by Warhammer
‘No. I was in the library and he came in drunk.’
‘And what did you do then?’
‘We talked.’
‘About what?’
‘About the dwarfish language, as if it were any of your business.’
‘You’ve suddenly developed an interest in dwarfish?’
‘The maps and books in the library are mostly written in it.’
‘That makes a certain amount of sense,’ said Felix with unsubtle irony. He began to strip off his clothes and get ready for bed.
‘You can be a nasty man, Felix Jaeger.’
‘Apparently. And Herr Schreiber isn’t?’
‘At least Max offered to accompany me to Kislev.’
Felix felt his stomach twist. He had not realised that her words could affect him so much. He threw himself down on the bed beside her, and glanced over. In the darkness her expression was impossible to read. Judging by her voice, she sounded upset. He paused to consider what to say. The silence stretched, a vast empty desert that threatened to swallow anything he could say.
‘I would go with you to Kislev,’ he said eventually.
‘What about the dragon?’
‘After it is slain...’
‘Ah, after it is slain, you will go...’
‘I have sworn an oath, and I know what you Kislevites think of oathbreakers.’
The silence stretched once more. She did not say anything more. Felix considered what to say next, but the beer surged through his brain, and the tentacles of alcohol-induced sleep dragged him down into the sea of slumber.
When he awoke in the morning, Ulrika was gone.
From the battlements above the courtyard of the Slayer King’s palace, Max watched the morning sun rise over the mountains. His mouth felt dry. His head ached. His stomach churned. He had not gotten drunk like that since he had been a student, many years ago. He felt vaguely embarrassed and ashamed. In part he knew it was simply the effects of the hangover. In part though, it was the knowledge that he had spoken to Ulrika about something that he should have best kept to himself. In part too he was annoyed at himself for getting drunk. It was a bad thing for a master magician to do. He shuddered when he realised he had been using spells, even such simple ones as casting light globes, while being inebriated. Magic was a tricky and dangerous thing at the best of times, without the added complications of booze. He remembered what his old tutor Jared had to say on the subject. A drunken magician is a foolish magician, and a foolish magician is soon a dead magician.
He knew it should not have happened, but he knew also he had his reasons. He was a mage. He was aware of his state of mind. He took a deep breath, and counted silently and slowly to five as he did so. He held the breath in for a count of ten, and then let it out slowly for a count of twenty. As he did so, he sought to empty his mind, as his tutors had taught him.
At first it would not come. The sickness in his stomach and the dizziness in his head prevented him from managing it. Another danger of drinking, he thought. If an enemy were to attack me now, I would have difficulty protecting myself. He cursed, knowing that such thoughts were themselves a sign that he was failing to perform even this elementary magical exercise. He continued, concentrating on his breathing, trying to feel calm and relaxed, trying to let the tension flow from his muscles.
Slowly, the exercise began to take effect. His thoughts became quieter and slower. His pains seemed to fade a little. Tension oozed from him. At the edge of his mind, he became aware of the tug of the currents of magic. Colours began to swirl in his mind, reds and greens and a predominant gold. He became aware of himself as an empty vessel, into which the power was starting to flow. The magic softly soaked his pains away; his mind began to feel cleaner and clearer and filled with a golden light. A sense of renewal filled him. The touch of magic was like the effects of some of the narcotic drugs he had experimented with under the supervision of his masters. It made him feel full of energy and almost euphoric in a low-key way. His senses were keener. He was aware of the wind’s gentle caress on his skin, the faint tickling sensation caused by his woollen robes. The heat in the stones under his fingers. He could hear the faint voices of dwarfs in the depths of the castle that he had only been subliminally aware of before. The light was brighter and his vision clearer.
Other senses than the five that mankind normally used clicked in. He could sense the flow of magic all around him, and the faint emanations of living things. He could feel the power of the runes that the dwarfs had bound into their buildings, and the way they channelled primal energies in magical defence. He knew that he could reach out in a manner inexplicable to normal mortals and begin to mould those energies to his will. For a moment, he felt utterly and completely alive, and filled with a gladness that he was sure no non-magician would ever understand.
