The Enterprise of Death

by Jesse Bullington

  “But wait,” said Manuel. “If Kahlert’s men, the muscle, were tracking her from some graveyard to here, to Wolfach, how was the barkeep involved, and—”

  “In time, in time,” said Monique. “I was almost fuckin there. So barkeep says them locals what got the witch caught’er up an old graveyard they don’t use no more, out the east side of town off a huntin trail. Barkeep says ta go out there ta pick’er up, an’ after gettin the biggest fuckin tip I ever seen the keep finally gets round ta pourin my beer while the muscle goes back ta ’is crew.”

  “His crew? He and the rest—”

  “Drinkin it up, real fuckin subtle-like, seven big assholes bunched together in one place. So I stagger o’er, not next to’em, understand, but close enough ta catch a word or two as everyone’s shoutin ta be ’eard in that fuckin place.”

  Manuel could scarcely believe she could hear anything after a lifetime blasting guns, but her words were starting to create an unhappy image in his mind, though a play might have served the complex story better. A tragedy, with Manuel as the lead, and—he caught himself. “I’m sorry, Mo, what was that?”

  “I said three of the big cunts was trackin’er this way, an’ come inta town the same day four of Kahlert’s boys come down from Calw. See, one of these local chumps went up ta let Kahlert know they’d caught ’is witch, but if that was true Awa couldn’t be muckin bout in them other churchyards the first three was followin’er through. So the muscle, all seven of’em, get inta town today, some from the south an’ some from the north, an’ someone recognizes someone else, they compare stories, an’ what the fuck? Somethin don’t add up, what with it soundin like the witch’s in two spots at once, an’ these boys pissed besides that some fuckin peasants is stealin they glory and they bounty.”

  “I know what’s going on, Mo, I—” Manuel began, but she cuffed him on the head.

  “Shut it til I’m finished. So the south muscle says she’d be up the graveyard tonight or next, seein as they don’t reckon she’s got a horse an’ this oughta be the next potter’s field in line for’er, an’ so they an’ the north muscle says why not go see if the peasants got themelves the witch, an’ if aye, great, kill the fuckers an’ take’er back to Kahlert, an’ if nay, send them peasants packin with an empty purse an’ lay in ta catch the witch if she shows her snout tonight or next. So they all runnin ta the graveyard, and we will, too, once you tell me how you got it all sussed, and what the fuck Doctor P is doin mixed up in it.”

  “He’s the first witch!” said Manuel, the pieces fitting together seamlessly. “Maybe Kahlert isn’t specific about what witch he wants, or maybe the locals think, what with him being a fucking witch hunter, that he’ll pay out for any old witch they catch, and who knows, maybe he will. So Paracelsus arrives in town, running his fucking mouth, and some of the locals decide he’s witchy enough.”

  “An’ you said you seen’em? Paracelsus?”

  “Just down the wall!” And Manuel quickly recounted what he had seen by the fence.

  “So Doctor Lump rides in a few days back an’ his fuckin mouth lands’em in witch territory.” Monique nodded slowly. “Barkeep sends word ta Calw tellin Kahlert they caught themelves a witch down in Wolf. Meantimes, Awa’s cuttin through graveyards for reasons obscure, with three fuckin bounty riders after’er, an’ is headed straight for this shitheap.”

  “That’s how it looks from here,” said Manuel. “And that’s a sight better to go on than what either the locals or Kahlert’s muscle is working with.”

  “I don’t give half a drunk-fuck what ’appens ta Doctor Lump, but if our girl’s blunderin inta it up the graveyard—”

  “Or if we’re wrong about any of the details—”

  “That’s enough head start for those assholes,” said Monique, straightening up. “Let’s get ta fuckin work, Manuel.”

  They jumped the rough stone wall where they stood, then hurried up the grassy hill toward the treeline. Manuel found himself excited, actually nervous and eager and hungry to stick his sword in some piece of shit that would sell a girl to a witch hunter. A shame, he thought, that he had been unable to conjure such enthusiasm when he was actually a mercenary who stood just as good a chance of living out the battle as anyone else, as opposed to an already winded has-been embarking on a blind charge into a dark forest on an increasingly dark night against unknown odds with only a single ally at his side. He might have laughed but he lacked the air, and then the screams started, shrill but distinctly male, and Monique laughed for him.

