The Corrupted

by Robert Earl - (ebook by Undead)

  There was a noise, too: a constant roar, almost like the sound of the ocean.

  “Just along here, sir.” The guards led them up another flight of steps. There was a wide hall at the top, and maybe two dozen armed men lounging around it. They looked at the prisoners curiously, and a couple of them sauntered over.

  “Are these the ones who wanted a breath of fresh air?” one asked, and there was a ripple of laughter.

  “Just open the doors,” the escort replied. “Let’s get this over with.”

  The guard muttered something obscene, handed his halberd to his mate and turned to unlock the door. When the last of the tumblers had clicked open, he turned to his men.

  “Come on you lot. Form up!” he shouted. The men reluctantly picked up their weapons and gathered around him. Only then did he push the door open and, squaring his shoulders, led them into the world outside.

  After the quiet of the dungeon, Vaught found the roar of the crowd outside almost deafening. He squinted in the sunlight, his eyes tearing up as he followed the guards into the prison yard.

  It stank. The smell of faeces and unwashed bodies hung in the air, trapped by the walls that towered up on every side. Vaught glanced up and saw archers silhouetted against the sky, their crossbows resting on their shoulders.

  A mass of humanity surged around them. There must have been over a thousand people here, a seething tide of ragged prisoners, and as the little column emerged they stared with the hungry curiosity of caged wolves.

  “Keep your shoulders back and your eyes straight ahead,” the guards told the witch hunters as they moved them forwards.

  “Eyes straight ahead!”

  The crowd parted reluctantly in their wake. They eyed the new prisoners with a dangerous interest, their hands disappearing into their rags to finger hidden weapons.

  Then, the sound of a winch started to echo and squeak between the walls, and the crowd shifted uneasily. Vaught could see some emotion ripple through them, an anxiety that creased even the hardest faces as they turned towards the sound.

  Then the chant started, apparently from all sides at once.

  “In the ’ole!”

  The guards looked back at the witch hunters, and then hurriedly looked away. As one man, they had stood straighter, squared their shoulders, and hardened their faces.

  “In the ’ole! In the ’ole!”

  Feet started stamping a rhythm, and Vaught felt the hairs on the back of his neck raise. There was an exhilaration in the air, a near terror that reminded him of the final few seconds before the start of a battle.

  Above, the guards shifted on the walls, their crossbows sorting through the mob for likely targets.

  “In the ’ole!”

  Thousands of feet stamped.

  “In the ’ole!”

  Thousands of hands clapped.

  “In the ’ole.”

  “What’s that they’re saying?” Peik shouted to Fargo, his eyes wide as he looked around him.

  “Sigmar knows.” Fargo shouted back. “Some northern nonsense or other.”

  “In the ’ole!”

  “It sounds like they’re saying ‘in the hole’,” Peik offered, waiting for a pause in the chanting and shouting over the stomping of feet.

  “What’s that?” Fargo shouted back, but then the crowd parted and he could see.

  Ahead of them, a granite blockhouse squatted in the centre of the yard. The rough hewn stones of its construction were massive, easily as big as a man, and the solid iron of its portcullis door had been winched up. There were more armed men inside, and torches, and the guards quickened their step as they approached.

  “What’s this?” Vaught asked one of them, and paused.

  The column halted behind him, and the chanting of the inmates degenerated into a storm of jeers and catcalls.

  “It’s the way to your courtyard,” the leading guard shouted over the din. He looked around nervously. “Come on, let’s keep moving. Don’t want to start a riot, do you?”

  “Why should we start a riot?”

  “Look around you. They want out too.”

  Vaught looked. Then he led his men into the gateway. When the last of them were inside, the portcullis dropped.

  The guards sagged with relief, and their chief turned towards Vaught.

  “They always get a bit lively when we have gentlemen like you in,” he explained. “Now then, we will take the cuffs off you one at a time, but I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to wait in the… in the tunnel for now. The gaoler himself wants to escort you on your way.”

