Sigmar raised his weapon, and the head of Ghal-maraz met the blade of the Dragon Sword in a cataclysmic explosion of force. Unimaginable energies exploded from the impact, and Artur’s blade shattered into a thousand fragments, the blade dying with a shriek of winter and the death of seasons.
Artur fell back, blinded by the explosion, and Sigmar surged to his feet, Ghal-maraz swinging in a murderous arc towards the Teutogen king’s head.
The ancestral heirloom of Kurgan Ironbeard slammed into Artur’s helmet, crumpling the metal and smashing the skull beneath to shards. Artur’s body flew through the air, landing in a crumpled heap before the blazing fire at the heart of the stone circle.
Sigmar stood over the body, his chest heaving with the power that filled his veins and the exultation of victory. He saw the priests of Ulric bow their heads and drop to their knees. Not a breath of wind or a single voice disturbed the silence as Sigmar turned to face those who had borne witness to his defeat of Artur.
‘The king of the Teutogens is dead!’ cried Sigmar, holding Ghal-maraz high. ‘You have a new king now. The lands of the Teutogen are mine by right of combat.’
Even as he spoke the words, Sigmar could feel the rightness of them, the conviction that this was the will of the gods. He closed his eyes as he pictured the Unberogens and Teutogens going on to achieve great things. This was but the first step towards that goal. So vivid was this vision that Sigmar did not notice Myrsa approaching, until he spoke.
‘You claim rulership over the Teutogens?’ asked the Warrior Eternal.
Sigmar opened his eyes to see Myrsa standing before him with a dagger held to his throat. The Warrior Eternal’s eyes were as cold as Ulric’s Fire, and Sigmar knew that his life hung by a thread. His eyes flicked to the edge of the circle, where he saw Alfgeir surrounded by armed warriors, his sword taken from him.
‘I do,’ said Sigmar. ‘I have slain the king, and it is my right in blood.’
‘That it is,’ nodded Myrsa sadly, ‘for Artur’s sons are dead and his wife is long gone to Morr’s kingdom, but here I am with a blade at the throat of the killer of my king.’
‘You said you would be proud to serve me if I were your king,’ said Sigmar. ‘Does that no longer hold true?’
‘That depends.’
‘On?’
‘On whether I believe you mean to make us slaves to the Unberogen,’ said Myrsa.
‘Never,’ promised Sigmar. ‘No man will be a slave of Sigmar. You will be my people, brothers to me, valued and honoured, as are all who hold true to the bonds of loyalty.’
‘You swear this before Ulric’s Fire?’
‘I swear it,’ nodded Sigmar, ‘and I ask again, will you join me, Myrsa?’
The Warrior Eternal lifted the dagger from Sigmar’s throat and dropped to his knees. Myrsa bowed his head, and said, ‘I will join you, my lord.’
Sigmar placed his hand on Myrsa’s shoulder. ‘I need men of courage and honour beside me, Myrsa, and you are such a man.’
‘Then what would you have me do?’
‘The lands north of the mountains are infested with the dark beasts, and one day the Sea Wolves from across the ocean will return,’ said Sigmar, offering his hand to his latest ally and hauling him to his feet. ‘As your king, I need you and your warriors to guard the northern marches and keep these lands safe.’
Myrsa nodded, and glanced over to the dead body of the king he had once served as the priests of Ulric came forward to retrieve it.
‘Artur was a good man once,’ said Myrsa.
‘I do not doubt it,’ said Sigmar, ‘but he is dead now and we have work to do.’
Fifteen
Union
The path wound through the hills east of the River Stir, the earth rutted and obviously well travelled by wagons, and war chariots, Sigmar remembered, looking to the rolling green slopes around their caravan, and half expecting to see a host of Asoborn warriors descending upon them.
Around Reikdorf, the roads were stone, formed from flat-faced boulders placed in shallow trenches, rendered level with sand and hard-packed earth. Before departing the lands of men to return to his king’s hold in the mountains, Master Alaric had helped Pendrag devise a means for constructing roads that could survive the rains and winter. As a result, Unberogen trade caravans travelled with greater ease and speed than those of any other land.
