01 - Sword of Justice

by Chris Wraight - (ebook by Undead)

  Anger welled within him. Schwarzhelm kicked the horse into a canter. The slaughter was sickening to watch. He remembered Turgitz. The endless slights, the sneering, the manoeuvres at court. The man was jealous of him, insanely jealous. But this?

  Schwarzhelm picked up the pace. The Rechtstahl blazed red in his hands, reflecting the light of the fires. He was alone, caught between the two armies. The dull rage began to flare.

  Helborg would have to be a saint beyond reproach not to wish to see you stumble, just a little. And from what I hear, he’s no saint.

  Still Schwarzhelm pulled back. The Rechtstahl thirsted for blood, but he resisted it. The two of them were brothers, the twin pillars on which the Imperial armies depended. It was impossible.

  Messages have been sent from the castle to Altdorf. It’s been going on for some time.

  Still he hesitated. Still his hand was stayed.

  Then Grosslich appeared, charging from the midst of his army, heading straight for Helborg. Schwarzhelm felt like calling out a warning, but the look on the count’s face told him it wouldn’t be heeded. It was suicide. No one took on Helborg in single combat. No one.

  The two men converged. Both were committed. That broke the spell.

  Schwarzhelm sprung into action. Grosslich could not be allowed to die. Grand Marshal or not, Helborg would not be permitted to subvert the outcome of the succession. Schwarzhelm hefted the Rechtstahl, feeling the taut metal hum with anticipation. The spirit of the blade remained near the surface, goading him onward. It sensed blood. Rivers of blood.

  And then, from nowhere, careering from behind Grosslich’s outriders, came a figure Schwarzhelm knew all too well. The wide-brimmed hat, the long learner coat. Verstohlen was there, right beside Grosslich, knife in hand.

  In a second, Schwarzhelm saw what he was trying to do. He was attempting to get between them, to prevent Grosslich from engaging.

  “Pieter!” cried Schwarzhelm. He was still too far away. Verstohlen was a deadly swordsman, but no match for Helborg.

  The spy achieved his goal, heading Grosslich off and forcing his steed from the engagement. But his flank was exposed. Helborg was on him in a second. Schwarzhelm saw the Klingerach, the Grudgebearer of legend, flash in the firelight.

  Then it fell. Verstohlen tumbled from his horse, hitting the ground hard. Schwarzhelm felt the tide of his rage break. “Helborg!” he roared.

  Even above the sound of the battle, the rush of the flames, the cries of the dying, Schwarzhelm’s mighty voice echoed around the square. Men in the thick of the fighting halted in their slaughter and turned to see what was going on, shaken by the resounding cry. Kurt Helborg himself, blood running down his sword, paused. He looked up at Schwarzhelm, and their eyes met. Across the tangled, confused press of fighting men, the ruin of Averheim, the twin titans of the Empire saw one another for the first time since Altdorf.

  A heartbeat passed. The sounds of battle seemed to recede into distant echoes. Even the cries of agony were muffled, indistinct.

  Then Schwarzhelm snapped. His rage, building up for weeks, fuelled by nightmare, driven by fatigue, became his master. Nothing, not even all the armies of the Emperor, would have been capable of stopping him then.

  He raised the Sword of Justice, blood-red in the failing light, and charged.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Helborg felt the thrill of the chase. Leitdorf had been dealt with. Now it fell to him to do what Schwarzhelm had been unable to. He sped towards Grosslich. The Averlander rode towards him at a similar speed, sword drawn.

  That was brave. Not many men chose to take him on in the knowledge of who he was. He liked that. It would be a shame to kill such a warrior, but he wouldn’t shirk from his duty. Averheim had been brought low by these feuding noblemen, and if they forced his hand he’d have no qualms about passing down the ultimate sentence.

  He brought the Klingerach up into position. He could hear the thunder of Reiksguard hooves behind him. They were keeping pace, dragging the unwilling Leitdorf with them. Where was Skarr? There was no sign of the preceptor.

