—<TWENTY-TWO>—

Champions of Life and Death

 

 

The Asoborn shieldwall splintered and buckled against the charge of the black knights. Men and women were hurled from their feet by the impact of the dead riders, but more Asoborns rushed to pick up the fallen shields and plug the gap. Skeletal horsemen plunged through the shieldwall, hacking with darkly glittering swords. Garr swept his twin-bladed spear through a black rider’s horse, bringing him down in a clatter of bone and plate. Maedbh’s bronze blade stabbed down, plunging through the rider’s helm and extinguishing the green light shimmering beyond his visor.

Garr nodded his thanks, but Maedbh was already on the move, spinning around as the thunderous sound of horsemen slamming into iron-rimmed shields boomed once more. Cuthwin now fought with a spear, wrenched from a dead man with his spine all but severed. Beside him Fridleifr rammed his own spear through a rusted gap in a dead knight’s breastplate. Sigulf protected his brother’s flank, holding a heavy shield and slamming it forward along with the rest of the Asoborns.

Ulrike loosed carefully aimed shafts into the dead, sending arrows through the eye sockets of those warriors whose helmets had been knocked off in the charge. Maedbh took a two-handed grip on the sword as three dead riders smashed through the shieldwall. Their defence was shrinking with every passing second, the Asoborns unable to resist the unnatural power of the black knights. One rode towards her with a curved black sword raised above its head.

Maedbh ran at the dead warrior, her own sword hungry to slay this champion of the knights. She dived forward, rolling to her feet as the rider’s weapon swept over her head. She slashed her sword across the skeletal mount’s rear legs, shattering the bones and toppling the rider to the ground. A host of Asoborns pounced on the dead warrior, stabbing and clubbing his bones to destruction. The second warrior rode straight for the fallen Freya, dropping from his horse and striding towards the fallen queen with murderous determination burning in his eye sockets.

Maedbh ran towards him, but the third dead rider reared up before her, his horse’s bony limbs pawing the air. One hoof caught Maedbh on the shoulder and sent her spinning. She landed badly, slashing her arm open on the blade of her sword. Blood poured from the wound onto the blade and she felt a sudden sense of power and anger flow through her.

She rolled as the hooves stamped down, thrusting her sword straight up and into the horse’s ribs. Like a ruptured soap bubble, something intangible broke within the steed and its form came apart in a rain of bones. Iron plates tumbled to the earth, and Maedbh rolled as the beast’s rider dropped beside her.

Maedbh brought her sword around in a move of desperation. The rider’s sword slammed into her own, barely a handspan from her face. Its armoured foot slammed down into her stomach and she doubled up as the rider reached down and lifted her from the ground. Its helmet slammed into her face and blood poured down her chin as she felt her nose break. The sword fell from her grip and the pain of her wounds seared her once again.

She cried out as the gouges on her back flared and the slash on her arm throbbed as though dipped in boiling water. Maedbh looked through the slit in the dead warrior’s helm and into his eyes. She saw endless suffering there, a soul chained to the mortal world by dark magic and kept in enduring torment. Though nothing remained of the man this warrior had once been, his suffering was eternal and unrelenting.

The black sword drew back and Maedbh’s eyes focussed on the notched tip, picturing how it would punch through her ribcage and split her heart in two. The skull’s grin became wider, but before its sword could stab forward, the dead warrior’s head flew from his neck and the body collapsed. Maedbh slumped to the ground, scrambling away from the warrior’s remains as a glorious figure in fiery bronze stood above her with a hand outstretched.

“Thank you for looking after my sword,” said Freya, hauling Maedbh to her feet.

Ulrike and Cuthwin stood at the queen’s side and her daughter held a spear out toward Maedbh.

“My queen,” gasped Maedbh. “You’re alive.”

“Never more so!” roared the queen, turning and hurling herself into the fray.

Together with Sigulf, Fridleifr, Cuthwin and Ulrike, Maedbh joined Garr’s faltering shieldwall. Though Maedbh’s arm and back burned with pain, she fought like never before, unhorsing dead warriors with every thrust. Together with the Queen’s Eagles they fought like the legendary heroes of old, but even with such courage there was no way the shieldwall could hold. Warriors were dying by the dozen with every passing moment and the ring of swords and spears was shrinking like a patch of snow in spring.

