Swords of the Emperor

by Chris Wraight

  Achendorfer looked genuinely offended, despite his fear. “We’ve done what we could within the boundaries of the law,” he complained. “We are required to conduct ourselves with an even hand. Much depends on the result of this appointment. The traditions of Averland require that all competing claims are heard in full.”

  “The traditions of Averland be damned,” muttered Schwarzhelm. “Money has changed hands here for too long. How many more of these submissions are there for me?”

  “There are twenty more depositions to cast judgement on. Then there are six cases of genealogical research carried out by the College of Heraldry. This sets out the case for the two candidates as clearly as we’ve been able to establish. Then there are the credentials for the Grand Jury to be cleared and some ceremonial documents that require your seal to ratify. To start with.”

  Schwarzhelm looked at the wizened man carefully. Was he deliberately doing this to rile him? Or were all of his kind so in love with parchment? Achendorfer must have noticed the dark look cast in his direction and stammered an apology.

  “You see, my lord, it is highly irregular for the Emperor’s representative to intervene in such matters. The Averland Estates would normally pronounce itself. To transfer the authority, protocol must be followed.”

  Schwarzhelm was about to say exactly what he thought of Averland’s protocol when there was a knock at the door to the chamber. The sequence of beats was unusual. Verstohlen. And he had news he wished to keep private.

  “Go,” snapped Schwarzhelm. “Deliver the scripts I’ve ratified to the Estates secretariat. I’ll do the rest later.”

  Looking grateful for the excuse to escape, Achendorfer scuttled away. He passed Verstohlen as he slipped through the door, his arms full of parchment rolls. The counsellor took his place in the chamber, closing the door behind him firmly.

  “Is this place secure?” he asked, sitting on Achendorfer’s chair and pulling it closer to the desk.

  “As much as anywhere. What do you have for me?”

  “I sent men to Heideck, as you commanded. I’ve had word back today. Grunwald passed through the town some days ago. He pressed on towards the mountains, where there are now many reports of orc attacks. No one can explain how they’re getting through the passes.”

  “Why hasn’t he sent reports back?”

  “He has. Messengers were sent from Heideck to Averheim. Perhaps more were dispatched later. There are witnesses who can attest to it. They never arrived here. Some of my own men are missing. Though I’m loathe to believe it, it may be that someone’s watching the roads.”

  Schwarzhelm frowned. There were many dangerous roads in the Empire. Losing messengers was not unheard of. But in Averheim?

  “What news of Grunwald after he left Heideck?”

  “None. I’ll keep working on it, but we must accept that the countryside is a dangerous place for us now. At least until some other explanation can be found.”

  Schwarzhelm felt his inner weariness begin to reassert itself. This was a complication he could do without.

  “I don’t like it. Grunwald has a large force, but we know little of the orcs. This business here is killing me. I should ride out to aid him.”

  “Perhaps,” said Verstohlen. “But consider the motives of those who wish to see no resolution. For such men, this is a very helpful incursion. They’d rather see you chasing greenskins across the countryside than forcing the Estates to come to a decision.”

  For a moment, Schwarzhelm had a vision of himself riding across the wide fields of Averland, the wind in his hair, scattering the orcs before him and scouring the land of their foul presence. It was an appealing image. He could feel himself going stale, cooped up in the dungeons of the Leitdorfs.

  “Maybe you’re reading too much into this.”

  Verstohlen reached into his clothes and handed him a scrap of parchment. It had been part-burned, but a few words remained legible.

  “I’ve been making enquiries in Averheim too. We’ve made some progress. Messages have been sent from the Averburg to Altdorf. It’s been going on for some time. The replies were burned before Kraus could track down their source. The man responsible took a draught of deathflower before I could get to him. We don’t know what was passed on. These scraps are all we have. But they’re getting help from outside.”

  On the fragment, beside some illegible scrawls, was a single word. “Schwarzhelm”. He looked at it dispassionately.

