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Gotrek & Felix: The Fifth Omnibus – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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PROLOGUE

Worlds Edge Mountains,
The Peak Pass

The sun was an ugly knot in the sky, its harsh light catching at armour and movement in the distance as the enemy approached the throng of Karak Kadrin’s position through the winding, crooked crags of the Peak Pass. Borri Ranulfsson, thane and commander of the throng, blinked and squinted, a thin wisp of smoke rising from the bowl of his pipe. ‘There are more of them than we thought,’ he said gruffly, tugging at one of his beard’s plaits. He stood on a heavy, embossed shield that had been braced across two upright stones, worn smooth by time and tide.

‘How many d’you think?’ a quiet voice asked.

Ranulfsson glanced over at his nephew. The two dwarfs were mirror images of one another, for all that Borri’s ginger hair and beard were streaked with white and Kimril’s were still dark with youth. Both had the wide, keg-shaped build of their people, and their armour was without the frippery or fancy that adorned the war-panoply of some of the clans of Karak Kadrin. There were better places for wealth to sit than on a shield or an axe’s haft or cuirass.

‘A thousand, at least,’ Borri said, sucking meditatively on his pipe. The contours of the pass made it hard to judge distance properly. It widened and thinned at odd points and the avalanches that were not uncommon in the Worlds Edge Mountains had a tendency to wreak drastic changes on the topography. Too, battle was as common as the avalanches in this region and as in the lowlands, and it had a tendency to re-shape the ground even as it was fought over. More than one throng had been buried in a sudden avalanche or the collapse of a cliff-face, entombed alongside their enemies forever. ‘Hard to tell at this distance, but I expect we’ll be getting a better look soon enough.’ He pretended not to see the jerk of his nephew’s throat, or hear his soft intake of nervous breath.

Kimril was nervous, and there was no shame in it. Borri had been nervous as well, the first time he’d been called to the killing fields. His armour had had the weight of a mountain that day, and he’d dropped his axe more than once. Nerves were natural.

Then, he’d only been fighting grobi. This… this was a whole other cart of ore.

The cool wind of the heights carried the stink of old blood and men and something else, something infinitely more unpleasant than either of the former, through the Peak Pass and Borri grimaced. Only one thing he knew of smelled that way.

He looked back at the approaching horde, and the feeling of worry gave way to disgust. It wasn’t the first time something foul had swept down out of the north. The Chaos filth tried to march through the pass at least once a season, sometimes in fewer numbers, sometimes in greater. Granted, this lot were quicker than usual, and it was a bigger group than he’d been prepared for, thanks mostly to the failure of his scouts to report back.

It had been six days since he’d sent Fimbur and his rangers to inspect the enemy. Borri had a grudging respect for the ranger, though he didn’t think spending that much time in the open was entirely healthy for a dwarf, and he hoped they hadn’t been caught. There were worse things than being captured by enemies such as these, but none he could bring to mind at the moment.

The horde had swarmed out of the eastern mountains in such numbers that the traders who’d brought word of their coming to Karak Kadrin had said that the dust of their passage had darkened the sky above the Skull Road for miles. They’d thought it exaggeration at first, which was why his throng numbered only five hundred stout clansmen. But now, seeing it, and with the failure of Fimbur to report back, he was starting to think that the traders hadn’t been exaggerating at all; they’d been underplaying, if anything.

Borri gave his nephew’s shoulder a quick pat. ‘We’ll be fine, boy. They’ll catch one look at this throng waiting on them, and they’ll run back north, tails between their legs,’ he said quietly. He turned, looking at the throng arrayed behind him. A sense of fierce pride swelled in him, a pride he saw reflected in the eyes of those warriors closest to him.

They were the throng of Karak Kadrin, and they had never failed to hold the Peak Pass when it counted. Borri expelled twin trails of smoke from his nostrils and pulled his pipe from his lips, tapping it on the rim of his shield. He refilled it without looking at it, the habit second-nature to him.

