The Empire Omnibus

by Chris Wraight

  Fabian pointed out an iron bench, just outside the entrance to the park. ‘Wait there for a while, lad,’ he said. ‘I have one last bit of business to attend to.’

  Fabian eyed the tall, crooked building with concern. ‘Will you need my help climbing the stairs?’ he asked.

  Jonas grinned and ruffled his hair. ‘Bless you, son, no. I have friends in there who will be more than happy to take my hand.’

  Fabian blushed, as he realised what kind of house it was. ‘Oh, of course,’ he muttered

  Jonas began to walk away and then hesitated, pursing his lips as he looked up and down the street. He came back to Fabian and placed a hand on his shoulder, stooping so that their eyes were level. ‘Best keep yourself out of view,’ he said, frowning. ‘Altdorf at night is, well…’ He stumbled over his words, looking a little anxious. Then he shrugged and his mouth split into a broad grin. ‘You’ll be fine,’ he said patting Fabian’s shoulder. ‘Anyway, I won’t be long.’ With that he hobbled off into the darkness.

  Fabian rushed over to the bench and did his best to become invisible. As he sat there, trying desperately to stay awake, Fabian saw a stream of people rushing by: ne’er-do-wells of every class and creed, from rowdy, drunken dockhands to sinister, hooded nobles, none of whom seemed to notice him as he crouched sleepily by the park gate.

  After a few minutes had passed, Fabian began to get the unnerving feeling he was being watched. He studied the faces of the passers-by, but everyone he saw was intent on either getting in or out of one the houses as quickly as possible. None of them were paying him any attention at all. So why was his skin crawling so unpleasantly? A movement caught his eye in an alleyway directly opposite. He peered into the shadows, but it was still too dark to see very clearly. Was that a barrel, or a crouched figure, he wondered? Despite his best instincts, he rose from the bench and started walking across the street towards the alleyway. As he neared the hunched shape, it suddenly leapt from the ground and dashed silently back up the alley, quickly disappearing from view. Fabian’s fear grew, as he realised his suspicions had been correct: someone had been watching him. The idea horrified him and he looked anxiously up at the house Jonas had entered, praying he would not be left alone for much longer.

  Fabian passed another awful fifteen minutes on the bench, crippled by fear and flinching at every shape that rushed past. Finally, he saw a tired Jonas step back out onto the street and head towards him, leaning heavily on his cane and finally looking as old as Fabian knew he must be.

  ‘Is everything alright?’ asked Jonas with a yawn, as he saw the fear in Fabian’s eyes.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ he replied. ‘I’m a little tired, that’s all.’

  ‘Of course you are, my boy. We should get you home. Isolde will be expecting us.’ He nodded to the wide, moonlit lawns of the park. ‘We can cut back through here.’

  A flagged path dissected the park, lined by tall, noble oaks, and low, serpentine yews. In the grey calm just before the dawn, it was one of the few places in the city that Fabian hadn’t felt claustrophobic. The path was broad, straight and silent and it seemed that for the briefest of moments that Altdorf was asleep.

  They had just spied the gates on the far side of the park when Jonas paused and frowned at Fabian. ‘Did you hear that?’ he asked.

  Fabian shook his head, but something in his uncle’s tone reminded of him of the figure he saw fleeing up the alleyway.

  Jonas stayed stock still, listening carefully. After a few minutes he curled his lip in disdain. ‘It seems that the evening’s entertainment isn’t over.’ He reached beneath the black velvet of his doublet and withdrew a long knife. He flipped it in his hand and held it out to Fabian, handle first. ‘Just in case,’ he said, with a wry smile.

  The sound of running feet came from behind them and Jonas and Fabian turned to see five slender figures sprinting towards them out of the darkness. Fabian recognised the gypsy bandanas that covered their faces from the men in the Recalcitrant Club. A cold fury replaced his fear, as he pictured the treacherous Calderino murdering his frail old uncle. He finally felt as though he had a relative who understood him and these dogs were going to butcher him.

  With a howl of rage, Fabian dropped his book and charged at the masked figures, brandishing his knife as though it were a lance. Every heroic tale he had ever read flooded through his mind as he leapt at the first runner, planting a well-placed boot in the man’s face and sending them both tumbling backwards onto the grass. Without a pause for breath, he climbed to his feet and threw the knife with all his strength at the second runner. It spun through the air, flashing in the moonlight before embedding itself deep in the man’s thigh.

