Brunner the Bounty Hunter Read online

  Brunner shook his head. ‘No,’ he replied. ‘They take their hero away for their own profane rites, which is more important to them than the prospect of man-flesh for their bellies. They will take that monster that led them and tonight, when the rot has had a chance to set in that creature’s carcass, they will take their fangs and their knives to him.’ Brunner saw Alberto recoil in horror, his face blanching at the image. ‘They think that if they consume the meat of a champion like that, they will absorb his strength. There will be a great falling out as they try to determine who will partake in the feast. By this time tomorrow, that rabble will have scattered, none of them in the same pack.’

  The sound of rustling cloth brought both men away from the view afforded by the doorway. Elisia stepped from the room beyond and moved toward Alberto. The youth hastened to the priestess’s side.

  ‘My father?’ he asked, his voice heavy with concern. The priestess shook her head, smiling.

  ‘No, your son,’ she replied. It took a moment for the import of her words to sink in, then a light of joy and understanding gleamed in Alberto’s face. He grabbed the priestess’s arms.

  ‘My son? When? How?’

  ‘Yes, a boy, as healthy and wonderful as any I have seen,’ Elisia responded. ‘He arrived during the night.’ A dour look came upon her. ‘Battle or no, he had decided this was his time.’ A smug smile replaced her dour look. ‘As to the how of it, perhaps you might ask your wife about that, if you have forgotten. She is with your son in the far room.’

  With hardly another look at either Brunner or Elisia, Alberto hurried from the chamber.

  The priestess watched him go, recalling for an instant the many hundreds of times she had seen men, great or poor, react in the same manner when she bore such tidings.

  ‘And what of the elder Bertolucci?’ the cold voice of the bounty hunter intruded. Elisia turned and stared into the emotionless face beneath the mask of steel.

  ‘He is down in the kitchen, warming some porridge. He was injured, but his wound is not serious, and I have taken precautions so that infection should not set in,’ she answered. A sudden questioning look entered her eyes. ‘You have not troubled yourself about anyone else in the brief time since I have met you. Even when you rescued me from the beastmen, it seemed more for your own convenience than any concern for me. Why does Bertolucci interest you so?’

  The bounty hunter made no reply, leaving the priestess’s question unanswered as he strode into the inner chambers of the ruined villa.

  The old kitchen was a shambles. Its tiled floor was cracked and broken, and grass peeped from between broken squares. Dead, ragged brambles were strewn in the corners where Bertolucci and his men had cast them hurriedly away. From dozens of places, sunlight shone down into the chamber, bringing light into the shadowy ruin, but also the chill of the dawn dew.

  In the old hearth, a small fire smouldered, heating a large black cauldron. It was an original implement of the villa, a relic of the old days that neither time, nor weather, nor looter had touched. And it had served the exiled merchant well; he boiled a mash of grain and vegetable into something that might feed his retinue after their long, hard night of battle. But Bertolucci was not so altruistic as to think only of his men. He sat before a cracked, leaning wooden table, on an even more feeble bench, and noisily slopped the contents of the wooden bowl with a jagged piece of brown bread.

  The sound of armour caused the merchant to look up from his meal. His eyes focused upon those of the man who had entered the kitchen.

  Bertolucci stared into the helmed visage of the stranger who had arrived with the priestess. A premonition of dread froze him for a moment, but he soon recovered, reaching forward and ladling some of the porridge into a second bowl.

  ‘I hope that you do not mind”,’ the merchant apologised, ‘but I felt I should do something useful if I could not be at the wall. And, since I did make it…’ Bertolucci finished his statement by biting down on the dripping bread.

  Brunner stepped towards the table.

  ‘I’ll eat later,’ the bounty hunter said, the eyes behind the visor of his helm burning into Bertolucci’s. The merchant finished his mouthful of food and rose from the table.

  ‘I should have guessed,’ the man said, the dread once more crawling down his spine. ‘Couldn’t you just tell Volonte you didn’t find us?’ His look was resigned; he already knew the killer’s answer before it was spoken.

  ‘I have a commission,’ Brunner explained. ‘The only thing in this world I honour. But Volonte only wants you. Your children are not my concern.’

