Dark Obligations: Book One of the Phantom Badgers (29 page)

“I’m grateful for the invitation, of course I’ll attend.”

“Oh, it’s nothing, really, just simple country fare, but my Britta lays as good a table as you’ll find on this part of the river. It’ll be nice to have a new face around the table, and a pretty one at that. Now,” the Mayor grinned at Kroh and Rolf, who had just joined the group as Meyer had left, “You and your friend will find I stood your first two rounds at the Fisher Hawk, so drink deep and tell a few tales for poor henpecked Rudolf.”

“He’s not my...” Starr’s discrete jab cut Kroh off. He scowled at the bland-faced Lanthrell before turning back to Rudolf. “Thanks.”

“Well, then, I’ll leave you to get settled in; should you need anything, you can find me at Sleiger’s Trading Post, the finest store in all Hohenfels.” He winked ponderously. “In fact, the only store. I’ve arranged for the Fisher Hawk to carry a tab for your meals until you’ve made your own arrangements, and should you desire a maid or cook my wife has several suitable candidates available who will do good work for reasonable rates. Let’s see,
Edmund
, come here; this is Edmund Forst, son of our brewer. Edmund, take these gentlepeople to Becker’s old cottage, the one with the green shutters, there’s a good lad. And tell your father I found those steel wedges he was asking about, turns out I’ve a dozen on hand after all. Good day to you three, and well met.”

The cottage was a small structure, old but well-built and spotlessly clean, the three rooms (two bedrooms and a kitchen-dining area) furnished simply with sturdy furniture. There was clean linen on the beds and more in the wardrobes, and an ample supply of unsplit log sections piled under the overhang of the eaves. A neatly-penned map of the town lay on the table next to a box of tallow candles, alongside a discrete bill for the rent of the cottage. Starr chose one bedroom for herself, unpacked, and set off to find the Mayor’s wife in regards to hiring a cook, having given her little detachment the rest of the day off.

Kroh promptly dumped his pack into the room he would share with Rolf and set off to find the Fisher Hawk, trailed by the subdued half-Orc.

Rolf sipped his ale and wistfully eyed the chalked menu on the Fisher Hawk’s common room wall, wishing he could read; Kroh was no help, being able to read only his native language. Sooner or later he would have to ask one of the help, an embarrassing action for the shy Badger, although he knew that
nearly half of the people in the Empire were illiterate. Starr had promised to teach him the secrets of the written word, but so far all she had had time for was to show him sixteen of the thirty letters of the alphabet.

Not much of a drinker, Rolf had given Kroh his second free tankard, hoping that the gesture would win him some small measure of approval from the manic Dwarf, whom Rolf secretly admired to the point of requesting a back-and-breast such as Kroh wore when issued armor at Oramere. Starr had quietly taken
him aside at the cottage and asked him to stick with Kroh and keep him out of trouble, or at least from killing anyone. It was a heavy responsibility to bear on an empty stomach.

The Waybrother scowled into the too-empty depths of his tankard, mentally reviewing his confrontation with Meyer. It rankled him that they had been interrupted, all the more so because it now occurred to him that a watcher could have interpreted his actions as having been in defense of Rolf, thus suggesting a friendship. He hated having to drag the big ox around with him, but Starr had had a quiet word with him back at the cottage, to the effect that he had to keep Rolf close to hand to prevent Meyer from getting the slow-witted half-Orc in trouble. She had also ordered Kroh not to kill Meyer under any conditions othe
r than the purest forms of self-defense, and his Dwarf’s honor thus deprived him of the evening’s planned entertainment.

Draining his mug, he thumped it onto the table and snapped his fingers to catch the attention of a passing serving girl. “Tell your master I need to settle accounts with him, and fill this tankard while you’re abou
t it. What’s the menu for today?”

“Rabbit pie, lamb stew, or fish-and-spud tumble,” the girl, actually a young woman of heavy features whose red hair was straggling from her bun, regarded the Dwarf with little interest.

