CHAPTER TWO

The Map of Darkness

 

 

The man’s name was Otto Brandauer, that much at least Stefan had learnt. And it seemed at first that the likeness to one of the dread scourges might not have been so wide of the mark. The carriage had taken them directly to the Palace of Retribution, the feared grey edifice that lay walled within the heart of Altdorf, a fortress within the city. This was not a place that Stefan would ever have chosen to visit. This was a palace of few splendours, and fewer comforts. This was where those accused of crimes were brought to be judged, and, for those judged guilty, where savage retribution was brought to bear. Many passed beneath its portals, transgressors bearing their sins like penitents to the shrine, but few who entered here ever returned. It was not a thought that Stefan found comforting.

As they entered the palace, Brandauer’s demeanour changed. Far from gaining in stature, as would befit a man of high office, he seemed almost to diminish, to shrink. As he stepped down from the carriage, his head bowed, Brandauer would surely have been taken for a man of little consequence, a bearer or humble scourge’s clerk at best. Stefan fell in step with his host, out of place and ill at ease in his new surroundings.

They skirted the edge of a broad courtyard, grey, featureless walls stretching to the sky on four sides. Stefan could only wonder at how many hundreds of condemned souls lay beyond those walls, their existence now limited to the windowless cells that confined them. He suppressed an involuntary shudder, and moved on, keeping close behind Otto Brandauer. Soon they came to a rusted iron door set into one of the walls which Brandauer unlocked. Beyond the door, a narrow stairway snaked its way down below ground. The stairway burrowed down beneath the palace to a passageway lit only by meagre tallow candles. The air was dank and stale. Stefan and his companion descended into a cold, silent world. The few people that they encountered acknowledged neither Stefan nor his companion. It was as though they had become invisible.

After a while walking in silence, they came to a second door and Brandauer paused. He turned and smiled at Stefan.

“Welcome to my domain.” He opened the door and bid Stefan enter ahead of him. “We can talk here.”

Only once he had closed the door of the chamber behind them did Otto Brandauer regain his earlier air of self-assurance. Stefan sat down, taking in the austere surroundings. The chamber was cramped, with bare walls, a single desk and three upright wooden chairs. Two doors: the one they had entered by, and a second on the opposite side which remained shut. This was certainly not the office of a lord confessor.

Brandauer shed his cloak, and seemed to grow a few inches in stature. He turned the key in the lock of the outer door and seated himself.

“First things first,” he said. “The gemstone, Stefan.”

Stefan hesitated. His intention, once he had recovered the stone from Furstlager, had been to find a way of destroying it. That was already proving more difficult than he had imagined. Now he had little option but to trust Brandauer. He unwrapped the cloth from around the crystal and placed the stone on the table in front of them. The polished gem flickered like sulphur fire in the lamplight, insidious and seductive.

“A thing of beauty,” Brandauer observed.

“Harmless, too, by Krenzler’s account,” Stefan said. Otto Brandauer shook his head. “Hardly,” he said, sadly. “The crystal is formed from mithradur—an element once much prized by the dark elves. It would have been mined from the ancient quarries near Gratz. In your hands—or mine, perhaps—it might be harmless enough. Once in the possession of anyone versed in the dark arts, it could become very dangerous indeed.” He looked up at Stefan. “I’m afraid we have no choice but to destroy it.”

“I tried,” Stefan replied. “It seems indestructible.”

Otto Brandauer smiled, then opened a drawer in the desk. He reached inside and pulled out a small, silver grey hammer. Given Stefan’s experiences with the heavy bronze figurine, this looked hopelessly inadequate for the task.

Brandauer balanced the tool carefully in his right hand. “This hammer is forged from a flux of metals, mithradur principal amongst them,” he said. “Take a good look at both it and the stone. I doubt you’ll see the like of either again.” He sighed. “Such a pity.”

Otto raised the hammer, and brought it down smartly upon the polished gem. The yellow stone shattered with a pop like an egg bursting open, scattering shards of crystal across the room. He swept the remnants into a small casket made from lead, which he fastened with a lock. He replaced the casket in the drawer of his desk.

“Now the gemstone is safe,” he said. “The Gratz stone is a thing of the past. Now, we must talk of the future, and we must decide whether you and I have something to offer each other.”

