MANBANE

Andy Hoare

Stinking cold mud gushed into Duerr’s mouth as he crashed to the root-choked ground, his ankle turning on a twisted stump. He coughed, spewed the bulk of the vile liquid from his mouth and blew through his nose to clear his nostrils. Gasping, Duerr cursed, invoking dread spirits only one of his calling could name. Duerr was a wizard, a student of the amethyst arts, what some might in their ignorance call a necromancer. Right now, stumbling through the night-shrouded depths of the Drakwald Deeps, he felt he was closer than ever to joining those spirits he had so foolishly named but a moment before.

Up! Gritting his teeth Duerr hauled himself erect, his grasping hands finding purchase on the clammy trunk of a thoroughly rotten tree. He cast around to regain his bearings, then looked directly up into the sickly green orb of Morrslieb. The Dark Moon was high overhead and, as such, little use as a navigational aid. But Duerr was gifted of the arcane sight, perceiving the questing tendrils of raw Chaos that seethed around it like a slithering halo of snakes. Breathing deeply, he turned west, knowing that his one, precarious hope of survival lay in reaching one of the scattered settlements along the Altdorf-Middenheim road before his pursuers overtook him.

As if to underscore his predicament and drive him onwards, the dark woods suddenly echoed to a coarse, braying war cry. Duerr cursed once more, feeling his guts turn to ice as they threatened to void themselves there and then. The sound was unmistakably that of the savage beastmen, the Children of Old Night, of Chaos itself. Beasts that walked and talked like men, or men that fought and rutted like beasts, the nature of the vile creatures that haunted the deep woods of the Old World mattered not. The only thing Duerr cared for was that his pursuers were closing on him, the scent of man-flesh and mortal fear sending them into an animal frenzy.

Another cry split the cold night air, and Duerr was spurred to movement. He pushed through the undergrowth in search of the path he had lost what seemed an age ago. The way ahead was even denser than the path he had already travelled, the trees more twisted and gnarled and the bracken ever more thick and treacherous. Thorns caught on his trailing robes, the deep purple fabric he had paid so much for soon tattered and stained with patches of crimson blood. His breath came in ragged gasps as he stumbled ever on, his arms flailing blindly before him to ward away branches that stabbed for his eyes from the darkness.

Another cry, far closer than the last. Duerr hurtled through the undergrowth, barely keeping his footing as he imagined hot, stinking breath on the back of his neck and razor-sharp, jagged fangs sinking into his flesh. A heavy thud sounded from somewhere behind, as if a body ten times his own mass had shouldered into, and through, the rotten tree he had just skirted. Heavy footfalls thudded hollowly across the moss-carpeted ground, but Duerr knew they were no normal feet. These were cloven hooves, trampling the undergrowth to pulp with their passage.

A hideous screech sounded from somewhere off to Duerr’s left, and he knew that some smaller, faster variety of beastman was attempting to outflank him or to herd him into a trap. Desperation welled inside him and his vision closed down to a tunnel. His every footfall seemed like it would be his last, for now the woods behind were filling with the cacophony of uncounted braying creatures. His imagination populated his wake with fanged, tentacled horrors slithering and stampeding through the undergrowth, every one of them intent upon dragging him to the ground and plunging their teeth into his belly to haul out his guts and suck them dry before his dying eyes. And worst of all, the small part of him that had not yet surrendered to terror knew such visions were, if anything, but the least part of the horrible truth.

Now shadows darted amongst the trees to left and right, little more than darker patches against the black woodland backdrop. Upright creatures, agile and sinuous upon reverse-jointed legs dashed from tree to tree. The nearest beast-thing was little more than a loping silhouette, but Duerr could see it was carrying a short, crude bow in a one of its clawed hands and an arrow in the other. The thing halted, setting arrow to cord and aiming directly at Duerr.

A guttural, incomprehensible, sound escaped Duerr’s throat as he flung himself to the ground at the exact moment the arrow sliced the air where his head had been. He rolled as he struck the ground, his hands sinking into the foetid mud almost up to his elbows. Gritting his teeth, Duerr rolled over onto his back, kicking against the leaf-strewn ground as he backed away from his pursuers.

In an instant, they appeared. Though little more than shadows, the green light of Morrslieb glinting dully from rusted metal cleavers and ragged mail, the beastmen were mighty brutes, a head taller than most human warriors. Duerr was not a large man, and they towered over him as he desperately backed further away, his mind almost shot.

The nearest slowed as it approached, its every movement imbued with savage, raw, animal power. It cast its head, shaped not unlike that of an ox, left and right and huffed, its foul breath billowing in the cold air. Other shapes lurked in the undergrowth behind, but backed away, evidently warned off by this mighty creature of muscle and horn.

