by Warhammer
Brunner poured powder down the barrel of the pistol. 'If it was a wolf, you'd be right. But this beast, I think, likes to fight. That is why Dietrich paid you and your father to kill all the other hunters and make it look like the beast's work.' Pujardov's sullen silence was all the confirmation he needed. 'He pays you to make sure no one hurts the beast.'
'Clever,' a sharp voice snarled from the shadows. Brunner swung around, firing his pistol at the voice. He swore as he heard the round smash against a tree.
'No more of that!' Dietrich growled, stepping into the clearing, his pistol pointed at Brunner. The bounty hunter was perched in the tree above Pujardov, a vantage point that allowed him to watch almost every approach to the clearing and his bait. 'Unless you want to die where you stand!'
You won't kill me,' Brunner told him. You can't afford to now.'
A tinge of doubt crept into Dietrich's hate-filled eyes. What are you talking about?' He glanced at Pujardov, a terrible suspicion growing in his mind.
Your assassins didn't get anything out of the witch before she died,' Brunner said. 'But I heard a few things. Something about a philtre and how to break an enchantment.'
Dietrich's body trembled with rage. Tell me what she said!' he ordered.
'No,' Brunner answered. 'We bargain for that. Throw away your pistol.'
Indecision crawled across the baronets face, his anger warring against his fear. It was the fear that finally won out. 'Throw away yours first,' he said, gesturing at Brunner's crossbow pistols. The bounty hunter nodded, carefully unfastening the weapons and letting them fall to the ground. With a sour expression, Dietrich threw his own weapon away.
The instant the threat of the pistol was gone, Brunner dropped from the tree, using Pujardov's body to cushion the fall. The Kislevite's livid curses went unnoticed as the bounty hunter rolled across the ground. As he straightened, a slender throwing knife flew from his hand. The blade slashed into Dietrich's arm, biting deep into his noble flesh.
The baronet recovered from his surprise almost too quickly for Brunner. The jewelled sword was in his hand a moment before the heavy falchion of the bounty killer came smashing down. Instead of collapsing the noble's skull, the blade only grazed his shoulder. Dietrich paled at the sight of his own blood on Brunner's sword.
'Surely the man who hunts wolves with neither spear nor bow isn't afraid of a little blood,' Brunner snapped. 'Because I assure you, there is more where that came from!'
The bounty hunter ripped his falchion free from Dietrich's parrying steel, nearly breaking the slender blade of his enemy in the manoeuvre. He swung the falchion at the nobleman's face, at the same time bringing his boot cracking into his shin. The unexpected move staggered the baronet. Brunner moved in for the kill.
The deathblow never struck. From the darkness, something black and savage exploded, smashing into the bounty hunter with the force of a lightning bolt. Brunner was knocked sprawling. He felt fangs scrape against his helm as he rolled on the ground, felt claws catch in his armour. The bounty hunter smashed a fist into the wolflike face of his attacker, then brought the iron pommel of his falchion crushing down on one of its hand-like paws.
The wolf yelped more from surprise than pain, but its cry was picked up by the wounded Dietrich.
'Don't dare strike her, you scum!' he raged. 'Don't you dare touch my Frieda!'
As it heard the name, the wolf-beast disentangled itself from Brunner. With a quick, loping trot, it ran to the wounded nobleman. Dietrich's vengeful advance was halted in a piteous display of affection as the wolf nuzzled its face against his body, licking timidly at his wounds. The baronet's hand stroked the wolfs pelt, not with the idle touch of man and beast, but the adoring caress of lovers.
'She cheated me!' Dietrich raged. 'The witch cheated me. She said the philtre would make Frieda love me despite her vows to the goddess. She said nothing about... about... this!' He turned tear-rimmed eyes to the she-wolf. 'He won't hurt you, my love! None of them will ever hurt you!'
Brunner staggered to his feet, another throwing knife in his hand. The wolf-beast turned, snarling at him. Dietrich glared at the bounty hunter, some trace of reason overcoming his concern for his lover.
You can't hurt her,' he smiled. 'When she is like this, no one can. So what does your knife matter!'
