A pulsating rhythm slammed into Oliver’s chest as he stepped from the dimly lit stairway alcove into a long, hallway with an arched mosaic ceiling curving just two feet overhead, stained oak paneling lining the lower three feet of the walls, and brilliantly lifelike murals of scenes from German folklore splashed across every wall. Just to his left, a wide staircase covered in opulent, but well-worn, red carpet wound up to the floor above. The thumping sound that filled the hall was accompanied by a lurid throbbing of colorful lights, their flash sequence seemingly beat-matched to the tempo of the music as their colors shifted in time to the rapidly modulating audio frequency, which poured into the hall through an open doorway up ahead on his right. Oliver felt as if he had just stepped out into an industrial rave venue, even though he now recognized this place as the Lower Hall of the castle, in which he had briefly paused on the tour two days previous.

Oliver quickly pushed the alcove door shut behind him and slipped along the wall towards the source of the noise until he reached the open doorway, which he knew would open into the Throne Hall. He risked a peek around the corner and saw, under the glittering refractions of light from the twelve foot wide gold plated chandelier, a crowd of at least a hundred people dancing to the electronic static, pulses, and trills being produced by a man dressed in an oversized Thor costume, who stood behind a bank of audio equipment on the upper balcony of the Throne Hall. The strobing lights had been placed between the columns of the banisters which ringed the fourth floor balcony, shining down to play their light across the dancers below, many of whom were also dressed as gaudy interpretations of mythological figures. Many of the men were dressed in leather and chain mail, with short swords or axes strapped to their waists and helmets on their heads. Those who had the muscle tone for it, and more than a few who did not, sported minimalistic leather or drapes of vivid blue cloth over bare chests. Most of the women were dressed in flowing white dresses sewn, or simply draped, from gauzy fabrics that shimmered as the varied hues of light slipped through the delicate layers. The dresses were secured at the waist with simple belts of gilt chain, which clasped at the belly with large enameled clips.

Oliver grinned as he counted no fewer than five men dressed in gray robes milling about the edges of the dance floor with drinks in hand. Odin as the gray wanderer might not have been the most popular costume at this party, but it certainly was common enough that Oliver would not stand out if he were somehow spotted. He stood, straightened his robe, and strode through the passageway into the throne hall as if he belonged there.

Nobody paid him any mind. Oliver adopted an unsteady gait and angled his way towards the nearest waiter, who was standing beside a pillar not far from where Oliver had entered the hall, to the side of the crowded dance floor. Oliver snagged a glass of champagne, frowned at the feel of cheep plastic crystal between his fingers, and tottered away. These sorts of parties were the same the world over, he decided. Cheap thrills dressed up to look fancy so that the donors could feel as if their money had bought something. He moved on through the crowd without visible purpose, bobbing his hooded head in time with the screeching music as it approached a crescendo, then broke into a stuttering tangle of sampled symphonies, the familiar strands of classical strings twisting and churning into a new form that was at once familiar and utterly alien to Oliver’s ears. Always, though, Oliver was scanning his surroundings, searching for guards, paths to his target, and possible exits.

Other than the passage through which he had entered the throne hall, Oliver did not see any clean exits, but he had anticipated that from when he had taken the tour. Still, it was worth checking carefully, since all of the velvet ropes and Plexiglass barriers that had been up during the tour to direct the flow of tourists had been removed to make room for the party. Along one side of the hall, opposite from the passageway through which he had entered, three sets of wide glass doors opened onto a long balcony that ran most of the length of the hall. Through the doors Oliver saw a small group of costumed revelers smoking and sipping their drinks under the gaze of two hefty guards. Under the DJ’s booth, and at the opposite end of the hall, behind the raised altar and throne dais, Oliver spotted four single windows, all of which were virtually useless as exits as they consisted of thick panes of glass glazed into heavy wooden frames. 

Over the course of a quarter hour, Oliver mingled with the crowd and checked each window to determine whether it might provide an escape route. Unsurprisingly, he was disappointed. The windows under the DJ booth opened over a thirty foot drop to the gray stone courtyard and that, while certainly not a safe exit route, was safer than the windows behind the throne, which looked out over the valley below in a sheer drop of over a hundred feet. 

“So, it’s a fall, a fall, or back out through the hallway,” Oliver muttered.