Silence hung heavy in the damp air, disturbed only by the ragged gasps of Duerr’s breathing and the slow, steady tread of the beast as it approached. Duerr felt a damp tree trunk at his back, and he knew that he was cornered. He knew that he was about to die.

The thing turned its silhouetted head to look down at the form before it, and Duerr saw that one of its four curved horns was broken, snapped off at the tip in some challenge or fight for dominance. The beast halted not ten yards from Duerr’s supine form, and the breath caught in the wizard’s throat.

‘Morr deliver my soul–’ Duerr began. Something sharp and fast zipped through the air, cutting a stinging furrow across Duerr’s cheek. He caught movement in the undergrowth to his left, and saw there the kneeling form of the creature that had shot at him moments earlier. Already, it was notching another arrow, which this time must surely strike home and bury itself in Duerr’s flesh. In a flash, part of him recognised such a death as vastly preferable to what he could expect at the beast-leader’s hands…

But the twisted wretch of a creature never loosed its third arrow, for the leader took a deep breath that seemed almost to draw the canopy down towards it, then unleashed such a dirge of a war cry that Duerr was forced back against the rotting tree. As the breath was forced from his lungs he screwed his eyes tight shut against a sudden gale that stank of mould and the earth between dead roots. Mindless with terror and deafened to all but the pounding of his own heart, Duerr scrambled around the trunk he was backed against. He stumbled against a looped root, lost his grip and struck his head against the hollow tree, the sudden impact bringing him somewhat back to his senses, though terror still threatened to overwhelm him. He looked desperately around and saw that a wide, open space lay behind the tree, though he had no time to gaze into the inky darkness.

The bellowing of the beast-leader had continued all the while, a steady drone of animal fury, but now it cut out with shocking abruptness. The damp air was silent once more, and Duerr could not help but peek cautiously around the tree trunk, holding his breath so as not to be betrayed by his own fear.

The smaller creature cringed at the leader’s feet with its forehead, studded with two nub-like horns, pressed firmly into the soft ground in abject supplication. The leader reared above its underling, each half of the broken shortbow held in a clenched fist. Duerr’s eyes widened in horror as the leader slowly raised a cloven foot over the smaller creature’s head, the whipcord muscles of its leg tensed in readiness.

With a start, Duerr realised that he had a chance of escape, and he turned his head from the gristly scene to the open space at his back. At that very instant, he heard the leader’s hoof come down with a wet thud, and he knew that the smaller beastman had received the ultimate punishment for the crime of interjecting in its lord’s kill.

That very thought spurred Duerr to push himself from the tree trunk and power forwards blindly into the darkness. The instant he was moving he heard the unmistakable sound of the beastmen pursuing. He turned his head as he ran, glimpsing the brute rounding the tree, following after him. His attention elsewhere than on the ground he was crossing, Duerr lost his footing on the wet soil, his momentum propelling him forward several more steps before he slammed painfully down, the breath driven from his lungs by the force of the impact.

Duerr lay stunned for a moment, his face in the mud, knowing that he would be fortunate indeed to die as the twisted underling who had shot at him had. In what he assumed would be his final moments, Duerr found some peace.

After what felt like an age, death was yet to come. Duerr opened his eyes, not having realised that they were shut. He blinked and strained his ears, but all he heard was the sound of the forest: the swaying of branches in a light wind and the creaking of ancient bowers. He glanced around but saw no sign of any murderous beast-thing nearby. Blinking more rapidly, he dared look up then rolled onto his side and looked about.

Duerr was lying in an expanse of rough ground, a glade or clearing of some sort, though he could not tell if it was natural or manmade. As his eyes adjusted, he saw that the tree line a scant twenty yards before him was lined with beastmen, dozens of heavily muscled, horned, beast-headed abominations, all stood in silence with dark eyes glowering straight at him. The stillness was quite shocking in the aftermath of the desperate pursuit through the forest, and more disquieting still because at any moment the beasts could simply stride forward and tear Duerr limb from limb. Why, Duerr thought as his mind struggled to take in the scene, did they not simply do so?

‘They fear this place,’ a dry, death-rattle voice sounded from somewhere behind Duerr. That voice injected ice water directly into his veins, yet the effect upon the beastmen was greater still. They visibly shrank back from it like cringing animals, cornered and desperate for an escape route.

‘And most of all,’ the unseen speaker continued, ‘they fear me.’

At that, the assembled beastmen backed away from the shadowed tree line, slowly at first, as if retreating from a foe that might lash out at any moment. Then they were gone, melting into the undergrowth silently without disturbing so much as a leaf. Duerr watched for long minutes, unwilling to trust that his would-be murderers were gone. He studied the shadows beneath the canopy and then turned slowly to locate the source of his deliverance.

