Collections

THE REALMGATE WARS: VOLUME 1

Various authors
Contains the novels The Gates of Azyr, War Storm, Ghal
Maraz, Hammers of Sigmar, Wardens of the Everqueen
and Black Rift
THE REALMGATE WARS: VOLUME 2
Various authors
Contains the novels Call of Archaon, Warbeast, Fury of
Gork, Bladestorm, Mortarch of Night and Lord of
Undeath
LEGENDS OF THE AGE OF SIGMAR
Various authors
An anthology of short stories
RULERS OF THE DEAD
Josh Reynolds & David Annandale
Contains the novels Neferata: Mortarch of Blood and
Nagash: The Undying King
WARCRY
Various authors
An anthology of short stories
CHAMPIONS OF THE MORTAL REALMS (Coming
soon)
Various authors
Contains the novellas Warqueen, The Red Hours, Heart
of Winter and The Bone Desert
TRIALS OF THE MORTAL REALMS (Coming soon)
Various authors
Contains the novellas Code of the Skies, The Measure of
Iron and Thieves’ Paradise
 GODS & MORTALS
Various authors
An anthology of short stories
MYTHS & REVENANTS
Various authors
An anthology of short stories
OATHS & CONQUESTS
Various authors
An anthology of short stories

Novels
• Hallowed Knights •
Josh Reynolds
Book One: PLAGUE GARDEN
Book Two: BLACK PYRAMID
EIGHT LAMENTATIONS: SPEAR OF SHADOWS
Josh Reynolds

• Kharadron Overlords •
C L Werner
Book One: OVERLORDS OF THE IRON DRAGON
Book Two: PROFIT’S RUIN
SOUL WARS
Josh Reynolds
CALLIS & TOLL: THE SILVER SHARD
Nick Horth
THE TAINTED HEART
C L Werner
SHADESPIRE: THE MIRRORED CITY
Josh Reynolds
BLACKTALON: FIRST MARK
Andy Clark
 HAMILCAR: CHAMPION OF THE GODS
David Guymer
SCOURGE OF FATE
Robbie MacNiven
THE RED FEAST
Gav Thorpe
GLOOMSPITE
Andy Clark
GHOULSLAYER
Darius Hinks
BEASTGRAVE
C L Werner
NEFERATA: THE DOMINION OF BONES
David Annandale
THE COURT OF THE BLIND KING
David Guymer
LADY OF SORROWS
C L Werner
REALM-LORDS
Dale Lucas

Novellas
CITY OF SECRETS
Nick Horth

Audio Dramas

• Realmslayer: A Gotrek Gurnisson Series •

David Guymer
Boxed Set One: REALMSLAYER
Boxed Set Two: BLOOD OF THE OLD WORLD
THE BEASTS OF CARTHA
David Guymer
 FIST OF MORK, FIST OF GORK
David Guymer
GREAT RED
David Guymer
ONLY THE FAITHFUL
David Guymer
THE PRISONER OF THE BLACK SUN
Josh Reynolds
SANDS OF BLOOD
Josh Reynolds
THE LORDS OF HELSTONE
Josh Reynolds
THE BRIDGE OF SEVEN SORROWS
Josh Reynolds
WAR-CLAW
Josh Reynolds
SHADESPIRE: THE DARKNESS IN THE GLASS
Various authors
THE IMPRECATIONS OF DAEMONS
Nick Kyme
THE PALACE OF MEMORY AND OTHER STORIES
Various authors
SONS OF BEHEMAT
Graeme Lyon
 CONTENTS

Cover
Backlist
Title Page
Warhammer Age of Sigmar
ULGU
Part 1
TRISETHNI THE UNSEEN
RED CLAW AND RUIN
A SNAKE SHEDS ITS SKIN
ULGU
Part 2
About the Authors
An Extract from ‘Warcry Catacombs: Blood of the
Everchosen’
A Black Library Publication
eBook license
 From the maelstrom of a sundered world, the
Eight Realms were born. The formless and the
divine exploded into life.
Strange, new worlds appeared in the firmament,
each one gilded with spirits, gods and men.
Noblest of the gods was Sigmar. For years beyond
reckoning he illuminated the realms, wreathed in
light and majesty as he carved out his reign. His
strength was the power of thunder. His wisdom
was infinite. Mortal and immortal alike kneeled
before his lofty throne. Great empires rose and,
for a while, treachery was banished. Sigmar
claimed the land and sky as his own and ruled
over a glorious age of myth.
But cruelty is tenacious. As had been foreseen,
the great alliance of gods and men tore itself
apart. Myth and legend crumbled into Chaos.
Darkness flooded the realms. Torture, slavery and
fear replaced the glory that came before. Sigmar
turned his back on the mortal kingdoms,
disgusted by their fate. He fixed his gaze instead
on the remains of the world he had lost long ago,
brooding over its charred core, searching
endlessly for a sign of hope. And then, in the dark
heat of his rage, he caught a glimpse of
something magnificent. He pictured a weapon
born of the heavens. A beacon powerful enough
to pierce the endless night. An army hewn from
everything he had lost.
Sigmar set his artisans to work and for long ages
they toiled, striving to harness the power of the
stars. As Sigmar’s great work neared completion,
he turned back to the realms and saw that the
dominion of Chaos was almost complete. The hour
for vengeance had come. Finally, with lightning
blazing across his brow, he stepped forth to
unleash his creations.
The Age of Sigmar had begun.
ULGU
PART 1
Morathi, High Oracle of the aelven war-god Khaine and
Grand Matriarch of the Daughters of Khaine, rose from
Mathcoir’s crimson depths, blood and magic dripping from
her. She stepped from the great iron cauldron with a shiver
of delight, the rejuvenation of her body and spirit complete.
Strong, lithe and long-limbed, Morathi’s beauty was as cold
and magnificent as ice and as deadly, too – not just to the
unwary but to all those on whom she turned her formidable
charms.
Three handmaidens, powerful warriors and sorcerers in
their own right, hurried to dry and dress her, while a fourth
was tasked with brushing out her luxurious hair until it
shone like moonlight. Her magic swirled around her, as
potent as an aphrodisiac. It, too, had been replenished in
the cauldron’s sacred blood-waters. Dressed and filled with
the boundless energy of Mathcoir, Morathi took her spear,
Heartrender, from its bracket on the wall and paced through
the corridors of the grand temple in the citadel of Hagg Nar.
All who encountered her progress prostrated themselves
and she passed without a glance or a murmur. She barely
noticed them unless they failed to offer her the correct
respect.
Encircling Hagg Nar like a translucent wall writhed the
shadow-magics that made the Realm of Ulgu impenetrable
to those who had not the knowledge to navigate its ways.
Shadows that confused and waylaid wanderers also gave
succour to the Daughters of Khaine, whose own magic was
attuned to it, but those same coils of mist hid the stealthy
incursions from the unholy minions of Slaanesh and Nagash,
who had learnt many of the secrets of Ulgu and exploited
them for their own evil purposes. The realm’s earth these
days ran with blood and her mountains echoed with
screams as the Daughters of Khaine defended their sacred
home from the Forces of Chaos.
No, Ulgu was not a peaceful realm, but then Morathi had
rarely craved peace in her long, extraordinary life. It
certainly did not serve her purposes now. The Shadow
Realm’s magic, and the blood spilt within it, was both
blessing and curse: power that gave and also took away.
Morathi was intimately familiar with such a seeming
contradiction. Her life and purpose had alike been forged in
such extremes, in horrors such as none living could ever
begin to comprehend. Horrors Morathi herself refused to
dwell on or allow to be spoken. And yet now, thanks to
Khaine and the she-aelves who so zealously worshipped him
and worked for his return, her strength grew and her power
with it.
Morathi ascended the spiralling walkways from deep
within the temple until she came to a wide balcony
overlooking an arena of black sand. Slabs of jagged stone
stood here and there within the oval pit, and surrounding it
was row upon row of tiered seating, filled with hundreds,
maybe thousands of her Daughters, eager for the contest to
begin.
Above them, the sky was black, its surface pitted and
cracked by lightning that flickered through and behind
obsidian clouds. Beyond Hagg Nar’s limits, Ulgu was a realm
of deception and bemusement, where a well-trodden path
could as easily lead over a chasm as it could to a Daughter’s
intended destination. For a Khainite to live within the
peculiar magics of the Shadow Realm, she was required to
dedicate herself wholly and without restraint to the war-god
and his High Oracle. She risked death with every breath she
took, and in so doing, she triumphed over it – and dedicated
that triumph to Khaine himself.
But not all of Ulgu was completely hostile to those who
called it home. Though coils of shadow, of magic and
misinformation, still writhed at the gates, their questing
tendrils could not penetrate the dome of protection built
over the citadel by Morathi’s power and reinforced daily by
the Scathborn who lived within Hagg Nar. The barrier
protected Morathi and Mathcoir itself from attack, but also
the thousands of she-aelves who lived and worshipped here.
Magic sparked across the dome as Morathi stepped back
from the balcony, a coruscation of crimson sparkles and
flitters that danced and shattered high above them. Weird
shapes and patterns flickered over the black sands and the
murmur from the seats faded away. Morathi sat in the huge
carved-stone throne at the balcony’s centre, ignoring
Melusai Filstag who waited in inscrutable silence beside it.
Filstag had much news; Filstag could wait.
The arena fell into held-breath silence, the weight of
thousands of awe-struck gazes caressing Morathi’s skin, the
reverence no less than her due and her demand. She held
them in suspense a little longer, winding the tension,
savouring their hunger, their love. And then she slammed
the butt of her spear onto the stone, the flat crack echoing
out across the vast space: the signal for the first bout to
begin.
All around the circumference of the arena, she-aelves
began to call out in praise of Khaine and in anticipation of
the bloodshed to come. Only under cover of that sound did
Morathi give Filstag leave to speak. Still she did not look at
her, but kept hungry eyes fixed on the warriors running onto
the sands below. More blood for Khaine’s glory, for the war-
god’s exaltation.
‘The Forces of Chaos grow bolder, First Daughter, both
here on Ulgu and elsewhere. Our war-covens march with the
humans and duardin, or come to their aid when the benefit
falls to us, and turn the tides of every battle they fight. Still,
the lesser races shrink from our forces, understanding
nothing of us and our dedication. Some have ventured the
opinion that they do not need us to achieve victory. That…
our ways mark us not as servants of Order, but of Chaos.’
Morathi noted the tiny hesitation in the melusai’s
response. Her lip curled. The old fear rising in the weak,
frightened denizens of the Mortal Realms as it ever did
when the Daughters of Khaine threw themselves into battle
to honour their god. Combat was sacred; slaughter was an
act of reverence and dedication that had made the
Daughters of Khaine the mightiest allies of Order since
Sigmar himself. To kill for Khaine, to destroy life in honour of
the sacrifice he had made, was their highest, and only,
purpose. Of course humans couldn’t understand such
dedication. Not even their Stormcast Eternals spent their
lives so willingly, for they knew that resurrection awaited
them. Morathi suspected they’d take fewer risks in battle if
their deaths were final, as the aelves’ were. That was true
dedication; true glory.
The temptation to abandon the other realms to face the
horrors of Chaos alone was great, but Morathi resisted.
Every enemy death was a triumph, after all, and every
being, god or mortal, who had ever harmed her was an
enemy, whether they allied with Chaos or Order. And every
drop of blood spilt was holy – and filled with glorious
purpose.
‘Khaine himself is pledged to destroying Chaos. We must
do no less, despite the mewling of the lesser races. Are your
sisters so feeble that the disgust of mere humans can
dampen their battle-fever? Is their faith in almighty Khaine,
in me, so small that they would cower from words and hard
looks the way a tzaangor cowers from our khinerai
lifetakers?’
Filstag cowered herself, just a little. She was a fierce
warrior in her own right, had led war-covens in a dozen
brutal, bloody campaigns before becoming Morathi’s
bodyguard, but none withstood the High Oracle’s rage
unscathed.
‘They fight hard and with honour, regardless of what their
allies speak or think,’ she said quickly. ‘They fight for Order
and for you. For the god of battle above all. There will be no
cease until Khaine is returned to us, First Daughter. Until he
is restored by your power and the sacred magic of Mathcoir
itself.’
Morathi’s fingers tapped Heartrender’s smooth haft in idle,
unconscious threat. ‘In Khaine’s image and for his glory,’
she said, and Filstag hurried to echo her.
Mathcoir. The great iron cauldron from which Morathi’s
magic sprang. Mathcoir had held her portion of the souls
reclaimed from the belly of Slaanesh, the God of Excess and
Morathi’s greatest nemesis. She too had spent aeons in that
belly and, before that, in torments and tortures that had
forever twisted her. From those freed souls she had crafted
the first Daughters: melusai like Filstag; and the khinerai.
From those small, humble beginnings, the Daughters of
Khaine had grown in stature, in number, in influence. In
power.
Tens of thousands of she-aelves now dedicated their lives,
their skills and their deaths to the war god – through
Morathi. Morathi who would not stop until Chaos was
defeated. Morathi who would not stop until she, herself,
gained immortality. Morathi who sat now in the heart of her
power, in the very centre of Hagg Nar beneath its
sheltering, concealing mists, and watched blood spilt in her
name and Khaine’s.
And yet she was not content. Morathi was never content,
for always she was slighted – her Daughters were slighted –
by the more puritan of the Forces of Order.
‘It pleases me to report, though, that I found no base for
your fears among the sects you sent me to investigate,’
Filstag said, breaking into Morathi’s reverie.
 The High Oracle raised an eyebrow. ‘Really?’ she asked,
turning briefly to the melusai. ‘That surprises me. Perhaps
you are ill-equipped to ferret out treachery. Perhaps it was
going on beneath your very nose and you could not see it.
Still, tell me what you can of your travels and interactions of
the last months. I shall judge for myself their loyalty or
otherwise.’
The Grand Matriarch listened to Filstag’s steady, calm
breathing. Whatever she was or wasn’t, she did not anger
easily. Still, Morathi suspected that Filstag harboured oceans
of rage beneath that cold, inscrutable visage. Here in the
very heart of Hagg Nar, the melusai had dropped the illusion
that made her appear as other aelves. Her slender waist
thickened where her hips should be into a muscular tail of
emerald shading into midnight black and she swayed tall
upon her coils. Monstrous in Morathi’s own image, but
beautiful, too.
She was a Blood Sister, and she had been Morathi’s
bodyguard for decades, following her into battle and
assisting her in many rituals. And yet despite their history,
in the past few years the High Oracle of Khaine had begun
to doubt Filstag’s loyalty. It should be impossible, she knew,
for one of the Scathborn to betray her, for she had moulded
that aelf’s soul herself when it had been freed from the
curse of Slaanesh. Moulded it and given it life as a melusai,
armed with loyalty and bloodlust and the exquisite pain of
the Scath touch, and yet the more time that passed, the
more convinced she became.
Filstag was disloyal. Filstag was a traitor. She stank of it.
As head of the Cult of Khaine, Morathi did not need proof
to act upon her suspicions, but she was determined to
discover how far the rot spread. None of these thoughts
showed in the High Oracle’s perfect face as she looked back
down at the black sands and the combat reaching a frenzy
below. She slammed her spear into the stone again, and
more gates in the arena walls opened. Captured beastkin
lumbered forth, braying challenges, and the fighters who
seconds before had been duelling to first blood – and
occasionally to the death – united into a single cohesive
force against this new, true enemy.
The cheers from the crowd rose in pitch, shrill prayers to
Khaine for blood and victory piercing the cacophony.
‘The Realm of Life is particularly beset by enemies, First
Daughter,’ Filstag said without a hint of animosity about
Morathi’s opinion of her ability or otherwise to sniff out
treachery. ‘The Dark Gods have their claws deep in Ghyran’s
verdant hide, though both the Draichi Ganeth and the
Khailebron sects oppose them at every turn. The Draichi
Ganeth, in particular, have integrated themselves into most
of the major cities in order to learn whatever they can to aid
us in our great quest. Both sects are ever alert for a
disparaging word said against them or against you, First
Daughter, and retribution is ever swift and savage. They are
loyal,’ she said again, perhaps unwisely, perhaps a little too
forcefully.
Filstag paused, but Morathi gave her nothing, instead
perceiving her via her magic as she kept her face turned to
the slaughter in the arena below. One of the beastkin, a
giant wolf five times its normal size and with a slavering
muzzle over-full with yellowed, wickedly sharp teeth, had a
witch-aelf by the leg and was shaking her, blood and
gobbets of flesh flying. Her screams shamed her, and one of
her sisters waited until others had hacked into the wolf’s
hindquarters and distracted it, and then decapitated her as
she began to crawl away. The crowd yelled its disgust for
her cowardice and stones and rocks rained down on her
corpse from those sitting close enough.
‘I spent time with each sect, as commanded, observing
their structure and worship, their daily ritual combat and the
interactions and commands of their priestesses. The Ghyran
Khailebron take on such quieter tasks as their hag queen,
Belleth, commands,’ Filstag continued, and her tone now
was one of stilted disdain. Most of the Daughters of Khaine
shared her contempt for the Khailebron aelves, though
Morathi kept herself above such pettiness; her favouritism
extended to particular aelves, those who showed real
promise, not entire sects. The Khailebron spies and
assassins had many uses that those loyal to other splinters
of the Cult of Khaine could not fathom. Yet it pleased
Morathi to foster inter-sect competition. The more her
children fought each other, the less likely they were to unite
to fight her.
‘Their hag queen agrees to only those assignments that
will further our cause, First Daughter, and marches her war-
coven to battle when called upon and when prudent. All she
does is in your honour and that of our lord. Meanwhile, the
Draichi Ganeth hag queen in Ghyran has sent a coven to
Phoenicium to scour it for the Shards of almighty Khaine. It
is mainly a den of thieves and outcasts now, but they won’t
allow that to stop them, of course. They will take apart that
abandoned city stone by stone if they must.’
‘And have they found success?’ Morathi snapped, as fast
as a striking snake.
‘Not by the time I left, First Daughter, but they did
discover some artefacts and scrolls that may aid us in where
to search next. Again, I found nothing to fault in that coven
during the weeks of my stay with them. The Daughters in
the Realm of Life are unswerving in their devotion to you,
Grand Matriarch, and to Khaine himself.’
‘So you say.’ Morathi made no effort to melt the ice in her
tone. The melusai did not respond. ‘Next.’
‘Another coven of Draichi Ganeth that came to your
attention,’ Filstag continued smoothly, ‘those in the far
reaches of Ulgu. I spoke with their hag queen, Lilithan, and
observed their ritual combats and interactions. Their
temple’s work proceeds as expected. They provide
gladiatorial entertainment for a price, act as guards and foot
patrols on the borders with Chaos-held lands, and throw
themselves into glorious battle alongside our allies. Their
foes are numerous and sly, but your children neither fear
nor are fooled by them. A great victory was recently won by
the Daughters when they came to the aid of ten companies
of Freeguilders, who were caught between the enemy and a
swamp, and fell on the Nagashi undead like vengeance
itself, hacking them apart to sever the divine spark
animating their corpses. None survived and the Freeguilders
in question now offer us their full support. Hag Queen
Lilithan expects they will be vocal in their defence of us
among the Forces of Order from now on.’
All this, too, Morathi already knew, but she let Filstag
prattle on. As if the Daughters of Khaine required the
mewling voices of Freeguilders raised in their defence.
The last of the beastkin in the arena below were pulled
down and destroyed. The surviving Daughters raised
weapons and demanded the applause of their sisters in the
seats. Thousands of she-aelves surged to their feet to give
it, ululating triumph and bloodlust of their own. When the
gladiatrixes turned to her, she raised both fists in salute.
The cheering increased and the aelves on the sand stood
tall despite their injuries. In ones and twos they limped to
the exits, while leathanam raced into the arena with hooks
and chains to drag the dead monsters away. Others raked
over the bloody sand.
‘Those Draichi Ganeth have accepted fifty witch-aelves
who wish to be promoted into the Sisters of Slaughter,’ the
melusai went on, and that did interest Morathi. The Sisters
were counted among the most zealous of all Daughters of
Khaine, forever marring their beauty and risking their lives
in the initiation ritual that included living metal masks being
welded to their skin, destroying their faces forever and
killing many through blood loss in the process. The survivors
then underwent a series of gladiatorial contests, with only
the victors being welcomed into the elite ranks of the
Sisters of Slaughter.
 ‘I see Hag Queen Lilithan is most diligent in her
recruitment,’ Morathi said and Filstag swelled with pride as
if it was she the Grand Matriarch was praising. ‘Are there
any of special promise?’
‘Two, First Daughter. I have their names and histories
here,’ Filstag said, handing out a scroll. Morathi waved it
away. ‘I will see it is placed in your chambers.’
They were silent as the next group of warriors came into
the arena: khinerai lifetakers who swooped on their wide
pinions to take a perch on the tall slabs of rock dotted
around the sands. Their harsh calls echoed as the
spectators abruptly quieted. Into that silence came a series
of underground booms, as of something massive beyond
comprehension throwing itself against the very bones of the
earth. A huge gate beneath Morathi’s vantage point
rumbled open and onto the sand erupted a sunwyrm from
the Realm of Beasts.
The khinerai shrieked and leapt into flight, circling as the
enormous creature surged around the arena looking for
escape. Those aelves seated closest to the sand threw
stones to drive it back into the centre, though the missiles
had no effect on its thick, spiky hide. It coiled around one of
the pillars of rock pointing like an accusing finger at the sky,
and flexed. The stone cracked through its middle, the top
half tumbling to the sand. The khinerai attacked in flights of
three, arrowing out of the sky with their long spears
extended, rending the sunwyrm’s back and flinging
themselves upwards before it could rear and pluck them
from the air with its huge mouth lined with rings of serrated
teeth.
The crowd screamed its approval, thousands of fists and
feet drumming on the stone in rapture. Morathi permitted
herself a small smile. The games were good. Not just the
bloodshed, but the bloodlust wafting like incense from the
crowd; it came to her and nurtured her. She siphoned it out
of the air and funnelled it into Mathcoir without a soul
noticing. Not even Filstag. Its power danced across her
unblemished skin and brought a girlish flush of pink to the
tops of her sharp cheekbones.
They watched in silence as the khinerai battled the
sunwyrm, as its sudden lunges and twists caught more than
one unawares. Wings were shredded and spears lost in its
flesh, but for every injury it inflicted, they scored a dozen on
its great length. A trio of khinerai hovered and sent arrows
at its blunt head, shaft after shaft, to weaken it further. Their
actions were met with jeering scorn – to fight from a safe
distance was the mark of a coward – and as soon as their
quivers were empty, they threw aside their bows and dived
in formation, to close with the wyrm and win back honour in
the eyes of their sisters.
One landed for a few moments on its back to plunge her
spear into its spike-armoured hide. It bucked and threw her
aside, but the weapon had bitten deep and soon the sands
were wet with gore. The wyrm’s high-pitched keening
drowned out even the roar of the crowd.
Morathi spun her fingers through a complex web and then
gestured. A flash of crimson and the noise was suddenly
muffled, as if behind a screen, though they could still see
the proceedings.
‘And the Kharumathi?’ she asked, for Filstag was
mesmerised by the battle.
The melusai started. ‘Forgive me, First Daughter. Yes, the
Kharumathi. They remain… fractious, on the verge of self-
destruction. Though there is much internal strife, more than
I have seen before, it’s true, that doesn’t make them
inherently untrustworthy. While they battle for supremacy
among themselves, their devotion to you remains clear.
Those who fight to control the sect do so only in your name,
to your glory and almighty Khaine’s. Of that I am certain.’
‘You are certain, are you?’ Morathi snapped, and Filstag
shifted upon the coils of her tail. Its stinger rose and flexed
and then sank again.
 Morathi narrowed her eyes; was that insult? Or challenge?
Or merely an unconscious indication of inner turmoil?
‘Again, it is clear your ability to understand the politics
among the sects is lacking. I hope your skills as a warrior
have not become as poor.’
Filstag clenched her fists. ‘They have not, First Daughter,’
she said, anger clear in her icy voice.
‘What do you think will happen if the Kharumathi fall
apart?’ Morathi continued as if the Blood Sister hadn’t
spoken. ‘Will the other sects accept those Daughters into
their ranks, Daughters who let strife and arrogance destroy
their covens and who embraced a sect so clearly lacking in
cohesion that it tore itself apart?’
She paused and Filstag opened and then closed her
mouth, unsure whether the question was rhetorical.
‘Well?’ Morathi demanded, though her gaze was fixed on
the sunwyrm’s dying struggles. Even in its extremity it had
the ability to cause vast destruction – of the khinerai, of the
arena itself. Much like the Kharumathi themselves if their
infighting proceeded much longer.
‘I do not know, First Daughter,’ the melusai replied with
false humility.
‘No. You do not. Yet you stand there and tell me there is no
need for concern, that these aelves can be trusted. Trusted
to spread sedition through any Daughters they come into
contact with. Trusted to break away and form their own cult
of Khaine, leaching legitimacy and followers from us, the
war-god’s true worshippers and interpreters of his divine
will. Will their hag queen set herself up as my rival? Will
there be civil war among us once more?’
The melusai’s tail writhed in distress, but this time she did
not attempt an answer.
‘You observed their internal strife and did nothing to
combat it. You allowed it to proceed, unable to see the
dangers inherent in such surreptitious clawing for power. No,
I think you are good only for killing these days,’ she added,
the statement deliberately ambiguous.
Filstag summoned the last dregs of fire. ‘You asked me to
report on their loyalty,’ she tried, the dry rustling of her
scales on the stone loud in the muffled silence of Morathi’s
magic.
‘And you failed to do so,’ Morathi interrupted. ‘You
discover not the slightest whiff of corruption within covens
that I myself told you to investigate. Think you that I sent
you there idly, sister? For your health?’ she mocked.
The High Oracle stared down into the arena at the
carnage. The sunwyrm was a heap of foul-stinking flesh
cooling as blood and life left it. The khinerai circled,
screeching their victory, swooping low over the tiers of
seating to accept the applause from the watching aelves.
Morathi’s pinions, bladed and wrought of shadow-stuff,
stirred in time with their wingbeats and Filstag slithered a
little further away.
‘We aelves are the highest of the mortal races,’ Morathi
continued abruptly. ‘Your incompetence shames us all. We
are born with a single great, glorious purpose – to return
Khaine from destruction. My every effort is bent to that sole
task, and the majority of my children revel in their faith. And
yet there are always some who put personal glory and the
pursuit of power above the needs of the many and the
return of our lord. I sent you to seek them, the corrupted
and the greedy. You tell me they do not exist.’
She faced Filstag directly, so the melusai could not doubt
she was speaking about her.
‘Those aelves think they could secure Khaine’s return
better than I, as if they understand the first thing about the
complexity of the task. They think their devotion to be
somehow greater than my own, their sacrifices larger and of
more import than mine. Those aelves shame themselves –
and they shame Khaine.’
 Melusai Filstag sank to the stone, arms and face pressed
against its chill. ‘First Daughter, Grand Matriarch of the
Daughters of Khaine and High Oracle of the Lord of Murder,
forgive my failings. I will return at once to the sects and I
will not stop until I have uncovered the treachery at their
hearts. I will–’
‘Get up, sister.’ Morathi’s voice was suddenly as sweet as
honey, as warm as fire. Filstag choked off her apology and
dared to raise her face. The High Oracle smiled, putting all
the power of her centuries of seduction into it. ‘Get up,’ she
repeated softly. ‘I suspect everyone, these days. Each year
that passes without the discovery of another Shard of
Khaine tears at me. Perhaps it is as you say – you are rarely
wrong, after all.’
Filstag rose back up, uncertainty and pleasure warring on
her features. They watched the khinerai fly out of the arena.
The sunwyrm’s bloated, ruined body remained where they’d
cut it down; captive beastkin would be sent in to devour it
once the games concluded, so that they were strong and
quick opponents for the Daughters of Khaine to face. Before
then, those in the next contest would fight around, over and
even within its corpse if they had to.
‘Tell me of Hellebron and the latest plots she has cooked
up,’ Morathi said, and once again she slammed Heartrender
into the stone.
Hellebron, ruler of Har Ganeth and the Second Daughter
of Khaine, was the most senior hag queen in the hierarchy
behind Morathi herself. Their rivalry was bitter and centuries
old. Hellebron had thousands of aelves under her command
and constantly plotted to overthrow Morathi and steal the
Mathcoir from her. Ever they danced around each other,
manoeuvring for position, seeking a secret or piece of
information to give them the upper hand.
‘Is she still old and ugly?’ the High Oracle added, a small,
cruel smile playing across her beautiful mouth. Below them,
four gates opened and a hundred aelves flooded onto the
sands. They were all acolytes seeking promotion within their
respective sect. Each one sought space, trying to ensure
none could come at them from behind. A few scaled the
pillars; others put their backs to the dead sunwyrm.
Anticipation and suspicion flooded the arena. All eyes turned
to Morathi and she waited, holding them in the palm of her
hand, building the tension to breaking point, before a single
clap released them.
Howls rose from the spectators as well as the fighters, and
within seconds the clash of weapons added to the noise.
The duels would be fought to first blood this time around,
with those emerging unscathed proceeding to the next part
of their testing on the gore-soaked climb into the hierarchy
of the Khainites.
‘She is, First Daughter, and she will not be rejuvenated for
some months yet. She is bitter with it, and angry.’
‘Hellebron is always angry,’ Morathi said, waving her hand
in languid dismissal, though beneath her indifferent exterior,
the thought of the hag queen’s wizened features and
impotent fury were as intoxicating as blood. ‘I asked of her
plots. How does Har Ganeth seek to supplant Hagg Nar as
the founding temple of our religion this time?’
‘The spies we have sent into Naggaroth have not
returned, First Daughter. Or not returned with their sanity
intact, at least. They have no information worth the name.’
Morathi stood, taking Heartrender from where it leant
against her throne and pacing to the edge of the balcony to
watch a young aelf of the Kraith sect leap from the
sunwyrm’s back and throw herself onto her opponent. The
hag queens had dosed the acolytes with battle-rage elixir
and in this one, at least, it had overcome any sense of self-
preservation or the habits and grace of ritual combat. She
held her blade high to decapitate her enemy, but that
enemy, an initiate of the Khelt Nar, slipped sideways and
swung her own blade up in a diagonal slash. The Kraith
aelf’s arm and weapon both spun away across the black
sand and she fell screaming, writhing, her remaining hand
clutching at the stump of her arm as blood sprayed high into
the misty air.
There was a lull in the cheering before it returned twice as
loud, howls and screams of pleasure echoing back from the
bellies of the lightning-rent clouds above. The victorious
acolyte hesitated, torn between triumph and horror at her
actions. Morathi snarled – regret was not a fit emotion for
any Khainite. She flipped Heartrender in her hand, took aim,
and threw. The great spear punched the aelf of the Khelt
Nar off her feet and pinned her to the sunwyrm so that she
was impaled on its spikes as well as Morathi’s own weapon.
There was no lull this time; the sound built until it was ear-
splitting despite the muffling magic around the balcony. The
Daughters on the sand responded to it like music. The ritual
became a massacre as those who’d been eliminated by the
drawing of first blood hurled themselves back into the fray.
The Grand Matriarch watched it with a smile, her arms
folded. Let all the sects know who had ultimate control of
their numbers and how fast they progressed through the
ranks. Let them know that she watched. That she saw
everything.
When there were barely thirty survivors, Morathi clapped
her hands and a bolt of crimson lightning earthed itself in
the central, tallest pillar in the arena. The fighting came to a
shocked standstill and silence fell faster than a weakling
human to the dark temptations of Slaanesh.
The High Oracle drummed her fingers on the carved stone
of the railing. Her steel wings twitched and unfurled to their
fullest, extending to either side of the balcony and catching
and reflecting the lightning far above so that it flickered
across her features and the throne, outlining her in
radiance. When she had the attention of them all, she
stepped off the railing, her pinions cupping the air so that
she drifted like mist to the sand. She ripped Heartrender
from the dead aelf and then, very deliberately, licked the
young acolyte’s blood from the blade. She shivered at the
fizz of the dead aelf’s fervour, at the fierce, unyielding love
for Khaine that flavoured her heartblood.
Morathi beckoned, and the survivors ran to surround her,
standing in panting, awestruck silence to be this close to
their Grand Matriarch.
‘You fought well today. You fought for me and for Khaine.
Remember that. Remember you fight for me and for our lord
first, and your sects second. Khailebron or Kraith, Draichi
Ganeth or Khelt Nar, ultimately it doesn’t matter. You fight
against the Ruinous Powers, to defend the Mortal Realms
from Chaos and to restore almighty Khaine to us. Remember
that. Remember this moment – remember me – when you
are weary and doubt your path. Remember me when your
wounds pain and slow you and your bodies are crippled and
torn. Remember me when you face your foes in the battle
line, more monstrous than you could ever imagine.
Remember that true faith provides true strength,’ she said
and leapt into the air, her wings holding her aloft. She threw
Heartrender again, threw it with all her strength, and the
spear flew true into the tall central stone pillar. There was
an earth-shattering crack, and the pillar broke and slumped
into jagged pieces on the sands.
The only sound from the thousands of throats was a
collective intake of breath.
‘I am Morathi and I give you blood to honour Khaine. I give
you ritual to honour Khaine. I give you opportunity and
enemies and quests – to honour Khaine.’ She landed in their
midst again and beckoned; they leant forward, a collective
coming together.
‘Remember. Me.’
She leapt up a final time and opened her wings with a
crack that echoed across the arena, then flew back to her
balcony without a sound. The spell held, thousands of
aelves immobile, their breaths trapped in their chests. She
turned back to them and held out both arms to embrace
them all.
‘For Khaine!’ she screamed, and the words were howled
back at her with such wild devotion that it was a physical
force, as sensual as a lover’s touch.
Filstag, too, was trembling with passion when Morathi
returned to her throne.
‘So,’ the High Oracle said as if there had not been an
interruption, ‘you begin with tales of your failure among the
sects and now you have nothing but failure to report where
Hellebron is concerned. Correct?’
The change was so sudden that the melusai physically
recoiled and the tip of her tail twitched in agitation. She had
been forgiven; now she was not. It was too fast for her to
comprehend.
‘I-I will send more spies, First Daughter, and they will bring
back Hellebron’s agents and followers to interrogate. I swear
it.’
‘Be quiet,’ Morathi said. ‘I tire of your words. You bring me
no new information. You learn nothing on your travels to my
temples, despite me sending you there myself. More and
more I am convinced you waste my time.’
The urge to flick out a wing and open Filstag from tail to
throat was great, but she resisted. Filstag deserved so much
more than a quick death, and Morathi meant to see she got
it.
‘The primary bout begins soon,’ she said instead. ‘Watch.’
Again the arena fell into silence as the survivors made
their dazed exit, many stopping and looking back and up at
the balcony. Morathi had spoken to them. Morathi!
The leathanam dragged away the slain initiates and raked
the sands to make ready for the primary. Morathi could feel
the excited speculation among the audience. What form
would the bout of greatest honour take? Beastkin, a
sunwyrm, acolyte slaughter – how could the primary exceed
those that had gone before?
 Quietly, slowly, three aelves made their way onto the
black sand, their hair and bodies pale against its bloody
darkness. They wore minimal armour. One limped, a second
held one shoulder higher than the other, and the third
worked her jaw as though it pained her. She turned her head
and spat a mouthful of blood and saliva.
‘They have fought before, and often,’ the melusai
murmured, frowning as she looked down at the trio. ‘And
they have not been blessed with rejuvenation before this
contest.’
The question was there, hovering behind the statements,
begging to be answered. Morathi didn’t look at Filstag, and
neither did she answer, either the statement or the
question. The melusai would learn the meaning of it all soon
enough.
The High Oracle rose from her seat and the crowd became
still.
‘My daughters, and the Daughters of Khaine himself – all
you whose loyalty to our god knows no bounds, whose zeal
for slaughter and for victory cannot be dammed, whose skill
and ability turns the tide of every battle – I give you the
primary bout. Blood for the war-god! Death for his life!
Victory to ensure our enemies’ defeat! I give you Trisethni
the Unseen, of the Khailebron. I give you Nepenora, of the
Kharumathi. And Vahis, who hails from the Draichi Ganeth.’
There was the rustle of scales on stone from behind her,
but the melusai was silent.
‘You, my Daughters, have recently seen much combat.
Now you will see more – you fight for victory and for truth.
You fight for Khaine and for Order. You fight to the death,
with no quarter asked and no mercy given. “For the blood to
speak it must first flow”,’ Morathi called.
The opening lines of the Red Invocation rang around the
arena and the aelves gathered to bear witness chanted
them with her. ‘Ten cuts are better than one, save for the
deft slash that opens an artery. For almighty Khaine, let your
blade drink deeply, and often.’
Morathi paused, feeling the swell of power and devotion
beat against her skin like a lover’s hands. This was what she
had come to see – this blood, spilt for Khaine and for her,
spilt to see her plans brought one step closer, her power
forged one link at a time. She took a deep breath.
‘Begin!’
The three aelves began to circle as Morathi returned to
her throne. Filstag leant close.
‘These aelves, First Daughter – the primary is the bout of
greatest honour, yet you are punishing them? A fight to the
death for some crime?’
‘Not at all,’ Morathi said, eyes fixed on the sudden
eruption of battle below. ‘In fact, quite the opposite.’
‘Yet they fight already injured,’ the melusai tried,
confused. ‘The combat will be over quickly.’
Morathi’s mouth curved into a sensuous smile, drawing
Filstag to her like a moth to a flame, unwilling and helpless
and always off-balance. The lightning changes of mood
Morathi underwent were impossible to predict and behind
them all was her amusement at watching her underlings
scramble to keep up.
‘Oh no, there will be no swift end to the combat, not with
these three. Lean in close, my love. Let me tell you their
stories as they fight for glory. Let me tell who they are and
all they have accomplished in service of their covens and
the Lord of Battle.’ She pointed. ‘First, the Khailebron
assassin, Trisethni the Unseen. A most interesting story…’
TRISETHNI THE UNSEEN
ANNA STEPHENS
She was a witch-aelf of Khailebron, a Daughter of Khaine,
and she slid through the night like steel through velvet –
silent, lethal and true. The great fortress city of Greywater
Fastness was intermittently dark and subdued, though never
entirely, for even this late there was business to be done
and perimeters to be walked. The great forge complexes run
by the wealthiest duardin families operated day and night,
and now they lit up the heavy smoke hanging over the city,
casting a sulphurous yellow glow over rooftops and along
streets.
The air was acrid, heavy with soot and hot metal, rent by
the deep-throated scream-hisses of quenching steel. Yet
despite the Greycaps’ vigilance and the hellish glow from
the forges, no one saw the aelf pass, for she was Trisethni
the Unseen, and the title was no mere posturing.
Lord Rygo’s mansion sat high upon the central hill of the
city, where the breezes did much to carry the worst of the
smoke away. Here were situated the most expensive
properties in the Fastness, exclusively occupied by
merchant lords, nobles, and members of the Council of the
Forge or the Grand Conclave.
Trisethni’s disdain did not show on her cold, beautiful
features, though it burned hot within her. These people
worshipped glory and wealth, comfort and reputation, when
they should worship the gods who kept them safe from the
Forces of Chaos; the gods who blessed them with the
resources and knowledge needed to manufacture their
weapons and black powder. Instead, they were enamoured
of their own skill, blinded by greed and arrogance and the
bright flash of gold coins.
Footsteps sounded up ahead and the aelf stilled in a
shadow as black as spilt ink. Her silver-blonde hair was
muted with charcoal, her boots, trousers and tunic in shades
of grey and deep blue. She splayed a gloved hand across
her face to break up its outline lest forge-light or moonlight
should glint upon her. The sentries marched past, silent and
alert – but neither silent enough nor alert enough to spot
her. Trisethni watched them go, and then slipped back onto
the road and increased her pace. She didn’t have long.
The aelf didn’t like Greywater Fastness, hating its stink
and endless hammering, the black skies and black walls and
black rain that fell. But her soul and devotion were to
Khaine, to Morathi his First Daughter and the High Oracle,
and to her coven. She would endure the contempt of
Greywater Fastness’ other, lesser, races with the outward
inscrutability common to both her species and her religion.
The Khailebron sect of the Daughters of Khaine did not
have a home temple, preferring to wander the Mortal
Realms in response to the tides of war and fortune or the
dictates received from Morathi herself. For the duration of
this dictate, the Draichi Ganeth sect was hosting them in
their temple here in this smoking, desolate, dead place of
rock and metal.
She headed towards Rygo’s confection of a mansion for
the second time that night. The first had been with her
sisters, clad in armour beneath their cloaks to perform their
ritual blade-dances at the coming-of-age celebration of
Rygo’s son. Trisethni did not know why the boy was to be so
honoured with their presence, but it was not her place to
question the commands of Hag Queen Belleth. The war-
coven had attended and they had performed, their every
movement composed of death and grace and worship,
moving in step, matchless in their abilities – and they had
been insulted. Rather, Trisethni’s sister Itara had been
insulted when some stinking-drunk human had told her she
lacked the grace to blade-dance with the others. Itara had,
rightly and instantly, slaughtered the scum for his sacrilege.
Just the memory of it set Trisethni’s rage to burning anew,
hotter and brighter than the largest duardin forge, for an
insult to one member of the coven was an insult to all, and
by the time they had departed the panic-stricken mansion
and reached the temple, they were clamouring for
permission to return and wreak holy vengeance.
The insult would not have been borne by any of the
aelven races, let alone those who had pledged their lives to
Khaine, god of battle and Lord of Murder. Belleth had
listened to their complaints and shared their outrage. While
she did not at this time want outright war with the humans
of Greywater Fastness, she had sent Trisethni to be the
silent blade of justice, streaking through the night to carve
retribution from the bodies of the perpetrators.
Trisethni ground her teeth together at the blind arrogance
the surviving human guests had displayed in the aftermath
of Itara’s righteous slaying. Once the initial screaming and
running had faded, after the Greycaps arrived at a run and
looked at their opponents and wisely did nothing but form a
non-threatening line between the Daughters and the
humans, some of the guests had spoken eagerly from that
supposed safety. Their mouths uttered false solicitations,
their hands and eyes told the lie that they did not share the
dead man’s opinions of Itara – or indeed all the witch-aelves
who had done them the honour of performing – and all the
while they stank of unearned superiority and pitying
derision.
You are beneath us. You are savage. You are animals, their
smiles and hearts proclaimed, and not an aelf there did not
see past the lies to that inescapable truth.
As she sped through the night, it pleased Trisethni that
she would prove them right in one of their beliefs. The
Daughters of Khaine were savage, because life was savage
in the endless struggle against Chaos. And before the dawn
fought the forge-light for possession of the sky, Rygo and his
whelp would know just how savage existence could be. The
humans would need to invent a new word for what she
would do to them.
Trisethni’s saliva was coppery with the need for blood. I
am the blade of my sisters’ just vengeance. My retaliation
on their behalf shall not be swift, though it shall be brutal. It
shall last for hours. And all humans will be reminded that
the Daughters of Khaine are true servants of justice, and of
blood.
The aelf ran the last mile over the rooftops of the houses
ascending the soft curves of the hill, springing from gable to
eave to ornamental tree until she reached the crest and the
largest, grandest buildings, each set back behind its own
protective wall. Trisethni had memorised the layout of
Rygo’s gardens – a wonder in the stone, smoke and metal of
Greywater Fastness and its bleak, uninhabitable surrounds –
and the approaches to the main house, as well as the three
large rooms she and the rest of the blade-dancers had been
permitted to enter. Permitted. As if they were a troupe of
common mummers. But she was deep into the
concentration required for her mission now, and the thought
– the outrage – skated over its surface without leaving a
mark.
There were house guards patrolling the base of the wall
and none of the trees were within jumping distance – she’d
have to cross open ground to reach the little orchard.
Trisethni waited until the pair of guards had vanished into
the gloom and then leapt from the top of the wall, covering
ten feet and rolling once to take the impact out of her
landing, and sprinted into the shadows. Her keen ears told
her she remained unnoticed.
From there it was two hundred paces to the house, eighty
of them within the trees. Once she was on the lawns and
among the flower beds, there would be little cover, but it
didn’t matter. Though the humans found it more comforting
to think of them only as blade-dancers or pit-fighters – little
more than brutal savages who fought for the Forces of Order
– the truth was that the Khailebron were the spies,
saboteurs and assassins of the Daughters of Khaine.
Concealment and subterfuge, the blackened blade in the
night or the slip of poison into a cup, were their tools in
trade. A hundred feet of open garden was no obstacle to
Trisethni the Unseen.
Grinning at the ease of outwitting the dull-sighted human
guards, the aelf sped light-footed across the grass, using the
low shrubs as cover, and flung a grappling hook from thirty
feet out. The hook, muffled in black cloth, flew long and high
and true, wrapping around a second-floor balcony
balustrade with a muted clatter. Trisethni didn’t wait to see
if anyone was alerted by the noise; she swarmed up the
rope and over the balcony, drawing it up after her, and lay
pressed against the smooth, cool stone until she was sure
she was undetected. Two more guards patrolled by below
her and she caught a glimpse of their grey hats – Rygo was
spooked and had supplemented his private guard with
others. Just how she liked it.
Trisethni packed the hook back into the small bag she
carried across her back and pulled out a stiff loop of wire
and a blackened, narrow blade. She worked the blade in
between the window frame and the lock, pushing to create a
small gap, then fed the wire through and felt around until it
hooked the latch. A twist and a quick upward jerk with the
loop, and it slipped free. She stepped into the house as soft
as liquid shadow.
Humans were so trusting. Give them high walls and
enough weapons and night-blind guards and they
considered themselves impervious to retribution. Trisethni’s
lesson would be for more than just Rygo and his mewling
pup; it would be for them all. The whole of the Fastness. The
whole of Ghyran. The Daughters of Khaine fought for Order
and for Light, and there wasn’t a human whose opinion
meant anything to them. This house’s fate would ensure no
one ever forgot that again.
The mansion was sprawling and opulent, as befitted a
member of the Grand Conclave. Wealth oozed from the
walls, displays so ostentatious they became tasteless. So
rich they looked cheap. The heavy carpeting silenced
Trisethni’s footfalls, but would also deaden those of any
guards; she proceeded cautiously but fast, gliding along the
corridor. It was lined with rooms, many with the door closed
and the distinctive sounds of breathing emanating from
within.
Rygo’s party guests inhabited these rooms, guests who
had stood by and let Itara be abused. If there’d been more
time, she would have chased them down one at a time or in
groups, spilling blood for Khaine, but tonight it was Rygo as
host and his son as guest of honour who deserved the full
measure of her fury. The rest would benefit from mercy they
had no right to expect.
Trisethni pulled a mask from her bag and tied it tightly
over her nose and mouth, then took a paper packet from a
pouch. One by one, she opened the doors and ghosted into
the rooms, using a long feather to waft the powder coating
the paper over the slumbering occupants before stealing
back out and shutting the doors. No one in this house would
wake at Rygo’s screams. No one in this house would ever
wake again.
In the name of almighty Khaine, in honour of his prowess
and his subtle arm, I dedicate these deaths. May he look on
me with favour, though these endings draw no blood in his
name.
That is still to come, she added to herself with a toothy
smile as she removed the mask. Anticipation stroked its
fingers across her scalp and began to whisper in her veins
as she padded up the stairs to the third floor, where the
private suites were located.
 She left the tainted mask, the feather and the empty
paper on a small table in an alcove, arranged beside a large,
gold-painted vase. The mask’s silk was painted with the
Khailebron sigil, but Trisethni placed it face down so it
couldn’t be seen without being handled. She smiled again,
wondering who would turn it over when the house’s fate
was discovered – and if they would live long enough to
identify the Cult of Khaine as the bringers of justice to this
house.
There would be sentries stationed throughout the lower
levels of the house to guard against intrusion. Trisethni
didn’t know how many, but she knew they’d come at the
first sounds of fighting or the first screams. Another slow
smile stole across her face.
Crouching at the top of the stairs, the corridor sweeping
away to her left and right, she scanned the darkness. Rygo
and his son, Rygel – how original – would have the entire
third floor to themselves; Rygo’s wife had died two years
before. Each man had a guard stationed outside their door
and the soft tramp of feet indicated at least one more
walking another, unseen corridor or room. Guards
downstairs she’d expected – it was why she’d entered the
mansion through the second floor. For Rygo to have or need
guards on the private floor spoke of paranoia in excess of
what she’d expect even for a lord.
He knows the insult given to my sister. He is expecting
me, perhaps.
Reaching into her bag, the aelf retrieved a different
packet. She didn’t need a mask this time. The tiny black
spheres shifted against the paper and Trisethni tipped them
into her hands. Rising fluidly, she called out: ‘What? Who
are you?’
The guards’ attention snapped towards her. ‘What?’ one
responded in dumb incomprehension. ‘Who are you?’
‘How dare you enter the lord’s house uninvited,’ Trisethni
growled. Confused but obeying their training, the guards
trotted towards her from either end of the corridor, pulling
short swords as they came. As soon as they were in reach,
she threw the spheres. Warmed by her body heat through
the gloves, the sudden cooling as they sped through the air
caused them to pop, releasing the gas inside.
Trisethni back-flipped down the stairs to the landing, well
below the reach of the coiling fumes. Coughing, spluttering
and then the snarling of rage drifted down to her, and after
a count of ten she sauntered back up. The guards lunged at
her and the aelf held up her hands. ‘You will do as I
command,’ she said softly, and they halted. She gestured at
their uniforms. ‘Kill all those dressed as you are dressed,
and those wearing grey hats who patrol the grounds, but
quietly, that you might take them all. Let none come up to
the third floor. Go.’
They passed her in a silent rush, teeth bared and eyes
black with compulsion. Dressed as you are dressed. When
the last of the non-compelled guards were dead, they’d turn
on each other, unable to stop the need to kill. Waving her
arms to dissipate any last traces of the gas, Trisethni took
the left-hand corridor first. Time to see who slept where –
and who got to watch the other die.
It was the boy’s room. Rygel. Newly come of age. An adult
now, but one who would never get any older. He didn’t look
like an adult as he sprawled drooling among the silks and
quilts of his bed, though; he looked young. He looked
innocent. Almighty Khaine would be pleased to receive his
life in offering.
The assassin backed softly out of the room and left the
door ajar, then hurried along the corridor to Rygo’s suite.
She could just make out the sounds of combat from the
ground level, too quiet for human ears. Would the Greycaps
in the gardens be aware and, if so, would they come to the
guards’ aid or summon help first? It was an idle query;
Trisethni would slaughter any who tried to stop her. She slid
in through the door and leapt, lithe as a cat, onto Rygo’s
immense bed. The thump of her landing was enough to stir
him; the press of the sciansá at his throat enough to bring
him to full, icy-cold wakefulness. Trisethni crouched over
him like the avenging spirit of murder she was.
‘Let’s visit Rygel,’ she breathed.
‘Who – who are you?’ Rygo stuttered. ‘Guard!’
They waited for twenty heartbeats, Trisethni’s smile
growing in time with Rygo’s blanching. ‘Oh dear,’ she
lamented. ‘No help.’ She slid off the bed, keeping the blade
against his throat, and wrapped her hand around his arm,
dragging him to his feet. Rygo winced at the force of her
grip and then gasped as moonlight crossed her face.
‘Aelf,’ he hissed. ‘What is the meaning of this?’
‘I think you know, but I’ll tell you both in Rygel’s room. I
dislike having to repeat myself,’ she said, hauling him
towards the door. The man dug in his heels and resisted, so
Trisethni spun behind him with a blade-dancer’s grace and
her sciansá nicked at his flesh, drawing a crimson bead of
blood. ‘Walk. Walk or I take your fingers one by one.’
He balked again, just for a second, and then all the fight
went out of him in a rush. ‘Whoever’s paying you to do this,
whatever their price, I’ll double it,’ he babbled as she
marched him along the corridor towards Rygel’s room. She
said nothing. ‘Triple. I’ll triple it, I swear. In Sigmar’s name, I
swear it.’
He seemed suddenly to realise where they were going,
because he slowed and then fought them to a halt. Trisethni
let him, let the fear build. ‘Ten times,’ he said, his voice
hoarse. ‘Ten times whatever you’re being paid if you let me
and my boy go.’
She shoved him in the back, got him moving again, her
lips peeled back at his proximity to her. His body heat
passed through her clothes; his fear-sweat clogged her
nostrils.
‘Everything I have,’ he moaned.
‘Open the door.’
 ‘Please.’
Trisethni sighed, spun him so his back was to the door,
pressed his hand against the stone of the wall and severed
his little finger with the wicked, razor edge of her blade.
Rygo sucked in a breath to scream and she slapped her
hand over his mouth, turned the door handle and shoved
him backwards into the room. Only then did she let go and
the shriek she’d muffled found its way out.
Trisethni locked the door and pocketed the key. When she
turned back, Rygel was sitting up in bed, yelling in shock at
the sudden commotion. Humans. Always so loud, so
emotional.
Rygel fumbled with the lamp on his table and turned up
the flame. Rygo had his maimed hand clamped in the other
and held in front of his face. He was grey and still screaming
as he stared at the space where his finger should be; maybe
he’d never stop. Trisethni relished the screams of her foes,
but this one was simply embarrassing himself. She
brandished the sciansá; Rygo sucked in one last deep breath
and then closed his mouth. Sweat poured into his eyes and
his chin wobbled as he fought to master the pain.
‘I am Trisethni of the Khailebron war-coven. We did you
and your whelp the greatest honour of your miserable lives
earlier this night by performing our blade-dance for you. The
response of one of your guests was to insult my sister.’
Trisethni’s voice lowered into a growl and her fingers flexed
on the hilt of her sciansá. Outrage and fury built anew in her
breast. ‘You have no honour, and you sought to strip the
same from us to, what, make your own inadequacies seem
less? Believe me, in that you failed. You will pay for the
insult, and all in this stinking prison of a city will know the
Daughters’ honour is intact and untainted.’
‘I didn’t… the insult has been paid for,’ Rygo squeaked,
trembling all over. ‘The man is already dead!’
‘The man is, yes. But who encouraged him in his folly?
Who was the corpse’s friend?’ She didn’t bother making it
easy for him, knowing the moment of realisation would be
sweet. For her, at least.
Rygo frowned amid his sweating and bleating and
bleeding, but then horrified recognition dawned and, slowly,
he twisted towards the bed. Rygel was standing by its side
now.
‘You fool,’ his father breathed. ‘Tell me you didn’t. Tell me
you’re not so stupid.’ He was almost begging.
Rygel’s warm brown skin drained to grey. ‘I… it…’ he
stuttered, but no more.
Trisethni felt a blush of satisfaction and another rush of
justified anger. There was no battle-joy to sink into with this
assignment, but that was simply another sacrifice the witch-
aelves of Khailebron made for their god. Alone of the
Daughters of Khaine, when it was necessary they forewent
the wild blessings of bloodlust that united them with their
lord. To be the subtle arm and poisoned cup instead of the
frenzied, joyous killer was their pride and their curse both.
Rygo turned back and seized both her forearms in a grip
strong with desperation. Trisethni raised an eyebrow.
‘He’s a boy, just a boy, a stupid, snivelling wretch. He
didn’t know what he was doing. A foolish prank, honoured
Daughter. We will pay reparations to you, your sisters. Many
reparations. A donation to the cause of the Daughters of
Khaine, however much you ask. My son will make a public
apology–’
Trisethni twisted her arm free and whipped up her sciansá;
the point scored through his cheek and eyebrow, a thin red
line that an instant later began to gush with blood. Rygo
screamed and fell back, both hands clutching the new
wound. Rygel screamed too, and seized up the lamp and
threw it at the aelf.
Trisethni leapt towards the bed. The lamp smashed
against the door and spilt burning oil in a pool across the
wood and the rugs. Hissing in fury, she batted the boy aside
and ripped the silk hanging down from the wall. She threw
the material over the flames and stamped them out, her
rage hotter than the burning oil. The last thing she needed
was the house to burn down – no one would find her
message if the occupants were nothing but charred corpses.
By the time she turned back, Rygel had fled, leaving his
father coughing and bleeding on the floor. Human loyalty
left much to be desired.
Trisethni slammed the hilt of her blade into the side of
Rygo’s knee – he wouldn’t be running anywhere now – and
set out in pursuit of the boy. The suite was a warren of
rooms, at least a dozen, but no human had ever outrun an
aelf and this one wasn’t to be the first. She caught him by a
window and slammed his face into the wall next to it. He
crumpled, and Trisethni bound his hands with cord from her
pack, and dragged him back into the main bedroom.
Rygo was hammering on the scorched door and calling for
his guards, his injured leg stretched out before him.
‘Stop that,’ the aelf said. ‘They’re dead or dying – no one’s
coming for you. You’ve done this to yourselves. Arrogance
has blinded you to any consequences that don’t involve
increasing your wealth. Weapons and gold are your god and
guiding light. Neither will save you.’
The lord’s voice faltered when he saw Rygel, blood
streaming from a broken nose, dazed in Trisethni’s arms.
‘Please, not my boy,’ he whispered. ‘I beg you, in the name
of Khaine, not my boy.’
Trisethni became very still. ‘In the name of Khaine?’ she
asked, and her voice was death. ‘How dare you swear on my
god’s name when it was my people – his people – you so
insulted? How dare you sully his divinity with your mouth?
What know you of Khaine or the sufferings we endure to
restore him, what know you of our battles and struggles
against the forces of darkness and death? My god decrees
his Daughters are sacrosanct – now you use his name to
turn me from my righteous vengeance? Will you debase
your final moments of life with more dishonour, more
arrogance and manipulation, or will you find your courage
and accept your fate for what it is – both justice for your
crimes and a warning to others like you?’
‘I will, I will, but not Rygel. He’s a boy. Just a boy.’ Tears
mingled with the blood on his face and he held out two
hands and nine fingers in supplication.
Trisethni scoffed. ‘We danced at his coming of age
celebration this very night. We came here to honour your
son and you repaid us with insult. He repaid us with insult.
You say, and your custom says, that he is now a man. He
will suffer a man’s fate.’
‘I have wealth,’ Rygo tried again, forcing himself up the
wall, balancing on one leg. He hopped towards them and
the aelf tightened her grip on Rygel’s arm. They stank of
desperation and this blind repetition of bribery only
increased her disdain. They could not conceive of an
existence dedicated to a higher purpose, or that wealth was
not the ultimate goal for every living creature.
‘I have already said I don’t want your stinking human
riches,’ she snarled, and put the edge of her sciansá against
Rygel’s neck.
Rygo stopped, wobbling, pain creasing his bloody face. ‘I
have other things, other valuables not treasures,’ he
babbled. ‘I have a book! A secret book, a book that your
priestesses will want. I guarantee it.’
The assassin laughed, the sound sharp as a knife with
mockery. ‘Is there no end to your lies and bribes? Is there no
beginning to your honour? How such a one as you rose to
power is beyond me. There is no doubt it is the Daughters of
Khaine who stand between humanity and Chaos.’
‘He does have a book. A book of information,’ Rygel
ventured. Trisethni shook him into silence. She was growing
tired of the delay. This wasn’t noble, joyful combat to praise
her god; it was the messy necessity of slaughtering
diseased livestock.
 ‘This book will change everything you think you know
about your religion,’ Rygo said, and the claim was so bold
and delivered with such fervour that it gave Trisethni pause.
‘Is it about almighty Khaine?’ she asked, reluctance and
suspicion clouding her tone. It was most likely just another
delaying tactic; Rygo probably hoped his guards were on
their way. But if not, if she passed up this opportunity to
discover information vital to their cause… If it did exist, the
tome might give an insight into the possible locations of the
shards of her destroyed god. With such an artefact they
could restore him to life and power and together, in his
name, crush the Forces of Chaos forever.
‘Khaine? No,’ Rygo said, patting the door. ‘It’s in my room
– we must go and get it.’
‘Tell me what the book is or the boy dies screaming,’
Trisethni snarled and Rygo’s momentary bravado shrivelled
in the heat of her anger.
‘It contains secrets, many secrets, that Morathi wishes to
keep hidden,’ he said quickly and it was as if he’d thrown a
bucket of ice water over her. The aelf’s natural grace
deserted her for an instant and the sciansá cut Rygel’s neck
as her hand jerked. The boy, who’d been standing so still he
barely breathed, screeched and tried to squirm away. She
held him tighter.
‘I swear! I swear,’ his father shouted. ‘Don’t hurt him, I
swear it’s true. A book of secrets about Morathi herself. Let
him stay here – let him live – and I’ll give it to you.’
Trisethni had her orders, but Hag Queen Belleth couldn’t
have known about this. Would her instructions have been
different if she had? The assassin made her decision.
‘No, he comes with us. And if you’re lying, I will make you
watch while I peel off your son’s skin. Now – let’s go.’
‘A book, a book,’ he repeated, the only words he seemed
able to say in the extremity of his terror.
Trisethni unlocked the door and followed, dragging Rygel,
who was silent but for a high-pitched wheeze with every
inhalation. He walked as if half turned to stone, legs stiff and
gait jerky. She shoved him along. If the uninfected guards
had killed the two she’d compelled, they’d sweep the house
for more threats soon enough. ‘Hurry,’ she hissed and didn’t
need to expand on the threat. Whimpering, one hand on the
wall for balance, the lord limped on.
His suite, if anything, was even more luxurious than his
son’s. The trio shuffled past the bed and into a study: walls
lined with bookcases, a huge desk in the centre beneath a
wide window. A lamp stood on the desk and Rygo fumbled
with it until light flooded the room.
‘The book,’ Trisethni demanded, keen not to waste any
more time. She listened back to the suite’s entrance and
beyond to the stairs. So far it was still clear. Every room on
the second floor would need to be checked and the dead
and dying guests any surviving guards found would need
dealing with. It should slow them some more.
Rygo unlocked a desk drawer, removed a second key from
it, staggered to a bookshelf and pulled out a dozen books,
letting them fall. Behind them was a little door set into the
wall – a hiding-place.
The governor unlocked it and Trisethni tensed – there
might be a weapon in there. This was Greywater Fastness,
after all. She would not underestimate its many innovations
on the subject of weaponry and swift death. She tightened
her grip on Rygel and pulled him in front of her as a shield, a
blade in each hand now, the steel framing his throat. The
governor reached into the hole and dragged out armfuls of
papers; these, too, he let fall. His confidential documents
scattered like snow around his bare feet. He reached in
again and dragged out a large book bound in what looked
like troggoth-hide leather. Clutching it to his chest, he
shuffled around to face them.
‘It is yours in return for our lives,’ he tried.
‘Where did you get it?’ the aelf asked, ignoring his
bargaining.
 ‘Before settling here I was – I am – a merchant. Spent
years travelling Ghyran. Even took the Realmgate to
Azyrheim a couple of times. Over the years I collected much
– wealth, treasure, artefacts. This,’ he rubbed his non-
maimed hand over the cover lovingly, ‘this I… made.’
Trisethni blinked. ‘Made?’
‘Sometimes I was paid in information, not coin. Or old
objects – scrolls, books, tablets and statues. A few pieces
from the World-that-Was itself even, invaluable objects that
held many secrets. Some of those secrets related to
Morathi, some to other figures. I collated each into a book –
this is the Book of Morathi.’
Rygo paused and a calculating look stole briefly across his
sweating features. ‘When you and your blade-dancers came
to perform tonight, it was but a cover. Your high priestess
Belleth came here too, in secret, to inspect this book. It’s
why I wasn’t downstairs to curb my idiot son’s indiscretions.
The chaos after your sister killed my guest alerted us.
Belleth had been reading the book – she told me to keep it
safe and that she would soon need me to arrange for its
transport. Then she left and returned to the temple ahead of
you. Or so I presume.’
Trisethni’s grip on her blades tightened. ‘No,’ she said
softly and then shoved Rygel out of her path. ‘No. Belleth
would never trust such an object to a human. She would
have taken it herself, guarded it and made her way to Hagg
Nar with it. You lie.’
Rygo’s eyes widened. ‘I assure you I do not, Daughter of
Khaine. Belleth herself came here and told me to keep hold
of it until she was ready for it to be sent away. She did not
want it falling into the wrong hands.’
And now Belleth has sent me to kill them. Rygel had not
denied her accusation back when she’d first burst into his
bedroom with his father screaming and bleeding at her side;
the insult had indeed been given and Itara had reacted
appropriately. But that didn’t explain all. It didn’t explain
anywhere near enough.
Rygo, of course, knows the contents of the book. Who
knows how many others he may have shared it with, and
yet Belleth would have the book remain with him. Rygel too
confirmed its existence; how much of what it contains does
he know? Knowledge like that cannot be allowed to rest in
the hands of a human. It is direst folly.
She went suddenly cold. What if Rygo had turned to the
Dark Gods? What if he was a traitor, allied to those who
would see the destruction of the Daughters of Khaine? If this
book was meant for an agent of Chaos…
No. If Belleth suspected that, she would have told me to
retrieve the book or at the least to destroy it. None of this
makes sense. She didn’t tell me to collect a book; she didn’t
even mention one. But how is she going to get it back once
I’ve done my work here and the mansion becomes overrun
with Greycaps?
Trisethni’s mind was a whirl of confusion and indecision.
Neither emotion was familiar to her; both were unwelcome.
She couldn’t think of a situation in which leaving the book in
Rygo’s possession – and not only that, but dead Rygo’s
possession – was a good idea.
But then, I am not hag queen. Belleth knows what she is
about; she is privy to more knowledge than I. There will be a
reason she acts as she does. Have faith.
The assassin had done Belleth’s will for decades, ever
since her birth-mother had deemed her old enough to begin
her training, first in obedience and the lore of the
Khailebron, later in weapons and finally in those other,
quieter methods of destruction. Belleth had raised her,
taught her, confided in her and trained her. It was Belleth
who named her the Unseen; Belleth who guided Trisethni’s
career within the Khailebron. Her loyalty, her love, would
allow no suspicion and no disobedience.
 She sheathed one sciansá and held out her hand. ‘Give
me the book.’
‘Our lives?’ Rygo asked. ‘Our lives for this knowledge?’
Trisethni sighed, pulled Rygel against her with her free
hand and slit his throat with a swift, hard jerk of her blade.
Blood gouted like water from a burst pipe and the boy
gurgled, trying to scream. His bound hands scrabbled at his
neck, but there was no stemming the flow of life. He
collapsed as Rygo gave a hoarse, despairing cry and
launched himself at them both. He threw the book. Trisethni
plucked it from the air – it was heavier than she expected –
and then Rygo was past her, running for the exit without a
single thought for his twitching, dying offspring.
Humans.
There was no glory in this hunt – Trisethni’s mind was too
unsettled – but she chased him down the corridor towards
the staircase, running up the wall to fall on him from above
and spear him through the top of his shoulder with her
blade. Her body weight punched it deep inside, cleaving his
lung, stomach, intestines.
‘For the blood to speak it must first flow. Ten cuts are
better than one, save the deft slash that opens the artery.
For almighty Khaine, my blade drinks deep.’ The words of
the Red Invocation spilt from her lips as Rygo crumpled
beneath her.
He was still alive when Trisethni carved the Khailebron
sigil into his forehead and the palm of each hand for all to
see. ‘Those who find you will understand. They will know the
Daughters of Khaine preserve their honour. And they will
know you threatened it. No one will mourn such fools as
you,’ she promised him. The governor didn’t seem to care.
He died as she stood and retraced her steps, to mark Rygel
the same, though she would have preferred to do it while
the boy still lived. Still, appearances were important.
When it was done, Trisethni stood in the study and looked
at the book in her hands. Then, very carefully and without
opening it, she replaced it in its hiding place, piled the
papers back on top, locked it, and hid the little door behind
books again. Her hag queen had given her orders; her hag
queen had her reasons for not telling Trisethni to recover the
book, or even of its existence.
She put the key back in the drawer and left the suite,
drifted like smoke down the stairs to the second floor, and
slid back out through the window. She didn’t need the
grappling hook this time; she dangled by her hands and
then let go, landing with a soft thump she turned into a
tumble to absorb the impact.
As she crossed the gardens without challenge – all the
guards had been pulled inside by the sounds of fighting –
her awareness of the book’s existence tugged at her.
Resolutely, the aelf put it from her mind and sped back into
the night.