The couple that had been standing beside him, a young woman with blond hair dressed as, Oliver thought, a valkyrie and her companion, an elderly man dressed in leather armor, both started and looked straight at Oliver. “Where did you come from?” the man demanded in German. 

Scheiße, Oliver thought. It was one thing to talk to yourself when alone in the jungle, or in a crowded city, but it was plain stupid to mutter in English when attempting to blend into the background at a German masked ball. He waved his half empty champagne flute at them and asked, also in German, “Do you know where the drinks are?”

The man snorted and pushed past Oliver, back out onto the dance floor, pulling the woman along with him. 

Oliver breathed a sigh of relief and moved quickly around the border of the dance floor towards the passageway through which he had entered the room. Sylvester had told him that the Wagner folio was on display in the Singers’ hall and, according to the maps he had downloaded that afternoon, that was located on the fourth floor, just off the Upper Hall. He looked upwards to the railing that separated the Singers’ Hall from the soaring vault of the Throne Hall at the level of the chandelier, but could see little more than the suited forms of seven security guards, one standing beside each pillar along the railing, so he continued towards the exit from the dance hall.

He moved slowly through the main hallway, keeping up the persona of the tottering drunk for the sake of the cameras that were wedged into the corners of the room and any partygoers or guards who might come upon him. Once he had returned to the Lower Hall, Oliver was found himself drawn to a large mural which occupied the wall between the entrance to the Throne Hall and the small door that concealed the staircase that he had taken up from the first floor.

Oliver had first spotted this mural on his tour of the castle, as the tour group assembled between the rope barriers, awaiting the guide who would take them through the tour of the castle. Now, granted the time to examine it more closely, Oliver thought that he recognized the scene depicted in the painting. Deep shadows and glowing firelight bathed the scene in a dramatic glow as a bare chested Regin worked at his anvil to reforge Gram, the sword of Sigmund, which his son Sigurd would eventually use to slay an evil dragon. As he examined the mural, Oliver felt a strange discomfort settle over him, as if he were picking up on an artistic detail that could be important to his quest, but which eluded his conscious mind. He searched the mural a second time and found no clue except that he felt the most uncomfortable when he looked at a shadowy figure who watched Regin and Sigurd from the darkness. Something about the mural, and that shadowy figure, disturbed him, but he could not quite identify why. After a few minutes, he moved on, climbing the wide spiral staircase up to the fourth floor.

As he climbed, Oliver felt the physical impact of the music against his body lessen as the sound of it grew fainter. It was still loud at the top of the staircase, but by the time he passed the carved stone dragon, which lay open mouthed at the top of the steps, the noise was no greater than if he were standing in the lobby of a concert venue during a performance. 

A dozen people stood about the hall, some dressed in full costume, others attired more conservatively in tuxedos with only a sword or winged helmet serving as concession to the theme of the party. They were clustered into groups of two or three and speaking animatedly as they drank their champagne. All around them the hall was decorated in an even more lavish fashion than the lower hall had been. 

Oliver smiled grimly to himself at the sight of the murals, which depicted the funeral feast of Gudrun, a fierce queen who was said to have married Attila the Hun, then killed him at a funeral banquet she held in honor of her brother, who Attila had killed. According to the legend, she had been so outraged at the murder of her brother that Gudrun had killed her own sons, fathered by Attila, and served their flesh and blood to him at the funeral feast. Only after he finished eating their hearts and drinking mead flavored with their blood did the fierce queen tell him what he had eaten. She then killed the famous Hun and burned his body. It was, Oliver thought, a fitting setting for whatever cutthroat business deals might be taking place here on the fringes of the party.

He crept past the groups, pausing near each one to see if they noticed him. None did. It appear that the robe was continuing to conceal Oliver, though his encounter with the couple down in the dance hall, and the chauffeurs in the first floor corridor, indicated that whatever power the robe possessed was better described as deflecting attention from its wearer than actually making them invisible.

