((I wrote for an extended period for the first time in a long while yesterday. Comments are welcome and encouraged. Enjoy! ^__^))
The sky was dark on the day that Falme fell.
The village watch had scarcely counted two hours past what should have been dawn when the first fires started, rousing those who had not woken with the cries of the first of many who would wish they hadn't woken at all that day. A storm of blood and fury had descended upon Falme, and the watch would not count another hour before the town lay in ruins.
Alec Koltiras knelt behind the blackened ruin of a burned out house, taking stock of the situation. It had been sheer chance that led him, a Captain of the Imperial Guard, to Falme on a routine inspection, mere hours before the Northen savages laid siege to the town. He had had little doubt of the identity of these attackers from the start; the attack was too savage and straightforward for the Druchii, but far too organized for the Greenskins. The corpses of the two Northmen he had overtaken just moments ago stelled any doubt he may have held on to.
Tossing aside the knife that had broken off in the second marauder, he spit on the ground, feeling unclean simplu being near the savages. The clash of steel still rang throughout the village, and Captain Koltiras said a silent prayer to Sigmar as the wind carried the dying screams of more villagers to his ears.
Coming to his feet, Alec moved around the edge of the charred house, one hand on the hilt of the longsword sheathed at his waist as he moved towards the center of the town. Falme was all but lost, the attack too sudden and vicious for the village to have any hope of fending off. The Captain shook off questions of ow and why the Northmen had ammassed such a force against an outlying town of the Empire; the savages had long since proven that there was nothing of reason to their actions. Falme's only hope now was for Alec to reach the town hall and evacuate as many of the citizens hiding there as he could. They would not long survive without his protection.
The sound of soft sobbing broke his stride, and Alec quickly dropped to his knees, turning in the direction of the sound. Through the unnatural gloom, he could just barely make out a tiny form kneeling within a hollowed out shack several yards away. A deep sadness rose within the Captain's heart at the sight of the child, now bereft of everything for no reason he could possibly understand. At twenty-five years old, Alec was considered young for his station, and had his share of sleepless nights from the horrors of war that he encountered during his first years in the Guard. He could not imagine how a child would be able to deal with this nightmare.
Creeping towards the shack, Alec shook off a deep feeling of wrongness, determined to allow the young boy a better life than what remained in this doomed city. The burgeoning dread grew in his heart even as he stopped a few feet from the boy, kneeling down and whispering softly.
"You're safe now." He spoke, reassuring even in his urgency, stretching out a hand, even as the child's sorrowful moans seemed to increase. "Come quickly. I won't allow anyone to harm you." As the tiny figure turned and ran to his arms, Alec found a deep sickness frow in his stomach as he caught sight of what lay on the ground where the boy had knelt.
An adult body laid on the ground, face frozen in a twisted mask of horror and agony. Blood pooled on the ground beneath the corpse, flowing freely from a stomach that seemed to have been clawed open, entrails torn out and shredded. In his revulsion, Alec found that he was unable to pull his eyes from the mutilated form, even to look at the child he now lifted into his arms and carried from the shack, desperate to rid himself of the vision.
As he stepped out into what little light was granted by the flames burning throughout the village, Alec looked down at the child he held, and too late realized where the sense of wrongness he had been feeling came from.
What he held in his arms was not a child, but a twisted mockery of the human form. Pale blue skin stretched too tightly over a skull too small to accomodate a human body. Empty eye sockets started into him with a malice that should not have been possible, and fresh blood spilled from the Daemon's mouth as it bared it's wicked fangs in what Alec might have thought a grin, had he the time to think. He had not been listening to sobs of grief, but moans of hunger. The last sound he would hear before pain shot up his chest and darkness took him was an unholy cackle of hunger and glee.
