[Angelika Fleischer 02] - Sacred Flesh

by Robin D. Laws - (ebook by Undead)

  “Where would any of us have got our hands on a goblin blade?” Rausch asked.

  Angelika beckoned to the site of the recent battle. “Didn’t we just slay a raft of the devils? They can’t take their weapons with them when they get killed, can they?” She gestured to a fallen tree, behind which the greenskin corpses were heaped. “Anyone here could have helped himself—or herself—to one of their weapons. Did any of you see anyone else skulking around the bodies?”

  Ivo raised a trembling finger to point at Richart. “He was the one who piled them all over there, while you were gone. He had ample chance to snatch up one of those stinking knives!”

  Richart took a step at him; he hid behind the prioress. “You wretch! After I stood up for you…”

  “You were there…” Ivo burbled.

  “Yes, I was,” said Richart, his olive skin turning rosy with anger. “And I threw all of their weapons into a pile by the bodies, and left them. I was leery to even touch them, lest I give myself lockjaw.”

  Devorah gulped, summoning the courage to speak. “But Fraulein Angelika—how can you presume that one of us did it?”

  “Indeed,” Waldemar said. “Surely it could be that there’s some human bandit shadowing us, hoping to throw us off the trail by posing as a goblin. We must depart in haste, and leave him far behind.”

  “Or smoke him out as he tries to follow us,” suggested Udo, the merchant, idly running his fingers through his tawny fringe of beard.

  Angelika threw up her hands. “One of you did this. Those of you who pretend otherwise might be next.”

  “What motive would any of us have?” asked Gerhold, in apparent sincerity.

  “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

  “We are penitents, on a holy pilgrimage,” said Ivo.

  “I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. Whichever of you killed Altman might have done so out of some private grudge. Or you might be planning to slay more of us. I wish I could stop to figure out which of you did it, but with goblins all around us, we don’t have that privilege. So gather up your gear. We’ve got to put some distance between ourselves and this place.”

  “You mean you’re just going to forget this ever happened?” asked Stefan, puffing his chest in preparation for an eloquent tirade.

  “What do you think? I’ll have to march and interrogate simultaneously.”

  The advocate, his cap-feather bobbling in the breeze, faltered momentarily then recovered his dignity to embark on a new line of attack. “I am an officer of the law. It should be I who conducts the interrogations.”

  “You’re a suspect,” said Angelika.

  “Excuse me for asking this,” said Lemoine, “but caution is the watchword, Fraulein Angelika.”

  “Out with it.”

  “How do we know it wasn’t you?”

  “Because it wasn’t.”

  “Angelika was with me, burying the widow,” said Franziskus.

  “But—and I say this only because in my abbey, back in Bretonnia, we were taught to think in a highly methodical, critical manner, which I know is a mode of thought unaccustomed to you simpler folk of the Empire. It must be pointed out that the two of you are confederates, so to speak. Therefore, if you did intend a plan to systematically murder us and strip us of our goods, it would make logical sense that you would vouch for one another, ah, in the course of so doing.”

  “Does anyone else here,” Angelika intoned, “believe that Franziskus and I are here to murder you all and take your possessions?”

  “Well, since you took over the task of looking after us, three of us are already dead,” Ivo muttered.

  Ludwig swatted him on the back of the head.

  “Ow,” he complained.

  “You prize idiot,” said Ludwig. “If it weren’t for these two, the entire lot of us would be goblin food.”

  Ivo had nothing to say to this.

  Ludwig stepped from the crowd and pointed a gnarled forefinger around at his fellow pilgrims. “And furthermore, I say anyone else who tries to stop Angelika here from finding out which of us did it, is probably the one, and we ought to string him from the highest tree branch. Is there any man to gainsay me?” His finger stopped on Brother Lemoine.

  “I hasten to add,” Lemoine sputtered, “that I was speaking not from my personal assessment of Fraulein Angelika and Herr Franziskus, which could not possibly be higher. I was merely making an academic point.”

  Ludwig thrust his face into that of the other man. “Well if you have any more academic points for us, you should know that you’re in danger of me thrusting them up your monastical backside. Understand?”

