02 - Nagash the Unbroken Read online

  A WARHAMMER “TIME OF LEGENDS” NOVEL

  NAGASH THE UNBROKEN

  Nagash - 02

  Mike Lee

  (An Undead Scan v1.0)

  It is a Time of Legends, a time of gods and daemons, of kings and heroes blessed with the power of the divine.

  The arid land of Nehekhara has been blessed by the hands of the gods, giving birth to the first great human civilization by the banks of the winding River Vitac. The Nehekharans dwell in eight proud city-states, each with its own patron deity whose blessings shape the character and fortunes of its people. The greatest of them all, situated at the nexus of this ancient land, is Khemri, the fabled Living City of Settra the Magnificent.

  It was Settra, hundreds of years before, who united the cities of Nehekhara into mankind’s first empire, and declared that he would rule over it forever. He commanded his priests to unlock the secret of life eternal, and when the great emperor eventually died, his body was entombed within a mighty pyramid until the day when his liche priests would summon his soul back from the afterlife.

  After Settra’s death, his great empire unravelled, and Khemri’s power waned. Now, amid the haunted shadows of Khemri’s mortuary temple, a brilliant and mighty priest broods over the cruelties of fate and covets his brother’s crown.

  His name is Nagash.

  PROLOGUE

  New Beginnings

  Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 63rd year of Khsar the Faceless

  (-1739 Imperial Reckoning)

  Small, soft hands gripped her and gently shook her. Voices whispered urgently in her ears, calling her back across the gulf of dreams, until the Daughter of the Moon stirred at last from her slumber and opened her heavy-lidded eyes. It was very late. Neru hung low on the horizon, sending shafts of lambent moonlight through the tall windows of the bedchamber. The golden lamps had been turned down, and only the faintest hint of incense still lingered near the room’s tiled ceiling.

  The sea breeze stirred the gauzy curtains surrounding her bed, carrying ghostly sounds of revelry from the Red Silk Quarter, down by the city docks.

  Neferata, Daughter of the Moon and the Queen of Lahmia, rolled onto her back and blinked slowly in the gloom. Tephret, her most favoured handmaiden, was crouched by the head of the queen’s sumptuous bed, one slim hand still resting protectively on Neferata’s naked shoulder. The queen irritably brushed the touch away, her own fingers slow and clumsy from the effects of too much black lotus and sweet, Eastern wine.

  “What is it?” Neferata murmured, her voice thick with sleep.

  “The king,” Tephret whispered. The handmaiden’s face was hidden in shadow, but the outline of her slender body was tense. “The king is here, great one.”

  Neferata stared at Tephret for a moment, not quite able to make sense of what she’d heard. The queen sat up in bed, the silken sheets flowing over the curves of her body and pooling in her lap. She shook her head gently, struggling to think through the clinging fog of the lotus. “What time is it?”

  “The hour of the dead,” Tephret replied, her voice wavering slightly. Like all of the queen’s handmaidens, she was also a priestess of Neru, and sensitive to the omens of the night. “The grand vizier awaits you in the Hall of Reverent Contemplation.”

  The mention of the grand vizier cut through the mists surrounding Neferata’s brain at last. She swung her slender legs over the edge of the bed, next to Tephret, and let out a slow, thoughtful breath. “Bring me the hixa,” she said, “and my saffron robes.”

  Tephret bowed, touching her forehead to the top of Neferata’s feet, then rose and began hissing orders to the rest of the queen’s handmaidens. Half a dozen young women stirred from their sleeping cushions at the far end of the room as Neferata rose carefully to her feet and walked to the open windows facing the sea. The surface of the water was calm as glass, and the great trading ships from the Silk Lands rode easy at their anchors in the crowded harbour. Specks of red and yellow lantern-light bobbed like fireflies down Lahmia’s close-set streets as the palanquins of noblemen and wealthy traders made their way home from an evening of debauchery.

  The lights of the Red Silk District, as well as the more upper-class District of the Golden Lotus, still burned brightly, while the rest of the great city had sunk reluctantly into slumber. From where Neferata stood, she could just see the sandstone expanse of Asaph’s Quay, at the edge of the Temple District and just north of the city harbour. The ceremonial site was bare.

