Foreword

Dear reader of this novel,

I’m glad you found this admittedly still short novel of mine. You’ll see, english is not my native language and I fear you’ll stumble over some formulations and phrases that somehow seem odd or irritating. That’s because I’m translating this story from my native language, german, and while I’m quite experienced in writing german novels, I’m new to translating or writing novels in english. I hope you get what I try to tell and I hope you still enjoy it. Improvements and suggestions are welcome.

Prologue

Death set his feet into the village in the early hours before dawn, the coldest of the summer night. Fog embraced the small huts, the trees on the wayside, laid like a chilly breath over the fields. On the edge of a forest, close to a small spring, he leaned his head on the neck of his horse, stroked through the mane, one and a second time. Then he girded up his knives, put his dagger on his hip and the sickle shaped short sword on his chest, where he could draw it easily.

Without hurry he emerged from the grip of the forestly darkness, and the moonlight revealed his true countenance: a young woman, her hair tied up to a tight knot, her body dressed in a dark leather harness. Nearly soundless she followed the paths between the fields, let the tips of the ripe grasses brush through her fingers. This place was not easy to find, that far away from everything noteworthy, from every important place in this world it was. Deserted it perched in a wide valley, like a tick on bare skin. Awoken memories passed her mind as she laid eyes upon the simple huts, old memories, hurtful memories. Shivers ran down her spine, but the cold morning wind took them along, blew them away.

“The house under the linden tree with the boar head over the lintel.” Silently she whispered what her search has yielded; it cost much time to track his traces and to cover her own ones. Her instructions were unambiguously, but still she had to make sure to remain nothing but a shadow, a stranger.

She found the house at the end of the village, on the bank of a small creek. Under the lofty top of the linden tree it laid, taller than the surrounding buildings of the backland, but still it must have been here long before its new residents took possession of its floors and walls. Creaking the door opened, revealed the simple stamped clay ground. No locks, not even bars hindered her entry. He must have felt save, must have thought that nobody could find him here.

Still outlines of bodies laid close to the hearth fire, in the warmth of the remaining ember. Soundless she stepped closer, past the round table, bowed over the sleeping, two children and a man.

It’s not him, she thought, he’s too young. Possibly just a servant and his offspring.

As silently as before she retreated, looked around. The master of the house doesn’t sleep with the servants, he must have his own room.

A stairway led up to the higher floors, and gently she put one foot in front of the other. Not the lightest creaking divulged her, not a scrape of her soft shoes.

He slept in an enormous bed, covered under goat skins, warm and cozy. But blissful he didn’t sleep, she just stepped into the room as he opened his eyes. It took some time until he discovered her in the twilight. He could not have heard her, but she new that some people could feel the presence of others, the hunted, the restlessly driven. People that knew that someone is searching for them.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“Who …” In a matter of seconds he noticed her, jumped out of his bed and pulled down a pike from a bracket. “Who are you?”

“Are you Lex Ostra?” Not a centimeter she moved, but her eyes steadily followed the tip of his pike.

“Who sent you? How did you find me?” Shrill his shouts echoed through the night, likely woke the sleeping in the surrounding houses. She won’t have much time till the whole village whould be on their feet. She had to hurry up.

“Are you Lex Ostra?”, she repeated her question, and her feet began to move on their own. Slowly and in careful circles she revolved around him, slightly leaned to the side, ready to react on an attack.

“You already know the answer.” Screaming Lex Ostra took a swing with his pike, aimed on her chest. She turned effortlessly, only a few centimeters, but the shaft of the pike slid over her harness without causing any harm. Again Ostra tried to stab her, but faster than his eyes could follow she drew her dagger and pushed the pike aside.

Meanwhile Lex became more and more erratic, second by second. A sequence of fast, but weak thrusts missed their target, until his enemy let her dagger slide along the shaft of his pike. Barely audible two of his fingers fell to the wooden ground, followed by the weapon they held moments ago.

Whimpering in pain Lex hold unto the stumps of his mutilated fingers, blood gushing in the tact of his racing heart.

“You don’t know what you are doing!” A plead of mercy in his eyes he looked in hers, searching for pity. “You have no clue who you work for!” Slowly she got closer to her victim, and Ostra desperately slipped further away, leaving a trail of blood behind. “You destroy our last hope!”

“That’s true.” Roughly she buried her hands in the hair of the screaming man, pulled him closer to the opened window, closer to the light of the moon. Quickly she let her dagger slide back into its scabbard, drew her curved sword in one fluid motion. “I don’t know who I’m working for.”

In that moment the door of the bedroom hit against the wall, pushed open hasty. Shortly she got distracted by the horrified looks of the servant and his children, but soon she pulled herself together.

The first slash cut trough Ostras carotid artery, and with an unfortunate gurgling his lungs filled with blood. Desperately he tried to cough, spraying his blood over the sheets of his bed with every quiver of his chest. Three more slashes followed until she held Ostras head insider her hand, bis hair clawed inside her fingers. With a kick she let his kneeling body fall over, twitching on the floor like the puppet of a demented puppeteer.

Screams, the rumbling of hasty feet, despaired cryings. Horrified the people fled from death, as always when she did her deeds in front of the eyes of the unsullied. Without hurry she rubbed her sword dry on the sheets of the deceased, shoved it back into its scabbard. Then she climbed up the opened window, pushed her legs through the opening – and jumped. Nimble she cushioned the impact of her fall, still holding the head of the dead by his hair. And then she left, walked as if nothing had happened, as if she would just fetch water from the well. Women, men and children stepped out of their houses, looked with horror at the blood smeared stranger with the head in her hands, but nobody tried to stop her. They never did, and probably it was for the better.

The dawn revealed its early, shy rose as she returned to the spring in the forest. Thoroughly she rubbed her hand, her arms; her harness didn’t get stained that much from the blood fountain. Often enough she practiced this form of execution to get blood till up her neck. It didn’t took much time till she cleaned herself from every evidence, but still this smell remained, this metallic note that was only fading with time.

Welcoming the brushed over the neck of her horse. Brief the animal lifted its head, looked at her, but seconds later the grass to its feet was of higher interest. But it didn’t matter; her mission was still not accomplished. With a nearly silent groan she opened the barrel on the flank of her mount, and without hesitation she reached into it and pulled out one of the three heads inside of it, let the curing lacquers drop back in. Inspecting she rubbed with her fingers over the neck base of the dead.

“No decay. No Smell. Good”, she said to herself before she returned the head into its wooden grave. Then she raised the remains of her latest victim, pulled out the drawning from her belt that was send to her weeks before. He had aged, the wrinkles around his mouth have grewn stronger, the hair on his temples retreated, but without a doubt it was him. With a last glance in the agonized lineaments of Lex Ostra she laid his head to the ones of his comrades in suffering, sprinkled curing salt from a small sachet over it.

Unmoved death straightened up, let the chilling morning winds play around her neck. Then she mounted her horse.

Another victim was waiting for her.