  “This proves little,” he said. “My visit here has hardly been secret.”

  “Maybe. But if the communication was innocent, then a man’s died for no reason. These are all small things. Messengers may be waylaid. Correspondence on the Estates may be kept secret. There are even stories of youths disappearing from the streets. People are scared, my lord.”

  Schwarzhelm pursed his lips, pondering the news. Verstohlen was usually reliable in these matters. “What do you recommend?”

  “I do not think we have the forces we need. Grunwald should be sent reinforcements immediately. The road from here to the east should be guarded. We can’t do that without help. I’ve taken the liberty of making enquiries. There’s a garrison of Reiksguard at Nuln. Helborg is with them. We could—”

  “Helborg?” The name was like a shard of ice. “What’s he doing there?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  Schwarzhelm felt old suspicions suddenly stir. “So he’s waiting there. For what, I wonder? What if the messages weren’t going to Altdorf, but to Nuln? Can he really be so jealous?”

  Verstohlen gave Schwarzhelm a startled look.

  “I’m sure there’s a reason for his being there,” he said, carefully. “Whatever it is, it gives us an opportunity. Ask for his aid. A regiment of Reiksguard to secure the Averburg and the roads would release the troops we need to make contact with Grunwald. I’m sure he’d agree, given the situation.”

  “No.” Schwarzhelm felt a surge of anger building up within him. He kept it down, but only barely. Helborg was unreliable. A glory-seeker. If he arrived now, fresh from his last-gasp charge at Turgitz, they would all say that Schwarzhelm couldn’t handle the Emperor’s bidding. That had to be avoided. At all costs, that had to be avoided.

  Verstohlen made to protest, but Schwarzhelm cut him off.

  “These are rumours. Fragments of information. I’ll not divert the Grand Marshal for such trivia. We have the men we need. Maintain your enquiries, but the decision on the succession will not be delayed any further.”

  Verstohlen looked at him steadily before responding. He was one of the few men who dared to meet his gaze. Schwarzhelm could see the counsellor was unhappy.

  “Very well,” Verstohlen said at last and rose from his chair. “I’ll do what I can.”

  He turned to leave, then hesitated. “My lord,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically halting. “I mean no disrespect, but is all well with you? You do not seem… quite yourself.”

  Schwarzhelm did his best to look equable. In truth, he felt terrible. His headache was now ever-present, and he’d grabbed only the barest snatches of sleep for the past three days. When he did drift off, his dreams were terrifying. The stress of the legal work also bore down heavily. He could feel himself starting to fray. It was another reason to bring this thing to a conclusion as soon as possible.

  “I’m fine. I could do without this heat, but I’ve been in worse.”

  “I have some sleepwort with me,” said Verstohlen. “Perhaps a tincture of that, now and again, would help? The nights are humid in the Averburg.”

  It was a tempting offer. He’d considered it earlier. Verstohlen knew his poisons, as well as the cures.

  “I’ll ask you if I need any,” Schwarzhelm said. “Now I need to finish reading these papers. Report back when you hear anything certain of Grunwald.”

  Verstohlen bowed and left the chamber. With his departure, the scriptorium felt more like a prison cell than a reading room. The door closed with an echoing thud. Schwarzhelm loo
ked around. The books looked down at him from their shelves. It was like being surrounded by enemies he couldn’t fight.

  With a weary sigh, he pulled the parchment towards him, and starting reading all over again.

  Dawn had broken. Grunwald looked around him in desperation. The orcs were everywhere. In the distance, he could see a fresh mob, mixed in composition and running steadily, making its way to his position. How had they coordinated so well? This was getting difficult. Very difficult.

  The greenskins had attacked all through the night, throwing themselves at the increasingly exhausted defenders with the fearless abandon typical of their race. Until the dawn, he hadn’t been able to tell whether the waves of attackers were different tribes, or whether the same bands had been charging the rise again and again. With the rising of the sun, the truth became apparent. This was no isolated collection of warriors. It was a major incursion, and fresh reinforcements were arriving all the time. His forces on the ridge were already outnumbered. They would soon be heavily outnumbered.

