Christopher Nuttall: Chosen of the Valkyries

Katherine nodded, crossly. A dozen cells had been expended in the battle for Berlin, but it seemed that their sacrifice had been wasted. She’d sent her remaining team members off to cause havoc across the city, yet in hindsight that might have been a mistake. No, it had been a mistake. They could do a great deal of damage before they were hunted down – they would do a great deal of damage before they were hunted down – but they would die for nothing.

“Let’s go,” she said. “Do you have the papers?”

“Here,” Hans said. “And if they’re not enough…?”

“We fight,” Katherine said.

She scowled. The attack had failed, which could only mean that the traitors had launched their own counterattack. And that meant that the roads around Berlin were likely to be consumed by savage fighting. Getting out of the city was one thing, but sneaking eastwards was going to be harder. About the only advantage they had was that there would be so much confusion that it would be hard for the traitors to throw out a search cordon…

“Come on,” she said. A new hail of gunfire echoed over the city as she opened the door for the final time. “Let’s move.”

Horst wasn’t too surprised to discover, as the bar came into view, that it managed to live down to expectations. There were strict public health rules across the Reich , but the bartender had clearly decided to ignore them. Even when closed, he could smell alcohol and too many unwashed men in close proximity as he walked towards the building. He was surprised that the bar was closed, even though the provisional government’s emergency broadcasts had ordered all businesses to close. The bartender must have had other things to do with his time than serve alcohol.

He hesitated, torn between desperation and training. His training had always encouraged him to scout the ground thoroughly before charging into battle, but desperation pushed him onwards. He hadn’t seen a single policeman or soldier on his run to the bar, nor had he been able to make contact with anyone else. The public telephones had all been deactivated, he’d discovered. He hoped, desperately, that they’d been shut down deliberately, instead of being sabotaged. If the telephone network had been wrecked, coordinating operations across Berlin was going to become a great deal harder.

Bracing himself, he walked up to the door and threw himself at the wood. It splintered under the impact, crashing into the darkened building. Horst moved forward, drawing his pistol and holding it at the ready. He darted into the shadows, keeping himself hidden, but there was no sound that suggested someone – anyone – was within the building. Even the sound of distant gunfire was growing quieter. He crept forward and rounded the counter, then swore inwardly as he saw a body lying on the ground. It was clearly a young girl… cold ice trickled down the back of his spine before he realised it definitely wasn’t Gudrun. The dead girl’s hair was brown, her exposed legs scarred badly. Horst puzzled over the wounds for a long moment, then checked the body carefully. Her neck had been casually broken.

A barmaid , he thought, as he pulled back. The girl’s uniform was easy to place: a blouse and a skirt just barely on the right side of the decency laws. Just someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time .

He tensed as he heard something – a rustling noise – from the rear of the bar. Lifting his pistol, he slipped forward, listening carefully as he peered through the door into the backroom. Another body was sitting on a chair in the rear of the room, head resting on the table as if he were crying into his drink. Horst slipped forward…

…And then jumped forward as he sensed someone hiding behind the door, spinning around to see Schwarzkopf hurling a punch at him. Horst twisted, but it was too late to avoid a glancing blow that sent his pistol flying off into the darkness. Schwarzkopf cursed savagely, then hurled himself forward, slamming them both to the ground. Horst barely managed to land well, trying to push the older man away. He knew how to kill Schwarzkopf, but he needed to get answers first; he slammed a punch into Schwarzkopf’s chest, then hurled him over, slamming him to the floor. Schwarzkopf grunted in pain, his eyes darting from side to side, then stilled as Horst drew his dagger and held it to his eye. Threatening to blind him would probably be as effective as anything else.

“Traitor,” Schwarzkopf managed.

“You’re the ones who covered up the deaths of my comrades,” Horst sneered. “We could have handled it.”

Cold bitter hatred flowed through his heart. He still remembered the betrayal he’d felt, back when he’d discovered that Gudrun was telling the truth. Konrad had been wounded, crippled beyond any hope of recovery, yet no one had bothered to tell his parents. The SS was supposed to look after its people, wasn’t it? And yet, Schwarzkopf had clearly killed the bartender just to cover his tracks. The bartender’s wife was probably dead too, if she hadn’t been arrested when she tried to leave the Reichstag .

He gathered himself, meeting Schwarzkopf’s eyes. “Where is she?”

Schwarzkopf smirked. “And which her are we talking about?”

“You know who I’m talking about,” Horst said. Schwarzkopf tensed as Horst placed the tip of the knife against his eyeball. “Tell me where she is or I’ll blind you.”

“She’s gone,” Schwarzkopf said. He snorted, rudely. “Did you think I would know where to find her?”

Horst stared down at him for a long moment. “You took her out of the city?”

“That was the plan,” Schwarzkopf said, casually. “Of course, they could have been killed as they crossed the lines. Or shot up by the stormtroopers as they retreat… nice-looking girl like yours, traitor. What do you think they’re going to do to her?”

“Damn you,” Horst said. “How were they planning to get out of the city?”

Schwarzkopf laughed at him. “What were you doing during training? Fondling yourself? I wasn’t told any of the details and if you bothered to actually think, you’d know I wasn’t told any of the details.”

Horst had to pull the blade back just to keep himself from ramming the dagger through the eye and straight into the brain. Schwarzkopf was right. No covert operative was ever told more than they needed to know, just in case they were captured by the enemy and forced to talk. Horst had endured weeks of training in resisting interrogation, but his instructors had made it clear that anyone could be broken. It was far safer not to know anything he didn’t specifically need to know.

And there was no trace of a lie in Schwarzkopf’s voice. He wouldn’t have been trusted completely, not by the commandos. If they’d suspected Horst – and it was clear they’d suspected Horst – they would have suspected his handler too. Horst had dropped the ball – or so they’d claimed to believe – and that meant that his handler had screwed up too, either by believing Horst or not keeping a close eye on him. No, Schwarzkopf wouldn’t know anything useful and…

A wave of despair threatened to overcome him. The commandos definitely wouldn’t stay in the city, not if they had orders to take Gudrun alive and deliver her to Germanica. And that , at least, had to be true. They could have tested Horst’s loyalty if they’d merely wanted her dead. But… if they tried to cross the lines surrounding the city, they might just be killed in the crossfire… and, if that happened, Gudrun would likely die too.

“You love her,” Schwarzkopf mocked. “And if you had kept a closer eye on her, she might not have died.”