The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart (5 page)

Hegel applied ax to cart, further burdening the workhorse-turned-pack mule with all the firewood he could cram into the folds
of blanket lashed onto its back. Then they started off, Manfried leading Horse down the mountainside. Although the path showed
no signs of usage, they remained convinced it would soon join a wider road leading all the way through the mountains. They
were wrong, of course, but did not learn this for some time. By noon they reached a wooded valley, and after plodding though
the shade they climbed another rise and came to an even steeper pass late in the afternoon.

In the failing light they decided to camp at the bottom of the slope. Providence offered them a clearing split by a small
stream, and they gathered wood to conserve the cart pieces for leaner times. Hegel unwrapped the horse head he had severed
that morning and set to carving and stewing it for headcheese. Manfried caught frogs in the brook, but mid-autumn in the low-lands
was early winter in the mountains, and the few specimens he found were sluggish and small. The chill brought on by night forced
them close to the fire, but the Grossbarts’ morale rose with the stars as they discussed the days and weeks to come. One of
the dead horses had yielded a cask full of rank beer and they shared it happily, laughing and swearing late into the dark.
The cold ensured that one always stood watch to stoke the fire, and shortly before dawn they loaded up Horse, came out of
the trees, and went up the next incline.

This pass came even higher, and after struggling upward for the better part of the morning they were afforded an unbroken
view of pristine peaks before them and the foothills behind. Their exuberance dampened several hours later when they came
down into an alpine meadow where the trail faded into the grass and could not be found again. The mount they had descended
met another across the field, jabbing skyward high as the sun. After much cursing and accusations, they decided to continue
on a roughly southern course, for somewhere beyond lay a wide and worn road leading all the way to the sea-lands. Another
argument ended with the conclusion that a slower road with the option of horse meat down the path was superior to the instant
gratification a quicker, more direct approach might yield.

Hegel laughed triumphantly each time Stupid slid on the rocks, but Manfried cooed to Horse and encouraged him to double his
efforts. Eventually they crested the obstacle and were rewarded with an even more precarious descent to the next meadow. Here
they dropped down exhausted, and did not rise until shadows coated the vale. Hegel assaulted the only tree to be found with
an ax while Manfried kindled a fire and wiped down Horse.

The headcheese had grown ripe in Hegel’s pack, and they feasted on horsesteaks and brains as they debated theology. The stars
shone and the wind blew, the Brothers enrapt in their discussion of Mary and Her ponce of a son. Hegel could not fathom how
such a wonderful maiden had borne such a pusillanimous boy.

“Seems simple,” Manfried theorized. “After all, Ma was shit as shit can be, yet we’s immaculate.”

“True words.” Hegel nodded. “But it’s natural for fine crops to spring from mecky earth, so we’s not so much a anomaly as
a rare, decent woman birthin heel stead a hero.”

“He took his lumps, though. Didn’t squeal none.”

“So what? Not puttin up a fuss when you’s gettin stuck up on a cross don’t seem honest to me. He could a kicked one a them,
at the very goddamn least.”

“I’s not quarrelin that point.”

“Only cause you can’t, you contrary cunt. Suppose you could go on about it bein braver to let’em torture you to death but
we both know that don’t wash.”

“Is damn strange, though. Seems someone must a closed their ears at some point in the tale and got it all crooked when it
came out again. She’s the bride a the Lord, yet She’s a virgin. A virgin what gets with foal. Then She gives birth to Her
husband.”

Hegel chortled. “Guess he got in there after all!”

“Watch your blasphemous tongue,” snapped Manfried, tugging his beard. “Had you the sense to listen you’d hear how I got it
all figured.”

“Oh you do, huh?”

“Damn right. See, one thinks She can’t be a virgin, cause virgins can’t have babes or they ain’t virgin. The Lord’s pole is
pole nonetheless, Hell, if anythin, it’s the biggest pole to ever poke fold.”

Hegel unbunged the cask, reckoning they needed some sacramental beverage if they were to truly unravel the mystery.

“But She’s definitely a virgin, I mean, just look at Her.” Manfried held up the Virgin he had recently carved. All day he
had waited for an excuse to show up his brother’s necklace.

“No question,” Hegel agreed, trading the beer for a better look at his brother’s handiwork.

