Tannhauser 02: The Twelve Children of Paris

by Tim Willocks

  Tannhauser gave Grégoire the belt. He righted the bent tin fletchings and found them serviceable. As he drew and reloaded the crossbow, he looked at Frogier.

  ‘Did you tell Marcel the children were important to me?’

  Frogier sobbed. ‘I told him you loved them.’

  ‘And what did Marcel say?’

  ‘He said: “Good.”’

  Squatting on a dunghill of hate.

  The hatred was Marcel’s.

  The hatred was for he who loved the children.

  He who loved Orlandu. And, above all, Carla.

  Tannhauser took up the spontone. He looked at Grégoire.

  ‘Let’s see if Lucifer can guide us through Hell.’

  He stepped over Frogier, pallid and shivering in the lamplight.

  ‘Excellency, don’t leave me here. In ten minutes they’ll have my clothes.’

  ‘You lived like a pig. Die like one.’

  They followed the alley until it widened and forked in four directions near what seemed like the crest of the hill. There had been no more gunfire, but, above the prevailing stench, Tannhauser at last smelled powder smoke. Down two of the forks, he sensed as much as saw wider spaces, the courtyards of lore. The dimmest of yellow lights glimmered here and there. It was quieter than it should have been, perhaps on account of the battle. He sensed they were being watched. There wouldn’t be many guns out here, if any, but there’d be arrows, stones, roof tiles. The lantern would give them a target.

  ‘Grégoire, give me the lantern. Go out in front with your dog.’

  He took the stick of the lantern in the same fist as the spontone while Grégoire murmured encouragement to the cur. The cur lunged off down the left-hand fork. They started across the yard. Within paces Tannhauser heard a dull hiss and he jumped forward, ducking his head, and half-turned his back towards it. The slinger was either lucky, or good enough to lead his target. The stone hit Tannhauser in the outer wing of his back muscle, just below his left armpit. He had taken musket balls that had stung less.

  ‘Run, Grégoire. Hold your arm over your ear.’

  They ran as more stones sang and cracked into the walls beyond them. Jeers came, too, boys doing their job, defending their ground. Tannhauser heard a thump and Grégoire staggered but didn’t fall and kept on running.

  They reached the alley on the far side without further injury. The yard boys would pursue; for such were the joys. With the alley to funnel their sling stones, the prospect was uninviting. Tannhauser halted, propped the spontone. He felt a trickle of blood down his loin. He gave the lantern to Grégoire.

  ‘Were you hit?’

  ‘Only the satchel,’ said Grégoire.

  ‘Keep going. Wait around the next bend.’

  Tannhauser watched the boys howl across the yard in a pack, seven- or eight-strong. He could have let them crowd the alley, and there have slaughtered enough to send the rest home; but at twenty feet he stepped out and let them see the steel of the crossbow.

  The gang were good. Instead of stopping in a bunch they scattered like deer. In a twinkling he could see not a one of them. He retreated into the alley.

  ‘Go back the way I came,’ he said, ‘and on my honour you’ll find a dying sergent with a pocketful of gold.’

  ‘On your honour?’

  ‘Why not bend over and we’ll kiss the back of your bollocks?’

  Laughter.

  Tannhauser joined in. They heard him and theirs stopped.

  ‘The low-hanging fruit lies yonder, lads, and its taste will be sweet. Take a dainty profit before some other does. Come this way and you’ll harvest only pain.’

  He heard whispers. An aimed stone skirred from a wall and into the alley, but its force was spent and it missed him. Even so, he admired the intention.

  ‘Your spleen is manly, so here’s another bargain. I seek my friend Grymonde, the mighty Infant, in Cockaigne. Take me there and I’ll pay you well.’

  ‘The Infant’s dead.’

  ‘No he’s not, not for sure.’

  ‘They said he was shot and fell from the roof.’

  ‘So what do they know?’

  ‘To Cockaigne will do,’ said Tannhauser.

  ‘How do we know this sergent’s there?’

  ‘He left his black guts on this quarrel. Take a sniff.’

  Tannhauser stuck the crossbow out into the lesser dark. He heard quick steps.

  ‘It’s bloody all right! Fresh as paint!’

  ‘Why didn’t you take his gold, then?’

  ‘I’m in haste and I’ve gold of my own,’ said Tannhauser. ‘But the sergent’s will spend easier than mine, and the prize is not to be counted in gold alone, for he’s still alive. You can peel him like an apricot and spin the tale round your kitchen fires for the rest of your lives.’

