Alexei Zucharov watched Anaise like a hawk. He recorded every gesture of her
hand, every movement, every line that animated her face. And, as he watched her,
so the Chaos Lord Kyros watched too. Watched, and bided his time. The net was
tightening.
The chamber they had gone to was within Anaise’s own private quarters. This
was a place where Konstantin and his guards would not, dared not go. But
Zucharov was unsure of his status now. Had the words that Kyros crafted for him
done their work? Did Anaise now accept him as her consort, her advisor or was he
still a prisoner? The armed men she had posted around the room and beyond the
closed doors did not suggest she considered him free to come and go as he
pleased.
“Why did you allow the combat to be ended?” Zucharov demanded.
“To appease Konstantin,” Anaise responded. “We must tread carefully around my
brother. He does not understand, not yet.”
Zucharov felt the anger chafing at him like a wound which would not heal. “I
should have killed him,” he said, slowly. “Kumansky. It was my right. My
destiny.”
“It did not look that way to me,” she retorted. “Kumansky had outwitted you.
You were at his mercy. Perhaps you should be grateful to Konstantin for
intervening when he did.”
Zucharov wanted to punish her insolence, but knew that Kyros would not allow
him, not yet. He felt the hand of his master, reining in his desires. His face
lifted up, and his eyes rolled back in his head. Kyros had nearly total mastery
of him now, able to orchestrate his every word and movement.
Zucharov looked around the room, his gaze taking in the guards standing with
their swords held upright, each man waiting on his mistress’ command.
“There are some amongst you that you can no longer trust,” he said at last.
Anaise looked at him, quizzically, then realised that Zucharov was referring
to her own men. She stepped closer, almost within touching distance.
“The soldiers of Sigmar have served me faithfully,” she said. She laughed, but
the laugh caught in her throat, giving lie to her confident manner. “What are
you saying?” she demanded. “That someone here is going to betray us?”
Zucharov closed his eyes. From deep within him, Kyros reached out, his
sightless gaze spanning both past and future, tracking the futile endeavour of
mortal souls as they struggled against inevitable fate. In that brief, flaring
moment of clarity, everything was clear, and everything was known to him.
Zucharov opened his eyes, and looked down on Anaise. A faint, sardonic smile
appeared upon his face.
“You have already been betrayed,” he said.
They walked, and sometimes crawled, through the cramped, airless passageways
for the better part of an hour, until they reached a shaft leading up to the
next level of the mine. Rilke lifted his lantern to indicate the ladder.
“You first,” he said to the guard.
The guard looked up at the ladder then back to Rilke, keeping one eye fixed
upon Stefan and the others. “You go first, then the prisoners,” he said. “Once
you reach the top, I’ll follow.”
“Of course.” Rilke forced a smile, and laid a friendly hand on the man’s
shoulder. “What am I thinking of?” He steered the guard away from the ladder,
and, in the same movement, turned in slightly. Stefan saw the brief flicker of
steel in Rilke’s right hand, then the guard’s eyes widen in sudden alarm. He
started to call out, but it was a gushing purple tide of blood, not words, that
spilled from his mouth.
Rilke cleaned the knife carefully on the dead man’s tunic, and went to tuck
it beneath his belt. He hesitated, then offered the blade to Stefan, “You’re
probably going to need this,” he said, “and this.” He held out the
lantern.
“By the time this wick has burnt down a finger’s width,” he said, “I’ll have
raised the alarm. You overpowered both of us.” he looked down dispassionately at
the crumpled body at his feet. “This poor wretch got the worse of it.” He bent
down, and gently extracted the sword from the dead man’s grip. “You’d better
take this as well,” he said. “There’s no telling what lies ahead for you now.”
“Armed or not, how are we going to get out of the mine?” Bruno asked, still
suspicious. “The place is thick with guards, all the way to the top.”
“You don’t go up,” Rilke told him. “You go down.” He indicated with his
lantern. “Take the passage off to your left. It works its way along for about a
quarter of a mile, then comes to a dead end.”
“A good place to die, trapped like a rat,” Bruno commented, sourly.