“A big bowl of the stew, half a loaf of bread, and a block of butter so big. What about you?” The Waybrother jerked his beard towards Rolf.

“The tumble, a big portion, and bread and butter as his.”

The two Badgers had just finished their meal when a short, powerful man carrying three mugs took a chair at their table. “This round’s on me, lads. Claus Becker, landlord of this miserable dive.”

“I’ve spent a lot of time in worse taverns than this,” Kroh shrugged, saluting the tavern keeper with his fresh mug. Indeed, the Fisher Hawk was a sturdy single-story building with a large common room easily able to accommodate thirty drinkers with no problems, even boasting a plank floor instead of the more usual dirt, which was able to soak up the inevitable spilled drink. “I’ve the first month’s rent for our cottage here, if you’ll just initial the bill as paid.” The Dwarf laid the coins in front of Becker.

“Up front and in hard cash, I’ll enjoy doing business with you Badgers,” Becker swept the coins into a leather purse hanging from his wide belt and noted the payment on the bill in a neat hand.

“How is business on this part of the river?” Kroh asked, carefully pocketing the bill.

Becker shrugged, sweeping the room with a glance, automatically checking the customers and servants. “In my grandfather’s day we had Imperial troops spending their pay, and Legion contracts to fill for ale, foodstuffs, and timber, but the troops have moved to the new Ward since then and the Emperor’s gold went with them. With the New Lands to the north of here being wild and Goblin-haunted, empty till just recently, the town damn near died when my father was young. But since then the lure of cheap land and the demands for furs and timber have been bringing things back. We’re on a solid footing here now, cash coming in, products going out, plenty for everyone. ‘Course things aren’t so good that we wouldn’t be happy to hear the Badgers are starting a new holding to the north. Anything to increase river traffic will ultimately draw more money to Hohenfels.”

“What about the local Goblins
?” Rolf asked.

“The Purple Spider
Keiba,
tribal Goblins, claims this whole area as its holdings, from the Old Ward north to the Emperor’s Ward, and from the east bank of the Burgen to the west edge of the Thunderpeaks. They were here long before Men first came to this area, and have been getting ground away a bit at a time over the years ‘till they’re a shadow of their old strength, but they can still put over a thousand warriors in the field if they ever get the notion and the right leader. Our Militia can count on a half-dozen skirmishes with ‘em a year, plus the usual ambushes of trappers, lumber parties, and prospectors. The town’s walls and the threat of Imperial retaliation holds them at bay from outright assaults, at least for the last few years. Now your holdings will take their attention off of us for a while, or at least so we hope, not wishing bad tidings for you and yours, of course.”

“We aren’t worried about Goblins very much,” Rolf scowled; like all mixed—
bloods raised in Human society he hated Orcs and Goblins with a bone-deep passion. “We cleaned out the best part of a
serao
of Cave Goblins last month with only a handful of Badgers, didn’t we, Kroh?”

“Damn true,” the Dwarf slammed his tankard on the table for emphasis. “I killed their commander and captured their unit totem in single combat as well. I
hate
Goblins, killed dozens, I have.”

“It looks as if the only thing you could kill is a bellyful of ale.” Meyer’s voice cut through the common room like a knife as the burly officer strode to their table, mail jingling with each step. “An hour in town and you’re drunk already.”

“Drunk?” Kroh was scandalized. “I won’t be drunk for hours yet.”

“Captain, don’t you have something more suitable to be doing than harassing my patrons, such as looking for the murderer of a better man than you’ll ever be?” Becker had stood up, and though a head shorter faced the Watch officer with an unflinching glare.

“Him find a murderer?” Kroh hooted. “He couldn’t find his butt with both hands and a torch.”

“Be careful in pushing your luck, rock-crawler; I’ll deal with you
and
the murderer in good time,” Meyer snarled, fists knotted.

“I’m not sure you could do that much in a Dwarf’s lifetime, much less yours,” Kroh drawled, causally shoving his chair away from the table and leaning back in it.