  Bare feet slapped the mud. Two shadows dashed away along the wall. Their comrades gave chase. Down the alley, Tannhauser found Grégoire.

  They pressed on.

  Lucifer led them with confidence through a bewilderment of twists and turns, pausing here and there to sniff or void. No passage they took deserved the name of ‘street’, but for the Yards such they were. The firework tang of gunpowder got stronger. Beyond the next row of dwellings Tannhauser saw a pillar of smoke. Flares of sparks flew up into the night. He caught another smell and realised why Lucifer’s progress had been so unerring, whether the cur was a native or not. Roasting pork. Then a more acrid whiff of burned hair. Perhaps it wasn’t pork. At the next corner he told Grégoire to restrain the panting dog and wait. A short alley gave onto the south side of another courtyard.

  He had found the Land of Plenty

  There were plenty of bodies. Men, women, youngsters. Some lay crumpled where they had dropped from the rooftops; others were heaped in doorways or sprawled on the open ground. All appeared to be denizens of Cockaigne. None moved or groaned; but the militia had been practising on the wounded all day. Several braziers burned and a brick fire pit glowed. Trestles; a barrel of wine; spilled dishes. A feast interrupted. Of the militia themselves there was no sign beyond the slaughter they had left behind them.

  Tannhauser had missed this chance.

  His purpose had not wavered since he entered the city. He wanted to be reunited with Carla. He wanted to make sure that she was safe. He had been in no hurry to kill Le Tellier, and, had it proved the price of her safety, he would have foregone the pleasure altogether; or at least until he could return to Paris alone. But Le Tellier had just changed from a dog snapping at his heels to a citadel standing in his way. Now he would have to take it by force of arms. He wondered if the riddle, to which Frogier had supplied the key, might guide his assault.

  Marcel Le Tellier wanted him to suffer.

  He aimed to punish Tannhauser’s loved ones as the worst way to punish him.

  For the moment it did not matter why; so Tannhauser wasted no thought on speculation. If he didn’t know already, Marcel would want to find out if Tannhauser was alive. His minions would find the headless harpist; the chapel of dead assassins.

  And then Marcel Le Tellier would be afraid.

  Le Tellier had expected to savour his vengeance at a distance of half a thousand miles. He had expected Tannhauser to get the news of Carla’s death in some weeks’ time. He did not even need to set eyes on him; he did not need to see him suffer, but simply to know it. For Marcel it would have been enough to know that Tannhauser, faceless, would grieve until the day he died, tormented by the knowledge that his wife had died alone, and in pain, and in terror, and without him.

  The wheel of the riddle had turned yet again.

  Tannhauser didn’t doubt that the plot to murder the symbol and start a war was real, and an element of Le Tellier’s intention. The man was a Catholic fanatic. The political logic grasped slowly by La Fosse, and instantly by Paul, held true. Two birds with one stone; but the second bird was not the one Paul had imagined. The second bird was Tannhauser’s heart. The political and the personal. His
instinct that morning had been both right and wrong. The plot to assassinate Carla had been personal; but the reason, and the target, was not Orlandu, but Tannhauser.

  Marcel liked his revenge packed in snow. Tannhauser preferred it piping hot, but, perhaps for that reason, he understood and was impressed. The patience. The foresight. The discipline. A tick lived for years on the tiniest drop of blood, clinging to a blade of grass until a bear or a dog walked by, whereupon it struck and glutted itself, bloating its being with enough to sustain it for a lifetime. Thus had Le Tellier survived on his drop of hatred; thus did he intend to feed on the thought of Tannhauser’s pain.

  A man, then, who placed his faith in design; in reason; in cleverness; not in boldness or passion. A politician; not a warrior. Not a barbarian; a chief of police.

  Marcel Le Tellier didn’t live on hate alone. A Caesar adored his empire. In both the personal and the political intrigues he had taken every precaution to protect his position. Much as he might feed on his various hatreds, he needed power even more. Most of all he wanted to live. A man who truly loved power – or hate – would risk his life for either, and Le Tellier, with efforts strenuous and scrupulous, had not.

  Tannhauser looked at the bodies of those who had died on Le Tellier’s behalf; he thought of the many more who were decomposing all over the city.

  Marcel Le Tellier was a coward.

