by Warhammer
Slowly, Wulfrik drew his sword from his belt. He glanced at the men holding Sveinbjorn back and laughed. ‘Whenever your nurse-maids will let you play.’
The last barb was too much for the retainers. One of them released the prince. Drawing his own axe, the warrior rushed at Wulfrik, a war cry howling from his lips. With the fury of a berserker, the marauder brought his weapon flashing at Wulfrik’s head.
Wulfrik twisted aside as the axe came hurtling down. Moving with the grace and speed of a panther, the champion swung his body around, side-stepping the Aesling’s charge. A blur of steel, a splash of crimson, and the Aesling toppled to the floor, his body folding back upon its spine where Wulfrik’s sword had slashed across his belly.
Sveinbjorn relented in his efforts to escape his retainers. His pale features turned a sickly colour and his tongue licked across suddenly dry lips. There was terror in his eyes as he saw Wulfrik stalk towards him.
‘Enough!’ Viglundr’s outraged roar thundered across the hall. He pointed a trembling finger at Wulfrik. ‘Whatever services you have performed for me in the past, barbarian, they will not excuse the murder of my guests!’
Wulfrik sneered at Sveinbjorn. ‘The Aeslings are welcome to collect their wergild anytime they have the stomach for it.’
The humiliated prince glared at Wulfrik, then ripped free of his retainers. Sheathing his sword, he marched from the hall. The other Aeslings quickly followed their prince in retreat.
‘It seems I won’t have a chance to kill any more of your guests,’ Wulfrik said, turning back to the throne.
Viglundr quivered with rage. ‘You forget your duty to me.’
‘You forget yours to me,’ Wulfrik answered, casting a sideways glance at Hjordis. ‘I was promised riches, rank, the privileges of a king…’
‘All these you were given,’ Viglundr snarled.
‘And I was promised the hand of your daughter,’ Wulfrik finished. ‘King Torgald is dead,’ he announced, his fingers tapping on the skull. ‘But I have not been paid for the killing.’
Cruelty filled Viglundr’s expression as he leaned forwards from his throne. ‘It was not our boasting tongue that brought the curse of the gods upon you,’ he reminded Wulfrik. His face softened into an expression of regret and pity, though there was still malignance in his eyes. ‘How can we give our daughter to a man such as you? Marked by the gods, cursed by them to wander the world to slay in their name? What manner of life would that be for a princess?’ Viglundr smiled to see that his words brought the champion pain.
‘You speak of our duty to you,’ the king persisted. ‘But what of your duty to Hjordis? Should she stay here forever waiting for you, waiting for a man despised by the gods? Must she grow old and wither, husbandless, childless, because you were too proud to free her from an impossible promise?’
Wulfrik felt his chest tighten, a coldness that was worse than the ravages of the yhetee. ‘It is not pride that binds me to Hjordis,’ he said.
Viglundr kept the triumph he felt from his face as he heard the champion’s confession. ‘You cannot keep her,’ he said. ‘If you do love our daughter, you must release her.
‘Why would you force her to share your curse?’
The king’s last words echoed through Wulfrik’s brain like thunder. Viglundr was right, he had no reason to force Hjordis to share his curse. Doomed to wander the world, killing men and monsters in the name of the gods. That was not the life he would have Hjordis share. She was better here, in her father’s castle, surrounded by the riches of Ormskaro.
The image made Wulfrik sicken. However much he tried, he couldn’t let her go. He wouldn’t let her go.
The sound of footsteps in the hall behind him brought Wulfrik spinning around. His sword was already half from its sheath before he saw that his stealthy assailant was a shapely young princess with long blonde hair.
‘I might have killed you,’ Wulfrik growled, slamming the blade back into his belt.
Hjordis placed her soft hand on Wulfrik’s scarred, leathery fingers. ‘Am I so ghastly that I frighten the great Wulfrik?’
‘You might have been an Aesling assassin,’ Wulfrik told her.
The princess cocked her head and smiled at him. ‘Who says I’m not?’ Her expression became serious, contemplative. ‘Prince Sveinbjorn is a handsome man and noble in his manners. A woman might do much worse than take such a man for a husband.’
Wulfrik snorted in amusement. ‘That sounds like your father talking.’
