Swords of the Emperor

by Chris Wraight

  There was another long silence. Helborg shot an enquiring glance at Schwarzhelm, but the big man said nothing. Eventually, the Marshal let slip a scraping laugh.

  “So be it!” he said. “The elector has made his judgement. Skarr will rendezvous with us to the east of Averheim, from where we’ll take position in the north. Messengers will ride out tonight, and we break camp at dawn.”

  He looked over at Leitdorf, and his expression was a mix of amusement and approval.

  “Not many men overrule my judgement in matters of war, Herr Leitdorf. Let us hope your confidence repays us with a victory.”

  Leitdorf bowed in return. There was neither diffidence nor arrogance in the gesture.

  “This is my realm, Reiksmarshal,” he said. “It is time I took control of it.”

  The plains north of Averheim had once been lush, covered in the thick grass that had made the wealth of the province. The wide river Aver had fed a dozen smaller tributaries, all of which had watered the fertile black soil and nurtured the thick vegetation. Herds of cattle had been driven across the rolling country for centuries, growing fat and sleek on the goodness of the land.

  Now all had changed. The city was still consumed by the column of fire. Its streets were havens of horror and madness, its residual inhabitants in hopeless thrall to the Dark Gods. Though the daemons did not venture outside the cordon set by their mistress, others of Natassja’s creatures had not been slow to venture beyond the city walls. They marched in file, rank after rank, trampling the grass beneath their iron-shod feet. Great engines of war were hauled up from the depths of the forges, swaying on iron chains the width of a man’s waist. Channels of witch-fire were kindled in the six lesser towers. These ran swiftly from their source, burning what little remained of the once healthy country and turning it into a bare, stark wasteland of choking ash. For miles in every direction, the canker spread. Averheim stood alone, a city of twisted iron spires amid a desolate plain of ruin.

  Upon that charred and fouled wilderness, the Army of the Stone made its camp. Lines of tents were raised, each surmounted with the skulls of those slain resisting the elector. Braziers were set up, sending clouds of smog rolling over the land and coating it in a cloying pall of soot. Massive spikes were hauled from the forges under the Tower and placed around the edges of the vast encampment. Trenches were dug by a horde of mute slave labour, then filled with quick-kindling oils, roaring with green-tinged flames.

  Above it all, the Tower loomed, vast and brooding, isolate and defiant, a shard of night-black metal thrusting up from the tortured land like a blade. The storm circled around it, its clouds drawn to the pinnacle by the rupture in the world’s fabric, furious and yet impotent. Lightning danced under the eaves of the piled mass of darkness, flickering along the flanks of the Tower, throwing rare glimpses of light into the perpetual gloom of the lost city. It might have been night, it might have been day—beneath the wings of the storm it was impossible to tell. The aegis of fire remained, boiling and churning as it tore into the heavens, drowning out all other sounds, the terrible mark of the corruption of Averland.

  Two miles distant, a high ridge ran around the northern approaches to the city. No trees had grown there even in the days of health and plenty, and from its vantage one could see across the entire Aver flood-plain. South of the ridge, the land fell smoothly down to the level of the river, the road looping and circling towards the flat ground before the mighty gates of the city. Men had long called the ridge the Averpeak, and they said it was Siggurd’s barrow that caused the earth to rise. At its summit it was broad and smooth, running east-west for several miles before the rolling hills broke its curving outline. In the semi-remembered past, armies had camped on the mighty bulwark, poised like eagles to swoop down on the city below them. Only Ironjaw, the last great besieger of the city, had rejected its advantages, so drunk had he been on the wine of conquest.

  Grosslich knew his history, as did the silent commanders who now stalked among his legions. So it was that the camp was set in opposition to the Averpeak, and the trenches cut off the lines of assault from the high places. The old road was dug up and embankments raised across it. As if the embellished walls of Averheim with their six subordinate towers were not deterrent enough, the plains before the gates had been turned into killing fields, laced with instruments of murder and marked with rivers of unholy fire.

