Bloodborn

by Nathan Long

  As they neared the house of Guildmaster Eggert Aldrich, Gabriella signalled the coach to stop, then turned to Rodrik and Lotte. ‘You must leave us here. Take the baggage wagon and find a nearby inn. I will contact you again tomorrow night once I know the lay of the land at this new place.’

  ‘But, mistress,’ said Rodrik. ‘I am your champion. I must not leave your side.’

  ‘And who will dress you, m’lady?’ asked Lotte.

  ‘I’m sorry, Rodrik,’ said Gabriella. ‘My job is to woo this Aldrich and win my way into his heart and home. Until I have done that it would not do to seem to have a rival for his affections. And Ulrika will act as maid, at least for now, Lotte. For I need a spy more than I need a dresser at the moment. Now go, both of you. I will send for you soon.’

  Rodrik shot a dark look at Ulrika, then thrust through the coach door with more force than necessary. Lotte ducked her head sadly and followed.

  On the snowy street, Rodrik bowed coldly to Gabriella. ‘I pray for your safety, mistress.’ Then he closed the door.

  Gabriella laughed and shook her head. ‘As faithful as a dog, and as stupid.’ She rapped on the wall of the coach. ‘Drive on!’

  The coach stopped in front of a sturdy, prosperous-looking townhouse in the Kaufman District, where all the houses were sturdy and prosperous-looking, and a bit dull. As the countess and Ulrika stepped down onto the drive and approached the white panelled door, Ulrika thought she had never seen a cleaner, more well-kept street, or one with so little character.

  Gabriella knocked, and a few moments later, a thick-set butler in regal black opened the door and looked down his nose at them. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Herr Aldrich, please,’ said Gabriella. ‘It is about his wife.’

  ‘I shall inquire,’ said the butler, then closed and locked the door again.

  After another short wait, the sound of hurried footsteps could be heard within, then the locks turned and the door flew open to reveal a wild-eyed and panting fat man staring at them, his breeches hastily pulled on under his night shirt.

  ‘What do you know of my wife!’ he cried. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘I cannot tell you on the street, Herr Aldrich,’ said Gabriella. ‘Will you invite me in?’

  Aldrich’s round face collapsed as he looked at Gabriella, and he staggered back. ‘You… you’re one of her sisters. Oh, Sigmar, it’s bad, isn’t it? Something’s happened.’

  ‘It is bad,’ said Gabriella. ‘May I come in?’

  The guildmaster sobbed and motioned them in, then led them to a dark parlour. When the butler had lit the lamps and withdrawn, he turned to Gabriella with pleading eyes.

  ‘Tell me,’ he said.

  ‘She is dead, mein herr,’ said Gabriella. ‘I am sorry.’

  Aldrich closed his eyes and sagged into a stout wooden armchair. ‘Dead. I knew it. Somehow I knew it.’ He raised his head. ‘But how? What happened?’

  ‘The thing which killed her sisters,’ said Gabriella. ‘It has struck again.’

  Now Aldrich wept in earnest, sobs shaking his big frame as he mopped at his eyes with the tailing cuffs of his nightshirt. Gabriella shifted with impatience, then sat down in the chair next to his and put a comforting hand on his arm. ‘Mein herr, I am truly–’

  Aldrich flung her off. ‘Don’t touch me, leech! This is all your fault! You and your filthy coven with your filthy intrigues. You killed her, as sure as you had wielded the knife yourselves!’

  ‘Mein herr, I assure you–’ started Gabriella, but Aldrich wasn’t finished.

  ‘Alfina wasn’t like you!’ he cried. ‘She was no black-hearted witch! She was good and pure, and only took blood because she had been trapped into becoming something she despised by a cruel trick. She wanted nothing to do with your plots and back-stabbings, but now she has died of them, and you still live! I hate you! Leave me alone!’

  He buried his face in his hands and Gabriella rolled her eyes at Ulrika. Ulrika frowned at the countess’s contempt. The man was a fool, certainly, to believe such a story, but pitiable nonetheless.

  Gabriella tried again, this time putting her hand on Aldrich’s wide neck. ‘Mein herr, I understand your anger, and you are right. Some intrigue has killed Alfina. I came to Nuln to stop the killing, and I am sorry to the bottom of my heart that I was not in time to save her.’

