Marks of Chaos

by James Wallis

  Valten went. Karl bent to the driver, who lay still in his seat. The fire in his hair was out but there was an ugly gash on his forehead where he had cracked it in the collision. Was he dead or just unconscious? The steam was suffocating and sweltering, but the man’s life was important. Valten was reaching down through the hatch: Karl manhandled the driver from his chair over to the hatch. Valten grasped him by the shoulders and hauled him out. The moment the circle of sky was clear, Karl pulled himself up through it, gulping in the cool morning air, feeling it on his skin, watching the steam billow around him, from his clothes.

  “Get clear!” he instructed. “The boiler could explode.” They climbed down from the tank. It had simply run into a building at the side of the street, and lay crumpled against the corner of the wide stone stairs leading up to the door. Some guildhall, he guessed; a prominent one to be so close to the Grand Theogonist’s gate. They were scarcely twenty yards away now. The soldiers had reformed at the gate, the wizard in their midst, all drawn weapons and anxious faces. They would attack at any sign of hostility, he knew.

  The tank’s plating was buckled, its wheels uneven. Pale smoke still billowed from the chimney at its rear end, now joined by clouds of steam from the open hatch, sending their beacons up into the windless air.

  Huss was crouched over the driver, examining the man’s wounds. Valten was—

  Valten was walking down the street towards the guards. Saint Botolphus’ hammer was cradled in his hands, looking more like a birthright than a weapon. His pace was utterly steady; he did not hesitate or turn away.

  The Reiksguard soldiers stood in perfect ranks, their uniforms and armour immaculate, weapons shining, identical, held at the perfect angle of readiness for attack. They were the finest the Empire had trained, the best soldiers it could offer. They stood ready to defend their Emperor against any threat.

  There was a complete hush over the street. Scattered pedestrians stood in groups, watching. Karl touched Huss’ shoulder and the warrior-priest looked up, his expression unreadable, then rose to his feet and walked after the young blond man. Karl followed him. If it ended here, if Valten and Huss were to die in a final confrontation, so close to their goal, then suddenly he knew he wanted to be part of it.

  Valten stopped. Less than ten feet separated him from the first row of the guards. He turned the hammer in his hands, then rested it on the ground, butt first, his hand grasped around the huge stone head, as if it was a walking-stick.

  “My name is Valten,” he said, and his voice was not his but something greater, stronger, more powerful. “My name is Valten,” he said, and the words were simple but each one felt like it had the weight of history behind it or as if it were spoken now for the first time. “My name is Valten,” he said, and Karl knew he would remember this moment for the rest of his life, though he would never be able to describe it, or how it made his knees weaken and his heart swell in his chest.

  “My name is Valten,” he said, “and I have come to meet the Emperor.” That was all he said.

  The words spread out like reverberations, like ripples, like shock waves, like tidal waves, like circles growing and growing across the surface of history.

  Without a word, without an order, without a thought, the ranks of the Reiksguard broke and moved aside to let him pass between them.

  Huss turned to Karl with a wild, exultant look in his eyes. “You see?” he said. “You see it now?”

  Karl nodded. He recognised the look: it had been on the faces of many fanatics in the last few months. For the first time he understood it. He did see it now.

  He watched as Valten and Huss passed through the ranks of the guards, through the gate and into the palace of the Grand Theogonist. The gates swung closed behind them and the Reiksguard moved back into their ordered positions as if nothing had happened. Behind him, the wreck of the steam tank hissed and guttered. People started walking. Far down the street, crusaders and Empire soldiers came at a run to see what had happened. Karl didn’t know what he could tell them.

  A ragged figure staggered towards him; some tramp or beggar. Karl began to move away; he had nothing he could give this man, not even money, and his work here was over. To stay was dangerous.

  “Spare a moment for a poor man, Herr Hoche?” the figure wheezed. Karl stopped at the sound of his name, studying the face under the rags and dirt. It was not one he recognised.

  “Who are you?” he said, quietly. “How do you know my name?”

