by Warhammer
Einarr considered the oldest of the sagas, the tales of the great giants who in the time before man had made war against the gods. Surely this could be nothing if not one of their mighty cities, brought low by the Plague God, its ancient power and glory sucked relentlessly down into the morass of his corruption.
It was this same power that Einarr now dared to oppose. He felt doubt again tug at his mind. Who was he to challenge the Plague God? Von Kammler was a mighty champion of Tchar, a warlord who had led an entire army to this blighted place and seen that same army scattered to the winds. Then he remembered his oath and what he had been promised. His mind turned to Birna and Asta and Vinnskor. A fresh wave of determination coursed through him. The Plague God was mighty, but the Plague Lord Skoroth was only a man.
They pressed on through the ruins, vile life slithering through the slime all around them. Flies the size of hawks crawled along the walls, sunning their wings in the crimson sun. Maggots bigger than serpents oozed across their path, blindly crawling across the land in search of carrion. A bloated, slobbering thing the size of an ox but resembling a melted toad regarded them with gem-like eyes from the shadow of a fallen archway but made no move to molest them.
The droning of insects, the scurry of unclean life and the omnipresent cackling of the daemons created such a din that they were unaware of the Hung warriors until they were almost on top of the vermin. It was Orgrim who detected them first, his long-suffering sense of scent picking the smell of men out from the reek that punished him so terribly. The Aesling snarled a warning, lifting his hand and motioning for them all to drop low.
Einarr crawled through the filth to join Orgrim. The woodsman was perched behind a jumble of slime-coated masonry, eyes fixed on what he had discovered. As he drew close to the scout, Einarr could hear the bubbling, slobbering voices of the Hung. Past Orgrim, he could see that a wide expanse of ground had been cleared of rubble and debris, forming an open plaza around the base of an enormous pillar, its sides dripping with yellow treacle. Around the circle was a large group of men and women, their bodies bloated with corruption, their jaundiced flesh split and oozing with pus and disease, their armour rotting on their bodies, their weapons rusting at their sides. They shared a rough semblance in the cast of their features, their faces broad with slender eyes and wiry hair.
‘The Hung,’ von Kammler said. Even encased within his armour, the massive knight had managed to appear beside Einarr without making a sound. ‘They sing their prayers to the Plague God, asking him to perpetuate their suffering, to strengthen the sickness that flows through them so that it might stave off the hand of death.’ The knight shook his head in loathing. ‘The wretches will grovel and whine for hours. We can go around them and they will never hear our passing.’
Einarr only partially heard von Kammler speak, his attention riveted to the obscene rites of the Hung. He saw a corpulent thing with the head of a slavering insect dressed in tattered green robes moving within the circle, spraying the ground with its filth, making symbols in the slime with the water from its body. Then the vile shaman turned, facing a wooden stake that had been pounded into the earth. Lashed to the stake was a hulking man, his crimson armour standing stark against the pestilential hues of the Hung and the rotting landscape.
‘We will go through this rabble,’ Einarr decided as he watched the scene unfold.
‘Do not be fooled by their rotten bodies,’ von Kammler warned. ‘They can endure wounds that would kill most men.’
‘Nothing should be too easy,’ Einarr said. He pointed to the stake and the captive lashed to it. ‘He does not look to be any friend of the Hung.’
Von Kammler stared at the prisoner for a moment. ‘He’s not. A Kurgan, I think. One of Khorne’s warriors, whatever his race.’
‘We will free him,’ Einarr said. Although it was impossible to see emotion in the glowing embers burning behind von Kammler’s mask, Einarr felt the bewilderment his words evoked. ‘Finding this cannot have been mere chance,’ he explained. ‘Was it not you who said the sacred number of Tchar is nine? That we are short one sword?’ Einarr clapped the knight’s shoulder, pushing him back towards where the others were gathered. ‘Tell them to ready for battle. We strike…’
His intentions were silenced by the blood-curdling howl from Orgrim. Throughout Einarr’s exchange with the knight, Orgrim had remained silent, eyes still trained on the ritual of the Hung. Einarr had put the berserker from his mind, thinking little of his rapt watchfulness. Now he had reason to curse his lack of caution. Orgrim was on his feet, axe raised above his head and roaring his animal hate at the men below. A thick, brute smell seemed to exude from Orgrim’s body and before Einarr’s stunned eyes, he saw the hair on the man’s face and hands begin to thicken and spread. With another howl, Orgrim hurled his axe at the Hung and leapt down into the court, his hands curled into savage claws.
