The Enterprise of Death Read online

  “He said let them.” Von Stein beamed, thrilled as ever to recite the magisterial ruling as Manuel sweated in his brightly colored confection of puffed sleeves and tight hose, swatches of padding and finer cloth stitched jauntily onto the garb by the artist’s nimble-fingered niece. “About wearing that foppery and all, instead of proper attire. Let them, he said, let them have something nice in their wretched, miserable lives! As if we were hurting for sport or coin down here where all good men are trampled, as if we were wretched to play at wars other than his!”

  “How generous of him,” said Manuel. “I don’t know how men could manage to serve were they lacking in ostrich feathers for their hats.”

  “For all that piss, the plume of your toque is brighter than most.” Von Stein frowned. “Or do an old soldier’s eyes mistake your halo for mere millinery accoutrement?”

  “I find a handsome presentation best for ingratiating oneself with the enemy. When they turn to fetch me wine and cheese I run them through. It’s quite less than Christian, really.”

  “You give me the impression you don’t enjoy the work I pay you for,” said the captain, his frown deepening. “A pity when the butcher has no stomach for slaughter, and that’s all these little squabbles have been. How’s your wife?”

  “Well, last I heard. And yours?”

  “Well.” Von Stein narrowed his eyes.

  “Well.” Manuel cleared his throat. “A very deep subject. But while it’s true I don’t relish the slaughter, as you say, I do appreciate the coin. One dead Milanese or Venetian or whoever will buy a lot of paint, the useful sort, and when we return to Bern I would beg the privilege of having your wife model for me—the powers that be mentioned a possible commission for the cathedral’s choir.”

  “Oh!” Von Stein perked up. “What sort of painting do you have in mind? Nothing provocative, mind you—my wife is a lady.”

  “I haven’t decided on the motif yet,” said Manuel. He had—she would be Salome, and John the Baptist’s head would be as closely modeled on her husband’s as Manuel dared.

  “She will be delighted, simply delighted,” said von Stein. “She’s been pressing me to ask, but, I don’t know, I thought it might, well, it might seem …”

  Manuel was taken aback that von Swine, as he was rather unimaginatively dubbed by his men, had actually demonstrated something resembling decorum. “Tell her it is my dearest wish, and that I hesitated to ask only out of respect for her esteemed husband.”

  “Oh, wonderful! Good, good.” Von Stein nodded enthusiastically, and Manuel felt a twinge of self-loathing to put his verbal fingers even the slightest bit under the codpiece of the man’s raging ego. “So we need to get you home safe to paint, and you don’t like this business anyway, so …”

  “I wouldn’t have come if I didn’t need the money,” said Manuel. “And if I had enough to go home I … I don’t have enough to go home yet. Sir.”

  “Now you do.” Von Stein plunked a bag down on the table, a purse closer in size to a saddlebag than a pouch. The captain leaned forward, clearly delighted with his presentation. Manuel waited to see if the man’s enjoyment would shrivel if he let it alone long enough, but when the smile did not fade Manuel sighed and took the bait, reflecting that unless one is quite blond or white of hair having teeth that match your beard is a most unfortunate circumstance. The captain’s beard was a pepper-flecked auburn.

  “A raid at midnight into a fortified city? A one-man assault on a gunner embankment? An assassination?” Manuel hefted the bag, poorly concealing the strain it took to lift it.

  “An errand. You deliver something to the Andalusian border, then you go home. None of that Papal dye or what have you, unless complications arise. Brigands on the road, that sort of thing.”

  “Spain?” Manuel cocked his head at von Stein. “What do I deliver? And how many men do I pick to go with me?”

  “Five men, and I’ve already picked them. Werner—”

  Manuel cursed.

  “Bernardo—”

  Manuel cursed louder, glowering at the stained knee of his hose.

  “And the Kristobel cousins. The three that are left—”

  “Two.”

  “Eh?”

  “We’re down to two Kristobels as of this afternoon, which is still two too many. Why do I get the dregs?”

  “Are you really asking? We march tomorrow, Manny, you would prefer I give you my best and boldest?”

  “Let me take Mo, and you keep the rest. The two of us—”

  “You would prefer I give you my best and boldest! No no, my powder maid stays, and you take the five. Er, the four.”

