The Hour Of Shadows Part 5

No elf or dryad, these h.e.l.lish apparitions. Nashrik could smell the fell energies saturating the dancing harridans, the abominable stink of blackest magic. Daemons. Creatures of the Outer Dark!

The stink of skaven blood made Nashrik's warriors belatedly recognize their peril. The ratmen tried to reform into a more defensible posture, some fragment of Nahak's tactics yet lingering in their minds. Nashrik shrieked orders to them to fall back, to retreat from this weird new menace that had formed to oppose them.

It was too late. Too many of the murdering daemonettes were already mixed among the skaven ranks. Nashrik could see more of the infernal spirits manifesting, these mounted upon long-legged steeds that seemed to mix all the qualities of worm, serpent and peac.o.c.k. The daemon cavalry descended upon the confused ratmen, spitting them upon golden lances or ripping them apart with slashing claws.

Victory, so close a moment before, slipped through Nashrik's grasping paws. Simple survival became the grey seer's only ambition. While the daemons were busy slaughtering his army, there was a chance he might be able to slip away.

The grey seer turned to flee, coming up short as he saw his way blocked by a grotesque daemon-thing. It was as big as an ox-rat, scuttling towards him on six spiky legs, its snake-like head tapering into a puckered mouth from which an obscene tongue flickered. Enormous claws sprouted from its shoulders and arched over its scaly back was a club-like tail tipped by a dripping stinger.

Nashrik cried out in fright, focusing his mind upon a spell to obliterate the disgusting monstrosity. Yet even as he tried to work his magic, his nose was filled with a strange, sickly-sweet scent. His thoughts became fuzzy, coherence collapsing beneath a warm idiocy. The warpstone fell from Nashrik's slackened grip, rolling away into the gra.s.s. The grey seer stood unmoving as the daemon-beast crawled towards him. He didn't even try to escape the mangling claws that snapped tight about his body or cry out when the poisoned stinger stabbed into his chest.

From the shelter of the trees, the elves watched in dumbfounded horror as the daemon host exterminated Nahsrik's army. They had been delivered from their enemy.

Delivered by a force far more terrible than either skaven or undead.

Thalos dashed through the benighted forest, desperate to reach the battlefield. He did not blame Ywain for the magic which had caused him to vanish from the heath and reappear within a copse of ash trees some half a mile away. He trusted that the spell-weaver had a good reason for working such magic upon him. However, his place was in battle, leading his kinband against the enemies of Athel Loren. Whatever peril that might mean.

The highborn hesitated as he rounded a turn in the narrow path through the trees. He felt a change in the air around him, almost as though the forest itself had shuddered. There was an unpleasant clammy sensation slithering across his skin, setting his hairs on end. It was an obscene feeling, ripe with the corrupt tang of evil. Thalos felt as though his very soul were being violated by the slimy phantasm which caressed his flesh.

The sensation crawled along his chest, crept down his arms and up his legs. Thalos could feel its progress, probing and groping, causing each nerve in his body to tremble with the thrill of abomination. Then the coldness seeped across his fingers, towards the amber sword clenched in his hand.

At once, the corruption fled from him, recoiling from the Dawnblade as though from a raging fire. Thalos could almost hear the unseen force screeching in terror as it fled, abandoning the elf once more to the darkness.

Thalos felt his gorge rise at the vileness that had a.s.saulted his senses. It was a struggle for him to regain his composure, to keep from running, to keep from screaming. Only the knowledge that the foul presence had fled from him allowed the elf to retain his courage. Whatever the atrocity had been, it had feared the Dawnblade.

The foul stink of carrion struck Thalos' reeling senses. The highborn forced his mind to clear itself of nameless fears. Sufficient to the moment were the evils thereof. The stink he smelled could only belong to some of Huskk Gnawbone's undead slaves.

Crouching behind the bole of a maple tree, Thalos waited while the smell grew stronger. Soon he saw a ragged mob of zombie ratmen shuffle into view, each of the hideous things bearing a clay jar in its decayed paws. Following behind his slaves, the emaciated form of the Black Seer crept into view. Even upon the b.e.s.t.i.a.l, leprous features of the necromancer, there was no mistaking an expression of malevolent triumph.

Thalos leapt out from behind the tree, striking with his sword. Before the invaders even knew he was there, three of the zombies were cut down. The others shifted awkwardly, laden down with the heavy canopic jars. The mindless things took no move to defend themselves against the ambusher.

