by William King
Or until the wolves picked them off, he reminded himself.
The dwarf looked just as miserable as Felix. He trudged along using the haft of his huge axe like a walking stick to test the depth of the snow ahead of him. The great ridge of red dyed hair that normally towered above his shaved and tattooed head drooped like the crest of some bedraggled bird. The sullen madness that glittered in his one good eye seemed subdued by their dismal surroundings. A great blob of snot dripped from his broken nose.
‘Trees!’ Gotrek grumbled. ‘The only things I hate more than trees are elves.’
Another piercing howl broke Felix out of his reverie. It was like those earlier howls, full of malign intelligence and hunger, and it filled Felix with blind primordial fear. Instinctively he flicked his cloak over his shoulder to free his sword arm and reached for the hilt of his blade.
‘No need for that, manling.’ Malicious amusement was evident in the dwarf’s harsh flinty voice. ‘Whatever it is, it’s calling our furry little friends away from us. It seems like they’ve found other prey.’
‘The Children of Ulric…’ Felix said fearfully, remembering his nurse’s old tales.
‘What has the wolf-god of Middenheim got to do with it, manling?’
‘They say that, when the world was young, Ulric walked among men and begat children on mortal women. That those of his bloodline could shift shapes between that of man and wolf. They withdrew to the wild places of the world long ago. Some say their blood grew tainted when Chaos came and now they feast on human flesh.’
‘Well, if any of them should come within reach of my axe I will spill some of that tainted blood.’
Suddenly Gotrek raised his hand, gesturing for silence. After a moment he nodded and spat on the ground.
Felix paused fearfully, watching and listening. Nowhere could he make out any sign of pursuit. The wolves had vanished. For a moment all he could hear was his own pounding heart and the sound of his rasping breath, then he heard what had caused the Trollslayer to stop: the sounds of a struggle, battle-cries and the distant howling of wolves drifted on the wind.
‘Sounds like a fight,’ he said.
‘Let’s go kill some wolves,’ Gotrek said. ‘Maybe whoever they are attacking knows the way out of this hell-spawned, tree-infested place.’
Panting from the run through the thick snowdrifts, face stinging from where branches and briars had torn at him, Felix bounded into the clearing. A dozen crossbows swung to cover him. The smell of ozone filled the air. The corpses of men and wolves lay everywhere.
Slowly Felix raised his hands high. His gasping breath clouded the air in front of him. Sweat ran down his face despite the cold. He would have to remember that it was not a good idea to run through the winter woods in heavy clothing. That was if he was still alive to remember anything after this. The heavily armed strangers looked anything but friendly.
There were at least twenty of them. Several were garbed in the rich furs of nobles. They held swords and gave orders to the others: tough-looking, watchful men at arms. For all their obvious competence there was an air of deep unease about all these men. Fear was in their eyes. Felix knew that he was instants away from being pin-cushioned by crossbow bolts.
‘Don’t shoot!’ he said. ‘I’m here to help.’
He wondered where Gotrek was. He had run for quite a distance. In the heat of the moment he had let his excitement and his longer legs carry him in front of the dwarf. Right now that might prove to be a fatal mistake, although he was not sure what even the Trollslayer could do faced with this glittering array of missile weapons.
‘Oh you are, are you?’ said a sarcastic voice. ‘Just out for a walk in the woods, were you? Heard the sounds of a scuffle. Come to investigate this little disturbance, did you?’
The speaker was a tall nobleman. Felix had never cared much for the Empire’s nobility, and this man seemed like a prime example of the worst of that pox-ridden breed. A trim black beard framed his narrow face. Startling dark eyes glared out of his pale features. A great eagle beak of a nose gave his face a predatory air.
‘My friend and I were lost in the forest. We heard the wolves and the sounds of battle. We came to help, if we could.’
‘Your friend?’ the nobleman asked ironically. He jerked a thumb towards a tall, beautiful young woman who stood chained nearby. ‘Do you mean this witch?’
