by C. L. Werner
‘Scream for me,’ the bounty killer’s murderous voice hissed into the Tilean’s ear as he flung the injured man from the top of the tower.
The sentry’s wail of horror echoed through the corridors of the fortalice in the brief instant before it was silenced in a dull crunch of bone. Cries of surprise and alarm sounded from the two rooms still occupied by the Tilean kidnappers. Ursio met the gaze of the foremost man from the former barracks.
‘Find out what is going on!’ the mercenary captain snarled. ‘And kill it!’ he added, slamming the door shut after him.
The trio of mercenaries crept up the stairway, swords held before them, making their way to the roof. They had already discovered the body of the lower watchman, removing any question that someone was loose in the tower. The men were wary, cautious and more than a little enraged. At least one more of their comrades gone, another debt of blood to be collected in this vendetta with the Bretonnian viscount.
The rearmost of the Tileans was only a few paces behind the leading pair when he paused. He had heard a sound: the scrape of stone against stone. He turned, facing a dark opening in the wall that had not been there a moment before. He opened his mouth to shout, but found his words silenced as a length of steel tore into his gut.
‘Aren’t you pleased you found me?’ Brunner asked the dying man as he pushed him off his sword. The bounty hunter turned his body as he emerged from the concealed passage and made ready to meet the attack of the other Tileans as they reacted to the sound of their companion’s demise. Brunner smiled to himself. The men would join their friends soon enough.
Ursio stared at the door of the room that had once served as the quarters for the commander of the tower. The sounds of combat, the ring of steel on steel and the gasping cries of dying men had sounded from beyond that now closed portal. The mercenary captain cast a nervous look over at his remaining men. The wiry, scar-faced Vernini nodded at his commander, hefting the loaded crossbow in his hands. Vernini was the best shot among all his men. Whoever opened that door would be rewarded with Vernini’s quarrel in his heart.
The brutish mass of Verdo glowered at Ursio. The homicidal thug was still chafing from the violent reprimand his captain had given him. When they had discovered that there were intruders in their hideout, a fit of rage had consumed the black-bearded mercenary. Before Ursio could stop him, Verdo had snapped the neck of the abducted nursemaid with his bare hands and was lumbering toward the basket that contained the baby before a blow from the hilt of Ursio’s sword had restored some degree of reason in the thug’s murderous mind. Verdo stood, his heavy cavalry mace clenched in his hands, his chest heaving, every muscle in his body tensed in anticipation. Ursio thought his brutish comrade was not unlike a hound straining at the leash, or a Norse berserker working himself into a frenzy.
Ursio’s roving eyes rolled to the basket and the crying form within. The mercenary captain had lost everything because of the Viscount de Chegney’s treachery. The small life in that basket represented the only way Ursio could make his deceitful former patron suffer. The Tilean’s face settled into a snarl. He pulled his long-bladed dagger from its sheath and moved toward the woven basket.
Just then, the heavy door swung open, its rusty hinges groaning. Vernini did not hesitate. The sharp snap of his crossbow discharging drowned out the creaking sound of the old hinges. The bolt sped into the shape that filled the doorway, smashing through leather tunic, flesh and ribcage. The body jerked as the bolt impacted, then fell forward as it was pushed into the room.
Brunner wasted no time discarding his cadaverous shield, shifting to the right as the body pitched to the floor. Vernini was already hastily reloading his crossbow, swinging his body about to bring the still unloaded weapon to bear on Brunner. Ursio froze above the basket, dagger in hand; his eyes locked upon the black-helmed figure that had slain so many of his men.
‘Blood of Khaine!’ the mercenary swore as recognition came to him. ‘Brunner!’
As if to punctuate the Tilean’s oath, the bounty hunter fired the smouldering weapon gripped in his left hand. The shot from the black powder pistol smashed into Vernini’s forehead with a force far greater than that of the marksman’s crossbow. The mercenary’s face disappeared in a red ruin as the shot punched through the Tilean’s skull and the man was dead before his body finished falling. Brunner let the spent pistol fall too, dropping the weapon and drawing the heavy falchion from the scabbard at his side.
