by Various
Serena tore the blade free as bow-wielding tzaangors shot past her in pursuit of Creel and his men as they fell back. Retrieving her shield, she moved after them.
The beastkin’s deadly arrows tore through several of the fleeing Freeguilders, ripping them from their feet and sending their bodies tumbling like dolls. Creel, despite the awkwardness of his wooden leg, made it into the shelter of a supply wagon. He hauled himself over the side and into the back with ungainly speed.
A line of crossbowmen had formed near the wagon, using it as an improvised rampart. As Creel clambered to his feet in the back of the wagon, someone handed him up a loaded crossbow. The Freeguilders fired at his barked command.
The onrushing discs didn’t slow, despite the bolts bristling from both discs and riders. Creel shouted again, and the crossbowmen dropped flat, allowing the halberdiers crouching behind them to rise up and thrust their weapons out. The beastkin were caught by surprise. One of the tzaangors fell from its perch, squalling, and several crossbowmen fell on it with knives and swords. Two died, but the blades of the rest of them found purchase, and the beastkin slumped, its broken bow sliding from its grip.
The remaining disc-rider tried to flee, but Creel raised his borrowed crossbow and let a bolt fly. It caught the tzaangor between the shoulder blades and knocked it from the sky. His men cheered as the thing rolled to a stop near Serena. She lopped its head off as it tried to rise, and raised her bloody blade in a terse salute. Creel responded in kind.
A wash of heat across her armour caused her to turn. She saw the tzaangor shaman swooping over a group of Stormcasts. Its fiery magics splashed across their armour, staggering them, but otherwise doing no harm. Judicator arrows slammed into its disc, and the circular daemon-thing convulsed and shrieked. The shaman leapt lightly from its daemonic mount as it fell, wracked by lightning.
The shaman landed and swept its staff out, unleashing a lash of flame that drove nearby Stormcasts and Freeguilders back. It cawed harshly, and began to weave a spell. Serena hurried to intercept it, but Gardus reached their foe first. The Lord-Celestant stepped through the shaman’s flames without hesitation.
His armour still smoked from earlier, and his sigmarite warcloak was in tatters. Streaks of soot and ash marred the golden ornamentation. But his light still burned, and as he scraped the blade of his sword against his hammer, the flames thinned.
‘This forest is not yours, beast,’ he said, his voice carrying easily through the glade.
‘Not yours either,’ the creature crowed. It pointed its staff at him and traced abominable sigils on the smoky air. ‘You will not claim Mzek’s plumage, Bright Soul, whatever others might have dreamed. I will rip out your lightning and weave it into a chain to wear about my waist, eh?’
‘No,’ Gardus said softly.
Even so, the word boomed out, as final as an executioner’s strike. The shaman cocked its head, as if confused. Then it reared back, screeching in pain. Serena’s eyes widened as she caught sight of one of the tattooed tribesmen behind the beast, a bloody knife in hand. While they’d all been distracted, the forester had struck. The shaman spun, shrieking a deplorable word. The forester died in silence, erased from existence by a fiery undulation that left an after-image seared on Serena’s retinas.
As his ashes fell to the forest floor, his comrades attacked. The tribesmen leapt on the tzaangor shaman. Knives and hatchets flashed as the savage warriors hacked at the stunned creature. It squalled in pain, and slashed wildly with a hooked knife. As it flung its attackers aside, crude arrows loosed from bows of horn and sinew sprouted from its back and chest. The beastkin staggered, slumping against a wagon. The knife fell from its hand.
The tribesmen stalked towards it, faces hard. Serena made to join them, but Gardus thrust his hammer out, stopping her. ‘This kill is theirs,’ he said firmly. ‘A debt long in the owing, now paid in full. As I swore to them.’
The shaman’s screeches spiralled up before breaking off into strangled gurgles. Out in the dark, the thump of drums fell momentarily silent before starting up again, their fury redoubled. Daemonic laughter echoed through the trees, but not so loudly as it once had. With the death of the shaman and his entourage, the rest of the tzaangors had retreated.
‘They will regroup soon,’ Gardus said. ‘We must be quick. Hyrn!’
The tribesman stood. ‘Here, lord.’ He looked at Gardus. ‘There are more beast-witches than that one in this forest. One more, at least.’
