Swords of the Emperor

by Chris Wraight

  “Let’s go.”

  He went inside, pistol drawn. There was no one in the antechamber. The stone was bare and the lanterns had been extinguished. The body of the grotesque dog-warrior had been removed. Where his corpse had been slumped, Verstohlen thought he could see a faint brown stain against the plaster.

  He went on, down the stairs and towards the central chamber. Euler followed close behind. The men had trouble squeezing into the narrow way, and their weapons clanged against the stone. Fighting in such close quarters would be difficult.

  Verstohlen reached the bottom of the stairs. The corridor was empty and silent. To his right was the route he’d taken last time. Ahead of him were the double doors leading straight into the chamber.

  Euler stood beside him, breathing heavily from the earlier exertions.

  “Which way?” he asked.

  Verstohlen nodded in the direction of the doors.

  “Straight to the heart of it,” he said.

  With a faint tremble that he couldn’t suppress, Verstohlen reached for the handle. He pushed firmly, and the doors to Natassja’s throne room swung apart.

  Bloch lowered his blade and grinned. After days of fighting, he knew they must be close to Heideck. The fact that they’d run into yet another splinter band of orcs wouldn’t stop them achieving their goal. The days of endless combat had begun to blur into one long procession of fighting, but he’d somehow managed to keep it together. His forces were intact, morale was as good as could be expected, and they were nearing their destination. They’d turned from mindless running from the enemy and started to engage them at will. Something had got the greenskins worried, and the feeling was infectious. From every direction he could hear his men laying into the enemy, hurling themselves into combat with a commendable ferocity. He was happy to join them. He’d even started enjoying himself.

  The orc before Bloch looked drunk with fatigue. Its slab-muscled shoulders slumped, and its chest heaved. The end would not be long now.

  “Is that the best you’ve got?” he taunted, swinging his blade and advancing towards his enemy. The orc stared back at him stupidly. The fire in its red eyes was nearly out. Blood as thick and dark as oil ran from a dozen wounds. Like a bull in the rings of the Estalians, it had been ground into the dirt.

  Bloch laughed and swung his halberd directly at the monster’s head. The orc parried, lifting its spike-studded cudgel to block the path of the blade. Bloch pulled back and swung again, probing for the weak spot. The orc, its breathing heavy and uncertain, matched the strokes. Bloch began to hammer his weapon down more quickly, using the shaft of the halberd as much as a club as a blade. The orc staggered backwards, desperately fending off the blows.

  Bloch didn’t relent. He felt a surge of exhilaration course through him. The greenskins had killed too many. They’d had it their own way for too long. This was their chance to even the score a little.

  With a final, limb-jarring thud, his halberd found a way through the greenskin’s defences. It bit deep, slicing into the thick flesh of the orc’s neck. The stricken creature bellowed a final time and sank to its knees. Bloch withdrew the blade and hacked downward again. And a third time. The creature collapsed on to the ground, limbs twitching. Bloch raised his weapon in triumph, angling the point over the orc’s prone heart. With a savage cry, he brought it down with all his might. The tip pierced the greenskin’s heart, ending its rampaging forever. Bloch twisted the metal, watching the blood bubble from the wound like spring water. It wasn’t much to celebrate, but it gave him some satisfaction.

  At last, he pulled the halberd from the still twitching body of the orc. He stepped back and looked about him. The enemy were routed. His men still stood their ground. They’d run the orcs out of the forests and into the open country. For the first time since Grunwald’s last stand, they had the initiative.

  “What’s got into them?” came a voice from behind him. Fischer. The lad had taken a nasty wound to his forearm and carried his weapon in his left hand. He looked pale but defiant.

  Bloch shaded his eyes against the violent sun and tried to make out where the fleeing greenskins were heading. The countryside was open. They were all loping in the same direction, as if called by a signal beyond his hearing. They didn’t look like they were running mindlessly or in a panic. Something had summoned them away.

  “Sigmar only knows. They’ve been all over us for days, and now…” He trailed off. He strained against the haze, trying to make out what was happening.

