The Great Big Fairy (The Fairies Saga Book 4) Page 18

  Mr. Jonathan and his pistol had followed them from town.

  “And, I will get my nigger back!” he added. “Come on, men; bring the chains. He won’t move as long as I have this pistol pointed at him.”

  Mr. Jonathan marched up to the unarmed pair and motioned for his mob of vigilantes to follow.

  Benji slowly brought his feet under himself to assume a squatted pose as he surveyed his chances of subduing the hesitant horde. He looked over at Jane and saw she was terrified. He gulped as he remembered that a slave would be put to death for touching a white man without his permission. He couldn’t expect her to lift a hand in her own defense…or his. He’d have to war alone. And, with the odds he was facing today, it looked like it would be best if he waged it with words.

  “What, ye think that ye can jest strut in here and take my property?” Benji accused loudly, “Isna that stealing? I mean, I do have a legal bill of sale here. Dinna ye ken that if ye try to take what is mine, then I’ll jest have ye arrested and get her back?”

  “Who are you going to tell?” Mr. Jonathan growled back with a sneer. “There aren’t any constables or magistrates in this area. I’m the only law around here. What I say goes. Come on men; don’t be bashful.”

  Eight men ambled in reluctantly from their secreted positions in the trees, armed with chains, hammers, and a wide range of cutting implements. Benji stood up slowly and dramatically, crossing his arms in front of himself to assume his Titan stance. They’d have to get past him to get to her, and he wanted them to know it.

  The posture worked. The men’s arms fell slack at their sides, a few of them letting loose and dropping their improvised weapons. Mr. Jonathan turned back and saw the fear in his minion’s eyes. “Don’t let him scare you, men. There’s only one of him. And if he comes at you, he’ll get this right between the eyes,” he said, as he shook his pistol at Benji and looked at his men.

  “That’s what ye think,” Benji screamed. He lunged forward and rushed him, making sure his shoulder came up under the man’s gun arm.

  Mr. Jonathan’s hand flew skywards with the impact of the full body tackle, and his pistol fired wildly in the air. The mob pulled back from the fracas, afraid that the brawling giant would go after them next.

  Benji rolled over and pulled away from his winded, would-be assassin who was now laid out, stunned and gasping on the dusty clearing floor. He stood up and re-evaluated the new situation. He threw a threatening glare at each of the men, intent on intimidating, terrorizing, or both, the motley crew.

  Mr. Jonathan regained his breath and shouted desperately from ground level, “Ten dollars to the man who brings me that nigger! And ten more to the man who gets him in chains! Get him! He’s gonna be mine!”

  Suddenly, eight men with newfound, monetary infused courage were encircling Benji; their scythes, chains, and hammers raised, ready to take him down. “Ye think ye can do it?” Benji taunted. “There hasna been a chain forged that could hold me, ye cowards. Come on, come on little chick, chick, chickies,” he chided as he waved his right index finger to one then another in the crowd, as if selecting his next victim. “Who wants to be the first to go down?”

  Benji heard an involuntary squeak behind him. He turned his head slightly, and saw that Mr. Jonathan had made use of his distraction with the crowd, and come up behind Jane. He had her captive. His right hand held a knife at her ribs, extracting a slow dribble of blood from his firm pressure. His other hand was kneading her shoulder, as if he was welcoming home a lost dog. “It looks like I just saved myself ten dollars,” he crowed. “Go get him, boys. I’ll make that fifteen dollars to the man who locks him up!”

  The motivation of more money, and their boss’s triumph over the slave woman, erased the mob’s fears. They paused long enough to look at one another, acknowledging with a shared nod that it was all for one and one for all: they’d split the reward money.

  Four of the men rushed him at the same time. Benji grabbed the arm of the first one who reached him, a skinny youth broadly swinging a scythe. He quickly twisted the tool out of his hand and grabbed him by his now empty wrists, swinging the boy’s body like a hammer throw, shooing the gang away with the flying teen. He let loose of the helpless and stunned youth, then turned him around and kicked him in the butt, knocking him to the edge of the circle, where he stumbled forward to hug the ground, reluctant to get up for more.

  Now Benji had a weapon. “It’s nae so good as a broadsword,” he boasted as he brandished the blade with a showman’s flourish, “but I’ll wager I can take every one of ye cowards down with it.” He challenged the wary vigilantes, pivoting in a tight circle to glare briefly at each man individually.

