by Warhammer
Kat and Felix hacked desperately to keep them back, but without Snorri’s steadfast hammer, the fiends swiftly drove them back. Felix took a cut on the arm, and Kat kicked to shake grasping claws from her leg as more ghouls clambered towards them over the dead beast. But then it shook, staggering the ghouls, and flopped to the side.
Snorri roared up from beneath it, covered in guts and slime and swinging his hammer – and went down again immediately, his peg leg snapped off at the stump. The ghouls pounced as he fell, piling on and weighing down his arms so that he couldn’t swing his hammer as more clawed for his neck and eyes.
Felix and Kat cried out and fought forwards to protect the fallen Slayer, but Felix knew they wouldn’t last long. Already one had Kat by the hair, and another was throwing itself on Felix’s sword so the others could drag him down.
Then something red and bloody and blowing like a blast furnace shoved past them and smashed back the clutching horde. It was Gotrek, breath ragged and blazing rune axe slicing through ghouls in every direction.
The ghouls fell back, shrieking, and Gotrek hauled Snorri up to his one leg. The old Slayer grinned through a crimson river that was pouring from his scalp as Felix and Kat fell in beside them and Krell roared in from the left.
‘Well met, Gotrek Gurnisson,’ said Snorri, spitting blood. ‘Snorri thinks we have found our dooms at last, eh?’
‘No,’ gasped Gotrek, levering himself up onto the battlements and pulling Snorri after him. ‘We… have not.’
And with that, he shoved Snorri off the wall.
Felix and Kat stared as the old Slayer dropped out of sight towards the river, flailing and howling in surprise.
‘Gotrek!’ cried Felix. ‘You–’
Gotrek ducked Krell’s axe, and pulled Felix up too.
‘After… him… manling,’ he wheezed, pushing Felix towards the drop. ‘Little one… too.’
Krell’s axe swept again towards Gotrek’s head, trailing its black cloud of grit. Gotrek blocked with the rune axe, but the blow was so powerful it drove the haft of it back into the Slayer’s cheek and smashed him into Felix.
For one brief, sickening moment, the two of them tottered on the very edge of the battlements, scrabbling at the stones, then gravity won out, and they too plunged from the wall.
Felix gaped as the scene on the parapet receded and the wall shot up beside him. Kat appeared on the battlement, screaming his name and bracing to jump, but Krell swung his axe at her and she fell back out of sight.
‘Kat!’ Felix screamed.
The river hit him in the back like a giant’s club and he plunged into its depths, the cold waves closing over him and blocking out everything that meant anything to him in the whole world.
TWENTY-ONE
After an eternity of sinking blackness, Felix’s feet touched bottom and he kicked up as hard as he could, fighting the weight of his chainmail and the rushing water and the ringing numbness of his body. He broke the waves for just a second and caught a ragged breath, then went down again, but this time he touched bottom almost instantly, though he was dragged along it by the current, and couldn’t stand.
He kicked up again, flailing and straining to find the top of the castle walls against the night sky. Was Kat alive? Had Krell killed her? Had she jumped? He couldn’t see anything! Already he was far down the river, and the castle was receding fast.
‘Kat!’ he shouted. ‘Kat! Jump!’
Nothing.
‘Kat!’
His chainmail pulled him down again, and the current dragged him on. He sheathed Karaghul and floundered for the bank, but just as he got his feet under him, he saw moving figures on it, lurching and turning towards his splashes. The fields were still crawling with zombies.
He sank back and looked around, searching the moon-rimmed waves.
‘Gotrek? Are you there?’ he whispered. ‘We have to go back! Kat is still in the castle!’
There was no response. Where was the Slayer? Had he already gone back?
‘Gotrek?’
A pale shape bobbed near him. He blinked water from his eyes and saw it was the Slayer’s broad, muscled back, blood welling from a score of wounds. He was face down in the river, unmoving.
‘Gotrek!’
Felix splashed to him and tried to lift his head out of the water, but they were still being dragged sideways by the current and he couldn’t get leverage. He cursed and tried again, catching Gotrek’s heavy wrist and pushing for the shore. Something sharp bumped his knee as he kicked, and he felt under the water. It was Gotrek’s axe. The Slayer still clutched it in an iron grip.