  Bertolucci was thoughtful for a moment, some measure of relief and hope filling him even as fear gnawed at his guts. ‘I saw you fight,’ the man said. He placed a hand on his wounded arm. ‘Even whole, you would have made short work of me.’ The merchant reached into his tunic, noticing the bounty hunter’s grip tighten about the hilt of his blade. He continued anyway, drawing a leather purse from his clothing.

  ‘Tell me, what is the market value of a swine in the streets of Miragliano these days?’ the merchant asked, his eyes returning Brunner’s icy gaze with a hateful flame.

  ‘Eighty copper pieces, when last I passed the swineherd’s lane,’ the bounty killer responded. The merchant carefully counted out an equivalent measure of gold and set the coins on the table. He sighed and set the leather pouch beside them. Brunner nodded at the man, and drew his sword.

  Bertolucci never saw the blade that sliced through his neck, so swift were the bounty hunter’s movements. As blood spread from his cloven neck, the last thing the merchant’s eyes saw were the gloved hands scooping up the coins he had placed on the table, never disturbing the leather purse beside them.

  The sound of booted feet brought Brunner up from his gory labour. He spun about, seeing the joy fade from Alberto’s features. He had rushed here, after tearing himself away from his wife and child to usher his father upstairs to see his grandson. Now a different purpose filled the youth.

  ‘Assassin!’ he hissed, ripping his sabre from its scabbard. Brunner did not wait to trade words with the boy, but met Alberto’s first strike with a parry. The youth did not fully recover from the fended-off attack, but turned the deflection into a sideways swipe at the bounty hunter. His mind clouded with rage, Alberto had forgotten all his schooling in the art of swordplay and duelling. It would have been easy for Brunner to kill him.

  The bounty hunters sword licked out, penetrating Alberto’s almost non-existent guard, and lashing upwards towards the boy’s head. At the last moment, however, Brunner adjusted his strike, smashing the flat of his blade into the boy’s shoulder, rather than the edge. Alberto dropped to his knees, staggered by the blow. Brunner smashed the pommel of his sword into the stunned man’s head, rendering him insensible. Under the care of the priestess of Shallya, he knew, the boy would recover. But not until long after he had gone.

  The sound of more running feet announced the hurried advance of the remaining retainers. The men cast murderous looks at the bounty hunter when they saw the two bodies lying behind him. They drew their blades as one.

  ‘It is the elder I came for,’ Brunner stated in a voice like a chill winter wind. ‘Alberto Bertolucci will recover.’ One of the men sheathed his sword and cautiously manoeuvred his way around the bounty killer. He reached the prone form of Alberto, clasped its wrist and nodded at his fellows.

  ‘If you wish to die for your former master, I shall oblige you,’ Brunner declared, his piercing gaze meeting each of the guards in turn. ‘But it seems to me that your duty lies with your living master now.’ It took but a moment for the men to reluctantly return blades to scabbards. They too had seen the contest between the bounty hunter and the beastman.

  Brunner strode down the hall towards the cavernous entry chamber where the horses were stabled. As he passed the stairs, he met the accusing glare of Elisia.

  ‘You never cared about any of us,’ she snarled. Brunner smiled at her and stalked away.
r />   ‘Only about Bertolucci, and the price on his head,’ the bounty hunter said, making his way toward his animals. ‘Pray to your goddess that I never have cause to care about you.’

  The bloated figure stood before the slowly mildewing painting of nymphs and satyrs, studying the painting, and its creeping corruption. A pity, the money-lender thought for a moment, for it had been a very vibrant and arousing piece, in its day. He had accepted it in exchange for not breaking the owner’s hands for missing a payment—though that rendezvous with mutilation was only deferred by a few months, when the man again fell behind in his debt.

  Volonte sucked at his teeth. Yes, soon he would have to see about having this one replaced. It never occurred to him to actually see to the care of his possessions. The acquisition was all that mattered to him. And now he wondered which of his debtors might be the owner of something of equal style and quality.

  A sound in the shadowy room caused the massive man to turn. He could dimly see a figure standing in the flickering candlelight, light dancing upon a helmet of steel.

  ‘Who’s there?’ the money-lender choked, fear seizing him. As the bounty hunter stepped more fully into the light, Volonte breathed a deep sigh of relief. ‘Brunner,’ he laughed. ‘My servants did not announce you.’

