No force as large as this has been seen around the town of Murstvig for as long as anyone there can remember, but now that the tainted mutants that make up their ranks have come together under one banner, Murstvig must try to hold its territories, and itself, and repel the threat; or they will be trampled beneath the herds of Beastmen that are hungry to feast on a land ill-prepared for full-scale warfare. The mythical Aegis, an object of great power and magic, could very well decide the outcome of the war before it even begins. That is, if it exists at all. Einar Herze must make a choice: to stand and fight in defence of his homeland, or to chase myth and legend in search of the Aegis. There can be no going back, and the wrong choice may very well plunge the Empire into even darker times.
Aegis
Part I
His sharp nose wrinkled in disgust as the pungent odours of his quarry suffused the dense undergrowth in which he stood. Dark patches of lichen littered the remnants of Calve's Stand; the bare skeletons of once ancient Oaks and Pines were host only to death and taint, their long deceased leaves and needles covered the floor like a rotting carpet. Twisted stands of Birch arose defiantly upwards, the slender limbs and branches pointing accusing fingers at the heavens as if Sigmar himself had damned them. And perhaps he had.
Einar shivered as an icy breeze swept through him. Behind, he heard Benedikt reciting mumbled prayers from the book he wore on a hefty length of gold chain around his neck. It took a lot to unsettle a Warrior Priest, and Einar found himself gripping the hilt of his blade so tightly that his knuckles had turned white. He checked that it was free in its scabbard, and eased his tensed hold.
Even in the middle of the day, a dense wall of fog clung to the forest like a leech. Had he the inclination, he didn't doubt that he could reach out and grab the vapour that blinded him as if it were a woollen blindfold. As it stood, he wasn't sure if he'd be able to see his hand if he held it so far from the end of his nose, let alone ensure he clutched anything.
Chainmail rustled around him as his men stirred. They had entered the forest with their blood boiling and rage blazing in their eyes, but their veins had long ago cooled, and the fires in their eyes were now little more than smouldering ashes. Cursing the forest for the umpteenth time, Einar flicked his hand forwards and motioned to move on, the gesture made to calm his nerves more than to be followed; it was impossible for any visual orders to be given in the fog.
He started off into the mist, relying on his noisy mail to signal the advance. Everywhere looked the same. He was no woodsman, and cared little for the art of traipsing off between the trees, but circumstances dictated that he must, and he counted himself lucky that this forest was vaguely familiar to him. Something crunched beneath his heavy iron boot, and he stared down at the splintered skull beneath; shattered eye sockets returned an empty glare that told him to go back, and order that he would've been all too happy to follow.
Instead, the hurried whispers of Benedikt alerted him. He wheeled around and jumped when he saw the wild grey eyes of the Warrior Priest. The man's eyeballs rolled crazily in their sockets, his thin lips contorting in perpetual prayer and his long nose twitching like a rabbit's. As if struck by some object, he stopped, his eyes fixated on a point behind Einar's head, pulled his Warhammer high above his head and yelled and indecipherable war cry.
Einar too shouted, partly out of shock and partly out of habit. He turned in time to see Benedikt bring his hammer crashing down onto the skull of a Gor. The Beastman's head exploded in a shower of flesh, brain and bone, coating Einar and the Warrior Priest in hot blood and viscera. Einar tugged his longsword clean of its scabbard and prepared to repel the ambush.
Behind him, he heard several of his men cry out as they were gutted by the mutants, the ring of steel and the creaking of bows soon followed, prompting yells of pain from the attackers. A pair of Gors darted out from the fog before Einar; their vicious axes already raised and prepared to cleave him in two. He kicked up a wall of dirt into their faces, distracting them enough for him to gut one with a quick thrust, recover and behead the other with a two-handed swing. A third caught him off guard, however, and buried a hoof into the back of his right knee.
He cried out as his leg buckled, forcing him to his knees, but he kept a hold on his sword. Twisting around, he parried the death blow of the Gor and pulled himself up. His knee still throbbed painfully, but the tough leather had absorbed most of the impact. The pair exchanged a handful of blows, each one dodged or parried with millimetres to spare, before three arrows suddenly sprouted from the mutant's side. It emitted a low, bellowing cry, and Einar silenced it with a swift cut to its throat.
He tested his knee and grunted his satisfaction as it held. Scoping the fog, he searched in vain for more Beastmen, but found only the grey wall of vapour wherever he gazed.
Sighing with frustration, he stalked back to where the ambush had taken place, the Beastmen having succeeded in separating his force. The red plate armour of Benedikt guided him to a small cluster of trees, where the Warrior Priest was bent over the thrashing corpse of a swordsman. The Priest put a hand to the man's head, muttered a few words and the thrashing ceased, his body going limp like a marionette whose strings had just been cut. Einar watched Benedikt close the man's eyelids over his lifeless eyes, and set him in repose before standing and straightening.
'We should never have come here,' He said, 'We can ill afford to lead the men into another ambush.'
Einar sheathed his blade and sighed at the reprimand, 'You know as well as I do that these mutants must be put down at all costs. Losses are to be expected.'
Benedikt turned to face him and lay an accusatory finger upon his breastplate, 'Losses? My boy, every army in the land expects losses in a fight. But this,' he swept his other hand across areas invisible through the fog, 'this was a slaughter.'
Einar hung his head and stared down at his boots, 'How many did we lose?' He didn't want to know the answer.
'Half.'
'To how many killed?'
'Five.'
Fifteen men lost for five dead Gors. That was far from the ratio Einar had hoped for, 'How many do we think attacked us?'
Benedikt idly scratched his chin as he thought, 'Low end estimate, about twelve, but likely in the region of about eighteen or twenty.'
'We must have wounded most of them at least, I heard the shouts. …'
'Wounded is not dead. They might die later, but not before we do if we stay in this accursed forest. May Sigmar bless those who fell this day, but I wish a pox upon Calve and his offspring.'
Einar snorted at the remark, 'We should be so lucky.'
More of his men made their way to the red beacon that was Benedikt, and they waited for as long as they dared before making their way back through the gloom; thankfully, most of Einar's pathfinders had survived the ambush.
As the fog faded to reveal the late stages of sunset as it pierced the leafy roof of Morze Forest, a dull sound reverberated through the air. Einar tensed as it grew closer. Everyone tensed. It seemed to be coming from every angle, and yet even the lack of fog still revealed nothing. And then silence.
Einar turned and stared back into the mist. His eyes caught something in the wall of grey, he couldn't tell whether it movement or merely a trick of the evening sunlight. A horn suddenly sounded only metres in front of him, and the thunder of hooves descended from the gloom.