He achieved emptiness and held it for a few moments, and then as he exhaled began to think again, reviewing his life with a new insight and clarity.
He could see now that he had gotten drunk as a response to the way things had been running out of control in his life. He had undergone a lot of things recently that were alien to the normal routine of his quiet scholarly life. He had been involved in a battle, and fought a sorcerous duel with a mage far mightier than himself. He could easily have died both in that duel, and in the battles with the skaven. He had fallen in love, passionately and uncontrollably and much to his own surprise. Perhaps he had been more vulnerable to it, out in the wilds of Kislev, far from his homelands, and waiting tensely for the return of the airship. True, Ulrika was a lovely woman, but he had known lovelier, and not fallen hard for them. Anyway, it did not matter what the reasons were, the simple fact was that it had happened and had affected him. He had been jealous, and desperate and filled with an anger he had only been barely aware of, and it had driven him to behave badly, and feel temptations he had never known before. He knew that the whole business was a threat to his peace of mind, and in some ways to his soul. His desire for the woman had led him to contemplate dark paths that should have remained closed to him and consider things he should never have given thought to. Last night he had even gone so far as to get drunk and use his magic. He was lucky he had been too drunk to work some of the spells he knew, ones that could bind others to his will.
He closed his eyes and considered the secret knowledge he had gained with such cost. Slaanesh, he thought. To the ignorant, he was the dark god of unspeakable pleasures, a master of daemons, whose pleasure-crazed worshippers engaged in orgies of dreadful excess. And such things did happen, as Max well knew. But this was not the only threat Slaanesh represented. He was the god of the temptations of the flesh, subtle and deadly. He could lure even the wisest onto the road of ruin through the urge to gratify their desires. Max knew that Slaanesh could ruin a man in many ways, through the urge to drink, or take drugs or to bed women. He knew that, in a way, what had happened to him last night was something he had to take seriously, for it was the first step on the path to perdition, if he followed up on it.
It was a thing he knew he must not do. He was sworn to oppose Chaos and not to serve it, that was why he had studied so long and so hard. He knew that he must forswear Ulrika and drink and all the other temptations that might lead him astray, or the consequences would be terrible. But even as he resolved this, part of him whispered that it did not want to do it, and his new insight showed him what might be another truth.
Perhaps he had studied the works of Chaos for so long for a less pure reason, not because he hated it, and wished to oppose it, but because he was fascinated by it. Perhaps he had merely been fooling himself all along.
Even as he told himself that this thought too was but one of the snares of Slaanesh, he was all too aware that it was, at least in part, the truth.
Felix wandered out into the street. He had no idea where to find Ulrika but according to the sentries she, Oleg and Standa had left the palace earlier in the morning and headed off in the direction of the fairground that had
sprung up around the Spirit of Grungni in the valley outside the city. This made sense. She would be looking for horses to continue her journey and the market there would be as good a place as any to buy them.
As he headed downhill, he noticed that a young dwarf of unusual appearance was looking at him. The dwarf was garbed in furs, and his head was covered in a pinkish fuzz that made it look as if it had recently been shaved. He had an axe slung over one shoulder. Noticing Felix was watching him, he began to move forward and fell into step beside him.
‘You are Felix Jaeger!’ The dwarf’s voice was even lower than usual for a dwarf’s and boomed out loudly. As Felix looked he saw that on the dwarf’s arms were an intricate series of tattoos, depicting huge, bleeding monsters. An inscription in dwarf runes ran under them. Seeing that Felix had noticed them, the dwarf flexed his arms proudly causing the muscle to ripple and the tattoo to expand.
‘You’ve noticed my tattoos, I see! The inscription reads “Born to Die!”’
‘Yes. Very impressive,’ said Felix. He lengthened his stride, and soon the dwarf was almost running to keep pace. He had no wish to be rude but he was in a hurry to find Ulrika and apologise for his behaviour of the previous evening. If the youth noticed his brusqueness, he gave no sign.
