Tales of the Old World (111 page)

Long minutes passed and the cries and screams faded away. The men upon the
shore watched as the last of the ship’s lingering lights was extinguished by the
devouring waters and all sign of their victim was lost to their view. Veytman
was the first to turn from the beach, striding toward the bonfire and putting
flame to the torch in his hand.

“The first will be making shore any time,” Veytman said as the other men of
Wulfhafen marched toward the beacon light and ignited their own torches. “Break
into pairs.” The descendant of Wulfaert let a cunning look enter his eyes. “You
all know what must be done.”

Gastoen handed Karel a lit torch, pressing the boy’s fingers tightly about
the firebrand’s grip. “You come along with me and Enghel.”

Gastoen did not wait to see if his son would obey, but nodded to the
grizzled, weather-beaten Enghel and the two men made their way away from the
bonfire, holding their torches high to illuminate the incoming tide and the
sandy beach.

Karel walked several paces behind the two older men, his face pale and
bloodless. He had heard the terrible shouts of discovery echoing from other
searchers, only their blazing torches visible to his sight. He had heard the
terrible screams that followed upon their findings, sometimes preceded by
desperate, babbled pleas for mercy. Karel did his best to shut out the sounds of
the drama’s murderous epilogue, but try as he might, he could not block out the
terrible sounds.

Ahead of him, Karel could see a dark object floating upon the white foam.
Only when it was deposited upon the sand and rolled onto its back did he
recognise the object as being a man. The youth ran towards the body that had
come ashore. The ragged figure was tangled in a mass of weeds. Indeed, had he
not seen the body wash ashore, Karel might never have noticed the object for
what it was. The boy hurried over to the brown mass of vegetation and found
himself staring down at a dishevelled shape that had lately been a man.

Who he was, Karel had no way of knowing. Certainly he was no simple sailor,
given the extravagance and finery of his clothes. There was a foreign look about
him, a darkness of skin that instantly sent Karel’s mind wandering to Tilea and
Estalia, places that were nothing more than exotic fables to the simple people
of Wulfhafen. Karel noticed the man’s slender, patrician fingers, locked in a
death grasp about a soggy, leather-bound book. Karel bent down towards the body
and forced the cold fingers apart, relieving the body of the slender folio.

Karel opened the book, holding it upside down to allow some of the excess
water to drool away. The ink had smeared and run in many places, but there was
still enough that was intact for the boy to be astounded. The slender tome had
been a sketchbook, it appeared, its pages crammed with fantastic drawings of
strange creatures and impossible plants. Karel gasped as he saw a drawing of an
ugly brutish creature with a warty hide and great horns protruding from its
face. He saw weird things that were like bats with the heads and tails of
serpents. Karel found that the last pages of the book were missing altogether,
lost in the violence of the wreck, denying him the pleasure of whatever sights
were depicted upon them. The boy found himself gazing again and again at the
drawings. Where had this ship been to see such things? Had they truly been to
the terrible Chaos Wastes he sometimes heard his father mention in hushed tones?
Or had some other, even more distant shore been the focus of their journey? A
wave of guilt swept over Karel. These men had gone so far, and survived so much,
only to find their doom on the wasted shore of Wulfhafen, victims of a hideous
deception.

The sigh that rose from the mound of weeds caused Karel to nearly leap from
his skin. The youth cried out in fright before he saw what had so alarmed him.
The man he had thought dead was staring at him, his eyes pleading for help, his
slender hand reaching out towards him. Karel bent down towards the man, his hand
reaching downward to meet that grasping for him.

“Stand back, Karel,” Gastoen said, his voice strange and heavy. Both his
father and Enghel were now looming over the survivor from the ship. Karel did as
his father ordered and stepped away from the wounded man.

The youth watched in open-mouthed horror as Enghel crushed the survivor’s arm
with a savage downward swipe of his axe. The man’s arm snapped, hanging limply
at a twisted, unnatural angle. All the same, he struggled to raise it to ward
off the second blow. He did not see Gastoen come upon him from the other side, a
wooden belaying pin in his hands. Gastoen struck the passenger’s head a brutal
blow with the wooden cudgel, sending a rush of blood seeping from the man’s
scalp. Gastoen did not pause to see what effect his first attack had
accomplished, but struck his victim’s head again and again. After what seemed an
eternity, Gastoen and Enghel withdrew from the pathetic, butchered thing that
had once been a man.

