by Warhammer
The witch scowled at him. ‘Your faith in my powers overwhelms me. Perhaps you spend too much time with the southlander.’
‘I have not forgotten the hag who abandoned me on the ice,’ Einarr retorted. Urda glared at him for a moment.
‘We all make mistakes, Steelfist,’ she said. ‘I can guide you out of the deceit Skoroth has infected this part of the swamp with, but the power to do so is taxing. The ogre will have to carry me.’ Einarr gestured at Thognathog and the huge brute reached down, cradling Urda in his enormous arm.
‘Walk where I tell you to walk, step where I tell you to step,’ the witch cautioned. ‘Your eyes will betray you, they will tell you that nothing has changed, that you are still locked within the trap. Do not believe them. Do as I say and you will emerge from this deception.
‘Disobey me, and your bones will rot here until the end of eternity.’
The thick undergrowth of the swamp eventually broke, just as the witch had told them it would, the sickly weeds and grasping vines finally yielding before ground too foul even for their fecundity. As Einarr and his followers emerged from the swamp they were struck by the diseased waste that sprawled before them. A great depression in the marshy land, stretching for what looked to Einarr to be a hundred leagues across, filled almost to the brim with filth that could only mockingly be described as water.
A thick green skin of scum floated upon the dead, still lake, like a scab over a festering wound. Rising from the middle of the lake, its foundations lost beneath the stagnant waters, rose a monstrously twisted tower. What stone had been used to build it, Einarr could not say, so thick was the slime that dripped from its walls and battlements. It reared impossibly high from the lake, clutching at the sky like the crooked claw of a corpse, seeming to rise miles into the leprous sky, its topmost summit hidden behind the gibbous moons that hung overhead. As he gazed upon it, Einarr felt his eyes itch and his belly sicken. A tangible aura of despair and decay exuded from the structure, sickening an already sickened land.
Vallac looked out across the vast lake and its rancid water, his face twisted in revulsion. ‘Just how in the name of the Changer are we supposed to get across that?’ he growled. He looked over at von Kammler, the hate inside him searing into the knight’s expressionless steel mask. ‘If you say “swim”, I’ll kill you and I don’t care what sorcerer’s tricks you have hiding up your sleeve.’
The knight merely nodded his head. ‘Swimming is an ill thought,’ he growled back. ‘Something might notice.’
Einarr set Birna down, taking a moment to check that the old witch was still breathing before turning toward their guide. ‘There has to be a way across,’ he said, defiance in his voice.
‘Yes,’ von Kammler agreed, arrogance in his tone. ‘There are powers that can be called.’
‘Then call on them, southlander!’ Vallac snarled back. The knight glowered at the misshapen Kurgan.
‘Some things are easier to summon than dismiss,’ he said.
‘Make boat?’ Thognathog suggested. The ogre wore a sheepish look as he voiced the suggestion. Zhardrach spun on his captor, kicking him in the shin.
‘From what, you idiot? Mud and weeds?’ The ogre stared down at the snarling dwarf, glowering at him. Realising what he had done, Zhardrach backed away as far as his chain would allow. Thognathog lowered Urda to the ground and reached for the dwarf.
‘Maybe Thognathog try throw you across?’ the ogre said, his immense hand closing around Zhardrach. ‘Can you fly, shortling?’ Thognathog lifted the squealing dwarf into the air, snapping the thick chain that bound him to the ogre’s waist. Zhardrach kicked and struggled to free himself from the ogre’s powerful grip.
Von Kammler stepped in front of Thognathog, his spiked mace held at the ready. The knight glared up at the ogre. ‘Disturbing the water would be unhealthy,’ he warned. Thognathog glared back at him. Einarr hurried to put himself between the two.
‘He is right, Thog,’ Einarr told the ogre. ‘Put Zhardrach down. He might still be useful to us.’ The look that Einarr shared with von Kammler did not go unnoticed by the dwarf. Suddenly he wondered if getting thrown into the lake by the ogre was the worst that could happen to him.
Reluctantly, Thognathog lowered the dwarf, a sullen look on his faces.
