Bloodsworn

by Nathan Long

  Ulrika frowned. ‘So no one will know Lahmia killed Karl Franz after all?’

  ‘Oh, they will,’ said von Messinghof. ‘For it will soon be discovered that Herr Doktor was a Lahmian dupe.’ He shrugged. ‘It is not quite the death we want, but it will suffice if the other fails.’

  ‘And what is our part in this?’ asked Otilia.

  Von Messinghof smirked. ‘Well, the good doctor is not a Lahmian dupe yet.’ He tapped the map again, this time over a dot labelled Legenfeld, up the River Aver to the east of Nuln. ‘Gaebler has a son, Dierck, who he loves dearly, a captain in the garrison that holds the Legenfeld bridge. We will therefore kidnap the boy and send his father a note in his hand, as well as a severed finger.’ He looked up at them. ‘But there is a difficulty. If the boy is reported missing, the Emperor’s guardians may suspect that someone is trying to influence Gaebler, and Herr Doktor would not be allowed to treat him.’

  Ulrika frowned. ‘But how are we to kidnap the son and not have him be reported missing?’

  ‘He will be reported dead,’ said Otilia.

  ‘Very good, beloved,’ said von Messinghof. ‘You learn well. He will die in a duel while defending a lady’s honour, then burn in a fire.’

  ‘And I am the duellist?’ asked Ulrika.

  ‘And the arsonist,’ said von Messinghof.

  Ulrika paused, shuddering as the image of Famke burning in the sun came unbidden to her mind. ‘I do not care for fire.’

  The general gave her a level look. ‘Understandable, but I thought you would relish the chance to burn men.’

  Ulrika’s skin prickled. That turned things around. She smiled, baring her teeth. ‘I would, general. Thank you.’

  ‘Your place is in the barracks of the Blood Knights,’ said Otilia, as she led Ulrika across the glade to a plain black tent tucked behind the others. ‘Until you can afford a tent of your own.’

  ‘Or take a lover who has one,’ said Ulrika.

  Otilia gave her a snide once-over. ‘I doubt that option will be open to you, but – best of luck.’

  They stopped at the barracks door and Ulrika turned to give Otilia a parting shot, but a curious scene caught her eye. To the left of the barracks, Rukke sat on a bench outside a small private tent, feeding from a bruised and bloodied female slave, while Blutegel stood at a respectful distance, hands folded together in distress.

  ‘You must ask him once more,’ the old steward was whispering. ‘Again he brings another in and she is already above you. But I know he will listen if you but ask. He is a good man–’

  Rukke snarled with bloody lips. ‘I will not beg! And neither will you. He will honour his promise when he sees fit. Your mewling will only poison him against me.’

  Blutegel drew himself up. ‘I have said nothing. It is not my place. But you – you are his–’

  Rukke swiped at him and sent him flinching back. ‘You don’t tell me what to do! Not any more! Leave me be, you filthy swain!’

  Blutegel bowed and withdrew, starting back towards von Messinghof’s tent, his face a mask of misery.

  ‘What is between Rukke and Blutegel and von Messinghof?’ Ulrika asked Otilia, still staring at Rukke. ‘Rukke says he is von Messinghof’s get, but…’

  ‘He is von Messinghof’s mistake,’ said Otilia, rolling her eyes. ‘A kind gesture gone bad. Rukke was born Blutegel’s son, and the count turned him out of pity, not love.’

  ‘Pity? For him?’

  ‘For Blutegel.’ Otilia led her to the other side of the barracks, out of earshot of Rukke. ‘Blutegel has been the count’s loyal servant for fifty years, and though von Messinghof has offered, he has never wanted immortality. His wife died young, and he believed that if he became a vampire, he would never be reunited with her in the afterlife.’

  Ulrika raised an eyebrow. ‘He is a pious man, yet he serves a vampire?’

  ‘He worships Khaine, as did his wife. He believes he will fight beside her in eternal battle when he dies.’

  Ulrika tried to imagine the dignified old man as a warrior of the Bloody-handed God and found it difficult, but looks could be deceiving, as she well knew.

