[Marienburg 02] - A Massacre in Marienburg

by David Bishop - (ebook by Undead)

  “Unlikely. They’d been patrolling together for years. I’ve known brothers who were not as close as Kemp and Ragan.”

  “—or else something attacked and slaughtered them; probably the latter.”

  Damphoost looked at her. “And you can tell all of that, simply by examining this old wooden boat for a while?”

  “It’s what I do, what I’m best at.” She touched a hand to the side of his face. “You look tired, Ruben—exhausted. You need to sleep.”

  “I will,” he said, but was already pulling on his coat.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To tell Kemp’s wife and Ragan’s daughter what we think has happened. They deserve to know, and I doubt there’ll be a chance to inform either of them tomorrow.”

  Not far from the Rijksweg, captains from the city’s northern districts and wards were gathering at the Red Cock Inn in Guilderveld. Well known for its superior ale and hot food, the tavern was also said to be a favoured haunt for smugglers and those looking to disappear. Innkeeper Donat Tuersveld’s alleged connections to the Thieves’ Guild made the tavern an unlikely place to find five senior watchmen, but that was precisely why Quist had chosen it. The captain for Noordmuur had no wish for word of their meeting to spread and Tuersveld’s alehouse guaranteed discretion for all—even Black Caps.

  Titus Rottenrow from Rijkspoort arrived second, his bushy red beard and barrel-chested physique making him easy to spot. Next was Guilderveld’s own Arthur Zeegers, a pinch-faced individual with darting eyes and foul breath, followed by the altogether grander Cornelius Bloom from Paleisbuurt, his regal bearing and garb befitting the captain for Marienburg’s richest district. Scurrying to a seat mere moments before the appointed hour, Samuel Mulder was nervous and hesitant, the narrow-hipped captain from Ostmuur sliding himself into one of the tavern’s chairs like a serpent.

  Quist waited until the others had finished exchanging small talk before raising his voice and calling them to order. “I’m grateful to you all for coming tonight, and on such short notice. No doubt you’ve heard what’s happening at Suiddock—”

  Mulder piped up, interrupting Quist in a sibilant voice. “Is Georges coming? Should we be starting without him, I mean? Seems a bit rude, not waiting if he—”

  “Sandler was not invited to this meeting,” Quist said, struggling to keep his temper with the agitated figure to his left. “He made his attitude quite clear at the last meeting of captains. All he cares about is Goudberg, and advancing his own career.”

  “Nevertheless, you should have invited me,” an aristocratic voice broke in. The captains twisted round to see Sandler approaching, a tankard of ale in his grasp. The late arrival took a chair from an empty table nearby and positioned it next to Rottenrow. “Still, I’m here now, so no harm done.” He sat down and supped his ale, before gesturing at Quist. “Please, carry on with what you were saying.”

  Quist continued, a scowl etched into his grim features. “No doubt you’ve heard what’s happening at Suiddock. The witch hunters have been given total jurisdiction over the district, usurping Captain Schnell, the local River Watch and all other authorities in Suiddock. The Stadsraad believes bottling up the problems there will save the rest of the city. Both houses of our parliament have abdicated all responsibility. But it’s not just the citizens of Suiddock who’ll suffer. Quarantining that district cuts off all land routes between the northern and southern halves of the city. It’ll cause anarchy within hours.”

  The scar-faced veteran of twenty years glared round the others. None contradicted him, but neither did they have the courage to speak up—except one. “I don’t understand what you want us to do about this,” Sandler said between sips of ale. “Much of what you say is true—”

  “All of it is true!” Quist raged.

  “Perhaps, but you know the adage; what happens in Suiddock, stays in Suiddock.”

  “So you think we should turn a blind eye, leave Schnell, Damphoost and the others to cope with a riot? We should deny them any help of any kind?”

  “What do you suggest we do?” Rottenrow asked, stroking his beard. “We cannot stand against the authority given to the witch hunters, we’d be branded as heretics.”

