Twelfth Krampus Night

by Matt Manochio

  They jerked their heads up in unison to see the butt of what appeared to be a hulking mountain goat using its hooves to propel itself up the wall and scurry into the entrance.

  A long log-thick arm tipped with talons darted out, grabbed the door’s interior handle and yanked it shut. The sound of the door locking lingered around the bergfried’s base.

  Simon, panting, cleared away enough gunk to see what was going on and then spoke calmly to the nearest guard but loud enough for everyone to hear.

  “Go get the ladder. We’ll likely need it. And I suggest we spread out—away from the base.”

  Nobody argued, but one faceless guard in the back spoke up: “Why?”

  Simon retrieved his pike and began walking away while looking at the churn tower high above. “I fully expect it to begin raining bodies.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Beate climbed into the lords’ protected perch. Wilhelm pushed her to the ground the moment she arrived, pointing a blade at her.

  “Be a good girl and behave.”

  Two guards scurried down the ladder and drew their swords. Wilhelm, after withdrawing the ladder, lowered and locked the door. Beate didn’t know how many men occupied the bartizans as lookouts, but figured every guard, and Mumfred, stood before the stairwell entrance, scared to open it.

  The octagonal loft, as Beate came to think of it, stood as tall as the room below it, although with windows on four walls and lanterns hanging from all eight. Save for a few sparse furnishings and a table holding a few more lanterns, there were blankets and pillows on the floor. She eyed a large water bucket and a couple of cabinets—likely stuffed with rations, she reasoned—against two of the walls. She spotted the ladder next to the closed floor door.

  Still on all fours, Beate glanced at Wilhelm. “I suppose if we’re meant to cower, we should do it in comfort.”

  He smiled and withdrew the blade. “Indeed. I’ve been up here a few times when the castle was under attack—unsuccessfully, as you can imagine. Nobody’s ever managed to scale the entrance below.”

  “Until today.” She took her time grinning.

  Wilhelm, unamused, “Stand.”

  She rose and for the first time saw Heinrich slouched against the wall directly behind Wilhelm. Her beau’s hands were bound behind his back, his ankles roped.

  Karl sat on a three-legged stool next to him and feasted on Heinrich’s discomfort. “Are you ready for the show?”

  The blacksmith glowered at the younger lord and shook, trying to free his hands.

  “I know how to tie a rope, trust me.” Karl stood. “Wilhelm, please sit next to Heinrich to make sure he doesn’t get frisky.”

  Wilhelm sheathed his dagger and plopped next to Heinrich. Beate saw Wilhelm’s bow and quiver propped by the older lord’s side. A sheathed sword and dagger rested before the longbow.

  “This can go a couple of ways, Beate.” Karl spoke calmly, as if addressing a child. “You can be a good girl, not resist, and perhaps live long enough be executed before the baron.”

  “The second option?” Beate backed herself against a wall as Karl crept forward.

  “I torture you with a knife, slowly. People in the village will hear your screams.”

  “The third option?”

  “I said this could go a couple of ways.”

  Beate pressed her sweaty fingers against the frigid wall. “Then I suppose the former.”

  “I thought so. Take off your clothes.”

  Beate stared at him, not answering, until, “I will not. I don’t see how that would do you much good, what with your lame penis.”

  Karl stopped five feet in front of her and balled his fists. “Maybe I will keep you alive long enough until I heal. And do to you what I intended to do earlier. While your man watches. I’ll spare him the sight of things now and let him think about what I’m doing to you.” He turned to Wilhelm. “I’ll be all right. Take him below to the cell.”

  “Very well. It’s your twisted revenge, not mine.” Wilhelm unsheathed his dagger and pointed it at Heinrich. “Up.”

  “The cell?” Beate said.

  “One of the many doors you saw down there upon entering,” Karl said. “One leads to a stone room with a barred window. A precaution just in case we find a traitor in our midst and need a place to put him.”

  Wilhelm unlocked and lifted the floor door and directed Heinrich, who hopped to the edge of the opening. “You first.”

