“Yes,” Bea replied, uncertainly. “That is, no, not directly. I was just
curious to hear more—more of how the citadel came to be built here.”
Baecker nodded, and smiled. “Later, perhaps.” He took up the reins and
started his horse down the stony path that would lead them to the citadel below.
“Let’s move on,” he said. Baecker gestured again at the path that wound down
the hillside ahead. “Sigmarsgeist waits to welcome you as its honoured guests.”
“Lead on,” Stefan told him. “For we are equally honoured to be invited
amongst you.”
Sigmarsgeist took shape as they followed the path down the mountain. The
descent became more shallow as, gradually, the land levelled out, opening on to
a patchwork of fields, huge green and golden squares, ripe with crops. Bruno
marvelled at the sight.
“There must be enough produce here to feed many hundreds,” he remarked. “You
have done well to cultivate so much from such barren land.”
Baecker surveyed the expanse of fields, each with its neat lines of labourers
all working the land. “Not nearly well enough,” he said at length. “As fast as we cultivate, Sigmarsgeist grows still
larger. Try as we might, it is never enough. Sigmarsgeist is a belly which can
never be filled.”
“How do you survive?” Stefan asked.
Baecker shrugged, as though the question had no real answer. “As best we
can,” he said, and gave short laugh. “We do whatever we must.”
Beyond the fields, teams of workers were quarrying stone from the mountain
side, men working hard and apparently ceaselessly, piling wagons with chunks of
rough-hewn granite. A succession of wagons was filled then towed away on the
network of roads that led towards the citadel, whilst, all the while, empty
vehicles moved in the opposite direction, out towards the rock face. The men
worked with an indefatigable zeal, prising rock from the hard earth, piling the
wagons high.
“Building the future,” Baecker commented. “Heroes, to a man.”
Stefan didn’t doubt that for a moment. Even in the relative cool of the early
morning, it must have been back-breaking work. Not for the first time, he gave
silent thanks that he earned his living by the sword. Dangerous work it might
be, but there were harder paths in life. Any man who could spend each day
labouring like this was a hero indeed.
More than three hours after they had begun their descent from the mountain,
they finally stood by the walls of the citadel. From above, the walls had looked
impressive enough. Now, close to, they seemed truly daunting, built from heavy
stone and taller than any fortification Stefan had encountered in the Empire.
Clearly, this was a place built to withstand the most sustained onslaught, and
outlast the lengthiest siege.
Massive iron gates set into the walls swung open to greet them. Hans Baecker
waved his men on, and led Stefan and his companions into Sigmarsgeist.
Word of their arrival had spread fast within the city. People on the streets
stopped and cheered to give thanks for the safe return of the captain and his men. The noise drew mothers and children from
their houses, and craftsmen and artisans from their shops and workshops. As the
procession of riders made their way into the city, more and more people poured
onto the streets to add their voices to the commotion.
In amongst the townsfolk going about their business, Stefan noticed more
soldiers dressed in the scarlet livery, as well as others—fewer in number—whose tunics were white rather than red. Each bore the same insignia: the image
of the Imperial eagle, its wings spread wide over Sigmarsgeist. Bruno took note,
approvingly.
“Feels like being back amongst our own, doesn’t it?”
“In many ways, yes,” Stefan agreed. But, he kept reminding himself, he was
not amongst his own. He would keep an open mind—for the moment, at least.
One thing was beyond doubt. Everyone they encountered upon the streets—soldiers, craftsmen, women bearing baskets of fruit or bread—looked healthy
and well-nourished. Every town in the Empire had its share of sickness and
disease, but if it was present here, then it was well-hidden. The people looked
healthy. And young.
“Curious,” Stefan commented. “I’ve not seen a single person above middle
years since we set foot through the gates.”
“We are a young people,” Baecker replied. “Many of us travelled here together
as pilgrims. We’ve not had the time to grow old yet.” He pulled up, leaning from
the saddle to shake the hands of the townsfolk who rushed to greet him. “The
Guides will explain how it came to pass.”
“I look forward to meeting them,” Stefan said.
