The skyline was aflame with the coming of the morning and Conqueror Cromicon stood unmoving since his arrival, at the top of the hill. He held out his outstretched hands, which from his point of view seemed like giant claws clasping around the orcish stronghold. Threatening to strangle the very walls. The motley forms of his assembled Dawnwatchers thronged behind him. The assortment of creatures and powers that made up his mercenary unit was testament to his natural ability to command.1
"It begins," he growled. A malevolent smirk began to stretch across his features, amused at some kind of private joke that only his mind was privy to. "Optio, get your team into position. Vallasch will provide an ample diversion and the orcs wont risk using the mangonels against one target. So all you have to do is keep him covered from enemy arrow fire." With that Optio and his scouts, Kaatishar the barbarian and the dark elf Sreggid silently and stealthily crept across the rocks toward the western side of the Fortress.2
--3
The spectral stallion vaulted down the mountainside. Its unliving, lucent form pounded its way down the rocks at an impossibly steep angle. A dark knight sat atop it armoured in blood red plate mail, save for his naked dark blue torso. Pauldrons sculpted like small horizontal wings were splayed across his shoulders, while his hands were cased in gauntlets with clawed fingertips. His mistress in revealing black armour sat behind him. Her arms were wrapped tightly around his waist, while her hands frequently ventured lower.4
Barely a few metres from driving into the ground, the ethereal mount leapt from the face of the natural wall. The ferocity of its near vertical charge was brought to an abrupt halt as the riders were propelled into the air and the phantasm's insubstantial form dispersed into the air. At the base of the steed's path a patrol of five Deathfist orcs loitered among the remains of rockslides and wasted catapult payloads. They antagonised each other and boasted feats of combat while avoiding their duties away from the eyes of their commanders. Their respite was ended by a low whistling sound, followed by a sudden downward rush of air.5
The small patrol band was only lightly armoured with studded leather and occasional patches of chainmail. Two were armed with spears too unwieldy for them to relax with. They stood upright like sentinels, their weapons rested against their shoulders. Two were sat down; one of them with a twin headed battleaxe strapped to his back, while the other held a two-handed maul in his lap. Their captain was a thick muscled brute with a cutlass and a wooden buckler that had a wide, conical spike in the centre. Before they could look up at the sudden howling wind, a pair of silver-maned shadows dropped among them. Before the orc captain had even seen Vallasch, a bastard sword hacked through his sword arm before making a loud clang against the ground as the blood-armoured knight landed on his feet. Orcs were renowned as resilient beings and Vallasch knew the officer was not out of action yet. With a wail of surprise rather than pain, the patrol captain moved to smash Vallasch's head open with the buckler strapped to his remaining arm.6
Vallasch's mistress had already gashed open a spearman's throat before the orcs could bring their cumbersome weapons to bear. Under the shower of blood she made a pirouette, twisting around to find the next victim. In her left hand lashed a curving, guardless short sword, which she held reverse gripped. The under-palm blade's venomous secret was revealed with a moist glint in the sunlight. With a flash the jagged dirk she held in her right hand drove through another orc's shoulder pinning it to the cliff. In the time it took the orc to drop the maul and pull the vicious weapon out, she had already spun around and made an offhand backward carving across its midriff. As the second spearman finally intervened with a broad horizontal attack she bent back low and scooped up the fallen dirk, her lithe body easily allowing her to flex and twist from harms way. She simply danced out of the way as the orc made a forward lunge, looping her right arm around the spear's haft before her opponent could pull away. She leapt over the spear before bringing down the spike heel of her metal boot against the side of his head in a brutal axe kick. The orc cried out in agony as he reeled back, letting go of his weapon. It was the last mistake of his life.7
Vallasch wouldn't be able to lift up his sword fast enough to guard against the oncoming attack. As the buckler came sailing towards his face his elven reflexes showed their worth, ducking low as the blow came over his head, leaving his opponent open for an attack if made quickly enough. The orc made a gurgling bellow as the jagged knuckles of a red gauntlet seared across its face with a swift uppercut. As the patrol captain staggered back Vallasch hefted the bastard sword upward in a great arc, scoring into the orc's chest. Though his enemy had fallen sprawled and helpless against a large boulder, he had no time to strike the final blow. Pivoting on his heel as he saw the twin blades of a battleaxe swinging low towards him. He twisted away from the blades path and immediately sprung back as the orc warrior spun his weapon around in a lethal figure of eight, making a second swipe for the elf's face. Time seemed to slow as Vallasch rocked backward in just enough time to watch the ends of a few strands of his white hair being sheared away inches from his eyes. The orc kept a cautious distance from the dark elf expecting to have severed more than just hair. Vallasch used the extra moments to regain his footing as a sudden stinging surged across his side. He doubled over and clutched at the scratch from the first attack he had apparently been too slow to evade. Seeing the moment of vulnerability the orc axeman charged turning the twin heads downward to drive the shadowknight into the ground. With his hand and a half sword he could do little more than lift it weakly above his head to block the oncoming attack. The black metal of his blade held firm, deadlocked in between the sweeping curve between the axe heads. But slowly being pushed towards him.8
