The End Times: The Return of Nagash

‘Treachery,’ Mannfred intoned grandiloquently. ‘Treachery most vile.’

‘Which treachery are we speaking of – yours, or mine?’ Arkhan asked, not bothering to look at the vampire. Mannfred glared at the liche’s back. The two stood at the top of Castle Sternieste’s tallest tower. Arkhan had arrived a few days before Mannfred, and had awaited his return at the tower’s pinnacle, as if in anticipation of a confrontation. Mannfred saw no reason to deny him such, if that was his wish.

Despite the fact that they had both been victorious in their respective endeavours, and that both Alakanash and the Fellblade were now in their possession, Mannfred saw little reason for celebration. Neither, apparently, did Arkhan. Mannfred wondered whether the liche was even capable of such an emotion.

On the ride back through the Border Princes, Mannfred had managed to half convince himself that Arkhan had somehow encouraged Markos’s failed coup. He hadn’t thought the liche would actually admit it, but he’d hoped to see some sign of concern. Instead Arkhan had seemed almost… relieved? He wondered what had happened on Arkhan’s campaign in Bretonnia. The vampires who had ridden with the liche spoke of a rain-lashed battle on the Lieske Road with a herd of beastmen, and an attack by the fierce elves of Athel Loren, which had seen the loss of Krell. Whether the ancient wight had truly been destroyed, or merely separated from his master for the moment, Arkhan had not seen fit to share. Mannfred shoved the thought aside. ‘Yours is the only treachery I see, liche,’ he snarled.

‘Then you are as wilfully blind as you are ignorant, vampire.’ Arkhan glanced over his shoulder. ‘Your assassin failed.’ Mannfred let no sign of his annoyance show on his face. Elize had sworn to him that her pets could accomplish the task he’d set for them, but they’d failed. Anark was dead, and the Crowfiend had either thrown in with Arkhan or chosen discretion over valour. If it was the latter, Mannfred found it hard to blame him. If it was the former, he fully expected Elize to deal with it before he next saw her.

‘As did yours,’ Mannfred hissed. Arkhan didn’t react. Mannfred glared at the fleshless face, and wondered what he had expected. Denial, perhaps, or denunciation. That was how a vampire would have reacted. Instead, the liche simply turned away. Mannfred shook his head, frustrated. ‘And I am not speaking of overly ambitious underlings, in any event, as you well know.’

‘Illuminate me then, I beseech you.’

Arkhan stared out at the horizon, his fleshless hands clasped behind his back. He stood at the edge of the crumbling battlement, at his ease and seemingly unconcerned. Mannfred’s hands twitched, and he considered unleashing a spell to send the liche tumbling from the tower like a skeletal comet. But he restrained himself. If Arkhan wanted to play the fool, fine. He would treat him as such.

‘The protective spells I wove about my land are failing,’ he ground out. ‘You told me that losing one of the nine would have no effect.’ Elize had reported as much to him as soon as his mount clattered into the courtyard of Sternieste. She had practically flown to his side to warn him that the omnipresent clouds that swirled overhead, blanketing his kingdom, had grown thin in places. The cursed light of day was returning to Sylvania. Slowly, but it was returning. And when it had, so too would come the zealous priests and fanatical witch hunters, to harry his subjects and tear asunder all that he had worked so hard to build. Worse, Gelt’s wall of faith still stood as strong as it ever had, and showed no sign of failing.

‘I told you that it would have negligible effect. And such is the case. Your enchantments still hold – the sun is kept at bay and your empire of eternal night yet stands. Rejoice,’ Arkhan said. Mannfred snapped at the air unconsciously, like a dog provoked beyond endurance.