Fiction The First and the Last

Short update: I am halfway happy with chapter 8, 9 and 10 now, working on 11, so you can probably expect another one getting posted soon.

I am holding them back because now and then I go back to them and change something to keep the story consistent. A harder task than one might think. And I don't want to have to go back and change major things after I already posted a chapter.

But in the last two weeks I have made substantial progress with chapter 11 (of 14 probably), so thank you for the likes, they are part of what keeps the story going.

I am also considering posting the story on reddit or so (maybe in r/WarhammerFanFiction and/or r/aosLore, tagged as fan fiction) eventually.

Reasoning behind that is that the story has around 42.000 words at this point (for comparison: Orwell's "Animal Farm" has 30.000 and F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" has 47.000), so now I am getting to an amount of work I put in there that starts to make me sad that only a handful people ever read it.

 

eh... a similar thing can be said for our short stories.
I've made more than 20 entries for the various short story comp.
Let's say 1500 words on average, it's already more than 30.000, and again it's just a handful of people

 

Wow, I never realized it but you entered a piece basically every time.
I am jealous, because I just can't come up with something creative for all the prompts _and_ find the time to explore it in a story without using 5000 words.

I'm not sure why I feel different about this story tham about the others (I have written only three short stories for contests I think). Probably because it is monolithic. The others are short and finished. If I don't finish this one and show it to the world (lol) it will be large and unfinished, which is somewhat worse.

In my mind I think I have already made the decision to never write something as long as this ever again. It is kinda stressful to have it in the back of your mind, and so much work still to do.
The short stories I wrote were all written down in one or two evenings.

Once I am done with it I might actually have time to write short stories again. I am sad that I have to disappoint y'all (especially @Scalenex but really all of those who also take part in the competitions, because those are the people who I _know_ write and read the stories) by not writing any more of them.
But I fear that if I stray too far from TFaTL I will eventually stop and never finish it.
I have one such a project (a Wing Commander fanfic I never finished despite getting close, almost 20 years ago) and I still think about that story and feel bad.

 

Hey y'all!

Here is the next chapter. Last we left off Jarel in the Sour Lake Post, helping to defend it from the Nurgle troops that attack it, with help of Saurus Knights and Skinks.


Chapter 8: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

They continued through the city as quickly as they could while still maintaining mutual support. Getting to where the battle raged was important, but not important enough to run headfirst into a trap.
When they got closer to the fighting they met more and more humans and a handful of Duardin. Most of them were either civilians or wounded soldiers who retreated.
"Blue is friendly" was a phrase many of them uttered. So the runners had carried out their task. Jarel hoped that it would be sufficient, he didn't want to be responsible for a lizardman's death.
Some joined Jarel's forces, but many ran into the other direction. Jarel asked one of them where they were going.
"The harbor" the old woman said before she walked on. "Maybe we can get away on the fishing boats".
That was indeed not a bad idea. If the Nurgle followers had had boats they would have used them to cross the Green river or the Sour Lake. So being on the water probably was reasonably safe.
Shortly after they had met the woman they met the first enemies. Nurglings were small so they could slip past the guards and spread mayhem in the town. The Skinks quickly dispatched them.
But soon they met real resistance. Small groups of guards were still fighting in the streets, but they were retreating. Both daemons and mortal followers of Nurgle hacked their way through the merchant district, and Nay-Noatl's Saurus knights did their best to join up with the inhabitants so they could form a larger force together. Again Jarel noticed that many of the guardsmen were almost as scared of the Seraphon as of the Nurgle daemons, but at least most of them quickly realized that their chances of survival were a lot better on this side of the conflict.
Fighting in the narrow streets was as hard for the daemons as for the Seraphon, maybe even more so. They could not use their strength of numbers fully to their advantage, sometimes two Saurus and their mounts could hold a street against far more daemons.
Jarel himself concentrated on the daemons, such as Nurglings and Plaguebringers. They could be quite resilient, but the twisted mortal followers of Nurgle were often bigger, faster, and stronger. Probably because they were less rotten but Jarel was not sure.
He lost count of how many he had slain after a while. Having Nay-Noatl at his side was like fighting alongside a tank. Even Tepi had done some significant damage with his javelin. They were holding up well against the daemons. But just as it seemed like they would get a chance to rest for a moment, they encountered a terrified fleeing guardsmen. "They conquered the market square!" he shouted. Jarel tried to stop him from fleeing. "Stay with us! We can fight them" he urged. But the young man shook his head. "No, you don't understand! There are too many of them, and from there they can go everywhere in town! We have to regroup or they will circle us!"
For a moment Jarel wondered whether Nay-Noatl had understood those words, or if it had been his experience that told him what he needed to know without understanding them. "Retreat!" the Scar-Veteran shouted, and they moved back toward the northwest. When Jarel looked around and saw daemons and their plague-ridden mortal followers pour out of the streets behind them like liquid he knew that the decision had been right. Everyone who had still been in the market district was now dead. And the daemons had begun singing again. The lyrics were garbled, but Jarel could understand some parts about a joyous journey with the Grandfather making flowers grow. Jarel knew the song, it was the same his friends had died to. He fought the urge to puke.
By now the Nurgle followers were slowing down from their frenzy. They knew that they had met proper resistance and coordinated their attack better. That gave the Seraphon time to build some makeshift barricades and improve their defense, but they knew it was a matter of time until the Nurgle troops would gain the upper hand. The goal was now to slow them down, so as many townsfolk as possible could escape either to the harbor or to the hills in the northwest.
Smoke started to fill the air over the Sour Lake Post. Either the Rotbringers or the fleeing guardsmen had set some of the houses on fire. Without anyone fighting them the city would be ablaze quickly. Jarel could only hope that the fires would be as bad for the daemons as for the defenders. They could also hear explosions now and then, a few buildings even collapsed. And those explosions were getting closer.
The young guardsman named Darin had stayed with Jarel after all. Now that he was surrounded by the lizardmen he had regained some of his courage. Nay-Noatl directed them, and they covered the Scar-Veteran's back while he sometimes charged into incoming enemies and then quickly retreated after killing a couple of large targets. Other Saurus knights were doing the same, and from what Jarel could hear from the Skinks their losses were still relatively low. Only three Saurus and five Skinks had died in the city so far. That was enough for Jarel to have mixed feelings though. Did they even have a chance? Had Nay-Noatl been right after all?
When they had to give up yet another street and retreated deeper back into the craftsmen district the young guardsman stopped, then ran into a side alley.
"There's someone still here!" he exclaimed, pointing at one of the houses. "I just saw a child at the window!" Jarel informed Nay-Noatl, and by now the Saurus had understood that the humans' priorities were unlike his own, so he did not try to stop them.
He growled loudly though. "Hurry! They are coming!"
Jarel and the guardsman ran up the stairs outside the building and kicked in the wooden door, while Tepi covered them. Inside sat two frightened little children who apparently had believed that a wooden door would save them from whatever was outside. The guardsman grabbed the boy's hand and told him to stay close, while Jarel carried the little girl out. She was too shocked to move, but clung to him tightly.
An explosion rocked the buildings, and the little boy gasped as he pointed over Jarel's shoulder. Jarel turned his head, just in time to witness one of the buildings in the alley collapse. He shielded the little girl from the falling debris, but he felt that he had been hit in the back. "Are you alright, Jarel?" Tepi asked as the smoke and dust began to settle over them. "I'll be once we are out of here" Jarel responded, while he reoriented to get back to Nay-Noatl. Then he realized that the building had blocked their path back. They had been cut off.

The crying children didn't make it any easier. Darin tried his best to calm them down, while Jarel and Tepi tried to find a way back to Nay-Noatl. There was none. The rubble from the buildings was unstable and the kicked up dust still clouded their view, so they tried to find another way. On the other end of the alley was a small square between a few larger buildings. Darin suggested to go there, and then back to the north. Jarel scouted ahead followed by Darin and the children, with Tepi covering their back.
They almost ran into a Plaguebearer when they entered the square. The daemon apparently had come through another alley that led to the south, and thankfully it was as surprised as them.
"Run!" Jarel screamed, while leaping forward and smashing his buckler into the daemon's face. That little opening allowed the others to run past it toward the north, where Jarel knew they would meet a few Saurus.
With his back toward what he assumed to be a safe direction Jarel started his duel with the Plaguebearer. He considered himself lucky that he was facing just one. He had fought them one on one before and knew he could win. The daemon's stench attracted flies that circled it and sat all over its skin and even on its single, swollen eye. Now and then it used its long tongue to lick the mouth that looked like it was at least one size too big for its face, the rest of the time it displayed a mad grin. Its belly seemed to have a mouth as well, and Jarel was happy that it was closed. The daemon cheered as it lunged forward with its sword that looked like it was made of sharpened bone. Jarel easily dodged the attack despite his aching back. He knew he was faster than the daemon, but that a single strike would most likely not kill it. Once again he wished that he had a breastplate or other parts of armor, but until he got one he would have to use speed to save himself from his enemies. He feinted high and made the daemon twitch, a movement that allowed him to drive his sidesword's point into his enemy's shoulder. Quickly he retreated a few steps back. A human hit in that spot would die quickly, but the daemon just laughed about the blood spraying out of the wound, and carried out another attack. Again Jarel dodged and this time he managed to place a proper cut at the daemon's leg. It collapsed, and Jarel stabbed it into its belly-maw. The maw snapped at the sidesword as he drew it back, but he janked it free and struck the creature's arm, almost chopping it off. The Plaguebearer was still not done. It used its other arm to crawl toward Jarel, still laughing, and swung its half-severed arm around like a flail. When it hit Jarel's boot its fingers held on to it, and Jarel lost his balance. Again the daemon cheered and crawled closer, its misformed hands grabbing at the human's legs.
"Just die already!" Jarel screamed at it, and his next swing cut off the daemon's arm completely. As he got up he drove his sidesword into the creature's eye and it finally stopped moving.
Taking a step back from the stinking corpse Jarel looked around on the small square, then turned around to follow Tepi and Darin.
"Jarel! Glad to see you alive!" a familiar voice exclaimed.

