Vampire Warlords

CHAPTER 6

Command Sergeant Wood sat on the rooftop, hidden by a chimney, and watched the vampires drifting through the mist-tinged streets below. There were eight of them, a mixture of men and women, and one young girl who reminded him so much of his own dead daughter it brought tears to his eyes. She had long, golden curls, but only the pale face and blood eyes brought Wood crashing back to the present and the world and reality. She was a child no longer. No, she was a killer!

Watch. Think. Learn. Act!

In the army thirty damn years. Never seen nothing like this. Give me a man with a sword any day! Give me a stinking Blacklipper with a rusted axe, give me a raw recruit with anger in his eyes, spit in his mouth and a dagger in his fist 'cos he thinks I'm a bastard on the parade ground! But this? This… abomination?

Wood considered himself a religious man. He had always thought of the gods as higher beings in control of his life, and always done his utmost never to piss them off, well, as best he could. Wood tried his utmost to be a fair and honourable man, sometimes in battle he slashed his sword across the back of an enemy's neck, maybe stabbed a few through the back of the kidneys as well, but in the scheme of things he didn't lie, cheat, rape or murder. And this was despite being dealt a rough hand in the game of life. For the grey plague to take his wife had been painful beyond bearing; hanging on to her withered hand, weeping, not caring if he died by her side and went down the long grey path to the black waters of the Chaos Halls. No. He'd been ready for that. Sort of. Could bear it. Just. But for his nine-year-old daughter to follow two weeks later… it had been too much to bear. Three days after Sazah's death, Wood tried to take his own life. Tried to hang himself from the polished oak banister of a house now devoid of life and warmth, and love and laughter… and stinking that plague stink, with two corpses filling the beds.

Wood took a length of old rope, and with hands frighteningly steady, formed it into a noose. He tied it with a blood-knot he'd learned when fishing with his brother as a boy; a good, strong knot, not likely to fail. Then he dragged a heavy chair from the bedroom, his daughter's corpse nagging at the edge of his vision, and tied the remaining end to the banister. He stood on the chair, then climbed up onto the banister, one hand against the wall to steady himself. He looked down, to the polished terracotta tiles, and it looked a long way down, looked a long way down into the welcoming well of his own death.

No fear. He smiled. No fear.

He would join Tahlan, and Sazah, and they would be together and that would be the end of it. Wood smiled, nodding to himself. He felt himself shift on the chair, and he passed the noose over his neck. The rope had been coarse on his skin, chafing him a little, irritating him – he was a man of small irritations, as his army recruits knew all too well. But this time he did his best to ignore it. After all, he was about to make that final leap…

Then, the door to his house opened, and a wizened old man stepped across the threshold. He was stooped, wearing brown robes and carrying a gnarled, polished walking stick. The old man's name was Pettrus. Once, just like Wood, he'd been a Command Sergeant and the two had met at an old soldier's drinking evening, down at the Soldiers' Arms, a dockside tavern of ill repute. The night had been a long one, and when Wood stepped outside for a piss, shuffling down a narrow alley to avoid prying eyes, he'd spotted Pettrus standing by the dockside, staring down into the black, cold, lapping waters, the churned scum and detritus of a busy city port.

"Pettrus? What are you doing, man?"

"I want to die."

"Don't be insane! You're a Command Sergeant in the King's Army! You've got everything a man could want!"

Pettrus turned then, and it was the haunted look in his eyes, the pain, that made Wood realise he was about to jump. There was anguish in the lines of the man's face; pure anguish. He was in mental turmoil. A psychological hell.

"I have nothing!" he snarled, and went to jump… but Wood was there, powerful fist around the older man's bicep, straining to pull him back. They fought for a few moments, struggled and scuffled, and fell back onto the dockside in a slightly drunken heap. They started laughing, and Wood stood, hauling Pettrus up after him.

"I'll buy you an ale. You can tell me all about it."

Pettrus nodded, and they went into the Soldier's Arms, through the smoke and crowds to a quiet corner. Wood brought two jugs of frothing ale, brown, bitter and intoxicating.

"Why the hell did you want to do that?" said Wood, slamming his jug down, a creamy moustache atop his real one.

"My wife."

"What's wrong with your wife?"

"Nothing. That's the problem. She's perfect. She's beautiful, well proportioned, long silky black curls, a perfect physical female specimen."

"However?"

"She'll open her legs to any man willing. I caught her, last night, with a young soldier from my own platoon. You hear that? My own fucking platoon. I beat him, of course."

"Of course."