Sigmar dearly wished for some of those Unberogen roads now, for the wagons he and Wolfgart had brought from Reikdorf were travelling slowly, and needed to be dragged from the sucking mud on a regular basis.
A spring storm had flooded the land a week ago, and the eastern lands were still waterlogged and muddy. A journey that should have taken only a week had already taken nearly a month, and Sigmar’s patience was wearing thin. Behind him, a hundred warriors of Reikdorf, a mix of White Wolves and Great Hall Guard, marched in perfect formation, and another hundred riders surrounded the four carts of weapons and armour.
Hunting dogs darted between the wagons and a string of six broad-chested horses and a dozen outriders roamed the countryside further out, alert for any danger to the travellers. Cuthwin and Svein moved ahead of the procession of warriors and carts, and Sigmar trusted them more than any other precaution to keep them safe.
Alfgeir and Pendrag had reluctantly remained behind in Reikdorf to protect the king’s lands, while he was away on this mission to win the tribes to his banner. The column of warriors had only recently left the lands of the Taleutens, where Sigmar had renewed his oaths with King Krugar with four cartloads of weapons and armour, some of which were crafted from fine, dwarf-forged iron and beyond price.
Now, Sigmar was travelling south to the land of the Asoborns to further strengthen the ties with the fierce warrior queen, Freya. The Asoborns and the Taleutens were allies, and had sworn Sword Oaths, but no such bond existed between Asoborn and Unberogen.
With these gifts, Sigmar hoped to change that.
Wolfgart rode alongside Sigmar, his chequered cloak and bronze armour dull and muddy.
‘We’ll never find their settlements, you know that?’ said Wolfgart. ‘Even with Svein out front.’
‘We will find them,’ said Sigmar. ‘Or, more likely, the Asoborn hunters will find us.’
Wolfgart cast a nervous glance to the hills around them and the thin copses of trees that crowned their summits.
‘I don’t like these lands,’ said Wolfgart. ‘Too open. Not enough trees.’
‘Good farmland though,’ said Sigmar, ‘and the hills are rich in iron ore.’
‘I know, but I prefer Unberogen lands. This is altogether too close to the eastern mountains for my liking. Lots of orcs are on the move in them, and it’s bad luck to go looking for trouble.’
‘Is that what you think we are doing? Looking for trouble?’
‘Aren’t we?’ countered Wolfgart, shifting the weight of his great sword on his back as water dripped from the pommel. ‘What else would you call riding into Asoborn lands without permission? Oh it all sounds wonderful, I grant you, a land full of buxom warrior women, but I’ve heard of the eunuchs they make of trespassers. I plan to hang on to my manhood, and to have many sons.’
‘Weren’t you the one who thought it would be fun to spend the night with an Asoborn woman? I seem to remember you being very amused when Queen Freya… handled me.’
Wolfgart laughed. ‘Yes, that was priceless. The look on your face.’
‘She is a strong woman, right enough,’ said Sigmar, wincing as he remembered the power of her grip.
‘All the more reason not to be here then, eh?’
Sigmar shook his head and waved a hand at the wagons. ‘No, if we are to make allies of the Asoborns then they need to see that we are serious.’
‘Well, we are certainly giving away enough weapons for that,’ said Wolfgart with a bitter shake of his head, ‘and the horses are some of my best stallions and strongest mares.’
‘It is not tribute, Wolfgart,’ said Sigmar. ‘I t
hought you understood that.’
‘It feels wrong. With what we just handed the Taleutens, this is more than we can afford to give. Our own warriors could use these weapons and should be wearing this armour, and do we really want the Asoborns breeding stronger, faster horses?’
Sigmar held the angry response he was forming. Even after all these years, Wolfgart could still not grasp the concept of all the tribes of men working together. The tribal rivalries were still strong, and Sigmar knew it would be many years before the race of men could truly break their small-minded associations of geography to come together as one.
Without giving Wolfgart an answer, Sigmar rode to the vanguard of the column, passing his warriors and wagons to join the outriders. Lightly armoured in cured leather breastplates and hide-covered helmets of wood, these warriors were expert horsemen and carried short, recurved bows.
