THE VOSS PAPERS
The Alte Brücke and the Marienberg fortress above the Main, barges and sailing vessels on the river below.

Würzburg

Franconia, 1815. This is the scene Hagan saw when he departed. A university town, a fortress on the hill, three inns worth knowing, and a woman who had a reason for him to return.

The Franconian Rake, a red and white shield charged with three red points.

Places & People

A whitewashed stone Bildstock at a crossroads, a statue of the Virgin in its niche, fresh flowers at the base, dated 1796.

The 1796 Bildstock

Roadside shrines, whitewashed and carefully tended, marking a battle nobody in the fields seems inclined to discuss.
A market street in old Würzburg, the Weisser Schwann sign hanging over the cobbles.

The Three Inn Signs

A black eagle, a Bavarian crested helmet, and a white swan nobody has bothered to paint.
The Raupenhelm's half-timbered exterior, flower boxes at every window, the painted inn sign hanging by the door.

The Raupenhelm

A quiet inn across the bridge from the fortress, well kept in a way that tells you something about the proprietor before you've crossed the threshold.
The Alte Brücke and the Marienberg fortress above the Main, barges and sailing vessels on the river below.

The Alte Brücke

Seven hundred years of the Main's trade, funneled through one crossing that has outlasted every army that ever marched over it.
Anna, blonde hair, carrying two beers, the Alte Brücke and Marienberg fortress visible behind her in the lane.

Anna

Widowed at Polotsk, recruited into a network a century older than the war that made her useful to it.
A dark cobblestone lane at night, one working lamppost, a couple in shadow near the stone tower, a group of men drinking further down the alley.

The Alley in the Shadows

The western approach. Fewer lampposts. Three of them dark, and have been for a month.
An older nun in a white wimple and crucifix stands in a moonlit orchard holding a burning stick.

The Last Hexenkommissar

A ghost story told by Ox. Nine loads of wood, a tenth, and a man whose name nobody remembers.
A 1930s touring map of the Main valley

Targeted Affair

A short story from the archive. Dr. Fraser-MacDonald, a woman from Schweinfurt, and a valley he once wrote a whole book about.