8) - Shadowbreed

No messing around, released in 1991 (or 1990 if you believe wikipedia) the second novel in the Konrad saga, Shadowbreed.  The cover is the Black Library reissue and is the one i have.  It looks like Konrad is getting older, has more scars and better armor and weapons than the previous cover.

The old warhammer art was really good, it feels darker than the stuff we get today.  Although saying that the quality has definitely improved.  Well apart from John Blanche, his is getting worse.

For a change the original GW books and Boxtree reissue cover are exactly the same.  Its got some knights charging in, i think they are Chaos knights but its hard to make out.  Re-issue cover wins this one for me.

David Ferring (Garnett) is back in the drivers seat unsurprisingly.  I must say i love the name, Shadowbreed.  Out of all the books i have gone through so far its the most dark fantasy sounding.  Not sure if that last sentence even made sense.

Please be better than Konrad, don't ruin my memories!!

Spoiler Grenade Thrown - 

Like the previous novel we get some Italic pre chapter text.  This one focuses on Sigmar and the battle of Black Fire Pass.  Well the first half of chapter one is the end of the last book so ill gloss over it.  Its now five years to the day that he and Elyssa had first seen the bronze knight, Wolfs twin brother and the next day he had seen the hordes of Chaos united when they destroyed his village.  He does not believe in coincidence and is expecting the same thing to happen again and rides through the night to try and get back to the mine in time.

Konrad makes it back too late, the battle has happened and its an absolute blood bath.  David Garnett does not pull any punches here as some of the visuals he describes of the scene are pretty horrific.  It is all to get across just how evil Chaos is and it does.  Again though the sheer difference of all the chaotic troops is overkill and hard to take in.  Chaos is different i know i get it, move on.

Good Point!

 As he tries to find whats happened to his girlfriend someone tries to kill him so he gives chase.

The would be assassin is a miner called Heinler who only has one arm.  He thought Konrad was a bad guy and tried to get revenge as he felt bad about hiding from the battle in a pile of corpses.  Heinler tells Konrad they took prisoners and he saw Skullface so Konrad decides to follow them south.  They march on in order to catch up with the chaos horde which divides up into three forces.  Under the cover of darkness Konrad goes to the camp hoping to find his girlfriend Krysten.  I hadn't bothered to name her earlier as all he obsesses about is Elyssa but he seems intent on finding Krysten and saving her.  Finally he is getting over Elyssa, it just took a chaos horde to murder everyone he knew.  For the second time in his life!  Doesn't go well though and he is knocked unconscious by an unseen enemy.

Konrad does not wake to a good situation.  He is tied but he can see the tortures going on around him.  Again its pretty brutal and when they die he is the last one alive.  He is released but only so two naked girls can make sport of killing him.  After being on the losing end he spots a shield design he recognises and shouts the name.  Its Kastring, the rich man from the village he was from and Elyssa's brother???  The man takes Konrad for a chat and we find out a bit about Elyssa's life and how he suspect they are not blood related.  Also some mentions of Incest, or at least attempted Incest as well, this book is not for kids.

He wakes the next day and Kastring is impressed by his resilience and decides to take him in his band as a slave.  We then get a very interesting insight into the chaos band as they drag Konrad around for the next few months.  One of the naked girls called Silk (she killed her twin, Satin) is his jailor.  Eventually he is offered a place in the warband but must kill a captured 15 year old boy to dedicate himself to the blood god, Khorne.  Konrad is in quite the conundrum as he doesn't know if he does it even though he doesn't want to does that mean he will be doomed.  Its a good question.  In the end Silk ends up saving his soul by killing the boy instead.  Silk then takes him away to make love to him.  Konrad has to put away thoughts of her forked tongue and tail as its his chance.  He kills her during it with a stolen knife and her look is almost of one of thanks.  This was a really good chapter and one you might not see in today's novels.

Khorne, kill the boy and we will send you your welcome pack in the post.

Konrad makes his escape but he spots the Bronze Knight who he has been chasing since early in the last book.  What he finds though is just the horse and the armor.  As his pursuers close in he decides to disguise himself like he did before.  As the bronze knight he kills all the pursuers and goes after Kastring.  When he catches up he kills him easily enough and then tries to remove the armor, he cant and he is locked into it.  Konrad has become the bronze warrior and the armor is feeding off of his life force and giving him life for every life he takes.

In good news though he made it into Magic the Gathering.

It seems the suit is also robbing him of himself for he struggles to remember any of his life from before he was the bronze knight.  During what appears to be a routine challenge though the horse buckles and throws him. Konrad is unable to move and can only watch as a strange man and four dwarfs dismantle the armor of the horse to reveal just a skeleton.  The strange man, Litzenreich tells him he plans to remove the chaos armor.  They take Konrad to Middenheim on a cart, he is still unable to move and is in constant pain as his body feels like its on fire.  The dwarfs ride horses....woah wait a minute....Dwarfs dont ride horses in warhammer, ever!

No, no, no none of this Tolkein nonsense here please.

They get him back and he mentions that he needs a lot of warpstone to perform the operation, yeah not sure he would survive in modern day warhammer, and that would make these Chaos Dwarfs, things were a lot less black and white in the old days.  They have some metal spider like contraption to open him up, only problem is that the armor has become his skin and he feels everything, more pain.  Not had a great life so far old Konrad.

We then get a strange chapter where Konrad has an out of body experience and David Garnetts take on the afterlife in the warhammer world.  Its weird but if you concentrate it makes sense.  Memories flood back as he is dragged back to life, but interestingly the memories though similar are not the same.

Konrad is back in his body but is very badly wounded, he is no more than a skeleton and most of his skin is gone.  Sucked away by the bronze armor he was in.  The man appears to be a wizard and he says he will look after him.  He is taken to a room and over time he starts to heal and plot his escape.  Oh and it looks like his future seeing eye is now a normal eye.  Konrad continues to recover and its obvious now that he is meant to be Sigmar reincarnated.

Reminds me of the bleeding effect in Assassins creed.  Time for David Garnett to sue Ubisoft.

Also i don't think warpstone is the same as it is now.  Litzenreich tells him its safe in powdered form and despite all the warpstone in the bronze armor and the tools used to free him he does not appear to be tainted.  Its still considered illegal and dangerous though and to pay him back for freeing him the wizard wants Konrad to steal some more warpstone from the Skaven.

So Konrad and four Dwarfs go Skaven hunting, nothing much happens here apart from desending into the dark beneath the world.  They split up and the Dwarf Konrad is with is killed and he finds himself in a Skaven lair fighting his doppelganger which is a bit random.  When he kills it he is restrained by none other than Heinler the miner that was still alive!  Except he is a Skaven.....what?   This is what Garnett does well, what felt like a slow chapter ends with a blockbuster revelation that of course asks more questions rather than give you answers.

It turns out Heinler is a grey seer, a Skaven wizard, and had used magic to change his appearance.  Konrad is once again in captivity and starts to contemplate all the coincidences of his life and starts to think they are all linked.  The dwarfs blast through a tunnel to save him.

Back at the wizards lair the city authorities appear in an attempt to arrest them, Konrad has the idea to lead them to the Skaven so that they will fight them instead.    It works and they descend into the depths at the head of a task force of the Grafs forces.  We get a good battle royal here and i find it much easier following Garnett's writing when he focuses on the action and not constantly trying to describe all the different types of Beastmen you get.  As he closes on the grey seer he must fight the guard that watched over him when he was in captivity, Silver eye.  The shock comes though when he sees Silver eye using a shield with the same motif that the bow and arrows Elyssa gave him.  The only clue to his enigmatic past.  The skaven are driven away but they have a doppelganger of the Emperor so Konrad, Litzenreich and the last Dwarf head to Altdorf to foil the Skaven plot.