Berus walked to the edge of the swamp, hacking down one of the immense weeds. He stripped the stalk, flexing and bending the pole-like flesh of the weed. ‘Norscan,’ he called out. ‘This not exactly wood. You think something built of this filth will float?’ Einarr stared down von Kammler and Thognathog. Satisfied the two would not come to blows, he stalked over to Berus, taking the stalk from his hand. His brow knitted in thought as he examined the rancid-smelling limb.
‘I can’t say,’ Einarr confessed at last. ‘It certainly isn’t wood. We put this in water it’s likely to lap it up like a thirsty dog.’
Berus took the stalk back. ‘One way to find out,’ he growled, striding towards the slimy shore of the lake. Von Kammler stepped into the Kurgan’s path.
‘No one touches the water,’ the knight hissed. Berus snorted derisively, moving to step around von Kammler. Before he could go more than a few steps, von Kammler’s mace was swinging towards his back. The berserker’s incredible reflexes saved him the worst of the blow, the deadly weapon glancing against his armour.
‘Swine of Tzeentch, I’ll feed your spine to the vultures!’ Berus flung the stalk at von Kammler, the crude spear snapping as it struck the knight’s breastplate. The force of the blow caused von Kammler to stagger back, long enough for Berus to get a better grip on his axe. With a roar, the berserker threw himself at the knight.
Einarr shouted for Vallac and Thognathog to help him separate the two battlers. This close to the palace, the last thing they needed were their already slim numbers further reduced by infighting. Vallac seemed to take a great deal of delight cracking the flat of his sword against von Kammler’s head, though he was less pleased to find the knight not even fazed by the blow. Berus rounded on Thognathog as the ogre reached for him, his axe slashing through the ogre’s thigh, causing him to crumple to the ground. Berus lifted his axe again, the fury of animal bloodlust in his eyes. Orgrim sprang to the ogre’s defence, leaping onto the berserker’s back and smashing him to the ground.
Einarr cursed as the melee quickly slipped past the point of no return.
Birna watched in disgust as her erstwhile comrades fell into conflict. Were they so blind? With glory and the favour of the gods almost within their grasp, they decided to let their own hubris overcome them! It was madness! She drew her sword and tried to help Einarr knock some sense into the fools, but as she did her leg crumpled beneath her. The wound the Hung had dealt her was sticky with blood, the flesh around it putrid with infection. Birna ground her teeth against the pain that threatened to overwhelm her as she looked at the wound. As a huntress, she had learned something of the skill of the vitki. It was a vital skill, alone in the wilds, to heal one’s own hurts. She knew a mortal wound when she saw one. The gangrene that had set into the ruptured flesh with impossible speed was even now sending its poison pulsing through her veins. A pleasant little gift from Old Father Nurgle.
The huntress accepted the death coursing through her with the grim pragmatism of the cold northlands. Glory, it seemed, was not to be hers. Yet, as she watched Einarr struggling with von Kammler, she realised that she could still help her man claim the power that was rightfully his. Agony flared through her body as she forced herself from the ground, red misery pounding through her bones. She firmed her grasp on her sword. She would not be weak. She would not shame her ancestors, not now when she could hear them calling her. She would be strong for Einarr, right to the end. Somehow, that was even more important to her now than the lost glory she might have claimed.
Even as Birna gained her feet, the scummy waters of the lake began to boil, the scab of pestilence lying across it rippling and writhing as the water beneath it churned into life. Birna saw Urda standi
ng beside the waters, the old witch backing away from the lake with haste. The crone’s eyes met Birna’s for a moment and a traitor’s grin split the hag’s countenance. Then Birna had no more room for the witch in her thoughts. The disturbance in the lake grew, foul-smelling bubbles bursting across the surface. The seething waters slopped upwards in a geyser of filth as an immense form exploded from the putrid depths.
Birna gazed up at the immense shape that reared up from the lake, its decaying hide coated in the clinging scum of the lake. Despite the nearness of her own death, she felt the wormy hand of despair crush her in its terrible might.
A seething hiss, like the snarl of a volcano, boomed across the lake, deafening even the bloodthirsty roars of the men who fought upon the shore. As one, they turned their eyes to the lake, their petty hates forgotten in a moment of awe and horror. They could feel their souls wither as their gaze fell upon the thing, cringing into the black corners of their flesh, desperate to hide from the abhorrence spat up from Nurgle’s stagnant hell.