  “You said five. So let me choose someone else, anyone else, to mind my back. Werner and Bernardo aren’t too choosy about where their thumbs come from.”

  “They’re cowards, Niklaus,” said von Stein, the sour expression on Manuel’s face at the use of his first name a welcome sight to the captain. “They’ll listen to you because you’re not. Now, along with the package I’ve got a letter for you to deliver, and if I don’t receive a letter back confirming that everything went smoothly you will find yourself in a bit of trouble.”

  “Right.” Manuel still held the satchel aloft. His arm was hurting, and he liked it. “Spain. What’s the delivery?”

  “Her.” Von Stein nodded behind him at a lump on the floor of the tent that Manuel had hereto failed to notice amidst the tent’s clutter, a faint smile on the older man’s lips, lips that looked oily as poached eels in the light of the candle on the desk between them. The lump was shaped like a human sitting with her legs crossed, a thick sack over her body with two bands of chain encircling it, one at the throat and the other at the waist. Manuel dropped the satchel on the table.

  “Get fucked.” Manuel turned toward the tent flap, his face gone as pale as his most recent model.

  “She’s a witch,” said von Stein, and Manuel did not need to look at him to know he was still smiling.

  “Of course she is,” said Manuel, willing his feet to carry him outside and down to the mercenary tents, to wine and food and murder in the morning, good honest murder with a crown bonus for each thumb. “Spain. Of course. I’ve heard about what they’re doing.”

  “Have you?”

  “Yes. Have you?” Manuel turned back to look von Stein in the eye.

  “No. I can imagine, though. Spaniards are evil cunts, as we both know from—”

  “What’s special about her? Those godless bastards don’t have enough heretics or madwomen to burn, they’ve got to import ours now? Fuck that, and fuck you.” Manuel’s wife Katharina would like that when he told her, he knew, and that helped propel him out of the tent.

  “They’ll rape her,” von Stein called after him, and he saw Manuel’s boots pause underneath the flap. “I knew you wouldn’t do the poor bitch, being as high and mighty as you are, so I wanted you to head it up, but if my work’s not to your liking I’ll put Werner in charge and hope—”

  “Fuck that, and fuck you.” Manuel came back in, his lips drawn back like the cadaver of a hanged man. “I’ll take her.”

  “And I suppose you’re too saintly to accept payment for safeguarding the maiden?” Von Stein reached for the satchel.

  “Why?” Manuel grabbed the man’s wrist, surprising both of them. “What’s she done? There’s no such thing as witches! And why in Christ are you talking with her in the room, you cruel bastard?”

  “As I said, I don’t know what she’s done or accused of.” Von Stein wrenched his arm away. “And I don’t care. I know a churchman, well, he’s an Inquisitor now, but you follow. He wants her, and he’s paid handsomely for her, and so he’ll have her, and in as good condition as you can manage to deliver. It took my best dog-snout to catch her. You know Wim?”

  Manuel nodded, having seen the former huntsman go into the ground that very morning. Before the battle. At the time Manuel had not thought much of it, scouts being even more exposed to the elements than most and thus more susc
eptible to all sorts of maladies. “They buried him around Matins.”

  “Caught something on the way back,” von Stein sniffed. “Fever must have worked his mind before he went, boy was raving all sorts of horrors. He certainly believed she was a witch, and worse. A black devil, he said.”

  “Did he?” Manuel peered over the commander’s thinning pate at the hooded prisoner and lowered his voice. “Don’t you worry about her listening? She might, I don’t know …”

  “Cast a spell?” Von Stein smiled. “Eavesdrop? We both know that where she’s going they won’t listen to a word she says, and even if they did, what of it? We’re men of war speaking of just that, albeit a spiritual combat.”

  “You don’t mean you approve of what the Spaniards are doing, or those bastards in Como?!”

  “It’s not just Spain or Lombardy, they’re going after them in the Empire, France, and even our precious little Confederacy. As I say, I am not as well-read as you regarding just what they’re up to,” said von Stein, and Manuel saw he wore the same unhappy, fearful expression as when his employers, be they French, Imperial, or whoever he was working for at the time, came to inspect his troops. “Rome certainly hasn’t condemned it, and I’m nothing if not obedient, something else you could learn from me, obedience, but yes, I’m obedient to Rome, so who are we to say if what they’re doing is the Lord’s work or not?”