  The figure gestured to himself. “They say all men are brothers,” he said, “and I wear a cloak, so a man of your intelligence…”

  Karl grimaced. The Cloaked Brothers. He was growing to hate them.

  “How did you know to be here?” he said. “Only the witch hunters and a few cultists knew of the changed plans.”

  “Trade knowledge?” the man said.

  Karl wanted to hit him. “Very well,” he said.

  “What just happened at the gate?”

  Karl paused, and thought. “I have no idea,” he said. “Not much of an answer, but a truthful one.”

  The man nodded. “It is enough.”

  “And my question?”

  “A new recruit to our numbers told us. A man I believe you know.”

  Karl inhaled. Things became clearer. “Brother Martinus,” he said.

  The beggar shook his head. “No. A witch hunter. Erwin Rhinehart.” He scratched his grimy nose. “And that, Karl Hoche, is the last information you obtain from the Cloaked Brothers. From now on, if you want our assistance you must join us.”

  “I won’t do that,” Karl said, but something had alarmed the beggar and he pulled his rags down over his face and hobbled away, crying, “Alms! Alms!” Karl was about to grab his arm and pull him back, but he heard the sound of well-booted footsteps approaching from behind him, and turned to meet the newcomer, suddenly aware he had left his warhammer in the steam tank, and of the crossbow-bolt still in his shoulder.

  “We have unfinished business, Karl,” said Anders Holger.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Scram

  Part of him thought about running. It was tempting, even with a group of soldiers a few yards away ready to give chase. They were armoured, he was not. He could do it. He could get away. But he did not do that. Anders was right: there was unfinished business. He looked the witch hunter in the face.

  “How can I help you, Brother Anders?” he asked.

  Holger was in full uniform, his hat set straight and tall, his silver buckles shining, the leather of his belt and boots gleaming with rubbed dubbin. There were pistols at his belt and a familiar sword at his hip. There was nothing of the old casual, informal, rule-breaking Holger in this figure of authority.

  “The matter of the Purple Hand,” Holger said. “Kunstler is still in the city, and we know where. I need your help in dealing with him.”

  “Just the two of us?” Karl asked.

  “There will be others,” Holger said. “If they arrive in time. But you know him, and you know the ways of Chaos. We need you.”

  “Where?” Karl asked.

  “Where you found them before: the old temple of Manaan. They are preparing something.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know.”

  A terrible sense of dread suffused Karl’s thoughts. “Can you run in that uniform?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then let’s run.”

  As they crossed the Altbrug, Karl thought he should have asked for a weapon of some kind. He had nothing except his throwing-knife, tucked inside the priest’s robes he wore: better than nothing but no match for a sword, a bow or any kind of spell. Perhaps Anders overestimated the nature and power of his mutations. Maybe, if he played the situation right, he could get his sword back.

  Kantsweg was busy but not crowded. The sight of a witch hunter and a priest running at full pelt down the middle of the road turned a few heads, but the good citizens of the district turned back soon enough to their
business or their conversations. There was plenty enough to talk about today already.

  The alley down to the temple was as dank as Karl remembered it, and the small courtyard in front of the ancient building as deserted. The temple door was dosed, but the chain that had held it shut was lying in a heap on the ground. There was no sign of a guard. Karl came to a halt at the entrance to the courtyard, Holger a few paces behind him. They paused to catch their breath, waiting until their lungs quieted.

  “How many in there?” Karl asked. Holger shook his head.

  “I have no idea.”

  “How did you find out about this?”

  “We had Kunstler followed.”

  “But you didn’t post look-outs?”

  “There wasn’t time,” Holger said, “and there still isn’t. They could be doing anything in there. Come on.”

  They crossed the flagstones of the courtyard, walking slowly to soften their footfalls, and climbed the shallow steps in front of the door. Karl strained to listen but he couldn’t hear anything from inside the dark building. It seemed as deserted as ever.

  Holger gestured to him. Karl mouthed “What?” The witch hunter moved closer, to whisper to him: “Look inside.”