  The queen frowned pensively, though she’d expected no less.

  “There was no word from the army?” she asked. “None at all?”

  “None,” Tephret confirmed. The handmaiden glided swiftly across the room and knelt beside the queen, offering up a small box made from fine golden filigree. “The king’s servants are in an uproar.”

  Neferata nodded absently and plucked the box from Tephret’s hands. She carefully opened the lid.

  Inside, the hixa stirred torpidly. Neferata gripped the large, wingless wasp between thumb and forefinger and pressed its abdomen against the hollow beneath her left ear. It took a few moments of agitation before she felt the hixa’s sting and the prickling tide of pain that washed across her face and scalp. Blood pounded in a rising crescendo at her temples and behind her eyes, finally receding several seconds later into a dull, throbbing ache that set her teeth on edge but left her alert and clear-headed at last. There was no better cure for the lingering effects of lotus and wine, as the nobles of the city knew all too well.

  She placed the hixa back in the box with a sigh and handed it back to Tephret, then raised her arms so that her maids could wrap her body in ceremonial robes of welcome. Tephret set the golden box aside and hurried to a cabinet of gilded ebony that contained the queen’s royal mask. Made of beaten gold and inlaid with rubies, polished onyx and mother-of-pearl, it had been crafted by the artisan-priests of Asaph as a perfect likeness of the queen’s regal face. It was the face she was required to show to the rest of the world. In time, it would serve as her death mask as well.

  It would have taken hours for Neferata to fully prepare herself for her husband’s return; she impatiently waved aside the proffered golden bracelets and necklaces, and glared at the maids who tried to paint her eyes with crushed beetle shell and kohl. The instant her girdle was pulled tight and the royal mask set carefully upon her face, she snatched up Asaph’s snake-headed sceptre from Tephret’s hands and hurried from the bedchamber. A servant dashed ahead of Neferata, her bare feet slapping on the polished marble tiles as she held up a bobbing lantern to light their way.

  Neferata moved as swiftly as her confining robes would allow, but it still took ten long minutes to traverse the labyrinth of shadowy corridors, luxurious rooms and ornamental gardens that separated her apartments from the rest of the palace. It was a world apart, a palace within a palace that served as both sanctuary and prison for the women of the Lahmian royal bloodline. Not even the king himself could enter, save on certain holy days dedicated to the goddess Asaph and her divine revels.

  There were only three small audience chambers where the queen and her daughters were allowed to interact with the outside world. The largest and grandest, the Hall of the Sun in its Divine Glory, was set aside to celebrate weddings and childbirths, and was open at various times to both the royal household and the common folk of the city. The smallest, a dark vault of green marble known as the Hall of Regretful Sorrows, was where long, solemn processions of Lahmian citizens would come to pay their last respects to a dead queen before her journey to the House of Everlasting Life.

  In between was the Hall of Reverent Contemplation, a medium-sized chamber built from warm, golden sandstone and inlaid wi
th screens of lustrous, polished wood. More temple than audience chamber, it was here that the king and the noble families of the city—as well as a handful of common folk, chosen by lot—would gather to pay homage to the queen and receive her blessings for the coming year.

  By the time Neferata arrived at the hall the great golden lamps had been lit, and incense was curling in dark, blue-grey ribbons from the braziers that flanked the royal dais. A red-faced servant, glistening with sweat, was single-handedly trying to unfold the delicate wooden screen that was meant to shield the royal presence from unworthy eyes. The queen stopped the servant in her tracks with a curt wave of her hand as she stepped from behind the elegantly carved wooden throne and approached the robed figure resting upon his knees at the foot of the dais.

  Like the queen, Grand Vizier Ubaid had taken the time to don his ceremonial saffron robes to welcome the king’s return. His shaven pate had been freshly oiled and matched the mellow tone of the room’s polished wood. Neferata could barely make out the coiling tattoos of Asaph’s sacred serpents that wound sinuously about the sides of Ubaid’s head and neck. She couldn’t help but note that the thin coating of fragrant oil effectively concealed any signs of nervous sweat on Ubaid’s high forehead.

