The Serpent Queen

by Josh Reynolds

Fiducci had taught her that the souls of those who dabbled in the dark arts were stronger than those of ordinary folk. They were like strange moths, trapped in a chrysalis shell of meat and bone, awaiting the cessation of breath to be free. Some were not strong enough to survive the transformation, while others became mad souls, and dangerous to everything around them, living or dead. She clutched the amulet so tightly that it bit into her palm. She wondered what she would become. Whatever it was, it would be glorious – a thing of death, and beauty, if and when it happened.

  From somewhere outside, a vampire screamed, interrupting her reverie. It was not a cry of pain, but one of warning. Andraste whipped around, her lips skinning back from her fangs. She gestured to the others. ‘See what’s going on.’

  She looked at Octavia as the others raced from the chamber. ‘And you – finish what you’ve started, witch. I’ll see to it that we’re not disturbed.’

  ‘Of course,’ Octavia said. She opened the second jar, and retrieved a pinch of dust, culled from a certain barrow in the Worlds Edge Mountains. She scattered it across the blade. Thin plumes of foul-smelling smoke rose from the sword. She felt Andraste draw close. The vampire circled her and the bier, not quite drawing close to the circle of sunlight that marked the bier. From outside, she could hear the clangour of weapons. It sounded as if they were under attack. How convenient, she thought, forcing herself not to smile. How unexpected.

  She had seen the intruders through the eyes of the dead stationed in the outer plazas, and later, through the eyes of her cats, who’d been patrolling the ruins of the outer walls. The cats had attacked, and she’d made no effort to stop them, or to alert Andraste, not realising what was going on until it was too late. If she’d been quicker of mind, she’d have had her beasts retreat and merely watch. The intruders, whether they were treasure hunters, adventurers or luckless wanderers, were no threat to her, and she had hoped they might provide her with a necessary distraction. Which, it seemed, they were doing.

  With a thumbnail, she cut open her palm and squeezed her blood into the bowl of teeth. They immediately began to hop and rattle against one another. She took them out and scattered them about her. They continued to twitch and move wherever they landed. Each tooth was like a tent spike, drawing the skin of her power tight over the room.

  Necromancy, more so than any other magic, had a tendency to leak away from its caster. The dead were hungry in more ways than one, and they required more and more energy to bolster them up, the longer they were active. They were sumps of dark power, absorbing it and basking in it, and demanding more. That was why most necromancers raised the newly dead at every available opportunity, such fresh corpses requiring less in the way of effort. After a time, it grew exhausting, unless you had a way of strengthening yourself.

  Some necromancers ate ghosts, swallowing the souls of their victims to strengthen their own. Others drew strength like a leech from the dead, though they became less human in the doing so. For herself, she’d found the best way was not to take from the dead, but to give. Every dead thing she had summoned had some part of her in it, nestled like a seed. A bit of life force, that grew in the dark soil of every rotting husk or whimpering spirit.

  It had weakened her and dangerously so, but she did not fear death, the way many of her peers did. Out in the plaza, the dead waited, and she could feel the seeds she had planted in them flowering. With a single gesture, she awoke that which she had given, now grown fat on the stuff of death. Energy flooded her, and she swayed on her feet, momentarily drunk with the delicious darkling essence of it all. She was connected to every corpse, skeleton and spirit left in the ruin, each one feeding from her and returning what they took in a pulsing loop of power. For a moment, all were one.

  The moment passed. Preparations complete, she laid her hands flat on the blade and began to speak the words of the spell. Around her, the forms of the ghosts wavered, like mist caught in a morning breeze. The invocation thundered in her mind, though her voice was soft. The sword blade grew warm beneath her palms, and then deadly cold.

  It was the single greatest feat of necromancy she had ever attempted. Once it was done, every dead thing in Lybaras would bend knee to her, and the path to cursed Lahmia and the knowledge she sought would be open.

  Chapter 19

  Felix followed Gotrek through the archway, and into the chamber. It was mostly dark, but a column of weak sunlight issued down through a hole set in the centre of the roof. His eyes were drawn immediately to the red-headed woman standing beneath the hole, before a stone bier. She was dressed in filthy clothes, and as she turned, he started. Her face had been tattooed to resemble a skull. She smiled as she saw them, but did not cease chanting.