A black rider thundered over a shieldbearer to Maedbh’s left and his steed, a black beast with skin like basalt, reared up as a powerful warrior leapt from its back. His black cloak unfolded like wings as he landed in the midst of the Asoborns. Maedbh had seen this man a handful of times only, and though he had changed beyond all mortal recognition, he still bore the features of Siggurd of the Brigundians.

The black riders charged through the gap he had broken, rampaging through the Asoborns and slaughtering them with slashing blows of their black swords. Siggurd hurled Garr to the ground, the heroic warrior’s throat torn out and his head lolling on a last shred of sinew. Transformed into something evil, Siggurd’s eyes blazed crimson with thirst and his fangs gleamed in the twilight as he bore Queen Freya to the ground.

Maedbh rushed to the queen’s side, but a backhanded blow from the vampire count hurled her back. Ulrike sent an arrow thudding into the blooddrinker’s back, and he roared in pain. His fangs bit down on Freya’s neck, but before he could tear out her throat, Cuthwin leapt onto the vampire and buried his knife in his side.

Siggurd arched his back, his form blurring as though in mid transformation and he slashed a clawed hand across Cuthwin’s chest. The young Unberogen fell back, his chest in tatters. Siggurd screeched in anger, his fangs bared and bloody. Fridleifr stabbed the vampire in the back with his spear, the tip punching through his belly. Siggurd spun around, wrenching the spear from Fridleifr’s hands and tearing the weapon from his body. Faster than Maedbh could follow, the spear left Siggurd’s hands and plunged into the boy’s chest, punching through his armour and driving him to the ground.

Sigulf gave a cry of loss and anger and slashed his sword through Siggurd’s arm. The vampire screeched in agony as a wash of black blood sprayed from the wound. Siggurd looked at the wound, unable to believe he had been hurt.

“That stung little one,” hissed Siggurd, leaping forward to take hold of Freya’s son.

He looked into the boy’s eyes and laughed, as though at some private jest, before drawing a short-bladed dagger and ramming it into Sigulf’s belly. The boy screamed, but before Siggurd could twist the knife and spill his guts, another arrow hammered the vampire’s body.

Maedbh saw Ulrike standing behind the vampire, scrabbling to nock another arrow to her bowstring as Siggurd fastened his hungry gaze upon her.

“Blessed arrows,” he said, dropping the wailing Sigulf to the ground. “Little girls shouldn’t play with such dangerous things. Now I’ll have to make you scream.”

The vampire stalked towards Ulrike, who fell to her knees before the terrifying figure, his form blurring as his cloak billowed around him like the wings of an enormous bat. Siggurd’s eyes widened as his lower jaw distended and his fangs sprouted like daggers.

Maedbh clambered to her feet and staggered towards Ulrike, though she knew she could never reach her before Siggurd. Her pain was incredible, but she had to reach her daughter.

“Ulrike!” she begged, hearing a swelling roar around her. “No, please! Don’t hurt her!”

Siggurd lifted Ulrike from the ground. The young girl’s face was a mask of tears. Siggurd turned back towards Maedbh. He sniffed the blood on Ulrike’s face and his monstrous face broke into a horrid leer of understanding.

“Ah… this is your spawn,” said Siggurd. “Now you will watch her die.”

Before the vampire could say another word, the roaring in Maedbh’s head swelled as a mob of people charged into the black riders. There were hundreds of them, maybe even thousands. Most were without armour, dressed in the garb of farmers and ordinary men and women. They fought with the fury of Thuringian berserkers, tearing the dead riders from their saddles and breaking them apart with blows from clubs, felling axes and scythes.

Leading them was a young boy spattered in blood and with the light of battle fury in his eyes. He fought with a spear tied with blue and red rags, and Maedbh saw he knew how to use it. The boy hooked the haft around the legs of an unhorsed black rider and stabbed it down into the dead warrior’s chest, twisting the blade before he withdrew it from the body. Dimly she knew she should know him, but how she could know an Unberogen boy escaped her.

The people of Reikdorf swarmed over the undead and drove them back. Siggurd threw Ulrike down as a score of howling men and women ran at him with spears and swords. Some of these, he could kill without difficulty, but all of them… Maedbh didn’t think so. She ran over to Ulrike and scooped her up into her arms.

