[Empire Army 04] - Grimblades Read online

  “The rest of you, stay in formation until you’re on the other side,” the sergeant continued. “Then you can break ranks.”

  Karlich let them go on alone, turning his back and pulling a stubby pipe from his tunic pocket. One of the village militia came past with a torch and Karlich stopped him so he could stir some embers to life in the cup and light his pipeweed.

  When the militiaman was gone, he took a long draw to steady his nerves. It was closer than he’d let on to Stahler. A bloody miracle, in fact, that no man had died in the forest. The bones scattered around the beasts’ squalid encampment could quite easily have been theirs.

  “You have your orders,” he said to thin air.

  Eber shuffled into his sergeant’s eye-line.

  “Sir…”

  Karlich’s face was hard at first. They’d been lucky and no thanks to Eber’s lack of concentration, but the halberdier had fought well in the end.

  “It’s all right, Eber. Any of us could have sprung that trap.”

  The big Reiklander’s expression suggested he thought differently.

  Karlich sighed and his face softened. “Go on, join the others.”

  Eber nodded, hurrying to catch the rest and take his place in the front rank.

  “Saw the way you faced off against that gor, Eber,” said Rechts from down the line, smiling through his ruddy beard.

  “He cut off its bloody horn!” added Volker, alongside him.

  Varveiter chuckled but was robbed of his humour by the pain in his leg and grimaced.

  Eber felt a little lighter, but he still knew he could have cost them all their lives.

  They emerged through to the next clearing—there was only a relatively short tract of sparse forest between it and the last one—and Rechts drummed for them to break ranks. Baggage train camp followers were already pitching tents and lighting fires before night crawled in. The watchtower torches of Hobsklein were visible a few hundred feet distant. Some of the Grimblades shook hands, patted one another’s backs or expressed other gestures of camaraderie as they wandered off into smaller groups.

  The clearing was a broad expanse, mainly flat ground of soft grass and loamy soil. Had the villagers dared to, so close to the forest, they might have planted seeds in the patch of ground and a very different group of rank and file could’ve held sway in it.

  The Grimblade front rankers stayed together and made for the nearest pitch. Other regimental troops were slowly making their way through in dribs and drabs. Volker would return soon, hopefully with game, but the others were content to wait.

  Eber was about to follow when Keller crept up alongside him and leant near his ear.

  “Fat oaf,” he snarled. “Get yourself killed next time and spare us all your idiocy.”

  Like a shadow passing over the sun, Keller drifted away, calling and joking out loud to the others.

  Eber stopped. An ache was building inside him. He hated Keller, hated him for saying what he’d just said; hated him for making Eber hate himself. He wanted to lash out, to strike Keller and wipe away his cocky smirk. Instead he merely clenched his fists and looked down at his feet.

  CHAPTER TWO

  CAMPFIRES

  Village of Hobsklein, on the Reikland border,

  190 miles from Altdorf

  Evening had drawn in, but the sky above was dark and clear. Stars shimmered in the firmament and the moon was full and bright.

  By now, the campfire was burning well and gave off the succulent aroma of cooking guinea fowl. Volker had caught the birds an hour earlier, plucked the feathers and spitted them over the hot flames. Fatty juices dripped from the birds’ carcasses, six in all, and made the fire below spit and crackle.

  “Smells good,” said Keller, licking his lips.

  “Better than trail rations at any rate,” added Rechts, taking another pull on the bottle of Middenland hooch. The drummer was a resourceful alcoholic and had procured the liquor from a peddler he’d met on the road to the Reikland border.

  “Nothing wrong with salt-pork and grits,” said Varveiter, stretching out his injured leg and hissing through his teeth as he eased it into position.

  “Aye, if you’ve got a stomach like a warhorse or your tongue is so old and leathery that you’re past caring about taste.” Keller laughed, and the others laughed with him. All except for Brand, who kept a yard or two away from the rest. He stayed to the shadows, sharpening his blades on a whetstone. Occasionally, the light caught in his eyes and they flashed with captured fire.