  All this Volkmar saw as he crested the summit of the Averpeak. He rode at the head of the army, the first to come to the edge of the ridge and gaze down on the plain below. As the view unfolded, he halted, staff in hand, and was silent.

  Behind him the rest of the army took up their positions. Maljdir, Roll and the warrior priests lined up in the centre, standing grim and resolute with the light of the fires reflecting from their breastplates. The battle wizards came behind them. There were two Celestial wizards, including the recovered Hettram, their sky-blue robes reflecting the fires like mirrors. Alongside them were three Bright wizards, their staffs already kindling with flame, and a triad of Light magisters clad in bone-white robes and already making preparations for their communal spellcasting.

  Once the command retinue was in place, the massed ranks of halberdiers, spearmen and swordsmen spread out across the Averpeak, arranged in assault formation. They too were silent. There were no songs of defiance as they edged towards their positions. They stood in their companies, mutely staring at the horror below, only half-listening to the hymns of hate and defiance droned out by the priests. On the far left flank, to the east of the battlefield, came the light cavalry, pistoliers and handgunners. The horses, even those used to the ways of war, stamped nervously.

  Only when the artillery was hauled into position did something of a cheer run through the ranks of men. Mighty iron-belchers were dragged into place by their teams of sweating horses. Piles of cannonballs were unloaded from the heavy carts and made ready. Helblasters, Helstorms and mortars were brought up from the engineers’ caravan. There were dozens of them, alongside over thirty cannons of various sizes. The broadside from such a collection would be monstrous indeed.

  Volkmar had chosen to place his heavy guns on the right flank of his army, to the west of the city. Here the Averpeak came closest to the city walls, and the cannon had a devastating view over the plains. As soon as they were in position, earthworks were raised around them. Six auxiliary companies fell into place to guard the guns from assault, bolstered by a detachment of greatswords decked in the colours of Altdorf.

  Behind the front lines, Volkmar placed nearly five thousand men in reserve. For the time being they were deployed among the baggage train, though no one doubted they would be called into action before long. There were also archer companies, fast-moving and lightly armed, held back behind the front ranks for rapid deployment. These took their allotted places as nervously as the rest of their peers, double-checking their strings and anxiously making sure fresh arrows were close to hand.

  Aside from Volkmar and the warrior priests, only one detachment of the entire army truly marched without fear. Gruppen was last into position, his four hundred Knights Panther having held back to allow the rest of the army to spread along the ridge. As he took his station with the artillery on the extreme right flank, the cheers from the men around him took on some real enthusiasm. His men were decked in their full plate armour and exotic pelts, mounted on chargers with broadswords at their sides. Their pennants were raised defiantly against the swirling winds of the storm, a forest of leaping panthers and slender figures of Myrmidia.

  Leonidas Gruppen was foremost among the knights, his visor up and his harsh face exposed to the horrors below. He went proudly, his armour draped in the hide of a black panther from furthest Ind, his standard-bearer at his side. The preceptor gave the word and the banner was unfurled, a glorious tapestry to Myrmidia picked out in gold and ivory.

  Gruppen turned to Volkmar’s position and raised his fist in salute. As he did so, the remaining banners of the army were swung into p
osition. Standards of Reikland, Nuln, Middenheim, Talabecland, city-states of Tilea, Averland and the mercenary companies all flew out, caught by the buffets of the storm and exposed in all their varied splendour.

  In the centre of the ridge, Volkmar gave Maljdir a curt nod. The burly Nordlander strode forwards, Bloodbringer swinging from his belt. He carried the Imperial Standard in both mighty hands. Planting the shaft firmly in the soil, he let the Theogonist’s own banner stream out. The golden fabric rushed into view, exposing the Emperor’s own coat of arms: two crimson griffons rampant flanking a sable shield with the initials KF emblazoned in dazzling argent. At the sight of the famous colours, the most revered in all the lands of men, the infantry regiments cried out with genuine fervour. If the Emperor had gifted Volkmar his own devices, men reasoned, then all hope had not gone.