Huskk Gnawbone snarled, his voice raised in a shriek of fury. A grey miasma, glowing with corpse-light, flashed from the Black Seer's paw. The malignant energy sped towards Thalos, but as it drew near to the highborn, the Dawnblade blazed with light. The magic shifted in flight, drawn towards the sword instead of the one who held it. Before Thalos' wondering gaze, the grey miasma crashed against the amber blade, sucked down into its translucent depths.

Huskk shrieked again, this time gesturing wildly with his claws. From the blackness behind the necromancer, the c.o.c.katrice appeared, leaping onto the path, its talons digging at the earth. The bird-beast snapped its beak, the feathers of its ruff shivering with agitation. Thalos felt the monster's beady eyes glaring at him. The c.o.c.katrice seemed to remember who it was that had cut its wing.

The beast's rage was all that preserved Thalos from instant destruction, for he doubted the Dawnblade would protect him from the c.o.c.katrice's gaze as easily as it had Huskk's magic. So incensed was the monster at the sight of its attacker that it chose to forgo training its petrifying gaze upon the elf, instead leaping forwards to rend him with beak and talon.

As Thalos prepared to defend himself, there came a sudden motion from the tree behind him. An immense cl.u.s.ter of branches, bound together in the semblance of a hand, reached down and closed about the body of the c.o.c.katrice as it charged him. The avian horror thrashed about wildly as the wooden fingers clenched tightly about it, plucking it from the ground and raising it high into the air.

"Attend to the root-chewer," the groaning voice of Daithru rumbled from above. Thalos looked upward to see the treeman's gnarled face, aware for the first time that his momentary refuge had in fact been the ancient forest spirit. "This doom is mine."

Thalos blanched in despair as he saw Daithru's body grow pale, stiffening as the c.o.c.katrice directed its lethal gaze upon the treeman. The groaning sigh of the treeman's voice fell silent as his wooden body became petrified.

The c.o.c.katrice cackled as its hideous gaze brought destruction upon the n.o.ble ancient. The monster kept its stare fixed upon Daithru until the treeman's body became stone, until the last spark of life had been extinguished. Then it allowed the deadly membranes to slide back. The c.o.c.katrice resumed its struggles to free itself, pecking and clawing at the treeman's now frozen fingers.

It did not notice the tiny lights emerging from the hollows of the treeman's body, the little spites that had sheltered within Daithru's wooden frame. Hidden from the c.o.c.katrice's baleful gaze, protected from its petrifying power, now the spites surged forth to wreak vengeance upon Daithru's killer. The fey lights a.s.sumed fearsome shapes, ghastly bodies of thorns and claws and fangs. Flittering upwards in a ferocious cloud, the swarm of spites engulfed the struggling c.o.c.katrice. The monster's cackle became a pained shriek as the swarm descended upon it, savaging its body with barbed tails and hooked swords, with serrated jaws and razor wings.

Thalos turned away from the gory spectacle of the monster's destruction. Sight of his pet's distress had spurred Huskk into action. The Black Seer was in flight, scurrying down the forest trail. The necromancer had drawn upon his occult powers, infusing his retinue of shambling corpses with the vigour of living beings, enabling them to keep pace with their master as he fled.

The elf clenched his teeth, chiding himself for being distracted by the c.o.c.katrice. He could not allow the necromancer to escape. Not after the sacrifice Daithru had made.

The highborn dashed off in pursuit of the fleeing skaven, but at the first turn in the path, he discovered that his foe had taken steps to cover his tracks. Thalos recoiled as a rusty sword flashed through the darkness, then ducked as a second chopped down at his neck. The elf back-stepped away from his attacker, trying to give himself a respite to take the measure of Huskk's rearguard.

The thing was an abomination, a horror constructed from three skaven. Swords were clenched in each of the thing's hands, six blades against the elf's one. Malignant fires smouldered in the depths of the undead nightmare's skulls. Its jaws clattered in a silent echo of a war cry, then the fiend surged forwards on its six bony legs.

Thalos met its charge, the Dawnblade dancing before him in a whirling pirouette of death. Only the reflexes and speed of an elf could have matched the crashing clamour of the rat-thing's six blades. Only the keenness of the Dawnblade could have shattered each of the enemy's swords, snapping them as though they were dried twigs.

The mindless horror did not falter as each of its swords was broken by the Dawnblade. Instead, it pressed its attack, seizing the elf in its bony claws, lifting him towards its snapping jaws.

