On the Perils of the Northern Wastes
A
Dark Destroyers story
by The Fanatic
Heavily armoured boots
crunched into the snow on the road to the Troll Country, as four figures marched
in line, not a single one speaking to any of the others, simply whining in a
private and unpleasant world of their own.
“Almost home, almost
home,” mumbled by the enormous Chaos Warrior Arkhan Doom. The home he spoke of
was Black Rock, the enormous Chaos Citadel on the edge of the Troll Country.
“Ouch, me feet! Ouch, me
feet!” muttered the Chaos Dwarf hammerman Gorath, his iron-shod boots offering
no protection against the cruel world outside.
“Bed, board and
carriage? Bed, board and carriage?” whispered Klaus the sorcerer. Of all the
Destroyers he was the worst affected by the freezing weather, even his fur-lined
cloak offering no protection.
“Why? Why? Why?” the
last Destroyer cried silently to the sky. Khe’rai had been a little confused
by the reasons for her march in the first place. At least the weather was more
her type – it reminded her of her home in Naggaroth on the far side of the
world.
In front of the Destroyers
marched a sizable corps of outlawed Empire Soldiers, armed with a variety of
rusty variations on the general theme of sword. To the fore was a unit of Empire
Pistoliers who had turned highwaymen, led by a man in black. Behind the reverse
adventuring group toiled a unit of archers, followed by a trio of Ogres. The
army of Jurgen Muntz, renowned bandit lord, plodded on north to the Wastes.
Several months before the
Destroyers had been conned into accepting this mission by Muntz as part of a
desperate attempt to raise some funds for their own passage to various parts of
the world. All of them had been abandoned by their race for some reason or
another, and of the four only Klaus and Gorath had no interest in getting home.
Klaus had been outlawed for attempted necromancy, Gorath banished for
accidentally freeing Goblin slaves in Gorgoth. Now they were stuck here,
somewhere in the Nothern Wastes.
From the renegade
Pistoliers came a cry of “Trolls! Trolls!” and sure enough there were. At
least forty massive Stone Trolls were shambling over the drifts towards the
road, waving crude clubs and bludgeons hand-carved from bone and rock and wood.
Several bellowed in their barbaric tongue, yelling unintelligibly at the
caravan. The Destroyers reacted instantly, Arkhan producing his massive axe
Skulltaker, Gorath waving his hammer, Khe’rai with crossbow at the ready and
Klaus brandishing his skull-headed wand. The sorcerer let out a blast of black
energy at the nearest Troll. The spell hit home, but simply fizzled into nothing
as the beast’s natural aura dispelled the magic powering it. Arkhan too had
noticed a decline in success as the enchantment of Skulltaker simply seized up,
doing little or no damage.
“I
can’t hurt the blasted things!” the Chaos Warrior shouted. “They’re too
damn tough!”
“Get
down!” Khe’rai answered, before opening up with a terrible volley of
crossbow bolts. They clattered harmlessly off the Trolls skins; the few that did
hit seemed to do no damage to the beastie.
Klaus chanted a second
mantra and this time a beam of pure fire shot from his staff.
It hit the Troll with massive force and sent the monster tumbling in a cascade
of flames. It suddenly occurred to him that Gorath was missing – oh no. There
he was. His hammer blazing with sorcery-born fire, the Dwarf had already felled
two Trolls and was hard at work on the third. Muntz’s men had finished off
another twelve and the rest were already fleeing. Klaus and Gorath bellowed
threats at the retreating monstrosities, as the other two Destroyers stood
agape, unable to believe their own apparent feebleness.
Four hours later and the
Destroyers were sitting around a campfire in the heart of a Kislevite forest. At
last they had found shelter from the biting cold – all except Klaus were
happy. Khe’rai was dressed in her normal tight tunic and trousers, seemingly
impervious to the low temperatures, Arkhan’s armour protected him from the
worst of the conditions and Gorath was naturally hardy as a Dwarf. Despite the
fire, Klaus had remained wrapped in his furs.
“I’ve
never seen so many Trolls in one place!” Khe’rai said, breaking the silence
that had settled over the group. “I wonder what got them stirred up like
that?”
“Maybe
it’s a warband moving south.” Arkhan’s massive voice cut in. “They drive
the Trolls before them as a vanguard sometimes.”
“Forty
Trolls?” retorted Klaus. “Must be one huge warband.”
“That
it must. Still, I remember some of them big enough to put the Krovas troops to
shame.” Arkhan growled. Klaus smiled in happy memory of the village they had
torched on the way north – all those screaming peasants. Bliss.
“Remind
me again,” muttered the unusually depressed Gorath, “exactly where we’re
going.”
“Err
– hold on a second – got it here somewhere – ah, Macadone.” Klaus
replied, scrimmaging in his robes for a small scroll.
“Big
place, this Macadone? Got lots of Kislev boys there?” asked the Chaos Dwarf,
absent-mindedly stroking his hammer.
“You
bet. Population nine hundred humans, three hundred mountain goats, two hundred
chickens and three dogs,” replied Klaus.
Suddenly, the atmosphere
of camaraderie around the little fire was broken by a blood-chilling howl. Klaus
sat bolt upright with shock, his normally relaxed face pulled up tight in
terror.
“What
is it?” Khe’rai’s voice lacked its usual world-weary confidence. “What
in Naggaroth was that sound?”
“I
have heard it once before. It scares the hell out of me. That was no ordinary
wolf.”
Khe’rai
walked around to the sorcerer, now slumped and near-paralysed with fear. She
whispered soothing nothings into the old man’s ear until he slowly overcame
his shock.
“Now
then. What is it?”
“As
I said, no ordinary wolf. That was a Dire Wolf, one of the servants of a
Vampire. The Undead seem to be the threat that panicked the Trolls into a
stampede.”
