Tales of the Old World (40 page)

Johansen sprinted and kicked it as hard as he could, away from the fuses.
Glass shattered and glistening liquid sprayed out as the lantern soared away
over the battlements and down into the city below. He didn’t hear a crash.

He turned. Grenner was crouched beside Hoffmann, cutting his bonds. Johansen
made an abrupt gesture and Grenner stopped.

“What?”

“Remember last night?”

Grenner’s eyes widened. “Back-up guy.”

“Where?” There was no sign of anyone else. Johansen took a few paces,
checking around the exit to the stairway.

There was a scream from the top of the roof and a figure hurtled down the
steep slope full-tilt, a lantern in one hand, a sword in the other.

The sword slashed at Johansen’s arm. He dodged sideways, grabbing for the
man’s jerkin, lifting him as he ran, using his momentum to throw him over the
wall.

The man screamed all the way down.

“I can’t believe Hoffmann went to start the search on his own,” Grenner said
as they walked away from the cathedral, leaving the oblivious crowds behind
them. “He must have known the Ulricans would have left people on guard.”

“Why didn’t they kill him when they caught him?”

“They wanted him to distract people like us. They only needed a few seconds.”

“They almost got them.” Johansen looked around. “Where are you taking me?”

“Since the Black Goat is out of commission,” Grenner said, “I thought I’d
treat you to Hexenstag breakfast at a place I know by the west gate.”

“I’d rather have a wash and get some sleep.”

“You’ll sleep better with a full stomach.” Grenner paused. “Have you noticed
that nobody thanked us?”

“Hoffmann did.”

“Hoffmann is deducting his surgeon’s bill from my wages. That’s hardly
thanks.”

There was silence as the two men walked on through the city. Some things
didn’t need to be said out loud. The watery sun was warm on their skin and the
light breeze helped them forget how dirty and tired they both were.

There was a queue of carts, wagons and pedestrians at the west gate, waiting
to leave the city. Already security had been tightened after the Konigplatz
explosion, and every guard wanted to be seen doing his job. Grenner felt
Johansen’s elbow dig into his ribs and looked up. His partner was pointing at a
familiar cart in the queue. “You owe someone an apology,” he said.

Grenner gave him a long look, then sighed and walked up to the cart, its
cargo of wide barrels stacked upright and roped together for travel. He reached
up a hand in greeting.

“It is Hexenstag morning, a time of goodwill, monsieur,” he said, “and I owe
you an apology.”

The Bretonnian wineseller in the driver’s seat looked startled and scared. He
groped for his reins to jolt his horses into motion. Grenner stepped back,
raising his hands in appeasement.

“We were looking for the men who caused the explosion last night. I thought
you might be involved. I was wrong. So,” he added, “you’re leaving Altdorf.”

The short man nodded sourly. “Zis city, she is not friendly to strangers, you
know? And zis thing last night, very bad. I go home.”

“Did you sell your wine in the end?” The Bretonnian nodded.

“Oui. In the end.”

“Well, that’s something. Travel safely.” Grenner nodded farewell and walked
away from the cart and back to Johansen. “Stop looking so smug,” he said.

Johansen grinned. “Hexenstag morning, a time of goodwill,” he said. “You hate
admitting you’re wrong, that’s your problem. You should keep some goodwill in
your heart the rest of the… What?”

Grenner was staring at the back of the Bretonnians head. “If he’s sold his
wine,” he said, “why’s he still got the barrels on his cart?”

Johansen turned to look. “I don’t know,” he said. “Do you want to ask?”

“You do it.”

The queue of carts had moved and the Bretonnian was almost at the gatehouse.
Grenner waited as Johansen walked up to the cart, then went to its rear, climbed
up and stood between the upright casks. He drew his sword, turned it and smashed
the hilt down on the lid. It cracked and splintered. A female face, gagged and
bound, terrified, streaked with tears, stared up at him from inside. The
Bretonnian leaped from his seat and ran for the gate, but the guards were ready
for him. They caught him, holding his arms as he struggled and hissed.

Five barrels on the cart. Five missing women. And he’d known there had been
something strange about the wineseller from the moment he’d met him. Johansen
hadn’t believed him, but he’d known. The man was a kidnapper, a slaver or
something worse.

From the ground, Johansen looked up at him. “Result?”

