The Bladeslinger of Canary Row

His face was contorted with fear and pain the moment he died. She knew because she was there, and she couldn’t stop it.

As she traverses the pitch black alley, a bead of sweat rolls out from beneath her umber gambler hat and trickles toward the popped collar of her long overcoat. The midsummer night is stifling, humidity hanging in the air. Overturned trash bins and drunken urchins are mere inky silhouettes against the neon lights of Canary Row that flicker beyond the alleyway. She follows the lights like a moth to a flame, the urchins pressing to the walls and slinking into doorways. None know her name, but all know her by the black, velvet ribbon around her neck—she is the Bladeslinger of Canary Row, and she is merciless.

She steps from the grimy shadows to the humming lights of Canary Row. A taxi whips past, its red taillights streaking like blood across her vision. She remembers the blood—hers mixing with his as she laid choking for air, sobbing for mercy. The Canary King never gave it to her, and so she gives it to no one in return.

Past the ramshackle buildings glowing with signs for booze, sex, and slots, she sets her sights on the Lonely Mile Saloon—a seedy bar with a repulsive, neon cactus above the double doors. Across the street she spots two plainclothes officers lurking on the corner, smoking cigarettes and inquiring about the Bladeslinger to a few drunks stumbling their way. The Marshal’s bounty is enough to make any regular man rich and any poor man desperate, but no one dares claim it. They fear her vengeance like a plague that spreads in unknown ways.

Tipping her hat low, she sidesteps into the bar. The crowd is as rowdy as it is unkempt. Music blares, but the laughter and swears still light up the room like an inferno. Her jade eyes sweep the bar, calculating how many patrons here would make her list. How many of their friends has she cut down in dark alleys and empty streets, her blades quick as gunfire and quiet as a crypt?

Perching a hand on her hip, she brushes back her overcoat to reveal a sickle blade. It glints in the hazy overhead lights, catching the eye of a man at a nearby table. He coughs, elbowing his comrades before pointing to his own neck and jutting his head in her direction. They know that velvet ribbon better than they know the back of their own hands.

Conversation stilts in her wake as she parts barflies like the Red Sea, dark eyes set on the bar counter. Two men collect their effects from the chipped countertop and hustle away just as she arrives to take their seats.

“The usual?” the barkeep asks with his gravelly voice, though a shot of whiskey is already being placed before her on a crisp, white napkin.

She takes the glass up with two slender, calloused fingers, swishing the amber liquid within. She says nothing.

“You know,” the barkeep continues, clearing his throat and leaning on his elbows. “The King’s been tellin’ folks he’s got you on the books. And I know you’re s’posed to meet him here.”

She flicks her eyes to him from beneath the brim of her hat. She can only see from his nose down, and watches the way his salt-and-pepper mustache quivers when he speaks, Adam’s apple bobbing along the five o’clock shadow of his turkey neck.

Fingers fidgeting, he clasps them together before drawing even closer. “It’s makin’ everyone real terrified,” he whispers.

“Weren’t they always?” she remarks, the corner of her mouth quirking in a ghostly smirk.

“Terrified of doin’ somethin’ wrong,” he clarifies. His breath is stale against her face, but it still beats the boozy sweat and cigarette smoke around her. “Everyone knows you kill crooks and bandits, but Ma’am, that’s not the King’s style.”

“You think I’m uninformed?” she asks cooly, shrouding the bar in a film of ice. The counter all but clears out, folks taking their conversations to distant tables.

“‘Course not,” he murmurs quickly, tongue prodding his parched lips. “All I’m sayin’ is the King kills men ‘cause he likes it, and with everyone knowin’ how good you are at what you do…” His mustache twitches as he swallows hard. “They’re afraid, is all. They wanna know why you’re doin’ it.”

She brings the whiskey to her lips and tips her head back, the liquid scalding all the way down. She lets it burn there a minute, then sets the glass neatly down atop the napkin without meeting his eye. “Money’s tight on the Row.”

He chuckles to himself, taking her glass and dropping it into a bus bin. “Nothin’ truer’s ever been said,” he sighs, then draws away from her and whistles across the room. 

“Boy!” he hollers, and her eyes follow the barkeep’s gaze to a young boy sitting at a tiny table in the corner. His green eyes widen at the sight of her, accompanied by an awestruck smile with missing front teeth. “Show her the way,” the barkeep instructs.

