Jade War

Bero was flung against the side door; his hip and shoulder slammed into the metal, and he heard a crack that he hoped had not come from any of his bones. The driver landed heavily on top of him. In the back, Bero could hear thuds and cries from the trapped Uwiwan workers. A few sickening heartbeats passed, then the door of the truck was flung open so hard it was nearly torn from its hinges. Several hands reached in and yanked out the driver, screaming, then reached back in and latched around Bero’s legs. Bero shouted and kicked, but his flailing, imprecise Strength did not prevent him from being pulled out of the overturned vehicle like a hooked tuna being dragged from the water.

Bero was dropped facedown on the road. He struggled to his knees as Mudt was deposited roughly next to him. A nauseating sense of dreadful familiarity rose in Bero’s throat; this was like that time nearly three years ago when he’d been caught and beaten by the Maik brothers. He had a crooked face and a limp to remind him of that encounter every day, and he had a terrible feeling that he was unlikely to get off as easily this time.

Mudt spat dirt from his mouth. “Now we’re fucked, keke. This is all your fault.”

Bero blinked grit from his eyes. The lower half of the upended truck was blocking the road; the other two trucks had been forced to stop behind it. Green Bones were dragging pickers out of all three vehicles and killing them with chilling efficiency. In minutes, they were dead, thirteen in all. Bero suspected the other seven in the crew were lying on the slag heap some distance behind. He considered leaping up and running for his life. With Lightness and Strength on his side, he might make it, though probably not. He was just about to give it a go anyway, because what did he have to lose at this point, but one of the Green Bones must’ve Perceived his intentions because a pair of rough hands seized them by the backs of their necks. “Do anything stupid and you die, you barukan piss rats.”

“We’re not barukan,” Bero protested angrily.

A man approached. He was older than the others, his closely cropped hair receding to either side of a sharp widow’s peak, but his trim body moved with the lean economy of a grizzled wolf. His piercing eyes did not seem to blink very much. “Zapunyo doesn’t send his hired barukan to supervise the scavenges, not anymore,” the man explained to the other Green Bone. “He needs them to run his operations in the Uwiwas and to guard his compound. The local jade-fevered shine addicts are a lot more expendable.”

“Should we kill them, then, Nau-jen?” asked the other Green Bone, his grip tightening.

The Horn of the Mountain studied the two kneeling teens. In the dark, Bero could not see much of his expression, but the man’s aura was like a low, simmering heat off baked bricks. The Horn’s searching gaze settled upon the jade encircling Bero’s neck and Mudt’s arms. “That’s a lot of quality green for a couple of punks like you.” His voice had the coarse, demanding quality of a military sergeant. “How’d you two scavengers come by it?”

Bero was quite sure he was going to be executed, but he lifted his head proudly and defiantly. “I won this jade. I took it from Kaul Lan’s body myself.”

There was a moment of stunned silence from the nearby Green Bones. Then they burst into raucous laughter that echoed over the idling engines of the stalled trucks. Nau Suen didn’t laugh, but he let his men do so. After the chuckling had died down, one of the Fists said, “These new green, as they call themselves, are worse than the barukan. Every one of them would have you believe they won their spoils in a pitched battle when not a single one of them can use jade worth shit.”

Nau Suen turned a stern look toward the Green Bone who’d spoken. “We hooked half of these sorry miscreants on jade and shine in order to use them against No Peak. Why should we be surprised now that Gont Asch’s discarded tools have been picked up by an opportunist like Zapunyo?” His men fell into chastised silence.

Nau looked back down at the two teens. “We’re not going to kill these two. We’re going to send them back to their employer as an act of goodwill.” He motioned for Bero and Mudt to be released. Bero blinked, not quite believing it enough to be relieved. Nau said to them, “Listen carefully. Tell the barukan Soradiyo that as long as I keep finding and catching his scrap-picking crews, he won’t make money. Zapunyo won’t be pleased. Your manager might even soon be out of a job in the worst possible way. Let him know that Nau Suen, Horn of the Mountain, would like to discuss bettering his career options.”

“You’re going to buy out Soradiyo?” Bero asked, suddenly interested now that he’d recovered from his fear. Mudt shot him an urgent look that screamed, Shut up, you want him to change his mind about letting us live?