  ‘I found my own way in,’ the bounty hunter explained. He lifted his hand, showing Volonte the leather-wrapped object he had carved from Bertolucci. The money-lender’s piggish eyes settled upon the gruesome thing, a smile widening across his face.

  ‘You have it!’ he chortled. ‘Bertolucci’s heart!’ He held out his hand, gesturing for the bounty hunter to give him his grisly trophy. Brunner stepped forward, dropping the leather-wrapped object in the fat-man’s swollen paw. Volonte hurriedly unwrapped it, revealing the gruesome, blood-soaked organ within. The fat man laughed deeply.

  ‘Your daughter was there as well,’ the bounty hunter said. ‘She has just given birth to a child, by Bertolucci’s son.’

  ‘Ha!’ the money-lender laughed. ‘With that old thief dead, the slut will come crawling back to me soon enough. Her husband can keep their bastard whelp for all I care.’ The fat man leaned over the disembodied heart, sniffing at it with flared nostrils, and savouring the stench of the butchered flesh. He snapped his head about, reaching into the table, withdrawing a cloth pouch, his hand trembling with the weight as he lifted it.

  ‘Your price, bounty hunter,’ the money-lender said. ‘You have done a good, if expensive, job for me.’ A sudden gleam of hate flickered across Volonte’s face, and he drew the bag close to his breast. ‘But before I pay you, I want to hear about his death. I want to hear how Bertolucci grovelled before you and begged for his life. I want you to describe his screams as you cut his heart out!’

  Brunner took another step forward. ‘Then I must disappoint you.’ A sullen look of anger contorted Volonte’s obese features. ‘Bertolucci did not beg, nor did he grovel. When he learned who I was, and what I had come for, he did not try to run.’ Brunner looked into Volonte’s eyes, seeing the dissatisfied look there. ‘He simply asked me what the market value of swine was in Miragliano these days.’

  A puzzled look replaced the scowl on Volonte’s face. Brunner took another step closer.

  ‘He paid me eighty pieces of copper before he died,’ Brunner said, his hand gripping the pommel of the long-bladed and serrated-edged knife sheathed at his hip. Volonte laughed nervously.

  ‘Not enough to buy a man like you, eh?’ the money-lender stammered, sweat beading along his brow.

  ‘It is the quarry that determines a bounty hunter’s price,’ Brunner said, closing the distance between the men. ‘A pig is worth much less than a man.’

  Volonte’s servants roused in their slumbers as a sharp scream echoed through the walls. The sound seemed to come from the study where their master was in the habit of going over his records of debts late at night. Apparently he was not alone this evening. The thought did not unduly disturb Volonte’s household, and many of them went back to sleep. There would be time enough to divide up the money-lender’s possessions in the morning.

  WOLFSHEAD

  There are few horrors of the night that have so thoroughly captured the imagination of rural folk as the werewolf. Peasants, hunters and woodsmen sit about their midnight fires on chill winter nights and tell bloodcurdling tales of these monsters stalking through the darkened woods, their jaws slavering in eagerness to sink their fangs into the tender young flesh of a lone shepherdess or a lost child. Such folklore is common throughout the Old World. In barbarian Norsca they speak of feral Wulfen and flesh-eating Werekin, still farther north there are tales of the skin-changing Ulfwernar. In Ostermark and Ostland, it is the Balewolf that haunts the night, passing its lupine curse to any hardy enough to survive a bite from its fangs. In Stirland, there are tales of sub-human hillmen who shed their human forms when the sickly light of Morrsleib casts its foulness across the night sky. In Middenland, such creatures are known as Ulricskinder and actually venerated by the cult of Ulric. The debased inhabitants of ghoul-haunted Sylvania speak of Doom Wolves and hulking bestial fiends called Varghulfs. The Bretonnians speak of ‘les loups garoux’, another terror to be protected from by their knights.

  As widespread as stories of werewolves and belief in such creatures is among the unlettered rustics of the country, very little serious scholarship has been conducted into the truth of such legends. Indeed, even the most complete bestiaries treat the subject with only passing mention, if at all. There are few accounts of the werekin made by what could be considered an educated witness that have been handed down. Discounting the spurious report by Felix Jaeger of his encounter with the Children of Ulric in his sensationalistic My Travels with Gotrek, Vol. II, we are left only with the unsatisfying record of the Red Moon Killer who terrorized Altdorf as recorded in the pamphlet The Private Life of the Great Sage-Detective of Altdorf, As Recounted by his Faithful Manservant and Companion. This later work is a tawdry volume published in the Moot and authored by a halfling simply addressing himself as ‘Vido’. Given such an unreliable source, this account of the renowned Zavant Konniger catching a were-beast in the middle of the Imperial capital can be safely discounted.

