Bloodforged (7 page)

A marauder warband, huge gaunt men, their half-naked bodies painted in purple woad and pierced all over with strange bone fetishes, were swarming a caravan –
her
caravan, the one she had travelled with since Kislev – while the soldiers and mercenaries who guarded it fought in a swiftly dwindling circle, outnumbered two to one. Mutated war hounds, their hides like armour and their muzzles dripping red, fought beside their barbaric masters, tearing out throats and intestines, while the leader of the band, a scarred bald gargantua on a hellish black horse, dealt death with axes in both hands.

A blistering rage gripped Ulrika at the sight. She had protected these people since Kislev, picking off the human wolves who would have thinned their ranks, and now, almost within shouting distance of Praag, they were attacked? How dare these northern scum touch her flock! They were hers to cull!

She whipped her rapier and dagger from their sheaths and sped down the hill, aiming for the giant on the horse. The marauders did not notice her as she charged their backs, and she killed four before they knew she was amongst them. Even when they turned, howling with outrage, they could barely stand against her. Her blades were so swift, and her arms so strong, that she could knock their attacks away and run them through almost at will. What a thrill to fight this way! Her reactions were twice what they had been when she was alive, and her strength even greater. Marauders fell back from her with neat little holes in their tattooed chests, dying with almost no blood spilled. Others lost hands and arms to her questing blades. She was a whirlwind!

But soon even her inhuman prowess was not enough to counter their numbers. They swarmed in behind her as she pressed forwards, and battered at her from all sides. A sword cut her back. Another sliced her over the eye. A mace stunned her shoulder. She staggered and nearly stepped into the swipe of an axe. This was madness. Had she thought she could fight a hundred men at once? Her bloodlust had caught her once again. She would not be able to reach the leader. She would have to get out.

She slashed around wildly with her rapier, then drove for the edge of the battle, running one marauder through the neck and opening the lean belly of another with her dagger. A third swung a stone maul at her. She pierced his ribs as it whooshed over her head, then vaulted his toppling body and ran for the brush by the side of the road.

Four marauders howled after her while the rest turned back towards the beleaguered defenders. Ulrika smiled. Four she could deal with. Four she could make use of.

The marauders crashed through the low scrub after her as she turned to face them. She killed the first as his feet got tangled in twisting roots, then ran the second through as he leapt over his dying comrade. Unfortunately, he crashed down on top of her and she had to twist aside to avoid being knocked flat. The third took advantage of her awkward position and aimed a slash at her unprotected back. She just blocked it with her dagger, then spun and took his head off with her rapier.

The last, a towering brute with painted black lips and purple cord sewn through the flesh of his chest like the laces of a corset, came in roaring and swinging an enormous axe, and leaving himself wide open for any number of death thrusts. Instead Ulrika only disarmed him, gashing his fingers as another clumsy blow whistled past her and making him drop the weapon.

He howled and drew his dagger from his belt, but she knocked that out of his hand too, then threw down her weapons and leapt on him, claws extended, like a mountain cat attacking a bear. Her hands caught his throat and she clamped down on it as he roared and battered at her with heavy fists, trying to knock her away. A punch to the temple and a knee to the groin stopped all that, and he sagged to his knees, moaning.

She shoved him onto his back and straddled him, never breaking her grip on his throat, then leaned in and showed him her fangs. A glimmer of fear finally flickered in his mad eyes.

‘This is my land, Norse,’ she breathed. ‘I will defend it with sword and knife and tooth and claw. I will feed on any who defile it. I will–’

Her grand speech was cut off by a tantara of horns and the thunder of two hundred hooves. She looked up. Pouring down into the valley from the direction of Praag was a full company of Gryphon Legion cavalry, lances lowered and feathered banners cracking in the night wind.

