A WARHAMMER “TIME OF LEGENDS” NOVEL

NAGASH THE UNBROKEN

Nagash - 02

Mike Lee

(An Undead Scan v1.0)

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It is a Time of Legends, a time of gods and daemons, of kings and heroes blessed

with the power of the divine.

The arid land of Nehekhara has been blessed by the hands of the gods, giving birth

to the first great human civilization by the banks of the winding River Vitac. The

Nehekharans dwell in eight proud city-states, each with its own patron deity whose

blessings shape the character and fortunes of its people. The greatest of them all,

situated at the nexus of this ancient land, is Khemri, the fabled Living City of

Settra the Magnificent.

It was Settra, hundreds of years before, who united the cities of Nehekhara into

mankind’s first empire, and declared that he would rule over it forever. He

commanded his priests to unlock the secret of life eternal, and when the great

emperor eventually died, his body was entombed within a mighty pyramid until the

day when his liche priests would summon his soul back from the afterlife.

After Settra’s death, his great empire unravelled, and Khemri’s power waned. Now,

amid the haunted shadows of Khemri’s mortuary temple, a brilliant and mighty

priest broods over the cruelties of fate and covets his brother’s crown.

His name is Nagash.

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PROLOGUE

New Beginnings

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 63rd year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1739 Imperial Reckoning)

Small, soft hands gripped her and gently shook her. Voices whispered urgently in her

ears, calling her back across the gulf of dreams, until the Daughter of the Moon

stirred at last from her slumber and opened her heavy-lidded eyes. It was very late.

Neru hung low on the horizon, sending shafts of lambent moonlight through the tall

windows of the bedchamber. The golden lamps had been turned down, and only the

faintest hint of incense still lingered near the room’s tiled ceiling.

The sea breeze stirred the gauzy curtains surrounding her bed, carrying ghostly

sounds of revelry from the Red Silk Quarter, down by the city docks.

Neferata, Daughter of the Moon and the Queen of Lahmia, rolled onto her back

and blinked slowly in the gloom. Tephret, her most favoured handmaiden, was

crouched by the head of the queen’s sumptuous bed, one slim hand still resting

protectively on Neferata’s naked shoulder. The queen irritably brushed the touch

away, her own fingers slow and clumsy from the effects of too much black lotus and

sweet, Eastern wine.

“What is it?” Neferata murmured, her voice thick with sleep.

“The king,” Tephret whispered. The handmaiden’s face was hidden in shadow,

but the outline of her slender body was tense. “The king is here, great one.”

Neferata stared at Tephret for a moment, not quite able to make sense of what

she’d heard. The queen sat up in bed, the silken sheets flowing over the curves of her

body and pooling in her lap. She shook her head gently, struggling to think through

the clinging fog of the lotus. “What time is it?”

“The hour of the dead,” Tephret replied, her voice wavering slightly. Like all of

the queen’s handmaidens, she was also a priestess of Neru, and sensitive to the

omens of the night. “The grand vizier awaits you in the Hall of Reverent

Contemplation.”

The mention of the grand vizier cut through the mists surrounding Neferata’s

brain at last. She swung her slender legs over the edge of the bed, next to Tephret,

and let out a slow, thoughtful breath. “Bring me the hixa,” she said, “and my saffron

robes.”

Tephret bowed, touching her forehead to the top of Neferata’s feet, then rose and

began hissing orders to the rest of the queen’s handmaidens. Half a dozen young

women stirred from their sleeping cushions at the far end of the room as Neferata

rose carefully to her feet and walked to the open windows facing the sea. The surface

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of the water was calm as glass, and the great trading ships from the Silk Lands rode

easy at their anchors in the crowded harbour. Specks of red and yellow lantern-light

bobbed like fireflies down Lahmia’s close-set streets as the palanquins of noblemen

and wealthy traders made their way home from an evening of debauchery.

The lights of the Red Silk District, as well as the more upper-class District of the

Golden Lotus, still burned brightly, while the rest of the great city had sunk

reluctantly into slumber. From where Neferata stood, she could just see the sandstone

expanse of Asaph’s Quay, at the edge of the Temple District and just north of the city

harbour. The ceremonial site was bare.

The queen frowned pensively, though she’d expected no less.

“There was no word from the army?” she asked. “None at all?”

“None,” Tephret confirmed. The handmaiden glided swiftly across the room and

knelt beside the queen, offering up a small box made from fine golden filigree. “The

king’s servants are in an uproar.”

Neferata nodded absently and plucked the box from Tephret’s hands. She

carefully opened the lid.

Inside, the hixa stirred torpidly. Neferata gripped the large, wingless wasp

between thumb and forefinger and pressed its abdomen against the hollow beneath

her left ear. It took a few moments of agitation before she felt the hixa’s sting and the

prickling tide of pain that washed across her face and scalp. Blood pounded in a

rising crescendo at her temples and behind her eyes, finally receding several seconds

later into a dull, throbbing ache that set her teeth on edge but left her alert and clear-

headed at last. There was no better cure for the lingering effects of lotus and wine, as

the nobles of the city knew all too well.

She placed the hixa back in the box with a sigh and handed it back to Tephret,

then raised her arms so that her maids could wrap her body in ceremonial robes of

welcome. Tephret set the golden box aside and hurried to a cabinet of gilded ebony

that contained the queen’s royal mask. Made of beaten gold and inlaid with rubies,

polished onyx and mother-of-pearl, it had been crafted by the artisan-priests of Asaph

as a perfect likeness of the queen’s regal face. It was the face she was required to

show to the rest of the world. In time, it would serve as her death mask as well.

It would have taken hours for Neferata to fully prepare herself for her husband’s

return; she impatiently waved aside the proffered golden bracelets and necklaces, and

glared at the maids who tried to paint her eyes with crushed beetle shell and kohl.

The instant her girdle was pulled tight and the royal mask set carefully upon her face,

she snatched up Asaph’s snake-headed sceptre from Tephret’s hands and hurried

from the bedchamber. A servant dashed ahead of Neferata, her bare feet slapping on

the polished marble tiles as she held up a bobbing lantern to light their way.

Neferata moved as swiftly as her confining robes would allow, but it still took ten

long minutes to traverse the labyrinth of shadowy corridors, luxurious rooms and

ornamental gardens that separated her apartments from the rest of the palace. It was a

world apart, a palace within a palace that served as both sanctuary and prison for the

women of the Lahmian royal bloodline. Not even the king himself could enter, save

on certain holy days dedicated to the goddess Asaph and her divine revels.

There were only three small audience chambers where the queen and her

daughters were allowed to interact with the outside world. The largest and grandest,

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the Hall of the Sun in its Divine Glory, was set aside to celebrate weddings and

childbirths, and was open at various times to both the royal household and the

common folk of the city. The smallest, a dark vault of green marble known as the

Hall of Regretful Sorrows, was where long, solemn processions of Lahmian citizens

would come to pay their last respects to a dead queen before her journey to the House

of Everlasting Life.

In between was the Hall of Reverent Contemplation, a medium-sized chamber

built from warm, golden sandstone and inlaid with screens of lustrous, polished

wood. More temple than audience chamber, it was here that the king and the noble

families of the city—as well as a handful of common folk, chosen by lot—would

gather to pay homage to the queen and receive her blessings for the coming year.

By the time Neferata arrived at the hall the great golden lamps had been lit, and

incense was curling in dark, blue-grey ribbons from the braziers that flanked the

royal dais. A red-faced servant, glistening with sweat, was single-handedly trying to

unfold the delicate wooden screen that was meant to shield the royal presence from

unworthy eyes. The queen stopped the servant in her tracks with a curt wave of her

hand as she stepped from behind the elegantly carved wooden throne and approached

the robed figure resting upon his knees at the foot of the dais.

Like the queen, Grand Vizier Ubaid had taken the time to don his ceremonial

saffron robes to welcome the king’s return. His shaven pate had been freshly oiled

and matched the mellow tone of the room’s polished wood. Neferata could barely

make out the coiling tattoos of Asaph’s sacred serpents that wound sinuously about

the sides of Ubaid’s head and neck. She couldn’t help but note that the thin coating of

fragrant oil effectively concealed any signs of nervous sweat on Ubaid’s high

forehead.

The grand vizier bowed low the stone floor as Neferata descended the broad steps

of the royal dais. “A thousand, thousand pardons, great one—” he began.

“What is the meaning of this, Ubaid?” Neferata hissed. Her husky voice sounded

harsh and menacing within the golden confines of her mask. “What is he doing

here?”

Ubaid straightened, spreading his hands in a gesture of supplication. “I swear, I

do not know,” he replied. “He arrived little more than an hour ago with a small

retinue and a handful of slaves.”

Like most Lahmian nobles, the grand vizier had a slender neck, high cheekbones

and a prominent jaw-line. Years of rich living hadn’t softened him, like many of his

peers, and despite being of middle age his body was still slender and strong. Many at

court suspected him of being a sorcerer, but Neferata knew that he was simply very

good at keeping up appearances. He had even taken to wearing golden caps on the

ends of his little fingers, each one ending in a long, artificial nail in the fashion of

bureaucrats from the Silk Lands across the sea. The affectation did nothing to

improve the queen’s mood.

“Where is the army?” she demanded. “The last report said they were still three

days’ march away.”

Ubaid shrugged helplessly. “There is no way of knowing, great one. Likely they

are still somewhere on the trade road, west of the Golden Plain. Certainly they are

nowhere near the city itself. The king appears to have hurried on ahead of the host.”

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As well as the majority of his noble allies, Neferata observed, growing more

irritated by the moment. Absolutely nothing about Lamashizzar’s expedition to

Mahrak had gone according to plan, and now he was risking the ire of people whose

goodwill he would desperately need in the years to come. “And where is the king

now?” she asked coldly.

The vizier’s carefully composed expression cracked somewhat around the edges.

“He’s… in the cellars,” he answered in a subdued voice. “He went there straightaway

with his men—”

“The cellars?” Neferata snapped. “Why? To inventory the jars of grain and

honey?”

“I…” Ubaid stammered. “I’m sure I can’t say—”

“Asaph’s teeth!” the queen swore. “I was being sarcastic, Ubaid. I know perfectly

well what he’s doing down there,” she said. “Take me to him.”

Ubaid’s eyes widened. “I’m not certain that would be proper, great one—”

Neferata straightened her shoulders and glared down at the grand vizier, her

golden face implacable and cold. “Grand vizier, the king has flouted ancient tradition

by returning to the city in this… unorthodox… fashion. By custom and by law, he

hasn’t officially returned, which means that I continue to rule this city in

Lamashizzar’s name. Do you understand?”

The grand vizier bowed his head at once. Over the last year and a half he’d been

exceedingly careful to conceal his true feelings about the king’s secret dispensation

of power. By rights, Ubaid should have been the one to rule Lahmia in Lamashizzar’s

absence; the queens of Lahmia were not meant to sully themselves with mundane

affairs of state. Now, eighteen months later, Ubaid understood what had persuaded

the king to make such a scandalous choice.

“Please follow me, great one,” he replied smoothly, and rose to his feet.

The great palace was honeycombed with a network of hidden passageways, built for

the use of the household’s many servants, and Ubaid led the queen through a

veritable labyrinth of narrow, dimly-lit corridors and dusty storage rooms as they

made their way to the cellars. Neferata could barely see where she was going within

the confines of her mask. The servant’s lantern bobbed in the darkness ahead of her

like some teasing river spirit, luring her onward to her doom.

Finally she found herself descending a series of long, narrow ramps, and the air

turned cold and damp. Gooseflesh raced along the skin of her neck and arms, but she

suppressed the urge to shiver. Then a few minutes later she felt the weight of the

narrow passageways fall away to her left and right, and she realised that they’d

entered a large, low-ceilinged space. Neferata glimpsed stacks of rounded, clay jars

sealed with wax, and heard the distant sound of voices somewhere up ahead.

Ubaid led her through one interconnected cellar after another, past jars of spices,

salt and honey, bolts of cloth and bricks of beeswax. The sense of space began to

shrink again, and the queen reckoned that they were heading into a much older part

of the cellars. The voices grew more distinct, until she could clearly make out her

husband’s hushed, urgent voice.

Suddenly, the grand vizier halted and stepped aside. Neferata rushed ahead and

emerged into a small, dripping chamber stacked with wide-bellied wine jars bearing

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the royal seal. A handful of torches guttered from the walls, casting strange, leaping

shadows across the floor.

Lamashizzar, Priest King of Lahmia, City of the Dawn, stood over an opened

wine jar and gulped greedily from a golden drinking bowl. His rich, silken robes

were grimed with the dust of the road, and his tightly curled black hair was matted

and limp with sweat. Half a dozen noblemen stood around the king, all of them

travel-stained and reeling from fatigue. Several drank along with the king, while the

rest stole apprehensive glances at the slaves working feverishly at the far side of the

room. None of them noticed the sudden appearance of the queen.

Neferata studied the men for a long moment and felt her irritation sharpen into

icy rage. She took another step into the room and drew a deep breath. “This is an ill-

omened thing,” she declared in a cold, clear voice.

Startled cries rang off the stone walls as the noblemen whirled, their dark faces

pale and eyes wide with shock. To Neferata’s profound surprise, many of them

reached for their swords; they caught themselves at the last possible moment, hands

hovering over the hilts of their blades. Yet they did not relax. None of them did.

Instead, their eyes darted between Neferata and the king, as though uncertain how to

proceed.

Now it was the queen’s turn to stare in amazement. Some of the men she knew to

be Lamashizzar’s closest supporters, while others, though Lahmian, were strangers to

her. All of them shared the same tense, hard-edged expression, the same fevered glint

in their eyes.

They look like cornered animals, Neferata thought, thankful that the all-enclosing

mask hid her startled reaction. Is this what war does to civilized men?

The king himself was no less stunned to see his queen. His handsome face was

sallow and drawn; his eyes were sunken and his cheeks hollowed out from poor

eating and little sleep, but his gaze was sharper and more penetrating than ever.

Lamashizzar lowered the drinking bowl. Red wine trickled thickly down the sides of

his sharp chin.

“What in the name of the dawn are you doing here, sister?” he rasped.

“I?” Neferata snapped, her anger managing to overcome her growing unease.

“More to the point, what are you doing here?” She advanced on Lamashizzar, her

hands clenched into fists. “There are sacred rites to be observed. The king may not

return to the city without first performing the Propitiations of the East. You must

thank Asaph for the blessing she gave when you first set out to war!” Neferata’s

voice grew in volume along with her ire, until her voice rang like a bell within the

confines of the mask. “But the army isn’t expected for days yet. Asaph’s Quay is

bare of offerings from the citizenry. The proper sacrifices have not been made.”

Without warning, the queen lashed out, striking the drinking bowl from the king’s

hand. “What happened?” she hissed. “Did you drink all the wine you plundered from

here to Khemri? Couldn’t you have waited two more days to slake your thirst? This is

an offence against the gods, brother.”

For a moment, no one moved. Neferata could feel the tension crackling like

caged lightning in the air. The king glanced past Neferata. “That will be all, Ubaid,”

he said to the grand vizier.

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Ubaid bowed and hastily withdrew, his robes rustling as he fled from the cellar as

quickly as his dignity would allow.

Lamashizzar stared at the queen, his eyes depth-less and strange. He raised his

hand and laid the tips of his fingers against the mask’s curved, golden cheek.

“The gods do not care, sister,” he said softly. “They no longer hear our prayers.

Nagash the Usurper saw to that on the plain outside Mahrak. Did you not read any of

my letters?”

“Of course I did,” Neferata replied, suppressing a chill at the mention of

Nagash’s name. She and Lamashizzar had been born during the height of the

Usurper’s reign, when the former Grand Hierophant of Khemri’s mortuary cult had

held all of Nehekhara in his iron grip. It was only when the kings of the east had risen

in revolt against Khemri that they had learned true horror of the Usurper’s power,

and though they eventually triumphed, the cost of victory was almost too terrible to

contemplate.

Angrily, she pushed aside the king’s hand and stalked past him. At the far end of

the chamber, the slaves stopped what they were doing and abased themselves at her

approach.

“It doesn’t matter if the covenant has been broken or not,” Neferata continued.

“In matters of state—and religion—perception is every bit as important as reality.

Lahmia was spared from the worst excesses of Nagash’s rule, but the war has

disrupted trade with the west for more than ten years now. Fortunes have been lost—

to say nothing of the enormous debt we now owe the Emperor of the Silk Lands. If

the people had any inkling of the deal we struck to obtain their dragon-powder there

would be rioting in the streets.”

“That was Lamasheptra’s doing, not mine,” Lamashizzar pointed out, bending to

retrieve his drinking bowl.

“It doesn’t matter!” Neferata insisted. “Father is dead. You are the one on the

throne, now. The people look to you for reassurance. They need to believe that the

Usurper’s reign of terror is over and that a new era has begun. They need to know

that Lahmia will prosper once more.”

The queen’s tirade had carried her nearly all the way across the chamber. The

slaves were still as statues, their previous labours forgotten as they pressed their

foreheads to the earthen floor. They had been in the process of shifting scores of

dusty wine jars and dismantling wooden shelves to create a cleared space for—

Neferata came to a sudden halt. Her eyes widened behind the golden mask as she

saw the linen-wrapped bundles resting on the earthen floor. “What—” she

stammered, suddenly at a loss for words. “Brother, what is all this?”

Behind her, Lamashizzar dipped his bowl in the open jar. He stared into its ruby

depths, and an ironic smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

“The dawn of a new era,” he said, raising the bowl to his lips.

They were not jugs of plundered wine or wrapped brinks of lotus leaf. Neferata

saw that at once. Each bundle had roughly square sides, some reaching as high as her

knees. The linen wrappings were stained brown by countless leagues of travel, and

were bound with braided twine. She went to the closest one. Slaves scattered from

her path like frightened birds as she knelt beside the parcel and tugged at its bindings

with long-nailed fingers. As she did, a stir went through the assembled nobles.

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Neferata heard angry growls and choked protests, until finally one of the men could

contain himself no longer.

“Stop her!” the nobleman snapped. Neferata didn’t recognise the voice. “What is

she even doing outside the Women’s Palace? She should be in her proper place,

not—”

“She is the queen,” Lamashizzar said, in a voice as cold and hard as Eastern iron.

“She goes where she wills.”

Neferata listened to the tense exchange with only half an ear. Her dark fingers

teased the twine knot apart, and a corner of the linen wrapping fell away to reveal—

“Books?” the queen said. Her eyebrows knitted together in a frown. They were

thick tomes of expensive Lybaran paper, bound in a strange kind of pale leather that

sent prickles of unease racing down her spine.

“The books of Nagash,” Lamashizzar explained. “Smuggled from his pyramid

outside Khemri. All his secrets: his plans, his studies, his… his experiments. It’s all

there.”

Neferata felt her heart grow cold. She rose and turned to face the king. “I don’t

understand, brother,” she hissed. “You were supposed to forge an alliance with the

Usurper. With the power under your command you could have broken the siege at

Mahrak and handed the east to Nagash! He would have agreed to any terms—”

“No,” Lamashizzar said flatly. He took another long draught from the bowl, his

face haunted with memory. “You weren’t there, sister. You didn’t see the… the

creature that Nagash had become.”

“We knew he was a sorcerer—” Neferata began.

“He was a monster,” Lamashizzar said darkly. “None of the rumours we’d heard

came anywhere close to the truth. Nagash was no longer human, and what he’d done

to Neferem—” The king’s words dried up in his throat. Finally, he shook his head.

“Believe me, Nagash would have never honoured the terms of an alliance, much less

shared the secrets of eternal life.” He gestured at the stacks of linen-wrapped volumes

with his drinking bowl, sloshing thick wine onto the floor. “So. Better this than

nothing at all.”

Neferata spread her hands. “Indeed? Are you a sorcerer now?” she shot back.

“I’m certainly not.”

“You were trained by the priestesses of Neru,” Lamashizzar said. “You know

how to perform incantations, how to create elixirs—”

The queen shook her head. “That’s not the same thing,” she protested.

“It’s enough,” Lamashizzar said. He lurched forward, seizing Neferata by the

wrist, and pulled her after him as he wound his way drunkenly through the collection

of plundered tomes. Beyond the linen-wrapped books lay another shape, stretched

out against the dank stone wall. “We also have this,” the king said proudly.

It was a corpse. It had been inexpertly wrapped, and the linen bindings were

devoid of the ritual symbols of the mortuary cult, but the shape of the body was

unmistakeable.

The king gave his sister a conspiratorial smile. “Go on,” he said, squeezing her

wrist with surprising strength. “Take a look.” His eyes glittered like glass, sharp and

fever-bright.

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Lamashizzar’s hand squeezed harder. Neferata clenched her jaw and sank slowly

to her knees. She heard the slaves shift nervously behind her as she stretched out her

free hand and began to gingerly pull away the wrappings that covered the corpse’s

head.

The face took shape by degrees: first a man’s beaklike nose, then a prominent

brow and deeply sunken eyes. Next came sharp-edged cheekbones and a long, square

jaw that gaped in a grimace of agony, revealing a mouthful of jagged, blackened

teeth.

The corpse’s skin was pale as a fish’s belly and covered in a patchwork of fine

scars. The veins at his temples and along his neck were black with old, clotted blood.

The very sight of it filled the queen with revulsion. Neferata recoiled from the

ghastly visage. “What in the name of all the gods—”

Lamashizzar pulled her close. “He is the key,” the king hissed, filling her nostrils

with the sour reek of wine. “This is Arkhan the Black. Do you know the name?”

“Of course,” the queen said with a grimace. “He was the Usurper’s grand vizier.”

“And one of the first immortals,” the king added. “But he fell from favour during

the war and betrayed Nagash on the eve of the great battle at Mahrak. He offered me

the power over life and death if I would side with the rebel kings against his former

master.” Lamashizzar gave the queen an almost boyish wink. “After the battle, I hid

him in my baggage train during the long march to Khemri. No one suspected a thing.

The others thought he’d fled westward with the rest of the Usurper’s immortals, so

once we’d reached the Living City and the Usurper’s troops made their last stand in

the city’s necropolis, I paid some soldiers to spread the rumour that Arkhan had been

seen fighting to the bitter end at the foot of his master’s pyramid. No doubt the

story’s taken on epic proportions since then.”

“And Arkhan actually held to his bargain?” she asked.

The king smiled. “As much as I expected he would. He led me to the books, deep

in the heart of the Black Pyramid.”

“Then you killed him.”

Lamashizzar’s smile never faltered. “Is that what you think?”

Neferata’s expression hardened beneath the mask. With a savage jerk, she tore

her wrist from the king’s grasp. “You’re drunk,” she hissed. “And I am not in the

mood for games, brother.”

That was when the smile faded from the king’s face. Slowly, deliberately, he

lowered his hand and set the bowl of wine upon the floor. His eyes bored into hers.

“Then perhaps I should make it plain for you,” he said quietly. He spoke again, in

that voice as hard and cold as iron. “Bring them.”

There was a commotion behind Neferata, and the slaves began to wail in terror.

She froze at the sound, and watched as Lamashizzar leaned forward and tore away

the linen bindings wrapping Arkhan’s torso. The immortal’s chest was even more

scarred than his face, but what was worse was the blackened, thumb-sized hole in

Arkhan’s breast, just above his heart.

“He was swift, but the bullet in my dragon stave was swifter still,” Lamashizzar

said. His nobles crowded around him, dragging the terrified slaves over to Arkhan’s

body. “It’s still there, buried in his heart. Here. Let me show you.”

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The king crouched over the body and pressed his fingers deep into the wound.

There was a thick, liquid sound, and Lamashizzar grunted in satisfaction. When he

drew his hand away his fingers were covered in a black fluid as thick as tar. A fat,

round metal ball was gripped between his fingertips. He held up the bullet and

studied it for a moment.

“You see?” he said. “Such a wound would have killed one of father’s mighty

Ushabti, much less a mere mortal like you or I. But to Arkhan it was nothing more

than an interruption.”

The king bent close to the immortal’s face. His voice dropped to a whisper. “He’s

still in there,” Lamashizzar said, but whether he said it to Neferata or to the immortal

himself, the queen could not be certain. “Locked in a cell of flesh and bone. So long

as his heart cannot beat, Nagash’s elixir cannot circulate through his limbs, nor fan

the flame of his cursed soul.”

The look on the king’s face sent a shudder through Neferata. This was not the

libertine who had led his father’s army to Mahrak. The things he had seen on the

field of battle—and possibly within the pages of the books he’d stolen from the

Usurper’s crypt—had left an impression in the young king’s mind. Blessed Neru, she

thought. What if he’s gone mad?

Lamashizzar chuckled to himself, entirely oblivious to his sister’s mounting

unease. “I have had many discussions with the former vizier on the journey home,

and I believe we have reached an understanding. He will serve us, unlocking his

former master’s secrets and teaching us how to create the elixir for ourselves. If he

serves well, then we will share the draught of life with him. If not…” he paused, and

his expression grew hard. “Then we will send him back into his cell, and we shall see

how long it takes for an immortal’s body to collapse into dust.”

The king tossed the bullet aside, then nodded curtly to his noblemen. Without a

word they drew knives from their belts and began slitting the slaves’ throats.

Hot blood sprayed through the air. The slaves thrashed and choked, pouring out

their lives onto Arkhan’s still form. As they died, Lamashizzar picked up the pale

leather tome and began turning its pages.

“The world has changed, sister,” Lamashizzar said. “The old gods have left us,

and a new power has risen to take its place—a power that now we alone possess. We

shall usher in a new age for Lahmia and the rest of Nehekhara. One that we shall

preside over until the end of time.”

At their feet, the blood-soaked body of Arkhan the Black drew in a terrible,

shuddering breath. His bruised eyelids fluttered, and Neferata found herself staring

into a pair of dark, soulless eyes.

The Wasteland, in the 63rd year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1739 Imperial Reckoning)

Night came swiftly to the wasteland.

As the last rays of Ptra’s hateful, searing light disappeared behind the jagged

fangs of the Brittle Peaks, stealing away the heat of the day and filling the narrow

gullies with inky shadow, the hunters of the dead spaces began to stir from their lairs.

11

Deadly vipers slithered from beneath rocky overhangs, tasting the air with their

darting tongues. Scorpions and huge, hairy spiders crawled from their daytime

burrows and began their hunt, seeking sources of heat against the contrasting

coolness of the rocky ground.

In one shadow-haunted gully, half a dozen lean, spotted shapes came nosing

along the broken ground, tracking the scent of death. The jackals had been following

the trail for many nights; it had rambled and looped back upon itself many times, like

the path of a beast lost in madness and on the verge of collapse. Now the hunters

sensed that the prey had been run to ground at last. Sniffing at the chill air, they

edged towards a low overhang carved deep into the gully wall.

Within the darkness of the overhang, a bundle of rags stirred fitfully at the

jackals’ approach. The scavengers paused, ears forward, watching as a single, bony

hand groped its way painfully from beneath the overhang. The skin was blackened

and leathery, the nails yellowed and splintered by months of scrabbling over rocks

and burrowing in the dry earth. The skin of the knuckles was split, peeled back like

shreds of dry parchment to reveal grey flesh inlaid with grit.

The jackals watched as the long fingers arched, digging into the earth for

purchase. There was a rustle of fabric and loose dirt. A trio of sleek, black lizards

bolted from beneath the overhang, startled as their refuge began to shift beneath

them.

Slowly, shakily, the figure dragged itself out into the night air. First an emaciated

arm, then a bony shoulder, then a thin torso clad in grimy robes that had once been

the colour of blood.

A bald head, blackened and blistered by the sun god’s merciless touch, emerged

from the shadows: a man’s face, once handsome, now ravaged by the elements and

the horrors of war. Dark eyes, set deep in bony sockets, regarded the jackals with

feverish intensity. The man’s face was gaunt to the point of being skeletal, his cheeks

and nose frayed by brushes with rock and the mandibles of burrowing insects. A

ragged hole, wide as a man’s thumb, had been punched into his forehead, close to the

left temple. At one time the ghastly wound had grown infected, causing the flesh to

swell around the rim of splintered bone and the veins to distend with corruption.

The jackals lowered their heads and began to whine softly as the figure continued

to drag itself from its refuge. This was not what they expected. Indeed, their would-

be prey exuded a sense of wrongness that their animal brains couldn’t quite

comprehend.

Death hung over the man like a shroud. In addition to the awful wound in his

head, his left arm was coiled uselessly against his chest. Another hole had been

blown through the upper limb, shattering the bone and constricting the muscles into

immobile knots. The scent of old bile rose from a puncture in the man’s belly, and

another wound in his chest carried the reek of old infection.

Dead, the jackals’ minds said. The man ought to be dead long since. And yet still

the leathery muscles worked, creaking like old ropes. The eyes still burned with an

almost feral rage. Thin, cracked lips drew back from blackened teeth in a snarl of

challenge.

Nagash the Usurper, Undying King of fallen Khemri and for a time the master of

Nehekhara, pressed his palm against the stones and grit of the gully floor and with a

12

bubbling growl pushed himself to his feet. Once upright, he swayed slightly as he

turned his head to the gleaming face of the moon and let out a long, ululating howl of

hate.

The jackals flinched at the awful sound. It proved too much for the leader of the

pack, who let out a nervous bark and sped from the gully with the pack hard on its

heels.

Nagash continued to howl long after they were gone, emptying the last dregs of

air from his lungs in a long, wordless curse against the living world. The exertion left

him shivering and weak, his skin burning with a fever that had no basis in the

sicknesses of living flesh.

Like the jackals, he turned his face skyward, casting about for spoor. The scent of

power hung above the emptiness of the wasteland, emanating from the slopes of a

dark, brooding mountain that always seemed to lie just beyond the far horizon. It had

a flavour unlike anything he’d ever tasted before; not dark magic, which he knew

well, nor the fitful heat of a human soul. It was something furious and unfettered,

primal and alien at the same time. It shone like a beacon in the emptiness, promising

him vengeance against those who had betrayed him and cast him out into the wastes.

He thirsted for it, and yet, like a mirage, it seemed to recede into the distance with

every step he took. Lately, even the scent of it had grown vague. It was getting harder

and harder to sense it past the pain of his ravaged body and the fever buzzing in his

skull.

You’re growing weaker, a voice said. Your power is almost spent. Darkness

waits, Usurper. Darkness eternal, and the cold winds of the Abyss.

Nagash whirled, hissing with rage. She stood just a few feet away, her translucent

body silhouetted by moonlight. Neferem, last Queen of Khemri, looked much as she

did the day she died: a withered, ravaged husk of a woman, transformed into a living

mummy by Nagash’s sorceries. Only her eyes, large and brilliant as cut emeralds,

hinted at the beauty that had been taken from her. Her ghostly figure was clad in

ragged samite, and the golden headdress of a queen rested precariously upon her

brow.

The Usurper reached out with his hand and clenched it at her like a claw—but his

febrile mind failed him. The words of power that once bound the ghosts of

Nehekhara to his will had been somehow stolen from him. Rage and frustration

boiled inside his brain.

“Witch!” he hissed. His voice sounded somewhere between a growl and a groan.

“I am Nagash the Immortal! Death cannot claim me! I have passed beyond its

grasp!”

So have we all, Neferem replied soundlessly. Her eyes glittered with hate. You

saw to that at Mahrak. The paths to the Lands of the Dead are no more, swept away

when you used me to undo the sacred covenant with the gods. Now none of us shall

ever know peace. Her shrivelled face contorted into the ghastly semblance of a smile.

Especially you.

Snarling with fury, Nagash whirled about, tasting the air for traces of the

otherworldly power. It seemed to lie just beyond the line of peaks to the east. He

lurched forward, scrabbling one-handed at the loose scree lining the gully slope. The

13

Usurper scaled the steep incline with an awkward, spider-like gait. When he was

almost to the top, he turned back to Neferem’s vengeful spirit.

“You haunt me at your peril, witch!” he croaked. “When I find the dark mountain

I will have the power to consume souls and command the spirits of the dead as I once

did! I’ll feast upon you, then, and silence your moaning forever!”

But the queen did not hear him. She was gone, as though she’d never been there.

Nagash searched for Neferem amid the shadows of the gully for a long time,

muttering bitterly to himself. Once, he called her name, but her spirit would not be

summoned so easily. Finally he turned and scrabbled the rest of the way up the slope.

At the summit, Nagash saw only a broken sea of foothills, stretching off to the

horizon. The dark mountain had receded from him once again. He turned his face

skyward, casting about for the trail once more, and then continued his limping course

eastward.

Hours later, when the pale moon was close to its zenith, another pack of scavengers

came sniffing into the gully where the Usurper had been. They circled about the

rocky overhang, hissing and chittering to each other in their own strange tongue. As

with any pack, it was the largest of the creatures that decided their course, cuffing

and threatening the rest into submission. They too continued eastward, moist noses

bent low over the rocks as they followed Nagash’s strange, unliving scent. They

loped and lurched and scrabbled along, sometimes on four legs, sometimes on two.

Nagash had so far passed beyond the grasp of death, but not beyond the jaws of

constant, grinding agony. Every step, every movement of arm or head, sent waves of

vivid, aching pain reverberating through his wasted body. The awful wounds he’d

suffered hardly troubled him at all—or at least, no more so than the agony that

gripped the rest of his frame. It was a consequence of the elixir, he knew. The

magical potion—wrought from blood and life energy stolen from innocent,

anguished victims—allowed him to retain the vigour of youth for hundreds of years,

and was the key to creating an empire unheard of since the age of Settra the

Magnificent.

Normally, it would also heal nearly any injury, no matter how severe, but not

since that fateful day at Mahrak, when the army of Lahmia had thrown in its lot with

the rebel kings of the east and unleashed their strange weapons on him and his

unliving host. He remembered the wall of fire and a crescendo of thunder from the

ranks of Lahmia’s black-armoured warriors, and then watching the massed ranks of

his corpse-soldiers disintegrating before him. The traitors had turned on him just as

he’d won his greatest triumph. Mahrak had been cast down and the sacred covenant

with it. The power of the priesthood and their parasite deities had been swept aside,

so that only he, Nagash the Undying, remained.

As he made his way slowly down the rubble-strewn slope of another dark

ridgeline, Nagash heard a wheezing breath in his ear. It had a rasping, ragged tone,

like wind blowing across the end of a broken branch.

You are no god, a man’s voice sneered. Do you remember what I said to you in

your tent at Mahrak? You are a fool, Nagash. An arrogant, deluded fool who thinks

14

himself the equal of the gods. And look at you now: a madman, clad in rags,

stumbling blindly through a dead and pitiless land.

Shouting in rage, Nagash whirled at the voice, but his footing slipped and he

tumbled head over heels to the bottom of the treacherous slope. He fetched up

painfully against a small boulder. His limbs were twisted awkwardly beneath him,

and at first they refused to obey his will.

As he struggled to force his body into action, Nagash became aware of a ghostly

figure glaring down at him from a little further upslope. Nebunefer was a frail,

ancient little man, clad in the same threadbare robes he’d worn on the day he’d died.

His wrinkled head lay at an unnatural angle, the stub of broken vertebrae jutting

painfully against the taut skin of his bent neck. Like Neferem, the old priest’s eyes

glittered with pure hate.

How the mighty have fallen, Nebunefer said. You dare to call the mighty Ptra a

parasite? He created the earth, and everything that lives upon it. What little power

you possess was stolen, ripped from the souls of the innocent. It’s finite, and the last

sands of the hourglass have almost run out.

“Not yet, you old fool,” Nagash snarled back. “If you were still flesh, I would

wring your neck a second time! Watch!

His limbs felt leaden, his joints frozen like corroded bronze, but Nagash would

not be denied. Slowly, clumsily, he forced his good arm to work, and then his legs.

Minutes later, he stood shakily on his feet again, but Nebunefer was gone.

“Jackals,” he spat into the darkness. “We’ll see who laughs last.”

It took more than an hour for Nagash to climb the opposite slope, snarling curses and

burning with fever all the while. His limbs were growing stiffer by the moment. He

drove himself onward with nothing more than the belief that the dark mountain was

just ahead, right over the top of the next ridge.

It had to be.

He would not succumb. He would not fail. He was the rightful King of Khemri,

heir to Settra’s throne, and by extension the master of all Nehekhara.

A faint wind hissed along the ridgeline, just a few yards out of reach. A voice

drifted down to him, riding on the sandy breeze.

Usurpation is not a right, brother.

Thutep stood at the crest of the ridge, his face turned towards the moon hanging

low overhead. His older brother seemed damnably at peace, staring up at Neru’s

beaming face. Only his fingertips, worn down to stumps of splintered bone, hinted at

his last, awful moments, buried alive inside his own tomb.

“The strong have the right to rule,” Nagash hissed. “You were weak. You did not

deserve the throne. Khemri’s fortunes suffered under your reign.”

Thutep shrugged, never taking his eyes from the moon and the open sky. That

was the will of the gods, he said. You were a priest, and a prince of the realm. You

wanted for nothing—

“Nothing except an empire,” the Usurper said bitterly. “Had I been firstborn, the

people of Khemri would have served me gladly, and the city would have prospered. If

you would blame anyone, blame those damned gods you so adore. It was they who

15

made me no more than a second son. It was their will who ultimately sealed you

inside that tomb.”

His brother had no answer to that. By the time Nagash reached the summit,

Thutep was gone.

Beyond the ridge was a broad, rocky plain. The dark mountain, and its promise of

power, might have loomed among the company of a dozen other peaks along the

horizon to the east. Beyond their jagged summits, the sky was already paling with the

light of false dawn.

There was nowhere to hide. No caves, no overhangs, no brush-covered depressions to

crawl into and escape the fire of the sun. Nagash knew it would sear his skin in

minutes, but that was of little concern to him. Far worse was its effects on the elixir.

The older he and his immortals had become, the more that sunlight sapped the

strength of their stolen vigour. When he and his armies marched to war, they moved

in a perpetual darkness wrought by fearsome sorcery. Even at the peak of his powers,

Nagash doubted he would have survived a full day’s exposure to the sun.

As things were now, he didn’t think that he’d last more than a few minutes.

Gritting his teeth, Nagash began scraping at the baked ground. Ptra could not

have him. He would sooner cover himself in dirt like an animal than concede defeat

to god or man.

May I be of service, great one?

The voice was soft and too sincere, the kind of tone a servant would take to mock

his master to his face. It sounded right by Nagash’s ear. With a monumental effort, he

turned his head and glanced up at the ghostly figure kneeling by his side.

Khefru was holding out his hand to Nagash, as though to help him stand. The

former priest, who had helped Nagash learn the secrets of necromancy and later

conspired with him to seize the throne, smiled down at his former master through a

mask of flame. As the Usurper watched, the priest’s body became wreathed in

sorcerous fire, just as it had centuries past when Nagash had learned of Khefru and

Nekerem’s betrayal.

“Traitor,” Nagash hissed. “Snivelling coward! Enslaving your spirit was too

good for you! I should have consumed you utterly when I had the chance.”

To Nagash’s surprise, the ghost’s burning face turned bitter. More is the pity,

Khefru said. Better oblivion than an eternity wandering in the cold places of the

world. You’ll understand soon enough. The former servant turned, gauging the time

until dawn. Not long now.

But the Usurper refused to be cowed by the spirit’s ominous words. “Let it

come!” he said. “What do I care if I’m freed from this broken husk of a body? You

were never a match for me in life, Khefru—not you, nor Thutep, nor even Nebunefer

or Neferem. You shall be my slave again, you cur. Watch and see.”

Khefru’s smile broadened as the flames bit deep into the flesh of his face. Do you

imagine that it’s just the four of us? Oh, no, great one. We’re just the ones who could

reach you the easiest. There are others out there in the shadows, waiting for your

demise. All the people of Mahrak, slaughtered in their thousands and cast adrift,

without Usirian to judge them or Djaf to conduct them to the afterlife. All the soldiers

of both sides who fell in the final battle, and all the skirmishes who came after, and

16

all the common folk who perished in the famines and plagues that wracked the land

afterwards. You cannot imagine so many, the former servant said. But you will have

all eternity to entertain them.

This time, Nagash watched the spirit go. Khefru simply stood up and walked

away, without so much as a backwards glance. He headed westwards, into the fleeing

shadows, and dissipated like smoke.

The scavengers heard him raving long before they actually saw him. He was lying

face down in the middle of a rocky plain, spitting curses in a tongue they didn’t

understand and directed at nothing they could see. The wasteland had obviously

driven the hairless one mad, not that it made any difference to them. His meat would

taste the same regardless.

The four of them were starving. There had been six of them once upon a time,

when they’d been sent from the tunnels of the Great City to scour the World Above

for the hidden gifts of the Great Horned One.

During the second year of their great hunt, they’d seen the claw of their god trace

a green arc across the sky, and had followed its trail into the depths of the wasteland,

where they’d found a scar gouged in the packed earth and a handful of treasures

nestled together like a clutch of new-laid eggs.

Great was their fortune, or so they’d believed. Great would be their glory when

they returned with their bounty to the clan master! But tracing their steps back out of

the cursed waste had proved much more difficult than they’d bargained for. After the

first few months the food had run out, and hunting in the rat-forsaken wasteland was

slim. Mad with hunger, they’d turned on one another, and the two weakest had

become food for the rest.

When the last of that meat ran out, more than a month ago, the four hunters had

spent weeks waiting for one of their fellows to slip up and become the next meal, but

none of them were so careless. Finally, growing more and more desperate, one of the

band began gnawing at the Horned God’s sky-gift, in hopes of gaining the upper paw

over his companions. Out of self-preservation, the other hunters began to nibble their

share of the god-stone as well. It tore like a knife through their guts and set their

nerves on fire, but it lent them enough vigour to survive and keep the stalemate

going.

The hunters ate of the god-stone sparingly, fearing the wrath of the clan-master

when they finally did manage to return to the city. Their fur was falling out in

patches, and awful, glowing lesions appeared on the raw skin beneath. Catching the

scent of the hairless one was a gift from the Horned One himself, they reasoned.

They hoped to find enough meat on the prey’s bones to last them until they could

escape the wasteland and make their way home.

When they caught sight of the prey’s shrivelled, leathery body they began

squabbling over the spoils at once. Knives were drawn. Threats were spat. Alliances

were formed and broken in the space of minutes. Finally, the leader of the little band

put an end to the bickering and declared that each hunter was entitled to one of the

prey’s limbs. Once those were cut off, the torso would be divided four ways, and then

they’d all get turns sucking the sweetmeats out of the skull. With dawn looming close

on the horizon, the band grudgingly reached an agreement. They shuffled about the

17

hairless one, choosing which limb they wanted and scheming how to steal the rest

when an opportune moment arose.

The leader of the pack hefted his knife and flipped the prey onto his back—the

better to get at the entrails when the time came. To their surprise, the prey was still

alive, its eyes widening at the sight of the knife in the pack leader’s hand. The

hunters chuckled. The meal would come with a little entertainment as well.

Hissing expectantly, the pack leader bent down and grabbed the bony wrist of the

prey’s one good arm. He started to stretch it out for a clean cut when the hairless one

reared upward with a howl and sank its teeth into the hunter’s throat!

Flesh tore. Hot blood sprayed across the rocky ground, and the pack leader let out

a choking squeak. The hairless one was clumsy and slow, but the hunters were weak

themselves and stunned by the sudden ferocity of the attack. They barely had time to

react before their would-be prey grabbed the knife from the dying pack leader’s hand

and buried it in the chest of the hunter to his right. Then, with an exultant howl, the

hairless one leapt upon the third hunter and the two fell to the ground, stabbing

wildly at one another with their knives.

In the space of just a few seconds, the pack had been all but destroyed. The

realisation proved too much for the fourth hunter’s fragile courage to withstand. It

abandoned its pack-mates and fled squeaking into the pre-dawn shadows.

Nagash pulled the crude knife from the monster’s throat. Dark blood bubbled from

the wound. He bent over it at once, gulping down the hot liquid as the creature

shuddered in its death throes.

The power! He could taste it in the vile thing’s blood. The Usurper drank deep,

marvelling at the fire that raced through his withered limbs.

When the monster was dead he leaned back, chest heaving, face bathed in gore.

His emaciated body shuddered as successive waves of agony wracked it, but he

welcomed the sensation for what it was. A semblance of power was coursing through

his form once more, restoring to him a small amount of vitality.

One day he would thank Khefru for the incentive to try his luck with the beasts.

Had he not been so persuaded to survive, the battle might not have gone half so well

as it did.

The Usurper glanced about the plain, looking for where the last of the monsters

had gone, but the creature had vanished from sight.

What monsters were these? For the first time, Nagash could study his attackers in

detail. They looked like nothing so much as diseased men with the heads and naked

tails of rats. They were even dressed in filthy kilts made of some sort of woven plant

matter, now frayed and begrimed with the dust of the wasteland. Silver earrings

glittered from their rodent-like ears, and one wore a thin, gold bracelet around its

right wrist. Each of them carried bronze knives of surprising quality, as well made as

anything forged in distant Ka-Sabar.

The only other possessions they carried were rough, leather bags, tightly-knotted

and secured to their leather belts. Nagash reached down and tugged at the one on his

last victim’s belt—and felt a shock of power like a live coal burning in the palm of

his hand. He dropped the bag with a start. Then after a moment’s thought he carefully

sliced open the side with the point of his bloody knife.

18

At once, a sickly green glow emanated from the slit. Working carefully with the

knife, Nagash opened it further and dumped the bag’s contents onto the ground.

Two small lumps of glowing green stone, each about the size of his thumb, rolled

onto the hard ground. The light they cast was intense. Where it touched his bare skin

it set his nerves to tingling.

Nagash reached down and carefully picked one up. Heat suffused his fingertips,

radiating from the stone in a steady, buzzing stream. He inspected the stone carefully,

and was shocked to find what looked like teeth marks chiselled into its rough surface.

The creatures were eating the rock? That explained the traces of power in their blood.

The Usurper’s heart began to race. The creatures must have come from the dark

mountain. How else could they have come by the same power he sought? No other

explanation made sense.

Already, the pain was fading from his limbs, settling into a dull ache that pulsed

like a hot ember in his chest. He considered the glowing rock for a moment more,

and abruptly reached a decision. Setting the stone back on the ground, he took the hilt

of his knife and broke it into three smaller pieces.

With only a moment’s hesitation, Nagash picked up the smallest piece and

swallowed it.

Fire burst along every nerve in the Usurper’s body. His muscles swelled with

power; his scalp tingled until it burned. Nagash’s mind reeled under the onslaught. It

was far wilder and harder to channel than any power he’d known before, but the

intensity was still nothing like the enormous energies he’d wielded in the past. It

raged through his body, wreaking havoc on flesh and bone. He seized it with his will

and directed the raging torrent where he wished it to go.

There was a crackle of bone and a creak of decayed sinew. The Usurper threw

back his head and howled his suffering to the sky as his ruined left arm knit back

together. Next, foul smelling smoke poured from the holes in his torso and forehead.

He doubled over, still shrieking in pain, as flesh and organs were shifted aside.

Thump. Thump. Thump. One after another, three small, dark metal balls thudded

to the ground, wreathed in pale greenish steam.

Seconds later, Nagash the Usurper was whole again, in body if not in mind.

The first rays of dawn were breaking over the distant peaks. With a trembling

hand, Nagash gathered up the rest of the stones and tucked them back into the slit

pouch. As he quickly dragged the bodies of the creatures over to him, he could sense

that more stones resided in the pouches of the other creatures he’d killed.

It wasn’t much, but it would be enough, the Usurper vowed. The stones would

sustain him and guide him to the great mountain, where he would learn to master its

fearsome power.

As Ptra’s light burned overhead, Nagash curled up on the rocky ground, shielded

beneath the bodies of those he’d slain, and dreamed of the doom that would befall

Nehekhara.

19

ONE

Balance of Power

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 70th year of Basth the Graceful

(-1650 Imperial Reckoning)

The yellow silk roof of the Hall of Rebirth rippled like a great sail in the freshening

wind blowing from the coast, and its polished cedar timbers groaned like a great ship

at sea. The comparison seemed particularly apt, Neferata thought bitterly, given the

legion of shipwrights that had been hastily drafted to build it.

Preparations for the great Council of Kings had gone on for three solid months,

beginning on the very day that the fateful news had arrived from Ka-Sabar. Even as

word raced through the winding city streets that the City of Bronze had fallen at last,

and the long war against the Usurper had finally come to an end, King Lamashizzar

was already digging into the city treasury in anticipation of his royal peers’ arrival.

Commissions by the hundred flowed from the palace and descended like flocks of

sea birds on the astonished city merchants and trading factors: jars of fine wine by

the hundreds; casks of beer by the thousands; cunning gifts of gold, silver and

bronze; bales of silk by the ton and a queen’s ransom in fine spices and rare incense.

And that was only the beginning. Swift trading ships plied the fickle seas between

Lahmia and the Eastern Empire’s trading cities to bring back the finest, most exotic

delicacies that the Silk Lands could produce, while the dockyards were stripped of

every able hand to build a vast tent city on the Golden Plain. As spring gave way to

summer it seemed as though every able-bodied man, woman and child was working

feverishly to complete the king’s grand design.

When the rebel leaders finally arrived, in the last month of summer, they were

met at the edge of the Golden Plain by Lamashizzar himself, at the head of a richly-

dressed panoply of courtesans, artists, musicians and servants. After being showered

with small gifts—from rings and bracelets to fine swords and splendid chariots—the

rulers were conducted across the great, fertile plain to the sprawling city of silk tents

set aside for their servants and retainers. The gentle breezes that caressed the plain

turned the tent city into a rippling banner of festive colour: sea green for Zandri, gold

for Numas, blue for Lybaras and brilliant red for Rasetra.

The royal processions descended upon their encampments with weary delight,

and allowed a few hours to rest and refresh themselves before the celebrations began

in earnest. Then, at sunset, Lamashizzar and his panoply summoned his royal guests

with a blare of golden trumpets and led them in a triumphant procession through the

streets of his city.

The people of Lahmia commemorated the end of the war for seven ecstatic days,

and from the halls of the palace to the mean streets near the dockyards, the king’s

20

royal guests were treated like saviours. They wanted for nothing, except perhaps a

few hours’ rest here and there between revels and enough room in their baggage to

carry all of Lamashizzar’s rich gifts back home with them.

It was only at the end of the week, when the king’s guests were thoroughly worn

out and more than a little overwhelmed by the Lahmians’ wealth and generosity, that

Lamashizzar convened the Council of Kings to decide the future of Nehekhara.

The great Hall of Rebirth had been built by the city’s carpenters and shipwrights

in the space occupied by the palace’s grand royal gardens. In fact, the wooden

structure encompassed the gardens themselves, creating the illusion that the council

chamber was surrounded by a tamed wilderness. Brilliantly coloured songbirds,

many imported at great cost from the Silk Lands, filled the space with music, while

fountains burbled serenely just out of sight. Servants came and went along hidden

paths, bearing refreshments to the guests, who sat around a huge, circular mahogany

table in a clearing at the far end of the garden. The effect of so much vibrant,

harnessed life on the desert rulers was nothing short of stunning.

The entire spectacle, from start to finish, had been calculated as carefully as any

military campaign, Neferata understood. It was couched to tempt, seduce and

intimidate the rulers of east and west, and muddle whatever alliances they might have

forged against Lahmia’s interests. It was also stupendously, ruinously expensive. The

city’s treasury was virtually empty. All of the wealth that their father Lamasheptra

had so carefully built during the dark years of Nagash’s reign was gone. Their last

reserves had been thrown away on a single, extravagant throw of the dice. There was

not enough gold in the coffers to make even a quarter of the coming year’s payment

to the Eastern Empire; if Lamashizzar’s negotiations did not bear fruit, the City of the

Dawn faced certain disaster.

While the king gambled with his city’s future, Neferata was left to watch the

proceedings from a broad balcony that spanned the rear of the great hall and

overlooked the great council table. Her handmaidens lounged on silk cushions and

ate candied dates while they gossiped in hushed tones about the scandals from the

previous week’s celebrations. A delicate fog of incense curled just above their heads:

nryrrh spiced with black lotus, to relieve the boredom. Servants knelt at the fringes of

the chamber alert to the queen’s every need. A low table, with sheets of paper and an

ink brush, had been hastily set beside her as she studied the visiting rulers from

behind a polished wooden screen.

As precarious as Lahmia’s future might be, judging by the appearance of their

guests it was evident to Neferata that the other great cities were in a far worse state.

During his unnatural reign, Nagash the Usurper had recreated the Nehekharan

Empire in principle if not in name, subjugating the other great cities through the

power he held over Khemri’s hostage queen, Neferem.

For centuries, each city had been forced to pay tribute to the Usurper in the form

of gold and slaves, driving them to the brink of ruin. When the priests of Khemri—at

the urging of their superiors on the Hieratic Council in Mahrak—finally attempted to

unseat Nagash and end his blasphemous reign, the Usurper retaliated with a terrible

curse that struck down two-thirds of Nehekhara’s priesthood in the space of a single

day.

21

It was that one act of infamy that finally caused the priest kings to rise up in

revolt, but the Usurper fought back with dark magics and terrible atrocities that

devastated the Blessed Land and slaughtered thousands. Yet even when the Usurper’s

army was finally defeated, close to a dozen of his immortal lieutenants escaped

destruction and continued to bedevil the land for decades.

Rather than celebrate their hard-won triumph at Mahrak, the Priest Kings were

faced with a long, gruelling campaign of terror and attrition as they hunted down

every last one of the Usurper’s minions. Since Nagash’s body had never been found,

it was secretly feared that one of them still possessed the Usurper’s corpse and, if

given the opportunity, might be able to restore the dreaded necromancer to life. It had

taken ninety years to finish the task, slaying the last of Nagash’s immortals after a

lengthy siege at Ka-Sabar, the City of Bronze.

The long years of war had left an indelible mark on each of Nehekhara’s rulers.

They were gaunt from strain and deprivation that no amount of easy living could ever

erase. Few wore jewellery, or gilt adornments on their robes of state, and the fine

fabrics of their ceremonial attire seemed shabby and worn. Even now, amid the

verdant luxury of the great hall, their expressions were haunted and fretful, as though

they expected fresh horrors hiding in every shadow.

Neferata was vividly reminded of that night in the cellars, now decades past,

when Lamashizzar and his cabal had returned from the war. And they’d scarcely

fought more than a handful of battles, while these men and women have known

nothing else their entire lives, she thought.

Yet as beleaguered and broken as these rulers might be, they were not to be

underestimated, the queen knew. When the doors to the great hall were opened,

Lamashizzar’s guests had filed through the gardens in solemn procession, led by the

Priest Kings of Rasetra and Lybaras and the young Queen of Numas. Each of the

three rulers bore a sandalwood box in their hands, and when they reached the great

council table they set the boxes before the smiling Lahmian king and drew forth their

contents.

The severed heads of Raamket, the Red Lord, and Atan-Heru, the Great Beast,

had been treated with nitre and the sacred oils of the mortuary cult, and looked much

as they had at the moment of their deaths. Their pale skin was mottled with burns

from the touch of the sun, and their lips were drawn back in savage, almost bestial

snarls, revealing teeth that had been filed to points and stained brown with human

blood. The third head, by comparison, was round and fleshy as a suckling pig’s, with

small, beady eyes hidden by a thick band of kohl.

Memnet, the former Grand Hierophant of Ka-Sabar, who murdered his king and

served Nagash in exchange for eternal life, had wailed like a babe as he was dragged

before the headsman. An expression of craven terror was still etched on Memnet’s

jowly face.

The heads still sat in the centre of the table, their hideous expressions turned to

face Lamashizzar. The message—to Neferata, at least—was clear. We’ve done our

part, while you sat in your city by the sea. Now you’ll help us rebuild, or there might

be one more head on this table by day’s end. At this point, it was difficult to say

whether Lamashizzar’s display of wealth had successfully undermined his guests, or

simply strengthened their resolve.

22

The queen bit her lip in irritation. We should be deciding this on the battlefield,

she thought. We can always make more soldiers. Gold is much harder to come by.

It was mid-afternoon. The council had been in session for almost five hours,

during which time Lamashizzar enquired of the needs of each of his guests and made

offers of assistance in the form of monetary loans and trade agreements. Dizzying

sums of gold were haggled over, while scribes hurriedly drafted copies of proposals

that would govern the flow of goods across Nehekhara for generations to come.

Trade with the Eastern Empire would rejuvenate the Blessed Land’s economy,

and open up a vast new realm of markets for Nehekharan goods—and all of it would

pass through the City of the Dawn. Each of the rulers had been given the chance to

speak, and a brief lull had settled over the table while each of the council members

took stock of their current positions. Off to the east came a distant grumble of

thunder as a late-summer rain shower made its way towards the coast.

Neferata heard a rustle of cushions behind her, followed by a familiar cat-like

tread as her young cousin Khalida came to sit beside her.

“Great Gods, is it finally over?” the girl asked, slumping theatrically onto the

queen’s lap. “We’ve been trapped in here forever. I wanted to go out riding before

the rain came in.”

Neferata chuckled despite herself. Khalida hadn’t the least interest in courtly

gossip or affairs of state.

At fifteen she was tall and coltish, full of so much restless energy that even the

sprawling Women’s Palace wasn’t large enough to contain her. She was much like

her father, Lord Wakhashem, a wealthy nobleman and close ally of King

Lamasheptra, who had secured a strategic marriage to Neferata’s aunt Semunet. Both

had died when Khalida was very young, and according to tradition she had been

returned to the keeping of the royal family until such time as a husband could be

found for her. She was passionate about horses, archery—even swordplay—and had

little interest in the finer aspects of courtly behaviour. Lamashizzar dismayed of ever

finding a nobleman who would take Khalida, but Neferata was secretly proud of her.

The queen reached down and stroked the girl’s dark hair. She kept it in dozens of

tight, oiled braids, like the Numasi horse-maidens of legend. “The real work has

scarcely begun, little hawk,” Neferata said fondly. “Up until now, the council has

merely argued matters of taxes and trade. Trivial matters, in the grander scheme of

things.”