  “Titus is right,” Mulder agreed. “This is a Suiddock problem, a local matter. It doesn’t affect our districts, our wards. Why should we worry?”

  “What about the dead rising from any crypts below sea level?” Quist asked.

  “Isolated incidents,” Rottenrow said. “Tiny ripples spreading outwards, as happens after someone has thrown a large stone into a pond. Nothing more, nothing less.”

  “You honestly think this dark magic can be kept to Suiddock?”

  “Probably not,” Bloom told Quist with a condescending tone in his voice. “But my district of Paleisbuurt is overflowing with private militia only too starved of an outlet for their aggression. Perhaps a few light skirmishes will do them some good.”

  Quist sprang to his feet, his chair tipping over backwards as he slammed a fist down on the tavern table. “Fools! That’s what you are! Suiddock is only the beginning, a foothold for the enemy that is coming. By abandoning that district to fight against this dark magic alone, you are dooming it to failure. Once Suiddock is lost, the rest of the city shall fall within days, if not hours. When that happens, you will remember this and you will hang your heads in shame —if you still have your heads by then!”

  Quist stomped away from the table, but one voice made him stop. It was Zeegers, Quist’s oldest friend among the captains. “Bram, where are you going?”

  “To prepare for war,” Quist snarled. “Those of you who have any sense will do the same, before it’s too late. Mark my words and mark them well; this fight will be ours before Geheimnistag is over. Unless you want to see your districts on fire and your citizens being sacrificed to Chaos, you’ll mobilise what forces you have—tonight!”

  An hour later, the Knights of Purity met in their star chamber above the oubliette. “What happened at the meeting?” one of the cabal asked. The leader’s face was hidden from the others by a hood, but the shake of his head was still evident to them all. “Why did they not listen? Why did they not rise to the challenge?”

  “It is prophecy coming to pass,” the leader said. “The other captains walk in the footsteps of destiny and do not even realise they are walking to their dooms.”

  “There must be something we can do.”

  “I shall seek help from other sources, other places. We have the benefit of knowing where the prophecy leads, and of having prepared ourselves for the dark days and hours ahead. We have seen the coming of this threat for time beyond reckoning. Now we must rise to the challenge and take our place in the final, terrible battle.”

  * * *

  Brother Nathaniel surveyed the great and the good of Marienburg not long after the chimes of midnight. He’d summoned one representative from each of the ten wealthiest families to the City Watch headquarters, using the threat of excommunication to bring them to heel when some refused to leave their homes. Now he stood on the raised dais in front of the watch commander’s desk, glaring down on the gathering.

  “You should be ashamed of yourselves,” he said. That brought a murmur of angry dissent from the richest people in Marienburg, but none dared raise their voice against the witch hunter. “The district of Suiddock is dying and you do nothing to help it. The citizens there are being tormented by dark magic, their lungs choked by a fog that steals away their lives little by little, their futures hanging in the balance. But you—the leaders of this city, those who should be setting an example—hide away in your palaces of marble and stone, hoping and praying to be spared the same fate. I’m here to tell you this simple fact: your prayers will not be heard, nor will they be answered. If you are not willing to help your fellow man, you deserve no sympathy for your own slaughter.”

  Stefan Rothemuur stepped from the shadow of his more illustrious counterparts. “But we have our own troubles to deal wi
th. Our houses are beset from within, the skeletons and corpses of our own families are rising up to attack us.”

  The witch hunter nodded. “We already know of your plight and we have a solution, if you are willing to help us with Suiddock.”

  That brought more appreciation from those gathered. Thus far Nathaniel had been browbeating them with the usual hellfire and brimstone treatment all had heard too many times in the past from his kind. But to have a witch hunter offer them help, now that was worth listening to. “What kind of help?” Stefan asked.

  “One of my brethren shall come to each of your homes, accompanied by a priest of Morr. Together they will drive out the daemons that afflict your palaces and mansions before dawn. In return, you must allocate two-thirds of your private militia forces to our control, to do with as I see fit. What say you?”

