Marks of Chaos

by James Wallis

  Following the crusade any further was not a part of his fate. He had a death-wish of his own, and he knew it was a death he would have to seek alone. Magnusson, the commander of Luthor Huss’ soldiers, was as much a false role as Hans Frei had been. He had to be true to himself. And that meant leaving the crusade.

  Besides, he knew that staying with Huss was dangerous. People here knew who he was, and Erwin Rhinehart knew too. Though perhaps Rhinehart would assume he was intelligent enough to realise that and therefore he would have already left the crusade… Karl caught himself, and shook his head. That was a game of bluff and double-bluff worthy of the Cloaked Brothers, and he had more important things to think about. Like Brother Pabst.

  Once they had settled into the farm buildings, the cavalry in the main barn with their bedrolls close to their horses, the rest of the men dispersed among cow-stalls, sheep-pens, empty grain stores and dilapidated sheds, he called the three officers together. They sat in the wide doorway of the barn, watching the men practising their drills in the rain.

  “What happens when we reach Lachenbad?” Gottschalk asked.

  “Lachenbad?” Karl asked. Gottschalk shook his head, dislodging raindrops. “Everyone knows. Huss is leading us there. He believes Sigmar’s there.”

  “If that’s what he believes,” Karl said, “then he hasn’t told me.”

  “What if Sigmar is there? Will he lead the crusade? Will he lead us into battle against the Grand Theogonist’s forces? Or the armies of Chaos?”

  “Brother Huss does not believe that Sigmar is at Lachenbad,” Karl said. “And he is a leader wise enough not to make plans on the basis of supposition and rumour. The reborn Sigmar could still be a baby. If he even exists.”

  Kuster made a “hmph” sound in the back of his throat. It might have been a cough.

  “That’s not why I called you together,” Karl said. “Brother Pabst, I’m asking you to step down as leader of the Hammers of Sigmar. Brother Kuster will take over. He has the military experience and understanding that we need to bring the men together.”

  There was a startled silence broken only by the patter of the rain.

  “You cannot do this,” Pabst said.

  “I will order you if necessary.”

  “Listen to me, whelp,” Pabst said through his teeth. “You have no authority. I am a warrior and a priest of Sigmar, eleven years in his service, since my sixteenth birthday. Who are you? Nothing. You don’t even wear his symbol, and you carry a sword not a hammer. You are no servant of Sigmar, and I do not follow you.”

  “My authority comes from Luthor Huss,” Karl said. Pabst spat onto the barn floor. “I swore no oath to Huss,” he said. “The men serve me because they share my faith and my fire. Try taking command of them. We will see who they follow, you or me.”

  Karl looked across at Kuster, seeing quiet apprehension in the cavalry leader’s face. He knew he had an ally there. Gottschalk was waiting to see which way this argument blew before saying anything.

  “Very well,” he said. “We will see. Call them.”

  Pabst stood and slung his warhammer over his shoulder. The movement reminded Karl of Luthor Huss, and he wondered if that was deliberate. Without waiting, Pabst stepped out into the rain. “Hammers of Sigmar!” he shouted. “Fall in!”

  The thirty warhammer-bearers left their training bouts and practice swings and walked forward to form a square. They looked cocky, sure of themselves, but the square was ragged. Karl stood behind Pabst, and drew his throwing-knife from his belt.

  “Hammers of Sigmar!” Pabst began. Karl jabbed him in the small of the back with the point of the knife, hard but not deep. The pain stopped him and he began to turn, angry. Karl was ready.

  “Hammers, who do you serve?” he shouted. “Pabst or Sigmar?”

  “Sigmar!” the cry went up. Three or four brandished their weapons in the air.

  “Then Kuster is your new commander. He will teach you to fight like true warriors of Sigmar. That is all.” Karl glanced at Kuster. “Take over.”

  Pabst glared at him furiously. “You’re scum, Magnus-son,” he said. “You’re some vile thing. Sigmar does not know you.”