  The now unsure rag tag posse had him surrounded, but he let them know with a glower that it wouldn’t be easy if they even could take him. He was going to hurt many, if not all of them, in the process.

  “Twenty dollars!” Mr. Jonathan yelled to them in encouragement.

  The promise of a larger reward to split emboldened the gang. They surged toward Benji in a human wave, their tools of destruction ready to deploy. Benji ducked and missed the first hammer thrown at his head, but the second one came at him just as a chain wrapped around his ankles. The maul hit him in the middle of his back, causing him to lose his balance and stumble forward.

  His fall was broken by the broad chest of a greasy man in an apron who was very happy to have his bounty off balance. The growling blacksmith quickly threw a loop of rope over Benji’s head, catching him under the nose. Benji ducked and twisted and tucked his neck in, finally able to shake off the noose completely. He grabbed the rope with his left hand and jerked it hard, pulling its owner to him in one, quick movement. Benji flung his right forearm up, and caught his assailant under the chin, snapping the blacksmith’s neck with the short, sharp blow. He picked up the fallen hammer, hastily cinching up the head of the maul in the noose. He swung it around his head like the hammer of Thor, growling like a cougar, hoping to discourage any more assaults.

  It worked. The men retreated, no longer interested in their attack. Benji saw that the blacksmith—the oily man in the long leather apron—was probably dead. He hadn’t meant to kill him, but his forearm reflex must have broken his neck. The angle of the man’s head wasn’t conducive to breathing, his eyes were fixed with a wide-open, unblinking stare, and his chest was still and silent. Yes, he was definitely dead.

  “Now, nobody else need be hurt,” said Benji, as he looked each lackey in the eye, counting heads to make sure they were all accounted for. She’s mine,” he said as he nodded to Jane, still held at knifepoint, “and yer boss man is jest a bit greedy. Dinna let the man be makin’ ye do things that arena fair or legal. He may say he’s the law, but ye’ll have to answer to the Real Man later,” he said and nodded toward heaven. “Thou shalt not steal and not bear false witness, either…”

  “Don’t listen to him,” Mr. Jonathan cried out desperately as he saw his gang of wannabe cutthroats start to look like a flock of sheep. “I don’t care what he says: I am the law around here. Do you want your loans called in right now? I’ll take each and every one of your homes and businesses, and you know I can.”

  Benji, ankles still wrapped in the chain that had caused him to fall, sidled away from the men, turning slightly so he could look the town boss in the eye. “What makes ye think yer shit doesna stink?” Benji asked snidely. He’d have to play the head game again. At least this man was ill equipped for it and could be intimidated easily.

  “What did you say?” the stunned, dimwitted dictator replied, his hand no longer kneading Jane’s shoulder.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” said Benji condescendingly, “I forgot, yer mentally challenged. I mean, ye canna read nor write, and yer not much to look at. If it werena for that gun ye show off or the money ye steal, ye’d be no better than a hound dog. I mean, a hound dog canna read, nor write either. At least he can get his own food, though. I’ll bet ye dinna even ken how to fish…”

  �
�You’re, you’re, you’re just stupid!” Mr. Jonathan screamed in exasperation. He was losing the showdown, and he knew it. But, he also had an ace up his sleeve. “I may not know how to do some things,” he admitted boldly, “but I have yer nigger and you don’t!” He glared at Benji, then pulled his right hand back, and thrust his knife into Jane’s side.

  Benji flashed lightning hot rage, rushing the brute before he even blinked. Jane quickly spun out of his hold, escaping her captor and allowing her rescuer full access to the man who now held nothing but a knife hasp.

  Benji’s left fist flew forward and broke Mr. Jonathan’s nose, crunching the cartilage up into his eye sockets. As his left hand pulled back, he powered off a right upper cut, catching the fiend squarely under the chin, sending him straight up in the air, landing flat on his back, right at Benji’s feet. Benji leaned over the town boss, meaning to pummel his face until it was the consistency of raw sausage, but froze at her words. “Watch out!” Jane screamed.