‘My queen, the task is complete and our sisters’ honour is

restored.’
Trisethni stood before the hag queen in the inner sanctum
of the temple deep in Greywater Fastness. Belleth was tall
and wrapped in shadow, her face distant and closed. Behind
her loomed the iron cauldron in which the Daughters bathed
to rejuvenate their bodies after battle. The cauldron that
went to war with them, dragged on a great chariot to aid the
hag queens in their magics. Before that cauldron, no
devotee of Khaine could lie. But why would they want to?
‘Rygo and his whelp are dead?’ Belleth asked softly.
‘They are, and every guest in the mansion with them. The
Khailebron sigil is carved into their flesh, and if any of the
guards survived the night, they will have only carnage to
speak of. It was good justice.’
Belleth was silent a long while and Trisethni stood within
it, feeling the sanctity of the temple soothe her troubled
thoughts like balm on a wound. ‘The house is intact?’
A tiny frown marred Trisethni’s smooth brow. ‘It is, my
queen. You gave me no orders to burn it. Should I have?’
‘No. It is fitting it remains untouched but for the bloodshed
within.’
Belleth fell silent again, and now not even the ancient
beauty of the temple could still the maelstrom of confusion
in Trisethni’s head.
‘You have done well. And Rygo… did he say anything
before he died?’
‘Yes, my queen.’ Trisethni’s palms began to sweat; this
didn’t feel right. ‘He told me of your meeting with him while
we were blade-dancing. He told me of the book’s existence
and how he had written it himself. He tried to use it to
barter for his life and his son’s. Promised the Daughters
anything and everything if he could but live.’
Belleth took three long strides forward and seized
Trisethni’s chin, forcing her to look up into her eyes. The hag
queen’s were dark with nameless emotion. ‘And did you?
Make any such bargain? Did you read the book?’
‘N-no, my queen!’ the aelf managed, bunching her fists to
keep from reaching for Belleth in turn and twist herself free.
Anxiety flared in her, fed by her sudden anger. Her body
tensed with the urge to fall into a fighting crouch, to snarl
her challenge and feel the comfortable worn leather hilts of
her blades in her calloused palms. She did none of these
things, for this was Belleth and the question was simple.
‘Of course not,’ she added when the hag queen did not
seem convinced. ‘I put it back from where he’d taken it and
left.’
‘Why?’ Belleth hissed and now danger flickered along
Trisethni’s nerve endings. What is this?
‘Because you had already seen it. You knew it was there
and you did not ask me to retrieve it, or do anything else.
Nor had you taken it from the house when you first saw it.
Rygo told me he was waiting to hear from you as to where
to send the book. Hagg Nar, of course. But I presumed you
had plans of your own for it that were none of my concern. If
I have done wrong, I beseech your forgiveness, my queen. I
followed the orders you gave me – perhaps I should have
thought for longer on the consequences but…’ She shifted
her weight back, just a little, and Belleth let go of her chin
so she could speak more freely. ‘But it seemed… it seemed
the sort of thing I should not carry alone through the streets
for fear of ambush. It seemed too precious an object. You
had not taken it from the house when a whole troop of
blade-dancers could have protected you and it as we
returned here. But you didn’t, so who am I to do what you
would not?’
Too late she realised that sounded like an insult, a
comment on Belleth’s actions – or lack of. The hag queen
scowled and death was in her eyes. Again, Trisethni resisted
the urge to reach for weapons. Combat was sacred, and
battles to the death between sisters were common, but this
was Belleth. Trisethni held her peace and swallowed more
anger, rubbing deliberately at the finger marks pressed into
the flesh of her face. To be treated so, in the temple itself,
under the very gaze of their god. As if she was nothing more
than a servant, a leathanam!
‘If you wish it, I will return immediately and retrieve the
book for you. I did not read it before – I will not read it now,
but bring it to you unopened. I swear it on my devotion to
Khaine.’ There was the faintest growl to her voice despite
her efforts, but if the hag queen noted it, she gave no sign.
Perhaps she approved.
‘He thought to set you against me,’ Belleth said instead.
‘Governor Rygo. He thought to seduce you with promises of
wealth and power to see whether you would allow him to
live. He failed. You did not.’
Trisethni’s eyes widened slightly and much of the tension
ran out of her shoulders. She let out a quiet breath, more
relieved than she expected at the hag queen’s sudden
softening towards her. ‘It was a test? You used a human to
test my loyalty?’ She didn’t know whether to be pleased at
passing the trial or insulted at the method.
‘I knew how he would react to his impending death,’
Belleth said and shrugged, flicking long black hair over her
shoulders. ‘I wanted to see how loyal you truly are after…
what happened between us ran its course. As for the book,
it is not as important as he believes it. There is little of real
import within its pages. Still, I will send someone to collect it
before dawn.’
‘I can–’ Trisethni began, for she knew the location of the
study. Even now, if any of the guards had lived, the alarm
would have been raised.
‘No,’ the hag queen interrupted her, the word harsh. Then
she softened and cupped Trisethni’s cheek in one long-
fingered hand. Heat blossomed within the aelf and before
she could stop herself, she pressed her face into that palm.
‘No. You passed my test and I did not set it idly. High Oracle
Morathi herself has informed me of an infestation in the
Realm of Shadow, an infestation she believes only a witch-
aelf of Khailebron has the necessary skills to eradicate. I
needed to know your mind and heart, and now I do. Of all of
our sisters here on Ghyran, and in light of your newly-
proven fidelity to our god and your coven, I select you for
this task. I select you to carry our name and glory into Ulgu
itself.’
Trisethni’s throat tightened until just breathing was an
effort. A task from Morathi herself? The chance to travel to
Ulgu and fight for Khaine on its sacred ground? A chance to
prove myself and my skills before all, before the First
Daughter? Passion rose in the assassin’s heart and twisted
her usually inscrutable features into wonder and humility.
She fell to her knees and pressed her fingertips to Belleth’s
bare feet.
‘I will do all the First Daughter and you command, my
queen. I will make you proud. I will make you love me
again.’
Belleth licked her lips but didn’t respond to the unspoken
plea that hovered like wings behind Trisethni’s last words.
Their ways had parted a year before, but still she felt
Belleth’s absence as she would a missing limb. The hag
queen took a decisive step back, leaving Trisethni on her
knees, her fingertips brushing only air and another crack
shivering through her heart.
‘The way will be long and dangerous, even before you
reach your destination,’ Belleth warned her. ‘You must take
the Ebonfire Gate – and you must live to reach it first.’
Trisethni swallowed her hurt, packing it down inside her
chest until it was a hard ball of ice, its edges smoothed so
they could no longer cut her. She rested her hands on her
thighs and schooled her face into a mask of impassivity. ‘I
offer my life and my skill to Khaine for his glory. If I die in the
attempt, I will die a warrior with blood on my blades and
Khaine’s name in my heart.’
A smile flickered across Belleth’s face, there and then
gone so fast she almost missed it. The ice unfurled a shard
and skewered Trisethni again. ‘Then, my favoured child of
Khaine, you will travel to the Ebonfire Gate and from there
take the shadowpaths through Ulgu to the Spyrglass
Warrens. That vast underground labyrinth of tunnels and
caves and bottomless pools has been infested by a trio of
daemonettes. They weave foul magic and seek to sever
Hagg Nar’s communications from the temples scattered
across the other realms. Who knows what other horrors they
have planned, or where they could strike next when their
hold on the Warrens is secure? If they are the frontrunners
of the forces of Slaanesh, the Shadow Realm could be facing
another war. You stand between them and their master’s
darkest desires. Go to the Warrens and kill them.’
Trisethni’s mask cracked and a rush of fear twisted her
features before she could suppress it. Daemonettes. The
courtiers to and torturers for the Dark Prince himself:
Slaanesh, the Lord of Pleasure. Morathi’s greatest and most
implacable enemy.
Belleth saw her doubt. ‘I have chosen you for this,’ she
reminded her. ‘I do not do that lightly.’
‘No, my queen,’ the assassin said and her usually liquid
voice rasped like a whetstone. ‘The task is great, but so too
will be the glory. To defeat the monsters of Slaanesh himself.
To rid Ulgu of their taint…’ she sucked in a deep breath. ‘Yes,
the glory will be great.’
‘And your name will be sung by the Khailebron,’ the hag
queen promised her. Again that smile, hotter than before
and loaded with memories of the past and, perhaps,
promises for the future. Trisethni took courage and heart
from it.
‘You know the daemonettes’ magic is in glamours and
auras,’ Belleth continued. ‘They will try to make you hate
yourself, doubt yourself. They will seduce you with stories of
the Dark Prince, of the delights inherent in submission to
him. They will promise you rewards larger than those Rygo
offered you. They will promise you immortality and eternal
youth, power beyond reckoning. Only because you passed
the test in Rygo’s household do I trust you to stand firm
against their temptations. You are Trisethni the Unseen for a
reason, and you will need to remain so to defeat this enemy.
Will you take on this task, for me? For the High Oracle and
almighty Khaine?’
Trisethni swallowed against the tightness of her throat and
rose fluidly to her feet. Slaanesh’s pleasure meant nothing
to her; the daemonettes would not win her so easily. Her
heart was Belleth’s; only the hag queen could command it.
‘With honour and devotion, I will exterminate these
monsters from the holy ground of Ulgu, my queen. I will not
return without victory. For you, for High Oracle Morathi and
for almighty Khaine.’
They shared a smile then, one heavy with the weight of a
different memory, a distant memory: the aftermath of
Trisethni’s first battle as a Daughter of Khaine when,
exultant and gore-streaked, exhausted and yet still filled
with bloodlust, she had found Belleth standing among the
corpses of the enemy, tears of joy carving lines through the
blood caking her face. She’d dedicated her victory to the
same trio that day, in thanks to Belleth for allowing her the
honour of battle, and the hag queen had danced with her,
there among the dead and the dying, and promised her
more glory than she could imagine.
Young as she was, Trisethni had known in that moment
that Belleth was the mentor and priestess she’d always
sought to guide her through the world and through the
connection she felt to Khaine and her destiny. Belleth would
never stifle her ambition or her talent; instead, she would
nurture both. And despite everything that had passed
between them and ended so badly, despite the hurt and the
blame they threw at each other’s feet, Belleth continued to
guide her, putting Khaine and the Daughters first as she had
always taught Trisethni to do.
And it had finally all led to this moment, this culmination
of it all. A task set by Morathi herself and for which Belleth
had chosen her from among all her sisters. Trisethni could
have forgiven her anything in that moment, seeing the
approval and faith in her face. The love.
But still excitement and caution warred in her belly.
Belleth’s trust in her was great, but the chances of failure
were equally large. Three daemonettes, wandering
somewhere below ground in the Spyrglass Warrens.
Daemonettes who had not fallen to the confusing mists of
Ulgu, who had not been stopped by Morathi’s magics or
other Daughters of Khaine.
She knew, even without Belleth’s warning, that this would
be her greatest challenge yet. Not just death, but dishonour
and the fouling of the Shadow Realm’s sacred ground by the
Forces of Chaos would result if she failed.
 Then I cannot fail. I must not fail. And by the love of
almighty Khaine and my hope for his return, I will not fail.
The prayer echoed inside the chambers of her heart and fed
it strength and determination.
‘The journey is long and will be fraught,’ Belleth warned
her again. ‘Take whatever supplies you need and set out no
later than dawn. Travel fast and light, let none turn you from
your path. And may almighty Khaine’s blessing speed your
blades as you drive them into our enemies’ hearts.’
Trisethni bowed to Belleth, almost overcome with emotion,
though all that showed on her face was fierce delight. She
strode from the temple, all weariness forgotten despite the
lateness of the hour. It will be different when I come back,
she promised Belleth and herself. Things will be as they
were between us, and I will stand high in the First
Daughter’s favour, my duty to her undeniable, my adoration
of Khaine writ in my flesh and my deeds for all the realms to
see.
Moving silently like smoke on a breeze, the aelf collected
trail rations from the kitchen and a blanket and fresh clothes
from her alcove in the sleeping hall. She padded to the herb
room and took an assortment of poisons, antidotes and
medicines, marking off the quantities in the ledger and
putting Belleth’s name down as authorisation. She didn’t
think the commonest poisons would work against
daemonettes, but she planned on taking anything that could
give her an advantage and besides, she would lose nothing
in the attempt. She was going to be facing three of them,
after all. Three.
Trisethni’s heart was thumping with nerves when she
wrapped herself in a dark cloak and pulled up the hood to
hide her restored silver-lit hair. Sciansá sheathed at each hip
and pack settled over her back, she paused to look back one
last time; perhaps Belleth would come to fare her well. No.
The temple steps were empty. Trisethni didn’t let herself be
hurt by it; she had a task and from now on it was all she
would think of. Silently, she slipped out of the temple
grounds and into the heart of Greywater Fastness.

As she moved through the blackened streets and into the

steelworks district with its blasts of superheated air and
blinding brightness from rivers of molten metal, the
enormity of the task before her grew in weight and
malevolence until it was a wave threatening to break over
her head, drowning her. She was a lone aelf, lacking even
the power to transform into a Medusa, and within months
she would be facing down three of Slaanesh’s favoured
torturers. Months during which they could familiarise
themselves with the Warrens, learning their every twist and
tunnel. Gaining every advantage against her.
Feverishly, Trisethni thought through the contents of her
pack again. What else might she need? What else could give
her an edge against her enemies? Should she go back and
take more poisons, some traps, one of the coven’s spell
scrolls to lend her strength or speed?
Panic threatened, and it took all her training and control to
push it away. She would not fail. She could not fail. Morathi
herself would know her name if – when – she was victorious.
And Belleth had trusted her with this task, so she would see
it done. No matter the cost.
Dawn was a purple promise on the edge of the sky as she
exited through a small land gate in the Fastness’ huge iron
wall. All the gates were heavily fortified and guarded, but
when she pushed back hood and cloak to reveal herself,
they let her through without comment. As she passed, she
heard one mutter: ‘She’ll run afoul of those accursed
Sylvaneth, most likely. Still, one less of her sort in the city
and I’ll sleep easier.’ There was a grating of ugly laughter
and the gate clanged shut behind her.
 ‘Humans,’ Trisethni sneered back at the sealed door, and
then drew cloak and hood and shadow and magic about
herself. Less visible than a gheist in the last of the darkness,
she left behind the endless, grinding industry and foul
smokes of Greywater Fastness and set out into the blasted
no-man’s-land of the Ghoul Mere, her easy loping stride
eating up the ground. She stayed far from the trade roads,
taking the most direct route across the mere to her distant
destination. Her magics would hide her from the gun
emplacements and spotters lining the wall; she didn’t trust
them to identify her as an ally.
As for the treelord known as Pale Oak and his band of
Sylvaneth who haunted the wastes, killing inhabitants of the
city and enemies of Chaos alike, she could do no more than
hope that the Daughters of Khaine’s well-known loathing for
the enemy would be enough to give them common cause
and see her safely through their territory, supposing they
did manage to penetrate her magics and intercept her.
Despite her focus on the task ahead of her, Trisethni’s
heart stuttered at the devastation wrought so long ago by
the duardin and humans, and though she knew it was the
result of defeating hordes of Chaos-tainted enemy, still the
dead land ate at her, its wrongness a prickling of her scalp.
Blasted tree stumps and thick roots told her how ancient the
woodland had been that had once stood here, bursting with
all the life that Ghyran had to offer. The desolation was all
the more sickening in light of the vibrancy that it replaced.
The woodland spirits’ fury was justified; in fact, she shared
it, for while the Forces of Order needed the majority of the
weapons produced in Greywater Fastness, surely this only
confirmed that some of them, their most despicable
inventions, should not be used. Those ones, it seemed to
her as she pulled her boots free of clinging, stinking mud,
did Nurgle’s work for him by turning a verdant forest into a
rotting, haunted hellscape.
 If even the Realm of Life cannot overcome the poisons left
by these weapons, then how can their use ever be
considered a victory? What have we gained but dead land?
There is no triumph in this, no matter how many of the
enemy were eradicated.
There are nobler routes to victory on the battlefield, yet
too many of our allies shy away from the purity that is
strength and skill and wit pitted against the foe, close
enough to smell their fear. Humans and duardin in
particular, always looking for the next weapon to put
distance between themselves and those they kill. Where is
the delight of battle, the thrill of the chase and leap and
slaughter? There is no ritual or glory in lighting a fuse from a
hundred paces away. No satisfaction can be had if you
cannot see the light die in your enemy’s face and feel the
warm spray of their blood across your cheek.
The aelf shook her head in pity at their stunted lives and
disgust at the destruction they had wrought here, in the
Realm of Life itself. She suspected Pale Oak would be
pleased to learn what she’d done to one of the lords of
Greywater Fastness and his many guests, if she did chance
to meet him out here in the bleak.

Trisethni stumbled as something rolled under her boot. She

splashed into the shallow edge of a mire, sending up a wave
of foul water – and flesh. Before she could even step out of
the pool, a tentacle, long as a vine but as thick as her wrist,
lashed up and wrapped her calf and thigh, serrated suckers
latching on and cleaving easily through the sturdy material
of her leggings before ripping into her flesh.
A second burst out of the water and flailed for her; the
aelf drew her sciansá and hacked it away, but didn’t draw
blood. Its hide was tough and rubbery, and though her
blades were wickedly sharp, they lacked a serrated edge
that would let her cut through the tentacle that crushed and
ate into her leg and the others writhing towards her.
Trisethni pulled hard, her empty hand grabbing a rotting
sapling and anchoring her partially on land as the creature
tugged in turn, its suckers chewing into flesh and muscle.
She stabbed and hacked again, rage and pain bursting into
a visceral need to kill. This time the sciansá scored a line in
the thick hide, but again it didn’t bleed or hinder the thing.
The tentacle tightened even further and Trisethni’s hand
slipped from the sapling’s slimy bark. Immediately she was
dragged a step forward, both feet in the murky water now
and a second tentacle coiling around her other boot.
‘Khaine!’ she screamed and sheathed the long blade in
favour of a simple hunting knife kept in the back of her belt
and a barbed, poisoned arrowhead from the quiver on her
back. The assassin stabbed and sawed at the tentacle until
it gouted green blood and writhed away from her. She
kicked free of the second tentacle and then the thing’s bulk
rose from the deeper part of the mire.
Trisethni dropped the arrow, pulled the longer blade and
leapt forward, jumping onto its back to avoid more
tentacles, each located near a gaping maw lined with
backward-facing teeth like a snake’s. She rode it as it
thrashed, sciansá plunged deep into its body to steady her
and knife stabbing between thick plates of horned
exoskeleton until its tentacles spasmed and tried to curl in
around its bulk.
Panting, elated, hot with rage and bloodlust, she pulled
her sciansá from the creature’s flank and stabbed it back in,
twice, three more times, until it fell back, bubbling a dying
shriek from its many mouths as it flopped and thrashed in
the fuming pool. Wincing, Trisethni drove the sciansá into it
one last time, to be sure, then ripped it free and vaulted
away, leaping a dozen feet to put her out of range of its
tentacles. Her injured leg flared with bright pain as she
landed, threatening to dump her back in the water. She
braced against the hurt and stood on the bank, weapons
ready and senses sharp, in case it made another attack or
its cries had attracted others like it.
The assassin was soaked in blood, her own and the
monster’s, as well as muddy water, by the time she was
convinced it was dead. She put an arrow in the nearest
gaping mouth, but the thing didn’t even twitch. She didn’t
know what it had once been, but Nurgle’s rot had warped
and twisted it by foul magics into something she’d never
seen before.
A sudden rustle of noise sent the assassin into a long,
graceful jump away from the water and towards the shelter
of a small stand of trees. Her injured leg buckled on impact
and she went to her knees, then threw herself into a forward
tumble to gain cover and protect her back so her next
attackers couldn’t come at her from behind.
By the time she came to her feet in the cluster of half-
dead, drooping trees, the wounds in her leg were burning
and she was already surrounded by Sylvaneth. Trisethni
blinked; how could she not have noticed them approach?
She felt a lurch of anxiety that had nothing to do with the
creature she’d just killed. She hesitated, forcing away pain
and then carefully sheathed knife and sciansá and held up
her green-bloodstained hands. Nothing had been able to
take her unawares since she began her training so long
before. She blinked sweat from her eyes.
‘I am Trisethni, witch-aelf of Khailebron and a Daughter of
Khaine. I have no quarrel with you, lords of the wild. I seek
only passage west through the mere.’
The Sylvaneth were silent, their branching forms and alien
faces making it impossible for her to gauge what they might
be thinking. She counted seven of them; if they were
hostile, she was in trouble, because the familiar symptoms
told her that the monster’s serrated suckers had carried a
venom and now it was burning its way through her body.
She could feel herself weakening, a clammy sweat breaking
out across the back of her neck. Nausea roiled in her gut.
‘I wish you good hunting, lords,’ she tried, and took a step
forward. Limbs and weapons stretched to bar her progress.
Trisethni licked her lips, thirst clawing at her throat.
Dizziness threatened. ‘Can I ask what that creature back
there was? Its venom works fast.’
There was a rustle of conversation at that and then one of
the spirits glided forwards. ‘You are hurt?’ it asked, in a
voice like dry leaf-litter.
The aelf indicated the oozing holes twining around her leg
like ivy. ‘I have a selection of antidotes, but I don’t know…
what…’ She blinked furiously, her tongue thick in her mouth,
breath whistling from a tightening throat. ‘I just… need–’
The wood spirit caught her as her legs buckled and sat her
down. ‘Your antidotes will do little,’ it said, ‘but I wonder why
I should help you, either. You stray through the remnants of
our land, far from the trade roads. You come from the
cursed city and its wilful, careless inhabitants, the
murderers of our home.’
‘I was not born there,’ Trisethni managed; the world was
spinning slowly and tongues of fire were burning in her leg
and licking up through the rest of her. There was a band of
iron tightening around her chest. ‘I had a job there. I
slaughtered one of their lords, his son and all his guests.
Killed for their… impropriety. What they did here, so long
ago, was not right. But I… must go. Important.’ She still
couldn’t read its expression. ‘Please.’
It was a word unfamiliar in the mouth of any Daughter of
Khaine, but it slipped from hers easily, greased with fear
and not a little shame. To have defeated the creature only to
be killed by its venom. To be helpless in front of the
Sylvaneth, who at any moment might consider her an
enemy. She scrabbled at the hilt of her sciansá, but her
fingers couldn’t close. She had begged. She had lost her
honour. It was only fitting she would not die with blade in
hand.
The spirit laid its woody fingers on Trisethni’s leg. Tiny
tendrils grew from the tips and snaked their way into the
tears in her thick leggings; she could feel them sliding
across her burning flesh. She gritted her teeth, groaning as
they jabbed into wound after wound. Her fingers dug into
the dirt and she glared at the Sylvaneth looming over her,
willing her tears not to fall, chanting prayers in her head to
prevent herself screaming as it killed her.
Slowly, as slowly as trees grow it seemed, the burning
began to fade and the sickness radiating through her began
to abate. She started to shake, darkness threatening at the
edges of her vision and chills racking her. And yet she lived.
The spirit pulled its hand away from her leg; the tendrils it
had exuded, like tiny roots, were black and pulsing. It
snapped them off one at a time and dropped them into a
small pouch. Then it stood.
‘You must sleep. Some of the injuries will need stitches.
The mere ends half a day’s journey that way. If you are
within its bounds by dusk tomorrow, I will put these back in
you and leave you to die. Only the Everqueen’s love of all
living things stays us, but even Alarielle’s mercy has its
limits.’
Trisethni blinked up at the Sylvaneth, almost too weak to
form words. ‘I praise the Everqueen’s mercy,’ she
whispered. ‘Almighty Khaine will favour you. And I thank
you. I will be gone well before tomorrow’s dusk.’
‘It was once a man, long ago,’ the spirit said, and Trisethni
frowned. It gestured. ‘The creature. It was turned by Nurgle
and sent here to plague us and infect others with its
sickness, as if humans had not already done enough
damage to our land. We thank you for its death.’
They didn’t wait for her to respond, and she wasn’t sure
what she could say anyway. They faded into the lowering
afternoon light and were quickly lost to view. Trisethni leant
her head back against the soft, rotting trunk of the tree and
closed her eyes. Pain washed through her, chased by cold
and thirst and discomfort. She ignored them all. She slept.
She’d slept through the last of the day and all of the night. It
was thirst that woke her, and the stiffness in her muscles.
Her leg burned with a fierce hurt, but a clean one. The tree-
spirit’s magic had drawn out the poisons even if it couldn’t
heal the wounds themselves.
Trisethni grunted as she levered herself to her feet. She
drank and then stitched those wounds that were too deep to
heal without help. She bandaged her leg and, teeth gritted,
pushed herself through a basic combat sequence, working
the kinks from her muscles and getting used to the
restricted mobility in her leg. There was still a long way to
go, not just through the Ghoul Mere but to the Ebonfire Gate
and from there to the Spyrglass Warrens; she needed to
know her limits.
Satisfied she could both run and fight as needed – a few
torn stitches could be mended; a torn-out throat could not –
the aelf settled her pack on her shoulders and began to limp
through the misty, blasted landscape. The Sylvaneth had
warned her to be out of their territory by dusk, and even if
Belleth hadn’t ordered her to travel quickly, she would have
obeyed their command. The bleak remains of the forest
unsettled her. She didn’t want to spend any more time here
than she had to.
The sun was at its height when the mere came to an end.
There wasn’t an obvious border, a line over which life once
again flourished. Rather, life began to creep into the mere.
Pools and swamps dried out and weeds and bushes
sprouted among the fallen carcasses of trees. The dead
silence was broken by more than just the whine of the wind
– birds began to sing and insects droned among the plants.
Soon there was more life than death, and then more and
more until it was as if the Ghoul Mere had never existed and
Trisethni again moved through the voracious plant life of
Ghyran. It lightened her heart and she realised then how
oppressive the silent threat of the mere had been and,
before that, the stinking sterility of Greywater Fastness. She
shook off the last clinging tendrils of depression and picked
up her pace, eating trail rations as she strode west, ever
west, towards the mountains and the hidden Ebonfire Gate.
Aelves were built for speed, and her years of martial
training and the battles she’d fought had hardened her to
privation and granted her endurance far beyond that of her
non-martial kin. Still, the knowledge of the miles she had
yet to cross and the precipices she would need to climb was
daunting. Even at her swift, ground-eating run, she was a
month’s travel from the gate, for the mountains were
treacherous and would slow her. A month of constant
wariness and solitude, of hard trail rations and cold camps,
even colder weather.
‘I offer my sufferings to Khaine, that he might know my
devotion,’ she muttered, and pushed herself faster, relishing
the tug and throb of the punctures in her leg. Reminders of
victory, not defeat. Of one less monster at the call of Chaos
masters. She’d move as fast as she could for as long as the
ground was flat enough. Once she was in the mountains,
she’d have to sacrifice speed for safety.

As the weeks passed, Trisethni skirted wide of four ranger

parties she spotted patrolling between Greywater Fastness
and the foothills. She had no need to be delayed and
distracted by their suspicion. A week into the forested hills
before the true mountains began, she fought a huge black
bear tainted by Nurgle’s rot, great weeping patches of raw
flesh among its thick fur, its eyes blind and drooling yellow
pus, but fast, so fast despite all that. Maddened, starving,
and driven by a need not solely its own to rend her flesh, it
homed in on her scent and the soft noises she made and
charged.
The aelf leapt up and back, somersaulting to a nearby tree
and swarming up it, then slashing down at the bear’s face
with her sciansá when it reared up on its hind legs.
The bear roared in pain and fury, long black claws swiping
so close to her legs that Trisethni was forced to leap over its
blind head out of the tree. She landed behind it and dealt it
two raking cuts across its back before it could turn, but its
thick fur and skin protected it. She needed to go for the
patches of rot gnawing on its hide if she was to deal it a
telling blow.
The aelf danced away from its slashing claws, then kicked
a stone away from her. The beast’s head tracked the sound
and she lunged at it, splitting open the raw flesh of its flank
with the razor edge of her blade. The bear squealed and
then bellowed rage, and Trisethni had to run clear, both
from the paws that could crush her skull and the hideous
flow of brownish, infected blood. The stink from its wound
brought bile to the back of her throat, while the sight of it,
roaring and bleeding and mad, pricked at her eyes with
unwilling pity.
The bear hadn’t been tempted by Nurgle or one of his
monstrous creations; it hadn’t chosen to give itself to Chaos
or evil or infection. It had been made this way simply to
hinder the Forces of Order and those travelling from the
Fastness into the mountains, to cause as much disruption
and anxiety as possible. It was just a bear, and a dying one
at that, maddened by its own hurts and the ones Trisethni
dealt it.
Death would be a mercy for it, and Trisethni set about
giving it that mercy with single-minded intensity. She lost
her grip on one sciansá when she had to dive out of the way
of a sudden charge and replaced it with her hunting knife,
hatching its forelegs, muzzle, thick neck and chest with
slices from the blades as she backed slowly away.
 The bear was wily and quick, despite the damage she’d
dealt it and its own infected flesh. Eventually she leapt into
another tree and peppered it with arrows from above,
aiming for the soft underbelly whenever it reared up to try
and reach her. It broke off or pulled out most of the shafts,
but then one went in low down in its gut and sank deep. The
bear’s bellow was tinged pink with blood, its breath vast and
rotten, enveloping her despite her perch high above it.
It staggered on its hind legs, tottering, and then dropped
onto all fours. Another bloody roar burst from its muzzle, but
now its head hung low and weary. Trisethni took aim and
dropped out of the tree onto its broad back, both hands
wrapped around the sciansá’s hilt and her bodyweight
adding to the force of the blow. She drove the blade deep
between its shoulders and down into its lung. It collapsed
beneath her, trying to roar its battle-fury one last time, but
the blade had stolen its breath along with its life.
Wanting only to hasten its end, the aelf twisted the blade
as she pulled it free, opening up more veins inside it. She
knelt by its side as it died, her silver-gilt hair dark with
sweat and dirt, her weapons sticky with poisoned blood and
the almost-healed wounds in her leg throbbing from the
exertion.
Trisethni stumbled away from the massive corpse,
wincing, and stared without seeing at the shattered ruin of
the glade, its saplings trampled and tree trunks scarred by
blades and claws. There was none of the battle-elation that
usually coursed through her veins, and though she muttered
the words of the Red Invocation, somehow this didn’t feel
like a victory.
‘What did that Sylvaneth do to me?’ she muttered softly.
Doubt plagued her: why hadn’t she revelled in this kill as
she did all others? Why hadn’t the thrill of combat lent
strength to her limbs and brought joy to her heart? Why
pity, instead of rage? Why sadness, instead of dark delight?
 Trisethni wiped sweat from her face and used a rag from
her mauled pack to clean her blades. ‘No. It’s nothing. I
have a mission from Belleth and the High Oracle. My
concern was for that, for bringing them victory. I allowed
that task to distract me from this one. The kill was just and
swift. Khaine will be pleased.’
She salvaged what she could from the scattered contents
of her pack and filled it back up, settling it on her shoulders.
She centred herself again, drawing close the threads of her
soul and the core of her power in the fight’s aftermath. She
cupped them within her, a shimmering crimson globe of
strength and magic and will that had no space for doubt or
anxiety, no room for distraction. She would need it all soon,
every scrap of determination, every breath of the faith that
beat so fiercely within her. Fighting the bear would be
nothing more than a pleasant memory when she was deep
within the Spyrglass Warrens.
Trisethni didn’t look at the bear’s corpse as she set off
west again, up into the mountains and towards the Ebonfire
Gate. She didn’t dare.

The aelf’s fingers teased at the pommels of her sciansá, but

she didn’t draw them from their sheaths. They were a mixed
mercenary company, some Freeguild soldiers and a few
duardin, and they had wounded with them. The assassin
would have skirted around the company, except they were
coming from the west and she needed to know the threats
that were awaiting her in those tree-clad hills and snow-
swept peaks.
She’d announced her presence loudly as she made her
way towards them, but they still had weapons trained on
her when she stepped into view. Hence her fingers tickling
at her blades.
 ‘May the Realm of Life grant you health and bounty,’ she
called, sweeping back the hood of her cloak to reveal her
aelven features. ‘And may almighty Khaine bless your
efforts against our enemies. I am Trisethni of the
Khailebron.’
A few faces twitched at that, as they realised what she
was. A heavyset woman with a scarred face stepped
forward. ‘What do you want?’ she asked gruffly. She didn’t
order her archers to lower their bows.
The duardin in the company clumped together as they
recognised her, muttering questions and theories they
thought she couldn’t hear. A Daughter of Khaine. Ruled by
bloodlust. A berserker in battle who’d as soon slaughter her
allies as her enemies in order to fulfil her profane oath to
the Lord of Murder. She drank blood and spitted infants over
fires, apparently. Captain should order the archers to loose.
Trisethni cocked her head as she faced them. Slowly she
drew her lips back from her teeth in something that
definitely wasn’t a smile. One duardin shoved himself
forward at that, but the others hauled him back, their gazes
flickering between her and the captain. She snorted gently.
Duardin were fierce allies in the battle line, but like so many
other races scattered across the Mortal Realms, they did not
understand aelven devotion, nor did they understand the
ways of Khaine. Even those men and women of other races
who requested the quiet aid of Trisethni and her sect did so
with distaste. Their political manoeuvring and greed might
necessitate the use of assassins every now and then, but
they didn’t like them, and they certainly didn’t honour them.
When the aelf looked back at the captain, she found her
with arched brow and folded arms. Trisethni dismissed the
duardin from her thoughts; they wouldn’t act without this
woman’s say so, no matter their prejudices. So it was this
woman she needed to deal with.
‘I travel to the west. You have injured fighters – news of
what befell you would aid my journey.’ Still no softening of
stance. ‘We all fight on the same side, captain,’ Trisethni
added. Some of us with more skill and dedication than
others, she added silently.
The Freeguilder eyed her for a few more seconds, and
then grunted again. ‘Brida Devholm, captain of Lady’s
Justice Freeguild company. Two days ago we ran into a large
party of beastkin. We fought and killed most of them, but
not all. Perhaps a hundred escaped. We lost them in the
storm and besides, we had our injured to tend to. We’ll send
out a heavier patrol once we get back to Greywater
Fastness.’
She paused to check her company, the action
unconscious, reflexive, assessing their readiness, their
positions, the tension in the bows still pointed at Trisethni.
She signalled and they lowered their weapons.
‘Anything we should know about between here and
there?’
‘I killed a rot-plagued bear some days back. I’d wondered
how it had got so close to civilisation without being dealt
with, but from what you say, it seems likely it got parted
from the force you encountered. Stick to the trade roads
through Ghoul Mere – there are things in the desolation you
don’t want to meet, especially with wounded slowing you
down. And the Sylvaneth are active.’
The captain started a little at that, and then nodded. ‘My
thanks and the Everqueen’s blessings go with you, aelf.’
‘May Khaine find you foes worthy of you, and lend you
strength in the killing of them,’ Trisethni replied. Devholm’s
mouth twisted a little, but she said nothing. Instead she
signalled, and the Freeguilders began slipping through the
forest again, parting like water around a stone and giving
Trisethni a wide berth.
‘If you stay on this trail, you’ll come across the
battleground, but there’s a fork about four hours’ march
from here, signalled by a small stone cairn. Take the right-
hand path and you’ll miss the carnage. It’ll add ten miles to
your journey but, unless those who escaped doubled back, it
should take you wide around where we last saw them.’
‘Thank you, Captain Devholm,’ Trisethni said. The woman
nodded again and backed away. She slung her shield over
her back before she turned it to the assassin and vanished
beneath the trees. Trisethni watched, still and silent, until
they were gone.
A hundred enemies between me and the Ebonfire Gate.
She showed her teeth again; it still wasn’t a smile. Belleth
told me it would be a challenge. I should have known she
didn’t just mean the daemonettes.
Checking the forest for danger, for patches of silence in
the birdsong that indicated a predator moving, feeling
outside of her skin with her senses in case she was watched
still, the assassin followed the faint trail the Freeguilders had
left into the west.
When she came to the fork in the path, she studied them
both. Devholm had no reason to lie to her, other than
Trisethni’s being a Daughter of Khaine. Her leg was almost
fully healed, but still, the thought of an additional ten miles
grated at her need to hurry. On the other hand, dying in a
mountain pass at the claws and fangs of beastkin, her body
never found, her fate never known by Belleth and – worse
than all that – her task for the First Daughter
unaccomplished, was far worse than weary feet.
‘If you lied to me, Brida Devholm of Lady’s Justice, I will
find you and kill you,’ Trisethni promised, and then she took
the right-hand path and broke into a light-footed run. She’d
cover the additional ten miles as fast as if she walked the
shorter path, she vowed, the pack bouncing on her
shoulders and her weapons bobbing on her hips.
As she ran, her keen eyes and ears quartered the trail
ahead and the trees to either side for any danger. The
Ebonfire Gate was another two weeks away at least, unless
storms or predators or enemies slowed her further. She
didn’t have time to hunt for food or for foes; instead, she’d
eat trail rations and avoid conflict, much as it rankled her
and went against everything she believed. But loyalty
meant following orders, not blindly seeking glory and the
fierce, red joy of combat. And loyalty and the sect’s rituals
circumscribed Trisethni’s every day, every decision, so that
if she was ever in doubt, she knew that to follow orders was
always the right decision.
The path wound higher up into hills that became
progressively less forested as she climbed. The soil thinned,
its skin peeling back to reveal the stone bones beneath. As
she came out onto a wide expanse of scree, the path
vanished. Trisethni scanned the ground and the trees dotted
on the other side. There. The resumption of the trail,
perhaps, or maybe just a rabbit run through the scrub,
disappearing into a crack in the rockface barring her way.
Either way, it was her only option.
The aelf set out across the loose scree, stepping sure-
footed across the shifting stones so they barely slithered
beneath her and no small stone avalanches clattered away
to betray her position. She reached the other side without
mishap and the gap revealed itself to be the resumption of
the path, though this time hemmed in between the broken
slabs of tumbled rock faces. The gap was narrow, even for
her slender frame, and the possibility of ambush was great.
An enemy could follow her in, or come at her from ahead or
above.
She hesitated in the mouth of the gap and then decided
against it. She backed out and looked up at the rocks to
either side. She chose the one that looked hardest to climb –
it was less likely that if there was an enemy waiting above,
they’d be guarding the most difficult route up.
Trisethni ran forward five steps and leapt, clearing six feet
and landing catlike on a tiny ledge barely wide enough for
her toes. Before she could tumble backwards, she stretched
and hooked her fingers onto another ledge and pulled
herself up. Her heavy pack tugged her backwards, inviting
gravity to drag her back to earth, but she declined, pressing
herself tight against the rock and traversing sideways like a
spider, before jumping up for another hold. She clung one-
handed, feet dangling free, hauled herself up higher,
planted a boot and eased herself up with infinite patience
until just her head and eyes cleared the top of the rocks.
The area above the trail was deserted.
A deep breath and a final shove, and Trisethni rolled onto
the top of the outcrop and up to her feet. The path was now
at the bottom of a shallow gorge; she could still follow it, but
she had room to run and fight and manoeuvre if she needed
to. Shaking the dirt off her palms, she set out again.
Dusk found her sheltering beneath a rock overhang with a
clear view downhill towards the treeline. The overhang was
deep enough that she could risk a small fire, one that
wouldn’t be seen from above, and she heated water in the
small tin dish she carried. She washed the grime of the
journey from her face and arms and hair, then peeled off her
leggings to check the wounds in her leg. They’d sealed up
well and did no more than ache after a long day’s march
now. They’d scarred, but only until her next rejuvenation.
Until then, they were a proud mark of survival.
Trisethni heated water over the fire and crumbled her
rations into it to make a thick broth, and then she practised
her blade-dance and sword drills, dedicating each move and
step and strike to her god and his First Daughter. There was
no blood spilt during this ritual, but the movements
themselves were sacred and the intention behind them was
one of worship as much as practice.
She used the ritual as a moving meditation, to once again
centre herself. Over the last days, she’d been so focused on
making progress across Ghyran, on not being tracked to the
Ebonfire Gate’s hidden location, that she’d almost forgotten
why she was travelling. Her every movement, her every
breath, should be dedicated to Khaine. Instead, she’d
passed hours running and daydreaming of the songs they’d
sing of her, Trisethni the Unseen and her single-handed
destruction of three daemonettes. Glory and progression
within the Khailebron sect had become the reward she
sought, when the only outcome she should crave and
dedicate her life to was Khaine’s return to the Mortal
Realms.
The admission caused a bloom of shame within her chest;
if Belleth knew the bent of her thoughts, she would never
have selected her for this task. Even after all these years of
service, Trisethni couldn’t ignore her own desire for power
and triumph.
The aelf threw herself back down next to her fire, sweat
misting her face. She unbuckled her sword belt and laid the
sciansá aside carefully. Rolling up her sleeve, she drew her
hunting knife instead. ‘Almighty Khaine, Father of War,
forgive the impropriety of my thoughts. My ambition is a
failing unless it is used in your regard. My pride has placed
itself between you and my task. With this, my blade, I cut it
away, that nothing stands between us.’
Trisethni drew the blade down the back of her forearm, a
long slice that gaped the flesh and instantly filled with ruby
blood that dripped onto the stone beneath her and then into
the fire as she held her arm above the flames, teeth gritted
at the heat boiling in the cut.
‘Each time I falter, lord, each time I picture my triumph
instead of yours, I will look at this scar and know that all I do
is in your service. Through Morathi your High Oracle I know
your will. Through my deeds I honour you – with my blades I
deliver to you the strength of your enemies on wings of
blood and screams.’
She pulled her arm back and sat looking at the oozing cut.
‘Forgive my failings, lord,’ she whispered, her aelven
reserve broken here in communion with her god so that she
had to press her lips together against the sob that
threatened in her chest. The bloodlust and elation of battle
had its opposite in this quiet opening of her soul to Khaine.
Here it was humility and fear of failure that dominated, a
desire to do better. To be better.
But even the strength of these emotions made her
anxious. Never had she heard Belleth talk of sobbing
through a communion. Was it another of Trisethni’s own
failings that she was so overcome when she opened herself
to her god? Or was it only a sign of the depth of her faith?
So many questions that the strictures and rules of the
Khailebron and the Daughters as a whole forbade.
Unquestioning obedience and the joy of combat, yes, those
she understood. But this… yearning, this longing for the
touch of Khaine upon her brow. Did they all feel so?
As ever, Trisethni received no answers to these questions,
questions that had plagued her all her life as she progressed
through the ranks of the cult.
She wrapped the wound in her forearm and ate her meal
in morose silence, holding her promise to her god close in
mind and heart. All she did was for him. All she was, was
what he made her. All she craved was his return. She turned
her mind from her own insignificant glory to the task ahead
– the long miles and the traverse of the Gate; the shifting,
treacherous shadowpaths she would take once in Ulgu; and
the coming conflict with the daemonettes.
Trisethni bound all her thoughts to victory – victory for
Morathi and for Khaine. She was but the blade while they
were the hands that wielded her. And like a blade, she had
but a single purpose: to make the blood flow.

Captain Devholm’s directions proved sound, and Trisethni

never ran across the remaining beastkin that had attacked
the Lady’s Justice Freeguilders. The rest of her journey was
uneventful, though hard. A storm blew in to the mountains
just as the last of the forest fell away below her, and she
was forced to shelter in little more than a scrape in the rock
for a day and a night until it passed, wrapped in her cloak
and all her spare clothing. When she emerged, the sun was
gone and winter had arrived, carrying snow in its teeth, its
breath laden with ice.
Through her magic, she sensed the distant pull of the gate
– or rather, the pull of Ulgu, the Shadow Realm and the seat
of Morathi’s power, leaking through it. It drew her
inexorably, like a lodestone to the north, so that despite the
hardships of the terrain and the snow drifts in the lee of
every outcrop, she could do nothing but increase her pace,
having to force herself to stop and rest each night to
replenish her strength.
When she rose at dawn, Trisethni knew instinctively that
this would be her last day in Ghyran. The shadows called
her, stronger than ever, and she could see the glittering of
the lake in the distance, a morning’s run, no further. She
shivered to think that she would be back in Ulgu after all
this time.
The witch-aelf had spent a decade there years before,
immersed in Khainite lore so that the weapon that she
already was against the Ruinous Powers could be honed to a
more lethal edge. There, the hag queens and slaughter
queens had tested her, physically, mentally and
emotionally, taking her to and past her breaking point again
and again until she learnt that there were no limits to
devotion, and that anything could be endured as long as the
love of Khaine burnt within her. The memories were
traumatic and triumphant in equal measure. She had lived
in Hagg Nar; she had worshipped at the great shrine in the
presence of the First Daughter herself; and she had been
broken and put back together in Morathi’s own image.
Stronger than before, with little mercy and less regret.
In the decades since, she had returned to Ulgu only four
times, on each occasion travelling to Hagg Nar itself. This
would be the first time since her final testing, so long ago,
that she would travel the shadowpaths alone, and to a
different destination in the Shadow Realm.
All she knew of the Spyrglass Warrens was their
approximate location and the particular shadow-sense of
them that Belleth had given her before she left, to enable
her to locate them during her journey. The Warrens were an
underground labyrinth formed in the Age of Chaos by who
knew what. They had never been completely mapped, for
they were far from Hagg Nar or any part of Ulgu useful to
Morathi. Trisethni was entering a region she knew almost
nothing about and to which she could expect no aid to come
should she need it.
As she ate cold trail rations and then moved through her
morning devotions, the solitude pricked at her, sharper than
she would have liked. It undermined both her courage and
her determination, and she chanted prayers as she
practised her drills, letting the rapture of movement and the
flash of winter sunlight on steel steady her nerves. She was
strong, she was fast, and she had Belleth’s faith and
Morathi’s command nestling in her heart. Over all, draped
like a great warm blanket, was her love of Khaine.
Wrapped in its cocooning strength, Trisethni left her cold
camp behind and broke into her easy, loping run towards
the lake, her legs and lungs strong, her body eager. Towards
the Ebonfire Gate and Ulgu. Towards her prey, which would
fall beneath her sciansá.
For Belleth. For Khaine and Morathi.
For glory.
The lake glittered blue as sapphire beneath a pale winter
sky. There was little snow within the bowl in the mountains
that held it, nothing to detract from its stark, cold beauty.
When Trisethni reached it, she had to pause just to marvel
at it. Despite having seen the lake before, the place didn’t
fail to exact its toll in awe. She stood on the shore, the reeds
slashing upright against the ripples of wind caressing the
surface of the lake, the geometry pleasing to her eye.
Slowly, as if in a trance, the aelf began to strip, the cold
biting at her exposed flesh and whipping her hair into a
silver corona about her head and shoulders and back.
She folded everything, even her boots, into her pack, the
sharp gravel of the shoreline digging into the soles of her
bare feet. ‘Morathi, High Oracle, this is Khaine’s will through
you. Guide my steps. Belleth, my queen, I will not disappoint
you again.’
She held the pack above her head and walked into the
water. Shudders ran through her at its icy touch as it crept
over her feet, up her calves and thighs, over her hips and
stomach, up her ribs. Her feet lost contact with the bottom
and then found it again and she stumbled on, teeth
chattering despite the clenching of her jaw, water lapping
up to her chin now.
Eventually it became too deep and she rolled onto her
back, pack held up above her chest, and kicked on, glancing
up and back every so often until the island came into view.
She’d drifted too far to the left and had to correct course,
adding more freezing minutes to the swim, but finally,
finally, she reached it, turning back over and finding the
lake bottom once more beneath her feet.
Trisethni stumbled up and out onto the tiny island, little
more than a huddle of stunted trees and a few bushes. Birds
nested there, but there was no other life – it was too far
from shore. The aelf ripped open her pack and used her
dirty shirt to scrub the water from her limbs, shivering
continually and stamping from one foot to the other. Then
she dressed and pulled her cloak on and tight around her,
hood up to conserve what little body heat she had left.
The urge to kindle a roaring fire and thaw out her frozen
limbs was strong, but now that she was here, Ulgu’s pull
was undeniable. She’d make a fire on the other side of the
Realmgate, rest and eat and regain warmth and strength
there. For now, she just wanted – needed – to cross.
 Pack settled once more on her shoulders, Trisethni wove
through the small copse of trees deep into its heart, where a
cairn of black stones, out of place in this part of the
mountains, sat waiting. She threw herself onto her knees at
their base and pulled ironoak and heartwood from her pack,
tiny splinters of wood she built into a pyramid. Next she
took wool, silk and leather, and placed them carefully
around the edges. Finally, she cut her finger and let three
drops of blood fall onto her flint, then struck her knife
against it.
The blood and the poor kindling shouldn’t have taken a
spark, let alone a fire, but black flames raced up the tiny
pile of fuel and from there leapt greedily to the blackened
cairn. Trisethni sheathed her knife and stood. The flames
were cold, doing nothing to leaven the ice in her veins, but
she ignored it now. Ignored everything but the black fire.
Waiting.
There was an instant where the flames parted and behind
them wasn’t the stone of the cairn but… space. A place.
Another realm. It lasted less time than it took the aelf to
draw in a breath, but when it appeared, she was ready. She
closed her eyes against the evidence that told her she was
running at a burning pile of stones and leapt forward. She
met no resistance, nothing but a heartbeat of even deeper
cold, a cold so intense it froze the breath in her lungs, the
moisture in her eyes, the blood in her veins.
And then she was through. Through the Ebonfire, through
the Realmgate. She was in Ulgu. She was home.
Trisethni stood on the other side of the gate, a matching
cairn of stones similar to the one on Ghyran, though this one
didn’t burn. It didn’t need to now that she’d passed through
it. The sky was blackened with clouds and mists, the
landscape one of rocky outcrops and dark soil. Black-leaved
bushes and trees of bone-white and charcoal spread before
her, a deep forest in which animals moved, predator and
prey in the ancient dance. She saw nothing of them; either
they were well camouflaged or they were made of spirit and
shadow only, invisible until the moment they struck.
It was warmer than the mountains of Ghyran. Cloying
fingers of mist drifted close and wrapped around Trisethni’s
limbs, investigating her. Was she friend or foe? Did she
belong here or was she, like Slaanesh’s minions, an intruder
to be hounded and attacked? The aelf spread her arms wide
and let the mists do their work, filling her heart and lungs
with the moist air of Ulgu. The deathly cold of the lake was a
distant memory; Trisethni didn’t need a fire. She didn’t need
rest or warmth. Ulgu’s strength filled her, flaring deep inside
and sparking a fierce battlelust that could not be denied.
She would go now.
The mists touched the magic at her core and found it to
be good. She reached after one coiling tendril as it began to
retreat, satisfied with who she was, and wrapped it around
her fingers; drew it softly back so that it smoked up her arm.
Letting a trickle of magic run into her fingertips, she
moulded the mist into shadow, drawing more to herself,
spinning it into a cocoon, wrapping it around her like a
cloak.
When she was the small point of light at the centre of the
shadow, Trisethni flicked her fingers, chanting the words
that opened the way onto the shadowpath. And there it was,
stretching away before her into darkness. A path of ebony,
walled with shifting, swirling mists laced through with
crimson flashes of magic.
‘The Spyrglass Warrens,’ Trisethni said, holding the image
of them in her mind that Belleth had shown her. She
stepped forward, hands still weaving complex patterns, and
the shadowpath took her. It felt she walked only a few
hundred steps, but she knew each one took her miles.
She was nearing the end of the journey when the magic
around her crackled and changed. The deep blood-crimson
colour of it curdled and darkened, sparking against her skin
like acid so that she cried out at the unexpected pain of it.
Something was very wrong and her fingers wove faster as
she visualised an exit to the shadowpath.
Instead of slowing and parting, the shadows coiled thicker
and faster, the magic edged with purple and gangrenous
green. Trisethni stopped walking, concentrating on ending
the spell, but she was dimly aware of the landscape still
speeding past her – she was still moving, still being drawn
along the path to the Spyrglass Warrens. To the
daemonettes.
The aelf stopped the weaving of her fingers entirely,
despite the risk that releasing her grip on her magic and
Ulgu’s could tear her apart. Instead she reached for her
sciansá, and had barely drawn the blades when the path
ended and spat her out – into utter blackness.
Not the perpetual soothing twilight of Ulgu but true
darkness that not even aelven eyes could penetrate.
Trisethni’s breathing echoed harshly off stone. Blindly she
thrust out both blades, one ahead and one behind; the latter
screeched off stone and she stepped backwards until her
pack rested against it. At least nothing could come at her
from behind.
They’d brought her here. She was inside the Spyrglass
Warrens and the daemonettes had corrupted the magic of
the shadowpaths to bring her into the depths instead of her
intended destination on the surface. Were all the paths thus
infected, or just the one that led to the Warrens, a
precaution taken by the daemonettes to disorient their
enemies?
Irrelevant to my purpose. There’s nothing I can do about it
even if they are, not until I get out of here. She tucked the
worry away to reconsider once she had victory.
The specific place within the Warrens they’d brought her
to would be to their advantage, not hers, so Trisethni began
to move, stepping as lightly as she could, wincing every
time her boot scuffed over a rock or rise in the tunnel. She
folded her right arm, bringing her weapon across her body
and using her elbow to stay in contact with the wall she
couldn’t see. She was painfully aware that she could be
walking towards a trap, or towards the daemonettes
themselves. But she had to choose a direction and she had
to put distance between herself and the corrupted
shadowpath’s terminus.
The tunnel curved slightly, almost imperceptible except
that Trisethni was straining every sense to pick up any
information she could. It angled downwards, too, and she
realised she was travelling deeper into the Warrens and
likely further from any of the exits.
Without warning, the echo of her breathing changed and a
chill kissed her exposed face. She halted and then probed
carefully at the ground, first with her boot and then the
reach of her sciansá. The tunnel floor vanished beneath her
touch. Blind and groping, Trisethni moved her blade back to
solid ground and walked it left and then right. Was that a
ledge around the hole?
A sudden skittering from far behind her and she jumped,
cold sweat prickling across her back. The urge to step
forward increased again. It probably wasn’t very wide; she
could jump it, she was sure.
The aelf was so sure that she was in the act of sheathing
her blades to do it when she paused. She didn’t know; there
was no possible way she could know how wide the hole was,
or how deep if she fell into it. Why was she so convinced
that jumping was the best option?
Because I’m already under their glamour.
The cold sweat that should have warned her returned,
accompanied by a prickling of awareness – Trisethni was
being watched. Something wanted her to jump and miss, to
fall into the hole. Something was in the hole, waiting to
catch her or simply slaughter her when she landed,
screaming. She knew it as surely as she knew where her
body was in space, though she couldn’t see it or the
environment around her.
 The skittering from behind her this time was closer – much
closer. Trisethni smiled without humour. So they were
herding her, trying to make her panic now that she hadn’t
fallen into their first trap.
But there was the path around to the right, the ledge
she’d felt with the tip of her blade. Head right, around the
hole, probably the route they took themselves. The aelf took
a pace to the right before something in her screamed a
warning. She took a deep breath and held it, calming the
whirl of thoughts.
The ledge was on the left, not the right. It was left. I know
it was left.
It was right, whispered a silky voice in her mind. She
swayed on her feet and then took a decisive step away from
the hole and towards whatever was behind her. She was
trapped between them either way – one below in the pit,
one advancing. No point throwing herself forward and
trusting she made the leap. Better to ready herself to fight
here, now. Take them by surprise as they’d tried to do with
her.
To that end she shrugged off her cloak and wadded it
tightly, then took a few steps back and ran to the edge of
the pit. She froze there and launched the cloak into the
blackness, careful it didn’t catch on the edge of her sciansá.
An ululation of triumph rose from beneath as something
leapt high and tore into her cloak and Trisethni threw herself
at the sound, left blade angled down to punch through the
creature, the right slashing around her in case there was
more than one.
She slammed into something big and warm, its limbs
smooth like hers until they weren’t, until skin became
something else, hard like bone, like shell. The creature
screeched its surprise and the aelf used the sound to locate
its head. Her right blade hooked around and sliced, bit in, bit
deep.
 Trisethni was thrown clear as the creature she’d attacked
screamed and convulsed. She hit a wall hard and slid down,
winded, still blind, and filled with a sudden panic. ‘Belleth?’
she croaked, arm wrapped around herself to clutch at the
ribs that had smashed into the wall. ‘Belleth? My queen?’
She could hear sobbing and fumbled blindly towards it,
horror-struck. How could she have attacked Belleth, her
mentor, her love?
Why is Belleth here?
The voice was tiny and easy to ignore amid the fear that
her hag queen was mortally wounded.
That’s not Belleth.
A little louder this time, and Trisethni stumbled to a halt.
She’d lost one of her sciansá and became aware of the sting
of a head wound and the hot trickle of blood down her brow.
She didn’t know how she’d got the injury, but she knew,
suddenly, that it was bad. Disfiguring. Not even a
rejuvenation bath would heal this scar, twisting her features
into monstrousness.
Stop it. These thoughts are not yours.
The sobbing became a laugh, a sultry low sound that sent
a shiver of unwelcome desire through Trisethni. A soft, very
soft, glow of light began to emanate from her left and the
pit resolved itself out of the blackness. It wasn’t deep, no
more than a dozen feet, with enough outcrops she could
climb out within seconds. But the figure in the centre held
all her attention.
It was the most beautiful creature the aelf had ever seen,
tall and slender with masses of deep red hair and wide, vivid
eyes. Eyes that were crinkled in amusement at Trisethni’s
open-mouthed shock. There was no wound across its face,
or anywhere on its perfect body.
Trisethni realised how dishevelled she was in contrast. Her
pack was tattered, one strap half-broken. Blood was
dribbling down the side of her face and her hands were
abraded. Her clothes were filthy and her tight braid of silver
hair had come loose. She licked her lips as shame welled in
her throat.
How could she kill something so perfect? How could
something so perfect be dedicated to evil, to Chaos? It was
all some terrible mistake. Belleth was wrong. Morathi was
wrong.
The light swelled a little more and the assassin wrenched
her gaze from the figure to find its source. A crystal the size
of her fist: native to Ulgu but rare, it sat on the floor only a
few steps away. The gleamstone gave off a wavering light
when shaken, a light that faded over time. She needed that
light to help her find her way out, to lead this beautiful
being to safety.
Kill it and you kill the glamour that confuses your mind.
Kill it and take the gleamstone. Kill it or it kills you.
Trisethni blinked and lifted her face to the scrabbling from
above. A… thing was hanging over the lip of the pit, its face
twisted into a mockery of aelven beauty more hideous than
the most bloated Rotbringer. She gasped, repulsed, and
when she looked back down, the one in the pit with her had
changed, too, though the image rippled and doubled, a
nauseating switch between beauty and horror and back
again. Elegant hands became cruel claws, finely-muscled
legs became chitinous, scrabbling appendages, and the face
Trisethni could have looked at forever became nightmare
incarnate. And it was bleeding. She had cut it after all.
It laughed again, beckoning, and the aelf threw herself
towards her fallen sciansá and swept it up in her free hand,
spun and leapt up onto the wall and used the momentum to
fling herself back at the creature, blades extended, her body
an arrow behind their lethal tips.
The daemonette watched her come and then slid
sideways at the last second. Trisethni responded by
sweeping her weapon wide; she caught it a glancing blow
on its claw, scoring a line across the stone-hard shell. Barely
a scratch. It didn’t bleed, didn’t even seem to notice what
she’d done.
The assassin rolled as she landed, tucking her shoulder
and head and coming back up on her feet. She snatched up
the gleamstone and shoved it down inside her shirt,
muffling much of the light. A faint glow still came from it, a
glow that moved as she did, pinpointing her location.
Trisethni leapt for the wall again, one blade in her teeth
and free hand hauling herself up. She rolled over the edge
of the pit on the far side from the second daemonette, rolled
to her feet and sprinted away into the blackness.
Shame dogged her heels. Her first encounter and she had
failed. More than failed – she was hurt, staggering, the cut
on her brow and the thudding ache in her ribs slowing her.
Making her weak. She had no plan, no way out, no idea
what to do other than run. She was the worst choice Belleth
could have made for a task this great. Better to let the
daemonettes catch up with her.
Run. For Khaine and Morathi, for Belleth your love, run.
Tears pricked the corners of her eyes as the daemonettes’
manipulations battered at her and she stumbled on in the
almost total darkness, the tiny flicker from the hidden
crystal just barely showing her bends in the tunnel, no more.
I am Trisethni the Unseen, witch-aelf of Khailebron.
Trusted of Hag Queen Belleth, on a mission from Morathi the
First Daughter, the High Oracle. My heart belongs to Khaine.
I am Trisethni the Unseen, witch-aelf of Khailebron.
Trusted of Hag Queen Belleth, on a mission from…
Come back to us, pretty aelf. Come back and play.
Trisethni shook her head as she ran, trying to dislodge the
words, the imperative, the beseeching command to return
and throw herself into the daemonettes’ embrace. She
stumbled on.
Eventually she found a crack in the side wall of the tunnel
she was in and forced herself through, dragging her pack
after her. It was so tight she felt her shirt tear on the sharp
stone, but that didn’t matter as much as finding a hiding
place. Somewhere to rest, to strategise. To pray for
guidance.
She reminded herself that she hadn’t failed; she’d barely
even begun. And in that first interaction she’d wounded one
of her enemies. Already, she’d drawn blood. Her hand went
to her brow and the stinging cut there. Fine, they’d both
drawn blood, but Trisethni’s had been the more serious
strike, even if she hadn’t been able to see it on the
creature’s face beneath its glamour. She knew she’d cut it.
She knew it. She could recall the sensation of flesh opening
beneath her blade; there was no other feeling like it. The
daemonette might have confused her eyes, but it couldn’t
defeat the knowledge of her body. That was what Trisethni
had to trust until this was done – her body, her reactions
and skill and movement. Not her senses, and certainly not
her emotions. Perhaps not even her thoughts.
The crack in the rock had opened into a tiny cave, so
small she could neither stand up nor lie flat. She huddled in
the bowl of stone deep beneath the earth and took the
crystal out of her shirt; its glow was fading now that she was
still, but she knew it would brighten every time she moved.
Now that she had it, she didn’t know if it was wise – it was a
beacon in the darkness, a clear indication of her location.
There could be more than just daemons down here who
would like to make a meal of her. Trisethni licked sweat from
her upper lip and then folded the gleamstone in her hands
and shoved them between her thighs, stifling its glow.
The blackness was complete. As it rushed in to fill the
space where the light had been, it seemed to bring whispers
and emotions with it until she was gasping at the fear
clawing at her. Desperately, Trisethni shook the crystal and
the glow flared up, illuminating the tiny bolthole. Slowly her
breathing steadied and the panic receded. She put down the
crystal and used her pack to stuff the crack she’d slid
through to keep the light from escaping. For now, at least,
she couldn’t bear to discard it.
Later, when I know this place better. When I understand
the Warrens and am sure of the exits, then I’ll get rid of it.
Come and play with us, sweet one. Come, little aelf, come
and play.
No, Trisethni thought at them fiercely. You speak only lies.
She was tired and hungry and cold, a chill leaching from
the walls and the ground and into her bones. She longed for
the comfort of a fire; instead she dug through her pack for
hard bread and dried meat. Her bottle was full of lake water,
but she’d have to make it last.

