There was shouting down the road, a group of rowdy men were gathered in a circle. A dog's vicious barking mingled with their jeering. They weren't far from the city proper, but far enough no city guards patrolled the tall grasses and short tree forests along a beaten path, some ways off the main road.
"All bets in?" A gruff man asked.
"I'll give my coppers once I see what we're up against. How do I know you ain't got a wolf hound or something in your favor?"
The gruff man raised a brow before giving a rotting teeth smile.
"Oh trust me, Owen. This scrappy beast won't last long."
And he stepped aside to reveal a scrappy dog, cowering at the end of a leash.
"So.. how many seconds you want?"
Owen frowned before slapping his coin into the other's hand.
"Give em thirty seconds." He cracked his neck. "Dades, sometimes I wonder where you get these pathetic beasts "
Dades pocketed the coin with a grin.
"Tw'asnt hard. Rulle nab it from a scrapper. What's free is free. We take what we can get. "
Owen nodded, eyeing the cowering dog before glancing towards the snapping fight dog held by Nurlthe. Then he glanced around, fixing the hood of hid cloak.
"We ought to hurry. Patrol don't often come out this far but it's still day light. "
Dade laughed at that.
"Don't tell me you're afraid, Owen. When's the last time the Grand Duke's men cared about a dog fight?"
"Even still... I only risk my money- never my life."
"Well, we're just waiting for Jee and his men. And.. ah! There they are now. And.. who's that he's got with him?"
Owen turned to follow Dade's gaze and saw Jee dragging along some small boy. He frowned.
Dade approached, eyeing Jee, then his men.
"What's with the boy, Jee?"
The 'boy' struggled determinedly beneath the larger man's grip.
"Found the boy out spying, creeping up on the dog fight." Jee said. Dade made a face. Then Jee tossed a knife on the ground. "Carried this on him. When we caught 'im, he was swearing up a storm that we 'free his dog'."
Dades' brows rose.
"Oh.. so this was our source. Well now.. perhaps we ought to thank the boy for.. donating his dog to the cause."
That's when the spit fire of a boy spat at him, directly onto Dades' face. The man frowned, face growing red. Then he backhanded the boy, the boy crying out and landing face first in the dirt.
"See the boy gets a good place to watch the show." Dades said. "Now.. we've waited long enough." And he sauntered over towards where the cowering dog was tethered, and began to pull him out into the circle.
The moment the young boy saw what was happening, he wrenched free of Jee 's hard grasp and dashed after Dade, picking up the knife so carelessly left in the dirt and he swiped it towards Dade.
"Let my dog go!"
The distraction lasted for a few seconds before the boy was kicked to the ground, and Jee's two men subdued him.
Dade growled, wiping at the blood from the cut on his cheek. Then he moved over to back hand the boy, sending him to the dirt and knocking his hat clean off his head. His red hair tumbled loose as Dade gestured back to the ground.
"Okay, enough distractions. Let the dog's play."
The boy peered up, eyes wild behind his hair as he watched in horror as the raging dog was released upon the other.
"No!" They cried out, and tried to Bodily throw themself into the circle.
