Sword of Vengeance, page 19
‘Mercy!’ the man screamed, scrabbling for his own weapon.
‘Not for you,’ Skarr rasped, and yanked the blade down, severing the man’s head cleanly. Then he was up on his feet again, poised for a fresh attack, sword swinging into position.
The skirmish was over. Eissen’s men had wiped out the rearguard and were hastening to the head of the column to join him. The convoy’s riders lay amongst their dead mounts, slaughtered to a man by the sudden assault. The Reiksguard were the deadliest troops in the Imperial army, and the fighting had been almost embarrassingly one-sided.
‘Secure those carts,’ spat Skarr to Eissen, wiping the gore from his face and looking round to check for casualties.
On the ground, whimpering from pain, the leader of the escort still lived. Half of him was trapped under the flank of his steed, and his attempts to crawl free were pitiful. Skarr walked up to him and crouched down close, keeping his blade unsheathed. The man’s face was pale, and lines of blood ran down from the corners of his mouth. It looked like his ribcage had been driven in, and his breathing was thin and halting.
Skarr grabbed him by his hair and yanked his head back sharply.
‘Who sent you?’ he hissed. ‘You’re no Averlander.’
The man’s eyes narrowed in pain, but he somehow managed to spit a gobbet of phlegm into the Reiksguard captain’s eyes.
Skarr laughed harshly.
‘Good man,’ he said, wiping his face and letting the man’s head fall back against the turf. ‘Do it again, though, and I’ll cut your balls off.’
He pressed his blade against the man’s neck, watching as the honed edge parted the flesh. The rider grimaced, and his defiance ebbed.
‘So I say again, who sent you?’
‘You no Averlander neither,’ the captain panted, his teeth red with blood, his speech slurred and heavy with a north Tilean accent. ‘All this for she. You stand no chance of it. Not against she.’
He tried a crooked smile, but the effort was too much. Blood and phlegm rose up his throat, and he began to retch.
Skarr withdrew, watching the man die impassively. Eissen came up to him, wiping his blade down with a handful of grass.
‘Get anything from him?’
Skarr shook his head. ‘Dogs of war,’ he said. ‘They know nothing. Let’s get the carts open.’
As the Reiksguard dragged the bodies into a pile at the front of the caravan and retrieved the surviving horses, Skarr and Eissen mounted the first of the wagons. The driver shrank back from them as they climbed up, face white with fear. Unlike his escort, he looked like a proper Averland merchant, full-cheeked and running to a comfortable layer of fat. Skarr ignored him. Behind the driver’s position there was a locked door. He kicked it heavily and the wood around the lock splintered and broke. Inside the wagon were crates, all of them bound with iron and locked tight. He pulled one out with difficulty. It was heavy, and the clink of metal came from within.
‘Money,’ said Skarr.
‘Lots of it,’ agreed Eissen. He turned to the cart’s driver. ‘Are all the wagons full of this stuff?’
The man nodded emphatically, eager to please. ‘And arms. The elector’s been recruiting hard.’
Further down the convoy there came the sound of Reiksguard breaking into more caches. Skarr clapped his hand on the shoulder of the driver, and the man winced under the impact.
‘You’re a good Averlander,’ the preceptor said. ‘You don’t need to spend your time working for these people.’
The driver looked back at him, still terrified, his fingers clutching the reins of his horses tightly.
‘What’ll I do? What do you want me to do?’
Skarr smiled, and the lattice of pale lines on his face creased.
‘My men’ll take these carts south. Take heart, my friend. An army is growing, and you’re going to be a part of it.’
The driver didn’t seem to know whether to look pleased by that or not.
‘Play that part well, and this could be good for you,’ continued Skarr. ‘Lord Helborg knows how to reward those who serve him.’
‘Helborg!’ gasped the driver, eyes widening further.
‘That’s right. Get used it. You’re working for the Reiksmarshal now.’