* * *

Jarel almost dropped his sword when he recognized the voice. A cold chill went down his spine as he swung around and looked at the tall human figure that had appeared through one of the streets that met at the square. Like Jarel, the man had a sidesword in his hand, and as he walked confidently through the semi-darkness of the square's far side toward Jarel, he wiped his bald head with his sleeve, a wide grin on his face.
"Silas," Jarel stammered breathlessly, "how did you... I saw you fall!" he blurted out, taking a step back. A little voice in his head already tried to tell him the truth, but he was too caught in the moment to pay it any attention.
Silas had stopped. He held up his hand in a soothing gesture and shook his head. "We were wrong, Jarel. We were so wrong!" he smilingly exclaimed. "There is no need to fight Nurgle, we just didn't understand him. You have to see the true beauty of his blessings, Jarel. Like one of the dresses your Ma made, you know? They always looked crappy when they weren't finished, but when Gella put that finished one on it made us drool, do you remember?" He laughed. Jarel didn't find the strength to interrupt him, so Silas continued. "We are gifted. The Grandfather's men are finally coming to Ghur, and this time they will get the chance to prove us all how much better the world is when we are all part of the party. Everything will grow and thrive, no more wastes and all those beasts, only laughter and joy for everyone! Just look at me!" he added, taking a step forward so Jarel could see him in a better light. "Sure, they had to give me a little nudge so I could see it myself," he admitted shrugging, "but remember how your Pa always said that nothing is without risk? They even forgave me that I hurt a few of the little ones. They are really nice!"
His friend had always been tall and quite a bit more muscular than Jarel, although not quite as big as Lutz. In the weeks since the battle he seemed to have grown, but not in a good way. His body had become bloated and his left hand had been turned into something that looked more like a claw than a hand. His face looked almost as it always had looked, with the friendly blue eyes and the strong jaw, but it was covered in flea bites and half of one ear was missing. Like Jarel Silas wore no armor and parts of his uniform were gone. But where Jarel's uniform had been replaced with smooth cloth made by the lizardmen, Silas' had been completely removed and Jarel could see that the skin below had taken on a sickly green tint and was covered in wounds and what looked like large plague-boils. A foot-long spike had grown out of the right shoulder and someone had decorated it with the pommel of a Freeguild greatsword.
"No," Jarel said, his voice breaking. "Look at you, look what they have done!"
Silas laughed. "It's alright, Jarel, you just have to get used to it. I feel great, better than I ever felt in my whole life!"
"They killed Ponn! And almost everybody in the Sixth, and they turned you into a monster!" Jarel screamed, more at himself than at Silas, because slowly his mind began to clear up and he knew what was about to happen. What had to happen.
"I am not a monster Jarel, I am a king!" Silas announced proudly.
Jarel took a deep breath "Only a king of the blighted ones" he lamented, tears streaming down his face. He blinked them away as well as he could and readied his sword.
"Alright, alright, buddy." Silas said nodding. "I will show you. Then you will see it, too." With that he raised his sidesword to a salute, like before a sparring fight. Then he ran toward Jarel.
Usually swordsmen did not charge in that way unless they were Orruks, or just dumb.
Jarel still was not quite ready for the impact. He barely had time to parry Silas' first low swing, then Silas crashed into him, shoulder first. The hit send Jarel flying but he rolled on the ground and came to his feet quickly enough to deflect the next swing by Silas with his Skink buckler. Jarel had no choice other than than to retreat slowly, as Silas did not give him the time to find better footing. A thrust knocked his buckler aside so he had to parry the following swing with his sword. Silas blew right through the static parry and Jarel got hit in the head with his own handguard. Dazed he took a step back, while Silas laughed. "See? I told you I got better. See how strong I am!"
That pause gave Jarel time to finally start an attack of his own. He feinted high and caught the parry with his buckler while striking low. He placed a cut on Silas thigh but barely got any reaction. Silas just shrugged and attacked again, and once more the raw strength that the Chaos God had lent him beat Jarel's capabilities. He caught the swing with his buckler but was not able to deflect it properly. A sharp pain in his wrist made him drop the buckler, and Silas laughed roaringly as he saw Jarel frantically look for it. Like a good sportsman Silas took his time while Jarel quickly picked up his buckler. When Jarel looked up again he saw Silas doing moulinettes while grinning and casually strolling toward Jarel. He paused and looked at the sky for a moment when a shadow similar to that of a bird passed over them. Jarel almost had not paid it any mind, but when a second, third, and fourth shadow of that kind followed and he heard the flapping of the bat-like wings the shadows belonged to, he gained some hope. Silas apparently did not know or care about Terradons, the Rotbringer's blue eyes concentrated on Jarel again and once more it was time to defend against a series of cuts. Each parry felt like being hit with a sledgehammer and Jarel knew he would not be able to take this very long. He tried to stay out of measure to catch his breath, but that was not easy against someone with long arms.
A bright yellow flash filled the sky in the east, and a short moment later an explosion rocked the ground. Silas paused with a confused look on his face while another followed, and then three or four more shortly after another, each accompanied by a little earthquake that shook the ground and shattered windows.
Jarel saw his chance to strike, but Silas deflected the blow with his claw-hand then kicked Jarel in the stomach. Jarel felt the air leaving his lungs, and stumbled backwards. His back against the large tree in the middle of the square he managed to deflect two more swings, Silas looked as fresh as before the fight. A crackling noise made him look around. Small pieces of wood and stone started pelting onto the square from above. Some of them were charred or even glowing. A few of them hit Silas from above, which gave Jarel a few precious seconds to recover while the Rotbringer looked at them. He considered running, but something told him that he had to stay and fight, maybe to give his friends a better chance to retreat, maybe because he saw it as his duty to fight Silas. He had been the one to leave his friend behind, and now he had been corrupted by Nurgle. He spat on the ground, then he advanced again, heavily panting. Silas just grinned and met Jarel's first blow with a static parry not unlike the one that had failed Jarel so terribly just a moment earlier. It felt like hitting a solid wall, but Jarel continued with two more strikes, then lunged forward, trying to stab his opponent in the chest. Silas deflected the thrust and grabbed Jarel's sword hand with his claw. Then he struck him in the face with the grip of his sword, before throwing him away like a puppet. Half-conciously Jarel crawled backwards, toward one of the alleys. This fight was over, and he had lost. An overwhelming feeling of sadness and anger filled his mind. Defeat.
Again Silas took his time. He ignored Jarel and looked around, he even turned his back at him. Ash and smoke started to fall like snow, and Silas pointed at it. "Was that the lizards?" he asked, but did not wait for an answer "Destruction," he explained, "that's all they bring. No life and laughter like the Grandfather offers" he continued while walking around the square, ignoring that Jarel kept crawling away from him.
A moment later Silas' monologue was interrupted by a piercing sound, like someone playing Duardin bagpipes, but in a horribly unmelodic and arhythmic way.
"Ah, the sweet sound of the piper calls for me, Jarel" Silas exclaimed, "so I guess our little match has to be postponed. 'No time to kill', as my Ma always said. But I have a parting gift for you, from the Grandfather himself. You will like it!"
With that he squeezed one of the larger plague-boils on his body, and took out a slimy green ball.
"Have fun!" he screamed laughing, and hurled it toward Jarel in a high arc before he turned and jogged toward the southeast.
As the Blightking that once had been his best friend disappeared into the alley and the slimy ball flew toward him, Jarel hoped that he had bought enough time for the children to flee.
He also hoped that he would have enough time to stab himself after being hit, so he would not join Nurgle's army, as Silas had.
The slime ball descended toward him, slower than a projectile usually moved. And not in a straight line. As it came closer Jarel could see that it had wings. Some kind of corrupted insect, not much smaller than a fist. He could hear its wings buzzing as it continued to fly into his direction. There was no time to dodge. Jarel raised his buckler but there was hardly a chance that he would be able to swat the insect with it.
But something else did. With a hiss a small Skink darted out of the alley and jumped to intercept the fly. Jarel heard a disgusting sound similar to that of a fruit being squashed as the Skink met the insect. Through his blurry vision he could see the lizard fall. He crawled forward.
Tepi lay only a few feet away from him, covered in green Nurgle slime, choking and quivering.

 

In other news: I am making good progress on the 11th chapter. Almost finished, I expect to start writing down chapter 12 as early as today.
Current estimate is that I will end up with 15 chapters and an epilogue.

 

Poor Tepi...

 

Short update: I am going on vacation next week and will probably be able to finish another chapter during that time.

So Jarel's story will continue soon-ish.

 

So here is the next chapter.

I re-wrote some parts of it, yet I am still not quite happy with it. I just can't say what exactly I don't like about it, but there might be a plot hole or two lurking, and maybe it also is the pacing. Anyway, here it is. Hope y'all will enjoy it nonetheless.