The centre of the wide clearing was dominated by a tower: circular and tall, crooked and ramshackle. Its blocks were rough-hewn and irregular, black and glistening damply in the wan light of the Dark Moon. Ivy crept upwards, the leaves shimmering with silvered spider’s webs and wet moss clothed vast swathes of the surface. As Duerr’s glance climbed upwards, he saw dark, slit-like windows, their stone frames engraved with ancient devices rarely seen in the architecture of the Empire. At the summit, he could just make out an open-topped, crenulated turret set apart from the main structure, seeming like it must surely fall away and topple to the ground far below.

‘You’d better come in,’ the dry voice crackled from the base of the tower. Duerr looked to a dark portal set in its base and the door – heavy oak, iron-reinforced – swung partly inwards. ‘Before they return.’

Galvanised to sudden motion by the thought of the beastmen reappearing from the trees, Duerr climbed shakily to his feet and stumbled towards the doorway. Glancing over his shoulder one last time, he passed through, the door swinging on screeching hinges and slamming shut behind him, plunging him into darkness far deeper than the moonlit night outside.

Only as Duerr had begun the ascent up the winding spiral stairs within the tower had he realised just how bone weary he truly was. The events of the last few hours had blurred into a terrible, confused melange of desperation and panic, which he was unable to string together into a coherent chain of events. How long ago had it been since the sun had set? How long since the beastmen had discovered him wandering lost through the haunted glades of the Drakwald Deeps?

As he climbed the stairs, one leaden step at a time, he gave up trying to make sense of any of it. He looked around as he climbed the narrow flight, which turned every few steps so that he became increasingly dizzy the higher he climbed. The stairs were so narrow and steep that he could set his hands upon them without bending over, which was fortunate because he was so tired he was almost reduced to climbing up on hands and knees.

At length, Duerr came upon a landing. It was dark, but the wan, sickly light of Morrslieb spilled in through an ached window, lending a half-light glow to the numerous objects strewn all about. As his eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom, Duerr saw that the walls were hung with all manner of artefacts, from blades of truly ancient pattern to shields the likes of which he had only seen in the most esoteric tomes of the Colleges of Magic. Fragments of armour were set in nooks, each coated in a layer of dust that had clearly not been disturbed in decades, perhaps even centuries. One floor to ceiling nook contained row upon row of glass containers, ranging from tiny phials to huge bell jars, the shoulders draped in the grey dust of ages and the contents dark and obscured.

A coldness settled upon Duerr’s soul as his eyes grew more used to the gloomy interior and he took in the collection of objects arranged about the landing. As a student of Amethyst magic – the realms of the spirit, of dark dreams and of death, Duerr was well used to dabbling in matters most would find more than a little unsettling. But there was something else here, something old, something…

‘Welcome…’ the same parchment-dry voice that Duerr had heard earlier intoned. He cast about the dark landing, but saw nothing more alive than the spiders that haunted the dusty webs strewn across every surface. His breath quickening, Duerr prepared to answer, but was interrupted before a word had left his lips. ‘The uppermost chamber, boy,’ the voice said, a note of impatience evident. ‘Don’t keep me waiting.’

‘Sit,’ the old man ordered as Duerr came finally to the topmost chamber in the tower, excepting a small turret which he saw was accessible from a low side door. ‘Rest.’

Duerr stepped over the threshold into a circular chamber that occupied the entire storey, finally coming face to face with the man who had apparently saved him from the beastmen. The chamber was lit by flickering blue and green flames dancing in archaic wall sconces, and it took Duerr’s eyes long moments to locate the speaker.

To describe the man as old would be a drastic understatement. The crooked, black-robed individual before him was truly ancient. His robes were ragged, but had clearly been made of the very finest material, for they were patterned in intricate runes and sigils in thread of gold and silver. The ancient’s hands were as twisted and gnarled as the trees outside, his wrists and fingers decorated with bands and jewels that whispered to Duerr of dusty tombs and long dead cities.

Duerr looked into the ancient’s face and his heart froze, just for an instant. For a moment, he had thought he was looking at a dry, wind-blasted skull, the mouth set in a rictus grin, the eyes hollow pits of darkness. Then the effect passed as the green and blue light flickering from the wall sconces changed its rhythm. Life, of a sort, glinted from the depths of the eye-sockets and the raw bone of the skull revealed itself to be covered with a paper-thin layer of dry, liver-spotted skin. Still, Duerr thought as he steadied himself upon the high back of a nearby chair, there was scant muscle and flesh between skin and bone, the sharp edges of the skull threatening to tear through the thin covering.

‘Please,’ the ancient insisted, a wizened arm gesturing to the chair Duerr was leaning against. Duerr looked down at the dusty, black velvet padding, before his mind caught up with him. He nodded, gathering his wits, and seated himself.

‘Well then,’ the ancient said. ‘So long has it been since I had a visitor pay me court. Your name, sir?’