‘Ulli, son of Ulli, at your service, and your clan’s,’ said the dwarf. He tried bowing as he moved and almost tripped.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ Felix said, hoping the dwarf would take the hint and leave him alone. His hangover was not making him feel sociable.
‘You are a comrade of Gotrek Gurnisson’s, aren’t you? You have held the Hammer of Firebeard in your hand?’ There was a note of awe in the youth’s voice as he spoke. Felix was not sure whether it was for Gotrek or for the hammer. He stopped and gazed down at Ulli.
‘Yes. What of it?’
‘I don’t like your tone of voice, human! Do you want to fight me?’
Felix looked at the youth. He was muscular in the apish way that dwarfs often were, but he was nowhere near as fearsome as Gotrek or Snorri Nosebiter. Still, there was no sense in getting into a fight for no reason, particularly not with a Slayer. ‘No. I do not want to fight you,’ Felix said patiently.
‘Good! I would not want to soil my axe with human blood!’
‘There’s no need to shout,’ Felix said quietly.
‘Do not tell me how to speak!’ roared the dwarf. Instinctively Felix’s hand went to the hilt of his blade. The young Slayer seemed to flinch back a little.
‘I am not telling you how to speak,’ Felix said as politely as he could manage. ‘I am merely asking you to calm down a little.’
‘I am a Slayer! I am not meant to be calm! I am sworn to die in battle against terrible monsters!’
Felix grimaced sourly. He had heard such lines before from Gotrek but somehow they didn’t seem quite so convincing coming from Ulli Ullisson. ‘You’ve probably noticed that I am not a terrible monster,’ he said.
‘Are you mocking me?’
‘As if I would.’
‘Good! I demand the respect a Slayer deserves from your sort!’
‘And what sort would that be?’ Felix asked softly. A dangerous edge had entered his voice. He was getting a little tired of being badgered by this boastful lout. Ulli seemed to notice it, and flinched back again.
‘Humans! The younger race! The men of the Empire!’
A crowd of dwarfs was gathering to watch the confrontation. He could hear them muttering to each other in dwarfish. Some of the spectators were nudging each other with their elbows and pointing to him. He heard his own name mentioned several times. It seemed he was quite a well-known figure around the town. ‘Is there something I can do for you, Ulli Ullisson?’
‘Is it true you intend to hunt down the dragon, Skjalandir?’
‘Yes. Why do you ask?’
‘I seek a glorious death.’
‘Join the queue,’ Felix said softly.
‘What?’ roared Ulli.
‘That’s nothing new,’ Felix said. ‘Do you intend to accompany us on our quest?’
‘I intend to go in search of the dragon with or without you! Still, if you are asking for my protection, I will grant it!’
‘I am not. Good morning to you,’ said Felix, and turned and strode away. He did not look back but he could hear Ulli blustering loudly behind him.
‘We are lost, aren’t we, most perspicacious of pathfinders?’
Grey Seer Thanquol did not like the way Lurk said this. There was an undertone of menace, combined with a hint of disbelief in Thanquol’s abilities that boded ill for future dealings with his henchman. Thanquol’s head hurt. He had run out of warpstone snuff two days ago and it was not helping matters. He felt a terrible craving for it. Maybe he could just nibble a little of his stash of warpstone. No! He knew he must preserve the pure stuff for an emergency. He would need its power then.
‘Are we lost?’ Lurk asked again.
‘No! No!’ chittered Thanquol with what he hoped was utter confidence. ‘Such are my powers of scrying that we are exactly where we need to be!’
‘And where exactly is that?’
‘Are you questioning me, Lurk Snitchtongue?’
‘Expressing an interest I am.’
Thanquol gazed at the horizon. The glittering peaks that marked the border with the Chaos Wastes seemed a lot closer. Was he being betrayed by his desire for warpstone, he wondered? Had the mysterious lure of those lost lands affected his sense of direction? Or was it simply that this constant badgering by Lurk’s inane questioning was beginning to affect his judgement? Perhaps a little of both, he decided.