  “That’s our fuckin girl, like as not! Move, lump, move!” They hit the trail where it entered the forest, and then he was huffing after her, Monique jangling in front of him with all the subtlety of, well, a furious Dutch gunner smashing up a studio. Fuck had no sake here.

  The screaming trailed off as lights came into view through the trees, and Monique continued to exercise the restraint that had so surprised and impressed Manuel by slowing to a stop, her hands fluttering over her body to press the bouncing metal silent. Manuel stopped as well, not for the first time admiring her array of guns and wishing he had learned the skill himself, or at least thought to pick up a crossbow. She must have invested some of her income in new pieces, for the twin pistols she silently drew from scabbards jutting out from under her armpits were unlike any the artist had seen before, the silhouetted barrels long as short swords. Even in the dark he heard her breathing steady as soon as the guns were in hand, and before he could ask how she meant to light the cords without drawing attention she left the trail and darted between the trees.

  How someone so big could move so quietly was a question Awa had asked herself recently as well, the necromancer having been taken unawares and bound in iron chain for the second time in her life—no coincidence, that. Merritt was supposed to be on watch to prevent just such a circumstance, but her immediate suspicion that he had sold her out was proven false when she spied two men shoving him into an identical sack just before the hood went over her eyes. Chloé gave a short gasp that was cut off, and Awa could only hope this was the result of a gag similar to the one Awa now wore being put into place. Then she felt herself hoisted up, their captors clearly not keen on dallying beside the churchyard where they had finally captured the witch and her accomplices. She realized that not only was she caught and most likely being delivered to someone who both knew her weaknesses and meant her harm, but this time there was no Niklaus Manuel Deutsch of Bern to save her.

  Manuel stumbled in the dark, ashamed of himself for making so much noise as he tripped through the underbrush, but when he glanced up to whisper an apology Monique was gone. The artist stayed very still as he peered around, close enough to the cemetery and its lights to see that he was very much alone in the stand of firs shrugging up against the low stone wall of the old graveyard. Turning his attention there, he did not see a single man, the seven bounty hunters from Wolfach and the five costumed locals who had kidnapped Paracelsus just as absent as Monique, only a few lanterns balanced on gravestones indicating anyone had been there at all.

  There were several stone markers but the only other obvious grave was a hulking barrow that dominated the rear of the cemetery, and with a silent prayer Manuel closed the little ground between him and the wall. Clambering over it he knocked a stone loose, the rock clattering down with all the volume of an angelic choir announcing the presence of the Almighty. Fuck.

  Landing in a crouch and drawing his sword, Manuel waited for the mob of bounty hunters and locals, now united in purpose, to charge around the side of the barrow and martyr his sorry ass. Nothing stirred but a breeze that brought the distant drumming of the Fastnacht festivities from Wolfach, where the witches and devils and beauties all danced and danced, celebrating the death of winter. The wind felt chill enough on his neck from where he knelt, and Manuel might have stayed there until Judgment if Monique had not materialized to his right.

  She marched in through the gate as if she were a noble lady taking in her gardens, a wi
nning smile on her face as she walked casually forward, only the two pistols jutting out in front of her implying she felt any anxiety at all. Manuel stood slowly, and felt a little piss dribble into his codpiece as both gun barrels suddenly yawned in his direction, Monique’s smile twisting to a frown as she saw who it was, her wrists relaxing. Then she motioned him toward the barrow with a pistol, and he hesitated only long enough to retrieve one of the lanterns from atop a leaning tombstone.

  Turning the light toward the barrow, Manuel’s eyes bulged and he heard a low, whining moan. Realizing he was the one making the noise, he instantly quieted, though his unease was not so easily dispelled. The side of the barrow and the ground before it was coated with blood, wide splashes of it reaching even the walls of the cemetery. Looking down at himself, Manuel saw he stood in a puddle of the old Papal paint. Monique was no longer smiling.

