Crooked Streets Read online

  “And the rescue, too!” Cainen exclaimed. He was grinning boyishly and glancing over to Kozef. “Do not forget that! I imagine that would warrant another two nights, at least! Including the one night that you owe us already, that at least about five nights, Helaire!”

  “We’ll give you both five nights, you rogues,” Helaire replied, shaking a finger at them. “And that’s provided you help us to clean the mess and mend the damage. You both are partially to blame for it, after all!”

  Kozef and Cainen are met with strife in the streets of Thieudan. Illustration by René Aigner

  Grey Scourge

  1 – The Lone Wolf

  It was deep night. The bright moon, swathed by banks of silvery cloud, shone its stark light down onto the forested vale. In a small clearing among a wood of beech and poplar trees there sat three brigands encamped about a guttering fire. Wrapped in their cloaks and blankets and sitting on their bedrolls, they were sluggish and content from the hearty supper they had shared not long before: a piglet they had stolen that morning, roasted on a spit and garnished with coriander. Their drink – a heady red wine they had taken from a clerk travelling north on the high road to Lemarne – had also helped to dull their wits and warm their hearts for the evening.

  They were hard and rough men; short-statured and stout, with dark shaggy hair and dirty faces. They talked, languidly, about what they had done that day, and about what they might do the next.

  “Head east,” one of them grumbled. “Where the wealth is; this country is poor as dirt. Not only that, but the whole place gives me an ill feeling.”

  “That may be because of the lord of this land,” another said. “The baron of this part is a true mongrel, I’ve heard. A despicable liar and deceiver; a greater thief than the three of us together.”

  “I’ve heard similar words to those,” the third brigand replied. “They say that the baron here is a scoundrel, while his brother – who was the baron before him – was a truly wicked man.”

  The first brigand nodded slightly at that, but did not bother to reply. A silence settled upon them, and the three men opted to sit and gaze on the dying fire for a while.

  A few moments later, the silence was broken. They heard a mournful sound of howling, drifting in from distant hilltops. It begun low, and then built itself up to a high crescendo before trailing off altogether.

  “Ah, can you hear that?” the third one asked his companions, blinking at the fire. He had a long, ragged scar running across his cheek – from the corner of his eye to his chin – given to him many years ago by a man who did not care for being robbed. “The wolves are singing prayers to their deity, the moon. It is late, and time for us to sleep, I think.”

  The brigand lay down on his side, and soon later rolled about onto his back. All was silent, save for the soft and lazy crackle of the fire and the quiet sounds of the night. It was just as the scar-faced brigand had closed his eyes to sleep, however, that he heard the call of response.

  The bestial howl sheared through the quiet night like the stroke of an axe, seemingly louder than anything the man had ever heard before.

  Scar-face cast his blanket aside and jumped up to his feet immediately, only to stand frozen in terrified awe. His fellow brigands leapt up also, only to stand still and rigid as fence-posts.

  It was a bellowing, deafening yowl that seemed to shake the tree-boughs as it reverberated down the vale. The fire itself seemed to shy away at the sound. Scar-face’s neck-hairs stood up straight, and bolts of dreaded cold rattled down his backbone. The howling grew louder and louder before reaching its terrifying height – a mind-numbing, soul-shaking summit that carried for what seemed like an age – before abruptly falling away into strained silence.

  The brigands exchanged terrified glances. Scar-face scrambled to pick up his spear, and clutched it tightly. The other brigands followed suit immediately – the first drew out his short sword, the second unsheathed his long, cruel knife – and both gripped them in trembling hands as they gathered closely about the fire.

  “The firewood,” Scar-face hissed. “Throw it on!”

  Knifeman did what he was told, taking up the remainder of their pile of branches and throwing it onto the sputtering fire. As the heap of wood crashed into the embers, Scar-face plunged the point of his spear in, stoking the fire into bright life. The flames flared up and soon the campfire was burning intensely.

  “Sweet Intercessor! A wolf? Was it a wolf?” Swordsman asked, his voice quivering.

