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Chapter 4

Sauer walked through St. Gotthard’s Chapel in the small French city of Dijon, wondering where, exactly, he had lost control of his life. He had spent nearly a year in Dijon doing absolutely nothing, and it was driving him insane. When he had reluctantly agreed to go study the disease that was crippling the Kingdom of France last September, he did not expect to spend his days doing menial tasks around a sleepy village of only a few hundred.

He was never one to change his mind after he set it, but when Hoffmann wanted something, his persistence was much more than Sauer could handle. He went as far as to beg Sauer during their drinking nights to head to Dijon because “These morons won’t get off my back, please Sauer, I’ll do anything.” So, Sauer made Hoffmann agree to buy his drinks when he got back to Nuremberg. For the rest of his life.

Hoffmann, unable to find anyone else around Nuremberg that was willing to give up their time to work cheaply for the empire and desperate for the Empire to leave him alone, foolishly agreed to Sauer’s conditions.

But unfortunately for Sauer, today was not one of the days of the rest of his life, and he would have to wait before he massacred Hoffmann’s wallet. The Empire officials bringing him to Dijon had told him to expect to spend no less than two years of his life on this project. Two years of work for unlimited drinks had sounded like a good idea when he agreed.

Chapter 6

Krause didn’t know why the people of Horb avoided the Church of the Beanmeister. She didn’t know why they only whispered of it, and why those whispers talked of psychotic members and religious zealots. She did know two things, however: the Church wasn’t as bad as everyone said, and no one could find out that she was a member.

Henry was very outspoken against the Church. When they were alone together he would call the congregation insane, saying that the Church was nothing more than a cult making a mockery of Christian values. He believed that the Church was merely using the public’s fear of the disease spreading in France to gather followers, but Krause knew that wasn’t true. The disease really was sent by God, and He really was going to punish unbelievers.

When the unbelievers talked about the Church, they never mentioned the Beanmeister. Krause was sure that if more people knew about Him and the values He preached, they would be more open to joining. Something that still bothered Krause about the Church almost a year after joining was the name Beanmeister. It was a unique name, to say the least. She assumed the name came from the small growths that formed on the infected, said to look similar to some species of beans, though she had no evidence to back up her theory. Either way, she was happy with the Church and still loved the Beanmeister.

Krause had left her home earlier that morning, leaving Annemarie with Henry and telling him that she was going to the market to buy produce. She changed her excuses often, making sure that Henry had no idea what she was actually doing. He could never find out.

She arrived at the edge of town and waited impatiently for Loretta to show at their predetermined meeting place. She played nervously with the necklace Henry had given her. Even though she had done this many times before, she was still scared of her secret being found out. All it took was one wrong move for her life to be ruined.

Chapter 1

Thomas Sauer was tired of the rumors. He had spent his whole day inside again, working with his patients while they talked about the rumors from Paris. Rumors of monsters roaming the streets at night or the dead returning to life around the city, new rumors sprung up nearly every day since the news about the outbreak of the disease reached Nuremberg last month. Of course, with Sauer being a doctor, he could easily see that it was just a resurgence of the plague.

Though the worst of it had happened long before he was born, there had still been numerous reports throughout the years of some towns and villages in the Holy Roman Empire experiencing small outbreaks. The solution was simple; continue to avoid Paris and the affected areas until it eventually goes away like it always has. Of course, those infected would die and times would be tough in the Kingdom of France for a short while, but that was the cost to avoid a more serious outbreak.

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Chapter 2

Barnabas Schmidt said with full confidence, “I know exactly what’s going on in Paris.”

“You keep saying that,” Robert Fiedler replied, “but I’m starting to believe that you don’t actually know anything.”

Schmidt and Rob were marching west towards the small French farming village of Dijon with the rest of the soldiers in Captain Humbert Bösch’s company, the soldiers’ chainmail breastplates and red cloaks the only blemish on the rolling hills of the French countryside. Bösch’s company was instructed to assist the French civilians in need after the partial collapse of the Kingdom of France following the plague outbreak in Paris a few months before.

Schmidt continued, “I’ve known what was going on since I first heard the news. I kept saying the disease would spread, but did anyone believe me? No, of course not. Did the disease spread? Yes, of course it did. Did I say the Empire should have prepared better? And did anyone listen to me? Yes, I did, and no, no one did. Not even you, Rob.”

“Barry, you know I listen to you!”

“Don’t call me Barry.”

“I always listen to you, even when you go on your weird rants, kinda like what you’re doing now.”

“You think this is a rant? I can show you a rant.”

“Please God no.”

“It’s too late Rob.”