  The ten summoned to the meeting turned to one another, debating the merits of this offer. Nathaniel did not bother to watch, instead turning to the man sat behind the desk. “You seem confident they will accept your deal,” the watch commander said.

  “They may be little better than idolaters paying homage to the gods of wealth and indulgence, but nobody wants to be throttled in bed by the corpses of their ancestors. They will haggle, but they will also agree. It’s in their best interests to do so, just as it was when I confronted the Stadsraad earlier. It is inevitable. In a way, it is destiny.”

  On the waters beyond Rijker’s Isle, a face split open into a wolfish grin. Eyes stared into a pool of blood, watching the meeting in the commander’s office, savouring each word Brother Nathaniel was saying. The fool spreads his witch hunters too thin. He has traded his strength for force of arms, when mortal men with their flintlocks and blades cannot hope to stand against the fury to come. His blunder shall be the undoing of Suiddock, and bring the devastation of this entire city.

  A hand swept across the blood pool’s surface, wiping away the image, as black lips muttered incantations so evil, so twisted that few had dared speak them aloud for decades, perhaps centuries. When the ripples had ceased disturbing the crimson liquid, a new image appeared on the surface. A bald man with thin, delicate fingers was writhing on a floor of stone, hands clutched to his temples, torment contorting his features.

  “This one is too strong for his own good. He must be broken. His spirit must be taken from him and crushed before his eyes. His will must be rent asunder, and his belief undone. He must be broken.”

  A single, wizened finger stabbed into the pool of blood where Otto’s face was. The priest of Morr screamed in pain, his cries echoing outwards into the shroud of fog that hung over the water. “Cry for me, sob for me, bleed for me.” Dark, forsaken lips whispered the words like some perverted lullaby of pain and torture. “Dance for me, holy man, sing for me, shaman. Say your prayers and chatter your credo, but it shall do you no good. Your soul is already forfeit, your life is mine to end, and your temple shall be my privy when this is over. Your death is but a bloodbath away.”

  An hour before dawn, the assembled ranks of the River Watch were gathering for their final orders before the quarantine around the waters of Suiddock was put into full effect. More than a hundred boats were moored round the district, each to be manned by four crew sent from every part of the city. Finding a room big enough to house all the maritime watchmen had not been easy, until Belladonna suggested the Temple of Manann on Hightower Isle. It could seat a thousand of the faithful, with room for another two hundred worshippers on the balcony overlooking the interior. Damphoost addressed his men from the balcony, making it easier for all of them to hear what he had to say.

  “I wish I could offer some special words of comfort or wisdom, provide a stirring speech of great inspiration and insight to see you through the ordeal that’s ahead of us all. Alas, I’m probably just like you—an ordinary man who loves being on water, and who thought joining the River Watch could make that love into a living. Now we find ourselves all in the same situation, the same boat you might even say. We have been given the unenviable task of stopping vessels from leaving or approaching Suiddock.”

  There was a murmur of disapproval among the boatmen. The vast majority were from elsewhere in Marienburg and couldn’t understand why they’d been chosen for this mission around the waters of Suiddock. None were looking forward to it.

  “In truth, I would call it an impossible task,” Damphoost continued. “There’s no point in me standing here and lying to you by saying otherwise. The River Watch have never been properly armed for combat, nor are our boats strong enough to withstand any vessel stupid enough to ram us. But we have a job to do and we will do it to the best of our abilities, because it is impossible. We are River Watch and we do the impossible every day. We have stopped smugglers and thieves, prevented catastrophes and turned back enemies far more formidable than anything seen on land in this city. We are River Watch, the forgotten peacekeepers, the people who battle against time and tide, who stand with honour against storm and squall. We are River Watch and we’re the best damned collection of mariners this city has ever seen! We are River Watch.”

  By now the boatmen were cheering their leader, surprised and excited by his words, proud to be part of this rare gathering. Damphoost let the men calm down before continuing with his words. “We will do what is asked of us, and we will do it well, better than anyone has a right to expect. Citizens will come to you in boats and dinghies and every other craft imaginable, pleading to be let past —you must turn them back. Smugglers may threaten you or even offer bribes—you must turn them away. Vessels may sail straight at you, fast as they can, expecting you to retreat from their fury—you must stand and take what is thrown at you. You are River Watch and you shall be firm, you shall be resolute and you shall be triumphant! What are you?”