The throng stood arrayed for battle across the point where this part of the Peak Pass grew narrow and began to rise towards the upper reaches which Karak Kadrin occupied. The high ground was always the best place to be in a slugging match such as this was shaping up to be. Representatives from four clans were present, and their standards, as well as those of the sub-clans, rose above the bristling block formations. The light caught on the golden discs carved in the shape of the faces of the ancestor-gods, and Borri turned away, knowing that Grimnir and Grungni looked down on the throng and were proud.

His reverie was interrupted when another dwarf ambled towards them, his beard tied into two plaits with copper wire and iron hair-clasps, pulled tight over his broad shoulders and tied off to hang down the back of his armour. His armour was heavier than that of either of the others, and he carried a long-hafted hammer slung casually across his shoulders. An ornate full-face helm rested in the crook of his other arm. He whistled softly, not looking at them.

‘Feel up to a wager, Ranulfsson?’ he said, squinting at the approaching enemy.

‘With you, Durgrim, no,’ Borri said, lighting a taper on the inside of his shield and holding the tiny flame beneath the bowl of his pipe. Durgrim snorted, his eyes flicking towards Kimril.

‘What about you, young Kimril? It’s your first taste of battle today… How about a wager to spice things up?’ he said.

Kimril glanced at his uncle, who shook his head. Durgrim caught the gesture and rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t be such a wanaz, Borri,’ he said.

Borri frowned and glared at the other dwarf, irritated by his lack of respect. ‘Where are your ironbreakers, Durgrim? Lounging in the back somewhere, gambling away their weapons?’

Durgrim gave no sign that the jibe bothered him. He extended his hammer. ‘We’re in the centre of the line, as is our right, Borri,’ he said. He smirked. ‘Where are your warriors?’

‘Right where they should be, Durgrim,’ a harsh voice interrupted, before Borri could reply. ‘As you should be,’ the speaker went on, joining them. Bare-chested and scar-faced, the dwarf was a terrifying sight. A thick ridge of greased and crimson-dyed hair flared up from his otherwise shorn skull, and thick steel bands covered his massive forearms. He leaned on the haft of an axe, and a necklace of orc tusks hung from his neck.

‘Ogun,’ Borri said respectfully. Durgrim looked away.

‘Thane Borri,’ the Slayer rasped. ‘It will be a good day, I think.’

‘One can hope,’ Durgrim muttered.

The Slayer looked at him, face as hard as stone. The ironbeard pretended not to notice. Durgrim was an effective warrior, but he had any number of bad habits, bred in his time in the deep dark, and he was unhappy being in a subordinate position. But then, Ogun was simply a discomfiting presence.

Even more discomfiting, Ogun had brought a number of his mad brethren with him, though Borri had neither requested nor wanted them. For all that Karak Kadrin was ruled by a Slayer King, Borri had the proper amount of wariness regarding the dishonoured and the doomed. They would not hold the line, nor would they obey his commands. Even Ogun could barely control them, and then only because he had knocked heads in a grand runk the night before.

Borri examined the Slayer surreptitiously. Ogun was old for a Slayer, and pragmatic. If he was mad, it was in a quiet sort of way, and he felt a brief flicker of sympathy for the warrior. To be without honour was to be set adrift in a world without sense. He could not imagine what it would be like to lack the solidity of hearth and home and his clan ties. To be so mired in shame that only death could erase the stain. Hopefully, he would never find out.

Kimril’s armour clattered as he shifted his shield to a more comfortable position. Borri watched his nephew for a moment, and then noticed Ogun doing the same. The Slayer grunted. ‘If we fall here, warning will need to be delivered to King Ungrim,’ he said.

Borri met Ogun’s eyes. ‘We won’t fall.’ They couldn’t afford to. If they gave ground, the horde would have a clear path to Karak Kadrin, though it would take them many days to reach the hold. The Peak Pass was a major trade route and had been since the Golden Age of the dwarf empire. Here and there, hidden now by time and fallen rocks, were the ancient stones of a long-vanished road, which had been ripped and shattered by some forgotten cataclysm. It was claimed that the Peak Pass only existed thanks to Grungni’s ingenuity, that the ancient ancestor-god had carved the pass with some long-lost mechanism of masterful artifice.

