Witchmarked (World's First Wizard Book 1)

by Aaron D. Schneider

  Milo tried to process the comments, all given in impeccable German.

  “Wait, so you aren’t German?”

  “Never said I was,” Ambrose replied flatly.

  “So, what are you?” Milo asked, sitting back as he cast a speculative gaze toward the big man. “And how did you get this assignment if you aren’t even a soldier?”

  “What I am is your bodyguard, and your best hope of surviving that worm-nest we’re about to crawl through,” Ambrose said coolly, pointing his pipe at Milo. “I’d think that after that dustup at the depot, you’d understand how I got the job.”

  A ripple of muscles that could not have been coincidence moved across Ambrose’s frame, and Milo vividly recalled the sickening sound of a man’s arm snapping like wet kindling.

  “I’m not one of you dandy soldiers, but I’m the best God-cursed warrior this side of the Apocalypse,” he stated, his voice low and heavy. “I killed men good and bad in more wars than you have fingers and toes before your mother even met your father. I’m here to keep you safe, and the way I’ll do that is by killing everything and anything seeking to do you harm.”

  This wasn’t the first or the hundredth time Milo had heard a boast like that from bravos and tough guys, but this was the first time he believed every word of it. Some intuition, maybe magical, told Milo that Simon Ambrose was the type of man who didn’t need to lie.

  Milo let a slow, impressed curse slide out with the smoke as he basked in the afterglow of Ambrose’s declaration. After a moment’s reflection, he shook his head and popped the train window to toss out the stub of his cigarette.

  “Not doubting your obvious credentials,” Milo said, one hand raised in warding placation, “but that only answers part of the question. I want to know why someone in your unique situation would take this position?”

  Ambrose nodded and reached over to tap his pipe out through the open window before Milo drew it shut.

  “That Colonel Jorge saved me a good deal of headache and then promised me something,” he said as he stowed his pipe. “I’m going to see you through this to make sure he keeps that promise.”

  Milo sat back and began to wonder if there would be a time in the near future when a question he asked would not lead to a dozen more.

  “My turn,” the bodyguard declared, capitalizing on the momentary silence. “That is, assuming you are satisfied and prepared to move on?”

  Milo wasn’t, but he nodded anyway.

  “So,” the big man began, sinking back and folding his hands across the belly, “why don’t you like the name Volkohne?”

  Milo sucked his teeth and considered taking a page from the other man’s book and pretending to be sleepy, but since this was the first real conversation he’d had in some time, he decided he could endure a little longer.

  “’Volkohne’ is the name given to every child taken in by the Krieg-Waisenhausr without a family name,” Milo said, trying his best to keep his voice steady and monotonous. “Even among orphans, having a name like that sets you apart, and when it comes to kids, it's never a good idea to be set apart.”

  Ambrose pursed his lips, his mustache flaring as he studied Milo.

  “So, some snot-nosed urchins made fun of your name.” He shrugged. “You're not a child anymore.”

  “But it’s not my name!” Milo snapped, the words rushing up like bile, hot and bitter. “That’s the name they stuck me with, like branding livestock. And that’s just what I was to them—some stupid animal fostered for slaughtering. Do you know what happens when you age out of the Waisenhaus?”

  Ambrose shook his head.

  “To repay the generosity of the Kaiser, you are obliged to either join a colonial regiment or serve a term of service as an indentured worker in the mines or factories. Death in the trenches or being mangled by machines and mishap.”

  “But you don’t have to join a penal regiment,” Ambrose observed, an infuriating twinkle in his eyes. “And let’s not forget the getup you’re wearing now.”

  Milo looked down at his black coat and strangled the biting reply he felt rising in the back of his throat. Ambrose wasn’t wrong about any of it, but the self-satisfied look on his face was irritating in the extreme.

  Silence stretched between them as the train rolled southward and the sun began to sink.

  “So, what am I supposed to call you?” Ambrose asked at last. “I can’t help noting they gave you that getup without any insignia of rank except those devil traps on your cap.”

