‘I wasn’t hiding,’ she called out.
‘That is good to hear, given how poor a job you made of it.’ He sank to his haunches, reaching one enormous hand out to a cat that rubbed itself against his greave. The animal accepted the touch with dignified grace and then ambled away, tail flicking. ‘There are more of them today.’
Elya stepped into the open, holding the brindle tom in her arms. The cat glared at the Stormcasts as if they were rivals, rather than giants. ‘They’re keeping me company,’ she said, with a hint of pride. ‘They’re my carters.’
‘Your…?’ the crouching Stormcast said, in confusion.
‘She means courtiers, Briaeus,’ the other interjected. ‘She thinks she is their queen.’
The brindle tom snarled. Briaeus ignored the animal. ‘Pharus told us you were not allowed down here, girl. Come, I will escort you to the entrance.’ Briaeus reached for her. Elya flinched back, clutching her cat to her chest. The tom snarled again, and other nearby cats wailed in warning. The Stormcast paused.
‘Perhaps you should let her go, Briaeus,’ his companion murmured.
Briaeus glanced back. ‘Our orders…’
Elya seized her chance. She dropped the cat and darted past Briaeus’ outstretched hand, as swift as her limbs could carry her. He rose to his feet and made as if to lurch after her, but his companion stopped him. His words rumbled after her as she ran.
‘Let her go. Pharus will deal with her.’
‘This is a waste of time,’ Gomes said, raising his lantern. The light washed across the path ahead, and long shadows stretched away into the sandy wastes outside the city.
The walls of Glymmsforge rose high above the small troop of Glymmsmen, soaring up into the black. From outside, Lieutenant Holman Vale could make out the irregular craters that scarred their surface – signs of the many sieges the city had endured.
More evidence of past wars littered the waste ground that sloped away from the walls. The mouldering wreckage of ancient siege engines loomed like lonely trees, and broken stones dotted the sands. Vale barely remembered the last war – he’d been a child. Gomes did, though he rarely spoke of it, and only when he was in his cups.
‘There’s no one out here. No one alive, anyway. And if they are, what of it?’ Gomes continued. He was squat and broad, and his black-and-mauve uniform was untidy. But the blade he held in his other hand was well cared for.
‘If they are, we must do our duty, sergeant, and see that they make it into the city safely,’ Vale said, glancing at the men who followed him. He’d brought five, including Gomes. It didn’t feel like enough, now that they were away from the gates.
It was too quiet out here. There were sprawling shanty towns clinging to the city walls to the south and the west, but none nearby. Too much blood had been spilled here. He cleared his throat. ‘After all, can’t have people camping in the spoil grounds all night, sergeant. That’s dangerous.’
‘And it also means they don’t pay our private toll, eh, lieutenant?’ Gomes said. Several men chuckled. Vale nodded.
‘Exactly, sergeant. Everyone pays the toll, if they want to come through our gate.’ Vale glanced back at the sloped walls of Glymmsforge’s northern mausoleum gate. The mausoleum gates were strongholds unto themselves – dodecagonal bastion-forts, jutting from the compass edges of the city. Each was composed of twelve overlapping, triangular bastions, laid out in a semi-radial pattern from the curve of the wall. And each was manned by a company of Glymmsmen. In the case of the northern gate, it was Vale’s company.
Vale was young, with a newly bought commission weighing him down. His family were traders – beer, mostly, though some silks and spices – with more money than influence. That was set to change, though, if Vale’s father had anything to say about it. Vale had taken a posting with the Glymmsmen, while his sister had entered Sigmar’s service. If all went well, in a few years the Vale name would rival that of the city’s other leading families.
If all went well. If a deadwalker didn’t feast on his guts, or a gheist didn’t stop his heart. There would be promotions aplenty in his future, even if Captain Fosko didn’t look as if he was going anywhere, anytime soon. He frowned at the thought. Fosko was old and hard and fixed in his place, like one of the gargoyles that adorned the city’s walls. Worse, he was happy where he was.
‘I know that look,’ Gomes muttered, glancing back at him. ‘Thinking about old Fosko, sitting in his warm quarters, sipping tea, while we’re out here in the dark and cold?’
‘Hoping he stays there,’ Vale said, annoyed by his subordinate’s perspicacity. ‘Otherwise we won’t be collecting any private tolls at all tonight. Where are these traders of yours? You said they came this way.’ It wasn’t unusual for people to duck out of line and seek an easier – or cheaper – way into the city. But only the foolish did so at night.
‘I said someone said they might have,’ Gomes corrected, testily. ‘No one on duty saw them. One minute they were in line, the next they weren’t. We’re stretched thin on the gate – old Fosko wants men walking patrol, not searching people for contraband.’
‘Maybe because he knows half of that contraband winds up in your private stores, sergeant,’ a soldier said, eliciting a number of chuckles.
Gomes turned and gestured with his blade. ‘Stow it, Herk. And the rest of you, keep quiet. Never know who or what might be listening out here.’
Herk and the others fell silent, as Vale studied his sergeant. Gomes was old for his rank. But he was a good line officer, when he wasn’t inebriated. And he knew how to keep the books looking tidy, despite the fact they were drawing pay for around a third again more men than were actually in their section.
That, along with the private tolls they levied from those passing through the mausoleum gate during evensong, had allowed Vale to accrue a tidy sum. When he had enough, he intended to purchase a suitably comfortable commission. Probably somewhere in the inner city. There were precious few prospects in the outer. This line of thought was interrupted by the whicker of a horse.
Gomes stopped. Vale stepped up beside him. ‘See something?’
‘No, but I hear them.’
The unseen horse whinnied again, more loudly this time. It sounded afraid. The wind had picked up, and sand stung Vale’s eyes. The lantern light flickered, and Gomes lowered it. Hooves thumped against the ground, as if the animal were turning in a hasty circle. Vale could hear metal clinking – the sound of tack and harness?
‘What was that?’ Herk said suddenly. Vale glanced at him.
‘What was what?’
‘I thought I told you to stow it, Herk,’ Gomes growled.
‘The stars… What’s wrong with the stars?’ Herk said, his voice edging towards shrill.
Vale looked up. The stars seemed to waver, as an amethyst radiance spread across the night sky in all directions. He heard the sands hiss, as if caught in a storm-wind. It almost sounded like voices whispering. He tried to ignore it.
Before his eyes, the stars vanished, swallowed up by the amethyst haze that occluded the sky. Vale tore his gaze from it and looked at Gomes. ‘What happened to the stars?’
Gomes’ reply was interrupted by a squeal of fear and the sound of galloping hooves. Vale shoved Gomes aside as a horse without a rider raced past, scattering the small group of soldiers. Vale heard a scream, somewhere out in the dark, as he picked himself up. It was joined by another, and another.
‘Jackals,’ he said.
‘No. Not jackals,’ Gomes said, swinging the lantern out. But there was nothing to be seen, save will o’ the wisps dancing, drifting across the detritus of war. Corpse-lights bobbed along the tops of the far dunes, and Vale turned abruptly. He’d heard something close by, like the sudden, repeated intake of breath.