Tales of the Old World (56 page)

He crept to the window and levered open the shutter far enough to allow him
to peer out into the night. It was a sight he had never seen before: the village
in total darkness. Not a single light burned in any of the windows of the houses
spread around the edge of the square. The streets were empty, the temple bells
stilled. Even the birds that settled after dark in the trees beyond the house
had fallen silent.

For a moment the thought leapt into Stefan’s mind that they had been
abandoned, that he and Mikhal were the only ones left in the whole village of
Odensk. But that was stupid, just a child’s imagination. There must be others,
people in every one of the houses, perhaps even now looking out from their
windows, like him. In the dark he just couldn’t see them, that was all.

But suddenly the darkness was no longer total. At the very far end of the
street, along the path that led down to the bay, he could see the orange flicker
of a lamp or torch being carried up the hill. The silence was no longer total
either; Stefan could hear voices following behind the light, though he couldn’t
yet make out any of the words. A surge of excitement filled Stefan’s body. He
closed his eyes and made a wish, wished that the news was good, that, in a few
moments, the door would be flung open and their father would be standing on the
step in front of them, his arms spread as wide as the grin upon his face.

“Mikhal,” Stefan called to his brother, remembering moments later he had
promised to keep his voice low. “Mikhal,” he repeated in a whisper. “Come here
and see.”

Mikhal joined his brother at the window, elbowing Stefan aside to get a
better view. The single lamp had become a procession, the voices swollen to the
sound of a large crowd. The air rang with the clatter of footsteps, marching up
the hill that led towards the centre of the village.

A wave of relief rushed over Stefan. It was over. His father and the others
were coming back. He reached up to unfasten the window, ready to call out to his
father as he spied him approaching the house.

His hand fastened upon the latch and then froze. Maybe it was the sound of
heavy boots upon the cobble stone—too loud, or too many. Or maybe it was
something in the building cacophony of voices, voices singing songs his
childhood had never taught him, in a tongue he still could not recognise.
Without thinking, Stefan found himself reaching out towards Mikhal, but his
younger brother had slipped away from the window.

He turned and saw Mikhal tugging hard upon the door.

“I’m going outside!” Mikhal shouted. “Find father!”

“No!” The intensity in Stefan’s voice frightened them both. But the bolts
were already drawn back; the door was open.

Fedor Kumansky gazed at the bloody carnage all around him and wept. The men
of Odensk had been prepared. They were strong, and though they had lived for
peace, they were ready to fight fearlessly to protect their homesteads. It had
made no difference.

He brushed away tears with a hand stained red with blood whilst he rested
upon his sword to draw precious breath. All around, his brothers of the sea lay
dead or dying, slaughtered by creatures driven by a single purpose; to destroy
every living thing that lay in their path.

At first, the battle had gone well. The invaders hadn’t seen Fedor’s men
lying in wait behind the rocks, and each of the cannons had found their mark.
The two boats that had been lowered from the ships at anchor were destroyed, the
men inside killed or thrown into the heavy swell of the sea.

But even as the first boats sank, three more were in the water, then five,
then six. Within minutes the mouth of the bay was clogged with oared vessels
being rowed hard towards the shoreline.

The cannons were reloaded and fired a second, a third time, but the men of
Odensk might as well have tried to hold back the tide itself. The invaders made
no attempt to rescue those who had been pitched into the water. They were left
to die as the next wave of boats ploughed onwards, relentless.

Fedor drew the sword from its scabbard and held it high above his head.
Moonlight glinted off the newly-polished steel.

“Rise up!” he called to his men. “We’ll send them back wherever they’ve
sailed from, and make them rue they ever made the voyage south!”

Cheers rang out from the rocks around and behind him. Men emerged in their
dozens, no longer fishermen, but warriors. Andrei Markarov appeared at his side,
his face flushed and excited. “Don’t worry,” he told Fedor. “We’re all ready for
this.”

“I know,” Fedor replied quietly. “I know we are.”

Andrei turned and urged his comrades forward. “Come on!” he yelled, stabbing
down at the beach with his sword. “This barren strip of land will be their first
and last taste of Mother Kislev! Let us make them pay dearly for each yard!”

