The Conquest of Kiynan

Vanga the Red, Master of House Fury, stood upon the eastern battlement of the Blood Fort. The bright moonlight glinted off the heavy sabres gripped in each of his large, powerful hands. Dressed in boiled leather, dyed red, his eyes a bright, fiery crimson, he was the very picture of rage. Yet, he stood patiently, waiting. Outrage and anger boiled and seethed inside him, threatening to throw him into a berserker fit at any moment. He tightened his grip still further as he gazed across the open fields before the walls where so many foes had died beneath his ferocious blows. Still, he waited.

“There is still time,” a grey figure spoke gently behind the Warlock.

“I have told you Sasha, my House will make its stand here,” he answered heatedly without facing the other magician.

“Master Vanga, this is hopeless,” returned the Necromancer sadly. “House Fury cannot stop the demon tide alone, no single House could hope to do so. Even Master Cadvin himself did not dare to face Daimin’s forces without the support of all the great Houses.”

The Warlock’s head snapped around to face the grey magician with a snarl. His upper lip quivering, Vanga glared into the aging man’s careworn face. It was only with an effort that he restrained himself from cleaving the Necromancer’s head off with a quick swipe of his sword.

“Master Cadvin is long dead, while Daimin lives again,” barked Vanga. “He was a fool, and so are you. You doubt the might of House Fury? We are the warriors of Ornland! We are the fists of Orn the Destroyer! There is no foe we cannot crush. Alone of all the citadels on Ornland, the Blood Fort has never fallen. What difference will the other Houses make in this war? The longer we delay, the stronger Daimin grows. He will create more and more of his foul minions until he becomes unstoppable. If the Warlocks cannot repulse Daimin here and now, all of Ornland is doomed anyway.”

Vanga regarded Sasha coldly, his anger unabated, but once again funnelled away from the Necromancer toward the approaching menace. As he resumed his tirade, the Master of House Fury turned his gaze back to the open fields.

“But fear not old man. We will defeat Daimin here and now. The Conjurer is a fool to move against the Blood Fort so soon after his return. His demons may have been able to crush Lament, but they will be no match for my House.”

“I will be unable to assist you,” Sasha droned. “I have learned from former Master Marhault that the demon spirits that animate the Conjurer’s creatures are sheltered by their physical bodies from my House’s powers to compel them. Moreover, they are unable to sense fear and so again, they are immune to my powers.”

Vanga laughed vociferously.

“I thank you for your warning, oh powerful Necromancer. Somehow, we will have to manage without your support.”

Sasha the Grey stood silently for a moment, watching the impetuous Warlock.

“For the last time, Master Vanga, please order your people to retreat to Castle Malice. My brethren and I are certain that the other Houses will reach it before Daimin can, even without meeting any resistance here.”

“And I’m telling you for the last time, meddlesome old fool, House Fury runs from no foe!” Vanga shot back with a guttural growl.

Sasha shook his head sadly.

“Then, I will see you again in the spirit world.”

“Get out of my sight!” roared the Warlock.

Vanga turned to watch the Necromancer soundlessly hobble away toward a guard tower, still shaking his grey head despondently. The red magician rolled his eyes involuntarily at the morose interloper. Returning his attention to his feelings of wrath, Vanga intensified his emotions. No matter how long it took for the demons to arrive, he must maintain himself on the verge of explosion, so that he would be able to summon his full powers the instant they were needed.

Instead of being concerned for the fate of his people when Sasha the Grey had brought him news of Daimin’s return, Vanga had celebrated. He had been spoiling for a fight, a real battle. He was eager for a bloody victory that would propel his name into the annals of Ornland’s long history. This was the perfect opportunity. He would be known as Master Vanga, the Demon Slayer, who had single-handedly ended Daimin’s quest for vengeance. Retreat to Castle Malice? And allow the other magicians to dilute his glory? Ridiculous. His arteries still pumping lava, Vanga shed his wandering thoughts.

Finally, a mass of dark shapes appeared in the distance moving across the open field with alarming alacrity. The dark mass rushed toward the castle like a flood breaching a dam. As it approached, Vanga could see the mass was made up of hundreds of skivers running with every ounce of their strength. The sound of their clawed feet pelting at the terrain raised a vociferous roar, growing louder with every breath Vanga heaved. Beyond the tide of racing skivers, the Warlock could just make out a steadily advancing horde of skeletal warriors.

