Blackhearts: The Omnibus

by Nathan Long

  Reiner checked as the postern gate swung suddenly open. What treachery was this? Reiner squinted, trying to identify the shadowed figure who let the warriors into the castle. It was impossible. He cursed. The Blackhearts looked around.

  Reiner pointed. ‘Our efforts may be for naught. Someone lets the Northers in by the back gate.’

  Loche looked up. ‘Hey?’ He peered forward.

  Franka groaned. ‘We’ll have to stop them,’ she said. ‘Unless we wish to die in this cursed wood.’

  Reiner glared at the girl. She was right, but the last thing he wanted to do was hunt through dark corridors after Northern marauders. They’d faced their like before, and nearly died of it. ‘It’ll take more than the five of us to bring those monsters down. Loche, we…’ ‘Not to worry,’ said the big man. ‘I ran from them once, and won my coward’s brand for it. I’ll not run again. Murgen, Aeloff, pick ten men and come with me.’

  ‘Ten and five.’ Hals swallowed, nervous. ‘I hope it is enough.’

  REINER AND LOCHE and their men entered the open postern gate and peered into the empty kitchen garden. Sounds of the battle echoed around the bulk of the keep, but it was quiet here.

  ‘Where are they?’ whispered Pavel.

  ‘Shhh!’ hissed Giano, cupping his ear.

  They held their breath. From over the garden wall they heard a closing door.

  The party started cautiously forward, but Franka slipped quickly ahead. ‘I’ll keep ‘em in sight,’ she said.

  ‘Frank… Franz! Wait!’ called Reiner, but the girl had already slipped into the garden.

  ‘Come on,’ growled Reiner. Damn the girl. He’d had enough of her foolish bravery.

  As they entered the kitchen they saw Franka waving them towards the cellar stairs. They followed, and caught up with her at the door to the dungeon.

  ‘What are they doing?’ asked Reiner.

  ‘Forcing a cell door,’ replied Franka.

  ‘Ah. Udo.’

  The sound of steel biting into wood echoed down the narrow hall. Lantern light flickered from a door at the end. Franka started ahead. Reiner stopped her and went forward himself. She gave him a dirty look.

  Reiner peered into a low-ceilinged guard room with stout oak doors on each wall. The Northmen had just broken the lock of one and were swinging it open. Udo stepped out and embraced the smallest warrior, who Reiner suddenly realized was the sorceress, dressed in black armour of barbaric splendour. Her six companions wore black and purple as well, and disturbingly, though they were as fiercely bearded as any Northman, were as rouged and painted as Marienberg streetwalkers. Udo’s manservant, Stier, stood with them, holding a lantern. It was he, Reiner realized, who had let them in.

  After receiving Udo’s enthusiastic kiss, the sorceress stepped back. ‘It is time, beloved, to seize your destiny. Are you ready?’

  The boy nodded, unable to look away from her eyes. ‘I am ready.’

  The beauty removed a jewelled broach from her cloak. The pin was covered in black crust. ‘Then take this and go to your father. A mere scratch and he will fall. When Manfred and his knights turn to assist him, prick as many of them as you can. We will be nearby, ready to protect you from any survivors.’

  Udo hesitated, looking at the broach. ‘Will it be… painful?’

  ‘Worry not, my sweet,’ said the witch, caressing his cheek. ‘Your father will not suffer. In fact he will die of an excess of pleasure.’

  She turned towards the door with Udo. Her men fell in around her. Reiner backed down the corridor to the waiting bandits.

  ‘Bows out,’ he hissed. ‘Pin ‘em inside the room.’

  He and Giano shouldered their guns as the others raised bows. Two warriors filled the door, eclipsing the room behind them with their bulk.

  ‘Fire!’

  The warriors bellowed as the barrage battered them. Most of the arrows glanced off the ebony armour, but a few struck home, and Reiner and Giano’s shots smashed through brains and bone. The Northmen fell. Behind them, Udo stared at an arrow sticking from his arm.

  ‘I… I am… hit!’

  The sorceress snatched him back into the room as one of her warriors leapt forward, sword drawn, and the last three backed up, protecting her.

  ‘Fire!’

  Reiner dropped his handgun and fired his pistol as the bandits’ bowstrings thrummed in his ears. The massive warrior took the ball and a thicket of arrows full on. He kept coming, eyes blazing with ecstatic fury.