Pesky Skaven, always plotting.

When they arrive at Altdorf Litzenreich and the dwarf are arrested for breaking Imperial Law.  The Sergent in charge recognises Konrad from his time in Kislev and offers him a job in the Imperial Guard.  Konrad accepts and for the first few weeks gets accustomed to his new life.  Finally he is not in captivity, so what does he do?  Decides to go and rescue Litzenreich and the dwarf.

He has had a terrible life and escaped certain death loads of times, he now had a cushy job and decides to throw it away.

 So he pretends to be an officer and gets all the way to the cell only to discover them missing.  Following the sewer system he finds them crucified by the Skaven Grey Seer and Silver eye.  In a great moment Konrad reveals his hidden crossbow and puts a bolt through the Grey Seers eye and killing him, genius move!  He then frees his comrades as they fight off a strange troglodyte baby horde before jumping into the river to escape.  When he looks around he sees Skullface and none other than Elyssa watching him!  Oh my that is a cliffhanger and a half!  Superb!

So that's Shadowbreed finished.  I did think it flowed better than Konrad with there being some really interesting scenarios that he finds himself in.  Although he really needs to stop getting captured.  Captivity starts to grate after a while.  At least there did not seem to be a ridiculous fight this time at least and the Skaven were better enemies.  The best part though is the intrigue, so many questions!  There better be a payoff but for now it keeps you hooked.

Rating - 8/10

7) - Konrad

For me my favorite ever black library published novels was the Konrad Trilogy.  I absolutely loved it.  However a lot of time has passed so I am a bit worried that its not going to stand up to the test of time and I will not enjoy it the same as i did before.  Only one way to find out though.

We have quite a number of covers to get through for this one.  The one at the top is the Black Library reissue in 2001 which is the one i have.  Dont know whats happend though as its a bit tattered.  Anyway we assume this is a young Konrad mid battle.

Now it was originally released in 1990 by GW books and Boxtree republished them in 1993.  I have no idea which of the below is which.  So ill lump them together.

Looks like an old Chaos Knight.  Not sure where i have seen it before, but i have!

Looks like the same Chaos warrior from before, i have never seen this picture before, looks old school 1st edition fantasy roleplay to me.

This one is the Boxtree reissue, the fact it says Boxtree gives it away i guess.  They have used the Slaves to Darkness Realm of Chaos book for the cover....strange choice as none of the daemons depicted appear in the book.

The trilogy was also put together in one book in 2005. 

As per standard it looks like the later the novel the better the cover.  The saga one is by far the best of the lot.  At least the Black Library reissues are unique to the story as opposed to just borrowing from other GW publications.

Author this time is David Ferring, but you all know the rules by now.  A bit of research shows its really David S. Garnett, famous UK Sci-fi author with a bibliography that look very long!  The mystery of early warhammer author fake names continues!

Well I have put it off as long as possible, its time....Spoiler Bomb Detonate!!!

Garnett opens each chapter with an italic paragraph which gives an indication of a gathering chaos horde.  Then the story kicks off with a young boy of around 12 looking for firewood in the forest.  You get a really good feeling of it as the writing immerses you in the foreboding forest.  The boy senses a beastman near by and the author builds the fear very well.  Its only a single beastman but to a boy alone in the forest it might as well be a daemon.  Because of his woodcraft the beastman does not know he is there but then he hears a rider and the beastman goes for it.  He makes the instructive decision to warn the rider and as the beastman attacks her the boy is able to catch up and sink his dagger into the creatures neck repeatedly.  A brief struggle afterwards and the creature is dead.  The girl he has saved is around 12 and he recognises her as the girl from the manor and her father is the ruler of the village where he lives.  She uses magic to heal his wounds and introduces herself as Elyssa.  It is also revealed the boy has a master, not parents and is always beaten by him and nobody knows that he can talk.  Good start so far, the writing style really immerses you and you can easily put yourself in the boys shoes.

The boy has never had a name, or parents and we find that his master and mistress are Adolf and Eva Bradenheimer who run the village inn.  His treatment sounds horrific as Eva chained him up with the pigs when he was a youngster and whipped him till he stopped crying.  He has to fight the dogs for scraps of food and it looks like even the animals are treated better.  Adolf and Eva eh?

Maybe they thought Konrad was Jewish?

The boy is the lowest of the low, just another beast of burden, while Elyssa is the only daughter of the richest man in the valley.  You can see where this is going.  Elyssa gives him an exquisite bow and arrows as a thanks for saving his life, she also gives him his name since he doesn't have one, Konrad.  If this was a film we would now get a montage of Konrad growing up.  Elyssa is his only friend and him hers as well.  He becomes a very good bowman but one day the bow breaks and he has to make his own one.  Now older and stronger he sees not hatred when Adolf beats him but fear....interesting.   Elyssa asks her father about Konrads origins but its more fear and he warns her away from him.  Also despite it being years he notices the bow and arrows are missing, prompted to look for them for the first time at the mention of Konrad.  We get some more insight into their relationship together and she mentions his eyes.  Apparently one of them is blind.

The pre chapter stuff continues to point to a chaos attack but its getting a bit weird.  Elyssa takes a mirror to show him is eyes.  His normal eye is green but the Iris of his blind eye is gold.  We do get quite a long preamble of how mirrors work which is to explain that Konrad has never seen before.  But its a bit long and unnecessary. 

Hows to use a mirror by David Ferring.

We get a slight tease that Konrad can see the future through his other eye but before anything can happen he throws the mirror away, shattering it.  Which is a shame for the mirror after the lengthy lesson we just got.  Elyssa gets angry and uses her magic to fix the mirror and Konrad explains he can sometimes see a few seconds into the future but it only seems to involve danger.  He has Spidey Sense!

There must be a Beastman near by!

And being an early warhammer novel they make love.  We even get a mention of a cupped breast and a pink nipple!  These warhammer authors are obsessed!  Anyway afterwards Konrad sees the future which is that complete love turns to utter hatred and that his only friend will one day betray him and cause his utter destruction.  Konrad mate you don't need a gold future seeing eye for that, that is known as a normal relationship.

Konrads spidey sense goes off when a knight comes to the village.  He intercepts Elyssa and they retreat to the Manor.  The knight makes no sound with his approach and is covered in bronze armor.  The knight just looks at the manor and turns away.  Does not sound like much but Garnett does a really good job of building the tension.  I think the knight is the one depicted on the early covers.  Anyway Konrad then has a vision of her death which confuses him as its a conflict with his earlier vision.  Elyssa tells him she is to marry some lord from another town she has never met.  He is 40 as well, arranged marriage being an issue in the warhammer world as well.  He decides to leave and the two part in the forest without words.  They both know they will never see each other again.  Elyssa because she thinks he is leaving and Konrad because he has seen her death.  It is quite sad all in all.

The pre chapter amble has now moved on to focus on Sigmar but it looks like the chaos forces are set to attack Konrads village.  Konrad struggles to leave, torn by the life he knew, no matter how bad, and the unknown.  In the end he spends the night in a hollow tree as its too dark to leave.  However during the night a chaos army makes its way past ready to attack the village.  Konrad knows he can not help now and decides to push further into the forest.  Instantly he comes upon a beastman with an upside down head and kills it with two arrows.

