**********

The wastes outside Nuln still glowed at night, though not quite so brightly as they had a year ago. But whether their efforts or the mere passage of time caused that, Brigid had no idea.

She strode through the hollow corridors of the Nuln Cathedral that until just a few weeks ago were filled with acolytes and priests of all the orders. Most left to prepare the new cathedral in New Altdorf, leaving only a skeleton crew of Silver Hammers to populate this one. Skeleton crew. Brigid chuckled. How appropriate.

She could live quite happily without ever seeing another walking, gibbering, mad pile of bones again. Four seasons of praying, blessing, and smashing them into dust hadn't diminished their numbers a fraction, it seemed. Defenses around the city demanded constant vigilance and even the city itself was not completely safe. The things haunted what little sleep she got now. Nuln's population was dropping before Karl left. Now it plummeted. Farmers in the outer regions abandoned their farms - farms that provided grain and vegetables and livestock. And, just to make matters worse, the sparse population and empty buildings provided plenty of incentive and cover for brigands who often stole away huge chunks of the harvest.

She caught a flutter of something out of the corner of her eye. Her right hand dropped slowly to hilt of the Ghal Mharaz, the Hammer of Sigmar that swung at her side.

"Don't bless me, if it's alright with you," a man's voice echoed out of a dark corner. "I haven't the constitution of a dwarf."

"Mikhal?"

"Brigid." He smiled through his beard as he stepped into the torchlight.

"What are you doing here? How did you get in without ..."

"Oh, I have marvelous ways of getting about. I'll teach you sometime -provided you can find a spare moment or two for me."

"I always have time for you."

Mikhal smiled again, though more whistfully. "Yes, I know. I was just on my way to New Altdorf and thought I'd pass through and offer my greetings."

"Nuln isn't on your way to New Altdorf."

"Well, that all depends on the way you're going. Do you have time to sit down for a meal? By Kislevi time, it's well past dinner."

"I have things to..."

"Tell me, I hope." He took her arm and propelled her down the hall. "Sigmar will forgive you the time for a meal. We're only servants of our gods, Brigid - flesh and blood like everyone else. You serve Him best when you also remember to serve yourself. Where is the kitchen in this place?"

Brigid gave in. "Follow me. How did you know I was still here?"

"We've heard a few things in Kislev - not much, but enough for me to deduce that you had probably sank your heels in here until the wastes were cleared. And since they are not..."

"Yet," Brigid added.

"Yet. And since they are not yet cleared, here you are." Mikhal swung open the kitchen door and immediately raised his nose into the room. "Fresh bread!"

The cook, who had retired hours earlier, kept a clean kitchen and Mikhal made an effort to keep it so. After ferreting out a loaf of bread, he poured two mugs of wine and carefully wiped up any drops and crumbs before sitting down with Brigid to eat.

"I smell hens, too, but I fear they left long before us," he shrugged. "Now," he said around a mouthful, "why are you still here?"

"You just told me - the waste."

"And that's more important than the Council?"

"It takes precedence over the Council." She sat her mug back down. "Nuln is a major city to the Empire. It's our root in the south. If it collapses, our hold here has weakened and Karl has enough problems with the "Free State of Marienburg" and this "Enlightened Empire" Jarod's cooked up. He doesn't need a city of undead to add to that. And if I leave, the last vestiges of any hope for Nuln leaves with me. I think that's more important than my hovering about until the Barons announce who Karl weds."

"And perhaps it is. But what if you cannot cleanse the waste? What if it is something that simply needs time to heal?"

"I created that waste trying to save Nuln. I didn't run away then and I won't run away now."

"Trying to save Nuln killed you last time," her reminded her.

"I learn from my mistakes."

The wine spilt over the table on dripped down on the stones of the kitchen's floor as Brigid pressed her hands to her temples. Mikhal reached for her.

"What is it? Are you ill?"

"I ... don't know." The room seemed to spin around her, except that the room was not the one in which she sat in Nuln. It was dark, narrow and heavy with the smell of tallow and snuffed candles. "Something has happened."

