Tyrion looked at the council, his eyes blazing with a heat equal to that which marked the runes on his sword. ‘You will cease your nattering. You will take up blade and bow as befitting lords of Ulthuan, and marshal your forces to defend the Ten Kingdoms. Any who wish to quarrel further can take up their argument with the edge of my sword and see what it profits you.’
Imrik shot to his feet and slammed his fist down on the table. ‘How dare you?’ the Dragon Prince roared. ‘What gives you the right to speak to this august council in such a disrespectful manner? We are your betters, whelp! Who are you to demand anything of us?’
Tyrion smiled humourlessly. ‘Who am I? I am the Herald of Asuryan, and of the Phoenix King, in whose names I would dare anything. That is all the right I require.’ He pointed Sunfang at Imrik and asked, ‘Unless you disagree?’
Imrik’s pale features tightened and his lean body quivered with barely restrained rage. ‘I do,’ he hissed. He circled the table and strode past Tyrion. ‘Strike me down if you dare, boy, but I’ll not stay here and be barked at by you.’
Tyrion did not turn as Imrik stalked past him. ‘If you leave, prince of Caledor, then do not expect to be included in our councils of war. Caledor will stand alone,’ he said harshly.
Imrik stopped. Eltharion saw his eyes close, as if he were in pain. Then, his voice ragged, he said, ‘Then Caledor stands alone.’ Imrik left the chamber without another word. No one tried to stop him. The remaining council-members whispered quietly amongst themselves. Eltharion looked at them and frowned. Already, they were plotting. Imrik’s star had been in the ascendancy, and now it had plummeted to earth. Those who had supported him were revising their positions as those who had been arrayed against him moved to shore up their influence. None of them seemed to grasp the full extent of the situation. He saw Tyrion looking at him. The latter crooked a finger and Eltharion and Eldyra moved to join him.
‘Thank you for watching my back,’ Tyrion said quietly. ‘But now that the council has been tamed, I need you two to do as you promised. Make ready, gather what you need for the expedition, and set sail as soon as possible.’ His composure evaporated as he spoke, and his words became ragged. Eltharion could see just how much it was costing his friend to stay in Ulthuan. There was pain in his eyes and in his voice such as Eltharion had never seen.
‘You have my oath as Warden of Tor Yvresse,’ Eltharion said softly. He hesitated, and then placed a hand on his friend’s shoulder. He looked at Eldyra, who nodded fiercely. ‘We shall rescue Aliathra, or we will die trying.’
La Maisontaal Abbey, Bretonnia
The three men descended down the dank, circular stone steps, following the woman. She held a crackling torch in one hand, and its light cast weird shadows on the stone walls of the catacombs. ‘The abbey was built to contain that which I am about to show you,’ the woman said, her voice carrying easily, despite the softness with which she spoke. ‘Rites and rituals went into the placement of every stone and every slather of mortar to make this place a fitting cage for what is imprisoned here. And so it has remained, for hundreds of years.’
‘But now?’ one of the men asked. They reached the bottom of the stairs and came to a vaulted chamber, which was empty save for a wide, squat stone sarcophagus the likes of which none of the men had ever seen. It had been marked with mystical signs, and great iron chains crossed it, as if to keep whatever was within it trapped. The woman lifted her torch and let its light play across the sarcophagus.
‘Now, I fear, we are coming to the end of its captivity. Something is loose in the world, a red wind that carries with it the promise of a slaughter undreamt of by even the most monstrous of creatures that infest our poor, tired land. Or those of its greatest heroes, Tancred of Quenelles.’
‘This is what he was after,’ Tancred, Duke of Quenelles, said staring at the stone sarcophagus. His breath plumed in the damp, chill air. Part of him yearned to touch the sarcophagus, while a greater part surged in revulsion at the thought. The thing that lay inside seemed to draw everything towards it, as though it weighed more than the world around it. Tancred felt the weight of his years settle more heavily than ever before on his broad shoulders. ‘This is what Arkhan the Black was after, then, my Lady Elynesse?’
‘Perhaps,’ Lady Elynesse, Dowager of Charnorte, said. Her voice was soft, but not hesitant. She was older than even Tancred, whose hair and beard had long since lost the lustre of youth, though her face was unlined and unmarred by time. ‘Such a creature weaves schemes within schemes, and concocts plots with every day it yet remains unburied.’ She held her torch higher and circled the sarcophagus. ‘This could be but one goal amongst many.’
