by James Wallis
No, he corrected himself, there were two people in Nuln whose information he did trust: the dead man in the pond and the dead man in the attic. Corpses did not lie. Then he thought of the mutant’s new mouth biting down on Father Darius’ wrist and amended his own reply: not usually.
The first corpse was almost certainly the man that Frau Farber had described to him, who had claimed to be an Untersuchung agent on the same trail as Karl: tracking down former members, wanting to restart the work. He had got himself shot in the head. If there had been an ambush at Dead Man’s Pond, or even if a meeting had been interrupted there, any clandestine group worth the name—and Karl knew from what he’d seen of them in action that Stahl’s organisation was tightly structured and intelligently run—would never have gone back there. So either they had no idea that the man was in the pond, or they put him there.
The former wasn’t impossible. A third party might have intercepted the courier on his way back and killed him. But Karl thought of the Imperial messenger who had waited for him, and the look in his eyes, and he knew that these men had been behind the fate of the unnamed corpse.
Which told him nothing, except that he was dealing with ruthless men who worked outside the law—which he had expected—and that Frau Farber’s skills as a fortune-teller were not to be underestimated. She had thrown the sticks for the dead man and seen nothing good in them, and she had been right.
The second corpse, the one in the attic, was more perplexing. It could have been someone who was retrieving a message from the cache above the privy. But was he a part of Herr Stahl’s group, caught and killed by a member of another organisation as he checked the drop-point? Or an outsider who had found the drop-point and been killed for it? It was possible but not likely that this was a traitor agent, possibly even the agent who had betrayed the group to the witch hunters—killing him in this way would render the drop-point useless. Perhaps that was the point. The man had been killed while the group was fleeing the town; always a good time to settle old scores and end unfinished business.
The thing that could answer the conundrum was the hand-print. The more he thought about it, the more he was convinced it was a deliberate mark, a symbol, not something left by a careless murderer. A scarlet hand. Did it refer to the dead man, or to the person who had killed him, or to the drop-point? What did it mean? Why leave a print of your own hand in the blood of a man you’ve just killed? And who was the murderess who had done it?
Not for the first time, he wished there was someone he could ask, or some library to refer to. The Untersuchung had employed some of the Empire’s best experts on conspiracies and secret groups across the world, whether connected with Chaos or not. It was their speciality, the reason for their existence: to monitor these clandestine organisations, observe their movements, and if they became a threat to the Empire or infiltrated by followers of the dark powers, then destroy them. More often than not they would inform the local chapter-house of the witch hunters and let them do the dirty work and the burnings, as well as taking the credit. When the witch hunters had turned on them, the library had gone up in smoke along with the experts.
So what had happened over the last two days? For some reason Kratz had decided to arrest him the same day that the witch hunters moved against Stahl’s organisation. Had somebody—an informant perhaps—made a connection between the two? Had Kratz just assumed that the two were linked? Had someone told Kratz that Karl was looking for a group like the Untersuchung, possibly containing former Untersuchung members?
Karl reined in his horse abruptly and sat in the saddle, staring at the grey clouds on the horizon. There was another possibility he hadn’t considered, hadn’t even realised: he didn’t know if the witch hunters were going after Stahl’s group at all. They had appeared at the docks and at The Dog and Pony, but then Karl had been seen in both places—they could have been following his trail, nothing more. He had no evidence that Stahl and his associates had fled the city as soon as the witch hunter raids started; in fact he had nothing to tie Stahl to the Eider except that he had known its cabin would be empty that evening.
It was even possible that Kratz wasn’t going into The Dog and Pony to search it or question its patrons, but just to use the privy. Stahl and his people could still be in Nuln, lying low till the witch hunters stopped hunting.
All in all, it wasn’t much of a reason to chase a fast wherry downstream. But Nuln had become too hot for him, and it didn’t seem likely that Herr Stahl would be eager to employ someone who had a price on his head, and who had led the witch hunters to two of his group’s meeting-places.
