Bloodforged (12 page)

Music was everywhere. Every tavern and kvas parlour had a singer or a group performing for the crowd. Raucous drinking songs rattled the windows of crowded inns. Sharp-faced poets sang scathing satirical ballads to groups of laughing students. Refugees crooned sad lullabies while rocking their hollow-cheeked children to sleep. Even on quieter streets, Ulrika heard snatches of wild melodies on the wind – a strummed lute, a drunken flute, the haunting keening of a mournful violin. In a dark courtyard, she saw a barefoot young refugee girl dancing to some song only she could hear, as silent tears streamed down her cheeks.

And the musical madness seemed to reach even the highest ranks. As Ulrika moved through the crowds, she heard that the ruler of Praag, Duke Enrik, a distant cousin of hers, was putting on a victory concert at the Opera House in a week’s time. It was to be the social event of the season. Ulrika found it offensive. It was indeed a great thing that the hordes had retreated, but to claim one’s armies had defeated them and won a valiant victory when in reality the invaders seemed to have destroyed themselves with infighting and then retreated in the face of a brutal Kislev winter, was exaggeration on a grand scale.

Ulrika shook her head. From the duke to the lowliest beggar, the people of Praag seemed to her like drunks dancing on the edge of a precipice, and putting on blindfolds so they couldn’t see it. Had the city always been like this? She didn’t remember such wild merrymaking going on before. But of course, when last she had been here, it had been in the middle of a crippling siege. Perhaps, after the fear and horror of the long, terrible winter, Praag had only gone mad with relief.

Finally she arrived at the place she had been edging towards since she left Chesnekov’s camp – the White Boar Inn. It had been inevitable she would come, but even as she’d headed for it, she had dragged her feet, and spent more time than was necessary watching the passing parade. At the same time, though her hunger had grown ever more insistent, she had put off feeding to come here, wanting to see the business to the finish before she did anything else.

The White Boar had been where she and Felix and Max and the Slayers had spent all their time while waiting out the siege. It had been here that she had fallen out of love with Felix, and into love with Max. It had been in a room above the taproom that she had nearly died of plague before the wizard had used his powers to drive the illness from her body. If her old companions were anywhere in Praag, they would be here. Just a few more steps, and she could be reunited with them.

She hesitated on the threshold, wondering again if that was what she wanted. Would they welcome her? Would they fear her? Would they attack her? Was she ready to fight them if they did?

A burst of harsh laughter came from within the tavern. She thought she heard a deep dwarfish guffaw amidst it. They
were
here. Knowing it, she almost turned around and walked away, but then she straightened. With the hordes not returning, she had lost one of the reasons she had journeyed to Praag. She wouldn’t give up on the other out of fear. Thrusting out her jaw, she pushed open the door and stepped in.

The taproom was just as she remembered it, dark, smoky and filled with soldiers, mercenaries, and the women who made their living from them. Gospodar lancers with drooping moustaches stood in one corner, toasting each others’ girls with kvas. Squat Ungol tribesmen hunched around a table, drinking fermented mares’ milk and murmuring to each other. Men in uniforms from Kislev, the Empire and beyond crowded the long bar. Ulrika saw Tilean pikemen, crossbow men from the Reikland and Hochland long gunners, all talking to each other at the top of their voices.

‘Another one gone, I hear,’ said a mercenary with an Erengrad accent as Ulrika eased past him. ‘That little beggar gal who sang so sweet down by the bridge. Hasn’t shown up at her patch for three days now.’

‘That’s the fifth I heard of this week,’ said a man who might have been a winged lancer once. ‘Too bad. I liked her. Gave her a coin for luck every time I passed. What d’ye suppose is happening to ’em?’

‘Who cares?’ said a third companion, a dour-looking swordsman in Praag’s colours. ‘Good riddance, I say. Filthy refugees spreading disease and stealing our food. Why don’t they go back where they came from?’

‘Because it isn’t there any more, y’clot,’ said the ex-lancer.

A loud cheer drowned out his friend’s reply, and a deep voice bellowed. ‘Harder! Strike harder!’

Ulrika turned towards the voice and saw, in a room at the back, a crowd of hard-faced mercenaries surrounding a short broad figure who sat on a bench and gripped the table before him, while a man with a hammer stood behind him, raising it over his head. There were too many men in the way for Ulrika to see exactly what happened next, but she saw the hammer swing down at the skull of the short figure as another cheer went up.

