Dieter could think of few things he was less inclined to do
then venture into the wilderness with Adolph. The latter plainly still harboured
a grudge against him even though, in recent weeks, he’d struggled to hide it.
But it wouldn’t look well to the other cultists if he refused.
“I’ll go,” he said. Jarla stared at him as if he’d lost his
mind.
Shrewd as she was, Mama Solveig must have harboured the same
suspicion that Adolph meant him ill, but it didn’t show in her demeanour. She
beamed as if they were two quarrelsome grandchildren who’d finally learned to
play together nicely.
It was well after sunset, but the benighted street was still
busy. Filthy and stinking, many labourers were only now shuffling home after a
long day of toil, even as the night people, painted whores, slinking cutpurses,
and their ilk, began to emerge from their lairs.
Which meant Dieter had to wait for a break in the traffic.
When it came, he glanced about. As far as he could tell, no one was paying any
attention to him. He stooped, picked up a pebble, and used it to scratch a
triangle divided by a diagonal slash on a grimy brick wall.
It had been easy enough to slip off on his own to inscribe
the sign. Mama Solveig had come to trust him. But as he trudged back the way
he’d come, he wondered if leaving the mark would actually do any good. If
Krieger’s agents hadn’t actually been observing him a moment ago, would they
find that one bit of graffiti amid all the enormous bustle that was Altdorf?
What if no one made contact? Dare he take it as proof the
witch hunters had lost track of him, and if he did, would he then see fit to
run?
Behind him, a male voice said, “It’s about time.”
Startled, Dieter whirled to behold Krieger. The big man had
exchanged his black garb for nondescript clothing and now, with his sword and
pistol, looked like a bravo or mercenary.
“Is something wrong?” Krieger asked.
In fact, the moment had the jarring, disjointed quality that
too many situations possessed of late, but Dieter saw no reason to go into that.
“You just surprised me. I wasn’t expecting someone to pop out at me almost as
soon as I drew the sign.”
Krieger grinned. “I told you, somebody’s always keeping track
of you. It happened to be my turn. Come on, I know a good place to talk. I’ll
even stand you a mug of ale.”
Krieger led him to a tavern, its four-panelled door crudely
painted with bottles and overflowing flagons. Excited voices jabbered on the
other side. When the witch hunter opened the door, a stench composed of stale
beer and sweaty, unwashed bodies wafted out, and Dieter spied a number of
soldiers among the crowd in the candlelit common room.
He froze. “Are you out of your mind?”
The witch hunter chuckled. “Those fellows may have been told
to keep an eye out for you, but I promise you, none of them is likely to
recognise you at the moment. Not when they’re all at least half-drunk, and
intent on their sport.” He pushed Dieter over the threshold.
Once inside, immersed in a stink compounded of beer, sweat,
and blood, Dieter saw that a fighting pit yawned in the centre of the floor. Two
bare-chested dagger-men, their muscular bodies gleaming with oil, stood glaring
at one another at opposite ends of the sunken arena. Most of the patrons were
indeed preoccupied with the contest to come, either arguing over who was likely
to win or placing bets with a fat man behind the bar, who employed a chalkboard
to keep the tally.
Krieger insisted on placing a wager of his own, and in the
process bought two mugs of ale and hired what in this seedy establishment passed
for a private room: a cramped alcove with a curtain to isolate it.
The witch hunter sampled his drink and made a sour face.
“Tastes like they emptied the latrine back into the barrel to stretch the
supply. Still, foul drink is better than none, especially when there’s cause to
celebrate.”
“You mean, because I’ve found the Master of Change? I
haven’t.”
Krieger gave him a stare. “I told you not to draw the mark
until you did. It’s too risky.”
“You don’t understand. The man has hidden himself too well.
We’ll never find him using the approach you dictated.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“Yes, two—”
The spectators beyond the curtain roared as, presumably, the
fight began. The sudden bellow drowned out Dieter’s voice. He waited for the
clamour to partially subside, then began again.
“Two of them. The first is, arrest Mama Solveig, the old
midwife—”
“Who leads your coven. I know who she is, and I explained to
you why it won’t work.”
