‘Those people are not my enemies,’ Kreyssig told his rescuer, pointing at the bound servants.
The ratman’s ears wiggled and its body shivered with an amused chitter. ‘See-know much-much,’ the creature explained with a wave of its paw. ‘Never say-tell what they see-know!’
Kreyssig spun around as more of the ratmen swarmed up towards him, his heart going cold as he considered that they might bear him away to their lair along with the doomed servants. Instead, the creatures reached out with their paws for Baroness von den Linden.
Kreyssig saw the witch’s eyes go wide with raw terror, compelling him to action. Heedless of their numbers, he dived at the ratmen, pushing them away. The mutants leapt back, their tails lashing and their fangs bared.
‘You will not have her!’ he shouted at the vermin, the leg of a broken chair clenched in his fist.
The ratmen glared back at him, their whiskers twitching, fangs glistening. The ratman who had cut his bonds circled him, waiting until it was behind him before pouncing. Kreyssig felt the rusty edge of the knife press against his throat.
The ratmen surged upwards once more, closing about the helpless baroness. One of them, a crook-backed thing with sores across its muzzle, leaned over her, snuffling loudly as it nuzzled her body with its nose. A moment of this loathsome action and the ratman reared back, chittering in a bestial approximation of laughter. It squeaked something in what might have been a language of sorts, bringing similar snickers from the rest of the verminous throng.
‘This is your breeder?’ the mutant holding a knife to him asked. Kreyssig was struck by the calm directness of the question, devoid of the fawning excitement with which the creatures usually treated him. He wondered how much of their ignorant subservience was merely pretext.
‘She is my woman,’ he told the mutant. Again the ratman laughed.
‘Kreyssig-man take new breeder,’ the ratman declared. The baroness screamed into her gag as the vermin began to lift her from the pyre. Kreyssig tensed, mustering himself for a desperate rush against the ratmen.
‘Leave breeder-meat,’ a raspy voice snarled from below. The ratmen carrying the witch dropped her instantly with a frightened squeak and scampered back down the pile. The mutant with the knife withdrew with similar haste.
Kreyssig rushed to the baroness’s side, fumbling at the knots that bound her. He paused when that grisly voice called out again. Turning his gaze downwards, he wasn’t surprised to find that the speaker was the ghastly rat-sorcerer.
‘Kreyssig-man may keep his breeder,’ the monster said. ‘He will remember-know his friends. He will do when he is told what to do.’
It didn’t take a flash of the creature’s sparking fangs to drive home the threat in its words. Kreyssig kept his eyes on the grotesque monster until it shuffled off into the kitchen, withdrawing back into the cellars and sewers and whatever black burrows the vermin made their lairs. The rest of the ratmen did not linger after their leader, slinking after him in a bestial procession.
Only when the monsters were gone did Kreyssig think to remove the baroness’s gag. When he did, the witch’s dry mouth could cough only a single word, a word she invested with every ounce of horror her voice could command.
‘Skaven!’
Chapter XI
Middenheim
Brauzeit, 1118
The alchemist stopped at a doorway far down the hall, very near the temple sanctuary itself. Unlike the other doors, this one bore no cross. Muttering prayers to both Verena and Shallya, Neist opened the door and walked right into a stream of Dwarfish invective.
Mandred followed Neist into the room, surprised to see a brawny dwarf lashed down to a stone bench. His torso was wound about in thick strips of bandages, and big black candles were arrayed all around his makeshift bed. Sticks of incense smouldered nearby, filling the room with a pungent scent.
‘Time for more of that snake-spit you call medicine?’ Kurgaz yelled at Neist. The dwarf thrashed against the straps holding him down.
‘Does it still itch?’ the alchemist asked. ‘You know you can’t scratch at it or any poison still in there will spread.’
Kurgaz glared murder at the alchemist. ‘If you were anything like a real healer…’ he started.
‘Your father seemed to be of the impression that a dwarf doktor would have fussed and studied so long that you’d be dead now,’ Neist told him in a placating tone. He had only a small idea of what it must have cost Kurgaz’s father to entrust his son to a human healer. The degree of despair that must have gripped the older dwarf would have been immense to force him into such a breach of tradition and propriety. It was humbling to be the recipient of such a trust, even if he was the option of last resort. Despite the sombre thoughts in his head, he kept his tone towards his patient jocular. ‘Maybe your own doktors were leery of incurring a grudge when they failed to help you.’
Kurgaz struggled against the bindings, the leather straps creaking ominously. ‘What does a manling know of grudges and honour!’
‘Nothing,’ Neist admitted. Stepping to the bench, he unstoppered the bottle and allowed Kurgaz to take a long pull from it. ‘That’s why I’m trying to help you… Even if I end up in a beardless grave with squirms gnawing my bones.’
The dwarf coughed and spluttered as he swallowed the medicine. When he found his voice again, it was perhaps slightly less hostile, though far from apologetic. ‘Squigs,’ he said. ‘It’s squigs that’ll be chewing on your bones.’ The dwarf twisted his head around, fixing his irate eyes on Mandred. ‘And I’m not some pickled abortion to be showing off to bored gawkers for a few coppers a peep!’
‘I thought dwarfs knew better than to cuss out royalty,’ the alchemist scolded Kurgaz. The dwarf’s eyes went wide with alarm for a moment, then he quickly subsided into a surly silence.
‘What’s wrong with him?’ Mandred asked. ‘Is he insane?’
Neist shook his head. ‘No, though I think the pain of what he’s endured would have driven any man insane.’ He wiped his hand on the hem of his cloak and reached into the pocket on the breast of his doublet. Carefully, he extracted an ugly looking blob of blackish green stuff. Mandred couldn’t decide if the thing were more like stone or metal. What he did know was that it had an evil look about it. ‘I took that out of him,’ Neist explained. ‘Seems there was a fight down in the Crack and Kurgaz was shot with this.’ He chuckled and shook his head again. ‘He claims it was fired at him by something called a skaven, though I think he’s just too proud to admit it was some lucky goblin that got him.’
‘Grimnir take all fool manlings,’ Kurgaz cursed from his bed. ‘Won’t believe anything unless they see it. Count your blessings you’ve never seen a skaven!’
Neist was laughing again, but Mandred looked at the dwarf with renewed interest. Underfolk, ratmen who lived beneath the world. Why wouldn’t the dwarfs be more familiar with such things, dwelling in the same places the monsters haunted?
‘Kurgaz, what do these “skaven” look like?’ Mandred asked, approaching the bench.
Before the dwarf could answer, Neist cried out in horror. The alchemist sprang away from the door as a hideous creature lunged at him. It was clad in a filthy brown robe, a heavy hood drawn close across its face, but there was no concealing the long naked tail that dragged behind it or the furry paws that gripped the rusty daggers it held. The thing was another of the verminous mutations Mandred had seen twice before!