The breeze rattled the barren tops of the birch and poplar trees like a symphony of hollow bones. Leaves leftover from the autumn past, curled and slick with slime, tumbled lazily across the swampy ground, stirring the air with the growing stench of forest rot. The harsh call of a blue jay rang in the distance. Rasp, however, noticed none of this over his own pained wheezing. Save for one sound, which dragged him kicking and screaming from his internal wallowing.
“You’re lucky I don’t tell Father about this,” Faris snapped.
The bolts of lightning slamming between his sore legs had lessened to a deep, throbbing ache. Hot tears stung Rasp’s eyes as he managed to speak around shaky gasps. “You’re lucky I don’t tell him you whore me out for fights!”
Faris’s father, the esteemed Judge Trant Belfast, served as the elected official for the sleepy village of Lonebrook. A former soldier turned peacekeeper, Trant had been attempting to teach Rasp the joys of reformation and what it meant to embrace a future without violence. The judge’s efforts, albeit noble, had fallen largely on deaf ears. Rasp could strive to be a better person, sure. But violence was a basic tenet of being a mountain man. And as much as Rasp enjoyed protesting Faris’s arranged fights, he enjoyed the actual fighting even more.
“Go ahead, tell him,” Faris said. “He’ll have no choice but to appoint you a new keeper. And let’s be honest here, you’re a handful. The whole village knows it. No one would accept. Father would be forced to take up the position himself. Do you really want to spend your days listening to him drone on about the philosophies of the enlightened mind? Or would you rather stir up shit with me?”
Rasp decided no answer was better than confirming what Faris obviously already knew.
“That’s what I thought.”
The sensible thing would have been to let it go. Sensible, however, was not how Rasp had ended up as a long-term guest of the Belfast household. A guest who couldn’t leave or go outside to take a piss without someone hovering over him, for that matter. Rasp raised his head from the cradle of his arms and hawked a glob of phlegm in the vicinity of what he hoped was Faris’s smug face.
“Gods dammit!” There was a rustle of damp foliage as the faun scrambled backward out of spitting range. “What is with you today? You claim you don’t want to fight, but you’ve been trying to pick a scrap with me since breakfast. The whole reason for the matches is to vent your rage in a controlled environment. Which you love, by the way. Why are you acting like an ungrateful brat all of a sudden?” Why indeed?
An uneasy feeling had been gnawing at his insides all morning, hanging heavy in his soul like a black cloud on the horizon. Rasp could feel the winds of change stirring. What exactly it would bring, he didn’t know. His life in Lonebrook wasn’t anything spectacular. But it was a life, at the very least—a living, breathing one that allowed him to exist outside the confines of a prison cell. Something worth celebrating, really, considering his people wanted him dead and his enemies wanted him deader. A quiet existence in Lonebrook was the absolute best his outcast ass could hope for.
Rasp couldn’t say any of this, of course. Faris wasn’t born the cursed offspring of a mighty Stoneclaw leader. He wouldn’t understand. And there were some things that just couldn’t be explained to outsiders. “I don’t know what you’re yammering on about. The only thing troubling me is my stomach. Must be those oats you tried to poison me with earlier.”
“Fine, don’t tell me,” Faris said. “If you want to avoid the subject so badly, we’ll get right down to business. You’re still fighting in today’s match. And we’re headed there next. But first, you’re gonna hand over whatever it is you stole.”
Or I’m going to kick you in the gems again was the part Faris didn’t need to say. Stifling a groan, Rasp eased upright and searched his pockets. He produced a spoon, a butter knife, and what he suspected was a little tidbit of jewelry, and deposited them into Faris’s outstretched hand.
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“This is Mum’s earring. She’s been looking for this one,” Faris said with a remarkable lack of accusation in his voice.
Rasp was a thief, yes, but not of jewelry. And certainly not anything belonging to Faris’s saint of a mother, Novera Belfast. Rasp only pocketed things of the sharp, stabby variety. The earring was something he’d simply picked up during one of his restless nights wandering the halls while the rest of the household slept, pleasantly unaware of his nocturnal activities.