Stefan drew out his sword, and set the blade down across the table between them. “If it’s a question of wielding this,” he said, “then you’ll find few better swordsmen in all Altdorf.”

Otto Brandauer nodded. “Absolutely,” he agreed. “In fact, I’d go as far as to say none better. Your prowess with the sword isn’t in doubt.” He gazed at Stefan, and drummed lightly upon the wooden surface of the table. “Nor, for that matter, is your bravery. No doubt of that at all.”

“Well then,” Stefan countered. “What?”

“Let’s talk about Stefan Kumansky for a moment,” Otto suggested. “Talk about the path that has led you here.”

“What more is there to talk about?” Stefan demanded. “You seem to know all there is already.”

“On the contrary. I know your history, the events of your life. The deeds and skills that distinguish a great swordsman from a dead one.” He took a sip of water from the cup at his side. “But, for what I am to ask of you, I have to be sure of the strength that lies within as well.” He touched one finger against his forehead. “I have to know what lies in here, and…” he lay his hand flat against his heart. “In here. Because, I assure you, the task I have in mind will test every part of your being to its very limits.”

Brandauer paused for a moment, content to let his words sink in.

“So,” he continued at last. “Let us review the life of Stefan Kumansky. Only eleven years old, your life is turned upside down when your village in Kislev is attacked by raiders from Norsca. Odensk is razed to the ground, your father is dead.”

“I live that memory every day of my life,” Stefan told him. “There’s no need to revisit it now.”

Otto Brandauer looked up at Stefan, and raised one hand in a placating gesture. “Together with your brother you come at last to Altdorf,” he continued. “Two orphans, taken in by your uncle Gustav. One of your uncle’s last acts before he dies is to secure you a position in the Altdorf civic guard.”

Stefan nodded. His tenure in the guard had been brief, and, from his point of view, unmemorable.

“After barely a year, and before your twenty-first birthday, you leave the service of the lord elector, and quit the guard to take up the life of a mercenary.” Otto Brandauer exchanged a glance with Stefan before going on.

“What makes a young man throw away a good career in the Guard for the uncertain life of a hired sword?”

“I don’t know,” Stefan replied, a little defensive now. “Perhaps it was boredom. Guarding the city from drunks and petty thieves pales after a while. Soldiering in the guard wasn’t quite what I’d expected it to be.”

“Possibly not,” Otto agreed. “Except that I doubt it was simply boredom that took you to the Grey Mountains. That endowed you with the skill and courage to single-handedly slay an orc chieftain. And it certainly wasn’t boredom that stopped you from resting until you had tracked down the Gratz stone and seen it destroyed.” He fixed Stefan with a stare that would have befitted the most feared of confessors. “So,” he demanded. “What was it?”

Stefan held himself firm against the intensity of the other man’s gaze. It felt as though the grey eyes in front of him were staring into the depths of his very soul.

“I did it—all those things,” he said at last, “because I had to.”

“Go on,” Brandauer said. His expression was no less severe, but there was an unmistakable note of encouragement in his voice now. “Go on,” he urged. “Say more.”

Stefan pondered the question. His heart knew the answer, but he struggled for the right words to convey the emotions that had become so familiar.

“I see a world,” he said at last. “A world where there is much good, but also—”

He stopped, mid-sentence. Otto Brandauer nodded, encouraging him to go on. “Also much that is evil,” he continued. “It may not always be visible to us. But it is there, always with us.” He paused and wiped a hand across his face, taken aback by the feelings rising, unbidden, within him.

“Go on,” Brandauer repeated. “Tell me more, Stefan. Tell me what lies inside.”

“I think, I—feel,” Stefan continued, “almost as if there is a battle—a battle being waged all around us, even now, as we speak—between those forces. And I’m a part of that battle. Ever since my father died, ever since Odensk, I’ve been a part of it, whether I like it or not. And whilst the battle continues, there will be no rest.”

He stopped and looked at the man sitting opposite him. “Don’t ask me to explain why,” he said, “because I can’t. All I know is I don’t have any choice.”