Thalos drove the Dawnblade between the horror's fangs, stabbing the sword upwards, driving it through first one, then another of its stacked skulls. The entire abomination shuddered as the power of the amber blade cut away at the dark magic sustaining its unholy semblance of life. The undead nightmare slumped to its knees, gnashing its fangs as it toppled to the ground.

The highborn pulled himself free of the rat-thing's lifeless claws. The mighty Dawnblade had protected him once more. Next it would be Huskk Gnawbone's turn to feel the enchanted sword's power.

Pulling the Dawnblade free, however, Thalos made a horrifying discovery. The rat-thing's gnashing fangs had shattered the sword, breaking it six inches above the hilt. The magic blade had been reduced from a sword to a dagger.

Thalos felt his body go numb at the discovery. Would the Dawnblade's magic still remain in the fragmented sword? Could it still protect him from the Black Seer's sorcery?

Whatever the answer, the highborn knew his decision was already made. He must pursue the necromancer and prevent him from reaching the Golden Pool.

Huskk Gnawbone scurried down the forest path. The Golden Pool was near; he could smell its tremendous power all around him. He could feel its energies swelling under the influence of the Hour of Shadows, far surpa.s.sing what Nahak had led him to expect. The liche had insisted the might of the Golden Pool could not manifest on its own, yet the Black Seer had felt its malefic power rippling across the forest. Nahak had been mistaken.

The necromancer's paw closed about the skull dangling against his chest. A savage smile spread across Huskk's withered features. Nahak had been mistaken about many things. Most importantly, the liche had deluded itself into believing Huskk would share the power of the Golden Pool.

Ripping the chain from around his neck, Huskk swung the skull of Nahak against the trunk of an oak. His mind quivered with the liche's spectral shriek as the skull shattered against the unyielding bole. The Black Seer lashed his tail in amus.e.m.e.nt as the fragments exploded across the path. He hoped that the liche enjoyed oblivion.

"Fast-quick," Huskk hissed at his grave rats. "Hurry-scurry!" The Golden Pool was near, but the Hour of Shadows would soon begin to wane. He would need to act fast if he wanted to siphon off the pool's power into his canopic jars.

The necromancer and his minions scurried onwards, the pulsations of dark energy growing as they advanced. Huskk bruxed his fangs, feeling his belly growl in sympathy to the hunger he felt.

Huskk blinked in confusion as the forest suddenly opened out into a wide clearing. He would have expected some sort of barrier, some kind of wall to contain the power of the Golden Pool. Yet there was no mistaking the smell of its dark energies, no denying the cold chill of dark magic in the air and the fiery glow of the pool's witch-light. Impatient, eager to slake his l.u.s.t for power, the necromancer hurried onwards, snarling at his zombies to quicken their pace.

It was when the Black Seer crept out into the clearing and felt the black soil under his paws that he became aware that something was wrong. A great geyser of golden liquid gyrated and pulsated at the centre of the clearing. It was only when he raised a paw to his face, shielding his eyes against the glow that he saw the slender figure poised high atop the magical fulcrum.

Horror filled Huskk's heart. The blind, stupid fool-meat! One sniff told him the figure atop the fulcrum was a she-elf tree-mage. The idiot was trying to use the power of the pool, not by siphoning it off, but by tapping it directly!

The mad fool-meat! She didn't understand what she was doing! She might think she was using the pool, but it was using her, using her to escape, to explode across the world in a storm of havoc and atrocity!

Huskk's ambitions wilted beneath a tide of raw terror. Better than the she-elf, he understood the force her magic had unleashed. Then his eyes caught a suggestion of motion beyond the writhing geyser. Squinting against the glare, he voided his glands as he saw a gigantic figure stride forth.

In shape it was like an elf, though vastly magnified in proportions. Great curved legs ended in splayed hooves, slender arms terminated in enormous claws. A horned head leered downwards from a serpentine neck, a sinewy tongue flickering between its sharp teeth. Staring up at the horrific thing, Huskk understood why the forest had seemed so desolate, for the monstrous creature had crafted its body from trees and bushes, luring them into its phantom clutches and reshaping them into a daemonic form.

The great daemon's eyes blazed as it met Huskk's stare. At once, the beast read the necromancer's intention, understood why the ratman had penetrated the forest to the Golden Pool and what he had hoped to accomplish. The daemon's gaze shifted to the canopic jars. Wooden lips curled back in a leering scowl. High atop the fulcrum, the tiny figure of the she-elf twisted around. She pointed her hands down at the zombies.

