Dawn's Early Light by Pip Ballantine Page A

to a few gallant strangers, Enoch was back on his feet, towering over the OSM agent. Bill hooked the tip of his boot under a bottle at his feet, and kicked. The glass slapped into his hand, which he in turn slapped across Enoch’s face. If this had been a comedy troupe at a music hall, the bottle would have shattered for comic effect. As this was a tavern somewhere on the American East Coast, the thick glass remained intact. The dockhand’s jaw wobbled inside the man’s skull as rivulets of blood shot out of the man’s mouth.
    The blow
should
have landed the man out cold, but Enoch spat free a tooth and then brought a beefy fist round to Bill. Enoch’s uppercut lifted him off his feet and sent him back to a chair that collapsed under him with a loud snap. Eliza winced a fraction, hoping what she had heard had been the chair and not Bill’s back.
    Bill certainly wasn’t stopping to check. He bounded to his feet, grabbed up the closest empty chair—most were empty as the brawl now held everyone’s immediate attention—and swept it in a wide arc, knocking the four men charging at him back a pace or two.
    Ministry orders dictated, as this was a goodwill operation, that Eliza should have jumped into the growing chaos and helped her fellow agent out, but their first meeting in San Francisco gave her a moment’s pause. That, and she was quite enjoying watching from outside the event how Agent Bill Wheatley handled himself. The man was quite a machine.
    Her enjoyment was interrupted by massive arms wrapping around her from behind. Whatever kind of clumsy attack it was, it was over as her boot heel drove down hard into the attacker’s foot, earning her a whiskey-accented scream into her left ear. She then turned and slammed her fist into the man’s nose. Brief as the skirmish had been, it attracted the attention of a table full of dockhands. One of them, a man with slicked-back blond hair, drew a bowie knife similar to Bill’s from his jacket.
    Now, officially, she was no longer
watching
the fray but following orders.
    Eliza loved a good bowie as much as the next woman, but the knifeman was just waiting to join the evening’s diversion a little too enthusiastically. She took a step back, and felt her own foot brush against an empty bottle. Considering Bill’s fancy footwork, Eliza hooked her toe under the bottle, kicked it up into her hand, and threw it at the man, all in one swift sequence. This time, the glass did shatter against the man’s head, and he dropped the knife with a yelp—which turned into a scream when Eliza took three quick steps and side-kicked him backwards into his friends.
    The thunderclap froze everyone in place. Eliza turned to see Merle crack open the blunderbuss-style shotgun, ejecting its spent shell that rolled across the tavern floor to disappear in the dingy shadows.
    â€œThe girl was kind enough to buy me a drink,” he announced as he slipped in a replacement shell. “Now I’m a drunk war veteran with a loaded blunderbuss. That makes me dangerous.”
    â€œYou got two shells, old man,” a sailor mocked.
    â€œKeep talkin’ and I’ll just have one,” he warned. “Consider this a southern gentleman’s thank-you, miss. Now I think you and the beau ought to leave.”
    A night out with a colleague, a bar brawl, and a lead. The night with Bill had not been a complete loss.
    â€œWell, this has been delightful,” Eliza said brightly against the quiet. She turned back around. “Bill,” she called, “you done?”
    Bill’s left cheek was a dark red, leaning with every moment to purple. The sailor behind him bent down, picked up Bill’s Stetson, and shoved it into his shoulder, crushing the hat’s crown.
    â€œJus’ a minute,” he slurred, forming his crumpled Stetson back into shape. Once his hat was resting as he thought it should, Bill thrust his elbow behind