  Karl ignored that. “You have a choice,” he said. “Join the Hammers of Sigmar as an ordinary soldier, rejoin the crusade, or go away.”

  Pabst’s eyes were ferocious, his face drawn tight, his knuckles white and drawn on the shaft of his hammer. For a moment Karl thought he might attack him.

  “I will fight,” he said. “By Sigmar, I will fight.” He stalked away onto the field to join his comrades, where Kuster was already putting them through some basic drills. Karl watched him go. Gottschalk came over from where he had been observing in the barn, out of the rain.

  “Was that wise?” he asked. “He’ll try to spread dissent.”

  “We need every fighter we can get,” Karl said. “It wasn’t wise, but it’s safer than the alternatives. He’s a loose boulder. We need to make sure he can’t roll too far, or people will get crushed.”

  Karl lay in the barn’s hay-loft, listening to the horses breathe and the men snore, and watching the sky lighten through cracks in the plank walls. The rain seemed to have eased during the night. He had spent most of it thinking of Marie, her face, her voice, her laugh, the pain and confusion he had inadvertently put her through, wondering what had become of her, where she might be, and what might have been. He had reached no answers and it had not eased his mind, but it had passed the time.

  He heard hoofbeats. Very faint, just audible over the rain on the roof and the sound of the swollen river, but definite.

  Several horses on the road, approaching at a trot. More than several.

  It was still dark inside the barn and he was careful to keep a hand over his eyes as he crawled between the bodies of his sleeping comrades towards the wall, to peer through one of the larger cracks. The sight chilled his bones.

  He recognised the column of figures on horseback, their armour and their bearing, and he recognised the banner that their standard-bearer carried, and the symbol on their shields. It was a great golden cat poised to spring, jaws and talons exposed.

  Thirty members of the Knights Panther were riding down the road towards Rottfurt, the steel of their half-plate armour and weapons gleaming in the dawn light, their horses and their faces magnificent in splendour. The Knights Panther: one of the Empire’s oldest and most elite Templar regiments, its allegiance sworn equally to the Empire and the Church of Sigmar. It had been members of the Knights Panther that Karl had exposed as worshippers of the blood-god Khorne two years ago, bringing the regiment’s centuries-old reputation into opprobrium. The Knights Panther had reason to hate Karl Hoche.

  Karl crawled back across the hay-loft, took Kuster by the shoulder and shook him. The big man was awake in a second, eyes scared, hand grasping for a weapon. “What?” he said.

  “Wake your men, and get them armed. The ones who have armour should put it on. Get someone to rouse the ones in the other building. Tell them to stay low, out of sight and listen for orders.”

  “What’s about?”

  “What we’ve been training for,” Karl said.

  Karl stood inside the half-open barn door, watching through the rain as the Templars rode the last hundred yards towards the closed gates of Rottfurt. There had not been room for all the crusade’s numbers inside the village and many were sleeping under makeshift shelters outside the rough wooden walls, but the mounted knights paid them no attention. Some of Huss’ followers had woken and noticed Kuster stood next to Karl. Behind them, the men were dressing and preparing their horses with apprehensive care.

  “What are they doing here?” Gottschalk whispered.

  Karl made no response, watching as two of the knights dismounted and approached the stockade gate. He leaned forward, straining to hear over the sounds of the men behind him, and the three hundred yards of river and rain-soaked pasture that separated the farm from the village. They seemed to be asking for the head
man. After a while he came. From the way he moved and stood Karl could tell he was tired and on the edge of panic.

  One of the Knights Panther said something, but his face was turned away and Karl couldn’t catch it. The head man nodded. The second knight replied, and though the words were faint, the movements of his mouth distant, Karl could understand it.

  “Open your gates. We are here to arrest Luthor Huss and two of his cohorts. Give them to us and we will leave you and the rest of the crusade in peace.”

  “Luthor Huss is his own master,” the head man replied, and Karl thought him brave or possibly foolish. “I will speak to him and send a reply.” He stepped back through the gates and unseen hands closed them to the knights.