  ‘Rukke, his son, would presumably have gone to the same glorious afterlife when he died,’ said Otilia, ‘except that he was wounded defending von Messinghof’s lands from northern marauders, and afterwards began to change. You saw the scars on his face?’

  Ulrika nodded.

  ‘Legs like those of a spider began to grow from the left side of his head. Blutegel was certain Rukke would not be allowed into Khaine’s halls because of his corruption. Instead, he would be cast into the void.’

  ‘So, he asked von Messinghof to turn him, so he would never die?’ asked Ulrika. ‘Why would the count agree?’

  ‘As I said, pity. He valued Blutegel’s loyalty and service, and it seemed the old man might kill himself if Rukke was not saved, so he turned the boy, tore out his mutations, and promised Blutegel he would treat him as his own son.’ She shook her head. ‘That was the mistake.’

  ‘The count has not followed through?’

  Otilia snorted. ‘Would you?’

  Ulrika looked back at Rukke, who had pushed away his victim, and now lolled on his bench with blood trickling from his half-open mouth like drool.

  ‘Von Messinghof schooled him and gave him every opportunity,’ said Otilia, ‘but he remains the lump he was as a man. The count has given up and put him in charge of his ghouls, promising to advance him after his “apprenticeship”, but it has been ten years, and he is still with the ghouls.’

  ‘It’s a wonder Blutegel doesn’t hate the count.’

  ‘He blames the boy. He is always at him to improve himself, but Rukke won’t hear him. He says von Messinghof is his father now. His true father – no matter that he treats him like a half-wit stable boy.’ Otilia slid sneering eyes at Ulrika. ‘The count seems to have a fondness for strays.’

  Ulrika grunted at the cut, then returned it. ‘Aye, he does, doesn’t he.’

  Otilia sniffed and started away from her. ‘I didn’t come to him, sister. He came to me.’

  Ulrika was going to retort that von Messinghof had only gone to her because he needed someone to spy on the Lahmians, but then paused. The same could be said for herself. She let it go.

  Ulrika lay on her cot in the dark of the Blood Knight barracks as the sun rose outside, staring up at the black canopy that shrouded her and wondering if she had made the right decision.

  She had been right to leave the Lahmians. Of that she was in no doubt. Though a small, weak part of her wanted to run to Gabriella and beg to be taken back, she knew she could no longer be a Lahmian. They thought it possible to live among humans, to feed on them from within, like parasites. Ulrika didn’t believe that any more. After what had happened to Famke, how could she?

  But did she want to be a Sylvanian? She liked von Messinghof well enough. He seemed honest to the point of bluntness about his goals and his reasons for recruiting her, but the rest of them? Those she had seen so far had been pompous blowhards more concerned with their personal glory than the war they were fighting. She had encountered such men before, and seen campaigns collapse because of them. Worse, Otilia was here, and already sharpening her claws. Did she want to spend eternity exchanging barbs with a poisonous, backstabbing turncoat?

  Perhaps it didn’t have to be an eternity. Ulrika’s situation had changed so much in the last two days, who was to say it wouldn’t change again? For now at least, this would serve. She wanted blood and vengeance, and von Messinghof was giving it to her. Tomorrow she would find this Gaebler and she would show the humans that they were right to fear her kind. They would bleed. They would die. And in Famke’s name they would burn.

  chapter sixteen

  UNBOUND

  As Ulrika looked down from the shadowed balcony that rose above the lamp-lit t
ap room of the River Troll the next evening, she had to admit that, no matter how much she might despise her, Otilia was the woman for the job at hand. Ulrika certainly couldn’t have done it. She only hoped she could do her job half as well.

  The River Troll was a sprawling inn situated at the east end of the Legenfeld bridge, where the main coach road from Averheim crossed the river as it continued on to Nuln. It was also not far from the barracks of the Averland state troops who guarded the bridge and the town. Consequently, it was a busy, boisterous place, filled with merchants, pilgrims, river men, soldiers, and the gamblers and harlots who preyed upon them all. It was also the place where Captain Dierck Gaebler and his fellow Averland officers liked to come and drink.

