Conquest unbound, p.42
Conquest Unbound, page 42
‘They’re a threat,’ he said. ‘To everything. Ogor. ’Uman. Everything.’
Stug watched the tight-knit army march ever closer. Was he right, was a single creature controlling all of them?
If the dead stayed together, for whatever reason, then maybe this was the chance he and his mates needed.
‘I have an idea,’ he said. ‘We gotta split up. Mebbe they’ll only follow one of us. We run ’ard for as long as we can. Whoever escapes returns to tell the clan, to warn ’em.’
His mates agreed.
For a moment they stood, awkwardly unable to meet each other’s eyes. Stug saw the truth: each hoped they would be the one to escape, that they would survive to tell the tale. Even Chidder seemed to understand.
The dead marched on.
‘I’ll see you back at the clan,’ said Stug, unable to think of anything else.
‘I’ll save you somethin’ to eat, if I get there first,’ said Algok, looking away.
‘I won’t,’ said Chid, examining his hands. ‘I’m so hungry I’m gonna eat everything.’
Nodding to each other, the three set off in different directions, jogging into the endless wastes.
Stugkor ran.
One foot in front of the other.
Snow fell so heavy he saw no more than half a dozen strides in front of him. It clogged his nose, piled on his head, and threatened to freeze his eyes closed. Even his nostrils felt like they were about to freeze shut.
The muted crunch crunch of dry snow, like brittle bones crushed in teeth.
The dead nothing sounds of Ghur.
The soul moan of a wind that’s claimed a thousand lives.
The groan of eternal ice.
When he slowed, unable to maintain his pace, he walked.
Head down. Going nowhere.
Forever.
The sun rose and fell, the temperature dropping until icicles hung from his nose and ears. Stopping, he stooped to scoop up a fistful of ice and snow and jam it in his mouth. Again and again until his belly grumbled. But it wasn’t food.
Looking back the way he’d come, he saw his meandering footprints weaving off into night. Of the dead there was no sign. His was a world of snow. They could be a score of strides away and he’d never see them. He wanted to lie down, to rest. Even if just for a moment. He’d never been this tired – this hungry – in all his life.
There, beneath the sighing wind, the rumble of a hundred hundred dead, marching lock-step.
Stugkor pushed on, staggering with exhaustion, falling often.
Strong bones.
They would not take him. They would not make him into some deader monster.
The eastern horizon brightened, and Stugkor saw the dim shapes of a great host. They followed, relentless. Tireless.
Exhaustion ate his strength, drained his will far worse than any freeze.
The dead drew closer.
‘I can’t.’
Corpse eyes watching, flickering green sparks in hollow caves of bone.
Empty sockets following his progress, waiting for him to fall.
He knew then he would never escape. ‘They followed me,’ he said to the northern wind. It wasn’t what he’d wanted, but if it meant his mates escaped to warn the clan, it was still a victory.
For a score of heartbeats he watched the dead advance. He found himself remembering that terrified hare Algok and Chidder had cornered when he’d first dreamed up his fantastic plan to go on a raid. He thought about the little creature’s pointless attempts to escape. Maybe it wasn’t smart enough to have other plans, but it still wanted to get away. He recalled Chidder mashing it flat.
The dead would never stop. They would follow until exhaustion felled him and he lay helpless in the snow.
‘No,’ he told the rising sun. ‘I will stand here.’
He’d bought his mates time to escape. Now it was time for these dead to learn the true might of the ogors!
The great host parted as the creature with the smoking green scythe stepped to the fore. It studied Stugkor for a long moment before gesturing.
A warrior of iron-wrapped bone stepped forward, a massive greatsword hanging in its skeletal fist. The weapon oozed sickly green smoke that ignored the northern wind, twisting with a life of its own.
It came at Stug, poking and prodding. Icy steel left long gashes in his hide that burned like fire. Stug fought on, unwilling to fail, sheer will keeping him on his feet. His warclub grew heavy, each swing coming slower until he stood, bent over, wheezing great sucking breaths of air.