  Lemoine set his jaw. “Perhaps it’s just this sort of unbridled fury that Angelika should be examining as she—”

  Richart stepped in to separate the two men, shoving Ludwig back. Ludwig shot his arm past Richart’s head to jab his pointing finger once more at Lemoine’s forehead. “In my years at sea, I served with many a Bretonnian,” Ludwig spat, “and none of them was worth a rancid dog’s liver. And my opinion of monks ain’t so high, either, come to think of it!”

  “Does anyone else have any brilliant thoughts?” Angelika asked. They shut up. “Then in that case do what I say and go get your things. And I’d like to get finished with this murder before the next one occurs, so no one is to wander away while we’re breaking camp. Even if you’re only ducking behind a tree to relieve yourself, take someone with you.”

  “Preferably not the killer,” Jurg said.

  “Go!” Angelika barked.

  The pilgrims shuffled discontentedly away. Angelika could hear mutterings of mutiny as they went. Waving Franziskus over to her side, she crouched over the body once again.

  Without enthusiasm, Franziskus approached. “Do you really think you can tell anything by looking at the poor fellow’s body?”

  “I may have seen more battlefield deaths than ordinary murders, but I do know my way around a corpse. Look at this.” She held up Altman’s limp right hand. “Our culprit had some reason to break Altman’s fingers.” The first three fingers were snapped completely back, broken at the knuckle. Holding it at the wrist, she offered the hand to Franziskus, but he declined to take it. He straightened himself back up and groaned, rubbing at the small of his back. The sudden exertion of the fight was catching up with him, and his muscles were cramping.

  “Anything else of note?” he asked.

  “Not that I’ve seen so far. But I’m going to stay kneeling here for a while, as if I’m learning all sorts of incriminating things. Then you can round them up and we’ll get ourselves back on the trail.”

  As she’d done during the first day of their journey, Angelika took the group up into the hills surrounding the floor of the pass. With goblins about, it would be supremely idiotic to stay down on the flatland, even though the well-forested slopes made it hard to keep a vigilant eye out for the killer.

  Angelika told Franziskus to take the lead. She didn’t entirely trust him with point position. Though he was steadily improving, the young Stirlander was not yet a seasoned woodsman. She could easily imagine him stepping into a viper’s nest, or leading the group into an ambush. It couldn’t be helped, though. If she was going to play the role of inquisitor, she’d have to devote her full attention to it. Perhaps she would be lucky, and Altman’s murderer would turn out to be an inept liar. Most killings, Angelika knew, were impulsive or ill planned. With the exception of a few hardened professionals, most men found it easier to commit murder than to convincingly deny it afterwards.

  The prioress was closest, so Angelika pulled her aside first. Heilwig huffed, and fussed agitatedly with a set of lacquered ebony prayer beads. “Surely you need ask no questions of me,” she said.

  “Of course not, but as an example to others I’m sure you’ll play along.”

  The prioress searched Angelika’s face for the signs of condescension. “Very well then.”

  “You had no quarrel with the bailiff?”


  “I have no quarrel with anyone. Murder is the very antithesis of Shallya’s doctrines.”

  “And Altman did not test your vows more strenuously than any other here?”

  Heilwig shook her head. “I would never stoop to harm any person, no matter what I thought of them. But if I was forced to name one among us who tests my forbearance, it would not be poor Altman.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That silky-haired mooncalf you call your partner.”

  “Franziskus?”

  “He’s leading my Devorah into gross and carnal temptation. With those dewy eyes of his. And those velvet cheeks. I request that you order him to cease all attempts at seduction. She has vowed her chastity to Shallya. By pursuing her, he imperils her soul.”

  “But Shallya is the goddess of mercy, is she not?”

  “You know that she is.”

  “If Devorah were to take Franziskus to her bed, it would be a surpassing act of mercy. I’m sure Shallya would understand.”

  “I should have expected my plea to fall on deaf ears. You’ve made your irreligion plain.”

  “Don’t worry about Franziskus. His finely attuned sense of guilt will stop him from doing anything more enjoyable than a little chaste pining.”

