They marched and the cobbles beneath their feet trembled. Ruined buildings lay in silence on their flanks as they passed. A few blocks from the Temple District, they came across the first bodies. They swayed precariously from lamp posts. They crouched, shrunken and black, in dead or dying pyres.

“Men-at-arms, to the front!” ordered the duke.

The men with their chain armour, kite shields, and spears became the vanguard then, spreading into two lines that easily covered the open width of the street. The hunters and the knights formed behind them, while their archers remained at the rear. The duke, the prince, and the Hammer conferred briefly. It was too dangerous for the three of them to cluster together. The duke would lead from the centre of his men. Siegfried, with Klara and Theo at his side, would anchor the left flank of their small formation. Eisengrim and Dietrich would have the right.

As they conferred, sounds reached them from deeper within the necropolis of Eichen. Distant drums, growing in tempo. The barest hints of smoke rose beyond the broken skyline. Their enemy was awake and waiting for them.

Eisengrim gripped Siegfried’s arm. He repeated the gesture with the duke next, and then each of his friends in turn.

“Good luck to you,” he said to each of them. “May God protect you all.”

They set off, heading towards the sound of the drums that pounded an impatient beat. They cast furtive glances left and right as they marched on, wondering if there were any foes amid the ruins on their flanks. In spite of himself, Eisengrim wondered what had become of their lone scout. He need not have worried.

Gerda emerged from behind a corner, her crossbow ready in one arm. Her report was quick. A few of Volkard’s Ashen had been watching them advance from the ruins. Most had fled immediately when she had surprised them. Others were never going anywhere again.

“They’re out in the open, clustered around the opening to the Temple, just out of bow shot from any cover left. Maybe three hundred at the most,” she said briskly. “He’s right in the centre of them.”

“Will they stand?” asked Eisengrim.

Gerda could only shrug.

“Take command of the archers,” ordered the duke.

They resumed their march, the sound of the drums that called them forward growing ever closer. Despite the lock in their step, it began to feel as if time were slowing, that the ruins they passed were somehow gliding past them at a slower rate. Every one of those assembled in the name of the King’s justice and Volkard’s demise, could feel the growing fear and sense rising apprehension in their comrades. The King’s men were furtive in those last seconds before the empty shells of houses and the swaying dead from the lampposts were suddenly gone, and arrayed before them was the vast, rubble strewn square of the ancient Temple District.

Waiting for them, several hundred yards away in the centre of the great space, stood arrayed a mob of people. Their naked bodies were caked in ash and their weapons were haphazard: true steel in a few dangerous looking hands, farm implements, mason’s tools and butcher’s cleavers for the rest. There were even a few crudely sharpened brooms, and were the situation not so desperate, the broom-wielders would have been comical. The mob loitered in the square about the Temple entrance, formed in clusters of friends or acquaintances as opposed to the ranks of the soldiers opposite to them.

Within the centre of this becalmed riot stood two figures, both great bull minotaurs. One brown, and one black.

The duke, the prince, and the Hammer made mark of them to their men, and then called the advance. The butchery began.

*

He had thought about praying. He had thought about drinking. He had thought about hiding. He had thought about running away. After all of that, he thought about his comrades, and wondered if they were thinking the same thoughts he was. Was it the same for all of them, or was he the one real coward here?

Siegfried did not know, and now it was too late.

“I should have brought a shield,” he heard Theo mutter behind him. Klara grumbled something the prince could not understand, but he got the gist of it. He kept his shield raised, locked beside that of the armoured woman to his left. Theo was holding them both by the shoulders, keeping low behind them as they followed the advance of the duke’s men. In any other circumstance, Siegfried knew he would probably be laughing at the sight they must make. But there was no laughter here, only the sounds of gravel crunching under booted feet. It was an old, familiar sound to the prince, reminding him of the days of his youth when he watched his father’s guard drilling in the courtyard of his home. Every last one of those men were dead. Siegfried tried to push the notion out of his head, but it lingered. His heart was thundering in his chest. How on earth could Klara and Theo not hear it?

“We’re falling behind,” Klara snapped at him. “Pick up the pace, your Grace.”

“Yes,” he answered automatically, mechanically almost. “Sorry,” he added then, unnecessarily. “Sorry.”