'It's not for her!' Brunner growled back. In a fluid motion, he sent the knife whistling through the air and slamming into the nobleman's injured shoulder. Dietrich screamed in pain, his agony exciting the wolf-beast's adoring fury. The monster lunged at Brunner, covering the clearing in a single bound.
The bounty hunter was ready for her, the witch's curved dagger slashing through the black pelt. The she-wolf wailed as the blade struck her, blood bubbling from the wound. Brunner leapt back as the beast clawed at him. He readied himself for another attack, then hesitated as he saw the wolf-beast's body shudder. He remembered what Miranda had told him about breaking the enchantment.
If he expected the wolf to change back into a woman, however, he was disappointed. It was still the lupine face of a beast that regarded him when the convulsions passed and the wolf lifted herself from the ground. The only change that had come upon it were the eyes. No longer blazing red, they were a soft blue, filled with horror and disgust and shame. Filled with so many things, but not a trace of love.
'Frieda!' Dietrich screamed, rushing to the fallen wolf.
Again the wolf-beast reacted to hearing her name. Understanding shone in her eyes. She knew all that had been done to her and why. She also knew who had forced this nightmare upon her.
With a snarl that was more than that of an animal, the she-wolf leapt upon Dietrich, her fangs closing about his throat. Savagely she worried at the nobleman's flesh, scattering his blue blood across the clearing. The baronet shrieked, wailing in agony that was more than physical. His hand closed about the heft of a jewelled dagger and with a moan of utter despair, he drew the blade and sank it into his lover's side.
Man and beast slumped to the ground, each quivering as death crept into their limbs. Dietrich struggled to touch his hand to the she-wolf's head, the wolf struggling just as hard to pull away from his noxious touch. In the end, it was the beast who won and an almost human smile spread across its muzzle as it saw the baronet's hand slump into the grass just out of reach of her.
Brunner dropped to the ground, watching through the night. If tradition was right, then the carcass of a werekin would change back into its human shape with the dawn. It was a terrible thing to consider, the only thing the body of a dead priestess would earn him would be a noose. Still, he did not want to risk the legends being right. After all, the dagger Dietrich had stabbed into the beast had been a silvered one, and silver was the only metal that could bring harm to a werekin.
'You've got your beast!' snarled Pujardov, struggling against his bonds. 'Untie me!'
The bounty hunter shook his head, then a grim smile started to form. What was it the old witch had said? The bite of the werekin would make a courageous man into a werekin? If so, then it would certainly do the same to a murderous Kislevite slug. Brunner walked towards the hunter, releasing him from the tree but leaving his hands tied. He shoved Pujardov towards the body of the wolf-beast. The hunter cringed away from the carcass in mortal terror, but another shove from Brunner pitched him to the ground beside it.
'You'll die for this! And for what you did to my father!' Pujardov threatened.
Brunner ignored the curses raging off the Kislevite's tongue, instead seizing the man's arm and shoving it between the gaping jaws of the wolf. Eyes wide with horror, Pujardov tried to squirm away as Brunner pushed the jaws of the dead beast close, sinking their sharp fangs into the Kislevite's flesh.
A dead priestess was worth nothing, but a live monster, that would be worth a considerable reward, enough to warrant waiting at the castle until the next time Morrslieb was full. When the baron watched Pujardov change, whatever the Kislevite tried to tell him would be forgotten.
&nb
sp; On the ground beside him, Pujardov wailed in agony, horrified at what the bounty hunter had done to him.
Brunner shook his head. 'What are you crying about? You would have made a lousy orphan anyway.'
THE DOOM OF GNASHRAK
Prowling the streets of Miragliano one day, in search of an elusive merchant who had a supply of Arahyan inks at a suspiciously low price, I found myself unexpectedly staring into the black steel face of Brunner's helmet. I was surprised at our sudden meeting; it had been some months since our last conversation. The bounty hunter nodded, relaxing the grip his hand had assumed on the hilt of his sword as he saw my own unarmed condition. I believe that the bounty hunter had a certain fondness for me, but I doubt if he trusted anyone.