"He ran around that bedchamber, trews round his ankles, squawking like a chicken with each punch until I knocked him down the stairs. That shut the bastard up. Then I turned on Darina…"

"You didn't…"

"No, no." Pettrus waved his hand. "We argued. She told me about them. About her lovers. Every week, a different man. Every night I was on sentry duty, she'd come down here, to the taverns, drink her fill and find somebody for comfort. She said she didn't want to be lonely, but we both know that's horse shit."

"Yes."

They drank in silence for a while, then Pettrus looked up, intense, and grabbed Wood's arm. "Thank you. Thank you for saving me."

"Ahh shit, Pettrus. Don't be ridiculous. I did nothing."

"No. No. You saved my life. I owe you."

And from that day they had become good friends, talking often, and helping Pettrus overcome his destroyed marriage. Until the plague hit. Until Tahlan and Sazah died, weight dropping away, skin turning grey, huge sores forming under armpits and in groins, gums peeling back from teeth and forcing them to protrude like on a five-week corpse…

Wood stood on the banister, noose round his neck, looking down into the shocked eyes of Pettrus. The man was older now, retired from the army, powerful but stooped a little. Too much sentry duty, he used to joke. Too much manual work.

"Get down here," he growled.

"Leave me be!" said Wood, tears streaming down his face.

"I'll not let you!" snapped Pettrus. "I thought you were stronger than that!"

"Stronger than what?" screamed Wood, swaying dangerously on the banister which creaked in protest at his weight. "Stronger than a man who watched his family crumble and die, holding their trembling hands whilst they begged for life? Begged me to help them? Spewed blood and black bile and black tears? Stronger than a man cursed by the very Black Axeman of fucking Drennach to the pits of fucking Chaos? Only he's not dead, he's alive and having to live through the same shit day after day after day? Tell me, Pettrus, in all your fucking unholy wisdom, what should I do?"

"Don't jump, is what you should do. Taking your own life is not the answer, my friend."

Wood stared down into those dark brown eyes. He saw a great sadness there, but it was not enough. Not enough to stop him… he went as if to step forward, but Pettrus held out a hand.

"The reason you are not to die, my friend, is because Tahlan would not want it so. She would want you to go on. To live. To be happy. And if you think about it, if you died, would you wish your wife and daughter to follow you to the Oil Lands? No. You know this in your heart, Wood. Trust me. Listen to me."

As he'd been speaking, Pettrus moved slowly up the creaking stairs, each board tuned so that intruders would alert Wood in the night; now, the noise got on his nerves, and he watched Pettrus reach him, and help him down from the banister, and he was covered in tears and snot, and sobbing, but as Pettrus' hand touched his, so the warmth of human contact felt good; it felt so very good.

They drank a bottle of rum, and talked about old times, talked about good times.

"Remember them, my friend."

And the next night, another bottle. And the next. And the next. Until Wood had a warm glow of memories, and of long companionship, and that nasty bite of wanting to die had gradually dissolved.

"Remember them always."

Now, Wood sat on the rooftop, eyes narrowed, watching the vampires. Over the past three nights he'd been making his way slowly, warily, across the Port of Gollothrim and towards the house of Pettrus. Hopefully, the old man would have locked himself in the attic and kept his temper in check. Wood needed to reach him. Needed to plan. Needed the bastard alive, for Pettrus was one of the best tacticians he'd ever met. But the going was slow for Wood, not just because of the rooftop scampers across ice-slippery slate, but because in hours he had watched the vampire filth spread, like an evil plague, a virus, oozing through the city like oil smoke. However, unlike the stories, the fireside myths whispered to frighten children in the dark, these creatures moved through the gloomy daylight; even more-so when thick fog rolled in off the Salarl Ocean, obscuring the winter sun. They weren't afraid of the light. And that worried Wood right down to his bones.

Now, down by the docks, Wood could hear a riot of activity. Carpenters were sawing and hammering, carving and sculpting, labourers carting huge planks of wood, and ship builders in their hundreds were at work. Wood stood a little, holding onto the chimney, aware that if he slipped and a piece of slate went tumbling to the ground the bastards would be over him like a swarm of insects. He shaded his eyes, trying to see the docks; he could catch glimpses, of bodies hard at work. And of course, their noises echoed through the light mist which had seemed, ridiculously, to have lingered for the past three days now. Or at least, since Bhu Vanesh and his vampire demons had invaded the Port of Gollothrim.

Think. Think. What to do?

Reach Pettrus. But then what?