  “How?”

  “Open the door. The hinges are oiled.” Karl’s face must have looked quizzical or uncertain, because he added, “Your eyes are better in the dark.”

  It was hard to argue with that. Karl moved silently to the door, Holger a step behind him, and grasped the handle. The bronze was cold in his hand. He gripped it tightly, and winced noiselessly from the pain that shot through his arm from the shoulder-wound. Taking care, listening for the slightest noise, he turned it slowly until he felt the latch slide free, then pushed the door inward a half-inch at a time, until there was enough of a gap between it and the wide jamb for him to press one eye to the dark crack.

  There were people in there. One, at least. But the angle was wrong and he could not see them clearly. He pushed the door another half-inch, hoping it would not let daylight spill into the dark interior of the temple, that they would not be noticed. A drop of sweat from the hot run trickled off his bare scalp towards his eyes and he reached up to wipe it away.

  Then Holger’s boot hit him hard on the arse, shoving him forward. His head hit the door with a thud and it flew open. He lost his balance, staggering and falling into the shadows inside the temple.

  He twisted as he was falling so he didn’t land flat. His wounded arm took the main shock of the impact, ramming arcs of pain through his upper body, but he was able to transfer his weight to his other arm, pushing himself away from a boot aimed at his head, and regaining his footing.

  Behind him, he heard bolts slam home on the door.

  He kicked off, forward, his body still almost horizontal, diving out of reach of his attackers so he could get his feet under him and sprint the remaining distance down the aisle, up towards the apse of the old temple, where its altar used to stand. He reached the top step, groped in his robes for his knife and spun round, raising it, prepared to throw it.

  They were there, behind him: not chasing, just waiting, knowing he had nowhere to go, sombre and sinister in their dark uniforms. Brother Theo Kratz, his sword drawn and raised; Brother Erwin Rhinehart holding a large crossbow aimed at his heart; behind them Brother Anders Holger, with the sword that Karl had told him to keep earlier that day. Had told him to use it to keep his word, to kill him.

  And a fourth figure on the other side of the church, in the full uniform and decorations of a member of the Senior Council of the Order of Sigmar, a man of high standing and honour among the witch hunters. Karl recognised the figure and knew this was not a man of honour. This was not a man at all.

  “Karl Hoche,” said Brother Karin Schiffer, and nothing more. There was no room for any more, so full of satisfaction was her voice.

  Karl looked at them, breathing heavily. Be calm, he thought. Be ready for their move. His shoulder ached. The knife felt small in his hand, insufficient for his needs. He had no idea what he was going to do, how he was going to survive. On his side, he had one weapon. Against him were his poor strategic position; his injured right arm; a woman filled with hatred and vengeance; and three witch hunters, all armed. They knew who he was, and what he could do. But he knew them too.

  “You’re going to kill me,” he said.

  Brother Karin laughed, and her laughter was low and sensuous, not cruel. She was enjoying herself. “Of course we are,” she said. “But not for a long time.”

  What can I do here, Karl asked himself, and knew the answer: whatever I can. What was more important: escape; justice; living to fight another day; information; or the mission to which he had sworn himself? And here too he knew the reply even as he thought the question. His first priority was to kill Brother Karin, or die trying. His second was to escape, or die trying. They would never take him alive. Never again.

  “Surrender, Karl,” Erwin said softly.

  Karl surveyed them, taking in their stances, the unspoken things revealed by their posture and their expressions. “I would surrender,” he said, “but not to you. One of you is as bad as I am. And one other is worse by far.”

  “More of your madness,” Brother Karin said, not moving from where she stood. “The infection of Chaos has reached your brain and turned your thoughts to darkness. You see conspiracy, treachery and subterfuge circling all around. The reason it orbits you, centering on your movements, Karl, is that it is all in your head?”

