Hungerblade

Part Four: A Monster, An Emperor, and a Thief

Hemwold the troll left his place at his employer’s side to gape at Jacques Gardien, who had leapt from the railing of the Geistschritter to combat the bizarre, enormous river monster that had taken two of the barge’s crewmen. He wanted to see the sword Hungerblade, which the imperial messenger had finally drawn. Flashes of metal moved through the air, but the furious speed of the struggle made any closer inspection of the weapon impossible. The creature turned and flailed in the water, throwing up an obscuring curtain of frothing liquid. What little light got through the leaves and branches above was now further dimmed. A heavy rain had started, sending streams of droplets through breaks in the tree canopy overhead. These were seized by the wind and dispersed in every direction as a punishing, sideways precipitation.

Jacques appeared to be clinging to the creature’s torso with one hand as he slashed with the other. Several of its tendrils entangled him. One choked him; another wrapped around his sword-arm, pulling it behind his back. Jacques groaned in pain. The näcken threw back its head and keened. Its cries at first reminded Hemwold of a gull, then grew distressingly intelligent in their inarticulate expression of pain and fury. Blood rushed down the creature’s torso, but Hemwold couldn’t tell whether its source was Gardien or the näcken.

A crewman, previously pulled over the side, burst up from the river a few feet from Hemwold. Annoyed by the interruption, the troll reached out to grab his arm and haul him from the water. The näcken shrieked while he heaved the guard up onto the railing. The creature listed like a sinking ship and then rapidly vanished beneath the river’s surface.

Wigandus lurched to the railing, his shouts drowned out by the howling wind. The creature’s sinking roiled the waters, rocking the barge and threatening to send the merchant pitching overboard. Berchtold pulled him from the railing.

A crimson cloud appeared in the water where Gardien and the monster went down. It widened and dispersed, occasionally punctuated by bursts of bubbles.

The barge settled; Wigandus returned to the rail, punching the air in impotent frustration. “No. I needed him!”

A splashing arose at the back of the boat, near the gargoyle figures guising its engines. Wigandus shouted redundantly for aid, as the Geistschritter’s crew scrambled to respond. They pulled a sodden figure over the side rail and onto the deck.

It was a second crewman, the other one seized by the näcken’s tendrils before Gardien leapt to engage it.

Hemwold muttered. “Gardien wasn’t so tough. I could have taken him after all.”

A shining object surfaced, just on the other side of the railing. It was Gardien’s sword, Hungerblade. The troll got down on his knees to reach his long arms through the railing for it.

A hand still gripped its hilt.

Gardien burst to the surface, gasping for air. Hemwold scrambled guiltily back, leaving the ship’s captain, Dietfried, to throw him a rope. Jacques clung to the side of the barge, then gathered the strength to haul himself in. He was provided a blanket and ushered into the sheltered front of the barge, where its helm was located. Dietfried placed him on a stool before an iron stove.

“If this rain keeps up, soon everyone out there will be as wet as I,” Jacques protested.

“None of them saved the whole ship just now,” replied the captain. Dietfried poured a hot dark beverage into a stone mug. “Drink this; you’ll find it invigorating. It is kafra, from Zanatium.”

Gardien nodded gratefully. “I’ve had it before. Thank you.” Kafra beans were a costly indulgence.

“You slew it,” said Berchtold, who had pushed his way into the helmsman’s cabin.

Jacques blew into the steaming liquid before taking a careful sip. “What choice did I have?”

“None. It was going to kill us all.”

The messenger remained gloomy. “Maybe I’m mistaken, but I looked into its face and believe I saw intelligence.”

“So?” asked the ex-bandit.

“So I’d be happier if there’d been a way to speak to it.”

“You can’t talk your way out of everything,”

***

No danger encountered during the remainder of the Geistschritter’s journey down through the Iron Wood proved more noteworthy than the encounter with the gigantic näcken. Screams were heard from the woods a few hours later. A beast with glowing eyes surfaced when the rains let up, but it was content to imperturbably skim the surface of the river for fallen leaves. Other beasts were more inquisitive, but they were beaten back by the ship’s crew. Propelled by the barge’s enchanted engines, they passed through the Iron Wood and into the port of Starcklingen, which stood at the northern tip of the large glassy lake called the Tanzerg. The next morning, the Geistschritter took them across the Tanzerg, then left them to make the rest of the journey to Roma territory themselves.

