Outside, the night was cold and wet, but inside the rustic cottage, the curtains were drawn, and the fire burned with tender warmth. Thick fog blanketed the coast of Nordland, as it frequently did, and storms lashed the few buildings among the bogs and marshes. A father and son were playing chess, the former putting his king into such intense and easily avoidable dangers that it even incited observation from the white-haired old woman weaving calmly by the fire.

“Listen to the wind,” said Johann Weiss, who, having seen a mortal error in his strategy after it was too late, remained hopeful of thwarting his son, Heinrich, from spotting it.

“I heard it,” said Heinrich, closely studying the arrangement of the pieces on the board as he stretched out his hand and stroked his hairless chin. “Check.”

“I doubt he’s coming,” said his father, with his hand hovering over the board.

“Mate,” replied the son.

“That’s the worst part of living out here!” roared Johann, launching into an impromptu rant. “Of all the awful, swampy, desolate places to live in, this is the worst. The road, if you can call it that, is a disgrace. I suppose because only two houses on it are occupied, they think it doesn’t matter.”

“Never mind, dear,” said his wife, Hilda, comfortingly. “Perhaps you’ll win the next one.”

Johann looked up abruptly, just in time to capture an expressive look between mother and son. He swallowed the words in his throat, and he hid a embarrassed smile in his thin grey beard.

Suddenly, the gate banged loudly, and heavy footsteps came toward the door. “There he is,” said Heinrich with restrained excitement.

The old man rose with eager alacrity, and opening the door, was heard commiserating with the new arrival. The guest also commiserated with himself, so that Hilda said, “Tut, tut!” and coughed lightly as her husband returned, followed by a large muscular man, his cheeks flushed red and his eyes glassy.

“Sergeant Heller,” Johann said, introducing the guest.

The sergeant shook hands, and taking the proffered seat by the fire, watched contentedly while his hosts served him several cups of ale drawn from a keg in the kitchen in the hopes of warming him up from the elements.

After the third cup he became much more animated, and he began to share his war stories, the small family regarding with great curiosity these tales of adventure, so different from their sleepy country life. As he squared his broad shoulders in the chair, the sergeant spoke of his service in a mercenary band hired to guard against raids by Norscan marauders. In his gruff and artless way, he talked of strange scenes and nightmarish monsters, of repulsive plagues and hideous mutants.

“Twenty-one years of it,” said Johann, nodding at his wife and son. “When we were boys, he was just a scrawny lad, not much to look at. Now look at him.”

“He doesn’t have too many scars,” said Hilda, politely.

“I’d like to square off against a Norscan berserker myself,” said the old man, deep in his cups as well.

“You’re better off not,” said the sergeant, shaking his head. He put down his empty cup, and sighing softly, shook it again.

“I never saw much action in the town watch,” admitted the old man. “What was that you started telling me the other day about a talisman or something, Heller?”

“Nothing,” said the mercenary hastily. “Anyways, nothing worth hearing.”

“A talisman?” said Hilda curiously.

“Well, it’s just a bit of what you might call magic, perhaps,” said the sergeant off-handedly.

His three listeners grew closer to him, leaning forward in their seats with wide eyes and open ears. The sergeant inattentively put his empty cup to his lips before setting it down again. His host filled it for him.

“To look at,” said the sergeant, groping in his pocket, “it’s just a normal little amethyst pendant.”

He took something out of his pocket and offered it. Hilda drew back with apprehension, but her son, taking it, inspected it interestedly.

“So, what is special about it?” asked Johann, as he took it from his son and, having scrutinized it, placed it on the table.

“Rumor has it, it belonged to some zealot who worshiped a raven god,” said the sergeant, “a very evil man. He wanted to show that fate ruled people’s lives, and that those who interfered with it did so to their grief. He put a spell on it so that three different men could each have three wishes from it.”

His demeanor was so grave that his audience was mindful that their scoffing laughter offended him slightly.

“Well, why don’t you have three, sir?” asked Heinrich smugly.

