Gotrek and Felix - Road of Skulls Read online

  Canto had never seen Garmr’s face. For all he knew, that silently growling visage was the Gorewolf’s true face. He touched his own helm, featureless save for the ragged gash of his visor. He had personally herded over a hundred screaming men, women and children into the great black iron wagons that would take them to smouldering citadels in the Dark Lands in payment for his armour. He wondered what Garmr had traded for his. He wondered whether Garmr, like Canto himself, ever wondered if the deal had been worth the making.

  Garmr twitched in his saddle. His horse came to a halt, savage hooves digging into the rock as it screamed in impatience and hunger. Garmr straightened, the brass muzzle of his helm rising, as if scenting the air. A long arm rose. The army ground to a halt like an avalanche. Somewhere, someone stumbled against someone else. A horse squealed and swords bit the light of the sun. Canto turned in his saddle, about to order someone to break it up, but the command died on his lips. He shrugged and turned back. It would sort itself out soon enough.

  It always did.

  ‘Ahhhhh,’ Garmr groaned. And it was a groan. There was pleasure in that sound, and longing, and it carried through the ranks like a plague. His arm fell, and as one his lieutenants rode forwards to join him as the dust of the army’s passage enfolded them like a morning fog.

  ‘They have come to meet us,’ Garmr said. The dwarf army had occupied the other end of the section of pass the horde was moving through, and awaited them, arrayed in gleaming ranks of sturdy warriors. So disciplined were they that they resembled nothing so much as small, broad statues, paying no heed to weather, time or tide. Even so, there were not many of them.

  Hrolf let loose a rippling snarl and his horse stirred uneasily. Canto did as well. When the brute had his blood up, he was dangerous, even to those who nominally shared the same standard.

  ‘How many?’ Ekaterina asked, leaning forwards.

  Canto stood slightly in his stirrups. ‘That’s a small throng, even by the standards of the stunted ones. I wonder if we should be insulted…’ he said.

  ‘Quiet,’ Garmr said. His voice was like the warning growl of a predator. He urged his horse into motion. ‘Canto, Ekaterina, Hrolf… follow me. I would see their faces before I peel the meat from their skulls.’

  ‘What?’ Hrolf grunted.

  ‘We’re parleying,’ Canto said.

  ‘We do not parley,’ Ekaterina said.

  ‘Well, what would you call riding alone towards the enemy?’

  ‘Fun,’ Ekaterina purred.

  Canto fell silent. She was right. It wasn’t a parley. A parley implied diplomacy. There was no diplomacy, no politesse in Garmr, simply purpose. All of them had purpose, except for him. He jerked his horse’s reins, urging the beast forwards, and it snapped its fangs in anger. He joined Garmr ahead of the others. ‘This is foolish, Lord Garmr.’

  ‘It is what Khorne wills,’ Garmr said. ‘We will take the skulls of all who stand in our path. Would you have me add you to the tally, Canto?’ Garmr’s voice was harsh.

  Canto shook his head. ‘Of course not,’ he said quickly. ‘But why not simply smash them?’

  Garmr’s only reply was to stroke the haft of the great axe that was slung across his saddle and bring his horse to a halt. The weapon was a crude, hateful thing. It was sharp in a way that seemed the apotheosis of the word. It could slice the wind in two, that axe, and Canto had seen it spill what passed for the brains of daemons in the madness of the far north.

  He knew the answer to his question, despite Garmr’s silence. There were proprieties to be observed, even among the worshippers of the Blood God. Enemies must know each other’s faces, for the sacrifice to be a proper one. It lent crude meaning to otherwise meaningless butchery.

  Canto shook his head again, and examined the arrayed ranks of the dwarfs. He had faced them once or twice, in other hordes, under other banners. They were fierce, and hard and stubborn in a way that men, even men like him, could not understand. They stood in disciplined ranks, shields held up and weapons low, like stones ready to weather the storm. He calculated less than six hundred, which was no small force, despite his earlier comments to the contrary. Disciplined, holding the high ground, they might be more of an obstacle than Garmr would have liked to admit.

  Four squat figures trotted to meet them, their pace unhurried and deliberate. One was red-bearded and clad in dusty, ornate armour; he was followed by a younger, similarly attired dwarf, and a bare-chested, broadly muscled one with an impressive ridge of crimson hair jutting from his skull; the last was more heavily armoured than the first two, and had a hammer slung across his shoulders. The dwarfs were big on formality as well, Canto remembered.