‘Good!’ cried the deep voice. ‘Once more to set it!’

Ulrika started across the taproom, alarmed. What was going on? As she walked up the three steps to the back room, the man with the hammer stepped back and raised it one more time, and she got a clear view at last of the figure sitting on the bench. It was Snorri Nosebiter, Gotrek and Felix’s ugly Slayer companion, and he was having a nail pounded into his head.

Ulrika stared at the sight. She knew it was not the first time Snorri had had nails pounded into his head. A row of three rusty spikes had jutted from his skull in lieu of the traditional Slayer’s crest since before she had first met him, and he’d still had them the last time she saw him, when he and Gotrek, Max and Felix had left her in the care of Countess Gabriella, in the ruins of Castle Drakenhof. Now it seemed he was adding to his collection. Four lesser nails, some bent, had been interspersed among the spikes, and he was in the process of adding a fifth.

He sat hunched, naked to the waist, his massive arms braced on the table before him, while a trickle of blood welled from the base of the new nail to run down between his bushy black eyebrows and drip off the end of his bulbous, oft-broken nose. A puddle of red was spreading between the mugs and plates on the table. Neither Gotrek, Felix nor Max was among the witnesses to this act of decoration.

The man with the hammer struck again, and the new nail sank another quarter of an inch into Snorri’s skull as the men around him cheered and raised their fists and mugs.

‘That’s it!’ called the hammerer. ‘It’s set! Your crown is complete, Slayer!’

‘Snorri will be the judge of that,’ said Snorri, and reached up to grip the nail. Ulrika winced as he tugged experimentally at it, but he seemed to feel no pain. He nodded, satisfied.

‘Good!’ he said. ‘Now Snorri needs a drink!’

‘Then Snorri better go get a drink,’ said a big man with a cheerful, red face and a kerchief around his neck. ‘For ’tis his round.’

Snorri wiped the blood from his brow with the back of his hand, then frowned. ‘Wasn’t it Snorri’s round last time?’

‘Aye,’ said the man, who looked to be the leader of the others. ‘But ye wagered it would take four strikes to pound that nail through yer thick skull, and it only took three, so ye owe us. Ye don’t remember?’

Snorri shook his head. ‘Snorri doesn’t remember that.’

The man with the neckerchief laughed. ‘Well, who would, if they’d just been hit on the head with a hammer. But it’s Ranald’s truth, ain’t it, boys?’

The boys all agreed it was indeed Ranald’s truth, and laughed and pounded Snorri’s back, calling him stout fellow and old friend.

Snorri grinned and shrugged. ‘Well, Snorri guesses it must be true, then. Snorri will get the drinks.’

Ulrika shrank back as the Slayer stood and stumped past her, roaring for the barmaid to take his order. She wasn’t certain she wanted to renew her acquaintance with him. Particularly not at that moment. Even if he didn’t want to slay her for being a vampire, he was just the sort to blurt it out at the top of his lungs in public. Unfortunately, he caught her motion out of the corner of his eye and looked her way. At first he didn’t seem to recognise her, for his eyes moved away again, uninterested, and she breathed a sigh of relief, but after five heavy paces he slowed to a stop, then turned back, frowning thoughtfully.

Ulrika shot a glance at the Slayer’s companions, who were joking amongst themselves now, and not paying any attention. She didn’t want them seeing him coming back to her, so she stepped to him.

‘Hello, Snorri Nosebiter,’ she said, keeping a hand on the hilt of her rapier in case he attacked. ‘It’s good to see you again.’

‘Snorri knows you,’ said Snorri, still frowning. ‘You are young Felix’s girl.’

‘Y-yes,’ said Ulrika, a bit stunned he had taken the reappearance of a woman he had last seen as a vampire so calmly. ‘At least I was. Ulrika Magdova, Ivan Straghov’s daughter.’

Snorri’s ugly face split into a wide grin. ‘Now Snorri remembers!’ He turned and continued on towards the bar. ‘Ivan is a good man! How is he?’

Ulrika paused, uncomfortable, then followed him. ‘He… he’s dead, Snorri. He died in Sylvania.’

