The men that had barged into the inn looked to be part giant, and they towered over Faye and Gavan by large margins. It was even more pronounced as they were still sitting at their table.

“Well,” the leader of the newcomers said, “looks like we’ll be having more entertainment than what we normally get here, eh, Knossy?”

Knossai skewered the man with a glare, but the way it rolled off him, Faye knew he was only play acting for their benefit.

“What kind of entertainment were you thinking of?” Faye asked.

At first, she was worried the man would fly into a rage, from the ripple of emotion that passed over his face, but he morphed his anger into something approximating amusement.

“There’s all kinds!” he said, spreading his arms wide. “We could wrestle, gamble, tell tales, or drink you under the tables.”

The men chuckled behind their ringleader. It was an anticipatory growl, more reminiscent of a pack of hyenas than any human. Faye narrowed her eyes.

“Of course, there’s one thing I know me an’ the boys’d prefer.”

Faye could not help but make a face. “Ugh, no, thanks, don’t know where you’ve been. Could catch something.”

The man fell silent, staring directly at Faye. She shivered. His eyes were void of emotion.

“No need to be rude,” he replied, much quieter than before.

The silence that fell after those words were tight with tension. Though Faye had leaned back in her chair as if she had not a care in the world, her hand was lying casually in her lap, close to her dagger handle. She dare not draw mana, yet, as she did not know what kind of perception abilities these five had.

“So,” Gavan said into the silence, drawing all five pairs of eyes to him. “Which direction you travelling from?”

They waited for their leader to speak, Faye noted. They each glanced at him, a flicker at most, but enough.

“West,” he allowed, with a twitch of his shoulder to indicate the direction. “Out a ways.”

“Oh, really?” Gavan said. “We were heading that way. How’s the road?”

“It’s fine.” The leader’s eyes narrowed. “What are you heading out west for, exactly?”

Gavan shrugged. “Not sure, got asked to go out there. We go where we’re told.”

The leader had paused and was thinking about Gavan’s words, his narrowed eyes flicking between him and Faye evenly. One of his subordinates cleared his throat.

“Gods, I’m parched. What is there to drink around here, Knossy, eh?”

The innkeeper nodded and moved over to the bar. It seemed he was eager to get the solid wood of the bar surface between him and the men. Faye hardly blamed him. If it were not for her levels and additional constitution since coming here, she would be sweating bullets.

The leader, eventually, took his eyes off Faye and Gavan and made his way over to the bar, too.

She was not sure what he was saying, but the fact that he was speaking and not throwing his muscle around was good enough. For now.

The other four men filtered through the chairs and tables into two tables that separated Gavan and Faye from the exit. They did it casually, but Faye saw it was a practised manoeuvre that effectively cut off Faye’s immediate escape and boxed Gavan in even more heavily.

She took her eyes off the men for a second, pulling her glass up to her lips and watching Gavan’s reaction as she did so.

He was quiet, intense, and focused on the men. She hid a grimace. Gavan’s game face was on. He did not expect this to go well.

Well, neither do I, so I can hardly blame him, can I?

A few minutes later, the leader of this merry band of walking muscle walked back toward the tables. He had a glass in his hand that he held at a precisely sloppy angle that looked too perfectly nonchalant. He was grinning again, in the same awful manufactured way.

Everything about him just set alarm bells ringing in Faye’s mind.

He squeezed through the tables and chairs, his four minions watching his progress with anticipation.

He sat down at the same table that Gavan and Faye were already taking up. The chair he pulled over looked hardly capable of bearing his weight, but it somehow held, creaking as he lowered his weight onto it.

“So, where was it you said you were coming from?” he asked.

“We didn’t,” Gavan supplied, but shrugged as if it did not matter, “but we’re through from Nóremest.”

The man grunted. “City folk. Don’t see your kind out here often.”

Faye caught a glance that the men on the righthand table shared. They had grinned into their shoulders but were hardly subtle about it.

