The Rebirth of Brigid Silverhammer

Walk into the underworld marked as the only one who will stroll back out again and heads will turn - sometimes right on the pikes. But somehow Brigid, priestess of the Order of the Silver Hammer (recently, and inconveniently, deceased), did not imagine that death involved dining with wolves.

She wasn't actually certain it could be called dining. The wolves only hunkered down in the murky light and stared. Their steady gaze bothered her more than the yellow glow in them, although that gleam reflected a light long extinguished. And Brigid knew tales about refraining from food in the empire of death. The decor left her appetite cold, anyway.

Various gods carved out their claims in the spirit realm eons past and built their halls, cathedrals, and citadels to receive the souls of their worshippers. But the godless ones came to the Underworld. Wretched, lost and exiled things roamed this waste on the rim of paradise, bewailing their lack of faith or broken oaths. Dark and drenched with darkness, the stones and the wolves took on a cimmerian translucency. But whether they were submerged in or projected from the shadow, Brigid could not say.

So, no one ate a thing. But "dining" sounded much more polite than quarreling.

Brigid met the golden gaze of the pack leader again. Unlike the others, this one's fur seemed tinged in red and the fire in his eyes felt warmer. "I told you. I have nothing to give you."

The lupine lolled his tongue in laughter. "Word is out. Sigmar gave you the key to find the Ghal Maraz. Give it to us."

The others in the pack growled and bared their teeth. Brigid scowled back. She chose to look insolent rather than afraid. Animals - even dead ones - smell fear. Pretend you're better than they are and sometimes they'll believe it.

"You saw me walk out those gates." She gestured to the giant walls behind her. Inside lay the Halls of Paradise for Sigmar's warriors. Great feasts and battles occurred constantly beneath the titanic rafters. Every table had space for another place. Every fight - room for another at your elbow. And she gave that up to walk home. Through the slums, no less.

Idiot.

"I had nothing more then than I do now. Perhaps the porter forgot to hand it to me on the way out. Shall I go knock?"

Sarcasm is wasted on wolves. "Ulric sent us..."

"Yes, I can see that. Well, I send you back to Ulric, then. Tell your god and master that he has better things to do than mug servants of his rival. Tell him, if he hasn't noticed yet, that there's a war on up there and perhaps if he shared Sigmar's concern for his people he could consider lifting a finger to help. Tell him," she leered with delicious spite, "that we've already made contacts within his church and expect mass conversions. Soon. So if he cannot fight for the living in general, he may want to fight for his worshipers!"

The wolf sniffed and backed away. "He shall. And His worshippers shall fight to keep the Ghal Maraz in the Underworld. You shall not leave here but through us." The wolves skulked back into the sooty shadows and down into a ravine, out of sight.

"Ave Sigmar." Dramatically dead and challenging gods in the same day. Well, the Church of Sigmar rarely taught her clerics diplomacy.

She stood her ground until she guessed that the pack no longer watched. More than likely, they left a sentry to track her path, but there was nothing she could do about that now. And trailing a minion of Ulric could have its benefits. She might need it to barter with some hungry denizen.

Brigid stumbled along the bottom of the ridge, putting as much distance between herself and the wolves' ravine without straying from the path. No one warned her to keep to its borders, but the unblazed land looked less than healthy. The black grasses that lurked on its edge writhed and strained toward her feet as she passed. She crushed one fat tendril with the butt of her staff. The thin membrane burst under the impact, spewing a viscous mess onto the road. The "grass" turned on the carnage, sucking in rabid frenzy. Brigid scraped the tar off the wood and staggered faster through the darkness.

She could not gauge how far she walked. Sigmar's citadel had been lost from sight for some time, but she could not see more than a few strides ahead in the murk, anyway. And the path careened with no hint of caution for what might develop out of the gloom. More than once, it doubled back on itself or zigzagged at an awkward pace and a half, daring her to blaze a direct road for herself. She declined, ungracefully, and kept both feet within its border with perfect impatience. The path twisted into more erratic tangles before settling on a sudden drop.

Brigid stopped at the crest of the plateau, looking down into a caliginous valley surrounding a great void of a lake. Obscure shades slid about the land and water, writhing past and atop one another at unnatural and unsettling angles. The entire surface of the valley floor bobbed and undulated in a dizzying visual cacophony.

Some old legends included tricks to safely escape the land of the dead if one were unfortunate enough, or foolish enough, to find a way in before her time. Some of them advised exits. A few suggested contacts. All of them stressed steering clear of the valley.

For a moment, Brigid was neither priestess nor warrior. Her eyes followed the path through the sea of shadows straight down to the void of the lake and she trembled at the thought of taking one step down. She looked down at the valley as a lone woman lost in a monstrous land.

