'Then we proceed as planned.' said Bremen. 'Knights Panther, column of pairs.'
The knights mounted up and assumed the formation of fast march, setting off at the canter with Kaspar riding alongside Bremen. He thought of the promises he had made back in Kislev, one to kill Sasha, one to take him alive, and wondered which one he would be able to keep. Though his warrior's heart and sense of honour wanted to cut Sasha Kajetan down like a beast, his intellect and civilised soul knew that to do so would be to perpetuate the evil that had surrounded Sasha for Sigmar alone knew how long.
As he had said to Bremen the previous night, evil was a concept that he had, until recently, used without thought to describe the enemies of his nation. The greenskin tribes he had fought as a pikeman had always been described to him as evil, as had the beasts of the forests that preyed upon isolated settlements of the Empire. But were any of these threats truly evil? Or were they simply acting as whatever had created them had intended?
He remembered a similar conversation he had had many years ago with Stefan as the army of Grand Countess Ludmilla camped in the hills the night before the notorious massacre at Owsen's Ford.
'This battle reeks of ambition, nothing good can come of it,' Stefan had said, sipping a mug of hot-brewed tea.
'What do you mean?' asked Kaspar. He had been a young infantryman at the time and looked to the sergeants and officers of the regiment as fonts of all knowledge.
'I mean that the countess may think that she is doing the right thing here,' replied Stefan, 'but then evil often grows from doing good.'
'I don't understand. How can evil come from doing good?'
Stefan smiled grimly and said, 'Let's say a man stands above a child with a spear poised to kill him. What do you do?'
Kaspar's reply had been immediate. 'I would stop him.'
'How?'
'I would kill him.'
'Very well, let us say you kill this man and save the child. The child then grows up to become a tyrant and is responsible for the deaths of thousands. Have you not then caused great evil by doing good?'
'No, I mean, I don't think so. You're saying I should have let the child die? I could not do that.'
'Of course not, because most men have a code of honour that does not allow them to let evil go unopposed. Had you let the child die, part of you would have died too. Your honour would never let you forget that you had allowed an evil act to prosper.'
'But does that not meant that the killing of the child would be an evil act that would result in good?' asked Kaspar.
Stefan had winked. 'Aye, it is a dilemma is it not?'
It had confounded him then and confounded him still. How could any man know the consequences of his actions? What might be seen as the only true and noble course of action might, in hindsight, be the catalyst for some great evil. The future was unknown and unless a man believed in fate there was no way to judge the outcome of his actions.
All a man could do was uphold his own code of honour and oppose evil wherever he saw it and, after the shameful victory at Owsen's Ford, this had been the bedrock of Kaspar's beliefs.
Kaspar was shaken from his thoughts as they rode into the darkness of the copse Valdhaas had spoken of. Here, the knights were forced to slow their advance, walking their horses through the unnatural gloom of the forest for fear that their mounts might plunge a limb into a concealed hole in the forest floor and break a leg.
They made their way through the forest for perhaps another hour, before slivers of light from ahead announced their emergence from the oppressive trees. The daylight was uncomfortably bright after the forest, but Kaspar saw that everyone in the group was glad to be free of the dark evergreens.
As he trotted to the top of a snow-lined ridge, he saw what was left of the valley estates of Boyarin Fjodor Kajetan. Though Valdhaas had told him the hall was in ruins, he had not expected to feel such an air of abandonment.
The blackened stone of the ruined hall filled him with a sense of melancholy. From the little Sofia had been able to tell him, he knew that the young Kajetan had suffered terribly in this place, that great evil had been born here through repeated and systematic abuse.
The tributaries of the Tobol foamed through a crease in the snowy folds of the valley, tumbling down over sprays of shale and granite before meandering across the valley floor to join the lazily flowing main body of the river. As Valdhaas had said, there was a ford at the base of the hill and they rode quickly down into the valley, making good speed across the rolling landscape.
The horses plunged into the icy waters of the ford, whinnying in discomfort as the water reached up their legs to their knees.
Kaspar looked up at the ruined hall, and for a second he thought he saw a shadow of movement. Kajetan? He didn't know.