“I’m scared too,” Theo whispered to him.

Oh god.

“Shut up!” Klara growled at the pair of them.

Siegfried leaned to the right, risking a glance past his shield. He cursed aloud in surprise, then silently berating himself for letting his self-control get away from him. They had started the advance just a few paces behind the duke’s loose line of knights. Now they had fallen behind by nearly a dozen further paces. A look further right only lent to the sudden shame that gripped him. The three of them were almost parallel now with Gerda and the four archers she commanded. They were in a skirmishing line with Gerda in the centre. The dwarf gave the human such a look of disgust that Siegfried was relieved that his borrowed helmet hid his face.

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“We need to go faster,” said the prince, filling the limited vision his helmet granted him with the back of his shield. He knew his enemies were out there before him, but perhaps if he did not look then catching up with the rest of their men might be easier. He heard Klara give assent, and they tried to speed themselves up.

Instead they stopped dead. Theo’s grip on Siegfried’s shoulder was so tight then the human could swear he felt the steel protecting it crumpling. He felt the minotaur’s ragged breath wash over the back of his neck, and could feel Klara rounding about as he focused on the back of his shield.

“Theo,” he heard her his. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“I can’t...I can’t…”

“Don’t you dare start this now!”

“Klara.” The voice was weak, pleading. “There’s hundreds of them. This is madness.”

“What kind of man are you? Siegfried, help me with him!”

The back of the shield was dark. The marching of their men made little tremors on the ground. They were growing far away. The horror would happen, but far away. Siegfried could hear it. The prince could feel the carnage coming, but he could not do anything about it. His limbs were stiff. His heart was breaking against his ribs in terror.

“Siegfried? Siegfried!”

Any second now it would start. The screaming. The blood. The death. Any second…

“God damn the pair of you!”

A loud noise reached the prince’s ears, then. Something heavy crashed into what sounded like wood, and a second later Siegfried realised their men were in range of missiles from the other side. A glance beyond his shield confirmed it. He saw their men and comrades advancing in a tight line, their shields raised together as the Ashen filled the air with stones that fell among them like hail. Siegfried watched their shields tremble as fist-sized bits of rubble bounced off of them. Gerda and her men had stopped just a few paces ahead, knocking arrows to bowstrings and preparing to get their range. Siegfried looked across the rest of their small force, watching the men advancing steadily under the barrage of missiles coming from the crowd, under the steady encouragement of the duke in their centre. Further to the right, Siegfried saw Dietrich, and the large, armoured monster just behind him.

Eisengrim was a few paces behind, and the prince noticed he was scanning the back of their own force. A sudden, primal fear hit him when he saw the look on the old bull’s face change as he noticed the missing hunters on their left. The old bull turned, and his eyes found Siegfried immediately.

Fear had kept the human prince’s legs from stirring, but it was shame that forced him forward. Theo gasped and let him go, but a second later he heard the minotaur let out a cry of pain as Klara slapped him across the face. Siegfried watched the exchange over his shoulder before he started half running to catch up with their comrades, Klara just a pace behind. A moment or two later, the heavy thuds of Theo’s booted feet reached his ears as the last of their trio raced to catch up.

“I’m sorry,” Theo panted, shaking. “I’m sorry!”

A large rocked smashed loudly into Klara’s shield, killing any hope of polite exchange. She staggered back, but Theo was behind her. He gripped her shoulder, steadying her even as his other hand found its place on Siegfried’s shield. Missiles from the Ashen began clattering off of it and the human was grateful for the bull’s assistance keeping his arm steady under the numbing impacts.

God protect us, Siegfried prayed to himself.

They’d nearly caught up with the rest of their force when they heard Gerda issues commands to her archers. The ground before them grew ever more uneven and sharp as the stony hail crashed into the ground or bounced roughly off of their shields. The first small volley of arrows whistled over their heads as they finally drew abreast of the duke.

Siegfried had heard individual voices throwing curses at them as they’d closed on the cultists. Those continued, but their pitch grew as he heard the familiar sound of arrows plunging into bodies, and the first screaming began.

