The Serpent Queen Page 7

  ‘Can he see where he’s going?’ Felix hissed.

  ‘We’re used to operating in the darkness,’ Steyr said. ‘You learn how out here, or you die. Each drop of rainwater carries a bit of moonlight, and the rain sounds different when it’s striking a moving body than when it’s striking a tree.’ He fell silent as Pieter rejoined them, soaked through and muddy.

  ‘Something is fighting, isn’t it?’ he whispered. ‘Something tried to eat something else, and it didn’t want to be eaten, maybe?’

  Felix strained to hear. He could hear distant splashes and bellows, and something that might have been a tree falling. ‘Maybe we should move on,’ he said.

  Steyr nodded. ‘Sound thinking,’ he muttered. ‘Time to go.’

  The night wore on as they moved, and the rain finally slackened, after what felt like an eternity of its unceasing rhythm. Felix’s legs throbbed with a dull ache, and his body was slick with rain, sweat and grime. He was exhausted. Steyr and his brothers, in contrast, appeared to be as well rested as they had been when they’d chased off the ghouls.

  They had an unflagging reservoir of energy that Felix envied, even as he cursed it. He wanted to rest for longer than a few minutes, but knew of no way of conveying that need that wouldn’t make him seem weak. And the last thing he wanted to do was appear weak in front of Steyr and the others.

  He didn’t feel the need to impress them, for he barely knew them, though they seemed amiable enough, and he found in Steyr a kindred spirit. No, it was wariness that prevented him from admitting that he’d passed his limit at a gallop some time back. He’d learned to be careful in his years of travel. Men were rarely the face they presented at first meeting. Steyr and his brothers could be from the port, as they claimed, or they could be bandits or pirates, though if they were the latter, he couldn’t understand why they’d bothered to save him.

  Despite these thoughts, Felix couldn’t help but utter a grunt of relief when Pieter, in the lead, paused and held up a hand. Felix was about to ask what such a signal meant when Steyr pressed him back against a tree and leaned close. ‘We’re being followed,’ he muttered.

  ‘By what?’ Felix asked as he gripped Karaghul’s hilt. His head swam with fatigue and his belly clenched in on itself, despite the jerky Steyr had given him earlier. The sun had risen, or as close as it came in these wet lands, some time earlier, and a weak grey light drifted down through the few gaps in the canopy overhead.

  ‘No idea. It could be a war-party of greenskins, or those lizards we saw.’

  ‘Or ghouls,’ Felix spat. Disgust was replaced by a twinge of fear. ‘Or whatever it was we heard, bellowing out in the rain.’

  Steyr grunted and nodded. ‘I doubt that anything would follow us that far, but it could be.’ He smiled. ‘Luckily, we’re not far from home. Look,’ he said, pointing.

  Felix followed the gesture and saw the outline of what must have been palisades, groaning beneath the weight of vegetation. He squinted, trying to make out guards or blockhouses, but saw nothing save the wooden stakes that made up the barrier.

  He wondered why he heard none of the noises he associated with a port; even a backwater like this must be bustling with activity. He blinked sweat out of his eyes and nodded. ‘Should we make a run for it, to draw out whatever it is?’ At Steyr’s look of incomprehension, Felix clarified, ‘If it’s a war-party, whoever you have guarding those walls might want to sound an alarm.’

  ‘Oh, I doubt that,’ Steyr said, peering over his shoulder and into the trees. ‘We’re a quiet community. We’re a live and let live sort of place, no trouble with the neighbours, that sort of thing. Once we get behind the walls, we’ll be fine.’ He slapped Felix on the shoulder. ‘Come on. Let’s go.’

  Felix had no energy left to muster a reply, so he simply nodded again and struggled after them as they moved towards the palisades. As they drew closer, the trees began to thin, and Felix could tell that the area had been swept free by the hands of men, rather than nature. He’d seen similar bald areas in the Drakwald and the Border Princes, places kept free of vegetation and trees in order to provide a killing ground for the men on the walls. But the folk of the Mangrove Port had grown slack in that regard – vines and thick plants now stretched from the distant trees, creating a flimsy covering from the tree line to the walls. Perhaps it was too damp to burn it back, he thought, or perhaps they thought being hidden was a better deterrent than a defensive clearing.