  ‘Have you a heart?’ Aldrich sneered.

  ‘You know Alfina did,’ said Gabriella.

  Aldrich sobbed anew. ‘She did. She did.’

  Gabriella lifted his head and turned it so that she could look into his eyes. ‘I will be honest with you, mein herr. Lady Hermione sent me to quiet you. To seduce you so that you will not go rushing rashly to the witch hunters or the watch.’

  Aldrich blinked, stunned. His mouth dropped open.

  Gabriella smiled sadly. ‘You see. The truth. But I am not so cynical as my sisters. I know that I could never replace Alfina in your heart. I know true love when I see it. I will not try to cozen you. Instead I will respect your grief if you will return the favour and respect our secrets.’

  ‘I… I don’t understand you,’ said the guildmaster.

  Gabriella looked uncomfortable. ‘I must stay here and pretend to beglamour you, for I cannot flout Lady Hermione’s orders, but I will leave you alone to mourn your dear Alfina if you will promise me that you will keep the nature of her death a secret, and not reveal us to the authorities.’

  ‘But, I do not want you here!’ moaned Aldrich. ‘I want Alfina!’

  ‘I assure you, I don’t wish to be here either,’ said Gabriella. ‘But as neither of us has a choice in the matter, I would make our enforced cohabitation as painless as possible.’ She moved her hand to his shoulder. ‘Here. I will make you a promise. You will see me as rarely as I see the sun. Now, do I have your promise?’

  Aldrich shook his head sadly. ‘It seems I must. You have my promise. But… but what am I to say about Alfina? And your presence here?’

  Gabriella let out an almost inaudible sigh of relief. ‘We will work all that out on the morrow. Now, if you will have your servants bring my things to Alfina’s rooms, I will leave you to your grief.’

  There was more weeping upstairs, for Alfina had left behind a maid as well as a husband, but Gabriella silenced the girl, whose name was Imma. There was no time to waste in sweet-talking her like she had Herr Aldrich.

  ‘Do not cry, child,’ Gabriella said, patting her hand as Ulrika quickly changed into her riding clothes on the far side of the room. ‘We will bleed you just as your mistress did. Have no fear. But now you must tell me, why did Alfina leave the house when Hermione ordered her not to? Did someone come to her? Was a note left?’

  ‘I… I don’t know, mistress. None that I saw.’

  ‘And she said nothing before she left?’

  The maid shook her head. ‘She fed very strongly on me this evening. I woke only a little while ago. I didn’t know she… she had gone.’ The girl burst into tears again.

  Hermione gripped Imma’s arm so hard she cried out. ‘Enough of that. Listen to me. Do you know where Madam Dagmar’s brothel is? Can you tell Ulrika how to get there?’

  The girl sniffed and wiped her nose on a handkerchief. ‘I know not, but Uwe, Herr Aldrich’s coachman, was also a blood-swain to my mistress. He took her everywhere.’

  ‘Very good,’ said Gabriella. ‘Then we will rouse him.’ She turned to Ulrika, who was just strapping on her old cavalry sabre. ‘Do not fail me here, beloved,’ she said. ‘And do not lose control. For if you are caught, I cannot protect you. I have not the influence here that I do at home.’

  Ulrika bowed like a Kossar, sharp and correct. ‘I will not fail.’

  As she followed Imma down the back stairs towards the stables, she could hardly keep herself from whooping with excitement. Action and freedom at last!

  CHAPTER
SIX

  THE STENCH OF DEATH

  Herr Aldrich’s coachman took Ulrika through the Altestadt Gate into the Universitat, where the Imperial Gunnery School and the College of Engineering rose like brooding black giants over the roofs of lesser structures, then south to the middle-class commercial district known as the Handelbezirk. This was where most of the business of Nuln occurred, and the walls of the tall, stone and half-timbered buildings that she passed were hung with the signs and plaques of trading companies, exchanges, guild associations and solicitors.

