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Brunner the Bounty Hunter – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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Chapter One

The little, sharp-eyed man scuttled through the grimy, manure-ridden back streets of Miragliano. He wore an ill-tended dark purple tunic above coarse homespun breeches. A slender poniard graced a leather sheath attached to a belt around his emaciated waist. The man did not seem particularly nervous as he passed a band of boisterous mercenary marines on leave from some wealthy merchant vessel berthed in the harbour. The frail-looking man kept his eyes averted from the mercenaries as they lurched their way to the next tavern on this, Miragliano’s most notorious street: the Strada dei Cento Peccati. Taverns, brothels, weirdroot dens, fighting pits and other, even less savoury, places of diversion prospered here. It was said that even the most dour priest of Morr could not walk the breadth of the street without discovering something to make him forget his clerical vows.

This lane of illicit pleasure was the most dangerous in the entire city. Murder was more rampant than venereal disease and alcoholism, and not a night passed without a cart of bodies being removed in the morning, destined for the lime pits outside the city. It was whispered that many more died without their bodies being found, slaughtered in dark rituals or spirited away to the abodes of necromancers. It was also rumoured that some of the taverns and brothels, and especially weirdroot dens, were not above drugging their patrons, the unlucky victims waking up to find themselves in the secret holds of some barque bound for the slave markets of distant Araby – a fate perhaps worse than death.

It was a lawless district, where even the watch did not dare to come during the hours of night. It was just the sort of place where the most wretched and depraved of men would thrive. And it was precisely where Rocha would find the man his master had sent him to look for.

The sound of loud, volatile cursing intruded into his thoughts as a gaudily dressed sailor was flung from the darkened doorway of a beer hall to his left. The man landed noisily in the dung-ridden gutter. He raised a soiled hand and screamed obscenities at the massive figure looming in the door, his high, nasally tones carrying the accent of a Sartosan. The bearded man in a grimy suit of armour glowered at the cursing sailor for a moment, then stalked from the doorway, his steps swift, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides.

The Sartosan started to rise, nervous fear stalking through his anger. Even as he tried to scuttle away, the bearded man was upon him. Rocha heard the sound of a mallet-like fist crashing into the sailor’s face, but he ignored the violent scene, having seen its like too often to be interested in its finale. His gaze drifted away from the brawlers and came to rest upon the wooden sign swinging beside the doorway. Depicted upon it was a dark, massive porcine creature. Crude characters beneath the slavering brute spelled out the name ‘The Black Boar’ in Reikspiel.

Stepping around the huge man raining punches upon the now slack form of the Sartosan sailor, Rocha entered the beer hall. Merchants and ships from all over the Old World came to Miragliano, from Marienburg and the Empire, to Araby and the near mythical elf realm of Ulthuan. And for every breed that came to Miragliano’s cluttered markets and swarming docks, there could be found a drinking hole to match their particular cultural tastes. The Black Boar, Rocha knew, was a beer hall operated by a displaced Reiklander brewer, and catered especially to the needs of men from the Empire – a familiar setting in a foreign land. Rocha was certain that at some point, the man he was looking for would show himself in the beer hall.

Rocha entered the dark building. The ceiling was much higher than might have been expected, for the floor was set well below street level. The cause of this architectural irregularity was clustered about the end of the massive bar. It was a bar that sloped from the chest height of a man, to terminate at just above knee-height at its far end. Numerous dwarfs, their dress ranging from the robes of tradesmen to the armour of mercenaries, were clustered about the short end of the bar, downing overflowing steins of white-capped beer.

The dwarfs were not the only ones who clustered within the tunnel-like hall, seeking a taste more substantial than the thin Tilean wines and Bretonnian ales of other taverns. Rocha could see men from such diverse places as Marienburg, Altdorf and Nuln. A dour group seated about a large round table had the fur caps and drooping moustaches of the far north: Kislevite horsemen, come to sell their martial prowess to the merchants of the south.

The Tilean turned his eyes from the Kislevites and scanned the dark niches cut into the far wall of the beer hall. There were small private tables for those who wanted to see what manner of patron entered the Black Boar without themselves being seen first. The gleam of steel reflected in the dim light cast by the hanging lanterns of the tavern caught Rocha’s eye and he advanced upon one of the darkened niches.

Rocha removed his hat as he approached, wringing it in both hands. It was partially a gesture of nervousness, but also a measure of caution, lest he accidentally make any motion that might be construed as a play for the dagger in his belt.

‘Say your piece,’ a steel voice intoned from the shadows, halting Rocha in his steps.

‘My master, the most esteemed merchantman Ennio Corbucci Volonté…’ Rocha began, bowing slightly to his shadowy accoster.

‘Volonté,’ the shadow scoffed. Rocha could see a head leer from the darkness. It was clothed in steel, a black helm in the rounded sallet style favoured by Imperial militia. Cold eyes stared out from the visor of the helm. A gloved hand raised a small clay cup to the exposed mouth below the edge of the helm. ‘Volonté is a leech and a parasite, who lends money to men who can ill afford to repay what they have borrowed, let alone the extortionate interest.’

The man in the shadows shifted forward still more, exposing a lean, muscular body clothed in a suit of brigandine armour, a heavy-bladed falchion sword strapped to his side, a belt of long knives crossing his chest. ‘That bloodworm has never been one to spend the gold he makes. My price is more than he can stomach. Let him deal with street thugs and unemployed duellists, let him look to the gutter trash he knows so well.’

Rocha smiled fawningly, diplomatically overlooking the slights upon the name and reputation of his master. He bobbed his head in appeasement. ‘It is true, my master has never had cause to engage a – collector – of your calibre. But he now finds himself set upon by a matter not only of errant debitry, but also of familial honour.’

The bounty hunter mulled over the Tilean’s words for a moment, keeping to himself any dubious thoughts about Volonté’s familial honour. He rose from the darkness, striding towards Rocha from the depths of the niche.

‘You have earned my interest,’ Brunner stated, retrieving a small compact crossbow from the bench. ‘Lead on,’ he gestured with a gloved hand towards the steps leading back up to the street. ‘But your master had better have conquered his miserly ways,’ the bounty hunter warned. ‘Men who take me from my vices only to waste my time do not find me agreeable company.’

The room was cold and clammy, almost like the preparation room in a temple of Morr. A lavish portrait of nubile wood nymphs consorting with horned satyrs dominated one wall, its gilded frame tarnished in the gloom, its colours overtaken by mildew and rot. A similar fate seemed destined for the exquisite marble statue of some slender and naked maiden that loomed beside a massive oak table that formed the focal point of the room. Behind it, seated in a high-backed chair, was a great greasy puddle of flesh that might once have resembled a man. He stared at the bounty hunter.

