Brunner the Bounty Hunter (Blood And Steel)

by Warhammer

  Brunner stood still for a moment, considering Tessari's advice. 'What is?' he asked.

  'Faith,' the old mutant replied. 'Faith in the good and noble gods, faith that they will preserve and protect you against such abominations'

  Brunner snorted contemptuously, stalking away from Tessari, and making his way back through the maze of damp rags. 'I'm afraid that my faith in anything has run pretty low, especially faith in the gods. I prefer to put my trust in steel. And in gold.'

  Tessari shook his head, and listened as the bounty hunter's steps carried him from the cellar.

  'Steel and gold won't help you, Brunner,' he said to himself. 'They won't help you at all.'

  Abdul-Qaadir pushed his swarthy hand into the wooden box, immersing it in the crisp dried leaves that filled it. The Arabyan smiled, stroking his scruffy beard with his free hand. This shipment of Crimson Shade that had been smuggled into Miragliano was the largest and freshest he had ever received. The noxious herb leaves felt like wealth, like power.

  The broad shouldered black marketeer removed his hand, bringing with it a fistful of the leaves. The Tileans were fanatics for this maniac art they called the vendetta. Many of them fancied themselves masters of the sword, true artists of the duel. But a Tilean did not like to leave anything to chance. He would plot and plan, laying schemes within schemes to ensure that events would transpire toward the end he sought. It was the same with the duellists. Their skill with the blade might indeed be remarkable, but they always liked extra insurance. Some would coat their weapons in garlic or some other blood poison so that the merest scratch would finish their enemy. Others preferred to make certain that theirs would be the swifter blade. Such men were easily lured into the use of Crimson Shade, an exotic herb that would speed up their reflexes and reactions.

  Abdul-Qaadir smiled again. That Crimson Shade was also dreadfully addictive was a side-effect his customers discovered for themselves. The Arabyan looked up and gestured for one of the hulking mercenary guards who stood watch in the sprawling warehouse. The hired sword walked over, his hands twitching on the grip of his halberd. Abdul-Qaadir handed him the leaves he had scooped from the crate.

  'A bonus, my friend,' the black marketeer said. 'You did well in ferreting out Emir's thankless thievery.' The Arabyan shook his head sadly. 'Poor Emir, such a disappointment. He, more than anyone else, should have understood that there must be honour among thieves' Abdul-Qaadir gave the big Tilean a knowing look. He knew that the mercenary had informed on Emir, but it was only because he had been too stupid himself to figure out a way to steal from his employer. The black marketeer dearly hoped that the mercenary would continue to be thick-headed. Smart men made poor guards.

  The swarthy Arabyan looked about the warehouse. It was a broad, squat building, crowded with the crates and barrels that held the black marketeer's wares. In one corner was a massive iron cage. It was a little early yet to collect drunks from La Strada dei Cento Peccati. The Arabyan barques with their secret holds would not be in port for several months yet, and feeding prospective slaves for weeks on end would cut into Abdul-Qaadir's profit margin. Profit was the black marketeer's lifeblood. He'd sold his own mother to a caliph's harem when he was a boy for the price of a camel. No matter what leader's face graced the coin, Abdul-Qaadir knew the value of a piece of gold.

  There was a furtive rapping on the heavy wooden door that opened onto La Strada di Falco. The guard nearest the door listened as the series of knocks was repeated. Abdul-Qaadir did not pay it much attention. The code had been given. It was one of the petty addicts who peddled Crimson Shade to Prince Borgio's soldiers in the many taverns and brothels scattered throughout the city. It never failed to amaze the Arabyan how the street peddlers always knew when he had a new shipment. It was almost as if they could scent the leaves like a pig with a truffle.

  The mercenary opened the door, and stared down at the heavily cloaked figure beyond the portal. Abdul-Qaadir's herb-sellers often arrived in shabby disguises. The guard swore an oath and stepped through the doorway. He held his halberd in one hand and balled a fist with his other.

  'The boss will send for you when he wants you,' the guard growled. 'You'd be smart to stay away from here until he does' The guard lashed out with his fist, aiming a punishing blow to the man's belly. He was shocked when the cloaked shape dodged aside from his blow. A surprised look froze on the guard's face when a slender stiletto sprang into the figure's hand and the cloaked killer punched a needle of steel into his throat. The guard slumped into the doorway, supporting himself against the halberd, as his fingers clutched at the spurting wound in his neck.