  “I don’t know,” Scar-face replied, annoyed.

  “They are timid beasts, aren’t they?” Knifeman asked, making fearful glances in every direction. “We are fully-grown men! He won’t come at us, especially with this fire. He won’t come at us, no matter how hungry he is. Won’t he?”

  “If it was a wolf, it was no normal one,” Swordsman said.

  “Quiet!” Scar-face hissed.

  The other two brigands fell silent in time to hear the sounds of snapping twigs and parting foliage. There was something moving about, out in the dark. Skirting their camp, but drawing gradually closer.

  Scar-face stabbed at their fire once again for good measure, knocking up a spray of embers and causing it to surge angrily.

  He noticed Swordsman, then: his gaze had fallen upon something in amongst the tree-trunks and brush. All the colour had drained from his face at that moment and his mouth hung slack. The knifeman, then, also looked over; his shoulders began to quiver, his eyes widened and a pall that spoke of indescribable dread fell upon his long face.

  The scarred brigand turned swiftly about and – with feet planted and his spear held firmly – assumed a mode of attack. He then saw, dwelling in the profound dark just outside the uttermost edge of the firelight, a pair of great, unblinking eyes. They were two yellow orbs in the darkness, gleaming at him and his fellow robbers with a savage and baleful fire.

  The eyes were accompanied by a rolling sound, low, deep and awful, that gnawed at Scar-face’s heart. A growl that was not unlike distant thunder.

  “Ha! Get away!” Scar-face screamed at the eyes, mustering up a loud and daunting voice in spite of his resounding fear. He flourished his weapon about like a crazed man, sweeping it this way and that and jabbing in the direction of the creature.

  The knifeman, meanwhile, had managed to shake away his immobilising terror and pull up a partially-burning brand from the fire. Taking Scar-face’s lead, he begun to wave it about and make loud calls and shouts. The swordsman joined in not long after, hollering and jeering at the beast lurking in the darkness.

  “Get you gone, monster!” Scar-face shouted. “Out of here! Ha!”

  The brigands’ terrible bellowing sounded throughout the vale.

  As if to compensate, the creature’s growling grew louder and fiercer. Below the shining and wicked eyes there appeared a set of bright, slavering jaws.

  “Leave us be, accursed beast!” Scar-face cried as loudly as he could. The muscles of his neck bulged and his lungs felt likely to burst from the strain. “Leave us be!”

  With that, the growling faded into a deep murmur, and then stopped altogether. The long, white teeth were sheathed away. With a blink of its eyes the monster promptly turned about and disappeared, melting into the darkness of the trees and foliage.

  “We frightened it away?” the swordsman said after a moment of tense silence. He lowered his weapon slightly. “What was that beast?”

  “A wolf,” Scar-face said, grimly. “Only a wolf!”

  “By my pocked arse, it was ‘only a wolf’!” Knifeman spat. “It was a monster! Had a she-wolf congress with a sulphur-spewing fiend from the blackest bowels of the abyss, their progeny wouldn’t be half as awful as that thing that was growling at us just now.”

  “It was a message, then,” Swordsman said, breathless and wide-eyed. “Sent from holy Mount Marai. A message from the blessed Intercessor and the gods. A warning for us to stop our wicked ways. To repent!”

  “It was only a
wolf, you blithering idiot!” Scar-face hissed, masking his terror with wrath. “But I do not want it coming back to harry us. Quick now, cut that low branch there and we’ll build more fires to keep it away.”

  Tentatively, Swordsman approached the branch indicated, and cut it down with two strikes from his short sword.

  It was then that the beast struck.

  A dark shape – hulking and wolf-like – loped in swiftly and sprung between Scar-face and Knifeman, vaulting over the flickering flames of the fire straight towards Swordsman.

  It reared up on its back legs as it attacked, standing significantly taller than its victim. It lunged straight for the brigand’s neck. Swordsman hit the earth with the creature’s massive body on top of him and its jaws at his neck, and within a heartbeat the man’s throat had been torn out. He had barely let out a scream.