  “You could call me Milo,” he offered. “That is my name, after all.”

  “No,” Ambrose muttered with a shake of his head. “I knew a Milo, and that boy was a whiny wretch.”

  Milo shrugged, feeling tired and hollow.

  “I’m thinking...Magus,” Ambrose said with a final nod. “Milo Magus, or probably just Magus.”

  Milo allowed himself a small smile. It was better than most of the names he’d been called.

  “Not sure I can live up to the name,” Milo said, turning toward the window. “But thanks, I suppose.”

  Ambrose gave him a lopsided grin as he yawned, and his eyes settled back to their customary position.

  “You’ll grow into it,” he muttered drowsily. “Like that new coat, I suppose.”

  Milo absently plucked at the coat, feeling the vacuous space within, wanting to believe the big man was right. Simon Ambrose didn’t seem the type who had to lie.

  5

  A Stair

  The last leg of the journey seemed determined to remind Milo that though he was Magus to Ambrose, he was still a soldier, and that meant marching.

  The rail line had taken them to a ferry across the Caspian, where they had joined a larger contingent of Federated troops, the venerable 33rd East Prussian Fusiliers. Captain Lokkemand seemed to be at ease as their attaché perched among the seasoned regiment like a vermin-eating bird on a behemoth, separate but still sheltered. Lokkemand was hosted by a fellow officer every night for some time, returning the next day bleary-eyed but less irritable. For Milo and his burly shadow, nothing much changed. They were instructed to keep to themselves lest they, as novices in shadowy operations, let something slip over a game of cards and some schnapps.

  Despite this moratorium on contact, Ambrose did manage to acquire a bottle of Ansatzkorn, a potent beverage the big man described as being “a dirtier German version of vodka.” They’d only intended to sample it the night they made the crossing, but as it turned out, Milo had to be carried by Ambrose like a child in the aftermath of the empty bottle clutched in Milo’s fist.

  After the crossing, the team and the regiment boarded another train that took them to a city called Merv. The ancient city, Lokkemand explained, marked the edge of secure territory, and that from here on out, the 33rd would be acting as a combat escort as they moved up and along the Murgap River. The river, which began deep in Afghanistan, was supposedly under German control, but there were no regular gunboat patrols, and attacks from British-friendly locals were not unheard of. The 33rd elected to disembark at the bend where the river rounded the edge of the Band-i Turkistans, a craggy range of low mountains that Ambrose promised were only a shadow of the things to come.

  From there, it had been marching across the barely passable, barely habitable lands that were lashed by unrelenting winds as they made for Bamyan. Despite having a vague notion that this part of the world was sun-scorched, Milo found he was thankful for the sturdy greatcoat as they trudged along. In his old colonial rags, he would have been scoured raw and shivering, but as it stood, he only had to deal with perpetual fatigue and the monotony of trudging onward.

  As the days stretched on, Milo began to wonder if anyone lived in the desolate place, but Ambrose and conversations he gleaned from eavesdropping assured him that there was more to this place than met his unfamiliar eye. Milo remained suspicious of any human life besides their own until in the distance, he spied what looked like a child tending a flock of rangy goats.

  Mi
lo had watched the little shepherd scamper up a scruffy hillock, half-heartedly corralling the beasts in his haste. As more of the herd scattered, Milo wondered at the child’s poor tending until he caught a clear glimpse of the youth, who cast sharp looks over his shoulder at their company.

  It was only then that Milo noted a squad of men had detached themselves from the marching order and were heading toward the shepherd and his flock. Rifles in hand, they loped across the rough terrain like dark-pelted wolves from some parable.

  “Seems like a lot of work for a little goat,” Milo observed, squinting at a small kid skipping spryly across a boulder. “I’d be more worried about getting lost among all these god-forsaken hills and valleys.”

  Ambrose paused, shielded his eyes from the pale glare of the sun, and tracked the progress of the pursuers.

  “They’re not going to catch him,” he said at last, catching up with a quick scuttle. “And it’s not the meat they want but the boy.”

