Danger at the Iron Dragon Read online

  The academy was in a long, low building next to a branch of the Heights Bank. There were a corner store and a gas station nearby, but other than that, the street was mostly homes and empty, boarded-up shops with FOR SALE signs posted out front.

  After glancing in nervously through the plate-glass window, I pushed through the front door and stepped into a lobby. The room was furnished with a wide gray desk, and the wall behind it was adorned with the same dragon logo that I’d seen on the back of Carly’s hoodie. There was a shelf overflowing with trophies and medals nearby, and a framed newspaper article from the River Heights Bugle on the wall. It was all about the academy and featured a picture of a serious-looking man with black hair and glasses, and what looked like a team photo. Beyond that, a handful of students chatted together in a sitting area with a sofa and chairs.

  A girl with long blond hair and a big smile rose from her seat behind the desk to greet us. “Hi there!” she said cheerfully. “Welcome to Iron Dragon MMA! My name is Libby. How can I help you ladies?”

  I opened my mouth to reply, but George beat me to it. “We are here to fight!” she said. A little bloodthirsty for my taste, but that’s George for you.

  Bess rolled her eyes.

  “We’d like to try out one of your classes,” I explained. “One of your students invited us to—”

  “Nancy? I thought that was you!” I turned to see Carly, dressed in a white uniform with a purple belt tied around her waist, jogging up to us. “You actually came!” she said, delight spreading across her face. “And you brought friends! Two of them!”

  I smiled. “Well, you did tell me to.”

  “I know, but that doesn’t always work. Actually, it almost never works.” She clapped her hands in excitement. “I’m so happy you guys are here!”

  Within minutes, Libby had picked out a rental uniform—traditionally called a “gi”—for each of us and given us each a white belt to wear. “We have Jiu-Jitsu classes from eight to ten thirty on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, and some morning classes on the weekend,” Libby told us. “We’re closed on Wednesdays and Fridays, but we often have people come in for private lessons on those days, if you’re interested.”

  “Let’s see if we survive first,” Bess said, and we followed Libby to the women’s locker room.

  After pulling the stiff, rough jacket and pants on over my workout clothes and figuring out how to tie the belt, the three of us walked to the training area, where all the other students were gathering. It was a large, industrial-looking space with a high ceiling and wall-to-wall black and gray mats covering the floor like a giant checkerboard. “Nancy, Bess, George—let me introduce you to some of the regulars!” The other students turned toward us, curious. “That’s Jake, Ernesto, Jamie, Tim, Penny, Ryan—don’t roll with him, he’s crazy—Erica—”

  “Hey!” Ryan protested.

  “Nate, Liam,” Carly continued, not missing a beat. “And that’s Jeremy.”

  “Hello,” said Jeremy, a tall, broad-shouldered young man with deep brown skin and glasses, who was wearing a blue belt. He gave me a friendly slap on the back that almost sent me flying.

  “FYI, Jeremy is bigger than he looks,” Carly murmured under her breath.

  “He looks pretty big, though,” I murmured back.

  “Ah, yep.”

  “Jiu-Jitsu, line it up!”

  I turned to see a man standing at the front of the room, hands on hips, waiting expectantly. His salt-and-pepper hair and beard were cropped close, and he was probably at least six inches shorter and fifty pounds lighter than Jeremy and some of the other big guys in the room. But between the look on his face and the black belt circling his waist, I could tell that this was not a man to be taken lightly.

  “Who’s that?” I asked Carly.

  “Ethan Sekula, head coach,” she said, herding me and my friends toward the mats. “C’mon, let’s go. No time to chat now!”

  “But what do we do?” said George.

  “Just do what everyone else does,” Carly replied.

  With military precision, all the students lined up by belt color—brown belts at the front, then purple belts, blue belts, and white at the rear. I stood next to the girl named Penny, nervously shifting my weight from one foot to the other. She was about my height, with wavy brown hair and a heart-shaped face. Penny was humming under her breath, and after a moment I realized it was “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” When she noticed me watching her, she gave me an encouraging smile.