Gavan nodded. “I know, it’s the first time we have taken this route. Not many travellers coming from the west, it seems. I think you five are the first.”

The leader made a face and shrugged. “Don’t know what to tell you.”

Gavan nodded and took a sip of his drink. It was too stiff for Gavan, Faye could tell, but she was sure these men would not be able to tell. He was holding himself a little different, acting his part. She was not sure what part she was supposed to be playing.

“What kind of work do you find out here?” Gavan asked, casually. The men tensed.

“Odd and ends,” the leader replied with a grin, “protecting rich city folk, sometimes.”

Gavan gave the man a perfunctory smile. He gestured to Faye. “My travelling companion is looking to improve her skills. Any of your men good in the ring?”

Faye felt a sudden desire to strangle the mage, but she just grabbed her cup and took a careful swig instead.

“You know what? I think that’s the perfect suggestion. My man, Joss, was just saying he wanted someone to practice on, didn’t you, Joss?”

One of the men nodded, despite his leader not seeing. “Aye, that’s right, practice makes perfect.”

The pack leader’s grin grew wider. “Exactly. Practice. Makes. Perfect.”

As Faye and Gavan exited the inn, sandwiched between the men, she got as close as she could to whisper to him without being too obvious.

“What exactly are you doing?”

“He was going to make some excuse, better to get it over with… outside the inn.”

That was all they could say, because the leader was close on their heels and started talking the moment, they were in the small yard area the inn boasted. The lanterns on either side of the entry gate and a few on the outside of the inn were the only light sources beside the glorious tapestry of stars above their heads. It was a clear night, frosty and bracing.

“Well, it’s chilly so we don’t want to be standing around for too long, eh?” the leader said. “How about this, no skills, weapons allowed?”

Faye frowned.

“To first blood, then?” Gavan said, as if suggesting stabbing each other in the inn’s yard was a normal state of affairs. “Or incapacity, of course.”

The leader grinned, and nodded. “Aye.” He turned away and thumbed over his shoulder when he looked at Joss, who nodded and stepped forward.

Faye turned her head to the side and spoke out the side of her mouth. “What happens if it goes too far?”

“Normally, not a lot. Here, I assume all out brawls. Just play this one normally for now.”

Taking a few steps to their left, opening up space between her and Joss, and the audience, Faye rolled her shoulders and moved her cloak around so that her arms were free. It was too cold right now to remove it fully.

She had no idea what type of combat Joss practised. Normally, she might have gone for the aggressor’s route, here, storming in and breaking through whatever defences her opponent had to score the hit she needed. But that instinct was born from an ordinary world where swordfighting was an historical martial art, not a life or death struggle between two super-powered people.

Here, she would need to take a more defensive stance to ensure she did not make a mistake and get killed in the first seconds of the match.

She drew her sword. The handle fit perfectly in her hand, and she once again found the balance perfect for her. She could not help but smile. Taking up a two-handed stance to begin with, she held her sword at close right, with the point aimed upward at an angle, ending near her eyeline, and her hands down by her hip. Her body was protected by her arms, and her sword was ready for thrusting, or other movements.

“It looks like our fighters are ready,” the leader said, and a moment later, he held up his hand, “then, begin!”

Joss immediately darted forward. His hands were close to his chest as he moved forward on swift feet, his head ducked low like a boxer almost.

Faye simply launched into a thrust. If she could penetrate his defences and win in a single blow…

But as her sword lashed forward, Joss spun on his leading foot, his hands coming out like a spinning top, and a metallic clang sounded as he battered her sword tip away from the line she had taken.

Being thrust off line that much had surprised her, the power of his deflection had come from seemingly nowhere. But as she pulled back and reset, she saw that his fists were covered in metal bands. They were brass knuckles, if brass knuckles were made for war. Small blades adorned each knuckle and the protection surrounded his fists like plate armour.

He was still coming in fast. Now that Faye had an idea of his combat style, she backed away. He would need to reach her to deal damage and draw blood. She had a small advantage with the length of her sword.

