The bridge was nothing special. A simple span of stone across a narrow cleft, constructed in the days of Otto von Drak, before the Vampire Wars. A thin sludge of water gurgled below it. Arkhan suspected that it had been a raging river in its day, but the arteries of running water that crossed Sylvania were fast drying up thanks to Mannfred’s sorcery. Storm clouds choked the skies above, and thunder rumbled in the distance.
His companions had collapsed by the roadside, exhausted by the gruelling pace. Even Kruk hung limp in his harness, stunted limbs dangling. Arkhan looked up at the churning sky, and then back at the bridge. Then he turned to his pack-bearers and motioned for them to drop to their haunches. They sank down, jaws sagging, blind, opaque eyes rolling in their sockets. They would not move, unless he commanded it, and they would not let anyone take the books they carried without a fight. He hefted his staff and stroked the cat, which made a sound that might have been a growl.
Someone – something – was coming. He could feel it, like a black wave rolling towards the shoreline, gathering strength as it came. Arkhan glanced down at his followers. ‘Wait here,’ he said. ‘Do not interfere.’
‘Interfere with what?’ Ogiers demanded as he clambered to his feet. ‘Where are you going?’
‘To parley with the master of this sad realm,’ Arkhan said as he strode towards the bridge. ‘If you value your insignificant lives, I’d draw as little attention to yourself as possible.’ He walked across the bridge, ignoring Ogiers’s shouts, and stopped at the halfway point. Then he set his staff, and waited. He did not have to wait long. The sound of hooves gouging the ground reached him several minutes later, and then a steed of bone and black magic, bearing a rider clad in flamboyant armour, burst into view, trailing smoke and cold flame. At the sight of it, the cat curled about his shoulders went stiff, and it hissed.
The rider hauled on his reins, causing the skeleton horse to rear. Its hooves slammed down on the stone of the bridge, and it went as still as death. Its rider rose high in his saddle and said, ‘It has been some time since I last saw you, liche.’
‘I have counted the years, vampire.’ Arkhan scratched his cat’s chin. ‘Have you come to surrender?’
Mannfred von Carstein threw his head back and unleashed a snarl of laughter. Overhead, the sky trembled in sympathy. ‘Surrender? To a fleshless vagabond? It is you who should prostrate yourself before me.’
‘I have not come to bend knee, but to reclaim that which is mine by right.’
Mannfred’s sneer faded into a scowl. ‘And what might that be?’
Arkhan held up his hand, fingers extended. As he spoke, he bent his fingers one by one. ‘A crown, a severed hand, and seven books of blood-inked flesh.’ He cocked his head. ‘You know of what I speak.’
Mannfred grimaced. ‘And why should I yield these artefacts to you?’
‘Nagash must rise,’ Arkhan said, simply.
‘And so he shall. The matter is in good hands, I assure you,’ Mannfred said. ‘Go back to the desert, liche. I will call for you, if I should require your help.’
‘I am here now,’ Arkhan intoned, spreading his arms. ‘And you seem to be in need of help. Or have you discovered a way of freeing your land from the chains that bind it and trap you?’
‘That is no business of yours,’ Mannfred snarled.
‘That is up for discussion, I think,’ Arkhan said. He held out a hand. ‘Nagash must rise, leech. Nagash will rise, even if I must destroy this blighted land to accomplish it. That is my curse and my pleasure. But he has always held some affection for your kind. If you serve him, perhaps he will let you keep your little castle.’ Arkhan cocked his head. ‘It is a very pretty castle, I am given to understand.’
Mannfred was silent, but Arkhan could feel the winds of death stirring as the vampire gathered his will. The air seemed to congeal and then fracture as Mannfred flung out his hand. A bolt of writhing shadow erupted from his palm and speared towards Arkhan. The liche made no attempt to move aside. Instead, he waited. A freezing, tearing darkness erupted around him in a squirming cloud as the bolt struck home. If he had still possessed flesh, it would have been flayed from his bones. As it was, it merely tore his cloak and cowl. The cat on his shoulder yowled, and Arkhan gestured negligently, dispersing the cold tendrils of shadow.
Arkhan laughed hollowly. ‘Is that it?’
‘Not even remotely,’ Mannfred snarled.
More spells followed the first, and Arkhan deflected them all and returned them with interest. Incantations he had not uttered in centuries passed through his fleshless jaws as he pitted his sorceries against those of the lord of Sylvania… and found them wanting. Arkhan felt a flicker of surprise. Mannfred was more powerful than he’d thought. In his skull, his master’s chuckle echoed. Was this a test then, to separate the wheat from the chaff?
Dark sorceries and eldritch flames met above the bridge between them for long hours, crashing together like the duelling waves of a storm-tossed sea. Cold fire bit at writhing shadows, and black lightning struck bastions of hardened air, as the muddy turf of the riverbanks began to heave and rupture, releasing the tormented dead. Bodies long buried staggered and slumped into the guttering river, splashing towards one another. More skeletons, clad in roots and mud, crawled onto the bridge and groped for Arkhan as he batted aside Mannfred’s spells. The cat warbled and leapt from his shoulder to crash into a skeleton, knocking it backwards.
He ignored the others as they clawed at him. There were few forces that could move him once he had set himself. The biting, clawing dead were no more a threat to him than leaves cast in his face by a strong breeze. Nonetheless, they were a distraction; likely that was Mannfred’s intent. It was certainly Arkhan’s, as he directed his corpse-puppets to attack Mannfred.
The vampire smashed the dead aside with careless blows and hurled spells faster than Arkhan could follow, hammering him with sorcerous blows that would have obliterated a lesser opponent. The stone beneath his feet bubbled and cracked. It had survived a weathering of centuries, and now it was crumbling beneath the onslaught. Arkhan was beginning to wonder if he was going to suffer the same fate. He could feel his defences beginning to buckle beneath the unyielding onslaught. Mannfred’s power seemed inexhaustible; vampires were reservoirs of dark magic, but even they had their limits – limits that Mannfred seemed to have shed. Where was he drawing his power from? Some artefact or… Arkhan laughed, suddenly. Of course.
Mannfred had sealed off Sylvania, blocking the sun and the rivers and the borders. Such a working would require some source of mystical power. Mannfred was drawing on those same magics now, and it gave him a distinct advantage. But, such a resource, while advantageous, was not infinite.
Certain now that he had his foeman’s measure, Arkhan redoubled his efforts. If he could force Mannfred’s hand, he might be able to simply outlast him. Sorcerous talons and bone-stripping winds lashed at him, but he held firm, his hands clasped around his staff. Overhead, the clouds swirled and contracted. Fire washed over him, and a thousand, thudding fists, which struck at him from every side. Wailing ghosts and serpentine shadows sought to drag him down, but Arkhan refused to fall. He sent no more spells hurtling towards his foe, instead bolstering the dead who fought at his behest.