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  The fearsome appearance of the creature’s spiked hide was echoed in its skull – it was long and lean, with two sets of wicked jaws dripping with drool. Its eyes – small, yellow and predatory – fixed on Vanik with something that felt like recognition.

  A sylvaneth arrow broke the moment. It thudded into the beast’s shoulder. The creature twisted low, far lither than any horse, and flung itself towards the Kurnoth Hunter who had dared to shoot.

  Vanik reacted without thinking. With a grunt, he reached for one of the arrows still lodged in his shield and snapped the shaft, which was almost as thick as a spear. Rising, he flung it underarm.

  The length of splintered wood scythed through the air and into the trunk of the hunter bringing its bow to bear, thumping through a crack in its blackened timber. Its own arrow was loosed too soon, slipping past the beast as it lunged. The powerful jaws clamped down over a limb, snapping it like a twig, while the beast’s great foreclaws raked the sylvaneth’s trunk. It toppled slowly backwards with a creak and squeal of tortured wood, the beast bearing it to the ground and savaging it.

  Vanik found Serpent’s Fang amidst the undergrowth. A sudden quiet fell upon the cursed woodland as he snatched it up. The beast that had saved him was hunched over, snarling as it ripped and tore at the sylvaneth’s remains, trampling out its flames and pulping its bark-skin. It was hungry, but the hunter could provide it with no sustenance.

  The thing seemed to regain its self-control abruptly, sensing his presence. It rounded on him, strings of drool slavering from its maw.

  ‘Tzatzo,’ Vanik said.

  The creature let out a soft trilling sound, and her crest of quills rose at the sound of her name. Vanik knew it, though he did not know how.

  ‘The Eightfold Path has brought us here,’ he said to the creature. ‘Already our souls are bound, one to the other.’

  She snapped at him – whether with agreement or hostility, he could not tell. He noticed that she was standing with one of her hind claws raised up off the ashy undergrowth. The second hunter’s arrow was still lodged there, and black ichor was oozing slowly from around its thick shaft.

  ‘Remain still,’ Vanik commanded. Tzatzo bared her bristling fangs, but made no move to lunge at Vanik as he moved round to her hindquarters. He sheathed Serpent’s Fang and placed one gauntlet tentatively against the yielding spines of her flank, the other closing around the arrow’s shaft.

  ‘Do your kind feel pain?’ he wondered aloud.

  Tzatzo snarled.

  ‘If so, we will avenge it together,’ he murmured, then pulled.

  The arrow came free amidst a spurt of ichor.

  Tzatzo threw her head back and shrieked, the hideous noise echoing through the smoke-shrouded forest. Vanik stood clear, but the beast made no attempt to lunge at him. Instead, as the flow from her wound became a trickle, she turned slowly and lowered her long, wicked muzzle. He cast the arrow aside and placed his mailed hand on the creature’s head.

  ‘One act of good favour deserves another,’ he said. ‘Your spirit brought me here, as mine brought you. It is the True Gods that will our partnership. Will you serve me, as I seek to serve the Three-Eyed King?’

  Tzatzo watched him, as though in contemplation, her hot breath washing over him. Then she knelt, her sinuous body pressing the ground. Vanik grasped the thicker clusters of spines along her back and threw a leg over, mounting her. Despite his weight she rose easily, her scaled body taut with strength. The wound in her flank was already beginning to clot.

  ‘The work of the Eightfold Path awaits us,’ he said, running the fingers of his gauntlet through her bristling spines. ‘Do you know the way out of this Gods-forsaken forest?’

  Without pause the Chaos steed sprung, quick as the falling Eightstar, out between the dead boughs.

  There were things moving in the smoke. Modred had tried ignoring them for the first few hours, fixing his eyes on the fires lit by the Iron Brotherhood. Vanik the Black Pilgrim’s retinue had built half a dozen of them from the kindling littering the corpse-covered ridgeline. Night had fallen, but the flames licked bright and hungry, at home in the parched earth of Aqshy.

  But the flames had also drawn something else. Shapes were circling them, indistinct in the darkness beyond the campfires. Modred was sure he could hear the creak of timber. He shivered, but didn’t move any closer to the nearest fire. The flames seemed too hungry for his liking.

