[Stefan Kumansky 01] - Star of Erengrad

by Neil McIntosh - (ebook by Undead)

  “No,” Stefan snapped back. “Are you? All I know is, every sword we muster shifts the odds back in our favour. And, as the gods are my witness, we need all the favour we can find right now.”

  Tomas wasted no time in buckling his harness back around his waist.

  “Thank you Stefan,” he said. “You won’t regret this.”

  “Don’t be so sure that you won’t regret it,” Stefan replied. “This is no game we’re about to face.”

  He noticed the priest standing at the edge of the group. “Father,” Stefan said. “You’ve fulfilled your part in our story. If you can find some refuge—”

  Father Andreas shook his head. “I have no fear of entering upon the garden of Morr.” He drew a short, bevel-headed sword out from under his robe. “If that is my path, then I would rather tread it with honour. I fear I won’t add much weight to your odds,” he added. “But if I’m to die tonight, it’ll be with this sword in my hand.” He tucked the weapon back inside his belt. “Let us pray Johann has got beyond their reach,” he said. “Pray he may have raised the alarm.”

  The emissary gazed at the men around him, machines made of muscle and of flesh pushing through the gaping fissure in the walls. Now the Morrspark, and all within, would be his. There was not a soul in Middenheim that would stand against him. The spell of entrapment he had cast around the outer walls would hold until dawn, sealing the Morrspark like one vast, single tomb. Cloaked by the shimmering deceit of the spell, his followers had set about the gates at will, unseen and unheard by the outside world. The heavy iron might have looked impregnable, but it had been built to contain the dead, not resist the living. Within a matter of minutes, they were through.

  Varik had at first despaired of ever being able to lead such a rabble, but now, he realised, there was almost no leading to be done. The wretched creatures were like starving dogs. It was blood they hungered for; he had put the whiff of it under their nostrils. Now they would stop at nothing until they had tasted more.

  Had he cared to, the emissary could have counted amongst them students, tradesmen, clerks and publicans. Some even wore the livery of the civic guard. All of them might have passed unnoticed through the streets of Middenheim. And all of them were now his: flesh vessels, emptied of all thoughts save his commands. The rage of Kyros flowed in the veins of each and every one.

  He was pleased enough with the host he had chosen for himself. The miller Krug had been a dull-witted man in his own life, but he was young, and he was strong. This was a body that could stand and fight until the light of dawn, if necessary. But it would be ended much, much sooner than that. Long before the guarding spell had waned, it would all be over.

  So far they had encountered only one adversary. The figure decked in priest’s robes had rushed at them, dagger held in outstretched hand. Varik had taken him himself, repelling the cleric’s feeble assault with ease. One almost lazy sweep of his sword had sliced the head from the man’s shoulders.

  For a moment the emissary had allowed himself the hope that this might be the very priest they had been searching for, the bearer of the Star. He rolled the severed head under Krug’s hefty boot and turned it face up. No. This one was too young. The emissary looked down upon Johann Eichler’s bloodied features and experienced a momentary twinge of disappointment. But if the other lives were to be extinguished as easily as this, then his master would surely have his prize long before the sun had risen.

  Varik kicked the head aside contemptuously. His servants were funneling into the Morrspark like termites filling a nest. The same expression was etched on the features of each and every one. No reason, no sanity. No other thought or purpose but to fight until their given foe had been driven to death. Varik regarded them with satisfaction. This mindless infantry would show no mercy to the Kislevite and her mercenary scum. He would let them gorge themselves, slaughter the mortals as they wished.

  Except for one. The emissary remembered the proud young man on horseback who had shouted at him to give way in the streets near the Morrspark. There had been more to him than just the usual arrogance and bravado of the hired sword. Varik had sensed a disturbing power, a steely determination implacably opposed to the forces of the Chaos lords. Here was danger. Here was one man, above all, who must not be allowed to leave the Morrspark alive. Varik would take a particular pleasure from killing that one himself.