It was like a mountain made flesh, towering above the lake and the swamp, immense despite the great part of it that yet remained beneath the rancid water. Huge legs, immense pillars of bone and scale, rose from the waters, dripping with slime. An armoured body stretched above the megalithic limbs, gradually dwindling into a thick, spiny tail. A massive neck, thicker than a longship, stretched from the front of the monster, terminating in a long, reptilian head.
There was something unspeakable about the neck, as though it was not one but three, all bound together like a pile of logs by the sinews of rotten flesh that coiled around them. The head of the thing was no less repulsive. Withered, almost skeletal, it looked as though the skulls of three monsters had melted and fused into one. Six great horns stabbed from the roof of its skull at irregular and insane angles, and the enormous jaws sported four rows of teeth, as though an extra set had been fused to either side of its proper mouth. Most despicable of all, however, was the thing’s eye – a single great, gibbous pool of jaundiced yellow set in the middle of its skull. From behind the milky substance of the orb, six black pupils floated, like beetles floundering in vomit. As the dragon roared, some of her pupils struggled to the fore of her eye, glaring down at Einarr and his comrades.
‘I told you not to disturb the lake,’ von Kammler growled, shaking free from the suddenly slackened grip of Einarr and Vallac.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The dragon’s putrescent eye scanned the shore, her black pupils rotating madly within the leprous jelly as she focused upon Einarr and his warriors. The reptile took a step towards the shore and the ground trembled beneath her weight. Einarr could see the thing’s rotten hide shudder as she moved, the festering flesh alive with crawling maggots and gnawing vermin. The Norscan backed away, his body heaving with revulsion. He was not alone, even von Kammler sickened by the loathsome sight.
‘Bubos,’ the knight spat, giving a name to the beast.
The dragon seemed to sense their disgust, the pupils swimming within her mammoth eye narrowing with spite. The great sheets of leathery flesh folded against her sides cracked open in a sudden, violent gesture, tattered pinions fanning the stagnant air. The rotten reek of the dragon smashed into them, the warband’s eyes watering and noses drooling beneath the stench. Bubos threw her head back, her bubbling roar crawling through the sky. Then she threw herself toward the shore, her bloated bulk surging forward like some gargantuan seal.
The advance of Bubos broke the paralysing grip of terror that had set upon them. Einarr roared at his comrades, thrusting his sword into the air. However big the beast was, whatever horrors von Kammler bestowed upon her, she was still a thing of flesh… and flesh could be slain.
Not surprisingly, it was Berus who took up the call for battle first, lunging at the dragon as she emerged from the dripping muck of the lake. The berserker threw himself at Bubos, his axe smacking into her leg with a meaty crunch. A spray of stinking brown sludge erupted from the wound, bathing him in the syrupy filth that flowed through the dragon’s veins. The Kurgan staggered back from the dragon, trying to wipe the slime from his helm. The reptile’s paw rose, swatting him like an insect, hurling the man across the shore to crash into the mud.
Bubos turned her head towards Berus, jaws dripping with poisonous slime, but before she could send her massive neck darting downward to snatch him up in her monstrous jaws, the dragon snarled in pain. While distracted by Berus, Orgrim had circled the reptile, waiting until he saw a weak spot. With the speed of the beast he had become, the werewolf pounced at the dragon, leaping onto her left shoulder. Orgrim’s claws tore at the beast, shredding her already rotten hide. His fangs sank deep into the throbbing vein he found beneath, the werewolf ripping at it as though worrying an old bone. Bubos’s body shook and writhed, trying to dislodge the painful parasite.
Thognathog limped towards the dragon, his leg still bleeding from the wound Berus had dealt him. The ogre glared up at the dragon and with a savage effort he sent his mattock smashing into her neck. Bones crunched beneath the blow and the leprous hide darkened as blood vessels burst beneath her flesh. Bubos recoiled from the blow, all six of her black pupils focusing on the ogre. The beast roared down at its attacker. Thognathog roared back, smashing his weapon into her jaw, cracking teeth beneath the blow.