  “I thought we were here to fight,” I joked. “Not play baseball.”

  Penny chuckled. “I can’t help it. I used to play when I was a kid, and the song stuck with me ever since. First class?”

  I nodded.

  “Nervous?”

  I blushed. “Is it that obvious?”

  “Looks like we’ve got some new people in tonight,” Coach Ethan said, and I jerked back to attention when I realized he was looking straight at me. I waved awkwardly. “Just don’t break them, please,” he told the class. “Ideally, we’d like them to come back.”

  I glanced over to Bess, whose pale face was now tinged with green. Help me, she mouthed.

  George, meanwhile, looked like she was about to ride a roller coaster. “This is so cool!” she whispered.

  “Bow in,” Coach Ethan commanded. After we all did, he said, “Start jogging!”

  After a ten-minute routine that had me panting and dripping with sweat, Coach Ethan signaled that we could take a water break. We regrouped in a semicircle and sat down on the mats. “Okay, guys! Good warm-up,” he said, clapping his hands.

  “That was the warm-up?!” asked George. She looked like she’d run a marathon.

  “Today we’re going to go over the basic hip toss,” Coach Ethan continued. “Ryan, come out.”

  Ryan, a lanky blue belt who looked to be about my age, hopped up from the floor and stood in front of the coach. “So, we get our normal collar and sleeve grips on the gi, step and turn in, load them up onto our back, and extend the arm to complete the throw,” Coach Ethan explained. With one fluid movement, he lunged at Ryan and launched him over his back and onto the mat with a thud.

  I winced, expecting to see Ryan writhing on the ground, in pain or unconscious. Miraculously, he jumped back up like nothing had happened and stood at the ready for another.

  “Whoa,” Bess murmured.

  The coach did the move twice more, explaining different details each time. “Got it?” he asked, scanning the room. His gaze stopped on me. “New girl!” he said, pointing a finger in my direction. “What’s your name?”

  “Nancy Drew,” I answered.

  “What’s with the deer-in-the-headlights look, Nancy Drew?”

  I blinked. “Well, I mean, it’s my first day, and I don’t really understand how—”

  Coach Ethan lowered his chin and looked down his nose at me. “Come out,” he ordered.

  It was my turn to feel a little queasy. Steadying my breath, I stepped into the center of the circle. “Get your grips,” he said, before walking me through the rest of the setup.

  “Now, throw me,” he said.

  “But you’re bigger than I am,” I said hesitantly. “How am I supposed to—?”

  “Don’t think about it, just do it!” he said firmly.

  Swallowing hard, I closed my eyes and calmed my mind. Just do it, I repeated to myself. When I opened my eyes again, I grabbed his collar and sleeve, twirled around, and threw a full-grown man over my shoulder and onto the ground.

  Bam! His body hit the mat with another thud. A second later, he was back up on his feet, unharmed. “So,” he said, turning to address the other students, “is it good to be bigger and stronger than the other guy when you’re doing Jiu-Jitsu? Sure, it’s good. But it’s not the most important thing. You have to believe in the technique for it to work. Believing in the technique is the first step toward mastery. Now, partner up!”

  Feeling exhilarated, I started to turn away to find a partne
r, when Coach Ethan stopped me. “Got it, Nancy?” he said.

  “Got it, Coach,” I replied, fighting back a smile.

  Bess and George came up to me as everyone else broke up to start drilling the move. “Oh my word,” Bess said, her eyes alight. “That was so amazing! How did it feel?”

  “Pretty awesome,” I replied.

  “Coach Ethan is terrifying,” said George.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “But in a good way.”

  “White belts!” Coach Ethan shouted. George nearly jumped out of her skin. “Find a partner before I have everyone in this room doing push-ups! And no white belts with other white belts! You guys can’t be trusted with each other.…”

  George and Bess scrambled to join up with Erica and Jake, both purple belts. I scanned the room. The only student left without a partner was another purple belt named Liam. Liam had copper-colored hair that he’d tied at the back of his head in a small ponytail. He was built like a linebacker and had the rough look of a seasoned fighter, but his cornflower-blue eyes were open and friendly. “Redheads rule,” he said, reaching out for a fist bump.