Karel was frozen to the spot as his father walked over to him. His father
reached out and took the boat hook from his son. The contact snapped Karel from
his horrified stupor and the boy looked away from his father.

“You are tired,” Gastoen said, laying a hand slick with blood upon his son’s
shoulder. “Hold the torches. Enghel and myself will attend to the body.” The old
fisherman turned to the body of the murdered man, sinking the boat hook beneath
the corpse’s ribcage. Enghel followed Gastoen’s lead, sinking a second hook into
the body’s ribcage. Wheezing from the effort, they began to drag the body back
towards the bonfire. Karel followed after the grim procession, both men’s
torches held in his hands.

The boy’s mind was in turmoil, reeling from the horror and barbarity of what
he had witnessed. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the horrible scene upon
the beach: the murdered man’s eyes staring with terror at his father as Gastoen
sent the belaying pin crashing against his skull. Karel could not believe that
his father was capable of such actions. The same man who had raised him, the
same man who had so tirelessly instructed him in the skills of a fisherman, the
same man who only the day before had jovially joked with him as they retrieved
their lobster pots. How could such a man be capable of doing what he had seen
him do? For most of his life, Karel had known what Wulfhafen’s trade was, but he
had not understood what that trade really was until a few minutes ago. Now, more
than ever, he thought about the virtue of such a trade, and was unable to
reconcile himself to it. How had his father ever been able to embrace so cruel a
vocation?

As they made their way down towards the bonfire, Karel could make out the
figures of men from the village drifting through the feeble light. He could see
them linger before dark objects lying upon the beach, debris from the ship left
stranded when the waters retreated back into the sea. Nearer, he could see
Veytman and several others standing before a pile of barrels, clothing, and
sacks. The men were laughing as Gastoen and Enghel hauled the body towards their
position.

“What have we here?” the firm, authoritarian voice of Veytman made Karel
stand straight, a look of guilt coming upon his face, as though he had been
caught in some mischief. Veytman met the gaze of the men dragging the body. “Ah,
loot,” the hetman of Wulfhafen declared. The hetman walked over as Gastoen and
Enghel withdrew their boathooks from the carcass. Veytman stared at the corpse,
then reached down towards him. The wrecker’s fingers closed around a silver
object dangling from the man’s throat. With a savage yank, Veytman snapped the
pendant’s chain and tore it from the man’s neck.

“My son found him,” Gastoen stated, looking over at his boy, favouring his
son with one of the strange, curious gazes that he sometimes directed upon
Karel.

“Congratulations, boy,” Veytman said. “You have found the best plunder yet.”
Veytman turned the pendant about in his hand, allowing the little light
penetrating the fog to play across its surface. In shape, it was like a crescent
moon, a thin, wisp-like tendril rising from the upward tip of the crescent.
Centred upon the crescent was a sphere or circle, as though Mannslieb had been
impaled upon the waning Morrslieb. Veytman did not know what the symbol might
be, whether it was a talisman of good fortune, a badge of rank or office, or the
charm of some foreign god. It did not matter him; it was made of silver, and
that was enough for the descendent of a pirate.

The night passed slowly, and the morning fog was thick upon the beach. In the
aftermath of the night, most of the men were gathered around the reduced flame
of the bonfire, though a few still prowled the sands, looking for any plunder
that might have escaped their notice the first time. Others were gathering
broken planks and shards of deck or hull that had been cast ashore, intending to
use the wood to bolster the frames of their homes and boathouses. Like the
captain of a pirate vessel, Veytman made no move to aid the beachcombers. He
stood with some of his closest cronies and examined what had already been
collected, principally the salted meats contained within a waterlogged sack and
the golden-hued rum within a slightly battered cask.

