I remembered that there had been guards at the city gates and we’d have to fight our way through them. To make matters worse, the sound of hooves behind me informed me that we were being tailed by cavalry.

‘Thies, Gunnar! To the gate! Karl, with me!’ Godke shouted commands and I immediately swung my horse around with Godke. Fleur sat before me but she had put a leg on either side of the horse as a man so that she would not be easily unseated. There was no time to move her so I told her to keep her head down as Godke led our horses into the Cologne cavalry that had been pursuing our caravan.

‘Charge!’ Godke shouted as he ploughed into them. They numbered only eight, but we were two and I had no time to thin their numbers with my untested pistol. Indeed, I scarcely had time to draw Joyeuse and slice it into a horsemen’s chest before the rest fell upon me.

I tried to angle my horse away from Godke rather than riding directly behind him so that we couldn’t be as easily surrounded. Fleur stayed low but I think that if God had not taken her voice she would have screamed as I did battle with the Prince-Bishop’s men mere inches from her prostrate form.

My sword met the sword of another Cologne cavalryman and we clashed as our horses stopped beside each other. I swung and he would parry, then he would swing and I would parry. I tried feinting but the cavalryman was experienced and did not fall for such a trick.

Thankfully I got the better of him when Fleur stuck her arm out and gave the man a great shove. He nearly fell off of his horse and I took advantage of his loss of balance to pierce his stomach with Joyeuse and render him incapable of continuing the fight.

As I fought a third cavalryman Godke came around and distracted him for long enough for me to cut the man down. Godke had killed four horsemen to my three and as the last man fled we were now free to catch up with Gunnar and Thies.

We rode like madmen and despite the fact that Grane was carrying two she kept pace with Godke’s horse as we approached the city gates.

That was when we saw what had taken place in our absence.

----------------------------------------

Ros was dead and the carriage was idle. Gunnar was on foot, impaling soldier after soldier on his Lucerne hammer despite a stream of blood pouring out of various wounds all over his body.

Thies’ body lay beside Ros’ and I realised that the trap had been successful. One of us was already down, and Gunnar wasn’t far behind.

I needed to get Fleur and my unborn child out of the city.

‘We can’t go through the gate,’ I told Godke and I was right. The only reason Gunnar was still standing was because he – betraying a greater intelligence than I had given him credit for – was constantly in melee range of several guardsmen and so their allies on the wall and closer to the gate were unable to get a clear shot without risking hitting their friends. I was thankful that we were far enough away from the melee that the soldiers hadn’t seen us yet.

‘But Gunnar…’ Godke stammered as we approached. I realised that he was faltering. His whole world was falling down, and though mine was too I had something to hold onto.

Fleur.

‘We have to get out of here,’ I said. ‘Look at those wounds. Gunnar’s already dead.’

And Godke did look at Gunnar’s wounds. It was true that he was covered in blood and that much of it was unmistakeably his own, but that wasn’t why he was dead. He would fall because one man, even a Swede who stood a head taller than his assailants, could not take on so many. And we were in no position to rescue him. If we got bogged down in a fight at the gate more town guardsmen would arrive from the palace and we would never leave Cologne.

‘Godke!’ I shouted. ‘We need to go!’

‘Where?’ he said back to me as Gunnar crushed another German’s skull against his hammer. ‘The gate is the only way out of the city!’

He was right, but I knew that we needed to get away from the gate anyway. There were too many soldiers there, and we need to stay mobile. Once Jaromil and his men had pinned us down we would be defenceless against their massively superior numbers.

‘We need to hide,’ I declared. I was momentarily glad that I had not taken up the call of my blood-oath against Godke in the previous months we spent in Metz as I had considered doing. If he had not been at my side, I surely would have perished to the eight horsemen who had tailed us, and Fleur along with me.

I took one last look at Gunnar, who was faltering either out of fatigue or blood loss, probably both. I made the symbol of the cross with my right hand and then led Godke back the way we had come. It was then that I was faced with another hard decision.

We had to let our horses go.

We approached a row of several old stone houses. One of them was bound to be empty and I thought that we could hide there for a few hours until the heat died down outside. Unfortunately the plan required that we loose Grane and Godke’s horse. They would probably live as horses are valuable beasts, but we would never see them again and so I said a brief prayer in the hope that God would take care of Grane. She had never been anything but a loyal and obedient steed, and now I was forced to part with her.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I quickly emptied her saddlebags of food and pistol rounds and lifted Fleur off of her. After my prayer I slapped her rump and she cantered away. Godke’s horse left in the opposite direction and I hoped that would confuse the guardsmen who were undoubtedly searching for us by now.

‘We have to get off the road,’ Godke said. His voice did not sound as normal; it was shaky and it lacked the confidence of a leader. That scared me.

I nodded and led Godke and Fleur to the nearest house. I knocked on the door and as we waited for a response Godke suddenly whispered with a great strain in his voice.

‘Quick! Soldiers are coming!’ he said.

He was right, several soldiers were approaching from down the road. The shadow of the house had kept them from seeing us, but it would not do so if they came much closer.

