Witch Finder

by C. L. Werner

  ‘But what would Sibbechai want at the plague pits?’ Thulmann pondered aloud.

  ‘It stole bodies, Brother Mathias,’ Kreutzberg said. ‘The corpses of my priests were taken, as well as an indeterminable number from the pit itself. The acolytes who escaped the massacre say the creature was not alone. It was helped by a heretic blasphemer, a necromancer.’

  The priest’s words did little to encourage Thulmann. The vampire alone was formidable enough, but if Sibbechai was working with a necromancer, the threat was doubled. The peculiar limitations imposed on the vampire by its profane state would not apply to a living sorcerer.

  ‘The wheel marks of a cart were present,’ Ehrhardt stated. ‘It was heavier when it left than when it came.’

  ‘Necromancers often profane the solemnity of Morr’s realm by forcing the semblance of life back into dead bodies,’ Kreutzberg explained. Gustl, one of the chapter house’s templars, rushed into the room, his young face flushed with excitement.

  ‘You’d better come quickly,’ Gustl said as he tried to catch his breath. ‘It sounds like your prisoner has got loose and is tearing apart his cell!’ As if to punctuate the templar’s report, a horrendous scream welled up from the depths of the chapter house, penetrating the thick stone floors. Even Streng was impressed by the violence of the act that could wrench such agony from a human throat.

  ‘That was a cry of death,’ Ehrhardt declared, his voice emotionless. Thulmann’s hand fell to the hilt of his sword. He raced toward the stone stairway that descended into the depths. The other templars hurried after him, the metal-encased bulk of Ehrhardt easily keeping pace with the lightly armoured witch hunters.

  The screams grew silent as Thulmann sprinted down the narrow dungeon corridor. A pair of templars stood outside the door to Hanzel’s cell, drawn swords clutched in their white-knuckled hands. From behind the doors came the wet, visceral noises of a body being torn apart.

  ‘Get that door open!’ Thulmann snapped. Hanzel still offered his best chance to track down Weichs. He cursed himself. He should have done as Streng suggested, simply beating Hanzel until he spat out whatever they wanted to hear. Instead he had chosen the cleaner, more sophisticated approach of breaking the man psychologically. Sometimes, he considered, he was too timid for his kind of work.

  ‘Out of the way!’ barked Streng, pushing a rusty key into the iron lock. The mercenary ensured that he had a good grip on the dagger in his other hand, then flung the door inward.

  Something leapt from the torture chamber, something spat out of a nightmare. The guards cringed, their minds refusing to accept the hideous apparition. The twisted shape moved with incredible speed, a blur of reeking rags and brown fur, its mangy hair caked in fresh blood. The thing hissed at Streng, filthy claws scratching at his face. The mercenary pulled away, the talons raking the heavy leather guarding his chest. The thing’s muzzle snapped open, baring its chisel-like fangs, ropes of saliva drooling from its mouth. The abomination hissed again and lunged for Streng’s throat.

  Thulmann acted at once. He stabbed the point of his blade into the ratman’s neck, tearing the steel out of its flesh with a savage sidewise motion. Putrid black blood exploded from the wound. With a pitiful mewing, the monster fell to the icy floor, its scabby tail quivering as life retreated from its malformed carcass.

  ‘Skaven,’ Thulmann pronounced. He could not blame the men for their shock and disgust. To most men in the Empire, the ratmen were a legend, a story told to frighten small children. But Thulmann knew better, he had seen their kind before, the inhuman patrons of his uncle, the sorcerer, Erasmus Kleib. The witch hunter jumped over the shivering corpse and into the cell.

  Hanzel Gruber’s death was more ugly than anything Streng could have inflicted on him. The remains of the plague doktor’s arms still hung from the manacles, but the rest of him was strewn across the floor. Thulmann had heard men describe bodies being ‘hacked to pieces’, but this was the first time that he found the phrase appropriate. The sound of scrabbling claws snapped Thulmann’s attention to the far wall where a jagged hole gaped, dislodged stones and earth scattered about its opening. A naked pink tail swiftly disappeared into the darkness of the tunnel.

  ‘They’re getting away!’ Gustl cried out, sprinting for the tunnel, a pistol gripped in his hand. Ehrhardt and two of the other witch hunters were right behind him. Thulmann cried out a warning, but they were already disappearing. The templar hurried after them, cursing under his breath. He had just reached the mouth of the opening when a terrible groaning sound rumbled through the tunnel. In an instant, the roof of the crudely burrowed passageway came crashing down, sending a cloud of thick grey dust billowing back into the torture chamber.

