Swords of the Emperor

by Chris Wraight

  More trumpets resounded from the centre of the ridge and the massed host of halberdiers began to run down the shallow slope of the Averpeak, hollering cries to Sigmar and Ranald as they went.

  Gruppen looked down at the battlefield below. Less than half a mile distant, the first ranks of the enemy waited. They’d had time to dig in, but not enough. Empire artillery had blasted huge gouges in their lines of trenches and swathes of the vanguard were in disarray from the bombardment.

  He picked his target and took up his lance.

  “For Myrmidia!” he cried. All around him his brother knights did likewise, and for a brief moment the shout of the Knights Panther drowned out the rest of the Imperial army.

  Then he snapped his visor down and kicked his horse down the slope. The squires sprinted clear and the squadrons tore towards the enemy line, picking up speed as they hurtled towards the front ranks.

  Gruppen felt his heart thumping within his armoured chest as his steed accelerated into a pounding gallop. The gap between the armies shrank rapidly. As at the Turgitz Cauldron, the knights formed into a wall of steel, their lances swinging down into position as each man picked his enemy.

  Gruppen narrowed his eyes. The battlefield was a riot of fire and smoke. Flashes of lightning still arced down, exposing the vast extent of the enemy formations in vivid detail. He saw men lumbering into his path, hauling pikes into place to frustrate the charge.

  Too slow. The ride of the Knights Panther was like a sudden deluge from the high peaks. Travelling at speed, their hooves a thudding blur, the squadrons smashed into the lines of defenders.

  Gruppen was at the forefront. He aimed for a knot of men trying to erect fresh spikes. They tried to pull back when they saw him bearing down, but they had no chance. He spurred his charger on, sweeping through them and impaling the leader clean through with his lance. On either side of him his knights did likewise, slicing open the defences and scattering the loose formations.

  Then they were amongst the press of men and the charge ground into its first resistance. Gruppen dropped his lance and drew his broadsword, whirling it round in the air as it left the scabbard. His men ploughed deep into the enemy ranks, crunching aside any obstacle. At this range, Gruppen’s horse was as deadly as he was. His charger’s hooves lashed out as it slowed from the gallop, crushing skulls and cracking ribs. His blade followed up, sweeping in mighty wheels to slash out at any infantry foolish enough to get close.

  Gruppen spurred his horse on further, maintaining the momentum, carving his way towards his objective. It loomed up in the dark, far larger than he’d guessed from atop the ridge. The war engine towered thirty feet into the air, a heavy muzzle of iron and bronze, studded with rivets and underpinned with its growling furnace. Iron-masked men milled around it like ants, readying it to fire.

  As the knights swept closer the defence became more stubborn. Grosslich’s heavy infantry, rendered impervious to glancing blows by their plate armour, formed a defensive line between the knights and the war engine.

  “Onwards!” roared Gruppen, kicking his steed back into speed, knowing they had to break them on the charge. The knights swept into range, still in formation, their line intact and deadly. They crashed together, a solid bastion of iron against a thundering curtain of steel.

  The assault instantly descended into confusion. Knights were knocked from their steeds, hurled back in the saddle by halberd jabs. Defending infantry were tossed aside, trampled into the mud, their armour cracked.

  Gruppen felled his target, riding him down and swinging heavily with his sword on the follow-through. His right-hand man was not so lucky, steering his horse into a thicket of blades and being dragged from the saddle by a dozen armoured hands.

  Gruppen whirled his steed round. He needed to keep moving. A soldier lumbered towards him, halberd stabbing at the flanks of his horse. The charger kicked out at him, shattering the staff before Gruppen could bring his sword round in a decapitating arc, aimed precisely for the gap between helm and breastplate.

  Gruppen looked up. The knights had carved a trail of death, just as they’d been commanded. Now the melee would undo them. Already four of his men were down, and the rest were struggling.

  “Withdraw!” he roared, kicking his steed back into motion.

  As one, displaying their peerless horsemanship, the knights pulled their mounts round and fought their way free. Another rider was dragged to earth as they turned, unable to escape the grasping fingers of the defenders, but the rest broke clear.