Seeing his weakness, the deader moved in for a killing blow. Instead of trying to mash it, Stug lunged, catching it by an arm. It stabbed him, drove steel into his gut, as it struggled to break free. But he had it. Raising his club with a roar, Stug smashed the corpse. It felt like he’d struck the frozen ground, the shock of the blow slamming through his arm.
Tossing the broken deader aside, he spat blood and showed the army his teeth in a feral snarl.
More came, and he fought, sometimes smashing them apart with his club, but always suffering dozens of wounds before he managed to finally dispatch them. Shattered bones littered the trampled snow, long lines of his blood drawing strange patterns. His lungs rattled, his heart banging away like it sought to break from his ribs.
So tired. Weak from long days of hunger.
One at a time they came, testing.
Cursed knives left long wounds in his flesh. Over and over they slashed and stabbed, until blood slicked him and his thoughts grew dim and pale.
Another quick-moving corpse, this one with four arms bearing two spears and two swords. Unlike the others, it was Stug’s height. It stabbed and slashed as it danced circles around him. Too fast. Too many weapons for him to defend against. It bled him, making no attempt at a killing blow.
Gore spattered the snow, bright crimson slashes in hard white.
Stugkor fell to his knees, and the four-armed corpse stood over him. Where he drew ragged breaths, great sucking gulps of air, his chest heaving, it stood motionless. When it glanced towards the scythe-bearing undead with the fanned crown of bone, Stug lashed out, grabbing its ankle. It stabbed him, over and over, as he dragged it closer. One of the spears broke, leaving an iron tip lodged in his flesh.
Stug broke its knees. He cracked its thick bones, crushed its skull in his fists.
Toppling backwards, he lay in the snow. Ice in raw wounds. Life bled out at a terrifying rate. He couldn’t rise, couldn’t move. His strength was gone.
The corpse sorcerer strode forward to stand at Stug’s side. Strange bones, twisted and melted like forged iron. It examined him, sparks of nacreous green glowing deep in hollowed eye sockets.
‘Very strong bones,’ it said. ‘Your kind will be a fine harvest.’
‘Never,’ Stugkor said, coughing blood.
‘All must pay the tithe. In the end there can be only death. In the end there can be only Nagash.’
‘I piss on yer puny god!’ Yelling hurt, felt like it tore something deep inside. ‘Anyway,’ whispered Stugkor, ‘you failed. My mates escaped. They’ve warned the clan by now. They’ll be ready. The Fangtorn are mighty! We’ll crush you!’
Unconcerned, the bone sorcerer straightened as two more deaders approached. These were different, taller, their bones thicker than the others.
‘As I said, strong bones. Your kind make fine Immortis Guard.’
His kind?
Stug recognised what remained of his mates. They’d been harvested, broken apart and remade, but there was no disguising who they’d been. The sloped brow of Chidder’s thick skull. The broad shoulders and powerful fingers of Algok. Stripped of flesh and blood, they were clean bone.
They’d failed.
No. Not yet. Not completely.
Stug coughed a bloody laugh. ‘You followed me far into the wastes. You’ll never find my clan now.’
‘We are the Ossiarch Bonereapers,’ said the undead. ‘We flense the useless from the useful, carve meat and sinew from bone, souls from life. We harvest the best of you, waste nothing. Your memories are useful, we shall keep them. Your loyalties are not, they shall be cast aside.’
Stugkor reached for the undead creature, but it stepped back.
‘You and your friends will lead us to your people,’ it said.
The bone sorcerer raised its scythe, green smoke wafting from the blade. ‘It is time,’ it said, ‘to carve away the weakness of life. We have plans for your soul.’
That hare, eyes wide with terror, darting for freedom. Doomed. Just like Stug’s tribe.
It couldn’t end like this. He wanted more. More life. More talking to Old Tooth. More mashing and more eating.
There wasn’t going to be more.
This, he realised, is what it feels like to be prey.
Jade steel flashed in the pale sun, slicing free Stug’s soul from the meat and bone of his body.