The mutation of upside down head is not just limited to Beastmen.

In order to survive the woods which are crawling with beastmen he skins this one and wears it as a disguise.  It works to a fashion but instead of escaping he is forced back to the battle lines as the attack on the village begins.

The little pre chapters stop now as the attack takes place.  The battle is one sided carnage as all the villagers are at the temple as its Sigmar's holy day.  Not that they could defend themselves anyway.  I have an issue with the chaos horde though.  Now i know chaos is all different but its sensory overload with all the different descriptions of creatures.  For the first time its hard to visualize the scene.  Konrad moves through the village, hoping Elyssa is not in the church but at home.  He sees some playing a version of blood bowl and they are using Adolf's head for a ball.  Good the guy was a dick.  When he gets to the manor house it is a raging inferno but no sign of life apart from a skull faced man that is moving through the flames as if they were nothing at all.

Ghost Rider is the main bad guy in Konrad....or does he mean Nicholas Cage?

Konrad puts an arrow through his heart but he just pulls it out without even leaving a wound behind.  Konrad does the most sensible thing you can do and runs away.

The next chapter has him being swept down the river for a few hours.  Nothing much happens in this one apart from Konrad getting his clothes dried and hunting some food.  He walks on and finds some strangers who encourage him to come back with them to town to sell the rabbits he caught.

They take Konrad into town, and the sheer scale of it shocks him.  They take him into a pub and buy him a drink, only to turn on him and accuse him of being a poacher.  Well that was inevitable.  As the baron makes his way through the town they take Konrad to him.  The baron sentences him to death for poaching.  Konrad finds it frustrating to survive the chaos horde that destroyed his village only to be killed for catching food.  The most dangerous creature of all - humans.  Yep very true that.  A black knight shows up and tells the baron that Konrad has the right of trial by combat.  He goads the baron into taking the bait before saying that Konrad can also nominate a champion.  Funnily enough he picks the black knight, who has a tattooed face to make it look like a wolf.  Guess what?  His name is Wolf and he clearly has history with the baron.  Wolf kills the baron easily.

Wolf offers Konrad a job as his squire, although he mentions that if he accepts he will own Konrad for five years.  With no other option Konrad agrees.  His first job is to get Wolf's horse, Midnight re-shoed.  The guys that tried to shop Konrad as a poacher though are waiting for him and they try to Kill him.  Konrad is able to fight them off and kills one.  Wolf appears to have watched the whole thing and tries to get Konrad to kill the other.  Konrad cant so Wolf does it instead.  He sees potential in Konrad before declaring that he is currently broke and wants to head to Konrads village.  Oh and it turns out the fat baron he killed was the one Elyssa was meant to marry!  They head back towards the village and Wolf tells of how he is a follower of Sigmar despite the wolf being the symbol of Ulric.  He belongs to no order though for he wants to be a lone wolf.

I think wolf was just trying to get his own set of gamebooks.

We then get a brief history of the Sigmar and the geography of the Empire as Konrad does not have a clue about any of it.

When they get to the village they find it completely gone.  Some magical force has wiped out all trace that anyone had ever been there.  Only a few stones remain of the manor house.  Wolf seems fascinated with the emblem on his quiver and commands him to leave it at the site of the manor house.  Konrad then tells Wolf of the strange bronze clad knight.  A shocked Wolf tells him that the knight is his twin brother.  They are then attacked by three winged beastmen.  They are after Konrad though and ignore Wolf.  Wolf kills two and Kondrad duels with another one, his foresight allowing him to see where each blow would fall so he is able to beat the creature.  They camp for the night and are encircled by wolves.  Wolf seems to talk to them though and they act as guard dogs. 

Wolf leads them to Erengrad in Kislev, Wolf goes off and of course Konrad gets attacked by two sailors.  Midnight kills one, trampled by its hooves and  the other is eventually killed by Konrad after they end up in the river.  I am pretty sure the cold of the river would nearly kill him but he just gets out and empties his boots.  Konrad's not having much luck, everyone and everything seems out to try and kill him.  They head to Praag to fight Beastmen but all of a sudden they appear to be guards at a gold mine deep in the mountains. 

Its time for another montage!

Montages allow people to learn skills by training long and hard while only taking up 2 minutes of the film.  Or in this case a few pages of a book.

Wolf soon takes control of the mines defenses and there Konrad gets an education in every form of combat you can think of from various other soldiers that defend the mine.  He even learns to read and write from a scholar.  The five years in Wolfs service all go by and we get to Book 2!  Ok ill be honest i didn't even notice it saying Book 1.

Wolf outlines his major plan.  He is after an old Dwarf temple in the area that is loaded with treasure.  He enlists the help of a female Dwarf, Anvila and with Konrad intends to leave the mine the next night.  It appears Konrad has found a new girlfriend but the first we know is when he is leaving her.  Konrad is still always thinking about Elyssa though, his first and only love.  I think this could have been a bigger part of the story but it feels a bit tacked on.  It could have easily been in instead of the geography lessons.  So the three of them leave but at one point it gets too difficult for the horses so Konrad needs to stay and guard them.  During the night though he has a vision of Wolf being ambushed so he goes to help.  It takes hours though and the ambush has already happened.  He finds Anvila down a crevasse and saves her but it looks like Wolf has been captured by goblins.  He heads into the mountain to try and save him.

Konrad finds Wolf about to be sacrificed by the goblins and Wolf shouts out to kill him.  Instead Konrad uses his only arrow to kill the goblin shaman.  He then wades into the mass of goblins with his axe and just when he is about to be overwhelmed a shining light appears in the darkness blinding the goblins.  Konrad has visions of being Sigmar as he kills around two hundred goblins and rescues Wolf.  Hmmm...two hundred...really?  Thats starting to get a bit absurd, i know he is meant to be channeling Sigmar but two hundred?  I find that hard to believe.

The light had appeared thanks to Anvilla finding lenses that the Dwarfs had used to deflect sunlight into the hold.  When Konrad checks them out he sees the image of the bronze knight, Wolfs twin, and goes off in pursuit.  Wolf is still weak and can only whisper one word, Chaos.  Very enigmatic.

Well i was on holiday from work today and read the book in one go.  And its not what i remember.  The start is excellent but when Konrad finally leaves the village after the battle it starts to go a bit downhill and drags a bit in the middle.  Also i have issues with the final battle being so unrealistic.  But the sense of mystery and intrigue keeps you reading.  I think it gets better as the trilogy goes on.

Rating - 6/10

   

6) - Red Thirst

Well after going back to a proper novel it is time to go back to the short story anthologies.  Red Thirst was the third and final of these collections of short stories from the original run and is again edited by David Pringle.  The first thing i noticed is that this one only has six stories compared to the eight of the other books.  This should allow the stories within to be a bit better as the authors have a bit more space to tell their tales.

Ok lets take a look at the cover.  I found finding anything a bit more difficult as the red thirst is something Blood Angels in 40k suffer from, so i only found two variants.  I suspect the one above is the original as it shares the same theme of others in this series.  The background is taken from the cover of the 1st edition warhammer fantasy roleplay.  And of course with the name Red Thirst the random background had to be red.  The one i have though is this one -

The ogres hairdresser should be applauded for such a good colouring job.

