[Stefan Kumansky 02] - Taint of Evil

by Neil McIntosh - (ebook by Undead)

  Zucharov nodded. “What of your brother?”

  “What of him?”

  “Konstantin is weak. He is the stone that would weigh down our ambition.”

  “My brother would never directly oppose me. Without the White Guard to support him, he has no choice but to follow my lead.”

  Zucharov continued to stare, impassively.

  “Is this not enough for you?” Anaise asked. “What else do you want?”

  “Progress,” Zucharov responded. “You have had days to work upon the girl, but we are no closer to finding Tal Dur.”

  “Does your dull mutant mind appreciate nothing?” Anaise snapped back. “I have delivered you the White Guard on a plate. Rilke is yours to do with as you wish. We are masters of Sigmarsgeist in all but name. And yet all you can do is chide me on account of the girl. She is not so simple, nor so compliant, that I can bend her like the branch of the tree.”

  “There are always other ways,” Zucharov responded. “Sooner or later, she will yield.”

  “No,” Anaise insisted. “We will do this my way, or not at all. You say we have achieved nothing. That is not true. Have you not looked around you? Have you not seen what is happening in Sigmarsgeist?”

  Zucharov inclined his head towards the window and gazed across the citadel, taking in the choking mass of buildings and stony growths that had become Sigmarsgeist, and the turmoil upon the streets.

  “The forces of strange magic are loose upon this place,” he concluded. He looked towards the mouth of the well. “You have set them loose.”

  “I have had Bea draw the energy here,” Anaise asserted. “She is the catalyst for all this.”

  Zucharov made no response, but, behind his eyes, Kyros made note of the arrogance that would be the Guide’s downfall.

  “The forces at work here are not Tal Dur,” Zucharov said at last. “They are tainted and impure, nothing but distant echoes of its mighty energy.”

  “Then we shall track those echoes to their source,” Anaise responded, defiantly. “The healer will lead us there, else she will draw the power of Tal Dur to us.”

  “Yes,” Zucharov agreed. “That she will.”

  Inch by careful inch, yard by yard, Stefan and his companions continued their subterranean journey back towards Sigmarsgeist. Progress was slow, sometimes almost impossible. Tunnels would end abruptly; the way blocked by barriers of stone or roof-falls. In other places the passageway had silted up, and they found their way blocked by a solid wall of earth, an impenetrable crust of hardened mud. But somewhere, somehow, by doubling back or searching out other routes, Lothar Koenig always found a way through. He had given up his complaints now, and was applying himself to the single task with a silent tenacity that Stefan could not help but admire. He was truly a survivor, and through him, Stefan hoped, they might yet all survive. Bea too.

  For a while the three of them had had to crawl on their hands and knees through a section of the dry sewer where the tunnel was almost totally blocked by rocks and broken debris. Now at last they emerged into clear space and were able to stand upright once again. Lothar brushed himself down and looked around with a quiet smile of satisfaction.

  “I reckon we’re below the city walls now,” he declared. “We’ll start thinking soon about finding a way up. Don’t forget,” he looked at Stefan and Bruno in turn. “They owe me. So do you. When we get up top we’ll see what’s what.”

  “Where should we look for?” Bruno asked. “I mean, where do we need to be?”

  “Inside the palace would be a good start,” Stefan suggested. Lothar raised an eyebrow and grunted in derision.

  “Perhaps you’d like to choose a particular room!” he sneered. “Look, friend. I said I was good. I didn’t say I had second sight. We’ll take what we can find. Wherever that puts us up top, that’s down to luck.”

  “There’s that sound again,” Stefan cut in.

  All three stopped and listened. The sound of tearing and rending was still faint, but insistent, like a deep vibration shaking at the very core of the earth. There could be no doubt. It was getting steadily louder.

  “We must be getting nearer to it,” Bruno said at last.

  “It’s getting nearing to us, more like,” Stefan said. “Whatever it is, it’s coming from somewhere behind us, and getting closer all the time.”

  “By the gods,” Lothar declared. “It sounds like something dying.”