The leading boats had run aground in the shallows of the bay. Now the men of
Odensk would come face to face with those who would take their land, their
living, their lives.

As one the villagers rose up to form a human shield. Together they would
drive the invaders back into the sea, and the waters would run red with their
blood.

Figures were in the water, ploughing through the waves towards the beach.
Fedor tried to take stock of their numbers and quickly lost count. Tens, dozens,
it might be hundreds. The air around him sang with the sound of arrows being
loosed, as all those nearby who carried bows launched the next attack into the
swirling waters of the bay. Fedor saw several of the advancing figures stumble
and fall beneath the onslaught. Countless other arrows found their mark, but
seemingly made no impact. The invaders strode on through the waters oblivious to
the arrow shafts lodged in their flesh, or tore out the wooden shafts from their
bodies and tossed them aside as if they were no more than irritations.

Any hope that the invaders could be forced back before they had got as far as
the beach died there and then. Fedor Kumansky said his prayers to the gods and
stepped forward towards the water’s edge. He thought about the life he was about
to set behind him, a hard life of peaceful struggle and simple reward. He
thought about his wife, lain six years in the cold ground. And he thought about
his sons, Stefan and Mikhal, waiting on his safe return at home. He begged the
Goddess Shallya for her vigilance in protecting them.

He looked into the faces of his attackers. Surely they, too, must be men like
he, men with homes and loved ones that they longed to see again. Surely some
sense could still intervene before the madness engulfed them all.

But Fedor Kumansky saw nothing of the kind. The faces that stared back at him
had long ago been leeched of any vestige of humanity as he understood it. In
fact, he was not certain if many of them were human at all. Most wore the coarse
fur jerkins and horned steel caps of the Norse hordes, but on some the marks of
mutation were clear. Stretched jaws gaped open to display rows of yellowed
rodents teeth. Horns grown out of bone jutted through ruptured faces and
foreheads. Skin sparkled with the chill lustre of the serpent’s scales. But one
thing they had in common, every one: their eyes, vacant, almost unseeing, empty
of compassion. They offered him no hope, no respite. This would be unto death.

The opposing forces met where surf crashed upon the shore. Fedor stood at the
edge of his world, and cast a last glance inland towards the village. The
invaders were shouting orders at each other in a harsh, guttural tongue, their
rough voices obliterating even the sounds of the waves. Tall figures dressed in
dark, foul-smelling skins were advancing on him on three sides. Fedor picked a
target at random, and attacked.

As he ran towards the thick-set figure he had marked out, it struck Fedor
Kumansky that he had not fought another being for more than six years. His
opponent turned towards him almost in slow-motion, and he aimed his first blow.
There was a moment that seemed to last forever as Fedor looked at the man; his
milk-white face and fair hair poking out from beneath the rounded iron cap upon
his head; the small scars pocking the baby-smooth skin on his face. The sly,
hungry grin that spread over his features as he met Fedor’s eyes.

Fedor swung his sword, and felt it judder as it struck home, cutting through
leather, cloth, or bone—he couldn’t tell. His opponent tottered as though
slightly drunk, but did not fall. Fedor saw the man’s sword arm swinging up
towards him. All of a sudden, Fedor found himself possessed by a furious frenzy.
He pulled back his sword, parried the blow aimed towards him then struck again
and again, hacking at the other’s man’s body as he might cleave meat from a
bone. Blood sprayed out of a deep cut through the man’s neck as, finally, he
toppled into the shallow water lapping the beach.

Fedor experienced a moment of pure horror, looking down upon a scene from the
very pit of Morr. Then he felt something cut through the cloth of his shirt,
cold metal grazing the skin below his ribs. He spun round to find a huge figure
bearing down on him, knives in both of its hands, the same insane, blind
bloodlust in its eyes. Fedor took his sword in both hands, stepped back and
swung a blow directly into the Norse’s face, the blade paring flesh away from
bone.

He wasn’t seeing men, or even mutants, any longer. Fedor Kumansky’s existence
had become distilled into one simple equation: kill or be killed. And he went
about that business with every ounce of his being.

