“A little unannounced trip to the country; I do like to see what my servants are up to. Now would you please let us pass?”
“Well… naturally, Your Excellency. And a good day to you!”
The wagon rolled on again while Magdalena cursed through her gag. That was her last chance! Silvio would soon be force-feeding her the ergot, and what awaited her then? She thought of Resl, the maid of Schongau baker Berchtholdt, imprisoned in her own nightmares, her limbs turning black, crying and howling until the dear Lord released her from her pain at last.
Would that be her fate as well?
After about another quarter-hour the wagon stopped and the raftsmen climbed down, whispering softly to one another. Evidently they’d reached their destination. Bags were hastily offloaded and carried away. Squinting at the blinding sunlight, Magdalena took a while to recognize Silvio standing over her, smiling.
“If you could promise me you’d be quiet, I just might be persuaded to remove your gag,” he said, pushing a lock of sweaty, matted hair from her face. He plucked a bug from her hair and crushed it between his fingers. “Do you think that’s possible?”
Magdalena nodded silently. When the Venetian untied the knot behind her head and pulled the gag out of her mouth, she spat in his face.
“Murderer, damn you! You’ve killed Simon! For that you’ll roast a thousand years in hell. I’ll rip your puny balls right off, I’ll—mmmmhhhh!”
Silvio forced the gag back into her mouth. “That wasn’t our agreement,” he whispered. “So once again, will you keep silent?”
Tears of anger welled up in Magdalena’s eyes, but she nodded a second time. When Silvio removed the dirty rag again, she kept quiet.
“Take this stubborn woman down below!” Silvio ordered. One of the raftsmen tossed Magdalena over his shoulder like just another sack of flour and climbed down from the wagon, panting.
Though she was upside down now, the hangman’s daughter could see that the wagon had come to rest on a wide road that wound through fields and meadows. The city wall lay less than a half-mile behind them. Nearby, on a hill that rose over rolling meadows, stood a strange, three-legged structure. Lifeless bodies hung from it, swaying in the gentle summer breeze. Despite the midsummer heat, Magdalena shivered.
My God, the Regensburg gallows hill! What do these insane men intend to do with me?
But the raftsman headed off in another direction entirely, along a little path where bushes, red poppies, and yellow broom grew wild, toward a stone staircase that led underground. Silvio, who was already waiting at the bottom of the stairs, opened a heavy iron door and bowed slightly as Magdalena entered a dark room on the raftsman’s back.
“After you, bella donna,” he purred. “Welcome to your new home. You’ll be spending the next several days and weeks here. It may be a bit damp, but we all must make some sacrifices in the name of science, mustn’t we?”
They were standing in a subterranean room built of huge stone blocks and filled with the sound of splashing water. The broad-shouldered raftsman set Magdalena down roughly on a stone bench and lit a torch. Only now could she see that the splashing came from a small waterfall that cascaded down the wall and emptied into a shallow basin at the back of the room. Stone tablets were mounted on the walls, but it was too dark to read the inscriptions. Behind the basin an arched passageway led to another vaulted area from which a loud rushing sound emanated.
Working silently, the five raftsmen carried the bags of flour past her and Silvio, through the knee-deep basin and into the rear vault. When they finished, the Venetian signaled to them.
“Stand guard up above. Only Jeremias will stay with us.” He pointed at a hefty raftsman to their left, who nodded politely and planted himself next to Magdalena with arms crossed. “Just in case you should refuse to take your water cure,” he reassured the hangman’s daughter. “As you know, patients can be a bit uncooperative at times.”
With a creak, the iron door swung closed.
“Don’t worry.” The Venetian fetched a tin cup from his pocket. “You won’t have to eat any flour. You’ll drink the ergot diluted with water. Sadly, I can’t offer you wine, as that would distort the effect.” Silvio took out a silver teaspoon, scooped some flour from an open sack, and stirred the pale blue powder into the cup.