He shook his head. After all, why were they building ships of all things? Wood moved off across the icy rooftop, lowering himself over a stone lintel and down to another. He eased tenderly across ridge tiles, hunched over and trying not to pose a large target, and below in the streets he caught peripheral glances of the creatures, the vampires, call them what you will, drifting like ghosts, almost regal in their lazy decadent dawdling.

After another few hours of subterfuge, of careful travel, Wood crouched by a stone gargoyle, glancing past ugly twisted features wearing a stubble of moss and haircream of seagull shit. There. He could see Pettrus' house, a narrow terraced stone building on a steep, cobbled road leading down to the southern docks. The door was open. Wood grimaced. That was bad. Even as he watched, he saw two vampires move to the doorway and pause, looking around. There came a subtle crack from inside, and the creatures moved in; vanished from sight.

"Bollocks." Wood leapt down to a lower roof, then scrambled to a pipe, swinging his legs over and dangling precariously for a moment, cold fingers clawing, nails dragging on stone, boots kicking uselessly until they found purchase. Wood half climbed, half slid down the iron water-channel pipework, and landed in a heap on the cobbles. He stood, drew his army-issue iron short sword, and approached the door…

Inside, darkness beckoned like a bad nightmare. Wood glanced behind him, licked his lips, and thought better of calling out for Pettrus. It would bring a city full of blood-sucking vermin to the door, that was for sure! But then, he did not need to call out – he heard Pettrus' voice, as grumpy and scratchy as ever.

"Get out, you filthy bastards!" he was snarling, and Wood heard the rasp of steel.

He ran, into the lower quarters where he'd spent many a happy evening drinking brandy and sherry and port, and recounting endless old war stories, tales of campaigns in Anvaresh and Drennach, Torragon and Ionia. Then Pettrus would break out the black bread and cheese, and they'd wash it down with more fine brandy and watch the sun come up over misty rooftops, hearing the call of gulls and distant cacophony of ships unloading their foreign wares at the docks.

Wood ran for the stairs. There came a thud, and a gurgle, and Wood stopped in his tracks. At the foot of the stairs was a dead vampire, chest awash with a flood of crimson, face a rictus mask, fangs gleaming, eyes blood-red and wide and dead. Through the heart. It had been stabbed straight through the heart.

Wood stepped gingerly over the corpse, and eased up the stairs. He heard Pettrus again.

"Come on, you blood-puking bastards! Let's see what you've got!"

"You will not be underestimated again," came a soft, feminine voice, followed by a crunch of wood, and a growl, and the sound of smashing glass.

Wood ran, reaching the landing and spinning into the modest bedroom. Pettrus' sword was on the floor, stained with blood, and he had been flung across the room, hitting the wall, one arm smashing through the window. Blood trickled over his wrist, and his face was slapped, stunned, dazed. Before him, back to Wood, stood a slim girl, no more than eighteen, with long blonde hair and hands focused into claws. She was hissing, a low oozing sound, and hunched ready to spring. To the right, there was another creature, crumpled in a foetal position, hands clasped to chest, panting fast like a heart-attack victim. Pettrus had not been taken easily. But even now, the slim girl was readying to pounce.

Wood leapt forward, shouting "Hah!" as his sword thrust out, but the girl moved fast, too fast, spinning as the blade struck, aiming for her heart but missing, and it scored a line under her arm, parting her flowered dress and opening a huge wound but she did not scream, did not moan or cry out in pain but simply took the blow, flesh parting like razored fish-flesh and no blood came out, just flapping bulging muscle revealing yellow ribs within. Wood's blade came back, and she leapt at him, and in reflex his sword shot up and she knocked it away, fist slamming out to thump his chest, the impact a crushing blow that threw him back against the wall, his head ramming back, stars fluttering and she leapt again, pursuing him, and Wood's head twitched sideways where the vampire's fist skimmed his cheek, punching a hole clean through the stone wall. Dust rose, Wood choked, the girl struggled for a moment with fist trapped and Wood side-stepped, glared at her in temper, pain pounding through his chest with hammer blows and realisation in his dark eyes that if her punch had connected, she would have crushed his head like a ripe fruit. His blade lifted, and he struck her a savage blow across the skull, which split her open revealing skull and brain within, a cross-section down halfway to her nose. She did not die. Wood stared with his mouth hung open at the large V of wound, the open skull, the struggling creature who should be dead as a corpse, but was still mouthing obscenities, flapping and fighting, and her fist came out of the wall grey with powdered stone and her fingers were twisted and mangled, snapped and bent in order to retrieve her fist and she turned on Wood, face a horrific open V, eyes split wide apart but still staring at him with recognition, understanding, hatred, and Pettrus against the far wall croaked, "Cut off its head!" and Wood's blade lifted wide, and slashed at the girl, and there was a thud as her decapitated split head hit the thick carpet. The headless corpse stood for a moment, and Wood watched it, wondering if the bastard thing would still attack him. What would he do then? Cut off the arms and legs? And what if each body part came after him? He felt an insane giggle welling in his chest and he forced it down with a grunt. Focus! You've seen worse than this! But when? When, really?