What was Brandauer thinking? Stefan felt strangely exposed, vulnerable. He had rarely expressed himself in this way to anyone, not even to his own brother. It was a part of himself he had learnt to keep well hidden. Doing otherwise had rarely earned him anything other than mockery or disdain. But there was no mockery in Otto Brandauer’s eyes now.

“How will you know?” he asked Stefan. “When the war is won?”

“I don’t know,” Stefan replied. “That’s the thing. I can’t be sure it will ever be won.”

Otto Brandauer nodded in silent agreement. “I need you for your skill with the sword, Stefan,” he said. “That was never really in doubt. But I also need what is in your heart.” He lay his hands upon the parchment scroll on the desk in front of him, began to open it and then paused.

“Is there anything that matters more to you than that battle, Stefan?”

Stefan considered the question for a moment. “No,” he said eventually. “I don’t think that there is.”

“Good,” Brandauer said. He reached across the desk, and smoothed open the parchment scroll.

It was a map, but a map unlike any other that Stefan had seen before. Through his uncle, and at school in Altdorf, he had learned to study the plans of the city, and sometimes those rarer scrolls that plotted the span of the Emperor’s realm.

This map went beyond even the boundaries of the Empire. There, laid out in the precise lines of the cartographer’s hand, were the lands of Bretonnia, and Kislev too. Stefan knew enough of those distant places to recognise that the map accounted for a good part of what men knew as the Old World.

He gazed at Kislev, and traced a finger around the line marking the borders of his motherland. He followed the outline of the coast to the mouth of the River Lynsk. The map was dotted with names, both known and unknown, but no name was any longer marked upon the place where Odensk once stood. He sat for a moment, thinking about a place, a life, that had vanished.

“Take a good look at the map,” Otto instructed him. “Take a good look, Stefan Kumansky, then tell me where in all this good land the blight of Chaos might be found.”

Stefan stared up at Otto, momentarily taken aback. It was not often he had heard the name of the Dark Powers spoken of so openly, or so candidly. He stared at Otto for a few moments then forced his gaze back to the map. “I don’t know,” he said, still discomfited by the question. He gestured with one hand towards the far edge of the map, towards where—he supposed—the northern lands of Norsca might lie.

Otto Brandauer leant forward towards Stefan, and spread his hands wide across the parchment scroll. “The truth is,” he said quietly, “the poison of Chaos can be found anywhere, within our borders as well as without. Anywhere at all.” He looked up and held Stefan in an unblinking gaze. “Isn’t that what your heart tells you, too, Stefan? Isn’t that what you know?”

Stefan took a deep breath. He could feel the sweat prickling the skin on his face and hands. It was as though the whole of his being was laid bare.

“I think,” he said at last, “that there is far more darkness in this world than men ever imagine.”

“You are right,” Brandauer told him, softly. “The gods be my witness, I wish that you were not. But you are right.” He rolled the parchment slowly and placed it away out of sight. “And you were right to say that you did not know when the struggle would end, Stefan. The truth it is, it will never end. It is eternal.”

He stood up and took a few steps across the narrow chamber. “Nowhere is that struggle now more desperate now than in Kislev,” he said. “Kislev is the mighty dam; the gatekeeper that stands between the darkness and the light. The forces of Chaos understand that only too well. They and their followers have been repulsed before, but they will always return. Now they are readying to lay siege once more. If the dam should ever be breached, then a tide of evil might sweep, unimpeded, across the world. The light would be extinguished, forever.”

He paused, lost in contemplation of his own words for a while. “The question is,” he continued, “are you ready to give your all to this struggle for Kislev? Ready, if necessary, to give your life?”

Stefan thought again of the map. In his mind it had become a map of darkness; a wash of black creeping across the face of mankind, slowly obliterating it. He shuddered, but it was a shudder born of anticipation as much as of unease. He had no doubt of what his answer must be.

“What is it that you need me to do?” he asked. By way of answer, Otto Brandauer opened the second of the two doors and spoke quietly to a servant waiting outside. A few minutes later the door opened again. A third figure stepped into the room, and without waiting for invitation or introduction, sat in the remaining empty chair by Otto’s side. The newcomer pulled back the cowl of their long grey robe and turned to face Stefan.

“Stefan,” Otto said. “Allow me to introduce you to Elena Yevschenko. Your companion on the journey to come.”