FANGS OF THE RUSTWOOD
Evan Dicken
In his time with the Order of Azyr, Kantus Valo had trekked through many perilous places – from the Bruteplains of Ghur to the feculent mires that had spread like tumours across the once beautiful forests of Ghyran. And yet, few places had been so menacing as the Rustwood.
What began as a respectable path had tapered to a tightrope of dirt. Razorweed loomed on either side of the trail, shredding cloaks and flesh at the slightest misstep. Scrubbing a hand across his sweat-streaked brow, the witch hunter gingerly stepped over a thick patch of mirrorvine, only to leap back as something fell from the branches overhead. A daggerlike leaf flashed past Kantus’ face to clatter in the brush below.
He glanced warily up at the canopy. It was late afternoon, but the tangled branches almost blotted out Chamon’s ruddy bronze sun.
‘You’re bleeding, lord.’ Bas, the commander of Kantus’ four guards, held out a bit of torn cloth, gesturing to the witch hunter’s face.
Kantus raised a hand to his cheek, and his fingers came away wet with blood. He took the proffered rag, wrinkling his nose as he dabbed at the cut.
‘By Ghal Maraz, we’ll have to hack our way through.’ Bas removed his helmet to run a hand through his sweaty hair. ‘Those vines will blunt any blade we have.’
‘Then we shall blunt them. The Order of Azyr will not be kept waiting,’ Kantus ordered. On the map, the path ran right through the Rustwood, a far quicker journey to the Order’s stronghold at Eshunna than the old Lantic road through the Iron Desert.
‘Lads won’t like that.’ The veteran sucked air through his teeth. ‘Not with night approaching.’
‘We must press on.’
‘And the prisoners, lord?’ Bas winced.
‘I shall see to the prisoners.’
Haste was not his only reason for passing through the Rustwood. As much as Bas and the other guards were discomfited by the journey, the forest’s danger hung like a noose around the necks of Kantus’ prisoners, drawing tighter with each step. Those in fear were less able to mind their tongues, more likely to let something slip.
And Kantus would be there when it did.
With a ragged salute, Bas turned away, calling for the other guards to break out axes.
The witch hunter made his way to the back of their tiny column where his three charges shuffled, chained hand and foot in a short coffle attached to the back of an ibuq. The great land lizard shuffled along with its rolling, splay-legged gait, its long rasp of a tongue flicking out to nervously test the air. The metal chest and supply packs on its back rattled around.
‘Apologies, lord.’ The guard, Yusán, tugged the ibuq’s rein as the witch hunter approached. ‘Something’s got her spooked.’
Kantus held out his hand.
‘You are needed up front.’
‘Thank you, lord.’ Yusán handed over the reins with a look of relief. ‘Don’t know how much more doomsaying I could stand.’
Kantus dismissed the guard, then turned to regard the lead prisoner.
‘You must turn back, before it is too late,’ the tall man in ragged robes wailed. Elabrin’s hair was unkempt, his once neatly combed beard now wild. Runes of negation were etched into his manacles, their soft glow casting the mage’s face in harsh relief and lending him a threadbare, nervous aspect like prey caught out upon an open plain.
‘Eyes like burning coals glitter in hungry shadow.’ Elabrin took a shaky breath. ‘We are as insects, struggling upon the surface of a still pond. Be still, be still!’
‘Enough prophecies, sorcerer. They’re what put you in chains in the first place,’ the second prisoner, Garrula Heko, growled, glaring at the back of Elabrin’s head as if she wanted to stab a knife in it. From what Kantus knew of Heko’s unsavoury reputation, she would have no qualms about killing the mage. Small and lithe as a gutter viper, with a round face and deep-set eyes, Heko cut an unassuming figure. But if Governor Bettrum’s journals could be believed, she was a purveyor of the most illicit and baneful toxins, linked to over a dozen poisonings over the past decade.
‘I am but a mouthpiece,’ Elabrin sighed, his voice taking on a weary tone.
‘It is not your prophecies that concern me.’ Kantus rested one hand on the pommel of his duelling sword. ‘But what steps you might have taken to realise them.’
‘Governor Bettrum would have brought doom to Uliashtai.’ Elabrin shifted with a clatter of chains. ‘I do not deny I prophesied this, but I did not murder him.’
