CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The first indication that he was approaching his destination was the sound of music echoing through the trees, and the welcoming orange glow of firelight. A bonfire had been built in the centre of a clearing up ahead, and sounds of laughter and revelry followed the light from the flickering flames as they diffused through the surrounding undergrowth. A small part of his mind urged caution. The memory of the beastmen was still strong, but the voices were unmistakably human, and he picked up his pace, eager to join them. Quite why he couldn’t have said, but the impulse which had guided him here was stronger than ever.
Now that he had light to see the going was easier, and he was unsurprised to recognise his new surroundings. The trees here were drooping, their leaves turning brown, and their trunks infested with fungus and other growths. The sweet stench of rot and decay were everywhere, although somehow the odour seemed pleasant and invigorating, like the incense Father Antrobus burned in the village temple.
He reached the edge of the clearing and blinked in amazement, his eyes dazzled for a moment by the roaring flames. Masked figures capered and danced a few feet away from him, drinking wine and devouring foodstuffs which ought by rights to have turned their stomachs as though they were the finest of delicacies. The sweetmeats crawled with maggots, the fruits were putrefying, and there were other, fouler things he was grateful not to be able to identify. Curiously he felt no nausea at the sight.
Despite the masks they wore, he had little difficulty recognising many of the revellers. Kirstin danced by, almost devoid of clothing, clearly living up to her reputation with enthusiasm. Her torso was speckled with the rash of the pestilence, although it didn’t seem to have weakened her. Quite the reverse, she danced and capered with preternatural energy. As he tore his eyes away from her he realised that many of the others were similarly unclad, and displayed rashes, pustules, and other signs of infection like badges of honour.
“Rudi! You found us!” His father shouldered his way through the throng, bellowing a welcome, a flagon of what looked like ale in his hand. His shirt was off, displaying the vivid discolouration of his arm and chest which had so worried Rudi. Many of the revellers were staring at it with what looked like naked envy. “I knew you would!”
“What’s going on?” Rudi was babbling, he knew that, but his bewilderment was almost overpowering. “I got worried and came looking for you…”
“Drawn to this sacred spot.” Magnus was there too, shrouded in a bile green cloak embroidered with patterns that echoed strongly in Rudi’s mind. As he gazed at them he felt the slipping away of his sense of self that he’d experienced walking the furrows in Altman’s field. The merchant laid a reassuring hand on Rudi’s forearm. “All part of the destiny which was foretold. Hail the vessel!”
This last phrase was delivered in a bellow, which echoed around the clearing, to be picked up and reechoed by the dancing revellers.
“Hail the vessel! Hail the vessel!” Rudi felt his head begin to spin with the strangeness of it all. Deep down in the core of his being a tiny voice screamed at him to flee, that this was wrong, very wrong. But confusion, and the instinct which had drawn him here, held him irresolute. After all, he knew most of these people and he trusted his father and Magnus more than anyone else in the world. Surely this would all make sense soon enough.
“I don’t understand,” he said, looking from one to the other. Gunther smiled, and patted him on the shoulder.
“You will,” he promised, “and it will be more glorious than you can possibly imagine.” He took a deep draught of his ale, in which something seemed to be floating. Magnus nodded.
“Even now your grandfather’s blessing is working through your veins. Can’t you feel it?” Rudi shook his head numbly. Magnus went on, enraptured. “The heat in your blood, the ripeness in your skin…”
“I feel fine,” Rudi said. “Just confused.” Kirstin capered past again, catching his arm, and swinging him playfully around. Before he could react she kissed him full on the mouth, her tongue entangling with his. Startled, Rudi jumped and pulled away. The girl stared at him in bemused disappointment.
“He’s unblessed!” she said, in tones of complete disbelief. “His body’s not prepared!”
“What?” Magnus turned to glare at her, an expression of barely-contained anger curdling his features. “You told me he’d eaten it!”
“Well he took it!” She glared back, arguing as though they were equals rather than master and servant. “I gave it to him myself!”
“Gave me what?” Rudi asked, his confusion growing ever stronger.
