Trachos stared blankly at Gotrek’s frenzied attacks, then went back to turning the cogs.
The lights flashed brighter over the ceiling and he nodded, taking another instrument from his belt and attaching it to the first.
‘To me!’ cried Prince Volant, still clinging weakly to the back of his steed as he waved his scythe. ‘Form a circle!’
His soldiers tried to cross the room towards him, but so many ghouls had crushed into the hall that many of the knights were surrounded. Lord Aurun led a group of soldiers to the prince, and they formed an island of black armour in the heaving mass of grey.
‘If we don’t go now it’s over,’ said Maleneth, leaning over Trachos, trying to understand what he was doing.
Every part of the machinery was flickering, and there was a low humming emanating from the cradles holding the Unburied, but Trachos shook his head and backed away, leaving his implements hanging from the cogs.
‘Not enough power.’
‘What?’ Trachos was nearly twice as tall as Maleneth and clad in hulking sigmarite, but she reached up, grabbed his arm and hauled him round to face her. ‘You’re giving up?’ She shook her head in disbelief, waving at the battle that was ending below them. The Gravesward around Prince Volant were falling fast, vanishing beneath mounds of frantic ghouls. ‘If we don’t get these things out, we’re all going to be butchered.’ She pulled him close. ‘You might not die, Trachos, but what will your next Reforging be like? And what will be left when you come out the other side?’
He loomed over her, his voice taut. ‘I know what this means for me, Witchblade, but I still don’t have the power to trigger those engines. They’ve been inert too long. It would take massive amounts of aether-fire to reignite them.’
Down below, the prince’s steed let out an unearthly scream as ghouls tore into it, snapping bones in its legs even as it lashed out with foot-long claws. The prince howled a command and the drake spat more lethal dust, but it was like punching a mountain. Ghouls continued tumbling towards the prince.
‘Try again!’ Maleneth shouted, infuriated by Trachos’ fatalistic tone. ‘Even if I have to drag you–’
He barged past her, whipping his hammers from his belt.
Her fighter’s instinct told her to duck, and she heard a crack of breaking bone.
She whirled around, knives drawn, to see ghouls lurching and scrambling up the steps.
‘Get to the knights!’ she gasped.
Trachos nodded, and they began fighting their way back down the steps.
Maleneth tried to kill as she had been trained, to honour the Murder God with every cut, but she was too mired in grasping limbs. The best she could do was use her momentum to bound over the heads and shoulders of the ghouls.
Trachos resorted to similar tactics, using his weighty, armour-clad bulk to smash through the crush.
By the time they reached the bottom steps, Maleneth could barely see, her face was so drenched in blood, but she managed to stagger into the circle of knights around Prince Volant.
Trachos punched his way after her and began hammering anyone who broke through the lines. He was unusually quiet, fighting in grim silence and glancing up at the machines still glowing overhead.
Gotrek was a few feet away, fighting outside the circle, his face locked in a scowl.
‘What happened?’ he cried, snatching a glance at Trachos.
‘It can’t be done!’ yelled Trachos.
Gotrek attacked the ghouls with renewed fury, his axe a golden blur. ‘Can’t be done?’ His words were contorted by rage.
The Slayer battled towards the base of a toppled column and climbed up onto it, wiping his face and staring out at the deranged figures crashing around him. He looked like the captain of a listing ship, standing at the prow as waves swelled around him.
‘So this is my doom?’ The rune in his chest was blazing constantly now, fuelled by kill-fever. ‘These wretched things? In this wretched place?’ He was talking to himself more than Trachos. ‘I’m glad you never lived to see it, manling. It would not have been worthy of a poem.’ He pounded the dazzling rune. ‘Redeem yourself, Grimnir! Give me something better!’
At the far end of the hall, the door shook, hurling masonry through the air as the giant tried to shoulder its way into the chamber. Its grotesque face was so vast that only half of it was visible through the tumbling walls.
Gotrek laughed. ‘Aye, I suppose he’ll do.’
The Slayer glanced back at the group battling around the prince. ‘Get out!’ he shouted. ‘I can’t save your dead, but I can save you. I’ll hold the morons back. Go. While you can.’
Lord Aurun called out to his men, waving them forwards. ‘To the Slayer!’
‘Don’t be a fool!’ yelled Gotrek. ‘Go!’
As the Gravesward charged, Aurun cried out. Despite the carnage, he sounded clear and determined. ‘What are we without the wisdom of our forebears? What use living if we lose the past?’
Gotrek’s eyes flashed, and for once it was with something other than rage. ‘Well said!’ He bared his teeth in a grin, looking back at Lord Aurun. ‘Well bloody said, manling!’
He raised his axe, letting the fury of the rune blast from his chest and up into the blade. He looked like a fallen comet, burning as the world collapsed around it. ‘Then we meet our dooms together!’ He locked his single, burning eye on the colossus at the far side of the hall. ‘And that one’s mine!’
Maleneth struggled to keep her footing as the knights shoved their way deeper into the ghouls. ‘No!’ she spat. ‘I refuse to die here.’
Knight after knight fell, shields torn from their grip and necks ripped open. It was grotesque. And brutal. Whatever Gotrek thought, Maleneth saw nothing noble in the sacrifice. These men were dying for no reason, which might be fine for them, but not for a Bride of Khaine.
She fought furiously, buying time to think, but it was all going to be over in minutes.
There was no way to reach the exit at the back of the hall on her own – there were too many ghouls in the way. She looked to where Gotrek was charging head down through the creatures, making for the giant. He was consumed by his determination to reach the grotesque monster, burning so brightly now that it was hard to look at him.
‘God of Murder,’ gasped Maleneth. ‘Why didn’t I think of it? Trachos!’ she howled, opening a ghoul’s belly and standing on its back as it doubled over, raising herself over the crush.
Trachos was only a few feet away. His turquoise armour had been painted crimson by blood, but he was still swinging his hammers, towering over the battle. He looked her way.
‘Power!’ she cried, dodging a blow and trying to point at Gotrek.
Trachos shook his head, confused.
‘The rune!’ she shouted, enraged by his stupidity. ‘The Rune of Blackhammer! Power!’
Trachos hesitated, only for a moment, but it was enough for a wave of ghouls to attack him. He fell, vanishing beneath the crowd of bodies.
‘Damn you!’ howled Maleneth, shaking her head violently as she fended off another blow.
Don’t be a fool, said her mistress. What do you know of engineering?
‘He hesitated!’ she snapped, too far gone to care if anyone heard her addressing a ghost. ‘Trachos hesitated. Because I’m right!’
She shrugged off the despair that had been threatening to overwhelm her and leapt from the back of the ghoul, landing on the shoulders of another one. Determination and hope thrilled through her veins, giving her a furious surge of energy. She bounded from one wretch to the next, moving so fast that they barely registered her footfall before she had leapt clear.