‘That remains for the Order to determine.’ It was highly unorthodox, Kantus’ superiors demanding to see to the matter personally, but Governor Bettrum hailed from an old Azyrite family, one with connections that stretched throughout the Mortal Realms. And if Kantus understood anything, it was the importance of connections – favours paid and owed, the invisible currency of Azyrite society, one far more valuable than gold.
As the fifth son of a minor noble family, Kantus had joined the Order of Azyr to root out corruption and rid the realms of the heretical filth that gnawed at the roots of civilisation. If he happened to rise through the ranks of the Order in the bargain, it would only mean he was better placed to do Sigmar’s holy work.
The witch hunter regarded the three prisoners. One of them was a murderer and a heretic. If two innocents needed to suffer to find the guilty party, such was the price of justice.
‘Lord Bettrum was slain sometime in the night. His bodyguards saw no one enter or leave, there was no sign of a struggle, no forced entry and nothing out of place – this suggests sorcery.’
‘He’s got you there, mage,’ Heko drawled.
‘Or poison,’ Kantus countered. Governor Bettrum had tracked Heko for years, but had been unable to link her to a single murder. It would be quite the coup for Kantus to visit Sigmar’s justice upon such a traitor.
‘This still does not explain why you dragged me from my garrison, witch hunter.’ Captain Lim met Kantus’ gaze with unflinching calm. The third of his suspects, Lim was a broad-shouldered woman who bore her chains with the easy familiarity of someone used to bulky armour.
Kantus gave the captain a thin smile. ‘Your disagreements with the governor are well known.’
‘Hardly a condemnation.’ The captain’s lip curled, revealing several missing teeth. ‘If I wanted Bettrum dead, I would have challenged him to a duel.’
‘Like you did Captain Hardanger?’
Her jaw pulsed. ‘Hardanger was a drunk. Inebriation and high ramparts make for poor bedfellows.’
‘Be that as it may, you gained from your old captain’s death, just as you stand to gain from Lord Bettrum’s.’ Kantus cocked his head. ‘Or did I misread your petition to be named interim governor?’
‘I have fought for Uliashtai my whole life, bled for it.’ Lim stiffened. ‘I would die for my city.’
‘Kill for it, too, I presume,’ Kantus replied. ‘The captain of the city guard would be intimately familiar with the governor’s security, the layout of his chambers, patrol routes, perhaps even his nightly routine.’
The captain lapsed into cold silence.
‘Lord Bettrum’s body bore only one wound – on his stomach, just below the ribs,’ Kantus said. ‘None of his servants were aware of the injury, and yet the wound had putrefied, dark veins spreading through the governor’s body, paralysing him long before the corruption reached his heart. He died alone and in great pain, unable to even call for help. Do any of you know what might have caused such a death?’
‘They tread silken paths, delicate and deadly. Legs like knives, mouths like daggers.’ Elabrin let out a soft moan, but Kantus remained watching the other two prisoners.
Lim gave no reaction.
Heko, however, did.
It was slight – a tick at the corner of the poisoner’s mouth, a narrowing of her eyes – and yet it was the first crack in Heko’s mask. Now, Kantus only needed to widen it.
‘Heko, let me see your manacles.’ The witch hunter reached for the keys at his belt. ‘I wish to speak with–’
A scream from the front of the convoy, from where the guards had travelled out of sight, drowned out the witch hunter’s order.
Kantus drew his blade, gripping the rein of the snorting ibuq tighter. But the trees were silent and still, leaves motionless in the gathering gloom.
Yusán burst around the corner, running up to them. He was stripped to the waist, skin sheened with sweat, a chipped axe clutched in his white-knuckled hands.
‘Lord, come quickly,’ Yusán panted. ‘Herat fell.’
‘Stay with the prisoners. If any run, cut them down.’ With a curse, Kantus dodged past the wide-eyed guard. The path curved around the great bole of a serashem tree and up a small rise. Kantus crested the hill to see Bas and another guard feverishly hacking a long section of mirrorvine from the lower branches. Herat was nowhere to be seen.