I greeted Brunner warmly, happy indeed to have stumbled upon him, thoughts of stolen ink at once banished from my head. My initial recounting of the man's exploits had proven extremely popular. Indeed, I was still living off some of the proceeds the pamphlet had won me, and I was eager to repeat my past success. I wasted no time in unleashing a barrage of questions, asking him where he had gone these past months, what feats of bravery (and avarice, though I kept that thought firmly to myself) he had accomplished. Brunner batted away my questions, saying that the street was no place to talk. He began to walk away, and as he did so, I noticed the stiff manner in which he moved and the fact that some pieces of his armour appeared to be new, as though the old ones had required replacements. The thought occurred to me that perhaps his lengthy absence had not been due to some long and difficult string of hunts, but because this grim and forbidding man had actually encountered a foe who was his equal Perhaps he had spent these long months recovering from injuries received in battle?
Thrilled by the prospect of such a tale, I hurried after him, a feat made easy by the slowed nature of his stride. As I had half-expected, Brunner's path led me to the Black Boar. I found the bounty hunter seated, as usual, at one of the rear tables, a tankard of beer set before him. I noticed a second tankard opposite him and quietly chastised myself for being so foolish as to think that my contact had not seen me dogging his tracks.
I took the unspoken invitation, and seated myself at his table. I sipped at my beer a moment, noting the dents and scratches on his armour, and observing once more the stiff, awkward movements of his left arm as he lifted the cup to his mouth. I inquired as to what mishap had discomfited Brunner so, not daring to suggest that he had fallen prey to injury or illness.
The bounty hunter sipped at his beer for a moment then set his tankard down, fixing me with cold blue eyes. In a low voice that was kindred to the sound of a raven gliding toward a gallows, he asked me if I had ever hunted orcs...
Smoke billowed from the blazing rubble, fingers of flame clutching at the darkening, overcast sky. Screams and sounds of slaughter rose into the darkness, as if to welcome the advent of night. Beside the inferno that had moments before been a barn, a massive, brutish shape loomed, glaring at the burning building.
The dancing flames picked out details of the figure. The shape belonged to no human body. The legs were short, bandy, almost bowed. The arms were long, much longer than a man's: more like the limbs of the fabled apes of the South Lands and rippling with such a quantity of muscle that even the strongest man could not match. The shoulders were broad, nearly four feet in breadth. The head jutted forward from the shoulders, supported by a thick stump of a neck. Its skull was thick, the forehead sloping away so quickly from the creature's face as to be almost nonexistent. Sharp, wolf-like ears adorned the sides of the head. One of them was notched and sported dozens of steel and brass rings, blades of rusting metal dangling from each loop.
The face of the beast was dominated by a massive maw, the lower jaw of the creature's mouth jutting forward, allowing its tusk-like fangs to stab past its upper lips and cheeks. Each of the tusks was tipped by a cap of steel pinned into the living ivory of the fangs. The tips of the two longest fangs rested against the edge of the deep-set eye sockets that sank into the creature's skull from either side of its small, smashed, snout-like nose. Beady red eyes glowered from the shadowed pits of the creature's face, offsetting the dark green hue of its leathery, weathered hide.
The monster had come from the impenetrable depths of the mountains in the south known as the Vaults, and wore the tale of his travels upon his grotesque body. Armour encased his form, armour ripped from the bodies of butchered foes. The shoulder plates that protected his upper arms had been beaten from the helmets of human knights, the chainmail hauberk that dripped about his chest and hung below his waist had once graced an ogre mercenary, the steel leggings had been cobbled together from the greaves of a dozen militiamen who had been unfortunate enough to discover the beings that had been preying upon their mountain village's cattle.
The piecemeal armour was held together by numerous leather straps and bits of wire, and it creaked and groaned as the orc moved. But the blade held in his ham-like fist was no looted and violated craftwork of man. The work of his own people's brutish smiths, it was a massive, cleaver-like blade, its edge nearly three and a half feet in length, honed to a dull sharpness that would punch through bone and steel without notching the blade. A thick, round stump of steel formed a crude handle for the orc's fist to grip at the bottom of the blade. A sideshow strongman would have been hard pressed to even lift the mass of steel. The orc lifted it above his head in one hand without even a grunt of effort from his lungs. The cleaver was like the orc who wielded it and whose people had crafted it massive, monstrous, ugly and murderous.