  Grosslich neared. The fool kept his blade raised. Helborg felt the ghost of a smile flickering across his lips. Just a few more strides…

  Then came a new figure, hurtling in from the side and riding between them. Helborg pulled on the reins, immediately adjusting his trajectory. He recognised the distinctive coat and hat again—Schwarzhelm’s spy. With phenomenal horsemanship, the man headed Grosslich off, pushing his steed away and shoving it off into the wrong direction. An impressive manoeuvre. It had saved the man’s life. So Schwarzhelm was in league with Grosslich after all. Leitdorf had been right. The damned fool.

  The spy’s horse was now careering towards him in place of Grosslich’s. Pushed off-balance by his last manoeuvre, the man was headed right into his path. Helborg could see him struggling with the reins. One traitor for another, then. The result would be the same.

  Helborg brought the Klingerach round in a decapitating blow. The man saw it at the last minute. He was quick. A long dagger rose to meet it, and the blades clashed.

  But the spy was still reeling from his centre of gravity. The power of Helborg’s stroke knocked him back from the horse and on to the stone below. He rolled over, head in his hands, desperately warding it from the stamping hooves around him.

  Helborg wheeled his horse round to finish the job. As he looked at the cowering figure on the ground below him, he felt nothing but contempt. The man had forgotten his duty. He’d been drawn into the feud rather than protecting against it. There was no pity for that breed of weakness. He raised his blade.

  “Helborg!”

  The shout resounded across the square. Men stopped what they were doing. Even the Reiksguard, inured to all but the most powerful presences on the battlefield, looked up from their rampage.

  Helborg sought out the source of the sound. The voice was one he knew intimately. He’d fought alongside the owner of it for years.

  Schwarzhelm was charging straight for him. The man looked terrible. His beard was matted with blood. His armour was dented and streaked with the evidence of fierce fighting. Even under the shadow of his helmet, the madness and rage in his eyes was evident. He looked like a man who’d been dragged out of the Chaos Wastes and let loose on the realms of mortal men. His horse seemed half-crazed with fatigue. Foam streamed along its muzzle. The blade, the famed Sword of Justice, swung wildly as he approached. As the metal carved through the air, blood flew from the shaft like a shower of rain.

  There was no time to react. No time to protest. A lesser man than Helborg would have been smashed from his saddle by the impact, driven into the ground and trampled under the hooves of Schwarzhelm’s crazed beast. As it was, it was all he could do to bring the Klingerach up to parry the sweep of the Rechtstahl.

  With an explosion of sparks, the two holy blades, each forged at the birth of the Empire, clashed together. The resounding clang swept across the courtyard, drowning out all other sounds. A blaze of light burst from the crossed swords, as if some powerful force within them had been unleashed after centuries of slumber.

  Helborg felt the massive power of Schwarzhelm’s blow shudder down his arm. He gritted his teeth, using all his strength to hold his ground. He held it. Just.

  The horses spun away from one another, pushed apart by the force of the impact. Schwarzhelm’s steed staggered. Its legs began to give way underneath it. With a strangled cry of distress, the overworked beast sank to the ground, its flanks heaving.

  Schwarzhelm leapt from the stricken animal and strode towards Helborg. He pointed his sword straight at him. There was a fire in his eyes Helborg had never seen before, even in the many sparring contests they’d had as young men. This was different. Schwarzhelm wanted to kill him.

  “What are you doing, man?” Helborg cried, keeping his own mount under control with difficulty. Despite its training, the beast shied away from the armoured figure walking towards it. Schwarzhelm was projecting a terrifying
aura of hatred.

  “Come down and face me,” growled Schwarzhelm. His voice was thick and snarling. As he spoke, Helborg could see his features twitching. He looked exhausted. Still he came on, inviting the contest between them.

  Helborg looked around. The Reiksguard were fully occupied and badly outnumbered. Grosslich’s riders had engaged them and more of his footsoldiers were arriving all the time. He caught a glimpse of Skarr with his company before they plunged into battle. Leitdorf still looked contained, but Grosslich’s men were clawing at his guards. The fighting was everywhere. They were in the heart of the storm.

  The two masters of the Emperor’s armies squared off against one another. Helborg couldn’t see where Grosslich had been driven to. It didn’t matter. Only one battle mattered now.

  “What have you done here, Schwarzhelm?” asked Helborg, keeping his voice level.

  “My duty, as always.”

  “You’ve forgotten your duty. This city is burning.”

