I shook my head, smiling indulgently at my dreamer-best-friend. Clue had been the result of an illicit affair between a Chinese diplomat and a Thai prostitute. Born out of wedlock, she’d been thrown away like rubbish when she was just two weeks old.
We met three years ago when I saved her from being raped and mutilated in a rural Sydney suburb.
Clue batted her eyelashes, blowing me a kiss. “You can’t tell me you don’t want to be ravished by someone who just fought a battle to win you? I know you don’t have physical needs like the rest of us, but that has to turn you on.”
This time I laughed with my heart and not just out of requirement. “I have needs, you know. I just have more pressing responsibilities than chasing a man who isn’t interested in a mother with baggage.” I refused to dwell on urges that woke me up in the dead of night. Craving a release, begging for another’s body—too bad I never found anyone I wanted—not even Clara’s father.
“But think of it, Zelly. Muscles, gruffness, barely restrained violence—a man who kisses with possession and gentleness.” She fanned herself dramatically. “I’m turning myself on just thinking about it.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re way too much of a romantic for these times. You should’ve been born six hundred years ago if you want men who kill and women who swoon.”
She grinned, showing perfect pearly teeth. “I was born six hundred years ago. That’s why I hanker after it so much. Men these days who work in offices and eat pies for lunch need to get in touch with their sword-wielding forefathers.”
“You’re getting worse.” I smiled. Clue had two fascinations in life: men and past lives. She swore she’d lived countless times before, and as much as I liked to joke and pluck holes in her tales, I couldn’t ignore the fact that she knew things. Things she shouldn’t know for a discarded child with no education.
“You’re an old soul too, Zel. I can tell. I haven’t figured out where you’re from, but I will.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her she was wrong. I acted old beyond my years, because I’d had enough bad fortune to last me forever. If I had lived before, I must’ve been a witch or a murdering psychopath to warrant the trials I’d endured.
I squeezed her hand as we turned left at the end of the corridor and promptly slammed to a halt.
“Holy mother of God, where have you brought me?”
Dropping her fingers, I moved forward, almost in a trance.
The double doors had been crafted from metal. One side depicted a fairy-tale: a young man faced away from the viewer, standing surrounded by piles of coins, sunshine, and young children. Fantastical turrets of a castle rested in the distance.
My heart hurt as I looked at the next door. If the first had been heaven, this one would definitely be hell.
The young man now faced the viewer, but his features were blank. No nose or eyes or mouth, just a smooth blank oval. Behind him wolves fought while lightning and storm clouds brewed. But what killed me was the children who’d been laughing in the other portrait were now in pieces, scattered on the ground in melting snow.
“Whoa, that’s a bit morbid,” Clue said, reaching out to touch a severed leg.
I snatched her hand back and pressed the other door to open it. I wanted away from the scene; it came too close to home.
Don’t think of your troubles. Tonight, pretend to forget.
Troubles.
I could never forget about them. They were a noose around my neck; a guillotine waiting to fall. But I was done moping, so it didn’t matter.
The instant the door cracked open, noise assaulted us. A potent mixture of fists hitting flesh, grunts of pain, lilts of feminine laughter, shouts of encouragement, and the smooth beats of music.
We entered a cavernous dark room—either a converted ballroom or a specially designed arena. It welcomed us with thick black velvet covering four story high walls. Lining the perimeter, a grandstand held black couches, La-Z-boys, and luxury daybeds. Each one had its own podium with side table and a small lamp, looking like fireflies in the dark.
“Oh my,” Clue murmured, focusing on the main event.
Every apparatus of fighting existed: a Mixed Marital Arts cage, a boxing ring, a Muay Thai ring, mats for close combat, and bare floor for other barbaric blood sports. Each space was crowded with men either bloodied from a fight or bouncing on their feet ready to meet a new opponent. I’d never seen such a display of masculinity—raw and unbridled.
Sweaty towels hung off chairs and modesty was non-existent as men changed from torn work-out gear into loose fitting cool down attire. Water stations and medic booths rested between each arena.
My breathing came faster, dragging in scents of disinfectant, beer, and the clean smell of hard work. I couldn’t focus on just one thing. A fight had begun with a bombardment of fists and scary determination in the Muay Thai ring, while another fight in the MMA cage had just finished—the victor pranced around his unconscious foe waving his blood-smeared fists in the air.
Everywhere I looked men grinned, audience members encouraged, and people throbbed with vitality. My body sucked up every ounce of liveliness, storing it.
What the hellis this place?
A huge banner hung from the ceiling directly above all five fighting rings.
Fight with honour, fight with discipline, fight with vengeance.
Goosebumps rose on my arms. The words were poignant, holding a promise of more than just violence—a whole new world I didn’t know existed. Despite myself, I wanted to find out more. Clue was right—seeing a man fight awoke something deeper, darker, less tame inside me. We may be refined and socially acceptable on the outside, but at heart we were still animals. All my life, I’d fought my own battles, but now I wondered what it would’ve been like to have someone fight beside me.
“I think I died and went to man heaven,” Clue whispered, her almond eyes the widest I’d ever seen. Her cheeks flushed with colour as a man in the boxing ring took a hit to the jaw by a fighter glistening with sweat and crimson.
Every man held an edge of eager pleasure—even those black and bruised joked and watched comrades get beaten while sipping on icy bottles of water.
The atmosphere in the room wasn’t feral or violent like I expected. It had an old-world class about it. An exclusivity. A richness. An unwritten code that said they’d try to win, but would never kill. I found the restraint reassuring but weirdly annoying at the same time.