Einarr cursed again, then rushed after the frenzied Aesling. Near the stake, the bug-headed shaman struggled to tear Orgrim’s axe free from his breast. He never had the chance. Like a predatory beast, Orgrim pounced on the stricken shaman, ripping and tearing at him with his claws. Ropes of brown entrails and shreds of green flesh littered the air as Orgrim tore the shaman apart. Einarr watched in horrified fascination as Orgrim lowered his head and savaged the shaman’s throat. When he lifted his head again, it was no longer that of the Aesling, but the lean, stretched muzzle of a wolf, its fur caked in the unclean filth from the shaman’s veins.
‘Ulfwerenar,’ Einarr gasped, recalling the stories of the were-kin, the men who bore the flesh of the beast within them. The Norscan fought to control his shock; there would be time enough to worry about Orgrim’s condition once the Hung were dead.
Fortunately, the Hung were as stunned by the sudden appearance of the werewolf as much as Einarr. The sudden, savage violence that had erupted from nowhere to claim their shaman had frozen them with confusion. But their inaction did not linger long. A huge warrior, his rusty armour struggling to contain the bulk of his bloated body, surged forward from the ranks of the stunned plague worshippers. He turned his pitted helmet in Orgrim’s direction, snarling a bubbling cry and pointing his corroded sword at the were-kin. Orgrim reacted to the champion’s challenge with a low snarl and launched himself at the armoured warrior.
The plague champion met Orgrim’s lunge with a slash of his polluted sword, digging a gory furrow through Orgrim’s chest. The werewolf howled in rage at the injury and his claws scrabbled against the champion’s armour, tearing into the corrupt metal. The Hung pushed him back with a thrust of his armoured gut, raising his sword for another strike. He froze as the eyes hidden behind his rusting helm watched the wound he had dealt the werewolf closing upon itself. It would take more than diseased steel to overcome the terrible powers that pulsed through the cursed flesh of an ulfwerenar. The champion seemed to realise his mistake, taking a cautious step back.
The other Hung did not seem to notice their champion’s distress, however. As the champion had charged, so too had they. Dozens of men and women, their bodies swollen with disease, their flesh leprous and pitted with oozing boils, charged into the plaza and rushed towards Einarr, intent on stopping him before he could reach the stake.
The foremost of the Hung disappeared in a burst of blue flame, their bodies collapsing as the eerie fire consumed them. The head of another burst like an over ripe melon as a shimmering fog appeared around it and then streamed up his nose and ears until the pressure within his skull became too great to contain. By comparison, the few who fell with black-feathered arrows in their diseased bodies were the fortunate ones. Whether they fell from Birna’s arrows or the spells of Urda and von Kammler, there were many more to take the place of the fallen.
The survivors kept coming, chanting the obscene name of their god. The sound caused Einarr’s stomach to churn, but he kept his grip on Alfwyrm steady. Just as the first of the Hung closed on him, he became aware of Vallac at his side, the Kurgan’s mangled face c
urled into a bloodthirsty snarl. Beside Vallac loomed Thognathog, the ogre’s bulk anchoring their flank. Still fastened to the ogre by his chains, Zhardrach cursed and threatened the oncoming Hung with a cruel-looking knife the dwarf had acquired.
Roaring a Baersonling war cry, Einarr met the charge of the Hung, his sword slashing through the belly of the first foolish enough to close with him. The marauder flopped obscenely against the ground, struggling to lift himself on his severed spine. Zhardrach was soon looming over him, plunging his knife again and again into the back of the tribesman’s neck.
‘Keep putting them down and I’ll see they don’t get up!’ the dwarf croaked, sadistic glee in his deep voice. Einarr and Vallac nodded grimly to the grinning fiend, then put him from their minds as they concentrated on the press of diseased humanity before them.
How long the killing continued, Einarr could not say. His body was caked in blood from his foes. Limbs and heads littered the ground around him, the air was heavy with the stink of death. Flies swarmed all around the carnage, a living curtain of blinding filth.
