Four men came out of a lane and deployed across the way. They were dirty, unkempt, sour-smelling; beard stubble showed that two had not used any inhibitor for some time. One kept a pistol tucked under his belt, one flourished a club, one carried a knife, while a bola danced in the hands of the fourth.
“Well, well,” said the first. “Well, well, well. Just stop where you are, if you please.”
Shan U crouched, mewed, bottled his tail.
Chill crawled along Diana’s spine. “What do you want?” she demanded.
“Oh, nothing bad, nothing bad.” They slouched and sidled forward. “Welcome to our fair com-mu-nity, little lady. How’d you like a good time?”
“Kindly let us by.”
“Now, now, don’t be in such a rush.” The pistoleer stroked the butt of his weapon. His free thumb he jerked at the bola man, who grinned and sent a ball whistling through the air. “Easy, take it easy. Just a friendly warning. You make a rush to get away, and Chelo here, why, Chelo hasn’t had any live target to practice on for days. That thing could break your ankle, lady. All we want to do is show you a real good time, and maybe have a little fun with the monkey-cat. Come along, now.”
Diana lunged. Her knife flew forth. It was Tigery steel, the back heavy and rasp-surfaced, the edge sharp enough to cut a floating hair. Suddenly the shirtfront of the pistoleer gushed red. He howled. She pushed him against the clubber. They fell together. She stepped on the Adam’s apple of the clubber, and heard it crack, in the course of attacking the knifeman. He slashed at her not unskillfully, but she parried, gave him the rasp across his face, and opened his fighting arm on the inside from elbow to wrist, after which he lost interest in anything but trying to stanch the blood. At this range the bola artist could not exercise his craft well. She severed the cord of a ball that snapped toward her, swayed back out of the way of the rest, and chased him several meters before letting him escape.
“C’mon,” she said through the ululations at her feet, “let’s get out of here ‘fore the cops arrive.”
“Hee-yao!” gasped Shan U as they made off. “I thought I knew about handling trouble, but you—”
“Oh, I don’t go lookin’ for fights,” Diana said. “In fact, I hate them. I’d’ve tried to talk or bluff us past those klongs peacefully. But they weren’t listenin’. Well, I grew up amongst Tigeries on Imhotep, and when they see danger clear before them, they don’t shilly-shally.”
Targovi, I learned from you. Pain smote her. What has your fate been, dear brotherlin?
“Do you think the, the casualties will live?”
“I didn’t try to do anything fatal, but there wasn’t time for finickin’, was there? Does it matter?”
Beneath the coolness she felt a dull but strengthening shock. She hadn’t done anything like this before—not really—though Targovi had put her through lots of practice; and she had been around when a couple of Tigery brawls got bloody; and she had, herself, perforce been physically pretty emphatic three or four times when human males got the wrong idea and couldn’t be persuaded out of it otherwise. I’ll prob’ly have the shakes for a while, once the adrenalin wears off. But not for long, I hope. I mustn’t let what I’ve been through, what I’ve seen, prey on my mind. Nothin’ was done here except justice. The war, now, the war is different, people killin people they’ve got no grudge against and have never even met. Though some wars in history have been the lesser evil, haven’t they?
I don’t know, she thought in rising weariness. I simply don’t know. How good it’ll be, floatin quietly down the river with Axor, if that works out.
She lost track of time and was a bit startled when they came to the waterfront. Warehouses bulked behind wharfs where a medley of craft lay tied and a hodgepodge of persons, human and nonhuman, bustled about. Machines scurried among them. Beyond, the stream flowed broad and brown. The opposite shore was dimmed by a thickening rain. Shan U registered a feline dislike of the wet, but Diana welcomed its warm sluicing. She felt cleansed.