“But which way do I go?” yelled Fabian in reply. “I’ll never find my way back
alone.”
Jonas’ face twisted into a mask of fury and for a second Fabian thought he
would strike him. Then he took a deep breath to calm himself and looked around
the house. His eyes came to rest on the pool of blood that surrounded them.
“Hold out your hand,” he said, stooping to the floor and dipping his finger in
the cold, thick liquid.
“Left at the top of this avenue,” said Jonas, drawing a crimson line across
Fabian’s palm. “Then a right, then two lefts, two rights and another left.” He
stepped back and looked at Fabian with desperation in his eyes. “Go, I beg you.”
Fabian looked at the crude, sticky map on his hand, and nodded once, before
turning and dashing from the house. Fleet with fear, he pounded across the
flagstones: barging past drunks and leaping over walls and hedges. As he ran,
the map trailed across his skin, gradually losing all its definition and
finally, with one turn still remaining, the lines of Puchelperger’s blood
blurred into a shapeless smear.
“Where now?” gasped Fabian in horror, as he reached a wide junction at the
end of a row of tenements. He had no idea which way to turn. His heart was
pounding in his chest as he looked up and down the two roads that lay before
him, straining to remember the last direction. He groaned in despair. Then,
something familiar caught his eye: the large dovecote that sat beneath his
bedroom window. He gave a howl of delight and sprinted towards it. After a few
seconds he saw the narrow street that led to the Unknown House and dashed up it.
As he ran towards the gate, he saw that just like Puchelperger’s it was
swinging on its hinges and to his horror, he saw that the front door was ajar
too. “I’m too late,” he panted, stumbling down the path.
He froze as he saw Calderino’s face looming out of the darkness towards him.
He drew the rapier his uncle had given him, but then he paused. There was
something odd about Calderino: he was much taller than Fabian remembered him and
his tanned, gaunt face was knotted in fear.
Fabian squinted into the darkness of the hall and slowly made out a second,
much larger figure, stooped behind Calderino. The colossal shadow stepped
forward into the moonlight and Fabian gave a laugh of relief. Calderino was
dangling helplessly in the grip of one of Kobach Ivanov’s massive hands. Fabian
stepped aside as Kobach hurled the cursing Tilean out of the door. Kobach gave
Fabian a brief nod of recognition before turning and closing the door firmly
behind him.
Calderino leapt to his feet, spitting insults in his own language and pulling
a stiletto from beneath his cape as he stepped towards Fabian. “If I can’t have
his whore, you’ll do instead,” he hissed, before lashing out with the
needle-thin blade.
A stream of droning words fell from Fabian’s mouth and the world seemed to
slow. He watched the Tilean’s blade moving towards his face with a feeling of
cool dispassion and stepped easily out of the way. As Calderino tumbled into the
space where Fabian had just been standing, the boy casually extended his leg and
sent the Tilean sprawling across the path. The man crashed to the flagstones
with a grunt and his knife clattered away into the darkness.
The world resumed its usual pace and Calderino clambered to his feet, turning
to face Fabian with a look of horror on his face. “You’re just like him,” he
gasped, backing away towards the gate. “You’re sorcerers, the pair of you.”
Fabian raised his slender sword, and levelled it at the man’s head. “You
should leave,” he said calmly.
Calderino cursed as the gate flew open and Jonas staggered, gasping, onto the
path.
“I think not,” said Jonas, grabbing the Tilean’s shoulder and ramming his
sword up through his chest.
Calderino stiffened with pain as the weapon emerged between
his shoulder blades, then he slumped lifelessly in Jonas’ arms. The old man
laid his body down onto the path and looked back down the street to see if they
were being watched. Once he was sure they were alone, he sheathed his sword and
stepped towards Fabian, grasping his hand and nodding enthusiastically. “You
see? You’ve begun a great journey, my boy.” He looked down at Fabian’s clean,
unused blade and shook his head. “You’ve still much to learn though.”
“He’s become unbearable,” said Fabian, steering his horse through the powdery
snow.
