It was early, and only the Castello’s most devout drunkards congregated in
the tavern. Giacomo, the proprietor, sat on his high wooden stool behind the
bar, one eye open. He was in his late sixties, an age few in these untamed parts
had any great hope of reaching. He had thin bones and a large, round head,
adorned by a meagre spread of silver hair. A snow-coloured moustache, kept
trimmed to a strict minimum, dwelled above his narrow upper lip. When he saw
Angelika, he leapt up from the stool and reached under the counter for a
fat-bottomed, blackened bottle of brandy. He poured her two shots, judged by
sight, into a chipped ceramic cup. She took a sip, wrinkled her face up, and
carried the cup over to a corner table. Franziskus hesitated at the bar.
“What is it today, my son?” Giacomo asked him. “Whole or half?”
Franziskus gulped and said, “The sights I’ve seen today require a whole
flagon. At least.”
Giacomo tutted and poured him a full tankard of ale. Franziskus carried it to
the table Angelika had selected.
“If today teaches us anything,” he began, “it is that we must seek more
honourable employment. The yellow and black will continue their march, and your
days of easy plunder have ended.”
“One day tells us nothing. The course of any war swings like a pendulum. And
if, contrary to its entire known history, the Blackfire Pass becomes a site of
sudden peace, there are still plenty of other places with battlefields in need
of my attention. Though of course I wouldn’t expect you to accompany me on any
long journeys.”
Franziskus sighed and stopped arguing. She sipped her brandy and let it warm
her. She closed her eyes and concentrated on its heat running up through her
breastbone. Beads of sweat materialised on her forehead. Angelika leaned back to
feel them slowly evaporate.
Heavy footfalls filled the tavern. The flooring shook under Angelika’s feet.
Without seeming to do so, she turned to see who was coming in. More than a half
dozen men were barging in together, jostling broad shoulders as they tried to
navigate through the doorway two at a time. In front of them wavered a stall
keeper—the bratwurst seller. While looking the other way, he crooked his baby
finger at Angelika. The men looming over him all bore the colours of Averland.
Close up, with their barrel chests and boxy fists, the men in the black and
yellow uniforms seemed less amusing. Each wore a gleaming breastplate, in which
Angelika could see a reflection of poor Giacomo, backed up against his shelf of
bottles and kegs. The first two carried helmets under their arms, like extra
green-plumed heads. The other men kept their helmets on, and their hands near
the hilts of their swords. Their postures, in relation to the men in front of
them, told Angelika that they held no rank. Their featherless helms confirmed
this assumption.
The officers presented a mismatched pair. One was a giant, six and a half
feet in height, his face a bony mass of jaw and cheekbone. His neck was as big
as his head; he moved it around to direct an intimidating glare at each of the
bar’s few patrons, Angelika and Franziskus excepted. The other paused to lean
his slender frame against the back of a chair, assuming an attitude of
impudence. His chestnut hair receded just a touch. The slightest of double chins formed and unformed
itself under the line of his jaw. His eyes glittered intelligence; their irises
were the colour of steel. He met Angelika’s gaze and held it, levelly, before
stepping, with exaggerated delicacy, toward her. Without looking directly at it,
he seized the back of a chair and dragged it close to him, its legs bumping the
uneven planking of Giacomo’s floor. He set the chair down next to Franziskus’,
touching it. Franziskus shifted his chair over, making room for the slim man.
The officer smiled unamusedly and sat down, legs spread spider-wide, and took
the liberty of a long and appraising look at Angelika.
“They call you Angelika Fleischer,” the slender man said.
She shrugged. “What do they call you?”
“I am Benno Kopf. My half-brother here is Gelfrat Kopf.” He indicated the
other officer, the big man. “Perhaps our family name means something to you?”
“Perhaps not.” She kept her hands on the table and remained still. One of the
greatest flaws of the Dolorosa La Bara was its lack of alternative exits.
Benno Kopf reached down to his waist, and, unfastening the clasp of his
pouch, withdrew a piece of jewellery, which he dangled in front of her. It was a
pendant, swinging on a silver chain. The back was silver too. On the front, an
emblem was marked out in marcasite, diamond, and obsidian: it depicted a sabre
against a black shield, on a field of white.
“This emblem means something to you,” Benno said.
“And to you, also, I gather.”