  “We are River Watch!” the men below bellowed.

  “I can’t hear you,” Damphoost shouted. “What are you?”

  “We are River Watch!”

  “Yes, you are—and never forget that simple fact. You have your orders, you have your positions, you have your weapons and you have your crewmates. You know what to do. You are River Watch, and today you will do this city proud. Dismissed!”

  Kurt watched his Black Caps leave the station as dawn approached, marching out into the swirling fog, masks of cloth secured over their noses and mouths to keep out the worst of the mist. He’d little doubt the stevedores and teamsters were poised to spread news of the quarantine as soon as it was sunrise. The captain could not help smiling at that; who knew when anyone on Suiddock would see the sun rise again?

  Yesterday it had driven away the sinister clouds for a few hours, but now visibility was worse than ever. The rising sun would make it possible to move around on the streets and cobbles, but that would only make matters worse once word of Suiddock’s confinement spread.

  The captain closed the front doors to his station. For all intents and purposes, Three Penny Bridge no longer had a complement of Black Caps. They had become jailors for all of Suiddock’s citizens, charged with keeping captive thousands of people whose only crime was living in this district. Kurt wondered how they would fare, his watchmen and the people he’d come to think of as his own. How many would perish, how many would lose their lives due to the follies of others? He’d never felt more helpless in his life, at least not since the deaths of his brother in battle, and his wife after childbirth.

  “Wondering what the day will bring?” a familiar voice asked. Molly was standing outside her bordello, a cloth held over her nose and mouth, but that mass of red hair couldn’t belong to anyone else. “Or can’t you sleep either?”

  “Don’t want to,” Kurt admitted. “Bad dreams.”

  “Nightmares.”

  He nodded. “How long would it take you and your girls to evacuate?”

  “Depends when we’d be coming back.”

  “Maybe tomorrow, maybe never.”

  Molly lowered the cloth from her face a moment. “Things are that bad?” Kurt
didn’t reply. He didn’t need to. “I could have the girls out of here within six minutes.”

  “Cut that in half and you might still make it out of Suiddock.” Kurt explained about the quarantine. “Take your girls south, over the Draaienbrug swing bridge. The witch hunters will be fewer there, most people will try to escape by crossing the Rijksweg. Once you’re out of Suiddock, go east, away from the sea, as far across Kruiersmuur as you can. If things go badly, you can get out of the city from there.”

  Instead of hurrying inside, Molly came and kissed Kurt on the mouth. “Thanks.”

  He smiled. “I thought bordello workers never kissed anyone on the mouth.”

  Molly shrugged. “Rules are made to be broken. Besides, there’re not many that would bother to warn the likes of my girls and me. I wanted to show my appreciation.”

  Andries was grateful to hear the sound of heavy boots stomping towards him over the Hoogbrug. He and Wijk had been patrolling the bridge all night, marching back and forth in the mist, only just able to make out each other’s silhouette in the greasy murk. Both had three kerchiefs tied over their faces, one on top of the other, to ward off the disturbing visions suffered by those who breathed in the insidious mist. It would be a blessed relief to get indoors and away from the fog.

  He listened to the footfalls as they got closer. Having spent two successive nights patrolling amid the cloud, the Bretonnian immigrant had become adept at detecting who was coming solely from the sounds of their approach. The oncoming boots were not the Black Caps’ standard issue, and there were more than two people advancing towards him and Wijk. Andries drew his sword. “Who goes there? Come forward and be recognised!”

  The dark shapes emerging from the mist were wrapped in dark cloaks and wide-brimmed hats hid their faces, but the uniform was all too familiar. “Witch hunters,” Wijk said.

  One of the newcomers stepped forward to confront the watchmen. “You are hereby relieved. This bridge is now under our jurisdiction.”