Somehow, Einarr managed to force his way through the throng, step-by-step cutting his way through the Hung until he had reached the stake. None of the plague worshippers had thought to slaughter their captive, or perhaps like the Aeslings of Skraevold, none of them dared kill one marked for sacrifice. Either way, Einarr found the captive still alive, lashing furiously at his bonds, almost berserk in his impotent rage. The prisoner roared curses on his foes, spitting dark promises of what he would do to them, of the black offerings he would make to the Skull Lord when he was free.
Einarr hesitated for a moment, staring at the raging captive. He was a huge man, bigger even than von Kammler, his armour chased in bronze and stained a bloody red. What looked like bones were somehow fixed to the heavy metal plates, looking almost as though they had melted into the steel, giving his mail an almost skeletal appearance. The face that looked at Einarr was cruel and savage, hideous runes scarred into his flesh, his wild hair matted with dried blood. Through his beard, the warrior smiled at Einarr, his teeth filed into points and capped with bronze. More disconcerting were the man’s eyes. There was no white in them, only the blood red of the battlefield and the shrines of Khorne.
Einarr regarded the bound champion for only a moment, then his sword was swinging through the clouds of buzzing flies. Alfwyrm struck the thick cords of dried entrails that bound the Kurgan, snapping them beneath its keen edge. The captive pulled his arms forward, rubbing at his chaffed wrists and then let loose with a roar of terrible jubilation. He nodded to Einarr, then flung himself at the press of the Hung. His hands gouged eyes and tore throats, his armoured feet smashed knees and shattered legs. Still shrieking his savage war cry, the Kurgan was soon lost amid the mob of his foes. Einarr grimly wondered what sort of madman he had unleashed. Even the bestial fury of Orgrim had seemed tame beside the wanton blood-thirst that the unarmed Kurgan displayed.
Then Einarr had no more time for thoughts of berserkers and beasts. The ground shuddered beneath him as something monstrous forced its way across the plaza. Even the clouds of flies seemed to part before it. It towered above the Hung, even the tallest of the tribesmen failing to rise to its breast. Its bloated body was coated in scabs and lesions, its bestial head little more than a fleshless skull. Mangy patches of fur dripped off its body and from the sides of its head great horns, cracked and filthy, jutted menacingly. In its massive paws, the beast carried an enormous hammer, the stone-head caked in slime and sludge. The minotaur fixed Einarr with its beady gaze, the lone eye staring out from its left socket looking like a tiny ball of pus. The plaguebull snorted, smashing its hoof against the ground, and charged.
Einarr leapt aside as the plaguebull brought its mattock hurtling downward, pulverizing the ground and sending shards of earth and stone flying in all directions. The minotaur did not hesitate to even consider its missed strike but with astounding speed swept the hammer up from the crater it had smashed into the ground, trying to catch Einarr with the side of the weapon. The Norscan threw himself flat, ducking under the blow. The hammer crashed against the sacrificial stake, smashing it into splinters. Einarr lashed out at the beast, his sword slashing deep into its side. Putrid water slopped from the wound in the brute’s belly, but if the plaguebull felt pain, it gave no sign. Instead it swung around, bringing the hammer about in a deadly arc of ruin. A pair of Hung were crushed as Einarr dove away from the strike, thrown through the air by the impact of the great hammer.
Landing badly, Einarr clutched at his stinging leg. He looked up in time to roll away from the hammer as the minotaur brought it crashing down once more. Splinters of rock tore into his side as the ground shattered beneath the blow. The plaguebull glared down at Einarr, snorting its frustration. A black-fletched arrow suddenly struck the brute’s face, quickly followed by a second. The minotaur shook its head, as though trying to shoo an annoying insect, then turned its murderous rage back towards Einarr. The hammer rose again.
Before the plaguebull could bring the hammer down, a hulking shape appeared behind it. Powerful hands closed around the head of the hammer, preventing the mattock from descending. The minotaur spun around, fury in its pustule eye. Thognathog glared back at it and drove his left head into the brute’s face. The thick skull of the ogre shattered the minotaur’s snout, sending a spray of brown blood and green snot into the air. The beast reeled backward, its hands slipping from the grip of its hammer. Thognathog’s faces split into a savage grin as the ogre hefted the stolen weapon and brought it smashing into the minotaur’s side.