A guard stood at the door of the Singers’ hall. A short, burly man with short cropped blond hair and a chiseled nose. He was dressed in a black suit, white shirt, and tie, and carried himself with the comfortable tension of a professional who was prepared to do violence whenever it might become necessary. He did not challenge Oliver as he passed through the low doorway into the hall, but as Oliver approached their eyes locked and Oliver knew that this man could see him. That, he thought, might be the last secret to mastering the robe Odin had gifted to him. The old god had said that cameras would still see him, so perhaps the secret was in the vigilance and intent of the watcher. A bored chauffeur, merely reacting to an unexpected sound, would catch at most an uncertain glance. Partygoers, already distracted by their hedonistic pursuits, would be oblivious to his passing unless he interrupted their dalliances. A guard, however, one who was alert on his post and prepared to carry out his duties at a moments’ notice, might still sight in on Oliver no matter how low he pulled the cowl. 

He stepped past the guard without acknowledging his presence, tottering slightly and intentionally allowing some of the champagne in his plastic flute to slosh onto the man’s black suit. If Oliver was visible to this man, he was determined to play his part to the fullest and ensure that he faded into the background of drunken revelers. 

“Allow me to take that for you,” the guard said in German, catching Oliver’s wrist and extracting the flute from his gloved fingertips in a single easy motion. “It wouldn’t do for you to spill any of that on the artifacts.” 

His eyes lingered on Oliver’s face, piercing the shadows of his hood to examine his features. Oliver drew himself upright and pawed ineffectually at the arm holding the glass. He kept his eyes drooped and did his best to not think of how easily this man had captured his drink. Oliver was no slouch in a fight himself, but he had sensed a mighty strength in the man’s grip and, judging from the speed with which he had snatched Oliver’s glass, that strength was coupled with a swiftness that Oliver could not match. 

Oliver summoned up a burp, tottered slightly, then pulled himself upright to stand as steadily as he could. He replied, “Thank you. It was getting a bit low. If you could have a fresh glass waiting when I finish in here that would be most appreciated.” With that, he turned from the guard and walked into the room, giving the best impression he could of a drunken man attempting to walk soberly. The burly guard did nothing to stop him. Oliver assumed that the guards, whoever they worked for, had been instructed to allow the partygoers to enjoy their evening unhindered, so long as they abided by some sort of liberal ruleset.

The Singer’s Hall ran the length of this wing of the castle. Four electric chandeliers, smaller than the one in the Throne Hall, but still larger than one would ever find in a home, or even most hotels or banquet halls, bathed the hall in a soft yellow glow. The golden hue was enhanced by the glitter of ten gilt candelabras standing noble sentries atop the ornate floor, which was comprised of interlocking triangles of deeply polished yellow ash boards. The walls of the hall were decorated as ornately as any of the other rooms which Oliver had visited, with colorful painted lines drawn into intricate knots sprawling across any surface not already decorated with murals, portraits, or gilded wood. When Oliver had first entered this room with the tour group, he had been mystified by the events depicted in the murals, which were starkly different from the Norse myths which adorned many of the other rooms. Only when the tour guide had said the name “Parzival” did Oliver recognize the tale unfolding around him. All around the perimeter of the Singer’s Hall were painted murals depicting the Arthurian legend of Percival and the Holy Grail. With the identity of the characters revealed, Oliver had quickly recognized the series of events depicted in livid color on the walls, which retold the German variant of the famous Grail Quest. 

Now, standing in the hall again, with only a perturbed guard, a white gloved museum attendant, and five costumed partygoers, Oliver took advantage of the moment to totter towards and examine a painting of Parzival, unhorsed and armed with only a spear, bravely confronting a knight in full plate, cloaked in a red tabard and riding a red horse with a flowing golden mane. Oliver might have felt a sort of kinship with Parzival in that moment, a lone hero in a dark robe, searching for a powerful relic, except that he couldn’t see himself as especially pure of heart. 

He was, after all, here to steal an artifact.

Oliver turned from the painting and strode towards the far end of the Singers’ Hall, where the museum attendant stood beside a tall, narrow display table covered in a white cloth, beneath a painting of Parzival looking on in wonder as the Holy Grail was displayed in the court of King Amfortas. 

Approaching the table from the side, Oliver saw a square of creamy vellum, about the size of an unfolded newspaper, scribed with short lines of painfully neat calligraphy, arranged in rectangles with narrow lines of blank page between each. About half of the lines appeared to be grouped into stanzas, with precisely drawn angular runes written above the first line of each. Around the edges of the folio, and between the blocks of neat text, were scrawled lines of darker ink in a looping German cursive.