As the roar of the firearm began to fade, it was replaced by a thunderous bellow no less violent. Verdo charged forward like a maddened bull, swinging his mace at the bounty hunter as if it were the avenging maul of Ulric himself. The bounty hunter managed to dodge the powerful but clumsy blow, kicking the brute in the knee. Verdo grunted, but did not stagger. Howling his wrath, the Tilean lashed out at Brunner again, this time finding his weapon blocked by the intercepting steel of the bounty killer’s sword.
Ursio cursed again, gathering up the child from the basket, heedless of the wailing infant’s cries. Keeping the baby pressed against his chest, the mercenary captain circled around the duelling figures of Brunner and Verdo. He did not favour his thuggish comrade’s chances against the notorious bounty hunter, but perhaps Verdo could keep the hunter occupied long enough for Ursio to effect his own escape. As if to speed Ursio’s flight, as he neared the doorway, he saw Brunner’s blade slip past Verdo’s guard, slashing the man’s left arm almost to the bone.
The Tilean was running when he passed from the chamber of death and into the corridor outside. His steps were heavy and swift. He did not see the tiny glittering objects strewn about the floor, the sinister little steel spiders that met his weighty footfalls. They were caltrops, metal spikes designed to cripple warhorses, dropped by the bounty hunter to maim any escaping prey. As Ursio’s booted foot encountered its first caltrop, the metal spike pierced leather and flesh, gouging a hole through the sole of his foot. Ursio cried out in pain, flinging both child and blade from him as both hands instantly sought to arrest his fall. The mercenary captain landed badly, another caltrop punching through the palm of his hand, three others digging into his chest and legs as he impacted against stone, another puncturing his right cheek.
Ursio writhed in pain, trying to dig the caltrop from his face with his uninjured hand. The sound of boots scuffling against flagstone brought a new horror to the Tilean. Ursio looked up to see Brunner framed in the doorway, wiping the lifeblood of Verdo from his sword with a rag torn from the mercenary’s tunic before sheathing his blade. Ursio saw the bounty hunter cast a glance at the small swaddled object that lay against the wall, now silent and unmoving. The face below the visor of the helm was unreadable as Brunner strode toward Ursio’s prone form.
‘Wait!’ the mercenary stammered. ‘I’ll go with you! I won’t try to escape!’ Ursio knew who had set the infamous bounty hunter on him, he knew that he could expect slow death and torture when he was delivered to the sadistic Bretonnian viscount. But it would take days to reach the viscount’s castle, and Ursio was desperate to gain even so small a respite from his journey to the gardens of Morr. ‘You can take me to the viscount. I won’t resist!’
Brunner leaned over the pleading sell-sword. ‘I will take you to the viscount,’ his cold voice stated. Ursio’s eyes grew wide with fright as he saw the bounty hunter draw a large serrated knife from its sheath. ‘But the viscount is only paying me for your head.’
‘My grandson is dead then?’ the question emerged from Viscount Augustine de Chegney’s mouth like the forlorn growl of a wretched and dying wolf.
Brunner looked up at the seated nobleman upon his raised throne-like chair. He could imagine the man sitting there—not as he was, a morose creature who had seen his last chance for posterity taken from him, who knew that his long and noble line would now end with his last breath—but as a cruel and sadistic brute, resplendent in treacherous triumph. He could imagine the viscount sitting there, slowly sipping his wine as a sobbing maiden with l
ong golden hair washed his feet with her tears, begging with the beast that had become her father to spare the battered and broken man whose blood still stained the stones of the hall’s floor. He could almost hear the viscount’s words of conciliation, of acquiescence to the pleas of his daughter-in-law. He could almost see the shabby, lice-ridden shapes of the slavers standing in the shadows of the room, there to ensure that every promise the viscount made to the maiden would become a lie.
‘They never had the boy,’ the bounty hunter’s cold voice said. ‘After leaving the castle, they killed the nurse and the baby, feeling that their prisoners would be too much of a burden to maintain. They never intended to return the child to you,’ the bounty hunter concluded. He reached over and carefully unwrapped the small knotted cloth bundle that sat at his side upon the floor. The soiled cloth unfolded itself and the head of Ursio cast its sightless eyes upon the viscount.