But for good or ill, their journey was almost over.
III
KAJETAN WATCHED THE knights ford the river through blurry, sleep-deprived eyes. At the head of the knights rode the ambassador and he choked back a sob. He burned with pain and fought to hold himself from slipping into darkness. His endurance, once so prodigious, was at its limit and all that was left was... nothing.
Nothing but the fervent desire to atone for what he knew he had done. His memory of what had happened while the true-self had been uppermost in his soul was still indistinct, like the ragged fragments of a half remembered nightmare, but he remembered enough to know that he must be punished.
He stumbled back towards the open grave, dropping to his knees before the bones he had exhumed. He lifted his mother's skull, still dotted with patches of faded auburn hair, and kissed it goodbye before slinging his bow over his shoulder and gathering up his twin swords.
Sasha Kajetan dug deep for the last reserves of his strength, whispering the Mantra of Inner Power.
Death might be hovering over his shoulder, ready to claim him, but he would spit in its eye one last time before going into the darkness.
Sasha had seen the cold determination in the ambassador's expression as he rode his horse through the river. He drew his swords, knowing that matka had been right.
The ambassador could help him.
IV
THE KNIGHTS PANTHER spread out into a long line as they approached the ruined hall, the wind howling mournfully around its shattered walls and empty windows. Kaspar drew his sword, scanning the high walls and broken rubble for any sign of Kajetan.
He and Bremen rode around the far corner of the ruin and there he was.
The swordsman stood before a dark gouge in the ground, browned bones arranged in the shape of a human body lying beside it. A tattered blue dress had been laid across the bones and a grinning skull topped the macabre ensemble.
Kajetan looked terrible, his hands dripping blood along the length of his swords to the snow, and the bottom half of his baggy white shirt stiffened with dried blood. His face was gaunt and drawn, his hair wild and bedraggled. Gone was the arrogant, confident warrior Kaspar had first seen, and in his place, a haunted, wretched man with the light of madness in his eyes.
But he had his swords drawn and Kaspar had seen enough of his sublime skill to know that even in this forlorn state, Kajetan was not a man to underestimate.
The swordsman looked up as Bremen shouted, 'Knights Panther, to me!'
Kajetan calmly watched as the knights converged on their leader's shout, surrounding him in an impenetrable ring of steel.
'It's over, Sasha,' said Kaspar, walking his horse forward. 'You don't have to die here, you know that?'
'No,' said Kajetan sadly. 'I do, I really do.'
'I know what you went through here, Sasha,' said Kaspar, keeping his tone even and measured. He heard Bremen's horse approach behind him and slowly waved him back.
'Don't think you do, ambassador. You can't. I did... things, terrible things, and now I have to pay price. I am tainted. Tainted with evil, with Chaos.'
Kaspar saw the agonised look in Kajetan's eyes and slowly dismounted from his horse. Rememb
ering his promise to Sofia to try and take Kajetan alive, Kaspar unbuckled his pistol belt and hung it from Magnus's saddle horn.
'Ambassador von Velten,' said Kurt Bremen, urgently. 'What are you doing? Step back.'
'No, Kurt,' said Kaspar. 'Remember what we talked about last night? This is how it has to be.'
'Matka said you could help,' said Kajetan.
'I want to help,' replied Kaspar, lowering his sword.
'I know,' nodded Kajetan with a last look at the skeleton beside the grave. He turned back to Kaspar and said, 'I'm sorry...'
Before Kaspar had a chance to answer, Kajetan leapt forwards, his swords singing through the cold air towards him. Kaspar barely brought his own blade up in time to block the thrust and parried a blow aimed at his stomach from Kajetan's other sword. Instinct took over and he launched his own attack. Kajetan's blades deflected his blows and he took a step back as the Knights Panther closed in.
The two men traded blows, back and forth, for several seconds before Kaspar realised that Kajetan was not trying to kill him. A warrior of Kajetan's skill could have finished him with the first strike of any such contest and as Kaspar thrust his sword towards the swordsman's heart, he realised what it was that Kajetan truly wanted.