  The witch hunters watched as the guards opened the trapdoor that lay in the centre of the blockhouse. Apart from the portcullis, it seemed to be the only way out of the place. Vaught and Fargo exchanged a glance.

  “We are supposed to be going outside,” Vaught frowned. The guard nodded eagerly as he sorted through his bunch of keys.

  “Yes, you are. That’s the way. You’ll go through a tunnel. Now then, who’s first?”

  Vaught offered his wrists, and the guard unlocked the manacles.

  “There you go sir,” he grinned wide enough to show all three of his teeth. “Now, if you’d just step down into the tunnel. Here, Ivan, give the gentleman the lantern.”

  One of the guards handed it over, and Vaught, the hairs on the back of his neck starting to prickle with unease, took it from him as he climbed down into the tunnel. The stairs were ancient, the living stone of them worn smooth by Sigmar alone knew how many years, and the walls sweated moisture.

  Ahead, there was a scurry of movement. Something pale appeared in the darkness and then was gone, so fleetingly that it might never have been there.

  “If you’d just wait at the bottom, sir,” the chief of the guards called down. “This shouldn’t take long.”

  Vaught took another couple of steps down as, one by one, his men were released, and sent down into the darkness with him.

  “Notice how there aren’t any candles in the walls?” Fargo muttered as he stood beside his captain.

  “There weren’t any in the other place,” Vaught reminded him.

  “At least there were spaces for them.”

  The clang of the trapdoor ended the conversation. The boom of it echoed down past the witch hunters and into the darkness beyond. The flickering light of their single lamp suddenly seemed horribly inadequate.

  Vaught scowled as he marched back up the steps.

  “Guards,” he called, his voice curt. “Guards!”

  He rapped his fist against the underside of the trapdoor. For the first time, he realised that it was metal plated.

  There was a clink, and a slit appeared in the centre of it.

  “What can I do for you, gentlemen?”

  There was no mistaking the contempt in the voice, nor in the laughter which followed it.

  “The gaoler has ordered us released into the fresh air,” Vaught said, although he knew that he should have trusted his instincts.

  More laughter and catcalls.

  “Well you’ve been released, sir. What goes on in the hole is nothing to do with us. You should have got someone to pay your bills. Even the scum in the yard can afford a copper every now and again.”

  Vaught and Fargo exchanged a glance, their eyes glittering in the darkness.

  “The prince regent will pay for our battels, as was agreed.”

  “Don’t waste your breath. The gaoler got a reply from him a couple of hours ago. Seems your prince doesn’t know you from an orc’s uncle. Most upset he was, and most insistent that you be given more suitable accommodation.”

  “When the prince regent hears of this,” Vaught said with a confidence he didn’t feel, “there will be trouble for your master. Best to tell him that.”

  There was a harsh chuckle.

  “I’m not telling him anything, the mood he’s in. I will tell you this much, though, the ones who last longest down there are the ones who stop screaming and start moving. It’s amazing how long some of
them last.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t you realise where you are, you fool? You’re in the hole. Don’t you realise that? Once you’re in there you never come back up. You’ll never see sunlight, or women, or ale.” He lowered his voice into a malicious whisper. “If I was you, maybe I would keep making noise. Best to get taken quick, perhaps, before you have a chance to suffer too much.”

  Before Vaught could reply, the viewing slit was closed, and with a farewell curse, the voices of the guards faded.

  “See,” Peik said, sounding pleased with himself, “I told you they were saying ‘in the hole’.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “Where have you been?” Titus snapped as Kerr staggered into the room. “The sun rose an hour ago!”

  “Sorry, boss,” Kerr muttered, and dragged his fingers through the tangle of his hair. “I’ll go and get some breakfast.”

  “Wait a minute,” the wizard said reluctantly. “Where have you been all night?”

  “I was caught in the curfew.”

  “Caught in the…” Titus sputtered to a halt. “What about the phantoms?”