With a slight change in direction, she slipped aside from his advance and tried to cut for his thigh. His hand flashed down and blocked her blade edge. She immediately riposted up to his eyeline, but his other hand was there to block that as well.

He was fast, quick with his reactions. He charged in once more, his fists swinging. Faye ducked one blow and dodged the second, lashing out with the tip of her blade. But Joss darted away again. Faye pursued him. She swung forward with two, three overhand blows that followed on one after the other. Joss sidestepped one way, the other, and back again. It was on the final movement that Faye stopped her feint and lunged for his forward knee.

She let go with one hand and stretched out past her obvious reach with just her right. The blade struck home, but before she could see the result, she had to scramble down to the floor to avoid his counter. His fists flashed for her face, seemingly quicker than he should have been able to move.

Suddenly, Gavan’s voice erupted into the night air.

“Match! Look at his knee!”

They both stopped, Faye glancing at his knee, and Joss growling and barely wanting to look. Blood seeped through the hole in his trouser leg.

“Aye, she got you, Joss,” the leader called.

The pugilist grunted and walked away without saying a word to her.

Faye slowly got to her feet, giving Gavan a look.

“Well done,” he said, quietly. “That was the easy one. They know what to look out for, now.”

“What? I won,” she said.

Gavan just shook his head.

“Well, your companion did well,” the man shouted. He seemed eager. “How about another round?”

Gavan did not consult with her, but shouted out, “Aye, she’ll go again.”

“Gavan?” she asked.

“Trust me,” was all he could say before the men were parting and a second one emerged from the pack. This one was not hiding his weapon. It was a bearded axe. The head of the weapon was at least a foot long, the so-called beard dropping to provide a long edge for the man to use.

She was surprised, because before now she had not realised he had been carrying it. She put that thought aside.

This guy did not wait for the start to be called. He simply rushed forward with a loud grunt, axe held up in the air as he came for Faye.

She shook her head and charged forward, too. She held her sword back and to the right, ready to swing up and either intercept the man’s arms, or knock the axe off target.

His axe descended with a surprising speed. She changed her mind at the last moment and darted to the right, avoiding the blow by a hair’s width. She spun and put her whole body into a cut at the man’s waist, but fully expecting him to block it.

Which he did with the long shaft of the axe.

The blade sunk in a centimetre, and she twisted and levered the sword out from the cut, causing a chip in the axe’s handle.

They all heard the damage to the wood, and the axeman’s eyes widened in anger.

“Oops,” she said. “Did I damage it?”

That was all it took for the man to lose his composure. He swung for her once again, this time horizontally. He was too angry with her to stop to think, he telegraphed his attack the moment he began pulling the axe backward.

The problem with axes is that they’re relatively slow.

Faye lunged forward. This time the point of her blade sunk an inch or so into the man’s right bicep, tearing a small chunk of flesh out as he twisted through her attack to bring his axe to bear.

She was satisfied with her blow, until she realised that not a single drop of blood escaped the wound.

His own attack was still coming, and she had to let her legs fall out from underneath her to avoid the blow. Unfortunately, he had expected that, so with a deft movement, he cancelled his axe’s momentum with a careful reining in, then lashed out with a savage boot to slam into her ribs.

She called out in pain. Something had cracked, she was sure of it.

The axe rose up, looking more like an executioner’s axe than one for battle at that moment. But before he could let it fall, Faye slammed her dagger down and through the top of his boot, all the way to the cross guard at the hilt.

He roared out in pain, and at that moment, whatever skill he had been holding active failed him, as his right arm gave way, bursting forth with blood, and he dropped his axe by his feet.

With his remaining hand, he tried to both grab his wounded arm and his leg at the same time, but ended up just equivocating and doing neither.

Faye retrieved her dagger and rolled out of the man’s reach before coming to her feet.

The men were not looking happy. The leader’s eyes bored into her own.

“Congratulations, it seems she won again,” Gavan called. He waited a beat before saying, “Will that be all?”