them, list of priors.

“That’s what I wanna know,” Finn growled, boring a hole through the glass.

“There’s enough here to warrant some serious questions,” Murphy said, scanning down the list.

“Oh yeah, our boys run the whole gambit of villainy,” Finn grunted. “Assault, burglary, possession, possession with intent, extortion, bootlegging, armed robbery, kidnapping, and he's been in the fit for a dozen bodies.”

“And he’s still on the streets?” Blake asked incredulously.

“What do you expect when your Uncle’s Sam’Sun Chaw’Drak,” Murphy said. “Is this right?”

Finn looked at what Murphy was reading.

“Apparently,” he said.

“What?” Blake asked.

“Our boy’s a war hero. Lieutenant Chaw’Drak fought in Gar Swamp about eight years back,” Murphy explained.

“Bad bit of business that,” Blake said almost reverently.

Everyone knew that particular conflict had been fought tooth and nail, as vicious and costly as any in the last hundred years. Poisons and disease killed in the thousands. The city's soldiers were embroiled in a guerilla war against an enemy that knew the land and were particularly cruel in their preference to mortally wound over killing, leaving dying soldiers to linger for weeks, sometimes rotting in their own filth and delirious in their agony, a constant burden to their own allies.

“Aye,” Finn agreed. “Our boy not only fought but earned himself a couple of medals for valour and a shiny little promotion to command.”

“He is a fucking war hero,” Murphy said as he read. “Pretty impressive stuff here, Finn.”

“Don’t forget he just beat a fuckin' Troll half to death,” Finn grunted eyeing Murphy coldly.

“He’s been picked up a few times but hasn’t been charged with a crime since leaving the army. Maybe he's changed his way,” Murphy said, a mischievous grin on his face that grew to a full beaming smile when he was rewarded by Finn's indignant outburst of curses.

“Fucking scum like him don’t get reformed, they just get smarter. And if that damn Troll doesn’t wake up, he’s looking at murder.”

“Come off it, Finn, you ain't getting no conviction off a physical assault charge on a bloody great seven foot Troll! You might as well try and charge a Pixie with a bank robbery, it ain't possible!” Blake laughed and nudged Murphy.

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“Don’t mean I can't put the fear in the little prick. Gotta show these scumbags they can't walk into our manor and start making trouble.” Finn hitched up his trousers and smoothed back his wild ginger hair.

“Come on, Blake. Murphy, you stay here.”

“Yes boss,” Murphy said as they swept out of the room in a cloud of cigarette smoke.

*

Rufi looked up sullenly as the door burst open. Two detectives stomped in with uniform scowls on their faces as they took the usual positions, one by the door, the other leaning across the table over Rufi with his hands spread wide on the desk.

“Wanna tell us what Uncle Sam’s nephew is doing dropping Trolls this far from the RatHoles?” the ginger haired detective growled.

He was clearly wearing the trousers and from the way he was already glowering, told Rufi he was in for some more headache.

“I’m dying for a smoke,” Rufi said, his voice dry and cracked but firm.

The officer blinked, a muscle in the side of his head pulsed as his jaws grinded together as barely contained rage frothed in his dark eyes.

“A smoke is the last of your worries son,” the detective said. The smell of cheap, acrid cologne and tobacco turned Rufi’s already wounded stomach. “That Troll is in a bad way. If he doesn’t wake up, you’ll be facing murder in the first. 100% of your natural life sitting in Black Water.”

Rufi just looked at him, his face blank.

“Facial and skull fractures, possible brain damage, definite brain bleeding,” the dark haired prick by the door said, reading from a brown folder.

"Well, at least nothing important got damaged,” Rufi replied apathetically.

Again he saw the vein throb in the ginger detective’s temple, his face was turning a shade of red complimentary to his shock of orange hair.

“You think this is a joke?” he snarled.

He threw aside the table and grabbed hold of Rufi’s soiled shirt, shaking him roughly. The detective by the door took a step towards them but did not interfere.