The mercenary regarded him in the way that old veterans are liable to respond to insolent youth. “I have,” he said gently, and his mottled face turned ashen.

“And did you really have the three wishes granted?” asked Hilda.

“I did,” said the sergeant, and the rim of his cup tapped against his strong teeth.

“And has anybody else wished?” inquired the old woman.

“The first man had his three wishes, yes,” was the answer. “I don’t know what the first two were, but the third was for death. That’s how I got the pendant.”

He spoke with such grim earnestness that a silence fell upon the group.

“If you’ve had your three wishes, it’s no use to you now, then, Heller,” said the old man at last. “Why do you keep it?”

The mercenary shrugged. “As a reminder, I guess,” he said after a pause.

“If the talisman could give you three more wishes,” said the old man, watching him closely, “would you have them?”

“I don’t know,” said the mercenary. “I don’t know.”

He took the pendant, and dangling it between his front finger and thumb, suddenly threw it upon the fire. Johann, with a slight cry, stooped down and snatched it off.

“Better let it melt,” said the mercenary lugubriously.

“If you don’t want it, Heller,” said the old man, “give it to me.”

“I won’t,” said his childhood friend assertively. “I tried to destroy it. If you must have it, what happens next is on you. Take my advice: throw it in the fire or throw it in the ocean. You are better off being rid of it.”

Johann tilted his head as he turned the pendant over in his hand. “How does it work?” he asked.

“Hold it up in your right hand and wish aloud,” said the sergeant with a sigh, “but I warn you of the consequences.”

“Sounds like something out of stories,” said Hilda, as she stood and started to set the table for dinner. “Don’t you think you might wish for four pairs of hands for me?”

Her husband drew the talisman from his pocket and then all three erupted into laughter as the sergeant, with terrified panic on his face, caught him by the arm.

“If you must wish,” he said grumpily, “wish for something sensible.”

Johann dropped it back into his pocket, and standing to his feet, motioned for the sergeant to join them at the dinner table. As they ate a meat and vegetable stew, they gradually forgot about the talisman, and afterward the three Weiss family members listened engrossed to more episodes from the mercenary’s life as a soldier-of-fortune.

“If the tale about the amethyst pendant is not more truthful than those he has been telling us,” said Heinrich, as the door closed behind their guest, just in time for him to catch the last carriage to Salzenmund, “then we shouldn’t be bothered by it.”

“Did you give him anything for it, father?” asked Hilda, a premature look of disapproval on her face.

“Just a few shillings,” he replied, blushing somewhat. “He didn’t want them, but I made him take it. And he advised me again to destroy it.”

“Of course he did,” said Heinrich, with mock dread. “Why, we’re going to be wealthy, and renowned, and content. Wish to be the Emperor, father, to begin with; then you can’t be henpecked.”

He darted round the table, pursued by the maligned Hilda, ready to take her son across her lap once again and wallop his backside.

Johann grinned and took the pendant from his pocket. He eyed it uncertainly. “Honestly, I don’t know what to wish for,” he said. “It seems to me I’ve got all I want.”

—

“If you only paid off all your debts, you’d be quite happy, wouldn’t you?” said Heinrich, with his hand on father’s shoulder. “Well, wish for two hundred gold crowns, then; that’ll just do it.”

His father, smiling awkwardly at his own gullibility, held up the talisman, as his son, with a sincere expression somewhat spoiled by a twinkling wink at his mother, sat down by the fire and started to hum an old song about Magnus the Pious.

“I wish for two hundred gold crowns,” said the old man under his breath.

A surge of flames from the fireplace greeted the words, interrupted by a shuddering cry from the old man. His wife and son ran toward him.

“It spoke,” he cried, with a glance of disgust at the pendant as it lay on the floor. “As I wished it whispered in some dark language in my mind.”

“Well, I don’t see the crowns,” said his son, as he picked it up and placed it on the table, “and I reckon we never will.”

“You must have imagined it, Johann,” said his wife, regarding him with concern.

He shook his head. “It’s no matter. There’s no harm done, but it gave me a shock all the same.”