  The thing inside his head let out a little childlike giggle.

  None of the Iron Brotherhood were near the fires either. The Chaos knights themselves stood arrayed around the small encampment, looking out into the ever-prowling darkness. Modred couldn’t help but notice their bared blades, or the tension in their stances.

  ‘How much longer?’ he heard the carnyx player, Aramor, murmur to the standard bearer, Kulthuk. The heavily armoured warrior didn’t respond. Modred realised why. He could hear something over the crackling of the flames, sounds that grew louder with each quickening heartbeat.

  It was the noise of combat. Steel clattering, a bellow of rage, a voice raised in anger. Then came a shriek, rising to a painful pitch, a cold, unnatural sound that made Modred shiver all the more. The smoke that seemed to eternally blanket this part of Aqshy caught in his throat, making him cough.

  ‘Stand ready,’ Kulthuk barked. Modred pulled out the short dagger he carried, feeling pathetic next to the full plate armour and heavy blades carried by the knights surrounding him. His heart raced, and his eyes strained as he tried to discern the movement beyond the edge of the fire’s glow.

  The laughter of the thing inside his head deepened.

  ‘There,’ shouted Aramor, pointing. A shape burst from the swirling smoke, springing fast up the slope. It reared up before Kulthuk, and Modred let out a shriek of terror as he found himself staring into a fanged gullet that loosed the same terrible cry he had heard a moment before. It was a daemon, he was certain, a hunter of the Realm of Shadows loosed on them by the True Gods. What transgression had they committed to warrant such cruel vengeance?

  The creature dropped back onto all fours, snapping its dripping jaws at the Chaos knights that were paralysed before it. Only then did Modred realise that the creature, its spines raised, was the mount for an even more terrible and glorious figure.

  Vanik the Black Pilgrim had returned. His shield and armour were scarred silver in places and studded with the snapped shafts of arrows. His great sword, Serpent’s Fang, gleamed in the firelight, notched as though it had been hewing timber. The black knight paused before his shocked retinue, glaring down imperiously as his mount’s chilling shriek echoed away into the night.

  ‘Another trial has been completed,’ he announced, twisting the mount’s head by the scruff of its quills to keep it from snapping at Modred. ‘Another step on the Path to Glory. I now have a steed worthy of a Knight of Ruin.’

  Modred fell to his knees. The rest of the retinue followed suit.

  ‘Sire, the shadows beyond the fire…’ Kulthuk began to say.

  ‘Are slain,’ Vanik finished. ‘Do not fear, my bannerman. Our time in this accursed place is at an end.’

  ‘We ride forth once again?’ Modred asked, hope overcoming the terror he felt at the close proximity of his master’s new mount.

  ‘We do,’ Vanik said. ‘From the Realmgate to the Eightpoints, and then on to Shyish. My next trial awaits.’

  ‘Another trial, sire?’ Aramor asked, unable to keep the dismay from his voice.

  ‘A final one, before I stand before the court of Neveroth and the Varanguard,’ Vanik announced. ‘For now I need but one more tool of ruin. My daemonsword.’

  THE DANCE OF THE SKULLS

  David Annandale

  The Mortarch of Blood’s party arrived at the royal palace in Mortannis with the coming of full night. Neferata, her handmaidens and her ladies of court swept up the gran
d staircase leading to the palace doors. On either side, standing to attention, were the elite guards of two cities: Mortannis to the right, Nachtwache to the left. Walking one step behind Neferata, Lady Mereneth said, ‘I do not trust the nature of this honour.’

  ‘Nor do they expect us to,’ Neferata told her favoured spy. ‘This will not be the trap. They know the consequences will be too great. What will come will be more subtle, one our enemies can deny.’

  Neferata had come to Mortannis to attend a ball arranged explicitly for her visit. The event was formally presented as an act of fealty and peace. She knew, therefore, exactly what it was. She was entering a battlefield.

  She would not have it any other way.