“Where’d you find it?” Faris asked.
“In my foot.” That was the trouble with wandering without shoes. You found a lot of interesting things with the bottoms of your feet. The earring hadn’t been nearly as bad as the time he found the lost embroidery needle.
Faris pried Rasp’s fingers back and placed the earring in the center of his palm. “You’d make her day if you returned it to her. She might even bake those sweet buns you like so much.”
“I was waiting for the right moment.” Rasp had hoped to give it to her in private, away from the watchful eye of her son. While he normally enjoyed Faris’s relentless taunting, sometimes it reminded him too much of home. Faris was like the unofficial seventh brother that Rasp neither wanted nor asked for, but got all the same. “She seemed sad the last few days. Did you notice?”
Faris produced a hoarse laugh from the back of his throat as he reached under Rasp’s arm and heaved him upright. “The Iron Devil’s got a soft spot for my mum. Who would have thought?”
“Maybe I’ve just got a soft spot for her buns.” Rasp ducked to the side to avoid Faris’s upcoming slap. He was semi-successful; Faris’s hand glanced harmlessly off Rasp’s shoulder. He spun out of range, throwing his arms out at his sides in a playful manner. “What? I can’t help it. They’re so warm and buttery. Don’t get me started on the sticky sweetness. It’s no wonder your father hoards them all to himself.”
The faun’s stocky shape bridged the distance between them in a single lunge. “If I hear another word out of your mouth about my mum, I’m going to jump into that ring and kick your ass myself.”
Rasp linked his elbow with Faris’s and started off at a clumsy skip, not entirely sure what direction he was supposed to be going. He picked one nevertheless, certain Faris would correct their trajectory along the way. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Dingle. It’s cruel to keep stringing me along with that same empty threat, you know.”
“Stop prancing and save your energy for the match. I don’t want another repeat of the woodcutter incident.”
Rasp slowed his pace to match Faris’s. He did so not out of obedience, but for the fact that he’d tweaked his knee in the tumble and skipping sent jolts of white hot agony up his thigh with every unnecessary bounce. A point in the favor of his opponent, he supposed. Rasp rarely lost a match. Maybe today would be some lucky sap’s day. Maybe Rasp would lose on purpose, just to stick it to Faris.
“The woodcutter? I won that one.”
“You bit the man’s ear off! I had to pay him half the pot to keep his mouth shut. You revert to dirty tricks when you’re tired. Which is great for the crowds, don’t get me wrong. Half the people are there just to see what stunt you’re going to pull. But you’ve got to rein it in a little. We’re starting to draw attention.”
It was only the tip of the ear, technically. Not the whole thing. And Rasp had been generous enough to spit it out and give it back afterward. “Fine,” he said. “Who’s on the chopping block today?”
“The blacksmith.”
“Again?” He would have thought the smith had learned his lesson by now. There were only so many times you could have your nose broken before you realized that fighting wasn’t your forte. The blacksmith outmatched him in both size and strength, but Rasp hailed from the Iron Ridge. Combat was his people’s favorite pastime and as such, mountain folk warriors were downright vicious. As were their healers and foragers and schoolteachers. Gods above, even the babies could bite off an unsuspecting finger when they wanted.
Faris’s gruff voice cut back in. “I suspect the blacksmith is out for revenge.”
“It was just a nose break!”
“Not for that. It was the hickey you planted on his neck afterward. His missus wasn’t very pleased. Seamus had to spend the next week sleeping in the forge, from what I heard.”
A snaggletoothed grin spread across Rasp’s thin mouth. “So you’re saying I should rub some lip color on his collar this time? Dingle, you devious little cuss. You really shouldn’t encourage me this way.”
Faris hooked his arm tighter and pulled Rasp along the slippery trail with a grunt. “Just focus on winning the match, alright? Seamus is not as twisted as you are, but he is bigger. And he’s going to come at you with everything he’s got.”