**********

Sixteen ships, flying the colors of the Emperor's house and the Hammer of Sigmar, escorted the Empress's barge into New Altdorf. The old port could hold four ships sailing abreast and the ranks of four by four were as ancient as the Empire, but New Altdorf's port shallowed more rapidly than the old, forcing the escort into odd groups of twos and threes that did not keep up the same majesty as the past.

Torsten adjusted his cloak on his shoulders for the forty-seventh time and rubbed his hands together in an attempt to dry his palms. "I cannot stay any longer," he apologized. "I will be expected to direct the ceremony at the gate."

Prince Ellis frowned darkly and looked back at the body of Karl Franz. The Emperor had been found before dawn, unconscious in the hallway outside his chambers. At first they had hoped he had simply overindulged in the prenuptial celebrations and hadn't quite made it back to his bed, but the ragged and swelling cut under his left arm told a different story. Palace pages roused Baron Errol and his wife from their bed to summon them to the Emperor at once, with the added message that Jehenne should bring her herbcraft. Prince Ellis, staying the night at the Baron's residence, came as well.

Torsten stepped toward the bed again as Jehenne removed the poultice from Karl's side. It came off in trails of green ooze shot with crimson. Both of them recoiled from the stench. The priest pulled his holy symbol from around his neck, a hammer encircled by a golden crown, and laid it on Karl's chest, praying, "In the name of Sigmar, founder of Empires, fist of justice, hammer of right, grant this man the strength to overcome his adversary and fight against the poison within him! In Sigmar's name, I bless him! Ave Sigmar!"

Ellis rolled his eyes. That wouldn't bless a bunny.

"Thank you Torsten," Jehenne smiled.

"You're, uh, welcome, Baroness. I, uh, will come back when my other... as soon as I can." He bowed and, with one last look at the Baroness over his shoulder, left.

BoneCrusher walked over to his wife and gently rubbed her shoulders. "How is he?"

"Worse. And getting worse by the hour. We've slowed it down, but I fear this is beyond anything I know."

"Are you sure that priest's blessings work?" Ellis folded his arms.

"A priest of the Golden Crown is as much one as a priest of the Silver Hammer," BoneCrusher replied. "He already knew about Karl and he's bound to be gentler than a Silver Hammer. He was the best choice at the time. But there's no reason not to try to find more help. What about that nomad we met on the way to find the anvil?"

"Rokan? Wouldn't know where to look for him."

"I can put out word through the mages. Someone might have dealt with him recently. And you have some pull with the Silver Hammers. Maybe one of them has run into him, too."

"It is not likely he would arrive in time," Jehenne shook her head.

"A small chance is better than none."

Jehenne finished applying the fresh poultice to Karl's side and checked his fever again. "What will Torsten tell the Bride?"

BoneCrusher sighed. "I don't know if it's worse to say he's sick or worse to allow everyone to believe he's still locked in his room in a snit."

"Tell them he's sick and they'll still think it's a snit." Ellis chuckled. "A rude snit, but a snit."

Torsten rushed back into the room.

"She wants to see him. I tried to persuade her to wait until he's feeling better, but she insists."

"You told her that he's ill?"

Torsten shrugged apologetically. "She wouldn't believe any other reason I offered. Either she has a very good opinion of our Emperor or can accept that nothing short of serious injury would keep her Groom away from her at her arrival. She's right behind me."

The Empress Elect Helene strode into Karl's chambers, silk sleeves and trains flowing out behind her, waving her retainers to remain in the anteroom. For only sixteen years old, she walked with the presence and self-assurance of a queen twice her age and experience and looked at everyone in the room with thrice the haughtiness. Without a word to any of them, she approached Karl's bed.

She looked down at his thin, pale body several minutes with no change of expression, no hint of grief or of delight. If anything, she seemed disappointed in her husband-to-be. At last she stepped away and reached into one of her voluminous sleeves. "I would like to leave a gift with the Emperor." Helene's voice sounded vaguely like her neck had been stretched in youth and the chords of her throat had never quite relaxed. At first, everyone in the room assumed she meant to gift him with a tiny, silver bell, but instead Helene rang it daintily and replaced it in her sleeve. A manservant carrying a small, jeweled box stepped over the threshold between the chamber and the anteroom. Helene made a small circling motion with her wrist and he opened it.