  Taking a few a steps forward and peering closer at the earth, he saw winding smears and furrows where bodies had been dragged around the side of the grassy mound, as well as several shattered lanterns and discarded swords. So there might have been a double cross after all, and enough of one side or the other had survived to drag away the bodies. A chicken mask lay cracked against a tombstone, matted hair stuck to its edge. Looking back to Monique, Manuel saw she was rounding the barrow, and the nerve that had to date saved him on the battlefield loosened his knees. Circling around the far side, he slowed almost to a crawl as he heard the unmistakable sound of muffled digging from within the hillock itself. Monique appeared around the other side of the mound, and together they advanced on a wide tunnel dug straight into the side of the barrow.

  Awa felt them set her down, every part of her aching and sore. People were moving around her and whispering, and she wondered if Chloé was still nearby or if the young woman had been taken to some other location. Then the slit in the hood was being uncinched, and even with the dimness of the chamber her eyes burned and wept. She smelled old bones and gravedirt but could not tell if the reek was her own, and then, finally, a familiar voice spoke to her. She froze, shocked beyond her ability to think, and so as her eyes adjusted and the face peering down at her came into focus she could only stare and gasp.

  “Paracelsus,” Manuel hissed at the mouth of the barrow tunnel, and from the corner of his eye he saw Monique’s cool features ignite in rage at his breaking the silence. The man heard, however, and looked up from the dark shape on the ground he was kneeling over. The doctor looked far more crazed than he had even at his most incensed and drunk back at his clinic, and he held a shaking red finger to his pale lips. Blood dripped down his hand onto the body beneath him, and the digging sound coming from deeper within the barrow stopped.

  “I mean you no harm,” Awa called from the darkness at the rear of the tunnel, and Manuel felt all his fear melt into delight at hearing her voice. She sounded frightened and anxious, terrified, even, but it was her, and they were all here, and everyone was safe.

  “Awa!” Monique cried, shoving the pistols back into their holsters and pushing past Manuel. “It’s us, Awa, Mo and Manuel!”

  Manuel felt a residual shiver at her sheathing the weapons, but the tunnel was obviously too narrow for more than one person to be back there. Paracelsus gaped at Monique as she neared him, and then snatched her leg with wet, bloody hands, gibbering up at her. Manuel moved in to drag the deranged doctor off of her, which was when the light from his lantern illuminated the figure in the rear of the tunnel. Not. Fucking. Awa.

  “I am Awa.” The horror spoke with her voice, the yellow-eyed canine monstrosity spoke with her fucking voice, and before Monique could turn from Paracelsus and see it, it and the bloody pile of corpses it crouched atop, before Manuel could even blink the tears from his eyes, the lantern sputtered once and went out. In the sudden and unbroken blackness they heard Awa say, “Funny! Funny! Funny!”

  Then the hyena let out its riotous, horrible laugh, and there in the dark of the barrow Manuel began to scream.

  XXX

  The Hammer Falls

  Omorose. The tears leaving Awa’s eyes were no longer only from the faint light searing them after a week blindfolded inside a sack as the bounty hunters took her west after catching her just outside Troyes. She had been directing their search to take them toward Bern, and if only she could have seen Manuel one last time, laughed and shared a drink and taken in his newest masterpiece …

  “Well well well, beast, it’s been a long time.” Omorose beamed at her old slave, as unblemished and beautiful as she had been the day she left her harem, unlike the weather-burned, haggard witch who cried in her bonds, only her chestnut-dark face jutting out of the cocoon of sackcloth and chain like some miserable caterpillar interrupted mid-metamorphosis. “You look good, beast, quite good like that, all tied up and bleating.”

  Awa realized she had been trying to speak through the gag, and went silent. She had to think, she had to find out what had happened, where she was, what they had done with—

  “We’ve got your friends, beast,” said Omorose, and Awa felt herself lifted up. She was in some sort of dungeon. Not that she had seen one before, but she made out stone walls, long wooden tables with shackles and cranks, an utter lack of windows— a dungeon to be sure.

  “Is it safe to, to move her?” An older man she had not seen before had spoken as he hoisted her off the ground with the assistance of two of the bounty hunters.

  “They got her here, didn’t they?” snapped Omorose. “If a week on a horse didn’t rattle her loose then putting her on the table shouldn’t be too risky, should it, Ash?”

