Gotrek & Felix- the Second Omnibus - William King

by Warhammer

  ‘You’re a pretty lass,’ said a deep, rumbling voice close to Ulrika’s elbow. She looked down to see a dwarf standing there. He was squat, muscular and repulsively ugly. His nose had been mashed and a huge hairy wart stood on the end of it. His head had been shaved and a tufted crest of dyed hair rose above it. Huge gold rings dangled from his ears.

  ‘And you’re a Slayer.’

  ‘As clever as ye are pretty, I see. Do you fancy a turn in the bushes?’ The dwarf gestured insinuatingly at the nearest clump of greenery. It took Ulrika a few moments to work out his meaning. When she did she did not know whether to be angry or amused. Oleg and Standa had reached for their blades. She quelled them with a glance. She was quite capable of handling this situation on her own.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘You’ll soon change your mind if you do. There’s no a lass ever regretted straddling Bjorni Bjornisson.’

  This time Ulrika did laugh. If the Slayer was offended, he gave no sign. ‘If ye change yer mind, let me know.’

  ‘I’ll be sure to do that,’ she said, and turned to go.

  ‘You know Gotrek Gurnisson,’ said the Slayer. ‘And Felix Jaeger?’

  That stopped her. ‘Yes.’

  ‘They’re going hunting for dragons, so I hear.’

  ‘You hear correctly.’

  ‘I might join them I think. We’ll be seeing more of each other, bonnie lass.’

  The Slayer turned and walked away. Astonished, Ulrika followed him with her gaze. The last she saw of him, he was disappearing into the crowd, arm in arm with two rouged and none-too-young looking human wenches.

  ‘Never seen anything like that before,’ Standa said, a look of discomfort showing on his moon face. Oleg tugged his long, drooping moustaches in agreement.

  ‘You’ll see a lot stranger things before we’re done travelling, I’ll warrant,’ said Ulrika. ‘Now, let’s get going. We might as well get back to the palace. We’ll find no horses here.’

  She was still not sure she believed what she had just seen herself. That was surely the strangest Slayer she had ever encountered.

  The Spirit of Grungni lay at rest. Even to Felix’s hungover eyes it was an impressive sight. The massive airship lay in an open field beyond Karak Kadrin. The area was roped off to keep the crowd at bay and surrounded by dwarf soldiers to prevent any interlopers getting too close. The gondola actually rested on the ground anchored by ropes held by hooks driven deep into the ground like tentpegs. More ropes arced up and over the gasbag, running through the guardrails that ran along the top of the dirigible and coming down the other side. Even over the voices of the crowd of spectators Felix could hear the ropes creak as the airship shifted slightly. The spectacle reminded Felix of an old story he had once read of a sleeping giant who had been trapped in his slumber, ensnared in a webwork of ropes, pinned to the earth and unable to move.

  Felix had been looking for Ulrika, but like everyone else he was getting distracted by the circus surrounding the airship. He smiled to himself. He had become so accustomed to the Spirit of Grungni on the quest for Karag Dum that he had forgotten just how impressive the massive airship was. The onlookers had not. They had come to gape at it, the way they might at some captive dragon.

  The guards recognised Felix as he forced his way into the roped-off enclosure, and let him pass. He heard his name murmured by the spectators as he moved closer to the Spirit of Grungni. It was strange to be recognised.

  Dwarfs swarmed over the fuselage of the airship, painting the gasbag with a pitch-like substance which sealed the rips and tears. Felix knew it was made from some alchemical formula known only to Makaisson and his apprentices. Blacksmiths and artificers worked on the engines and the dented cupola, banging away with hammers, twisting nuts into place with huge spanners. The clangour was deafening. Looking through the portholes, he could see more dwarfs inside. It looked like the repairs were proceeding apace. Borek Forkbeard leaned on his stick and watched the work in progress. He looked sadder and older than ever but a smile crossed his face when he noticed Felix approach.

  ‘Have you seen Ulrika?’ the young warrior asked

  ‘I thought I saw her and her guards heading back up to the city.’

  Felix clamped down on his disappointment. He did not feel like going back to the palace right now. Maybe he should have some ale. It might help his hangover. He considered this briefly and decided against it. It probably wouldn’t help, and he’d need his wits about him when he saw Ulrika again.

