‘Woe! Peril, Most Terrible Despot!’ Abin-gnaw wailed as the warpguard pointed their halberds at him. The murder-rat flinched away from the sharp blades. The human beside him moaned in terror and tried to bolt. Abin-gnaw must have noticed the motion out of the corner of his eye, for his scaly tail whipped out, tripping the man as he started to run.
‘Squeak-speak!’ Sythar Doom growled from behind the thrashing body of his living shield. The idea occurred to him that a dead shield would be just as viable as a living one. The tinkerer’s fur sizzled as Sythar’s metal jaws clamped down around his neck.
‘Man-things try to trick-lie!’ Abin-gnaw squeaked. ‘Kreyssig-man make army to fight-fight skaven!’ The murder-rat turned quickly, almost earning himself a jab from the closest halberd. Nimbly, the ratman seized the prostrate human and pulled him to face Sythar Doom. ‘Speak-squeak, Rati-man!’ he growled, kicking the human with his clawed foot.
Shivering from head to foot, every hair on his body bristling with fear, Lord Ratimir, Imperial Minister of Finance, related to the ghastly Warpmaster what he had discovered. He told of the irregularities in the treasury, the diversion of taxes and tribute not towards the army but to bribes sent to Talabheim’s ruler, Grand Duke Cvitan. Even a human wasn’t stupid enough to send treasure to an enemy right before attacking him. No, that bribe was to convince the grand duke that for all the antagonistic posturing, Altdorf wasn’t going to march against Talabheim.
Why, then, was Kreyssig building up an army? It wasn’t paranoid to guess the answer. With a snarl, Sythar Doom pointed his claw at Lord Ratimir. Abin-gnaw chirped in terror and dived away as the Warpmaster sent a bolt of searing energy from his hand into the human spy. Ratimir’s body crumbled into a jumble of charred stumps and blackened ash.
‘Kill-kill! Slay-slash! Burn-maim!’ Sythar Doom roared, glowering at Abin-gnaw. ‘Take-fetch all murder-rats!’ he ordered. ‘Find Kreyssig-meat and kill it!’
Sythar Doom barely noticed Abin-gnaw’s genuflection as he scurried off to carry out his orders. The Grey Lord’s mind was awhirl with fresh plans, remoulding his carefully conceived intrigues to fit the changing situation. He’d have to cancel the assassinations of Twych and Pakritt. He’d need both of those mouse-sniffers now! The army that had been gathering under Altdorf would have to march at once, strike against the humans before they were ready.
The Grey Lord’s fangs crackled as he licked them with his tongue. At least, he reflected, the warpcaster was finished. Unleashing the full potential of the invention in something more than a fratricidal field-test would mark a new level of achievement for Clan Skryre, would demonstrate to all of skavendom the enormity of their might and malice. They might even allow the other clans to buy their own warpcasters, with a few modifications so that regular maintenance by a warp-engineer would be essential.
Exterminating several thousand humans would make quite an impressive demonstration. One Sythar Doom would make certain Vecteek and the rest of the Council didn’t soon forget!
Middenheim
Ulriczeit, 1118
In all his life, Mandred had never imagined anything could be as dark as what he found filling the vaults of Karak Grazhyakh. It was a blackness that seemed to have mass and substance, a cloying presence that pressed in all around as the humans marched into the depths. He could feel the weight of the mountain above him, on all sides of him. The impression of walking into a vast tomb was almost impossible to shake.
Entrance had been effected through a tunnel hidden beneath the temple of Grungni. No more did the prince have to wonder about what lay behind those massive doors. It was somehow anticlimactic, really. The dwarf temple had been brooding, ponderous even, but it fell far short of the megalithic construction Mandred had seen in the dwarf stronghold itself. Those regions illuminated by oil lamps and sputtering torches had been beyond magnificent. Great pillars of stone soaring up to meet arched ceilings in a seamless harmony that made him wonder if the dwarfs had carved them out of the living rock when they’d first dug the halls. Gigantic statues of ancient ancestors and mighty kings frowned down at them from niches gouged high upon the walls. Great stretches of runescript adorned entire tunnels, prompting Mandred to wonder what the Khazalid script said and what had been so important that the dwarfs had set it into solid rock to withstand the ages.
No marching songs roused the humans into quickening their step as they descended deeper and deeper into the mountain. The same oppression of spirit that gripped Mandred was shared by those he led. Occasionally, the tones of a whispered prayer might be heard, but that was all. Some of them might have wondered about this world beneath the streets of Middenheim, but none of them had ever imagined they would actually probe its depths. To their credit, despite the fear that dogged their steps, not a man of his expedition turned back. Noble or Dienstleute, the soldiers kept true to their oaths. Not since that fateful ride to relieve Warrenburg had Mandred felt such pride, such kinship, with those he would someday rule.
Would that pride withstand the real test, he wondered? These men had been told the sort of enemy they would face here in the dark beneath Middenheim, but could any warning really prepare them for the hideous reality? Would they stand before the skaven, or would they break and run?
‘A cheerless lot,’ Kurgaz Smallhammer opined. Marching beside Mandred, guiding the column into the depths, the dwarf cast a suspicious look over his shoulder. The same thoughts that had bothered the prince had likewise afflicted the dwarf. ‘Not a laugh, whistle or fart among them. If they’re trying to sneak up on the skaven they needn’t bother. The ratkin will smell them even if they don’t hear them.’ Kurgaz slapped the haft of the hammer he carried, a vicious-looking weapon he’d brought down from the temple. ‘Wish I had Drakdrazh with me,’ he grumbled for the hundredth time. Mandred rolled his eyes, bracing himself to hear another complaint about how Kurgaz’s younger brother Mirko had availed himself of the chance to bear the magic hammer into battle. Even now, he was down in the mines helping fend off the skaven incursion with Kurgaz’s preferred weapon.
Fortunately, Mandred was spared the bitter relation of that story. With an abruptness that startled the prince, Kurgaz fell silent. The dwarf lifted his hand, motioning for those behind to stop marching. His normally gruff voice became a hissed whisper. Soon the other dwarfs accompanying the humans came dashing forwards, joining Kurgaz at the head of the column. There was a brief consultation, then the dwarfs fanned out across the tunnel, axes and hammers at the ready. Kurgaz turned back to Mandred.
‘Get your soldiers ready,’ the dwarf warned.
‘Trouble?’ Beck asked, the bodyguard as ever keeping close to the prince. The knight’s sword was already in his mailed fist.
Kurgaz tilted his head to one side. ‘The rock sounds wrong,’ he stated. His eyes hardened as he focused on a particular patch of the tunnel. ‘Hollow sound. Like something moving behind the walls.’
Belting out orders to the other dwarfs, Kurgaz unlimbered his warhammer and scratched a line in the floor with the iron toe of his boot. ‘This far and no further,’ he vowed. The fact that the oath was made in Reikspiel rather than Khazalid wasn’t lost on Mandred.
‘The enemy is coming, men!’ he shouted to the soldiers behind him as he drew his sword. ‘We hold them here. Steel yourselves. Let the fury of Ulric pour into your hearts. This is where we turn back Old Night and make its children wish they’d kept to the dark!’ The prince’s voice brought blades rasping from sheaths, jaws clenching in grim resignation. It wasn’t the defiant enthusiasm Mandred had hoped to evoke, but at least the men were standing firm. In the ponderous gloom of the Crack, he supposed that was more than he should have expected.