Ogun grunted and turned away. Borri knew what the Slayer’s look had meant and he looked back at Kimril, who nervously shifted his grip on his axe. He had been considering much the same himself, but the lad had to be blooded sooner or later. To deny Kimril the right to stand or fall with his clan was not something that Borri was prepared to do.

From above, a brass-bellied ram’s horn gave an eerie moan. The enemy were drawing close. Borri raised his axe, and war-horns sounded from within the body of the throng. The block formations dissolved into heavy overlapping lines. The pass was wide enough to accommodate a half-sized throng such as this one, but their foes would be squeezed tight, with nowhere to go but forwards and upwards, into quarrel and shot. And those that survived would meet the axes of the clan-warriors, Durgrim’s ironbreakers and Ogun’s motley lot.

Borri puffed on his pipe in contentment. Ogun was right. It was looking to be a good day.

‘This will be a good day,’ Hrolf growled, hunching low over his horse as it trotted forwards, scaly hide rippling with colour. ‘The wind stinks of slaughter.’ Hrolf was built large, and as he shifted in his saddle, muscles swelled beneath his scarred flesh. As if to emphasize his point, he took a deep sniff of the air. His lips peeled back, revealing yellowing fangs that jutted from his gums and jockeyed for space with more normal, human teeth.

‘You say that every day,’ his companion said, his voice echoing oddly from within the black helm he wore. Unlike Hrolf, every inch of the man was shrouded in black iron. The armour was bulky and imposing, but shorn of ornamentation save for the yellowing skulls with strange marks carved into them that had been hung from his pauldrons and cuirass by small, wickedly curved hooks. The armour creaked as he leaned back in his saddle. ‘Sometimes I think your nose is clogged with the effluvium of the butcher’s block.’

‘Efflu-what?’ Hrolf growled, his eyes narrowing.

‘He’s mocking you, Hrolf,’ a soft, rasping voice said. ‘Aren’t you, Canto?’

‘That is what I’m here for, Ekaterina, as you never fail to remind me,’ Canto Unsworn said hollowly, craning his head to look at the woman who rode on the other side of Hrolf. She was a lithe creature, clad in the ragged ruin of a Kislevite boyar’s brass-buttoned coat, with the scalps of dead men dangling from her shoulders like hideous epaulettes. Heavy gauntlets hid her hands, one of those resting on the pommel of the sword sheathed on one hip. A sleeve of chainmail covered one arm, stretching to the gauntlet from a light pauldron that had been decorated with a leering face.

She had been beautiful once, Canto mused. She was beautiful still, in the same way that a tiger was beautiful. The icy poise of a well-bred woman of Kislev was still there, despite the hair bound in wormy dreadlocks and slathered with blood and fat, and the slit corners of her mouth that gaped to reveal deep-set fangs when she smiled her terrible, too-wide smile. Her eyes were carmine slits that bored into his own dark ones, challenging him, daring him to draw his own sword.

He looked away.

Ekaterina laughed, and the sound scratched his eardrums like razors. ‘You are still so cautious, Unsworn, and so afraid. You should be more like Hrolf.’

Canto glanced over at Hrolf, whose chest swelled as he preened, flashing his ragged teeth at the woman. Canto shook his head. ‘I prefer to be what I am, woman. I remain true to myself.’

‘A coward, beloved by no gods,’ she said.

He ignored her and turned in his saddle. Behind them, the army of Garmr Hrodvitnir, called the Gorewolf by some, spilled through the pass in a cloud of dust and noise. Horns torn from the hairy skulls of beasts wailed and drums made from human skin were beaten, pressing an erratic and discordant rhythm into the very stuff of the air.

Armoured Chaos knights mingled with half-naked Chaos marauders on the shaggy horses of the eastern steppes, and worse things came behind them. A sea of altars and shrines, their brass and iron wheels chewing the rocky ground as monstrous beasts strained against heavy chains, pulling the shrines in their wake. Far behind, men – Norscans and marauders and dark-armoured Chaos warriors – marched, loped or ran in whatever formations made sense to them, and ahead of them all, the Exalted Champions – lords and lady alike – whose combined will worked to hold the natural instincts of their followers in check.