  Thulmann retreated, trying to blink the dirt from his eyes. When he could see again, he found Tuomas and one of the guards, swords drawn, eyes filled with terror. Thulmann could appreciate their distress. It was a horrible moment when myth became reality, when the underfolk of childhood stepped out from the shadows. Their minds were probably trying to find a sane explanation for the ghastly body lying in the corridor. Perhaps they might even find one they could believe in.

  ‘You can relax,’ Thulmann said, slamming his sword back into its scabbard. ‘They are gone – for now anyway.’ He could see the men were unconvinced, eyes fixed on the blocked mouth of the tunnel. Thulmann pointed to Tuomas. ‘Fetch shovels, picks, whatever you can find to dig with. If luck is with us, we may be able to excavate the hole and find their tunnels.’ It was a forlorn hope, but it would give the men something to do. Thulmann could already hear more of the chapter house’s denizens rushing along the corridor outside. ‘Take a few of them to help you,’ he commanded as Tuomas headed back to the hallway, striving to avoid nearing the ratman’s carcass.

  ‘Phew! Somebody didn’t want him to talk.’ Streng inspected the carnage, turning over what may have been a part of Hanzel’s face with his dagger.

  ‘The skaven are quite accomplished at covering their tracks,’ Thulmann agreed. It seemed that Sibbechai wasn’t the only evil at large in Wurtbad that had found powerful allies. Weichs and the skaven was a combination that churned the witch hunter’s stomach – the inhuman and the unhuman.

  Other witch hunters openly marvelled at the horror that had been done to Hanzel Gruber, many of them making the sign of the hammer as they studied his scattered remains. Thulmann was about to give orders when the man watching the imploded tunnel called out.

  ‘Brother Mathias! They return!’

  His sword leapt from its scabbard. Dirt began to fall away from the hole, spilling into the cell. The witch hunter considered evacuating the room. If the skaven were returning it would be in far greater numbers. Or perhaps only a few had been trapped and managed to survive the collapse of their tunnel. If they could capture one of the monsters alive, Thulmann might yet be able to uncover Weichs’s hideout. He motioned for the other men to make ready, noting the glowing iron Streng held in his left hand to augment the dagger in his right.

  ‘I want one alive,’ Thulmann declared, giving Streng a sharp look who gave a noncommittal shrug of his shoulders.

  The dirt continued to spill into the room. Suddenly something black emerged from the earth, clawing at the open air. Thulmann eyed the flailing fingers, then advised his men to stand down. It was no skaven paw, but an armoured gauntlet. Thulmann hurried to the hole, helping the man to dig his way free. Captain-Justicar Ehrhardt emerged, his plate armour caked in dust, his sombre raiment torn and ragged. As the huge Black Guardsman fought his way free, he dragged the insensible shape of Emil with him, tossing the stunned witch hunter to the nearest of his fellows. Ehrhardt lifted the steel helmet from his head, exposing a harsh, weathered countenance that would not have been out of place on a seasoned veteran of the Reiksguard.

  ‘We had the vermin in sight all the time,’ Ehrhardt snarled. ‘But there must have been others deeper in the tunnel. The scum collapsed their run on top of their own.’

  ‘Courage a
nd honour are not trademarks of the rat-kin,’ Thulmann said. ‘They will happily kill dozens of their own to eliminate a single enemy.’ The Black Guardsman nodded in understanding.

  ‘When we have finished with this vampire,’ Ehrhardt growled, ‘then this vermin will wish they had made a better job of it.’

  ‘I was unaware that the underfolk were the concern of Morr’s Black Guard,’ Thulmann observed. Ehrhardt turned his penetrating blue eyes on the witch hunter, shaking a pile of dirt from his armoured shoulder.

  ‘They are now,’ the knight said.

  ‘Then I shouldn’t worry about losing the ones in the tunnel,’ Thulmann said. ‘Because where one skaven is found, there are always others.’

  Filthy paws scrabbled in the murky water beneath the docks, struggling to wash the odour from their fur. The pungent lilac scent was chosen by Grey Seer Skilk because his minions could track it easily across great distances. In truth, the skaven found the smell unpleasant, even more intolerable than the odour of the man-things they were sent to collect for the grey seer.

