“When my company has been strong, Grenzstadt’s walls have gone untested by
the greenskin horde! When we have been weak, your ancestors have all paid the
price! Our honour is your survival!”
A few onlookers nodded their heads, as if this were a reasonable proposition.
But most kept their eyes trained on poor, whimpering Lukas. One wizened woman,
clad in well-worn velvet, took the liberty of dismissively pawing the air.
Jurgen lunged at her. “How dare you even question my rights, in this private
affair?” He widened his gaze to take in the entire mob. “How dare any of you?”
Angelika saw the first of them: a raised fist, safely back in the crowd.
Another, closer, joined it. Somewhere—just out of her field of view, Angelika
guessed—a hand would now be going up. A signal given.
“Pah!” Jurgen said, giving the collected busy bodies of Grenzstadt his back.
He nodded to the sergeant, who threw Lukas at his feet. He lifted up his sabre.
The bugles now cried out, with trumpets, and drums. It was hard to tell, with
the echoes that came off the armoury buildings, but Angelika judged that they
were back on the street. Heads turned. Jurgen stopped.
“What is it?” asked the bulb-nosed soldier.
“Shut it,” replied the one beside Angelika.
“What’s going on?” asked the bulb-nosed soldier. He opened the carriage door.
“Get back.”
“Something’s going on,” he said, hopping down.
“Get back here!”
Recognition wrote itself on the young soldier’s face. “Gods and daemons!” he
exclaimed. The mob mirrored his expression.
“It’s the count,” Angelika mouthed, to Franziskus.
“It’s the count!” gasped the soldier, and the crowd.
“Shallya’s teats!” the senior soldier swore.
Angelika tore the curtains from their rod and switched sides for a better
view of the procession. Townspeople crushed into one another, forced forward.
Angelika could not yet see what pushed them, but she felt well prepared to
guess. Elbows and curses flew. Finally the crowd parted, revealing the
procession Angelika expected.
Flanked by willowy, boyish lantern-bearers, who wore fancy Araby turbans and
robes of silk, came a troop of fresh warriors in Averlandish livery. They held
shields aloft; from each of these shields grimaced the solar emblem of Count
Marius Leitdorf. Then came a cantering, coal-coloured charger, on which the
count himself perched. A fan of monstrous plumes jutted up from his floppy cap
of silk. Embossed sun emblems glowed from his massive plates of shoulder armour.
A heavy gold medallion, of the same design, dangled from his neck. It glowed, as
if imbued by magic—which it doubtless was. Chained to his ankle with mighty
links was an enormous greatsword, an ornament of painted flames flaring above
its hilt and onto the base of its blade. He held it up for the crowd to gawk at:
some, hushed and reverent, couldn’t help but say its famous name: “Runefang!”
Jurgen looked for the sheath to his quite ordinary sabre. Some gawpers were
standing on it. He crossed his arms, sword still in hand. He faced away from
Angelika, toward his count, so she couldn’t tell if he now, finally, wore a look
of comprehension.
Riding behind Marius, on a nondescript nag, wearing a moleskin robe and a
drab-feathered felt chapeau, came his counsellor, Anton Brucke.
The columns of attendants stopped, with smooth precision; even the pretty,
purse-lipped boys in the turbans proved themselves expert horsemen. Marius
clopped his magnificent horse onward until its front hooves stood no more than seven feet from
Jurgen’s feet. With chiselled, craggy features, he surveyed the vast crowd. He
reached into a brocade bag that swung at his hip on a golden rope. Scrupulously,
he untied its top. From it he withdrew a cloisonné box, oval-shaped and a few
inches long. He plucked its lid off, pinched a ball of snuff between his gloved
fingers, and inserted it daintily into his nostril. He inhaled it noisily, blew
out his cheeks, and loosed a plaintive sigh. “What occurs here, my good Kopf?”
His horse pointed its head and red-rimmed eyes down at Lukas, its expression
carnivorous.
Jurgen looked down at the nightshirt he wore. “You find me at an awkward
moment, your excellency.”
Marius tittered. He licked his lips. “Apparently.”