Canto grimaced and looked at the creatures he’d fallen in with. Hrolf was a brute and a lunatic; every dawn shrank the gap between him and the blood-mad beast things that served as his vanguard. The Chaos marauders riding just behind their twitching, muttering leader were nervous of the Chaos hounds that lurched and loped around Hrolf’s horse. Even their horses were nervous of them, snorting and bucking every so often, trying to ward off the monstrous canines.

Past Hrolf’s warriors were those who followed Ekaterina. Like their mistress, they had been Kislevite, once. There was a rumour, a whisper of a ghost of a story, that those men were all that remained of those who had ridden in pursuit of the remnants of Asavar Kul’s once-mighty horde as it retreated north, a captive boyar’s daughter in their clutches. Some had been suitors, they said, brothers, cousins, lovers, and now… what?

Ekaterina caught him looking and opened her mouth, the slit edges of her smile gaping to reveal the inwards-curved maw of threshing fangs that hid behind her human lips and teeth. Canto turned away. His own followers, a bevy of horsemen riding powerful, foul-tempered steeds, trotted in his wake, at a respectful distance. Like him, they wore heavy armour, though theirs lacked the protections woven into his during its forging. He noted that several of his men were already showing signs of bending beneath the weight of the gods. Blood-daubed sigils and massive studded collars marked out those whom he might have to cull sooner rather than later.

There were other lieutenants of course, other chosen or Exalted warriors; dozens if not hundreds, whose individual retinues and ranks made up the army, though only eight were of any importance. And of those eight, only four were of importance to him, and of those four, only one was truly important.

He sought out the Gorewolf. He was easy enough to find. Garmr liked to be at the front, where Khorne could see him clearly. Canto fought to restrain a smirk. No one would be able to see it, not with the helm he wore, but lowering your guard, even in private – especially in private – was a sure-fire way to wind up with your skull added to one of the shrines. Or worse… Canto shifted uncomfortably in his saddle.

Garmr rode some way ahead of his lieutenants, his night-black horse a handbreadth larger than any other in the army. His armour was the colour of clotted blood and the stink of him was enough to choke even a follower of Grandfather Nurgle on a hot day; or so Canto thought, though only in private. Indeed, Hrolf and Ekaterina seemed to quite like the Gorewolf’s stench. Then, he’d once seen Hrolf burrow into the carcass of a daemon-beast and fall asleep; there was little sense in what the worshippers of the Blood God found pleasurable.

Garmr, like his mount, was large, bigger than any man, with arms and legs like bunches of thick rope crammed into baroque armour. He rode almost dejectedly, his great head bowed and his gauntlets limp on the pommel of his saddle. Hundreds of hooks dangled from the edges of the plates that made up his armour, swinging from braids made of hair, flesh and metal. His helm was a snarling brass daemon’s head, surmounted by a mane of matted animal hair. A number of chin-scalps – blood-matted beards taken from the mauled bodies of the dwarf scouts they’d run across a few days prior – hung from his saddle.

Canto had never seen Garmr’s face. For all he knew, that silently growling visage was the Gorewolf’s true face. He touched his own helm, featureless save for the ragged gash of his visor. He had personally herded over a hundred screaming men, women and children into the great black iron wagons that would take them to smouldering citadels in the Dark Lands in payment for his armour. He wondered what Garmr had traded for his. He wondered whether Garmr, like Canto himself, ever wondered if the deal had been worth the making.

Garmr twitched in his saddle. His horse came to a halt, savage hooves digging into the rock as it screamed in impatience and hunger. Garmr straightened, the brass muzzle of his helm rising, as if scenting the air. A long arm rose. The army ground to a halt like an avalanche. Somewhere, someone stumbled against someone else. A horse squealed and swords bit the light of the sun. Canto turned in his saddle, about to order someone to break it up, but the command died on his lips. He shrugged and turned back. It would sort itself out soon enough.

It always did.

‘Ahhhhh,’ Garmr groaned. And it was a groan. There was pleasure in that sound, and longing, and it carried through the ranks like a plague. His arm fell, and as one his lieutenants rode forwards to join him as the dust of the army’s passage enfolded them like a morning fog.