Winter had come early to Ostland and the Berlau estate was a kingdom of
ivory, frozen ponds and heavy, glittering boughs. “He was never the most
rational soul,” continued Fabian, as his charger picked its way carefully
through the waist-high drifts, “but since we returned from Altdorf, he seems
determined to prove his holiness at every turn. Mainly by labelling everyone
around him as morally suspect.” He pulled the collar of his fur-lined coat a
little tighter, as a fresh flurry of snow rolled across the hills towards them.
“Sigmar knows why they ordained him at such a young age, but it’s made him even
more in love with his own myth. I dread to think what he wants to talk to me
about. I imagine he intends to announce his impending godhood.”
The young man riding beside Fabian threw back his hood to reveal a face that
looked like it had been carved from granite; his features had a crude, brutal
quality to them and his eyes were as flat and lifeless as a corpse’s. He grunted
in disgust. “So why are we running back to the house with our tails between our
legs?” He patted the bleeding mass of fur and teeth hanging from his saddle.
“The hunting is good at this time of year.”
Fabian shrugged. “I hear you, Ludwig, but Jakob’s been ensconced in the
temple with Brother Braun since the summer, so I suppose even I’m a little
interested to know what his news is. But, more than that, for the first time in
my life, my father is actually allowing me some leeway.” He clutched the waxed,
fur-clad sheath that held his sword. “My new-found military prowess has achieved
the impossible and actually impressed the old man, so I’m determined not to do
anything to upset him.” He looked over at his friend. “Finally, I’m able to
remind people that the Wolffs are a family with a proud history—a family not
to be trifled with.” He gestured at the grizzled head that was fastened to his
saddle. “Father would never have let me roam the estates like this, marshalling
the watch, and cleansing the woods of filth, if I hadn’t proved to him that I
have skills as impressive as Jakob’s. How wonderful it is to finally be able to
reinstate some order.”
“And dispatch transgressors,” said Ludwig, leaning forward with a hungry grin
on his face.
Fabian looked over at his friend a little nervously. “Yes, that too I
suppose. Although it might be best to keep that under our hats for now.”
Ludwig’s head snapped to one side a couple of times in an involuntary twitch.
“They deserve everything they got. The idiot peasantry only understand brute
strength, Fabian. We were absolutely right to kill them. It will be a long time
before anyone dares to poach from the Berlau estate again.”
Fabian continued to watch Ludwig from the corner of his eye. He was his
oldest childhood friend and had been very useful during the months since he had
returned from Altdorf, but he was beginning to wonder if he had been a little
too open with him. “Remember, Ludwig,” he said, placing a hand on the reins of
the man’s horse and bringing it to a stop, “we should not mention any of my
uncle’s training techniques either. Father knows my new-found skill is due to
Jonas’ teachings, but he has no idea of the methods involved. And I don’t think
he would understand. Such ancient, unorthodox practices could easily be
misconstrued by people less cultured than ourselves.”
Ludwig nodded eagerly, continuing to grin. He stretched out his arms, tensing
and relaxing the muscles with obvious delight. “We wouldn’t want everyone to
have such skills anyway—we’d lose the advantage.” He laughed. “I imagine
that’s why your uncle made you swear that ridiculous oath of secrecy—to limit
the number of people who might be able to face him in single combat.”
Fabian flinched at the mention of the oath. With so many miles between him
and Altdorf, it had seemed no great crime to share what he had learned with his
closest friend; but every now and then, he felt a chill of doubt. “You’re
probably right,” he muttered, steering his horse onwards down the hill. “But
nevertheless, I’d rather no one else knew.”
He smiled to himself as he remembered the other reason he was happy to visit
Berlau: there was a parcel waiting there for him. Since their training sessions
in Altdorf, Jonas had sent several packages containing fencing manuals, military
textbooks and other, more unusual items. In his most recent letter he had
mentioned some dolls, acquired through one of his guests at the Unknown House.
They were things of incredible antiquity, believed by Jonas to have originated
in far Cathay. The letter explained that despite their grotesque appearance, the
dolls contained great power. Jonas claimed that if Fabian placed a single strand
of a man’s hair beneath the wax skin of one of the dolls, he would be granted
unnatural power over the flesh of that man. Fabian had thought immediately of
how easy it would be to pluck a hair from his brother’s pillow.