  “Look,” said Kuster. “At the back.” The voice jolted Karl from his concentration and for a second he was confused. Then he saw what the old Templar had meant. At the back of the column of Knights Panther were two figures that looked out of place. Their mounts were not heavy warhorses, and they wore sombre black uniforms and tall black hats.

  Erwin Rhinehart, and Theo Kratz.

  “Where did they come from?” Kuster asked.

  “Auerswald, probably,” Gottschalk said, joining them. “It’s a couple of hours by road but they probably set off before dawn.”

  “No, they came from the north.” Kuster paused, thinking. “How did they know we were here?”

  “Rhinehart knew our course. There are spies in the crusade,” Karl said, “and renegades among us. I know of one man here who has a price of two hundred and fifty crowns on his head.”

  “Who would that be?” Gottschalk asked. Karl gave him a sideways look and a scowl, and he shut up.

  “What are they doing here?” Kuster asked again.

  More importantly, Karl thought, what are we doing here? We should be in the village, inside the stockade, protecting the heart of the crusade, not out here. Instead I let my guard drop and now we’re as useless as defenders. There’s only one place to cross the river, and the Knights Panther can block it with just a handful of their men.

  He cursed himself for a fool.

  Behind them men were beginning to enter the barn through the rear entrance, bringing their weapons. Karl turned to them. “Horsemen, mount up in the yard at the back,” he said. “The rest of you, form into your groups here. We don’t know what’s going to happen, so we must be ready for anything. Don’t let them see you and don’t make any movement until I give an order.” He turned back to stare through the rain.

  “How will you know what’s going on?” Kuster asked.

  “When it happens, we’ll all know,” Karl said.

  He watched as the knights waited. If they were impatient, if the cold rain trickling inside their armour made them restless, they gave no sign of it. After a few minutes the stockade gate opened again and a priest appeared, wearing full robes and carrying a warhammer. Karl recognised him as one of Huss’ lieutenants, Brother Martinus. He spoke to the two knights who still stood there.

  “Brother Luthor sends his greetings, and wishes to know on whose orders and what charges he is arrested,” he said. The knight paused for a second, then walked slowly back to his horse, undid a saddlebag and produced a document. He carried it back and passed it to the lieutenant, who disappeared inside. The gate shut, and the waiting started again.

  “How can you tell what they’re doing?” Gottschalk said.

  “I have the eyes and ears of a—” Karl started. He was going to say, “hawk”, but then his eye caught a familiar black shape wheeling in the sky above the village, and he recognised it. “A raven,” he finished.

  The village gate reopened. The lieutenant emerged. “Brother Luthor does not recognise the truth of the charges laid against him, nor the authority of the man that lays them,” he said. “He desires an hour to discuss his position with his council.”

  “What of the others named in the warrant?”

  “They are not here to answer. One hour?”

  “Luthor Huss must surrender himself.”

  “He desires an hour.”

  “Now.”

  The lieutenant stepped inside and the gate closed. The two knights returned to their horses and climbed back into the saddle. The gate did not move. Evidently Huss was taking his hour whether it was granted or not.

  Rhinehart and Kratz rode up to the front of the column, and there was a brief discussion. The rain grew heavier, drowning out their voices. The first of the knights rode a few paces forward, facing the bare face of the village’s stockade and drew his sword, holding it aloft like a man ready to charge.

  “Hear me, people of Rottfurt and honest crusaders!” he declared, and his voice carried clearly across the river to the farm. “We seek only three men among you. Give them to us and we will leave you. Deny us, and we will take them by force.” He paused, to let the words sink in.

  “We seek Luthor Huss,” he said, “on charges of heresy, consorting with the allies of Chaos, and protecting an enemy of the Empire.

  “We seek Lars Kuster on charges of foul murder and desecrating a sacred place.

  “We seek Karl Hoche, the mutant, traitor and servant of Chaos, whom Huss has knowingly sheltered in this crusade, bringing danger of damnation to you all.”