“So here’s what I think. The Lord comes pokin his thing round Mary, bein all sweet and tryin to get him some a Her sweetness.
And She straight denies him the privilege.”

“Why’d She do that?”

“To stay pure. Lord or man, She knew to stay holier than the rest She’d have to be virgin for all time, else She’d be just
another mecky sinner.”

Hegel stared at the statue, contemplating this.

“So the Lord’s mad, real mad, as the Lord’s wont to do. So he sticks it to Her anyway.” Manfried belched.

“No!”

“Yes!”

“But couldn’t he, I dunno, make Her want to?”

“He tried! Everythin’s got limits, brother, and even the Lord can’t make a girl
want
to spread for him, even if he can force Her.”

“Poor Mary.”

“Don’t pity Her, cause She got Her revenge. Made sure the Lord’s son was the snivelingist, cuntiest, most craven coward in
a thousand years.”

Enlightenment misted Hegel’s eyes. “She done that for
vengeance
?”

“Worst fate imaginable, havin a son like that. And that’s why She’s holy, brother. Out a all the folk the Lord tested and
punished, She’s the only one who got him back, and worse than he got Her. That’s why She intercedes on our behalf, cause She
loves thems what stand up to the Lord more than those kneelin to’em.”

“I understand
that
. But why’s She still called the Virgin?”

“Well Hell, everyone knows rape ain’t the same.”

“It ain’t?”

“Nah, you gotta want it. It’s fuckin spiritual.”

Hegel ruminated only a moment before his mind convinced his mouth that his brother was indeed in the wrong: “Nah.”

“Nah?”

“Nah.”

“Explain your fuckin
nah
or stand and deliver, you mouthy bastard!”

“Rape,” Hegel cleared his throat, “is the forcible takin a one’s purity through brute effort. Or in simpler speak for simpler
ears,
only
a virgin can be raped, and she ain’t virgin once she’s had the business.”

“Seein’s how I happen to be dealin with a hollowhead, I’s prepared to overlook your disparagin view a my ears. As for rape
bein constrained to those what still got their chaste goin on, let lone possible only on such, may I ask by whose oafish,
misshapen mouth you gained this wisdom?”

“Jurgen was sayin—”

“Ah! Illumi-fuckin-nation! The same Jurgen what was so fond a tellin you the evils a liberatin the dead a their unused valuables,
that ill-learned asshole?”

“Now Jurgen weren’t half bad!”

“Correct again, that sister-fuckin thief was all bad. Can’t trust a man what cleans his dirty junk in his ma’s mouth, regardless
how fit she might appear to the unrelated eye.”

“That’s damn conjecture and you know it!”

“Jecture or no, don’t lend’em weight as a reliable font a knowledge.” Manfried adopted the northern accent of the accused
incest practitioner: “
Only virgins kin git rapt
.
Gittin rapt means you ain’t virgin nah more
. Ashes to assholes that filth told you fuckin your own kin weren’t no sin, neither, eh?”

“No,” Hegel lied, and poorly at that.

“Well, who you trust is up to you,” Manfried sighed, “some forsaken degenerate or your own blood, sayin naught a the fuckin
Virgin.”

“You know it ain’t like that, brother!”

“Then why’s we still talkin, eh?”

That was good enough for the both of them, and they bedded down for the night. A howling wolf somewhere deep in the mountains
reminded them of the prudence of keeping watch and they passed another night in shifts. The sun found them where it had left
them—mildly lost in the Alps.

Picking their way up and down the range for several days brought them no closer to the southern road, and after a minor squabble
over whose sense of direction surpassed the other’s, they traveled southwest over the spines of great peaks, skirting their
stony brows and plodding onward, always in search of the next pass. The weather grew meaner by the day, the winds slashing
ever deeper through their coats. The grassy meadows diminished in size and frequency while the glaciers increased, and each
night the baying of wolves seemed closer. The meat had run out and the turnips were growing scant, and while Manfried’s logic
had thus far prevailed, they both appraised Horse hungrily by starlight.

