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Dark Harvest – Extract

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Chapter One

BLACKWOOD

When I awoke, the rain was pattering against the canvas overhead. The wagon smelled of ghyroch and gunpowder. My back ached, and my head was ringing like a duardin smithy. I could taste last night’s mistakes in the back of my mouth, and my skin had that greasy, gritty feeling that comes from too many baths in water barrels.

For a moment I looked around, wondering what had woken me. Then I realised that the wagon wasn’t moving. I cleared my throat and called out, ‘Have we stopped?’

No one answered me. Then, ‘Blackwood? That you?’

‘It’s me, Lucio,’ I said.

The drover leaned through the front flap and gave me a tepid smile. ‘I thought you’d sleep right through it.’

‘Right through what?’

‘Come up and see.’

I sat up and winced. Everything hurt, the way it always did when I slept rough, which was altogether too often for my liking, these days. Sometimes it felt as if I’d spent half my life sleeping in the backs of supply wagons or in tents. At other times, I realised that was a charitable estimate. I tried not to think about it too much.

I squinted against the gloom. There was no lantern, and for good reason. The wagon was packed to the canvas with crates and barrels full of guns and gunpowder, the primary exports of Greywater Fastness. If it belched fire or spat lead, it came from the foundries of the Fastness. Business was good, especially these days. The dead rested uneasily in their graves, and shot was more effective than prayers.

I wasn’t the only one sleeping in the back with the merchandise, though I was the only one awake. When they were off-duty, the drovers were allowed to rest in the wagons, if there was room. I made my way to the front as carefully and as quickly as I could, trying not to disturb anyone. I had enough problems as it was. The last thing I needed was an angry muleskinner trying to knife me.

I didn’t like leaving the city. Especially to go into the wilderness. I’d had enough of that to last me a lifetime. But sometimes you have to do things you don’t like. Life is like that. And then you die.

The buckboards were wet when I hauled myself out onto the front of the wagon. So was Lucio. He wore an oilskin cape and broad-brimmed hat, but neither had done him much good. He didn’t seem to mind. He offered me an apple. ‘We got us a right fine quagmire here.’ I didn’t bother to ask where ‘here’ was. I’d realised where we were as soon as I saw the gun-towers – Mere Keep. The edge of civilisation, as far as many inhabitants of Greywater Fastness were concerned; where Sigmar’s light faded, and the dark of Ghyran began.

The immense gatehouse-keep straddled the only road out of the city, its foundations set deep in the muddy ground the way only duardin stonemasons could manage. Built of heavy, black stone, dredged from the marshes centuries ago by labour gangs, it held a dozen wide portcullises within its sturdy frame. Each of these gates was closed at the moment, causing much consternation among the waiting travellers.

Above the portcullises, a long, reinforced parapet supported a battery of cannons and their crews. Greycaps, armed with handguns and fire-casters, patrolled the palisade walls and gun-towers that stretched out to either side of the gatehouse and folded back along the road leading to the city like the walls of an immense corridor.

Once, the road had been bigger and there had been others. Now there was only one thin snake of raised stone and packed earth, squeezed between two expanses of blasted heath and mire. One way in, one way out. Even that had cost a generation of blood and fire to keep, and annual sacrifices to maintain.

I rubbed the apple on my sleeve, trying to find an unbruised spot to bite. ‘So what’s going on? Why aren’t the gates open?’

Lucio shrugged. ‘Don’t ask me. I just drive the wagons. Scribe made a mistake somewhere, probably. Chantey is fit to be tied.’

‘I bet.’ Chantey was the master of the caravan I was hitching a ride with. He was unhappy at the best of times. Most caravan-masters were. It wasn’t the sort of job that attracted those of cheerful disposition. ‘Where is he?’

‘He and some of the other masters went looking for somebody in charge.’ Lucio leaned over the side of the buckboard and spat. ‘Good luck to them, I say.’

‘You get paid either way, right?’ I said, and he laughed. I bit into the apple and watched as Greycaps and scribes threaded their way among the line of covered wagons that waited to depart through one or another of the portcullises. The apple had a bitter taste, like much of the fruit grown in the city’s allotments. Something was wrong with the soil, but everyone pretended not to notice. Or maybe we’d all just grown used to it, like the rain.

