by C. L. Werner
‘I told you that I like to know about my enemy,’ the bounty hunter replied. ‘I’ve had dealings with such creatures before, and after my first encounter with one, I determined to learn their weaknesses.’ He looked back at the edge of the precipice. ‘By itself, the salt would only have pained him. But that wooden shaft I drove through his side was crafted for the express purpose of destroying his kind, blessed by the priests of Sigmar, if the good intentions of priests and gods have any merit.’
‘Then that is the last we’ll be seeing of that leech,’ Ulgrin commented.
‘Let us hope,’ Ithilweil replied, a haunted quality of uncertainty in her voice. ‘But I should feel much better if we were far from this place.’
‘I don’t think any of us would get much sleep knowing that thing’s body is down below,’ Brunner agreed, replacing Drakesmalice into its sheath. ‘We’ll risk a bit of night travel. Who knows,’ the bounty hunter observed with grim humour, ‘we may even find ourselves sharing the same inn as Gobineau.’
There were five rogues in Hubolt’s little mob, though Gobineau would not have put much stock in any of them should problems arise. Two of them looked old enough to be Hubolt’s father, if any man had ever cared to accept that dubious honour. Another was young enough that Gobineau wondered if his chin had even considered sprouting hair yet. The other two were little different from the simple peasant rabble he’d shared the inn with the previous night, though they wore swords at their sides. None of these men had that ruthless, predatory air, the chill in their eyes that marked the veteran bandit. Whatever notoriety these men had garnered was due entirely to their leader.
Still, Gobineau knew such men were easily manipulated: lacking the proper experience or cunning to think for themselves, they were apt to follow most any command before questioning the intent behind it. No, Gobineau would have nothing to fear from such a quarter. Hubolt, however, might be a different matter. If he was reduced to allowing such men to call him captain, then the bandit must have fallen much farther than he had admitted to at the inn. There was no smuggling scheme with Mousillon, these men would be stripped and eaten five minutes after setting foot in that city. Probably not much thievery either, beyond some poaching and rustling. Hubolt would indeed bear watching, it would take only the tiniest spark of ambition to cause the man to think of better things.
The bearded bandit stared back at Gobineau from the forefront of their small column. They were riding through a narrow strip of woods skirting the edge of a vast tract of farmland. After some discussion, the two had decided that Gisoreaux might make a more viable base of operations than Quenelles. Apparently the predations of the dragon had disturbed more than just the knights. There were tales that the wyrm’s presence had driven twisted beastmen from their lairs deep within the Forest of Chalons. Hubolt was not willing to put such rumours to the test, and after seeing the man’s company of rogues, Gobineau was inclined to agree with him. He’d not trust such men against a mob of children. Besides, if beastmen were roaming about the countryside near Quenelles, then the peasants would already have troubles enough to concern them than the threat of a dragon destroying their homes.
‘Now, friend,’ Hubolt said, his lips twisted into a grotesque leer because of the brand marring his face. ‘We’ve yet to discuss the split for this scheme of yours.’ It was a topic that had been suggested a few times. Gobineau noticed that Hubolt’s demeanour was becoming more unruly the deeper into the country they rode. Perhaps the bandit was already starting to decide that he didn’t need his partner? Gobineau had hoped to delay that eventuality a little longer. ‘Since I have my five men to think of, perhaps I should receive the larger…’
Whatever percentage Hubolt was about to mention was lost in the strangled cry that rose from his throat. A red-feathered arrow protruded from the brigand’s chest, its momentum knocking him from his saddle and spilling him into the road. Gobineau did not spare a second look for his erstwhile ally, but quickly scanned the road ahead. Emerging from cover were a half-dozen leather-clad archers, an armoured knight with a horned helmet mounted upon a great black warhorse behind them. However, it was the mounted man seated next to the knight that caused Gobineau’s breath to fall short. How Rudol had found him was not quite so important as what the wizard wanted and was likely to do in the way of getting it.
