Chapter 1 - A Test of Faith

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

The burnt shells of long-dead crustaceans covered the ground. Even with ten months of callousses under his bare feet, Tagada could still feel the sharp edges of the shells stabbing underfoot.

He didn’t mind the pain.

Each stab was a prayer to Sigmar. His blood helping to purify the land. The blood of the faithful.

“Still,” he muttered, “I wouldn’t have been able to do this when I set out. The pain would have been too much.” He nodded to himself. Another sign that his path had been chosen by Sigmar, that the God-king was only giving him challenges he could overcome.

His stomach growled. It had been a few days since he’d eaten. Maybe it was the heat of Aqshy, but he was feeling light-headed.

Although there was still some muscle left on his frame from his former life, much of it had left him. He looked the part of the wasted-away pilgrim. He shrugged to himself. Flexed his hands.

What was left though was strong. He had a strength that belied his appearance.

Caws of spritehawks sounded against the lapping of waves to his left.

The barony was supposed to be here somewhere. The priest in the previous town had told him about it. A barrel chested man with scars crisscrossing his arms. ‘An important destination for any man of faith,’ he’d said. Tagada still wasn’t sure he considered himself a man of faith, even after ten months on the pilgrim’s road. But what better way to become one? It hadn’t been far off the Ember road so he’d set out.

Tagada adjusted the metal twin tailed comet he wore around his neck. It was heavy. He’d wrapped it in cloth since his second day on the road. He’d been walking hunched over for a few hours under the unceasing heat, and when he’d stood upright it had seared his flesh. His chest still bore the twin-tailed scar. And if he wrinkled his nose a certain way, he could still smell the cooked flesh.

Truthfully, he wasn’t sure if it was a memory of the smell, or if the heat was perpetually cooking him.

It was a beautiful comet, and it hurt his soul to cover it. But he was here to do Sigmar’s work and purify the road. The further he walked, the more good he would do, and so he covered it. In particular, he missed running his fingers along the inscriptions set into each tail of the comet.

“The realms are cleansed by the rage of the believer,” he muttered, “and the realms are purified by the blood and sacrifice of the faithful.” He made the sign of the comet after finishing his little prayer.

Tagada paused and looked out over the [bright] sea. It was the first water he’d seen in Aqshy that wasn’t boiling or on fire. It was nice to watch the light of Hysh play across its surface.

A growl of hunger interrupted his thoughts.

“The breeze waits on no man or god,” he said as he turned towards the path and started to walk. And it made him think of home. At least, what used to be home. The longer he stayed out on the road, the weaker the urge to go back was. Maybe he was changing.

He’d been born on the Endless Plains in Azyr. His father, an Azyrite, was heir to one of the steppe tribes, and his mother, a Ghurish woman, was reclaimed. He’d never quite fit in. And when his parents died - he let out a little hiss of breath as he let himself think of their deaths, he still hadn’t gotten over it. When his parents died, the tribe elders had passed over him and elected one of his cousins to lead the tribe. He was a stallion without a herd.

So he left.

It wasn’t home anymore. Not since his parents were gone.

He’d inherited some things from his mother, including his stomach. He could never think properly on an empty stomach, so he didn’t bother. His feet still moved, the hot breeze off the water still gusted over him. If he closed his eyes and ignored the sounds of the waves, it almost felt like he was back on the plains at the height of summer. Tagada might not miss his tribe, but he definitely missed the open plains.

A skull polished white in the sun’s light sat to the side of the path.

He nodded his head towards it and made the sign of the comet. “Well met traveler. Any idea how far the Feterene’s manor is?”

The wind gusted and a few crustacean shells were picked up and pinged off the skull.

“Didn’t think so.” Tagada sighed. “I wonder, if I fast long enough would you answer me? Or might my stomach become more like my father’s?” He turned and started shuffling down the path. “And then would they have passed over me? Bah.” He spat on the ground.

Shells sizzled as the spit quickly disappeared.

The waves kept time as he walked.

One hundred waves? A Thousand waves? Ten thousand waves? He didn’t know, but eventually the path took him around an outcropping on the coast and he spotted something ahead perched on the cliffs overlooking the water.

A large manor with a stone wall. A few other buildings poked up out from the wall. A large twintailed comet was mounted on the tallest tower in the compound. A defensible position. A bastion of order out amidst the wildlands.

Despite himself, he smiled. It had been days since he’d smiled and his dry lips cracked as the unfamiliar shape pulled at them.

~

“Ho there!” A helmed man atop the wall raised a hand to shade his eyes from the sun setting behind Tagada. “Who goes?”

Tagada raised his hand and made the sign of the twin-tailed comet. “I am Tagada.”

“Tagada what? Of what nation? What town?”

How to explain his origins? His ancestry? His youth spent on horseback and with bow and spear in hand. His early adulthood spent preparing for a leadership role that never became his. Instead, he nodded his head towards the shells underfoot. “Of the road.”

The guard peered at him. Shifted his grip on his crossbow.

Finally, he pronounced. “You’re not from near here.”

“No, I come from Hareta, and from the realmgate in Brightsbane before that.” Tagada stopped there. There was only one realmgate in Brightsbane. Everyone knew it led to Azyr.

The guard peered at him. For a manor of faith, they were not being very welcoming. He rubbed his bone comet bracelet, inherited from his mother, to give him patience.

“That’s a long way.” The guard finally said.

Tagada nodded. “Yes. As I said, I walk the pilgrim’s path.”

The guard didn’t move, he just continued to watch Tagada.

Impatience and frustration raced like fire down Tagada’s shoulders and neck. He spread his arms and opened his light dust-caked cape to show his naked torso and the heavy twin-tailed comet hanging from his neck. He lifted up its clothed form to show the guard his chest. It had been ten months, but the comet’s burn was still covered in thick black scabs. It would be visible from that distance.

That seemed to satisfy the guard, for he yelled something intelligible down behind the walls. Shortly, the gates began to open and Tagada entered.