  Benji turned around and saw a hefty man with a huge, ornate cavalry saber rushing toward him. Benji’s feet were still tangled up with the chain. He was trapped where he was and without a weapon. He dodged the first thrust of the sword and rolled onto his side, kicking at the mass of iron links wrapped around his ankles, trying to free himself from his twelve-pound prison before the man struck again.

  The others in the gang found courage now that Benji was on the ground. They gathered around him like jackals on a downed zebra, cheering on the swordsman, eager for their share of the lion’s prey and the bounty. “Argh!” the big man screamed as he thrust anew. Benji’s feet came up as one and deflected the blow, knocking his attacker off balance. The assailant was quick on his feet, though, and came back for another assault.

  Jane ran towards Benji’s saber wielding attacker, and dove in front of his feet, tripping him before he could reach his target: her master, her friend.

  The man stumbled sideways, instinctively placing his sword in front of himself to break his fall. In his awkward attempt to stay upright, the swordsman inadvertently skewered the downed Mr. Jonathan.

  The town boss was alive, but stunned, flat on his back, the sword straight through his cowardly and portly belly, pinned to the ground.

  Benji rolled over and saw the blade that had missed him was now stuck in another. He gulped in shock as he saw the blood spurting out of the fallen man—the manipulative, thieving gambler whose nose he had just broken, the bully who he had wanted to kill for knifing Jane. The brainless brute’s body was flailing like a fish out of water. “Take it out of him,” Benji yelled to the swordsman. He hated Mr. Jonathan and everything he stood for, but he couldn’t stand to see him suffer.

  But, the swordsman who had accidentally stabbed the evil town boss didn’t obey. He looked down and watched the now trembling body slow in both its blood spurting and thrashing. The body was still alive, though. He shook his head at no one in particular. He couldn’t believe that he had just stabbed his own brother-in-law.

  Benji, still bound by the tangle of chains around his ankles and unable to stand, crawled on his elbows to Mr. Jonathan. He put his hands around the sword wound, trying to staunch the flow, but he knew it was futile. All of a sudden, he realized that the man under his hands was yelling, screaming the non-words of indescribable agony. “Be still,” Benji ordered, then turned to ask the horde, “Willna somebody pull this blasted sword out of him?”

  But, nobody was listening to him. Benji changed his focus to the chains around his calves and ankles. After what seemed like an hour, but was more like thirty seconds, he was free and able to stand up. He stood above the body—now silent and only twitching—and put one foot next to the saber, grabbed the ornate hilt, and pulled the weapon from the victim’s belly. Only a slight trickle of blood and stinking greenish brown slime came out with it. The body was spent. The vacant, unblinking eyes verified the loss of life.

  The stench made Benji turn his head and gag. He paused to compose himself then brought his head back up and saw seven pairs of eyes staring at him. He looked to the side and saw Jane’s head bowed, shoulders drooped. He’d have to take care of this situation’s damage control right away.

  “Weel, I think we have a lot of witnesses here who saw a tragic accident,” he said, using the tone of his voice to take command. He walked away from the dead body and looked at the group. “It looks to me like this fine man here was chasin’ off a…a…wolf and tripped. The saber went right through Mr. Jonathan here. It was a shame that the wolf got away, but I’m sure that all of ye here will testify that it was jest an accident. And, it looked like Mr. Jonathan had also tripped and fell earlier, landin’ on his face, bustin’ up his nose, right?”

  Benji asked for confirmation with words, but he was actually looking for the real answers in their eyes. “But, but,” a small man in the back mumbled, and pointed at Jane.

  Benji walked toward the objector who scrambled backwards until he was stopped by an inconveniently placed tree. “Did ye see the lass lay a hand on anyone?” he asked. The man shook his head, but pointed to the place where Jane had dived, tripping the man in order to stop his attack on Benji.

  “Oh, ye mean that the lass jumped in front of the wolf to try and keep it from hurtin’ Mr. Jonathan? I mean, that’s what I saw. How about ye?” Benji asked, then looked at the man with his cold, blue eyes squinted, daring him to deny the fabricated alibi.

  “Um,” he replied, then bit his lip, shaking his head minimally, not willing to agree.