  He faced the swelling mob gathering behind him. “Spread out!” he commanded. “Cover every inch of this cursed ground. No living soul must escape. Find me the Star and you can do what you will with whoever carries it.”

  First he must have the Star. Then the baying mob could slake its thirst for blood. They could drink until the well was dry.

  Stefan watched the lights closing in as their pursuers tightened the ring around the Morrspark. The animal cries of the hunters rang in his ears, and the reek of smoke from the torches filled his nostrils. For a moment, he was swept back to his childhood. Back to that other night of smoke and fire, the night that the invaders had come to his village. In his mind he pictured his father’s face as it had been on that night, before he strode from the house to meet the evil tide with his sword. The last time he had seen his father in this life.

  His father’s sword had not turned the tide that dark night, and Stefan’s belly tightened at the thought that tonight he, too, might fail. The forces of darkness, he now knew, were everywhere within the world.

  There was no refuge from the poisoned stream, no more than from the air that men breathed. It ran through all life. What if it were as all-powerful as it was omnipresent? What if Stefan’s sword, righteous and mighty though it might be, was not enough?

  For a fraction of a second Stefan felt something akin to fear, but, almost instantaneously he had banished it. He thought again of that grey dawn long ago over Odensk; the dead eyes of his father staring to the heavens. That was not cause for fear. That was the reason he was here, the reason he would wield his sword against the black tide as his father had done before him. And he would not yield whilst there remained a flicker of life in his body. If he was to die tonight, then he would give his enemies cause to remember his name for eternity.

  Elena was another matter. For all the adrenaline racing in his veins, Stefan knew his head must stay clear. In this battle there was one objective that must remain above all others. Elena must live to reach Erengrad, and fulfill the destiny of the Star.

  “Is there any other way out of the Morrspark?” he asked. “Tunnels, passageways below the earth?” Father Andreas shook his head. “Below ground is the domain of the dead alone,” he replied. “Aside from the main gate, there’s only a single passage leading out on the east side.”

  “Very well,” Stefan said, his mind racing to work through the possibilities still open to them. “That’s the only chance we have. We’ll have to hope we can break through. Stay close together.”

  “But that’s folly,” Elena retorted. “If we stay in one group we make ourselves an easy target. If we split up, at least one or two of us may have a chance to make it through.”

  “No!” Stefan was conscious of precious time slipping away. “Do that and they’ll pick us off like carrion,” he said. “It may take them longer, but they won’t worry about that. If we keep close and join swords, we may have a chance.” He looked round at his comrades. “Agreed?”

  Bruno nodded. “It makes sense. It’s the only way we have a chance.”

  Alexei Zucharov merely shrugged; he seemed distracted, as if his mind were already engaged with the conflict to come. “All roads lead to battle,” he said, finally.

  “What about you?” Stefan asked Tomas. “Perhaps this is more than you bargained for?”

  Tomas fixed Stefan with a determined grin. If the fear was starting to eat into him, then, to his credit, he wasn’t letting it show. “I’m with you,” he said. “You only die once.”

  “If you’re lucky,” Alexei added, coolly.

  “Very well then,” Stefan concluded.
“Mount up, stay close together, and ride hard.” He extended a hand to the priest. “Father, you should ride with me. Be our pathfinder.” He extended his hand, and helped the priest climb up into the saddle behind him.

  They set off in close formation, Stefan and the other swordsmen grouped around the women in a protective ring. Swords aloft, they rode hard for the east wall, threading a route through the narrow paths that ran between the silent graves. Soon they were bearing down upon a jagged line of flaming torches, that was moving in upon them from the north-eastern edge of the grounds. As the distance between the two groups narrowed, Stefan saw the lights ahead bunch together to block the path ahead. Any faint hopes that their adversaries could be cowed into stepping away from the line of flight died there. Stefan knew then that this was to be a conflict which only death itself could end.

  He exchanged last glances with the men around him as the collision approached. Alexei Zucharov looked as he always did as battle neared: energised, totally focused, his face red with the flush of blood in his veins. Tomas looked pale and drawn, but there was no fear showing in his face. It was the vacant, staring eyes of Bruno that worried Stefan most. It was as though his body was keeping pace with the pack, but his mind was elsewhere.