Volkmar pushed his warhorse up the ridge above the road, feeling the cleansing wind ruffle his cloak. Efraim Roll was with him, as was a guard of twenty mounted warrior priests, all clad in heavy plate armour and carrying warhammers inscribed with the livery of the Cult of Sigmar. The Theogonist himself had donned bronze-lined armour of an ancient lineage, covered in runes of destruction and adorned across the breastplate with a priceless jade griffon, pinions outstretched.
He carried the massive Staff of Command in his hands at all times. A lesser commander would have had it taken up by an underling, but such luxuries were not for Volkmar. Though his palms were already raw from the weight of the iron and ash he kept his grip on the sacred weapon tight.
Below them, his army crawled along the road. In the vanguard came the companies of knights, Gruppen riding at their head. Their squires, spare horses, armour and lances came in a long caravan behind them, such that they almost constituted a small army in their own right. Behind them came the long train of halberdier and spearman regiments, marching in close-knit squares and decked out in their State colours. Drummers kept the pace tight. There was little of the casual joking and bawdiness of a regular campaign. Volkmar drove them hard, and the sergeants had kept the men on a short leash.
It took some time for the long lines of infantry to pass Volkmar’s position. He watched them as a hawk watches its prey, scouring the ranks for weakness and insubordination. Some of his own warrior priests were among them, clustered in tight groups of half a dozen. Those fanatics asked for neither rest nor privilege.
Behind them came the artillery train. Huge assault cannons were hauled by teams of horses up to six strong, followed by the infantry-killing pieces, the Helblasters and Helstorms. Handgunners, artillery crew and engineers sat on their carts in their wake, keeping a close eye on the wagons of blackpowder, matchcords, ammunition and spare parts. Volkmar’s brow creased with disapproval as he surveyed them. He trusted blackpowder less than he trusted faith and steel. Still, they would be called on, just as every other part of the massive force would be called on.
Behind the artillery caravan came the auxiliary companies, archers and irregular troops who’d been drafted in since the march had begun. There was never a shortage of men willing to fight for a schilling, and much as Volkmar loathed mercenaries too, he had the resources to employ them and turned no man away.
The main baggage train followed, wagon after wagon loaded with stores. Barrels of ale were piled high on open carts, mixed up with cloth-covered food wains. Armour, cloaks, bundles of arrows, heaps of firewood and fodder for the horses were all stacked closely and guarded watchfully by Roll’s own men, as incorruptible as zealots. Dozens of his soldiers, clad in the scarlet colours of Altdorf’s Church of Sigmar Risen and Transformed, swarmed around the pay wains, the all-important guardians of the cases of coin that kept the soldiers loyal.
Finally, bringing up the rear, were three companies of greatswords and a unit of pistolier outriders, their steeds stepping impatiently. Every so often a squadron of six of them would kick into action and ride up the flanks of the huge army, peeling off into the terrain on either side of the road to scout ahead before returning to the long slog, their need for adventure satisfied for the moment.
Over thirty thousand regular troops, with maybe five thousand more dogs of war who’d joined on the march from Pohlbad. More would come at the rendezvous south of Nuln. A whole regiment of warrior priests to augment those he already had, plus more artillery and heavy cavalry. It was a formidable force, scarcely less powerful than the massive armies that marched across the north of the Empire against the scattered warbands of Archaon’s invasion. If the predictions of the Celestial magisters proved reliable, it would need to be.
‘You look displeased,’ said Roll, his bald head gleaming in the cold light. The tone was one of mild remonstration. No other man in the Empire would have dared to speak thus to the Theogonist.
‘What use are mortal men here?’ Volkmar muttered. ‘When have they ever been able to stand firm against the great enemy? We’re leading them to their deaths.’
Roll spat on the ground.
‘It’s as you said. They’ll do their duty. The enemy will have mortals too.’
Volkmar said nothing. He remembered the ranks of men marching into ruin in the Troll Country with him at their head. As the daemons had screamed across the sky and the rivers run with blood, mortal faith had done little to stem the tide of insanity and pain. Above all, he remembered Be’lakor, grinning from ear to ear, the daemon’s eyes little more than windows on to a world of utter, terrifying horror.