  “To the ridge!” cried Gruppen, urging his horse onwards. The knights swept back, pulling away from the avenue of death they’d created. As they galloped back for fresh lances and fresh steeds, they swept past Imperial infantry heading the other way, swarming along the cleared territory, desperate to engage at last.

  Gruppen smiled. His blood was up. Another pass and the engine would be destroyed. The enemy seemed to have no answer to the sudden cavalry charge. Just as the beasts had found at Turgitz, there was little in the Empire that could withstand their driving wedge of steel.

  Then the engines fired.

  The massed boom of their report made the earth itself reel. All along the enemy lines, the infernal devices detonated their charges and sent their cargo of death sailing into the sky. Vast streaks of blazing red fire scored the storm-wracked heavens, tearing through the bolts of the Celestial magisters. Whips of flame wrapped themselves like serpents around the discharges, flicking and snapping angrily. The massive engines slammed back hard from the recoil, crushing the men behind them before the binding chains went taut with a shower of sparks.

  The Averpeak ridge disappeared. As the shot impacted it bloomed into a screaming inferno, hurtling across the exploding earth as if kindled on a lake of oil. Lilac and crimson blasts ripped the skyline apart, flaring up with sudden, eye-watering brilliance. Echoes of the impact resounded across the battlefield, swiftly followed by the anguished cries of men caught in a sudden and terrible wall of fire. It felt as if the world had been shattered, cracked open by the devastating power of the Chaos engines.

  As the backwash from the explosions rippled out, the vast plumes of lilac-edged smoke rolled clear. Huge sections of the ridge had been demolished, crushing men beneath the earth, burying them under the bodies of their comrades. Fires kindled on nothing, sweeping through what was left of the defences. Some standards still flew, but whole companies had been destroyed. Gruppen couldn’t see Volkmar’s position for the smog.

  One of his knights rode up alongside him, pulling his steed to a halt. Gruppen did likewise, shaken to the core by what he’d seen. Nothing could resist that degree of firepower. Nothing.

  “Orders, sir?” the knight asked. The man’s voice was tight.

  Gruppen took a deep breath, looking about him for some evidence that his senses had deceived him, that what he’d just seen hadn’t been quite as devastating as it looked. None came.

  “Send the second wave in,” he growled. “Then get a fresh horse. We’ve got to get those engines down, or this’ll be over in an hour.”

  Volkmar picked himself up from the ground, his robes covered in mud and blood. He tried to stand, and staggered, falling to one knee. His vision was black, picked out with spinning points of light. The roar of the battle rushed back to him slowly, as if coming from far away.

  “My lord!” Maljdir was at his elbow, helping him up. The priest was similarly covered with debris. All around them men were regaining their feet. Others didn’t get up.

  “Unhand me!” growled Volkmar, shaking himself loose. Signs of weakness were the last thing he needed to convey. “Do we have the musicians?”

  “Some.”

  “Order the second wave in. We can’t survive another barrage - we have to get amongst them.”

  Maljdir nodded sharply and rushed off to find a surviving trumpeter. Volkmar looked around him. The dying and wounded stretched along the ridge in both directions. Some companies had been entirely destroyed, others
only maimed. Those who’d been quickest on the charge had escaped the volley, though they now grappled with the front ranks of the enemy alone. Those who’d been held back for the second wave had been decimated.

  Volkmar retrieved his staff. His men were outnumbered and outgunned. He needed to act fast.

  “Where are the wizards?” he demanded. The younger Celestial magister limped forwards, blood running down his face. Two of the Bright wizards had survived the blast, and the Light magisters were untouched, set back as they were further down the far side of the ridge, still working. Hettram was gone, lying face down in the filth and debris, his robes stained dark red.

  “Come with me,” Volkmar rasped to the Bright wizards. “We’re going down there. As for the rest of you, I need something big, and I need it soon.”

  The Celestial wizard nodded numbly, still in shock. His Light counterparts, lost in their preparations, made no response.