Its the same picture but zoomed out a bit.  Ill talk about this picture a bit more when we get to The dark beneath the world.  No red background though, in a book called Red Thirst i cant say i am happy with that.  The bad news though is that as its the later version i wont have any of the cool illustrations to comment/mock.

No time to waste lets get going - SPOILERS INCOMING!

Red Thirst - Jack Yeovil

Editor David Pringle has decided to stick with the same format as Wolf Riders and lead with the title story.  He can now sit back and relax and cash his cheque.  Its written by Jack Yeovil, aka Kim Newman so expectations are high for this one.  We join the mercenary Vukotich as a prisoner being taken to a penal colony.  Vukotich was in the short story Ignorant Armies where he was killed at the end so i think we can safely assume this is a prequel.  Readers from previous blogs will remember this was written before the current fluff was set.  This is an issue with Red Thirst as the dwarven sea fortress of Zhufbar now appears to be in Empire hands.  It could be fixed just by setting it in another city as Zhufbar doesn't play a major role in the story.

Within the first few pages their is mentions of characters from Drachenfels, I do like how all Newman's stories all merge together.  I think it helps bring the world together more than other novels which are set in the same place at the same time and still feel separate.  It helps build the world and the modern black library authors should take note.

So The Empire has an issue where a moral zealot called Claes Glinka has gained sway with the powers that be and now these non affiliated guardians of purity enforce strict moral codes on the populace.  Vukotich has fallen foul of these moral crusaders and is now incarcerated.  The viewpoint swiftly changes outside the prisoners wagon to the would be jailor, Dein Ch'ing who is using the moral crusade as cover for his work in the name of the chaos god Tzeentch.  We get some mentions of far flung Cathy, probably more than anywhere else in the warhammer library.  We get a mention of the Pagoda of Tsien-Tsin, the Monkey King, Great Gojira (Japanese word for Godzilla!) and erm......the Catshit Daemons.

Godzilla exist in warhammer!  Great news for everyone.

Alas so does this.....and its a daemon!

Anyway Vukotich escapes but is chained to a young women who he takes for a whore and plans to lose her as soon as possible.  They work together to kill there pursuers and Vukotich says he need his hand more and uses a sword to attempt to chop her hand off.  Doesn't go so well though as it bounces off her skin.  The young lady is none other than the vampire Genevieve Dieudonné.  As they make their way to a small village looking for a smith to cut their chains (Genevieve's is made of silver) Vukotich is torn between lust and disgust at the vampire.
They make their way to an abandoned lodge so Vukotich can sleep but during the night there is a secret meeting held there that the overhear.  Wladislaw Blasko who is currently ruling Zhufbar (god the dwarfs must be pissed) meets with the strangest looking mutant I have read about so far.  He is called Yefimovich and is described as a perfect living statue of transparent glass that has an inner fire burning inside him.  What an amazing description, sounds like something out a marvel film.  I really like this as its completely unique, well at least to my knowledge.  Anyway the two are in cahoots that when Glinka does his next big speech he will be assassinated and the mutants will take control of the moral crusade.  And when Blasko's aid starts to panic Blasko kills him and then kicks the body, just in case you were in doubt that he was a bad guy.
We go back to Ch'ing who is still pretending to be a member of the moral crusade.  He is due to be the one to perform the assassination but when he uses some magic to see the meeting between his high priest and Blasko he spots Vukotich and Genevieve listening in and recognises them as the escapees and cant allow then to live.  So he uses a bamboo flute and calls on the ancestor Xhou to harry them, as you do.

The Duo are currently on an Ox cart escaping the area when the spirit arrives.  From the description i see an an old school genie hovering over them.  Xhou promises them all sorts if they just leave and don't interfere with their plans.  Vukotich, the Iron Man, is all for leaving but Genevieve persuades them to turn around and save Glinka, the leader of the moral crusade which they hate.  The next town they arrivein is home to a mass burning of art.  A poet gets angry and the only reason i mention this is that a young boy watching him in admiration is dragged off by his mother, the boy is Detlef, the lead character in Drachenfels.  Its all related i tell you!  Anyway a riot breaks out and they escape the area heading for an inn.  Oh my!  They get to the inn and have sex, doesn't sound like it was very good!  I do not know why earlier warhammer authors are obsessed with sex but they are!  I may investigate further in a future blog.

As they try and leave a wood daemon sent by Ch'ing appears.  As they flee other elemental's, fire, water, air and earth appear.  Vukotich notes that wood is not an element and Genevieve tells him it is in Cathy.

Glad they mentioned that as i was sure wood wasn't an element but was too shy to mention it in case it was and i looked like a idiot.

Genevieve remembers an old tale and uses it to her advantage.  She asks that the mightiest of them accept her surrender and the get into a battle royal and cancel each other out.  Very clever way of setting that up.  They make it to the black water just in time to stop the assassination but Ch'ing does not go down without a fight.  The end fight sounds like a scene from Mortal Kombat with Ch'ing flying around, spells going off and he turns into a spectral dragon!  In the end he flees, Blasko drowns and Glinka is found out to be a mutant.

How ace would a warhammer beat em up be?

So that was Red Thirst and i really enjoyed it.  The pacing was just right and as usual is very well written.  The insight on Cathy was refreshing and i enjoyed the tie ins with Newman's other warhammer novels.  Alas it would take a lot of fluff retconing to pull it into line with the now established warhammer world.  I doubt the dwarf players would be happy with them losing another hold!

Rating - 8/10

The Dark Beneath the World - William King

We are back with Gotrek and Felix as the fantasy novel franchise juggernaut is still in its early phases.  On there way to Carak Eight Peaks (still Carak not Karak) they find a group that have been ambushed by Orcs.  We see this from Felix's point of you who ends up in the river trying to avoid being drowned by an Orc.  They both get carried by the current and Felix almost goes over a huge waterfall.  Interesting fight this one as it was different to your normal fantasy affair.  We are off to a good start.  Oh and we also get the answer to the age old question, what colour is Orcs blood?  Emerald Green!

So the duo fall in with the three ambush survivors, a religious knight, a scout and a wizard.  Sounds like a roleplaying adventure group to me.  They travel to the eight peaks and Gotrek gives a quick history of its rise and fall.  When they get there a group of Dwarfs greet them and take them to the keep.  The journey emphasizes the danger of the area and just how run down the fallen city now is.  They are taken to Prince Belegar who is the same Prince Belegar from the old Dwarf army book which had a battle in it.  Ah the good old days, when all literature GW pumped out was taken into consideration.  Now the Black Library books are not even considered cannon by some.  So Gotrek wants to hunt Troll and the humans have come to recover an ancient blade, Karaghul, both are granted permission to go down into the depths.  They are warned though of Dwarf Spirits roaming the underground, the thought of ancestors trapped in the afterlife causes Gotrek to show fear for the first time in the novels.  If its enough to scare him, yeah you should be afraid.

They go down into the depths and Felix gives up counting the stair at 862...to be honest if you have got that far you might as well keep going.  Gotrek gets a bit sad as he points out the amazing architecture they encounter is now beyond them and that their race is a dying one.  Although King does write that he has sadness in his eyes, plural.  He only has one left.

Maybe he can have different eye patches with drawn on eyes to reflect his mood, today he was wearing his sad eye.

So they come across the first bit of resistance with an Ogre led tribe of goblins.  During the feet another rival tribe arrives and after the wizard lets loose a fireball the two tribes end up fighting each other allowing the heroes to punch through and escape in the confusion.  Now i must draw your attention to the front covers again.