  “They certainly do,” I said. “Partners?”

  “Sure thing, Nancy. Let’s do this!”

  “Okay, so… I throw you, then you throw me?”

  He nodded. “First let me show you how to properly break the fall, and then you can give it a shot. Don’t worry, I’m one of the assistant coaches here. I’ll let you down gently.”

  “Sounds good.” We started to get into a rhythm, and my throwing—and landings—got a little better with every turn. “So,” I said, getting up off the mat for the fifteenth time. “How long have you been doing Jiu-Jitsu?”

  Liam put his hands on his hips. “Whew, a long time. Around nine years, I think.”

  “Wow, that’s real dedication. Does it take that long to get a purple belt?”

  Liam cleared his throat and looked away. “It’s a journey,” he said with a pained smile. “Everyone’s is different.”

  “Oh, of course,” I said, feeling like I might have put my foot in my mouth. The students here might be pretty competitive about stuff like that. “Do most people come here to learn self-defense?” I asked, trying to change the subject.

  “It’s a mix,” Liam answered, adjusting the knot on his belt. “Some come for that. Others come to get in shape. And then we have people join who want to become competitors.”

  “Competitive fighters—that’s so cool!” I said. “So, who here competes?”

  “A lot of the regulars do,” he said. “Carly’s been winning a lot of tournaments lately. In fact, she has a big one coming up in a few days, on Saturday. She and some of the others have been training really hard for it.”

  We spent another fifteen minutes working on the hip toss, and then Coach Ethan gathered everyone to walk us through a few other moves and have us try them out.

  “Time’s up!” Coach Ethan yelled, stopping us in the middle of practicing a defensive technique. “Take a water break, then get your sparring stuff on and partner up! Please find someone of similar size. No bully fights!”

  I thanked Liam and gave him another fist bump before jogging to the sidelines and taking a few gulps from my water bottle.

  “Wanna roll?”

  I turned to see Jamie, a petite girl with a button nose and dirty-blond hair, looking at me expectantly. “Sure,” I said, following her onto the mat. She’s smaller than me, at least, I thought. How bad could it be?

  “First time sparring?” she asked. “No worries. Got any brothers?”

  “Only child.”

  “Ever done any high school wrestling?”

  “Can’t say that I have.”

  “Ever got in a fight?”

  I raised an eyebrow, remembering the untold number of times I’d grappled with thieves, saboteurs, kidnappers, and other criminals, then replied, “More than you’d expect, actually.”

  “Oh! Well then, sparring should be no problem for you. If you’re uncomfortable or anything hurts, just tap out. Easy peasy.”

  “Easy peasy,” I repeated, my heart starting to race as we bumped fists.

  “Go!” Coach Ethan shouted, and thus began the most exhausting, confusing, and exhilarating five minutes of my life.

  Jamie was a blue belt, so I expected her to be good, but I didn’t expect to be so completely and hopelessly outmatched. She moved like a caffeinated puma, while my technique more resembled a hippopotamus encased in Jell-O. Within thirty seconds, I was completely winded, and within a minute, she had my face pressed against the floor. Her legs were twisted around my arm like a pretzel, and with one gentle movement from her, I felt intense pressure in my shoulder. I tapped the mat twice and Jamie released me immediately. By the time I sat up, panting, sweating, and thoroughly impressed, Jamie was already back on her feet.

  “What was that?” I asked.

  “Omoplata,” she replied. “It’s a joint lock submission.”

  “It certainly is,” I said, rubbing my shoulder.

  “Ready to go again?”

  “Again?”

  “It’s only been two minutes. It’s a five-minute match, so we’ve got three left. You good?”

  Was I good? I couldn’t really tell. I was tired and sore and maybe a little dizzy, but—

  Jamie sensed my indecision. “C’mon, Nancy. You’ve got a lot of fight in you. I can tell.”

