"Sword against wood! That ain't fair!" A man with a thick accent shouted, his words slurred from drink.
"Aye, but two against one ain't fair neither!" Someone else refuted.
"He's right, Pash," Ermos said. "You don't need your sword against these guys."
Pash agreed with his assessment. He'd already all but defeated one of them. With his robe open, more of the man's tattoos were revealed, skulls and swords and all sorts of menacing graffiti, but when he was rendered all but naked, he lost that toughness of his and he was red with embarrassment instead, desperately trying to hold his robe closed.
Facing off against the last thug, Pash dropped his sword to the floor, knowing that he did not need his edge to best the muscle-bound mess in front of him. He slid the wooden scabbard from his belt and grasped that like a sword instead.
"Bastard…" the thug growled angrily, losing all traces of fear now that there was no blade to cut him. He came lumbering across the open ground, his wooden baton raised high, threatening serious damage.
"That's it! That's it! Bash him up clean! He's gone and insulted your pal! Make him pay!" The crowd jeered, riling him up even further. They did not care who was in the right and who was in the wrong, all they wanted was the blood and entertainment.
He swung at Pash, hard. It was the type of strike that would have snapped a door in two had it landed, yet in there lay the problem – against any respectable opponent, a strike that slow would never land. Pash ducked it with ease, rolling past the thug. And then, from his knees he swung, attacking the back of the man's legs.
"Yah! Bastard! That hurt, damn you!" He howled in pain as the wood of the scabbard clattered hard against the exposed tendons of his hamstring. His knee buckled from the strike.
"There you go, you're getting a rhythm going now. Finish strong," Ermos called out encouragingly.
Pash felt that. The adrenaline was pumping through him. He felt light and strong against such a slow opponent. He danced around him, staying behind the thug. He hit him in the back again as the thug whirled around to try and catch him.
The next strike caught the man in the ribs. There was a questionable crack as the bone broke. A low groan of pain came with it – the real pain would start later, when the man truly understood the injury that had just been inflicted on him.
As slow as the man was, each wound that Pash gave him, every bruise and every broken bone, they all served to slow him even further. To the crowd's shock, he completely dominated his opponent.
"End him, boy! Go for the head!" They began to call out for the finishing move. Pash was only too happy to oblige. He looked for the man's head. He could not grip the scabbard as tightly as he could grip his sword, limiting his power. But, as he stuck to the corner of the man's vision, Pash managed to work himself into a position that allowed him to go for the executioner's blow.
"Look out!" The thug's friend called out, but it was far too late. Pash leapt into the air and the blow landed a moment later. A hollow sound rang out and the man collapsed to the floor, unconscious.
Seeing his friend land so hard, the other thug had his anger overwrite his embarrassment, and he stopped trying to hide his nakedness, opting instead to punish Pash for his transgressions. But by now, Pash was loose and confident. He easily ducked the hairy hand that reached for him and then he clattered the man in the back of his head, knocking him out as well.
Pash stood there, breathing heavily. He looked to his master for approval. Ermos gave him a thumbs up and a wink. "Good show, young Pash. You're getting stronger."
That was all Pash wanted to hear. He retrieved his sword and slid it back into his scabbard, struggling to hide his smile.
The crowd was not likely to go away at any point soon. Pash and his master had caused quite the commotion. There were a few that cheered his victory over the barbaric-looking henchmen of the lead entertainer, but there were more than a few that looked for more drama, and hurriedly pointed out to anyone with authority that a fight had just gone down and that the ruffians who had caused such trouble needed punishing.
"I think it's about time we call in our boulder hound, isn't it?" Ermos asked. "He'll never believe us unless we show him."
Pash was about to suggest it might not have been such a good idea, but his master was already cupping his hands around his mouth and he shouted to the sky. "HERE BOY!"
People wrinkled their noses at his noisiness, thinking him to be a mad man. Pash wasn't even sure if the dog could hear them. And if he could hear them, what was there to make sure that he came? They were going to sell him, weren't they? If the dog had any sense, he would run as far away from them as possible.
But a tremor ran through the earth. A tremor that might have been mistaken for a light earthquake. The tremors became regular poundings as their dog grew closer. Pash looked towards the hill and it was not long before he saw the hound's black floppy ears and then his head, his jaws parted as he loped across the open fields, letting his tongue waggle freely.
The crowd didn't know what was going on. Not at first. They staggered in a daze as the ground shook beneath them, thinking there to be an earthquake on the way and praying that it was only a minor one. And then, one of them noticed the boulder hound.