Tales of the Old World

by Marc Gascoigne

  Mormacar had been reared in the wild expanses of the Shadowlands, and spent his life waging a merciless war on the Forsworn. Now he used every iota of his instinct and his training to slip through the woods unnoticed. He could hear the pounding of hooves and the shouts of the search parties, but he was a ghost in the shadows. Striving to keep his pace steady, Mormacar darted from tree to tree, his passing silent and leaving no sign. It took him nearly two hours to circle the dark elf army and he could now see the plains beyond. He was close, and the hated enemy was almost behind him.

  Suddenly, the quiet was shattered by the thunderous approach of a Forsworn war party. Heart pounding, Mormacar threw himself flat and crawled into a tangled bush. The sharp branches cut his face and hands but he uttered no sound. Sitting perfectly still, he waited as the dark elves approached. The horses had slowed their pace as they entered the forest, and now Mormacar could only hear the gentle clip-clop of hooves and the jangling of harnesses. The sounds got louder as the Witch King’s minions approached, and Mormacar gripped his crossbow tightly with his sweaty palms.

  The dark elves broke out of cover, and the Shadow Warrior could see the wiry forms of three dark riders atop their midnight steeds. They circled the area slowly, scanning the ground for some sign of their quarry. When the riders found nothing, they regrouped and began to ride deeper into the forest.

  But a chance glance from the last of the retreating horsemen aroused his suspicion. This rider broke off from his companions and cantered toward the concealed elf. Mormacar noticed too late that a piece of his cloak had torn off and was now clearly visible, hanging in the branches of the bush. Cursing himself for his carelessness, Mormacar readied himself as the dark elf approached.

  The remaining horsemen now turned their steeds and galloped towards the hidden high elf, skilfully guiding their horses around the intervening trees. The foremost rider, spear extended, moved ever closer.

  Mormacar launched himself out of the bushes with a yell. The evil steed reared in surprise, its rider dropping his spear while seeking desperately to calm his snorting mount. Mormacar stepped to the side of the stomping beast, and levelled his crossbow at the other two dark riders. With cold precision, he fired the crossbow twice in quick succession at the approaching horsemen, the infernal mechanism of the Forsworn weapon now turned against its masters. Both bolts found their mark, and the stunned dark elves fell from their saddles, wounded or slain. The last of the dark elves had regained enough control of his mount to leap from the saddle and tackle the weary Shadow Warrior. Both elves fell to the ground and the Forsworn smiled cruelly as he felt Mormacar’s bones crunch beneath his weight.

  Mormacar felt the breath knocked out of his body, and could only struggle as the dark elf rained blows down on him. The dark rider pulled a gleaming dagger from his belt, his other hand at Mormacar’s throat. The Shadow Warrior thrashed desperately, trying with all his might to wrench the blade free. As the two mortal foes struggled, Mormacar’s empty hand closed around a rock. Smiling grimly, the Shadow Warrior shifted his weight, and smashed the jagged rock into the skull of his foe, caving it in with one great blow.

  The dark elf crumpled to the ground and Mormacar struggled to his feet. He grabbed the reins of the dark elf’s mount and swung himself into the saddle. Nothing would stop him from reaching Arnhaim. Nothing!

  Leaving the dead and dying behind, Mormacar raced out onto the plains and kept on riding. He could almost feel the hot breath of Lady Bela on his neck, and whipped the horse furiously to coax every ounce of speed out of the swift beast. Even though he rode at a full gallop, he would turn to look for dark riders every few minutes, but the crucial first hours saw no pursuit. All too aware of the power of dark magic, however, the Shadow Warrior rode on as if Khaine himself was in pursuit.

  For the better part of a day, Mormacar stayed in the saddle and drove the horse on. Finally, the dark steed could take no more: it threw the Shadow Warrior from the saddle and collapsed. The huge steed rolled in the tall grass, whinnying in pain.

  Mormacar lay in the grass, agony shooting through his shoulder. For minutes, or maybe it was hours, he drifted in and out of consciousness. He could tell that his arm was broken and his body seemed to be one big bruise. Gods, but he was wrecked. Perhaps he should surrender to the screaming pleas of his body and rest? But what of Arnhaim?

