Witch Killer

by C. L. Werner

  ‘You’re certain we’re in no danger?’ Lajos asked for what seemed the fiftieth time since they had ridden past Gernheim and Ehrhardt. Thick streams of nervous sweat plastered the merchant’s hair to his forehead, while the hat in his hands was contorted into a rumpled coil of fabric.

  ‘No,’ Thulmann said, deigning at last to answer his companion. ‘If they are certain we’re bandits, they’ll attack us before we can even say “Good morning”. But that’s a risk I’m willing to take.’

  ‘Well I’m not,’ Lajos hissed, turning his mule’s head.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that,’ Thulmann said. ‘We’re within bow range now. Turn tail and run back and your back will sprout more feathers than a goblin headdress.’ The words had their desired effect. Lajos fell into a terrified silence and followed meekly beside the witch hunter. The armed militia were only a dozen yards from them now. They were grim-faced, weather-beaten men, farmers and woodsmen, their hard, lean bodies wrapped in wool breeches, fur tunics and leather boots. The weapons they bore shone murderously beneath the sun.

  The mounted figure in the midst of the militia was dressed in a fur cloak and a massive silver pectoral rested against his chest, fastened around his neck by a thick silver chain. The rider was different from his fellow townsfolk, his skin paler, his features a bit fuller and less hungry. The clothes beneath his cloak did not have the stamp of crude utilitarianism of his fellows and the rings on his fingers gleamed with gold. The rider watched Thulmann approach and when he judged the strangers had come close enough he raised his hand. At once the witch hunter and his reluctant companion brought their steeds to a halt.

  ‘Who are you and what is your purpose in Wyrmvater?’ the mounted leader called out, his voice heavy with authority. ‘If you think to do mischief here, it will not go unopposed.’

  Thulmann lifted his own hand in greeting. ‘I am Mathias Thulmann, templar knight of the most holy Order of Sigmar,’ he said. He noticed that the pronouncement did not seem to diminish the wary hostility that exuded from the militiamen. ‘Who do I address?’

  ‘I am Bruno Reinheckel,’ the leader said, ‘duly appointed burgomeister of Wyrmvater township these past twelve winters,’ he added, patting the silver pectoral. ‘But you have answered only one of my questions, sir. What business do you have here in Wyrmvater? We are a decent, Sigmar-fearing community, why should we interest a witch hunter?’

  Thulmann could hear the anxiety in the burgomeister’s voice. Far from relieving the man’s unease, Thulmann had the impression Reinheckel would almost have preferred a gang of brigands than a visit from witch hunters. The grim servants of the Order of Sigmar were hardly popular beyond the confines of their own temple, their fearsome reputations well known in even the most remote corners of the Empire. No man’s conscience was so clean that he felt entirely at ease in the presence of a witch hunter, be he burgomeister or baron. The question was: how far would Reinheckel allow his reservations to take him? There were a good many witch hunters who vanished without trace in remote towns and backwoods villages, and only a naïve fool would believe all had been the victims of the ruinous powers.

  ‘He’s not interested in your town,’ Lajos offered. Thulmann wasn’t the only one who had appreciated the lingering suspicion in Reinheckel’s expression. ‘The templars are on the trail of some heretics who are supposed to have taken refuge in the forest near here.’ The merchant looked towards Thulmann as he spoke, repeating the story they had decided to tell were they challenged about their mission. It would hardly have helped matters telling Reinheckel they were hunting for a nest of the mythical underfolk. The burgomeister was uneasy enough entertaining a witch hunter; he would be even more so if he thought Thulmann was mad.

  Lajos was largely unconvinced by Thulmann’s tales of scheming ratmen, although he was certain the story was meant to conceal an even more horrible truth he was better off not knowing.

  ‘Yes, the men we are looking for are hiding in the woods around your town,’ Thulmann said. ‘They could cause you any measure of hurt if allowed to linger here.’

  The burgomeister listened to Thulmann’s words, but kept looking at Lajos, eyes narrowed as he scrutinised the little man. ‘No, brother templar, things have been very quiet in Wyrmvater. We’ve seen no strangers since Mittherbst, either in the woods or in the streets. You are the first guests our town has seen in some time.’