A small silvery orb encrusted with black pearls glittered inside the purple velvet cloth of the case.

BoneCrusher and Jehenne leaned forward.

"Do not trouble yourselves." Helene directed a dismissive wave their direction. "It is a relic from the days before the Empire: magical, but apparently locked from all use. However, some have claimed it has healing properties. My father meant it as a gift to heal the rift between the Empire and the Eastern Principality. I did not imagine it would be necessary to heal the Emperor himself." She turned on her perfect heals. "I will return to visit him again this evening. I trust you will ensure he is more presentable."

Her manservant placed the box on the table near the bed and followed her.

Ellis counted to thirty: enough time, he was certain, that the Empress Elect and her courtiers would be out of earshot.

"No wonder he's comatose!"

"Ellis, hush!" Jehenne chided in a soft voice. "Regardless of what you think of her, you cannot say such things about your royalty."

"Karl and I may have had our disagreements," BoneCrusher whispered, "But I wouldn't wish her on Jacob. Well, maybe Jacob. But no one else."

But Ellis was already poking at the reliquary. "Strange. I think it's two pieces. You can barely make out the seam, but no trace of hinges. Hrm." He scratched his poorly bearded chin and began to reach into the box. "I've never seen a metal quite like this. Except the Fork. And this isn't like that. I wonder..."

"Ellis!" BoneCrusher stepped toward him.

"I wasn't going to do much."

"It's the bit you were going to do that worries me. We have no idea what that thing is. Jehenne, would you go and find Torsten and ask him how far from the Emperor we can politely put this?"

"Of course."

Torsten had left the anteroom with the Empress and Jehenne followed their trail.

Brigid nearly barreled into her.

"Where is he?" Her silver eyes flashed with lightning bolts.

"The Emperor? In his chambers, with Errol and Ellis."

Brigid nodded and continued on in running strides.

Mikhal came round the corner of the stairs just as she vanished.

"How are you today, Baroness?"

"Well. Thank you."

"Good. Congratulations on your child. All the blessings of Ulric on you both. Have you seen a blonde woman with a large hammer pass this way?"

"Yes - toward the Emperor's chambers."

"Is he...?"

"Ill? Yes. Any help you can offer..."

"Absolutely. Until later, Baroness." He bowed over her hand and followed Brigid.

Torsten was nowhere to be found, so after a few minutes of fruitless searching, Jehenne turned back. When she returned, Mikhal stood outside Karl's door with his hands deep in his pockets and a worried look on his face.

"This is the Emperor's chamber, isn't it?"

Jehenne assured him it was.

"And the Hand was with him?"

Jehenne assured him they were.

Mikhal pushed open the door.

The morning sun had moved away from the window, dimming the light in Karl's room and casting long shadows over the furniture. The bed, where Karl had lain a few moments before, was empty. No Ellis. No BoneCrusher. No Brigid. Only the shadows and the fleeting smell of magic.

Jehenne stepped toward the door, but Mikhal raised a hand to stay her. "It seems safe - now. But I want to be certain before anyone else goes in there."

"Perhaps they have moved the Emperor somewhere else?"

Mikhal thought. "It wouldn't be unlike Brigid to sweep in here and carry him off to wherever she thought might be safe, but using the Hammer that way leaves holes in the floor - smaller ones now, but holes nonetheless - and the floor in there looks fine. And, as humorous as the image is, I can't imagine the three of them carting Karl off somewhere under our noses."

Jehenne felt cold. "The relic."

She could see the reliquary on the table opposite the door, its lid closed. The latch looked wrong, but she could not clearly see why.

Mikhal looked at her. "What relic?"

"The Empress brought Karl a gift - a magical item from ages past. It's in that box." She pointed.

"What does this relic look like?"

"Silver - platinum, but deeper in blue. And it's covered in black pearls."

"That sounds like something worth looking into. Well, someone has to cross the threshold, I suppose." He took a breath and began to step forward.

"Wait." Jehenne stayed him. "Allow me."