  He screamed in pain and tumbled to his knees, clutching at the blade and spitting out a stream of insults in a language Fabian did not recognise.

  Fabian flew at the man and pounded his fist into the side of his head, sending him sprawling across the flagstones. ‘The books were forgeries!’ he cried, his voice cracking with emotion. ‘Keep your hands off my uncle!’ Then he gasped in pain as his face suddenly slammed against a flagstone. He realised vaguely that someone had just punched him, but as the stars whirled over his head, he could not quite work out how to operate his legs.

  A furious, swarthy face snarled down at him. ‘Stay out of this, you ridiculous child,’ cried Calderino, ripping the bandana from his face and spitting on the path. ‘I’d be quite happy to slit your throat too.’

  Fabian tried to climb to his feet, but his legs collapsed beneath him and his stomach emptied its contents noisily across the path. He could do nothing but watch in helpless, mute despair as the men drew their knives and stepped towards his defenceless uncle.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kindred Spirits

  Fabian writhed across the ground, still retching as the men circled Jonas. All his strength had vanished and a terrible nausea twisted his guts as he realised his uncle was about to die.

  Calderino and his men tossed their slender blades from hand to hand as they closed in on the old man, hurling mocking insults as they prepared to strike. Even the man Fabian had injured managed a grin as he limped towards his prey.

  Jonas, however, seemed quite calm. He placed his books carefully on the ground and raised his slender cane, as though intending to use it as a weapon. Then he shook his head sadly. ‘You’ve wasted a lot of my time today, Calderino. Thanks to you I was unable to greet a very important guest, and the lies you told about those books will set my studies back months. But as a club member, I was prepared to forgive your lack of professionalism. Despite my better judgement, I was willing to write the whole thing off to experience.’

  Calderino’s wiry body shuddered with fury. ‘You owe me my money, Wolff!’ he screamed. He looked around at his men and pointed his knife at Jonas’s head. ‘Kill the bastard, quickly. I can’t bear to listen to his stupid, pompous voice.’

  The man nearest to Jonas sprang, cat-like, bringing his stiletto down towards his face with lightning speed.

  Jonas rocked back on his heels with the practiced ease of a dancer. His agility shocked the knifeman and he stumbled past him in confusion. Jonas drew a long, slender sword from within his cane and slid it neatly through the man’s ear so that it emerged on the other side of his head in a bright fountain of blood.

  The man twitched and lurched for a few seconds, dangling puppet-like from Jonas’s sword, then the old man withdrew the blade and the attacker slumped lifelessly to the floor.

  Fabian stopped trying to climb to his feet and lay down again in shock. His uncle’s movements had been faster and more graceful than any swordsman he had ever seen. He noticed something else, too: as Jonas fought, his lips had moved as fast as his limbs, mouthing strange, silent words and phrases.

  Calderino’s three remaining men took one look at each other and leapt at Jonas with their blades flashing.

  The old
man rolled to the ground in a fluid, elegant movement, so fast that the first man to reach him tripped awkwardly over his hunched frame and toppled heavily onto the path. Jonas then rose smoothly to his feet and skewered him through the back of his neck with a quick thrust of his rapier, leaving him gasping horribly for breath and clutching at his severed windpipe.

  The second man to reach Jonas jabbed his stiletto at the small of the old man’s back, but Jonas simply rolled forward out of harm’s way and the knifeman’s own momentum sent him crashing to his knees. He had barely cried out in pain before Jonas spun around in a delicate pirouette with his sword held at just the right angle to sever the man’s head from his shoulders and send it bouncing away down the path.

  At the sight of such formidable skill, the third man tried to halt in his tracks, abandoning his attack and turning it into an attempt to flee, but his leg still had Fabian’s knife embedded in it, and as he turned it collapsed beneath him. He slipped on his heels and fell backwards with a cry of fear. Jonas had no need of any more acrobatics. The man was so petrified, Jonas simply took one step forward and, with an artistic flourish, jabbed his sword quickly in and out of the man’s left eye, puncturing his brain and leaving him to thrash around for a few seconds like a landed fish, before finally lying still.