“We’ll have to wait,” Gunther suggested, as though he wasn’t even there. “If we go ahead now it’ll be free!”
“We can’t wait!” Magnus retorted. “We’ve spent too much time preparing. The stars are in the right alignment. It’s tonight or never!”
“It’s too dangerous,” Gunther insisted, all trace of his previous good humour gone. “It’ll slaughter us all!”
“What will?” Rudi asked, feeling that he almost understood.
“Not if the wards hold,” Kirstin said firmly. Magnus nodded in agreement.
“They must do. The omens are right. Grandfather told us that when he blessed your arm.” He indicated Gunther’s swollen, discoloured limb. “That’s when we began to prepare the way, and it’s all gone perfectly. Even the beastmen arriving served our cause, and deflected attention away from us.”
“I suppose so.” Gunther nodded reluctantly. “What else can we do?”
“Precisely.” Magnus nodded again. “That idiot witch hunter won’t waste his time chasing mutants forever. When he’s finished with the healer he’ll turn on us, unless we finish it tonight.”
“Greta?” Rudi grabbed Magnus by the arm. “What’s this got to do with her?” Magnus shrugged.
“She suspects something, I’m sure. But I doubt she’ll be able to convince the witch hunter of anything. She’s got secrets of her own to hide.”
“Gerhard’s after her?” For all his confusion this was one thing that Rudi could understand. He took a step towards the edge of the clearing. “We have to warn her!”
“I don’t think so, lad.” Gunther took a step to bar his way. “Let the witch take care of herself, if she can. We’ve more important business here tonight.”
“What business?” Rudi asked, relieved to be finally getting some kind of explanation. Abruptly he became aware that the crowd of revellers was getting closer, hemming him in. He tried to take another step, but Kirstin draped herself around him, and someone else took hold of his upper arm. Irritated he tried to tug it free, and the grip tightened, to be joined by another, then a couple more. In a moment he would be completely immobilised…
Someone screamed, and the crush of bodies around him abruptly lessened. For a moment he struggled to identify the hissing sound which permeated the air. Then recognition hit. Arrows in flight, dozens of them, their trajectories abruptly terminated in the dull wet thwack! of impact against flesh. As the revellers scattered, leaving several of their number screaming on the ground, a chorus of bleats, barks and howls echoed from the surrounding woods.
“Beastmen!” Gunther screamed, hurling his ale pot at a charging mass of horns and matted hair. Heavy pewter met thick skull with an audible thud, checking the creature in its tracks, and Gunther charged forward, his diseased arm outstretched. It met the beastman’s descending cudgel and wrested it from the creature’s grasp. Gunther’s other hand punched it hard in the gut.
How he fared after that Rudi couldn’t tell, as the confused tide of combat swept them apart.
“Quickly!” Magnus bellowed, drawing a couple of daggers from under his robe and throwing one to Kirstin. “Before it’s too late!” A charging beastman grabbed the cowl of his robe and yanked him backwards; Magnus twisted, and stabbed the creature in the stomach. Kirstin turned to face Rudi, a smile on her face, and before he had time to realise what she was doing aimed a thrust at his heart.
Ti
me seemed to slow. The sharp point of the weapon travelled towards him while his muscles refused to respond. They started working again far too sluggishly to preserve his life.
“Why…?” he began, at a complete loss to understand, then something large and agile sprang into the gap between them. A huge, talon-tipped hand enveloped the girl’s, twisting it back with a snap of bone. Kirstin screamed, more from frustration than pain.
“Little girls shouldn’t play with knives.” Hans Katzenjammer looked down at her, malicious glee sparking in his trio of eyes. Kirstin spat at him, and tried to kick him between the legs. Before she could complete the motion Hans slashed the talons of his other hand across her throat, releasing a fountain of blood. He watched her fall, spasming, and laughed. He turned to Rudi, who was rooted to the spot, his head spinning. “Still here?” he asked, conversationally. “You’re even stupider than I thought you were.”