"Absolutely not, Baroness. Even if you weren't with child. My nose is better than yours. No offense." Mikhal stepped in front of her and into the room.

Nothing happened.

He walked around the room in a slow circle, peering under the bed and chairs and poking below the table.

"I don't like the smell of this thing," he said when he got to the reliquary. "Or I don't like the smell of its bearer. Sometimes the two are difficult to discern. Did you say you saw the item in this box or it was described to you?"

"I saw it. The Empress Elect opened it."

Mikhal gingerly picked up the reliquary and brought it into the light where Jehenne could better see the strange form of the latch she noticed earlier. Instead of curling gold looped around a sapphire knob, the latch was a misshapen mass of metal and jewels. The embroidered silk below it bubbled with blisters, some black and cracking. The smell of magic hung heavy on it.

"Some spell has savaged it. Perhaps Errol tried to prevent it from causing harm and they fled?"

Mikhal set the box back on the table and waved her in. "I don't think so. Come and look."

Jehenne walked into the dim room where she had last seen her husband and followed Mikhal's gesture toward the foot of Karl's bed. The sheets still held his impression in them, as if he still lay there invisible to their eyes. Splinters ran down one side of the nearest bedpost, little cracks that led all the way down to the floor, where the weapon that broke them lay on its side, humming its own mystical grumble. The Ghal Mharaz.

Jehenne stepped back. What could have wrested that from Brigid's hands? She suddenly felt faint.

"Easy, now." Mikhal grabbed her elbow to support her. "Let's get you into some fresh air." Before she could protest, he guided her out.

"What about the..."

He gestured her to be silent.

Word spread through the palace like a flood, and panic followed after it.

**********

"My Lords! My Lords!" Konrad of Marienburg could barely raise his voice over the din. The Barons, all of whom had been greatly relieved that their work was finished and they would never have to sit in the council chambers again, Sigmar willing, panicked at the news of Karl's disappearance. The three High Priests of Sigmar handled the news with less grace. And the Empress Elect had fainted no fewer than eight times.

"My Lords!" This time his voice boomed to the rafters. Karl's sorceress nodded to him. A pretty lady. No wonder Dierk of Nordheim would rather talk about her than the choices for Empress.

The council, startled badly enough to loose their train of thought, stared at him. "My thanks," he said dryly. "In the day since the Emperor vanished, we have found no trace of him or of the Hand within the boundaries of New Altdorf and her environs. Perhaps the Hammer transported him to a distant region to seek a cure for his illness, as has been proposed by the High Priests..."

"And perhaps he's just run off again." Prince Raimund looked lazily at Konrad. Helene glared at him.

"I am afraid the Emperor left us no explanation for his actions," Konrad sighed.

"And the Ghal Mharaz?" Grigorii leaned forward. "Is it true that it remains in the Emperor's chambers, resistant to anyone's touch?"

"And there it shall remain," Gundar, the High Priest of the Order of the Silver Hammer, nodded. "Until one who is worthy to wield it arrives."

"Wouldn't Sigmar consider you worthy, Gundar?" Konrad wondered if any of them had bothered to try and pick up the Hammer yet.

"Only three mortal hands have wielded the Ghal Mharaz: Sigmar; Brigid, his paladin; and Karl Franz, his heir. It is not my place to define worthiness, your Excellency, but were I to try I would fall far short of these."

"Still," Dierk smirked, "they're taking a large risk leaving it laying around like that."

"The Silver Hammers have taken up guardianship of the Ghal Mharaz until the Hammer returns." Gundar folded his tree-trunk arms over his chest and looked at his compatriots as if challenging them to say anything about it.

"Good," Konrad brushed that matter off his hands. "We have Sigmar's hammer taken care of. Now - Sigmar's Empire. What shall we do about that in the Emperor's absence?"

"We do have an Empress," Lothar of Reikland suggested."

"Empress Elect," Nils corrected him.

"Technicality." Lothar and Nils could argue for hours in monoverbal sentences.

"Barons," Raimund scoffed. "Are you suggesting we put up a woman to rule?"

"On the contrary," Petir raised a finger, "according to the laws of the Empire, Helene and Karl were married upon the decision and consent of this council. The rest is, as Lothar said, a formality." He pushed on before they could burst into fresh andemonium. "She cannot, however, rule alone. That is forbidden."