“It will if we manage it correctly. I’ll be with her when you
come for her, and I’ll use my magic to make sure she doesn’t escape or kill
herself.”
The crowd howled, possibly because one of the fighters had
landed the first slash or stab.
“We had a wizard working with us when we tried to arrest one
of the others,” Krieger said. “It didn’t help.”
“But she trusts me, and I’ll be standing right beside her.”
Krieger shook his head. “You said you had another idea?”
“Yes. The cultists are sending me into the forest to carry
supplies and a new recruit to the mutants.”
Krieger cocked his head. “And so?”
“And so you have some scouts or skirmishers or some such
shadow me, and a company of soldiers follow them. They can find and exterminate
the raiders, and isn’t that the main thing? Every day, I hear people grumbling
about how the mutants butcher innocent people, hamper trade, and affect the
price and availability of goods. Every day, folk lose more of their faith in an
Emperor, who, despite all his knights and men-at-arms, can’t seem to deal with a
threat lurking just outside the walls of his capital city.”
Krieger leered. “I didn’t realise you were such a keen
student of politics.”
“Damn it, you know I’m right!”
“Maybe you are, wizard, maybe you are. But when mutants stop
concealing their deformities, run away to the wilderness, and turn brigand, I
don’t have to worry about them anymore. At that point, they become the army’s
problem. My job is to ferret out the corruption hiding in our midst, and at the
moment, my target is the Master of Change.”
“It’s possible Leopold Mann—the leader of the bandits—knows the Master’s identity. If you take him alive, maybe you can get it out of
him.”
“Not the worst notion I ever heard, but I’m inclined to stick
with the original plan.”
Dieter had to clamp down hard on an urge to jump up and
strike the big man in the face. “That isn’t sensible or fair! I’ve brought you
more than you had any right to expert, and I’ve explained how it can be used to
deal with the Master of Change and the marauders as well. I deserve to be set
free and cleared of the charges against me.”
“That’s one point of view, but for better or worse, I’m the
one who decides when your work is done.”
“Do you want me to die? Because that’s what’s likely to
happen if I go into the forest, and then you’ll derive no benefit at all from
all my spying.”
“You tell me your sorcery’s potent enough to manage this Mama
Solveig. Then it ought to be strong enough to protect you out in the woods as
well.”
“Even if it is, I can’t stay where I am, doing what I’m
doing. I—” Dieter abruptly realised what he was babbling, and stopped short. He
didn’t dare tell Krieger that he’d come to find dark lore fascinating if not
addictive, or about the incipient changes in his mind and body. Bargain or not,
the witch hunter might well deem such an admission ample justification to send
him to the fire when his task was done.
Krieger studied him. “Go on, finish your thought.”
“Never mind. What’s the point? You aren’t going to change
your mind no matter what I say.”
The big man grinned. “Now there’s the discernment a good spy
needs.”
The crowd beyond the curtain roared, most likely in
appreciation of the death stroke. Then they started chanting, “Tzeentch!
Tzeentch! Tzeentch!”
Dieter cried out and jerked in his chair. His flailing hand
knocked over his tankard, spilling beer across the tabletop.
Quick as a cat despite his heavy frame, Krieger jumped up and
put his hand on his pistol. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” Dieter said, “just my ears playing tricks on me.”
The spectators were actually shouting, “Zeyd”, no doubt the name of the
victorious pit fighter.
The tender spot on his forehead throbbed to the beat.
The armoury was a massive, ugly limestone building, a small
fortress in its own right. Standing beside the wagon with Adolph and Lampertus,
Dieter stared at the recessed double doors in the centre of the wall and tried
to avoid picturing what was happening on the other side.
Adolph chuckled. “It galls you, doesn’t it?”
“What?”
“Knowing that right now, behind those doors, Jarla’s lifting
her skirts for another man. Better get used to it. It’s what whores do. It’s the
reason I cast her off.”
Dieter sneered. “You cast her off.”
“Did she tell you it was the other way around? Well, she
would, wouldn’t she?”