  He looked west, as if some help might come from that direction. There was nothing. Just the endless rolling fields, empty of anything but the beating sunlight.

  Bloch came to his side. His armour was dented in several places. For a moment, Grunwald recalled Ackermann. He’d looked similar, back on the ridge. Everything was horribly similar.

  “They’re preparing to charge again,” Bloch said grimly. “What are your orders?”

  “We have no choice,” Grunwald replied. “We’re too far out. We’ll hold them here.”

  Bloch looked exasperated.

  “If we stay, we’ll soon be outnumbered two to one.” Grunwald noticed he’d stopped using “sir” automatically.

  “What do you suggest, Herr Bloch? That we withdraw across the fields? They’re not going to let us walk out of this.”

  “Then we’ll fight our way back to Heideck!” Bloch spat. “The men need some direction. Keep us here and we’ll all die on this hill.”

  The man’s voice was raised. Troops nearby started to look around. There was a murmur of assent from the ranks further down the slope.

  “We have the high ground,” insisted Grunwald, keeping his own voice low. “I’ll not see my men cut to pieces as they try to run for safety. I have my orders.”

  “Damn the orders!” Bloch was now red-faced and angry. “We’ve been drawn out here by cock-and-bull stories. Even you can see that this has been planned.”

  Grunwald hesitated.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Have you seen the weapons those orcs are using? Have we heard a thing from Averheim since we set off? We should have stayed at Heideck. We’re useless this far out.”

  The man was beginning to ramble. It was probably the lack of sleep, or the heat. It was getting to them all. Even Grunwald could feel it begin to affect his judgement.

  “Keep your voice down,” he growled. “I’ll not give you orders twice. We’ll hold the ridge. My instructions were to meet the incursion head on. I won’t run back at the first sign of trouble.”

  Bloch gave a bitter laugh.

  “So that’s it,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re trying to make up for Turgitz. Schwarzhelm’s ordered you to hold the ridge and you’re damn well going to hold it. Even if it kills us all.”

  “Enough! Get back to the front, lieutenant. I’ll not tell you again.”

  Bloch was still smiling, but there was no humour in his face. He looked as bitter as wormwood.

  “Yes, sir,” he said sardonically. “I’ll do my duty. But don’t come running to me this time when you need bailing out.”

  Grunwald’s hand leapt to his sword. That was too much. But then fresh shrieks of alarm rose up from the lower slopes of the hill. The orcs were back in the assault. With a final backward glance of despair, Bloch ran to his position amongst the halberdiers. He didn’t say another word. Grunwald called his personal guard to his side, drawing his sword as he did so.

  “Watch for the breach,” he said, trying to push the dispute to the back of his mind. “On my mark, we’ll enter the melee.”

  The artillery spat out again, spinning shot high over the ranks of the defenders and into the advancing orcs. It did little to halt the tide. On every side, greenskins surged towards the defensive lines. Grunwald watched them as they came, looking for a weak point to exploit. The orcs were unusually tightly-formed. He had a sick feeling in his stomach. There were so many. They looked well armed indeed. Perhaps Bloch was right.

  He grasped the grip of his broadsword with both hands. There was no time to reconsider now. Battle had come again.

  The long day waned over Averheim. It was still hot. Verstohlen looked up into the sky. There wasn’t a cloud in it. The sun remained strong. He’d never known a summer like it. Now he realised why southerners were so flaky. It was the heat that did for them.

  He was standing on one of the seven bridges across the Aver. Long ago, Averheim had consisted solely of the Averburg and its attendant residences. As the Empire had grown, the city had sprawled out across the whole valley. As a rule, the richer dwellings were still on the southern shore. The poorer quarters,-some of them legally inside Stirland, were on the north-west bank. They were crammed close together, like all impoverished tenements in all cities of the Old World. There were none of the wide parks and elegant avenues the graced the Old City on the east side. That made it far less edifying to spend time in, but, for his purposes, much more interesting.