  “And if the pay is good—”

  “The money they’re paying if we deliver isn’t the issue, it’s what we lose if we don’t. Our souls, Manuel, our souls!”

  Manuel crossed his arms, trying not to look at the bound witch.

  “Tell a single man and I’ll have you hanged, I swear it.” Von Stein nibbled his lip. “What was promised me, what was promised all of us when I donated that stallion to the Church, is in jeopardy! Forgiveness, Manuel, for everything we’ve done! They’ll take it all away! If I don’t deliver the witch there will be no indulgence, Manny!”

  Manuel’s eyes widened and his hands shook. “Are you fucking serious?”

  “Yes, yes! They mean it, too, and of course the Spanish cardinals are—”

  “You actually believe God will forgive your sins if you give the Spaniards a woman to burn?” Manuel looked like he was going to be sick as he forced a dry, barking laugh. “And that story about you trading your horse for blanket indulgences is true? You really believe the word of pardoners, you sad-eyed old cock? I thought only merchants with more coin than sense bought that claptrap!”

  “What I believe is no concern of yours.” The fear von Stein had poorly concealed ignited into rage, and his fists tightened as he stared at Manuel. “What should concern you is getting that witch to Spain, because if you don’t hand me a letter with a certain seal on it you’ll be burned yourself, you little tick! Yes yes, I see you, Niklaus Manuel Deutsch, tacking a little Imperial flourish on your name, clawing your way up, here and at home, ever anxious to have a word with your betters, ever eager to pretend your father wasn’t a fucking peddler. You say you want to get involved in politics, my boy? Loose those lacey breeches, bend over, and take your first proper lesson, you mouthy fucking peasant!”

  The men glared at each other, Manuel’s left eye twitching until the older man finally exhaled, deflating like a sack of wine around a table of good friends.

  “Take her and get out,” von Stein ordered. “We’ll be in Milan, playing nanny until the Emperor arrives to throw his hired landsknechte against we fine Swiss confederates, our French employers, and whatever thick-headed Milanese are still about. You meet us there and give me the letter, I give you the crowns, and then you go home to that nice little house on Gerechtigkeitsgasse or whatever fashionably unpronounceable street you’ve set up on, yes yes?”

  “I don’t have a choice, do I?” said Manuel, knowing full well that one always has a choice.

  “No. You’re the only one I can trust to deliver her, Manuel, and you can tell your confessor it was my fault. And even if she isn’t a real witch and you aren’t doing God’s work, what’s another mortal soul on your tally? I wager you’ve lost track of how many you’ve killed, yes?”

  “No,” said Manuel, finished with lying to von Stein for the night. Not only did he know the exact figure but he knew all their faces, most sketched from memory but a few on the field, and if he returned to his workshop in Bern he would have another seven saints to add to his pile of planks. He wondered if he could bring himself to sketch the witch—to date there was a dearth of female martyrs in his collection.

  “Go on, then,” said von Stein, waving toward the witch. “Better you set out tonight and camp some leagues away, lest the rest of the boys get a whiff of her. Hard on them since Paula and the rest of her whores skipped off back to Burgundy. The Inquisitor’s name is Ashton Kahlert, and he’s got men waiting to receive her at the church in Perpignan, off the Barcelona road.”

  “Kahlert isn’t a Spanish name,” said Manuel, but he was looking at the witch.

  “They’re all Spaniards to me,” said von Stein.

  “I’m going to lift you up now,” Manuel loudly informed the lumpy, bagged woman. “We’re going to march for a while.”

  “She’s got a leash round her neck,” said von Stein helpfully, and with a sigh Manuel untied the tether and fixed it to the chain around her waist instead.

  Von Stein rolled his eyes, put the money satchel back into a small chest under his table, and retrieved a sealed letter. He waited until Manuel had taken the letter and awkwardly led the witch to the tent flap before setting his pistol, a glorified hand cannon, on the table next to the sputtering candle. Just as the flap fell behind Manuel, his kidskin boots visible under the edge, the captain called out a final warning.