Stefan found himself looking at a young woman, no more than twenty years old, possibly less. Her hair was cut shorter than was customary for a noble, and though she wore the sculpted silk gown common amongst the women of the high court, she looked curiously ill at ease in her finery.

The young woman turned to appraise Stefan. A high forehead and deep-set blue eyes gave her features a severe, intense look. Striking, rather than beautiful, Stefan decided.

“An unwilling companion, actually,” she said, picking up on Otto’s remark. Beneath the flawless Reikspiel, the slightest trace of accent still remained.

Elena maintained her gaze upon Stefan, looking him over rather as though she were weighing up a commodity she’d been invited to buy. Stefan discovered, to his surprise, that he’d taken an instant dislike to her. The skeptical, mildly disdainful expression on the girl’s face told him the feeling was probably mutual. Not a good start.

Brandauer broke the tense silence that had followed Elena’s opening words. “Elena is yet to be convinced of the need for your services,” he explained. He eyed the young woman carefully before continuing. “But I take a very different, and very firm view on that.”

“It would help if I knew what service it is I am asked to perform,” Stefan said, puzzled by the turn of events since the girl had stepped into the room.

Brandauer exchanged glances with Elena.

“I should explain a little of Elena’s history,” he said. “She has been living here in Altdorf, under the protection of the court. Originally, however, she is from—”

“From Erengrad,” Stefan said, voicing the connection he had made in his mind a few moments earlier. “Or somewhere very close.”

Otto nodded, appreciatively. Elena merely glowered. “Your accent,” Stefan added. “Very faint, I grant you. I doubt anyone else would be able to tell. I was born not thirty leagues from the city walls,” Stefan said. “I’m honoured to meet a kinsman.”

They exchanged a stiff, rather formal greeting, Elena responding to Stefan’s bow with a rather perfunctory curtsey.

“Elena has been here in Altdorf for the last two years,” Brandauer explained. “Now it’s time for her to go home. That’s where we need your help.”

“Where you need his help,” Elena countered, testily. She got up and began to pace the room, managing somehow to look both graceful and awkward. A proud but untamed animal, penned within a gilded cage.

“No offence, sir,” she said to Stefan. “But I can look after myself.”

I’ll bet you can, Stefan thought to himself. He looked from one to the other of them, seeking to piece this new puzzle together. “You want me to take Elena home, back to Erengrad,” he said. “And that’s all? I understand what you’ve shown me, and it’s clear the lands to the east are in peril. But with no offence to you—” he paused, and glanced over at Elena, “how is one young woman going to help redeem Kislev?”

Brandauer smiled at the girl, and made the slightest of bows toward her. “Elena, you may as well explain.”

Elena spoke slowly, making only occasional eye contact with Stefan. “My family is one the oldest in the western territories of Kislev,” she said. “I am—so they tell me—a distant cousin of the tsarina herself.”

“A noble, powerful family,” Otto underlined, quietly. Elena smiled sourly.

“For decades, our family has been locked in a bloody, pointless feud with another, the House of Kuragin. The feud has simmered across the generations, but the last three years have taken our noble kin to the brink of civil war. In that time, half of our respective families have murdered each other.” She raised her eyebrow a fraction, as if to emphasise the futility of her history. “I was smuggled out of Erengrad, across the border to the Empire a month before my eighteenth birthday. I’ve never been back since.”

“And now?” Stefan asked.

“Now,” Brandauer interjected, “it is vital that Elena return home. The fabric of Erengrad and the whole of the western territories is collapsing. We can no longer afford the indulgence of an Erengrad that is torn apart at its heart. Chaos presses from all sides, and there are many who would abandon the ancient alliance between Kislev and the Empire, in favour of some treaty of servitude to the dark powers. If Erengrad should fall, then others will follow. Then it may only be a matter of time before—”

“Yes,” Stefan said, quietly. “I understand. But how can Elena do anything to change all of this?”

“An opportunity exists,” Brandauer told him. “It may not stay long, but, for the moment, it exists. A chance to forge a new bond between the Houses of Yevschenko and Kuragin. To unite the people of Erengrad once again, and form an alliance strong enough, perhaps, to turn the tide against Chaos.”