Kaspar's world narrowed to encompass only the tip of his sword as it travelled the short distance towards Kajetan's exposed chest. Time slowed and he saw the forlorn look in the swordsman's eyes replaced with one of gratitude.
Unable to halt his blow, Kaspar rolled his wrist and managed to alter the angle of his thrust. His blade descended and plunged into Kajetan's thigh, stabbing through the muscle, fat and bone and sliding effortlessly from the back of his leg.
Kajetan grunted in pain, collapsing as his leg gave out beneath him, tearing the sword from Kaspar's grip. Kaspar stumbled backwards as the Knights Panther closed in and kicked away Kajetan's swords. Kurt Bremen planted his foot on Kajetan's chest and raised his sword to strike the deathblow.
'Kurt, no!' shouted Kaspar.
The knight's sword hovered above the swordsman's neck and Kajetan screamed, 'Do it! I deserve to die! Kill me!'
Kaspar gripped Bremen's arm and said, 'Don't, Kurt. If we kill him like this we only perpetuate the evil that caused this and we will have learnt nothing.'
The knight reluctantly nodded and lowered his blade as other knights moved in to drag Kajetan to his knees and bind his wrists with rope. Valdhaas braced his armoured boot against Kajetan's side and dragged the ambassador's sword free in a wash of blood.
'No, no, no...' wept Kajetan. 'Please... why won't you kill me?'
Kaspar knelt beside the weeping swordsman and said, 'I won't lie to you, Kajetan, you are going to die, though it will be at the end of a hangman's rope, not like this. But I swear to you that I will see that those who made you this way are punished as well.'
Kajetan did not reply, too lost in his own misery, and Kaspar pushed himself to his feet, suddenly drained of energy. As the knights bound the wound in Kajetan's leg, he collected his sword from Valdhaas and gathered up the swordsman's weapons, slinging them across his saddle.
Kurt Bremen joined him and the two men shared a moment of quiet reflection.
'I think I understand now.' said Bremen at last. 'What you were saying around the fire.'
'Yes?'
Bremen nodded. 'Kajetan will die for his crimes, I have no doubt about that, but at least this way, people who hear of what made him such a monster may learn from it.'
'Perhaps.' said Kaspar. 'We can but hope, eh?'
Before Bremen could reply, a shout arose from the edge of the hill.
"Ware cavalry!' bellowed one of the knights, pointing to the far side of the valley. Bremen cursed and ran to gather his warriors as Kaspar rushed to the edge of the hillside.
Across the valley, emerging from the shadowed treeline on the northern slopes of the valley were scores of dark horsemen on snorting steeds.
Kurgans! The northern tribesmen. Warriors of the Dark Gods.
Armoured in black chainmail and lacquered leather plates, their painted bodies and wild coxcombs of hair were bestial and ferocious. They carried a terrible array of broad bladed war-axes and huge two-handed broadswords.
Packs of fanged warhounds, their fur stiffened and matted with blood, snapped and howled around the legs of the stamping horses.
Kaspar ran back to his horse, clambering into the saddle as a Kurgan horseman blew a long, braying note on a curled horn and the warhounds were set loose.
'Knights Panther!' bellowed Bremen. 'We ride!'
V
KASPAR RAKED BACK his spurs and Magnus set off at the gallop down the hillside towards the river. The Knights Panther unholstered their lances from the leather cups and even amid the desperate flight from the ruined hall, Kaspar was struck by their magnificence. Armour blazing silver in the sun, their standard raised high and iron lance tips gleaming, they were the very image of courage and nobility.
The baying warhounds sprinted downhill to intercept the knights before they could make their escape, leaping in great bounds through the snow and closing the gap between them rapidly, with the Kurgan horsemen following. Kaspar saw the dark armoured warriors were splitting into two groups, one following the warhounds, the other riding in a wider circle to cut off their escape should the knights make it past the first group.