‘What is it?’ one of the others asked. His hands were clamped tightly around the hilt of his blade. Tancred wondered whether the other knight felt the same pull towards the sarcophagus as he did. Though Fastric Ghoulslayer was a native of Bordeleaux, he had shed blood beside Tancred and the third knight, Anthelme of Austray, in defence of Quenelles in the civil war. The Ghoulslayer was a warrior of renown and commanded a skylance of Pegasus knights, and there were few whom Tancred trusted more.
‘Whatever it is, I’d just as soon it stays in there,’ Anthelme said nervously.
‘And so it shall, if we have anything to say about it,’ Tancred said, looking at his cousin. Anthelme, like Fastric, was a trusted companion, even beyond the bounds of blood. There were none better with a lance or blade in Tancred’s opinion. ‘Our kingdom lies broken and bleeding, and the one who struck that blow will return to capitalise on our weakness. The Dowager has seen as much. Arkhan the Black wanted this sarcophagus and its contents, even as the Lichemaster did in decades past. But we shall see to it that La Maisontaal’s burden remains here, in these tombs, even if we must die to do so.’
‘But surely whatever is in here is no danger to us? The true king has returned. Gilles le Breton sits once more upon the throne of Bretonnia, and the civil war is over. We have passed through the darkest of times and come out the other side,’ Anthelme said. Those sentiments were shared by many, Tancred knew. When Louen Leoncouer had been felled at the Battle of Quenelles by his treacherous bastard son, many, including Tancred, had thought that the kingdom’s time was done.
Then had come Couronne, and Mallobaude’s last challenge. The Serpent had challenged the greatest knights in the land on Quenelles, Gisoreux, Adelaix and a hundred more battlefields, and had emerged victorious every time. But at Couronne, it was no mortal who answered his challenge; instead, the legendary Green Knight had ridden out of the ranks, appearing as if from nowhere, and had met Mallobaude on the field between the armies of the living and the dead. In the aftermath, when the surviving dukes and lords inevitably began to turn their thoughts to the vacant throne, the Green Knight had torn his emerald helm from his head and revealed himself to be none other than Gilles le Breton, the founder of the realm, come back to lead his people in their darkest hour. The problem was, as far as Tancred could tell, the darkest hour hadn’t yet passed. In fact, it appeared that Mallobaude’s rebellion had only been the beginning of Bretonnia’s ruination, the return of the once and future king or not.
‘And so? Daemons still stalk our lands, and monsters burn the vineyards and villages. Mallobaude might have lost his head, but he wasn’t the only traitor. Quenelles is in ruins, as are half of the other provinces, and home to two-legged beasts. Bordeleaux is gone, replaced by a daemonic keep of brass and bone that even now blights the surrounding lands. No, we are in the eye of the storm, cousin. The false calm, before its fury strikes again, redoubled and renewed. I fear that things will get much, much worse before it passes,’ Tancred said firmly. He looked around. ‘Come, I would leave this place.’
He led them back up the stairs and out of the abbey, ignoring the huddled masses of peasants, who genuflected and murmured respectful greetings. More and more of them came every day, seeking the dubious sanctuary of the abbey’s walls as the forests seethed with beasts and the restless dead,
and the sky blazed with blue fire or was split by the fiery passage of warpstone meteors.
As they got outside, Tancred gulped the fresh, cold air. It was a relief, after the damp unpleasantness of the catacombs, and the close air of the abbey, redolent with the odour of the lower classes. He looked about him. His father, the first to bear the name of Tancred, had funded the fortifying of the abbey in the wake of the Lichemaster’s infamous assault some thirty years earlier. The Eleventh Battle of La Maisontaal Abbey had been a pivotal moment in both the history of his family and Bretonnia as a whole.
The fortifications weren’t as grand as Tancred’s father had dreamed, but they were serviceable enough. There were garrison quarters, housing hundreds of archers and men-at-arms, as well as scores of knights, drawn from every corner of Bretonnia. The abbey sat in the centre of an army.
Somehow, he doubted that would be enough.