His chosen weapon, though not as broad was slightly longer than most bastard swords. Such weapons were developed to be used offensively, with the ability to bludgeon as much as cut. As such it would be futile Vallasch figured, to be used to defend against a similarly heavy weapon. He turned the blades edge so he could press his left hand against the flat side for extra leverage. Having been forced to one knee, his slender but nonetheless athletic body was like a coiled spring. He burst onto his feet and forced his comparatively bulkier foe back a few steps. Now with enough space to counterattack, he decided that in this instance, the simplest method was the best. Gripping the hilt two-handed he swung left and right in powerful horizontal sweeps. Having to try and knock the clumsy yet strong attacks aside the patrolman was now the one losing control. After blocking a massive vertical strike the axe had been forced downward, opening up the orc's guard slightly. More advantageous for the red knight however, was that his sword was now held to his left side. Giving him the chance to fully swing back with his right arm. As the sword powered up towards him, the patrolman had little option but to bring his axe up to guard himself, but the force of the attack launched his arms into the air. Vallash's swing didn't stop. Having completely spun himself 360 degrees his black sword came around again and tore through orcish lungs.9
The Patrol Captain winced as his lungs forced another mouthful of bloody filth out of his throat. With his right arm torn from the elbow and the great wound upon his torso he was bleeding furiously. Having fallen back and now led against a large boulder, he no longer had the strength left to move. Though he was evidently alive, he came to understand how that was more a curse than a blessing as he looked up to see the slim form of his red clad assassin. "Fucking pointy eared dog," he spluttered to Vallasch in the common tongue. "What do you blue bastards want here besides death? Why do you test our defences with this pathetic attack?"10
Vallasch stretched his left leg forward and rested his foot against the orc's neck, bringing his sword forward so his enemy could stare his death in the face. As the captain looked at the black blade he noticed intricate symbols inscribed into it of an origin he didn't recognise. For a moment he could swear he heard whispers in a wicked voice emanate from the sword but his attention snapped back to reality as the elf began to speak. "Why?" he answered, his voice soft but backed with strong annunciation. "Because...My Lord Cromicon calls for your obliteration. My love, my mistress desires your pain. And..." he lifted the sword point down, high in the air.11
The orc ignored the obvious attempt to instil fear in him and watched as the female dark elf joined his killer. All elves looked the same to him but the male was certainly younger in appearance, possibly only at the beginning of his adult years. With that realisation he felt shame pull at his deflated ego. He watched the female embrace her mate, but prodding against the flesh wound one of his soldiers had made to the side of the male's abdomen. She forced him to grimace slightly as she encouraged a new trail of blood to weep from it. His attention was suddenly torn away as he saw that the blood pouring from his own wounds began to evaporate around him. He watched in horror as the bloody haze swept up and coiled around the black blade in a gaseous sheath. Some of it began to pool into the markings and glowed furiously, and the malign whispers came again.12
"And," Vallasch repeated nodding to his sword, "he wants your blood." The orc had no time to scream, as the full weight of Bloodfire caved down into his mouth.13
--14
The shrill below of horns filled the fortress as General Zorg burst out of the barracks door with his twelve-strong retinue behind him, each carrying a poleaxe or halberd. All over the courtyard troops swarmed toward the gates or the armoury. "Come ‘ere you dogs!" he said snarling from behind his tusked pot helm. "What in the name of Rallos Zek is happenin'?" He was a hulking figure, as broad as he was tall. His arms were bare, armoured only in a cuirass, a single spaulder with a multitude of spikes on his left arm, and half-plate greaves. The sight of his helmet combined with his body mass made him look more like some kind of hybrid between orc and mammoth. Strapped against his back was a glaive with a saw-toothed blade. It's monstrous size obviously specifically crafted for only someone of his colossal stature. His furious orange eyes scanned the scurrying grunts before he single-handedly yanked one into the air by their arm. 15
With a throaty bark from his general the orc squirmed and yelped, "Dark elves boss! It's an attack!"16
"WHAT? Then what are you waiting for, MOVE! " he roared, even though he'd only just dropped the trooper to the ground.17
"B-but my arm, it feels broken!"18
"So?" replied Zorg gruffly. "You've still got the uver one! So you can still use a choppa! Now go." With that he gave a mighty kick to the soldier's chest sending him five meters away.19
While his personal guard were forced to run to keep up, Zorg strode on toward the shambled mass of troops at the front walls. His mighty voice easily carried over the din of alarms and shouts. "Wake up you scum! Archers, get on that wall. Open da gates! We need more troops to reinforce the vanguard."20