Just the same, even as his instinct of self preservation stirred, another emotion began to assert itself. The desire to crush these men who dared to oppose him, to still their hearts and leave their burning carcasses smouldering beneath the sun. Gobineau caught himself just as he began to put spurs against the side of his horse, to initiate his mad and suicidal intention. With terror, Gobineau fought down the insane aggression that had flared up within him. He was not about to lose his life fighting knights and wizards. Not when there were others to fight his battles for him.
‘Ride them down before they can fire again!’ Gobineau shouted, drawing his sword and waving it above the neck of his horse like some Kislevite cavalry officer. Hubolt’s vermin did not think twice, but dug their spurs into their own mounts and charged forward. Gobineau had to hand it to Hubolt, at least he had an eye for collecting morons.
The outlaw turned his own mount around with a savage tug on the reins. With any luck, the sacrifice of Hubolt’s men would buy him enough time to put some distance between himself and the wizard.
Rudol glared down at Sir Thierswind. The knight had dismounted, prowling amongst the bodies of the men his archers had slaughtered, checking each one for the object the wizard had described for him so often since they had left the Chateau de Chegney. The wizard fairly burned with irritated frustration, enraged at this arrogant swordsman’s stupidity. Rather than listening to the wizard, rather than hastening with all speed after the man who had escaped, Thierswind had insisted on searching the bodies of the slain for the Fell Fang, sending only two of his men in pursuit of the escaped man. Thierswind made no secret of his distrust of the wizard, suspecting Rudol’s every suggestion and warning him that any deception on his part would be reported back to the viscount.
‘It seems you were right,’ Thierswind conceded as he rose from the last corpse. ‘We should have pursued the man who escaped.’ There was no note of apology in the knight’s voice. Indeed, if anything, his tone was even more arrogant and hostile than before.
‘And what will you do now?’ Rudol sneered. Thierswind glared back from behind his helm.
‘We question the one who is still alive,’ the knight snarled back. Two of the men-at-arms dutifully lifted the injured Hubolt from the ground, the arrow still sticking from his chest.
‘Who was the man that escaped?’ Thierswind demanded. The bandit gave the knight a mocking smile.
Thierswind closed his armoured hands into fists. ‘Tell me or…’
‘Or what?’ Hubolt wheezed. ‘You’ll kill me? You’ve already done that, so there’s no reason to fear you now!’ The bandit began to laugh heartily, enjoying the knight’s impotent rage. But the laughter passed into a shriek of mortal agony as violet energy blazed into the arrow, searing through the wooden shaft into Hubolt’s body. Seeing what was happening to their captive, the soldiers backed away. Sparks of energy rippled about Hubolt’s body.
Smoke rose from the stricken man, whose body twitched and shuddered as though seized by a fit. The magical lightning continued to stream into Hubolt until the man’s body began to cook from the inside out, his screaming voice cracked with the shrillness of its tormented shrieks. Only then did the sorcerous attack subside, allowing the smoking corpse to topple to the singed earth.
Thierswind and his men looked with open horror upon Rudol as the wizard straightened himself in his saddle, the last flickers of power fading from his eyes. It was his turn to indulge in arrogance, now that he had shown the knight and his scum just who was in command of this little enterprise, that he could destroy each and every one of them with a simple gesture of his hand.
‘We will do as I say now,’ R
udol declared, daring Thierswind to protest. The knight did not rise to the lure, earning himself a reprieve from Rudol’s wrath. ‘The thief who has the Fell Fang knows we are after him. He will seek to lose himself in the nearest city. We will need to stop him before he can do so.’
‘And how are we to accomplish this?’ Sir Thierswind managed to ask. Rudol smiled at him indulgently, as though the knight were no more than an idiot child.
‘My magic will tell me where the Fell Fang is, always,’ Rudol stated. Then a broad smile began to spread on the wizard’s features. ‘Perhaps two men were enough,’ he hissed. ‘It appears that our prize is coming back to us.’
Brunner dismounted from Fiend, taking a closer look at one of the red-feathered arrows lying beside the bodies of the slain men. They had chanced upon a shepherd who recalled having seen Gobineau pass his fields, riding in the company of a half dozen men with ill-favoured looks. It was a simple matter to follow the trail of the riders, until it at last led them into a stretch of woods and the massacre they now gazed upon.