  I was considering the paucity of reliable stories of werewolves one evening while sitting in the Black Boar. Being a bit deeper in my cups than usual, I began inquiring if there were any legends of such creatures told in Miragliano. As I should have expected, I was soon up to my ears in ridiculous stories about verminous underfolk stealing babies and grain, but these were hardly the sort of thing I was interested in. I said as much, hoping to curtail the barrage of fables being foisted on me and again reiterated my interest in creatures that were not a hodge-podge of beast and man, but ones that could change from one to the other and back again. As I expected, silence rewarded my outburst.

  The silence was broken by a familiar cold voice from the shadows. I turned in surprise, for I had not seen my grim collaborator sitting there in the darkness. I hurriedly sat down at the table and fumbled for quill and parchment as Brunner began to tell me of his own encounter with a werewolf in the lonely forests of the Empire…

  Trees loomed thick and brooding on every side, casting weird shadows by the sickly light of Morrslieb. The gibbous moon glowered like the face of some malignant god from the starless sky, its more wholesome companion Mannslieb just a thin silvery sliver cringing against the horizon like a whipped cur. What had started as a clear and distinct path through the forest had degenerated into little better than a boar run, overgrown shrubs and bushes pressing in to reclaim the ground.

  It was rough going for the two horses that forged their way through the overgrown track, but for the man who walked behind the beasts, the passage was nothing short of tortuous. His lean face was a scabby bruise from where branches had whipped across it, his rough homespun garments were tattered and torn by the ravages of thorns and his goatskin boots were almost shapeless within thick layers of dried mud. The man s
tumbled, his arms pulled taut ahead of his body and his hands crossed and lashed together by a thick cord of rope. Its other end was tethered securely to the tack of the smaller of the animals, a grey packhorse, its back laden down with bundles and sacks, a small wooden keg lashed to its side and the ugly hook of a halberd peeking from beneath rolled blankets.

  ‘Shallya’s Blood!’ the man cursed as another branch smacked across his nose, splitting the skin. ‘It’s too dark to go on!’

  The rider on the foremost horse, a huge black destrier, turned in the saddle, cold eyes staring from behind the visor of a steel sallet helm. The captive blanched as he felt those eyes bore into his own.

  ‘I don’t like it any better than you,’ the rider said, his tone as menacing as the purr of a panther. ‘I don’t like it when they want the merchandise delivered still breathing.’ He leaned over in the saddle, spitting the taste of his cigar into the brush. ‘You might mention that to Judge Vaulkberg when you see him.’

  Beads of sweat peppered the prisoner’s face as he heard the name of the magistrate. Viktor Schwartz had fled the Reikland when he learned the infamous Judge Vaulkberg was looking for him. The confidence man had gone too far when he had assumed the title of ‘Baron von Schwartzhelm’ in his last racket. The real von Schwartzhelms had taken offence at the indignity of their name being appropriated by a criminal and made their displeasure known in no uncertain terms. He had thought Stirland would be beyond Judge Vaulkberg’s reach. He hadn’t thought about the fat bounty Vaulkberg had set on his head to appease the von Schwartzhelms, nor how far the ruthless breed of men who made their living as bounty killers would go to collect that reward.

  Viktor had certainly never imagined a man as tenacious and relentless as the one who had finally caught him. Single-handed, the bounty killer had dragged him from the nest of river pirates with whom he had taken refuge. The confidence man shivered as he recalled the gruesome epilogue to that murderous scene. The bounty killer had set fire to the pirate lair, then shot down the outlaws as they came out the door, only he had been spared such a miserable death. That had been barbaric enough, but afterwards he had been forced by his captor to help him poke among the cinders for any bodies recognisable enough to turn in to the riverwardens. Viktor turned his horrified eyes to the wooden keg lashed to the side of the packhorse the bounty hunter grimly called Paychest and felt his stomach turn. He ran his hand against his neck, imagining the steel teeth of the killer’s knife sawing through flesh and bone.