  I smiled, and suddenly felt a little less tired. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  Three minutes and two more tap-outs later, I started to understand exactly why people got addicted to this. Being on the other side of that much skill and physical dominance really made you want to know how to do it too.

  “Thanks so much,” I told Jamie, giving her a fist bump. “That was really fun.”

  “Anytime!” she said with a smile.

  The group took a minute for another water break, and I looked around to see how the girls were doing. George was lying on the floor, hyperventilating. Meanwhile, Erica seemed to be showing Bess how to do some kind of complicated choking technique. “You okay, George?” I called out.

  She gave me a thumbs-up, but otherwise didn’t move.

  “She’ll be fine,” Jamie assured me. “At least she hasn’t thrown up yet!”

  “Yet?” I asked nervously.

  “Next round, coming up!” Coach Ethan shouted. “Find partners!”

  I somehow got through two more sparring rounds—the first with another white belt named Tim, and the last one with Penny. “So, what do you think of Jiu-Jitsu?” Penny asked once our round was over.

  “I’ll tell you when I catch my breath,” I said, struggling to my feet.

  Penny laughed.

  The class was finished, so we lined up again by belt and bowed out, giving each fellow student a friendly fist bump. As soon as we were done, Bess came running up and grabbed me by the shoulders. “Oh my gosh, Nancy! That was so amazing! I jumped on her, and then she rolled around like this, and then I pushed her and she got me in this crazy choke.… Erica says I have natural instincts. Can you believe it?”

  “Honestly?” I said. “No! You didn’t even want to come along tonight!”

  “I know, I know. I was just freaked out, but I was wrong, Nancy! So, so wrong!”

  I shook my head in disbelief. Bess Marvin, falling in love with combat sports! Who would have thought? “I’m happy for you. Hey, where’s George?”

  Bess sucked her teeth. “Well, she left the mat after the second round of sparring and took off for the bathroom. I think she might have been sick.”

  “Huh,” I said, “I guess Jamie was right.…”

  “Right about what?” Bess asked. “I’d better go check on George—oh! There she is. She looks okay… just a little green around the gills.”

  “Poor George,” I said, suppressing a grin. “All her dreams of becoming a ninja dashed by too many cheese fries before training.”

  As George slowly made her way back to us, Carly jog
ged over. “So, what did you guys think? Did you have a good time?” she asked.

  I opened my mouth to reply, but Bess beat me to it. “Where do I sign up?” She was practically dancing. “Can I get one of these gi things in pink?”

  “Actually,” Carly said, “You can—”

  “AHH!”

  Everyone in the academy froze as a loud shriek pierced the friendly chatter. It was coming from the lobby. I joined the rest of the group, dashing out of the training area to where Libby was backing away from her desk, her face as pale as a moon.

  I followed her eyes to the desk. A large dead rat lay there on its back, its feet stiff and curled, its eyes open and glassy. On the wall behind the desk, someone had spray-painted a single word across the Iron Dragon logo in vivid, dripping red letters:

  TRAITOR.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Martial Law

  FOR A MOMENT, THE ROOM was quiet as we all took in the gruesome tableau. Then everyone started talking at once.

  “What the—”

  “I think I’m going to be sick.…”

  “That poor rat!”

  “Who did this? Because so help me, I’ll—”

  Then one voice cut through all the others like a knife. “Let me through.”

  Everyone fell silent as Coach Ethan made his way to the front of the crowd. He surveyed the damage, his face a mask of barely concealed fury, then turned to Libby. “Explain,” he demanded.

  “O-okay,” Libby stammered. “Well, um—a little while ago, I stepped out to get some cash from the bank, like I usually do on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. I was only gone for five minutes, ten at the most. And when I got back…” She gestured toward the dead rat. “It was like this.” Her face started to crumple under his harsh stare. “I’m sorry, I never thought—”

  Seeing that she was upset, Coach Ethan seemed to soften. “Hey,” he said. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault.” His eyes flicked back and forth from the expired rodent to the writing on the wall. “Seems like someone’s trying to send us a message. But who? And why?”