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“I’m fine, thank you.” Lore backed up until she hit another warm form—Bastian. She could recognize the hand that came to rest on her shoulder.
The drunk man shrugged and turned back to the ring. The blond fighter launched at the bruised one, fist curving through the air to connect with a kidney. The other fighter fell to the hay-covered cobblestones.
Lore whirled on Bastian. “Did you know it was Lightweight Night?”
“Truthfully, I didn’t know such a thing existed.” Bastian grinned beneath his mask, craning his neck to see over the crowd. “How marvelous.”
She cursed under her breath and turned away from the ring to scan the masses of people who’d gathered to watch. It was harder to get a feel for the crowd when there were so many of them, but most were focused enough on the match that it should be easy to spot someone slipping off for a whispered conversation. Gabe slumped a few feet away from her and Bastian, facing the fight, but with his one blue eye scanning back and forth through his mask.
The boxer with the bruised lip feinted to the side. The blond one stumbled, a punch overthrown.
“There,” Bastian said.
He didn’t point, but angled his chin toward the shadows on the far edge of the ring, a place between streetlights where the dark was deepest. Three figures huddled, angled away from the match. The one whose face Lore could see looked like he was listening intently to whatever was being said. The figure speaking had their back turned.
Bastian and Gabe exchanged a look. Gabe nodded, then started moving toward the group, pushing through the crowd like a shark through a school of fish.
“Come on.” Bastian took Lore’s arm and tugged her after him. “I don’t think our pet monk will need any backup, but we should stick close, just in case.”
A roar went up from the ring. When Lore looked back, the blond boxer was on the ground.
The group in the shadows broke apart before Gabe could reach them, the figure who’d been speaking fading into the crowd without Lore getting a good look at them.
Gabe approached one of the men who’d been listening, struck up a casual conversation. Bastian and Lore stopped a few feet away; from what she could hear, it sounded like Gabe was talking about sailing weather.
“Bleeding God,” she muttered, and Bastian snorted.
A few more inane words about northwesterly winds, and Gabe nodded in the direction of the now-disappeared speaker. “You all wouldn’t know about any job opportunities opening up around here, would you? I’m looking to make some extra coin.” A pause. “Something that could be done in one night would be ideal.”
“Laying it on a bit thick,” Bastian whispered. Lore dug her elbow into his ribs.
The man Gabe spoke to—very small and slight, if it weren’t for the thick stubble on his jaw, Lore would think his voice still hadn’t cracked—glanced at his companion, then rubbed at his neck. A constellation of bruises bloomed there, deep purple and new. “I might,” he said slowly. “But the details aren’t mine to share.”
Gabe’s jaw tightened, and the slight man stepped back, eyes widening in brief alarm. Lore didn’t blame him. Gabe didn’t look like the kind of person you’d want to anger.
“How could one find someone willing to impart details?” Gabe asked.
The man’s companion—larger than he, but still young looking—let out a harsh laugh. “Lose,” he said, cutting a hand toward the ring.
Lore looked back. The blond fighter was up again, but blood trickled steadily from a cut across her forehead, dripping into her eyes.
“Lose?” Gabe’s confusion drew his brows together, wrinkled the black domino mask.
“Lose a fight,” the slight man mumbled, rubbing at his fresh bruises again. “They only approach people who lose a fight.”
“Why?”
“Gods damn me if I know,” he replied snappishly. “I guess because you have to buy in to fight a match, and those of us who just lost money are more likely not to ask questions.”
Another roar from the crowd. The blond fighter was down, this time for good. A huge man with a tangled black beard stepped over the hay bales, laughing, and lifted the other fighter’s arms over her head. Her eye was blackened, her smile viciously triumphant.
Gabe looked back at Lore and Bastian, then sighed. “Who do I talk to about getting in the ring?”
“You can’t.” The bruised man looked Gabe up and down, then shook his head. “Not tonight, anyway. It’s Lightweight Night.”
Three eyes turned to Lore—Gabe’s one, Bastian’s two, a question in them all.
“Fuck,” Lore muttered.