The gleamstone faded as Trisethni ate, and the aelf steeled

herself to the encroaching darkness. She ate the last bite of
food as the light blinked out and then folded her hands in
her lap and mouthed invocations, seeking the calm clarity of
meditation, of ritual.
Less than a hundred increasingly rapid heartbeats later
and Trisethni kicked out, knocking the crystal tumbling so
that as the light flared up it bounced and skittered about
her. Her breathing was harsh in the confines of the space.
Images of the glorious creature – daemonette, she’s a
daemon, a plaything of Slaanesh – had danced before her in
the dark, beckoning, promising.
Leaving the crystal glowing, the aelf attempted her rituals
again, yearning for the space to dance with her blades and
lose herself in movement. Her mind found it easier to free
itself to worship and Khaine through ritual combat. But she
sat still, barely breathing, casting her mind towards her god
and the blessings and strictures of the temple, to anchor
herself once more within its rules and requirements and use
them to strengthen her will.
 It was pathetic that she could be so easily dissuaded and
distracted. Her strength was paltry against the
daemonettes’ perfect devotion to the Lord of Pleasure.
Trisethni shook her head violently to dislodge the thoughts.
Again, she brought her mind to stillness, nestled in Morathi’s
teachings, and sought to still her soul so that she might plan
an offensive.
Morathi, not even a god, no longer even of true aelven
form but a monster, and Khaine not interested enough in his
followers to return to them. Lost. Probably destroyed for all
time.
Trisethni gritted her teeth and forced the thoughts away.
They returned with all the power and inevitability of an
incoming tide and she realised, belatedly and with dread,
that her task wasn’t to ignore them, but to endure them. To
plan and stalk and attack and kill despite the whispers and
the promises. To be battered by them every waking and
sleeping moment and not give in. She’d never make them
stop; she had to survive them. To remain uncorrupted.
Sly laughter drifted through the tunnels – or perhaps just
through her mind.
‘So be it,’ Trisethni said aloud. ‘So be it.’ She wanted to
utter promises and threats of her own, but firstly they must
know she was here to kill them, and secondly any plan she
did devise she mustn’t give away. So she held her tongue
and concentrated instead on burgeoning herself with love of
Khaine and Morathi and Belleth, who trusted her, who
named her for this task out of every witch-aelf of
Khailebron. Who had wooed her and loved her and cast her
aside.
Stop it!
She began to plan. She needed to understand the layout
of the Warrens, or at the very least the nesting areas used
by her enemies. She needed to know how they moved
between nests and how fast they could travel, whether they
needed light as she did, how they manifested their magic.
Belleth had told her she would need to be Trisethni the
Unseen in order to defeat these creatures, and she knew
what that meant; as much as the thought terrified her, she
knew she had to give up the gleamstone. Or, at the very
least, bury it in her pack or a pocket so that it didn’t give
her away.
She needed to find one of the daemonettes and trail it
back to their principal nest. And she wouldn’t be going
unarmed. With the gleamstone’s glow beginning again to
fade, Trisethni worked quickly and mostly by feel, removing
items from the pack still stuffed into the gap in the tunnel
wall. The blow pipe and feathered barbs were intimately
familiar to her and she didn’t need the light to know where
they were and which was which – the pattern of lines and
dots carved into the shaft of each one told her which
poisons their tips carried.
She hung the light blowpipe from its cord around her
neck, inside her shirt, and strapped the package of darts
around her waist, feathered ends upright for quick use. She
had other poisons, many of them, in powder form, and she
tied the poison pouch to her belt and hung a black silk mask
around her neck. The sciansá she removed from the sword
belt and strapped to her back so they wouldn’t scrape and
clatter against the walls in the darkness.
Lastly, she took the innocuous, plain-hilted little hunting
knife from its sheath against her spine and summoned her
magic. Trisethni bent low over the blade and chanted, her
voice so low it was more breath than sound, more a caress
of air against metal than an invocation. Scarlet magic
spooled from her fingers and into the weapon. ‘All Chaos
turn from me. No evil can stand against me. No life remains
where I have been. No life returns where I have passed. For
almighty Khaine and for Light, I will strike down my enemies
and bring ruin to Ruin.’
The assassin fed her knife with magic until the crimson
orb within her had shrunk to a dull bead of blood, almost
gone. She was shaking by the time she finished and nausea
clawed at her throat while spots danced before her eyes.
She drank some water and then pulled at a little of the
ambient magic of the Shadow Realm to replenish what she
had given. But not too much, or her enemies would sense it.
The crystal’s glow died as she rested and she was plunged
yet again into the black. Trisethni closed her eyes and
moved by feel, keeping her mind occupied. She wouldn’t
think about how thick the darkness was, so thick it was
almost tangible, brushing against her face and hands like
spider webs. She wouldn’t think about the daemonettes and
their ethereal beauty, waiting for her with promises of
pleasure and immortality in return for a surrender that
would steep her in bliss.
But she was thinking of it, and her hands had stopped
moving. Methodically, Trisethni rechecked the rest of her
preparations, tightening buckles and straps and strings. She
didn’t attempt to dismiss the silent suggestions, only to
move through them and emerge unscathed. To acknowledge
the promises and yet decline their offers, one after another.
It was a little easier if she was busy, and so she checked
everything again, from the beginning.
Eventually the aelf had run out of excuses. There was
nothing for it but to venture back into the tunnel. She
decided the crack in the wall would be her refuge, and so
she left her pack behind. She took the gleamstone, its glow
muffled in a velvet bag and shoved deep into her pocket.
She shuffled to the exit and listened, straining over the
patter of her heartbeat, and then pulled the pack out of the
split in the wall and squeezed through, into the tunnel. She
flattened herself there, listening again. Still nothing. Or
nothing she could detect with her dull aelven senses,
anyway.
Trisethni told herself those weren’t her words. Sciansá on
her back, knife at her hip and swathed in poisons, she put
her left hand on the wall and began to walk back the way
she’d fled. She counted her footsteps as a guard against the
murmurings and to aid her in her return.
Come and learn pleasure at our hands, little aelf. Look on
our beauty and understand your place in the world. See how
high our lord lifts us and the gifts he gives us, of power and
beauty and knowledge. Such knowledge. Come, come to us
that we might make you worthy. Worthy of him. Worthy of
love. Belleth’s love.
Trisethni had stopped walking and her hands were
hanging by her sides when she came back to herself. There
were tears on her face. She sucked in a tremulous breath
and placed an image of Khaine, drawn from the oldest relics
in the cult’s possession, between her heart and the
temptations of the daemonettes. It shivered beneath the
onslaught – she shivered beneath the onslaught – but held
firm.
The aelf wiped her face and reached back out for the
security of the wall. Taking a deep breath, she began
walking again. Laughter bounced and echoed around the
tunnel, behind and ahead of her at once. Trisethni kept
walking.
‘Of course Belleth stopped loving you,’ a voice said, and it
was a voice this time, not a thought in her head, insinuating
its way into her consciousness. She stopped again, this time
to draw a sciansá from her back. ‘How could she love a
twisted, broken little thing such as you?’ it went on, and
despite the cruelty of the words, the voice itself was perfect.
Low and sultry and enticing. Its words were reasonable,
obvious even.
‘We can tell you how to make her love you again,’ said the
voice, or perhaps a different one. It sounded from behind
her and Trisethni whirled, slashing blindly in the darkness.
‘But you already know how to make her do that,’ came the
first, and she twisted again, thrusting this time. She’d lost
contact with the wall and stumbled left until she bounced off
it, all her usual grace lost.
 ‘You just need to speak his name,’ came a third voice, and
this one seemed, impossibly, to be above her. The aelf
swiped upwards and the chorus of laughter echoed around
her once more. ‘Speak his name. Speak his name. His
name.’
‘Khaine!’ Trisethni screamed. ‘Khaine!’ She fumbled in her
pocket and grabbed up the gleamstone, shook it furiously,
sciansá ready. She was alone.
‘Slaanesh,’ came the sibilant whisper from ahead.
‘Pleasure,’ from above.
‘Surrender,’ from behind.
‘Never,’ Trisethni breathed. Holding the crystal up she
advanced, faster until she was running with blade in hand,
racing towards the pit where she’d first encountered the
daemonettes. When she reached it she simply sped up and
then leapt, clearing the ten or twelve feet without effort. As
she flew over, she glanced down, but it was empty.
Wherever they were, it wasn’t down there.
Soon enough she’d pass back through the area where the
corrupted shadowpath had spat her out, so she slowed
down and cupped her palm around the gleamstone,
directing its meagre light forwards only. Cautious now and
focused on the hunt, it was a little easier to ignore the
persistent whispers that slid through her ears to twist and
warp her mind.
Something that might have been movement, right at the
limit of the light – a slide of pale, smooth limbs disappearing
around a corner. The tunnel forked and whatever she’d
seen, it had gone left. A grim smile split Trisethni’s mouth.
Finally. She slowed still further as she approached the fork,
creeping along, the light almost fully muffled in her hand
and giving off just enough to show her where to place her
feet to avoid making noise.
The stone was black in the dim light, but the shadows
were blacker still – surely the pale flesh of the daemonettes
would stand out in contrast? Despite her care, the walls
echoed Trisethni’s slow breaths back to her, though she
could just make out a furtive scrape of chitin on rock from
ahead. Where the tunnel split, the two new passages
watched her like the eyes of the Dark Prince himself,
beckoning and judging. Offering her a choice.
The merest breath of fresh air from the right hand
passage promised an escape to the surface: freedom; life.
To go left was to scurry to her death like a beetle – or to run
forwards in ecstatic surrender. The aelf stopped a pace back
from the fork. She would go left, but she would go as
herself, as a witch-aelf devoted to her god, neither insect
nor apostate. Trisethni took a slow breath in through her
nose, mouth open to let the air caress her palate as well.
There was… something. A musk, a scent. Faint but
unmistakable. The scent of vibrant life, almost as perfumed
as a wild glade in Ghyran’s Nevergreen Mountains. Trisethni
began to smile and pulled in a second, deeper breath. She
could almost feel it race from her lungs to every part of her,
tingling and intoxicating.
A laugh rose in her chest but then her eyes widened in
horrified understanding and she fumbled at the mask
hanging loose around her neck with her sword hand. She
tugged it up over her nose and mouth, holding her breath
until it was in place and then gusted out the air. She knew
poisons and narcotics; she knew too the smell and taste and
effect of dream-pine. Stupid, stupid, she cursed herself.
Yes, something agreed and knocked the gleamstone out of
her hand.
Trisethni jumped backwards, away from the fork in the
tunnel as the crystal bounced and skittered along the stone,
each impact brightening its glow but its movement making
shadows leap and dart. Her sciansá caught its light and the
edge gleamed with righteous vengeance, reflected in the
eyes of the…
Of the most beautiful being Trisethni had ever seen. Eyes
of a vivid green, wide with welcoming delight and youthful
innocence. Eyes that mesmerised and pulled her not
unwilling towards the creature who wore a skin of honey-
brown and a great mass of black, tumbling curls that draped
artfully, seductively, over one brow. So beautiful. So
voracious and perfect and…
For Khaine’s sake, don’t look!
The aelf closed her eyes and leapt to the attack, aiming
for where she’d last seen the daemonette but slashing in a
wide arc to catch it if it had moved. It hadn’t, or at least not
far enough. Impact and a screech, the spray of hot liquid
over her hand and up her arm. The glorious sensation of
that flawless flesh cleaving beneath her sacred blade.
Trisethni looked, and she saw what it was she faced. Her
blow had sliced the creature across the midriff and the pain
had made it drop its glamour. Claws and teeth and a mouth
that opened impossibly wide, a crest of ragged hair and
eyes too big for its face, black and pitiless and quite mad.
Its skin was wound with tattoos that writhed and chased
each other in the uncertain light, seeking to draw the aelf’s
eye and confuse it. Instead she looked aside, keeping it in
her periphery so that when it lashed out with its clawed arm
she knocked it away, her blade biting deep and bitter into
the inside of its elbow. Ichor spurted and it screeched again,
higher this time, louder.
Trisethni reversed her blade, the backhand sweeping
towards the daemonette’s unprotected throat. A blast of
sensation struck her – touch and smell and the
overwhelming sense of her own insignificance, her myriad
failings heaped up on her shoulders like a cloak of iron. The
stroke faltered, slowed enough that the daemonette could
duck it and strike in turn, her other arm ending in long
fingers tipped with curved black talons. They caught
Trisethni across her upper arm, an upward sweep that laid
open flesh and continued on to peel open her cheek like a
ripe fruit.
 Trisethni bellowed hurt and blood and fury and shame,
shame at all the daemonette was showing her and making
her feel. Her mind shut down, unable to cope with the
battering of her senses, but her body, trained for decades in
the dance and duck and strike of combat, reacted without
conscious intervention. She tossed the sciansá into her
other hand and leapt, planted one foot on the daemonette’s
knee to drive herself upwards, and hacked down with all her
strength. Its severed arm tumbled to the tunnel floor,
bouncing the gleamstone into a corner and brightening its
glow once more.
Trisethni back-flipped away from it and landed in a
fighting crouch, dragging the second sciansá from her back.
The daemonette screamed this time, a scream high and
pure in its agony. There was no assault on Trisethni’s senses
as it tried to disorient or distract her; it turned and fled up
the right-hand fork of the tunnel, leaving its severed limb
leaking ichor. The aelf snatched up the crystal and set out in
pursuit, the pain in her face and shoulder pounding at her
nothing compared with her fury and righteous bloodlust.
The chase went on for miles, Trisethni following sound and
ichor spattered on the walls and floor but leaving her own
blood trail in turn. The mask protecting her against poisons
and fumes had been torn off by the claws, and the hot rush
of blood down her neck into her shirt seemed as if it would
never stop, but the assassin ignored it: the frenzied joy of
combat and victory was singing in her veins and every drop
of blood she lost was replaced with fury and dark, churning
delight at the battle to come. She was Trisethni the Unseen.
She was a Daughter of Khaine. And she was unstoppable.
Slowly, almost without realising, she began to slow. She
wouldn’t catch it; the daemonette was too swift, even
injured. She should rest, recuperate, follow the occasional
breath of fresh air back to the surface. She couldn’t win
anyway. She should flee, save herself while she still could
and bear the scars across her face until the day she died,
years from now, broken and ashamed.
Trisethni growled at the alien, lying thoughts and tried to
speed up, but it was like running through sand. She was
heading uphill, but the roaring in her ears was more than
breath and heartbeat. A chill wind beat against her face
now, whipping her braid behind her. It carried moisture with
it. Still it was more than the slope and the wind slowing her.
There were no thoughts or images, no crushing humiliations
or reminders of past mistakes. Just weight, and pressure,
and the imperative, pounding along with her slowing feet, to
stop. Stop and rest, sit, tend wounds.
The aelf was walking now, head down as she trudged, and
wherever the daemonette was, it was long gone. She
probably should stop and rest. Why not? What harm could it
do?
It was that last thought that hooked its claws in her, but
not with the effect the daemonettes had no doubt wished
for. What harm can sitting down on a well-travelled path
used by my enemies do me? Trisethni managed a weary
snort. She did stop, but only to close her eyes and let the
darkness take her. She tried not to think, to let her body
understand her surroundings rather than her fallible and
easily manipulated mind or senses.
She was close to water. She’d come a long way uphill and
miles from her hideout. It wasn’t fresh air she tasted on the
breeze after all, but the movement of a waterfall ahead that
pushed the air into motion. A waterfall that would disguise
even the loudest scuff of foot or claw on rock, or the keening
cry of an injured foe.
She had to go back.
Thirsty. So thirsty. Need to wash out the wounds.
Trisethni was tired, both in mind and in body. So tired she
wasn’t sure if the thought was hers or not. She thought back
to the route she’d so blindly taken – the fork in the tunnel
with its many ambush sites, the place where the
shadowpath had deposited her, the pit she needed to cross,
all the way back to the tiny crack in the wall and her hiding
place. Where her water was. And she was so thirsty.
Her hand rose without volition to probe gently at the slices
in her face. They were puffy and hot, almost certainly
infected already – another ploy of the daemonettes’. She
needed to wash them out. She began to walk, putting the
gleamstone back in her pocket as she did, not in the sock
this time so the tiniest glow shone through the material, just
enough for aelven eyes to see the lay of the path. The roar
of the waterfall increased, the chill of the air on her hot,
scored face and shoulder.
Trisethni walked a little further and then came to an
abrupt halt. She put her hand over her pocket, blocking the
crystal’s light – she could still see. More light, ahead this
time. Dim but there, unmistakably there. An exit? The aelf
rushed forward, heedless, and rounded a bend to find a
great waterfall blocking the passage and thundering on
down below her into inky blackness. She teetered on the
edge and then pulled herself back, fingers digging into cold
wet stone.
She looked up. High above, the underground sky that was
the roof of the Warrens was fractured and through that
crack pounded a river, its forward motion across the surface
of Ulgu arrested into a waterfall that plunged deep into the
guts of the Realm of Shadow. No way out above, while below
was the roaring unknown. Tumbling water and sharp-edged
rock and the absolute absence of light.
But here, here on the ledge, was water and refreshment
and a way to soothe the claw marks in Trisethni’s face and
shoulder. She threw herself onto her knees at the very lip of
the path and reached out cupped hands. The water was
shockingly cold, making her back teeth ache as she brought
it to her lips and drank. She held a palmful to her ruined
face, gasping at the chill in the wounds and relishing it, too.
She drank some more, filling her belly, and then bathed her
face and shoulder again.
And now your form is as ugly, as small and wanting, as
your soul.
It was so unexpected that Trisethni gasped and opened
her eyes, staring around in bewilderment. She rocked on her
knees, as if someone had shoved at her.
‘What?’
Only Slaanesh can restore you now. Only the Lord of
Pleasure will give you a form to match your secret soul, the
aelf you’ve always wanted to be.
Strong.
Beautiful.
Fierce.
‘No,’ Trisethni managed. ‘That’s not true.’ She looked to
her right and saw the creature, beautiful beyond compare,
kneeling at her side and watching her with such pity that
she sucked in a breath. ‘No,’ she tried again.
The being ran gentle fingers over the slashes in Trisethni’s
face, her own a mask of grief. ‘Just say his name,’ she
breathed, ‘and it will all stop.’
‘I… Slaan… I can’t.’ Trisethni pulled herself back from a
brink that had nothing to do with the edge and the waterfall.
The creature’s perfect face crumpled with sadness and
her hand fell from the aelf’s cheek. ‘Then throw yourself in,’
she murmured, ‘for you cannot live as this pallid, broken
thing. Just throw yourself in and end it now. The pain, the
suffering of never being good enough, of not being worthy
of Belleth’s love. Just die, little aelf. Die now.’
A sob broke from Trisethni’s chest, the sound of a heart
splintering into pieces that would never be put back
together. She rocked forward on her knees, her centre of
balance teetering. The salt in her tears burned in the cuts, a
clean hurt that spoke to her, warned her.
‘What?’ she tried, and looked again.
 The daemonette shrieked in her face and plunged her
claw at Trisethni. The aelf parried with her forearm, an
instinctive defence that required no thought from a mind
reeling from pain and confusion and the hot, sick glamour
cast over her. Its other arm was missing at the elbow and it
thrust at her again, and again she deflected, her mind
coming back to her, struggling against a web of self-loathing
and self-doubt.
‘No,’ she snarled. ‘No, you won’t have me.’
The daemonette laughed, a mad skirling noise that
shrieked across Trisethni’s ear drums. It jumped up and
sideways, clinging to the cavern walls with clawed feet, and
raised its arm.
‘Die!’ It slammed the claw downwards into the stone
ledge and a crack erupted, zig-zagging rapidly between
Trisethni and the tunnel mouth.
The slab she was standing on tilted and began to slide
into the abyss into which the waterfall fell. Trisethni
launched herself at the daemonette and wrapped her arms
around her. ‘Die?’ she growled and sank her teeth into the
creature’s throat and tore out a chunk; ichor flooded her
mouth and across her face as they peeled off the wall and
began to fall. She spat out meat as the daemonette tried to
scream. ‘You first.’ Trisethni reached back and drew the
enchanted knife and stabbed it into the side of the
creature’s neck. ‘Ruin to end Ruin. No life remains where I
have been. No life returns where I have passed. Blade of
Light, burn blood of Chaos.’
The daemonette didn’t scream now; it gurgled and choked
as red light burst from the knife and snaked along its veins
and arteries swifter than thought. The aelf wrenched out the
blade and let go as they vanished deeper into the chasm of
the waterfall. She flung out her hands, twisting through
space like a cat. She hit the wall hard, the snap of a finger
loud despite the roar of the waterfall, and began to slide
down it, following the choking, dying daemonette into the
depths of the Warrens to drown or be shattered on rock.
And then her free hand caught and arrested her
movement so hard Trisethni nearly dislocated her shoulder.
Desperately, the aelf tightened her grip and put the knife
between her teeth and scrabbled with her right hand and
her boots until she found another hold, and then another.
Cursing at the pain of her wounds, shaking with adrenaline,
fear and roaring, churning fury and the crystal-bright,
diamond-hard elation of bloodlust, she began to climb back
to the remains of the ledge. Back to the tunnels.
Back to her surviving enemies.
One down. Two to go.
Praise Khaine.

Trisethni couldn’t find her hiding place again. The aelf was
sure she had returned along the same path, but when she
took the fork in the tunnel, she began immediately to
descend where before the path had been straight, and this
time there was no pit to jump across. Her hiding place, her
supplies including her food and water, were gone. But so
was one of her enemies. One of Morathi’s enemies, a cruel
and poisonous creature of Slaanesh and his foul
perversions. Tumbled and dead and lost at the bottom of an
underground waterfall.
As the hunger grew in Trisethni’s belly, it seemed scant
reward. There were still two more. Two who whispered and
sighed to her, two whose beauty would never be marred as
hers now was, whose bodies would not fail as hers failed
from want of water, food and healing. They would never
bear such marks, such sickness. Two whose dedication to
their lord and master would never be called into doubt. Not
like the aelf’s, with her questions and her misgivings about
Belleth and the book.
 And always, as insistent as the beat of her pulse, the
command: say his name. Surrender. Say his name.
And ‘Khaine,’ she would respond in a halting tone when
she could bear it no longer. Always, it was received with sly
and disbelieving laughter as they herded her about in the
darkness, always just out of reach.
Will Khaine make you beautiful? they jeered. Will Khaine
return Belleth to your arms or show you pleasure such as
you have never even imagined could exist? No. But you
know who will.
Say. His. Name.
Trisethni was on her knees, both hands pressed over her
mouth, the right one digging into the scabby wounds on her
cheek. She gagged at the stink of corruption and the hot
stickiness of pus against her palm as the infection broke
free under the pressure. Her mind screamed the name of
the Lord of Murder; her mouth and tongue formed the name
of the Lord of Pleasure.
Morathi cannot help you.
Morathi doesn’t know you serve her. She doesn’t even
know you exist. She doesn’t care whether you survive in
here or not. And Khaine is dead. Dead and not coming back.
You should ask your High Oracle about Khaine’s fate. Ask
her about his heart.
Say his name. Slaanesh. Say it. Say it!
Abruptly, again, Trisethni became aware of the scent of
dream-pine. She stuffed her broken finger in her mouth and
bit down savagely so the urge to speak became a sharp
inhalation of agony, and her other hand reached into her
pocket for the gleamstone. She drew it out gently, slowly, so
as not to light it. So slowly that she couldn’t help but take a
breath of the narcotic. Contentment nibbled at the edges of
her fraying mind and dulled the pain in her hand and face
and shoulder and ribs. The aelf held her breath and took her
finger from her mouth. She gritted her teeth so hard that
new pain erupted, through her sinuses this time, and drew
the hunting knife silently from its sheath. Stealthily she rose
to her feet.
Morathi cannot save you. Your god is dead, your sect is
dead – give in or you are dead. Come to us, love. Breathe.
Dream. Say his name.
Trisethni’s lungs were burning but she didn’t dare take a
breath. Gripping the knife tight in one fist and the
gleamstone hidden in the other, she shook it hard and as
the light burst from it, she flung it in one direction and leapt
in the other.
The daemonettes were either side of her, as if their night
vision was sufficient to know her location in even the
darkest tunnel. Yet both threw up their arms as the light
burst upon them. Trisethni, her eyes screwed to slits against
the glare, stabbed at the closest and gutted it as it shielded
its face, chanting the invocation that prevented a being of
Chaos from being reborn. She was already moving before it
knew it was dead, before an agonised keening burst from it
and its glamour vanished so that she saw, clearly, not only
its hideousness but its stinking intestines bulging from the
slit she had carved in its belly.
The other raked its talons down her back, but the
sheathed sciansá turned the blow and only a single claw
seared into her shoulder blade. Trisethni caught a glimpse of
outcrops of rock and climbed the wall; the daemonette
came after her and it was fast. Faster than the aelf and with
a longer reach. Claws or teeth, Trisethni couldn’t tell which,
pierced the stiff leather of her boot and cut into her calf and
she screamed and let go of the wall. She fell back into her
enemy’s embrace and the daemonette caught her up easily
and cradled her as if she were a child. It was still halfway up
the wall, balanced on wide, clawed feet as easily as if it
stood on flat ground. She looked into its face, perfect and
yet cold, its eyes pitiless. Trisethni wanted to drown in them.
‘Say his name, little aelf,’ it whispered, caressing her hair.
‘Pledge everything you are to the Lord of Pleasure and I
might let you live.’
‘I am a Daughter of Khaine,’ Trisethni began, and stabbed.
The daemonette slapped the knife out of her hand and it
clattered down out of sight. It threw itself off the wall with
the aelf in its arms and landed with a soft thump near its
dying nest-mate. It looked down and a terrible sadness
crossed its features.
Tears pricked at Trisethni’s eyes and shame closed her
throat. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she whispered to the glorious being
holding her, to the one dying on the cold rock. ‘I’m so sorry.’
She turned her face into the creature’s shoulder and
sobbed, hitching in breaths of its musky skin. Shame welled
in her, both at her actions and that she would never be as
perfect, as devoted or as skilled as the one who cradled her.
‘Say his name,’ it commanded again in its low, lilting
voice. ‘Who do you love above all others?’
‘Khaine,’ Trisethni said, her tone begging, as the
daemonette’s claws drifted down her unscarred cheek to
her throat. ‘Khaine.’ She knew it would be the last thing she
ever said and she poured her heart into it.
‘No, my little one,’ the daemonette corrected her and the
talons dug in, just a little, enough to dimple the skin but not
break it. ‘Not Khaine. Who? Take a deep breath and tell me.
Say his name.’
Its skin was perfumed, more intoxicating than even the
dream-pine, and Trisethni pressed her face against it and
inhaled again. ‘I’m not worthy,’ she cried. ‘Not of you, not of
any of them.’
‘No. You are not,’ the daemonette agreed. ‘Not until you
say his name. Who do you love? Who, above all others?’
And it was there, on her tongue, fizzing like bubbles, warm
like blood. Her mind began to form the shape of it, her heart
began to yearn towards it. The Dark Prince. More tears
warmed her face and the daemonette hushed her as if she
was a babe. ‘Say his name,’ it breathed again and she could
feel it drinking in her despair as if it were wine. A delicate
shudder rippled its lithe form, pleasure at her pain. It
squeezed, cutting off Trisethni’s breath, and the wound in
her shoulder spasmed into sudden, burning life.
That, too, the daemonette imbibed. The musk of its skin
grew stronger. ‘Mmm,’ it hummed and squeezed again,
eliciting another stab of agony and a wheezed, strangled cry
from the aelf. Even though it was hurting her, Trisethni
wanted nothing more than to surrender – to it and to its
commands.
Say his name. Say his name and know all the delights of
the Lord of Pleasure and his worshippers.
‘Put me down,’ Trisethni managed as her ribs creaked
under the pressure of its embrace. ‘Put me down so I can
breathe and I’ll say whatever you want.’
It reared back enough to look in her face and the aelf’s
breath caught in her throat at its perfection again. ‘Are you
lying, little aelf?’ it asked.
She shook her head, mute.
‘Pleasure and power, immortality and beauty await you,’ it
promised her. ‘An end to any pain that isn’t also pleasure.
All you have to do is renounce Khaine and give yourself to
Slaanesh. Pledge your heart to the Dark Prince. Will you say
his name?’
‘Yes,’ Trisethni whispered, broken and hurting and wanting
it all to end. She was so tired; she carried so many wounds,
inside and out. ‘Yes.’
The daemonette tucked her against its chest and jerked
the sciansá from her back, then threw them singing into the
blackness out of the gleamstone’s reach. They landed with a
skirring clatter far off in the tunnel’s blackness. Then it set
her on her feet.
‘Say his name,’ it commanded and its features now were
twisted with excitement. It was still beautiful and Trisethni
was as a worm in comparison. It was everything worship of
Khaine should have brought her.
 It was everything and Slaanesh had made it so. The other
daemonette was finally dead. There was only this one left,
this perfect embodiment of the Dark Prince’s will. Of
everything Trisethni could be – once she surrendered.
Trisethni’s legs buckled and she fell to her knees on the
stone as if in worship. Perhaps it was. Her fingers raked the
ground, searching, while she held the daemonette’s gaze
with her own. Searched. Found. The daemonette cocked its
head, birdlike, and its elegant, long-fingered hands came up
before it.
‘Say his name. Say his name and be damned and saved
and loved. Slaanesh. Say it. Say it!’
The name thudded in her blood, in her heart and her head
and tingled across her skin like a lover’s touch. Slaanesh.
Slaanesh. Slaanesh. It ate at the last tattered shreds of her
will, gnawed at her faith in Khaine, her god, her lord. It
placed itself between her and Morathi, as the daemonette
placed itself between her and memories of Belleth.
Slaanesh.
Slaanesh.
Slaanesh.
The aelf’s faith hung by a single shimmering thread of
habit and magic and loyalty and the decades of worship.
Shuddering, she stood and her feet began to move, taking
her through the opening steps of the blade-dance that was
ritual.
The daemonette hissed and the strength of her glamour
increased, cutting at that last thread of belief until it was
fraying in the face of its power. The name built in Trisethni’s
stomach and grew in strength, travelling up into her chest,
burning as it came – a sweet burning that she found she
liked, that she craved – and into her throat and the last
vestige of her faith was unravelling…
Trisethni opened her mouth to speak. The daemonette’s
shriek of triumph echoed along the tunnel, but the aelf
roared and grabbed her own tongue and hacked it off with
the knife.
Blood spurted in her mouth. Pain like she’d never known
exploded through her face and the daemonette paused in
disbelief, then screeched with laughter, revelling in
Trisethni’s agony, shivering with the rapture of it. Its
glamour winked out of existence and its unblemished skin
vanished, its hands became claw-tipped and stunted even
as they reached for her.
Bellowing and spraying blood, Trisethni threw the stump of
tongue at the daemonette and hurled herself after it. She
struck it full-force in the chest, all her bodyweight behind it.
The knife went into its shoulder and out; into its chest, the
side of its neck. Its claws tore at her back, shredding
scabbards and shirt and flesh, tearing into muscle. It went
over backwards and Trisethni rode it down like a bucking
horse, knife hand pumping as she carved its face and chest
into bloody ruin. She chanted the invocation in her head
with every thrust of the knife, praying it would be enough to
extinguish the daemonette from existence.
Its hands fell limp at its sides and its only movements
were the jerks of the blade punching in and out of its flesh.
And then the magic, the glamours and auras and
whispers, faded. Still Trisethni stabbed, weeping, drooling
blood and saliva and bleeding from a dozen wounds, her
knife hand slowing now until eventually she collapsed on top
of the ruined monster.
Khaine, her mind whispered as her mouth could not.
Khaine.

The Khailebron had left the Draichi Ganeth temple in

Greywater Fastness months before. By the time Trisethni
tracked them to Hammerhal Ghyra, the winter had
deepened and her wounds had healed. Physically, at least.
 It had taken her days to retrieve her weapons and
supplies and then find a way out of the Warrens. Drinking
had been an agony; eating impossible. Both accepted
punishments for her failure, for how close she had come to
betraying everything she held most dear.
With the daemonettes dead, the shadowpath magic would
have taken her back to the Ebonfire Gate without
interference, but she had no tongue to command it. And so
she had walked, day after day through the mists that slowly,
patiently, helped her heal. Once back in Ghyran, she had
stayed on the tiny island for a week, sleeping and weeping
and bathing her wounds in the icy lake every day to flush
them clean. Even now she could taste her own blood. She
wasn’t sure the stump of her tongue would ever stop
bleeding.
And yet despite it all, and the months of travel alone and
on foot, first back to Greywater Fastness and then along the
trade routes to Hammerhal, she was alive and she was
victorious.
Trisethni’s hair was loose and pulled around her scarred
cheeks, the hood of her tattered cloak up to shadow her
face. She climbed the steps to the temple’s main entrance
and the witch-aelves there lowered spears to bar her path.
‘Who seeks entry to Khaine’s sanctuary?’ one demanded.
Trisethni shoved back the hood of her cloak to reveal her
aelven features and then showed them the hilts of her
sciansá. The scars the daemonettes had tried to make her
believe were her shame blazed now as testament to her
devotion.
‘Well met, sister,’ the second said. ‘Where do you hail
from?’
Trisethni closed her eyes for a brief second. When she
opened them, she pointed at her mouth and then shook her
head. The aelves exchanged glances. She held out a piece
of paper.
 The first read it and her mouth dropped open. ‘Stay here.
Guard her,’ she said and fled inside before the other could
respond. Trisethni waited. The months had taught her
patience. Soon enough the guard was back and gestured
Trisethni inside. ‘Go to the hag queens’ private sanctum.
Belleth will meet you there. And,’ she paused and then
grinned, ‘and it is an honour to meet you and know you
victorious, Trisethni the Unseen. You… you are victorious?’
She managed a small smile, a smaller nod. The other aelf
grinned again and clapped her on the arm.
‘Welcome home, sister. Go now, she’ll be waiting for you.’
Trisethni walked slowly and took the long way around to
Belleth’s sanctum. Now that she was finally here, now that it
was all so close to being over, she was afraid. She was held
together with determination and loyalty all the more fierce
for having been so nearly abandoned. Yet shame coated all
of it, thick and cloying. She had been so close to giving
herself to Morathi’s greatest, most implacable enemy.
Belleth would see it and know it, for it was surely as clear on
her face as the claw marks.
‘She cannot be alive,’ a voice murmured as Trisethni
reached the door. It wasn’t Belleth.
‘Clearly she is. Clearly she succeeded. Against all the odds
she went to the Spyrglass Warrens and singlehandedly killed
three daemonettes. I can scarce believe it.’
That was Belleth, and Trisethni smiled just a little, but then
it faded. Why could she scarce believe it? It had been the
hag queen who chose her for the task, out of all the
Khailebron witch-aelves.
‘And she knows of the book,’ the first voice said. ‘What
is–’
‘Enough. Leave me now – she will be here any moment.’
Without quite knowing why, Trisethni fled back down the
corridor and then turned and made her slow way towards
the door again, as if only just arriving. She didn’t recognise
the aelf who hurried from Belleth’s rooms and paused to
stare at her as she passed. She was Khailebron, but not of
Trisethni’s coven.
When the other had padded around the corner, Trisethni
approached the door and tapped on it. She was wary now,
wary and worried.
Belleth opened the door, backlit in the yellow glow of
many torches and candles, tall and dark and beautiful.
Ageless and fierce. Trisethni’s heart tightened at the sight of
her after so long, but she only held her gaze for an instant
before dropping her head and teasing her silver hair forward
across her ruined face. All her noble convictions about
bearing the scars with pride faded at the thought of her old
lover seeing them.
She heard Belleth draw in a sharp breath. ‘Tris,’ she said,
the nickname one the aelf hadn’t heard in a year. She
gritted her teeth, stoic. ‘Come in, come in, my sister. My
glorious, victorious sister. Let me look at you.’
Trisethni followed her into the sanctum, warm and smoky
with incense. She stepped around Belleth before the other
aelf could speak and approached the altar, with its images
of Khaine and Morathi, its small cauldron. She made an
inarticulate sound and fell to her knees and pressed her
face to the stone. Forgive me, my lord, forgive me, High
Oracle. I was tested and found wanting. I so nearly
supplanted you both in my inmost heart. Forgive me.
Belleth knelt next to her and pulled her into an embrace.
‘Hush, sister, hush. You are home and you are safe. You
have done a great thing, Tris. There will be songs sung
about your deeds in the Warrens once the details are
known. You’re safe.’ Tenderly, she pushed Trisethni away
and brushed back the hair from her face. Horror flickered
across the hag queen’s features, followed by pity. Both
emotions carved at Trisethni’s heart anew.
‘Tell me what happened,’ Belleth commanded.
Again Trisethni pointed to her mouth and shook her head.
Belleth frowned and hugged her again.
 ‘Then worry not tonight, sister. You will sleep in my
quarters and tomorrow you can give me a full written report,
when you’ve rested and eaten.’
The hag queen stood and stepped away, leaving Trisethni
kneeling in disbelief on the stone. A written report? What
about rejuvenation? I can speak what happened then – I will
have my voice back to raise in praise of Khaine and Morathi.
She scrambled to her feet and grabbed Belleth by the
arm; the hag queen wrenched away, fury twisting her
features, there and gone in an instant.
Fury about what, Trisethni’s victory?
‘Rest, sister. For now, just rest. I will have food and drink
sent to you to restore your health.’
Food would not restore Trisethni to the aelf she had been
before; only rejuvenation in the cauldron could do that. Why
would Belleth refuse her such a boon, when it was she who
had sent Trisethni on the quest in the first place? Why was
she not allowed to heal?
Unless she knows. Cold washed through her and she
made no further efforts to stop Belleth leaving. Her hag
queen knew. Knew how close Trisethni had come to
abandoning her sisters, her faith, her god. She was tainted
and Belleth could sense it on her. Sniff out her doubt and
shame and see their cause.
Numb, she retreated to the small room off the sanctum
and stripped out of her filthy, travel-worn clothes and
broken-down boots. There was a full-length mirror opposite
the bed; the aelf hung her ragged cloak over it. She had no
wish to see the broken thing she had become.
Trisethni washed in the basin and combed out her hair, let
it fall free around her face so that when the leathanam
brought her food, it hid her scars. She cut everything up into
tiny pieces to eat; without a tongue, it was hard to move the
food around her mouth. It smelt good; tasted of nothing.
She left the wine and drained her waterskin instead, then
curled up on the bed. All this way, all these months, and she
was finally safe. It didn’t matter; sleep eluded her as her
mind thrashed like an animal in a snare with questions and
no answers.
She lay staring at the ceiling for an hour before getting
up. Maybe the wine would help, after all. She padded across
to the table and picked it up, brought it to her lips, and
paused. There was the tiniest skin on the surface of the
wine, like oil floating on water. As if something that had
been mixed into it had separated while it stood there
untouched.
Trisethni swirled the glass beneath her nose and inhaled,
then she shoved the cup away from her and snorted.
Dream-pine, she’d swear it. Its potency in its liquid state
was far stronger than the smoke and changed it from a
pleasant narcotic to a poison. In large enough quantities it
was fatal.
She stared at it with fixed intensity and then flinched at
the sound of footsteps. She lunged into the sanctum and
spotted another cup; she swapped them over and hurried
back into the bedroom. She put the new, empty cup next to
the plate – was the food poisoned, too, she wondered with a
lurch in her gut – seized her weapons and flung herself onto
the bed.
Belleth came in, and the aelf from earlier followed her.
They paused in the doorway to the bedroom.
‘Is it done?’ the stranger breathed.
The hag queen came to the bed and checked Trisethni’s
pulse. ‘She lives still, though not for long, I imagine. She
won’t wake now.’
‘Her survival was unexpected. Hellebron does not like
things to be unexpected. First she finds the book, and then
she returns from what you assured us was certain death.
The high priestess will not be pleased.’
‘The high priestess has nothing to fear,’ Belleth said
smoothly as they moved back into the sanctum, their voices
becoming muffled. Trisethni strained her ears. ‘I have the
book in my safekeeping as agreed. I wait only for Morathi’s
eyes to turn away and I will bring it to Hellebron myself. My
coven is loyal to me – I am loyal to her.’
‘Be sure that one never wakes,’ the stranger said in a dark
tone, ‘or none of your coven will live through the transition
of power.’
Trisethni heard the quiet click as the outer door shut, and
another as the lock was engaged. A long pause and then
Belleth’s shadow fell across her. ‘Tris, let me explain,’ she
began, stepping further into the room.
Tris. The pet name Belleth had given her when they were
together.
The witch-aelf came up off the bed with sciansá flashing.
She’d heard enough – more than enough. No fine words and
no allusions to their past could convince her that Belleth
wasn’t the blackest of traitors. She had lied to her and
arranged for her death at the hands of a pitiless enemy.
Trisethni would repay the latter favour.
The tip of one sciansá caught Belleth along the line of her
jaw, opening up flesh for blood to pour through. The hag
queen’s shout of protest became one of pain and then fury.
She jumped backwards into the sanctum and snatched up a
weapon of her own – a long spear with a wicked steel tip.
‘It’s not what you think, Tris,’ she grunted as Trisethni
hacked at the spear, trying to batter it down so she could
slip past it. ‘Morathi keeps secrets from us – Mathcoir is not
safe in her hands anymore! Hellebron will–’
She bit off the words as Trisethni skidded across the
polished stone on her knees, beneath the spear, to hack at
the hag queen’s legs. Belleth hissed in fury and surprise and
jumped back, her usual grace missing as she scrambled to
make enough space to bring the long weapon to bear. She
was fighting defensively, still trying to make Trisethni
understand, to save her and bring her to her side. To
Hellebron’s side.
 There was so much Trisethni wanted to say: how it had
been Khaine and Morathi who’d given her the skills to
defeat the daemonettes, but Belleth herself who’d given her
the self-belief. But she couldn’t.
Instead, in her head, she began reciting the words of the
Red Invocation, the promise and prayer that meant her
sciansá could not be sheathed without the taking of life. For
good or ill, one or both of them would die in this room.
Perhaps Belleth intuited some part of Trisethni’s
determination, because she stopped defending and
attacked, driving the witch-aelf back across the sanctum
and almost into the bedroom. She spun the spear in her
hand and punched the blunt end into Trisethni’s chest,
slamming her into the wall and holding her there.
‘I could have killed you twice already,’ she panted. ‘I could
have driven this through your ribs and out of your back, but
I didn’t. Listen to me, Tris, just listen. Morathi is–’
Trisethni threw one of her sciansá, scything it end over
end through the air. It sheared through Belleth’s arm,
severing her hand at the wrist. The hag queen roared in
shock and agony, rearing back and releasing the pressure
on the spear. Trisethni threw herself clear, tumbling past the
altar and the small table with the votive offerings of food
and wine upon it. There was a ritual knife next to the wine
glass and she hesitated for just an instant and then
snatched it up.
Another roar from behind her and a sudden pulsing blast
of magic that had her diving for cover again. She rolled
behind the small altar and peered out, sciansá and knife
clutched tight.
Hag Queen Belleth’s form shifted and twisted within a
writhing column of shadow and crimson magic. She grew in
size, taller and heavier, her legs lengthening into a great
muscular tail that whipped back and forth, destroying
furniture as she transformed into her Medusa form.
 Trisethni tried to strike at her while she was still changing,
but that tail flailed so hard and fast she knew it would
shatter all of her ribs if it caught her. Instead, she ripped the
ritual knife across the back of her forearm, clamped the
blade between her teeth and scurried back to the front of
the altar. The carven image of Khaine sat heavy and aloof
above a trio of red candles. The aelf swiped a palmful of
blood from her arm and slapped her hand down before the
idol, leaving a red handprint. The first part of the offering for
a blood sacrifice. She glanced over her shoulder; Belleth’s
metamorphosis was nearly complete. She didn’t have much
time.
The siren song of combat was singing in her veins as
Trisethni snatched up a piece of vine-cake from the plate.
She crushed it in her fist and let the crumbs trickle down
onto the red handprint. Glanced back again; the aelf was no
more. In her place a Medusa twice Trisethni’s height and
four times her strength – bones and muscles fortified with
magic and the spirit of Khaine.
Belleth roared.
Desperately Trisethni turned back and snatched for the
wine glass. The hag queen’s tail lashed out and knocked her
sideways, then thumped down where she’d been lying just
as she rolled away. Fire coursed through her side as broken
ribs grated against one another. Still she rolled up onto her
knees and lunged again for the glass to complete the
sacrifice and invoke Khaine’s aid in this holy battle, to make
him see who fought with truth and devotion and who
planned betrayal.
Belleth beat her to it, snatching up the glass and facing
her with a mocking, pitying smile. ‘So close, Tris. And yet so,
so far. I don’t know how you defeated those daemonettes,
and I confess it was death well done, but you should never
have come back here. And when you did, your loyalty
should have stayed with me. I’ve known you in ways no
other aelf ever has. Did you think I wouldn’t see that your
love for me had faded? Did you think I wouldn’t know why,
Trisethni the Unseen? Or should that be Trisethni the
Tongueless, who will die with no words left to speak.’
She shook her head in mock regret as Trisethni jumped,
hand clawing for the glass. Belleth thrust her away and then
saluted her with the wine, before draining the glass in one
long swallow.
Trisethni bellowed in rage and slashed at Belleth’s torso,
where moonlit aelven skin darkened to the red of old blood
and the tough plates of scales. Belleth roared and threw the
wine glass to shatter against the far wall, twisting sinuously
as Trisethni ducked behind her and somersaulted over the
thrust of her spear, tucking her feet, her breath caught on
the jagged ends of the bones broken inside her.
She landed and Belleth thrust again, then swept the spear
laterally to crack into her back. She turned the fall into a
tumble and came up in the slim gap between altar and wall.
Not even Belleth would risk desecrating Khaine’s idol to
reach her.
But Belleth didn’t need to. She reared up on her coils and
stabbed over the altar and downwards; the witch-aelf was
forced to throw herself clear again, each impact with the
floor jolting her injuries and knocking free a little more of
her strength and speed. Trisethni gathered the pain of her
injuries to her, as she’d done so many times in the past
months, and she fashioned them into a shield between her
heart and what she had to do. Privation and pain and
solitude had hardened her from aelf into diamond, and she
shone with the brightness of her devotion.
What she had done in the Spyrglass Warrens was a feat no
other aelf had matched. What she had suffered had not
broken her faith, but tempered it. She had walked the edge
of surrender and stepped back. Trisethni had nothing to
rebuke herself for. The realisation was as if an anvil had
been lifted from her back.
 With a ruthlessness she had only discovered in the
blackness beneath Ulgu, Trisethni excised Belleth from her
heart and viewed her with the cold dispassion of her kind.
Traitor. Disloyal to Morathi and therefore to Khaine. Disloyal
to me.
Belleth’s next strike was slow and clumsy and she paused
to shake her head. The witch-aelf slid behind her and scored
a cut across her back and skipped away.
And poisoned.
It was as if she’d spoken the words aloud. Belleth twisted
to the altar, where the wine glass had sat, and then to face
her old lover. ‘You switched the glasses. That’s why you’re
not dead – that’s the only reason you’re not dead. You put a
poisoned glass on the altar? Heresy.’
Trisethni just shook her head. It was Belleth who was the
heretic, Belleth who sought to overthrow the First Daughter,
founder of their very way of life. She wondered how long
ago Hellebron had seduced the hag queen away from the
true path to Khaine’s resurrection. She dismissed the
thought as she parried the spear thrust with her sciansá,
chipping wood from the haft. She didn’t want to know how
much of what she’d shared with Belleth had been to secure
her loyalty. It was bad enough the other aelf was betraying
them all now; to know she’d been manipulated, perhaps for
years, would be too much.
Trisethni was grimly amused that the act of carving out
her own tongue in the depths of her distress was all that
now prevented her from asking whether Belleth had ever
loved her.
It doesn’t matter, anyway. I have been tempted, both by
the daemonettes and by her. I have not surrendered to
either. I will never surrender my faith or my devotion.
And I will never place anyone between me and Khaine
again.
Trisethni leapt high over the slashing of Belleth’s tail,
scoring a cut through the Medusa’s forearm as she passed.
Belleth hissed and struck back, but the sweat on her face
and the pallor in her cheeks told the assassin the poison and
blood loss from her missing hand was working fast now. It
probably wasn’t enough to kill Belleth in this form, but it was
all that evened the odds between aelf and Medusa. Trisethni
would have been torn to pieces if she hadn’t tricked Belleth
into drinking the wine. Even so, she was reaching the limits
of her own endurance.
And yet there was still a battle to be fought, with steel and
flesh and will and heart and devotion. Grim-faced, Trisethni
set about winning it. She didn’t know how long it would be
until others heard the sounds of battle, and she wouldn’t
survive if Belleth’s co-conspirators broke down the door. She
spotted her second sciansá under the shattered remnants of
a table and threw the sacrificial knife. The slim blade
thunked into Belleth’s stomach just above where the scales
began. It sank in deep.
Trisethni snatched up her second sciansá, back-flipped
over the spear and again over the thrashing tail. Dizzy and
slowing now, she dared to put one foot on the edge of the
altar and pushed upwards in a final desperate burst of
strength, leaping higher even than Belleth’s head as the
Medusa reared up on the coils of her tail.
The hag queen began to lift her spear; Trisethni ignored it.
She reached the apex of her jump and fell like an arrow into
Belleth, her feet smacking into the Medusa’s torso and
bearing her down. She drove her sciansá down too, the
sharp points entering Belleth one above and one below each
collar bone. The razor-edges sliced through flesh and
muscle, through lungs and veins and arteries, the points
coming together in the hag queen’s heart.
Belleth gave a great shudder and all the magic left her;
she shrivelled in on herself, losing her battle-form until
Trisethni crouched over the beautiful, black-haired aelf who
had made her the devoted assassin she was.
 Tears pooled in Belleth’s eyes, her face twisted with a
silent plea for forgiveness. Trisethni had fought coldly and
without pity and now, coldly and without pity – and certainly
without that forgiveness Belleth craved – she ended it. The
assassin twisted both blades inside the aelf’s body, bursting
her heart and sending her into death on a wave of agony
that was the last thing she’d ever know. That, and who had
killed her.
The hag queen was a traitor and Khaine would mark her
as one. Forever.
Trisethni left her blades quivering in Belleth’s corpse and
slumped back, the rush of hurts making themselves known
as the hyper-focus of a battle to the death began to leave
her. She groaned, pressing a hand to her broken ribs and
staring with dull fascination at the blood leaking from the
slice in her forearm. Another scar to match the many given
her by the daemonettes.
Eventually she stood and surveyed the damaged sanctum.
The altar was almost the only piece of furniture still intact.
Trisethni found the sacrificial knife and retrieved the glass
from the bedroom, then she drew one sciansá out of
Belleth’s heart and caught some of her blood in it. She put
the knife and glass on the altar.
Almighty Khaine, in your name I took your servant’s life.
Murder for the Lord of Murder and to protect your Daughters
and your worship. To protect First Daughter Morathi and her
plans for your return.
If I have done wrong, I beg your forgiveness.
She knelt a few moments longer, staring sightlessly into
the shadows beneath the altar, before a small frown marred
her brow. She reached into the recess and her fingers
brushed something heavy and square-edged. She drew out
the book she’d last seen in Lord Rygo’s mansion in
Greywater Fastness. It was thick and heavy and burgeoning
with secrets. Trisethni stared at it for a long time, and then
she sighed and ripped off one of her sleeves. She tied it
tightly around the book and pressed her finger to the knot,
infusing it with a trickle – almost her last trickle – of magic.
She mustered what will she had to bind the knot so that
none may break it save Morathi herself, and then she
wrapped the book in half a bedsheet and put it in the
bottom of her much-abused pack.
She buckled her sword belt and sheathed the sciansá
she’d removed from Belleth’s still-warm body. Again without
pity, without much of any emotion at all – perhaps she was
simply too exhausted after the months of her trials and this
unforeseen and unforgivable betrayal – she used the other
to sever the hag queen’s head. Trisethni wrapped it in the
rest of the bedsheet and put it, too, in her pack. Then she
replenished her waterskin, took up Belleth’s spear, and left
the room.
The aelf padded through the dark and empty corridors of
the Khailebron temple and slipped out of a small, little-used
exit. If any had heard the battle, they dared not approach to
see who had taken the victory. Perhaps the unknown aelf,
the agent of Hellebron, had ordered them to leave Belleth
alone, or led the others in ritual in the main worship space,
the better to provide herself with an alibi should one be
needed.
Trisethni didn’t care; if any stepped from the shadow to
confront her, they would die. The temple grounds were
guarded, but she evaded the sentries and scaled the wall,
dropping down into a well-lit main thoroughfare in the heart
of Hammerhal Ghyra.
She was only a few miles from the Realmgate into Aqshy,
and from there, eventually, she would reach the Tarnish-life
Gate to Ulgu and the shadowpaths back to Hagg Nar.
She had been tested past all limits of endurance – and yet
she had endured. She had been betrayed by those she
loved the most – and yet her love for Morathi and Khaine
only grew stronger. She would not be stopped, and she
would not be turned from her path. Morathi would know all
Belleth had done, and all Trisethni herself had accomplished
to bring her this warning.
She didn’t walk with excited purpose or nervous
anticipation towards the Shadow Realm this time. She didn’t
wonder what to expect or whether she would distinguish
herself. She didn’t worry about covering herself in glory or
making her hag queen proud.
Instead, Trisethni walked with danger radiating from every
limb and the flash of her eyes. Head high and unhooded,
silver hair matted with blood, she bore her scars with brittle
pride and dared those she passed on the street to so much
as glance at her. None did. Heads down, they crossed the
road to avoid her, or flattened themselves against buildings
as she strode past, trailing the scent of blood and an aura of
righteous fury.
Every dark rumour about the Daughters of Khaine, every
piece of malicious gossip or wondering tale, she embodied,
and none who saw her doubted that her god was the God of
Murder.
Driven by icy anger and burning faith, Trisethni the
Unseen stalked the streets of Hammerhal Ghyra with a
traitor’s head and a book of secrets in her pack.
And though she was the Unseen, many marked her
passage through both halves of the city of Hammerhal.
Marked it, but dared not follow.
RED CLAW AND RUIN
LİANE MERCİEL
Morathi’s emissary came at sunset.
She emerged from the shadows with the red light behind
her, painting the black-lipped scales of her body with blood
and casting her eyes into terrible darkness. The Kharumathi
sisters, who were no strangers to such tricks themselves,
were nevertheless awed by the deftness and totality with
which the melusai welded the sun’s death to her own
grandeur. Their coven had never been deemed worthy of a
direct visit from one of the High Oracle’s snake-bodied
handmaidens before, and this one was all they’d imagined.
Smoothly the emissary climbed onto the great black rock
that thrust up over the Kharumathi’s enormous blood
cauldron, her serpentine body undulating across the stone.
Hundreds of sacrificial victims had died on that rock, their
blood poured into the cauldron’s gaping maw as an offering
to Khaine’s glory. The emissary’s scales scraped up the rust-
coloured flakes of their lives, and the dried blood floated
before her like rose petals thrown to carpet her arrival. Little
flecks clung to the pale skin of her aelven upper body,
stippling her abdomen and elbows with pinpricks of brown
and red.
The Daughters of Khaine fell to their knees in a ring, eyes
downcast and knives outstretched in ritual supplication.
Rhaelanthe, their hag queen, prostrated herself at the head
of their circle, though it was excitement rather than terror
that tensed the aelf’s body. No greater honour had been
bestowed upon the Kharumathi during her reign.
 ‘Sisters of the Kharumathi!’ the emissary called from the
sacrificial stone. As one, the witch-aelves of the coven lifted
their eyes, though they remained kneeling with their hands
flattened on the ground over the hilts of their knives. ‘I am
Myrcalene, Blood Herald of Khaine, Fatescribe to High Oracle
Morathi, Finder of the Volathi Shard. I bring you greetings
from the High Oracle, and instruction.’
‘Loyally we serve!’ Rhaelanthe cried, though the melusai
had not indicated that she should speak.
In the ranks behind the hag queen, one of the kneeling
witch-aelves snorted, very quietly, in disdain.
Nepenora, kneeling next to the disrespectful aelf –
Thaelire, her oldest and only friend – stiffened in instinctive
alarm. Very deliberately, she forced herself to relax. If
Rhaelanthe or any of her pet kittens noticed Nepenora’s
reaction, they’d assume she, too, was disloyal, because
she’d heard the seditious noise and hadn’t reported it.
Which would end very badly, and messily, for her.
Fortunately, it seemed that none of them had. All the
other Kharumathi were riveted by the melusai on the blood-
streaked stone. Nepenora exhaled a silent sigh of relief and
fixed her attention on Myrcalene too.
‘In the fiery Realm of Aqshy,’ Myrcalene told them, ‘there
is a fortress said to have been raised by Khorne. Whether
this is true – whether the Lord of Battle has the patience, or
the skill, to build anything – is unknown, but doubtful. Most
likely that is a lie that his slaves tell to cover him with
unearned glory. Regardless, the fortress stands. Its original
name is long forgotten. We know it today as Redhollow Ruin.
Khorne held it for a long and terrible age, and then it was
taken from his servants, and sat empty for another.’
The melusai’s voice hardened, and her beautiful face took
on a predatory aspect.
‘Now one of his Bloodbound has come forth to claim it
again. Graelakh the Gore-Gorger, he is called, and on his
right hand he wears a gauntlet of iron and blood with a
pulsing ruby in its palm. This is the Goregorge Claw, and the
power it grants Khorne’s brutes is stolen from us, for the
ruby it holds is none other than a Shard of Khaine.’
A gasp swept through the circle of aelves. Nepenora
echoed it too, for she could hardly miss the implication.
There was only one reason that an emissary of High Oracle
Morathi would come to them with news of a Shard of
Khaine.
‘You, sisters of the Kharumathi, must reclaim this shard of
our wounded god from the brutes who hold it now. You must
fall upon Redhollow Ruin and tear the blasphemer Graelakh
apart. Seize the Goregorge Claw, shatter the Blood Lord’s
prison, and free our wounded god’s soul-shard from his
grip.’
‘For Khaine’s glory, it will be done,’ Rhaelanthe swore,
leaping to her feet and clashing her knife’s hilt against the
crosspiece of her plated harness. The other witch-aelves
were swift to their feet beside her, and Nepenora got up as
well, shouting with the rest, for anything less would be
viewed as treason.
One of the witch-aelves called for the leathanam. The cry
was soon taken up by others, and the leathanam hastened
to answer. Heads bowed in mute subservience, the gaunt
and wretched half-souls scurried from their dirty slave-tents,
bearing loads of cut wood that seemed far too heavy for
their frail frames. They heaped the wood about the
cauldron’s base, covering its nest of bloodied ashes with a
ring of fresh fuel.
Their task done, the leathanam retreated. Not all of them,
however, were quick enough to reach safety. A laughing
witch-aelf seized the nearest half-soul by his wrist, pulling
him to her in a wild, whirling dance around the cold cauldron
and its firewood.
He didn’t resist. There was no use in a leathanam trying to
resist anything a female wanted to do to him. The gold-
crowned witch-aelf tossed the male about like a toy, yanking
him close and hurling him away, until she’d danced a
complete circle around the cauldron. At the end, she threw
him to the next Daughter of Khaine. She, too, spun the
hapless leathanam through a furious revel and cast him to
the next Kharumathi.
They spun him around and around, their dance growing
steadily faster and angrier, their treatment of the unlucky
half-soul rougher. The leathanam’s wrists and arms bled
from a hundred shallow cuts that the female aelves’ bladed
gauntlets and bracelets had slashed in him, but he never
made a sound. He never even lifted his eyes from the
pounded earth beneath his feet. Nepenora took her turn,
and Thaelire too. Then the last of them took her dance, and
hurled the leathanam to Rhaelanthe when she was done.
The hag queen brought the exhausted, injured male
stumbling up the stone to where Myrcalene waited. Blood
from his dance-inflicted lacerations pattered onto the rock
between the hag queen’s feet and the melusai. It was the
only sound in the hushed, reverent silence that weighted
the air.
Some of the Daughters of Khaine, after their dances, had
gone to get their ritual drums. Softly, then with greater
insistence, they took up the rhythm of the leathanam’s
dripping blood on their instruments, first echoing and then
drowning out the thudding of his heart.
‘We pray, now, for the glory of Khaine and the favour of
his High Oracle, Morathi,’ Rhaelanthe pronounced. The hag
queen gripped the leathanam’s hair and slashed her ritual
knife across his throat, splashing his lifeblood into the
cauldron in a messy, erratic fountain. After a few thrashing
moments, the male went limp in her grip, dying with no
sound save a choked, involuntary gasp. Blood continued to
pour from him even as his heart stuttered to a stop and his
flesh went white. Drawn by the cauldron’s magic, it spilled
out until all that remained of the leathanam was a dried
husk, light and empty as a cicada’s shell.
 The drums, which had fallen silent for a beat so that all
could hear the first sacrifice die, took up their hammering
rhythm again.
‘We pray,’ Rhaelanthe said, letting the male’s body fall
from the rock onto the heaped firewood, ‘and we dance. We
dance, my sisters. We dance!’
As she shouted, the leathanam’s withered corpse burst
into red flame, igniting the fire around the cauldron and
washing the Daughters of Khaine in its bloody light. The
Kharumathi cried out in furious joy. Those who were not
drumming went out into the camp, seizing war-slaves and
prisoners and unfortunate leathanam, then pulling them
back to the cauldron to dance.
They whirled madly, the witch-aelves wild and terrible and
beautiful in the scarlet light, the orruks and humans and
leathanam held helplessly in their thrall. Around and around
they spun, and the aelves’ ritual knives flashed in their
dance, and the air smelled of copper and sweat. The
cauldron filled with blood, first slowly and only from a few
scattered streams, then in dozens of bright overlapping
arches at once, like a grisly fountain running in reverse.
Above them all, Myrcalene watched, impassive as an idol.
Wisps of red steam twined about her scales and stirred the
loose strands of her white hair. As the last of the sacrifices
emptied his life into the cauldron, the bloody steam grew
thicker, enveloping the Kharumathi in a warm red fog.
The dancers vanished in its embrace, only shapely limbs
or an occasional toss of red-streaked hair emerging from the
fog. The drummers remained visible at its outer edges a
while longer. Then the mist swallowed them as well, so that
their thudding song resonated through the blood-cloud like
the disembodied beating of all its harvested hearts.
In that hot red haze, hardly able to breathe, buffeted by
the thunder of the Kharumathi drums, Nepenora felt herself
seized by a transcendent, incandescent ecstasy. Exhilaration
flooded her veins, sang in her heart, filled her sight with a
swirl of tingling stars. She was cradled with her battle-
sisters in their god’s embrace, suffused with the greatest
satisfaction that any male could give them, sated and
supreme.
Graelakh and his Bloodbound were doomed.
The blood-cloud began to dissipate, releasing them back
to the cool shadow of the world. Witch-aelves emerged from
the fog, slowly, unwilling to relinquish the red pleasure of
the night. Many, including the hag queen, went off to their
own tents in twos and threes. A few eccentrics who
preferred males, like Thaelire, took what they could from the
leathanam or their surviving captives. Thaelire herself kept
a pair of rune-scarred warlocks as pets, and Nepenora was
unsurprised to see her summon them to her side.
A comely witch-aelf beckoned to Nepenora, breaking her
chain of thought. Blood smeared the woman’s upper arms
and chest. Her cheek was daubed with crimson, stark
against her bone-pale skin. She beckoned again, her smile
alight with promise, and Nepenora laughed and followed her
into the shadows.
The last she saw of the revelry was Myrcalene, still
standing sentinel on the sacrificial rock, watching the
Kharumathi disperse with hot, red eyes.
Thaelire came to her the next morning. The sorceress wore
a hooded robe of grey velvet, soft around her face and
hands, but crinkled about the hem with a rime of dried
blood.
Nepenora looked up from her morning tea and waved
away the leathanam who had brought it. She’d already
dismissed her companion from the night before.
‘Unwise to show your disrespect so openly. You would
have been punished severely if you’d been caught last
night.’
Thaelire shrugged. She settled onto a cushioned stool and
poured her own cup of tea from Nepenora’s tray, after
peering into the kettle to determine whether it was a kind
she liked.
‘Even if Rhaelanthe had noticed – and she wouldn’t have,
because she hadn’t a thought for anything beyond trying to
impress the High Oracle’s emissary – she wouldn’t have
done anything.’
‘She could have condemned you at the blood-dance. You’d
have made a marvellous sacrifice to Khaine’s glory.’
‘No.’ Thaelire sipped her tea, unconcerned. ‘If she’d done
that, she would have conceded that she has no control over
her own people. Perhaps in another fortnight, if she’s won
some other victories and proved her worth to the melusai,
she’ll feel at liberty to punish us for small transgressions.
But to do so on the first night, over something so petty? It
would make her look weak. Frantic, ineffectual. She isn’t
especially bright, but she is acutely conscious of her pride.
So even if she had noticed, she would have pretended not
to.’
‘It’s not a gamble I would have chosen to make,’
Nepenora said.
‘Ah.’ Thaelire smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling with
gentle amusement. ‘But you didn’t. I did. Now, if you’re
finished chastising me for it, perhaps we can decide what to
do about this Goregorge Claw and the expedition to
Redhollow Ruin.’
‘Do you think it’s a true Shard of Khaine?’ Nepenora
asked. Both had heard the stories of covens sent on quests
for shards that, once obtained, proved to be false artefacts –
but they had also heard tales of the glories earned by those
who restored true shards to their god. Each soul-shard, they
were told, healed one of Khaine’s innumerable wounds and
brought him that much closer to reclaiming his true
splendour. A Daughter of Khaine could perform no greater
service, and know no holier communion, than touching a
shard of the god’s essence with her own hands, and
returning it to his whole.
 Thaelire shrugged. She finished her tea and set it aside,
steepling her fingers and resting her chin upon them. The
nails were stained a dark, gleaming ruby. Nepenora knew
that the sorceress indulged herself by using her magic to
paint them with her captives’ crystallised blood.
‘Does it matter? Even if the Claw isn’t really a shard of
Khaine, it’s most assuredly a powerful weapon for Khorne.
Capturing such a trophy, and shaming the champion who
held it, would be a worthy victory even if we can’t turn that
weapon to Khaine’s service afterward. But that presupposes
that we can win.’
‘You don’t think we can?’ Nepenora asked. Lightly, so
lightly. As if it weren’t the thought that had consumed both
of them since the melusai’s arrival.
‘Not with Rhaelanthe leading us,’ Thaelire replied.
And there it was, the forbidden truth, laid out all-too-
casually over their morning tea. Nepenora glanced
reflexively at the tent’s door, but of course there was no one
there. Her leathanam servant was well trained, and had the
scars to prove it; he knew better than to lurk nearby when
the witch-aelves were discussing serious matters, and he
also knew enough to ensure no one else was listening,
either. His life depended on such vigilances.
‘Do you suppose Myr– the emissary knows?’ Nepenora
sipped her tea to cover her discomfort at almost having
used the melusai’s name. Perhaps it was only superstition
that claimed the High Oracle’s handmaidens could hear
anything that followed the mention of their names, but…
superstition or not, it seemed wiser not to take the chance.
‘I don’t know,’ Thaelire admitted. ‘But how could she not?
The Kharumathi are a thin shadow of what we were before
Rhaelanthe claimed the mantle of hag queen, and our
losses far outnumber our victories. The shadowlands
whispered Hag Queen Orimache’s name with awe. They
speak Rhaelanthe’s with scorn. The melusai must know how
weak she is.’
 ‘Then this isn’t a real shard quest.’ Nepenora felt an
unexpected pang of disappointment. She hadn’t realised
how badly she’d hoped to achieve something of significance
in Khaine’s honour until the possibility had been taken from
her. ‘It’s a suicide mission. An excuse to be rid of a coven
that’s become an embarrassment.’ They’d heard those
stories, too.
‘Maybe. Maybe not. The quest for the Goregorge Claw
might be a test – if the Kharumathi are truly worthy, we’ll
defeat Khorne’s warlord and seize his prize for Khaine’s red
glory. But if we’re not…’
‘Then we’ll deserve to die.’ Nepenora traced the
enamelled inlays of her bladed gauntlet with a fingertip. Red
and gold in slashing runes, interspersed with razor-sharp
blades that lifted the same designs into lethality. It was an
heirloom of the Kharumathi, passed down from one devotee
to the next for centuries. She couldn’t imagine a day when
there might be no witch-aelf of their coven left alive to bear
it into battle.
She looked across the tea table to Thaelire, her eyes
alight. ‘We can’t allow Rhaelanthe to destroy the
Kharumathi.’
‘I’m not sure we can stop her,’ Thaelire said dryly. ‘We’ve
never seen Redhollow Ruin. We have no information about
what its fortifications might be, or who its defenders are. All
we know is that it was held by Khorne in one age and
reclaimed in another, which suggests that those
fortifications and defenders are formidable. Perhaps too
formidable for us.’
‘Our chances would be better with different leadership.’
‘Would they?’ Thaelire arched her eyebrows, all
innocence. ‘Whose?’
Nepenora leaned across the table, her voice low and
intent. What she was saying now was treason, worse by far
than what Thaelire had said a few moments earlier. Worse
than anything either of them had said to the other over the
long years of their friendship – but, perhaps, what all those
years had been leading up to.
‘Ours. Yours and mine. Rhaelanthe can’t lead us to victory,
we both know that. She’s a fanatic, not a general. She
hasn’t any of the skills needed to prevail. But you and I,
together, do. We have all of them. We could bring the
Kharumathi to glory. For Khaine, for the High Oracle, and for
the coven.’
‘Maybe. If we had the opportunity,’ Thaelire agreed.
‘Though I suppose there’s a fair chance that Graelakh the
Gore-Gorger might be able to make a persuasive case
concerning the deficiencies in Rhaelanthe’s leadership. Until
then, I’m afraid, this conversation strikes me as slightly
premature.’ The sorceress stood, her grey robe whispering
as it fell into place around her. ‘The Kharumathi have a hag
queen. We can’t move against her until she’s… discredited.
Whether that will happen at Redhollow Ruin is uncertain. But
we should keep to safer plays until Rhaelanthe’s fate is
clear, I think.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning we focus, for now, on keeping our own followers
safe. My witch-aelves, and yours, should be under clear
instruction to follow no orders but ours. Rhaelanthe is free
to kill herself with her zealotry, but I don’t intend to let her
bring the rest of us down with her.’ Thaelire made a small,
dismissive gesture, mostly hidden under the loose shroud of
her robe, as she moved to the tent door. ‘We can make no
other plans until we’ve had a glimpse at the field of play.’
In the stillness following the sorceress’ departure,
Nepenora shrugged. ‘Then perhaps we should have a look,’
the aelf murmured to herself. She refilled her cup with the
last of the kettle’s tea and drained it in meditative quiet.
When she felt sufficiently calm and focused, Nepenora went
to the door to summon her favoured leathanam.
He came quietly, head bowed, eyes fixed deferentially on
the ground. ‘Mistress?’
 ‘I require a sacrifice,’ Nepenora told him. ‘Find one from
the pens.’
‘Yes, mistress.’ The leathanam hesitated, visibly resisting
the reflexive temptation to glance up at her for guidance.
He’d been lashed too many times for that mistake to make
it again, but plainly the impulse remained. Nepenora
decided to ignore it for now. ‘The sorceress sent… one of her
warlocks. With a gift. She suggested that you might find this
gift suitable as a sacrifice. Shall I bring him to you?’
‘Yes,’ Nepenora decided, after brief consideration. She had
a good guess which captive Thaelire might have sent. The
sorceress had captured a human wizard during one of their
previous raids – the only glimmer of success from an
otherwise wretched foray. Evading Rhaelanthe’s repeated
demands to sacrifice the wizard, Thaelire had kept him alive
for months so that she could interrogate him about his arts.
She’d recently lost interest in her captive, however, which
suggested that she’d learned all she could from him.
Sometimes Thaelire freed her playthings when she tired of
them. She could, Nepenora knew, be dreadfully soft-hearted
that way; she hardly ever disciplined her warlocks, and
seemed amused by infractions that any other witch-aelf
would punish viciously. But the wizard had evidently
annoyed her, or else had showed a glimpse of power in his
blood that was too great for even Thaelire to resist. He had
not been released, and never would be.
Nepenora was, accordingly, unsurprised to see one of
Thaelire’s warlocks, and the shackled wizard, following her
leathanam back towards her tent.
The wizard was a miserable creature, haggard under his
unkempt beard, his once-fine robes reduced to gilded
threads on rags. His wrists were chafed raw and weeping
under the coarse rope that bound him. The warlock –
Fealorn, the crueller of the two that Thaelire kept – was
dark-haired and white-faced, unearthly in the shadowy
robes that the doomfire warlocks all wore. Inky runes
scarred his brow, and his eyes were black and hateful.
‘She says you can kill him,’ Fealorn said, gesturing to the
wizard. Unlike the leathanam, he didn’t look down when he
spoke to Nepenora. He met her eyes insolently, daring her
to punish him and knowing that she wouldn’t.
‘And you?’ Nepenora asked, acidly. She disliked the
warlocks. They were strange, cursed creatures. Their affinity
for the shadow-spirit of Ulgu was unnatural, so deep that it
ran almost to consanguinity, in some way that she didn’t
fully understand but instinctively distrusted. It made them
stronger and less biddable than other males, and therefore
more dangerous. Most witch-aelves avoided them,
preferring to let the doomfire warlocks congregate into
small bands with their own kind.
‘She still wants me. You only get the human,’ Fealorn said
with a smirk. He tossed the wizard’s rope to Nepenora’s
leathanam. ‘But he’s no small gift. There is a magic in his
blood, even now. Some she took, but some remains. His
mastery was in deciphering patterns in the puzzle-weaves of
fate. Reading omens and auguries, listening to the winds of
prophecy, all those desperate human attempts to divine the
future. Many of his gifts belong to my mistress now, but… if
you want a sacrifice to offer for a glimpse of what might lie
ahead, this one should serve well.’
‘Good. I accept. You can go now.’ Nepenora waved the
warlock away. Fealorn bowed mockingly and departed.
When he was gone, she turned to her leathanam. ‘See
that I’m not disturbed,’ Nepenora ordered, and took the
wizard’s rope to lead him into her tent.
She had her own private Khainite altar, as any witch-aelf
of sufficient standing to claim a personal tent did. Some
were no more than especially blessed sciansá, holier
versions of the ceremonial blades that all witch-aelves
carried. A few were even smaller: shards of ruby or
engraved gold reclaimed from broken artefacts and used as
pommel or blade decorations to consecrate a devotee’s
otherwise ordinary ritual knife.
But Nepenora had a proper altar, gilt and bladed. It was
built in three parts: a low pillory that held the kneeling
victim’s head and wrists; the wide, shallow iron bowl, its
base inscribed with stylised flames to mimic the coven’s
great cauldron, that collected the blood offering; and the
terrible likeness of Khaine that stood over the bowl,
watching the victim’s death and taking the red god’s due.
She took the human’s head by its filthy hair and dragged
him across the tent to kneel before the pillory board. The
wizard moaned and struggled as Nepenora pushed him
down and latched the hinged board over his neck and
wrists, but there wasn’t much fight left in him. With an easy
twist of her knife, Nepenora opened his throat. As the iron
bowl filled with the human’s life, she prayed.
Red steam rose from the bowl and caressed her face as
she spoke the ritual incantation and drew Khaine’s four
sacred signs in the blood with the tip of her sciansá. Each
line in each rune was followed by a trail of bubbling steam
as the holy magic took hold in the blood, and Khaine
accepted his servant’s offering.
Nepenora closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. The
steam was warm, animalic, redolent of hot iron and fading
life and the prickling half-scent of magic. A tense and
thrilling focus filled her, like the clarion moment of calm that
came before the charge to battle sounded.
‘Give me a sign,’ Nepenora whispered into the steam. Her
hand tightened about the dagger’s carved grip. ‘Show me,
Khaine Iron-Hearted, what awaits your daughters in
Redhollow Ruin. What snares have been set for us? Whom
must we kill? Let me see clearly, that I may serve well.’
The blood roiled around her dagger, boiling violently
across every line of every rune that she’d traced into the
liquid. Steam buffeted Nepenora’s face and blew her hair
back and up, over her head, in a tangling cloud. She
squinted into the red haze, trying to make out some symbol,
some glimpse of guidance, in the hissing rush of her god’s
answer.
Images rose in bubbling lines within the bowl and
collapsed just as quickly, one cascading rapidly after
another. Many formed and vanished too swiftly for Nepenora
to grasp their contours, but she was able to pick a few out
before their bubbles burst back into shapelessness.
A bolt of lightning. A warhammer crossed over a sciansá.
A mailed fist with drops of blood or sparks squeezed out
between its armoured fingers. Two snakes tangled together,
each swallowing the other’s tail. A melusai crossing a chasm
on a bridge of aelven bodies, each gripping the ankles of the
one in front to hold themselves together and suspended,
precariously, above disaster.
Other images, too many, too fast. Nepenora couldn’t
follow them, couldn’t squint through the buffeting rush of
steam long enough to see them clearly. Red droplets fogged
her vision and weighted her eyelashes, gluing them
together when she blinked. Finally she couldn’t see anything
else through the stinging, opaque film of blood on her eyes.
There was red, only red.
She pulled away from the bowl. The last of the wizard’s
blood boiled away, leaving its iron mouth open and bare.
Only a faint sheen of moisture clung to the idol of Khaine
standing above the sacrificial bowl. There was nothing left
inside the vessel, or in the husk of the wizard she’d drained.
Nepenora wiped her face. The cloth came away crimson.
She folded it absently, not really noticing the scarlet
fingerprints that she left on the other side, and tossed it
onto the basket of laundry that her leathanam would take
away later.
Signs and portents. That was all such rituals ever gave
her: signs and portents, symbols whose meaning became
clear only later, often too late to do any good.
 But this time, maybe for the first time, two of the symbols
were clear enough to be read immediately. The lightning
and the warhammer were unambiguous. Together, they
could mean only one thing – but even that answer only led
to more questions.
What do the Stormcast Eternals have to do with Redhollow
Ruin?

