“The kids don’t need to be part of this,” Leo said immediately. He turned to Eret and Linua. “Leave. Now.”

“Ah, ah, ah,” Tuwa Shone sang, holding his hand up. “Not so fast.” He snapped his fingers, as if summoning a dog, and more shadows appeared in the doorway, people outlined against the light. They filed past him, lining the walls in orderly rows. All of them were in their late teens or early twenties, and wore scruffy street gear. One of them grabbed the sliding door and hauled it shut, leaving the boathouse illuminated only by dim light of the single bulb overhead.

“Nim’s balls, Bead, don’t do this,” Leo pleaded.

Tuwa Shone shrugged.

“I am simply reacting to events.” He smiled at Horn. “Horn, I wasn’t expecting you. What brings you here?”

Horn blinked rapidly. It was clear he had no idea what was going on, but he could see something was wrong.

“I received a phone call recently,” he said, uncertainly. “During which I was told Leo was missing, and had been for twenty years. However, I had received a letter from him … oh, perhaps ten years ago? So I knew that couldn’t be right. I tried looking him up in the phone book and … well, anyway, to cut a long story short I was concerned. I tried to get in touch with you, Bead—I still had a telephone number for his dad’s old business—but the number was no longer active.” He gestured to the boat house. “I have been meaning to visit a colleague at Herkow University for some time, and it was the weekend, so I cancelled my plans, and decided … and well, here I am.”

“And what a delightful surprise it is too,” Tuwa Shone said warmly. “I am sure you will come in useful.”

Linua had stopped watching Tuwa Shone and started scanning the new arrivals. The physical threat would come from them. There were at least ten of them, not including Tuwa Shone. Several of them had their hands shoved in their pockets, which were big enough to hide weapons of some sort. One of them was carrying a small wooden chest, but he was the only one who didn’t have his hands free. Even if they didn’t know any wushu, eleven against four was too much. There was only one thing Linua could do.

She opened her mouth and screamed loudly.

Everyone jumped and turned to her. For a few moments, no-one did anything. Encouraged, Linua took a few steps back and banged loudly on the wall of the boatshed, still screaming. A few of the crew started towards her, but Tuwa Shone grabbed one of the girls by the arm and said something in her ear. The girl grinned nastily, pulled her hand out of her pocket and pointed the pistol she was holding at Eret.

Linua stopped screaming. The pistol was very black and very real, and the girl’s finger was touching the trigger guard. Linua was afraid even to breath, in case that somehow caused the girl’s finger to tighten.

She could only hope that Pickle and Solly had heard and signalled to Anith to call the police. They probably had done so as soon as they saw Tuwa Shone and his little gang of teenagers, but now they could report they had heard banging and screaming too, and maybe that would make the police more likely to take them seriously.

“Good girl,” Tuwa Shone said warmly. “I’m glad you decided to do the sensible thing. Well, I was hoping to spend some time catching up with my old university buddies, and having a bit of chit chat, but never mind that now.”

Horn had been rooted to the spot while all this had been going on, but now he roused himself.

“Bead, what are you doing?”

“I am no longer Bead,” Tuwa Shone said. “As I told you, my name is Tuwa Shone. I would advise you to use it if you wish to address me. At present, my dear old friend, I don’t wish to speak to you.”

“But … I mean … really, a gun?”

“Shut up,” Tuwa Shone said, with sudden venom. Horn blinked and took half a step back. Tuwa Shone’s face smoothed out immediately, as if he hadn’t spoken. He looked around at them all thoughtfully. “Now, where was I?”

“For Nimras’s sake, Be … Shone, not the kids!” Leo burst out.

Tuwa Shone looked around at his crew, bland and smiling.

“Which particular children are you referring to?”

Leo flushed. “Not your filthy little acolytes.” He pointed at Eret and Linua. “I meant them, They don’t have anything you want.”

Tuwa Shone’s smile widened.

“Oh, but you are wrong. I do need them. This is a unique opportunity for me, don’t you understand? I have been working quite hard this week to put everything in position. I even sacrificed my top lieutenant, who is now facing several years in jail.”

“You sent the intruder,” Linua said suddenly. “The one who broke into my house.”

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“Of course I did, my child.”

His voice, full of a sort of faux avuncular approval, made a shiver of distaste travel up her spine.

“At first it was just to find out what you knew, after one of my acolytes heard you talking to your boyfriend about contacting a journalist, right after you both visited Leo at the boathouse. But when he broke in you caught him and trounced him. My top fighter! So, I looked into you and found out who you were. That’s when I realised how much I needed you.”

That sounded really, really bad.

Tuwa Shone grinned wider.

“But by that point you had bodyguards. I sent my boy around breaking into other people’s homes, made the police think it was just a random thief, with orders to make sure he got caught. Your bodyguards got pulled off yesterday. And now, here you are, delivering yourself up to me in one neatly tied little package. It’s fate!”

He switched moods instantly again, the smile evaporating as if it had never been, and a little frown appearing between his eyes.

“I was going to spend some time here being creative. Here I am with two perfect scapegoats.” He gestured carelessly to Horn and Leo. “One of them could have been the kidnapper, the other one the heroic bystander who tried to rescue you. I could have been so artistic about it! But after all that banging and screaming someone might have called the police. I simply don’t have time to set it up right. So, we’ll all have to go.”