Chapter 7

Sauer awoke to the ringing of a bell.

He was sitting up before he opened his eyes. The sounds of hurried footsteps and worried voices echoed through the stone streets outside. As he opened his eyes, he realized that he was alone in the doctors’ sleeping quarters. That in and of itself was not unusual. What was unusual was that there was no hint of the sun outside.

The village of Dijon was filled with torchlight and the amount of movement that would typically be reserved for hours much later after sunrise. As Sauer got out of his bed, he noticed that the other three beds in the room were all unmade. That was what concerned him the most.

The dull ringing of the bell remained. There is only one bell that Sauer knew of, and that was the bell directly above him in the bell tower of St. Gotthard’s Chapel.

That bell was only supposed to be rung in the event of a dire emergency.

Chapter 3

Julia Krause and her two-year-old daughter Annemarie were making their way towards the shopping district of Horb in the Holy Roman Empire. Horb wasn’t the richest area of the world, but the quaint vendors sold some of the freshest produce in the western Empire, and Krause loved them for it.

Krause’s curly brown hair fluttered softly in the breeze as she held Annemarie to her chest. Her eyes sparkled with joy as she looked at Annemarie, her adorable blue eyes looking around the town excitedly.

Her husband Henry was out working the fields, and would be for the rest of the day. She didn’t feel comfortable leaving Annemarie alone at their cottage, so they went to the market together. If something were to happen to her daughter, Krause wouldn’t know what to do with herself.

As Krause walked down the street, she noticed a man wearing the church’s clothes, with a look in his eyes that made her uncomfortable. He was loudly preaching about gaining salvation by joining the church, and she walked hurriedly past him while his attention was on someone else. Once she was a safe distance away, she breathed a sigh of relief, glad she didn’t have to interact with the strange man.

She continued walking down the main street towards the produce vendors when she heard someone in front of her call her name. “Julia!” She looked up to see her friend, Loretta Gartner, half jogging towards Krause with her arms full of bags of produce. She grinned as Loretta approached. “Jules, hello!”

Chapter 9

Sauer stood in silence. Behind him, the sun rose steadily. To the south, the Ouche river rambled peacefully through the French countryside. Next to him, his colleagues Wagner and Gladisch stood, terrified of what was going on merely a hundred meters in front of them.

The soldiers were silent as the first shot was fired.

They remained silent for a moment, watching as the dead body of an Empire scout was reanimated by a black mass that ran into the shadow of a tree. They finally began to move again when more black creatures began to emerge from the forest, moving steadily towards them.

Sauer, Wagner, and Gladisch could not see what was going on, their view blocked by the army of soldiers and villagers in front of them. And the soldiers were terrified. 

Wagner whimpered, shaking so hard that his teeth clattered together. Gladisch frowned, looking towards the commotion as if the noise was only a mild inconvenience. Sauer had absolutely no idea what was happening, and stood confused as the commotion transpired around him.

The soldiers began to shout over each other as they readied their muskets. The weaponless French villagers began to retreat towards the safety of Dijon’s walls, causing some Empire soldiers to follow. A few soldiers stood motionless in fear as they watched the monsters advance.

Chapter 8

Schmidt heard the hushed voices of his fellow soldiers, the dull thump of supplies being loaded onto carts, the hurried footsteps of men moving quickly around the camp, and muttered one word to himself. “Finally.”

He kept his eyes closed as he lay under his blanket, waiting for someone to shake him awake and tell him that it’s time for battle, to be prepared to lay down his life. He waited, but no one came. He slowly moved his head out from under his blanket, the cool early morning air refreshing, but the warmth of his cot much more relaxing.

For a moment, he considered rolling over and falling back asleep. If no one was going to wake him for the battle, was it even worth getting out of bed?

Schmidt sighed and slowly rolled out of his cot. As he stood up, he noticed that most of the other dozen or so cots that lined the walls of the sleeping tent were empty. Rob’s cot was vacant, his blanket on the earthen ground which had been packed down after a year of use. Only two other cots had people in them, peacefully sleeping away what would most likely be their last day alive. He let them sleep, exiting the tent.

Outside was much more chaotic than Schmidt had anticipated. The entire area was lit by the flickering light of torches, both carried by soldiers and set in improvised sconces around the encampment. Other soldiers carried crates of supplies to and from the many sets of waiting horse drawn carts, with carts that were already filled heading west through Dijon. Schmidt assumed whatever was causing the commotion was in the western countryside of Dijon, the same direction where, as far as Schmidt knew, no one had come from in his entire time patrolling the town.

That was also the direction the Empire didn’t want anyone to go.