Rolf saw what the angry Captain didn’t: that rather than standing to fight, Kroh was now in position to kick with both feet against his opponent’s legs, sending him to the floor where there would be no height advantage. Hopping up to stand between the two, he found himself face-to-face with Meyer, an eventuality he hadn’t considered. He was an inch or so taller than the Human and broader in bone structure, although his years of short rations had left him substantially lighter. Worst of all, the officer chose to interpret his act of peace-keeping as a hostile move.

“You got something to add,
Goblin
?” It was bad enough to be insulted about his ancestry, but to be called a Goblin when his father had been an equally vile but physically superior
Orc
was pushing even the good-natured Badger close to anger.

“I’m not a Goblin,” he managed to keep his voice calm under the mantle of growing irritation and burning embarrassment he felt. “I am of half-Human, half-Orc
blood, and not proud of the last at all. You should leave me and my...comrade alone.”

“I must
insist
that you follow this fellow’s advice,” Becker shut off a snide remark from Kroh, who had abandoned his chair in order to get an unobstructed path to Meyer. “Again, why are you in here rather than searching for Emil’s murderer? Or are you here preparatory to resigning your commission as the head of the Watch?”

The officer flushed angrily and took a half-step back from Rolf to face the tavern-keeper. “Helbrit was killed by bandits, road-thieves, Becker. You know that as well as I.”

“Bandits
,” Kroh sneered, irritated that things kept being interrupted just short of violence. “That’s always the excuse: mysterious bandits, scallywags in the night, the Goblins did it. Too lazy, or too scared, that’s the real reason there’s no action being taken, mark my words.”

Meyer’s flushed face deepened to a rich plum color as he struggled to choke out the words. “It takes more than an axe to solve a murder, you twisted rock-toad.” Catching himself, he turned back to Becker. “If there
was
a murder...”

“I’ve got just the axe to do it!
” Kroh roared back, too caught up in the argument to worry about making sense. “
I’ll
find the murderer and rub your damned
face
in...in... the
doing
of it.” Words and his grasp of the Pradian language failed the Waybrother.

Ultimately it took the combined efforts of Becker, Rolf, and Becker’s two nephews to get Meyer and Kroh out of the Fisher Hawk by separate doors without violence erupting. Rolf led the muttering Dwarf on a
n aimless ramble of the town’s back streets until the Waybrother finally calmed down.

“How are you going to do it
?” The big half-Orc finally asked, hoping that there was some way he could be a part of the process.

“Do what
?” Kroh snapped, some of the irritation flooding back into his face.

“Solve Helbrit’s murder.”

It took Kroh a moment to work out who Helbrit was, and to realize with a sickening lurch of his stomach that in a moment of rash anger (he knew no other sort) he had vowed not only to solve the crime but to report its doing in a public manner. Dwarven pride and a Waybrother’s honor left him no room to squirm out of the matter, despite a singular lack of murder-solving experience. “The usual sort of things,” he muttered, gloom wiping out the hot flush of anger.

“Oh.” Rolf wondered
what the usual sort of actions were when one went about solving a murder. “Can I help? I’ve never seen a murder being solved.”

Kroh caught
the instinctive refusal in time because the tiny voice of common sense that occasionally prevailed over his temper was pointing out that he could use all the help he could get, and that despite being a half-Orc and having spent years trapped in Dwarven ruins, Rolf was still more in tune with Imperial mores and culture than he, a Dwarf, could ever be. “I suppose you could tag along, do the odd chore or two, that sort of thing.”

This was turning out to be the finest day since his rescue: not only was Kroh going to let him help, but they were going to bring a murderer to justice. Rolf marched happily alongside the Dwarf as they made a circuit of the town’s main street. Finally Rolf ventured a questio
n. “What will be your fist move?”

Kroh was ready for that. “We’ll go tell Starr what we’re about, and enlist her aid as well.” The little Threll was quick-witted and cunning; with her assistance there might be a way out of this mess.