  The cloaked figure tucked the stiletto back into its place beneath the armour enclosing his forearm. Other weapons filled the bounty hunter's hands.

  It had not taken Brunner long to find one of Abdul-Qaadir's Crimson Shade vendors. It had only taken a little longer to extract the information he needed from the wretch: the coded knock that would gain the man entry to the Arabyan's warehouse. Now he only hoped that Abdul-Qaadir would be as forthcoming.

  Brunner checked his weapons and kicked open the door that had been left ajar. Across the street, a tiny shape observed the prelude to death and violence. It was a small black creature with jade green eyes.

  Abdul-Qaadir turned as the door of the warehouse slammed noisily. A ragged-looking man wearing a shabby brown cloak stood in the doorway. The Arabyan could not make out the man's face beneath the hood of the cloak; much of it was masked by the visor of a steel helm. The curious-looking crossbow and heavy blackpowder pistol gripped in the man's gloved hands, however, were menacingly identifiable.

  'Jafar's rotting soul!' Abdul-Qaadir exclaimed. 'Brunner!'

  Even as the Arabyan spoke, the bounty hunter had sprung into action. He sprinted across the room, closing upon the stunned black marketeer. The hulking Tilean Shade addict moved to intercept him.

  Brunner's repeating crossbow sent steel bolts smashing into the guard's stomach and breastbone. He fell to the floor in a bleeding pile.

  Abdul-Qaadir made to draw the curved blade from the colourful sash that crossed his midsection, but the business end of the bounty hunter's pistol made him reconsider. The remaining five guards surged towards the intruder who had killed two of their number and was now menacing their employer.

  'I wouldn't,' growled the bounty hunter, as he gestured with his repeater crossbow. 'Any closer, and your boss dies.'

  'You can't get us all,' snarled one of the Tileans.

  'Maybe not,' agreed Brunner. 'But I can get at least two more of you before you reach me. Who's it going to be?' The bounty hunter uttered a short, mocking laugh as he saw the mercenaries falter, and doubt and indecision worked their way onto their faces. 'I should warn you, I coat my bolts in garlic. A trick I learned from you noodle-slurpers. That way if the bolt doesn't finish you, poison will.'

  The mercenaries were all but cowed now, their grips on their weapons becoming lax.

  'You're professionals.' Brunner said. 'You understand that no matter what, I'll splatter your boss's brains all over this place. If he dies, the paydays dry up.'

  'Listen to him!' pleaded Abdul-Qaadir, staring into the yawning barrel of the gun. 'Don't try anything stupid!'

  Suddenly the Arabyan was finding himself regretting hiring men who were not the greatest thinkers. A clear-headed man would understand that there was no way to help him except to obey the bounty hunter. But what lunacy might the idiots he had hired contemplate?

  'All of you.' Brunner snapped. 'Outside! I have a few questions I need your boss to answer. Then you can all get back to your swindling, stealing and smuggling.'

  'Do as he says!' urged Abdul-Qaadir when he noted his men were hesitating. With muttered oaths and murderous looks, the guards filed out of the warehouse, into the street.

  'I thought they would never leave.' Brunner said, training his attention on the prisoner. 'I have a few questions for you.' he said in a dry, icy whisper. 'And trust me, you won't like
it if I have to ask you twice.'

  Abdul-Qaadir swallowed the lump in his throat. He brushed sweat from his brow. 'You could ask me for the keys to my daughters' chastity belts and they would be yours!' affirmed the Arabyan, his voice cracking with fear. He could well imagine that if Brunner were to discharge his weapon, there would be nothing left of him above his beard.

  'Good.' the bounty hunter said. 'We're going to get along quite nicely.' The icy menace returned to his voice and he pressed the tip of the gun barrel against the Arabyan's hawkish nose. 'Tell me, what do you know about mummies?'

  The Black Boar was even busier than it had been when Brunner was first contacted by Ortez. The bounty hunter stalked through the crowd of merchants from Marienburg, mercenaries from Reikland and sailors from Kislev. He made his way to the bar, and grabbed the sleeve of the balding barman.

  'Where is Mahrun?' he asked, speaking so that he could be heard over the din of Reikspiel spoken in a dozen contrasting dialects. The barman nodded towards a door set towards the rear wall of the tavern. Brunner turned and strode toward the back room.