Original Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Cover 1986

  The Ogre in the battle is the one described exactly in the short story.  Even down to the hair.  Also the knight and wizard are the same as well.  The only problem is that the dwarf that is meant to be Gotrek has two eyes.  But the problem is the dates.  This was published in 1986 and Red Thirst came out in 1990.  And to eliminate any doubt that this is the scene take a look at this one -

Its a flip of the whole picture.

This one includes the second tribe appearing, the demon fireplace and the stand off on the stairs.  So it looks like William King has seen this cover and decided to tailor it so it can be included in the story.  I think that's a great idea and i wish they could do it more with covers past and present and is also quite impressive at how well he pulls it off.

After the battle they run into their first ghost.  It dissipates before anything can happen but brings a tear to Gotreks eye, yep he is back to only having one eye again, normality ensues.  After a while including an encounter with a mass of moths, another spirit appears and speaks to Gotrek, they need help as their tombs have been desecrated which has pulled them back from the afterlife.  Of course Gotreks going to help, he is a hero!  They find the desecrated tomb and the massive chaos mutated troll within it.  The troll has a chunk of warpstone chained to its neck and has grow a few mutations.  The description of the baby head and the pincer arm do make it sound truly horrifying and shows how mutations should be done to effect.  The three red shirts all die as per standard star trek protocol.   

We are all going to fight the troll, not all of us will make it....but you know i will

Using lamp oil Felix is able to set it on fire which stops it regenerating and allows Gotrek to bring it down in the end.  With the troll dead though the goblins are no longer scared to approach and it looks like its all over for them.  However the dead spirits of the dwarfs appear and slaughter the greenskins like the scene in return of the king.  Felix take Karagul the sword and they leave. 

Well that was another good entry in the series and i liked the story of how Felix came upon Karagul.  It had the scene with the roleplay cover and a great end bad guy to fight.  Also i like a bit of backstory which we got on the journey there.  Only negatives are the other characters are instantly forgettable and a bit of inconsistency on Gotrek's eye(s).  Positives far outweigh the negatives though.

Rating - 8/10

The Spells Below - Neil Jones

Red Thirst has been great so far, lets see if this one can maintain the momentum.   We meet Neil Jones for the first time and in fantastic news it appears Neil Jones is his real name.  He wrote Deathwing which is from the warhammer 40k early novels.  Can't see many more warhammer novels by him, that always makes me a bit nervous. 

So here we have a wizard in training Katarina Kraeber on her way to her next lesson with her mentor and lover Anton Freiwald.  When she arrives at the house she finds it completely surrounded by the Grafs men, wizards from all the colleges and a siege engine.  Wow they must be up against an army.  Before she can do anything she is spotted by Antons rival and captured and taken to the Graf.  It transpires Anton is accused of using dark magic and being in league with chaos.  The Graf orders the siege engine to fire but it hits a magical wall and the stone falls short.  The distraction allows Katarina to get loose and she sprints for the house.  With the spells help she makes it to the house.  There she finds Antons Kislev mercenaries and realises that Anton has placed a loyalty spell on them.  She wonders about the morality of that but tells herself Anton had no choice.  Anton himself is there and he has a familiar!   Not enough of them about anymore.

I love these guys, nothing chaotic about them at all....

An assassin of Khaine appears, yeah that wont work in todays fluff, and goes after Anton who is in his inner sanctum.  Despite being forbidden to go in Katarinas love for Anton overrules her fear and she goes in.  Antons bound to be a chaos worshipper.  The journey down the stairs is not easy as Anton has put all sorts of spells in the way.  But she uses her love for Anton to get through it....groan.
She gets to the lab where skulls are flying around, although she describes Anton as being of the rainbow college, im not sure that has ever existed?

There is a rainbow mage in this though!  Two player gamebooks were ace.  Shame by playing gamebooks meant you had no friends, rendering two player ones pointless.

 Anton and the assassin are dead and for some reason she does not feel the emotion she should.  Eventually the spell fades and it appears Anton had enslaved her with his magic.  With rage she searches for his grimoire and eventually finds it, including having to put up with her arm being chewed by a magical trap when the area holding the book grows teeth....wow.
So the familiar become Anton as she realises that he has had many lives and every time he dies the homunculus becomes the wizard and he is reborn.  A scuffle ensues and she stabs him with the assassins blade in a scene from Empire strikes back when she uses a fetch spell when she cant reach it.

Hmm this was not very good, it was pretty obvious and was filled with some cartoonish stuff.

Rating - 3/10

The Light of Transfiguration - Brian Craig

Its another tale from Orfeo, everyone's favorite spoony bard.  Brian Stableford has reverted back to Bretonnia, his favorite place to write about.  We get a brief history lesson about a daemon worshipper called Khemis Kezula who had a fortified manner near the Vaults mountain range.  He was defeated by the Knight Lanval de Valancourt who proceeds to smash the place down and leaves it abandoned.  Upon his death he warns his son not to go near it but when his son then dies in battle he can not pass the message on.  Instead the ground is left to the sisters of Shallya, the Goddess of Mercy.  So after agreeing the ground was so remote and therefore no bloody use to them the current Valancourt provides them with masons to help build a temple.

We join a young priestess by the name of Sister Adalia who is one of the priestess of Shallya sent to the cursed location to set up their temple.  Not much happens as the men set to build houses for everyone, Stableford puts across how difficult the work is but you cant really make it exciting.  Eventually the house is built and it sounds a very dreary place.  Adalia though discovers some fragments of broken stained glass.  She starts to collect them in the attempt to reconstruct it (her dad was a window maker).  The mother superior frowns on this so Adalia has to continue her work in secret.  The story basically revolves around her searching for glass fragments amongst the ruins.  Yes those cursed ruins, stupid girl.  So as the window starts to take shape the completed parts glow at night, with the light causing the shadows to dance randomly.  Does this put Adalia off?  No don't be silly, her life is very boring and this is the only excitement she gets!

The picture half way through reconstruction.

Adalia starts to neglect her spiritual duties and even goes as far as praying to any god to help her finish the window.  That night she finds a Dwarf waiting for her with the rest of the pieces of the painting.  Never trust a random dwarf with shards of stained glass!  So she completes the picture that night and gets this -

Terrifying

Ok i lied.  Its got a daemon in the middle that sounds like a Lord of Change from the description.  As soon as she completes it the daemon materializes into the room.  She is enraptured with it and opens her arms to embrace it.  This is as close as we get to Stablefords usual random sexual encounter, should it count?  Yes it does.  We flip to the next day and the burnt body of Adalia is found in her room completely covered by all the fragments of glass.

Well typical of Brian Stableford that i don't know what to make of this one.  It does make you think a bit but you could see the ending coming a mile away.  Even worse was the build up as its was extremely dull.  Still its better than Spells Below as the writing style is much better even though the subject matter is not.

Rating - 4/10

The Song - Steve Baxter

Steve Baxter is back, i enjoyed the Star Boat in Wolf Riders, but in an interesting twist he appears to be writing about halfling detective Sam Warble, whose previous short story was written by Sandy Mitchell (which was not his real name).  Keeping up?  Good.