  Milo jerked his head around so quickly his labor-stiffened neck gave a pop.

  “What do you mean?” he asked, pitching his voice low.

  All the terrible things one heard about orphanages were not true of most such institutions, but the Dresden Krieg-Waisenhaus was not most institutions. As such, Milo was never shocked but always on guard against the depredations of wicked men.

  “Not that,” Ambrose muttered as though reading Milo’s thoughts, though he seemed to take no joy in the dismissal.

  “Then what?” Milo pressed.

  Ambrose cast a look around the hills flanking the column and then assessed the column itself.

  “The officers in the 33rd are not fools,” he answered in his low rumble. “That boy’s going to scamper off to whatever village or band is lurking around these parts. From there, any man with a gun or a rock and a love of British coin is going to descend on us like flies on a corpse.”

  Milo felt an itch between his shoulder blades and forced himself not to do his own fearful scan of the hills.

  “We’ll be ready, then?” Milo asked, throwing a surreptitious glance at the men in the column around them. “If they know it’s coming.”

  Ambrose shook his head, his voice still barely above a conspiratorial whisper.

  “We’re stretched out across a few kilometers at least, and tightening things up is going to slow us down. You’ll see more sentries, maybe a few more recon patrols, but any bandit-turned-mercenary is going to know how to hide in these hills.”

  Milo didn’t bother to suppress a shudder as the itch became an icy claw racing up his spine.

  “So, we’re going to be ambushed?”

  Ambrose nodded.

  “Several times, unless we’re incredibly lucky or unlucky,” he said, chewing his lip. “They’re opportunists, little better than scavengers, so they aren’t going to be doing anything more than taking a few shots before skittering off to do it again.”

  “What are they going to do?” Milo asked, nodding at where the senior officers rode in growling Land Rovers commandeered from the British.

  “Do?” the big man asked, seeming shocked by the question. “I know you’re young, Magus, but I thought you were trained as a soldier.”

  Milo blushed, hating himself for it, then shrugged in an attempt to seem unflappable.

  “The training of a penal regiment is hardly exhaustive.” He laughed, a tart, biting sound the wind snatched away. “March, fight, and die in that order, over and over. Didn’t take things like tactical appraisals into consideration.”

  The bodyguard gave a concessionary nod as he nodded toward the setting sun.

  “Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow night, but once things get dark, we’ll see the fighting and dying part, mark my words.”

  Milo sighed.

  “At least that might spare us some of the marching.”

  The first attack came on the second night after the shepherd escaped.

  Milo had just managed to convince himself that the attack wasn’t coming, despite Ambrose standing guard for the second night in a row. Their position was more defensible than the trench of a valley they’d been in the night before, being a broad, level patch in front of a craggy hillock. The 33rd had placed two concentric rings of sentry posts around the camp, and the rattling hum of generators powering massive searchlights seemed a comforting din.

  Unfortunately, the lights only served as excellent initial targets.

  The first went out with a snap, and it was a full two seconds before the crack of the rifle was heard—a long shot by a good marksman.

  The rest of the camp hadn’t woken to the danger, and Milo was still blinking when Ambrose hauled him out of the tent.

  “What?” Milo slurred, his feet scrabbling on the hard ground as he was half-dragged, half-carried. “Wh-where are we going!?!”

  Lokkemand had them bunk down in the center of the camp, which seemed a simple if cold calculation to put as many of the 33rd between them and the enemy as he could.

  Another light winked out, followed by another rifle crack, and the rest of the camp began to stir. Men shouted in German and tent flaps fluttered as the remaining lights raked the surrounding hills. A siren’s blaring wail sounded and was soon echoing off the surrounding hills in strange, unsettling tones.

  “Move it,” Ambrose snarled, tossing Milo out in front of him.

  Ambrose had a rifle in his hands. It looked like the Gewehr 98s some of the older Federated Regiments carried, but it somehow seemed a little thicker, almost blocky. A bandolier festooned with five-round clips hung across his huge chest.