‘Is that you, young Felix?’ came a voice from nearby.
‘Snorri!’ Felix cried, staring around. ‘Snorri, come here!’
A dark shape with nails sticking from its head sloshed up out of the waves beside him.
‘Snorri thinks Gotrek Gurnisson shouldn’t have pushed him like that,’ said Snorri. ‘That was a good fight.’
‘Snorri, help me. Gotrek is drowning.’
Snorri snorted. ‘Gotrek Gurnisson can’t drown. Snorri has seen him swim many times.’
Nonetheless, the old Slayer caught Gotrek’s shoulders and rolled him over in the water so that he was face up. Gotrek’s head hung to the side, and a trickle of water flowed from his mouth. Felix couldn’t hear him breathing.
Felix’s heart lurched at the sight, then he looked back towards the dark silhouette of the castle, dwindling further into the distance with every passing second. What did he do? He had to go back for Kat, but he couldn’t leave Gotrek. Or could he? He could leave him with Snorri and head back alone, but how was he to storm the walls and fight Kemmler and Krell and the wights by himself? It was impossible. He’d be torn apart by the zombies before he even reached the castle. As shameful as it was to admit it, Felix needed the Slayer’s help.
‘Wake up, Gurnisson,’ said Snorri. ‘Snorri wants to go back and finish that fight.’
‘Gotrek’s hurt, Snorri,’ said Felix. ‘And you’ve lost your peg leg.’
‘Oh,’ said Snorri. ‘Snorri forgot.’
‘We’ll go back as soon as Gotrek wakes up,’ said Felix, staring towards the disappearing castle. ‘We have to.’
A mile or so down the river, they came upon a small village, so dark Felix would not have noticed it but for the little dock sticking out into the river that he banged his head on. No light burned among the low cottages, nor did Felix hear any sounds of movement. He feared that they had not travelled beyond Kemmler’s sphere of influence, and that the place might be populated with zombies, but the cold of the river had penetrated all the way to his heart now, and his teeth were chattering uncontrollably. He could wait no longer.
‘H-h-here, Snorri,’ he whispered. ‘Help me pull him onto the beach.’
‘Aye, young Felix,’ said Snorri.
Together they dragged Gotrek out of the water onto a narrow strip of mud. This was not easy, as Snorri had to do the whole thing on his knees, but finally they managed it and rolled Gotrek on his side. More water spilled from his mouth, but Felix still could not tell if he was breathing. He put an ear to the Slayer’s chest and heard it at last, a faint, thready whisper. There was a heartbeat too, but it was soft and uneven, like waves sluicing over a broken wall. Felix swallowed, hardly relieved.
He slapped the Slayer’s cheek and whispered in his ear.
‘Gotrek, wake up!’
There was no response. Snorri frowned, concerned.
‘Let Snorri try,’ he said, then slapped the Slayer so hard it sounded like a pistol shot.
Felix cringed and glanced around, afraid the noise might attract attention, then turned back to Snorri.
‘I-I don’t think that’s going work, Snorri. Gotrek is… sick or-or, I don’t know.’ He shivered as the night wind nosed through his wet clothes, then looked towards the town. ‘We have to get him someplace warm and dry. Can you…’ He paused and looked at Snorri’s stump. ‘No, of course you can’t. I’ll go look for a cart.’<
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‘Snorri doesn’t need a cart,’ said Snorri, and pushed unsteadily up onto his one leg, then tucked the head of his warhammer under his arm.
The old Slayer grabbed Gotrek’s wrist, then pulled. Felix stood and helped and, with a lot of grunting and cursing, they got Gotrek onto his feet, then Snorri bent and put his shoulder against Gotrek’s belt buckle and heaved him onto his shoulder.
Felix cursed as Snorri swayed alarmingly under Gotrek’s weight, but then the old Slayer steadied, bracing with the hammer-crutch as Gotrek’s head and arms hung limp down his back, dripping water. Felix noticed that, even though he appeared completely unconscious, Gotrek still had a death-grip on his rune axe, which dragged on the ground.
‘Lead on, young Felix,’ said Snorri, turning towards the village. ‘Snorri hopes they have beer.’