“So this alliance,” Stefan said, “is going to be forged—”

“Through me,” Elena replied, crisply. “I am to be married, to Petr Illyich, eldest son and heir to the House of Kuragin.” She reached inside the pocket of her blouse and pulled out a silver locket. She released the catch and held the locket open for Stefan’s inspection. The painted image of a young, blond-haired man in his late twenties looked out at him from astride a horse on the field of battle.

“Be in no doubt, Stefan,” Otto told him, “Elena is destined to play a vital part in the struggle between light and darkness.”

Stefan found himself momentarily dumbstruck by the thought that the future of Kislev—and, perhaps, much of the world beyond—could hinge upon the fate of this diminutive young woman. Elena looked at him and laughed.

“What’s the matter, Kumansky?” she asked him. “Haven’t you always wanted to rescue a princess?”

“Elena must return to Erengrad without delay,” Brandauer went on. “The alliance is fragile, and the pressures bearing upon it are many. This family feud has becoming a weeping sore at the very heart of Erengrad. It must be healed now. We cannot afford to wait any longer.”

“Of course,” Stefan agreed. “It must—it must be hard,” he said. “Being away for so long. This separation. It must have been painful for you both.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Elena replied, acidly. “The two of us have never met. At least, if we have, I don’t remember it.”

She snapped the locket shut. “I’m told he looks rather older now,” she added. “Older, and fatter, as well.”

“Elena is a soldier,” Brandauer continued, gravely. “She knows what sacrifices she must make, if true and righteous order is to prevail.”

“I still don’t see where I fit into this,” Stefan insisted. “If you’re telling me that Elena has the protection of the court, then you surely don’t need to hire swordsmen, however perilous the journey. You have hundreds of civic guard at your disposal.”

Elena laughed, but there was bitterness in her voice when she spoke. “A fine notion,” she said. “But I don’t think the noble court of Altdorf places quite that value on my head.”

Stefan shook his head, still not satisfied. “But if it’s so important for the alliance that you are returned to Erengrad—”

“The politics of the Old World are delicately balanced,” Otto cut across. “With the active support of the Emperor, we would doubtless be more secure. But Karl-Franz has been long from court.” He cast his eyes around the chamber. “Too long, in fact. Without his assured patronage, we can neither be sure who will support us, and who will not.”

“They’d be happy enough to get an ignorant Kislevite out of their fine court,” Elena commented. “But don’t expect them to go to any trouble. I’m just a misfit here. Most of your gracious nobility couldn’t care less if I lived or died.”

“It’s more complicated than that,” Brandauer insisted. “We could arrange an escort for Elena if we really needed to. But it’s also a matter of who we can trust. These are dark times, Stefan. Times when it pays to trust as few people as possible.” He glanced across the chamber at the sound of footsteps approaching along the passageway outside. The footsteps seemed to slow to a halt by the door, and then move on. Otto waited until the sound had died away.

“If you accept this commission then you should be under no illusion,” he continued. “There are people in Kislev, in the Empire, even here in Altdorf, who would very much want Elena dead if they knew who she was.” He paused. “And they will kill you, too, if they have the chance.”

“Which is why,” Elena cut in, “it’s better if I travel alone.”

“Which is why you must be protected,” Otto countered, “but discreetly.”

“How discreetly?” Stefan asked.

“A small party. Small enough to travel anonymously, to pass almost invisibly on their journey east. Nor can you expect to spend too much of your time on the beaten paths; they may be too dangerous.”

Stefan turned the proposition over in his mind. The idea of facing danger held no fear for him, and the answer he had given Otto was true. There was nothing in his heart more important than to take arms against the darkness. It was a path he had been destined to follow ever since that grey morning in Odensk.

“I’m a swordsman,” he said at length, “not a scout. The forest trails east of Altdorf would be a match for all but the ablest woodsman. How do you propose we find our way, other than by staying close to the trade routes?”

“I have mapped the journey,” Otto replied. “I may look as though I’ve spent my life safe behind city walls, supping with the elector counts. But it was not always so. I know more of the world than you might imagine.” He flicked a gaze between Stefan and Elena, and Stefan glimpsed the steel behind the features now softened by comfortable living. “I will lead the mission,” Otto continued, “at least as far as Middenheim. There you will find papers waiting for you; new identities, new lives. You will travel on as part of a merchant caravan, bound for the border with Kislev.”