Ennio Corbucci Volonté was one of many money-lenders in Miragliano, but his were the fattest fingers, the greasiest thumbs. His bribes went higher than most men, his retinue of thugs and enforcers more brutal than any. It was said that Volonté would loan a gold crown to anyone, because he would see five returned to him before the month was out. And if he did not, the streets of Miragliano were teeming with beggars who sought to placate the toad-like man, even after his enforcers had reduced them to penury. And, darker rumours averred, the money-lender even had ways to turn a profit from the dead – passing their parts off to alchemists and herbalists for use in the concoction of remedies and elixirs, and selling the refuse to sausage makers who, it was also said, had never laid eyes upon a hog.

The fat man rolled forward in his chair. His maggot-like fingers were fitted with rings, the rolls of fat flesh almost engulfing the bands of gold.

Volonté swept a greasy lock of black hair from his face, staring into the eyes of the bounty hunter with his own swine-like orbs.

‘Bertolucci,’ the fat man wheezed, as if every breath spent away from the plate of roast fowl set before him came at great exertion. ‘I want Bertolucci, bounty killer.’

‘So your minion explained,’ Brunner returned, unfazed by the money-lender’s attempt to affect an air of superiority. His gloved hand casually rested about the pommel of the heavy falchion sword at his side.

‘He has wronged me terribly,’ the money-lender croaked. ‘I lent him a tremendous sum, in good faith, to fund a business venture I wanted to invest in.’ Brunner noted that Volonté was careful not to mention the exact sum, lest he give the bounty hunter any ideas about his own fee. ‘But more than this, he insisted that I allow my daughter, my lovely Giana, my only child…’ The thin, rasping noises issuing from Volonté’s throat resembled belching more than sobbing and were silenced quickly as the money-lender continued to speak. ‘Bertolucci insisted that I make my daughter wed his pig of a son! To seal our pact with blood! As if his were some great and noble house!’

‘Get to the quick of it, fat man,’ Brunner’s icy voice intoned.

‘Ninety in silver,’ the money-lender croaked. ‘Ninety in silver when you bring me Bertolucci’s heart.’ Volonté’s fat fist opened in a clutching, clawing motion. ‘When you place it in my hand.’

‘Ninety it is,’ the bounty hunter said, his voice level and emotionless. ‘But it will be gold, not silver.’ Brunner gestured with his gloved hand. ‘This is a matter of revenge, not restitution, as I understand it. Passion such as that is costly. And besides,’ Brunner said as he turned away from the scowling face of Volonté, ‘she was your only daughter.’

The dingy cellar beneath the tannery stank of rotten cabbage and spoiled fruit. Strips of wet cloth were hung from the beams that supported the floor above, in a desperate attempt to fend off the heat of day. Brunner picked his way through the wet strips of cloth, penetrating the maze-like veils to reach his goal – a shabby wooden cot that crouched like a crippled beast in the far corner of the cellar, where the stench was less and the shadows more. A form stirred upon that cot, and Brunner watched as it reached out to light a stubby candle with a strange device of flint and steel.

‘Ah, Brunner,’ the voice of the figure called out as the light of the candle revealed the bounty hunter’s armoured shape. The form on the cot was revealed as well: an emaciated thing, little more than a bag of bones, withered by age and unnatural disease alike. The face of the man was skull-like, his skin dark with small bony growths like little nubs of teeth embedded in the flesh of cheek and forehead. One hand was a perfectly natural, albeit shrunken and gaunt. The other was a trio of long, worm-like digits, short tentacles that gripped the candle in a loathsome parody of fingers. The bounty hunter strode forward, undisturbed by the sight of the mutant.

‘I need information, Tessari,’ the bounty hunter said, seating himself in a battered wooden chair opposite the cot.

‘No one ever just comes just to visit me,’ the mutant sighed, his watery eyes rolling skyward. ‘They always come because they want something.’

‘Maybe it is because your son charges three pieces of copper to let anyone come down here,’ Brunner replied. Tessari drew himself up as straight as his frame would allow.

‘Hmph! That bastard! I should have brained him when he was a babe in arms!’ The mutant leaned toward the bounty hunter. ‘Do you know that that rascal has started letting children pay their way down here? “See the Beast in the Cellar”, let the urchins have their morbid little eyes gawk at my affliction.’

‘I came here to ask what you knew about Ennio Volonté and Goffredo Bertolucci,’ the bounty hunter snapped. ‘There was a time, before your affliction, when you knew quite a bit about everyone in Miragliano. But perhaps the rot has crawled into your brain as well as your hand.’ Brunner rose from the chair, but Tessari’s human hand beckoned him to sit once more.

‘Not going to grace me with the pleasure of human company and a few kind words?’ the mutant asked, his voice heavy. Noting the lack of compassion on the bounty hunter’s face, the mutant sighed. ‘You always were a ruthless bastard, Brunner. What do you want to know?’ Brunner leaned forward, his helm gleaming in the candlelight.

‘Bertolucci has fled Miragliano,’ the sharp voice of the killer rasped. ‘Where would he have gone?’

‘How can you be certain he has left the city?’ the mutant challenged.

‘Because if he hadn’t, Volonté’s men would have found him by now. Bertolucci, his son, Volonté’s daughter and about twenty of his household have vanished. Almost as if the Chaos gods plucked them from his villa and whisked them away to the Wastes.’

‘Bertolucci does not have much money,’ Tessari mused. ‘After this thing with Volonté, he is almost as badly off as myself. Now where might he go?’ Tessari turned his face to stare into Brunner’s eyes. The palm of his human hand was turned upwards. Brunner placed a pair of silver coins in the mutant’s hand.

‘In better days, many of the wealthy families of Miragliano kept villas in the country, before the beastmen and the orcs drove them back into the stink of the city.’ The mutant laughed, the sound dry and moist at the same time. ‘The Bertoluccis had a villa somewhere to the north of here, a winery as I recall. Perhaps he has decided that the dangers of the city outweigh those of the country. Perhaps he has gone home.’

‘Thank you,’ Brunner said, plucking the coins from Tessari’s hand. The mutant sat bolt upright, snarling at the bounty hunter. His face twisted into something as bestial as his tentacled hand.

‘Don’t worry, I’ll be back,’ Brunner said. ‘You’ll get paid when I return.’

‘Do you actually think Volonté is going to pay you for killing Bertolucci?’ the mutant sneered. ‘Did he tell you why he wants Bertolucci dead?’

Brunner turned back towards the mutant. ‘Something about his daughter and a broken business deal.’

Tessari laughed again, the sound both louder and more liquid-laden than before.