‘Oh yes, most certainly,’ Hjordis sighed. ‘He’s been urging me to marry that reptile for the last fortnight. Fear of you is the only thing that’s kept him from forcing me into it. Somehow he thinks you won’t burn down Ormskaro if the whole thing is my decision instead of his.’
Hjordis cried out as Wulfrik’s hands clamped around her arms. ‘I’d make all Norsca a smoking crater if you were taken away from me! I’d kill every damn Aesling that ever crawled out of its mother if they–’
‘Be careful of your boasting,’ Hjordis warned. She regretted her words when she saw the pain that sprang into Wulfrik’s eyes. She quickly diverted his thoughts, squirming in his grip.
‘You’re going to leave marks,’ she scolded Wulfrik. Rubbing her arms as he released her, she fretted over the stains his fingers had left on her gown. ‘You might have stopped to wash before coming here. I don’t even want to know what kind of things you’ve been touching while you were gone.’
‘Only some ice-giants,’ Wulfrik told her. ‘I killed their king. Cut all five of his heads clean off.’ A sharp look from Hjordis made Wulfrik think better of continuing the tale.
The princess rubbed at the stain Wulfrik’s fingers had left. ‘This is never going to come off. I’ll have to get a new one before my father sees and asks indelicate questions.’ A sly smile spread across her face as she glanced at the hero. ‘You should help me pick one out,’ she suggested.
‘And what about Viglundr?’ Wulfrik asked.
‘He’ll be busy all night trying to apologise to the Aeslings,’ Hjordis said. ‘I think we could pick out a dress by then.’
‘Maybe not,’ Wulfrik warned her. ‘I’ve been at sea for two months.’
Hjordis laughed and led the champion by the hand down the corridor. ‘Where is your caution now? This could all be a trick to leave you so weak and tired that Sveinbjorn will only need a dozen warriors to overcome you.’
‘I’ll take my chances,’ Wulfrik assured her, kissing the back of her neck.
CHAPTER THREE
The feeble light of the Norscan sun was just starting to peek beneath the heavy furs shrouding the tower windows. Hjordis awoke slowly, stretching her body and sighing contentedly. She smiled as the warmth of the bed tried to lull her back to sleep. She rolled onto her side, half-tempted to submit to the enticing lure. As she moved, her arm fell into the warm emptiness beside her.
Hjordis blinked her eyes in confusion, then heard once more the sound which had awakened her. She sat upright, letting the bearskin blanket tumble from her body. Her eyes stared into the darkness. Only faintly could she pick out the figure standing at the foot of the bed, buckling armour about his brawny frame.
‘You rise early,’ the princess said, her words not quite spoken before a terrific yawn overcame her.
‘There’s much to be done,’ was Wulfrik’s gruff response.
The content smile she was wearing faded. Hjordis crawled across the length of the bed, pressing herself against the hero’s armoured back. The cold mail sent a shiver through her naked flesh, but it wasn’t so cold as the fear that trembled in her heart.
‘Another of your dreams?’ she forced herself to ask.
Wulfrik abandoned the vambrace he had been tying about his arm, tossing the piece of armour across the room. He sank back into the embrace of the princess. ‘Always the dreams,’ he told her. ‘Always the dreams. When will the gods stop sending me these visions? When will they relent? How much do they expect a man to suffer before i
t is enough to appease them?’
Hjordis leaned over Wulfrik, pressing his head against her bosom. She ran her fingers through the wild tangle of his hair. ‘You must have hope.’
‘I saw a town,’ Wulfrik continued. ‘Some southling place. The walls were of stone and a river ran through its gates. Buildings were burning, the dead strewn like seed in the streets. The wailing of children filled the air and there was an ugly light in the sky. A great voice spoke, crying out: “For the Lord of the Winds, the last breath is given!” Then the earth shook with the laughter of vultures and I saw myself among the dead.’
A shiver of absolute terror ran through Hjordis as she heard Wulfrik relate the apocalyptic dream. It was easier for them to discuss the things as though they were only dreams, of no more substance than any other nightmare. But they both knew better. Wulfrik’s dreams were not his own. They were visions sent by the gods, a portent of things that would come to pass. They were a part of his curse, guiding him to the offerings the gods demanded of him.