“We still don’t know exactly how strong the poison is in humans,” he declared, “and above all, how fast it acts. If we dilute the ergot with well water rather than baking it into bread, it will presumably take effect later.” He sniffed the cup and shrugged. “We expect the Reichstag to last a few weeks, and that should give us enough time. For you that means, unfortunately, the experiment may be a bit prolonged, but your hallucinations promise to be quite interesting in such an environment. May I?” Silvio set the cup down, pulled out a dagger, and with a flourish cut the ropes binding Magdalena’s feet. “Since you’ll be here a few weeks, you ought to be allowed to move about freely at least. You simply must have a look around your new home. It’s really… well, come see for yourself.”
Silvio climbed over the edge of the basin and waded toward the dark vault in the back.
He really intends to lock me in this place for the next few weeks and force me to drink cup after cup of this damned ergot! Magdalena thought. She closed her eyes, hoping to suppress her growing panic. The noise of rushing water was already getting on her nerves, and the echo in the underground vault intensified the volume until it sounded like a single towering waterfall.
How long will it take the nightmares to overwhelm me? And what will they be like down here, in this pit?
Magdalena decided to keep quiet and followed the Venetian and his stocky companion into the vault in back. She ducked under the low archway, then took an involuntary step backward.
The room was gigantic.
Torches illuminated a narrow corridor at regular intervals until, past where the eye could see, the light was swallowed in darkness. The vault had to be over a half-mile long. Water shimmered across the floor, but she couldn’t tell how deep it might be. Even more water streamed into the basin from holes and pipes in the wall—some small, some large—and the sound of splashing filled the room, echoing from the walls and ceiling. To either side, more than two dozen flour sacks were lined neatly along narrow elevated ledges.
“Welcome to your new home,” Silvio shouted over the roar. “The entire world drinks from this spring!”
He ordered Jeremias to hand him the tin cup, then pointed at the sacks. “We’ll store the ergot here until the Reichstag begins, and then we’ll slowly start dissolving the thirty one-hundred-pound bags in the water. You needn’t be afraid that anyone will find you down here, since I’m the only one with a key. And now…” With a solemn gesture Silvio held the cup under a small stream. Carefully he swirled the water to dissolve the ergot, then put the cup to Magdalena’s lips. “It’s time for our experiment. One cup a day. Be good now, and drink up.”
With her hands still bound, Magdalena turned her head from side to side. Nevertheless, Jeremias held her in his viselike grip while Silvio maneuvered the cup.
“Oh, by the way…” Silvio was speaking almost directly into her ear now. “I do hope very much that your visions are not all gloomy and gruesome. I’ve heard ergot can stimulate physical desire. If that’s the case, do let me know. I’d be glad to share a few dreams with you.”
The cup had reached Magdalena’s lips.
Screaming, Friedrich Lettner writhed on the floor of the ruined church as hornets swarmed over his face and upper body. He thrashed about as if possessed, crushing dozens of the insects in his swollen hands, even as new ones kept coming.
Meanwhile Kuisl sought shelter behind the altar, out of sight of the angry hornets. Leaning against the huge stone slab, he peered out to observe an utterly bewildered Philipp Lettner. Only after a few moments did the raftmaster run toward Friedrich and attempt to swat the hornets away from his brother’s shirt collar. But in doing so he was stung several tim
es himself.
“Damn you, Kuisl!” Philipp Lettner shouted, waving his katzbalger through the air as if warding off invisible ghosts. “Damn you and your whole clan! Damn you forever!”
Kuisl had no time to waste now. Sword raised, he ran toward his opponent, who was still preoccupied with the hornets circling around him while trying to help his brother. The raftmaster cast an irritated sidelong glance at Kuisl, then, with a growl, left Friedrich to his own devices as he prepared himself for battle. A cloud of hornets circled his head and clouded his vision.
“You damned son of a whore!” Lettner shouted, brushing away a few angry buzzing insects with his left hand. “For this, Jakob, I’ll slit your belly open and hang your entrails from the church steeple.”
“Spare the talk and fight, will you?”
Without another word, Kuisl lunged at his enemy. He felt the hornets sting his arms, face, and back, but the pain was eclipsed by his fever and the excitement of battle. The hangman was horrified to realize that the clanging swords aroused something like lust in him.