  The three names hung in the air like shrouds. Nobody moved in the barn. Karl listened for sounds of horses in the yard behind the barn, to detect Kuster’s reaction to the declaration of his crimes, but nothing came. There was no outcry, no response at all. The crusade did not give up its own.

  Outside the stockade, Erwin Rhinehart stood up in his stirrups. “You know Karl Hoche by another name,” he shouted. “You know him as Brother Magnusson.”

  “Here!” Pabst was pelting down across the pasture towards the river, his robes swirling around him. “Magnusson is here! In the barn! Kuster too!” He stopped and pointed back.

  Karl swore aloud. The man must have been standing outside, watching and hoping for something like this. Gottschalk had been right, and now the loose boulder had rolled too far to be pulled back.

  The lead knight turned his horse and gave an abrupt order. Fifteen of the mounted Templars broke away from the column, riding two abreast down to the ford in the river. The front four carried lances. Karl watched them, feeling sick. Now the moment had arrived, the thing he had trained these troops for, he had been betrayed. Suddenly he was in as much danger as the crusaders. He could not think abstractly about their fates. He was too involved. He was the target, not them.

  The crucial thing was to get himself and the soldiers to the village. The village was defensible; there were stocks of food there, it could withstand a siege. But how? He needed a strategy, and the advice of Huss and Kuster.

  The first of the knights was half-way across the river.

  “Attack!” Kuster yelled from outside, and horses thundered past the barn. Karl ran to the doorway, watching as the small pack of horsemen galloped down the pasture, their riders already whirling their warhammers. He swore again. So that was how Kuster had reacted. So much for coherence and fighting as a unit. It was undisciplined, unplanned, suicidal, disastrous—but he had to admit it was glorious to witness.

  For a moment he thought that Kuster might pull it off. The Templars were at a disadvantage, hampered by the narrow ford and slowed by the water and the mud of the riverbank, facing a slope, unable to form up or charge. Some lowered lances, others tried to back off or wheel their horses round.

  The crusaders were at full pelt, the damp air resounding to their shouts, their robes and their horses’ manes and tails flying. Pabst, in their path, threw himself to one side to avoid the assault. He did not make it. One of the riders caught his head a blow with a hammer that lifted him off his feet, sending a spray of blood into the air. He tumbled and lay still.

  The two forces closed on each other.

  It was an insane strategy. It might work.

  He had reckoned without the horses. They were priests’ horses, accustomed to pulling ca
rts or carrying men of Sigmar from town to town. They were not used to facing walls of armoured riders holding lances at their throats. They did not know how to respond.

  Two turned aside. Two pulled up short; one tried to and fell, throwing its rider down in a cartwheel of limbs in front of the line of knights. One reared, tossing the man on its back to the ground. Two charged on. One of them was Kuster.

  His horse staggered, tossed its head and died, collapsing, a lance through its chest, its life-blood pouring out. Kuster leaped from its saddle, his hammer spinning in his hands, striking the man who had killed his mount before he touched the ground. The knight fell sideways, landing hard. Kuster spread his feet and whirled his hammer around his head, catching another knight in the back with a clang of steel. The other Templars backed away, dropping their lances, drawing swords, circling, blocking Kuster from Karl’s view.

  Kuster’s companion screamed, half crushed under the body of his dying horse. The other horsemen backed away, reforming, riding back into the attack with hammers ready. They had never done this before, and it showed. The Templars’ blades flashed, fast and assured, and men and horses fell.

  Karl saw Kuster reappear. He had scrambled across the river and up the far bank to give himself an advantage in height. Two Templars came at him, their horses’ hoofs spraying water around them. Kuster swung early at the first one, striking his horse just above the eye. The animal dropped, throwing its rider forwards, and Kuster brought his hammer back, taking the knight off into the river with a great splash. He sprang back up the bank, ready for the second knight, staggered, and fell face-first into the water. He did not move.