The drizzle was constant, cold and thin. How could something so relentless be so half-hearted at the same time? His horse cropped grass from the side of the road. He decided to let it loose outside Grissenwald and walk the last couple of miles into the market-town. Maybe its owner would find it and reclaim it. He hoped so.
Over in the bare strip-fields to his left, a peasant shouted some greeting. No, the man wasn’t farming, he was running towards the road, shouting.
As the man got closer, Karl could see his clothes were long and ragged, not what a peasant would wear for working in the fields on a day like this, and he was out of breath.
The bedraggled man staggered closer, his feet heavy with dark mud. “Sir, we need help,” he gasped. Longhaired, long-bearded, ragged cloak over dark clothes. Thin. No hat. Middle-aged. Scared.
“How can I help you?” Karl asked.
“Ride and get help. The village is being attacked.” He pointed back across the fields.
“Attacked?” Karl could see the village now, spirals of smoke rising beyond a line of trees, and the stone bell-tower of a temple standing square against the sky.
“Attacked by a fiend of Chaos! Bring soldiers and witch hunters! Please, ride!”
Karl grinned. He had needed something to bring him back out of his head, and this panicked rustic would suffice. “Lead on,” he said. “I’ll do your dirty work.”
They went to the village, Karl riding and his fetcher leading the way on foot turning back every few paces to check he was still there, or to explain a part of his story in greater detail. There was already too much detail to it, Karl thought, and too much of that biographical. The man’s name was Oswald Maurer and he described himself as a traveller in the service of Sigmar, which seemed to mean he went from place to place visiting shrines and sacred sites, preaching in villages and inns, living off the alms of the generous, and sleeping in temples or under hedges.
He had been in Haldedorf, that being the name of the village, for less than a day when the Chaos creature had attacked. Oswald’s description became chattered and confused at this point the thing was ten feet tall, hairy all over, or with scales, with one or possibly three heads which might or might not have horns, or look like a goat, or a bear, or a dragon. Karl realised that Oswald had not actually seen the creature. From the man’s garble he was able to work out that the invader was most likely a beastman, a second- or third-generation creature of Chaos, its body roughly human, its head roughly animal, its intelligence and instincts somewhere between the two.
It had come to the village first by night, breaking down a hut door, killing a man and making off with his body. An hour ago it had returned in daylight, killing three peasants and two cows, then dragging the body of one of the animals away into the woods.
Anything that could drag a dead cow any distance was worthy of respect, but Karl had fought beastmen before: they were coarse, belligerent adversaries who believed in the strength of their own aggression. He could do this, and he needed to remind himself that there were things he was still good at.
They arrived at Haldedorf. It was hardly worthy of the word village: just a few houses clustered around a temple in bad repair, and a building beside the stream that doubled as mill and smithy. Oswald wanted to introduce him to the priest of the temple, and the blacksmith, and the blacksmith’s wife, but Karl held up a hand and passed him the reins of
his horse. “Stable him, rub him down and give him some water,” he said and as Oswald started to protest, “Well, find someone who knows how. If I’m not back in a day, sell the horse and hire some mercenaries.”
A few scared, puzzled villagers watched as he inspected the tom-up pasture where the cows had been kept, then followed the beastman’s cloven-hoofed tracks away, between outlying hovels, towards the woods. Karl’s hunting skills weren’t honed, but the trail left by a dragged cow wasn’t hard to follow.
The woods were light, the spring leaves still small, pale-green and delicate. Rain dropped onto rotting loam with heavy plashes. Karl drew his heavy sword and stalked in, using the thicker trees as cover. He wanted to get close enough to take the beast by surprise.