  Scar-face and Knifeman, meanwhile, could only stand rooted; overwhelmed by a stupor of profound terror.

  The thing disengaged itself from Swordsman’s body and wheeled about to face the remaining brigands. Bold round eyes flared in the firelight. It let out a direful growl and bared its bloodied fangs.

  Knifeman reeled, as if suddenly knocked from his state of shock by a blow to the face. He turned and began a frantic run for the trees.

  He did not reach them. With two bounds, the creature was upon him. Powerful jaws clamped fiercely around his neck, this time crunching and cracking the bones instead of tearing at the flesh.

  Soon, the beast would be finished, and it would lift its shaggy head and set its bright, hungry eyes upon Scar-face. He knew that he would have no other opportunity, and that his fellows were suddenly beyond any sort of help that he could render. He dropped his spear, spun about and broke into a tearing dash, running head-long into the trees.

  He ran as fast as his legs could convey him, flying recklessly through the black woods, heedless of the branches whipping at his face. He heard the bloodthirsty call of the creature, and heard it spring into savage pursuit – but did not dare to look back.

  2 – Wolf-catcher

  A pair of vagabond-mercenaries, both foreign to that land, pressed their way northwards through the rough massif country. Kozef, from Kaszia in the east, was tall and burly, with a mostly-bald head but a bristling black moustache. Slung at his broad back he bore a round shield, battered but sturdy, and at his hip he carried his steel war-hammer. Cainen, a Fennishman from the west, meanwhile, was slight of stature and light of hair, and had sheathed at his back his long-hafted battle axe.

  They walked a road that was dusty and poorly-maintained. It took them across hills and depressions and skirted about low, weathered ridges. The earth of that country, where relatively flat and amenable, was given to crops and agriculture. The more uneven ground, meanwhile, was better suited to grazing, and Kozef and Cainen were reminded of this often while travelling north, noticing many wary herdsmen out with their herds of cattle, goats, or sheep.

  The mercenaries had resided in Thieudan’s Grotto Grouse hotel for only a few days, where they had enjoyed the hospitality of their hosts and had done their best not to be the cause of any further trouble. There was plenty of fixing and restoration work to be done to the inn, particularly to its common room – but the mercenaries, claiming that they did not want to ‘cause a bother or get in the way’, managed to avoid the bulk of it.

  They took their leave on the morning of the fifth day – earlier than was agreed upon – and had been stocked generously for their travels.

  Their stay at the Grouse had been a happy one. They were practical men, however, and both realised that they were in serious need of something more substantial than simply a warm bed for the night. Coin, in short, was on their minds.

  “Good food and drink and a soft bed below us are all grand, big fellow,” Cainen began, looking at his companion. “But sure, it would be nice to find someone that’ll pay us with something that clinks and clatters. We’ve been light for weeks; we don’t even have a pair of coppers to rub together!”

  “You have said what I am thinking, small man,” Kozef replied. Just at that point they were making their way over a low ridge, and the big Kaszian noticed something in the distance ahead of them and pointed it out. “Look, you see there. A city.”

  Cainen looked ahead. A fairly level plain stretched away before them and, sure enough, a small walled city sat in its centre. Some distance beyond the city there was a rocky prominence, and sitting astraddle this there was a squat, square and stern-looking castle.

  “We will go to the inn, and ask the keeper if he knows of any work. No different from what we have done many times before,” said Kozef.

  “Right then, so be it,” Cainen said, curtly.

  Kozef grunted. He knew, of course – by his comrades’ tone, by the way he had not-quite-finished his statement – that the matter was not yet settled at all. “What is it, Cainen?”

  “Sure, what if there isn’t any work, then?” he said, feigning desperation. “Absolutely none at all?”

  “Then you may work your fleet-fingered magic, with my blessing,” Kozef said, glancing over warily. “However...”

  “You don’t want to know about it,” Cainen said, his voice singsong. “‘Oh, Kozef, look here at what I found – it was just left on the ground,’ I’ll say. It need not be a bother to you.”

  Kozef, black moustache bristling, nodded at that. “And if someone finds you out? Refresh my memory.”