Duerr opened his mouth to speak, then caught himself, his throat so dry he thought he might gag. It was the dust in the air, he realised, and the residue of mud and fear left over from his flight through the Drakwald. He coughed, and tried to speak.

‘Where are my manners?’ said the ancient, a dry chuckle sounding from somewhere inside his robes. ‘Where indeed?’ he continued as he shuffled across the faded, yet still ornate, Arabyan carpet. At length, he reached a cabinet seemingly carved of ivory and opened its doors, the creaking of the dry hinges shockingly loud in the confines of the chamber. The ancient muttered and chuckled as he withdrew a pair of crystal goblets and a decanter filled with liquid so dark it appeared black in the flickering illumination cast by the sconces. As the old man shuffled back the way he had come, Duerr risked a furtive glance about the chamber.

If the landing lower down the tower had been cluttered, this place was overrun with artefacts. Every square foot of the wall was occupied, most of it by curved shelves housing volume after volume of ancient tomes. He squinted as he sought to read the text inset in gold at the spines, then his breath caught in his throat and his eyes widened in disbelief. Mroggdok K’Thing’s Testimony! He could scarcely believe that such a priceless work might be secreted away in the tower of some mad old wizard in the depths of the Drakwald. He scanned the spines of the next few volumes, his disbelief growing all the while. There were several volumes of Drivot’s Diatribes, copies of which he had glimpsed once in the Colleges of Magic, but never been allowed to read. Next was a tattered, rat-chewed copy of Trakall’s Paradox, a tome he knew by its fell reputation, but was unaware that any copy existed within the borders of the Empire.

‘Trakall…’ the old man sneered as he leaned over Duerr, a goblet of dark liquor proffered before him. The sudden speech made Duerr start and he felt suddenly guilty for his curiosity, as if he were a student again, caught rifling in the ingredients store.

‘Bah!’ the ancient continued, waving a hooked, claw-like hand in dismissal. ‘Trakall was a hack,’ he said as he backed away and eased himself down into a chair across from Duerr’s. ‘And he cheated at cards.’

Duerr realised that his throat was still painfully dry, and raised the goblet to his lips. A sharp tang rose from its contents, making his eyes water. He hesitated, yet did not want to appear ungracious to his rescuer.

‘It’s just Solland brandy,’ the old man said, taking a sip from his own glass and grinning wryly. ‘With a dash of black-eyed jenny,’ he added. ‘You’ve had a shock, by the looks of it.’

Duerr nodded as he sniffed the concoction gingerly. Black-eyed jenny was an archaic name for a rare variety of herb he knew to grow about the southern marches of the Midden Moors. It was not unrelated to the reason he had come to the Drakwald Deeps himself. He took a sip, the effect of the herb all but instantaneous. His mind cleared as the preparation worked its way through his system, while the brandy relaxed him, the chamber seeming to come into focus all around him.

‘Back from the dead, eh?’ the old man said, settling into his high-backed chair. ‘What’s your name, boy?’

‘Benedi…’ Duerr started, before taking a second draft on the dark liquor, his throat not quite wetted. ‘Benedikt, sir. Benedikt Duerr.’

The ancient grinned, his features assuming the death mask rictus once more, if only for a second, before he replied, ‘Welcome then, Benedikt Duerr. I am called Koth, Sidon Amen-Koth to be precise. I welcome you to my home, and to the Drakwald.’

Not quite sure how to take the welcome, Duerr decided he owed the old man some form of explanation for his presence. ‘Sir,’ he started. ‘I came for the–’

‘You came for the manbane,’ the ancient interrupted. ‘That much is quite clear, eh?’

‘It is, sir?’ Duerr stammered, his mind racing. How could this Koth have known his reason for coming to the Drakwald Deeps?

Koth grinned once more, the light in his eyes dwindling to a speck as the shadows closed in. ‘You are not the first, young man. And I have no doubt you will not be the last.’

Duerr blinked and took another sip of the Solland brandy to steady his nerves. ‘How could you–’

‘How could I know?’ Koth interjected once again. ‘What else would one of our calling be seeking on the verges of the Midden Moors? You sought the manbane herb, to distil its blood, brew its essence and gain its power over dreams… and nightmares. Did you not?’

Duerr steadied the crystal goblet on the worn arm of the chair, and nodded. ‘You are correct, sir. I needed the manbane to progress in my studies.’

‘To attain the charter?’ said Koth, grinning. ‘To gain permission to practice your arts?’

‘My master requires this of me, sir,’ Duerr admitted, a feeling of dejection stealing over him. ‘Or else I cannot attend to the funerary rites.’

‘Hmm,’ Koth nodded. ‘And who is this mentor to whom you are apprenticed?’

‘My master?’ Duerr replied. ‘My master is Lord Mhalkon, Adept of the Seventh Circle, he…’

‘Hmpff!’ Koth snorted, his grin twisting into a grimace. ‘Seventh Circle, indeed. Lord Mhalkon, you say?’