  With that gesture, the army was in place. Forty thousand troops deployed along the ridge, all facing south, all armed and ready for combat.

  Volkmar looked back over the plain. The enemy army waited silently a mile distant, sprawled before the walls of the city in their sullen magnificence, spread like a vast black contagion over the once pristine plains. No banners flew. No brazen trumpets called them to arms. Instead, the braziers continued to belch smoke, the fires continued to blaze, the engines continued to churn.

  Then the sign was given. High up in the Iron Tower, a lilac star blazed out briefly, cutting through the columns of fire for an instant. A sigh seemed to pass through the distant ranks of waiting troops. Drums started to beat across the walls. All over the waiting host, men—or things like men - took up their crystal halberds and locked them into readiness.

  Volkmar looked across the enemy formation impassively. The traitor host was larger than the Imperial army, though the smog made it hard to gauge by how much. This Grosslich had been busy. Now his designs would be put to the test.

  “So we come to it at last,” he growled to Roll, taking up the Staff of Command. The gold reflected the distant lightning, glowing proudly against the gathering dark.

  “Sigmar preserve us,” said Roll grimly, drawing his sword. “Sigmar preserve us all.”

  Natassja waited in the throne room. The doors to the shaft beyond had been closed and the roar of the fires was subdued. She could feel the power beneath her feet growing, though. The time was fast approaching. Both her body and mind were changing. Her awareness, already more acute than the limited senses of mortal women, had magnified a thousandfold. She could feel the heartbeat of every soul within the city, could feel the slow burn of their stunted emotions as they readied themselves for the coming assault. From the augmentation chambers in the pits of the Tower to the daemons circling above, they were all transparent to her.

  The transformation had some drawbacks. Her grasp on the material world was becoming ever more tenuous, and she had to concentrate to ensure that she retained her proper place within it. This was a dangerous time for her. If she lost her grip too soon, before the Stone had reached the appropriate pitch of awareness, the process would never complete and she’d be left torn and rootless.

  That would not happen. Not after so many decades in the preparation.

  Ever since her youth, almost forgotten on the plains of Kislev, she had known she was destined for greater things. The life of a serf had never been enough for her. Even before she’d known of any existence other than the casual brutality of the ice-bound villages, some voice had reassured her that the future held improvements. That voice had never left her, her constant companion as the years had worn on.

  It had all changed with the coming of the dark ones. Out of the wastes they’d ridden, tall and slender and bearing the curved scimitars of raiders. She’d loved them at once, relishing their cruelly and skill. The villagers hadn’t stood a chance. The headman had been the last to go, roaring with pointless resistance right up until the lead horseman put a spike through his temple.

  Then they’d taken her. She’d been pretty and young enough to be worth corrupting. Ah, that had been a hard time. Even during the worst of her misery, manacled in the hut of the bandit chieftain, subject to the crude tastes of a savage and ignorant man, the voice hadn’t gone away. The raiders were His people, and He promised to deliver her from them. If she was just patient for a while and accepted the trials He sent her, then the path would open up to worlds of discovery.

  And so it had proved. In the far north, there were wonders fit for a mind of her subtlety. Her knowledge grew, fed by the snatched tutelage of shamans and their slaves. Beauty was an asset amongst such people, and in time she learned to use it. Each night she abased herself before the Dark Prince, and He gifted her luck. When she finally escaped the chieftain and was free to explore the fringes of the realm of madness, He gave her the Vision. She could remember it as clearly as ever. It had been so beautiful. By comparison, the bleak steppes became dreary and tedious to her. So she worked harder as she traversed the hidden realms, studied forbidden books, learned secret rites, delved into the wellspring of Dark magic which gushed so fulsomely on the edge of the mortal world of matter.

  The years passed. Others aged, and she did not. When after so long in the far north she finally discovered the old bandit chieftain again he was in failing health, ready to put aside the cares of mortal life and join the symphony of souls in the hereafter. Natassja kept him alive for another fifty years, every day of which was a fresh and unique agony. By the time she was ready to let his shrivelled soul slink into oblivion, her powers had become swollen and overripe. The hunt for a greater challenge was on. She needed to find a way to fulfil the Vision.

