Josh Reynolds - Master of Death

‘Careful, sorcerer,’ Ullo said, waving down Tarhos’s snarl of anger. ‘You still need us just as much as we need you, if only to keep Vorag happy. You recall Vorag, I trust? Your master and ours, for whom we wage these battles,’ he continued.

W’soran frowned. ‘Was that a threat?’

‘Merely a reminder,’ Ullo said. He looked towards the trees. ‘Tarhos has a point — why should we retreat? Why not crush the orcs as well? With your sorcery, we could have quite the army after a few hours. And end two threats at once.’

‘You have fought orcs, Ullo. Do you think we could crush them? Or do you think we would become bogged down, fighting an ever-growing number of greenskin savages?’ W’soran flung out a hand, indicating the dark peaks that rose around them like monstrous fangs digging for the throat of the sky. ‘There’s a reason the dawi simply close their doors and let the savages wash across their mountains… they are not an army, but a storm. You do not fight a storm — you wait for it to pass. Neferata might have shattered the great Waaagh centuries ago, but the orcs still cling to these crags like limpets. They are growing in strength, and I want that strength directed away from us and towards Mourkain. Let Ushoran shed the blood of his slaves on orc blades. And even if the Red Eyes continue their pursuit, I would rather face them from a position of strength, than in enemy territory.’

‘And what if his necromancers raise an army from them?’ Ullo asked shrewdly. ‘For Ushoran will defeat them. Of that I have no doubt.’

‘And so,’ W’soran shrugged. ‘We have enslaved tribes of the beasts ourselves, and Vorag sends more westward as he tears a bleeding hole in those mountains. And it will take Ushoran years to do so. Even with our help, it took him centuries to do the job the first time. Without us — indeed, with Neferata actively working at cross-purposes — it will take him much, much longer.’

He leaned towards Ullo. The sound of Strigoi horns was carried towards them on the wind, but he ignored them. ‘We are merely buying time, my lords. Every battle we fight, every raid we conduct is to buy us — to buy Vorag — a few more days of grace. We will bleed Strigos white and set it stumbling towards doom, and then, at the last, we will take it! ’ His hand snapped out, snatching a tumbling snowflake from the air for emphasis. Tarhos flinched back, as if W’soran’s hand were a striking spider. Ullo merely grunted. He looked back towards the trees.

‘And what of Neferata?’ he asked. Horsemen threaded through the trees, clad in the loose armour and furs of Strigoi horse-archers. There were lancers as well — vojnuk , the Strigoi called them. They were heavily armoured, and their armour was all swooping curves and serrated edges, engraved with scenes of battle and slaughter. Their helms, rather than being the simple conical affairs the Strigoi normally wore, were grotesque things, all bat-winged flanges and gargoyle visors. Their lances were not the thin spears of the Arabyan kontoi, but heavy things, more like iron-banded staves. The vojnuk did not pierce the enemy, they crushed them.

The infantry followed; archers mostly, but a few units of spearmen, carrying large, square shields that could be anchored to the ground to create a makeshift barricade. The Strigoi had long since learned the arts of fighting their more disorganised enemies, whether those enemies were orcs or men. W’soran wondered whether this legion had come east looking for orcs, and merely stumbled upon him. It didn’t matter; he would destroy them regardless. Even better, the Strigoi would think that the orcs had done it.

‘Time and patience,’ he murmured, watching the enemy draw up their lines. ‘Those are weapons you never learned how to use, Ushoran.’ Idly, he played with his amulets. He was tempted to eat one, but there was no need. Not for this. There was no need for a sword when a knife would do.

He looked at Ullo and said, ‘As to Neferata, what of her? She is no threat to us. Merely an annoyance — she is a child, attempting to join the games of her elders. No, Ushoran is the true threat, and it is he that we face here, or his proxies, at any rate.’ He smiled. ‘I’d wager he knew all about the orcs. He was probably hoping to send us fleeing right into them. Instead, we shall slip aside and let our enemies have at each other.’ He sat up in his saddle. ‘Ah, there they are.’

The enemy commanders were easy enough to spot. Horda rode with the horse-archers, his manticore-pelt banner rattling in the snowy breeze. Like most Strigoi nobles, he wore the bare minimum of armour, and no helm. Instead, he wore the tatty hide of a beastman over his head and shoulders, and golden clasps on his muscular arms and wrists.

Walak was more impressive looking. He was as big as W’soran recalled, and plated in the armour of a vojnuk, save that it had been enamelled crimson. His helm was topped by two flaring wings and his visor was crafted in the shape of a snarling face. A crest of black wolf pelt hung from the top of his helm, and a cloak of the same was wrapped about his armoured bulk. He carried no lance, and instead wielded a heavy blade which was sheathed across his saddle, his hand resting on the hilt. There was a stillness to him that put W’soran in mind of Abhorash, though Walak was smaller and thinner than the champion. He was still bigger than any Strigoi.

Ullo snarled at the sight of him, and his grey flesh seemed to ripple with anger. W’soran peered over at him and smirked. ‘Calm yourself, Ullo. I’d hate to lose your counsel to foolishness.’

Ullo snapped his teeth and shook his head, like an animal stung by an insect. ‘I am quite calm, sorcerer. I am merely eager for the fight. It has been too long since our last proper one.’

‘Aye,’ Tarhos rumbled, swiping the air with his hook. Even as he said it, the horns of the enemy split the air. W’soran hunched forward in his saddle. The beginnings of a plan crouched in his mind.

‘It’ll be Walak,’ Ullo said, noting his expression. ‘The vojnuk will charge first, to break our lines. It’s been long enough since Vorag’s exile that they’ve fought your kind many times since, sorcerer. He’ll be looking to take your head.’

The words startled W’soran more than he cared to admit. What if Ullo was correct — what if Walak was looking for him ? What if Ushoran were searching for him, even as Neferata had been? What if this wasn’t just a battle, but a hunting expedition? The thought wasn’t a pleasant one. W’soran didn’t like to consider what Ushoran might have planned for him, should he fall into his clutches.

He grunted and pushed the thought aside. ‘Let him come. There is a reason I chose this ground, Ullo, as you will soon see.’

‘I hope so, for your sake, sorcerer, for you will hold the centre, while Tarhos and I take the flanks. If we’re simply keeping them occupied, there’s no reason to hold our horsemen in reserve, eh?’ Ullo grinned and snapped his reins, urging his red-eyed mount forward. The black beast whinnied in annoyance, and pawed the snow with obsidian-hued hooves. The horses the vampires rode had been fed on blood and abn-i-khat, and turned into something else. W’soran wasn’t sure there was a ghoulish equivalent for an animal, though he’d heard tell of herds of man-eating horses on the steppes. His own mount was thankfully quite dead, and as such, not prone to making noise.

Ullo was correct, of course. There was little need for reserves in this battle, though the enemy would suspect desperation in the tactic rather than design. W’soran knew little of military stratagems, but he knew enough to understand that a battle unfolded not all at once, however it might appear, but in stages. Move and counter-move, thrust and counter-thrust, back and forth in a dull little dance; it was less a game here, in these grim mountains, than it had been in the Great Land, but the pattern was the same. There were only so many pieces and only so many moves.