One of the partygoers, a portly man in a studded leather doublet, trundled over to the table and leaned precariously over the folio. The attendant tensed and his eyes darted down to the man, but he remained the model of an accommodating host and did not move as the guest tottered over the table for several minutes, muttering to himself in slurred words, lips moving as he attempted to read the text. Eventually, the man looked up at the attendant and said, in slurred German, “Wagner bad handwriting.”

The attendant nodded politely. 

“And the folio, what’s the age on this thing?”

“It has been reliably dated to the fifteenth century, sir, and we believe it to be a translation of an even older text that was smuggled out of Christianized scandinavia. If you look at the...”

“Yes, yes, it’s old, but can you explain why the institute spent,” he paused, pressing a hand against his face to stifle a prodigious burp, then continued, “As I was saying, the institute spent so much money to acquire this old scrap of sheep skin.”

The attendant gave the man a thin smile and said, “The purchase was approved by the board of trustees, sir. Our director thought it a key element of the exhibit as much of Wagner’s interpretation of the Ring Cycle, and thus much of the inspiration for this castle, was drawn from this very document.”

“Are you serious?”

“Most, sir. The folio itself is a translation of an ancient legend, the plot of which is quite distinctive in the corpus of Germanic myth, though it bears some parallels to the Völsunga Saga. Do you see the cursive writing between the lines of calligraphy?”

“Of course. I’m drunk, not blind.”

“Those words are written in Wagner’s own hand and indicate that he drew inspiration for elements of Siegfried’s quest from this portion of the folio. Specifically, the notes indicate that...” The attendant trailed off as the portly man turned and tottered away in the direction of the door to the outer hall. He glanced down at the sleek steel watch on his wrist, dusted his fingertips against one another, then arranged his mouth into a neutral smile and returned to gazing at the opposite wall. 

Oliver recognized the expression of someone marking time until an unpleasant duty was complete and approached the display table wordlessly, not bothering to maintain his faux drunken shamble. The attendant continued to stare into the distance, though Oliver could not tell whether he was ignoring Oliver until he asked a question, or was unaware of his presence due to the effects of Odin’s cloak. He glanced back and saw that the guard at the door had turned his back to the room again, while the few suited and costumed partygoers were distracted with their own conversations. If he crept into one of the cluttered alcoves in the eastern corners of the room, or up the narrow steps to the balcony seats above, Oliver suspected that the robe would enable him to remain concealed until the party had ended. But if the folio was taken to a locked room, or placed in a secure display case, there was no certainty that Oliver would be able to gain access to it. He specialized in retrieving artifacts from ancient sites by outthinking ancient traps and skirting around magical wards, not in breaking into museums like a common burglar.

He backed away from the table and walked around to the side of the dais on which the table stood, then slipped past a gold encrusted candelabra and up onto the platform, placing his feet carefully for fear of creaking boards. Not that the attendant was likely to notice a board creak with the constant murmur of conversation from the groups partygoers admiring the murals and the barely audible, but pervasive thump of music from the Throne Hall. He knelt down on the dais, about ten feet behind the display table, and lowered his head within the cowl to study the grain of the floorboards as he contemplated the situation.

If he could have got away with simply photographing the folio, Oliver would have gladly done that rather than stealing it, but he could not be certain that an image would be sufficient. Oliver was not even certain why this particular document was so important, so if he wanted to unravel this mystery he would have to take some time to examine the folio in detail. Perhaps, he thought, he could pull the folio from the tabletop and slip it under his robe while standing behind the museum attendant and nobody would notice that the folio was missing until he had already made it back out into the corridor. 

A cold wind gusted through the hall, breaking Oliver’s reverie. 

“That shouldn’t happen,” he muttered, recalling the ornate glazed glass windows he had seen downstairs in the Throne Hall. 