  “Where are we going?” Milo shouted as a handful of soldiers raced past them.

  “That way,” the big man barked and stabbed a thick finger at the crown of the craggy hill.

  Milo fumbled to get his pistol from his belt, realizing his rifle had been left in the tent. He’d been outfitted with the Luger P08 back in Poland, but Ambrose had acquired a rifle for him during their march since his training had been exclusively with rifles in the Mud-Snakes. Now staggering in the dark toward a looming face of rock, it seemed Ambrose’s gift would be wasted.

  The sporadic pops of smaller, more excitable arms and marksman sounded along both flanks of the camp.

  “We’re surrounded!” Milo called back to Ambrose, whose crushing presence kept driving him forward for fear of being flattened.

  “Shut up and move, boy!” the bodyguard bellowed in a voice that made Milo’s bones feel like water. He somehow quickened his pace.

  Like a lion at bay, the 33rd roared to life, and the Prussians sent rippling volleys across the undulating hillocks around the camp. Slipping bladelike through the gaps in the cacophony of wailing sirens and gunfire, men could be heard dying on those hills. Only two searchlights remained and they swept over the jagged terrain, picking out a crumpled form here and there. The 33rd gave a cheer at the sight, only for more sporadic fire to draw their eyes and rifle barrels to another lump of earth.

  “Sounds like we are winning,” Milo panted as they reached the foot of a rough hill that was nearly a cliff.

  “Sounds like you and the Prussians are all fools,” Ambrose growled and stabbed his finger forward. “Those miserable idiots in the hills are a distraction.”

  Milo wanted to question how he was going to get up the rough wall of stone, but when he looked at it in the moonlight, he saw rough shelves of stone jutting out in a zigzagging pattern up the face of the cliff. Drawing a breath, he started up the stone staircase, throwing one last look over his shoulder.

  More of the 33rd was pouring out to the left and right of the camp in lethal, disciplined order. Under the streaking, searching lights, he saw the Afghan raiders attempting to flee, some having abandoned their rifles in haste. Everyone he saw illuminated in the stark light of the searchlights toppled in seconds like stringless marionettes as the 33rd’s rifles bayed for more.

  Milo, torn between cheering and hollering at Ambrose in rebuke, found his mouth hanging open as his eyes we
re drawn to the front of the camp. A second after he saw the rushing, gleaming shapes, he heard the thunder of their hooves.

  A contingent of horsemen mounted on spry-footed steeds was pouring into the camp, angry red sparks flickering in their hands.

  Leaping the low tents or trampling them underfoot, they made for the center of the camp. The men of the 33rd, intent on their chastising of the flanking ambushers, were slow to realize the true attack. Officers bellowed, but the sounds that filled the valley were the shrill screams of riders and horses, triumphant as they plunged like arrows into the heart of the camp.

  “Keep climbing!” Ambrose shouted to Milo, who sluggishly obeyed. “And keep your eyes open when you get to the top.”

  His limbs felt like lead as he saw sullen sparks fly from the riders’ hands. The tiny flames nestled amongst command tents and stockpiles of munitions and fuel before bursting into flames. The incendiaries lit the entire plain, stretching the shadows of the wheeling, shrieking horsemen across the camp like huge specters of death. Swords, lances, and pistols flashed in their hands as they set about striking and hewing at men or machines that lay within reach.

  Milo felt his arms begin to burn while below him, the gutted camp smoldered.

  The 33rd had turned about-face and was pouring into the camp, their faces grim and hard in the light of their decimated caches and tents. Some opened fire, smiting horse and rider, while others had affixed bayonets and charged in for a more visceral retribution.

  Milo had just mounted the crown of the hill when he saw the lunging, wailing riders begin to flee. They’d lost nearly a quarter of their number, but the devastation they had wrought on the material resources of the 33rd was substantial.

  “Well, those boys earned their coin,” Ambrose growled as he joined Milo at the top of the hill. “Perhaps a touch too eager to bask in their handiwork, but I can’t say that I blame them.”