‘Is that what he told you?’ the mutant gasped between cacklings. ‘Volonté’s daughter and Bertolucci’s son had for months been secretly attending one another in the long hours before dawn. They are in love, you see. But that toad Volonté was not about to give away his only daughter without a substantial profit. I think the reptile had thoughts that he might marry her off to some petty lord and thereby ooze his way into the noble classes. Be that as it may, he at last relented, but only on condition that Bertolucci allow Volonté into a business dealing that promised a great reward.

‘Spices. Spices from Araby, Brunner, worth their weight in gold. That was what Volonté wanted. For his consent to the marriage, he was allowed to invest in Bertolucci’s enterprise, though the money-lender forced Bertolucci to squeeze out all of the other investors. The money-hungry maggot could not bear the thought that other men might profit alongside himself. This destroyed Bertolucci’s reputation and made enemies of many that were once his friends. And many of those laughed when news arrived that the ship bearing the spices from Araby was lost – claimed by pirates, storm, or some horror of the deep. You can imagine that Volonté was the most upset of them all. He had lost his investment and the chance to marry his daughter to some great advantage. So now he sends you, the wolfhound, to bring his prey to ground and slake his thirst for retribution.’ The mutant’s eyes glittered in the flickering candlelight, studying the reaction his words had caused.

After a moment, the bounty hunter turned his back to the mutant.

‘I care not for the whys of it,’ Brunner said, stalking away. ‘Only that there is money waiting at the end.’

The countryside beyond Miragliano was rolling, hilly terrain, marked by isolated pockets of humanity, but, more often, vast stretches of uninhabited wildland. Streams and brooks snaked their way along the deep hollows between the hills, encouraging the thick woods that filled each of the valleys. To the north side of the boulder-strewn hills and their forested hollows was a great plain of sandy, level ground. Stands of thin, scraggly trees were scattered in clumps, sometimes only a few dozen, other times a few hundred, forming an irregular forest.

The occasional stretch of level, grassy earth showed where farms had once stood, or, more rarely, where some hardy peasant still fought to wrest a living from the land. A path of brown dirt snaked its way between the trees and rocks, passing each of the farms, deserted or occupied, a relic of the time when there had been peace and safety in the hills of Tilea.

Two travellers made their way along the path, haste warring with caution for mastery over their steeds. One of the travellers was a large man, his powerful body encased in a tunic of hardened leather further toughened by strips of steel riveted to the garment. A rounded helm covered the man’s head, the low cheek-guards fanning outward to join the rounded rim. A long sabre hung from a scabbard at his side and a heavy crossbow was strapped to the saddle of his horse. The man cast wary glances to right and left as they proceeded on their journey, his hard features betraying none of the fear that gripped him. There were things abroad, the soldier knew, things inhuman and unclean.

The other rider was mounted upon a short, shaggy-pelted burro. The little creature kept pace with its larger kin with great effort, its shorter steps causing it to fall behind several lengths before a brief burst of speed would bring it beside the horseman once more. No saddle graced the burro’s back, only a thick blanket of wool. Seated upon that blanket, her legs thrown across the left side of the animal, rode a woman dressed in a hooded robe of pure white. Her face, framed by the fringe of her hood, was not unhandsome, but the stamp of age was creeping into it, the first webwork of wrinkles trickling away from the corners of her eyes.

Elisia had been a priestess in the service of Shallya for most of her life. Her family had been taken from her by plague; a husband and three children lost to an outbreak of the dreaded red pox. Somehow, though she too had become ill, she had recovered, and in her survival had seen the mercy of the goddess. She had devoted her life to Shallya, joining a shrine deep in the countryside, catering to the needs of the poor peasants and farmers who braved the wild to feed the swarming cities. Somewhere, in the long years of healing the sick, tending the wounded and soothing the bereft, Elisia had discovered within herself another woman, a woman far different from the one whose life the red pox had ravaged.

The priestess brought her burro to a halt as the soldier reined in his horse. She looked up at the armed man, a questioning look on her face.

‘What is it, Gramsci?’ she asked. ‘Do you see the villa?’

The soldier kept his armoured head staring down the path even as he replied to the priestess. ‘There is a man on the road ahead.’ He pointed his finger toward a figure, only distantly visible, ahead of them upon the road. The horseman slapped the reins in his hand against his steed’s neck, urging it forward.

‘Stay here, sister,’ he called back as he left, ‘I shall see what he is about.’

Gramsci rode towards the man he had seen, scanning the trees and brush for any sign of lurking banditti. He doubted that any brigands would be so bold as to attack a priestess, but it was not unknown for some follower of Ranald to return the contempt of Shallya’s followers with the edge of a knife.

‘That is close enough,’ a cold voice arrested Gramsci. The soldier came to a halt as the armoured man before him pointed a crossbow in his direction. Gramsci tried to peer at the face of the man, but it was hidden behind the steel mask of his Imperial-style helmet.

‘I mean you no harm, sir,’ Gramsci offered, raising his hands. ‘I am but escorting yon priestess upon an errand. Let us pass and we shall be upon our way.’

The bounty hunter stared at the soldier, then his attention turned away from Gramsci. The soldier stifled an annoyed groan as he heard the clopping steps of the burro draw up beside him.

‘It is true, sir,’ Elisia stated, not at all intimidated or threatened by the crossbow aimed at her. ‘I am a servant of Shallya on a mission of mercy to aid this worthy swordsman’s household. Please, sir, let us pass, for we bear you no threat.’

Brunner lowered the crossbow, striding back to the horses he had left tethered at the side of the road. ‘If your travel takes you north of here,’ the bounty hunter remarked as he returned the crossbow to a scabbard set into the harness of his packhorse, ‘I should advise you to turn back now. Just this afternoon, I was set upon by three beastmen. Their numbers will only grow when the sun fades.’

The bounty hunter’s words brought a gasp of alarm from the priestess, who for the first time noticed the slight limp in the bounty hunter’s gait, the small flecks of crimson staining his leggings. At her side, Gramsci glowered at the armoured killer, suspicion in his eyes.

‘And what became of these beastmen?’ the soldier asked. Brunner favoured him with a cold stare.

‘They will not trouble you,’ he said, ‘but I cannot speak for whatever friends they might have.’

‘What causes you to be abroad in the wilds alone?’ Gramsci persisted, trying to inch his hand towards the sword at his side. The bounty hunter’s eyes locked upon the slight motion. Gramsci scowled and let his hand drift away from the hilt of his blade.

‘My business is my own affair,’ Brunner stated.

Elisia interposed herself between the two men.

‘This fencing with words is pointless,’ she declared. ‘We are yet distant from our destination, are we not, Gramsci?’ The soldier, eyes and scowl still trained on Brunner nodded his head reluctantly.