‘This will all come down to us, Roll,’ he said.
‘Don’t forget Helborg.’
‘Helborg? Even if he lives, what can he do?’
‘And Schwarzhelm.’
He looked south. The dark leagues of endless forests were behind them, and the country was now beginning to open up. Far in the distance lay the wide ribbon of the Aver, winding through the grassland ahead.
‘Schwarzhelm has done enough. If he attempts to interfere again before this thing is ended, I have the authority to prevent him.’
He turned to Roll, and his gaze was bleak.
‘I have all authority in this. The Emperor’s Champion has served faithfully for a generation of men, but weakness is weakness. I will judge the matter when he’s found.’
Roll raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. Volkmar paused for a few more moments on the ridge, before kicking his horse onwards, back down to join the vanguard of the immense host. His guard did likewise, and soon the high place was bare once more, home to nothing more than the sigh of the wind and the rustle of grass.
The Tower was nearly complete, and the last veils over the charade were close to being lifted. Smaller versions of the Tower were being built at six points on the city walls, each also made of iron and given the same spiked profile as the master construction. The vista across Averheim had been marred irrevocably. Ancient halls had been demolished, the stone carted off to bolster the new fortifications springing up across the old walls. Merchants’ townhouses had been commandeered for garrisons, while the Averburg was now nothing more than a vast store of arms. Soldiers were everywhere, thronging the streets, clustering in the squares, camped out to the north of the city on the flat plains running towards Stirland.
Above it all, the Grosslich banner hung proud. The six-pronged crown of the Tower had been completed at last, and long pennants with the crimson boar’s head draped down towards the massive courtyard, three hundred feet below. Red and gold were ubiquitous, drowning out the memory of any other allegiance the city may once have had. Alptraums and Leitdorfs were forgotten. Now only the new dispensation had any meaning.
As night fell, the new aspect of the city showed itself to most effect. The Tower was lit along its entire height by a series of lilac beads, each glowing like stars. At the summit a pale flame burned incessantly. Lanterns in the streets below shone with a range of intense shades, banishing shadows from the night and bathing the city in a mingled fog of colour. Those citizens not steeped in joyroot found their sleep interrupted and fractious. A certain faded elegance had been replaced by rampant excess.
Those few clear-sighted citizens who remained now knew beyond all doubt that Grosslich was a tyrant, and one whose perversion of the Imperial Law had only just started. Insurrections were ruthlessly put down, and the hated witch hunters of Odo Heidegger kept the furnaces burning. Any faint flicker of revolt was overwhelmed by the vast numbers of troops arriving every day from every corner of the wastelands south of the Grey Mountains, drawn by the promise of money and glory. Some were paid in joyroot, and that seemed to satisfy them. Just as it had been in the spring, the roads were lined with drooling, vacant-eyed figures, slumped against the stone and lost in dreaming.
All of them, deep in their reverie, whispered the same thing.
She is coming. She is coming. Blessed be her path, everlasting be her reign. Queen of pleasure, mistress of the world. She is coming. She is coming.
Endlessly they mumbled the mantra until their lips were calloused and cracked, and they crawled off to find more root to numb the pain. Whatever debaucheries Averheim had known before, it suffered a hundredfold more then, stepping down a path of ruin as surely as if guided by the Lord of Pain himself.
Elector Grosslich now rarely ventured from the pinnacle of his precious Tower. The topmost chamber had been fitted out in silks and upholstered with fine soft leather. The floor was polished marble, veined like a flayed muscle, shining in the light of a dozen suspended orbs. There were six windows in the iron walls, each overlooking one of the massive suspended spikes.
The view was commanding. Grosslich’s armies, so long in the mustering, were now mobilising. The numbers astounded even him. Where there was corruption and power, humans seemed to drawn to it like insects around a candle flame.
Grosslich himself was swathed in crimson robes, beautifully lined with fur and monogrammed with the flowing ‘G’ motif. A tall crown had been forged for him in the hidden pits of the Tower below, a swirling sculpture in steel which tapered to a point above his forehead and sent tendrils of slender metal curling down across his cheeks. Natassja had designed it herself, but he’d made it his own.