  The leader of the small pack of ratmen looked over at the bound form they had abducted from the little fishing boat he called home. The skaven’s teeth gleamed as it snarled at the fisherman, punctuating its displeasure by nipping at the man’s arm. Skilk’s doktor-man wanted his subjects alive, but ‘alive’ did not mean ‘unharmed’. The fisherman screamed into the linen his abductors had crammed down his throat. The creatures chittered with amusement as the wretch struggled against his bonds. His days of dreaming about a big catch were over, his nightmare as the big catch itself was about to begin.

  The skaven leader resumed its fastidious cleaning. The vermin paused as it noticed a shape floating upon the water nearby. Its whiskers twitched as it tried to pick up the object’s scent, the lilac stench making it more difficult.

  ‘Man-person,’ it declared in a whispered hiss. In reply, the belly of the skaven beside it rumbled with hunger. The leader lashed its tail in agreement. They were forbidden to nibble at the subjects they secured for Weichs, but there was no reason they shouldn’t avail themselves of other man-flesh. The body floating beside the dock was almost like a gift from the Horned Rat. The skaven leader looked about it nervously, afraid that it would see the eyes of its god watching from the shadows.

  ‘Fetch-bring,’ the ratman snarled, shoving the skaven with the growling belly toward the body. The creature glanced about cautiously, then slithered into the water, swimming slowly and silently. Soon it was back under the concealment of the dock, dragging the corpse with it. Five sets of hungry eyes glared at the body. The leader snapped at its subordinates with a display of teeth and the pitted sword it held in one claw. It wouldn’t do for them to snatch the most succulent meat until after the leader had eaten its fill.

  The ratman jumped back, tripping over one of its subdued minions. The leader picked itself up, gesturing with a claw at the corpse they had dragged from the river. ‘Man-thing live-move,’ it squeaked. The other skaven cast suspicious looks at the body, drawing their own weapons. Life was a problem they could solve quickly enough.

  ‘No!’ their leader hissed, lashing its tail through the mud. ‘Tie-bind, quick-quick! Fetch-bring for doktor-man!’ The ratman paid little notice to the ugly looks its underlings cast as they sullenly complied with its orders. Their leader was already lost in thoughts of the reward for bringing two subjects to Skilk’s doktor-man. Of course, it wouldn’t be big enough to share with its fellow skaven. Rewards never were.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The sitting room was dark, the dying fire insufficient to banish the shadows that devoured swan-legged tables, upholstered chairs and fur-strewn divans. The room’s sole occupant did not stir to replenish the flame, content to sit and study the darkening wall as he drained the contents of the crystal goblet in his hand. The intensifying gloom was a perfect companion to the pall covering his heart.

  Lord High Justice Igor Markoff did not stir as the door to his sanctuary opened. Dancing candlelight fought against the darkness threatening to engulf him. He did not care who this midnight violator of his tranquillity might be. It was much too late for that. He had devoted his life to making his name respected and feared throughout Wurtbad, in the murky dens of petty thieves and the polished halls of the nobility. It was only now that he truly understood how tenuous and fleeting such strength and power were. With their parting they had left little but the shell of a tired, frightened old man. Markoff took another swallow from his glass. It might not be possible to restore his strength from a bottle, but he knew he could find oblivion within one.

  Dimly, words began to filter through the darkening haze. Harsh, angry words, accusatory words. How could he have let such an atrocity come to pass? How could he have engineered such a hideous scheme? Once he had been a man worthy of respect, even emulation. Now, the self he had shown to the world was revealed as naught but a sham, unmasking the murderous coward within.

  ‘Enough, girl.’ Markoff lifted his hand, begging his daughter to cease her tirade. He forced his eyes to remain fixed upon the wall. She had been there, at Otwin Keep, when Meisser carried out his orders. She would not be silenced. Markoff smiled thinly, a tiny ember of pride flickering in the gloom. There was so very much strength in her, so much more than the gods had seen fit to bestow upon her father.

  ‘How?’ Silja’s words cut at Markoff like a dull knife. ‘How could you have conceived such a horror? How could you allow such wanton murder to be perpetrated in the name of the baron?’

  ‘What good would it do to deny your accusations?’ Markoff sighed. ‘Oh, I am not pleading my innocence. Far from it! I am as guilty as any of the others, those great and noble lords so very concerned with the welfare of their mighty city.’ He drained the last dregs of schnapps from his goblet.