  “I’ll not bandy words with a traitor. Come down and face me.”

  Traitor. The words stung. Something terrible had happened to Schwarzhelm. He bore the look of a man who’d suffered some kind of prolonged torture.

  “Do not use that word in my presence.” Helborg felt his own anger rising. There was an aura of violence in the air. He’d need to be stopped. Somehow, Schwarzhelm would have to be brought down. But how, without killing him?

  Then Schwarzhelm smiled.

  Of all the things that had happened in Averheim since Helborg’s arrival, that spoke most clearly of some terrible twisting of the great man’s mind. Schwarzhelm never smiled. Now his mighty face, the scourge of the Emperor’s enemies across the endless expanse of the Old World, distorted into a mocking, sarcastic leer of savage intent. His eyes flickered with a baleful gleam. The blade rose again, glittering coldly. The afternoon sunlight was failing, to be replaced by the angry heat of the huge fires. In their crimson glow, Schwarzhelm looked half-daemonic.

  “Come down and face me,” he repeated, looking eager for the fight. “I know you, Kurt. Refuse me now and all will know you for the traitor you are. Face me!”

  Helborg let his eyes flick around him again. His men had their hands full keeping Grosslich’s men at bay. None of them could match Schwarzhelm. Reiksguard or not, they’d be dead in seconds if they as much as moved towards him.

  Only one man alive had the power to contest him in combat. It felt as if fate had brought him to Averheim for this purpose alone. Wearily, feeling a sickness enter his heart, Helborg prepared for the duel that only he could undertake. Schwarzhelm had been driven to the edge of ruin and had to be stopped.

  “So be it,” he said, dismounting heavily. “If this is how you want it. Your mind has been poisoned, Ludwig. I warn you, if I have to, I will cut you down.”

  Schwarzhelm snarled. The strange half-smile still twisted his face.

  “That’s what you’ve always wanted, Kurt. At least now the truth of that is out.”

  Then he charged, the Sword of Justice held high. Helborg raised his own blade, focused on the weapon before him and waited for the impact.

  The duel had begun.

  Verstohlen came to his senses. He’d hit his head hard on the stone. There was a black corona around his vision and the world about him was blurred and indistinct.

  With difficulty, he dragged himself up on to his knees. Everything was in motion. His horse was long gone. In all directions, men struggled against one another. He saw one burly trooper drag another to the ground, tearing at the man’s eyes. Another throttled his opponent, rolling with him in the filth as each strove to finish the other off. There were scraps of skin on the ground about him, tufts of hair and knocked-loose teeth.

  What was going on? Even for such debased kinds of combat, the very air seemed heavy with a deranged, fervid stench. There was no shape to any of the fighting. This was a mass outpouring of rage; a messy, maniac brawling.

  Verstohlen clambered to his feet. For a moment, the world swung around him. Then, slowly, it clarified. The evening was waning fast. In the east, stars had appeared. The sunlight seemed to have bled from the sky surprisingly fast.

  Then he saw it. Morrslieb. Just a sliver of the Chaos moon was visible, jutting out from behind the dark towers of the distant Averburg. Its sickly light was barely visible in the glittering of the swords. How long had that accursed moon been in the sky? It explained some of the madness around him. When the dark moon was abroad, men’s minds were altered. Perhaps this whole city had cradled its sickness for too long. Maybe it had affected him too. Maybe it had affected all of them.

  Verstohlen shook his head, trying to clear his mind of the rambling thoughts. He retrieved his knife shakily. All around him, the fighting continued unabated. How had he been wounded? He couldn’t remember. He had to find Grosslich.

  Verstohlen began to stumble through the milling bodies around him. One of Leitdorf’s thugs staggered into his path. The brute lunged at him. Verstohlen dodged the blow casually, feeling sluggish and nauseous. His knife felt unbalanced in his hand. He returned the attack, letting the blade guide him. It plunged deep into the man’s stomach. Verstohlen pulled it sharply to the right. Hot blood and viscera streamed over his wrist. The gobbets of flesh, glistening in the firelight, slipped over his hand and fell, plopping and slapping, to the ground. The soldier, face fixed into a frozen scream of agony, crumpled to the stone.