The viscount trembled with emotion, one hand rising to conceal his face from the bounty hunter. With his other hand the nobleman gestured to his seneschal. ‘Pay the man,’ the viscount spoke through his fingers.
Elodore Pleasant shambled forward, withdrawing a leather pouch from the breast of his tunic. Brunner rose, opening his hand, letting the heavy sack of money sink into his palm. The bounty hunter bowed slightly to Pleasant.
Brunner favoured the viscount with a final icy stare. The viscount looked back, seeing only the hired killer his henchman had engaged. Brunner bowed again, leaving the viscount to consider all that he had lost.
The armoured traveller emerged from the rear room of the tavern, leaving the young woman and the quietly sleeping baby behind. He turned his black-helmed head towards the innkeeper, a slightly balding man in early middle age. The merchant gulped as he met the icy eyes of the bounty hunter.
‘When I brought the child here three days ago,’ the voice beneath the helm rasped, ‘I promised you gold if you would care for him.’ The man’s gloved hand placed a leather pouch upon the counter of the bar, the sound of clinking metal whispering across the tavern as the bag came to rest. The innkeeper stepped forward, placing a protective hand on the bag of money.
‘Rest assured, sir,’ he said, his voice betraying his nervousness, ‘I shall look after him as though he were my own.’
‘You will do better than that,’ the warrior said, his tone slipping still lower. ‘Look after him as though his life were your own.’ The bounty hunter strode towards the door. ‘Because it is.’
‘I shall return from time to time,’ Brunner said over his shoulder as he opened the door of the tavern. ‘To check on my grandson, and to bring you more gold. Take good care of him, Wiedemann.’
The bounty hunters last words seemed to linger as he closed the door.
‘I’ll find out if you don’t.’
BLOOD MONEY
PROLOGUE
For me, it all began one hot summer night in the sweltering back streets of the Tilean city of Miragliano. I was in my second year of exile from the place of my birth, grand Altdorf, that emperor of all cities, that symbol of human endeavour, might, learning and faith. It followed, as some may recall, the publication of my own retelling of history’s most fearsome villain: A True History of the Life of Count Vlad von Carstein of Sylvania the Vampyre—that my troubles began.
True, the name of Ehrhard Stoecker became known far and wide across the Empire. There was even an invitation to visit the tsarina in Kislev, a land fascinated by tales of the aristocracy of the night. But in my own land, even as fame and fortune crept towards me, implacable foes arose between me and the rewards of my labours. My work was denounced by no less a personage than the Grand Theogonist himself, and the High Priest of Ulric in Middenheim even called the novel ‘contemptible’. Literary critics, ever bowing their craven heads to the mood of the pulpit, decried my work as doggerel and claptrap, the work of a barely literate hack who ‘doubtless thinks Sylvania is a province in Bretonnia’.
I could contend with such spiteful and petty detractors, for my publishers happily informed me that with every harsh word the Grand Theogonist deigned to hurl upon my volume, another five hundred copies were sold. And it is in the matter of coin, perhaps, that public opinion has always been, and shall ever be, expressed. No, it was not the vitriol of the critics, nor the scorn of the pulpit that drove me to distant lands to lose myself from the Empire. It was one late night in a darkened street, when I discovered that there were others who had taken offence at my work, and that not all my detractors were human. It was then that I distanced myself from the land of my birth.
So it was that I, Ehrhard Stoecker, came to be sitting in the burrow-like interior of a filthy tavern in the seediest district in Miragliano, that notorious port of merchant princes, swashbuckling privateers and dastardly smugglers. I had found my status much reduced. I, who had once put to pen some of the most well-known and sinister tales of horror to ever grace the libraries of the Empire.
The last of my monies from A True History of Vlad were fast failing and I had been impressed upon by a most unscrupulous Tilean by the name of Ernesto—a publisher of thin tomes foisted upon seafarers to lessen the tedium of their ocean voyages—to turn my talents to furnishing him with fodder for his schilling dreadfuls. I found my days spent lurking in the taverns of Miragliano, dutifully committing to memory the tales of seamen and mercenaries as they sank into their cups, wading through their crude dialects and inveterate boasting to seize any germ of truth behind the stories they related.