“And they will be glad to welcome you.”
Bruno turned towards Bea, fighting to make himself heard above the bustle of
the streets. “Not quite like Mielstadt, is it?”
Bea gave an almost imperceptible shake of the head, but didn’t respond.
“What is it?” Bruno asked, a note of concern in his voice. “What’s the
matter?”
“Nothing wrong,” she assured him. “But this place has an energy. A positive
energy,” she added. “It is a force for good. But it’s so
strong…” She paused, and took a gasp of breath. “I’ve not come
across such a thing before.”
Stefan looked around at the neat, timber-framed houses, homes laid out in
tightly-packed rows along the clean-swept streets. Everywhere the citadel had
the look of a great labour that was still in progress. Many buildings were
unfinished, none looked more than a few weeks or months old.
“These houses,” Bruno observed. “The whole place looks newly-built.”
Stefan agreed. That was how it seemed. Every street they passed down looked
fresh and clean, with a sense of vigour and purpose he had rarely, if ever,
noted in cities such as Altdorf or Middenheim, or indeed any other place he had
visited. But, in parts—particularly at the edge of the citadel near the walls—Sigmarsgeist had a disordered look to it, with too many houses crammed into
too short a space. That, Stefan supposed, explained Hans Baecker’s comment about
feeding his people. The citadel was growing fast, almost too fast for its own
good.
Nearer the centre of the citadel the streets resumed a more orderly look. The
design of the streets appeared more structured and less cluttered, and the
surrounding workshops and houses older, though hardly long-established. Here, as
elsewhere, statues cast in marbled stone abounded. Many of them were in homage
to the Emperor Sigmar, and showed him astride his horse, or standing triumphant
in victory. But others—almost as many—depicted a second figure that Stefan
did not recognise. The carvings showed an older man, standing proud and upright,
with what looked like the citadel in miniature cupped within his outstretched
hands. In the course of an hour moving through the streets of Sigmarsgeist,
Stefan saw the image at least a dozen times, both in statues, and carved into
the facade of buildings.
Finally, the streets opened out into a wide courtyard facing a high-walled
building, fronted by iron gates. Stefan recognised the cluster of domes that he
had picked out from above. The presence of much larger numbers of militia
suggested that it was indeed a palace of some kind.
“We must remain here for just a moment.” Baecker waited with Stefan and the
others whilst one of his men approached the sentries standing guard either side
of the gates. After a brief conversation, they were waved through. They passed
through a stone archway into an open courtyard, where their horses were
collected by stablemen clad in the same red livery.
Baecker dismounted, then extended a hand to Bea.
“Time to get some rest,” he said. “Afterwards, we shall learn more of you, and
you of us.”
Stefan had a hundred questions in his mind that he wanted answering, but they
had been riding since dawn the previous day, and he was more than glad now to be
offered some respite. The questions, on both sides, could wait a few hours
yet.
Their quarters were on an upper floor of the great building—single rooms,
sparse but clean. A bed, a basin with an attendant pail of freshly drawn water,
and a window that looked out across the rooftops. Before Stefan finally lay his
aching body down, he stood for a while gazing out of the slitted window, taking
in the panorama of streets, houses and workshops that lay beyond. Standing
there, at the heart of a place that, a day before, had not existed for him even
in his imagination, it occurred to Stefan that he had put himself entirely at
the hospitality of people he barely knew, and whose motives were at best
uncertain.
Stefan Kumansky had grown up at odds with much of the world he had walked
through. He had seen shadows where others had seen only light, and suspicion and
doubts had walked with him as constant companions. But, as he finally lay his
head down, he searched his heart for those doubts and found none. Instead he
found rest, and a feeling that had been alien to him for much of that short
life. The feeling known to the fortunate traveller at the end of a long and
uncertain journey. A feeling of coming home.
He awoke feeling more refreshed than he had any right to hope for. When he
finally opened his eyes Bruno was standing over him, a playful look of impatience resting on his face.
“Ulric’s toil!” Stefan exclaimed, sitting bolt upright upon the cot. “How
long have I been asleep?”