  ‘How is it going?’ Felix asked. Borek nodded his head. An unlit pipe was clenched between his teeth. Felix knew it was there from force of habit. He would not light it so close to the gasbag.

  ‘Slowly. Makaisson was here yesterday and said it may be some weeks before the airship is ready.’

  ‘Why is he not here himself? Surely he should be supervising this.’

  ‘His apprentices know all that is needful or so he claims. The crew were well trained before we set out. We knew he might not be alive to oversee any repairs that were needed.’

  From his expression, Felix could tell that the old dwarf was thinking of someone else who was not here to witness this, his nephew. The scholar continued, ‘Makaisson is obsessed with slaying the dragon. He gets like that. He has locked himself up in his workshop and is building weapons to kill the beast. He refuses food and drink, and only came to see the repairs being done yesterday because I banged on his door for an hour.’

  Felix looked at him. ‘Do you think even Makaisson can come up with something that will destroy Skjalandir?’

  Borek shrugged. ‘If anyone can, he can. He is a genius. In a dozen centuries the dwarf realms have not cast up an engineer as brilliant as he.’

  ‘A pity then that he has become a Slayer.’

  ‘Aye; he might have changed the world otherwise. If his theories had been accepted. If the Engineers Guild had not hounded him. As it is, his name will go down in history anyway. Creating this airship was a deed worthy of the Ancestors. Piloting it to Karag Dum means his name will live forever, even if he does not.’

  ‘Was the deed really so notable?’

  ‘More than you can imagine. Your name will live as long as the mountains too, Felix Jaeger. Your part in the slaying of the daemon, and the recovery of the Hammer of Firebeard will see to that.’

  Felix found this a strange thought. He was not sure how he felt about the knowledge that his name would be recalled in centuries to come, in a time long after he was dead. He did not want to think of dying just yet. It was not a thought he found pleasant.

  ‘Where is the hammer now?’

  ‘It is in the shrine of Grimnir. Hurgrim has left it there for the time being.’

  A thought struck Felix. Curiosity overcame him.

  ‘One day I would like to see the inside of the shrine.’

  ‘It is not usual for humans to be allowed to view the inside of Grimnir’s sanctum.’ Borek paused for a moment. ‘But you are the Hammerbearer, and the gods have looked on you with favour, so I suppose an exception could be made in your case.’

  ‘I would like that,’ said Felix. If he ever was going to write up the tale of Gotrek’s adventures, it might be important. Perhaps seeing the inside of the shrine would give him some insight into the dwarf personality.

  ‘Thank you,’ Felix said. ‘I will go now.’

  ‘May the Ancestor Gods watch over you, Felix Jaeger.’

  ‘And you,’ Felix said, striding away.

  Grey Seer Thanquol watched the dust cloud come ever closer. It billowed to the sky. It was as if all the grass of the plain had caught fire and was sending smoke plumes skyward. The ground vibrated. He could feel the thunder of hundreds of hooves against the earth. His nose twitched. He could smell warpstone in small quantities, and cold steel and flesh, human-like and yet not human. His mystical senses told him that powerful magic was present. He and Lurk exchanged scared looks, animosity temporarily fading as they confronted a threat to their common
well-being.

  Almost. Thanquol briefly considered running and leaving Lurk to face whatever it was that rushed towards them. What held him in place was the knowledge that it would probably be pointless. Instinct told him that there were so many foes coming towards them, that a few of them could overcome Lurk, and others would still have time to seek him out. Being with Lurk at least offered the possibility of some protection. At moments of stress like these, when the urge to squirt the musk of fear filled him, the scent of another ratman reassured even a skaven as independent as Grey Seer Thanquol.

  ‘Horse warriors, most perceptive of potentates?’ rumbled Lurk.

  Thanquol shook his horned head and bared his fangs. His mouth felt dry. His heart pounded within his chest. He fought the urge to begin stuffing the last of the powdered warpstone into his mouth.

  ‘No. Others. Not humans.’

  ‘From the north? From the Wastes?’

  ‘Yes! Yes! Black-armoured warriors. Altered beasts. Other things.’

  ‘You have seen this? The Horned Rat has granted you a vision?’