A week later, the Kharumathi marched through the Argental

Gate.
The Realmgate was held by the Eluathii coven, a far older
and more powerful sect than the Kharumathi. The Eluathii
hag queen came forward with great pomp and ceremony to
wish the Kharumathi well in their venture to Aqshy, but
Nepenora noted that she didn’t show the least bit of
jealousy that they, and not her war coven, had been given
the shard-quest, and she didn’t offer to send any of her own
witch-aelves or Sisters of Slaughter with them.
It is a suicide mission, Nepenora thought grimly, as she
followed her sisters-in-faith towards the vastness of the
Argental Gate. She stole a glance at Rhaelanthe, standing
proud at the head of their formation, but the hag queen
never turned back, and would only have been irritated if she
had noticed Nepenora looking her way. Rhaelanthe had
wanted to give Thaelire’s wizard to the Eluathii as a token of
gratitude for their welcome, and had been vexed to learn
that Nepenora had already sacrificed the human.
He was better spent as our offering. The Kharumathi had
needed Khaine’s guidance for the task they now confronted.
Without the wizard as sacrifice, they might not have got it.
To them, he’d been potentially invaluable.
But the wizard would have been worth nothing to the
Eluathii. They had slave pens that held hundreds; they
would hardly have been impressed by the gift of a single
ragged, half-dead human. Rhaelanthe would only have
shamed herself by presenting such a paltry gift. It was
better for the Kharumathi’s honour to offer nothing. Then
Rhaelanthe could claim that the High Oracle required her
people to move with such urgency that they had to forgo
such courtesies. That explanation elevated the Kharumathi
by showing that they were entrusted with a task of such
importance, and it did not insult their hosts, since the
Eluathii could hardly say that a token gift was more pressing
than Morathi’s shard-quest.
This was, ultimately, the position that Rhaelanthe had
been forced into. Not ideal, but vastly preferable to the
alternative. But, rather than being grateful that Thaelire and
Nepenora had protected their coven’s dignity by preventing
their hag queen from making such an obvious blunder,
Rhaelanthe was bitterly angry with them both for stymying
her plan.
Nepenora shook her head and turned back to the march. If
indeed Myrcalene’s shard-quest was meant to put an end to
the Kharumathi – as the Eluathii seemed to believe, and as
she herself was becoming convinced – then Rhaelanthe,
plainly, couldn’t be relied upon to spot the trap before it
closed. She couldn’t even navigate something as simple as
a tribute gift.
And there was no time to change any of that. Already, the
Kharumathi were marching through. Already, Nepenora
could feel the Realmgate’s chill reaching for her.
The Argental Gate appeared as a stillness within the
endless gloom of Ulgu, a pane of grey and black fog trapped
in mid-swirl like dark paint washed across glass. A deep and
subtle cold surrounded it. Not biting, like a blast of winter
wind to the face, but a slow drain, almost imperceptible at
first, that bled out living warmth with seductive, languid
ease.
The Eluathii had surrounded it with a thin frame of iron
and silver, inscribed with blades and the howling likeness of
Khaine. It was a strange thing, the frame, for it had been
built to trace a line between reality and not-quite-that, and
as such it was peculiarly angled and bizarrely proportioned,
like the drawing of an imaginative but clumsy child. Along
its outer edge, the frame appeared ordinary enough, but
along the inner rim, the metal seemed to pull inward, its
shape subtly distorted and liquefied, as if iron and silver
were as easily deformed as the water at a whirlpool’s
mouth.
The last of the previous war-leader’s witch-aelves passed
through. Nepenora glanced back to her followers, raised her
arm, and signalled their advance.
‘Kharumathi! We go through!’
With her witch-aelves’ obedient shouts ringing in her ears,
Nepenora strode to the Argental Gate. As she drew near,
she felt the Realmgate’s magic pull at her. It was a
profoundly unsettling feeling: a magnetism that tugged at
her skin and bones and hair and blood all at different
frequencies, such that her blood rushed forward and her
bones vibrated uncomfortably while her skin prickled with
fine electric tingles and her hair flew towards the gate in
stronger, but slower, pulses.
It was hard to see, hard to breathe, hard to think with
every part of her body drawn to the Realmgate in a chaotic,
uneven thrum. Her eyes jumped inside her skull. Her tongue
pushed spasmodically forward against her teeth, each of
which shivered in her gums in answer to its own separate
call.
It was unbearable. It would drive her mad. Nepenora
screwed her eyes shut and stumbled forward, unable to tell
whether her warriors were following.
Cold buffeted her, and a howling black wind. Then light,
brighter and brighter, battering at her eyelids and the
hand…
And then she was staggering out onto a plateau of
cracked grey rock. A huge red sun blazed overhead, burning
with an intensity unlike anything Nepenora had ever seen.
The landscape around it was scorched and withered, burned
down to bare skeletal stone.
Behind her, the Realmgate roared. From this side, it
appeared to be a towering firespout issuing from a rift in the
smoking rocks. She could discern no sign of its realm-
crossing magic; perhaps it was only a one-way passage.
Kharumathi sisters moaned around the gate, covering their
eyes and shouting for leathanam to bring them cloaks,
cowls, anything they could use to block the hellish glare.
But there was no answer. The leathanam were at the back
of the Kharumathi train, behind all the war companies, as
befit their lowly status. They had not yet passed through the
Realmgate, and they could not serve.
‘Here. Put it on.’ A bundle of cloth was shoved into
Nepenora’s hands. She shook it out clumsily, feeling more
than seeing the shadowsilk cloak, and draped it over herself
gratefully. Protected by the hood’s deep shade, she finally
dared to squint at the fiery realm. Nothing seemed about to
attack them while they staggered about blindly, which was
some small relief. At least their lack of preparation wouldn’t
be immediately fatal.
Thaelire stood next to her, wearing a near-identical grey
cloak. Her witch-aelves were similarly outfitted, but none of
the others were. The sorceress shook her head, surveying
the Kharumathi disarray.
‘Inexcusable. Rhaelanthe knew we were coming to Aqshy.’
‘Yes.’ Nepenora fingered the fine grey silk. Woven in Ulgu,
it carried a great and soothing depth of shadow, but
weighed almost nothing. It wouldn’t burden them in Aqshy’s
heat. ‘How many do you have?’
‘Not enough for your warriors as well as my own.’ Thaelire
shrugged, lifting a hand to her eyes as she took in the
blasted landscape. The blackened hills spiked up into fiery
mountains to the north. The horizon glowed red over those
mountains’ crowns – from their own fires, Nepenora
suspected, not the sun. Not a trace of water, greenery, or
settled civilisation was anywhere in sight. ‘The baggage
train will come through soon, though. They won’t be blind
for long. Consider it a lesson, if you like. We’ll all have to do
better to anticipate dangers here. Not just Rhaelanthe.’
‘Duly noted,’ Nepenora said dryly. Thaelire was right; the
leathanam and baggage-slaves were coming through the
Realmgate now, bent low under their heavy burdens. The
witch-aelves fell upon them at once, covering themselves in
cloaks and hoods against Aqshy’s brutal sun.
Nepenora strode over to join them. She directed her
witch-aelves into some semblance of order, forming them
into a line and seeing that cloaks were disbursed more or
less evenly, with those already sheltered from the sun
assisting the warriors who were still suffering under its
blaze. When all her witch-aelves were protected, and even
the leathanam had been given time to adjust their rags to
cover their bare skin and shade their eyes, she ordered
them to fall in with the rest of the Kharumathi. Slowly, their
coven was returning to readiness.
Too slowly, if there’d been any threat waiting on this side
of the Realmgate. Nepenora adjusted her cloak, feeling the
silk again. Aqshy was a strange, hard place, as far from their
shadowy homeland of Ulgu as it was possible to imagine.
None of them, save perhaps Myrcalene, had ever set foot in
it before, and they knew little of what to expect.
If their arrival had been an early test, they’d failed
decisively.
And nothing would get easier from here.
For three days and four nights they traversed the Sootstain
Hills, following a path mapped out for them in their captives’
blood. These lands, though bitterly inhospitable, were not as
devoid of life as they’d initially appeared – there were tribes
of humans, stunted and scarred and sworn to Khorne, who
clawed out an existence amid the smoking stones.
 The Kharumathi took them. Rhaelanthe ordered the
captured tribespeople to be bound and given to Thaelire, for
the sorceress was by far the most adept blood-mage among
them. From their blood, Thaelire drew their memories of
where water could be found, and food, and the largest of
their camps. She tasted their fear, and their anger, and their
prayers for vengeance, and she learned the rough direction
of Redhollow Ruin, where they hoped the witch-aelves might
meet their destruction.
And then, time and time again, Rhaelanthe had the
captives finished in the Kharumathi cauldron. Myrcalene
watched all these sacrifices, and the red dances that
accompanied each one, but the melusai never manifested
either pleasure or disapproval at the rites.
The third time, Thaelire objected. ‘We’re wasting these
captives. There’s so much more they know that I can’t draw
out through the spells. All I can read are old memories, the
ones sunk deep enough to be in bone and blood, and the
strongest emotions that course through their veins when I
work the magic. Everything else – everything these people
know about Redhollow Ruin and its defenders – escapes. We
need to question them conventionally.’
‘We need to honour Khaine,’ Rhaelanthe replied flatly. The
hag queen was uncommonly beautiful, even by the
standards of aelvenkind. The High Oracle was known to
favour the fairest of her servants, and few in the upper
echelons of the Daughters of Khaine were anything less
than stunning. But when Rhaelanthe was irritated, that
beauty hardened into something brittle and sharp.
Thaelire shot a pointed glance back to where Myrcalene
accompanied their train, keeping always alongside the
sacred cauldron and its leathanam bearers. The melusai
made an unsettling figure with her head and upper body
draped in shadowsilk, and her serpentine lower body
painted a reflective, satiny white to turn away the sun.
‘This entire shard-quest is a test.’
 ‘Do you think I don’t know that? How stupid do you
imagine I am?’ Rhaelanthe snorted. Her long hair, white
down to her shoulders and dyed in streaks of pink and red
with sacrificial blood below, swirled in Aqshy’s furnace-
bellows wind. Tiny steel blades had been woven into her
hair like beads and enchanted to supernatural deadliness.
They rang against each other in the wind, chiming a quiet,
hungry song. ‘Of course it’s a test. Therefore we must take
every opportunity we can to show our faith. We must honour
the Lord of Murder with every sacrifice we can capture, so
that Khaine will be pleased and his emissary will witness our
piety.’
‘I think she’d prefer to witness our victory,’ Thaelire said
acidly.
‘There can be no victory without piety.’ Rhaelanthe stared
hard at the sorceress, her eyes ablaze with fanatic certainty.
‘Do you doubt this, Thaelire? Do you wish to challenge my
leadership?’
Thaelire bowed her head and steepled her hands in
submission. The sorceress was unparalleled in her mastery
of magic, which was why Rhaelanthe allowed her as much
leeway as she did, but she was clumsy with a sciansá. Any
girl in training could best her in single combat, and all knew
it. ‘No, hag queen. If that is your order, I will obey.’
‘See that you do. And don’t question me again.’
‘You really do want to die,’ Nepenora marvelled to Thaelire
later that day, when the Kharumathi had made camp and it
was possible for her to speak to the sorceress without
drawing the loyalists’ suspicions. She’d surreptitiously
watched the entire conversation with Rhaelanthe, as had
every other witch-aelf close enough to catch the words.
‘We’re all going to die if we march blindly into Khorne’s
teeth,’ Thaelire said gloomily, sorting through the powders
and potions that enhanced her rituals. Silver dust and the
fine-grained powder of dried, deadly resins sifted through
her fingers. ‘The prisoners’ emotions were very clear.
Whatever waits in Redhollow Ruin, they believe it will
destroy us, and will do so with such savagery that the
thought consoles them even as they die. It isn’t just
Graelakh, or even his Claw. The memories run older than
that, and deeper, and grislier. There’s something else in the
fortress. If we’re to have any chance against that doom, we
must know what it is.’
‘I’ll send out my scouts to see what they can spy.’ Just as
Thaelire’s warriors focused on weaving steel and spellcraft
into a distinctive fighting style, so Nepenora’s specialised in
stealth and quick, surgical strikes. If there was anything
worth scouting in this wasteland, they’d find it.
‘Tell them to be careful. We’re drawing near. The captives’
imaginings have got stronger by the day. The last one had
seen Redhollow Ruin with her own eyes. Her thoughts of
what would happen to us weren’t just hopes and prayers.
They were mingled with memories of horrors she’d actually
witnessed. She thought of long, pale claws that towered to
the sky. They were threaded with the bodies of her dead kin
like meat on roasting skewers.’ Thaelire dropped a handful
of spiky seeds into a mortar and began crushing them with
quick, violent twists of her black granite pestle.
‘I’ll warn them.’ Nepenora caught a whiff of stinging red
dust and covered her nose before she could inhale any more
of whatever delirium-inducing powder the sorceress was
grinding. ‘Have you seen anything of the Stormcast Eternals
in your spells?’ She’d told Thaelire about the vision in her
prayer shortly after she’d seen it, but thus far none of the
Kharumathi had seen any sign of the Stormcasts in Aqshy,
whether with their own eyes or through their divinations.
‘No. Nothing.’ Thaelire shrugged without looking up. She
measured three drops of bitter-smelling ink into the crushed
seeds, then pricked her finger and squeezed out a single
drop of blood. Curling steam rose from the mortar. ‘I don’t
think that, at least, can be blamed on Rhaelanthe’s refusal
to let me question the humans. The Sigmarites are terrifying
enough that, even if only glimpsed once, they would be
remembered in the blood. I can say with some assurance
that no one we’ve captured has seen them.’
‘Maybe they aren’t here yet.’ Nepenora frowned behind
the shadowsilk sleeve she was holding against her nose.
‘Prophecies can be inexact. It could be that the Stormcasts
will arrive later in the game. Perhaps in response to
something we do.’
‘I hope not,’ Thaelire said dryly. She scraped the mortar’s
contents into a smoked glass jar and capped the steaming
mixture. ‘I don’t think I’d care to have them coming down on
my head for something I’d done.’
‘No.’ Nepenora shuddered. All the tales she’d heard of
Stormcast Eternals suggested that they made terrifying
allies. They were said to be heedless of lesser races’ fragility
when unleashing their destructive tempests, and to be
brutally unforgiving of transgressions that offended their
moral codes. Perhaps not all Stormcasts were as harsh and
haughty as the ones she’d heard of – like the Daughters of
Khaine, they had their own factions and divisions of belief –
but she found it difficult to imagine that such powerful
creatures could ever really be trusted, whatever their
intentions. They were simply too far from mortal.
‘Well, if they are here, they should be easy to find,’
Thaelire said. ‘Behemoths armoured in sigmarite and
crackling with lightning? Even in Aqshy, they’ll stand out.’
Guided by Thaelire’s divinations, Nepenora’s scouts needed
only a few nights to locate Redhollow Ruin.
As soon as they relayed word of their discovery, the main
Kharumathi march stopped, drew back, and went into
concealment. Thaelire and her warlocks wove shadows into
a barrier around their camp, deflecting outside eyes, and
the Daughters of Khaine settled in to await the scouts’
report.
 Nepenora, cloaked in shadowsilk and subtle magic, went
out with her warriors. They were all lightly armoured, even
by the standards of the Daughters of Khaine, and carried
few weapons beyond their ritual sciansá, envenomed
throwing knives and spiked bucklers. Their purpose was
speed and stealth, not sustained fighting with Khorne’s
heavy brutes.
Under the cloudy stars, they crept towards the red
fortress. Even by night, Aqshy was hot: the sun-baked
stones exhaled the day’s heat back out into the darkness,
and the hills were pierced by gouts of flame from
subterranean gas vents or the realm’s own bizarre
creatures. Glowing insects fluttered past them, and jewel-
bright lizards with incandescent eyes and claws skittered
between the smoking rocks underfoot. Ahead, white spines
erupted from the blackened earth and stretched up towards
the sky. They looked like immense, eight-fingered skeletal
hands outstretched in unspoken greed. Broken bodies, tiny
from afar, were impaled on several of them. A few still
twitched in the night.
Past that grisly gauntlet loomed Redhollow Ruin. A slow-
moving river of liquid fire poured from the wounded black
hill into which the fortress had been carved, surrounding the
edifice with a deadly moat and casting an unholy red light
up to its battlements. The fortress itself was coated in
ancient soot, which hung off its towers and crenellations in
craggy black beards. There was something strange about
the stone beneath that grimy coat, but from this distance,
Nepenora couldn’t be certain what it was.
Drums carried faintly on the night wind, and with them the
ineffable, blighting touch of Khorne. Nepenora felt the music
as a shuddering thump against her bones, a vast and
rageful heartbeat that swallowed and dwarfed her own. It
had an echo of the sacred songs that the Daughters of
Khaine drummed around their own cauldron fires, but
twisted into a mockery of their hymns to Khaine. As if the
Blood God, who had stolen their own deity’s heart and
squeezed it dry, couldn’t be content with that great theft
and needed to steal Khaine’s songs and worship, too.
The sound filled her with anger. The warm wind seemed to
blow hotter as Nepenora listened, ruffling her hair and
stroking her cheeks with a touch that felt almost alive. That
enraged her too – the presumption of it, the gall.
It was only when she looked at the faces of the scouts
around her, each one tense with her own near-boiling fury,
that Nepenora recognised the trap for what it was.
‘Be calm,’ she hissed. ‘The anger is Khorne’s, not ours. He
seeks to provoke us out of hiding and into an open attack,
so that we can be slaughtered. If you cannot resist it, you
must draw back.’
‘If we can?’ Ivoreine, one of her senior scouts, asked in a
rough whisper.
‘Then come with me.’ Nepenora slid away from the
hillside, quiet and fluid as moonlight, her sciansá close at
hand. ‘Let’s get a look at who’s inside.’
In loose formation they slipped forward, each witch-aelf
breaking off from the others as needed to find cover in the
smoking dark. Their white hair was gathered beneath
shadowsilk cowls, and their pale skin had been rubbed with
handfuls of ash, so that nothing betrayed them in the night.
They were careful, well-practised and soundless.
And still, as they came to the barren white monstrosity of
the eight-clawed hands outside Redhollow Ruin, the corpses
threaded onto those bones lifted their tortured heads and
looked down.
They were dead, clearly dead. Nepenora could see the
withered black holes of empty eye sockets, the puckered
gape of mortal wounds baked dry in Aqshy’s heat, the
yellowed knobs of dirty bone exposed by receding flesh.
Some were fresher than others, but none was new, and all
were dead. Still they lifted their heads. Their jaws sagged
open in ghastly grins, and a red glow welled in their ruined
throats. The two nearest corpses vomited gouts of blood,
splashing across the Daughters of Khaine.
The blood was virulently crimson, shockingly hot,
impossibly wet. It stank richly of iron and meat and stolen
life.
It was rage made manifest.
Three of Nepenora’s scouts were caught in the crossing
splashes. Instantly, howling in banshee fury, they set upon
each other with spiked buckler and sciansá. The fight was
swift, vicious and impossible to stop. Within moments, all
three were dead beneath the monstrous claws of Khorne.
Even before they’d fallen, Nepenora signalled for the
others to pull back. ‘Go. Go. We can’t fight this.’ She needed
to consult with Thaelire, to learn what strange sorcery this
was. The Blood God infamously hated magic, and she hadn’t
expected to encounter any outside his domain.
Foolish. Khorne wasn’t the senseless beast that some
made him out to be, and there was no telling whether this
was his warding, anyway. Nepenora had known that
Redhollow Ruin had been occupied by some other power
after the Blood Lord lost it, and perhaps even before he’d
first claimed it. Other hands had touched this place, and
might have laid their own traps. In any case, she couldn’t
counter it, and there was no clear path through the impaling
claws to the fortress gates. The witch-aelves had no choice
but to withdraw.
Nevertheless, after the rest of her scouts had withdrawn
to the relative safety of the hills, Nepenora came back.
Crouched in the last bit of cover that offered a good vantage
of the fortress, she settled down to wait. She wanted to see
whether any of Khorne’s followers emerged to claim the
bodies.
None did. Instead, a blue star broke away from the
heavens, growing brighter as it arced across the dim and
smoky sky, then vanishing as it plummeted towards the
hills. Nepenora squinted into the gloom, perplexed by the
shooting star’s course, until she spotted a single cloaked
figure striding out of the hills towards her dead scouts’
remains.
That cloak fluttered over armour enamelled in blue and
white, and around an unsmiling mask of gold. Its wearer was
taller and broader-shouldered than any aelf or human, yet
moved faster than the swiftest of Nepenora’s scouts. The
Stormcast Eternal – for so it was, so it had to be – stooped
over the dead and picked up their broken bodies, all three,
as if they weighed nothing. Then the Stormcast turned back
towards the hills and carried the dead aelves away.
It all happened too quickly for Redhollow’s impaled
corpses to react. Nepenora blinked, unsure that she’d seen
it clearly herself. But the bodies were gone.
She lifted a hand to signal Ivoreine. ‘Take the others back
to camp. Tell the hag queen what we saw – and find a way
to tell Thaelire, discreetly, too. I’m going after that
Stormcast.’
‘Alone?’ Ivoreine balked.
‘I’ll move faster alone. If I don’t return in two days, you
have my witch-aelves.’ Nepenora waited until she’d seen
that they’d gone, and then she set out after the Stormcast.
She couldn’t hope to match the Stormcast’s pace, and she
didn’t bother to try. Such warriors were not mortal flesh;
they were forged by the divine power of Sigmar, their god
and creator, and they had a speed and endurance that no
natural-born creature could rival.
But they did leave tracks. Surprisingly clear ones, in this
case.
At first Nepenora was startled by how little the Stormcast
Eternal seemed to have bothered trying to hide them, but
after a moment it made a sort of sense to her. Sigmar’s
chosen had little reason to fear pursuit, for who could harm
them even if they were found? And perhaps it was possible
that this particular Stormcast was unfamiliar with Aqshy,
and failed to realise how easily soft ash and brittle cinders
were stamped into sign.
Or the Stormcast could be baiting me on purpose.
That was, Nepenora supposed, the likeliest explanation of
all. Nevertheless she continued her pursuit across the soot-
flecked hills, until morning began to break red on the
horizon and the small fires of Aqshy’s night faded before
that far greater blaze.
The Stormcast Eternals’ camp lay before her. It was
smaller than Nepenora had anticipated, and less guarded.
Judging by the number of tents, there might be ten
Stormcasts, and no mortal allies or fortifications as far as
she could discern.
She withdrew. Daybreak was coming, and she’d seen
more than enough for one night.
‘We should go to them,’ Thaelire said. ‘Ten Stormcast
Eternals. Think of the power. They could make all the
difference in this fight.’
‘We don’t know that there are ten,’ Rhaelanthe snapped.
‘Nepenora didn’t actually see them. No one did.’
They were gathered in the hag queen’s tent, discussing
the news Nepenora had brought back. All the witch-aelf
leaders were present, save Myrcalene. The melusai had
offered no excuse for her absence, and none knew where
she was. Nepenora suspected that the melusai’s apparent
absence was merely a ruse to trick the witch-aelves into
speaking more freely than they might have otherwise. She
thought Myrcalene was probably hidden in this very tent, or
otherwise spying with her magic.
She bowed her head. ‘You are correct, hag queen. I didn’t
see them. Ten is only my guess.’
‘Ten or one, it hardly matters. They’re Stormcast Eternals,’
Thaelire said impatiently. ‘Sigmar’s power made flesh. If we
can win them to our side–’
‘No.’ Rhaelanthe’s tone was hard. ‘We can’t trust them.’
 ‘They’re sworn against Khorne. They hate the Blood God
as much as we do. They’ll surely join battle–’
‘No.’ Rhaelanthe’s hand flew out. She struck Thaelire hard
across the cheek, knocking the sorceress to the pillows and
rugs that covered the floor. The hag queen, furious, stalked
after Thaelire as she scrambled away. ‘Why do you suppose
the Stormcasts are here? Perhaps they’re seeking the
Goregorge Claw themselves. Even if it isn’t why they came,
do you imagine they’ll let us keep an artefact that they
believe to be tainted by Chaos? No. They’ll take it, they’ll
destroy it, and then we will have failed.’
‘But–’
‘Not another word, Thaelire.’ Rhaelanthe put a hand to her
sciansá, clicking her long nails against the rune-inscribed
hilt. ‘You’re alive now only because we need you to get past
the corpseclaws. But if you utter another word, we’ll have to
find out how well you work your magics without a tongue.’
Thaelire lowered her head to the floor, flattening her
hands against the piled rugs, but not a single witch-aelf in
the tent believed she had really been cowed. Nepenora saw
the hag queen’s nostrils flare and her fingers tighten about
the knife’s hilt, but in the end Rhaelanthe spun away in
barely-restrained fury.
‘You are fortunate, sorceress, that I have no better wizard.’
‘What would you have of us?’ Melletiora, one of
Rhaelanthe’s favourite kittens, asked.
The hag queen’s anger softened as she looked at her pet.
‘Nothing yet. Not for you. Nepenora will go out at dusk with
her scouts to make another try at the fortress. Thaelire will
go with them, and will find a way past these Khorne-cursed
corpses. Then we will follow. When they’ve found their way
in.’
Thaelire touched her sciansá to Nepenora’s neck, opening a
light nick over one of the life-veins but not cutting deeply
enough to pierce it, and wet her thumb in the blood that
welled up. She sprinkled sand and ashes onto the blood,
then pressed it onto Nepenora’s forehead, sealing Aqshy’s
dust onto the witch-aelf’s skin. Magic prickled across
Nepenora’s skin and lifted her hair, and when the crackle of
its completion passed, her complexion was cast in grey.
‘The illusion will mask you as ashes, and your movements
as the blowing of the wind,’ Thaelire told her, already
moving to the next aelf. ‘Your blood will seem as cinders to
unliving eyes, your skin will seem as dust. Aqshy’s flesh is
your own, and yours will seem as its.’
‘How long will it last?’ Nepenora asked.
Thaelire finished her spell on the next scout before
answering. ‘A day and a night, at most. The magic will fade
faster if you tax it. Fighting, shouting – any action that could
be undertaken only by a living creature will burn the magic
faster. Much faster, in some cases. You’ll know it’s gone
when your skin returns to its natural complexion, or when
the blood-print has faded entirely. Wiping off the blood-print
or its earth will end the spell at once. And it is possible that
it may not deceive some of Khorne’s creatures. His flesh-
hounds may scent you through the spell, especially if it’s
been weakened already.’
‘Good to know.’ Nepenora did a last check of her
equipment and circulated through her scouts to ensure that
they, too, were as prepared as they could be for the
unknown. Just on the other side of these hills, Redhollow
Ruin and its ghastly corpseclaws waited. They’d got as close
as they dared before Thaelire began her spells, so that the
magic would cover them as long as possible inside.
Nepenora had taken thirteen hand-picked witch-aelves,
the best of her scouts, on this second attempt at the
fortress. The remainder, under Ivoreine, had stayed back at
the camp, keeping ready in case Rhaelanthe called for a full
attack. Thaelire had come with them too, both to examine
the corpseclaws first hand and veil the scouts against them,
and then to splinter off on her own task.
 Nepenora finished her circuit of the scouts and returned to
Thaelire, who was pressing a bloody thumbprint to the last
witch-aelf’s brow.
‘You’re certain you want to do this?’ she asked the
sorceress. ‘Even if you succeed, Rhaelanthe will kill you for
the insubordination.’
Thaelire completed her spell, examined her handiwork
critically, and then turned to her friend. ‘Then she kills me.
We need allies, Nepenora. Mistrust has always been the
weakness of our people, and we can ill afford it now.
Redhollow Ruin is already fortified by Khorne’s power. He
didn’t raise these bony claws – that has the imprint of
Nagash’s death-workers, through and through – but the
Blood God has claimed them, and has turned them against
their original masters to serve his ends instead. That means
his servants are here in force, and are in his favour enough
to have earned a signifier of his approval. Khorne does not
grant such things lightly, we all know that.’
‘And if Rhaelanthe’s right, and the Stormcasts seize the
Goregorge Claw for themselves?’
‘Then perhaps that’s for the best.’ Thaelire shrugged,
wiping dust and blood from her hands. ‘If the Claw is truly
built around a Shard of Khaine, and that shard can be
salvaged to heal our god, then there is no reason for our
allies to keep it from us. We fight beside them against a
shared enemy – they should want us as strong as possible.
But if the shard is false, and there is nothing in the
Goregorge Claw but Chaos’ taint, then the Stormcasts will
sense this, and will keep Rhaelanthe from sacrificing us to
her folly.’
‘You place a great deal of faith in their judgment,’
Nepenora said doubtfully.
‘Of course.’ Thaelire smiled briefly, lifting her shadowsilk
cowl over her hair. ‘They were forged by a god for that
purpose. I presume they’re good at it.’
‘It’s not a gamble I’d take.’
 ‘No. But, once again, it’s not one that I’m asking you to
take.’ Thaelire shaded her eyes as she scanned the horizon,
pausing at the little landmarks that Nepenora had told her
would guide her to the Stormcasts’ camp. After a moment,
the sorceress nodded to herself and looked back to
Nepenora. ‘And, anyway, I wouldn’t take your gamble. A
fortress that passed from Khorne to Nagash and back again,
with who knows how many other masters along the way?
Even with my spell to cloak you, it will be perilous in the
extreme.’
‘Probably,’ Nepenora agreed. She raised a fist, signalling
her scouts to move out. ‘But it won’t get any safer for
waiting. Khaine be with you, my friend. May he bring us to
victory, or at least bring our enemies to woe.’
‘To victory,’ Thaelire echoed, setting off in the other
direction, ‘and woe.’

Etanios lowered the spyglass from his eye. ‘There’s a witch-

aelf coming.’
‘Only one?’ Othoros sounded mildly surprised. The Lord-
Aquilor held out a gauntleted hand for the glass.
Etanios passed it wordlessly to his superior, and waited in
silence as Othoros scanned the soot-dark hills himself. At
length, Othoros lowered the glass and handed it back.
‘Only one,’ he repeated, bemused.
‘Is it the one who followed your trail last night?’ Etanios
slid the glass back into its protective case. Aqshy’s hot,
scouring winds swirled endlessly with grit, and the
mechanism would be ruined within moments if he left it out.
‘No. That one was a warrior. This one, I think, is a wizard.
But of the same tribe, unless I’m mistaken, and following
the trail that we laid for the other one. I expect she’s being
sent as an emissary.’ Othoros clapped the younger
Stormcast’s armoured shoulder and went back towards their
camp. ‘Receive her with courtesy. Let’s find out what the
Daughters of Khaine want with Redhollow Ruin.’
‘Yes, my lord.’ Etanios bowed and turned back towards his
watch.
The hills were grey and barren, devoid of life or movement
save the slow curl of smoke wafting from the burning rifts
beneath their rocks. Few animals braved these treacherous
slopes, and the only birds he glimpsed were black-banded
vultures and the occasional high, distant hawk. For lack of
anything else to watch, Etanios found himself uncasing his
spyglass and checking on the witch-aelf more often than he
needed to.
She was a strange creature. Beautiful, he supposed,
although it seemed peculiar to think of Khaine’s murderous
devotees in such terms. She moved through the hills with
unearthly grace, apparently untroubled by the blasting heat.
Her dark grey cloak flowed like water in the wind,
sometimes wrapping tight about her slender figure and
sometimes billowing so loosely that he could scarcely make
her out at all. There were sigils embroidered about the hood
and sleeves, which he supposed had been how Othoros had
recognised her tribe.
Etanios was relatively sure that he’d never seen a
Daughter of Khaine before, although it was hard to be
certain. He was new-forged, having come to his immortality
in Sigmar’s service only recently, and he retained more of
his memories than did his senior comrades, like Othoros,
who had died and been reforged so many times that they
had lost almost everything of their onetime humanity.
Still, it was impossible to know how much he’d forgotten.
Perhaps he had encountered the Daughters of Khaine as a
mortal, and there was no reason that the pale, lithe woman
approaching across the hills should strike him as so
unsettling.
Then again, Etanios thought, perhaps witch-aelves only
became more disquieting once you knew them.
 Etanios stood and went halfway down the hill. He removed
his golden mask as a courtesy as he approached. Mortals
often felt reassured by seeing a real face.
‘Be welcome to our camp. I am Etanios, a Stormcast
Eternal sworn to the service of our Lord Sigmar. The
commander of our brotherhood is Lord-Aquilor Othoros. May
I escort you to his tent?’
The aelf lowered her hood slightly, shaking away the
cinders that had collected on the cloth, and regarded him
with amusement. Her hair was white at the roots, but
darkened rapidly to the red-black of poisoned blood as it
grew longer, so that she seemed to be crowned in white and
mantled in darkness.
‘What if I said no?’
‘Then I would turn you away from our camp,’ Etanios said,
perplexed. He had the sense that she was wrong-footing
him on purpose, but he couldn’t fathom why. Most mortals
approached the Stormcast Eternals with awe, and this one…
didn’t. ‘Did you not come here to see us?’
‘Oh, I did. I was merely curious.’ The aelf smiled. That was
a strange expression too. It put him in mind of vampires,
with the cold veneer of control thinly disguising something
hungry and bestial underneath. ‘My name is Thaelire. I am a
sorceress in the Kharumathi coven of the Daughters of
Khaine. Please, show me to your lord.’
‘Of course. If you would follow me.’ Tucking his masked
helm under an arm, Etanios led the aelf into the Stormcasts’
camp. A few of his fellows glanced over as they passed, but
most of the Stormcasts were away, either sparring in the
field to adapt their fighting techniques to Aqshy’s
treacherous terrain, or scouting Redhollow Ruin’s defences.
They were a small contingent anyway, numbering only
nine, but Etanios felt himself wishing, for some obscure
reason he could not name, that more of his brotherhood had
been in the camp. He wanted their visitor to be impressed.
 Etanios announced them as they came to Othoros’ tent.
The Lord-Aquilor greeted them within, standing as they
entered. He towered over the aelf, as they all did, but such
was his courtesy that it hardly seemed to matter – even as
all present knew that it mattered very much.
‘What brings you to our camp?’ Othoros asked, after the
introductions were made.
‘I thought I would offer an alliance,’ said the sorceress,
‘against our mutual enemy in Redhollow Ruin.’
The Stormcast Eternals exchanged a look. Othoros’
expression didn’t change, but Etanios knew his commander
well enough to sense the Lord-Aquilor’s amusement. He,
himself, felt only a tinge of mild embarrassment at the
witch-aelf’s presumption. Few they might be, but the
Stormcast Eternals vastly outstripped these witch-aelves in
power.
It would have been proper for the aelf to request their
help, certainly. But to speak of an alliance, and to offer such
a thing as if the Daughters of Khaine were granting them a
favour, was arrogant in the extreme.
‘An alliance?’ Othoros inquired politely.
‘Our gods are allied,’ Thaelire replied. If she sensed the
Stormcasts’ scepticism, she betrayed no sign of it. The aelf’s
face and manner remained as coolly serene as a lake in
winter. ‘It seems only logical that their servants should be as
well. We share a common enemy in Khorne. Why not join
forces against Graelakh and whatever else waits within
Redhollow Ruin?’
‘What would you propose to bring to such an alliance?’
Othoros asked, cordial but noncommittal.
‘Magic.’ The aelf lifted a slim, pale hand and turned it up
so that her palm cupped the air. ‘We cannot rival you for
sheer force, obviously. But I suspect you might find some of
our other talents intriguing, and very probably useful.’
‘Such as?’ Othoros pressed.
 ‘May I show you?’ Thaelire gestured to the Lord-Aquilor’s
armoured hand and drew the knife sheathed at her hip. Its
hilt was made of bleached and polished bone, richly
engraved with aelven runes and flowing, sharp-tipped
geometric forms that evoked both grace and lethality. The
steel blade was straight on one side, curved along the
cutting edge, and perfect in its simplicity.
Othoros removed his gauntlet and extended his hand.
‘Certainly.’
Etanios leaned forward slightly, caught by curiosity, as the
aelf took the Lord-Aquilor’s hand. She studied it for a
moment, tracing Othoros’ veins across the back of his hand
and then the palm as if she were memorising a map of
unfamiliar terrain. Then, carefully, she put the point of her
knife to the Lord-Aquilor’s second finger and pricked the tip,
drawing a bead of blood. At the same time, she murmured
an invocation softly, the words too foreign and fluid for
Etanios to follow.
The drop of blood on Othoros’ finger melted into scarlet
mist. It drifted upwards, smoothing into a hazy pane.
Shadowy figures materialised hesitantly on its face, like
reflections in a darkened mirror.
As they grew and gathered definition, Thaelire murmured,
‘Interrogation is one area in which we may be able to assist.
We can draw memories from the blood. Deep ones, old
ones, things that even the holder may no longer consciously
recall. But they are there, buried in the blood. Waiting.’
The images in the red mist solidified into children. Two
little boys, laughing together. One of them, Etanios could
dimly perceive, was Othoros. The Stormcast Eternal bit back
an exclamation, stealing a glance at the Lord-Aquilor’s
reaction. He had never imagined his superior as a boy – as a
human boy – even though he had known that, of course, at
one point it must have been so.
Othoros watched motionlessly, enthralled. Reflected red
light played across the hard planes of the Lord-Aquilor’s face
as the vision pulled back, showing the boys scampering
across a lightly wooded hillside towards a creek. Sunlight
slanted through the green leaves around them, sparkling
across the stream. There was a dog with them, a floppy-
eared mongrel with a white blaze across its chest,
gambolling happily down the hill with the children. The
vision was so clear that Etanios could see that the dog’s
white toes were stained green by crushed grass.
‘Visconya,’ Othoros breathed, and then seemed surprised
that he’d spoken. He cleared his throat, looking at the other
two as the vision swirled and dissipated into air. ‘Our dog. I
had forgotten about her. I had forgotten… all of this.’ He
shook his head, glancing at the emptiness where the image
had been. A faint tang of copper lingered in the air. ‘Strange
to see it. I had forgotten… yes, everything. My own brother.
That dog. I loved that dog. I loved them both. But they
were… gone from me.’
He shook his head again, a lion emerging from
enchantment.
‘It’s true. It is all true, that day in the sun. I remember it
now.’
‘What else can you do?’ Etanios asked the aelf, mostly to
give the Lord-Aquilor time to recover. He’d never seen
Othoros so shaken. He’d seen his superior stand against
Nurgle’s pestilent knights and the howling wraiths of Shyish
without flinching, but this memory in blood… this had
affected him.
‘There is more in your blood than what was. We can see,
also, what is. Not only memories of the past, but desires for
the future. Anything that is wanted strongly enough to set
the blood afire.’ Thaelire beckoned for Etanios’ hand. ‘May
I?’
He offered it to her, suppressing a flicker of misgiving.
Strange that he feared nothing on the battlefield, and yet
this single aelf had him off balance. Both of them, really. Two
Stormcast Eternals, held briefly but undeniably in thrall.
 She pricked his finger. Then, to his surprise, she brought it
to her lips and licked away the bead of blood. The aelf was
still for a moment, tasting it, and then she laughed in
sudden, delighted mirth. Othoros, still distracted by his own
reverie, startled at the sound.
‘You can still feel desire,’ the aelf marvelled. She glanced
up at Etanios, eyes bright. A daub of crimson smeared her
upper lip, and she licked it delicately away. ‘I didn’t know
that was possible.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Etanios demurred,
uncomfortable. The warm rasp of her tongue had been…
disquieting.
‘No?’ Thaelire let his hand slip out from between hers. Her
smile lingered, and her amusement. ‘I could tell you more, if
you liked. There is a burn of sigmarite in your blood, as in
his. It tastes of lightning, and it stings. But in him there is
more divinity, less of what made a Stormcast once human.
In you, more humanity lingers. More blood runs through
your veins, and less sigmarite. Your emotions, and your
desires, are clearer. I expect you are younger, and have
been across the anvil fewer times.’
‘Interesting,’ Othoros said, clearing his throat, ‘and
enlightening. I understand more of what the Daughters’
magic is now. But I am not yet clear on how you mean for
these spells to aid us in Redhollow Ruin.’
‘There are others,’ Thaelire said with a shrug. ‘We can
mask you as dust to pass the corpses strung on claws, or as
lesser creatures to mislead Graelakh and his berserkers. We
can incite your blood to heighten strength and speed, or to
help you heal wounds more swiftly. We can intervene with
Khorne’s spells, for he, too, exercises his power through his
servants’ blood, and we can spill or slow it to interfere.’
‘You keep saying “we,”’ Etanios interrupted. ‘Can every
Daughter of Khaine do what you describe? Do you all have
the same spells?’
 ‘No,’ Thaelire admitted. She wiped her knife delicately,
though no blood dimmed its blade, and slipped it back into
its sheath of braided red silk. ‘Only I can work the spells I
have described. But others in my coven have their own
skills, which you may also find useful.’
‘No doubt.’ Othoros stood, signalling that the audience
was at its end. ‘You’ve given us much to consider. We will be
in contact. I believe my rangers can find your camp.’
The aelf bowed politely to each of them in turn, pressing
her hands together sideways over her chest. Etanios
supposed it was some sort of ritual farewell, but not
knowing its meaning, refrained from imitating the gesture.
He escorted Thaelire back out into Aqshy’s scouring winds
and furnace heat, and then hesitated as she drew up her
hood again. It seemed discourteous to simply abandon her
in such a brutally inhospitable place, and yet he saw no
alternative. He could hardly leave his post to walk her back
to the Daughters’ camp.
‘Do not worry for me,’ the aelf said. He couldn’t see her
face with the hood up, but he could hear the laughter in her
voice well enough. ‘I can go back as easily as I came here. It
is not so far. But it is possible – if you will allow me the
immodesty of the suggestion – that your lord’s rangers may
find it harder to locate our camp than he imagines. This will
help you find us.’ She held out a loop of braided white hair
bound together by an elongated, blade-shaped bead. Half of
it was stained a rusty brown, as if it had been dipped in
blood.
Almost certainly, it had been. Etanios took it with no sign
of his distaste. ‘Thank you.’
‘Best if you carry the talisman,’ Thaelire advised. ‘It will
find its strongest echo with you, I think.’ She walked away,
then, her grey cloak blowing in the wind, its billows
becoming smaller and smaller as the aelf’s figure receded.
Etanios went back to the Lord-Aquilor’s tent. Othoros was
buckling his gauntlet back on, his demeanour reflective.
 ‘What did you think of our guest?’
‘She didn’t ask about the bodies,’ Etanios said. It had just
occurred to him. ‘The three witch-aelves we recovered from
Redhollow Ruin. She didn’t ask after their remains.’
‘No,’ Othoros agreed. ‘What do you make of that?’
‘I don’t know. Don’t the Daughters of Khaine care about
honouring their dead?’
‘They do. But this one didn’t. Which suggests a few things
to me.’
‘Such as?’
The Lord-Aquilor regarded the pinprick that the witch-aelf
had left on his finger. ‘Why would she decline to bring them
back? Perhaps because she didn’t want her comrades to
know that she was here.’ Sigmar’s blessing granted his
Stormcasts swift healing, and already the pinprick was
fading. As Othoros rubbed the mark thoughtfully with his
thumb, it vanished altogether. ‘Curious, don’t you think? For
someone proposing an alliance.’
‘What does that mean?’ Etanios asked.
Othoros shrugged, heavy gold and sigmarite plates
clanking like solemn bells at his movement. ‘It means be
careful, young Etanios. The Daughters of Khaine may be
part of the Grand Alliance, but they’ve never been
trustworthy. Useful, yes. But never trustworthy, not to us
and not to each other. Forget that at your peril.’
The pen was bleeding.
Thaelire glanced back at the Stormcasts’ camp. She was
out of view behind the hills by now, and she could see no
indication that the Sigmarites had followed her. Opening her
satchel, the sorceress spread a curling sheet of parchment
across the hillside and weighted its corners with rocks, then
took the pen from the bone case that rattled against her
sciansá. She uncapped it carefully, withdrew the rune-
carved fingerbone from its case, and set the bone pen to
the thin-scraped skin.
 As soon as it touched parchment, the pen began scrawling
its message in shaky, bloody script. The handwriting was
recognisably Nepenora’s, though agitated by emotion, and
further distorted by wind buffeting the fingerbone as it
traced its scarlet letters against the skin.
We are in Redhollow Ruin. Past the corpseclaws, across
the fiery moat, through the skull fields. The gates appear
unguarded but they have eyes. Beyond them are quill-cats
and Graelakh’s screamers. We are trapped. Must find a way
out before the spell fades.
Thaelire waited a long moment, forcing herself to be
patient, until it was clear that the fingerbone had nothing
else to write. Its magic spent, it teetered and fell onto the
parchment, smearing the last few drops of blood into a
jagged comma at its tip.
Carefully Thaelire removed the stones, shook off the grit
that dusted the parchment, and furled the grey-tinged skin.
Aqshy’s relentless heat had already dried the bloody letters.
She would have preferred to answer Nepenora’s call for
help herself, with only her own trusted witch-aelves in
support, but that was impossible. There was no way to pull
her forces out of the Kharumathi camp without Rhaelanthe
noticing.
Which meant that Thaelire had no choice but to offer the
Kharumathi an invitation to disaster. Rhaelanthe would hear
none of the warnings in Nepenora’s message. She’d see
only a list of enemies, and an excuse to incite her followers
to bloodshed. That it would be mostly aelven blood that was
spilled would do nothing to stop her. Thaelire harboured no
illusions about how highly the Daughters of Khaine valued
their people’s lives. The Kharumathi killed one another
routinely in jealousy and sacrifice. They didn’t think of each
other as friends, or even valued subordinates; they viewed
their kin merely as pawns and enemies, evaluated solely to
the extent that they might be useful or dangerous.
 She was tired of it. Tired of dodging snares, tired of trying
to show any of her sisters a stronger, surer path. Death, at
this point, would be a welcome reprieve from her people’s
endless, short-sighted treachery.
It alternately amused and irritated Thaelire that Nepenora
worried so constantly about the consequences of her
insubordinations. She was touched by her friend’s loyalty – a
rarity among the Kharumathi – but also bemused, and
faintly insulted that Nepenora seemed to think she hadn’t
already considered such things.
Of course she was going to die.
Possibly even today.
‘We attack,’ Rhaelanthe announced jubilantly. She clapped
her hands in vicious joy, clanging her spiked bracers
together, and then thrust them upward, towards the great
idol of Khaine and the melusai lurking behind it. ‘Let the
Lord of Murder see and be pleased by the offerings we make
in his name.’
‘Praise Khaine!’ the witch-aelves cried. A dozen sciansá
and spiked bucklers thrust into the air, shredding imaginary
foes. Thaelire breathed out a silent sigh, resigned to their
exultation. As the other war-leaders dispersed to gather
their own followers for battle, the sorceress turned away to
summon hers.
Before she’d taken two steps, Rhaelanthe’s hand closed
hard about her elbow. ‘You veiled Nepenora’s warriors to get
them through the corpseclaws.’
‘Yes.’ There was no sense lying about it. The hag queen
sniffed out lies effortlessly.
‘How many of our witch-aelves can your magic hide?’
Thaelire considered it. ‘Only as far as the corpseclaws?’
‘To the gates. Past whatever “eyes” Nepenora
encountered there.’
So the hag queen had taken heed of the warning. Thaelire
spent a moment trying to calculate the burden on her
magic. ‘Presuming that the same spell concealed her from
those watchers, and it wasn’t simply her scouts’ skills that
got them through… I might be able to veil seventy or eighty.
As many as a hundred if you want me to exhaust myself,
but then I’ll be of no use for anything else for at least two
days, perhaps longer.’
Rhaelanthe nodded. The knifelike beads in her thin braids
clattered, and Thaelire fancied she could see some of them
straining to stretch upwards, like the hungry snakes in a
melusai’s hair.
‘How long will the magic last?’
‘Stretched to cover that many? A few hours at most. The
magic fades faster when it’s taxed. Once they start fighting,
it’ll evaporate within moments.’ Thaelire hesitated, glancing
around. The others had gone, and there was no one obvious
in earshot. Which did not, of course, mean that they were
actually alone. ‘But we’ve no real idea what we face in
there.’
‘Oh, I know.’ A sudden, dark mirth lifted Rhaelanthe’s
eyebrows and curled her lips. It was the first time she’d
shown anything but rabid fanaticism to Thaelire, but then it
was also the first time they’d spoken in anything like
confidence. The hag queen pulled the sorceress closer, her
expression masked between their bodies and her voice kept
low. ‘Do you really think me that foolish, Thaelire? I should
be insulted. Of course I know we’re charging blind into the
unknown. Although it’s not quite as “unknown” as you might
imagine. Graelakh doesn’t have many more than two
hundred bloodsworn screamers, two or three quill-cats, and
perhaps a hundred slaved conscripts, less however many
he’s killed by now. Ah, that surprises you?’
‘You didn’t mention it during the briefing,’ Thaelire
muttered.
‘Are you entitled to an explanation?’ Rhaelanthe’s fingers
tightened painfully on Thaelire’s upper arm. ‘I am the hag
queen of the Kharumathi. You owe me fealty without
question.’ She relaxed her grip minutely, still smiling in
bitter amusement. ‘And our trackers are better than you
seem to credit. So. Our numbers are almost equal. Those
are not impossible odds, if we can even out the advantage
of their terrain. And, perhaps more importantly, we must
attack. Myrcalene is impatient. The melusai has been
pressing me to seize the Goregorge Claw since we came
through the Realmgate.’
‘Why does she want it so badly?’
Rhaelanthe shrugged, releasing the sorceress’ arm.
‘Because the High Oracle wants it. Because it is an artefact
of power. What else do we need to know? Even if Myrcalene
wants it for no other reason than to wear it as a decoration
on her tail-tip, we must obtain it, or be deemed disloyal.
Under the circumstances, charging blind into the teeth of
Khorne’s fortress seems a less certain death.’
‘But surely we can find a better approach,’ Thaelire
protested. ‘We could at least try to extract Nepenora’s
forces first. We’d have more blades then, and the advantage
of whatever intelligence they’ve gathered.’
Rhaelanthe pushed her away with a sharp little shove. Any
glimmer of warmth or shared confidence was gone from her.
Only the familiar hard fanaticism showed on the hag
queen’s face. ‘I’ve given my order. Prepare the warriors.
Cast your spell over the full hundred, whatever it costs you.
Veil mine first, then Yveline’s, then on down the war-leaders’
ranks until you are exhausted. Your own contingent will
come last. If you can’t summon the energy to protect them,
they don’t deserve to be safe.’
Ultimately, Thaelire managed to veil one hundred and seven
witch-aelves, a little over a third of their force. So exhausted
she could barely stand, she watched from afar as the dirt-
daubed warriors slipped between the corpseclaws towards
the fortress gates. They were moving under cover of
darkness, where sharp aelven eyes might give them an
advantage that human sight couldn’t match.
Past the field of immense, curving bones was a charred
and desolate plain, then a river of molten stone that ringed
Redhollow Ruin. A single bridge, blackened and adorned
with spiked skulls, crossed the burning moat. Beyond that
lay the fortress gates, immense and immobile.
Rhaelanthe’s plan was simple, and as likely to succeed as
anything else they could do with the little information she
had. The first wave of the Daughters of Khaine would
advance under stealth, relying on Thaelire’s spell to blind
the corpseclaws and their own skills and shadowsilk
camouflage to hide from ordinary eyes in the night.
Then, once they were in position around the gates, the
rest of their force would make an open assault on Redhollow
Ruin, hoping to bait the fortress’ defenders into an attack.
While conventional enemies would probably have remained
behind their walls, defeating Rhaelanthe’s plan without even
meeting her, Khorne’s Bloodbound were unlikely to ignore
such a challenge. The hag queen expected them to pour out
in a wild tumult, vying to be at the fore, after which her
hidden witch-aelves could pounce upon them from behind.
At the agreed-upon count, the remaining Kharumathi
began filtering through the corpseclaws. Thaelire led her
contingent along with the rest of the main body, keeping to
the rear. Over two hundred Daughters of Khaine moved with
unearthly grace between the high, impaling stakes and the
withered corpses threaded upon them, flitting through them
with such quick, light steps that the dust was barely
disturbed beneath their feet.
Still the corpseclaws awakened. The mummified dead
convulsed obscenely on their nightmarish spikes of bone.
The ruined sockets of their eyes strained open, and blood
fountained from their lips. Witch-aelves evaded the sprays
with impossible agility, bending their bodies away sinuously
so that the corpseclaws’ poison spattered over empty stone
and air. Exhausted by her earlier spellcasting, Thaelire didn’t
have the energy to dodge. She dropped her head and ran
forward, relying on blind luck.
Hers held. Not all of her sisters were so fortunate. Several
Daughters were caught in crossfiring sprays between two or
more corpseclaws. Blood splashed across one red-tattooed
warrior to Thaelire’s left. She froze for an instant, then
thrashed her wet hair in sudden bloodlust, flinging ruby
droplets across the corpseclaws’ pale bases. Shrieking, the
corrupted witch-aelf threw herself at her nearest comrades,
stabbing wildly.
Thaelire grabbed reflexively at the threads of magic that
always hovered around her, and then gasped as if she’d
been punched in the gut. She’d worn out her control earlier.
Touching magic now felt like grabbing at glass-coated razor
strings. It was nothing but burning, slashing agony,
impossible to weave into meaning. She let go, tears
streaming from her eyes, and ran from the corrupted aelf
instead of attempting any further defence.
Around her, the others were running as well. Perhaps a
dozen Kharumathi had been caught by the corpseclaws, and
each spun her own little whirlwind of destruction through
the ranks. The other Daughters split away from the stricken
warriors, darting ahead rather than risk getting trapped
amid the claws, but here and there a witch-aelf was caught
by one of her maddened sisters and forced to defend
herself.
Some fought free, but most, unable to devote their full
attention to dodging the corpseclaws’ vomited hate, swiftly
succumbed to either their attackers or Khorne’s madness.
Chaos multiplied through the ranks.
For a moment, it looked like that chaos might consume
the Kharumathi attack. But most of the witch-aelves stayed
focused on their forward run, and most broke free of the
corpseclaws’ ring to reach the blackened, rubble-strewn
clearing before Redhollow Ruin.
 Now, on open terrain, it was a simple matter for them to
surround and slash down their rage-mad pursuers. The work
was swift and brutal. Within moments, twenty or so blood-
cursed Kharumathi lay dying at the periphery of the
corpseclaws. The rest were through. And the Bloodbound
host, somehow, hadn’t emerged to capitalise on their initial
disarray.
Thaelire doubled over, heaving for breath. The sulphurous
air scorched her throat, forcing her to hack painfully, but she
couldn’t stop gulping it down. She wasn’t accustomed to
running like that, and she’d been wrung out before they
began.
But she’d made it through. All of her witch-aelves had
made it through. She hadn’t lost one.
Ahead, the gates of Redhollow Ruin opened with a
thunderous groan. Only darkness showed of the fortress’
maw beyond the river of flame.
From that blackness, across the skull-spiked bridge, a
single man emerged.
He was tall, bare-chested, fearsomely musclebound. To his
lips he held a great curled horn, so massive that he wore a
harness around his chest to help support its weight. Then,
as the man came to the peak of the skull-spiked bridge and
the fiery river’s light washed over him, Thaelire saw that he
wasn’t holding the horn. He was its prisoner. His hands were
chained to it, and his lips were welded to it in thick, blistered
ribbons of cauterised flesh. The harness that bound it to his
chest was anchored by dozens of bleeding spikes that had
been hammered into the man’s body.
He blew the horn. A low, dolorous groan rolled across the
quaking night. Liquid wept from the sides of his mouth and
pattered onto the bridge. In the red-lit gloom, Thaelire
couldn’t see whether it was blood or saliva or sweat, and
she certainly couldn’t hear it sizzle away on the hot metal,
but she imagined it all the same.
 He blew again, and glistening liquid ran down his scalp.
Smoke plumed from the horn’s deep mouth. A second cry
shivered through the night. Where the first had been
mournful, cutting through listeners’ courage, this one spoke
of swelling rage. The Daughters of Khaine shivered, and
then answered with a roar of their own, and a clash of
sciansá against buckler.
They should be using arrows, Thaelire thought, but of
course they had none. They’d had to travel as lightly as
possible to twist and dodge through the corpseclaws, and
Rhaelanthe thought bows would slow them, so she’d
ordered the Daughters to leave them behind. Nor did they
have much magic, with Thaelire exhausted and her warlocks
held, by her own order, in reserve. Rhaelanthe had gambled
everything on Graelakh’s forces coming out to answer her
challenge.
The horn-blower wavered on his feet. For an instant
Thaelire thought he’d been cowed by the witch-aelves’
cries, but then he turned in the burning river’s glow and she
saw that his eyes were empty and filmed with wet darkness.
Beads of liquid wavered on his bald head, some as large as
coins, and their crimson sheen told her, finally, that they
were blood.
He blew a third time. Now it was pure fury that roared
through the night, the cataclysmic rage of a territorial alpha
scenting interlopers in its domain, and the Daughters of
Khaine shuddered before its force. More smoke poured from
the horn, hanging thickly above the bridge.
No, Thaelire realised, as the haze steamed in the bridge’s
heat. It wasn’t smoke at all, but the blower’s vaporised
blood.
The man’s scalp split and sloughed away. His mouth split
open as well, ripping wide as the horn pulled down his jaw
and fell out in a dark, splashing gush of half-boiled blood.
The blower collapsed over his instrument, still
haemorrhaging from his mouth and scalp and ears.
 No one except Thaelire seemed to notice. Because now
there was a new fire in the gate’s gullet, and a new cry from
a horde of rage-choked voices, and a new, cataclysmic
cacophony of metal clashed against metal.
Graelakh’s screamers poured out in a river of iron and
brass, and the battle was on.