Chapter 9: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Jarel crawled closer. The bug had burst in Tepi's face, its green slime was everywhere. The stench almost overwhelmed Jarel even from three feet away. Tepi was trying to get the slime off his face, but his movements looked frantic and uncoordinated. Jarel wanted to help him, but he knew that he had to avoid touching the slime. He looked around and even though his vision was still blurry he could see a bucket of water near the door of a house. He staggered over and grabbed it, and then poured it over Tepi to clean him from the slime. It worked, but Tepi did not look good. He was pale, his third eyelids were half closed, and the yellow eyes had a reddish tint. He was still coughing but at least he had stopped clawing at his own face.
"We have to get you to a healer" Jarel told him, "can you walk?"
Tepi tried to get up, but he would not have made it without Jarel's help, Jarel himself almost fell when he helped him. Together they walked toward the north as well as they could.
The next alley was empty. Jarel had hoped to see Saurus warriors but there were none.
"Where are Darin and the kids?" he asked Tepi. "Where did they go?"
Tepi pointed wearily into a direction and Jarel walked there, supporting his friend as well as he could.
When the Skink fell for the third time and Jarel tried to pick him up again he noticed that Tepi tried to brush his hand off. "No," the Skink said, looking at Jarel with one half open eye. "Leave me."
For Jarel that was not a possibility. "I won't. You came back and saved my life. The First must be just around the corner, just a little further along the street. Come on, get up!"
"You saved my life, too. In the woods. We are even. Go." the Skink insisted.
"No, Tepi. I will not leave you."
"I am expendable Jarel. Just a Skink." Jarel could hear the confusion in the blue lizard's voice.
New strength flowed through him. It was his anger that fueled it. Anger about Silas, Nurgle's and his corruption, and the lizardmen and their cold way of thinking. Anger about the Stormcast abandoning the people of the Realms, and about himself, that his lack of ability had gotten him into this situation and that yet another friend was dying for him.
"NO!" he screamed into the lizardman's face as he grabbed him and slung him over his shoulder.
He stumbled more than once as he walked to the north, but he kept talking to Tepi even though the Skink stopped responding after a few minutes.
He almost lost hope as he recognized several spots they had fought at before, when they had advanced through the streets. Now and then he saw a few dead daemons or humans, and once they walked past the body of a dead Cold One. But there were no Seraphon. He continued, concentrating on every step and stopping to pay attention to their surroundings. If there were lizardmen around they would help him, and if there were enemies they would kill him. Everything else did not matter anymore. Just one foot in front of the other, then the next one, trying not to fall, moving forward.
Tepi was not moving anymore. But it didn't matter. He would not abandon him. He would reach the Seraphon.

* * *

Pain. Jarel opened his eyes. Apparently he had fallen. He didn't remember, but as he looked around he saw Seraphon and humans. He was outside the settlement walls on the grassy hills, the Sour Lake in view. Around him were Saurus and their Cold Ones, and some of the Skinks. A large black column of smoke was still rising from the settlement, and Jarel could see that townsfolk with all kinds of buckets, tubs and barrels on carts were moving between the lake and the Sour Lake Post.
But what stood out most were the dozen or so Terradons and their riders standing around. The large winged reptiles nervously moved around their long beaks whenever their purple-crested riders were not close to them, looking into every direction. They probably knew that they were much more vulnerable on the ground than in the air. There was one of them in the air at all times, to scout and warn them if enemies were coming close.
The sound of human voices distracted him from the Terradons. They were shouting at a Skink priest, who apparently did not speak their language. As Jarel looked at them, one of the Saurus warriors who stood next to the priest stepped forward, spear in hand, and made sure that the humans understood to not act too aggressively.
Jarel got up and checked himself for wounds. There were none. Except a splitting headache it seemed that he was fine, even his muscles were not as sore as he had expected them to be after the fight and carrying Tepi.
Tepi. Where was he? Jarel looked around and saw several Skinks, a few Saurus and their mounts around him. Some were still asleep and others were just waking up and rejoining their units. Tepi was nowhere around, Jarel would have recognized him at first glance because of his missing crest color. Surely the priest would know.
Jarel walked toward the priest with the purple headgear made of feathers, and his Saurus bodyguards who were still trying to calm down the small group of humans in front of them. One of the men apparently was a city guard or militia member, the other ones looked like fishermen and merchants.
"What's wrong?" Jarel asked them.
"They are upset because of the collateral damage I think" the priest speculated, "but you could ask them yourself."
Again Jarel had forgotten that he spoke the Seraphon language without thinking about it.
He turned toward the townspeople and repeated the question, this time making sure that he used their language.
"I'll tell you what's wrong!" the merchant with the expensive but dirty cap on his head shouted at him. "Your lizard-friends here bombed the market district with their flying beasts!" he exclaimed while gesturing at the Terradons in a way that made them turn their heads toward him. "Everything is gone, no house is still standing, and what wasn't turned to rubble is now burning to the ground. We are lucky that the fire hasn't spread to the other parts of the city. If this is the kind of help you offer then we would probably be better off fighting the daemons alone!"
Jarel smiled sarcastically. It had been drastic, but if the Seraphon had not helped then everybody in the city would now be dead or worse. He had seen the floods of Nurgle-followers and daemons coming out of the market district.
But before he could formulate an appropriate response another voice answered from his left.
"We would all be dead without them, Gidor, and you know that. Yes, we have lost a good part of the city, and some people died. But houses can be rebuilt, and thanks to the lizardmen we still have the people to do so" Darin explained to the red-faced merchant. Now that he was not panicking anymore the young guardsman's voice sounded quite a bit lower, and filled with determination. "Now go and help the other merchants with organizing the remaining food supplies. If we want the Sour Lake Post to survive this we all have to do our part. Your wife is coordinating the work right now, so I don't see any reason for you to not join her."
The discussion went on for a little while, with Jarel translating for the Seraphon, but eventually the humans went back into their city. Jarel put a hand on Darin's shoulder.

"I am glad you made it" Jarel told him. "Are the kids alright?"
"They are. We ran into a few Skinks after you bought us time, and after the battle we found their mother. She was on one of the boats that made it out of the harbor. I am glad that you made it out as well. I didn't understand what the lizards were saying, but I think one of the flyers spotted you and a group of Saurus got you out of there so the priest could heal you."
"What about the Skink who was with me?" Jarel inquired. Where is he?
Darin shrugged. "I don't know, I immediately went back into the city with a few others. But... he didn't look good Jarel. I hope he made it. You should ask the priest, I have to go and help the people in town. The head of our city guard is missing and we lost a few officers, so right now it seems that I am the highest ranking one still alive and capable of fighting."
Jarel shook the other man's hand and then made his way to the Skink priest who was now brushing one of the Terradons. For a moment it seemed strange to Jarel that a priest would do that kind of work, until he realized that this was the priest's own mount. He had apparently come with the Terradon riders.

"Thank you for your help." Jarel said with a bow. The priest only answered with a short nod before he turned back to his mount.
"It is our duty to follow our orders" he said, and Jarel was not sure whether he talked to the winged beast or him.
"We haven't met yet. I am Jarel" he tried to establish a conversation.
"I know. You may call me Paloni" the priest answered, but he did not seem too interested in talking to Jarel.
Jarel decided to cut things short and get right to the point.
"I am sorry to disturb you but I really need to know what happened to my friend Tepi, the Skink I was carrying."
With a sigh the priest stopped brushing his Terradon and turned around. The beast put its beak on his shoulder and the two stared at Jarel with very similar expressions on both of their faces.
"Because of Nurgle's foul plagues we have isolated the casualties" he said, pointing at the hills north of the city. "I did what I could and healed or at least stabilized those like you who still had a chance. But when I reached that Skink he was already as good as dead."
"Can I see him?" Jarel asked, but he already knew what the answer would be before Paloni shook his head.
"He sacrificed himself for me" Jarel exclaimed, both to himself and to the priest.
"It was his duty and he fulfilled it" Paloni stated.

Jarel had enough of this by now. He had quite some sense of duty himself, and had proven it more than once, but the way the Seraphon took it to extremes made him angry. For them the individual didn't seem to matter at all, unless the individual in question happened to be a Slann.
But before he could snap at the priest, another lizardman interrupted his thoughts.
"Warmblood!" Nay-Noatl's unmistakable raspy voice boomed. "We need you over here."
Still fuming with anger Jarel walked over to where the Scar-Veteran had gathered the Saurus and Skinks. Immediately he saw that they had taken some losses, and some of them were wounded. He hoped that the Saurus would give the order to follow the Nurgle forces. He would gladly hop onto a Cold One, ride it to battle, and skewer the Blightking that had once been his friend with a lance.

Instead Nay-Noatl only explained the situation:
The Nurgle troops had been greatly decimated with the help of the Terradon riders that had arrived just in time, and had used their bombs to kill hundreds of daemons by trapping them in a fire between collapsing buildings. But the surviving daemons had not retreated into the direction they had come from. Instead they had moved southwest along the shore of the Sour Lake, led by the Harbinger of Decay and a group of mortals. The slower daemons had remained in the city or fallen behind, and had been slain by the First. Nay-Noatl himself had killed dozens of them, including their Bilepiper, and now carried his skull and one of his pipes tied to a spike on his back.
The flying scouts reported that they were moving toward some ruins which the inhabitants of the Sour Lake Post described as empty. Many of the stone blocks from there had been carried away and used for buildings in the city.

To Jarel's delight Nay-Noatl had decided to stretch his orders a bit and follow them. Cold Ones were not exactly the fastest cavalry, but even with the headstart the Nurgle troops had Nay-Noatl suspected that the Saurus could reach them before they would have the chance to fortify their position. When Jarel asked the Scar-Veteran to be part of the group the big Saurus hesitated, but then agreed.
This time the Saurus had no mount to spare though, so Jarel would have to spend the three hour ride on the saddlebags of one of the knights. He was not looking forward to that, so he quickly made a few adjustments to the saddle using some material he got from the townsfolk.
When he was just finished with it, Darin once again walked over to him, carrying a large pouch on his back. His face was dirty from the soot of the fires, but he was looking more confident now. "The fires are under control" he announced with a relieved smile, "but Gidor was right, there is not much left of the market district. Whatever the Seraphon use in their bombs, it burns hot. And the explosions were at least as strong as any heavy mortar round I ever saw impact. Quite some buildings collapsed, the damage is actually worse than most of what the daemons did. But nothing we can't or won't rebuild. We paid a high price for this victory, but I don't see how it could have been achieved otherwise."
He paused. "Jarel, I don't know why you are here, how you ended up with your reptile friends, or what brought them to this province in the first place, and I don't know if you even have the permission or the time to tell me. but I do know that you were one of the reasons why the Seraphon helped us at all, and without you many more of us would have died" the guardsman began. "And I know that you have lost a lot of your equipment during your journey so I want to give you this" he said, while handing Jarel the pouch.
Jarel opened it and found a helmet, a cuirass, and sets of arm and leg armor in it. The plates were of good quality and well oiled, made in the style the Sour Lake Post guards wore.
"This belonged to my father. I cannot wear it as I have a slightly lighter frame than he had. But if I am not mistaken then you should be able to wear it, and he would be proud to see it used by someone who fights as bravely as you do."
"Thank you, Darin." Jarel said. "I know that you and the other guards were scared to death, but you still managed to put up a fight, and the way you acted when you saw the kids in that house tells me that you are a good man, and have quite some bravery in you as well. You were there when your town needed you." The guardsman smiled.