Snorri’s face fell. ‘Oh, yes. Snorri forgot. That’s too bad. Snorri liked him. He was always very generous with his kvas.’ He frowned again and peered up at Ulrika. ‘Snorri remembers something happened to you too. Something bad.’

Ulrika blinked. Snorri had taken her reappearance so calmly because he didn’t remember she had become a vampire. What a stroke of luck.

‘Y-yes,’ she said at last. ‘Something bad. I became sick, and had to go away. Now I’m better. But listen.’ She hurried on, not wanting him to think too long on it. ‘I’m looking for Felix and Max. Are they here in Praag? Do you know where they’re staying?’

Snorri pushed through the crush at the bar and pounded on it for service. ‘Drinks for Snorri and his friends!’ said Snorri as the barman turned his way.

The barman began filling mugs, and Snorri turned back to Ulrika. ‘Max is here,’ he said. ‘But young Felix went through a door with Gotrek Gurnisson and never came back. Snorri misses them.’

Ulrika frowned, confused. ‘They went through a door? What do you mean? What door? And why didn’t they come back?’

Snorri shrugged. ‘A door in a hill, in Sylvania. Max and Snorri waited outside that door for a long time, but Gurnisson and young Felix never came back out. Max couldn’t open the door again, and neither could Snorri. His hammer couldn’t touch it. And then there were beastmen again.’

Ulrika was even more confused now that he had answered the question. A door in a hill? What did he mean? Was it some sort of magic?

‘Are they dead?’

‘The beastmen? Oh yes. Snorri killed them.’

‘Not the beastmen. Felix and Gotrek,’ said Ulrika, fighting for patience. ‘Are they dead?’

Snorri shook his head. ‘Snorri doesn’t think so. They just didn’t come back.’

Ulrika sighed. She wasn’t going to get anything sensible out of the Slayer. She would have to find Max and ask him what had happened.

‘But you say Max is here?’ she asked. ‘Where?’

Snorri began to fumble in his belt pouch for coins as the barman set a brace of mugs on the bar in front of him. ‘Max is staying with his fancy friends. They have a foolish manling house on the street with the statue of the lady with the big hat.’ He snorted, disgusted. ‘A house with seven towers, and none of them big enough to put a stairway in, let alone mount a cannon on. Snorri thinks it’s stupid.’

Ulrika nodded. The statue of the lady with the big hat must be the monument to revered Miska, Mother of all Kislev, dressed in her ancient armour. She knew where that was – an intersection in the Noble Quarter – and finding a nearby house with seven ornamental towers shouldn’t be too hard.

‘Thank you, Snorri,’ she said. ‘I’m going to look for Max now. It was good to see you again.’

‘Snorri thinks it was good to see you too, Ulrika, Ivan’s daughter,’ said Snorri, pushing his coins across the counter to the barman. ‘Goodbye.’

Ulrika turned to go, then paused, shooting a look towards the mercenaries, who were laughing and miming pounding nails into one another’s heads.

‘Listen, Snorri,’ she whispered. ‘Your friends are taking advantage of you. They’re cheating you. They’re making you buy drinks for them when you shouldn’t, and probably worse besides. If I were you, I’d find other friends.’

Snorri frowned at her. ‘Ragneck wouldn’t cheat Snorri,’ he said. ‘He’s a good man. He drinks almost as much as Snorri, which is pretty good for a manling.’

Ulrika sighed, then fished in her coin purse, still bursting with stolen gold. ‘Well, you can’t say I didn’t try,’ she said, then dug out enough coins to cover Snorri’s round, and then some. She put them in the Slayer’s hand as he was reaching for the mugs. ‘Here. At least let me pay for the next one.’

Snorri beamed at the gold in his hand, then grinned at her. ‘Snorri thinks that is very nice of you.’

‘It’s nothing,’ said Ulrika. ‘Goodbye, Snorri. And good luck. I hope you find your doom soon.’ And before those villains rob you completely blind, she added to herself.

‘Goodbye,’ said Snorri as she turned to go. ‘And good luck to you too.’

It was much too late for that, Ulrika thought. Her luck had died in Sylvania, at the same moment she had. She pushed through the crowd to the door, then stepped out into the cold night.

As she turned towards the Noble Quarter, her hunger tugged at her again, like an eager dog straining at its leash, but she again pulled it to heel. She had to find Max first. She had to know. Everything else could wait.