  ‘Turn around,’ the red-bearded dwarf grated. ‘Go back where you came from. The Peak Pass is property of Ungrim Ironfist and the folk of Karak Kadrin and you will find no passage here, unless it is bought in blood. So swears Borri Ranulfsson.’

  Ekaterina chuckled. Garmr raised a hand, silencing her. ‘We will grind you into the dust,’ he said. He said it as if he were talking of the weather. For Garmr, victory was inevitable and his due.

  ‘Then there’s no need to talk, is there now?’ the dwarf with the ridge of jutting crimson hair growled. Canto eyed him warily, smelling the rage that boiled off him.

  ‘No,’ Garmr said. ‘Your souls are already harvested, and your skulls spoken for.’

  ‘Borri–’ the fourth dwarf, clad in heavy armour, began. The thane made a sharp gesture.

  ‘Then why bother with a parley?’ he said. ‘We aren’t planning to move.’

  ‘Proprieties,’ Garmr grunted. He reached towards his saddle and plucked loose the bloody lot of beards. ‘These were yours. This is what awaits you.’ He tossed the beards at the thane’s feet, and Ranulfsson’s face became as still and as cold as ice. Garmr gestured. ‘Send me a champion. We must sanctify this ground before battle.’

  ‘What?’ Ranulfsson said through gritted teeth.

  ‘Maybe him,’ Ekaterina said, leering at the younger dwarf, whose features paled noticeably.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ the third snarled, stepping past the young warrior. ‘I am Ogun Olafsson and I will kill any daemon-lover you send against me, Northman.’

  Garmr nodded. ‘You have until the fight ends. Retreat or stand, it makes no difference. We will add your skulls to the road regardless.’ Without waiting for a reply he turned his horse’s head and galloped back towards the waiting horde. Canto and the others followed. As they rejoined their men, Garmr looked at Canto and the others. ‘One of you will bring me his skull. Decide amongst yourselves.’

  Canto shook his head and stepped back immediately. ‘Leave me out of this,’ he said.

  ‘Coward,’ Ekaterina said, but mildly. ‘The honour is mine, Hrolf Dogsson.’ She pointed her blade at Hrolf, who gave a bark of laughter.

  He looked around, at his men, smirking. They growled and nodded and the Chaos hounds echoed them, displaying maws full of crooked fangs and tearing the ground with malformed talons. ‘I think not. No soft southerner is worthy to spill blood for Khorne, least of all a woman.’

  ‘Khorne cares not from whence the blood flows, nor whose hand sheds it,’ Ekaterina said. Then, more loudly, ‘I am Ekaterina Maria Anastasia Olgchek, Sword-Maiden of Praag. I danced before the balefires of the Beast-Queen and took the heads of the Chattering Legion. I bathed in the Rivers of Red Dust and spat in the eye of the Sleeping God. I have slain a hundred-hundred men and offered up their skulls to the Blood God and I will offer up a hundred-hundred more.’ She gestured with her blade, and said, ‘Including yours, Dogsson, if you cross me.’

  Her followers set up a chant, calling out her name and shaking their weapons. Men among the army, marauders as well as Norscans, took up the chant as well and the rattling hiss of hundreds of weapons clashing against shields filled the air.

  Hrolf laughed and spread his long arms. ‘Fierce words from a pampered child. I am Hrolf Wyrdulf, Prince of the Vargs. I am the Promised Son of the Wit
ch-Moon and I slew the sea-worm Ship-Crusher after a battle of thirty days and thirty nights. I can lie on the ice and not freeze and I can drink an ocean of blood and not burst. I stalked Hrunting Iron-Axe from pole to pole and placed his smoking heart on Khorne’s board. I took the star-skulls of the Women-With-Skull-Faces and flung them into the Sea of Chaos!’ His hounds howled and his men roared, shaking their blades at their rivals.

  Canto watched them, as they went back and forth. It was a ritual as old as yesterday, or perhaps longer. Every Exalted Champion had a litany attached to their name, mighty deeds and sagas that spoke to their prowess and skill. If there was one thing servants of the Blood God liked almost as much as spilling blood, it was talking about blood they had already spilled. Duelling with stories, however, was only a prelude to the more physical sort. In many ways, the battle had already been settled. Ekaterina’s supporters outnumbered Hrolf’s and no wonder – no one loved a berserker, even in an army of indiscriminate killers.

