Lord Mannfred had tasked him with the eradication of two of the invading forces currently assailing the heartland. It was a job that Nyktolos was more than capable of accomplishing, but he nonetheless felt a certain concern.
He had learned early on that the best way to survive the continuous cycle of incessant purges and inevitable betrayals that marked one’s entry into the inner circles of the von Carsteins was to become part of the background. Show no ambition, and rarely offer more than an amusing bon mot, as the Bretonnians put it. If that failed, stand around looking stupid, busy or stupidly busy. In truth, it wasn’t much different than being a mortal aristocrat. The von Carsteins were vicious but the von Draks had been monsters.
Below, the trees cleared momentarily, and he saw the galumphing, hairy shapes of beastmen. They were still following him, as they had been since his first attack several days ago. It had taken no great effort to antagonise the creatures. His forces had struck again and again at the flanks of the great herd before retreating ever eastwards, and drawing the beasts away from the Glen of Sorrows and the Nine Daemons.
Nyktolos hawked and spat. He could feel the world grinding to a halt, deep in the marrow of his bones. The sky boiled like an untended cauldron and the earth shuddered like a victim of ague. He wasn’t a learned man, but he knew what it meant well enough. Still, the lessons of his wild youth held – stay in the background and stay alive, or as close to it as a vampire could get. Markos and Tomas and Anark had all made that mistake. They’d thought of themselves as main characters, when really they were only bit players in the story of another. Well, he wouldn’t make that mistake.
No, he would play his part to perfection. And at the moment, that part was as a distraction. The beastmen composed the largest group of invaders, and were thus the most dangerous. They could be beaten in open battle easily enough, but it would take time and effort better spent elsewhere. If, however, the brawling mass could be redirected at another of the invading armies – say, for instance, the disciplined throng of Karak Kadrin – then they could leave them to it, and get on with more important matters.
A day before he had encountered the buzzing mechanical contraptions the dwarfs called gyrocopters, and swatted them from the sky with little difficulty. He’d lost a terrorgheist and more than a few fellbats in the process, but the dwarfs had been too few and too slow. He still recalled how one of the doughty little creatures had made a terrific leap from the cockpit of his machine, axe in hand, even as a terrorgheist crushed it. The dwarf had gone right down its gullet, hacking away in a most amusing fashion. Well, amusing right up until the terrorgheist had exploded.
Nyktolos shook his head, banishing the memory. He wanted no part of the dwarfs and their explosives and cannons, thank you all the same. Better to let them vent their petty grudges on more deserving targets.
Down below, horns wailed and the beastmen slowed in their tramping. That wouldn’t do. The dwarfs were still several leagues away, and marching towards Templehof. Nyktolos clucked his tongue and set his spurs to his mount. ‘Come, my dear. It is feeding time, I expect,’ he said as the terrorgheist shrieked and dived down towards the trees. The rest of the swarm followed him, screeching and chittering. Nyktolos drew his sword as the terrorgheist crashed through the canopy and landed atop a squalling centigor. Several more of the snorting quadrupedal beastmen charged towards Nyktolos, who flung himself from his seat with a yowl. He chopped through a hairy midsection as he landed, separating the centigor’s top half from its lower body.
Quicker than thought, Nyktolos spun and blocked a club that would have dashed his brains across the forest floor. The centigor reared, and Nyktolos slashed open its belly as he ducked aside. The beast fell with a squeal. Beastmen rushed headlong out of the trees, covered in bats, and the terrorgheist lunged forwards, making a meal of two of the closer ones.
Nyktolos killed another, opening its throat to the bone with a casual flick of his blade. More creatures poured out of the trees. He surged amongst them for a moment, like a tiger amongst goats, killing them with wide sweeps of his sword and his own talons. Then, satisfied that he had regained their attentions, he leapt back onto the terrorgheist and swatted it between the ears with the flat of his blade. ‘Up, you great, greedy beast! Up!’
The giant bat-thing heaved itself up into the air with an explosive shriek, tearing apart the forest canopy as it clambered into the sky. Nyktolos guided the creature in a low swoop across the tops of the trees. ‘Follow me, little beasts. Your playmates await you!’