_______________________________________________
Conciousness returned slowly, along with a dull, throbbing pain in Alec's chest and head as he felt himself being dragged along the ground. The daemon's masters had clearly decided there was more use for him than as fodder. Abruptly, the dragging stopped, the hands gripping his arms letting him crash to the ground. Colors and shapes defying description danced before his eyes as the air exploded from his lungs and darkness threatened to overwhelm him again. They had left his armor on, and he hit the ground with far more weight than would have been possible for his athletic frame. Cries of grief and savage cheers mingled in the air for what seemed like ages, and then all at once, silence returned. Heavy footsteps moved toward the prone captain, stopping just in front of him.
"Sit him up." Said a voice that sounded like hope itself dying.
As rough hands grabbed Alec and lifted him to his knees, he took a chance to look around. He had been dragged to the town square, which had clearly fallen to the invaders. No more than fifty villagers - men, women and children - knelt in a small group at the edge of the square, bound and staring helplessly in Alec's direction.
Behind him, an army of impossible size knelt, faces staring resolutely at the ground. Alec's head swam with the implications. How could so many Northmen have assembled without the Empire's knowledge? What could be their purpose?
"You will look upon me. " The voice, which seemed to be many voices speaking in unison, spoke again, and Alec's blood ran cold as he could not help but face forward to see what manner of man could create such a sound.
Two men stood before Alec, and each sight struck fear in his heart in a manner he had never experienced before. The man on the left did not speak, or even meet his gaze, but the frail figure, cloaked in a long robe of deep blue and leaning on a staff that appeared to be made of blackened bone, exuded power beyond any sorceror that Alec had ever faced.
If the frail, hunched figure seemed to exude power, the man standing directly in front of him was power itself embodied. Alec had always been considered a tall man by his peers, but this man dwarfed him easily, standing at least eight feet tall, his body deeply tanned and impossibly muscular, every feature speaking of a tremendous capacity for violence. A face that looked as if it had been carved from stone twisted with disdain as the man looked down upon the kneeling captain, the scar that ran from the top of his bald head to his upper lip somehow making the expression even more hateful.
He wore nothing, save for a flowing black garment around his lower body, which seemed to move in the wind, in spite of the fact that wind had long since stopped blowing. His torso was covered in arcane runes, and upon his chest was tattooed an eight pointed star with a skull as it's center, the ancient symbol of the Dark Gods. Yet all of these details became mundane as Alec's eyes fell upon the warrior's right arm, which ceased being an arm at the elbow, flesh and bone twisting and warping into a monstrous blade. Alec was certain that, flesh or not, such a sword would cut just fine.
"To think," the man grinned, a smile on his lips somehow more frightening than his previous scowl, "that a Captain of the Guard would be here. Did your false Emperor send you to us, work? Speak!"
"Who..." Alec choked, fighting burning in his chest and throat, pushing back rage at the insult to the Emperor. "Who are you?
The words were barely out of his mouth when the man's foot caught him in the chest, thrwoing him backward. Alec rolled onto his side, coughing violently as he felt his fractured ribs.
"My name?" The Northman barked, laughing cruelly. "Long ago, such worthless details fell from memory. I know only the lust for glorious battle - for blood, for victory!"
"What do you want?" Alec demanded, pushing himself up as anger rose in his chest. "Why have you vile savages done this?!"
The Northman growled, stepping forward and driving his knee into the Captain's gut, doubling him over as he coughed blood.
"I seek only the Eye of Tzeentch! His favor - his dark gifts, that I may be remade - REBORN!" He lifted his armblade high, and was met with roars of bloodthirsty joy by the ammassed Northmen. "Why, you ask? Why do we raid your lands? Why do we burn your homes? Why do we flay your flesh? To serve the Lord of Change and his glorious designs!"
"Savage!" Alec spat, overwhelmed with revulsion. "Heathen... monster!"
The man said nothing, turning and lifting a scabbard from the ground behind him. Alec's sword. Throwing the blade at the captain's feet, he roared.
"Come! We shall do battle, and I will take your spine to the false Emperor's door myself!"