The horn echoed wildly through the crimson halls of

Redhollow Ruin. Nepenora lifted her head, trying to track the
sound through her exhaustion.
Everything was distorted here. Outside, she’d thought the
fortress clearly the work of Khorne’s followers, apart
perhaps from the corpseclaws having been raised originally
by Nagash’s necromancy. Once within its gates, however,
Nepenora realised that the taint of Redhollow Ruin ran
deeper.
It wasn’t only one of the Ruinous Powers that had touched
this place. It might have been all of them. At the very least,
Nepenora thought, the Changer of Ways had laid a heavy
hand on the halls of Redhollow Ruin.
Nothing here was constant. Corridors turned into blank
walls or doubled back onto themselves, twisting into
impossible loops even as her warriors traversed them.
Rooms were too big, too small, filled with strange echoes
and apparitions. The marks that the Kharumathi left to chart
their passages appeared in front of them, or around them,
often inverted or turned upside-down or bunched together
into nonsensical patterns, mocking their attempts to impose
any semblance of reason on this place.
The floors and halls seemed half alive, half hallucinatory.
They were hot as a still-beating heart to the touch, and they
thrummed in every imaginable shade of red: the vaporised
spray of a spell-burst artery, the glossy red of a fresh spill,
the gritty black of blood digested by a dying, wounded
thing. Some of the walls were glittering red crystal, mad
with fractures, that reflected non-existent scenes. Wet
curtains of liquid fell through alien, pulsing apertures to
form walls elsewhere. In some places there were no walls at
all, only banks of warm red mist that swam and coalesced
according to their own unknowable logic.
Ever since her warriors had infiltrated Redhollow Ruin,
Nepenora had become increasingly convinced that they’d
stumbled into the latest stage of an ancient, ongoing war.
She didn’t know what the Blood Lord’s servants wanted
here, any more than she knew what the Undying King or the
Great Conspirator had wrought in this place. But she knew
they’d been here, all of them, and that they’d scrawled a
palimpsest of madness and cruelty into the fortress so
profound that merely witnessing it threatened her sanity.
The fingerprints of Chaos were smeared everywhere in
Redhollow Ruin. The place would never escape their grip.
All Nepenora wanted, now she’d had a glimpse of what lay
within, was to get her people out. And the nightmare baying
of that Khornate horn, awful as it was, signalled that they
might just have that chance.
That was a battle cry. If they were fighting, the fortress
gates were open. Perhaps Graelakh was marching against
the Daughters of Khaine, perhaps the Stormcast Eternals –
but to Nepenora, right now, it didn’t matter.
The gates were open. There was a chance to slip the trap.
The rest was unimportant.
‘Kharumathi, forward,’ Nepenora whispered. The signal
passed through her scouts’ ranks, muted as a ripple of wind
through grass. ‘Follow the horn.’
Three times that terrible horn blew. Three times, it sent a
beacon flare through the disorienting madness of
Redhollow’s interior. Nepenora’s scouts followed it intently,
using the sound of Khorne’s rage as a lodestone to guide
them through the mazed insanity.
 Finally, they glimpsed the fortress gates, flung open to
darkness and violence.
A battle raged before Redhollow Ruin. It seemed surreal
against the hellish glow of the fiery river that encircled the
fortress, like a shadow-play of puppet silhouettes. Lithe,
lightly armoured witch-aelves spun their deadly dance
around hulking Bloodbound slaughterpriests and the gaunt,
ropy-muscled humans who called themselves Graelakh’s
screamers. These, Nepenora had glimpsed several times
while scouting outside Redhollow Ruin, and she knew that
the tattered, lumpen cloaks that flapped about their
shoulders were the flayed hides of their foes and brethren,
welded together by clotted gore. Their mouths were cut
wide in ritual scars that stretched to their ears, so that their
faces could stretch open fully to shriek the glorious horror of
their god’s name.
She didn’t care about them now. She didn’t even care
whether the Daughters of Khaine were winning their battle.
This place was poison. All Nepenora wanted was to escape
it, and to bring her own aelves through. Whatever victory
Rhaelanthe and Myrcalene sought in Redhollow Ruin, they
were welcome to it.
Nepenora motioned for her aelves to slip across the skull-
spiked bridge. Quickly, quietly, hunched almost double, the
witch-aelves crossed the blackened bridge under the blind
grins of its skulls. Aqshy’s winds had polished the skulls
smooth as river stones and filled their empty braincases
with grit. They rattled softly in mindless, cinder-blasted
mirth, empty eyes flickering with fire shadows, as
Nepenora’s scouts sneaked past.
They came up behind Graelakh’s screamers. Foulness
hung heavy over the Khornate troops: the gobbets of human
meat that festered between their teeth, the caked and grisly
trophies they wore across their backs, their unwashed
bodies after weeks of sweating in Aqshy’s heat. Many of
them wore skulls knotted into their hair like crowns, and few
had bothered to clean their ghastly trophies first.
They deserved to die. Nepenora felt her lips pull back in a
feral snarl. Filthy creatures, stained by Chaos to their
marrow. And – most importantly, most unforgivably –
between her aelves and safety. There was no room to skirt
around them. She could not escape Redhollow Ruin without
cutting them down.
‘Kharumathi!’ Nepenora shouted, feeling the last strands
of Thaelire’s illusion snap around her as she cried out. Dust
sifted from her brow as the magic failed, revealing her to
the Bloodbound. ‘Slay our foes! Let none escape alive!’
Her warriors needed no further incitement. Unleashed,
they leapt into the fray.
Nepenora sprang forward with them. She whipped her
sciansá across an unsuspecting gore-priest’s throat, choking
off his prayers in a scarlet spray, and then dipped low to
slash her blade across the backs of a screamer’s knees.
Another warrior in crusty skin-rags turned on her,
chopping at the aelf with a two-handed swing of his axe. But
he was only human, and to her laughably slow. Nepenora
dodged the axe, stepped in close, and thrust her sciansá up
through his scarred jaw, shattering teeth and splitting his
tongue. The man’s last scream exploded from his mouth in
blood, and the skull knotted into his filthy hair rattled as if in
macabre glee as Nepenora jerked her knife away and let
him fall.
Most of her scouts had done equal damage. But their
advantage was fading swiftly. The Khornate warriors had
recovered from their surprise at the witch-aelves’ sudden
appearance and set into their new foes with savage glee.
Two of Nepenora’s scouts were caught in a knot of howling
screamers, and though they twisted and dodged as deftly as
only aelves could, they had nowhere to go. A gore-cloaked
screamer grabbed one aelf’s long hair, pulling her into his
comrade’s axe. The other tripped on her wounded sister,
and was hacked apart herself.
A high-pitched, grating shriek jerked Nepenora’s attention
upwards. She caught a glimpse of a sleekly murderous, raw-
muscled beast clinging to one of the corpseclaw spires. Its
ribcage had split open and spread wide into flexible bone
spikes, each as long as her arm, upon which human and
aelven skulls bobbed. Daggerlike teeth distended its scab-
bearded jaw, and eight wet little eyes gleamed along its
quilled skull.
Daemon.
The quill-cat coiled itself and leapt into the fray. More
screams followed, but these were torn from living throats.
A space opened around the daemonic cat and the
mangled bodies of its victims. Kharumathi and Bloodbound
alike shrank back from the beast. Those who failed to
retreat quickly enough were swiftly torn down.
Across the gap, Nepenora finally spotted Rhaelanthe. The
hag queen was lost in joyous wrath, her knife-tipped braids
flying like crimson serpents as she scythed through the
screamers around her. Her honour guard ringed her in a
blossom of bristling sciansá, each one moving so quickly
that they could be seen only by the scarlet sprays they
threw.
Fierce they were, but not invulnerable. A witch-aelf fell,
cut nearly in two by a gore-flecked warrior twice her size.
The others stepped in seamlessly to close the circle over her
body, but Nepenora could see now that the aelven ring was
far smaller than it had been in their camp, and its surviving
members danced over the bodies of their dead.
And there, closing on the hag queen and her defenders,
was Graelakh Gore-Gorger, his clawed arm red to the elbow.
He was a tall man, grey-bearded and sun-browned, with
muscles strung like corded jerky over his bones. On his
chest he wore a human skull at the centre of an iron torc, its
terminals wrought into spiked fists that punched into the
skull’s temples. His blood-soaked beard draped the skull in
grisly tendrils, leaving clotted red streaks as they slithered
across the bone.
As Graelakh advanced, he reached out almost casually
and ripped a Daughter’s heart from her chest, tossing the
ragdoll corpse aside with a contemptuous flick of his wrist.
Graelakh threw her heart in the other direction, spattering
Rhaelanthe and her warriors with the aelf’s bright lifeblood
as her heart spun over their heads.
The quill-cat sprang up to snatch the gobbet from the air.
It swallowed convulsively, landed on all fours, and snarled
through reddened teeth as it looked about for its next
morsel. Witch-aelves and Khornate screamers backed away,
all eyes on the daemon.
But Nepenora, who had seen the quill-cats before, kept
her attention on Graelakh.
He’s hurt. Graelakh had been scored across the lower ribs
and his left tricep. The latter injury was bleeding freely, and
judging from the way he held it, had caused enough
damage to slow his shield arm. He was limping, too,
favouring the same weakened left side. His heart-throwing
was only a spectacle to distract the witch-aelves from his
wounds, and to keep them filled with fear.
He was vulnerable. And Rhaelanthe still had almost half
her honour guard, some of the fiercest fighters that the
Kharumathi could field. She had a chance. Even with the
quill-cat. The hag queen could prevail. Nepenora felt an
unexpected rush of hope at the realisation.
Perhaps she’d been so quick to believe that escape was
the only thing that mattered because she’d thought it was
the only thing that was attainable. But if victory, actual
victory, was possible, and they truly had a chance of
destroying their enemies and winning Khaine’s shard…
A second disturbance was breaking through the melee: an
invisible wave of force that bulled aside aelves and humans
alike, with one of Thaelire’s warlocks at its centre. Fealorn,
again, as black-eyed and spiteful as ever.
‘Come,’ he hissed to Nepenora, his words bubbling up in
puffs of shadowy smoke from the blood spilled around her
feet. ‘I can’t hold them back for long. Bring your witch-
aelves if you want them to live.’
‘We can win,’ Nepenora protested. She gestured to the
hag queen with her sciansá. Rhaelanthe was shouting
taunts at the Khornate warlord. Around the hag queen, her
honour guard clashed knives against spiked bucklers to
show Graelakh that they were unafraid.
‘Stay, then,’ Fealorn said, ‘if you believe that. But you’ll
die, and so will your aelves. If you’re too stupid to see that,
you deserve it.’
‘Thaelire must delight in your endless charm,’ Nepenora
snapped. She had no idea whether Fealorn could hear her
over the battle’s clamour, and didn’t care.
The calculation she had to make was simple, but
surpassingly hard. If she abandoned Rhaelanthe, and the
hag queen prevailed, then Nepenora and all her witch-
aelves would be tortured to death for their disloyalty. On the
other hand, if she joined the fight, then Rhaelanthe might
win where she would otherwise have lost, and the
Kharumathi would remain trapped under her leadership.
And that was without considering the Shard of Khaine in
the Goregorge Claw. If they could salvage a fragment of
their god…
‘The hag queen won’t hold him for long,’ Fealorn said. He
turned on his heel, his inky black cloak whirling behind him
in the empty space created by the force-wave. Again aelves
and screaming Khornate ravagers were thrust aside by his
spell. ‘Come or die.’
Cursing inwardly, Nepenora made her bet. ‘My aelves! To
me!’
Without looking to see who followed, she rushed after
Fealorn, chasing the path of emptiness he cut through the
battle. As she closed on the warlock’s heels, however,
Nepenora stole a glance over her shoulder at Rhaelanthe.
Have I doomed us?
The hag queen met her eyes. Raw hatred contorted
Rhaelanthe’s beauty into something blind and monstrous;
Nepenora broke away from her gaze with a shudder. They
were dead, worse than dead, if Rhaelanthe survived.
Snarling, the hag queen turned away, ripping open one of
Graelakh’s screamers from throat to belly. She kicked the
eviscerated warrior into the bloody mud. Her honour guards
stamped his face into the sludge, choking off the man’s last
gasps. Over his croaks, Rhaelanthe shouted: ‘Graelakh! You
puling, cowardly wretch! Face me if you dare!’
‘Stop throwing your little dolls in my way,’ Graelakh
snarled in return. It wasn’t a witch-aelf he struck next,
though, but one of his own screamers who’d stumbled into
his path. Graelakh bashed the man in the face with a
backhanded blow of the Goregorge Claw, splitting his cheek
open and scattering teeth like hail.
Rhaelanthe swept her sciansá in a wide arc. ‘Kharumathi,
hold back.’ Her honour guard retreated obediently, forming
a protective half-circle around the hag queen. Brutally
efficient, they slashed the throats of any humans who
stepped into the empty space and kicked away the bodies.
Graelakh growled and hacked at any of his own underlings
who dared to interfere, and soon the two leaders faced each
other in a makeshift arena of blood-dark mud.
‘Keep moving,’ Fealorn told Nepenora, with only the
briefest look at the two circling each other in the mud. ‘You
don’t want to be caught here when it’s over.’
But she could win, Nepenora wanted to say, and didn’t.
She turned away from the fight and followed the warlock
through the cinder-strewn rubble field. They came to the
corpseclaws, and passed through. Their grisly guardians
were dead, or exhausted, and never stirred as Nepenora
slipped beneath their contorted shadows.
 A victorious cry jerked her attention back to the duel so
quickly that Nepenora’s forehead brushed against a
corpseclaw’s dangling hand. Even this failed to rouse the
creature, though. She hurried past it, urging her scouts
along. When the last of her witch-aelves was through,
Nepenora turned to squint through the corpseclaws’
bleached curves to see what was happening in the arena.
She could make nothing out from this distance. Nepenora
hissed in frustration, and Fealorn cast her an amused look.
The warlock seemed to have relaxed now that they were out
of immediate danger.
How could he be so calm? It was maddening. Rhaelanthe
would eviscerate them all the instant she’d finished with
Graelakh.
‘Do you want to see what’s happening?’ Fealorn asked.
The question was a taunt.
Nepenora refused to be baited. But she did want to know.
‘Yes.’
‘I thought you might. Add this to the list of favours you
owe me.’ The warlock scanned the witch-aelves who had
followed Nepenora out of Redhollow Ruin, stopping when he
came to a young scout, Halumai, who’d been wounded
during their retreat. She was putting a brave face on it, but
Nepenora could see how badly she’d been hurt. Blood
dripped steadily from a gash in her side, soaking through
the balled shadowsilk she clutched over it.
‘Come,’ Fealorn crooned to the young aelf. With a hesitant
look at Nepenora, who nodded her onwards, Halumai
approached him. When she was within reach, the warlock
seized her by the chin and slit her throat, twisting her body
deftly to spill the blood into a shallow indentation he’d dug
into the rocky earth with his foot.
Nepenora turned her face away from the spray, annoyed
not at her scout’s murder but that Fealorn had seized her
without asking permission. From the mutterings of the
witch-aelves behind her, she knew that her warriors felt the
same. But none of them spoke out, not even Sacrima, who
had been Halumai’s most frequent lover. The young scout
had been seriously injured, and even if her wound hadn’t
killed her – which, Nepenora thought, it might well have – it
was shameful to have been cut so deeply in a mere retreat,
and one guised by magic, no less.
Halumai had been weak. They were better off without her.
The only insult was that a warlock, not even an oath-sworn
Daughter of Khaine, had taken her life without Nepenora’s
grant. And that he’d had the presumption to talk of her
owing him favours. Ridiculous.
But reprisal could wait. In the spill of fresh hot blood, a
vision was taking shape, and Nepenora squatted at the
puddle’s edge for a better view. Around her, the Daughters
of Khaine crowded in, all staring at what the warlock’s
magic showed.
Halumai’s blood did not reflect their own gathered faces,
but rather the view from a different pool of blood
somewhere on the battlefield. The view was slanted and
distorted, its figures stretched into rippling disfigurement,
but it was sufficient to show that Rhaelanthe and Graelakh
were still locked in their furious battle. Quill-cats, witch-
aelves and gore-streaked, shaggy screamers ringed the
makeshift arena, all watching, none daring to interrupt.
Rhaelanthe had the advantage, or so Nepenora thought. It
was hard to tell. Both combatants were soaked in blood,
their own and each other’s, and she couldn’t make out any
nuance of shifting position or intent in the puddle’s murky
scene. They might as well have been mirror images of each
other: twinned apparitions masked in red, circling around
one another with weapons drawn.
Not for the first time, Nepenora reflected on how close
their two gods were. Khorne and Khaine, Khaine and Khorne.
Both gods of blood, death, murder. One was aelven to the
core of his soul, the other drew worshippers primarily from
crude human tribes, but still they might have been branches
sprung from the same tree.
That was why their enmity was so bitter. It wasn’t the
Chaos blight that spurred such vicious hate, not directly.
Hating the taint of Chaos for its own sake was for Sigmar’s
fanatics, not the Daughters of Khaine.
No, the Daughters’ hatred ran deeper. Theirs was the
hatred of true believers for blasphemers, of loyal followers
who had seen their god murdered and consumed by a
grotesque pretender who had devoured all there was of
Khaine save his iron heart. Every death claimed by Khorne’s
hordes, every drop of blood spilled for his glory, was a theft
of what rightfully belonged to Khaine. Even Khorne’s name
sounded like a defilement of Khaine’s. Another warping,
another lie. Another encroachment on divinity.
That the usurper was befouled by Chaos only worsened
his sin. But the original affront, the deepest and worst of
Khorne’s offences, was that his entire faith was nothing but
a trespass against, and a mockery of, Khaine’s.
Even knowing what it would mean for her, and for her
aelves, Nepenora found herself bitterly hoping that
Rhaelanthe would prevail. She hoped the hag queen would
smash Khorne’s warlord into the mud, and open his throat
so his death rattle could form a proper, final prayer to the
true god of death.
Graelakh’s blasphemy deserved no less.
The puddle erupted into a flurry of shadowy blurs, the
combatants moving too fast for the uncertain image to
track. Rhaelanthe’s elongated knife stabbed in, once, twice,
then too many times for Nepenora to distinguish. The hag
queen’s visage was just a pale blotch with black pits for
eyes, but all could see the sudden, victorious smile that
drew dark across her face as Graelakh’s wounds flooded
red. Rhaelanthe liked to poison her weapons, Nepenora
knew, and the slightest nick meant an ugly death by
haemorrhaging. Having been cut, the human was doomed.
 Words passed between them, though the spell conveyed
nothing more than the movement of lips and the stiffening
of postures.
And then Nepenora glimpsed a spark of light that hadn’t
been in the reflection a moment earlier. ‘What is that?’
Something was glowing amid the blood-bedraggled
tendrils of Graelakh’s beard, as if his heart had ignited into
flame within his chest. Its light swam in the puddle’s
reflection; Nepenora couldn’t make out what it was.
Fealorn settled back on his haunches, grimly satisfied.
‘She fought well. Khorne will honour her.’
‘He’s cut,’ Nepenora told him, as if she were explaining
matters to a simpleton. ‘Her blades are venomed. He must
die.’
‘You may find that the gods have their own ideas about
such things,’ Fealorn replied.
The light was growing brighter. Now it blazed hot and red
through the eyes, nostrils and missing teeth of the skull that
Graelakh wore on his torc, and through the spill of its flames
showed itself for what it was. Even in the poor reflection
they could see Graelakh’s beard blackening in its heat.
‘What is it?’ Nepenora asked, hating the apprehension she
heard in her own voice.
‘Khorne’s honour,’ Fealorn said, amused. ‘You were close
to right. She should have won.’
Even as the skull on Graelakh’s chest burned, he shivered
with blood loss. Thin cuts on his upper body – small and
shallow enough that they wouldn’t have shown in the
puddle if they hadn’t bled so profusely – bled like torn
arteries, pumping out Graelakh’s life.
Yet he did not fall. He seized Rhaelanthe’s shoulders with
the last of his strength, pulling the aelf close enough that
even in the puddle, Nepenora could see the hag queen
trying to recoil from Graelakh’s stench as much as the
burning skull on his chest.
 She could escape neither. The skull’s jaw sagged open.
Fire erupted from between its teeth, igniting Rhaelanthe’s
hair in a ghastly burning crown. Skin and flesh crisped
instantly, bubbling brown and then black in the puddle’s
view. At the same time, Graelakh plunged his clawed hand
into the hag queen’s chest, tearing out her heart in his gory
fist.
Rhaelanthe slumped forward. Her skull, burned loose,
tumbled from her neck and into the torc’s ready maw, as its
original skull crumbled to ash between the iron fists and the
ensorcelled metal seized hold of Rhaelanthe’s instead.
Graelakh held up the hag queen’s heart in impossible
triumph, ignoring the blood that still streamed from his
poisoned wounds. He’d lost at least twice what any mortal
body should hold, yet he seemed unaffected. Graelakh
shouted something, and though Nepenora couldn’t hear the
words through the spell, she did hear the Khornate troops’
answering roar, which rolled across the burned plain and
through the corpseclaws like the thunder of a coming storm.
‘We should go.’ Fealorn stood and kicked dirt over the pool
of blood, ignoring Halumai’s corpse lying in the dirt nearby.
‘It won’t take them long to finish the remainder of
Rhaelanthe’s forces.’
‘Where’s Thaelire?’ Nepenora asked.
‘Over the hills. She thought if she stayed behind, you’d
waste too much time trying to convince her to go back for
Rhaelanthe. Whereas if she sent me, you’d know to save
your breath.’
Nepenora cast a last look back through the corpseclaws.
She couldn’t make out individual battles from afar, but she
could sense the overall tide as well as anyone, and she
knew it was running badly against the frightened,
demoralised witch-aelves. They had seen their hag queen
mortally wound a human who had failed to die; they had
seen her heart-torn and beheaded by the grisly might of
Khorne.
 They would fall.
She nodded to Fealorn. ‘Let’s go.’
Thaelire was waiting for them in the Kharumathi camp. It
looked shrunken and tired with almost all the warriors gone.
Weak. Only leathanam and slave drudges walked among the
tents, bent double under heavy loads of water and firewood.
The supplies they’d carried through the Realmgate were
running low, and what they’d been able to forage from the
harsh native terrain fell far short of their needs.
Although, Nepenora reflected, those needs were likely to
be considerably reduced now.
She dismissed her surviving followers to rest and tend to
their wounds. Alone she continued to the great cauldron,
where Thaelire had asked her to meet.
To Nepenora’s eyes, after their misfortunes in Redhollow
Ruin, the cauldron of Khaine seemed strikingly alien among
the blasted hills of Aqshy. Its belly was full of ash and dust
instead of ripe red blood. The great idol of Khaine was filled
with wind-cast grit that dulled its shining surfaces and filled
its crevices, giving it the aspect of something ancient and
neglected, like the last relic from some ancient, long-dead
civilisation.
Perhaps that wasn’t so far from the truth, or what would
soon become truth. Nepenora grimaced as the cauldron’s
shadow fell over her face.
‘What becomes of the Kharumathi now?’
Thaelire was sitting in the shade, reading a worn old book
lettered in a soft grey ink that glimmered softly in the
shadow. The sorceress looked up at Nepenora’s question.
‘We still have two companies of warriors, and most of our
captives and drudges. It’s enough to rebuild.’
Not enough to take Redhollow Ruin. That was too obvious
to need saying. Over two-thirds of their force had perished
along with the hag queen. What remained was a slender
core, perhaps strong enough to regenerate the Kharumathi
eventually, but far too weak to challenge Graelakh or his
screamers. Even with the losses that Rhaelanthe had
managed to inflict on the Bloodbound horde, it would be
purest suicide for the Daughters of Khaine to try the fortress
again.
‘Do we try to rebuild in Aqshy, or return to Ulgu?’
Nepenora asked instead.
‘Neither.’
It wasn’t Thaelire who answered, but Myrcalene, rising
sinuously from her hidden perch coiled atop the cauldron’s
great idol. Both witch-aelves stiffened; neither, evidently,
had known she was there.
‘You will go back to Redhollow Ruin.’
‘You weren’t there?’ Nepenora asked. Perhaps it was
exhaustion and desperation that made her so bold, but
abruptly she didn’t feel like being deferential to Morathi’s
handmaiden. Had Myrcalene been there? Nepenora hadn’t
seen the melusai in the fighting, but her view had been
limited, and she had assumed that Myrcalene would use
illusions to disguise her true nature anyway. The snake-
bodied handmaidens rarely revealed themselves to
outsiders, and Nepenora had presumed that meant
Myrcalene wouldn’t show herself to Graelakh’s horde.
It had never occurred to her that Myrcalene might not
have joined in the fighting. Or, if the melusai had been
there, that she would have abandoned the hag queen and
her witch-aelves before the end. That crept too close to…
cowardice, or treachery, or any of a dozen different words,
each equally treasonous to consider.
But, apparently, that was the truth. The melusai had
either abandoned the hag queen early, or hadn’t fought at
Redhollow Ruin at all.
Myrcalene bared her teeth, ignoring Nepenora’s question.
‘You did not reclaim the Goregorge Claw. You returned
empty-handed from Redhollow Ruin, and have thus failed in
the High Oracle’s task. But I will, in my beneficence, allow
you one more chance to prove yourselves in Khaine’s eyes.
Go back. Retake our artefact from the hands of the unclean.
Or else it will be clear to all – to our lord and god, to his High
Oracle, and to me, as her handmaiden and the instrument
of her will – that you are unworthy to be counted among the
Daughters of Khaine.’
‘Yes, handmaiden,’ the two aelves chorused humbly, in
unison. Myrcalene watched them with hot eyes for a long
and hostile moment, breathing shallowly through her mouth
as if tasting the air for the telltale scent of their defiance,
then slithered down the immense effigy of Khaine, along the
cauldron’s bloodstained lip, and away across the sand.
When she was gone, Thaelire tucked her small book away.
‘So.’
‘So.’
‘We don’t have a chance against Graelakh’s horde.’
Thaelire watched Myrcalene’s figure dwindle between the
tents. ‘We’d probably have better luck trying to kill her
instead.’
‘Thaelire.’ Even breathing a word against one of Morathi’s
handmaidens was suicide.
The sorceress shrugged. ‘It’s true. The only way to change
the outcome is to change the equation. We’ve lost too many
aelves to win on our own strength, if we ever could have.
We need allies, and there’s only one prospect worth
pursuing in this waste.’
Nepenora nodded, eager to move away from the
dangerous suggestion of treachery. ‘How do we win over the
Stormcast Eternals?’
‘If they were men, I’d seduce them. One of them, at least.
There’s a young recruit in their retinue who seems likely. But
they aren’t human, so that may not be possible, and even if
it is, it may not be wise. So we must find another way.’
Musing, Thaelire tapped the cover of the book tucked
beneath her shadowsilk cloak. ‘Stormcast Eternals are
permitted only one desire – to destroy the Chaos fiends who
are their god’s greatest enemies. Anything else they may
want… those desires are not gone from them, not entirely,
but I think they will resist admitting that any other wish
exists. Our easiest path, then, is to offer what they are
permitted to want.’
‘How? They’ve little use for us as battlefield allies.
Especially now that two-thirds of our fighting strength is
gone.’
‘I’m not sure that’s true,’ Thaelire said. ‘There are so few
of them that they might well be grateful for whatever help
we can give. But, in any case, that wasn’t how I planned to
open my offer.’ She regarded Nepenora with the bare hint of
a smile. ‘We – you – have something they do not, and which
they will want very badly, the better to serve their god.’
Nepenora raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘What’s that?’
‘You’ve actually been inside Redhollow Ruin. You have
seen what lies within the fortress with your own eyes.
There’s something the Stormcasts want in that place, badly
enough to have staked out a camp in this barren waste, and
while I don’t know what that is, I’m willing to wager that
they’ll be very interested in your observations.
‘Think. These are Stormcast Eternals. Serving Sigmar’s
holy tasks is the only purpose, the only pleasure, that exists
for them across their long march through eternity. They are
immortals slaved to that end. Redhollow Ruin, for whatever
reason, is their task here. Therefore they must know what
you’ve seen.’ Thaelire’s smile sharpened, and took on some
of the twisted contentment of victory. ‘Yes. I think I can
secure our alliance with that. What you and your scouts saw
in that place is our key. So. I will need your blood. And then
we will see what weight of sigmarite that blood can buy.’

‘She came back,’ Etanios murmured, astonished.

 There was no one to hear him. Othoros had taken the rest
of the Stormcast Eternals to scout the aftermath of the
witch-aelves’ attack on Redhollow Ruin. In part they’d gone
to pick off any surviving followers of Khorne they could kill
without revealing themselves, but mostly Othoros had
wanted to see whether any of the fortress’ secrets had
cracked open in the fighting. The Lord-Aquilor had been
visibly agitated when he’d received news of the witch-
aelves’ attack – the first time Etanios had ever seen him
show any emotion that might be characterised as even a
distant cousin to ‘fear’ – but whatever Othoros had been
afraid might happen had, evidently, not come to pass.
Still, the Lord-Aquilor had gone with some urgency to
reconnoitre the battle’s bloody leavings, and he’d taken
almost all of their fighting force with him. Only Etanios
remained behind to watch over the scorched wastelands
surrounding their camp, and so only Etanios saw the lone
aelf approaching over the blasted hills.
It was the same one who’d come before. Thaelire. He was
certain of it. She dyed her hair dark red, almost black, where
most of the Daughters of Khaine wore theirs white, or
stained a vibrant crimson with the spell-touched blood of
their victims. While the shadowsilk cloak might have
belonged to any witch-aelf, and she was too far distant for
Etanios to make out her face even through his spyglass, the
sorceress’ hair was distinctive.
It was her. It could be no one else.
He was surprised by the relief he felt. There was no
particular reason that Etanios should care whether Thaelire
had survived the attack on Redhollow Ruin. As far as he
knew, it didn’t matter to the Stormcast Eternals whether
every last one of the Daughters of Khaine had perished in
the hag queen’s foolish charge. The aelves were not
important to any strategic concern. And Etanios had been
sent to spy on the aelves’ camp a few times, enough to see
how they treated their captives, and to lose whatever
illusions he might have had about their sometime allies’
morality. The Daughters of Khaine were very nearly as cruel
as the worst of Chaos’ servants.
And yet…
Etanios couldn’t explain, even to himself, why he cared
that the sorceress had survived. But he did. With more
anticipation than he would have liked to admit to any of his
fellow Stormcasts, he watched her approach across the hills,
appearing and disappearing with the smoke that drifted
across the slopes. When finally she reached his sentry post,
he had to subdue a little thrill under his mask of solemnity.
‘Sorceress. What brings you back to our camp?’
Thaelire lowered her hood, looking up at Etanios with a
curious, lopsided little smile. ‘You’ve surely noticed that our
hag queen made her attack on Redhollow Ruin.’
‘Yes. It appears fortune did not favour her.’
‘I’d lay the fault more with her planning than with the
whims of fortune,’ Thaelire said, with a little shrug that
suggested she considered this to be of no moment. She
shook her cloak out carefully, and cinder-flecked dust
billowed from the shadowsilk in gritty puffs. ‘In any case,
she’s dead, and the greater part of our strength with her.’
‘Yes,’ Etanios agreed cautiously. He was, as ever,
astonished by her boldness. He couldn’t imagine any
Stormcast so casually admitting to an outsider that their
fighting strength had been demolished, or blaming it so
openly on poor leadership. It was true that she hadn’t told
him anything that their own rangers hadn’t already seen,
but even so, her attitude was breathtaking. ‘Is that what you
came to tell us?’
‘No. I came to discuss the alliance that I proposed on my
last visit.’ Thaelire smoothed her cloak, caressing the dusted
silk with another little smile cast up through her lashes. Her
fingers lingered on the fine grey cloth, and Etanios’ skin
prickled as if her touch lingered on him, instead.
 Foolishness and fancy, but his throat was suddenly dry. He
cleared it awkwardly. ‘The Lord-Aquilor is presently afield.
Would you care to wait inside? The climate here is harsh.’
‘It is,’ she said, and Etanios led her towards their camp.
After a moment’s indecision, he guided the aelf towards his
own tent rather than Othoros’, because he wasn’t sure that
they should risk the possibility that the Daughters of Khaine
would see anything sensitive that the Lord-Aquilor might
inadvertently have left on display. They hadn’t expected
visitors, and it was possible that the sorceress might catch a
glimpse of something she wasn’t meant to.
So he told himself, anyway.
‘I’m surprised you notice the harshness,’ Thaelire
observed conversationally, as they walked. ‘I wouldn’t have
thought Stormcasts would be troubled by it.’
‘Of course we are,’ Etanios told her, surprised. ‘We are still
flesh, and our equipment is still cloth and metal. Even if
Aqshy’s fire-winds can’t harm sigmarite – and, between the
two of us, I’m not entirely sure they couldn’t erode it, given
time enough – they can certainly scour away everything
else.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’ Thaelire glanced about the spartan
furnishings of Etanios’ tent as she stepped inside. He had a
canvas cot, a folding table, armour polish and buffing cloths,
a sigmarite-flecked whetstone for his blades, and not much
else. Little that spoke of personal interests, and nothing of
recreation.
It hadn’t occurred to him, until just now, that someone
might find this strange.
He’d had more, much more, when he was mortal. There
had been cherished keepsakes from loved ones and
mementos from his travels. Perhaps a prized weapon from a
vanquished enemy, or a lock of hair from a sweetheart.
Maybe a favourite spice blend carried from his homeland, or
an instrument to play the songs of his youth through lonely,
foreign nights.
 Or… something of that sort. He couldn’t remember. But
there had been more. Etanios was sure of that, just as he
was sure, looking around his tent, that he could no longer
recall what any of it was, or why it had mattered.
Thaelire touched the plain clay jug and cup that Etanios
used for water. There was only the one cup. ‘Do you mind?’
‘No. Not at all. Please.’ He cleared his throat again. ‘We…
don’t entertain guests very often.’
‘It rather seems that you don’t “entertain” at all. Even
yourselves. What do you do in your spare moments?’ The
sorceress poured and sipped gracefully, looking about the
tent again.
‘We don’t really have many,’ Etanios said self-consciously.
‘Spare moments, that is. There’s always some other task to
be done. Our work in Sigmar’s name is unending.’
‘Even when you die. Does that trouble you?’ Thaelire
asked coolly, giving her water a second look after she’d
tasted it. There was a skin of gritty dust on it – Etanios
hadn’t covered or emptied the jug in almost a day, he
belatedly recalled, far too long to keep water unsullied even
inside his tent – but she swirled it as if fascinated by the
way the grit vanished into the cup’s whirlpool, and then
drank the rest without complaint.
‘No. Sigmar’s is a worthy cause. It is an honour to be
counted among his chosen.’ This, Etanios felt to be true with
every fibre of his being, and he answered with absolute
conviction.
‘What is that cause, exactly?’ Thaelire looked pointedly
about the tent, so utterly barren of any signs of personality,
curiosity or joy. ‘I suspect you could tell me very clearly
what it is you fight against, but what – in your view – do you
fight for? Is there anything? Or does it exist only as
abstraction and generality?’
Etanios shrugged, helpless and a bit nettled. ‘Maybe we
fight so that the rest of the Mortal Realms can enjoy the
luxuries we’ve forgotten. Would it even make sense if we
wanted to… carve sculptures, or the like? It’s mortals who
want to achieve eternity through art. We already have it.’
‘You do,’ Thaelire sighed. She set the cup aside and stood,
coming closer. ‘Immortality. An eternity of war and death,
fighting in the service of a cause you can’t articulate and
possibly don’t remember. How terribly tragic.’
‘It is an honourable fate,’ Etanios said stiffly. The aelf was
close enough that he could feel the soothing coolness
trapped in her shadowsilk cloak, and smell the curious
resins and spices of her spellcraft. He fought the urge to
step back.
Thaelire smiled gently. A little sadly, perhaps, though he
might have imagined that. ‘Oh, of course. It would hardly be
tragic otherwise. But you make me rather glad that I will die,
and then be free. I don’t think endless servitude in the
model of Sigmar or Nagash would suit me.’
‘We’ve little in common with Nagash’s slaves,’ Etanios told
her, even more stonily.
‘No? I suppose not. Vampires, at least, want things. And
decorate with a certain amount of personality, even if they
really only have two or three modes.’ Thaelire lifted a slim
hand to stave off further protest. ‘No, I know, I shouldn’t
mock. I’m being an ungracious guest. But… really.’
She took Etanios’ hand and held it lightly between both of
hers, gazing up at him with a serenity he couldn’t read. Her
touch was as soft and cool as the silk of her cloak.
‘When we first met, I was surprised that I could taste
desire in you. And that remains – the surprise, and the
desire. Doesn’t it? But it isn’t all you want.
‘You are lonely, Stormcast. When was the last time
someone touched you with kindness? With your fellows, you
have friendship. Camaraderie. It is very strong, strong
enough to sustain immortality. But it is the brotherhood of
the battlefield, bound in violence and rough in its ways, and
you have no one outside that. And you want it. You still have
enough humanity that you want it. Even now, you’re hoping
that I’ll call you by your name. Aren’t you?’
‘Yes,’ Etanios said. But before he could think of what else
to say in response to the aelf’s astonishing, perplexing
words, he heard the rush and clamour of the other
Stormcasts’ return.
Thaelire heard it too. She drew back, releasing his hand
from hers. ‘Ah, they’re back. Marvellous. Do you suppose I
should give them a moment, or will the Lord-Aquilor want to
hear my proposal now?’
‘Lord-Aquilor Othoros appreciates efficiency,’ Etanios said,
trying to disguise his regret. He would have liked to keep
her to himself a little longer. To understand the riddles she’d
given him. Perhaps, simply, to feel her fingers on his palm a
moment more.
His own wishes, however, were of no importance. Etanios
stood, with as much graciousness as he could manage, and
offered his arm to escort the sorceress out. She took it
lightly, and together they went out to meet the Lord-Aquilor.
Othoros’ expedition had been unsuccessful. Etanios
recognised the blend of frustration and relief in his
superior’s demeanour at once, and wondered whether
Thaelire saw the same. The Lord-Aquilor was a master of
restraint, but the aelf had shown herself to be a sharp
observer.
‘Daughter of Khaine,’ Othoros said, removing his masked
helm courteously as Thaelire drew near. ‘I’m pleased to see
you survived the attack on Redhollow Ruin. It appears many
of your sisters did not.’
‘Our hag queen was a poor leader.’ Thaelire shrugged.
‘But now she’s dead, and with her, the primary obstacle to
our alliance.’
‘I see you’re heartbroken at the loss. Well, you knew her
better than I.’ Othoros kept his manner solemn, but Etanios
could see a sardonic amusement lurking at the corners of
his mouth. It seemed the Lord-Aquilor’s guess about
disloyalty in the Daughters’ ranks had been on the mark.
‘Remind me, please, what terms you hoped to offer for that
alliance?’
‘We need your help defeating Graelakh Gore-Gorger and
seizing the Goregorge Claw,’ Thaelire replied. ‘Regrettably
our own strength is not sufficient to this task, now that our
late lamented hag queen’s got most of our witch-aelves
killed. Without your Stormcast Eternals, we have no hope of
fulfilling our charge. Which would be unfortunate on a
number of fronts, not least that of our continued survival.’
‘I see,’ Othoros said, with the same near-perfect gravity
over subdued mirth. ‘What do you offer in exchange for this
help?’
‘The chance to kill Khorne’s Chaos-corrupted fanatics isn’t
enough? I’m grievously disappointed. Everything I thought I
knew about Stormcast Eternals seems to have been false.’
Thaelire sighed theatrically and reached into her cloak to
draw out a small, wax-sealed vial of dark red liquid. ‘But, as
it happens, I do have something else to offer.’
‘Yes?’
‘I don’t know what you want in Redhollow Ruin, but I do
know it isn’t Graelakh or his cursed Claw. If it were, you’d
have swept in to seize it while he’s still licking the wounds
we left him. I must presume that it’s something within the
fortress itself, then, and not merely the warlord currently
occupying the place. And that you can’t simply go in to get
it yourselves, at least not yet, or else – again – you’d already
have killed Graelakh and done so. Am I right?’ Thaelire
lowered her lashes minutely, then glanced up through them,
hardly bothering to hide her victorious little smile.
Othoros’ amusement dimmed abruptly. ‘Yes.’
‘Then this might be of interest.’ The sorceress held up the
little bottle again, sloshing its crimson contents. ‘Some of
our scouts entered the fortress, as you might already know.
They saw strange things in Redhollow Ruin – things that
they couldn’t begin to describe, things that bore the imprint
of not only Khorne, but multiple Ruinous Powers. Perhaps
even all of them. You can, I’m sure, imagine the conflict and
confusion in their accounts.
‘But I have distilled their memories into their blood, and
so you can witness all that they saw, just as they did,
without the clumsy intermediary of words. And without
worrying about tipping your hand as to what, exactly, it is
that you seek in that place. You need not ask us anything.
The blood will show you all.’
‘A tempting offer,’ Othoros said. He sounded
noncommittal, but Etanios saw the tension that suddenly
gripped the Lord-Aquilor. ‘And all you want is our assistance
in defeating Graelakh’s host?’
‘That and the Goregorge Claw. Yes. You needn’t even tell
me what draws you to Redhollow Ruin – although, of course,
I might be able to offer more assistance if I better
understood your needs.’
‘No doubt.’ Othoros extended a hand for the bottle. It was
tiny in his palm, a doll-sized absurdity. The glass caught the
late slant of light and flashed as he studied it. ‘But I think
this will suffice. What lies in Redhollow Ruin is best not
disturbed. Or, frankly, discussed.’ The Lord-Aquilor closed
his fingers around the vial. ‘What must I do to watch the
memories?’
‘I will perform the spell for you. As I did before.’ Thaelire
brushed her fingertips over the hilt of the knife at her hip.
‘Have we a bargain?’
‘We do.’
‘Excellent,’ Thaelire said briskly. ‘First I will show you the
aelves’ memories, and then I will paint you with their faces.’
The Lord-Aquilor arched an eyebrow. ‘What?’
From her cloak, the sorceress withdrew and unfastened a
small case of matte grey leather. It held rows of tiny glass
bottles, even smaller than the one she’d given Othoros,
nestled neatly in little loops of braided silk. Many were
empty, but about a dozen were filled with blood.
 ‘The faces of the dead,’ she explained, holding out the
case. ‘You and your host are formidable, but you’ll be more
formidable yet with the advantage of surprise. Graelakh
doesn’t know exactly how many warriors we have, but he
does know that he defeated us decisively when we had
three times our present number. Therefore I expect he won’t
notice, and certainly won’t care, if our companies hold nine
additional aelves. On the other hand, he very much would
notice and care if we marched on him with nine Stormcast
Eternals. So we will make you look like aelves, and remove
that trouble from his mind.’
‘I see.’ Othoros squinted into the wind-scoured distance,
where the sun was falling from Aqshy’s cloudless sky.
Nothing could be glimpsed of Redhollow Ruin beyond the
smoking hills, but all felt the weight of its presence, perhaps
more ominous for being unseen.
He turned back. ‘Yes. I accept.’
‘The Kharumathi will need a new hag queen,’ Myrcalene
said.
Nepenora paused in mid-stretch. Twice a day, at morning
and dusk, she and all the other Kharumathi went through
the series of flowing, dancelike stances and transitions that
they relied upon while fighting. The Daughters of Khaine
practised these movements again and again, unceasingly,
honing their bodies and embedding the memories into their
muscles so that they could perform perfectly even in the
throes of their wildest rage. Each sect had their own
preferred style, but they all practised with equal fervour.
War was prayer, and dance was prayer, and there wasn’t a
Daughter of Khaine in any of the Mortal Realms who would
dishonour her god by displaying incompetence in either.
It was possible, Nepenora thought, that the melusai
meant to bait her by dangling a promise of advancement to
see whether it distracted the witch-aelf from her piety. If so,
she was resolved that the trick would fail. She nodded as
briefly as she dared, stealing only the quickest of glances at
Myrcalene, and continued through her stances. Only when
she’d finished the full, exhausting sequence did she stop
and sheathe her weapons. Gritty black dust flecked her
sweaty brow and neck and clung to her damp garments.
Nepenora ignored the irritation.
‘What of it?’
‘Morathi is watching you. Closely. The recovery of the
Goregorge Claw would be a considerable triumph. Of course
it is a test of your sect’s worthiness to survive… but that
does not mean that survival must be the only reward. A
leader capable of bringing her people to victory in such
difficult circumstances would have proved herself able
indeed.’
The melusai’s eyes were hot in the twilight, burning
against the vertical black slits of her pupils. Nepenora stared
at them in fascination. She’d never noticed that Myrcalene’s
eyes were snake-slitted before. Perhaps they hadn’t been,
and the melusai had just now dropped – or used – an illusion
to make them so.
‘Am I clear?’
The back of Nepenora’s neck prickled, and not with drying
sweat. ‘Yes.’
‘Good. It would be unfortunate if you thought that the
High Oracle relied only on threats to secure her servants’
loyalty. Nothing could be less true. To the clever and
courageous, she can be very generous indeed.’ Myrcalene
smiled, showing the tips of her teeth, and abruptly her eyes
were aelven again. Her gaze glittered as hard as it had
before, though; there was no comfort in her thin pretence of
normalcy. ‘Your ruthlessness with the former hag queen did
not go unnoticed.’
Nepenora nodded again, not trusting herself to say
anything. She’d been afraid that Myrcalene might suspect
her abandonment of Rhaelanthe to be cowardice. That
would have been unforgivable. But opportunistic treachery
among the Daughters of Khaine was considered
understandable, even commendable, under the right
circumstances. If the High Oracle agreed that Rhaelanthe
had been an inept leader, then deposing her and arranging
her murder was clearly the correct course of action.
Perhaps it was even worthy of reward.
‘I’m glad we understand one another. The Kharumathi will
need a strong leader when this is done. And there may yet
be other rewards in store. The High Oracle may wish to see
the Kharumathi made more powerful than they were before
– and their new hag queen, mightier yet. But the Goregorge
Claw must come first.’ Myrcalene slithered away, her
serpentine body leaving a wavery trail across the coarse,
rock-splintered sand.
Nepenora brushed the remaining grit off her skin. Her
sweat had baked dry in the furnace-blast heat, and the dust
fell easily from her clothes. As she stooped to pick up her
spiked buckler, she heard a chorus of vyatti bird cries
spread through the Kharumathi camp.
That was an alarm. The shy, reclusive vyatti bird lived in
the shadow-draped heights of Ulgu, and could not survive in
Aqshy. The Kharumathi used its soft, whirring cry as a
warning when they dared not raise a louder call. Thaelire’s
warlocks had wrapped their camp in illusions to hide them
from Graelakh’s screamers, but if the Kharumathi had raised
a full alarm, its noise might have broken through the magic.
Even now, it wasn’t the witch-aelves who raised the cry, but
the leathanam, so that any intruder who might have
breached their camp would follow the noise only to their
near-worthless slaves. The witch-aelves, meanwhile, could
melt into the shadows and spring on interlopers by surprise.
It wasn’t an intruder who came through the cracked grey
hills, however, but Thaelire – and nine witch-aelves that
Nepenora knew for a fact had died outside Redhollow Ruin.
She knew that because she was the one who had slit their
dead veins and collected the cold blood from their bodies.
She’d filled the vials that Thaelire had used to disguise the
Stormcast Eternals now accompanying her into the
Kharumathi camp.
Nepenora smiled, and then smoothed the expression
away as she strode through the tents to greet the
newcomers. Cinders crunched under her boots, alerting
them to her arrival.
‘Welcome, Stormcast Eternals,’ she said. ‘Welcome to our
war.’
The second time the Daughters of Khaine came to
Redhollow Ruin, they didn’t even try for stealth.
They came openly, beating drums and flying makeshift
banners of shadowsilk cloaks strung from spears. Nepenora
marched at their head, and when they came to the fortress,
she ordered their archers forward. The leathanam set down
pots of coals and hurried away, and the archers dipped their
alchemically treated arrows into the flames.
Then they shot the bodies threaded on the fortress’
towering bone spikes, igniting the impaled corpses from
afar. The cursed things writhed and screamed through
blackened teeth as they burned. They vomited sorcerous
blood onto the sand, convulsed in shrouds of carrion-foul
smoke, and died.
Behind them, the fortress gates opened. Fifty, sixty,
seventy gore-streaked howlers poured forth, thundering
their own drums in answer. Daemonic quill-cats slipped out
to a chorus of deafening, bone-shrilling shrieks, the gory
spines of their ruptured ribs grabbing hungrily at the air.
Graelakh came out last, flanked by the most devout of his
Bloodbound. He was shaggy in ropes of hair and gore-caked
skin, Rhaelanthe’s skull trapped in the grip of his torc.
‘Little dolls! Have the rest of you come back to die with
your sisters? I thought you’d run away, weeping in fear.’
‘Little human!’ Nepenora shouted back. ‘Have you come
out to fight us like a warrior this time? Without hiding behind
walls and dead things and’ – she drew a circle over her
chest, as if tracing the shape of a skull on a torc – ‘magic?’
That taunt drew a chorus of gibes from the Daughters of
Khaine, and an inarticulate roar from Graelakh’s horde.
Khorne’s brutes hated nothing so much as sorcery, viewing
it as the province of weaklings who used guile and deceit to
overcome the stronger and more worthy. Any insinuation
that an artefact of Khorne’s favour was a mere wizard’s trick
was the vilest blasphemy to them.
Nepenora hoped it would enrage them enough to make
them overlook the Stormcast Eternals disguised among the
Daughters of Khaine. Although Thaelire had altered their
faces, and even their armour and weapons, no magic could
grant them the grace of true aelves. Close scrutiny would
reveal that the Stormcast Eternals moved with the heavy
deliberation of plate-clad warriors, and that they clustered
together in disciplined groups of two or three, unlike the
witch-aelves, who moved far more fluidly across the rough
terrain. An especially sharp-eyed observer might even note
that they left heavier footprints in the sooty, rock-studded
grit.
Therefore Nepenora needed to prevent Graelakh and his
minions from studying her aelves that closely.
‘Stung, eh?’ she taunted. ‘Ashamed we all saw that you
had to resort to sorcery to defeat our hag queen? It wasn’t
your axe that killed her. It wasn’t your claw. It was your toy
skull’s magic.’
‘She was dead already!’ Graelakh screamed back.
Thrusting the Goregorge Claw into the air, he led the charge
over the fiery bridge and into the corpseclaws.
As they crossed the killing field, the Bloodbound horde
kicked up the coarse black dust, and Aqshy’s ever-vicious
winds whipped the grit into a storm. Graelakh spat it out
viciously, still shouting.
‘She died by my hand! Mine! The Blood God took her skull
as a trophy. Khorne honoured her skill. But it was I, Graelakh
Gore-Gorger, who killed her!’
‘You killed nothing, except your own feeble claim to glory,’
Nepenora sneered. Around her, witch-aelves tensed, sciansá
drawn and spiked bucklers held at the ready. The archers
dipped their bows towards the fire pots once more. The
Bloodbound host was nearly in range.
‘I’ll kill you next,’ Graelakh promised. One of the charred
corpses strung overhead tumbled from its claw, showering
him with gory cinders. He slapped them away, leaving his
face and shoulders flecked with black and red. ‘I’ll tear out
your heart. But never fear, little doll. I won’t take your
worthless skull. I’ll crush it for pig food instead.’
The Daughters’ archers nocked and loosed their burning
arrows. Arcs of fire hissed from the sky to strike Khorne’s
warriors down. They fell howling, but Graelakh was deaf to
their cries. The screamers in the next rank cursed their
wounded comrades as weaklings, kicking them savagely
and spitting on their dying pleas as they charged past. Then
they were through the corpseclaws, and their stench
engulfed the aelves.
Nepenora’s archers loosed their last arrows, almost point-
blank, at the wall of oncoming warriors. A screamer lunged
forward, ripped the bow from an aelven archer’s grasp, and
whirled its shaft like a quarterstaff to smash her throat. She
dropped to her knees, clawing at her crushed windpipe. A
moment later she vanished, trampled underfoot, as the two
armies crashed together.
The clamour of flesh and steel and screams was
deafening. Nepenora squinted against the whipping wind,
slashing at any howler who came near. She nicked one,
spun away, hamstrung another. Neither was a killing cut,
but both of her victims would die. The venom on her sciansá
would see to that.
The dust storm grew thicker, its gritty motes coarser. It
was near blinding now, and its cinders battered against the
combatants’ shields and armour like black hail. The quill-
cats were lethal blurs in the storm, each one invisible until it
tore into its next victim with a mad, yowling shriek.
Nepenora grimaced, trying to track the nearest cat
through the blowing ash. Distracted, she almost blundered
into a pair of enraged Bloodbound. One had a broken arrow
sticking out from his back. He’d fingerpainted red streaks
across his face with the blood from that wound. The other
had slashed his own mouth from ear to ear so that he could
howl more fearsomely to his brute god. Windblown cinders
caked the dripping wound, lining his lips with ghastly, half-
dissolved spikes of black.
Both of them attacked her. Nepenora ducked under a
goreaxe, sidestepped, and slashed underhand at its wielder.
She scored a long, bloody scratch – enough to kill him in a
few moments, but not enough to disable the man at once.
As if to prove the point, the Bloodbound screamed and
swung at her again. This time he clipped her, and though
Nepenora managed to avoid decapitation, the force of the
blow still drove her to a knee. A shock of heat, then
numbness, seized her shoulder.
She stumbled away. Seeing their advantage, the
Bloodbound chased her, shouting in glee.
Another witch-aelf darted in, stabbing at the brutes to
protect Nepenora. They roared and set upon her. She
dodged the one Nepenora had wounded, but failed to evade
the other.
The storm has blinded her, Nepenora thought, even as the
Bloodbound’s axe buried itself in the aelf’s side. The
Daughter of Khaine fell with an unvoiced cry of
astonishment on her lips. Cinders battered her face, clinging
to her sightless eyes. The Khornate warriors stepped over
her body to pursue Nepenora; one of them crushed the
fallen aelf’s skull, casually, as he left her in the ashes.
Nepenora danced back, worried now. There hadn’t been
as much poison left on her sciansá as she’d thought. The
injured one wasn’t dying fast enough. He had scarcely
slowed, even as blood ran down his body and left black
dust-clots in his wake. The Bloodbound fanned out, widening
their angle to trap Nepenora between them as they
continued to drive her back, away from the main body of
her force. The ash was blowing thick and fast, cutting her off
from any other witch-aelves who might help her.
Everywhere, it seemed, the battlefield had broken into
isolated duels and small knots of fighting separated by walls
of blowing grit.
Then Nepenora heard a quill-cat’s cry, and her blood
curdled cold. The daemon stalked through the billowing
blackness like an apparition out of nightmare, broken bodies
briefly visible in the eddied storm behind it.
Even the Bloodbound hesitated at that eerie, keening wail.
They paused, just for an instant, and Nepenora seized the
opportunity to skitter away sideways, retreating as quickly
as she could with her injured shoulder still throbbing in
protest at every step.
If she was lucky, the cinder storm would hide her. If she
wasn’t, she’d be trapped between quill-cat and Bloodbound.
She was better than lucky. Through the veils of falling ash,
she glimpsed three witch-aelves just as they slaughtered
the last of the Bloodbound in front of them. Nepenora
veered towards the trio, prepared at any second to feel the
quill-cat’s claws thudding into her back.
‘Cat!’ she shouted, both to get their attention and to warn
them.
They turned, showing neither fear nor the delirious,
wrathful joy she would have expected from the Daughters of
Khaine, and instantly fell into a defensive formation. Their
fighting stance clicked in Nepenora’s head as an abruptly
wrong-shaped thing, like the sight of a Chaos rune on a
Khainite prayer scroll, or a possessive daemon grinning from
behind a once-familiar face. The three aelves stood like a
single body, ordered and disciplined, in a manner utterly
alien to the witch-aelves’ fluid, individualistic fighting style.
 She thought: Oh.
The quill-cat shrieked again, close enough for the
vibrations to thrill against Nepenora’s spine. Hot breath
lashed her back. She couldn’t tell whether it was from the
cinder storm or the quill-cat, and she didn’t care. She threw
herself flat on the ground, undignified and helpless, and
exhaled through her clenched teeth in bitter relief when she
felt the quill-cat leap over her, unwilling to waste its
strength on such pitiful prey when there were three better
challengers waiting to be fought.
Khorne’s creatures had his spirit. Probably the quill-cat
intended to come back and eviscerate her slowly, at its
leisure, to show her the cost of weakness after it had
finished with its worthier foes.
Nepenora didn’t think it would survive to have the chance.
She lifted her head as the quill-cat sprang over her,
raining cinders from its paws. It extended its claws as it
prepared to land on the frontmost witch-aelf, and then
screeched in shock as the aelf caught it and bashed it aside
with an impossibly strong, impossibly fast swing of her
spiked buckler. The quill-cat twisted in midair, righting itself,
only to scream again as a second witch-aelf hurled her
sciansá like a javelin through its exposed belly.
The cat hit the ground hard, rolled twice as it strained to
avoid driving the knife any deeper, and gasped in frantic
disbelief, its flanks heaving under a prickly coat of black
grit, smeared blood and daemonic ichor. Gathering its
strength, the quill-cat twisted upright again, but the witch-
aelves were already upon it.
Nepenora couldn’t see what followed. The wind turned,
then turned again, and the cloaking cinders swirled in its
grip. It had only obscured the false aelves for a split shard of
a second, but that was all it took for them to disembowel
the quill-cat and hack its head off for good measure.
No witch-aelf could have done that. And now Nepenora
wasn’t the only one to have seen it. Thaelire’s disguising
illusion was rapidly failing as it strained to cover the
impossible. In another moment, it would give away the truth
hidden beneath her spell’s false faces.
But even before the magic crumbled, Graelakh’s shout
rang out.
‘Stormcasts! These are not aelves, but Stormcast
Eternals! Sigmar’s hammers are here!’