Starr, however, was less than encouraging. “I’ve no time for such matters,” she shook her head with great finality. “I understand that your honor requires you to do this, and in truth it would be very good for the Company’s reputation should you bring a killer to justice, but
someone
has to go about our business here in the meantime. I’ve hired a girl to cook our meals and do the cleaning, and now I’m off to look at warehouse space; after that, if there’s time, I need to see about having someone build spacing pallets, establish a contract for the services of a rat-catcher to begin once we have goods stored on the pallets in the warehouse, and many other things.”

The little Threll’s refusal only stiffened Kroh’s resolve; sitting at the kitchen table, he fired up a cigar and studied the twisting smoke while he pondered his predicament. Rolf sat across the table and arranged the candles into various formations and structures while he waited. Finally the Waybrother puffed out a last smoke ring and tossed the soggy stub of the cigar into the banked fireplace. “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?” Rolf slung his axe across his back and pulled on the wool cap he wore when not in armor.

“To the store: I don’t have anything to write on. If you are a murder-solver, you have to ask questions, and it’s always good to write the answers down so you don’t forget them.”

“Ah, I see. I wish I could read and write. I do know half the letters, so far, Pradian ones, anyway.”

“It’s a start,” Kroh conceded, leading the way out the door. Like all Dwarves, he appreciated the importance of literacy. “I s
hould sit in with you and Starr; if I’m going to be speaking Pradian most of the time, I might as well read it, too.”

Sleiger’s Trading Post turned out to be a large, rambling log building near the center of town, housing not only a store but also a wheelwright’s shop. The central portion of the structure was a single large room three times the size of the Fisher Hawk’s common room filled to overflowing with goods for sale. The walls were covered with whitewashed clay which reflected the bright light given off by a half dozen large storm lanterns hung from the rafters, making the store a cheery place, warm even through no fires burned in either of the central brick stoves.

Kroh purchased a simple bound book of blank pages between wood covers, a tin stylus, a bundle of sharpened reed pen points for the stylus, a bottle of ink, and a pound block of fudge, while Rolf bought two pounds of gingersnaps and a dozen sticks of hard candy. Thus equipped, the two murderer-stalkers headed back towards the Fisher Hawk to begin their investigation.

They found Claus Becker in back of the tavern haggling with a farmer over the price of two hundred pounds of turnips; when the sale was completed, the tavern-keeper led them to a private room and sent for a round of ale.

From Becker they learned that
Emil Helbrit had been a good friend of his, a former Imperial Legionnaire who had lost an eye to an Orc’s spear north of the Ward some years back. With his savings and wound-bonus Emil had purchased tinker’s tools and set about that wandering trade, travelling up and down the Burgen river, usually wintering in Hohenfels, where he had made Becker’s acquaintance.

“Emil was a good man and a good friend,” Becker stared off into the middle distance, a sour look on his face. “Not an enemy to his name. He left his savings here with me and dropped off his earnings whenever he came to Hohenfels. And they were adding up, too: Emil was good with his hands, and carried all sorts of
peddler’s goods as well as tinkering, not to mention passing on letters for a small sum, even did a bit of guide work for loggers. Winters he would help out here at the ‘Hawk for his keep and do odd jobs about town for pocket money. He wasn’t a young sprout, nearer forty than thirty, planning to give up the wandering and go partners with me on a couple enterprises here in Hohenfels, do some local tinkering on the side, that sort of thing.” Claus cleared his throat gruffly and took a long draught of ale. “My wife was pushing him and a local widow together, I wouldn’t have been surprised if it hadn’t worked out.”

“Was he carryin
g much money when he was killed?” Kroh asked.

“No, not nearly any, in fact, and he wasn’t the sort you would want to rob in the first place. His goods were carried on his mule, so he was unburdened, and he was always armed with a war hammer, dirk, and spear. He was a veteran of the Legions, a tough hand in a fight, and his wolfhound bitch Effie was as big as a colt and mean as a snake. Meyer can talk of road-thieves all he wants, but no grass-robber would bother with that tough of a target for a peddler’s money and traps.”

