Arabella of Mars(39)
Arabella’s hand still lay on the ladder’s guide rope. Without thinking she twitched herself out of Gowse’s path, just as though he were some obstacle she’d encountered while running bags of powder back and forth. Gowse hurtled past the point she’d recently occupied, growling as he collided with the coaming above the ladder.
Arabella turned in the air and pushed off the ladder’s lowest step, rocketing through the crowd of airmen that had surrounded Gowse. Other men scrambled out of her way as she flew, until she stopped herself with a hand on an overhead beam. “Do you think if I’m beaten black and blue I’ll be able to go faster?” she cried.
Gowse made no reply, save another growl as he pushed through the crowd.
Arabella turned and prepared to push off the beam. But all the other airmen had gathered in a ring around her and Gowse. No direction offered an easy escape.
Twisting in the air, panting, she stared in every direction, hoping that some member of her mess, or an officer, or any friendly person would appear to save her. But every man in the watching crowd, even airmen she’d thought friendly, merely waited, looking up at her with an attitude of grim expectation.
Gowse floated in the center of the ring of men, fingers flexing, a determined scowl on his face. “So, Ashby, are ye gonna fight?”
Arabella swallowed.
She could bend her knee to Gowse, acknowledge her failure, beg forgiveness. And he would beat her senseless, after which her sex would almost surely be revealed.
She could cry out for help. And every man present would know her to be a coward, one who could not be depended upon if the ship did happen to fall into battle with pirates or the French. She’d lose the respect of the captain, who’d emphasized that in his ship every man must take responsibility for his own actions and his own failures. And Gowse would probably still beat her senseless.
She could fight like a girl. She’d seen many a hair-pulling, scratching altercation in the fields and paths near Marlowe Hall, and even been drawn into a few. Girl fights produced much noise and little serious injury. If she fought like that, Gowse would overpower her, and beat her senseless.
Or she could fight to win.
And Gowse, though a huge, muscular man, showed no understanding of the unique challenges and opportunities of free descent. Every tactic he had displayed thus far would have been perfectly at home on the floor of some tavern on Earth.
With a sudden shriek, Arabella pushed off the beam with both feet, hurling herself downward into Gowse’s face. They met in midair with a stinging thud. Taking advantage of his momentary surprise, she tore into him with all she had, thrashing at his face with both fists.
Gowse recovered his wits quickly, grabbing Arabella’s wrists and squeezing until the bones ground together. She cried out at the pain, struggling in his grasp, but all her strength was not enough to pry herself loose. He grinned at her, an evil leering thing that promised far more pain to come. Desperate, fighting for her life, she twisted and writhed, lashing out with feet and knees and elbows, any thing at all—as hard as she could, but to little effect.
But then, by chance, one flailing foot caught the man between his legs. Gowse winced and his grip lessened. Immediately Arabella bent herself double, bringing up her legs between herself and Gowse, then kicked out with all her might.
She missed her target, but caught Gowse in the stomach. His foul breath came out in a grunt and he let go!
The momentum of the blow carried Arabella away. She collided with a few of the surrounding airmen, who immediately shoved her back toward Gowse. Now she was flying feet-first. Again she brought her knees up to her chest, and struck out with her heels at the last moment, connecting solidly with Gowse’s nose. She felt a sickening crunch, like the carapace of a shikastho breaking beneath her heel, as she ricocheted away. Gowse cried out and clapped both hands to his face.
This time Arabella caught herself on an angled stanchion. She hung there for a moment and assessed the situation.
Khema had often conducted mock battles with Arabella and Michael among the crags and rilles beyond the plantation fence. “Aren’t you going to finish me, tutukha?” she’d taunted once, lying panting in the dust after a solid blow to the leg. “Or are you too soft-hearted?”
Arabella had blinked at the weapon in her hand—in reality nothing more than a lightweight bundle of thukathi-reeds—marveling that she had finally managed to land a proper hit on her itkhalya after so many months of sparring. “I’ve just cut your leg off,” she’d said. “You’re no threat to me now.” She’d tossed the reeds aside.
“No threat?” Khema had said. And with one swift motion, not using the supposedly severed limb at all, the Martian had pivoted herself upright and brought her own bundle of reeds down on the leather at the junction of Arabella’s shoulder and neck. “Now we’re both dead.”
A few beads of blood squeezed out from between Gowse’s fingers, tumbling in the air as they drifted away. Arabella cried out, a wordless howl of rage, and pushed hard with her legs against the stanchion, driving her outstretched fists with all her strength into the hands that clutched Gowse’s injured nose.
Gowse shrieked in pain, scrabbling ineffectually at Arabella as she collided with him, wrapping her legs around his waist and seizing his shirt in her left hand for leverage. She raised her right fist, preparing to drive it down a third time upon the already broken nose.