  Felled trees had been shaved flat on top and laid across the root networks and hummocks of damp ground to create an improvised boardwalk system. Some enterprising soul had hammered iron stakes into each tree on either side, and strung a rusty chain around the top of each stake, making a sort of guard-rail.

  The current was stronger here, which was no surprise given how close they were to the coast. From what Gotrek had told him before they’d left Sartosa, the Mangrove Port rested at the mouth of an eddy in one of the rivers that cut through the mangroves, where it pooled and grew deep enough to sail ships. He couldn’t see it, thanks to the palisade, but he could hear the water.

  The port itself sat on a vast hummock that was likely one of the few true patches of dry ground anywhere along this coast. The palisade was smaller than he’d expected, and he guessed that it contained something the size of a fishing village, at most. It wasn’t quite the gateway to the Southlands that he’d been promised, he reflected sourly.

  As they drew closer, he could hear birds squawking and the rustling of leaves and the cracking of branches. Whatever was following them was making almost as much noise as the great lizard the night before.

  He increased his pace. Whatever it was, he didn’t want to meet it in the open. No alarm was raised as they reached the palisade. There was no sound save that coming from the mangroves. He could hear the cry of birds, the hum of insects, and the splash of heavy bodies through the roots as well as the gentle tap-tap of the slowing rain on the canopy overhead. But no voices, no bells, no sounds of movement. There wasn’t even any smoke. Felix was too tired to question it, but it nonetheless nagged at him. It was as if some, small, far-off voice was trying to warn him, but he was too exhausted, too thirsty, too hungry to care. He wanted sleep and food and to rest, just for once, without having to worry about assassins in the eaves or ratmen in the privy. He blinked and forced himself into a stumbling trot so as not to fall behind. The noises continued behind them, and he fancied he heard something bellowing in frustration.

  There was no gate, as such, in the palisade. Instead, a heavy door had been built into the wall where it curved over a chunk of ossified wood and rock, creating a natural incline. The door was as wide as three men, but not tall. It reminded Felix of the blocking board of a kennel, less entrance than handy aperture. Steyr noticed his quizzical expression as they climbed towards the door and said, ‘Gates get attacked, but doors, not as much.’

  Gregory pressed his shoulder to the door and gave a grunt of effort as he pushed it back and slid it aside. As Steyr led Felix through, he saw that there had likely been another door there, some time ago, but that it had been burst from its hinges by some great impact.

  Once inside, he realised why there had been no smoke or sound rising from within the palisade. Just below the edge of the walkways that lined the interior of the wall, someone had attached great swathes of sailcloth and tarpaulin and stretched them drum-tight from the palisades to the ramshackle buildings that stretched towards the water. There weren’t many of the latter, and they were all in various states of disrepair, dripping with mould and rot and opportunistic vegetation. To Felix’s tired eyes, there was just as much swamp inside the palisade as out.

  Nonetheless, there were a number of ships in the natural sandy harbour that the port had grown up around. As with the buildings, however, the ships had a destitute look about them, as if their crews had had better things to do than look after them.

  ‘Home sweet
home,’ Steyr said as he stripped off his quiver of arrows and tossed it aside with his bow. ‘Forgive the state of things. We’ve had so little help, keeping it up.’

  ‘No inclination either,’ Gregory said, setting the door back in place. From the way his muscles strained, Felix knew that the door likely weighed more than he himself could move easily, if at all.

  ‘Does it rain that much here?’ Felix asked, even as he tried to ignore how much the quiet and the state of things disturbed him. Had there been an attack? Had the port fallen to some tropical disease, or had it simply been abandoned en masse?

  ‘No, that’s for the sun, weak as it is,’ Steyr said. ‘It took us several nights, but, it was worth it.’ He smiled at Felix. ‘We’re well protected from all the nasty elements, now, rain or shine.’

  ‘What happened here?’ Felix said. He’d lost sight of Pieter as soon as they’d entered. The youngest brother had seemingly vanished. Gregory hadn’t moved from the door, where he stood, leaning on his khopesh.

  ‘A sickness,’ Steyr said. ‘It was quite a nasty one too, and over all too quickly, unfortunately. A hundred or more souls perished in a single night.’ He clucked his tongue. ‘And now, only we few, we happy few, remain to welcome travellers to this bustling community.’

