Swiftly he looked away from the city.

In the fields covering the vast plain around the city, peasants still worked, gathering their crops from the long strips of cultivated land, driving their beasts towards the city. There was a sense of feverish industry down there, of folk frantically gathering the last meagre scraps of the harvest. They worked as if their efforts might make the difference between life and death. Felix supposed it was true. If a siege came — no, when a siege came — every last bite of food would be precious. These Kislevites knew that. They had spent their entire lives here on the borderlands between the lands of men, and the lands occupied by the powers of Darkness.

Felix wondered if any peasants in the Empire could have remained so calmly at work. He doubted it. Most likely they would be long gone, their fields abandoned, their crops left to rot. Parts of the Empire were a long way from the war against Chaos, and Kislev stood as a bulwark between the nearest provinces and the eternal enemy. Some in the Empire doubted the very existence of the Chaos warriors. It was a luxury that was not available here.

Another glance around reassured him a little. Huge cauldrons for the burning oil were already in position along the walkways. Massive ballistae bristled from towers along the walls. Felix doubted that any army the Empire had ever mustered could take the city but the horde approaching was far from an ordinary mortal army. He knew it contained monsters and beastmen and evil magicians as well as crazed warriors gifted by the Dark Powers. Where the armies of Chaos rode, evil magic, plague and festering corruption were ever their allies.

Worse yet, Felix knew that within the city itself the approaching enemy most likely had powerful allies. The worshippers of Chaos were numerous and not all of them were mutants or wore the ornate black armour of the Chaos warrior. Some of those workmen there might be plotting to open the gates one dark night. One of those noble captains might well be plotting to poison his own men or lead them into an ambush. From his own experience, Felix knew that such things were far from uncommon. He pushed the gloomy thoughts aside. Now was not a good time to be thinking them.

He looked down at his hand and was surprised to see how steady it was. He had changed since he and the Slayer had started their wanderings. There was a time when simply knowing what was out there on the plain burning those little towns would have turned his bowels to water. Now he was capable of standing here and discussing it calmly with the dwarf. Maybe it’s not the Chaos worshippers who are mad. Maybe it’s me.

His keen blue eyes picked up a disturbance on the horizon. Dust clouds, he thought. Men riding fast and coming closer.