CHAPTER EIGHT

ON THE WINGS OF GRYPHONS

Conflicting emotions swirled within Ulrika as she saw the Gryphons galloping towards the melee – pride in their martial glory, relief for the poor caravanners and love for one of the great symbols of her land, but also worry. Would they see her before she could feed? Would they attack her?

Her painted captive took advantage of her distraction and threw her off, scrambling for his axe. She caught him by the ankle and brought him down again, then pinned his arms to his sides and looked back. The Gryphons were fighting the marauders, and hadn’t the advantage of her nocturnal vision. They were unlikely to see her and her prey in the thick brush. She would risk it.

As the marauder struggled in her embrace, she sank her teeth into his dirty neck and drank, then immediately jerked back, spitting and cursing, as crimson sprayed her face and clothes. His blood tasted as dirty and rank as he smelled, but if it had been only that, she would have drunk her fill. The taste, however, was the least of it. There was a taint within his blood, a sickening, dizzying wrongness that sparked mad whisperings in her mind and sent feathery tendrils probing through her veins like poison-winged moths looking for places to lay their eggs. The marauders had been feeding so long at the teat of Chaos that they were now carriers, and anything that fed on them would become as twisted and mad as they. She dared not drink more.

The marauder got an arm free and punched her. She caught it and pinned it under her knee, then grabbed his head and twisted. His powerful neck muscles fought her, but her strength won out and she snapped his neck and he subsided. She leaned over him, cursing and shoving her finger down her throat to try to puke out the mouthful of vile blood she had swallowed.

Before anything came up, however, heavy hoof strikes shook the ground. She looked up. A handful of marauders were fleeing towards her, with six Gryphons bearing down on them from behind, lances lowered.

Ulrika cursed and rolled, dragging the marauder on top of her as his comrades bounded past her and the Gryphons thundered over her. Had they seen her? Had they seen what she was doing?

The Gryphons ran the marauders down, impaling them on their lances, then wheeled back towards the main battle, and straight for Ulrika. Ursun’s teeth, they were going to find her! And she was covered in blood!

But what of it?

Suddenly she saw possibilities. Hadn’t there been a battle? Wasn’t she wounded? Blood was to be expected. And now that she thought of it, getting into Praag at night by herself might be just as hard as getting out of Nuln had been. If the Gryphons were stationed there, perhaps she could ride in with them. She smiled to herself. Now she was thinking like a Lahmian.

She wiped the blood from her mouth and chin, then struggled under the marauder as if she were fighting him. The patrol was almost upon her.

‘Help, brothers!’ she called. ‘Help me!’

The Gryphons turned, but as they started for her, Ulrika grunted in dismay, realising she had made a mistake. The marauder’s neck was a torn ruin. They would see it! Where was her dagger? There! She clawed for it.

One of the Gryphons, a dashing young Gospodar with a proud nose and magnificent moustaches, slid from his saddle and stabbed the marauder in the back with his sabre, then pulled him off. Ulrika snatched up the dagger at last, then rolled with the corpse and straddled it, stabbing wildly at the bite wound in its neck, as if mad with rage and fear.

‘Filthy savage!’ she cried. ‘Monster!’

‘Easy, fellow – er, madam,’ said the Gryphon, catching her arm. ‘He’s dead now.’

Ulrika reeled back and let herself slump against him. ‘Thank you,’ she murmured. ‘There were too many.’

The Gryphon helped her to her feet, giving her an appreciative once over, then waved his fellows away. They turned their horses, smirking, and galloped back into the melee, which still raged around the surrounded caravan.

‘There now,’ said the Gryphon, picking up her rapier and returning it to her. ‘Are you hurt?’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. It… it all happened so fast.’

‘Let me have a look at you.’ He held her at arm’s length and gave her another longish head-to-toe, then returned to business and squinted at the gash over her eye, tsking softly. ‘Well, it’s bloody, but not very deep. Listen, I must get back, can you make it on your own to our field surgeon? He’ll be setting up just there on the hill. I’ll come check on you after.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ she said. ‘I believe I can, and I am most obliged to you.’