  He did not knock before pushing the oak door aside. The room was small and dark. It smelled of beer and the unwashed. A few miserable specimens of humanity shuffled out of the bounty hunter's way as he entered. They watched him pass with furtive, frightened looks. These were wretches, the slovenly displaced Imperials who had been stranded in Miragliano when their money dried up or their luck ran out. The owner of the Black Boar allowed such men to spend what few coins they could beg or steal, but he did not want them cluttering up the main room. He also found it useful to keep a few such men on hand in case some ship's captain was looking for a few bodies to increase his crew. Men such as these would never rise again from their squalor and misery; they were marking time until they passed beyond the gates of Morr.

  There was only one man among these whom the tavern keeper took genuine pity on. That man was Mahrun. Brunner found him seated on a wobbly, warped chair, staring despondently into a dented tin stein. He wore a shabby brown robe similar to the one Brunner had worn on his visit to Abdul-Qaadir. The man's blond hair was long, scraggly and filthy, his beard unkempt and matted. Brunner walked over to the wretch, staring down into the man's rheumy, drunken eyes.

  'Mahrun,' the bounty hunter said. He produced a pair of copper coins from his belt, and held them tantalisingly before the drunk. 'Would you like these?' Mahrun snatched at the coins, but his clumsy reach was easily avoided by the bounty hunter. 'You have to earn them,' Brunner stated.

  'What can I do?' the wretch asked, his voice cracking with emotion. 'What use am I?'

  'None at all,' the bounty hunter replied. 'But maybe you have something that is worth buying? Let's get your things and have a look.'

  Mahrun slunk from the back room, and crept out into the main hall. He made his way through the kitchens and into the storeroom where the taverneer was hiding his few possessions. The taverneer was trying to protect them from Mahrun's impulses, but the wretch had discovered where they had been hidden. It was not stealing, for however low he sank, there were things Mahrun would not do, even in his most drunken stupor. The things he retrieved really did belong to him; they were relics from another life.

  Brunner watched the drunk return, cradling a bundle wrapped in black cloth. The man set down the bundle, and spread out his belongings like a bazaar merchant displaying his wares. The bounty hunter glanced over the objects, and nodded his head as he saw a funnel-shaped cylinder of wood resting beside the mouldy old Sigmarite prayer book.

  Gotz Mahrun had once been a warrior-priest in the service of Sigmar, tasked to a band of templars that was charged with rooting out a nest of vampires from a haunted fortress in Averland. Whatever had happened in that blighted place, Mahrun's companions had died. Apparently, the warrior-priest's courage and faith had not stood up to the unnatural horror of the undead.

  Mahrun had fled, eventually ending up in Miragliano. He had become a broken shell of a man, plagued by inner daemons of guilt and self-loathing.

  The more valuable of Mahrun's possessions - the silver buttons of his black priest's habit, the silver Sigmarite hammer that had once hung from a slender chain about his neck, the massive steel hammer he had been taught to wield upon the enemies of the Empire - had long ago been transformed into beer by the wretched priest. All that was left were objects that had no great material value unless one had a specific use for them.

  'The stick,' Brunner said. 'I'll buy that.' He tossed the copper coins down to Mahrun. The wretch grabbed the money, and stuffed it into the top of his tunic. Then he reverently handed the long wooden stake to Brunner.

  'It is hawthorn,' Mahrun explained. His thumb twitched, brushing one of the inscriptions that had been carved into the stake. 'Blessed by the temple. Invocations to Sigmar carved into the wood. A very potent weapon,' Mahrun's voice slipped into a hollow whisper, 'against them.' The man slumped down onto the floor, tears streaming from his eyes. 'Would that I had had the courage to use it. Would that I had been worthy of serving mighty Sigmar.'

  Brunner left the wretch to wallow in self-pity. He considered the weapon for a moment, then thrust it into his belt and made his way out of the den of lost humanity.

  Abdul-Qaadir had been very forthcoming with information; Brunner had only been forced to cuff the man with the steel barrel of his pistol three or four times. Through his split, bleeding lip, the Arabyan had informed Brunner that he had sold the mummy to a Tilean, a man named Carandini. Another slap of the steel and Abdul-Qaadir had admitted to Brunner that Carandini was reputed to be a practitioner of the dark arts, a black magician who had turned to the black marketeer in the past to provide him with unspeakable, abominable things.