They sat down by the fire again while the two men smoked their pipes. Outside, the wind was higher than ever, and the old man jerked fretfully at a door banging upstairs. A stillness rare and discouraging settled upon all three, which continued until Johann and Hilda rose to retire for the night.

“I expect you’ll find the crowns tied up in a big bag in the middle of your bed,” said Heinrich, as he wished them pleasant dreams, “and a pink horror squatting up on top of the wardrobe watching you as you pocket your ill-gotten gains.”

Heinrich sat alone in the darkness, gazing at the fading fire, and seeing faces in it. The last face was so horrifying and so avian that he gazed at it in amazement. He saw a figure with long gangly limbs and neck, covered in iridescent plumage. It wore a wizards’ raiment of a bejewelled robe, and carried in a clawed hand a staff adorned with the iconography of ravens. It got so vivid that, with a little uneasy laugh, he felt on the table for a cup containing some ale to throw over it. His hand grasped the talisman, and with a little shiver he wiped his hand on his coat and went up to bed.

—

In the brightness of the wintry sun next morning, Heinrich laughed at his fears. There was an aura of simplistic country life about the room which it had lacked on the previous night, and the small, purple little pendant was pitched on the sideboard with a inattentiveness which suggested no great interest or concern in its power.

“I suppose all old mercenaries are the same,” said Hilda. “The idea of our listening to such nonsense! I’ve heard many stories, but the idea of a talisman granting wishes? And even if it was true, how could two hundred gold crowns hurt you, father?”

“Might drop on his head from the sky,” said the playful Heinrich.

“Heller said the wishes came true naturally, even if the talisman is supernatural,” said his father, “so that they could be confused with coincidence.”

“Well, don’t break into the gold before I come back from work,” said Heinrich, as he rose from the table. “I’m afraid it’ll turn you into a mean, avaricious man, and we shall have to disown you.”

His mother giggled, and following him to the door, observed him walk down the road, before returning to the dining table, amused at the expense of her husband’s naïveté. All of which did not prevent her from scurrying to the door at a knock on the door, nor prevent her from referring somewhat rudely to mercenary soldiers with a taste for drink when she found that the person at the door had a bill from the butcher.

“Heinrich will have some more of his funny remarks, I expect, when he comes home,” she said, as the day gave way to early evening.

“I swear to Sigmar,” said Johann, pouring himself out some ale, “I heard a voice when I held the thing in my hand.”

“You thought you heard it,” said the old woman softly.

“I heard it,” insisted Johann. “I heard it as clear as I hear you now. I had just… What’s the matter?”

His wife did not answer. She was watching the enigmatic movements of a man outside, who, gazing in an unsure manner at the cottage, appeared to be trying to decide whether to enter. Suddenly thinking of the two hundred gold crowns, she noticed that the stranger wore a buttoned shirt and jacket made from fine material underneath an expensive woolen cloak. Three times he stopped at the gate, and then walked on again. The fourth time he stood with his hand on it, and then with rapid determination flung it open and strode up the path. Hilda at the same time placed her hands behind her, and unfastening the strings of her apron, shoved it beneath the cushion of her chair.

She brought the well-dressed stranger, who seemed very uncomfortable, into the room. He looked at her with side glances, and sat silently in a preoccupied fashion as the old woman asked forgiveness for the condition of the room, and her husband’s coat, a garment which he usually reserved for the garden. She then waited patiently for him to submit the reason for his visit, but he was at first oddly quiet.

“I… was asked to call,” he said at last, and stooped and picked a piece of lint from his cloak. “I come on behalf of the burgomeister. There was an accident at the docks.”

The old woman jolted upright. “Is anything the matter?” she asked breathlessly. “Has anything happened to Heinrich? What is it? What is it?”

Her husband interrupted. “There, there, Hilda,” he said hurriedly. “Sit down, and don’t jump to conclusions. You’ve not brought bad news, I’m sure, sir,” and he watched the stranger pensively.

“I’m sorry…” began the visitor.

“Is he hurt?” demanded the mother.

The visitor lowered his head in acquiescence. “Badly hurt,” he said softly, “but he is not in any pain.”

