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The Hardest Word – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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The Hardest Word

David Guymer

A mural of the two-headed orruk war-deity, Gorkamork, covers the rock in age-blanched chalk. Beneath, the granite is stained with black, yellow and faded pinks, the marks left by a succession of lords of destruction and Chaos. Gorkamork is the largest but not the most recent. Several layers of runes and glyphs adorn the mural, proclaiming the greatness of their lord and his god, but none of them claim this throne room now.

The visiting Lord-Veritant looks up at the painted wall, disapproving. But I like the wall. It is a tapestry of my enemies’ defeats, a thousand years old, and there is something about it that reminds me of my mortal home.

When Vikaeus is Lord-Castellant of the Seven Words, she can decorate as she pleases.

‘Do not haunt my doorway, Lord-Veritant,’ I say. ‘I will stand for no ceremony here.’

‘The doorway is not yours, you self-aggrandising fool. You guard it for Sigmar. Like a dog.’

With a scrape of her boot and a wind-ruffle of a cerulean cloak, she turns to me. The phrase ‘Ice Queen’ leaps unbidden into my mind.

I do not immediately disavow it.

Her armour is the white and blue of the Knights Merciless. Her mask is an expression of bitter spite, which I am relieved to see she carries underarm. The Knights Merciless are known for donning war-masks only when in hostile lands, or in the dispensation of Sigmar’s judgement. Her long black hair is drawn back from her forehead and worn in a tail. Her skin is like marble, though no artisan of Azyr ever worked on a material so hard.

I beckon impatiently.

Her footsteps clank on bare stone as she walks down the aisle towards my throne. A pair of gryph-hounds with beaks clad in blessed sigmarite, their neck scales picked out with runes of abjuration, snarl at her heels. My own companion, Crow, uncurls from the beastman pelts piled at my feet and barks a warning that echoes between the crumbling arches and columns.

It appears that even our hounds share a mutual dislike.

‘What brings a Lord-Veritant to the House of the Seven Words? Chaos retreats on every front, for Hamilcar Bear-Eater is as decisive as he is vigilant.’

She halts ten strides away and plants the staff bearing her Lantern of Abjuration, the symbol of her office, into the ground with a resounding clang.

‘I have crossed the Chamonic Gate and been admitted to the crucible pools of Molybdenos. I have spoken with the Prophet Argent, and conferred with the oracles of the Sigmarabulum. I have seen a skaven as old as the world, his paws in the secrets of the gods. His tail is a serpent of probing shadows and in my visions I see it winding close about Sigmar’s neck.’

I scratch my bearded chin. It is oft remarked that Sigmar and I share a likeness, and it is true, the resemblance is uncanny.

‘So why come here?’

‘I see a rising vermintide. It begins here. And I have seen you, Hamilcar. You appear in my visions most frequently of late.’ I smile importunately, but she douses it with a frown like ice water. ‘I see you caged in a storm of unholy lightning, screaming as you are broken, piece by piece.’

I lean back, the totems and trophies that bedeck my purple war-plate clinking as I shift position. ‘You are certain it is me? You are certain it is my fortress?’

‘Even if my visions were less clear, then yes. Now I am here, I am sure. I can feel the taint of the rat-men under my skin, Lord-Castellant.’

I glance up to the Lantern of Abjuration, a cage of comet ice that encircles the top of her staff.

‘They are here already,’ she continues. ‘Though I know not where, nor how they mean to enter a bastion of Sigmar.’

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A Black Library Publication

Published in Great Britain in 2017 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Original lantern illustration by John Michelbach.
Original skaven illustration by Jon Cave.

The Hardest Word © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2017. The Hardest Word, 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: 978-1-78572-812-9

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