  The grand vizier bowed low the stone floor as Neferata descended the broad steps of the royal dais. “A thousand, thousand pardons, great one—” he began.

  “What is the meaning of this, Ubaid?” Neferata hissed. Her husky voice sounded harsh and menacing within the golden confines of her mask. “What is he doing here?”

  Ubaid straightened, spreading his hands in a gesture of supplication. “I swear, I do not know,” he replied. “He arrived little more than an hour ago with a small retinue and a handful of slaves.”

  Like most Lahmian nobles, the grand vizier had a slender neck, high cheekbones and a prominent jaw-line. Years of rich living hadn’t softened him, like many of his peers, and despite being of middle age his body was still slender and strong. Many at court suspected him of being a sorcerer, but Neferata knew that he was simply very good at keeping up appearances. He had even taken to wearing golden caps on the ends of his little fingers, each one ending in a long, artificial nail in the fashion of bureaucrats from the Silk Lands across the sea. The affectation did nothing to improve the queen’s mood.

  “Where is the army?” she demanded. “The last report said they were still three days’ march away.”

  Ubaid shrugged helplessly. “There is no way of knowing, great one. Likely they are still somewhere on the trade road, west of the Golden Plain. Certainly they are nowhere near the city itself. The king appears to have hurried on ahead of the host.”

  As well as the majority of his noble allies, Neferata observed, growing more irritated by the moment. Absolutely nothing about Lamashizzar’s expedition to Mahrak had gone according to plan, and now he was risking the ire of people whose goodwill he would desperately need in the years to come. “And where is the king now?” she asked coldly.

  The vizier’s carefully composed expression cracked somewhat around the edges. “He’s… in the cellars,” he answered in a subdued voice. “He went there straightaway with his men—”

  “The cellars?” Neferata snapped. “Why? To inventory the jars of grain and honey?”

  “I…” Ubaid stammered. “I’m sure I can’t say—”

  “Asaph’s teeth!” the queen swore. “I was being sarcastic, Ubaid. I know perfectly well what he’s doing down there,” she said. “Take me to him.”

  Ubaid’s eyes widened. “I’m not certain that would be proper, great one—”

  Neferata straightened her shoulders and glared down at the grand vizier, her golden face implacable and cold. “Grand vizier, the king has flouted ancient tradition by returning to the city in this… unorthodox… fashion. By custom and by law, he hasn’t officially returned, which means that I continue to rule this city in Lamashizzar’s name. Do you understand?”

  The grand vizier bowed his head at once. Over the last year and a half he’d been exceedingly careful to conceal his true feelings about the king’s secret dispensation of power. By rights, Ubaid should have been the one to rule Lahmia in Lamashizzar’s absence; the queens of Lahmia were not meant to sully themselves with mundane affairs of state. Now, eighteen months later, Ubaid understood what had persuaded the king to make such a scandalous choice.

  “Please follow me, great one,” he replied smoothly, and rose to his feet.

  The great palace was honeycombed with a network of hidden passageways, built for the use of the household’s many servants, and Ubaid led the queen through a veritable labyrinth of narrow, dimly-lit corridors and dusty storage rooms as they made their way to the cellars. Neferata could barely see where she was going within the confines of her mask. The servant’s lantern bobbed in the darkness ahead of her like some teasing river spirit, luring her onward to her doom.

  Finally she found herself descending a series of long, narrow ramps, and the air turned cold and damp. Gooseflesh raced along the skin of her neck and arms, but she suppressed the urge to shiver. Then a few minutes later she felt the weight of the narrow passageways fall away to her left and right, and she realised that they’d entered a large, low-ceilinged space. Neferata glimpsed stacks of rounded, clay jars sealed with wax, and heard the distant sound of voices somewhere up ahead.