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, sir,’ Felix said. ‘I’ve never seen that young lady before in my life.’
He glanced around him. The dwarf was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps it was just as well, Felix thought. The Trollslayer was not known for his tact. Doubtless right now, he would be saying something that would get them both killed.
‘I was travelling with a companion…’ It dawned on Felix that it might not be such a good idea to mention Gotrek right now. The Trollslayer was a conspicuous figure and an outlaw, and perhaps these men might want to claim the bounty, if they recognised him.
‘He appears to have got lost,’ Felix finished off weakly.
‘Put down your sword,’ the noble said. Felix complied. ‘Sven! Heinrich! Bind his hands!’
Two of the men-at-arms raced forward to obey. Felix found himself kicked to the ground. He fell face first into the snow, and felt the cold wetness of it begin to seep into his tunic.
He opened his eyes and found he was lying in front of the corpse of a wolf. As he gazed into the creature’s death-clouded eyes, the soldiers swiftly and efficiently bound his hands behind his back. Felix felt cold metal bite into his wrists and was surprised to find that they were using more than mere rope to hold him.
Then someone tugged down the hood of his cloak and pulled his head up by the hair. Foul breath assaulted his nostrils. Coldly crazy eyes gazed deep into his own. He looked up into a lined face framed by a greyish beard. A gnarled hand made a gesture in front of his face. As it swept through the air it left behind a trail of glittering sparks. Quite obviously this old man was a magician.
‘He seems untouched by the taint of Darkness,’ the sorcerer said in a surprisingly mellow and cultured voice. ‘It may be that he tells the truth. I’ll know more when we get him back to the lodge.’
Felix was allowed to slump forward into the snow once more. He recognised the voice of the noble speaking.
‘Even so, take no chances with him, Voorman. If he is a spy for our enemies, I want him dead.’
‘I’ll find out the truth once I have my instruments. If he’s a spy for enemies of the Order, we’ll know!’
The noble shrugged and turned away, obviously dismissing the matter as beneath his concern. A boot hit Felix in the ribs again and knocked all the air out of his lungs.
‘Get up and get on the sledge,’ a burly sergeant said. ‘If you fall off, I’ll kill you.’
Felix drew his legs underneath himself and reeled to his feet. He glared at the sergeant, trying to memorise every line of the man’s face. If he got out of this alive, he would have vengeance. Seeing his look, one of the men-at-arms drew back the butt of his crossbow as if to brain Felix. The magician shook his head mildly.
‘None of that. I want him undamaged.’
Felix shivered. There was something more frightening in the magician’s calm detachment than there was in the soldier’s unthinking brutality. He climbed on to the back of the sledge.
As far as Felix could tell, the party consisted of the nobleman, some of his toadies, the men-at-arms, and the mage. The nobles rode in horse-drawn sledges. The soldiers clung to the running boards or sat up front driving.
Beside him sat the young woman. Her hair was pure silver in colour and her eyes were golden. She had a sleek predatory beauty and a naturally haughty bearing that was in no way diminished by the collar and chain that attached her to the back railing of the sledge or the strange rune-encrusted metal shackles that bound her hands behind her bac
k.
‘Felix Jaeger,’ he murmured by way of introduction. She said nothing, merely smiled coldly and then seemed to withdraw within herself. She gave no further acknowledgement of his presence.
‘Be silent,’ the magician sitting opposite them said, and there was more menace in his calm, quiet tone than there was in all the angry glares of the guardsmen combined.
Felix decided there was nothing to be gained by defying the old man. He cast another look around the forest, hoping to see some sign of Gotrek, but the Trollslayer was nowhere in evidence. Felix lapsed into morose silence. He doubted that the dwarf could overtake them now, but he could at least follow the tracks of the sleds – providing it didn’t snow too heavily.