  Stefan dwelled upon his worries for the briefest of instants and cast the thought away. They would prevail. They had to prevail. There was no one else to call upon.

  “Stay together and we may yet break through,” Stefan yelled. “Use your swords to clear a path, but don’t break formation to carry on the fight. Once we’re clear, keep riding!” He spurred his horse forward, wringing every last ounce of pace from his mount. Stefan could hear the enemy ahead of them, their animal chant rolling across the cold fields of Morr. If they craved death, then Stefan would see to it they had satisfaction of that, at least. As the moment of reckoning approached, he drew his sword across his body in front of him, and braced himself.

  “All glory to the noble Alliance!” he shouted, “and death to the spawn of Chaos!”

  A moment later and they were amongst their enemies. Stefan’s horse whinnied and bucked as they struck the advancing line of Scarandar, and Stefan struggled to keep the animal from throwing him and his companion from the saddle. The horse reared up and twisted, then dropped to earth again. Stefan went with the motion, the momentum adding weight to the arc of his sword as it sliced into the knot of faces below. Stefan looked down at them. Expecting to find monsters, what he saw shocked and dismayed him. These were the faces of ordinary men, the simple people of everyday life. For an instant a terrible possibility invaded his thoughts. That these were no spawn of Chaos. That he had fatally misjudged the situation; launched a murderous attack upon innocent men.

  Then the voice of one of his comrades—Alexei, perhaps, or Bruno—rang out a warning at his side. Stefan remembered the map, remembered the shadow spreading, unstoppable, across the face of that very ordinary world.

  He drew back his blade, already running red with blood, and struck and struck again.

  For the man who had been Werner Schlagfurst, it was like an unseen light guiding him towards his destiny. Or a bell, calling him to temple perhaps. Not that Werner had ever made devotions at temple, even in his other life. Perhaps he might have gone if the call had been as clear, as beguiling, as this.

  He had crossed the Morrspark with a clutch of brothers towards the south wall, away from the main attack. For a few minutes they had wandered aimlessly, their torches casting light on nothing besides grey memorials to the worm-eaten dead. He was burning with a thirst to add fresh meat to their number, but their search had revealed nothing.

  Then the light had sparked inside his head, and he had turned, following in step with his unknown comrades. This way, the light promised, your burning thirst shall be slaked in full. Or perhaps, he realised, it was neither a light nor a bell, but a voice, sweet and soft like a whore’s caress. It beckoned him on, and Werner had no mind to resist. Whatever it was, it called irresistibly, a signature marking time to the hammer beat inside his skull.

  Werner marched, his body forming a segment of the snaking line working its way into the heart of the Morrspark. Not a word was exchanged. Each man was locked inside a private world, yet each, Werner dimly understood, marched to the same incessant beat. Their quest was single and pure; the pure red of fresh blood washing across the grey tombs of Morr.

  Now, directly ahead, the first signs of the feasting to come. Riders on horseback were trying to get across the open ground in front of them. The riders were pushing their mounts hard, but their pace was being slowed by a steadily thickening knot of figures, converging remorselessly upon them. Like vermin, Werner realised: vermin trapped by a pack of starving dogs.

  The outermost riders were wreaking a havoc of their own with the flashing steel of their blades. So many of his brothers fell beneath their swords that Werner lost count, yet this was no cause for dismay. For every man that fell, two more would take his place. The hunger would be sated.

  Werner and the men around him broke spontaneously into a run, hungry to join with the pack. They would have their share of the feast.

  “Death!” Werner screamed. Though his body appeared unchanged, his voice was now barely recognisable as human.

  “Death! Death! Death!”