He turned as he heard a loud voice bellow a greeting. The broad, burly form of Duke Theoderic of Brionne ambled towards him, his battle-axe resting on his shoulder. ‘Ho, Tancred! They told me you were slinking about. Come to inspect the troops, eh?’ Theoderic had a voice that could stun one of the great bats that haunted the Vaults at twenty paces. He was also the commander of the muster of La Maisontaal. He’d come to the abbey seeking penance for a life of lechery, drunkenness and other assorted unchivalric behaviours, and had, according to most, more than made up for his past as a sozzle-wit.
They clasped forearms, and Tancred winced as Theoderic drew him into a bear hug. ‘I see that the Lady Elynesse is here as well,’ he murmured as he released Tancred. He jerked his chin towards the Dowager, who swept past them towards her waiting carriage. She had come to show them what was hidden. Now, having done so, she was leaving as quickly as possible. Tancred couldn’t blame her. Lacking even the tiniest inclination to sorcery, he could still feel the spiritual grime of the thing that lurked in the depths of the abbey. He could only imagine what it must be like for a true servant of the Lady. ‘Has she foreseen trouble for us?’
‘Arkhan the Black,’ Tancred said.
‘I thought we sent him packing, didn’t we?’ Theoderic grunted.
‘Do such creatures ever stay gone for as long as we might wish?’
‘Ha! You have me there. Never fear, though – if he comes, we’ll be ready for him,’ Theoderic said, cradling his axe in the crook of his arm. ‘Some of the greatest heroes of our fair kingdom are here. Gioffre of Anglaron, the slayer of the dragon Scaramor, Taurin the Wanderer, dozens of others. Knights of the realm, one and all. A truer gathering of heroes has never been seen in these lands, save at the court of the king himself!’
Tancred looked at Theoderic’s beaming features and gave a half-hearted nod. ‘Let’s pray to the Lady that will be enough,’ he said.
Somewhere south of Quenelles, Bretonnia
The voices of the Dark Gods thundered in his ears and Malagor brayed in pleasure as his muscles swelled with strength. He snapped the gor chieftain’s neck with a single, vicious jerk, and snorted as he sent the body thudding to the loamy earth. He spread his arms and his great, black pinioned wings snapped out to their full length. Then, he looked about him at the gathered chieftains. ‘Split-Hoof challenged. Split-Hoof died. Who else challenges the Crowfather?’ he bellowed. ‘Who else challenges the word of the gods?’
None of the remaining chieftains stepped forward. In truth, Split-Hoof hadn’t so much challenged him as he had voiced a concern, but Malagor saw little difference between dissension and discomfort. Neither was acceptable. The gods had commanded, and their children would obey, whether they were inclined to do so or not. He snarled and pawed the ground with a hoof, glaring about him to ram the point home. Only when the chieftains looked sufficiently cowed did he allow them to look away from him. They wouldn’t stay cowed for long, he knew. The children of Chaos did not have it in them to be docile, even when it served the gods’ purpose. In their veins was the blood of the gods and it was ever angry and ambitious. Soon, another chieftain would voice dissent, and he would have to fight again.
His goatish lips peeled back from yellowed fangs. Malagor looked forward to such challenges. Without them, there was no joy in life. Taking the life of an enemy with the sorceries that hummed in his bones was satisfying, in its way, but there was no substitute for feeling bone crack and splinter in his grip, or tasting the flesh and blood of an opponent.
Malagor folded his wings and looked about him as he idly stroked the symbols of blasphemy that hung from his matted mane and leather harness. Icons plucked from the bodies of human priests dangled beside twists of paper torn from their holy books, all of them stained and soiled and consecrated to the gods, who even now whispered endearments to him as he pondered his next move.
The forest clearing around him echoed with the raucous rumble of savage anarchy. Beastmen yelped and howled as they danced to the sound of drums and fought about the great witch-fires, which burned throughout the clearing. All of this beneath the glistening gaze of the titanic monolith that had sprouted from the churned earth months earlier. The strange black stone was shot through by jagged veins of sickly, softly glimmering green, and it pulsed in time to the thudding of the drums.
Ever since the dark moon had waxed full in the sky, and the great herdstones had risen from their slumber beneath the ground, so too had the voices of the gods hummed in his mind, stronger than ever before. And they had had much to say to their favoured child. They had demanded that he join the beast-tribes south of the Grey Mountains, and lead them into war with a man of bone and black sorcery. But his fractious kin had been preoccupied with battling their hated enemies, the wood elves.
