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As some of you may know, over the past couple years a lot of work has been done on Blood and Ashes, a dark fantasy setting of Michael Rechlin’s graphic design. If you don’t know about Myke and are wondering about his style - first of all, where have you been?! - and second, it’s best to let the man speak for himself, so here’s his Etsy shop blurb:

“Take one part Germanic Mythology and Dungeons and Dragons, the inspiration of Frank Frazetta and Berni Wrightson and add a large dose of Heavy Metal and you have the Art of Michael Rechlin!”

Grim, populated by savage peoples and even more savage beasts, and filled with violence and turmoil of all sorts, the universe in question has been continuously nurtured by D-Verse Publishing. And with copious amounts of words strung together by our own resident wordsmith, it’s still growing behind the scenes. Today, we’re bringing you another short story from it, and we plan on revealing more and more in regards to B&A on a constant basis, mostly through short bouts of fiction or commentary describing the setting and its main place of action, the realm of Attheim, so stay tuned!

Their beards swayed in the brisk wind and a pale, yellow-pink gunk flowed from their severed necks along the wooden stake and onto the muscled back of the orc. The grisly sight peppered the landscape - it was customary for Blackened warriors to weave the body parts of their slain foes into their battle garb for reasons of pride as well as to drive fear in whomsoever they faced in combat. At least, that was their original intent. A side effect was that whenever the vicious Gwaed warriors saw the heads of their fallen brothers and sisters worn as battle regalia, they only became more enraged and targeted the wearers with reckless abandon.

Such had been the case today, but Kurnuk, known to his enemies as the Bane of Gilderhoost after one of his more renown, vile exploits, had once again held his own against the onslaught. What he lacked in smarts he more than made up for in vigor, and where his weapons were crude and blunt compared to a Gwaed’s masterwork axe, his wild, constant swings did more damage than most any foe knew how to deal with. Kurnuk was the first to jump into the fray and the last to extract his weapon from the warm skull of an enemy. Kurnuk was the best, and he acted as such.

His scouting party had stumbled upon a small enemy force not too far East of the Komor woods, and had made short work of them the night prior. The element of surprise and no small amount of Witch magick to deal with the sentries had seen the skirmish through within minutes, and Kurnuk had harvested a couple fresh decorations for his device, with several more spread evenly among his comrades. Now, dozens upon dozens lay dying around them or were about to face the even more gruesome fate of being harvested by the Witches and joining the ranks of the ever-shambling Infested.

At the behest of their Witches, they had allowed one of the Gwaed to escape in hopes of him coming back with reinforcements. And he had done so in grand fashion. The increased harvest the Witches beheld put blood-lusted smiles on their faces. There were three of them – pale, cold, and graceful – moving slowly among the slain and marking the ones they would turn in the coming ritual.

A retinue of stitchkin followed further back, their misshapen, sewn-together bodies lolling awkwardly on stunted legs. They were reaching out limbs that had not been their own for long in order to pick bones, brain matter, and even cutting into some of the dead warriors’ bowels looking for refuse to fuel some of the upcoming rituals and other minor spells. The stitchkin knew if they behaved appropriately one of them might even get a new head by morning. Or even better - another head!
The procession ended with a pair of malnourished goblins gathering up the bodies the witches had marked into a giant, bloodied cart. Pulling it was a massive, clearly overfed Corlannu, its eyes matted and grayed with age. Kurnuk passed by the line of harvesters, his eyes trained straight ahead.

The air itself shimmered beside the Witches. Their desire to wring new subjects out of the captured foes seeped outward and inward in pulses of energy that could clearly be seen bending the very space around them, channeling power from the carnage Kurnuk and his troops had wrought. They were at their most satisfied when drawing on fresh blood and even fresher death. The orc had learned to follow the Witches closely during these moments – the sensation he experienced from coming into contact with the syphoning energies was unlike anything he’d been privy elsewhere, or probably ever would. He could feel himself flying on the utmost of ecstasy and falling to but an inch from death all at once, his body first exploding with life only to flirt with certain demise the very next instant. It was the closest thing to thanks the Witches ever gave the armies and all of those serving in their Culldraeth and it wasn't even on purpose - just exhaust and overflow from the Void-tainted processes rumbling inside of them.

Weaker beings would have been driven mad by getting as close to the Witches, relishing in the intensity, but Kurnuk had trained himself to resist the energies, harness the positive in them and - he thought - use them to rejuvenate his body and replenish his thirst for battle following a grueling campaign. His head swayed in unison with Witches' hips and he mirrored their gestures, bending over a dead body whenever they did, pointing with his giant mace whenever they would aim a finger at a future Infested, letting out a mute, crooked laughter when they guffawed in unison.

He was so close now he could feel his skin stretch and tighten around his body and his armor tremble with each new wave, its leather straps vibrating and straining against his flesh. He thought he could almost smell the Witches, and so he breathed deep. He smelled wet rock in the late hours of the night and the sweet, acrid miasma Void magick left behind. He could sense desire, rage, and demented happiness all the way down his spine and the back of his legs. He smelled blood - wet, dark, sweet, dripping down to his chin. His own.
His eyes opened wide and he gasped at the dark, smoking end of a black strand boring into his sweaty forehead, the pain bursting through every inch of his body. He knew better than to talk, and probably couldn’t if he tried. He was now at the mercy of the Witches, the shimmering funnel birthing dark ichor from their fingertips, burrowing into his skull, clawing at his deepest, darkest secrets, and erasing, rewriting, rewiring his very thoughts.

Nobody knew why they let him live, and few dared even speak of it. Perhaps his battle prowess had saved his life, perhaps the Witches didn't feel he'd served his purpose just yet. But there was chatter among the ranks, or at least those of them that stood high enough on the evolutionary scale to string a proper thought together, that the Witches had taken some perverse pleasure in what they saw within Kurnuk, and allowed him to keep leading the armies of their Cull, with a brand new plate of armor adorning his upper scalp.

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Tags: Costin Becheanu, Fiction, D-Verse