“There you’ll find rubble that’s been hewn from the rock face,” Rilke
continued, ignoring Bruno. “Hidden underneath there’s a plate, a trapdoor. It
hasn’t been opened in a while, but you should still be able to prise it free.”
“And underneath?” Stefan asked.
“A shaft, just about big enough for a man to pass through-Climb down it, and
you will be in the tunnels which once formed part of the old city.”
“The old city? You mean the original foundations of Sigmarsgeist?”
“No.” Rilke shook his head. “The rulers of Sigmarsgeist were not the first to
build here. As the foundations were dug, they came upon the ruins of another
city, long since abandoned or destroyed.”
“Who built this other city?”
“No one now knows for sure,” Rilke replied. “Perhaps they were people not
unlike the Guides. Perhaps they too had dreams of a great citadel, a bastion to
protect them against evil. But the underground tunnels are all that remain now, and they will not
survive long. Soon the seam that lies directly above is going to be mined. The
shaft will be buried and access to the old tunnels will be lost forever. This is
your only chance.”
“Doesn’t sound like much of a chance,” Bruno commented. “How can we find our
way through?”
“Head due north,” Rilke said. “That is, directly away from Sigmarsgeist. Find
the routes that take you upwards, towards the surface. Some will be impassable,
but a few, I know, are still open.”
“If there’s a path, I can find it,” Koenig said, confidently.
“You must leave now,” Rilke said. “Time is running out.” He held out the lamp.
“Take this. There should be a good hour’s worth of light in it. Then you’re on
your own.”
Stefan took the lantern. “It seems we misjudged each other.”
“One last thing,” Rilke said. He took a step towards Stefan, his hands down
by his sides. “Hit me,” he instructed him, “and make it look convincing.”
Stefan hesitated, momentarily disarmed by the request. “Not long ago I’d have
gladly done so,” he reflected.
“Then act on that memory.” Rilke offered his head to one side. “My very
survival may depend upon it.”
Konstantin von Augen stood, as he had on countless mornings before, on his
balcony high on the east face of the palace, looking out across the ever-growing
expanse of Sigmarsgeist. Through the last decade of his life, the sight of the
citadel growing from a scattering of flimsy homes into a vast, impenetrable
fortress had filled him with joy, and with hope for a future world to come. It
had seemed to him as though he were standing upon the threshold of a new age.
But today there was no joy, and his hope was strangely muted. Today his heart
was heavy, and he could not envisage when, or even if, that burden would ever
lift.
This cold early morning he seemed to see Sigmarsgeist as he had never seen it
before. The citadel was his: Sigmarsgeist was his creation, his child. But now,
with the wind blowing off the hills setting a cruel chill into his limbs, he
began to see that creation for what it truly was. Instead of order, he saw
anarchy. He counted dozens of new houses and workshops which had not existed the
day before, new buildings that had sprung up across the city almost literally
overnight. But equally there were dozens more that appeared to have been destroyed for no reason, burst open like cracked, discarded shells and
new, half-finished structures emerging from the ruins like jagged teeth.
The streets of the city were full, as they always now seemed to be. But where
before Konstantin had seen only labour and purposeful endeavour, he now saw
discord and strife. Men and women clashed upon the roads and walkways of the
citadel, elbowing one another out of the way, jostling for what limited space
remained. So many people, too many. He could hear their voices raised, a tumult
of sound rising to the high towers of Sigmarsgeist. And what for so long had
sounded in his ears as exaltation now rang with bitter anger. He saw the White
Guard amongst them, staffs and clubs raised as well as voices. Many he no longer
recognised. Even the guard were passing beyond his control.
Most of all, wrapped around nearly two thirds of the city like a choking
weed, were the structures of fibre and bone that no mortal hand had built. Walls
that blocked off streets; walkways and bridges that ended in empty space.
Flights of steps that vanished into the ground without entrances or exits. A
madness had seized hold of Sigmarsgeist, a touch of Chaos, and this was its
physical form.