  When he found out that Tannhauser was alive and at large, he would keep Carla in pawn, as he had Orlandu. He would use them to manipulate his foe. To bargain with him. To play on his love and his fears. But if Le Tellier won, both Carla and Orlandu would be killed anyway, as Paul had said, to wipe the slate clean.

  As a matter of both temperament and logic, Tannhauser scorned all such bargains and such fears. He had nothing to lose. Marcel Le Tellier had gambled everything, and a man who went into a fight with that much to lose had already lost.

  Tannhauser studied another figure in the yard. As far as he could see, the only one still breathing. He was a big man: big in the shoulders, big in the skull, big in the thighs; big in his pride and big in his fall. He knelt in the red glow thrown by the fire pit, his hams on his heels, his arms bound behind his back, his head bowed down on his enormous chest like some chastened and penitent boy.

  The Infant.

  Grymonde, King of Cockaigne.

  The yard was scattered with fragments of broken roof tile and up above there yet lurked a lithe shadow or two. In one far corner sprawled a vast heap of wooden wreckage.

  Tannhauser raised his weapons aloft in what he hoped would be read as a sign of peace by the lurkers. The sling stone lodged in his back tugged and he felt a fresh trickle. He walked into the yard.

  A dead woman knelt at one end of the fire pit, the upper half of her body burning on the coals. She was the source of the smoke. He could see from the shape of her begrimed ankles that it wasn’t Carla. The smell of charred flesh and bone was nauseating. He lowered the spontone and pitched her from the pit with a hiss and crackle of fat. The corpse fell on the far side and lay smouldering. Beyond her lay the remains of a roast pig.

  Tannhauser turned to the kneeling giant. On his back was a quiver of arrows and the horn bow that had belonged to Altan Savas. His scalp gaped open and oozed black gore. A shard of timber jutted from his outer thigh. He seemed near insensible.

  ‘I’m Mattias Tannhauser.’

  Grymonde mumbled into his chest. Tannhauser stepped closer.

  ‘I’ve come to parley with the Infant.’

  ‘All you have found is the Traitor.’

  The voice rumbled with anger and shame. He didn’t lift his head.

  ‘Is Carla alive?’

  ‘She was hale the last I saw of her.’

  ‘I’m told you love her.’

  Grymonde gave a coarse laugh.

  ‘Aye, we’ve both of us had our hands between her legs.’

  Did the man want to die? It was hard to tell; he hadn’t yet looked up.

  ‘Can I catch the Pilgrims before they reach the Hôtel Le Tellier?’

  ‘No. They were keen to get back to civilisation, where their victims don’t bite back.’

  ‘Why did they spare you?’

  ‘Spare me what?’

  Grymonde raised his face towards Tannhauser.

  His eyes had been bored out with something hot. The roasting skewer. His cheekbones, and the rims of the empty sockets, were blistered and deformed, the lids puckered and shrivelled like melted wax. They must have scooped out the burned eyeballs, for of them there was no trace. In places the orbits were charred to the bone. His pain must have been extreme, though his shame seemed to grieve him more.

  ‘Did they enjoy themselves?’ asked Tannhauser. ‘Did they have a good laugh?’

  ‘Does it please you, too, to mock me?’

  ‘I seek to gauge the depth of your rage.’

  ‘How deep is the ocean wide? How deep run the bowels of Hell?’

  ‘I came in hope of finding my wife. I’ll settle for finding a comrade.’

  The grotesque features twisted in confusion. He choked a grunt of agony.

  ‘You came here to kill me.’

  ‘If revenge is not your balsam,’ said Tannhauser, ‘I can do you that favour.’

  The Infant grinned. His teeth were hugely gapped.

  ‘She promised me the Devil’s own. She knows her man. As to balsam, give me my knives and cast me amid the throng, and see what riot a blinded bull can run.’

  Tannhauser turned. Grégoire stood at the mouth of the alley, battling to restrain his dog. He beckoned him. He saw a line of youths, girls and boys both, holding slings, cudgels and blades. He glanced up and saw the shapes of others cut out against the stars.

  ‘Your friends suspect my intentions, and they look staunch.’

  ‘Children of Cockaigne!’ the man’s voice was thunder. ‘We have a new brother!’

  ‘This is my young friend Grégoire.’

  ‘Two new brothers! Brave Grégoire! And Mattias Tannhauser, of grim and murderous repute!’

  Grymonde turned his face towards Tannhauser.

