Runefang Read online

  A WARHAMMER NOVEL

  RUNEFANG

  C.L. Werner

  (A Flandrel & Undead Scan v1.0)

  This is a dark age, a bloody age, an age of daemons and of sorcery. It is an age of battle and death, and of the world’s ending. Amidst all of the fire, flame and fury it is a time, too, of mighty heroes, of bold deeds and great courage.

  At the heart of the Old World sprawls the Empire, the largest and most powerful of the human realms. Known for its engineers, sorcerers, traders and soldiers, it is a land of great mountains, mighty rivers, dark forests and vast cities. And from his throne in Altdorf reigns the Emperor Karl-Franz, sacred descendant of the founder of these lands, Sigmar, and wielder of his magical warhammer.

  But these are far from civilised times. Across the length and breadth of the Old World, from the knightly palaces of Bretonnia to ice-bound Kislev in the far north, come rumblings of war. In the towering World’s Edge Mountains, the orc tribes are gathering for another assault. Bandits and renegades harry the wild southern lands of the Border Princes. There are rumours of rat-things, the skaven, emerging from the sewers and swamps across the land. And from the northern wildernesses there is the ever-present threat of Chaos, of daemons and beastmen corrupted by the foul powers of the Dark Gods. As the time of battle draws ever near, the Empire needs heroes like never before.

  PROLOGUE

  In that time, the lands of Sigmar were sore beset by wickedness and malice. For the sake of greed, men turned their swords against sovereign and son. For the sake of glory, men bowed before false crowns and false blood. For the sake of power, men forgot their Lord Sigmar and sought to unmake that which He had forged in courage, in valour and in might. Three thrones were raised, to slake the hubris of usurpers, and men forgot which was their rightful liege. The land was without master. The country became a domain of wolves and goblins. The city became the lair of pestilence and blight. The Empire was slain, not by the fang of the lion without, but by the gnawing of the worm within. Brother forgot brother and men turned their faces from the sun.

  While petty lords built petty crowns and named themselves emperor of all, while ragged armies fought ragged wars and called slaughter glory, ancient evils stirred in the black places they had been driven into. Evil revelled in the unseeing lust of men, for by such folly would it know its hour. Even as the lords squabbled over their titles and honours, even as the barons made sport of war, old enemies crept back from the shadows, to test the mettle of the broken land.

  With fire and steel, the Great Beast descended from the mountains, driving all before him. Ironclaw his teaming horde named him, and upon him the powers of Old Night smiled. Numberless was the host he led, a swarming mass of snarling horror come from the wastes to reclaim the land that man had squandered. Slinking goblin, raging orc and mighty troll, all flocked to serve the Ironclaw. Like a storm, his host crashed down upon the places of men, and none could stand before him.

  Across Averland and the Moot he came, killing all who would not flee. The fields became ash and the pastures were as mire beneath the boots of the Ironclaw. Cities fell to rubble until not even their name survived them. Towns were left as open graves, the butchered dead choking their streets. The howl of orc and wolf praised the darkness where once men sang prayers to the gods.

  Into the west the Ironclaw marched, following the smell of man’s fear. The country emptied before him. Men forsook their homes in their despair and abandoned all they had built. The fury of the Ironclaw was great, to find that the strength of men was so weak. In his rage, he unleashed the worst of his brood, giving them liberty to raze the land and work what havoc they would. No bird nor beast nor tree nor field did the orcs spare, leaving the land a barren desolation.

  The Ironclaw turned his host north, and the city of Nuln burned. He turned his horde against Sigismund and the pretender’s army was scattered to the winds. Still, the Ironclaw searched, trying to find the strength that had banished the orcs to waste and cavern. In Pfeildorf, the terrified masses took shelter, trying to hide from the beast that ravaged the land.

  Our lord, Count Eldred, ruler of Solland by right of blood and birth, could have fled before the Ironclaw, to cower in the north as other lords had done, but Count Eldred would not abandon his land, would not leave his people behind to be slaughtered. With the sword bestowed upon his house by the hand of Mighty Sigmar, the noble Runefang of Solland, he would stand before the Ironclaw and defy him.