“Eight weeks ago—or is it nine?—you who sold this piece of jewellery to a
travelling merchant named Max Beckman.”
“Are you asking me a question?”
Benno smiled, showing her a mouth full of small and crooked teeth. “You’re a
proud person and don’t like to be challenged. I bear no ill wishes towards you.
I merely find myself in need of certain facts. If you choose to make this
transaction difficult…” He leaned back, to give her a clear view of Gelfrat’s
full height and bulk, and his glowering expression. “My half-brother and I
respectfully urge you to cooperate,” he concluded.
“Yes, I sold that piece to Max Beckman. I hope he made a good profit on the
sale.”
“Your associate knows how to smell the wind, and does not, I think, regret his
dealings with us.” He flashed another charmless smile. The question Max could
not answer for us is: from whom did
you
acquire this piece?” He started
swinging the pendant again.
Angelika daintily scratched her face, just above her eyebrow. “You’ve learnt
a lot about me. I assume you know how I make my living, then.”
“You steal from slain men, fallen on the field of valour.”
“Then that is where I got your pendant.”
“We need to know exactly where. It belonged to another of our half-brothers,
Claus von Kopf. You unwrapped it from his dead fingers, perhaps?”
“In fact, I found it lying in a footprint, in the mud.”
“On a battlefield?”
“Yes, but it wasn’t clear which of the bodies it had come from.”
Benno leaned forward. “You needn’t be afraid of offending us. We scarcely knew
him. In fact—” He turned to his brother. “We can be frank here, can’t we,
Gelfrat?”
Gelfrat grunted unrevealingly.
Benno turned back to Angelika. “Neither of us were raised alongside him. Our
father has a number of sons, by a number of women. Though naturally it is tragic
that Claus has died in battle, we Kopfs are born to fight, and thus to die.
Claus was my father’s legitimate son; he lived on cakes and honey, while Gelfrat
and I have had to scrabble and scrape. In his demise, either of us may find
opportunity for advancement. Our father will have to reach down into the ranks
of his many bastards and choose one to legitimate. Perhaps you have heard his
name—Jurgen von Kopf.”
Angelika twitched her shoulder, dismissively. “He is a great man in Averland,
I take it.”
“Great. And rich. The von Kopfs have for many generations served the electors
of Averland, as statesmen and generals. It is our father who pursues this war
against the orcs, and it is his victories that protect the Empire’s naked
underbelly.”
Franziskus cleared his throat, as if asking permission to speak. “I have
heard your father’s name. So you say it is not Count Leitdorf who presently
leads the armies of Averland?”
“He has delegated the task.”
Angelika broke in. “My assistant’s interest in the intricacies of Averlandish
politics exceeds mine.”
“Then I shall cut to the heart of the matter: Gelfrat and I don’t care if you
had to saw off Claus’ arm to get the pendant. We merely need to find his
effete, snuff-sniffing bones and haul them back to father for proper burial, in
accordance with the family rites.” He interlaced his fingers and cracked his
knuckles. “We are eager to please our sire. As we speak, other bastards also
jockey to seize the vacant position of favoured son. Thus we are hungry to
execute his wishes, and will react intemperately to those who decline to assist
us.”
Before replying, Angelika took a slow sip of her brandy, and let it work its
way through her. “It is always sad when sons grow up without the affection of
their fathers. It makes them impolite. And grasping.”
Gelfrat balled his fist and stepped closer.
“Wait,” said Franziskus.
Benno put up his hand, showing Gelfrat the back of it. “Please, speak,” Benno
said. “I did not catch your name.”
“My name is Franziskus.”
“You were with Fraulein Fleischer when she found our family emblem?”
“Ah, no, we met several weeks after that. Listen, you must excuse my friend’s
sharpness of tone.”
Angelika made a coughing noise.
Franziskus pushed his chair back, attempting to strike a more casual pose. “I
am recently of the Empire, and I am just getting used to the customs of the
borderland. People here pay little heed to rank, and you must give respect to
get it in return.”
“I’ll show you respect!” Gelfrat spat. He lunged at Franziskus, but Benno
stood, interposing himself between his brother and the smaller man.
“No, Gelfrat. This fellow is right. I have tried to secure with knife-edged
words what I should be accomplishing with silver.”
Gelfrat positioned himself toe-to-toe with Benno, bumping his half-brother’s
breastplate with his own. Benno grinned at Gelfrat. He spoke through his teeth.