The conscripted peasant archers on the walls near Vanga began to loose their arrows upon the encroaching skivers. Their aim was true, but their arrows had no visible effect, glancing harmlessly off the smooth hard skin of the creatures. The foremost hellhounds reached the base of the battlements and leapt onto the walls, their sharp claws digging into the sheer stone surface. The wave of demons crashed against the Fort and fluidly rose along the wall. As one of the skivers approached the top of the battlement near where he stood, Vanga yelled out a gleeful war cry. He screamed as he struck the demonic creature across the torso, and his fellow Warlocks took up the cry, raining blows upon the encroaching beasts. Vanga’s sword was blunted as it collided with and slid harmlessly off of the beast’s slick skin, but the shear force of the blow pushed the creature back. It lashed out with its mid-claws and gnashed its fearsome teeth, but Vanga parried its outstretched limbs with one blade and struck its skeletal neck with the other. A resounding crack was heard and the beast’s mouth was snapped shut. Twice more Vanga struck the beast’s neck with all of his enraged might and finally, it snapped. The monster’s long cruel head plummeted to the ground far below and one final blow to the torso sent the creature’s body after it. Vanga screamed in triumph and rued himself upon the nearest beast.

As he blunted and warped his swords upon his next opponent, Vanga noticed one of the younger Warlocks fighting. He deftly parried three then four of the beast’s claw strikes but could not stop the fifth and the monster’s clawed paw plunged into the man’s stomach. As the man dropped his weapons and keeled over, the beast grabbed the man’s neck in its lethal jaws and lightly tossed the magician over its back. With a ferocious kick, Vanga sent his adversary flying off the wall, legs flailing, and charged the murderous skiver that had killed his disciple. His muscles bulged as his strength increased, his House’s magic power being fuelled by his mounting fury. A thin stream of foaming spittle streamed from the corner of his mouth as he roared his deafening battle cry again. Dropping his broken swords, he leaped into the air. He caught the creature’s head in one hand on his way down and slammed it into the stone of the battlement with his full momentum. The stone cracked with the force of the impact, and the skiver’s head splintered, its body limp. Vanga was instantly on his feet again, his might growing with the intensity of the fighting. He charged toward the wall’s edge, slammed his shoulder into another beast and sent it flying over the side. Without a moment of hesitation, he spun on his heel, put his fists together and slammed them upon another creature’s back with his full might. The skiver’s spine shattered under the fearsome blow, and it collapsed motionless to the battlement. Two more skivers charged the incensed Warlock, sharp claws flailing in all directions. Vanga ducked under a swinging claw and grabbed one of the skivers by its spindly neck, squeezing until the stone-hard bone began to crack. The other skiver’s claws found purchase in Vanga’s right thigh, digging through tough muscle. Unaffected, the Warlock grabbed one of the monster’s limbs and snapped it in two with his free hand. The beast leapt back, its mouth opened wide in a mute cry of anguish. The first skiver struck with all its claws at the arm destroying its neck. The razor-sharp talons dug into Vanga’s left shoulder, tearing into his tendons. With blood streaming down his arm, the fighter grabbed the fiend with both hands and hurled it into the second skiver, sending both toppling off the battlement.

With his rage radiating off him like heat, Vanga looked around to survey the state of the battle. Skivers were swarming over the battlement, crawling off the walls, surrounding and overwhelming every Warlock. Most of the peasant conscripts lay in broken, shredded bundles. Looking back toward the field, Vanga’s unbridled rage was suddenly cooled by unexpected fear. The skeletal soldiers now occupied the entire field, and continued their stalwart advance toward the castle. The skeletons were little more than rotting bones, black and sickly yellow, held together by nothing but the rancorous spirits within them. They carried a variety of damaged and archaic weapons, and were clothed with fragments of mildewed cloth and rusted armour. Innumerable insects crawled over the creatures and buzzed about them. It was not the appearance of these warriors that worried Vanga, but the sheer number of them. As they reached the foot of the Blood Fort’s wall, they stretched as far as Vanga could see, thousands of unflinching demon shock troops. Above the horde, the sky was beginning to fill with dozens of winged demons, still too distant to make out clearly. Suddenly, Vanga noticed a lumbering mass making its way through the ranks of skeletons to the bottom of the castle wall.

The creature had long muscular legs with wide feet, and a thick flat tail trailing behind it. It had no head, and three arms stretched from the front of the creature, with long clawed fingers. It had broad shoulders from which jutted a long bony protrusion. Three imps stood on the creature’s shoulders, holding on to the jutting bone as the creature swayed as it moved along. No taller than a man’s knee, the imps were bony creatures, with long spindly arms and legs. Their heads were broad and flattened, nearly the width of their scrawny shoulders. As the tall headless creature neared the foot of the wall, the imps pulled backwards on the bones in near perfect unison. The lumbering creature stopped moving at once and extended its arms upwards. As it did so, its chest moved outward and unfolded more of itself, extending the creature’s body to the height of the wall. The three-clawed hands grasped on to the top of the rampart and dug its nails into the stone. Vanga watched transfixed as skeletons ran up the creatures tail, onto its sloped back and climbed toward the top of the castle wall. An instant later, several more clawed hands clung to the wall as more of the tall creatures moved into position.