One of the orcs wearing battered platemail approached Zorg. He was head and shoulders above the grunts but still nowhere near the mass of the general. "But boss, we've only spotted two of them. Lets just keep da gates closed an' shoot ‘em."21
"No pointy eared, midgety elves are stupid enough to come ‘ere on their own! Not even if they knew we had a maggot brained idiot like you as a gate captain Goortz!" Zorg's looming shadow swallowed Goortz as he lurched toward him, "Now you get out there and do something useful with that lumpy skull of yours, I'm da boss now!" As Goortz promptly ran to the inner gate to rally troops, Zorg turned to his bodyguards. "Make sure he doesn't screw up, keep an eye on him." They said nothing and marched toward the gate. The slowly opening gate...22
Seeing the lack of progress Zorg hauled himself up a ladder against the front wall. Pushing several archers out of his way as he reached one of the cranks that operated the drawbridge either side of the gatehouse. "I said get it open, NOW!" he bellowed. Grabbing the orc that was straining to carry out the order, he single-handedly threw him over the wall to tumble into the moat. Then he drew his glaive. Wielding it as easily as twig he smashed it into the crank, tearing it from the wall with an explosion of debris and splintered wood. With nothing keeping the chain secured, the heavy weight of the bridge caused the brackets against the gatehouse to wrench away. It slammed onto the ground and orc infantry ploughed forward across it, gushing through the outer gate the second it was unbarred. Hundreds of orcish lungs forced a thunderous chorus into the air. "DEATHFIST! DEATHFIST! DEATHFIST!"23
Zorg's eye caught movement. He snatched an archer by his jerkin and held him in front. A second later the archer was dead, three arrows protruding from his throat. Still waving the corpse around like a shield Zorg barked commands at the archers to return fire. But the arrows of the Dawnwatcher's scouts struck with deadly precision. Killing an archer with every hit. They only managed to fire a few un-aimed volleys before they had to duck behind the ramparts for cover. Seeing them huddled in the rocks beyond the western wall, Zorg roared his defiance at Optio and his men. Joining the cacophony of, "DEATHFIST! DEATHFIST! DEATHFIST!"24
--25
"Yes, excellent! They're coming exactly as I have designed," cackled Crom as he raised his arms in a beckoning gesture. "Dawnwatchers advance, make sure the enemy sees you. Give Vallasch and our scouts space to regroup." Half their number, a phalanx of humans, dwarves, iksar, elves and a menagerie of other creatures made their way past Cromicon and down the hill. He knew that a dozen Dawnwatchers couldn't halt the orcish tide, which was precisely why, "I think it's time to recruit from the local militia." He strode a few steps forward out of the foliage and threw his arms wide, then burst into hysterical laughter, "See me. See me now. See your pestilent death!"26
He threw off his spectacles to reveal his maniacal eyes, bulging horrifically before they melted out of the sockets. The patterned flames upon his robe burst into true arcane fire, searing all over his body, cremating his flesh. Through the monstrous inferno he simply continued laughing, his voice taking on a new echoing resonance. The sound was like three Cromicons speaking simultaneously through one mouth, but each at a slightly higher pitch. His robes fell away in a pile of ash, followed closely by every scrap of tissue from his body, reduced to nothing but a smouldering ruin. What remained of Conqueror Cromicon was a black skeleton, now the same height as a human. Pink fire still cloaked him, dancing across his fleshless bones and unholy red light flared from the empty sockets where his eyes used to be. Now revealed as Arch Lich Cromicon his hideous laughter finally ended as a pair of horns sprouted from the temples of his skull, pointing forward.27
"Reob, have them begin the incantation," he said with his new voice, more demonic than before. As Reob, another gnome and cluster of other necromancers in black robes chanted in a cursed language behind Cromicon, he punched a skeletal claw into the air. "This citadel is a tombstone, marking the graves of thousands of soldiers from hundreds of battles. Their corpses were trod into the ground, pecked apart by ravenous birds or simply left to fester in the open air! The fortress stands as a monument to their failure. I hear their restless spirits, the discord of their dying wishes, which I intend to grant." A cloying shroud swirled through the air around him, throbbing with the necromancers' monotonous spell. His hand was acting as a beacon. Siphoning the powerful flow of forbidden magic into himself. Such power being driven into his body would have killed a mortal man outright. But he hadn't been mortal for a long time. "Victims of Deathfist, I give you... YOUR REVENGE!" he screamed as he crouched and slammed his hand against the ground, causing it to quake briefly with the negative energy he channelled.28
For a few moments nothing happened. But then the entire valley made a ghastly wail as dark magic raped the earth and thousands of lost souls were dragged screaming back into their bodies. Cromicons new army burst from the ground all around the walls of Deathfist Citadel. Wights, zombies, revenants and the skeletons of ancient soldiers reared up onto their feet for the first time in a number of years they had long since forgotten. As they brandished their time-eroded weapons once more, they marched toward the orcs in silence. The one thing they could remember hung about the living corpses like a shroud. Their empty but accusing eyes were full of it. It was even present in their skinless smiles.29
Malice.30
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