‘Yes, sir. Are you acquainted with my master?’

‘Acquainted?’ Koth answered. ‘Never heard of him. Should I have?’

‘Well, yes,’ Duerr stammered. ‘He is plenipotentiary-designate of the Cult of Morr, ambassador to the court of–’

Koth raised a wizened hand, affording Duerr a view of his curled and cracked nails. ‘Young man,’ he said, his voice low and dangerous. ‘Do not be so quick to name our true lord and master.’

‘Ours?’ Duerr replied, realisation dawning. ‘Then you serve M…’ he caught himself. ‘You serve those who wear the shroud?’

‘I serve no man, young sir,’ Koth replied. ‘But to answer your question, in a manner of speaking, yes, I serve, though I have scant dealings with those mumbling fools in Lucinni.’

Duerr knew that Koth was referring to the convocation of the priests of Morr, the god of death, sleep and dreams, which gathered once every decade in the city-state of Lucinni, far to the south. The Cult of Morr was a loose affiliation of priests and wizards and followed precious little dogma, with no established church as such. That meant that each practitioner was apt to conduct themselves as they themselves saw fit, and some did so in widely divergent ways.

‘If I might ask,’ Duerr dared venture. ‘How do you serve?’

Koth did not answer straight away, but looked about the chamber, his eyes, mere pinpricks of reflected light in the shadowy pits of their sockets, seeming to look beyond his mundane surroundings. His gaze swept over shelf after shelf of arcane tomes and dusty relics, over locked chests and baroque book stands, until, finally, it settled back on Duerr.

The ancient sighed, the sound redolent of stale air stirring within a tomb opened for the first time in centuries. ‘I serve the past. I serve that which has gone before. Most of all, I remember. That is how I serve.’

Duerr nodded and swallowed hard. ‘How long, sir?’ he asked. ‘How long have you served? How long have you remembered?’

The flickering of the wall-mounted sconces seemed to slow to a gentle pulse as Koth’s gaze settled upon Duerr, the air thickening as if reality itself were leaning in closer to hear the ancient’s reply. ‘I have always served, Benedikt Duerr. And I always shall.’

‘Sadly,’ the old man continued. ‘So too must you.’

Duerr’s blood turned cold as he met Koth’s gaze. ‘Really, sir,’ he started. ‘I must return–’

‘You cannot,’ Koth replied.

‘Sir, I–’

The ancient leaned forward, his death mask visage all Duerr could perceive as the shadows seemed to close in. ‘Hush, Benedikt Duerr,’ Koth whispered. ‘This is no doing of mine, and I bear you no ill will.’

‘Then what, sir?’ said Duerr. ‘What holds me here?’

Koth inclined his head towards the nearest window and, after a moment, Duerr broke his gaze and looked out. All he saw was the dark forest, the twisted boughs questing upwards towards the gibbous moon. Then a deep, coarse braying filled the night, and Duerr understood.

‘The beasts?’ he said.

‘Aye. The Children of Old Night. How they hate this place.’

Duerr stopped himself from asking why the beastmen might hate the tower of this ancient wizard. His studies and the arcane knowledge he was party to came to him and he had no need to ask. ‘They know this place is not subject to the laws of nature, the laws by which they themselves live and die. They know that you are not subject to such laws. Am I correct, sir?’

‘Very good, young man,’ said Koth. ‘Very good. This… Mhalkon, is it? Yes, he has taught you something at least.’

Duerr glanced around the chamber once more, seeing as if for the first time just how old its contents truly were. How long had Koth dwelt here, coveting priceless relics of ages long gone, while the surrounding forests seethed with beastmen?

‘There must be a way out,’ said Duerr. ‘Surely you have the power.’

‘I may well have the power, Benedikt,’ Koth replied. ‘But I have no desire to leave.’

‘They protect you?’ Duerr asked. ‘They keep the world at bay. They keep the past locked in.’

Koth chuckled, the sound like an ancient coffin lid sliding from its resting place. ‘They do.’

‘They keep all of your… artefacts, your tomes, your relics, safe.’

Koth nodded, though he did not reply.

‘You have such power here,’ said Duerr, aware that Koth was studying him, his skull-like head cocked at a slight angle. He looked towards the ancient volumes arrayed on the shelves. ‘You have knowledge. If I could harness but a portion of that, I could win past them, and escape.’

Koth remained silent for another minute, though to Duerr it felt like ten times as long. The flickering of the sconces had slowed right down to a rolling rhythm, disturbingly synchronised with Duerr’s own heartbeat. The longer Koth remained silent, the more resolved Duerr became. He was certain of it – Koth must surely have some weapon, some rune-bound blade that would turn the beastmen aside and secure his escape!

