Nick Horth’s Age of Sigmar novella Heart of Winter features the aelf Fleetmaster Arika Zenthe – originally introduced as a secondary character in City of Secrets, she’s now front and centre in her own story. A Scourge Privateer of considerable reputation, Zenthe leads her crew into Ghur, the Realm of Beasts, intending to kill her father and see out a decades-long grudge. Little does she know that her mission will eventually take her from her father’s Black Ark to the frozen darkness of a sylvaneth-infested forest in search of a powerful artefact known as the Heart of Winter.
Zenthe pretty much stole the show when she appeared in City of Secrets, and likewise in the sequel The Silver Shard, so it’s great to see Horth developing her as a protagonist in her own right. This is a 130-page novella we’re talking about so don’t expect an in-depth character study here, but there’s nonetheless a decent amount of backstory to enjoy interspersed amongst the sheer fun of watching Zenthe swashbuckle her way into and out of trouble. If you’re interested in how Dark Elves (ok, aelves) fit into the Age of Sigmar this also offers an opportunity to see a glimpse of how the Scourge Privateers operate and organise themselves, and how they view their current role in context of Sigmar’s Grand Alliance.
If you can, try to avoid reading the synopsis on the back of the book or the Black Library website, as it rather spoils an important plot point which occurs more than a third of the way into the book. Unwanted spoilers aside, it’s a tremendously entertaining story which explores an interesting little corner of the Mortal Realms complete with typically duplicitous aelves, hateful sylvaneth and at least one surprisingly wily human. It’s a fast-paced and relatively straightforward plot, although the aforementioned spoiler ties in nicely with Zenthe’s backstory and offers an appropriate diversion which adds a little more urgency to the story, while one particular secondary character – the wonderfully named Malvo L’Polche Guinmark – plays an important part in adding variety and some clever little details.
Ironically, considering how Zenthe stood out in her previous appearances, the human Guinmark manages the same trick here with his golden tongue and wry humour, nicely complementing the colder Zenthe and suggesting that the unlikely pair could work together again in future stories. Assuming you enjoyed City of Secrets, chances are you’ll be happy to sit back and be entertained here as Zenthe and her motley crew fight, sneak and swindle their way through this story. The chance to learn more about Zenthe and her people is welcome, but at its heart this is a classic fantasy adventure with a strong, capable protagonist and plenty of opportunities for excitement. In other words it’s great fun!
Heart of Winter is book 10 in the Black Library Novella Series 1. You can read reviews of the rest of this series by following this link.
Check out the main Age of Sigmar reviews page on Track of Words.
Awesome, I’ll be picking this one up, I think.