Khalida looked up at the queen. The goddess Asaph hadn’t blessed her with the

radiant beauty that Neferata and most of the Lahmian royal bloodline possessed. She

was striking, in a fierce, angular way, with a sharp nose, a small, square chin and

dark, piercing eyes. She frowned. “Trivial compared to what?”

The queen smiled. “Compared to power, of course. The decisions made here will

determine the balance of power in Nehekhara for centuries to come. Each of the

rulers seated below us has their own idea of how that balance should be struck.”

Khalida took the end of one of her braids between her fingers and twirled it

thoughtfully. “Then who decides which idea is best?”

“We do, at the moment.” And Lamashizzar had best exploit this opportunity to

the fullest. Neferata took Khalida by the shoulders and pulled her gently upright.

“Pay attention to something other than horses for a moment and I’ll try to explain.”

23

Khalida sighed heavily. “If it will make the time go faster.”

The queen nodded approvingly. “It begins with Khemri,” she said. “Since the

time of Settra the Magnificent, the living city was the centre of power in Nehekhara.

Even after Settra’s empire fell, the Living City and its mortuary cult exerted

tremendous political and economic influence from one end of the Blessed Land to the

other. Their interests were guaranteed before all others, and that translated to power,

comfort and security. Next in line came Mahrak, the City of the Gods, then Ka-Sabar,

Numas, Lybaras, Zandri, Lahmia and Quatar.”

“Numas was more powerful than Lybaras?” Khalida exclaimed. “They’re

farmers, mostly. Lybaras had airships!”

“The Numasi provided the grain for most of Nehekhara,” the queen said

patiently. “You can’t eat an airship, little hawk.”

“I suppose,” the girl said. “But what about us? Why were we so low on the list?”

Neferata sighed. “Because we were so distant from Khemri, for starters. Zandri

was closer, and was somewhat richer due to the slave trade. And unlike other cities,

we preferred to keep to ourselves.”

“But Nagash changed all that.”

“That’s right. Khemri is nothing but ruins now, as well as Mahrak, and most of

the other cities suffered greatly thanks to the Usurper. Now that the war is over,

everything lies in flux.”

It was then that King Lamashizzar’s voice rose above the muted murmur of the

hall. “My honoured friend, Priest King Khepra; do you wish to address the council?”

A heavy wooden chair creaked as Khepra, Priest King of Lybaras, rose slowly to

his feet. The son of the late King Hekhmenukep looked much like his illustrious

father: he was tall and lean, with narrow shoulders and a square-jawed, hangdog face.

Unlike his father, though, Khepra’s arms and shoulders were thick with muscle, and

his hands and face bore the scars of dozens of battlefields.

Like the kings of Lybaras before him, Khepra wore a fine gold chain about his

neck, hung with a bewildering assortment of glass lenses bound in gold, silver or

copper wire. It was a relic from a more prosperous, peaceful age, when the engineer-

priests of Lybaras crafted wondrous inventions for the greater glory of Tahoth, patron

god of scholars.

The king nodded to Lamashizzar. “Great king, on behalf of your esteemed guests,

I wish to thank you for this splendid display of generosity on our behalf. I’m also

grateful to see that all of us have come together today to ensure the continued

prosperity of our great cities, and the land of Nehekhara as a whole. It is a welcome

beginning, but there are still very serious matters that require our attention.”

Neferata’s eyes narrowed. “Now it begins, little hawk. Watch the faces of the

rulers around the table. How are they reacting to the Lybaran king?”

The young girl frowned, but did as she was told. “Well… they’re looking curious,

I suppose. Politely interested.” She paused, her head tilting slightly to one side.

“Except for the King of Rasetra.”

“Oh?” the queen asked, smiling faintly.

“He’s not even looking at Khepra. He’s pretending to sip his wine, but really he’s

watching everyone else.”

24

Neferata nodded approvingly. “Now you know who is truly asking the question.

King Khepra is speaking on Rasetra’s behest, while King Shepret can devote his full

attention to gauging the reactions of his rivals.”

Rasetra and Lybaras had been close allies during the war, and had borne the brunt

of the fighting from beginning to end. Whatever it was that Rasetra was now after,

King Shepret could almost certainly count on Khepra’s support in the council. She’d

tried to warn Lamashizzar to find a way to drive a wedge between the two kings; if

he didn’t one of the other kings wouldn’t hesitate to try.

Neferata turned to the table at her side and picked up the waiting ink brush. She

wrote hurriedly in the sharp-edged pictographs of the Eastern Empire’s trading cant:

Divide Rasetra and Lybaras, or they will outmanoeuvre you!

She paused, tapping the end of the brush against her lower lip as a thought

occurred to her. King Khepra’s son is in need of a wife. Perhaps Khalida?

She plucked a pinch of fine-grained sand from a tiny box by the ink-pot and

scattered it across the pictographs to help set the ink, then held out the page for a

servant to carry downstairs to the king.

“While we now have plans in place to ensure the stability of our own homes,

there are still three cities that are desolate and devoid of leadership,” the King of

Lybaras said. “We cannot sit idly by and watch them fall to ruin.”

“Generous words from a man who just spent the last four years desolating one of

the very cities in question,” Lamashizzar replied good-naturedly. The other rulers

laughed at the gentle jibe, but for a moment King Khepra was put on the back foot.

He faltered for a moment, unable to come up with a proper response.

“The city of Ka-Sabar is the least of our concerns at the moment,” King Shepret

said in a flat voice. He was lean and muscular, with his late father’s broad shoulders,

but where the legendary king Rakh-amn-hotep was stout and pugnacious, Shepret

had the aquiline features of an up-country patrician.

Though he was just over a hundred years old, well into middle age, his thick

black hair only showed a few streaks of grey, and his green eyes were as vivid and

sharp as cut emeralds. “The Living City has lain in ruins for almost a century.” He set

down his wine cup and turned his piercing gaze on Lamashizzar. “Now that the war

is over, we must reclaim the city and restore the rightful order of things.”

Agitated murmurs rose around the council table. Khalida grinned. “Lamashizzar

made Shepret state his own case,” she said proudly. She glanced sidelong at Neferata.

“That is what happened, right?”

Neferata sighed. “With Lamashizzar it’s difficult to tell, sometimes. But possibly,

yes.”

“But why does King Shepret care about restoring the Living City? Doesn’t he

have enough worries with the lizard folk?”

The queen gave her young cousin an appraising stare. Apparently Khalida wasn’t

as oblivious to matters of state as she appeared to be. Rasetra was the smallest of the

great cities, but because of its proximity to the deadly southern jungles and its tribes

of Lizard Folk, their army was second to none. But the war had bled Rasetra white,

and now the city was fighting for its survival against growing attacks by lizard war

parties.

25

Neferata considered the question carefully. “It’s not entirely unexpected,” she

said. “Rasetra was originally settled by Khemri, just a few hundred years ago. When

King Shepret talks of putting another king on Khemri’s throne, he means one of his

own sons. They’re directly related to the old royal family, and have an unassailable

claim. It would give Rasetra a powerful ally on the western side of the Bitter Peaks,

and allow it to exert its influence across all of Nehekhara.”

At the council table, Lamashizzar cleared his throat, and the murmurs fell silent.

“That’s a very noble goal, honoured friend,” the king said, “but also a daunting one.

Khemri lies empty now. Only jackals and restless ghosts prowl the city streets.”

King Shepret nodded. As a young man, he’d been with his father’s army when

they’d reached Khemri, just a few months after the battle at Mahrak. He’d seen the

city’s sand-choked streets firsthand. “According to my sources, many of Khemri’s

citizens fled to Bel Aliad, hoping to begin a new life there.” He shrugged. “They

could be resettled again, with the proper incentive.”

Khalida let out a snort. “At the end of a spear, he means.”

The girl was absolutely right, Neferata realised. She turned quickly and took up

the ink brush again. Give Shepret what he wants, she wrote. Give him Khemri. A

servant scurried forwards and plucked the message from the queen’s outstretched

hand.

Khalida watched the servant go. “Does the king actually follow your advice?”

“It’s been known to happen,” Neferata replied.

“Is it true you actually ruled the city when he was fighting against Nagash, all

those years ago?”

The question took Neferata aback. “Who told you that?”

“Oh,” Khalida said, suddenly uncomfortable. “No one in particular. Everybody

knows it—inside the Women’s Palace, at least.”

“Well, it’s nothing that needs to be repeated elsewhere,” the queen warned.

“Other cities may treat their queens differently, but here in Lahmia, such things are

not done.” She paused, uncertain of how much she should reveal. “Let’s just say that

it was a difficult time, and we were at a delicate stage of negotiations with the

Eastern Empire. I… consulted with Grand Vizier Ubaid on a number of important

matters while the king was away. Nothing more.”

Khalida nodded thoughtfully, and turned to regard the council once more.

“Shepret would have been right about my age back then,” she mused. “He looks so

old now. Yet you and Lamashizzar still look as young as thirty-year-olds.”

Neferata stiffened. “You see much more than I give you credit for, little hawk.”

For the last nine decades, Lamashizzar and his cabal had been hard at work

deciphering Nagash’s tomes and trying to replicate his elixir of immortality. For the

first few years the king had consulted her regularly, and despite her misgivings, she’d

helped explain the necromancer’s basic methods in crafting potions and performing

incantations. Relinquishing control of the city to Lamashizzar had been much harder

to bear than she’d imagined; experimenting with Nagash’s books had at least given

her something to do. Returning to a quiet, cloistered life in the Women’s Palace

seemed like a fate worse than death.

26

It had taken them four years of trial and error before they managed to create a

very weak version of the elixir. After that, Lamashizzar no longer summoned her

from the Women’s Palace. She received a small bottle of the potion every month,

which managed to slow the process of ageing, but nothing more. As far as she knew,

Lamashizzar and his noblemen still experimented with the process, in an unused

wing of the palace. She had no idea what had eventually become of Arkhan, the

king’s immortal prisoner.

“My brother and I have been very fortunate,” Neferata replied, as casually as she

could manage. “The blessings of Asaph run strong in the royal bloodline. They

always have.”

Khalida chuckled. “I hope I’m half so lucky when I’m a hundred years old,” she

said.

“Time will tell,” the queen replied, eager to change the subject. “What’s was

King Teremun saying just now?”

The young girl blinked. “Ah… I think he asked Shepret what he meant by

restoring the rightful order. Something to that effect.”

As Neferata considered the question, Shepret turned to the King of Zandri and

replied. “The will of the people has been worn thin by a century of warfare. We need

to send a clear sign that the age of Nagash is no more. There needs to be a new king

on Settra’s throne, and a Daughter of the Sun at his side.”

Neferata drew in a sharp breath. That was clever, Shepret, the queen thought.

Very clever indeed.

It was a proposal almost guaranteed to win Lahmia’s support. From the time of

Settra the Magnificent, the Priest Kings of Khemri were married to the eldest

daughter of the Lahmian royal line. The Lahmian king’s firstborn daughter was

called the Daughter of the Sun, because she was the living embodiment of the

covenant between the gods and the people of the Blessed Land. The marriage was

meant to create a union between the spiritual and temporal power of Settra’s throne,

and it had been one of the cornerstones of Khemri’s power ever since.

Clearly, the King of Rasetra was proposing an alliance with Lahmia, one that, in

theory, would benefit both cities. It was also something that none of the other great

cities would stand for.

As if on cue, Queen Amunet of Numas turned in her chair to face Shepret. She

was the daughter of Seheb, one of the twin kings of the city, and the only survivor

after the vicious cycle of fratricide that occurred in the wake of the twins’ sudden

deaths. She had eyes as black as onyx and a smile like a hungry jackal.

“You’re putting the chariot before the horse, King Shepret,” the Queen of Numas

said dryly. “Lamashizzar and his queen have to actually produce children before your

dream can become a reality.”

The rest of the council responded with nervous laughter—all except for the sickly

King Naeem of Quatar, who planted trembling hands onto the table-top and pushed

himself to his feet. Naeem was of an age with his peers, but as a young acolyte he’d

been among those trapped at Mahrak during Nagash’s ten-year siege, and he’d never

truly recovered from the suffering he’d endured there. His body was painfully gaunt,

his head bald and his cheeks sunken. When he spoke, his voice was little more than a

whisper, but his rheumy eyes burned with conviction.

27

“King Shepret speaks of restoring the proper order of things, but his priorities are

misplaced,” Naeem declared. “The greatest of the Usurper’s crimes was that he broke

the sacred covenant between the people and their gods. The blessings that have

sustained us for millennia are slipping away. The sands press a little closer to our

cities each year, and our harvests are dwindling. Our people suffer a little more each

year from sickness, and do not live the same span of years as our ancestors. Unless

we find a way to redeem ourselves in the eyes of the gods, within a few hundred

years Nehekhara will be a kingdom of the dead.”

Khalida’s eyes widened. “Is this true?”

Neferata’s lips pressed together in irritation. “I haven’t had the opportunity to

measure the size of our fields lately,” she answered. “It certainly sounds ominous

enough, but remember that Naeem was a priest long before he became a king, so his

convictions are more than a little suspect.”

The young girl frowned. “What does that mean?”

“Wait and listen.”

Down at the council table, Lamashizzar spoke. “What, then, would you have us

do?” he said to Naeem.

From the look on Naeem’s face, the answer seemed obvious to him. “Why, the

people must first be reminded of their duty to the gods!” he replied. “We must spare

no effort to rebuild Mahrak, and restore the Hieratic Council to its proper place in

Nehekharan society.”

“Now we get to the heart of the matter,” the queen said to Khalida. “Naeem has

been listening to those bitter old buzzards that have roosted in his court.”

Throughout the history of Nehekhara, the Hieratic Council had presumed to

speak on behalf of the gods themselves, issuing edicts and meddling in the affairs of

kings from their seat of power at Mahrak. With temples in every one of the great

cities and religious advisors in all of the royal courts, their wealth and influence had

been tremendous. Their grip on Nehekharan society had finally been broken by the

Usurper, and since the fall of Mahrak the remnants of the council had taken refuge at

Quatar, where they continued to issue dire warnings about the passing of the old

ways. As far as Nefereta was aware, none of Nehekhara’s rulers seemed willing to

listen to their harangues anymore. Their divine powers had faded, and the glories of

the Ushabti, their holy champions, were nothing more than a fading memory. Their

day was done.

Lamashizzar raised a placating hand. “Your piety does you great credit, King

Naeem,” he said smoothly “and I’m sure that all of our friends here would agree that

we would like to see the council restored to Mahrak one day. Of course, I don’t need

to tell you, of all people, how our cities have suffered during this long war—”

“If it wasn’t for the Hieratic Council, none of us would be sitting here today!”

Naeem shot back. His watery eyes widened in righteous indignation. “It was they

who forged the great alliance between Rasetra and Lybaras! They who financed the

building of the armies and the engines of war! We owe them—”

“No one here has claimed otherwise,” Lamashizzar replied, his voice taking on a

steely edge. “Just as no one here has claimed to possess the resources to rebuild

Khemri, either.”

28

Neferata straightened. Don’t be a fool, brother, she thought. You have a golden

opportunity here. Don’t squander it!

“For a century, everyone here has given much in the service of the common

good,” Lamashizzar continued, conveniently overlooking the fact that half of the

cities represented at the table sided with Nagash up until the very last moment

outside Mahrak. “I think the gods would forgive us if we now focussed on regaining

our strength, if only for a short while. Vast restoration projects are, in my opinion, a

bit premature at this point. Does anyone disagree?”

The King of Quatar glared archly at the assembled rulers, but even Shepret sat

back in his chair and stared silently into his wine cup. Neferata clenched her fists in

frustration.

“Then we are all in agreement,” Lamashizzar said. “But I thank both King Naeem

and King Shepret for making their concerns known to us. I’m confident that when the

time is right, we will no doubt revisit these proposals and give them due

consideration.” Smiling, the Lahmian king rose to his feet. “For now, though, may I

suggest we adjourn and refresh ourselves before the evening’s feast?”

King Naeema looked as though he would protest Lamashizzar’s suggestion, but

he was pre-empted by Queen Amunet and Fadil, the young King of Zandri, who rose

to their feet without a word and took their leave of the council. Servants and scribes

rose to their feet, swarming around the table, and the King of Quatar had no choice

but to gather up his retainers and leave with what little dignity remained to him.

“Thank Asaph,” Khalida said with a sigh. “King Naeem looked like he was ready

to argue all night long.” She turned to Neferata, her expression hopeful. “Shall we

return to the Women’s Palace now?”

“Go on,” Neferata told her. “Take the maids with you. I’ll be along presently.”

Khalida’s eyes widened. “I—I mean, I don’t think that’s very wise—”

“I must speak to Lamashizzar,” the queen said, anger seeping into her voice. “In

private. Do as I say, little hawk.”

The young girl shot to her feet as though stung, and within moments she was

herding the bemused handmaidens from the balcony. As soon as they were gone,

Neferata snatched her mask from a nervous-looking servant and stormed down the

stairs to the lower floor.

She found Lamashizzar along one of the twisting garden pathways that led from

the council space. The king was surrounded by a number of senior scribes, who were

presenting drafts of various trade agreements for his approval. He looked up as she

approached, and the self-satisfied smile on his face vanished.

“I must speak to you,” Neferata said icily. “Now.”

The king’s eyes narrowed angrily, but Neferata met his stare without flinching.

After a long moment he dismissed the scribes, who wasted no time withdrawing

down the garden path.

“I’m starting to think W’soran was right, all those years ago,” he growled at her.

“You seem to have a problem with understanding your place, sister.”

Neferata stepped close to him, turning her masked face up to his. “Did you read a

single thing I wrote, brother? I made the words as simple as I could,” she hissed. The

29

vehemence in her voice surprised even herself, but she was too frustrated to hold it

back. “Give. Khemri. To. Shepret. Is that too complex an idea for you to grasp?”

“Why in the name of all the gods would I do such a thing?” Lamashizzar snarled.

“Hand control of Khemri to Rasetra? It’s ridiculous!”

“It was the perfect opportunity to cripple our most dangerous rival!” Neferata

shot back, her voice echoing within the confines of the mask. It took all of her self-

control not to tear the damned thing off and fling it into her brother’s smug face.

“Don’t you see? Rasetra hasn’t the strength to rebuild Khemri and keep the lizard

folk at bay simultaneously! Shepret’s greed would have been his undoing. All we had

to do was sit back and give him our blessing!”

“And deprive ourselves of a major trading partner? Are you insane?” the king

snapped. “Has the black lotus permanently dulled your senses? These trade

agreements will pay our debt to the Eastern Empire and cement Lahmia as the centre

of power in Nehekhara.”

“Are you really as naive as all that?” the queen replied. “Our honoured friends

won’t abide by those agreements one moment more than they have to. As soon as

they’ve restored their cities and rebuilt their armies, they’ll form a coalition and force

us to negotiate terms that are more to their liking. Did you learn nothing from the war

with Nagash?”

The king’s hand shot out, seizing Neferata’s jaw and gripping it with surprising

strength. “Don’t speak of things you know nothing about,” he warned. “I should

never have let you advise Ubaid in my absence. It put too many dangerous ideas in

your head.” He shoved her roughly backwards. “If you know what’s good for you,

you’ll concern yourself with more proper matters, like providing me with an heir. Or

would you rather I stopped sending you bottles of elixir every month? I can always

marry Khalida once you’re dead and gone.”

Lamashizzar’s words cut through Neferata like a knife. And it was no empty

threat, she could see the truth of it in his eyes. She was trapped. He could withhold

Nagash’s elixir any time he liked and simply wait for her to die.

Rapid footfalls sounded down the garden path. Neferata turned to see a pair of

royal guardsmen appear, obviously drawn by the heated exchange. Lamashizzar

acknowledged them with a curt nod.

“The queen has grown overexcited from the events of the day,” he told them.

“Conduct her to the Women’s Palace at once, and inform her maids that she’s to be

given a draught to help her rest.”

Lamashizzar took the queen by the arm and handed her to the guards as though

she were a child. Neferata felt herself moving, as though in the grip of a dream, as the

warriors took her back to her gilded prison.

30

TWO

The Burning Stone

The Bitter Sea, in the 76th year of Asaph the Beautiful

(-1600 Imperial Reckoning)

As it happened, using the glowing stone never did lead Nagash to the slopes of the

dark mountain. If anything, it confused his course further, leading him ever deeper

into the heart of the wasteland. It was a mystery that took him more than a hundred

years to solve, during which time he was forced to re-learn the sorcerous arts that had

made him master of Nehekhara.

The properties of the glowing rock—over time Nagash simply called it abn-i-

khat, or “the burning stone”—were similar in principle to the winds of magic he’d

learned from his druchii tutors centuries ago, but not as easily manipulated using the

rituals he’d mastered in Khemri. As near as he could tell, it wasn’t truly a stone at all,

but a physical manifestation of pure magic. If he used a fragment of stone as the

locus of a simple ritual, the mineral consumed itself, converting to a dry, ashy

substance that flaked away from its outer surface. The conversion was proportional to

the amount of energy used, so far as he could determine; more than once he bitterly

regretted the lack of paper and ink to document his observations. He’d learned over

time how to ration the stone perfectly: a single thumbnail-sized chip provided him

with enough strength and mental acuity to fulfil his needs for as much as a month,

provided he didn’t need to draw unduly upon its power. The flecks sustained him far

better than his elixir ever did, but its chaotic energies sometimes caused his thoughts

to become unmoored, or his perceptions to shift in unexpected ways.

If not kept under careful control, the stone wrought physical changes as well. His

skin had retained its leathery texture, but it had taken on a green-tinged alabaster

tone. As soon as he’d understood the stone’s transformative properties he focussed

his attention on channelling it to good use as much as possible; now he was stronger

and swifter than ever before, and virtually tireless for days at a time. Lately his skin

was growing mottled with faintly luminescent deposits around his shoulders and

midsection, leading him to wonder how much of the stone he ate was accumulating

in his bones and organs. Would there eventually come a point where its energies

became too concentrated for him to control? He reluctantly conceded the possibility,

even as he continued to consume the glowing stone.

Time had no meaning in the trackless expanse of the wasteland. Nagash no longer

marked the passage of days, focusing all his attentions on unlocking the powers of

the stone and shaping rituals to harness its power. The first rite he experimented on

was creating a resonance between a fleck of stone and the source it had stemmed

from.

31

The results were initially very disappointing. Over time, as he began to grasp the

mineral’s properties more closely, the experiments became merely baffling. It wasn’t

that the resonance failed to draw him in a distinct direction—it pointed him in a

multitude of directions at the same time, including straight up and straight down.

Following the many paths the ritual revealed to him caused Nagash to cross and re-

cross the length and breadth of the wasteland. From time to time he would find pieces

of stone, sometimes buried deep beneath the ground, but none led him towards the

dark mountain. After a time, he began to think that the fickle energies of the stone

were somehow purposely leading him astray.

Then one night, he saw a streak of green light arc across the starlit sky, and

another piece of the puzzle fell into place.

Whatever the abn-i-khat was, it truly was not of this earth—or at least not part of

the earth that Nagash knew and understood. He marked the plunging arc of green

light as a soldier might trace the fall of an arrow shot, and then began a long and

arduous trek to find where the stone had fallen. Eventually he came upon a shallow

crater dug into the earth. Pieces of the green stone were nowhere to be found, but

large, rat-like footprints were in abundance. The beasts had made it to the site mere

hours before he did. Nagash tried to track them further, but soon lost their spoor

across the hard, rocky terrain. After that, he resolved to kill the rat-beasts wherever

he found them, for clearly they coveted the stone at least as much as he did.

Nagash mulled over everything he’d learned, and concluded firstly that if he’d

been able to detect the power radiating from the mountain at such a distance, it must

contain a much larger collection of abn-i-khat than he’d ever seen before, and its

chaotic energies made magical divination difficult, if not impossible. So he

abandoned his ritual and let his instincts guide him, heading ever eastward over the

ridges and foothills and leaving his senses open for concentrations of magical power.

It was the hazy glow to the north-east that drew him first—a faint, greenish

luminescence that limned the crooked lines of the mountain peaks, almost too faint to

see against the paling of the early morning sky. He was well beyond the foothills

now, crossing the first of the Brittle Peaks, and the sensations of power seemed to

shift directions like the fey mountain wind.

Like everything else about the wasteland, the glow seemed just a few miles

distant, but it took him nearly a fortnight to reach the last of the intervening peaks.

From there, Nagash found himself staring down upon a broad, dark sea. The night

was early, and the glow he’d seen on previous nights wasn’t in evidence yet,

allowing him to see a long way in the clear mountain air. Marshlands glittered

frostily beneath the moonlight along the sea’s south-eastern shore, while a broad

crescent of watch fires flickered along the coastline to the north and north-west.

None of that mattered to Nagash. To the east, hard by the shores of the gloomy

sea, rose the dark slopes of the mountain that had called to him for more than a

hundred years. It was larger and far more imposing than the broken peaks that

surrounded it; tendrils of steam leaked from fissures along its flanks, glowing faintly

green in the darkness. It dominated the horizon for miles, crouching at the edge of the

sea like a brooding dragon from some barbarian myth.

32

Looking upon the mountain, Nagash realised he had never actually seen it with

his own eyes before that moment. The shadow of the power buried at its heart had

somehow etched itself upon his mind’s eye. Now he understood why it had always

seemed to hide, just out of his grasp, no matter how hard he tried to reach it. All this

time he’d been chasing a phantasm, a ghost of the true mountain. The notion both

intrigued and troubled him.

Nagash reckoned that there could be dozens, perhaps even scores of stone

deposits hidden within the mountain. How could they have been gathered all in one

place? His gaze strayed to the constellation of watch fires lining the northern coast.

Perhaps it was the rat-things. They were gathering up the stones faster than he. It all

had to be going somewhere.

He would have to learn more before proceeding. The secrets of the mountain

would be his, no matter what; he would need every bit of power he could muster to

re-conquer Nehekhara and punish those who had defied him. If the rat-things stood in

his way, then he would deal with them as well.

It took most of the night for Nagash to descend the far slope of the mountain and

make his way to the outskirts of the marshland. In the early hours before dawn, when

the night was coldest, a thick blanket of glowing mist rose from the marshlands and

along the shores of the distant sea. The vapours curled and shifted across the surface

of the water, though there was no wind to stir them; the unearthly light created the

illusion of half-formed shapes capering and whirling madly within the mist.

The marsh terrain was more dense and treacherous than Nagash realised. He

sloshed through foul-smelling, scummy water that rose up to mid-thigh in places. It

was unnervingly warm, and where it touched his skin he felt the faintest brush of

sorcerous energy. The necromancer considered the tendrils of steam writhing like

serpents across the flank of the distant mountain. If there were enough burning stone

buried within the mountain to taint the neighbouring sea, his vengeance upon the

living world would be great indeed.

He wound between hummocks of thick, yellow marsh grass and stunted trees,

listening to slithering, splashing creatures hunting through the mist. Strange howls

and high-pitched cries echoed from the moss-covered branches of the trees, and once

he saw a pair of faintly glowing yellow eyes regarding him intently from the shadows

to the left of his path. But the creatures of the marsh shunned him, as all living beasts

did. More than once he heard something huge rise up in the mist ahead of him and go

thrashing off into the water at his approach. When the sun finally broke over the

horizon, hours later, he crawled into a muddy hollow formed by the thick roots of a

half-dead tree and waited for nightfall.

Voices and the sounds of thrashing water roused him from his meditations, many

hours later. Darkness had fallen, though the moon was still low in the sky, and as he

crept to the edge of the tree’s sheltering roots he could see a yellow haze of lantern

light playing upon the surface of the water.

The voices sounded human, guttural and strained with effort. There were at least

two speakers, perhaps three, calling out to one another in a barbarian tongue unlike

anything Nagash had heard before. It was difficult to tell how far away the voices

were, the sounds echoing flatly from the surface of the water and the surrounding

trees.

33

Nagash eased carefully from his hiding place, head low, and searched for the

source of the noise. The thrashing continued unabated, punctuated by grants and

muffled blows. It was coming from beyond a screen of moss-covered trees just a few

dozen yards away. The glow of lanterns seeped between the gnarled trunks,

flickering crazily as straggling figures moved past the source of the light.

The necromancer still carried two of the large bronze daggers he’d looted from

the corpses of the rat-things so many years ago. He drew one of the blades from his

leather belt and crept from tree to tree until finally he caught sight of the source of

the noise.

Peering through a screen of hanging moss, Nagash saw a wider patch of water

just past the hummock where he stood. Perhaps ten yards away a low, flat-bottomed

boat had poled up close to another small, tree-covered hummock, and within the

globe of light cast by the lantern set at its bow, four men were wrestling with the

thrashing body of what appeared to be a huge, whiskered fish. Two of the men stood

up to their waists in the murky water, their arms thrown around the fish’s scaly flanks

as they tried to heave it up into the boat. A third stood in the boat and tried to grip the

creature’s flat, toothy head, while the fourth tried to kill it with blows from a short,

thick club. From where Nagash stood, it was difficult to tell which side was winning

the fight.

The men were barbarians; that much he saw at once, but they had little in

common with the tall, fair-haired northerners sold on the slave block at Zandri. Their

bodies were short and squat, thick with muscle but deformed in different ways. He

saw hunchbacks and misshapen skulls, long, ape-like arms and bulging, knobby

spines. Their heads were hairless, and their skin was a sickly, pale green. The men in

the boat wore simple, belted kilts of rough leather that hung below their knees, and

their chests were decorated in swirling scar patterns similar to Nehekharan tattoos.

So it wasn’t the rat-creatures who inhabited the north shore after all, Nagash

realised. Clearly these barbarians had lived close to the tainted waters for much, if

not all their short, squalid lives. The mutations wrought by the burning stone

appeared pervasive. The necromancer’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. With a little

patient study, these men could teach him a great deal.

Sticking to the deep shadows, Nagash crept around the edges of the wide pool

while the barbarians straggled to finish off their prey. The noise of their struggles

masked his movements, until finally he reached the far side of the hummock next to

their boat.

The sounds of thrashing abruptly ceased. Nagash heard the barbarians whooping

and laughing, and then the sounds of feet tramping through foliage just a few yards

away. Carefully, he eased through the undergrowth towards the sounds.

Within moments, lantern light was seeping between the mossy trees. Nagash

heard the scrape of wood on soil, and then a meaty thud on the ground nearby.

Peering around the bole of a gnarled old tree, he saw that the barbarians had

grounded their little boat and dragged their monster catch up onto dry land to clean it

and cut away the meat. The fish was huge—easily six feet long—and almost as thick

as a human torso. The scales along its back were a dark grey, grimed with muck from

the bottom of the pool, and its wide mouth was full of small, black, triangular teeth.

34

The two men who had wrestled the thing from its hiding place beneath the water

had pulled on heavy, oiled leather cloaks and stood tiredly over their catch, their

mud-streaked chests heaving, filthy water streaming down their legs. One of their

companions was digging a leather-wrapped bundle out of the bottom of the boat,

while the fourth man was busy tying the craft to the branch of a nearby tree.

Sensing his opportunity, Nagash slipped silently from the shadows beneath the

tree and crept across the small clearing where the men had set down their catch.

Being careful not to startle the barbarians, he walked quietly up behind one of the

cloaked men. At the last moment, just as Nagash came within arm’s reach, the man

must have sensed his presence. The barbarian whirled about, his powerful hands

poised to seize whatever was creeping up behind him. The man must have been

expecting an animal of some kind, because when he saw Nagash, his beady eyes

widened with surprise.

Before the barbarian could recover, Nagash darted in quickly and slashed his

throat with the rat-beast’s dagger. Blood splashed across the clearing and the man

collapsed with a choking scream.

Nagash turned on the second cloaked man just as the barbarian leapt at him with

a guttural shout. He managed to get his left hand around the man’s throat as they

crashed together, nearly knocking him from his feet. A stubby-fingered hand seized

Nagash’s knife wrist and held it in a vice-like grip, while jagged fingernails clawed

for his eyes. Nagash tightened his grip on the barbarian’s throat and tried to pull his

knife hand free, but the man refused to let go. A knobby fist smashed into the side of

the necromancer’s skull; he responded by driving his knee into the barbarian’s groin.

The man roared in pain, but doggedly hung on.

The barbarian who had been tying off the boat snatched up a fallen branch and

charged across the open ground towards Nagash, and the fourth man wasn’t far

behind. The tide of the battle was rapidly turning against the necromancer, and the

very idea infuriated him. With a snarl, he drew upon the power of the burning stone.

Fiery strength surged through him. His hand closed about the barbarian’s neck,

crushing the man’s spine. Nagash hurled the body like a children’s doll straight into

the third man’s path. Both man and corpse tumbled across the ground in a tangle of

limbs.

Nagash pounced on the man before he could pull himself free and drove his

dagger through the barbarian’s eye.

The last man stopped dead in his tracks, mouth agape in shock. Without thinking,

Nagash flung out his hand and hissed a stream of arcane words—and the power of

the stone responded. The man’s body went suddenly rigid, as though gripped in a

giant’s invisible fist. The necromancer hissed in satisfaction.

“Good,” Nagash murmured, feeling the power crackling through his outstretched

hand. “Yes. Very good.”

He rose slowly, careful to maintain his focus on the impromptu spell. It was more

difficult than it once was; the magic was more potent, but less controlled, and fought

against his will every second.

Nagash approached the man carefully. The cloth bundle was still clutched in the

barbarian’s hands. The necromancer reached up and carefully prised it from the

man’s fingers. The objects wrapped up in the greasy cloth clinked metallically.

35

He smiled. Kneeling down, he set the bundle on the ground and unrolled it. The

tools within gleamed in the lamplight. The necromancer nodded grudgingly. Crude

implements, but suitable to the task. Satisfied, Nagash turned his attention back to his

prisoner.

“I have many questions,” he told the terrified barbarian. “This is a strange land,

and there is much I do not know about you and your people.”

He drew a long, curved flensing knife from the pouch and inspected the bronze

blade in the lantern light.

“Fortunately, I expect you will be a font of useful information,” the necromancer

said. He rose to his feet and studied his subject carefully. He raised his left hand, and

with a slight gesture, the barbarian’s arms rose from his sides.

Nagash’s smile widened. It had been a very long time since his last vivisection.

“We shall begin with the muscle groups,” he said to the man, and went to work.

36

THREE

A Silken Betrayal

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Asaph the Beautiful

(-1600 Imperial Reckoning)

The Eastern priests crouched before the queen like great, yellow bullfrogs, backs

slightly arched and palms pressed to the marble floor as they filled the Hall of

Reverent Contemplation with their buzzing, wordless song. Their eyes were squeezed

shut in concentration, perspiration gleaming beneath the brim of their outlandish felt

hats as the six elderly men emitted a basso drone that Neferata could feel against her

skin. The delegation from the Silk Lands seemed to find it uplifting, judging by the

beatific looks on their faces. She found the noise deeply unnerving—and it just

seemed to go on and on. For the first time, Neferata was genuinely glad that she was

required to wear a mask in public. The longer the Eastern throat music went, the

more horrified she became.

The audience with the Imperial delegation had begun in a civilized enough

fashion, with little of the outrageous fanfare that usually accompanied the arrival of a

member of the Celestial Household. Normally, the first Imperial attendants would

arrive well before dawn to decorate the Hall of Reverent Contemplation with silk

hangings, lacquered screens and an unbroken line of royal carpet stretching all the

way to the palace gate. Priests would walk from one end of the hall to the other,

chanting prayers to chase away evil spirits and promote harmony, then give way to a

procession of musicians and artists whose task was to tune the vibrations of the space

in a manner that was pleasing to Celestial ears.

When the delegation itself finally arrived, many hours later, it would be

accompanied by a small army of courtiers, bureaucrats and servants that would fill

the cramped chamber to capacity. By the time that Neferata met the delegates face-

to-face, it was only the relative placement of the throne-like chairs that made it clear

who was actually giving an audience to whom.

By contrast, the current ambassador had arrived with very little fanfare, appearing

at the palace gates promptly at midday and pausing only long enough to have a

brilliant blue carpet unrolled at his feet before continuing onward to the hall. He was

accompanied by a very modest retinue: five bureaucrats, a handful of courtiers, and a

young woman clad in rich robes whose face was painted white as alabaster. The

entire delegation could be seated in a comfortable half-circle before the royal dais,

lending the proceedings an unusually intimate, almost conspiratorial air.

Of course, all the usual Imperial proprieties had to be observed. The audience had

begun with a lengthy recitation of the queen’s lineage, followed by an even longer

recitation of the ambassador’s ancestry. The ambassador, speaking through his senior

37

bureaucrat, then offered a very appreciative and long-winded greeting, bestowing

upon Neferata the acknowledgement of the Imperial Court and the hopes of

continued harmony with the City of the Dawn.

Tea was served. The strange Eastern concoction, served in tiny ceramic cups, still

tasted like little more than heated bathwater to Neferata, but she’d learned to nod

politely and listen with feigned appreciation as the ambassador’s courtiers spoke at

length of the refinement of the leaves and the delicacy of its flavour.

Once the cups had been collected and a prayer offered to the Eastern gods in

thanks for the tea’s many blessings, it was time for the customary tokens of esteem.

Neferata accepted a fine Eastern bow and a quiver of arrows on behalf of the king, as

well as a half-dozen scrolls of poetry, three chests of fine silk robes and a prince’s

ransom in exotic spices from the far corners of the Empire. This time the ambassador

even brought a gift for the queen’s lovely cousin, whom the king had required to

attend the audiences as part of her courtly education. A servant presented Khalida

with a magnificent falcon, taken from the Emperor’s personal stock. Evidently, the

last ambassador had overheard Neferata’s pet name for her cousin, confirming the

queen’s suspicion that the delegates from the Imperial court spoke perfectly good

Nehekharan, and insisted on translators for their own inscrutable reasons.

After presenting the gifts, a light meal of Eastern delicacies was served, followed

by more tea and polite conversation that lasted for two long hours. Then came a

period of digestion and restful contemplation that normally would be accompanied

by soft music or recitations of poetry. Neferata grimaced as the droning of the priests

continued, and wondered if perhaps the Eastern Empire’s culture was on the decline.

Meeting with the delegates from the Eastern Empire was the only official

function left to Neferata. King Lamashizzar hadn’t opened the palace to his citizens

on the high holy days in many decades, and the temples no longer had the power to

influence court affairs as they once did, so Neferata now spent the vast majority of

her time locked inside the Women’s Palace. The only reason she was still allowed to

receive the Easterners was because Lamashizzar had never had any patience for the

Silk Lords’ tedious social rituals, yet couldn’t risk offending his erstwhile allies by

fobbing them off on one of his viziers. It was the primary reason she’d been given so

much authority when the king had taken the army to Mahrak. At the time, the risk of

a royal scandal paled in comparison to a diplomatic incident with the Empire.

Since the war, official visits from the east generally only happened once a year,

when an Imperial delegation arrived to collect Lahmia’s annual payment for the

shiploads of iron and dragon-powder that Lamasheptra had purchased more than a

century before. The next scheduled payment wasn’t due for another three months, so

the unannounced arrival of an Imperial vessel had caused considerable curiosity

among the members of the Lahmian court.

Something was definitely going on, the queen knew, studying the resplendent

figure of the Eastern ambassador. The Empire didn’t send a prince of the blood all

the way across the Crystal Sea on a mere social call.

Xia Ha Feng, August Personage of the First Celestial House and Scion of

Heaven, was young and very handsome, in the coldly detached manner that all the

Silk Lords affected. He was clad in layered robes of blue and yellow silk. The outer

robe was embroidered with sinuous, bearded serpents whose scales were picked out

38

in tiny garnets, and whose belly plates were fashioned from lustrous mother-of-pearl.

The prince’s raven-black hair was oiled and pulled back in a severe topknot, and a

circlet of gold rested upon his brow. Long, artificial fingernails, also crafted of fine

gold, capped all ten of the prince’s fingers. Though a mark of refinement and wealth

in the Silk Lands, the affectation seemed sinister, even monstrous, to the queen. She

wondered idly where the young prince fell in the line of succession to the Imperial

throne. Despite hundreds of years of trade and diplomatic relations with the Silk

Lands, the Eastern Empire was still largely a mystery to the Lahmians. It was reputed

to be vast in size, but foreigners were forbidden to travel beyond a handful of

sanctioned trade cities situated along their western coast.

The Silk Lords claimed that their civilization was far older and more advanced

than that of the Nehekharans, but Neferata, like most Lahmians, doubted the truth of

this. If the Eastern Empire was so old and powerful, why were they afraid to let

foreigners see it?

All at once, the priests’ disquieting song came to an end. Rather than build to a

satisfactory conclusion, like proper music did, the droning simply stopped. The

priests bowed low to the queen and swiftly withdrew. Neferata blinked dazedly in the

sudden silence, uncertain how to respond. She stole a surreptitious glance at Khalida,

who sat upon a lesser throne to Neferata’s right. Over the last half-century, the little

hawk had blossomed into a tall, elegant young woman, though somehow she’d never

outgrown her love for horses, hunting and war. She remained one of Neferata’s

favourites, though once the queen had given birth to her own children they had

grown inexorably apart. Soon she would be leaving the City of the Dawn altogether,

for Lamashizzar had arranged her betrothal to Prince Anhur, the son of King Khepra

of Lybaras, during the last round of trade negotiations.

The young princess was sitting very straight in her chair. Like Neferata, her face

was hidden behind a serene golden mask, but the queen could see that her chin was

bobbing ever so slightly as she fought to stay awake.

As one, the Imperial delegates nodded their heads and gave a contented sigh as

the priests silently left the hall. The prince turned to the bureaucrat at his right and

spoke softly in his native tongue. The functionary listened intently, then bowed his

head to Neferata.

“The Scion of Heaven hopes that this gift of song is pleasing to your ears, great

queen,” he said in flawless Nehekharan. “The music of the mountain priests is

reserved only for the gods themselves, and those whom Heaven deems worthy.”

“I can’t imagine what I might have done to deserve such an honour,” Neferata

replied smoothly. She thought she heard a tiny, muffled snort of amusement from her

cousin. “The Scion of Heaven is as discerning as he is generous.”

The Eastern prince listened to the translation and inclined his head to the queen.

He spoke again, very softly, and the bureaucrat smiled. “The Scion of Heaven would

be honoured to share the gifts of the gods with you whenever you desire, great

queen.”

The statement sent a prickle of alarm racing up Neferata’s spine. “The Scion of

Heaven’s generosity is truly boundless,” she answered calmly. “The court is always

honoured to receive a visit from the Celestial Household, and we hope he travels to

Lahmia often in the coming years.”

39

As the functionary related the queen’s words, the prince smiled for the first time.

The look in his dark eyes as he spoke reminded Neferata very much of the cold,

predatory stare of the falcon he’d given to Khalida.

“The Scion of Heaven has no plans to travel in the foreseeable future, great

queen,” the bureaucrat replied. “And he is looking forward to sharing the fruits of our

civilization with you in the coming months.”

Neferata straightened slightly on the throne. “Do I misunderstand?” she asked.

“Are we to be graced with your august presence for a lengthy stay?”

This time the functionary didn’t bother to translate. “The Scion of Heaven will

take residence in Lahmia,” he replied. “His factors are seeking appropriate lodgings

near the palace even as we speak.”

For a moment, the queen forgot all sense of Eastern decorum. “Will he be staying

long?” she asked.

The bureaucrat frowned ever so slightly at the forwardness of such a direct

question, but he replied smoothly, “The Scion of Heaven wishes to broaden his

education of foreign cultures, and hopes to gain a deep understanding of your ancient

and noble traditions.”

He means years, Neferata thought with alarm. She hesitated, composing herself

and considered her reply. “This is unprecedented,” she said carefully. “And a

momentous event in the history of our two peoples.”

The prince’s smile widened as the bureaucrat translated. His reply was delivered

with carefully modulated deprecation. “The Celestial Household merely wishes to

become closer to our Western neighbours, and hopes to offer what meagre aid we can

in this time of transformation and rebirth.”

Neferata’s unease deepened. “We are naturally deeply grateful to the Emperor,

and appreciate his interest in our people’s wellbeing,” she replied.

The bureaucrat bowed deeply. “The Emperor of Heaven and Earth is a dutiful

son, and is responsible with the gifts that the gods bestow upon him,” he replied. “A

momentous event in Guanjian province has enriched the Empire, and he has taken it

as a sign from Heaven that he must turn his attentions to our neighbours who are in

need.”

“That is very comforting to know,” the queen replied, though she felt anything

but. “Might one inquire as to the nature of this blessed occurrence?”

The functionary beamed proudly. “Imperial surveyors have discovered gold in

the mountains of the province! Even the most pessimistic reports suggest that the

vein is larger than any found in the Empire’s history. Within two years, three at most,

the Imperial treasury expects to benefit from the gods’ great bounty.”

Neferata felt her blood run cold. Now she understood the reason behind the

prince’s sudden arrival.

“Truly, the fortunes of the Celestial Household are a wonder to the rest of the

world,” she replied, as calmly as she could manage.

Prince Xian rose gracefully from his chair and clapped his hands together. His

translator bowed once again. “The Scion of Heaven thanks you for the graciousness

of your welcome, and hopes that this audience is but the first of many to come.”

40

Neferata rose to her feet. “The august personage of Prince Xian is always

welcome,” she said, “and we hope that he will grace us again with his presence

soon.”

The queen remained standing as the prince and his entourage departed. When

they were gone, Khalida leaned back in her chair and sighed. “What an insufferable

bunch of fops,” she growled. “I think I fell asleep at some point during the meal. Did

I miss anything?”

Neferata drew in a deep, silent breath. “No, little hawk. You didn’t miss anything

at all.”

The prince’s message had been for her and the king alone. Among the Silk Lords,

even betrayal was delivered by polite implication.

Rain hissed against the thick glass windows, obscuring the view of the predawn city

and the sea beyond. Within the bedchamber, Neferata’s handmaidens lay sleeping.

Every now and then, one of them would whisper or sigh, deep in the grips of a lotus-

fuelled dream. The queen had pushed the bottle of dream-wine on her maids,

insisting that they should all drink a cup before she partook herself. It was a rare

luxury for the maids, who were expected to be ready to serve the needs of the queen

on a moment’s notice. Neferata appeared to sip from her own cup, but scarcely let the

bitter liquid touch her lips.

Tephret was the last to succumb. The elderly handmaiden had held on until well

past midnight, until finally Neferata had been forced to feign sleep herself before

Tephret would finally give in herself. The queen had lain in her bed for several hours

afterwards, grim thoughts whirling through her head as she listened to the rain steal

over the slumbering city. Finally, not long past the hour of the dead, she rose and

slipped on a robe, then lit a small oil lamp and sat down at her writing desk.

The words had not come easily. The Eastern devils have laid a trap for us, she’d

written in deft brushstrokes. Within two to three years, the value of gold in the

Empire will plummet.

On the surface, the statement seemed innocent enough. She chewed the end of the

ink brush. Did she need to spell it out for Lamashizzar? She sighed. As a result, our

annual payment to the Empire is certain to increase well beyond our capability to

pay.

What had possessed their late father Lamasheptra into entering such a potentially

disastrous deal with the Eastern Empire would remain a mystery for the ages. He had

concocted the scheme not long after Nagash seized the throne at Khemri and made

the queen—Lamasheptra’s daughter Neferem—his hostage. After years of secret

negotiations in the Imperial trade cities across the sea, the Imperials agreed to share

with Lahmia the same arms and armour that equipped their own fearsome legions.

This included enough of the Easterner’s mysterious and explosive dragon-powder to

equip an army of warriors, as well as weapons to employ them, which alone would

be enough to make Lamasheptra’s forces the dominant military power in all of

Nehekhara.

In return, the Emperor demanded a staggering sum, equivalent at the time to ten

tons of gold per year for the next three hundred years, and required nothing less than

the sovereignty of the city itself as security for the trade. If Lahmia failed to make

41

even one payment to the Empire, the city would become an Imperial possession from

that day forward. Lamasheptra accepted the deal without qualm, despite the fact that

the amount of money owed to the Empire each year was greater than the city’s yearly

tax revenue.

Perhaps the old king had planned to supplement his payments with plunder taken

from Khemri; possibly he thought to exact tribute from the other great cities once the

fearsome power of his army became known. As it turned out, the delivery of the

promised arms and armour had taken more than a century. The final shipment,

consisting of the dragon-powder itself, reached Lahmia some five months after

Lamasheptra’s death, and the young king Lamashizzar proved far too cautious with

the powerful weapons he’d inherited. Meanwhile, the city treasury had dwindled

steadily away. It was only through several shrewd trade deals with Lybaras, Rasetra

and Mahrak during the war that Lahmia was able to survive at all.

Of course, the Empire had never intended to deal fairly with Lamasheptra.

They’d done everything in their power to make it difficult for the city to fulfil its

financial obligations, and now that there were only a few years left before the debt

was fully paid, the Silk Lords had gone to extreme measures to ensure that Lahmia

would be theirs.

Neferata was sure that the discovery of the gold mine was a lie. The Imperial

household would flood the market with coin from their own treasury to convincingly

drive down the value of their currency long enough to force Lahmia into default,

after which point things would gradually return to normal again. It would cause a

short period of suffering for the Empire’s subjects, but it would be a small price to

pay for a strategic foothold in Nehekhara.

The question, Neferata thought, is how do we get out of the trap before it snaps

shut?

The complex web of trade deals that Lamashizzar had built after the war had

produced dividends, and greatly increased Lahmia’s influence across Nehekhara, but

it wouldn’t be enough if the Empire demanded more gold. The only way to save the

city from the hands of the Easterners was to either seize more wealth from Lahmia’s

neighbours, or defy the Silk Lords, and Neferata was certain that Lamashizzar hadn’t

the nerve to do either.

To be honest, she wasn’t even certain if her brother cared what happened to the

city anymore.

The confrontation in the council chamber, now a half-century past, had ended

whatever feelings of affection Neferata had for her brother. There was a time once

when she thought she might have loved him, when she thought he would stand up to

centuries of hoary tradition and treat her as a co-ruler instead of a mere possession.

Now she knew better. All he wanted from her were heirs to continue the dynasty,

while he fumbled after the secrets of immortality. Nothing else mattered.

Well, Lahmia mattered to her. Neferata would be damned before she saw the City

of the Dawn become a plaything for foreign lords. She could rule the city with a surer

hand than her brother ever could.

The queen set aside the ink brush and listened for a while to the sound of the rain

on the windowpanes as she turned the problem over in her mind. Always, she came

back to the same conclusion.

42

Something had to be done. If Lamashizzar wouldn’t take action, then she must.

Neferata took up the sheet of paper and considered it for a long moment. Her

expression hardened. Slowly, carefully, she fed the paper to the flame guttering in the

oil lamp on her desk.

It was no more than an hour before dawn when Neferata rose from her place by

the window and dressed herself in a dark robe and slippers. She left her black hair

bound up and pulled on a black wool cloak, then picked up a small gold box from her

dressing table and tucked it into her girdle. Her golden mask was left on its wooden

stand, its smooth curves masked in shadow.

Her maids were still sleeping soundly, though she knew that they would begin

stirring as soon as it was light. There wasn’t any time to waste. The queen slipped

quietly from her bedchamber and hurried down the dark halls of the palace towards

the Hall of Restful Contemplation.

She moved as quickly as she dared, keeping to little-used passageways as much

as she could. Twice she saw the telltale glow of a lantern crossing down an adjoining

corridor, but each time she found a pool of deep shadow to hide in before the sleepy

servant girl passed by. Within minutes she was standing before the tall bronze doors

of the audience chamber. The metal surface was cold to the touch as she pulled one

of the doors open just wide enough to slip through.

Heart racing, she dashed down the length of the hall and pressed her ear to the

outer doors. Would there be guards on the other side? She had no idea. After

listening in vain for several long moments, she gave up and decided to take a chance.

She grasped the door’s heavy brass ring and opened it just a bit. The corridor beyond

was dark and empty.

Neferata felt a faint thrill as she slipped across the threshold into the palace

proper. Now she was officially an escapee, in violation of royal and theological law.

But only if they catch me, she reminded herself, and grinned in spite of herself.

The going was slower once she emerged into the palace proper; she was far less

familiar with its layout, and not accustomed to its routines. At least there were no

guards about. Once upon a time the halls would have been patrolled by the king’s

Ushabti, who were as swift and deadly as Asaph’s terrible serpents. She had only the

vaguest memories of them now, from when she was a young girl. Neferata

remembered their silent, graceful movements and their depthless, black eyes. All that

remained of them now were the great statues that guarded the royal tombs outside the

city.

Once again, she kept to deserted hallways and managed to avoid the few servants

who were up and about at such an early hour. It took her nearly half an hour to make

her way to the far side of the palace and the dusty, deserted wing where Lamashizzar

hid his darkest secrets. The main doors to the wing were locked, but Neferata

expected as much. Within a few minutes she located the entrance to the servants’

passageways and felt her way into the oppressive darkness that lay beyond.

Cobwebs brushed ghostly fingers across the queen’s face. The narrow corridor

was windowless, and dark as a tomb. Neferata listened to rats scuttling across the

floor up ahead and cursed herself for not thinking to bring a candle stub to light her

way. Gritting her teeth, she reached out with her hand until she found the wall to her

left and let that guide her onwards.

43

The air was cold and dank. Now and again her fingertips brushed across a slimy

patch of mould. Once, something large and many-legged darted out from underneath

her fingers, and it was all she could do not to let out a startled shout. For all she

knew, the king or his companions could be nearby. If they caught her now, Neferata

didn’t care to speculate what they might decide to do with her.

After about twenty feet, her hand encountered a wooden doorframe. She

continued on, counting each doorway as she went. It had been more than a century

since she’d last stood inside Lamashizzar’s improvised sanctum, but she knew it was

in the centre of the wing, far from any windows that would reveal the telltale glow of

oil lamps burning far into the night. When Neferata reached the tenth doorway she

stopped and tried the latch. It moved with a faint screech of tarnished metal, the

sound deafeningly loud in the oppressive darkness. She paused, hardly daring to

breathe, but several seconds passed without any sounds of movement other than the

scampering of rats.

The door opened with only the tiniest sound of wood scraping through the grit

that had accumulated on the sandstone floor. Enough predawn light filtered through

windows on the eastern face of the palace wing to provide some definition to the

interior of the building. She saw that she was in a narrow corridor facing eastwards

that connected to a wide central passageway that ran the entire length of the wing.

Moving as silently as she could, Neferata crept to the end of the servants’

corridor. The walls of the central passageway had been stripped of their hangings,

and every piece of art and furniture had been removed many years ago; they had all

been surreptitiously sold in the city marketplace during lean years to help pay off the

debt to the Silk Lords.

The thick dust that had settled in the central passageway had been churned by the

regular passage of sandalled feet. Peering through the gloom, Neferata followed the

muddled tracks down the wide hall until they stopped outside an otherwise

unobtrusive door to her right.

Heart pounding, she laid her hand on the latch. This was the point of no return;

once she crossed the threshold, there would be no turning back.

This is not for me, she reminded herself. This is for Lahmia.

The latch gave an oiled click as she pressed it. She pushed the door open with her

fingertips, smelling the faint scent of incense and the tang of spilled blood.

There was still a faint red glow emanating from a banked brazier on the far side

of the room. Neferata paused in the doorway, taking in everything she could see.

There were more tables than she remembered, most of them covered in stacks of

paper, collections of papyrus scrolls and jumbled piles of leather-bound books.

Wooden chairs and tattered divans were scattered about the room, with wine goblets

and trays of half-eaten food set nearby. The queen’s lips curled in distaste. It

resembled nothing so much as the cluttered library of a wealthy young dilettante.

Convinced that Lamashizzar and his cronies were nowhere about, Neferata

stepped inside and shut the door behind her. She navigated carefully around the room

until she reached the brazier, and within a few minutes she’d stoked it carefully back

to life.

The glow of the burning coals reached into the far corners of the large room,

revealing still more shelves and wide, utilitarian tables set with dusty ceramic jars

44

and glass bottles filled with exotic liquids and powders. They were set to either side

of a cleared patch of floor that had been scrupulously swept clean of dust and grime

and inlaid with a complicated magical symbol the likes of which she had never seen

before.

It took a moment before Neferata spied the figure sprawled in one corner on the

other side of the sorcerous circle. The queen searched the tables around her for an oil

lamp. Finding one, she lit the wick using a coal from the brazier, and, summoning up

her courage, she crept closer to the king’s prisoner.

Arkhan the Black hadn’t changed one bit in the last hundred and fifty years. He

was clad in filthy rags, and his bluish skin was covered in grime, but his face looked

exactly as it had when she’d first set eyes on him all those years ago. A thick, iron

collar enclosed the immortal’s neck, connected to a heavy chain that had been bolted

deep into the wall. At his side, an upended wine goblet spilled a thick trickle of dark

fluid onto the floor.

The immortal’s lips were stained black by lotus root. Though his chest did not

rise and fall as a living mortal’s would, Neferata knew that Arkhan was deep in a

drugged slumber. From the very beginning, Lamashizzar kept his prisoner under

control by feeding him a mixture of his weak elixir and enough lotus root to kill a

half-dozen men. When he wasn’t needed to translate Nagash’s esoteric writings,

Arkhan was kept in a stupor so he couldn’t escape.

Staring at the immortal’s slack features, Neferata wondered how much of his

sanity still remained. She consoled herself with the thought that if Arkhan was of no

further use to Lamashizzar, he would have been disposed of without a moment’s

hesitation.

The queen took a deep breath and drew the gold box from her girdle. Opening the

filigreed lid, she withdrew the hixa and pressed it to Arkhan’s neck. It took several

attempts before the insect’s abdomen arched and drove its sting into the immortal’s

flesh.

For a moment, nothing happened. Neferata expected Arkhan to groan as the

wasp’s venom burned away the effects of the lotus, but the immortal didn’t so much

as tremble. His eyes simply opened, as though he’d only been lightly dozing, and he

fixed her with a dull, listless stare.