Grenner nodded. “Happy Hexenstag,” he said. He stared up at the sun, letting
its warmth massage the weariness from his body. “The nights start getting
shorter now.”

“They’ll get longer again soon enough.”

“I know. So enjoy them while you can.” He tugged the rest of the barrel lid
away and reached in to help the woman inside to her feet. “I know you’re not
much use at handling women, but I could use some help here.”

They set to work.

“Gentlemen, the deal is done. Your honour, sorry,
our
honour is at
stake!”

The young man stood defiantly in front of the rough wooden table, around
which three travel-worn characters played cards and drank from battered
tankards. Two tankards were full of frothy ale in which suspicious shapes
surfaced now and then. The other held a liquid golden glitter, which the owner
refilled from a delicate bottle every so often.

“Raise yer ten, and throw in me spare dagger of wotsit slaying.” The gruff
voice was that of a dwarf of indeterminate age and very few teeth. His black
beard was streaked with silver grey (and gravy stains), his face a mass of scars
from old wounds, weather-beaten and rugged. His armour was dented and scratched,
and two fingers were missing from his left hand. A huge, rune-encrusted axe
leaned against the table next to him. Unlike everything else about the dwarf,
the axe gleamed and shone, even in the fuggy gloom of Ye Broken Bones Inne.
Grimcrag Grunsonn peered at his cards through beady black eyes.

“Ach, Grimcrak, ven to admit Defeat! Dat Kard is nozzink bot a Seven.” The
heavily-accented growl came from the lips of a wolfish barbarian sitting
opposite the dwarf. Heavily muscled, with a bearskin draped across his broad
shoulders, the barbarian glanced at Johan Anstein and grinned, showing white
teeth. “I got ’im now, ja?”

Johan threw his eyes heavenwards and tapped an impatient foot on the worn
floorboards. “Look, we’ve been sitting around for weeks now. So I’ve sorted us a
job out, and—”

“What sort of a job, lad? More wetnursing ladies on the way to court? You
know what happened last time! Hah! Wetnurses!” Jiriki the elf laughed quietly, a
knowing look shining in his eyes.

Keanu the Reaver, the fur-clad barbarian, emitted something halfway between a
belch and a throaty guffaw. “Vetnurse! Ha! Zome joke dat, eh, Grimcrak?”

The dwarf stared stony-faced at his cards. “Weren’t no fault of mine.
Should’ve had good dwarf buckets ’stead of them shoddy things.”

Johan winced at the memory, but pressed on bravely. “No, a proper job. You
know, underground—with monsters and danger and stuff, a real quest.” The young
would-be hero looked dreamily across the bar, already envisaging the many brave
and daring deeds awaiting them.

The others ignored him. They’d heard it all before; Johan’s pipe-dreams
rarely came to anything.

“Okey-dokey, Grimcrak, da dagger it is.” The Reaver held his cards to his
massive chest in a conspiratorial fashion.

“It’s a wizard, see, lives here in town, wants us to find a long-lost magical
item.”

“They all do, lad, they all do,” Grimcrag muttered. “Let’s see you, then.”

“Funf tenz!” proclaimed the barbarian.

“Damn!”

“Ja!” Keanu grinned viciously. “I vin! I vin! Da dagger, if ya pleez…”

Johan drew in a deep breath and threw a sizeable bag down on the table. It
clinked with an instantly recognisable metallic sound. “He’s given me a
down-payment.”

Expecting a row for dubious tactics, Keanu was more than a little surprised
when Grimcrag handed over the dagger, but the Barbarian did notice that a
familiar glazed look had come over the dwarf’s craggy features. Even as
Grimcrag’s left hand passed over the weapon, his right sidled of its own accord
towards the bag, giving it a nudge. The bag jingled again.

“It’s—” Johan began.

“Shush now, lad, I knows what this is.” Grimcrag’s features had taken on a
look of rapturous awe. “Bretonnian gold, brought back from the new lands of
Luscitara.”

“Lustria actually,” Jiriki corrected. “And you only had to ask; we’ve known
about the humid, swampy, jungle infested place for…”

“Never mind that. Their gold is second to none.” Grimcrag felt the bag again.
After a few more investigative pokes, a secretive, greedy look came over the
dwarf’s craggy face, and he paused, before continuing in a disappointed tone.

“Actually, on second thoughts, I’m wrong y’know.” He dragged the bag towards
him across the table.

