Merowig’s Hellrakers
Nobody had ever seen Prince Merowig wearing spikes on his armour. To anyone’s knowledge, he had never so much as looked twice at an accessory decorated with something as unfashionable as skulls. Yet many an upstanding dwarf would have confidently called him evil, among other, even less flattering epithets. Not a few of Merowig’s more conservative compatriots would have considered his first volume of love poems sufficient reason for disgrace and exile, to say nothing of his non-literary exploits in the circles of high society. The young Prince was, as one had to regretfully admit with a sigh and a shake of the head, a rake if ever there had been one. All anyone could do was thank the ancestors that Merowig was the king’s youngest son of many, with no realistic expectation of inheriting any sort of responsibility; otherwise it would doubtlessly have gone ill with the monarchy.
Still, nobody could deny a certain fascination that emanated from Merowig’s scandalous personality. A rake he may have been, but he was also amiable, entertaining, and generous with his family’s money, a connoisseur and patron of the arts, and the life of every ball in the capital. Especially the younger members of the nobility did not quite share their elders’ outrage over the young Prince’s behaviour: After all, was he not merely a dwarf of descent who knew how to live? And had he not demonstrated a sound understanding of military affairs, too, personally designing new uniforms for the kingdom’s army, even against the malevolent opposition of those old-fashioned generals and their so-called concerns regarding practicality? Was such a dwarf not deserving of friendship and admiration? Was he not, perhaps, a better fit for the crown than any of the old bores he had for brothers?
Whether it was such dangerous talk or simply one broken promise of marriage too many that finally brought banishment upon Merowig is not known for certain. Whatever the truth may be, his popularity at that point was such that when he left his home, he did so accompanied by a flock of ambitious patrician youths as well as a sizeable crowd of fortune-seeking members of the lower classes. There also happened to be a considerable amount of gold in Merowig’s baggage that corresponded exactly to the sum that was reported missing from the royal family’s coffers some days later. Nobody could reasonably expect him to set up as a mercenary commander without some starting capital, after all; and even as he embarked on a life of campaigning, Merowig felt no inclination to change his exquisite and expensive tastes. And who knew? One day, if business went well and the fancy took him, he might choose to return to his estranged family’s lands and lay claim to a good deal more than a few bags of gold.
Some more combinations:
Here, at last, comes Prince Merowig’s entourage! All in all, there are four torsi, four heads, one left arm with optional adarga, and arm/weapon options for musket, polearm, pike (doubling as a flagpole if desired), and hammer. The empty-handed arm came about purely by accident: I actually intended to make each weapon complete with its own arm bit. But while I was working on the pike-wielding hand, the metal rod came loose, so I decided to roll with it and adjusted the thumb so that a variety of weapon bits should fit. In retrospect, I’m very glad this happened because the empty hand lends some opportunity for customisation.
If I ever get around to painting some of these, I would like to make a small KoW Ambush band out of them, using the Imperial Dwarfs list. But that is very theoretical at the moment, as hobby time is scarce, and when given the choice between sculpting and painting, I will usually choose the former. 
In any case, this project was a lot of fun for me, and I hope that some of you will also get some joy out of these sculpts!
Cheers
Antenor
Add-on: Boar Dragoon torso