He looked up just in time to see a dark form in tattered, billowing robes leap from the corner alcove to his left and drive the attendant to the floor with a blow from the pommel of a short sword. Light glinted from the cutting edge and from runes carved into the matte grey metal of the blade. The attendant cried out and fell to his knees, then toppled forward to the floor. The guard at the door spun, reaching under his jacket for the pistol he carried in a shoulder harness. He pointed the gun towards the figure, then hesitated, seemingly unsure whether he was facing a true threat or an elaborate scene enacted for the amusement of the party guests. The cloaked figure vaulted over the prone attendant, the dull grey metal of his sword glinting in the golden light of the hall as landed in a tumble, and came up swinging the blade in a wide arc. The guard dove back into the hall and fired twice at his assailant. The figure jerked backwards as the bullets impacted its body, then surged forward again, spewing thick black blood on the floor as it pursued the guard out into the hall.

Oliver took his chance. Leaping to his feat he grabbed the folio from the display table and flipped it closed along the worn crease lines between the blocks of lettering. He tucked the folded square of vellum, now the size of a thin paperback book, under the gray robe and into the side pocket of his khakis, then darted past the stunned guests and into a short passageway to his right. 

Another gunshot echoed through the halls, followed by a piercing scream, and Oliver dove out of the passage into the long, windowed hallway which ran parallel to the Singers’ Hall down the length of that wing of the castle. He peered back around the corner and saw the cloaked figure striding down Singers’ Hall with his sword gripped in one hand, now stained red with blood that still dripped from the familiar etching on the blade. Someone screamed and the figure turned, flicking its sword to fling a spray of red blood across the gilt walls. The screams halted, to be replaced with sobs and pathetic cries for mercy. 

Oliver turned away and ran to the oak door at the western end of the windowed side hall, praying that it was unlocked. The knob refused to turn in his hand but, breathing deeply and keeping doing his best to remain calm, Oliver examined the mechanism and located the wrought iron lever which would unlock the door.

An inhuman scream of rage echoed through the Singers’ Hall and down the passage in which Oliver stood. At the back of his mind Oliver knew that the cloaked figure had just realized that the folio was missing.

Oliver wrenched the door open and leapt through, then lost his footing in the pool of blood surrounding the dead guard, tripped over the man’s slashed body, and fell to the stone floor. Dark red blood drenched the front cloak and Oliver heard someone shout and looked up to see two more guards rounding the corner of the staircase.

“He’s got a sword!” Oliver screamed in German. He pointed towards the Singers’ Hall and stumbled to his feet. He didn’t have to pretend that he was terrified. This was his second encounter with the cloaked thief in less than a week and, unless he was mistaken, the sword that the figure had wielded was the same one which had dissolved into a silvery mist in his hands back in Munich. The guards stormed past him, one entering the hallway Oliver had just escaped through while the other halted at the doorway to the Singer’s Hall, then darted around the corner shouting threats. 

Oliver searched around him, located the dead guard’s gun, and grabbed it. Damn the consequences, he was not going to carry on another minute unarmed. He shook the sleeve of the robe down to cover his gun hand, then went down the stairs at a run, leaving bright red bootprints on the worn marble steps. In the lower hall he encountered two more guards, guns drawn and held at their sides, watching over the now closed doors to the Throne Hall. The thrumming rhythms of the music still pulsed from behind the doors, the revelers within apparently unaware of the violence that had taken place beyond the all consuming beat of the dance music. The guards shouted for Oliver to halt, but he ignored them, plunging through the small door beside the staircase and taking the spiral steps down to the lower floors of the castle as quickly as his bloodied shoes would allow. The guards shouted at him as he retreated, but did not leave their post. 

Oliver burst out of the staircase into the basement hall to find it as barren as when he had passed through it before, after leaving the waiter tied up in the bathroom. He strode down the hall, running through his options, trying to plan out the best way for him to escape the castle and make his way back to Munich. Before he reached the side corridor which lead out to the parking lot, however, the door at the far end of he hall opened, spilling the warm light and tantalizing scents of a kitchen out into the bare hallway. A man in dress uniform backed through the doorway, calling out a jovial insult to the other drivers, who sat crowded around a formica tabletop. Oliver threw himself down, skidding to a stop full-length on the floor as he yanked the hood up over his head, and prayed that the robe would still conceal him if he didn’t present the bloodied portions to an observer.

No such luck. The driver turned and shouted out in alarm at the sight of a robed man laying crumpled on the floor at the head of a streak of blood. He shouted in alarm and Oliver knew he had only seconds to react before he was mobbed by well-meaning drivers who would doubtless detain him and call for emergency services.