Pain, anguish and rage overwhelmed Alec as he pulled the blade free and rushed the savage, who roared with approving bloodlust, meeting the blade with his own arm.
"I will be your death, heathen!" Alec growled, even as he was pushed backward by the force of the Northman's blow.
"Neither you, nor any of your Emperor's dogs, captain." The warrior grinned, pushing the guard further back and launching a vicious flurry of attacks at the young captain.
It was all Alec could do to parry the blows, carried by a strength no mere human could possibly wield. Every thrust, every parry, was thrown off as if it was nothing, every opening nothing more than a disguise for a potentially deadly blow. Just barely dodging a slash that tore into his left arm, armor and flesh alike, Alec fought back pain and fatigue, charging forward in desperation. His courage caught his foe by surprise, and his thrust yielded a deep gash in the Northman's cheek. Alec roared in victory, righteous fury flooding his body, only to find himself yanked from his fet as the warrior grabbed the blade and used the captain's grip to pull him into the air.
Time seemed to stand still as Alec watched the savage's face twist in a mocking smile, felt the blade tear into his stomach, tasted blod rise from his chest into his mouth and spill over his lips.
"Your time is up, worm." The warrior spoke slowly, as if pronouncing judgement on the captain, whose body already began to drain of color and blood.
Releasing the longsword, the Northman ripped his blade from the captain's body, dropping him to his knees and roaring in triumph.
"Call us savage because we strike at you." The warrior's many voices reverberated throughout the square, speaking to every living citizen of the Empire. "But know this! It is we who are closest to the Ruinous Powers! We most favored of the Gods shall raid your lands, revel in your suffering and destroy you."
Alec could do nothing but watch as the marauder stepped forward, raising his blade in the air. Conciousness was already slipping away, his body becoming numb.
"Despair! For all that remains for you is the taste of Northern steel and the end of your world! Such is the will of the Gods!"
Alec's last thought as the blade of flesh clove through his skull was a prayer for the Empire. He thanked Sigmar that he would not live to watch it burn.
The sky was dark on the day that Falme fell.
The village watch had scarcely counted two hours past what should have been dawn when the first fires started, rousing those who had not woken with the cries of the first of many who would wish they hadn't woken at all that day. A storm of blood and fury had descended upon Falme, and the watch would not count another hour before the town lay in ruins.
Alec Koltiras knelt behind the blackened ruin of a burned out house, taking stock of the situation. It had been sheer chance that led him, a Captain of the Imperial Guard, to Falme on a routine inspection, mere hours before the Northen savages laid siege to the town. He had had little doubt of the identity of these attackers from the start; the attack was too savage and straightforward for the Druchii, but far too organized for the Greenskins. The corpses of the two Northmen he had overtaken just moments ago stelled any doubt he may have held on to.
Tossing aside the knife that had broken off in the second marauder, he spit on the ground, feeling unclean simplu being near the savages. The clash of steel still rang throughout the village, and Captain Koltiras said a silent prayer to Sigmar as the wind carried the dying screams of more villagers to his ears.
Coming to his feet, Alec moved around the edge of the charred house, one hand on the hilt of the longsword sheathed at his waist as he moved towards the center of the town. Falme was all but lost, the attack too sudden and vicious for the village to have any hope of fending off. The Captain shook off questions of ow and why the Northmen had ammassed such a force against an outlying town of the Empire; the savages had long since proven that there was nothing of reason to their actions. Falme's only hope now was for Alec to reach the town hall and evacuate as many of the citizens hiding there as he could. They would not long survive without his protection.
The sound of soft sobbing broke his stride, and Alec quickly dropped to his knees, turning in the direction of the sound. Through the unnatural gloom, he could just barely make out a tiny form kneeling within a hollowed out shack several yards away. A deep sadness rose within the Captain's heart at the sight of the child, now bereft of everything for no reason he could possibly understand. At twenty-five years old, Alec was considered young for his station, and had his share of sleepless nights from the horrors of war that he encountered during his first years in the Guard. He could not imagine how a child would be able to deal with this nightmare.