  She never regretted leaving the steppes. The warmer lands were so much more interesting, bursting with opportunity and places to practise the art. Over the long, wearing years she’d lived in many places—Marienburg, Altdorf of course, Talabheim, the heart of the Drakwald, a Lahmian citadel in the Middle Mountains, a hundred other places great and small. The world aged and grew colder while her blood and flesh remained hot and vital. The Vision never left her. She was just waiting for the right moment.

  She thought it had come with Marius, but he’d proved impossible to subvert. Then she’d found Lassus, and the possibilities began to coalesce. Four hundred years of searching, and the Vision had been vindicated in Averheim, that most provincial of Imperial cities. Turning the dull, prosperous, strait-laced pile of dung into a cacophonous oratory to the Lord of Pain had been the most pleasurable thing she’d ever done. The men of Averland were no better than the cattle they reared, and their fate was well and truly deserved. It was an appropriate place to begin her new life, and her gratitude to the Dark Prince was profound and sincere. To those that pleased Him, He asked for so little, and gave so much.

  Now she’d passed beyond the power of any in the province to hinder her. Helborg, for so long the one she’d feared, could do nothing in the time that remained to him. Schwarzhelm even less so. Volkmar and his little band of sword-wavers might be an irritation, but her vast legions stood between her and the Theogonist. All she needed now was a breathing space, just enough for the harmonies to reach their optimum pitch. It wouldn’t be long.

  “Natassja!”

  Grosslich’s voice was thick with anger. She turned to see him framed in the doorway to her throne room. He was still dressed in his ridiculous red armour. The Dark Prince only knew what had made him design such a thing. He carried his bone wand in one hand and a black-bladed sword in the other.

  He looked hugely annoyed. She didn’t blame him for that. If she’d been him, she’d have been hugely annoyed too.

  “My love,” she murmured, walking over to the throne and taking her place on it. The little gestures were important, even now. “What brings you—”

  “You know damn well what brings me here,” Grosslich said, advancing towards her. There was a powerful aura about him. He’d grown strong. In another place and another time, he’d have been a mighty warlord. The waste of it saddened her.

  “You seek Eschenbach.�
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  “Seek? No. I know full well what you did to him. Sacrificed to your power, just as you intend to sacrifice me.”

  “And why would I want that?”

  “To rule this place alone,” spat Grosslich, eyes blazing. “That’s why you made it a home of capering devils. None of this is what I wanted.”

  Natassja raised an eyebrow. “Then stay here with me. I’ll show you how to enjoy it. I never lied to you, Heinz-Mark. Believe me. If you stay in the Tower, there are still many things we could accomplish together.”

  Grosslich laughed harshly. A fey light had kindled across his features. The power he’d accumulated was already leaking, spilling out from his fingertips like water. He couldn’t handle what he’d been given. Ach, the waste.

  “Perhaps you’d like that,” he said. “Perhaps that would give you all you wanted from this arrangement.”

  He laughed again, a bitter, choking sound. “I won’t do it, Natassja. There’s one role left I know how to play. Your army needs a commander. I’m leaving to take them. I’ll destroy the challengers, and then I’ll make my next move. Perhaps I’ll bring them back here. Perhaps I won’t. You’ve given me the tools to carve out a realm of my own—it doesn’t need to be here.”

  “I could prevent you,” Natassja said, and the sadness in her voice was unfeigned.

  Grosslich shook his head. “I don’t think so. My skills are greater than you think.”

  Natassja knew that wasn’t so. She could kill him with a word, but to do so would solve nothing. Out of affection, she would give him a final chance, after which he would have to make his own decisions.

  “If you leave the Tower, I cannot protect you. If you stay, you will remain safe. You have my word. You will never be the master, but you will be provided for. You may yet become truly mighty, a regent worthy of long service.”