The Halfling Detective is sitting in the bar when his friends come in and ask Sam about the ring he has.  After some back and fore he eventually starts to tell them his tale.  It all starts with Sam losing a card game to an elf.  With a strong hand but no money the elf asks him to put his mind on the line as the stake.  Sam of course loses and the elf casts a spell on him.  Eight days later Sam wakes up in the pub cellar with a message to go to a specific house.  Sam makes his way to the house and its the elf that he lost the card game to, Eladriel.  He has sealed some of Sams being away (Sam describes how bland his senses appear to be) and would like to trade him that back for the chance to here a human called Lora sing.  It turns out that some of the elves have taken to collecting human art and also collecting the humans themselves.  Lora is meant to be the greatest singer of her generation and has been purchased by the most powerful elf in Marienburg, Periel.

Sam makes it out to Periels private island and is confronted by his Ogre guardian.  He manages to bluff his way out of it by teaching the Ogre how to play cards in an entertaining encounter.  He finds Lora and hears her sing which reduces him to tears.  She bemoans her captivity to him but when Sam tries to free her she keeps making excuses.  She is treated like a Princess now and prefers that life to being free at her fathers pig farm.  Now when she sang last her voice shattered a glass and Sam now has a magical bottle for her to sing into.  He uses his hat to protect it from shattering and returns to Eladriel.  The elf opens the bottle and listens to the song, everyone cries again but without the protection of the hat the glass shatters.  But so does the bottle containing a part of Sam and he is whole again.  Impressed by his trickery the elf lets him go.

So what about the ring?  Well that is fragments of the glass bottle set in gold and when he blows on it he can hear some of the song again.

Ok, i like the way Sam talks and uses his brains and wit to get him out of trouble and Baxter really does make him a very entertaining character.  His descriptive writing is excellent as well and it was a very clever ending.  However it was too short at just over 20 pages so its hard to tell a compelling tale in that time.  Normally i would say it was a bit boring but going by how i have just read about a girl putting a stain glass window back together its not that bad.

After his card game with the Ogre Sam had won a rare collection of Bat Droppings.  Sorry for the second picture of animal poo in one blog, but i don't write the stories!

Rating - 5/10

The Voyage South - Nicola Griffith

Well after a great start Red Thirst has began to flag a bit.  Hopefully the last story here can give it a bit of a boost.   This is Nicola Griffiths second effort in the warhammer world after The Other short story in Ignorant Armies.
Isobel takes her sister Ariel to a remote location by boat and from the start its clear that its a cult of Slaanesh.  All sorts of sensuous things go on and they are all drugged by Olla milk from Araby.  Then we get a sex scene Brian Stableford would be proud of where Isobel's lover has found a cheap source of Olla milk and rubs it all over her.  She clearly overdoses though and her muscles lock up.  The guy runs away but Ariel somehow manages to manhandle her home.  Looks like the warhammer world has the same issues with drugs that we do.  Isobel dies shortly after and Ariel takes a sample of the Olla milk to an apothecary who finds it has been contaminated on purpose by seeds only found in Estallia.   The man that gave it to Isobel coughs up a name of whom sold it and Ariel goes down to the docks to search for clues and finds a women sailor who knows the man.  In order to get to him though she needs passage on a ship but doesn't have the money required so she is hired as crew to work for her passage.  Before they sail though the captain asks her why she is being followed which adds some intrigue. 

We get a brief interlude of Ariel learning the ropes but during the first port of call the first mate comes back from town and speaks to the captain.  Turns out people are asking about the ship and Ariel.  My initial thoughts are its the Estallians who do not want her to find the truth about the corrupted Olla Milk.  More time goes by and Ariel is below deck thinking about her sister, Griffith does a really good job here of making the grief believable but before you can think two much on it the man that has been following her appears.  He gives her a warning to go home or she will ruin everything and that she is not the only one interested in whats going on before vanishing.  Ariel of course ignores the warning as that would be a terrible novel if she listed to his advice.  As they continue down the river they are attacked by archers and boats that try and board the ship.  They are only saved by a mystery boat who has an archer on board that takes out most of the assailants before giving chase to the other boats.  Ariel is wounded and faints.

They finally reach Brionne only to find out the man they are after has left for Magritta a week before.  Despite the offer to stay she leaves the ship and gets a job on a new boat, the Genevieve.  Nothing of note happens and she disembarks at Bilbali, still some distance from her destination.  Ariel goes into town but it does not go well for her and soon an angry mob are chasing her, basically because she is foreign.  Pretty sure that racism.  Anyway she is rescued by an elf who is revealed as the mystery archer and the person that delivered the warning from before.  His name is too long to type but he says its easier to call him Send so i wont argue.  Send doesn't give much away to begin with and they take his ship to Magritta.   The Estalia's are trying to control the sea routes and Send is trying to find out the naval power they have.  So he is a spy then.  When she gets there she learns the truth.  The Olla Milk is not addictive, they are adding the seeds to it to make it addictive and then selling it at a lower price.  Then when the people are addicted they then raise the price and they have no choice but to pay it.  I sense this is meant to be a life lesson here.  But to keep it warhammer related its Khone followers targeting Slaanesh cultists.

When she is brooding about it all and getting angry at her sister for leaving her she hears the militia coming for Send as he is signalling a ship.  She saves his life and we are onto boat four now by my tally.

The boats that feature in Ariel's trip at there annual reunion

On-board it appears plans are in place for a fleet to go against the Estalians fleet.  We get introduced to more characters but its beginning to drag now and i find myself not really caring who they are.  The fleet attacks Magritta and its quite one side.  The real battle is magical and a Bloodthirster of Khorne appears but Send summons a Greater Daemon of Slaanesh to battle it.  The fleet leaves knowing the battle will destroy the remains of the Estalians fleet.  Ariel struggles with the revelation that he is a Slaanesh worshiper.  Send explains chaos can quickly get out of control and now he just tries to channel it where it will do most good.  To be honest i am not sure whats going on anymore.

Well what to say about this one.  It starts off very well and i enjoyed the way it was written, especially the way her sisters death affects Ariel.  Throw in a bit of a mystery and your on a winner.  The way Griffith deals with real world issues is clever but when writing a blog like this its hard to find a place to put comedy pictures in with that subject matter....If it stops with the revelation about the Olla Milk then it would have been fine but it kept going and it did feel it was dragging a lot by the end which made it hard to invest in late introduced characters.  It just became a bit of hard work in the end which is a shame as it was a good start.

Rating - 5/10

And so with that we finish Red Thirst.  Best stories are the first two by far.  If more space had been given to The Song and less to The Journey South both would have benefited i feel and been better.  Next up is a big one.  

5) - Plague Daemon

Excitement in the world of this blog!  First we have passed 1989 and made are way into the second year of warhammer novels.  Second i have no idea what order they were released in so i decided to go for Plague Daemon so we could do our first full sequel as its the second tale of Orfeo!  I tried to get my mindset into 1990 so did a bit of research into what happened, i was 10 when it rolled round the first time and have long since forgotten.  So forget the reunification of Germany or the first Gulf war and Jim Henson's death.  I did remember this however -

Magicland Dizzy on the ZX Spectrum was released in 1990, 128k of greatness.  Eat your heart out GTA 5!

Ok the cover at the top is the one i got which is the Black Library reissue of 2002 so lets have a look at the other ones the world wide web has revealed to me.

Erm.....Wow

So this one i think is the original, its got the same random background as others in the series and in case you don't know the title they have repeated it time and time again in child's writing.  Its then copy and pasted the Great Unclean one from the Lost and the Damned onto the front.  You may think this is a bit easy but remember its 1990!  That would have taken a supercomputer!  