The corpse collapsed, and lay still. Wood gave a sigh, and glanced right to the fast-panting vampire. Its eyes were watching him, and blood was pooling under it.

"I winged it," said Pettrus, pushing himself to his feet and brushing broken glass from his dressing-gown sleeve. "Go on. Kill it, lad."

Wood moved to the thing, wary, sword gripped in a heavily sweating palm. He could feel droplets in his moustache, and on his shining pate. Damn his thinning hair! How would he woo the young ladies now?

His sword slammed down, separating the creature from its head, which rolled a short way and stared up at him, tongue protruding and purple like a great bloated worm.

Pettrus moved to Wood, and slapped him on the back. "Thanks, boy. I had it under control, but you arrived just in time, all right." He coughed, and grinned, and bent to retrieve his own sword.

"Why are you wandering around in your dressing gown?"

"I was asleep, wasn't I?"

"What, here? Didn't you have the bloody sense to hide, man?"

"Of course I hid, you buffoon!" chortled Pettrus, and rubbed at his sliced wrist. "I was in the attic! What did you think I'd be doing, painting my arse blue and parading it up and down the docks? I just needed a piss, is all."

"Why not piss in a bucket?" snapped Wood, as usual becoming irate at the old man's obstinacy.

"I'm not doing that, boy. It'd stink."

"You risked certain death because of a piss stench?"

"Not certain death. You turned up. Eh?" He slapped the younger Command Sergeant again, and grinned a mouthful of bad teeth.

"Stop calling me 'boy'. I'm fifty years old!"

"Still a boy to me," said Pettrus, then his mood turned a little sour, and he surveyed the corpses. "We need to do something about this outrage. We need to sort this shit out."

"I agree. They've taken over the whole damn city, and worse than that, it's spreading quicker than the Red Plague!"

"Yes." Pettrus rubbed his side-whiskers. "We need to get rid of them, because unless we do, all the good restaurants will remain closed. And how will I get my steak and port then, eh?"

Wood stared at the old man. There was a twinkle in his eye.

"You always liked a challenge, didn't you?"

"When the Gold Loop Tribes of Salakarr mounted a charge on elephants with spikes attached to their legs, and tigers straining on golden leashes, and with arrows which flamed and spears which had mechanisms to cut a man in two, well, me and the lads did not flinch! We stood our ground, shields high, spears and swords ready, jaws tight and with good hard Falanor steel, good old Falanor backbone, and a bit of Falanor spunk, we turned back those screaming hordes. We did that."

"And your point?"

Pettrus stood straight, as if to attention on a parade square. He held his sword, and ignored the blood, and with proud whiskers quivering, said, "I'm not going to let some dirty blood-sucking youngsters ruin my city. We need to get to the Black Barracks. That's where all the old soldiers know to go in times of crisis. The Black Barracks! And when we've got a few of the old boys together, well, Command Sergeant Wood…"

"Yes?"

"We'll give these damn vampires a bloody nose to remember," he grinned.

Graal sat in the high stone tower, head in his hands, mind pounding. It was the worst headache he'd ever had, a flowing river of thumping tribal drums that seemed linked to his clockwork, to his inner gears and cogs, a rhythm in tune with the tick-tock of his twisted clockwork heart.

Reaching out, Graal took a glass of brandy and drank deep. He had started to drink more and more, usually just before he was required to see Bhu Vanesh and give the Vampire Warlord an update on progress. Certainly, he drank after every meeting. Because, and he knew this to be true, General Graal was now little more than a slave. He had worked so hard to summon the Warlords, with the mistaken belief he would be in control… when in reality they were so powerful as to be beyond physical retribution.

Graal had tried to kill Bhu Vanesh. Just the once.

On the second night, he had crept to the darkened bedchambers where Bhu Vanesh slumbered. The room was filled with blacks, and purples, and crimson colours, candles burned stinking of human fat and corpses littered the floor at the bottom of the bed – evidence of Bhu Vanesh's supper.