  All along the ridge, the army was beginning to recover. Maljdir’s orders blared out, and the infantry companies still held in reserve started to stream down the slope. The warrior priests, grim-faced and bearing their warhammers, formed up around Volkmar, ready to take the battle to the enemy. Maljdir was among them, carrying the torn and charred standard in his massive hands. Roll was at his side hefting his broadsword eagerly.

  Lightning still lanced down, the residue of the Celestial wizards’ casting. The Army of the Stone was advancing again, rank after rank of steadily marching troops, eyes glowing in the dark. All across the battlefield, loyalist and traitor clashed with desperate ferocity. As company after company committed to action, the battlefront unfurled to over a mile long, a seething mass of straining bodies broken only by the avenues carved by the cavalry charges and artillery fire.

  Volkmar looked across the plain and cursed under his breath. The bulk of his forces were engaged and the rest were racing to do so. There was no pulling back, and no room to manoeuvre. Those damned engines had turned the pattern of the battle and he was now dancing to the traitor’s tune.

  The Theogonist felt the rage well up within him, the desperate mania that had afflicted him since Middenheim. Like a tide pushing against a dam, cracking it and poised to overflow, the currents of his fervour rose to breaking point. Streissen had unlocked it, and Averheim had pushed wide the door.

  There was no point in suppressing it now. Frenzy had a purpose, and he had to use it.

  “Follow me,” Volkmar growled, planting the Staff of Command firmly in the soil. As he did so it roared into life, blazing with a swirling golden aura. “We’ll find the bastard who caused this. I want his eyes.”

  Seen from five miles to the east, the column of fire was shrouded in a thick grey pall of smoke. It rose from the base of the city like a rolling sea mist, dousing the angry blood-red of the pillar until the shaft of it pierced the obscurity again a hundred feet up in the air. The very earth vibrated with its muffled roar, thrumming under the hooves of the horses.

  Helborg had driven his forces hard. Leitdorf’s decision had been vindicated by the obvious signs of battle around Averheim. Judging by the drifting shreds of blackpowder smoke in the air, the Empire had arrived to the north of the city. Despite the presence of the looming Tower, hope had spread across his own men like a fire through dry scrub. Eager to join up with the besieging forces from the north, the infantry columns had speeded up and left the lumbering baggage train far behind.

  Helborg rode with his Reiksguard escort at the vanguard, willing the miles to pass quicker, itching to draw the runefang in anger. If they went as quickly as they were able, his men would arrive at Averheim before the day’s end and in time to make a difference. All depended on Skarr being at the designated muster, now imminent. Helborg had no doubt he would be.

  As the vanguard rounded a long, shallow bend in the road, his expectations of the preceptor were vindicated. Under the lee of a sweeping curve of grassland the reinforcements waited, Skarr at their head, the banners of Leitdorf and the Reiksguard fluttering in the swirling, unnatural winds.

  The Marshal kicked his horse on ahead, casting a critical eye over the ranks of soldiers as he approached them. Some looked very useful, standing in ordered ranks and with the proper air of belligerence. Others looked little better than flagellants. Still, that was to be expected. The numbers were impressive, given the time in which they’d had to work. Helborg estimated the combined total under arms at five thousand on foot, plus a hundred or so horse.

  “Preceptor,” he said gruffly.

  Skarr saluted, fist on breastplate.

  “My lord,” he replied. “The men are ready to be led.”

  “Very good. Take up the rearguard and ensure they keep the pace tight. I’ll be at the spearhead. We leave at once—I don’t want to arrive when this is over.”

  Skarr bowed and made ready to take up his place when he suddenly pulled up.

  “My lord,” he started hesitantly. “Is that… but forgive me.”

  “Is it what?” snapped Helborg.

  “Your sword. It’s the…”

  As the words left his mouth, Ludwig Schwarzhelm loomed up from amongst the column of men at Helborg’s rear. The Emperor’s Champion was unmistakable, a massive and brooding presence even among the escorting Reiksguard. Skarr’s jaw fell open. For a moment he looked like he might draw his blade and charge. Then he whirled back to the Marshal, confusion etched on his face.

  “The runefang, yes,” said Helborg, his expression as hard as ever. “Much has changed since you rode north. You’ll have to learn the rest on the ride.”

