and God only knew what other injuries lurked beneath her clothing.
“They’re comin’ for me!” Sally cried, hysterical. “I worked me hardest, but they said it weren’t good enough! But I tried, I did! I tried! Only ’tweren’t enough!”
Varanus and Ekaterine exchanged glances. They both understood what had happened.
“Did you lock the door, liebchen?” Korbinian asked. He turned his head and looked across the room.
Varanus looked toward the door as well. She hadn’t locked it.
A moment later, the door was flung open. A tall man of tremendous girth pushed his way in through the doorway, followed by three others of normal stature. They were dressed in shabby suits and battered hats, though their clothes were far more flash than most men of the streets—toughs with pretensions to respectability perhaps.
Members of a gang.
“There’s the ’ore!” the giant shouted.
“Thought she could run,” said one of the others—a scrawny lad of perhaps fifteen. “But she can’t!”
He and the other two shared a cruel laugh. The giant merely advanced, turning a large club over in his hands.
“’Ere poppet…” he said, looking directly at Sally.
Varanus rose up to her full height—which was not terribly impressive, truth be told—and planted herself directly in the man’s path.
“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, barking like a terrier standing off against a bear.
The giant paused for a moment and prodded Varanus with his stick.
“Outta the way, miss,” he said. “This don’t concern you.”
Varanus pushed the stick away with a flick of her hand and said, “This is my surgery. Get out.”
The giant twisted his head, his neck giving an audible crack. He bared his teeth and snarled.
“That one’s ours, an’ ain’t none o’ your business,” he said. “Now outta my way!”
He pushed Varanus with a heavy hand, but she stood firm.
“Sally,” Varanus said, “go into the storeroom and lock the door. Open it for no one but me.”
“Yes, doctor,” Sally said, her voice weak and afraid.
With Ekaterine’s help, she got to her feet and hobbled toward the back of the surgery as fast as she could manage. The giant’s three companions made to intercept her, but Ekaterine barred their way. The men laughed a little and started to push past her.
“What has the girl done?” Varanus asked. “What crime could possibly warrant such cruelty?”
“She owes us money,” the giant answered. “Now outta my way.”
He pushed at Varanus again while the other ruffians shoved Ekaterine aside. Varanus exchanged looks with her and nodded. These men were not about to further abuse a woman, certainly not one of Varanus’s patients in her own clinic!
Varanus kicked the giant in the shin, making him stumble. Across the room, Ekaterine grabbed her hat from the table and shoved it, top-first, into one man’s face, crushing the one and disorienting the other. She struck another man in the throat with her fist before grabbing the last man and throwing him into the first, knocking both to the ground. Varanus grinned at her and leapt upon the giant, punching him in the stomach with a rapid barrage of fists. The giant grunted, but the mass of fat and muscle over his stomach withstood the blows better than most. Still, to her satisfaction, Varanus felt a rib break.
The giant drew back his club and swung at Varanus. Varanus ducked beneath the first blow and the one that followed it, but a third struck her on the side of the head and threw her onto the floor. Her vision went black for a moment.
She came to in time to see the giant step over her on his way toward the back room. Varanus shook her head to clear it. She felt something wet trickling across her cheek, and her vision was blind on that side. Blood was probably filling her eye, she reasoned. The giant’s blow must have fractured her skull.
How irritating, she thought as she picked herself up. No matter. It would heal.
Across the room, Ekaterine was busy managing the other three men, which mostly consisted of tripping them up or throwing one into another. They fought hard, inflicting clumsy blows where they could, but Ekaterine bobbed and weaved and deflected with startling grace, and she received but a few hits in reply to her own.
The giant was another matter. Even Varanus, with her inhuman strength, could hardly throw him about like a man of common stature. Still, he did not expect her to attack again, having given her what ought to have been a killing blow. That she could use to her advantage.
Varanus ran after the giant and kicked his ankle, tripping him and sending him to one knee.
“’Ere, what?” he shouted, twisting about. He caught sight of Varanus, and the blood drained away from his face. “’Ow, by God…?”
Varanus did not waste the opportunity. She ran at him and planted her foot firmly atop his knee. Using the man’s bent leg as a step, she leapt up and grabbed him by the head, pulling it downward as she brought her knee up to meet it. She struck the man squarely in the face. The giant fell backward, bleeding from his nose and eyes.
Landing on the balls of her feet, Varanus hurried forward and knelt upon the giant’s chest. She pounded her fists into his face as he tried to rise and kept punching until he finally gave up struggling.
Varanus stood and looked toward Ekaterine in time to see her strike the heads of two of the ruffians against one another. The men fell senseless, soon to die. The last one let out a cry of fright and ran for the door. Swearing loudly, Ekaterine hiked up her skirts and chased after him.
“Well,” Varanus said, looking down at the giant, “it seems you will not be murdering my patient tonight. Too bad for you.”
The giant struggled to rise, grabbing at her with his hands. Varanus swatted him away and placed on foot upon his throat.
“No, no,” she said. “I have won. Be a proper man and accept defeat with dignity. Now then, I have some questions for you.”
“Go ta ’ell,” came the reply.
Varanus applied more pressure with her foot to make a point before easing off enough to allow conversation.
“Ain’t possible…” the giant said. “Should be dead.”
“But I am not, and you must think of the future,” Varanus said. “Surely you have no wish to die.”
“The Boss’ll ’ave you for this.” The giant leered at her.
This caught Varanus’s attention and she asked, “So, you’re not alone, is that it?”
“Rest’a the boys ’ill kill ya for this. Give you a sound thrashin’ an’ cut yer—”
Varanus