  Ubaid led her through one interconnected cellar after another, past jars of spices, salt and honey, bolts of cloth and bricks of beeswax. The sense of space began to shrink again, and the queen reckoned that they were heading into a much older part of the cellars. The voices grew more distinct, until she could clearly make out her husband’s hushed, urgent voice.

  Suddenly, the grand vizier halted and stepped aside. Neferata rushed ahead and emerged into a small, dripping chamber stacked with wide-bellied wine jars bearing the royal seal. A handful of torches guttered from the walls, casting strange, leaping shadows across the floor.

  Lamashizzar, Priest King of Lahmia, City of the Dawn, stood over an opened wine jar and gulped greedily from a golden drinking bowl. His rich, silken robes were grimed with the dust of the road, and his tightly curled black hair was matted and limp with sweat. Half a dozen noblemen stood around the king, all of them travel-stained and reeling from fatigue. Several drank along with the king, while the rest stole apprehensive glances at the slaves working feverishly at the far side of the room. None of them noticed the sudden appearance of the queen.

  Neferata studied the men for a long moment and felt her irritation sharpen into icy rage. She took another step into the room and drew a deep breath. “This is an ill-omened thing,” she declared in a cold, clear voice.

  Startled cries rang off the stone walls as the noblemen whirled, their dark faces pale and eyes wide with shock. To Neferata’s profound surprise, many of them reached for their swords; they caught themselves at the last possible moment, hands hovering over the hilts of their blades. Yet they did not relax. None of them did. Instead, their eyes darted between Neferata and the king, as though uncertain how to proceed.

  Now it was the queen’s turn to stare in amazement. Some of the men she knew to be Lamashizzar’s closest supporters, while others, though Lahmian, were strangers to her. All of them shared the same tense, hard-edged expression, the same fevered glint in their eyes.

  They look like cornered animals, Neferata thought, thankful that the all-enclosing mask hid her startled reaction. Is this what war does to civilized men?

  The king himself was no less stunned to see his queen. His handsome face was sallow and drawn; his eyes were sunken and his cheeks hollowed out from poor eating and little sleep, but his gaze was sharper and more penetrating than ever. Lamashizzar lowered the drinking bowl. Red wine trickled thickly down the sides of his sharp chin.

  “What in the name of the dawn are you doing here, sister?” he rasped.

  “I?” Neferata snapped, her anger managing to overcome her growing unease. “More to the point, what are
you doing here?” She advanced on Lamashizzar, her hands clenched into fists. “There are sacred rites to be observed. The king may not return to the city without first performing the Propitiations of the East. You must thank Asaph for the blessing she gave when you first set out to war!” Neferata’s voice grew in volume along with her ire, until her voice rang like a bell within the confines of the mask. “But the army isn’t expected for days yet. Asaph’s Quay is bare of offerings from the citizenry. The proper sacrifices have not been made.”

  Without warning, the queen lashed out, striking the drinking bowl from the king’s hand. “What happened?” she hissed. “Did you drink all the wine you plundered from here to Khemri? Couldn’t you have waited two more days to slake your thirst? This is an offence against the gods, brother.”

  For a moment, no one moved. Neferata could feel the tension crackling like caged lightning in the air. The king glanced past Neferata. “That will be all, Ubaid,” he said to the grand vizier.

  Ubaid bowed and hastily withdrew, his robes rustling as he fled from the cellar as quickly as his dignity would allow.

  Lamashizzar stared at the queen, his eyes depth-less and strange. He raised his hand and laid the tips of his fingers against the mask’s curved, golden cheek.

  “The gods do not care, sister,” he said softly. “They no longer hear our prayers. Nagash the Usurper saw to that on the plain outside Mahrak. Did you not read any of my letters?”

  “Of course I did,” Neferata replied, suppressing a chill at the mention of Nagash’s name. She and Lamashizzar had been born during the height of the Usurper’s reign, when the former Grand Hierophant of Khemri’s mortuary cult had held all of Nehekhara in his iron grip. It was only when the kings of the east had risen in revolt against Khemri that they had learned true horror of the Usurper’s power, and though they eventually triumphed, the cost of victory was almost too terrible to contemplate.