  The words thrummed on the air, like the peal of a hammer-stroke. Three large sarcophagi rattled and shook nearby, and Felix hoped not to see what was trapped screaming within them. The sunlight was already fading, and the chamber grew darker with every passing moment.

  ‘Necromancy,’ Gotrek spat. Felix didn’t bother asking how the Slayer knew that. He recognised it easily enough himself. Only death-magic resonated on the air so sourly. It made his bones throb and his teeth ache. Past the woman, Felix saw a sword on the bier. It was a small thing, but he knew what it must be. Why else would it be where it was, after all?

  ‘Gotrek, there – the sword,’ Felix said.

  ‘Aye, manling, I see it,’ Gotrek growled. ‘One side, woman,’ the Slayer continued, starting forwards, murder glinting in his good eye.

  The necromancer gestured, as if in welcome. Overhead, the steady thud-thud-thud of the drumbeat abruptly ceased. Gotrek bounded forwards, axe raised. A number of heavy bodies tumbled through the hole in the roof. Felix realised why the zombie drummers had ceased their rhythm. They fell onto the Slayer, eliciting a bellow of anger from Gotrek. Flabby hands grabbed the dwarf and tossed him across the chamber. The bloated corpses slipped and slumped towards Gotrek as he bounced to his feet.

  Felix started towards the woman, Karaghul in his hands. The templar blade had, in the past, provided some amount of protection against sorcery. He hoped that still held true. The necromancer, however, seemed unconcerned by his approach. She stood relaxed, fingers tapping the pommel of her sheathed blade. Abruptly, Felix realised his mistake. Instincts screaming a warning, he spun on his heel, blade licking up to block the blow that would have split his skull otherwise. He was nearly knocked from his feet by the force of the blow. ‘Oh, very nearly, Andraste,’ the necromancer said, her tone mocking.

  ‘Silence, witch,’ Felix’s attacker snarled. The vampire was tall, and clad in leather armour and a cloak of feathers and scales that flared around her as she moved. He lashed out at her, driving her back. She rocked back on her heels and began to circle him. ‘Finish killing that creature, Octavia, while I dispose of the man,’ Andraste hissed, motioning towards Gotrek. She sprinted towards Felix and slashed at him with vicious speed. He blocked the slash, and his wrists and arms ached from the force of the blow. His heels skidded on the floor as he blocked her second blow. The necromancer turned towards the battle between her zombies and Gotrek.

  She pursued him, giving him no chance to recover or counter her. She wasn’t as good with a blade as he was, but like Steyr, she was stronger and faster, and that more than made up for her lack of skill. She hammered him back towards the entrance, her blade drawing sparks from Karaghul. Felix caught a blow and stepped towards her, trying to drive her back. His shoulder thumped her chest, and she stumbled and lashed out at him, unhurt but angry. Felix leapt back, and Andraste followed. But then she paused and stepped back. ‘Enough of this,’ she spat. She turned towards the three sarcophagi. ‘I shall free my sisters, and let you be their first taste of blood.’

  As she turned her back, Octavia spun away from Gotrek, and a wave of crackling, ebony energy leapt from her extended hand. It struck Andraste in the centre of the back, and black, wailing flames enveloped the v
ampire. Andraste shrieked and staggered. The black flames swirled about her, reducing her to a vaguely human-shaped torch as she crawled towards the sarcophagi. Felix backed away in shock as the vampire sank to her knees and crumbled, burning and shedding clumps of ash.

  The necromancer smiled and nodded to Felix. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  ‘What?’ Felix said. Confusion made him hesitate. He’d thought for a moment that she’d been aiming for him, and hit the vampire by mistake.

  ‘She had outlived her usefulness. As have you, I fear,’ Octavia said. The hovering spirits started towards Felix at her gesture. He struck at them, and they recoiled from Karaghul’s bite. The blade was enchanted, after a fashion, and a holy weapon besides, having belonged to a templar order. The spectres wanted no part of it. They swirled about him, like circling sharks and Felix backed away. Gotrek was still battling the drummers, and was in no position to come to his aid. ‘You’re the one Sigmund mentioned, aren’t you?’ Octavia said. She drew her sword and padded after him. The spirit host whirled about her, as if she were the eye of a storm. ‘The red cloak,’ she said. ‘You don’t see cloaks like that, much. He said you were a poet.’