  Mortannis lay close enough to Nulahmia for it to be a point of concern. Queen Ahalaset had never challenged Neferata directly, and the tensions between the two cities had long been unspoken, subterranean. Close to the borders of Mortannis’ region of influence lay Nachtwache. It was ruled by Lord Nagen and Neferata had kept a close watch on the relations between Mortannis and Nachtwache. As long as there had been friction between the two, friction that she had encouraged, the two powers had kept each other contained. She had even tolerated temporary alliances in the face of the threat from the legions of Chaos. But the armies sworn to the Everchosen were, for the time being, pushed back from this region of Shyish, and it appeared that the cities’ rulers had formed a much more substantial alliance. That would never do.

  So she had accepted the joint invitation from Ahalaset and Nagen immediately, after putting on the expected charade of diplomatic negotiations. There was work to be done here, and she knew she was putting her neck into the jaws of a trap. Though she arrived at the palace with only her immediate retinue, she was confident in her assurance to Mereneth. Ahalaset and Nagen would not strike here, with their own guard. Neferata’s army waited outside the gates of Mortannis – legions of vampires, skeletons and wraiths cantoned in the lower reaches of the mountains that surrounded the city. Any move by the forces of Mortannis or Nachtwache would see Mortannis burned to the ground.

  These were the realities of the game about to be played. They were known by all. The war would take place at another level. There would be no siege, no scaling of the walls. After all, this was a celebration. The war would be invisible, until a point came when the combatants chose to drop the illusion.

  Neferata’s party passed through the high doors of the palace, down the entrance hall and into the grand ballroom. Torchlight shone off the gold leaf of marble caryatids that held up the vaulted ceiling of the ballroom. The ceiling mosaic was a wonder of bronze-covered bones. Hundreds of skeleton arms reached from the edges of the vault towards the centre, where a huge skull composed of other skulls opened its jaws in an ecstasy of death.

  The honour guard of the two cities was also present in the ballroom, but more discreetly, keeping to positions against the walls. To the fore, lining the path of the procession to the large dais at the back of the ballroom, was the gathered nobility of Mortannis and Nachtwache. Vampires and mortals bowed as Neferata passed. She acknowledged their greetings with the faintest of nods. She met the eyes of the nobles, all of them, and watched the spasm of fear and admiration take them.

  Queen Ahalaset and Lord Nagen stood together on the dais. Though Ahalaset was host, they were side by side, equals at the event. They bowed too, completing the show of respect that had greeted Neferata.

  No one was armoured except the guards, and even their plate was ceremonial, adorned with jewels and golden skulls, more resplendent than practical. Neferata, like her opponents on the dais, had prepared for the kind of war about to be waged. She wore a regal black dress of silk so fine it flowed like water. The train of the dress was much lighter than its length would suggest, and it moved behind her over the marble floor like the touch of night. From her shoulders hung a crimson cape. Its leather, so soft it was a mere breath of wind against the fingers, was made from the tanned flesh of fallen enemies.

  ‘We are honoured, Queen Neferata, that you accepted our invitation,’ said Ahalaset as she rose again. Her cheekbones were high, her eyes proud. Her brilliant green robes shimmered with silver thread, which wove the designs of scores of coats of arms, as if meant to remind Neferata that Ahalaset too had long experience on the battlefield.

  At the end of his bow, Nagen began to reach out for Neferata’s hand to kiss. When she did not extend her arm to him, he turned his gesture into a flourish, though the effort was clumsy enough to be obvious, then straightened. He wore a damask coat and a waistcoat inlaid with diamonds. The buttons of the coat were obsidian and shaped into finger bones. Its delicate fringe was human hair. Nagen’s features were narrow and refined, and he consistently let a single fang poke down from beneath his upper lip. ‘It is our greatest wish,’ Nagen said, ‘that you understand our intentions to be peaceful. We want you to know that Nulahmia can trust Mortannis and Nachtwache.’

  ‘Of course you do,’ Neferata said, and smiled.

  Her hosts hesitated for a moment, uncertain how to take her words. Then they returned her smile and descended from the dais. ‘We hope you will enjoy the ball,’ said Ahalaset. She and Nagen led Neferata’s party to join the other nobles. ‘There will be a Dance of the Skulls.’