The boy sets down his homework book and slides off his wooden chair. He eyes her with wonder as she approaches—he’s heard the stories, and he’s seen her handiwork in the papers. But unlike adults on the Row, he’s too young to have done anything worth making her list. Unlike them, he has no reason to be afraid.

The second she reaches him, his mouth flies open. “Why do you wear that ribbon?” he all but demands, surely excited to tell the boys at school who he met tonight.

Rolling her neck, the velvet ribbon shifts against her skin. She hasn’t taken it off since her last encounter with the King, and she certainly doesn’t plan on removing it. She doesn’t answer, but instead thinks of a story her mother used to tell, and that she herself told her son many years ago: The Girl with the Velvet Ribbon. She never took it off, and every time her husband asked her to, she always refused.

“Is it ‘cause you’re mourning?” he prods. “My friends think you must be mourning.”

She shakes her head. She misses when her son was like this. So young and alive.

“Will you take it off one day?”

The little quirk of a smile returns to her lips. “You’ll be sorry if I do,” she says, echoing the girl from the fable.

Rounding the corner, they come upon a narrow corridor lined with old, dusty bottles and used, moldering rags. At the end of the corridor are two men, and she stops the boy at the sight of them, her fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt.

“This if far enough,” she says quietly. “Go on back now.”

“Why?” he wonders, staring up at her. “Pa says I’m s’posed to take everyone directly to the King.”

“I can get there just fine on my own,” she glowers, hand still clamped to his shirt. “And little boys like you would be wise to stay as far from the King as possible.”

The boy furrows his small brow. “I didn’t know people like you spoke from sentiment.”

For the first time she looks at him, and the ferocity in her eyes makes him gulp. “I’m not—I’m speaking from experience.”

The boy blanches, wriggling free from her grasp and stumbling back. His previous wonder shatters like glass, and he scrambles for his father.

She traipses down the corridor, though her nerves are on fire. For years, she’s waited for this. This moment—it clouds her every thought, desire, decision. She’s struck down more men than she can count for this, and she’s become not a killer, but a living legend. All in the hopes of catching the King’s eye.

Though his moniker passes through the lips of every person on Canary Row, the King is a ghost. His empire stretches with wicked talons throughout the Row—he runs the liquor for the bars, the women for the brothels, and the cash for the casinos. The stains of his dirty work are everywhere, yet—to keep the Marshal from breathing down his neck—the King is no where. He is a boogeyman that hides in the shadows, and the very few who have seen him almost never live to tell.

She greets the men with a password that was slipped to her two nights ago, and they push against the false wall behind them before ushering her into a windowless room swelling with smoke.

The King lounges in an overstuffed leather chair, chubby fingers folded lazily atop his bulging stomach. He puffs on a cigar as he peers over his desk at two men counting cash and placing stacks of bills into a pair of briefcases. At the front of the desk, resting atop a mahogany sword stand, is the King’s prized possession: a razor sharp katana with a ruby red hilt stained even darker with blood. The blood is fresh, its richness drawing her mind from the King’s office to the bedroom of her old apartment. To the blood soaking into the cream carpet. And not just her blood, why couldn’t it just be hers—

“I see my invitation found you well,” the King booms with a wide grin as he runs a plump hand over his smooth, bald head. He gestures to a chair sandwiched between the two stringy men.

She doesn’t move.

“I was worried you weren’t coming, considering you’re…” he procures a gold pocket watch from his vest. “Eight minutes late.” He watches her, attempting to peek under the brim of her hat. “I don’t like late,” he clarifies.

“I don’t like more ears than necessary,” she counters, voice even though rage rips through her chest like hellfire. Her eyes flick to the two men, and they falter with their piles before looking to the King for guidance.

He stares at her a moment, eyes lit with an exuberant flame. She’s a challenger that doesn’t grovel before him, though he cannot wait until she does. “You heard her,” he barks, and the men leap from their chairs.

He gestures to the seat again, and only once the false door clicks behind her does she take his offer. Dropping into the uncomfortable seat, she crosses one leg over the other, letting her coat fall open to reveal her twin blades.

Their glint makes the King grin with glee. “Oh, you have no idea what a happy man you’re making me,” he gushes, clasping his hands together. “I’ve had my share of assassins before, but you are something else entirely.” He leans in, beady eyes devouring her hungrily. “You might be the only person on Canary Row to hold a candle to my death toll.”

She bites her bottom lip, weighing her words carefully before she sets them free. “Are you counting the work of your men, or by your hand alone?”

