DARK AGES
GANGREL
Tenth of the Dark Ages Clan Novels
By Tim Waggoner
Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press
Dark Ages Gangrel is a product of White Wolf Publishing.
White Wolf is a subsidiary of Paradox Interactive.
Copyright © 2004 by White Wolf Publishing.
First Printing February 2004
Crossroad Press Edition published in Agreement with Paradox Interactive
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Table of Contents
What Has Come Before
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
What Has Come Before
It is the year 1231, and decades of warfare and intrigue continue among the living and the dead. The Teutonic Knights and Sword-Brothers have embarked on campaigns to conquer and convert pagan Prussia and Livonia, spreading the crusading zeal into new lands. Bloodshed has, as always, followed in its wake.
Away from the eyes of the living, in the shadowy world of the undead, matters are even worse. Alexander, the ancient vampire who had ruled Paris for many centuries, was deposed some eight years ago. Seeking allies to recapture his throne, Alexander traveled to the Saxon city of Magdeburg where he imposed himself on the prince, Lord Jürgen the Sword-Bearer. The two vampires now wrestle for control of the court and a claim on the heart of the vampire Rosamund of Islington, sent into exile with Alexander.
Jürgen, who heads the vampiric Order of the Black Cross, has many interests among the Teutonic Knights and Livonian Sword-Brothers and supports their crusades. Livonian efforts, however, have recently faced a setback. Apparently a Tartar vampire named Qarakh has formed a war band among the pagans and has defeated many Sword-Brothers in battle.
Alexander has stepped forward to lead Black Cross Knights against Qarakh, and Jürgen has been unable to refuse the request. Meanwhile, Rosamund has kept secret the fact that Qarakh has the aid of a group of sorcerers called the Telyavs.
So Alexander, powerful and mad with ambition, marches into Livonia. All that stands before him is the chieftain Qarakh….
Prologue
Steel rang on steel, swords wielded by arms so inhumanly strong that sparks flared to life with each impact. The brief flashes lit the faces of the two combatants as they fought. Not that they needed the sparks’ illumination to see. Darkness was light to their kind.
As if by mutual agreement, the two broke apart and circled each other warily, moving with liquid, feline grace. Their footfalls made no sound on the damp grass, and despite their exertions neither was breathing hard. They weren’t breathing at all.
The adversaries stood upon an open plain beneath a full moon, deep in the lands of the Livs east of the Baltic coast. A furious battle raged around them as mailed knights fought wilder warriors in leathers and furs, many of whom possessed animalistic features: tufted ears, jutting fangs and feral-yellow eyes. The knights fought on horseback, while many of the others battled on foot. Swords clashed, arrows flew, claws maimed. The battlefield was littered with bodies, many of the corpses savaged beyond recognition, and the fetor of spilled blood and Final Death hung heavy in the air.
The larger of the two combatants was a swarthy and muscular man with wild black hair, a short beard and a long, thin mustache, the tips of which hung well past his chin. He wore leather armor, a bearskin cloak and wielded a curved saber. His most striking feature, though, was his flat, expressionless eyes. They were the eyes of an animal, the eyes of the dead.
His opponent appeared to be a youth of no more than sixteen summers and was clad in the mail vest and tabard of Christian knighthood. Emblazoned on the chest was his coat of arms--a shield with a pattern of black spots bisected by a broad vertical stripe upon which rested a gold laurel wreath. He was handsome and slim, with curly dark hair and a regal bearing that belied his seeming youth.
The leather-clad warrior knew better than to judge his enemy by mere physical appearance. The “youth” was two millennia older than he, and the ancient blood that flowed through his veins granted him immense power. He wielded a broadsword one-handed, moving the tip in slow, small circles as if the blade were light as a dagger. But the ancient also had other weapons besides those made of steel. As they circled one another, the leather-clad warrior sensed his opponent reaching out with his mind, sending out waves of fear and awe, searching for a chink, however small, in the warrior’s resolve.
The youth smiled, but his eyes remained cold and