  The orcs brought siege to Pfeildorf and for weeks the cruel weapons of the goblins rained death upon those within its walls. Time and again, those within were forced to the battlements to turn the orcs back. Time and again, the Ironclaw was repulsed, his warriors slinking away to lick their wounds. Always, more came, for their numbers were without number, and always did the numbers of the men of Pfeildorf dwindle.

  At last, it became known that the walls could be held no longer. Men gave voice to the gods in that moment, ambition, glory and greed forgotten in the hour of their doom. Count Eldred saluted Lord Sigmar, praising him with the runefang held high. Then he turned his horse and rode to the gate of the city to await the coming of the Ironclaw. Only his closest knights rode with him, to meet their deaths with their sovereign, those who had sworn their oaths upon the runefang’s cold steel.

  The great rams of the orcs crashed against the steel-banded doors. Again and again, the rams pounded against the gates, until the walls shuddered. Some dared hope the gods had remembered them and that the gates would hold, but the spite of men was not so easily washed away and the hour of the beast had come. With a great crack, the gates fell open and the foul howls of orcs echoed through the city.

  A great green-skinned beast with bear’s strength and boar’s tusks was first to enter the city. Beneath his horned helm was a face scarred with cruelty, malice and wrath; the mark of such evil that Count Eldred knew he gazed upon the warlord: that which the orcs named Gorbad and which men named Ironclaw. The count did not falter before the monster’s fiery eyes and did not flinch as the very weight of the Ironclaw made flagstones crack beneath his feet. Count Eldred remembered his oaths to land and people; he remembered the legacy handed down to him by Lord Sigmar.

  Count Eldred drew the runefang from his scabbard and made ready to face the Ironclaw, and his knights felt shame that their courage was so small beside that of their lord. Even the Ironclaw hesitated, raising his brutish axe in respect to this man who had the strength to stand against him.

  Of that great battle, no man can speak, for all who stood with Count Eldred shared his doom. The gods had decreed that the hour of the beast was not past, that there was yet wickedness within the hearts of men that must be scoured with flame and steel. Pfeildorf was cast into ruin by the Ironclaw and its people were put to the sword, but the Ironclaw knew that he had found the echo of that strength which had driven his kind into hole and hollow. He bore away with him the runefang, the blade of the only man who had the courage to face him. It became a token of his victory, a symbol of his might, a reminder to his horde why he was their master, a warning to himself that there was yet strength in the blood of men.

  When at last the Ironclaw was driven from the lands of men, hounded back into the wastes, he bore with him still Count Eldred’s runefang. From all the plunder of half the Empire, this alone did the Ironclaw value, for in the runefang did he sense the power of men, the power forever denied to the beasts of the dark.

  —From the Saga of the Southern Sword

  CHAPTER ONE

  Armin von Starkberg strode from his tent, nodding to the page who held the flap for him. The page was a young, dark-haired boy, perhaps only a few winters younger than Armin had been when he’d earned the spurs of a knight. The thought gave him pause. Would t
hat be the legacy of this battle? A host of squires and pages given their spurs, not because of some act of valour, but simply to fill out the ranks of a depleted order? Armin clenched his hand into the sign of the goddess Myrmidia to ward away the ugly image. The man who rode to war with his head full of doubt and defeat only brought his fears to fruition.

  The knight stood just outside his pavilion, letting the breeze brush along his closely-cropped skull, feeling the unseen fingers of the wind tease across his patrician features. Eyes as blue as the waters of the Reik studied the cluster of tents that surrounded his, a field of black and red pavilions that swarmed in every direction, blotting out the larger camp that surrounded them. As he watched, each tent disgorged its occupant. Tall and broad of shoulder, their faces weathered by years of strict drill and discipline, their quality tested in a dozen campaigns across the province, these were the pride of Count Eberfeld’s army, the razored edge of Wissenland’s sword. Armin felt his chest swell as he looked on them, their red armour shining like rubies in the fading light of day their surcoats as dark as the descending night. Upon the breast of each surcoat, picked out in golden thread, was the image of a sword.