“Vot meanink?” Keanu asked, his razor-sharp intuition picking up the change
in the dwarf’s manner.

“He’s gone all goldsome on us. They all go like that,” the elf sighed. “He’ll
be alright in a minute or two.”

“Can we get on with it? The wizard is waiting.” Johan was getting more
exasperated by the second. “You’ve got… sorry, we’ve got the gold. It’s just a
down-payment; we’ve got to meet him at his tower within the hour.”

Grimcrag shook his head, a sly look in his eye. Jiriki gave a short barking
laugh and drew his dagger. From past experience, the elf knew what was about to
happen.

“You’ve bin done, lad,” the dwarf said, peering inside the bag. “Yup, just as
I thought: brass and copper, brass and copper—just enough to pay back what you
owes me for the sword and stuff I gave you.” Tutting disappointedly to himself,
Grimcrag made to put the bag into his pack, moving with startling speed—but
the elf and barbarian proved faster.

Keanu held Grimcrag’s wrist while Jiriki split the bag open with one
lightning-swift stroke of his dagger. Gold coins spilled across the table,
glinting and gleaming in the light.

“Koppa?”

“Brass my—” Jiriki began.

“Sorcery!” exclaimed the dwarf, looking sheepish, “It was all brass a moment
ago, I swear.” Johan could have sworn that the dwarf was shaking, and had tears
in his eyes, but he put it down to the smoke which filled the air of the gloomy
inn.

The young man drew a deep breath and gave it one more try. He was one of the
Marauders now, so they had to listen to him. Johan tried to look stern and
authoritative, copying a look he’d seen Grimcrag use to good effect a number of
times—usually when confronting ogres or trolls and addressing them as if they
were naughty children who deserved spanking.

“Ahem!” Johan frowned for effect. “AHEM!”

Keanu shot the ex-Imperial envoy a glance and involuntarily spat beer across
the table. “Vot’s up, jung ’un? Konstipatid?”

Grimcrag was dabbing his eyes with a dirty cloth, whilst trying to regain his
composure. Jiriki was putting the last coin away in his pack to be shared out
later, but he looked up and grinned at Johan’s posturing.

“Not bad, lad, not bad—now, what’s the story again?”

Seizing his chance, Johan closed his eyes and took a very deep breath, before
rattling off as many of the details as he could remember of his chance encounter
with the cowled wizard with the twinkling eyes.

“Err… He wants us to rescue a magic item of some sort from the clutches of
the monsters—that’s undead and suchlike—from some caves under the Grey
Mountains. He’s been after it for years, and it’s all he wants. He has lots of
gold and treasure, and the bag is a down-payment. He lives in the big tower on
the outskirts of town, and says that if we bring the artefact back, we can keep
all the other loot from the dungeon—all he wants is the thing itself!”
Panting, Johan finished his monologue and opened his eyes, proud of his powers
of recall.

He was sitting on his own at the table. A few regulars stared at him as if he
was mad, or had the plague perhaps.

Flushing a bright red, Johan picked up his pack and stumbled for the door,
making his excuses as he fled. “Damn them all to hell!” he muttered, buckling on
his sword belt and setting off after his companions. He could just make out
Grimcrag’s stumpy figure running off at the end of the street.

“Wait for me, you callous bunch of thugs!”

Johan set off in hot pursuit. Well, he knew where they going. As he tore
round the corner, he heard the unmistakable voice of an enraged innkeeper.

“Wretched Marauders! Who’s payin’ for all this beer?” Johan Anstein wasn’t
stopping. This was his quest, and he was going to be in on it whether the others
liked it or not.

The grey-cowled wizard had obviously been expecting them, since he was
waiting by the door to his tower. It was a run-down building, perhaps a hundred
feet high and little more than twenty feet in diameter. Weeds grew in thick
clumps around its base, and ivy crawled up the lichen-encrusted brickwork. No
windows looked out any lower than a good thirty feet up the walls, giving the
tower obvious defensive capabilities.

From the top, Johan imagined, you could see for miles and miles, at least as
far as the Grey Mountains, far off to the north. He also noticed that although
the tower looked decrepit in places, the front door was very impressive indeed.
Ten feet tall, five feet broad, its dark black timbers and heavy iron surround
suggested indomitable strength and near indestructibility. It had so many locks
and bolts that in places it was hard to see the wood at all.