“Oh, thank Sigmar!” said the old woman, clasping her hands. “Thank Sigmar for that!”

She broke off suddenly as the ominous connotation of the answer dawned upon her and she saw the dreadful validation of her fears in the stranger’s averted face. She caught her breath, and turning to Johann, placed her quivering old hand upon his. There was a long hush.

“He fell into the waters while unloading cargo,” said the visitor at length, in a soft voice.

“Fell into the waters,” repeated Johann, in a stunned fashion, “yes.” He sat gaping vacantly out the window, and grasping his wife’s hand between his own, squeezed it as he liked to do in their old courting days four decades before.

“He was the only one left to us,” he said, turning gently to the visitor. “It is hard.”

The stranger cleared his throat as he stood, transitioning into the business part of his visit. “The burgomeister wished me to convey his sincere sympathy with you in your great loss,” he said, without looking round. “I beg that you will understand I am only his servant and merely obeying orders.”

There was no reply. The old woman’s face was white, her eyes staring, and her breath inaudible. On Johann’s face was a look such as his friend the sergeant might have carried into his first deployment against a horde of Norscan raiders.

“I was to say that the burgomeister and the Merchant Guild deny all responsibility,” continued the stranger. “They admit no obligation at all, but in reflection of your son’s loyal service at the docks, they wish to offer you a humble sum as recompense.”

Johann dropped his wife’s hand, and rising to his feet, stared with a dreadful aspect at the well-dressed man. His mouth, starched dry, shaped the words, “How much?”

“Two hundred gold crowns,” was the matter-of-fact answer.

Hearing his wife’s scream, Johann grinned feebly, extended his hands like a blind man, and fell to the floor in a dazed trance.

—

In a huge cemetery at the nearest temple of Sigmar, some two miles distant, the old couple buried their dead son, and came back to a cottage pervasive with shadow and silence. It was all over so speedily that at first, they could scarcely comprehend it, and continued in a state of anticipation for some mysterious subsequent event – something else which was to ease this load, too substantial for old hearts to tolerate.

But life went on, and anticipation gave place to acceptance – the despairing resignation of the old, sometimes mistakenly labeled lethargy. Sometimes they barely traded words, for now their lives with empty and incomplete, and their days were despondent.

It was about a week after that that Johann, waking suddenly in the night, stretched out his hand and found himself alone. The room was in darkness, and the sound of subdued weeping came from the window. He raised himself in bed and listened.

“Come back,” he said sympathetically. “You will be cold.”

“It is colder for my son,” said the old woman, and sobbed anew.

The sound of her tears died away on his ears. The bed was warm, and his eyes heavy with sleep. He slept restlessly, until a unexpected desolate call from his wife awoke him with a jump.

“The pendant!” she cried madly. “The talisman!”

He started up in fright. “Where? Where is it? What’s the matter?”

She came faltering across the room toward him. “I want it,” she said quietly. “You’ve not destroyed it?”

“It’s downstairs, on the fireplace mantel,” he replied, gaping. “Why?”

She wept and chuckled at once, and bending over, kissed his cheek.

“I only just thought of it!” she said uproariously. “Why didn’t I think of it before? Why didn’t you think of it?”

“Think of what?” he asked.

“The other two wishes,” she responded quickly. “We’ve only had one!”

“Was not that enough?” he demanded aggressively.

“No!” she cried, exultantly. “We’ll have one more! Go down and get it quickly, and wish our boy alive again!”

The man sat up in bed and threw the sheets from his shuddering limbs. “By Sigmar, you are insane!” he cried horrorstruck.

“Get it,” she gasped. “Get it quickly, and wish! Oh, my boy, my boy!”

Her husband grabbed a candle from the bedside table. “Get back to bed,” he said, his voice tremulous. “You don’t know what you are saying.”

“We had the first wish granted,” said the old woman, agitatedly. “Why not the second?”

“A c-c-coincidence,” stuttered the old man.

“Go and get it and wish!” cried the old woman, shaking with excitement.