The contours of these lands were dangerous, for an attacking force of hundreds could be hidden in the hollows and dead ground without them knowing it. Ahead, the path curved around a waterfall in full spate on the hillside, and numerous bushes and boulders were scattered around the edge of the track.
It was open country, the sky somehow wider, and pressing down with grey clouds upon them. Rain was coming in from the mountains, and as Sigmar looked towards the vast wall of dark rock that reared up at the edge of the world, a shiver of premonition passed through him.
Wolfgart was right, it was not good to be so close to the boundaries of the land, for terrible creatures lurked in the mountains, entire tribes of greenskin warriors, who just awaited the rise of a warlord to lead them down into the lands of men.
All the more reason to make allies of the eastern tribes.
Little was known of the Asoborns, save that their society was fiercely matriarchal, ruled over with passionate ferocity by Queen Freya. Of the tribes further east and south, the Brigundians, the Menogoths and the Merogens, even less was known.
This journey into Asoborn land was dangerous, but it was necessary. Nothing provoked fear in people like the unknown, and, despite the danger, those other tribes would need to become known to Sigmar if his dream of empire was to become a reality.
Satisfied that the outriders and scouts were as alert as they ought to be, Sigmar halted his horse to give the rest of the caravan time to catch up as the threatened rain began to fall.
No sooner had Wolfgart and the caravan reached him than a great whooping yell arose from hundreds of throats, as the ground itself seemed to come alive with figures where none had been before.
Naked and semi-naked warriors leapt from concealment, clad in cloaks pierced with ferns and tufts of grass, which had hidden them from sight amid the brush and boulders.
‘To arms!’ shouted Sigmar as he heard a rumble of chariot wheels from beyond the curve in the track ahead. He lifted Ghal-maraz from his belt as his warriors splashed through the mud to form ranks in the road ahead of the caravan.
Spears were thrust forward, and archers took up position to loose shafts over the heads of the spearmen. Sigmar spurred his steed along the line of Unberogen warriors, expecting a deadly volley of arrows from their ambushers at any second. Unberogen warriors drew back on their bowstrings, but as the Asoborn warriors made no move to attack, Sigmar knew that for them to loose would be folly of the worst kind.
This was an ambush, but not one designed to kill.
‘Wait!’ he cried. ‘Ease your bowstrings. Nobody loose!’
Confusion spread at his order, but Sigmar repeated it again and again. The rain rendered everything grey and blurred, but Sigmar could see that the strange figures surrounding them were women, naked but for loincloths, iron torques and bronze wrist guards. Each carried two swords and was painted with fierce war-tattoos, their heads crowned with a mix of wild cockades and shaved scalps.
Every one of them stood utterly immobile, their stillness more unnerving than any war shout would have been. Sigmar guessed that at least three hundred warriors surrounded them, and could scarcely credit that he had walked into the middle of such an ambush. What had happened to Cuthwin and Svein?
Wolfgart rode alongside him, his mighty sword held before him, his expression accusing.
‘I told you this land was dangerous!’
Sigmar shook his head. ‘If they wanted to kill us, we would be dead already.’
‘Then what do they want?’
‘I think we are about to find out,’ said Sigmar as a score of war chariots appeared on the hillside and rolled towards them, the tripartite standard of Queen Freya billowing in the wind from spiked banner poles.
Sigmar blinked as the blindfold was removed and he found himself in a great, earth-walled chamber, illuminated by hundreds of lanterns and a great fire pit. The smell of wet earth and damp cloth was strong in his nostrils, and he ran his hands across his face and through his hair.
Wolfgart was beside him, similarly startled by the change in their surroundings.
The rain had eased as the charioteers surrounded their procession, and though they made no overtly aggressive moves, the tension was palpable. A tall, broad shouldered woman, naked but for her long cloak and tattoos, had leapt down from the lead chariot and stood defiantly before them.
Cuthwin and Svein were bound on a chariot behind her, and Sigmar could feel their acute embarrassment in their refusal to meet his gaze.
‘You are the one the Unberogen call king?’ asked the woman.
‘I am,’ confirmed Sigmar, ‘and this is my sword-brother, Wolfgart.’