Thognathog and the plaguebull slowly drifted away from Einarr, the battle of the hulks crushing any Hung too slow to give ground before them. The Norscan drove his sword across the neck of a marauder who lunged at him with a morning star then disembowelled a second who came at him with an axe. For the moment, he was free from the press of his foes. He could see his comrades all around him, slashing and smashing their enemies. Orgrim, his shape now almost completely that of a great grey wolf, savaged the Hung with claw and fang, littering the plaza with torn bodies. Vallac plied his curved sword in a murderous arc, hewing limbs from his diseased foes.
Across the plaza, Einarr could see von Kammler. Weary of working his sorcery, the knight now waded through the marauders, crushing bone and rupturing organs with every sweep of his mace. Urda continued to ply her magic, however, sending streams of crackling energy searing into the Hung horde. Beside her, Birna sent black arrows streaking into any of the plague worshippers who took it in their worm-eaten minds to close upon the witch.
Einarr looked away from his comrades, trying to find the Kurgan berserker he had freed. He found the man, his body caked in the blood and filth of his foes, relentlessly slaughtering his way towards the pillar. Einarr could hear the howl of triumph erupt from the warrior’s throat as he won his way clear. He pounced towards an altar of green stone that stood beneath the pillar, crushing the skull of one last Hung between his powerful hands. The Kurgan reached the altar, lifting from it a great horned helmet. Even from such a distance, Einarr could see the skull rune of Khorne glowing evilly upon the brow of the skeletal helm. The Kurgan lowered the armour over his head, his scarred visage vanishing behind the beast-skull mask of the helm. With another roar of triumph and fury, he grabbed the enormous axe that also rested upon the altar and turned to face the Hung once more.
The Hung withdrew from the berserker, their ruined faces pale with fear. But it was not the Kurgan that drew their frightened eyes. Einarr could see something descending the column, slowly dripping down the pitted stone pillar. The berserker sensed it too, turning and craning his head upward. Unlike the Hung, the Khorne worshipper seemed to welcome the descent of the abomination.
It was like a worm, Einarr decided as he watched it slither down the pillar, its obscenely fat bulk exuding a purple slime to ease its passage. As thick around as a tree, its head split by a great gash of a mouth, its body pitted with dozens of le
prous eyes. The giant worm oozed its way down the column, an aura of pestilence preceding it. The Hung cringed before it and from their rotting mouths came a wailing chant of supplication and subservience.
The enormous green maggot slithered its way to the base of the pillar, its nether regions still coiled about the structure. The purple sludge drooling from its belly singed the ground as it reared up and surveyed the plaza with its slobbering head. None of the Hung dared meet its gaze, more afraid of setting eyes on their terrible god than the stabbing blades of their foes. Zhardrach found easy prey among their prone, trembling shapes. The worm lurched forward, its mouth spitting obscenities into the unclean air. The daemon’s voice seemed to defile every ear that heard it, gnawing at the mind like a jackal’s fang or a vulture’s beak. Scabrous blood leaked from the ears of those closest to the worm. The daemon slithered to the closest of the Hung, licking the crusty gore from his head with a mottled, whip-like tongue. Like a rotten fruit, the man’s head crumbled beneath the daemon’s touch, his flesh corrupting faster than he could scream. The Hung wailed in horror and devotion as the stench of their decaying tribesman exploded across the plaza.
The berserker had seen enough. The Kurgan leapt at the worm, a savage cry booming from his skeletal helm. The great axe held in his hands seemed to burn with a crimson light as it swept down towards the worm’s back. The burning edge seared through the worm’s blubbery flesh, spilling stinking brown ichor across the slimy ground. As the berserker drew back, the steel on his gauntlets smoked, the filth of the daemon gnawing at the metal. The wound stood raw and ragged for a moment, then was obliterated by a oozing stream of pus that flooded into the injury. The berserker roared again and flung himself back at the daemon. Even as his axe bit into it again, the first wound assumed the sickly green of the worm’s scabrous hide, showing no sign of the hurt that had been done to it.