Hilde closed the man’s eyes with the reflective gentleness she had learned in years of caring for the sick and dying. She tucked the strange flask into a pouch but had more pressing concerns than worrying about carrying out the last wish of a dying man. 

Arrows buzzed spitefully by, smacking into shields and bodies. The casulties were starting to mount, wounded and dying soldiers were propped against the wheels of the wagon, calling out to Sigmar or some other god to save them. The only gods watching this place were dark and merciless. Hilde’s lips were blackened from biting cartridges and her mouth was dry as Araby from the saltpeter.

A rush of beastmen charged into the tightly packed soldiers, many of them frothing at the mouth with ecstatic frenzy. One of the dog headed brutes cut down two halberdiers with a swipe of what must have once been a scythe. The sergeant beside her cut it down with a vicious backhanded swipe. Another horror raised a great boarspear and drove it at the sergeants side. Hilde leveled her pistol and fired, the beast roared and fell back, the spear falling from its smashed bloody shoulder. She pulled another cartige from her pouch and bit the top off the waxed paper cylinder before pouring powder into the barrel of her pistol. She spat the ball into the barrel and rammed it home with the short brass rod. 

Before she could prime the weapon a sudden hush fell over the battlefield. The tide of beastmen slacked for a moment, leaving only the baying and screaming wounded. The seargent beside her immedately began thrusting his sword into the wounded beastmen with methodical savagery. Hilde gasped for breath and finished reloading her weapon.

A chaos warrior stepped from the treeline. He was larger than the others, his armor glistened with varicolured runes. He carried a great longsword that seemed to mist or smoke. A weird warbling cry echoed from his throat and it took Hilde a moment to realise that the man was laughing.  The beastman added their own mocking brays to the hellish sound.

[b]“Sigmar!”[/b] came a great warcry that seemed to echo through the forest.

[b]“Sigmar and the Empire!”[/b] the warrior priest crashed from the treeline, swinging his hammer in a glittering silver arc at the reavers head. The heretic moved like quicksilver, seeming to flow away from the blow effortlessly. Both beastmen and Imperials watched the duel unfold in a kind of paralysis. The chaos warrior moved like a striking snake but somehow the priest caught the blow on the haft of his hammer, the enchanted sword lifting a long sliver of oak away from the haft. The priest responded by slamming the studded end of his hammer into the heretic’s stomach. The man didn’t even flinch.  Hilde raised her pistol with shaking hand, the barrel wavering, her mind seemed to rebel against attacking the warrior, every instinct in her mind screamed at her not to be noticed. Hatred and terror boiled in her stomach like fire. The warrior struck like lightning, ramming his sword through the priest's throat, nearly decapitating the Sigmarite.

[b]“No!” [/b]the cry came up from a dozen throats but the roar of beastmen drowned out the Imperials. Hilde closed her eyes and pulled the trigger.


[@POOHEAD189]