  He could still hear the horse screaming in pain. It thrashed in the grass, surely dying. And its howls took him back to the altar of the Khaine. Once again he was in dark temple at Hag Graef, prisoner of the Lady Bela, forced to watch his kinsmen fall under her knife. And he could not decide if the screams of the dying horse reminded him more of the victims of Lady Bela, or of her bestial witch elf minions. But he did know that he would gladly give his life to spare his brethren in Arnhaim such a fate. There was no more time to waste. He had to push on.

  So steeling himself, Mormacar rose, every joint and bone straining with the pressure. But he staggered forward… east, always east towards Arnhaim. As he crossed icy streams and tore his way through obstructing brambles, he lost track of time completely. It was all he could do to put one foot in front of the other, to ignore the pain in his shoulder and cover those final miles. When his body threatened to fail him, he thought of those who had already fallen in the struggle. The faces of his dead friends seemed to hang before him, urging him on. He saw his Shadow Warrior brethren, slain in foul ambush. He saw the prisoners of Hag Graef and Galaher Swiftblade, ruthlessly sacrificed by the Lady Bela. And he saw Einar Volundson, now surely dead. For all of them, and his kin yet living in Arnhaim, he forced himself on.

  So Mormacar passed the night, stumbling in the dark in a desperate bid to bring salvation to the last high elf bastion outside of Ulthuan. As the morning haze evaporated under the burning sun, he saw it. In the distance, rising above the well-ordered fields of the outlying farms, a shining tower of pure white, surrounded by stout battlements and sharp elven steel. Arnhaim! Arnhaim at last!

  He stopped, overcome with emotion, all his pain forgotten for that one instant. He had done it. He had escaped from Hag Graef and come in time to warn his kin of the impending attack. He looked forward to watching Lady Bela wither under a crushing defeat, and hoped he could face in her the battle to come. Only when his blade clove her in twain would justice be served.

  Eyes closed, Mormacar smiled then, thinking of his sweet revenge, and failed to notice the tell-tale hiss of a speeding missile. His head jerked up as it struck his throat and pain shot through him like fire. He fell to his knees, blood oozing from the terrible wound. He reached out to the horizon, reached for the tower of Arnhaim but his hand grasped at nothing. His life ebbing away, Mormacar tried to cry out, to warn his brethren in Arnhaim that doom approached. But no sound emerged from his ruined throat, and he fell forward in a heap.

  “Forgive me,” Mormacar thought, his head full of visions of Einar, Galaher, and his kin, “I have failed you all.” Then he surrendered to the pain, and it consumed him utterly.

  “He’s down!” an icy voice shouted. “Let’s take a look.” Three figures rose from the tall grass and walked over to the body of the fallen elf. They looked him over silently, poking the body to make sure the arrow had done its work. Seeing his haggard form, bloody and dressed in a ragged dark elf uniform, their faces filled with disdain.

  “Look at this Forsworn scum, he’s filthier than a pig,” a disgusted voice said.

  “What was a lone dark elf doing so close to Arnhaim?” said a second.

  “You can tell by the state of him,” the icy voice said, “he’s clearly a fugitive. We get these strays now and again. Throw him in that ditch and let’s continue our patrol.”

  “But sir, shouldn’t we alert the garrison, just in case.”

  “There’s no need to rush, brother. We’ll report in at the end of the day, as usual. What could happen by sunset anyway?”

  THE CHAOS BENEATH

  Mark Brendan

  In the dank, subterranea
n depths of the Marienburg Grand Sewer network, more than effluent was being carried along the crumbling, cavernous conduits. The stark glare of the flaming torches held aloft by four sinister, robed figures projected dancing shadows upon the tortured frame of a man dragged along the waste channel between them.

  The captive was clad in fine, black leather britches and riding boots. Above the waist he had been stripped, revealing a gaudy patchwork of lurid bruises and angry red weals where a lash had bitten him, and most disturbing of all a mass of blisters and scabs which traced an unearthly, sinuous pattern where he had recently been branded on his breast. The cluster of sores formed a circular hub, from which a broad point projected from the bottom left quadrant, and a lithe tail twisted away from the top right to form a design as strangely fluid as the flames which had imprinted it onto the victim’s flesh. A sack of purple velvet covered the man’s head and was securely knotted around his throat, so that he was forced to stumble along, being shoved, kicked and whipped in the correct direction.