Elisia turned to face the bounty hunter. ‘What you say about beastmen alarms me greatly, and it seems to me that you are just as far from shelter as we. Please, ride with us and make camp in our company this evening. We shall be safer with a second sword should the fell creatures chance upon us in the night. And I can tend your wound, for I see that you did not emerge from your combat unscathed.’ The priestess’s eyes were bright, pleading and hopeful. Brunner inclined his helmed head.

‘I shall join you, at least for the present,’ he said, striding back towards his animals.

‘And what are you named?’ Gramsci called at the bounty hunter, his voice betraying his belligerence and suspicion. The bounty hunter halted, one hand upon the horn of his saddle.

‘I am named Habermas,’ the bounty hunter said, raising himself into the saddle.

‘Then be warned, Habermas,’ the Tilean soldier continued. ‘Do not think to take advantage of us.’

Brunner turned the head of his steed, facing the Tileans once more. ‘If I did,’ the bounty hunter’s voice was as frigid as a Norse breeze, ‘you would not stop me.’

Brunner sat beside the fallen rubble of a chimney, all that remained of a long-departed farmstead. He let his gaze pass warily from the dark shadows beyond the light of the fire the priestess and her companion had started. He locked eyes with the scowling Gramsci, then let his stare linger on the tired, frightened features of the priestess. He let his hand rest for a moment on the compress the woman had pressed against the injury in his leg. Elisia did good work, the bounty hunter had to admit as he flexed his knee, noting only the faintest trace of pain. It was just as well for her that he had discovered them. And just as well for him, if their destination was the one that he suspected.

‘Still annoyed by my fire, Habermas?’ Gramsci snorted from his place beside the fire pit.

‘I have already told you that it is unwise,’ the cold voice beneath the steel helm responded.

The Tilean soldier favoured the other warrior with a friendless smile, heedless of the fact that the man was not looking at him. ‘A good fire will keep any animal away. They fear flame. Anyone knows that.’

‘Your knowledge of woodcraft is quite good for a city dweller,’ Brunner stated. He focused his attention on a patch of shadow. His keen ears could not be certain, but had there been the whisper of a sound from there? The bounty hunter fingered one of his knives.

‘Is it possible that the question of the fire could be put to rest?’ asked Elisia, her patient temperament worn away by the long verbal skirmish.

‘This fool thinks the fire will drive away the haunters of the night,’ the bounty hunter said, almost under his breath, his eyes still focused on the shadow. ‘Beastmen are not so craven as wolves or wild cats. Far from keeping them away, your fire is attracting them. It is like a beacon letting them know that there is food to be had here.’

The priestess stifled a gasp as she heard Brunner’s words, so firm and sure was his tone. Gramsci just scowled anew, tossing another branch into the blaze.

‘If that is so,’ the Tilean said, ‘then where are they?’

In that instant, the darkness exploded into life as howls, bleats and whinnies sounded from the shadows surrounding the camp. The noise of hooves, feet and claws crashing through the underbrush told of the swift and hurried advance of many large bodies. A thin, whiny and inhuman voice shrieked above the clamour. ‘Skulls for the Skull Throne! Blood for the Blood God!’

The first beastman broke from the patch of midnight. A wiry brute with a mangy pelt of tawny fur, its face like a housecat, save for the glittering, multi-faceted eyes that gleamed in the dancing light of the campfire like two diamonds. A massive stone-headed axe was gripped in its long-fingered, clawless hands, a ghastly skull rune worked into the crude edge of the blade. The creature let a snarl, like the drone of a wasp, emerge from its fanged mouth as it sprang into the clearing. A moment later, the axe fell from slackened hands and the droning challenge faded into a bubbling gurgle as Brunner’s throwing knife sank into the fiend’s throat.

But even as the cat-beast died, its fellows swarmed into the camp: things with goat-like heads, others with dog faces, and still others sporting a twisted, almost human form. Brunner did not hesitate. He fell back toward his horses, sending another throwing knife whirling into the Chaos throng. The blade embedded itself in the long snout of a slavering hound-headed creature. The beastman dropped its swords to tear at the steel that had bitten into its face. A towering brute turned a goat-like face in the direction of the bounty hunter as it heard its fellow cry out in pain. The monster roared, pushing its companions aside to charge towards the knife thrower.

Gramsci rose from beside the fire, sword in his hand. A small beastman, its form more human than many of its fellows, its lope more steady and regular, fell upon the Tilean, smashing at him with a bone club. Gramsci’s blade slashed through the crude weapon, and bit through the forearm behind the cudgel. The beastman wailed in pain as gore slopped from the stump of its arm, a look of agony frozen on its features as a quick thrust of Gramsci’s blade pierced the monster’s heart.

But the soldier did not have time to savour the beastman’s death, for already more of its fellows had surrounded him, jabbing at him with spears, gesturing at him with rusted swords and stone axes. Fanged mouths drooled froth and spittle as the creatures of Chaos promised the soldier a bloody death in their inhuman voices.

Elisia fled from the fire and ran towards Brunner, instinctively hurrying to the side of the more capable of her two defenders. As she did so, one of the beastmen, a smaller version of the goat-headed horror that led the throng, capered after her, snarling and snapping at her heels. The monster swung a heavy wooden club at the woman, missed, and raised its paw to try again. A cry of pain arrested its attack, and the brute rolled against the ground, clawing at the small crossbow bolt that had smashed into his breast. Elisia, with a last burst of speed, reached the bounty hunter, as he lowered the small crossbow pistol he had fired into the inhuman attacker.

‘I had meant that for him,’ Brunner gestured with the point of his sword at the huge goat-headed thing that was now so near that the stink of its lice-ridden fur brought tears to the priestess’s eyes. The bounty hunter handed the pistol to Elisia, pushing her behind him. The beastman’s yellow eyes narrowed as it watched its foe, its fanged mouth twisting in a parody of a smile.

‘Blood for the Blood God,’ it hissed, its voice low and rumbling. The monster stepped forward, the lengths of chainmail dripping from the crude hide armour that encased its twisted form swaying and clattering with its every step. A mask, daubed with the skull rune of Khorne clothed the monster’s face. Small lengths of chain had been driven into the brute’s horns, and from the end of each dripped a fresh human scalp. The monster slapped the massive axe into the palm of its left hand. No thing of wood and stone, but a weapon of bronze, haft and head, and it seemed to call out for blood.

Brunner gestured at the beast with his sword, a motion that he was certain this debased thing would interpret as challenge. The beastman showed the rows of fangs, wicked and sharp, gleaming in its muzzle. One of the smaller creatures that had gathered about their leader shrieked and leapt forward, a rusted sword in its hands. The hulking leader split its minion in half with a sweep of its axe, the bloodied debris thrown across the clearing. The meaning was clear: none but the goat-headed chieftain would be allowed to offer this skull before their gory god.

The beastman loped forward, its hooves punching into the ground with every step. Brunner stood defiant, his sword in a guarding position, his left hand held immobile at his side.