Once before the Destroyers
had worked alongside the Undead, but of all of them only Arkhan, too annoyed to
be scared, had enjoyed the experience. The stench of dead flesh and the flies
drove Khe’rai mad, Klaus was terrified of them for all his dreams of
necromancy, terrified of meeting his own death instead of mastering it, and
Gorath simply hated the fact that the dead carried no money worth mentioning.
The Destroyers worked with the Undead at a pinch, but preferred to avoid them.
With another howl, the
forest was suddenly alive with wolves, huge rotting lupine shapes padding softly
through the trees. Dead, cold eyes stared out from decaying flesh wrapped around
old bones as the Dire Wolves loped around the fire. Klaus’ eyes lit up in fear
as he scrabbled for his staff, Khe’rai’s face was tight and drawn as she
reached for the crossbow, and Gorath was possessed by grim remembrance. Only
Arkhan seemed pleased at the encounter as Skulltaker was swung back ready for
the fight.
“Good
– I like a challenge!” the Chaos Warrior roared. The first of the wolves
leapt into the clearing towards him. Skulltaker swung in a wide arc and the
surprised Undead was smoothly decapitated. Klaus unleashed his Doom Bolt, the
spell he began every battle with, at the next, but the spell flew wide as he
shook in fear. Khe’rai’s crossbow transfixed it but the wretched creature
carried on going. Gorath leapt out, swinging his hammer down onto the beast’s
skull. The weapon impacted into the dead wolf and it finally fell. Arkhan was
surrounded now by snapping shapes as his axe whirled in a figure of eight,
lopping down a wolf with every stroke. Khe’rai and Klaus had retreated up a
tree and rained down crossbow bolts and magic onto the wolves around them. And
then from out of the night stalked their worst nightmare.
An enormous wolf stood at
the head of his pack, even the Doom Wolf behind him seeming small. This one was
not marked by decay as the others and his eyes blazed with bloodlust.
“Wamphyr!”
shrieked Klaus, falling into Classical in shock. “Kill it and the rest will
flee!”
“No
sooner said,” Khe’rai grinned; “than done!” as she fired her crossbow at
the huge lupine shape. The bolt flew straight and true, but at the last moment
the Vampire’s wolf-form whirled away and landed some dozen feet away, whirling
into a new form as a tall, dark-haired man holding a longsword that blazed with
evil fire. It brought back it’s hand in a gesture towards the other skirmishes
now raging all over the camp and chanted in some long-dead tongue. Muntz’s
men, now reduced to less than six, fell back in mindless terror as their own
comrades clawed to their feet as Zombies, screeching in high, terrible voices as
they pulled their comrades down. The Vampire span around to face the Destroyers;
but then a bellowing voice distracted it from its chant of a new spell.
From out of the pile of
dying wolves he strode, armour slicked with black, reeking blood, bearing an axe
emblazoned with forbidden runes. Arkhan Doom, Chaos Warrior, clanked and ground
towards the Vampire, raising his hand in a vulgar gesture of challenge. The
Vampire replied with a practised fencing stance, swinging its weapon towards the
challenger. Arkhan charged towards the Vampire, axe raised behind his head in a
two-handed grip. He crashed into the beast and whirled his blade down into the
evil one’s shoulder. It impacted with a dull thud, crushing bone. The Vampire
grinned, pulling the weapon out of its shoulder with every sign of enjoyment. It
lashed out with its dark sword and Arkhan fell to the ground with a clank of
armour, a vicious wound visible through the hole, dropping his axe behind the
advancing Undead lord. Klaus groaned. With Skulltaker at hand, he would have
backed Arkhan against anyone, but weaponless and wounded, he felt sure that
Arkhan’s beserker wish to die in battle with a mighty foe would be satisfied.
But, as usual, he had underestimated the Chaos Warrior’s resilience to pain.
As the Vampire’s blade fell in it’s deadly arc, Arkhan’s foot lased out,
catching the Undead right in the groin. It flew across the clearing and smacked
into a large pine tree on the far side. Arkhan laughed dementedly and picked up
his axe, obviously enjoying his pain. Then, however, a sound distracted him.
From between two trees the Vampire stepped out again, good as new, still
wielding it’s longsword. Arkhan’s whole stance seemed to be fed up with
this. The Chaos Warrior turned on the spot, raised his blade and charged,
bellowing in the Dark Tongue. The Vampire moved with lethal speed, parrying his
first blow. But Arkhan wasn’t finished yet. The Warrior swung his free hand
around into the Vampire’s jaw, smacking it loose and causing it to drop its
sword in surprise. As it staggered back, Arkhan’s hand swung up, grabbed it by
the neck and shoved it bodily into the tree-trunk. Still the thing would not die
– until Arkhan grabbed its blade from the floor and drove it straight into the
Vampire’s chest. With a final guttering scream, the monster expired,
disintegrating into a cloud of bats, which fluttered away eastwards. The Dire
Wolves fell as if pole-axed, their bodies ceasing to live on without the
Vampire’s sorcery. Arkhan staggered towards the tree where Khe’rai was
hiding.
“Hardly
worth the effort,” he said, and then blacked out.
At dawn the next day,
Arkhan lay there semi-conscious, his ornate armour clamped around him like a
vice. His face, freed from its helmet, grimaced in pain as the armour’s magic
forced his wounds together. Khe’rai looked towards him in sadness, knowing as
she had done hundreds of times before the agony he was suffering. The Chaos
Warrior was more or less invulnerable inside the armour, but the price he paid
was this excruciatingly painful process of forced healing. The Destroyers had
awoken to find their tent and supplies the only ones left. The caravan had gone
north without them leaving them stuck in the middle of the Troll Country.
Comments? Suggestions?
Email me on thefanatic@talk21.com.