A large beast brayed in triumph and brandished its gore-encrusted axe at the dark ceiling of trees overhead. It was a massive creature, all simian muscle and taut sinew, with a belly like a stove and splay-hooves that ground the snow underfoot into slush. Scraps of armour and badly tanned hide struggled to contain its girth as it stooped and jerked the body of its opponent into the frosty air. All around it, similar scenes played out as its companions stooped to scavenge from the bodies that still steamed in the chill mountain air.
The dwarfs had fought bravely, but in the end, had been too few. The beasts’ attack had been hard and wild, seemingly driven as they were by the talons of a desperate winter. Hunger gnawed at their bellies; some had already fallen to filling their gullets, slicing open the fine mail and jerkins worn by the dwarfs and burying their snouts in the tough flesh beneath. Others fought one another over the scraps and silver trinkets scoured from the bodies.
Wolf-teeth snapped behind goatish lips as the pack-leader drove back those who drew too close; it swung its axe wildly, and stamped its hooves as it tried to keep the body of its most recent opponent for itself.
The dwarf coughed and blood spattered his beard. Nonetheless, he grabbed the hand that held him and squeezed. Chaos-born bone popped and cracked and the beast screamed in shock and pain, releasing its hold. The dwarf fell heavily, his armour clattering. Blindly, he groped through the snow for a weapon. Talons speared through his hair and sank into his scalp and he was jerked backwards and sent hurtling spine-first into a crooked tree.
The dwarf groaned as he collapsed into the snow. Dwarfs were harder than most creatures, but even stone cracked if you hit it hard enough. He coughed again and tried to push himself upright. Blood drenched the dwarf’s limbs and stained his armour, and the heady scent of it filled Neferata’s nostrils as she looked down. The beastman stalked forwards, cradling its broken hand and swiping at the air with its axe. The others crowded around it, baying like eager hounds.
‘Come on then,’ the dwarf spat hoarsely, jerking upright, a rock in his hand. Pushing himself onto his feet, he hefted the rock. ‘I’ll match you stone for stone,’ he said weakly. It was an empty boast, Neferata knew. The dwarf was dying on his feet, and his blood had turned the snow pink. The beastman roared and launched itself into an awkward charge, its axe cocked back for a skull-crushing blow.
Neferata moved.
She struck the tree above the dwarf’s head and catapulted towards the beastman. Steel flashed and the beastman stumbled to a stop, blinking quizzically. Behind it, Neferata had landed in a crouch. One arm was stretched out, the crude steel sword held tight in her pale fingers. She glanced over her shoulder and her eyes met the dwarf’s. The moment was broken by the hiss of hot blood sliding off the tip of the sword to plop into the snow. The dwarf’s eyes rolled up into his head and he pitched forwards, unconscious at last.
The beastman made a curious sound as its head rolled off its shoulders to land in the snow near the unconscious dwarf. The other creatures drew back, whining and growling. Neferata rose smoothly to her feet, her arm still extended. She swept her gaze across the gathered beastmen and smiled. ‘Take them,’ she breathed.
A large beastman howled and lunged for her, swinging a spiked club. Something crashed down atop its head and shoulders, driving it snout-first into the snow inches from Neferata. Khaled rose, wrenching his sword from the pulverised skull of the twitching beastman. Black-haired and bearded, his hawk-like features twisted into a fierce expression as he gave a bark of laughter.
The remaining beastmen hesitated, their nostrils flaring. Snow drifted down from the branches above. A beast screeched as a figure dropped down beside it, cleaving through its shoulder and chest. Naaima spun, jerking her sword free of the dying beast and bringing it crashing around into the neck of another. She danced among them for a moment, leaving carnage in her wake, before she sprang to Neferata’s side, blood coating her bare, pale arms to the shoulders.
‘They smell foul and taste worse, I’d wager,’ she hissed, her dark eyes narrowing.
‘Needs must, when the gods demand, Naaima,’ Neferata said, bringing her blade up and letting it extend in front of her. She grasped the hilt with both hands and chuckled. ‘Their blood is red enough, regardless.’
‘It’s not the bottle, it’s the vintage, Lady Neferata,’ Khaled said, stepping to join them as the beasts pawed the snow and gathered their courage. He flung off his furs, revealing a tight cuirass of banded and beaten metal over a jerkin of thin, brightly coloured silk. He spun his sword with a flick of his wrist, his eyes meeting those of each of the beastmen in turn.
‘And what vintage would these abominations be, Khaled?’ Naaima said.
‘Something unsubtle and northern,’ Khaled said, grinning insouciantly at her.
‘Silence,’ Neferata said, and the pair fell quiet. She ran a finger along the thin runnel cut into the length of her blade, where the blood had collected. Delicately she licked the tip of her finger and grimaced. ‘Sour,’ she said.
‘Needs must, Neferata,’ Naaima murmured, her tone only vaguely teasing.
Neferata shot a glare at Naaima and then swung the sword, splattering the nearest beastmen with blood. ‘Needs must,’ she said. ‘Twelve left.’
The beastmen had got over their confusion. They started forwards in a howling, stamping mass, drawing courage from numbers. Something snarled and sprang from the snow to the side, bringing down a squalling, goat-headed monster. The desert-leopard’s fiery coat stood out in the snow as it shrieked a challenge at the beastmen before it casually bit the top of the goat-thing’s head off.
‘Ha! Cheat!’ Stregga snarled, springing from a tree to wrap her long arms around a simian brute’s head. She gave it a vicious twist as her feet touched the snow, snapping the creature’s spine and nearly jerking it from its back. She finished the job with all the efficiency of a fish-wife and shook the bloody spinal column at the leopard. ‘Cheat, Rasha! No points for you!’ she said, and the leopard snarled in reply. Neferata smiled slightly at the sight of the beast. The changing of skins came less easily to those who had accepted her blood-kiss than it did herself or Naaima. It had taken Rasha almost a century to learn how to do it without agony or mistake, and only because Neferata had tutored her relentlessly in the practice. The others still couldn’t; not even Khaled, quick study that he was. He might learn in time, if he survived.
A beastman spun and swung a crude hammer at Stregga’s head. With a wild cry, Anmar interposed herself. Her sword pierced the hammer-wielder’s gut and lifted it off its cloven feet, hurling it backwards where it landed limply near the leopard. Anmar panted slightly, her body shaking from blood-hunger and exertion.
‘Nine now I think you’ll find, my queen,’ Khaled said, looking at Neferata, who said nothing. She and the others glided forwards. The six vampires surrounded the nine beasts, closing in on them from all sides. The battle that followed was brief and bloody. In moments, every beast was dead and their foul blood warmed the bellies of their killers.
‘Tastes like goat,’ Stregga said, sucking blood from a dollop of hairy flesh. Her eyes narrowed. ‘Or like what I recall goat tasting like.’
‘It tastes foul enough without you adding to it,’ Rasha, now returned to her own shape, snapped, letting a beastman fall from her grip to thump into the pink-stained snow. She wiped the back of her hand across her jaw, smearing more blood than she removed.
‘Needs must, children,’ Neferata said, looking down at the crumpled form of the dwarf. He was breathing shallowly, and his blood smelled strangely acrid, like hot metal on a forge fire. She prodded his body with her sword, and he groaned.