“Stay back. I’m warning you…” Rudi fumbled for an arrow, nocking it with trembling fingers.
Hans laughed again; the firelight glinted from the razor-edged fangs that now filled his mouth. His chest was decorated with a crudely daubed sigil, drawn in something that looked suspiciously like blood. Rudi recognised it as the mark worn by the dead beastman in Altman’s field. And once again he had the sense of having seen it somewhere else before, but couldn’t put his finger on where.
“I just saved your life. If you want to keep it, run.” Hans turned away, as though his old enemy was of no interest at all, and lunged after a fleeing cultist. The man’s scream was loud, and abruptly terminated.
Rudi needed no further urging, and made for the safety of the surrounding trees. Around him all was confusion and slaughter, a cacophony of screams, bestial braying, and the stench of blood. Bodies cannoned into him, in flight or pursuit he couldn’t tell which, and several times he stumbled over corpses. Once his foot caught in something that crunched under his weight; hardly daring to look down, he found his boot entangled in the wreckage of a lute.
After what seemed an eternity he made it to the refuge of the trees unmolested, and collapsed in the lee of a scraggly bush which had managed to retain enough of its foliage to afford him a measure of concealment. He gasped for breath, sucking in the rancid air, and trying to still the kettledrum beating of his heart.
His father! The thought struck him like a blow to the head. Gunther was still in the clearing, fighting for his life. He had to go back, had to help him… He turned, finding his bow still clenched in his left hand, and to his immense surprise the arrow he’d tried to nock still grasped in his right. He fitted it to the string, trying to still the trembling in his hands, and slunk towards the firelight again. The sounds of combat had diminished in volume now, most of the revellers surely dead or put to flight.
Concealing himself behind the crumbling trunk of a dead tree, he peered cautiously into the clearing. A few struggling figures were still on their feet though most of them had been run through or were battered to the ground as he watched. The churned-up ground was littered with corpses, most of them human, but there were a handful of the beastmen down too. With a mounting sense of dread Rudi scanned the bloodied revenants, searching for a face he hoped not to find…
A roar louder than the others drew his attention, and his head snapped round. The giant beastman he’d seen in the clearing was battling furiously with a man who barely reached its chest, but who was driving it back with swings of a cudgel. As Rudi watched the man raised the crude weapon to block a downward stroke of the creature’s sword. Just then his face came into view, and Rudi felt a violent spasm of relief shake his body. Gunther! His father was still alive!
Trembling he drew back the bow, and stilled his breath. He tried not to think about his ineptitude with the weapon. His aim had to be true. There was no margin for error here. The muscles of his back and arms fluttered with the strain of keeping the weapon at full draw as he waited for a clear shot. But the two figures were moving so fast, their intricate dance of death so close, that there seemed no separation between them. Rudi’s palms felt clammy, his breath was coming in short gasps and he fought to remain still. But the harder he tried the more the point of his arrow wavered.
“Damn!” The string slipped from his fingers, his arm jerked, and the arrow flew wide, disappearing somewhere in the dazzle of the flames. Almost at the same moment the giant beastman howled in triumph as it hacked down at Gunther. A bright spray of arterial gore spattered the creature’s matted hide.
“Sigmar, no!” Rudi might have shouted out his horror and grief, he never knew, but the bellowing of the beastmen drowned any noise he could have made. Hot tears stung his eyes for a moment, and as he wiped them clear he saw the creature stop where it was and sniff the air. Then it bawled something in the bestial tongue he’d heard the creatures employ before.
To Rudi’s amazement the entire herd fell silent, and turned to look at the giant. It bellowed something else, and gestured with its vast, deformed hand. Gradually the beastmen began to slip away into the forest. Within moments all were gone, except for the giant, and the mutated form of Hans Katzenjammer. They seemed to confer for a moment, then to his horror their heads turned, and both appeared to be looking right at him.
His heart seemed to stop briefly, but then it resumed, beating in a harsh, staccato rhythm. He began to reach for another arrow, already certain that it would be futile. He hadn’t been able to shoot well enough to save his father’s life, and he doubted that he’d be any better at preserving his own. Then he sagged with relief. The two figures turned away, to follow the rest of the herd.