  “How can you expect him to climb down a ladder with his hands and feet tied?” Beate said.

  Wilhelm replied by pushing him through the floor’s hole.

  “Heinrich!” Beate lunged for the opening, but Karl backhanded her.

  “Stay back!”

  Wilhelm peered over the hole. “Don’t worry. He’s moving.” He called down to the guards, “Get him out of the way!” He waited a few moments and lowered the ladder. Just before his head disappeared from view, he spoke to Karl: “You can handle this?” He glanced at the ladder.

  “Leave it open, just in case you need to get up here in a pinch.”

  Wilhelm vanished.

  Karl backed away from Beate, his eyes never leaving her, and opened one of the cabinets. Beate felt sick when she saw him holding rope. She put her hands behind her back.

  “Very good, Beate. I don’t want you to worry, because what I’m planning to do won’t hurt you physically—that much. You already observed that my, well, body doesn’t work the way I’d like it to. But my tongue does.”

  He advanced, preparing for her to dive for the floor’s opening. “If Beate climbs down, kill her!”

  She bit her lip.

  “I thought as much,” he said. “And those guards will be up here the second I call them.” He held up the rope. “Understand?”

  Beate nodded. “I will not come to you. Whatever you do to me, you’ll have to come get me.” And there she stood.

  “That’s it? That’s how you’re protesting?” He walked toward her, still on his guard. “I expected better, given everything you’ve put me through today.”

  Her jaw fell. “What I’ve put you through? You can go to hell.”

  “I’ve paved my way there in brimstone. Now, turn around and show me your hands.”

  “I’m not doing a damned thing for you. You want me to turn around. Then you make me do it.”

  “If you say so.” Karl shrugged his shoulders and grabbed for her arm. Beate brought both hands forward and joined them, thrusting up and into Karl’s midsection. He gasped, dropped the rope and grasped a knife handle. Beate punched him in the nose. Karl stumbled backward and fell on his butt.

  Beate screamed toward the floor, “Karl, no! Not that! Please don’t!”

  She heard chuckling and knew Wilhelm’s voice. “My brother can be such an animal.”

  She focused on the breathless lord and continued her faux protestations. “I wanted to wait for my wedding night before doing anything like that!” She kicked the side of his head and he was out. Again toward the opening: “That’s not natural! The tongue was never meant to do that!”

  More guffaws.

  She gripped the blade, realizing that Karl’s fit midsection and layers of muscle had likely saved his life. She’d plunged only halfway the throwing knife that she’d swiped from the dead archer who had fallen onto her from the second gatehouse. Thank goodness Mumfred had just searched me and didn’t think to do it again, she thought.

  Her mind ran through scenarios: I climb downstairs, I’m dead. Wilhelm or the guards could climb up here, I’m still dead.

  “No, Karl! Please don’t shut the door! It’s bad enough what you’re doing to me when they can listen!” She yanked up the ladder and kicked closed the door, which muffled even more loathsome laughter.

  Then it hit her. She ran and opened the cabinet. Thin, coiled rope sat o
n a shelf.

  I just hope there’s enough.

  She slipped out the rope and assembled a mental game plan, unaware that Karl had regained consciousness and crept behind her.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Perchta trailed Krampus up the stairwell as he swiped away guards with his ruten. When they came upon a closed door, Krampus yanked it off its hinges and Perchta dove in to slaughter whoever kept watch within.

  Guards heard the commotion and descended the stairwell to find a nearly ten-foot-tall horned monster beating guards with a birch switch, and a gruesome, haggard lady disemboweling whoever was behind him.

  The men fled upstairs. If they encountered a closed door, they warned the guard inside to join them. “You’re dead if you stay in there!”

  A dozen guards had reached the top steps and the frontmost men pounded the door, pleading for refuge.

  More than halfway up the tower, Krampus found a locked door, tucked his ruten under his arm and pulled the handle with both hands. Stones gave way, and he flicked the door down the stairs as Perchta scurried inside.

