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Memories of Blood and Sand – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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Memories of Blood and Sand

Gary Kloster

Heat filled the crooked streets of the dusty, almost empty desert settlement like liquid lead, and Rostus limped through the thick, scorching air, leaning heavy on his crutch.

‘Wait and heal.’ He tried to bark out a laugh, but his throat was too dry and the sound that emerged resembled a death rattle. He shook his head, and fat beads of sweat fell from his hair onto his face. Swiping them away, Rostus stared up at the narrow strip of empty sky between the battered, sand-worn buildings. ‘I’ve waited, Lord Sigmar. Now may I heal, and return to your service?’

The only answer to that prayer was heat, and the jolt of pain that went through him with every shuffling step. So Rostus kept moving, limping down the empty, heat-shimmered street as if his injuries were something he could outpace, until he heard the scream.

The shrill sound cut through the air, drowning out the low, hissing roar of the sandstorm that swirled endlessly beyond the settlement’s broken walls. Rostus shoved aside his pain and swung his crutch as fast as he could, limping down a narrow alley that ran between an empty, half-fallen tenement and a small, battered inn. At its end he found a shabby square, home of the inn’s privies and small stable. In the middle of that stinking space was a young woman, hopping back and forth on one leg as a ragged gang of children, feral as desert cats, threw a crutch back and forth, keeping it just out of her reach.

‘C’mon, Belil!’ a boy shouted as the crutch sailed over the woman’s head. He was tall, older, almost a man, and when he caught the crutch he held it up over his head, out of the woman’s reach. She stood before him, balanced on her single leg and screamed again, a cry of impotent rage and frustration. The tall boy laughed.

‘What is this?’ Rostus asked, his deep voice echoing off the broken stone walls. The shifting pack of filthy children went silent, staring at him with wide eyes. Then they were gone, slipping away through cracks in the walls of the crumbling tenement, vanishing like mirages.

All except the tall boy, caught in the centre of the square, still holding up the crutch.

‘It’s just… just a game,’ he stammered, staring up at Rostus. The boy was big, but Rostus was huge, even for a Stormcast Eternal, and he towered over the boy, his massive frame casting a dark shadow. ‘It’s just…’

The boy was clearly having trouble speaking, and Rostus was content to loom over him and wait until he put together his halting words.

‘Just some fun.’

‘Some fun,’ Rostus said. He plucked the woman’s stolen crutch from the bully’s hands and held his own out in front of him. ‘Then would you play with me?’

The boy went pale, staring at the massive crutch, and shook his head. Rostus looked at him silently, then shifted his crutch so that its tip was resting against the boy’s chest.

‘Cruelty is the toy of daemons,’ he said, his voice low thunder. ‘If I catch you at it again…’ Rostus shoved his crutch forward, using just a little of his strength, but it was enough to send the boy tumbling down to the filthy cobblestones before one of the privies. ‘I’ll treat you like I treat one of them. Understand?’

The boy answered with a desperate nod and then fled, disappearing into the empty tenement. Rostus watched him go, then held out the young woman’s crutch. She snagged it from him and half hopped, half stepped away. She was agile even with only one leg, and she watched him, warily. The right side of her face was red, blotchy with tears, but the left was a mass of scars, the eye there a milky-white ruin. Her left arm, the one she tucked her crutch beneath, was also covered in scars, and Rostus caught a glimpse of more scarred skin on the stump of her left leg when her ragged skirt shifted as she moved. The scars were old, and they had the smooth, shiny look that came from being badly burned.

‘Small minds play small games.’ Rostus held out his hand. ‘Rostus Oxenhammer. But you may call me Rost.’

She stared for a long time at his massive hand, then reached out and brushed it with her fingertips. ‘Belil,’ she whispered. ‘You… You’re one of Sigmar’s chosen. One of those ones that came through the storm. A Stormcast Eternal.’

‘True,’ Rostus said, and leaned on his crutch. ‘A broken one, right now.’

‘What happened?’ Belil asked, her eyes wide, as if she couldn’t imagine what force might be enough to hurt him.

Rostus considered this for a long moment. ‘A rock hit me,’ he said finally. ‘A large one.’

‘This is the thief.’

The aelven mage Lorai floated in the air in the middle of the hall, beside a globe of water holding an image of a young man’s face. The man had dark hair, dark eyes and dark skin above a bright robe. He was trying hard to look stern, but Rostus thought his eyes looked lost.

‘Battlemages of the Collegiate Arcane usually have better titles,’ Shakana said. The marksman sat against the farthest wall, almost lost in the shadows, but of course her keen eyes could pick out details from the drifting image that identified the man’s rank.

‘Not when you steal an artefact from your masters.’ Hendrick sat up front near the mage, but his eyes were on the last member of their group, who stood frowning up at the globe of water.

‘The Sandken.’ Neave said the name crisply, and she looked at Lorai. The aelf stayed still, silent. She wasn’t really one of them, not a Blacktalon exactly, and yet she was too. Which meant that Neave, the frowning woman, wasn’t Lorai’s leader. But there was something between them and after a long moment the mage moved her hand, thin fingers performing an intricate dance. A haze of water droplets condensed out of the air, pulled in on themselves and formed another globe of water. In its centre the image of the artefact took shape. It looked unassuming, a smooth globe carved out of sandstone, its surface striped with a hundred shades of brown. But those stripes shifted and swirled. What at first glance seemed like solid stone was actually moving sand, somehow holding itself together in a smooth sphere even as it shifted and flowed.

‘The Sandken is tied to Aqshy. It gives its wielder great power over sand and stone and whatever blood and pain has been spilled upon them.’ She pointed at the first image. ‘And this man, Tareth Vir, has taken it.’

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A Black Library Publication

First published in Great Britain in 2022.
This eBook edition published in 2022 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 illustration by Phil Moss.

Memories of Blood and Sand © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2022. Memories of Blood and Sand, 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: 978-1-80407-241-7

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