Brunner smiled up at the hulking brute. The chieftain raised its bronze axe, gripping it with both hands. With a last snarl it leapt forward. Brunner’s left hand rose in tandem with the brute’s attack.

A white cloud engulfed the masked face of the beastman as it charged. The bounty hunter had quietly worked the packet of salt kept in the sleeve of his tunic into his palm, puncturing the little pouch of sackcloth with his fingernail. Now the mineral did its work, stinging and biting into the Chaos monster’s eyes. Brunner lashed out with his sword, taking advantage of his enemy’s blindness and surprise. The sword stabbed at the monster’s belly, but the bounty hunter’s strike was deflected by the crude armour of hide and steel – upon which had been carved all manner of strange and loathsome runes. Instead of opening up the monster’s belly, Brunner’s falchion gored a patch of the monster’s thigh. The beastman let a howl of pain, terrifying like a human scream, rise from its throat before toppling backward. Its brutish followers stood in a stunned silence.

‘Come on!’ Brunner snapped, spinning and racing toward his horses, dragging the stunned priestess with him. ‘They won’t be confused for long, and they will be twice as enraged when they recover!’ Brunner slashed the tether of his steed with the edge of his sword, spinning and doing the same for his packhorse. He scrambled into the saddle, pulling Elisia up behind him. The woman pulled at his arm, trying to direct him back toward the fire, back into the camp. He spared a look to where the Tileans’ animals had been tied, seeing the swarm of beastmen upon them. His gaze canvassed the clearing, noting Gramsci holding off the press of monsters, though he was cut in both leg and arm, and his blade was not as quick in warding away adversaries as it had been.

‘Do you know the way he was taking you?’ Brunner asked.

‘Y–yes,’ Elisia muttered, her gaze wavering between Brunner, the beastmen and her embattled bodyguard.

‘Good,’ the bounty hunter said as he saw a beastman’s spear puncture Gramsci’s side. ‘Because your guide is dead.’ Brunner turned and quickly brought the horse to full gallop, dragging his packhorse behind them as they raced through the midnight wilds.

Behind them, a monstrous shape rose, snarling beneath its mask of flayed skin. The beastman chieftain watched as its chosen offering to Khorne escaped into the night. Infuriated, the monster reached out, snapping the neck of one of its fellows that had come closer to examine its master’s wound. As the creature died, and the blood bubbled from its mouth, the wound in the beastman’s thigh stopped bleeding. The masked brute turned its head, gazing at the still gaping wound. No, it thought, the wound shall remain until it is salved by the blood of a proper offering. The chieftain turned its head in the direction of the vanished bounty hunter. Its sharp bark of wrath and command brought the other brutes loping away from the gory, butchered bodies.

The hulking monster pointed its axe into the night, in the direction its prey had retreated.

‘Blood for the Blood God!’

The villa crouched on the summit of a lonely round-topped hill. The overgrown ruin of the vinefields that had surrounded the estate formed a buffer zone between hill and forest, a few scraggly, thin trees ignoring the boundary and providing patches of shadow upon the grassy expanse. The crumbling remains of a wall appeared beside the dirt path that had once been a road, a narrow strip of dirt wending its way from the rotten wooden gate through the overgrown fields to the hill at their centre.

It had taken Brunner and his guide the better part of two days to reach this place, and once again the dark cloak of night was falling upon the land. They had ridden long and hard, with the bounty hunter pausing only long enough to give the animals such rest as they might require to keep up the pace. And even those brief stops had been forsaken since the afternoon, when Brunner had sighted the first of their pursuers. The beastman had loped off before the bounty hunter could get a shot at it. Not long after, the sound of many bodies crashing through the brush to either side of the path had lent speed to the horses’ efforts. The beastmen were masters of the wild, and where the path turned and twisted like some serpentine river, the Chaos creatures could travel through the undergrowth and hidden trails known only to these children of the wild.

Many times, Brunner had heard hooting and snarling, and was certain that an ambush was about to be sprung. But the anticipated attack never came. Recalling the hulking chieftain’s casual slaughter of its overeager follower, the bounty hunter could guess the reason for the reluctance of the monsters to attack.

Now, as they at last reached the villa, the sounds of pursuit had grown louder, and Brunner guessed that the entire pack had caught up with them now – even the brute he had crippled during their brief encounter. The sanctuary of the ruined Bertolucci villa had come none too soon. Brunner whipped his steed into a final effort, the packhorse obediently following after the leading horse.

The villa had been opulent and splendid in its day. A two-storey structure, the upper floors had been devoted to bedchambers, music rooms, dining halls and the every pleasure of its noble owners, while the larger lower floor had served as quarters for servants, as stables and kennels, kitchens and storerooms. The villa’s walls were still intact, but its wooden shutters and doors had long ago collapsed into rotten ruin. As Brunner rode up, he could see swarthy Tilean faces peering out at him from every opening. But a loud cry from the woods forced the attention of the watching men away from the bounty hunter and his companion for a moment – all eyes were trained upon the treeline. Brunner rode his horse through the gaping maw of the old main entrance, whose double doors rotted on the floor just inside the portal. He lowered Elisia from the saddle, then dismounted after her and led the horses to where ten other steeds were tethered.

‘Praise be to Shallya!’, a voice cried out. A young man, wearing a suit of well-tailored clothes and a leather jupon studded with steel raced from one of the four doorways leading into the entrance hall. He was fair-featured, his black hair short, after the style favoured by the merchant princes themselves. He had the air of a man used to quality in his life, but as Brunner’s gaze took in the newcomer’s appearance, he noted the calluses upon his hands, the worn spots in the knees of his breeches, the abrasions on his boots. Here may be a man of quality, but he had not shirked from his part in labour, now that things were not so prosperous as before.

The young man strode towards the priestess. ‘I feared that you would never come! My wife is very near her time, please hurry!’ Then, as if noticing Brunner for the first time, the young man froze. ‘Who are you? And where is Gramsci?’

‘Questions which I was about to ask,’ a second voice spoke from another doorway. The speaker was an older man, but shared the facial qualities of the younger. He was dressed like the other, his fine clothing perhaps not quite so well worn. His aged hands had been hardened by a life in which pleasure and comfort had been all too infrequent.

‘His name is Habermas,’ the priestess said. ‘Your man and I met him on the road as we journeyed here. We were set upon by beastmen.’ A sad look crossed Elisia’s face and she bowed her hooded head in the direction of the older man. ‘I fear that the monsters killed Gramsci. We barely escaped with our lives.’

‘We have not escaped yet,’ the bounty hunter’s cold voice sounded for the first time. He turned his helmeted head towards the elder man. ‘The monsters that set upon us have followed us here.’ The news brought startled and fearful expressions to both men’s faces. ‘Even now they surround this ruin.’