Kaspar drew his sword, wrapping the reins around his left wrist as their mad ride carried them closer to the river. The wind whipped past him and he leaned forward into the saddle, bracing his weight on the stirrups and holding his sword in front of him as Bremen had taught him. Valdhaas, the knight with Kajetan tied across his horse's saddle, rode on the flank furthest from the Kurgan horsemen and Kaspar could see how much it chafed him not to be riding with his lance at the ready.
The horses thundered into the ford, glittering spumes of water thrashed into mist by their swift gallop. But it was already too late to escape. Baying for blood, the warhounds were upon them, leaping into the water with their fanged jaws snapping at their prey.
The knights roared and lowered their lances and the first beasts were spitted upon their iron tips. Wood splintered as lances snapped, the water foaming red with the warhounds' blood and the dying animals thrashed in their death throes. Swords flashed and more yelps of pain sounded as warhounds died. Horses whinnied and reared up as more beasts surrounded them, darting forward to snap at their flanks.
A knight was unhorsed as his mount's legs were bitten from under him. He splashed into the river and was immediately set upon by a trio of snarling beasts. All was noise, yelling, howling and confusion as the knights circled in the middle of the river, fighting to drive off the blood-maddened warhounds.
Kaspar wheeled his mount to aid the fallen knight, stabbing with his sword and drawing yelps of pain from the warhounds. He slashed his blade through a hound's back, leaning back into the saddle as another leapt for him.
Its fangs snapped inches away from his thigh, its claws raking bloody furrows in Magnus's side. The horse reared and lashed out with its iron-shod hooves, stoving in the warhound's skull. Kaspar fought to stay in the saddle as the unhorsed knight rose from the water, his left arm hanging uselessly at his side and blood pouring from a deep wound in his shoulder.
The knight nodded his thanks then fell back into the water as a black-fletched arrow punched through his breastplate, the shaft fully as thick as Kaspar's thumb. Kaspar turned his mount as more arrows slashed into the combat. The riders who had followed the warhounds to the ford galloped towards them, shooting powerful recurved bows from the saddle. He saw a hound plucked from the air in mid leap by an arrow meant for a knight and leaned low over his horse's neck. A flurry of arrows slashed through the air, most ringing from the fine dwarf-crafted armour and shields of the knights. Grunts of pain told Kaspar that not every arrow was thus defeated, that some had found homes in the flesh of the knights.
Kurt Bremen hacked his sword through the last warhound's neck and w
heeled his mount to face the oncoming horsemen. With perfect martial discipline, the remaining knights rallied around their leader, the standard of the templars of Sigmar raised high.
Kaspar rode alongside Bremen, breathing hard and streaked with blood.
'Charge!' bellowed the leader of the Knights Panther. 'For Sigmar and the Emperor!'
With their leaders battle cry echoing in their warriors' souls, the knights rode out to meet the Kurgan horsemen. Kaspar felt himself carried along with the knights, caught up in the desperate heroism of Bremen's warriors. More arrows clanged from armour and shields, but Kaspar saw there were fewer than before as the horsemen swapped their bows for long handled flails with barbed iron balls whirling on the ends of chains. As he rode his horse from the river, he realised that these horsemen had made a dangerous mistake.
Sure that the hounds and arrows would defeat their enemies, the Kurgan horsemen had ridden too close to their foe, and were unprepared for the swiftness of the knights' charge.
They desperately readied themselves for the attack, but in a contest of arms between armoured knights and lightly armoured horse archers, there could be only one outcome. The charge of the Knights Panther hit the Kurgans like a hammer blow, lances and swords plucking the ferocious northmen from their saddles in a few heartbeats of brutal, close quarter fighting.
Steel rang on iron and men roared in pain. Kaspar saw a Kurgan punched screaming from his saddle on the end of a knight's lance, scarlet blood spraying from around the shaft. Horses fell and men knocked from their mounts were crushed beneath the stamping hooves of the swirling melee.
Kaspar fired his pistol into the face of a screaming northman, the ball ricocheting within the man's skull and blasting a hole through the side of his helmet. He shoved the smoking weapon through his belt and drew his second pistol as another tattooed warrior charged him, swinging his flail above his head. Kaspar blew out his shoulder with his shot, but the man kept coming, roaring in his feral northern tongue.