The city was his too, locked in an iron grip of control. More dog-soldiers were being spawned in the basements, all answering to his command. There were other creatures down there too, terrible products of Natassja’s imagination, taking shape under her pitiless tutelage. Soon the whole host would be ready, a legion of terror ready to sweep across the river and destroy the army he knew had been sent from Altdorf to rein him in.
A chime sounded from outside the chamber. Grosslich turned from the windows and sat down on his throne, an obsidian block composed of tortured limbs, just like the one Natassja had used to dupe Verstohlen.
‘Come,’ he said, and marvelled at how his voice had changed. Gone were the gruff, plain tones that had drawn peasants flocking to his banner in the early days. Now his speech was clipped and refined, almost as smooth as Natassja’s own. The Dark Prince had changed him in many ways, not all of them to Grosslich’s liking. Still, it was too late for regrets.
A glass door at the far end of the chamber swung open silently and Holymon Eschenbach entered. The man had continued to change. His eyes were now entirely white-less and glowed a subtle pink. His flesh was bleached and his lips stained the colour of old wine. Like Achendorfer, he walked with a pronounced limp, as if some terrible rearrangement had taken place beneath his robes of swirling colour. The old smugness had gone, wiped from his features by Grosslich’s merciless drive to bring the city under his control. Eschenbach had assumed all the duties of Stewardship in the wake of Tochfel’s unfortunate demise, and the burden had proved heavy.
‘You asked to see me, your Excellency?’ he whispered. He could barely speak above a sibilant hiss these days, another result of the improvements made to his otherwise unremarkable body.
‘Steward, perhaps you could tell me the names of the fugitives we have been so assiduously pursuing since our ascension to the electorship.’
Eschenbach looked nervous. He knew what was coming.
‘The traitors Leitdorf and Helborg, as well as the spy Verstohlen.’
‘Well done. And can you inform me how close we are to tracking them down?’
‘Your armies are spreading further east with every day. Courts of enquiry have opened in Heideck, and Grenzstadt will not be far behind. It cannot be–’
Grosslich extended a hand lazily and clenched his fist. Eschenbach gasped and fell to his knees. As he did so, his neck seemed to constrict, veins bulging on his temples. He choked, falling forwards, scrabbling to release the pressure.
‘You think I don’t know this?’ Grosslich hissed, watching with only mild pleasure as the fat Steward writhed in agony. ‘You have the entire resources of a province at your disposal. Your orders are simple. Find them and kill them.’
Grosslich released the vice around Eschenbach’s neck, and the man fell forwards, panting like a dog.
‘All Leitdorf’s houses have been stormed,’ the Steward gasped. ‘His estates have been plundered. I have men scouring the countryside. What more could I do?’
‘Listen carefully,’ snarled Grosslich, leaning forwards in his throne. ‘Things are approaching a delicate stage. The mistress’s plans are nearing fruition, and the Empire is beginning to wake up. An army will be here within days. It is imperative that this matter is concluded before then.’
Eschenbach nodded miserably.
‘There’s another aspect to this,’ continued Grosslich, choosing his words carefully. ‘The mistress has dispatched creatures of her own to dispose of Helborg. It would be... preferable for my own troops to find the Marshal first. As for the Leitdorf pup, I want to bring him in myself. This is very important to me. I’m not convinced you’re giving your work the attention it deserves.’
Eschenbach began to panic. He’d been on the end of too many punishments from Grosslich already.
‘I am, your Excellency! A thousand men have been sent east this very day. They have orders to bring in Helborg and the pretender. There have been reports of supply columns being raided in the far south, towards the moors. If he’s there, he’ll be uncovered.’
‘Double the numbers,’ he ordered. ‘They have licence to burn the countryside to a husk if they have to. Spare no expense, and give them no respite. Helborg must be found.’
Eschenbach nodded. His eyes gave away his misery. Raising that many troops would be difficult, especially given the numbers he’d been instructed to make ready for the defence of Averheim.