After twenty minutes he knew he had been right: it hadn’t been able to drag the carcass very far, and judging by the dead cow’s exposed bones and torn flesh, it was very hungry. It was what he had expected: lone beastmen did not attack human communities unless they were starving or mad. He could see the creature kneeling over the remains of the cow, ripping out organs and stuffing them into its mouth. He crept closer. What was this monster’s story? How did it come to be alone and starving so close to human settlements? Most beastmen lived in the depths of the Empire’s huge forests, or in the frozen north towards Kislev, where the armies of Chaos were gathering. Perhaps this one’s tribe had been wiped out, or had all died. Perhaps it was following some weird instinct of Chaos, travelling across the world to fulfil some strange destiny?
But who understood the ways of beastmen, and who cared? Karl held its destiny in his right hand. He lifted it, feeling the perfect balance in the blade. Down the trail, the beastman lifted its snout into the air, sniffed and turned, and he saw it was a female, young, ribs exposed and dugs wrinkled from hunger. It looked at him and stood, snarling, its face and body covered with blood and hair. Its hands were huge things, its fingernails hooks, its teeth crags.
Karl charged and swung.
It sidestepped, ducking, swinging wild claws at him.
Karl stepped back, let the blow go past and thrust his sword-point through its heart. It staggered. He withdrew the blade and, as it raised its hands to cover the wound and staunch the first gouts of fatal blood, beheaded it.
That had been pathetically easy.
It was too wet to burn the body. He picked up the head by one curled horn and carried it back down the trail, out of the woods, across the pasture and into the square of muddy earth outside the mill house. The villagers began to gather, hanging back from him and the ugly thing he carried, talking in hushed tones.
Karl threw the head down on the ground. It rolled and came to rest, its sightless eyes red and bovine, its tongue lolling from between its elongated jaws. Mostly goat-like, Karl thought. There was a hush from the villagers, part sated, part expectant. Karl waited for the first words of thanks and praise.
Opposite him, a big man in a rough smock pursed his lips, making a sucking sound. “No,” he said, “that’s not the one. The one that took the cow was more like a bear. And bigger.”
A bellow shook Haldedorf. At the edge of the woods, something was charging across the pasture, its arms as thick as the five-foot tree branch it carried as a club. Each step in its charge shook the earth. It was, Karl had to admit, more like a bear. And bigger.
He suddenly became aware that he was standing alone, next to the lolling head of the beastwoman. The villagers had disappeared.
About nine feet tall, he calculated. Its arms were long, probably a reach of five feet plus its weapon. That was a hell of a reach, too far for him to hit with his sword, too difficult to get in close. Time to think of some fresh tactics.
He pulled his knife from his belt, balanced it in his hand and, as the beast thundered into range, flung it. He was aiming for its eye, or its mouth. He hit it in the right shoulder, the blade making an audible sound as it struck and stuck.
The beast didn’t notice. It swung its rough club, the splintered end whistling through the air towards him. Karl danced back, but it struck him on the side, knocking him sideways and over. He hit the ground, rolled and was up on his feet—a move beyond most men but then he, like his monstrous opponent, was more than human. He guessed it had broken two of his ribs.
Damn, but it was fast. The tree-branch crashed into the ground where he had been an instant before. It was as if the club had no momentum; it flicked and spun as easily as Karl’s sword did, recovering from a swing, twisting back into the air for another blow. All Karl’s energy and all his mind were taken up with dodging and defending: he knew that if he spared a moment to think about parry or attack, he would be dead. The club thrust at him and he jumped sideways to avoid it. The wood was too thick to hack through, too fresh to break.
He stepped back and stood still for a second, daring the beastman to take its best swing at him, and it did, whirling the club around to bring it wheeling down in a great overhand stroke that shuddered the earth as it struck. Karl moved left and slightly forwards, closer in towards his enemy, and as the beast began to heft the branch out of the mud for another shot, he leaped in and thrust at its hand, sweeping the tip of his blade up to slice across its wrist. A slash of bright blood sliced through its furry skin and the beast howled in pain and increased rage. It dropped the club…
…Karl jumped back, his heart leaping that his attack had succeeded, readying his sword for another blow…
…and it charged him, head lowered, arms outstretched, its massive brawny legs powering across the village square with incredible speed and force.
