Contents

Cover

Reclaimed Honour – Extract

A Black Library Publication

eBook license

RECLAIMED HONOUR

Jacob Peppers

The charnel odour of blood and rotting meat hung heavy in the air, as thick as if he stood in one of Hammerhal’s abattoirs. Flies buzzed a celebratory chorus as they revelled in their grisly feast.

Don’t fret, Gideon. The darkest days give way to the brightest mornings.

He winced, rubbing at his leather jerkin where it covered the puckered scar on his chest. It was a nice sentiment. Sigmund had been full of those. But the scar served as a reminder that Ghyran cared little for nice sentiments.

He turned to his left, where his friend – his brother – had always stood. He was not there now, of course. Sigmund was rotting in his grave in Hammerhal along with the rest of their old company, all save Gideon himself. He was the only survivor. The last.

He gave his head a shake, trying to banish the grim memory. It didn’t go far – it never did. He frowned, regarding the man in front of him once more.

‘Tough day?’ he asked.

The man didn’t answer.

The corpse lying on the grass before him might not have spoken, but he still told Gideon plenty.

And none of it good.

Gideon scanned the woods around him, but whoever or whatever was responsible for the dead man was nowhere to be seen.

Satisfied that he was alone, Gideon knelt. Already, vines had begun to form around the body – Ghyran was anxious to use the dead man as fuel in its never-ending cycle of life. Still, the corpse was not yet as covered as he might have expected. The man had not lain there for long.

Gideon raised his gaze from the body, glancing this time not at the woods around him but at his dog, Runt. Like all Wildercorps hunters, Gideon had trained the trailhound from a pup and knew that Runt’s keen senses would detect danger far before his own. Runt, though, was far more concerned with chewing on the orruk thigh bone he had found half an hour ago than he was with the corpse in the clearing. Not that there was much left to chew. The trailhound was as unforgiving to such spoils as he was the living creatures he tore them from.

Gideon regarded the body once more. The man wore rough homespun clothes, the sort common among the settlements east of Hammerhal Ghyra. For some reason or another someone or something had taken it in mind to poke a few extra holes in him. Nothing so unusual about that. Out here in the wilds, far away from the Twin-Tailed City, there were a thousand things eager to kill a man, if given the chance. These wounds, however, didn’t appear to be the work of some Chaos-worshipping tribesman. Nor were they the ragged rips or tears Gideon would have expected if the man had run afoul of one of Ghyran’s many beasts. They were precise, circular wounds that appeared in patterns of three. A deep puncture at the centre with a shallower one flanking it on either side.

Gideon rose, surveying the ground near the corpse. A broken twig and a drop of blood further on were enough to tell him that the dead man had come from the north-east, likely one of the coastal villages.

He turned his gaze to the sky, darkening as evening came. ‘Come on, Runt. Time to go.’

As he set off, Gideon drew the small machete he kept at his waist. He wouldn’t use it to clear the brush and vines of the forest unless he absolutely had to, for like anyone who’d spent time in Ghyran’s wilder places, Gideon knew that here, the flora held grudges. Still, it felt good to have a blade in his hand. The sabre belted at his waist would have been better for combat, but its length meant that it would get snagged in the choking undergrowth in moments, should he swing it with any feeling.

An hour later, he emerged from the woods into a clearing, catching sight of Fort Satler in the distance. Not that anyone called it that. When the fort had been constructed twenty years ago, a dead gargant corpse had been found nearby. Instead of risking the forest’s ire by clearcutting any more than they had to, the builders had improvised, using the bones of that great fallen beast to form its ten-foot-high walls. And so the epithet ‘Fort Bones’ had been born.

It was a place where only the realm’s most foolish or unlucky would find themselves. Here, the fort’s inhabitants contended not just with local beasts and plants, but also the thick, humid Verdian heat. Not to mention the mosquitoes and flies that all seemed to compete in the application of their particular brand of misery.

And then there was the smell.

A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

This eBook edition published in 2025 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.

Reclaimed Honour © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2025. Reclaimed Honour, 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.
All Rights Reserved.

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-1-83609-248-3

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

eBook license

This license is made between:

Games Workshop Limited t/a Black Library, Willow Road, Lenton, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, United Kingdom (“Black Library”); and

the purchaser of a Black Library e-book product (“You/you/Your/your”)

(jointly, “the parties”)

These are the terms and conditions that apply when you purchase a Black Library e-book (“e-book”). The parties agree that in consideration of the fee paid by you, Black Library grants you a license to use the e-book on the following terms:

* 1. Black Library grants to you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, royalty-free license to use the e-book in the following ways:

o 1.1 to store the e-book on any number of electronic devices and/or storage media (including, by way of example only, personal computers, e-book readers, mobile phones, portable hard drives, USB flash drives, CDs or DVDs) which are personally owned by you;

o 1.2 to access the e-book using an appropriate electronic device and/or through any appropriate storage media.

* 2. For the avoidance of doubt, you are ONLY licensed to use the e-book as described in paragraph 1 above. You may NOT use or store the e-book in any other way. If you do, Black Library shall be entitled to terminate this license.

* 3. Further to the general restriction at paragraph 2, Black Library shall be entitled to terminate this license in the event that you use or store the e-book (or any part of it) in any way not expressly licensed. This includes (but is by no means limited to) the following circumstances:

o 3.1 you provide the e-book to any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.2 you make the e-book available on bit-torrent sites, or are otherwise complicit in ‘seeding’ or sharing the e-book with any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.3 you print and distribute hard copies of the e-book to any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.4 you attempt to reverse engineer, bypass, alter, amend, remove or otherwise make any change to any copy protection technology which may be applied to the e-book.

* 4. By purchasing an e-book, you agree for the purposes of the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 that Black Library may commence the service (of provision of the e-book to you) prior to your ordinary cancellation period coming to an end, and that by purchasing an e-book, your cancellation rights shall end immediately upon receipt of the e-book.

* 5. You acknowledge that all copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights in the e-book are, shall remain, the sole property of Black Library.

* 6. On termination of this license, howsoever effected, you shall immediately and permanently delete all copies of the e-book from your computers and storage media, and shall destroy all hard copies of the e-book which you have derived from the e-book.

* 7. Black Library shall be entitled to amend these terms and conditions from time to time by written notice to you.

* 8. These terms and conditions shall be governed by English law, and shall be subject only to the jurisdiction of the Courts in England and Wales.

* 9. If any part of this license is illegal, or becomes illegal as a result of any change in the law, then that part shall be deleted, and replaced with wording that is as close to the original meaning as possible without being illegal.

* 10. Any failure by Black Library to exercise its rights under this license for whatever reason shall not be in any way deemed to be a waiver of its rights, and in particular, Black Library reserves the right at all times to terminate this license in the event that you breach clause 2 or clause 3.