I kicked open the wooden door to the house and burst inside with Joyeuse in hand. Five Germans were huddled up against the back wall of the house and I ran up to them as Godke and Fleur entered the house behind me, slamming the door shut behind them.

‘Make a noise and I’ll slaughter you all,’ I told them. There three children and two adults who I presumed to be their parents. The father was brandishing a metal candelabra as a weapon in one heavily calloused hand so I spoke again. ‘I swear that none of you will be harmed if you keep quiet.’

The man nodded and though he did not relinquish his grip on the candelabra he relaxed a little and the mother stopped whimpering. I turned back to face the door. There was no shouting coming from outside the house, and I realised that we had successfully entered the house without being seen by the soldiers.

We were safe, for now, but Thies and Gunnar were dead. And it was still only morning.

Well, I knew not for certain that Gunnar had died. It seemed likely, but if he had been captured we were certainly not in a position to render him assistance.

Godke stayed by the door and peered out through the crack. He was keeping an eye open for soldiers and my biggest fear was that they would start doorknocking randomly. As I had forced the door open to gain entry it would collapse quickly in the face of an assault. We would be trapped and unable to mount an effective defence.

Thankfully it seemed that we were alone for the time being. Aside from the house’s residents, that is, who were huddled up at the back.

With the realisation that we could be stuck inside for a while I turned to the family and began to speak to them. I sheathed Joyeuse and raised my hands into the air to show that I intended them no harm.

‘Please, put down the candelabra,’ I said and the man hesitated so I continued. ‘We have not come to harm you or your family. I have a family of my own.’

I indicated Fleur as I said that, and though it implied that we were husband and wife I did not think it qualified as a lie because she carried a child that would be family to both of us once he or she was born. If Fleur ever got the chance to birth it, that is.

Thankfully the man listened and put the candelabra back on the nearby table which represented the only furniture in the room other than a wooden display cabinet on the far wall.

‘Why are you running from the town guard?’ he asked us.

‘The Prince-Bishop is in the pay of a man whose brother I killed,’ Godke said, leaving his watch at the door to join the conversation. ‘The brother was a confessed witch and I was hired to kill him.’

That was a succinct but sufficient explanation and the man introduced himself following that.

‘I am Karsten Trost and this is my family,’ he said. His three blonde children looked up at me with big eyes and I think he knew from my expression that I would never cause them harm. I continued to try to earn his trust because I knew that was our best chance of survival.

‘I am Karl, and this is Fleur’ I said and Godke introduced himself in turn. ‘We wish only to stay here until an opportunity to leave this city presents itself.’

That was how I saw it. We had to wait until Jaromil and the Prince-Bishop made a mistake, because security at the gate was so tight that we weren’t going to be able to get out on our own. I was scared that we would be stuck inside that cramped three-room stone house with eight people for weeks on end. It was a real possibility.

Karsten did not respond and a few seconds of silence brought reality crashing down upon me. I no longer had to act, I had time to think, and I hated it.

Gunnar was dead. Thies was dead.

Sadness was beginning to dawn upon me and Godke saw it. I knew he did and hoped that he would act to prevent it but he did not for it had reached him too. We both slumped into chairs at the table and held our heads in our hands.

It was a dark moment. My mind was cloaked in sadness. How could Gunnar die? I thought that the brutish Swede would outlive me despite the fact that he had a decade or two on me. He was so large and warm and fearsome and I had never feared that he would die in combat. He was the best warrior that I had known and I wondered if Jaromil could be defeated without Gunnar to lead the fight.

And somehow Thies had fallen as well? How could that happen? How?

Thies was so smart, so calculating. I thought that he could figure a way out of any situation, yet he had been the first to hit the ground. I remembered his motionless body lying next to Ros, trampled by soldiers’ boots.

A tear fell to the table’s surface and I blinked away several more. I felt a hand on my shoulder and I turned to see Fleur’s empathetic face looking up at me. I looked upon her characteristic beauty spot and pale eyebrows and they made me weep as I longed for Gunnar and Thies and Jacob and Hurland and if God could take them from me then why not Fleur?

Eventually the power of the moment was lost and it was time to put aside the loss and begin to focus on the present. There was only one thing I had to do first.

‘Do you have a crucifix?’ I asked Karsten.

He pointed at a small wooden cross that was nailed above the doorframe. ‘It is Lutheran,’ he said. I had already guessed that due to the absence of Christ’s form splayed across the device.

‘God loves all his children,’ I said. It was something Hurland used to say, and I was realising his wisdom even moreso after his passing.

I stood from the table and knelt before the crucifix. After a moment Godke and Fleur joined me. We were all silent – me because I prefer to pray privately, Fleur because of her muteness, and Godke because we were – but I knew that we were all thinking the same thing. We were asking God to protect Gunnar’s and Thies’ souls and welcome them into His kingdom.

At the end of my prayer I asked God to show us a way out of the mess that we’d found ourselves in. I think He decided that we’d suffered enough for as I opened my eyes and turned away from the crucifix Karsten spoke to me.

‘I think I can get you out of Cologne.’