I risked an upward glance. The sky was the colour of slate. Grey on grey. Some said the weather was proof that Sigmar had abandoned us, that he was angry with us for our crimes. Though just what those crimes were, no one really knew. Others insisted it was punishment from the Everqueen, or even Elder Bones. All I knew for sure was that I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen the sun, or felt anything other than damp.

‘Is it true you used to be a priest?’ Lucio asked me.

I laughed. ‘Who told you I was a priest?’

‘Just something I heard.’

‘Gossip is a sin,’ I said.

It was his turn to laugh. ‘I just thought it was funny is all.’

‘Why?’

‘On account of you breaking legs for Caspar Guno.’

I took a bite of my apple. ‘You shouldn’t say such things. You never know who might be listening.’

He had the good sense to look afraid. The truth was, I didn’t break many legs, if I could help it. A man who can’t walk can’t work. Arms were my speciality. And occasionally necks. But only rarely. Most people were only too happy to pay tithe to Caspar Guno. Those that weren’t… well. Guno employed men like me for a reason. In my learned opinion, working for him wasn’t much different to serving Sigmar.

Atop the palisade, Ironweld cannons began to boom. Lucio started in his seat, and the ghyroch pulling our wagon began to low. The great bull-like beast was covered in shaggy, moss-like hair and had a rack of branch-like horns that rose higher than the top of the wagon. Massive, stony hooves splashed mud everywhere as it stamped in growing agitation.

It wasn’t the only one doing so. Animals up and down the line of wagons began to bellow, squawk and whinny. I saw two Chamonian axe-beaks claw at the mud with their talons, their metallic feathers shimmering in the rain, and a half-grown demidroth drool acidic spittle and lash its scaly tail as its duardin rider tried to calm it.

Lucio extended his goad and scratched the ghyroch between its shoulders, soothing it. ‘There’s something on the wind,’ he said, softly. As if afraid someone might hear him.

‘Besides gunpowder?’ I said, as the stink of the volley washed back over us. Living in the Fastness, you got used to the smell quick, or your sinuses burned out. It was everywhere in the city, in every stone. It wafted across the Ghoul Mere in black banks of powder-fog, staining the trees and turning the rain to acid. Was it any wonder the sylvaneth hated us?

‘They say the treekin are on the march.’

‘Who says, Lucio?’

‘Greycaps,’ Lucio said.

‘How drunk were they?’

‘Less than me.’ He looked around. ‘Listen to that.’

I didn’t ask what he meant. I could hear it well enough – had been hearing it since I’d woken up. I’d thought it was just the rain at first, but it was the sound of trees. Of branches swaying in the rain and wind. Only there was no wind. The sound beat against the air with a constant pressure beneath the more bellicose thunder of the guns.

Maybe Lucio’s Greycaps were right. I wondered if I ought to cut my losses and go back to the city. But that wasn’t an option.

‘It’s nothing,’ I said. ‘Just a lot of noise.’

‘Doesn’t sound like nothing. I haven’t seen them this agitated since…’ He trailed off. I knew what he’d been about to say. Since the last time the treekin had decided to tear the Fastness down, stone by stone. They’d failed then, as they always failed. But we lost ground nonetheless. We always lost ground.

‘Guess I picked a bad time to leave the city.’

‘You after somebody?’

‘Why would you say that?’

‘Only reason I can think of that a man like you goes anywhere is if you’re after someone – or they’re after you.’ Lucio looked at me. ‘So which is it?’

‘Bit of both,’ I said, after a moment.

It had started with the coin. A message from a dead man. Or someone as good as.

When it found me, I considered ignoring it. I’d broken almost every oath I’d taken when I’d abandoned the azure, after all. What was one more? I wasn’t a priest any more, and the promises I’d made while I was one were just ashes as far as I was concerned.

But here I was, on a southbound wagon. I took the coin out of my pocket. It was Aqshian, a kind minted in some backwater city of the Great Parch. Not even real gold. It was stamped with the face of some petty king who’d probably long since been forgotten. Only, the face had been scratched out. That was how I knew what it meant.

I flipped it across my knuckles, trying to distract myself. Ten years on, I was fairly good at it. You can ignore almost anything, if you convince yourself there’s no point in seeing it.