‘I have no such talisman, boy,’ said Koth at length. ‘I am no Alaric to craft weapons that hack and hew.’

Without Duerr realising Koth had moved, the old man was across the chamber and standing beside a shelf piled high with dusty artefacts. ‘What use to me Elbereth’s Leash or the Mirrors of Mergith? I have no need for Urn Guards or the Cat of Calisthenes, Niobe’s Torch or Rathnugg’s Boots. Not that they did Rathnugg any good…’

‘But you know spells,’ Duerr insisted, knowing he was correct. ‘You have power. This very place has power. I can feel it!’

Koth fixed Duerr with his pit-eyed gaze once more, regarding the young wizard with something akin to curious amusement. Duerr felt powers moving, energies aligning, and dead things stirring in cold, damp earth. He knew with terrible certainty that here before him was perhaps the most puissant master of the old ways of shyish, the Wind of Death, in all the land. That such a being dwelt within the very boundaries of the Empire, albeit deep within the Drakwald Deeps, was astonishing. He felt the draw of temptation, a small part of him begging leave to remain and to learn the secret arts and become master of nightmare and death. But a greater part of Duerr longed to escape this place and the perils pressing in on it from the forests all about. The sensation of dead things stirring grew ever more powerful, until he could feel movement beneath his feet though he stood upon stone flags. His nostrils filled with the musty stink of worm-chewed earth, his mouth with the copper tang of a mourning coin placed beneath his tongue in the funerary rites…

‘Enough!’ Koth ordered, and the power receded, the stink of rotten earth fled, and the slithering of dead things faded away. The copper tang lingered in his mouth as Koth rounded upon him.

‘You are correct,’ the ancient sighed. ‘I cannot keep you here. But I would not see you consumed by things you have no knowledge of.’

‘You will help me?’ Duerr pressed. ‘You will lend me your power?’

‘I will lend you my knowledge, Benedikt,’ Koth replied, holding up a gnarled claw to forestall interruption. ‘Though be warned. You may not thank me, even should you escape.’

Now the blue-green illumination cast by the archaic sconces was all but frozen.

‘I understand,’ replied Duerr, though both men knew full well that he did not.

One month later, Duerr stood high atop the tower of Koth, looking down from the highest turret upon the wind-lashed, night-shrouded Drakwald. Such knowledge infused his mind and his soul, such power was his to command, that he knew he would soon be gone from this place. He would be free of the beastmen, free to return to the Colleges of Magic. He would show his master and his peers that he was worthy, more than worthy, to serve Morr. Perhaps he would return to Koth’s tower, and treat with him as an equal one day.

‘I am ready, master,’ Duerr announced, feeling a cold wind stir his robes. The gale was not entirely natural, the tang of dark magic underlying it.

‘You know you cannot return,’ the voice of the old man came from behind Duerr. ‘Should you even escape.’

‘I know,’ Duerr lied as the wind increased. ‘I am ready,’ he repeated.

‘Upon your own soul then,’ said Koth as he proffered Duerr a rolled up, ribbon-bound scroll. ‘Begin.’

Duerr took the scroll and broke the black wax seal, the discarded ribbon snatched away upon the wind to flutter to the dark clearing far below. He grinned as his eyes scanned the first lines of the spidery text written countless centuries earlier. Here was the last piece of the puzzle, the completion of the knowledge Koth had instilled upon him this last month. With it, he would turn the beasts to his service and escape this ancient trap.

Unfurling the scroll fully and holding it out before him, Duerr located the archaic sigil which he must enunciate in order to turn the beasts to his service. The night gale increased still further, and now it was clear that the Wind of shyish was building to a storm, an invisible vortex of magical energies forming overhead. The sigil glowed blackly upon the ancient parchment, tendrils of ebon power questing outwards as if to draw Duerr’s soul inwards to embrace it…

‘Speak the word and be done!’ Koth shouted over the now howling winds. ‘Before it is too late!’

Fully appreciating Koth’s warning, Duerr took a deep breath and braced himself, the wind seeming to pause in its surging for that instant.

Then he spoke the ancient word of power.

The word had not been spoken in millennia, not by mortal lips at least. Only one schooled in the funerary rites could form it and not be blasted to crematory ashes or withered to a husk. It was a word that few ever spoke this side of the grave. The Wind of shyish whipped to a howling gale, buffeting Duerr and forcing him to set his feet wide lest he be snatched from the turret and tossed to the storm. The trees all about the clearing thrashed and dry leaves were whipped upwards. In an instant, the night was turned to a howling storm.

The feeling of power that Duerr had experienced a month before returned, only this time it was a thousand times more potent, and a thousand times more than that. He was the master of death and of dreams, the bearer of the forbidden key that would unlock the portal between this world and the next. The air about him transmuted into the cold earth of the grave and the air that filled his lungs was scented with the heady, cloying cocktail of incense masking decay.