  This deep into the evening, the broadsheet sellers and charm hawkers had gone home and the area was quiet, with only the occasional furtive figure hurrying out of sight, or a patrol of the city watch making its rounds, squelching through the mud and slush with long staffs and lanterns in their hands. It became even quieter as Ulrika’s coach turned off the main streets. Here the buildings were private homes, not as nice or solid as those in the Kaufman District, but still respectable, with glass in the windows and fresh paint on the doors. If this is the neighbourhood of the Silver Lily, thought Ulrika, it must be quite a discreet and high-class establishment.

  A few streets on and the coachman pulled the coach to a stop.

  ‘Just around the corner, lady,’ he said.

  Grinning with pent-up excitement, Ulrika rose and opened the door, then looked cautiously up and down the street. It was dark and quiet. The burghers and their wives were all abed and asleep at this hour. She stepped out and started for the corner.

  ‘Shall I wait, mistress?’ whispered the coachman. ‘You will have difficulty getting back into the Altestadt on foot.’

  Ulrika looked back, then paused. It would be wiser to ask him to stay, but she was sick of coaches, just as she was sick of dresses and wigs and curtseys. It would be much more exciting to find her own way back. ‘You may go,’ she said. ‘I don’t know how long I will be.’

  ‘As you wish, mistress,’ he said, and began to turn the coach about.

  Ulrika stepped to the intersection, feeling freer already. She edged her head around the corner to look down the street on which the Silver Lily had its door, then pulled back quickly as she saw men milling about in front of a nondescript townhouse in the middle of the street. There was no sign above the door, nor red lamps in the windows, yet Ulrika was certain it was the brothel – firstly because every one of its windows was brightly lit, and secondly, because the men before it were Lord von Zechlin and his exquisite gentlemen.

  She was surprised to see them still at the scene of the crime, for it was almost two hours after she and the countess had left Hermione’s house, but there they were. In fact, it looked like they had only recently arrived.

  She smiled to herself as she crouched at the corner to observe. Hermione’s brave heroes had seemed so full of righteous fire when von Zechlin had promised her they would look into the murder, but it appeared they must have stopped at some watering-hole along the way, and were now full of something else entirely. In fact, one of them was being sick on the iron railing in front of the brothel – the same iron railing, Ulrika was certain, upon which Mistress Alfina had been found.

  Von Zechlin was at the door of the Lily, talking to a man in servant’s livery, who was gesturing up and down the street, while the others prowled the snow-rimed cobbled street like drunken scholars looking for a pair of lost spectacles. Ulrika grunted, annoyed, for whatever traces the killer might have left behind, they were no doubt grinding them into the slush under their high-heeled Estalian boots.

  Then one of them gave a great shout and nearly fell over. Von Zechlin and the others ignored him, most likely thinking it drunken clumsiness, but then the gentleman found words to go with his excitement and beckoned them all over, pointing animatedly at the ground.

  His comrades gathered around him in a swaying circle, all jabbering at once until von Zechlin waded through them, pushing them aside, and squatted down in their centre. After a second he called for a lantern, and one of his men fetched one from the brothel and came back.

  Ulrika wondered what they had found. She supposed she should have been wishing them success, as catching the killer was the reason she and her mistress had come to Nuln, but really she hoped it was nothing, so that she would have a chance to find a real clue and give the glory to her mistress. Lady Hermione and her perfumed gentlemen had so far not impressed her in the least.

  A moment later von Zechlin stood, lantern in his left hand, examining something in his right that Ulrika could not make out. Seemingly satisfied, he handed the lantern to one of his men, took out his handkerchief and laid the invisible thing in it and folded it up.

  ‘Back to the house!’ he called, and strode off down the street in the direction of the Altestadt. His men swaggered loosely after him, taking the brothel’s lantern with them, without so much as a thank you or a goodbye.

  Ulrika waited until they were out of sight around the corner, and until the Lily’s servant had closed the front door, then she hurried forwards to where the men had been squatting. The spot was a wide oval mud hole where the cobbles had come up, half pooled with icy water from the melting snow. Ulrika knelt beside it and peered into it. With her night vision, she needed no lantern to see immediately what the men must have been looking at.

  A set of large paw prints was pressed into the mud, made either by a big dog or perhaps a wolf, and also, matted in the muck, big tufts of black fur. Ulrika looked at the surrounding cobbles and saw more tufts there, as if they had been pulled out during a fight. It must have been one of these that von Zechlin had folded into his handkerchief.