The closest Etanios ever came to understanding the

destructive joy of Chaos was in the heart of battle.
There was a terrible exultation in feeling the rightness of
his Sigmar-blessed body moving in the brutal rhythms of
war. This was, in the most literal sense, what he had been
made for. The weight of the hammer in his hands, the
gratifying crunch of slamming it into a foe’s head or torso –
this, this above all, was the purpose of his reforging.
War sang to his soul. His muscles and sinews rejoiced at
the exertion, at the test of their strength and the fulfilment
of their duty. His heart swelled with a strange and angry
pride, a volcanic glow of pleasure, at the slaughter of
Sigmar’s enemies. Their broken bodies stirred no pity or
remorse in him, only savage contentment that he had done
his work well.
Afterwards, when his blood had cooled, he often felt
confused and ashamed by his excesses while in the grip of
battle-lust. It seemed… unbecoming, in some way that
Etanios couldn’t quite articulate, that one of Sigmar’s
honoured servants should take such satisfaction, such
delight, in death and destruction. Even when it was Chaos’
corruptions that were destroyed, it felt… wrong.
But those regrets always came later. In the heat of the
moment, there was only ever joy. And that joy filled him
now, pounding through his veins with every beat of his
heart, as Etanios crushed the howling Bloodbound beneath
his hammer. His spell of disguise had failed at some point.
Etanios hadn’t noticed when. One moment, his hammer had
appeared to be a ritual sciansá, and his limbs had looked
pale and slender as a witch-aelf’s. Then he’d pulled his
hammer out of the gory rubble of a screamer’s skull and
had realised that it appeared to be itself once again, and so,
too, did he.
This detail had registered distantly. It was unimportant. All
that mattered was tracking Graelakh’s howlers through the
swirling blackness of the cinder storm, and smashing them
into ruin when he found them.
Grit beat against his gold-masked helm. To his left, a gore-
painted screamer hurled a glowing skull into a cluster of
witch-aelves. It exploded, obliterating two aelves and
ripping the arm off a third. The Bloodbound threw more
exploding skulls, demolishing the remaining Daughters of
Khaine, then rushed into the wash of fire, tearing at
anything still standing.
Two Stormcast Eternals met them with hammer and
sword. The Bloodbound, expecting to find only dying aelves,
ran full into the force of their weapons. Human bodies flew
like dolls, limbs wrenched awry and faces gaping sightlessly
into the wind. From the grey-gold lightning that crackled
through the melee, Etanios knew that one of those
Stormcasts was Agashon, whose reforgings had imbued her
with an aura of tempestuous stormlight that flared
uncontrollably in a fight.
That stormlight flashed through the cinder clouds,
illumining hunched, scuttling figures that scurried towards
the melee with their heads low and odd, glowing objects
clutched close to their chests. More exploding skulls,
perhaps. Beset by the Bloodbound horde, the Stormcasts
didn’t notice them, or didn’t care.
Agashon thrust her spike-headed hammer into a
screamer’s chest. Lightning burst from her weapon,
illumining the incandescent red cavern of the man’s ribcage
as it broiled his heart and lungs. Steam heaved from the
dying man’s mouth like the last sigh of his soul escaping,
and Agashon cast the wreck of his body into the storm.
She turned immediately to the next warrior, and so didn’t
see the scuttling ones converge on the broken thing she’d
tossed aside. Not exploding skulls, then. Lifting a gauntleted
forearm to shield himself from the battering wind, Etanios
bulled across the battlefield to intercept them.
He didn’t reach them in time. One of the scuttlers tipped
the dying man’s face up, and another crammed its glowing
burden into the ruined warrior’s mouth. A veil of windblown
cinders obscured them momentarily, then swirled away
again. When it cleared, Etanios saw a vile, purplish-red glow
sliding down the man’s throat.
The broken man hissed, soft and low and far too long for
any mortal lungs to sustain, much less lungs that had been
charred by Sigmar’s lightning. He sat up in a quick, inhuman
jerk of movement, and his hands snapped out to seize the
throats of the two scuttlers who had revived him. The bones
of his fingertips burst out into grisly claws, tearing out their
throats, and the broken man hooted a gleeful, mindless
laugh. Some glowing object, the same colour as the one
he’d already swallowed, tumbled from one of his victims’
lifeless fingers. He pounced upon it and stuffed it down his
throat with both hands.
Then Etanios was on him. Up close, he saw a horrible
fractal light spinning in the pits of the broken man’s burned-
out eyes and emanating from his throat. It spilled from his
ruptured ribcage and flooded from the bone claws that
thrust out of the ragged ends of his fingers. Perverse shapes
and eye-searing sigils formed and collapsed in that ugly
purple light, some of them traced in radiance, others pulled
from the fibres and sinews of the screamer’s body, all of
them endlessly consumed and reborn by the glow that had
seized him from within.
 ‘Tzeentch,’ Etanios hissed. Was this what the Lord-Aquilor
had feared? That the servants of one Ruinous Power, delving
into Redhollow Ruin, would unlock the forces of another?
‘No,’ the broken man whispered, but the word he said was
crowded by a thousand others that the glow in his throat
emitted as echoes: yes and fools and mine mine mine. ‘No.
Blood for the Blood God. Skulls for Khorne.’ He lunged at
Etanios, bony claws outstretched, and the glow in his chest
whispered: blood to ichor, skulls to looking-glasses, and
what Khorne takes will take him too, the fool the fool the
fool.
Etanios swung. His hammer pulverised the broken man’s
hands, burst apart his spell-rotted forearms. Fragments of
bone and purple light scattered into the cinder-black wind.
But rather than falling inert to the ground, they knitted
themselves into a nightmare constellation of gristle and
broken fingerbones, a hollow structure that billowed like a
wind-filled sail in the storm. This hideous apparition threw
itself at Etanios, clattering against his armour and digging
furiously to reach any exposed skin or flesh it could.
It will transform me too. He slapped at the skittering filth,
trying to keep its poisoned splinters away. The broken man
cackled and lunged again, thrusting the jagged stumps of
his arms out at Etanios like spears.
Inches before he would have hit Etanios, the shadows
seized him. A gossamer net of cinders and darkness covered
the broken man and crushed him small, holding him bound
in its depths. One of the aelves – a male, a warlock, Etanios
remembered dimly – gestured, and the shadows knotted
tighter, while inside the corrupted thing thrashed.
‘Crush it,’ the warlock spat, and Etanios did. He
hammered the shadow-bound ball again and again, until the
thing inside it stopped moving, and the male aelf released
his spell.
A lump of macerated flesh fell out, unidentifiable as
anything that had ever been human. It was dead, finally,
and the ash storm buried it swiftly.
But it hadn’t been the only one. Other warplings dotted
the field, appearing and disappearing with the vagaries of
the storm. Blue lightning suddenly spiked from the earth to
the sky: one of the Stormcast Eternals, slain.
‘Do you suppose the reforging will purify out the
Changer’s taint?’ the warlock asked, almost meditatively, as
he turned his white face towards the lanced sky. There were
black runes scarred on his face. They made him look almost
as sinister as the Bloodbound themselves. ‘Or will it merely
spread Tzeentch’s poison across the anvil so that it stains all
the souls that follow?’
‘Sigmar’s might must prevail,’ Etanios answered grimly.
Nothing else was imaginable.
‘Ah. Yes. I forgot who I was asking.’ The warlock smiled
mirthlessly. ‘Perhaps we should go and make sure of that,
then.’
They did. Again and again, the warlock wrapped the
tainted Bloodbound in nets of shadow, and Etanios crushed
them. He glimpsed other teams doing the same: another
warlock paired with Agashon Storm-Crowned, and Thaelire
with a Stormcast Eternal he couldn’t identify through the
sweeping ash. Around them, witch-aelves and Bloodbound
spun in dances of mutual slaughter. The Lord-Aquilor
wrestled a quill-cat, hugging the beast’s back against his
armour while he punched a gauntleted fist into its side,
again and again, splintering its ghastly ribs apart until he
could reach and rip out its heart.
Then Graelakh Gore-Gorger came back into view, coated
head to toe in blood-damp ashes, and Etanios glimpsed a
depth of bleakness that he could never have conceived of
existing.
Graelakh had been defeated. No – destroyed. Utterly. Not
by the Daughters of Khaine, nor even by the Stormcast
Eternals, but by what he himself had wrought and witnessed
in the cursed halls of Redhollow Ruin.
 In Graelakh’s face, in his haunted eyes and the slope of
his shoulders and the defiant, hateful fury that hunched his
skin-cloaked back, Etanios saw the defeat of the fanatic who
has seen his god’s power defied, of the Bloodbound
berserker who sacrificed his fellows’ strength to sorcery, of
brute rage spun round by deceit. In that moment, Graelakh
suffered every agony of the accidental traitor, and Etanios
almost pitied him.
Almost. The warlord was still Bloodbound, and though he
was defeated, Graelakh had not given up. His despair was
absolute, but he would never surrender. To his last breath,
Khorne’s champion would destroy all he could, and take
every possible soul to damnation with him.
‘So,’ Thaelire called across the smoke-swept field, ‘you
begin to comprehend your failure.’
Cinders eddied about the aelf’s shadowsilk cloak and
rattled against the armour of the Stormcast Eternal beside
her. Now Etanios could see the Stormcast’s white-enamelled
sigmarite well enough to recognise its wearer as Valancar, a
gaunt-cheeked giant originally from somewhere in the high
mountains of Ghyran.
Graelakh snarled at the witch-aelf and stepped away from
the Daughter he’d just torn apart. Blood dripped from the
Goregorge Claw as he straightened. ‘My enemies are dead
before me. I have not failed.’
‘Are they?’ Thaelire made a show of looking around. Not
much was visible through the blowing ash, in truth, but most
of what Etanios could see nearby were the corpses of
Tzeentch-warped Bloodbound. ‘I see many dead, but few of
ours. But – oh. You didn’t say they were ours. You said they
were enemies. Which, I suppose, is true. Even if they did
begin as your people.’
‘Die, witch,’ Graelakh spat. He flexed the Goregorge Claw
and stalked towards his adversaries. Halfway there,
Graelakh tore the skull from his gore-matted torc and hurled
it at Thaelire and Valancar. The Stormcast Eternal blocked it
effortlessly with his shield, and it bounced to the ground at
their feet.
Perhaps they thought Graelakh had only thrown it out of
contempt. The skull had come from the Kharumathi’s
previous leader, Etanios had heard.
But it wasn’t merely a taunt. Fire pulsed in the skull’s
empty braincase, intensifying rapidly. It looked just like the
ones Etanios had seen explode before.
He ran forward. Kicking the skull away would only
detonate it – he’d seen what happened when the Daughters
of Khaine tried that earlier – so, instead, Etanios grabbed an
astonished Thaelire by the shoulders. Spinning to put his
own bulk between her and the skull, he hurled the sorceress
away.
‘Bomb!’ he shouted to Valancar.
The other Stormcast raised his shield and turned to follow,
but the skull exploded before he could. The blast engulfed
Valancar and knocked Etanios forward. Lightning crackled
behind him and flashed to the heavens: Valancar, returning
to Sigmar’s anvils to be reforged.
Etanios rolled over, spitting out rocks and cinders. He felt
his limbs hastily. Nothing broken, nothing maimed. Maybe
he’d chipped a tooth hitting the rocks when he fell. Hard to
tell now. He wondered, briefly and absurdly, whether his
tooth would stay chipped if he died and was reforged, or
whether he’d wake in the halls of Azyr to find the tooth
repaired.
He looked up. Thaelire hurried towards him, unscathed.
She was lugging his hammer awkwardly, using both hands.
‘I presume you’ll want this. I don’t. It’s abominably heavy.’
Nodding dazedly, Etanios took back his hammer. He stood,
trying to regain his bearings. Graelakh was battling another
Stormcast Eternal, and to Etanios’ surprise, was more than
holding his own.
No human could stand toe-to-toe against one of Sigmar’s
chosen, yet somehow the bedraggled man was doing
exactly that. The Goregorge Claw flashed on his hand, red
as iron, red as blood. Moving of its own accord, the Claw
blocked the Stormcast’s swings with swift, loud clangs and
lashed out with vicious blows in return. Bright scars opened
on the Stormcast’s armour where the Claw gouged through
enamel and even sigmarite itself.
‘You could have let me die,’ Thaelire murmured beside
him. Shadows gathered around her, filling the folds of her
cloak as she began another spell. ‘You should have. Death is
the only way to break our enslavement, Stormcast. Haven’t
you seen that by now? All our gods are gods of war, and
they bring us all to ruin. Only in dying can you finally escape
their game.’
Etanios didn’t know what to say to that. He didn’t have
time to answer, anyway. Graelakh had won his contest. The
Bloodbound warlord tore off the Stormcast Eternal’s
loosened gorget and plunged the Goregorge Claw into the
immortal’s unprotected neck, tearing out his throat and
sending another blast of lightning to the sky.
Then a noose of shadow interwoven with cold, dead blood
shot out of the air to grapple Graelakh’s wrist. As the
warlord strained against the shadows’ unnaturally solid grip,
the blood seeped out of the magical shackle and into the
joints of the Goregorge Claw. A sheen of blood, old and new,
built between Graelakh’s skin and the Claw, separating it
from his body.
‘No,’ Graelakh protested. His eyes widened, and a mixture
of disbelief and abject pleading – and then, a split second
later, hatred that he’d been made to plead – filled his voice.
‘No.’
But the spell didn’t stop. The Claw wrenched upwards.
One of Graelakh’s fingers cracked audibly in its metal claws
as he failed to straighten them swiftly enough. The
Goregorge Claw heaved again, cracking another bone, and
then toppled off Graelakh’s hand and to the ground. A
ghostly, hollow fist of blood showed briefly inside the
gauntlet, then collapsed into shapeless liquid and trickled
away.
‘No!’ Graelakh dived for the fallen Claw.
A thrown sciansá found him first. The ritual blade
skewered Graelakh’s wrist, pinning him to the earth. As he
grabbed at the weapon’s handle, trying to free himself, a
second Daughter of Khaine approached him. This one was
taller and more muscular than Thaelire, and garbed in light,
scant armour rather than flowing shadowsilk.
She stooped, planted a booted foot on Graelakh’s back,
and wrenched his head up painfully by his hair. ‘In the name
of High Oracle Morathi and our great god Khaine, I take your
blasphemous life. The Goregorge Claw is ours, defiler.’
The aelf jerked her sciansá out of the ground and slashed
it across Graelakh’s throat. She held the warlord’s head up
until the crimson arcs of his lifeblood failed. As the spurts
slowed to trickles, she dropped his face into the wet ashes.
Then, with an air of relief as much as victory, she picked up
the Goregorge Claw.
From there, the fighting came swiftly to a close. The
Bloodbound didn’t retreat – Khorne’s sworn fanatics never
did – but they fought with suicidal fervour, all but throwing
themselves onto the Khainites’ weapons in disorganised,
self-destructive charges. The warplings had already mostly
been subdued, and it didn’t take long to destroy the last
few.
Yet, curiously, it was in those last few minutes that both of
the warlocks died. Etanios didn’t see either of them fall, but
he saw the bodies as the storm finally began to calm, and
he wondered at their carelessness when victory loomed so
near. Why now?
Perhaps it was only bad luck. The fates could be perverse
in war.
Othoros took off his helm and surveyed the field when it
was over. ‘Closer than it should have been. We lost three
Stormcast Eternals today.’
 ‘What were those… warplings?’ Etanios asked. He nudged
one of the corpses, now little more than a pile of cinder-
cloaked pulp, with the toe of his boot. ‘Was that what you
feared might lie within Redhollow Ruin?’
‘That was one of my fears, yes,’ Othoros admitted. ‘I
expect those were the work of falsity mirrors. The witch-
aelves’ memories suggested that some of those artefacts
might be found in the upper halls. They are creations of the
Changer of Ways – crystals that reflect lies about what the
future might hold, and offer deceptive visions of the
transformations they might provide. You will have noted, I’m
sure, that all the warped Bloodbound had claws of one kind
or another. I presume Graelakh believed he could amplify
Khorne’s blessing in his followers, and give them all a
semblance of the Goregorge Claw’s power, by using the
falsity mirrors.’
‘Just as they tried to use Nagash’s artefacts outside,’
Etanios said, eyeing the corpseclaws. Even stripped of their
impaled bodies, they were obscene things, pale and
monstrously alien to this land.
‘Yes. Or, at least, that would be my guess.’ Othoros
shrugged. ‘But the falsity mirrors, though terrible, are only a
fragment of what we believe Redhollow Ruin might hold. It is
not a place that can be left standing, and it is not a place
easily destroyed. That is why we were sent to watch over it,
and no more.
‘Though, after this, the lords of the Stormhost may wish to
revisit their calculations. If a single Bloodbound warlord and
his ragged human host could successfully unlock several of
Redhollow’s secrets, and kill three Stormcast Eternals in a
single battle, it may be time to take Redhollow Ruin more
seriously. Still, this need not be our concern today.’ He
paused as the witch-aelf who’d killed Graelakh approached.
‘My lady.’
‘I am Nepenora,’ the aelf said. She inclined her head
politely, but there was nothing subservient about the
gesture, and nothing warm in her manner. ‘We thank you for
your aid, and congratulate you on our shared victory.’
‘You are most welcome,’ the Lord-Aquilor said solemnly.
He looked to the fortress. ‘Will you require anything else
from us here? If not, I believe the terms of our agreement
have been met.’
‘They have. We thank you again.’ Nepenora nodded to
Etanios, as well, and left. She was still holding the
Goregorge Claw. Gingerly, but firmly, as though it were a
slippery and dangerous beast that might try to bite her and
escape.
Othoros seemed to approve of her caution with the
artefact. He watched the aelf go with a touch of
bemusement. ‘Strange allies, the Daughters of Khaine. I feel
I know even less of them after this.’
‘Will we stay?’ Etanios asked. ‘To investigate the fortress,’
he added hastily, though that wasn’t really why he had
asked.
The Lord-Aquilor shook his head. ‘We return to Azyr. As I
said, our report may be what finally compels the lords of the
Stormhost to take more serious action in Redhollow Ruin. At
the least, they’ll certainly want to know what happened
today.’
‘Of course.’ Etanios bowed in acquiescence. Yet as he fell
in behind Othoros, following the Lord-Aquilor from the field,
he stole a glance backwards.
He wondered whether he’d see the Kharumathi again.
Aelves were long-lived, and the Stormcasts immortal, but
the Daughters of Khaine pursued a violent path, and the
Mortal Realms were very large. The chances, he thought,
were not good.
He wondered, too, whether he would remember Thaelire if
he did see her again. Reforging stripped memories, as every
Stormcast knew all too well, and it was possible that if
Etanios died and was remade on Sigmar’s anvils, he might
not recognise the aelf even if their paths did cross.
 That, Etanios feared, would be far worse than simply
never seeing her. Forgetting was a crueller loss than
absence.
But it was out of his hands. It was all out of his hands.
Sigmar called, and he served.
He was a Stormcast Eternal. This was all that was left to
him.
Myrcalene did not show herself until the Stormcasts were
long gone. Then, and only then, did the melusai let her
veiling illusion fall.
Nepenora fell to a knee immediately, as did the rest of the
Kharumathi on the field. Not that there were many left to
grant obeisance. Those who were too wounded to kneel had
been dispatched, since their warlocks were dead and
Thaelire’s magic had been exhausted in the fight, and there
was no other way to heal those so gravely injured. Seeing
their ranks so badly thinned filled Nepenora with a curious
kind of sorrow: the grief of seeing a dreaded but expected
fate confirmed, and of knowing that she dared not voice the
foremost thought in her mind.
This wasn’t worth the cost.
She could not say that. She couldn’t even mourn her
fallen warriors, for mourning implied that she regretted their
deaths, rather than accepting them as welcome sacrifices to
Khaine’s glory. So Nepenora remained silent, and lifted the
Goregorge Claw above her bowed head with both hands as
she knelt and awaited Morathi’s handmaiden.
‘We have fulfilled the High Oracle’s charge,’ Nepenora
said. She kept her head low, but pitched her voice so that it
filled the hushed field of the dead. Whatever happened
next, she wanted the surviving Kharumathi to know their
triumph. They had done all that was asked, and more. ‘We
defeated Graelakh Gore-Gorger. We seized the Goregorge
Claw. The shard of Khaine is ours.’
 ‘You have served well,’ Myrcalene agreed, her voice
carrying to match Nepenora’s. She took the Goregorge Claw
in both hands and held it high, signalling to the Daughters
of Khaine that they could lift their heads to behold their
trophy. ‘You fought bravely and with skill, and honoured
Khaine with your piety. The field is washed in our enemies’
blood, and the High Oracle is pleased. The Kharumathi have
proved their worth, and will be rewarded.’
Such praise should have filled Nepenora with elation, and
yet she felt little more than creeping dread. There was
something else coming, she was certain. Some other
demand. If there was anything she had learned during this
shard-quest, it was that Morathi and her servants were
never satisfied.
Even so, she couldn’t deny the thrill that swept through
her when Myrcalene said, ‘In your new age of glory, you will
need a new leader. One who is clever and courageous, loyal
and resourceful. Worthy of the Kharumathi. The High Oracle
believes that Nepenora is such a leader, and has named her
as your new hag queen.’
A murmuring swept through the surviving Kharumathi. Not
of their voices – it would have been unforgivable to utter a
word while the High Oracle’s handmaiden was speaking –
but the creak of leather-bound armour and the crunch of
cinders under shifting weight as the witch-aelves turned to
regard Nepenora.
She had their loyalty. Nepenora felt that as surely as if
they’d all shouted their acclaim, and it warmed her
profoundly. The Kharumathi wanted no other leader. Would
accept no other. They were hers, and she was theirs, with a
fierceness forged in battle.
‘But there is one among you who is disloyal,’ Myrcalene
continued, ‘and this, our faith cannot forgive. Therefore High
Oracle Morathi has decreed that the first act of your new
hag queen must be to impose sentence against this
apostate soul, and offer her blood as sacrament and
sacrifice to Khaine. In this way, the purity of the Kharumathi
will be assured, and your sect will seal its place in the High
Oracle’s favour.’
Nepenora froze. She knew exactly who this had to be.
Even so, her heart sank at the sight of Thaelire approaching.
The sorceress had her hood down, her dark-dyed hair
blowing freely in Aqshy’s heated breeze. Against the
immensity of the battlefield, with the smoking hills behind
her and the bare white corpseclaws reaching high overhead,
she was an impossibly tiny figure, yet somehow she
commanded the eye. Unchained and unescorted by any
other Kharumathi, Thaelire appeared to move towards death
of her own free will.
Or perhaps that was only what Nepenora wanted to
believe. She had sacrificed countless victims to Khaine’s
cauldron, but none of them had ever been a friend. Those
sworn to the Lord of Murder didn’t have friends.
But she’d had one.
Shakily, Nepenora walked to the cauldron. She kept her
head high and her back straight, as though she, and not
Thaelire, were the one condemned.
Perhaps I am.
They met at the side of the cauldron. There was no one
nearby. The wind had picked up, scouring the great bowl
with rattling cinders and ensuring that none could hear
them.
Thaelire touched the rim with a fingertip, faintly amused,
though Nepenora could see the apprehension that gripped
the sorceress beneath her nonchalant veneer.
‘You did always warn me that I’d find myself here. Are you
gratified to be right?’
‘No. Not like this.’ Nepenora steeled herself. She dared not
voice anything as damning as regret, not this close to the
sacred cauldron. Who knew what the High Oracle, or Khaine
himself, might hear through the vessel? But she hoped that
her feelings might be clear enough in her tone. She thought
they were. The Daughters of Khaine were well versed in
hearing what could not be said.
‘No? You should be.’ Now it was Thaelire’s turn to pause.
There was a slight softening at the corners of the sorceress’
eyes, and her lips pursed minutely, as if there was
something that she, too, struggled not to say.
In the end she only shrugged, gathered up her hair, and
pinned it into a loose knot at the nape of her neck.
‘Lead the Kharumathi well. They’ll need it. If you need
allies you can trust, in the future – and probably you will, I
think – look outside our faith.’
‘The Stormcast Eternals?’
That small, private smile touched Thaelire’s lips again.
‘They do have the rare and remarkable virtue of
predictability. That, and they’ll always want things, because
their war will never end. So yes. The Stormcast Eternals.’
‘It would be easier to secure their aid with you,’ Nepenora
said. It had never been the Daughters’ fighting strength that
interested the Stormcasts; it had been their magic. Which
would be greatly weakened, with Thaelire and her warlocks
gone.
‘Everything would be easier with me. But the High Oracle,
in her wisdom, no longer believes that outweighs the trouble
of my impiety. And, to be quite candid, neither do I. So. Are
you ready?’ Thaelire’s amusement had vanished. Her eyes
were dark and very intent. That tension was in her again,
thrumming just beneath the surface. Not fear of death,
Nepenora thought, but… something else. Something she
had no name for.
‘Yes,’ she managed to say. The sciansá in her hand felt
unreal. Like a dream. All of this felt like a dream. Even the
black grit stinging against her skin felt numbed, as if it
struck her through some shielding patina of unreality.
‘Then do it.’ Thaelire knelt smoothly and bent her neck
over the cauldron.
 And Nepenora, still marvelling at the strangeness of this
dream, in which she’d won everything she wanted and lost
everything she’d valued, brought her blade down.
To victory, and woe.
A SNAKE SHEDS ITS SKIN
JAMİE CRİSALLİ
Vahis stalked across the grey plains of Zoshia, swinging the
fanged head of a vampire by the hair. She moved with all
the grace afforded her kind, honed over the centuries until
she no longer walked but danced. Every motion was precise,
languid and boneless. Her black hair, an unusual trait
passed down from her grandmother, the great matriarch
Fernash, flowed like ink down her back. The only hint of
anticipation was the knife-edge grin that split her pale face.
In her other hand she carried a sciansá, the ritual blade of
the Daughters of Khaine. Heavier and straighter than the
usual curved razor preferred by other sects, it was ideal for
puncturing armour or removing heads in one stroke. The
Draichi Ganeth regarded hearts and other organs as
belonging to Khaine, but took heads as trophies so that
others might see the measure of their foes. What better way
to show their strength and skill?
Behind her, the great cauldron of the Temple of Thraik,
Seb’ahn, seethed in the dull grey that was Ulgu’s day. The
ruddy glow of the simmering blood lit up the icon of Khaine
that stood over the great bowl. The icon loomed over all,
arms outstretched, a heart in one hand, a sword in the
other. As she watched it, Vahis swore she saw the great
statue take a great luxurious breath as if savouring the
vapours coming off the steaming blood.
Despite her closeness to the cauldron, the cool air seemed
to suck the warmth from her. An ache started in her hip as
she marched in time with her sisters. She shifted a little to
stop the pain, adjusting her step.
 A breathless horn blew, shrill and thin like a dying drevar.
All around the sisters shivered with anticipation and their
laughter rose with manic bloodlust. Their enemy was nearly
in sight.
The Temple of Thraik was on the move, marching at a
stately pace through the ruins of the Zoshia planes. Cool
and calm, the enchanted drums attached to the cauldron
beat like a heart at rest. The sisters advanced in neat ranks,
ready for the frontal assault for which they were famed.
While other covens might scoff at such straightforward
tactics, the Draichi Ganeth knew themselves to be superior,
their skills in battle unmatched by all others. Let the
cowards of the Khailebron skulk in shadow and the brutal
Kraith use venoms like that of Nagendra to make up for their
sloppy technique. When their tricks failed, Khaine saw their
weakness and ensured their deaths.
All around Vahis, the waving grasses of the Zoshia plains
and their endless ruins stretched to the horizon. Vahis had
heard many legends about this place, each more ridiculous
than the last. Some said the ruins moved of their own will,
or flickered out of existence to reappear elsewhere, or even
that shadow daemons haunted them from end to end. The
reality was they simply existed, a city that had died quietly,
emptying without a whimper when Chaos had come.
‘Vahis!’ Lilithan shouted from near the rim of the Seb’ahn.
Lilithan, their hag queen. She was the strongest among
them. Her black robes flapped in the crimson steam, her
dusky skin shimmering with blood droplets. Her white hair
dripped with blood. While Vahis was the better combatant,
Lilithan had the patience and skill of a politician and
tactician as well. As much as Vahis hated it, Lilithan was a
greater leader than she could ever be. And it showed.
‘Take the position of Oserka,’ Lilithan said. ‘I want this
beast to know that we fight with honour and that she was
defeated by our might and fury. Not by deceit. The creature
will have no excuses for her defeat.’
 The position of Oserka was the one who delivered the
ritual challenges before battle commenced. Vahis smiled.
Lilithan still wants me happy and content. You do not keep
your throne. I allow you to keep it. For as long as Vahis could
remember, their relationship had been based on a tense
balance of power, a stalemate between equals.
‘Of course,’ Vahis said. ‘It will be done, my queen.’
Lilithan shut her eyes and began to pray as the cauldron
rumbled on. Above her, the icon of Khaine shifted moodily,
his brow furrowing.
Vahis shot off into the grey day as her sisters quickened
their pace. Once again, the old fire burst through her. The
eye of Khaine was on her, and unlike some, she knew she
had earned such scrutiny and that she was worthy of his
attention.
‘To me, my sisters,’ she shouted. ‘It is time to defeat the
foe. It is time for slaughter!’
She keened a war cry, the high sound bursting through
the silence of Ulgu. Khinerai circled above, adding their
voices to the ritual. The Sisters of Slaughter howled, their
masks twisting in the gloom. Soon, the dark skies were filled
with their terrible cries.
Off in the distance, the invaders who thought that they
were the masters of fog and shadow tramped onward.
Skeletons clattered in step, while long-dead knights on
rotting destriers trotted behind, their armour creaking and
clanking. Even the grotesque varghulfs kept in tight packs,
loping along with the rest of the force. All walked with a
parade ground formality, advancing in an unsubtle rumble.
At the head of this force was a figure in dark red armour,
glistening like arterial spray, seated upon a dead horse with
bloody eyes. Her skin was dusky grey, her white curls
heaped atop her head and bound with precious jewels.
Fangs glistened behind her dead lips. She pulled on her
horse’s reins as the cries of the aelves reached her.
 As the two armies grew closer, the drums of the cauldron
quickened. The sound reached out to the vampires, the
skeletons, the spirits, promising a death that had long been
denied to them. One that would be delivered swiftly and
without mercy.
‘Hold!’ the vampire roared, her clenched fist rising up.
Where most armies might have muttered with disquiet,
the undead ranks simply stopped. Not a breath stirred
among them, not a batting eyelid, not even the flinch of a
reflex. Devoid of the rattle of thousands of bones, silence
crashed in like the void between worlds – save for the drums
and the keening of the sisters.
‘Who challenges Nadiya Layir, warrior of the court of
Queen Neferata?’ Nadiya bellowed, kicking her undead
destrier forward. About her, Blood Knights milled, their red
eyes trying to pierce the gloom that hemmed in all around
them. The ruins hunkered in closer, the daytime shadows
concealing the flitting shapes of the doomfire warlocks as
they rushed down the flanks, readying their spiteful magic
and slicing blades to pick off any stragglers.
Vahis slowed to a walk. She watched the vampire lord as
she shouted threats. Her keen aelven ears picked up the
strain in the vampire’s voice, the shrillness of a beast under
stress. Vahis snorted at the weakness that the creature hid
so badly under layers of arrogance and bloodlust.
There was a way that these things were done. Formalities
to be observed, rituals to be performed. With a roar, the
cauldron swirled into a rolling boil, crimson mist heaving
into the air. The icon shifted, Khaine’s screaming face
grimacing, fists tightening. The drums quickened to a
rousing thunder. A high wail shrieked overhead as the
khinerai marked their targets. Vahis shivered with
anticipation. Time to do her duty.
‘Nadiya, sycophant to the blood thief Neferata,’ Vahis
said, lifting the head so that all could see it. ‘You have
insulted the Oracle of Khaine, the Voice of Iron. There are
none that match Morathi in skill or beauty. Certainly not the
lifeless Neferata. Further, you have invaded shadows that
reject you and all your parasitic kind. For that, you will be
destroyed. Khaine has called for your soul, and we shall give
it to him.’
The drums beat louder and the mists of the cauldron
thickened. Filled with the blood of young vampires and
necromancers, the Seb’ahn simmered. Lilithan’s voice
carried as she wove the enchantments about the icon of
Khaine, stirring the great icon with a small portion of the
god’s murderous impulses.
As one, the other vampires lifted their heads, scenting the
thick ambrosia.
Vahis grinned and jiggled the head. ‘By the way, is this
someone you knew well?’
Nadiya’s eyes nearly bulged from her skull as she
recognised the head. A convulsive twitch shuddered through
the vampire, then she gagged with appetite. The mists from
the cauldron were all about her, beading on every surface
like oil.
‘You wretched aelf,’ Nadiya shouted. ‘How dare you come
into my presence bearing that. How dare you!’
Vahis laughed shrilly, turning the head so that she could
look into its face. ‘You bloodsick creatures are all the same,’
she shouted, turning back to Nadiya. ‘You think that you are
the greatest, the most wicked, the most lethal, but turn
craven the moment you meet your equal in battle.’ She
flung the head away. ‘You disgust me. Your death will be a
wonderful display for Khaine. Just as this beast’s was.’
The dead held back, sensing the obvious trap.
Unfortunately for them, they had stepped into it hours ago.
They just needed to make the last mistake, the final plunge
to their doom.
‘Charge me, wretched creature!’ Vahis screamed, ripping
her other sciansá from its sheath. ‘Do you not desire what
flows in my veins, beast? Have the years turned you
craven? Do you not want revenge?’
Khaine’s voice rose from a whisper to a thundering
demand, ringing in her skull. Like a bolt of lightning, his
blessing crackled over her skin. Manic bloodlust glittered in
her dark eyes. At her age, it was rare that a foe might
match her. Just the chance to shake free from her ennui was
a thrill. Still, she reined herself in. Precision and discipline
was what won battles. The killing blow was all that
mattered.
Nadiya drew away then, as if realising that a superior
predator had her in sight. She backed her horse up, never
taking her eyes off Vahis for a second. Several of Vahis’
other sisters snickered, the sound rippling through the
anticipation of battle.
‘What are you laughing about?’ a hoarse voice said.
Vahis glanced to her right and rolled her eyes.
Sareth, Vahis’ rival by Sareth’s own estimation. A tall and
bulky woman, Sareth moved with less grace and lightness
than most Daughters. Her thin white mane floated about her
head, made dull by grave dust. Wherever she walked, she
stomped, her face set in a sneer as if she always smelled
something foul.
‘Little sister?’ Vahis said, as lightly as possible.
‘Yes?’ Sareth said through clenched teeth, fixing her with a
glare.
‘Hold your tongue,’ Vahis said, her tone as cutting as a
garrotte.
Sareth’s gaze veritably burned on her skin. Vahis turned
back to her quarry as her sisters sang and joked. As sour as
ever, Sareth swore and stewed.
As if sensing the dissension within the witch-aelves’ ranks,
Nadiya seized on the moment and charged. ‘Kill that witch!’
she bellowed.
Vahis shrieked and bolted in to attack as the skeletal
masses rushed forward in a great rattle. Behind her, the
Daughters of Khaine hurled themselves forward into the
bloodless forest of skeletal footmen and fleshless ghosts,
rapid as sicklecats on the hunt. Around the flanks, another
two forces knifed in even as khinerai swooped down,
skewering their victims at will.
Yet, killing the dead was less than thrilling. Worse than
human soldiery, these wretches provided no worship.
Without life, without blood, they were mere kindling. The
ghosts fell all the same, Khaine’s wrath not sparing those
without flesh any more than he spared any other being.
Vahis slashed into them, blades flickering with lethal
speed. The skeletons may as well have been standing still
as she cut through them. Clumsily, they swiped where she
had been, rusty spears whooshing through air. Arms, legs
and skulls scattered to the ground all about her as her
sciansá flashed and whirled. Crack went the bones, in
terrible rhythm.
It was music of a kind that Vahis took much delight in. She
made a show of killing as if she were in a gladiatorial ring,
practising her faith with utmost skill. However, with no blood
to spill, there was no point aside from her own enjoyment. It
was a little sacrilegious, this selfish and hollow killing, but
her true faith would come when she faced the beast that
cowered behind the skeletal ranks.
Ahead, Nadiya’s bellowing voice echoed above the din,
exhorting the dead to fight. Did the creature not know that
she was delaying the inevitable?
Despite the speed with which Vahis dispatched her foes,
Nadiya moved further away, her jewellery clinking against
the barding of her horse. With frustrating ease, the vampire
drew away into the horde. More skeletons piled in to block
Vahis’ path until all the world seemed filled with their
rattling mass. It was as if Vahis were trying to empty the sea
with a bucket. Cut one down and another shambled into its
place. Boredom set in, a yawning frustration that would not
be satisfied until there was blood. Khaine’s voice rumbled
with discontent.
The earth quivered under her feet as Vahis scattered
another skeleton. Then the dead ranks parted and Vahis
stumbled into emptiness, like stepping into cold mountain
air. A wall of undead horseflesh, blood red armour and
jagged spears rolled towards her like a tidal wave. Blood
Knights, the best that the undead had to offer.
Vahis chided herself as she crouched down before their
onslaught. She should have known. The vampire had used
herself as bait. Perhaps she was not a complete idiot. Too
bad the beast was not fighting humans or Stormbloods but a
Daughter of Khaine. These creatures would not stop Vahis,
nor keep her from claiming her prize. She laughed as the
knights bore down on her.
The Blood Knights bellowed and a trumpet blew shrilly,
their banners snapping. Silvery grass churned under hooves
as large as plates as the wall of force pounded forward. A
stray skeleton burst asunder when it stumbled into their
path. Lance tips glinted in the dim light as they lowered.
Vahis darted forward and leaped up with all the power in
her body. Rapture rushed through her as she hurtled
through the air. At last, opponents that were worthy of
Khaine.
It all happened with delicious slowness.
The lead vampire’s eyes widened, his head turning as he
flinched. His shield arm started to move back as he pulled at
the reins. A knee dug into the undead flank, desperate to
turn the heavy horse. The great lance lurched off target. He
was just fast enough to know what was happening but not
fast enough to stop it.
Vahis’ leap carried her over the lances, inside their guard,
to the same height as their fragile necks. She spun artfully,
her dark hair fanning, her meagre armour glinting. Her
blade lashed out as she whipped past the Blood Knight
officer. A spray of old blood flashed into existence. The
horse stumbled as its rider went slack, his lance falling to
the ground.
She landed in a crouch on the other side of the charge,
something hitting the ground beside her. Howling with
laughter, she sheathed one of her sciansá, snatched up the
helmeted head by its bat-winged crest and held it aloft. The
stump of the neck was smooth as glass, sheered through
with utmost perfection.
‘This is the fate of all of you!’ she shouted.
Such was the way of the Draichi Ganeth. To kill in one
strike was the ultimate goal, the closest to the perfection
that was Khaine. Let the Kraith roll around in gore and
Khailebron skulk in their shadows. The Draichi Ganeth had
always understood that killing in Khaine’s name was an act
not only of worship but of proselytising. Let the Mortal
Realms see the strength of Khaine in her every move.
The old scar snagged in her hip again as she turned. She
ignored it with a growl even as it ground with every step. It
was nothing that a rejuvenating bath could not cure.
Certainly nothing that she could not overcome. She had
seen worse in her long life, as her scars could attest.
The battle whirled around her as the Daughters ripped the
undead apart. The great icon vomited forth boiling blood,
burning away the skeletons into a greasy paste. Above, the
khinerai dived in and struck the Blood Knights from their
saddles, spearing their hearts as they did. The Sisters of
Slaughter tore into the varghulfs, slaughtering the beasts
like the animals they were. Through it all, the blood mist
seethed across the battlefield, blessing the Daughters as
they went about Khaine’s holy work.
Vahis caught a glimpse of Nadiya amidst a knot of
clattering skeletons. The vampire screamed some
incantation, a terrible unlight boiling from her, desperate to
summon new forces. At last, Vahis’ prey was in sight. It was
time to end this.
 ‘Come, Nadiya, are you not strong?’ Vahis shouted, raising
the knight’s head high. ‘Is this the best you have to offer?
Neither of your lieutenants have proved their worth in my
eyes.’
Nadiya glowered as she turned, the necromantic light
fading. Drawing forth a flanged mace from her belt, she
settled into her saddle. Her horse danced beneath her,
hissing like an asp.
‘Witch, Bertrand had lived for centuries,’ Nadiya growled.
‘As had Krishof.’
‘Clearly not sufficiently long enough to match my skill,’
Vahis said, grinning like a mad woman.
Nadiya kicked her horse viciously into a charge, bellowing
in fury. Vahis laughed, flung the head away and darted
forward. Quick as a cracking whip, she ducked to the side as
the flanged mace swooped past her head. The mass of
horse flesh thundered by like a storm.
With a casual flick of her wrist, Vahis hewed off the horse’s
back leg at the knee, her blade sheering through bone and
muscle.
Horse and rider stumbled and crashed into the tall
grasses, limbs flailing, metal barding grating over stone.
Howling, the vampire thrashed, pinned under the massive
animal.
Vahis walked towards her, drawing forth her parrying
sciansá once more. Suddenly, the thrashing body hurtled
towards her, screaming. Vahis ducked as Nadiya sailed over
her and smashed against a stone pillar. The vampire lurched
to her feet, cursing in some barbarous human tongue.
‘I will make you pay for Krishof and Bertrand both, crone,’
Nadiya said, striding forward.
A snarl flickered over Vahis’ face, ego twisting in her chest
at the insult. This wretched pretender to the glories of
Khaine knew nothing. A crone! What a vile creature.
‘Sikia Khaine mors!’ she roared, charging the beast.
 The two women danced around each other, blows flicking
in like lightning. Vahis darted about, probing for a weakness,
but the mace blocked her, and the vampire’s armour was
seemingly impenetrable. The clang of metal against metal
was constant, almost running together into a hum. Sparks
flew off the bloody armour but even the sciansá could not
pierce that metallic hide.
The vampire was unperturbed by Vahis’ blows, as if they
were nothing more than light rain. Her great mace arced in,
heavy and howling. However easy she was to dodge, Vahis
knew if the vampire hit her she would crush Vahis like a bird.
Nadiya swung her mace at her head. Vahis hooked the
weapon and hauled the vampire around with her
momentum. Nadiya stumbled as she tried to regain her
balance, her foot sliding out in the slick grass. With a shriek,
Vahis stomped down on the beast’s outstretched knee.
Sinew and cartilage gave way with a crunch. Screaming in
agony, the vampire dropped onto her hands and knees.
‘Now you perish!’ Vahis shrieked, slashing her sciansá at
the vampire’s neck.
Then Vahis’ right shoulder hitched, and lightning pain
arched down her back. The strike went wide, the sciansá
instead slicing the vampire’s jaw. With a crackle, the
vampire’s leg snapped back into perfect form and she
lunged to her feet.
Shock rolled through Vahis, her confidence evaporating.
Sweat prickled over her chilly skin. She never missed. She
had not since she was new to the sciansá. Something was
going dreadfully wrong. She was not herself.
‘Is that mortal fear that I sense?’ Nadiya said, chuckling
evilly.
The mace whistled up at Vahis’ face and pain burst
through her skull, her vision blurring red. The crest on her
head took the blow, crumpling like tin. The world lurched
and swayed as she spun around. Her mouth filled with
metal. She tottered back as her strength leached away.
 This cannot be happening, she thought as her legs
crumpled.
Blackness flashed across her vision. Vahis opened her
eyes and felt cold grass under her. She lay prone, staring
through the silvery grasses. Where was her sciansá? There:
her striking blade lay just beyond her reach. She stretched
for it, clawing at the dirt.
A pair of red boots stepped into her field of vision and
kicked the blade away.
‘You still deny the truth?’ Nadiya grated above her. ‘You
are just another mortal playing at immortality. We are the
true masters of death. You are merely ephemera who will
come to Nagash’s embrace sooner rather than later.’
‘No,’ Vahis said, her muscles jerking. ‘Khaine has blessed
me. I–’
Nadiya raised her mace for the killing blow. Vahis closed
her eyes on the impossible finality of it all.
A pale shadow rushed in, shrieking Khaine’s name.
Sareth. Bitter Sareth.
Sareth slashed at the vampire’s throat as the mace
slammed down towards Vahis. Nadiya flinched back and her
mace swung wide, carving a trench into the dark soil. Dirt
scattered across Vahis’ face. Sareth hooked the vampire’s
weapon arm with a blade and pulled her off balance.
Cursing, the vampire stumbled a few steps, one arm
outstretched. Sareth reversed her stroke and slammed her
other blade through the chainmail covering her exposed
armpit.
The vampire choked, coughing up clotted blood.
So the aelf has skill after all, Vahis thought.
Vahis shambled to her feet and snatched up her lone
sciansá as the vampire kicked Sareth away from her like
vermin. The younger aelf spun away, choking, her sciansá
flying from her grasp.
‘I have been assailed by the best of you,’ Nadiya shouted,
whirling about. ‘I will not be beaten.’
 Vahis laughed. ‘You were beaten the moment you met
me.’ She scuttled in low like a hunting grot-spider and sank
a sciansá into the crook of the vampire’s elbow. Cartilage
cracked.
Bellowing like a wounded drevar, the vampire dropped her
mace, the weapon thudding on the earth. The sciansá
ground against bone as Vahis twisted the blade.
Sareth tore back into the fight, thrusting a sciansá at
Nadiya’s face, forcing the vampire to ignore the threat of
Vahis behind her. Again and again, the aelf slashed at the
vampire’s unprotected head. Nicks and cuts appeared over
the vampire’s face as she fought to protect her head with
her other arm.
Vahis straightened, grabbed hold of the vampire’s white
hair and hauled back. Shrieking, Nadiya snatched at her,
sharp metal fingers gouging Vahis’ skin. With her other
hand, Vahis stabbed the blade into the vampire’s neck and
it sank straight through.
The beast barely flinched. She clamped a fist onto Vahis’
neck and slammed her into Sareth, knocking the other aelf
away. Then the blood leech turned Vahis towards her, her
face locked into a grimace. Vahis choked, clawing at the
vice-like grip. She kicked the vampire in the side, landing a
solid blow. The creature stood as still as if she were made of
stone.
Her breath reeking of stale blood, the vampire pulled her
closer. ‘Do you think that you are strong?’ Nadiya hissed,
her voice gurgling around the blade in her neck. ‘Look at
you. Sunken cheeks, thin skin. Mortality eats at you. And
you would dare challenge me? I will swallow your soul.’
Animal panic raged through Vahis as her body cried out
for a breath. Her nails clawed at the vampire’s gauntlet, and
her legs twitched. Blood thundering in her veins, her mind
darted about like a trapped sicklecat, desperate for a way
out. She struggled to spit out some retort, some last bit of
spite.
 ‘Your blood is Khaine’s,’ she hissed.
With her last strength, Vahis snatched the sciansá piercing
the vampire’s neck and twisted it around. The blade tore
through cartilage and bone as the vampire choked, bloody
froth spewing from her mouth. Then the foul beast’s head
messily separated and the corpse crumpled, dragging Vahis
down with it.
‘My soul belongs to Khaine, wretch,’ she wheezed. ‘Not to
the bloated skeleton that holds you in thrall.’
She could not shake the feeling that this was what death
would feel like, a hand clenched around her throat, slowly
sinking to the cold earth. Vahis tore herself free from the still
twitching corpse. She coughed, her body shaking and
aching.
Sareth looked about her, her black eyes glittering. Her
thoughts remained veiled behind a narrow gaze. ‘It’s not like
you to struggle with your prey,’ she said, lifting the head to
examine it. ‘You’ve ruined the trophy.’ She smirked. ‘Not like
you at all. See you at the seral’heth. Wise one.’
The last words were spoken as a curse. Vahis glared at
her, resisting the urge to challenge her. Her entire body
ached.
Sareth dropped the grisly trophy and strolled away
without a backward glance. Something she would never
have done an hour ago. She never would have allowed even
the slightest impression of disrespect to slip past, for fear of
Vahis’ wrath.
‘I’ll deal with you later,’ Vahis muttered, staggering to her
feet with a groan. Yet, she could not summon the will to be
truly outraged at the insult. Instead, her anger turned
inward in a bout of self-recrimination.
Vahis owed the wretched woman her life, something she
neither wanted nor had needed until now. To owe that
whelp, of all people; it made her sick. For such a fool to
become a threat to her reputation seemingly overnight.
Anger boiled in her chest as she bent down and picked up
the head.
It was a messy kill, ragged and ugly. The work of the
clumsiest novice.
She looked at her fists. Blue veins puckered over her
bones, her knuckles prominent. Her skin hung loose over
her muscles, dry and covered with fine wrinkles. She
touched her hair, and found it brittle and dry.
She shook her head. She could overcome this, just as she
would end Sareth as a threat. All she needed was a
rejuvenating bath. That was all. Vahis smothered her pain,
stiffening as the others glanced at her before their eyes slid
away. She threw a cool facade over the roiling turmoil.
She tore open the vampire’s armour, and with great
precision, cut the beast’s heart from the body. The blood
was cold and thick as old mud, though that mattered not for
the krish’lar. Ever so carefully, she drew the sigils onto her
skin, calling down Khaine’s blessings. Yet there was no thrill,
there was no presence of him.
It was as if he had abandoned her.

Vahis carried the head and heart of Nadiya Layir back to the
Seb’ahn. Unlike previous battles, her sisters did not
approach her to congratulate her. Some started to, and then
shied away like shadow horses upon seeing the ugly head
and the bleak look on Vahis’ face. Others simply pinched
their lips tight, eyes wide, as if shocked she’d be seen with
such an ugly trophy. And then there was the small twittering
coterie that fluttered around Sareth, as the girl strutted
pompously, a smile mixing poorly with her permanent sneer.
The battlefield was quiet. Breezes rippled through the
grasses and whistled in the cracks of the ruins. Overhead,
sleek gazure and leathery skelkrin, scavenger birds,
wheeled slowly through the air, while speedy ashswallows
zipped through the clouds of gloomflies that swirled over
the grotesque corpses of the varghulfs and warhorses.
Briefly, Vahis considered retrieving the head of the
vampire Bertrand. But she knew that there was no saving
face, no matter how many heads she returned with. Not
from this.
This rite, the seral’heth or the display of foes, typically
took some time to organise. Many sisters lingered on the
battlefield, performing their own personal rites, daubing
sigils on their skin in the rite of the krish’lar, the sign of
victory. Others were injured and needed help reaching the
Seb’ahn to witness the rite. And then there were the Sisters
of Slaughter, who had their own customs to observe and
often took hours. Not that anyone was foolish enough to try
and rush them along.
Fortunately, most of the others were returning from the
battlefield with dry skulls. Such trophies were useful for the
personal esteem of lesser fighters but provided nothing for
the cauldron. Doubtless, the leathanam would be forced to
open their veins for the seral’heth. There was not enough
blood for the cauldron otherwise.
‘By Khaine’s sword, I hate fighting the undead,’ a voice
said next to her. ‘They barely seem worth it.’
‘Greetings, Avara,’ Vahis said, glancing at her.
Avara blanched and stiffened. The girl was new to the
temple, her crest still the small circlet denoting a novice to
their sect. Her brown eyes were large and set wide in her
face, giving her a look of constant surprise. Small and slim,
she barely came up to Vahis’ shoulder. In her right hand, she
carried a skull in a conical helm, a gift worthy of her station.
Still, the girl seemed ready to leap out of her skin.
‘All foes are worthy of our attention,’ Vahis said, thankful
the ugly head was on the other side of her body. ‘Even the
bloodless dead. After all, they thwart the truth of the realms.
It is the purpose of the weak to die or serve. Not to be
elevated with unnatural strength. Even the Stormking knows
this, even if his criteria for strength is suspect.’
‘Of course, sister,’ Avara said, bowing her head.
Vahis took a deep breath and looked away from her. She
could only hope that her sisters feared her in the same way
after this pitiable display. Shaking her head, she
reprimanded herself. She deserved to lose their esteem for
this, but she would gain it back.
The Daughters assembled in front of the cauldron where it
seethed still. As always after a battle, the icon of Khaine
seemed to waver on his feet through the smoke. It may
have been an illusion created by the heat, or the icon might
really have been drunk from the gallons of blood spilled in
his name. His Daughters cared not.
The chant began, praising Khaine for the opportunity to
take lives in his presence. Drums rolled over the plains as
the shrill voices of the Daughters joined the scavengers that
circled overhead in a terrible hymn of slaughter.
‘Vahis,’ Lilithan called, beckoning to her. ‘Come.’
Vahis started and took a deep breath.
Normally, she would have vaulted up one of the two
flights of stone stairs that wove around the Seb’ahn, eager
to share her prize, but not this time. The two guardians that
stood on the stairs looked at her and made subtle motions
with their heads for her to come up. Instead, she limped up,
failing to hide the pain in her bruised body. What a pitiful
figure I make, she thought, exhausted, pained, limping – an
old drevar fit only for slaughter. A murmur reached her ears
and she glanced down.
Sareth watched her, three perfect heads clutched in her
hand, a heart in the other. Next to her was Melaka,
whispering in her ear, her pale eyes alight with gossip.
Sareth was splattered in blood, her mane stiff with it. A cold
smile lit her face and she licked her teeth.
A promise, a threat. It was only a matter of time until
Sareth challenged her to a public duel, most likely to the
death.
Vahis looked away and climbed on, her head high, her jaw
clenched tight. She reached the upper platform where
Lilithan and the Seb’ahn waited. After a deep breath, she
muttered the ritual words and dropped the grey heart into
the cauldron. Then she held up the head by its hair. Lilithan
leaned forward and carefully examined the trophy. Then she
shook her head.
‘This is unworthy of you,’ she said softly, as if trying to
ease a blow. ‘I know what you are capable of and this is not
it. It is unworthy of your strength and Khaine knows this. I
cannot accept this trophy.’
Though Vahis had expected some disappointment, she
had never thought that she would be rejected outright. For
one enraged moment she thought of striking Lilithan, but
held back. The hag queen was right. Such a creature was
not beyond her capability. Perfection had eluded her.
A flush crept up her face, and Vahis let her arm fall limp at
her side.
‘Keep it for your own use,’ Lilithan continued, then she
crossed her arms in formal rejection. Vahis had no choice
but to crouch down on all fours in a gesture of penance and
touch her nose to the bloodstained flagstones. She thought
she might choke on the shame of it.
Vahis would not receive the mark of the seral’heth, the
mark of the executioner, for the first time since she could
not remember when. And she could only beg for another
chance to do so.
‘Bring a mighty gift to Khaine, or greater pain than this
indignity will be your reward,’ Lilithan said. ‘All weakness
must be purged. If need be, we will reforge you anew.’
Vahis rose and walked down another flight of stairs
opposing those she had climbed up. Every step seemed to
take an age and Vahis kept her eyes firmly on the ground.
An audible gasp reached her ears, and she could not bear to
look at her sisters as she took her place among them.
 ‘I would not put too much stock in this,’ Imyana
whispered, leaning in.
Vahis glanced at the slender wisp of a woman as she
stood with a varghulf head in her hand.
‘It is but a moment in your long life,’ she continued. ‘Soon
everyone will have forgotten all about this.’
‘Of course,’ Vahis said in a shaky voice, staring straight
ahead. ‘Thank you, sister. It is good to keep perspective.’
The rest of the sisters walked up one by one and their
hearts and heads were added to the cauldron as they
chanted on. All received their rewards based on their gifts.
And every one of them looked at her as they came down the
steps, whether they earned the sigil of the seral’heth or not.
Then at last the excruciating ceremony was over. The dim
light of Hysh vanished under the horizon, shrouding the
plains of Zoshia in a gloom so deep one could taste it on the
tongue. Some said it tasted like the richness of old ashes,
others spoke of bitter salty tears, still others thought it was
like fresh velum. It differed from individual to individual. The
Daughters made their way back to the temple, their cries of
triumph echoing over the plain. As they journeyed, the
others sang of their triumphs and their dangers.
Vahis stayed silent.
The temple rose before them like a great flower, glowing
red against the impenetrable blackness. Its curving spires
wrapped around a central core, eerie red light flickering
from its heart. About it, spiked walls spread outward like
vines to direct the enemy in, not to keep them out. Like all
of the Draichi Ganeth’s works, it was meant to be seen. And
seen it was, for many miles. Thousands had journeyed
through the plains using the red pulsing of the temple for
guidance, where on another plain they might have used the
stars. None ever approached, however; no inhabitant of
Ulgu was so foolish.
The smell of a feast reached her nose and Vahis could
only curse herself. ‘The Feast of Kimendech,’ she groaned.
Another of her favoured rituals stained by her failure.
In the main hall, the Daughters lay upon a sea of
cushions. Leathanam brought out delicate meals on thin
clay dishes. The feast was a short time of rest, a well-earned
respite, between worship and constant training. The
priestess, Des’tat, brought Vahis the cup of the Kimendech –
lined with four heads, depicting Khaine’s four moods – but
Vahis waved her on. Des’tat blinked and cast about, looking
for the one who was worthy. Smirking and flushed with
triumph, Sareth immediately took her place. Once again,
Vahis was forced to look at her smug face.
‘To Khaine, we give this victory,’ Sareth recited. ‘As we
might give a head or a heart.’
Vahis looked away as Sareth took the first sip and then
passed it to her right. A leathanam skulked nearby with a
pitcher to refill the cup, thus ensuring all the sisters
received the blessings of the draught. When Vahis took it,
the draught was watery and tasteless.
She looked at Sareth as the brat droned on in her ritual
speech, her pet, Melaka, leading her audience. I hope that I
was never that pompous, or dull. As she spoke, Sareth’s
eyes slid over to Vahis, dancing with cruel glee. I have
caught you, they said. The others scrutinised Vahis through
narrowed eyes, even as she struggled to get comfortable
with her sore hip.
Vahis endured until the festivities slowed, and then she
stalked out. Snarling in fury, she disappeared into her
chambers, yanking off her ruined crest, hanging up her
sciansá, stripping off her armour. And she waited. She would
not endure this humiliation for another moment.
It was late in the night when the leathanam cleaned up
the last plate, the last knife and the last drop of blood. Only
when all the others had dragged themselves to bed did she
order the bath at last.
It was close to dawn when it was ready and the leathanam
retrieved her.
Vahis looked into the churning cauldron, the red mists
coiling around her. Over her shoulder loomed the icon of
Khaine, cavernous mouth closed, eyes half open in moody
contemplation. The rest of the chamber was empty, save for
her personal leathanam. With pinched lips and clenched
jaw, she lifted the ugly vampire’s head straight out in front
of her.
‘Khaine, god of the blade, father of murderers,’ she said,
‘giver of life unending, keeper of our souls, bless your
daughter that she may continue to bring you mighty gifts.’
She dropped the head into the cauldron and it sank into
the gruesome stew.
The leathanam on either side of her gently removed the
black silk robe from her shoulders. Underneath it, she was
nude. Her body was covered in scars, many thin and knitted
together in a strange barely noticeable pattern from
hundreds if not thousands of years of the Colmthart, the
dance of scars, ritual gladiatorial duels performed solely for
outsiders so they could witness the Daughters’ skill without
risk of life and limb. But others, puckered and ugly, stitched
across her skin from dozens of old adversaries; from swords,
spears, knives, fire and teeth. One of the leathanam braided
her dark hair, wrapped it into a knot atop her head and
bound it with a steel chain.
Her pale skin prickled in the cold chamber. Neither the
cauldron nor the ghostly torches offered much warmth.
Incense smoke curled through the air, spicy and dizzying.
The silence was immense, as the leathanam of her sect
were not allowed to speak prayers to Khaine themselves;
only a priestess did that for them. And only then if they
were worthy.
The cauldron hummed, the gruesome contents gurgling
within. Another leathanam stirred the gore with a ranureh, a
sacred instrument not usually touched by one such as him.
However, necessity had a way of making the profane holy.
 Some of Khaine’s daughters preferred a grand ritual like
the felath’ahn as their mortality was washed away by the
blood in the cauldron. However, as the list of their rivals
grew long and the rituals became rote, older aelves left such
displays behind. Not even Lilithan oversaw Vahis’ ritual bath
any more.
With a sigh of anticipation, she stepped into the cauldron.
The warm blood churned as she lowered herself fully into
the gruesome bath. She tried to force herself to relax as the
blood mist infiltrated her lungs. Her eyes itched from the
incense. And time passed. As the blood congealed and the
incense became stale, she waited for the tingle, the shock
of youth. She waited for the aches to fade away, for her skin
to smooth, for her senses to sharpen.
The bath cooled and became still.
And she felt just the same. She twisted around and looked
up at the icon, searching its face. Its lips were shut tight, its
eyes squeezed closed. Its fists were clenched so tight that
she thought the stone might bleed. Khaine rejected her.
‘No, this is not possible,’ she hissed, rising from the fluid.
In a storm, she leaped from the bath. Blood gathered in
her scars and dripped from her skin. She looked like one of
her mad Kraithian sisters. The leathanam cringed, putting
their hands up, eyes dark with cowardice. They did not look
at Vahis, but flung themselves to the floor.
‘You,’ she said, pointing at the one with the ranureh.
He froze, the ranureh clenched in his fist. Then a shudder
rolled down his body and he pressed himself harder into the
floor in his fear. She leaned in and slowly gripped the
leathanam by the hair. Ever so gently, she pulled his head
back, so that he had to look at her gaunt face.
‘Tell me,’ she said, ‘was this duty that I have given you
beyond your meagre capabilities?’
He swallowed, his throat working. His black eyes flicked
nervously about.
 ‘No,’ he said, knowing full well his life stood on the edge
of a knife. ‘Yes.’ He gagged as he searched for the answer
that would satisfy her.
She looked at the others as they prostrated meekly in a
row. They were scrawny things, repulsive in their weakness.
Pale and tremulous, they hunkered under her gaze. Their
thin white hair clouded their faces, the livid brands of their
marks of control red as blood on their foreheads.
She released him and his black eyes returned to her feet.
With a deep breath, she looked down the line of them and
coolly whipped a knife from the rack by the cauldron’s rim,
leaned down and slit the throat of the first, her eyes never
leaving the others.
He thrashed on the ground, watery blood leaking over the
tile. The others did not flinch, even as he died.
‘Was he the one responsible for the failure?’ she asked the
others, focusing on the next one.
They hesitated. Vahis could almost see them making the
calculation. Blame the already dead leathanam and be
caught in a lie, or reveal something of the truth. One of
them pulled in a breath as if to speak but then let it go.
She coughed, crooked a finger at him and he flushed. He
was caught. Carefully, as if faced with a viper, he rose up on
all fours and bowed once more.
‘Fe’tiata,’ he said as she loomed over him. ‘You are
graceful and lovely, but you are ancient. It is rumoured that
after many centuries…’ He paused and swallowed. ‘The
baths cease to work at all.’
She leaned even closer, a snarl twisting her features.
He collapsed to the floor again.
With a contemptuous sniff, she hooked his chin with her
blood-stained toes and turned his head. His features
quivered as if he was face to face with a medusa and
waiting for her to boil him alive with her gaze. Slowly, the
blood from his dead companion crept towards him over the
stone.
 ‘You are not the first,’ he whispered. ‘I know that I am
short lived compared to you, Fe’tiata.’ Something hardened
in his eyes, then faded. ‘But even we share stories. Even we
see things.’
‘No doubt you do,’ she said, her lip curling. Why must I
depend on creatures such as these? ‘You saw nothing. If you
speak of this, I will send you to the new temple site at
Tarnastipol to consecrate the foundation. And there you will
wish you had never been born.’ She released him and he
snapped his eyes back to the floor. ‘Now wash me.’
They bowed as one, sensing that the danger had passed.
As they washed her clean, Vahis considered whether or
not to kill them all. There was a certain practicality to it but
such a move merely delayed the inevitable discovery. A
group of dead leathanam was not that alarming in and of
itself, but even the most oblivious of her sisters would have
noted who they were last seen with and when. And they
would ferret out the truth.
No, better to let the leathanam live and pretend that
nothing was amiss. A fearful closed mouth often kept
secrets better than the dead. Even leathanam had some
touch of will, whereas the dead had none. Besides, she had
little interest in training an entirely new group of them.
Discipline and restraint was essential here.
After all these years, the moment had finally come. Had
anyone else reached this point? And had they escaped their
final fate? She knew of none, but then such a thing would
not be spoken of, not even by the most irreverent of the
Daughters. None of them wanted to think that one day, they
could die from age. A shameful death indeed.
Once dressed, she left the chamber and went to her bed,
where she lay staring at the ceiling until the grey dawn
came.
Weeks passed. Vahis kept to herself, healing in private. This
was typical of her and no one questioned it. Once her
bruises had faded and her skin sported a few new scars, she
went back to the routine she had perfected over the years.
She performed her private dedications to Khaine, bleeding
into a bowl and burning it in a smaller version of the
senies’lat, a bloodletting rite held at a public altar. Then she
ate a small breakfast before heading out into the duelling
rings for the first time in weeks.
The duelling rings were elaborately decorated, as befitted
a holy temple of Khaine. They ran in rows down a long hall,
each one framed by grey daylight streaming down from tall
arched windows. At the end of the great chamber, an icon of
Khaine loomed in grandeur. Iron runes lined the bounds of
the rings and pale sand gleamed under the harsh light.
Several Sisters of Slaughter already skirmished, lashing and
cutting at each other with their kruip-lashes, the razor-
tipped whips they were famed for. As Vahis walked into the
chamber, their dance faltered.
Cheba was there, as always, practising by herself. She
turned to watch Vahis walk by, the living mask she wore as
blank as a mirror. Vahis caught sight of her haggard
reflection in the smooth brass and repressed a frown.
Cheba’s hair had been burned off from receiving the mask,
and only her eyes remained of her original features, glaring
bright from behind the metal. Not only the face, but the
tongue was also frequently lost. Cheba was the most vicious
of the Sisters of Slaughter and even Vahis stepped about
her with care.
Vahis nodded to her and the sister nodded jerkily before
turning back to her combat stances.
As Vahis walked down the aisle, she noted that Lilithan
was also present. Overlooking the ritual practice, Lilithan
stood upon a balcony. She rarely participated in these
functions unless she felt the need. Sometimes she might
offer a soft compliment or subtle rebuke but more often
than not, she was utterly silent.
 The hag queen caught her gaze and her brow furrowed in
puzzlement but she nodded all the same.
Apparently the elder of her sisters was not going to
underestimate her. That was something at least.
Vahis stripped off her outer robe, revealing her armour,
now repaired, and stepped into one of the duelling rings.
Her sciansá gleamed in the cold light as she began to go
through the ritual stances. The iase’set, the stance of
readiness, the drosmor, the dragon’s horn and so on,
flowing from one to the next without pause.
Her hip ached but she could ignore it. All about her, her
sisters fought. Blades struck shields and aelven shrieks
echoed in the chamber. Sounds that she had listened to all
her life. Vahis relaxed, forgetting about her troubles for a
little while.
A flutter of conversation broke her serenity. Then Sareth’s
laughter rattled through the air.
Vahis’ calm vanished under a flood of seething rage. Then
she took a breath, released the tension and ignored the
grating upstart. Back to her stances. Into the ustale, the
fool’s gambit, then back through the drosmor to the
iase’set.
‘Tell me, Vahis,’ Sareth said behind her. ‘Will you face me?
Though if you are not ready, I understand. You look a bit…
tired.’
Silence slammed down over the chamber. The other
sisters did not even pretend to be practising; instead they
watched, listening and whispering to each other. Ages had
passed since Vahis had a serious rival, and now they wished
to see just what drama and hate would arise.
Vahis stepped out of the circle, tapping her sciansá
against her thigh. Then she turned to regard Sareth with a
cold glance.
‘Of course I can,’ Vahis said, noting the hoarse note in her
own voice.
 Sareth cocked her head slightly, her eyes narrowing. Then
she stepped to the edge of the ring and bowed towards the
centre of it, as did Vahis.
‘In this way, we dedicate ourselves to Khaine,’ they said
together. ‘To hone each other that we might remain strong
and deadly in your name.’
With that, they stepped into the ring and they began to
circle each other, sciansá shifting in the light. Vahis watched
her opponent as the larger woman circled. She moved with
little grace, every step landing heavily, her breathing loud
and slow. Every move she made had a mechanical touch,
like a clockwork toy ticking through its movements. Vahis
moved like water, each move flowing into the next without
thought. Every shape she created pleased the eye.
A hard smile crept onto Sareth’s face and she lunged
forward, one sciansá leading, the other held back. With a
flick of her wrist, Vahis blocked the strike and slashed out to
block the other. Sareth flinched back, clearly startled by the
older woman’s speed. But the smile on her face remained.
No matter. The brat was merely over-confident. Vahis would
teach her the error in her thinking.
Snarling, Sareth charged into her once more, blades
flashing. Vahis skittered back, blocking every strike in an
easy rhythm. Round and round they went, darting around
the sand. Vahis let Sareth chase her. It would be all the more
delicious when she put the aelf on her back.
Then Sareth thrust out with her sciansá and pain flashed
across Vahis’ bicep. Shocked, she glanced down. A line of
blood welled up on her pale skin.
Anger blossomed in Vahis’ chest and she darted forward.
She was going to cut every tendon in the brat’s body. Their
blades banged together, the harsh metallic ringing echoing
through the chamber. Leaping, darting, rolling, they danced
together in that terrible way that the Daughters did.
Yet Vahis just could not land a blow. She could not even
touch Sareth’s skin. Always there was a sciansá parrying, a
vambrace blocking. Her breathing quickened with effort,
whistling out of her throat. Her hip burned. Her grip on her
sciansá was vice tight where it needed to be loose and
shaky where it needed to be firm.
Sareth backed away and she circled, one blade high, the
other low. ‘You should have had me on the sands minutes
ago,’ she said.
‘Allow me to rectify that, then,’ Vahis hissed, trying to
tamp down on her frustration.
Vahis slashed in once more, thrusting her sciansá at
Sareth’s chest. Impatience boiled. It took only a moment for
Vahis to realise that she was coming in too hard. Sareth
dropped her parrying blade, snatched her arm and hurled
her over her shoulder.
Vahis twisted in mid-air and landed on her feet, still
caught in Sareth’s grip. Yet, when she tried to jerk away, the
woman’s greater strength kept her tight. With a triumphant
shriek, Sareth drove her lone sciansá at her gut. Vahis
slashed at her face in an act of utter spite.
‘Enough,’ Lilithan’s voice rang out.
Both blades stopped within a moment of cutting into flesh.
‘You have both proved your devotion today,’ she said.
‘Behold, you are the greatest of our servants.’
Sareth released her and they drew away from each other.
Vahis shook with fury as Sareth looked at her like a wolf
might look at a drevar. Lilithan had just saved Vahis from
being humiliated by a rival that she had been toying with for
decades.
Vahis glanced at Cheba once more. The woman looked
away from her slowly, her chin high in disdain. The others
were no better. Some looked away in pity; others, like
Melaka, watched her with a vengeful avarice.
The second time that she had needed saving in as many
days.
Vahis resisted the urge to rail at Lilithan, swallowing her
fury in a hard knot that ached all the way down her throat.
Instead, she bowed gracefully and left the ring. As she
walked down the aisle, whispers reached her ears.
‘Why does she wait?’
‘How can she exist in such a state?’
‘Has she gone mad?’
Sareth’s boots rang on the floor of the arena. ‘Vahis, what
does it feel like to owe one such as me?’ she said.
Vahis froze at the entrance to the chamber and turned.
Then she laughed at the absurdity of it. Her sisters stared at
her, wary once more.
‘I admit that it brings me shame to owe one such as you,’
Vahis grated. ‘I would not put too much stock in your
meagre success. I have watched sisters better than you
come and go. Some of them, I crushed myself.’
Sareth balked for an instant, though it seemed the
remnant of an old habit than real fear. She snorted in
disdain. ‘Yes – that was before,’ she said. There were a few
sniggers.
With a hiss, Vahis turned on her heel and stalked out.
Perhaps not tomorrow, not in a month, but in a short time,
they would kill her. It might not be Sareth, but one of them
would put her out of her misery. And they would be right to
do so. A Daughter that lost Khaine’s favour deserved to die.
And somehow, Vahis had.

Vahis held her head high as she strode from the duelling
chamber. No mind did she pay to the stares, the furrowed
brows of her sisters. Even the leathanam paused, their black
eyes widening at the sight of her. She maintained the calm
facade until she reached the sanctity of her private
chambers.
With sudden fury, she slammed her door shut. Her
leathanam backed away, scuttling into the corners as she
cursed in every language she knew.
 A mirror, she needed a mirror. She was not usually one
given to preening; had no need to surround herself with her
own image. But she needed to see. How fast were the years
creeping up on her? She tore apart her rooms as her
leathanam cowered against the walls, scampering out of her
way. Bottles of perfume, fine silks, blades of various sorts
toppled onto the floor. From one room to the next, like a
hurricane she went.
Until she found a small silver mirror in a drawer, and
gasped.
Her cheeks were hollow, her hair streaked with grey. Fine
lines crossed her face and her skin sagged from her skull.
She touched her throat, her cheeks, the bones sharp and
angular under her fingers. Her muscles shivered, her joints
grated as she moved. Scars that once had been so beautiful
now seemed only to enhance her years. As she stood there,
she felt the years crawling through her veins.
This was too fast.
Ageing was a taboo subject among the sisters, simply not
spoken of in polite company. But those morbid sorts who
studied it noted that the older the aelf, the faster she aged.
And such ageing usually followed some sort of tragic event;
a defeat in battle or a severe illness. Something that tore at
the mind as well as wearing down the body. Vahis had only
weeks before she was too feeble to defend herself. Or
worse, simply crumbled into dust. It seemed like mere days
since she had been at her peak. Now she withered,
becoming trapped in a shrivelled sack of bones and skin,
her mind crumbling into a ruin. This could not be happening.
There had to be other options.
Some tool, some artefact, some foul magic. Something.
Anything!
She turned to her leathanam and clicked her fingers at
two of them.
‘You, dress me,’ she snapped. ‘The rest of you clean this
up.’
 Her mind whirled as they swiftly straightened her hair and
brought her new fluttering silks. Once she looked
presentable, she swept from the room. As she stalked down
the dim halls, she noted those who lingered at the doors
and crossed her path, their dark eyes veiled.
There was only one place where she could find what she
sought: the library. There had to be some record of such an
affliction as hers. One of her foremothers must have
experienced this. She could not be the first. There were
crones that were older than her. Had they defeated this
moment?
Though not as grand as the libraries of Hagg Nar, the
library of Thraik contained many secrets and desires in the
dark corners of its many shelves and alcoves. Magics
banned by hag queens, scandals of affection, moments of
cowardice all slipped away into dark corners. Stuck between
the tomes, fixed to the undersides of shelves, hidden
between stones in the wall, the place oozed with scandals.
One of the few places in the dark temple with windows, a
thin grey light shot down its centre, doing little to illuminate
the vast shelves with their rows of gilt books. A thick, musty
smell rose from the millions of pages. Somewhere a mouse
squealed in pain, and a shadow scrabbled in the dark.
Her eyes adjusted to the blackness as she walked
between hundreds of years’ worth of knowledge. Leathanam
lurked among the shelves, stooped and timid even by their
standards. One slunk forward and she waved him away.
Though these wretches had their tongues carefully sliced
out, they could still communicate. Some of them had
summoned enough wit to learn to read a few words, and
that was more than enough to answer questions by other
less friendly sisters. Better for them that they knew nothing.
She searched out tomes and scrolls, the old forgotten
dialects posing no barriers to her. Books were removed,
flicked through and put back. Hours passed like seconds.
She sought out dark secrets in the depths where dust
gathered and spiders roamed with impunity. Yet hours
stretched into a day, and no answers presented themselves.
Hopelessness set in and she found herself wandering amidst
the stacks, aimlessly noting tomes so withered that their
titles were no longer decipherable.
Then she noticed a strange tome tucked behind a faded
gift of alliance from the Stormbloods and a thick folio on the
rise of the great Macol of the Khelt Nar. Vahis realised that
she was in the section of personal histories, which were
more propaganda than any real accounting of one’s deeds.
When she opened it, it was a handwritten account in the
deeply formal verb tenses of a hag queen. Nareka the
Reaper. Not the sort that would be hidden away.
‘So, why are you here?’ Vahis muttered. She sat down in a
chair, and began to read.
At first, it was a typical account, carefully written to feel
candid without actually being candid. Small shames, minor
errors, harmless trifles. Nareka of course spoke endlessly of
the faults and scandals of her predecessors, which was
quite amusing.
Then there was a spelling error. Then another. Her writing
began to skew and wobble, bulging and slumping down the
page. Vahis sat up in her chair and flipped through the book.
The baths, they no longer work. No matter how many
gallons I spill, nothing changes.
Why has Khaine turned his sight from me?
Vahis went still. At last, someone admitted that it
happened. The hag described her search, as she deployed
ever more elaborate rituals and exotic materials, bathing in
daemon’s blood, a cauldron made of tainted sigmarite. All
apparently in vain.
The faults grew worse. She began to misuse symbols,
exchanging one for another. Gradually the sentences
shortened, the writer growing angry and childish. At the
end, it was a last agonised scratch on the page and a few
drops of blood.
 ‘Wretched woman,’ Vahis hissed, slapping the book
closed. ‘I will not die like you. I will not. I am not as weak as
you.’
She put the account back where she had found it. Her
anger flared, and then snuffed out under a flood of despair.
Was this all there was at the end? Just this cruel waiting. No,
she would not wait for death to find her, as the old hag had
done, in denial until the moment she was murdered by her
sisters. She would seek it out.
A scraping sound reached her ears, dry and light, like a
knife over a whetstone.
‘Tell me, ancient one,’ a voice whispered out of the dark.
‘What is it that you seek so fervently?’
Vahis swallowed and bowed slowly, unnerved by the
speaker’s voice.
The melusai slid out of the dark, her purple coils
gleaming. Her aelfish upper half was lithe and beautiful, her
skin so deep that her pale hair glowed and her eyes seemed
lit from within. Pearls glowed over her skin as she moved. A
bow was lashed to her back.
‘Forgive me, as I am a visitor,’ the melusai said. ‘I am
Relath, handmaiden of the Oracle Morathi.’
‘Relath, one who is closest to the word of iron, what do
you want from me?’ Vahis said.
Relath arched an eyebrow. ‘Blunt as ever the Draichi
Ganeth are,’ she said. ‘But no, there is nothing that I desire
at this time. Though I can guess at what you seek.’
Vahis flushed. ‘You know?’
‘Yes, and there are ways around it. This doom of yours.
But it will not be easy, or without cost.’
Vahis was immediately suspicious. ‘I suppose that you
want some favour owed at some future date?’
‘Nothing so official. Often we must do what is best for the
order we serve, not ourselves. Khaine would be furious to
lose a servant such as you.’
‘It is about faith, then?’
 ‘Of a kind.’
The melusai smiled and it was not an aelfish smile. It
stretched too far over the aelf’s bones and Vahis caught
sight of a pale forked tongue between the melusai’s thin
lips.
‘The Stormbloods captured an artefact that allegedly
returns the user to their peak,’ she said. ‘They are keeping it
at a hidden temple out in the Skelcar Mountains called
Sigmar’s Shadow. Not very imaginative, I know. Still, it
would return your youth to you, the point when you were at
your best. Beware though, this thing is dangerous and the
Stormbloods will miss it.’
‘What is the nature of this artefact?’ Vahis asked.
The melusai looked at her from under her lashes. ‘It is one
of the Clawing One’s elixirs.’
Vahis took a step back. ‘I should not,’ she said, shocked
that one of the handmaidens would suggest such a
blasphemous endeavour. ‘The taint.’
‘Is it worse than dying?’ Relath said. ‘I know a ritual to
keep the taint from you. That is when the favour will come
in. A debt owed, no sooner or later.’
‘But the Stormbloods. You know the dangers of acting
against their interests. They cannot be truly killed, and they
see everything.’
‘Well,’ the melusai said, slithering around the table and
retrieving the hag queen’s account from its hiding place. ‘It
is something to consider.’ She dragged a sharp nail down
the spine. ‘I remember this one, she turned craven. This is
the fate of those who wait too long to seek death. I would
not choose to linger under such a destiny.’ She looked at
Vahis as she put the book back. ‘May your blades always
strike true.’
With that, the melusai slid away.
‘As may yours,’ Vahis said, knowing that the melusai
would hear her.
 Relath was right, though she clearly had her own agenda
to fulfil here. Vahis did have a choice of sorts. Either she
pursued the artefact, or she chose a death that was
preferable to her like some deranged duardin.
‘I will not die,’ she muttered.
Someone gasped from behind one of the towering shelves
and pelted away.
Definitely not one of her older sisters, more likely a
novice. Vahis sprinted back towards the entrance to the
library. While there were other secret entrances, a novice
would not know them. The shelves flickered by and Vahis
caught sight of her spy.
Avara.
Vahis darted down an aisle and tackled the youngster into
a shelf. Dry tomes toppled, and brittle paper rustled as it
fell. Her hand closed on a great fistful of pale hair and Vahis
slammed Avara’s head back, cracking her skull against the
wood. Then Vahis spun the girl around as she screamed in
pain, and drove her to her knees.
‘Great One,’ Avara stammered. ‘I was just…’
Vahis jerked on her a little to silence her. She was a
gullible girl. Her mother was the esteemed high priestess
Sethosh, a steadfast warrior and charismatic speaker who
currently lived in Azyr as an emissary to Sigmar’s court.
Unfortunately, Sethosh had kept her daughter at her knee
for too long, instead of sending her away to be hardened as
she needed to be. The only reason she was not dead was
the power of her mother’s name.
‘What do you want?’ Vahis snapped.
‘I saw Sareth approaching others,’ Avara said. ‘Along with
Melaka. Sisters that hate you, like Imyana and–’
‘Imyana? She is a surprise, I confess,’ Vahis grated. ‘I
thought that I had her cowed. Clearly not. Thank you for the
warning. I will deal with them in time. Why come to me?’
‘You are the strongest,’ she said. ‘My mother said that I
should find the strongest and–’
 ‘Engage in blatant flattery?’ Vahis said, relaxing just a
little.
For a moment the other aelf hesitated.
Vahis drew a sciansá and with excruciating slowness,
pressed the blade to Avara’s face.
‘Who are you really working for?’ Vahis said. ‘Answer me,
young one. Before I take off your nose.’
‘Just me,’ she said, her liquid eyes wide.
Vahis hooked a nostril with the tip of her sciansá. ‘What
did you hear just now?’ she hissed.
‘Not much,’ Avara said, wincing. ‘Something about a
temple to the Stormcasts.’
‘So you are merely a fool,’ Vahis said. Time to bluff the
idiot, she might be useful still. ‘I’ll be getting rid of you,
however.’
‘I can still be of use to you,’ Avara said, eyes wide. ‘I’ll do
anything. Just stop.’
Vahis kept from smiling. This ruse always worked. Novices
were so gullible. Threaten them with death and let them talk
themselves into being a servant in exchange for their lives.
‘Really?’ Vahis said. ‘I fail to see how you could be of
service.’
‘I can ingratiate myself with the others,’ Avara said. ‘I can
help you with Sareth and her allies. Sareth is easy to flatter,
I can tell.’ Something hard flickered in her eyes. ‘I can tell
them what you want them to hear. I could even help you
find others that could help you with the vault. Even you
could not do this alone, and you have few friends.’
‘And how do I know that you won’t say the same thing to
them?’ Vahis said, twisting the sciansá just enough to draw
a bit of blood. ‘Or that you are not going to betray me at an
inopportune time. Prove your loyalty. Speak a secret.’
‘I know something about Thesobhe,’ Avara gasped.
‘This should be good,’ Vahis said, smirking at her.
‘Thesobhe desires to join the Sisters of Slaughter. What
secrets can she have? The woman is so devout it is a
wonder she does not sweat blood. Besides, she has no love
for me. How does this help me?’
‘She had a son – by someone not of aelven blood,’ Avara
said.
‘It’s embarrassing, but it happens. As I recall, he died.’
Avara shook her head. ‘No, no he didn’t.’
Vahis blinked. ‘Go on.’
‘I know from my mother, and I swore to keep her
confidence,’ Avara whispered. ‘Thesobhe would do anything
to keep this secret hidden. She would be a powerful ally in
dealing with your troubles. She is held in high regard by the
others.’
‘And what are the details of this secret?’
Avara told her. And Vahis listened with a smile like knives.
Vahis stalked through the halls in that prowling way that she
did when something pleased her. Her sisters, sensing
danger, slid out of her way. While she took care of
Thesobhe, she had given Avara the difficult task of bringing
others into her quest for the Stormblood’s artefact. While
Avara might have been gullible, she had the advantage of
her mother’s name. And she knew how to use it.
Vahis caught Thesobhe alone in the shrine in the temple’s
eastern corner.
‘Hello, sweet one,’ she said, kneeling next to her.
Thesobhe looked at her out of the corner of her eye. She
was tall, pale and almost painfully thin. Her hands rose and
fell, her thin steel bracelets ringing as she worshipped. As
she turned her head to look at Vahis, her hair shimmered in
the light, still tinged with old blood.
‘Not your usual haunt,’ Thesobhe said, her voice never
rising above a murmur.
Vahis leaned over to her. ‘I have a request to make of you,
There’s a–’
‘I want nothing to do with your issues,’ Thesobhe
interrupted, her bracelets ringing rhythmically. ‘Your
struggles with Sareth are your own problem.’
‘Listen to me,’ Vahis snapped. ‘I know of the shame you
conceal from your sisters, and if you do not do as I ask, I will
expose it.’
Thesobhe turned even more pale as she turned away from
the icon. ‘You know nothing.’
‘I know that you flouted Khaine’s laws,’ Vahis said. ‘You
allowed your boy-child to escape his marking and sent him
off where he will exist without his sisters there to ensure he
knows his place in the world. Some might call that
blasphemy.’
Thesobhe stared at her. ‘No. I do not want to be indebted
to you,’ she hissed, rising to her feet. ‘Anyone but you!’
‘You will come with me on a journey,’ said Vahis, looking
up at her. ‘If you survive, I will keep my silence. And you will
go to the Sisters of Slaughter with my full weight behind
you.’
Thesobhe’s shoulders slumped. ‘My sister, you will own
me forever.’
‘I give you my word, I shall not,’ Vahis said, waving her
hand dismissively. ‘Do you know how many secrets I have
forgotten?’
Thesobhe watched her as if she were an asp, poised to
strike.
‘Look at me,’ Vahis said, gesturing to herself. ‘I am
ancient. Once your task is done, I will have no reason to
remember your sordid little scandal. It isn’t that interesting
to me. Assist me, and I will forget that I ever heard it.’
‘You give your word?’ Thesobhe said.
‘Of course. I have no patience for keeping ledgers of
blackmail and grudges. These games were always Lilithan’s
forte.’
Thesobhe’s face cleared just a little, and she bowed her
head.
‘That’s a good girl,’ Vahis said with a smile. She cut off a
small lock of greying hair and burned it in the offering fire
before leaving Thesobhe alone in her misery.
As soon as Vahis was prepared, she went to the temple gate
during the height of the day, her bags packed with
provisions. The great mouth of needle-like teeth loomed
open, a giant stone image of Khaine with sword and heart in
hand standing watch. Graceful as eagles, khinerai drifted
above them, keening to each other. Vahis found that the
khinerai were a distant sort, the allure of the sky pulling
them away from affairs on the ground. Just as well, given
their strange ways.
She waited for a time before Avara and Thesobhe arrived.
Avara vibrated with excitement while Thesobhe still
wallowed in self-pity.
‘Why don’t we sneak out at night?’ Avara said, nervously
looking about as the temple guards performed their shift
change. Thesobhe rolled her pale eyes.
‘Sneaking out at night will look suspicious,’ Vahis said.
‘And the others will try and find out what we are up to.
Whereas now…’ She gestured around the yard as sisters
and leathanam went about their business. ‘No one cares.
Besides, for all our sisters know, I am leaving at the request
of Melusai Relath. There is no reason to sneak about.’
‘I thought you wanted this to be a total secret though,’
Avara said.
‘My purpose is secret,’ she said. ‘Relath’s instructions are
not. Start acting smarter, or I’ll be rid of you before we even
leave.’
Something hard flickered in Avara’s eyes before the wide-
eyed innocence returned. Vahis had been alive for too long
to miss it. Many tried to act the naïf, but they rarely
succeeded in the ruse. While Avara might just be that
inexperienced, there was too much steel in her glance.
She opened her mouth to speak, but snapped her jaw shut
as she saw who approached.
 ‘I will be coming,’ said the newcomer. Sareth,
accompanied by Melaka, both Daughters dressed for travel.
The younger woman smiled, its wickedness reaching all the
way to her eyes. A skulking thing, Melaka tended to remind
Vahis of a lizard, always creeping where she did not belong.
‘You,’ Vahis snarled at Sareth. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Our queen has spoken,’ she said, her smirk deepening.
‘What makes you think that I will believe such an obvious
lie?’ Vahis snapped.
Sareth produced a seal from under her robes. A metallic
scroll with a thin metal lining, it could be etched and then
wiped clean many times. Upon it was an edict and the hag
queen’s mark. Vahis snatched it from her and read it with
increasing fury.
‘How did you get this?’ she said. ‘What lies did you
concoct that she would believe?’
‘I didn’t,’ Sareth said. ‘She gave it to me. I am to aid you.
Those are Queen Lilithan’s orders. I have already saved your
life once.’
‘As you keep reminding us every breath you take,’
Thesobhe muttered.
Vahis took a deep breath. Why in Khaine’s name was
Lilithan sending her?
‘If the hag queen demands that you accompany us,’ Vahis
said, ‘then I suppose that you do not have a choice. Just
stay out of my way or I might decide that you should not
come back at all.’
Sareth chuckled and leaned in closer to her. ‘Do you not
think that I don’t know what is happening to you? How long
before you are sucking gruel through a toothless mouth and
leathanam must bathe your shrivelled body clean of your
own filth? I want to make sure that you live so that I can see
that. And I will come to see you every day.’
Vahis rolled her eyes but said nothing. As much as the
threat bothered her, she would not let Sareth know she was
jabbing such a tender nerve.
 ‘How remarkably petty,’ Thesobhe said, pulling a face.
Someone coughed as another walked up to them,
shrouded in robes.
‘And you are?’ Vahis said through clenched teeth.
‘You know me,’ Cheba’s voice hissed from underneath a
hood, and Vahis caught a hint of steel.
‘Worthy one, how did you know of this task?’ Vahis said,
blinking in surprise.
‘I had the strangest dream. It involved the Clawing One,
and you,’ Cheba said. ‘The temple cannot afford to lose one
of your skill. Not now. There are other battles on the horizon.
And Lilithan will need your blades.’
They all stilled. The gift of sight was rare, and in Cheba it
was more accurate than not. Vahis did not like this one bit.
Had Relath known that champions of the enemy might be
present? If so, why had she not warned her?
It was hard not to second guess every move that a
handmaiden made. What did they know and when did they
know it? And most importantly of all, how did their mistress
factor in, and what did they tell her?
‘I am pleased to have your strength at my side,’ Vahis
said, bowing her head slightly.
Cheba bowed in return. ‘I am pleased that our strength
has found unity under the gaze of Khaine.’
Vahis turned towards the gate.
‘Let us go,’ she said, walking out. ‘Before the rest of the
temple decides to join us.’