The word resounded through the thrashing woods and Duerr knew it had been heeded. Soon, he would be master of life and death – his own life and the death of others. The beast would turn pale and do his bidding, and he would be free.

‘It begins!’ Duerr heard Koth bellow into the wind, his voice tinged with terror.

A wet rending split the earth, and Duerr looked downwards into the clearing. The ground appeared to be boiling, as if the roots of the trees all about were stirring in hideous motion. His eyes widened in horror as he saw what he took for a root appear in the cracked earth, questing upwards with a jagged motion. But it was no root. It was nothing natural at all. It was an arm, or the skeletal remains of one, and it was dragging itself clear of the unmarked grave that must surely have held it fast for centuries.

In moments, the arm was clear and the body itself was visible, as were dozens more as they rose with jerking motions from the cold ground. Skeletons, the bones stained almost black by the raw earth, pulled themselves erect all about the clearing, and only then did Duerr see what he had wrought.

‘Beasts…’ he stammered. ‘Beasts from the earth…’

‘Yes, young Benedikt,’ Koth whispered from behind Duerr, his dry voice somehow carrying over the howling wind and speaking directly into the wizard’s mind. ‘And they are yours to command as you will. Now you have the power to escape this place.’

‘Now you may leave.’

Duerr stepped through the portal at the base of the tower, out into the night and the clearing beyond. He trod cautiously, despite the knowledge that the army of dead things arrayed about was his to command. He felt as though he were walking the hunting ground of the most voracious of predators and knew that, in many ways, he was. Steeling himself, he walked through the tattered ranks, studying the rotting things he had brought into being.

The beasts were dark skeletons, rags of flesh and fabric caught amongst ribs and joints. Insects scuttled about disturbed nests while squirming worms fell to the churned ground. They stood upon cloven bone feet and clutched rusted cleavers and rotten shields in their dead grips. Their skulls were the sharp-snouted forms of cattle, though their teeth, where these had survived, were long and wickedly sharp. A pair of horns framed each skull; some curled tightly, others straight and proud. The eyes were empty sockets, but Duerr could perceive the faint spark of animal cognition deep within.

As he walked through the ranks of dead beasts, the sound of creaking bone and rustling dried flesh all about, he saw that one amongst their number was far larger than its fellows. Cautiously, he approached the mighty beast, looking up into its bovine-formed skull and perceiving in its empty eye sockets a vestige of raw, animal power. Echoes of the creature’s death reverberated about the night, faded visions of blasphemy and desecration imprinting themselves over Duerr’s vision. This beast lord had led its war herd against the hated tower and its fearful denizen, seeking to cast it down once and for all so that no stone was left standing upon another. The creature had failed; it and all of its herd had perished in the clearing. Yet, centuries later, its hatred remained, pure and distilled to the essence that still imbued it with fearful power.

At once quelled by the might of the undead beast lord before him and almost drunk with the fact that it was his to command, Duerr spoke the word of command. ‘March!’

At first, nothing stirred but the wind. Then the wet creak of movement filled the clearing about the tower of Koth, and the army of long dead beasts set out. Slow and unsteady at first, the dead things followed Duerr’s order and were soon marching slowly and irregularly through the undergrowth beneath the dense canopy. Duerr hesitated at the tree line and looked over his shoulder towards the tower. There at its peak was Koth, looking down from the turret. He could not see the old man’s expression for he was silhouetted against the green orb of Morrslieb. Then Koth was gone, the tower fading to the ramshackle aspect that Duerr had found it in weeks before. He turned, and followed his army into the black depths of the forest.

He did not get far.

Mere yards beyond the tree line, Duerr came upon the rearmost ranks of the war herd, stood still and silent. The air beneath the black canopy was still, the sounds of the wind muffled and distant. Duerr felt waves of animal threat spilling off of the dead things all about him and knew that death beyond death waited to be unleashed. He edged forward through the silent ranks until he saw the back of the undead beast lord before him.

Duerr saw then why his army had halted. The path ahead was blocked. A single massive beastman stood waiting, its every muscle bunched and tensed in readiness. Though the beast was wreathed in shadow, Duerr could see clearly the form of its four horns, one of which was broken off at the tip. It was the leader of the war herd that had pursued him through the Drakwald long weeks before, returned for its meat. Likely it had never left, but skulked out of sight in the dark, dank forests, biding its time for the trapped prey to emerge.

Though all but rooted to the ground with horror, Duerr knew what he must do. After all, this was the reason he had imbibed the ancient wisdom Koth had taught him, and why he had spoken that dread word of power from beyond the grave; to command this army of dead things to deliver him through the perils of the Drakwald that he might gain his freedom and escape alive.