  Passing beyond the grand arches of the main channel, they entered a little-used part of the system, where the walls once more narrowed about them like the jaws of a great serpent. It was here that they came upon a bizarre little iron bound door and the journey came to its end as the cultist bearing the lash unlocked the portal and the group passed into the dim glow beyond.

  The room within was of a comfortable size to accommodate perhaps twenty or more people and had a high, vaulted ceiling. Low swirls of thick, choking incense from braziers situated around the walls carpeted the tiled floor. The central area of this floor was dominated by a huge mosaic, with a pattern delineated in slivers of coloured glass, marble and shell which bore a strong resemblance to the brand seared on to the prisoner’s torso. At the centre of the design, four shackles anchored to the floor by thick steel chains awaited a victim.

  On the opposite side of the chamber from the door was a slightly raised platform, upon which stood a large throne of twisted black wood and purple velvet. A tall, feminine silhouette rose from this throne and came down from the platform to stand before the circle. Like the other cultists she wore a long, deep purple robe, but rather than being belted by a simple cord, hers was a thick leather belt with a large, wrought-iron skull for a clasp. Also, there were long vents up to her hips in the sides of the robes, beneath which she wore fine purple velvet trousers and soft, doeskin boots. The tall figure wore her hood down, in contrast to the other disciples, and her face was concealed by an ornate black ballroom mask shaped like a raven. Delicate mother-of-pearl inlay chased around the eye slits of the mask, behind which blazed violet irises, and edged the elegant beak too, whilst a spectacular spray of midnight black feathers held soft golden hair back from her temples.

  “Let the offering be brought forward to the circle,” she announced in a clear, cultured voice. At her behest, the four cultists thrust their prisoner forward into the circle and more robed figures hurried forth from the shadows to spread-eagle him in the centre of the mosaic. Only once he was securely shackled to the floor was the bag removed from the prisoner’s head. His face bore none of the marks of the torment his body had suffered in the cultists’ care, and for the briefest of instants his clear grey eyes locked upon the dreamy violet orbits of the figure looming over him, before he closed his eyelids in despair and submission. His jaw was clean shaven, and his features lean and predatory, with a suggestion of strong lineage in both his high forehead, with its sweeping collar-length black hair, and in the long, straight line of his nasal bridge.

  “Well, well, well,” the woman mocked. “Obediah Cain, second lieutenant of the Church of Sigmar’s Holy Inquisition in Marienburg. You are welcome as our very special guest of honour. Indeed, you might even say that we need you.”

  “Do what you will with me, witch!” groaned the man on the floor. “Remember that when judgement comes, it is final!”

  “It is good that you have given up all notion of redemption, and you are now looking to history for vindication,” the masked woman spat. “For when M’Loch T’Chort, Weaver of the Ways, High Daemonic Prince of Twisted Destiny and Misguided Fate, comes to seize possession of your miserable skin, the last thing he needs is some lost soul contesting his right to it.”

  With that, she delivered a stinging kick to his ribs, causing him to whimper as the scabs on his brand cracked with the force.

  “It’s such a shame that we have to inflict punishment on your earthly clay before our lord can take up residence within it, but as you witch hunters are always so fond of demonstrating, the prisoner’s cooperation isn’t adequate grounds to carry on to the next stage of the procedure. You, more than anyone, should appreciate what is required to ensure the veracity of any actions or claims made by a prisoner, because, after all, their co-operation might be a falsehood to avoid torture. Isn’t that the option presented to your victims, witch hunter?” she asked, bending down so that her face was close to his own pained visage. “Isn’t it, you pious worm?” she howled when he did not answer, and dug the points of her gauntleted fingers into the weeping wound on his chest.

  “Yes! Yes it is, damn you!” sobbed the broken man squirming on the floor.