Just as before… the smell of blood, the screams of dying men. It’s like a fog that suddenly engulfs a man—only much clearer…
He could see Philipp Lettner clearly in front of him now, but the former mercenary’s movements seemed strangely slow. Kuisl lunged with his sword, flailing away at his opponent, who continued to retreat, for the first time with fear in his eyes. Finally Lettner’s back was to the wall, and the two warriors stood face-to-face, less than an inch apart, with crossed swords.
“The letter in the bishop’s palace,” Kuisl gasped. “What was that sentence supposed to mean? Did you really think I would believe such utter nonsense?”
Philipp Lettner’s eyes lit up as he flashed his wolfish grin again.
“It’s the truth, just as sure as I’m standing here before you!” With great effort the raftmaster forced Kuisl’s sword a hand’s width to the side. “I had to make only a few quick calculations. I learned from the Venetian how old your daughter is—twenty-four! Barely a year before that, late in the fall, we were here in Weidenfeld. Your Anna had screamed at the time, but believe me, Jakob, they were screams of desire.”
“You dirty lying bastard!” Anger blinded Kuisl like a corrosive poison. Over and over a line flashed through his mind, a line from the letter slipped into his pocket just the night before in the bishop’s palace… That one line hurt more than all the torture he’d experienced in the Regensburg dungeon.
Kiss my daughter Magdalena for me… her mother tasted like a sweet ripe plum…
“Bastard!”
Kuisl shoved Lettner so hard he cried out in surprise as he staggered back to the wall. This put the raftmaster just beyond Kuisl’s reach, so Lettner took a deep breath, planted his feet firmly, and braced himself for the next attack. Scornfully he spat on the ground and swung the katzbalger through the air while his brother still rolled around on the ground, howling.
“I may be a dirty bastard,” Philipp Lettner whispered, “but I’m not a liar. I took Anna-Maria like a steer takes a cow. And what do I learn all these years later? That shortly after our rendezvous pretty little Anna was pregnant. What a coincidence!” He licked his lips and giggled. “Take another look at your daughter, Jakob! How could she not be mine? Her soft eyes; her matted, always-snarled hair; her full lips. She doesn’t take after you at all, does she?”
“She takes after her mother,” Kuisl said between clenched teeth as doubts started to grow in his mind. Anna-Maria never told him the name of the village she came from, and that was likely why he’d forgotten the name Weidenfeld completely. He knew she’d experienced horrible things there, but just what and how horrible these things were she’d never said.
She tasted like a sweet ripe plum…
Blood-red spots appeared before Kuisl’s eyes and his head began to spin.
I can’t let him get to me, he thought. He wants me to lose control… But why else would Anna have never spoken about it? Her sad face, when I took my baby girl in my arms and sang her to sleep… I can’t let him get to me…
“She’s my daughter,” the hangman replied flatly. “My daughter, my—”
“Maybe you’re right,” Lettner interrupted. “Perhaps she isn’t mine after all. Or maybe she is.” He chuckled. “You know something funny? A while ago, in the bathhouse, I very nearly burned her alive, along with that little quack. I was there just to cover my own tracks. When someone came in, I hid up in the attic but later ran down to smoke the intruders out of the cellar. By God, I didn’t know it was Magdalena at the time, but when the Venetian told me about it the next morning, I really did feel bad.” The raftmaster laughed loudly. “Whether you believe me or not, I like the girl; I feel close to her. I could have killed her a dozen times, but I didn’t. And do you know why? Because I know I’m her father.”
“Never!” the hangman yelled. “You—you damned liar!”
Philipp Lettner sighed theatrically. “Oh, Jakob, why must you be so pigheaded? Let’s agree that Magdalena has two fathers. That’s more than fair, isn’t it?” He snickered when he saw Kuisl clutching his sword so hard the blood drained from his fingers.
“I’ve sown doubt in your mind, haven’t I?” the raftmaster said. “I’ve given you a wound that will never heal. From now on, whenever you look at your daughter, you’ll see my face, too. That’s my revenge. Now, fight!” Philipp Lettner rushed the hangman like a man possessed, his teeth bared, holding the katzbalger out in front of him.
