“Whisper!” Karlich hissed. “We don’t want that filth finding us in all this bloody smog. If only there were—” the sergeant stopped abruptly when he saw another shadow heading for them in the gloom.
“Captain Stahler?”
It was hard to see for sure, but the figure wore Imperial trappings synonymous with Karlich’s captain and nodded. Keeping his distance, he beckoned them to follow him.
“This way,” Karlich said to the others. He made off after Stahler. “Captain,” he added, brandishing the rune-blade before him. “I found your sword.”
Stahler’s response was to plough on through the fog and smoke, always a few feet again, just barely discernible.
It wasn’t long before the grey veil receded and the rugged shape of the embankment began to form. Sporadic explosions illuminated it in grainy white light, banishing the darkness briefly before it reigned again.
The heavy report of the volley gun was intense and devastating. Karlich had never seen one used in battle before. It fired with a crank-choom, crank-choom cadence, spitting out tongues of flame with every shot.
As they were emerging from the smog, Karlich realised he’d lost sight of Captain Stahler. His attention had lapsed for only a few seconds, drawn by the spectacle of the guns.
“Where is he?”
“Where’s who?” asked Volker.
Karlich fixed him with an angry glare. “Now isn’t the time. Stahler, where is the captain? I just saw him a moment ago. He led us out of the killing field.”
Lenkmann was shaking his head. “It was just the three of us. I thought you had found a route through the smog…” The banner bearer paled a little and looked as if he were about to vomit.
The sight of Masbrecht, Brand and Greiss running towards them prevented Karlich’s immediate reply.
“Sigmar’s blood, it’s good to see you, sergeant.” Masbrecht clapped Karlich on the shoulder and nodded to the others.
“We very nearly didn’t make it back at all,” said Volker.
They walked and talked. The rest of the Grimblades were just beyond the embankment with the rest of the Empire army. They were pulling back the entire force.
“Wilhelm’s retreating,” said Brand flatly. “The greenskins have won. So how did you get back?”
Lenkmann’s eyes were hooded and he looked down.
“The sergeant found a way,” said Volker.
“And I thought you were the scout,” offered Greiss with a grin.
Volker gave him a stern look but in mild jest.
Much of the urgency surrounding the withdrawal had subsided. The spiked palisades were lowered over the abatis-filled trench, spanning them for the retreating regiments to cross. At least Wilhelm’s escape plan was proving successful. The cannonade combined with the confusion of the smog had dissuaded all but the dumbest or most bloodthirsty greenskins from pursuit. The few that did make it through were soon cut down and those numbers dwindled by the minute.
Over the hill, past the slowly reforming lines of handgunners and crossbowmen, there was a scene of mass upheaval. Captains and sergeants bellowed for order, shifting banners hither and thither in an effort to achieve some kind of cohesion in the ranks. Many soldiers had been separated in the rout, those who lived were only just returning to their regiments. Horns and drums were beating in a cacophony. Runners ferried messages back and forth with frantic gusto. Waggoneers and drovers laid carts with remaining supplies. Some of the baggage train carried the dead and wounded. Hundreds would have to be left in the smog for the greenskins to eat and butcher. No one spoke of it.
Slowly, laboriously, a line of march began to form. Wilhelm was seen near the front, at a distance, marshalling his officers. The cadre had thinned distinctly since the battle. Ledner was alive, much to Karlich’s disappointment. He was exchanging words with Captain Vogen, about halfway up the line. Instructions from the prince, no doubt.
Journeymen in teams of five and six hurried past Karlich and the others, bound for the war machines. The last of the army was packing up and readying to move to Sigmar only knew where. Defeat at Averheim was not fully countenanced, it seemed to the sergeant. What happened next was anyone’s guess.
Karlich surveyed the milling crowds as Lenkmann led them back to the rest of the Grimblades.
“Where is Captain Stahler?” asked the sergeant. “I want to return his sword.”
Brand looked over his shoulder. His face was cold like an iron mask.
“It’s yours now, sir,” he said in all seriousness.
Karlich frowned.
