And they did. Hell-eyed nightmares snorted and shrieked as night-black hooves tore the sod, and a wall of black-armoured death descended into the glen with Mannfred at its head. As he rode, he tried to gather the skeins of magic about him for an incantation, but found that the currents of sorcery shifted in his grasp, as if to thwart him. He knew at once that it wasn’t merely the fickle nature of the winds of magic that prevented him from weaving his spells. His eyes were drawn to the distant figure of the elven mage on his dais of floating rock, and he snarled. He was too far away to deal with the creature himself, but was he not the master of every dead thing?
Mannfred reared back in his saddle and let slip a guttural howl, and the air above him was suddenly thick with the ragged shapes of spectres and ghosts. The spectral host shot towards the distant column of floating rocks. They flowed over the mage’s bodyguard of Sword Masters like a tide of filthy water, chill fingers stretching towards the mage. The mage flung out his hands, and cleansing fires roared to life, surging in all directions. It left the living untouched, but the dead were consumed utterly. Spirits burst into clouds of ash, and zombies blazed like torches. Soon, the elves were surrounded by a ring of fallen, blackened corpses.
Mannfred laughed, despite the failure of his minions to kill the elf. They had served their purpose regardless. The elf mage had been outmanoeuvred, and his obstruction of Mannfred’s sorcerous undertakings faltered as he was forced to see to his own defence. Mannfred seized the moment, and swept out his sword, carving an abominable glyph on the quivering air even as he urged his mount to greater speed. All across the battlefield, the newly dead began to twitch to life. Whatever losses his army had suffered would be replaced within moments.
Yet he could feel the elf-mage attempting to undo what he had just wrought. He gnashed his teeth and jerked his steed about. He raised his blade and the strident shriek of a horn sounded from behind him as the Drakenhof Templars wheeled about and formed up around him with supernatural discipline. It was time to deal with the sorcerer personally. Mannfred chopped the air with his blade.
As one, the Drakenhof Templars charged.
Arkhan did not bother to bid Mannfred a fond farewell. The battle did not concern him. He drained the blood of another of the sacrifices into the cauldron, and reflected on the days to come. He did not know what awaited him come Nagash’s return, but he did not fear it, whatever it was. He hurled the body aside and chose the next.
Behind him, the vampire made little sound as she drew her basket-hilted blade from its sheath. Arkhan heard it regardless but did not turn around. ‘Do you think that he will thank you, woman?’ There was a grim sort of humour to it – Mannfred, ever alert to treachery, had placed as Arkhan’s guard the least trustworthy member of his entourage.
‘At this point, what Mannfred does or does not do is of little concern to me, liche,’ Elize said. The spurs on her boots jangled softly as she strode towards him, the blade held low by her side. She stepped over the bodies of the previous sacrifices, where Arkhan had flung them – the Shallyan, the Ulrican, the Ranaldite. He held the last of the preparatory sacrifices over the bubbling cauldron, his knife to the dead-eyed young man’s throat.
‘I was not speaking of Mannfred,’ Arkhan said, as he drew the knife across the waiting flesh of his captive. The young priest of Morr gave a gurgling moan as his life’s blood ran out to join that of the others bubbling in the belly of the cauldron. When he was satisfied that it had been drained to the last drop, Arkhan let the body fall, careful that no blood should splatter on him. The consequences of even a small drop touching him would be disastrous.
Elize stopped. ‘Erikan will thank me, when he comes to his senses. Ennui is but a passing madness – a flaw in his blood. I will draw it from him, when this madness is past, and I will make him know his proper place.’
‘How like a woman, to think that only she knows what is best for a man,’ Arkhan rasped.
‘How like a man, to think that a woman does not know what is best for him,’ Elize said. ‘Are you going to try to stop me, old bag-of-bones, or are you content to watch as I bring your plan to an untimely end?’ She raised her sword to Morgiana’s neck. The Fay Enchantress’s eyes flickered and she tilted her head back.
‘Do it,’ she hissed. ‘Kill me, before it’s too late.’
‘Quiet,’ Elize snarled. She met Arkhan’s gaze without flinching. ‘Well, liche… Try your hand, if you would. You will get no second chance.’