  ‘Perhaps my information was erroneous,’ Thulmann said, adding a ring of disappointment to his voice. It was much too early to tell if what Kleib had told him was actually false. ‘Just the same, I would be remiss in my duty if we did not make a search of the woods.’ Thulmann noted that he still enjoyed only a part of Reinheckel’s attention. The burgomeister continued to stare at Lajos. The merchant squirmed nervously in his saddle. It was just possible somebody did remember him.

  ‘It is my intention to use your town as a base of operations while we search the woods,’ Thulmann continued, hoping at least some of what he said was being heard by the burgomeister. ‘Perhaps you have a building we could employ as a headquarters?’

  Reinheckel nodded. ‘The Splintered Shield, Wyrmvater’s only inn. It’s empty just now, only Schieller and his family in residence there. I’m certain he would give you the run of the place if I ask him.’

  ‘I’m certain he would,’ Thulmann agreed. ‘I should also like to consult your town records. If there are any ruins or old mine works in the area they might prove a good place to start looking for my fugitives.’

  ‘I’ll have them ready for you by the time you are settled at the inn,’ Reinheckel said. He turned in his saddle, waving to the town behind him. Slowly the archers began to withdraw and the gates swung open. The militiamen began to disperse, filing off towards a squat stone building that Thulmann assumed must be the town armoury.

  The witch hunter followed the burgomeister’s example, waving his hat over his head, giving the sign to the watching Krieger that all was well.

  When Thulmann turned back around he could see peasants already heading back into the fields. The last of the militia had vanished into the town, but Reinheckel remained on the road, still staring at Lajos.

  ‘I shall leave you then to gather the town records,’ Reinheckel said, turning his horse back towards the gates of Wyrmvater. ‘Believe me when I say I will do everything I can to ensure a quick hunt, brother templar.’

  Lajos crumpled into his saddle as the burgomeister rode off, muttering to himself in his singsong strigany dialect. Thulmann had heard enough prayers of thanksgiving over the years to recognise the gist of Lajos’s whispers.

  The witch hunters rode through the narrow streets of Wyrmvater, their arrival watched with keen interest from behind shuttered windows and cracked doors. Frightening and forbidding even in the cosmopolitan environs of Altdorf or Nuln, in a backwater village the arrival of such men was viewed in equal parts fascination and dread. Hushed voices whispered half remembered travellers’ tales of witch hunters and their doings. Not in living memory had men such as these descended upon Wyrmvater and its people could only wonder at what their arrival might mean. The burgomeister would be busy the rest of the day, not in securing the records Thulmann wished to consult, but in addressing and alleviating the fears of his citizens.

  Thulmann’s expedition marched through the cramped streets until at last the timber and plaster walls of the Splintered Shield rose before them. Testament to the prosperity Wyrmvater had once enjoyed, the inn was a large, three storeyed structure with glass windows and a cluster of brick chimneys.

  The witch hunters unloaded their gear from their horses, leaving Streng and Gernheim to settle the animals in the stables.

  When the last of Thulmann’s group had entered the inn, a lurking figure rose to his feet in the alleyway from which he had observed their arrival. The tall, gaunt man dusted the grime from his long brown coat, and scowled at the building. With a stifled oath, the old man slipped deeper into the back alleys of the town, putting distance between
himself and the witch hunters. Freiherr Weichs had enough to trouble his mind without the accursed witch hunter intruding upon his affairs.

  Thulmann, always Thulmann. The man’s tenacity was matched only by his lack of vision. Superstitious prayer-mongers like him would never be able to grasp the noble work, the great experiment upon which Weichs was engaged. Through his studies, mankind might one day be free from the taint of mutation, immune to the baleful energies the theologians dismissed with the word ‘Chaos’. What did it matter if a few hundred, or even a few thousand, had to be sacrificed to bring about such a noble end? But no, instead of acclaim and recognition, Weichs had been pursued and hunted across the Empire by zealot lunatics like Thulmann, forced to hide like a hunted animal and seek refuge with creatures straight from a nightmare.

  Weichs was not sure how Thulmann had tracked him from Wurtbad. Nor did he care. That the witch hunter had chosen to turn up just as Skilk had finally allowed him to resume his experiments, to venture beyond the caverns of the skaven to collect test subjects, this was more than Weichs could endure. It was unjust for the witch hunter to interrupt his great experiment again.