As they neared the regiment he noticed a sullen-looking wagon with a bodyguard of six silent Griffonkorps, last survivors of the goblin fanatics. Three bodies were lying on it, partially covered by red blankets with gilded trim. They looked like the dead warriors’ cloaks. One face was visible, the other two were shrouded.
It was Masbrecht who spoke. His tone was sombre and sepulchral. “Captain Stahler is dead. Someone found him on his horse. His body had no fresh injuries. It was like he’d just died.”
Karlich tore his eyes off the corpse as a priest of Morr driving the wagon covered its face.
Somewhere behind the sergeant, Lenkmann threw up.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
THE LONG RETREAT
Beyond the Stirland border, Stirland,
433 miles from Altdorf
Averland was no longer deemed safe. Harried all the way by warbands from Grom’s army, Wilhelm led his troops north across the border and into Stirland. Here in peasant country, the lay of the land was no better. As in Averland, villages and towns were burning. Some of the smaller hamlets were little more than ashen husks; Grom had made bonfires out of them. Doomsayers and refugees littered the province like disconsolate sheep.
Whereas Averland was largely flat and wealthy, Stirland was rugged and poor. To the east was Sylvania, a shadow of a land that lingered like a dirty secret everyone already knew. The Carsteins had once ruled over it, a house of aristocratic fiends whose last scion had fallen to Count Martin’s runefang. Strangely, in the vampires’ absence, it was even more a haunted place of which few Stirlanders spoke and fewer still ventured. As for Stirland itself, it was hilly and the last tranches of the Great Forest crept over its northernmost reaches as if to colonise it with its forbidding arbours. Rural, down to earth, Stirland’s people were slow to change and quick to cast suspicion, especially on outsiders. It made for a bleak and unwelcoming vista as the army crossed the border, most of its watchtowers already smoking ruins.
On the third day of the march, armed outriders approached the column. They rode black mares that matched the colour of their hair, and carried harquebus and bows. Most of the riders wore dark caps of Stirland green. Their leather hauberks, hose and tassets were grimy. A quick parley with the leader of the fifty-strong group, a dirty-faced sergeant with an eye-patch and a dark beard, went down the line in short order. Wurtbad was the nearest, possibly the only, safe city in the province.
Despite the obvious provincial differences, Wilhelm was still a prince of the Empire and as such the Stirland outriders insisted on escorting him to their capital. Faster riders, without armour and carrying dirks, were sent ahead to bring advance word to Lord Protector Krieglitz.
All being well, the Reiklanders and their guides would reach Wurtbad in two days.
Wurtbad was not like Altdorf. Nor did it resemble Averheim. To the rest of the Empire, these were magnificent cities, shining testimonies to the achievements of man. Wurtbad, despite its bustling trade, its markets and its white walls, was a grim place. The mood was hardly helped by the greenskin hordes rampaging not so far from its border. They’d sent flocks of refugees before them, like cattle chased by the drover’s whip.
Rustic, backward and generally unwashed, they lent an air of bigotry and superstition that the Count would rather leave in his hinterlands, not confront on his doorstep.
Karlich scowled back at a native Stirlander who was passing by in the near-des
erted street. Though Lord Protector Krieglitz had allowed the Reiklanders entry to his capital, the army was to be billeted outside in tents. Only Wilhelm and his entourage were permitted to lodge within its walls. Forays into town by small bands of the soldiery were allowed, however, in order to drink and forget their troubles, if only for a short time. Such “excursions” went by rote, a few regiments at a time. Karlich and the Grimblades were currently enjoying their rotation in what was regarded “the wine capital of the Empire”.
Good news for Rechts, he thought bitterly, and wondered if a drunken stupor would ease his pain.
The sheer scale of the defeat at Averheim was barely just setting in. Fighting for your life, even trudging down the Old Dwarf Road, ever fearful of greenskin attack, tended to occupy the mind. Now, in the quiet and the solitude, the dust had begun to settle. It smelled of the grave and itched with despair. Suicides had already been reported by several sergeants. Mercifully, desertion was scarce. It was mainly Averlanders, sneaking back across the border, wanting to meet the end in their own lands. Karlich couldn’t blame them. He felt a long way from home.
