Spears were cunning. Spears did not smile like an axe, nor did they possess a sword's majesty. A spear was a darting tongue, wounding like a hag's unkind words. The spear was the mocker in the court, the long reach of shame. A spear put a man at too far a remove from his foe. You could not taste a man's fear sweat when wielding a spear. You could not look him dead in the eye. Might as well use a gun as a spear.

But that was not why Russ did not like his father's gift.

'What are you saying?' said Ogvai. He snarled the words. They vexed him, and he bit at them as they came from his mouth.

'You heard what I said. Horus will not fall to my sword,' said Russ. 'Then we are not to go?' said Scarred Oki.

'Unstopper your ears, Oki!' said Russ. 'I said I could not beat him if we left now. But, my jarls,' he said, standing, 'I shall find a way. We have a purpose to fulfil, and we shall do what we were made for. Horus will fall. Kva!'

Russ called for his chief Rune Priest, Kva, also called He-Who-is-Divided. He walked haltingly, even with the support of his power armour. The Allfather's remoulding of his flesh had stayed the progress of a disease that had plagued him since birth, but it could not reverse it. Beneath his battleplate his body was knotted and gnarled as the rigging on a storm-wrecked ship. Men outside the Legion thought his war-name came from his deformation. That was not so. Kva's spirit was so strong it more than compensated for his enfeebled body. It was said of him that he was more powerful in the Underverse than he was in the Sea of Storms that is this world.

On the face of it such a person was not fit to be a legionary but then, such a person was not fit to survive childhood on Fenris. That he had done both was enough to validate him, never mind his wisdom or his wyrding skill. His disability was invisible to his brothers.

The Varagyr stepped back to give Kva room. The more superstitious among them spat upon the floor. They meant no disrespect to the priest, but the wights crawled close below the surface of the world where warlocks like Kva went.

'Horus' transformation is no surprise to we gothi,' said Kva, addressing the room. 'His altered soul quivers the Underverse. The stench of his corruption is carried on the winds of a thousand worlds. His name is howled in anguish by every wolf in Asaheim. He is a monster, but all here know that no monster is unbeatable.'