‘Kill it!’ Duerr ordered the beast lord of his undead herd, his heart swelling with the desire to avenge himself. ‘Stamp it into the ground! Grind it beneath your hooves!’

Grinning savagely, Duerr waited with bittersweet anticipation for his order to be obeyed. But it was not.

The two beast lords, one towering and skeletal, the other shorter of stature but very much alive, squared off against one another. The war herd of the living beast lord loomed from the shadows behind, but did not approach or attempt to intervene. Instead, the two armies backed off, making a space for their leader to face one another.

‘What…?’ Duerr stammered, before the truth of what he was witnessing dawned. He spun suddenly about to face the ranks of undead beasts behind him. ‘Kill them! Just kill them!’ he bellowed.

But none heeded Duerr’s orders. Instead, the two beast lords began to circle one another in the space cleared for them by the herds. The living one huffed and snorted as its hooves stamped upon the rotten ground. The dead one moved with an oddly disjointed gait, patches of rusted mail rattling against dry, black bones. Though the shadowed pits of its eye sockets were empty, Duerr’s wizard’s sight perceived the dark unlife glinting deep within, responding to, and glorying in, this challenge.

Duerr backed away, his gaze fixed upon the sight unfolding before him. The instant his back pressed up against a rotten tree trunk, the living beast lord bellowed deafeningly loudly and launched itself at its rival. The other moved sideways and raised its shield, but the wood splintered under the attacker’s two-handed cleaver. Splinters as deadly as crossbow bolts showered outwards, but the dead lord recovered, discarding the remnants and diving forward. The living beast lord’s momentum carried it forward as its opponent stepped aside and both turned as one, their positions traded.

The beast that was living flesh snorted loudly, its breath so hot that it steamed from its flared nostrils like sulphurous smoke. The other redoubled its grip on its weapon, a sword of ancient fabrication clearly not made by the hand of his race or any other that Duerr knew of. Once more, the two circled the open ground, Duerr pressing himself against the tree all the while as the living beast lord’s great, rippling back hove near.

‘Morr…’ Duerr breathed, desperately seeking to harness something of the power he had felt at the moment he had brought his army of dead things into existence. But he knew in that moment that the god of death and of dreams would not aid him; that this thing he had done was nothing of Morr’s work. Morr was the god of rest, of eternal slumber and of oracles. This night, Duerr had blasphemed in the worst possible manner. Better that he died, he realised as the living beast lord stepped backwards towards him.

‘Morr!’ Duerr bellowed, his mind all but shattered with grief and horror. ‘Morr, forgive–’

But he never completed his prayer, for the beast lord turned and bellowed its savage war cry directly into Duerr’s face. Noise, and the creature’s vile breath, forced him back hard against the tree trunk, knocking his head and causing his vision to blur. As he slid to the ground, he saw the beast turn in time to block a downwards blow from the undead lord and strike a savage counterblow in return.

The beast lord’s two-handed cleaver struck the undead thing through the middle. Had the target had guts, they would have spilled across the clearing, but instead, the blade severed the exposed spine and brought the two halves of the unliving beast crashing to the ground. Its lower half came to rest amongst its followers, while the upper lay clawing the ground at the victor’s feet.

The beast lord bellowed such a roar of triumph that the trees bowed and the canopy thrashed as if the storm that had whipped the forest when Duerr called forth the undead beast herd was returned. The sound left Duerr stunned and half-deafened, his balance shot and his vision all but gone. As he slumped to the ground, he saw the victor raise its cloven hoof high above the dead-thing’s bovine skull head, and bring it crashing down with such force that the land itself cried out in pain.

The skull splintered into a thousand fragments and the undead beast lord was slain a second time. Slumping to the ground, Duerr rolled over onto his side in time to see the dead beastmen prostrate themselves before the victor.

The challenge was won; dominance was established; the herd was one and the rival beast lord was slain.

But Duerr knew that one more matter needed to be decided: his own fate. He felt his end drawing near, even as the heavy, cloven tread of the beastmen approached.

Imagining the beast lord’s hoof raised above his head, poised to end his existence, he looked away across the ground. His blurred gaze settled upon a nearby object, a black-stemmed plant mere feet from his head, trampled into the ground. It was manbane, the very herb that he had so foolishly ventured into the Drakwald to obtain, so many weeks before.

He screwed his eyes tight shut as the Beastmen gathered all about him. He waited for the inevitable, yet the killing blow never came. Instead of a cloven hoof slamming down upon his head, a stream of near-boiling acrid liquid struck him hard. Another joined it, then a third. One after another, the beastmen of the Drakwald demonstrated their disgust for this human, whose life was so meaningless to them that they would not even deign to snuff it out.

And high atop the Tower of Koth, the ancient Necromancer returned to his studies of texts not read by mortal eyes for uncounted millennia, content to ignore the passage of the ages and the folly of man, until the end of time itself.