Creeping towards the shack, Alec shook off a deep feeling of wrongness, determined to allow the young boy a better life than what remained in this doomed city. The burgeoning dread grew in his heart even as he stopped a few feet from the boy, kneeling down and whispering softly.
"You're safe now." He spoke, reassuring even in his urgency, stretching out a hand, even as the child's sorrowful moans seemed to increase. "Come quickly. I won't allow anyone to harm you." As the tiny figure turned and ran to his arms, Alec found a deep sickness frow in his stomach as he caught sight of what lay on the ground where the boy had knelt.
An adult body laid on the ground, face frozen in a twisted mask of horror and agony. Blood pooled on the ground beneath the corpse, flowing freely from a stomach that seemed to have been clawed open, entrails torn out and shredded. In his revulsion, Alec found that he was unable to pull his eyes from the mutilated form, even to look at the child he now lifted into his arms and carried from the shack, desperate to rid himself of the vision.
As he stepped out into what little light was granted by the flames burning throughout the village, Alec looked down at the child he held, and too late realized where the sense of wrongness he had been feeling came from.
What he held in his arms was not a child, but a twisted mockery of the human form. Pale blue skin stretched too tightly over a skull too small to accomodate a human body. Empty eye sockets started into him with a malice that should not have been possible, and fresh blood spilled from the Daemon's mouth as it bared it's wicked fangs in what Alec might have thought a grin, had he the time to think. He had not been listening to sobs of grief, but moans of hunger. The last sound he would hear before pain shot up his chest and darkness took him was an unholy cackle of hunger and glee.
_______________________________________________
Conciousness returned slowly, along with a dull, throbbing pain in Alec's chest and head as he felt himself being dragged along the ground. The daemon's masters had clearly decided there was more use for him than as fodder. Abruptly, the dragging stopped, the hands gripping his arms letting him crash to the ground. Colors and shapes defying description danced before his eyes as the air exploded from his lungs and darkness threatened to overwhelm him again. They had left his armor on, and he hit the ground with far more weight than would have been possible for his athletic frame. Cries of grief and savage cheers mingled in the air for what seemed like ages, and then all at once, silence returned. Heavy footsteps moved toward the prone captain, stopping just in front of him.
"Sit him up." Said a voice that sounded like hope itself dying.
As rough hands grabbed Alec and lifted him to his knees, he took a chance to look around. He had been dragged to the town square, which had clearly fallen to the invaders. No more than fifty villagers - men, women and children - knelt in a small group at the edge of the square, bound and staring helplessly in Alec's direction.
Behind him, an army of impossible size knelt, faces staring resolutely at the ground. Alec's head swam with the implications. How could so many Northmen have assembled without the Empire's knowledge? What could be their purpose?
"You will look upon me. " The voice, which seemed to be many voices speaking in unison, spoke again, and Alec's blood ran cold as he could not help but face forward to see what manner of man could create such a sound.
Two men stood before Alec, and each sight struck fear in his heart in a manner he had never experienced before. The man on the left did not speak, or even meet his gaze, but the frail figure, cloaked in a long robe of deep blue and leaning on a staff that appeared to be made of blackened bone, exuded power beyond any sorceror that Alec had ever faced.
If the frail, hunched figure seemed to exude power, the man standing directly in front of him was power itself embodied. Alec had always been considered a tall man by his peers, but this man dwarfed him easily, standing at least eight feet tall, his body deeply tanned and impossibly muscular, every feature speaking of a tremendous capacity for violence. A face that looked as if it had been carved from stone twisted with disdain as the man looked down upon the kneeling captain, the scar that ran from the top of his bald head to his upper lip somehow making the expression even more hateful.