  ‘Fire!’

  But the Northman was on them before they could reload. Pavel and Hals shouldered Reiner and Giano aside and jammed their spears into the warrior’s chest just as he reached their line.

  The force of his charge drove them skidding back, but at last he stopped, blood erupting from his painted mouth as he fell.

  ‘Die hard, don’t they?’ said Loche, swallowing.

  ‘Aye,’ agreed Hals.

  The bandits stood with bows flexed, waiting for the rest of the warriors to spill from the room, but they didn’t come.

  ‘Don’t advance,’ said Reiner, reloading his pistol. ‘We’re in a better position here than fighting them in an open room.’

  ‘No fear, Silvertongue,’ said Loche. ‘No fear.’

  A noise returned their attention to the guard room. Reiner aimed his pistol, but no berserk warriors spewed forth. Instead, stepping into the hall was the sorceress, arms raised… and naked.

  ‘Hold,’ she said. ‘I would parlay.’

  Reiner and the Blackhearts and the bandits stared, open-mouthed, as she paced forward, her ripe curves swaying with every step. ‘You wouldn’t shoot an unarmed woman, would you?’

  Reiner began forming a joke about the woman being better equipped than most armies, but it died in his throat as a delicious scent reached his nose. It wafted from her like musk—vanilla and jasmine—and drifted into his brain like fog.

  He tried to tell the others to shoot her before she ensorcelled them all, but found himself unable to speak or raise his gun. The others seemed similarly affected.

  The sorceress continued forward, smiling sweetly. ‘In fact, you would kill any man who tried to harm me, wouldn’t you? You would defend me to the death.’

  She stopped in front of them. Reiner fought to free his mind, but her beauty was all-consuming. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. He would do anything for her—die for her—if she would only take him into her arms. He heard bows and guns clatter to the floor as they fell from slack hands.

  ‘You, boy,’ she said, pointing at Franka. ‘Your captain raised his gun to me. Will you protect me? Will you cut his throat?’

  Franka nodded and wove towards him, drawing her dagger, glassy-eyed. Reiner raised his chin obligingly. It was true. He had tried to kill the sorceress. He deserved to die.

  The woman smiled at Franka. ‘Of course you will,’ she said. ‘No man can resist me.’

  Franka stepped to Reiner, raising her dagger. The sorceress licked her lips, her eyes eager.

  Suddenly, Franka spun and stabbed the dark beauty in the throat. She stared, open mouthed, more shocked at Franka’s disobedience than at the dagger in her neck.

  Franka smirked. ‘Fortunately, I am no man.’

  The woman fell, blood pouring down over her alabaster breasts. The spell was broken. Reiner shook his head. The others did the same, cursing and groaning.

  ‘No! Beloved!’

  Reiner looked up. Udo was racing at them, sword above his head. ‘Murderers!’ he cried. ‘Savages!’

  Behind him came the three remaining Northmen.

  Reiner fired but missed. The bandits were still picking up their dropped weapons and got off only a few shots. Reiner drew frantically, and met Udo sword on sword as Pavel and Hals thrust their spears at the Northmen and the bandits rushed to back them up.

  ‘Foul defiler!’ shrieked Udo. ‘To kill such a gentle—’

  Reiner ran him through. The boy curled in on himself and fell. Reiner felt unexpectedly
guilty. There was no glory in killing fools.

  Around him, the Blackhearts and the bandits were attacking the Northmen with all their might, but the corridor was too narrow and too crowded to make a good swing, and the warriors’ armour was too strong. The men could hardly dent it.

  The warriors, on the other hand, swung mailed fists and axes held high on the haft. Reiner saw Pavel reeling back from a fist to the shoulder. An axe sheared off a bandit’s arm at the elbow.

  ‘Fall back!’ shouted Reiner.

  The Blackhearts and the bandits ran up the stairs, leaving their dead and wounded behind, the Northmen hot on their heels. A bandit went down, his skull crushed as he turned to flee.

  The men emerged into a corridor and ran across it into the kitchen.

  ‘The table!’ cried Reiner. ‘Block the door!’

  But before they could drag the heavy oak board more than a step, the painted berserks were upon them again, and the bandits, in full rout now, ran out of the kitchen door. Reiner and the Blackhearts followed, inches ahead of the Northmen’s blades.