“This is why I prefer ruins,” he muttered. “No damn people to complicate matters.”

He tightened his grip on the gun, the warmth of the molded plastic grip lending him a modicum of confidence that he might escape, tensed his muscles, and waited until the first driver had approached to within ten feet of him. Then Oliver leapt upwards and slammed into the driver’s right shoulder, pushing him back into a spin that set him off balance and spun him around. The man was a little taller than Oliver, but he reached up and wrapped his left arm around the driver’s neck, then rammed his knee into the back of the man’s leg, driving his knees out and dropping his head down to the level of Oliver’s shoulder. He tightened his grip around the driver’s neck and leveled the gun in the direction of the other drivers as the spilled out of the kitchen door.

“Don’t move,” he shouted in German.

The nearest driver, who Oliver recognized as the woman who had nearly spotted him in the hallway as he entered the castle, slid to a stop on the stone floor. Two others collided with her from behind and she threw out her arms to keep her balance. “What do you want?” she called, pushing the other drivers back behind her towards the kitchen.

Oliver ignored her. He ducked his mouth close to the ear of the driver he had captured and muttered, “Do you have your keys?”

The man nodded. 

“I was just attacked by a business rival. I’m bleeding. Get me to a hospital without a fuss and I won’t hurt you.”

He hesitated. Oliver squeezed his neck more tightly and looked to the other drivers standing in the hallway just before the kitchen door. “I need to escape before an assassin finishes me off. Your friend will be safe if he gets me out. Don’t believe me? Send someone upstairs as soon as we’re gone. If everything hasn’t gone to hell you can come after us.” He eased up on the driver’s neck just a little and said, “Are you going to take me?”

The man nodded.

Oliver walked him forward at an awkward gait, keeping the man’s head at shoulder level so his knees stayed bent and he remained off balance and unable to fight. The other drivers backed up until all but the woman in front had retreated into the kitchen. Oliver caught a glimpse of one of them turning and running deeper into the kitchen, most likely to go up a servants’ stair to the party and report that a madman was kidnapping one of the drivers at gunpoint. They reached the passage to the outer door and Oliver began backing towards the exit, pulling the driver along more quickly now that they were out of sight, glancing back occasionally to ensure that he was not stepping into a trap.

Outside a chill wind whipped through the mountain tops, carrying with it a chill that had not been predicted by the weather forecast Oliver had viewed earlier in the evening. They reached the car, a long black Mercedes with silver trim and windows tinted black, and Oliver ordered the driver to open the driver’s side door, put the keys into the ignition, and turn the headlights on, without getting into the car.

When the driver had complied, Oliver pressed his gun into his side and whispered, “Go stand against the wall. I’ll have this pointed at your back the whole time, so don’t try to run back into the castle until I’m gone. The car will be parked along the road into town. If you wait half an hour then get a ride down there there is no need for your employer to ever know of this. You wouldn’t want him to know how willingly you gave up the car, would you?”

The driver grunted and shook his head. Oliver nudged him in the side with the muzzle of the pistol and the man stood, raised his hands above his head, and walked slowly to the stone wall, taking obvious care to move slowly and not approach the door.

Oliver waited until he had covered half the distance, then slipped quickly into the car, turned the ignition, and slammed the door shut. He wrenched the gearshift into drive and pealed out of the parking space before the driver had reached the castle wall. He took the tight turn to the castle drive as rapidly as he dared, then accelerated hard down the steep mountain road.

A cloaked figure stepped from the shadows of the castle gate. The wind whipped at its tattered black robe, obscuring the figure’s shape, but doing little to conceal the pained heaving of its chest. The moonlight illuminated the stones around it, except for in places where a dark black liquid had dripped onto the ground from the gaping wounds in the figure’s chest. It reached up and pressed the fingers of its left hand into the tattered edges of one of those wounds, wincing as torn flesh was pushed aside, then grunted as it extracted the flattened remnants of a hollow point bullet. It held up the leaden lump to inspect in the moonlight, then threw it aside into the brush. 

It looked down the roadway at the receding taillights of the car and a smile crept across its face. “Finally the seeds begin to grow,” the figure growled. “Soon I will reap what ought to have been mine so long ago.” 

It drew the tatters of the cloak around itself and slipped away into the darkness.

Next Chapter: The All Father