  “Maybe so,” Karl said. He let his hands hang loosely by his side, the throwing-knife palmed, concealed by sleeve and bent fingers. “Maybe. But why did you wait to take me until after Huss and Valten had been delivered to their appointment with the Emperor? So that Valten could lead the Empire’s armies north, to the greatest bloodletting in the history—”

  “Politics,” Karin said, and this time she did take a step forward. “Not conspiracies, at least not the kind your twisted mind sees everywhere. The military could not take you; you defeated the Reiksguard; the scheme to trap you in the Gendarmenmarkt failed, but we have you. The word will spread: the witch hunters did with four men what the others could not do with an army. We gain reputation; they lose face. The Senior Council will increase its power at court and in Altdorf. It may take us months but,” as she glanced over at the three witch hunters arrayed across the floor of the temple, blocking any hope of escape Karl might have, “but we always get our man.”

  “Or our mutant,” Theo Kratz said.

  Karl watched him, his eyes half-lidded. Karin had cut off one of his lines of attack and it had been deftly done: if he accused her now of being a follower of Chaos it would sound like the ravings of a fanatic or a paranoid fool. He could not turn her troops against her so easily.

  All he needed, he thought, was a clear shot at Brother Karin. No. He had to be sure; he would have to get in close and finish the job, to be certain she died. But Rhinehart and Kratz would block him if he made a run for her, and then Holger could come in behind him, and—

  He needed a distraction, but there was nothing he could use. If he wanted to move someone, he would have to move them with his mind.

  “Anders,” he said. “You listened to me before. Because I told you he was necessary to our success and the defeat of the cultists, you helped Oswald Maurer escape. Listen to me now, that woman is—”

  “You helped a renegade escape?” Kratz exclaimed. “You? Our brother?”

  Brother Karin cut across him: “Leave it, Theo. A procedural matter only. We will deal with it later.” Kratz subsided into silence and turned his glare back to Karl. So did Karin, but for a second her eyes flickered over to Anders Holger and her expression was pure hatred. She did not take betrayal well, Karl understood.

  Kratz raised his sword, the tip pointing at Karl’s throat. The thin light filtering through the dirty windows gleamed on the steel, making it a line of blue-grey hovering in the semi-darkness.

  “Submit or die,
” he said.

  “You weren’t so formal when I trapped you in that privy in Nuln,” Karl said, “with your arse bare and smeared with your own shit.”

  Kratz’s lip curled. “Submit,” he said again. To his left, Rhinehart shifted his weight from one foot to the other, nervous, and Karl’s planned follow-up died on his lips. The man was nervous, and probably because he had guessed his turn would be next. Karl had thought he might be able to use Rhinehart’s new-learned allegiance to work for him. Perhaps it would be better to use it against the others instead. They would not trust a Cloaked Brother in their midst. They would turn on him. It might give him enough time.

  “Rhinehart,” he said, and stopped. Something was telling him he was doing the wrong thing. Some voice in his head.

  He reached up, within the robes he wore, to the bandage around his neck, and untied it. Under the sweat-soaked fabric was the gag, and he pulled that free too. He could feel his second mouth moving under his fingers, flexing at its unaccustomed freedom. It made a mewling sound, but no more.

  Then he looked up at Brother Karin, and his eyes met her stare, but she was gazing at his mark. She had put it there, or at least her lover Lord Gamow had. He wanted her to see it, to remind her of the reason he had sworn to kill her, and to remind her of Gamow, and what he had been, and how he had died on Karl’s sword a year before. He wanted to raise her blood and make her passionate; make her angry.

  Angry people make bad decisions.

  After a second she acknowledged his look with a contemptuous glare, and her lips pulled back from her teeth in a half-snarl. “He shows us his mark of Chaos,” she said, “and acknowledges his own damnation. There is nothing more to say. Take him down.”

  Kratz and Holger began to move forward, swords raised defensively, moving warily with the poise of experienced close-quarter fighters. Rhinehart held back, his crossbow aimed at Karl.

  “For the last time, drop your weapon,” Holger said.

  “I promised you a name, Anders,” Karl said. “You won’t get it from me this way.”

  “We’ll torture it from you,” Rhinehart said, “like we tortured that wizard.”