And then what? Felix did not know. He had every respect for Gotrek’s formidable powers of slaughter and destruction but he doubted that even the Trollslayer could overcome this small army.
Occasionally he risked a glance at the woman beside him, noting that she too was casting anxious glances towards the trees. He could not decide whether she was hoping that friends would come to her rescue or was simply measuring the distance of a dash for freedom.
A wolf howled in the distance. A strange inhuman smile twisted the woman’s lips. Felix shuddered and looked away.
Felix was almost glad when the manor house loomed out of the gathering storm. The low, massive outline of the lodge was partially obscured by the drifting snowflakes. Felix could see that it was built from stone and logs in the style they called half-timbered.
He felt weary beyond belief. Hunger, cold and the long trudge through the snow had brought him almost to the end of his strength. It occurred to him that this was their destination and that here he would be prey for whatever foul schemes the wizard had in mind, but he simply could not muster the energy to care. All he wanted was to lie down somewhere warm and to sleep.
Someone sounded a horn and the gates were swung open. The sleds and the accompanying men-at-arms passed through into a courtyard, and then the gates were closed behind them.
Felix had a chance to glance around the courtyard. It was flanked on all four sides by the walls of the fortified manor house. He revised his earlier opinion. It was not so much a hunting lodge as a fortress, built to withstand a siege if need be. He cursed: his chances of escape seemed slimmer than ever.
All around, the party climbed down from the sledges. The nobles called for hot mulled wine. Someone ordered the drivers to see that the horses were stabled. All was bustling disorder. The breath of men and beasts emerged from their mouths like smoke.
The guards pushed Felix into the building. Inside it was cold and damp. It smelled of earth and pine and old woodsmoke. A massive stone fireplace filled the centre of the entrance chamber. The warriors and nobles stamped about inside, windmilling their arms and hugging themselves against the chill. Servants rushed forward bearing goblets of hot spicy wine. The scent of it made Felix’s mouth water.
One of the warriors hastily laid kindling in the fire and then set to work, striking sparks from a flint. The damp wood refused to catch.
The wizard watched with growing impatience, then shrugged, gestured and spoke a word in the ancient tongue. A small burst of flame leapt from the end of his pointed index finger to the wood in the fireplace. The wood hissed, then roared. Ozone stink filled the air. Blue flames flickered around the wood, then the logs all caught fire at once. Shadows danced away from the fireplace.
The nobles and the wizard passed through one of the doors into another chamber, leaving the warriors and the prisoners alone. Tense silence reigned for a moment, then all the men began to speak at once. All the words that they had held in during the long trek to the lodge tumbled from the soldiers’ mouths.
‘By Sigmar’s hammer, what a fight that was. I thought those wolves were going to have our nuts for sure!’
‘I have never been so frightened as when I saw the hairy beasts loping out of the trees. Those teeth looked plenty sharp.’
‘Yeah but they died quick enough when you put a crossbow bolt through their eyes or twelve inches of good Imperial steel through their mangy hides!’
‘It wasn’t natural though. I’ve never even heard of wolves attacking such a large party! I’ve never seen wolves fight so hard or long either.’
‘I think we can blame the witch for that!’
The girl returned their stares impassively until none of them could meet her gaze. Felix noticed that her eyes were odd. In the gathering gloom, they reflected the light of the fire the way the eyes of a hound would.
‘Yeah, just as well we had the wizard with us. Old Voorman showed them what real magic is and no mistake!’
‘I wonder why the Count wants her?’
At this a chill smile passed over the girl’s face. Her teeth were small and white and very, very sharp. When she spoke her voice was low and thrilling and strangely musical.
‘Your Count Hrothgar is a fool if he thinks he can hold me here, or kill me without my death being avenged. You are fools if you think you will ever leave this place alive.’