“I’ve got you, dear heart,” said Maedbh. “I’ve got you.”

“Mother!” cried Ulrike, burying her head against Maedbh’s shoulder. “The bad man…?”

“Gone,” said Maedbh, oblivious to anything except her daughter’s weight. “He can’t hurt you now. Not ever.”

Ulrike wept into her neck, and Maedbh held her tightly, closing her eyes and willing the fear away as her body pulsed with waves of fiery pain. They stayed like that until Maedbh heard footsteps. She looked up and saw the young boy with the spear tied with the blue and red rags looking down at her.

“Is she all right?” he asked, and Maedbh caught the strong eastern accent in his words.

“Daegal?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She smiled. “You remembered your spear training.”

He nodded, and suddenly he wasn’t a blood-covered Asoborn warrior, but a boy of twelve years. She gathered Daegal to her and hugged him and Ulrike close to her chest. At last, she released them both and said, “You were both so very brave. I can’t tell you how proud I am of you. You fought like real heroes.”

Ulrike smiled through her tears, and Daegal held himself tall, as though some dreadful weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He looked back over her shoulder and Maedbh saw Freya carrying Sigulf while Fridleifr and Cuthwin had their arms around each other’s shoulders to hold themselves upright. Both were bloody, but they were unbowed.

“Siggurd?” she said.

“Fled,” answered Cuthwin. “When the people came, he took to the air and flew away.”

Maedbh nodded, looking to her queen with relief beyond words. Freya was pale and unsteady on her feet, and blood streamed from the wound at her neck. Sigulf’s eyes were closed and his belly wet with crimson. His chest rose and fell, but weakly.

“He’s alive?” asked Maedbh.

“Barely,” said Freya, her voice cracked and faint. “We have to get him back to Reikdorf.”

“We all need to get back,” said Cuthwin. “We’ve seen this lot off, but there’s more of them coming this way.”

Maedbh looked to the east, and the flame of hope was smothered in her breast as she saw thousands more skeletal warriors marching in lockstep towards them. They had weathered this attack, but the dead had many more warriors to send into battle.

“Everyone back!” she shouted. “To Reikdorf!”

 

Krell’s axe slashed down, but instead of cleaving through armour and flesh as it had done in his slaughter of the Red Scythes, this time his blade was halted by gromril armour and the strength of mountains. The towering monster paused in its butchery and looked down at the stout forms opposing it. The furious light in the champion’s eyes burned even brighter, as though recognising the stunted forms before him from battles fought thousands of years ago.

Master Alaric felt the power of Krell’s blow throughout his body, his great-grandfather’s shield almost bent in two by the force. The shock reverberated through his armour and he thanked Grungni that he’d thought to strengthen himself with several firkins of beer.

“Is that the best you’ve got?” he sneered at the long dead champion. “No wonder Grimbul Ironhelm was able to beat you.”

Krell roared with renewed fury, and his axe came up as a hundred dwarfs charged him. Alaric hurled himself at the ferocious champion whose name was entered countless times in the Dammaz Kron, his every transgression written in the blood of the High Kings of the age. He hammered his axe against Krell’s blood-red form, feeling the star-iron of his axe bite a hair’s breadth into the skull-etched plates of armour. Krell roared and slammed his axe down on a dwarf warrior’s head, cleaving him from skull to groin. Blood sprayed the armour of his comrades, and they attacked with renewed fury.

Like the great pistons of Zhufbar, the dwarf axes beat the black armour of Krell, cutting shards of cursed iron away from his body, but leaving the giant, skeletal body beneath unharmed. Alaric circled behind the undead champion, rolling beneath the return swing of the black axe that left six dwarfs bisected at the waist. The ring of iron and gromril tightened around Krell, but the sheer weight of numbers only seemed to drive him to greater heights of frenzied delight.

Krell’s axe swept left and right, and those it didn’t kill were hurled away to land with the butchered human horsemen. An injured warrior, the one Alaric had spoken to, watched the fight in pained amazement. Alaric would sooner eat grobi dung than fail in front of a manling. The shameful life of a slayer awaited such unfortunates. That was not going to be Alaric’s fate.

Yet more of the undead were moving up behind Krell, pushing forward in giant blocks of marching skeletons and lurching corpses. Hundreds of bats wheeled overhead and ghostly wisps of howling shades swirled around them. One way or another, this fight would need to end soon, for there was no way his dwarfs could hold against such numbers.