The older man quickly recovered himself. ‘Alberto,’ he snapped, ‘lead the priestess to Giana, then find me! I’ll get the men together.’ He turned toward the bounty hunter. ‘I am no soldier, sir,’ he addressed Brunner. ‘The house of Bertolucci has seldom produced military men. If you have any notion of how best we might defend this place, I would like to hear it.’

Seven bodyguards had remained loyal to Bertolucci after his fall from grace, and one of these had been Gramsci. That left only eight men apart from Brunner himself to hold the ruined villa. The bounty hunter snapped his orders as quickly as he could. Below, in the woods, the grunting and lowing of the monsters reached the villa’s occupants, indicating that others were making their plans as well.

It was decided that those armed with crossbows would be positioned in the upper floor, descending when the brutes crossed the clear ground surrounding the hill. This accounted for five men. The remaining men, including Bertolucci and his son, were to stand with Brunner. They would guard two chambers: the larger entry hall where the horses were tethered, and the small parlour that abutted it and gave entry to the stairs leading to the upper floor. It was where the non-combatant servants and Alberto’s expectant wife had retreated.

Hasty barricades were thrown across the windows and doorways, leaving only narrow places from which the defenders could peer out and Brunner could fire his own crossbows. It was a ramshackle defence, but it was the best Brunner could manage. Two things favoured their chances: the fact that most beastmen were too simple to manage even the most rude missile weapon, and the fact that the notion of burning the villa down about their ears would likewise not occur to them. The brilliant blue-silver light cast by a full and engorged Mannsleib did much to favour the defenders; it made the grounds of the villa almost as visible as under the noonday sun. Only beneath the surrounding trees were the shadows still long and the grip of darkness tight.

No sooner had the preparations been made, and the Tileans sent to their posts, than the beasts began their attack. Brunner watched as a number of the brutes loped from the edge of the trees, a lanky thing with a snake’s head squirming from its shoulders bearing a standard of flayed skin. Brunner raised a clumsy-looking contraption of wood and steel. He aimed the tube-like barrel at the creature. The weapon sparked and a loud crack of thunder sounded with the brilliant flash of its discharge.

The standard bearer howled and fell, crushing its flag beneath its bleeding body. The other beastmen gave bleats of fright and capered back into the woods.

‘That should give them pause,’ the bounty hunter said. ‘Though I don’t think that leader of theirs will let them hide for long.’ As if in response, ten brutes stole from the trees once more. The bounty hunter watched as several of them cried out, dropping as crossbow bolts pierced their flesh. The wounded hastened back into the trees, leaving the dead ones lying in the field. The scene was repeated on each side of the villa, and soldiers shouted down news of the monsters’ advance and retreat in the face of each volley.

‘What are they doing?’ Alberto asked the bounty hunter, unable to find a reason for the beastmen’s tactics.

‘Testing us,’ replied Brunner. ‘They are trying to see what kind of defence we have, how many archers. Where we are strongest and where we are weakest.’

‘But their probing has cost them ten of their number,’ marvelled the elder Bertolucci.

‘No doubt they can spare twice as many,’ Brunner responded, watching the trees. ‘I had the ill fortune to face the thing that leads these animals, a worshipper of the Blood God. Like its god, it cares not whose blood it sheds.’

A loud cry of savagery rose from the darkness, and the beating of drums rolled from the woods. Horns sounded, their moans low and warped. Shouts both near-human and unhuman roared into the night sky. At the edges of the trees, shapes appeared.

‘Looks like our friends are done playing strategist,’ Brunner remarked, raising his crossbow. Then the frenzied, inhuman mob burst from the shadows.

The battle was short, but fierce. Ten more beastmen were wounded or slain by crossbow bolts before they could reach the hill. Brunner had added his own fire to that of the Bertolucci soldiers. As the monsters reached the ruin, Brunner gave the first one to try and batter down the barricade in front of the wide entry a blast from his handgun. The monster shrieked and toppled backwards, its chest a mass of chewed meat. Others were quick to follow it. A second beast perished, its body draped across the barricade as Brunner’s crossbow pistol sent a bolt slamming into its eye. Then he drew his sword and joined the other defenders.

Four of the bodyguards had descended, two of them joining Bertolucci and their other comrade in the far room to protect the stairs. The others joined Alberto and the bounty hunter in the makeshift stable. The horses whinnied in fear as the stench of blood and the mangy pelts of the beastmen reached them. One of the soldiers broke away to try and quiet the animals that were straining at their tethers.

‘Leave them to their fear,’ Brunner called to the man. ‘If you want to help, help us drive this scum away.’

Despite the best efforts of the men, the barricades were not holding. Great holes had been chopped and clawed into the wooden debris, and at each opening a slavering monster snarled. One hound-like thing with a spider-like assemblage of legs and a single clawed hand erupting from its belly leaped through an opening. It capered wildly about in the room, and snapped at the men with its claw before a blow from Alberto’s sword sent the deformed limb sailing away from its body. A stroke from the nearest bodyguard’s blade detached the snapping dog-head from its body. The thing’s abnormal corpse sagged, as a bubble of blood oozed from the stump of its neck.

One of the soldiers cried out. Brunner looked round to see the man’s torso fly away from his legs, and land in a bloody smear against the far wall of the chamber. A massive shape smashed its way through the barricade, its goat-like head craning from side to side, scanning the room for its prey. The monster now wore the severed head of Gramsci about its neck, a length of the man’s intestines tying the trophy to the monster’s neck.

The sight of the gruesome ornament caused Alberto and the remaining bodyguard to fall back in fear. Brunner met the monster’s gaze, his icy stare unflinching before the yellow orbs peering from the beastman’s mask. As the two locked eyes, the sounds of battle died away. The other beastmen fell back, their eyes gleaming in expectation and fear. Each howled for blood, but none of the beastmen wanted that blood to be their own.

The chieftain gestured with its gory bronze axe, a crude parody of Brunner’s own challenge. The bounty hunter raised his sword and closed upon the beast. He circled the monster, as it circled him, its steps uneven as it favoured its uninjured leg. Then it roared and attacked. The axe swung down in a gleaming arc of death – only Brunner’s quick reaction saved him from a blow that would have split him down the middle. Sparks flew as the axe bit into the tile floor.

The beastman recovered as Brunner lashed out at it, catching the killer’s strike on the haft of its great bronze axe. The beastman spat bloody phlegm into Brunner’s face, the gory drool trickling down the side of the bounty hunter’s helm. Brunner replied by kicking a steel-toed boot at the monster’s injured leg. The beast staggered, roaring in anger and pain. Brunner darted in once more, but the monster proved quicker than its great bulk would suggest, and the axe was slashing towards Brunner even as he began to move. The bronze blade scraped across the gromril breastplate, digging a deep scratch in the hard metal.