“We had best keep this away from Una,” Veytman joked as he tasted the rum. “I
don’t fancy another night listening to Enghel’s wife screaming at invisible
goblins.” The comment brought laughs from all, and Veytman turned his attention
to the salted meats, lifting a weird creature from the bag. Gastoen reached
towards Veytman and took the strange salted carcass from the hetman’s hands.

“Hopefully they were carrying something more useful than this,” Gastoen said,
allowing the weariness to strain his voice. He turned the strange salted carcass
in his hands, holding it by its tail. In size, it was akin to a squirrel, but in
shape it was like a salamander. Altogether, Gastoen doubted if he would trust
the thing’s meat to a dog.

“The rum is good, anyway,” Veytman defended himself. “And they had some very
fine clothing, as well. In fact, Emil found himself a fine set of boots.”

“A wondrous haul,” Gastoen groused.

“There might be more to recover,” Veytman replied, already turning away from
the old man and returning to his conversation with the other men.

The small fire continued to burn, fed by dry wood brought down from the
village. Much of the kindling was wood salvaged from last season’s victims. It
was a cruel jest that the same timber should be employed to consume the first
victims of the new season. The men of Wulfhafen watched as the blaze devoured
all traces of their prey, removing the last vestiges of their crime. It was
rare, but not unknown, for a road warden or witch hunter to pass through the
village and Veytman was taking no chances that the true nature of their
livelihood might be discovered.

“Has everyone come back?” Veytman asked Emil, eager to get to the business of
splitting up the loot.

“All except Claeis and Bernard,” replied the grim faced Emil, obviously
disgusted by the smell of cooking flesh. There were things even a cutthroat
could not get used to.

Veytman rolled his eyes and began to mutter a curse against the laziness of
the men in question when, as if on cue, a horrified scream rang out from the
beach. As one, the men withdrew from the pyre and ran towards the sound. The fog
had still not entirely dispersed from the shore, yet it had thinned enough that
Bernard could be seen, kneeling in the sand, staring at the sea and sobbing
hysterically. Veytman was the first to reach the terrified man.

“Get a hold of yourself,” Veytman snarled, grasping the front of Bernard’s
shirt and shaking him roughly.

“What happened?” Gastoen asked, his voice more calm and even than Veytman’s
savage tone. Bernard turned his face towards the sound of Gastoen’s voice.

“Claeis… Claeis,” was all the man could stutter.

“What about Claeis?” snapped Veytman, pulling Bernard to his feet. “Where is
that idiot brother of yours?” Veytman slapped Bernard with his open hand, trying
to beat sense back into the frightened man.

“Gone!” Bernard shrieked. “A daemon rose from the sea and grabbed Claeis in
its claws! It dragged him screaming into the sea!”

The men of Wulfhafen cast apprehensive looks about them and fear began to
crawl across their faces as they heard Bernard’s frightened tale. Only Veytman
was unperturbed. Far from fear, the hetman broke out into laughter.

“You expect me to believe that?” Veytman buried his fist in Bernard’s belly,
knocking the man to his knees. “A daemon, eh?” A savage kick to Bernard’s face
sent the man sprawling. “You and your brother must have found something very
choice to concoct that ridiculous tale!” Veytman sent another booted kick into
Bernard’s ribs.

“I tell you, we were searching the beach and a huge daemon rose from the fog
and grabbed my brother!” Bernard shrieked. Another brutal kick silenced the man.
The men of Wulfhafen watched as their leader turned away from the unconscious
Bernard, uncertain what to make of the situation.

“Two of you drag this thief to the meeting hall,” Veytman ordered. “And keep
him there,” he snarled as an afterthought. “The rest of you try to find his
idiot brother. I won’t stand for any man trying to cheat this village of what it
has earned!” The gathered men began to break away into small groups to search
for the missing Claeis.

It was with great reluctance that Karel joined his father and Enghel in the
search. Despite Veytman’s contempt for the story Bernard had told, despite the
hetman’s claim that this was nothing but a plan to cheat the people of
Wulfhafen, the boy was not so very sure that something had not in fact risen
from the sea and taken Claeis. More than ever before, Karel understood that
Wulfhafen was an evil place and that perhaps the Darkness had at last reached
out to claim its own.