  The scientist hesitated, allowing his thoughts to turn down roads they had not travelled before. Always he had run before the witch hunter, always he had allowed Thulmann to set the pace. He had accepted the role of prey and allowed Thulmann the guise of predator. No more: now it would be the witch hunter who would be the victim, the witch hunter who would be the hunted. Weichs thought of the Splintered Shield, of the room Thulmann had no doubt secured there. The templar might still be looking for his quarry, but Weichs had already found his.

  For all that it was virtually unused, Schieller and his family maintained the sprawling inn in admirable condition. The rooms were somewhat musty, thick layers of dust on the windowsills, but otherwise were exceedingly spacious and comfortable. In Thulmann’s opinion, the Splintered Shield’s rooms put a number of better-known establishments to shame. The vacancy of the building allowed nearly all in his group to secure separate rooms, only Haussner’s fanatics eschewing the comfort of the establishment, opting to sleep in the loft above the stables instead to avoid ‘the pitfalls of hedonistic indulgence’.

  After dinner, the witch hunters discussed their plans, Thulmann illuminating once again where they should be concentrating their search. They would scour the town records for any mention of old ruins, abandoned mines, troll caves, fissures in the earth, or any other place that might easily conceal a tunnel. They would keep a keen watch for any mention of beastmen, mutants, goblins or fey folk – anything that might be a disguised reference to the skaven or their activities.

  It was long into the night by the time they broke away from their consultation. Thulmann mounted the stairs leading to his room with a leaden step, fully appreciating the ungodliness of such a late hour.

  As he climbed the stairs, his soul felt again the echoes of that long ago dread, of the terror that had so filled him. He’d raced home from the temple, from his betrayal of Erasmus Kleib’s vile scheme. As soon as he’d thrown open the door of his home, he’d known he was too late. Some instinct, some sense of wrongness told him Kleib was gone. The witch hunters had searched the lower floor anyway, leaving Thulmann to make that long, terrible climb upwards. His steps were no longer hurried. He knew that he was too late, knew that he didn’t want to see whatever had been done, what terrible revenge Kleib had visited upon him. He wanted to delay the moment for as long as he could, the moment when he would see his fears realised, when he would know his wife and child were no more.

  Thulmann paused at the door of his room, his mind still fixated upon the past. He’d paused then too, forcing his arm to rise with an effort that dredged every speck of courage from his pounding breast. The bedroom door swung inward beneath his hand. It took long, tortuous moments for his eyes to adjust, for him to see that the room was empty. Strangely, Thulmann felt an intense wave of relief rush through him – his illusion of hope had been preserved for another fleeting moment. Then he discerned the sounds coming from further down the hall. Grotesque, hideous gnawing, slobbering sounds that sickened his sensibilities and ignited his terror to still greater depths of misery. He trembled with fright, his body shaking as with an ague, yet somehow he forced himself to follow those sounds, to find his way to the closed door of the nursery.

  Thulmann shuddered again, forcing his mind away from its morbid reverie. The past was the past, and there was nothing even the gods could do to change it. It was the present that he needed to focus on, the real horrors that plagued the land and would work their evil upon it. He needed to let the dead rest.

  He pushed open the door to his room. His eyes had grown sharper since he’d left Bechafen all those years ago. Thulmann saw at once the slender figure waiting for him in the darkness. His eyes told him he looked into the pretty face and shining eyes of Silja, but the waking nightmare still lingered at the edges of his consciousness. In his mind he saw not Silja but a thing of dripping hideousness, its gaping mouth ghastly with blood, its cyclopean eye glowing like a pool of rancid pus. He thought he could smell its pestilent stench, the reek of excrement, thought he could hear it gnawing, gnawing on the tiny bones clasped in its wizened claws. Thulmann cried out in horror, recoiling against the door.

  Silja rushed forward, her stern expression draining away into a look of concern. The nightmare’s grip lessened as she reached out to him, the evidence of his eyes and not his fears finally prevailing within Thulmann’s mind. The witch hunter sank to the floor as he tried to collect himself and recover from the ghastly phantasm he had imagined.

