01 - Empire in Chaos (10 page)

She parried the blow with an overhead defence, as her father had taught her,
and gave a swift riposte, smoothly he parried the blow with a deft flick of his
wrist, and he nodded at her, seeing that she had at least some skill. She felt a
sudden need to impress the silent elf, and she whipped another attack towards
him, rowing more weight and speed behind it.

He stepped swiftly to the side and angled her blade away from him. She
stumbled, off balance, and she felt a flush creep over her face. He had been so
balanced and swift. Frustrated and embarrassed she attacked again, her sword
cutting left and right.

Eldanair’s blade moved like liquid silver, darting back and forth,
effortlessly deflecting her increasingly powerful blows, and the sound of steel
on steel rang out sharply as each strike was turned away. He was not launching
any attacks of his own, and Annaliese felt her frustration grow. She pulled her
arm back to launch a yet fiercer attack, but Eldanair stepped away from her,
raising his hand, a slight smile curling the corner of his lips.

Feeling foolish, she dropped her arm, breathing heavily. Eldanair walked to
stand by her side and raised his sword into a defensive ready position before
him. He nodded to Annaliese. When she didn’t understand his meaning, he motioned
more emphatically for her to raise her own weapon into the same position.

He ran through a series of strikes, correcting her technique and posture as
she tried to emulate his crisp, sharp movements. He massaged her shoulders for a
second, motioning to her to relax. She felt awkward, and the blush returned to
her face.

Eldanair imitated her, swinging his sword in a wild arc, putting too much
power into the blow and stumbling theatrically off balance. Annaliese’s mouth
opened in mock indignation.

“I don’t look like that,” she said, half insulted and half laughing. Eldanair
nodded at her.

“Right, well show me how to move like you, all balanced and everything.” She
knew he could not understand, but it felt strange to her to remain in silence.

They practised for over an hour until Annaliese’s arm felt like a leaden
weight. Still, she had begun to feel more comfortable with the sword, that her
movements were a little more controlled and sharp. She was now acutely aware
that it would take her many years of practice to be classed as a decent
swordswoman. She had been humbled, for she had regarded herself as at least
competent with the blade, but that fact was now doubtful, she realised. She blew
a strand of hair away from her face, and smiled broadly at Eldanair.

“Thank you,” she said, as she sheathed her blade. She collapsed onto the
ground in mock exhaustion.

When she opened her eyes she saw Eldanair standing looking into the distance,
his posture alert and his expression intense.

“What is it?” she said, sitting up. Eldanair held up a hand for silence and
cocked his head to the side, listening intently. Annaliese could hear nothing
but the gentle babbling of the spring. The light had dimmed further, so that it
resembled the shadowy half-light after sunset.

Tense and cold, his eyes hard, Eldanair urged Annaliese to her feet swiftly,
speaking sharply, and he led her quickly to the east, climbing the gentle rise
away from the spring.

A distant horn sounded, and Eldanair broke into a looping run, nocking an
arrow smoothly to his bowstring.

Annaliese felt a wave of fear wash over her at the horrible sound. It was the
sound of victorious hunters closing on their prey.

But what, or who, was the prey?

They travelled swiftly across the countryside, Annaliese struggling to keep
pace with the elf. Dimly, she heard shouts and a shrill scream, accompanied by
what sounded like the snarls and roars of wolves, or bears, though there was
also the bleating not unlike that of goats, though deeper and more powerful. It
made her feel instantly uneasy, and a shiver ran down her spine. There was the
clash of weapons, and the hunting horn blared again; two long, hard notes.

As she struggled to the top of a steep rise, Eldanair pushed her roughly to
the ground. She opened her mouth to voice her protest at his rough treatment,
but held her tongue as he dropped to one knee and raised his bow. In one smooth
action he pulled the bowstring taut and fired; the arrow hissed through the air
away from him. In a flash he had another arrow drawn and nocked, and he fired it
seemingly without pause to aim.

She followed the path of the arrows with difficulty through the dim light,
and saw a powerfully muscled figure clad in furs stagger as an arrow slammed
into its lower back.