  Jonas raised his hand to stifle a yawn as he turned to face Calderino. ‘That’s even more effort I’ve wasted on you,’ he said, taking a languid step towards him. ‘You’re running up quite a debt.’

  Calderino shook his head in horror and backed away into the shadows. ‘You’re a witch,’ he hissed, before turning to sprint away across the silvery lawns.

  Fabian looked up at his uncle in awe as he loomed over him. ‘I can’t believe what you just did,’ he groaned, struggling not to vomit again. ‘You moved so fast. It was incredible. Even men half your age aren’t so agile.’

  Jonas looked down at him with a sad smile. ‘It’s true,’ he said, placing the tip of his sword against Fabian’s throat.

  ‘What’re you doing?’ asked Fabian, trying to twist his neck away from the blade.

  The smile slipped from Jonas’s face, to be replaced by humourless frown that Fabian had not seen before. ‘I could never have learned such techniques from any normal swordsman,’ he continued. ‘And unfortunately, on the rare occasions I’m forced to use them, I must ensure there are no witnesses. It’s nothing personal, you understand. It’s just crucial that nobody can tell the world of my special talents. Calderino may have eluded me for the moment, but his days are numbered. I’ll see to him shortly. You, however, are a different matter.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ croaked Fabian, hoarse with panic. ‘You’re going to kill me?’

  Jonas sighed heavily and nodded. ‘It is most unfortunate,’ he said. ‘I’ve already grown quite fond of you. I particularly liked the way you attacked a gang of vicious hired killers without the remotest chance of surviving.’

  ‘Uncle, I beg you,’ cried Fabian, grabbing his uncle’s leg. ‘Don’t do this!’

  Jonas narrowed his eyes. ‘I wonder,’ he muttered, pressing the tip of his sword a little harder into the soft flesh under Fabian’s chin. The boy whimpered as he felt a thin trickle of blood run around his trembling neck and begin to pool on the ground beneath his head. ‘Tell, me Fabian,’ said Jonas, lowering his voice to a whisper. ‘What do you crave most of all in the world? What do you dream of?’

  A host of possible answers filled Fabian’s mind. He saw that his life depended on choosing the right one, but which was it? What did his uncle wish to hear? That he wanted to be an honest, law-abiding man, or an infamous villain? Or that he wished to be a great scholar and author, or an artist even? What could it be? He sighed and let his head fall back to the ground, realising that it was hopeless. What ever he said would be wrong. ‘If I weren’t about to die in this filthy, fish-stinking, cesspit of a city,’ he said finally, ‘my dream would have been to reinstate my family’s honour. And to see a Wolff at the head of the Empire’s armies once more; leading us to glorious victories, as my ancestors did, instead of poring over prayer books and building even more temples.’ He glared up at Jonas. ‘And who knows, maybe if I hadn’t been betrayed by such a lying, ungrateful maggot of an uncle, I could have reminded my father that Jakob isn’t his only son.’

  Jonas continued to frown at him for a few seconds, then a smile spread slowly across his face. He tilted his head back and began to chuckle. Then his chuckles became great, heaving guffaws and he dropped his rapier to the ground with clatter. ‘Lying, ungrateful maggot,’ he gasped through his laughter. ‘Oh, I like that.’ He fell to the ground, next to Fabian, still shaking with laughter. ‘We truly are kin, you and I,’ he said, blinking away a stream of tears.

  An overwhelming feeling of relief washed over Fabian as he realised he’d somehow stumbled across the right answer. As a grey dawn crept nervously over the convoluted spires of Altdorf, it found the two Wolffs laughing and rolling hysterically across the park, surrounded by blood and the spread-eagled corpses of their foes.

  As they arrived back at the door of the Unknown House, blackbirds were trilling from its eaves and sleepy-eyed merchants were already hurrying past on the way to market.

  Isolde was waiting for them: leaning against the doorframe with her arms folded and a despairing look on her face. ‘I see you’ve already introduced our guest to the dubious pleasures of Altdorf’s nightlife,’ she said with a wry smile.