Kuisl lowered his sword feebly to the ground and, with a vacant look in his eyes, awaited the final blow.
“How long will it take us to get to this damned wellspring?” Simon asked Nathan, gasping as they hurried along the low corridor. “That madman may already be forcing ergot down Magdalena’s throat!”
Just as they had the last time they visited the Wöhrd together, the beggar and the medicus made their way through the underwater tunnel connecting the city with the island. Foul water stood knee-deep in places in the muddy passageway, and falling bits of stone kept reminding Simon that only a thin wall of rock, clay, and dirt separated them from the Danube. And the decrepit bricks and beams of the ceiling weren’t reassuring.
Stooping, the beggar king ran ahead, carrying a lantern that bobbed like a will-o’-the-wisp lighting the way. Nevertheless, Simon managed to stumble several times. At one point his boot stuck on a half-submerged stone, toppling him over into cold brown muck. Grinning, Nathan held the lantern up to the medicus’s mud-splattered face.
“If you keep doing that, we’re never going to get there,” he squawked, his voice still hoarse from all the smoke at the mill. “The wellspring and the new chamber they’ve built around it lie to the south of the city, in the fields near the gallows hill. We still have quite a ways to go.”
“Near the gallows hill?” Simon asked as he stood up again and wiped off his jacket as best he could. “Not exactly the ideal place for a freshwater spring, is it? Are you really certain we’ll find them there?”
Nodding, Nathan marched ahead with the lantern. “Quite sure. The well chamber at Prüller Heights was built only a few years ago. It feeds into the fountain on Haid Square, as well as the bishop’s palace, but most importantly, it feeds into city hall. If someone wishes to poison the Reichstag, that’s where he’ll be. Ouch!” He bumped his head on a jagged rock on the low ceiling. “Moreover, our dear Venetian friend will be absolutely undisturbed there. Except for a fountain guard, no one has access to the chamber. As far as I know, it’s under lock and key. And because it lies deep underground, Silvio can store the stuff there for months and simply pour his poison slowly into the spring.”
“A perfect place to imprison and poison someone with ergot over the coming days and weeks,” Simon mused. “Come, we must hurry!”
“Don’t worry. And if you didn’t have to lie down and take your mud baths all the time, we’d be there faster,” Nathan replied.
Finally they reached the end of the tu
nnel. As before, they climbed a matted fishnet like a rope ladder to a hole in the ceiling. They emerged at last into the roomy trunk that smelled as badly of fish now as it had a few days ago.
When Nathan opened the lid, fresh air rushed in. Simon eagerly took several deep breaths before he ventured a look outside. Barrels, bales, and crates towered all around them, and in the distance they could hear shouting. Every now and again it sounded as though someone passed close by.
Nathan whistled between his fingers, and shortly thereafter they heard a whistled reply. The beggar king nodded contentedly.
“Good fellows,” he said. “Told them to wait here for me. The men will be glad to see you again—most of them, in any case.”
Simon swallowed hard. Soon Hans Reiser, Brother Paulus, and two other beggars emerged from behind the barrels, waving and grinning when they caught sight of Simon. Hans Reiser, whose eyes were apparently fully healed now, spread his arms wide to welcome the medicus.
“Simon!” he cried out. “You just up and left us and knocked out the king’s teeth to boot! That’s no way to behave! And where have you left Magdalena?”
“This isn’t the time for long explanations,” Nathan said. “I’ve forgiven Simon and his girl. Everything else I’ll tell you along the way.” He looked around. “Where are Trembling Johann and Lame Hannes?”
“Down at the tavern by the Stone Bridge,” Hans replied. “A great day for thieves. The mill on the Wöhrd is burning, and everyone’s standing there gawking at it and—”
“I know,” the beggar king snapped. “Quit blathering and get the others. We’ll all meet outside Peter’s Gate. Now, get moving.”
Hans headed off with a shrug, while Simon hurried through the city with the other four. As word spread around town that the Wöhrd was on fire, people came running from every direction to congregate on the raft landing, making it difficult for the ragged band of beggars to navigate the narrow streets. But no one stopped them, and not a single person wasted so much as a glance on Simon.
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