38: The Threshold of Dominion

 

Wellentag 6th Sommerzeit

After defeating the dreaded puppets, you went back to Bluecher’s where you had left Berta guarding him, and told him he was now safe. He was very grateful, although Berta was concerned you hadn’t required her grave digging skills, again, and had just dumped the puppetmaster’s body in the Rijk. You headed back to Frau Koester’s. You were all pretty beaten up, but the night’s sleep didn’t do you that much good.

Aubentag 7^th Sommerzeit

In the morning you wondered, now you had more money, whether it would be better for you to live in less of a dump, where you might get some better sleep, but you decided that the doss house had its advantages.

You hung around all day doing nothing, resting and recuperating, feeling sorry for yourselves, and just picking up a few supplies. The weather was actually pretty nice, now it was the height up summer, but that just meant the canals smelled worse.

In the evening a package arrived addressed to ‘Max et al’ and you sat around looking at it for a while, a bit frightened to open it. But in the end Berta ripped it open and you found four boxes inside addressed to each of you.

There was the red leather bandolier Bluecher had promised Max. And some nice black shoes for Dietrich, although he complained that they weren’t purple. And some well made hob-nail work boots for Berta, and some marsh sandals for Balden. And the shoes didn’t eat you.

Marktag 8^th Sommerzeit

You had another restless night, and apart from Balden, you were all still suffering from your wounds, and Berta was still feeling the affects of the pink fire. And so in the morning you decided to visit Sister Marit at the temple of Shallya, to see if she could ease your unquiet souls, plus, Max fancied her.

She was pleased to see you again and praised you for your work in opposing the dark gods, but also criticised you for your violent ways. And she prayed to Shallya for you, and you all felt a greater sense of wellbeing.

So, you headed to the Hangman to see if Rotter had any work on. He said that Greta had been after him for half his stuff and he wanted you to move some of his cargo from his warehouse to a new warehouse he had hired. That sounded like hard work, and you didn’t need the money, but you agreed to do it, anyway. The new warehouse was only a few blocks away and Berta’s hand cart meant you could move many crates at once.

Then about halfway through your work, Rotter turned up and told you a friend of Ernst Bluecher was after you for another job. He said word must be getting round that you were reliable troubleshooters. But you still needed to move all his crates or he wouldn’t pay you. He told you to go up to some arty-farty knick-knack shop on Siegfriedstrasse in Kruiersmuur, called the Jumble, which was just round the corner from Bluecher’s cobblers.

The Jumble was as Rotter described, and you introduced yourself to Rudolf Drakwald. You could see behind his counter, there was a large empty picture frame which had obviously had a painting cut out of it.

Drakwald explained that it was his favourite picture, and was an old family heirloom, which was said to hold an old family secret he didn’t really pay much credence to. He said it was called the Threshold of Dominion and it depicted Sigmar looking out over the sea and an island just off the coast, which was supposed to show the northern most point of his domain.

He told you that some professorial looking halfling, who gave his name as Ted Brambledown, had turned up a few days before offering five guilders for the painting, which he refused. And then he had come back the next day and offered twenty guilders, which he had also refused. Then he had come back the next day offering fifty guilders, which he still refused.

Then, first thing yesterday morning, he had turned up with a couple of henchmen and ripped the painting down and made off with it. Drakwald had witnessed the whole thing but had been too frightened to put up a struggle.

He described one henchman as a wiry young woman with red spiky hair, dressed in the sort of snotball warm up suit that a lot of the youngsters wore these days. She had cut the painting down.

The other was a very tall and broad thuggish looking man wearing all black, with black feathers and a silver skull badge on his hat. He had intimidated Drakwald into just sitting there while he was robbed. You decided that this was a very distinctive looking group.

Drakwald said that the painting was by Johannes van der Rijk, before he was famous. And he had had some students in, a while ago, copying it. And one of the worst copies had been left behind, which he let you have.

The copy showed Sigmar on a cliff top looking out to sea, holding a sword, with an elf and an Ulrican as part of his retinue, and with an elephant. You noted that Sigmar’s retinue usually had Ar Ulric and a dwarf in it. So it was unusual to have an elf, instead of a dwarf. And it was also unusual to have him wielding a sword. And also an elephant.

Drakwald agreed that the sword and the elf were unusual, but they were in the original. He said the original definitely didn’t have an elephant, though, and the student probably just got bored and added it in to amuse herself.

And then Drakwald remembered that just as they were leaving, the halfling had said, ‘Bon Voyage.’ This made you think that perhaps they were going on a sea journey, but apart from that, and the distinctive appearance of the thieves, you didn’t have much to go on.

You decided to go and see Rotter, as he had lots of underworld connections, to see if he had any idea who they might be. He said he didn’t recognise the description of the woman, but the black feathers and skull badge sounded like a local mercenary band that hung out at the Sword and Flail in Kruiersmuur, so you went there.

At the Sword and Flail you had the idea of pretending to be a contact of Ted Brambledown, but no one there really knew him. The halfling had visited, a couple of days before, though, and one of the mercenaries told you that he had offered him a job that would last about two months and involve a voyage north. He said that a big mercenary called Kurt had taken the job.

Then you decided that as Brambledown appeared to be a professor, they might know of him at the university, so you headed there. The porter said there was no one like that on the faculty. And you asked to speak to someone who knew about art history, and he pointed you to Professor Lowrie.

You described the painting to Lowrie and he said that Johannes van der Rijk had been a decent and fairly successful artist based in Marienburg, but he hadn’t heard of the Threshold of Dominion. He suggested that perhaps it might be a more allegorical representation of some metaphysical element of Imperial identity, rather than a realistic depiction of an event from Sigmar’s life.

And he lent you a biography of the artist. And so you headed back to Frau Koester’s for the night, and Max stayed up reading the book. It took him nearly all night, but eventually he found a short passage that piqued his interest, and woke everyone else up, to read it to you.

One mysterious event from van Rijk’s youth which he supposedly told at a dinner party in later life. He tells how a famous pirate of the time commissioned him to paint a very specific scene on the coast of Wrecker’s Point on Nordland. He was told to paint the natural landscape in exacting detail, for it contained the key to some fantastic pirate treasure, or forfeit his fingers. Needless to say, he complied to the very best of his ability.

But afterwards, back in Marienburg, he was instructed to paint an allegorical representation of Sigmar over the landscape and was given very precise instructions as to the composition of Sigmar and his retinue.

Whether his was an entirely fictional account for the entertainment of his guests, or there is a degree of truth to it, is not known. I was never able to locate the painting or hear any first hand account of its composition. Needless to say, it does not appear on any catalogue of his works.

The life of Johannes van Rijk, Phillipe de Jong, 2473IC

You found Wrecker’s Point on a map, and saw it was a headland about fifty miles long, on the north west corner of Nordland, and it looked like it might well be the most northerly point of the Empire.

You thought about just heading north to Wrecker’s Point without a clear idea of precisely where you were heading. You knew that the Mudlark would be no use, once you left the relative shelter of the Manaanspoort See, so you would need to find an ocean-going ship heading in that direction.

You knew any number of ships left Marienburg every day heading for the eastern side of the Sea of Claws. It might be difficult to find one heading for Wrecker’s Point but you might be able to pay one to drop you off, there.