‘Do it, and damn the world to madness and ruin,’ Arkhan said, his knife dangling loosely in his grip. ‘If Nagash does not rise, the world burns. And you will burn with it, whatever your schemes and plans.’
‘And if he does rise, what then? Servitude and eventual oblivion? No, I’ll not accept that,’ Elize said. ‘Better to be consumed by the fire, than to suffer a puppet’s fate.’
‘Fate is a mocker,’ Arkhan said. ‘A woman once told me that. Like you, she refused to surrender to Nagash. She told me that there are no certainties, save those you make for yourself. I still do not know if she was right or wrong.’ He looked down at the cauldron. ‘Nagash will rise. The world will shudder. But the sun will still come up tomorrow. Sylvania will still be here, and Bretonnia as well. But if he does not rise, the sun will go dark and Sylvania will be consumed in fire, blood and Chaos. These are my certainties.’ He raised his hand and pointed to the battle raging outside of the Nine Daemons. ‘That is yours.’
Elize glared at him suspiciously for a moment, and then glanced back in the direction he’d indicated. The battle was a maelstrom of carnage; elves and vampires both lost their hold on eternity as two lines of knights crashed into one another. ‘I don’t see what–’ she began.
‘There,’ Arkhan said. ‘The Crowfiend fights alone against a hero of Ulthuan. A woman who has fought daemons and worse things than any suicidal blood-drinker.’
Elize turned back to face him, her eyes narrowed to crimson slashes. ‘You lie,’ she hissed. ‘No elf can kill him. I trained him myself. He is better with a blade than any among the order.’
‘Will he win, you think? Or will she take his head, as she has already taken the heads of those who fought beside him? Will your cannibal prince stand alone… or will you go to his aid one last time?’ Arkhan continued, as if she hadn’t spoken.
‘If he dies, he dies,’ Elize snarled.
‘Then why do you hesitate?’
He knew what she would do before she did. He had seen such looks before, in other places at other times. Some people possessed a pragmatic ruthlessness of spirit that outstripped even Nagash’s histrionic malevolence. Vampires were often blessed with this quality, if they survived long enough. The drive to see their goals through at any cost. They would lie to themselves, rationalising that obsession into entitlement.
But some could only go so far.
Some went to the edge of that night-dark sea and then turned back.
Elize lowered her sword, turned and sprinted away, towards the battle.
‘Run fast, little vampire,’ Arkhan said, as he turned to the Fay Enchantress. ‘We come to it at last, Morgiana.’
‘She was right, you know… Better the fire than the dust,’ Morgiana whispered, her eyes closed. ‘Better death than what is coming.’
‘And you shall have it, I swear to you. Your spirit will not rise at his command or mine,’ Arkhan said, drawing her to her feet. ‘You shall be dead, and will suffer no more.’
‘Do you promise?’
Arkhan hesitated. Then, he nodded. ‘I do.’
‘Why?’
‘It seems some small touch of mercy yet remains to me,’ he said.
Morgiana smiled as Arkhan cut her throat.
Overhead, the dark sky turned ominous as strange clouds began to gather. Screeching spirits swarmed about the stone circle. The wind began to howl, like a dying beast. Turning from Morgiana’s body, Arkhan gestured, and his wights dragged Volkmar to his feet.
‘Do what you will, corpse,
but Sigmar will have you, in the end,’ the old man spat. ‘Your bones will be splintered by his hammer, and the dust he makes of you scattered on the wind.’
‘I am certain he shall, and it will,’ Arkhan said. ‘You were born for this, you know. All of your years and deeds are the foundation of this moment. The blood that flows in your veins is the same as that of your god. It is the blood of the man who destroyed Nagash, and set the world on its current course.’
Volkmar’s eyes widened. Arkhan gestured, and the wights began to place the Black Armour upon the old man. Volkmar struggled and screamed and cursed, but he was too weak to break the grip of his captors. He called down the curses of his god on Arkhan’s head. Arkhan looked up, waiting. Now would be the time for Mannfred’s enchantment to fail at last. If this were a children’s story, that is how it would go. When nothing happened, he looked down at Volkmar. ‘Nothing. Proof enough that destiny holds us all in its clutches, I’d say. This was always meant to be. This moment is an echo of a promise of a thought cast forward through a thousand-thousand years. And we must all play our part.’
