The Yellow Silk - Don Bassingthwaite [101]
Brin released Black Scratch and grabbed Veseene with both hands, dagger tight to her throat. The old woman's eyes were wide. "You're in no position to make demands!" he spat above the enraged bellows of Black Scratch. Lander jumped in to grab the boar and hold him back, but the beast's squeals spread to the pigs in the shelter. The din was deafening.
Li's hand moved closer to his pocket. "Tell me! The Silk is mine to give. Without an answer, you will never get it, no matter who you threaten!" Brin's face twisted and Li added, "If Yu Mao told you about the Silk, he told you I'm stubborn. Vengeance drove me along the Golden Way. Will one old woman's life stop me?"
"All right!" spat Brin. His sneer was fading, but his eye was as hard and bright as one of the beljurils. "He's gone. Yu Mao died when Sow sank."
The words hit Li like a hammer in the gut, even though he had been half-expecting them. Even though he had been half-hoping for them. The captain's curse-Yu Mao had not lived to forget Sow. Yu Mao was already dead. Suddenly it felt as though a great weight had been lifted from him. The fire of his rage faltered.
Brin must have seen it in his face. His grip on Veseene tightened. "Now give me the Silk!"
Li clenched his teeth and his rage flared back to life. His hand dropped away from his pocket. "Give us Veseene first."
The trick to dealing with Brin, Tycho had said as they made their plans, is always to give him exactly what he wants. Do that and you're safe. It's when he's thwarted that he gets angry, and when he's angry, he's dangerous. Just like a shark.
"The Silk!" Brin snarled.
Li braced himself. "Veseene," he said. In his mind's eye, he saw Tycho's crooked smile. And when a shark is angry, it can't control itself. Try to spear a shark when it's in control and you'll never hit it. Get it mad and it will throw itself on your spear.
Brin's lips curled back. His dagger-bearing right hand flinched away from Veseene to point at his gathered thugs. "Get them!" he howled. "Get the Silk, get the beljurils, and kill them!"
The men lounging against the plank fence hurled themselves across the sty. Lander, Serg, and Nico lunged forward. Bor and Ovel closed from behind.
Words had done all they could do. It was time to spear the shark.
Li drew in a sharp breath, focusing himself. Grace and strength seemed to flow into his limbs. In a single smooth motion, he whirled around, left leg snapping out in a spinning kick that cracked into first Ovel then Bor. The thugs staggered back, stunned. Li let his momentum carry him over into a whirling horizontal flip that took him halfway across the sty. He rose with his sheathed dao held horizontally in front of him and a shout on his lips. "Hrah!"
Stunned by Li's acrobatics, Lander and his men pulled up sharply in confusion and turned to face him-just as Tycho had hoped they would. Mostly as he had hoped, at least. Extra men and wizards? Red Wizards, too. Tycho knew them-Mosi Anu and Hanibaz Nassor. He growled a few choice words for Brin under his breath. In their original plan, he had counted on Li's stunning fighting to keep attackers back. The halfling's additional men, gathered up from across dockside, complicated things. At least he was still in the clear. He spun around to face the thugs from the fence, his hands swirling through the air and his voice ringing out with a song of gentle power.
Four of the thugs dropped to the ground in mid-step, fast asleep. The fifth stumbled, startled by the display of magic. Tycho stepped forward and kicked him viciously in the groin. The man dropped hard. Tycho turned back to face Ovel and Bor as they shook off Li's kick and came back to their feet.
Laera grabbed a spade that was leaning against the wall of the Eel and swung it against Bor's back. The blow was clumsy, but it was enough to send him staggering again. "Tycho!" she called and hurled the spade at him. The bard snatched it out of the air and spun it in a high, menacing sweep. Ovel rocked back, avoiding the heavy metal, but