The sergeant drew back his hand and struck her with his gauntleted fist. The outline of his palm stood out stark and pink on her cheek where the blow fell. Anger blazed in the girl’s eyes so hot and hellish and fierce that the sergeant shrank back as if he himself had been the one struck. The girl spoke again and her words were cold and measured.
‘Hear me! I have the gift of the Sight. The veils of the future do not blind me. Every one of you, every single miserable lackey of Count Hrothgar, will die. You will not leave this place alive!’
Such was the compelling certainty in her voice that every man present froze. Faces went white with fear. Men glanced at each other in horror. Felix himself did not doubt her words. The burly sergeant was first to rouse himself. He slid his dagger from its sheath and walked over to the girl. He held the blade before her eyes.
‘Then you will be the first to die, witch,’ he said. The girl looked at him, unafraid. He drew back his blade to strike. Filled with sudden anger, Felix threw himself forward. Weighed down with chains he cannoned into the man and knocked him from his feet. He heard a low gurgle come from the man he had hit and felt a stab of savage exultation at taking some small revenge on the man who had struck him.
The other soldiers dragged him to his feet. Blows slammed into his body. Stars danced before his eyes. He fell to the ground, curling himself into a ball as heavy booted feet crunched into him. He pulled his head against his chest and drew his knees up to his stomach as the pain threatened to overwhelm him. A kick caught him under the chin, throwing his head back. Darkness took him momentarily.
Now he was really scared. The angry soldiers were likely to keep up this punishment until he was dead and there was nothing he could do about it.
‘Stop!’ bellowed a voice he recognised as belonging to the sorcerer. ‘Those two are my property. Do not damage either of them!’
The kicking stopped. Felix was manhandled to his feet. He looked around him wildly, then he noticed the spreading pool of red liquid on the floor that surrounded the recumbent form of the sergeant.
One of the soldiers turned the man over and Felix noticed the knife protruding from the sergeant’s chest. The sergeant’s eyes were wide and staring. His face was white. His chest did not rise and fall. He must have fallen on the blade when Felix had knocked him over.
‘Throw them in the cellar,’ the sorcerer said. ‘I will have words with them both later.’
‘The dying has begun!’ the girl said with a note of triumph in her voice. She looked at the spreading pool of blood and licked her lips.
The cellar was damp. It smelled of wood and metal and stuff contained in barrels. Felix caught the scent of smoked meat and cheeses as well. It just made him hungrier than he already was, and he remembered that he had not eaten in two days.
A clink of chains remi
nded him of the girl. He sensed her presence in the dark. He heard her shallow breathing. She was somewhere close by.
‘What is your name, lady?’ he asked. For a long time there was silence, and he wondered if she was going to answer.
‘Magdalena.’
‘What are you doing here? Why are you in chains?’
Another long silence.
‘The soldiers believe you are a witch. Are you?’
More silence, then: ‘No.’
‘But you have the second sight and the wolves fought for you.’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re not very communicative, are you?’
‘Why should I be?’
‘Because we both appear to be in the same boat and perhaps together we can escape.’
‘There is no escape. There is only death here. Soon it will be night. Then my father will come.’
She made the statement as if she was convinced that it was a complete answer. There was the same mad certainty in her voice, as convincing as it had been when she predicted death for all those armed men upstairs.
In spite of himself, Felix shuddered. It was not pleasant to think that he was alone in a dark basement with a madwoman. It was less pleasant to consider the alternative to her being mad.
‘What do they want with you?’
‘I am bait in a snare for my father.’
‘Why does the Count want you dead?’
‘I do not know. For generations my people have lived at peace with the Count’s. But Hrothgar is not like his forefathers. He has changed. There is a taint about him, and his pet wizard.’
‘How did they capture you?’
‘Voorman is a sorcerer. He tracked me with spells. His magic was too strong for me. But soon my father will come for me.’
‘Your father must be a mighty man indeed if he can overcome all the occupants of this castle.’
There was no answer except soft, panting laughter. Felix knew that the sooner he got out of here the better.