Gotrek & Felix: The Fifth Omnibus by Josh Reynolds

Author:Josh Reynolds
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-10-06T12:27:42+00:00

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Nitocris extended her arms out from her body and allowed her handmaidens to dress her. Quick, strong fingers slid her armour on and tied it in place. She had awoken in a good mood. There was a charnel wind blowing through the jungle. Everything had come down to a single moment. There were no more decisions to be made or questions to ponder, only the work to be done. She looked around the chamber. Her senior handmaidens were arrayed about her, awaiting their final orders before the die was cast.

‘Talia, you will take command of our fleet,’ she said to a broad, muscular woman with a shorn scalp and a scar that exposed the fangs on one side of her face. Talia had had that scar before Nitocris had claimed her, and wore it even now as a badge of honour – a sign that she had been blooded in battle. It was the scar that had convinced Nitocris of her worthiness to join her sisterhood. ‘Make straight for the coast, and avoid open battle, where possible. If the servants of the false serpent wish to control the empty seas, let them. You will take three others with you – you may choose who – to help control the fleet. It will be no easy task, but it must be done. We will need those troops when we reach Lybaras.’

Talia, whose people had done their share of raiding along the Arabayan coast, nodded silently. Nitocris turned to a short woman, smaller than the rest of the handmaidens, and slight. She wore no armour, save for animal hides and a chest-piece of rattling bone. Golden trinkets, lifted from the cities of the two-legged lizards, dangled from her hair, arms and neck. There was an air of the feral about her, more so than her sisters, as if her flesh were but a mask for the beast within. ‘Yamina, you will take your pack and support the cannibal tribes that have flocked to our banner. Harry them, and keep them moving towards Lybaras. They will be our shock-troops, and I would have them full of fear and fury when they reach the enemy.’ Yamina exposed her fangs in a grin.

Nitocris gave the rest of them their orders. She had enough sisters that they could control the unruly horde at her disposal, but she needed to ensure that they all moved as one. Otherwise the legions of Lybaras would carve them to pieces. She let her gaze pass over the eager faces of her sisters and wondered how many of them would survive to see the glor-ies of lost Lahmia. How many would join her, in the lands beyond the desert? How many wanted to? Her eyes flickered to her lieutenant.

Andraste watched the others with a sour expression. She was visibly annoyed, though whether because of envy or impatience, Nitocris couldn’t say. ‘As soon as we’ve marched, bring the sword to Octavia,’ she said, catching Andraste’s attention. ‘We should be outside of Lybaras’s walls by the time she’s finished the ritual.

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