In the aftermath, Wilhelm’s quartermasters had taken a tally. The death-books were growing into quite a compendium. He’d lost a large body of troops at Averheim, together with nearly all the knights. Middenland had almost none of its original contingent.
It gave Karlich no pleasure that the Steel Swords had not returned from the plains. Even though they had left his Grimblades vulnerable to a flank attack and were, in no uncertain terms, the biggest whoresons he had ever met, Karlich could not bear a fallen soldier ill will. For all their faults, Sturnbled had led his men bravely, fighting in a war they didn’t understand or believe in. They deserved to die in the land of Ulric with their forefathers, not in some foreign field.
True survivors that they were, the greatsworders and Von Rauken still lived, though “Carroburg Fewer” might be a more appropriate name now. At his last count, Karlich gauged there were no more than ten of the greatsworders left. They bore it all stoically, of course.
That left mainly citizen levies and those infantry regiments raised in Reikland townships and trained as professional soldiers. Then there were the few remaining Averlanders, dwindling by the day. It wasn’t much.
Most of the war machines and engineers made the journey. Meinstadt was one of the few officers Karlich had met that was still breathing. Stahler was gone—it left a hole in his stomach and a chill down his back to think of it. Karlich pushed the memory of what he’d seen—or had he?—on the plains outside Averheim to the back of his mind. No good could come of digging there. Lenkmann had refused flat out to acknowledge it. To him, it never happened. The banner bearer was right at home with the superstitious Stirlanders. Of the rest, Hornstchaft was assumed slain in the initial charge, though his body remained unrecovered, and Preceptor Kogswald had met his end protecting the life of the prince, or so the propaganda went. Ironically, Blaselocker of Averland had died when the cannon misfired on the embankment. By seeking refuge behind the massive iron gun he had actually doomed himself. The demise of Father Untervash, Karlich had witnessed himself. The sight of the warrior priest being bitten in two still haunted his nightmares.
Thankfully no one had questioned the death of Vanhans. With the witch hunter gone, the funds from the temple dried up. Without coin, the mercenaries left the following morning. Most of Vanhans’ faithful horde disbanded too with no shepherd to guide the fervent flock.
Karlich had the blood of two templars on his hands. Both were madmen to his mind. After the campaign, assuming he survived, he might have to move on again, lest the spectre of Lothar Henniker catch up with him.
Bleak. Yes, it was the only word Karlich could think of to describe their situation as he sat outside an inn with too few customers and sipped at hot ale.
“Apparently, it’s the custom,” said a familiar voice behind him.
“Eh?”
Masbrecht came into view and gestured to the clay tankard Karlich was cradling.
“I’ve heard they use a poker from the fire to warm it.”
Karlich smacked his lips and scowled. He’d been holding the tankard so long, the heat had long since stopped emanating off it. “Tastes like soot.”
There was a long pause. Masbrecht looked uneasy and rubbed his chin.
“Spit it out then,” said Karlich.
“Sir?”
“Whatever it is you’ve come to speak to me about, say it.” Karlich set his tankard down on the stumpy table beside him. The two men were alone.
“It’s not right,” Masbrecht uttered simply.
“What isn’t? The ale, the war, our defeat? There’s much in the world that isn’t right, Masbrecht. You’ll need to narrow it down.”
Masbrecht barely moved. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“Ah,” said Karlich, stretching his legs and pulling his pipe from his tunic pocket. “That.” The cup was already packed with tobacco. It was late, night was drawing in. Karlich leaned over to a candle stuck to the table with its own wax and coaxed his pipeweed to life.
“Are you really surprised we lost at Averheim?” Masbrecht continued. “Even the greenskins can form an alliance. We are at each others’ throats!”
“Hardly,” Karlich said through piping smoke. “We’ve been left to our own protection, Masbrecht. There’s a difference.”
“Someone within Wilhelm’s camp, someone who could be here, now, wants our prince dead. How can you stand idly by and let it happen?” Masbrecht sat down next to Karlich. “At Averheim, it was different. Surrounded by the army, the prince was safe. But here, now—”
“Ledner said he’d take care of it. We’ve done our part for prince and province.”