The bounty hunter arrested his charge; the beastman regained its feet.

Brunner glared at the monster, taunting it with his sword. The beastman snarled back and tensed itself, preparing for some brutal effort. Then it noticed Brunner’s left hand, lying slack and immobile at his side. A flash of warning widened the monster’s eyes and it raised both its hands to ward off the coming attack as Brunner thrust his left arm forward. This time, however, no cloud of salt enveloped the creature’s face. Instead, Brunner slashed the creature’s good leg, cutting through its knee with the blade held in his right hand.

The Chaos abomination screamed as it staggered from the maiming blow. It lashed out at Brunner once more, but the weight of the bronze axe overbalanced the crippled thing and it fell. The bounty hunter was quick to pounce upon his fallen adversary, slashing its right arm with his sword as his left hand stabbed a dagger across the brute’s face. Thick blood streamed from the ruptured eye, and the beastman’s body twitched in spasms of agony. The Tileans watched in horror as it strove to rise again. But its right arm was nearly severed, and the terrible bronze axe slipped from its slackened grasp.

As the axe clattered to the floor, Brunner darted in once more, stabbing his blade into the monster’s throat, above the gruesome necklace it had crafted. The beastman’s head sagged forward as the bounty hunter withdrew the blade, and it crumpled to the floor like a wilting flower.

The mutant throng at the barricade watched in silence as their champion died. Then a few loped into the room, their clawed hands empty. Brunner and the Tileans watched warily as the creatures converged on the body of their leader. Gripping the carcass under the arms and by the legs, two brutes carried it back through the doorway. A third beastman, its face almost human but for the horns sprouting along the bridge of its nose, grabbed the bronze axe with its clawed arms and followed its comrades.

Slowly, the brutish throng retreated. When the horses at last grew quiet, the men knew that the last of their foes had truly gone.

Brunner made his way to the barricade and peered down on the moonlit clearing below.

‘I truly hate working for free,’ the bounty hunter muttered to himself.

Brunner watched as the silent beastmen bore the corpse of their champion into the gloom of the trees. He looked over at the younger Bertolucci leaning against the doorway. The young man’s face was smeared with dirt and dried bestial blood, his clothing ragged and torn, his leather tunic sporting a gash that had nearly penetrated the skin beneath.

‘Think they will come again?’ the merchant asked. ‘Slink back into the woods and rally?’

Brunner shook his head. ‘No,’ he replied. ‘They take their hero away for their own profane rites, which is more important to them than the prospect of man-flesh for their bellies. They will take that monster that led them and tonight, when the rot has had a chance to set in that creature’s carcass, they will take their fangs and their knives to him.’ Brunner saw Alberto recoil in horror, his face blanching at the image. ‘They think that if they consume the meat of a champion like that, they will absorb his strength. There will be a great falling out as they try to determine who will partake in the feast. By this time tomorrow, that rabble will have scattered, none of them in the same pack.’

The sound of rustling cloth brought both men away from the view afforded by the doorway. Elisia stepped from the room beyond and moved toward Alberto. The youth hastened to the priestess’s side.

‘My father?’ he asked, his voice heavy with concern. The priestess shook her head, smiling.

‘No, your son,’ she replied. It took a moment for the import of her words to sink in, then a light of joy and understanding gleamed in Alberto’s face. He grabbed the priestess’s arms.

‘My son? When? How?’

‘Yes, a boy, as healthy and wonderful as any I have seen,’ Elisia responded. ‘He arrived during the night.’ A dour look came upon her. ‘Battle or no, he had decided this was his time.’ A smug smile replaced her dour look. ‘As to the how of it, perhaps you might ask your wife about that, if you have forgotten. She is with your son in the far room.’

With hardly another look at either Brunner or Elisia, Alberto hurried from the chamber.

The priestess watched him go, recalling for an instant the many hundreds of times she had seen men, great or poor, react in the same manner when she bore such tidings.

‘And what of the elder Bertolucci?’ the cold voice of the bounty hunter intruded. Elisia turned and stared into the emotionless face beneath the mask of steel.

‘He is down in the kitchen, warming some porridge. He was injured, but his wound is not serious, and I have taken precautions so that infection should not set in,’ she answered. A sudden questioning look entered her eyes. ‘You have not troubled yourself about anyone else in the brief time since I have met you. Even when you rescued me from the beastmen, it seemed more for your own convenience than any concern for me. Why does Bertolucci interest you so?’

The bounty hunter made no reply, leaving the priestess’s question unanswered as he strode into the inner chambers of the ruined villa.

The old kitchen was a shambles. Its tiled floor was cracked and broken, and grass peeped from between broken squares. Dead, ragged brambles were strewn in the corners where Bertolucci and his men had cast them hurriedly away. From dozens of places, sunlight shone down into the chamber, bringing light into the shadowy ruin, but also the chill of the dawn dew.

In the old hearth, a small fire smouldered, heating a large black cauldron. It was an original implement of the villa, a relic of the old days that neither time, nor weather, nor looter had touched. And it had served the exiled merchant well; he boiled a mash of grain and vegetable into something that might feed his retinue after their long, hard night of battle. But Bertolucci was not so altruistic as to think only of his men. He sat before a cracked, leaning wooden table, on an even more feeble bench, and noisily slopped the contents of the wooden bowl with a jagged piece of brown bread.

The sound of armour caused the merchant to look up from his meal. His eyes focused upon those of the man who had entered the kitchen.

Bertolucci stared into the helmed visage of the stranger who had arrived with the priestess. A premonition of dread froze him for a moment, but he soon recovered, reaching forward and ladling some of the porridge into a second bowl.

‘I hope that you do not mind,’ the merchant apologised, ‘but I felt I should do something useful if I could not be at the wall. And, since I did make it...’ Bertolucci finished his statement by biting down on the dripping bread.

Brunner stepped towards the table.

‘I’ll eat later,’ the bounty hunter said, the eyes behind the visor of his helm burning into Bertolucci’s. The merchant finished his mouthful of food and rose from the table.

‘I should have guessed,’ the man said, the dread once more crawling down his spine. ‘Couldn’t you just tell Volonté you didn’t find us?’ His look was resigned; he already knew the killer’s answer before it was spoken.

‘I have a commission,’ Brunner explained. ‘The only thing in this world I honour. But Volonté only wants you. Your children are not my concern.’

Bertolucci was thoughtful for a moment, some measure of relief and hope filling him even as fear gnawed at his guts. ‘I saw you fight,’ the man said. He placed a hand on his wounded arm. ‘Even whole, you would have made short work of me.’ The merchant reached into his tunic, noticing the bounty hunter’s grip tighten about the hilt of his blade. He continued anyway, drawing a leather purse from his clothing.

