Vincent hid in the bushes on the side of the road, a hand on the grip of his gun. It was cold against his fingers, itching for him to slip his finger over the trigger, even though there wasn’t anything to shoot at. Not yet, anyway. His targets weren’t far away if he’d timed everything correctly.

He’d left his horse in the field nearby to eat where she wouldn’t be a distraction. The trees that lined the dirt road hid her from view, meaning his targets weren’t going to be able to see her either and weren’t going to know what was waiting for them in the bushes. By this point, they should have been expecting it, leaving the confines of a town was pretty much begging to be robbed.

Vincent had been there for almost half an hour, waiting for the horse-drawn carriage to come trundling towards him, holding gold and supplies he’d been without for far too long. The satchel that held his ground vireen herb had been empty for at least a week, but anxiety had been settling in for far longer than that. It was getting harder and harder to find the herb and unlike some people, Vincent wasn’t the best at telling which parts of the actual plant were able to be ingested without poisoning himself.

If he’d had some, he would have been able to hear the carriage coming from miles away, but without it, he would have to wait for the last minute. It meant he had to be prepared from the moment he squatted down in the bushes. He’s been ready for his gun from the start, and his favourite knife was tucked into his belt next to his vireen pouch. The second he heard the sound of hoofbeats on dirt, he would be ready.

But until then, he had to sit and stew in the same boring scrub he had used as his hunting grounds for seven years. Sometimes, he thought it was pretty, but when he was tense and waiting and growing more and more desperate by the second, the muted greens and browns of the eucalyptus trees were bland and boring. The road was the only thing that differed from the bush, cutting a curving line through it all.

It stretched on for miles, low hanging branches ruining Vincent’s view of the road. If he poked his head out from the thick bush he hid behind, he would be able to see it perfectly, but he’d also be giving himself away. With a heavy breath and pursed lips, Vincent pulled his thoughts away from the scenery and focused on the job he needed to do.

Within moments, he heard a sound that made him smile. Hoofbeats mixed with carriage wheels moved towards him, drowning out the birds chirping in the distance. He adjusted his grip on his gun and waited for the horses to round the bend not far from his little hiding spot.

All he needed was a little gold for food and little vireen to get by on his way to New Feridian. With a little vireen, it wouldn’t take much effort to get more. And he’d have bragging rights. He wasn’t the only one struggling to get the herb and it would be a lot of fun to rub it in the face of all the others that were fighting for it like he was. Specifically, a certain masked git that had been a pain in his arse for almost as long as he’d been robbing people.

He gave it a second or two after the horses rounded the corner to stride out onto the dirt road. The carriage wasn’t anything fancy, but the fact that it was there meant there had to be something worth selling inside. There weren’t many people in the little town two hours up the road that could afford to own horses, let alone a carriage, only the rich.

Vincent walked out into the middle of the road, head held high and a smirk on his face. With a quick flick of his wrist, he had the gun pointed at the carriage driver, who let out a sharp string of curses as he pulled the horses to a stop. Confused cries came from within the thin walls and it would only be a second before an angry man shoved the door open to ask what the hold up was.

“Off you get,” Vincent said with a flick of his wrist. He gave the two horses a quick pet on the muzzle as he walked to the side of the carriage. Horses tended to panic and spook when he showed up, but they didn’t know any better. It was best to keep them as calm as possible.

Fear in his eyes, the carriage driver let go of the reins and jumped from his seat, his hands up high above his head. Vincent gave him a once over, checking for anything valuable on him. Of course, there was nothing, but it was always worth a shot. All the man had on him was his dark pants and tunic, dirty and ratty.

Vincent grabbed him by the shoulder without so much as a grunt and pressed the muzzle of his gun against his back. It mustn't have been the first time the old driver had experienced a robbery; he walked forwards, barely resisting Vincent’s nudges towards the carriage door.

The couple inside couldn’t have been much older than Vincent’s nineteen years and were holding each other close when the driver pulled the door open. “Come on,” Vincent said in a drawling voice. “Gold, vireen and anything valuable in the bag.”

He slung his knapsack off his shoulder and dumped it on the carriage floor with a thud. It held nothing of importance, a bread roll and a spare shirt. Most of his belongings were either on him or with his patiently waiting horse.

“We don’t have much,” the man said, immediately reaching for a small chest under the seat. “Please, it’s all we have left.”

“Don’t care,” Vincent snapped, moving the gun from the driver’s back so they could see it. “Show me what’s in it.”

They had been telling the truth. In the chest was barely thirty gold coins and a satchel of vireen half the size of his own. The gold would get him enough food to last a week and the vireen would last him at least double that. It was good enough. He pursed his lips again, looking over the dark-haired man and the pretty blonde woman. He had a watch and she had a hand over her neck, covering something she assumed valuable.

“Put the chest in the bag. Show me what’s around your neck,” he ordered the woman. She shook her head, her hand trembling, but moved it quickly when he pointed the gun at her again. The driver stood in silence, but Vincent could feel him tremble under the hand on his shoulder.