‘We need to find the seat of their power.’
‘It is not far, I think,’ Hyrn said, cleaning his knife on his furs. ‘There is a place where the forest turns sour, and the wind sings strange songs. It is where they lair. But they will intercept us before we can reach it…’
‘Not if we force them to split their attentions,’ Gardus said. ‘Gather your warriors. You will lead us now, while they are in disarray.’ He turned. ‘Feros, with me – you will clear us a path. Aetius, Solus – I will need some of your conclaves too. We must find the head of the serpent that encircles us, and crush it.’ Gardus looked at Creel, who stood nearby. ‘Sergeant Creel. Can you get the Impertinent Maiden singing again?’
Creel saluted with a bandaged hand. ‘We’ll get her caterwauling, my lord.’
Gardus nodded in satisfaction. He looked at the others. ‘Hold the line. Hold their gazes here. I don’t want them to see the blow that kills them until it’s too late.’ He met Serena’s gaze. ‘You – Sunstrike. You will come with me.’
‘As you will, my lord,’ she said. ‘As far as my faith will carry me.’
‘To the heart of the forest will be far enough.’ He turned to Aetius. ‘I need four more. And five from you, Solus.’
‘Will that be enough, my lord?’ Aetius said doubtfully.
‘It will have to be.’ Gardus looked at Serena. ‘Who will walk through the fires of Chaos unbowed, sister?’
Serena slammed the flat of her sword against her battered shield. ‘Only the faithful.’
‘Only the faithful,’ Gardus said, nodding. He looked towards the forest. ‘Let us hope that is true. I fear that this blaze is but the barest edge of an inferno unseen.’
Chapter Seven
RITE OF THE CROOKED PATH
Rollo Tarn gestured, unleashing his spell, and multi-coloured flames washed over the deck of the airship. Gage threw himself aside and fired one of his pistols. Tarn staggered with a startled cry as a blossom of blood appeared on his robes. He clapped a burning hand to his shoulder and screeched, ‘Kill him!’
Tattooed crew members leapt to obey. Gage cast aside the empty pistol and fired the other. Tarn ducked away, and a crewman folded over with a groan. Then the others were on Gage, and he had no time for anything but the fight at hand. Parrying a blow from a cutlass, he drew his knife and retreated, intent on putting the mast at his back.
The crew were tough. Experienced. The veterans of tavern brawls and boarding actions. But he was a knight of the Order of Azyr. With cool, precise skill, he used their numbers against them, as he’d been taught. Witch hunters often found themselves alone and outnumbered, and Gage had learned how to turn that weakness into strength.
As the crewmen closed in on him, he twisted aside, avoiding blows that fell on the men behind him. His rapier lashed out, not for killing blows, but in crippling slashes directed at tendons and hamstrings. Overeager crewmen tripped over their wounded fellows, opening themselves up for his blade. His knife zipped out across wrists and elbows.
However, skill alone wouldn’t see him through. He knew that, as surely as he knew that he had to stop whatever rite Tarn had set in motion. Carus’ light wouldn’t hold the daemons back forever either. The Stormcast might be able to purge the vessel of its daemonic infection, but only if he were given time.
As he fought against the crew, Gage kept an eye on the duel between the Lord-Veritant and the fatemaster. The two war
riors seemed evenly matched, but Aek was fresher. The wailing blade he held disrupted the wind with every slash, causing the deck to pitch and yaw. Carus stumbled back, barely interposing his own sword as the fatemaster struck at his head. The echoes of the blow swept across the deck, knocking several of Gage’s opponents sprawling. He took advantage of the momentary opening and lunged towards Tarn.
The magister, hand still pressed to his wounded shoulder, thrust his staff towards Gage. The sigils hammered into its length flared with a sickly light. Gage, on instinct, dived aside as the sorcerous blast pierced the space where he’d been standing. It enveloped a crewman who’d been coming up behind him, club raised.
The man screamed as his body tore itself apart. His flesh split like an overcooked sausage, revealing scales and feathers. His bones splintered and reshaped themselves, lengthening and curving. His flesh sloughed away and resurged, colours changing. Eyes and mouths sprouted in the nooks and crannies of his new shape, as thorn-like talons slid from raw, fleshy paws. Bulbous tendrils composed of repurposed muscle and fat lashed out in an orgy of agonised violence. The thing screamed through a thicket of sharp fangs.
