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Krakenbane’s Curse – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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Krakenbane’s Curse

Jonathan Green

Lights rippled in the deep, far below the barnacle-clad bow of the wolfship.

‘Shutter the lanterns!’ commanded Vainlor Krakenbane, and his crew of corsairs hurried to obey.

Darkness fell over the deck of the vessel, along with a preternatural silence, as every aelf on board the Burning Blade held their breath. The night sky cooled to a penumbral purple in the absence of the illumination provided by the deck-lamps, while to the south the horizon blazed orange with the fading remnants of sunset.

Kirineth Krakenbane froze, legs braced, fearing that if she moved at all she might break the spell of silence that had fallen over the ship. The blood quickened in her veins as the thrill of the hunt coursed through her. An involuntary smile spread across her face. This was what it felt like to be a privateer of the Scourge.

The creak of ropes under stress seemed horribly loud in the tense stillness that held sway above the waves. She only dared move her eyes, in case anything more might startle their prey and send it squirming back to the Stygian depths.

Her father hung from the rigging, leaning out over the water, watching. Vainlor Krakenbane’s face was a dagger of ice, his features as sharp as the prow of the Burning Blade. With his hair tied back, the livid purple scar that ran from his temple to the corner of his mouth was clearly visible. It lent his countenance a menacing quality, like the threat of storm clouds on the horizon.

Many of the crew crowded the gunwales of the ship, their eyes following their captain’s gaze down into the abyss beneath the vessel. Kirineth had never seen the Searing Sea look so black. But within that inky darkness, she perceived tendrils of bioluminescence reaching for the surface.

Night was when the biggest beasts rose from the seabed to feed, and so the hours twixt dusk and dawn were the perfect time to hunt monsters. A crew that could conquer such a leviathan could then turn it on their enemies in battle, relishing the sight of their foes fleeing in terror only to be snapped up in one of the abyssal horror’s multitudinous mouths.

Not half a cable’s length off the port bow, two of the other ships under Vainlor Krakenbane’s command – the Sea Dagger and the Firedrake – waited, barely moving upon the becalmed waters, their sails slack but their crews ready to hoist them at a moment’s notice should their patient wait end in a chase.

But Kirineth’s attention was wholly fixed on the undulating pearls of light. Probing tentacles curled and uncurled in their exploration of the underwater realm, as the creature rose from the suffocating cold of the ocean depths to the warmer waters above.

The closer she looked, the better her vision adjusted to the gloom. She saw more spots of luminescence, like sunken stars, outlining the flanks of the great beast. They made it look as if the beast’s scaly hide was studded with a thousand nodules of aqthracite.

The streams of light suddenly began to move at speed – coming ever closer, becoming ever brighter – as the creature rushed towards the ship.

‘Ready arms! Prepare for boarding!’ Kirineth’s father shouted, shattering the silence.

With a whetstone ring of steel, the corsairs unsheathed their weapons, cutlass blades gleaming darkly.

A split second later, the sea between the aelven ships exploded in a geyser of white water. Briny rain cascaded onto the Burning Blade, running in rivulets across the deck.

A chorus of startled cries rolled like a wave across the ship as it yawed sharply to port. In the otherworldly glow given off by the corsair’s quarry, Kirineth could see that the monster had managed to get one great clawed limb over the gunwale and was using it to pull itself out of the water.

Kirineth’s feet threatened to slip from under her as the deck tilted sharply down towards the prow, and she found herself facing the frothing tumult of the ocean. Lunging backwards, she flung her arms around the mast and hung on, as tight as a limpet.

‘Give me light!’ bellowed Vainlor.

Those aelves within reach of the deck-lanterns unshuttered them so that the fiery glow of their fat-fed flames might cast their radiance over the ship once more.

The abyssal horror screamed, recoiling before the sudden illumination, the intensity of the lamps burning the fleshy black spheres of its myriad eyes. Five monstrous necks tied themselves in knots as they squirmed in agony, and great clawed forelimbs raked the hull of the Burning Blade.

The creature’s armoured hide was the green of the twilight undersea world, its leathery underbelly the grey sand of the sea bottom, and the fleshy interior of its malformed mouths a striking coral pink.

A shiver of fear coursed down Kirineth’s spine, like a bolt of lightning loosed from the heart of a storm, but she felt more alive than she ever had before.

She could hear cries echoing over the water from the Sea Dagger and the Firedrake as someone called for the sails to be raised and the harpoons readied, but she could not tear her eyes away from the monster now exposed to the light of the deck-lamps. She had never seen so big a beast.

‘Ready grappling hooks!’ shouted her father. His voice, as sharp as a cutlass, cut through the horrible shrieks of the creature. ‘And launch!’

As one, a dozen corsairs let fly their whirling grapnels. The forged-iron claws described great arcs through the air before finding purchase between the ridges of bony scales and spear-like protrusions that covered the monster’s body. Tough as eel-flesh, the snaking columns of muscle, which might have been fang-mouthed throats or sinuous tentacles crowned with snapping claws, writhed as the aelves pulled the trailing ropes taut. More and more of the privateers grabbed hold as they fought to overcome the sheer physical power of the sea-borne nightmare.

Truly it was a horror from another world, an abyssal place as alien as the name Kirineth’s ancestors had bestowed upon the monster’s kind: kharibdyss.

The beast fought back, twisting the largest of its hideous heads away from its attackers, gills opening and closing spasmodically, while its distended lower jaw coiled and uncoiled as if governed by a sentience all its own. As the mandible mouthparts of its pharynx scissored together, it wound its neck into impossible hagfish knots and caught one of the ropes between them, slicing through the twisted hemp fibres as easily as if they had been made from fronds of kelp.

Giving voice to another unutterable cry – one that Kirineth doubted had ever been heard anywhere other than at the bottom of the Searing Sea – the creature jerked its great neck, lashing it as if it were a giant whip. Half a dozen aelves, still clinging to the chafing ropes attached to the hooks, gave startled yells as they were yanked into the air and flung into the churning waves.

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A Black Library Publication

This eBook edition published in 2023 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Represented by: Games Workshop Limited – Irish branch, Unit 3, Lower Liffey Street, Dublin 1, D01 K199, Ireland.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustrations: Idoneth creatures by Nuala Kinrade, Black Ark Ship by Pedro Núñez.

Krakenbane’s Curse © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2023. Krakenbane’s Curse, GW, Games Workshop, Black Library, Warhammer, Warhammer Age of Sigmar, Stormcast Eternals, and all associated logos, illustrations, images, names, creatures, races, vehicles, locations, weapons, characters, and the distinctive likenesses thereof, are either ® or TM, and/or © Games Workshop Limited, variably registered around the world.
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ISBN: 978-1-80407-532-6

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