“You trust him?”
“Not as much as a goblin, but what other choice is there?”
Masbrecht’s body language was beseeching. “Let’s tell the prince, warn him of the danger he’s in.”
“We don’t know he’s in danger. The assassin’s dead, remember.”
Masbrecht’s expression darkened. “Eber’s blood was all over my hands and he’s still not fit to fight. I remember well enough.”
“Look, I’m sorry. Morals are all fine and good but they’re not always practical. If word got out…” Karlich sucked a breath in through his teeth. “Well, let’s just say the consequences could be ugly.”
“Or the culprits could be found and brought to justice,” said Masbrecht. “The prince’s reputation is reinforced and would-be betrayers will think twice before plotting against him. Moreover, we’d be rid of the traitors in our midst!” He was agitated, breathing hard. Karlich had seldom seen him so passionate about something other than religion. He saw it for what it really was though. Refutation. Disbelief.
That men could turn on their own, on someone as pure and noble as Prince Wilhelm, dented Masbrecht’s faith. Belief in Sigmar was really all he had. Without it, he was a shadow. Karlich saw that now, just as he saw the look that flashed across Masbrecht’s face when he’d regarded the cup of ale. It was need. The absence of one thing meant its replacement by another. Small wonder he was so puritanical about Rechts’ drinking.
Karlich leaned forward and hissed: “We stopped an assassination. I wouldn’t say we rested on our laurels, Masbrecht. What more would you have us—”
The inn door slamming open interrupted him.
“What’s he doing here?” a surly voice asked. It was Rechts, nursing his own hot ale, one of several he’d already imbibed by the look of him. “I said I didn’t want to drink alone, but I’d rather that than share ale with this naysayer. The mood is grim enough.”
“Drunkenness will do that to a man,” Masbrecht replied. Anger underpinned his voice. He was already in a pugnacious mood.
“Voice of experience, brother!” Now Rechts was goading him.
Karlich went to intercede but Masbrecht cut him off.
“Are you a heretic, Torsten, is that it?”
&nbs
p; Karlich quickly got to his feet. “That’s enough!”
Rechts had just sat down and was about to get up again when Karlich pushed him back onto his stool. There was silence as the drummer gritted his teeth and rode out his anger.
“They were burned,” he said eventually. “All of them, my entire, village.”
Masbrecht found he was wrong-footed. “Wha—”
“A templar came to us, a servant of Sigmar, or so he claimed. A boy was found with a webbed toe. Fearful of mutation, the villagers took him before the witch hunter.” As darkness crept across the sky, the shadows pooling in Rechts’ face made him look cadaverous. Too much drink and lack of proper sleep had worn the man down. As he spoke, it didn’t appear to lessen his burden. “I never saw the boy after that. Trials followed, then executions. Soon the trials were abandoned altogether and it was just about the burning. Our village preacher let him do it. His voice was loudest in the mob. I only survived because my mother hid me. When I came out, they were all dead. My mother, my whole family were ash. The witch hunter and his cronies had moved on. So, forgive me if I do not trust those that preach the word of Sigmar as readily as you do.”
Rechts stood up. Karlich let him, showing his palms in a gesture for the drummer to stay calm. He did. Until Masbrecht opened his mouth again.
“That boy could not have burned for no reason, he must—”
Rechts exploded. Spittle was flying from his mouth, “Whim, brother. That was all. Whim and the will of a raving mad man, clad in Sigmar’s cloth. Preaching fear and doubt, an entire village turned on itself. The hammer is not a death warrant, yet there are those who brandish it like one.” Rechts was clenching and unclenching his fists. The old pugnacity had returned. Karlich edged around the table so he could get between them if he needed to.
“Reason?” Rechts went on. “Reason doesn’t come into it. An innocent boy burned, an untainted village destroyed, all at the hand of our self-proclaimed protectors. Show me the reason in that.” In a much smaller voice, he added, “I can still smell my mother’s ash on my hands…”
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