Wigandus outfitted the group with horses, except for Hemwold, who had no choice but to plod along on foot. At Bregenau, on the southern tip of the Tanzerg, the merchant struck a deal with a cargo caravan, promising them the protection of a mighty troll and a legendary member of the Seven in exchange for the right to travel with them. Eventually Jacques, speaking to the caravan leader, learned that Wigandus had bargained a fee for himself in exchange for making the arrangement. The amount so gained had to be trivial compared to the assets of a high counselor of the North Coast League. Wigandus, Jacques concluded, drove bargains for their own sake, or perhaps to keep in practice.

Keeping company with a load of fine wood, crates of silver cutlery, and dozens of grain bushels, the four moved down through the mountainous region separating the Dotur and Roma empires. The caravan moved in the shadows of snowy peaks, following riverbeds and tracing a winding path through valleys and switchbacks.

Incidents of banditry were few. On three occasions over as many days, Jacques saw the flare of sunlight bouncing off a distant spyglass and called a halt. Furtive figures circled the party’s camp when they had bedded down for the night by the side of a stream, but apparently decided not to chance an incursion. Wolves were constant shadows, but they never attacked, much to Jacques’ surprise.

In the lush grasses of an alpine meadow, they were hailed by a trio of local peddlers, led by a one-armed Romari named Ranero. The newcomers held aloft a brace of pheasants each, with which they paid for the right to accompany the caravan for a day and a night.

Wigandus sidled up to Jacques. “This Ranero, I wish to glean from him the latest on the state of his Empire.” It transpired that the peddler spoke only the vulgar version of the Roma language, and that Wigandus had learned only the High Tongue. Jacques agreed to translate.

It was Wigandus who directly invoked the Emperor’s name.

“Nero?” the peddler exclaimed. “He’s the one who cost me this!” Ranero rotated the stump of his left arm at the Doturi travelers. “Nero! They say in the old days the Emperors were gods. Nothing but a demon he is. What was my crime, you might ask. Well, I’ll tell you. He had declared another of his carnival days—this one in celebration of his pet ass, who supposedly had bested a fine race horse in a match—which surely was fixed, perhaps with the horse being poisoned—and I was a seller of olives and figs in the capital then, and the crowd was poor and dispirited, for how many festivals can you attend before you become listless and tired of them all? Apparently I wore a discouraged look on my face, doubtless from my poor sales that day—and at this moment, the Emperor’s carriage comes through the square, and he singles me out. Me! Has his soldiers beat me. For looking unhappy. And I fight to defend myself, and I get stabbed, and the wound becomes infected, and the physicks eventually cut my arm off, for I had no money for a ritualist. I lodge a formal protest and in exchange Nero himself hears me out. He weeps wet tears at my tale. He settles a thousand denari on me as compensation. So I allow myself to think that justice has—“

Ranero’s companions groaned and told him to shut up.

“These gentlemen asked about Nero and I will tell them! Soon afterwards, I am told that I have been exiled to the north, to this deity-forsaken region of mountain goats and men who marry their aunts. For what crime? Despoiling the serene quiet of the emperor’s contemplation, they call it. For which the fine is nine hundred and ninety denari!”

As Jacques suspected, Ranero had no current information on affairs in Romulus, where he had not ventured since his exile. For fresher intelligence, they would have to wait until they arrived there themselves.

That trip took another twenty days, from the foothills of the northern mountains down through the lowlands to the capital. Along the way, they paid the normal tolls to a series of bandit kings and local generals, and were neither waylaid nor unduly extorted. Half a day was lost when Hemwold drank himself insensate, and Wigandus refused to leave him behind. Only once did they have to hide from dinosaurs. They didn’t actually see the giant lizard, but Jacques guessed it was an Allosaurid. It was, all told, one of Jacques’ more uneventful journeys.