But, even as he fought, Fedor was aware that they were being pushed back up
the beach, on to the path that would lead eventually to the village. He saw
Jacob Kolb on his knees, trying to fend off the blows raining down upon him from
a Norscan wielding a fierce-looking, double-headed axe. Fedor cut a path through
the battleground with his sword, his desperation to reach his friend endowing
him with the strength of two men. He lunged with his sword, slicing through a
Norse arm, severing it above the elbow.

“Get up, old friend! Get up!” He lifted Jakob’s face towards his own and
wiped away the filth crusting his friend’s face. But Jakob was already dead, he
had seen the last light of this world. Fedor had barely a moment to mark his
grief before something landed heavily upon his back, sending him sprawling
face-down. Long fingers ending in sharpened talons fastened a grip around his
neck. Fedor felt as though the very life was being squeezed from him. Then, just
as suddenly, the pressure eased and the weight was lifted off his back. Fedor
turned to see Andrei freeing his sword from the mutant’s body with the help of
his boot. Andrei’s face was caked with blood. He stretched out a hand and helped
Fedor to his feet.

All around him Fedor saw the dead and the dying. Friends, brothers he had
toiled with very working day of his life. Men who would not be beaten by
anything had given their all, given their lives. And it was not enough.

“We must re-group,” Fedor said, fighting for his breath. “Pull back to the
village. They’ll destroy us out here.”

“But—”

“No buts, Andrei. This is not glory. This is survival. Survival of our loved
ones. Gather whoever you can. We pull back, to the village. We must defend our
homes.”

Stefan’s heart pounded hard inside his chest. Mikhal had either not heard, or
not heeded him. By the time Stefan had reached the door of the house his brother
had gone. Now he stood in the empty village square, calling Mikhal’s name. His
breath came in short, tight bursts, frosting the cold night air. The surrounding
houses were still wrapped in darkness, but in the distance street a house at the
edge of the village was on fire. Orange flames licked the night sky, and thick
coils of suffocating smoke rolled up the hill towards Stefan.

Moments later a figure emerged from the smoke, staggering wildly from one
side of the road to the other. The man was clutching the side of his stomach
with one hand and cradling his head in the other. His face looked wet, and red.

Stefan felt his body tense. His hand was inside the pocket of his jerkin,
clutching the handle of the short knife as though his life depended upon it. The
man slowed his pace as he got closer to the centre of the village and looked up
at Stefan.

Stefan recognised him. It was Jan Scherensky, one of the men who worked the
nets on his father’s boats. His son was a friend of Stefan’s; they had played
together only a day or so ago. It all seemed a lifetime away now.

Stefan stared at the man in shock. As well as his face, one side of his body
seemed to be have been drenched in blood. Something thick and dark oozed from a
hole that had opened up beneath Jan’s ribs. Scherensky noticed Stefan standing
by the side of the road and limped towards him.

“In the name of the gods, Stefan,” he shouted, “save yourself.”

Stefan was stunned. It was a while before he could reply.

“I can’t,” he said at last. “I have to find Mikhal.”

Jan Scherensky knelt upon the ground as though he had been overcome by
tiredness. He held out a hand towards Stefan and Stefan took it in his own. He
didn’t know what else to do.

“Jan,” Stefan said, “what’s happened to my father?”

Other figures were starting to emerge from the smoke and flames at the end of
the village. Men carrying torches, marching towards them. Scherensky looked back
down the street then turned back to Stefan, his eyes bright with fear.

“Save yourself,” he repeated. “Save yourself.”

He slipped forward, his forehead cracking hard against the cobblestones.
Stefan shook Scherensky’s body in desperation, trying to stir him back to life.
He hadn’t said anything about his father. He needed to be told that his father
was safe.

But Scherensky wasn’t going to tell him anything now, and eventually Stefan
let go, and left him lying in the road. The marching men hadn’t yet reached as
far as the village square. They were stopping at every house along the way,
Stefan realised. The air was filled with the sounds of wooden doors being broken
down, glass being smashed. And the sound of the screaming.