The Shades, or Dark Elf Scouts as they were formerly known in earlier editions, are clans of Dark Elves who inhabit the Blackspine Mountains. Their origins lie in city Clar Karond. Sent to explore the lands under the mountains by the Underworld Sea, they were betrayed by their rivals. In their exile they settled in the barely hospitable, monster infested heights of the Blackspine Mountains. In spite of everything, the Shade clans prospered, life there has bred them into cruel, hawk-eyed killers, their new home being an excellent battleground for their inter-tribal wars of sniping and ambush. The denizens of Clar Karond live in fear that they might one day return from their mountains to exact vengeance on those who once wronged them.
A band of shades.
Many of the ancient traditions of the Nagarythe are preserved in their culture. Newborns spend their first night outside their parents dwellings; only after the child has survived the nocturnal beasts and fierce climate will its parents accept it. They are also known to drink fermented blood. It is customs such as these which have earned the shades the label "feral" in even the eyes of their own Dark Elven kin.
When deployed as part of a greater Dark Elf host, shades serve as scouts, skirmishers and infiltrators. Their primary weapon is the repeater crossbow which they also use for hunting in their native lands. Other than this they are armed with a number of daggers and short swords. Their captains are known as bloodshades.
Some shades were stationed in the Sunken Isles during the Age of Strife. Malekith promised to reward them for each Shadow Warrior head delivered to him in Naggarond.
The End Times
The Shade tribe, the Knives of Khaine, fought at the Battle of Reaver's Mark at the command of Malus Darkblade. After the battle they flayed the skin off dead High Elves to sell at profit. They committed gruesome atrocities against the Elves of Tor Emyrath. Although the were one of the clans under the auspices of Morathi, it is unknown whether they survived or remained loyal long enough to fight under the Aestyrion in the later stages of the war.
Sources
- Warhammer Armies: Dark Elves (8th) -- p. 40
- Warhammer Armies: Dark Elves (7th) -- Gav Thorpe p. 48
- Warhammer Armies: Dark Elves (6th) -- Gav Thorpe p. 7
- Warhammer Armies: Dark Elves (4th) -- Jervis Johnson p. 37
- Warhammer: Khaine, Volume III (The End Times: Book I) -- p. 38