  Kerr looked at him, his eyes bright above the grey hollows.

  “You knew about them?”

  “Of course, everybody knows about them. The streets of Praag are built from hungry stones. They try to hold on to the spirits of the dead when it’s their time to leave. Why do you think everybody is cremated outside the city?”

  Kerr sat down.

  “I didn’t know. I do now, though. They were horrible.”

  Titus’ concern evaporated beneath the heat of his curiosity.

  “Horrible? Could you see them? Opinions vary. Some say that seeing the phantoms is the mark of a wizard, although others say not. Last year, one of our order even travelled here to find out once and for all. We never did find out what happened to him.”

  If Kerr felt offended by his master’s callous indifference, he gave no sign of it. He was too tired.

  “Well?” Titus prompted as his eyelids began to droop. “Did you see them?”

  “They were mostly just voices. They shrieked and cried, and one of them even talked to me.”

  “Aha! A Stahlwerden. They’re very dangerous. You’re lucky to have made it back.”

  Kerr nodded.

  “I have this to thank.” He unclenched his fist to reveal the stone. It was greasy with sweat, and his palm was pink from grasping it. “I was holding it when I hit the… What did you call it?”

  “The Stahlwerden,” Titus said.

  “Yes, that’s it, but when I hit it with this in my hand there was an explosion of light and it went. I think I killed it.”

  “Can’t have done,” Titus told him, waddling over to take the stone from his apprentice’s hand. “It was already dead, and anyway, this rock has no power. It’s just a thing to practise on, like the knitting.”

  The wizard weighed the stone in his own podgy hand before returning it to Kerr.

  “It worked, though,” Kerr said. “I hit the… the ghost and it exploded.”

  Titus looked at him, eyes as expressionless as glass.

  “As you say,” he decided at length, “and then what happened?”

  “I got lost. I couldn’t find my way back until daybreak.”

  “Fascinating,” Titus said, and wandered over to the diamond paned window, “but we have more important things to worry about.”

  “Yes,” said Kerr pulling himself to his feet. “I could smell breakfast cooking as I came in.”

  “I meant finding our target,” Titus sniffed. “Although, as you mention it, some sustenance might be a good idea; but as soon as we’ve eaten it’s straight back to work. That idiot Grendel’s a lot more slippery than I thought he’d be. He must be eschewing the use of our craft in order to remain hidden. I wouldn’t have thought that he would have the wits.”

  Tongues of purple fire flickered around Grendel’s body as he worked. He didn’t seem to notice the flames, even those that developed lascivious faces before fading.

  Sweat poured off him, dripping from his sharp nose onto the ingredients before him. He didn’t think that it mattered. The concoction that he had dreamt of the night before was a robust enough combination. A few impurities wouldn’t make any difference to it, and even if they did, what of it? His master wouldn’t mind.

  Grendel giggled at the thought, and started to grind some fragments of bone in a pestle and mortar.

  He really wasn’t sure what the potion was going to do. In the nightmare… no, in the dream… he had seen the beginnings of something wonderful: something that would make Zhukovsky’s coven worthy of the attention of Slaanesh himself.

  Grendel swatted at a flash of violet light that shimmered in front of his eyes. It had assumed an obscene form, but the sorcerer had no time for such distractions. Now, he was creating.

  He blinked sweat out of his eyes and pressed a fingertip into the powdered bone. Deciding that it was fine enough, he poured it into a vase of finest Cathayan porcelain. Then he turned back to rummage around through his supplies. Although he had no idea what he was looking for, his bony fingers rustled through the merchandise as confidently as rats through a barn.

  “Aha!” he said, lifting a bundle of feathers clear. They were long and luxuriant, and shot through with iridescent colours.

  Grendel lit a candle, and then held the feathers over the pot and burned them. The acrid smell of burning filled the room, and Grendel giggled again.