‘Looks like our bandit met some of his fellows,’ Ulgrin observed with grim humour. ‘No honour among thieves, eh?’ he hissed over at Ithilweil. The elf enchantress seemed distracted, out of sorts ever since they had come upon the ghastly scene.
‘This was not done by a pack of rival bandits,’ Brunner stated. The bounty hunter’s voice was laced with such intense hatred that Ulgrin’s hand instinctively fell to the small axe nestled beneath his belt.
Brunner snapped the shaft of the arrow he had been examining.
The dwarf wondered at the sudden change in his partner. What could there have been about a simple arrow that could get under the skin of so cold a character as the infamous Brunner? Ulgrin did not know, but suspected that such information might be of great interest and possibly of even greater profit.
‘I see,’ the dwarf commented, stabbing a finger at the charred remains lying in the middle of the road. ‘Our dragon has taken up archery as a hobby.’
‘This was not done by a dragon,’ Ithilweil stated. ‘That poor man was struck down not by dragonfire but by the darkest magic.’
Brunner looked at the corpse, giving it only the briefest of examinations. It was too large to be the man they were hunting. Beyond that fact, he had no interest.
The bounty hunter remounted his warhorse. ‘I’ve seen a man who could work such sorcery,’ he declared when he had regained the saddle. ‘We are not the only ones hunting Gobineau.’
‘Then someone else has claimed the bounty,’ Ulgrin grumbled, immediately contemplating the expense of time and effort that he had wasted pursuing the outlaw.
Brunner shook his head. ‘I don’t think the wizard and his allies are interested in the bounty,’ he told the dwarf. ‘They are after the Fell Fang, as Ithilweil is.’ He stared intently at the tracks leading away from the massacre. ‘It looks as if they might have gotten what they were after too.’
‘Then we must find them quickly,’ Ithilweil told the bounty hunters. ‘The Fell Fang in the hands of a fool who doesn’t know what he has is bad enough, but it is much more dangerous in the possession of someone who actually thinks he knows what it is!’
Brunner stared back at the red-feathered arrows, remembering another time he had seen them sprouting from the bodies of fallen men. ‘We’ll find them,’ the bounty killer said, confidently. ‘Gobineau was with these men. It is likely he is now the prisoner of the ones who killed his comrades. That actually makes our job easier. Gobineau is an outlaw, a man so used to covering his tracks that it comes as easily as breathing to him. The men who have captured him are not, they are knights, trained warriors too arrogant to cover their tracks, too certain of their own abilities to bother about such things.
‘We’ll find them,’ Brunner repeated. ‘My concern is what will be waiting for us when we do.’
The waning light cast by the setting sun did little to disconcert the croaking ravens gathered about the broken corpse. The hungry birds had been drawn by the smell of death hovering over the lands in which the dragon now roamed. But there was little left in Malok’s wake upon which to feed, only cinders and ash. So it was that the body lying upon the sandy bank of the Grismerie River provided a welcome meal for many hungry creatures. For long hours, their sharp beaks pecked away at the exposed flesh, trying to dig fresh morsels from beneath the coat of steel plate that encased much of the corpse.
One raven picked at the back of the face-down corpse’s neck, throwing its head back and letting another sliver of meat slide down its gullet. But the bird had eaten its last: with the retreat of the sun, a new vitality filled the dead thing sprawled beneath the raven’s claws. The bird croaked in fright, but as it rose to take flight, a powerful grip closed about it. The raven struggled to free itself even as its former meal shifted its body and rose from the sand.
Corbus glared at the scavenger, then lifted the struggling bird to his mangled, freshly burned face. The vampire’s jaws clamped about the raven’s body, swiftly draining it of the tiny amount of blood coursing through its veins. It was a pathetic meal, and did nothing to satisfy the vampire’s growing thirst. But it would nourish the monster, give him strength to find other, more satisfactory prey.