“Listen here scumbag, you don’t come into my borough and throw your weight around! I don’t give a flying rats fuckhole who your uncle is! This ain’t Goblin Town, Green holds no weight up here!”

Their eyes locked; the heat was almost palpable. The hatred in both their eyes was open and reciprocated. As suddenly as the moment flared, it ended. Rufi grinned at the ginger detective, his eyes warm and mischievous, the murderous intent underneath expertly smothered.

“Any coffee in that, or is it all brandy by this point?” Rufi asked the other officer, ignoring the rage that pounded through his veins, his voice as level as when they first walked in.

The officer by the door looked down at his cup, and then dumbly to the officer in charge, clearly they had expected this interrogation to go different. Before either of them could react there came a hurried knock at the door.

“We're busy!” the ginger haired detective snapped, letting go of Rufi as the door opened.

“Sorry sir, there's a HobGoblin on the way up. He says he’s the Goblins lawyer, and he’s pissed,” a thin, spotty faced, plod squeaked from the door.

“Shit! Stall him,” he growled, running his thick, swollen hands over his throbbing face and smoothed back his hair, before hastily putting the room back together.

Rufi smirked insolently at the detective as he heard the barking cries of his lawyer, Ne’boo Balba, one of the most feared litigators in the Free Cities, not only for his encyclopaedic knowledge of the law but also for his predatory nature and propensity for civil suits against law officials. Inside, however, Rufi felt his fragile stomach drop; if Ne’boo was here, then that meant his Uncle must already know about last night. Outwardly, Rufi maintained his smug grin. Ne’boo’s words buzzed down the hallway like angry hornets, getting louder as he drew closer, and he most certainly did sound pissed, more so than usual. The door burst open and both the detectives milled about the room sheepishly like children caught at the sweet jar.

“Where is my nephew?" Ne’boo barked as he bowled his way into the room.

Ne'boo, like most HobGoblins, stood only about five feet tall and was incredibly frail looking. He had a weathered, leathery face, and his yellowish scales were so worn they looked more like aged parchment. The loose, scaly flesh on his face had wrinkled and folded around his eyes, turning them into beady little caverns devoid of mercy. Ne’boo was old for a HobGoblin at almost a hundred years old, and the age showed on him. Rufi had learnt, however, not to let Neboo’s wizened look trick you into any sympathy. He was as cunning and vicious as a cornered snake. He wore a finely tailored, yet simple, dark grey three-piece suit, a tasteful expression of his abundant wealth.

“Gratzi Ganya, uncle,” Rufi said, greeting Ne’boo in the Kith tongue.

“In Forreste! I don’t want you discussing with my prisoner in code,” the ginger haired detective snapped, trying to re-establish command of the room.

Ne’boo rounded on him so swiftly and with such righteous indignation that the detective was forced to take an unconscious step back.

“How dare you detective, question my client without even contacting his legal representative? Not only that, but from your booking sheet it looks like you didn’t even give him a cell for the night but rather kept him shackled to the floor in this airless hole! Not only is that a violation of his rights as a free citizen, but a blatant disregard for the duty of care placed upon you as an officer of the law!" Despite the height difference, Ne’boo was somehow nose to the nose with the officer, his naturally high voice trembling with indignation. “You wouldn’t even treat a dog like that!”

“We… we weren’t interrogating him,” the ginger haired officer replied lamely, clearly abashed by the force with which the diminutive lawyer had dressed him down.

“Two officers in a locked room with a chained prisoner, as well as a third looking in, would you be able to argue that point in a court of your peers?” Ne’boo snapped while Rufi smirked at the detectives from behind the fiery HobGoblin. The detective’s sullen silence was all the response Ne’boo needed. “Now uncuff my client, and we shall be on our way whilst you still have a badge.”