“That rings true,” Kroh wiped foam from his mustaches. “When did you last see Emil?”

“The day he died, ten days ago, in fact. He came up the Burgen road, getting here a couple hours past dark, got a meal and some sleep. The next morning he dropped off his money with me, seven Marks in small coins, replenished his supplies from a stock he kept in my cellar, bought food and some odds and ends at the store, and set off on his rounds of the outlying farms. Pretty much business as usual, he seemed his old self, nothing out of place. He left not long past noon, and that evening Wilhelm Lang came into town for supplies and said he had found Emil dead four miles outside of town. Lang said he heard the killers running off as he came around the bend, leaving Emil and Effie dead on the trail. I grabbed up a couple lads and we set off to look, and sure enough, it was Emil all right, stone dead. Not even a drop of blood on his spear or hammer. We loaded him on his mule, which hadn’t gone far, and took him back to town, to Doctor Drewes’ place as a matter of fact, although any fool could see that Emil was gone. I still don’t know why we did that.”

The Waybrother frowned at the wall for a bit. “What sort of supplies did Emil pick up?”

“Repair supplies: wire, solder, rivets, that sort of thing, and sale goods: ribbons, thread, needles, fish hooks, nails, pins, small things that farmers would want or need. Plus food and trail supplies, grain for his mule, the usual.”

“Where does this Lang live?”

“That I don’t know
exactly, but Sleiger would, Lang trades at his store.”

Rolf waited patiently while Kroh, seated on a cane chair in front of the tavern, carefully noted down the facts in his bound book, mumbling to himself and pausing here and there to tap his nose with the butt of the stylus. Finally the Waybrother capped the inkwell, tossed aside the used reed point, and stowed his materials in his belt pouch. “Now what should we do, Kroh?”

“Buy some bread, cheese and a jug of ale, and then go see this Doctor they took Emil’s body to.” Kroh shrugged. “Then we’ll see what we have.”

They found Doctor Martin Drewes in a shed behind his home checking the herbs on his drying racks. The Doctor, a tall, gangly young man not long out of the University, was bemused at his unlikely visitors and their unusual mission, but cooperated willingly. He dug his daily journal out of the battered pack that served as his medical bag and consulted his notes to insure accuracy, a thoughtful frown on his face.

“Of course, Helbrit was beyond any help when they brought him to me, but I made a thorough examination of his corpse in the event that it could provide some indication of the killer’s identity. In Aldenhof, where I studied at the Brinkmorse University of Medicine, the staff regularly performed such examinations to assist the Brotherhood of the Trident in their criminal investigations. I gave the information to Captain Meyer, but it didn’t seem to provide him with much assistance. In any case, the cause of death was strangulation by a cord or thin strap applied from behind. The only other injuries were abrasions to both wrists and a dislocated right shoulder, the wrist-abrasions being similar to rope-burns.” He glanced up at his watchers and clarified. “An abrasion is a raw patch of skin, such as a skinned knee, rope-burn, or similar injury.”

“No cuts or anything to his hand
s, like when you fend off blows?” Kroh rumbled.

“Such injuries we
re called ‘defense wounds’ back at the University, wounds incurred, received, while defending yourself from an attack, but no, only the wrist and neck injuries, and the shoulder. They brought me the dog’s body as well, and I examined it when I had finished with Helbrit. It had been killed by a single thrusting stab to the heart with a long, narrow blade driven straight into the side and then twisted when fully inserted. Death would have been swift for either of them, seconds at most.”

The two digested this for a moment. Finally Rolf, standing with his cap held before him in both hands, and fearful about his ignorance regarding the terms one used when addressing the educated, spoke up. “Sir, was Helbrit clothed? I mean, could he h
ave been sleeping when attacked?”

“No, he was fully dressed, with his dirk still in its scabbard and a hammer of some sort in his belt, the fighting kind, not a tool.
His clothes were clean, he had not been out of town long. The knees and lower legs of his breeches were dirty, as if at some point while he was being strangled he was forced down onto his knees, but otherwise there was no blood or any other stains.”