  “What do you want to do?” asked Fischer. “We’re out of cover here.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Bloch. He peered into the distance. The heat made the ground shimmer. On the horizon, everything was indistinct. It looked, though, as if there were another orc warband in the distance, kicking up dust from the parched earth. A big one, by the cloud they threw up. As big, perhaps, as the one that had defeated them in the foothills. And, unless his eyes deceived him, it was already fighting.

  He turned to Fischer. This was getting interesting.

  “They’re not running from us,” he said. “They’re mustering to face a greater threat. That’s why they’re falling back. Something bigger has got them worried.”

  Fischer looked blank.

  “From Heideck?”

  Bloch snorted derisively. “Those milk-fed weaklings? No. You’d have to have balls of gromril to take that mob on.”

  He hefted his halberd, ready for another long trek across the fields. This time, however, the objective was more than just survival.

  “Ready the men,” he ordered. “We’ll form up again and follow that pack. Carefully, mind. Nothing reckless. But I’ve a feeling we’re all headed towards the same place. And I’ve a feeling I know who’s there too.”

  Fischer still looked clueless. Bloch grinned at him. “Trust me. We’re not done fighting yet.”

  The doors of the townhouse’s central chamber swung open. Their motion was noiseless. For a moment, Verstohlen thought he saw movement within. He swung his pistol round swiftly.

  Nothing. The chamber was empty.

  He walked in, keeping the weapon raised. Euler and his men followed, fanning out across the wide circle.

  “Send men up to the next level,” said Verstohlen. His voice sounded very loud against the echoing silence. “They may be hiding. No man is to enter any room alone.”

  While Euler relayed the orders, Verstohlen took a good look around. There was no throne, no dais, no iron braziers. The place had been stripped bare. The floor was wooden, the stone unadorned. If it were not for the lingering smell of jasmine, he might have begun to doubt his own recollection.

  He crouched down and examined the floor. There were no scraps of cloth, no remnants of Natassja’s spiked toys. They’d done a good job. As good as he would have done.

  “See anything, counsellor?”

  Verstohlen stood up.

  “No, Herr Euler. Not a thing. That may be a cause for satisfaction. They are not yet so bold as to leave traces of their presence behind. But we must not be complacent. Let us explore further.”

  Euler nodded, but Verstohlen could see the doubt in the man’s eyes. None of his band wanted to believe that there were cultists in Averheim. Without tangible proof, they were always likely to distrust the word of a stranger. For the time being, though, they were not ready to question his orders.

  From up above, Verstohlen could hear men going through the antechambers on the next level. There was the noise of crates being shifted and doors slamming. No fighting, though. No unnatural hissing, or warped barking. That was something to be thankful for.

  “Come,” he said, turning round and heading back to the corridor outside. He led them out of the circular chamber and along the way he’d fled before. The smell of jasmine grew stronger as they went. Months of processing joyroot couldn’t be erased overnight.

  Verstohlen entered the hall with the drying tables. As before, everything had gone. The refining kettles, the stacks of raw ro
ot, nothing remained.

  “Have your men search this place closely,” said Verstohlen, letting his eyes roam across the scrubbed surfaces. “They may have left something behind.”

  He pressed on further, studying every bare floorboard, every blank stone wall. Behind him he could hear Euler’s men clumping around, pulling apart anything they could prise from its fastenings. They were too clumsy for this work. With a twinge of regret, Verstohlen realised that they were as likely to destroy any evidence as discover it. The mission had been fruitless. Natassja and her horrific court were long gone.

  He turned back, ready to order Euler to stand down. Just as he did so, something caught his eye. Once he’d seen them, he wondered how he’d missed them. Hung on the wall, two of them. Verstohlen walked over to them and took one down.

  Euler came to his side.

  “What are these?”

  Verstohlen picked up the second and held the two together. They were masks. The faces had been artfully carved. In every respect, they resembled their real-life counterparts. The fidelity was remarkable. He found himself looking at the simulated flesh, marvelling at the detail and precision. The face in his left hand was his own. The one in his right was Schwarzhelm’s. In the low light, he could almost have been staring into the big man’s features. Only the eyes betrayed the origin of the masks. They were caked with blood and had been crudely rammed into the sockets. No doubt retrieved from Natassja’s long-suffering pets. Sigmar only knew what had happened to them.