I charge you with driving the forces of evil
from my beloved Empire.

Sigmar's words swelled, unbidden, in her mind.

I charge you with creating a new church of Worship.
I charge you with the destruction of Jacob,
and the shattering of his armies.
And finally I charge you with placing Karl Franz,
my True heir, on the Golden Throne.
To that end, I give you the key to find Ghal Maraz,
my beloved hammer, and to wield it in the pursuit of those
charges...

She felt the pull of the Ghal Maraz. The great hammer swung from her soul and she, clinging to its momentum, arced behind in its wake. She splattered more of the groping tentacles en route downhill.

The narrow path slid into a wide stone road, slick with shadows, and sped downward to the bottom of the valley. The roll of the sucking grasses propelled it as though they conveyed the stones on their rancid backs. In the gloom, shades of mangled things called in pulpy rhythm, drawing the pace of the path to acceleration. The pitch of the Hammer refused to allow her steps to falter as the tide of the valley wrapped around her. She could not stop. The road curled, pooling down into the black lake through the unholy host.

A rolling mound of broken flesh sneered through a conglomeration of misshapen faces, split and oozing. Something mostly bone and all arms reached for her and wailed as she shot out of its grasp. She briefly met the glazed gaze of a woman half translucent loveliness, half rotten, stumbling alongside her armless, headless fetch. Other figures crowded the shadows: impaled, severed, blighted, or twisted as befit their distrust and broken oaths to their gods. Brigid shut her eyes to blot them out.

She slipped.

Blaring burbles and gurgles of triumph spewed in the darkness around her. She dug the heels of her feet and palms against the slide to slow herself, but they found no resistance and the chaotic world spiraled as she tumbled down.

She punched through the surface of the shadow lake. The darkness clung to her, dragging her under its weight, stinging with the venom of a thousand wasps. Her spirit bloated under its influence and still she sank, pushed by the shadow and drawn by the swing of the Ghal Maraz.

Its pale glow withstood the murk. She could just make out its shape, lying on the face of a great stone, as casually as if left only a moment. Brigid reached for it. It sang to her soul and hers to it, casting a luminescence over both of them.

Brigid whooped, laughing at the darkness around her and her misplaced fears of this impotent facade. As her hand brushed the Hammer, she grinned in triumph, heaving a sigh of relief. This place held no threats.

Her hand went awry as her body wrenched back and away from the rock.

She slammed, belly down, into the floor of the lake, barely able to raise her leaden head. Her spine pushed against her sternum - or it would have if she were corporeal enough to have either. The weight of the shadow ground her spirit and the rock beneath her shifted and began to tilt away. Laughter purled down, adding to the pressure.

Alright. Brigid cringed. Maybe a few threats.

She tried to arc against the darkness, but it held her in complete paralysis, right down to her toes. She could not lash out at it or squirm from beneath it as it pressed her deeper into the ground. She could not escape.

Let it crush me, she lamented. This is impossible to fight.

"They are impossible to fight!" There was always one, down front,
who dissented. Brigid learned to expect it, but this point of the
speech always made her fingers prick, anyway. The others around him
mimicked his crossed arms and waited. After all, they knew him better
than they knew these self appointed generals of the dead Emperor.
Bonecrusher pulled his arm from around Shyva's shoulders, sliding
her cloak off at the same time. Ellis grinned and chortled in dwarven
fashion (loudly) as the giant tossed it at the skeptic's feet. Awe
gasped through the smoky room as he picked it up, wyvern scales
shimmering in the lamplight. Brigid mirrored Ellis' wide smile.
"How do you know unless you try?"

Brigid stretched one finger out to the Hammer and felt her spirit strain to the tearing point.

"I am the emissary of Sigmar," she croaked at the distant laugh. Darkness rammed into her mouth to plug her throat, but she fought it out. She pressed her back against the gloom and heaved herself onto an elbow. "He granted me life. Dea..."

She found herself face down in the rock again. She snapped back up.

"I am the emissary of Sigmar. He granted me life. Death has n..."

The shadows pitched around her, smothering her voice in thick, pulpy folds. Brigid revolted against it in holy rage, forcing it away from her.

Her hand slapped against the stone and found a hold. Blind, she fumbled for a second. Never had the simple curl of an elbow ached so. But each inch sloughed away an ounce of the darkness. Brigid strained for the top of the rock, scratching fingertips in desperation, fumbling for the thing calling her name. Her fingers closed on the cool metal.

Soul met soul and spirit became flesh.