The woman acknowledged them with a curt bow. ‘I am Maedbh of the Asoborns,’ she proclaimed. ‘Queen Freya has declared you a friend of her tribe. You will come with us to the settlement of Three Hills.’
‘And if we don’t want to?’ called Wolfgart before Sigmar could respond.
‘Then you will leave our lands, Unberogen,’ replied Maedbh. ‘Or you will die here.’
‘We will come with you,’ said Sigmar hurriedly. ‘For I much desire to see Queen Freya. I bring gifts from my land that I wish to present to her.’
‘You desire her?’ asked Maedbh, waving a pair of her warriors forward. ‘That is good, it will be less painful that way.’
‘Painful? What?’ asked Sigmar as the painted Asoborns unwound cloth bindings from their wrists and made to blindfold them.
Wolfgart lowered his sword to point at the Asoborn woman’s chest. ‘What is this for? We will not be rendered blind.’
‘The secret paths to the halls of the Asoborn Queens are not for the eyes of men,’ said Maedbh. ‘You travel in darkness or you turn back.’
‘You’re going to blindfold us all?’ snarled Wolfgart.
‘No, just you and those who bring your gifts. The rest of your warriors will remain here.’
‘Now just hold on–’ began Wolfgart before Sigmar silenced him with a gesture.
‘Very well,’ said Sigmar. ‘We accept your terms. I have your word that no harm will come to my warriors?’
‘If they remain here and do not try to follow us, then no ill will befall them.’
Wolfgart turned towards Sigmar and hissed. ‘You’re going to let these damned women blindfold us and take us Ulric knows where? Without any warriors? They’ll have our balls for breakfast, man!’
‘This is the only way, Wolfgart,’ said Sigmar. ‘We came here to see Freya after all.’
Wolfgart spat on the ground. ‘If I return and am unable to provide my father with a grandson, then you will be the one to explain this to him.’
The blindfolds had been tied tightly, and amid the protests of his men, the Asoborn warrior women had led Sigmar and Wolfgart away. As a parting order, Sigmar had shouted over his shoulder to Cuthwin and Svein.
‘Make no attempt to follow us! Remain here until we return.’
They had been led into the forest, that much Sigmar knew, but beyond that, he could make no sense of their route, for it ventured over hills and through sheltered valleys and dense undergrowth. Though Sigmar
tried to hold true to their course, he soon hopelessly lost his bearings and any sense of how far they had travelled.
At last he had heard the sounds of people and could smell the scents of a settlement. Even then, this was not the end of their journey as they had travelled through a long, enclosing space of echoes and wet, earthy smells. Sigmar had felt the heat and smoke of a fire, and had a sense of a great space above him.
The blindfolds had been removed, and Sigmar had found himself within the hall of the Asoborn Queen. It was like nothing he had seen before, the walls curving upwards as though they were in some giant underground barrow. Snaking tree roots laced together on the ceiling above him, and a timber-edged hole penetrated the roof to allow smoke to disperse.
Hundreds of warriors of both sexes filled the hall, dressed in striped leggings and long cloaks. Most were bare-chested, with bronze torques ringing their arms and swirling tattoos covering their chests and necks. Sigmar noticed that they were all armed with bronze-bladed swords.
‘Ulric preserve us,’ whispered Wolfgart, seeing the fierce queen presiding over the assembly on her raised throne.
Queen Freya was a striking woman at the best of times, but here in her own domain, she was extraordinary. She sat draped across a graceful curve of fur-lined tree roots, the wood carefully shaped over hundreds of years by human hands to form the throne of the Asoborn queens.
Her flesh was bare, save for a golden torque around her neck, a split leather kilt and a cloak of shimmering bronze mail. A cascade of hair like flaming copper spilled from her head, held from her face with a crown of gold set with a shimmering ruby.
Freya swung her legs from the throne and stood facing them, lifting a trident spear from the warrior woman Maedbh, who stood next to her. Muscles rippled along her lean, powerful arms, and Sigmar did not doubt the strength in them.
‘I knew you would come to me before long,’ said Freya, descending from her raised throne, and Sigmar could not help but admire her full, womanly figure. The cloak of mail partially covered her breasts, but what lay beneath was tantalisingly revealed with every sway of her hips and shoulders as she approached.