“Let’s retire into my receiving chamber, your excellency, and we can—
“Oh,” Marius said, drawing the word out. He wanted to show both his profound
disappointment, and pity for Jurgen, as the cause of it. “The disarray I see
before me sharpens my curiosity to fever pitch. I must know all.” He executed a
half-turn on his horse, to look into the crowd. He raised his voice. “Don’t we
all deserve to know what is happening here?” he asked his subjects. They
murmured in an inarticulate affirmative, and stepped back from him. He turned
back to Jurgen. “So explain, before my impatience curdles into… some other
thing.”
Jurgen finally repositioned himself so that Angelika could see his face and,
yes, he already wore the knowledge of his undoing. He closed his eyes. “It is a
family matter, your excellency. The oath of the Black Sabres—
“A colourful custom,” Marius interrupted.
“Yes, your excellency, as you know, a Sabre vows never to flee from a battle—
“A quaint barbarism, I think you might call it.”
“This is my son, Lukas, your excellency—
Marius peered over his horse’s neck. “Stand up, boy. Let me have a look at
you.”
Lukas meekly obeyed.
“I see,” said the count. “Your father has sentenced you to death for sporting
such an appalling haircut?”
Marius waited, but no one dared respond to this witticism. “But surely,” he
said, playing to the crowd, “that would be no more absurd than the thought that
a noble of the Empire, a scion of Averland, would actually be slain by his own
father, for failing to uphold such an antiquated decree? A rule which, I hasten
to add, is not any kind of law that I have set down, not a law of the land, but
a mere family vow?”
“It is a family vow, your excellency,” Jurgen said.
“Does it not seem,” Marius pondered, “that a vow is an individual matter, for
a person to break, or not to break, as his conscience dictates? That neither
state, nor familial patriarch, may enforce its terms on persons unwilling to
uphold it?”
“Honour is inflexible, your excellency, even when it conflicts with state
prerogatives, or our personal wishes.”
“The pronunciation is prerogatives, Jurgen. You know I hate that.”
As Jurgen’s face fell, Angelika felt a sickly thrill pass through her. She no
longer had any sense of where her sympathies should lie. Her pulse raced hard
around her ears. Jurgen’s chagrin was plain on his face:
of course he knew
the proper pronunciation of the word. Any person can make a simple error in
speech.
“Surely, Jurgen,” the count continued, “this whole—this whole…” He waved
his hand indistinctly about. This whole
matter
is but a theatrical, a
ritual gesture. You meant, did you not, to pull up at the last moment, to spare
your son the penalty of death?”
Resolve and resignation seemed to settle on Jurgen in equal measure. He took
a step forward. “No, your excellency, I did not. Because that would be immoral.”
Marius lowered his voice. “Jurgen,” he began. The closest onlookers edged in
to hear him better. “Do not deprive me of my battlefield genius. Tell us that
you did not mean it.”
“He must die,” Jurgen said. “No matter what the consequences.”
“Then you leave me no choice.” Marius made his horse rear up. It bellowed a
high note of protest, sharpening the mob’s attention. Marius projected his
voice, so that all of his gathered subjects could hear. “I cannot bear it! My
valiant servitor stands revealed, by his own admission, of barbaric and criminal intent! Can we allow such a man to carry forth the banner of our
homeland?”
The crowd rumbled its confusion.
“Even though he has served us well, we cannot permit him to continue. Without
the favour of our battle god, Sigmar, all is lost. History shows that, when we
are wicked and apostate, we lose our wars, and die in droves before the heathen
green-skin! Only when we act righteously does Sigmar reward us with his crucial
favour.
“You have seen it here tonight—we have given our Jurgen every chance to
repent of his folly, yet he cleaves ever more tightly to it. O woe, this day is
a day of sorrow!” He turned back to von Kopf. “Jurgen von Kopf, you are hereby
removed from all duties as field general of Averland. All of your prerogatives
and authorities are now revoked! You are stripped utterly of all military rank.
You may command no soldier, issue no order, receive no deference! Until further
notice, all your duties, including leadership of the Sabres, now devolve to me.”
Jurgen hung his head. He let his sabre fall from his hand.
“My people,” boomed Marius, “I shall personally lead you into the coming
fray!” The throng responded with tepid cheers. Marius brandished his sword.
“Runefang shall smite the foe!” The sight of the legendary weapon brought a
measure of enthusiasm to the crowd’s shouting. “Victory shall be ours!” The third
cheer was almost ardent.