The denizens of the underworld shrieked, recoiling in one wave from the apparition. She stood on the surface of the shadow lake, blazing with silver fire cast down her body. Her hair flowed, molten gold, down her shoulders. Her eyes burned fierce sapphire. In both hands, she held the Ghal Maraz high over her head. Light radiated off them, illuminating what nature never intended to be illuminated. And what it touched, it destroyed.

She opened her mouth and her voice shook the discarnate world.

"I am the emissary of Sigmar. He granted me life. Death has no power over me.

"I am Brigid Silverhammer. I am the Ghal Maraz."

Brigid Silverhammer strode over the shadow lake, rolling back the sea of the shadows in her path. But the figures on the hills above held their ground.

The old legends taught another lesson about the underworld: Getting in is the easy part.

The road remained steady under her feet and the grass crawled back as she passed. At the top of the hill, the red wolf sat on his haunches.

"I told you that you would not leave except through us. But the forces of our enemies are coming. It would be wise to follow now."

From the corner of her eye, Brigid watched the wolves move in to flank her.

"I am the Ghal Maraz. I will not run from a battle."

"Shall you charge headstrong into a fight on your enemy's chosen field or maneuver to something more advantageous?"

Brigid raised the Hammer. "You cannot stay me."

"No," the wolf's voice was cool, though his eyes watched the weapon. "We cannot. But will you slay your allies to get to your enemy? And we shall fight to the death if you resist us. Please, you are newly reborn. Do not rush to die again so soon."

They thought of everything for a flesh and blood guest. The table gilded the corner with tiny loaves of bread, flagons of sweet water and wine, and two trays piled with apples, limes, and pomegranates. Silent servants fluffed the pillows on the settee and lay silk robes out on the high bed.

But a luxurious prison remains a prison.

Brigid Silverhammer stood in the center of it, weighing the Ghal Maraz in her hand and betting with herself on how fast she could reduce Ulric's 'guest room' to splinters and rubble. She had it down to three swings, if follow through into the headboard counted as part of one, when another of his minions demonstrated their annoying habit of manifesting out of thin air.

"You could at least pretend to use the door."

The red wolf sat back on his haunches and stared at her through yellow eyes. "You told me you carried no key. You lied. There are dire consequences when a paladin lies."

"So I've been told." Brigid said flatly. She was in no mood to be chastised by a dog. "But I did not lie. I did not carry a key to the Ghal Maraz. I was the key to the Ghal Maraz."

"That sort of technicality will bite you in the end."

The wolf stretched his nose upward, raising his forepaws up off the floor. Brigid stepped back as it stood upright, losing the bend to its legs and filling out in the shoulders. Its nose receded to a narrow bridge, flattening the jaw. Claws slendered into fingers and ears slid, round, down to the sides of the head.

She found herself eye to eye with a man. Only the autumn color of his hair and beard and the golden glow in his eyes hinted at all of his other form. Brigid shifted her stance. A second ago, her own biting reply sat on the tip of her tongue, but she could no longer remember what it was.

"Nevermind about the door. That's much worse."

He laughed - a human laugh this time. "I shan't do it again if it disturbs you so much. In the spirit world, I can go much faster in my god's form." He plopped down on the settee. "Sit. Eat. We mean no harm to you."

"No. Thank you." Brigid crossed her arms. "But help yourself."

"There is no need. Unlike you, only my spirit is here. My body is back in Kislev."

"Convenient. So I'll either starve or remain here forever?"

He had the courtesy to drop his yellow gaze. "Yes."

Brigid's blood, simmering at a checked rage until that point, broke into a full boil. "Damn your god! Whose side is Ulric on?"

"It is not so simple."

"Isn't it?" Brigid hurled an apple at him. "Good." She followed it with a pomegranate. "Evil. Pick one."

He set aside the fruit, freeing his hands in case she starting throwing larger objects. "Can you look so shallowly on this? I want the same thing that you do - victory over chaos. But your methods will only incite more problems. Sigmar is an ailing god, and his bloodline has weakened with him. Do you think that young bastard can execute control? You shall be fortunate not to spark civil war over his right to rule. The era of Sigmar's dynasty is ending. His Cult, which has mismanaged the Empire from the start, crumbles today. When a new leader emerges, it shall be one free of its strings."

"And with stronger ties to Ulric?" Mismanaged. What did a natural know about ruling an Empire? She seethed.

"Ulric and his priests understand the true relationship of politics and nature. Seasons change and one must give way to another in its time. Ulric does not want rule of the Empire or any other government. But he will not allow his people to fall for the outdated desires of an immortal man."

"Ulric envies Sigmar's worship..."