  “Or something being reborn,” Stefan said, quietly. “A wakening beast.”

  He turned to the bounty hunter. “You’re right, Lothar. Let’s not worry too much about where we reach the surface. Let’s just concentrate on getting up. Fast.”

  They moved on, in silence now, through the stale gloom. Then Bruno stopped dead again. “That’s strange,” he said. “I can hear water.” His voice was suddenly tinged with anxiety. Lothar raised his arm to call for quiet, then strained to listen to the sound. He turned and grinned broadly at the others.

  “It’s the sewers,” he said. “Not these dead worm-holes. The real, working waterways running beneath the citadel. This must be where the two systems meet up, where the tunnels below the old city meet with those of the new. Come on,” he said. “We’re close now. There must be a way through.” He started running his hands across the crusted surface of the tunnel wall. “Somewhere near here,” he said again. “Further on, maybe. Here,” he said to Bruno, “give me your knife.”

  Bruno handed the knife over. Lothar moved steadily down the length of the tunnel, keeping his head pressed close to the wall, listening all the time. Half way down he stopped, and began to prise the stones loose with the point of the blade. Soon he had worked a hole large enough in the tunnel wall to put his fist through. Dank air gusted through the breach in the wall, ripe with a familiar stench.

  “Help me,” he called out, “we’re almost there.”

  Stefan and Bruno joined in, working with their bare hands to pull out the stones. On the other side of the tunnel they found a second, almost parallel passage. As Bruno hefted the torch, light glittered upon the surface of a dark stream, flowing sluggishly at its base.

  “We’re home, boys,” Lothar muttered. “Let’s hope it was worth it.”

  Stefan stepped through the breach into the second tunnel, taking the torch from Bruno. “I can see a ladder,” he called back. “Barely twenty yards further down. With any luck it will take us all the way to the surface.”

  Lothar clambered through behind Stefan, dragging Bruno after him. “Come on,” he said to Bruno. “Didn’t you hear him? We’re getting out of here.”

  But Bruno didn’t move. He had stopped, straddling the gap between the two tunnels, his attention fixed on something back the way they had just come.

  “Water,” he said. “It’s water.”

  “Of course it’s water,” Lothar replied. “The sewers on this side are teeming with it. Lovely, stinking, filth-laden water.”

  “No,” Bruno shook his head. “That’s not what I mean. That’s not what I mean at all,” he called, more urgently now. “Listen—can’t you hear it? The sound of rushing water, like a flood… Can’t you hear it?”

  But they did not need to hear it, for by now they could feel it, a shock wave as a great shudder passed through the belly of the earth, and somewhere from out of the depths, an unstoppable tide broke free. Everything around them began to shake, violently. Great slabs of stone and earth tumbled into the sewers as the walls of the tunnels blurred then began to break apart.

  Stefan turned to shout back to Bruno, but his words were lost in the pandemonium. Almost at the end of their journey, they had stumbled upon the end of the world.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The Flood

  Anaise von Augen had lost track of how long she had been sitting in the shadows of the chamber, staring deep into the void which was the Well of Sadness. She was not a woman given to stillness, but, for at least the last hour, as the shadows lengthened and daylight fell to grey, she had not moved f
rom that place.

  Surely, she reasoned, she had done enough for it to come to pass. She had taken each of the cards that the gods had offered her, and she had played them well. They had given her the girl, Bea, and the monster Zucharov. Two opposite and opposing forces that, combined, could nonetheless deliver her unfettered power. And they had given her the opportunity now to use that power.

  Konstantin had stumbled; his judgement had been shown to be weak, fatally flawed. The gods had loosened her brother’s grip upon Sigmarsgeist, prised the chalice that was power from his grasp. Now it could be hers. Everything was in place, her destiny stood ready to be fulfilled. And yet she found herself waiting, for what she did not know. Perhaps for the next, decisive chapter in the story to unfold, and for a sign, some signal that it had begun. Anaise stared down into the depths of the Well of Sadness, but found only dark silence in answer to her questions.