Unlucky crewmen were smashed from their feet, or torn apart where they stood. Loyalty to the Dark Gods was no proof against the maddened instincts of the newborn Chaos spawn. It was a thing of pure hunger and instinct, all that it had been consumed in the unholy fires of its creation.
The Chaos spawn lunged for Gage, yowling. He ran, leaping over casks and bundles of rope, and darted behind a mast. The Chaos spawn blundered after him, splintering the deck boards with its heavy body. It caught hold of the mast and swung itself around, its stretched maw opening in a roar.
Gage dropped flat as its claw lashed out. The mast shuddered as the beast struck it. Gage turned, caught hold of a mast line and chopped through the knot holding it secure. He was jerked off his feet and yanked upwards as the rope slithered through the pulleys above. The Chaos spawn shrieked and pursued him, scrambling swiftly up the mast.
Gage slammed into the mast, on a perch just beneath the bottom of the gasbag. He let go of the rope and caught hold of a guide line, preventing himself from plummeting back down to the deck below. He tried to think of some way of defeating the creature rapidly ascending in pursuit. There were any number of blessed sigils and sacred talismans in the pockets of his coat, but he doubted they would do any good.
Mind racing, he glanced up across the night sky, back towards the aether-dock. A thin shape was visible – a skycutter. The smaller vessel was a graceful blade, its aether-sails pushing at the air like the wings of a falcon. The skycutter arrowed towards the Hopeful Traveller, and Gage’s heart leapt as he caught the faint sound of a duardin sky-shanty, ringing out from the approaching vessel.
‘Bryn?’ he muttered.
The skycutter caught the wind and surged forwards, closing the gap. No one had noticed it yet, being too distracted by the Chaos spawn’s rampage. Gage glanced down as the creature hauled itself closer. Its bulk was still realigning itself to its new shape, slowing its ascent. It lashed out at him with a spiny tendril, and he slammed back against the mast to avoid it. Its claws tore into the perch, and he stabbed at them with his rapier. A tendril tipped by a snapping maw shot towards him, and, using the guide line for balance, he ducked aside, swinging out over the deck. He pinned the tendril to the mast, eliciting a shriek from the Chaos spawn. The monster began shaking the mast, trying to free itself.
Gage ripped his sword free, and the beast screamed as it made to haul itself up onto his perch. Before it could do so, the skycutter crashed into the side of the Hopeful Traveller with a tooth-rattling roar. Timbers bent and burst, and the airship thrashed like a wounded animal. Crewmen were flung screaming from the ship, and Gage was nearly hurled from the mast. The Chaos spawn wasn’t as lucky. It tumbled to the shattered deck below with a bellow.
Through the smoke of the impact, Gage could see that the skycutter had lived up to its name – its reinforced prow had chopped into the side of the Hopeful Traveller like a knife blade. The smaller vessel hung in place, embedded in the larger airship. It had torn a gouge in the deck, deep towards its centre. Stunned crewmen started towards the vessel, even as others ran to try and steady the Hopeful Traveller. The airship was listing badly, its hull creaking. Shouts of alarm filled the air. Gage wondered how much longer it would hold together.
‘Ha-ha!’ Bryn bellowed as he dropped down from the prow of the skycutter, a pistol in either hand. The duardin’s armour was scorched and stained, but he seemed to be in one piece. ‘Khazukan Khazuk-ha! The duardin are on the warpath, and your debts have come due!’
The drakefire pistols roared, and crewmen fell. Bryn holstered the weapons and unslung his hammer, swinging it out in a bone-crushing arc. He trod over the bodies of the fallen, accompanied by the gryph-hound Zephyr.
‘Ho, Gage! You can come down now – I am here, and you are safe.’
‘I’m not worried about me, Bryn – watch out!’ Gage shouted down as the Chaos spawn rose unsteadily to its feet. Its many eyes fixed on the duardin, who turned to face it.
‘Come on then, you ugly–’ he began.