"Ulric once stood in a great pantheon of gods. Gods for every range of man and nature, from dawn to night, love to hate, ocean to sky. If his brothers and sisters returned today, dividing his worshippers into their own ranks, he would welcome their company with open arms. But Sigmar's plan for his Empire, always under control of his creatures, suffers the populace of the Empire to suffer when those creatures fail."

"I have spent three years in service to the Empire! Three years in combat in one place or another from Altdorf to the Evlan Woods to the caverns of Karak Ungor. We have bled and endured. Don't talk to me of failure when your face has never appeared near me before now."

"There is darkness in Kislev and I have never seen your face there, either."

"By the Hammer of Sigmar, I cannot be everywhere." So, she could coax a smile out of the stony man, even if it were a wry one. "Listen to me. Nagash is awake. Do you know what that means?"

His yellow eyes stared into her azure for a long time. His jaw twitched. "Yes, I know."

"And you know what I am?"

"What you are to Sigmar, so I am to Ulric."

"They why in the name of Sigmar are you my jailer? We should be standing on the same line, not dividing our forces. Would a wolf challenge the pack in the middle of winter?" She sat down on the edge of the bed, leaning slightly so they remained eye to eye. "In Altdorf and in Nuln our churches stood together. We defended the other in battle and bound one another's wounds afterward. We stood shoulder to shoulder." She gripped the shaman's hand and held it, laced in her own fingers, between them. "If simple priests can put aside their differences, can not we? If we, the vessels of our gods, stand together, who can stand against us?"

"Brigid," his face contorted in sorrow. "I agree. But I am sorry. I cannot help you." He disentangled his hand from hers and stood. "If you return as the fist of Sigmar, swinging his Hammer in his name, you will propagate a dying idea. Ulric commanded his priests to assist yours and conquer the enemy, but not to reach their hand into the natural processes."

"You make no sense."

"The Empire, as you knew it, is broken. But few realize that yet. Within the fires of war, few will. But when peace comes again..."

"We will see the gaping vacancies left by the dead." Brigid understood. She looked down at the Hammer. "And those remaining will be split by loyalty to the Emperor or loyalty to the Hammer."

"Yes. I had not considered that, but yes. I had wondered why your High Priests granted each Emperor the title 'Hammer of Sigmar.' It is a role, not a title, isn't it?"

Brigid nodded. "Yes, I..." She jerked upright. "In Sigmar's Name! The charge! Of course!"

The cleric stepped back, looking at the laughing woman a little dubiously. Brigid chattered on.

"He told me, but I didn't hear. He told me. I even said the words. I am the Ghal Maraz. I am the Hammer of Sigmar. I thought he meant Nuln or Altdorf. I thought he meant wood and stone. But then he would have said "build," not create. By the Hammer.... I really need to find new swears. By the Hammer." Her elation died as suddenly as it burst. "He knows. He knows the seasons are changing."

For the first time, she looked back on the Empire she vowed to serve at her elevation to priestess and knew with certainty that she would never stand in it again. In name and geography, it would remain, but after flood of blood and strife, the Empire would not return to its previous form. All her spirit went hollow at that moment and her body neglected to breathe. Every light in her world burned a little dimmer.

The cleric of Ulric, concern lighting his face, took a half step toward her but she stopped him. Brigid pressed her back against the gloom. The blood and the strife would resolve the Empire into a new body - the strength of that form determined by those who created it.

"My god charged me with the creation of a new church of worship."

"What kind of church?" He cocked his head to one side slightly, intrigued as much by her words as the dawn in her eyes.

"I don't know yet, but if you keep me here we never will and I'll be doomed to the Underworld of the godless."

He spread open his palms. "You could convert. I have power of absolution."

She just looked at him.

"Brigid, I cannot simply let you walk out of here. What would I say to Ulric and the others?"

Brigid shrugged. "Tell them I seduced you."

He raised a stern eyebrow. "Wolves mate for life."

"Tell them I was irresistible. Tell them I hit you with the Hammer. Tell them anything you think reasonable. Just turn around for a minute! Release me or I go back to the bottom of that lake."

"You will not go back to the Underworld."

"Until I'm dead. This place will not welcome my spirit and I cannot return to Sigmar in failure - not after I turned down paradise for life."

He looked down at his hands, picked up the apple and rolled it between them. "I do not..." Brigid stepped closer and spoke softly.

"You've made your concerns very clear and I agree with you. Perhaps the creation of this new church requires both of us, but we will never have that opportunity if I am left here. I am a weapon to defeat Nurgle and Nagash. Do not lock me away and curse me to the Underworld."

His face and hers reflected in the red skin of the fruit. "I could appeal to Ulric," he suggested.