  ‘Just you three,’ Felix asked, looking around. He could smell something, just beneath the rot. It was a thick, clotted stink, like that of ripe carcass or newly hung man. Steyr’s lips split in a wide grin. For the first time, Felix saw his teeth, and an atavistic shudder rippled through him at the sight. Steyr’s mouth was full of razor slivers, and his smile uncurled, revealing more teeth than Felix thought belonged in a man’s mouth.

  ‘Oh no,’ Steyr said. ‘Not even Gregory could eat that many.’ He tilted his head back and spread his arms, and a thunderous scream burst from his throat. The noise sprang from one building to the next, and the sound of it caught Felix’s spine in a fearsome grip and squeezed it into water. He made to step back, but froze, riveted in place as the cry was answered, not by Gregory or even Pieter, but from within the buildings.

  Pale shapes, clad in rags and outfits from every nationality, spilled from the darkened doorways and windows, and loped towards him. A dozen pairs of red eyes, blazing with wild, inhuman hunger were fixed on him and Felix wished he’d let the ghouls eat him, for that would have been a more merciful fate than what he now faced. Steyr stepped towards him, still grinning. ‘Welcome to the Mangrove Port, Felix Jaeger. Sit. Stay awhile.’ He licked his lips. ‘Stay forever.’

  Chapter 5

  Felix drew Karaghul with a speed born of pure, unadulterated terror and had the tip to Steyr’s throat before the latter could say anything more. Steyr blinked, startled. ‘You’re quite fast, for a breathing man,’ he said genially. ‘You’ll be faster still, I wager, if there’s enough left of you afterwards. Oh, Pieter, be a good lad, would you?’

  Felix jerked forwards as Pieter dropped down atop him, one hand clamping down on his sword arm. Cold fingers squeezed and Felix’s hand spasmed. Karaghul fell from his nerveless fingers and Steyr kicked it aside. He stepped forwards and plucked Felix’s dagger from his belt as well, and spun it before the latter’s eyes. ‘It’s not so bad, after all is said and done. And then, well, you’ll be a member of a new brotherhood. We’re not much to look at, but we’re quite good in a fight. You’ll have to get used to the taste of blood and flesh, but you didn’t have a problem with the jerky, so we’re halfway there, hey?’

  Felix struggled ineffectually in Pieter’s grip. As Steyr’s words sank in, he felt sick. ‘Vampires,’ he said. ‘You’re vampires.’ He’d faced vampires before. Several times, in fact, and he cursed himself for not recognising them for what they were. He could only blame his exhaustion, and the addled state of his wits. He wasn’t tired now, however. Fear had added fire to his blood.

  Steyr leaned forwards and tapped the tip of Felix’s nose with the flat of the dagger. ‘I can tell you were a university lad. Yes, we are. What gave it away? Was it the fangs, perchance?’

  ‘The smell,’ Felix said.

  Steyr made a face. ‘Ah. Yes, well, we can’t help that, believe me. It’s the blood. Spill enough of it and it takes over, like mould. Also, hygiene is the first thing to go with many of the lads.’

  He gestured to the approaching knot of vampires, and Felix saw that they were a far cry from the courtly devils he’d faced before. They were less human looking than the brothers Steyr. They were almost as bestial as the ghouls; they were rampant hunger, given human shape, and he cringed as they drew close. They stank of dark places and bad deaths, and their mouths were full of too-sharp teeth and their fingers were clawed. Before they could reach him, however, Steyr drew his sword and extended it like a barrier between them. ‘Not so fast, lads,’ he said. ‘This one has to last us.’

  ‘They look hungry, don’t they?’ Pieter murmured, nuzzling Felix’s ear in a disturbing fashion. ‘We’re always hungry, aren’t we?’

  ‘Yes, but some of us know better than to inhale the first bit of blood to stumble into our waiting arms,’ Steyr said without looking at his brother. ‘Back off, I said!’ he roared, lunging at the other vampires. He stamped forward, whirling his blade over his head. The vampires shied back, hissing and snarling. Steyr glanced at Felix and smirked apologetically. ‘Forgive their eagerness, but it’s been a few months since our bellies were full. There isn’t much eating in lizards and orcs, though Gregory swears by the latter, greedy pig that he is.’