The story had the ring of truth, yet Stefan still sensed there was something missing, some component of the story not yet told. For all that Elena Yevschenko might be a formidable character, he couldn’t believe that a single marriage could prevent the flood of evil from sweeping across the western plains of Kislev.

He looked long and hard at Otto Brandauer. “Now tell me the rest,” he said at last. “There must be more.”

Otto bowed his head ever so slightly, and exchanged a glance with Elena. The young woman shook her head, almost imperceptibly. Otto hesitated, then went on. “There is,” he conceded. “The marriage of Petr and Elena is vital. Their union will end the strife between the families. Without an end to their feud, there can be no lasting peace. But that alone will not be enough to mend the wounds of Erengrad.”

He glanced again at Elena. The young woman seemed to read his meaning, and bristled. “Why am I supposed to trust this—this mercenary?” she demanded, her face flushing red. “If his sword can be bought and sold for a pocket of silver, what’s to say he won’t sell me?”

Well, Stefan thought. At least we know where we stand. Otto stood up, and took a few paces around the room. For the first time his voice when he spoke to Elena betrayed a trace of irritation. “You must trust Stefan because I trust Stefan,” he said. “And, if you don’t, then you may as well not trust me either.” He glared at Elena, waiting to see whether she was going to respond. When she didn’t, he said: “Now, if you please, show him.”

Elena Yevschenko hesitated, then, reluctantly, reached to her neck and lifted a silver chain over her head. For a moment she sat with an object locked within her fist upon the desk. Otto signalled his rising impatience; Elena opened her fist and let a metallic object fall free. She glared at Stefan, as though defying him to make sense of it. “Well?” she demanded.

Stefan looked. The piece seemed to be fashioned from a dull silver or lead. It was moulded in the shape of a broad, flat arrowhead with a long, narrowing tail. He shrugged. “It could be a spear,” he suggested. “Or a bird in flight, perhaps—a dove?”

Otto nodded. “Good guesses,” he said. “The spear and the dove. Conflict and peace. Yes, it can be both of those things.” He slipped a sheet of white paper onto the desk. He handed a pen to Elena, and waited while she drew the outline of an identical shape onto the paper next to the pendant, then a second next to that. She looked up at Stefan, and, for the first time, she smiled.

“See?”

Stefan saw. Together the three shapes combined to form a six-pointed star.

“The Star of Erengrad,” Elena said, quietly.

“Individually, the three segments of the Star are all but worthless,” Otto told him. “In union, they exert a mighty, binding force over Erengrad and its people. Remember, Stefan, magic can work for good as well as for evil. In the right hands, the Star can be a powerful force for good.”

“In the right hands,” Elena emphasised.

“Too powerful for one family alone to possess,” Otto added. “But now Erengrad has need of the healing power of the Star.” He turned to Elena. “And it has need of the peace that your union will bring to those who would rule it.”

Stefan gazed down at the new single shape made from the three. “Where are the other two parts?” he asked.

Elena slipped the silver chain back around her neck. “The second of the three parts of the Star is in Erengrad,” she said. “It belongs to the man I am to marry, to Petr Illyich Kuragin.”

“And the third—”

“Is in Middenheim,” Otto said. “The other, and principal, purpose for your journey to the City of the White Wolf. When the bloody feud engulfed Erengrad, the three parts of the star had to be separated. We permitted the Houses of Kuragin and Yevschenko to keep one part each. But, so that neither family might gain absolute power, we arranged for the third segment to be carried to the Empire, to Middenheim. There it rests in the safekeeping of one trusted man. A friend of Erengrad. A friend,” he added, “of mine. He will be awaiting your arrival.”

Stefan turned the words over in his mind, carefully. “And who,” he said at last, “is ‘we’? More to the point, who exactly are you?”

Otto smiled, as if to signal that he had been awaiting this question. “I am a loyal servant of the Empire,” he said. “But I am also allied with a group of men who recognise the wider boundaries that border good and evil. Men who see the world painted stark in darkness and in light. Men, Stefan, much like you.”

“Do they have a name?” Stefan asked.

Otto considered for a moment. Stefan noticed Elena paying close attention, as if much of this were new to her, too.