  Not in the strictest sense, Thanquol thought, but it served no purpose to let Lurk know, so he maintained a significant silence as he peered into the cloud. The dust made his pink eyes water and his nose twitch. His musk glands felt tight and he lashed his tail to try and dispel the tension. Lurk let out a low threatening growl. Thanquol glared into the advancing dust cloud trying to see into it.

  Forms moved within the cloud. Massive, dark shapes that emerged slowly from the gloom and resolved themselves into riders. Thanquol had seen many of the mounted warriors the foolish humans called knights when he had served the Council of Thirteen in Bretonnia. The horsemen reminded him of those, save that their armour was made all of black iron with brass rondels. It was more intricate than any human armour Thanquol had ever seen before. Daemonic faces, twisted runes, arcane symbols: all seemed to have been moulded into the steel by some sorcerous technique.

  One warrior had a gaping mawed daemonic face set in his chest plate. His helm echoed the daemon’s features and glowing red eyes glared out from behind his visor. Another wore armour covered in monstrous spikes and clutched a similarly spiked mace, shaped like a shrieking human head, in one armoured fist. A third’s armour glowed with an eerie yellow light, pulsing softly as if in time to his heartbeat. Behind them came other riders garbed in armour just as fantastically elaborate.

  Their weapons were also of black steel set with fiery runes. They carried swords and maces, lances and morning stars. Their shields showed the symbol of Tzeentch, the Great Mutator, one of the four Ruinous Powers. The horses were huge, far bigger than normal human steeds. They needed to be to carry their massive armoured riders, and the weight of the impossibly intricate, segmented barding. Like their riders, the steeds’ eyes glowed with baleful internal fires. It was as if the gates of Hell had opened and these awful spectres had ridden straight out.

  The Chaos warriors were a terrifying sight, and what was even more frightening was the fact that Thanquol knew they were but the outriders of a vast horde. What had those fiends, Felix Jaeger and Gotrek Gurnisson done, Thanquol wondered? He did not doubt for a moment that the onset of this monstrous army was somehow connected with their mission into the Chaos Wastes. It was just like them to stir up a hornets’ nest of malefic forces and then run, leaving others in the path. May the Horned Rat devour their souls, Thanquol cursed.

  With a terrified howl, Lurk threw himself headlong on the ground and abased himself. Thanquol cursed him too, and fought the urge to repeat Lurk’s action himself. His mind raced. If he prostrated himself before these bloodthirsty madmen, they would most likely simply ride over him, trampling the greatest skaven mind of this age into a bloody husk. Thanquol knew that would never do. He needed to keep all his wits about him if he wanted to survive.

  Dramatically he threw his arms wide and let a nimbus of power play around his claws. The leading horse reared but its rider kept it under control and dropped his weapon into the attack position. Thanquol desperately controlled his musk glands as they sought to void themselves. He raised his chin high and let them see his horned head, his white fur, his magnificent lashing tail. He felt his power surge within him, and knew that if worst came to the worst he would take a few of these Tzeentch worshippers with him to greet the Horned Rat in the Thirteenth Level of the Abyss.

  ‘Halt!’ he shouted in the common tongue of humans in his most impressive oracular voice. ‘I bring you greetings from the Council of Thirteen, lordly rulers of all skavendom.’

  If the Chaos warriors were impressed, they gave no sign of it. Instead, one of them touched spurs to the flanks of his mount, dropped his lance and thundered forward, obviously intent on skewering the grey seer.

  Everything seemed to slow as the armoured warrior advanced. The spearpoint looked very sharp. Thanquol wondered if his last moment had come.

  ‘Wait! Wait!’ shrieked Grey Seer Thanquol. ‘Don’t kill me. You are making a grave error. I bring tidings from the Council of Thirteen. They wish to make obeisance to your all-conquering army!’

  Thanquol thought his doom was upon him. He summoned his power to attempt the escape spell that would cast him across the warp. He was not sure he had the time or the energy, but it seemed like his only slim hope. The glittering lance point came ever closer. It looked sharp as Felix Jaeger’s sword and ten times as deadly. Just before it pierced his body, the lancer raised his weapon and let out a bellow of mocking malevolent laughter.

  ‘You wish to ally with us?’