  Verstohlen walked across the bridge and into the maze of streets beyond. The air was thick and unmoving. Out of the evening sun, beggars slumped in the shadows, their mouths open like dogs. Flies droned lazily in the open doors to shops and taverns. There was no sign of the militia that seemed to patrol the Old City’s streets incessantly. Verstohlen made sure his pistol was safely stowed under his jacket, ready to be withdrawn quickly. The atmosphere seemed reasonably benign, but it did no harm to be careful.

  He pressed on, walking away from the river and further into the rows of mean houses. The more he walked, the less obviously cared-for the architecture became. The streets passed from having stone flags and proper gutters to being dirt tracks. Piles of refuse were deposited at the ends of streets. Rats openly scuttled across them. Everything looked slumped, weary. The heat didn’t help. The people dragged their feet as they walked, leaving trails behind them in the dust. They looked shabbier than he’d expected. There was an air of casual degradation about the place.

  Verstohlen walked further into the suburb. He knew what he was after. After a long trail up a winding cobbled street, he turned into a narrow alley and found himself in an enclosed square. On the far three sides, old stone buildings lurched haphazardly into the air. They’d seen better days. Clothes hung from the windows, heavy in the listless heat. If they’d been laundered and left to dry then the washerwomen had done a poor job, and there were still stains all over them. Naked children squatted at an open sewer, playing some kind of game in the filmy water. Their parents were nowhere to be seen. The only visible adults were in a shadowy doorway on the far side of the square. One of them, a fat man wearing no shirt, stared at Verstohlen with little interest. He looked half-asleep.

  Verstohlen walked up to the doorway. There was a strange aroma on the air, detectible even over the reek of the sewer and clumps of refuse. One didn’t need to be a bloodhound to be able to follow it.

  “Greetings, friend,” said Verstohlen, taking off his hat. “Can a man can get a drink here?”

  The man looked as if he didn’t understand Reikspiel. After a pause, he granted and motioned for Verstohlen to enter the house. They went in together. If the stench had been bad outside, it was worse inside. Used cooking pots had been discarded at the back of the room. Scraps of food, rags and other clutter littered the floor. A flight of wooden stairs led up to the next floor, and a doorway at the rear of the room indicated there were more chambers set further back.

  As Verstohlen had guessed, this
place served as an inn of sorts. It didn’t sell ale, but that wasn’t what the patrons were after. The strange aroma he’d detected outside permeated the place.

  “You’re a stranger here,” said the man, bluntly. As he spoke, his jowls quivered. There were a few others in the room, mostly propped up against the walls. Their eyes were blank. One of them, an older man in reasonably expensive clothes, looked like he’d been there a long time. A glittering line of drool ran down his chin from his open mouth. Every so often, his fingers would twitch.

  “I am,” said Verstohlen coolly. He’d need to keep his wits about him, though none of the residents of the den looked capable of sudden movements. “Just passing through. I’d heard about the fine ale you people sell. Perhaps I could try some of it?”

  The man’s senses seemed to have been permanently damaged. He’d obviously forgotten the first rule of the peddler of contraband and had indulged himself. After a while, he realised what was being asked of him and ducked under the doorway. From the chamber beyond there was the sound of something heavy being dragged from its place. Verstohlen looked around him. The clientele were lost in another world. It was as if he wasn’t there at all. He squatted down and waved his hand in front of the old merchant’s face. Nothing. The man was still breathing, but he might as well have been dead.

  The owner came back. He had a collection of objects in his hand. They looked like ginger roots, but were a darker brown. Even from a couple of yards away the aroma was pungent.

  “How many?” he asked.

  Verstohlen picked one up and rolled it between his fingers. The outer skin came off in his hands easily. It felt strangely caustic. Underneath, the flesh of the root was a pale pink colour.