“The best part of a day,” Bruno replied, keeping a straight face. “Actually,”
he admitted, “little more than an hour, two at most.”
Stefan stretched and yawned. Certainly he felt as though he might have been
asleep for the best part of the day. The air here clearly agreed with him.
“Is Bea awake yet?”
“Yes. We all are. They’re ready for us now, apparently.”
“They?”
Bruno shrugged. “Baecker and his men speak of them only as ‘the Guides’.”
Stefan sat up and pulled on his boots. He splashed cool water from the basin
onto his face, rubbing away the last of his sleep from his eyes. “In that case,”
he said, “let’s not keep them waiting.”
They were received in a spacious, low-ceilinged chamber somewhere near the
core of the palace. The attendant who had escorted them from their rooms
executed a brief, low bow as he entered into the room. Stefan repeated the
gesture. As he looked up, he scanned the chamber to take stock of who or what
they were about to be presented to.
The chamber had few concessions made to luxury. If this was the office of the
high council, or whoever ruled Sigmarsgeist, then it was austere indeed. For all
that, the room was airy and well lit, possessed of the same spartan health as
the citadel itself. Stationed along the walls around the edge of the chamber
were soldiers decked in the same red livery as Hans Baecker’s men. Each bore a
brightly burnished sword, held upright and close to the chest, in the formal
posture of vigilance. But where Stefan might otherwise have expected to see a
table of high office, there was only open space and a stone floor bare except
for a wide circle marked out in runes bearing pious homage to the gods. Seated
within the circle was a group of about a dozen people, Baecker amongst them, some wearing the white livery that Stefan
had noted earlier.
Hans Baecker got up, offered greeting, and bid them join the circle. Two
officers wearing scarlet moved aside, making room for Stefan and his friends.
Only as he sat did Stefan notice the man and woman who, although part of the
wider circle, seemed by their presence to dominate. The man, Stefan saw at once,
was the one he had seen depicted all through the citadel.
“AH honour to our Guides,” Baecker began, addressing the couple directly. “I
beg to present Stefan Kumansky, Bruno Hausmann and Beatrice de Lucht, who joined
arms with us in glorious battle. They have travelled far to this land, from
beyond the borders of Kislev.”
“Not I,” Bea corrected him, hastily. “I hail from Mielstadt, a place not so
very distant from here.”
The man that Baecker had addressed as Guide nodded, signalling familiarity
with the lands to the east, or with Mielstadt, or both. He studied Stefan and
his companions with the steady, unhurried ease of a man grown comfortable with
holding power. His lean face and fine, almost aristocratic features, gave his
face a look of power tempered with wisdom. Stefan put his age at about forty
years, or possibly even more, his years betrayed by the flecks of grey in his
hair and beard.
“Welcome to Sigmarsgeist,” he said. “Through the naming of our citadel, and
through the works of all its people, we glorify the spirit and memory of our
great emperor.” He turned to the woman next to him. “We extend the hand of
friendship to these, our most honoured guests, do we not?”
The woman was some ten years or so younger, with dark hair swept back from an
unblemished, olive-skinned face. Her heavy-lidded eyes would have given her an
almost languid look but for the expression in the eyes themselves: bright and
piercing. Like her companion, she exuded authority. She sat, hand-in-hand with
her neighbour, yet some similarity in the delicately chiselled features of the
two suggested they were not husband and wife. The woman inclined her head and
favoured the newcomers with a smile.
“You are welcome indeed,” she concurred. “We have had reports of your valour
in coming to the aid of our people—both with your swords, and—” her smile
broadened as it fell upon Bea—“with your sacred powers of healing. We are
thankful indeed, and indebted.”
“Your thanks are appreciated,” Stefan replied, “but you owe us no debt. Your
enemies are ours, too.”
“Indeed they are,” her companion concurred. “I am Konstantin von Augen, the
Father of Sigmarsgeist.” He indicated the woman seated beside him. “And this is
Anaise, my beloved sister.”
Stefan bowed again. “You rule over a most remarkable city.”
Von Augen raised both hands as if to fend away the words.