Johann turned and looked at her, his eyes welling with water. “He has been dead ten days, and besides he… I don’t want to mention it… We could only recognize him by his clothing. If he was too terrible for you to see at his funeral, why now?”

“Bring him back!” cried the old woman, and dragged him toward the door. “Do you think I fear the child I have nursed?”

He went down the stairs in the darkness, and felt his way through the living room, and then to the mantelpiece. The talisman was in its place, and a horrible fear that the unspoken wish might bring his mutilated son before him ere he could escape from the room seized upon him, and he caught his breath as he found that he had lost the direction of the door. His brow cold with sweat, he felt his way round the table, and groped along the wall until he found himself in the small passage with the unwholesome thing in his hand.

Even his wife’s face seemed changed as he entered the room. It was white and expectant, and to his fears seemed to have an unnatural look upon it. He was afraid of her.

“Wish!” she cried, in a strong voice.

“It is foolish and wicked,” he faltered.

“Wish!” repeated his wife.

He raised his hand. “I wish my son alive again.”

The talisman fell to the floor, and he regarded it fearfully. Then he sank trembling into a chair as the old woman, with burning eyes, walked to the window and opened the curtains.

He sat until he was chilled with the cold, glancing occasionally at the figure of the old woman peering through the window. The candle end, which had burnt below the rim of the candlestick, was throwing pulsating shadows on the ceiling and walls, until, with a flicker larger than the rest, it expired. The old man, with an unspeakable sense of relief at the failure of the talisman, crept back to his bed, and a minute or two afterward the old woman came silently and apathetically beside him.

Neither spoke, but both lay silently listening to gusts of wind outside. A stair creaked, and a squeaky mouse scurried noisily through the wall. After lying for some time screwing up his courage, Johann raised from his bed, fumbled through the darkness to the stairway, and then descended the stairs again to visit the kitchen.

At the foot of the stairs the candles downstairs all blew out with one gust of wind, even though the door and windows were closed. As he stood stunned in pitch blackness, Johann heard a knock, so quiet and stealthy as to be scarcely audible, on the front door. He stood motionless, his breath suspended until the knock was repeated. Then he turned and fled swiftly back to his room, and closed the door behind him. A third knock sounded through the cottage.

“What’s that?” cried the old woman, starting up.

“A rat,” said the old man, in shaking tones “It’s a rat. It passed me on the stairs.”

His wife sat up in bed listening. A loud knock resounded through the house.

“It’s Heinrich!” she screamed. “It’s Heinrich!”

She ran to the door, but her husband was before her, and catching her by the arm, held her tightly.

“What are you going to do?” he whispered hoarsely.

“It’s my boy! It’s Heinrich!” she cried, struggling mechanically. “I forgot it was two miles away. What are you holding me for? Let go. I must open the door.”

“For sake of Sigmar, don’t let it in!” cried the old man trembling.

“You’re afraid of your own son!” she cried, struggling. “Let me go. I’m coming, Heinrich! I’m coming!”

There was another knock, and another. The old woman with a sudden wrench broke free and ran from the room. Her husband followed to the top of the stairs, and called after her appealingly as she hurried downwards. He heard the rusty knob turn and a yanking on the wood, but the flimsy iron lock kept the door locked. Then came the old woman’s voice, strained and panting.

“The key! The key!” she cried loudly. “I must find the key!”

But her husband was on his hands and knees groping wildly on the floor in search of the pendant. If he could only find it before the thing outside got in. A perfect fusillade of knocks reverberated through the house, and he heard his wife pulling open drawers in search of the key. Finally, he heard the scraping of metal against metal as his wife struggled to gain the composure to unlock the door. At the same moment he found the talisman, and frantically breathed his third and last wish.

The knocking ceased suddenly, although the echoes of it were still in the cottage. He heard the lock open followed by the door. A cold wind rushed up the staircase, and a long loud wail of disappointment and misery from his wife gave him courage to run down to her side, and then to the gate beyond. Beams from the twin moons, Mannslieb and Morrslieb, shone down on an empty and deserted road.