Had it come so suddenly, or had the change been so gradual, so stealthy, that
it had crept upon him without his noticing? Or was it simply that he had tried
so hard, and for so long, not to see what was unravelling before his very eyes?
The wind gusted, raw and hard against his face, and Konstantin felt a tear
cold upon his cheek. There was more, something in its way, almost worse.
Konstantin had lived his life battling adversity and disappointment, but
betrayal had always wounded him most deeply of all. And this wound went to his
very core. He had trusted this man above all others, a man who had been his
lieutenant and his confidant. After Konstantin’s own death this man might have
carried the torch of Sigmarsgeist in the darkness. But if what Anaise had told
him was true, Konstantin had been truly deceived. His trust had been
extinguished like a flame, and now hope itself was starting to die.
He turned at the sound of knocking, then the door to the chamber opened.
Rilke appeared in the doorway, with two of the Red Guard in close attendance.
His normally austere countenance had given way to look of confusion and alarm,
and he wore a crude bandage above one eye.
“My lord,” Rilke began, “I bring news—”
Konstantin held up his hand, stopping Rilke’s words. He looked at the
scarlet-clad soldiers standing on either side. “Where are your own men, Rilke?”
he asked, his voice cold and dispassionate. “Where are the White Guard?”
“My lord, my men cannot be found,” Rilke told him. “But be assured, I shall
account for them before long.” He paused, and took a breath. “But first you must
know—”
“I already know,” Konstantin interjected. “I already know that the prisoners,
Kumansky and his comrade, have escaped from the mine and that they overpowered
you and your men. I have already heard your hollow apology. Spare me your
disgusting fabrication.” He gripped the arms of his chair and, slowly, lowered
himself into a seated position.
“I do hope that earning your wound did not cost you too dearly.”
Rilke made no reply. He heard footsteps from the corridor outside, marching
towards the Guide’s chamber. This time there was no announcement before the
doors were flung wide.
Anaise entered, flanked by six or seven men wearing the white of the elite
guard. Rilke stared at them, taking in the pale, Norscan faces; their skin the
colour of winter. They stared back at him with a look of open disdain.
“These are not my men,” Rilke protested.
“You have no men,” Anaise told him. “You have no one to protect you any
longer.”
Another figure now entered the chamber, a huge, imposing man. Rilke and
Konstantin looked in astonishment at Alexei Zucharov. The tattooed mutant had no
shackles upon his arms or legs to temper his frightening power. Instead of
chains he bore steel armour—a breast-plate fastened upon his chest, and a
broadsword at the belt about his waist. He stood amidst the white-clad guards, his posture proclaiming his authority
over them.
All colour had drained from Rilke’s face.
“What is he doing here?”
“He?” Anaise responded. She smiled, first at her brother, and then at Rilke.
“He is your executioner,” she said.
Lothar Koenig stared at his two companions in mute disbelief. “You want to go
where
?” he asked.
Up to that point—from his perspective at the very least—it had gone
perfectly. He hadn’t trusted the man the others called Rilke one jot, but he had
been as good as his word, Lothar had to give him that. The journey through the
mine had been difficult—rock spills and fallen roof beams threatening their
progress every inch of the way. But when they finally reached the far, dead end
of the gallery, everything had been as Rilke had described it. Buried beneath a
carefully placed slew of rocks they had found a hatchway which led, quite
literally, to another world. Once down the angled set of steps—a stone
stairway that had not seen use in several years—they had found themselves in a
network of old, abandoned tunnels that had once served another, far older
settlement.
“Sewers, probably,” Bruno had offered, speculating about their use. “But bone
dry now.”
Lothar Koenig didn’t care what they had once been, so long as they could now
lead him back towards sunlight, clean air and freedom. Again, it had been exactly
as Rilke had described it. The tunnels splayed off at different angles and in
various directions, some boring deeper into the ground, but others following a
gentle incline towards the surface. Lothar could swear he could see daylight, or
at the very least, smell it. His sense of direction was unerring he was
confident he could find a way back to the surface in a matter of hours. It came
as a shock to him when Stefan told him he had no intention of going that way.