Scavenging a blade from a fallen Warlock, the Master rushed to the nearest clawed hand and hacked at it with all his might. The creature’s hand did little more than twitch as he chopped at it, and after several moments, he managed to hack its fingers off. As the ruined hand fell away from the wall, the creature’s side sagged and twisted, sending the dozen skeletons climbing on that side tumbling to the ground in a broken heap of corrupted bones.

As Vanga turned to attack the next hand, he faced an enormous skeleton wielding a massive bastard sword. The skeletal fighter towered over the Warlock and stared at him with its empty sockets. Bits of rotted, dried flesh clung to its hideous visage. A pair of fat cockroaches scurried out of its gaping mouth, across its face and into its right eye socket. It gnashed its nearly toothless jaw as it swung its cracked sword at Vanga’s head. The magician easily dodged the mighty blow and slammed his fist into the creature’s chest. His fist broke through the dry ribcage, sending bone fragments flying. The monster seemed unaffected as it backhanded Vanga with its bony fist, sending him stumbling. The Warlock recovered quickly and again dodged the fiend’s attack, breaking its right leg with a strong kick. The skeleton collapsed, losing its grip on its weapon.

Hundreds of skeletons were now climbing onto the rampart, attacking with a tireless ferocity. Suddenly, a guttural howling washed over the combatants, chilling the surviving Warlocks to the bone. Looking up, Vanga saw the winged demons descending upon the battlement, howling a sickening low-pitched war song. Despair filled the mighty warrior and he felt his strength leave him as his rage subsided. Skeletons surrounded him, their mocking, fleshless faces leering at him cruelly. Tiny biting insects seemed to be everywhere. With a desperate cry, Vanga threw himself into the army of skeletons, thrashing blindly. Two or three warriors were shattered by his mighty fists before he was run through by a rusted spear. Stumbling in a state of shock, he looked down upon the broken shaft protruding from his abdomen. As he stumbled, a skeleton came at him brandishing a club. As his bony adversary swung at his head, the motion seemed to slow and Vanga watched the approaching blow as though mesmerized.

“I’m dying,” he thought, “my disciples are dying. House Fury is defeated; the Blood Fort is lost… Yet, my mind still functions. I am still drawing breath! When I die here, it will be under a mountain of my foes!”

A renewed surge of fury exploded inside him, he felt his blood double its pace, and his muscles bulge and tighten. The demon’s club smashed into Vanga’s head and splintered, while Vanga felt nothing. With a single enraged punch, he shattered the skeleton into a dozen pieces. He ripped the spear from his body with an abrupt motion and smashed it against a skiver’s head. He could feel blood streaming down his leg, but it did not matter now. He screamed as he destroyed another skeletal warrior with his fist. A skiver leapt onto his back digging its claws into his sides and stabbing him repeatedly in the back. He reached behind his head to grab the creature, and it slammed its jaws on his hand. Screaming with mingled rage and pain, Vanga closed his hand around the creature’s jaw, the sharp teeth cutting through his palm. He pulled the demon over his head, ripping its claws from his skin and swung it against a skeleton charging him with a sickle. There was a loud crunch as the skiver’s body crashed into the creature. Vanga spun the skiver around himself in a wide circle, mowing down three more skeletons. With its jaws still clamped on his hand, Vanga dropped to one knee and slammed the creature into the battlement. He lifted his hand and repeated the motion twice more before the beast released its grip. Grabbing the broken skiver with both hands, the Warlock jumped to his feet and hurled the creature off the battlement, sending it plunging into the roiling mass of demons below. One of the towering winged demons landed next to Vanga, the rush of air knocking him backward. The bleeding Warlock looked up at the massive beast. More than half his height over again, the creature was bulging with skinless muscle. Its head was long and bony, resembling a horse’s skull. It shrieked a guttural howl at him and smashed him with one of its four enormous fists. Vanga was lifted into the air and came crashing down upon a pair of human corpses. Two skeletons immediately fell upon him, stabbing a sword through his ribs and a spear through his thigh. He brought the creatures down with a powerful sweep of his leg, and struggled to his feet. Although his rage continued to grow, he could feel his strength fading. He had just long enough to spit out a glob of blood before another skiver sank its teeth into his leg and the giant winged demon approached him. It grabbed him by his head, lifting him until the skiver was dangling by its deadly jaws. Vanga punched the imprisoning hand ineffectively. With a mighty heave, the stubborn Warlock was thrown from the battlement while he screamed defiantly with his last breath.

As he plummeted, Vanga saw with his failing eyes bright flames spreading across his beloved stronghold. As his vision faded to darkness, his mind formulated its last, despaired thought:

“They are unstoppable… unstoppable…”