  Varveiter grumbled something derogatory about Keller’s mother under his breath and went back to massaging the stiffness from his leg.

  There were several separate campfires set around the clearing. The sounds of good-natured jostling, tawdry songs and the clatter of knives on plates emanated from them. Smoke from slowly-burning kindling and pipe-weed scented the cloudy air. Tents stood in ranks or half circles, blades and polearms racked outside or leaning against trees. With the destruction of the beastmen, the mood was relaxed. Even the sentries stationed at all the cardinal points of the encampment looked undisturbed. It was a good time, and those came very rarely on campaign.

  “By Taal, you’re a good hunter, Volker,” said Rechts when he was given his first strip of guinea fowl. He devoured it whole, wiping the juices from his bearded chin and sucking at the heat baking his tongue. “Why did you end up joining the army as a halberdier and not a huntsman?”

  “State troopers’ pay is better,” Volker answered simply. “Even if the company’s not,” he added with a wry smile.

  Now it was Rechts’ turn to laugh out loud, so hard that he jarred the shoulder wound from the ungor’s blade. He winced and clutched at the bloodstained bandage.

  “I could see to that for you, brother,” offered Masbrecht. As well as something of a Sigmarite puritan, Masbrecht also had some skill as a chirurgeon. His father had done it as his profession, and passed some of his skills onto his son before he died of pox nearly ten years ago. The death of the man he had idolised had hit Masbrecht hard and the youth fell into bad ways for a time until he found religion and the cult of Sigmar.

  “It’s fine,” snapped Rechts, as the mood abruptly soured, “and I’m no brother of yours.”

  “We’re all brothers of Sigmar, Torsten.”

  Rechts stood, leaving the rest of his guinea fowl but taking his half-empty bottle. “Piss off, Masbrecht, and leave your sermonising for someone else. Don’t call me that, either. My friends call me Torsten. You’re just another soldier I happen to serve with.” He turned, stumbling a little with the grog, and stalked off.

  Silence descended for a while before Keller let out a long, high-pitched whistle.

  “What crawled up his arse and died?”

  Masbrecht paled and kept his mouth shut.

  “I heard he was victimised by zealous preachers when he was young,” said Brand, so grim the air seemed to get colder with his voice. “Executed his family, left him for dead.”

  More silence. Brand had as much of a knack for killing the mood as he did for killing in general.

  “Ah, don’t worry about that miserable whoreson,” said Keller, trying to lighten the atmosphere. “Come and bless me instead, Masbrecht. Sigmar knows, I need it!”

  He laughed again and drew some humour back out of the night.

  Volker chuckled, though it felt forced.

  “What about you, Eber?” Lenkmann piped up, his opening a little awkward. He was better accustomed to polishing his tunic’s buttons or pressing the creases from his hose than conversing with his comrades. “Why did you join up?”

  The big Reiklander had been quiet until then, content to fade into the background. His guilt still felt heavy, like a lead ball in his gut, and he was hoping the night would pass without any further attention. The others were of the same mind, only poor old Lenkmann was about as intuitive as a rock.

  “I, er… used to be with a band of travelling carnival folk—”

  “A bumbli
ng klown, no doubt,” quipped Keller, keeping his malice hidden from everyone except Eber and, unbeknownst to him, Brand too.

  “Strongman,” Eber corrected.

  To Keller’s annoyance, the others appeared interested in Eber’s secret life.

  “What did you lift?” asked Volker.

  “Ale barrels, anvils, that kind of thing,” said Eber. “Once, I lifted a cart mule.”

  Lenkmann was impressed. “What, over your head?” He mimed the feat as he imagined it.

  “Aye, just so.”

  “Sounds likely…” Keller’s sarcasm was biting.

  “It’s true,” said Eber, quietly. Evidently, the carnival was not a place of happy memories for him either.

  “I believe him,” said Volker.

  Keller sniffed impatiently, shaking his head. “Aw, why are you even talking to the lout? He almost got us all killed today,” he said, adding under his breath. “Dumb ox.”

  Eber heard him, and it made him angry. “Don’t call me that.”

  “What? Dumb or ox?”