  As they burst into the yard, Reiner was momentarily afraid that they had run into more Northmen. The place was full of men in blood-caked armour. But then he recognized Manfred and Groff in the crowd. The knights raised a shout as the Northmen roared out of the kitchen, and a fierce battle erupted as the two sides slammed together.

  Reiner was happy to observe from the sidelines, as were the bandits and the Blackhearts, who sucked in deep breaths and mopped at their wounds.

  After it became certain that the knights would be victorious, Hals turned to Franka and gave her a curious look.

  ‘What meant ye,’ he asked, ‘when y’said “fortunately you wasn’t a man”?’

  ‘What?’ said Franka. Reiner swallowed nervously. The girl was turning bright red. ‘I… er, I, well, I merely meant that I am but a boy.’

  Hals scowled. ‘When I was your age, laddie, I was twice as likely to fall for a woman’s wiles.’

  But before he could pursue the question further, the last of the Northmen fell and Manfred was striding their way, glaring.

  ‘Hetzau, what is the meaning of this?’

  ‘My lord,’ said Reiner as he thought how to answer. ‘We are most glad…’

  ‘Never mind that, villain. I…’

  Behind the count, Groff suddenly raised a cry. All turned. Servants were carrying Udo’s body into the garden. Groff hurried forward and took the boy in his arms. ‘Who has done this?’ he cried. ‘Who has slain my son?’

  Manfred glared at Reiner. ‘Hetzau?’

  ‘My lord, you wound me,’ said Reiner. He crossed to Groff and bowed. ‘Lord Groff, the sorceress came to free your son so he might assassinate you, but he refused. They slew him for it.’

  Groff looked at him with grateful eyes. ‘He resisted then?’

  ‘Yes, my lord. I only regret we were not able to stop them.’

  Manfred gave Reiner a cool look. ‘Regrettable indeed. And who are these gentlemen with you, who were yet not enough to save Lord Groff’s son?’

  Reiner swallowed. ‘My lord, this is Captain Loche, leader of the noble woodsmen who helped you hold the castle this night.’

  Loche touched his forelock to Manfred. ‘M’lord.’

  ‘A leader of bandits, you mean,’ said Manfred, ignoring Loche. ‘Who you recruited against my orders.’

  ‘I thought your lordship might be pleased to find yourself alive at the outcome.’

  ‘I am never pleased to be disobeyed.’ He turned to the captain of his retinue. ‘Strieger, arrest these outlaws, and all who have remained on the field.’

  ‘What?’ said Loche, surprised.

  ‘But, my lord,’ cried Reiner as the knights began to surround the surviving bandits. ‘They have saved your life. You must admit that. You would be dead if not for their help.’

  ‘That may be,’ said Manfred, ‘but certainly they aided us not out of any loyalty to the Empire, but only to save their own skins. They are still outlaws. They must still hang.’

  ‘Hang? My lord!’ Reiner was sweating now. ‘My lord, it took all my gifts to convince these men to come to your aid. I promised them that you would be grateful—that you might even reward them for their service.’

  Manfred raised an eyebrow. ‘Ah. Then they have no one to blame for their fate but you, who promised things it was beyond your power to grant.’ He motioned to Strieger. ‘Take them. In these troubled times the laws of the Empire must be firmly upheld.’

  As the knights took the bandits in tow, Loche shot a look at Reiner that pierced him to his soul. ‘Y’dirty liar,’ he rasped. ‘I hope y’rot.’ He spat on Reiner’s boots. The knights jerked him forward and marched the bandits out of the garden.

  Reiner hung his head, more ashamed than he’d ever been. He felt like a trained rat who had led his wild brethren into a trap. He wanted to tear Manfred’s throat out, but—more shame—he was too much of a coward. He valued his life too much.

  Franka put a hand on his arm. It didn’t help.

  THE NEXT MORNING the Blackhearts were locked back into their coach and Manfred and his knights continued south to Altdorf. As they rode from Groffs castle, Reiner and the others peered back through the slotted windows. Hanging from the battlements were scores of bandits and cultists, mixed together as if the hangmen had made no distinction between them—rotting fruit hanging from a stone tree.

  Reiner’s heart clenched when he saw Loche’s massive body swaying among them. He closed his eyes, then sank back in his seat. ‘And that, my lads,’ he sighed, ‘is fair warning of how Lord Valdenheim will deal with us when he no longer finds us useful.’