A double-bladed axe spun through the air, embedding itself in the spawn’s skull. The creature stiffened, whined and slumped. It seemed to deflate as Gage watched. Kuva leapt lightly from the skycutter and reclaimed her axe.
Bryn glared at her. ‘He was mine.’
‘There are plenty of other things to kill.’ Kuva nodded to Gage as he climbed down from the mast. ‘You caught the curseling?’
‘We caught more than that. The skycutter?’
‘We borrowed it from the dock when Zephyr came to find us.’ She bestowed a rare smile on him. ‘I had forgotten how much fun they are to fly.’
The smile vanished as quickly as it had surfaced. She spun, axe chopping through a crossbow bolt as it streaked towards her. The crewman who’d been holding it backed away, hastily attempting to reload. Kuva pursued him, frowning.
Gage looked at Bryn. ‘Help Carus.’
Zephyr was already loping across the deck, following the ringing clash of blades. Carus and his opponent ignored everything else, intent only on each other. They moved through the smoke, easily holding their balance on the swaying deck as their swords connected again and again.
Bryn frowned and peered at the duel. The fatemaster raced through the air, and Carus met him, blade to blade. Gage and Bryn had to turn away as lightning flashed.
‘Doesn’t look like he needs any help to me,’ the duardin growled.
‘It’s a distraction. I need him to help me undo whatever rite they’ve begun. Help him.’
‘And what’ll you be doing, while I’m doing that?’
‘What I can.’ Gage started towards the rail and the wound that the skycutter’s arrival had opened in the Hopeful Traveller’s starboard side. He had not seen Tarn since the crash, but it was too much to hope that the magister had been one of those killed in the impact.
Sheathing his sword, he climbed out over the rail. The wind tore at him, and he caught a glimpse of the city, spinning out below. From this height, it looked like the rings of a tree. Moving carefully, he kicked aside broken hull planks and clambered through the hole, down into the ruptured hold. He was acting on instinct now; Tarn had mentioned a rite, but there had been no evidence of one in the warehouse, or above decks.
A curious sight greeted him as he dropped beneath the broken deck. A circle of nine acolytes, dressed much the same as those they had fought in the warehouse, sat in a wide circle around an alchemical flame, burning up from a large, flat crystalline plate. Braziers had been arranged about the hold, but several had been knocked over, scattering burning coals. The wood smouldered.
Despite the condition of the hold, the edge of the skycutter’s prow thrust into their sanctum, and the rush of the wind, the nine acolytes paid no heed to anything
save the flames. Their hands moved in ritual gestures, and their voices, hoarse with effort and exhaustion, were raised in a chant. They looked wasted, somehow, as if they had not eaten in weeks. Their golden masks sat strangely on their faces, and their robes hung loosely.
Gage had seen similar sights before. They were feeding something of themselves into whatever rite they were conducting; it was draining them of life, so it could grow stronger. But as to what the rite was, he could not say.
In the false light of the flame, he could see different parts of Hammerhal, the images floating like soap bubbles above the crystal plate. In one, the door of a tavern split like a new scab as something tubular and frenzied wriggled out into a packed common room. Daemonic flames washed across the startled patrons, consuming them. In another bubble, the back wall of a stable began to shudder as pink shapes burst from it like maggots from a wound. The chuckling daemons fell on the screaming horses with a monstrous enthusiasm.
Sickened, Gage looked away. It was the same in the other bubbles – and not just daemons, but twisted beastkin as well. Tzaangors erupted into filthy alleyways and temple naves, and they immediately set about slaughtering anyone who crossed their path.
More bubbles rose from the flames: tens, dozens, hundreds. In each, similar scenes played out. In the barracks of a Freeguild regiment, in a duardin delving tunnel, inside the warehouses of the aether-dock – anywhere and everywhere Tarn’s wood had been put to use, daemons and beastkin emerged from the flat planes.
‘Gate and key, as I said.’
Gage looked up. Tarn walked down the steps on the other side of the hold, followed by several crewmen.
‘The God-King’s witches harnessed the volatile emanations that nestle in the bedrock of this place to create protective wards about the city. Wards which are proof against even the most cunning magics, as others have discovered to their detriment, time and again. However, I long ago learned that there is no problem money cannot solve.’ Tarn rubbed his fingers together for emphasis.