Sadly there indeed was not much time, now that the Saurus were preparing to chase down the Rotbringers, but Jarel tried the armor on while providing Darin with a rough outline of what had been his campaign up to this point. "I wish we had more time to talk, this sounds like a story that has to be told." Darin remarked while he helped Jarel to fit the breastplate. To his surprise Darin had been correct, the armor fit him quite well. The few places where it didn't could easily be fixed by adjusting some of the padding.
"I hope we will," Jarel agreed, "as soon as we have made sure that we have slain every last one of those that escaped. In the meantime I will do my best to honor this gift."
They had a quick meal of bread and a dry, hard sausage together, then a Saurus knight walked over and told Jarel to get ready to ride.
"Go and kill those Nurgle-bastards!" Darin exclaimed while Jarel climbed onto his makeshift saddle. Jarel nodded in agreement, and gave him a quick salute.
He took a last look at the Sour Lake Post and its inhabitants while he adjusted the padding and tried to make himself halfway comfortable behind the Saurus knight.
The black column of smoke was still there, but it was less intense, now that most of the fires had been put out, according to Darin. He saw townsfolk carrying out rubble by hand and on carts, and he saw people at the small cemetery outside the town's walls, burying those who had not lived.
Jarel wondered if Tepi had been buried, burned, or if the Seraphon had just left him, like the dead Skinks in the forest. He had wanted to ask Tepi about that, but forgotten to do it when more urgent problems had been on his mind. And now Tepi was dead and he would never ask him anything again.
He banished the thought. Now was not the time to mourn, now was the time to make sure that more mourning would not be necessary. He signalled the Saurus knight that he was ready to ride. The chase began.

 

Nonetheless, it's not bad.

 

It has been a while, hasn't it? Maybe some of y'all still remember this story.
While I am not back to playing or painting Warhammer, I am back to writing this story. I want to finish it. Currently 58,000 words and counting.

I am still changing stuff around in those chapters that I am going to post, so they fit what I am doing with the one I am writing currently, but I think I'll release them anyway. When the full thing is finished I'll probably post one large PDF that contains the final version. Probably no signficant changes, maybe just a few fixed plot holes.

Anyway. Here is chapter 10. Hope you'll enjoy it.


Chapter 10: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"The chase"

Riding on the saddlebags of a Saurus knight proved even less comfortable than Jarel had expected. The spikes on the Saurus' back were constantly in Jarel's face, forcing him to lean to one side until he got tired and then switch to the other side.
Nay-Noatl was also determined to make up for some of the preparation time, so the knights were riding hard.
Skinks could not quite keep up with the Cold Ones at that speed, but they followed as quickly as they could, and never got far behind. Now and then Jarel looked up to catch a glimpse of the priest that was following them on his Terradon, but most of the time he was hidden behind the low hanging clouds that had formed.
He would only join combat if it was necessary, but he accompanied them to protect them from the Chaos sorcerer's magic.

That left the town with only its guards and the Terradon riders as defense, but the Nurgle force had been beat so Jarel assumed that the town was safe. He hoped it was.
He asked why the Terradon riders weren't helping them, and Nay-Noatl explained to him that once their bombs and the element of surprise were gone they were not too useful in a fight, especially when the enemy could take cover. They had also flown a long way to the town after the Slann had decided that they were necessary, carrying the heavy bombs all the way, so they were quite tired.

Jarel's back hurt tremendously when the ruins finally came into view, but his anger kept him upright.
Now was the time. Revenge would be his. The lizardmen knew that there were not many of the Rotbringers left, that they did not have daemons with them anymore, and that they had nowhere to go.
The Skink priest had imbued the Saurus with a spell that was supposed to protect them from Chaos magic to a certain degree, with a bit of luck that would allow them to kill the Harbinger of Decay.

"Disperse!" Nay-Noatl commanded. The Saurus and Skinks now slowed down a bit and formed a wide line to approach the ruins from different angles while still being close enough to support each other.

Slowly they rode into the ruins. They consisted mostly of large overgrown stone blocks that had once formed buildings of some sort, but all the smaller stones had been carried away over the course of the last few centuries, so the ruins more closely resembled a field of huge monoliths. Jarel drew his sidesword and dismounted, but remained close to his mount and the Scar-Veteran, taking cover behind the monoliths whenever possible.
Everything was silent. No singing and no sounds. Not even birds or insects.
The Saurus kept following the trail that the Rotbringers had left, and it led toward the center of the ruins where the stone blocks stood more dense and were also overgrown more densely. To avoid running into a trap the Skinks spread out a bit more, always looking behind all obstacles and even climbing on top of them.

"Nothing" the Skink Alpha remarked when he met up with Nay-Noatl after they had done another round of scouting, this time completely around the ruins. "They have to be in there."
The Saurus nodded and gave the order to advance.

When they finally reached the center of the ruins they discovered an empty space. Judging by the amount of ash on ground it had obviously been cleared of plants with fire, and someone had removed the dirt in some spots to reveal a number of remarkably flat, octagonal stones that formed a circle with a diameter of thirty paces. The stones were engraved with symbols that Jarel did not recognize, but someone had clearly cleaned them up.
"Stop." Nay-Noatl bellowed. "Nobody enters that circle."

The Saurus looked up, then let his Cold One do a few sidesteps to the right and back to the left. That had apparently been a signal, because moments later the Skink priest's Terradon descended near them in a tight spiral and landed on a nearby monolith.
From there Paloni took a look at what they had found. Then he climbed out of the saddle and took a closer look, following the symbols with one of his painted claws. Just as Jarel prepared to ask him about the stones he noticed the priest's concerned face.
"This is a hidden Realmgate, and they activated it" Paloni stated.
"A Realmgate?" Jarel asked. Of course he knew what a Realmgate was, like the name suggested they were magical places that allowed travel between the eight Realms. So he added "I thought they looked... different." followed by "Where does it lead?"
Paloni shrugged. "I don't know. But this is not a coincidence. They were searching for it. Maybe they have an army waiting on the other side, but the Realmgate had to be opened from this side first." A shiver ran down Jarel's spine and he saw how the Skinks and Saurus readied to attack whatever would appear in the middle of the stone circle. Only Nay-Noatl remained his usual, calm self.
"I doubt that," the Scar-Veteran said. "They arrived here hours ago, found the gate, opened it, and went through. If they had an army waiting on the other side then they would have immediately send someone through, to control this side. They either don't know where it leads to, or it cannot be opened from the other side."
He paused, and his face went even more grim than usually. "We have to follow them, quickly. Can you open it?"
Paloni looked at the center of the stone circle and closed his eyes. "I think so. Actually I think it is already open, in a way. It just requires a small amount of magical energy to travel through it now. I can almost see it glowing. I am not even sure if I could fully close it."
"So we will go through, and kill the Chaos bastards before they can tell their masters where it leads" Jarel explained the Saurus' plan, more to himself than the Seraphon, but they still both nodded.
Paloni explained the strategy: "I will send you through, and keep the gate open for a short time in case you have to return immediately. Then I will fly back and return with as many troops as possible, as quickly as possible. I am sure that our master will decide to come here in full force. You will do anything that is necessary to prevent enemies from using the gate."
Nay-Noatl nodded. "You can stay here if you want to", he told Jarel.
But he was not surprised to see Jarel shake his head. "No", Jarel just replied. "I have to do this." Silas, or what had been Silas, was among those enemies. Jarel felt responsible because he had failed to stop him. The price had already been too high.
The Skink priest sat on the ground near one of the stones, cross legged and with his eyes closed. He took a few deep breaths, then he stretched out his hands, and the air inside the stone circle began to move. A swirling blue vortex of magical energy formed, and became more dense until it stopped and formed a calm circle, several paces in diameter.
"Follow me!" Nay-Noatl commanded, and rode into the circle, where the Scar-Veteran and his mount vanished with a faint flash of light. The Saurus knights and Skinks followed after their leader as quickly as they could, weapons drawn. Jarel took a last quick look at the familiar scenery of Ghur, and then stepped into the circle himself.

