augmented as I was. He had black plastic lenses for eyes and was obviously a vet. I lowered the bow. Kenny lowered the hunting rifle.
‘Right you are, Mr Laird,’ Kenny said. His West Highland accent marked him as a local.
4
Laird lived in a fucking castle! So this was how the other half lived. I’d come to the conclusion that I’d been bored. Maybe I’d wanted to get caught. Maybe I wanted the drama. They’d heard the trumpet and thought it was an animal. What they called a crypto-zoological specimen. With Them living inside me I guess I was to an extent.
We were in the cellar, except I don’t think it’s called a cellar if it’s under a castle. Dungeon? It was basically a large underground room of ancient-looking stone with a vaulted ceiling and sand on the floor. It was filled with a lot of Laird’s friends and associates, many of whom were cheering or else shouting and screaming. I was half the reason; the other half was trying to kick me in the face. I was loving it. Pit fighting in Lochee was never like this. Of course, I was some kind of hybrid now.
I leaned back out of the way of the roundhouse kick, putting my left hand down on the sand as his leg spun over me. I pushed myself back upright and jabbed him twice in the side of the head. He tried to spin away but instead turned into a hook that picked him up off his feet and sent him crashing to the ground.
I felt fucking great. I felt faster, stronger. I was grinning as I spat blood out. Stripped to the waist and holding my arms up like a champion as the crowd cheered more enthusiastically than they ever had at Doogie’s Pit Fighting Emporium.
People came up to congratulate me. I was handed a very generous dram of Glenmorangie as they pounded my back. I took a mouthful, blood and whisky mingling in the glass, the whisky stinging the cuts in my mouth. I towelled off the blood and the sweat from my body. Calum smiled at me from where he was standing. I grinned back and spat some more blood out onto the sand.
It seemed the other half lived just like us, only more enthusiastically and in more style and comfort. It seemed nobody got tired of watching otherwise healthy grown adults beat the shit out of each other. And I was feeling no pain tonight.
Laird was all right for a rich guy. I’d checked with God. He’d grown up in Stirling, like Gregor had, though he was much older. He’d been an NCO with the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders and fought on Sirius before I’d got there and later on the freezing wastes of Proxima Prime, where he’d received a battlefield commission. He’d traded on the commission for education and contacts, and after he’d served his term gone into business for himself.
His education had been in law and now he went looking for clever projects that the corporations did not already own. He’d found a new way of moulding ceramics for use in missiles and components for remotes designed for vacuum. He’d gone into business with the young genius who had developed the application and stopped her from being completely exploited by the corporations. This had basically meant navigating a dangerous labyrinth of trade and contract law. They had diversified and he had not looked back since. His wealth allowed him a spectacle like this and the ability to play lord of the manor.
The next fighter flew through the air at me. I rolled forward under his flying kick. This guy was the favourite. This was the fighter Alasdair had been grooming.
I rolled back up onto my feet and spun round just in time to block some of a flurry of kicks aimed at my body and head. Even the blocked ones caused me to stagger back. The kid was fast, not as strong as me but obviously skilled. His style seemed mainly some form of Kung Fu with bits and pieces pulled from other forms to help with the practicalities of fighting in this kind of arena.
He threw a fast kick at my head. I spun out of the way and kicked his supporting leg. He went with the blow and threw himself into a full reverse spinning kick, apparently not learning his lesson. I ducked low and threw my own spinning kick under his guard. The length of my leg smacked into the top of his body and my foot caught him on the chin. It knocked him back, but the crowd cheered as he turned the retreat into a showy backflip. How come I’m winning and he’s being cheered?
Deciding the long game wasn’t for him, he tried to close with me. I lifted my knees to block a flurry of low, sharp, fast kicks and used my arms to protect my head from an equally rapid flurry of hand strikes. I then side- kicked him repeatedly in the chest and elbowed him in the face hard enough to knock him to the ground.
I was bringing my fist back to deliver the coup de grace when he kicked me in the side of the head from the ground. I staggered away and he flipped back up onto his feet. More cheering from the crowd. Still, the kid was young, had been good-looking and was probably not as augmented as I was. I should have been feeling like a bully but this was the most fun I’d had kickboxing since I use to train with my mum.
He moved into a graceful stance, and I raised my fists into a much less graceful boxer’s stance. He smiled at me through the blood and I nodded, smiling back. Good kid, good fighter. Again this sort of thing was missing from the desperation of the Dundee pits. Time to destroy him.
His kick was fast, powerful, well aimed and beautifully executed. Mine was a short, brutal, front kick delivered with no finesse whatsoever but with a lot of power. The energy of his kick was broken on my elbows, though it hurt. I felt something give as my foot hit him in the waist area and drove him back.
He tried another kick. I just kicked again with the other foot. Booing. Who gives a fuck? So I’m the villain? This time, after I knocked him back, I was up in the air and hit him on the crown of his head with a flying elbow. Again he fell back. I did not relent. I threw myself into the air again. My knee caught him under the chin. His head flew back in a spray of blood. I had all the time in the world to deliver the reverse spinning kick to his face. Somehow he was still standing after that so I delivered another and then spun low and swept his legs out from underneath him. The kid hit the sand a mess.
‘Yes!’ I was roaring holding my arms up. I felt like there was a feral expression on my face. There was as much booing as there was cheering. The kid was carried off. I noticed that Alasdair was glaring at me. Fuck him. What was he going to do?
Drinks were thrust into my hand, more backslapping. I even saw some of the well-turned-out salon-pretty girls, who moments before had been screaming for my blood like everyone else, look my way.
I pushed through the congratulatory crowd to where Calum had just sat down. He smiled as he looked up at my blood-covered body.
‘Do you want a drink or a medic?’
‘I’ve had worse,’ I said, slumping into a seat as he passed me another drink and both of us exchanged words about the fight with some of his hangers-on. The music started again and people started to drift away as if at some hidden signal from Calum. I was catching my breath and drinking more bloody whisky.
‘Cigar?’ Calum asked. I was about to refuse. ‘It’s from Barney’s four, pre-war.’
What the hell! Let’s see what all the fuss was about. I took the cigar and he lit it for me.
‘So, is the extent of your ambition to squat on my land and poach? Because if so, we can sort something out.’
‘I don’t think ambition is something that people like me have. Life’s pretty good at the moment.’ If we ignored the impending war, which I was getting quite good at, and didn’t think about Morag – less good at that. ‘I just don’t want to…’ I searched for a way to explain myself.
‘Suffer any more?’
I gave this some thought.
‘Yeah, actually.’
‘So do I have this right – you’re recently independently wealthy?’
‘I guess.’
‘Do you want more money?’
‘For what?’
‘I followed your exploits, read Howard Mudgie’s stories and watched the footage that he shot. I’m not sure I agree with what you did, and certainly it’s causing me a lot of trouble with industrial espionage and bidding for
