03 - Sword of Vengeance (53 page)

Volkmar fed power to his staff and the tip burst into golden
illumination. The nimbus filled the chamber, reflecting back from the utter dark
of the Stone and banishing the shadows around the sculpted iron walls. The fury
of the bloodfire roared back, swirling around the Staff of Command like a swarm
of enraged hornets.

On either side of him, warrior priests surged forwards, all
eager to land the first blow on the towering figure before them. With a pang of
regret, Volkmar watched as the foremost were reduced to weeping, shuddering
wrecks.

The daemon’s power was a subtle one. Natassja had been
elegant as a mortal and daemonhood had not changed her. There were no sudden
bursts of flame or crackling discharges of aethyr-spawned lightning. Her powers
were those of the mind, of sensation, of fear and pain.

The first warrior priest to get near her exploded into a ball
of blood at a flick from her shapely finger. The Reiksguard at his side was
next. She shot a cool glance from her smooth eyes and his armour shattered.
Beneath it, his body was transmuted into a writhing, hermaphroditic mess. Fleshy
growths wrapped themselves around what was left of his throat and strangled the
life out of him.

With every fresh death an echoing boom rushed up the shaft of
the Stone. Volkmar could sense the enormous power contained there. It had been
enough to grant Natassja her elevation into immortality and it had still been
hardly tapped. With a dreadful realisation, he knew that there was nothing he
could do to dent it. He might have had a thousand warrior priests with him and
the result would have been the same. There was no hope left, not for them, not
for Averheim.

“The blood of Sigmar!” he bellowed, defiant to the end.

He whirled the staff around and sent a stream of blazing fire
at the daemon. It impacted directly on the sigil of Slaanesh at her breast and
exploded, showering the chamber with spinning points of light.

Natassja took a step back, entirely unharmed. She bared her
fangs and fixed Volkmar with a withering look of contempt.

He screamed, and staggered to his knees. Something vast and
malice-drenched entered his soul. He could feel his essence being ripped away
from within, dragged from his mortal frame on barbs of steel. She was destroying
him.

His staff fell to the floor as he withdrew his power from it.
Resisting the crushing influence of the daemon took all his residual art. He
screwed his eyes closed, grimacing with pain. He was being dragged back to the
hells he had escaped before. There, in the darkness, he could see the
androgynous form of his nemesis. The Dark Prince had been waiting there since
his last death, happy to welcome him back.

“Not…” he gasped, digging deep, drawing on every last shred
of strength left in his battered body. “Not
now…”

Dimly, he was aware of more men rushing past him. There was a
flash of light, and the crushing sensation eased.

Volkmar edged his eyes open, gasping for breath. Helborg had
engaged the daemon. The notched runefang danced as the Marshal pressed towards
the abomination.

Natassja evaded his blows easily. She shifted with incredible
speed, darting from one place to another as if the steps in between positions
had become completely unnecessary. Helborg’s attack had at least diverted the
terrifying power of her will, and Volkmar climbed back to his feet, picking up
the staff again and preparing himself to use it.

“This is hopeless,” came a voice from his right.

Leitdorf was standing there, sword trembling in his hands,
staring at the abomination with horror. His face was grey with fear.

“Stand your ground!” snarled Volkmar. “Damn you, Rufus, stand
your ground!”

Even as he spoke, another warrior priest was ripped apart by
Natassja’s malign will. She nodded curtly and the man’s flesh was turned inside
out, spilling his entrails across the Stone in glistening rings. Six men had
already died without so much as making contact with her. Helborg fought on,
roaring with defiance and frustration as she evaded his attacks.

“What good will it do?” Leitdorf wailed. All trace of his
self-assurance on the battlefield had drained away, and he looked half-mad with
fear. “She’s untouchable.”

Volkmar knew he was right. That didn’t change a thing.

“This is your city,” he growled, preparing to kindle the
staff again. “Stand up for it.”

Then he strode back towards the daemon, and golden flame
flared up along the shaft of his weapon.

“Scion of darkness!” he roared, sending a spitting column of
lightning screaming towards the abomination. “You will
not
prevail
here!”

Helborg leapt forwards, trying to find purchase with the
Klingerach. He knew the runefang would bite deep if it connected, but making
contact with the flesh of the daemon was impossible. With a twist of his
stomach, he saw more of his men being cut down, one by one. Natassja seemed to
be picking off the lesser warriors first, toying with them all like a cat with
its prey.

He stabbed at her massive thigh, whirling the blade around
with blistering speed and force. At the very last moment, she shifted position,
appearing a yard away, still in the same pose. She winked at him, flicked her
fingers, and the last Reiksguard standing lost his skin. The man collapsed in a
screaming, writhing pool of blood, held together by his armour and nothing else.

“Damned witch!” Helborg hissed, keeping his sword in guard
and searching for some kind of opening.

Volkmar had got back to his feet by then, and sent a fresh
stream of spitting golden fire straight at the daemon. His staff was the only
weapon that seemed able to harm her daemonic flesh. Irritated by the
interruption in her killing, she turned her attention back to the raging cleric.

Helborg tensed, ready to plunge back into the attack, but
then caught sight of Leitdorf. The man had frozen. The Wolfsklinge was in his
hands, but only just.

“Your blade, Leitdorf!” bellowed Helborg, rushing to the
elector’s side. As he did so, he saw Volkmar being beaten back, just as before.
“Remember Drakenmoor!”

Leitdorf shot him a panic-stricken look.

“I
can’t
…” he began, but then Helborg was dragging
him to face Natassja.

“We attack together!” he cried, pushing him forwards. “Just
as before!”

The Marshal hurled himself at the daemon. Somehow Leitdorf
summoned the courage to join him, and the two men charged the monstrous figure.