By the time they reached the via Cassia, Wigandus had picked up an additional four bodyguards, including one who spoke Visigi in addition to the high and vulgar Roma tongues. Away from the cities the road was lightly used and in poor repair. Although the small troop occasionally passed Romari clibanarii, the armored cavalry seemed happy enough with Wigandus’ papers. At least the merchant didn’t complain too loudly about the coins that disappeared when the papers were passed. Ultimately they reached the farmlands around Romulus itself and traffic began to pick up noticeably. The road at midday was a bustle of men, carts and horses jostling for position. Further out stood the crumbled villas of a more prosperous time, before the depopulation, when the city’s people overflowed its gates. Vineyards and fields were still barely recognizable, although the wilderness had reclaimed much beyond the boundary of the road. Nearer the city hard-working farmers and their slaves toiled in the fields and vineyards, gradually beating back the wilderness and reclaiming what previous generations had lost.

A few members of the jostling throng, mostly children or the simple-minded, gawked openly at the Doturi travelers. Others, Jacques saw, took more surreptitious note of them, as if mentally preparing reports for masters, patrons, or their fellow gossips. It was not without reason that Romulus was known as the city of spies. In its taverns and salons, the smallest scrap of news would be studied, turned over, and cut apart, so that portents might be seen in its entrails. In its taste for schemes and counter-schemes, it put the cities of the Dotur Empire to shame.

Wigandus ably threaded himself through the crowd, using his bulk to push aside the hoi polloi. Hemwold followed close behind him, creating a larger wake in the crowd, in which Jacques and the others could easily follow. The road was well maintained near the city and the crowd moved quickly. The enchanted walls towered above the throng, intimidating outsiders and providing mute testimony to the empire’s strength. Colonnades and statues lined the road, growing grander as they neared the entrance. Jacques could not help but notice the excellent craftsmanship and longed to study each piece at length, but he was apparently alone in his sentiment. The others, Romari and Doturi alike, walked through the flanking pieces with hardly a sideways glance. Jacques could only shake his head and continue with the rest.

The northern gate was, perhaps, the most used, and for that it was the most impressive. Towering warriors of ancient marble stood in recesses to each side of the gate, weapons drawn. As the traffic constricted they moved more slowly and Jacques finally had time to examine the statues. The left held a trident and net. His face was masked, but his body was practically naked. The right held short sword and shield. His open-faced helm allowed Jacques a good look at his face; beautiful and fierce were the worlds that immediately sprang to mind. As he watched, he was certain the eyes moved over the crowd, slowly, but surely. Perhaps it was only his imagination that they lingered on him and Hungerblade for long moments before continuing on. Without knowing the type of enchantment on the statues, Jacques decided better safe than sorry and kept his hand well away from his blade.

They finally reached the fabled gates of Romulus, which in ancient times had repelled wave after wave of barbarian invaders. Among these would have been Wigandus’ ancestors. Now he strolled boldly to the centurions on duty, exchanged a few quiet words, dropped a small bundle in a legionnaire's hand, and sauntered through the gate.

Romulus did not share the regular street pattern of later Romari cities. Having grown from the confluence of seven hillside villages, it was a warren of cramped, winding streets, whose snakelike routes worked around the land’s varying elevations. Moving wagons, or troops, through the constricted streets would be long, hard work.

The company headed for the villa of Isabelle Darras, their Doturi contact. After Zanatino, Wigandus’ new translator, took them down a series of wrong avenues, Jacques seized control of Wigandus’ map and led the party to the steps of her villa. Jacques memorized what he would of the map before returning it to Wigandus’ outstretched hand. He would create his own copy at the first opportunity. Accurate maps of any type were nearly priceless and Jacques wondered how the merchant had acquired his. The Messengers had an extensive collection of maps, perhaps the best in the empire, but new maps were precious and they all looked for ways to increase their stockpile. The Doturi legation was housed on a narrow but busy avenue. On its stone gable, an old frieze of Roma and foreign gods had been altered, so that they supported the Doturi emblem of Radiant Reason. A servant, seeing their approach, bolted from a wooden stool outside to fetch his mistress.

Jacques awkwardly adjusted his dusty traveling cloak. It had been several years since he had last seen Isabelle.

A small figure saw her opportunity and darted from the throng. She came at Jacques as if she had been pushed aside, bumped into his hip and slipped a piece of metal against his belt, then dashed away. Jacques reached for his waist, to find the belt missing, scabbard and all.

The girl had stolen Hungerblade.

To be continued...