“The boy is spared, Jurgen,” Marius commanded. “Should any harm come to him,
by your hand, or by the actions of your loyalists or dogsbodies, I shall
consider it an affront to my authority. And that, naturally, would force me to
adopt remedies of the gravest and most permanent kind.”
Jurgen maintained stony-featured.
“Make some acknowledgement that you have heard me, Jurgen.”
“I have heard you, your excellency.”
Marius’ eyes rolled up suddenly. “Ah. Then. That is it, I believe.”
Behind him, with exquisite delicacy, Brucke coughed.
“Ah yes,” Marius said, in a conversational voice, “those two in the carriage.
They are to be spared, also.”
The soldiers inside the coach looked at one another for guidance. The
commander leaned over to open the door nearest to Marius and Jurgen. Angelika
opened the door on the opposite side, waited for Franziskus to exit through it,
and then followed him out. They heard Marius’ procession turn and ride.
Angelika leaned against the coach until it seemed they had gone.
Franziskus held himself at a remove, examining her mood with what he hoped
was a casual air. “We were not serving Prince Davio at all, were we?” he asked.
“No, we were not.”
Lukas popped his head around, and moved skittishly toward them. “What’s to
become of me?” he asked Angelika.
Angelika found some dirt under a fingernail. She slid the nail along her
bottom incisors, then spat. “Didn’t you hear? You’re absolutely free. Your
father can’t lay a hand on you.”
“But what do I do?”
“Do?”
“Where do I go?”
She appraised his grimy, bloodied state. “To an inn, I’d recommend. For a bath
and some decent food. After that… You’ll have to think of something, won’t
you?”
He fixed her in his most imploring look.
“Oh no,” she said. “You won’t be going with me. One displaced blueblood is
enough to be stuck with. Maybe the two of you should head off together. Do
whatever it is that people like you ought to be doing.”
Lukas moved his beggar’s gaze from Angelika to Franziskus.
Franziskus put up his hands. “I’m sorry, Lukas, but I’ve made avow…”
“I’ll be at the Hat and Pony,” Lukas said. Then he ran out of the courtyard.
“Go ahead,” said Angelika, as Franziskus watched him go. “Go with him. I can
tell you want to.”
“You’re mistaken.”
The coach pulled away, exposing them to the rapidly thinning crowd. They
moved into it, receiving little attention from the people of Grenzstadt. They
listened in as the consequences of Marius’ appearance were debated:
“Death and woe will be the result of this, I tell you.”
“—seemed right in the head, comparatively—
“—won’t miss him one inch—
“—didn’t seem happy to do it, did he?”
“—won’t have the strategy we did with Jurgen, but Runefang will make up for
it.”
“So you hope.”
They broke from the crowd at Jurgen’s gate. “And what of us?” Franziskus
asked. “What do we do? Where do we go?”
“Our business here is not quite concluded,” Angelika said, making her way
north, toward the estates of the wealthy. Franziskus followed, thinking of the
quick glimpse he’d had of the count’s face. There was a scar on it, old, and
well-healed, but noticeable nonetheless. It was a white diagonal line that
stretched from the hairline, over the bridge of his straight and sloping nose,
all the way to his jawbone. Something about the scar’s position on the elector’s
face tugged at Franziskus’ memory, and he was sure that if he could just kept
thinking about it, its significance would spring eventually to mind.
The two of them found Brucke’s carriage, identifying it by its Leitdorf
colours. It was in the manor lane, not far from where they’d been when they
passed it in the carriage. The manor, a thin, dark building, had seen prouder
days; greenish stains ran down its walls from its roof troughs. Scorch marks
marred the wooden posts of its lopsided porch. As for the grounds, crickets
croaked from thorny patches of untended vegetation. Neglect freed topiary trees
from their obligations; new shoots and leaves struggled to shrug off their old
forms. Soon they would not look at all like blocks, or domes, or spires; they
would just be yews again. Old stone statues, faces worn into complacency by
centuries of rain, regarded them with satisfied complicity.
The pair hopped—Angelika first, then Franziskus—over the low stone walls
and onto its mossy lawn. Franziskus crept low. Angelika told him to stop looking
like a thief or night-skulker. She straightened her posture, and strode boldly
up the laneway. They saw no signs of life or movement, not through the shuttered
windows, or on the narrow porch.