Neferata expected Arkhan to wonder at her presence, but the immortal said

nothing. The unnerving silence stretched for several long minutes, until finally the

queen could take it no more. Without thinking, she reached out and gripped his arm,

and to her surprise, Arkhan the Black flinched from her touch.

The Queen of Lahmia struggled to give the ghastly creature a friendly smile.

“Greetings, Arkhan of Khemri,” she said. “Do you remember me? I am Neferata,

Queen of Lahmia, and I have a proposition for you.”

45

FOUR

The Barrow-Lands

Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Asaph the Beautiful

(-1600 Imperial Reckoning)

Nagash understood now why the barbarians favoured their long, oiled cloaks. It was

the rain: the steady, invasive, unrelenting rain.

North of the great sea, the coastline was a mix of flat, marshy plains and rolling

hills girdled with stunted, grey-green thorn trees. The larger of the barbarian villages

squatted atop these bald hills, their squalid mud-and-grass huts crouching like

clusters of toadstools beneath the never-ending sheets of rain. Smaller villages or

clan-like communities hunched amid the yellow weeds of the marsh plains,

connected by winding, waterlogged foot paths worn by generations of hunters and

raiding parties. The barbarians avoided travelling along those paths at night, Nagash

found, for the humans were not the only hunters who favoured the paths when the

moon was high in the sky. More than once, the necromancer heard the caterwauling

of great cats out in the darkness, and the bellowing of a fierce creature that sounded

bestial but had the timbre of a human voice. Sometimes he would hear stealthy

footsteps creeping through the tall weeds as he walked the paths at night, but none

came close enough to threaten him.

It had taken weeks to make his way up from the southern marshes to the sea’s

north coast. Since then, Nagash had moved more cautiously among the barbarian

settlements, gathering information about them where he could and then moving on.

They were a primitive, suspicious people, hostile to outsiders and capable of the

kinds of treachery and cowardly viciousness common to the poor and the weak-

willed.

The barbarians were little better than animals, subsisting on what little food they

could scrape from the land or catch in the dark, bitter waters of the sea. They clad

themselves in rough leather and worked with crude tools of wood and stone for the

most part, although occasionally Nagash would peer from the shadows into the open

doorway of a village hut and spy a tarnished bronze sword or spearhead hung from

pegs close to the crude stone hearth. The style of the metal weapons was crude by

Nehekharan standards but entirely functional, and obviously kept as treasures by the

barbarians. He suspected they were battle-trophies, since the villagers had nothing of

substance to trade with. That meant there was another, more prosperous and

advanced barbarian culture somewhere nearby.

Virtually all of the barbarians he observed bore the mark of the burning stone in

one fashion or another. The waters of the Sour Sea—or so Nagash called it, because

it was dark and bitter with mineral salts from the abn-i-khat— permeated everything

46

in the region and warped it in uncontrolled ways. Physical deformities were

commonplace: most were minor, and a few even seemed beneficial. One night, as

he’d crept up to peer into the doorway of a village hetman’s dwelling, he was

surprised to find himself staring at a young boy of eight whose eyes shone like a cat’s

in the reflected glow of the hearth-light. The child saw through the darkness with

ease, raising such a hue and cry at Nagash’s appearance that the entire village rose up

in arms to try and capture him. The pursuit had lasted most of the night, and they’d

come close to catching him a number of times.

At first, his interest in the barbarians had been more a matter of survival and a

certain degree of scholarly curiosity, but the more Nagash learned, the more he saw

the potential that lay before him. Here was a vast source of magical power, one that

might even rival that of the Black Pyramid in Khemri, and a primitive people who

could provide him with soldiers and slaves.

He would not necessarily have to return to Nehekhara to continue his quest for

domination. His empire could begin again here, along the shores of the Sour Sea.

The barbarians were a fractious and tribal lot, not dissimilar to the desert tribes he

had known in the past. They were led by whoever was strong enough and brutal

enough to cow the rest into submission, supported by a strong cadre of kinsmen and

allies who served as the hetman’s warband. They posed little threat to Nagash; even

the larger, hilltop tribes were still isolated from their neighbours, and could be

brought down one at a time. No, what concerned him most were the totem-shrines of

polished wood that every village boasted, and the treatment of the itinerant priests

that tended them.

The totems were columns of carved wood more than fifteen feet high—no small

feat in a land where the trees grew like gnarled fists and were no more than eight or

nine feet tall—and were shaped to resemble tall, powerfully-built men and women.

There were four to eight figures carved into each totem, always in pairs, facing

outward from the trunk in poses that Nagash supposed were meant to convey

strength, wisdom and prosperity.

The craftsmanship was crude by Nehekharan standards, and there was no

common iconography from one totem to the next that might suggest anything like a

pantheon. The only common factor he could discern was that none of the figures bore

the deformities common to those who worshipped them.

Villagers made offerings of food and simple, carved tokens to the shrines, and

Nagash suspected that, given the location of the totems at the centre of each village,

they were the focal point of the barbarians’ important ceremonies.

The priests who tended the shrines travelled from village to village, never staying

in one place for more than a few days at a time. Like the priests Nagash had known

in Khemri, these holy men got the best of everything. Their leather kilts were well

made and often decorated with pieces of metal or polished stones, and carried

polished wooden staves that they wielded both as weapons and badges of office.

They were uniformly tall, well-fed and physically fit, and not one of them bore the

slightest trace of disfigurement. The holy men travelled in groups of six or eight,

usually with an older priest attended by a pair of functionaries and two or three

young acolytes. When they stayed at a village they slept in the hetman’s hut, even if

it meant the hetman and his family slept outside that night.

47

From what Nagash could tell, the priests’ duties involved anointing the totem

shrines with oils and performing prayers over them, collecting tribute in the form of

food, beer, clothing and tools (which the acolytes carried on their backs when the

priests left) and occasionally meddling in the affairs of the villagers themselves. They

decided who could marry whom, settled certain disputes involving inheritance, and in

one case ordered the death of a young man whose ravings suggested that exposure to

the burning stone had rendered him mad.

The priesthood’s influence and authority could be problematic, Nagash realised.

More importantly, their lack of deformities hinted that they’d learned to control the

worst effects of the abn-i-khat, just as he had done. Potentially that made them very

dangerous indeed.

The barbarian villages grew larger and more elaborate as Nagash drew closer to the

great mountain. The broad hillsides had been crudely terraced, and ranks of round-

roofed huts sprawled down and across the sodden fields, where crops of rice and

tubers were nurtured in paddies of bitter water. The tracks were wider and better

travelled, and the woodland more sparse. Only the constant rain worked in his favour,

giving him reason to conceal his face beneath the dripping hood of his cloak and

discouraging conversation with the barbarians he encountered on the muddy tracks.

There were times, on moonless nights, when he would attach himself to larger groups

of travellers and follow along with them in silence for many miles, little more than

another vague, cloaked shape in the darkness.

Now he stood beneath the dripping branches of a small copse of trees, close to the

point where the northern coast began to curve south and east towards the mountain,

and watched a strange procession make its way down the switchback trail of one of

the largest barbarian villages Nagash had seen yet.

Normally the crude customs of the barbarians were of no interest to him

whatsoever; what caught his attention this time were the dozens of glowing green

lights that accompanied the procession down the dark trail.

The necromancer clutched his sodden cloak tightly around his ever-thinning

frame and edged back into the shadows of the wood as far as he could manage. As far

as he could tell, the procession would make its way down the muddy trail directly

past where he stood, which also meant that they were heading towards the mountain.

The procession was a long one. He reckoned that he was almost two miles from

the village. The tail end of the line was still working its way down the hillside when

he began to hear the low, mournful chanting of voices emanating from around a

curve in the track to his left. Minutes later, a familiar glow began to seep around the

muddy track, followed by a pair of young priests wearing fine robes and carrying

gnarled wooden poles in their hands. The acolytes’ heads were bared to the bitter rain

as they led the procession down the track, their faces turned downward and their

shoulders heaving as they led the rest in the funereal chant. The green light emanated

from globular sacks of hide hung from the ends of the wooden poles. Each hide sack

had been scraped until they were translucent and then filled with water. Glowing

green shapes stirred within, occasionally darting and swimming from one end of their

prison to the next.

48

Behind the priests and their heavy lamps came a large group of chanting, bare-

headed holy men, all clad in rough vestments of cloth and hide that were decorated in

glittering bits of metal and precious stones. Their faces had been painted with

glowing oil that highlighted their handsome, unmarred features.

After the phalanx of chanting holy men came a column of groaning acolytes

bearing a rough, wooden palanquin. Upon the palanquin rode an arrogant old man

that Nagash knew had to be the barbarian high priest. He sat upon a straight-backed

throne, wreathed in layers of heavy robes festooned with chains of actual gold and a

kind of polished, ruddy copper. A circlet of gold rested upon his brow, inset with a

glowing oval stone. The piece of abn-i-khat looked to be the size of a bird’s egg;

Nagash could feel its crackling power from a dozen yards away. His hands clenched

hungrily at the sight of it. Had he more power at his command, he might have been

tempted to lay waste to the holy men and take the stone for himself.

The high priest went by, heedless of the necromancer’s feverish gaze. Behind him

came another set of lantern-bearing priests, followed by a funereal procession

uncomfortably similar to those Nagash had once presided over in Khemri.

There had been a battle, Nagash realised at once. The barbarians followed the

priests in family groups, arranged by order of prominence within their village. Their

fine clothes had been covered in grey ash, and many of the women had cut away their

hair in a gesture of grief. They carried the dead upon their naked shoulders, resting in

a woven litter made from swamp reeds. The corpses were naked, and Nagash was

surprised to see that none of the litters contained trophies or grave gifts to aid their

spirits in the afterlife. The tribe needed absolutely everything they could get just to

survive. The dead, however honoured in life, clearly had to fend for themselves

afterwards.

A pair of lantern-bearing priests marched at roughly even intervals along the

length of the great procession, filling the air with their droning chant. Nagash

watched the line snake its way southeastward, apparently heading for the broken

plain at the foot of the great mountain. Intrigued, Nagash waited for the end of the

procession to go by, then fell into step behind him. The darkness and the steady,

drizzling rain hid him effectively from view.

They passed through rocky, flat terrain, devoid of any signs of life. To Nagash’s

surprise, the path widened after a time and became paved with irregular, flat stones.

Totem shrines appeared at intervals along the crudely-built road. Their faces had

been painted some time earlier with the same glowing oil that adorned the priests,

lending the carved faces an eerie semblance of life.

Hours passed. The barbarians walked for miles in the dark and the rain, growing

steadily closer to the mountain. Eventually, Nagash saw a glowing, greenish nimbus

in the air some distance ahead. After about half a mile he could see a line of tall,

formidable-looking structures that stretched across the path ahead. More glowing

orbs hung at intervals along their length, or shone from the slits of windows set into

their flanks. Before long Nagash realised that he was looking at a strange kind of fort.

From what he could tell, it was a series of long, high-walled buildings made of mud,

brick and wood, connected end to end and stretching from a rocky spur to the north-

east all the way to the shore of the Sour Sea, perhaps two miles to the south-west. A

single, wide gateway provided the only access between the barbarian villages and the

49

sea’s western coast. It was also the first real attempt at fortification Nagash had seen

in the entire region.

The procession led through the wide gate and into the lands beyond. There were

acolytes waiting to shut the gates as the last of the mourners passed by; they had just

begun to push the heavy, wooden portals closed when Nagash appeared out of the

darkness and rain. They stared at the cloaked and hooded figure uneasily, but made

no move to challenge him.

Nagash strode down the long, torchlit tunnel between the first and second gates as

though he had every reason to be there. He studied the iconography carved into the

support beams and the archways: more perfect faces, and occasionally something

akin to a falling star, superimposed against a stylised mountain.

When he emerged from the second gate, Nagash strode a few more yards and

then turned to stare back at the fort. There were more windows on this side, as well

as long, roofed galleries that allowed the inhabitants to view the mountain and the

wide plain. He could see more priests and acolytes up there, standing alone or in

small groups, watching the procession continue towards the foot of the mountain. At

once he realised that the huge structure was both temple and fortress combined. From

here they could control the barbarians’ access to the mountain and the evident power

it represented.

Nagash looked up at the priests, smug and comfortable in their fortress of wood,

and his lips drew back in a ghastly smile. One day he would show them the true

meaning of power.

The procession continued across the plain for another ten miles before leaving the

stone road and travelling across the rocky ground between rolling mounds of earth

and stone that Nagash had come to realise weren’t broken hills at all.

There were hundreds of them, crowding the plain before the mountain and

spreading along the eastern coast as far as the eye could see. The barrow mounds

varied in size: some were not much bigger than a rude barbarian hut, while others

were the size of hillocks. He supposed the priests constructed them, for no one else

had access to the plain. Their foundations were shaped from fitted stones, and then

were roofed over with a cunning arrangement of rocks and packed earth. The older

ones were hills in truth, covered over with yellow grass and even a few small trees.

It was a necropolis of sorts, similar in some ways to the great cities of the dead in

far-off Nehekhara. As he worked his way among the great barrows his mind reeled

with the possibilities. Here, sealed in earth and stone, was the beginnings of an army.

All that he lacked was the power and the knowledge to bring them forth.

Upon leaving the road, the procession had spread out among the barrow mounds.

Each family followed a pair of lantern-bearing priests to the mound that had been

built for their kin. Nagash ignored them, making for a collection of glowing orbs

farther across the plain that lay almost at the feet of the mountain itself. That was

where the high priest and his retinue were to be found.

There were almost a dozen families gathered around the priests; no doubt they

represented the kinfolk of the hetman and his warband. The bodies they’d carried for

so long had been laid side-by-side before the dark entrance to the mound. Each

corpse was naked. Their hair had been shorn close to the scalp, and their physical

50

deformities had been covered in dark ash, so that they practically vanished in the

gloom. All of the men bore ghastly wounds; Nagash had seen such things often

enough to know the marks of spear and axe, expertly delivered. The hetman and his

chosen warriors had gone to do battle with a far superior foe, and been dealt a bitter

defeat.

Nagash kept his distance, sticking to the shadow of an older mound as he

watched the high priest rise from his chair and spread his arms over the dead men. In

a guttural yet powerful voice, the old man began to speak. Nagash didn’t understand

the words, but the cadences and the inflection were all too familiar. A rite of some

sort was being performed. After a few moments, the senior priests joined in, and he

could feel the currents of invisible power growing between them.

The chanting went on for many long minutes. The ritual was a simple one. It

made no use of magical symbols or carefully-inscribed circles, just torrents of raw

power drawn from the high priest’s circlet and, cleverly, the deposits glowing from

the skin of the fish held in the priests’ lanterns. Slowly, steadily, the rite built to a

crescendo—and then he saw one of the corpses start to twitch.

A wail went up from the crowd. As if in response, another corpse began to twitch.

Then another. Soon, all of them were trembling with invisible energies.

There was a crackle of dead joints as, one by one, the dead men sat upright. They

moved like statues, stiff and awkward, driven by unseen hands. A number of the

mourners cried out again. Some tried to crawl across the wet ground, reaching for

their kin, and had to be dragged back.

The corpses paid them no heed. First the hetman clambered slowly to his feet,

followed by his retainers. Then, without a backwards glance, they walked slowly

through the doorway of the waiting barrow.

To Nagash’s surprise, the chanting of the priests continued—and then he realised

that the wailing of the barbarians was being echoed from all across the plain. The

high priest wasn’t just animating the bodies of the hetman and his retainers—he was

interring all the dead at once. Nagash’s mind raced. How many bodies had there

been? A hundred? More? Enough to constitute a small army, he was certain.

The high priest and his followers weren’t holy men. They were necromancers as

well, drawing upon the power of the burning stone to command the bodies of the

dead. And for the moment, they were far more powerful than he.

51

FIVE

The Word of Kings

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Djaf the Terrible

(-1599 Imperial Reckoning)

Arkhan the Black dreamt of riding beneath an endless desert sky, with nothing but

the stars and the gleaming moon to watch over him. The Bhagarite stallion seemed to

float across the rolling dunes, its hooves thudding softly like the beat of a living

heart. Silver bells were woven into the stallion’s mane, jangling a fine counterpoint

to the horse’s stride, and a dry wind caressed his skin, smelling of dust and faded

spice.

There was no end to the sands, no end to the emptiness of the desert night. It was

a benediction, a gift that he knew he did not deserve. And yet, when rough hands

seized Arkhan and shook him awake, the pain of the longing he felt was worse than

any wound he’d ever known.

He found himself lying on his side, cheek pressed against the grimy floor of the

king’s hidden sanctum. His eyelids felt stiff and brittle, like old paper. The immortal

opened them with effort and peered up at the robed figure kneeling beside him.

W’soran’s bald, bony head and long neck reminded Arkhan of nothing so much

as a vulture. His wrinkled face, with its deep-set eyes, hooked nose and receding

chin, would not have looked out of place on a statue of the Scavenger God himself.

Once upon a time, he might have even been a priest of Ualatp. Arkhan knew that the

man had come to Lahmia from the ruined city of Mahrak, more than a hundred years

before, and had ultimately thrown himself on the generosity of Lamashizzar’s court

when none of the city temples would have anything to do with him. Without doubt he

possessed a wealth of arcane knowledge and sorcerous ability that none of

Lamashizzar’s other allies could equal, which explained how he’d found his way so

quickly into the king’s secret cabal.

Cold, black eyes studied Arkhan with dispassionate interest. “It’s taking more

effort to wake him with each passing night,” W’soran observed. He gripped Arkhan’s

shoulders and upper arms, testing the rigidity of the immortal’s muscles and joints.

“No obvious signs of morbidity, but his vigour is clearly waning,” he said with a sour

expression.

Arkhan heard sounds of movement at the far end of the room. An oil lamp flared,

filling the space with orange light and the faint reek of melting tallow. “Perhaps

we’re giving him too much lotus these days,” he heard Lamashizzar say.

W’soran grunted, bending closer and peering into Arkhan’s eyes as though

searching for signs of deception. “He’s being given the same amount as always,” he

52

stated flatly. “So, therefore, his ability to recover from its effects has diminished.

He’s weakening.” His small, dark eyes narrowed. “Or…”

Arkhan heard footsteps draw nearer. A wine bowl clunked down onto a nearby

table, followed by the dry rustle of papers. “What?” the king said irritably.

W’soran stared into the immortal’s eyes for several long moments, as though he

could reach inside Arkhan’s mind and read its contents like a dusty scroll. Arkhan

gave the man a flat, predatory stare. His expression was unequivocal. Given half a

chance, I’d tear your head off your scrawny neck.

It was nothing that W’soran hadn’t seen every night for decades. What he didn’t

know was that, for the first time in a century and a half, Arkhan was strong enough to

actually do it.

W’soran straightened, his knees popping noisily. He’d been well advanced in

years when he’d first come to Lahmia, and Lamashizzar’s elixir could not completely

halt the implacable march of time. He shrugged his knobby shoulders.

“Perhaps the elixir is less effective as the physical body ages,” W’soran muttered,

turning his back on the immortal. “His flesh and organs are four hundred years old.

It’s possible that we are approaching the limits of your arcane prowess.”

There was no mistaking the accusatory tone in W’soran’s voice. Lamashizzar did

not reply at first, but Arkhan could feel the sudden tension in the air between the two

men.

“Come here, Arkhan,” the king said coldly.

The immortal’s eyes narrowed in concentration as he drew his legs up underneath

him and pushed himself to his feet. His limbs were stiff and clumsy—not due to the

effects of the lotus root, but rather the months of hixa stings he’d been receiving from

Neferata. The wasp’s venom collected in his muscles rather than passing away as it

would in a living body, making even the simplest movements difficult. He tried to

turn its debilitating effects to his advantage, letting it slow his movements to

something approximating the lassitude that the king and his cohorts had come to

expect. If Lamashizzar had even the slightest suspicion that he no longer had

complete control over his prisoner, Neferata’s scheme would come to naught, and he

would never be free again.

The king was standing before a long, wooden table set just a few feet to one side

of the room’s ritual circle, his expression preoccupied as he tried to bring some kind

of order to the pile of papers and scrolls spread before him. More figures moved

about in the shadows at the far end of the room, murmuring in low voices and

passing jars of wine between one another. Lamashizzar was accompanied by nearly

his entire cabal: beside W’soran, the immortal recognised the tall, muscular outline of

Abhorash, the king’s champion, as well as the reclining forms of Ankhat and

Ushoran, his oldest and most powerful allies at court. The king’s grand vizier, Ubaid,

stood apart from the other men, politely refusing offers of drink and waiting to do the

king’s bidding. Opposite the doorway, young Zuhras poked at the banked coals of a

brazier with the point of his dagger, stirring them back to life. Grinning slyly, he

speared one of the small coals on the point of his knife and used it to light the small,

clay pipe dangling from his lips. The acrid scent of Eastern pipe smoke began to

spread throughout the chamber.

53

That left only the two libertines, Adio and Khenti. Arkhan suspected they were

chasing whores or losing their money in the gambling dens of the Red Silk District.

Likely they would stumble in later, reeking of sour wine and cackling like hyenas to

claim their share of Lamashizzar’s elixir. Why the king hadn’t lost patience with

them and had their throats cut remained a mystery to Arkhan. He knew all too well

that Lamashizzar would turn on anyone that he considered a threat.

Iron chain links rattled dully as Arkhan shuffled across the floor to stand before

the king. Arkhan studied the man warily. Outwardly, Lamashizzar had aged

somewhat, with grey hair streaking his temples and a fleshiness to his face that

bespoke years of self-indulgence, but he still held himself with the easy assurance of

a younger, fitter man. The effects of the elixir had left its mark on the king in more

ways than one, Arkhan knew. He could see it in Lamashizzar’s stiff shoulders and the

swift, almost furtive movements of his eyes. The immortal had seen that look many

times, in the court of the Undying King. The hunger for immortality turned the

strongest men into beasts, making them savage, suspicious and unpredictable. If what

the queen had told him was true, Lamashizzar cared little for the fortunes of his

kingdom anymore. Mastering Nagash’s terrible incantations was his one and only

obsession, which made him very dangerous indeed.

Arkhan clasped his hands together and bowed his head. The iron rim of the collar

dug into his scarred neck. “How may I serve, great one?” he asked his captor. The

words burned like molten lead on his tongue.

“Is it true?” the king asked. He never took his eyes from the occult diagrams laid

out on the table. “Does the elixir no longer sustain you as it once did?”

The immortal considered his answer carefully. He knew that the moment he was

no longer useful to Lamashizzar, the king would have him killed. “I do not deny that

it is harder to shake off the effects of the lotus,” Arkhan replied. “It is possible that

the learned W’soran is right. Certainly there is much more to be learned from

Nagash’s tomes. You have scarcely scratched the surface of the Undying King’s

power.”

From the moment that he had awakened in the cellars of the royal palace, Arkhan

knew that his only hope of survival was to give up Nagash’s secrets grudgingly,

giving Lamashizzar just enough power to whet the king’s appetite while he waited

for an opportunity to escape. But Lamashizzar was no fool, he saw to it that Arkhan

had no personal access to Nagash’s books, and the only sustenance allowed to him

was the same thin gruel that the king and his cohorts drank. It left him with barely

enough strength to move, much less break free from the iron collar that the king had

riveted about his neck. Even the black lotus had given him little relief; he was so

weak that the potion brought no dreams, only cold oblivion.

W’soran seized on Arkhan’s reply. “Listen to him, great one,” he said. “We must

go back to the source and start again.” He stepped forward and laid a hand on one of

Nagash’s books. “Follow the Usurper’s instructions to the letter. We know that the

rituals work—Arkhan here is proof of that!”

“And they also led to the Usurper’s downfall!” Lamashizzar snapped. “Everyone

knows the horrors that took place in Khemri before the war. How long do you think

we could prey upon palace servants and criminals before people began to take

notice?”

54

“You can buy slaves from the East!” W’soran exclaimed. “No one would care

what you did with them! Or round up the hundreds of beggars clogging the streets in

the lower districts! You’re the king, or have you forgotten?”

The words had scarcely passed W’soran’s lips when there was a rasp of metal and

suddenly Abhorash was standing beside the king, his iron sword held loosely at his

side. There was no expression on the champion’s broad, heavy-boned face: he had

the look of a man about to kill a snake that had slipped inside his house.

Lamashizzar said nothing to either of the two men. He simply met the older

man’s stare until W’soran finally looked away.

“I apologise, great one,” W’soran growled. “My words were intemperate and ill-

considered. I meant no disrespect.”

“Of course,” the king replied, but there was an edge to his smile that belied the

graciousness of the answer. He gave a sidelong glance to Abhorash, and the warrior

obediently—although not without some reluctance—slid his sword back into its

scabbard. It was only then that Arkhan realised how tense he had become. His hands

had curled into fists, and his jagged teeth were on edge. Just like Nagash’s court, so

long ago, he thought. How we circled each other then, like hungry jackals, ready to

sink our teeth into the weak the minute their back was exposed.

Arkhan saw the champion relax slightly. Lamashizzar returned his attention to the

papers on the table, and just when it seemed that he confrontation was over, Lord

Ushoran took a sip from his wine bowl and said, somewhat offhandedly, “Our guest

from Mahrak does have a point, cousin.”

The king turned, as did Abhorash, both of them with almost the same look of

irritation on their faces. W’soran’s eyes narrowed as he tried to divine the real

purpose behind Ushoran’s words. Lord Ushoran was infamous for his intrigues, both

in and out of court; mostly the king tolerated it because Ushoran came from one of

the oldest families in Lahmia, and because the nobleman was smart enough not to

involve any members of the royal family in his schemes.

Though distantly related to the king’s household, Ushoran wasn’t blessed with

Asaph’s gifts of beauty and charm; he had the sort of face that blended easily into a

crowd, with close-cropped dark hair and unremarkable brown eyes. Arkhan gathered

that Ushoran had gone to some effort over the decades to keep the cabal’s activities

out of the public eye. Lamashizzar believed him capable of anything.

“Do you now question my claim to the throne?” the king asked with a brittle

smile.

Ushoran chuckled. “Certainly not, cousin. I merely wish to point out that our

progress has been almost nonexistent these past fifty years. We continue to age,

albeit very, very slowly, and possess nothing like the power that his ilk—” the

nobleman gestured to Arkhan with his wine bowl, “—displayed during the war.” He

shifted slightly on the divan. “It cannot be argued that you aren’t following Nagash’s

incantations as they were intended.”

“Blood is blood!” Lamashizzar snapped, giving in to his anger at last. “It carries

life in it, whether it’s from a goat or from a man! And no one will raise a hue and cry

if we decide to sacrifice an animal once a month—if anything, they’ll likely laud us

for our piety! This way raises less suspicion. You all know that.”

55

Next to Ushoran, Lord Ankhat straightened and swung his legs over the edge of

the divan. He was less, the dilettante than Ushoran, though his family name was just

as old and respected. Though small in stature, he was still trim and physically fit,

with piercing eyes and a sharp mind that has hampered only by his notorious

impatience. “I know that power is meant to be used, or else it is worthless.” Ankhat

said, fixing the king with a steady gaze. “If we had the full power of the Usurper at

our command, we wouldn’t need to fear the other cities.”

“I’m certain Nagash thought the same thing,” Lamashizzar retorted, glancing

back at Arkhan as if for confirmation. When the immortal gave no obvious sign of

agreement, the king continued.

“It’s different now,” Ankhat persisted. “The other great cities are but a shadow of

their former glory, and the power of the priesthood is broken forever. They wouldn’t

dare defy us.”

“Not separately, perhaps, but together?” Lamashizzar shook his head. “An

alliance of the great cities would destroy us as surely as it doomed Nagash.”

Ankhat snorted in disgust. “Who would lead such an alliance? All the great kings

are dead. All except you, that is.”

The king ignored Ankhat’s clumsy praise. “All we need is time,” he said. “Every

passing year, the cities of Nehekhara grow ever more dependant on our trade with the

East. Our influence reaches all the way to distant Zandri, and as far south as Ka-

Sabar. In another hundred years, perhaps two, no one will dare to move against us.

There is no need for bloody gambles and ruinous wars. All we have to do is wait, and

everything we want will fall into our hands.”

For a moment, no one spoke. Even the stolid Abhorash seemed uncomfortable

with the king’s vision. The very idea of restraint was alien to these men, who were

accustomed to getting what they wanted with a snap of their fingers. Yet they could

not bring themselves to gainsay the king. At least, not for now.

But for how much longer, Arkhan wondered. How long until they start to feel the

creeping approach of time, and become obsessed with their fading vitality? How long

until they realise that Lamashizzar’s carefully reasoned caution is a mask for

something far more simple and straightforward. The man is weak. He inherited his

power from Lamasheptra, and the one time he tried to gamble with it, he lost his

nerve. If I hadn’t arrived at his tent outside Mahrak, he might never have committed

his army to battle at all, and Nagash would very likely have won.

It still galled the immortal that he’d let Lamashizzar turn the tables on him inside

the Black Pyramid. Even a weak man can be dangerous in the right circumstances, he

reminded himself. Greed can sometimes be a courage all its own.

W’soran took a deep breath and folded his hands at his waist, not unlike a priest

lecturing a group of acolytes. “You mention animal sacrifice and piety, great one,” he

said. “Yet you fail to mention that the greatest of holy rites specify the spilling of

human blood instead.” He spread his hands. “If the lifeblood of a goat is no more

potent than that of a man, then why do the gods make a distinction?”

The king turned and glared at W’soran, his brow furrowing as he searched for a

proper rebuttal, but here the former libertine was out of his depth. Finally he turned

to Arkhan.

“Is he right?” Lamashizzar asked.

56

The immortal affected a shrug. “I’m no more a priest than you are, great one,” he

answered carefully. He was treading in dangerous waters now. If Lamashizzar ever

bothered to read Nagash’s commentaries more attentively, he would see the truth of

what W’soran was getting at right away. “It’s certainly possible that W’soran has the

right of it, but that isn’t really the point, is it? The question is whether creating the

elixir from animal blood is potent enough to grant immortality or not. And that is

something we have yet to prove one way or the other.” Arkhan gave the king a black-

toothed smile. “Certainly there is still room for improvement in your performance of

the incantations.”

Lamashizzar gave Arkhan a hard, penetrating stare, and for a moment the

immortal thought he’d overplayed his hand. Then, abruptly, the king grinned

ruefully. “There you have it,” he said, turning back to his cohorts. “It’s all my fault.”

Ushoran chuckled politely. “Spoken like a true king,” he said, raising his wine

bowl in salute. The others joined in, and Arkhan allowed himself to relax. He

approached the table and pretended to study the ritual symbols. He could see places

where he could suggest miniscule changes to the geometries that would suggest areas

of improvement without providing any real benefit to the elixir.

The immortal bowed to the king, and smiled his ghoulish smile.

“Shall we begin, great one?” he said.

Raw, burning pain gnawed at Arkhan’s nerves, banishing the thick fog of the lotus

root. His muscles quivered like plucked bowstrings. Arkhan groaned, baring his

ruined teeth against the pounding agony, and with an effort of will forced his stiff

eyelids open.

She was standing over him, bathed in warm light from the oil lamp in her right

hand. A tiny frown pulled at the corners of her perfect lips.

“Are you well?” Neferata asked. Her voice was dusky and sweet, like rich honey.

Even in his wretched state, the sound of it was riveting. Large, almond-shaped eyes

narrowed in concern. She raised a slender hand, and for a moment, the immortal

thought she might actually reach out and lay her palm against his head, like a mother

might to a sick child. The queen seemed to catch herself at the last moment, her hand

pausing scant inches from his brow.

“It is nothing,” Arkhan grated. Even his jaw muscles were stiff now, despite the

taste of the king’s elixir he’d received little more than an hour ago.

The immortal tore his gaze away from the queen’s face and used the end of the

iron chain to pull himself to his feet. For a moment he leaned against the grimy wall

and tried to orient himself. It felt as though he’d only just choked down the bitter

bowl of wine and lotus root that W’soran had forced on him. He blinked in the dim

light, still expecting to see the king and his cohorts moving about the chamber.

“What time is it?” he mumbled.

“Scarcely an hour before dawn,” the queen replied, a note of tension creeping

into her voice. “The king was here much longer than usual. I had to hide in an

adjoining room until he and W’soran left. I think they were arguing.”

Arkhan managed a nod. “W’soran is growing impatient,” he said. “The old

vulture covets not just Nagash’s elixir, but the rest of his incantations as well. The

others are starting to agree with him.”

57

Neferata’s dark eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “All of them?” she asked. She turned

and walked back to the paper-strewn worktable where her husband had stood just a

couple of hours before. Every movement was sensuous and fluid, almost hypnotic.

Like one of Asaph’s sacred serpents, Arkhan thought. The sight of her filled him with

a bewildering mix of wonderment, hunger and terrible dread.

She was so like Neferem, he thought, and yet so unlike her at the same time. The

women of Lahmia were famous for their seductive beauty, but the daughters of the

king bore the likeness of the goddess herself. But where Neferem’s staggering beauty

had been tempered by her role as the Daughter of the Sun, Neferata’s allure was

darker and far wilder, like Asaph herself. A single look from her could topple

kingdoms, the immortal thought. No wonder the kings of Lahmia keep their

daughters locked away and their queens hidden behind golden masks.

“Well, Abhorash still seems loyal, but that’s to be expected,” Arkhan said.

“Ushoran and Ankhat, on the other hand, are tired of Lamashizzar’s half-measures.

They were at Mahrak. They know how feeble the king’s elixir truly is.”

Neferata stood beside the table and studied the arrangement of the papers

carefully, noting their precise order carefully before picking through the pile.

Lamashizzar would know if a single sheet was out of place when he returned the

following night. “What of Ubaid?”

The immortal shrugged. “I confess I do not know. Lamashizzar only brought him

into the cabal because he needed the grand vizier’s help to maintain his secret. Since

then he’s been very circumspect with his opinions.”

“Typical,” the queen observed. “But somewhat encouraging, nonetheless. And

the others?”

Arkhan snorted. “The young libertines? Irrelevant. Their loyalties belong to

whoever supplies them with the elixir. Frankly, you would be better off without

them.”

Neferata carefully peeled back several pages until she came to a yellowed sheet

depicting a complex ritual circle. It was one of several versions of the Incantation of

Immortality that Arkhan had tried to recreate from Nagash’s books. To the

immortal’s unending irritation, the Undying King had not committed a definitive

version of the ritual to paper, no doubt to keep its secrets firmly under his control.

Lamashizzar could scarcely tell the difference between one page and the next without

Arkhan’s help, but Neferata’s training with the priestesses of Neru gave her a degree

of insight that her brother lacked.

Since she’d begun her secret tutelage under Arkhan, some eight months before,

the queen’s skill in the necromantic arts had grown by leaps and bounds. Sneaking

into the cabal’s sanctum each night, right on the heels of the king and his cohorts, she

learned more in a few stolen hours than Lamashizzar had managed in more than a

century.

Of course, it helped that Neferata was far less squeamish about the nature of the

blood she used.

The queen studied the page intently. After a few moments, she took a piece of

chalk from a clay bowl on a nearby shelf and began making precise adjustments to

the circle laid out on the sanctum floor.

58

“Things are coming to a head quicker than I expected,” she said as she worked.

“We must be ready very soon now.”

Arkhan caught himself staring at the queen, watching the way her body moved in

the lamplight. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “If this ritual succeeds, then

you will have all the power you need,” he told her. Together, they had already

created versions of the elixir that were several times more potent than anything the

king had made. The immortal licked his lips. “Much depends on the quality of the

base material, of course.”

Neferata gave Arkhan a sharp look. “The blood of a royal handmaiden is

sufficient, I should think.”

The immortal smiled. “Younger is better than older,” he said. “Of course, a live

victim is better still.”

The queen made one last change to the circle and rose to her feet. “And why is

that?” she asked, as she inspected her work.

“The more youthful the blood, the more of life’s vigour it contains, of course,”

Arkhan replied.

“And using a live victim in the ritual grants even more vigour?”

Arkhan hesitated, uncertain how much he should reveal. Neferata had already

gleaned far more secrets from him than he’d been willing to share. “In a manner of

speaking, yes.”

“Well, that will have to wait for another day,” the queen said. “For now, we must

be content with what we have.”

She moved past him, to a table at the far end of the room—one well out of reach

of his iron chain, Arkhan could not help but note. Neferata picked up a small ceramic

jar, not much larger than a nobleman’s wine bowl, and carried it to the centre of the

ritual circle. The immortal felt his turgid pulse quicken. Neferata never told him how

she obtained the blood from her handmaidens, and, in truth, he didn’t really care.

Neferata knelt beside the jar and placed a number of additional marks around its

circumference, then retreated to the edge of the circle. “The sun will rise soon,” she

said, raising her arms towards the ceiling. “Let us begin.”

Arkhan moved to the far side of the circle, taking care not to drag his iron chain

across the sorcerous glyphs. He raised his own arms—stiff and yet trembling, all the

same—to mirror Neferata’s own. And then, together, they began to chant.

The words of power now rolled easily off Neferata’s tongue, and the air began to

crackle with invisible energies, harnessed to a force of will as great as any Arkhan

had ever known save for Nagash himself. The immortal echoed every syllable,

adding his will to her own, until the ritual circle seethed with power.

The incantation was long and complex, stretching for many long minutes, and

Arkhan felt the energies of the ritual building to a furious crescendo. The jar began to

tremble, its lid rattling maniacally as gusts of steam billowed from the contents

within. His lips peeled back in a ghastly, feral snarl as he smelled the fragrant odour

of the rapidly quickening elixir. Arkhan threw back his head and cried out the words

of the incantation in an exultant voice. The centuries seemed to unwind within him,

and for a single instant he was once more a mighty warrior, a master of magic and

conqueror who once made all Nehekhara tremble with fear.

59

And then, immortal and queen cried out as one, and the ritual culminated in a

shower of lambent sparks from the glyphs inscribed on the surface of the jar.

Neferata staggered, momentarily stunned by the force of the power she’d

commanded, but Arkhan’s senses were razor-sharp. In an instant he was inside the

circle, feeling the residual energies of the incantation burn across his skin as his

hands closed about the curved surface of the jar.

He felt the queen’s eyes upon him. They cut through his raging thirst like a knife.

He clutched the jar tightly, imagining that he could feel the strength of the elixir

through the glazed walls of clay. If he drank it dry, it might give him the strength

enough to tear open the collar and finally escape.

Then again, it might not, and then where would he be? Neferata would not take

such a betrayal lightly. And she already knew more than enough to continue studying

Nagash’s books without him, whether she realised it yet or not.

Arkhan sank slowly to his knees. With an effort of supreme will, he raised the jar

to Neferata, as a servant might proffer wine to his master. “Here, great one,” he said

in a hollow voice. “Drink of the fruits of your labour. Drink, and be restored.”

Neferata smiled at him, and Arkhan was secretly ashamed how it made his dead

heart lurch in his chest. She came to him, graceful as a serpent, and took the jar from

his unwilling hands.

The queen raised the steaming vessel to her lips and took a long draught. A

delicious shudder went through her slender frame. “Oh,” she whispered. “Oh!”

Arkhan watched in silence, gripped by a helpless despair. She would drink it all.

He knew it. Months ago, she’d sworn to share every draught of elixir they made, just

as Lamashizzar had promised him long ago. But promises meant nothing to kings and

queens, except when it suited them. Nagash had taught him that lesson well.

He was surprised, therefore, when the queen lowered the jar to him once more.

“Here, favoured servant,” she said with a regal smile, her lips red with the sweet wine

of stolen life. “Take your due.”

It took all the remaining willpower he had not to snatch the jar from Neferata’s

hands. Still, they trembled as he brought the rim of the jar to his lips and drank.

The elixir flowed into his mouth like molten metal, setting every nerve alight. He

stiffened, gulping greedily, as he felt a fraction of the old power return to his wasted

limbs. It was a shadow of what he’d once felt as the Undying King’s right hand, but

it was still greater by far than anything Lamashizzar had wrought.

When he was done he sat back on his heels, gasping for breath. The queen was

studying him, her dark eyes thoughtful. He met her gaze directly, too intoxicated for

the moment to be cowed by her supernatural beauty.

“Why, great one?” he asked. “What do you wish to gain from all this?”

Neferata’s lips curved in a crooked smile. “Besides eternal youth and power?”

she asked.

“Yes.”

The queen’s smile faded. “Lahmia is in peril,” Neferata replied, “and her king is

too weak and too foolish to protect her. So I must instead.” She cocked her head and

regarded him appraisingly. “What of you? What do you wish, now that Nagash is

dead and gone?”

60

Arkhan did not reply for a moment. He felt the power coursing through his veins

and drew a heavy breath. “What do I want? I want to ride a horse again, and cross the

desert sands beneath the moonlight.”

Neferata quirked a delicate eyebrow. “Is that all?”

The immortal gave her a tight-lipped smile and hefted a length of iron chain.

“Forty-seven links,” he said. “That equates to exactly twenty-three and a half paces.

For the past one hundred and forty years, that has been the length and breadth of my

entire world. What I wish for, great one, is nothing less than paradise.”

Neferata considered this, and then, to Arkhan’s utter surprise, she reached down

and laid a hand upon his cheek. Her skin smelled of sandalwood, and was warm as a

summer breeze.

She bent close to him, and her eyes seemed to swallow him whole. “I know what

it’s like to live every day as a prisoner,” she said softly. “Keep your oath to me,

Arkhan the Black, and I swear you will see your wish fulfilled.”

Then she was gone, retreating from the circle and returning the ritual materials to

the way they were as Lamashizzar had left them. Arkhan hadn’t felt her pluck the jar

from his hands. He hadn’t even noticed it was gone until minutes after she’d

departed.

It was a long time before Arkhan crawled from the circle and curled up like a dog

at the base of the sanctum wall. When his mind finally quieted enough to let him

sleep, he dreamt of endless, moonlit sands, and the music of silver bells. The warm

desert air caressed his face, smelling of sandalwood.

61

SIX

The Barrow-thief

Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Djaf the Terrible

(-1599 Imperial Reckoning)

Now that he had reached the mountain at long last, Nagash’s great work began in

earnest. His first months were spent combing its slopes, crawling into each fissure

like a spider and searching for ways to reach deeper into its heart. He’d hoped that

the deposits of abn-i-khat would lie close to the surface, and that the vents were signs

of ancient impacts that would point the way to the burning stone, but within the first

few days he realised that his theory was only half-right. The fissures were mostly

shallow crevices that narrowed quickly as they plunged even deeper into the rock.

They weren’t the scars of multiple impacts, but the marks of a single, giant impact

some incalculable time in the past. The burning stone had been driven deep into the

mountain’s guts, cracking its granite flanks like a dropped wine bowl.

He searched the mountain systematically, starting at its foot and working upward

in a rough spiral. By day he took refuge in one of the deeper fissures, breathing in the

glowing vapour in an attempt to replenish some of the power he’d expended.

Already, his exposure to the burning stone was beginning to take its toll. He found

that he needed to ingest more of the abn-i-khat to maintain his strength, which left his

skin ravaged by terrible lesions and glowing traces of the mineral in his bones. The

luminescence penetrated his flesh, revealing the workings of his muscles and the

shrivelled knots of organs nestled in his chest, but so long as his mind remained sharp

and his limbs obeyed his will, he paid the changes little mind.

Finally, many weeks later, he found a fissure almost two-thirds up the mountain

that sank crookedly into the stone for more than twenty feet, then opened into a wide,

low-ceilinged cave that glowed with residue from centuries of subterranean vapours.

From that moment on, the mountain was Nagash’s fortress, his sanctum from the

burning sun and the meddling of feeble-minded men.

Nagash spent months searching the tunnels that branched from the great cave,

discovering a vast, tangled network of passageways that honeycombed the fractured

mountain. He marked the passageways with hieroglyphs using the point of his bronze

daggers, slowly building a map of the labyrinth as he made his way ever deeper into

its depths. He scraped residue from the rock walls and collected the dust in the hood

of his cloak, and conceived of different ways to strain the mineral from the steam that

billowed from the deepest parts of the mountain, but he could not find a way to reach

the deposits themselves. The tunnels would have to be extended; exploratory shafts

would have to be sunk deeper into the earth, and structures built to haul the stone to

the surface. He would need an army of slaves to conquer the mountain and plunder

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its treasures, and so the necromancer turned his attention back to the surface once

more.

It was very late, and though well past the rainy season the mountainside was

wreathed in thick layers of mist. Luminous ribbons of steam caused the cooler layers

of mist to writhe and dance, teasing the eye with ghostly images in the fog. Nagash

paused at the lip of the fissure and listened. It was deathly silent along the slopes of

the mountain and the barrow fields below. In the distance, he could hear the lapping

of waves along the rocky shore of the Sour Sea.

The necromancer clutched his tattered cloak about his chest and made his way

down the slope. Power crackled along his withered veins. He’d ingested the last bits

of his scavenged stone and a healthy pinch of the cave-dust as well, to ensure that he

would have ample strength to complete the ritual he’d planned.

At the foot of the mountain he paused again, his senses stretched to the utmost.

For the last week he’d crept among the barrows, observing the activity of the priests

while he searched for the likeliest spot to attempt his experiment. He’d learned that

groups of acolytes, led by one or more senior priests, would patrol the northern edge

of the wide plain for several hours each night. They rarely ventured further south,

where the barrows were much older, and they hastened to return to the temple fort

before the hour of the dead. He suspected that the patrols were more of a punishment

for lazy acolytes than a genuine attempt to guard the barrow fields from intruders.

He’d crossed paths with the patrols more than once during his explorations, and

they’d never even suspected he was nearby. Nagash had listened to their nervous

chatter often enough that he thought that he was beginning to understand parts of

their bestial language.

He’d decided that it was best to attempt the ritual after the patrols had returned to

the temple, to minimise the risk of discovery, but that served to limit how far he

could travel from his mountain lair and still make it back before dawn. Satisfied that

there was no one about, Nagash headed north and west, among the newer barrow

mounds.

The barrow where the high priest had interred the hetman and his warriors was

still relatively unspoiled. Streaks of mud had drained down over the stone

foundations during the rainy months, and a layer of sallow, sharp-edged grass had

grown atop the mound, but the wooden cover that had been placed over the entrance

was still easily accessible. The cover, round as a wagon wheel and made from layers

of planed wood, had been wedged into the stone frame and the cracks filled with

packed earth.

Nagash stepped into the shadow of the barrow mound’s entrance and stretched

forth a gaunt, faintly glowing hand. The power flared along his limbs as he focussed

his will upon the wooden cover. Words of power fell like stones from his lips as he

unleashed a short, concentrated spell.

Green light licked from the necromancer’s fingertips and played across the

surface of the wood. At once, the planks blanched, crackling from within as the

energies ate through the living matter. The sound of decaying wood spread, growing

in volume and intensity, until the entire cover collapsed with a hollow crash. Nagash

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hastened through the entrance, his bare feet kicking up dry clouds of dust with every

step.

Beyond the opening was a short tunnel made of fitted stones that led into the

centre of the mound. Nagash moved easily in the darkness, his eyes having long since

adapted to the conditions of the deep tunnels beneath the mountain. After thirty feet

or so, the tunnel gave way to the barrow proper: a dome-like chamber made of stone

and packed earth that stank of mould and decay. There was nothing in the way of

ornamentation on the walls, or the rotting platforms of wood and leather upon which

the corpses were laid. It was a far cry from even the meanest of Nehekhara’s crypts.

The hetman’s body lay on a platform in the centre of the mound, surrounded by

the bodies of his chosen men. The damp and the ravages of beetle and worm had

worked their harm upon the corpse, causing flesh and muscle to liquefy and slough

away from the bone. Much of the skin covering the hetman’s skull had been chewed

away, revealing part of a cheekbone and the warrior’s gap-toothed jaw.

Nagash’s lip curled in distaste. Amateurs. He’d hoped to find the corpses in better

condition. It was easier to send power twitching through muscle than to animate bare

bone. Looking about, he saw that none of the other bodies were in any better

condition, so with an irritated grimace he drew his dagger and bent to work.

The damp earth made carving the ritual circle a simple task, though filling in the

magical symbols was much harder to do with the necessary precision. He had to cut

deeply into the dirt to chisel out the proper lines, taking far more time than he’d

intended. By the time he was ready to begin, he reckoned that dawn wasn’t more than

an hour away. He hadn’t even properly begun, and already the experiment had run

into trouble.

Tucking away his dagger, Nagash stepped up to the edge of the circle and raised

his arms. He began with a long litany of curses, focusing his anger and his desire by

calling up the names of all those, living and dead, who had wronged him and cast

him out into the wasteland. Khefru. Neferem. Nebunefer. Hekhmenukep. Rakh-amn-

hotep. Lamashizzar… The litany went on and on, until finally he was hissing with

rage. At some point the names gave way to words of power, and the dank air crackled

with the force of the necromancer’s will.

He drew deeply of the power he’d absorbed, pouring it into the circle and the

hetman’s body. “Rise,” he commanded. “Rise. Your master commands it!”

Slowly the chamber became suffused with a greenish glow, emanating first from

Nagash, and then from the hetman’s body itself. Green light pooled within the

corpse’s eye sockets. A tremor went through the rotting flesh: muscles constricted,

stirring colonies of beetles and wriggling worms.

Nagash watched in triumph as the corpse’s spine arched. One arm lolled off the

side of the platform, spilling rotting flesh onto the floor. Then, slowly, as though

pulled by an invisible tether, the hetman sat upright. The skull oriented on the

necromancer, its bare jaw working as though trying to speak.

“Rise!” Nagash ordered. “Come forth!”

The corpse paused for a moment, as though uncertain of its strength, and Nagash

redoubled his focus. The hetman’s body shuddered under the lash of the

necromancer’s will, and haltingly swung its legs over the edge of the frame. Wood

snapped beneath the shifting weight, all but tumbling the corpse to the floor. It

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tottered unsteadily on bare, uneven feet for a moment, but then it seemed to find its

balance. Slowly, steadily, its back straightened. The corpse turned carefully on its

heel to face its summoner, bale-lights flickering where its eyes had once been.

Nagash’s lips peeled back in a ghastly, triumphant grin. Cruel laughter bubbled

up from his chest. And then the hetman’s corpse raised its bony arms and lurched

forward, reaching for his throat.

He was so certain of his control over the corpse that at first he didn’t recognise

his peril. It was only when the hetman’s grasping fingers were scant inches from his

throat that Nagash backpedalled in shock. “Back!” he commanded with a sweep of

his hand, pouring still more energy into the spell.

But the corpse did not cease. It staggered forwards, fingers grasping, bony jaws

clicking hungrily together. Snarling, Nagash tried to push the monster’s arms aside. It

tottered unsteadily for a moment, but recovered with disturbing speed. With every

passing moment it seemed to grow in strength and intelligence. Cursing the chaotic

energies of the abn-i-khat, Nagash angrily banished the energies of the ritual.

He expected the corpse to collapse at his feet. Instead it leapt forward, seizing

Nagash by the throat. Bony digits dug deep into the necromancer’s own unliving

flesh, clawing into the waxy muscle beneath. Stunned, Nagash struggled in the

hetman’s grip. He stared into the bale-fires that still burned in the corpse’s eye-

sockets, and suddenly realised that it was being directed by a will other than his own.

The faint sound of chanting echoed down the dark tunnel from the barrow

entrance. The priests! They hadn’t been so careless or so blind as he’d thought.

As he struggled with the hetman, Nagash saw that the bodies of the retainers were

starting to move as well. The energies of his ritual had dissipated, but he pressed his

hand against the hetman’s chest and lashed out with his will. The corpse staggered

slightly, but resumed the attack almost at once.

Had he been a living man, Nagash would already have been dead. As it was, he

would be surrounded within moments and torn to pieces by the rest of the hetman’s

retinue.

Rage consumed the necromancer. He, who had mastered the energies of the

Black Pyramid, and once commanded armies of warriors both living and dead, laid

low by a handful of corpses and a pack of bawling savages? It was unthinkable!

With a roar, Nagash drew upon his diminished reserves of power and felt his

limbs burn with unnatural strength. He seized the hetman’s right wrist with his left

hand and squeezed, shattering the small bones and tearing its clenching hand free,

then drew one of his bronze daggers and drove it through the corpse’s forehead. The

monster staggered, but did not fall. Snarling, Nagash wrenched the knife left and

right until the vertebrae snapped, then tore the corpse’s head from its shoulders. At

once the body collapsed, falling apart as the sorcery that had animated it was

suddenly dispelled.

Nagash had time to draw his second knife before the hetman’s retainers closed in.

There were five of the shambling creatures, their eyes burning with malice as they

reached for him with claw-like hands. He slashed with his heavy blades, severing

fingers and shearing through hands, but still the corpses closed in. They jabbed at

him with splintered bones and snapped at him with their rotting jaws. He smashed the

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skull of one leering corpse, obliterating it like a rotting melon, and then shattered the

knee of another. It fell at his feet, wrapping its mauled arms around his legs.

Another arm slipped around Nagash’s throat and tightened with frightening

strength, while a fourth creature fastened its jaws on his left arm. He felt himself

being dragged off his feet. Snarling, he kicked at the creature holding his legs and

succeeded in crushing its neck and shoulder with one savage blow. It fell back, one

arm hanging uselessly at its side. Free of its grasp, Nagash twisted at the waist and

drove his dagger into the throat of the creature whose teeth were savaging his side.

Rotten flesh parted like damp cloth; he twisted his wrist and the monster’s head came

loose with a wet, popping sound.

The last of the corpses crashed into him, hands pressing on his chest. Nagash fell

backwards, slashing wildly with his blade as he fell. He landed on his back, and the

creatures fell atop him, pinning him down and tearing at him with their jaws. The

necromancer writhed and kicked. Teeth sank into his cheek, tearing at the waxy flesh.

Nagash brought up his left-hand blade, driving it so deeply into one corpse’s ribcage

that it became hopelessly entangled. Enraged, he let go of the dagger’s hilt and drove

his hand deeper, past the shrivelled organs and leathery muscles until his fingers

closed around the creature’s spine. He squeezed, crushing the vertebrae, and then

shoved the crippled monster aside. Moments later, the last corpse collapsed with its

skull crushed beneath the pommel of his dagger.

Growling like a beast, Nagash kicked himself free of the corpses and staggered

back to his feet. Grisly wounds had been gnawed into his face, chest and arm, but he

felt no pain. His flesh burned and his bones shook. Smoke curled from the ragged

ends of skin hanging from his cheek.

He burst from the barrow mound with a Nehekharan war cry on his lips, his eyes

blazing with wrath. Half a dozen priests were waiting outside, standing in a semi-

circle and chanting, their arms raised to the sky. Perhaps a dozen acolytes attended

upon them, holding aloft lantern-globes that were already half-dead from the strain of

the priests’ incantation.

Nagash flung out his hand and spat words of power. Arcs of green fire burst from

his fingertips, spearing half of the priests. They fell screaming, their skin blackening

as they burned from the inside out. Lantern poles toppled as the acolytes fled in

panic, the globes bursting as they hit the ground.

The rest of the priests recoiled in shock and horror. He waited for them to strike

back, unleashing searing blasts of their own, but no such counter-strike came. Nagash

advanced on them, dagger poised. He slashed out with the blade, and one of the

savages toppled with his throat slashed open. The last two turned to flee, wailing and

babbling imprecations to the heavens. Nagash leapt upon them, hacking and stabbing

until both lay silent and broken at his feet.

Nagash staggered, bloody and torn, chest heaving with exertion. His power was

all but spent, his flesh savaged by combat and the fire of the abn-i-khat. He could still

hear the screams of the acolytes, fading in the distance off to the north-west. Nagash

threw back his head and howled after them. I’m coming, he thought savagely.

There’s nowhere you can run in this forsaken place that’s safe from me!

Muscles quivering, he turned, heading back for the safety of the mountain—and

saw that he was not alone. A single acolyte stood watching him, eyes wide and jaw

66

agape with fear. He was young, scarcely old enough to be a man, and he clutched his

lantern-pole with a white-knuckled grip.

When Nagash’s merciless gaze fell upon him, the acolyte sank slowly to his

knees and bowed low. The necromancer studied him for several moments, debating

on what to do. Finally he simply nodded silently and walked away. Truth be told, he

wasn’t certain he had enough strength left to kill the young man and still make it

back to the foot of the mountain.

Power. It all came down to power. He’d thought he’d had enough, and nearly

paid for that mistake with his life. As he lurched across the lifeless plain towards the

distant mountain, with dawn less than half an hour away, Nagash vowed that he

would not make the same mistake again.

67

SEVEN

The Right of Queens

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Djaf the Terrible

(-1599 Imperial Reckoning)

“Please, great one. Try one of these.” Tephret reached for a golden bowl with one

ancient, palsied hand and tried to fish out a few candied dates. “You’ll waste away if

you don’t eat something.”

A light supper had been laid out for the queen at the edge of the small pond that

served as the centrepiece of the palace garden. Neferata leaned against the bole of a

small ornamental tree, surrounded by a constellation of golden dishes laden with

uneaten sweetmeats and Eastern delicacies. It was late spring, the rainy season, but

the night was surprisingly clear. Neru shone high in the sky, and drops of rain from

the evening’s rainstorm glittered like diamonds on the blooming garden flowers. The

night air was warm and heady with their perfume. Large fish swam in lazy circles

just beneath the surface of the water, their opalescent scales glimmering ghostly

white beneath the moonlight. If she listened very closely she could hear the whisper

of the currents they stirred in their wake.

Neferata stilled Tephret’s hand with a gentle touch and a warm smile. They were

alone in the great garden, she’d sent her other handmaidens away as soon as the

dinner had been laid out.

“These foreign foods have lost their savour, I’m afraid,” she said to Tephret. The

woman’s skin was soft and wrinkled beneath the queen’s fingertips. At a hundred and

sixty-five years of age, her most favoured handmaiden was nearing the end of a long

and faithful life. The queen had watched her grow from a nervous slip of a girl into a

grey-haired old woman, and in all that time, Tephret’s devotion hadn’t wavered.