  That was who they were, Armin reflected. That was the legacy, the heritage that rested upon their shoulders and within their souls. For the sons of the Solland, the scarred frontier of Wissenland, there was no greater honour than to wear the red armour and the black surcoat, to be admitted into the almost sacred ranks of the Order of the Southern Sword. The knights could trace their history back to the very founding of Solland, and they had been there to the very end, when the orcs had come with fire and steel to lay waste to the province and slaughter its last lord, the Count Eldred. The order had endured their realm’s destruction, transferring their loyalty to the lords of Wissenland when that province absorbed the ruined carcass of Solland into its domains.

  An older knight, his dark hair peppered with lines of silver and a nest of crows’ feet stretching from his eyes, approached Armin. The veteran dropped to one knee as he reached the younger warrior, setting his helmet on the ground beside him. Armin nodded and motioned for the knight to rise. Of the three marshals who commanded the order, it was old Eugen Grosschopp whose council he valued and trusted the most. As the youngest hochmeister in the history of the order, Armin often felt the weight of tradition and precedent working against him. In another order, perhaps it would not have mattered, but the Order of the Southern Sword was fanatical about its traditions, even maintaining the archaic title of hochmeister for its leader where other knightly orders had adopted the convention of placing Grand Masters at their heads.

  There were some within the ranks who still resented Hochmeister Mannstein’s appointment of one so young to be his successor. Even on the eve of battle, Armin had heard such rumblings within the pavilions of his warriors. Marshal Eugen was not one of them. He valued the hochmeister for his abilities on the battlefield, his fitness to lead and his bravery in combat. Eugen didn’t care a goblin’s backside about how many years a man had under his belt, or how many titles he bore before or after his name.

  “Your report, marshal,” Armin said, addressing the older knight. Eugen set his helm beneath his arm as he stood, fixing the hochmeister with his dark eyes.

  “The men await your pleasure, my lord,” Eugen said. Armin looked past the marshal and watched as, across the camp, squires in the livery of the order led massive warhorses towards each tent. Powerful, majestic destriers, the smallest seventeen hands high, the steeds of the Southern Swords were the finest in Wissenland, perhaps the finest in the Empire. Tradition held that there was a bit of Bretonnian courser in the pedigree of the order’s destriers. Armin did not know. He did not think that anything but the grace of the gods could produce such magnificent animals. They carried the heavy steel barding that covered nearly their entire bodies as though born into the metal skins. They would show little more strain even with an armoured rider astride their back. The quality of any body of cavalry was decided by the kind of horses that carried the riders into war, and by the kind of men who rode their steeds into the fray. It made Armin proud to know that even beside such destriers, the Knights of the Southern Sword were not found wanting.

  “Count Eberfeld has given us the centre,” Armin reminded his marshal. “Ours is the position of honour. All eyes will be upon us. Remind the men that it is not their honour that will be judged today, but the honour of the order.”

  “They know the oaths they have sworn,” Eugen replied. “No knight of the Southern Sword has ever forsaken his duty.”

  Armin watched as the knights mounted the small wooden ladders their squires placed before them and lifted their red-armoured forms into the saddles of their steeds. Like statues, the destriers stood silently waiting for the jostling bulks of their riders to settle into the leather stirrups and wood-framed seats.

  “You have heard the rumours circulating through the camp?” Armin asked by way of broaching the subject. He knew that Eugen would not be so remiss in his duties as to fail to become familiar with the mood among the common soldiers in Count Eberfeld’s army.

  “Spook stories and old wives’ tales,” Eugen sneered. “Even our squires are too stout to be troubled by such gossip!”