It had taken Malagor months to browbeat, bully and brutalise a number of tribes and herds into following him into the war-ravaged provinces of Bretonnia, only to find that his prey had already slipped over the mountains and into the north. But all was not lost. The gods had murmured that Arkhan would return. And that he would fall in Bretonnia. That was their command and their promise. The skeins of fate were pulled taut about the dead man, and there would be no escape for him again.
‘The Bone-Man must die,’ Malagor bellowed. ‘The gods command it! Death to the dead! Gnaw their bones and suck the marrow!’
‘Gnaw his bones,’ a chieftain roared, shaking his crude blade over his horned head. Others took up the chant, one by one, and soon every beast in the clearing had added its voice to the cacophony.
Malagor’s muscles bunched and he thrust himself into the air. His black wings flapped, catching the wind, causing the witch-fires to flicker, and bowling over the smaller beastmen. He screamed at the sky as he rose, adding his howls to those of his kin.
The liche would die, even if Malagor had to sacrifice every beastman on this side of the Grey Mountains to accomplish it. The Dark Gods demanded it, and Malagor was their word made flesh. He was the black edge of their blade, the tip of their tongue and their will made into harsh reality. He flapped his wings and rose high over the trees. Overhead the sky wept green tears and crawled with hideous shapes, and Malagor felt the blessings of his gods fill him with divine purpose. He roared again, this time in triumph.
Arkhan the Black would die.
Near the King’s Glade, Athel Loren
The gor squealed and staggered back, grasping at its sliced belly with blood-slick paws. Araloth, Lord of Talsyn, darted forward to deliver the deathblow before the beast recovered. The ravaged glade rang with the sound of blade on blade, and the death-cries of elves and beasts. Blood, both pure and foul, turned the churned soil beneath his feet to mud.
A shadow fell over him, while his sword sent the beastman’s brutish head spinning from its thick neck. Araloth glanced up and saw a minotaur raising its axe over him, its bestial jaws dripping with bloody froth as it gnashed its fangs. Its eyes bulged from their sockets, and it whined and lowed in mindless greed. The minotaur stumped forward, reaching for him with its free hand. He tensed, ready to leap aside, a prayer to Lil
eath on his lips.
Then a second, equally massive shape slammed into the bull-headed giant from the side, bearing it to the ground. The two enormous figures ploughed through the fray that swirled about them, scattering elves and beasts alike as they smashed through the trees of the blood-soaked glade. Araloth could only watch in awe as Orion, the King in the Woods, rose over the fallen minotaur, a hand gripping one of its horns.
Orion dragged the dazed beast to its feet and locked his arm about its throat. He grabbed its horns and threw his weight to the side. The glade echoed with the crack of crude, Chaos-twisted bone, and then Orion threw down his opponent and let out a roar of victory that caused the trees to shiver where they stood.
The beastmen began to retreat, streaming back the way they had come, first in ones and twos, and then in a mad panic, bellowing and braying in fear. Orion put his horn to his lips and sounded a long, wailing note. Glade Riders galloped off in pursuit of their fleeing enemies. Orion met Araloth’s gaze for only a moment, before turning away and loping after his huntsmen. Araloth shivered and sheathed his blade.
There had been nothing but rage in his king’s eyes. Even sorrow had been burned away, and reason with it. Only the battle-madness remained.
Despite his fear, Araloth could find no fault in that. Ariel was dying, and the forest with her, and there was nothing Orion or anyone could do. He understood the king’s rage better than most, for was he not the queen’s champion? ‘Much good I did her,’ he murmured, looking about him. Every muscle in his body ached, and his hands trembled with fatigue. He had been fighting for days on end, trying to drive back this latest assault on the deep glades of the forest.
The source of the sickness that afflicted the Mage Queen was not readily apparent, but in its wake came a rot on the boughs of the Oak of Ages, and then a sickness that spread through the forest, twisting and tainting everything. Glades that had gone unaffected by the shifting seasons since the first turning of the world now withered, the trees cracking and splitting, their roots blistering and turning black as the forest floor heaved with decay. Madness swept through the ranks of the dryads and treemen, making dangerous, unpredictable enemies of ancient allies as the children of Chaos poured into these now-desolate glades in their thousands.
The End Times | The Return of Nagash Page 9