  The sign, when it finally came, was from a quite different, and at first unwelcome, source. It came in the shape of a knock, tentative and brief, upon the door. Anaise looked up, pulled away from her contemplation by the sound.

  “What is it?” she demanded, irritably. “I gave clear instructions that I was not be disturbed.”

  The door opened just wide enough to reveal an officer of the Red Guard standing upon the threshold, his head bowed.

  “I beg your forgiveness, mistress. But these are exceptional circumstances.”

  Anaise beckoned the man inside with a curt wave of her hand. “Come in, then,” she snapped. “And make it quick.”

  The guard stepped into the chamber and made a further bow before the Guide.

  “Well?” Anaise asked him. “What do you want?”

  “My lady,” the guard began. “There is water in the streets of Sigmarsgeist.”

  Anaise was still vexed by the interruption. For a moment the significance of the guard’s words was lost upon her. “That’s good news indeed,” she replied, caustically. “Perhaps now the miserable wretches will get on with their work and stop complaining they don’t have enough water.”

  She shot the man a look to indicate he was dismissed, and turned back towards the well. The guard hesitated, but did not move.

  “I ask pardon, mistress. I did not express myself clearly.” He paused, marshalling his words. “There is water pouring into the streets. A great deal of water, mistress. I have received word that the lower quarter of the citadel is flooding.”

  Anaise turned around. Now the guard had her full and undivided attention. She crossed the room and seized the man by the arm.

  “Have you seen it?” she demanded. “Have you seen for yourself?”

  “Madam, no,” the guard replied. “Word has only just been received from the Watch. But if they tell true then the levels are rising quickly.”

  Anaise pushed the guard to one side and went to the window that looked south, towards the lower levels of the citadel. Little could be seen beyond the flickering of the lamps. Sigmarsgeist looked calm, almost tranquil in the moonlight. Anaise uttered a curse, then reached for her cloak, and drew it around her. “Hurry,” she commanded. “I need to be taken there. I must see for myself. Now.”

  The guard held the door open for the Guide and stood at attention.

  “A carriage is waiting below,” he reported. For a moment the man forgot his deference, and stared earnestly at his mistress.

  “Some of the men say it is the wrath of the gods, my lady. That gods have come to punish our ambition. Could it be so?” he asked of her. “Has vengeance come to Sigmarsgeist?”

  Anaise hurried on, no longer interested in what the Red Guard had to say.

  “No,” she said to herself. “Tal Dur has come to Sigmarsgeist.”

  As soon as she heard word of the floods, Bea knew that she had no option but to go. She no longer had any fear of Konstantin, or Anaise, or of what either of them might do. She knew that she must answer her calling, and that the time for concealment was over.

  The streets of Sigmarsgeist beyond the palace were as full as ever, but now the crowds flowed in only one direction, towards the higher ground on the northern side of the citadel, away from the rising waters. Nearer to the palace people were jostling each other out of the way. Some were not even sure what the commotion was about. But as Bea got closer to the lower reaches of the citadel the angry flow became a stampede of frightened, panicking humanity. Against it all, Bea pressed on, a solitary figure moving against the tide. She watched them fleeing all around her: men and women from the foundries, labourers cut loose from their gangs, children with even smaller infants in their arms, fleeing servants and dishevelled officers of the Red Guard. All kindness and patience had been swept aside. Order was breaking down. All that would soon be left was the law of survival, the strong enduring over the weak. The final act in the history of Sigmarsgeist was beginning.

  Bea had no clear notion of where she should be going, only that she must go. She let the massing crowds be her guide, and, before long, the water had begun swirling about her feet. After an hour the flood reached above her ankles. Soon after that it had reached her knees. Now she knew for sure that what the people were saying was true: Sigmarsgeist was drowning.