He looked back at the corpses of the marauders as he mounted his horse. ‘You gave better than you got, that’s certain,’ he said approvingly, then dug his spurs in and galloped after his comrades. ‘See you soon!’ he called over his shoulder.

Ulrika waved after him, then turned and made her way around the edges of melee towards a little pony cart that had drawn up on the low hill. She watched enviously as the Gryphons wheeled and charged in formation, trampling the disorganised marauders like so much wheat. Her blood rage was still upon her, and she wanted more than anything to join in the slaughter, but she didn’t dare. In the frenzy of battle she might forget herself and reveal her unnatural strength, or let out her fangs and claws. Besides, she had written herself a part as a nobly wounded maiden, who needed the care and attention of a brave man, and it wouldn’t do to let her ‘saviour’ see her back in the fray, fighting like a whirlwind.

In less than a quarter of an hour it was finished, and the Gryphons were victorious. As the rescued caravanners crept out from behind their circled wagons to thank the white-bearded Gryphon captain, and a few selected squads chased down the last of the fleeing marauders, the rest began the dirty work of collecting the corpses of their fallen comrades and heaping the bodies of the Norsemen onto piles for burning.

Ulrika watched it all from the Gryphons’ field hospital, where the surgeon and his assistants bandaged and stitched up lancer and caravaner alike, and the screams of the wounded almost drowned out the hiss of hot pitch being applied to the stumps of amputated limbs. She sat as far away from the surgery as she could, for the swallow of tainted blood she’d had from the marauder had not sated her hunger in the least, and the scent of honest human blood was making her head swim.

A while later, as the wounded and the dead were being loaded onto any wagon that had room, and the lancers and caravanners were sorting out their order of march and making ready to move out, the dashing Gryphon at last rode up the hill to where Ulrika still waited, and the surgeon and his assistants were packing up their cart.

‘You look a proper veteran now,’ he said, grinning at the bandage she wore wrapped around her head. He glanced again at her leather jerkin and boots. ‘You really are a very martial sort of girl, aren’t you?’

‘I am from a riding family on the border of Troll Country, sir,’ she said, standing. ‘Everyone fights there, daughters as well as sons.’

The Gryphon looked at her with new respect. ‘Your family serves with the march wardens? They are brave fellows. Good with a lance.’ A thought came to him. ‘Listen, some men from those lands make their camp near us. What is your surname? Perhaps your people are among them.’

Ulrika tensed. She was on dangerous ground. If she gave a name he knew, she could be caught in a lie. If she gave her real name, he might know it. Worse, he might try to bring her to the north country camp, and there was a very real danger that her father’s old rota might be there. The last people she wanted to see were Yuri or stern old Marek.

She shook her head. ‘I believe my family was wiped out trying to hold the northern passes. I… I was in Kislev, visiting relatives, when word came of the invasion, and I was stuck there all winter. Now I am going north to… to learn if any still live.’

The Gryphon looked grave. ‘I am sorry to hear it, lady. I hope you have good news.’ He looked her up and down again, then put his hand to his chest. ‘I am Petr Ilanovich Chesnekov, of Volksgrad, at your service. If there is anything I can do to help…’

Ulrika hung her head to hide a smile. The Lahmian way seemed to be working quite well. ‘Ulrika Magdova… uh, Nochivnuchka,’ she said, remembering at the last minute not to use her real name. ‘An honour to meet you, Petr Ilanovich Chesnekov, and I would not impose on you more than I have, but…’

‘Speak, Madam Nochivnuchka,’ he said. ‘If it is in my power, I will do my best to serve.’

She paused, as if hesitant, then continued. ‘I have a cousin within Praag who might be able to tell me more of my family. It would be a great weight off my mind if I could enter the city tonight to speak to her. I cannot bear another moment of uncertainty, but I fear the gates are closed.’