  “They are a warning, Herr Euler,” said Verstohlen, standing up. He let the ceramics fall to the floor. “Frau Leitdorf has a fondness for surgery. No doubt she wishes us to know the fate of those who stand against her husband.”

  Euler looked down at the masks warily. They gazed back blankly from their unseeing eyes. Verstohlen stamped down heavily, shattering the fragile artistry.

  “Ignore them,” he said, turning away from the scattered shards. “There’s nothing more to see here. It was a mistake to think there would be. Gather the men and prepare to leave. Grosslich will need our support.”

  With that, he turned on his heel and walked towards the exit. He hoped he projected an aura of casual disregard. Deep down, though, he knew he didn’t.

  Out on the fields of Averland, the orcs continued to cluster. More and more had streamed into combat, drawn from miles around. Schwarzhelm and the Averlanders had pushed them steadily east, wearing them down with a series of heavy cavalry charges followed up by ranks of footsoldiers advancing across the trampled turf.

  As ever, Schwarzhelm was at the heart of it. All around him, ranks of orcs and men struggled for mastery. Readying his steed once more, he charged straight at the cluster of heavily-armed greenskins before him. With a sickening clatter, he smashed into their midst. The Rechtstahl swung down, slicing the hands of the nearest grasping warrior clean from its wrists. His horse whinnied frantically, clutched at from all sides by the orcs. Schwarzhelm kicked out against them, trying to turn the steed round. He could hear the cries of the honour guard as they fought their way to his position. For the moment, he was isolated, cut off by a sea of slavering orcs. There were too many. As the orcs hacked and dragged his steed down, he felt the noble beast give out a final shudder. He twisted free of the stirrups and leapt from the saddle as the horse was pulled to the earth.

  Then they came for him. Finding his feet, Schwarzhelm whirled around. The warriors here were massive, clad in heavy iron plates and wielding cleavers and crude halberds. They surrounded him, clamouring to get close. One jumped right in front of him, swinging a long sword in a wide arc. Schwarzhelm ducked under the swipe, feeling the soft earth give under his heavy armour. They were all around him, slavering with bloodlust. They knew who he was. More than anything, they wanted to take down the Emperor’s Champion.

  He almost felt like smiling. Almost. Many orcs had vied for that honour. The result had always been the same.

  Schwarzhelm clenched his gauntlet and punched the nearest adversary in the face. The metal bit deep, slashing even the tough orc hide open. Schwarzhelm kept moving, shifting balance, parrying blows and counter-striking with his own blade. More cudgels and blades swung in his direction. The Rechtstahl flashed. Howls of agony showed it had found its mark.

  One brute, four foot wide and weighed down with burnished plate armour, charged straight at him. Schwarzhelm waited for the impact, then turned aside at the last moment. The orc brought down its cleaver in a heavy arc. Schwarzhelm swung the Rechtstahl back to meet it. When the metal met, a resounding clang rang out.

  He pushed back, heaving against the bulk of the greenskin with all the strength that remained in him. The monster staggered back. A look of amazement passed across its grotesque features. It couldn’t have been often that a human had held such a monster up.

  Schwarzhelm ignored it, turning quickly to meet the attacks coming at him from all directions. His sword moved ever more quickly, sparkling radiantly in the powerful sunlight. Even in his full armour, he could move faster than the orcs around him. Years of endless combat, honed and polished in the best training grounds in the Empire, had left their mark. Though his frame was battered and his body scarred, he was still more than a match for these lumbering foes. Steel clashed against iron, and the greenskin blood flowed freely.

  Slowly, painfully, their bestial will began to break. Single-handedly, Schwarzhelm began to hammer them back. Some wavered, loath to concede the field to a lone human warrior. They were the first to fall. The Rechtstahl cut through their armour as if it were made of mere scraps of parchment. Like a master blacksmith pounding at a forge, Schwarzhelm waded into the throng, fearless and resolute.