Had she ever wondered why her mistress had never lost the bloom of youth? Had

she ever resented Neferata’s enduring beauty, even as her own faded with the passage

of time? If she did, Tephret had never let it show. Other handmaidens had come and

gone over the decades, but she had remained, until now the queen could not imagine

life without her.

Tephret returned the queen’s smile, her rheumy eyes glittering. “Shall I catch you

a fish, then?” she said, and a sudden memory made her chuckle. “Do you remember

that time when you gave little Ismaila that bowl of Rasetran liquor, and she got so

drunk she waded out into the pond and tried to catch the fish with her hands?”

“And she nearly drowned half of us trying to get her out,” Neferata added. “I had

weeds in my hair, and a frog went down the front of your robe.”

“That’s right!” Tephret exclaimed, her face lighting up. “I didn’t realise it until

we got back to your bedchamber, and then we spent half the night chasing the little

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thing around the room!” She threw back her head and laughed, transported by the

memory, and Neferata joined in.

“Oh, she was such a silly one,” Tephret said, wiping tears from the corners of her

eyes. “But a good girl, bless her. What ever happened to her?”

Neferata sighed. “Oh, her family had her married off to some petty lordling.

Suheir, I think his name was. It was years and years ago, now.”

“Years and years,” Tephret echoed, shaking her head. “It seems like that was just

yesterday to me.”

“I know,” Neferata replied softly, feeling a sudden pang at the wistful look in

Tephret’s eyes. She gently gripped the handmaiden’s arm. “It must have been hard

for you, watching all the other girls go on to raise their own families.”

“Oh, no,” Tephret replied, slowly shaking her head. “I had no such illusions. I

had no family after all, no one to search out a suitable husband.”

“I could have,” the queen said. “I should have. It was my responsibility. I just

couldn’t bear to part with you.”

The handmaiden smiled, a little sadly. “That’s very kind of you to say, great

one.”

“No,” the queen said. “Call me Neferata. Nothing more. Tonight, let’s talk as

friends do. All right?”

At first, Tephret didn’t quite know what to say. Finally, she nodded. “You have

been a friend to me,” she managed to say. “Perhaps the only friend I’ve really known.

Does that seem strange?”

“Not to me,” Neferata said, and felt tears prickle at the corners of her eyes.

“Here,” she said, picking up a wine bowl. “Drink with me, and let’s talk a little more

about old times.”

The handmaiden hesitated for a moment. Tephret had never much enjoyed the

taste of wine, and had always been the one to keep her head when Neferata and the

rest of her handmaidens were deep in their cups. She started to speak, perhaps to

voice a polite refusal, but then she met the queen’s eyes and her resolve melted away.

Without a word, she took the wine bowl in both hands and raised it carefully to her

lips.

Neferata smiled to herself as she watched her handmaiden drink. Once upon a

time, she could have ordered Tephret to partake of the wine, but now she could

command others with nothing more than a gentle suggestion. Moreover, they wanted

to obey, as though nothing might please them more. It was another gift of Nagash’s

elixir, she knew. It had manifested itself over time, growing in power as she and

Arkhan continued to refine the necromancer’s formula. Until now, the queen had

been careful to use her newfound gift sparingly, but tonight, she would test it to its

limits.

They sat and talked quietly for hours. Tephret drank wine while the two of them

talked of times past, while Neferata kept a careful watch on the moon’s stately

progress overhead. As the hour drew close to midnight, she took a deep breath and

said, “How long has it been since you left the Women’s Palace, Tephret?”

69

The handmaiden paused, her lips working silently as she tried to puzzle through

the question. It was fairly late, by the queen’s standards, and Tephret had consumed

the better part of an entire jar of wine.

“Blessed Asaph, let me see…” the handmaiden muttered. “It would have been the

sixty-second year of Geheb, I believe. That was the year I was presented to the king,

and he made me your handmaiden. I was just eight years old. That was…”

“More than a hundred and fifty years ago,” the queen observed. She considered

Tephret for a moment, then reached over and plucked the empty bowl from the

handmaiden’s grasp. “Walk with me,” Neferata said, taking Tephret’s hand and

gently pulling the old woman to her feet.

Tephret frowned in bemusement. “Where? Is it time to return to the bedchamber,

or do you wish to visit your cousin Khalida?”

The queen shook her head. “Khalida is gone, remember?” she reminded Tephret.

“She was married to Prince Anhur, years ago. Now she rules as Queen of Lybaras.”

“Oh, of course,” Tephret said, chiding herself. “Forgive me, great one. My

memory plays tricks on me sometimes.”

The queen squeezed her hand. “There’s nothing to forgive, except that you forgot

to call me by my name. Now come.”

“Where are we going, then?”

“Into the palace proper,” the queen replied. “You’ve been shut up in here too

long, Tephret. It’s time to set you free.”

To the queen’s surprise, Tephret stopped dead in her tracks, pulling against the

queen’s grip with surprising strength. “We can’t!” she said, her eyes widening. “It’s

not allowed!”

Neferata turned, stepping close to the aged handmaiden and peering deep into her

eyes.

“Do you trust me, sweet Tephret?” she asked.

The handmaiden fell silent, a reply half-formed on her trembling lips. She met the

queen’s eyes and relaxed at once.

“With my life,” she answered faintly. “But… but what will the king’s servants

say? What about your mask?”

“They will say nothing,” Neferata said firmly. “Tonight of all nights, we will go

wherever we wish, and we will not hide who we are. Do you understand?”

“No,” Tephret said, shaking her head. “But that’s no matter. I go where you go.”

Neferata squeezed her hand and smiled. “That’s right, dear one. Just follow me.”

The queen led her most favoured handmaiden down the lamplit corridors, through

rooms and galleries that they had both known all their lives. Servants made way for

the pair, marvelling at how queen and handmaiden walked hand-in-hand, like close

friends. They spoke to one another as they walked, sharing memories and laughing

softly at one another’s tales.

They passed through the Hall of Reverent Contemplation, still lost in times past.

Tephret barely paused when the queen reached the end of the hall and pulled open

one of the heavy outer doors. As luck would have it, a pair of palace servants were

just passing the chamber as the queen emerged. One of the servants, a younger

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woman, took one look at the queen and fainted. The other was transfixed, his eyes

wide and his jaw hanging open as Neferata approached.

“Tend to your companion,” she said, peering into the servant’s eyes. “And tell no

one of what you saw.”

Trembling, speechless, the servant fell to his knees and pressed his forehead to

the floor as the queen and her companion glided past.

Tephret followed the queen like an obedient child, clutching the queen’s hand

and staring openly at the unfamiliar surroundings. Neferata felt giddy, her pulse

racing as she openly walked the halls that she’d been forced to skulk through for

nearly a year. Other servants crossed her path, and each one she left prostrate on the

marble tiles, stunned and quivering in shock. She relished their stunned, slack-jawed

expressions, their instant subservience. This is how it shall be from this night

forward, she swore to herself. I shall walk these halls whenever it pleases me. I shall

see my children again. And no one will dare say otherwise.

Moving openly, Neferata covered the distance to the abandoned wing of the

palace much faster than expected. For a moment, all she could do was stand at the

servants’ entrance. Her heart was in her throat.

Tephret was weaving on her feet. The late hour and the wine were weighing

heavily on her. “What are we doing here?” she said bemusedly.

The queen drew a deep breath. “I have a gift for you,” she said. “It’s not much

further now.”

The handmaiden peered through the doorway. “It’s so dark in there.”

“I know,” Neferata said. “I know. Just hold my hand. Everything will be all

right.”

And with that, her course was set. She could not turn back now. If nothing else,

her pride wouldn’t allow it.

Tephret followed her into the darkness without hesitation. She said not a word as

they walked through the dust and debris, nor did she fret at the sounds of creatures

scurrying just out of sight. All she did was tighten her grip on the queen’s hand, and

pressed on.

Neferata scarcely paused as she pushed open the door to the sanctum, as though

she was entering nothing more than a room inside the Women’s Palace. She took

Tephret to the banked brazier, and then stirred the coals to sluggish life.

The handmaiden turned slowly in place as the orange light filled the room. Her

gaze drifted past the laden bookshelves, the stained divans and the cluttered

worktables. Neferata saw the look of innocent wonder on her face and realised that

the old woman was looking for the gift she’d been promised. She watched as

Tephret’s eyes moved to the ritual circle at the far side of the room… and then she

saw the huddled form of Arkhan, just at the edge of the light. Immediately, Tephret

turned towards the immortal and then gripped the queen’s arm.

“Someone’s there!” she hissed, her voice quavering.

“I know,” the queen said. “It’s all right, Tephret. There’s nothing to fear.”

Arkhan stirred, his head rising slowly at the sound of the handmaiden’s voice. He

leaned forward, into the firelight, and Tephret saw his face.

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“Oh!” Tephret cried, her eyes widening in terror. She pressed a hand to her

mouth, even as her voice built to a scream. “Oh, merciful gods. Asaph protect us!”

Neferata batted Tephret’s hand aside and seized her by the chin. “Hush!” she

commanded, turning the handmaiden’s head so she could stare into her eyes. “Do not

be afraid. There is nothing to fear, do you understand?”

Tephret’s voice fell to a whimper. Neferata heard a rattle of heavy, iron links, and

then Arkhan spoke.

“What’s going on?” he demanded. “What’s she doing here?”

“It’s time,” the queen told him, never taking her eyes from Tephret. “It’s been a

month. Lamashizzar will gather the cabal together to create his elixir. Correct?”

“Yes,” Arkhan replied. “But what does that have to do with her?”

“Then this is the moment we’ve been waiting for,” Neferata replied. “But before

we confront the king, we’ll need to be at the peak of our strength.”

The immortal let out an exasperated sigh. “All right, but that doesn’t explain—”

Neferata tore her gaze away from the handmaiden and fixed Arkhan with her

stare. “Months ago, you told me that the elixir can be made even more powerful

using a living vessel.” A small part of her mind was surprised at how calm she

sounded.

Arkhan was taken aback. “No,” he stammered, shaking his head. “You

misunderstand. She… she’s too old—”

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Neferata snapped. “She’s alive, and she’s

here. If you are half as skilled as you claim to be, you should be able to make this

work.”

A moan slipped past Tephret’s trembling lips. She was weeping now, trembling

from the strain of containing her fear. “What’s going on?” she asked in a fearful,

almost childlike voice. “What are you talking about? I don’t understand…”

Neferata touched a finger to the handmaiden’s lips. “Hush, dear one,” she said,

and forced a smile. “You’re about to receive your gift.”

She took Tephret’s hand and led her across the room. She held the handmaiden’s

gaze the entire time.

“You’ve done so much for me,” Neferata said to her. “For so many years you’ve

served without hesitation or complaint. And now, dear one, I’m going to set you

free.” The queen manoeuvred her into the centre of the circle and placed her hands on

the woman’s cheeks.

“Don’t be afraid,” the queen said, drawing on the power of the elixir coursing in

her veins. “Everything is going to be all right. Stand here but a moment, and then no

one in all Lahmia will ever command you again. Do you understand?”

Slowly, by degrees, Tephret relaxed. When she spoke again, her voice sounded

small and frail. “I understand, Neferata.”

The queen smiled, tasting tears on her lips. “That’s right, dear one.” She leaned

forward, touching her forehead to Tephret’s. “You’ve done so very much for me, for

so many years. You’ve earned your rest. Part of you will be with me always,” she

said, and then stepped back until she stood outside the circle.

72

Arkhan was waiting for her. The immortal’s expression was strange and troubled.

“You do not understand,” he said, so softly that only she could hear. “If you truly

love her, then you must not do this.”

The queen studied Tephret for a moment, then shook her head. “No,” she said.

“It’s too late for that. I need her, this one last time.” She turned to the immortal, and

bore down on him with the full weight of her stare. “Do what you must,” she told

him. “The king will be here in little more than an hour.”

Arkhan stiffened. “Very well,” he said in a hollow voice. “Prepare yourself, great

one.”

Neferata nodded, wiping more tears from her eyes. “I am ready,” she said.

The immortal bowed to her, then went to a nearby table. She watched, surprised,

as he picked up a small knife and tested its edge against the ball of his thumb.

She was not prepared for what happened next. She was not prepared at all.

The sound of footfalls echoed through the darkness. Neferata focussed on the sound.

Her senses were sharp as a razor; she could hear nine distinct sets of footsteps. One

moved with catlike grace, which she took to be Abhorash, the king’s champion. Two

more were loose-limbed and clumsy. The drunkards could be virtually anyone.

The steps drew closer, then suddenly there was a hiss of surprise, and everyone

stopped, just outside the sanctum door. Neferata heard Lamashizzar’s voice,

whispering urgently. Doubtless he’d seen the light of the brazier seeping beneath the

sanctum door.

She heard a rasp of metal—it rang faintly, and she could tell it was sharp iron by

the note, as distinct as a musical tone. Then came the catlike tread, and after a

moment the door to the chamber swung slowly open. Abhorash entered, sword ready,

with the king and the rest of the cabal close behind.

Neferata waited for them at the edge of the ritual circle, her head held high.

Arkhan stood to one side, his hands clasped behind his back. Behind them, Tephret’s

bloody remains still lay sprawled in the centre of the circle. The queen’s hands were

spread at waist level, palms out, like a welcoming goddess. Her linen robe, from neck

to sleeves, was stained crimson, and her chin was red with fresh blood.

Abhorash, the grim, implacable warrior, recoiled from the sight of Neferata with

a cry of shock and wonder. Even Lamashizzar, who had known her all his life, was

momentarily stunned by the sight of her naked, bloodstained face. The rest of the

cabal looked upon her as though she was the vision of a vengeful goddess, come to

wreak a terrible judgment upon them. Ubaid sank to his knees with a groan, his face

filled with rapturous terror.

Given the scene spread before him, it was a wonder that the king could manage

find his voice at all.

Lamashizzar took a halting step towards Neferata. “How dare you!” he said. The

words welled up from his throat in a choked whisper. “This is an outrage. An offence

against the crown!”

Neferata met his gaze without flinching, yet it was not her husband she saw. Her

mind’s eye could see little past the horrors of the hour before. She could still hear the

echoes of Tephret’s screams in her mind. She had lingered for a very long time,

73

given the hideous things Arkhan had done to her. The queen had watched every

agonising second of it. She had owed poor Tephret that much.

“This,” Neferata said in a leaden voice, “is for the future of Lahmia. You have

forgotten your duties to your people, brother, so I am taking matters into my own

hands. Starting now.”

Lamashizzar’s face went pale with rage. “You stupid, arrogant bitch!” he

growled. He rushed towards her, seizing both of her arms and shaking her roughly.

“When I get you back to the Women’s Palace I’m going to flog you within an inch of

your life! Do you hear—”

Neferata’s small, slender hand moved too fast for mortal eyes to follow. She laid

her palm against the king’s chest and pushed, and Lamashizzar was hurled

backwards as though he were nothing more substantial than a straw doll. Abhorash

dodged nimbly aside, leaving the king to crash into the drunken forms of Lords Adio

and Khenti. They fell to the ground in a tangle of thrashing limbs.

“I am the queen,” she said coldly. “And from this night forward, there is no place

in this palace that is barred to me. You shall remain king over Lahmia, brother, but

know that I am Queen of Lahmia, and when I speak, you will take careful heed of

what I say. Henceforth, we shall rule this city together. Do you understand me?”

Lamashizzar broke free of the paralysed libertines. His face was a mask of hatred,

but Neferata could see a glimmer of fear in his eyes. Still, he managed a defiant snarl.

“Seize her!” he ordered Abhorash. “She has gone mad! Strike her down!”

“He will do no such thing,” the queen replied calmly. She glanced at the king’s

champion and smiled. “These men are mine now, brother—each and every one of

them. They will serve me gladly, because I can give them something you cannot.”

That broke the spell. W’soran stirred, his eyes alight. “The elixir!” he hissed.

Neferata nodded. “I will offer you the power that you have so long craved,” she

said. “And in return, you will serve me as you would your king.”

Abhorash stirred. “I want nothing of power,” he said in a deep voice.

The queen took a step towards him, well within reach of the champion’s sword.

“No, you crave something far more elusive. You crave perfection,” she said. “It’s not

enough to be the champion of the king; there are six others in Nehekhara who can

rightfully claim such a title. No, you want to be the greatest of warriors, the epitome

of fighting men. That’s why you accepted the king’s offer in the first place, didn’t

you? So that you could have all eternity to hone your skills beyond mortal ken.”

The mighty warrior blanched at the queen’s unsparing assessment. The others

looked at her as though she was an oracle, never pausing to think that, through

Arkhan, she had more than a century’s worth of knowledge about their every hope

and desire.

She surveyed the assembled noblemen. “Lamashizzar has failed you for the last

time,” she said to them. “Bow to me, and I will give you all that you desire. The

choice is yours.”

W’soran did not hesitate. He sank to his knees and prostrated himself before the

queen. Ankhat and Ushoran followed suit, and the three young libertines, Adio,

Khenti and Zuhras followed suit.

74

Ubaid, already kneeling, simply nodded deferentially to the queen, as he had

done so many times before.

That left only Abhorash. The queen turned to regard him with a raised eyebrow.

He held her stare for a long, silent moment, then slid his sword back into its

scabbard.

Lamashizzar, who only moments before had been the undisputed ruler of the

greatest city in Nehekhara, could only look on in helpless fury.

“What is it you want, sister?” he snarled.

Neferata smiled.

“For now, fetch a hammer and an iron chisel,” the Queen of Lahmia said,

savouring her triumph. She pointed a bloodstained finger at Arkhan the Black.

“You’re going to set him free.”

75

EIGHT

The Eye of the Burning God

Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Djaf the Terrible

(-1599 Imperial Reckoning)

After the ambush at the barrow, the priests organised large hunting parties to comb

the plains and the mountain slopes to find Nagash’s lair. For weeks they searched the

mountain, sending acolytes down into the fissures as far as they could manage.

Almost a score of them died in the attempt, overcome by the concentration of

glowing vapours, and their bodies were never recovered. Despite their best attempts,

the hunters never came close to him; he’d become far too adept at navigating the

labyrinth of tunnels and caves beneath the deeper fissures. Whenever they drew too

close he would simply retreat deeper into the maze until the hunters lost their nerve

and withdrew.

Eventually, the barbarians’ hunger for vengeance faded, and they abandoned their

hunt. The stormy season was about to begin, and the older priests had no desire to

spend day after day out on the mountain slopes in the rain. They retreated back to

their temple fort and doubled the patrols out on the barrow fields, in case the terrible

grave robber should return again.

Nagash spent weeks studying the movements of the patrols out on the plain,

sometimes moving among them on nights when the rains were heavy and the brassy

notes of thunder rumbled across the surface of the Sour Sea. He’d come to realise

that the priests were not true necromancers; their skills were limited and extremely

crude compared to his. What they lacked in sophistication they made up for in

numbers and raw power, though, and the priests he encountered on the plain took

their duties very seriously indeed. They were sharp-eyed and vigilant, even under the

worst conditions, and they knew the plain far better than he.

If it came to battle, Nagash had no doubt that he would win, but the fight would

cost him resources he could ill afford to spare. Though he spent nearly every day

combing through the tunnels in search of more dust, there was now little left to

scavenge. He’d filled his cloak hood to almost three-quarters full; perhaps two

pounds, more or less, and mingled with all manner of impurities. It was his sole

source of strength, unless he managed to find a way to reach the deposits buried

deeper inside the mountain.

Thus, Nagash was forced to surrender much of the barrow fields to the priests,

restricting his activities to the southern edge of the plain where they rarely patrolled.

The barrow mounds there were very old, many having collapsed altogether under the

weight of centuries and their contents long gone to dust. Any corpses left within the

76

mounds would be nothing more than bones, and much harder for him to control, but

for the moment they would have to serve.

Nagash searched the southern barrow fields for some time, examining the barrow

mounds carefully before he found one that suited his purposes. Like the rest, its stone

foundation had settled into the earth over the centuries, completely burying its

entrance-way, but the weeks of steady rain had softened its earthen roof enough that

he could dig through it with his bare hands. Night after night, he clawed at the soft

ground, tearing it away in chunks and casting it aside. Flashes of green lightning

illuminated him as he worked, revealing his grotesque, almost skeletal figure. Sickly

emerald light seeped from his bones, revealing the dark, rope-like muscles working

beneath his tattered skin. More skin hung like torn parchment from his cheeks and

forehead, revealing the leering skull beneath. The necromancer’s eyes had long since

rotted away, boiled from within by the heat of the burning stone. All that remained

were twin, green flames, flickering coldly from the depth of sunken eye sockets. His

limbs were held together not by sinew, but by sorcery and willpower alone.

Finally, late one night, Nagash’s efforts bore fruit. His fingers tore through the

last layers of root and soil covering the barrow, releasing a hissing cloud of noxious

air that would have slain a breathing man within moments. Redoubling his efforts,

Nagash widened the hole far enough to allow him to slither his way inside.

He had chosen this particular barrow because it was one of the largest ones still

intact on the southern end of the plain. Nagash hoped it had belonged to a great

warlord or hetman, and thus hold the remains of a large retinue that he could raise as

well. What he found was far better than he’d hoped for.

Nagash slid through the muddy channel he’d carved in the barrow’s roof and

found himself in a moment of freefall as he plunged some twelve feet to the barrow

floor. He landed hard, snapping his right collarbone like a dry twig; irritated, Nagash

focussed his will on the surrounding muscles to pull the broken ends of bone back

into place, and then healed the break with a small measure of his power. Frowning,

he bent down and laid a hand on the barrow floor. It had been laid with crude paving

stones, now cracked and slimy with age.

Lightning flickered high overhead, casting a shaft of brilliant green light through

the hole in the barrow’s roof. It pierced the gloom, revealing a carved stone bier at

the centre of the barrow. Laid upon the bier was the skeleton of a once-powerful

man, clad in a mouldy shell of thick leather armour. A belt of heavy gold links hung

loosely about the warrior’s shrunken waist, and a circlet of gold, tinged black with

corruption, lay against the corpse’s bony brow. The warrior’s hands were folded over

the hilt of a long, black sword that had been laid atop his chest. It was straight and

double-edged, and it seemed as though it had been shaped from a single piece of

obsidian. Crude glyphs had been carved into the surface of the blade and then filled

with a familiar green dust. The abn-i-khat still glowed faintly after so many years.

Nagash turned about slowly, his burning stare taking in the rest of the chamber.

There were no less than a dozen other skeletons interred with the warlord, laid on

stone biers and arrayed in a circle about their lord with their feet pointing towards the

walls of the mound. Ten of the skeletons were clearly warriors, clad in rotting leather

armour and carrying crude stone weapons of their own. The other two appeared to be

female, judging by the tattered scraps of fabric and the tarnished golden jewellery

77

that adorned their fingers and necks. Wives perhaps? There was no way to tell, and it

mattered little to him at any rate. So long as they could dig, they would be of use to

him.

Taking out his dagger, Nagash began to carve a ritual circle into the barrow’s

stone floor. It was different in design and intent than the one he’d used months

before, and similar to the arcane circles he’d placed in the Black Pyramid at Khemri.

This circle would not contain magical power; it would broadcast it in very specific

ways.

When the circle was complete, Nagash took a moment to inspect it and make

certain that every line, every symbol was correct and properly aligned. Then he

retreated to the far side of the chamber and pulled a tightly closed bag from his

frayed leather belt. Very carefully, Nagash opened his makeshift bag and studied the

glowing dust contained within. It was slightly less than half-full at this point.

A growl rose from his ravaged throat. Power. In the end, it all came down to

power—and the willingness to use it.

Nagash raised the bag, tilted back his head, and poured a stream of glowing dust

down his throat.

A whirlwind of fire burst inside his chest and went howling up into his brain. The

entire world seemed to shudder under his feet. When he finally lowered the bag, he

could hear the thunder of rain on the earthen roof of the barrow and feel the slightest

wrinkles in the leather of the bag clutched in his hands. His gaze pierced the gloom

of the barrow, until every detail of the dank chamber was sharply etched in his brain.

That’s when Nagash realised that the walls of the chamber were not raw earth, as

he’d supposed. The builders instead had covered it with a kind of lime mixture,

creating smooth, white surfaces that they had then decorated with paint. He saw

crude representations of battles between human tribes, focusing on the triumphs of a

tall, dark-haired man with piercing eyes: no doubt the very warrior whose bones now

resided in the tomb. Of greater interest to Nagash was the woman depicted next to the

warlord, whose eyes flashed with green fire and who flung bolts of burning energy to

slay the warlord’s foes. His gaze turned once again to the two female skeletons,

whose corpses were arrayed by the warlord’s head—and then he saw the mural that

had been painted on the wall above them.

Fiery eyes blazing, Nagash approached the fading mural. At its feet he stared up

at the curving wall and the image of a dark, broad-shouldered mountain, looming up

over a bare, rocky plain. A long, burning line, like a spear, had been driven into the

mountain’s side, piercing it to its heart. At the centre of the wound there burned a

green, lidless eye.

Nagash’s burning heart raced. Quickly, he turned and stepped into the ritual

circle. Raising his arms before the warlord’s corpse, he focussed his mind by hissing

out the names of those he hated. Then, with visions of dark vengeance glimmering in

his brain, he began the incantation of awakening.

The necromancer infused every arcane syllable with power until his shrivelled

lips were ragged and the air clashed like a cymbal with every word he spoke. Nagash

turned his implacable will upon the ancient corpses. Rise, he commanded. Your

master summons you. Rise!

78

More power washed over the skeletons, stirring flakes of decaying leather from

their armour and scattering scraps of moulding cloth—then the blackened bones

began to emit a faint, green glow. There was a crackle of decaying hide and the creak

of bending sinew, and Nagash saw the warlord’s hands tighten on the hilt of his

blade.

“Rise!” Nagash said aloud, his voice rising to a furious howl. “The Undying

King commands you!”

There was a rasp of metal and bone. Slowly, the warlord rose at the waist, like a

man sitting up from a long slumber. Tiny points of green fire glittered from bony eye

sockets as the skeleton regarded Nagash.

Around the barrow chamber, the other skeletons were doing the same. They rose

from their beds of stone and studied Nagash in cold, pitiless silence. The

necromancer clenched his fists in triumph.

“Come to me!” he ordered.

Bones clattered as the warlord and his retinue slid from their biers and walked

haltingly to stand before Nagash. With every passing moment they seemed to stand a

little straighter, their movements a little stronger and more assured. Their bones

radiated the chill of the grave, and ancient malice gleamed in their flickering eyes.

Nagash pointed a bony finger at the painting on the far wall. “Now, show me,” he

told his ghastly retainers. “Take me to the burning eye.”

The undead took no notice of the rain, or the mud, or the sprawl of barrow mounds

that had risen up across the plain since their death. They led Nagash across the

barrow field to the east, and then skirted the southern slope of the mountain until they

reached a path that only they could somehow perceive. Nagash wondered if the

warlord and his retainers saw the mountain as it had been at the time of their deaths,

or if they were simply following the course of ancient memories, heedless of the

reality laid before them.

They climbed steadily up the slope through the darkness, and the more that

Nagash studied the surrounding terrain, the more he began to see faint remnants of a

roadway, and the outlines of foundations that might have once supported wooden

structures. He’d paid them no mind during his initial searches, focusing on natural

caves and fissures instead. Now he began to see telltale clues of a large complex—a

palace perhaps, or a temple—that had once been built into the side of the mountain,

many hundreds of years ago.

His servants led him to a wide depression in the mountain’s flank, its edges

rounded in places by the passage of years. He spied more outlines of foundation

stones, now that he knew what he was looking for. Once upon a time, a huge,

wooden structure had been built here—and perhaps there had been tunnels as well,

burrowing into the mountainside. Clearly this was the place where the huge piece of

burning stone had impacted, then was buried by hundreds of tons of shattered rock

and smouldering earth. Apparently the barbarians’ ancestors had witnessed the fall of

the great stone and had decided to worship it, a tradition now aped by their debased

descendants.

The warlord climbed the slope without hesitation, certain of his bearings even in

the darkness and rain.

79

At the base of the depression was a wide, rounded shelf of earth that Nagash now

realised had been excavated in ages past to form yet more building foundations. The

rain-slicked skull glanced left and right, as though expecting to see squat, wooden

towers, or tall statues flanking the entrance to a hallowed place of worship. After a

moment’s hesitation, the warlord continued forward, marching stiffly for another

thirty paces into the depression before coming to an abrupt halt by a steep slope of

grassy earth.

Nagash smiled in satisfaction. “Dig,” he commanded. At once, the skeletal

women stepped forward and began clawing at the slope. The warriors paused long

enough to set aside their weapons before joining in as well.

By the time dawn broke through the scudding clouds overhead, the skeletons had

carved a small cave out of the muddy earth. Nagash took refuge within and stood

watch while his servants worked tirelessly through the day. By late afternoon, the

skeletons were digging up squared-off pieces of stone that must have once belonged

to a building’s foundation. By late evening, they’d reached the broken pieces of a

collapsed stone arch. Whatever passage the archway had once anchored had

collapsed during the intervening centuries.

That night, Nagash went out into the barrow fields once more and returned with

another dozen skeletons to add to his workforce. Less than a handful of dust

remained in his bag. It was all or nothing now. They had to reach the burning stone.

They must.

The skeletons worked through the night and into the following day. They shored

up the walls with piles of broken stone and packed earth as the shaft descended at a

steep angle into the side of the mountain. Then, during the third night, the skeletons

clawed through a layer of earth and rock and broke into a narrow tunnel made of

closely-fitted stones.

Nagash heard the hollow clatter of bony feet against flagstones and pushed his

way to the front of the group. Sensing his thoughts, the skeletons paused and stood

aside to let him pass.

The necromancer stood on a broad, stone staircase that sank still deeper into the

side of the mountain. The walls of the staircase were carved with intricate reliefs,

depicting men and women carrying offerings of food and grain down the stairs to set

before the waiting god. Nagash descended the slimy steps as quickly as he dared,

trying to gauge how much further the staircase went before they reached bottom.

After only a few minutes, the steps led to a small antechamber. Four thick stone

columns supported the antechamber’s low ceiling; they had been carved with reliefs

depicting a pair of men and women, their hands held against their chests in a gesture

of supplication. They reminded Nagash of the totem statues in the barbarian villages

to the north-west, though these figures were not quite so idealised as the others.

Wide, earthen bowls were scattered across the antechamber floor. The offerings that

had once been heaped inside them were nothing more than dust now.

Nagash crossed the small chamber and came to a tall, rectangular doorway. The

wooden doors that had once sealed the portal lay in heaps of dust across the wide

threshold. He stepped through the drifts, scattering them with his bare feet, and

entered a much larger rectangular chamber. This room’s ceiling was supported by

four pairs of squat stone columns, each one carved to represent a man or a woman

80

kneeling in worship towards an undefined point at the far end of the chamber. There,

in the darkness, Nagash sensed a steady buzz of magical power.

The necromancer walked carefully past the ancient pillars. Those on the left were

male likenesses, he noticed, and the ones to the right were female, and each pillar

represented the same person as the one before it, but with a critical difference. As

Nagash progressed across the chamber, the carved figures grew stronger, more

handsome—more perfect in shape. By the time he stood at the far end of the

chamber, he was flanked by a pair of stone gods, still poised in supplication before an

invisible god.

There was a pair of tall doors at the far end of the chamber, made of a grey metal

that blended cunningly with the stone surrounding them. Nagash ran his hands across

the surface of the doors, and was surprised to find them warm to the touch. There

were four holes in each door at shoulder-height, arranged to accept a man’s fingers.

Without hesitation, the necromancer slid his bony fingers into the holes and pulled on

the great doors.

At first, the metal panels refused to budge. Nagash let out an impatient hiss and

called upon his ebbing power. His muscles burned, and he heaved upon the doors

with all his might. There was a crack of corroded metal, then a squeal of hinges, and

the doors began to move. They were immensely heavy, Nagash realised, far heavier

than bronze, though not quite as heavy as gold. As they swung open, a fierce green

glow poured out over Nagash and spilled into the ancient hall.

The necromancer felt his skin prickle at the touch of the sorcerous light. Beyond

the heavy metal doors was an alcove of rough stone that had been chipped away to

reveal a hemisphere of glowing, green stone as large as a wagon wheel. Aeons past,

some foolhardy barbarian had braved the stone’s searing touch to carve the

semblance of a pupil and an iris into the surface of the stone, transforming it into an

unblinking, blazing eye.

Nagash raised his hands covetously to the eye of the burning god and began to

laugh. It was a sound of madness and murder, of devastation and despair. It was a

ringing portent of ruin for the kingdoms of men.

Far up the tunnel, where the storm winds were rising, the warlord and his

retainers heard the terrible sound and awaited their master’s bidding.

81

NINE

Among Thieves

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1598 Imperial Reckoning)

It wasn’t the tireless white horse of his dreams, but the chestnut-coloured Numasi

warhorse was as fine as any animal Arkhan had ever ridden. Long of leg, with a

broad chest and powerful hindquarters, the stallion had been bred for agility, strength

and stamina—qualities meant to keep it and its rider alive on the battlefield.

Presented as a gift from the Horse Lords to the King of Lahmia, the animal had been

stuck in a stable, surrounded by sleek-limbed palfreys meant for nothing more

demanding than an occasional hunt or ceremonial parade. The immortal had taken to

the sullen, snappish creature at once; both of them had been locked away and largely

ignored for far too long.

They passed through the palace gates at a trot, barely eliciting a response from

the royal guard, and followed the broad processional that wound downhill amid the

grand villas of the city’s elite. It was just past nightfall, and the city’s young lamp-

lighters were still making their rounds down the narrow city streets. One boy with a

long, reed taper had to leap nimbly to the side to avoid a bite from Arkhan’s horse as

he went by. Sounds of music and conversation flowed from the open windows of the

walled villas as nobles gathered for an early evening meal before heading out into the

city for a long night of debauchery. For the moment, the streets were relatively clear,

and the immortal made good time. He was already impatient for the wide road and

the rolling hills west of the city.

It had only been six months since Neferata had ordered the king to set him free—

she’d forced him to wield the chisel personally, to Lamashizzar’s utter humiliation—

and already his memories of the last hundred and fifty years were fading away, like a

long and tortured fever-dream. Neferata had chosen to maintain her quarters in the

Women’s Palace, far from her husband, and had been careful not to make too great a

spectacle of her own newfound freedom. Where he’d once been confined to a single

corner of a large, dingy room, Arkhan now had the run of the entire palace wing.

Servants had been ordered to clean the corridors and begin refurnishing a suite of

rooms, and he had been provided with a fine wardrobe of rich, dark silks and fine

leather accoutrements.

Neferata had even gone so far as to provide him with a sword—not the curved,

bronze khopesh that most Nehekharan warriors favoured, but a heavy, double-edged

weapon made from dark Eastern iron. It was more than just a gesture of trust and

esteem, Arkhan knew. The queen was also demonstrating her authority, both to him

and to the rest of Lamashizzar’s small cabal.

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The queen gave him a weapon as a sign that she had nothing to fear from him.

She opened the king’s stables to him to show that she understood he had nowhere

else to go.

After a short while the processional reached the bottom of the great hill and

entered the city’s eastern merchant quarter, where fine goods from all over

Nehekhara were sold to the city’s nobles and wealthier merchants. Business was still

brisk, despite the hour. Trade with the west was finally on the rise again, with

caravans arriving every few months from as far away as Numas and Zandri. Small

crowds of citizens and servants browsed through the lamp-lit bazaars, buying bronze

goods from Ka-Sabar, leather saddles from Numas or exotic spices from the jungles

south of Rasetra. Merchants in the short capes and linen kilts of the desert cities

haggled with silk-clad Lahmians and even a few haughty-looking Imperial traders,

looking for luxury goods to carry back to their homeland. At one point, Arkhan heard

a loud crash and a series of hoarse shouts across the wide square, and turned to see a

pair of city guardsmen dragging a struggling, spitting young urchin away from a

Rasetran spice trader’s stall. If the young thief was very lucky, the city magistrates

would only sentence him to a year’s labour on a Lahmian merchant ship, otherwise,

he’d be chained to the rocky shoreline north of the city and left for the crabs to eat.

Beyond the merchant district sprawled the cramped districts that were home to

the city’s many artisans and labourers. Here the streets were mostly quiet, as the

tradesmen and their families retired to their rooftops or their small, walled courtyards

after a long day’s work. Children ran about or played games in the cool of the

evening, enjoying a few precious hours of freedom. One group ran past Arkhan, led

by a tall boy wearing a ghastly clay mask. They were pursued by another group of

children brandishing sticks and wearing crude circlets or crowns woven from river

reeds. They were intent on catching the masked boy, while his companions

brandished sticks of their own whenever the pursuers drew too close.

“After them!” the young kings shouted gleefully. “Death to the Usurper and his

minions! Death to Nagash!”

The masked figure turned and made an obscene gesture at his pursuers, sparking

more laughter and threats. Arkhan reined in his horse as they dashed across the street

in front of him. The grotesque mask turned his way for a brief instant, and then the

boy was gone, leading his young immortals into the shadows of a nearby alley.

Arkhan was still shaking his head in bemusement when the tightly packed mud-

brick homes gave way to the cruder, sprawling mass of huts and wicker enclosures

that crowded up against the range of rounded hills at the western edge of the city.

The people here were mostly descendants of refugees from distant Mahrak, left to

eke out a miserable existence among Lahmia’s outcasts. Beggars, whores and would-

be thieves skulked around the fringes of the trade road, eyeing the immortal’s rich

attire with predatory interest. Arkhan gave the boldest of them a black-toothed grin

and they quickly looked away, seeking easier prey.

He spurred the warhorse to a canter, eager to be free from the stench and squalor

of the dispossessed. Within minutes he was heading up into the wooded hills, leaving

the noise and the lights of the city behind at last. Scraggly trees pressed close to the

trade road, and the sky was just a narrow band of stars and moonlight overhead.

Arkhan breathed in the cool air, fragrant with cedar and pine, and gave the horse its

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head. The stallion leapt eagerly into a gallop, and for a while he was able to put aside

thoughts of formulae and incantations and simply feel the wind upon his face.

They had made great progress in the past few months, now that Neferata was in

the position to obtain human subjects for their experiments. It was easy enough for

Arkhan to snatch a beggar or a whore from the edge of the city, drug them with lotus

root and slip back with them into the palace in the dead of night. Afterwards, the

body could be dumped amid the condemned thieves north of the city and within a

few days there would be nothing but bones, picked clean by the hungry sea. So long

as they were suitably cautious, the city’s refugee population would keep them safely

supplied for hundreds of years. Their mastery of Nagash’s complex ritual was still far

from complete, but the elixir they created was more than potent enough to ensure the

continued loyalty of Lamashizzar’s cabal.

As usurpations went, the queen’s move was as clever as it was subtle.

Unbeknownst to the rest of the city, Lamashizzar had been transformed overnight

from a king to a mere figurehead, issuing Neferata’s edicts in his own name. He

couldn’t expose Neferata’s scheme to the rest of the city without implicating himself

in the practice of necromancy, and he couldn’t move against her in secret without

being opposed by the rest of the cabal.

Now that Ushoran, Abhorash and the rest had been given a taste of what the elixir

could really do, they would have to be idiots to want a return to the thin gruel of

goat’s blood offered by the king. So far, Lamashizzar had accepted the new balance

of power with what little grace he possessed, spending most of his time drinking and

sulking in his quarters. It was possible that the coup had broken his nerve completely;

Neferata seemed to think so, but Arkhan wasn’t so sure. Losing a crown was one

thing; losing control over Nagash’s elixir was something else again.

He rode on, up into the hills and onto the edge of the great Golden Plain, where

countless farmers reaped harvests of grain, corn and beans from the fertile soil. The

vast fields now lay dormant and bare, awaiting the return of the spring. Arkhan

reined in the warhorse and stared in silence, savouring the wide-open expanse. The

crushed white stone of the trade road glimmered like a mirage beneath the moonlight,

beckoning him ever westward, towards the Brittle Peaks and the lands beyond.

The stallion slowed to a walk, its flanks heaving from the long ride, and Arkhan

let the horse choose its own pace as they continued down the road. He was tempted,

as he was every night, to simply keep going, past Lybaras and the desolate streets of

Mahrak, through the Valley of Kings and the distant Gates of the Dawn. From there,

he could slip past hated Quatar, and then to the citadel he’d built in the southern

desert, or even to the deserted streets of Khemri itself.

The Black Pyramid remained at the centre of the city necropolis; the great crypt

had been built to defy the ages, and would endure long after the sun had gone dark

and cold. There were secret ways inside that no mortal knew of, and with the proper

sacrifices, the dark winds of magic could be his to command once more.

And then… what? The memory of Nagash’s terrible reign was still fresh in the

mind of most Nehekharans. If the kings of the great cities knew he still survived, they

would spare no effort to destroy him. He could either cower in the shadows like a rat

and hope to escape their notice, or else try to raise an army and defy their combined

might for as long as he could.

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Lahmia, on the other hand, held out the promise of immortality and the comforts

of a wealthy and powerful kingdom. He had little doubt that, under Neferata’s

capable leadership, the city would become the undisputed centre of power in all of

Nehekhara. Within a few centuries it might even become the seat of a new empire,

something that not even Nagash had been able to achieve.

When that day finally arrived, Neferata would need a strong right hand to lead

her armies in the field and expand the borders of her domain; a faithful and ruthless

lieutenant—perhaps, in time, even a consort.

Listen to you, he sneered. Arkhan the Black, bald-headed and broken-toothed,

consort to the Queen of the Dawn. What a fool! The damned woman has you under

her spell. Can’t you see that? The farther away from her you can get, the better!

Except, of course, that he had nowhere to go.

Brooding on his fate, Arkhan continued down the road for more than an hour,

passing farmers’ houses and dark, fallow fields. Dogs barked in the distance; owls

hooted, hunting prey, and bats flitted across the face of the moon. After a while, he

came to a section of the plain that was still subdivided by stretches of dense

woodland. Each time he came upon a stand of trees he paused and took a deep

draught of night air.

Soon enough, his preternatural senses detected a faint hint of cooking fires and

sizzling grease. He turned off the road and headed south, down a game trail that led

deep into the shadows beneath the trees. The horse picked its way forwards carefully:

even Arkhan had a hard time seeing much farther than the stallion’s drooping head.

Yet it wasn’t long before the immortal could feel that he was being watched.

The camp was large and cunningly concealed within the thick trees. Undergrowth

had been cleared away to create a series of linked clearings, then used to make a

cluster of lean-tos and overhangs surrounding a small, banked cook fire. More than a

dozen gaunt, filthy men—as well as a number of women and children—all clad in a

motley collection of robes and desert kilts stood and stared warily as he emerged

from the woods into the firelight. The women gathered the children and retreated

swiftly into the next clearing down the line, while the men drew battered swords or

hefted spears at his approach.

Arkhan reined in and gave them all a long, calculating look. Lips pulled back in a

predatory grin. “Well met, friends,” he said. “I smelled wood smoke as I was passing

along the road. Is there room for one more traveller around the fire?” He drew a fat

wineskin from one of his saddle hooks and showed it to the men. “I’ve two skins of

Lybaran red I’ll be happy to share in exchange for a hot meal, and then I’ll be

moving on.”

From where he sat, it was difficult to tell how many people occupied the camp: it

could be anywhere from a few score to as much as a few hundred. Bands such as

these moved like nomads up and down the plain, never staying in one place for too

long lest they draw unwanted attention from the city. Mostly they stalked along the

edges of the trade road, preying on merchant caravans for food, trade goods and

horses. Arkhan had been seeking out their camps for several months. Many of the

bandit gangs had grown adept at hiding in the woods and hollows scattered across the

plain, but he’d learned his trade hunting Bhagarite desert raiders, and there were only

so many places a large group could make camp without attracting attention.

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The brigands cast questioning glances at a short, stocky man standing closest to

the fire. He studied Arkhan for a moment, then nodded curtly. “You can sit by me,”

he said, and the rest of the men lowered their weapons. “We’ve grain mash and a

little rabbit we can share. Where are you headed?”

Arkhan slid easily from the saddle and tossed the wineskin to the brigand leader.

He shrugged. “Oh, here and there. You know how it is.”

He might not have any place he could truly go, but in this, Arkhan was far from

alone.

The brigands drank every last drop of Arkhan’s wine, and in return gave him a bowl

of greasy stew and some news about the comings and goings of bandit gangs across

the plain. The immortal chewed his gristle thoughtfully and listened to every word.

Much of it was lies and exaggerations, he knew, coupled with a few honest facts

about rival gangs, in the event he was a spy for the city guard. Later, when he’d

returned to the palace, he would compare what he’d learned with the notes he’d taken

from previous encounters, and look for common threads.

As the hour drew close to midnight, he took his leave of the brigands. Their

leader and his lieutenants, who’d gotten the lion’s share of the wine, made no protest,

friendly or otherwise, as he said his farewells and led his horse back into the dark

woods in the direction of the trade road. He could sense the movements of other

bandits pacing him through the darkness, all the way to the edge of the wood line and

beyond. They shadowed him across the bare fields, their brown capes blending with

the dark earth. Most likely they were making sure he wasn’t reporting back to a

waiting troop of city guardsmen, but it was also possible that they meant to avail

themselves of his fine horse and expensive iron sword. It had been tried a few times

before.

They followed him all the way to the trade road, but pressed no closer than a few

dozen yards. Once the horse was back on stable footing, the immortal swung into the

saddle and waved farewell to his erstwhile shadows before setting off towards the

city at a brisk trot.

He gauged that the camp contained a good hundred or so bandits, and a third as

many women and children. It was one of the largest such gangs he’d encountered to

date. There were enough armed men wandering the Golden Plain to amount to a

small army; most were fairly organised and they were all heavily-armed. All they

lacked was a strong leader to unite them under a single banner.

The more such gangs he encountered, the more Arkhan believed that his plan had

merit. He could start with the largest gang, gain their loyally through a mixture of

charisma, fear and bribery, then begin forming ties with other, smaller groups. With

the right mix of ruthlessness and reward, he could build an organization fairly

quickly, and having an armed force at his command occupying the Golden Plain

would give him an outside source of power that he currently lacked. That was a lever

that he could apply to any number of inconvenient obstacles.

Before he knew it, Arkhan was at the edge of the plain and heading downward

through the wooded hills. The lights of the city glimmered on the horizon,

unimpeded by the barrier of high city walls. Of all the great cities of Nehekhara, only

Lahmia disdained such fortifications. Siege warfare had been unheard of before the

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war against the Usurper, and old King Lamasheptra trusted in his dragon men to keep

the city safe. He wondered if the queen would take steps to correct her father’s

mistake.

Suddenly the stallion tossed its head, checking its stride and snorting in surprise.

It was the only warning the immortal had before the arrows struck home.

Two powerful blows struck him on the left side, one just below his ribcage and

the other in the side of his thigh. Searing pain stole the wind from his lungs. He

pitched forward against the horse’s neck, tasting blood in his mouth and fumbling at

the reins. Gritting his teeth, he tried to spur the horse forward, only to find that his

left leg wouldn’t move. The arrow had passed completely through his thigh and

buried itself in the thick leather of his saddle, pinning it in place.

A third arrow hissed out of the darkness, missing him by a hair’s-breadth, then a

fourth punched deep into his left shoulder. This time he cried out, cursing at the

ambushers. He’d grown careless during his long confinement, letting himself walk

into such an obvious trap. With the moonlight glowing on the white stone road he

might as well have hung an oil lamp around his neck. The archers could see him

clearly, while he was all but blind.

The warhorse sidestepped, tossing its head and snorting at his confused

commands. Even if he managed to get the animal under control the archers would put

an arrow in its neck before he’d gone half a yard. As near as he could reckon, he only

had one option left. Gritting his teeth, the immortal grabbed the arrow jutting from

his thigh and tore it free, then simply let himself fall from the saddle.

He landed on the right side of the horse, striking the road with a bone-jarring

crunch that consumed him with another wave of blinding pain. Pure reflex forced his

limbs to work, rolling him off the road and into the brush. He fetched up against a

tangle of briars and lay still, pretending to be dead. Were it not for the elixir coursing

through his veins, he likely would have been.

The stallion bolted as he fell, galloping down the road and out of sight. For a

moment, nothing moved. Arkhan bit back waves of agony and listened for the

slightest signs of movement.

Before long he heard quiet footsteps edging from the tree line on the opposite

side of the road. It sounded like just two men. The bandits must have left camp long

before he did in order to set up such an ambush. How had they known he would be

heading back towards the city?

He heard the men make their way cautiously nearer. His right hand, shielded

beneath his body, edged towards the hilt of his sword.

The ambushers paused in the middle of the road, just a few yards away. “Not so

tough as we thought,” one of them said. Arkhan thought he recognised the voice.

Arkhan heard the rasp of a sword being drawn. “He’ll want proof,” said another

familiar voice. “We’ll take back his head. Roll his body out of the brush.”

The two men drew nearer. A hand gripped his right shoulder and pulled. Arkhan

rolled onto his back, drawing his iron blade with a bestial snarl. The two ambushers

cursed, their faces exposed by the same lambent moonlight.

They weren’t bandits at all. Arkhan found himself staring at Adio and Khenti,

two of the king’s young libertines.

Arkhan cursed. He’d been a fool. An utter and complete fool.

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The two libertines stared back at the immortal with wide eyes. Khenti still

clutched a powerful Numasi horse bow in his left hand, while Adio had left his on the

white stone roadway so he could grip a curved, bronze khopesh in both hands. They

were both clad head to foot in dark, cotton robes and short cloaks. Neither wore

armour, as far as Arkhan could tell. No doubt they’d expected to kill or incapacitate

him with a volley of arrows, then collect their trophy and ride back to the city. Had

they been proper archers, they likely would have succeeded.

Careless, the immortal thought angrily. He’d all but planned the ambush for

them. The cabal knew about his nightly rides out to the plain, and a few coins in the

hand of the right stableboy would tell them exactly when he left. All they would have

to do is ride the same route and pick out the best place to lie in wait.

The two fools hadn’t killed him yet, but the powerful, broad-headed arrows had

done their damage. His left leg felt leaden and unresponsive, and the arrow in his left

shoulder made it difficult to move his arm. The third arrow had sunk deep into his

vitals. It and the shaft in his shoulder had snapped when he’d rolled off his horse,

leaving two bloodied and splintered stubs jutting from his robes. Agony washed over

his body in cold waves, but he scarcely felt its bite. Pain held no power over him

anymore, not since the war. Not since Quatar.

He only had moments to act; if he was still on his back when Adio’s shock wore

off, even a pampered Lahmian libertine would have little trouble hacking him to

pieces. Gritting his ruined teeth, he rolled onto his right side and then, using just his

sword arm and his right leg, he pushed himself onto his feet. The moment he put any

weight on his left leg it began to buckle. Desperate, he drew upon the power of the

queen’s elixir to lend him strength and speed.

For an instant, the immortal felt his veins catch fire, but the heat began to fade

almost at once. Neferata’s potion was powerful, but it still had its limits. Darkness

crowded at the corners of his eyes, until for a moment he feared that he’d drawn too

much and he was about to do Adio’s work for him. The pain ebbed, held for a

dizzying instant… and then swept back in again, pushing the threatening shadows

aside. His leg remained weak, but at least the muscles responded to his will. It would

have to be enough.

Adio was already lunging forward with a choked cry. He was a tall man, with

long, lean arms, narrow shoulders and bony knees. His brown eyes were wide with

fear, bulging above a long, hooked nose, and his narrow lips were stained by years of

exposure to lotus root. His swing was swift enough, but lacked skill. Arkhan parried

it easily with his iron blade and countered with a swipe to the nobleman’s throat, but

after more than a century his skill was little better than Adio’s. The libertine clumsily

blocked the strike and fell back towards the road, his sandals scuffing across its stone

surface. The clash of bronze and iron galvanised Khenti as well. With a startled shout

the paunchy nobleman turned and ran back the way he’d come.

Cursing, Arkhan charged after his would-be ambushers. He would have just as

soon see Adio break and run as well, but the nobleman either didn’t like his odds in a

foot race, or was possessed of much more courage than the immortal had given him

credit for. Adio threw another wild swing that missed the immortal by more than a

foot, then abruptly shifted direction, swinging around to the immortal’s left. Arkhan

tried to match Adio’s movements, but his wounded leg hindered him. The libertine

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slashed at him again, and Arkhan’s sword was too far out of position to block it. The

bronze blade gouged across the immortal’s upper left arm, leaving a shallow cut

through the muscle. Had the blade been sharper, it would have cut him to the bone.

Snarling, Arkhan planted his right foot and spun on its heel. The iron sword

flickered in the moonlight, arcing around to catch Adio from an unexpected direction.

The libertine reacted with surprising speed, just barely raising his curved sword in

time to block the heavier blade. Still, the nobleman let out a high-pitched shriek as

Arkhan’s weapon sliced open Adio’s sword arm just above the elbow.

Then a powerful blow hit the immortal in the back, punching into his torso just

beneath his right shoulder. Arkhan staggered, shouting in surprise and anger. Khenti

hadn’t been running away at all; the pudgy little bastard had simply been getting

enough room to start firing arrows again.

You’ve gotten soft in a century and a half, Arkhan thought, as Adio regained his

balance and rushed at him, khopesh raised high for a skull-splitting blow. In a

moment of cold clarity, Arkhan wondered if this was how he was going to finally die,

struck down by a callow young gambler and left in a ditch for the vultures.

The khopesh swept down, its nicked edge whistling through the air. Arkhan’s

limbs moved without conscious volition, driven by instincts honed on countless

battlefields. His iron sword swept up in a sweeping block, meeting the khopesh just

past the height of its arc. There was a discordant clang, and the lighter bronze

weapon snapped in two.

Adio reeled backwards, staring in shock at the ruined sword, and Arkhan was on

him like a wolf. A backhanded blow from his heavier sword shattered the nobleman’s

right elbow, eliciting a scream of raw agony. The cry turned to a bubbling wail as the

immortal’s second stroke slashed Adio’s throat all the way to the spine. The libertine

fell backwards, his left hand trying to stanch the dark blood pouring from the gaping

wound. He had no sooner hit the ground than the immortal was standing over him,

sword raised. Arkhan ended the nobleman’s thrashings with a single blow to the

head.

Another arrow hissed out of the darkness, flying a handspan over Arkhan’s bent

back. The immortal pulled his blade free from Adio’s shattered skull and turned,

throwing back his head and howling like a fiend as he charged across the road.

His wounded leg hobbled him, turning his charge into a headlong stagger, but

Arkhan pushed forward as quickly as he could. His bloodcurdling shout echoed from

the dense trees. It was a calculated move, meant to rattle Khenti. Every second

brought the immortal closer to his foe, and it took nerves of stone to calmly draw and

nock an arrow in the face of a charging enemy swordsman.

Arkhan glimpsed movement across the road, then heard a muffled curse. Teeth

bared, he oriented on the sound and tried to increase his pace. A moment later he

could make out Khenti’s head and shoulders, then the raised arm of his horse bow.

The immortal was close enough to hear the twang of the bowstring, then Khenti’s

arrow smashed into his chest. It missed his heart but pierced his left lung; Arkhan

staggered, but the sight of Khenti reaching for another arrow spurred him forward

once more.

Crying out in fear, Khenti fumbled for another shaft from the hunting quiver at

his hip. Arkhan reached him in eight long steps and smashed the bow from the

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nobleman’s hand with a sweep of his sword. Forgetting the khopesh at his side, the

libertine made to turn and run, but Arkhan’s left hand seized him by the throat and

held him fast. The point of his iron sword came to rest against Khenti’s chest, just

above his heart.

“I have some questions for you,” Arkhan grated. Flecks of dark ichor stained his

pale lips. “How long you live depends on how well you answer.” He drove the point

of his sword a fraction of an inch into Khenti’s chest for emphasis. The young

nobleman moaned in terror.

“Who else is part of this?” the immortal demanded. He didn’t know whether to be

relieved or insulted that Lamashizzar had sent the two libertines to kill him. Had

Abhorash been waiting for him instead, his headless body would already be cooling

by the side of the road. Did that mean the king’s champion might not be a part of the

plot, or was he being reserved for a more important task?

Khenti squirmed in Arkhan’s grasp. His puffy features were pale and mottled

with fright. “The king—”

Arkhan shook the nobleman like a dog. “I know the king’s involved, you idiot,”

he snarled, revealing ichor-stained teeth. “Who else?”

“I—I don’t know,” Khenti stammered, his tiny eyes very wide. “I swear! He

claimed there were others, but he wouldn’t name them!”

Which could mean anything, Arkhan mused angrily. It was entirely possible that

Adio and Khenti were the only ones stupid enough to turn on Neferata, and the king

lied to lend them some extra courage.

The immortal’s grip tightened. “Is the queen in danger?” he said. “Was this just

about killing me, or does the king have plans for Neferata as well?”

Khenti let out a groan. Tears of fright rolled down his round cheeks. “It’s too

late,” he said pleadingly. “She’s already dead. You were— ghurrrk!”

The libertine’s body spasmed. Arkhan hadn’t realised he’d stabbed the man until

the point of his blade burst from Khenti’s back. The nobleman’s body sagged in

death, and the immortal let it sink to the ground. He left his blade sticking out of

Khenti’s chest, reached up with his right hand and grimly pulled the arrow shaft from

his chest. The arrow in his back was more problematic. He groped at it for several

moments, only succeeding in breaking off the shaft close to his torso. The exertion

left him reeling. He turned his face to the night sky. How much stolen life did he

have left, he wondered. More importantly, what should he do with it?

If Neferata was dead, there was nothing left for him in Lahmia. Lamashizzar

would have him killed on sight. On the other hand, if Khenti was wrong, and the

conspirators hadn’t yet reached the queen…

For a long while he stood, staring up at the sky, feeling cold and weak. He tried to

think about endless, rolling dunes, and the citadel he’d built in the middle of the

empty desert, but Arkhan’s mind kept coming back to the startling touch of a hand

against his cheek, and the queen’s depthless eyes staring into his own.