Just as he reached the tree line Hans turned back for a moment. He gazed in Rudi’s direction again, and raised a hand in an ironic farewell.
So they had seen him! Then why hadn’t they come after him? Come to that, why had Hans saved his life after threatening to kill him the last time they met, and why had Kirstin tried to stab him? His head buzzed with questions, as loudly and insistently as the swarm of flies which had settled eagerly on the blanket of corpses covering the rotting grass, feasting on the fluids that leaked from their burst-open flesh.
Hesitantly he took a step into the charnel house, still vividly illuminated by the roaring bonfire. Though he’d seen his father cut down with his own eyes, he couldn’t just turn and leave. A faint flicker of hope remained that he had only been wounded, and might yet recover. A few faint moans echoed his thoughts, although he hardly dared turn aside from his goal to track them to their sources for fear of what he might find. After he’d found his father, he told himself, he’d look for other wounded and try to help them too.
“Father?” He knelt next to the body of the man who’d raised him, and held out a trembling hand to feel for signs of a pulse. This was the only family he’d ever known. But he knew it would be futile. Gunther was drenched in his own blood, his face a mask of it, and the torrent flowing from the gash in his neck and chest had already slowed to a trickle. The wound was terrible; it cleaved down into his torso like an axe blow through a tree stump. Rudi’s breath caught in his throat, a hard knot of emptiness lodging deep beneath his breastbone. “Father!” His vision was blurring, his eyes hot.
“Rudi…” Impossibly, an eye forced itself open in the thick veneer of gore obscuring the forester’s features. Hope flared for a moment before withering in the face of inescapable logic. By rights Gunther should be dead already, his soul clinging to his body only by an act of superhuman will, and it was impossible to believe he could last any longer than a handful of heartbeats. “Listen…” Gunther’s voice trailed away.
“What?” Rudi couldn’t contain the questions. Now they were bubbling up inside him, forcing their way out. “What was happening here? Why were you…”
“Magnus. Find Magnus…”
“Everyone’s dead!” The words burst out of him like stones from a cannon. But as he turned his head, the distinctive green cape was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps the merchant had survived after all… Another questio
n slipped from his lips almost before he was aware that he was asking it. “He mentioned my grandfather. Did he know my family?” The idea was stunning, the concept so strange it was all he could do to articulate it. “Did he know where I came from?”
“Magnus knows…” Gunther spasmed, his breath escaping in a long, rattling gasp, and went limp. The single exposed eye went glassy and unfocussed. The last faint vestiges of hope in Rudi’s chest evaporated, leaving only a howling void of loss. Too numb to mourn, he stood up slowly, and scanned the scene of desolation for some sign of Magnus. The leaping flames illuminated everything vividly. Scenes of butchery were seared into his retina from wherever he looked. He stumbled through the carnage almost without volition, trying to make sense of his adoptive father’s last words. If the merchant had known who his real family was then why hadn’t he said anything before now? Perhaps it was already too late to find out, and Magnus had taken the secret to his grave.
A flash of green caught his eye, and he turned, his heart seeming to stop for a moment. Magnus’ distinctive cape lay on the ground, ripped and bloodied. For an instant he thought the body next to it was that of the merchant himself, but as he took a step or two closer he realised that it was one of the villagers whose name he didn’t know.
Before he could investigate further, his attention was caught by the unmistakable sound of movement through the underbrush. Galvanised, and dreading the return of the beastmen, he ran for the edge of the forest. As before he found the cover of a convenient bush and went to ground, sure that the bright illumination of the fire would prevent anyone seeing him in the surrounding darkness. He could just have kept going, and part of him urged him to do so, but he wanted to see who or what else was abroad in the forest tonight.
Raised voices echoed around the clearing. It was the welcome sound of Reikspiel instead of the harsh gutturals he’d half expected, a surge of relief almost sent him out into the light to greet whoever it was. But a growing sense of caution held him back.
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