Chapter 174: HECTOR. An example
Chapter 174: HECTOR. An example
I stepped back, all of a sudden feeling a shaking in my guts. This was too good to be true. This place was a city—city people didn’t stick together. The old man was luring me into a trap. I heard the tales on the street! There were people who did bad, bad things to kids and men alike, and many of them seemed nice on the first glance.
I stepped back, now regretting coming with Gi at all. He was weird and outlandish. Even if he saved me, that didn’t mean he did it all for nothing. “No, I… I’m fine. I better go.”
The old man’s brows furrowed slightly. “Well, I can’t force my help on you, but if you will need it in the future, you may always knock on my door.”
Gi said nothing, just gave me a sharp look from under the hood. I gave them a shaky wave and dashed away until the house was out of my sight. Out of sight, but not out of mind.
I forgot about being hungry as I thought about the strange boy. He attracted my thoughts more than the old man—his mystery and the way he held himself, how deft he was with the knife and how he looked grown up beyond his years.
I wanted to be like him. Gi wouldn’t let others bully himself, I was sure. He’d threaten them with a knife until they back off.
That day, after I finished the bowl of hot soup I bought on the money I saved from Dagger, I trained with twice as much of an effort as usual. In the quiet dead-end of an alley, where only rats were my watchers, I imagined taking my knife to Dagger’s neck and telling him off, so Gi wouldn’t have to interfere and save me.
Though I didn’t take on the old man’s offer, and the desire to come to his house and look for Gi was strong. I fought it in the next few days, but I didn’t waste it and asked many questions about him and the old man to the other street urchins.
From them I learnt Gi would often come to the poorer parts of the city, alone or with other people, and help other kids in trouble on occasion, too. The old man was a more well-known figure, who often gave out food, clothing and coin. There were no mentions of him harming anyone he helped, but plenty of words about how weird he was.
A preacher, they said, with a few cards missing from his deck—or with the roof sideways, as I was more used to taking. He spoke mad things, like how the Twelve weren’t very good at being gods, or how the world was ending and they should prepare for it.
I decided it was good that I didn’t use his help, after all, and I kept avoiding his house. What if his madness was contagious? Or what if he cracked completely and decided to kill people left and right? I remembered the old story about a village fool who was quiet like a mouse and calm like a pond until he just snapped and killed five people.
But I still hoped to meet Gi again. Maybe… Maybe I’d ask him to teach me. Adventurers I approached earlier didn’t agree to train me, or take me as a helper with them, but Gi wasn’t an adventurer, and he was cool, and he was a kid, too.
Well, I was a man—but also a kid. I was a man because I was on my own, so I had to be. But everyone still saw me as a kid. Gi didn’t seem to be on his own, but he was so cool that he was a man, too. But also a kid.
In the next week, the luck wasn’t on my side with seeing him again—but it was there for me for all other things. An owner of a bakery where I often bought bread deemed me trustworthy enough to run small errands for him. It was a real job! It paid less than begging, but I was sick of that, and I got two meals a day as a part of the payment.
The errands mostly consisted of hauling packages across the city, and we were paid per package or other errand. There was another boy doing them, too, and we had to compete for the orders. Whoever ran faster got more orders, and who got more orders, got more money. It was a great training of my dexterity and constitution, so I didn’t even mind that it cut into the time I usually left for training with my knife.
On my third day of work, the owner gave me a heavy package of baked goods and an address—both regular orders that usually went with the other errand boy. But right now, he was already off to elsewhere.
“Careful with that one. The buyer is an adventurer and can explode like an oil fire when water gets thrown in. Just give the package and go back. She paid already,” the owner warned me beforehand.
An adventurer. I’ve seen plenty of them by now, so that wasn’t scary. Neither was I afraid of people prone to anger. But when, approaching the house, I heard an angry voice coming from behind the door, I slowed in my steps.
Something crashed loudly inside. I stopped completely. I noticed other people present avoided the house by a wide berth. Strange, as it seemed to be as unremarkable as any other on the street.
Then, the door slammed open and out, in a speed I’ve only seen adventurers have, dashed the ghost-like boy who could be no one else but Gi, chased by a woman who looked like a furious fire with red hair and eyes.
On the porch of the house, she caught Gi by an arm. All before I could even blink. I wished to meet Gi again—but this certainly wasn’t how I imagined that meeting.