It was possible Khenti was wrong. In fact, it was more than possible. There could

still be a chance to reach Neferata before Lamashizzar’s trap could spring shut. Or so

Arkhan cared to believe.

90

“Damn me,” he snarled up at the cold face of the moon. “First Nagash, and now

this.” He bent forward and pulled his sword from Khenti’s chest. “When will I ever

learn?”

Gritting his teeth, Arkhan staggered down the trade road, towards Lahmia. With

luck, his damned horse wouldn’t have run too far.

91

TEN

The Hour of the Dead

Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1598 Imperial Reckoning)

The storm was the worst of the season by far, and it broke upon the shores of the

Sour Sea with little warning.

It had been a cloudy, windy day, with sudden gusts of rain interspersed with long

periods of drizzle—nothing out of the ordinary for that time of the year. But shortly

after sundown the wind picked up, howling like a chorus of hungry ghosts across the

barrow fields, and flickers of lightning danced behind the roiling clouds out to sea.

The barbarians along the north coast heard the ominous rumble of thunder, saw the

height of the waves dashing against the shore, and rushed to their low, rounded huts.

Lowland tribes flocked to the hills, begging the hetmen for shelter from the

coming storm.

The reaction was altogether different among the Keepers of the Mountain, as the

barbarian priests were known. Their lookouts reported the rising winds and the

ominous clouds to the High Keeper, and after a moment’s thought he ordered the

patrols of the barrow fields doubled until the storm had run its course. The High

Keeper was an old and cunning man, or he never would have risen to claim the God’s

Eye in the first place. The elder Keepers were certain that the grave-robbing monster

who’d killed their brethren had been driven away by their hunting parties, but the

High Keeper wasn’t convinced. He was certain that the creature was still close by,

perhaps hiding somewhere on the mountain in spite of his order’s best efforts to find

it. If so, the storm would draw it out of hiding. The wind and the rain would conceal

its movements, providing the perfect opportunity to resume its grisly deeds. And

when it did, the Keepers would be waiting.

A few hours later, well past nightfall, the storm broke upon the coast in all its

fury. The wind raged, lashing at the men out on the barrow fields with blinding

sheets of rain. Visibility dropped to twenty feet, then fifteen, then ten; had the

Keepers not known the plain like the backs of their hands, they would have been

utterly disorientated. Even still, the patrols could do little more than huddle together

against the furious gale and creep from one mound to the next, trusting that the

Burning God would lead them to the monster if it were about.

Then, around midnight, with the storm still scouring the plain, the patrols spied a

pillar of green fire blazing fiercely to the south, towards the older barrow mounds.

The sight lifted the Keepers’ hearts. At first, they believed their prayers had been

answered, and, in a bitterly ironic sense, they were right.

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The four patrols made their way independently southward, converging on the

source of the god’s own flame. They had learned their lesson after the first disastrous

encounter with the monster. The ostentatious lantern-globes had been left behind, and

the acolytes had been armed with bronze swords and spears from the fortress’ ancient

armoury. The Keepers in each patrol had been entrusted with even more precious

treasures: reliquaries of tarnished bronze, each more than a thousand years old,

containing polished spheres of god-stone to fuel their invocations. It was more raw

power than any of the Keepers had ever seen, much less controlled. Each patrol felt

confident that they could deal with the monster on their own, and pressed forward as

quickly as they could in hopes of securing the glory for themselves.

Nagash stood in the eye of the raging storm, shielded on all sides by a whirling

column of power. Beyond the pillar of fire, the tempest roared, clawing at the shield

like a frenzied beast, while within the air was still, and silent save for the scratching

of his dagger through the damp earth. Where the bronze knifepoint passed, the earth

was left blackened and smouldering by its touch.

The chunk of abn-i-khat burned like molten lead in his shrivelled stomach. He

had carved a piece of stone the size of his fist from the centre of the Burning God’s

eye and had forced it down his throat, and the tempest raging within his flesh made

the storm above seem as gentle as an evening breeze. He could feel every nerve,

every muscle fibre, every inch of flesh and bone with sharp-edged detail. He felt

every blade of grass beneath his feet, and every tiny mote of power within them—he

could even feel the lingering vestiges of life force in the hide cloak that lay across his

shoulders. A veritable sea of sensations raged within him from one moment to the

next: it might have been pain, or pleasure, or a mingling of both. Nagash could not

tell any longer. He was long past the point of making distinctions between the two.

Yet his mind was absolutely, utterly clear. His thoughts were gleaming and sharp-

etched as obsidian, and beggared the lightning for speed. What mighty deeds could

he have accomplished in Khemri with such clarity of thought? The power of the

Black Pyramid paled in comparison.

The site he’d chosen for the great ritual was a flat region surrounded by four

barrow mounds near the exact centre of the plain. He’d chosen the spot not only

because it would allow him to cast his invocation over the entire area, but also

because the pathways around the barrows would serve to channel the barbarian

patrols in predictable ways. Nagash had no doubt that they would appear, once his

work began in earnest.

There were more of them than he expected, and by either luck or design they

struck at more or less the same time. Thin cries rose and fell amid the howling gale as

sword- and spear-wielding acolytes charged blindly across the open ground towards

the beacon of flame. Behind them, tiny pinpoints of green light glowed like sullen

coals as a dozen priests brandished their bronze reliquaries and made ready for battle.

The necromancer straightened, gauging the acolytes’ approach. To his mind, they

seemed ponderous and slow, stumbling haltingly across the wet ground towards him.

When they were halfway to him, he raised his dagger skyward and reached out with

his will.

Slay them!

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Blinded by eagerness and lashing curtains of rain, the acolytes did not register the

figures rising up from the dark ground until they’d charged in among them. The

skeletons reared up with disturbing speed, rain coursing from their age-darkened

bones, and closed in on the barbarians from all sides. Obsidian blades flashed,

severing limbs and spilling entrails. Bony hands grabbed at the acolytes, dragging

them to the ground by their robes or by their hair. Leering skulls closed in, jaws

snapping, their eye sockets alight with green flame. In moments, the acolytes’

bloodthirsty shouts had turned to confused and agonised screams, punctuated by the

clang and clatter of blades as the survivors rallied and fought for their lives.

It took several long seconds for the priests to grasp what was happening, and

when they did their response was potent but poorly coordinated. Nagash felt a ragged

volley of invocations from across the field as the priests tried to seize control of his

warriors. Here and there one of the skeletons stumbled beneath the onslaught, and the

acolytes lashed out at them, smashing several to pieces. The barbarians took heart,

sensing that the tide of battle was about to turn—and then Nagash raised his left fist

skyward and hissed a dreadful invocation of his own.

An ominous rumble echoed through the clouds overhead, followed by stuttering

flashes of lightning. Moments later, the priests were stunned by a single arc of

burning, green light that plunged to earth and struck the barrow mound between them

with a sputtering hiss. Another glowing mote fell from the bruised clouds, then

another, and then there was a clap of thunder and a shower of burning hail the size of

sling stones plunged down upon priests and acolytes both.

Men fell dead with their skulls dashed in or their necks broken. Others shrieked

in agony as their robes burst into greenish flames that the rain could not quench. The

priests scattered under the onslaught, running in every direction to escape the attack,

and the sight of their panic unnerved the beleaguered acolytes, who tried to break

free from the clutches of the undead and escape into the darkness. Many were cut

down as they tried to flee, or were dragged to the ground by claw-like hands and torn

apart. The last thing the survivors heard as they fled for their lives was the sound of

soulless, mocking laughter riding the howling wind.

The skeletons made no effort to pursue the fleeing barbarians. Heedless of the

sizzling hail, those undead warriors with no weapons of their own began plucking

weapons from the bodies of the dead, while the warlord and his skeletal retinue went

about killing the wounded that had been left behind. Perhaps a third of their number

had been destroyed in the fighting, their bones scattered across the smouldering

ground.

The losses mattered little to Nagash. Close to forty-five dead barbarians littered

the battleground, some still burning as the magical fire consumed their flesh. They

would more than make up for the numbers he had lost.

Grinning cruelly, Nagash returned his attention to the ritual circle. His army had

only just begun to grow.

The great circle took another hour to complete, while the wind and the rain raged

unabated over the barrow fields. As the hour of the dead approached, Nagash cast

aside his bronze dagger and drew the oilskin bag from his belt. He bent over the great

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circle and poured the last of the stone dust into the channels he’d burned into the

earth. When he was done the ritual symbols glowed with latent power.

It was time. The necromancer tossed the bag aside and stepped into the centre of

the circle. He felt each tiny tremor of energy in the web he’d created—a net of

sorcerous power that he merely had to speak the proper phrases and draw tight over

the plain.

Nagash looked out across the open ground. Skeletal figures waited in the

darkness, silent and patient as death itself; the hetman stood among them, his rune-

sword glinting balefully.

Clenching his fists, Nagash threw back his head and began to chant, spitting the

arcane words into the sky. The arcane symbols within the ritual circle blazed with

light, and the bruised clouds recoiled overhead, receding in every direction as the

power of the necromancer’s invocation spread in a great wave across the barrow

plain.

Power flowed in a torrent from Nagash’s body, racing across the fields and

sinking like claws into the hundreds of barrow mounds. The energies sought out

every corpse, burrowing into rotting flesh and yellowing bones and stirring up the

ghosts of old memories buried within. The spell was attuned to the worst passions of

the human soul: anger, violence, jealousy and hate, and it lent those memories a

semblance of life.

Bodies trembled. Limbs twitched. Dead hands clenched, scattering dust from

decayed joints. Pitiless flames burned in the depths of old, dead eyes.

Nagash felt them stir, hundreds of them, caught within the strands of his

sorcerous web. Ragged lips pulled back in a triumphant snarl. “Come forth!” he

shouted into the tumult. “Your master commands it!”

Sealed up in their earthen barrows, the dead heard Nagash’s command, and they

obeyed.

Hands clawed at muddy earth, or tore at wooden boards. The earthen surfaces of

the barrow mounds rippled and heaved. Flashes of lightning silhouetted the stark

outlines of skeletal figures dragging themselves free from their graves.

Silent figures shambled out of the stormy night, drawn by Nagash’s command.

When the southern barrows had been emptied, and a horde of more than a thousand

skeletons stood at his back, the Undying King stepped from the glowing circle and

ordered his army to advance.

The undead horde marched northwards, growing in size as it went. Keepers and

acolytes who’d panicked and lost their bearings in the storm were the first to die,

their terrified screams rising and then quickly vanishing amid the howling wind. The

revenants let the bloodied corpses fall where they were slain and continued onwards,

towards the temple fortress to the north. Within minutes the mutilated bodies began

to twitch, preparing to join the implacable advance.

The lookouts had all retreated into the safety of the fortress the moment the storm

had broken, so there was no one to witness the emptying of the sacred barrows. It

was only when the survivors of the slaughtered patrols came stumbling out of the

darkness that the rest of the order became aware of the doom that approached.

Concealing his fear, the High Keeper ordered his brethren to the armoury, and them

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commanded that the ancient alarm-horns to be sounded, summoning aid from the

villages to the north-east. The great horns had not been blown for hundreds of years,

and only two out of the dozen instruments still worked. The urgent, wailing notes

sounded for more than an hour, rising and falling with the wind. The hetmen nearest

the fortress heard the call, but their warriors refused to leave their families and brave

the fury of the storm. When dawn came, they would march, but until then the

Keepers would have to fend for themselves.

Believing that reinforcements would soon arrive, the Keepers emptied the

armoury and barricaded the southern gates. Lookouts were ordered out onto the

walls, but there was little to see in the darkness and the rain until the walking dead

were almost upon them.

The men guarding the gates heard the first shouts of terror from the acolytes atop

the walls, and then, moments later came the eerie sound of fingers scratching against

the wood. One of the Keepers, hoping to encourage the others, laughed at the pitiful

noise.

At once, the scratching fell silent. The men held their breaths, hands tightening

around the unfamiliar grips of their weapons. A young voice up on the wall was

babbling in fright, begging for the Burning God to save them.

And then the Keepers felt an invisible wave of power wash over them, and the

southern gates began to rot before their very eyes. Iron-hard planks cracked and

splintered, filling the corridors with clouds of dust and snuffing out the torches. And

then the scratching began again, louder and more insistent, followed by the sound of

rending wood.

Within seconds, pairs of flickering, greenish fires shone out of the gloom. Claw-

like fingers raked across the Keepers’ wooden barricades. Men screamed and called

out to their god for aid, while those in front who had no way to escape hefted their

weapons and threw themselves at their foes. Bronze and stone blades hacked and

stabbed. Ancient bones cracked and splintered, and blood spattered across the walls.

The Keepers of the Mountain were no cowards. Though unused to battle, they

stood their ground and defended the fortress with strength and determination. The

gateways limited the number of enemies that could be brought to bear against them at

any one time, and for a while they managed to hold the invaders at bay. Some of the

senior Keepers arrived with reliquaries of god-stone, and tried to hold back the

undead by force of will. At some of the gates they were successful, holding the

corpses fast so that their brethren could strike them down.

Yet the enemy was implacable. They knew no fear, nor pain, nor fatigue. When

their legs were smashed, they dragged themselves across the floor and grabbed at the

Keepers’ legs. When their arms were torn off they snapped at the Keepers’ flesh with

their broken teeth.

Worst of all, every brother who fell rose up and joined their ranks. Before long,

the Keepers found themselves fighting against the savaged corpses of men whom

they’d known for years or even decades. It was too much for any sane mind to take.

At one gate after another, exhausted Keepers were overwhelmed, and resistance

began to collapse. Acolytes fled, shrieking in terror, to the deepest parts of the

fortress. They hid themselves in wooden chests, in dry cisterns and bins of dusty

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grain, trembling and weeping and whispering prayers for their deliverance right up to

the moment that bony hands seized them and dragged them to their doom.

The main gate on the temple’s south face was the last to fall. Most of the order’s

senior priests were marshalled there, aiding in its defence, and they had already

thrown back three successive assaults. They had learned enough from the last few

attacks to try a different strategy: instead of hurling their energies at the army en

masse and trying to halt it in its tracks, the priests were focusing their will on isolated

elements, attempting to seize control and turn them against the rest of the undead

horde. Though Nagash’s force of will far eclipsed any of the individual priests, he

found it difficult to control his army and resist a score of individual attacks

simultaneously, and the cursed priests were starting to inflict significant damage.

A cheer went up from the priests as the third assault foundered. Piles of shattered

corpses clogged the gateway, and the stink of blood and spilled entrails hung heavy

in the air. The defenders had paid dearly since the gate had fallen, but they’d learned

hard lessons since the first assault began. More barricades had been erected to break

up the undead advance, and the priests had organised themselves to operate in three

groups. One group fought while the second performed the grim task of destroying the

corpses of their brothers who fell in battle, so that they could not be turned against

them. The third group rested and tended the wounded, or formed a new set of

barricades for the defenders to withdraw behind. It was a potent and effective

defence; so long as they kept their heads, they could hold the gate almost indefinitely.

Nagash struck them just as the defenders were rotating groups. All at once, the

piles of old bones glowed a furious green and then exploded, filling the tunnel with

jagged splinters. Men fell screaming, their bodies raked by the needle-like fragments,

and the rest reeled back in shock. Before they could recover, Nagash himself burst

through the gate, his hideous body wreathed in sorcerous flame. He spat words of

terrible power, and darts of fire shot from his fingertips—where they struck, men

collapsed in agony, their bodies consumed from within. Behind the necromancer

came his retinue of ancient warriors. The undead warlord stepped past Nagash and

began slaughtering the stunned priests with his rune-sword.

The surviving defenders recovered quickly, retreating back to another set of

barricades and forming another, smaller defensive line. Nagash caught a glimpse of

the High Priest and his senior servants clustered behind the barricade, along with

perhaps a few score acolytes and holy men. They had been driven back almost the

length of the tunnel; the north gate stood only ten yards behind them.

Nagash’s hands clenched in anticipation. Teeth bared in a feral snarl, he advanced

on the defenders.

The acolytes and the younger priests gaped in terror at his approach, their pale

faces lit by the greenish flames wreathing the necromancer’s body. Skeletons poured

into the tunnel behind Nagash, filling it with the dry clatter of bones.

The High Priest saw his opportunity. Here was the chance to stop the attack in its

tracks, if the glowing abomination could be destroyed! His old voice rang with

authority as he shouted exhortations to the elders, and at once they linked their voices

in a sacred chant. The rest of the defenders took heart from this, standing shoulder to

shoulder and raising their weapons once more as the enemy approached.

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Nagash flung out his hand and spat an angry invocation. A blast of green fire

sped down the tunnel—and the priests responded, focusing their energies in a crude

counter-spell. The bolt disintegrated a few feet from the terrified defenders, leaving

them unharmed.

Smiling, Nagash hurled another bolt. Then another. Cold, mocking laughter

echoed down the tunnel.

The priests deflected the second blow, and the third, but each one seemed to get a

bit closer before breaking apart. A fourth bolt came close enough to singe the robes

of the defenders. Lines of strain appeared on the faces of the holy men as they tried to

withstand the onslaught.

A fifth blast was deflected. Then a sixth. Thunder reverberated in the confined

space, deafening human ears. The seventh blast broke up with a blinding flash, close

enough to cause the defenders’ robes to smoulder. One of the senior priests slumped

silently to the ground, blood streaming from his nose, eyes and ears.

The eighth blast slew five acolytes before the rest of its energy was dissipated.

Another senior priest collapsed with a groan, clutching at his chest. The defenders’

lines wavered, and then an acolyte, his mind overwhelmed by horror, hurled himself

at the oncoming skeletons with a wordless shriek of terror and rage. Another acolyte

succumbed, then another, and then the defenders’ lines broke as they launched a last,

desperate charge into the face of certain death.

Nagash blasted a charging acolyte point-blank, scattering burning body parts

back down the tunnel towards the High Priest. The elders of the order began to

waver, their minds strained to the breaking point by the contest of power. His

laughter took on a harsher, wilder edge as he hurled a final bolt, straight at the High

Priest’s face.

The holy men summoned the last of their strength, and the bolt dissipated with a

thunderous crash less than a foot from where they stood. The concussion hurled

men’s bodies against the tunnel walls, breaking old bones and crushing skulls. Others

were slain instantly by the sudden flash of heat, their bodies charred beyond

recognition.

Only the High Priest survived, his body largely shielded from the blast by the

men in front of him. His robes smouldering, the old man tried to crawl backwards,

away from the necromancer.

Nagash loomed over the barbarian, bending low and seizing him by his wrinkled

neck. He pulled the old man up until their faces were scant inches apart. The High

Priest stared into the necromancer’s burning eyes and saw in them the death of all

living things. Nagash’s fist clenched; old bone snapped, and the High Priest’s head

lolled to one side. The barbarian’s feet thrashed spasmodically for several seconds

more, then went still.

Slowly, Nagash lowered the old man’s body until his feet touched the stone floor.

He released his grip, and the High Priest remained upright. Green flames flickered in

the depths of his glazed eyes. Gripped by the necromancer’s will, the old man sank to

his knees, then reached up with wrinkled hands and gripped the golden circlet set

upon his head. Haltingly, as though some part of the old priest’s soul still struggled

within the broken frame, the corpse removed the circlet and offered it to Nagash.

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The necromancer took the symbol of the order in his bony hands, and, grinning

cruelly, he twisted the soft gold until the setting holding the abn-i-khat burst apart.

Nagash plucked the burning stone from the circlet, and tossed the mangled gold band

aside.

The storm raged through the night and into the dawn of the next day, finally spending

the last of its strength well past daybreak. As soon as the winds had dropped off, the

hetmen of the nearby villages summoned their warriors and set off as quickly as they

could down the muddy tracks towards the temple fortress.

When they arrived, the great fortress was silent and still. The gates along the

north face were shut and locked, and no amount of shouting would bring one of the

Keepers out onto the wall. Finally, one of the hetmen ordered runners to fetch a tall

ladder from his village, and they sent a young lad scampering up to the top of the

wall to see what he could find.

The warriors waited in silence as the boy disappeared from sight. The minutes

stretched, one after another, and the hetmen exchanged nervous glances. After half an

hour, they knew something had gone terribly wrong.

Finally, the main gate swung open. The boy appeared, trembling and pale. No

amount of questions, cajoling or threats could make him relate what he’d seen inside,

and nothing on earth could get him to go back in again.

Weapons ready, the hetmen led their troops into the fortress. At once, they saw

that a terrible battle had raged inside the walls. Blood was splashed on the walls and

the floors, and the stench of death hung heavy in the air. A mere ten yards from the

north gate, one of the hetmen let out a cry of dismay and picked up a mangled band

of gold. The other village leaders recognised it at once. If the God’s Eye had been

taken, it meant that the High Keeper and the order had been destroyed.

And yet, no matter how hard they looked, the villagers found no bodies inside the

temple fortress. None at all.

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ELEVEN

Necessary Sacrifices

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1598 Imperial Reckoning)

Ubaid bowed his tattooed head at the queen’s approach. “All is in readiness, great

one,” he said, as though he were speaking of nothing more untoward than a palace

feast.

Neferata acknowledged the vizier with a nod. It was fast approaching midnight;

the audience with Xia Ha Feng had lasted much longer than she’d expected, but it

had been important not to appear rude and hasten away too early. She needed the

august personage to be receptive to her overtures, to believe that he could win her

confidence and thus gain a lever to use against the king. So long as he believed that

he had power over her, she was free to lay the trap that would ultimately ensnare

him—and possibly the whole Eastern Empire as well.

A thin line of warm light shone beneath the door to the sanctum. Ubaid had been

busy for hours, preparing for the ritual. The grand vizier was the only member of the

cabal that she permitted into the chamber; the rest were now required to pay their

respects and receive their draught of elixir in the funereal confines of the Hall of

Regretful Sorrows. She’d chosen the location for the express reason that it was the

least used of the queen’s three audience chambers—and also because she wanted

Lamashizzar and his former allies to never forget that she alone now stood between

them and the realm of the dead.

Lamashizzar, of course, was furious at the thought. She knew that it was

dangerous to provoke him in such petty ways; he lacked ambition, but he could be

ruthless when his pride was offended. Perhaps, in time, she would release him from

the obligation, but right now he needed to kneel before her and acknowledge her

authority. He needed to be humbled. He needed to know what it was like to live at

the whim of another. It was the one concession to her feelings that she allowed

herself to make.

For the most part, she had been careful not to abuse her power. For all their

reputation for decadence, in some ways the people of Lahmia were just as hidebound

as other Nehekharans. None outside the palace knew that she no longer confined

herself to the Women’s Palace, and none other than the members of the cabal knew

that the city was ruled by anyone other than its king.

Neferata intended it to remain that way. Nagash might have believed that he

could rule as an Undying King in Khemri without tempting the wrath of the other

great cities, but she knew better. Now that she had access to her children once more,

she had plans to ensure that, to all outward purposes, the ruling dynasty would

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continue as before. When her son Lamasu reached marriageable age, she would find

him a proper wife, and then it would be time for Lamashizzar to join his ancestors in

the afterlife. Naturally she, as the dutiful wife, would appear to drink from the

poisoned cup and join him in his journey to the underworld, and to all intents and

purposes she would be dead and gone.

The trick would be to convince the other members of the cabal to engineer their

own deaths as well. Already their long lives—and miraculous vitality—were giving

rise to unwelcome rumours both at court and even as far away as neighbouring

Lybaras. According to Lamashizzar’s spies, Queen Khalida had hinted at suspicions

of her own on more than one occasion, though she’d never come out and publicly

accused her royal cousins of any unnatural dealings.

Neferata had tried to reach out to Khalida on more than one occasion, hoping to

use their past friendship to build strong ties between the two cities, but so far the

Lybaran queen had found compelling reasons not to accept any of her cousin’s

invitations to court.

At some point she would also have to decide what to do about Arkhan. For now,

his knowledge of Nagash’s sorcery still outweighed the risk of keeping him alive, but

that balance was shifting fast. She was starting to grasp the finer nuances of the

Usurper’s incantations. Soon she would allow W’soran to begin studying the more

esoteric aspects of Nagash’s necromantic lore, using it to both control him and

expand her own base of knowledge through his studies. Once that was underway,

Arkhan would only be useful for his sword arm and his ability to procure victims for

the cabal, two functions that she was certain Abhorash and Ushoran could perform

just as well. It had been pathetically easy to win over the monster’s loyalty, though it

had required her to open herself to Arkhan far more than she would have liked.

Neferata was already looking forward to the day that she could order Abhorash to put

an end to the whole tiresome business.

The queen pushed open the sanctum door and hastened within, mindful of the

sands hissing through the hourglass. Ubaid had laid out the ritual implements and lit

the incense in preparation for the incantation. The sacrifice had likewise been

prepared and awaited her in the centre of the circle. His wounds had been cleaned

and he’d been given a potion that would banish his fatigue and leave him awake and

alert for the ceremony to come.

He was part of an experiment that Neferata was conducting in an attempt to better

refine the outcome of Nagash’s ritual. Arkhan had found him amid the squalid

refugee districts west of the city: a young man, relatively fit and healthy enough to

survive a full week of suffering. The subject was chained to an iron ring that had

been set in the ceiling at the centre of the ritual circle, and the dark stone around his

toes was layered with thick spatters of blood. The incisions that covered his body in

precise, intricate patterns had been inflicted according to the diagrams provided in

Nagash’s tomes, and represented the culmination of the torturer’s art. The wounds

left every nerve in the victim’s body throbbing and raw, but the injuries themselves

were not serious enough to kill.

According to the necromancer’s experiments, no victim had survived the

nightmare of constant pain for more than eight days. By Neferata’s estimation, at

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seven days the victim’s energies would be at their peak; past that point they would

start to ebb as the body began to fail.

Now would come the true test. Neferata crossed to the worktable at the edge of

the circle. The razor-edged torture knives had been scrupulously cleaned and set

aside on a clean linen cloth. In their place, Ubaid had set out the curved sacrificial

blade, the golden bowl and the jewel-encrusted goblet that she used to drink the first

draught of the elixir. The heavy tome containing the great ritual lay open to the

proper page at the table’s edge, but she hardly spared it a glance. She’d learned the

necessary phrases and gestures by heart a long time ago.

Neferata breathed deeply, drinking in the delicate incense that permeated the

room. She reached down and touched the blade of the sacrificial knife; the sharpened

bronze was cold to the touch. The queen smiled, tracing a fingertip along the narrow,

wooden hilt, then picked it up. It felt light and comfortable in her hand.

She entered the circle with care, and sought the young man’s eyes. His gaze was

fixed upon her, both terrified and hopeful all at once. A faint groan escaped his

lacerated lips.

The queen held him with her gaze. Arkhan had taught her to draw upon the power

inherent in the elixir. She used it now, and watched a spark of longing catch fire in

his eyes. He drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and from the expression that crossed

his tortured face, she knew that the agony wracking his body had been transformed

into something far sharper, far sweeter and much more agonising than anything he’d

felt before. How she had made him suffer in the last few days of his life. And yet he

loved her, with all his heart and soul. He ached for her, through and through.

Smiling, Neferata placed the knife in her belt, and drew so close to him that she

could feel his laboured breathing against her cheek. She stretched, almost languidly,

reaching up to undo the chains that held his wrists. He staggered as the bonds were

released, yet he did not fall. Her gaze held him upright.

Her smile broadened. “You have pleased me,” she told him, and the words sent

shudders through his frame. “Now there is one last thing you must do, and then, my

sweet, you will be with me forever.” She drew out the knife. “Will you do this for

me?”

His mouth worked. Broken sounds issued forth, until tears of frustration gleamed

at the corners of his eyes. Finally, he managed a shaky nod.

“I knew you wouldn’t fail me,” she said softly. “Take this,” she said, and held out

the knife.

The young man reached out a trembling hand and grasped the gleaming blade.

“Good,” Neferata whispered. “Wait here.”

She retreated to the edge of the circle. The hour had come. Ubaid appeared at her

side, silent and ready.

Neferata raised her hands. Her eyes had never left her victim’s. “Now,” she told

him. “Repeat after me.”

And so she began to chant, slowly and purposefully, and the man in the centre of

the circle joined in. She drew him into the ritual, weaving his pain and passion into

the incantation, and he surrendered himself to it willingly, eagerly. At that moment,

he wanted to give her everything her heart desired.

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The incantation built slowly and steadily. Minutes passed into hours, until time

lost all meaning. The climax, when it came, took both of them by surprise.

“Now!” she gasped. “The knife!” Neferata raised a trembling finger to her throat,

right over the pulsing artery. “Give me your heart’s blood!”

A beatific smile crossed the young man’s scarred face. He brought the knife to

his throat and sliced it open with a single, graceful motion. Ubaid was beside him at

once, the golden bowl held in his upraised hands.

The man stood there, bleeding his life away, his face transported in ecstasy. She

held him with her gaze until his heart ceased to beat, and his lifeless body collapsed

to the stone floor.

Neferata let out a long, shuddering breath. Her nerves were afire. She reached for

the golden goblet as Ubaid rose from the victim’s corpse and brought her the

brimming, steaming bowl.

Slowly, carefully, the grand vizier poured a measure of blood into the gleaming

cup. Neferata inhaled the heady scent. It was sweeter than any fragrance she’d ever

smelled before.

Suddenly, there came a sound in the corridor outside the sanctum. It sounded to

Neferata like the scuff of sandal leather across stone. Ubaid frowned, and carefully

set the sacrificial bowl upon the floor. The dagger he drew from his belt was anything

but light and utilitarian. He circled around the bowl and moved quietly towards the

closed door.

Neferata turned to watch him go. Something was wrong. She thought of

Lamashizzar, and felt a sudden sense of foreboding.

The goblet was warm in her hands. She stared down at the still surface of the

elixir, sensing the power seething in its depths. Neferata raised the cup to her lips and

drank deep. The taste was painfully bitter, yet it filled her with a power the likes of

which she had never known before.

Ubaid was struggling with someone at the door. Was it Lamashizzar? She could

not tell, and at that moment, she did not care. Neferata let out a throaty chuckle.

“Stand aside,” she said to Ubaid. “Let him pass.” Whoever it was, he would bow at

her feet and beg her forgiveness for the unwelcome intrusion.

The grand vizier retreated from the doorway, and a lone figure staggered into the

room. It took her a moment to recognise who it was.

“Arkhan?” she asked. She could smell the stink of blood on his robes. “What is

the meaning of this?”

The immortal lurched towards her. As he stepped further into the light, she could

see the bloody stubs of arrow shafts jutting from his shoulder and side. His ghastly

face was paler than usual, and the iron sword she’d given him was held in his hand.

Its edge was dark with dried blood.

“The king is moving against you,” Arkhan croaked. He sounded as though he was

at the very limits of his strength. “Lamashizzar sent Adio and Khenti to murder me

on the trade road. He means to kill you as well.”

Neferata shook her head. Arkhan wasn’t making sense. She laughed softly, drunk

with sudden power—and then a cold spike of pain lanced through her heart.

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The queen had time for a single, startled gasp before the poison took hold and

dragged her down into darkness.

* * *

Arkhan watched in horror as Neferata collapsed. The golden goblet tumbled from her

hand, spilling the last, thick dregs of elixir at her feet. He lurched towards her, his

body stiff and clumsy from his wounds. “Help me!” he snarled at the grand vizier as

he collapsed to his knees beside the queen.

“There is nothing to be done,” Ubaid replied in a dead voice.

Neferata lay upon her side, head resting on one out-flung arm. Her skin was cold

to the touch. Arkhan rested his fingertips against her slender throat, but could not feel

the pulse of her heart. He brought his cheek close to her lips. There was barely a

whisper of breath.

The immortal’s gaze went to the dented goblet. There were scarlet drops of elixir

beading its rim. As he watched, they turned dull red, then black. Realisation sank into

him like a knife. It was one thing to murder a man on the trade road and leave his

body in the ditch; killing a queen was something altogether more risky. Her body

would be handled by the priests of the mortuary cult, and viewed by thousands of

grieving citizens. Her death would have to appear natural.

“This cannot be,” Arkhan snarled. “No poison in all Nehekhara could overcome

Nagash’s elixir.”

“It is the venom of the sphinx, a poison both natural and supernatural,” Ubaid

said. “Even before the fall of Mahrak it was vanishingly rare. The gods alone know

how Lamashizzar obtained it.” The grand vizier approached the queen. His

expression was inscrutable as he studied Neferata’s still form. “According to the old

texts, the venom attacks the blood, rendering it lifeless. Death is instantaneous.” He

shook his head. “It’s a wonder that the queen is alive at all.”

Something in Ubaid’s dispassionate voice kindled a black rage in Arkhan’s heart.

He surged to his feet, seizing the grand vizier by the throat. The immortal could feel

the last vestiges of elixir boiling in his veins. Dimly, he was aware that Ubaid still

held a knife in his hand, but the immortal scarcely cared. The point of his own sword

was scant inches from Ubaid’s belly.

“Why?” Arkhan growled.

The grand vizier glowered at the immortal, but his expression was bleak.

“Because, like Abhorash, I serve the throne,” he replied. “Lamashizzar is weak and

feckless, but Lahmia has survived such rulers before.” Ubaid squirmed a little in

Arkhan’s grasp. His voice rose in frustration. “The queen did not keep her word.

Instead of advising the king, she usurped his power entirely. It’s not right—”

Arkhan’s hand tightened around Ubaid’s throat. “She thinks only of this city!

Lahmia will prosper under her rule! And for this, you betray her?”

Ubaid’s eyes widened in anger. “Who are you to judge me?” he hissed. “Arkhan

the Black, who betrayed his own king in favour of the Usurper, then even turned

upon Nagash when it suited your purposes. What do you know of loyalty, or

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devotion?” He spread his arms. “Kill me, if you wish, but you may not presume to

pass judgement on me.”

Arkhan’s grip tightened on the hilt of his sword. His mind whirled. Snarling in

disgust, he turned and shoved the grand vizier towards the door. Ubaid staggered a

dozen paces, an uncomprehending look on his face.

“I will leave it up to the queen to decide your fate,” Arkhan said coldly. “Now

go.”

Ubaid shook his head. The snake tattoo on his neck seemed to slither in the

shifting light. “Don’t you understand? The queen will never wake. The elixir’s power

may slow the venom for a time, but it’s just a matter of hours now. Days at the

most.”

“I said get out!” Arkhan roared, and took a step towards Ubaid. The grand vizier

saw the murderous look in the immortal’s eyes, and his nerve finally deserted him.

Tucking his knife back into his belt, he fled the room with as much dignity as he

could muster.

Arkhan listened to the grand vizier’s footsteps retreat down the corridor. He

swayed on his feet. I must be out of my mind, he thought. How did I let Neferata do

this to me?

He spun on his heel, surveying the chamber. Ubaid would go back to the king and

report what had happened, and the king would swoop in like a hawk to seize the

queen’s body and reclaim Nagash’s tomes. There was no time to waste.

With a trembling hand, Arkhan slid his iron blade back into its scabbard, and

limped over to the golden bowl. The immortal knelt, placed his hands against the

bowl’s curved surface, and raised it to his lips. The liquid inside was still warm and

fragrant.

He drank it all; it was far more than he needed, filling his innards to bursting, but

he was careful not to waste a single drop. Stolen vigour seethed through his veins.

The power of the elixir staggered him; it was nearly as powerful as Nagash’s own,

and far sweeter. Grinning mirthlessly, he plucked the remaining arrow stubs from his

torso and cast them aside.

The immortal searched through the room until he found a large, linen sack, then

filled it with a half-dozen carefully selected tomes. If the elixir was potent enough to

resist the effects of the sphinx’s poison, then perhaps there was a chance to defeat it

entirely. First, however, he needed a place where he could work in relative safety. At

the moment, only one option seemed open to him.

Arkhan knelt carefully and took the queen in his arms. Her body was already

stiffening, as though in death, and felt as light and brittle as old paper. Once again,

the immortal was struck by the sheer folly of what he was doing. He ought to be

fleeing the city with as many of Nagash’s books as he could carry. Once on the

Golden Plain he could escape Lamashizzar’s wrath with ease.

The immortal looked down at the queen’s unconscious form and was reminded

once again of Neferem, another daughter of Lahmia who was a pawn of kings and

suffered for centuries while he stood by and watched.

Neferata didn’t have to set you free, he reminded himself.

Cursing under his breath, Arkhan carried the queen from the room. With luck, he

could make it to the Women’s Palace before the king realised that she still lived.

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It appeared that King Lamashizzar hadn’t entertained the possibility that his wife

might survive the poisoned cup. There were no palace guards roaming the corridors

as Arkhan hastened to the southern edge of the palace. Just to be safe, he crossed into

the Women’s Palace via the rarely used Hall of Regretful Sorrows. The immortal

fought down a sense of grim foreboding as he bore the queen’s body past the great

marble bier where the queens of Lahmia had been laid in state for millennia.

The Women’s Palace was echoing and empty. For more than a century, the

sprawling sanctuary housed only Neferata herself, along with the bare minimum of

servants and handmaidens that protocol demanded the king provide. And yet his

presence in the dusty halls was detected almost at once. Within minutes, the immortal

found himself surrounded on all sides by pale, outraged women, some of whom were

armed with small, wicked-looking knives. Had he been alone, he had no doubt that

they would have set upon him like a pride of angry lionesses. Only the sight of the

queen’s motionless corpse held them at bay. They paced alongside him in mute shock

for close to an hour while he wandered aimlessly through the sprawling palace.

Finally, his patience stretched to the breaking point, he turned to the women and

asked where the queen’s bedchamber lay. They stared at him as though he were

mad—all but one young woman, dressed in fine robes, who stepped forward and

silently beckoned for him to follow.

Her name was Aiyah. Much later, Arkhan learned she had served Princess

Khalida as one of her handmaidens during the last year she’d lived at the palace.

Despite her youth, she was calm and controlled in the face of catastrophe. She led

Arkhan to the queen’s chambers, then banished the crowd of servants to the outer

corridor while the immortal laid out Neferata’s body on the bed. The handmaiden

returned as the immortal was unpacking Nagash’s tomes, and waited quietly by the

door. No protests, no tedious questions or hysterics. She simply waited, patient and

composed, ready to serve the queen in whatever capacity she could. Arkhan’s first

instinct was to dismiss her, but the more he considered the difficulties of trying to

work inside the confines of the sanctuary, the more he had to admit that he was going

to need her help.

He knew that it wouldn’t be very long before Lamashizzar learned where he’d

taken the queen: hours, perhaps a day at most. So Arkhan told the handmaiden a

partial truth—that the king had conspired to poison Neferata because he resented her

claims to equality. Aiyah accepted the story without comment while the immortal

took ink and brushes and began to inscribe out a ritual circle on the bedchamber

floor. At some point during the process, the handmaiden slipped quietly from the

room again, and he knew that his tale was winging its way through the Women’s

Palace. Arkhan reckoned that once the story was known, the palace servants would

block any attempt by Lamashizzar to enter the sanctuary in search of the queen. As it

was, the palace guard would baulk at any command to enter the forbidden halls of the

palace; even though the palace was technically open now, hundreds of years of

tradition carried a weight that was very difficult to overcome. That left only the

king’s fellow conspirators, and Arkhan was certain he could deal with any of them

save for Abhorash—if the king’s champion was even involved. He still had no idea

how deep the conspiracy went.

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The rest of that first night was spent sitting vigil at the queen’s side and poring

through the Usurper’s tomes in search of an incantation or ritual that might banish the

poison from the queen’s blood. Hours passed, and Neferata began to turn pale. Her

breath was still very faint, and only Arkhan’s preternatural senses allowed him to

hear a heartbeat. So far, the elixir was holding the poison at bay, but she was clearly

weakening. As dawn began to break, far out to sea, Arkhan was no closer to finding a

solution. He had Aiyah draw the curtains tight across the tall windows and continued

his search. By the time night fell once more, he still had nothing to show for his

efforts, and the queen’s condition was becoming steadily worse.

Growing desperate, Arkhan set the books aside and placed the queen’s body

inside the ritual circle. Aiyah watched the immortal spread open three magical tomes

on the floor by the circle, then gather up the inkpot and horsehair brush once more.

“Undress her,” he said to the handmaiden, and then began riffling through the

pages of the three books.

The young woman hesitated. “What do you intend to do?” she asked coolly.

Arkhan shot the handmaiden a hard stare. “She will need help to overcome the

poison in her veins,” he said. “So far, her… blood is strong enough to at least slow

the venom’s progress.” He paused, studying a detailed drawing of a human figure on

one yellowed page. After a moment he shook his head and continued his search. “So

I must find a way to increase her vigour enough to overcome it.”

The handmaiden took a step towards the circle and frowned. Her dark eyes

lingered on the strange markings painted on the floor. “I could send for an

apothecary,” she offered. “The priestesses of Neru have tended to the health of the

royal line for centuries. They have experience with poisons—”

“If I thought there was an herb or potion that could save her, I would have carried

her to the temple myself,” Arkhan snapped.

Aiyah took a deep breath. “But this,” she began. “What you’re doing—”

“What I am doing is trying to save your queen,” the immortal said. He paused in

his search, studied another image, and nodded to himself. Arkhan removed the

inkpot’s ceramic stopper. “The longer we wait, the weaker she becomes,” he told her.

The handmaiden hesitated a moment more, brows knitted in consternation, before

making her decision. She knelt carefully within the circle and began to deftly pull

away Neferata’s robes.

Arkhan laid out the runes with care. The work took hours, winding in intricate

ribbons from Neferata’s scalp to her toes. The immortal was conscious of each

minute slipping away; it seemed to him that her skin was growing steadily cooler

beneath his touch.

It was well past the hour of the dead by the time the preparations were complete.

Arkhan stood and pressed the book into Aiyah’s, hands. “Go and stand at the edge of

the circle, by her feet,” he said. “When I begin, repeat the words as I say them. They

are marked on the page there.”

Aiyah looked dubious, but accepted the tome nonetheless. “Is that all?”

“Do you wish the queen to live?” he asked.

“Of course!”

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“Then make that uppermost in your mind,” Arkhan told her. “Think of nothing

else. With luck, it will be enough.”

Arkhan took his place on the opposite side of the circle. Standing at the head of

the queen, he spread his arms and began to chant.

The ritual was little different from the incantation of reaping that was used to

create Nagash’s elixir. He had made several modifications to the arrangement of the

runes to account for the elixir already present in her body. He wasn’t interested in

transmutation so much as enhancing what was already there. In theory, the problem

seemed simple enough.

Drawing on the surfeit of elixir filling his body, Arkhan poured a steady stream

of power into the incantation. At once the air grew heavy above the circle, and he

saw the queen’s body begin to tremble. Tiny wisps of steam curled from the sigils

painted on her skin.

The immortal felt the elixir boil inside him and directed the released energy into

the arcane words rolling from his lips. And, within the circle, Neferata’s body

suddenly spasmed. Her back arched painfully, arms splayed and chest thrust

skyward. Arkhan could see the tendons in her neck and along the backs of her hands

grow taut as bowstrings; her mouth gaped, emitting a billowing gout of black vapour.

Arkhan watched as the queen’s skin began to change. Her rich, brown skin,

already pale, began to lose all trace of colour, taking on the cold tone of bleached

linen or alabaster. He stopped the incantation abruptly, fearing that he might already

be too late. The backlash of forces tore through him; he staggered, his hand going to

his chest as invisible knives tore through his vitals. A thin trickle of ichor ran down

his chin.

The immortal sank slowly to his knees. Neferata’s body had gone limp again,

shrouded in tendrils of steam. The runes painted on her skin had already begun to

fade, running together in dark blue threads that formed pools on the stone floor.

Aiyah sank to her knees, her eyes wide with shock. She crawled gingerly into the

circle and laid a trembling hand against Neferata’s flank. The handmaiden jerked her

fingers away as though stung.

“She’s cold,” Aiyah said. “Colder than the desert night. What happened? What

have you done?”

Arkhan stared at the queen’s near-lifeless form. The runes had all but melted

away in the heat that had radiated from her skin. Beneath the bluish tinge of the ink,

he could see that her veins had turned black at her temples and throat.

The immortal rubbed the back of a hand across his lips. It came away slick with a

film of ichor. Anger and revulsion roiled in his chest. What horror had Lamashizzar

unleashed?

“I don’t know,” Arkhan said in a hollow voice.

Five more days went by. Arkhan never relented, searching through Nagash’s books

again and again for something he could use to defeat the sphinx’s venom. The queen

scarcely breathed now; her flesh was cold and stiff as marble. Her heart still beat,

stubbornly driving the elixir through her veins, but it had grown inexorably weaker

with each passing night. Every ritual he attempted, no matter how great or small,

only seemed to worsen her condition. It seemed that the sphinx’s deadly venom had

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somehow bonded with Neferata’s ensorcelled blood, transforming it from within.

Any attempt to increase the elixir’s vigour empowered the poison as well.

Now, as the seventh night fell upon the city, Arkhan believed he knew the

answer. He sat at Neferata’s writing desk and studied the words and symbols of the

incantation one last time, checking carefully to ensure he’d made no errors. Satisfied,

he took the large sheet of paper and set it on the floor at the edge of the circle. Next,

he laid out the tools for the ritual with care, and then went to kneel at the queen’s

side. The immortal took her limp body in his arms and carried Neferata to her bed.

He laid her body gently upon the silken sheets, and then returned to the freshly-

drawn ritual he’d made. Arkhan took off his sword belt, and then let his robes fall to

the floor. He turned to Aiyah and spread his arms.

“Follow the diagrams exactly,” he said to her. “The symbols and their positions

are crucial, or the energies will not conduct properly.”

The handmaiden nodded, but Arkhan could see the weariness and apprehension

in her eyes. She had laboured every bit as hard as he had, yet without the benefits of

the elixir to sustain her. When she wasn’t participating in Arkhan’s rituals she was

trying to glean information about Lamashizzar and the other members of the cabal.

Despite her best efforts, however, there was no way to find out who had chosen to

side with the king in the wake of Neferata’s disappearance. All that could be learned

was that the king was incommunicado, conferring with his advisors. Arkhan knew he

was simply waiting for news that the queen had succumbed at last. With luck, the

king’s strategy could be used against him. He had ceded the initiative to Neferata, if

only she could make use of it.

This was their last chance. If this ritual failed, Arkhan was certain that the queen

would not last until the dawn.

Aiyah stepped forward, brush and inkpot in hand. She studied the paper carefully

for a moment, then dipped the brush in the inkpot and went to work. Her

brushstrokes were tentative at first, but her confidence increased steadily as the hours

went by and the ribbons of arcane symbols wove their way along Arkhan’s skin. Still,

it was close to dawn by the time the last symbols were inscribed upon the immortal’s

flesh.

“Well done,” Arkhan said, and hoped it was true. There was no way he could tell

for certain. “Now, quickly, take your place at the circle. There is very little time left.”

The immortal went and stood in the centre of the circle. “No matter what happens

to me, do not falter,” he told the handmaiden. “Complete the incantation, no matter

what. Do you understand?”

Aiyah nodded. Her eyes were now wide with fear.

“Then let us begin,” he said gravely. “We are almost out of time.”

As before, they chanted the incantation together. At once, the immortal felt his

veins begin to burn as the ritual tapped into his remaining reserves of elixir. But

rather than draw out the stolen power, this ritual was meant to shape it instead,

transforming it into a tool designed for a very specific purpose. Arkhan gritted his

teeth as stabbing pains shot through his torso and limbs. His vision began to dissolve

into a reddish fog, and a hollow roaring filled his ears. His skin drew painfully tight,

until he thought it would split apart, but through it all, his chant never faltered. He’d

suffered far worse in the past.

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Time lost all meaning for the immortal. The incantation went on forever, and the

agony only grew worse, until it was as boundless as the desert itself. Arkhan’s voice

was little more than a ragged howl of pain, but he still spat out the words that kept

the incantation going. His entire body was afire; a small part of his mind was certain

that his flesh and bones were melting in the heat.

An eternity passed. He did not feel the culmination of the ritual when it finally

arrived; for him, there was only a shift in the roaring whirlwind that filled his ears,

signifying that Aiyah had finished her chant. It took several long moments before she

could make him understand anything else.

“Now?” her voice echoed in his skull. It sounded small and far away.

Arkhan tried to see beyond the red mist that filled his vision. He nodded, or at

least he thought that he did. “The… knife…” he gasped. The words sounded

impossibly loud.

Aiyah let the page fall from her fingers. Her gaze fell to the small, curved knife at

her feet. The edge, honed to a razor’s sharpness, gleamed bright in the lamplight.

When she tried to speak again, her voice caught in her throat. “Are—are you

certain?”

The immortal responded with a tortured groan that made the handmaiden flinch.

“Do it!” he moaned. His eyes were orbs of dark red, the pupils completely obscured,

and yet she could feel the weight of his stare. “This is… her only hope,” Arkhan

continued. “She is certain… to die… otherwise.”

Aiyah took a deep breath. Swiftly, she bent and took up the knife. It felt terribly

heavy in her hand.

She crossed to the bed. But for her unnaturally white skin, the queen might have

been sleeping, lost in a deep lotus-dream. Aiyah laid a trembling hand upon the

queen’s forehead, grimacing at how cold she felt.

“Asaph forgive me,” the handmaiden said faintly. Then she took the knife and

sliced open the side of Neferata’s throat.

Black liquid, hot and foul-smelling, poured from the wound and spread across the

silken sheets. Neferata shuddered faintly, then went deathly still.

“It’s done,” the handmaiden said, stepping back from the bed to avoid the rain of

droplets pattering on the floor.

“Good,” the immortal replied. He climbed unsteadily to his feet. He beckoned to

her. “Help me. Quickly.”

Aiyah hurried to Arkhan and took his outstretched hand. She led him, stumbling,

to the queen’s side.

The immortal knelt beside her, leaning in until his face was inches from hers. He

nodded. “Not long now,” he rasped. “Hand me the blade.”

Aiyah handed over the knife and stepped back, wringing her hands. “I never

imagined there would be so much,” she said, staring in horror at the spreading pool

of ichor. “I’ve killed her. She’s going to die!”

“It must be done,” Arkhan insisted. “Her blood has been corrupted. Can’t you

see? We have to remove it, or she is doomed.”

The immortal watched in silence for another minute, watching the flood of ichor

slowly ebb away. When it had become no more than a trickle, he took the knife in his

110

left hand and pressed the point into the skin of his right forearm, just behind the

wrist. He cut deep, slicing open one of the major veins. There was no pain. All he

could feel now was fear.

The knife clanged to the floor. Left hand trembling, he cupped the back of

Neferata’s head and raised it from the sodden pillow. “Live, oh queen,” he said, his

voice shaking as he pressed the pulsing wound to her pale lips. “Drink of me, and

live.”

Arkhan felt her body tremble as the ichor touched her lips. His skin tingled as her

lips brushed the inside of his forearm; they moved against his skin, almost like a kiss,

and then she began to drink.

“Yes… yes!” Arkhan breathed. The red mist began to recede. “Drink!”

And she did. Hungrily, greedily, with gathering strength, she drew the liquid from

the wound. Her mouth opened, teeth pressing into his flesh. Arkhan clenched his fist.

As he watched, the cut in her neck closed up with startling speed.

“It’s working!” he gasped. “Aiyah, do you see? It’s working!”

The roaring in his ears was receding. Within seconds he could see clearly again,

and the pain had begun to fade. Arkhan’s muscles felt loose and weak, and a chill

settled into his bones. Neferata still drank from him, her eyes clamped tightly shut.

And then, without warning, her body began to convulse. Arkhan felt the muscles

in her neck writhe like serpents. She tore herself from his grasp, her mouth agape and

her chin stained dark with fluids. The queen thrashed upon the bed, arms and legs

flailing. A cloud of steam boiled up from her throat, followed by a long, terrible

howl.

Arkhan watched in horror as the queen’s body began to change. Her flesh

shrivelled, stretching the skin across her bones, and her lustrous, black hair grew

faded and brittle. Neferata’s eyes sank into their sockets, and her cheeks turned

gaunt, transforming her face into a ghoulish, bestial mask.

Shrieking in agony, Neferata reached for him with one flailing hand. It clawed at

the sheets, just inches away, but Arkhan could not bring himself to touch her.

Neferata’s screams turned to a choking rattle. She collapsed back upon the bed.

Her head turned towards Arkhan, and the immortal saw that her eyes were wide and

staring. They were still vivid green, but the pupils were slitted, like those of a cat.

She stared at him for barely a moment, her expression filled with pain, and then

all the air went out of her lungs and her body went limp. Arkhan heard Aiyah let out

a long, heart-wrenching moan.

Neferata, Daughter of the Moon and Queen of Lahmia, was dead.

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TWELVE

Apotheosis

Cripple Peak, in the 76th year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1598 Imperial Reckoning)

The slaughter of the barbarian priests had been more than just an act of vengeance on

Nagash’s part; it had served a pragmatic purpose as well. The mountain would

become the seat of his power, just as the Black Pyramid had been in Khemri. From

here he would raise the armies that would cast down the kings of Nehekhara. He

envisioned sprawling mines, foundries, armouries and great laboratories from which

he would continue to master the arts of necromancy. The construction alone would

last centuries, and occupy his undead army both day and night. Eliminating the

priests was necessary to keep them from interfering in his designs, and to swell the

ranks of his workforce.

Construction began the night after the battle at the fortress temple. The undead

rose from their beds across the barrow plain and converged on the south face of the

mountain. Guided by Nagash’s will, they began constructing the first stage of

fortifications around what would be the first of many mine complexes. Within the

first month the southern barrows had been dismantled, and the foundation stones

hauled up to the mountain to help form the first buildings. Earth and stone excavated

from the mountain were used as well, but Nagash knew he would need much more

before he could say the great work was well and truly begun. The fortress would take

many centuries before it was complete, and much of it would be underground,

sheltered from the burning light of the sun.

At the same time, Nagash kept a close watch on the temple fortress. He knew that

he hadn’t managed to kill every member of the order. At any given time close to a

hundred junior priests and acolytes were travelling between the barbarian villages,

tending to each of the totem statues and performing the ceremonial duties of the

order. Sure enough, almost two months later, a few score of the holy men returned to

the fortress and began making it fit for habitation again. That night, he sent a large

force to slay them and add their numbers to his own. Nagash especially savoured the

irony of using the undead members of the order to slay their younger brethren and

deliver them into his hands. After that, no one else attempted to take residence in the

great fortress.

Nagash suspected that the superstitious barbarians thought it to be haunted and, in

a very real sense, they were right.

Surprisingly, the burials on the barrow plain continued. The families of the

deceased would cross the Sour Sea in boats, making landfall just after sunset and

bearing their dead kin to a spot on the northern end of the plain. They would bring

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tools with them, and under the moonlight they would dig a deep hole in the ground

and lay the body inside. Then, to Nagash’s amusement, they would turn their

attention to the mountain and utter some kind of absurd prayer before filling up the

hole again. Once the family had gone, Nagash would summon up the corpse and find

a place for it on one of his work parties.

A year passed. Work on the mountain continued, and then the rainy season

returned. Not long after, burials on the plain increased sharply. Scores of bodies were

brought across the sea and laid to rest, usually in large groups. Nagash noted that the

corpses were men of fighting age, and all of them had been slain by sword, spear or

arrow. The barbarian tribes were at war again, though against whom Nagash did not

know. One night, Nagash saw an orange glow on the horizon to the north-west, and

realised that one of the larger hilltop villages was on fire.

Another wave of burials occurred, twice as large as the ones before. The war

continued unabated, Nagash reckoned—and the barbarians were losing badly. Their

loss was his gain, he reasoned. And then something unexpected happened.

One night, in the midst of another spate of burials, a small group of men made

their way across the barrow plain in the direction of the mountain. They were

dragging a large sledge behind them, bearing a large, cylindrical object wrapped in

ragged sheets of muslin.

The men hauled the sledge over the muddy ground, until they reached the eastern

edge of the plain. There, virtually in the shadow of the mountain, they took up tools

from the sledge and went to work digging a deep hole. When one of the men judged

the hole deep enough, he gestured for his companions to proceed, then he knelt

before the hole and bowed his head, spreading his arms as though in supplication, or

in prayer.

The rest of the men returned to the sledge and pulled away the muslin sheets.

Then they took their places to either side of the cylinder and lifted it from its cradle.

Struggling under the weight of the object, they inched towards the hole. Finally, after

long minutes of effort, they let the end of the cylinder drop into the cavity and pushed

the object upright. The kneeling man rose to his feet, his hands turning upwards in a

gesture of triumph, as the men shovelled loose earth into the hole and stabilised the

object. Once they were satisfied that the object was secure, the men gathered their

tools and began the long trek back to the shore.

Nagash had observed this through the eyes of several of his servants, who stood

watch over the plain to mark the arrivals of the burial parties. The object left at the

foot of the mountain intrigued him. When the men had disappeared to the west, he

sent one of the undead sentinels to inspect it.

What the sentinel found was a totem-statue, similar to those found in the

barbarian villages. But where the other statues were four-sided and depicted two

pairs of men and women, this statue was carved to represent one figure only.

The workmanship was crude. Nagash, looking through his servants’ eyes, stared

at the statue for some time, until he saw the suggestion of a cloak about the figure’s

shoulders and realised that the skeletal monster carved into the wood was meant to be

him!

Nagash didn’t know what to make of the statue. Was it some pathetic attempt at

an abjuration, meant to forbid him from trespassing upon the plain, or was it simply a

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crude attempt at defiance on the part of the barbarians? At length, he decided to wait

and see if the men visited the statue again.

And visit they did, just a few nights later, when the next wave of burials landed

upon the shore. Nagash watched the men approach the statue, and this time he noted

that the men were young and clad in robes—and, most importantly, bore none of the

physical deformities that marked the rest of the villagers. They were members of the

old order that Nagash had thought extinct!

To his amazement, the men surrounded the statue and laid plates heaped with

offerings at its feet. They knelt in supplication and offered up prayers, then anointed

the statue with oils. The whole ritual took almost an hour, and then the men hurriedly

withdrew.