‘They have come to meet us,’ Garmr said. The dwarf army had occupied the other end of the section of pass the horde was moving through, and awaited them, arrayed in gleaming ranks of sturdy warriors. So disciplined were they that they resembled nothing so much as small, broad statues, paying no heed to weather, time or tide. Even so, there were not many of them.

Hrolf let loose a rippling snarl and his horse stirred uneasily. Canto did as well. When the brute had his blood up, he was dangerous, even to those who nominally shared the same standard.

‘How many?’ Ekaterina asked, leaning forwards.

Canto stood slightly in his stirrups. ‘That’s a small throng, even by the standards of the stunted ones. I wonder if we should be insulted…’ he said.

‘Quiet,’ Garmr said. His voice was like the warning growl of a predator. He urged his horse into motion. ‘Canto, Ekaterina, Hrolf… follow me. I would see their faces before I peel the meat from their skulls.’

‘What?’ Hrolf grunted.

‘We’re parleying,’ Canto said.

‘We do not parley,’ Ekaterina said.

‘Well, what would you call riding alone towards the enemy?’

‘Fun,’ Ekaterina purred.

Canto fell silent. She was right. It wasn’t a parley. A parley implied diplomacy. There was no diplomacy, no politesse in Garmr, simply purpose. All of them had purpose, except for him. He jerked his horse’s reins, urging the beast forwards, and it snapped its fangs in anger. He joined Garmr ahead of the others. ‘This is foolish, Lord Garmr.’

‘It is what Khorne wills,’ Garmr said. ‘We will take the skulls of all who stand in our path. Would you have me add you to the tally, Canto?’ Garmr’s voice was harsh.

Canto shook his head. ‘Of course not,’ he said quickly. ‘But why not simply smash them?’

Garmr’s only reply was to stroke the haft of the great axe that was slung across his saddle and bring his horse to a halt. The weapon was a crude, hateful thing. It was sharp in a way that seemed the apotheosis of the word. It could slice the wind in two, that axe, and Canto had seen it spill what passed for the brains of daemons in the madness of the far north.

He knew the answer to his question, despite Garmr’s silence. There were proprieties to be observed, even among the worshippers of the Blood God. Enemies must know each other’s faces, for the sacrifice to be a proper one. It lent crude meaning to otherwise meaningless butchery.

Canto shook his head again, and examined the arrayed ranks of the dwarfs. He had faced them once or twice, in other hordes, under other banners. They were fierce, and hard and stubborn in a way that men, even men like him, could not understand. They stood in disciplined ranks, shields held up and weapons low, like stones ready to weather the storm. He calculated less than six hundred, which was no small force, despite his earlier comments to the contrary. Disciplined, holding the high ground, they might be more of an obstacle than Garmr would have liked to admit.

Four squat figures trotted to meet them, their pace unhurried and deliberate. One was red-bearded and clad in dusty, ornate armour; he was followed by a younger, similarly attired dwarf, and a bare-chested, broadly muscled one with an impressive ridge of crimson hair jutting from his skull; the last was more heavily armoured than the first two, and had a hammer slung across his shoulders. The dwarfs were big on formality as well, Canto remembered.

‘Turn around,’ the red-bearded dwarf grated. ‘Go back where you came from. The Peak Pass is property of Ungrim Ironfist and the folk of Karak Kadrin and you will find no passage here, unless it is bought in blood. So swears Borri Ranulfsson.’

Ekaterina chuckled. Garmr raised a hand, silencing her. ‘We will grind you into the dust,’ he said. He said it as if he were talking of the weather. For Garmr, victory was inevitable and his due.

‘Then there’s no need to talk, is there now?’ the dwarf with the ridge of jutting crimson hair growled. Canto eyed him warily, smelling the rage that boiled off him.

‘No,’ Garmr said. ‘Your souls are already harvested, and your skulls spoken for.’

‘Borri–’ the fourth dwarf, clad in heavy armour, began. The thane made a sharp gesture.

‘Then why bother with a parley?’ he said. ‘We aren’t planning to move.’

‘Proprieties,’ Garmr grunted. He reached towards his saddle and plucked loose the bloody lot of beards. ‘These were yours. This is what awaits you.’ He tossed the beards at the thane’s feet, and Ranulfsson’s face became as still and as cold as ice. Garmr gestured. ‘Send me a champion. We must sanctify this ground before battle.’