Siegfried tried to block it out. It was bad, but it was only the beginning. The mob out there that they were about to clash with frightened him, of course, but a far greater sense of dread hung over the young man. Siegfried took some solace in the knowledge that the rest of the hunters had to share it. They had seen first-hand what Volkard’s power could do, and he waited out there now for them as they closed steadily on the minotaur’s rabble. What would he do? What terrible power would he unleash on them, and why had he not done it yet? Why was he waiting?

“We’re nearly there,” Theo said then, raising his voice to make sure he could be heard over the cacophony of the stones landing all about them.

Siegfried nodded and risked a look around the edge of his shield. He saw the backs of their men, now just a few paces away. Beyond them, through gaps that opened here and there between their advancing wall of shields and lowered spears, he saw bare shoulders and heads of the Ashen. He could make out the features of those in the mob’s front ranks from here.

Behind them, something moved, a great black figure rising up behind the crowd. Siegfried had not seen Volkard before, but it was unmistakably the target of their entire endeavour this morning. He heard Klara and Theo curse, as the black bull stood above the mass of the Ashen. He raised his hands. Siegfried held his breath as cries rang out along their line to keep steady, and prepare to charge. Seconds crawled by. The great black bull loomed above his people, large even at this distance. Arrows swept past him suddenly, missing their target. Volkard ignored them.

God please, Siegfried prayed then. God please, let us stop him.

Cries reached Siegfried’ sears. Sudden gasps for breath cut off came from the mass of people ahead of them. The earth beneath their feet grew unsteady. Tremors along the stone set the pebbles and rocks that littered the field trembling. Siegfried heard screams of panic, and a sudden onrush of pounding feet. The line of men ahead of him let out a collective roar and staggered back raggedly as the crashing wave of frightened, horrified people smashed into them. Arms flailed over the shields and the soldiers’ arms started thrusting in and out between the gaps, spears and swords dripping red in the morning light. Shrieks of agony joined the chorus of fear. Booted feet slipped on the flowing blood that made grey little islands of the cast stones. Thrashing limbs littered the courtyard, disturbing everything as the wounded or dying fell, or were thrown down by the press of the people behind them.

The rumbling of the earth grew. Lines in the perfect surface beneath them began to crack.

“Fall back!” Eisengrim bellowed. His hammer whirled in the air over his head at the opposite end of the line, its weight seemingly nothing to the minotaur. Dietrich stood at his side, terror written plainly upon his face. “He’s opening the earth up! Fall back!”

Siegfried heard him, but he could not react. Things began to slow. His legs stopped working. Air shook all about him. People were screaming.

A figure rose up at Volkard’s side, stepping up onto whatever rubble gave his master the view he needed. It was another minotaur, wielding a massive bow. An arrow that looked like the limb of a young tree was knocked to its string, and that string was drawn taught, the great limbs of the bow flexed as far as they could without snapping. The bull had twisted his evil, ruined face into a smile of such maliciousness that Siegfried almost thought him a demon. The prince knew instantly that this was Rahm, the archer.

Something was at his shoulder, pulling him back. The prince watched helplessly as Rahm’s bow swept over the crowd of dying, screaming men to aim his terrible weapon at the old bull issuing orders to the panicking soldiers. Eisengrim did not see, and no warning could save him in time. Siegfried felt his mouth open. He must have screamed, but he could not hear the words.

The earth opened, a gaping black maw that rushed to meet them. The Ashen and the front rank of the King’s men vanished into it. They must have cried out, but their shouts were drowned by the terrible crashing of stone and earth being rent apart. Amid it all, beside the laughing black devil that was its cause there stood Rahm the archer. At the edge of the crumbling formation stood Eisengrim, who, as he fell back, seemed to sense something amiss. He turned and regarded Rahm as the younger bull lined up his shot. Siegfried saw resignation on his greying muzzle. The archer loosed. Siegfried called out, and knew that he was not the only one to do so.

In the instant before the arrow slew the old bull there was movement in the dust-choked air. Siegfried saw the battered round shield, the pale withered skin.

Rahm’s arrow went through Dietrich’s shield as if it weren’t there. The force of the shot pinned Dietrich’s shield and his arm to his body even as the arrow continued unimpeded. It picked the dead man up as the head of the arrow burst from his back in a shower of gore, hurling him bodily into Eisengrim. The two of them toppled together, weapons splaying across the ground.

Siegfried felt his heart stop. Klara and Theo screamed.