  “Leave him alone, Krieger,” Volker pleaded. He had been looking forward to a quiet evening of simple pleasures, of good food and reasonable company, when they could leave the horrors of the Reikwald behind them, if just for a night. Everyone else on the patch was getting on, why not them?

  Keller turned on the huntsman.

  “Why? But for Karlich’s quick thinking, the oaf’s stupidity could have seen us all dead.”

  “Everyone makes mistakes, Keller,” offered Lenkmann, distinctly uncomfortable at the sudden turn.

  “Mistakes that’ll get us all killed, one day,” Keller replied, focusing back on Eber. “Should’ve stayed at the circus, klown.”

  Socially awkward as he was, the banner bearer could think of no way to defuse the rising tension. Volker had said his bit. Masbrecht was content to stay out of it, after Rechts’ earlier outburst. He looked to Brand for support, but all he got was cold, hollow eyes, narrowed like knife slashes in the campfire gloom. In the end, it was old Varveiter that had the answer.

  “He showed more bravery than some.” The old man was staring into the dark, picking at his guinea fowl idly.

  Keller bared his teeth.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that I saw you, more than once, skulking in the shadows on the flank, keeping your head down and your blade unsullied.”

  “I’m no coward, Varveiter.” Keller was on his feet. Brand made to move, too, his hand disappearing into the dark folds of his tunic before the old soldier warned him off with a look.

  Varveiter fixed the other halberdier with a stony glare.

  “Well, let’s just say all of your enemies usually have their wounds in the back.”

  “I outmanoeuvre, you bast—”

  Varveiter cut him off.

  “No need to sour the evening. And in my day,” he added, “that kind of… outmanoeuvring was called cowardice.”

  Keller snorted, backing down a little when he realised the old soldier was actually spoiling for a fight.

  Lenkmann caught onto the ploy late: Varveiter was baiting Keller, just like Keller had been baiting Eber. It took the attention off the big Reiklander who didn’t have the wit to match him and was already torn up with guilt so as not to be thinking that straight.

  “In your day, our troops wore loin cloths and tattoos.”

  “That so? I must be ancient, then. Well you should have no trouble besting me, should you?” Varveiter got up with a grunt and a grimace. Unbuckling his breastplate, he let it fall to the ground.

  “Now, come on…” Lenkmann began, half an eye on the nearest campfires, but was far, far too late. The wheels had been long in motion by the time the danger presented itself to him.

  Varveiter raised a hand. “It’s all right, Lenkmann. Keller wants to show us his skill. I’m happy to let him. Don’t tell me you’ve never brawled with comrades before? Good for camaraderie, or so we old campaigners say…” He glanced at Keller, who suddenly looked less sure of himself.

  “What are you doing, old man?”

  “Readying for a fight,” he answered, rolling up his sleeves and rotating his shoulders. “Come on, son, don’t disappoint me.”

  Keller caught another twinge as Varveiter moved. The old soldier betrayed the weakness in his bruised leg and stood awkwardly.

  Fair enough, he’d dump the geriatric on his arse and then see what he had to say about “cowardice”.

  “You should’ve hung up your blade a long time ago, Varveiter. And now I’m going to show you wh—”

  Varveiter lunged forward and punched Keller hard in the gut. The mouthy halberdier doubled over and heaved up his guinea fowl.

  Backing up, he raised a hand.

  “Bastard!” he managed through hard breaths. “I wasn’t ready.”

  “I was,” replied Varveiter, and swung again. This time the move was slow, and Keller saw it coming. Dropping his shoulder, he took the punch on his back, most of the force lost through the extra distance the blow had to travel. Varveiter wasn’t done, though, and threw in a left hook that Keller had to step back from to avoid.

  The old man was breathing in short, sharp gasps. That last combination had taken something out of him. Keller smiled thinly, like a snake sizing up a mouse, and leant in with a quick jab. He struck Varveiter on his upper torso then he rained in another blow that clipped the side of the old man’s head. It was like striking iron.