He chuckles, getting comfortable in his seat as he dabs out the cigar. “My own, of course. Believe it or not, I like making the occasional house call—especially when I’m restless.” His eyes flicker to his sword as the last word leaves his lips.

“I’m no stranger to your methods,” she responds, and his eyes narrow.

He mulls over her words before his gaze falls from her shrouded face to her neck. “Say, tell me about… this,” he coos, motioning to her ribbon, oily smile resurfacing. “I’m dying to know, do you always wear it?”

“I do.”

“And you never take it off?”

“Never.”

“Will you for me?” He gestures at the money around him, as if asking her price.

She smiles. “You’ll be sorry if I do.”

He smiles back, but it’s tight, and his fingers dance toward his sword. “The price I offered through my messenger—does it meet your needs?” he asks, one hand now caressing the blade as if he dares her to say otherwise.

“I didn’t come here for the money,” she replies simply, unfazed by his vague threats.

“Oh?”

“I wanted to see you again.”

His brow knits. “Again?”

She nods, knuckles rapping against her armrest. “As it turns out, it’s much harder to get an invitation to see you than it is for you to invite yourself over.”

He opens his mouth, shuts it, opens it again. His jaw locks, one eye twitching. “I don’t recall you.”

She rolls her tongue against the back of her teeth. “No, I suppose you wouldn’t. I didn’t leave much of an impression back then. But my husband,” she adds, sitting up a little in her seat and relishing the way the King’s hand clasps his sword—as if it will protect him now. “You probably remember him.”

The King grunts. “Who is he?”

“Was he,” she corrects. “He was… a piece of crap. A drinker, a cheater, but most importantly, a gambler.” She chuckles, and it chills him to the bone. “A terrible gambler. I can’t say he ever won, but I can say he never paid up. And that’s where you come in.”

The King shifts in his seat, rearing on his haunches and ready to spring for his blade. His eyes loose their jovial spark, and his pale skin ruddies. “Listen lady, if your husband didn’t clear his dues, he had it coming.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” she clarifies, though the calmness in her voice is betrayed by a rising tidal wave of fury. “But you know who didn’t?” she asks, words like a whisper as she finally looks the King in the eye. “My boy.”

The King’s eyes flare with rage, wicked sneer ravaging his face as he realizes she never intended to work for him at all. His countenance triggers the memory of that night like lighting through her nerves, streaking her vision red. Red with the blood of her boy, red-hilted katana piercing his chest. He was too young to understand why it was happening, or who the King was, but she was too injured to save him.

The King lurches across his desk, snagging his blade and driving her chair over backwards. They topple to the floor, and her head cracks against the hardwood. Blood and bile rise in her mouth as the breath is forced from her lungs, the King’s meaty legs pinning her to the chair and crushing her chest. He looms over her, pressing the point of his weapon against the flesh of her neck.

Breath ragged, mouth foaming, he growls, “I don’t know who you are, but I don’t care.” Tracing his blade along her neckline, he slips it between her skin and the velvet ribbon. A despicable smile creeps across his face. “And while we’re here, let’s see what makes this ribbon so special.”

“You’ll be sorry if you do,” she rasps, dark spots forming at the corners of her vision.

The words send a flurry of flames to his eyes, and in one swift motion, he slashes the ribbon from her neck. And what he sees beneath snuffs his fire out.

A long, gnarled scar snakes its way around her neck, red and angry. A scar he put there long ago, after he’d killed her husband but before he’d found her son hiding in the closet. Before she could save him from the King.

He recoils as if poisoned, and she chokes in a breath. Recognition bolts across his black eyes, and she knows now that he remembers her after all. His face slackens, katana held limp at his side.

“You were supposed to be dead,” he whispers.

“I told you, you’d be sorry.”

Before the King can come to his senses, she reaches for the sickle blade at her waist. Slinging it from its sheath, she strikes out with one, quick slash.

The King’s body freezes, face contorted with fear and pain as droplets of blood spill from his neck and speckle her cheeks like rainfall. And then, the King’s head slides from his shoulders, dropping to the wooden floor with a heavy thunk. His body slumps after, falling aside as she pushes him off and clamors to her feet.

Wiping her face with the back of her hand, blood smears across her knuckles, and her nostrils sting with its pungent, coppery odor. She repositions her hat over her eyes and pushes through the false door into the narrow corridor. Watching her leave, the King’s men don’t know what to make of the warpaint streaking her face, and by the time they call the Marshal it’s too late—the Bladeslinger of Canary Row is gone to the night.