Vahis frowned as she trudged through the thick snow and

howling wind. Swathed in dark furs, she fought the urge to
curse wildly. The Draichi Ganeth were a disciplined sect and
she was not about to lose control in front of her rivals.
The cold cut through her, grinding in her joints. The
journey had been utter misery. A storm had rolled over the
Zoshia plains, howling through the broken ruins for days
before moving on. Then in the shadowy Skelcar Mountains
another storm rose, worse than the first. Some said that the
mountain range was made from the spite of some gloom-
fleshed godbeast, and she could believe it. There was a
determination in how the mountains hurled storms,
sicklecats and worse into their path.
Behind her, her not-so-carefully chosen group of allies
stalked through the snow, eyes lit with suspicion.
‘What exactly are we doing?’ Sareth asked. ‘Lilithan was
somewhat vague.’
‘You really expect me to just tell you?’ Vahis said, a smirk
tugging at her thin lips.
‘Yes, actually,’ she replied. ‘We need to make sure that
you are not planning on committing some sort of heresy.’
Vahis rolled her eyes. ‘I am retrieving an artefact from the
Stormbloods without their knowledge,’ she said. ‘Relath,
Morathi’s handmaiden, wants it. In return, she promises to
teach me rituals usually only given to the Daughters of
Hagg Nar when they perform their ritual baths. She says it
will increase their potency.’
Sareth met her gaze and Vahis stared back coolly. It was
not the precise truth, but even if Avara had heard the entire
conversation, she did not seem keen on revealing it.
‘Seems reasonable enough,’ Avara said, right on cue.
‘Do we really wish to encroach on the first temple’s
remit?’ Melaka said.
‘You really are a nervous little pet, aren’t you?’ Vahis said.
Melaka hissed and half drew her sciansá. Thesobhe and
Avara both snatched at their own blades.
‘Now is not the time for personal duels,’ Cheba said, her
mask betraying a slight irritation underneath its serenity.
‘We all serve Khaine in this task, do we not?’
‘Since when did you become Vahis’ ally?’ Sareth snapped.
Vahis gave her a sharp, sidelong glance. Sareth was
becoming even more arrogant with the hag queen’s
backing. Why had the queen sent her, of all people? What
did Sareth have that so many others did not? She was
stupid enough in her hatred to challenge Vahis anywhere.
No matter the circumstances.
Damn Lilithan. They had co-existed for centuries without
incident because Lilithan understood that Vahis had no real
ambition for power. Crowns, ranks, rituals. Those things
exerted a control, an obligation all on their own. Obligations
that Vahis wanted no part in. She wanted nothing that could
tie her down.
Had Lilithan heard about her conversation with the
handmaiden? Was Lilithan seeing ambition where there was
none? Or was Lilithan playing her own game with Relath and
saw Vahis as a traitorous pawn to be flung off the board? Or
maybe Lilithan simply saw an opportunity to be rid of an aelf
whom she was tired of?
Vahis shook her head. She had no time for this scheming.
Such things were for younger minds.
A low tone almost beyond the reach of hearing rumbled in
Vahis’ chest, deeper than thunder.
‘Silence, all of you,’ she snapped.
A strange ringing shriek echoed to them over the snow, as
if a bell could scream. Blades flicked from sheaths and the
Daughters collected together like a pack of sicklecats. Some
crouched down low, preparing to cut hamstrings and break
knees, while others went high to cut off heads and pierce
hearts.
They all smelled it at the same time: a sweet musky scent
that somehow stung the eyes. Warmth shivered over the
skin and the aelves shuddered.
‘We are not the only ones who know of this place,’
Thesobhe said, drawing herself to her full height.
‘As I said we would not be,’ Cheba growled.
Cheba darted ahead with a feral snarl, her mask twisting
into a hateful grimace. Her whip lashed free, the metal tip
glinting in the half-light. Vahis did not attempt to call her
back as she vanished into the falling snow. Cheba was on
the hunt now, and might disobey her orders. Vahis’
authority was already fragile. If a nominal ally refused to
obey, what reason did the others have to obey her? The loss
of face would be unbearable.
‘Shouldn’t you…?’ Thesobhe said, a pale ghost in the
falling snow. Her grey eyes gleamed with an odd light as she
stared after Cheba.
‘Call her back?’ Vahis said. ‘No, I will not. Cheba feels the
call of Khaine stronger than I, and I trust his judgement.
Come. Let us slaughter the foe with our sister.’
Vahis pelted forward, shedding her cloak. They leaped
after her, feet crunching through the snow. Vahis suspected
that Cheba somehow remembered her time in the Clawing
One’s gut, even if it was only as a nameless dread that rose
in the middle of the night. And while she was wicked with
her kruip-lash, that desperate memory made her prone to
raging out of control against the followers of Slaanesh.
As they drew closer, the musical howling and shrieking of
the cultists became louder. Strange perfumes wafted to
them, poisoning the clean smell of the snow. Strange bursts
of light flashed, and weird patterns of light and smoke roiled
in the sky overhead. Then the snow parted, revealing an
astounding sight.
A gateway lay open in an otherwise natural-looking cliff
face. The two stone doors hung limply, their shape irregular
and meant to blend into the rock. Human riflemen stood
atop disguised crenellations, firing down at the writhing host
below them. Their efforts were for naught, as the Slaaneshi
force flowed into the gateway with the creeping agility of a
swarm of insects.
Cheba hovered at the edge of the battlefield, stalking
about and muttering to herself. Vahis let out a sigh of relief
that she had managed to restrain herself. As they
approached, she whipped about.
‘You are all slow,’ she snarled, her mask bearing its fangs.
 ‘No, sister, it is just wiser not to rush off like that – we are
better protected if we stick together,’ Vahis said.
‘Yes, sister,’ Cheba said, though she did not relax, even a
little.
Vahis squinted, looking for any sign of the Stormbloods,
but her ageing eyes failed her. Between the snow and the
Slaaneshi horde, the whole scene devolved into a garish
smear of colour.
‘Are there any Stormbloods?’ she asked.
‘No. If they were ever here, they’re long gone now,’ Avara
said.
‘Good, otherwise this will end for us before it has even
begun,’ she hissed. ‘Let us wait for the real bleeding to
begin. Our time will come.’
Cheba snarled and paced, but she did not disobey.
Vahis turned her eye to the cultists. There was a certain
point in every battle when an army turned to pillaging: when
they thought that they had won, and started to take their
time. For Slaaneshi cultists, this was when they were at their
most awful – and their most distracted.
‘They are also here for the artefact, aren’t they?’ Sareth
said. ‘It is the only explanation. It is not as if there is much
else here that they would desire.’
‘She is right,’ Melaka said, her voice grating.
Sareth’s eyes narrowed as she turned to Vahis. ‘So why
didn’t the handmaiden mention this to you?’ she demanded.
‘It’s not as if they are hard to miss.’
Vahis stayed silent, watching the battle with false
intensity. It was a legitimate question. And one that she
could not answer.
Sareth opened her mouth to speak again.
‘Such is the nature of Chaos,’ Thesobhe cut in. ‘It is
probable that the handmaiden did not know that they were
coming. Our enemy is swift and mercurial, is it not?’
Sareth fumed. ‘It’s possible.’
 Thesobhe joined Cheba at the forefront and they quietly
conversed. Vahis realised that the aspiring Sister of
Slaughter had never had the chance to approach Cheba
before. Or simply had not been brave enough to do so. They
were different fighters in the extreme. Cheba killed with
directness, speed and little relish, while Thesobhe killed
artfully, more vivisecting her prey than killing it. Vahis
wondered if Thesobhe would ever understand that her own
retiring nature was at fault for keeping her out of the Sisters
of Slaughter.
‘We must wait for their forces to relax before we strike,’
Vahis said. ‘Otherwise they will overwhelm even us. The
humans on the wall we may have to kill. I doubt they would
be useful.’
Even over the Slaaneshi shrieking, the humans’ barking
language reached their ears. Unlike the inhabitants of other
settlements when Chaos raided them, their tone was calm
and aggressive, their morale holding out. These were not
the pathetic garrisons of the Free Cities. These were humans
who understood exactly what they fought and knew not to
be caught alive.
Still, the riflemen on the wall were overwhelmed and
butchered by the cultists that crawled up the walls like grot-
spiders. A human male screamed, a high strained wail.
Others started to join him in awful harmony as the torture
began in earnest. The stink of terror went up, as the
knowledge of what was going to happen to them ran
through the human ranks.
Cheba jerked and her eyes bulged, like a shadehawk
seeing a mouse.
‘Now we move in,’ Vahis said.
Cheba and Thesobhe lunged forward, chanting prayers to
Khaine. Normally there would have been a ritual challenge,
but even the Draichi Ganeth did not waste their time on the
followers of Slaanesh. They had no honour, nor loyalty, nor
restraint, nor any other qualities that the Daughters felt
compelled to respect.
The Daughters pelted through the snow, their shrieks
muffled only a little by the blizzard. Rushing across the
approach, the aelves fell into formation. Their high-pitched
cries tore through the storm like the cries of birds.
A cluster of cultists rushed out of the gate. They wore
white armour and deep purple silks, and gems dripped from
them in a dazzling array. As they stood in the doorway, the
light from within hit their faces. Their features blended
together as if they had melted like wax, their noses almost
gone, their eyes black slits. Only their lips remained, lush
and painted red like wine.
The aelves fell upon them before the cultists even
understood what was happening. Vahis leaped high even as
others raced in low. Heads rolled, blood splashed. Rushing
past the dying cultists, the Daughters were within the vault
before the bodies even hit the ground.
The first chamber was broad and deep, with barricades of
stone and spikes at the opposite end. Above them, the
ceiling opened to a second floor, allowing the mortal
defenders to attack from safety. The ground was thick with
ash, oil and blood. Mutilated corpses lay strewn from end to
end. A broken gate stood opposite.
More cultists filled the place, rushing around the
barricades at the sight of the aelves.
‘The Twins will want them,’ they shrieked. ‘Take them
alive!’
Daughter and cultist met in a whirl of steel, spinning and
hissing at each other. Like a storm, they rushed about,
blades flickering in the light. Vahis met a pair of the cultists
head on. One was armed with an axe, the other with an
overly large broadsword. They chopped and hacked, their
deformed faces clenched with need.
There were no tricks, no cunning plans; it was simply kill
or die. Vahis ducked under the axe as it whooshed in. Then
she pirouetted away from the swordsman as he blundered
past. Gracefully, as if she danced, she lashed out with both
blades and cut their throats. She surged on, gutting the next
man who rushed at her.
All around, the cultists died, hewn apart by her sisters.
They fell, dropping as if death itself were among them. The
floor was awash in fresh blood once more. And then there
was silence.
Yet someone breathed still; harsh and quick. Vahis turned,
and recoiled at the sight.
A man hung from the barricades, his skin carved and
peeled into the shapes of bloody roses. From the skin on his
feet to the flesh of his shoulders, the flowers were etched in
as lush as a Ghyranian garden. His face was slack with
exhaustion, and he stared with dead eyes into nothingness.
‘Human,’ Vahis said gently.
His eyes clicked over to stare at her and a thin moan
creaked past his lips.
‘Who leads this rabble, that we may avenge you?’ she
asked in the same soothing voice.
‘The Twins of Emrolond the Swift. They come seeking a
relic we have sworn to protect,’ he whispered in a broken
voice. ‘They took my key. There is only one other, but soon
they will take it from Captain Jened. Stop them before they
reach the vault. They are daemons in human flesh,
champions of every cruelty.’
‘They did this to you,’ Vahis said. ‘Do you want peace?’
‘Please, in Sigmar’s name.’
His eyes rolled back and his head dropped forward.
Without hesitation, Vahis stabbed him through the heart,
killing him instantly. While they looked with contempt upon
most humans, none deserved the tortures that the
Slaaneshi gave.
With that, Vahis knelt down and dipped her fingers into
the pooling blood. Her sisters did the same and they
carefully traced the marks of Khaine and killing upon their
skin. The lines were straight, the hooks and slashes perfect.
It might as well have been drawn on with a brush. While
they did so, they sang the bellicose and eerie hymns of
Khaine and Morathi. Though they did not paint the krish’lar,
there were other rites to observe – in this case the teth’sar,
or the first taste. The first sighting of the enemy and putting
them to flight.
Then they waited on Cheba. The Sisters of Slaughter held
more elaborate rites. It had been some time since Vahis had
paid attention to the ansu’lar, the painting of the mask.
Cheba’s mask opened its mouth and shivered as she
painted the surface ever so carefully. Every cranny, every
crease. She wanted to become ever closer to her god and
for that she must become him. Thus she painted her mask
red, the screaming face becoming ever more savage, the
jaws stretching open, the eyes becoming wilder.
Vahis turned and strode inside, sciansá at the ready. With
a jerk of her head, she ordered Sareth to join her at the
front. She did not offer any justification as there was none
that she could offer.
It was too blatant, this need to keep Sareth where she
could see her. Vahis knew that it made her look weak. Yet
she could not stand to have the girl behind her. Especially
when her aelf-sharp hearing was fading. The others noted it
in their subtle ways but did nothing else. Avara was the
most obvious and put herself behind Sareth, glaring at the
back of the woman’s head. Even though it was largely a
futile gesture, Vahis was strangely comforted by it.
They walked into the heart of the mountain, their every
step marred with the blood of Slaanesh.

Vahis looked around, as if alert for threats. In reality, she

wanted to keep a watch on the others, to observe their
faces. Aside from Avara, none of them had any loyalty to
her. Or they were creatures of Lilithan, may Khaine turn his
face from her. True allies had perished long ago.
There was much to despise about ageing: the pain, the
sluggishness, the clouding of vision and hearing. But
perhaps the most irksome thing was the maudlin longing for
those long dead. Genuine bonds, allies unburdened by
betrayals and revelations. The knowledge that one could not
stand on their own, that they needed someone else to rely
on. It was weak, disgusting.
She waved her hand as if she could swat away the morose
thoughts like insects.
‘Are you all right?’ Avara asked.
‘Yes – no need to ask again,’ Vahis said, her voice hoarse.
‘Of course not,’ Avara said, her cheeks reddening.
Sareth and Melaka murmured to each other, that irritating
smirk creeping ever larger on Sareth’s face. As always, the
other two kept their own counsel, each utterly unreadable.
Vahis ignored them.
Each corridor, hall and chamber had a similar look. Perfect
square corners, no ornamentation of any kind. The torches
burned without smoke, or even heat. There was nothing that
an invader might use to navigate unless one wanted to use
the corpses of the mutilated dead. The craftsmanship was
almost admirable.
‘Clever,’ Vahis murmured, looking at the walls. ‘This place
is not human made.’
‘Really?’ Avara said.
‘No, there’s no mortar between the slabs,’ she replied.
‘Only duardin are so precise with their stone work.’
They moved on, their steps light and soundless. For all
their speed, the aelves made little progress. In contrast, the
Slaaneshi cultists seemed to be finding their way through
easily. Vahis considered that the labyrinthine corridors
presented a tantalising challenge for them, something that
broke up the terrible ennui with which they were afflicted.
The disgusting creatures bounded through the halls, defiling
every surface with their passing. They daubed vile runes
and images on everything that would take paint, and pinned
their victims to the walls like displays in a collection of
treasures.
When the aelves met them with sciansá and kruip-lash,
the mortals leaped eagerly at the weapons, gouging out bits
of their flesh upon them. But for all their suicidal tendencies,
they were hard to kill and seemed to feel barely any pain.
Even as the aelves cut into them, they giggled with glee.
Vahis grew frustrated. She had the sense that something
was not right. Even as she made staunch progress
decapitating one cultist after the next, the vault itself
seemed to foil her. Duardin were a predictable people, and
their structures even more so. It was said that once one had
seen one duardin stronghold, one could navigate any of the
others without issue. Yet this place had the strangest turns.
It was less a vault or temple, and more a maze. A maze that
made less and less sense as they moved through it. There
had to be a logic to it, but what that was evaded her.
As the sisters walked down a long hall, something clicked,
no louder than a whisper.
They froze, starting like sicklecats.
A stinging reek filled Vahis’ nostrils and they all bolted as
one, not waiting to see what befell them. With a whoosh,
flame jetted from the walls. The heat boiled their skin and
smoked their long hair. As they sprinted down the hall, the
fire raced after them like something alive.
Then Melaka screamed.
Vahis glanced behind, not even slowing. Melaka had
stumbled over some bit of debris, and the hungry flames
were rushing at her with a bestial roar.
‘Leave her!’ Vahis yelled.
‘No,’ Sareth said, turning back.
‘Don’t you dare,’ Cheba hissed, grabbing her arm. ‘Run or
die.’ She pushed Sareth ahead of her, practically whipping
the woman along.
 Vahis spared another glance. Melaka’s left leg had caught
fire, and gave out beneath her. Her scream rose to a high
keening, almost like a whistle. Flesh and leather blistered.
Tumbling to the ground, the aelf shrieked and writhed. As
the hungry flames peeled her flesh away, the rest of them
sprinted on. Finally her shrieks cut off. She went still.
They slowed to a stop and looked back. As if sated, the
flames cut off with a snap.
A perfect ash silhouette lay on the floor, and when a
breath of air brushed through the chamber, the ash
collapsed. Not even her bones remained.
‘May Khaine forgive her for such an ignoble death,’ Vahis
said, as the others looked on in horror.
They turned towards her, eyes wide. Sareth shook with
fury and seemed about to speak, but Vahis cut her off.
‘This death would not have earned her a place in Khaine’s
halls,’ Vahis stated, her voice cold as stone. ‘One dies in
war, or not at all.’
‘Any of us could have been caught in that,’ Sareth said.
‘This is true,’ Vahis replied. ‘But we weren’t, and she was.
That is all that matters. Death is for the weak, not the
strong.’ She turned and began to walk down the hall. ‘Come
– now.’
The others glanced at each other, but made no move to
follow. Vahis looked back.
‘What is it?’ she hissed. ‘Do not tell me that you are all too
moved by sympathy to continue.’
Nobody spoke. They knew better than to provoke her ire
with soft words, even if they felt them, and they were not
about to lose face in front of the others. Even that word
sympathy was borrowed from their softer city-dwelling
cousins.
‘Lead us on,’ Sareth said, bowing her head.
As the Daughters ran down corridors, they tried to mark
the subtle differences in stone and light to navigate. But it
was difficult. Every hall seemed the same, smooth and
square, filled with corpses of every sort. The cultists stank,
as if their blood were perfumed, reeking like sweet vomit.
The defenders had made them pay for every step.
Finally, they turned a corner and found themselves looking
upon Melaka’s ashes once more.
‘You have led us in a circle,’ Sareth said.
‘She can’t have,’ Avara said. ‘Not by the route we took.’
‘Then how are we back here?’ Thesobhe said.
‘I think I know,’ Vahis said. ‘We can work this out. The
duardin built this place, and as much as our people might
deny it, they have a way with stone and metal we do not.
We just have to understand how they think.’
‘I do not see the need to know how such a weak species
thinks,’ Sareth said. ‘Why do you?’
Vahis turned. ‘Drop the pretence, young one. If you wish
to challenge me, do so. Say the words, draw your sciansá.
Please.’
Sareth looked at her and a sheen of sweat appeared on
her face. Then she looked away.
‘Now hold still,’ said Vahis. ‘Before I carve out your
tongue. The only reason that you are not dead is because
the Slaaneshi are here.’
‘Our queen sent me here,’ Sareth said. ‘Or have you
forgotten? If you are too aged to do this, say so. And we will
help you–’
‘If that is what you wish to do, stand still and be quiet,’
Vahis said softly. ‘And listen. Your hearing is doubtless better
than mine at this point.’
They waited for a time, looking around, ears pricked.
Then Avara gasped. ‘I hear a ticking sound.’
Vahis winced. She had not heard anything. She swallowed
the noxious mix of injured pride and existential dread and
forced a smile onto her face. ‘Well done,’ she said.
There was a strange motion, like a lifting deep in their
bodies, and the entrance behind them slid away. Momentum
swept through them and then pushed them as the hall
moved. Beads from a broken necklace rolled around the
floor, and a bottle spun then clinked against a wall. Another
opening appeared on the opposite side, sliding into place.
‘The entire maze moves,’ Avara said, her eyes wider than
usual. ‘That is clever. Like a puzzle box.’
‘We will have to mark our way,’ Vahis said, ‘leave
directions for ourselves. Otherwise we will be trapped here
for days.’
So they did. Here Khaine’s name on the underside of a
sconce, there a curse tucked down near the floor, a
benediction here amongst foul Slaaneshi scrawls just to
keep oriented.
Then, a crashing bang echoed down to them from
somewhere.
Guns. Uncouth and common weapons, they required little
skill to wield. Indeed, they were almost as obtrusive as the
Stormbloods. But that meant some human defenders had
found a place that they could defend.
‘I bet a human knows this place,’ Vahis said with a wicked
grin. ‘Let’s go help. They’ll be grateful.’
She turned and jogged towards the sound, the others
following. They came across a corridor, the floor strewn with
corpses of Slaaneshi tribesmen. The walls were torn and
pock-marked from shots and an acrid smell lingered on the
air. Some of the corpses grinned until their lips had split, as
if their gory deaths had brought about unspeakable ecstasy.
‘They were running towards the end of the corridor,’
Cheba said, ‘that way.’
The aelves delicately picked through the corpses. Towards
the end, the bodies thinned, becoming even more
mutilated. Limbs lay scattered, torsos blown apart. Their
dexterity had been wasted in the close confines and their
armour was not enough to block the shot hurled at them.
‘There may not be many defenders left, but there were
evidently enough to defend the corridor here,’ Avara said,
kneeling on the ground. ‘Looks like they formed a line.’ She
touched something on the ground, and her fingertips came
away covered in a black powder. ‘Riflemen, most likely.
Where are they now?’
‘Seems that you have the same thought that I do,’ Vahis
said.
‘And that is?’ Sareth said.
‘Where we find resistance, we find the other human
leader,’ she said. ‘This Captain Jened.’
Avara crept over the floor, searching. ‘One of them was
wounded,’ she said, noting drops of blood that stood out
from the rest of the gore. ‘Almost did not see it. The trail
goes that way, to that wall.’
‘That would make sense, why not have secret doors on
top of everything else?’ Vahis said. ‘There is only one way to
find out.’
Vahis examined the wall, running her hands over the
stone. The others watched her, their faces etched with
doubt. As much as Vahis understood it, she was irked by
their constant lack of confidence in her. She was old, not
dead! But she would prove herself to them again later, when
they weren’t surrounded by the foul worshippers of their
greatest enemy.
A small crease in the stone finally revealed itself to her
searching fingers. A button so flush with the wall it was
nearly invisible. She pressed it and something turned over
with a hard click. She pushed on the wall and a door opened
soundlessly, moving back with eerie smoothness. A deep
blackness loomed beyond.
Vahis took a step forward.
A perfume assaulted her nose, so pungent her eyes
watered. A terrible musky scent that reeked of sweet
incenses and succulent fruits filtered through the body. Her
sight blurred; muscles slackened. The sudden impulse to lie
prone and simply breathe in the luscious perfume almost
took her to her knees.
‘Khaine, grant me your hate,’ she whispered.
 ‘We did not expect you, sweet ones,’ a double voice
purred. It was both male and female and yet, at the same
time, neither of those.
Vahis hesitated.
‘Oh, how we missed you.’

Animal-like eyes glowed in the dark. Terrible creatures

moved with immortal precision. Slinking forwards on bird-
thin legs, their eerie, boneless bodies oozed a grotesque
sensuality that was both feminine and masculine, and
everything in between. They ran clawed hands over their
bodies, slicing into their own pale skins. Black tongues
writhed in the air, and they gasped and moaned with horrid
delight. Eyes with the slotted pupils of goats lingered upon
Vahis under long lashes as they sighted fresh prey.
‘We know you of old,’ the daemonettes purred. ‘Come
back to us. Come, sweet ones, let us carve our love into
your flesh.’
There was a moment of terror, a spike of soul-deep fear. A
moment when Vahis’ memories, of moist flesh, bloody
razors and loving words, seeped from somewhere deep
within her. Heart hammering in her chest, the brief flash of
fear ignited a torrent of rage.
The daemonettes bolted forward.
‘In Khaine’s name, I will teach you hatred!’ Cheba
shrieked, cracking her kruip-lash. The creatures bounded off
the walls, knives and claws scraping its surface. One flipped
over Vahis, slicing at her with a long clawed arm. The
gleaming chitinous blade caught her across the shoulder,
opening a paper-thin line that started to bleed profusely.
Another leaped at Cheba like a shadehawk, its taloned
feet outstretched. With a flick of her wrist, Cheba lashed at
the daemonette as it fell, opening a sharp slit across the
creature’s face. She howled with glee as it crashed to the
floor, clutching at the wound. Then, eyes shining with
murder, Cheba hammered her single sciansá into the thing’s
temple.
The battle raged as daemonette and aelf matched each
other blow for blow, flipping and whirling around each other.
Daemonic knives that glimmered like mercury clashed
against razor-sharp sciansá. Vahis danced away as a
daemonette chased her, slicing at her with its glittering
claw. Even as she ducked and parried against the thing, the
daemonette nicked her here and there – a cut on her thigh,
a slice across her collarbone.
‘You are sluggish,’ the thing cooed. ‘Dull, fumbling. Old.
You are coming back to us, yes. Coming back to us…’
It kicked at her head, talons flashing. Vahis snapped her
head back. Without thinking, she grabbed the thing’s ankle
and slashed upwards, the heavy sciansá shearing through
the back of its knee. The blade sliced into tendon and bone
as if it were made of soft clay. Squealing, the daemonette
scrabbled back on its mutilated leg. Vahis hewed off its head
in a clean swipe and the body and head disintegrated into a
sparkling glutinous mass.
Someone shrieked in fear and pain, and Vahis whipped
around. A daemonette had Avara pinned to the ground and
was slicing into her face with a needle-thin knife.
‘I only do it because I miss you so,’ the daemonette
purred, and then sank the knife into her eye.
The aelf screamed. Blood soaked her cheeks and hair.
Vahis leaped over her and hacked the daemonette’s head
from its body. It disintegrated into slurry, its face still locked
in a rictus.
Avara pulled the knife from her eye with a scream.
Clutching her face with one hand, she struggled to stand,
still holding onto her sciansá in the other.
‘Thesobhe, Cheba, protect Avara,’ Vahis shouted above
the din.
 The other two aelves obeyed, battering back the
daemonettes as the creatures sensed Avara’s pain and
moved in to taste it. Watching the whirling battle, Vahis
dragged Avara onto her feet.
‘Keep steady,’ Vahis said. ‘One of the priestesses will
restore you, I promise. Then Khaine will smile on you, and
you will have your revenge.’
Avara nodded shakily, her other eye watering.
Vahis quickly bound the wound with a cloth as the others
drove the remaining daemonettes back.
Come back to us. They always said the same thing.
Always. And it would not have been so terrible if there was
not a small part of Vahis, of every aelf, that felt tempted to
listen.
Together, Thesobhe and Sareth rent another daemonette
apart as Cheba mowed through yet another, shouting
prayers. Then, silence slammed in as the last daemonette
collapsed back to the Realm of Chaos.
Another rippling bang echoed down to the sisters. The
others perked like hunting hounds, hearing a shout followed
by another thunderous crack, dim with distance, but
nonetheless recognisable.
‘Our humans,’ Sareth said.
Vahis and the others slunk down the ichor-slicked corridor
and came to a wide open chamber supported by tall square
pillars. The air was hazy with gunsmoke and heavy with the
stench of Slaaneshi dead. At one end, a line of gaudily
dressed humans knelt behind a stone barricade. Another
line of humans stood behind them, rifles held level. They
were grizzled and blood-stained, haggard with exhaustion,
yet they held steady.
Before them lay dozens of corpses – human mostly,
though Vahis noticed the occasional noxious slurry. A
churning crowd of cultists, utterly blind to everything but
the chance to sate their vile hungers, surged from an
entrance opposite to where Vahis and her sisters stood.
 Behind the human gunmen, a short woman bawled orders.
Upon her greying hair she wore a vast hat decorated in
brilliant metallic feathers. In her hand was a thin sabre. Her
skin was white as fine parchment and laced with blue veins.
An Ulgu native through and through, her eyes were black
and cutting as a jet knife.
‘Keep tight!’ she said, her voice grating. ‘Sigmar alone
knows what these lunatics will do to you, and you sure as
Khaine don’t want to find out what that is. Fire at will!’
The rifles roared; wreathes of smoke burst violently
upwards and shot whizzed through the air, ricocheting off
the pillars and walls. The sulphurous stench of the guns
overwhelmed the smell of the dead. Running cultists
screamed and slewed to the ground. Yet for all the
devastation, Vahis foresaw that the riflemen would be
overrun in mere moments. The cultists were rushing over
their dead, hands reaching for still-living flesh.
‘Daughters, kill them all,’ Vahis intoned.
As one, the sisters shrieked their prayers. The cultists
balked, eyes popping as the sisters rushed out of the dark.
With shrieking glee, the Daughters cut down the remaining
cultists like wheat.
‘Draw sabres!’ the woman bellowed. ‘Into them, lads!’
The humans dropped their rifles, drew their thin blades
and lunged into the fray without hesitation. Suddenly
overwhelmed by sheer numbers, the Slaaneshi cultists cast
about and attempted to bolt, but in their panic they started
to clog up their only exit. Trampling and clawing, they tore
at each other as they tried to escape death.
Between them, human and aelf slaughtered their mutual
enemy, cutting and stabbing until none survived. Even then,
they picked through the bodies, piercing hearts and eyes
just to be certain their foes were dead.
Their leader stood very still for a long moment, then she
took a deep breath and walked up to Vahis.
 ‘Welcome, I’m glad you could make it,’ she said. ‘Thank
you for getting us out of that, we were making our last
stand. We didn’t think anyone was going to come. But you
always do surprise us.’
Vahis blinked, before it dawned on her and she
understood the human’s assumption. She thought the
Daughters of Khaine had been sent to assist them. Aelves
dealt with situations far more efficiently than their weaker
human allies, and occasionally arrived to fix what the
humans alone could not. And humans, inferior as they were,
seemed to assume their arrival was brought about by
sorcery, or simple providence. Vahis thought it best in this
case to let the woman keep believing that.
The humans gathered together, muttering to each other.
Their eyes were wide with alarm and they looked the aelves
over with blatant suspicion. Normally, Vahis would have
been able to hear what they said, but their words were
muffled beyond her comprehension. One of the men caught
the captain’s attention and he whispered in her ear, his eyes
fixed fearfully on Vahis.
‘They don’t like us,’ Avara said in their own tongue. ‘We
horrify them. And they suspect our motives. They are
comparing us to the dead cultists.’
‘It is because we are covered in blood,’ Vahis said.
Avara glanced at her, her brow furrowed.
‘Remember, humans are much closer to beasts than we
are. So they have less control over their fears.’
‘Is that why you speak so sweetly to them?’
‘Yes, a calm human is useful, as you probably noticed in
Azyr. A scared human is an animal. And a dangerous one at
that.’
Vahis coughed, pulling the human’s attention back to her.
‘Forgive us.’ She spoke in the Azyrian tongue, ignoring
Sareth’s hiss of disgust. ‘Our queen only recently learned of
your predicament.’
‘What are you doing?’ Thesobhe whispered.
 ‘Silence,’ Vahis said, keeping her face pleasant. She
turned back to the human. ‘We are here now, though we
have already had casualties of our own. You are Jened, I
presume?’
‘Pleased to meet you. I am indeed Captain Jened. I
command here now,’ the woman replied. ‘These are the
Sixth Zoshian Rifles, what is left of them. Though, I confess,
I am baffled that you know who I am.’
‘Your other captain told us,’ Vahis said. ‘He has perished.’
‘Damn,’ Jened said, shaking her head. ‘And you are?’
‘I am Vahis, and these are Sareth, Avara, Thesobhe. The
masked one is Cheba,’ she said.
Cheba’s mask stretched into a sneer and she skulked
back, twisting her kruip-lash in her hands.
Jened furrowed her brow. ‘We should leave this room. The
Slaaneshi seem to follow sound more than anything. Come,
this way.’
She gestured to the entrance at the back of the chamber.
Vahis joined her at her side. The others fell behind their
leaders, but not too close. Instead, the two groups of
warriors eyed each other warily. It had always been thus,
and while other peoples might be offended, here all were
from Ulgu. Mistrust was the standard.
Still, Jened told Vahis everything she had seen, answering
her questions as best she could. Her account painted a
frightening picture.
‘The Twins,’ Vahis said. ‘That is interesting. Normally, they
have only one leader. One master, and endless servants.
I’ve not heard of this particular pair. Do you know anything
about them?’
‘Pallador-Prime Vegus went out to learn more weeks ago
but he has not returned, same as the rest,’ said Jened.
‘What we do know is that they are new to this region, and
they seek their god. One of the Twins is a massive brute,
insanely strong and tough. The other seems weaker but has
strange powers – a deadly scream. All I know is that even
their daemonic followers seem afraid of them. I wish I knew
more but, well, we’ve been running for our lives.’ She took a
deep, weary breath.
‘It is all right,’ Vahis said. ‘I understand. Still, it’s strange,
why would they come here?’
Jened shrugged. ‘For the artefact I suppose.’
Vahis put on a curious expression, feigning ignorance.
‘Oh?’
‘Though I don’t understand why they want the thing. Near
as we can tell, it does nothing. But then, it is one of their
treasures, it has their marks, anyway. Maybe it works for
them.’
‘It is a Slaaneshi artefact?’ Vahis said, just to be sure it
was the right one.
‘Yes, it is,’ Jened replied. ‘Fortunately, our priest Edvard is
confident that he can destroy it.’
An icy chill rolled through Vahis. Since when could humans
achieve such a thing?
‘Destroy it?’ she said, as lightly as she could.
‘Of course, it is what we do here,’ Jened said, taking out
her watch, glancing at it then slipping it away again. ‘It took
many years, but we have the tools to hold and eventually
destroy certain Chaos artefacts that come into our
possession. You don’t know this? The aelf who brought us
this one seemed to.’
‘What?’ Vahis said. ‘The Stormcasts did not bring it to
you?’
‘No,’ Jened said. ‘According to her they all perished.’
‘What was this one’s name?’ Vahis said.
‘Kolviri.’
For a moment, Vahis was confused, but then she shook
her head in admiration. ‘Interesting, I must have been
mistaken,’ she said. ‘I am sorry to hear about the
Stormcasts. They are powerful warriors.’
A comfortable lull settled between them and they walked
in silence. Vahis considered asking more questions but
Jened seemed cunning enough to see through her feigned
sympathies. Vahis drifted back to Avara as Jened checked
her own men.
‘It was Relath who brought the relic here,’ she said quietly.
‘Kolviri and Relath use the same rune. Clever. Why bring it
here to have me come and retrieve it, potentially causing a
schism between our peoples? I’m going to gut that witch.
She is playing games with me. Or Lilithan is. Either way.’
‘But what’s the point of this game?’ Avara said. ‘Why have
you do this?’
Vahis frowned. In light of what she had discovered,
Avara’s question rang out. Could she trust her doubts to the
youngster? It had been many years since she had shared
her inner thoughts with anyone. Still, in this game that was
being played, apparently at her expense, she needed allies.
And not just in battle, but in thought. Avara had a nose for
scheming where Vahis did not. Maybe. Just share a little.
She took a deep breath as if she were leaping off a cliff,
and said, ‘I am not sure any more.’

Vahis’ mind burned with questions as Avara prattled on,

speculating. Vahis had been right, her young sister did have
a mind for plots. Yet there were questions that Avara did not
know to ask. Was the ineffectiveness of Vahis’ baths more
than it seemed? What if it was not merely age, but
sabotage? Was Relath behind it? Lilithan? Some other
unknown foe?
They walked on, moving down through the levels with
ease now that Jened led them. She was utterly confident, as
if she had lived in the place all her life. And maybe she had.
The cultists seemed to have a nose for them though,
attacking in rabid packs, reeking of desperation. Between
the riflemen and the Daughters, they ensured that none of
the enemy lived to report their whereabouts.
 Vahis drove herself onward through the pain and
exhaustion. She would not stop now, if only to find out what
the game was. It made no sense, this scheme.
Avara walked beside her, bursting with curiosity.
‘Relath was clearly working on her own,’ Vahis said out
loud. ‘But why give the humans the item just to have me
take it back? Any thoughts?’
Avara’s step skipped a beat. ‘What if–’ she started and
then stopped.
‘Speak, I asked for your thoughts,’ Vahis said.
‘What if this is the wish of the Oracle?’
The others turned to look at Avara as if she had grown a
second head.
‘That is impossible,’ Thesobhe said. ‘Why would the Oracle
involve herself?’
‘I agree, I am not that important,’ Vahis said. ‘I am a great
warrior but that is all. I have no real ambition. At least, the
sort of ambition that would warrant the High Oracle’s
attention. She cannot be involved. This is on Relath alone.’
Cheba’s kruip-lash creaked as she worked it in her hands,
losing patience with the lot of them. ‘It is a curiosity,’ the
Sister of Slaughter growled, her mask snarling as if in
emphasis. ‘But it is also a moot point. Whatever plans that
this handmaiden had for Vahis, I doubt that the devotees of
Slaanesh were a part of it. Killing them all is our goal here.
Nothing else matters.’
‘Nothing?’ Sareth said, her eyes narrowing at Vahis.
‘Thank you for getting to the heart of the matter, Cheba,’
Vahis said. ‘All our questions will be answered later. Cheba is
correct. Whatever my original mission was supposed to be,
keeping the artefact out the cultists’ hands is paramount.’
‘For now,’ Sareth said. ‘Our queen was not so confident in
your purpose.’
A chill shivered through Vahis. So, the order to assist her
was just a cover. It seemed a bit blatant for Lilithan though.
Normally, she was more subtle, but then those who were
willing to move against Vahis were on a very short list.
Perhaps Sareth and Melaka had been the only ones who
would take up such a duty.
More likely, Sareth was here to assassinate her, not spy on
her. And likely die in the attempt. That made more sense.
She was too blunt an instrument for anything else.
Vahis glanced at Cheba, then Thesobhe. They were not
supposed to be here. The only reason Sareth hadn’t
attempted the assassination was because of those two, who
were apparently neutral, interested only in killing cultists
and retrieving the artefact as a noble duty. Cheba in
particular would not tolerate any interference in this goal.
A stalemate, then. Though that obviously did not stop
Sareth from posturing.
‘Is there something wrong?’ Jened asked in a tone that
suggested she did not like being shut out of the
conversation by language. She slid her watch back into her
pocket.
‘Other than the obvious, no,’ Vahis said. ‘We were just
discussing some internal politics.’
‘I see,’ Jened said, ‘I have the feeling I am better off not
knowing.’
Vahis smiled. At least the human seemed smarter than
most.
She glanced at Sareth, now understanding that her rival
was little more than a piece on a game board. Hag queens
played their games on the same level as the handmaidens
and frequently battled with them for access and standing
with Morathi. So whose piece was she?
Vahis rolled her shoulder, the bones cracking
uncomfortably. All this thinking irritated her. She missed the
simple days before this mess, when she knew who her
enemies were and where they all stood.
Trapped in the prison of her doubts, Vahis barely noticed
as her surroundings changed. The colours of the maze
shifted subtly, the air stirring as the walls moved around
them. The stench of death lessened a little.
The presence of the humans irked Vahis. Having to
depend on them, being reliant on the judgement of such
short-sighted beasts, made her skin crawl. Jened in
particular irritated her. The captain was not a young woman,
yet – unlike Vahis – she seemed utterly at home in her
ageing body, apparently ignoring every ache, every grinding
joint, every moment of blurry vision. It was disgusting, that
placid resignation. Vahis wanted nothing more than to crawl
out of her wrinkled hide and burn it; she wanted to shatter
Jened’s complacency, to see her howl and shriek in the face
of creeping death.
A hiss rose behind her and she looked back. Sareth glared
at her as if her gaze had become knives and she could
murder Vahis with them.
‘What is it now?’ Vahis said.
‘You might have fooled the others, but you haven’t fooled
me,’ Sareth whispered. ‘This lie that Relath sent you on a
mission here… None of us saw her at the temple. Don’t you
think we would have greeted her? There would have been
feasts for days if one of the handmaidens visited us.
Instead, we only have your word and this idiot’s,’ she
nodded towards Avara, ‘that she even exists.’
Avara’s placid mask fell, and a hard, unforgiving edge
appeared. ‘The human saw her,’ she said. ‘And we
Daughters know that they can’t tell a lie worth anything.’
‘Humans are animals,’ Sareth said. ‘They can barely tell
the difference between a witch-aelf and an Idoneth. This aelf
could have been anyone. Why would a handmaiden bother
with this creaking crone?’
Vahis frowned. For all her faults, Sareth’s instincts were
aggravatingly sharp. She missed little that happened around
her, even if she could not at once put it all together. Vahis’
contempt blossomed into a burning loathing. She turned to
stalk away, but Sareth reached out and grabbed her arm.
Vahis snatched one of Sareth’s fingers and twisted – not
enough to break it, but enough to make the threat clear. She
tempered her grin as she noted the humans watching with
wide eyes. Jened stood still, though her hand strayed
towards her pistol. Vahis pushed Sareth’s finger to make her
wince.
‘Please do provoke me into killing you,’ she said. ‘Break all
discipline in front of strangers. Indeed, dare to touch me
without my permission. Keep going. Try it again, please.’
‘You have no idea how much I hate you,’ Sareth
whispered. ‘You’ve stood in my way all my life, resting on
past victories even as you grow soft and mewling. When
was the last time you did anything worthy of the outrageous
esteem others heap on you?’
‘So that is it,’ Vahis said, scoffing. ‘I do not care. You have
yet to impress me, and therefore your opinion means
nothing to me. Now…’ Vahis grabbed Sareth’s face, her nails
digging into her cheeks. Then she leaned in close. ‘You will
maintain your discipline in front of allies, as that discipline is
the will of Khaine. That is our contribution to his song and
our defence against the Clawing One. It is this reputation
that is vital to our way of war. So, next time you feel like
being petty and rebellious, I will puncture your gut and
leave you to fester where you lie.’
Sareth swallowed and took a deep quivering breath to
steel herself. ‘I am not afraid of you. The reek of conspiracy
is all about you. I will find out why we are really here – and
then, I will kill you.’
Vahis smirked. ‘Of course you’re not afraid,’ she said,
patting Sareth on the cheek. ‘Of course not. Let’s go.’
She glanced at Jened, who watched them with knowing
eyes. That one saw far too much. For all her mayfly
existence, Jened’s advanced age in human years had clearly
taught her to read the subtleties of situations. Or perhaps,
Vahis considered, the Daughters were just not as subtle as
they thought.
 As Vahis opened her mouth to speak to her, she caught a
whiff of something. A sweetness like overly ripe fruit, a spice
that stung the eyes. It was not the pungent aroma of a
daemonette, but something worse. Mortal sweat
undermined the scent, a faint sour note.
Vahis barely brought her sciansá up in time to block the
shimmering blade wielded by a pale purple blur. Pain
flashed across her arm, hot and seething like acid. Another
bolt of pain flicked across her nose. Then a blow to the
stomach sent her tumbling to the floor.
‘You’ve led me on a merry chase, mouse,’ a shrill voice
piped like the notes of a flute. ‘And you’ve found some true
sweetmeats for me. I so love receiving gifts. Come,
Sigmarite stooge, give me the other key to this wretched
place. We haven’t much time.’
Someone in stately court shoes stepped over Vahis, tall
heels clicking. A thick white braid swung, complementing
glittering white armour spattered artfully with red blood.
Jewels on fine silver chains spun and flashed in their dozens
from every limb. A sabre gleamed, oozing like liquid metal.
One of the Twins. A champion of Slaanesh well on his way to
daemonhood.
Vahis’ head swam as she tried to breathe, choking and
gagging. Blood trickled over her lips and she finally
managed to take a deep but polluted breath. Her lungs
wilted under the stench of the Slaaneshi lord. The fugue
smothered her, crushing her to the floor. Her vision blurred
and darkened around the edges. Her muscles slackened,
and her body became heavier even as her mind battered
about like a bird in a cage.
The others fell back before him, aelf and human alike,
eyes wide in fear. The only one who did not was Cheba. Her
steel mouth opened, revealing a great maw of fangs. Her
kruip-lash sang as she struck at the creature, flicking that
knife edge at his face.
He ducked back, laughed and drew nearer.
 ‘Look at what we have,’ another Slaaneshi cultist crooned
right by Vahis’ head.
Someone touched her shoulder experimentally, their
fingers slick with slime. It was as if they needed to assure
themselves that she was real. A gross slurping sound
gurgled by her ear as someone licked their lips.
A primordial fear rattled in the foundations of her soul.
Never be taken alive! Never go back to them!
Get up!
A hiss. The crashing bang of rifles. Swords hit flesh, feet
pounded over the floor. A human screamed. The kruip-lash
whistled. Vahis snatched her sciansá from the floor and
stabbed out blindly. The blade sank into flesh up to the hilt.
Someone gurgled and then slumped over next to her.
Her eyes flicked open, her vision still murky. There was
red, so much red. Blood flew as mercury blades flashed and
hissed through flesh. The cultists gibbered obscene prayers
as they killed, hoping for some sign of their goddess in the
entrails of their victims. As always, they sought out the
aelves, who flipped and slid away from them, light as fog.
Purring, the Slaaneshi lord stabbed a rifleman through the
chest as he tried to drag a pistol from his belt. Yet the man
did not die. Instead he writhed, his veins blackening, eyes
bulging. His screams turned ecstatic, even joyful, as vile
poison rattled through his veins.
The other humans charged as the preening lord leered at
them, twisting the blade inside their comrade.
Something broke loose in Vahis’ mind, something older
than she was. That furious terror born before she had first
breathed air. Deeper than instinct, uglier than taint. It boiled
out of her soul to stain her mind like the sea rising to
swallow the land. Then it sank back down through the
chambers of her memory, slipping back out of her thoughts,
leaving only the terror of its passing.
Vahis spun up onto her feet and slashed into the pale lord
in front of her. The creature shrieked as the sciansá raked
across his back, scoring his armour. Jewels flew and
scattered over the floor.
‘I am Zelintha, and you will not touch me!’ he shrieked,
whirling around.
His piercing voice stabbed through her ears like a pick and
she staggered back, clenching her teeth. With a will of iron,
she kept up her guard instead of covering her ears in agony.
Daemonic metal banged off holy steel. Another blow
crashed into her, and she stumbled back.
There were so many little cuts and scrapes. The lord’s
miasma seethed over her, intensifying the petty stinging
wounds into a scorching agony, as if touched by a
cauterising brand. The pain shivered through her veins into
her joints where the old ache of age lived. Sweat slicked her
skin. With each parry, every riposte, every duck, every
dodge, the pain grew worse until she burned as if she were
on fire.
Through this pain, she fought him. Forcing sluggish
muscles to tighten and relax, she slashed in with her
sciansá. The bang and scrape of swords rattled off in a near
continuous staccato. They chased each other up and down
the corridor, their movements so well timed their duel could
have been mistaken for a dance.
‘You were doubtless so beautiful once,’ Zelintha piped. ‘I
can see its remnants in your ragged countenance. Will they
put you down out of mercy, like an old dog?’
Vahis ground her teeth, muscles shuddering. She hated
him. The Slaaneshi cultists had a terrible way of making one
value their perverse thoughts, of infiltrating one’s esteem
with a mere glance. This creature was no different. It was as
if he had ferreted out the fractures in her will.
She darted in, slashing at him.
‘They’re going to kill you because you remind them of the
fate that you sweet ones all share,’ he said, pivoting away
from her. ‘Every second is a step closer to our embrace.’
 ‘Perhaps, but you will see your vile god first,’ Vahis
snarled.
She stabbed at his face and he flinched back. With a quick
step, she struck at his flank and hooked the straps between
his breastplate and backplate. The exotic leather parted and
the armour flapped loose, banging and scraping like a falling
smithy. Underneath lay pale, slimy flesh.
He flushed with fury, his sensuous grace suddenly turned
to a comedic cacophony of movement and sound. ‘How dare
you!’ he shrieked. ‘No one does this to me!’
Vahis chuckled mirthlessly as she forced her body to
straighten, her hip aching.
‘All of you preening creatures are the same,’ she said. ‘You
hold only the illusion of strength. You have no true fury.
You’re pathetic.’
He staggered, his blade held at the ready. Eyes wide and
bulging, he took one step back, and then another. His face
twitched with daemonic fury.
‘How can you even move?’ he said, his voice shaking. ‘You
should be rolling on the floor in agony. My aura works on
everyone. Why not you, you ancient, wrinkled crone?’
But Vahis had no fear of him. And he knew it.
She stalked forward, holding steady through sheer will
alone, quickly planning the moment when she would claim
both his heart and his head. Slowly, she shifted from one
stance to the next with all the grace of an asp, her sciansá
shining like fangs. His black eyes followed her as she struck.
Bursting forward, she snapped a sciansá at his soft flank.
He blocked the blow, reaching with his other hand. Shifting
her grip, she hooked his sabre and yanked it aside. He
jerked back as she slashed the other at his neck. The
sciansá dug into the soft flesh under his jaw, the edge
ripping his flesh, tearing the cartilage of his throat.
His scream frothed in his mouth, and he spat up a gout of
blood. ‘You wretched slime, insect,’ he gurgled, cringing
away from her. ‘Worm! I will make you pay for ever crossing
my path. I promise you that.’
He pelted away, leaving his followers to their fate. They
fled after him, wailing like children after a parent. With keen-
eyed relish, the human garrison fired their rifles into their
backs. Many tumbled to the ground and did not rise again.
Despite her pain, Vahis cackled in glee.
‘Wretch! I am stronger than you,’ she roared at him. ‘Go
and tell your sibling they are next! You will all fear me in the
end. Do you hear? It will be Vahis that sends you to the hell
that is your master’s gut!’
This was what it was like to have life again. This was a
humiliation the cultist was not likely to forget, and she had
been the one to give it to him. Suddenly, her aches and
pains did not matter so much, nor did the sagging skin or
grey hairs.
Vahis smiled. To be hated by such as he. That was a goal
in and of itself. It was part of their holy creed: her enemies
must hate her, because that meant that they feared her.
And the fear of a Slaaneshi cultist was difficult to earn. Yet
she had done it, even in her weakened state.
‘Mewling creature,’ she spat.
Behind her, the humans had gathered around their fallen
comrade, Zelintha’s victim. Even dead, his corpse moved,
constricting and splintering as muscles pulled tight. He
shrank like a paper caught in a fire, until he lay in an
unrecognisable knot on the floor.
‘Gentlemen, ladies, there’s nothing we could have done,’
Jened said gently. ‘Load up. By Sigmar’s eyes, we need to be
on our way.’
They did so, calmly loading their rifles in an almost
mechanical fashion. A hardness had entered their eyes. A
calm that Vahis did not like. Something was wrong. They
stared where they once feared to look.
Jened turned to her riflemen with a cough. ‘Soldiers. I
think it’s time we dropped the pretence.’
 They suddenly stepped back and raised their rifles at the
Daughters, their eyes hard as stone.
‘What are you doing?’ Vahis snapped.
‘What does it look like?’ Jened said. ‘Betraying you.’

‘I don’t speak much of your language,’ Jened said, pointing

her pistol at them. ‘But I understand enough to know that
you’re lying to me. Sigmar’s Hammer, you’re not even
truthful with your own people.’
‘Are you serious?’ Vahis snapped.
‘The reputation of your people precedes you,’ Jened said.
‘A pack of lying vipers.’
‘Oh really?’ Vahis said. ‘I have to say that I am genuinely
impressed by this little display of courage. But you will lead
me to that relic – I do not care how, but you will do it.’
‘What are you really here for?’ Jened said.
‘One of the High Oracle’s handmaidens has ordered us to
retrieve the artefact for our queen, Morathi,’ Vahis said. ‘I
am afraid that I cannot allow you to destroy it.’
The lie flew easily from her lips, as if she believed it
herself.
‘What would she want with it?’ Jened said, cocking the
hammer back.
‘That does not concern me,’ Vahis said, moving about in a
leisurely way. ‘I only obey.’
‘Well it concerns me,’ Jened said, aiming at Vahis’ head.
Opposite them, the aelves chuckled, twisting sciansá in
their hands. Cheba licked her steel lips. They breathed in,
knowing what was coming. And the humans knew it, too.
‘Give me that key, human,’ Vahis hissed. ‘These matters
no longer concern you.’
‘No, I don’t think so,’ Jened said. ‘Right now, you need me.
And the moment you don’t need us, we’re dead.’
 ‘Are you really going to risk the Slaaneshi cultists getting
the relic instead of either of us?’ Vahis said.
‘I have my duty,’ she said. ‘And it’s to see that relic
destroyed. And I will kill you to see it done.’
‘Do you think that I will give you a chance to shoot me?’
Vahis said, chuckling mirthlessly.
‘Unlike you,’ Jened said, ‘I am not afraid of dying.’
‘What?’
‘I can see it in your face.’
Be ready, Vahis signed to the others.
‘You are right,’ she said. ‘I do fear death. What is it that
you fear, captain? Brutality? I know you humans well,
unfortunately for you, and you are often moved by your
compassion. It’s what you think separates you from Chaos
and all the other monsters that haunt your dreams…’
Vahis needed to break the line of soldiers, as she had seen
the devastation that they could bring with just a pull of their
fingers. Her gaze swept over them, studying each in the
blink of an eye. Not that one. There – there is a strong one…
a small surly soldier with a worn hammer at his throat, held
steady. And next to him, nervous, trembling, a broken look
in his eye, stood her true victim.
That one will do well. She needed one that would bawl
and beg.
‘Go on your way, witch-aelf, and I will show you what
compassion is,’ Jened said. ‘I will show you my strength.’
‘Compassion is not strength, and here lies my point. What
compassion really does is make any army as weak as the
most pathetic snivelling member.’
Vahis darted to the short soldier as the line erupted with
noise and smoke. Shots whizzed past her but did not touch
her flesh. The acrid smoke blocked their sight as the raw
pandemonium of combat set in. Yet even in these tight
confines, the humans were not fast enough, not agile
enough to strike those that wore the sigil of the teth’sar.
Such blessings the sigil bestowed, gifts of endurance, sight
and most importantly speed.
Sareth and Thesobhe sheared through the garrison, the
humans screaming as they cut them down. They spun and
danced, severing necks and puncturing hearts. Her steel
face flat, Cheba went about her killing seemingly without
thought, as if she was going through her ritual stances back
at the temple. Blood flew in great arcs, humans tumbling to
the ground like broken dolls.
However, Avara struggled against a hardened veteran, his
blade slipping through her guard and piercing her arm. The
loss of the eye had clearly weakened her.
Cheba flinched as a bullet skipped off the cheek of her
mask.
With glee, Vahis whipped a sciansá across her victim’s
throat. Blood spurted across the face of the weaker man,
who flinched and chopped his rifle at her. She smashed the
rifle from his hands, wrapped an arm around his throat and
put a blade to it.
Jened pointed her pistol at her even as her hostage
started burbling for mercy.
‘You have no bullets,’ Vahis said. ‘You are even less of a
threat to me than you were a few minutes ago.’ Vahis flexed
her neck. ‘I want to see just how compassionate you
actually are. I’ll let you load your pistol, even. Will your
strength of will win out? Will you shoot through him to kill
me?’
As she expected, the man started burbling for mercy.
Jened’s face twisted in cold fury. For all her contempt for
human beings, Vahis had to respect the old one. She had
steel on her spine. Too bad she had been wasted in this
place instead of seeing her true potential.
Vahis stared right at her as Jened glared at her.
‘Witch,’ Jened said through tight lips. ‘Treacherous witch.’
Even as they talked, the battle raged on, metal crashing
around them. Jened dropped her empty pistol and snatched
another from behind her back. It was slim, almost fragile-
looking, but doubtless it would get the job done.
‘Well done,’ Vahis said, smiling. ‘Somehow, though, I think
that you will give that key to me. And you will show me how
to get to this vault of yours.’
‘Please,’ the man whimpered. ‘Don’t let her kill me,
captain. Please.’
Jened swallowed.
‘Give me the key, show me the way down,’ Vahis said.
‘Come. I will give you both a quicker death than the torture
the Twins would give you.’
‘You can’t be serious,’ Jened said. ‘That is your offer.
Dying? The horrible part is I think that you genuinely believe
that you are doing us a favour.’
With a final shriek, the last human died, Thesobhe letting
her limp body slip off her blade.
‘I am,’ Vahis said. ‘All your other comrades died fast, they
died easy. I will cut the tendons in this man’s legs and leave
him there. And you know what that would mean.’
‘How could you do that?’ Jened said. ‘Even your vile lot
must have limits.’
When Vahis was at her peak, it would have been true.
Vahis would not have threatened even these wretches with
such a fate. Somewhere in her darkest dreams, she knew
what would happen. Torture did not begin to cover it. Even
her own language, which had many words for death and
cruelty, did not describe the utter malice of Slaanesh.
To kill was the desire of Khaine, to purge the weak so that
they did not succumb to Slaanesh and destroy the strong.
That was their purpose as his Daughters. However, this
calling had no tolerance for cruelty without end, torture
without death. The Draichi Ganeth knew this most of all;
swift killing was the greatest gift they offered Khaine, as
suffering was a gateway to Slaanesh.
But in the face of every second which seemed to bring
some new ache, another grey hair, another forgotten word,
no threat or tool was beyond her use. To escape that fate,
there were lines that she was prepared to cross. Wasn’t that
one of the great hypocrisies of ageing?
Vahis shook herself free of such rancid thoughts.
‘To see Morathi’s will done,’ she said, channelling her
desperation into false sincerity, ‘I would do that. And more
besides. Do not think to test the depths of my loyalty to the
High Oracle. And do not think that you know what I will do to
you to learn your last secrets. Now give me that key.’
‘Shouldn’t you lie?’ Jened said. ‘Give us some hope that
we will walk out of this alive in order to fool us into
cooperating. Something more than a merciful death.’
‘I don’t think you realise how much of a mercy that is,’
Vahis said. ‘Besides, you should know your fate. Really, you
know it anyway. What would lying to you achieve?’
Jened crumpled before her. Her shoulders slumped and
her face sagged. It seemed as if she felt every single
moment of her short life then, and that burden was heavier
than she could bear. For a brief moment, Vahis had the
uncomfortable sensation of looking into a mirror.
‘Damn you,’ Jened muttered. The captain’s jaw tightened
and she lifted her head, tears standing in her eyes. The
pistol came up.
Something flickered over Vahis’ shoulder and slammed
into Jened’s chest.
Vahis shoved the hostage aside and darted forward, but
her hip flared with pain. She was slow as her leg crumpled
under her weight, causing her to stumble. The parrying
sciansá winked in the weak light as Jened toppled, the pistol
dropping from her limp hand.
Time slowed, every element sparkling with colour. One
stumbling step. Blood pumped out of the mortal wound,
staining her coat red. And then Jened laughed, a last
breathless chuckle as Vahis drove herself back onto her
feet, wincing.
‘I pity you,’ Jened said, her voice hoarse.
 Her last breath leaked from her lips and Vahis looked
behind her as Avara shrank back in fear, only one sciansá in
her hand.