‘What?’ Ranulfsson said through gritted teeth.

‘Maybe him,’ Ekaterina said, leering at the younger dwarf, whose features paled noticeably.

‘I’ll do it,’ the third snarled, stepping past the young warrior. ‘I am Ogun Olafsson and I will kill any daemon-lover you send against me, Northman.’

Garmr nodded. ‘You have until the fight ends. Retreat or stand, it makes no difference. We will add your skulls to the road regardless.’ Without waiting for a reply he turned his horse’s head and galloped back towards the waiting horde. Canto and the others followed. As they rejoined their men, Garmr looked at Canto and the others. ‘One of you will bring me his skull. Decide amongst yourselves.’

Canto shook his head and stepped back immediately. ‘Leave me out of this,’ he said.

‘Coward,’ Ekaterina said, but mildly. ‘The honour is mine, Hrolf Dogsson.’ She pointed her blade at Hrolf, who gave a bark of laughter.

He looked around, at his men, smirking. They growled and nodded and the Chaos hounds echoed them, displaying maws full of crooked fangs and tearing the ground with malformed talons. ‘I think not. No soft southerner is worthy to spill blood for Khorne, least of all a woman.’

‘Khorne cares not from whence the blood flows, nor whose hand sheds it,’ Ekaterina said. Then, more loudly, ‘I am Ekaterina Maria Anastasia Olgchek, Sword-Maiden of Praag. I danced before the balefires of the Beast-Queen and took the heads of the Chattering Legion. I bathed in the Rivers of Red Dust and spat in the eye of the Sleeping God. I have slain a hundred-hundred men and offered up their skulls to the Blood God and I will offer up a hundred-hundred more.’ She gestured with her blade, and said, ‘Including yours, Dogsson, if you cross me.’

Her followers set up a chant, calling out her name and shaking their weapons. Men among the army, marauders as well as Norscans, took up the chant as well and the rattling hiss of hundreds of weapons clashing against shields filled the air.

Hrolf laughed and spread his long arms. ‘Fierce words from a pampered child. I am Hrolf Wyrdulf, Prince of the Vargs. I am the Promised Son of the Witch-Moon and I slew the sea-worm Ship-Crusher after a battle of thirty days and thirty nights. I can lie on the ice and not freeze and I can drink an ocean of blood and not burst. I stalked Hrunting Iron-Axe from pole to pole and placed his smoking heart on Khorne’s board. I took the star-skulls of the Women-With-Skull-Faces and flung them into the Sea of Chaos!’ His hounds howled and his men roared, shaking their blades at their rivals.

Canto watched them, as they went back and forth. It was a ritual as old as yesterday, or perhaps longer. Every Exalted Champion had a litany attached to their name, mighty deeds and sagas that spoke to their prowess and skill. If there was one thing servants of the Blood God liked almost as much as spilling blood, it was talking about blood they had already spilled. Duelling with stories, however, was only a prelude to the more physical sort. In many ways, the battle had already been settled. Ekaterina’s supporters outnumbered Hrolf’s and no wonder – no one loved a berserker, even in an army of indiscriminate killers.

Frustrated, pushed beyond the bounds of propriety by Ekaterina’s mockery, Hrolf swept his blade out, slicing the air where his tormenter had been. Ekaterina laughed and whirled around him. Hrolf spun, but not quickly enough. Ekaterina’s boot caught him in the belly, sending him sprawling. The cheers redoubled in volume and she preened, drinking in the adulation.

Hrolf howled and sprang to his feet. Ekaterina’s sword flashed out and the pommel crunched against Hrolf’s skull, sending him to his knees. She wouldn’t kill him, Canto knew. Garmr still needed bloody berserkers. Too, this wasn’t a duel so much as a temper tantrum.

Hrolf collapsed, wheezing, clutching his skull. Ekaterina kicked him in the side for good measure and then extended her sword at the dwarf, Ogun, in a traditional fencing style that had been popular in the Empire decades ago. She wasn’t even breathing hard. She looked back at Garmr, who raised his hand as if in benediction, and she smiled, pleased.

