Looking around he saw they were not the only ones. The flat landing at the tower’s top was packed with people, not all of them soldiers by any stretch of the imagination. He saw men in the thick sable furs favoured by merchants, and women in the heavy velvet gowns currently fashionable at the duke’s court. Felix did not feel too out of place. He had grown up around such people. His father was one of the wealthiest merchants in Altdorf. He could tell Ulrika felt the same way. She was the daughter of a noble. Gotrek did not give a damn about what anybody thought. Seeing that they behaved as if they had every right to be there, no one gave them a second glance.

Looking around he could see that there was a picnic hamper and wine. The fat merchant held a silver goblet in his hand. Felix shook his head. These people seemed determined to treat the arrival of their foe as if it were some sort of entertainment. Felix was not sure whether it was bravado or pure mule-headed stupidity.

“By Ulric, look at that,” he heard one fat man mutter. The man had a spyglass jammed to one eye. He did not sound as if he were being entertained. Glancing out over the rooftops Felix could see the cause of the man’s disquiet.

The Chaos horde covered the plains beyond Praag for as far as the eye could see. It was an inexorable black tide of steel and flesh flowing in to drown the world. In the lead were the riders, massive men mounted on monstrous black or red fleshed chargers. Those riders belonged in the haunted lands of the Chaos Wastes; it was a nightmare to see them here on the grasslands of Kislev. From the sea of armoured figures rose hundreds of rune-covered banners, cloth ensigns whipping in the breeze. Behind the riders were more heavily armoured infantry. And behind those were countless hideously mutated beastmen, foul creatures that walked upright like men but whose heads were horned, and who had the muzzles of animals. Scattered throughout the vast host were tens of thousands of barbarically clad men, feared marauders from the northern Wastes. He doubted that if every soldier in the Empire was mustered they could match the numbers of beastmen out there. Huge clouds of dust rose up where they marched, obscuring the more distant figures. Somehow Felix knew that if he could see them, the monsters would stretch to the horizon.

“Could be worse,” Ulrika said. All the wealthy folk on the tower top turned to look at her. Some shook their heads in disbelief.

“And what would you know about it, my dear?” said the fat merchant patronisingly. He sounded like he was suggesting that she should go home and play with her dolls.