“Remember what we agreed.”
Gelfrat stormed across the tavern, to the bar. He slapped its wooden top.
“Give me ale!” he bellowed. Giacomo hastened to fill the order.
Benno retook his seat, cupped his right hand in his left, and addressed
Angelika. “We will pay you a hundred crowns to lead us to the site of Claus’
demise.”
“Two hundred.”
“We are not rich men.”
“One hundred and seventy-five.”
Benno moved his head sorrowfully back and forth.
“One fifty.”
“One twenty-five.”
“Done.” Angelika proffered her hand, for shaking. Benno hesitated, apparently
unused to performing the gesture with a woman. Gelfrat grunted.
Benno shook her hand. “We have an arrangement, then.”
To the settlers of the Castello del Dimenticato, the notion of a straight
road was a civilised frippery. They’d clustered their shacks, sheds, and hovels
haphazardly together. If a space between buildings continued for more than fifty
feet, the locals called it a road. Homes rested on poor foundations, or none at
all. Roofs slumped in the middle. Doors rested uneasily on yawning hinges. Most
of the houses were made of hardened mud, reinforced by scraps of timber, but a
handful of larger cottages were built of stone. Angelika and Franziskus stepped
lightly along the meandering, dirty path that served as one of the town’s main
arteries. Neither carried a lantern; they relied instead on meagre bands of
light escaping from shuttered windows. They trod slowly, eyes down, alert for
heaps of rotten food, spreading pools of urine, and for the turds of dogs. This
caution marked them as more finicky than most of their neighbours.
Franziskus said, “I don’t trust them.”
“Good,” Angelika said. “You shouldn’t.”
“Yet you’ve agreed to accompany them.”
“Their money will look better in my purse than it does in theirs.”
“They are graspers and pretenders, frank in their lust for undeserved rank!”
“All rank is undeserved, so they are no worse than their so-called betters.”
“You say such things just to shock me.”
“Seeing as my new clients disgust you, you’ll naturally want to stay behind
while I take them where they want to go.”
Franziskus stopped short. A woman posed in the open doorway of a stone house,
lit by the firelight behind her. The edges of her flaxen hair glowed. She leaned
languorously against the doorframe, cocking out an angular hipbone. She blinked
her emerald eyes at him, then slipped back into the building, closing an oak
door behind her. Franziskus stared at it. He shook his face from side to side,
like a beagle, to wake himself from his trance. He turned. Angelika was waiting
for him, in the middle of the lane, hands behind her back. A wicked smirk pulled
at her lips.
“I’ve been boring you, I see.”
“No,” said Franziskus, too quickly and too loudly. He took several long
strides to close the gap between them.
“Did one of the local rent girls catch your eye, Franziskus?” Her grin
widened. “Which of them was it? Gisela? Teapot?”
He couldn’t help but turn back and look at the door of the building. “No,
none of those. She was not of their—she was—
He started; Angelika had stuck him in the ribs with her elbow. “Go on,
Franziskus. You’ve been a good boy ever since you first started tagging after
me. You’re entitled.”
“No,” he said, eyes on the door.
She pushed him. “I know how men are. I won’t think less of you. Go on.”
Annoyed, he moved out of the range of her shoves. “It’s not that at all. I
was merely… captivated by a moment of beauty.”
She uttered a throaty laugh.
“Not everything is ugly or some kind of cynical joke. I saw a woman who was
beautiful. Such a person can stand in a doorway and not be a harlot. A man can
look upon her and react without base and carnal lusts.” He marched past her.
Without matching his increased pace, she followed. If she were lucky, his dudgeon would prove permanent, and, when she reached the
hovel they’d rented, she’d find no trace of him. But Angelika had never
considered herself lucky. She watched Franziskus disappear around a corner into
the gloomy night.
She slowed her pace a little more, to savour this rare moment of solitude.
She thought about going back to La Bara, but, for all she knew, the Kopfs would
still be there. The hours she’d spent watching as the Averlanders filled their
throats with ale had already been wearying enough. There were other taverns, but
they would also be full of sweating, shouting, farting men. It occurred to
Angelika that she should just disappear from town and never come back, leaving
both Kopfs and Franziskus behind. But night was not a time to travel through the
wilderness alone, and she wanted those hundred and twenty-five crowns.