“We are known as the Keepers of the Flame, though the name is rarely spoken,” he said. “We tend the light that stands, eternal, against the forces of dark night. We are ever present. Ever vigilant.”

Stefan exhaled a long breath, taking stock of the unexpected journey that this particular night had brought him to. He tried to make eye contact again with Elena, but she had turned her back on him. The decision was his alone.

“How many men, then?” he asked. “Aside from me?”

“Two,” Otto said, simply. “No more than that. The choice of companions is yours, but…” he looked across at Stefan. “I think you understand the qualities we need.”

Stefan nodded. Such men were rare, even in Altdorf, but he knew who they were.

“Well, thank you for further mapping out my life for me!” Elena declared, sardonically. She glared at both men, then seemed to accept something of the inevitability of the situation. “Once these arrangements have been made, we must leave Altdorf as quickly as possible. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” said Brandauer. “Without delay.” He opened the door to the chamber, allowing a little air to freshen the room. “We’ll need horses,” Stefan said. “And provisions, of course.”

“Whatever you require will be provided,” Otto assured him. “Else you will be given money to procure what you need.”

“What about during the journey?” Stefan asked. “It’s going to be a long ride.”

“Arrangements will be made for you to draw fresh supplies. You’ll be told more of that in due course,” Otto said. “Now, for the moment: is there anything else?”

Stefan considered. It seemed there should be a thousand questions to be answered, but, in another way, it seemed ridiculously simple. Simple, and dangerous. “No,” he said finally. “I don’t think there is.”

“Then begin your preparations,” Otto said. He held the door open wide for Stefan to pass through. “In the meantime, there’s a carriage waiting to take you back to wherever it is you need to go.” He shook Stefan firmly by the hand. Elena now sat at her place by the table, gazing distractedly towards the window. Maybe time would be the best healer for their differences after all.

Just before Stefan left the room, Otto took him aside. “Just remember, Stefan,” he said. “Evil will not always confront you with a weapon raised. It will just as likely come to you as a comrade, or as a sweet beguiling friend. But do not ever doubt its purpose, or the determination of those serve their masters in Chaos. Beware their many guises, Stefan. Beware the poison that runs within the stream.”

 

* * *

 

It seemed sure that no one noticed Stefan Kumansky as he left the Palace of Retribution to rejoin the outside world. Few townsfolk were still on the streets at that hour, and those that were took little interest in the drab, unlit carriage that clattered through the gates and then sped, without ceremony, through the sleeping streets towards the edge of the city.

But far away, beyond Altdorf, in a place that was neither the Empire nor even the Old World, he had indeed been noticed. Deep within the cold, merciless nebula that spanned the dark realm of Chaos, Kyros, Lord of Tzeentch, the God of Change, sensed Stefan’s presence in the mortal world.

For so long Kyros’ focus had been fixed upon Kislev, upon Erengrad. The prize his master had so long coveted was now all but within their grasp. The subtle powers of change had eaten away, almost unseen, at the fabric of the city, weakening its foundations of strength and unity. With the hand of Tzeentch to guide him, Kyros had steadily tightened the dark thread he had woven around and through its crumbling edifices. Soon, by stealth or by force, Erengrad would fall.

One by one, the obstacles along the path had steadily been removed. All except… Kyros had cast his sightless eyes over the face of humanity, across the numberless hordes of weak, yet obdurate mortal men. Creatures to be pitied and despised in equal measure.

His inner gaze had sifted through their masses, drawn suddenly back towards the west. He could neither see, hear nor physically touch the young swordsman, for Kyros’ corporeal body had long since been rendered to dust. As yet, he did not even know Stefan by his name. But he knew now of his existence, just as he had come to know of the daughter of Kislev. He sensed them both, as a spider senses the first tremor in its web. And he sensed a purpose that, if allowed to blossom, would lay threat to his intricate design.

Kyros brooded upon his discovery, tracing out the myriad consequences scattered upon the seas of chance. He unravelled the paths of possibility, following them though to their end. He must watch them: the mercenary, the Kislevite, the scheming courtier. He must watch them all. He must dispatch his servants to walk amongst them. Unheard and unseen, they must wait; wait for the moment to act.

It was time for the children of Tzeentch to awake.