Malagor roared in fury as his herd rampaged out of control through the forest. They were going the wrong way and there was little even he could do about it. The horde was driven by its primal appetites. The cloven-hoofed warriors had left a trail of devastation in their wake, burning and pillaging a path right into the heart of Sylvania, and Malagor felt little impetus to control their baser urges, so long as they kept moving in the right direction.
What lay at the end of their trail was a mystery even to him. He knew only that though he was the truest of servants, he had failed to fulfil the desires of the Dark Gods three times. Three times Arkhan the Black had slipped away from him, and three times Malagor had given chase. He had pursued the bone-man across the world, from mountain to forest to plain and back again, and always, always the dead-thing escaped. With each failure, the whispers of his gods had grown in volume, until he thought his brain would be pounded to mush inside his vibrating skull. But they had not punished him, as he’d feared they might.
The Dark Gods knew that even though he was their truest child, his kin were less so. They were too wild to ignore their primitive urges and too feral to be organised for long. His failures had been no fault of his, but a weakness in the tools he’d been gifted. The gods knew this, and they whispered their endearments to him, urging him towards Sylvania. As he’d driven what was left of his horde after the debacle at Heldenhame into the lands of his enemy, more and more beastmen emerged from the forests and submitted to his will. By the time he’d reached Sylvania’s northern border, and the crumbling wall of bone that protected it, the tumult of his horde could be heard for many leagues in all directions.
It had been a simple enough matter to gain entry after that, between his magics and the brute strength of his followers. They’d poured into Sylvania like a flood, following the pull of the Dark Gods. Now, however, that pull was being disrupted yet again by his followers’ bestial instincts. No matter how many he killed, order could not be restored and they still pursued the flapping abomination that had harried them for some days.
It attacked and retreated, drawing his followers ever further away from their true goal, playing on their bloodlust and stupidity. He’d come close to killing the vampire more than once, but the creature was almost as slippery as Arkhan. It avoided open battle, and seemed content to bloody his flanks and slip away, just out of view.
Malagor flew over his loping warriors, easily dodging through the twisted woodland, his frustration bubbling away inside him. If he could get ahead of them, he might be able to head them off. That hope died a quick death, however, as he exploded out of the trees and saw what awaited him in the open ground beyond.
Arrayed about an irregular circle of standing stones the colour of freshly spilled blood, was a force Malagor recognised easily, though he’d never seen them before. Gold-topped standards rose above a wall of shields, and the air was cut by the stink of gunpowder. Malagor rose into the air, his black wings flapping, and tried to understand what he was seeing.
There were dwarfs ahead, thousands of them. Their numbers were nothing compared to those of his followers, but they should not have been there, and certainly not arrayed for battle. It made no sense – why were the stunted ones here? Was this part of the Dark Gods’ plan? Or was it something else?
As he tried to come to grips with it, he heard the first of his followers burst through the tree line. The big gor, a chieftain called Split-Nose, snorted in incredulity as his watery,
yellow eyes fixed on the distant shieldwall. Then he brayed and raised the axe he held over his head. Malagor growled in realisation. He had to stop them. If he failed again, there would no next chance.
‘No,’ he roared, and fell out of the sky like a rock. He crashed down onto Split-Nose and crushed the gor’s broad skull with the end of his staff. He swung the staff like a club, battering another beastman off his hooves as they began to straggle through the trees in small groups. ‘No! Go back – Dark Gods say go back!’
A bellow greeted his cry and the ground trembled beneath his feet. A moment later an enormous doombull smashed a tree into splinters with its gargantuan axe as it charged out of the forest. Its piggy eyes were bulging redly with blood-greed, and slobber dripped from its bull-like jaws as it charged forward. Malagor bleated in anger as he thrust himself skywards, narrowly avoiding the doombull. Minotaurs, centigors and beastmen followed it. It was as if some great dam had been cracked, and a tide of hair and muscle flowed out, seeking to roll over everything in its path.