Nagash continued to study the statue throughout the night, trying to puzzle out

the meaning of the ritual offerings and prayers. Were they actually offering up

adulation and worship, or were the offerings more of a bribe to keep him from

interfering in their business? The fact that the ritual coincided with another round of

mass burials wasn’t lost on him, but the timing didn’t argue one way or the other.

He continued to watch and wait, though now he made sure that a small group of

warriors were always kept close by the statue each night. The men returned each

night that a burial took place, laying out more offerings and taking care of the great

statue. On the fifth visitation, Nagash’s patience was rewarded.

As the men gathered about the statue and laid out their offerings, another group

of men and women approached from the north, where the latest round of burials were

taking place. They accosted the supplicants, brandishing cudgels and shouting

threats. The leader of the supplicants—a young man whose mannerisms seemed

strangely familiar to Nagash—seemed to try reasoning with the second group, but his

arguments fell on deaf ears. There were more shouted threats, and finally the

supplicants chose to depart. The second group pursued them for a while, waving their

clubs in the air, then, satisfied, they returned to the sombre ceremonies to the north.

The confrontation suggested a great many things to Nagash. The supplicants

considered Nagash a god, and sought to worship him, but their newfound devotion

wasn’t popular with the rest of their kind. What was it they hoped to accomplish?

Had the confrontation convinced them to abandon their heresy? The questions only

served to pique his interest further.

Another week passed before the next spate of burials occurred. Again, the supplicants

journeyed across the plain to kneel before the statue. This time, Nagash was ready for

them.

The supplicants had no sooner begun their rite when a much larger group of

villagers came charging out of the darkness, brandishing cudgels and knives and

shouting threats at the kneeling men. The young leader of the supplicants rose to his

feet and approached the villagers, but it was clear to Nagash that the mob wouldn’t

be interested in talking this time. They were out for blood.

Nagash issued a series of commands to the warriors that lay in wait just a short

distance from the totem statue. They rose silently from their places of concealment

and crept towards the unsuspecting barbarians.

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The leader of the supplicants started to speak, but a burly villager stepped from

the crowd and lashed out with his cudgel, striking the young man in the head and

knocking him to the ground. The attack galvanised the rest of the mob; they rushed

forward, shouting furiously, and fell upon the other worshippers. The holy men fell to

the ground, covering their heads with their arms to ward off the avalanche of blows.

No one saw the undead warriors until it was too late. Half a dozen skeletons

appeared out of the darkness, stabbing at the villagers with spears or slashing with

tarnished bronze blades. Shouts of anger turned to screams of fear and pain as the

mob was cut apart by the remorseless skeletons. The survivors reeled away from the

attackers and fled into the darkness, abandoning their wounded compatriots to their

fate.

The leader of the mob lingered a moment too long, pausing to deliver a final,

vicious kick to the leader of the supplicants before trying to make good his escape.

As he turned and prepared to run, he found himself face-to-face with a leering

skeleton; the flat of the undead warrior’s blade crashed into the side of his head,

knocking him senseless.

The fight was over in seconds. Nagash’s warriors surveyed the scene of carnage

for a moment, and then a pair of the skeletons seized the leader of the mob by the

shoulders and dragged him away. Two more of the warriors went to the leader of the

supplicants, who was trying to force his battered body to stand upright. They seized

him by the arms and dragged him away as well.

The remaining two skeletons hefted their weapons and slew the wounded

villagers one by one. As the supplicants watched in horrified wonder, their

oppressors died screaming—then, with the last of their lifeblood still flowing from

their wounds, the corpses rose to their feet and followed their killers into the night.

A single tower reared up from the ugly sprawl of buildings, mine works and

fortifications that now girdled the mountain’s southern flank. Five storeys tall, square

and built from stone, it would have been thought crude and artless in the civilized

cities of Nehekhara, but it dominated the surrounding countryside and provided good

fields of view over the southern barrow fields and the mountains to the south-east. It

was no palace, but it allowed Nagash to oversee the labours on the mountainside and

continue his necromantic studies in solitude until such time as a proper sanctum

could be built.

The top storey of the tower was a single, window-less chamber, lit only by the

pulsing green glow of a huge chunk of burning stone that rested on a crude metal

tripod at the left of Nagash’s new throne. The high-backed chair had been wrought of

wood and bronze, shaped to resemble the Throne of Settra that had once rested in

Khemri. The necromancer sat back in the tall chair, his hands steepled thoughtfully,

as his warriors dragged the two barbarians into his presence.

The former leader of the village mob struggled in the skeletons’ grip, spitting

curses and roaring oaths in his bestial tongue. Blood flowed freely from a cut at his

temple, but otherwise he appeared none the worse for his experience. The young

supplicant, on the other hand, had been beaten within an inch of his life. He hung

almost limply from the bony arms of the warriors. It took all of his strength to hold

his head upright and look about in dull wonder at the shadowy interior of the tower.

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With a mental command Nagash directed his warriors to drag the mob leader into

the centre of a ritual circle he’d prepared some time before. They forced the man to

his knees. When he tried to rise, one of the skeletons dashed him to the floor with

another blow to the head.

The supplicant was deposited on the floor a short distance from the circle, at the

very edge of the light shed by the chunk of burning stone. His wide-eyed stare fell

upon Nagash, and immediately the young man bent forward, prostrating himself

before the throne. The gesture triggered a memory: this was the young acolyte he’d

seen outside the barrow during the ambush. Nagash smiled thinly. His instincts had

been correct. This one could prove useful.

Nagash rose slowly from the throne. He was clad in robes that had been looted

from the temple fortress, which concealed much of the changes that time and the

abn-i-khat had wrought upon his body. It was only his hands and his face that hinted

at the horrors concealed beneath the rough-spun cloth. His flesh, once paper-thin, had

begun to liquefy under the heat emanating from his bones, giving it a sickly, gelid

appearance. Muscles and tendons glistened in the open air where the flesh and skin

had been worn away, and only the barest shreds of flesh remained at cheek and brow

to lend the hint of life to Nagash’s skeletal face.

He approached the leader of the villagers, whose eyes widened in pure terror. The

barbarian screamed curses at the necromancer, his voice rising in pitch as his sanity

neared breaking point. When Nagash entered the ritual circle, the barbarian surged to

his feet, but before he could take a single step, the necromancer seized him by the

throat.

Wide-eyed, gasping, the barbarian began to thrash and kick. Nagash spoke a

single word, and the villager’s muscles contracted savagely, putting so much stress

on his limbs that the long bones of his arms and legs broke like dry twigs. His curses

became shrieks of agony, growing ever more shrill and frenzied as the necromancer

reached up with his left hand and began methodically pulling away handfuls of the

barbarian’s black hair. When the man’s scalp was bald and bleeding, Nagash pulled a

knife from his belt and began carving runes into the barbarian’s skin.

The preparations took almost half an hour. When it was complete, Nagash

dropped the villager in a heap at the centre of the circle and then withdrew. Once

outside the circle, the necromancer raised his arms and began to chant. At once, the

sigils etched into the circle flared into life, and the spell began to unravel the

barbarian’s mind and soul.

It was a variation on the ritual of reaping that he’d perfected in Khemri, and then

reconstructed from memory in the years he’d spent wandering the wasteland. The

difference between this version and the original was the way it separated the

constituent elements of a victim’s spirit. As he tore the villager’s soul from his body,

Nagash picked the elements he wished and discarded the rest, like a lord picking at a

resplendent feast.

The barbarian’s memories meant nothing to him; he cast those aside with a

contemptuous flick of his wrist. Nagash learned that the man was an apprentice

woodworker by tasting the flavour of his skill with chisel and saw. Those, too, he

cast aside.

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There! Nagash tasted the rough flavour of language in the stew of the man’s

thoughts. He drew that out and consumed it. Crude, guttural words came and went in

his mind, etched one by one into his memory.

Finally, the necromancer consumed the barbarian’s life essence. He tasted its

potency and compared it to the power of the burning stone. Nagash’s lip curled in

distaste.

“Disappointing,” he sneered, as the shrivelled corpse collapsed onto the floor.

With a wave of his hand, he sent a flow of power back into the sack of bones and sent

it shambling off to the mines.

Nagash turned to the supplicant, who had watched the entire ritual in terrified

silence. The necromancer searched his memory for the right words.

“Who are you?”

The supplicant pressed his forehead to the floor. “Ha… Hathurk, mighty one,” he

stammered.

“Hathurk,” Nagash echoed. “Who are you to worship me? You served the temple

once.”

The necromancer expected the former acolyte to equivocate, but instead, Hathurk

nodded matter-of-factly. “I served the Keepers of the Mountain,” he admitted readily.

“In time, I would have become a Keeper myself. But their time is finished. The

words of the Ancients have been fulfilled.”

“How so?”

Hathurk dared to glance up from the floor. “The Ancients told us that one day the

mountain would wake,” he explained. “The god would come forth. And now you are

here.”

Interesting, Nagash thought. “Where are the words of the Ancients…” he paused,

realising that the barbarians had no words for the act of writing. “How were the

words of the Ancients preserved?”

“They were passed down, generation to generation, from Keeper to acolyte.”

Nagash nodded thoughtfully. “And do the village hetmen know these tales?”

Hathurk shook his head. “They were not worthy, mighty one. They are ignorant,

superstitious folk.”

“Indeed,” Nagash said.

Sarcasm was lost on the likes of Hathurk. The supplicant nodded quickly. “They

know of you, though,” he continued. “We have travelled between the villages,

spreading the word of your coming. We told the hetmen that it was you who came for

the Keepers, because the High Keeper refused to accept that the words of the

Ancients had been fulfilled.”

“Do they believe?” Nagash asked.

The supplicant shook his head. “Not yet, mighty one. They are stubborn and set

in their ways. But,” he added quickly, “the war season has begun, and the tribes of

the Forsaken have come down from the northlands with fire and sword. Without the

Keepers to aid them, the village warbands have suffered many defeats. Already, two

villages have been destroyed, their women and children slaughtered in their homes.

The other hetmen are talking openly of an alliance against the Forsaken, but even that

will not be enough. They will need the power of the mountain if they are to prevail.”

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Nagash considered this. More vassals were needed to labour in the mines and

seek out sources of stone and timber for constructing the fortress. Empires grew on a

steady diet of conquest.

The Undying King crossed the sanctum and settled once more upon his throne.

His eyes guttered thoughtfully.

“Tell me more,” he said.

118

THIRTEEN

Blood for Blood

Lahmia, the City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Khsar the Faceless

(-1598 Imperial Reckoning)

“The queen! The queen!” Aiyah wailed in horror. “Blessed gods, what have we

done?”

Arkhan reeled backwards, away from the bed and Neferata’s withered corpse.

The sight of her left him speechless. He shook his head, stunned at the enormity of

what had happened.

“I don’t understand,” he finally managed to say. “There were no mistakes. The

ritual should have worked. It should have worked!”

The immortal rubbed his face with a bloodstained hand. Belatedly, he realised

that his arm was still bleeding. With an effort, he focussed his will and sealed the

wound shut. He felt weak and stiff. His limbs were cold. He’d given her almost every

ounce of vigour he possessed. All for nothing, he thought bitterly. She looks no better

than Neferem now.

Arkhan forced himself to close his eyes. He took a deep breath and forced the

image of the dead queen from his mind. Almost at once, his sense of regret

dissipated, like the heat of the desert at sunset, leaving his mind sharper and clearer

than it had been in years. Neferata was gone, and the glamour she’d cast on him had

faded along with her. Arkhan was both surprised and ashamed at how keenly he felt

the loss. Bitterness and hatred welled up to fill the void it had left behind.

He was himself again. And the way ahead was clear.

The immortal rose slowly to his feet and went to collect his robes. Aiyah was

curled into a ball at the foot of the queen’s bed, sobbing despondently.

“That’s enough,” he said as he dressed. “She’s gone. All the wailing in the world

won’t bring her back.”

By the time he had tied on his sword belt, the handmaiden had mastered herself.

She sat up, rubbing at the tracks of kohl that stained her damp cheeks. “What would

you have me do?” she asked.

Arkhan grabbed a carry-bag from the floor beside Neferata’s writing desk and

began stuffing Nagash’s books inside. “That’s your concern now,” he said. “If I were

you, I’d gather up some changes of clothing and as many of the queen’s trinkets as I

could carry, and then steal a fast horse from the royal stable. Any number of

merchant caravans would be happy to let you ride along with them, for the proper

fee. I wouldn’t advise riding the trade road alone.”

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The handmaiden stared bemusedly at him. “Leave the city?” she said dully.

“Where would I go?”

“Anywhere but here, you little fool,” he snarled, slinging the bulging bag over his

shoulder. “Unless you’re keen to drink from a poisoned cup and follow your queen

into darkness.”

Aiyah watched him as he headed for the chamber door, her expression full of

dread. “Where are you going?” she asked.

“To see the king,” Arkhan growled. “There’s something I’ve been wanting to

give him for a very long time.”

The halls of the palace were quiet in the small hours before dawn. Arkhan slipped

from one shadow to the next, his pale face hidden by a desert scarf and his hands

concealed by dark leather gloves. He disliked the notion of creeping through the

palace like a rat, but he suspected that if Lamashizzar knew he was coming, the

feckless king would go into hiding, and the immortal did not have time to waste

hunting for him across the sprawling royal compound. He meant to settle accounts

with the king and be well away from the city before daybreak. There were secluded

spots on the Golden Plain where he could lie up until nightfall and contemplate his

next move.

Arkhan didn’t plan on going far. He’d already come to that conclusion. With the

queen dead and the king soon to follow, there would be chaos and confusion among

the noble houses as the most prominent lords vied to rule the city as crown regent

until Lamashizzar’s young son reached adulthood. The process could last for weeks,

even months—more than enough time for him to knit the plains outlaws together into

something resembling an army. With a little luck, the city nobles would still be

scheming against one another on the night his cutthroats came scrambling over the

city walls.

The streets of Lahmia would run with rivers of blood. Her villas would go up in

flame, as would the ships filling her harbour. The sack of the city would take days,

and when he was done, not one stone would be left standing atop another. Then

Arkhan would lead his howling mob eastward, and woe betide anyone or anything

caught in their path. The petty cares of mortal men filled him with contempt; he

wanted nothing more than to scourge mankind for its callowness and stupidity, to

bury all of Nehekhara under a pall of suffering and despair. By the time he was done,

the survivors would look back on the reign of Nagash with envy.

The immortal moved as swiftly as he dared, encountering few servants and even

fewer palace guards as the crossed the royal compound towards the king’s quarters.

The royal apartments were a collection of luxurious chambers for the ruler, his

children and his favoured concubines, connected by a sprawling network of common

rooms, libraries, small shrines and meditative gardens. It occupied the entire north-

west corner of the palace compound, with views looking out across the city proper

and the wide, blue sea. What little he knew of it came from Neferata, and she’d only

lived there during her early childhood. He had no idea where the king’s bedchamber

lay, but he’d spent enough time in the royal palace at Khemri to know how such

places operated. When in doubt, follow the servants, he thought.

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Once past the great central palace garden and the royal audience chamber,

Arkhan passed through the palace’s smaller privy chambers, where the king met with

his councillors to conduct the day-to-day business of the city. From there he came

upon a series of increasingly well-appointed passageways. He began to encounter

more and more sleepy-eyed servants, hurrying about on one errand or another in

anticipation of the coming day. Before long, Arkhan came to a tall, wide doorway,

flanked by basalt statues of Asaph and Ptra. Hieroglyphs carved into the stone lintel

proclaimed, Here dwell the most favoured of the gods, the mortal seed of Asaph the

Beautiful and great Ptra in His Glory. With a wolfish smile, the immortal drew his

iron sword and crept across the threshold.

Beyond the great doorway was a small, silent antechamber, with passageways

leading off in three directions. Arkhan continued through the doorway on the

opposite side of the room, and soon found himself in a small, shadow-filled garden.

Narrow paths wound among the ornamental trees and clusters of ferns. Somewhere a

fountain chuckled to itself, and captive songbirds chirped sleepily in the branches.

Was this the central garden for the royal apartments, or just one of several? Arkhan’s

confidence began to ebb. He couldn’t afford the time to search every path and

passageway until he found the king. The first hints of false dawn were already paling

the sky overhead.

Suddenly, he caught the sound of soft voices approaching him from behind.

Arkhan slipped off the path as quietly as he could and hid behind the bole of a palm

tree. Moments later, a pair of bare-chested slaves walked past, murmuring to each

other in quiet tones. One carried a polished bronze bowl filled with steaming water,

while another bore clean cotton cloths and a small, bronze shaving knife.

The immortal was surprised. He had no idea that Lamashizzar had become such

an early riser. Arkhan waited until the men had disappeared from sight before easing

himself back onto the path and following along in their wake.

It took several minutes to reach the far side of the garden. The paths wound a

meandering course through the lush foliage, creating the illusion that the garden was

much larger and more secluded than it actually was, and effectively concealed the

routes into and out of the open-air space. It had been so cunningly designed that

Arkhan hadn’t realised he’d reached the opposite edge until he rounded another sharp

turn in the path and came upon another tall, imposing doorway, flanked by a pair of

royal guards.

Arkhan froze, his sword held low at his side. The two men were clad in lacquered

iron armour and polished skullcaps, and were armed with heavy, straight swords like

the one he carried. Neither man saw him at first; his dark clothing blended well with

the shadows, and it was clear that their senses were dulled from a long, quiet watch.

They were less than fifteen paces away. Arkhan gauged the distance carefully,

and drew upon what little remained of the queen’s elixir. Strength swelled in his

limbs, and he dashed forward, almost too quickly for the eye to follow. His blade

whickered through the air. The first man barely had time to register the movement

before his head toppled from his shoulders. Blood sprayed across the second man;

Arkhan saw his eyes widen in shock, stunned by the speed and ferocity of the attack.

The hesitation was fatal.

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Arkhan paused just long enough to drag the two bodies beneath a nearby stand of

drooping ferns, then crept carefully through the doorway into the king’s personal

apartments. Beyond was another dark antechamber, thick with a fog of cloying

incense. He glimpsed low divans and wooden tables arranged together in tight

clusters around the room. Empty wine jars and bronze trays littered with scraps of

food covered most of the tables.

On the opposite side of the antechamber was another open doorway, filled with

the shifting orange glow of lit braziers. Arkhan paused at the threshold and glimpsed

what appeared to be another long rectangular chamber. There was a set of tall blue-

painted doors on the far side of the room, and the doorway was carved with intricate

hieroglyphs of protection, wealth and good fortune. The king’s bedchamber had to lie

on the other side of those doors, he reckoned. Arkhan steeled himself, acutely aware

of how little vigour remained to him. He would have to make this quick. The thought

galled him, but better swift vengeance than none at all. Tightening his grip on his

bloodstained sword, he raced for the doors.

The guards rushed him the moment he stepped across the threshold.

There were six of them, waiting with swords drawn, three to either side of the

doorway. Doubtless one of them had heard something as he’d despatched the guards

at the edge of the garden, and they’d lain in wait for him. Now they leapt at him with

triumphant shouts, moving quickly to cut him off from the king’s bedchamber.

Arkhan had little time to curse his own carelessness, and no choice but to draw

upon the elixir once more. The guardsmen were swift and skilled, but lacked

experience; in their haste they got in one another’s way, fouling the sweep of their

own swords. The immortal gave them a bestial snarl and struck first, ducking low and

spinning on his heel to strike at the man just behind and to his right. The heavy iron

blade slashed across the guard’s thigh, through the narrow gap between the edge of

his armoured skirt and the top of his iron greaves. The sword sliced through flesh and

muscle and left him thrashing on the floor in a spreading pool of blood.

The guardsman to Arkhan’s immediate left chopped downwards with his sword.

He parried the blow swiftly and drove the man back with a feint to his throat. The

warriors shouted curses at him and at one another. A blade scored across his back,

and another jabbed into his side, just above his hip. Arkhan scarcely felt the blows.

He whirled left and slashed upwards, catching another guardsman’s sword wrist and

severing his hand. The man reeled backwards with a scream and slipped in the dark

blood pouring from the other guard’s leg.

Two down, but now the other guards had more room to manoeuvre. Arkhan

sidestepped a fearsome downward slash, and then had to whirl out of the way of a

thrust angling in from his far left. Then a powerful blow on his back cut deep into his

shoulder blade and nearly sent him sprawling. This time he felt the sharp pain of

broken bone, but he sealed the wound with a thought and kept fighting, lunging

upwards and catching a guard in the throat with the point of his sword.

The remaining guards circled around him, harrying him with a flurry of strikes

that were meant to test his defences and keep him off-balance. He kept moving,

turning in place and batting the attacks aside, waiting for his moment. A warrior

lunged at him from the right, thrusting at his sword arm. He turned on his heel,

sweeping the point aside with his own blade and causing the man to stumble slightly

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forwards. The guard saw his peril and moved swiftly to regain his balance, but it was

already too late. Arkhan’s blade flashed, and the guard’s head bounced across the

floor.

The two surviving guards struck at once, hitting him from behind. One sword bit

deeply into his right hip, its edge grating against bone, while the other stabbed into

his back, just below his left shoulder blade. Arkhan staggered, tasting blood in his

mouth. He turned, almost tearing the sword from the grip of the man who’d stabbed

him, and slashed his blade across the man’s face. The guard fell with a scream,

clutching at his ruined eyes. His sword was still trapped in Arkhan’s back, lodged

between his ribs.

With a savage jerk, the last guard tore his blade free from Arkhan’s hip. Seeing

his foe gravely wounded, the guard rained a storm of ringing blows down upon the

immortal’s guard. Sparks flew as the iron blades clashed, and the immortal’s counter-

blows began to slacken. The guard cut him three times in swift succession, once

above the right elbow, once in the left thigh, and once across the chest. Sensing

triumph, the warrior redoubled his attacks, aiming a lightning-fast blow at Arkhan’s

neck that the immortal barely turned aside. The block left his torso unprotected, and

the guard leapt forward with a shout, thrusting his sword straight at Arkhan’s heart.

But the blow never struck home. Arkhan had given him the opening to draw him

in, then spun on his heel and let the guard’s sword go past him. His own blade

smashed into the side of the man’s head, shattering his iron skullcap and driving

shards of bone into his brain. The warrior was dead before his body hit the floor.

Arkhan staggered, nearly toppling as well. The battle had lasted only a few

seconds, but no doubt it had woken everyone in earshot. The alarm would be

spreading through the palace even now. He groped at his back, fumbling for the

sword that jutted from his ribs. It took several more agonising seconds to pull it free,

and then a moment more to focus his will and use just enough power to seal the

wound. He had very little remaining now. If he used much more he might not have

enough strength left to escape.

It would be enough, he thought, gritting his ruined teeth. It would have to be

enough.

Arkhan lurched forward, gathering speed, and shoved open the doors to the

king’s bedchamber.

The room was large, much more so than the queen’s, and dominated by a wide

bed piled with silken pillows. Two braziers along the walls to the left and right had

been recently stoked to life, revealing rich, painted carvings etched into the sandstone

that depicted the great journey of the Nehekharan people from the southern jungles

millennia ago. Tall, basalt statues of Ptra and Asaph stood watch over the royal bed,

their stone faces uncharacteristically smiling and beneficent. More padded divans and

low tables were clustered around the edges of the room, along with a little-used

writing table near the tall windows on the room’s opposite side. Gauzy window

hangings shifted lazily in the breeze blowing in from the sea.

The two body servants cowered at the foot of the bed, their eyes wide with terror.

The upended bowl and the bronze knife gleamed at their feet. Arkhan ignored them,

searching the room for the king. Just then, the wind shifted, drawing back the

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window hangings, and he caught sight of a silhouette between two of the windows.

The figure moved suddenly, raising his right arm.

Arkhan was faster. His left hand shot up, fingers outstretched, and he spoke a

single word. The last vestiges of his power flowed through his fingertips, and the

silhouette stiffened.

A slow, cruel smile crossed the immortal’s face. “Did you imagine I’d

forgotten?” he told the king. “Oh, no. That little trick won’t work a second time.”

He forced his stiff limbs to move, making his way haltingly across the chamber.

When he passed the great bed, the two servants bolted from the room. He could hear

their hysterical shouts receding in the direction of the garden. As he drew nearer to

the windows he could see the king clearly now. Lamashizzar was clad in a silken

sleeping robe, stained here and there with splashes of wine. The strain of the last

week had taken a toll upon him: his face was gaunt and sallow, and his eyes were

sunken deeply in their sockets. Arkhan saw that the king’s lips were stained from the

steady use of lotus root. How long had Lamashizzar kept himself here, surrounded by

guards, waiting for word that Neferata had died?

The short dragon-stave was gripped in the king’s outstretched hand. A faint wisp

of smoke rose from the wick held in his left hand. The little red coal had burned very

close to his fingers, but the king could not let it go. He stared at Arkhan, his

expression transfixed, as a bird watches the dreadful approach of the cobra.

Arkhan stared deep into the king’s eyes, savouring the terror he saw there. “As

you can see, I’ve learned a few tricks of my own,” he said. “It took some time to

perfect the technique, but I knew I’d need it when this day finally came. Thanks to

you, I had plenty of time to practice.”

Never taking his eyes from the king, Arkhan set his sword carefully upon the

floor. He straightened, his ghastly smile widening. “There’s something I’ve been

wanting to share with you for a very long time,” he said. “You know, it was very

clever of you, shooting me in the heart with that damned stave of yours. When the

bullet pierced, I honestly thought you’d killed me. Everything went black, but then I

realised that I could still hear and feel everything around me. How I screamed then.

How I raged. After a while, I even begged. I called upon gods I’d forsaken centuries

ago, praying for the mercy of death. Naturally, it never came. It was the worst torture

I’d ever felt, and if you knew anything about my past, you’d know just exactly how

profound that statement is.”

Arkhan reached up and carefully took hold of the dragon-stave. One by one, he

plucked the king’s stiff fingers from the haft of the weapon. “Do you know what

sustained me in that darkness? The only thing that allowed me to keep what little

sanity I had left was the slim hope that one day, I’d visit the same awful fate upon

you.”

He took the weapon carefully from the king’s hand. “It was worth it, teaching you

the secrets of the Undying King’s elixir. Without it, my vengeance would not have

been possible. Now, when the bullet strikes your heart, you’ll know the same

smothering darkness, the same helplessness. The same despair.”

The immortal pressed the gaping muzzle of the dragon to Lamashizzar’s chest. A

faint tremor shook the king’s body. His eyes widened a tiny, terrified fraction. It

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would have taken a prodigious, desperate exertion of will to manage even so small a

movement.

Arkhan plucked the wick from the king’s left hand, and blew softly upon the end.

The tiny coal blazed to life.

“When your servants find you, they’ll think you’ve been slain, of course,” the

immortal continued. “Doubtless, they’ll summon the mortuary priests, who will bear

your body to the House of Everlasting Life and prepare you for the ages to come. If

you’re lucky, you’ll die when they remove your heart and seal it in a canopic jar. If

not… you’ll have a very long time to regret you ever dreamt of crossing me.”

Arkhan touched the wick to the stave’s touch-hole. “The queen is dead,” he said

to Lamashizzar, “but at least she’s free. I hope you rot in darkness until the end of

time.”

The weapon discharged with a flash and a muffled thump. The impact knocked

the king from his feet.

He hit the wall and slid to the floor, his body going limp. Arkhan knelt, staring

into the king’s wide eyes, and then reached up with his fingertips to slowly push

them shut.

Arkhan studied his handiwork a moment more, then rose and tossed the smoking

weapon aside. The sky beyond the windows was paling. He was nearly out of time.

Snatching up his sword, he made his way across the bedchamber. His mind was

already racing ahead, planning his route to the royal stables, when he heard a loud

commotion in the chamber beyond.

Arkhan reached the doorway and saw a score of royal guardsmen dashing into the

chamber from the direction of the garden, led by the king’s champion. Abhorash’s

face was pale with fury. Two long iron swords gleamed in his scarred hands.

There would be no escape. Arkhan knew that at once. He was spent, and

Abhorash was too skilled an opponent to be taken in by his tricks. For a moment, the

immortal thought wistfully of the warhorse waiting in the stables, and the feel of the

desert wind on his face.

He had his revenge upon the king. That would have to be enough. Raising his

sword, Arkhan went to meet his fate.

The scope of the tragedy was immense, the carnage terrible to behold. The royal

apartments looked like a battlefield, heaped with the mangled remains of

Lamashizzar’s valiant guard. Though Abhorash, the king’s champion, had slain the

assassin in the end, it was a bitter victory for the people of Lahmia. Lamashizzar, the

great king, was dead.

It was a crushing blow for the royal household to bear. Functionaries and servants

alike were overwhelmed by the news, not realising that it was only a fraction of the

greater catastrophe. Only Ubaid, the grand vizier, and the few remaining servants of

the Women’s Palace knew that Neferata was dead as well.

For a handful of hours, just after dawn, Ubaid held the fate of the city—and by

extension, all of Nehekhara—in his hands. His first act was to order the king’s

champion to seal off the palace, allowing none to enter or leave upon pain of death.

One of the queen’s handmaidens was already missing, probably having fled in the

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small hours of the morning, but the rest of the household was kept from spreading the

word to the city at large. Orders were given not to inform the king’s children of his

death, at least not yet. That bought the palace precious hours to organise a proper

response.

After careful consideration, the king’s privy council was summoned. Lords

Ankhat and Ushoran answered the call at once, as well as the old scholar W’soran.

Lord Zuhras, the king’s young cousin, could not be found for hours, having gone

drinking with his friends in the Red Silk District the night before. It was mid-

morning by the time his servants brought him, pale and trembling, to the palace

gates.

While the council met in secret to discuss the shocking turn of events, the priests

of the mortuary cult were quietly summoned to begin their ministrations to the dead.

Rituals began at once for the great king, preparing his body for transfer to the House

of Everlasting Life. The protocols for the queen were different. By tradition, her body

was to be washed and clothed by her handmaidens, and at dusk they would bear her

upon their shoulders to the Hall of Regretful Sorrows. There she would be given into

the keeping of the priests, who would tend her while her body lay in state for the

proscribed three days and three nights. Only then, after the citizens had been given

time to pay their last respects, would Neferata join her husband in the House of

Everlasting Life.

Shortly before the appointed hour, just as the sun was setting far out to sea, Ubaid,

the grand vizier, appeared at the door to the queen’s bedchamber.

The last of the queen’s handmaidens—half a dozen women ranging in age from

youthful to elderly—were crouched on their knees around the perimeter of the

queen’s bed. The traditional preparation of the body had lasted for almost the entire

day, and most of the handmaidens were slumped and silent with exhaustion. The rest

rocked slowly on their heels, keening softly in mourning.

Ubaid stood in the doorway and carefully surveyed the room. He’d been told

what the handmaidens had found when they’d entered the room that morning, but all

traces of Arkhan’s desperate rituals had been scrupulously removed. The ritual circle

had been scrubbed away, along with the pools of dried blood that had stained the

floor around the bed. The bedclothes themselves had been stripped away, and now

lay in a tightly wrapped bundle in one corner of the room. The grand vizier made a

mental note to have them burned before the night was out.

Neferata lay on a bare white mattress, her body wrapped in a fine cotton robe that

had been marked with hieroglyphs of protection and anointed with sacred oils. Her

arms were folded across her chest, and her golden mask had been laid across her

face. Only the bare skin of her hands, marked with intricate bands of henna tattoos,

showed how cruelly wasted her body had been at the time of her death. The sight of it

sent a pang of guilt through the grand vizier, but he stifled it with an effort of will.

What was done was done. His responsibility now was to look to the future, and

ensure the continuation of the dynasty.

One of the older handmaidens caught sight of Ubaid and straightened. “You

shouldn’t be here!” she said. “It’s not proper!”

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“These are not proper times,” Ubaid replied. He approached the bed. As one, the

handmaidens scrambled to their feet, forming an implacable barrier between him and

their charge.

The grand vizier addressed the old handmaiden. “Forgive the intrusion,” he said,

inclining his head respectfully. “I meant no disrespect. This has been a hard day for

us all, and I wanted to make certain that the queen and her quarters had been seen to

properly.”

“We know our duty,” the handmaiden said, folding her arms indignantly. “Do

you imagine we would allow any slight to her honour?”

“No, naturally not,” Ubaid replied. “It must have been hard, preparing the queen

and… restoring her chamber to its proper appearance. Did you manage all of it

alone?”

“Just the six of us,” she replied grimly, though her head was held high. “We

couldn’t trust such an important task to anyone else.”

“Yes, of course,” the grand vizier said, inwardly breathing a sigh of relief. He

studied each of the handmaidens in turn, committing their faces to memory. All of

them would have to die. Hopefully they would all choose to follow the queen into the

afterlife, but if not, he would take matters into his own hands. Once they were gone,

there would be no one left who knew the real circumstances of Neferata’s death.

The cabal—what was left of it—could continue its work in secret. Ubaid had

little doubt that W’soran would be able to take up where the queen left off. Lord

Ankhat or Lord Ushoran would be named regent, and life in the city would go on

much as before. In fact, the grand vizier thought, the opportunities for power and

influence for the surviving cabal members would be even greater.

Ubaid took a step back and composed himself, then bowed solemnly to the

handmaidens. “It is time,” he said. “The priests and the privy council await in the

Hall of Regretful Sorrows. Let the people of Lahmia look upon Neferata one final

time, and weep.”

The handmaidens grew subdued at the grand vizier’s solemn words. The old one

sighed and gestured to her companions, and they turned their attention once more to

their beloved queen. Three of the women circled around to the far side of the bed,

then they all hung their heads and intoned a ceremonial prayer to Usirian, god of the

underworld. Ubaid listened to the low, mournful chant, as the sun sank low on the

horizon and the light fled from the room. The prayer came to an end, and the

chamber was plunged into a funereal gloom. As one, the handmaidens began their

keening wail again, and bent over the queen’s recumbent form.

Suddenly, there came a dreadful sound from the bed. It was a faint, wet, rippling

crackle, like the popping of joints grown stiff from disuse. Then the keening of the

handmaidens spiralled into a threnody of horrified screams.

Bone crunched and flesh parted with a sound like a knife through wet cloth. The

two handmaidens closest to the head of the bed were hurled backwards in a welter of

blood, their throats reduced to ragged pulp. Ubaid’s stunned mind barely had time to

register the horrifying sight before there was a blur of motion above the bed and the

sickening sound of crunching bone. Two more handmaidens collapsed, their skulls

crushed by swift and terrible blows.

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There was scarcely time to breathe, much less react. The last of the queen’s

devoted servants seemed to reel away from the bed in slow motion, their hands rising

to their faces as a lithe, bloodstained figure reached for them with gaunt, grasping

hands.

The grand vizier stared in shock as Neferata lashed out at one of the handmaidens

with an open hand. The blow crushed the woman’s skull like a melon and flung her

corpse against the far wall. The last of the handmaidens, younger and swifter than the

rest, turned and fled towards Ubaid, her hands outstretched and her face twisted into

a mask of absolute terror.

She managed less than a half-dozen steps before Neferata leapt upon her back

like a desert lioness. Fingers tipped with long, curving claws sank into the

handmaiden’s throat. The impact jarred the golden death mask from the queen’s face,

its cold, smooth perfection falling away to reveal the snarling face of a monster.

The queen’s face was horribly gaunt, her cheeks sunken and the flesh stretched

like parchment across the planes of her face. Her eyes were twin points of cold,

pitiless light, shining with animal hunger as she fell upon her prey. Neferata’s

shrivelled lips were drawn back in a feral snarl, her delicate jaw agape to reveal

prominent, leonine fangs. The handmaiden scarcely had time to scream before the

queen’s head plunged downward and those terrible fangs sank into the young

woman’s throat. Flesh tore and vertebrae popped, and the girl’s screams dwindled

into a choking rattle.

Ubaid pressed a trembling fist to his mouth, biting back a scream of his own. His

legs trembled, threatening to betray him completely as he backed towards the

bedchamber door. No matter how hard he tried, he could not take his eyes from the

handmaiden’s body. He dared not turn and run.

Each step lasted an eternity. The handmaiden’s body twitched as the queen

worried at her throat, gorging on the young woman’s blood. He had to be close to the

doorway now, Ubaid thought. Another few feet at most, and then—

Suddenly the grand vizier realised that the sounds of feasting had stopped.

Neferata’s head was raised, her mouth and chin soaked in bright, red blood. His own

veins turned to ice as she turned her unearthly gaze upon him.

“Ubaid,” she said, her voice liquid and menacing. The power of her stare left him

transfixed. His heart laboured painfully in his chest. “Loyal servant. Fall to your

knees before your queen.”

The grand vizier’s body obeyed. His knees cracked painfully on the stone as he

all but prostrated himself before Neferata’s terrifying visage.

The queen smiled, her teeth slick with gore. Her eyes glinted cruelly.

“Now tell me all that has transpired.”

The gathering in the Hall of Regretful Sorrows was silent and subdued. The only

sounds in the vault-like space were the soft sounds of the mortuary priests’ robes as

they went about their preparations to receive the body of the queen. Votive incense

had been lit, and the proper sigils of preservation had been laid across the marble

bier. Lord Abhorash stood at the foot of the cold slab of stone, his head bowed and

his hands resting upon the hilt of an ancient ceremonial sword. Lord Ushoran and

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Lord Ankhat stood apart from one another, each lost in their own thoughts as they

contemplated the difficult days ahead.

When news of the king’s death became widely known it would send ripples

throughout the entire land. It would require adroit manoeuvring to keep the other

priest kings in check. Behind the powerful nobles, W’soran stood with his hands

folded at his waist and his head bowed, as though in prayer. The old sholar had an

impatient expression on his face. He now had unfettered access to Nagash’s works,

and he was eager to begin his studies. Behind W’soran stood young Lord Zuhras,

who lingered close to the door as though he might bolt from the hall at any second.

The king’s cousin looked pale and stricken, though from grief or guilt, none could

truly say.

They had been waiting for more than an hour already, having gathered long

before sunset to view the body of the queen. It had already been decided that once

Neferata’s body had been laid in state, the word of her and Lamashizzar’s death

would be announced to the city. When the doors at the far end of the chamber swung

silently opened, a stir went through the small assembly as they braced for the

beginning of a new era.

None expected to see the queen emerge from the shadows of the Women’s

Palace, pale and terrible in her glory. Her beauty, once the gift of the goddess, now

took on a divine power all its own. They did not see the dark blood that stained her

white robes and painted her hands and face. Her eyes, dark and depthless as the sea,

banished thought and replaced it with a yearning that was deeper and more all

consuming than any they had known before.

Beside the queen came Ubaid, the grand vizier. He stepped past Neferata, head

bowed and shoulders hunched. He descended the shallow steps that led to the waiting

bier, and regarded the assembly with haunted, hollow eyes.

“Rejoice,” he said in a bleak voice. “Rejoice at the coming of the queen.”

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FOURTEEN

The Dark Feast

The Plain of Skulls, in the 76th year of Phakth the Just

(-1597 Imperial Reckoning)

The warriors of the Forsaken had pitched their tents upon the Plain of Skulls, a broad,

roughly triangular plain some three leagues north-east of the Sour Sea. As the only

navigable terrain between the coastline and the village-forts of the northlanders, the

plain was where the barbarians—or the Yaghur, as Hathurk knew them—and the

Forsaken had met to do battle for centuries. By ancient custom, the warbands of both

sides normally encamped along the northern and southern edges of the plain, but after

a series of recent victories of the Yaghur, the northlanders were no longer abiding by

the old rules. They had taken note of the absence of the Keepers, and believed that

the strength of the tribes had been broken. The destruction of the Yaghur was finally

at hand.

For the last month, Forsaken raiding parties had struck southward from the plain

at will, destroying a number of lowland settlements and storming a pair of hilltop

villages. They left behind heaps of charred skulls as offerings to their four-faced god,

Malakh, and sent scouts further westward to test the defences of the remaining

Yaghur villages. Unless they were driven off the plain, the Forsaken would decimate

the Yaghur to the point that the survivors would have little chance of surviving the

winter.

According to Hathurk, the war between the Forsaken and the Yaghur had nothing

to do with resources or territory; there was nothing the Yaghur possessed that the

Forsaken could possibly desire. Indeed, according to Hathurk, the Forsaken once

ruled the entire coast, down past the great mountain where a narrow strait led to the

great Crystal Sea. It was they who had witnessed the fall of the star-stone that had

pierced the side of the mountain, and who had built a great temple-city to venerate

their newfound god. They had used the power of the burning stone to dominate the

surrounding tribes and carve out a kingdom of their own. In those days, they were

known as the Yaghur, which in Hathurk’s tongue translated as “the faithful”.

But the kingdom’s glory days were short-lived. The noble houses, which ruled

from the temple-city on the southern flank of the mountain, turned paranoid and

cruel. Madness infected the ruling clans, and soon the kingdom was torn by civil war.

Clans fought over the god-stone buried beneath the mountain, and thousands died.

Finally, the noble houses of the Yaghur were overthrown when an exiled prince

returned from the northlands with the teachings of a new god: Malakh, the Dark One,

Master of the Fourfold Path. Malakh’s power gained the prince many followers, and

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in time they conquered the temple city and slaughtered the maddened Yaghur nobles

in a grand sacrifice to their god.

Afterwards, the prince sealed up the tunnels beneath the temple city and led his

people northwards, where they settled far from the mountain and its corrupting god.

But the insatiable desires of Malakh turned out to be just as bad—if not worse—than

the lunatic rule of the old Yaghur kings, and once again the people were torn by civil

war. Eventually, a schism occurred. Those who rejected Malakh broke away and

returned to the shores of the Sour Sea in a vain bid to reclaim the glories of the

kingdom they had lost.

The war had raged ever since. The Forsaken would not rest until the last Yaghur

had been offered up to their four-faced god. Malakh would be satisfied with nothing

less.

Watch-fires flickered across the Plain of Bones, picking out the curved flanks of

hide tents and tall, wooden trophy poles festooned with rotting human skulls. Here

and there, warriors dozed drunkenly around the fires. As far as they knew, there were

no Yaghur warbands for miles; had there been any, their scouts would have warned

them long before.

Those selfsame scouts now crept silently towards the Forsaken camp, their eyes

burning with necromantic fire. Nagash’s warriors had hunted down every one,

tracking them by their life energies across the dark, lifeless plain. Now the small,

skeletal army was less than fifty yards from the Forsaken camp, crawling inexorably

across the rocky ground with the tireless patience of the dead.

A hundred yards further south, Nagash and Hathurk waited with the Yaghur

hetmen. The barbarians had taken too long to unite against the northlanders. After

months of fighting, the hetmen could barely muster two hundred warriors against an

enemy force almost ten times that size. Most were armed with nothing more than

crude spears and clubs, and none wore anything resembling proper armour. Nagash

wasn’t surprised that the Yaghur had hardly ever won a pitched battle against the

Forsaken; indeed, it surprised him that they’d survived as long as they had. The

Keepers must have been hard-pressed indeed just to maintain an uneasy stalemate

against their foes.

The hetmen themselves were armed and armoured with bronze wargear that had

been brought from the northlands during the time of the schism. They nervously

fingered tarnished bronze swords or clutched at the hafts of bronze-tipped spears and

cast fearful glances at Nagash and his undead bodyguard. Hathurk had suggested to

the necromancer that bribery would be the best way to win over the hetmen, but

Nagash had opted for a more direct approach. When the village leaders had gathered

to formally seal their alliance, he had arrived unannounced during the evening feast,

riding upon a palanquin borne by the corpses of the High Keeper and his senior

subordinates. That served to get the village leaders’ attention with a minimum of

expense and effort. The rest would hinge on the outcome of the battle that was about

to unfold.

As before, Nagash sat upon the palanquin that had once belonged to the High

Keeper, which in turn rested upon the motionless shoulders of his servants. It gave

him a slightly better view of the battlefield. He could see his warriors crawling

forward steadily under the fading light of the moon; another few minutes and they

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would be at the edge of the watch fires. The necromancer stirred, turning his burning

gaze upon the hetmen.

“The time has come,” he said. “The hour of your victory is at hand. We will

slaughter the northmen and drive them from the plain, as I have promised.”

The hetmen shared sidelong glances. Finally, one of them stepped forward. He

was a large man for the Yaghur, with dark hair and a shelf-like brow. A third eye,

covered with a cataract-like green film, tracked lazily from his forehead. His name

was Aighul, and among the barbarians he was reckoned a mighty warrior. The

hetman threw out his chest and clutched at the haft of his bronze axe, but he could

not quite bring himself to meet Nagash’s burning eyes.

“What about the rest of your promise?” Aighul replied. “You said—”

“I said I would give you the secret of the northmen’s prowess,” Nagash almost

sneered, “and so I shall. After the battle is won.”

“And after you bow before great Nagash and accept him as the new god of the

mountain!” Hathurk added, in the steely tones of a true believer.

Nagash fought the urge to slay each and every one of them. Men such as they

weren’t even fit for the slave dock at Zandri. They were little better than animals,

unworthy of the attentions of a king. Even Hathurk’s credulous worship disgusted

him. And yet, for the moment, they were all he had.

“Go now,” he told the Yaghur. “My warriors are nearly ready.”

Aighul looked as though he was about to say something more, but at the end his

nerve deserted him. He and the other hetmen nodded curtly and fanned out into the

darkness to meet their warbands. Before long the Yaghur were on the move, loping

across the stony plain with admirable stealth. Nagash watched their progress

carefully. The barbarians moved much faster than his undead warriors, hence the

need to hold them back until his own forces were almost on top of the camp.

Hathurk and his disciples crowded around the palanquin, their expressions

earnest. “How may we be of help, master?” the young supplicant asked.

“By doing nothing and saying less,” the necromancer hissed. “I must

concentrate.”

The Yaghur had almost overtaken his warriors. Nagash willed forth his

commands. As one, a mix of two hundred and fifty skeletons and rotting, shambling

zombies reared up against the moonlit sky and closed in on the northmen sleeping

around the watch fires.

Quick. Quiet. Nagash impressed his will upon his warriors. He’d learned long ago

that the undead did not need to be guided through each and every movement of a

given order; there were memories and reflexes that lingered in their rotting bodies,

though he could not say precisely how. All he needed to do was provide the impetus,

and the corpses would do the rest. Those that performed poorly made good sword-

fodder so that the rest could fulfil his wishes.

Long, angular shadows crept towards the north-men. Nagash watched swords rise

and fall; powerful hands clamped over mouths and tightened about throats. A few

northmen thrashed in the grip of the zombies, but never for more than a few

moments. Nagash smiled to himself, whispering an incantation into the night air.

Most of the slain northmen rose slowly to their feet.

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Now the fire, Nagash ordered.

Several of the skeletons turned towards the watch fires. They reached their hands

into the dying flames and drew out pieces of burning wood. One by one, they raised

their torches skyward, signalling the Yaghur.

Out on the plain, the barbarians saw the signal fires and broke into a ground-

eating charge. Then one of the Yaghur, overcome with bloodlust, threw back his head

a howled a savage war cry.

“Idiots!” Nagash snarled. More and more howls rent the night as the other

Yaghur gave into their rage and bayed for the blood of their foes. Already, shouts of

alarm were answering the cries from deeper within the camp. Attack! The

necromancer commanded. Kill! Burn! His lips moved, hissing out another

incantation.

The undead warriors surged forwards, moving with a sudden burst of speed and

agility. Northmen staggered from their tents, sluggish from sleep and the lingering

grip of wine. Most barely had time to gape in shock at their attackers before they

were slain. Torches were pressed against the oily hides, and within seconds half a

dozen tents were ablaze.

Howling like fiends, the Yaghur came charging into the camp. They swung their

clubs at anything that moved, adding to the pandemonium. At Nagash’s command,

the undead pressed further into the camp. Speed was critical, the necromancer knew.

The attackers had to stay ahead of the enemy’s ability to organise a proper defence,

or the defenders’ greater numbers would quickly tip the scales against them.

And yet, many of the Yaghur were milling about the edge of the camp, tearing

down tents and looting bodies! Nagash’s fingers clawed furrows down the arms of

his chair. Forward, he commanded the corpses carrying his palanquin. If the

barbarians were still there when he reached the edge of the camp he would slay them

where they stood!

More fires were spreading through the camp, but now came the sound of fighting

as well.

Nagash gazed through the eyes of his warriors, and saw that the Forsaken were

reacting quickly to the surprise attack. The northmen were huge, powerfully-built

warriors, far larger than their deformed southern kin and almost as large as the giant,

bronze-skinned fighting men of faraway Ka-Sabar. They wore leather kilts like the

Yaghur, studded with wide disks of bronze, and broad belts hung with polished skulls

and long chains of finger bones. Some of the warriors were bare-chested, their skin

marked with elaborate scar patterns that wound from their thick necks all the way to

their waists, while others wore heavy leather vests covered in layers of small, bronze

squares.

They showed no fear at the sight of Nagash’s warriors. Instead, they charged

headlong into their midst, swinging huge axes or long-bladed swords and screaming

the name of their strange god. Bones shattered; rotting bodies burst apart. The

Forsaken waded through their foes, heedless of peril. They fought on despite terrible

wounds, intent only on slaying as many enemies as they could before they were

brought down.

In the darkness and the confusion the northmen even attacked one another,

further adding to the chaos. Nagash knew that if the enemy’s confusion could be

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fanned like the flames already consuming the camp, the Forsaken would ultimately

defeat themselves.

Then the air over the centre of the enemy camp flickered with orange and red

light, and series of small thunderclaps shook the air. Nagash felt the aether tremble

with invisible energies, and knew that dozens of his warriors had been obliterated.

Hathurk had warned him that the Forsaken warlords were often accompanied by a

trio of witches, a custom that dated back to the earliest days of the Yaghur kingdom.

Their power, he saw, was considerable.

On the heels of the detonations came the baying of horns. Nagash spat out a

curse. The warlords were trying to rally their warriors and organise a counterattack.

The necromancer knew that he had to deal with the enemy leaders, and quickly, or

his meagre forces would be quickly overwhelmed.

The palanquin had nearly reached the perimeter of the camp. Snarling

impatiently, Nagash rose from his seat and leap to the ground. Around him, Forsaken

warriors were charging out of the darkness, their blades glinting hungrily in the

firelight. The Yaghur attacked them with guttural shouts, but the northmen hacked

the unarmoured warriors to pieces.

Snarling, Nagash swept his hand in a wide arc, and unleashed a fan of sizzling

green bolts that cut down three northmen who sought to bar his path. He charged

towards the centre of the camp, forcing his limbs to move at preternatural speed. The

tents weren’t laid out in neat lines, like a proper Nehekharan army camp, which

forced him to weave his way left and right past one shelter after another. Bodies were

strewn across the open ground between the tents, half-glimpsed in the firelight.

Another series of flashes lit the air above the camp, followed by a rumble of

thunder. His warriors were being decimated. Nagash called back the survivors,

drawing them in towards him in hopes that it would force the warlord and his witches

to follow. He found a tent blocking his path and raced around it, coming upon a

small, cleared area where eight or ten Yaghur were trading blows with six northmen.

Nagash let fly with a volley of glowing missiles, spearing friend and foe alike. The

survivors scattered in every direction, clearing the necromancer’s path.

Moments later, Nagash found himself at the edge of a much larger, open square.

Tall trophy poles marked the corners of the square, festooned with dozens of fresh

skulls. Within the square stood perhaps a score of Nagash’s warriors, engaged in a

fighting withdrawal with a large force of northmen. At the forefront of the enemy

warriors was a tall, powerfully muscled warrior, clad in bronze scale armour and

swinging a huge, bronze sword. Runes had been engraved along the length of the

heavy blade, and the air around the sword seemed to shimmer, like the haze over a

desert dune.

At Nagash’s arrival, the undead warriors halted their retreat and the Forsaken

crashed against them in a howling wave. Over the heads of the warriors, Nagash and

the enemy warlord locked eyes, and both recognised the other for who and what they

were. But the necromancer spared the warlord only a moment’s thought. He wasn’t

the greatest danger inside the enemy camp. Nagash reached out with his arcane

senses, seeking the source of the magical energies that had destroyed so many of his

warriors.

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There! He sensed swirling vortices of power on the far side of the square, well

behind the line of savage northmen. Here was the heart of the Forsaken host. He had

to seize it quickly and tear it apart.

Nagash reached out across the camp, summoning every one of his surviving

warriors. Then he uttered a powerful incantation, increasing the vigour of the

warriors in front of him threefold. They surged forwards, into the Forsaken line, their

weapons moving almost in a blur. The sudden push caught the northmen by surprise.

Several of them fell, slain outright or bleeding to death from mortal wounds. The

rest, including their warlord, found themselves on the defensive. It wouldn’t last for

long, Nagash knew, but it would give him the time he needed to deal with the

witches.

Or so he thought. Almost at once he sensed tendrils of magical energy pulling at

the forces contained within his invocation, seeking to dispel it. Angered, Nagash

threw out his hands and hissed out another spell. A trio of burning green globes

flashed from the space between his hands, arcing like arrows over the enemy line and

hurtling towards the witches. But before they could plunge onto their targets, the

spheres burst apart in thunderous detonations that buffeted the warriors struggling in

the square. The witches’ counter-magic was potent indeed.

Within moments, Nagash discovered that their offensive sorceries were deadly as

well. Tendrils of dark mist coalesced out of the night air around his warriors and

wrapped like ropes around their arms and legs. In seconds, they were thoroughly

enmeshed, limiting their movements and the strength of their blows. The Forsaken

warriors struck back with bloodthirsty shouts, breaking apart many skeletons in the

front rank.

Nagash ignored his warriors’ plight. He could not afford to become distracted in a

contest of spell and counter-spell with the Forsaken witches. So long as the mists

clung to his warriors, it meant one or more witches were occupied with maintaining

the spell. That was one or more witches who weren’t able to act directly against him.

He hurled another volley of magical bolts over the warriors’ heads. Again, the bolts

were dissipated before they could reach their mark, but only barely so.

By this time, more undead warriors were converging on both sides of the square.

Nagash launched another storm of sorcerous missiles, then unleashed his

reinforcements on the northmen’s flanks. The Forsaken found themselves beset on

three sides. More of the northmen fell, and despite the exhortations of their warlord,

the courage of the Forsaken began to waver.

Sensing his opportunity, Nagash hurled another volley of bolts—this time aimed

right at the faces of the Forsaken warriors. Several of his own warriors were caught

in the volley, but that mattered little to him. Men fell to either side of the warlord,

their bodies consumed in burst of green fire; the warlord himself was driven back,

but some kind of magical protection deflected the force of Nagash’s bolts away from

his body.

Through the gap created by the dead men, Nagash caught sight of the witches at

last. They stood in a loose semicircle, clutching tall, wooden staffs topped with skulls

and strings of ritual ornamentation. Nagash sent another stream of bolts hissing their

way, and the witches quickly brandished their staffs and chanted counter-spells. The

fierce energies burst about them, but once again failed to inflict any damage.

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But magic was not the only danger threatening the witches. No sooner had they

turned aside Nagash’s latest attack than a flight of spears plunged into their midst

from the northmen’s right flank. One of the weapons struck the right-most witch in

the chest. She collapsed, blood pouring from her mouth, and her sisters recoiled in

surprise and fear.

The cries of horror from the Forsaken witches was the last straw for the

northmen. The Forsaken warriors fell back in confusion, believing that they were on

the verge of being surrounded and destroyed. The warlord retreated with them,

roaring curses at his men, but no amount of shouting or threats was enough to get

them to stand their ground.

With a snarl, Nagash drove his warriors forward, pushing them in a rough

semicircle towards the warlord and the surviving witches. He let fly another volley of

bolts, and watched as one of the witches was wreathed in green flame. The energies

set her robes on fire and wracked her with terrible burns, but somehow she survived

the necromancer’s spell.

The Forsaken were in full retreat now, fleeing north through the square and into

the maze of burning tents beyond. The witches held their ground, and the warlord

retreated to stand among them. He turned, his eyes blazing with hatred, and Nagash

prepared to crush them beneath an avalanche of sorcerous might. Yet no sooner had

be begun the incantation than the last of the witches spat a savage string of syllables

and smote the ground with her staff. The shadows around the two witches seemed to

enfold them and their master like a cloak. It swallowed them up, and then simply

vanished, right before Nagash’s eyes.

What manner of sorcery was this? Nagash had never seen the like. Not even his

druchii tutors in Khemri had ever hinted at such a thing. What else did these

barbarians know that he didn’t?

Nagash ordered his warriors to pursue the retreating northmen. Without their

leaders, the rest would flee the destruction of their camp, possibly even going so far

as to return to their homelands beyond the north edge of the plain. It had been a

close-run thing, Nagash realised, much closer than he’d expected. His small force of

warriors had been almost destroyed, and there was no telling how many of the

Yaghur still survived. Had the battle in the square lasted another few minutes, the

outcome might have been very different.

The necromancer made his way across the square, stepping over crushed

skeletons and bleeding bodies. He made his way to the witch and stood over her,

studying the woman’s corpse carefully. She was dressed in fine, dark robes, and wore

a curved dagger at her hip. A necklace of bronze plates, engraved with strange runes,

rested against her collarbones.

Nagash knelt beside her and picked up her staff. The skull that capped the length

of wood wasn’t human. He studied it for a few moments in the flickering light before

he realised that it was the skull of a huge rat.

Shouts split the air behind him. Nagash turned to see Aighul and the rest of the

Yaghur hetmen come charging into the square. Most of them bore battle-wounds, and

their weapons dripped with blood. Hathurk accompanied them, his eyes blazing with

triumph.

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“They’re fleeing!” the supplicant cried. “The north-men are running for home! It

all happened as you said it would, master!”

Hardly, Nagash thought. He had underestimated the Forsaken. They were far

more powerful than he’d expected. They’d won because the enemy had been

overconfident and unprepared. Next time, things would be different.

And there would have to be a next time. The fighting would continue until the

Forsaken had been conquered. There was no choice now. The campaign could take

years, or even decades, but it would only end when one side or the other was broken.

And Nagash intended to make them subjects of his growing empire. They would

prove far more useful than the Yaghur.