Chesnekov beamed. ‘Not for the lances of the Gryphon Legion, they are not. It will be an honour to escort you into Praag, madam.’ His eyes glittered eagerly. ‘In fact, you may ride with me if you wish.’

‘I would be most grateful, sir,’ she said, stepping forwards. ‘Thank you.’

She almost vaulted up behind him, but then remembered who and what she was meant to be. So instead she waited while he dismounted, held the stirrup for her, assisted her in climbing up onto the horse’s rump, then at last remounted.

‘There,’ he said. ‘All comfortable?’

Ulrika circled her arms around his waist and pulled in tight behind him as he nudged the horse forwards. ‘Very comfortable, thank you.’

She smiled to herself as she felt his heart start hammering in his chest. Yes, she thought. She was getting better at the Lahmian way.

Chesnekov returned to his company and filed in at the rear as they kicked their horses into a canter and thundered down the road towards Praag. As they rode along, Ulrika began to wish she had been able to find some way to feed before mounting up with him. Spending so long in such close proximity to the lancer’s bare neck and the heat of his blood was going to be difficult to bear. Her lips kept inching forwards towards the pulsing vein beneath his skin, and she had to forcibly pull herself back to keep from nuzzling and biting him.

After more than an hour on the road, the cavalry company approached Praag’s towering red walls. Ulrika looked with wonder upon them, amazed that, having taken such damage, the city remained undefeated. The great outer bastion was horribly scarred and smashed, riddled with black pockmarks where the vile missiles of the daemon cannons had struck it, and where the massive rams and towers had crashed into it. In places it was down entirely, with wide gaps where it had been reduced to mounds of rubble. Around these, rickety scaffolding had been erected, and men worked through the night to pile the fallen stones on top of one another again.

‘I hope they are in time,’ Ulrika said in Chesnekov’s ear as they rode closer. ‘Spring is almost upon us. The hordes will return soon.’

Chesnekov looked over his shoulder at her, then turned back and frowned. ‘They’ll be in time. The hordes aren’t coming. Not this year at least.’

Ulrika blinked, baffled by his words. ‘What? Of course they’re coming. They vowed to destroy us.’

‘Then they lied,’ said the lancer. ‘The army has watchers from here to Black Blood Pass. No one has seen them. They haven’t even started massing. If they were coming in the spring, they would be on the move already. They are not.’

Ulrika’s skin prickled with dismay. The world seemed to shift beneath her. ‘But… but I don’t understand. What happened?’

Chesnekov shrugged. ‘No one knows. Some say it was the death of their leader, Arek Daemonclaw – that without his strong hand, the other leaders fought amongst themselves. Some say it was the disappearance of his twin sorcerers – that only their magic had held the alliance together. I heard an ice witch say something had happened with the winds of magic. Some great balance had shifted, and they had receded, and the hordes receded with them; at least, most of them did. Whatever the cause, there will be no invasion – at least until the next time.’

Ulrika still couldn’t quite believe it. ‘But the supply caravans, the troops. Why would they keep marching north if there is to be no war?’

Chesnekov laughed. ‘Oh, Duke Enrik isn’t fool enough to tell Tzarina Katarin the invasion’s off. If he did, she’d cut off all the money that’s coming to Praag. There’s plenty of rebuilding and resupplying to be done, and plenty of marauders still to hunt – as you’ve just seen.’ He shrugged. ‘No, we need what the Tzarina is sending, make no mistake. But if she thought there was no longer any threat, she’d find other uses for the money, so Enrik keeps sending dire warnings south, begging her to help rebuild the “Great Bastion of the North” before it’s too late.’

Ulrika hardly heard the half of what he said. The hordes weren’t returning. Her biggest reason for coming to Praag had vanished. She had planned to lose herself in blood and slaughter, to fight for her people and her land, now it seemed there was nothing for her to do. She had travelled across two countries for naught.