Then, and for the first time, Helborg almost wounded her.
Distracted by Volkmar’s attack and faced with the onslaught of two ancient
blades, Natassja faltered for just an instant. She pulled back from Helborg’s
blow, but failed to withdraw from Leitdorf’s attack. The Wolfsklinge passed
through her flesh without biting and came clean out the other side.

Off-balance, Leitdorf stumbled to his knees. As quick as a
whip, Natassja kicked out with a hoof and sent him flying across the chamber
floor. He hit the far wall hard. His sword spun from his grasp, coming to rest
by the eviscerated body of a fallen Reiksguard knight.

Isolated and unable to land a blow, Helborg fell back.

Two of the surviving warrior priests charged at the daemon
then, their warhammers swinging heavily. Natassja turned to face them and bared
her fangs again. One priest simply exploded, his breastplate spinning across the
floor and spraying blood. The other seized up, his face marked with agony. He
shuddered, and his bones burst out through his flesh, lengthening with
frightening speed, tearing the muscles as they came. The priest collapsed to the
ground and dissolved into a mess of ripped flesh and still-extending skeleton.

By then there were only six priests left, all cowed by the
daemon’s contemptuous response to their attacks. Helborg looked over at Volkmar.
The Theogonist was preparing for a third attack, but Natassja had badly hurt
him. Leitdorf lived too, but he looked dazed and shaky on his feet.

“We can’t do this,” breathed Helborg, aghast at the sudden
awareness of his weakness. He took up the Klingerach again and prepared for
another charge. Duty demanded no less, but he held no hope for it. “We have come
too late. The bitch will kill us all.”

Leitdorf gasped for breath. The merest touch of Natassja’s
flesh had been enough to send a searing chill through his body. He’d felt the
vast power coiled up within her then, and it dwarfed anything he’d ever felt
before.

He gazed up at her, watching as she pulled the limbs from
another warrior priest. Natassja looked almost bored, as if this were a mild
distraction before the real entertainment began. Next to her, Helborg and
Volkmar, two of the mightiest warriors in the Empire, looked more ineffectual
than children playing at combat.

Determined as ever, Helborg charged back into contact,
spinning the Sword of Vengeance around him, trying to land a blow on Natassja’s
shifting, ephemeral body.

As he did so, Volkmar sent a third barrage of faith-fire at
her. The Theogonist aimed at her face and the swirling column of lightning
impacted directly. She was knocked back against the Stone. The impact didn’t do
any real damage, but the interruption seemed to infuriate her.

She extended her palm and Helborg was flung back through the
air, his limbs flailing as the unseen thrust slammed him aside. Then she
clenched her fist and Volkmar doubled over. The light streaming from his staff
dimmed, and he fell to his knees in pain.

Ignoring his own wounds, Leitdorf limped to Volkmar’s side.
He clutched at the Theogonist’s shoulders as the man toppled to one side. The
remaining warrior priests charged heroically at the daemon, drawing her
attention away from Volkmar. Their six lives bought nothing but a few moments of
respite.

“My lord!” Leitdorf cried, helping the man to the floor.

The Theogonist’s eyes were filmy. It looked like he wasn’t
seeing very much.

“Too…
powerful
…” he gasped, and his fingers
clutched at his staff feebly.

Leitdorf felt his despair turn to a desperate, frustrated
anger. He looked up. The roof of the chamber was open, and a vast shaft of fire
soared away into the distance. This had been Natassja’s birth-chamber. The
entire structure above was nothing more than an amplifier for the energies
needed to bring her into being. That was why she’d needed Averheim. It was
nothing to do with temporal power or riches. For her, the city had been a
machine.

He looked at Natassja. She killed two more men then, flaying
them alive with a twist of her fingers. The remaining quartet still came on,
still trying to find a way to harm her. Helborg too had staggered back into
range. Their bravery was phenomenal, but it would do little to save them.

“Can you ignite the staff again?” asked Leitdorf, a note of
desperation in his voice.

Volkmar shook his head.

“Look around you,” he panted. “This has been centuries in the
making. We cannot hurt her.”

Leitdorf slammed his fist against the marble floor. He was no
longer afraid, just furious. After all the pain, all the bloodshed, it had come
to this at last. His inheritance, turned to ashes before his eyes, destroyed in
order to bring a new horror into the world.

“There must be
something
.”

Volkmar shook his head. “Her daemonhood is complete. Without
knowledge of her true name, she is invulnerable to us.”

The last of the warrior priests was riven where he stood, his
body torn into ribbons. Only Helborg, Volkmar and Leitdorf remained. The last
ones to die, locked beneath the earth under a tower of iron.

From above, the distant howling grew louder. The lesser
daemons were still looking for a way in. The bloodfire bloomed anew, roaring and
thundering against the iron. The Stone could sense victory, and gloried in it.

“Her name?” asked Leitdorf, suddenly feeling a sliver
of hope. “What power would that give you?”

Volkmar looked up at him. There was a grim smile on his face,
the resigned look of a man who knows death is upon him.

“I could hurt her then,” he growled. “By Sigmar, I would
hurt
her.”

Leitdorf began to fumble at his belt.

“Find the power,” he ordered, his voice suddenly resonant
again. “Find it from somewhere. This isn’t over yet.”

Helborg pulled the body of the warrior priest back, but too
late. The man’s skin hung in strips from his frame. For a last few agonised
moments, the priest still lived. He fixed Helborg with piteous eyes, blood and
tears mingling across his destroyed face. Then he collapsed, just another corpse
on the floor of the chamber.

Helborg withdrew a pace, keeping his blue eyes locked on the
figure looming over him. Natassja smiled at him and flexed her talons.