“Please, miss,” the woman said in a whispery voice. “It’s all I have.” It was a necklace and from a single glance, Vincent could tell that it wasn’t going to be worth much. But if there was one thing that was going to anger him, it was being referred to as a woman.

His hand clenched tightly around the grip of his gun as he pointed it at the woman’s painted face. “Put the fucking necklace in the bag,” he growled, sneering at her. “Your watch too.”

Tears were running down her face when she unclasped the silver chain and placed it gently in the bag, but Vincent couldn’t find it in himself to care. He would have let her keep it if she’d just kept her mouth shut. He wasn’t a woman, he hadn’t been a woman for a long time, even if he might sometimes look like one.

Once everything was safely in the bag, he shoved the old driver away, not caring when he landed on the dirt with a grunt. “Thank you kindly,” he said, giving the young couple a smirk. It was barely anything, but it was enough to last him for a little while. He slammed the carriage door shut, stepped over the man sprawled in the dirt and walked back towards the bushes he had come from.

After years of robbing people, both for the thrill and for survival, he believed he had gotten quite good at reading his victims. With some, he could tell that they were going to attack him the moment he opened the door or as soon as he walked away. Most of the time, they sat in their carriages and cried like the cowards they were. That’s what he thought the young man was going to be.

Sometimes, he got it wrong. Sometimes, they took him by surprise. He had scars on his body that showed the price he paid for his mistakes, but when the carriage door burst open, he vowed he wasn’t going to mar his body again. He already hated it enough as it was, he wasn’t going to make it worse.

The young man let out an angry cry of garbled words, the door slamming against the side of his carriage and startling the poor horses. They neighed and kicked at the ground, ready to run if they were given another spook. Vincent didn’t like the idea of scaring them more, but leaving the angry man alone in the middle of nowhere did send a spark of amusement running through him.

“You wretched woman!” the young man yelled. He had one hand pressed against the side of the carriage, his other holding what looked to be a decorative sword. There was a small part of Vincent that laughed at the ridiculousness of it all, but most of him was angry.

He stalked forward, his free hand reaching for the knife in his belt. It was sharp, serrated and only supposed to be used when he didn’t have his gun. Or when he was feeling particularly enraged by something. “I’m not a woman!” he growled, twisting the blade in his hands.

The man, more like a cowardly boy, trembled as Vincent reached him. He did nothing to defend himself, even as the blade came swinging towards him, his eyes wide with a fear Vincent couldn’t care less about. Blood bloomed in a line from shoulder to waist, spreading across the clean white shirt he’d been wearing. It wasn’t a killing blow, but a warning shot.

Vincent sneered again as the man stumbled back, dropping his sword to clutch at his chest. He acted as if he were dying when he’d only have a scar. The wound would heal easily without vireen. Even when fueled by his rage, Vincent wasn’t going to kill someone who was only trying to defend his belongings, no matter what they might view him as.

He disappeared into the scrub as the driver moved to tend to his boss. Despite the adrenaline and anger still flooding his veins, an anxious hand moved up to rub his chest, hating what he felt there. He tried so hard to get people to see him as he was and still, people looked at his face, at the lack of hair and the roundness that shouldn’t be there, and assumed.

And they always assumed wrong. He kept his hair cut short, a dark wavy mop that couldn’t be slicked back no matter how hard he tried, and wore clothing that was supposed to hide the one thing he wished he didn’t have. But sometimes, even with the black coat that fell to his knees, it wasn’t enough. It was never enough for him; he always knew what lay beneath the layers of clothing.

His voice didn’t help much either. Despite many attempts to practice deepening it, there was no stopping the pitch it rose to when he was truly angry. His normal voice was deep enough to stop anyone being confused unless they looked too closely and that was more than he could ever hope for. It was a struggle he had dealt with for years and one he would continue to deal with. He knew he would have to fight for his existence, but it was always in ways he didn’t expect.

His horse, a brown mare that he had named Sparks, was still eating grass when he arrived. People always questioned the name, but he never gave a proper explanation. There had been an explosion, accidentally caused by him and another ranger after an argument. He’d needed a horse and the first one he’d found had sparks of a fire biting at her hooves as she galloped past.

Patting her allowed him to calm down. The man from the carriage wasn’t going to follow him, not with that wound in his chest, meaning he was free to untie Sparks from the tree she stood nearby. He might have gotten a bit too angry back there, but at least he wasn’t leaving empty-handed.

For the first time in days, he had his hands on vireen again. His pipe sat in one of the bags on Sparks’ side, waiting for him to have a free moment to smoke it. Then he would be able to hear properly again, see properly again, and work towards growing his stash some more. There would be more once he headed towards the city of New Feridian in a few days.

The sound of a gun clicking behind him made him freeze. “Run out of vireen too, Vincent?” an annoyingly familiar voice asked. “I never could sneak up on you when you were using it. You always heard me coming.”