  Frustrated, pushed beyond the bounds of propriety by Ekaterina’s mockery, Hrolf swept his blade out, slicing the air where his tormenter had been. Ekaterina laughed and whirled around him. Hrolf spun, but not quickly enough. Ekaterina’s boot caught him in the belly, sending him sprawling. The cheers redoubled in volume and she preened, drinking in the adulation.

  Hrolf howled and sprang to his feet. Ekaterina’s sword flashed out and the pommel crunched against Hrolf’s skull, sending him to his knees. She wouldn’t kill him, Canto knew. Garmr still needed bloody berserkers. Too, this wasn’t a duel so much as a temper tantrum.

  Hrolf collapsed, wheezing, clutching his skull. Ekaterina kicked him in the side for good measure and then extended her sword at the dwarf, Ogun, in a traditional fencing style that had been popular in the Empire decades ago. She wasn’t even breathing hard. She looked back at Garmr, who raised his hand as if in benediction, and she smiled, pleased.

  The dwarf had watched the fight with studied indifference. At some point during the duel, the other three had walked back towards their lines, leaving the fourth to face Ekaterina, his axe in his hands. It wasn’t cowardice, Canto knew, but pragmatism. However long their champion could buy them was time well spent; every moment counted when preparing to receive a charge. The dwarfs would not retreat. They would dig in and stand and the toll they claimed for the horde’s inevitable passage would be terrible. ‘Well, stunted one?’ Ekaterina said, spreading her hands in a gesture of invitation. ‘What do you say?’

  The dwarf said nothing. Ekaterina laughed and her men chuckled and grinned. Canto climbed into the saddle and walked his horse back a few feet. Hrolf scrambled up and did the same, glaring at Ekaterina as he went. She paid him no heed, her eyes unnaturally wide and her grin nearly splitting her face. She and the dwarf circled each other slowly. From the horde came the thump of drums and the chants of warriors. The dwarfs remained silent.

  Then, with a cat-scream, Ekaterina moved. Her blade flickered, and Ogun only brought his axe up just in time. Metal rang on metal, and Canto could tell by the dwarf’s grunt that he was surprised by her strength.

  His surprise didn’t last long. The axe looped out, and Ekaterina flipped backwards, the soles of her boots grazing the blade. She landed and sprang, stabbing. The sword caught the dwarf on one muscular arm, releasing a splash of red. She sprang back and tipped her head, holding the sword aloft. Blood drizzled into her mouth and she licked her lips as the dwarf roared and charged.

  They moved back and forth, until the shadows cast by the sun draped the pass in curtains of darkness. Hrolf had already rejoined his howling comrades, bored. Canto couldn’t bring himself to leave, so instead he sat on his horse like some black iron statue, watching and waiting and hoping.

  After an hour, the moment he’d been hoping to see came. The edge of the dwarf’s axe gashed her side and her laughter turned to a snarl of rage. She was spun by the force of the blow, and Ogun pressed his advantage, his weapon spinning in his hands. Canto leaned forwards. The axe rose, the flat catching Ekaterina in the jaw and knocking her sprawling. Ogun bellowed in triumph and the axe swung up in a headsman’s blow.

  Ekaterina’s sword moved so quickly, Canto didn’t see it until the blade was exiting the meat of the dwarf’s torso. Ogun’s eyes bulged, but no sound escaped his lips. Ekaterina rolled to her feet as the axe fell, burying itself in the rock and hard soil. The dwarf leaned forwards, breathing heavily. Blood spilled from his belly, coating his legs and drenching the ground. He hunched over, one wide hand pressed to his belly, looking at nothing.

  Ekaterina darted forwards, pinking him. The dwarf tried to hit her, but his movements had become slow and pained. More of his blood joined the first deluge, spattering the rocks as he weaved drunkenly after his tormentor. Finally, she darted behind him and her sword swept through his legs, severing the tendons. The dwarf toppled with a grunt and lay panting in the dust. And still, Ekaterina did not deliver the killing blow. She capered and howled, thrusting her arms up, eliciting roars from the tribesmen and warriors beneath her banner as she danced a gavotte.

  Disgusted, Canto drew his sword and urged his horse forwards. Ekaterina’s shriek stopped him. ‘He’s mine, weakling,’ she snapped.