The orc's mouth gaped open, exposing bits of rotting meat caught between the fangs. Its voice roared over the screams, over the crackle of the flames. It was like the boom of a cannon, and carried with it the grating harshness of a knife scraping bone. The slobbering, brutal tones sounded like shredding metal. The monster was howling to his minions in the harsh Orrakh tongue.
The orcs had fallen upon the village like one of the Grey Mountains' capricious storms: suddenly, without warning, and utterly devastating. The villagers, peasant farmers and a few craftsmen, had fallen before the orcs like wheat before the scythe, and the greenskin marauders had reaped that harvest in a frenzy of murder and butchery. The terrified Bretonnians had mounted no form of defence. They had run before the orcs, fleeing for their lives rather than standing to fight. The sight of their human adversaries fleeing had driven the raiders into an even more berserk rage. They had come for loot and slaughter, it was true, but above all else, they had come for battle. Now, with the entire hamlet in flames, the last survivors cowered within the quickly burning barn.
Gnashrak turned his attention toward the barn as the wooden door opened. A coughing man emerged, thick black smoke billowing from behind him. Several soot-stained, sobbing faces appeared in the doorway behind him, gasping for fresh air.
Gnashrak's beady red eyes studied the man. He was a burly sort for a human, most likely the protector of this nest of cattle. A simple leather contrivance hung about his neck and was tied to his knees. The man held a large hammer in his hands, but one look told Gnashrak that it was a tool, not a weapon. The orc's gruesome face twisted, as though he had eaten something distasteful. He spat a blob of phlegm as if to remove a foulness from his mouth. Still, the warboss hefted his huge blade and shambled forward.
Gnashrak growled at the leather-aproned human. The man hesitated, glancing back at the burning barn. Then he walked forward. He shifted his grip on the hammer, his knuckles turning white as he firmed his grasp. The man spread his legs apart, adopting a combat stance. It had been long years since he had raised a weapon against bandit raiders, but the blacksmith was no coward. He fought down the fear in his breast, staring at the mob of greenskinned monsters with his best defiant glare. Gnashrak and his followers laughed at the pathetic sight. The blacksmith rushed at them, hate overcoming his fear as their grunting laughter washed over him. Gnashrak's lips twisted into a parody of a smile.
The orc warboss loped forward, the
brutal length of his cleaver held straight up beside him. Thick lines of foamy spittle trickled from the corners of the fiend's mouth as he anticipated the coming fray. The blacksmith was the first man in the entire village to turn and fight him, and Gnashrak intended to savour the moment.
'Ore scum!' the man screamed in a voice filled more with terror than rage. He leapt forward, bringing the hammer down in a smashing blow. The orc leader stepped back, turning his body, and letting the clumsy blow strike the armour of his shoulder guard. Gnashrak glared at the man. The orc's jaws dropped to their full cavernous extent and a deep, rumbling roar issued from its bellows-like lungs. The blacksmith cringed, holding the hammer across his chest, as though to make a barrier between himself and the greenskin marauder.
Gnashrak lifted his massive blade and brought the weapon crashing down. The crude cleaver snapped the steel hammer like a twig, and sliced into the flesh of the man cowering behind the crude weapon, crunching through his ribcage and severing him crosswise from shoulder to waist. Blood exploded from the wound that slid apart, the dismembered halves slipping into the dirt. The faces at the doorway of the burning barn wailed in horror. Gnashrak paused to hawk a glob of phlegm on the dead body. He turned and roared at his followers.
The orcs rushed forward, not using their weapons to kill, but to herd the survivors back into the burning barn. Gnashrak watched his mob for a moment, then craned his bull neck about, casting a last disgusted look at the mutilated blacksmith. He turned his eyes from the body, towards the orcs herding the cowering survivors back into the blazing barn, with the points of spears. The screams brought a slight smile to Gnashrak's face, but it was not enough. As the clouds at last released the slightest of drizzles, the orc nodded to himself.
Somewhere to the north, he would find the knights who owned the sorry cattle he and his mob had claimed. Then there would be a slaughter worthy of an orc, a proper fight to make the name of Gnashrak Headkrusher. The peasants thought the harvest was past, but the orc would teach them and their masters differently. There was a second harvest coming. A harvest reaped not with sickles, but with swords.