  Had magic ever been so much fun? He didn’t think so. It had been all reading and study, and endless rules and restrictions; not at all like this freedom.

  Not at all like this power.

  He paused for a moment and gazed rapturously into space. In a couple of days, the coven would assemble, and then what a work of art he would make of them. What a masterpiece! And all to the greater glory of Slaanesh, greatest of all the gods.

  Tears of joy slid unnoticed into his beard, and he started work again.

  “Toadstools,” he muttered as he searched amongst the detritus that filled the room. “Toadstools, toadstools, toadstools.”

  Behind him, a snap of green lightning arced from one wall to another. A rind of fungus sprouted from the area where it struck. Grendel took no notice of it as he rummaged around.

  “Aha, here it is,” he said and, his scrawny form glowing with energy, he continued with his preparations.

  Kerr had barely finished clearing Titus’ breakfast things away when the first of his informants appeared at the inn. It was the boy who had tried to pick his pocket, and this time he was not alone. Half a dozen other lads stood behind him, huddled in one corner of the inn’s small yard.

  They stared at Kerr with a frank interest as their leader spoke.

  “I reckon we’ve found your man, your lordship,” he said. Aware of his audience, he stood tall. With thumbs hooked around the strings that served him as braces, and with his chin held high, he looked like a miniature version of the innkeeper himself.

  “Found our man, have you?” Kerr asked, returning the level gaze.

  “Southlander you said, sir with a funny accent like your own. Sort of whiny like.”

  Kerr bit back the retort that sprang to mind, and nodded.

  “I’ve seen him with my own eyes.”

  “You might have seen him,” Kerr allowed, “but what exactly was this fellow like?”

  “Big, just like you said. Wide across the chest and with arms like hams. He had a beard just like you said, too, and a wild look about him. Is he a murderer or something?”

  Kerr frowned.

  “No, not really. That doesn’t sound like him either.”

  The informant’s face fell, and his shoulders slumped.

  “You ain’t just saying that? I mean, I can tell you where this fellow is. You won’t find him without us.”

  “Sorry,” Kerr said, and he meant it. He hadn’t been long enough out of the gutter to forget what it was like. “Our boy isn
’t big anywhere, apart from straight up.”

  One of the other urchins tugged at his leader’s arm and whispered something into his ear.

  “We know of some other southlanders,” the representative said, turning back to Kerr. “They’re smaller, but they aren’t much. They barely have enough coin for their inn.”

  Kerr frowned.

  “How many of them are there?”

  Another muffled conversation ensued.

  “About six.”

  Again, Kerr shook his head.

  “No, not them then, the fellow we’re after is alone.”

  There was another huddle, but their optimism was waning. Even their leader had lost his confidence.

  “The only other one we know of is some sort of aristo,” he frowned. “Lanky he is, and crazy.”

  “Oh?” Kerr licked his lips and tried not to look too enthusiastic.

  “That’s right. Ert here saw him going into… Well, going into a certain building.”

  “Which one is Ert?” Kerr asked, looking at the huddle of children before him. There seemed to be even more of them now than there had been a moment before, and not a one above ten years old.

  “This is Ert,” their leader said, and pushed one of their number reluctantly forwards. Although he couldn’t have been more than eight or nine, he had the biggest and the grimiest ears that Kerr had ever seen.

  “Well then Ert,” he said, kneeling down so that they were on eye level, “tell us about this man you’ve seen.”

  Ert swallowed and looked at his friends for reassurance. They encouraged him with a flurry of pinches and prods.

  “Tall,” he blurted out, “very tall. He had a beard too, and fine clothes, but dirty.”

  Kerr nodded encouragement.

  “Anything else?”

  “Not really. Only he was with Count Zhukovsky.”

  The name was drowned out by a chorus of disapproving voices, and his friends pulled him back into their midst.

  “Of course,” their leader hurriedly took over the talking again. “Ert don’t know where he saw your man, or when. Or even which aristo he was with exactly.”