  “Oh, we don’t know each other, not us. Never seen you before in me life, nor you me.”

  “Quite correct!” Kozef replied.

  They drew closer to the town, passing fields of wheat and barley, pasturelands, olive tree orchards and vineyards and various small outlying settlements. It was not yet noon and there were plenty of people about – travelling the road to and from the city in the distance and tending to fields and flocks. People and animals were thin, for the most part, and clothes were drab and tattered. The purses, Cainen figured, would not be heavy in that part of the world.

  The Fennishman could not help but notice, then, that the people he was seeing seemed dispirited and fearful, in addition to poor. They were often looking over their shoulders into the distance, and here and there men armed with pitchforks and sickles were walking among the wattle fences and hedgerows that divided the fields, not doing any work in particular. Keeping watch, most likely. There were several makeshift watchtowers to be seen, also, each one manned and fitted with a large bell or gong.

  The people of that country were deathly afraid of something, but Cainen could not be sure what. It was not a usual mistrust of strangers, nor even of strange fighting-men: the villagers did not appear at all bothered to see a pair of shabby foreign mercenaries tramping up the road towards the town. It was a fear of something else entirely.

  Eventually they came to the small city – Vaudain was its name – and entered by the southern gate. The Fang and Fur, a modest but respectable hotel, was situated on the main avenue not far from the gatehouse. The mercenaries promptly entered.

  It was dark and quiet inside the inn, and Kozef and Cainen could only see a small handful of patrons seated about the common room, eating and drinking and muttering to one another in low, uneasy voices. Together the pair started for the main counter, but at that moment, Cainen felt something wet and soft brush itself across the back of his hand. He jerked his hand away, and looked down in surprise.

  At his side there lingered a dog with a brown and white coat. It looked up at him blithely, with a wagging tail and lolling tongue.

  “Why hello there, doggy!” Cainen exclaimed. He reached down and gave the beast a rub behind the ear. It was a lean and taut creature, with a narrow head and a deep chest. A quick and agile sighthound, Cainen supposed, bred especially for chasing down quarry during the hunt.

  “Kozef,” the Fennishman said. “Ask the innkeeper about work, won’t you? I’ll deal with this handsome fellow.”

  “Very well,” Kozef muttered. He approach
ed the counter but had to wait his turn to speak with the hotelier, who was seeing to the needs of a particularly long-winded and demanding patron.

  Cainen crouched low to converse with the hound more intimately.

  “Who are you, good saigneur?” he asked, letting the dog sniff his hand. “What’re you doing here? Who do you belong to?”

  It was not long before another lean and bright-eyed hound appeared, smelling and eyeing Cainen inquisitively.

  “Oh, and who’s this, then?” The Fennishman cooed, giving the new dog a pat on the flank. “Two handsome fellows! Aren’t I lucky?”

  Soon later, both animals lost interest in Cainen and scampered off back where they had come from. The Fennishman could not help but follow after them. Picking his way between the rickety tables and chairs, he saw another hound, a wrinkly young creature with floppy ears. Before he knew it, he found himself in a far corner of the hotel’s common room, more or less an alcove, perhaps, for the fact that it was somewhat secluded by the building’s stairwell and timber pillars.

  In the corner there was a small round table at which there was seated a man drinking wine from a pewter cup. He was alone, save for the dogs – his dogs, evidently – who were arrayed about and under the table. He was already looking up at Cainen, his dark eyes inquisitive.

  The man took a slow sip of his wine, and then set his cup down on the table. “Do you like dogs, friend?”

  “Sure,” Cainen replied. “I’m fond of all the animals.”

  It was the honest truth. As a small child he had delighted in his family’s cattle, and mighty but happy hounds had often been his playmates and comrades. As an adolescent he had lived as a cloistered monk, and, while working at his illumination, had always been glad to have the monastery’s resident mouser sitting alongside.

  The stranger, mildly surprised, raised his eyebrows at that and gave a small grin. “And what of their grey sires, the wolves?” he asked.