* * *

Magic swirled around Jarel, in all colors of the rainbow and in shapes he did not have words for. He felt like falling and floating at the same time, and both hot like under the midday sun and cold like below the surface of a frozen lake. He could not breathe nor move his limbs, not even blink, and the sounds he heard were like whispers and thunders at the same time, coming from all directions.
The sensations did not last long, then they were gone with a flash, and Jarel found himself standing in ruins not unlike the ones in Ghur, but surrounded by rolling hills which where covered in lush, purple grass. And in the midst of a fierce battle between the Seraphon and the Rotbringers of Nurgle.
"Warmblood! To me!" Nay-Noatl's command broke through Jarel's state of disorientation, and he ran toward the sound of the Scar-Veteran's voice while trying to regain his situational awareness.
It came as a welcome surprise to him that he had not lost his weapons in his confused state, and when he could think straight again he attacked a Blightking who was fighting two Skinks from the rear, inflicting a cut to his leg and allowing the Skinks to swarm and kill him.
He then tried to do the same with the mutated human warrior that fought against Nay-Noatl and his Cold One, but the Rotbringer quickly retreated a step back and easily parried Jarel's blade. He then swung his rusty sword at Jarel. Jarel managed to parry the attack in time, but like in the fight against Silas the blow broke his defense. Both his opponent's weapon and his own were smashed against Jarel's breastplate, and he was thrown to the ground. Before he could get up again the laughing Rotbringer had lifted his heavy boot and kicked against Jarel's shoulder, which sent a sharp pain through Jarel's body and sent him flying again. He would have died if Nay-Noatl had not attacked with his war pick right in that moment. The Blightking's face turned into a bloody pulp when the Scar-Veteran's celestite weapon smashed through the rusty helmet and the skull beneath it as if they were made out of paper.
"Focus!" Nay-Noatl growled at Jarel, then leaned out of the saddle to retrieve his lance from the body of another dead Nurgle-follower before he charged into the direction of the closest enemy, joined by another Saurus knight.
Jarel followed, only to witness how a fireball hit the other Saurus knight directly. It burned away half of the Saurus body, and the panicking Cold One ran away, dragging the rest of the corpse along. Nay-Noatl's Cold one jumped to the side and the cursing Scar-Veteran took cover behind a large monolith. Jarel took cover himself and looked for the source. He spotted the sorcerer a moment later. He had retreated behind a few of his Blightkings who protected him against the Seraphon, and threw magical spells at the Saurus to prevent them from forming orderly ranks again.
Nay-Noatl had also spotted the sorcerer now, and he motioned Jarel to approach the spellcaster from the other side. Jarel understood that he would not stand a chance against the Blightkings, but he figured that he was probably just a distraction anyway.
Together with a limping Skink that somehow still was faster than Jarel he ran toward the place Nay-Noatl had pointed at, using as much cover as he could find on the way. He was determined to be a great distraction, he just hoped he would also be quick enough to not end up as a smoldering heap of bones on the ground of a foreign realm.
As calmly as he could he walked out from behind his cover, ready to jump but trying not to show it.
In the common tongue he shouted "Chaos followers! Your time has come! Face the wrath of the indomitable forces of light!" At the same time he raised his sword above his head and stretched out his other hand at the Chaos sorcerer in a way that he hoped would gain the enemy's full attention. Maybe he could make them think that he was more of a threat than they had previously thought.
At first he was disappointed, because only a few of the Nurgle-followers reacted to him at all, but that alone allowed a few of the lizardmen to strike true, and a long moment later the sorcerer's head finally turned into Jarel's direction. Jarel could not hear what the frail-looking figure in the green robe was saying, but he could see how the sorcerer swung his crooked staff at him. The distraction worked. The Blightkings doubled their efforts on this side of the fight, which gave the Saurus and Skinks valuable seconds to reform.
A blink of an eye later Nay-Noatl appeared from the other side of the battle. At high speed the Scar Veteran charged toward the sorcerer, his lance lowered. Unlike usually there was no war cry. In deadly silence he came rushing in, the heavy footsteps of his Cold One getting drowned out by the noise of the fight. Far too late a Blightking spotted him. The bloated warrior didn't have the time to dodge the Saurus lance that skewered him. Nay-Noatl did not slow down and charged on.
In panic the sorcerer threw a fireball at the Scar Veteran, but Nay-Noatl ducked in the saddle and the Cold One jumped to the side so the flaming spell narrowly missed him. There was no need to be silent anymore now, so the Saurus roared a battlecry as his mount jumped straight into the sorcerer's remaining bodyguard. The Cold One's impact knocked the enemy to the ground, and for a short moment Jarel thought that Nay-Noatl had also been knocked out of the saddle, but instead the Scar-Veteran used the momentum to catapult himself onto the surprised sorcerer, and buried the spellcaster under his body.
As far as Jarel could see the time had not been sufficient to draw a weapon, but a Saurus was never unarmed. With his bare teeth and claws Nay-Noatl mauled the sorcerer, and when additional Rotbringers arrived a moment later to try and support their leader the Scar-Veteran had ripped the sorcerer apart, and was dripping with his enemy's tainted blood.

With their leader gone and their ranks broken the rest of the fight was over quickly. Jarel and the lizardmen made sure that none of the Blightkings survived.
After his bad experiences fighting enemies alone, Jarel made sure to always stay near at least one or two Saurus or a handful of Skinks. He kept telling himself that it was just because he was used to fighting in a formation and was not a trained duelist, but the truth was that he was simply outclassed. The Rotbringers were too strong for him, and without the Saurus looking after him he would have been dead at least four times.
Jarel cautiously inspected all the dead bodies, but the one that still called himself Silas was not among them. When he told Nay-Noatl about it, the Scar-Veteran nodded. "A few of them are missing, including the Harbinger of Decay. The Skinks found a trail, they must have been gone for hours." He spat on the ground. "We will follow them. Take a Cold One, we have to hurry up."
Jarel wanted to inquire about the Realmgate, but when he turned to look at it, the glowing circle had vanished, and only a faint glow in the air remained. So the priest had indeed closed the gate behind them.
"Don't worry," Nay-Noatl answered the question Jarel had meant to ask, "I sent one of the wounded Skinks back before it closed. I have no doubt that the First will guard the other side of the gate as soon as possible."

The remaining troops gathered, only eighteen Saurus knights and thirty Skink skirmishers remained. Only a few of them were not wounded at all, but except four of them all could fight at full strength.
The dead were not buried, the Seraphon just picked up their bodies and laid them on the ground near the gate.
When Jarel returned with the Cold One that had lost its rider to the fireball, it was the first time that Nay-Noatl showed any sign of attachment to one of his Saurus. He looked at Jarel and the Cold One and his tail flicked from side to side.
"This is a good mount, Warmblood. Acach always took good care of his mounts. Show him respect by treating it well."
"I will" Jarel just said.

* * *

Led by the Skink Alpha whose name Jarel had not learned yet, the Seraphon followed the trail that the Blightkings had left. Apparently they did not try to hide it at all, presumably to move more quickly.
The Skinks scouted ahead this time, in their usual fast jogging pace, while the Saurus knights followed in silence. Jarel took in his surroundings. Most of the terrain was just grassy hills, similar to Ghur's savannahs if the grass had not been purple. There were a few small lakes between the hills now and then, and once they crossed a narrow creek of clear water. The only mountains Jarel could see were to the east. At least Jarel was pretty sure it was the east, as the light of Hysh was apparently still rising, and coming from that direction. The west was covered by fog, so he could not tell how the terrain looked like in that direction.
"So, which Realm is this?" he asked Nay-Noatl.
"Shyish." the big lizard replied.
"Shyish? Are you sure?" Jarel was confused, in the stories the Realm of Death was always a barren wasteland full of bones and undead, under constant dark clouds and filled with evil magic by Nagash, the Supreme Lord of the Undead.
Nay-Noatl sighed. "I have been here. Not in this part but in one that looked similar. Not all of Shyish is dead, or inhabited by the dead. Don't you know the stories of Nagash gathering large amounts of grave-sand? The areas that were cleared of it develop a certain amount of life. There are humans and Duardin who live and farm in these areas, there are even cities. Who do you think built those structures back there? Zombies?" He did not wait for Jarel's answer, but continued with a warning: "Never forget that you are in Shyish though. This is Nagash's realm. He may not have complete control over it, but mortals who live here usually worship him, and there are many threats here. Stay sharp or you will join the bones that make up the ground below that grass."

They kept following the trail for a few hours. They did not rest, but ate in the saddle. Jarel followed the knights' example and fed his Cold One a few pieces of dried meat from the saddlebags. He was concerned about the mounts. They were large predators and surely needed more meat than that, but so far he had only seen a few insects and what had looked like small rodents. Nothing to feed more than a dozen horse-sized reptiles.
When he asked a Saurus about it he was told not to worry, and that Cold Ones needed less food than he thought. But he was still told to look out for animals that would potentially be edible.

Now and then a Skink dropped back to the knights to talk to the Scar-Veteran, and each time Nay-Noatl's expression darkened a bit more. Jarel asked for the reason.
"We are not catching up with them. In fact it looks like they are leaving us behind. Nurgle troops are not exactly known for their speed, so I think that their sorcerer has sped them up" the Saurus explained. "We cannot keep up this pace for much longer, and we have no priest with us to heal us or remove our exhaustion."
When he mentioned the sorcerer, Jarel noticed that the Saurus was looking at the small blood-stained pouch that he had tied to the horn of his saddle. He had seen Nay-Noatl attach it after he had mauled the spellcaster, and now he asked what it contained.
"A short rod the size of a sword grip. The sorcerer did not have many possessions except it. I am not a magic user so I don't know what it does, but it might be the key to the Realmgate in Ghur or some other magic item that the sorcerer used."
"Maybe he used that item to speed up the Rotbringers" Jarel suggested. "Do you think we could use it to catch up with them?"
The Saurus just stared at Jarel for a moment. "Listen, Warmblood" he growled, "Our lord might have touched you, but you aren't a Slann. And if you haven't suddenly developed the ability to use magic, then I'd suggest that you keep your fleshy little hands off this rod and not get us killed by powers that you cannot control."
Jarel did not have any good reply to that. He wondered if the rod's purpose would be revealed when he looked at it, but like the Saurus he did not have a good reason to believe that.

* * *

When the afternoon was drawing to a close the Skinks came to a halt, and then quickly retreated a few hundred paces. Jarel tensed up. Had they caught up with the Rotbringers after all? They had just used a ford to cross a river, and the Skinks had had some issues picking up the trail again on its rocky banks.
The Skink Alpha - meanwhile Jarel had learned that his name was Cayo - reported to Nay-Noatl a moment later: "There is a village behind the next hill to the west. There are too many trails of people and animals on the ground." He paused, then looked at the side, his crest flattened against his head. "I fear we lost them, Scar-Veteran."
After a short discussion, during which Nay-Noatl surprisingly managed to keep his voice down, they came to the conclusion that the Rotbringers had to have bypassed the village, unless that was a village of Chaos-worshippers. That was not unheard of in any realm, as Chaos cults appeared here and there, sometimes where one least expected them, but when the Seraphon crawled up the hill and took a longer look at the village, it looked far too orderly to be under the control of a Chaos cult. Villagers were walking around carrying out everyday tasks, and the buildings made of grey stone that had purple grass growing on their roofs looked clean and orderly.

What stood out and made the village look different to any other village Jarel had seen so far was the towers. Between the houses stood square towers, multiple times as tall as the mostly single story houses. They were apparently made out of the same grey material the houses were made of, and their lower levels were decorated with shields and weapons. Jarel wondered if they were fortifications, but their placement suggested that they weren't. They were seemingly randomly placed where they fit.