"Then we are still without an Emperor." The debate looped in the same circle so many times, Konrad felt dizzy.

Dierk groaned. "Another three weeks with all of you to choose an Emperor now? Here's my coronet. I quit."

"We have no power to do that," Petir shook his head. "But we may act as regent for the Empress until the Emperor returns or she chooses another."

"She chooses?" Raimund turned pale. "You would leave this to feminine fancy?"

"The Empress, with the consent of the Council, may extend her hand to someone of suitable lineage. It is the law."

"With the consent? How much..."

A herald rushed in. "Your Imperial Highness," he bowed to Helene. "Lords of the Council. Loyal servants of the Empire. His Highness, Jarod, Emperor of the Enlightened Empire, is at the gates of the city."

The High Priests looked to one another.

"We summoned him." Petir waved away their confusion. "It is customary for the Council to consult with the Emperor's family."

Gundar scowled. "Then why is he here three days after anytime you might have required him?"

"I imagine," Konrad said tranquilly, "we will find out momentarily. With the Empress's permission, may we dispatch an honor guard for the Emperor's brother?"

Helene nodded and the herald left with the same haste he brought in with him.

The council chamber fell into a unique silence as they waited and listened for the echo of footsteps outside. Jarod had not waited for his guard - honor or otherwise - and strode into the chamber alone.

He bore a strong resemblance to his half-brother. His long dark hair refused to stay tied back and tousled over his forehead and ears in unruly ringlets. His cloak and clothing, embroidered only with the dust of his journey, wrapped him in earthy wool. Honest. Strong.

The council stood as he entered.

"The city is full of tales about my brother." Jarod's voice reverberated with the same might mingled with concern. "And I am brought to you rather than to him. Tell me what has transpired and if I can aid Karl in any way."

The council looked among themselves. Konrad stepped forward.

"He is gone. Vanished."

"Impossible! How can he just vanish?"

"It is not unheard of, you highness. There are tales of the Hand, in the first years of the Choas War, lost in magical passages of nothingness and..."

"I know the tales, Baron. Is this what you claim has happened to my brother?"

"We... do not know. The Empress Elect brought the Emperor a gift - an ancient relic. But we have no idea if that has anything to do with it."

Jarod stared at him, as if measuring out his words before he spoke.

"Have you examined this relic?"

"We cannot."

"It has vanished as well?"

Konrad turned slightly pink. "No. Its reliquary is locked."

"Locked?" Jarod's eyebrows shot up.

"The box is sealed - magically." Svylan, the High Priestess of the Children of Sigmar spoke up. "It is a very delicate thing to undo."

"And while you sit here, who is in command of the Empire?"

Several voices spoke at once.

"The Church of Sigmar, in the Emperor's absence..."

"... The Empress should act in her husband's name ..."

"... Obviously, the Council ..."

"Obviously." Jarod smiled with dry humor. "I can see you have much to do, so if I may take my leave of you, your Highness." He bowed to Helene.

**********

"How much?" Mikhal blanched at the prices in the merchants' stalls. "Is everything so expensive in New Altdorf?" he asked Jehenne.

"The harvest goes badly," she sighed, slowly counting the coins in her purse. How could she feed Errol's apprentices and foundlings on this? Though she tried not to, she felt a little relieved that Anga had moved on. One fewer was even worth the price of the cloak and dress she took when she left.

Mikhal looked around. "It's not even near the first frost yet. Ulric's Breath, Jehenne - what will you do for food at midwinter?"

"Karl asked the same thing a week ago. No one knows. He hoped that stopping the brigands would alleviate some of the pinch, but now he ... And the brigands still roam."

"I don't like this," Mikhal muttered as he took her basket from her to carry. "It feels orchestrated."

"By who?"

"Ah - there's the question. Who has the power and time to be so thorough and subtle? And might hold a personal grudge against the Emperor and his Hand?"

"Jacob?"

"Not his style. He's more the 'infest your cities with rats and slime' kind of enemy. No we're dealing with someone much more amoral - a politician."