  The man grunted even with the bounty hunters to help him, and then Awa was laid flat on one of the tables. From up here she could see the two other swaddled shapes on the floor, and then they rolled her on her side and the man, Ash, looked across Awa at Omorose. She held up a knife, Awa’s ibex knife, the necromancer realized with a shudder, and then a cold thought came to her—what if Omorose had found the book, found a way to break the curse, to hurt her despite being an undead creature? Then the knife sank into the sweaty cloth bundling Awa and Omorose began cutting around the chains, tearing away the sack in wide swaths.

  One of the bounty hunters said something to Kahlert, who glanced sadly at Awa and then disappeared from view. They had used much more chain this time, the man who had initially seized her holding a loop of it around her shoulders as his fellows beat her until she went still, and then they had locked it into place, covered her with the hooded sack, and applied yet more chain. Bands of the iron links tightly encircled her ankles and knees, and a single length of it wrapped around her torso many times over, pinning her arms to her side; even with the sack cut away from her Awa had no hope of squirming loose, and she looked helplessly up at Omorose.

  “— an extra ten to ride down to Wolfach and find Olaf,” Kahlert was telling the man. “Obviously the lead there is useless at best and fraudulent at worst, and if they already purchased the alleged witch then the barkeep at the Wolf’s Step will know who has taken my money. I know there’s plenty of room for duplicity in such a convoluted matter, so I shall make it simple for you—so long as the money I gave to Olaf for the acquisition of the witch is returned to me, you shall have a reasonable cut, and I don’t care if the money is currently held by Olaf, the barkeep, or the amateur witch hunters of Wolfach. Once you’ve acquired my funds please inform Olaf, and the barkeep, for that matter, that until further notice I’m not paying out for sorcerers and—”

  “You’re going to suffer in here.” Omorose rolled Awa onto her back again and leaned down, her face hovering just above Awa’s as she whispered to her, “He’s alive, beast, think about that. He can do anything he wants to you. Annnnything I can think of. And I’ve thought of a lot since last we saw one another, since last you tried to murder me.”

  “Thank you, Inquisitor,” said the bounty hunter. Awa heard a door open and close, and then the sound of metal sliding on wood. Omorose straightened up and Kahlert came back into vi
ew at Awa’s feet, his face grim. No, Awa realized, not grim, but trying to look it—the man was trembling all over, nowhere near as calm as he was pretending.

  “They’re gone,” Kahlert said, switching from German to Spanish. “I had him dismiss the lot, so I’ll go and make sure all the servants have cleared out, and then we can …” His fingertips were extended, almost brushing Omorose’s cheek, and the woman gave a little sigh. Awa’s surprise was wearing off, and she began to extrapolate what was going on. She did not have to do much guessing, however; as soon as the man disappeared Omorose positively gushed.

  “His name is Ashton Kahlert, and he was an Inquisitor when I found him,” said Omorose, smiling down at Awa. “You chased me right into his arms, and before you know it he’s doing everything I say, because of you. Because of what you did. I told him a bit of it, of what you did, only a bit, and even still you should have seen the look on his face! So he told everyone he knew about you, and even when it cost him his position in his church he kept at it, an obedient man, a loyal servant, the sort of slave that a woman might find herself admiring, appreciating. Loving.”

  Awa would not have had a great deal to say, even without the gag.

  “So his men found you.” Omorose sighed. “It’s almost too perfect. Daddy’s favorite caught in the only place she ever goes to meet girls, and with a pair of friends, too! One of them’s a woman, I gather—is she your girlfriend, beast? Is she a stupid little cunt who doesn’t know what you do? What you’ve done?”

  Keeping Chloé—and Merritt, for that matter—oblivious to what she was up to as they had scoured the churchyards of France had not been easy, but Awa had managed. Both assumed she was simply a graverobber, albeit a remarkably successful one given the coins and jewelry she returned with, and as she limited her raising and questioning of the dead to the times when she was able to ditch her companions, usually on her turn at watch, neither ever suspected that they were traveling with a necromancer, and Awa had never found a suitable opportunity to tell Chloé. Awa did not see how she could have given away anything with the gag in place but perhaps her eyes or her nostrils twitched, for Omorose smiled even wider.