I knew who the coin was from, even if I didn’t know who’d sent it, or how they’d found me. I’d spent a decade making myself hard to find and thought I’d done a good job of it. I’d even changed my name. ‘Blackwood’.

The coin said otherwise.

I didn’t like that, people knowing where I was. Who I was, or who I had been, for that matter. The coin was from someone who should’ve known better. I intended to tell them so. That was part of the reason I was going to Wald. Or so I told myself.

The truth is… the past, like the dead, doesn’t always rest easy. There’s always someone looking to dig up what’s better left buried.

I tossed my finished apple to the ghyroch. ‘I’m going to go find Chantey. See what the hold-up is.’

‘He’s in a foul mood,’ Lucio warned.

‘So am I.’

As I climbed down, I looked back, past the wagons and inner defences, towards the distant forge-glow of the city. Greywater Fastness crouched at the end of the fortified road like a tiger herded into a cage.

I made my way around the wagon, sinking into the mud with every step. I pulled my coat tight about me, grateful for the heavy magmadroth leather. It was tough enough to turn aside most blades smaller than a sword, and kept out all but the worst of the weather.

I looked around. The gatehouse was a fortress in and of itself. Stables and animal pens occupied the north, while a forge anchored the south. Even with the rain, it was busy. Hammers rang as horses were shod. Block-and-tackle frames lowered goods to waiting wagons, as scribes hurriedly weighed cargoes and noted the results in logbooks.

It had to be self-sufficient. Every year, a little more of the mere vanished. Every year, the trees pressed closer to the road, further isolating the city from the rest of the realm. Every year, the Greycaps demanded more funds for guns and towers and walls to defend what was left. And every year, the Council of the Forge and the Grand Conclave gave it to them.

Given that they’d started out as a regiment of backwater handgunners it was almost impressive. The Greycaps had gone from a shifty crew of garrison soldiers to overseeing the defences of a city of several million.

The forecourt was crowded – drovers and sellswords diced or argued; food-sellers circulated, offering steaming bowls of broth for cut-rate prices; pilgrims gathered against the walls and sang hymns, rang bells or simply read loudly from the Canticles of Thunder. A steady tide of humanity, filling an ever-shrinking space – a microcosm of the realms themselves.

Despite the crowd, I spotted Chantey easily enough. He was right in the middle of all of it, as usual, along with a few other caravan-masters. They surrounded a put-upon Greycap in a vaguely threatening manner, and took turns yelling at the stubbornly unresponsive soldier. Several of them were waving scrip papers or badges of licence, as if it would do any good. If the Greycaps wanted the gates closed, they were staying closed.

Chantey turned as I drew near. He stepped away from the others, a sour expression on his hatchet face.

‘Blackwood.’ He said my name as if it were something unpleasant. I didn’t hold it against him. Fallen priests aren’t exactly high on anyone’s list of desired companions. And I’d fallen harder than most.

‘What’s going on?’

‘Something has the Greycaps riled up.’ Chantey ducked his head and water spilled off the broad brim of his hat. ‘Troggoths again, maybe. Or a mere-gargant…’

‘Or Pale Oak,’ one of the other caravan-masters said. Everyone fell silent at the treelord’s name. If the sylvaneth were on the warpath again, there wasn’t much chance of anyone going anywhere except back to the city.

‘Whatever it is, it’s something that ought not to be so close to the road, this time of day,’ Chantey said firmly. ‘They’ll see it off, never fear.’

‘Are they still going to let us through?’ I asked.

‘Eventually. Might be a few hours.’ Chantey was from somewhere else, and his accent was a medley of all the places he’d ever lived. He fished a filigreed pocket watch from his coat and popped it open. The hands of the watch were stylised lightning bolts, and the runes were Azyrite. The Fastness was on celestial time, like all of Sigmar’s cities. ‘It’s going to play merry hell with my schedule.’

Chantey led convoys south to Headwater Breach and back twice a month. That was the direction I needed to go, so I’d wrangled a berth aboard one of his wagons.

I flicked rain from my eyes. ‘We’ll make it in time, though?’

He looked at me. ‘I said we would.’

‘You also said there’d be no delays once we got past the New Fen Gate.’

‘You can walk, if you like.’ He snapped his pocket watch shut and put it away.

‘If I thought it’d get me to Wald faster, I might.’