It was not unlike being put to the question by an Estalian torturer, those long hours of trying to endure some simpleton’s vanity as he explained how he was the mightiest hero since Sigmar, or at least Konrad. Still, Ernesto needed as much material as I could furnish, and the pittance he paid for each page ensured that I furnished him with as many manuscripts as I could compose.
I was deep in my cups one evening, sitting in a dockside dive known as the Maid of Albion. I was not, however, as deep as my companion, a petty banditti named Ferrini, who was drunkenly slobbering out his life story. He explained to me how he had become a veritable bandit prince after being villainously spirited away from the household of a noble family in Tobaro by agents of his younger brother, who desired the title for himself. I was finding myself unable to decide if even Ernesto would be able to swallow the lout’s lies, when the door of the tavern opened and my companion suddenly became sober as a priest of Morr. I followed his ashen gaze to the figure that had made its way into the room.
He was a tall man, lean yet muscular, after the fashion of a professional duellist, or a professional assassin—men whose need of strength is seconded to their need for agility. The man wore a suit of brigandine armour about his body, a breastplate of gromril, that fabulous metal of the dwarfs, over his chest. Belts of knives, crossbow bolts and other weapons encircled his waist and crossed his chest above the armour. A heavy falchion sword swung from his hip. The man’s face was partially obscured, the region above his upper lip hidden behind the rounded surface of his black steel helm. As I gazed upon him, he turned and for a moment the icy blue eyes that stared from behind the visor met my own. The man at my side muttered a word under his breath.
‘Brunner.’ Ferrini croaked. He cast a desperate look at the two brutish men who had been with him before my arrival. The pair of bandits was already in motion, one pulling a long-bladed dagger from his belt, the other hefting a heavy club of steel and oak. As the man Ferrini had identified as Brunner began to walk towards our table, Ferrini’s comrades assaulted him. There was a flash of light as a knife whipped from one of the armoured man’s gloved hands and I saw the club-wielder drop his weapon as the blade sank into his forearm. Even as he screamed, Brunner turned on him, kicking in his teeth with a steel-toed boot. The other bandit charged the killer from behind. Brunner dodged the stabbing blade. I did not see what transpired next, however, though I could hear the man screaming a moment later. For I was hurrying out of the side door of the Maid of Albion, hastening a
fter my drinking partner who had risen from the table and scurried away the instant Brunner’s attention had been diverted to the other bandits.
Had I been even a moment tardier in my pursuit, I should never have caught up with the weasel-faced bandit. The door opened upon a narrow alley, and my former companion was already half way down its length. It took a tremendous effort to catch him. When I did, he spun on me, a dagger clenched in his fist. He recognised me in an instant and withdrew the blade, then turned to run. I placed a hand on his shoulder and told him I knew of a place where he could hide. He sighed a moan of thanks through heavy breaths and the two of us slid down a dank alleyway toward the dingy little hostel where I kept my rooms.
Ferrini immediately went to the single window that looked down upon the street, quickly searching for any sign of pursuit. Finding none, he hastily slammed the shutters, sealing off the window. Then, feeling a bit safer, some of the old bravado wormed its way up in the bandit, and he began to tell me about this figure of dread, this walking herald of death and judgement.
Brunner was a bounty hunter, Ferrini explained. The man’s name was a fearful whisper among bandits, pirates and highwaymen as far away as the forests of Bretonnia and the villages of the Reikland. It was said that once Brunner had set out to catch a man, that man’s days were numbered not in years, but in weeks. It was said that the bounty hunter had spirited a buccaneer captain from the sanctuary of the pirate stronghold of Sartosa, that he had brought down a traitor to the King of Bretonnia in the court of an Arabyan sheik, and that he had pursued one notorious smuggler to the depths of Black Crag and returned with his prey from the bowels of the goblin fortress. Or at least, the man’s head… With sword and bow, there were few men who could match him, and none who could claim supremacy over him in both. The tales went on, each more terrible and grim than the last.