He wore nothing, save for a flowing black garment around his lower body, which seemed to move in the wind, in spite of the fact that wind had long since stopped blowing. His torso was covered in arcane runes, and upon his chest was tattooed an eight pointed star with a skull as it's center, the ancient symbol of the Dark Gods. Yet all of these details became mundane as Alec's eyes fell upon the warrior's right arm, which ceased being an arm at the elbow, flesh and bone twisting and warping into a monstrous blade. Alec was certain that, flesh or not, such a sword would cut just fine.
"To think," the man grinned, a smile on his lips somehow more frightening than his previous scowl, "that a Captain of the Guard would be here. Did your false Emperor send you to us, work? Speak!"
"Who..." Alec choked, fighting burning in his chest and throat, pushing back rage at the insult to the Emperor. "Who are you?
The words were barely out of his mouth when the man's foot caught him in the chest, thrwoing him backward. Alec rolled onto his side, coughing violently as he felt his fractured ribs.
"My name?" The Northman barked, laughing cruelly. "Long ago, such worthless details fell from memory. I know only the lust for glorious battle - for blood, for victory!"
"What do you want?" Alec demanded, pushing himself up as anger rose in his chest. "Why have you vile savages done this?!"
The Northman growled, stepping forward and driving his knee into the Captain's gut, doubling him over as he coughed blood.
"I seek only the Eye of Tzeentch! His favor - his dark gifts, that I may be remade - REBORN!" He lifted his armblade high, and was met with roars of bloodthirsty joy by the ammassed Northmen. "Why, you ask? Why do we raid your lands? Why do we burn your homes? Why do we flay your flesh? To serve the Lord of Change and his glorious designs!"
"Savage!" Alec spat, overwhelmed with revulsion. "Heathen... monster!"
The man said nothing, turning and lifting a scabbard from the ground behind him. Alec's sword. Throwing the blade at the captain's feet, he roared.
"Come! We shall do battle, and I will take your spine to the false Emperor's door myself!"
Pain, anguish and rage overwhelmed Alec as he pulled the blade free and rushed the savage, who roared with approving bloodlust, meeting the blade with his own arm.
"I will be your death, heathen!" Alec growled, even as he was pushed backward by the force of the Northman's blow.
"Neither you, nor any of your Emperor's dogs, captain." The warrior grinned, pushing the guard further back and launching a vicious flurry of attacks at the young captain.
It was all Alec could do to parry the blows, carried by a strength no mere human could possibly wield. Every thrust, every parry, was thrown off as if it was nothing, every opening nothing more than a disguise for a potentially deadly blow. Just barely dodging a slash that tore into his left arm, armor and flesh alike, Alec fought back pain and fatigue, charging forward in desperation. His courage caught his foe by surprise, and his thrust yielded a deep gash in the Northman's cheek. Alec roared in victory, righteous fury flooding his body, only to find himself yanked from his fet as the warrior grabbed the blade and used the captain's grip to pull him into the air.
Time seemed to stand still as Alec watched the savage's face twist in a mocking smile, felt the blade tear into his stomach, tasted blod rise from his chest into his mouth and spill over his lips.
"Your time is up, worm." The warrior spoke slowly, as if pronouncing judgement on the captain, whose body already began to drain of color and blood.
Releasing the longsword, the Northman ripped his blade from the captain's body, dropping him to his knees and roaring in triumph.
"Call us savage because we strike at you." The warrior's many voices reverberated throughout the square, speaking to every living citizen of the Empire. "But know this! It is we who are closest to the Ruinous Powers! We most favored of the Gods shall raid your lands, revel in your suffering and destroy you."
Alec could do nothing but watch as the marauder stepped forward, raising his blade in the air. Conciousness was already slipping away, his body becoming numb.
"Despair! For all that remains for you is the taste of Northern steel and the end of your world! Such is the will of the Gods!"
Alec's last thought as the blade of flesh clove through his skull was a prayer for the Empire. He thanked Sigmar that he would not live to watch it burn.