Alaric waited until Krell swung his axe in a low arc, killing another four dwarfs, before throwing aside his shield and leaping onto the dead champion’s back. He wrapped his hand around a broken hunk of armour and beat his axe against Krell’s shoulders.

Plates shattered under the assault, and Krell arched his back as he felt Alaric’s presence. He roared and spun around, seeking to dislodge Alaric as the remaining dwarfs pressed their attack, battering his thighs with axe blows and hammer strikes. Sparks flew from the red armour, like metal fresh from the forge on an anvil. Alaric fought to hold on as he thundered his axe against the metal of Krell’s armour. He felt his grip slipping and slammed his axe though a weakened plate, wedging himself in place by gripping an exposed rib within the unclean iron.

It felt like plunging his hand into an icy lake, and Alaric felt the cold of the other side seeping into his hand, a frozen touch of utter lifelessness and doom. He tried to snatch his hand back from Krell’s essence, but it was stuck fast. The cold slithered through his hand, oozing through the veins and meat of his wrist. Alaric knew that when it reached his heart, he would become no better than Krell.

“Master Alaric, sir!” shouted a loud manling voice. “Da says you got to get clear!”

Alaric knew he had only one chance to live and grimly freed his axe from the weakened plate of broken armour.

“Alaric the Mad, eh?” he said. “Maybe they’re right.”

He brought the axe down upon his wrist, the razored edge easily slicing through his flesh and bone. Alaric grunted in pain and kicked out on Krell’s armour, throwing himself as far away from the champion as he could get. He landed on a dead horse and rolled behind it as he heard a series of snapping hammers being pulled back.

“Left one’s out of alignment,” he grumbled, as the world filled with fire and noise.

 

Govannon pulled the leather firing cords, elated and terrified at the same time. He couldn’t see much of the battle, which was a relief to him, yet out of the shadows one shape was terrifyingly clear. The blood red form of Krell loomed in the darkness, a monster of nightmare come to hunt the living.

The first hammer struck the side of its brass cauldron, slowing enough to prevent the flint from sparking, and Govannon’s heart sank. The hulking champion of Nagash loomed over the war machine and Govannon cursed himself for a fool in wishing to be part of this fight. Krell would kill them all; nothing could stand against this horror from an ancient age.

He cursed his naive belief that he could repair a machine of the dwarfs, bitter that he could have spent these last weeks far more productively. Armour, swords, shields, axes, arrowheads—

The second hammer struck true, and puffs of smoke and fire frothed from the brass cauldrons at the back of the machine. The barrel erupted in a booming storm of shot and fire, another a few seconds later. Govannon’s ears rang with the concussive force of the detonation and his eyes watered with the brightness of the fire erupting in thundering booms from the barrels. Then the fourth barrel fired. As the hammer slammed down in the powder cauldron of the barrel he had repaired, Bysen lifted him away as the Thunder Bringer rocked back with ferocious recoil.

The barrel held firm and erupted with a blizzard of iron shot and, clear as day, Govannon saw the towering champion fall, his blood red armour ripped to shreds by the hurricane of fire and iron. Bones were shattered and torn away, the horned helmet little more than a ragged lump of pulverised iron hanging from a torn leather chin strap.

Part of Krell’s head was gone, the left side of his skull a shattered ruin. Blackness gaped within, yet the fire in Krell’s right eye blazed as the dwarfs fell upon his ruined body with sharp axes and vengeful hearts.

“It worked!” shouted Govannon. “In Ulric’s name, it worked!”

“Aye, da, it worked good!” said Bysen happily. “Big, big bang! Bysen’s ears hurt!”

 

Khaled al-Muntasir rode at a leisurely pace towards the north, watching as the army of the dead began to fully envelop these mortals who dared to stand against Nagash. He had ridden with all speed towards where the red-armoured cavalry had fought the black knights to a standstill, but halted upon feeling Markus’ death.

For a mortal, Markus was a tremendous swordsman, but enhanced with the power of undeath, he had been superlative—better even than Khaled perhaps. Yet he was dead, his soul consigned to oblivion by a mortal. The unease that had stirred in the vampire’s belly all night returned, stronger this time, and he cursed himself for succumbing to such a mortal sensation.