  ‘Take his head and stop playing with him,’ Canto snapped back.

  Ekaterina was in front of him even as the words left his mouth, causing his horse to rear and bugle a challenge. Her blade flashed, slashing through his saddle, pitching him to the ground. He rolled to his feet, clawing for his sword.

  ‘Blood for the Blood God,’ Ekaterina hissed, and the words seemed to bounce from peak to peak, carrying to every ear in the pass. ‘Blood and souls for my Lord Khorne,’ she said, stalking Canto, forcing him to scramble back. She lunged, her carmine eyes burning with slaughter-lust. Canto grabbed her jacket and jerked her aside – even as he instinctively interposed his sword between her back and the dwarf’s axe as it bit at her spine.

  The tableau held for a moment. Even Hrolf’s baying madmen fell quiet. Impossibly, the dwarf had gotten to his feet. Impossibly, he had covered the distance, leaving a red path to mark his trail. Impossibly, at that moment, the dwarf was the most terrifying thing in the pass, his axe creaking against Canto’s sword, his muscles bulging and his face set with a grim fatalism that defied even Ekaterina’s berserk enthusiasm.

  And then she screamed and the horde joined her in that howl as she twisted out of Canto’s grip and tackled the dwarf, knocking him flat. Her mouth opened like a flower at the first spring rain, revealing clattering fang-spurs hidden behind her teeth, and she ducked, fastening her too-wide mouth on the dwarf’s face, cutting off his last roar. Canto backed away, sword still in his hand, unable to look away as Ekaterina’s spine tightened and rippled and her head shot back, gory locks flaring as she tore the meat from the dwarf’s skull in one go.

  She turned to Canto, shreds of meat dangling from red-stained jaws. Her eyes were wide and staring and he had the sense that she was not looking at him so much as something behind him. And then there was no time to ponder it further.

  ‘He was worthy,’ she hissed, her jaw working as she swallowed what she had torn loose from the dwarf. ‘Unlike you,’ she added, and sprang into the saddle of her horse and screamed again. The horse shot forwards, galloping up the slope towards the dwarf lines.

  As one, like some hungry beast that had slipped its chain, Garmr’s army surged in her wake, eating distance even as Ekaterina’s horse flew over the heads of the front rank of dwarfs and she crashed down among them, her sword flashing in the fading light as she howled out the Blood God’s name. Canto, caught between the dwarfs and his side, raced towards the former, cursing with every step.

  It was going to be a slaughter.

  Canto was not opposed to slaughter; indeed, he had instigated more than one. But since joining Garmr, he’d been glutted on it. Whatever fire it had once stoked in him was now only guttering ashes, and though he could lose himself in the rhythms of battle easily enough, it
lacked the comfort it had once provided.

  Crossbow bolts struck his armour as he charged up the slope in Ekaterina’s wake. He was faster than a man, even in his armour, but even so, the vanguard of the Chaos horde swept him up in its momentum and he crashed into the dwarfs a moment later, using his greater weight and size to bull them aside. He was stronger than any man or dwarf, and a backhand blow from his fist broke necks as surely as his sword cut through them. He lost sight of Ekaterina in the melee as the dwarfs sought to simultaneously pull him down and prepare themselves for the blitzkrieg thundering towards them. Determined not to be caught in the main crush when it came, Canto waded deeper into the dwarf lines, striking out with calculated brutality as, around him, the armoured warriors of Chaos hewed at their enemies with brutal abandon.

  The dwarfs held their ground, and hammers and axes sang hollow songs as they struck sparks from his armour. Somewhere, a dirge began, and was taken up by every dwarf with the breath to do so. ‘This far,’ it seemed to say, ‘and no further.’

  It was an admirable sentiment.

  Canto swept his sword out in a wide arc, bisecting two warriors. An axe crunched into his side and he stumbled, almost knocked from his feet. Blindly, he lashed out. An oath was cut short as warmth spilled down his sword blade. The thunder of hooves was so loud that it shook the slopes, and small avalanches of rock and dust tumbled into the dwarf ranks. Canto, momentarily bereft of enemies, turned.

  Hrolf was in the vanguard, of course. His horse was shrieking in reptilian eagerness as he howled wildly and his men howled with him, the dread sound rising above the first clash of weapons, the creak of crossbows firing and the war-horns of the dwarfs. Chaos hounds ran alongside their horses, screaming and snarling.