  Stefan looked about him in growing desperation. Ten or more of their foes now lay dead upon the ground. All four swordsmen were bruised and bloodied, but there had been no real casualties. And yet Stefan knew it would not be enough. The children of Chaos still flocked around them like moths about a lamp. Their progress had slowed to a crawl. He swung his sword yet again and hacked through the body of another attacker, a crazed mannequin in the uniform of the Civic Guard. The guard toppled back, lifeless, sending two or three others sprawling in his wake. Bruno and Alexei were harvesting a bloody crop between them, and Tomas was at least holding his own. They were surviving, but for how much longer?

  Stefan backed off from the melee and turned to face the priest. Father Andreas had claimed the life of at least one attacker, cutting the man down with his inlaid silver sword. His face still bore the look of steely determination, but Stefan knew at once that he shared the same fear.

  “We’re not going to make it,” Stefan shouted over the din of clashing steel. “There’s just too many of them.”

  “I know,” Andreas responded. “What are we going to do?”

  “We must change plan,” Stefan said. “Find refuge if we can. Is there any where in the Morrspark where we could hope to hold them off, at least until dawn?”

  “There may be one,” Andreas replied. Doubt clouded his features. “But you should know—”

  “No,” Stefan interrupted him. “If it’s a chance, then it’s our only chance. Which way?”

  Andreas pointed diagonally across the Morrspark. “Break off!” Stefan shouted to the others. “Hold fast, father,” he urged. He twisted the reins and dragged the horse about, ploughing through a smaller group of attackers gathering on his left flank. He kicked in his spurs and pushed on, keeping close by the priest. Marshalled by the Scarandar, the attackers checked their relentless march and turned to follow. They moved slowly, methodically. They’re in no hurry now, Stefan thought. They think they have us trapped inside the Morrspark.

  He just had to hope they weren’t right.

  The change of course back into the interior of the park had bought them some breathing space. Before long they might be overrun again, but for now Stefan and the others had managed to break clear of their attackers.

  Father Andreas guided them along a path that led between vaulted marble tombs to a dark recess ringed by low-hanging trees. Stefan and the priest dismounted, and, by the light of Andreas’ single lantern, picked their way through the thicket until they reached a single black iron door set directly into the ground.

  Stefan looked to the priest.

  “You have the key that unlocks this door?” The priest nodded.

  Stefan took sto
ck of the door, then walked back towards his horse. He reached up and stripped a bag from the saddle, then gave the horse a heavy slap upon its flank. The animal whinnied, and took a few steps forward. Stefan delivered a second slap and the horse began to trot, quickly disappearing into the dark.

  “What in the name of all that’s holy are you doing?” asked Elena, incredulous. “You’ll have lost that horse for good.”

  “Maybe,” Stefan agreed. “But I’d rather give them a chance than leave them up here to be butchered.”

  Tomas now dismounted and followed Stefan’s lead, stripping what provisions he could carry from his horse. “You never know,” he said, “They might even set our friends running after them for a while.”

  “It’s a slim chance,” Elena commented.

  “Better than none at all,” Stefan replied, firmly. He stood, waiting until the rest of them had climbed from the saddle and dispatched the horses. Then he turned again to Father Andreas.

  “Let’s get going,” he said.

  “This will lead us to some kind of refuge below ground?” Elena continued, “a place where they can’t reach us?”

  Andreas looked at both of them in turn. His face betrayed no sign of relief. “Understand that this is not a shelter,” he said “nor a refuge of any sort that I would choose.”

  “What is it then?” Bruno asked, uneasily.

  “A tomb,” Andreas replied. “Of sorts.”

  “Time enough for explanations later,” Stefan said. “Whatever it was, or is, we’re going in.” He nodded to the priest. “We’re ready, father.”

  It was then that Stefan noticed that one of the party was missing. “In Taal’s name!” he exclaimed, “where’s Zucharov?”

  “He was with us when we broke away from the mob,” Tomas offered.

  “I didn’t see him fall,” Bruno added. “He was riding right behind me.”

  “Well, he’s not behind you now,” Stefan said. He swore under his breath. He could ill afford to lose any one single man, let alone one with the strength and skill of Alexei Zucharov. That Alexei had been slain barely bore thinking about, yet the alternative—that it was he who was the traitor in their midst—was far worse.