  Verstohlen withdrew his knife, watching the man enter his gasping death throes. For a moment, a savage joy filled his heart. He looked around him. The knife was hot in his fingers, glowing like a brand. The shapes of the men around him flickered and shuddered, like a candle flame caught in a sudden gust. A curious musk was mingling with the stench of blood and sweat. He recognised it immediately. Welcomed it. It was sweet, as sweet as death. Like jasmine.

  He raised his hands to his face, uncaring of the flow of carnage around him. His hands were steeped in gore. Dark trickles ran down his arm, staining the leather of his coat. He felt an overwhelming urge to lean forward, press the still-hot viscera against his face…

  Verstohlen jerked his hand back. What was happening to him? What was happening to all of them? He drew in a deep breath. The air was hot. It wasn’t the sun. The fires were burning higher. Their flames danced into the dusk. They writhed like snakes. Against the red tongues of flame, a faint lilac flickered.

  Joyroot. Tons of it. Leitdorf had chosen his battleground well. At last, the dark sorcery at the heart of his campaign had become manifest.

  Verstohlen wiped his sleeve in disgust. Even now, he could sense the beckoning lure of madness. Weaker minds had little defence. Where was Grosslich? He needed to be warned.

  He started to stumble through the press around him. There was a knot of knights a few yards away. They seemed to be protecting something. For a moment, he thought he saw Leitdorfs livery hidden amongst them. The man was smiling smugly, arms crossed over his flabby chest. Why were they protecting him? A surge of hatred ran through Verstohlen’s body, and he lurched unsteadily forward towards him.

  Then another warrior blundered into his path. Verstohlen couldn’t tell what his allegiance was, but the man looked ready to take on anyone. His eyes were wild and starting. A bloody weal ran across his neck. Seeing Verstohlen in turn, he launched himself forward, sword waving wildly.

  Verstohlen met the attack, parrying with his knife and pushing the lurching soldier back. He worked quickly, trying to recover his balance. The nausea and confusion were beginning to wear off. Deep down, though, he was worried. More worried than he’d been since arriving in the accursed city. What was driving the attacks? Where was Grosslich?

  He dispatched the clumsy attacker with a double-back swipe of his knife. Behind him, more men were approaching. For some reason, they seemed to have latched onto him.

  Verstohlen stayed low and gritted his teeth. He didn’t have time for this. The stench of Chaos was everywhere. He had to get to those knights. Th
e soldiers came for him, stumbling and tripping as if in a drunken stupor.

  Verstohlen hefted his knife lightly, whispered a prayer to Verena the Protector, then charged into their midst.

  The two swords danced around one another, flickering like flames in the dusk. Each blade moved with breathtaking precision. As he worked, Schwarzhelm felt the fatigue fall from his arms. His concentration was absolute, his movement perfectly controlled. Just as Lassus had taught him, he let the sword become an extension of his being. He was a plain man, but it was in such moments that he got as close as he ever came to the sublime. The Rechtstahl responded. The heavy shaft of steel swung through the air as if made of a weightless shard of ithilmar. The metal shimmered, glorying in its impeccable balance and poise.

  Before him, Helborg kept pace perfectly. He was a master swordsman. The best in the Empire, they all said. His technique had always been just a fraction ahead of Schwarzhelm’s. When they’d sparred in front of the Emperor in their youth, he’d won all their contests. Only by a shade, only by a fraction. There had been so little at stake then. Now things were different.

  Schwarzhelm took a big step forward, swiping heavily with the Rechtstahl to draw the defensive push, switching direction at the last moment.

  Helborg was alive to it, and parried watchfully. For a moment, they came together. The blades locked.

  “Why are you doing this, Ludwig?”

  Schwarzhelm didn’t reply. He broke away, back into the duelling posture. As he moved, he thrust the Rechtstahl upwards jerkily, nearly twisting the runefang from Helborg’s hands.

  He could hardly bear to look at his old rival. Of all the men to turn to the great enemy, this was the most bitter blow. He’d always known Helborg had secretly envied his closeness to the Emperor. Whatever men said, being master of the Reiksguard didn’t compare to the honour of carrying the Imperial Standard into battle. Now his mask had slipped. The man’s treachery had been revealed.