They crested the brow of the next hill and saw the white folds of the valley
spread out before them. “Someone’s burning the welcome feast,” said Ludwig,
nodding to a thin column of black that was snaking up towards the bright,
pregnant clouds.
“Odd,” muttered Fabian. The smoke was coming from near the house and it gave
him an unpleasant sense of foreboding. He kicked his horse into a canter and cut
through the deep snow with as much speed as he could manage.
As they approached the sprawling mass of the house, the source of the smoke
became clearer: a pyre had been constructed not far from the gatehouse.
Fabian peered through the eddying banks of snow and made out a group of
figures, silhouetted against the whiteness. “What’s this?” he muttered, with
growing impatience at his horse’s slow progress.
His agitation grew as he neared the figures. A loose circle of servants,
soldiers and officials was scattered around the smouldering pyre and at the head
of them was Brother Braun with his head bowed in silent prayer. Next to the
priest was a small, stocky figure, swaddled in a mountain of furs and bright,
ceremonial robes. Fabian recognised him immediately as Tischer, the local
magistrate, but there was another man by his side he could not place: a wiry,
fanatical-looking priest of some kind. Fabian’s gaze passed quickly over the
stranger and came to rest on a shape near to the pile of charred wood. Jakob was
lying a few feet from the pyre, curled up on the snow in a foetal position and
shuddering violently.
Fabian reined in his horse as a row of ashen faces turned towards him. At a
nudge from the magistrate, Braun looked up from his prayers and saw Fabian
riding towards them.
“Fabian,” called Braun, with a look of panic on his face. He began clambering
up the hill towards him, but Fabian had now looked beyond Jakob and fixed his
eyes on the pyre. His head felt oddly light as he focussed on two corpses
fastened to the top of the wreckage. They were burned beyond recognition, but
from Jakob’s shuddering sobs, he had no doubt who they were. The brightness of
the snow seemed to grow suddenly, lancing painfully into his eyes and the whole
scene began to spin around him as though he were drunk. He gripped the neck of
his horse in an effort to stop himself falling.
“What have you done?” he whispered under his breath, steering his horse down
the hill towards his brother. “What have you done?” he repeated a little louder
as he neared Braun who was still clambering up the hill. “What have you done?”
he howled, as he kicked his horse into a gallop, leaving a cloud of snow behind
him as he charged down the hill.
“Wait, Fabian,” gasped Braun, reaching out in desperation as the horse
thundered past.
“What have you done?” screamed Fabian, leaping from his horse and planting a
ferocious kick into Jakob’s side.
Jakob spun across the snow and clambered to his feet. His eyes were red raw
from crying and he looked across at his brother in confusion.
Fabian strode forward and punched Jakob with such force that his head snapped
back with an audible click of bone, sending a spray of red across the crisp,
white snow.
Jakob reeled backwards but managed to stay on his feet. The blow seemed to
clear his head slightly and he looked at Fabian with a spark of recognition in
his eyes. “Occultists,” he slurred through bloody teeth, trying to explain.
Fabian’s face flushed a dark purple and he howled with inarticulate rage,
before drawing a long hunting knife from his belt and rushing at his brother.
“Wait,” cried a piercing voice.
Fabian paused to see the wiry priest striding towards him, closely followed
by the magistrate and a group of militiamen. The priest had odd, pale eyes that
bulged out of his thin face as he approached. “Jakob only did what he had to,”
he said. “Your parents were engaged in the most depraved, heretical activity.
Who knows what havoc they would have wrought if your brother hadn’t reported
them to me. You should thank him.”
Fabian shook his head in disbelief. “Who are you?” he gasped, noticing that
the guards lined up behind the man were drawing their weapons.
“My name’s Otto Surman,” he replied, “and I’m a Templar of Sigmar.” He nodded
to the guards and officials that surrounded him. “You should think very
carefully about what you say.”
“Surman’s telling the truth, Fabian,” said the magistrate, anxiously rubbing
his hands together and cowering behind the priest. “You know how fond I was of
your parents, but there was very convincing evidence. I’d never have sanctioned
this if there had been any doubt.”