  ‘These bonds gall me more than the burns.’

  Tannhauser laid the spontone on the ground. He removed the bolt and laid the crossbow by the spear. He grabbed the thick splinter in Grymonde’s leg and braced the thigh with his left hand. He hauled the shard free and tossed it in the fire pit. Grymonde made no sound. The wound leaked a thick black ooze.

  ‘The tower broke my fall. The only good use it was ever put to, apart from smearing a brace of Pilgrims into the mud.’

  ‘That bow belongs to my friend Altan Savas.’

  ‘They left it as a jest. Petit Christian. He said the image of the blind archer was poetic. It wasn’t that turd’s idea to take my eyes, but he gave the order.’

  ‘How many did Altan take with him?’

  ‘Six.’

  ‘You got off lightly.’

  ‘Another heartbeat and he’d have done for me. Strange, eh? Another heartbeat, and all these hearts would still be beating.’ Grymonde tossed his chin at the dead he could no longer see. ‘How many hearts have you stopped, today, chevalier?’

  ‘Today isn’t over.’

  ‘You’re not the type to leave the count to God.’

  ‘I can think of only one with a chance to reach His gates.’

  ‘Indulge a blind archer.’

  ‘Since I got out of bed, call it forty-five.’

  ‘Hellfire. Poor Paul.’

  Tannhauser slit Grymonde’s bonds. He handed the dagger to Grégoire.

  ‘Go and cut us some fat meat, then help yourself.’

  Grymonde rose to his feet, allowing himself some groans at the stiffness.

  ‘I’m taking the bow and quiver,’ said Tannhauser.

  ‘They’re no use to me.’

  ‘Hold still.’

  Tannhauser manoeuvred the weapons over Grymonde’s head.

  ‘I’ll have the thumb ring, too. It’s on your
finger.’

  ‘I don’t remember which hand.’

  Grymonde fumbled, found the ring, handed it over.

  ‘Have you a woman handy with a needle?’ asked Tannhauser.

  ‘For a man whose wife is in the hands of swine, you don’t seem overly troubled.’

  ‘We could both use some stitches.’

  ‘What thorns await that little wren indeed. Hugon! Are you alive?’

  Heads turned this way and that. A bent man of middle years answered.

  ‘He’s not here. Some as got shot on the tiles are still up there.’

  ‘Who’s that? Andri? Tell Jehanne she has some needlework to do. And bring me some knives. And some chairs. And don’t tell me that barrel is empty or there’ll be woe.’

  They filled their bellies with pork and a wine of exceptional quality. Courtesy of Grégoire, the bald dog ate as well as they, while a pack of curs emerged from nowhere and petitioned the hare-lipped deity without satisfaction.

  ‘You said Carla was hale the last you saw her.’

  ‘Just before they cored my right eye.’

  Tannhauser flinched at the thought that Carla had witnessed it.

  ‘Her face was the last thing I’ll ever see,’ said Grymonde. ‘Given I’ve cheated the pale mare for more years than I deserve, it was worth getting blinded for.’

  ‘Beyond basking in her gaze, did you note aught else?’

  ‘I’d say she had Bernard Garnier on a tight leash.’

  Tannhauser considered the politics. An excellent stratagem.

  He said, ‘I’ll drink to that.’

  ‘Aye. Who’d have thought we’d have something in common with that big fart?’

  Tannhauser laughed and so did Grymonde, until the burns stalled him.

  ‘Did Carla say anything?’

  ‘She said, Alice is with me.’

  ‘What did that mean?’

  ‘It means they killed my mother.’

  Tannhauser said nothing, his own memories stirring in the dark.

  ‘I’ll thank you to keep your pity,’ said Grymonde.

  ‘None was felt nor offered, nor will be.’

  ‘Good. After that, they ran. They’d won, but they knew they hadn’t conquered.’

  Every facial gesture, every word, caused Grymonde’s seared nerves to jump in agony. Apart from muted gasps, the man made no complaint, but Tannhauser could see the burns were driving him to distraction. He had known many men thus scourged, such as Le Mas on the blood-caked rubble of Saint Elmo’s. Even such as he, the stoutest who ever wielded steel, could find their senses overwhelmed, and of those Grymonde was short already. From the pocket sewn into the inner face of his belt, Tannhauser dug out a pill of opium. It was wrapped in a patch of oilcloth, which he peeled and discarded.