Never before, though, had Wulfrik seen himself in one of these visions, much less seen his own corpse. It sent a wave of horror pulsing through Hjordis’s veins. In their cruelty, perhaps the gods had answered all of the hero’s questions.
‘What will you do?’ Hjordis asked, her voice little more than a feeble croak.
Wulfrik pulled away from her so he could stare into her eyes. ‘I’ll see Agnarr and ask him to interpret the dream,’ he said, making it sound almost inconsequential. ‘Then I’ll supervise the choosing of new men for the crew. If Sigvatr hasn’t finished outfitting the ship, I’ll have to help him rumble some of the traders. Then it’ll just be the small matter of dragging my men out of the mead halls and whore-huts. I hope I don’t have to kill any of them this time.’
The champion looked hard at Hjordis. His forced joviality hadn’t fooled her; there was still a troubled expression in her eyes. He ran his thumb against her cheek, trying to tug her face into a smile. After a few tries, the smile became genuine.
‘Tchar take all of them!’ Wulfrik exclaimed, pushing Hjordis onto her back. ‘They can do without me for a few hours yet!’
The seer Agnarr lived in a strange little shack crouched between a smithy and a storehouse for salted fish. Unlike its neighbours, the shack hadn’t been built from timber and stone, but was made entirely from whale bone, the splintered ribs of a dozen beasts lashed together with stout cords to form a weird, ramshackle shelter. For the entirety of their length, each bone was richly carved with scenes drawn from the sagas. Wulfrik had heard that if a man studied the carvings for too long they would change, and that some of the carvings depicted things not yet chronicled in the sagas. He wasn’t sure he believed such stories. There were always tales being told about the strangeness of seers. Even so, he made it a point never to look too closely at the engravings.
The interior of the seer’s home never failed to evoke a sense of uneasiness in Wulfrik. The air was always colder than outside, whatever the season. There was a crude sort of ceiling stretched overhead to keep out the rain, but even in all his travels, Wulfrik could put no name to whatever scaly beast had once worn such a craggy skin. Oddments of every shape hung from hooks set into the scaly hide so that moving anywhere inside the shack required an effort not unlike that of an explorer forcing his way through a jungle. Dried bats, the desiccated shells of mammoth spiders, stagnant weeds that smelled like blood and looked not unlike severed fingers, the mummified husks of crocodiles, such were the arcane bric-a-brac of the seer.
Wulfrik pushed his way past a string of goblin bones and a rope made from the intestine of a manticore, manoeuvring into the heart of the dwelling. An eerie blue flame smouldered in a circle of skulls, beckoning the warrior forwards. He found it unsettling that the flame should burn so brightly yet do nothing to ease the chill of the place. He glanced at the floor around the fire, then sat down upon a pile of wolf pelts some distance from the flame. As he sat down, an insane gibberish accosted his ears, the idiot babble of a tiny batrachian daemon locked inside a silver cage. The thing eyed him with malicious, multi-faceted eyes and licked its long talons with too many tongues.
The hero threw a stone at the noxious creature, smiling when he heard it growl its displeasure. Wulfrik hoped Agnarr wouldn’t keep him waiting long. From past experience, he knew the daemon’s gibberish would start to make his head swim after a time. If he had to suffer from a headache, he’d prefer to induce it on his own with a few barrels of mead.
The idea turned sour almost as soon as it occurred to him. A few barrels of mead had been the cause of all his troubles. After the Battle of a Thousand Skulls, with King Torgald’s head tucked under his arm, Wulfrik had celebrated the victory. Along with the arms and armour of the Aeslings and their allies, Wulfrik’s army had captured their supplies. Whatever his other vices, Torgald had not scrimped in maintaining his troops and Wulfrik’s warriors enjoyed a victory feast worthy of the sagas.
How hollow that celebration felt now, for it had brought doom upon Wulfrik and tainted his glory. The hero had feasted with his men. No man had fought more fiercely than he in the battle, now he vowed no man would outdrink him in victory. Using the skull of King Torgald for his cup, Wulfrik had matched his words with deeds. It had taken four entire barrels of mead to put him under the table, a feat that impressed even the ogres.