  ‘It was the baron’s great vision,’ Markoff stated. ‘It was Meisser who gave it form and substance, the rest of us who gave it life. I’ve always had a good head for logistics, for efficiency,’ the magistrate said. ‘The baron has always appreciated that. Left on his own, Meisser would still be wondering which direction the keep is in. Was in,’ he corrected himself.

  ‘Then it was your idea, your plan,’ Silja hissed back at him. The fire in her gaze had little to do with her reddened face and the salty trails staining her cheeks. Her knuckles whitened as Silja’s anger drained into them. ‘All these years I’ve admired you, tried to follow your example. What a fool I was to be so blind!’

  Markoff rose from his chair, turning to glare at his daughter. ‘You would have me play the fool then?’ he snapped. ‘Stand aside and refuse to have anything to do with the baron’s mad schemes, just let Meisser ooze his way ever deeper into his good grace? Would that please you? Would that make you proud?’

  ‘But you are the Lord High Justice–’ Silja began to object. Markoff shook his head, scoffing at his daughter’s protest.

  ‘Simply another instrument of the baron’s will. What power I have, what authority I have, is because the baron allows it. A snap of his fingers, a stroke of his pen, and I am no more powerful than the rankest ratcatcher in the sewers.’

  ‘There must have been someone you could turn to.’ Silja’s voice had lost some of its venom, her father’s pain, frustration and disgrace touching her heart. Markoff shook his head.

  ‘Who? The Grand Theogonist? The Emperor, perhaps? Or maybe our gracious elector count, who has set a ring of steel around this city and is perfectly content to sit back and watch it die? No, Silja, there is no authority I can appeal to.’ Markoff’s hand began to tremble. ‘Baron von Gotz is the only law in Wurtbad. While the quarantine is in effect, he may as well be Sigmar returned.’

  ‘Then madness rules Wurtbad!’ Silja swore. Her anger flared as she looked upon her father’s trembling frame. She had come here to confront a traitor, an archfiend who had engineered the deaths of thousands. Instead she had found only a broken, defeated old man. She turned, striding from the chamber until she stood on
ce more upon the threshold.

  ‘Tell me, father,’ she said, her voice a withering snarl. ‘When the baron next calls for his sycophants to endorse whatever insanity stirs his rotten mind, will you crawl to him on your belly like a dog, or will you have enough dignity to stand before him like a man?’

  Silja did not wait for an answer, disappearing into the maze of hallways that formed the Ministry of Justice. Markoff stared at the empty doorway for a time, then contemplated the empty goblet in his hand. It would be so easy to ignore her words, to sit out the storm. But she was right. The baron was dangerously mad, more of a threat to the city than the plague he was obsessed with destroying. But Markoff’s days of boldness and bravery were behind him, all he wanted now was to live his few remaining years in peace, to enjoy the rewards of his labours in the time left to him. Someone else could try to counter the influence of the baron.

  He tried to forget the contempt in his daughter’s words. But, even with the schnapps dulling his mind, Markoff couldn’t banish her accusations. With a deep growl, the magistrate hurled the goblet into the fading fire, watching as it shattered into a hundred shards of starlight. He grabbed up his cloak from where he had thrown it across one of the divans.

  If he was unable to forget, then the time may have come to act in such a way that he would not be ashamed to remember.

  Furchtegott slammed the book closed, too furious to experience the repugnance that crawled up his spine whenever he touched the binding of the mouldy old grimoire. The mystic wiped his hands on his golden robes. Das Buch die Unholden seemed to grin back at him with a mocking smile. He had consulted many tomes of magic since taking up the mantle of wizard, and learned many disquieting, profane secrets in his studies. Knowledge that some insisted man had never been meant to know.

  But the ponderous volume compiled by the witch hunter Helmuth Klausner, from the writings of warlocks and sorcerers he had condemned during his career, was another matter. The book almost seemed to be alive, possessed by a malicious intelligence. Pages would turn of their own volition, even when weighted down by lead ingots. The book would never remain where Furchtegott remembered leaving it, always manifesting itself in some unusual spot within his laboratory, some place it had no right to be. Most frustrating of all, though, was the way in which it seemed to guard its secrets; the way text seemed to slither from one page to another, as though evading the prying eye that sought to decipher it.