All this just to copy and paste the cover of Plague Daemon

Next i found this - 

Getting a bit better

They have decided by this time the copy and paste is far too difficult and time consuming so they just used the whole cover of the Lost and the Dammed.  The best one by far is the remade one as its actually for the book with the main hero and villain both depicted.  Although the daemon has some real issues with its nails and is long overdue a manicure.  How does he manage to hold anything?

Again it is authored by Brian Craig, real name Brian Stableford and if you have read my previous reviews of Zaragoz or the short stories you will know we are in for three guaranteed things.  Lets crack out the Brian Stableford warhammer checklist - 

1) An awesome build to the character development and plot.

2) A disappointing ending to said plot after it fails to live up to expectations.

3) A really strange sexual encounter.

Ok checklist at the ready - SPOILERS INCOMING

So we start of with the narrator of the tale Orfeo still in captivity and in the midst of a daring escape.  Maro is with him and they steal some donkeys....yep.  Maro fumbles the harness and Orfeo gets annoyed but come on, Maro has been threatened with becoming a eunuch!  I would be a wreck under that kind of pressure so come on Orfeo give the kid a break.  Funnily enough they are caught as the pursuers can walk faster than the donkeys and Orfeo is asked to tell a tale about the dread powers of chaos.

Saddle this or loose your manhood, good luck!

The tale starts with a scene setting description of the location of this adventure which will be based in the Border Princes.  For those who don't know the Border Princes are an area of the warhammer world where no maps really exist.  The story goes that its full of petty kingdoms that are constantly falling and being rebuilt so its a blank canvass for writers.  I am for this as its nice to see some other areas of the warhammer world get some love rather than being set in the Empire all the time.  Oh and its nice to see Brian Stableford leave Bretonnia!  The first chapter proper describes the land of Khypris which is built around the river of the Tana Dante.  It is made up of many towns and the chapter goes into quite a lot of detail about the land and its enemies, the hill men known as the Zani.  It reminds of a campaign setting and this is one of Stableford's strengths as i really buy into this as a real place that could exist. Next we are introduced to the star of the show, Harmis Detz.  Detz is a soldier in the border guard who wear the colours of Prince Faramond the ruler of Khypris.  Stableford has obviously learns from Zaragoz where we had to imagine a poet was an amazing warrior.  At least now we are following a soldier any fights will be a lot more believable.  So Harmis Detz and his brother Lavarock are stationed in a remote village.  Lavarock has a wife and child, Harmis is single.  Oh well i dont fancy Lavarocks chance of surviving this now!  Wait?  Lavarock.....

Lavarock.....Interesting choice of firstname from Mrs Detz, Luckily for Harmis he was born first.

So Harmis is on watch and after a strange drowsy fog they come under attack and he is knocked out by a flying hoof before he sees anything.  When he comes to its carnage and everyone is dead, including Lavarock.  Wow i know i did not like his chances of surviving but that was much quicker than expected.  Harmis decides to track down his brothers murderers who turn out to be a band of mutants.  Knowing he cant beat them in a fight he continues to follow them to the wizard Astyanax's tower.  Cracking name for a wizard and again gives life to this area of the Border Princes.

What follows is the first major battle scene of the novel.  Harmis cant get to the wizard before the mutants so uses a mirror to try and signal them.  The tower (or house but i prefer to think of it as an old school wizards tower) is based in a lake of dark water known as the Tarn.  When the mutants attack they are assailed by tentacles and battle to free themselves from being dragged into the water.  A lone archer is also shooting at them but eventually the mutants make it through the door.  Soon though they are fleeing back out but their leader who is a sorcerer is clearly getting ready for a large spell.  Harmis sneaks up behind him and sinks his two throwing daggers into the sorcerers back.  At first they have no effect and the spell causes the tower to collapse before the sorcerer collapses.  Harmis gets a bit cocky seeing himself as a mighty wizard slayer, but then the sorcerer looks at him and curses him before he dies.

Dont look at his eyes!  Schoolboy error from Harmis.

Harmis awakes to find the wizards two apprentices helping him.  The girl Averil who is described as being very plain and Nicodemus who was the archer.  Nicodemus has injured his arm and is now next to useless.  It turns out the sorcerer who they call a Lazarite has cursed him and he must drink the black water, known as Tarnwine to keep the curse in check.  Harmis is taken to the dying wizard Astyanax who has been trapped under the debris of the collapsed tower.  The wizard pleads with Harmis that a greater threat still exists.  A daemon known as the Katharos is abroad in the land and they have planned for his coming. The wizard blesses the knives he used to kill the sorcerer so they can damage the daemon and tells him the daemons true name.  Harmis is less than impressed by this turn of events but decides to help the young apprentices get to the town they need to get to.

So in a quick recap we have a reluctant hero who must go on a quest to save the people form a daemonic magical threat that he knows nothing about.  Oh and he is after revenge for his brother as well.  Its classic sword and sorcery!

The trio come to Aldium where they spread word to the authorities.  Unlike your normal fantasy affair where no one believes the heroes the people of power kick start into action.  We then get the rest of the chapter dealing with how the towns people deal with the news.  I can see why its included as it gives the sense of impending despair which Nurgle feeds on but its not very exciting to write about so will skip over it.  Harmis and Averil kind of fall out as he wants to leave them and go back to the Border Guard instead of following the quest.  However he is addicted to the Tarnwine which they have as its fighting the corruption inside him.  The local commander gives him special dispensation and written orders to accompany the young apprentices wherever they need to go.  The quest continues!

After a few plodding chapters the action starts to ramp up.  The Zani have invaded and a scouting group of them spot the three companions and they try and shake them off but to no avail.  Harmis leads them into a wooded area.  Looking for help he finds some Gypsies who he decides are just as bad as the pursuing Zani, so he decides to hide up a tree and hope they take each other out.     

Nope, no respite from Murdering Marauders here, best let them kill each other.

Sure enough the Zani attack the camp and we get a pretty gory and descriptive account of the fate of the gypsies.  Well i guess thats what you get for camping on someone else's land and not paying any tax.  Anyway as the Zani sleep Harmis descends from the trees and starts silently killing them.  However it would be boring if it was that easy so of course they wake up and the fight ensues.  Harmis uses their injuries from the previous battle to his advantage to win the battle.  Stableford is very clever with these kind of fights.  Technically Harmis should have no chance but by manipulating the environment and being clever the victory is believable without any over the top heroics.  Harmis has to use one of his magic daggers though so he is down to one which means he has one shot at the daemon, just to build the tension. 

During the fight though Harmis is wounded and the infection still within him gets worse.  They find a roadside hamlet and it looks deserted as people flee the oncoming Zani.  They find an inn where a few people have decided to hide and hope the Zani miss them.  There is only one bed and Harmis takes it, much to the annoyance of the locals but they are fearful of him for he is a member of the border guard.  They decide that there mission is to important to wait so Nicodemus goes on ahead in a bid to find the wizards old apprentice (who i assume is now a wizard in his own right) Ritandyr.  With only plain Averil to look after the ill Harmis from the locals there is a bit of tension here of a different kind to that we have found so far, it examines human nature and its very well done.  Then things go a bit bizarre.  It wouldn't be Brian Stableford if it didn't i guess.  One of the women in the Inn needs to give birth, so she needs the bed.  Harmis is too ill to move so she has to lie next to him and give birth.  Harmis is in and out of consciousness and we get the events from his viewpoint, which needless to say is a bit f*cked up.  Anyway the baby is born and its a hideous mutant.  They all blame Averil as she helped deliver the baby and being a wizards apprentice is accused of being a witch who has cursed them.  Also the women giving birth dies from the labor as she bleeds to death.  All while poor Harmis is in bed next to all this.  I dont care how ill you are i would have got up before then.

