Fearful Forests and Stinking Bogs: A Project Manifesto

The Tale of the Zorndorf Halberdiers 

Hansel Garz knew that if he could just find his way back to the logger’s path, he would be able to get back to the Zorndorf watchtower before nightfall.

The trouble was that he and his companion Pieter Kröte had strayed from that path more than twelve hours ago.

“We’re lost, lad,” Pieter said, his voice weary. “There’s no helping it. I’d reckon we’ve got less than an hour of light left, then these woods will turn very dark indeed.”

“There’s got to be a way back,” Hansel replied, suddenly conscious that he was whispering. He wasn’t sure why. Perhaps the silence of the woods was starting to get to him.

“We need to find shelter for the night. The Drakwald is not known for its hospitality, especially at night,” Pieter said. The older man took a swig from his canteen. Hansel could tell that the older man had drunk down the last of his sour beer. It seemed like an intentionally nihilistic gesture, a moment of resignation.

“Let’s just walk a little while longer,” Hansel said. He leaned on his halberd and began picking his way through the tangled briars, mangy ferns, and knife-tipped thorns. He scanned the maze of big pines, looking for some kind of path. There was nothing. No escape. Just an endless expanse of dark forest. Just the blank, unreasoning hostility of the Drakwald. Shadows stirred in the voids between the trees, shadows that seemed uncannily alive.

“We’ve got to get out,” Hansel muttered. He jerked his head, indicating which direction he was headed. Pieter nodded and followed him, moving slowly. He pointlessly hacked at the undergrowth with his katzbalger. The crude, dull blade left ragged wounds in the undergrowth.

The two men walked on in silence. With every step, the forest darkened, the sun sank, and Morrslieb, the green Chaos moon, swelled. It gleamed like a madman’s eye. It bathed the forest in its septic, poison-hued glow.

Hansel let dark thoughts come. He thought about the one-eyed old timer he and Pieter had met in a tavern in Kemperbad, the man who had warned them against travelling to the wilds of Middenland. The old man had laughed when they had said they were marching north to join the mustering of Count Todbringer, the preening Elector of Middenland. “Middenhland is a land of fearful forests and stinking bogs, lads,” the old timer had said. “Wise men fear the north woods. Wise men keep to the cities, where the worst that happens to ye is a dirk in yer ribs or a poisoned ale. The Drakwald is no place for city lads like you. It’ll eat you alive.”

Hansel regretted not listening to the man. They had thought he had been addled on rotgut and rank wine. 

“Once we get back to Zorndorf,” Hansel said, “We ought to reassess our employment. I’m thinking the Grand Prince of Reikland could use a couple more lads.”

“Aye,” Pieter replied. “I’ll be taking my month’s wages, dashing it away on some good beer, and leaving this Morr-forsaken forest for good. Just as soon as I can, I’m going . . .”

Hansel heard a sharp whistling in the trees behind them. It might have been a strange birdsong, were it not followed by the wet sound of a blade slicing through meat and gristle and bone.

He turned. He saw the stain first. Bright crimson blood blossoming across Pieter’s white doublet. Then, he saw the blade, a big brutally curved spike, stuck to the end of a rotten spear. The blade was sticking out of Pieter’s belly.

The older man looked down, stared at the spear in his gut, and said, “. . . home.” Then he sank down on his knees and fell forward into a bed or dark green moss. The spear in his back quivered obscenely for a moment after he fell.

Hansel froze and looked into the blue murk of the surrounding forest. The spear had been hurled out that darkness. He watched as the shadows between the trees began to move, to warp, to gather substance and shape and form. They circled him. They were predatory. In the gathering darkness he saw spiraling horns, gnashing, drool-flecked jaws, and blood-colored eyes. And in those eyes, he saw the crude cunning of brute beasts fused with the malignant logic of twisted men.

And then Hansel Garz saw no more.

This is not my best paint job. But this is among my most satisfying paint jobs. I had a vision for how I wanted this classic Jes Goodwin Beastman miniature to look, and it was gratifying how readily it yielded to that vision. I’m not the smoothest or deftest painter. In a lot of ways, my work is pretty crude. My painting techniques stopped evolving in 1997; and I painted some parts of this miniature more roughly than I would have liked. But, overall, I’m really happy with how it turned out. 

The genesis for this project was a single piece of artwork, the painting that more than any other doomed me to the chasmal haunts of permanent nerddom. I’m talking about Ian Miller’s cover for the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay “Death on the Reik” module, published as part of The Enemy Within Campaign. Miller’s cover depicts the glowering Castle Wittgenstein, a rambling hulk of fungoid masonry topped with impossibly kinked towers and surrounded by a sinister Old World forest. The forest, of course, seethes with mutants and monsters. The painting contains everything I love about Miller’s work. His characteristically restrained blue-green palette. Those gnarled, alien trees that look like they’ve been lifted from Durer’s woodcuts. A palpable sense of menace and threat, harkening back to the wickedest of Teutonic fairy tales. It’s perfect – the essence of old school Warhammer.

I consider this miniature to be a sort of thesis statement. It represents where I’m at with my work and where I want to go. I want to burrow deeper into the flamboyant Gothic weirdness of the Warhammer world, using a combination of texts and images to communicate a very specific and increasingly idiosyncratic aesthetic.

I hope you’ll join me.