Normally, Lorna and Division General Dekull would be standing in attendance; but Graal had witnessed them leave the chamber, and decided it was time to strike.

He drew his thin black sword, and with blue eyes glinting in his pale, white face, Graal stepped daintily over husked corpses, their flesh shrunken and shrivelled over grotesque twisted skeletons thinking all the time how this reminded him of the Harvesters, and the way they drained the blood for the Refineries… his mind snapped to the present. Bhu Vanesh reclined on black satin sheets, stained with pools of dark, dried blood. He slept, breathing rhythmical, body still coiling and twisting, each limb fashioned from dark smoke, red eyes closed in dreams of… what did a Vampire Warlord dream of? World domination? World slaughter? An end to fear of imprisonment? Graal had grinned, then, a slightly manic grin. Remove the head, and the body dies. Such was the vampire mantra.

He crept with all the agility and silence he knew he possessed. His sword lifted, so gentle a butterfly could have landed on its razor edge and not been disturbed by its fluid movement. Then, it slashed down, angle and force perfect for removing a head, and Graal watched in lazy-time slow-motion as if through a shimmering wall of treacle and the air felt suddenly muzzy with a discharge of magick and Graal realised too late the charms which surrounded this ancient creature. His blade struck Bhu Vanesh and simply stayed there, a hair's-breadth from severing his neck, and slowly Bhu Vanesh rose from the bed in one rigid arc of movement and his red eyes opened and he stared down at General Graal as his sword thumped to the satin sheets.

"You had one chance," said Bhu Vanesh, his voice a portal to the Chaos Halls, smoke oozing from the terrible orifice as he spoke. "That is now gone. Betray me again, and I will suck your bones. Go now."

Graal turned, shaking, and walked past Lorna and Dekull who stood either side of the door, fangs gleaming, red eyes watching him with hunger. He returned to his tower with a panicked tick tick tick in his ears as he acknowledged he was vachine, and he was weak, and he was a slave, and he did not know what to do.

There came a knock at the door. Graal drank the brandy and placed the solid glass down with a clack.

"Enter."

The man was small, stocky, with thick black hair, shaggy eyebrows, frightened eyes. Once, Graal would have relished the terror in this little man, but not now, not today, not in this life; because Graal was subject to the same rules and the same slavery. He was shackled by fear. Strangled by power. Bhu Vanesh was Warlord. Graal was a worm.

"What is it?" snapped the General.

"I… I've been sent here, because of the ideas I had, I'm a designer, an engineer. I… I…"

"If you stutter again, I'll rip out your throat and eat your spine. Now. Continue."

Graal focused on the man, watched him swallow, could smell the ooze of piss in his pants, could hear the rumbling of his churning guts, smell the acid of his fearfilled reflux. That made Graal smile. To add a razor edge to any conversation always filled Graal with an almost sexual delight. To put the pressure of death on a simple exchange of words made Graal feel strong again, powerful, in control. Ha! But he knew it was a false feeling, the imitation of an imitation. So… the feeling of elation dropped like an avalanche from his soul.

"You are building new ships?"

"No, I have a thousand carpenters and riggers carving piss-pots. Of course we are building ships."

"I have a new design."

"I have hundreds of designs. They work well. We have corvettes, frigates, galleons and merchant hulks. We have everything we need, armed with the biggest damn crossbows I've ever seen and capable of punching a hole the size of my whole body through the side of an enemy vessel. What could you possibly offer me?" sneered Graal, and poured himself another large glass of brandy. Below, the shipwrights, caulkers and carpenters worked on, their noise adding to Graal's pounding head and rising temper. Who was this little man? Why did he plague Graal so? And what fucking idiot had sent him up? Graal would kill this fucker, then make sure whoever was responsible got to clean out the sewers for the next year.

"I can build you a metal ship," said the man.

"Ridiculous! It would sink."

The man watched Graal carefully, then shook his head. "No. I have designs, and I have made models. A metal ship will not burn, and is armoured by natural design; it will be smaller and more manoeuvrable than any war galleon you care to pitch against it."

Graal considered this. "What is your name?"

"Erallier, sir. Just think, if I can do this for you, if I and my family are looked after, and not turned into…" He shuddered. Then composed himself. "You will please your," he considered his words carefully, "your master, yes? You will have an incredible warship the like of which has never been seen."

Graal nodded. "Yes. You have a month to deliver plans and begin work. See Grannash below, he will issue you with coin and a… mark."

"A mark?"