  An hour ago, just after Gaebler and his mates had entered and had their first pints, Otilia had staggered through the front door, her fine dress torn, and mud and blood on her cheeks. She told the tavern a grim tale of jumping from the moving coach of an honourless rogue who had intended to strip her of her virtue, and begged that she be allowed to stay until the next stage arrived, though she had no money to pay for food or board.

  Otilia was not young-looking enough that she could pretend maidenhood, but instead acted the unfortunate widow of a nobleman, driven from her rightful home by her dead husband’s cruel relatives and hounded by unsuitable suitors. This was just the thing. If she had played a harlot or a merchant’s wife, the officers might have flirted with her and paid her way, but they would not have thought to defend her honour. A noblewoman in distress, however, stirred their hearts and imaginations. Dreams of rich rewards and titles bestowed fortified the lust her torn dress and shapely curves inspired. They were ready to die for her honour – or so they pledged over their pints – and Ulrika was ready to kill them. All, that is, except Captain Dierck Gaebler.

  At a table near where the officers drank to Otilia’s health, seven Sylvanian soldiers talked quietly among themselves. They were human household troops from von Messinghof’s castle, led by a captain named Ruger – who Ulrika remembered as the false wagon master who had come for Bull Klostermann’s hay – and again they were in disguise, this time as bargemen – all but one. One of their number was a corpse, and hidden under a big cloak, he wore the uniform of an Averland officer of spears – exactly the uniform that Captain Gaebler wore.

  Ulrika nodded and stepped back from the rail. It was time. Gaebler was drunk enough, and so were his mates. She slipped down the back stairs and circled through the coach yard to the front door, then hesitated, a queasy feeling stealing over her. She didn’t like playing parts. She didn’t like deception. She liked honest battle. Well, the deception wouldn’t last long, and there would be fighting at the end of it, and fighting would make everything else go away. With a sigh, Ulrika tugged down the brim of her broad hat, pulled up an unseasonable wool muffler to hide her face, and pushed through the door.

  Otilia looked up as Ulrika strode into the inn, then cowered back, clutching Gaebler’s arm.

  ‘It’s him!’ she gasped. ‘He has come for me!’

  Gaebler and the other officers turned and followed her gaze. Ulrika stepped in front of them but looked at no one but Otilia. She held out an imperious hand.

  ‘Come, chattel,’ she said, as gruff as she could. ‘You will not escape me again.’

  Otilia turned to the officers. ‘Please, sirs,’ she quavered. ‘Do not let him take me. He has whispered unspeakable things to me. Unspeakable!’

  ‘He won’t take you anywhere,’ said Gaebler. ‘Never you fear, my lady.’

  Gaebler stepped before Ulrika with the others. Their hands were on their hilts.

  ‘Be off with you,’ said Gaebler. ‘The lady does not wish your company.’

  ‘The lady,’ rasped Ulrika, ‘is mine by right. I paid for her. I will have her.’

  ‘Not while I live,’ said Gaebler, and drew his rapier.

  His companions followed suit, and Ulrika faced five blades. She drew her own.

  ‘As you wish.’

  All around them people started crying out and backing away. Otilia shrank back in feigned fear. Ruger and his fellow ‘bargemen’ turned to watch – all but the dead one. The barman crouched behind the bar.

  ‘Now, gentlemen, please!’ he cried. ‘Take it outside, I beg you!’

  ‘Somebody call the watch!’ called a woman.

  ‘Somebody call the garrison!’ countered a man.

  That Ulrika did not want. Ruger had assured her that the enlisted men did not drink at the River Troll. They preferred the cheaper Count of Solland on the other side of the bridge. If they came running to the aid of their officers, however, she would have her hands full. She had to finish this quickly.

  She lunged and pinked Gaebler’s sword arm immediately, then skipped back as he staggered, hissing, and the other four officers hacked and stabbed at her, shouting curses. Ulrika smiled under her muffler. After fighting Yusila and the vampiric Ungols these men were painfully slow. It was like they moved through water. She could have killed the four of them in a matter of seconds, but that would have been too quick. No one must suspect she was anything but human – and she had some destruction to cause first as well.

  She parried the sword of a grandly moustached young lieutenant, then ran him through and kicked him off her blade into a table with a lamp on it. His bleeding body knocked the lamp to the floor, shattering it and spreading fire.