"We should go in there and contact them," the Skink Alpha suggested, "they are obviously no allies of the blighted ones, so if the expected Nurgle forces show up to secure the Realmgate then these people will all die if they are not prepared. They probably will want to avoid that, and that could buy the First the time we need."
"We won't catch the Rotbringers anyway, so I think it is worth a try," Jarel concurred, although he hated the thought that the people in that village would probably die anyway.
Nay-Noatl just sighed. "Alright," he grunted. "But just the three of us."
He then gave the order to another Saurus to retreat to the Realmgate in case his plan would fail. Like always he accepted the possibility of his imminent death with the stoicism that was common for the Seraphon. Jarel's heart was racing again, but the Saurus did not even blink when he stored most of his equipment on his mount and turned toward the village.

"Are you sure that they will even listen to us, and not just kill us on sight?" Jarel inquired.
"No," the Scar-Veteran just said, "but Nagash hates Nurgle. He doesn't hate the First quite as much. Not even as much as he hates the Stormcast Eternals".
Jarel decided to ask about the reason for that later. Now it was time to look as non-threatening as possible again.
So the three figures strolled toward the village. Jarel and Cayo on either side, with Nay-Noatl in the middle, towering more than a foot over them.

The villagers - all of them humans as far as Jarel could see so far - gathered between the first few houses, near the closest of the towers.
Half a dozen of them were recognizable as militia, they had spears and shields in their hands and swords on their hips, and they wore armor. Their gambesons looked plain but orderly, and two of them even wore breastplates. Jarel could tell that they had hastily donned them though, as most of the straps were not tied properly, or not at all. At least all of them had helmets on.
In addition to that there were a few farmers standing around, trying to not look aggressive but clearly prepared for a fight. One of them was leaning too casually on a heavy flail, while others had pitchforks and rakes at the ready. A woman carried an iron pan in one hand and a rolling pin in the other, and definitely looked ready to cave someone's head in with either of them. Nay-Noatl acknowledged the villagers' presence with a dismissive snort. Indeed Jarel was quite sure that if a fight started now, Cayo and himself would have to fight for their lives, but only for the approximately twenty seconds it would take for the unarmed Scar-Veteran to cause a bloodbath among the villagers.
Only when Cayo spotted the crossbowmen that were hiding behind the houses did Nay-Noatl blink and incline his head. A tall woman with a hard face seemed to lead them, now and then the crossbowmen and -women looked at her. Unlike most of them who wore their regular clothes and wide-brimmed hats she was wearing a full set of light armor including an archer's sallet, and she directed them to line up in angles that allowed them mutual cover and avoid friendly hits. The village was not too badly prepared after all.

A middle aged man approached them, seemingly unfazed. He was shorter than Jarel and relatively thin, and his white robe was clean and well-made.
"The Reaper King's favor" he greeted them in a friendly voice, "We haven't seen any of your kind for quite some time here. I hope that you don't intend to cause any problems for our village, as the justice of our master will come upon all of us."
Nay-Noatl gave Jarel a quick nod so he took a step forward.
"Well met," he greeted the man who he assumed was a village elder, or maybe the mayor of the village. "I am Jarel Mallard." He hesitated. Maybe the place he had come from was something he should not tell the villagers right away. "These are my Seraphon allies" he instead said, pointing at the two lizardmen who remained silent. Then he decided to immediately cut to the most important part: "We followed some of Nurgle's Rotbringers here, and we have reason to believe that they are scouts for an army that will come to take this area."
"I am Johannes Flottmann, mayor of Guteruh", the grey-haired man introduced himself, then continued, speaking with a slight accent that was unknown to Jarel but that he could understand fine: "We have seen those Rotbringers, three hours ago, half a mile to the east and headed north. They were just seven on foot and a rider, but the huntsman said that they were moving very quickly, and where there are eight of the Maggotkin, others will soon follow." He paused, a concerned look on his face. "Should they really bring one of their armies here, then we are in great danger." he agreed. "I expected that though, and have already sent for the Necromancer, who will arrive very soon."
A Necromancer. Jarel still could not believe that ordinary people were living here, and talking about calling a Necromancer like the folks at home would talk about calling a priest.
But before he could answer the mayor continued. "I know that your lizard... friends fight Chaos wherever they encounter it, so in exchange for a temporary alliance we would offer you food, drink, and a place to rest for them and their mounts, as far as we can provide them. Nagash's justice is hard but fair, and we bear no grudges against you. The Necromancer will have the last word on this, however."
The mayor mentioning the mounts made it clear that the Skinks and Saurus knights had already been spotted. Jarel tried to not look surprised, and decided to just play along. "That is very kind of you, mayor. We will make camp just outside of your village, and see if we can find some food for our mounts, while we wait for your Necromancer to arrive." He almost succeeded in making waiting for a Necromancer to arrive sound like something ordinary.
Flottmann quietly laughed. "The Amethyst Realm looks dead to you, son, doesn't it? But I can assure you that the river contains lots of fish, enough to feed all of you for a while."
Again Jarel hid his surprise. Something felt off. The mayor was very friendly, much more than Jarel expected. At the same time the rest of the villagers, including the crossbowmen, still had their weapons ready to strike at the three newcomers, much more in line with what Jarel expected from a remote village that was being visited by a group of possibly hostile soldiers. It just didn't properly fit together. Jarel looked at the two Seraphon now and then, to reassure himself that they were ready to react if something unexpected happened.
They exchanged a few more friendly words about the weather and the landscape, and the mayor told Jarel that the Nurgle army would definitely come through the village if they wanted to move south, as there were a swamp and a large lake to the west, and canyons to the east of the village. Jarel made a mental note. Hopefully that would turn out to the Seraphon's advantage later. If that Necromancer wouldn't just summon an army of undead and kill them all. Whenever there was a pause Jarel informed Nay-Noatl in the Seraphon language, so the Saurus would be able to follow the conversation. Eventually it was Cayo who urged Jarel that they should leave. If the Necromancer turned out hostile it would be better to be prepared, and so far the other Saurus and Skinks knew nothing. Nay-Noatl agreed, so they politely said goodbye and returned to the other lizardmen.

 

In other news: I noticed that I will very soon pass 60,000 words with this story. Kinda weird to think that when this story is finished (which will hopefully be soon, I am writing the penultimate chapter right now) it will literally surpass the size of The Catcher in the Rye, Carrie, The War of the Worlds, or Lord of the Flies.

 

And here is the next one. Enjoy!


Chapter 11: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"The Necromancer"


Like when they had made the journey to the Sour Lake Post the Seraphon did not really set up a proper camp. They lit a few fires with wood that they collected from the dry bushes that were scattered over the grassy plains and on the river bank. They fished in the stream and like the mayor had told them it was not hard to catch enough fish to avoid using up their dried rations.
The rest of the day they spent nursing their wounds, scouting the area, and preparing for the next battle. Then they slept for a few hours, and when the light was good enough to see again they continued their preparations.
For Jarel that meant that he trained. A few Skinks included him in their sparring fights, and he learned that even though Skinks were quick, he had a better reach and was stronger than them. It was a nice boost to his confidence when he even managed to land hits on Cayo once or twice.
That quickly changed when he started to fight Saurus though. Jarel was not even able to hit the limping warrior with the missing eye that Nay-Noatl commanded to "get the Warmblood into better shape". The Saurus had longer arms, and he was so much stronger than Jarel that every time Jarel parried one of his swings with either his buckler or his sword he was either pushed back, or the Saurus blew through his defense. His arms hurt after every swing, and his opponent easily parried every attack Jarel attempted. The knight also made a point of getting into grappling distance with Jarel, and the human had even less of a chance there. The Saurus' large hands held him in a vice-like grip, and when the Saurus had grappled Jarel he reminded him that he still had a weapon left by opening his mouth to show his teeth. In a real fight he would have just bitten Jarel now, and likely ended the fight.

