Martak laughed harshly. ‘Gelt was Supreme Patriarch. I’m just a filthy bird-tamer.’ He looked at Gausser shrewdly. ‘Call the Carroburg garrison back here. Call them all back. Surrender the forest – it can look after itself. You can’t weaken this army, not out there. All we have are walls.’ He shot a glance at Haupt-Anderssen. ‘You’re right. We need to use them.’
Von Liebwitz took a short breath, trying not to sniff too deeply. ‘It is clear to me, master wizard, that you have little understanding of war. There are three armies making their way towards us. Once they reach the Reik valley, we will be without hope of reinforcement. If nothing is done to hamper their progress, the noose will tighten before the solstice falls.’
‘They won’t hurry,’ snorted Martak. ‘Do you not see it yet? Geheimnisnacht is the key. They will arrive then, when their powers are at their height and the daemon-moon rides full.’ He crossed his arms. ‘That is the hour of our doom. We can neither delay nor hasten its coming, so we should just make ready for it.’
Zintler looked uncomfortable. In normal times, Martak’s advice would have been balanced by the Grand Theogonist’s, but, as with so many others, Volkmar was missing, presumed dead, and the arch-lectors had not answered his summons.
‘Superstition,’ muttered Gausser, though with no great certainty.
Martak raised a dirty eyebrow. ‘You think so? I’ll remind you of that when the wind is screaming and the earth beneath our feet begins to move.’
‘That is already taking place,’ observed Haupt-Anderssen archly.
He was right – reports had started coming from across the city. Panicked residents had begun to flee the poorer quarters after wells had sprouted foul weeds overnight, and gutters had burst open with broods of writhing rats. The nights had been filled with unearthly screams, though the City Watch had never been able to track them down. Some even said that the river itself was changing, thickening up like broth over a stove.
‘And that is your task, wizard,’ accused von Liebwitz. ‘Let us look to the defences – your kind should be cleansing the city.’
Martak glared at her darkly. ‘We’re doing our part. It would help if I weren’t summoned to all these damned councils.’
‘We need to determine the order of defence,’ insisted Gausser, his cheeks reddening.
‘So you can master us all,’ sniped von Liebwitz.
Haupt-Anderssen laughed at that, and Gausser started to shout something about the noted cowardice of Wissenlanders, to which their elector vigorously responded.
By then, though, Martak was not listening, and neither was Zintler. Heavy crashes could be heard from outside the chamber, echoing up the long corridors. The Reikscaptain drew his blade, and slowly moved towards the double-door entrance. Two guards on either side of the portal did likewise. The commotion drew closer, growing louder on the far side.
Then the twin doors slammed back, and a band of heavily armed men broke in. They were plate-armoured, and bore the marks of a hard road on travel-worn garb.
‘Stand down!’ shouted Zintler, barring their passage with commendable bravery, seeing as how he was outnumbered eight to three. ‘This is a private council – who dares to interrupt?’
The intruders parted, allowing one of their number to stride to the forefront. Unlike the others, he was helm-less, exposing a hawk-like visage barred by a long, carefully lacquered moustache. There could be no mistaking the proud features that adorned coins and devotional lockets from Helmgart to Middenheim, though they had been badly disfigured by claw-marks along one cheek. The lines were still raw and bloody, making the Reiksmarshal look half daemonic.
‘What is this rabble?’ rasped Kurt Helborg, striding up to the electors. ‘Where is Todbringer? Where are the Reikland generals? And who is this beggar?’
Martak bowed clumsily. ‘The Supreme Patriarch, my lord. Or so they tell me.’
Helborg stared at him, incredulous, before turning to Gausser. ‘My lord elector, tell me this is some foul jest.’
Gausser shot him an apologetic look. ‘Times are not what they were, lord Reiksmarshal.’
Von Liebwitz drew up to Helborg then, a rapt expression on her aged face. ‘You are alive! Thank the gods. Now we can plan our defence in earnest – what of the Emperor? What of Lord Schwarzhelm?’
Helborg briefly looked lost then, as if the questions confused him. His gaze ran around the chamber, from Gausser to von Liebwitz to Haupt-Anderssen to Martak. ‘This is the war council?’
Martak sniffed noisily, dislodging a troublesome clot of dried mucus that had been plaguing him since waking. ‘Who were you expecting? You took every blade worth having north.’
Helborg repeated his incredulous stare, before shaking his head with resignation. ‘Then these are the tools I have. They must suffice.’ He turned to Gausser, the only figure in the room he seemed to have any rapport with. ‘I bring hard truths with me. The Emperor is slain. Our northern armies are scattered, and the enemy follows hard on my heels. We do not have much time, and the city must be secured. What preparations have been made?’
Gausser glanced at von Liebwitz, whose eyes strayed towards Haupt-Anderssen, who quickly deferred to Zintler.
‘We were debating our first moves, my lord,’ said the Reikscaptain, haltingly. ‘The news from Marienburg is just in, and we had not yet determined just where to concentrate–’
‘Taal’s teeth,’ swore Helborg. He beckoned to his preceptor. ‘Find out what forces are still in the city. Order the gates closed – no man leaves without my order. Secure the armouries. Appoint a quartermaster-general and place all water-sources and food-stores under his protection. See the Imperial standard is flown from the Palace summit, and spread the word that the Emperor has routed the enemy at Heffengen and will soon return. Make sure this is believed.’
His preceptor saluted, and departed to carry out his orders, taking the remaining knights with him. As he left, Martak chuckled softly. This was why Kurt Helborg was Reiksmarshal, and why fighting men worshipped the earth he trod. For the first time since his appointment, Martak wondered whether he actually might survive this war.
‘May I say, sir, your return seems timely,’ Martak said.
Helborg looked back at him doubtfully.
‘We will see,’ he muttered. ‘We will see.’
Deep in the foundations of the old city, far below the streets and avenues, the vapours never ceased. They curled along the brick-lined sewers, steaming from the surface of the foetid waters. They pooled in the dank, dark recesses of ancient cesspits and long-buried catacombs, curling like hair amid the endless shadows.
No natural light penetrated so far down, and the only illumination was the pale glow of phosphorescent mosses clambering all across the crumbling masonry. The moss had spread quickly since its introduction, racing down the winding shafts and choked tunnels, feeding on the filth that sank to the city’s base. It was everywhere now, smothering all other growths and lending the forgotten ways of Altdorf a ghostly sheen.
It got worse the lower one went, until the waterways were a thick soup of throbbing spore-clumps and the luminous tendrils hung from the low ceiling like stalactites. At the very bottom, in the deepest shafts of the undercity, the infestation was so complete that it felt like the entire structure was built from nothing more than fronds of softly iridescent lichen.
Down there, behind a locked door under a low stone archway, the noise of bubbling and hissing never ceased. The vapours poured out from the cracks in the door, seething out from between planks of long-rotten wood before drifting off down the myriad tunnels of the labyrinth beyond.