  An older captain swung a stool at her. She ducked it and turned the blade he thrust after it, then shouldered him into a third officer. They went down in a heap in the blaze, then rolled out of it, bellowing and on fire.

  Ulrika slashed at the head of the fourth officer. He ducked and she chopped through the bracket that held another lamp to the pillar beside him. It crashed to the floorboards and there was another pool of flame.

  ‘Fire!’ shouted someone. ‘Get water!’

  ‘Out! Out to the street!’ called someone else.

  Captain Gaebler charged Ulrika, his arm bleeding but his composure recovered. ‘Wrecker! You’ll die for this!’

  Ulrika parried his thrust with ease and sent him careening into Ruger and his men. Under the guise of helping the captain to his feet, they held his arms and punched him in the back of the head with brass knuckles. He sagged, and Ulrika lunged and stabbed, but though her blade seemed to pass through him, she made sure she only slid it along his ribs, piercing his doublet, but not his side.

  ‘Sigmar, he’s killed him!’ shouted Ruger. ‘Revenge!’

  They dragged Gaebler behind the table, leaving the cloaked corpse where it sat. Ulrika kicked it, knocking it sprawling as she leapt onto the table after them, but Gaebler’s three remaining friends got in front of her and defended their exit.

  Ulrika glanced around as they came. The place was nearly empty now, and the two fires she had set were spreading nicely, consuming the straw that covered the floor and climbing the pillars to the rafters. Ruger and Otilia were doing their part by knocking over more lamps as they followed the fleeing patrons towards the doors. Good. The place would be beyond saving in a few moments. Now she could kill the captains.

  They leapt up onto the table, slashing and hacking and trying to crowd her off. Ulrika slipped her rapier under a clumsy swipe and punctured the throat of the first, then cut down the second with a chop that broke his clavicle as he tripped on his friend’s falling body. The third threw himself at her, trying to tackle her to the ground, but she stepped back and kneed him in the face, shattering his cheekbone, then stabbed him through the back as he collapsed before her.

  ‘Fetch more buckets! Hurry!’

  Ulrika spun. The barman was racing towards one of the fires with a slopping bucket and more people were running in from the stable yard, carrying pots and pans they had filled from the trough. Ulrika snarled. They came with water to save a building – a dirty pile of sticks and plaster – but they would b
urn a living, thinking woman? Humans were scum!

  She sprang from the table at the barman and hacked his head from his shoulders before he reached the blaze. The water from his bucket missed its mark, but his head rolled into the flames as he crashed to the floor. The other water carriers screamed in dismay at this and fled as Ulrika ran at them, slashing and howling.

  ‘Burn, you savages!’ she shouted as they darted back out the doors. ‘Burn as you burned her!’

  ‘Quiet, fool!’

  Ulrika turned. Otilia stood by the back door as Ruger’s men bundled the now cloaked and hooded Gaebler out into the yard.

  ‘That is not what the count told you to say!’

  Ulrika collected herself with difficulty and glanced around. She and Otilia were alone now, but for the bodies of the dead and the dying, and the flames were roaring all around them. Ulrika could hear the creaking and groaning of weakening timbers. It was time to go.

  Otilia pointed at the corpse Ruger had left behind, smouldering at the edge of one of the fires. ‘Take the cloak and let’s be off.’

  With her red rage ebbing, Ulrika suddenly felt the furnace heat of the flames all around her and shrank from it. She didn’t want to go any closer to the fire, but the final piece had to be put in place. She edged around the blaze, then grabbed the heavy cloak and tugged it off the planted corpse. The dead man was of roughly the same height and build as Captain Gaebler, but his face – well, his face was gone. Otilia had taken the precaution of having Ruger burn it off beforehand, just in case the tavern fire did not do its job. Ulrika wrapped the cloak around her shoulders to shield herself from the flames, then ran through the burning door into the yard after Otilia.

  The men and women who stood around the inn were too busy staring at the flames to pay any attention to them, but they played their parts anyway. Otilia ran to Ruger and his men, shrilling for them to protect her, and when Ulrika stalked after her, Ruger brandished a pair of flintlock pistols.

  ‘Stay back, murderer!’