Engines of the Apocalypse

twitching, dismembered body parts by axe and cleaver and scythe.

The carnage did not last long but it gave Slowhand and Fitch enough time to overtake the horde and burst from the tunnel, the archer shouting warnings. But the distribution centre had already been alerted by the workers' screams, and the cathedral's cloister bells were sounding a security breach.

Guards were pouring from the sublevel's barracks to take up position before the tunnel. Slowhand bundled Fitch behind their lines, amazed that he had started the day intending to kill the man and was now getting him to safety.

'Arrest this man,' Fitch ordered, intercepting two of the guards. 'He tried to kill me.'

The guards stared at Fitch questioningly.

'The First Enemy moves. For all we know he is in league with him.'

The guards faces paled at the mention of the name, but they nodded and seized Slowhand by the arms. The archer glared — that was what you got for being the good guy.

'Fitch, don't be a fool,' he pleaded. 'I don't know what's going on here but let me help.'

'Take him,' Fitch ordered, and headed for safety.

'Dammit, Fitch! Can't you see this is about more than just saving your skin!'

Slowhand's protests fell on deaf ears as the horde continued to pour from the mouth of the tunnel. The guard commander hesitated for a moment before barking orders to his men. Crossbows were loosed and fifty or more quarrels slammed into the front ranks of the horde, the archers reloading instantly to despatch a second volley. By their sheer weight of numbers the quarrels slowed the horde more than Slowhand's arrows had, but they were as ultimately ineffective at stopping them and, despite a third volley, the horde gained ground into the sublevel itself.

Ordering his crossbow men to continue firing at will, the guard commander turned to a number of robed figures who had hastily shuffled into position at the rear of the line, and with a downward sweep of his arm instructed them to deploy their defences.

Nothing happened, for the figures were shadowmages, and the magic here, too, was gone. A wave of desperation crossed the guard commander's face and, despite his evident fear, he changed tactics, breaking forward from the line and unsheathing his sword, ordering his men to follow and do the same.

It was a mistake and a massacre. Only Slowhand and Fitch had so far witnessed how the horde behaved in close combat, and it hadn't just been the utter lack of mercy with which they had mutilated the tunnel workers, it had been the way they had done so with no regard to mutilation to themselves. They didn't care, didn't feel anything, and the only way to stop them was utter dismemberment.

The cathedral guards didn't get the chance. As they ploughed on, swords raised, into the front of the horde, the grey-fleshed intruders responded in kind, their makeshift weapons all the more deadly because of the suicidal way in which they were wielded. The guard commander and first wave of his men were bloodily felled without claiming a single foe, and even those who miraculously survived the sweeping attacks died horribly moments later, torn apart. More guards joined the fray and the horde began to slaughter these, too, fighting in eerie, absolute silence. The only noise was the wet sound of butchery, and the desperate cries and screams of the dying.

'Stop!' A voice commanded suddenly.

Slowhand glanced towards its source and saw that reinforcements had arrived, summoned from the upper levels by the tolling of the cloister bells. The Anointed Lord herself — Katherine Makennon — stood at their fore.

The archer drew a sharp intake of breath. He hadn't forgotten how striking Katherine Makennon could be, but as the Anointed Lord strode towards the tunnel, shoulder to shoulder with her men, his thoughts were not on the way her shining armour accentuated rather than hid her statuesque form, nor on the feral mane of long red hair that swept behind her like a fiery comet's tail. All he could think was that, for once, she might be biting off more than she could chew.

'Makennon, don't,' he implored her as she passed. His words were barely heard above the clanking of her armour. 'I don't know what these things are but I'm not sure they can be stopped.'

The Anointed Lord halted briefly, her face a mix of recognition and curiosity at the archer's presence, swiftly replaced with cast-iron determination. 'I will stop them. This is my cathedral.'

Slowhand struggled against the guards as Makennon strode on, but their grip was firm. All he could do was watch as the Anointed Lord marched at the horde, her battleaxe swinging down before her with an audible swoosh. Scholten might well have been her cathedral but for the moment at least she was no longer its Anointed Lord, reincarnated instead as the battle-hardened Vossian general she had once been.

Makennon directed her men to the peripheries of the horde and then, roaring, waded into the heart of them, battleaxe carving a path as the invaders' weapons sparked and clanged on her armour. While it looked as though she was wielding the heavy weapon with as much carelessness as the enemy were wielding theirs, it was in fact with great precision. Its twin blades bypassed, by hairsbreadths, her own people fighting beside her, cleaving only into the things that flailed about them. The horde might have been unaffected by damage from lesser weapons but the sheer mass of Makennon's axe, to say nothing of the expertise with which it was used, was something they could not withstand. Within seconds she had reduced their numbers by twenty or more. As damaging as Makennon's incursion was, though, the numbers involved were great, and as more guards fell beside her it was clear she faced a war of attrition with an inevitable conclusion. This did not deter Makennon from continuing her impassioned defence of her domain, however, and while she shouted for what few men remained to pull back to a safer position, she herself continued to wade forward until she had carved a sea of body parts that reached almost to the tunnel entrance. There, fatigue at last started to get the better of her, and she was forced to stand her ground. Breathing heavily and slightly bowed, her blood-slicked hands nevertheless levelled her axe before her, ready to swing it in a circle and cut down any or all of the horde who closed in about her.

But the horde did not close in. Instead, as one, they collapsed to the ground.

Slowhand's surprise was as great as the Anointed Lord's, but their interpretations of the unexpected development differed. Obviously concluding her efforts had somehow won the day, Makennon's heavy breaths turned into shuddering gasps of relief, and slowly she raised her gaze to him, displaying flaring and victorious eyes. The archer was considerably more wary. Puppets, Fitch had called these things, and if that was the case their strings had just been cut. But he seriously doubted that, with such an advantage, this First Enemy — whoever he was — would have cut them in defeat.

Something was wrong.

Every one of the horde that remained intact began, slowly, to laugh. They didn't stir from where they had collapsed, and their faces showed no more emotion than they had before, but from each of their upturned, gaping, black mouths came the sound of laughter. It was a cold and calculating laugh that echoed throughout the now otherwise still battlefield, and it seemed to come from very far away.

Makennon turned in a circle, her eyes on the collapsed forms, her axe ready to be wielded once more. And as she turned, she faced the tunnel.

She stared into the darkness. Something darker still seemed to grow there.

And then that darkness exploded in her face.

Chapter Four

Kali stirred, blinked in confusion. After the clout she'd taken from DeZantez she guessed it was normal to see stars, but the Enlightened One's clout had clearly been an Almighty Clout because she was seeing balloons, bunting and flags as well. There was also a worgle right in front of her nose, staring at her in what seemed to be a very accusing way. Worgles had no eyes but it still stared, conjuring up flashes of Horse's darting tongue and a pang of guilt she'd never realised she'd felt.

Kali shook her head to free it of weirdness, then groaned. She was surrounded by the stuff of festivals and fun, but the way DeZantez had turned on her she wasn't feeling much like either. Wincing at the pain in her bruised temples she gently picked herself up off the floor to see she'd been confined in a small storeroom with a tiny window and solid wooden door. She tried to open the door but, naturally, it wouldn't budge, no doubt barred on the