  As Schwarzhelm drew closer, some of the halberdiers under Skarr’s command recognised him and rushed forwards in greeting. In the forefront was a thick-set man with a bruised face and the look of a tavern brawler.

  Skarr shook his head in disbelief, hand still on the pommel of his sword.

  “I thought…”

  “Did you not hear me, Skarr?” asked Helborg. “Your vengeance can wait.”

  The preceptor snapped back into focus.

  “Forgive me,” he said again. Then he reached around his neck and unhooked the trophy he’d been wearing ever since the last battle of Averheim. The shard of the runefang, salvaged from the Marshal’s own wounded cheek, kept safe even while the blade itself had been taken hundreds of miles away.

  “At least let me give you this.”

  Helborg extended his gauntlet and took the fragment of steel. He held it up to the glowing red of the sky. It twisted on its cord of leather, winking in the dull light.

  “The final piece,” he mused, watching the metal turn.

  Then, reverently, he hung the shard around his own neck, threading it under his breastplate for protection. The metal was cold against his skin, a reminder of what had been warded for so long, preserved against the day when the Sword of Vengeance would be united with its wielder.

  “You did well, Skarr,” Helborg said, taking up the reins. This time his voice was a little less harsh. “When this is over, I will explain. Until then, trust my judgement. We ride together, Schwarzhelm and I. That very fact should give you hope.”

  He looked up then, gazing west across the heads of his men towards the Iron Tower, visible in the distance as a spear of darkness at the foot of the shaft of fire. Clouds of smoke billowed around it, driven into great eddies by the unnatural storm. There were blackpowder plumes among them.

  “Enough talk,” he said, and his expression was dark. “The threads gather on the loom. We’ve done what we can to prepare. To the city.”

  Gruppen wheeled his steed around under the shadow of the Averpeak and prepared for the charge. It would be his third foray into the enemy ranks. Of his original squadron, only six remained. He quickly commandeered more troops from two of the other depleted detachments, making up a restored line of twenty-two knights.

  “One more time!” he yelled, his voice cracking. The resistance around the big guns was tough, far tougher than he’d expected. Two more of the bronze-bound
monsters had been destroyed by cannon fire but the rest still thundered out, reducing any exposed Imperial positions to scorched earth and scraps of bone.

  In order to survive, the bulk of the Empire troops had piled forwards, locked in close melee combat with the enemy infantry. They fought bravely, but they were outmatched by Grosslich’s troops. Things had been done to the defenders. The Averheim troops fought without fear and their formations never broke, no matter how savagely they were mauled.

  That was just the human soldiers. There were others among them, more like beasts than men. Gruppen had nearly been felled by one such creature on the last withdrawal, a vast armoured brute with a face like that of a dog. Rumours ran wild along the ranks that there were worse horrors along the east flanks: scuttling fiends with talons for hands, unstoppable killing machines tearing a swathe through horrified Imperial companies.

  Gruppen shook his head. No point in worrying about that. The battle was on a knife edge. The enemy had been hurt by the initial barrage of cannon fire, but now the field was swinging back their way. Above it all, the Tower glowered, dark and forbidding.

  “Stay close!” he bellowed at the knights mustering around him. The men were gathered at the base of the ridge where the squires had hurried to avoid the worst of the artillery punishment higher up. “Tight formation, keep on my shoulder. We strike fast, we strike hard. Remember who you are! For Myrmidia!”

  The knights shouted back the name of their goddess, fists clenched, their martial spirits undaunted. The Knights Panther were the finest soldiers in the Imperial ranks and they knew it.

  “Come about!” bellowed Gruppen, kicking his charger into position. “Charge!”

  Just as before, the line of riders tore across the battlefield, lances lowering, accelerating towards the enemy lines with a thunderous chorus of hooves.

  Those lines were closer than they had been. Gruppen had barely made full gallop before the first defenders came into view. A company of the hideous dog-soldiers was loping up towards a beleaguered regiment of Empire swordsmen, halberds held two-handed and faces hidden behind iron masks.