Huskk could feel the dark energies explode around him as the elf's spell crashed down upon the zombies. The canopic jars exploded, detonating like bombs as the enraged daemonic power smashed them asunder. The undead skaven were torn to ribbons in the explosion, their dismembered fragments strewn about the clearing.

The Black Seer squeaked in fright. Before he could flee, however, the daemon's claw swept downwards, snapping tight about his body. Desperately, the necromancer evoked one of his spells, using his full energies to attack the ghoulish monster. Possessed wood peeled away, blistered and rotting as Huskk's malign spell consumed it. The energies of the Hour of Shadows continued to augment the Black Seer's dark magic.

But the boon the Hour of Shadows presented Huskk Gnawbone was as nothing compared to that which it gave the daemon. A being whose essence was dark magic, the ent.i.ty's entire substance was swollen with the fell energies. Even as Huskk's spell ate away its claw, the splinters coalesced into a new limb, a vicious snapping pincer that shot outwards. Darting towards the Black Seer, the daemon's pincer clacked shut about the skaven's neck. Huskk's final squeak of horror went unvoiced as his leprous head leapt from his shoulders.

The Keeper of Secrets gazed upon the twitching corpse of Huskk Gnawbone, savouring the sight and smells of its would-be exploiter's demise. The daemon had been chained within the Golden Pool for millennia, shackled within its amber prison since a time before time, when even the G.o.d it served was yet unborn.

A daemon of sensations and emotions, of sights and smells, of touch and sound, the millennia of isolation and deprivation had been an endless torment to it. Yet even its suffering had been an experience towards an end. It had penetrated the deceit of time, seen the world before the world, known the shape of what had been before the G.o.ds and what would be after even the G.o.ds were no more. It knew, and knowing, it could reshape the toils of fate. It could break the wheel and end the cycle of things that had been and would be.

The daemon lifted its silvery voice, crying out to the darkened sky. Soon it would be free from the pool. Soon the last of its essence would pa.s.s through the sacrifice, freed from the prison which had held it for so very long. The daemon closed its eyes, indulging in the agonies of the she-elf's body as she struggled to contain the power cascading through her. The Keeper forced itself to slow the escape of its essence from the pool, appreciating that there was a limit to what mortal flesh could withstand. It had to be patient, and careful. If the elf expired before it was free from the pool, it might never escape.

Escape! Even as that long-cherished word exploded across the daemon's mind, the Keeper's awareness was drawn back to the floor of the clearing. Its wooden lips pulled back in a sneer of contempt as it observed a lone elf coming forward. It recognized the impudent little mortal who had defied its investigation earlier, the bold creature who dared to carry a sliver of its prison in his hand.

The Keeper laughed, the sound keening through the forest like the moan of a lyre. The elf's sword had been broken somehow. There was not enough of it left to menace the daemon, not in its body of living wood. The Keeper would take its time destroying this one, peeling away each layer of skin with its claws, relishing every cry of agony as it stripped the elf's body down to the bone.

Before the daemon could take more than one lumbering step towards its prey, the giant froze. It turned its head, staring at the one stand of trees which had defied its call. The trees were in motion, scuttling aside on their roots, drawing apart like the gates of a fortress.

The daemon's wooden lips curled as it sensed the presence of its captor, the coming of the Warden of the Wood.

Thalos trembled as he felt the malign attention of the hideous daemon focused upon him. He recognized this horror for what it wasa"a creature of Slaanesh, the profane Prince of Pleasures whose corruption had sundered the asur and brought evil into the heart of Ulthuan with its l.u.s.tful malice. Now that evil power had been set loose in Athel Loren.

Remembering the spectral touch of the daemon and how it had recoiled from the Dawnblade, Thalos raised the broken fragment of sword he yet retained, hoping to drive back the abomination. His heart went cold when he saw the daemon snicker at his bravado. Clearly, it had no fear of a shattered sword.

Suddenly, the daemon's attention was diverted. It shifted its bulk about, staring into the forest. The trees parted, shambling away on their roots, opening a path fora something.

The highborn gawped at the weird creature which came stomping out from among the trees. It was like nothing he had ever seen before, a great reptilian beast with a scaly brown and black hide. It tromped down the trail on four ma.s.sive, pillar-like legs. A great, club-like tail swung from its hindquarters, sharp barbs running along the sides of the cudgellike b.u.t.ton on its tip. A humanoid torso rose from the fore of the creature's lower body, muscular arms descending from broad shoulders, a lizard-like head perched atop the merest stump of a neck. In the creature's hands, a bladed staff of silver and white shone with the brilliance of starfire. Even from a distance, he could tell it was no natural denizen of Athel Loren, nor yet some strange manifestation of the fey. He was reminded of Ywain's words, her insistence that the Warden of the Wood was not a creature of the forest but rather something far older.