  A surprised guard dropped his crossbow at the sight of a double-fisted, knife-wielding crone. He climbed onto the window’s ledge and judged how far he’d fall. Then he looked up, and Perchta saw fleeting happiness in his expression as he jumped and plummeted, screaming until Perchta heard the distant life-ending thump.

  She leaned over the ledge to see the pancaked guard and then glanced above the window as Krampus scrunched through the doorway. “What’s the holdup?”

  “I know why he jumped,” she said, eyeing the heavens. “Keep the guards busy. And be ready.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Any trace of laughter on Wilhelm’s and Mumfred’s faces vanished as the guards’ pleas from behind the churn tower’s closed door grew more desperate.

  “It’s coming! I can hear it!” called one voice.

  “Open it! Please! Have mercy, my lord! There’s still time! We’ll be quick!”

  Wilhelm and Mumfred, daggers drawn, stood behind the phalanx of guards.

  “My lord, it would allow for more protection in here,” Mumfred said.

  “Why chance it? Opening that door even for a moment would give those things the advantage. Those men are supposedly among the bravest in the castle. Today they can prove it.”

  The door shimmied and rattled on its hinges, and the men’s caterwauling devolved into gibbering laments.

  The roar silenced all.

  Blades cascaded to the ground, clanking and sliding down the stairs.

  “So much for proving their bravery,” Wilhelm mumbled, and then called to the guards before him, “Fight to the death, men!”

  They twisted their heads, looking cockeyed at Wilhelm.

  “I will not abandon you,” he said. “If you fall here—so shall I.”

  The ceiling door drew upward. Wilhelm and Mumfred stood directly below and moved aside just as the ladder hit stone.

  “Wilhelm, Mumfred, come up now,” Karl called. “You must see what’s become of Beate.”

  Wilhelm, knife still in hand, scurried up the ladder without eyeing the guards—many of whom grunted to convey Thought so.

  “I’m not much good with a weapon and would get in your way,” Mumfred said while climbing.

  Wilhelm waved for Mumfred to hurry and then ripped the ladder into the room and secured the ceiling door.

  Wilhelm breathed easier and turned to his brother standing near the cabinets. Beate waited by his side.

  The older lord assessed the girl. “So what’s become of her? I don’t see much difference.”

  “Drop your dagger,” Karl said. “You too, Mumfred.”

  “What’s wrong, my lord?” Mumfred said.

  “I’d do as he says, Mummy.” Beate slid away from Karl, and into view came a little old lady holding Karl by his neck scruff, a dagger tip to the base of his skull.

  “Do it, Wilhelm,” Karl said.

  Wilhelm and Mumfred released their daggers simultaneously.

  “Kick them this way, please.” Perchta tilted her head toward the cache of weapons in the corner and the pair obeyed. Beate grabbed Mumfred’s dagger.

  “Move away from Mummy, Wilhelm.” Beate ambled toward the steward and placed the blade tip to the warm flesh below Mumfred’s Adam’s apple.

  He gulped, the pulse moving the blade.

  “Open the door, Mummy. Make a sound and Karl dies.”

  The grinning hag pushed the knife into Karl’s neck, drawing both blood and whimpers.

  Beate stepped back and Mumfred dutifully lifted the door and lowered the ladder.

  “I’d like you to go down first, Mummy.”

  The steward steadied himself with one foot on the floor and the other on the top wooden rung, which provided a perfect archway for Beate, who kicked to break stone.

  Mumfred shrieked, lost balance and fell through the hole. Wilhelm rushed to the edge. Beate, watching him, cautiously glanced through the opening. Mumfred’s back faced the ceiling—as did his head. His neck had twisted, the skin shaped like intertwined rope. His eyes remained open. Guards circled the body and looked up.

  “I’m not going to kick you, Wilhelm,” Beate said. “You’re to climb down and command the guards to disarm and to open the door. Those are her orders.” Beate waved her dagger to Perchta. “Not mine. So I wouldn’t disobey them.”

  “Let’s go, Karl. Baby steps.” Perchta pushed the young lord to limp forward. Wilhelm descended and stood at the ladder’s base. Karl stood sandwiched between Beate and Perchta.