"Stop!" Nay-Noatl growled, "this is just unbearable." He had watched the fights while eating a raw fish that the Skinks had caught in the early morning hours, but when he had finished his meal he walked over. "I can now see why you are constantly losing, Warmblood" he told Jarel, while he dismissed the one-eyed Saurus knight with a hand motion and took the wooden practice weapon himself. "You are fast enough, but you are weak. You cannot change that, that's just how humans are. But you parry like you were fighting goblins, or men." He was not hiding the fact that to him the two were roughly equivalent. "Rotbringers are strong, almost like Orruks or Saurus" he continued, "and that means that in order to defeat them you have to fight like a Skink, not like a Saurus. Use your speed, don't let them grapple you, and stop with those damned static parries. Use deflectional parries, and keep your distance unless you are striking yourself."
He then attacked Jarel, who tried his best to avoid the blows. He had thought that he had been more careful fighting the Saurus warriors than he was fighting Skinks or men, but now that Nay-Noatl had mentioned it he realized that he had apparently gotten used to them too much. He had been thinking of them as equals, although even the smallest and weakest of them were taller and stronger than him. That would surely not happen this time, he thought to himself. The Scar-Veteran was more than a foot taller than most Saurus, and even though he was armed with a piece of wood, Jarel instinctively wanted to run. He fought the feeling, and tried to do what Nay-Noatl had told him. If he wanted to have a chance against Silas, he would have to fight that way, or he would die, or worse.
The Saurus did not give Jarel an opportunity to counterattack. A steady stream of attacks forced Jarel into a number of parries, some with his weapon and some with the buckler. Nay-Noatl looked almost bored as he kept attacking his much smaller opponent from all directions, now and then rushing in to attempt to grapple him. He clearly was not fighting at full strength, but Jarel recognized that he was testing his techniques.
They fought for a few minutes, while a few of the Skinks and Saurus watched. Now and then the Scar-Veteran took a step back and let Jarel attack, and it felt a bit like back in training with his sword instructor. At no point was Jarel close to scoring a hit, but he did notice that the Saurus had to move more quickly now and then, and even grunted a few times when he barely avoided one of Jarel's attacks.
He also noticed that he got better at defending. It still felt like a sledgehammer blow when the Saurus hit his shield, and his arms did still hurt, but he managed to let the blows glance off far more often now.
After a while the Scar-Veteran signalled Jarel to stop, just as Jarel felt like he was finally finding weaknesses in his defenses. "What is it?" Jarel asked, panting.
"We should stop," the Saurus just replied, not looking even a little bit tired, "because we might have to fight soon, and I... want you at full strength. You are getting better and it would be a waste of my time if you died too soon."
With that he walked off, probably to yell at one of the Saurus knights that was slower than the others in preparing his Cold One.
"Wait," Jarel mumbled to himself. "Was that a compliment?"
He heard a chuckle behind him, it was Cayo who was cleaning his blowpipe and grinning. "I think it was," the Skink Alpha laughed, his crest twitching, "but he was right. You should sit down and eat a fish or two."
The thought of eating the Shyish fish that looked more dead than alive even when they were alive was not too thrilling, but at least the Skinks had cooked the fish, unlike the Saurus who seemed to prefer eating them raw. So Jarel shrugged and shared a meal with a few of the Skinks. He liked being around Skinks. Like most Seraphon they were very serious when doing something important, but in their free time they joked, sang, and pretty much did all the things humans did. One told a story about when he had last been to Shyish and had barely escaped a group of ghosts in a haunted forest, and for a moment Jarel felt like back home. Eduardo had enjoyed ghost stories, and frequently told them. Apart from the fact that this one was real, it could have been one of Eduardo's. Well, if it had contained girls. That made Jarel think. He decided to ask about how Seraphon reproduced, and was mainly met by confusion when he asked whether there were caves with Seraphon eggs somewhere. "We don't lay eggs, Jarel" Cayo explained. "We are spawned in spawning pools. We develop in them and eventually emerge from them, fully grown and basically ready to fight or work to fulfill the Great Plan. So no, there are no males or females among us, unlike it is the case with most beasts or peoples", the Skink Alpha explained. "...which brings us back to our current situation" he said, pointing at the hills. "It seems like the humans have something to tell us."
Indeed there was a single villager on the next hill. He had apparently come from the village, and was led towards Jarel by a Skink.
"The Necromancer has arrived, and has agreed to the mayor's plan" the villager explained smiling. Like the mayor he was short, but he was muscular and had hair like straw. "Oh, and the Necromancer would like to talk to you" the young man added. He looked nervous, but Jarel was not too concerned at this point. Cayo had told him that the people of Shyish were usually quite honest, it had apparently to do with their religion. Cayo claimed they believed that they would be punished after their death if they lied while they lived.
Like the evening before only Nay-Noatl and Cayo accompanied Jarel into the village. But the rest of the Seraphon remained close, and Jarel noticed that both the Scar-Veteran and the Skink wore their weapons.

* * *

A few villagers followed them as they walked into the village, but most of them continued with what they had been doing. Jarel noticed that many of them were carrying weapons, but other than that the village and its inhabitants looked ordinary, except for the towers.
When they followed their guide past one of the tall buildings Jarel looked up. The towers looked like they had doors on every level, and there were stairs on the outside to access the upper levels.
"Are those for storage?" Jarel asked the man with the strawy hair.
"Yes, in a way" the man replied over his shoulder. "We store weapons in the lower levels. But they are built for our master and our honored dead."
Jarel looked at Cayo, who explained that there were temples of different kinds in Shyish, usually dedicated to Nagash and his Mortarchs. He had not seen towers yet, but pyramids or long pillard temples were as common as large underground structures.

When they reached the village green - which was not very green here at all - the mayor met them.
"The Reaper King's favor" he repeated the same greeting he had spoken the last time they had met. "The Necromancer is here and ready to meet you inside." With that he pointed at the largest building of the village besides the towers. It was a three story house, probably the town hall. "Follow me."
The white-robed man walked up the stairs that led to the second floor. Nay-Noatl had to duck to not hit his head on the ceiling, and looked decidedly uncomfortable while he walked down the corridor trying to not knock over any of the wall decorations.
At the end of the corridor there was another door. "My office" the mayor said proudly, "but of course it is the Necromancer's right now."
The mayor opened the door and led his guests into the office. Book shelves lined most of the walls and to the right stood a desk with all kinds of papers on it. On the opposite side of the room was a large window, and in front of it stood a dark-hooded figure. The Necromancer.
"The Seraphon are here to meet you, Necromancer" the mayor announced, and stepped aside.
Jarel had expected a wrinkled, bald man with bad teeth in filthy dark robes, or perhaps a vampire with fangs and bloodshot eyes, but when the Necromancer turned around Jarel instead looked at a slim woman in a black, red lined gown split for riding. Like most inhabitants of Shyish Jarel had met she had very fair skin, and dark hair. But unlike most of the villagers' hair hers was long, and hung over her left shoulder in a neat braid.
She smiled as she took a step forward, and made a graceful all-encompassing gesture with one of her arms. "Welcome to the Amethyst Realm, visitors" she said in a melodic voice that had something aristocratic to it, "it seems that you arrived here in the right moment to revive an ancient alliance of the forces of Order against Chaos." In a slightly sharper tone she added "Although I am curious to learn how you got here. These are dark times, and we should not keep secrets from each other when our very existence is at stake."
Jarel cleared his throat and took a step toward her.
When he looked at her more closely it looked like she was about his age, probably a bit older, but it was possible that she looked older than she was, because she looked very tired. Dust from her journey covered her black cloak, her boots were muddy, and there were dark shadows under her eyes.
He bowed and introduced himself. This time he mentioned that he and the Seraphon had been teleported to Shyish from Ghur, without going into too much detail. It was not the full truth, but not a complete lie either. He did not want to tell her about the Realmgate, and the Necromancer would surely know that Slann were very powerful, and thus might believe that they had been teleported by a Slann's magic.
She raised an eyebrow when he mentioned the Realm of Beasts, but she let him continue.
"I fear that I am in no position to speak for all the forces of Order, but I can speak for this group of Seraphon. We are here to destroy those Nurgle forces, and we are ready to fight at your side... my lady... Necromancer." He stumbled over the titles. Until that point he had managed to speak relatively smoothly, but he had not been told how to address her.
"Call me Kalene" she said with a smile that made her look younger and far more attractive than a Necromancer should have looked in Jarel's opinion.
He had talked to the two lizardmen about what to say in which situation, so he had a good idea how to continue: "So, Kalene, how are we going to prepare for the assault? We don't know how many of them will come or when they will come, and we don't have an army at our disposal. I assume that you will be able to call some undead? How many?"
She looked at him for a moment, not smiling anymore now. Instead her brown eyes looked at him thoughtfully. "I can raise a few hundred skeletons," she explained calmly. "I also have access to a few Fell Bats from the swamps."
"No cavalry?" Jarel inquired.
She shook her head. "There are not many horses around here, there never have been. They don't like the grass. Keep in mind that I can only raise what died here once. So that means no Black Knights. But if we need fast troops I could raise some warhounds."
"Where are you going to get those from?"
She looked surprised about the question. "Well, from the ossuary towers, obviously."
So that's what they were. The villager had been literal, earlier when he had referred to them as having been built for the dead.
"That means that you have access to the remains of all the people that ever died here?" he asked.
Kalene nodded. "Yes, in principle. But I am no Mortarch. I cannot just raise all of them at once. Then there is the tithe, and Guteruh has never had a large population, so there are less skeletons available than you might think. If they can really bring an army then we will be in trouble." She indeed looked concerned. "As for when they will come: Based on where their army was last seen I estimate that we have two to three days. So I will start summoning right now, even though I am very tired." She straightened herself and took her staff from the corner. It was a simple, slightly curved wooden staff, but its tip was decorated with bones and a stylized scythe blade.
On her way out she paused and turned back at Jarel. "Wait. You have not told me why you came here with so little support. Where are your masses of lizards, your mighty beasts, your Starpriests, or your Engines of the Gods?" She pointed out of the window. "Those out there number just over four dozen. If I include you, which I am not sure I should." That made him think. Was he part of the Seraphon now? Did they see him as one of their own? He sometimes felt like the Skinks did, but much of the rest of what the Seraphon were was still alien to him, and that feeling was probably mutual. He banished the thought and concentrated on the answer that he needed to give.
"We were only a small vanguard to begin with, and we had some losses" he gave back. Again, that wasn't a lie, just not the whole truth. "I hope that there will be reinforcements soon, but I don't know when they will arrive. It might be in an hour or in a week." Or never, he thought to himself, but he did not want to tell Kalene. He was not even ready to accept that possibility himself.
There was an expression of scorn from her.
"You have chosen the wrong master it seems. The Slann have a reputation for sending their troops into certain death, without further support if it doesn't factor into their 'Great Plan'." Jarel was glad that Nay-Noatl and Cayo could not understand her, the way she talked about the Great Plan and the Slann. But then, they might have wholeheartedly agreed, and not even have seen a problem with that. He still wanted to object, but he had not yet made up his own mind about the Slann's ethics either, so he remained silent.
"But the Grave God cares about his servants" she continued, smiling again. "Where there are bones there is an army to support us. We never fight alone." For a moment she looked at him without saying anything, as if she was waiting for him to disagree, then she shook her head. "We can talk later. Now I have to start summoning. You should also prepare your troops. Stay close to the village, within it if you like to. Just don't stand in the way."