  “I’ve seen his sort before. He cloaks himself in virtue, but when his lusts are aroused…”

  “The preservation of Devorah’s maidenhood seems of great importance to you. I don’t suppose the bailiff laid his hands on her?”

  “His eyes perhaps wandered where they should not, but I laid a righteous scolding upon him, and after that he comported himself acceptably.” Heilwig’s speech slowed as she realised that she’d just assigned herself a motive for the crime. “And even if I were inclined to callous slaughter, do you think I, a feeble old woman, could have overpowered that great hog of a man?”

  Angelika shrugged. “I merely ask questions. Tell me—is your abbey prosperous?”

  “We are blessed with many benefactors. The funds I control are disbursed to the needy.”

  “But they would be more than enough to pay one of these other rag-tags to send Altman prematurely to his maker, if you were so inclined?”

  “I have said it already: I am not.” With a conclusive flap of her habit, she swept away. Angelika observed her as she fixed herself to Devorah’s side. The canny old bat had certainly changed the subject quickly. Her concern for Devorah’s chastity would seem a poor reason to kill—unless, Angelika mused, the prioress herself harboured a few untoward feelings for her pretty young charge. It wouldn’t be the first convent romance. Angelika resolved to question Devorah closely.

  But before doing that, she selected another pilgrim by whim, settling on the merchant, Udo Kramer, who had so far made little impression on her. He was perhaps on his way to fifty years old, with a vigorous manner, a trim frame, a healthy crop of curly chestnut hair sitting happily on top of his head. A matching fringe of beard highlighted his jaw-line. He wore sturdy, rugged clothing in forest tones: thick trousers of earthen brown and a pine-green tunic.

  “We have not yet had much occasion to speak,” Angelika said.

  “As you mostly speak to us in order to abuse us, I am pleased to have been excluded from your discourse,” the merchant replied, his tone light and bantering.

  “You are a wit, I see.”

  “In my profession, one must never let the customer know what one thinks of him. No matter how carefully honed my wit may be, I rarely get the chance to take it from its scabbard.”

  The group reached a narrow trail bordered on the right by a steep drop down onto exposed rock. Angelika checked the front of the line; Franziskus seemed to be maintaining close attention to the pilgrims’ safety.

  “What is your profession, precisely?”

  “I am an importer and reseller of goods. I bring in shipments from all over the Empire, to my shops in Averheim.”

  “Shipments of what?”

  “Grain and meal. Oil, and the lanterns to burn it in. Rugs, tapestries, fine brocades. If you can think of it, one of my enterprises most likely buys and sells it. Lately we’ve been doing a brisk trade in ornately decorated beer steins.”

  “And you’ve come on this pilgrimage for what reason?”

  “It is well known—at least, all the preachers say it—that trade stains the soul. Even one as successful as I am is little more than a wretched grubber after money, or so it is written. Yet without my efforts, they’d all starve: from the lowliest friar to the Grand Theogonist himself. But who am I to question the received wisdom of the ages? So here I trudge, seeking expiation for the sins of commerce I’ve already taken upon myself—and dispensation for those I’ll commit in the future.”

  “You seem to have the transaction all worked out.”

  “A blessing from Mother Elsbeth will carry weight with Averheim’s city fathers, with whom I must often negotiate.”

  “And the bailiff—what was he to you?”

  Udo thought a moment before answering. “A fellow pilgrim, no more, no less. I had little call to speak with him.”

  “A good merchant is a skilful judge of character. How would you assess him?”

  “Not quite the jolly fool he made himself out to be. I am glad he fought against those orcs. He was brave.”

  “Who would want to do him in?”

  “The miller, as you know, mocked him in front of all of us.”

  “Maybe Altman perhaps went after the miller, who then got the better of him?”

  Udo shrugged. He sidestepped to avoid a cloud of gnats, but they shifted to follow him. Screwing his face up in revulsion, he spat one of the little insects out of his mouth then wiped his lips repeatedly, to rid himself of any residue. “I don’t know what happened,” he said.

  “But it was Jurg who found him, correct?”

  Udo parcelled out a noncommittal nod. “I lack specific knowledge of his guilt.”

  A shriek came from up ahead.