  ‘Then my pleasure is assured in advance,’ Neferata said.

  Ahalaset clapped her hands. Musicians emerged from side doors at the rear of the ballroom, carrying instruments and chairs. They mounted the dais. Within moments, the orchestra began playing, and the war began.

  ‘Do they think we do not realise this is a trap?’ Mereneth whispered to Neferata as they watched the first of the dances.

  ‘Of course they know that we are not fooled,’ said Neferata. ‘They believe they can overcome our wariness, and that is what matters. They will act, have no fear. Our journey will not have been in vain.’

  A few dances in, Neferata saw, from the corner of her eye, Lord Nagen turn towards her, about to invite her to the floor. As if she had not noticed, she took a single, graceful step away and began to speak to one of the ladies of Ahalaset’s court. Mereneth remained where she was, and Nagen, already committed to the beginnings of a bow, had no choice but to make his invitation to the spy. Mereneth accepted.

  Neferata left her conversation as quickly as she had begun it, but though her departure was abrupt, the other vampire was awed, not offended. With a parting glance, Neferata saw the woman shrink before her, overcome with the knowledge that she had not been destroyed.

  Neferata walked slowly along the edge of the dance, watching Mereneth and Nagen. Other nobles parted before her, backing away even when they also sought to greet her. She exchanged brief words with the vampires and mortals she passed, but they did not deflect her attention from the ball.

  Mereneth was a skilled, graceful dancer. Nagen had difficulty keeping up with her. Her movements were never such that he stumbled, though. She kept him away from the edge of humiliation, and though Neferata could tell that he was a well-practised dancer himself, and prided himself as such, Mereneth’s control of their turns made him appear even better than he was. He had to focus on his steps, and he was grateful enough for the guidance of Mereneth’s hands that he did not pay attention to what else they might be doing. Neferata kept level with them as they moved up and down the ballroom floor. Twice, at chosen moments, she caught Nagen’s eye and gave him the hint of a smile. The first time, he seemed unsure that she had done so. The second time, his face lit up with certainty, and her unspoken, vague promise was enough. He devoted himself with even greater energy to his performance, as if to say, Look how well we shall dance together.

  Neferata allowed her smile to grow a little broader, though she hid her amusement. Are you already forgetting your purpose, Lord Nagen? she thought. For the moment, it seemed he had.

  When the dance ended, he and Mereneth joined her. Nagen rushed to speak before Neferata could esc
ape him again. ‘Queen Neferata,’ he said, ‘will you do me the honour of being my partner for the Dance of the Skulls?’

  ‘It would be my great pleasure,’ she said.

  Nagen beamed. Neferata held him before her with her smile. He would, when the necessity pushed him hard enough, remember what he was supposed to be doing. He would remember that his purpose this night was not to secure a dance with the Queen of Nulahmia. But he was not remembering now. And while Neferata transfixed him, he was not looking at Mereneth, and he did not see her slip the ring she had stolen into Neferata’s hand.

  ‘And now,’ Neferata said, releasing Nagen from her gaze, ‘I have neglected my other host for too long.’ She left Nagen happy and willing to be distracted by Mereneth once again. She doubted he would ever notice the missing ring. The theft was a preliminary step. She had no specific use for the ring as yet. Instead, her possession of it opened up a wider field of action. She would see what possibilities would arise.

  Ahalaset was at the feasting table on the other side of the ballroom. She gestured for Neferata to join her. ‘You must tell me what you think of this vintage,’ she said when Neferata drew near. She filled two crystal goblets from a large decanter.

  Neferata accepted hers and brought it to her nose. She sniffed a finely crafted blend of blood. ‘Most inviting,’ she said, but did not drink.

  Ahalaset smiled. ‘Please accept it,’ she said, and drank first.

  Neferata sipped. ‘This is extraordinary,’ she said, and it was. She tasted the innocence of the newborn, the enthusiasm of youth and the wisdom of age. They existed together on her palate, forming the entire arc of mortal life. She was impressed. ‘You have some superb artisans at your disposal,’ she said.