  ‘Yes! Yes!’

  ‘Or you wish to surrender to us?’

  ‘Yes! Yes!’

  ‘Which is it? Or is it both?’

  ‘Both!’ Thanquol had squirted the musk of fear, but it did not matter right now. What was important was that he preserve his life and his genius for the benefit of the skaven nation. Once he had gotten through the next few difficult moments, he would go about the business of turning the tables on these arrogant dullards. At the moment though preserving his skin took the highest priority.

  ‘Why should we spare you?’

  ‘We have mighty armies! We can aid you in crushing mankind! We have knowledge of the human cities and human dispositions! We know many things!’

  ‘Perhaps you could spare this mutant’s life and keep it as a jester!’ roared the creature with the daemon’s face on its breastplate. Thanquol forced himself to bob his head in an appeasing manner, although inwardly he seethed and swore vengeance on the speaker as soon as the moment was right. If there was as much warpstone nearby as he suspected that moment would come soon.

  ‘Or maybe we should nail it to our banners as a warning to the rest of its kind. I have met skaven before. I have fought with them. A nasty treacherous bunch they were too.’

  ‘Doubtless they were renegades,’ said Thanquol thinking quickly. ‘True skaven always keep faith with their allies.’

  ‘That’s a good joke,’ said daemon face. ‘You shall be our jester!’

  ‘This one is a grey seer,’ said a Chaos warrior carrying a massive banner depicting a flayed human brandishing a sword. ‘It is possible that it does speak for the Thirteen.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Perhaps we should spare it! Perhaps the warlord or his pet sorcerers should interrogate it!’

  Listen to this one, Thanquol prayed. He shows common sense. And doubtless the horde’s leader would have the wisdom to negotiate with a grey seer.

  ‘And we can always offer his soul to Tzeentch afterwards. The seers are said to be magicians and our mighty lord might appreciate such a tasty morsel!’

  What have I let myself in for, Grey Seer Thanquol asked himself? Perhaps he should have tried the escape spell but before he knew it, the lancer had stopped, snatched him up and thrown him across his saddle like a sack of wheat. The others had surrounded Lurk and were herding him forwards with their weapons.

  In heartbeats they were on their way into the heart of the onco
ming Chaos horde. Thanquol’s heart raced with fear, and his empty musk-glands hurt from the strain of trying to squirt. It was not a reassuring feeling.

  Felix entered the inner sanctum of the Temple of Grimnir. His fame had obviously proceeded him. The priests had made no fuss about letting him in. They had simply seemed surprised that any man should want to enter the place. It was dark and gloomy in here after the huge fire that burned bright in the entrance hall, and it took his eyes a few moments to adjust to the dimness.

  The enormously thick stone walls muffled all sound. The air smelled of incense and the acrid odour of burned hair. This inner sanctum was empty save for a few old dwarfs in plain robes of red. They carried no weapons; their beards were long and bound with clips that showed the sign of two crossed axes. They seemed to do little else but pray and tend the enormous fire that burned constantly in a pit in the antechamber.

  Felix looked around. The ceiling would be considered low in a human temple but it was still three times his own height. Enormous stone sarcophagi lined the walls. Each was as tall as a man and carved to represent a dwarf lying flat on his back, a weapon clutched to his chest. These were the tombs of the Slayer Kings, Felix knew. For many generations the royal family of Karak Kadrin had been buried here.

  The centre of the room was dominated by a massive altar over which loomed a statue of a mighty dwarf warrior with an axe held in each hand, standing with his foot on the neck of a dragon. The figure depicted was recognisably a Slayer. His beard was short. A massive crest towered over his head. A dwarf knelt before the altar, murmuring quiet prayers.

  On the altar rested the Hammer of Firebeard. Just looking at it, Felix felt a spasm of pain pass through his fingers. He could still remember carrying it into battle against the great Bloodthirster of Karag Dum. Mortal man had not been meant to wield such a weapon, and he paid the price for it in agony. Sometimes, in the still small hours of the night, he wondered about this. Why, of all the men in the world, had the hammer allowed him to wield it? He was no hero. He had not even wanted to be there in Karag Dum, and he could have lived his entire life quite happily without ever seeing a Great Daemon of Chaos, let alone fighting one.