  ‘Almost as good as Miss Miggins’s rat pies, back in Altdorf,’ Gregory said. He smacked his lips nastily. Steyr grimaced.

  ‘I prefer the real thing, myself, but then I’m a bit of a gourmet, to borrow a Bretonnian term, as my brothers would likely attest,’ he said. ‘Only the finest foreign rats for me back in Altdorf, eh, Pieter?’

  ‘Are there foreign rats? Aren’t all rats, rats?’ Pieter said.

  ‘So speaks a gourmand,’ Steyr said, using the flat of his sword to turn Felix’s head to the side. ‘Do you know what the difference between a gourmet and a gourmand is, neighbour?’

  ‘Quality and quantity,’ Felix said.

  ‘Bravo,’ Steyr said. He licked his lips as he examined Felix’s jugular. ‘I can see that we have years of scintillating conversation ahead of us, Felix. I love my brothers, but Gregory is only conversant in the contents of his stomach, and Pieter is a bit touched. And this lot – well, if I want to know which port has the best whores, they’re my men. But if, say, I’d like to discuss Sierck’s The Tragedy of Oswald, all I’m going to get are blank stares.’ He used the point of his sword to knick Felix’s neck. ‘You know what I mean, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ Felix grunted, wincing. Blood dribbled down his neck. Pieter’s grip tightened, and painfully so. The vampire whimpered. The others moved closer, grunting and muttering. Steyr nodded cheerfully.

  ‘Good, good. Conversation is a more valuable commodity out here than blood.’

  ‘Only to you,’ Gregory said. ‘I’m hungry, Soggy.’

  ‘Don’t call me Soggy, Greedy-guts,’ Steyr snapped. ‘And I told you, we have to make him last. Who knows when the next ship will come by, and be convivial enough to dash itself to flinders within easy reach, eh?’

  He snorted and met Felix’s gaze. ‘The ghoul-tribes get to them first, mostly, or the lizards. We’re too few to do more than scavenge the scraps. But you, neighbour, you’ll last for weeks, if we’re careful. My sister is something of an expert on grave matters, and she has assured me that a single sip of blood every few days is all that is necessary to keep individuals in our condition in fighting trim.’ He sniffed. ‘Of course, some of us lack the self-control… Gregory.’

  ‘I was hungry,’ Gregory said, petulantly.

  ‘A hundred people, in a single bloody night,’ Steyr said, throwing up a hand. He looked at Felix. ‘A hundred, Felix. Can you believe that? Thi
s place could have been a larder for months, years even, but no, and now we’re left with this motley crew to feed as well as ourselves.’ He placed a hand to his chest. ‘The responsibility they have placed upon me is terribly stressful to a man of my humble origins. But the cream rises to the top, they say. I’ve always fancied myself a “von”. Sigmund von Steyr, it has a nice ring to it, eh?’

  A vampire abruptly lunged from the knot of gathered blood-drinkers. Fangs agape and claws extended, he bounded towards Felix, panther-smooth. Steyr, however, was quicker. His blade flashed out, separating the vampire’s head from his shoulders in one quicksilver blow. He whirled with a roar, his face becoming something out of a nightmare. ‘I said no!’ he shrieked. ‘No, no, no!’

  He stooped, grabbed the ankle of the decapitated vampire, and, in a display of inhuman strength, sent the body whirling over the heads of the others. ‘If you can’t wait like civilised men, fight over that,’ he snarled.

  He turned and kicked the head towards Gregory. ‘And you can shut up and eat that.’

  Felix’s stomach churned as Gregory grudgingly scooped up the head and the vampires fell on the thrashing, headless body with eager growls. The head’s eyes bulged and the lips writhed soundlessly, still somehow possessed of some measure of abominable life as Gregory hefted it. He cracked the top of the skull like an egg and upended it, his jaws unhinging like those of a snake. Felix closed his eyes and gave a soft groan of disgust as a loose mush of brain matter plopped into Gregory’s gullet with a sound like a stone dropping into a well. When he opened his eyes, Steyr was looking at him. As he watched, the vampire raised his bloody sword and licked it clean with a thick, leech-like tongue that contorted itself about the blade in an unnatural way. ‘Waste not, want not,’ he said, chuckling.