Malagor could only watch as his lesser kin charged towards the dwarf shieldwall, heedless of anything save their own desire to kill, defile and devour that which was in front of them. He could feel the displeasure of the Dark Gods beating down on him, and with a strangled snarl, he flung himself after his followers, eager to drown out the voices of the gods in the noise of slaughter.
Red Cairn, northern Sylvania
‘Come on then, scum! Come kiss my axe,’ Ungrim Ironfist roared hoarsely. His voice was almost gone, and his limbs felt like lead. Nevertheless, he and his bodyguard of Slayers bounded out from amidst the dwarf shieldwall as the pack of bellowing minotaurs and bestigors charged towards the dwarf lines stationed around the blood-red standing stones. From behind him, volley after volley of cannon fire tore great, bloody furrows in the ever-shifting ranks of the children of Chaos, but the hundreds who died only served to make room for those who thundered in their wake. The air shuddered with the roar of the guns and the maddened braying of the horde, as it had for days.
‘I’ll crack your skulls and gift my wife a necklace of your teeth,’ Ungrim shouted, as he ploughed into a mob of bestigors like a cannonball wrapped in dragonscale. He lashed out with blade, boot and the brass knuckles on his gloves. ‘Hurry up and die so your bigger friends can have a turn,’ he snarled, grabbing a bestigor by the throat. The beast bleated in fury and struck at him with a cut-down glaive, but Ungrim crushed its throat before the blow could fall.
Momentarily free of opponents, Ungrim clawed blood out of his face and looked around. The beastmen had flowed around the Slayers and smashed into the shieldwall, where many were thrown back in bloody sprays. Thunderers loosed destructive volleys at point-blank range over the shoulders of clansmen as minotaurs hacked at their diminutive opponents, stopping only to gorge upon the fallen. Skulls were cracked, and blood ran in thick streams across the lumpy ground.
Ungrim hesitated. All around him, Slayers were fulfilling their oaths as they savaged the belly of the enemy horde, and part of him longed to hurl himself even deeper into the fray alongside them, axe singing. But he was a king as well as a Slayer, and a king had responsibilities. He spat a curse and lifted his axe as he started back towards the dwarf lines. He picked up speed as he ran, and he smashed aside any beastman who got in his way without slowing down.
When the Imperial herald had come to Karak Kadrin so many weeks ago, Ungrim hadn’t been surprised. It was just like the Ulthuani to go running to the humans when the dawi weren’t feeling charitable. Given what he’d learned at the Kingsmeet the year before, and what tales his own folk brought east, from the border country, it wasn’t difficult to see that something foul was brewing in Sylvania. Despite the fact that the thought of helping the feckless elgi sat ill with him, Ungrim had decided to set an example, to show Sylvania and the world, including his fellow kings, that the dwarfs were still a force to be reckoned with. Over the numerous and vociferous complaints of his thanes, he had gathered his throng and marched west. He had made arrangements to meet Leitdorf, the Imperial commander, at Templehof. His siege engines and cannons had easily shattered the petty defences the Sylvanians had erected – walls of sorcerous bone were no match for dwarf ingenuity and engineering – but his progress had slowed considerably as they reached the lowlands.
Dead things of all shapes and sizes had come calling, and the throng had been forced to shatter one obscene army after the next. A necklace of vampire fangs rattled on the haft of his axe, taken from the masters of each of those forces. But it wasn’t just the living dead that attacked his warriors. Even the land itself seemed determined to taste dwarf blood – bent and maggoty trees clawed at them as yellowed grasses clung to their boots and sucking mud tried to pull them down. But the dwarfs had trudged onwards, until they’d reached the standing stones where they now made their stand.
They’d heard the cacophony of the horde from leagues away, and Ungrim, knowing what the noise foretold, had ordered cannons unlimbered and the oath stones placed, as the Slayers sang their death songs and his clansmen gave voice to prayers to Grimnir. Three times they’d driven the beasts back, and three times the creatures regrouped and charged again, as if the scent of their own savage blood on the air only served to drive them to greater ferocity.
Again and again and again the beasts had thrown themselves at the shieldwall of Karak Kadrin. Though it was almost impossible to tell, thanks to the sunless skies overhead, Ungrim thought that the battle was entering its second day. The dead were piled in heaps and drifts, and the dwarf lines had contracted more than once, shrinking with their losses.