It fell to its knees but struggled back to its feet, pulling the arrow free.
Another arrow thudded into its head, and it fell motionless to the snowy ground.

It had been running with astonishing speed toward a train of wagons, and
Annaliese saw that there were women and children crowded within them—more
people fleeing the plague, most probably.

Forming a desperate ring around the wagons were a score of uniformed men,
dressed in the black and yellow of Averland state troops. She heard a barked
command, and four of the men fired their long arquebus handguns, the cracking
sound of their fire echoing across the sky. Flame flashed from the barrels of
the unwieldy weapons, and smoke obscured them from view.

These soldiers were accompanied by a rag-tag bunch of men hefting a motley
array of axes, pitchforks and spears—the husbands, fathers and sons of the
womenfolk within the wagons.

Hurtling through the snow from either side of the wagons came their
attackers, big men dressed in furs—they seemed to Annaliese to be wearing
bestial faced, horned masks as well, and she was momentarily stunned by their
bizarre appearance. They streamed towards the wagons and a fusillade from a
second group of handgunners boomed, dropping several of them, dark blood misting
out behind them.

Eldanair dropped another of them with an arrow through the base of his skull,
and Annaliese heard three sharp blasts from a hunting horn. At the sound,
Eldanair instantly rose, dragging Annaliese to her feet, and began pulling her
by the arm down the hill, cutting left away from the wagons. She lost sight of
them as she was half-dragged around a raised hillock covered in twisted thorn
bushes and rocks.

Annaliese shook free of his grip.

“We have to help them!” she shouted, pointing towards the wagons. Eldanair
said something sharp in his own tongue, and made to grab her wrist once again,
but she stepped away from him, her face defiant.

“No!” she shouted. “We are going to help them!”

A stream of words spat from Eldanair’s lips, and he made an encircling motion
that she did not understand.

“These are my people,” said Annaliese. “I have to help them.” She turned away
from Eldanair, and began moving around the hillock back towards the wagons.

A monstrous bestial roar, something akin to that of a bear but filled with
malice, echoed loudly down into the dip, and Annaliese faltered, looking around
her fearfully. Scanning the area with wide eyes, she saw a pair of the fur-clad
figures standing on the ridge they had just left, their horned heads scanning
the area. One of them snarled as it spotted her, and the pair of them began
leaping down the incline towards her, kicking powdery snow out around them.

They were not wearing furs, she realised, and they were not human. The one in
the lead was roughly the same size of a man, but its face was a bestial mockery
of humanity. A pair of short horns jutted from its forehead, and small, feral
eyes fixed hungrily on her. It whooped in excitement, exposing an array of
stubby fangs, and began closing the distance to her with terrifying swiftness.
Its two legs were back-jointed like those of a goat and covered in shaggy, dark
fur.

And yet, it was not some mindless, mutated beast of the forest, that much was
clear. Its baleful eyes blazed with animal cunning, and there was the hint of a
feral intelligence working there, and it wore a semblance of clothing. A
loincloth of rough leather was secured by strips of sinew tied around its waist,
and tokens and bones hung from this crude belt. Bracers of beaten copper
protected its forearms, and in its clawed hands it clasped a pair of weapons—a
savagely barbed spear decorated with plaited hair soaked in blood, and rusted
cleaver.

The second of the creatures was much more heavily built, and thick matted fur
hung down over the rippling muscles of its torso. It stood easily a head taller
than six feet in height, and its brutish face was broad and hateful, a pair of
thick horns covered in beaten copper curling from the sides of its head. Around
the thick, corded muscles of its neck hung strings of bones and teeth. An
obscene symbol had been smeared in blood upon its massive chest, and it carried
a massive axe in its hands. Its skin, the colour of wet earth, was pierced with
studs and rings of metal, and it bellowed deafeningly as it charged towards her,
hefting its axe over its heavy head.

The first creature drew back its arm and hurled its heavy spear.

Eldanair slammed into Annaliese from behind, knocking her to the ground, and
the deadly missile streaked over her head to imbed itself into the snow. He was
up instantly, loosing an arrow from his bow.