Aighul approached the necromancer slowly, his expression a mix of fear and

wonder. He stopped a few yards from Nagash and sank to his knees.

“All hail the god of the mountain,” he said in a hollow voice. The hetman bent at

the waist, pressing his forehead to the blood-soaked ground. One by one, the other

hetmen followed suit.

Nagash rose to his feet. Their obeisance meant nothing to him. He recalled how

the barbarians had very nearly ruined the attack at the outset, and felt nothing but

contempt for them.

Hathurk approached the necromancer, an ecstatic look on his crude features. He

came right up to Nagash and bowed deeply. “The hetmen are ready to receive their

reward, master,” he said proudly.

Nagash suppressed an angry sneer. When he’d promised to give them the secret

of the northmen’s strength, he’d meant skills like metalworking and simple tactics.

But such things were lost on these animals. No doubt they expected some kind of

magical gift—or worse, a damned miracle!

A cruel idea came to him then. He looked at Hathurk and smiled, as a man might

smile at an obedient dog.

“They want to make the strength of the Forsaken their own? Very well. Tell them

this: the power of a man lies in his flesh and his bones. His heart is the fount of his

strength. The liver is the seat of his courage. If you would become like them, you

must consume them, down to the very bones.”

Hathurk’s eyes widened in shock. “You… you mean—”

“Tell them!” Nagash commanded. “I command it! Tell them that they must feast

upon the dead. It is the only way.”

The supplicant stared at Nagash. A look of dread crept across his face. After a

moment, the necromancer thought that Hathurk would refuse, but then the fool

bowed to him once again and turned to give the hetmen the first commandment of

their new god.

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FIFTEEN

The Shadow of the Hawk

Lahmia, the City of the Dawn, in the 76th year of Phakth the Just

(-1597 Imperial Reckoning)

The news of King Lamashizzar’s death took flight within hours of the announcement

by the palace. Swift messengers raced across the Golden Plain, carrying word to

Lybaras and Rasetra, and then past ruined Mahrak to the Valley of the Kings and the

cities of the west. Within months, royal processions from each of the seven cities

were underway, heading east to pay their respects to the dead king and to gauge the

new state of affairs in the City of the Dawn. It was rare for a queen to assume the

throne in the great cities of Nehekhara, and unheard of in Lahmia itself. Speculation

was rampant on how this would affect the complex web-work of trade deals that the

city had woven during Lamashizzar’s reign. The priest kings hastened to Lahmia as

quickly as they could manage, suspecting that those who reached the queen first

would stand the best chance of profiting under the new regime.

Queen Amunet of distant Numas was first to arrive, having journeyed by barge

up the River Vitae and deep into the mountains, where the great trade stations had

been built around the shores of the wide Vitae Tarn. From there the Numasi had off-

loaded two score of their fine steeds and rode swiftly through the twisting mountain

passages until they reached the northern edge of the Golden Plain.

King Teremun of Zandri followed the same path and arrived less than a month

later, leading a procession of northern slaves laden with gifts for the new queen. The

delegation from Zandri had been bedevilled by bandit raiders as they crossed the

plain, losing several of their number along the way before finding refuge within the

city.

Next to arrive was dour, white-haired King Naeem of Quatar, accompanied by a

solemn retinue of ash-daubed priests. Beset on all sides by the dispossessed

hierophants of Mahrak, the Quatari ruler had spent his entire life trying to restore

both his city and theirs, with minimal success. Had it not been for a quick-witted

captain at the city gates, the delegation might have been taken for beggars and turned

away.

Two weeks after the Quatari delegation came a much larger procession, led by

King Ahmun-hotep of Ka-Sabar and a score of nobles clad in the old armour of the

once-mighty Legion of Bronze. Though the city still lay mostly in ruin following the

dreadful siege a half-century before, Ahmun-hotep intended to show his peers that he

and his city remained a force to be reckoned with. His servants bore rich gifts for the

queen that likely had been stripped from the royal palace itself, and the blood

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staining the tips of his warriors’ spears told of the bandits who’d come to grief trying

to wrest those treasures from Ahmun-hotep’s grasp.

Curiously, the cities closest to Lahmia were the last to send delegations to honour

the queen. First came King Shepret of Rasetra, hard-faced and armed for war, at the

head of a procession of royal guardsmen armoured in glossy lizard-scale. Unlike the

other delegations, who bore treasures of gold and precious stones, the Rasetrans

brought with them the riches of the deep jungle: raw amber, polished thunder lizard

horn and jars of exotic herbs found nowhere else in all of the land.

As lavish as the gifts were, they were also a message for the queen: Rasetra had

regained much of its strength since the dark days after the war, driving back the

lizard tribes and reclaiming much of their lost territory. In short, the Rasetrans meant

to show the queen that Lahmia would be far better off treating them as friends and

allies rather than rivals.

Last of all, more than three months after the arrival of the Numasi delegation,

came the Priest King of Lybaras and his fierce warrior-queen. They arrived with even

less pomp than the dour Rasetrans, attended by a retinue of nobles and spearmen clad

in glossy plates of dark iron.

The sight was a shock to the Lahmian nobility. For years there had been rumours

that the Lybarans had been hard at work searching for local sources of iron in the

Brittle Peaks. Not only had they evidently succeeded, they had also divined the art of

working the dense metal, something that even the Lahmian royal artisans hadn’t been

able to achieve. It was also clear that the rumours of cooperation with Rasetra was

borne out in the martial skill of the warriors under the Lybaran king’s command.

Unlike Lahmia, the City of Scholars had dealt aggressively with the roving bands of

raiders that had plagued the trade road within their sphere of control, and it was said

that on more than one occasion the Lybaran queen herself had led expeditions to run

down the largest and most stubborn raiders. She rode in full armour alongside the

marching warriors, her hair bound back in tight braids and her expression as

unsparing and fierce as her namesake.

Rather than keep the royal delegations at a lavish remove by housing them in tent

cities, as Lamashizzar had once done, Neferata instead welcomed each procession

into the royal palace. They were assigned luxurious quarters, as befitted their

stations, and treated with generous, if sombre, hospitality. The opportunity provided

by the queen wasn’t lost on her guests, each of whom made use of the proximity to

the throne to press for their individual agendas.

For weeks, Neferata met each ruler in private, discussing matters of state deep

into the night—all but the kings of Rasetra and Lybaras, who treated the queen’s

representatives with careful courtesy but chose to keep their own counsels

nonetheless.

By the time all the kings and queens were assembled, Lamashizzar had been

more than six months in the tomb. Rather than take part in a funeral procession the

visiting rulers took part in a solemn ritual of remembrance in the great necropolis to

the north of the city, then spent another six days attending lengthy afternoon councils

and sumptuous feasts held in the great palace garden.

The guests used the council meetings to test the success of their private dealings

with the queen and determine where they stood in relation to their peers. Each and

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every one soon discovered that, no matter how ruthlessly they’d pursued their

agendas, not one of them had emerged in a better position than their peers. If

anything, their strengths and weaknesses had been carefully exploited to neutralise

their counterparts, creating a status quo that left each city prosperous and stable only

so long as they fulfilled their obligations to Lahmia.

The net of trade and debt, first envisioned by Lamasheptra, then laid down by

Lamashizzar his son, had finally been drawn tight by Neferata, trapping the great

cities at last. And not one of Nehekhara’s rulers could say just exactly how it had

happened. They had understood the danger when they’d begun the journey to

Lahmia, had plotted and schemed diverse ways to counter it, and yet their cunning

had all come to naught when matched against the wiles of Lahmia’s canny and

seductive queen.

By the end of the sixth day it was clear to the visiting rulers that they had

journeyed to Lahmia not just to bear witness to the passing of a king, but to also

formalise the city’s ascension as the centre of wealth and power in all Nehekhara.

In private councils, sometimes well into their cups, the royal guests confessed

their dismay to one another in rueful whispers. They wondered how all their plans

could have gone so wrong, pitted against a cloistered and untried queen. The rulers of

Rasetra and Lybaras listened closely, but kept their suspicions to themselves.

The Hall of Kings glittered like a treasure vault in the slanting rays of the afternoon

sun. The gifts of five great kings and queens had been heaped upon the gleaming

marble floor, at the feet of towering basalt statues that flanked the long processional

leading to the Lahmian throne. No less than eight of Nehekhara’s lost gods looked

down upon the supplicants of the court. The first two, closest to the chamber’s great

double doors, were grim, jackal-headed Djaf, the death-bringer, and faceless, hooded

Usirian, who judges the worth of the souls of the dead. Sixty paces onward stood

lion-headed Geheb, god of the earth and giver of strength, standing opposite Phakth,

the hawk-faced bringer of justice. Yet another sixty paces further, at the feet of the

wide steps leading to the great throne, rose sensuous, cat-faced Basth, giver of love

and beauty; her feline eyes seemed to stare mischievously across the great hall at

slender Tahoth, giver of knowledge and keeper of lore. Finally, towering to either

side of the throne, stood Lahmia’s patron goddess Asaph, giver of magic and

architect of the sacred covenant, and mighty Ptra, god of the sun and father of all

Creation.

The guardians of the throne faced westward, towards the sea. Sunlight streamed

through high, rectangular openings set above the chamber’s entrance, bathing the

statues in golden light. Only the great throne room in Khemri had rivalled the

chamber in splendour and regal glory; now it was without equal in all the land.

So, too, the great throne of Lahmia had been wrought from the same fine-grained,

dark wood as the one that had once sat in the palace of Khemri. There was nothing

like it in all of Nehekhara, and legends said it had been brought out of the deep parts

of the southern jungles during the Great Migration of mankind. The throne was high-

backed and deep, shaped in sinuous curves that suggested it had been grown rather

than carved by the hand of man; its thick, rolled arms were glossy and smooth,

polished by generations of royal hands. They felt warm beneath Neferata’s touch as

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she leaned back in the ancient chair and studied the approaching figures of the

Imperial delegation. Even at a hundred paces she could read their discomfort in the

curt swish-swish of their slippered feet and the thin whistle of breath through their

tightly-pressed lips.

The queen was clad in her richest robes of state: layers of rich saffron

embroidered with gold and thousands of tiny pearls. A girdle of gold thread and lapis

circled her narrow waist, and a thick necklace of gold plate circled her alabaster

throat. Her lustrous hair had been bound up with golden pins and more strands of

pearl, and thick bracelets of gold circled her slender wrists. Nestled in the crook of

her left arm was the sceptre of Asaph, a heavy rod of solid gold wrought in the shape

of a pair of twining asps and inset with tiny scales of onyx. Upon her face rested the

cold, lifeless contours of her golden mask. It was the first time she had worn it since

rising from her deathbed. She had resolved that the scheming barbarians of the far

east deserved nothing more.

Sunlight shone from the mask’s polished surface, almost too bright to look upon.

Neferata felt its rays upon her bare hands and felt little more than a faint discomfort,

like the fading ache of a hixa sting. Even Nagash and his immortals had grown to

shun Ptra’s searing rays, but the queen found that she could move about in the

morning and afternoon with little trouble. She was nothing like the necromancer or

his minions; somehow she had been reborn in a crucible of poison, sorcery and death.

The interactions of the sphinx’s venom with the powers of the elixir and the workings

of Arkhan’s rituals had transformed her into a being of flesh that existed beyond the

reach of death.

She was no mere immortal. Neferata had become like unto Asaph herself, and the

secrets of the world were laid bare at her feet. She could sense the passage of the sun

through the sky and feel the rhythm of the tides through the stones beneath her feet.

She sensed the presence of each and every living thing in the echoing audience

chamber, from the members of her privy council who stood at the feet of her throne

to the Celestial Prince and his retainers and even the stolid-faced royal guards who

stood just outside the chamber door. She could hear their every movement, smell the

scents upon their skin and taste the rich, sweet blood hissing through their veins.

It was blood, always blood, that was uppermost in her mind. If there was one

weakness to her new existence, it was the endless thirst for human blood. It was the

wellspring of her power, a thousand times purer and more potent than Nagash’s petty

brew, but almost as soon as she had drunk her fill of it, she found herself craving

more. Neferata found that she had to drink each and every night to sustain her

strength. Fortunately, with a city of souls at her beck and call she knew that she

would never go without.

The queen smiled languidly behind the implacable curves of her mask and

studied Prince Xian’s young, handsome face with the cold intensity of a hungry

lioness. His expression was set in a mask of calculated disdain as he and his retinue

approached to within a dozen paces of the queen’s privy council and came to an

abrupt halt, as though noticing the Lahmian nobles for the first time. As before, the

Scion of Heaven was accompanied by a fawning translator, a handful of imperious-

looking bureaucrats and a silent, demure young woman whose face and hands were

painted as white as Neferata’s own. The queen could not be certain if she was the

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prince’s wife or merely a favoured concubine. Her hands were clasped at her waist,

and her eyes were focussed on a point just behind Xian’s heels.

Xian gestured almost imperceptibly with one long, golden fingernail, and his

translator immediately took one small step towards the throne. “The Scion of Heaven

offers his condolences on the death of your husband, the king,” he said stiffly. “He

cannot help but observe your sorrow, so deep that even the simplest ceremonies are

too terrible a burden to bear.”

Neferata’s smile sharpened. “The Scion of Heaven is mistaken,” she said simply,

careful to keep her tone neutral and unaffected. “I am conscious of my obligations as

ruler and host. Has he not been treated with all due courtesy and respect?”

The translator paused, pressing his lips together tightly as he struggled for a

proper response. “It is to my eternal shame that I must inform you that your guards

have refused to admit the Scion of Heaven’s servants to prepare the hall for his

arrival.” He spread his hands. “Where is my lord and master to take his ease, while

he indulges you with fine tea and civilized conversation?”

“There is but one chair in the Hall of Kings,” Neferata replied coldly, and

watched with satisfaction as the translator shivered in response. “And it is a place for

conducting affairs of state, not indulging in idle chatter.” The queen waved her hand

dismissively. “Though the Scion of Heaven can be forgiven his misapprehension,

since this is the first time he has been invited to attend upon the throne.”

One of the prince’s bureaucrats let out a strangled gasp; the rest kept their

composure, but Neferata could hear their hearts beating angrily in their chests. She

couldn’t have insulted the prince any worse if she’d walked up to him and slapped

him across the face.

The translator was completely taken aback. Uncertain how to proceed, he turned

and stared at Xian, whose own expression might have been carved from stone. Once

more, the Son of Heaven gestured to the functionary with a tiny flick of one curved

nail. The man bowed deeply to the prince, then drew a deep breath and turned back to

the queen.

“The Scion of Heaven has the honour of bearing tidings from his divine father,

the Emperor of Heaven and Earth,” the translator said with as much affronted dignity

as he could muster. “He wishes you to know of the great fortune bestowed upon the

Empire in the form of the gold mines of Guanjian province. So great is their bounty

that the value of gold is not as it was when your father incurred his debt to the

Empire.” A tiny glint of satisfaction shone in the functionary’s eyes as he bowed

before the throne. “A single payment remains to settle the matter between Lahmia

and the Celestial Household, but it must be no less than triple the agreed upon

amount in order to satisfy the terms of the debt.”

Silence fell across the great hall. The prince and his retainers watched and waited,

expecting cries of outrage and growing ever so slightly concerned when none was

forthcoming. Finally, after a long moment, the queen shook her head.

“No.”

Now the cries of outrage began in earnest, but it was the prince’s retainers who

shouted their anger at the insult to the Scion of Heaven’s honour. One of the

functionaries even went so far as to take a step forward and raise his fist to the queen.

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Before he could take a second step Abhorash was blocking the man’s path. The tip of

the champion’s iron sword rested in the hollow of the bureaucrat’s throat.

“Enough,” Neferata said, her voice carrying clearly over the tumult. “Prince

Xian, the insolence of your retainers offends me. They will remove themselves at

once.”

The translator puffed up his narrow chest. “It is not for you to dictate—”

“Go,” Neferata commanded, exerting her will. The Imperial functionaries fled, all

but stumbling over the hems of their robes in their haste to obey the queen’s

command. Within moments, the prince and his woman were alone.

Neferata rose slowly from the throne. Her movements were fluid and graceful, as

mesmerising as the movements of a cobra. She descended the stairs and approached

the Scion of Heaven, who held his ground out of sheer, stubborn pride. The queen

drew close enough to touch him, staring deeply into his dark eyes.

“What your father asks is impossible,” Neferata said softly. She exerted her will

and listened with satisfaction as the prince’s heart quickened in response. “You know

that as well as I.” The golden mask cocked slightly to one side as she studied him.

“You’re a clever man, Prince Xian. Pragmatic too, else you’d have never agreed to

come here in the first place. So perhaps there is a way to settle Lahmia’s debt with a

currency other than gold.”

Prince Xian frowned slightly. He hesitated but an instant before answering the

queen. “What have you to offer?” he said in fluent Nehekharan.

The queen took a step closer and laid a hand on his chest, right at the juncture of

neck and collarbone. She could feel the pulse of blood vessels throbbing sweetly

beneath the prince’s skin. Her lips parted, brushing against the tips of razor-sharp

fangs.

“For you, oh prince,” she whispered. “I offer the gift of life eternal.”

Xian’s eyes widened. She could sense the struggle within him, as reason warred

with the seductive force of her will. He wanted to disbelieve her, to heed his father’s

wishes and close the trap around Lahmia, but his heart refused to obey.

A tiny frown creased the prince’s smooth forehead. “How?” he asked faintly.

Neferata held up a tiny, ceramic vial. Within lay a single dram of her blood.

“Take this,” she said. “Return to your home in the city, and when the sun has set,

drink it down. Then you will understand.”

Moving as though in a dream, the prince reached out and took the vial from her

hand. The vigour stored within faded much quicker than Nagash’s elixir, but its

potency was a hundred times greater. She had tried it already on the members of the

cabal, and was well pleased with the results. “Return to me tomorrow,” she

continued, “and we will discuss our arrangement in more detail.”

Xian gripped the vial tightly. His heart bade him obey, but still his mind tried to

resist. “I… I cannot defy the will of the Emperor,” he protested.

“Might the Emperor’s will not change when he hears of this?” Neferata said,

tapping the vial lightly with a lacquered nail. “Or with this power at his command,

might a son not rise up to supplant the father, and become Emperor himself?”

“I…” the prince began. His expression grew troubled, but then slowly he nodded.

“I will think on this.”

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Neferata smiled. “Then go,” she said, “but tell no one of what we have

discussed.” Her gaze drifted to the woman standing in the prince’s shadow. On a

whim, the queen said, “She will remain here in the meantime, to vouchsafe your

discretion.”

Xian turned and looked at the woman, as though suddenly remembering that she

was there. “Her?” he asked, clearly surprised by the queen’s request. “She is nothing

to me.”

Neferata saw the woman stiffen slightly. “Then she will remain here at my

pleasure,” the queen said coldly. “I thank you for the gift. Now go. Your servants

await you.”

Xian turned back to her, as though to protest further, but with one last look in

Neferata’s eyes, the last of the prince’s resolve was swept away. He sketched an

awkward, uncertain bow, and then retreated dazedly from the hall.

The queen contemplated the woman. Her thin shoulders trembled faintly, but she

continued to stare resolutely at the floor. Neferata frowned slightly. She reached out

and touched a finger to the woman’s chin and gently raised her head. For a moment

they regarded one another, their expressions concealed by carefully constructed

masks. “What is your name?” Neferata asked. The woman frowned slightly. The

queen sighed. Naturally the woman wouldn’t speak Nehekharan. “Ubaid,” Neferata

snapped. “Show her to the Women’s Palace and see that she’s made comfortable.”

Ubaid hurried to the woman’s side. The queen’s displeasure had crumpled the

once-proud grand vizier; he had bent beneath her will to the point that he was

hunched over like a whipped dog. His eyes were wide and furtive, and his hands

trembled as though with palsy. Silently he took the young woman’s arm and led her

into the shadows at the rear of the hall.

As they left the queen returned to the great throne and stared down at her privy

council. Not for the first time, she found herself wondering who had sided with

Lamashizzar. Lord Zurhas, the king’s young cousin, had most likely been one of the

king’s supporters. Abhorash, perhaps? Certainly not W’soran; the king would never

have given him the freedom to explore Nagash’s works as she had. Or would he?

Such an offer would have made for a powerful bargaining tool.

None of them knew how to react to her now. She could sense their unease, now

matter how hard they worked to conceal it. On one level they were repelled by her

transformation, while on another level they craved the power she possessed. Only

Abhorash, the stoic master warrior, seemed unaffected by the allure of her newfound

power. In the end, all of them would have to accept the poisoned cup, Neferata

reckoned, whether they wanted it or not. She needed their support in order to rule the

city; the only way she could guarantee that was if they shared the same degree of risk

that she did. She now had Arkhan’s notes in her possession, and Ubaid had led her to

the vial of sphinx venom hidden in Lamashizzar’s quarters. In time, Neferata was

certain that she could reproduce the process.

Lord Ankhat waited until Prince Xian had left the hall before he spoke. “It might

work,” he mused. “Much depends on the amount of influence he wields at home. The

Emperor might simply send another, more powerful envoy to demand payment.”

Whatever his loyalties might have been, Ankhat had proven invaluable to her

since Lamashizzar’s death. It was he who concocted the story that a priest of Sokth,

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patron god of assassins, had crept into the palace to murder the king in reprisal for his

treatment of refugees from Mahrak. As the story went, the assassin-priest had

attacked the queen first, slaughtering her handmaidens and striking her with a

poisoned needle, then fighting his way to the king’s chambers and slaying him before

being slain in turn by Abhorash and the royal guard. It was a cunning move, one that

focussed the need for revenge on a group of outsiders that were already held in

contempt by much of the populace. More importantly, Neferata’s recovery had been

touted as nothing less than a miracle, reminding Lahmia and the rest of the land of

her divine lineage. Support for her rule had been absolute.

It was also Ankhat who arranged for the disappearance of Arkhan’s decapitated

corpse. W’soran and even Abhorash had been adamant that the immortal’s body

should be incinerated, but at the last moment, Neferata found that she could not bring

herself to permit it. Instead, Ankhat discreetly purchased a pauper’s tomb in the great

city necropolis and had the immortal interred there at the same time King

Lamashizzar was being placed inside his own, far greater tomb farther north.

Neferata felt she owed the ghastly creature at least that much.

The queen considered Ankhat’s counsel and nodded thoughtfully. “Perhaps, but it

would take many months, possibly even years, for another delegation to arrive. That

gives us time to build up the treasury and consolidate our power.” She shrugged. “If

the Emperor is a pragmatic ruler, he’ll take our final payment and accept the fact that

his gambit failed. If not… well, we will be in a far better position to defend our

interests.”

Abhorash turned and looked up at her. He did that very rarely now, which hinted

at his surprise. “You mean war with the Silk Lands? That would be ruinous!”

“That is certainly not my intent,” Neferata said smoothly. “But I will defend this

city with every power at my command. You may be assured of that.”

“Then you should worry more about enemies closer to home,” Ushoran said

quietly.

Neferata straightened. The Lord of Masks was infamous for his intrigues within

the city, and she knew that he spent lavishly to maintain a vast network of spies

within Lahmia and elsewhere. “Enemies within the city?”

“At present, yes,” Ushoran replied. “My sources tell me that the King of Lybaras

is… uneasy about your ascension to the throne. And he’s been sharing his concerns

with others.”

The queen frowned. Ushoran liked to savour his revelations, but she wasn’t in a

patient mood. “Such as?”

“The King of Rasetra, for a start. Since he’s been here, he’s also held late-night

meetings with the King of Quatar and the Queen of Numas.”

“And what exactly are his concerns?”

Ushoran shook his head. “That I do not know, great one. But it is safe to assume

that Rasetra will be sympathetic, if for no other reason than the age-old friendship

between the two cities. Quatar and Numas might not be receptive yet, but…”

Neferata sighed irritably. “What lies at the heart of this? What are the Lybarans’

concerns, exactly?”

The Lord of Masks shrugged. “That I cannot say, great one. King Anhur has been

very careful to avoid details.”

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Lord Zurhas shifted uncomfortably, clearly torn between the desire to appear

useful and the fear of gaining the queen’s attention. “Perhaps you could ask Queen

Khalida? Surely she would tell you.”

Neferata sighed under her breath. How long had it been since she’d spoken to

Khalida? Years, certainly. After a moment, she shook her head.

“There is no need,” she said, rising from the throne. “As it happens, I had already

planned on a pair of announcements at tonight’s feast that will put an end to these

intrigues. No doubt the Lybarans covet Lahmia’s newfound power, but we’ve laid

our plans with care. The treaties have been signed and sealed. Nothing short of war

can break them, and no city in Nehekhara would contemplate such a thing.”

Neferata reached up and pulled away her mask. As one, the assembled nobles

lowered their heads—in respect, to be sure, but not without a certain amount of fear

as well. That was well, as far as she was concerned.

The queen smiled down at the men. “Lahmia’s time of glory is at hand. Savour

this, and thank the forgotten gods that you were alive to see it.”

* * *

Neferata’s guests were feted in the great palace garden that night, seated at the same

wide, circular table that had served them during the long council sessions with

Lamashizzar more than a half-century before. The feasting had begun an hour after

sunset and had lasted well into the evening. Rich courses of fish and fowl, prepared

with fiery spices imported from the Silk Lands, were served with jars of fine wine

and bowls of thick, yeasty beer. Musicians and silk-clad dancers beguiled and

entertained the royal guests between courses, allowing time for the food to settle and

the potent drink to mellow their moods. Small braziers had been discretely situated

around the wide clearing, filling the air with sweet-smelling, slightly narcotic

vapours.

The queen sat in the tall chair that had once belonged to her husband and studied

her guests from beneath heavy-lidded eyes. She pretended to eat a little when each

course was served, and the servants were instructed to clear her dishes away first.

Since her transformation, food and wine had lost their savour; in fact, even the

smallest taste caused her throat to tighten and her stomach to knot in pain. No amount

of lotus root or drugged incense could dull her senses, either. Fortunately, the small

goblets of hot, red liquid Ubaid served her between courses more than made up for

the absence of solid sustenance.

She watched the gathered rulers closely for signs of suspicion or discontent. King

Fadil of Zandri was raucously drunk, laughing loudly and hissing salacious whispers

into the ear of a pale-skinned barbarian concubine. To his left, Queen Amunet of

Numas made no effort to conceal her disdain as she picked at a bowl of spiced eels

with a long-tyned copper fork. King Naeem, grey-haired and gloomy beyond his

years, sat amid a flock of querulous old priests who stolidly refused to share in the

queen’s entertainments.

That left the kings of Rasetra and Lybaras. King Shepret sat to Neferata’s left,

sipping from a jar of beer like a common soldier. The elderly Rasetran king, still hale

despite the passage of years, had eaten well from all the fine offerings at the feast

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table, and had taken great pleasure in the procession of silk-clad dancers that had

whirled past him during the course of the evening. Yet Neferata could not mistake

the tension in the warrior king’s shoulders, and the wary glances he cast about the

table when he thought no one was watching. She also couldn’t help but notice that

the dagger hanging from the king’s belt was anything but ceremonial.

The King of Lybaras sat to Shepret’s left, almost close enough to touch, and yet

they had spoken scarcely two words to one another since the feast began. Instead,

Anhur had spent nearly the entire time in quiet, sometimes heated, conversation with

his queen. Neferata hardly recognised her beloved cousin; her years in Lybaras had

transformed her, not into a quiet, submissive queen, but into the fierce, radiant

warrior she’d always longed to be. She had shed the soft flesh of a cloistered princess

and become lean, tanned and muscular, with sword-scars on her hands and a Rasetran

warrior’s tattoo marked in red ink along the right side of her slender neck. Her black

hair was done up in a score of tight braids and bound with a gold pin at the base of

her neck, accentuating the sharp lines of her face. She was a scandal in royal society;

not even the queens of warlike Rasetra were permitted to learn the ways of sword and

spear, much less march with the common soldiery. But Khalida did as she pleased,

riding, fighting and hunting like any man, and public opinion be damned. Supposedly

the Lybaran people loved her for it, which filled Neferata with equal measures of

pride and bitter envy. They hadn’t spoken at all since Khalida had returned to the

city. Even at the feast table she avoided Neferata’s gaze. When she wasn’t speaking

to the king she was trading whispers with a young, nervous-looking woman that the

queen was certain she’d seen somewhere before.

Had she offended Khalida somehow? Neferata couldn’t imagine how such a thing

was possible, unless her cousin somehow resented her arranged marriage to Anhur.

She found herself studying the young Lybaran king and wondering if perhaps her

relationship with her cousin might improve if Anhur were to have an unfortunate

accident. The idea had its merits, she thought.

It was late in the evening now. Servants were emerging from hidden paths to

carry away the last courses of the feast. Ubaid appeared at Neferata’s side with

another brimming goblet to slake her thirst. She sipped at the hot liquid as the

servants finished their work, savouring the rush of strength and vitality that flooded

her limbs and took the chill of the evening away.

When the servants had finished their work and withdrawn, Neferata returned the

goblet to Ubaid’s trembling hands and rose smoothly from her chair. The nobles of

her privy council, who were seated either side of the queen, immediately set aside

their drinks and gazed at her expectantly. Within moments her royal guests took note

and paid heed as well. King Shepret studied her over the rim of his beer, his

expression neutral. Anhur folded his arms tightly across his chest, his gaze darting

uneasily between Khalida and Neferata. Only Khalida failed to meet her gaze; her

cousin stared stubbornly at the tabletop, tracing patterns across the polished surface

with a close-bitten thumbnail.

For a fleeting instant, she was tempted to use her power to bend these kings and

queens to her will. It was so tempting, so easy… and yet, Ushoran’s warnings about

Rasetra and Lybaras gave her pause. If she tried, and somehow failed, the backlash

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might be catastrophic. And there was no sense taking such a risk when she had other

sources of power to draw upon.

“Beloved friends,” she said, lifting her arms and smiling warmly, as though she

meant to take them all into a wide embrace. “Words cannot express how truly

honoured I am that you made such a long and arduous journey to pay your respects to

my husband, whom we pray has reached the company of his ancestors in the Lands

of the Dead. His loss is a terrible blow to all of Nehekhara, but after speaking to most

of you over the course of the last few months, I’m hopeful that his legacy of

prosperity and renewal will continue to live on.”

Neferata allowed her smile to fade, transforming her luminous expression into

one of wistful regret. “If there is one thing I have learned from this awful experience,

it’s that there are still a great many Nehekharans who are still suffering from the

horrors wrought by the Usurper. The breaking of the sacred covenant and the passing

of the old gods have left a terrible wound on our collective soul. We no longer think

of this as a blessed land, nor we a blessed people.”

That got the attention of King Amunet and his gaggle of priests. Their sullen

expressions vanished, replaced with looks of genuine surprise and faint, dawning

hope. That sent a ripple of interest through the other rulers as well. Anhur’s bemused

expression turned increasingly wary.

“Beloved friends, honoured kings and queens, I say that the gods are with us yet.

The bloodline of Lahmia remains strong. The blessings of Asaph have not deserted

us, even in these dark times! It was she, great goddess of beauty and magic, who

persuaded great Ptra to take pity on our people and make this land a paradise.”

Neferata’s gaze went around the table, meeting the eyes of each ruler in turn.

“Hear me, friends. The goddess lives on through me, as she has lived in each of my

ancestors since the dawn of civilization. We are not forsaken. If we come together

and restore what Nagash cast down, perhaps we can forge a new covenant—one that

will lead us into a golden age of rebirth.”

“Praise the gods!” cried an elderly hierophant. The old man rose to his feet, his

age-spotted hands rising skyward. “Praise be! We are delivered at last!”

The queen smiled fondly at the old man. Go on believing that, she thought. It will

help convince the others.

“In the past, my husband believed it was wiser and more compassionate to focus

on the needs of the living rather than the memories of the dead,” the queen continued.

“And it is not for me to question the wisdom of his policies at this late date. But now

that our cities are well on their way to recovery, and we have a plan to ensure our

continued trade and prosperity, I believe that now is the time we moved to erase the

last traces of Nagash’s infamy. Mahrak, the City of Hope, must be rebuilt. Khemri,

the Living City, must be restored to her former glory once more.”

Everyone, even drunken King Teremun, stared in shock. Several of the priests

began to whisper prayers of thanks to their gods, silent tears trickling down their

lined cheeks. Neferata paused, letting the moment build, until finally King Shepret

took the bait.

The old warrior-king of Rasetra put aside his beer and leaned forward, resting his

elbows on the table.

“And how do you plan to oversee such a restoration?” he asked.

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Neferata acknowledged the question with a respectful nod. “In truth, I wouldn’t

presume to do such a thing at all,” she said, “not when there are better people, like

yourself, who have already demonstrated a desire to undertake the effort. Rasetra was

born from distant Khemri; the bloodline of her royal house runs in your veins. By

rights, it should be for you and your children to determine the city’s future. I merely

wish to share some of Lahmia’s riches to make the task possible.”

Shepret didn’t know how to respond at first. That wasn’t nearly the response he’d

expected. “How… how much do you propose?” he asked.

“Ten thousand talents of gold each year, until such time as we agree that the

city’s reconstruction is complete,” the queen replied.

King Telemun gasped in shock. Queen Amunef’s eyes went as wide as dinner-

plates.

King Naeem drew in a long breath and pressed his palms against the tabletop.

The look on his face hinted that he was afraid he might be dreaming. “What of

Mahrak, great queen?” he said. “Surely you can do no less for the City of Hope.”

Again, Neferata nodded. “Nor shall I. You shall have ten thousand talents of gold

each year for you and Mahrak’s surviving hierophants to use for the city’s

reconstruction.”

Pandemonium ensued. Mahrak’s priests erupted in loud cries of joy, praising

King Naeem and Queen Neferata with equal fervour. Queen Amunet rose from her

seat and went around to speak intently to King Shepret, whose eyes were half-glazed

with shock. King Telemun threw back his head and roared for more wine.

They were fabulous sums of money, far richer than either ruler could have

reasonably hoped for, but in truth they were little more than half of what Lahmia had

been paying annually to the Empire. Lahmia would still profit, and while Rasetra and

Quatar would spend decades, even centuries, focusing their efforts on rebuilding two

cities that would never again enjoy the wealth and power that they’d once possessed.

By the time they realised they’d been duped, Lahmia’s preeminence would be

unassailable. It was the crowning triumph to decades of carefully laid schemes.

“LIES!”

The shout cut through the din like the peal of a war horn. Khalida was on her feet,

hands clenched into fists and trembling with rage. Her face was pale and her

expression anguished.

“Queen Neferata lies,” Khalida declared. “It’s not the blessings of Asaph that

lend her beauty and unnatural youth, but vile necromancy! She consorts with

monsters, and practises the damned sorcery of Nagash himself!”

Neferata stared at her cousin in stunned silence. “Khalida?” she finally managed

to say. “How… how can you say such things?”

“I have a witness!” Khalida snarled. She pointed to the woman seated beside her.

“Aiyah was there when the pale-skinned creature appeared at the Women’s Palace

with your body in his arms! She witnessed the rituals, and the obscene bloodletting!

It was a miracle she managed to escape the palace and reach Lybaras with the truth!”

Now Neferata knew where she’d seen the girl before. Aiyah the handmaiden

would not meet the queen’s eyes, as though she feared that her very soul would be

forfeit if she did so. Betrayed, by a mere handmaiden? The very idea galled her.

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“I don’t know what the little fool is talking about,” Neferata shot back. “You’d

take the word of a handmaiden over that of the rightful Queen of Lahmia?”

Khalida continued, as though she hadn’t heard. “How long?” she demanded.

“How long had you been worshipping at the feet of the Usurper? I always wondered

why you never aged, cousin. Did Lamashizzar know? Is that why he poisoned you?”

Neferata’s hand came down on the table like a thunderclap. “You go too far!” she

snapped, transmuting shock and sudden fear into burning anger. “How dare you sit at

my table, share my bread and salt, and then accuse me of such terrible things, when I

alone in all of Nehekhara still bear the mark of the gods’ favour!”

“Beware, cousin! If the gods still hear us, they will not suffer such blasphemy

lightly!” Khalida shot back.

“It is you who blaspheme, Khalida!” Neferata cried. “The innocent have nothing

to fear from the gods!”

“Then challenge me,” Khalida said. “Prove your innocence beyond a shadow of a

doubt.” A glint of triumph shone in the warrior queen’s eye. “Let us cross blades, and

see who the gods truly favour.”

Too late, Neferata realised she’d gone too far. Khalida had laid the trap, and

she’d charged headlong into it. She did not dare refuse, especially not in front of a

gaggle of priests and hierophants. It would undermine everything she had worked so

hard to achieve.

“So be it,” she said numbly. “Abhorash, bring me a blade.”

The preparations were made largely in silence. Lord Ankhat led Neferata away

from the table to the far side of the garden clearing. For a wonder, there were no

clouds overhead, and the queen marvelled at the vault of stars glittering coldly over

the palace. Khalida followed several minutes later; King Anhur dogged her heels,

whispering urgently, but she paid him no mind. She had bound back her voluminous

sleeves with a pair of leather cords, and the hem of her feast robe had been pinned

back so that it wouldn’t tangle her feet. Neferata saw that Khalida was wearing

sturdy leather sandals instead of slippers, the kind that soldiers wore on the

battlefield. On any other day it might have amused her, but now the sight left her

cold. She was planning this all along, the queen realised. One way or another, this

evening was going to end in blood.

Abhorash appeared before her, gripping a bronze blade in his hands. The

champion’s expression was stricken. He held out the hilt to her; it took Neferata a

moment to realise he meant her to take it. The leather wrapping felt cold against her

palm. The weapon was short and straight, like an oversized dagger about two feet

long, but it seemed to fit her hand well. She stared morbidly at the tip of the blade.

“Not iron?” she asked.

The champion shook his head. “You’ll notice that Khalida isn’t using iron

either,” he said, nodding slightly in her direction. “Bronze is lighter and quicker. She

was hoping you’d take iron and give her one more advantage.” He paused, pressing

his lips together as if uncertain what to say next. “Have you any training, great one?

Any at all?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Neferata snapped.

Abhorash grimaced. “Then you’re going to have to make this quick,” he said to

her. “You’re faster and stronger than she is. She doesn’t know it yet. Use that to your

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advantage.” He reached forward and gripped her wrists tightly, his gaze burning into

hers. “And when you strike, don’t hold back. She’s not your cousin any longer.

Khalida will kill you if she can.”

Neferata pulled her hands away. “Let’s be done with this,” she said, and stepped

into the circle formed by the assembled crowd.

Khalida gently pushed her husband aside and went to stand before Neferata. She

carried a bronze sword nearly identical to the queen’s, though Khalida held hers

easily, as though it were an extension of her hand. Her face was emotionless now, her

eyes cold and remote, like an executioner.

Neferata surveyed the crowd, seeking out the priests. There were formalities that

had to be observed. “Is there a priest or priestess of Asaph in attendance?”

The priests and hierophants shifted uncomfortably. The eldest shrugged his

narrow shoulders. “That honour falls to you, great one,” he said.

Neferata growled under her breath. She closed her eyes and raised her hands to

the heavens, struggling to remember the proper words.

“Great Asaph, goddess of beauty and the mysteries of the world, we beseech you

to preside over this contest of arms and judge it fairly, lending your strength to the

righteous and casting down the false claims of the wicked. Let justice prevail in your

name.”

“Let justice prevail,” Khalida echoed faintly, and rushed forward, her sandals

gliding on the grass, as though hurrying to her cousin’s embrace. Neferata saw the

glinting tip of her blade at nearly the last moment and tried to leap aside. She swung

her own weapon in a wide, clumsy block, and connected with a discordant clang of

metal.

Khalida’s blade flickered again, and the point tugged at the billowing sleeve of

Neferata’s left arm. The queen circled right, trying to get away from the slashing

sword, her own weapon hanging forgotten in her hand. She felt a burning pain in her

left hand and jerked it back with a cry. Khalida’s blade had slashed cleanly across her

palm. Neferata stared at the wound in horror, watching beads of dark blood well up

from the cut.

But Khalida never paused. She leapt forward, grabbing Neferata’s sword wrist

and stabbing at the queen’s chest. Neferata felt the point of Khalida’s sword pierce

her robe and sink into the skin beneath her left breast. Without thinking, she seized

her cousin’s sword wrist with her wounded left hand before Khalida could drive her

weapon home.

They grappled for an agonising moment, nose-to-nose, feeling each other’s

gasping breaths against their skin. Khalida dug in her heels and pushed for all she

was worth. Neferata could feel the muscles working in her cousin’s arms as she tried

to drive the sword deeper. Khalida’s lips were drawn back in a rictus of fury, her dark

eyes burning with battle-lust.

Cold terror clenched Neferata’s throat. Without thinking, she drew upon her

power and shoved Khalida backwards. Her cousin was hurled off her feet, flying

back for nearly five feet before landing hard on her back. Khalida turned the impact

into a backward shoulder roll and sprang swiftly back onto her feet. Blood glistened

on the tip of her sword.

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Now she knows how strong I am, Neferata thought. She won’t make that mistake

again.

They circled one another for a moment, contemplating their next moves.

Neferata’s left hand ached dully, and the wound in her chest felt like it was on fire.

Abhorash’s words echoed dully in her mind. You’re going to have to make this quick.

She stared at Khalida, her eyes pleading. “Don’t do this,” she whispered.

But Khalida was beyond hearing. With a snarl she rushed forward again, sword

held low. She was on the queen in moments. Neferata tried to twist aside again, but

felt the point of Khalida’s blade dig into her hip. She cried out, groping instinctively

for Khalida’s wrist again, but the attack was only a feint. Swift as a snake, Khalida

jerked the blade away and brought it around in a swift, looping motion, straight for

the side of Neferata’s throat.

She saw the blade arcing towards her out of the corner of her eye. With a scream,

Neferata called upon her power once more and surged forwards, deeper into

Khalida’s embrace. Her cousin’s sword missed its mark by inches, carving a furrow

across the back of Neferata’s neck.

The queen held her cousin for just a moment, and she could feel Khalida’s heart

hammering wildly through the thin fabric of her robe. Then they parted. Khalida took

one step back, her expression slack. Her gaze fell to the hilt of Neferata’s blade,

jutting at a downward angle from her side. Slowly, wonderingly she grasped the hilt

with her left hand and with a strangled gasp, pulled the weapon free. Dark blood

poured down Khalida’s side.

Neferata watched in horror as her cousin sank to the ground. An agonised cry

split the stunned silence. It was Anhur, his face a mask of anguish.

The queen fell to her knees beside Khalida. Her terror was gone, replaced with a

bottomless well of sorrow. Without thinking, she pressed her hand to the wound in

her cousin’s side, but the bleeding would not stop. The warm fluid ran over her

fingers and stained the sleeve of her robe. Khalida made a choked sound and tried to

move, but she was already growing weak. Her eyes were open, searching wildly

about for something or someone.

“Oh, gods,” Neferata whispered. “Oh, great gods.” Her eyes burned, but no tears

would come. She laid a trembling hand against Khalida’s cheek, staining it with

blood. “Forgive me, little hawk. Please, please forgive me…”

She could still be saved, Neferata realised. She took her lower lip in her teeth and

bit down hard, tasting blood. She bit until her lip was bitter with the taste.

Neferata took Khalida’s head in her hands and turned it until their eyes met. She

lowered her face, until all they could see was one another’s eyes.

“Kiss me,” she said to Khalida. “Kiss me, little hawk, and you’ll live forever.”

Khalida stiffened. Tears welled in her eyes. Her head trembled, and her hands

pressed weakly at Neferata’s shoulders. When she spoke, her voice was almost too

faint to hear.

“No,” she said.

“Please,” Neferata said. She pressed closer, and felt Khalida push back with the

last of her strength. “I never wanted this. I never wanted any of it, but Lahmia needs

me. Please, let’s kiss and be friends again, like before.”

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Khalida resisted a moment more, and then Neferata felt her body relax. With a

gasp of relief, the queen pressed her bloody lips to Khalida’s.

Her cousin did not return the kiss. Khalida’s body was utterly still.

After a long, painful moment, Neferata raised her head again and stared into

Khalida’s vacant eyes. Slowly, she became aware of people shouting, and a man’s

voice wailing in misery. Hands grasped Neferata’s shoulders and pulled her away

from Khalida’s body. Her robe was heavy with blood.

Ankhat stepped close, whispering in her ear. “Say something,” he urged.

“Everyone is waiting to hear the goddess’ verdict.”

Neferata’s gaze fell to her cousin’s body, and felt her heart break.

“Justice is served,” she said in a hollow voice.

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SIXTEEN

The Glory of Nagash

North of the Plain of Bones, in the 96th year of Ptra the Glorious

(-1350 Imperial Reckoning)

Cold, dead hands seized the priests and dragged them towards the towering wooden

statue of Malakh that stood in the hill fort’s ceremonial square. Pieces of splintered

wood, scavenged from the fort’s shattered gates, had already been piled around the

statue’s base and soaked with pitch from the temple’s own storehouses.

The Forsaken priests screamed and kicked, crying out to their god to bring down

bloody vengeance on the invaders, but the skeletal executioners paid them no heed.

The four old men were all that remained of the god’s temple at Maghur’kan, the chief

hill fort of the northmen’s petty empire. Those members of the cult that hadn’t died

in the bitter defence of the main gate were dragged from the temple cellars and their

bodies left to bleed out in the muddy street.

Every man, woman and child still living after the month-long siege of

Maghur’kan had been herded to the edges of the square to bear witness to the death

of their god. The night air trembled with their muffled wails. Most were so weak

from hunger that they could manage little else.

Nagash sat upon a palanquin of polished oak at the southern end of the square,

surrounded by the skeletal warriors of his bodyguard and a score of northmen vassals

drawn from hill forts conquered during the long war. The struggle against the

Forsaken hadn’t lasted years, or decades, but centuries—nearly two hundred and fifty

years since that first, confused night battle upon the Plain of Bones.

The northmen had proven to be mighty warriors, and their witches possessed of

great skill and cunning. Nagash had lost count of the number of battles that had been

fought down the years, but in most cases the Forsaken had given as good as they’d

got. Ultimately, the path to victory had rested on the simple fact that the Forsaken

had to eat, and his army did not. By keeping up constant pressure on one hill fort at a

time, he prevented the northmen from adequately tending their fields and setting back

enough food for the winters to come, until finally they had been so weakened by

hunger and sickness that they couldn’t resist Nagash’s constant attacks. And so the

northmen had been enslaved, one hill fort at a time, until only Maghur’kan remained.

The necromancer watched as the priests were lashed to the great totem of their

god. Off to the east, near the circular wall of the hill fort, one of the Yaghur let out a

bone-chilling howl. Children squealed in terror, burying themselves in their mothers’

skirts. No doubt the barbarians were feasting well tonight.

When the ropes had been drawn tight, Nagash rose from his seat and stepped onto

the stinking mud of the square. Heavy, leather robes, faced with polished bronze

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medallions inscribed with runes of protection, flapped about his lean limbs. A deep

hood, its hem ornamented with tiny disks of gold, concealed all but the flickering

flames of his eyes. There was a dry clatter of bone as his bodyguard made to follow

him, but he held them back with a wave of his hand and a curt mental command.

His legion of undead servants had grown so vast that he could no longer keep

them all under control at the same time. Most functioned more or less autonomously,

operating on a strict set of commands according to their function. It was an

arrangement he’d perfected out of necessity during the long campaigns in the

northland. Unfortunately he’d yet to find a way to impose the same degree of control

on his human minions without ultimately killing them. He was instead forced to rely

upon intangibles such as loyalty and devotion, which, as far as he was concerned,

was a kind of sorcery all its own.

Thus, the death of the priests was a ritual in more ways than one, Nagash mused,

as he approached the condemned men.

Malakh’s high priest had been lashed to the statue facing Nagash. He and the two

senior priests to his left and right glared at the necromancer with pure, fanatical

hatred.

“You have not won!” the high priest spat. The Forsaken spoke a purer, somewhat

more cultured form of the tongue once spoken by the Yaghur. “You will not defeat

great Malakh by ending our lives! He is eternal! He will triumph after—” the holy

man’s curse faltered.

“After my works are dust, and I am nothing but bones,” Nagash chuckled cruelly.

“Your curses mean nothing to me, old man. I am eternal. What can your petty god do

to one who has passed beyond life and death?”

The high priest thrashed against his bonds. “May pestilence find your house! May

it burrow in the walls and consume your treasures!”

Nagash shook his head in disgust. The Forsaken had been worthy foes. He’d

hoped for better from their high priest. He raised his right hand. The energies of the

burning stone had permeated the flesh that remained, until it was swollen and foul

with cancerous tumours. Black veins, thick and pulsing with unnatural life,

penetrated muscle and tendon and sank their roots into bone, where they drew

sustenance from the deposits of burning stone. He reached out and seized the priest’s

jaw, cutting off his tirade. Nagash’s fingers left streaks of slime on the northman’s

cheeks.

“There is nothing your god can do to me that I have not willingly inflicted upon

myself,” Nagash said. “Malakh’s days are done. Go and tell him, when your soul is

wandering the wastelands beyond death’s door.”

Nagash released the high priest and withdrew a few steps. On cue, Thestus, the

leader of his Forsaken vassals, came forward with a blazing torch in his hand. The

northman, once the chieftain of a hill fort nearly as large as Maghur’kan, wore leather

and bronze armour in the Nehekharan style, and his scalp had been shaved bare. His

hard, craggy features showed no emotion at all as he approached the bound priests

and held his brand aloft. It was important that the people of Maghur’kan saw one of

their own feeding their god to the flames.

“Witness!” Thestus cried. “Malakh rules here no longer! From this moment

forward, Maghur’kan serves only Nagash, the Undying King!”

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The high priest spat upon Thestus. The Forsaken warrior’s only reaction was to

bend low and thrust the torch into the wood directly beneath the holy man’s feet.

Flames whooshed through the pitch-soaked wood, until the totem and the men

tied to it were wreathed in hungry blue flames. The priests began screaming at once,

their cries of agony piercing the night. From the narrow mud lanes of the hill fort, the

Yaghur began to howl in reply. Nagash listened to the gruesome chorus for a

moment, savouring the sound, then left Thestus and his warriors and headed to the

opposite side of the square, where the warlord’s great hall could be found.

The Forsaken built their halls the same way they built their barrows. It was large

and dome-shaped, with a roof of wood and thatch, and the only building in the entire

fort with a thick, stone foundation. As he approached the hall, dark, humanoid shapes

glided from the shadows and paced along behind the necromancer. They wove back

and forth in Nagash’s wake like a pack of two-legged hounds, panting and sniffing at

the sweet smell of roasting flesh.

There were no guards stationed outside the hall’s large, round door; only a pair of

lit braziers, vainly trying to hold back the shadows of the night. The Yaghur raised

clawed hands to shield their faces from the hateful light; their eyes shone a pale

yellow in the firelight, like a jackal’s.

Nagash passed through the open door, noting the sorcerous wards that had been

incised into its wooden foundation. Protection against misfortune, against pestilence

and evil spirits… he felt not the slightest murmur of power from the old symbols.

Perhaps they had died along with the men burning in the square outside.

Beyond the door was a wide passageway leading to the centre of the hall, flanked

by branching corridors that ran left and right around the building’s circumference.

Tapestries hung along the walls, depicting glorious victories against the northmen’s

many enemies. Nagash saw human tribes defeated and enslaved, and fierce battles

against hulking, green-skinned monsters that walked upright like men. He also saw

one old, threadbare tapestry that depicted the Forsaken triumphing over a horde of

rat-things like the ones he’d encountered in the wasteland.

Interestingly, there were no tapestries showing mighty victories over their old

foes, the Yaghur. Nagash wondered what his long-time vassals thought of such an

omission—if they thought of it at all.

At the far end of the passageway, Nagash entered a large, circular great room,

dominated by a crackling fire pit in the centre of the space. A crowd of silent, grim-

faced warriors stood around the dying flames, their scarred faces fixed in masks of

anger and despair. They turned as the necromancer appeared, and retreated slowly to

the perimeter of the room.

These were the Forsaken warlord’s few remaining allies, as well as the survivors

of his own personal warband, gathered together at Nagash’s command to bear

witness to Braghad Maghur’kan’s submission.

Over the tips of the crackling flames, he could see Bragadh, the last of the

Forsaken warlords. Even in defeat, the young leader of the northmen was proud and

defiant, flanked on his right hand by Diarid, his scarred, grey-haired champion, and

on his left hand by Akatha, the last of his witches. Akatha’s two sisters had died

horrible deaths during the battle at the fort’s main gate. She had survived Nagash’s

sorcerous bolts only because of the heroism of another of Bragadh’s champions, who

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had stepped in front of the blast and had died in her place. Like Bragadh, she was

very young, perhaps twenty-five or twenty-six. In Nagash’s day, as a priest in

Khemri, they would have been considered little more than children. It was a sign of

how badly the northmen had suffered during the last, bitter years of the war.

Nagash paused just inside the great chamber, pointedly ignoring the hateful stares

of the Forsaken as he studied the many war trophies hung along the walls. Eventually

his gaze came around to where Bragadh stood. The necromancer smiled coldly.

“I had expected a throne, at the very least,” he said.

The warlord nodded at the timber crackling in the fire. “You’re looking at it,” he

growled. He was a huge, broad-shouldered giant, with a forked, red beard and a

heavy, brooding brow.

Nagash inclined his head to the warlord. That kind of bitter spite was something

he could understand. “It is time,” he said.

Bragadh raised his chin stubbornly. “Let’s hear your terms.”

“Have I not already given them?” Nagash countered.

“I want my people to hear you say them as well.”

Nagash considered the request. Bragadh had been a fearsome war leader in his

time: bold, cunning and ruthless to a fault. The necromancer did not take him for a

petty man; that suggested his allies did not necessarily support his decision to

surrender.

“Very well,” Nagash said. “You will receive the same terms as every other fort

which has surrendered to me. To begin with you will reject the worship of Malakh

from this night forward. In addition, two-thirds of your fighting men will return with

me to my fortress, where they will serve in my army until death and beyond. The rest

will remain here, along with the women and children, to tend the fields and grow the

population. Two-thirds of each male generation will be called to serve, while the

village will supply them with shipments of meat and grain twice each year. These are

the only tithes that you will owe to me as your master.”

The Forsaken glanced sidelong at one another. The terms were very generous, as

far as Nagash was concerned.

Diarid folded his muscular arms. Like Bragadh, his long face was framed by a

dark, forked beard, and polished finger bones were plaited into his hair. “How will

our people defend themselves against our other enemies?” he asked. “You would

leave us with too few warriors to survive.”

Nagash chuckled. “I have walked your lands from one end to the other,” he said.

“There are a great many graves here. Enough for a very large army indeed. They

can be called to war at any time.”

Diarid’s dark eyes narrowed thoughtfully. The implication hadn’t escaped the

young champion. If any village were foolish enough to rebel, their own ancestors

would rise up to punish them.

Bragadh nodded. “All this you will swear to, if our villages submit?”

“I would not have said so otherwise,” the necromancer replied.

“No!” cried one of the Forsaken to Nagash’s right. He was an older man, with

streaks of grey in his beard, and a barrel-like body clad in bronze and leather armour.

He stepped forward, shaking his fist at Bragadh first, then at Nagash. “We are true

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men, not slaves!” he said. He turned to face Nagash, his expression savage. “I would

sooner choose death than to betray my god and serve the likes of you!”

Nagash regarded the old village leader for a moment. ’As you wish,” he said.

At once, the Yaghur were upon him. Sleek, misshapen figures burst from the

passageway, racing past their master and leaping on the man. Their bodies were

hunched, naked and hairless, covered in layers of dried blood and filth, and they

propelled themselves across the packed earth floor using all four limbs, like mad,

bloodthirsty apes.

A baying chorus of terrible, ululating howls filled the great hall as they seized the

old man in their clawed hands and dragged him off his feet. Jagged, rotting teeth sank

into the barbarian’s face and neck. He tried to struggle, screaming in terror and pain,

but the creatures held him fast. Flesh tore like rotting cloth; hot blood sprayed

through the air, and the man’s screams became a choking death-rattle. The Yaghur

tore at the man’s body with their claws, ripping apart his armour to get to the warm

meat beneath. Their howls transformed into slobbering, chewing sounds as the

monsters began to feast.

“Before the sun rises, every man, woman and child in his hill fort will be dead,”

Nagash said into the stunned silence that followed. “The fields and buildings will

remain, and will be given to someone with better sense than he.” His gaze swept

across the crowd. “Your choice here is simple. Serve me, and your people will

survive. They will even prosper, as well-tended vassals should. Otherwise, they will

die, and their bones will serve me in the mines for centuries to come. Do you

understand?!”

No one spoke. Finally, the witch—a tall, dark-haired woman with large eyes and

a narrow, pointed face—folded her arms and glared at the men. “Don’t be fools,”

Akatha snarled. “The time for defiance has passed. We must be pragmatic. The True

People must survive.”

One of the Yaghur raised his head as the witch spoke, blood drooling from his

jaws. His flat nostrils flared, and he growled hungrily. After a quarter millennia of

feasting on human flesh, the Yaghur had developed an especial love for the soft meat

of women and children.

Bragadh glared hatefully at the ghoul, and the Yaghur quickly turned back to its

meal. The warlord sighed. “The witch speaks true,” he said wearily. “We must all

take the long view now, and look to our people’s survival.”

Groans went up from a dozen throats as Bragadh walked around the fire pit

towards Nagash. When he stood before the necromancer he drew the great, bronze

rune sword from its sheath and sank to his knees.

“I am Bragadh Maghur’kan,” he intoned. “Warlord of the True People.” He

carefully set his blade at Nagash’s feet. “And I submit.”

For a moment, no one moved. Then, one by one, the village leaders came forward

to lay their weapons at the necromancer’s feet.

Nagash accepted the submissions in silence, his expression of triumph lost within

the depths of his hood. Across the chamber, Diarid and Bragadh’s chosen men

watched with stricken expressions as they watched their honour and traditions laid at

the feet of their long-time foe.

