ALTDORF (The Forest Knights Book 1)

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

  LIKE SHEPHERDS FROM HELL, the demons drove their flock of evil spirits and twisted minions over the Alps far into the valleys below, spreading disease, insanity, and chaos. The only warning of their approach was the föhn, a warm, dry wind that preceded the horde’s arrival. It was not superstition or myth to the locals, but simply an event that occurred a scattering of times every year, and the föhn in the late winter of 1314 was longer and warmer than any could remember.

 At first, as the warm breeze reduced great banks of snow to puddles, it was a welcome respite to a hard winter. But as the air continued to warm and the moisture was wicked out of the countryside, throats dried out, and animals became uneasy. Once the people recognized it for a föhn, the wise ones hastened to the safety of their homes to latch their shutters and bar the doors.

 They knew what chased the wind.

 Erich felt ill at ease, but he could not be sure whether the cause was the föhn or the six horsemen that had appeared with it. He had shadowed them from the woods for the past hour.

 Their mounts were great long-legged beasts, with heads held high and chins tucked in; not the sturdy mountain ponies that fared better in this land of hills and steep mountain passes. At first he thought they might be soldiers on patrol to Einsiedeln, or one of the other wealthy monasteries in the area under protection of the Holy Roman Empire, but they were not dressed like any Austrians Erich had ever seen.

 Unlike the heavy wool and sackcloth garments Erich had on, the riders wore layers of simple dark clothing of lightweight fabrics, the likes of which Erich had never seen. In addition, each man wore a black chainmail shirt, the mesh so fine and light, it seemed more a vest than armor.

 A single one of the mail shirts would fetch a price large enough to keep a family in these parts fed for years. But first it would need to be removed from the man wearing it, and that, Erich knew through experience and by looking at the weapons each man wore at his side, could only be accomplished one way.

 He waved to a man concealed in the woods a hundred yards up the road, who in turn, relayed the signal to more men hiding beyond a bend in the road ahead.

 Brigands. Highwaymen. Desperate men turned predators, who singled out the weak to provide for their own existence. Now in his late twenties, Erich had made his life amongst men such as these for nearly fifteen years. His band of almost thirty men was one of the most lucrative gangs working the road leading north out of Saint Gotthard’s Pass. Traffic had been good of late, and by targeting nobles with insufficient escorts, the occasional small trade caravan, and local peasants as poor as the raiders themselves, Erich’s group managed a comfortable existence, unlike most in the settlements surrounding the Great Lake.

 But they never ascended far up into the pass. The craggy peaks were the domain of demons, and were to be avoided lest one risk the corruption of his soul. And, besides, there was no profit to be had on the other side.

 A number of years past the Duke of Milan had purchased the area and built a great fortification, the Castelgrande, which sat atop a rock bluff overlooking the southern approach to the Saint Gotthard Pass. Regular patrols from the castle had almost eliminated all banditry in the valleys on the south side of the pass. However, once the merchants managed the winding climb from the narrow valley floor out of the tree line and over the barren summit, which was covered in snow eight months of the year, they were in Austrian lands, and there were no longer any Milanese patrols to protect them. Austrian patrols were rarely seen this far south.

 It was this pass that the six men had recently climbed, and they now rode slowly, relaxed. The weary slump to their shoulders told of a great distance traveled. Although tired of the road, they exchanged easy banter and laughed often, with one man standing out by his immense size.