An action packed tale of the Chaos-worshipping Darkoath tribes, Darius Hinks’ Age of Sigmar novella Warqueen takes place on the Arad Plains in Aqshy, the Realm of Fire. Warqueen Vedra has united the Darkoath tribes into a great host – the Untamed – with just one more battle required to finish driving the forces of Khorne from their lands. When treachery within the tribes is revealed on the eve of that final battle, Vedra only becomes more determined to fulfil her destiny and lead her people into a future of endless war in the name of their god, Tzeentch.
It’s unusual to see a Chaos character who isn’t fully enamoured of their patron, but Vedra follows Tzeentch because of the power he offers, rather than because of any bone-deep faith. While her vassal chieftains cling to ritual and superstition, she believes in pleasing her god through battle and victory, which makes for an interesting conflict within the tribes, and some obvious antagonism. Vedra is a total badass, fully capable of going toe to toe with pretty much anyone and anything around her, and although there’s little real sense of danger for her, Hinks uses her concerns for her family (several of whom accompany her into battle) and her desire to prove herself as weaknesses for her enemies to exploit.
As you’d imagine it’s kept nice and pacy, with short chapters helping keep the plot rattling along. It starts off well, with vivid Tzeentchian rituals and some interesting conflict between Vedra and her chieftains, but gets a little bogged down with a big battle fairly soon; thankfully, while the fighting gets a bit stale at times, it’s never long before events move on and things freshen up. For a time it appears to be turning into a fairly generic all-action story, but it gradually develops into something rather more interesting – there’s still lots of fighting, but with an unusual complexion as Vedra is challenged both physically and psychologically and has her faith tested along the way.
It would have been nice to see a little less fighting and more of the politicking within the tribes, as we’ve previously seen so little of the Darkoath in Age of Sigmar and there’s clearly a rich seam of interesting material to be explored. Hinks maintains a little of the inter-tribe rivalry and intrigue, but there just isn’t enough space to really dig into it or provide too much depth to the antagonists. That being said there’s some cool little world building touches which add a little character to the locations, despite the book’s pace and brevity, and Vedra is easily entertaining enough to sustain the story. Overall it’s an interesting and satisfying story, and while the novella length does restrict it in some senses, it also helps keep it focused, pacy and entertaining.
Warqueen is book 7 in the Black Library Novella Series 1. You can read reviews of the rest of this series by following this link.
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