  “Like we discussed, dear.” The hag removed the blade from Karl’s neck, and Beate’s dagger took its place. Perchta dropped through the hole and seized Wilhelm before she landed. She held her blade across his throat so all the guards could see.

  Wilhelm closed his eyes and slowly raised his hands to reassure them.

  “Open the door,” he said.

  “My lord?” A couple of guards spoke in unison.

  Wilhelm hissed through gritted teeth as the hag slowly dragged the blade—not to cut, but to raise every hair on his body.

  “Men, lower your weapons and open the door.”

  Karl labored down the ladder and was trailed by Beate. She eventually stood behind Karl and tickled the back of his neck with her dagger.

  “Open the door and no harm shall come to you,” Perchta said.

  Still, the guards hesitated. One ventured, “What about the thing behind the door?”

  The door boomed once and rattled.

  “Open this door and your fate will be that of the men around me,” came the monster’s voice.

  “But you killed them all!” said the guard closest to the iron slats.

  “No, he didn’t,” said a terrified guard from behind the door. And after a few moments, “But I fear he could easily change his mind.”

  Two of the guards within manned up and dropped their weapons and removed the top slat. Another pair did likewise to the middle section. Soon the door was clear. One of the guards unlocked it and tugged, and the door flew open as an avalanche of frightened guards spilled in and scrambled across the room to make way.

  Hooves clopped on stone and the beast emerged, pounding the ruten in its palm. Perchta took over.

  “I take it my furry friend is being more benevolent than I care to see,” she said. “Drop your weapons—not that they’ve been doing you much good anyway—and leave the tower and the castle. If I see even one of your faces when I get down, I’ll gut you and make your loved ones watch. And the same goes for anyone who’s currently defending the bottom. They already know I’m serious based on what I did to the man at the door.”

  Every guard turned to Krampus, who emphatically nodded yes. One by one the men dropped their weapons and walked single file out of the room and down the s
taircase. Krampus extended his ruten to stop the line, leaving three guards in the room.

  “Take that with you.” The beast pointed to Mumfred.

  Unquestioning, the men grabbed arms and legs and made off with the corpse.

  “Heinrich, where’s Heinrich?” Beate pecked the blade into Karl’s neck, pinpricking it with blood.

  “That one.” He pointed to a door smaller than the main entrance, similarly barred with iron slats, which prevented escape all the same.

  “Get your hands dirty for once.” She pushed him hard. Karl glared at her, affronted, and straightened himself with whatever dignity he could muster before hobbling. He labored to dislodge the beams, and once successful, he unlocked the door.

  “Step back!” Beate said. And Karl did. “Heinrich, come out! It’s safe!”

  The blacksmith warily nudged the door and glanced from behind it. Seeing the weirdest assemblage of characters he’d encountered up to that point in his life, he eased himself out of his small cell. His arms and legs still bound by rope, he hopped across the room to join Beate, but first stopped before Karl and viciously head-butted him to the floor. Once Heinrich was reunited with Beate, she cut the ropes to free him.

  Karl mewled while pushing himself up, and fell against a wall for support.

  “Poor baby.” Perchta withdrew the blade from Wilhelm’s neck and left him standing alone, powerless.

  “How the hell did you get up here?” Wilhelm grew more nervous with each step she took toward Karl.

  She pointed her curved blade at Beate while passing her. “The girl secured a rope around the cabinets and tossed it from the tower’s window. Apparently it took her a few tries to clear the bartizan.”

  Beate nodded, feeling victorious.

  “You were going to climb down?” Wilhelm said. “Nonsense.”

  “I’m deathly afraid of heights,” Beate said. “So no, rappelling down a tower was out of the question. But I had a feeling she’d find her way up if she saw the rope. And she arrived just in time to save me from your wretched brother.”

  Perchta stood behind Karl. He pressed his cheek against the stone wall and closed his eyes to avoid her. She stood on her tiptoes and whispered into his ear.