The last clasp was tightened and the armour was attached. Volkmar sagged beneath its awful weight as the wights stepped back. Arkhan gestured, and a pile of iron chains, discarded when the prisoners were killed, rose at his command, clinking and rattling. The chains rushed forward and ensnared Volkmar, binding him and dragging him to his feet again. Arkhan motioned towards the cauldron, and the chains rose into the air, carrying Volkmar with them. As they deposited him feet-first into the cauldron, Arkhan reverentially lifted the Crown of Sorcery up and placed it upon the old man’s bloodstained brow.
Volkmar moaned, and his eyes rolled up in his head. Arkhan could hear the crown’s whispers start up as the voice of Nagash murmured in the old man’s mind. Arkhan retrieved Alakanash and began to chant the ritual of invocation and awakening.
Elize sprinted across the battlefield, moving quicker than any black steed from the stables of Drakenhof. She swept her blade out, cutting down anything, living or dead that sought to bar her path. Erikan had been with the Templars. She had seen them charge before she made her move to stop the ritual, and she saw that the elves had met the assault at full gallop. Now the centre of the glen was a whirling melee of screaming horses, splintered shields and falling bodies.
She charged into the melee, her blade sweeping the life from an elven knight as the warrior rose up in front of her. She saw the Drakenhof banner, flapping in an unnatural breeze, and knew that that was where Mannfred was; and where he was, Erikan and the other members of the inner circle would be as well.
She caught sight of Nyktolos a moment later, duelling with an elven knight, his too-wide jaws agape in laughter. Nictus hurtled through the air on leather wings, plucking enemies from the saddle and dashing them to the ground, mangled and broken. And there, beneath the banner, Mannfred and Erikan, fighting back to back. But even as she caught sight of them, she saw a flash of painful light as the Drakenhof Templar bearing the battle standard fell. The source of the light was a sword, held in the hands of an elf woman, who leapt into the air while the standard fell, her blade clutched in both hands.
Mannfred turned, but too slowly. The blazing sword swept down, searing the air white in its wake. And then Erikan was there, parrying the blow. He and the elf swayed back and forth, their blades ringing as they connected. Elize fought her way towards them through the press of battle, Arkhan’s words ringing in her head.
In that moment, nothing else mattered. All of her hopes and dreams and schemes turned to ash and char, consumed by the fire that drove her forward towards the man that she loved. And it was love, for all that it was built on hate and blood and deception. Perhaps that was the only kind of love available to creatures like them. Love was the reason she had schemed to bring him back in the only way she knew how, to show him that he still needed her, that he belonged with her. And she had failed. All of her lies and deceptions had done nothing save drive him even further away from her, down a dangerous path.
She bashed an elf to his knees and chopped down on him. As she jerked her blade free, she saw Erikan lose his blade and snatch up the Drakenhof banner to fend off his opponent. The elf hacked down through the standard pole as he tried to block her blow. Her sword scraped against his cuirass, and he fell.
‘No!’ Elize howled. She flung herself towards the elf, her lean frame moving like quicksilver. The elf woman pinned Erikan to the ground and raised her blade. Elize intercepted the blow and rocked the woman back with a wild slash. ‘He’s mine,’ she snarled, extending her blade. She glanced down at Erikan. His eyes were closed, and his cuirass had been split open by the blow that had felled him. Dark blood welled up from within it, and he lay limp and unmoving. Elize turned her attentions back to her opponent as the elf woman spat something in her native tongue.
Elize studied her, sizing up her opponent. Her armour was battered and her robes torn and stained. But her face was composed, with no sign of weariness or fear. Her sword was steady. She lunged smoothly, and Elize was hard-pressed to parry the blow. They circled one another, feeling each other out.
They crashed together a moment later, like lionesses fighting over a kill. The elf woman was strong, surprisingly so, and more vicious than Elize expected. Even Cicatrix hadn’t been as ferocious. She was forced to give ground, step by step.
Something caught her foot and she slid backwards. Her legs were tangled in the tatters of the Drakenhof banner and she almost laughed at the foolishness of it. She fell, and her sword was jolted from her hand. The elf lunged, blade raised.