  As his uncle placed a kiss on her outstretched hand, Fabian could hardly believe it was the same woman. Her hair was tied back in a neat, intricate plait, and her eyes were bright and alert. She was no less beautiful, but all trace of her earlier feyness had vanished. She shook her head in reply to Jonas’s wry smile and held out her hand to Fabian.

  ‘I doubt Jonas has found time to mention me. I’m Isolde, his wife. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Fabian.’

  Fabian frowned in confusion, but Jonas’s raised eyebrows and fixed smile implied that Fabian should say nothing about their previous encounter, so he simply kissed her hand and gave a low bow. ‘The pleasure’s all mine, Frau Wolff. Uncle told me you were beautiful, but you surpass even his most enraptured descriptions.’

  Isolde pursed her lips in disbelief. ‘Hmm. I see he’s been giving you lessons in flattery, too.’ She gave a good-natured chuckle as she waved them inside. ‘Come in. Come in. I doubt he remembered to offer you anything as mundane as food. I thought you’d come scurrying back at first light, so I’ve rustled you up some breakfast.’

  The house was just as gloomy and labyrinthine as the day before, but with Isolde waltzing through its maze of halls and antechambers, humming a merry tune as she went, the atmosphere seemed far less oppressive. She led them to a dining room crammed with suits of rusting armour and dusty, stuffed animals, bears mainly, who crowded around the long table like hungry dinner guests. Fabian shoved a mangy badger from the seat he was offered and began to eat. Isolde had prepared a platter of cold meats, sour bread and scrambled eggs and as soon as Fabian took his first bite he realised how hungry the night’s adventures had left him. For a few minutes he forgot everything else in his eagerness to wolf down the food.

  After a while he sat back in his chair and found that Isolde had left them. He could still hear her nearby, whistling and bustling around the house, and the sound comforted him for some reason.

  ‘So,’ said Jonas, pouring him a cup of tea. ‘Where does this leave us, you and I?’

  Fabian leant across the table and looked imploringly at his uncle. ‘I would never talk of what I saw. You must believe me.’

  Jonas nodded and twirled his waxed moustaches thoughtfully. ‘And just what exactly did you see?’

  Fabian shrugged. ‘I saw a man too old to walk properly, suddenly become the most agile, deadly swordsman I’ve ever seen. I saw him slay four trained assassins with no more effort than if he were combing his hai
r.’ He paused, recalling the incident. ‘And I saw him utter strange, whispered sentences that seemed to aid him in some way – almost as though the strength and speed of the attack were linked to the force of the words.’

  Jonas nodded. ‘You’ve a sharp mind, and you’ve already guessed at far more than I would usually be comfortable with. However, as I said earlier, I feel we share more than just a bond of blood. Your ambitions remind me very much of my own adolescent dreams.’ He took a sip of tea and sat back in his chair, eyeing Fabian carefully.

  ‘I’m a collector of curiosities, Fabian,’ he explained. ‘Curiosities and antiques of all kinds, and I’m not just talking about physical relics. I’m a kind of archaeologist of ideas, as much as anything. I’ve spent my whole life digging beneath the oppressive, facile foundations of our universities and colleges, looking for older, broader forms of knowledge. However,’ he said, waving at his lined face, ‘I’m even more ancient than I look, believe it or not, and I sometimes wonder what will happen to all this accumulated wisdom when I finally grow tired of life. I’ve no children, you understand.’

  He looked around at the rows of glassy eyes that surrounded them. ‘I inherited the Unknown House from my great grandfather, Johannes Wolff. I know very little about him, but I believe he may have shared the same desire for strength and glory that burns in the two of us. I’m not sure of his profession, but his house was full of oddities even before I took possession of it, and I also inherited many of its odd guests. They continued to arrive, unannounced, long after Johannes had died, still expecting an unquestioning welcome at the house of a Wolff.’ He shrugged. ‘So, in exchange for various gifts and pieces of information, I let them keep coming. This house has countless rooms and half of the time I couldn’t tell you who’s staying in them. But my guests have proved to be an invaluable source of knowledge. Many of them have travelled from the furthest corners of the Old World and are prepared to provide me with the most incredible artefacts in exchange for nothing more than hospitality and discretion. My one condition is that only the most interesting people are admitted. If there’s one thing I can’t bear, it’s a dullard.’