  ‘Mathias! Mathias, it’s me, Silja,’ her soft voice told him over and over again. Slowly, gradually, the hammering in his chest lessened and his breathing resumed its normal steadiness.

  ‘I am… I apologise, Lady Markoff,’ Thulmann said. ‘I was… my mind was… elsewhere. I’m afraid you gave me a fright.’ He smiled weakly at her. ‘I wasn’t expecting to see you.’

  Silja helped him to his feet. A trace of the old severity worked its way back onto her face. ‘I wanted to talk to you.’

  ‘Please, Silja, not now,’ Thulmann said. ‘Tomorrow will be a very busy day.’ He laid his hand on the woman’s shoulder, moving her towards the door.

  ‘Who is Anya?’ Silja asked. The question caused Thulmann to freeze. He looked at her in disbelief. ‘When you came in just now you cried out “No, Anya! No!” Who is she, Mathias?’

  The witch hunter let his hand fall to his side. He paced deeper into his room, sitting down at the side of his bed. His words were hollow, rasping echoes devoid of their usual strength and command. ‘Anya was my wife,’ he said, almost in a whisper. ‘She… she died, our daughter with her. It was a long time ago, but sometimes it seems like only yesterday.’

  Silja closed the door and walked across the room, sitting down beside Thulmann, taking his hand in hers.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mathias,’ she said. ‘I really do know how you feel. Sometimes I imagine I can still hear my father’s voice calling to me. Someone once told me that the pain never goes away, but it does get better.’ Thulmann nodded as she spoke to him. Those had been his exact words when he had broken the news of her father’s execution to her in Wurtbad.

  ‘For me, it doesn’t,’ Thulmann said. ‘There are some wounds that never heal.’

  ‘Maybe you haven’t let them,’ Silja replied. Thulmann shook his head.

  ‘I failed her. I should be the one who is dead, not Anya,’ he said. ‘It was because of me that she was… destroyed. I was forced to make a choice. I knew what I was doing when I made it, knew that she would pay for my “duty”, but I did it anyway. I thought I could have things both ways, but the world is never so kind.’

  Silja was silent, uncertain what she could say, what she should say. Thulmann stared at the darkened walls of the room, his eyes lost in some horrible past. Silja held him, trying to soothe the turmoil in his mind. At length, the witch hunter turned his face
towards her.

  ‘That is why we can never be,’ he said. ‘I failed her. I would fail you. I cannot let that happen.’

  ‘You wouldn’t,’ Silja insisted, rubbing his hand. It was so cold, as if all the life inside Thulmann was retreating from her touch.

  ‘Silja, I can’t let anything happen to you because of me,’ Thulmann said, rising to his feet. ‘You should ride back to Altdorf. I’ll see to Haussner and Krieger.’

  ‘If that’s what you really want, Mathias,’ Silja replied, ‘but I want to hear you say it. I want you to say you don’t want me. Tell me you don’t love me.’

  Silence filled the room as Thulmann stared down into Silja’s face. He knew what he needed to say, but he could not force the words to his lips. Silja waited for him to speak and then rose, embracing him, crushing her lips to his.

  A tremor of fear crawled its way along the templar’s spine. After so many years, after all he had suffered and lost, he hadn’t learned anything.

  He still thought he could have things both ways.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The town hall of Wyrmvater was a large, timbered structure that dominated two corners of the town square. The lower walls had been reinforced with stone, and a quick inspection verified Thulmann’s suspicion that the precisely cut blocks had been exhumed from the old dwarf road rather than hacked from any local quarry. The interior of the building, at least those rooms Burgomeister Reinheckel led them through, was spacious, with high ceilings, panelled walls and tiled floors. The witch hunter was reminded again of Wyrmvater’s lost prosperity as he encountered the unexpected finery of its town hall. He broached the subject with Reinheckel as the official led him up a flight of stairs towards the record room.

  ‘Ah yes,’ Reinheckel said. ‘Wyrmvater was once a most lively place. It used to be called “Zwergdorf”, after our little friends from the mountains. We were an important stopping point on the way to Altdorf and Nuln, and more than a little of the dwarfs’ gold and silver found its way into the town coffers.’