  Much to Keller’s delight, Varveiter was backing up. A space had cleared around the campfire, Masbrecht, Volker and Lenkmann moving from the “arena” to avoid getting hit by a stray blow or a falling body Eber was on the other side of the flames and well out of it. Brand just kept his seat and watched. If Karlich had been there, he’d have put a stop to it. Lenkmann, however, had lost the reins of the situation long ago, before he’d even realised it was brewing.

  “Not so bullish, now, eh?” Keller goaded.

  Krieger Keller was a small man. Not physically, but mentally and morally. And he was a coward, just like Varveiter had said. It was the truth of his remarks that set Keller off in the first place. He didn’t like feeling small, and any chance to vent his wrath, his sense of inadequacy on something smaller, frailer, he took it. Eber was an easy target. A big man but a dumb man, without the resolve to fight back. Keller had heard his wailings in the night, about his mother and his abusive father. Eber was easy meat. And now he’d prove his superiority over Varveiter, too.

  The old man didn’t reply, just kept his guard up and spat out a gobbet of blood from where Keller had caught him in the mouth. He beckoned the younger man on scornfully.

  Filled with over-confidence, Keller came forward again. He feinted with a punch to Varveiter’s strong side then aimed a kick at his bad leg when the old soldier’s guard was down.

  Varveiter cried out, and the pain was there on his face for all to see. Lenkmann went to intercede but something in the old soldier’s eyes told him not to. It had gone beyond a brawl. This was personal. Even Brand kept his seat, but his gaze never left the two pugilists.

  “Aiming for a weak spot…” gasped Varveiter. “Good tactic…”

  “With you, your whole body is a weakness,” Keller snarled and threw an overhand meant to finish the old man off.

  Varveiter was ready for it. He ducked beneath the punch, sending an uppercut into Keller’s stomach at the end of the move.

  “Yours is your pride, lad,” he hissed.

  He followed the uppercut with a heavy jab to the man’s ribs, not so hard as to break one, but hard enough to bruise and hurt like hell. The air was blasted from Keller’s lungs as if he’d been hit with a hammer. The hammer came next.

  As Keller bent over again, spewing up his empty guts, Varveiter smashed his elbow against the younger man’s back, flooring him. By the end, it was Keller that was gasping for breath, puking bile and crumpled in a heap. Varveiter stood over him, all of his feigned fatigue abruptly gone.<
br />
  When he leant down to pick up his breastplate, he whispered in Keller’s ear.

  “Don’t let’s you and me have this talk again, you little shit, or I will break something next time. Permanently.”

  Keller scowled through his agony, having finished dry heaving, and nodded meekly.

  “See?” said Varveiter out loud as he yanked Keller to his feet. “Good for camaraderie.” He slapped the other halberdier hard on his back, a little harder than he really needed to.

  Keller smiled thinly. His eyes conveyed all of his shame and impotent rage. They said something else too, a message just for Varveiter.

  This isn’t over between us.

  Varveiter stared back, as stoic as stone. He’d had more than one run in with a fellow soldier in his career, men much tougher than the one before him now. Keller was just a jumped up little snot who needed taking down a peg. He wasn’t even slightly worried. Other concerns were on his mind right now.

  “I reckon that’s enough excitement for me for one night,” the old man said. “I’ll bid you all a fair evening. You too, Krieger,” he added with a final glance in the seething halberdier’s direction. Varveiter walked away in the night, heading for one of the tents.

  After Volker had bid the old man good night, and Masbrecht had muttered a benediction to Sigmar for him, the familiar silence returned.

  Keller decided he couldn’t take it and, clutching his stomach and snarling, stomped away in the opposite direction to Varveiter.

  “An eventful evening,” Lenkmann began after a minute or so, trying ineptly to leaven the heavy silence.

  Volker chewed on his guinea fowl, but set the strip down after a few bites. He’d suddenly lost his appetite. Eber looked as sullen as ever, his brawny arms and legs tucked tight into his body despite the fact it wasn’t a cold night. Masbrecht nodded to Lenkmann, just as awkward as the banner bearer, before his eyes dropped and he fumbled at the Sigmarite talisman hung around his neck.