Something nagged at him. Something was wrong. The stag just stood there, watching him. It should have bounded away, darting back into the cover of the trees.
Sevekai reached down gingerly and pulled a second dagger from his belt. A blade in each hand, he slunk a little closer, keeping as low and silent as possible.
He needn’t have bothered. The stag stayed where it was, perfectly aware of his presence. Two black, deeply liquid eyes regarded him steadily. Its ribcage shivered as it breathed.
What are you waiting for?
Sevekai paused. Everything felt disconnected, as if he was in a dream. He sniffed. He picked up no taint of Dhar, but then he hardly had Drutheira’s facility for sensing it.
A few more steps and he was into throwing range. He hesitated for a moment longer, perturbed by the creature’s lack of movement.
Something is wrong.
Then, sharp as a snake-strike, he threw. The first dagger went cartwheeling through the air before thunking heavily into the beast’s shoulder. The stag buckled, baying, and at last kicked free of the briars.
By then Sevekai was already moving. One hand loosed the second dagger, the other reached for a third. Every throw was perfectly aimed: one after the other, the long steel blades bit deep, carving through the beast’s hide.
The stag managed to stagger on for a few more yards before tripping over its buckling legs and collapsing heavily to the ground. Sevekai caught up with it, grabbing it by its shaggy nape and using the last of his blades to slit its throat. He pulled the knife across its flesh viciously and a jet of hot, wine-dark blood gushed out, drenching his clothes.
The smell of it intoxicated him. He grew dizzy, both from the exertion and from the thick, viscous musk enveloping him. He reeled, falling down against the animal’s heaving shoulders.
Blood splashed against his chin. Almost unconsciously, he sucked greedily on it. As soon as the hot liquor passed his lips he felt a sudden swell of energy. He plunged forwards, cupping his hands under the torrent and gulping more blood down.
The thick, earthy taste of it made his vision swim, but he kept going — it felt as if life were flowing into his limbs again, heating him, strengthening him. He drank and drank, tearing at the wound’s edge with his teeth, gnawing at the raw flesh in his famishment.
He did not stop until the flow had slowed to a dribble and the stag’s eyes had gone glassy. Then he pulled free, his hands shaking again, chin sticky with residue.
He felt nauseous. He sank down on his haunches and stared about him. The empty land gazed back, still scoured by the wind, still as broken and grey-edged as it had been. In the distance loomed the Arluii, a wall of solid darkness against the low sky. Behind him, the land fell away into the bosom of the gathering woodland.
It took a long time for his breathing to return to normal. Practical thoughts began to enter his head — to make a fire, to butcher the carcass, to preserve more for later, to clean the blades.
He did none of those things. He just sat, his face and hands as bloody as Khaine’s. Something like vitality had returned, though it was bitter and hard to absorb.
The blood of the land.
He didn’t know where those words came from. They entered his head unbidden, just as so much had entered his head unbidden since the fall.
Now you have drunk the blood of the land.
He began to shiver again, and wondered if some of the poison from his blades had got into the stag’s bloodstream. His stomach began to cramp, and he curled over, coiled up next to the corpse of the stag in a bizarrely tender embrace. A curtain of shadow fell across his eyes. The shaking got worse. He tried to still his teeth’s chattering, and failed.
So cold.
His eyes fluttered closed, his fists balled, his neck-cords strained. Cradled amid the limbs of the beast he had killed, Sevekai screamed. Then he screamed again.
It was hard to tell how long the screaming lasted. He nearly blacked out from it, but when the spasms finally eased he found he could lift his head. Lines of saliva hung, trembling, from his bloody chin.
Ahead of him, no more than ten paces distant, a crow was perched on a briar. It stared at him just as the stag had done, eerily unmoving.
Sevekai looked at it for a long time. Then, without quite knowing why, he held up his hand. The crow flapped across, alighting on his wrist and digging its talons in.
‘Well met, crow,’ said Sevekai, his voice cracked and hoarse. It sounded like someone else’s.
The crow nodded its sleek head. Then, unconcerned, it began to preen.
Sevekai got to his feet. His head was light but the worst of the blood-agony had passed. He stood for a while, looking down into the valley, holding the crow like a falconer holds his hunting-bird.
For the first time, perhaps, in many years, something like certainty descended over him.
‘It has changed,’ he said, surprising himself. ‘Blood of Khaine, everything has changed.’
Chapter Eleven
The chamber was dark, lit only by a few wall-mounted candles. Four bare walls enclosed an empty stone floor, a single door served as entrance and exit, and there were no windows.
Liandra waited impatiently. It was hard to resist the urge to pace up and down, like some prisoner in a cell. It wasn’t just her current surroundings; ever since arriving at Tor Alessi she had felt confined. The huge city bore down on her, shutting her in, cramping her movement. Every so often she had fled the walls for a short time, taking Vranesh out on the sudden, vigorous flights the dragon loved. They had circled high up, going as far east as they dared, hoping against hope to see the first glimpse of the dwarf army marching through the forest.
But she could not always be on the wing. Membership of the Council brought duties with it: fresh troops arriving at the harbourside every day, and every shipful needing to be garrisoned and supplied.
It had initially been exhilarating to see the huge strength of the asur legions being landed at Tor Alessi. It had felt for a time as if the real power she had craved for so long had finally fallen into her lap.
That feeling had not lasted. She was not in command, not truly; Imladrik gave the orders, locked away in his isolated tower overlooking the sea, taking no advice and heeding no requests for fresh Council meetings. The enormous strength at his disposal was kept behind the walls. No armies were sent out into the wilds. No regiments were spared for outlying fortresses such as her own Kor Vanaeth.
For a long time she had held her tongue, biding her time. Surely, she reasoned, Imladrik would come to her. As the long days passed, however, it became clear that he would not.
Liandra had almost gone to the tower herself. She had walked halfway there, rehearsing what arguments she would make to him.
‘Kor Vanaeth can be defended,’ she had planned to say. ‘Give leave for two regiments, that is all — two regiments and a battery of bolt throwers. The rest I can manage.’
She had never made it. As she had walked, her pride had got the better of her. Liandra had never begged, not even to him. Her father, still in Ulthuan fighting the druchii, had taught her that. If Imladrik had softened and turned away from the sacred savagery of his calling, then that was his loss; she would play no part in it.
Since then she had made no fresh attempt to contact him. She had festered, her frustration with enforced inaction growing with every wasted day. At times it felt like her heart was hammering at her ribcage, inflamed by imprisonment.
If he had not come back we would be marching by now, she thought, watching the candles burn low. If he had not come back, the battles would have started.