Yet no sooner had the painful empathic horror of Markus’ destruction passed than he felt Siggurd’s pain as weapons blessed in the name of the god of all living things pierced his immortal flesh. He winced with each wound, unused to such pain, and felt Siggurd’s anger as he was forced to flee. His two unbeatable warriors had been defeated, one destroyed, the other wounded almost to the point of dissolution.

Khaled al-Muntasir forced the anger at their incompetence aside and turned his attention to the rest of the battle, trying to regain his impregnable confidence. Thousands more dead warriors were advancing towards the city, pushing past the tiny islands of resistance that had met with some fleeting success. The battle line of mortals arrayed before the walls was fighting with admirable courage, but no hope of victory. They took backward step after backward step, and it was only a matter of time until they broke. Yet in the centre of the battle, cut off from the rest of his army, Sigmar drove for the low hillside where Nagash awaited him. Less than a hundred warriors still rode with the Emperor, yet they charged as though all of mankind were with them.

The vampire looked to the black form of Nagash, who stood with his enormous sword and twisted-snake staff in his hands. Black light flickered from the staff and blue fire wreathed the blade of his ancient sword.

“What are you waiting for?” hissed Khaled al-Muntasir. “Just kill him and be done with it.”

Yet even as he said the words, he knew Nagash could not kill Sigmar with his black sorcery while he wore the crown. Its incredible power would protect any wearer from virtually all forms of magic.

Khaled al-Muntasir watched as Nagash raised his staff and arcing bolts of lightning forked downwards, striking the gems inset along its scaled length. A storm of dark energy surrounded the necromancer and he slammed the staff into the ground. With senses beyond those of mortals, Khaled al-Muntasir watched the energy flow from the staff and into the hillside, spreading like the roots of a poisoned tree beneath the earth.

“That’s more like it,” he said.

These black roots sought the bleak places of the land, the abandoned graveyards long since paved over, the forgotten plague pits covered in quicklime and the sites of murder and mayhem. Drawn to these places like rats to a cesspit, Nagash’s sorcery infused the earth with the dark magic of undeath.

And the unquiet dead rose from their ancient graves to claw their way to the world above.

 

The earth rumbled with the sound of digging claws and moaning hunger, the churned grass rippling as the dead of centuries before rose to the surface. Hands long devoid of meat erupted from the earth and hauled flesh-less corpses back to the land that had consigned them to the ground. From the southern fork of the river to the city gates, a huge tear opened in the earth and a thousand or more dead warriors from the time before men had dwelled in cities and towns lurched unsteadily to their feet.

The Asoborns and the people of Reikdorf fleeing the onward march of the dead abandoned all pretence of an ordered retreat at the sight of this new horror. They ran for the city gates, terrified at being surrounded and cut off from their home. Even Freya, whose courage was unquestioned, fled along with her sons, Maedbh, Ulrike and Cuthwin. Daegal, with his newfound courage, formed a rearguard with the few surviving Queen’s Eagles, and if any of them thought it strange to be taking orders from one so young, none remarked upon it.

Within the walls of Reikdorf, the ground broke open as the dead climbed from below, pushing their way into the half-light as Nagash’s sorcery compelled their grisly remains to rise up and slay the living. Hundreds of dead things stalked the streets of the city, fighting anything warm and feasting on their flesh.

Alfgeir and Teon were trapped within a closing ring of undead, their retreat cut off by a newly emerged phalanx of the dead. They were unarmed, these dead men, but they swiftly picked up the weapons of those the Unberogen had already destroyed. Ragged, disorganised and freshly risen, they were formidable in their numbers if not their skill as fighters.

In the north, yet more dead arose, surrounding Govannon, Bysen and the dwarfs as they hacked at the indestructible corpse of Krell. Though their axes were sharper than any weapon forged by the hands of men, they could not easily undo armour worked in the forges of smiths who gave praise to the bloody gods of the north.

The mortal army was surrounded and doomed.

 

Sigmar smashed aside a pair of skeletal warriors, champions in ancient, verdigris-stained armour of a thousand years ago. Hundreds of these undying creatures surrounded him, and yet still they pushed on. Ghal-Maraz flickered with silver fire and shimmering sparks flew from his every blow. Hundreds of the dead had fallen before him, but hundreds more still awaited destruction.