“Hold on a minute! I can’t do that! At the very least he’s facing assault charges as well as possession of a controlled substance… and resisting arrest." the ginger haired detective huffed, pointing a finger at Rufi.

"Yes, I heard about the Troll,” Ne’boo sniffed indifferently.

“Well then you know if that Troll doesn’t wake up your clients facing life for murder!” He puffed out his chest and glared at the HobGoblin, determined not to be cowed in his own interrogation room.

Neboo snorted derisively in return and raised one of his thick, leathery brows at the detective.

“Please, you really think you’ll be able to prosecute for bodily harm on a damned eight foot four hundred pound Troll? I’m sure a jury would be ever so convinced that your Troll is a victim.”

The detective opened his mouth to argue but was cut short by Neboo.

“Don’t waste your time or mine. Would you like to know out of the four hundred and something assault cases involving Trolls in the last three years, as both defendant and plaintiff sided in favour of the Troll? Zero, that’s how many. As for the alleged controlled substance, I’ve already had a word with my good friend, your captain, and he agrees due to my client’s military history and recent clean record that we will plead no contest and pay a fine. As for resisting arrest, you can shove that trumped up charge in the same place that I’ll ram your badge if you try and take this matter any further! Now if you’re quite done wasting my time and taxpayers’ money, we will be going.”

Both detectives looked at each other completely at a loss. Ne’boo tapped his expensive loafers impatiently and then gestured to Rufi’s chains. The ginger haired detective sucked his teeth and then sighed.

“Uncuff him Blake,” he said.

“But sir…”

“Take the damned manacles off of him!”

Blake, the dark haired officer, stiffly walked across the room, slapped down his folder, and uncuffed Rufi.

“It’s been a pleasure lads,” Rufi said as he hauled himself to his feet, towering over everyone in the room. “You ever find yourselves down South, look me up, I’d love to repay the hospitality.”

Rufi swaggered out of the room behind Ne’boo, the delicious look of hate on the two detectives’ faces dulling his aching head. Ne’boo led them out of the precinct in haughty silence. Outside were two cabs and another HobGoblin. He was the rounder, more orange scaled variety. He wore simple homespun clothing more suited to a dock worker than a Villain. His chubby face was swollen on one side, and one of his eyes had puffed shut. He grinned broadly as he saw Rufi walking out.

“Pauli,” Rufi said with a grin of his own, embracing the portly HobGoblin. “Did you bring him?” he whispered in his ear as they hugged.

“They already knew. He was waiting for me,” Pauli whispered back.

“Shit.” They separated, and Rufi cupped Pauli’s face, turned it so he could look at his shiner, and tutted loudly. “Who told you to knuckle up with a damned Troll.”

“Couldn’t let him ruin those pretty looks of yours, could I?” Pauli said with a wolfish grin.

“You got the heart of a lion Paul,” Rufi chuckled.

Ne’boo cleared his throat loudly, and Rufi turned to him.

“Thank…”

Ne’boo held up a hand.

“Never mind that, nephew. That was foolish. You know better than to go getting drunk and brawling, especially out of our quarter of the city. This could have been very messy if your Uncle hadn’t acted so swiftly.”

“I know,” Rufi said, trying to give the HobGoblin a rueful grin, but it died on his bloody lips.

“Get back to the Hall, get yourself cleaned up, and report to your Uncle. Immediately.” Ne’boo waved at the driver to open the door to his cab. “And next time have the sense to run, I don’t need my mornings wasted with your foolishness.”

With that, Ne’boo climbed into his carriage and was gone.

“I fucking hate that guy,” Rufi growled and spat on the cobbles.

"Yeah, but he’s good at what he does,” Pauli said, opening their own carriage door. “Come on. Uncle Sam’s gonna have the scales off your ass as it is. Let’s not piss him off further by being late.”

“I’m starving,” Rufi grumbled as he eased himself into the carriage, holding his ribs.

“Later.” Pauli whistled at the driver, and they took off. "Let's find out what your Uncle wants first."