  Armin nodded his head, but he had his doubts. The reports that had come back from General Hock’s scouts were troubling. Since the first attack had been reported, seven towns and villages had been razed, not so much as a dog left alive within the smouldering ruins. If the perpetrators had been beastmen or orcs, or even a free company turned brigand, Armin would never have questioned the valour of his men, but the things that were despoiling Wissenland were none of these, at least, not anymore. The walking dead, abominations from beyond the grave, that was what was menacing the people of Wissenland. Against any mortal thing, the courage of the Knights of the Southern Sword was beyond question, but faced by these deathless horrors the courage of even the bravest man might falter. Even the most stalwart heart might know doubt.

  The supernatural was nothing new in the long history of the order, but the menace Wissenland now faced was very different from the shambling mobs of decaying corpses called up by the curse of a witch or the malice of a vampire. These things marched with purpose, with some dread simulacrum of discipline. By night, they marched in ordered ranks, crushing anything too slow or too stubborn to flee from their path. By day, they rested within fortified encampments.

  Armin felt a chill run down his spine as he recalled the deserted camp he had seen, the earthen berms and deep trenches, the palisade of sharpened logs and the cunning arrangement of gates within the defences to allow the occupants swift egress from any of the four sides of the fortification. General Hock had balked at the prospect of laying siege to one of these encampments, for how could one starve into submission a foe who was already dead? Worse, the best soldiers in the assembled Wissenland force, the three knightly orders that had answered Count Eberfeld’s call to arms, would be squandered in such an engagement. The power of the knight was the cavalry charge, which was impossible to execute against an immobile fort.

  So it was that they had marched ahead of the undead host, anticipating its ghastly movement across the land. By day, the dead camped, but by night they marched. General Hock intended to bring his army smashing against the lifeless legion while they were strung out along the narrow road, which they had been following since the destruction of the village of Dobrin, before they reached the town of Heufurth.

  The Order of the Southern Sword would spearhead that attack. Watching his knights slowly form ranks on the parade ground just below his pavilion, Armin knew that he could ask for no finer warriors. They would play the part they had been given, and all the horrors of Khemri would not hold them back. Armin quietened his fears. Young or old, he was their hochmeister and they would look to him to lead the way.

  Armin drew a deep breath, holding the air within him for a long moment before letting it out through his teeth. Eugen gave him a curio
us look.

  “It is good,” Armin told him.

  “What is good?” the marshal replied, not understanding.

  Armin looked down at his men, at three hundred of the best cavalry known to man. They had fought in many battles, in many lands. From the Siege of Averheim to crushing the orc warhost of Uhrghul, the knights had never faltered. They had upheld their oaths to Wissenland and done their duty to their adopted liege and lord. This time was different, however. This time they were fighting for something more.

  The hochmeister turned his head and smiled at Eugen. “It is good to feel the air of Solland in my lungs again. Now, let’s to our horses and show Count Eberfeld how hard the sons of the Solland fight for their own!”

  The Knights of the Southern Sword formed ranks, steel-tipped lances standing rigid and proud in their sheaths, their black pennants fluttering sombrely. Eugen sat to Armin’s left, his company of knights given the honour of leading the charge by their hochmeister. To his right, was Johannis Roth, the hero of the Battle of Meissen, where the tide had finally turned against Warlord Uhrghul Skullcracker. In recognition of his bravery, Johannis had been given the duty of bearing the order’s standard into battle.

  Armin felt the bittersweet pang of nostalgia and loss as he looked upon it, a tattered length of singed fabric, its scarlet field splotched with blood stains and pitted with ragged tears. Yet the standard held a respect that was beyond the rich finery of a nobleman’s banner. It had been part of a tapestry that had adorned the halls of the Counts of Solland, one of the few things that had been recovered from the ruins of Pfeildorf after the horde of the Ironclaw had ransacked it in the aftermath of the Battle of Solland’s Crown. There was power in the threadbare tapestry, an echo of the glory and strength that had been Solland, a strength the men who fought beneath it could feel flowing through their limbs, infusing their hearts with an iron resolve.