  Felix didn’t waste his breath on a reply. The ghosts boiled through one another like bubbling water as they swarmed about him, herding him out of the chamber. He cut and thrust, carving wisps of chill mist from their ethereal forms as he muttered out a stream of prayers to any gods he thought might be listening. The ghosts moaned and screamed and chattered, pounding his ears with black noise. He was forced back out into the open air and the ghostly shapes spilled after him. More swept down from above, and he felt the chill clutch of spectral fingers on his hair and hands. He whirled, trying to drive them off. Octavia pierced the phantasmal fog, her sword held extended before her. Felix jerked back at the last moment, and the blade glided across his shoulder, the metal shrieking as it gnawed at his chain shirt.

  The force of the unexpected blow knocked him from his feet, and he fell. He struck the stairs and rolled down them. Karaghul slid out of reach as he came to a stop on the next level down, his body aching. He shoved himself to his hands and knees. Octavia descended. ‘You have a few moments left – would you like to serve me? My brother would not have asked, but I do not force the dead to do my bidding,’ she said as she approached him.

  ‘Would you like to be my troubadour, poet? I will leave you enough of yourself to write such works as you can only dream of. You will sing a song of death for me, so that the living will know not to fear my coming, but instead welcome me as they should.’

  Felix coughed and tried to get to his feet. Octavia set her foot against his head and gave a gentle shove. Off balance, Felix slid off the plateau and tumbled down the next level of stairs. She followed at a leisurely pace, then paused just out of reach as he lay sprawled on the stairs, trying to pull air into his abused lungs. ‘You’re mad,’ he wheezed.

  ‘No more than anyone else,’ she said. ‘Look at them.’ She indicated the slaves, who were fighting against their former captors. ‘They fight without hope. Death is the only safe harbour left to them, but they refuse to enter it.’ She shook her head. ‘I offer them safety, purpose, love, and they struggle like beasts in a trap. The meat makes beasts of us all, poet,’ she said, looking at him. ‘Life makes monsters of us. Only in death can we find freedom from the tyranny of pain.’

  Felix stared up at her. He had faced madmen and women before – the world was full of madness. But there was an earnest appeal in the necromancer’s quiet voice that was more disturbing than the cries of any frothing lunatic. In her eyes burned the light of true belief, of hope, and he felt a stab of pity for her. Then pity was washed aside by necessity and he scrambled to his feet. She stepped back and raised her blade. The ghosts crowded closer, so thickly he could see nothing else but the silently screaming faces that clustered about him. ‘You dropped your sword,’ she said, stepping through them as if they were no more substantial than a morning mist. The tip of her sword touched his neck. ‘Let them take you, poet. It will be kinder than the sword. There will be no pain, only a slight chill. Join them, and I will give you an eternity upon which to inscribe your words.’ She smiled gently, and on her tattooed face the expression was ghastly. ‘I will love you as my brother,’ she said. ‘Please – death is my gift. Let me give it to you.’

  ‘Manling,’ Gotrek bellowed, from somewhere above. Octavia turned, her eyes widening, and Felix saw the Slayer charging down towards them, his axe in one hand and Khalida’s sword in the other. Gotrek leapt, springing straight up into the air, his axe raised. As his feet left the stone, he sent the sword spinning through the air towards Felix and the necromancer. Octavia whirled aside and Felix stretched out a hand and caught the hilt of the sword as it spun past her. She rose up over him as he turned, her blade slashing towards his head. He blocked the blow, and then Gotrek’s axe flashed down, chopping through her extended wrists as the Slayer landed.

  Octavia stepped back, a curious expression on her face. She held up her wrists, and her eyes widened as they took in the ragged stumps and the blood that bubbled from them. Then she crumpled and fell back into the swirling cloud of spirits. The ghosts howled in seeming agony as they spun about the necromancer’s form and bore her aloft. Every ghost flew to join the growing cloud, and soon the necromancer’s form was completely obscured by the sheer number of phantoms curled about her, like hounds comforting their dying master. Then, with a vast, communal sigh, the ghosts retreated, allowing her body to tumble down the stairs. Her hair had become wispy and white, and her body was shrunken, as if all of the life had been drained from it. Something very much like black smoke boiled from her eyes and mouth and wrist stumps, and rose into the air, where the ghosts clustered together about this new dark core. The smoke billowed and pulsed as the spirit host spun about it, as if in celebration. Felix tore his eyes away from the sight and looked down into the plaza below.

