Forged in Battle by Justin Hunter - (ebook by Undead) Read Free Book Online

handguns. A pair of cannon had once sat atop the building, until the
burgomeister had sold them. Or so the rumours went.
    The doorway of the guild was guarded by a couple of town
watchmen. They wore white ribbons tied about their arms and carried long wooden
batons at their belts.
    Seeing Sigmund approach, one of them slouched over to the
entrance and called inside.
    Roderick, the watch commander, appeared at the doorway. He
had taken over command of the town watch when Osric had enlisted. He was a tall
handsome man, but there was a cruel glint in his blue eyes. Sigmund had no
reason to disbelieve the rumours about Roderick: that he’d stabbed a rival
merchant to death when he tried to replace the burgomeister. Of course, no one
was arrested for the murder and no one talked about it anymore. Not in public
anyway.
    “Captain Jorg,” Roderick smiled without warmth. “How can we
help you?”
    “I have important matters to discuss with the burgomeister.”
    “Who are these two?”
    “Messenger boys.”
    Eugen bristled at the contempt with which Sigmund referred to
them.
    Roderick smiled and bowed a little. “Greetings, gentlemen.
Please follow me.”
    Sigmund pushed past the watch man. “I’ll see them in.”
     
    The outer door opened into a central courtyard. On the other
side, a heavy oak door opened into the guild hall.
    Sigmund strode across the courtyard into the guild hall,
where the burgomeister was sitting, at the end of a long oak table, talking with
a scribe.
    “Captain Jorg,” the burgomeister said without any hint of
emotion. He was a tall thin man, his bony hands folded on the table in front of
him. His fingers were covered with gold rings set with all kinds of coloured
stones. Around his neck hung a gold chain of his office. “What news from the
hills?”
    “Not good, lord burgomeister. The rumours are true. Beastmen
are banding together and they are coming lower than we have ever seen before.
Osman Heinz’s house was destroyed, and—”
    “Osman Heinz? There are a hundred men who would have burnt
his house with pleasure.”
    “It was beastmen,” Sigmund said. The memory of what he’d seen
there made him shudder.
    “So you tell me,” the burgomeister said. “But that is just
your opinion. I have other matters to take into account. Anyway, who are these
people?”
    “Your captain was kind enough to help us when we were
attacked,” Eugen intervened.
    “We killed all the beastmen, and I lost one man,” Sigmund
said.
    “So you dealt with the offending creatures. What is the
alarm? I am sure they will have learnt their lesson. They will not dare to stray
back down near human settlement.”
    Sigmund was thrown for a moment. “But I do not think the
beastmen we killed were the same as those who—”
    Again the burgomeister cut him off but Sigmund refused to be
silenced. “Sir!” Sigmund said, his voice rising as he rested his hands on either
side of the ledger and glared at the burgomeister. “I am sure that this was not
the party who slaughtered the Osman and his family. I believe we must call for
reinforcements and until then the outlying farmers must be brought into town for
their protection.”
    The burgomeister looked up at the halberdier for a moment and
then laughed. “Captain Jorg—I think you have been listening to these stories
about Sigmar’s star. Meanwhile I have a town to govern. I cannot waste time with
superstitions!”
    Sigmund slammed his hand onto the table. “Beastmen killed
Osman. More will be killed unless we get reinforcements and bring those living
in the forest down to Helmstrumburg!”
    The burgomeister put up his hands and closed his eyes.
“Please, captain. I have heard your request and will consider it. If it is half
as bad as you think then I suggest you go and find those last few beastmen!”
    “If you will not request more men then I insist that we put
in place a policy to bring the outlying villagers into town for their own