Brigid looked dubious. "How long will that take?"

"I cannot say."

"Longer than it would take me to smash every stone in this castle?"

He glanced from the Ghal Maraz to the protective walls around them.

The latch on the door shifted with an agreeable click. He sighed. "This is the second time you've talked me into your bidding. When I have to explain this, I hope I have the agility of your tongue."

"Come find me. I'll teach you agility if you teach me how to come here without dragging my body around - and keeping it to return to."

"Our ways are different," he started to protest, then smiled at her. "But perhaps we can learn from each other. Send word to me in Kislev, should you have need of me. My name is Mikhal."

Brigid checked the hallway outside - an empty corridor of glowing butter stone hung with thick tapestries. She hefted the Hammer and bolted, barely holding back a war shout.

"Brigid!" Mikhal hissed. He leaned out the doorway, thumbing over his shoulder. "That way!"

She paused as she passed him. "Thank you."

"We shall meet again, Brigid Silverhammer. Thank me then. I cannot wait long to raise the alarm and... Damn!" A howl split the air. "Run," Mikhal growled, thrusting her in front of him. "At the end of the corridor, turn left.

"Halt! You cannot escape!" He raced after her. A silver wolf appeared at his side. "Yohan," he called to it over his shoulder, "take the others to the gate. It's the only exit she knows."

The silver wolf sped off. Mikhal held pace behind her, just out of arm's reach. "That should buy time. Through the door on your left, now."

No time for latches and locks. Brigid swung the Ghal Maraz and smashed the wood off its hinges, flinging it through a set table and into the stone wall on the other side.

"Try not to wreck the place, please," Mikhal muttered behind her as they tore through the hall. "I'll be doing enough penance for this as is."

"You could convert," she suggested. "I have power of absolution."

He smiled. "Right turn."

She slid into a narrow corridor, sparsely lit and lacking ornamentation. Unlike the rest of the castle, this area seemed cut from living rock - not as well as dwarves could have done, but Brigid felt part of her embrace the familiarity of it.

"Where are we going?"

"Back door. Down those stairs."

They took them two at a time, dashing down the tunnel. It emptied into a small cavern. Brigid could just make out the exit on the other side.

"This is as far as I may go," Mikhal stopped. "That passage will return you to the upper world. Since I am already in it, in body, progressing any farther is too dangerous. Where it forks, stay to the left. Go. Quickly."

"Thank you, Mikhal."

"Another time, Brigid. Run."

At the mouth of the exit, she nearly turned to wave goodbye. Astonished at her carelessness, she lunged into the darkness, barely watching the path in front of her. The tunnel inclined sharply upward until she felt as though she were running almost vertical. Was that a howl somewhere far below? She pumped her legs faster.

Ahead, she could see the fork. A diffuse glow lightened the path on the right. Sunlight? She nearly ignored Mikhal's advice. He could have been mistaken. She could think of a dozen reasons not to trust him, but she leapt to the left anyway.

Sunlight slapped her in the face. Brigid squeezed her eyes shut and raised her face up into the brilliance. Alive! Laughter danced inside her. Alive! And what a tale for Ellis and Bonecrusher. Her smile broadened at the thought of telling them. So, first to find the Hand. An Empire awaited their forging.

Brigid Silverhammer stepped into the sunshine.

The wind buffeted the torch flames, throwing odd shadows about the granite walls. They danced on the face of the rock, climbing upward from the ridge of the shrine. From this height, the torches of Kislev seemed remote stars far below.

Mikhal stepped to the edge of the precipice of the howling winds.

"I failed."

The wind crashed against him, but he held his ground.

"I believed she carried the key and that we might take it from her before she found the Ghal Maraz. I was wrong. Sigmar planted the key in her soul and when she found the Hammer, she and it were united. I thought to detain her, but..."

The force pounded against the cleric.

"She is an ally we cannot afford to waste," he shouted over the storm. "She is strong, but she walks foreign ground. She shall seek aid somewhere and now that I put myself at risk for her, I believe she shall come to me. We have power over her now."

The gale died to a contemplative bluster. Mikhal clasped his hands behind his back and waited. Finally, the breeze shifted. He cocked one ear to the wind.

When he opened his eyes, the stars above had shifted and those below had dwindled to a small handful. Mikhal backed away from the cliff and began the long climb back down, hand over hand in the night. He covered the roughest ground before dawn, testing himself against the darkness. He reached the lower cliffs in the twilight, more bruised than weary, but no other spot on the mountain granted similar refuge.

As the sun began to rise, Mikhal rested on the rocks and watched the swelling glow in the east, a far away look filling his golden eyes.