Beside him, Wolfgart hacked through the dead with great sweeps of his sword, each blow weaker than the last as his strength grew less and less. Where Ghal-Maraz imparted a measure of its power to Sigmar, Wolfgart enjoyed no such boon. Wenyld fought mechanically, slumped low over his saddle, though Sigmar’s banner still flew above the heroic warriors who rode with him.

Ghal-Maraz swept out to either side, breaking the dead warriors apart with brutal cracks of shattered bone. As the last ranks of the dead were crushed beneath their horses’ hooves, Sigmar’s Unberogen, fifty warriors in total, rode onto the clear ground before the low hillside where Nagash awaited them. Its base was encircled by tall warriors in heavy hauberks of black iron, who carried long halberds with icy blades. A host of swirling spirits gathered in the air above the necromancer, and the darkness around him was total. Sigmar had no idea how fared the rest of his army, but knew that unless he could end this now, it would be slaughtered by morning’s light.

A trail of broken bodies littered the ground behind them, and though thousands of the dead were within reach, none turned towards them, as though their presence was an irrelevance.

“Almost there,” said Wolfgart, twisting in his saddle to make sure no more of the dead were moving to attack them.

“Aye,” agreed Sigmar. “One more push and I’ll have him right where I want him.”

Wolfgart gave him a sidelong look and then burst out laughing.

“Damn me, Sigmar,” he said. “I’m tired worse than I was at Black Fire, and that’s saying something, but you can still make me smile.”

Sigmar nodded, feeling the weight of the crown at his brow grow heavier with every step his horse took towards the hillside. He felt its anger at him surge, a fury that a mere mortal dared to wield it and not partake of its power. Its maker was at hand, and it renewed its assault on his mind, battering him with dreams of pleasure, nightmares of failure and temptations of wealth, power and godhood.

None could reach Sigmar, for he had reached that place where all thoughts of self were extinguished. All that was left to him now was service to his people, and not even death could keep him from that duty. Piece by piece, Sigmar had shed all his earthly desires, putting them aside for the greater good of the Empire.

Nagash’s crown had nothing left with which to tempt or intimidate him, for his entire being was dedicated to one ideal. That was something no necromancer could ever understand, the dedication of the self to a higher purpose, where the one man could make the difference between life and death, success or failure.

In this world, at this time, Sigmar was that man. He had believed that from the day he had walked amongst the tombs of his ancestors on his Dooming Day, but had known it when he passed through the fire of Ulric unharmed.

Everything he had done had driven him to this moment, and he knew this foe was his to face alone. Sigmar swung his leg over his saddle and dropped to the earth as a sudden stillness and silence spread outwards from the hillside. Though battle still raged beyond, Sigmar could hear nothing beyond his own laboured breathing and the distant howling of wolves.

He walked over to Wenyld and lifted his hand towards the red and gold banner.

“Time to pass it on, my friend,” said Sigmar.

Wenyld nodded, too weak from blood loss to resist as Sigmar took the banner pole from his blooded grip.

“What in Ulric’s name are you doing?” demanded Wolfgart, walking his horse alongside him and dismounting. “Get back on your horse, you fool!”

“No,” said Sigmar. “I’m going to end this now.”

“What? You’re just going to walk up to the bloody necromancer on foot?”

“That’s exactly what I’m doing,” replied Sigmar, turning and making his way towards the hillside. “And don’t follow me. This is something I need to do alone.”

“Why, for the love of the gods? Tell me that at least.”

Sigmar said, “Because this is how it has to be. You know how it goes. At the end of all the sagas, the hero always stands alone or else he’s not a hero.”

“Damn the sagas,” swore Wolfgart. “I’m not leaving you.”

“Yes you are,” said Sigmar as the ancient warriors at the base of the hill parted to allow him passage. “Wenyld needs you.”

Wolfgart turned and caught Wenyld as he fell from his saddle. Once again the howl of wolves sounded from over forested hills and shadowed valleys, carried to Reikdorf by cold northern winds. As Wolfgart lowered the dying Wenyld to the ground, Sigmar turned and climbed the hill towards Nagash, his banner in one hand, Ghal-Maraz in the other.

He heard Wolfgart shouting his name, but didn’t dare look back.