Dieter thought how satisfying it would be to blast Adolph
with his magic, or simply to hit him. Perceiving the barely restrained hostility
between his companions, Lampertus looked from one to the other with perplexity
and trepidation manifest in his expression. Dieter could scarcely blame him for
his reaction, considering that he was entrusting his life to them.
Lampertus was a smallish, middle-aged coppersmith with a
round, jowly face. Troubled by aches in his hips and knees, he’d submitted
himself to Mama Solveig’s poisonous ministrations. Now some new extremity grew
from his chest and periodically squirmed of its own accord, the motion
perceptible even beneath his layers of baggy clothing.
Dieter tried to produce a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry. We
like to mock and taunt one another, but it’s all in fun.”
“If you say so,” Lampertus replied.
The right-hand leaf of the double door cracked open. Jarla
beckoned from the shadows. Adolph climbed back up onto the wagon, flicked the
reins, and the two mules started forwards. Dieter and Lampertus jogged
alongside, swung the doors open wide enough to admit the conveyance, and closed
them behind it.
The interior of the armoury was a square, high-ceilinged box
of a place, with barrel upon barrel, rack upon rack and shelf upon shelf of
swords, poleaxes, shields and helmets that looked like severed heads in the
gloom. Enticed by Jarla’s charms, a bargain price, and the offer of a swig or
two of wine to sweeten the transaction, the sentry had fallen victim to the same
sleeping powder that had once rendered Dieter insensible. He now lay snoring on
the floor with his breeches undone and his manhood peeking out. Jarla noticed
Dieter looking at the fellow, and winced and lowered her eyes.
Dieter reminded himself that she’d done only what he and
Adolph had asked of her, and dredged up the resolve to react as was her due. He
smiled and squeezed her shoulder. “Well done. Did you take his purse?”
Jarla nodded. “I remembered.”
With luck, when the guard found his money missing, he’d
believe the whole point of the incident had been to rob him, and would fail to
notice someone had stolen from the arsenal as well. If so, it was unlikely he’d
report the crime, considering that he’d forsaken his responsibilities to consort
with a streetwalker.
The cultists scurried about the store, taking swords here,
shot and arquebuses here, never too many of any one item or too much of anything
from any one place, and stowing them in the hidden compartment beneath the
wagon’s cargo bay. Throughout the process, Dieter’s nerves jangled with the fear
that someone would walk in and discover what was happening. But nobody did, and
in less than half an hour they were ready to claim the final prize: two casks of
gunpowder. The item Leopold Mann supposedly needed most of all.
The barrels were too bulky to fit in the concealed
compartment. The robbers lashed them down in the wagon bed and draped a
tarpaulin over them to conceal the marks of the Imperial forces and the
Blackpowder Men. Then they made their exit.
If there’s another sentry, Dieter thought, peering down from
the ramparts, or if anybody else is looking and decides it’s strange for four
civilians, one of them a whore, to be driving out of the armoury at such an
early hour, we’re as good as dead. But their luck held, and, the team’s hooves
clopping and the wagon wheels rumbling on the cobbles, they rolled on while the
first grey hint of dawn appeared in the eastern sky.
They stopped in the miniature lumberyard behind Hanno’s shop,
where the stacks of wood concealed the beer barrels stolen two weeks previously.
They loaded and secured the kegs on top of the gunpowder, and then Jarla kissed
Dieter goodbye. “Be careful,” she whispered.
Dieter, Adolph and Lampertus donned caps sewn with the badge
of the Brewers’ Guild. Thus disguised, if one could call it that, they climbed
back onto the wagon and drove on towards the northern gate.
As planned, they reached the immense arch, portcullis and
iron-bound valves shortly before the soldiers who’d stood watch through the
night were due to be relieved. Tired, the guards had little inclination to
question any of the merchants and other travellers lined up in hopes of an early
start. They simply waved Dieter and his companions through with the rest.
Lampertus twisted around and stared back at the metropolis
slowly dwindling behind them. He’d probably spent his entire life in Altdorf,
and was now trying to come to terms with the truth that he was unlikely ever to
walk its streets again. Rather, he must now struggle to survive in a wilderness
infested with bears, wolves, beastmen and countless other perils.