“Why would someone want to kill Emil Helbrit?” Kroh asked, irritably rubbing his
nose. “Claus Becker said he had no enemies, and peddlers aren't worth robbing.”

“That has perplexed me as well,” the Doctor nodded, missing the confused glances his listeners exchanged. “Emil was a good man, well-liked in the area, fair in his prices and reliable. I myself used him to send medicines and messages to outlying farms on numerous occasions, and he never charged for the service. I disagree with Captain Meyer’s theory that this was trail—
robbers as we’ve not had another robbery or killing before or since this attack. It is a mystery, and I wish you both the best of luck in solving it. Let me know if I can be of further service.”

The two murderer-hunters wandered down to the docks as the noon sun began breaking through the clouds. Sitting on the weathered remains of a flat-bottomed boat, Rolf set out the bread and cheese while Kroh grumbled over his book of notes, recording what they had learned from the Doctor. Finished, the big Badger shaved strips off his block of cheese and idly nibbled then while he watched Kroh write. When the Dwarf finally closed his book and stowed it the half-Orc ventured an observation. “Dwarf letters all look alike.”

“That’s ‘cause there’s only seven, plus numbers,” Kroh tossed off the contents of his shallow earthenware cup and refilled it from the ale jug. “See, when Dwarves first wrote, it was on soft clay tablets, which we would bake hard if we wanted a permanent record; no trees or reeds underground to make paper from, so we wanted to keep things simple. Later on we bought paper and parchment from Men, but things were established by then. Anyway, we’ve seven letters in the alphabet, and four accent marks; by mixing the accents and letters, you end up with twenty-eight letters, which suits the purpose.”

“Is it hard to learn
?”

“Wouldn’t know; it’s the only one I can read.”

The two ate in silence for a while; Kroh traded a chunk of fudge for a double fistful of gingersnaps, and spit chunks of cheese rind at a dirt clod with fair accuracy, impressing Rolf. Finally the Waybrother carefully combed his beard free of crumbs and pulled his book out of his pouch. “Helbrit knew who killed him.”

Rolf was
stunned. “How do you know that?”

“Simple: they could never have surprised him, his dog would hav
e smelled or heard them if they had been lying in ambush. So they met him on the path, he knows them so he isn’t on guard, and lets them walk right up to him. Stab his dog, choke him to death, it’s all over. Although how they killed the dog so neatly is a problem, one clean thrust directly from the side like that, it would have to be half-asleep.”

“Catch-pole,” Rolf nodded shortly. Seeing Kroh’s frown, he explained. “I saw them in the pits, they used ‘em to move the wolves and fighting dogs, it’s a spear shaft with a couple metal rings attached, one at the end,
one midway back. You run a strong, light rope through the loops with a slip-knot noose at the pole’s end. Put the noose over the beast’s neck and jerk it tight, brace the shaft over your shoulder or on your hip, and you can hold the animal in place, force it to the ground, anything.”

Using his tinderbox, Kroh lit the stub of a candle, then used the candle to light a cigar. “Then they used one on Helbrit too, choked him to death from behind. No, first they catch his
arms
with them, one on each wrist, take him to his knees, and strangle him.” The Dwarf shook his head. “Ugly way to die, that.”

“Four killers, at least,” Rolf burst out, having been counting on his fingers. “One to grab the dog, three to kill Emil.”

“True, four at least,” Kroh conceded. “But why would four men who knew Emil want to kill him? And who uses catch-poles to kill people? Damn things would be useless in a real fight.”

“If the rope was kind of wrapped around the pole, and the pole was carved or something, it would look like a walking stick or herdsman’s staff,” Rolf ventured, brow furrowed in thought. “But the only place I’ve seen them was in the pits, and there aren't any
fighting games around here, maybe in Teasau, but nowhere close.”

Flipping to a fresh page, Kroh fitted a clean point into the stylus. “So we know this: there were at least four killers, Emil knew them, or maybe just one, but that one well enough not to be cautious...”