Ywain! Thalos forgot about daemons and monsters, turning his frantic attention to the swirling pillar of molten amber. He could see the spellweaver standing atop of the fulcrum, her arms outstretched, her lips locked in the cadence of a spell.

The spell must be broken.

Thalos staggered as the voice of the Warden echoed through his mind. He looked over at the strange beast, watched as it charged into the wooden daemon. The silver sky staff crackled with eerie lightning as it scorched the daemon's claws. The daemon retaliated, swatting aside the Warden's staff, slashing its scaly flesh. The entire clearing quaked as the two monstrous beings brought their terrible power crashing down upon one another.

The evil must end.

Thalos felt a sliver of the Warden's strength flow into him, spurring him towards the Golden Pool. As the creature's focus was momentarily split, the daemon rallied, driving the reptile back, gouging its side with a th.o.r.n.y talon. The highborn needed no further warning. The reptile was giving him time, holding the daemon's rage, allowing Thalos to do what must be done.

Thalos hesitated for only a moment when he stood beside the swirling, gyrating geyser of magic. Tightening his grip upon the Dawnblade, he gave his trust to the Warden and the spirits of Athel Loren. A glance back at the battling behemoths, then the elf cast himself into the roiling pillar.

Swiftly, the elf lord was borne upwards, rocketing to the summit of the geyser. In the blink of an eye, Thalos found himself standing at the apex of the fulcrum, standing beside Ywain.

The highborn moved to embrace his lover, to take her away, to bear her to safety, far from battling daemons and raging reptiles. As he stretched forth his hand, however, Thalos drew back in horror. A single glance was enough to see the monstrous changes which the daemon's essence had inflicted upon Ywain's flesh. In the eyes of the spellweaver, the woman he loved had vanished, leaving only hollow pits of pain and madness.

Anger flared up within Thalos' breast. He cast his furious gaze down upon the wooden daemon. How dearly did he wish he could leap down upon its timber shoulders and drive the Dawnblade into its fiendish brain. But he knew such a gesture would be both foolish and futile. What was a body to a thing that was composed only of intangibles like emotion and thought?

The spell must be broken. The evil must end.

Thalos understood the Warden's meaning now. He shuddered as he considered what he must do. However, he knew there was no other way. The spell had to be broken, and that could not be done while Ywain yet worked her magic, allowing the daemon to escape its prison.

Thalos approached the spellweaver, wrapping his arms around her tortured body in a final embrace. A single thrust sent the broken sliver of the Dawnblade stabbing through her vitals. The highborn grimaced, then pressed the blade still deeper, not relenting until he had transfixed his own body and felt his own life-blood streaming from his veins.

Together, slayer and slain sank into the Golden Pool, their bodies drawn into its amber depths as the geyser withdrew, retreating back into the pit. A howling gale accompanied its retreat, the screaming wail of the Keeper as its essence was sucked back into the arcane prison. The great wooden body it had crafted for itself became an empty sh.e.l.l, teetering awkwardly upon its hooved feet as the governing vitality slipped away. A moment the grotesque stood, then it came crashing down to lie in rotten splinters beside the amber pit.

The Warden of the Wood watched as the fulcrum collapsed back into the earth and the last of the daemon's power was returned to its prison. The reptile looked skyward, watching as a subtle shifting of the stars heralded the waning of the Hour of Shadows.

The ancient reptile accepted the end of the present danger with cool detachment. It cast its awareness through the forest. At Hawk Heath, the last of the skaven had been annihilated, the daemons called forth by Ywain's desperate spell cast back into the Realm of Chaos with the sealing of the Golden Pool.

The Warden contemplated its fallen acolyte. It had warned the elf, warned that the evil of the pool would seek her through the evil in her own soul. It was a failing of the new races that they could not understand the nature of Chaos, would not see that the spiritual defects they cherished and called emotion were the feeding grounds for evil.

The age of the new races would pa.s.s. The wheel of time would run its course. The Warden and its kindred would await the pa.s.sing of the warm-flesh.

One day, it would again be the age of its kind.

The age of the zoats.

end.