  Angelika grabbed her knife and dashed past Udo, weaving between the other pilgrims. She saw Franziskus stooped on the tip of a granite outcrop, hands on the sides of his head. He was peering disconsolately down into empty space. She crept up beside him, first testing the rock to see that it would hold both of them.

  Franziskus turned to her. “Look what he’s done now,” he said.

  Ivo Kirchgeld had fallen down the slope, which was nearly so steep as to qualify as a cliff. Much of it was clad in a layer of earth and grass, but erosion had exposed a network of sharp-edged rocks and boulders. An intermittent brown streak of torn-up sod marked the path of the pardoner’s jaunt down the hillside. Ivo stood on an expanse of naked rock, frantically struggling to free his foot from the roots of a dead and twisted pine. The pine enveloped the slab of stone, sending a dried-out, branchless trunk shooting up crookedly into the air. “I’m stuck!” Ivo cried. His high-pitched voice reverberated up through the mountains above them. “Stuck!” He was twenty feet or so down from the level of the trail.

  Angelika hissed at him. “Silence yourself, you nitwit, before you attract every predator in fifty miles!”

  “But I’m stuck!” he cried, lowering only slightly the volume of his wails.

  Angelika edged over for a better look at him. “If you got your foot in there, you can get it out.”

  “I’m stuck, I tell you!” His ridiculous ears paddled up and down.

  “I need rope,” she told the others.

  Franziskus, Richart and Ludwig went fumbling into their packs for it. Ivo’s pine tree creaked alarmingly. Angelika shook her head and climbed down from the outcrop, carefully picking her way down the slope. The grass proved slippery; she found it easier to keep her footing by stepping from one protruding stone to the next.

  “Don’t fall!” Ivo shouted.

  “I appreciate the advice.” She could hear the holding of breath above as the others watched her climb. The hillside became progressively more vertical the closer she got to Ivo. Angelika told herself tha
t it was impossible for her to fall, because there was no earthly way she was going to die saving someone like Kirchgeld. She made her way down to him, holding onto the dead tree trunk, feeling gravity’s pull.

  “You’re lucky your ankle got caught,” she said. “Otherwise it’d be—how far down do you think that is? Fifty feet?”

  Ivo followed her gaze to the floor of the pass below. “It seems soft and grassy, however.”

  “Then you won’t mind if you slip.” Angelika incrementally tilted herself until she could jam a hand between the roots that held Kirchgeld’s feet to the rock. “You’ve just got to shift your foot a little,” she told him.

  “I can’t,” he said, trying to move his foot in the wrong direction.

  “The other way,” she said.

  Kirchgeld easily removed his foot from its trap. Holding tightly to the log, he moved his leg out over empty space, tentatively rotating his ankle, to see if it still worked.

  “You hadn’t tried the other way at all?” Angelika asked.

  “I thought I was stuck,” he said.

  “Start climbing. We’re going to have to get moving quickly, thanks to your caterwauling.”

  Kirchgeld directed an uncertain look up at Franziskus and the others, now a good twenty feet above them. “We should wait for a rope, shouldn’t we?” Roots tore from their tiny patch of dirt as Ivo scrambled up.

  “I’ll be right behind you,” Angelika lied. She would, in fact, be off to one side of him, ready to quickly sidestep and hug the cliff-side if it looked it looked like Ivo was about to plummet. But once he worked his way free of the tree trunk, the pardoner showed an unexpected agility travelling easily from stone to stone.

  “So would you have had any reason to murder Altman?” Angelika asked him.

  “What? Why? Is there something I ought to know?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You were asking if I had motive to kill Altman. I don’t think I do. Have you discovered something? People are always plotting behind my back. Are they accusing me? I bet it’s that summoner, Waldemar, saying I did it. Well, you should look at him. He has a streak of cruelty in him as wide as the River Reik.” A rock rolled out from under Ivo’s foot, sailing past Angelika’s shoulder. Ivo waved his arms, wobbled, and steadied himself. He chuckled in what seemed like disbelief. “On the one hand, it’s well known that I’m very clumsy. Except that I have a very good sense of balance. You’d think the two things wouldn’t go together.” He continued on up the slope.