  She fought her way past the fleeing crowds towards the bottom of a wide avenue that was fast becoming a canal. At the bottom of the avenue the road forked sharply to the right then turned downhill again. As Bea reached the turn in the road, a wall of water rolled out towards her and, when it had subsided, the icy waters had risen up above her waist. Soon she would need to swim if she were to make any further progress. She could feel the current plucking at her feet, trying to pull her over. She reached out and caught hold of the first thing that came to hand, the chassis of a cart that had been thrown over and upended in the stream, one set of wheels poking up towards the sky. All around, bales of clothes and possessions bobbed up and down on the water, the remnants of a life swept away.

  Bea clutched tightly to the shattered iron frame and took a moment to look around her. The streets—if they could still be called that—were emptier now, as most of the people had fled. The bodies of those who had failed to escape lay around her on every side, face-down or face-up in the water, some still clutching the sticks or bundles of rags that they hoped might save them. Further ahead, Bea could now see where the flood was entering the citadel. Great plumes of water were shooting into the air, bursting from the grates and holes in the ground above the sewers. The force of the water still forcing its way from below ground was enormous; there was no possibility that the waters were about to subside.

  A terrible noise from somewhere ahead made Bea look up. She turned her face to the sky just in time to see a huge marbled shard break off from the structure above her head and tumble into the rushing waters. The maze of mad bridges and pathways that had taken a parasitic hold upon the citadel was being broken apart by the power of the surging waters. As Bea looked on, sections of the bone-like mass sheared off and crashed down into the waters, bringing great slabs of masonry tumbling down with them. Those people still looking on screamed out, in wonder or in horror at the sight. Some proclaimed it the vengeance of Sigmar, others the might of the Dark Powers. Bea kept her counsel and looked on. She already knew that it was neither of these things.

  Still the waters rose, relentless, pushing up out of the ground, overwhelming Sigmarsgeist. Another surge caught Bea, and plucked her feet away from under her. She managed to clutch hold of the abandoned wagon, still just visible above the water. But when she tried to place her feet again she could find no solid ground. She would have to swim from now on.

  Gradually, a kind of eerie calm settled upon the scene as most of those around her in the water were swept away. She scanned the empty windows that lined the buildings on either side. Two or three of the tallest still had floors that rose clear of the water line. After a while, from those windows, the cries started to come. The last desperate cries of those who had all but abandoned hope.

  Bea drew down a
lung full of air and prepared to cast herself adrift from her fragile place of sanctuary. She was at one with her calling now. She knew what she had to do.

  News of the great flood had reached Konstantin much as the waters themselves had breached Sigmarsgeist. Slowly, at first, no more than a trickle of rumour and speculation. But the rumours had quickly become an unstoppable tide of reports, all of them bad, all of them pointing towards the destruction of the citadel that had been his life’s achievement.

  Konstantin knew he should act. His action should be bold, and decisive; an intervention that would turn back the waters and reverse the ill fortune that had stricken Sigmarsgeist. But he did not act. He could not act. He had become paralysed by a sickness that had taken hold of both mind and body. It was a sickness seeded in the belief, deep within his heart, that all of this was his doing.

  Konstantin had sat and listened in silence to the reports of death and destruction brought to him with ever-increasingly regularity by his men, those of them that he could still trust. At length, even that became too much, and he barred all messengers from his chamber. He could hear them still, beyond the door, pleading to be admitted to the presence of the Guide, begging for him to save the citadel.

  Konstantin sank his head into his hands and wept. They did not understand what he now knew. It was the judgement of Konstantin that had brought things to this. All that was left for him was to oversee its final undoing.

  There was a pounding upon the door, louder and more insistent than before. Konstantin did not know who it was. Perhaps it would be his sister. They had not spoken since Rilke’s act of betrayal, and the overthrow of the White Guard. Anaise had taken her opportunity to seize all power, and he had let her take it, for in that same moment he had known for certain that he was broken. Konstantin raised his head as the knocking came again.

  “I will speak with nobody,” he cried. But he knew instinctively that his authority would no longer hold. A few moments later, the door was opened and Hans Baecker strode in, accompanied by three or four of his men. Konstantin favoured him a weak smile. Baecker, he knew, was still loyal. He would be loyal until the death, but that counted for too little now.