Annaliese scrambled to her feet, her shaking hands fumbling for her sword.
The first creature fell as if pole-axed as Eldanair’s arrow thudded into its
neck, but the second was barely slowed as another arrow embedded itself deep
into the slab-like muscle of its chest.

Then it was on them, towering over Eldanair, swinging its axe down in a
powerful blow that would have split him in two had it connected. He ducked
beneath the wild swing and leapt past the creature, rolling neatly and coming up
to one knee, an arrow nocked. He fired, and such was the power of bow at close
range that the arrow sank almost to its feathered flight into the creature’s
back, and it roared as it was knocked forward a pace by the force.

Still it did not fall, and it swung towards him, spittle dripping in thick
ropes from its maw.

With a scream, Annaliese surged forwards and the blade of her elven
shortsword pierced the creature’s side. With one hand upon the pommel she drove
the blade in with all her strength and weight, pushing it deep into its body.
Blood, dark and hot, poured from the wound and the creature roared in pain and
fury. It spun around and the haft of its giant axe caught Annaliese a glancing
blow to the side of the head, sending her reeling backwards into the snow. It
stepped over her, axe raised for the killing blow. The beast shuddered as an
arrow punched through the back of its skull, piercing its brain. It toppled into
the snow beside Annaliese, blood leaking from its wounds.

Annaliese rose shakily to her knees, wincing as she touched a hand gingerly
to her temple. She felt a wave of nausea overcome her, and she coughed and
retched the contents of her stomach onto the pristine white snow. The stink of
the creature was overpowering.

Three sharp blasts were blown on a hunting horn, and Eldanair loosed several
more arrows, though Annaliese, her head pounding, could not focus on what he was
firing at. She gathered a handful of snow and held it against her head; the cold
numbed the pain.

Wiping her mouth, she stared bleary-eyed at the corpses of the two creatures.
Shuddering, she looked away. Eldanair was kneeling at her side, concern on his
face, and he gently pulled her hand away from the rising lump on her head,
inspecting the wound carefully. Apparently satisfied, he nodded his head, and
went to the bodies of the dead beastmen, wrenching his arrows free from their
dead flesh and studying their tips, testing them on his thumb. He pulled free
Annaliese’s sword, and wiped the gore from it with a handful of snow. Spinning
it around in his hand, he presented it hilt first to the fallen woman.

When she was able to stand, her legs shaking, Annaliese saw that the battle
was over. Milling people surrounded the wagons, and she heard the wailing of
women and the cries of children. She motioned to Eldanair that she was going
towards the wagons, and he nodded, pulling the hood of his cloak over his head
to hide his elven features. He moved out across the open ground to retrieve his
other arrows.

As she drew close, she saw women crying over the bodies of dead men:
husbands, brothers or fathers. Others were binding the wounds of those lucky
enough to have survived, and a team of soldiers was struggling to get the lead
wagon moving, as it was stuck in a snowdrift.

She saw a flicker of movement, and cried out when she saw a small boy, no
more than five years old, crawling through the snow towards a corpse on the
ground. Fresh blood was trailing behind the boy.

No one was moving towards the child, and Annaliese ran to him. The man he was
crawling towards had the look of a farmer about him, and his head had been all
but severed from his body by a vicious blow to the back of his neck. Blood
soaked the snow around him.

Kneeling, Annaliese took the boy in her arms, carefully turning him over. He
cried out, straining to see the corpse, and Annaliese felt tears spring to her
eyes as she saw the blood soaking the child’s tunic and the expression on the
child’s face as it contorted in pain. She clasped him to her, tears rolling down
her cheeks, soothing him with gentle words.

“Da?” gasped the boy, his wide blue eyes fearful.

“Shh,” soothed Annaliese, wiping her hand over his brow, brushing back his
sandy hair.

“Where is Da?” the boy said again, blood frothing on his lips.

“At peace,” said Annaliese softly. The boy cried out in pain, and Annaliese’s
heart wrenched. “Be brave, little warrior,” she said.

She closed her eyes and prayed then, silently mouthing words to Sigmar. Angry
and bitter, she raged against the cruelty of the world, and beseeched the
warrior-god for mercy, tears running down her face.