With another roar of fury, Bubos lifted her immense paw and drove the clawed foot down into Thognathog, stomping him into the mud. She twisted her head around, trying to catch hold of the werewolf still clinging to her back. Sorcerous lightning crashed against her face, searing the skin and incinerating the legion of maggots crawling across her brow. The dragon paid no notice to von Kammler’s attack, fixated on removing Orgrim.
Einarr shared a grim look with Vallac. The Kurgan slowly nodded. They had both seen the terrible way in which Thognathog had been crushed. If the ogre’s immense brawn was unable to faze the dragon, there was little chance their own efforts could. Even so, both of them were determined that if they were to die this day, they would die as men, with their wounds to the fore and defiance in their hearts. The gods would expect no less from the worthy.
Einarr struck at the leg Berus had already injured, slashing deep into it with Alfwyrm. Vallac stabbed at the dragon with his own curved sabre, targeting the patch of neck discoloured by Thognathog’s assault. More of the dragon’s corrupt blood rained down around them as both blows found their mark. Einarr dove aside as Bubos lifted her injured leg and tried to smash him into the ground as she had the ogre. Forgetting Orgrim for the moment, she lowered her head, her jaws snapping at Vallac. The Kurgan leaped back, the immense maw snapping close only a few inches from him. Vallac could feel the dragon’s pestilent breath washing over him, so near was her face. The Kurgan glared at the beast and exhaled his own breath, his mutated throat pulsating as he sent a great burst of flame spewing into Bubos’s reptilian visage. The pestilent breath of the dragon exploded as the flame contacted it, engulfing her head in fire. Vallac was thrown back a dozen yards, crashing into the mud with a liquid squelch, his armour and hair smoking.
Bubos thrashed across the shore in pain, lashing out madly at everything around her as the flames seared her rotten hide, bursting boils and melting scabs. The dragon’s claws ripped apart the muddy shore, her tail thrashing against the lake. In a blind rage, she spun her head around, mouth agape, and sent a blast of her own pestilent fire burning into the swamp. Like mucous, the fire clung to everything it touched, withering and corrupting the already vile landscape. Rocks crumbled into powder, weeds yellowed and wilted, water became naught more than a festering vapour.
Orgrim sprang from the incensed dragon, unable to hold his grip on the furious reptile. The werewolf struck the ground and rolled, narrowly missing the stomping feet of the behemoth. He loped towards Einarr, crouching down beside the Baersonling like an old hunting hound, waiting for the war leader to make the next move.
Einarr glared at the dragon, trying to decide where they could attack
that festering bulk where they could have any real chance of bringing her down. There had to be a way past her, and he would find it.
Von Kammler’s armoured hand closed on Einarr’s shoulder. ‘There is no hope here,’ the knight warned. ‘If you would gain the palace, we must find another way.’
Einarr pulled away from the knight’s grip, savage fury filling him. Everything in his culture, everything he’d ever been taught to believe decried fleeing from battle like some whipped cur. His very flesh railed against the idea, but his mind understood the reality within von Kammler’s words. This was no different than the kraken, an enemy that could not be fought on its own terms and on its own ground. The only difference was his stubborn perception that there was a difference.
Einarr’s choice was made when he looked away from von Kammler and saw the pathetic sight of Birna limping through the mud, desperate to join him, to spend her last moments fighting at his side. The woman’s determination and loyalty decided him. He didn’t know what had become of Urda and the Kurgans, but he could still try to save the rest of his retinue.
‘We’ll try and lose her in the swamp,’ he told von Kammler. ‘If the orm follows us, maybe the bog will suck her down. Even if it doesn’t, we’ll fare better than we would here.’
‘First decent idea you’ve had since I met you,’ Zhardrach griped, the dwarf already sprinting for the swamp. Von Kammler nodded to Einarr and followed after Zhardrach. Einarr watched them go, then looked back at Bubos. The fire licking about the dragon’s head had largely burnt itself out, the flesh beneath blackened and cracked. Awareness rather than blind fury seemed to be returning to the beast. It would be a matter of heartbeats before she was after them once more. Einarr shook his head. It was too soon, much too soon. They needed more time to retreat into the swamp, to hide their trail in the tangle of weeds and filth.