  Pavel nodded. ‘The swine.’

  Giano shook his head. ‘We dead soldiers, hey?’

  ‘There must be a way out,’ said Franka.

  ‘But how?’ asked Hals.

  And so the endless conversation began again, all the way to Altdorf.

  The Broken Lance

  ONE

  An Untested Tool

  THE HAMMER BRANDS were gone. The shameful scars that had been burnt into their flesh had been removed at last by a sorcery so painful it made the original branding a pleasant memory by comparison. The skin of their hands was clean, unblemished, as if the red iron had never touched it. But the blood beneath that skin, that was another story.

  Reiner Hetzau and his convict companions; the pikemen Hals Kiir and Pavel Voss, the Tilean crossbowman Giano Ostini, and Franka Shoentag, the dark-haired archer who only Reiner knew was not the boy she pretended to be, had been given the deserters brand by Baron Albrecht Valdenheim as a way to force them to help him betray his brother, Count Manfred Valdenheim. He had promised them that when their service to him was done, he would remove the brands. But after they learned that he intended to betray them as well as his brother, they had helped Manfred instead, in hopes that he would make good on Albrecht’s promise.

  And he had. Manfred had been so impressed by the unorthodox ways in which Reiner and his companions had escaped their predicaments, by their ability to adapt and survive in any situation, and by their utter disregard for what respectable men might call right and wrong, that he had decided to make them agents of the Empire whether they wished it or not. The country, he said, had need of blackhearts who would not flinch at dishonourable duty. So he had ordered his personal sorcerer to remove the brands—which marked them deserters who could be shot on sight, and therefore useless as spies—and instead bound them to him with a much more subtle leash.

  He had poisoned their blood.

  It was a latent poison, which would lie dormant within them unless they attempted to leave Manfred’s service or betray him. Then a spell could be read that would wake the poison and kill them wherever they might run, within the Empire or beyond.

  There might be some, Reiner thought, as he folded his compact frame into the bay of a mullioned dormer window and looked out over the moonlit rooftops of Altdorf, who would be happy with the arrangem
ent. Manfred had installed them in his townhouse and given them the run of the place, allowing them to read in the library and practise at swords in the garden, and had provided them with warm beds, fine food and obsequious servants—a soft life in these days of hardship and war, when many in the Empire were maimed and starving and hadn’t a roof over their heads to call their own—but Reiner hated it.

  The townhouse might be the epitome of comfort, but it was still a prison. Manfred wanted their existence kept a secret, so they were not allowed beyond its walls. It tortured Reiner that Altdorf was just outside and he couldn’t reach it. The brothels and gambling halls, the dog-pits and theatres he called home, were within walking distance—on some nights he could hear singing and laughing and perhaps even the rattle of dice. But he couldn’t get to them. They might as well have been in Lustria. It was agony.

  Not that the others didn’t suffer as well. When Manfred had recruited them, he had promised the Blackhearts action—secret missions, assassinations, kidnappings—but for the last two months they had done nothing but sit, waiting for orders that never came, and it was driving them stir crazy. It wasn’t that Reiner relished the thought of risking life and limb for the Empire that had falsely branded him sorcerer and traitor, but endlessly waiting to be sent to one’s death was a misery all its own—an edgy, endless boredom which set him and his companions at each other’s throats. Casual conversations suddenly erupted into shouting matches, or broke off into sullen silences. Though he liked them all, Reiner’s companions’ tics and mannerisms, which he had once found amusing, now grated like brick on flesh: Hals’s incessant barbs and jokes, Pavel’s little clearing of the throat before he asked a question, Giano’s moaning about how everything was better in Tilea, Franka’s…

  Well, it was Franka that was the real problem, wasn’t it? Reiner had made a terrible mistake falling for the girl. He hadn’t thought it would happen. After he had gotten over the shock of learning her true sex he hadn’t given her a second thought. She wasn’t really his sort—a wiry hoyden with hair shorter than his own—nothing like the laughing, lusty harlots he usually favoured, with painted lips and voluptuous hips. But that day on the crag above Nordbergbruche, when together they had killed Albrecht, they had exchanged a look that had awakened a flame of desire in him he knew could only be quenched in her arms. The trouble was, though she had admitted to him that she shared his passion, had in fact kissed him once with a fervour that had nearly carried them both away, she refused to consummate their lust. She…