The creature struck Karl hard, hitting his sword out of his hand, knocking him flying backwards and down. One fist struck at his heart, and he felt more ribs break. The other grasped for his head, to squeeze it until his eyes burst and the blood ran from his ears. It was on top of him, pushing him down, smothering him with its weight.
He pressed back against it with what strength he had left, feeling his broken ribs scythe against each other, tearing flesh inside him. His hands groped against the hard contours of its heavy flesh. One of them, the left, found something. Smooth and metallic. He grasped it. His dagger.
The air was being crushed out of him. His skull felt like it was about to split. His heart was vibrating, his mind closing in with pain and lack of breath.
He pulled at the dagger, feeling its short blade tug free from the muscle of the beast’s shoulder, twisting it to get it out and sensing the creature react to the pain, moving slightly, allowing his arm a little more space. He felt its hot breath, stinking of fresh blood and rotting meat, hot on his face, and knew where its throat was.
He struck for it.
A flood of hot liquid gushed over him. It was in his eyes and his mouth. The beast thrashed. Its weight was crushing him. He could not breathe or think any more.
He passed out.
He was lying on his back. Light was shining through his eyelids, but he couldn’t open them. He raised an arm—it felt heavy, and his broken ribs angrily reminded him of their presence. His face was covered in a crusty residue. Dried blood.
He rubbed what he could from his face, becoming aware of the cold wetness where he lay. Then he opened his eyes and found himself still in the village square, where he had fallen. The beast’s blood discoloured the ground around him, making his clothes foul and stiff, but there was no sign of the carcass. The drizzle had stopped. From somewhere beyond the row of rough cottages, smoke rose into the grey sky.
He staggered to his feet and looked around him at the churned mud of the village square. He could only see one person, hunkered down on his haunches beside the rough lumps of a ragged wall that formed a boundary around the temple yard. It was Oswald. The older man climbed upright slowly, as if weighed down and tired. Karl looked across the muddy, bloody space at him.
“Is it dead?” he asked.
Oswald jerked his thumb towards the fields and the column of smoke. “They dragged the body out to the pasture and burnt it.”
“Was I next?”
“No. Well, perhaps.” Oswald looked confused and embarrassed. “You were covered in its blood. Nobody wanted to touch you, even to see if you were alive. Some wanted to kill you before you mutated.”
“Mutated?” Karl said, startled at the word. Had his bandage come untied? Had they seen his hellish disfigurement?
Oswald’s lips parted in a smile, but there was little humour and fewer teeth in it. “They seemed to think that you’d turn into a beastman like that. But if you wash it off they’ll see you’re fine.” He gestured towards the stream that flowed past the mill.
Karl waded into the knee-high flow of cold water, and kneeled to wash the blood out of his face and hair. Then he removed his jerkin and shirt, rubbing the fabric in the flow to release the dried blood, watching it stream away in thin lines of red. The cold numbed his legs, dulling the pain of his bruises and cuts. His ribs were still a sharp pain but, he reminded himself, as long as he took things easy they would be set and strong again in a week. One of the benefits of his curse. He didn’t remove the bandage around his neck.
He wrung the water out of his clothes, stepped out of the stream and pulled the wet garments back on. It was uncomfortable but the warmth of his body would dry them soon enough. Oswald was watching him.
“What?” Karl asked.
Oswald was silent, his eyes unwavering. “Why did you do it?” he said.
“It was the beast or me.” Karl picked up his sword from where it had fallen, and began wiping the blood and earth from its blade. There was no sign of his throwing-knife. They’d probably burnt that too.
“No, why did you come to our aid? Why go into the woods on your own?”
Karl spotted the knife half buried in the earth, and retrieved it. “Someone had to. There was no time to fetch help.”
“Why you?”