After a week they clambered to the summit of a boulder field and surveyed a forest sprouting between two monstrous ridges.
They scrambled down the scree, dragging the weary Horse behind them. Firewood, fresh water, protection from the wind, and
hopefully meat awaited them. Birds circled the thick pines, and the shady Brothers were cheered to enter shadows after being
exposed to the open sky for days on end. The silence of tombs enveloped them, and the naïve Brothers prayed they might even
stumble upon an overgrown churchyard. The Virgin had delivered them into such a fine sanctuary the idea did not seem beyond
reason.

“Mark me well,” Hegel cautioned, “them hill-dogs we’s been hearin is probably laid up somewhere in here.”

“Stands to reason,” Manfried agreed, scampering around the thick bushes that choked the wood. “Wolf meat’s better than none,
though.”

A brook could be heard deeper in the copse, and when they finally found it among the twisted trunks they made camp nearby.
Stretching out on the moss and drinking their fill, they realized they had burned most of their daylight; night comes on fearful
quick in the mountains. They collected a huge pile of fallen limbs and underbrush but found no evidence of any animal they
might catch for dinner. Hegel made a stew out of the last few turnips while his brother set snares along the stream, and even
when the wind rocked the trees and howled through the crags above they remained comfortable.

“You want to sit first?” Manfried asked, pulling his blankets tight.

“Guess so.” Hegel set both crossbows beside the fire. They had salvaged only a dozen bolts, one of these having been removed
from Hans’s groin. Hegel looked forward to trying out the heavy sword and pick, his brother curling up beside Bertram’s mace
and his ax leaned against a tree. After Manfried began snoring, Hegel swigged the last bit of gutrot.

Night wore slowly under the trees, the canopy blotting out any stars or moonshine. The large fire provided ample light though,
and nothing stirred in the wood. Just as Hegel felt his lids droop and reckoned he should wake his brother, a peculiar feeling
crept over him.

In the course of their nefarious adventures neither Grossbart was a stranger to being hunted, yet time and again Hegel felt
some inkling of when their pursuers drew close, and always knew when they were being watched. He kept such things to himself
save when the situation necessitated it, and years earlier his uncle had declared him to possess the Witches’ Sight after
Hegel suddenly urged they take cover just before a search party rounded the path they had walked. Hegel resented the term
as any good Christian would, but his hunches always proved right.

The familiar raising of his hackles told him eyes watched from somewhere beyond the fire, and given the unbroken silence their
owner must be soft of sole indeed. A more cautious and clever man might have feigned sleep to lure out the voyeur or slowly
reached for a weapon. Such intelligent action would have meant disaster for both Grossbarts, so it is fortunate Hegel instead
leaped to his feet as he notched a quarrel, shouting at the top of his lungs.

“Come out, you bastards!”

Manfried rolled out of his blankets and gained his feet, mace and ax at the ready.

“Got guests?” Manfried blinked his eyes, peering into the night.

“Don’t know,” Hegel shouted even louder. “Guests show themselves, honest-like! Only fools and fiends cower in the dark!”

A deep laugh rolled out of the blackness, and to Hegel’s shock it came from just behind him. He twisted around, crossbow leveled,
but found no target. He aimed at where he thought the laughter emanated from but held his finger, wanting to make sure.

“Come over by the fire,” Hegel called a bit more softly. Manfried moved closer to his brother, squinting into the moonless
forest.

“No thank you,” a voice growled from the dark, seeming to come from a throat choked with gravel. “Unless you care to douse
that fire.”

Another chuckle that chilled the guts of both Brothers. They were accustomed to being the sinister voice in the night, and
did not care to be on the receiving end of such a discourse. Manfried attempted to wrest control of the situation.

Taking a step forward, Manfried intoned, “May all those who love their salvation say evermore Mary is great!”

Another genuine belly laugh, and after a pause, that voice: “My mistress is far closer than that slattern, dwelling as she
does in this very wood!”

“Fire your bow,” Manfried hissed.

Hands shaking, Hegel fired toward the voice. There was a skittering in the underbrush while Hegel clumsily reloaded, Manfried
cocking his ear to pin down where the man was moving. Readied, Hegel raised the weapon but the silence persisted, only their
breathing and the wind disturbing the stillness. Then they heard a swishing, like a switch being swung back and forth. Now
the man must be even closer, somewhere just beyond the glow of the fire.