"A ward. To protect you, like those out there," Graal waved a hand in the general direction of the thousands of workmen on the docks. "We can't be having all our workers changed, can we? How then would the ships be built? Now. Go. Please me, and I will personally guarantee your family's safety."

"Yes, General. Thank you, General."

Erallier departed, and Graal considered the proposal. A metal ship. The greatest warship ever! Enough to beat the Vampire Warlords? Graal shrugged, and stood, and stretched his back, and stared out at the Port of Gollothrim. Beyond the docks, the navy of Falanor was being gradually recalled. Now, four hundred vessels lay at anchor along the docks and for as far as the eye could see; and to the south in the city's shipyards, another two hundred skeleton vessels were in building progress. Graal had been given a year. One year to build up the navy. And then the Vampire Warlords would seek to… expand. They would travel. And they would conquer. They would take their plague to every corner of the modern world. They would build a new empire!

Graal smiled. And sighed. And pondered. And waited for news. And plotted against Bhu Vanesh. One day, you fucker, I'm going to eat your heart and take your place. One day. One day!

To the north of Falanor, where the Selenau River flowed through the Iron Forest and entered the vast realms of the Black Pike Mountains, there was a wall of rock, a half-league wide, jagged and black, sheer and vast. Impassable, and yet beyond there was a road, a black road, a wide road, built over a hundred years by the White Warriors, the soldiers of the vachine, the soldiers of the Harvesters, a secret road from whence the Army of Iron arrived at Falanor's northern borders and thence to the city of Jalder, and beyond.

This mammoth wall of towering rock was a barrier, a shield of sorts, between the world of men and the world of albino soldiers. Between men and Harvesters. Men and vachine.

Snow fell from a bruised sky. The wind howled mournfully from the edge of the Iron Forest, and whipped up in little dancing eddies, creating complex patterns in the snow before scattering and merging once more with undulating fields of white.

Everything was still, and calm – a perfect watercolour of serenity.

Then the black wall shimmered, each chimney and vertical ridge hung with rivers of ice sparkling for a moment as if hoarding a million trapped diamonds… And then the wall was not a wall, but a veil, like a shimmering black curtain. And beyond, a black road stretched away, edged with ice and snow, a blasted road, a desolate road. And as the mountain rock shimmered like insubstantial lace, so there came the stamp of marching boots, and the rattle of armour, and beyond the wall as if seen through mist came ranks of soldiers, their flesh pale and white, their armour matt black, carrying spears and wearing swords and maces at belts. They wore highpeaked battle helmets, and their shields bore silver insignia. The sign of the White Warriors. The sign of the Leski Worms, from whence they were once hatched.

The front battalion approached the wall, then stopped with a stamp of boots. Slowly, they walked forward, and eased through solid rock, out onto the snowy drifts. Rank after rank came, until the battalion was free of a rocky, blood-oil magick imprisonment, and they moved out across the snow in a square unit formation – to be followed immediately by a second battalion, another square group of four hundred soldiers, marching out into the cold crispness of Falanor from the black road beyond the Black Pike Mountains. More battalions came, until they made a brigade, and the brigade doubled into a division of four thousand eight hundred soldiers, and eventually, through churned snow and mud, the battalions finally formed into an albino army. The Army of Silver, the silver on their shields glinting with reflections from a low-slung winter sun.

The Army of Silver, led by General Zagreel, moved west from this secretive rock entrance, and they were trailed by a hundred Harvesters, bone-fingered hands still weaving the magick of opening and long white robes drifting through snow, tall thin bodies ignoring the bite of the Falanor wind.

Silence flowed for a while, followed by the stamp of more boots, and this time the approaching battalion held matt black shields decorated with insignia in brass, and they flowed from the mountain wall like a river of darkness, their pale faces impassive, their spears erect, swords gleaming black under winter sunlight, ignoring the whipping snow as more and more units and regiments filed out to stand before the mountain wall and then, with the tiniest of sighs, the mountain wall lost its sheen and became solid once more, leaving two full albino armies standing in the snow between the Black Pikes and the Iron Forest.

General Exkavar turned his eyes to the forest, the dark iron trunks twisted and threatening, and a cruel smile crept across his narrow, white lips. Blood eyes surveyed the snow, and he removed his helmet and ran a hand through thick, snow-white hair. He glanced back at his perfectly ordered Army of Brass, and then over the snow fields to the equally professional Army of Silver.

He turned to the bugler. "Sound the march," he said, and his eyes were distant, as if reliving a dream. "We head south."