  “Very good,” she said evenly, and stood up once more. “Then let us begin the rite.”

  The dozen or so cultists in the room took up positions around the circle and began to sway rhythmically, chanting in alien, melodious tongues an otherworldly mantra of damnation which rose up from the strange vaulted room and out into the still night beyond, inviting a thing which should not be into the realm of living men.

  Led on by the strange, powerful sorceress, the cultists’ performance became more frenetic, their exhortations more desperate, and a singular change began to take place within the eerily lit room. The heavy clouds of incense drifting languidly at waist height coalesced in the centre of the chamber, above the recumbent witch hunter, and then spiralled upwards into a point like some grotesque, ectoplasmic worm rearing its swollen bulk out of the foetid soil. The tip of the apparition dipped towards the unconscious man’s face and infiltrated his mouth and nostrils, feeding itself, coil after coil into his twitching, choking body.

  The ritual’s leader suddenly ceased her rapturous chanting to command, “It is time. Let the sacrifice be brought forth for the Sanguinary Binding!”

  From a curtained alcove in the shadowy chamber, a night-spawned abomination of uncommon vileness shambled into the circle. It was a man in stature but, through constant exposure to the warping malignancy of the Chaos lord, Tzeentch, his head had puckered and inflated like an over-ripe fruit, the skin thick, wrinkled and lurid pink in hue, his mouth a broad, grinning slash filled with row after row of sharp, blackened fangs and his scalp studded with starfish’s suckers in place of hair. His left arm, too, had become severely mutated and was grossly elongated and jointed in four places, covered in tough pink skin like his face, while the hand on the end of the offensive limb had grown to absurd proportions and its eight thick fingers were hollow tubes. In the daemonic limb he held a struggling lamb, while in his other, human hand he carried a large sacrificial knife. Taking up position over the witch hunter, the mutant prepared to complete the ceremony with a blood sacrifice.

  Despite everything that Obediah Cain had been through, some spark of his original consciousness yet remained untainted by the invading entity, and the unacceptable presence of a Chaos mutant hovering over him stirred that faint ember into scintillating action. Cain did the only thing he could under the circumstances—he brought his knee up sharply, as far as the chains would permit, into the creature’s shin. It was enough to cause the mutant’s leg to buckle and deposit him in a heap on top of the witch hunter. The sacrificial lamb scurried free and gambolled around the room, adding to the confusion.

  When the mutant picked himself up from the witch hunter’s body, ready to give the prisoner one final taste of pain before the ritual erased his soul forever, pain and shock registered upon his grotesquely leering vi
sage. Others, too, had noticed the unthinkable thing which had befallen their great plan and began gasping and crying out in fear and dismay.

  “You fool! What have you done?” shrieked the sorceress.

  The mutant backed away, shaking his bloated head, his eyes never leaving the terrible sight in the centre of the circle. The sacrificial knife jutted from beneath the chin of their prisoner—but worse than that an ephemeral glow was intensifying within Cain’s open mouth and his cheeks were beginning to bulge with warp-born energies. Then the coruscating wash of power seemed to contract in upon itself.

  The cultists eyed one another with deep trepidation. The mutant continued to back off, still shaking his head in pained denial.

  Suddenly a brilliant, prismatic cascade of light erupted from the corpse’s hideously stretched mouth, an otherworldly illumination which seemed to siphon the flesh from the cultists’ bodies where it touched them, drawing out their substance in little lumps which evaporated within the searing beams. In the space of a minute, the screaming and pleading was done. A dozen charred skeletons clattered to the stone floor.

  Obediah Cain’s body writhed and jerked with unholy vigour, then sat bolt upright tearing the steel bonds from their fittings as though they were a child’s paper chains. With an impatient gesture he yanked the knife from his throat and cast it aside. After a deep, gurgling cough, he clamped a hand over the hole in his voice box and uttered in a horrible, reedy, burbling timbre, “Nec-ro-mancer! I must find a necromancer!”

  “I’m sorry, de la Lune, but after careful consideration the Guild’s senior tutors have concluded that you are simply not possessed of the finer skills of meditation and concentration required to make the grade as a qualified Wizard in this academy.”