Chantey grunted. ‘Don’t see why you’d want to go there, of all places, anyway.’ He looked at me speculatively. ‘There’s nothing in Wald except eels and moss.’

‘My business, isn’t it?’

He grunted again, but didn’t press the issue. Chantey had once had a profitable side-business delivering the bodies of vagrants to the ash-grounds for cremation. I had helped him out a few times, enough to earn me some goodwill, along with a ride.

Up on the palisades, Greycaps were ringing bells and shouting. Handguns popped and cracked, splitting the curtain of rain. I heard a sound like trees bending in a great wind. I knew that sound. We all did, everyone who made Greywater Fastness their home.

The caravan-masters shared nervous looks. Even Chantey had lost the usual pugnacious gleam in his eyes.

‘They’re not attacking,’ said the Greycap, the one Chantey and the others had been berating. His voice was soft, as if he weren’t speaking to anyone in particular. ‘They never do. We have a truce.’

And then he laughed. A sort of high-pitched, raggedy sound. He looked worn out and worn down. Unshaven, his uniform threadbare and stiff with stains. His hands were shaking and his eyes moved quickly, as if searching for something.

All of the soldiers looked the same. They were men riding the broken edge. They’d been out here too long, enduring the wild hours with no relief. I’d felt that way myself, often enough. There was only so long you could bear it. Every man had his breaking point. I knew that better than most.

Something slammed against the eastern wall. And then to the west. An echoing boom that made the wooden walls bow and flex alarmingly. Greycaps scrambled back from the ramparts as cannon crews redoubled their efforts.

‘If they’re not attacking, they’re doing a pretty good job of making it look like they are,’ Chantey spat.

‘They can’t attack,’ the Greycap said dully, as if it were a mantra. ‘We have a truce.’

I heard something like the skitter of leaves over lead roof tiles and felt a chill race through me. I knew that sound. The treekin were laughing.

‘Maybe somebody needs to remind them,’ I said, as my hand fell to my knife. It was the only weapon I carried these days. It was a good knife, but it was still just a knife. I had never been any good with a sword, and I wasn’t about to pick up a hammer again. I couldn’t afford a pistol and wouldn’t have known how to use it, even if I’d had the comets to spare.

Chantey had his own blade half-drawn when the gun-towers on the palisade walls started up. The ghyrochs lowed in plaintive agitation. Everyone was nervous, even the beasts. Whatever it was was moving past the gatehouse, along the western walls. Greycaps scrambled to keep pace, and I could hear the order to fire being given.

‘They’re not attacking,’ the Greycap said again, his voice high and thin. ‘Not really. They’re just… just playing, you see. Trying to draw us out. It’s harmless. Harmless.’

‘Doesn’t sound harmless,’ Chantey growled.

The volleyguns in the gun-towers spat rhythmic hails of lead into the rain. I heard the sound of trees in the wind again – a vast sighing that seemed to grow deeper and louder with every passing moment. It echoed through my bones and I felt it, down deep inside me. Like the memory of a song once heard and never forgotten.

The sylvaneth were singing. Somewhere out in the rain, out among the trees, they were singing. I wasn’t the only one who heard it. I thought the Greycap was weeping, but it was hard to tell in the rain. Chantey pulled off his hat and closed his eyes. The guns stuttered to silence, as the song danced across the ramparts.

I’d heard that melody before, once and in another realm. But it had the same anger, the same sadness I’d heard back then. They hated us so much that it hurt them to feel it. Like a wound that never healed. The song – the attack – was a way for them to remind us of how much they despised us. How little we mattered.

The song reverberated through me, louder and louder, until I thought my head would burst from the pressure. And then, suddenly, it was done. As quickly as a man might snap his fingers, the song ended. The bells on the walls fell silent and the only sound was the rain and the lowing of ghyrochs.

The Greycap wiped his eyes, and made the sign of the hammer. Chantey put his hat back on, and I realised he’d been praying. I released a breath I hadn’t recalled taking.

Chantey was the first to speak. He looked at me. ‘Still want to go, then?’

I didn’t trust myself to reply, so I just nodded.

Behind us, the portcullises began to open. The swamp road was clear.

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Warhammer horror

A Black Library Publication Imprint

First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustration by Maxim Kostin.

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ISBN: 978-1-78999-631-9

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