  Then Kraus and the honour guard broke through. The whole company of knights fought in the same style as their master. Swift, precise, controlled. Their blades like a wall of whirling steel, they slammed into the ragged orc ranks.

  That was the final blow. Faced with Schwarzhelm and his retinue working in concert, the greenskins fell back, then broke. As the knights pursued them remorselessly, Schwarzhelm finally relented. His guard drove the orcs back, creating a window of calm amid the fury of the battlefield.

  Breathing heavily, Schwarzhelm lent on his sword. His arms ached. His body ached. Sigmar had been his protector, as He always was.

  “You were cut off, sir,” said Kraus, coming to stand beside him. There was a touch of reproach in his voice.

  “An orc respects only one thing,” replied Schwarzhelm, ignoring the tone. “Bravery. If they see you’re willing to take the fight to them, and do it in a way they recognise as their own, they’ll know doubt. That’s the way to crush the greenskin.”

  Kraus looked doubtful, but said nothing. Schwarzhelm was tempted to smile at his concern. He didn’t, though. He never smiled.

  “Anything else to report?” he said, wiping his blade clean and looking around. The knights had cleared a space around him, but it wouldn’t last long.

  “We’re holding our own. They’ve mustered in numbers, but we can match them. I’d like to have tougher men under my command than Averlanders, but there’s nothing I can do about that.”

  Schwarzhelm shaded his eyes against the glare and tried to make sense of the fighting. His army had initially formed up in lines along the high ground to the west. The detachments were still intact and were now steadily advancing across the undulating grassland. The orc horde had become more ramshackle in its defence. Frequent charges by the cavalry had punctured the greenskin ranks, pushing them back further. The orcs were all footsoldiers, and they had no answer to the heavy cavalry assault. The greenskins had decent wargear, and fought with all the savagery of their race, but they were losing ground. The footsoldiers now scurried to follow the breakthrough up, labouring under the hot sun to keep the assault moving and secure the ground won.

  Schwarzhelm looked back at the greenskin army, squinting against the morning sun. The nearest ranks of orcs, separated from him only by the swords of the honour guard, were stil
l howling in a mass of incoherent rage. But beyond them, something else was happening. Incredibly, hidden by the press of bodies, there was the sound of more fighting.

  So that was why the orcs were in trouble. There was a second front to the east. They were being attacked from two directions.

  “Find me a fresh horse,” he said, suddenly filled with an unexpected hope. “Then re-form the cavalry detachment.”

  “We’re consolidating?”

  “Mother of Sigmar, no. Can’t you see it? We’re not the only men at work here. We’ll cut our way through to them, right through the heart of the horde. They’ll be gutted like a fish. We’ll take a detachment of the heavy cavalry. Fast and deadly. I want those men relieved.”

  Kraus looked out across the heaving rows of bodies uncertainly. Striking out again risked breaking their formation, leaving the mass of halberdiers and spearmen behind them unprotected. Schwarzhelm knew the manoeuvre was dangerous. But everything worthwhile was.

  “Who do you think it is?”

  Schwarzhelm hefted the Rechtstahl once more, relishing as always the solid weight of steel.

  “Only one man it could be,” he said. “And we’re not leaving him to fight alone.”

  Bloch reeled backwards, knocked almost from his feet by the blow. The orc warrior before him roared in triumph, pressing home the advantage. Bloch desperately tried to parry, but his halberd was ripped from his hand. On either side of him, his men were being pushed back. Perhaps the decision to charge after the orcs hadn’t been such a good idea after all. The horde was still massive. He’d always been guilty of taking too much on.

  He staggered backwards, weaponless, as the orc charged him again. With a sudden sense of despair, he realised he stood no chance. He had nowhere to go, no way of warding off the killing blow.

  Balling his fists, he acted in the only way he knew how in such situations. He let fly with a torrent of filthy invective, every obscenity he’d collected over a long career in the Emperor’s forces and hostelries and prepared to fight with his bare hands. It was pointless, and he’d be dead in seconds. But at least he’d go down scrapping.