The undead knight threw the broken bird from him, then closed his hands about the wooden shaft protruding from his side. It had been a near thing: the treacherous assassin had nearly killed him with his dishonourable deceits. The salt had badly burned his already mutilated face, but the stake had come near to destroying him. Only the mail he wore beneath his plate armour had prevented the bounty hunter’s blow from piercing deep enough to penetrate his heart. To come so close to destruction when he was so near to redemption was a thought that made Corbus seethe with fury. The assassin would suffer for the indignities he had heaped upon him. By the oaths he had sworn to the Blood Dragons, Brunner would be a long time in meeting his end.
The vampire’s jaws distended to utter a long painful howl as, with a tremendous effort, Corbus ripped the stake from his body, casting it into the swift moving waters of the Grismerie.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Gobineau cursed again the fickleness of Ranald, god of thieves. Things had seemed to be going so well for him. He’d escaped from the vengeful Duc Marimund and the blighted city of Mousillon, left the notorious bounty killer Brunner buried beneath an entire castle, and made the rather profound discovery that the hoary old elf artefact actually was able to do what myth claimed it could do: summon dragons. Gobineau had just decided on a course of action to exploit his discovery when misfortune had again reared its ugly head. The wizard Rudol had found him, no doubt by some sorcerous means. At first Gobineau had counted himself lucky yet again, making good his escape while Rudol’s men slaughtered the sorry remains of Hubolt’s bandit gang.
But things had taken a bizarre turn then. Two of Rudol’s men had ridden off in immediate pursuit of him, determined that no one should escape the massacre. Even so, their horses had been chosen for war, while Gobineau’s had been selected for speed. It should have proven an easy matter to elude his pursuit. Then the same compulsion that had nearly claimed him when the ambush had been sprung came over him once again. Instead of fleeing, Gobineau had turned his steed around, charging headlong into his pursuers. One of the men he had struck down with the edge of his sword, but the other had exploited the demise of his comrade, slashing at Gobineau’s horse and causing the injured animal to hurl the outlaw from the saddle. Gobineau had struck the ground hard, and before he could recover his wits, the remaining soldier had disarmed him and bound his hands.
The outlaw had considered that his luck might have been restored when he was brought back to Rudol and the wizard did not kill him outright. The conjurer had immediately relieved Gobineau of the Fell Fang. The outlaw viewed the theft with a surprising degree of relief, something working on a primal level within his soul taking joy in the absence of the enchanted artefact. Then things had started getting worse. First Gobineau learn
ed that the men aiding Rudol were soldiers in the service of the Viscount Augustine de Chegney, a man infamous for his cruelty and villainy. Then he had learned why Rudol had not killed him as the wizard began interrogating the rogue regarding Gobineau’s experience with the Fell Fang and how the talisman was employed. For all of his knowledge of legend and lore, the wizard knew far too little about the treasure he coveted.
Gobineau shuddered as he considered their present destination, and the reason Rudol continued to suffer the outlaw to live.
Sir Thierswind rode at the head of the small column of riders, the wizard Rudol beside him. Though the knight towered over the wizard, everything about him dwarfing the thin sorcerer, there was no mistaking the subdued air that hovered about him as he spoke with his companion.
‘Why do we not simply return to the Chateau de Chegney?’ Thierswind asked once again.
Rudol gave the knight a thin, irritated smile. The professional warrior was becoming even more obnoxious now than he had been with his pompous ego intact. Thierswind kept asking the same question over and again, as though Rudol might change the answer.
‘We must ensure that the Fell Fang will do what it is supposed to do,’ the wizard told him. ‘The viscount would not be terribly forgiving if we presented him with an artefact that does not work. I would rather not trust to his forgiveness if such a thing were to happen, would you?’ Rudol turned his attention back to the road ahead. ‘We shall find the dragon, and make certain that it will obey the will of he who holds the Fell Fang. Only then will the viscount hear of our success.’
‘The bandit,’ Thierswind said, gesturing to the centre of the column where the bound outlaw rode the horse of the man he had killed. ‘Why keep him alive?’
Rudol was beginning to understand why a suspicious despot like de Chegney trusted a man like Thierswind to command his troops. The man had probably never had an original idea in his life.