Congratulations its a.....erm....

80s cartoon Muppet Babies would have been much better if it was Mutant Babies.  But anyway Harmis is well enough to ride so they get out of town as quick as they can before things can turn nasty.  In the next village they come across another moral conundrum.  Three members of the border guard are all that is left and they are wounded.  A women is trying to help them but they need Harmis help as with their horses they can have the cart pulled and use that to get them to safety.  Averil is dead against the idea as she wants to press on with the mission, and not at all to do with the fact that she has been described constantly as plain and the women helping the wounded soldiers, Asmunda, is otherworldly beautiful.  In the end Harmis gives them one horse and they leave them.  However in thanks Asmunda gives him a gold coin, even though he was willing to give the spare horse for free.  This section of the novel reminds me of an after disaster type film when society breaks down and focuses on human nature and moral issues.  Its a change of pace but it makes you think so it does add to the novel.

Finally they reach the town of Cavanal where they are meant to rendezvous with Nicodemus and Ritandyr.  Cavanal sits on the Tana Dante, the river and even though the bridges have been broken to prevent the advancing Zani from taking the town a small temporary bridge has been set up with all the refuges desperate to cross it.  This is bad news as we know the Zani are not the real threat but the plague daemon so it will be able to cross the river.  Averil has to wait in the queue as Harmis goes to look around.  He bumps into Asmunda again and a bit of light flirting ensues before she goes her own way.  While waiting he hears rumors of a plague in town and that the first victims were three soldiers who arrived on the back of the cart.  Harmis starts to wonder if he is the cause of the plague.  I don't think so, the daemon is Asmunda, its far too obvious to build any suspense.  Anyway with the Zani approaching tensions rise with the refugees and as it starts to boil over Harmis intervenes and the wizard Ritandyr appears to cool things down.  With the wizards authority they are able to get across the bridge into Cavanal itself.   

They take up residence in an inn at the first task is to locate the daemon.  They decide to use a powerful spell to locate the corruption.  During the spell it turns out its the gold piece Harmis was given by Asmunda is the source of the plague.  Oh well at least they didn't keep the obvious suspense going for to long.  We now know its her officially.  Anyway they need to perform an even more powerful spell to stop the corrupted gold.  They are going to unleash a thunderstorm and use the tarnwine to wash away the corruption.  Harmis will see none of this as the Zani now lay siege to Cavanal and Harmis must join the defence.

The clue was in the giant skull face of death.....

Now to explain the siege i must explain a bit more about the Zani.  They are hillmen who have massive Yak like beasts called Aurochs.  When they need to they move down into the lands of Khypris for their herds to graze but they have never made it across the river, the Tana Dante.  Anyway they are clearly being manipulated by the daemon who wants to sow the seeds of despair.  Despite the fact we have been building to this confrontation for some time the siege is pretty brief.  The battle on the banks of the river is brutal enough but as the Zani make it into the town the magical storm starts with a far from natural lightning and thunder storm.  This causes the herd of Aurochs to panic and stampede, crushing the Zani who were trapped by the beasts on one side and the river on the other.

The siege of Cavanal

Ive never seen the Lion King....I know!  Brian Stableford should sue Disney, they are clearly stealing his ideas.  When Harmis gets back to the inn he finds the wizard dead, the daemon has got to him via the spell.  Nicodemus is hurt, again, he really is useless.  So despite being defeated they head to the city of Khypris itself in an effort to confront the daemon.  During the journey Harmis hears Nicodemus and plain Averil making love when they camp, and is annoyed about it but then doesn't begrudge them seeking solace with each other.  Well that was random!  And it means we can check off the random sexual encounter from the checklist!  I didn't think it was going to happen but he managed it.  Pro.

Now it gets serious.  The plague has spread and decimated the land and the writing goes into great detail about the people that are left and the dead at the side of the road.  People are desperate for help but they cant help them so they must walk on.  The part about Harmis not looking at the children is pretty tough to read.  I can understand why he wont look as it would break his resolve.  Tough stuff.  

So the heroes arrive at Kyphris and the guards let them in but the city is deserted, everyone is dead or in hiding from the plague.  They make their way to the palace where it is locked and Nicodemus does his first useful thing and opens the bolt of a locked door using magic so they can get in.  Again there is no sign of life as the plague has claimed everyone within.  Movement out of the corner of the eye leads them on and they make their way down into the dungeons with each step the corruption gets worse.  Waiting for them is the Asmunda and the daemon tries very convincingly to persuade Harmis to join her and serve the plague god.  Harmis refuses and says the daemons true name, Ystareth.  The daemon is now bound to the place but then it all goes a bit weird.

Harmis has an out of body experience due to him still having some of the curse in him.  There he sees the story behind the daemon.  She had once been a citizen of Khypris and had a brother whom she had loved dearly.  However the brother had been killed in this dungeon.  There was no one person to blame so the revenge had been directed against Khypris itself, revenge the chaos god Nurgle was happy to help with.  I like how we get to see the story behind the daemon and its motivations but i am not sure about the way it was delivered.  The daemon could easily have just told them!  

The final confrontation takes place in the throne room with the daemon in its true form sitting on the throne.  Now lets quickly look back at the checklist, we should have a very anti-climatic ending.  Well i am very pleased to report that this is not the case in Plague Daemon.  It is a cracking end where Nicodemus sacrifices himself to give them a chance against the magical pestilent breath of the daemon.  Harmis users that powerful image of the dying children earlier to overcome the daemons power and put his magical dagger through the daemons heart.  I cant do it justice in a paragraph so i wont try.

So the story comes to an end and we switch back to Orfeo who reveals afterwards that Harmis ended up ruling Khypris with his wife Averil.  Wait he gets married to Averil, why did he mention in the story she was having sex with Nicodemus, strange thing to put in your story to a wandering bard.  Anyway they get into an argument as the Caliph says this should have been in the story.  Orfeo disagrees saying the story is about hope.  I disagree the Caliph is right.

Orfeo has been watching too much Dawson's Creek....Spooney bard!

Okay to sum up Plague Daemon i would say i enjoyed it more than Zaragoz.  The build up is not as good but the detail of the lands of Khypris and its population lends it credibility and i really bought into it.  It is a little light on the action but the moral dilemma side of it gives it a different aspect and realism.  We still had the random with the sexual encounter and the out of body experience at the end, oh and the weird birth scene.  The more i think about it the more i am convinced Stableford enjoys, erm, herbal medicine as some of the stuff is so random. In the end it was much more of generic sword and sorcery romp than his previous efforts and it better for it.

I do however have one major gripe.  Its a big one as well.  During the setup at the start when Orfeo is speaking to the Caliph about the tale and setting up the story itself he says this - "But i have only known one man who claimed to have fought a champion of chaos face to face and won."  So right at the very start of the novel we know Harmis wins.  This instantly ruined all sense of suspense that the novel then tries to build.  Drop this part and it would be a much better read, or put it at the end.

Im off to play Magicland Dizzy.

Rating - 6/10