And of course the weather was not helping either. When it was not raining, it was misty. When it was not misty, it was so bright that it hurt their sensitive skaven eyes and forced them to burrow into the earth rather than risk being spotted. Unwilling as he normally was to admit that humans might be superior to skaven in anything, Thanquol had to admit that a man on horseback was much more likely to spot them before they spotted him. There seemed to be no happy medium. The rains were awful. They drove in hard and reduced visibility to almost zero. They left his fur sodden and deadened his sense of smell. It was as if the very elements conspired with his enemies to undermine Thanquol’s sanity.
Actually, he was surprised that he had not considered this before. It seemed all too likely that this atrocious weather was the product of some enemy’s spell. Thanquol could think of several candidates. One thing was certain, he swore, when he returned to skaven civilisation, he was going to make someone suffer for the discomfort he had endured. And one candidate for his certain vengeance was no more than a few tail lengths away from him.
Lurk had become less and less endurable as their journey progressed. When he was not being insolent, he was hungry and cast alarmingly voracious looks at his rightful master. When he was not doing that he was asking foolish questions, and actually appeared to be implying that he had no faith in the grey seer’s judgement. Thanquol would show him whose judgement was faulty soon enough, he vowed. He was not prepared to put up with insolence from underlings forever.
‘You have not answered my question, most scintillating of seers,’ said Lurk. Thanquol glared at him until he noticed that Lurk was not looking back but instead was staring off over Thanquol’s shoulders. Thanquol bared his teeth in a snarl. That was the oldest trick in the book. He was not going to turn around and let Lurk spring on his back. Did Snitchtongue take him for the merest runt?
‘What are you looking at?’ Thanquol asked.
‘Why not use your awesome powers of divination, and find out for yourself?’ suggested Lurk. ‘Perhaps you could ascertain what that monstrous cloud on the horizon portends and whether it has anything to do with the way the earth shakes beneath our paws.’
At first Thanquol suspected that Lurk was mocking him till he realised that the ground was indeed vibrating. He risked a quick glance over his shoulder and noticed that there was a massive cloud stretching
all the way to the horizon, obscuring everything, even the mountain peaks.
‘Some strange mystical phenomenon,’ he suggested.
‘More like an army on the march, it looks to me, mightiest of masters. And a very large one too.’ Lurk could not quite keep the fear from his voice. Thanquol could not exactly blame him. If that cloud was indeed being raised by an army, it was the largest one Thanquol had ever heard of.
Thanquol shuddered. There was little they could do except wait and hide.
Ulrika looked around the fairground that had sprung up around the airship where it lay outside the town walls. Hundreds of dwarfs surrounded the enclosure and looked at the mighty vessel in awe. Fire eaters and jugglers moved through the crowd. Pie vendors sold their wares from trays around their neck. Alemongers carried massive pitchers of foaming beer through the crowd, dispensing the brew to anyone with a few coppers to spare. A dwarf on stilts towered high over her and shouted jokes to the crowd. Ballad singers rumbled out fanciful tales of the great airship’s voyage in the common speech.
She was disappointed. The horse market had proven to be nothing of the sort. It sold only pit ponies, mules and nags that no true Kislevite would be seen dead riding, beasts that would never survive the long trip north. It seemed, annoyingly enough, that once more Felix had been proven right. Dwarfs were not famous for their cavalry nor for their knowledge of horseflesh. She gritted her teeth. She was not going to allow the thought of the man to annoy her today. She did not want to give way to her anger. Last night she had been ready to make up with him, until he had proven himself a drunken sot. Now he would have to apologise to her.
She had never seen quite so many dwarfs from so close up before. There must be hundreds, perhaps thousands of them, most of them at least partially inebriated. They were all bent on celebrating in their own dour way. It seemed that the return of the Hammer of Firebeard was an event of great significance to them. Not that it appeared they needed any excuse to get drunk. In this they were like Kislev men. The alesellers were doing good business, but then so were the smiths and weaponsellers. It seemed that the dwarfs liked to haggle, and buy and sell almost as much as they liked to drink.