The dwarf had watched the fight with studied indifference. At some point during the duel, the other three had walked back towards their lines, leaving the fourth to face Ekaterina, his axe in his hands. It wasn’t cowardice, Canto knew, but pragmatism. However long their champion could buy them was time well spent; every moment counted when preparing to receive a charge. The dwarfs would not retreat. They would dig in and stand and the toll they claimed for the horde’s inevitable passage would be terrible. ‘Well, stunted one?’ Ekaterina said, spreading her hands in a gesture of invitation. ‘What do you say?’

The dwarf said nothing. Ekaterina laughed and her men chuckled and grinned. Canto climbed into the saddle and walked his horse back a few feet. Hrolf scrambled up and did the same, glaring at Ekaterina as he went. She paid him no heed, her eyes unnaturally wide and her grin nearly splitting her face. She and the dwarf circled each other slowly. From the horde came the thump of drums and the chants of warriors. The dwarfs remained silent.

Then, with a cat-scream, Ekaterina moved. Her blade flickered, and Ogun only brought his axe up just in time. Metal rang on metal, and Canto could tell by the dwarf’s grunt that he was surprised by her strength.

His surprise didn’t last long. The axe looped out, and Ekaterina flipped backwards, the soles of her boots grazing the blade. She landed and sprang, stabbing. The sword caught the dwarf on one muscular arm, releasing a splash of red. She sprang back and tipped her head, holding the sword aloft. Blood drizzled into her mouth and she licked her lips as the dwarf roared and charged.

They moved back and forth, until the shadows cast by the sun draped the pass in curtains of darkness. Hrolf had already rejoined his howling comrades, bored. Canto couldn’t bring himself to leave, so instead he sat on his horse like some black iron statue, watching and waiting and hoping.

After an hour, the moment he’d been hoping to see came. The edge of the dwarf’s axe gashed her side and her laughter turned to a snarl of rage. She was spun by the force of the blow, and Ogun pressed his advantage, his weapon spinning in his hands. Canto leaned forwards. The axe rose, the flat catching Ekaterina in the jaw and knocking her sprawling. Ogun bellowed in triumph and the axe swung up in a headsman’s blow.

Ekaterina’s sword moved so quickly, Canto didn’t see it until the blade was exiting the meat of the dwarf’s torso. Ogun’s eyes bulged, but no sound escaped his lips. Ekaterina rolled to her feet as the axe fell, burying itself in the rock and hard soil. The dwarf leaned forwards, breathing heavily. Blood spilled from his belly, coating his legs and drenching the ground. He hunched over, one wide hand pressed to his belly, looking at nothing.

Ekaterina darted forwards, pinking him. The dwarf tried to hit her, but his movements had become slow and pained. More of his blood joined the first deluge, spattering the rocks as he weaved drunkenly after his tormentor. Finally, she darted behind him and her sword swept through his legs, severing the tendons. The dwarf toppled with a grunt and lay panting in the dust. And still, Ekaterina did not deliver the killing blow. She capered and howled, thrusting her arms up, eliciting roars from the tribesmen and warriors beneath her banner as she danced a gavotte.

Disgusted, Canto drew his sword and urged his horse forwards. Ekaterina’s shriek stopped him. ‘He’s mine, weakling,’ she snapped.

‘Take his head and stop playing with him,’ Canto snapped back.

Ekaterina was in front of him even as the words left his mouth, causing his horse to rear and bugle a challenge. Her blade flashed, slashing through his saddle, pitching him to the ground. He rolled to his feet, clawing for his sword.

‘Blood for the Blood God,’ Ekaterina hissed, and the words seemed to bounce from peak to peak, carrying to every ear in the pass. ‘Blood and souls for my Lord Khorne,’ she said, stalking Canto, forcing him to scramble back. She lunged, her carmine eyes burning with slaughter-lust. Canto grabbed her jacket and jerked her aside – even as he instinctively interposed his sword between her back and the dwarf’s axe as it bit at her spine.