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Only Akatha met the necromancer’s eyes. Her expression was hard as stone.

Pragmatic, but no less hateful for that, Nagash noted. Well enough, he thought. So

long as she serves.

The Yaghur watched the ceremony with feral disinterest, chewing noisily.

The long procession marched from Maghur’kan just after sunset on the following

day. First came Nagash, borne upon his oaken palanquin and attended by his skeletal

bodyguard. Behind them came his vassal lieutenants, Bragadh, Thestus and Diarid,

and the witch Akatha. They marched from their ancestral home with their heads high,

but their expressions were bleak.

In their wake marched the columns of Nagash’s infantry—human and undead,

more than four thousand strong, their ranks replenished by the corpses of those

they’d slain. Then, shoulders hunched and heads hung low, came the remnants of the

once-mighty Forsaken host: four hundred barbarian warriors, stumbling from

exhaustion and the pain of their wounds. Not all of them would survive the three-

week march to the mountain. The Yaghur loped along the army’s flanks, sniffing the

air and waiting for the first of the barbarians to stumble.

South the column wound, through conquered territories that had lain under

Nagash’s hand for many decades. The hill forts were well maintained, the fields

tended and the muddy lanes kept clean of filth. Silence and despair, heavy as a

funeral shroud, hung over the entire region. Food and water were brought out for the

human soldiers by hollow-eyed men and women, none of whom seemed to

understand the simplest of questions posed by Bragadh or his kinsmen.

After the second week the army was close to the northern end of the Plain of

Bones, and on bright, moonlit nights they could see a pall of dark grey clouds

hanging low on the southern horizon. At first, the enslaved barbarians thought they

were seeing storm clouds hanging over the Sour Sea, but night after night, the sight

was still the same.

Three nights later the army had reached the Plain of Bones. The old battlefield

had changed a great deal in the last two-and-a-half centuries, as Nagash had pursued

his campaign against the northmen. A wall of stone had been built across the narrow,

northern approach to the plain, anchored on each end by a citadel garrisoned by

human and undead soldiers. A wide gate in the centre of the wall creaked open as the

army approached, and the warriors marched through a tunnel of stone some ten yards

long before emerging onto a wide expanse of tortured earth. Every square foot of the

plain had been churned by pick and shovel over the centuries, digging up the bones

of those who had fallen there over the millennia and adding them to Nagash’s undead

army.

A pall of stinking, ashen cloud hung low over the plain, plunging it into perpetual

darkness, and a heavy, almost tangible silence clung to the broken land. Even the

baying of the Yaghur was muted beneath the churning shadow cast from the south.

From that point on, the army marched day and night through the perpetual gloom.

Hard-bitten warriors who had endured the bitter siege and the torturous march south

became unmanned as they stumbled through the nightmarish landscape. Some broke

ranks and tried to flee, raving and screaming in terror before the Yaghur pulled them

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down. Others simply fell by the wayside, their hearts gone dead between one step and

the next as the burden of fear and despair simply grew too heavy to bear.

Two days later, as they crossed the southern edge of the plain and began the long

descent to the coast, the vassals got their first sight of the great mountain.

Nagashizzar, it was now called, which in Nehekharan meant “the glory of Nagash”,

and a quarter millennium of constant labour had transformed it into a vast and

impenetrable fortress. High walls girdled the wide slopes in seven concentric rings,

each one higher and more forbidding than the next. Hundreds of towers clawed at the

ashen sky, interspersed between barracks buildings, storehouses, foundries and mine

works.

Wavering tongues of ghostly green fire flickered from scores of bronze forges,

and twisting plumes of noxious vapours poured from countless mineshafts carved

deep into the mountainside. The great barrow plain that once stretched westward

towards the coast was now covered in vast piles of crushed stone and poisonous

tailings from the mines, spilling down into the dark waters of the sea. To the north,

where the Yaghur still dwelled, the marshland had turned into a poisonous waste,

devoid of all life save for the flesh-eaters and their squalid lairs.

As the army descended onto the coastal plain the barbarians’ fears mounted.

Howls rose from the wasteland as the Yaghur sensed the return of their master, and

shrill, wailing horns echoed them from the phantasmal towers. Down they went,

across the lifeless slope and through the ruins of the old temple fortress, and then

along a wide road of crushed stone that led to the first of the fortress gates.

Men began to wail in horror as they approached that dark portal. It yawned wide

like the mouth of a hungry beast, eager for their souls. And, in a sense, they were

correct.

Slowly, inexorably, the fortress gate swallowed them whole. The screams of the

Forsaken echoed for a long time afterwards, until the huge gates crashed shut behind

them.

As vast and ominous as Nagashizzar was upon the surface, the fearsome array of

walls, towers and industry only represented a fraction of the fortress’ true size. Much

of the enormous stronghold had been burrowed into the mountain itself, with miles

upon miles of tunnels, mineshafts, laboratories, vaults and storehouses. Night and

day, Nagash’s undead servants toiled in the darkness, extending tunnels and

hollowing out still more chambers to support Nagashizzar’s ever-growing population.

No one knew for certain how deep the tunnels went any more, or even where many

of them led. There were exploratory tunnels and deep shafts that had not been trod in

a hundred years or more.

Deep, deep within the earth, in the very lowest levels of the mighty fortress, bare

hands clawed relentlessly at dirt and stone. When at last they broke through into a

vast, half-finished gallery, the exhausted tunnellers all but fell onto their snouts in the

open, echoing space. They lay there on the smooth stone for several seconds,

wringing their taloned hands and panting shallowly. Their smooth, pink noses tasted

the dank air. Oil and metal, old bone and the teasing scent of man-flesh. Could this

be the place the Grey Seer had sent them to find?

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Yes! The Seekers caught the scent at almost the same moment. Quivering, they

scrambled to their feet, wringing paw-like hands in excitement. They licked their

noses, tasting the bitter dust. Sky-stone! Gifts from the Great Horned One, in

numbers uncounted!

The Seekers froze, still as statues but for the wrinkling of their noses and the

twitching of their ears as they searched for signs they’d been discovered.

Always, always there was the risk that something vigilant waited in the darkness;

some horror with teeth or blades to rend rat-flesh. Such was the way of life in the

tunnels. Every one of the Seekers had secretly picked out which of their companions

they could safely throw in the path of danger so they could make good their escape.

Nothing stirred in the abandoned gallery save for the Seekers themselves. Such

luck! Such glory to the first one who carried the news back to the Council! Minds

buzzing with dreams of power and schemes of treachery, the Seekers turned about

and fled back the way they’d come, their long, pink tails twitching behind them.

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SEVENTEEN

The Deathless Court

Lahmia, the City of the Dawn, in the 96th year of Ptra the Glorious

(-1350 Imperial Reckoning)

By day, Neferata slept, yet she did not dream. Instead, the sounds of the great city

washed over her, filling her mind with fragments of mortal life that existed beyond

the cold palace walls.

Sailors shouted bawdy boasts to whores walking the city docks, or sang songs of

foreign shores while they made their ships ready for another long journey at sea.

Servants gossiped in the market squares, or haggled over the price of melons or grain.

Beggars called out to passers-by, pleading for a copper or a crust of bread. A tavern-

keeper opened his doors with a muttered prayer for a good day’s custom.

Lovers argued over an imagined slight. A thief jeered at the city guard as he made

good his escape. A young mother sang a lullaby for her baby. An old man wept

softly, mourning the wife he’d lost the year before.

She awoke at sunset, in the utter darkness of her bedchamber, her legs tangled in

silken sheets. Her limbs were stiff and cold. Thirst tightened her throat. No matter

how much she drank the night before, the thirst was always with her when she woke.

The faintest sounds of movement came from beyond her bedchamber door.

Neferata swiftly wiped the tears from her cheeks as her attendants swept into the

room to prepare her for the long night ahead.

Lamplight filled the room as the women went about their tasks with swift and

silent precision. They were all priestesses of the highest order in the secretive

Lahmian Cult: orphans raised within the precincts of the former Women’s Palace and

trained to serve the sacred bloodline of Asaph, as manifested in the person of the

queen. Only the cult’s inner circle knew the true nature of the living goddess whom

they served, but by that point their hearts and minds belonged to Neferata alone. The

initiates of the cult wore robes of purest samite and masks of fine, beaten gold,

wrought in the image of Asaph herself.

She waited as the priestesses laid out her robes and drew open the heavy, bronze

shutters that covered the windows and shielded her from the sun. A sea breeze stirred

the curtains, caressing her icy skin, and she heard the distant murmur of waves. The

riot of voices in the city below faded to a dull roar, not unlike the sound of the

restless surf.

A priestess knelt by the side of her bed, her masked face carefully downcast. The

mask she wore had been modelled on Neferata’s own face, and wrought with

exacting detail. With both hands she offered a golden goblet brimming with blood.

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“For you, holy one,” she intoned in a hollow voice. “An offer of love, and life

eternal.”

Neferata took the goblet from the priestess and held it to her breast, savouring its

warmth. The thirst grew suddenly, painfully sharp; her hand tightened on the metal

rim, and she became horribly aware of the curved fangs pressing against her lower

gums. As she did each night, she forced herself to remain still and calm until the feral

impulse subsided. Slowly, deliberately, she raised the goblet to her lips and drained it

in a single draught. Not one precious drop escaped her lips.

When she was done, she handed the vessel back to the priestess. The ritual would

be repeated again at midnight, and once more just before dawn. Bloodletting in small

amounts was a central tenet of the Lahmian Cult; from the lowliest acolyte to the

most senior priestesses, each initiate surrendered a small portion each night as part of

rituals intended to bring them closer to the goddess.

The cult had been a clever scheme on the part of W’soran, who envisioned it as

both a cover for their predations and a safe haven from which to continue their rule

over the city. Under Neferata’s leadership it had also become a useful political tool as

well, lending the Lahmian throne a degree of divine authority that the other

Nehekharan cities lacked. The cult boasted a single, grand temple, converted from

the Women’s Palace during the latter days of Neferata’s official reign. The temple’s

inner sanctum, a small complex of buildings in its own right, encompassed her

private apartments and the palace’s old central garden and still retained the opulence

of its former existence. Nagash’s tomes were kept in an arcane laboratory inside the

sanctum, its doors sealed by physical and magical locks that only Neferata and

W’soran together could open.

Fresh strength flowed through Neferata’s limbs and lent her a small measure of

warmth. She rose from the bed and spread her arms, allowing the priestesses to dress

her. They garbed her in the raiment of an empress: robes of the finest Eastern silk, in

layers of saffron, crimson and sapphire, embroidered with gold and silver thread and

hundreds of tiny pearls. A girdle of fine, hammered gold was draped about her hips,

its plates inset with dark, polished rubies. Deft hands slid precious bracelets onto her

wrists, and a necklace made of heavy, gold links was fastened about her neck.

When the priestesses had completed the elaborate costume, they led her to the

dressing table and bade her sit. Jewelled slippers were placed on her feet, and her

eyes were darkened with kohl. All the while, Neferata stared out the open windows,

listening to the sea. The steady whisper of the deeps soothed her mind as almost

nothing else could.

As the priestesses worked, another pale figure slipped silently into the room and

sat gracefully upon the edge of Neferata’s bed. She was slim and delicate of feature,

like the porcelain dolls from the land of her birth, and favoured elegant silk robes cut

in the Eastern style. Her raven-black hair was swept up behind her head, held there

with golden pins and a comb of polished jade. It drew attention to her slender neck,

and emphasised her artful, elegant sense of poise.

Everything about her was carefully crafted, from the precise angles her hands

made as they rested in her lap, to the patient, composed tilt of her pointed chin. She

had been a courtesan once, expensively educated and trained from early childhood to

be a companion to princes and emperors. Her purpose had been to moderate the baser

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appetites of noble men and elevate their public appearance with her refined manner.

She had been an ornament, like a jewelled songbird that hovered about the shoulders

of the wealthy and powerful. In those days, she hadn’t even had a proper name. To

her master, Prince Xian, she had simply been known as White Orchid. Neferata

called her Naaima, and in her court she wanted for nothing.

The priestesses finished their work and withdrew as silently as they’d come. As

they left, Naaima rose from the bed and went to her mistress. She ran slender fingers

through Neferata’s long hair, deftly teasing out the tangles, and then chose a silver-

backed brush from the table.

“You called out in your sleep,” Naaima said softly, in the oddly lilting tongue of

the Silk Lands. She drew the brush through Neferata’s hair in long, smooth strokes.

Naaima slept in a luxurious bedchamber just across the corridor from Neferata’s

own. Centuries ago, when Neferata had persuaded her to take the poisoned cup, she

had kept Naaima as close to her as she could, often taking comfort in the former

courtesan’s embrace while she slept. It did not last, however. As time wore on,

Neferata felt only the coldness of Naaima’s embrace, the deathly stillness of her body

as she slept. There was no comfort to the found in the embrace of the dead.

The question irritated her. “Perhaps I was dreaming,” Neferata said coldly. Even

after two hundred years, the language of the easterners felt strange on her tongue.

“Do you always listen to me while I sleep?”

“Sometimes,” Naaima replied, ignoring the brittle edge in Neferata’s voice. She

was silent for a time as she finished her brushing, then gathered up a handful of

golden pins. As she drew back Neferata’s long hair she said, “It sounded as though

you were calling to a hawk.”

Neferata’s body betrayed nothing. The pain was still sharp, even now, like a

needle in her heart. The passage of years wore away the softer emotions first, she’d

learned, while the harder, crueller ones endured.

“You must be mistaken,” she managed to say. “I know nothing of hawks.

Falconry never held any interest for me.”

“Of course,” Naaima replied smoothly. She did not pursue the matter any further.

When she was finished with Neferata’s hair, she went to the wooden box that sat on a

pedestal in one corner of the room. Opening it, she drew out Neferata’s golden mask.

The delicate metal of the mask bore the weight of centuries upon its cold face. She

studied it for a moment, frowning slightly. “You should have a crown,” she said.

“You deserve better than this.”

“The crown is for the Queen of Lahmia,” Neferata replied. “I am merely its

ruler.” She beckoned to Naaima. “Bring it here. I have work to do.”

She forced herself to hold still as Naaima slipped the mask onto her face. Every

time she felt the touch of metal against her cheeks she was reminded of her own

funeral. It reminded her now of nothing but death and loss. When it was in place she

rose without a word and made her way from the chamber. Naaima fell into step a

precise six paces behind her; the habits of a lifetime and were nearly impossible to

overcome, and only became more so in the unlife that followed.

The corridors of the inner sanctum were funereal in their stillness. There were

never more than three hundred acolytes and initiates of the cult at any one time, and

they were swallowed up whole by the vast size of the temple complex. Neferata

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walked in silence down the dimly lit passageways, then across the broad expanse of

the former palace garden. The trees and tall ferns grew wild and untended now, and

many of the rare flowers had died without the care of the gardeners. Bats circled

overhead, darting and dancing in the moonlight. She listened to their strange, almost

plaintive cries, as she did every night, and wondered who or what it was they were

calling for.

They crossed the wild garden, and then entered another set of silent, echoing

chambers on the far side. Moments later they arrived at a pair of bronze doors,

attended by silent, masked priestesses. Ubaid waited beside them. Though he still

looked as young as the day he’d tasted Lamashizzar’s elixir, his back was hunched

and his hands trembled like that of an old man. His eyes were round and bright like

polished glass. As Neferata approached, he managed a clumsy bow.

“The court awaits, holy one,” he said in a ragged voice. The former grand vizier

sounded as though his inner workings had been crushed to pieces, then carelessly

reassembled.

Neferata ignored him. With a curt nod, the priestesses pulled open the doors.

Warm, yellow light poured over her as she crossed the threshold into the audience

chamber. The blocks of polished sandstone and the lacquered wooden screens of the

Hall of Reverent Contemplation had been dismantled and rebuilt within the inner

sanctum when the Women’s Palace had been renovated. She knew she would no

longer have any need for the vast, echoing court chamber that she’d presided from in

the palace proper, and she’d thought the familiar surroundings would be a comfort in

the ages to come. How little she had known.

She climbed the back of the dais and stepped around the tall, wooden throne. It

was the one concession to her ego that she’d allowed when she surrendered her

crown. A vast fortune had been spent to hire a small expedition to scour the southern

jungles for a match to the wood that had been used for the original throne, and a still

greater sum paid to find and commission an artisan skilled enough to shape it into an

exact copy of the original. The whole process had taken almost as long as the

construction of the temple itself. Neferata had never gotten around to asking Lord

Ushoran what had become of the artisan afterward. Certainly no one ever found the

body.

Neferata settled gracefully into the ancient chair and surveyed the audience

chamber. Lord Ankhat stood closest to the dais, attended by a pair of enthralled

retainers burdened with stacks of ledgers and bundles of scrolls. Lord Ushoran

waited at a careful remove from Ankhat, his expression distant as he meditated on his

intrigues. This evening W’soran was present as well, accompanied by an enthralled

young scribe who was busily copying down his master’s muttered dictation. As

always, Lord Zurhas lingered furthest from the throne, his arms folded tightly across

his chest and a look on his face that said he would rather be gambling away his

fortune in some squalid dice house.

Each one bore the marks of unlife in their own, unique way. Lord Ankhat, was, if

anything, more lordly in mien than before, possessing a dominating presence that

nearly rivalled her own. Ushoran, on the other hand, was just the opposite. He

seemed more changeable, more chimerical than before. There were times that

Neferata was certain his features looked subtly different from one moment to the

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next. Unfortunately for Lord Zurhas, his features were entirely fixed. Neferata

couldn’t help but think he turned more craven and rodent-like with each passing year.

Then there was W’soran. The old scholar had been the first to ask Neferata to

drink from the poisoned cup, and since rising from his deathbed he had grown even

more gaunt and skeletal than before. Now, centuries later, he was a hideous creature,

more resembling a walking corpse than a man. The very sight of him filled her with

dread. For the longest time, she was afraid that some error in the ritual had caused his

transformation, and that he secretly hated her for it. But Lord Ushoran insisted that

W’soran was actually pleased with what he’d become.

When she was seated, Naaima glided soundlessly around the dais and took her

place at Neferata’s right, head bowed and hands clasped at her waist. Moments later,

Ubaid shuffled around to Neferata’s left and cleared his gravelly throat.

“Pay heed to the throne of Lahmia,” the grand vizier intoned, his voice echoing in

the nearly empty chamber. “The court of Neferata the Eternal is convened. Let all

bear witness to her glory.”

* * *

“The last of the annual tribute has arrived,” Ankhat said, scanning the contents of the

ledger in his hands. “Zandri has come up short again.”

Neferata sighed. “What is the excuse this time?”

Ankhat shrugged. “Pirates, of course. Cut down profits on the slave trade by

nearly a third, according to them.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Are they telling the truth, Ushoran?”

The Lord of Masks shook his head. His network of spies now reached from one

end of Nehekhara to the other. Lahmia was the centre of the civilized world, richer

by far than any of the other great cities combined. The yearly tribute to pay off the

interest on their debts saw to that. There were a great many powerful people who

resented that fact. “Zandri’s navy is as strong as ever,” he said. “There hasn’t been a

pirate spotted in her waters for more than a century.”

“And does Numas support Zandri’s reckless behaviour?” Neferata asked.

Ankhat snorted. “Given how much we’re paying them for grain? I should hope

not.” The city of Numas, situated on the wide Plains of Plenty, had long been the

chief food producer in Nehekhara. Now, with reports that the fertile banks of the

River Vitae were shrinking, and the desert encroaching on the other cities more and

more each year, their power and influence had grown tenfold. Even Lahmia found

itself increasingly beholden to the distant city, as increasing numbers of bandit gangs

drove farmers off the Golden Plain.

“Numas has given no sign of support for Zandri,” Ushoran agreed. “The west has

changed a great deal in the last two hundred years, and the only real common ground

the two cities ever had was their brief allegiance to Nagash. If anything, I suspect that

Zandri is growing bold in response to Numas’ growing stature.”

“And does Numas pose a threat to us?” Neferata asked. Naaima chided her often

that she saw potential threats everywhere these days. When one ruled a de facto

empire, it was the only way to survive.

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Ushoran gave another of his shrugs. “Now? No. A hundred years from now?

Perhaps.”

Neferata sighed. “How quickly they seem to forget,” she growled. “Three

hundred years of peace and prosperity has evidently spoiled them. Perhaps a punitive

expedition to Zandri is in order.”

Ushoran glanced at Ankhat, who shifted uncomfortably.

“For that, we’ll need an army, I suspect,” Ankhat said.

Neferata straightened. “What happened to the army we had?” she demanded.

“Three hundred years of peace and prosperity,” Ankhat replied. “Lamashizzar

began reducing the army right after the war, and it was allowed to wither ever since.

There didn’t seem to be a point to maintaining an expensive army when the trade

policies were working so well, and besides, it’s highly unlikely the dragon power has

retained its potency after so long in storage.”

Neferata glowered behind her mask. There likely wouldn’t be any more

opportunities to buy the exotic powder, either. The Eastern Empire was still as

secretive and isolationist as it ever had been, but Ushoran’s spies in the trade cities

hinted that there had been great upheavals inside its borders. Prince Xian Ha Feng,

scion of the Celestial Household, had defied the edicts of the Emperor for two years

after his first taste of Neferata’s blood, effectively resolving the matter of Lahmia’s

debt to the Empire.

When he was finally recalled by his august father, the prince left for the Silk

Lands with two more vials of the queen’s blood, and promises of much more in the

future. But shortly after Xian’s return, all contact with the Empire abruptly ceased,

and all foreigners were barred from its trade cities on pain of death. It would be more

than a century before contact was restored, whereupon it was learned that the old

emperor had met with sudden misfortune, and issues of succession had turned

violent. Prince Xian disappeared into the chaos of the civil wars that followed, and

none knew his fate. The current emperor’s view on Nehekhara was one of benign

disinterest.

“What have we been doing with all the money that was supposed to be going to

the army?” she inquired.

“Some of it went to the navy,” Ankhat said. “Most of it went to expanding the

City Guard and adding patrols to the trade routes across the Golden Plain.”

“And much good that did us,” Neferata replied sourly. “No wonder Zandri feels

free to withhold tribute.” She pointed at Ankhat. “That policy changes now. How

long will it take to raise a new army and train it?”

Ankhat blinked. “I don’t know for certain,” he replied. “I seem to recall that it

took your father decades—”

“That was because he was negotiating with the damned Easterners,” Neferata

said, and then cast a guilty look at Naaima.

“Abhorash could tell us,” Ankhat replied. “If he was here, of course.”

Neferata glanced at Ushoran. “What of Abhorash?” she asked. “Any word?”

The Lord of Masks shrugged once again. “There are rumours he was sighted in

Rasetra last year,” he said, “The last I knew for certain, he was heading into the

jungles, but it’s been twenty years now. He could very well be dead.”

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Abhorash had been the last member of the cabal to accept the poisoned cup; later

even than Naaima by more than a decade. Having witnessed the voluntary

transformation of the rest of Neferata’s cabal, he wanted no part of an existence that

would prevent him from fighting on the battlefield. He believed that more than a

hundred and fifty years of loyal service to the throne was enough to ensure that he

would never betray the cabal, but Neferata was not convinced. Finally, she lost

patience. When he came to the palace to receive his elixir from the queen, she gave

him the poisoned cup instead.

He had been furious upon awakening as an immortal, and refused to accept what

he had become. Incredibly, he’d denied his thirst for many nights, as though it were a

sickness that could be overcome, until Neferata had begun to think the mighty

warrior might actually waste away. But then, one moonless night, Abhorash

succumbed. By the time the sun had risen once more, twelve people—men, women,

even a small child—had been slain across the length of the city. Ankhat and Ushoran

had scoured the city in search of Abhorash on the following night, but the champion

was nowhere to be found. He’d fled the city, and no one in Lahmia had seen him

since.

“Abhorash isn’t dead,” Neferata declared. “There’s nothing in the southern

jungles—or anywhere else—capable of killing him. When he discovers that for

himself, I expect we will see him again.” She glanced at Ankhat. “In the meantime,

my lord, we need an army.”

Ankhat bowed. “I will inform the queen of the new policy at once.”

A group of priestesses slipped into the chamber, bearing goblets to quench the

court’s thirst. Midnight already. They’d been discussing matters of state for six

hours. The notion surprised and dismayed her.

Neferata accepted the first goblet and drank it down, then watched the others

drink. The transformation affected each of them differently, she knew. They all dealt

with the thirst in their own ways, and it was reflected in the way that they fed.

Ankhat took the proffered cup, studied its depths, and then drank it slowly, like wine.

Lord Ushoran took his cup in an almost absent fashion, his brooding mind distracted

by one intrigue or another. He drank the blood in swift gulps; for him it was fuel, and

nothing more. Zurhas eyed his goblet with dread, yet he accepted the cup with a

grimace and drank it down in a single swallow. Naaima accepted hers with studied

calm, as with everything else she did, and drank it without evident interest or

emotion.

W’soran shook his head curtly, refusing the cup as he always did. Neferata

wondered at his appetites, and how he managed to indulge them.

Once the priestesses had withdrawn, Neferata sighed. “Is there anything else to

discuss?”

Ankhat and Ushoran consulted their notes. “More reports in Numas of strange

clouds seen over the mountains to the east,” Ushoran said. “King Ahmose is thinking

about sending an expedition to find its source.”

“Much good may it do him,” Neferata said. “Anything else?”

To her surprise, W’soran spoke up. “I have a request,” he said.

“Go on.”

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The old scholar raised his chin, almost in challenge. “I would like access to

Nagash’s books for a time,” he said. “I want to begin a new field of research.”

“And what would that be?” Neferata asked, though she had suspicions of what it

might be.

“An aspect of necromancy,” W’soran began.

“We’ve discussed this before,” Neferata growled. “Many, many times—”

“Not raising the dead,” W’soran interjected. “Not that. My interest lies in raising

spirits and communicating with them. If I recall, Nagash made some notes regarding

summoning circles in one of his books.”

Neferata thought it over. “And what do you hope to gain from this?” she asked.

W’soran shrugged. “Knowledge, of course. What else?”

Her first instinct was to refuse, but she knew that W’soran would ask for her

reasons, and she had none. “Very well,” she said. “But I expect to be kept apprised of

your efforts.”

“Of course,” W’soran said, and gave a small bow of gratitude.

“There is also the matter of Khemri,” added Lord Ankhat. “The rebuilding of the

city is nearly complete, and the inhabitants are clamouring for a king. Will you

approve of such a thing?”

The news surprised Neferata, though she chided herself that it had been centuries

since she’d made her pledge to help the late King Shepret restore the ruined city.

“I see no reason why not,” she said at length. “It’s been almost four hundred

years. Nagash is nothing more than an evil memory now. And the sooner that Khemri

has a king, the sooner we can stop subsidising the city’s construction.”

“Perhaps it’s best to wait and see if the would-be king lives to claim the throne,”

Ushoran said wryly.

Neferata turned to the spymaster. “What does that mean?” she asked.

“The Queen of Rasetra is with child, but she has never been a woman of robust

health,” Ushoran said. “The pregnancy has been very difficult. From what I gather,

there is little chance that the baby will survive.”

Ankhat nodded. “She is here right now, in fact, praying at the temple.”

“What?” Neferata said, sitting straight upon the throne.

“She’s holding vigil in the presence of the goddess, praying for her child’s life,”

Ushoran explained. “A pity it will do her little good.”

Neferata did not reply at first. The silence stretched, until Ushoran began to look

uncomfortable.

“Is there something wrong, great one?” he asked.

Again, Neferata did not immediately reply. When she did finally speak, it caught

them all by surprise.

“Nagash is just an evil memory now,” she repeated. “A legend. One that grows

more nebulous each year.”

Ankhat frowned. “So we hope,” he said warily.

Neferata nodded—thoughtfully at first, then more decisively. “The baby will

live,” she declared.

Ushoran gave her a bemused look. “How can you be so certain?”

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“Because I am going to save him,” Neferata replied. As she spoke, the idea took

shape in her mind. “The queen will remain here in Lahmia as our guest, for the

duration of the pregnancy, and I will give her an elixir mixed with my blood.”

The news stunned the cabal. Ankhat and W’soran looked visibly shaken. “What

makes you think she would agree to such a thing?” Ankhat said.

“She travelled, heavily pregnant, for weeks, just for the chance to pray for her

son’s life,” Neferata snapped. “That woman is prepared to do anything to save her

child.”

Ushoran frowned. “But to what end?”

“When the child is born, he will remain here until his majority,” Neferata

declared. “It’s past time that the heirs apparent to the great cities came to Lahmia for

their education.”

The spymaster gaped at her. “Hostages. You’re talking about hostages.”

“Not at all,” Neferata replied. “I am talking about shaping the future of all

Nehekhara. Think of it: what if, in a hundred years, we ruled an empire from here to

Zandri, and we did so openly?”

“The other cities would never stand for it!” Ankhat exclaimed.

“They would if the kings supported us, and soon they will,” she countered.

“We’ve existed under the shadow of Nagash for too long. I’m tired of hiding. After

everything I’ve done, everything I’ve sacrificed, all I’ve done is trade one prison for

another.” Her fists clenched. “No more. Do you hear? No more.”

She rose from the throne. “Instruct the queen to draft the summons to the other

cities,” she said. “I will speak to the Queen of Rasetra personally. I want the first

children here within the next year. Offer to lower their yearly tribute if you must.”

“And if they refuse?” Ushoran countered.

“They won’t, once we hear how the temple saved the future King of Khemri,”

Neferata said. “We will show them that we are not the children of Nagash. We are

something altogether different. In time, they may even worship us as gods.”

She left them in shocked silence, her mind whirling with possibilities. Naaima

followed behind her, for once surrendering her composure and dashing after her

mistress.

“You’ve frightened them,” she whispered in Neferata’s ear as they rushed

through the dark halls of the inner sanctum.

“We’ve all been afraid for too long,” Neferata replied. “I meant what I said. I’m

tired of skulking here, while the world turns without me. Perhaps Abhorash had the

right of it all along, fleeing Lahmia and seeking his destiny elsewhere.”

“This has nothing to do with destiny, or with compassion,” Naaima replied, her

voice taut. “This is about Khalida—”

Neferata’s hand blurred through the air, seizing Naaima by the throat. One

moment they were racing through the inner sanctum, then the next Naaima was

dangling from Neferata’s iron grip in the middle of the passageway.

“Never speak that name again,” Neferata hissed. Her fangs glinted in the faint

light. “Never. Do you understand me?”

It took all her strength to gasp out her reply. “I… I understand,” Naaima said.

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Neferata held her there for several agonising seconds, her face a mask of madness

and rage. Slowly, one heartbeat at a time, the anger ebbed from her face, until she

realised what she was doing. With a start, she released the former concubine. Naaima

hit the floor hard and collapsed, clutching her throat.

“Forgive me,” Neferata said softly. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Naaima shook her head. The pain she felt in her heart left her breathless.

“You can’t bring her back,” Naaima gasped. “Nothing you do will bring Khalida

back. Why can’t you see that?”

But there was no answer. Neferata was gone.

171

EPILOGUE

Portents of Destruction

Lahmia, The City of the Dawn, in the 98th year of Asaph the Beautiful

(-1325 Imperial Reckoning)

“Here they come!” the tutor roared in his leathery, field-of-battle voice. “Get on your

feet, boy! Get up!”

Four men in bronze scale armour hefted their weapons and charged across the

training ground, their sandaled feet kicking up plumes of sand as they converged on

their prey. The early morning sun slanted across the square, leaving much of the

ground still in deep shadow except for where young Alcadizzar lay. Haptshur’s pupil

lay in his back in the rocky sand, half-covered by an overturned chariot. His bare legs

were wrapped in the chariot’s traces, and a heavy sack of grain—representing the

body of his dead driver—lay across his chest. The young man’s shield was strapped

to his left arm, but his sword was ten paces away, back along the chariot’s imagined

trail. As a final touch. Haptshur had smeared pig’s blood over his pupil’s face, taking

care to dab it liberally in the young man’s eyes. The older warrior believed in making

his lessons as realistic and messy as he possibly could—much like the brutal reality

of the battlefield.

Haptshur’s assistants likewise dispensed with any fanciful notions of honour or

fair play—they had no intention of giving Alcadizzar the slightest chance of

extricating himself and getting to his sword. They came at him all in a rush, intent on

chopping him to pieces as quickly and savagely as they could.

Swathed in deep shadow behind a lacquered wooden screen, Neferata watched

the oncoming collision with mounting concern. Accidents happened in training. Even

wooden weapons were more than capable of breaking bones or fracturing skulls, and

if an infection set it, the results were often fatal. It had never happened to any of

Haptshur’s royal pupils, but… She pressed the fingertips of her right hand against the

screen’s fragile wooden vine work, as though willing speed and strength into the

young man’s body.

Not that Alcadizzar needed it; despite his age, the Rasetran prince was already

more than six feet tall, and more powerfully built than the burly Haptshur and his

men. His mother had done everything Neferata had asked of her, remaining at the

temple and drinking a vial of elixir each and every week until the baby was born, and

its effects on the unborn child had been profound.

The young man’s attackers covered the sandy ground in seconds, but Alcadizzar

was already on the move. Cool and calm despite the angry shouts and the blood

stinging his eyes, the young man paused for scarcely a moment to formulate his plan,

and then sprang swiftly into action. Neferata watched as he got his hands underneath

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the heavy bag laid across his chest, then with a heave of his shoulders and arms he

flung it backwards, over his head and into the path of the oncoming men. The

projectile caught the attackers momentarily by surprise, but they recovered almost at

once, dodging left and right out of its path, but the diversion bought Alcadizzar a few

more precious seconds.

To Neferata’s surprise, the prince didn’t bother untangling his legs from the

leather traces; instead, he drew back his muscular legs, propped his feet against the

chariot’s wicker rim, and heaved with all his strength. With a creak of wood and

leather, the chariot rolled over onto its side, and Alcadizzar scrambled after it,

disappearing into the open bed.

Now the prince’s attackers pulled up short, suddenly without an easy target to

reach. Alcadizzar had backed into the chariot like a cornered viper, and his foes could

only come at him from one direction. Furthermore, the upper side of the chariot

provided a roof of sorts over Alcadizzar’s head, preventing the men from raining

blows down on him from overhead. They would have to come right at him, thrusting

with their curved khopeshes, which made their task that much more difficult.

The three men spread out, communicating with one another using glances and

hand gestures. One of the attackers nodded, rushing towards the prince, while the

other two circled around the opposite side of the chariot. Neferata frowned. What

were they up to? Then she understood. While one man kept Alcadizzar occupied, the

others were going to grab the chariot and pull it back upright, disorientating the

prince and leaving him open for a blow from his attacker.

But Alcadizzar had plans of his own. As the first man rushed in, stabbing

awkwardly with his curved blade, his feet came down amid tangled loops of leather

traces that the prince had trailed behind him. At once, Alcadizzar jerked back on the

traces, and the man flew backwards with a yell. The prince leapt onto him like a

desert lion, landing on his chest and pummelling him with one powerful blow after

another. Snarling, the swordsman tried to counterattack, but Alcadizzar caught his

sword-hand by the wrist and cracked his fist across the other man’s chin, knocking

him senseless.

Just then, the chariot lurched, rolling back onto its wheels with a loud crash. The

traces jerked tight, yanking Alcadizzar away from his foe, but not before he plucked

the khopesh from the unconscious man’s hand. He twisted onto his back as the traces

dragged him across the sand, and began trying to kick his way free of the tangled

leather straps.

It took the remaining attackers scarcely a moment to realise what had happened.

They came racing around the back of the chariot, eager to avenge their fallen friend.

Alcadizzar, his legs still trapped, did the only thing he could: he rolled across the

sand towards the charging men, closing the distance more quickly than they’d

expected. The men recovered swiftly, trying to circle around the oncoming prince,

but the young man moved with preternatural speed. His wooden khopesh slashed

through the air, feinting low at one man’s calf, then cutting suddenly upwards and

striking the man in the groin. The attacker fell to the sand with a muffled groan.

There was a whack of wood on flesh. Neferata missed the blow, but saw the

angry red weal rising on Alcadizzar’s right thigh. The prince didn’t utter a sound at

the painful hit; his sword blurred, reaching for the last attacker’s left arm. The man

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pulled his arm out of the way just in time—and was caught by surprise when the

prince’s left leg swept into his right foot and knocked him from his feet. The man hit

the sand with a whoosh of tortured breath as the wind was knocked from his lungs,

and before he could recover, Alcadizzar had scrambled atop him and laid the

khopesh’s blade against his throat.

“Enough!” Haptshur cried. At once, Alcadizzar sat back with a grin and tossed

the practice weapon aside. Within moments, the three men who’d been so intent on

giving the prince a thrashing were slapping him on the back and laughing ruefully as

they helped to unwind him from the dust-stained traces.

Haptshur walked over, his leathery face beaming with pride, and tossed the prince

a cloth to wipe the blood from his face.

“He has grown into quite the young man,” Lord Ankhat observed quietly. “I’m

certain his father would be proud if he could see him now.”

Neferata nearly jumped at the sound of the lord’s voice. Ankhat was standing at

the far end of the observation gallery, near the door that led to the secret corridor

back to the temple’s inner sanctum. He was careful to remain completely in shadow.

Even so, the mere proximity of sunlight clearly made him uncomfortable.

“My lord Ankhat,” Neferata said smoothly. “I didn’t hear your approach.” Once

upon a time, Naaima would have warned her, but she saw little of the former

concubine these days. She kept to herself, spending her evenings in the wild garden

or poring through the tomes in the temple libraries. Neferata had been offended at

first, but then she had become preoccupied with Alcadizzar’s birth, and after a while

she hadn’t missed Naaima’s presence at all.

“Forgive me if I startled you,” Ankhat said with a mirthless smile. “No doubt

your attention was devoted entirely to the young prince.”

Despite herself, Neferata glanced proudly at the prince. He now stood next to

Haptshur, towering head and shoulders over his tutor, his expression intent as he

listened to the burly warrior’s assessment of the fight. Even coated with dust and

smeared with traces of blood, his face was handsome and refined, with a square chin,

strong cheekbones and a sharp nose. Alcadizzar had black hair and dark, intense eyes

that he offset with a brilliant, disarming smile.

“He is a wonder,” Neferata admitted. “A true prince. One day, he will have the

world at his fingertips.” Certainly he had been given the finest education in the land.

Alcadizzar and the other royal children who now lived at the Lahmian court were

lavished with the best of everything. The kings of the other great cities might resent

sending their children to be raised in a foreign court, but they couldn’t say that their

sons and daughters weren’t being treated as well—or in most cases, better—than they

would have at home.

Ankhat studied Neferata intently. “That day is close at hand,” he said. “There

have been letters from Rasetra. The king says that it’s time for Alcadizzar to assume

his duties as King of Khemri.”

“Now? Nonsense!” Neferata exclaimed. “He’s only twenty-five years old!”

“His father became King of Rasetra at his age,” Ankhat pointed out. “People do

not have the span of years that our fathers once did.”

“He will,” Neferata said. “Look at him. See what the elixir has wrought! He’ll

live to be a hundred and twenty, perhaps more!”

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Ankhat shrugged. “Perhaps so, great one. Nevertheless, he has reached the age

when he should be king in his own right.”

Neferata turned back to the practice field. Alcadizzar was walking away, still

talking with his tutors and rubbing the thick dust from his bare shoulders. His smile

was dazzling against his dark skin. Ubaid waited at the edge of the field with fresh

clothes for the prince; at Neferata’s command, the former grand vizier had been

Alcadizzar’s personal servant since childhood, allowing her to keep a constant watch

over the boy. Even Ubaid seemed to have been charmed by the young prince’s

magnetism; in Alcadizzar’s presence he seemed to recover a bit of his former poise

and presence of mind.

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “He’s not ready yet. Tell the Rasetrans they

cannot have him.”

Ankhat blinked. “He belongs to them—”

“He belongs to me,” Neferata hissed. “Were it not for me, he would have died in

the womb! I made him what he is today, and I say I’m not finished with him yet!”

The full force of her will hit Ankhat like a gale. He visibly wavered underneath

her stare.

“This is dangerous, great one,” Ankhat managed to say. “The other kings already

resent sending their children to live here as hostages. Refusing to return Alcadizzar

will lead to repercussions.”

Neferata’s eyes narrowed at Ankhat. Her lips drew back slightly, revealing her

fangs. “Are you threatening me?”

Ankhat bristled. “I’m merely pointing out the risks of your… attachment to the

young prince,” he replied. “It is a danger to us all.”

“No,” Neferata said. “That’s where you’re wrong. Alcadizzar is the future.

Through him, we’ll remake all of Nehekhara in our image, and rule over it until the

end of time.”

The practice field was empty now. Neferata hurried down the length of the

gallery, brushing past the stunned Ankhat.

“Tell the Rasetrans whatever you must,” she said to him as she went by. “Khemri

will have a king when I say it is time, and not before.”

Acrid smoke hung in a dense, blue cloud over the ritual circle in the temple’s arcane

sanctum. The incense braziers still burned after the long night’s work, mingling with

the candle smoke and the arcane vapours that W’soran had learned were efficacious

in the summoning of spirits. Over the last twenty-five years he had summoned

countless spirits from the bleak wasteland beyond death’s door, until now he

reckoned himself a master of the art. And yet his ultimate goal remained stubbornly

out of reach.

The very thought of it galled him. W’soran had never been a strong man, but he

reckoned that only one man in all of Nehekhara had ever rivalled him in matters of

intellect. He was not accustomed to the notion of failure where his studies were

concerned.

A glassy-eyed scribe shuffled up to him, holding out the transcript of the

evening’s ritual. W’soran snatched the papyrus from the thrall’s hand and compared

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it to the invocations that Nagash had written in the yellowing tome open on the table

before him. His lips pulled back in a snarl at the scribe’s atrocious handiwork. The

thralls made terrible assistants unless the lightest amount of pressure was brought to

bear on their minds, but W’soran had little patience for such foolishness. He would

have preferred the steady, tireless hand of a skeletal servant, and once again cursed

Neferata’s edict forbidding such creations. She was little better than her dead

husband: ambitious, but too timid to make use of the tremendous power that lay in

their hands. The specific tomes that governed the creation of the undead were locked

away in another vault, along with Arkhan’s notes on the transformation ritual he had

used on Neferata. There they would remain until the end of time, if she were allowed

to have her way.

“Stupid, moon-eyed bitch!” he muttered, smoothing out the papyrus next to the

ancient page and reaching for an ink brush.

“The evening’s work didn’t go well, I take it?”

W’soran whirled, hands clenching into claws. Fleshless lips drew back, revealing

long, needle-like fangs. He didn’t recognise the bland features of the man standing

just inside the doorway of the sanctum, but he knew the voice all too well.

“Ushoran!” he exclaimed. “How did you get in here?”

Lord Ushoran gave the skeletal W’soran a ghostly smile. “The door was unlocked

long ago,” he said. “You requested it, in fact.”

“Don’t be impertinent!” W’soran snapped. “You’re not allowed here! If Neferata

knew—”

Ushoran’s smile turned cold. “If she knew I was here, she’d no doubt be angry.

I’ll give you that. But that would be nothing compared to how furious she’d be if she

knew what you were really up to.”

W’soran’s anger vanished in an instant. “What are you talking about?” he said,

suddenly wary.

Ushoran sighed. “You’ve been summoning and binding spirits for a quarter of a

century. Do you mean to tell me that you haven’t figured out how to do it yet?”

“Certainly not!” W’soran snapped. “I mastered the art of summoning years ago!”

“Then I have to assume you’re in here, night after night, not because you’re still

learning how to call up spirits—but because you’re trying to call up a very specific

spirit instead.”

W’soran cursed himself for a fool. Ushoran had led him right into the trap, and

he’d never seen it coming. He affected a sneer, hoping it would hide his unease.

“What of it? Do you think Neferata would care if I was summoning one particular

spirit over another?”

“Oh, yes,” Ushoran said. “She most definitely would—if the spirit in question

was Nagash.”

W’soran froze. How had he been found out? For a wild instant, he wondered if he

were capable of killing Ushoran and disposing of the body. The Lord of Masks

would often disappear for weeks, even months at a time. No one would notice his

absence for a long while.

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He slowly turned back to the table and began casually searching through the pile

for another one of Nagash’s books. There were offensive spells inside that would turn

Ushoran to a blackened husk in seconds.

“How did you find out?” W’soran said, hoping to keep Ushoran distracted.

The nobleman gave a snort. “It’s my business to know things,” he replied

casually. “What I don’t understand is why.”

“Why else?” W’soran exclaimed. “Because we should have crushed the other

cities long ago and built a new empire on their bones! The whole world is ours for

the taking, and yet Neferata is content to hide behind her descendants and rule over a

city of merchants! She might have had potential once, but killing that fool Khalida

broke her nerve.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Look at this foolishness with the

Rasetran boy. Pure idiocy.”

“And how will summoning Nagash’s spirit help us?”

The spell-book forgotten, W’soran whirled on Ushoran. “Think of the knowledge

he possessed! He was the only man in the world I would have called my equal. To

this day I curse the fates that I was born too late to have journeyed to Khemri and

served him!” He spread his hands, taking in the entirety of the room and its shelves

of arcane tomes. “With the knowledge at my command I could bind even a spirit as

powerful as his to serve me.” He smiled a death’s head smile. “And then the world

would truly change, Lord Ushoran. You may be assured of that!”

Ushoran was silent for a moment, his bland eyes regarding W’soran inscrutably.

“You’ve been at this a quarter of a century,” he said at last. “Why haven’t you been

able to summon him yet?”

The answer stuck in W’soran’s throat. It took an effort of will to get it out.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“How is that possible?” Ushoran asked.

W’soran turned back to the tome. “It’s not difficult to summon a spirit in

general,” he said, searching through the pages once more. “The breaking of the

covenant with the gods resulted in countless numbers of dead souls trapped between

the world of the living and the lands of the dead; they wander in a kind of wasteland

between the two, desperate for rest.” Suddenly he found the page he’d been seeking.

He narrowed his eyes and quickly read over the incantation.

“Summoning a specific spirit is more challenging,” he continued, absently. His

fingers traced the necromantic writing on the fragile page. “One must possess a

means of focusing the spell on that one spirit in particular.”

“Can’t you just call the spirit by name?” Ushoran asked.

W’soran paused. He’d always taken the Lord of Masks for a dilettante. Perhaps

there was more to him than met the eye. “I suspected the same thing at first,” he

continued. “But either the name doesn’t provide a strong enough connection, or the

rituals I have to work with aren’t as effective as they need to be.”

“All right,” Ushoran said. “For the sake of argument, what would provide a

stronger connection to the spirit?”

W’soran gave a bitter bark of laughter. “A piece of his body would suffice.

Failing that, perhaps a piece of a close family member, like his father.”

“Or his brother?”

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W’soran paused. Slowly he turned to regard the Lord of Masks.

“Nagash’s brother is entombed in a crypt outside Khemri,” W’soran said.

The Lord of Masks smiled and gave an offhanded shrug. “That’s not so great an

obstacle as you might think.”

Now he had W’soran’s undivided attention. “You could do this?”

“If I put the right amount of gold into the right hands… yes, it’s possible.”

Was this a trap? W’soran could not be sure. Temptation warred with his sense of

preservation. Finally, he concluded that Ushoran already had more than enough to

involve Neferata already. He didn’t especially need anything more.

“Why would you do this?” W’soran asked.

The Lord of Masks gave another shrug. His expression was unreadable.

“As it stands right now, we’re all hostages to fate,” he said. “Neferata has seen to

it that our fortunes are inextricably tied to her own. That can’t be allowed to

continue. We need to find a way to level the field against her before this affair with

young Alcadizzar drags us all to our doom.” He regarded W’soran intently. “Just be

certain you have the means to control what you call up, sorcerer, or Neferata may

well turn out to be the least of our problems.”

Nagashizzar, in the 98th year of Ptra the Glorious

(-1325 Imperial Reckoning)

At first, the Children of the Horned God responded swiftly to the reports of god-stone

buried beneath the great mountain. Within a year, packs of black-garbed scouts were

pouring from the first, exploratory tunnel and scuttling silently through the lower

tunnels of the fortress. Slowly, warily, they followed the bitter scent of the Horned

God’s spoor until finally they came upon the first of the active mine shafts. What

they discovered in those dimly-lit tunnels sent the first scouts scampering back into

the deeps in terror.

Glowing skeletons, they swore to their pack leaders. Skeletons that swung picks

and hauled away stone, their bones glowing with god-stone dust. The first scouts who

reported this were slain out of hand, for the pack leaders were foul-tempered,

suspicious creatures that reacted poorly when they thought they were being mocked.

The rest were sent back, and warned to return with proof if they valued their mangy

hides.

And so the black-cloaks crept about the mine tunnels, whispering and watching

and waiting for their opportunity. In short order, a trio of tunnel-creepers caught sight

of a skeleton with a smashed foot that could not keep pace with its companions. As

soon as the rest of the work party had disappeared around a bend in the tunnel the

ratmen swarmed over the crippled thing. Knives flashed and teeth snapped; within

seconds the skeleton had been expertly dismantled. The scouts smashed the thing’s

skull with a rock for good measure, then stuffed the glowing long bones into their

packs and scuttled back into the darkness.

By the end of the day the bones had been snatched from the paws of the lowly

scouts and were personally rushed back to the Great City by the pack leaders

themselves. The sight of the bones stunned the Grey Seers, who by virtue of their

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own self-interest were knowledgeable themselves in the mining of god-stone. The

bones were ground to powder and mixed with various potions to determine their

potency. The results surpassed their wildest expectations. Even assuming that the

scouts were wildly exaggerating their reports, the amount of dust found upon the

bones hinted at deposits of god-stone beyond anything the Children of the Horned

God had ever seen before. At once, the seers knew that the news had to be kept secret

from the Council of Thirteen at all costs until they could determine the best way to

exploit it. The pack leaders who had brought the bones to the Great City were

rewarded with goblets of poisoned wine, and all records of their testimony were

destroyed, but by that point it was already too late. A dozen spies had already drafted

coded messages detailing the discovery to their masters on the council.

The Council of Thirteen was the ruling body of the skaven, as the ratmen called

themselves, and was comprised of the twelve mightiest lords of their subterranean

empire. The thirteenth seat was a symbolic one, reserved for the Horned God himself.

The coded messages sped by magical means to the far corners of the empire, and

within days there were tangled intrigues afoot as the council members schemed to

seize the mountain’s riches for their own. Alliances were forged and subsequently

betrayed; bribes and counter-bribes changed hands, and acts of assassination and

sabotage abounded.

The great lords assembled expeditionary forces and hastily rushed them to the

mountain, only to have them collide en route and decimate one another in an

escalating series of ambushes and ruthless hit-and-run raids before ever reaching

their destination. This went on for twenty-five years before the members of the

council surrendered to reason and called for a gathering in the Great City to

determine who had the best claim to the mountain’s riches.

Of course, every lord had the best, most compelling claim. Many even had

elaborately forged documents to prove it. Finally, the Seerlord, who was chief among

the skaven’s grey seers and a member of the council himself, came forward and

explained in no uncertain terms how they had received signs from the Horned God

that had led them to the mountain, and that the riches buried there belonged to the

skaven as a whole rather than any one clan. He concluded his tirade with the very

persuasive notion that every day they argued gave the skeletons more time to seize

the stone for themselves.

That served to focus the council’s attention. Within three more months, after

another furious round of politicking, intriguing, bribing and assassinating, the skaven

lords had agreed to an elaborate and complicated alliance of clans. Another

expeditionary force was assembled, this time comprising warriors from all the great

clans and their vassals, and a warlord appointed who would ultimately answer to the

council as a whole. According to the terms of the alliance, every last piece of god-

stone recovered from the mountain would become the property of the council, and

would be shared evenly among the clans.

It was all a bunch of high-handed nonsense of course. Not one of the council

members had the slightest intention of sharing such a huge treasure trove, but they

were pragmatic enough to wait until they had the plunder in hand before the

backstabbing began.

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The mighty expeditionary force left the Great City with much fanfare, and Lord

Eekrit, the warlord in command of the force, was urged by the council to return with

his treasures as quickly as possible. The size of the skaven force was huge: equal

contingents from each of the major clans made it the largest army of its kind in their

race’s history. With so powerful a force under Lord Eekrit’s command, the council

members felt certain that the looting of the great mountain would scarcely take more

than a month to complete.

When Lord Eekrit finally arrived in the deeps of Nagash’s mighty fortress, he

was greeted by a small colony of scouts who had mapped out much of the mountain’s

lower tunnels and the routes to each and every mineshaft.

The number of shafts and the estimates of god-stone being pulled from them each

day staggered Lord Eekrit. The wealth buried within the mountain was beyond his

most avaricious dreams. It would take months to haul it all back to the Great City

perhaps even years. The treasure trove tempted him with feverish ambitions. He had

visions of conquering the great mountain and claiming it for himself, ruling from the

deeps like one of the great lords who sat upon the council; there was ample precedent

for such things in his race’s past. But the composition of the army made such an

ambition nearly impossible. He could count on the rats of his own clan (and only then

so far as he could make it worth their while), but the others would turn on him in an

instant. The council had put a great deal of cunning into the creation of the

expeditionary force, ensuring that they wouldn’t be cheated of the treasure. Eekrit

roundly cursed their conniving, black hearts!

At least victory would be swift and certain. His scouts assured him that there

were only a few thousand skeletons working in the mines, and there wasn’t a single

one of them that stood a chance against a pack of stalwart clanrats. Lord Eekrit’s

force was almost fifty thousand strong, not counting the hordes of expendable slaves

he could use to soften up any serious resistance. They would overrun the skeletons,

clear out the lower tunnels, then push into the lower levels and see where all that

precious stone was being taken. Nothing would stand in their way.

The gifts of the Horned God belonged to the skaven, and to them alone.

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DRAMATIS PERSONAE

Lahmia—The City of the Dawn, strange and decadent

Lamashizzar: Priest King of Lahmia

Neferata: Queen of Lahmia

Khalida: a young noblewoman and ward of the royal household

Ubaid: Lamashizzar’s grand vizier

Tephret: most favoured handmaiden of the queen

Aaliyah: handmaiden of the queen

Abhorash: the king’s champion

Ankhat: a wealthy and powerful noble

Ushoran: a wealthy and powerful noble

Zurhas: a dissolute young noble and cousin to the king

Adio: a dissolute minor noble

Khenti: a dissolute minor noble

W’soran: a scholar, formerly of Mahrak

Prince Xian Ha Feng: emissary of the Eastern Empire

Rasetra—Former Khemri colony, now an independent city

Shepret: King of Rasetra

Lybaras—City of Scholars

Khepra: Priest King of Lybaras

Anhur: Prince of Lybaras

Quatar—The White Palace; Guardian of the Valley of Kings

Naeem: Priest King of Quatar

Numas—Breadbasket of the Kingdom

Amunet: Queen of Numas

Zandri—The City of the Waves

Teremun: Priest King of Zandri

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THE NEHEKHARAN PANTHEON

The people of the Blessed Land worship a number of gods and goddesses, both major

and minor, as part of an ancient pact known as the Great Covenant. According to

legend, the Nehekharans first encountered the gods at the site of what is now

Mahrak, the City of Hope; the timeless spirits were moved by the suffering of the

tribes, and gave them succour amid the wasteland of the desert. In return for the

Nehekharans’ eternal worship and devotion, the gods pledged to make them a great

people, and would bless their lands until the end of time.

Each of the great cities of Nehekhara worships one of the great deities as its

patron, though devotion to Ptra, the Great Father, is pre-eminent. The high priest of

a Nehekharan temple is referred to as the Hierophant. In every city but Khemri, the

high priest of Ptra is referred to as the Grand Hierophant.

In addition to the priesthood, each Nehekharan temple trains an order of holy

warriors known as the Ushabti. Each Ushabti devotes his life to the service of his

patron deity, and is granted superhuman abilities in return. These gifts make the

Ushabti among the mightiest warriors in all the Blessed Land. Since the time of

Settra, the first and only Nehekharan emperor, the Ushabti of each city have served

as bodyguards to the priest king and his household.

The fourteen most prominent gods and goddesses of Nehekhara are:

Ptra: Also called the Great Father, Ptra is the first among the gods and the creator

of mankind. Though worshipped all across Nehekhara, the rides of Khemri and

Rasetra claim him as their patron.

Neru: Minor goddess of the moon and wife of Ptra. She protects all Nehekharans

from the evils of the night.

Sakhmet: Minor goddess of the green moon, also called the Green Witch. Ptra’s

scheming and vindictive concubine, who is jealous of the Great Father’s love of

mankind.

Asaph: Goddess of beauty, magic and vengeance. Asaph is the patron goddess of

Lahmia.

Djaf: The jackal-headed god of death. Djaf is the patron god of Quatar.

Khsar: The fierce and malign god of the desert. A cruel and hungry god worshipped

by the tribes of the great desert.

Phakth: The hawk-faced god of the sky and the bringer of swift justice.

Qu’aph: The god of serpents and subtlety. Qu’aph is the patron god of Zandri.

Ualatp: The vulture-headed god of scavengers.

Sokth: The treacherous god of assassins and thieves.

Basth: The goddess of grace and love.

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Geheb: The god of the earth and the giver of strength. Geheb is the patron god of

Ka’Sabar.

Tahoth: The god of knowledge and the keeper of sacred lore. Tahoth is the patron

god of Lybaras.

Usirian: The faceless god of the underworld. Usirian judges the souls of the dead

and determines if they are fit to enter into the afterlife.

THE NEHEKHARAN CALENDAR

The Nehekharan calendar operates on a twelve-year cycle, with each year in the

cycle devoted to one of the major gods in the Nehekharan pantheon. For example, the

62nd year of Qu’aph (-1750 Imperial Reckoning) represents the year of Qu’aph in

the 62nd calendar cycle.

Scanning and basic

proofing by Red Dwarf,

formatting and additional

proofing by Undead.

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