He clanged the callipers against the pipes and strode across the engine room, examining cables and wiring and tapping gauges.
‘It should be working!’ He wrenched a circular hatch open and prodded the workings inside the case. ‘The aether-gold is still here. There’s no reason for the engines not to fire.’
He halted, spotting something in the forest of pipes and levers. ‘Of course!’ He grabbed it. ‘The conduits have split. There’s no pressure.’
Maleneth stepped closer and saw the two lengths of cable he was holding. Unlike everything else, they had perished and crumbled.
‘Aether-gold is corrosive.’ Trachos dropped the pipes and wiped his gauntlets on his armour. ‘The Kharadron probably replace these conduits regularly to keep them working.’
‘So we can’t fire up the engines?’
‘We’d need some way to channel the aether-gold.’ Trachos stared up at the hatch. ‘It’s not so different from the machines that were holding the Unburied.’
‘So we could use Gotrek’s rune again?’
‘Perhaps. If he’s happy to come down here and let the aether-power blast through him. If he doesn’t mind being used as an engine part.’
Maleneth raised an eyebrow. ‘Ah…’
They stood in silence for a moment, then heard footfalls up on the deck and clambered back up the ladder, weapons readied.
It was Gotrek. He was trembling with battle fury and staring wildly. Rune-light rippled over his skin and his beard, spilling through the gloom. The knights of the Gravesward were behind him, carrying the cocoons onto the deck under the watchful eye of Prince Volant. Lhosia was there too, standing with the prince, and the pair were locked in a whispered debate.
‘Did you kill it?’ asked Maleneth as she rushed towards Gotrek.
‘What?’
‘The giant ghoul.’
He shrugged. ‘He won’t be breaking any more doors, let’s put it that way. Unless someone puts his ugly head on a battering ram.’
‘What do you intend to do?’ asked Prince Volant, looming over Gotrek. ‘You swore to preserve the Unburied, and we are running out of time.’
Gotrek looked at Trachos.
‘The engines are intact,’ said Trachos. ‘And there’s plenty of aether-gold on board. We just need a conduit – a way to channel the power. A powerful piece of ur-gold would do it.’
Gotrek nodded, then realisation dawned in his eye. ‘Me? You want to use me as an engine part?’
‘Your rune is powerful enough to channel the aether-gold.’ Trachos’ voice remained dull and flat. ‘Nothing else could handle it.’
Gotrek tapped the rune. ‘And what would be left of me when the journey was over? How much would be Gotrek and how much would be Grimnir?’
His beard bristled, and he looked so furious that Maleneth backed away, readying herself to dodge his axe.
‘Grungni’s teeth,’ he snarled, scowling at the rune. It was still rippling with energy. The aether-light was spreading from the rune into Gotrek’s veins, pulsing across his chest and revealing the arteries beneath his scarred skin. It looked like rivulets of molten gold passing under his ribs.
‘I refuse to keep doing this,’ said Gotrek, not looking at Maleneth. ‘I did not come all this way to give my soul to the one god who betrayed me more than any other.’
Trachos grabbed one of his massive biceps. ‘There is another way.’
Gotrek glanced up at the Stormcast Eternal in shock. Then he glowered. ‘What way is that? Trot meekly into one of Sigmar’s sparkly towers and prostrate myself before his greatness? Oh, Hammer Lord, let me comb your mighty beard! That sort of thing?’
‘There’s no need to worship him. Your soul is your own. Your faith is your own. The Order of Azyr only needs the power you wield.’
‘And how exactly would you get it out of me? Last time I checked, my ribs weren’t hinged.’
Trachos seemed oblivious to Gotrek’s rage. ‘The power isn’t just in you. It’s part of you. If you harnessed it in Sigmar’s name we could–’
‘In Sigmar’s name?’ Gotrek’s face flushed with anger and the rune pulsed brighter. He slammed against Trachos, about to yell something else, when they were interrupted by the sound of fighting back in the hall.
‘Mordants!’ cried several Gravesward as they ran towards the ship, struggling under the weight of the last few cocoons. ‘Hundreds of them.’
Volant cursed. He knelt down so that he was facing the Slayer. His tone was an awkward mix of outrage and desperation. ‘I could send you to Nagash, Gotrek, son of Gurni, but only if you get my ancestors to the Lingering Keep. And only if we leave right now.’
A growl rumbled up from Gotrek’s chest and he gripped his mohawk, wrenching his hair back and forth as though trying to rip it out. He stared at the shapes rushing through the shadows towards the ship, muttering angrily under his breath. Then he nodded, spat on the deck and climbed down the hatch, waving for Trachos to follow him.
Maleneth shook her head. ‘I never dreamed he’d do it.’ She looked at the cocoons. ‘I suggest you tie those things down.’
Chapter Nineteen
The Eventide
I refuse to be sick, thought Maleneth as the world turned around her. Even over the roar of the engines, she could hear people groaning and vomiting across the deck. She had lashed herself to the railings, but the ship was shaking so violently that she was covered in bruises.
‘God of Murder,’ she groaned. ‘How long will this take?’
‘Hours at most!’ cried Lord Aurun from a few feet away. He looked exhilarated. ‘Look how fast the Spindrift is!’
She shook her head and looked out at the sea. The waves were shimmering, illuminated by the ship’s blue-green light. It gave them the illusion of movement, and seen in such snatched glimpses, it could almost have been a natural sea. Rather than crashing through the breakers, though, the aether-ship was lurching drunkenly over them, gliding a few feet above the pitted surface, hurled by the arcane science of its Kharadron-wrought engines. Light knifed through the seams in its iron hull, splitting Morbium’s endless dark.
Every now and then she heard Gotrek cry out, his voice rising up from beneath her like the howl of a wounded leviathan. Trachos was down in the engine room with him, battling to harness the aether-gold Gotrek was channelling, but Maleneth was glad to be nowhere near them. There were alternating bouts of anger, confusion and excitement in the Slayer’s voice. He sounded even more unstable than usual. Even though he was hidden from her, his presence was unmissable – beams of golden light were shining up through the deck plating. It looked like the ship had a piece of the sun stowed in its bilges.
At the end of another deck she could see Prince Volant, standing unaided at the wheel, legs apart as he struggled to keep his footing. Lhosia was at his side, tied to the gunwale and cradling one of the Unburied. She was crying out instructions to the prince, and he responded by wrenching the levers and handles that surrounded the huge brass wheel.
‘What did I do to deserve this?’ muttered Maleneth.
Murder the one person who ever cared for you?
Despite her nausea, Maleneth laughed. ‘Cared for me? Cared for my blood, you mean. And only in the way a cat cares for a mouse.’
You never understood me, Witchblade.
‘I understood you as well as I needed.’