“G…” Horn swallowed. “Go where?”

The smile switched on again, brilliantly and without warning.

“I can’t wait to show you!” Tuwa Shone turned to Linua. “You are going to let Jaiya and Nancine here tie your hands together. If you don’t, Ceci will shoot your boyfriend. Are you going to be good?”

Linua couldn’t see a way out of it.

“Okay,” she said. Her voice didn’t work properly the first time, so she had to repeat herself.

They fastened her wrists using a zip tie with practised efficiency, as if they had done this many times before. Linua shivered again.

Tuwa Shone sent two of his acolytes outside to make sure there were no police or concerned citizens primed to investigate the boathouse. Two more were dispatched to ‘make the boat ready.’ Tuwa Shone then ordered Linua and Eret to be bracketed by one acolyte each, with Ceci following behind. Eret had spent all this time frozen and staring. Linua hoped he wasn’t having flashbacks. She saw Leo step up to him and put hand on his shoulder.

“Snap out of it, man,” Leo said roughly.

“Leave him alone,” Linua cried. “He got kidnapped last year.”

Tuwa Shone recaptured their attention by bursting into laughter.

“Did he really? How priceless!” He gestured to the group to walk out of the boathouse, and turned to Horn and Leo. “Leo, I think you know by now not to make trouble, don’t you? And Horn, you don’t strike me as a troublemaker, but if you do cause any issues I will kill Leo and frame you for his murder. Alright?” He said that last bit brightly, as if he was making arrangements to meet up for dinner.

That was the last Linua heard before she was pulled out into the evening, still bright after the dimness of the boathouse. Her hands were wrapped in scarf to hide the rope, and one of the acolytes—Nancine—had flung an arm around her shoulder. Nancine wore a fluorescent green top and cycling shorts, and had dyed her hair green at some point too, but the dye had faded and now it just looked mouldy. Jaiya had linked arms with Linua, and was pulling her across the sand. She caught Linua glancing at her and smirked, and Linua realised it was the girl she had seen in the chocolate and ice cream shop who had been eyeing up Eret.

Jaiya had probably been close enough to overhear some of the conversation between Linua and Eret when Eret had had his panic attack—Linua remembered they’d referred to the journalist then.

That was probably why Leo had disappeared for a week. He’d been scared of Tuwa Shone.

Tuwa Shone must have had his acolytes keeping a watch on the boathouse. Leo seemed to know something about Tuwa Shone’s activities, but Linua didn’t think they were allies. It was more like Tuwa Shone had some kind of power over Leo—probably the fact that Leo had spent twenty years pretending to be Bead.

Linua looked casually around but the acolyte hanging onto her arm gave her a shake and said roughly, “Eyes front.” In the quick glance Linua had taken she had seen no sign of Anith, Pickle or Solly. She hoped they were okay, and that they were off somewhere calling the police.

Linua could make a run for it now. She could easily throw these two off, but Ceci, who was following at the back, would be free to shoot Eret. Would she really shoot Eret in front of all these people? It was evening, so there were still people on the beach going for evening walks, or sitting in the late night cafés that lined the promenade. Linua couldn’t risk it.

Instead of running, she let them pull her down the beach and onto a jetty, where a forest of masts bobbed at anchor. Their destination was a fishing boat of some sort, about thirty feet long. It reeked of fish and had several crab cages scattered on the deck. Stencilled on the bow was the name A Reel Lady. The acolytes milled around on the deck uncertainly, waiting for direction, but it was only a minute before Tuwa Shone arrived.

He clapped his hands.

“Well done my dear children! Good work.”

He split his force in two, leaving five behind to keep watch and warn him of any pursuit, and kept five on the boat.

Four versus six was much better odds than four versus ten, but Eret, Leo and Horn had had to submit to having their wrists fastened with zip ties as well, and Tuwa Shone ordered his acolytes to re-tie Linua’s hands behind her back. That was a shame, because during an episode of Keng Boh Kids at Castle Yi, one of the cousins had shown everyone a method for breaking out of zip ties, but they’d only tried it with their hands tied at the front. Linua wasn’t sure that she could get enough leverage with her hands tied behind her.

When she had rescued Eret last year, none of the kidnappers had expected her to be an effective combatant. She’d disarmed one of them because he had been facing away from her, and not expecting an attack. But Tuwa Shone had researched Linua’s background extensively. He knew exactly who she was, and she had already outed herself by fighting his lieutenant. The same tactic wouldn’t work here.

The five acolytes who had stayed on the boat all looked older—they were the ones in their later teens or twenties. The ones who had been left behind had only looked Linua’s age. The older ones on the boat would be Tuwa Shone’s senior, most trusted acolytes, she thought. This included the three who had hustled Linua down the beach. Ceci now had the pistol thrust into her pocket.

The boat had already been cast away from the pier. Nancine was driving it whilst Jaya threw the crab cages overboard to make more space on the deck.

Helged would be frantic when Linua didn’t come back. She pushed down the panic at the thought, just leaving the hollow, aching, empty churn of fear inside.