  The confirmation that the mummy of Nehb-ka-menthu had indeed fallen into the hands of a necromancer did not discourage Brunner, but it did make him cautious. He knew that it was best to fight magic with magic, and while he might no longer honour the gods, he knew that they were not without their own magic. He always felt it was better to err on the side of caution. Mahrun's wooden stake would provide him with a little extra insurance.

  The house in which the necromancer could apparently be found was in one of the easternmost districts of Miragliano. The land had begun to sink here, the entire island was slowly crumbling away to join the marshes beyond the city walls. It was a dilapidated district, abandoned, and all but deserted. The canals had become so choked with mud and overgrown with weeds, that they were no longer navigable. The network of dubiously maintained bridges had to be crossed to move about the district. Only the thick walls that surrounded the area had been kept up. Their bases had been shored up with rocks, boulders, gravel and rubble, to prevent them from sinking, and to preserve the integrity of Miragliano's outer defences.

  Brunner walked through the derelict neighbourhood. Fallen tiles from rotting roofs crunched beneath his feet as he strode the broken cobblestone streets and decaying bridges. The only sign of human life he encountered was a work crew removing the heavy statue of a cavalry hero from the forlorn remains of a piazza. They were obviously salvaging the work of art before the swamp could consume it. The Tileans were rather odd when it comes to art, thought Brunner.

  Although human life had forsaken the district, it was not without other denizens. A family of red-feathered shrikes had established a gruesome nest in the broken window of a dilapidated palazzo, numerous frogs and insects impaled on the broken splinters of the window's shutters. Great brown rats scuttled along the edge of the street, descendants of that plague of vermin that brought the red pox to Miragliano centuries before. A solitary vulture, its scrawny neck fringed by a circle of white down, pecked at a rotten cadaver that swayed from the only visible guard tower in the district.

  The bounty hunter made his way through the silent streets. Even the sound of water lapping at the edges of the stone-lined canals was missing from this blighted area. On every side, doorways yawned, their ornately decorated panels looted long ago
, like the glass that had once filled the empty windows above them.

  Brunner paid the desolation scant notice. He was not interested in the lost glory of this neighbourhood, much less in the sorry abandonment it languished in. He was intent on finding the red-roofed three-storey building that Abdul-Qaadir had informed him served as the lair of the necromancer Carandini.

  It was nearly an hour before Brunner found the house. The abandoned district was a confusing maze of streets, and some sections were unreachable now that the canals had become a muddy quagmire. This was a part of the old city that had never been reconstructed by Prince Cosimo to match the orderly planning of the great Leonardo da Miragliano. The bounty hunter was annoyed by the delay and determined that when the job was finished, he would be paying a visit to a certain Arabyan black marketeer and discussing his skill at giving directions.

  Brunner checked his pistol, then unslung the curious skaven crossbow from his back. Examining the magazine that held the crossbow's bolts, he slid it into place on the weapon. Patting the large wooden stake thrust through his belt, Brunner set out for the warped, leaning building.

  As the bounty hunter worked his way along the street, he took advantage of every shadow and doorway so that his arrival might not be detected. But he did not see the pair of green eyes watching him from the mouth of an alleyway. The lithe feline watched the bounty hunter for a while, then turned and strolled away, obeying some summons only the ears of an immortal cat could hear.

  Brunner mounted the steps that led to the second floor of the ramshackle palazzo. It was a broad, sprawling building that leaned towards the necromancer's lair - the second floor balcony that rose above the portico almost touched the red-roofed building. The bounty hunter peered through the doorway of the room that opened onto the balcony. Seeing no sign of activity in the house across the narrow street, he swiftly made his way through the empty room and onto the balcony. A moment later, he climbed on top of the stone railing. Brunner did not even glance at the empty street below as he stepped across the gap between the two balconies. His left foot touched the wooden railing of the far balcony and he shifted his weight, letting his body fall into place after his foot. His quarry might reasonably be expected to have taken pains to guard against intrusion from the doors and windows on the street, but it had been the bounty hunter's experience that very few men took the same precautions against intrusion from above. Many were the second-storey burglars whom he had hunted down in the thieves' quarters of the Old World's cities, men who had gained entry to the supposedly well-protected domains of their victims with almost contemptuous ease.