The tableau held for a moment. Even Hrolf’s baying madmen fell quiet. Impossibly, the dwarf had gotten to his feet. Impossibly, he had covered the distance, leaving a red path to mark his trail. Impossibly, at that moment, the dwarf was the most terrifying thing in the pass, his axe creaking against Canto’s sword, his muscles bulging and his face set with a grim fatalism that defied even Ekaterina’s berserk enthusiasm.

And then she screamed and the horde joined her in that howl as she twisted out of Canto’s grip and tackled the dwarf, knocking him flat. Her mouth opened like a flower at the first spring rain, revealing clattering fang-spurs hidden behind her teeth, and she ducked, fastening her too-wide mouth on the dwarf’s face, cutting off his last roar. Canto backed away, sword still in his hand, unable to look away as Ekaterina’s spine tightened and rippled and her head shot back, gory locks flaring as she tore the meat from the dwarf’s skull in one go.

She turned to Canto, shreds of meat dangling from red-stained jaws. Her eyes were wide and staring and he had the sense that she was not looking at him so much as something behind him. And then there was no time to ponder it further.

‘He was worthy,’ she hissed, her jaw working as she swallowed what she had torn loose from the dwarf. ‘Unlike you,’ she added, and sprang into the saddle of her horse and screamed again. The horse shot forwards, galloping up the slope towards the dwarf lines.

As one, like some hungry beast that had slipped its chain, Garmr’s army surged in her wake, eating distance even as Ekaterina’s horse flew over the heads of the front rank of dwarfs and she crashed down among them, her sword flashing in the fading light as she howled out the Blood God’s name. Canto, caught between the dwarfs and his side, raced towards the former, cursing with every step.

It was going to be a slaughter.

Canto was not opposed to slaughter; indeed, he had instigated more than one. But since joining Garmr, he’d been glutted on it. Whatever fire it had once stoked in him was now only guttering ashes, and though he could lose himself in the rhythms of battle easily enough, it lacked the comfort it had once provided.

Crossbow bolts struck his armour as he charged up the slope in Ekaterina’s wake. He was faster than a man, even in his armour, but even so, the vanguard of the Chaos horde swept him up in its momentum and he crashed into the dwarfs a moment later, using his greater weight and size to bull them aside. He was stronger than any man or dwarf, and a backhand blow from his fist broke necks as surely as his sword cut through them. He lost sight of Ekaterina in the melee as the dwarfs sought to simultaneously pull him down and prepare themselves for the blitzkrieg thundering towards them. Determined not to be caught in the main crush when it came, Canto waded deeper into the dwarf lines, striking out with calculated brutality as, around him, the armoured warriors of Chaos hewed at their enemies with brutal abandon.

The dwarfs held their ground, and hammers and axes sang hollow songs as they struck sparks from his armour. Somewhere, a dirge began, and was taken up by every dwarf with the breath to do so. ‘This far,’ it seemed to say, ‘and no further.’

It was an admirable sentiment.

Canto swept his sword out in a wide arc, bisecting two warriors. An axe crunched into his side and he stumbled, almost knocked from his feet. Blindly, he lashed out. An oath was cut short as warmth spilled down his sword blade. The thunder of hooves was so loud that it shook the slopes, and small avalanches of rock and dust tumbled into the dwarf ranks. Canto, momentarily bereft of enemies, turned.

Hrolf was in the vanguard, of course. His horse was shrieking in reptilian eagerness as he howled wildly and his men howled with him, the dread sound rising above the first clash of weapons, the creak of crossbows firing and the war-horns of the dwarfs. Chaos hounds ran alongside their horses, screaming and snarling.

Canto’s blade rose and fell in the red storm that followed, monotonous and unceasing.

It was a slaughter.

And Khorne found it good.

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A Black Library Publication

‘The Contest’ first published in Black Library Advent Calender 2012.
‘Berthold’s Beard’ first published in Black Library Weekend Anthology 2012.
Road of Skulls and Lost Tales first published in 2013.
The Serpent Queen first published in 2014.
‘Marriage of Moment’ first published digitally in 2014.
First published in Great Britain in 2020.
This eBook edition published in 2020 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustration by Tomas Duchek.
Map by Nuala Kinrade.

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ISBN: 978-1-80026-417-5

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