Then, something dark rose up behind her and smashed into her, bearing her to the ground with a roar. Elize scrambled to her feet, snatching up her sword. Erikan had his fangs sunk into the elf woman’s neck, and he tore her sword from her grip and flung it aside. She screamed and tore a dagger from her belt. The blade caught him in the chest and he staggered, clawing at its hilt. The elf woman sank down to one knee, a hand clasped to her throat. Her eyes were dull with pain as she scrabbled for her sword. Elize stepped on it and pressed the tip of hers to the elf’s throat. She tensed, ready to thrust it home.
Somewhere behind them, Elize heard a monstrous roar and the earth trembled. She felt a wave of excess magic wash over her. Then something was dropped to the ground beside her. She looked down and saw a blackened corpse, clad in the burned remnant of blue robes. ‘My thanks, sweet cousin. You gave me the respite I needed to deal with that pestiferous mage,’ Mannfred said from behind her.
‘One moment more, and I’ll add another to your tally,’ she snarled. She made to ram her blade home, when she felt Mannfred’s hand on her shoulder.
‘No, I think not. This one has spirit. Most elves are nothing more than trembling knots of vanity and fragile ego, but this one is something… wilder, I think,’ Mannfred purred. ‘She killed several of your fellow Templars, and nearly killed you both as well.’ He stepped forward and crushed the charred skull of the dead mage. As the elf woman tried to get to her feet, Mannfred slapped her to the ground. She did not get up. He looked at Elize. ‘I leave her in your tender care, sweet cousin. You and the Crowfiend can finish what you started with her. Be gentle, I beseech thee.’
A moment later, his smile faded. His face twisted in an expression of panic and he clutched at his head. Elize felt something like a wasp’s hum in her head, but as soon as it had sounded, it faded. ‘What was that?’ she spat.
‘Nagash,’ Mannfred snarled. He sprang past them, running flat out back towards the Nine Daemons. As he ran, his skeletal steed seemed to appear from nowhere, galloping beside him. Without pausing, Mannfred reached up and swung himself into the saddle. Elize watched him go, and then turned back to Erikan. Count Nyktolos had joined them, and Nictus as well. Both vampires looked as if they had waded through a sea of blood, and the former had plucked the blade from Erikan’s chest. He held it up. ‘Barely missed his heart. He has the luck of a von Carstein, if not the name,’ he said, gri
nning.
‘He’ll live, child,’ Nictus gurgled comfortingly. ‘He is tough, your ghoul-prince.’
Elize sank down beside Erikan and caressed his cheek. He looked at her. ‘W-why did you come for me?’ he croaked.
‘Fool,’ she said gently. ‘No one leaves me. Especially not you.’ She leaned forward and kissed him. She could taste his blood and that of the elf woman. She sat back on her heels and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear as she looked back towards the Nine Daemons. The winds about the stones had reached a howling crescendo, and the stones themselves glowed with an eye-searing light. Whatever was happening there, it was too late for her to do anything about it. It was up to Mannfred now. She looked back down at Erikan and smiled sadly.
‘Freedom is overrated, my love,’ she said, and kissed him again.
Mannfred rode madly towards the Nine Daemons, his fangs bared in a snarl. Elize had failed him. He would punish her later, her and her pet. But for now, he had to reach the stone circle before Arkhan completed the ritual. Nagash could not be allowed to return unfettered.
So intent was he on his destination that he barely noticed the shadow that swept over him. A moment later, pain tore through him as large talons pierced his armour. Mannfred flung himself forwards, over his mount’s neck, and hit the ground hard. He rolled across the hard-packed earth as his mount came apart around him, showering him with bones and bits of flesh. As the dust cleared, he saw Eltharion’s damnable griffon swooping towards him like an immense, spotted bird of prey. Its shriek cut through his skull and he jerked his sword from its sheath as the elf’s lance dipped for his heart.
Mannfred snarled and ducked. The lance point skidded over his pauldron and tore through his cloak as he lunged upwards to meet the griffon’s descent. His blade smashed through its furry ribcage and the great beast shrieked in agony. It tore away from him, knocking him from his feet with a flailing talon, and crashed into the ground right at the foot of the slope upon which the Nine Daemons stood.
The End Times | The Return of Nagash Page 38