‘Tell me, what is the market value of a swine in the streets of Miragliano these days?’ the merchant asked, his eyes returning Brunner’s icy gaze with a hateful flame.

‘Eighty copper pieces, when last I passed the swineherd’s lane,’ the bounty killer responded. The merchant carefully counted out an equivalent measure of gold and set the coins on the table. He sighed and set the leather pouch beside them. Brunner nodded at the man, and drew his sword.

Bertolucci never saw the blade that sliced through his neck, so swift were the bounty hunter’s movements. As blood spread from his cloven neck, the last thing the merchant’s eyes saw were the gloved hands scooping up the coins he had placed on the table, never disturbing the leather purse beside them.

The sound of booted feet brought Brunner up from his gory labour. He spun about, seeing the joy fade from Alberto’s features. He had rushed here, after tearing himself away from his wife and child to usher his father upstairs to see his grandson. Now a different purpose filled the youth.

‘Assassin!’ he hissed, ripping his sabre from its scabbard. Brunner did not wait to trade words with the boy, but met Alberto’s first strike with a parry. The youth did not fully recover from the fended-off attack, but turned the deflection into a sideways swipe at the bounty hunter. His mind clouded with rage, Alberto had forgotten all his schooling in the art of swordplay and duelling. It would have been easy for Brunner to kill him.

The bounty hunter’s sword licked out, penetrating Alberto’s almost non-existent guard, and lashing upwards towards the boy’s head. At the last moment, however, Brunner adjusted his strike, smashing the flat of his blade into the boy’s shoulder, rather than the edge. Alberto dropped to his knees, staggered by the blow. Brunner smashed the pommel of his sword into the stunned man’s head, rendering him insensible. Under the care of the priestess of Shallya, he knew, the boy would recover. But not until long after he had gone.

The sound of more running feet announced the hurried advance of the remaining retainers. The men cast murderous looks at the bounty hunter when they saw the two bodies lying behind him. They drew their blades as one.

‘It is the elder I came for,’ Brunner stated in a voice like a chill winter wind. ‘Alberto Bertolucci will recover.’ One of the men sheathed his sword and cautiously manoeuvred his way around the bounty killer. He reached the prone form of Alberto, clasped its wrist and nodded at his fellows.

‘If you wish to die for your former master, I shall oblige you,’ Brunner declared, his piercing gaze meeting each of the guards in turn. ‘But it seems to me that your duty lies with your living master now.’ It took but a moment for the men to reluctantly return blades to scabbards. They too had seen the contest between the bounty hunter and the beastman.

Brunner strode down the hall, towards the cavernous entry chamber where the horses were stabled. As he passed the stairs, he met the accusing glare of Elisia.

‘You never cared about any of us,’ she snarled. Brunner smiled at her and stalked away.

‘Only about Bertolucci, and the price on his head,’ the bounty hunter said, making his way toward his animals. ‘Pray to your goddess that I never have cause to care about you.’

The bloated figure stood before the slowly mildewing painting of nymphs and satyrs, studying the painting, and its creeping corruption. A pity, the money-lender thought for a moment, for it had been a very vibrant and arousing piece, in its day. He had accepted it in exchange for not breaking the owner’s hands for missing a payment – though that rendezvous with mutilation was only deferred by a few months, when the man again fell behind in his debt. Volonté sucked at his teeth. Yes, soon he would have to see about having this one replaced. It never occurred to him to actually see to the care of his possessions. The acquisition was all that mattered to him. And now he wondered which of his debtors might be the owner of something of equal style and quality.

A sound in the shadowy room caused the massive man to turn. He could dimly see a figure standing in the flickering candlelight, light dancing upon a helmet of steel.

‘Who’s there?’ the money-lender choked, fear seizing him. As the bounty hunter stepped more fully into the light, Volonté breathed a deep sigh of relief. ‘Brunner,’ he laughed. ‘My servants did not announce you.’

‘I found my own way in,’ the bounty hunter explained. He lifted his hand, showing Volonté the leather-wrapped object he had carved from Bertolucci. The money-lender’s piggish eyes settled upon the gruesome thing, a smile widening across his face.

‘You have it!’ he chortled. ‘Bertolucci’s heart!’ He held out his hand, gesturing for the bounty hunter to give him his grisly trophy. Brunner stepped forward, dropping the leather-wrapped object in the fat-man’s swollen paw. Volonté hurriedly unwrapped it, revealing the gruesome, blood-soaked organ within. The fat man laughed deeply.

‘Your daughter was there as well,’ the bounty hunter said. ‘She has just given birth to a child, by Bertolucci’s son.’

‘Ha!’ the money-lender laughed. ‘With that old thief dead, the slut will come crawling back to me soon enough. Her husband can keep their bastard whelp for all I care.’ The fat man leaned over the disembodied heart, sniffing at it with flared nostrils, and savouring the stench of the butchered flesh. He snapped his head about, reaching into the table, withdrawing a cloth pouch, his hand trembling with the weight as he lifted it.

‘Your price, bounty hunter,’ the money-lender said. ‘You have done a good, if expensive, job for me.’ A sudden gleam of hate flickered across Volonté’s face, and he drew the bag close to his breast. ‘But before I pay you, I want to hear about his death. I want to hear how Bertolucci grovelled before you and begged for his life. I want you to describe his screams as you cut his heart out!’

Brunner took another step forward. ‘Then I must disappoint you.’ A sullen look of anger contorted Volonté’s obese features. ‘Bertolucci did not beg, nor did he grovel. When he learned who I was, and what I had come for, he did not try to run.’ Brunner looked into Volonté’s eyes, seeing the dissatisfied look there. ‘He simply asked me what the market value of swine was in Miragliano these days.’

A puzzled look replaced the scowl on Volonté’s face. Brunner took another step closer.

‘He paid me eighty pieces of copper before he died,’ Brunner said, his hand gripping the pommel of the long-bladed and serrated-edged knife sheathed at his hip. Volonté laughed nervously.

‘Not enough to buy a man like you, eh?’ the money-lender stammered, sweat beading along his brow.

‘It is the quarry that determines a bounty hunter’s price,’ Brunner said, closing the distance between the men. ‘A pig is worth much less than a man.’

Volonté’s servants roused in their slumbers as a sharp scream echoed through the walls. The sound seemed to come from the study where their master was in the habit of going over his records of debts late at night. Apparently he was not alone this evening. The thought did not unduly disturb Volonté’s household, and many of them went back to sleep. There would be time enough to divide up the money-lender’s possessions in the morning.

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A Black Library Publication

This omnibus edition first published in 2010.
This eBook edition published in 2019 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustration by Stepan Alekseev.
Map by Nuala Kinrade.

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