Ungrim bounded over a fallen centigor and launched himself at a towering bull-headed monstrosity that was hacking at the shieldwall. It was larger than any of the others, and it stank of blood and musk. He gave a triumphant yell as his axe sank into the thick muscles of the minotaur’s back. The monster bellowed in agony and twisted away from its former opponents. Ungrim was yanked off his feet and swung about as the minotaur thrashed, but he clung to his axe grimly. He reached out with his free hand, grabbed a hank of matted hair and hauled himself up towards the creature’s head. ‘You’ll do, you oversized lump of beef,’ he roared. ‘Come on, let’s see if you can kill a king before he boots you in the brains.’
Ungrim tore his axe free in a spray of blood and chopped it down, hooking the screaming minotaur’s shoulder. He snagged one of its horns and drove his boot into the back of its skull. The minotaur reared and clawed for him, trying to drag him off. Ungrim hung on, anchored by his axe, and continued to kick the beast in the head. It wasn’t particularly glorious, as tactics went, but they were good, tough boots, and the creature’s skull was bound to give before his foot did. It caught hold of his cloak and began to yank at him, and Ungrim lost his grip on his axe. Flailing wildly, he caught hold of the brute’s horn with both hands and, with a crack, he snapped it off.
The minotaur wailed and tore him from his perch. It smashed him down and so powerful was the blow that he sank into the soil as all of the air was expelled from his lungs. Drool dripped into his face as the minotaur crouched over him, its hands squeezing his barrel torso. Unable to breathe, Ungrim rammed the broken horn into one of the beast’s eyes. It reared back with a scream. Ungrim tried to rise, but it smashed him from his feet with a wild blow. Dazed, he glared up at the monster as it loomed over him. Then, there was a roar and the minotaur’s head vanished in an explosion of red. It toppled over.
‘Och, are you dead then, yer kingship?’ a voice shouted.
‘Damn you, Makaisson,’ Ungrim spluttered as a burly Slayer dragged him to his feet. ‘What’s the meaning of cheating me out of a perfectly good death?’
‘Was that yers, then? I hae noo idea, yer kingship,’ Malakai Makaisson said. A pair of thick goggles, liberally spattered with blood, covered his eyes, and he wore a peculiar cap, with ear flaps and a hole cut in the top for his crest of crimson-dyed hair. A bandolier of ammunition for the handgun he
carried in one gloved hand crossed his barrel chest, and a satchel full of bombs dangled across it. As Ungrim watched in consternation, the engineer-Slayer grabbed one of the bombs, popped the striker-fuse and slung it overhand into a mass of confused beastmen.
‘Stop blowing all of them up!’ Ungrim roared. He kicked and shoved at the minotaur’s body as he tried to retrieve his axe. If he didn’t get his hands on it quickly, there was every likelihood that Makaisson would blow up the lot of them.
‘What? I cannae hear you, what wi’ the bombs,’ Makaisson shouted as he lit and hurled another explosive. ‘They’re loud, ya ken.’
‘I know,’ Ungrim snarled. He tore his axe free in a welter of brackish blood and shook it in Makaisson’s face. ‘Why aren’t you with the artillery?’
‘Beasties are falling back, ain’t they?’ Makaisson said. ‘They’ve had enough, ya ken?’
‘What?’ Ungrim turned and saw that the engineer-Slayer was correct. The beastmen had broken and were fleeing into the trees, as if the death of the giant minotaur had been a signal. Behind them, they left a battlefield choked with the mangled and half-devoured bodies of the dead. The throng of Karak Kadrin had control of the field.
But, as he looked at the battered remnants of his once-mighty army, Ungrim was forced to come to the conclusion that though they had won the battle, they had lost this particular war. As he moved through the weary ranks of his warriors, his mental abacus tallied the losses – with a sinking heart, he saw that almost eight in ten of them had fallen in the battle. Though they’d won a great victory – perhaps the greatest victory in the annals of Karak Kadrin against the foul children of Chaos – they had failed their allies.
The End Times | The Return of Nagash Page 35