  “And if you find yourself imagining it’s your wife or little niece under that witch-sack, and if you then find yourself imagining that maybe I won’t be quite so cross if tragedy strikes and the delivery does not transpire for any number of reasonable excuses, then, dear Manny, then I want you to remember, and you will not need to imagine because we both know that it is true, then I want you to remember that I know just where your wife and niece sleep this night, and every other.” Von Stein smiled and raised his pistol toward the tent flap as it was ripped aside, the touchhole at the base of the weapon hovering beside the candle. Manuel took three steps before he noticed the gun, and then the long blade of his sword slowly slunk back into its scabbard as the artist backed out of the tent. Von Stein smiled in the empty, bright pavilion, while outside in the damp night Manuel futilely tried to stop picturing his wife or his niece under the sackcloth and iron as he led the witch into the darkness.

  II

  The Coming of His Acolytes

  Something other than the wind howled in the darkness of the Sierra Nevadas, the Andalusian currents blowing rain straight into the mouth of the grotto as if the world had turned on its side and the African captives were in a pit instead of a cave. Despite the cold and wet the beautiful harem girl Omorose slept, and could scarce have awoken had she been of a mind to. Days spent in idle abandon had ill prepared her for forced marches over the cruelest terrain her bare feet had ever blessed with their presence, and bundled in the soggy clothing her servants had stripped off, she groaned and tossed on the stone floor of the cave.

  Halim crouched naked behind his mistress, staring at a point in the blackness at the rear of the cave. When lightning flared the bandit chief was illuminated, his eyes likewise fixed ahead so that when the weather permitted he could return the eunuch’s glare. The man stationed at the entrance was the only one more exposed to the storm than the three Africans, and he entertained no false hope of sleep in such conditions and so amused himself by waiting for the lightning to give him more glimpses of the two naked Moors.

  The slave clung to Omorose’s back, confident her mistress slept too heavily to awaken and discover her impertinence. Awa had never before touched Omorose, or any master, without permission, and the sensation of Omorose’s heart beating
against her chest brought new and strange thoughts to the girl. On the hard march Omorose had tried to hide her pain and fear but her hazel eyes had bubbled over like the fountain in the harem’s courtyard when Awa offered her lady her own share of water. Omorose had smiled as she took the drink, an honest if sad smile. Such kindness in spite of hardship confirmed for Awa that she had come into the company of an extraordinary creature indeed, a girl not unlike herself but one previously gifted with a far grander existence.

  Awa recognized that her own chaotic life was again mutating, and that life had taught her that when armed men force you to accompany them on treks through the wild the end result is never for the better. She would have run, and escaped, too, for these men were clearly not slavers by trade, but she had resolved not to abandon Omorose even before the calamities of the recent days. Her mistress was only a few years her senior and mayhap that made her seem more agreeable, and unlike the rest of her former masters, Omorose never shouted or beat her. That she would come to prize and consider rare such simple courtesy never occurred to the happy daughter of the Fon headman Awa had once been, but experience is just that.

  Crouching beside the young women, Halim had decided that the flashes of lightning were infrequent enough that he could throttle Omorose and her slave to death before being discovered. Whether he would, or should, Halim was not so certain, even with Boabdil’s orders that Omorose be granted a quick and royal death rather than fall into the hands of lowly men should piratry or banditry occur. When the lightning lit them up the bandit chief saw that the eunuch had broken his blind stare and looked instead at the sleeping women beside him. Then the cave went dark again, only the rioting storm giving indication of where the cavern’s exit was located in the blackness. He would not, Halim decided, not admitting that upon seeing Omorose’s beatific sleeping face he could not.

  Omorose awoke to feel someone holding her down but was too terrified to scream. The wet cloth against her cheek and the quaking of the naked slave pressed against her back cheated the noble girl of any hopes that she had been suffering a nightmare. She realized the girl was not pinning her down but hugging her gently, and while a few days before the indignity of having the slave touching her might have sent Omorose into hysterics, there in the freezing darkness the warmth Awa provided was palpable and calming. Confident neither the wretched creature on her back nor the men could see, Omorose let her tears join the growing pools on the cavern floor.