* * *

Jarel and the two Seraphon followed her out of the building, where the mayor and several villagers joined them. Some approached her and spoke about gifts that they had for her, which she told them she would gladly receive later, as now was the time to do work. The kindness with which she spoke to them was a stark contrast to the cool tone in which she told Jarel that she expected to not get interrupted in any way.
Jarel carried no wish to anger a Necromancer in himself, so he stepped aside.
While Kalene used her staff to draw runes into the dirt of the village green, and poured white powder from a pouch that she carried into them, Jarel quietly spoke to Cayo and Nay-Noatl to keep them up to date.
Nay-Noatl decided to keep the Seraphon in their riverside camp, but both him and Cayo were in favor of staying in the village to keep an eye on the Shyishans.
When she had finished her circle of runes Kalene took a deep breath. Then she slammed her staff into the ground, which made a louder sound than Jarel had expected on soft ground. She repeated the process three times, then stood still as a statue while a soft purple glow developed around her. Jarel's skin began to crawl while it intensified.
Eventually she spoke, and her voice sent shivers down Jarel's spine. It was too loud and booming for any man, and the single word she uttered was spoken with such an authority that even Jarel could feel an impulse to follow it.

"RISE!"

Again Kalene assumed a statue-like pose, Jarel could not even see her breathing. First nothing happened, and he thought that maybe her ritual had failed. But then the doors of the closest ossuary tower opened, one by one. And out marched skeletons. Dozens of them. In a neat row they marched down the tower stairs, evenly spaced as if they were parading, and each of them carried a spear and a shield in its hands. Some were armored, but most of them only partially or not at all.
The villagers stood there and cheered, equally reminding Jarel of a parade. It felt wrong. Even Cayo and Nay-Noatl looked uneasy as the skeleton warriors marched onto the village green and formed up a rectangle, twenty skeletons wide and four deep.

"RISE!"

Kalene's voice boomed once more, and a second tower's doors opened. The skeletons marched out, this time some of them were carrying swords instead of spears and Jarel counted fourty spearmen and fourty swordsmen - or swordswomen, it was hard to tell from a skeleton's body - that formed up two rectangles next to the ones from the other tower.
Jarel looked at Kalene. The lines in her face had deepened, she looked older now, and like on the brink of death. She swayed, and the mayor offered her his arm, but she softly brushed it away. "Just one more" she told him. It was almost a whisper.
This time she turned around and faced the west, and she uttered a different word, but it was as loud and booming as the other two.

"COME!"

Nothing obvious happened. But after a moment she smiled. It was more a grimace than the endearing smile Jarel had received earlier, but then she looked into Jarel's direction for a moment, gave him a quick nod and at least started breathing again.
The effects of the Magic Winds of Death vanished, except for Kalene's physical state, but when he inquired about her she just told him that it was normal, that she needed rest, and that the villagers would care well for her.
She then accepted the mayor's arm and the man with the white robe led her back into the town hall, a beaming smile on his face.
In the meantime the villagers had gathered around the skeletons, and some of them were apparently caring for the armor and weapons that the skeletons were carrying. Some attached colorful strips of cloth on them, and Jarel even saw some of them attach flowers to the undead, looking elated to do so while he tried to shake off that primal fear of death which befell most people looking at the walking dead.
He forced himself a few steps toward them. Most of the skeletons didn't react at all. Some turned their heads for a moment but otherwise didn't move. He still felt like they were watching all of his steps.
"Come closer, they don't bite." a voice said. It belonged to an elderly woman with a friendly face that reminded Jarel of his late grandmother. She was in the process of carefully cleaning a skeleton's breastplate with a piece of cloth, and smiled when Jarel approached her.
"I am sorry, but being around undead is new to me" Jarel explained. "You don't seem to fear them at all."
"Well, there is no need to fear them, these..." she motioned towards the orderly lines of skeletons on the village green, "...are family" she just said. "Look at Jens over there, the young man that led you into the village earlier." The old woman pointed at the man with the strawy hair, who stood next to some armored skeletons twenty yards away. "See those three warriors with the long chain shirts? Those are his parents and his brother. You don't fear your brother, do you?"
"I am an only child" Jarel answered laconically. When she had asked him the question he had immediately thought of Silas, who had been like a brother to him. And he did fear his brother now. Thankfully she misinterpreted his facial expression. "Ah, don't be sad. It is nice to have a large family, but you can also have family that isn't related to you. Let old Mina tell you this: Some of the best family members can be the ones you meet during your life, and don't share a single drop of blood with." She continued wiping down the skeleton's armor and chattered on happily like some old lady at home would have done while cleaning her kitchen.
"My husband was part of the last tithe," she explained. However before Jarel could ask what that was she continued: "It was a proud moment, but I am still happy that at least Timon is still here."
"The Necromancer mentioned the tithe earlier, but she had no time to talk," Jarel interjected. "Could you explain it to me?"
She looked at him thoughtfully for a moment. "Of course you wouldn't know. I sometimes forget that customs are different elsewhere. The tithe happens every few years. The army of our lord sends a caravan and they take some of our dead with them to support the army. It was a great honor for my family, we did not expect that my husband's old bones would still be worthy. He died over ten years ago."
There was a hint of sadness in her voice, but it vanished when she carefully took a white flower out of her pocket and attached it to the skeleton's armor. "Timon is my son. He was a farmer but died six years ago. He is still here and protects us. This is only the second time I see his body since his soul left." She smiled at the skeleton, and Jarel felt torn. His instincts still told him to run away, but a part of him understood the old woman. She knew that those were only bones, but just like people cared for the graves of their ancestors, she cared for her beloved son.
He still wanted to change the topic.
"About the Necromancer..." he began. Immediately Mina's mood brightened even more. "She is wonderful, isn't she? We can be so thankful that she was sent here. She is more powerful than our former Necromancer, so she made this area much safer. We are indeed favored by the Reaper King."
"Ah, uhh... yeah, you really seem to be" was all that Jarel could reply to that. "I wanted to ask why she doesn't live here in Guteruh."
Mina shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it is easier to concentrate out there, where there aren't hundreds of people around you. But you have to ask her that question yourself. Just don't be sad if she does not answer you. Necromancers need to have their secrets!" she added with a raised index finger that was wet and soapy from her ongoing cleaning task.
In the meantime even more villagers had gathered on the village green and like Mina most of them cleaned the skeletons, repaired their armor and weapons, or just talked to each other about their families. Some of them were waiting near the town hall, and now and then one or two of them entered it.
A movement in the corner of his eye caught Jarel's attention. A swarm of large bats silently approached the village from the west, and Jarel had already half drawn his sword when he realized that neither the villagers nor the skeletons paid them any attention. The old woman noticed his confusion. "Fell Bats from the swamps" she just said. They serve the Necromancer. See how numerous they are. I told you that she is powerful". It were at least a dozen of them. It was hard to tell but they looked almost the size of men. They landed on the towers and folded their wings around themselves, most hiding their faces from the light of Hysh that was slowly rising higher. Their eyes were fixed in one direction, and without looking Jarel knew that they were staring right at the town hall, into which Kalene had retreated. Compared to them even the skeletons looked almost harmless. Jarel figured that he would be able to beat several skeletons in a fight if need be, but he doubted that he would stand a chance against even a single of those bat monsters.
"Just one last question," he turned to Mina again. "What are the gifts that the villagers bring to Kalene?"
"Just regular things," she said. "Some provide her with food and drink, some with information she needs. Some wash her clothes, clean her belongings, run errands, or help in any other way she might need us. We do everything that helps her helping us. That tall woman with the crossbow who just entered the town hall was Uta, who leads our crossbow units. She will probably inform the Necromancer about the number of men and women who will be able to fight."

* * *

Jarel thanked Mina for the explanations and made his way back to the two Seraphon.
Nay-Noatl and Cayo were talking quietly among themselves. When Jarel arrived, they were just discussing lanes by which the Knights would be able to pass through the village in all directions, should it be necessary. Apparently they expected the Rotbringers to attack from different angles, especially if they had enough troops to swarm the village, like they had done it at the Sour Lake Post. They included Jarel in their conversation, and time passed quickly while they discussed how to hold the village as long as possible. They did not talk about possible reinforcements, but Jarel had decided that it would not change anything for now. Their best chance was to stay and fight.
Jarel appreciated how the Skink Alpha and the Scar-Veteran more and more treated him like one of their own. He doubted that they would ever become family, like Mina had said, but he slowly came to the conclusion that even though the lizardmen were confusing him at times, so were other humans. He wondered whether he would ever return home, and whether he would even be able to fit back in, after the things he had seen now. He had to remind himself that he had only been with the First for a few weeks, but his life had changed so much in that short time.
The hours passed, and at some point before noon the Fell Bats moved deeper into the shadows of the towers. They came back out later in the afternoon, and so did Kalene a few moments later. She looked a lot better, and even smiled at him again when she noticed Jarel who had taken position on the tavern's front porch, sipping on a surprisingly tasty ale that the Shyishans brewed.
She did not talk to him - which disappointed him more than he liked to admit - and just repeated her earlier ritual. Another fourty skeletons from an ossuary tower joined the units on the village green, and again she slumped after summoning them and went back inside. This time however she made sure to send a villager to inform Jarel that there would be a meeting to discuss tactics the next day.
Before Jarel and the Seraphon eventually returned to their camp in the evening, Uta walked over to them. She carried an additional crossbow and quiver.
"I noticed that you lack a ranged weapon. Can you shoot?" she immediately came to the point.
"I can." He was not great, but crossbows were easy to aim and shoot and many soldiers of the Crawling City trained with them.
She explained the loading mechanism to him, which was slightly different to the crossbows he knew. So far he had only shot hand spanned crossbows and the unwieldy but strong windlass crossbows. The crossbowmen of Guteruh mostly used goat's foot mechanisms that were neatly stored on the shaft when not in use.
Under Uta's strict gaze he demonstrated his ability to shoot the crossbow on a practice target behind the village's smithy, and after two dozen shots of which most hit their targets the hard faced woman was satisfied with the results: "Probably good enough to not kill yourself or one of my people by accident" was all she said. He thanked her, and she just nodded and walked back toward the town hall without another word.
Neither her nor Nay-Noatl knew it, but she reminded Jarel of the big lizard in a way.
He later told Cayo about it, and the Skink laughed so hard about the idea that he nearly fell off the rock he was sitting on.
They went to sleep early that day, and Jarel's dreams would have been more pleasant if they had not been a confusing mix of scenes in which Kalene either smiled at him or made the undead attack him.