  Benji pulled back his shoulders and tried a different tactic. He took a deep breath. “I was jest wonderin’…now that Mr. Jonathan is deid, who’s in charge? I mean, he said he was the law—that he could take yer homes and lands, call in yer notes if the whim hit him. Who’s the new man in charge who’ll get all yer assets? Or,” he suggested, “are ye gonna to have a town meetin’ and select a real magistrate? I mean, it sounds like a reasonable idea. That is, of course, after a proper burial fer him.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Murmurs were tossed back and forth among six of the seven, but the accidental assassin stayed mute. He looked back on the men and said, “Grab some blankets off the horses. Let’s wrap him up and take him back to town for his funeral.” He chuckled, “But first, we’ll have an open casket so we can all spit on him. Let’s make sure my sister gets first shot. She’s earned it.”

  Benji noticed that there was a new leader in town. But, this new lion who had accidentally taken down the old one seemed to be working with the men, not by intimidation, but by mutual agreement. They might have a chance.

  Benji walked up to the new boss man. “I’m sorry fer the loss of the, um, blacksmith there,” he said as he nodded to the big man with the face forever frozen in shock. “It was an accident. I was jest meanin’ to knock him away. I dinna think I hit him that hard.”

  The new boss shrugged his shoulders. “No loss there. He pretty much fed Mr. Jonathan’s perversions. He even designed the little brand they put on my sister. I’ll never forgive either one of them for that. We’ll be haulin’ him away, too. Sorry to have interrupted your breakfast. I don’t mean to be rude, but it might be best if you two left and never came back. I don’t think these men will change their stories, but she seems to upset them. I think they’re a bit jealous of her size and strength.” The brother-in-law looked over at Jane, crouched on the ground, holding her side. “I think you ought to take care of her wound. There seems to be a lot of blood comin’ out.”

  Benji nodded to the man and rushed to Jane’s side. “Can ye make it to the creek?” She nodded in answer, both of her lips sucked into her mouth, trying to contain the pain and urge to scream out. “Wait jest a minute and I’ll help ye.”

  Benji dashed to their makeshift tent, grabbed his sporran, and rushed back to her side to help her walk to the water’s edge. He glanced back and saw the men dragging the two corpses on improvised blanket sleds, not paying heed to the roughness of the trail caused by the stones and fallen branches.
One man used the shovel he had initially bought as a weapon to dig a shallow pit. He was scraping the stinking mess of blood and body fluids into it, doing a quick and efficient job of cleaning up traces of the ‘incident.’

  “oof,” Jane cried as she started to fall, grabbing Benji’s arm for support. Tears started flowing, but they weren’t from the pain: she hated to show any sign of weakness.

  “Hold onto this,” Benji said, and handed her the sporran. Jane clutched it with her weakened right hand. Her left arm stayed crossed in front of her body, holding onto the knife wound, trying to keep the blade that was still stuck between her ribs from being jostled or moved.

  Benji came around to her left side, squatted down beside her, and put his left arm behind her knees, his right under her shoulder. “I shouldna asked ye to walk,” he grunted as he walked with her in his arms over the uneven rocks to the creek.

  He set her down carefully and whispered, “Wait,” and ran to their site, took the tent down, and bundled up the camouflaged covering. He rushed back to her and opened it out, laying it beside her like a huge tortilla. “Lie on yer good side,” he ordered gently. “I’m gonna have to do some doctorin’, and I want to wrap what bits of ye that dinna need fixin’ with the cloth. Yer getting’ chilled, even if it is warm out. Yer in shock, Janie, but I’ll take care of ye, aye?”

  “aye,” she answered softly, and did as he instructed, gingerly scooting onto the soft fabric.

  Benji covered as much of her nearly nude body as he could, then washed his hands with the soap. He looked over and saw that the cleanup crew was about ready to leave. He stood up and yelled back to them, “Do any of ye happen to have any whisky?”

  The brother-in-law was out of sight, but came into view when he heard the call. “Just a minute,” he hollered back. He walked over to the pile of horse blankets that was the funeral shroud of Mr. Jonathan, pulled back the cloths until he exposed the corpse. He opened out the dead man’s jacket and took out a silver flask. He quickly threw the blankets back over the frozen, anguished face, and walked towards Benji. “Here, will this do?” He looked over at Jane, all wrapped up with her wound exposed, then at Benji with knife in hand. “It’ll burn, but I think she can handle it. You can keep the flask. I doubt anyone else would want it.” He nodded in farewell and went back to join the others.