Before the mead overwhelmed him entirely, however, the drunken Wulfrik had started to boast of his exploits. Before he was done, he’d killed every monster in the Wastes twice and personally boxed the ears of three southling emperors. It was his final proud boast that had doomed him. He claimed that he was the equal of any warrior in the mortal world or in the realm beyond flesh.
The gods enjoy punishing hubris.
That night he’d had the first of his visions. A dark shape stole upon him in his dreams, a shadow blacker than night. It was an emissary of the gods, it told him. The gods were displeased with his proud words. However, it amused them to allow Wulfrik the opportunity to prove his arrogant boast. In his dream, he saw fantastic worlds, places he could recognise only from the dimmest legends. He saw cities built from bones and the soaring towers of the elf-folk. He saw the vast underground warrens of the ratkin and the jungle temples of the dragon-folk, the ramshackle fortresses of orc kings and the gilded halls of the dwarf lords. The putrid palace of the Plague Lord rose from the muck of his nightmare, its walls crafted from the wailing bodies of the damned. The dead halls of Nagashizzar, silent with the dust of centuries, made his soul cringe in terror.
Such would be Wulfrik’s hunting grounds. He would wander the world, seeking battle to prove himself the equal of any warrior, mortal or spirit, living or undead. He would make offerings to the gods he had offended, offerings the gods themselves would choose. When he failed – and the dark emissary left no question he would fail – the gods would take great delight in torturing his soul through eternity.
Wulfrik might have believed the vision nothing but a drunken nightmare had it not been for the changes that had been visited upon his body. He bore the brand of the gods in his flesh, marked not by one, but by all the Great Powers. His tongue had become an inhuman thing, sharp and fluted like that of a bird and he found he could speak any language, however strange to him. The Gift of Tongues, the Kurgan shaman had called this strange power.
The first offering he was to make came to him in a dream. He was to kill the tomb lord Khareops and sacrifice its shrivelled entrails to Wormking Nurgle. The dream even told him where he would find Khareops. The creature’s tomb was far to the south, in the wastes beyond Araby: a voyage only the boldest northmen ever attempted. It was a voyage that would take even a fast ship many months to make.
And this was only the first of the tasks the gods would have of him.
Wulfrik would have despaired then but for his old friend Sigvatr. The grizzled warrior remembered hearing about a ‘sky-ship’ crafted by the Skaeling witch Baga Yar, a ship that could sail anywhere in t
he world in the blink of an eye. It was the kind of extravagant legend Wulfrik had always discredited, but it was the only hope he had of beating the curse.
It took all of the treasure he’d won from Torgald and all the gold Viglundr paid him for defeating the Aeslings to bribe the warriors he’d needed to assail the fortress of Baga Yar. In the end, the witch had been consumed in her own cauldron after Wulfrik’s sword removed her arms. Two hundred warriors had died fighting the crone and her daemons, but victory had been his. The other treasures in the witch’s fortress he left to his followers; the only thing Wulfrik wanted was her magic ship.
Seafang he had named the vessel and quickly he learned how easily fables can lie. It was not flight that allowed the ship to speed its way across the seas. Instead the Seafang would fade from the mortal world to sail upon phantom tides in that realm known only to gods and daemons. Such was the horror of the ship he had taken for his own.
‘A man may forge his own doom.’
The voice was like the croak of a raven, at once thin and guttural. Wulfrik turned around to find the seer Agnarr limping through the menagerie of oddments. He was old, so old that even the elders of Ormskaro could not remember him as ever being young. His head was hairless and wrinkled, like a turtle’s egg, his face like dried parchment across the bones of his skull. Eyes frosty with blindness stared vacantly from Agnarr’s colourless face. The seer wore a heavy sealskin robe, the bisected head of one of the creatures framing his shoulders. He leaned heavily upon a staff carved from troll bone and behind him he dragged the twisted abortion of his left foot. It was more a shapeless mass of flesh than anything else, though there was some affinity to the webbed foot of an albatross about it.
‘I have tried,’ Wulfrik answered the seer gruffly. There was no need to introduce himself. Agnarr did not need sight to know things. Whenever he visited the seer, he had the impression that Agnarr knew everything he was going to say before he said it.
