Read Gonji: A Hungering of Wolves for Free Online

cavalry.
    No war-dog among them offered reply to the French knights’ threat; their valor was admirable. All wore Flemish burgonet helms, but beyond that their armament varied widely. They sported brigandines, jacks, and cavalry cuirasses. Some carried broadswords slung on their backs; others, lighter blades at their belts. All displayed at least one pistol. There were two muskets and two polearms sprouting up from their ranks, and one broad-backed rogue carried an enormous double-edged broadaxe of a sort that had long been out of fashion. Men still displaying such weapons usually had known combat against extra-human foes, foes that yielded only to hardy steel in a forthright grasp. Some of their horses’ heads were armored with chanfrons. Some saddles were of the common riding variety; others, war saddles with cantle-and-bow faced with steel plates. But all of them were festooned with powder flasks on the same side.
    A slow smile spread over the lead brigand’s face to see Gonji’s canny inspection of his men. It was a handsome face, in its way. Piercing dark eyes flashed over high cheekbones. His mouth was sharply delineated over a cleft chin, and his tall wiry frame sat proudly astride a nickering destrier. He swept off his burgonet and bowed to Gonji.
    “There can be no mistaking your identity, monsieur…Red Blade of the East.”
    “This man is a bandit, sir, a highwayman,” the lieutenant advised Gonji.
    “Ah, so desu ka?” the samurai replied. “If so, he seems to have left his cunning on the trail.”
    The bandit chuckled. “We are free companions. Something I think the samurai understands, if his legend be true. Like the others here at this…fashionable conference, we’ve been drawn by Gonji’s fame to discuss the prospect of becoming, eh—Wonder Knights, is it? As such, kind sirs, we had hoped to be granted temporary amnesty—in the name of Wunderknechten brotherhood, as it were. Now, have we a truce?”
    The lieutenant scowled in disbelief. “You must be mad, scoundrel! Unbuckle your weapons and dismount—all of you.” He gestured to the French troopers, and they began to fan out, flanking the outnumbered highwaymen. Some of them drew pistols and leveled them at the brigands from behind their mounts’ crests.
    Gonji dismounted and strode between the lines of horsemen, Orozco and Buey also dropping from horse to walk beside and slightly behind him.
    “So sorry, lieutenant,” Gonji said, “but I would hear more of this…pilgrim’s appeal.”
    The officer cast about indignantly, then raised a staying hand to his men. Gonji bowed to the lieutenant.
    “Who are you?” he asked the bandit leader.
    “I am Armand Perigor—” The name was echoed in whispers among the folk who had begun to crowd around now, all wondering whether Gonji was again threatened. “—swordsman, adventurer, and—” Perigor laughed softly “—fellow wonder-seeker, I believe, monsieur. You’ll pardon me if I speak bluntly. My men and I have grown weary of bowing to the winds of change, of serving questionable masters. We’ve killed Huguenots for papist gold and Catholics for Huguenot silver. Now we’ve heard that you say, ‘Spill only the blood of those who threaten the land.’ Some…mysterious powers who would control us, rob us of our humanity, from beyond our world. Makes a crazy kind of sense, I suppose, given certain things we’ve seen and scarcely believed. But I must know who we throw in our lot with. They say you dodged a lead ball this evening from a pistol fired by an unsteady hand. They say it didn’t miss by much. But that is the way of the gun, n’est-ce pas? It lacks surety, the proof of gallantry of both assailant and victim. Not so with the sword—”
    Perigor snicked out his rapier. There was a shuffling in the French cavalry ranks, weapons hefted menacingly. But the nine rogues held their ground and glared back coldly at the troopers. Perigor grinned and bobbed his head.
    “Think he could