Memories of Ice

Deceit! They are not mortal beasts! How dare they assail my defences! Here, at the very gates! And now the T'lan Imass has vanished — I can find him nowhere! Does he come as well?

So be it. They shall not find you. We journey, the three of us. North, far beyond their reach. I have prepared another. nest for you two.

The inconvenience.

But Toc no longer heard him. His mind had been snatched away. He saw brittle white sunlight, a painful glare shimmering from ice-clad mountains and valleys buried in rivers of snow. In the sky, wheeling condors. And then, far more immediate, there was smoke, wooden structures shattered, stone walls tumbled. Figures running, screaming. Crimson spattering the snow, filling the milky puddles of a gravel road.

The point of view — eyes that saw through a red haze — shifted, swung to one side. A mottled black and grey hound kept pace, shoulders at eye level to the armoured figures it was tearing into with blurred savagery. The creature was driving towards a second set of gates, an arched portal at the base of a towering fortress. None could stand before it, none could slow its momentum.

Grey dust swirled from the hound's shoulders. Swirled. Spun, twisted into arms, legs gripping the creature's flanks, a bone-helmed head, torn fur a ragged wing behind it. Raised high, a rippled sword the colour of old blood.

His bones are well, his flesh is not. My flesh is well, my bones are not. Are we brothers?

Hound and rider — nightmare vision — struck the huge, iron-banded gates.

Wood exploded. In the archway's gloom, terror plunged among a reeling knot of Seerdomin.

Loping towards the breached portal, Toc rode his wolf's vision, saw into the shadows, where huge, reptilian shapes stepped into view to either side of the hound and its undead rider.

The K'ell Hunters raised their broad blades.

Snarling, the wolf sprinted. His focus was the gate, every detail there sharp as broken glass whilst all that lay to either side blurred. A shift of weight brought him to the Ke'll Hunter closing from the hound and rider's left.

The creature pivoted, sword slashing to intercept his charge.

The wolf ducked beneath it, then surged upward, jaws wide. Leathery throat filled his mouth. His canines sank deep into lifeless flesh. Jaw muscles bunched. Bone cracked, then crumbled as the wolf inexorably closed its vice-grip, even as the momentum of his charge drove the K'ell Hunter back onto its tail, crashing against a wall that shuddered with the impact. Upper and lower canines met. Jagged molars ground together, slicing through wood-like tendon and dry muscle.

The wolf was severing the head from the body.

The K'Chain Che'Malle shook beneath him, spasmed. A flailing blade sliced into the wolf's right haunch.

Toc and beast flinched at the pain, yet did not relent.

The ornately helmed head fell back, away, thumped as it struck the slush-covered cobbles.

Snarling, lifeless shreds snagged on his teeth, the wolf spun round.

The hound crouched, spine hunched, in a corner of the archway. Blood poured from it. Alone, to battle its wounds.

The undead swordsman- my brother — was on his leather-wrapped feet now, his flint sword trading blows with the other K'ell Hunter's twin blades. At speeds unimaginable. Chunks of the K'Chain Che'Malle flew. A sword-bound forearm spun end over end to land near the flinching hound.

The K'ell Hunter lurched back in the face of the onslaught. Shin-bones snapped with a brittle report. The huge creature fell over, spraying slush out to all sides.

The undead warrior clambered onto it, systematically swinging his sword to dismember the K'Chain Che'Malle. It was a task swiftly completed.

The wolf approached the wounded hound. The animal snapped a warning to stay away-

Toc was suddenly blind, ripped away from the wolf's vision.

Bitter winds tore at him, but the Matron held him tight. On the move. Swiftly. They travelled a warren, a path of riven ice. They were, he realized, fleeing Outlook, fleeing the fortress that had just been breached.

By Baaljagg. And Garath and Tool. Garath — those wounds-

'Silence!' a voice shrieked.

The Seer was with them, leading the way through Omtose Phellack.

The gift of clarity remained in Toc's mind. His laugh was a ragged gurgle.

'Shut up!'

The entire warren shook to distant thunder, the sound of vast ice … cracking, exploding in a conflagration of sorcery.

Lady Envy. With us once more-

The Seer screamed.