  Ulrika chewed her lip. Finding the fur was strange. She had been certain that the killer had not been a beast, as it had used a stake. Perhaps the murderer had a dog that did his killing for him? She picked up a tuft of fur and inhaled. It smelled, unsurprisingly, of animal, but also, oddly, of cloves. She looked at the position of the paw prints and determined that the dog might have come from an alley opposite the brothel. She hunched towards it, almost on hands and knees, sniffing but, strangely, the animal scent vanished almost immediately. Had the dog leapt? Flown? And why had she not smelled its scent on Alfina’s body? She paused and looked back at the fence where Alfina had been hung by the stake through her torso. Perhaps she would smell it there.

  She tucked the tuft of fur into her belt pouch and crossed to the fence. A few wooden splinters on the ground were all the visual evidence that remained of any unpleasantness happening there that night. The brothel had cleaned up everything else. Blood on the fence was undoubtedly bad for business. But there were still some lingering smells. The most overpowering came from the puddle of vomit von Zechlin’s man had contributed, but under that sour stench there were others. She could smell various human signatures, and the distinctive Lahmian musk of Mistress Alfina, and again, stronger here, the rotting, earthy scent that had also been on her body – but she did not smell the dog scent. With each new inhalation the picture of what happened changed in her head, like a drawing as an artist erased and redrew different elements – a man with a dog, then a man alone, then the man erased and replaced with something inhuman, possibly undead, or at least something that had lain recently with corpses. But, then, what of the dog?

  She shook her head. She couldn’t hold one picture in her mind. She couldn’t see it. There were too many elements. She turned back to the alley across the street, thinking she might scent something there. A shape ducked back into the shadows, then around a corner. Ulrika’s hair bristled on the back of her neck. Someone had been watching her!

  She started quickly forwards, drawing her sabre. Her night vision had shown her a man’s face, but indistinct, hidden under a deep hood. She had not recognised it. As she entered the alley she heard swift footsteps receding away from her. The prey was fleeing. Her blood-born hunting instinct welled up in her and she plunged down the alley and took the corner, skidding in the snow and dodging
mounds of rubbish, her claws and fangs extending unconsciously.

  Thirty paces ahead of her was a further intersection of alleys, but the man was already out of sight. She sprinted for the junction, not slowing to wonder which way he had turned. She knew. He had left footprints in the slush, and a trail of stench like the tail of a comet – not the rotten, earthy odour, though that was present too – but an ordinary human stink; a mix of sweat, food and fear – and also cloves!

  She banked round the corner, jumping a slumbering beggar, and saw him, a scrambling, puffing little man, with too much belly to be running so hard. She loped after him easily, her long legs and inhuman strength easily closing the gap between them.

  He took another corner, this time onto a street. She laughed as she bounded on. Poor little mouse. His attempts at escape were pathetic.

  She rounded onto the street and skidded to a stop. The mouse was gone – vanished as if he had never been. Then she saw a sewer grating that had been pulled aside, revealing a square black opening in the gutter. The mouse had found a hole.

  She ran towards it, then paused at the lip. Was it a trap? Surely the little man could not have lifted the grate himself. He must have had accomplices. She inhaled. The death reek was strong here, overpowering the little man’s stink of sweat and cloves. Had some undead monster moved the grate? Was it still down there?

  She looked down into the hole. She could see nothing but brickwork and an iron ladder and the greasy glint of sewage moving through the sewer channel below. Furtive assailants could be hiding just out of sight. She might be dropping into an ambush.

  She sneered. Good. Her blood was up. After so much sitting and talking, she wanted a fight. And when she was done she would drag the mouse back to Gabriella and let her play with him.

  With a snarl she leapt into the hole, her hands and feet barely touching the rungs of the ladder as she flashed down it, then landed on guard on the slick narrow ledge that flanked the sewage channel. There was no ambush. She was alone, and the overpowering stench of sewage hid the man’s subtler scent. She looked left and right. The curve of the arched brick tunnel hid the distance, but to her left she heard the slapping of flat feet echoing away. She turned and sped silently after them.