  Even as the necromancer was swallowed up in the cloud of spirits a number of zombies stumbled and fell like puppets with their strings cut. Wights staggered, the hell-light in their eye sockets flickering and dimming. The remaining vampires looked about in shock as the slaves redoubled their efforts.

  It was only a temporary reprieve, for several of the vampires gestured and spat black words in an effort to keep the dead from crumbling back into oblivion. There were only a few of the creatures left, but even one was too many. But more slaves had been freed from their pits, and now there were almost a hundred men and women fighting the dead in the plaza. As Felix watched, one of the remaining vampires was tackled by a group of emaciated slaves, and had a length of broken wood shoved through her heart.

  ‘Let’s get down there, manling,’ Gotrek said. He eyed the cloud of ghosts warily.

  ‘And then what?’ Felix asked, as he recovered Karaghul. Ghosts streaked across the sky, joining the host. The blackness within them had assumed an almost humanoid shape, and he felt the water in his body turn to ice as he gazed at it. Something was happening there, and whatever it was, it was terrifying.

  Gotrek turned to glare at Felix. ‘Did you forget that army, manling? Allow me to refresh your memory – it’s between us and Lybaras,’ he said. ‘And you’re still under a death sentence.’

  ‘What about them?’ Felix said, gesturing at the nearest knot of slaves.

  ‘What about them,’ Gotrek said, starting down the ziggurat’s steps. ‘They are fighting for their freedom. We gave them what aid we could. The rest is up to them. We have an army to catch, and a bracelet to remove.’

  ‘Barbarian, do you have it?’ Zabbai called out, as they descended. Felix held up the Nehekharan blade in reply. Zabbai was alone, her armour rent and torn, and her axe nicked and notched from much use. Felix couldn’t see any sign of her warriors. It appeared that Antar was the only other member of their group on his feet. Antar was across the plaza from Zabbai and Felix, and as he watched, the t
omb-prince smashed a wight to the ground, and exhorted a group of slaves to destroy another undead warrior.

  ‘It is time to depart,’ Zabbai said. She cast a glance up at the phantasmal cloud growing above the ziggurat as she pulled out the feathered amulet that Djubti had given her, just before they’d left Lybaras, and, with a great, rattling cry, she smashed it down on the ground. The amulet exploded, and what looked like sand spilled out across the ground. The sand stirred and rose, as if caught in a strong breeze. It spiralled up, and expanded, until a whirlwind of sand was spinning in the spot where the amulet had fallen.

  Then, with a hoarse, croaking cry, a huge shape exploded from the sand and shot upwards with a snap of colossal pinions. It curved through the air with ill grace, and every wingbeat assaulted Felix’s nostrils with the stink of rotting meat and battlefield leavings. Zabbai raised her axe and cried out, ‘Come, O child of Ualatp! Come and bear your servants into the sky, so that we might strike our enemies!’

  At her cry, the massive, rotting hulk of the creature dropped down into the plaza accompanied by a thunderous gust of wind from its broad wings. Zombies tumbled from their feet, and a vampire screeched as it was flattened beneath one of the beast’s talons. The creature’s head dipped, swiftly and suddenly, and the vampire’s cries ceased. Zabbai grabbed Felix, who stared at the sorcerously summoned beast, awestruck.

  The bird resembled one of the black desert vultures that prowled the skies of the Great Desert, albeit far, far larger. Putrefied ropes of muscle and meat hung from its bloated frame, and it shed feathers with every twitch. A razor-sharp beak stripped the pale flesh from the vampire’s bones, and the long, bald neck bulged and rippled as the bird swallowed its meal. Bits of vampire flopped pathetically from the bird’s gaping belly, to drop sizzling to the sun-washed stones.

  ‘Time to go,’ Zabbai said. ‘The beast won’t remain docile for long, and we’d best be on its back before it decides to leave.’ She hurried towards the bird, Felix in tow.