‘You fool,’ Vahis said, jumping to her feet. She stalked over
as the younger Daughter quailed.
‘She was going to kill you,’ Avara said.
‘I needed that wretch alive,’ Vahis barked. ‘You are a
corpse!’
Vahis raised her blade to end the girl, but Cheba caught
her wrist.
‘Your judgement is clouded. She is right.’
If it had been anyone else, Vahis would have killed them.
However, as the Sister of Slaughter gazed at her, she knew
she was right.
‘She would have killed you,’ Cheba said. ‘She was going to
pass the test you set for her.’
‘You cannot do this to me,’ Vahis hissed at Jened’s corpse,
breathless. ‘You cannot deny me. Not this way.’ She
shivered.
It didn’t matter. She was stuck in this maze with allies who
were fools and enemies in equal measure. Her
disintegrating body could not take much more of this
punishment and every second ticked by with dread finality.
And there were the vile Slaaneshi that thirsted for their
souls and would hound them through the halls. No matter
where she turned, horrid bleak deaths waited for her.
‘What shall we do with him?’ Sareth asked, as the last
remaining human snivelled against the wall.
Vahis broke out of her reverie. Grinding her teeth
together, she squatted down next to Jened’s corpse. She
rifled through the human’s clothing but there was nothing
like a key as the humans knew them.
 ‘Khaine curse this human,’ Vahis said. ‘Unless I can find
the key, I will fail.’
And I will die in a miserable, helpless state.
The final wordless scrawl of the old hag’s account crept
into her mind. A withered hand dragging a quill across the
page as sentient thought crawled to a stop. The final
moment when a body became a mere sack of meat. When
her sister put her out of her misery, ending her muttering
forever. Or was it worse than that? Had her body ceased to
function but her mind remained sharp? What would Vahis’
rivals do to her if given such a chance? What would their
revenge be like?
Then she remembered that the human had constantly
checked her watch. It had seemed like a nervous habit, but
what if it wasn’t?
She reached into Jened’s blood-soaked pocket and pulled
it out. It seemed nothing more than a common steel-crafted
pocket watch. She held it up by the chain like a dead rat. It
spun in the air, shining dully in the light. A smear of blood
obfuscated the case. So scratched, so mundane. Bandits
would have tossed it aside as junk. She closed a fist over it
in preparation to throw it to the floor. Then she stopped.
‘Clever,’ she said, smiling. ‘Very clever.’
Bouncing it gently in her hand, something small rattled
inside. She opened the lid and studied the face with its
black hands. Something glimmered underneath it. A small
groove lay etched into the rim, and she pried it open with
one long nail.
The false face came up with a click. Behind it was a small
silver key, shorter than her thumb.
‘Well, there you are,’ she murmured, lifting the key out.
Calmly, she slipped it into a pouch at her belt. ‘You. I bet
you also know how to reach the central vault don’t you?’
He moaned in terror, but nodded all the same.
With the human leading them on they encountered no traps,
though the Slaaneshi cultists still stalked them. Their
perfumes filled every hall, and their gruesome handiwork
lurked around every corner. Slaanesh had granted them a
capacity for cruelty not unlike the Daughters of Khaine’s,
though with none of their superior discipline. And the further
down the halls the sisters went, the worse that cruelty grew.
It was as if they were descending into the Realm of Chaos
itself. Even Vahis felt disgusted by their horrors.
The physical suffering was terrible enough, bodies flensed
like butchered drevars, or wrenched into knots of limbs.
However, the worst were those that seemingly had nothing
wrong with them at all. Instead, they lay limp, their eyes
blinking and darting in their sockets, their breath leaking out
in unvoiced screams, sweat and waste soaking their clothes.
Their minds laboured under some ghastly torture that only
they could see, and they would live on for long days and
nights until at last their bodies gave out from the strain of it.
Vahis took to killing them when she saw them.
‘You are getting soft in your advanced age,’ Sareth said.
‘Am I?’ Vahis said. ‘Tell me. What fault would be great
enough that you would consign someone’s soul to
Slaanesh’s vile gullet? To this? Even I have my limits.’
‘It’s pathetic,’ Sareth said. ‘They were killed by Slaaneshi
cultists. They deserve everything coming to them for being
so weak.’
Vahis turned on Sareth, her disgust with her deepening.
For some reason, Sareth’s casual attitude towards the fate
of these mortal souls enraged her. Sareth had little
appreciation for what they fought against. She simply lacked
the imagination to understand the true threat of Slaanesh.
The scope of their struggle. For her, only aelf souls
mattered, never mind how all the races could be found in
the ranks of both Chaos and the dead.
‘Sigmar, Teclis, Alarielle,’ Vahis said. ‘I could not care less
who possesses which souls. But Slaanesh must be denied
every morsel. Every crumb. Even the smallest particle. Is
that not our purpose?’
‘It is, but is it yours?’ Sareth asked. ‘You are desperate, too
desperate. You have never been one that was eager to
please others, to perform tasks for others. What drives you?’
‘What drives me?’ Vahis repeated. ‘They call us Khaine’s
executioners. We cull the weak that would fall and
strengthen those that remain through whatever cruelties
that are required of us. It is for this purpose that we kill. To
deny Slaanesh a glut of weak, feeble souls. Until all that
remains is strength, and Slaanesh is destroyed.’
‘That does not answer the question,’ Sareth snapped.
‘Does it not?’ she said. ‘Let me ask you this. Why did
Lilithan send you here? Even in my… condition I can still kill
you, and you know it. Even if you find out this supposed true
purpose of mine, I will just kill you. She knew you wouldn’t
survive. So, why are you here?’
Sareth swallowed but Vahis saw the doubt creep in. The
wretch shied back, suddenly unwilling to look at her. Vahis
was grateful for the silence.
They set off again. Sareth still refused to look at her as
they moved deeper into the maze.
As Vahis mused, they delved deeper into the mountain.
The air became cold and dry and dust lined the edges of the
corridors. Bloody footprints and trails of clear slime marked
the floors. The artefact called to the cultists. And there were
a lot of them, easily outnumbering the Daughters. Was it
worth facing them? Surely there had to be worse things than
dying. She should just run, now. Find some quiet shadow
and let the cold hand of death find her. Yet, the idea that
Khaine would not pull her into his arms in the afterlife stilled
her thoughts. A quiet death was not a death for which
Khaine would embrace her. Instead, it was a death that
would hurl her into Slaanesh’s mouth.
There were many fears that were hidden so deep that it
seemed not even Morathi dared ferret them out. And the
greatest of these was simple: what if the Daughters were
not free of the taint, as they had been promised? What if
Morathi had been mistaken? What if their wretched souls
wended their way back to Slaanesh as soon as they slipped
their mortal bonds?
No other race lived with such a terrible fear. Even the
vampires with their endless gluttony for survival, enduring
terrible deprivations to eke out one more miserable moment
of undeath, did not fear death as the Daughters did. Nagash
was a heartless and greedy god, but the only thing he
threatened them with was an unknowable oblivion. There
was worse. So much worse.
Vahis snarled to herself. What was this wretched thinking?
She was not dead yet, though her body was giving way. How
it burned and ached. Joints ground and popped. All the tiny
wounds slowed her. With a growl, she pushed herself
onward.
Avara lifted a hand and they slowed. The reek of a
Slaaneshi host assaulted them, bringing up bile in their
throats. Choking, they stumbled, swallowing the coughs that
threatened to alert the monsters that were so close by.
Unnatural, warbling cries crashed down the corridor to
them. And a certain piercing voice stabbed through the air,
an assault on hearing itself.
‘Zelintha,’ Vahis snarled. ‘I should have killed him.’
‘Yes, you should have,’ Sareth said, her words biting.
They crept down the hall and found the next room was
massive, a vast killing field of flat stone without a scrap of
cover anywhere. High above, great white stalactites many
yards long hung down like ivory chandeliers, lending an
alien glow to the room. A wide circular abyss dominated the
chamber. A large stone block was suspended over it, held up
by great chains that gleamed hard as diamonds in the light.
The pit below was so deep that not even echoes escaped
from it. Curiously, a small bridge of silver led to one of the
block’s blank faces.
 Vahis glared at their human captive. ‘What is that?’
‘The block is hollow,’ the human said. ‘There’s a ritual
chamber inside. If something goes wrong, the block can be
cut loose and fall. No one could reach it down there. Not
that it matters.’
Between the sisters and their goal was an army of
writhing, oily bodies. The human cattle shrieked and slashed
themselves, their self-torture giving them no peace. Fiends
loped around the rim of the abyss, their distorted bodies
rippling with unnatural muscle, their too-human legs
splaying as they ran. Daemonettes lashed at the stone block
with their whips, slithering over its surface like insects.
‘Give it to us!’ they cried, like distraught lovers. ‘Please,
give us the essence of our mistress. It is all we ask.’
The block swayed as the Slaaneshi daemonettes hacked
and clawed at the stone. Even stone could not withstand the
weapons and flesh of daemonettes. Given enough time,
they would break into it, like cracking open a turtle shell for
the meat inside.
Beside Vahis, their human captive whimpered, a scream
working its way out of his throat.
‘Thank you for your help,’ Vahis said. Coolly, she slit his
throat before he made another sound. His corpse dropped,
blood pouring out. Then Vahis looked out of the shadows
into the chamber.
Near the edge of the chasm, there was an empty space
where not even the daemonettes dared to dance. And
standing within that space was an incongruous pair. One,
lean and white and cringing and the second something
entirely other, and far more deadly. The stranger was the
opposite of Zelintha. Where Zelintha had pale purple skin,
the other had skin of a deep dark blue. Where Zelintha’s
armour was white, his was black. Where Zelintha was slim,
this man was powerfully built and thunderous. Where
Zelintha carried a sword, this creature had an immense
steel mace strapped to his back. He had a terrible aura, a
cold inky air that radiated from him like the breath of a
blizzard.
‘Be generous, priest,’ the powerful man boomed at the
block. ‘We will give you such gifts if only you would come
out and speak with us. Though you are a heretic that
chooses another god, we come to you in good faith. I am
sure that we can come up with a compromise that works for
all.’
It was difficult not to be moved by that voice, by its
powerful, reasonable tones. By its cooing softness. Its
promise of a peaceful resolution. That was often the way of
Slaanesh, sweet promises of whatever the target might
desire most.
‘All this way and we must plead with this fool, Srayma,’
Zelintha’s voice piped.
Zelintha cringed by his brother, crouching like a beaten
dog. He no longer wore armour on his upper half, revealing
pallid, inhuman flesh. Strange bony protrusions stretched
out of his skin and muscle rippled weirdly across his torso.
He flinched as his brother looked at him.
‘Cease your mewling, elder brother,’ said the other. ‘It is
your fault that we are in this situation to begin with. You
failed to keep the relic from the Stormcasts and you failed to
bring me the Daughters.’
‘They are so beautiful, save for the one,’ piped Zelintha.
‘You should worry about that one more,’ Srayma said.
Then the man sniffed the air, breathing deep as if inhaling a
fine perfume. ‘Shouldn’t he, she-aelf?’
The whirling mass stopped their frenzy and stared with
eyes glassy and black as a leviathan’s. For a brief moment,
the Daughters nearly broke and ran. Memories rose, cloying
and stinging, dancing just beyond their mind’s eye.
‘Don’t,’ Srayma said, as one of the daemonettes jolted
towards them. Then he beckoned to the Daughters with a
gentle motion, like he was coaxing out a kitten. ‘Come, let
me see you.’ They stayed still, sciansá poised. ‘Or – I could
order my army to fetch you. Come.’
Compulsion roiled in that voice, smooth and shimmering
as the silk of a bizhab spider.
‘I will go,’ Vahis said.
‘You cannot,’ Avara said. ‘They’ll kill you.’
‘They will kill us if I don’t go,’ Vahis said. ‘I have a plan. I
think I understand how these Twins work.’
‘But–’ Avara started.
‘I know these creatures, they do not frighten me,’ Vahis
said. ‘Not any more.’ Then she walked out into the vast
cavern, knowing that Khaine was with her.
She felt a presence at her side. She turned and saw Cheba
walking with her.
‘I will not wait for them to come for me,’ the Sister of
Slaughter said, her face twisting in hate. ‘We are Draichi
Ganeth, and we do not shrink from a fight.’
Then she heard quick steps behind her and found that
Avara and Thesobhe also followed. Not willing to linger on
alone, Sareth grudgingly caught up with them.
With their heads high, the Daughters strode out into the
wide, open chamber. All around them, the Slaaneshi fiends –
daemonettes, marauders, knights and cultists – purred and
chattered. Tongues slid over lips, hands worked and
caressed whips of daemon-skin. The daemonettes
whispered promises of tortures unimaginable. Yet Vahis
walked as regally as a queen and did not look about her at
the sadistic crowd. They were beneath her notice.
‘No matter what happens,’ Vahis said, ‘we are sisters with
one purpose. Despite our bickering, we are the Draichi
Ganeth. Our purpose is to destroy the followers of Slaanesh.
Nothing else matters.’
‘Sikia Khaine mors,’ they said.
As they closed in on the cultists, the crowd crept in,
slithering ever closer.
 ‘Don’t any of you touch them, especially not her,’ Srayma
said, pointing at Vahis. ‘She is mine.’
‘Yours?’ Zelintha chirped, offended. ‘She cut me.’
‘One moment, dear ones,’ Srayma said, holding up a
finger.
They stopped, wary, their blades shimmering in the light.
Srayma whipped around and punched his brother to the
ground. Shrieking, Zelintha crumbled under the onslaught
as Srayma hammered him with both fists. Raining down
blows, Srayma stood over the other, his face twisted into an
inhuman snarl. Finally, he stopped as the other feebly
covered his head, silently weeping in pain.
‘Understand, brother,’ Srayma said. ‘I am at my zenith.
You are the weaker. So you obey me.’
‘When it is my turn, I will remember this,’ the other
howled, bloody tears streaking his face.
Vahis watched them, loathing them. She hated their
stench, their voices, their gleaming black eyes. It went
beyond revulsion and horror to a deep seated disgust, as if
she were looking at some thrashing vermin. The instinct to
lash out, to cut them down, was nearly impossible to resist.
But that was how the Slaaneshi cultists worked – how they
won. They would die to pull you into their embrace. To drag
another into depravity even in spite of themselves. More
than any other quality, the Draichi Ganeth prized precision,
and fear was anathema to that trait. That well-honed sense
saved her here as the two lords bickered. She stayed cool,
observing.
With a final kick to Zelintha’s unprotected gut, Srayma
took a deep breath.
‘Now be silent,’ he said, turning back to Vahis. ‘As I was
saying, you are mine. You will be my plaything.’
‘I will not be,’ she said. ‘He could not defeat me, and
neither can you. Pray try it.’
‘The rest of you will wait until I have defeated this wretch,’
he bellowed.
 Hissing, the Daughters huddled together, their sciansá
jutting out around the group like thorns on a vine.
‘Vahis,’ Avara shouted. ‘We can help you.’
Vahis waved her away, not taking her eyes off Srayma.
The aelves hunched down, alert, watching her, but stayed
where they were. With a deep breath Vahis relaxed. She did
not have to worry about them interfering. They would obey
her orders.
Srayma charged forward, ripping the great mace free from
the strap on his back. Sheathed in iron, it was coated in
square spikes and the pommel sported a squat, brutish
head. Not a beautiful weapon, but one of sheer power. As
one, the crowd scuttled away from their lord’s charge,
screaming with joy. They howled in a dozen languages,
some melodic, some noble, some clipped and harsh. But
they all screamed his name.
Vahis danced away, tilting back as the mace whooshed
past her face, ruffling her hair. Srayma left himself open, his
flank exposed. She whipped back, lashing both sciansá
across his breastplate. Sparks sprayed out as two deep lines
appeared in the black armour. Snarling, she reversed the
stroke in a second, sciansá rasping across the plates once
more to little effect.
The club swung back around at her head and she ducked
under it, then scampered back. There was no way she could
parry the massive weapon, not when wielded by such a
heavy fighter. Instead, she gave ground as he pursued,
swinging the club in short quick chops. He wielded the club
as if it weighed nothing in his hands.
Sudden instinct ran through her and she spun away as a
thin sabre flashed by her face. She parried the stroke as
Zelintha flicked the blade down, narrowly missing her arm.
Desperation etched itself onto his bruised face as he jabbed
at her, eager to draw blood.
Srayma drove in, swinging a backhanded strike at her
shoulder, missing only by a hair’s breadth. As he drew it
back she powered herself into a reverse flip, kicking
Zelintha in the jaw as she did.
She landed, then sprang back at Srayma in the same
motion, her sciansá leading. Driving one weapon low, she
hooked the other at his face. He blocked the blow aimed at
the thin gap between his breastplate and the fauld that
protected his hip, but could not block the other.
‘You are dead,’ she hissed.
The sciansá struck his cheek – and snapped in two with a
metallic bang. She leaped back in horror as he threw back
his head and laughed.
‘Fool!’ he said. ‘I am not so easily–’
Snarling, she slammed the broken blade into his open
mouth, crunching it into his teeth and slicing his wagging
tongue. Screaming, he jerked away and clutched his
bleeding mouth.
‘Brother!’ Zelintha shrieked.
The daemonettes stopped laughing.
‘Kill her, fools,’ they howled. ‘Kill her. Stop playing.’ They
hopped and skipped around the perimeter of the fight,
anguish etched onto their alien faces.
Srayma backed away, clutching his destroyed face, his
black eyes gleaming with hate. Vahis’ ears stayed pricked,
listening to every boot scrape as he stumbled around.
Zelintha hurled himself back into the fight, his sabre
dancing. She parried as the flurry of blows came in. Flexible
as a drevar whip, his blade angled and curved like a living
thing in search of her flesh. Pain flashed into existence as he
nicked her collarbone.
Then he opened his mouth and sucked in a breath to
scream.
No, absolutely not. She slashed her sciansá in and he
swept the blow aside, leaving his torso open. He was
accustomed to having armour to cover his mistakes.
‘Sloppy,’ she whispered.
 She kicked him in the gut, driving her heel under his ribs.
His breath blasted out with a paltry squeak and he doubled
over, choking.
‘Same,’ Srayma slurred through broken teeth.
She spun away but it was too late. The mace brushed her
ribs and frail bone cracked under the blow. Such was the
force of it that she tumbled onto the earth, scrambling on all
four limbs like a dog. Srayma stalked after her, breathing
liquidly, blood dribbling down his breastplate. As she tried to
regain her footing, Zelintha lunged back in and skewered
her calf.
Shaking in shock, Vahis cursed. She was over-focusing on
one Twin, and she could not find the discernment to track
the other. Was it age? Or was it fear? She was better than
this.
‘Khaine, behold,’ she hissed, drawing the god’s eye to her,
daring herself to fail.
She jerked her leg off Zelintha’s blade and spun back onto
her feet. As she came up, she kicked Zelintha in the face
with her heel.
Whimpering in false pain, she favoured the injured limb. If
she had been less experienced, this might have been the
end. But it was not the first time someone had tried to
cripple her in such a manner. Her strength would see her
through and Khaine would reward that strength with his own
greatness.
‘You witch,’ Zelintha said, rubbing his jaw. ‘How could you
do that to him? To me?’
The lordling came in for the killing blow, slashing at her
throat. She hooked his sabre with her remaining sciansá,
and with a grinding scream, she twisted. Metal creaked as
blood-blessed steel tore at daemonic metal. For a moment,
they strained together, Zelintha trying desperately to
withdraw the weapon.
With a ringing bang and a burst of sweet smoke, the sabre
broke. He held the hilt like the hand of a dying lover and
screamed.
The noise.
It banged off the walls of the cavern and the foul audience
writhed in agony. His voice drove through Vahis’ skull like a
pike, reverberating in her skull. Tears rolled down her cheeks
as she staggered. Her thoughts scattered as the sound filled
her mind.
She ground her teeth against the shrill scream, steadied
herself and stalked in. Snarling, Vahis slashed at Zelintha’s
neck, even as he sucked in another breath.
The blade whipped through his flesh.
For a moment, Zelintha stared at her in total shock. He
could do little more than gurgle wetly before his head
toppled from his shoulders.
She straightened up, despite her injured leg. The pain
receded to the back of her mind and a chuckle bubbled out
of her throat. Turning towards the growling Srayma, the
chuckle turned into cold laughter. It echoed through the
silent chamber as the favoured of Slaanesh realised their
existence on this plane lay in the hands of a single mortal.
Her sisters began to keen, their voices cutting through the
silence like a knife through flesh.
‘Is this really all you have?’ Vahis crowed. ‘Is this it?’ She
turned and looked at the crowd. The fear on their faces was
delicious. She smiled. Even if death caught her, she was still
strong. Even now.
Srayma drove himself to his feet, breaths choking out of
his shattered face. With a gurgling bellow, he charged her.
She leaped to the side as he chopped the mace down. Stone
burst under the blow, dust and rubble scattering over the
floor.
She flitted away as he laboriously pursued her. Her leg
burned like fire but she did not dare falter. The force of his
passing blows beat over her skin like the breath of a
hurricane. It was a careful dance, keeping just close enough
that he kept coming on instead of falling back and waiting
for her to come to him.
His desperation and fury led him on, his desire to possess
her enslaving his mind. Frothing curses coursed from his
mouth and his black eyes seethed with malevolence. With a
scream, he darted forward faster than he should. Vahis
leaped back as the mace crashed down once again, but her
weakened leg crumpled as she landed, sending her
sprawling on the floor.
‘Die, witch,’ he hissed, hefting the mace above his head.
Vahis struggled away from him, unable to rise quickly
enough. Her hands scrabbled over thick gravel.
She grabbed a fistful and hurled it into his face.
With a choked bellow, he reared back, the stroke swinging
wide. Snarling, she finally leapt to her feet as he tore at his
eyes. Coughing, he looked up with one reddened eye just as
Vahis plunged a sciansá into his socket.
He stiffened and then went slack, the mace dropping from
his hand to crack on the floor. Slowly, he toppled over and
landed with a crash.
Breathing heavily, Vahis turned and staggered towards
her sisters. Everything hurt: her hip, her calf, her shoulder,
all with their own special pain. A shudder rolled through her
body and she stumbled a little. Sweat soaked her hair and
ran down her skin. She wanted nothing more than to rest,
but that was not going to happen.
Something squelched behind her.
‘Khaine’s bloody hand, what now?’ she said, shoulders
sagging. She turned.
Srayma’s body contracted, curling and twisting
unnaturally as if his flesh was separating from his bones. His
muscles shuddered and shifted as if a thousand worms
seethed under his skin. His eyes split, and thin tendrils
flickered out of his mouth and nostrils. Then the black skin
stretched, tentacles oozing their way out of his ruined flesh,
which sloughed off like melting wax as new, slimy pink flesh
uncoiled from within. The newly birthed spawn stretched
outward, weird shuddering tones murmuring from a dozen
pouting mouths.
Apparently, Slaanesh was not about to lose because of the
weakness of his champions.
‘Of course, why not?’ she growled.
Where another might have hesitated upon seeing this
horror, Vahis leaped straight in to attack. She hurled herself
into the air, intent on the disappearing nodule that had been
Srayma’s head.
Tentacles rose up to meet her, brightly coloured as poison
and covered in barbed suckers. She did not see them, so
focused was she on her target. Burning welts erupted over
her skin where the tentacles touched her. Curling and
slurping, the beast lunged at her with every limb, eager to
devour the creature that had hurled itself into its maw. Pain
seethed as the vile fluid spattered her, but it was not
enough to stop her.
She stabbed her broken sciansá into the blob of flesh
before it could sink into the central mass of the spawn,
pinning it in place. With her other blade, she lopped it off,
revealing a tumorous mass of skull, brains and hair. The
tentacles thrashed just for an instant and then collapsed, as
limp as silk rope.
With a flourish, she flipped back out of the horrid mass
and landed lightly on her toes. Turning the gruesome trophy
this way and that, she looked around her at the stunned
followers of the Twins of Emrolond the Swift. She hoisted the
severed head above her, her face hard as stone.
‘Your masters are dead,’ she shouted, her hoarse voice
ringing. ‘I bid you be gone.’
The daemonettes shrieked and wailed, and then began to
fade, their colours bleaching. They clawed and writhed as
their grip on reality loosened, and their screams thinned and
quieted. Then they were gone, as if they had never been.
Only the faintest note of perfume lingered to mark their
existence.
The remaining mortals howled, clawing at their faces and
weeping like children.
And they leaped to attack.

The glory of the slaughter was upon them. Clean, effortless

as a razor through skin. The Slaaneshi cultists fought with
all the desperation of failures, eager to win back some
esteem with their god. If there was one thing they should
have known, it was that there would be no redemption.
Slaanesh did not forgive, and those he did not forgive, he
abandoned to their fate.
‘Khaine, look upon us and bless our might,’ Vahis shrieked
as she struck off the head of some fool. Sareth leaped in, as
always relying on her sheer strength rather than skill. She
smashed aside the weapons of her opponents, driving her
sciansá into them as if she were hunting boar. The others
flowed in her wake, slicing through the rabid creatures, their
prayers drowning out the desperate cries for clemency.
Vahis laughed at the wretches and hewed into them. The
ease of the battle soothed her aches and washed away her
exhaustion. This was clearing the battlefield, nothing more,
and it was always deeply meditative to her. Cut, spin, kill. All
so easy.
‘Who do you expect will give you mercy?’ she shouted, as
she hammered her single sciansá into a man’s chest. ‘Your
god certainly will not, and neither will we. To whom do you
pray?’
Bone cracked, blood dashed over the floor. The Daughters
abandoned all discipline, their rapture rolling over them as
they sensed Khaine’s eye upon them. A lightness flowed
through them, and they flew over the battlefield and their
enemy could not touch them.
 ‘Daughters,’ Vahis shouted. ‘Show these wretches true
faith! The gifts of their perverse god are nothing compared
to the blessings of Khaine.’
Cheba howled as she lashed open throats and veins. Her
mask twisted into a rictus grin, the brass tongue lolling out.
As the others stayed in tight together against the
debauched tide, Cheba ranged out, leaping and flipping
through the horde. She could have been in an arena in one
of Sigmar’s cities, given the ease with which she worked.
Heads flew and bodies toppled, blood flowed in a slick tide
about their feet. The smell of iron replaced the remnants of
the heady perfume. The Slaaneshi numbers thinned, and
the cultists wept, their tears cutting through the thick make-
up they wore. Death found them all, from the strongest to
the weakest. Remorseless as a tide, the Daughters washed
the stain from the vault until, with one feeble cry, the last of
the cultists fell, Vahis slicing his head off in one clean blow.
She snatched it up by the hair and examined her work.
The cut was clean, the head’s owner barely seeming to have
registered dying. Spattered in gore from the top of her steel
crest to the tips of her boots, she presented the awful
strength of the Daughters made manifest.
Silence settled over the chamber like a shroud.
Khaine’s blessing rippled over her skin and Vahis shivered
at the power of it. The others looked at her and grinned.
‘I didn’t think you could do it,’ Sareth said, flicking blood
from her blades.
‘This victory is yours,’ Thesobhe said in her usual
understated way.
Meanwhile, Cheba was busily performing her rituals and
the rest of them gave her the time she needed.
Gasping from the exertions of her gory work, Avara walked
up to Vahis. ‘So, which one of them has the key?’ she asked.
Vahis glanced at her. That hardness was back, behind the
missing eye, underneath the blood. Then once again it was
gone.
 She groaned and made a face. ‘I hope that it was not
Srayma.’ Vahis glared at the great mound of liquid flesh and
shuddered. As the high of the battle left her, a chill washed
over her skin. Feeling the others watching her, she walked
over to the pallid corpse of Zelintha. His body stank, the
blood pooling and discolouring, his flesh drooping and
sliding over his bones.
Ever careful, Vahis picked through the pouches and bags
at his belt. Rare herbs and potions scattered around her,
priceless and forbidden. Where was it? Just as she was
beginning to glance suspiciously at the dead spawn, her
fingers closed on a small key, just like the one she already
possessed.
‘Now what?’ Sareth said.
Vahis was so close she could taste it. The freshness of
youth on her tongue, rolling through her body in a gentle
tide. She could just imagine it.
She turned towards the floating block where it hung above
the pit. There was something serene about it, holy even, as
it loomed there. Now that the chamber had been cleansed
of the taint of Chaos, even the Daughters could sense it, the
motion of power at work. A gentle glow radiated from it, and
Vahis’ skin prickled.
A dread rattled through Vahis. Had the priest succeeded in
destroying the artefact? She wanted to be wrong. However,
that was not how this world worked. That was one of
Khaine’s truths. The Mortal Realms were harsh and ugly.
Fate would always work against the strongest and devour
the weak. Decisions would be wrong, allies would be witless,
companions would betray. That was how the realms worked.
As she walked forward, the block vibrated. It shuddered
suddenly and the great chains holding it up lurched. Then it
went still. Vahis walked over the bridge. Two perfect
keyholes opened in the flat surface of the block. With a sigh,
she inserted the keys and turned them with a click.
 A door slid aside, the opening it revealed perfectly square.
There was a gust of sterile air.
A man stood there, dressed in the robes of a Sigmarite
priest. He was slim and stooped, his head utterly hairless.
His skin was a luminous white and he had a thin beard of
the same colour. In his hand was a crystal urn in the shape
of a daemonette nursing an infant.
It was empty.
Vahis started to shake.
The man blinked as he looked over the ruin in the
chamber. Then he gagged as the smell hit him. ‘What is all
this?’ he wheezed, pressing a sleeve to his face. ‘Where is
Captain Jened, or Captain Pietra?’ He walked over the bridge
out into the chamber, looking about in horror at the
slaughter.
Vahis clenched her fists around her sciansá, trembling in
absolute rage. This puny, servile little thing had ruined
everything.
‘What have you done?’ she hissed.
‘What have I done?’ he repeated, then he grinned and
laughed. ‘I am Edvard, a priest of Sigmar. You don’t need to
worry, Daughters of Khaine. I have destroyed the artefact
they sought. No one will be tempted by it again.’
He dropped the perverse vessel and it shattered at his
feet, crystal ringing across the bloody floor of the battlefield.
‘It seems that you have killed the Twins,’ he said. ‘That’s
amazing. I’ve been stuck in here since they first laid siege to
the temple. I was beginning to feel like I was going to be
living in there for the rest of my life.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m
babbling, forgive me.’
Vahis stared at him, what little colour she had left fleeing
her face.
‘They actually did it,’ Sareth said, her voice echoing in the
stillness. ‘I am impressed. I didn’t think–’
Vahis stabbed the priest in the chest. She buried the blade
up to the hilt, skewering his heart. Then she jerked the
blade out.
‘Do you know what you have done, you wretched little
man?’ she shrieked, as the priest toppled to the ground, his
face twisted in utter shock. ‘Do you know what you have
done to me? I needed that for myself!’
There was a breathless moment of astonishment as the
others gasped. Vahis stood shaking, looking about her at the
ruin of it all.
‘At last we know the truth,’ Sareth said. ‘At least part of it.
What was your plan, decrepit one? To use that monstrous
relic?’
Vahis turned towards them. ‘Yes, not that it matters now.’
‘You heretic!’ Cheba shrieked. ‘You were the best of us,
the strongest of us. We fought with you. To kill the Slaaneshi
cultists is our purpose. And yet you were going to…’ Her
words failed her, and she shrieked in fury.
‘What were you hoping to gain?’ Thesobhe said, her cold
voice shivering.
Vahis said nothing, she simply waited. Her old patience
returned once more. Now that she was all but dead, she had
all the time in the world. She could afford to indulge these
youngsters.
‘A reprieve from age,’ Sareth said, shaking her head. ‘Look
at her. Khaine has turned from her. He is letting her die. So
she goes scuttling back to the enemy.’
‘Perhaps,’ Vahis said. ‘Or he tests me.’
‘I hope that the handmaiden is truly watching us,’ Sareth
said. ‘So she can see us kill you. Or was that a lie as well?’
They slowly spread out, sciansá and kruip-lash at the
ready.
‘Not entirely,’ Vahis said, settling into a defensive stance,
her sciansá held out in front of her. ‘Relath, one of the High
Oracle’s handmaidens, directed me to this place to retrieve
the relic – but for myself, not Morathi. It hardly matters now,
though, does it? Come, let’s see if you’re strong enough to
take me on.’
 She relaxed as she looked at them. All of the sisters
surrounded her save for Avara, who lingered behind them,
fretting. Even Thesobhe seemed to have lost her fear of her.
‘My secrets no longer matter,’ Thesobhe said. ‘I will kill
you. I am already dead for being caught up in your scheme.’
‘I have one request from you all,’ Vahis said.
‘And what is that?’ Sareth said, leaning into an attack
stance.
‘Kill me clean,’ she said. ‘I have no interest in surviving
this. However, I won’t make it easy for you. I will die in
battle. I will die on my own terms.’
‘You are strong enough to deserve that,’ Cheba said, then
she cracked her kruip-lash. ‘Now, let us kill this pathetic
heretic.’
Vahis let the calm, the certainty of her death wash over
her. There was a serenity that she had never felt in all her
long life. Always she had clawed and screamed and scraped
to avoid death. That had always been her greatest strength,
the raw, unrepentant need to survive. But now, she knew
that there was a strength beyond that; it existed between
knowing death was coming and the final blow. She had seen
this in Jened’s eyes as the human had died. And now she
understood what true strength could be. Spite, true spite,
had a strength all of its own, and humans and duardin both
died for it. Perhaps that was one lesson that Khaine had
finally found a way to teach her.
The others paced around her like sicklecats around a
shadebeast. Sareth stalked around the periphery, her back
as stiff as iron, while Cheba slunk about, half-handing her
kruip-lash – which increased its speed at the expense of
reach. Thesobhe approached cool and composed, her eyes
hard. Avara shied back entirely, watching the others with
her one eye.
‘So, Sareth, you have what you wanted,’ Vahis said,
pacing about warily. ‘You have others to fight your battle for
you.’
 ‘You have no right to call me coward,’ Sareth snarled.
It was not Sareth that charged her but Thesobhe. With an
uncharacteristic shriek of rage, she pelted in, her sciansá
whistling towards Vahis’ neck. Vahis spun aside as Cheba
struck at her simultaneously with the half-handed whip, the
blade cutting past her face. She continued through the spin
and bent back nearly horizontal, so that Thesobhe’s strike
whipped through empty air.
Vahis flipped away, her leg throbbing as Thesobhe tangled
with Cheba, forcing the Sister of Slaughter to break her
pursuit. Vahis let go of her broken sciansá and caught it by
the blade. She landed lightly and hurled the blade at
Thesobhe’s face.
The sciansá speared through her skull. Thesobhe crashed
to the earth like a puppet with cut strings.
All of this unfolded in mere moments, no more than a few
breaths. The other two swallowed and spread out further.
‘That one was too gentle for this world,’ Vahis said,
shaking her grey hair out of her face.
Sareth’s face crumpled in fury as she settled into a ready
stance, her sciansá held easy.
Vahis reached down and scooped up one of Thesobhe’s
fallen blades. Then she lunged at Sareth, blades whipping
in.
‘Avara, will you join us against this traitor?’ Sareth
shouted as she blocked the blows that Vahis rained down.
‘What are you waiting for?’
Avara balked. ‘I am no fool,’ she said. ‘She is unbeatable.’
Vahis laughed from deep within her gut, a hoarse cackle
that rattled through the chamber. Slamming her sciansá
against Sareth’s guard, she smirked at her remaining foes.
‘What were you expecting?’ she said. ‘That little milk fool
was never going to ally with you.’
Vahis slammed another bone-breaking blow into Sareth
but she held fast, wincing at the force of it. Then the whistle
of Cheba’s kruip-lash caught her ear and Vahis spun away
as the barbed whip cracked through her hair. Sareth leaped
into the attack and Vahis was on the defensive once more.
Cheba stayed back, lashing at her from beyond Vahis’
reach. The snapping blade flashed and danced, probing for a
weakness, even as Vahis held Sareth at bay. Feeling truly
alive for the first time since this ordeal started, Vahis
blocked her with sciansá, vambrace and agility. However,
Cheba was skilled and she found the weakness she sought.
A blinding pain sheared through Vahis’ healthy calf as the
barbed tip sank in and then ripped free.
Vahis cursed and fell to one knee. She flinched back as
Sareth slashed her chest, opening a bloody line across her
sternum. Roaring, Sareth chopped down at Vahis’ skull and
Vahis rolled back out of the way. More pain scorched across
her back.
As she sprang up, Sareth was already there, her sciansá
cutting down once more. Vahis crossed her sciansá and
caught the blade on them. The impact jarred her but Vahis
held fast. She twisted Sareth’s blade out of her hand.
‘You always did come in too hard,’ she said.
Sareth’s sciansá clattered to the floor and she snapped up
a vambrace. Sparks flew as Vahis struck her guard.
Meanwhile, Cheba let out her whip to its full length and with
a few quick blows, drove Vahis away from her.
Vahis stumbled back, blood leaking from the cuts on every
limb. It would not be much longer before the blood loss
made her weak and they would have her at their mercy.
Cheba spun and whirled the kruip-lash, swiping at Vahis
again and again. The weapon cracked and whistled around
Cheba, slicing into the corpses that littered the ground.
Sareth snatched up her blade from the bloody floor, her
eyes never leaving Vahis.
Cheba’s brass face snarled and she hurled herself
forward. The whip hissed through the air, snatching at Vahis’
striking arm.
 Vahis resisted the idea of letting the whip snare her and
trying to rip it away. Cheba was too good to lose her weapon
in such a manner. Instead, she sprinted towards the Sister of
Slaughter as fast as her injuries and decrepitude would
allow.
Khaine’s fury and fire struggled to compensate for her
wounds. Slow, stumbling and wincing, Vahis closed the
distance, rushing across the wreck of armour and flesh that
lay between them. Cheba would strike her one more time,
probably twice. She had no choice but to gamble, and hope
that Cheba made a mistake.
It was a thin hope: Cheba had not lived so long by
underestimating her opponent. Vahis knew her sister. She
knew her rage. They had fought together for long centuries.
Cheba would never commit unless she knew that she would
kill in one blow. It was the way of the Draichi Ganeth.
With a deep breath, Vahis let her weakness show. The
trembling, the pallor, the pain. Her age.
Cheba charged in, kruip-lash rolling out. Vahis ducked,
expecting the strike at her throat. Instead, a bolt of pain hit
her striking hand, lashing her sciansá from her grip. The
weapon flickered off into the corpses. With a yelp, Vahis
spun about, raising her off-hand sciansá to strike with her
momentum.
But Cheba also knew her and her ways of war. She
snatched Vahis’ arm, looping her kruip-lash around her
wrist. The leather dug in painfully, tearing her thinning skin.
Unable to keep her grip, Vahis’ other sciansá dropped to the
floor.
With a hiss, Cheba yanked Vahis around with her
momentum, looping another length of her kruip-lash around
Vahis’ neck. Vahis stumbled, Cheba at her back, pulling the
whip tight. Vahis gripped her arm and tried to throw her off
over her shoulder. Instead, Cheba kept hold of her and
dragged Vahis down with her, landing underneath Vahis at
her back. The Sister of Slaughter wrapped her limbs around
Vahis like a spider, pinning her down.
‘Sleep, old one,’ Cheba hissed in her ear, pulling the lash
tight around her throat. ‘Sleep now.’
Vahis twisted and wrenched but Cheba’s strength was like
iron, as if she wrestled Khaine himself. Her lungs burned and
lights danced in her vision. Her muscles spasmed as she
gasped and choked and writhed, but there was no breaking
out of Cheba’s grip.
Flailing, Vahis searched blindly with her off-hand for a
weapon. Anything she could use. Blood-slicked armour
plates, spongy flesh, leather… There! A glass bottle. Vahis
fumbled, grabbed the bottle and smashed it into Cheba’s
metallic visage. A noxious liquor splashed over them both.
Cheba shrieked as the foul fluid ran into her eyes. Her grip
loosened and Vahis tore herself away, snatching up her
fallen sciansá.
Numb and trembling, Vahis turned and punched the blade
into Cheba’s throat with a crunch. Cheba choked, her hands
fluttering at her ruined throat. Then she slowly went limp,
blood splattering from her mouth.
‘I thought she had you,’ Sareth said, eyes wide. She took a
step back. ‘I swear on Khaine’s eyes that I will kill you.’
Vahis rose to her feet, retrieving her sciansá once more.
‘You will try,’ she gasped. ‘But I have stood over the corpses
of thousands across the centuries, and now I will stand over
yours.’
‘Khaine’s blood, I hate you,’ Sareth whispered, her jaw
clenching in fury. ‘Always in my way, for centuries on end.
Finally, it seems you might die, and you just will not.
Crumble already, you wretch! I am better than you.’
‘Come and prove it,’ Vahis said.
Sareth leaped at her with a shriek, bringing both her
blades down in a hard arc. With a crash of metal, the blow
knocked Vahis onto her back and Sareth drove a heel into
Vahis’ chest. Vahis choked as her ribs cracked, her breath
catching uselessly in her throat. Rolling aside, Vahis dodged
a second stabbing strike, the blades whipping a lock of hair
off her iron-coloured mane.
Cursing, Sareth stomped on Vahis’ hair, pinning her to the
ground. Then she crashed down on top of her rival, grabbing
her parrying sciansá with both hands and driving it down at
Vahis’ face. With trembling limbs, Vahis parried the thrust
but Sareth pressed it down, her greater strength and weight
steadily driving the jagged tip closer and closer.
Thrashing amidst the gore of aelf, daemon and human
alike, the pair snarled and spat their hatred at each other.
‘Just die, get out of my way,’ Sareth hissed, pushing the
blade inch by inch towards Vahis’ bloodied face. ‘Get out of
my way!’
The blade touched Vahis’ gaunt cheek and a drop of blood
welled up. Vahis said nothing. Instead, she summoned the
last drop of her energy and twisted the sciansá away from
her. Sareth’s strength drove the blade into the stone with a
metallic bang.
Roaring, Vahis grabbed Sareth’s head on both sides and
jabbed her thumbs into the aelf’s eyes. Sareth’s scream cut
through the silence as Vahis punctured her eyes, her grip
tightening into claws. With a desperate strength, Sareth
heaved herself away, stumbling and crawling amongst the
corpses.
Vahis coughed as she stood. ‘Did you really think that you
would not end up like all the rest?’ she said, pulling a
sciansá off the floor.
Sareth’s head jerked about, her eyes a bloody ruin. ‘I’m
better than you,’ she screamed. ‘I’ve been trapped in your
shadow all my life. All I wanted was to be free of your odious
presence.’
Vahis struck off her head, clean and swift.
‘And now you are,’ she said as the body dropped. She let
out a breath and looked at Avara. ‘You know what the sad
thing is? She never seemed to notice that I never became a
hag, never had any authority of any kind. She always
blamed others for why she was never elevated, why she
stayed at the bottom. She always looked for the next rival,
when the true rival is one’s past self. It is why she could
never truly defeat me.’
A shiver rolled through her and she dropped onto the
floor, sitting amidst the gore. As she sat, a warm numbness
rolled over her, filtering from her chest all the way out to her
limbs, to the tips of her fingers. Her aches faded, the agony
leeching away.
‘I don’t recall bleeding to death being this pleasant,’ she
said, holding up her gore-soaked hands.
Beneath all the blood, her skin was the colour of cream,
and smooth as porcelain. Veins wove as subtle as distant
rivers underneath. Trembling in gleeful shock, she stood up.
Her wounds were gone, the aches, the stiffness, all of it,
leaving behind an absence, a sense of buoyancy where the
weight of age had been lifted. She was light as a shadow on
a slip of silk.
‘Vahis,’ Avara said, her eyes wide. ‘You’re youthful!’
‘I am,’ Vahis said, her voice still a touch hoarse. ‘I am! By
Khaine’s blood, I am!’
Laughter bubbled out of her, rising from a low chuckle to a
hysterical shriek. She laughed and laughed, her voice
bouncing through the empty room. She laughed until she
couldn’t any more and could only wheeze, as if in agony.
She owed no one. Not Lilithan. Not Relath. She had found
her rejuvenating bath, her worthy sacrifice to her dread god.
And he had deemed it good. She had freedom, a perfect
freedom.
Save for one little thing.
‘Come here, Avara,’ she wheezed, still laughing. ‘I want to
thank you.’
‘Of course,’ Avara said, approaching, her eyes wide.
Vahis drove her blade up into Avara’s chest, spearing
through her heart.
 ‘Why?’ Avara gasped, blood dribbling from her lips. ‘I
didn’t do anything.’
‘Quite correct,’ Vahis said. ‘You did nothing to help me just
now. Which, in itself, I would have killed you for. But you
mustn’t be coy. You actually did quite a lot, didn’t you? You
always seemed to be there, asking, prodding, directing.
Little things. You played off Sareth well. Perhaps rather too
well. And of course, you knew Thesobhe’s little secret. I
thought that was your mother’s doing, but it wasn’t, was it?’
A little wheeze escaped Avara’s lips.
‘I wanted to trust you, Avara,’ Vahis said, gently lowering
her to the floor. ‘I liked you. You were ambitious, finally free
of Azyr, ready to play your mother’s games. However, you
were a novice playing beyond your level of mastery. I scared
you so badly that you gave me Thesobhe’s secret, the best
you had. The sort of secret only Lilithan could know.’ Her
lips pressed together. ‘You’re just like all the rest. Useless
and conniving and weak.’
Avara’s eyes rolled back in her head, her blood emptying
out until there was nothing left.
Vahis looked about at the silent dead. It was time to leave
before the Stormbloods crashed down like meteors, looking
for answers. As much contempt as she had for their ways,
no secrets remained hidden from them for long. With a
spring in her step, she drew the krish’lar into the blood that
coated her skin, humming sweetly to herself and
considering her next move.
Something still nagged at her.
There was something about the scheme that surrounded
her. Relath had wanted favours freely given, not through
obligation, but Hag Queen Lilithan had turned on her. Did
that mean that Lilithan was turning on Morathi in trying to
foil Relath’s plans? Or was there something else that Vahis
was missing?
There was only one place that she would find her answers,
and that was Hagg Nar. True, the city was a nest of vipers
where no one ever revealed their true thoughts. But if
answers could be found, they would be found there. There
was only one person who could untangle this plot that she
was enmeshed in, only one who could possibly know the
truth of this game.
Morathi.
She rose lightly and fled into the night, eager to see her
High Oracle.
ULGU
PART 2
Much time had passed when Morathi finally finished reciting
the histories of the aelves who fought below, and yet still
they battled, with zeal and exuberance and dogged
determination. Their faith glowed from them, their
righteousness a musk in the air. Their fury and speed
seemed only to increase as they shrieked invocations and
prayers in between the grunts and howls of combat. Rage
and bloodlust twisted their faces, their limbs shining with
sweat and spattered with blood against the black sands
beneath their feet.
‘And so you see,’ Morathi said, ‘all that they have done for
us and for Khaine. And yet you asked why I would honour
them with a primary bout, or with a battle to the death.
Surely now you can understand? The primary unifies us all
in the great undertaking to restore our god to life and to
crush the Forces of Chaos forever.’
Melusai Filstag was quiet and Morathi watched her from
the corner of her eye. She waited.
‘Truly they have served you well,’ Filstag said carefully, no
doubt wondering if there was a way out of the trap Morathi
had set and into which she had blundered.
‘As you know full well,’ the High Oracle said, her tone
neutral. ‘The Khailebron, Trisethni. She never found out the
name of the aelf who seduced her hag queen away from me
and to Hellebron’s cause, but I don’t think we need that as
well as everything else, do we, Filstag? Or should I call you
Myrcalene? What about Relath?’
 Filstag raised her eyebrows and even managed a low
chuckle. ‘First Daughter, you cannot think I am the same
aelf from the tales of those three down there? I don’t
remember seeing any of them before – I didn’t even know
their names until you announced them at the start of the
primary. My investigation was into the hierarchy of their
sects, not individual witch-aelves. Such an undertaking
would take decades. I did exactly as you commanded.’
Melusai Filstag slipped hurriedly backwards as the razor-
lace metal of Morathi’s wings flexed and rasped against the
floor and her throne.
‘You say I am wrong, Filstag?’ she asked, as in the arena
the Draichi Ganeth aelf went over onto her back. She rolled
desperately, black sand scuffing into the air as sciansá
flashed down to take her life and missed. She gained space
and leapt back to her feet in time to block and jump out
from between the pair crowding her. The crowd screamed its
approval and the Kharumathi and Khailebron, who a
moment before had been united in seeking her death,
hacked at each other instead, each seeking any advantage
she could.
‘You tell me I am wrong?’ she repeated.
Filstag hesitated. ‘Not wrong, First Daughter. But perhaps
the information you have been given is faulty. If you have
been misled, then it is the one who spoke who is wrong, not
you.’
‘You are pretty, Filstag, and your words are prettier, but
neither will save you now. You said your spies had found no
agents of Hellebron to interrogate, but you are wrong. You
are an agent of Hellebron yourself, are you not? I sent you
to those covens because I knew they were already
corrupted by her poisonous treachery and you obliged me
by allying with or recruiting those who are disloyal. It was
not them whose loyalty I doubted – their treason was
already well known to me. It was you, Filstag, child of my
own making, forged in Mathcoir by these very hands. You,
whose loyalty I doubted. And those doubts are well founded,
for Trisethni, Nepenora and Vahis here brought me the
names of those among their covens who had betrayed me.
And they brought me you, as the one who orchestrated
those betrayals.’
The Khailebron aelf leapt to the top of the sunwyrm’s
back, clinging to one of its spikes and leaning out to rip her
sciansá through the Kharumathi’s scalp. Blood and hair
puffed into the air.
‘So it would seem I do have an agent of Hellebron to
interrogate after all,’ Morathi continued. She had her wings,
her magic and her bare hands, for Heartrender was still on
the sands below, and Filstag was a melusai and her
bodyguard, armed with a Heartshard glaive – any fight up
here in the confines of the balcony would be messy and
inelegant. And with an audience of thousands.
‘This is ridiculous,’ Filstag protested. Her thick tail uncoiled
and looped behind her, the stinger twitching off the floor as
if it had its own will. Her glaive was within reach. ‘Clearly
they seek to hide their own plots by implying I am a traitor
and so diverting your attention from the true threats. You
are being deceived, Morathi.’
They both froze at the enormous lack of reverence implicit
in Filstag using the High Oracle’s name. The melusai hissed
and her stinger rose to hover over her shoulder.
‘I didn’t…’ she began. She expected Morathi to attack,
and her own hand darted out for her polearm.
Morathi rose from her throne, graceful and seemingly
without haste, and completed the invocation she had been
preparing throughout the conversation.
Her fingers twined in complex geometries and then thrust
out at Filstag. The melusai was lifted effortlessly in coils of
shadow and crimson, lifted struggling and snarling and
spouting spells of her own that could not overcome the
potency of Morathi’s.
 The Grand Matriarch pushed shadow, magic and traitor
out over the arena’s sands and let go. The serpentine form
flailed as it fell, landing with a thud that seemed to cut
through the screeches from the seats. The glaive rolled from
her hand as she thumped down, tangled in her own tail.
Morathi stood at the edge of the balcony and looked down
at the four aelves frozen beneath her. The arena thundered
into silence. Her steel and shadow wings were spread wide
and the urge to fly down and kill the Scathborn herself
burned within her.
No. The spectacle. The reward for faithful service.
‘The first to kill her takes her place,’ she shouted down,
and the three aelves converged on Filstag with bloody
weapons and bared teeth. The melusai rose and prepared
herself, surging to snatch up her glaive, an additional
weapon alongside her stinger, the thick muscle of her tail
and her Scath touch. She would not be taken easily.
Morathi knew it was possible, perhaps even likely, she
would not be taken at all: the three were injured and tiring,
despite the speed and fluidity of their combat and the elixir
still coursing their veins, and Filstag was an exquisite
warrior with nothing to lose. If she could triumph, it would
weaken Morathi in the eyes of her disciples. A smile crossed
her face. ‘Oh, but that would be delicious,’ she murmured to
herself. ‘What better proof of my supremacy and Hellebron’s
incompetence than to slaughter her myself? It has been too
long since I tasted the joy of a personal kill.’
Her long fingers gripped the balustrade and she stared
down as the battle began anew. Seamlessly, as if they had
practised together a thousand times, the trio moved in
unison, Vahis and Nepenora coming at Filstag from the
sides, Trisethni sliding around behind her. The melusai’s tail
flicked back with lightning speed and precision; Trisethni
leapt high and swept her sciansá blades down and back as
she somersaulted. One missed; the second severed the
melusai’s venomous sting, hacking through the thick horn.
Venom drops spattered across the sand, along the length of
the blade and over the aelf’s hand.
She landed and immediately bellowed, scrubbing her
hand frantically against her light leather jerkin as the venom
ate at her flesh. Filstag screeched and spun to face her, the
glaive punching into the air. Into the aelf too, flinging her
across the sands, rolling in a tumble of limbs and flashing
weapons.
The melusai roared her triumph and Vahis used the split
second of distraction and stabbed hard with her blade under
Filstag’s raised arm. It bit, but not deep. Still, it was blood
drawn and she was forced to hold that arm close to her
body.
The Khailebron aelf stirred on the sand, to wild
celebrations from the spectators whose loyalty had turned
in a heartbeat from seeing the trio kill each other to calling
for their opponent’s death. There was only one reason
Morathi would have flung her bodyguard into the arena, and
the watching aelves clamoured for Filstag’s slaughter.
Trisethni staggered to her feet and shook her head, groggy.
There was a spreading stain of blood above her hip, and she
limped – but she moved. Ran. Jumped.
The other two saw her coming and committed to their own
attacks, driving Filstag backwards – onto the assassin’s
blade. Three sciansá went in, from three directions so that
she couldn’t defend against them all. Her glaive took
Nepenora in the chest and stole breath and life from her,
then swept right into Vahis’ shoulder. Filstag’s Scath touch
began to turn the Draichi Ganeth into living crystal.
Still, those three blades had done their work and the
weapon fell from Filstag’s hand. Her tail flopped and she
slumped forward. Vahis was screaming as crystal began to
grow from the entry wound in her shoulder. Trisethni of the
Khailebron was nursing a hole in her belly and the skin on
one hand was eaten away by venom, exposing muscle and
bone. Nepenora was dying – and perhaps all the Kharumathi
with her – though she fought to cling to life, her eyes fixed,
pleading, on Morathi high on her balcony. But Filstag, too,
was dying – and she was doing it faster.
Morathi grinned when she saw the surviving aelves eye
each other. Trisethni and Vahis tore their sciansá from the
melusai’s twitching flesh and separated, giving themselves
space. The Draichi Ganeth aelf had decades of age and
experience on her side, and a ruthlessness that warmed the
High Oracle’s heart. Vahis sliced the crystal from her own
flesh, howling, to a corresponding roar of approval from the
crowd. Neither had delivered the killing blow, or perhaps
they both had. Until Morathi told them otherwise, their
combat – their honouring of the god – was not complete.
But if they thought a melusai fashioned by the Grand
Matriarch from the soul of a dead aelf in the depths of Hagg
Nar itself was killed so easily, they were fools. As their
attention focused on each other again, Filstag surged one
last time into lethal movement. She caught Trisethni in her
coils and squeezed, and she ripped the last sciansá from her
own flesh and stabbed Vahis a second time.
Crystal burst from her chest and Vahis’ scream was high
and piteous, but then Morathi was gliding overhead on
wings of steel and shadow. She landed and snatched up
Heartrender, leapt back into the lightning-riven sky and
threw her spear into the melusai’s heart with unerring aim
and devastating force. Filstag was dead before she even
knew her mistress was there.
Morathi landed in a small whirlwind of black sand. She
ripped the blade free and cut the second crystal, hard and
smooth like a second skin fused to her own, out of the
Draichi Ganeth’s flesh. Vahis screamed and dropped to both
knees, her arms wrapped around the wound, blood pouring.
The High Oracle crossed the sand and hacked Filstag’s tail
apart; it had tightened in her death throes and Trisethni of
the Khailebron was grey with lack of oxygen and pain, her
ribs shattered within her chest. Morathi left her whimpering
as she sucked in air and crouched at Nepenora’s side.
‘You are exquisite,’ she whispered in a voice for the
Kharumathi alone. ‘What a pity your sect could not produce
more like you.’ Morathi raised the dying aelf’s head and
shoulders from the sand and kissed her brow. The steel of
her wing slit her throat and ended her torment; Nepenora
was dead when she laid her back down.
The Grand Matriarch stood and surveyed the carnage and
found it to be good. She found these aelves good, and
useful also, but Vahis was bleeding to death. Morathi
flapped her wings until a vortex of sand and shadow and
magic swirled around her and within that cloak of mystery
she allowed her true form to emerge – serpentine as Filstag
had been but far, far bigger. Far more monstrous. Far more
dangerous. Her passions grew as she warped and changed,
her rage and hate and twisted, yearning love burgeoning
within her until they threatened to overflow with all the
force of a winter storm and destroy every living thing in
Hagg Nar.
Her hair lifted in thick clumps and transformed into living,
writhing snakes, and her steel wings became black and
leathery, like those of an immense bat. Her legs twisted and
lengthened, erupting in scales as they melded into one
huge, muscular tail.
The two aelves were watching with awe and fear and
zealous, consumptive love on their faces despite the pain of
their myriad wounds. Morathi drew Vahis up into her arms
and brought her close to her face. One of the snakes lunged
out and stung her, at the base of her throat. Within seconds
Vahis was screaming again, this time with strength and
vigour, and Morathi let her drop to the sand to writhe and
keen.
She swept Trisethni up next, cradled her close and
pressed her mouth to the aelf’s, sending a blast of healing
magic through her. Again, she let her drop and then,
maintaining the vortex of shadow and sand around her, she
flew back up to the balcony and drew a curtain of mist-
magic around it.
In the arena, Vahis of the Draichi Ganeth shivered and
flailed and howled her torment as Morathi’s blessing formed
her body and bones anew, melding and moulding her into a
new, unnatural and blessed form – a Medusa.
Carefully out of reach, Trisethni of the Khailebron knelt,
her hands pressed to her mouth where Morathi’s magic had
restored her severed tongue and knitted her ribs and torn
flesh back together. Her shoulders shook as she wept,
unashamed, in front of her sisters. Her voice once again
would be raised in devotion to Khaine, in love of Morathi, in
joy at slaughter.
By the time Vahis’ agonising transformation was as
complete as it could be without immersion into Mathcoir
itself, Morathi’s own form had returned to the exquisite,
flawless she-aelf, queen and priestess and lithely muscled
warrior, that suited her soul best, if not her tormented
memories. Her Shadow Queen shape was the constant
background reminder of her torment at the hands of the
Dark Prince Slaanesh, at the aeons she had spent as his
plaything even before he had devoured her. That twisted
body, while perfectly suited to slaughter and the generation
of fear, was the visible manifestation of her inglorious past.
With the ruthless precision of long practice, the High
Oracle excised the memories from her mind and calmed
herself, enduring the pain of transformation back to herself
with gritted teeth and clenched fists. When she was again
as perfect as it was possible to be – outwardly at least – she
unfolded wings delicate as silk and deadly as a garrotte, and
glided again to the sands.
She didn’t hide in shadow and magic this time; she was
too magnificent not to be seen and she demanded the awe
of the watching thousands to soothe the shame that
inevitably accompanied her Shadow Queen shape, and the
necessity of taking it in order to make Vahis a Medusa. The
watching aelves were tense and silent with anticipation.
Every eye was on Morathi, as it should be. Thousands of
lives held in her hands, dedicated to her.
‘Melusai Filstag displeased me,’ she said, her magic
making her voice clear to everyone in the arena, as if she
spoke to them alone, a whisper across the backs of their
necks. Intimate. More than one aelf started or raised her
hand to her ear. ‘But more than simply incurring my
displeasure – though that would have been enough – her
loyalty was no longer to me and therefore, it was no longer
to Khaine. The dedicated and exquisite aelves you
witnessed in the primary bout had all uncovered similar
treachery in their own covens. All of which pointed to
Hellebron of Har Ganeth and her spy – that pathetic creature
lying in humiliating death there.’ She pointed at Filstag.
Jeers and curses burst from the assembled crowd,
promises of retribution and revenge. Of war. She had no
doubt that reports would reach her by dusk of any aelf here
today who didn’t abuse Hellebron’s name with sufficient
vigour. A slew of Khainites to watch for further signs of
disloyalty. She smiled. The next step on the path to her
rival’s destruction was taken here as she whipped these
aelves into righteous fury.
She turned to Vahis. ‘Whom do you serve?’
The noise died quickly and every aelf there strained to
hear. Vahis shifted awkwardly in her new body, the shadow
of agony still darkening her face.
‘Khaine,’ the Medusa whispered. Then, ‘Khaine and his
First Daughter,’ louder. And finally, ‘Khaine and his First
Daughter,’ she screamed, and the High Oracle took her
voice and amplified it so that it echoed around the arena
and built a crescendo of sound as every aelf there joined
her. Trisethni of the Khailebron did the same, screaming with
devotion and the pure joy of having speech returned to her.
 Trisethni. The clever one. The assassin who had killed
three daemonettes singlehanded in the blackness of the
Spyrglass Warrens. Who had killed a Medusa hag queen
singlehanded. And who still lived now. Morathi turned to her.
‘And you, Trisethni of the Khailebron. Spy and assassin,
poisoner, the silent knife in the darkness. Where do your
loyalties lie?’
The aelf threw herself onto her knees. ‘With the God of
Battle and with you, my queen. There is no other. Your will,
Khaine’s will, are my guiding stars.’
‘The Matriarch and Khaine, our guiding stars!’ yelled an
aelf and others took up the chant until it built into another
wall of sound, of love and devotion that would on any other
day have filled Morathi with greedy joy.
But not today. Today she had seen an aelf crafted by
Morathi’s own hands and magic betray her. And this one,
this Trisethni the Unseen, had a way with words. A way of
bringing others with her when she spoke. And she was
Khailebron, made for sneaking and for lies.
Morathi gestured and the aelf stood, her face alight with
belief. ‘I will keep you, Trisethni, for I may have need of one
with your skills in the future,’ she said, and this time none
but the Khailebron could hear what she said.
‘But I mislike your words,’ she added, and confusion
flickered over Trisethni’s restored face; the healing Morathi
had gifted her had stolen the scars and made her perfect
once more.
‘If I have offended,’ Trisethni began, but Morathi cut her
off with a sharp gesture.
‘Who do you serve?’ she demanded.
‘You,’ she replied instantly. ‘You and my god. My devotion
is without question. Belleth deceived me. She took my love
and twisted it into a noose and tried to kill me with it.
Instead I killed her. But she taught me well, First Daughter –
I will honour none save you and our lord from now on. No
matter what.’
 Yes, this one had a way with words and Morathi misliked it,
but she could sense no deception in the delicate aelven soul
or that fierce, unbending love.
‘You are no longer Trisethni the Unseen,’ she declared and
wove magic in her hands. ‘You are Trisethni the Tongueless,
and will remain so – and at my side – unless I decree
otherwise.’ She sent the magic blasting at the aelf’s head
and crimson claws forced open her mouth and flowed inside,
choking and seeking. Trisethni’s hands went to her face and
she began to retch, and then to scream, and then to gurgle
as blood flowed and the meat of her tongue was torn free
again.
‘When I need you to be able to speak, you will speak,
Trisethni the Tongueless. Until then, you will be silent and
deadly and mine. Are you mine?’
The aelf looked up at Morathi, blood running down her
chin and throat and chest, a gory half-mask. She looked
down, and she found her tongue lying on the sand. She
knelt and offered it to Morathi and despite everything, there
were no tears in her eyes. Nothing but righteous devotion.
I am yours.
The arena was silent as Morathi took the tongue and held
it up for all to see. ‘Vahis the Medusa and Trisethni the
witch-aelf have proven their loyalty. They have killed for me.
They have put their devotion to Khaine above fidelity to
their covens, their hag queens, and themselves. Both have
sacrificed much here today, for Khaine and for me. I expect
no less from each of you. No rest until Khaine is restored. No
rest until the Forces of Chaos are defeated.
‘We are the Daughters of Khaine and you are all my
sisters. Return to your temples and covens. Fight our
enemies with skill and joy. Find the Shards of Khaine. These
are your tasks, my sisters. The rewards will be great.’
Vahis and Trisethni came to flank her and the three of
them turned slowly so every row of seats around the arena
could see them. The screams rose to the shadows coiling
above Hagg Nar – and Morathi siphoned off the strength of
that adoration and fed it into Mathcoir.
Another splinter of power on her long, arduous road to
immortality.
 ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Anna Stephens is a UK-based writer of epic, grimdark

fantasy. She is the author of the Godblind trilogy and her
first story for Black Library, ‘The Siege of Greenspire’,
featured in the Age of Sigmar anthology Oaths and
Conquests.
Liane Merciel is the author of novels including The
River Kings’ Road, Pathfinder Tales: Nightglass and
Hellknight, and Dragon Age: Last Flight. She lives in
Philadelphia with her husband, two big unruly mutts,
and her preschooler, the unruliest of them all. ‘Red Claw
and Ruin’ is her first story for Black Library.
Jamie Crisalli writes gritty melodrama and bloody
combat. Fascinated with skulls, rivets and general
gloominess, when she was introduced to the
Warhammer universes, it was a natural fit. Her work for
Black Library includes the short stories ‘Ties of Blood’,
‘The Serpent’s Bargain’, and the Age of Sigmar novella
The Measure of Iron. She has accumulated a frightful
amount of monsters, ordnance and tiny soldiery over
the years, not to mention books and role-playing games.
Currently, she lives with her husband in a land of
endless grey drizzle.
An extract from Warcry Catacombs: Blood of the
Everchosen.
On the edge of the blasted wasteland that was the Desolate
March, the settlement of Spite prepared for the Feast of the
Black Spire.
Spite was a mean collection of squalid huts and
tumbledown shacks, and as the evening crept through its
meagre streets the wind began to blow from off the plains.
The mountains of the Fangs, like a ragged jaw, loomed dark
in the distance. The horizon flashed and muttered with
thunder, and great banks of cloud roiled like silt in brackish
water across those distant peaks. The storm was moving
closer.
Ankhad huddled into his cloak as he moved through the
streets, a bucket of water sloshing at his side. Uneasily he
passed the towering model of the Black Spire, the seat of
the Everchosen, which had been cobbled together from
bone and rusting scrap in the middle of the town square –
the centrepiece of the ceremonies that would take place
later that night. He turned his gaze from it. Archaon
Everchosen, the lord of this benighted land… Ankhad had
never thought it advisable to pay too much attention to the
Three-Eyed King; there was always the chance that the
Three-Eyed King would start paying attention to you.
The wind picked up, stripping the plain of its ferrous
topsoil and scouring it across the night. Lightning stabbed
towards the earth, probing its way from the mountains to
the edge of the March. The air in Spite was febrile and
tense, and the gathering storm had only made it worse.
Ankhad had already passed a scuffle or two, mutants and
scavengers squabbling over a crust of bread or a scrap of
salvage, rolling in the dust in bitter argument. No doubt
blades had been drawn and buried, although it was death to
shed blood on the Feast of the Black Spire. He cut through
the derelict market and watched the other looters gather
round to watch as another fight broke out.
Like corpse-hawks, he thought. Waiting for the scraps…
He hurried on, toting the bucket he had filled with muddy
water at the well. The clouds seemed to drift closer above
the settlement, thick and menacing. Spite’s rickety walls
shivered in the wind, rattling with blown dust and sand.
Ankhad grimaced at the smell in the air, the rank scent of
fear and festering meat.
Above him, the clouds flickered and pulsed with light.
Thunder rumbled across the land, shaking the very air, as
coarse and violent as if the mountains themselves were
being ground together. Ankhad flinched as the air cracked
and trembled around him, and then, as he reached his hut
on the edge of the settlement, a spear of red lightning
crashed down with a deafening bark against the scrubland
outside the gates. He heard her scream.
‘Ilthis!’ he said. He pulled back the heavy hide that served
as the hut’s door, and the smell assailed him at once – a
coppery tang, the harsh, metallic scent of her lifeblood
pouring out onto the earth.
She was dying. Ankhad knew that. He knelt at the side of
the bed and squeezed her hand. Sweat ran greasily down
her face and her skin was grey. She twitched and mumbled,
her green eyes staring into the hut’s dim light, seeing
nothing. Below her waist the sheets were drenched in blood.
‘Ilthis,’ he said softly. He dipped a rag into the bucket of
water and wiped her brow. Her stomach heaved and
twisted. He could see the child toiling under the skin,
stretching it as if trying to break through. ‘Ilthis, can you
hear me?’
She shook her head, her breath harsh and stuttering.
‘I don’t know what to do. Please… tell me what to do?
Don’t leave me here, not on my own.’
He pressed his forehead to the back of her hand. Her skin
was cold.
How could this bright thing be so cold? he thought. This
pillar of flame, this incandescent life so fierce and free.
The storm ravaged the settlement outside. He heard the
rain begin its deafening percussion against the roof, but
when he looked to the window he saw that the glass was
sheeted in red. Blood rain, he thought, and fear twisted
uneasily in his gut. On this day, of all days.
Ilthis writhed on the bed and wailed again, but her voice
was strained and weak now. It trailed off into silence. She
shuddered, and then the walls were rattling around him, the
wind threatening to tear them down. Ankhad wiped the
cloth across her face. When he passed it over her eyes, he
knew that she would see nothing at all now, ever again.
The green had faded to black. She was gone.
Now, at the moment she left it, he thought of the moment
she had first come into his life. There had been a whipping
storm then, too. Savage winds on the outskirts of Carngrad,
the rubbish and detritus of another skirmish in the
scrubland, the smell of dead meat and spilled blood on the
air. A sandstorm had been blowing in from the Corpseworm
Marches, and then stumbling through the whirlwind in the
aftermath of the fight came Ilthis, trailing a scavengers’
caravan of looted silks. She had wandered, as if led by fate,
into a warzone. He had taken her and everything she owned
as a prize, one of the easiest he had ever won.
Fool, he thought. To think you could ever own such a
woman! She tamed me, as no one ever could. She owned
me, and I was hers entire.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Ankhad whispered.
 The skin of her stomach buckled, undulating in the
candlelight like some fevered tide. He let go of her hand and
drew his knife.
They came for him not long after the last scream had died.
Ankhad heard the tramp of their feet across the muddy
ground. Lothin, as close as Spite came to a town chief, was
the first to the hut. When he threw back the flap Ankhad
saw that his face was streaked with blood from the rain, his
hair matted to his scalp. The settlement outside was a
morass. The lightning, as it stabbed across the sky, fused
and cooked the raindrops into weeping scabs, and they fell
on Spite like bloody snowflakes.
Lothin was small, hunched, his head swollen with festering
lumps. As he entered the hut, he was flanked by his
enforcer, Grulsham Mof, a quick and deadly fighter with a
great, spiked club in his hand. Others milled about the
entrance, apprehensive and uncertain, some slinking off to
lose themselves in Spite’s ramshackle streets, others
bearing weapons and girding themselves for a fight.
Fine, Ankhad thought. A fight is what you shall have…
‘Ankhad,’ Lothin cried, his voice almost drowned out by
the thunder. ‘What have you done?’ He shifted his weight
from one foot to the other. One of his eyes was cloudy with
cataracts; the other two were sharp and black, and they
looked almost sad.
‘What needed to be done,’ Ankhad said. He still sat there
by the bedside, next to the peeled and opened body of his
dead wife. When the baby cried, everyone stepped back.
Lothin raised his knife.
‘You said it wouldn’t be for another month!’ he said. ‘Not
on Feast Day, Ankhad! Don’t you know what this means?’
‘Life comes when it must,’ Ankhad muttered. He turned
and stood, and the baby he had cut from his wife’s belly
mewled in his arms. He had wrapped the child in a cloth, red
and filthy from its birth. Born in a bath of blood, lifted from
its mother’s corpse, the child opened its mouth and cried
again.
Others pushed past Lothin to crowd the hut’s entrance, a
stinking mob of scavengers and mutants cursing and
muttering to themselves, scratching with fused claws or
peering into the gloom with bulbous eyes. Ankhad stood
there, warily watching them. The bag he had hastily packed
was at his feet, and his knife, its blade cleaned of Ilthis’
blood, was tucked into his belt. He was a big man, rangy
and tough, seasoned where others would have been
whittled down by all his years in the Desolate March.
Although he was far older than most of the scavengers who
crowded his door, the years hadn’t diminished his sense of
danger. Ankhad had heard the rumours others told about
him. Some said he had been a warrior once, a pilgrim from
the outside realms come to lay his sword on the steps of the
Black Spire. Others claimed he was no more than any other
native of the Bloodwind Spoil, a cowering scrap merchant, a
ragpicker just like the rest of them – only luckier, because
he had found in Spite a cursed little settlement full of
ragpickers smaller than he was. Let them say what they
wanted; he did not care.
‘A child born on Feast Day is for the gods,’ Lothin said in
his rasping voice. ‘It’s always been thus. And this storm, the
blood rain… The omens cannot be denied. It must die.’
‘You would spill blood on the Feast of the Black Spire?’
Ankhad said. His voice was low, his bearing outwardly calm.
‘Let me tell you then – so would I.’
Grulsham Mof stepped forward, his club in his hands, but
Lothin held him back. He looked uneasy. Where others
dominated through violence, Lothin’s strength had always
been in his cunning, even in his sense of diplomacy.
‘Tarnot’s already broken that rule,’ Lothin said. ‘He killed
Mad Rhukar in the marketplace. He dies tonight, as he must,
but there’s no need for you to join him.’
 Beyond Lothin, out in the street, Ankhad could see Tarnot
cast down into the mud on his knees, his arms bent behind
his back. He was a young man, his eyes wide-spaced on
either side of his head like a fish’s, his lank hair plastered to
his face from the bloody rain. He grinned wildly.
‘He started it!’ Tarnot protested. ‘Shanked me in the back,
he did.’
‘And you tore out his throat with your teeth,’ Lothin called
wearily over his shoulder.
‘You never said,’ Tarnot shot back. ‘What’s it to be in the
end then? Stoning? I think I’d like a good stoning, if I’ve got
a choice.’
‘You, we’ll drown in the water trough,’ Lothin said. ‘The
baby… I’m sorry, Ankhad, for what it’s worth. But the child
must be burned. The True Gods demand it. It’s their right.’
As if it understood their words, the child cried again, and
from the crashing skies came an answering rumble of
thunder, the flash-crack of red lightning. Ankhad flinched.
The spire at the centre of the Eightpoints hung heavy on his
mind then, stabbing its weight deep into his marrow. He
looked down into his son’s face, and for the briefest
moment, as if illuminated in the lightning flash, he saw a
mask of shadow pass quickly across it – a mask in the shape
of an eight-pointed star.
‘I will kill every man, woman and child here before I let
you harm this baby,’ Ankhad said, and he knew they all
believed him. Cudgels were hefted, and the press of bodies
in the street grew nearer. Ankhad dropped his hand to the
hilt of his knife. Over Lothin’s shoulder he could just see
Tarnot, struggling against his captors and straining to stand
up.
‘Ankhad,’ Tarnot shouted. ‘It’s over for me, but it doesn’t
have to be for you.’ Through the press of bodies, their eyes
met. ‘Run!’ he shouted.
The fight, such as it was, lasted mere moments, but it was
long enough.
He owed Tarnot nothing. They had passed no more than a
handful of words in all the months he had lived in Spite, but
something had made the other man help him. Whatever it
was, Ankhad silently thanked him for it.
He saw Tarnot break free and snap an elbow into his
captor’s face, sliding then through the mud to launch
himself at Lothin’s back. Grulsham Mof, with no room to
swing his spiked club, dropped his weapon and punched
Tarnot in the side until his ribs cracked, but by that point
Tarnot was lost under a scrum of bodies and Ankhad was
kicking his way through the mouldering planks of the hut’s
wall. He had the baby clutched tightly in his arms and he
paused to swing his pack up onto his shoulder – and then
the wasteland of the Desolate March was there before him,
strobed with red lightning, black and forbidding and no less
dangerous than the streets of Spite.
‘Run, Ankhad!’ he could hear Tarnot shout, before his
voice was muffled into silence. ‘Run!’
Ankhad ran, and the miserable little town of Spite was
smothered in the blood rain behind him.

Click here to buy Warcry Catacombs: Blood of the

Everchosen.
 A BLACK LİBRARY PUBLİCATİON
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 Table of Contents
Cover
Backlist
Title Page
Warhammer Age of Sigmar
ULGU
Part 1
TRISETHNI THE UNSEEN
RED CLAW AND RUIN
A SNAKE SHEDS ITS SKIN
ULGU
Part 2
About the Authors
An Extract from ‘Warcry Catacombs: Blood of the
Everchosen’
A Black Library Publication
eBook license