Felix doubted it. There were lines and grooves on the muddy beach that showed where small boats had been, but they were gone now, and he had the feeling the people of the village would be gone too.
He drew Karaghul and they started forwards into the middle of the dark huddle of cottages, Felix as quiet as a thief, and Snorri as quiet as an ogre fist-fight, stumping and thudding and hitching and grunting with every step. If there was anything hiding there, it would certainly hear them coming, but perhaps it would be frightened away.
Felix couldn’t see any damage to the village, nor any bodies on the ground, but at the same time, the place didn’t look or sound occupied. In a normal village, he would have heard the clucking of hens in their roosts and the shifting of livestock in their pens. There would have been carts and barrows at the backs of the cottages, and the dull red of banked hearths showing through the shuttered windows. There was none of that here. The carts were gone, the windows were dark, and it was as quiet as a graveyard.
To the left a cottage door was hanging open, the interior as dark as a cave. The tiny tavern across the way, however, was boarded up tight, heavy planks nailed across the front door and all the windows.
Felix stopped just outside the open cottage, peering uneasily into the darkness until his eyes adjusted, then went in. It was empty. He beckoned to Snorri.
‘Lay him by the hearth,’ he said. ‘I’ll make a fire.’
Snorri hobbled in as Felix dried off his flint and steel and found some tinder.
‘Snorri thinks Gurnisson has gained some weight,’ said Snorri as he settled Gotrek to the dirt floor in front of the fireplace, then peeled his stiff fingers off his rune axe and leaned it beside the hearth.
After a few damp strikes, Felix finally knocked a spark from the flint and it kindled the tinder, then found a stack of chopped wood to one side of the hearth, and built it up around the tiny flame.
A few minutes later, once the fire was going nicely, he went and shut the door to hide the light, then looked around. The shack was a lot like the village as a whole – undamaged, unoccupied and stripped. The few cupboards along the walls were empty of plates and cups. The crude table was bare, and the bed stripped of linen and blankets. The people must have fled when Kemmler’s hordes arrived. The question was, had the necromancer’s unnatural blight spread this far? Was the food rotten and the water poisonous?
Felix crossed to a row of jars, his stomach suddenly howling. He tore off their lids, hoping for anything – flour, lard, honey. There were dried traces of something in the last one. He scraped at them with a finger, then stuck it in his mouth. Mustard, as crumbly as chalk.
Still, it tasted like mustard, with no mildew smell or sour reek of rot. In fact, to his starved tongue, it tasted better than grilled beef. Sigmar, he was hungry!
He turned to Snorri, who was wringing out his beard by the fire. ‘Snorri, see if you can get into the tavern. Look for food and drink.’
Snorri grinned. ‘That is the best idea you’ve had in a long time, young Felix.’
He gave his beard a final twist, then started out the front door as Felix went out the back. The garden was little more than a bare-earth dog run, but there was a tiny vegetable plot at the back and the wooden hatch of a cold cellar next to a chicken coop. Felix stumbled to the coop and threw open the door. Empty. He fumbled through the stinking straw at the bottom. Not even an egg. He pulled up the hatch of the cold cellar and looked in, then gave a glad cry – two small carrots and a head of cabbage that had seen better days.
He pulled them out and stuffed one of the carrots in his mouth immediately. It was dry and rubbery and covered in dirt, but still good – not rotted through like all the food in Castle Reikguard had been. He chewed it noisily as he crossed to the vegetable patch, and moaned as the juices ran down the back of his throat. In other times he would likely have thrown the thing aside as not fit for pig fodder, but these were not other times. This was the best carrot nature had ever grown!
The vegetable patch was a disappointment. It was barely spring, and nothing had sprouted yet. Still, the carrot and the cabbage were better than nothing, and the rest of the cottages would have cold cellars too.
He heard a splintering crash from the street and crouched, on guard, then realised it was only Snorri breaking into the tavern. He went back inside and sat down by the fire next to Gotrek, then began to stuff the cabbage leaves in his mouth, groaning with happiness. He eyed the other carrot lustfully, but put it aside. He couldn’t be greedy. Snorri would be hungry too. And Gotrek as well.
‘Gotrek,’ he said, shaking the Slayer’s shoulder. ‘There’s food.’
The Slayer didn’t move. He lay sprawled where Snorri had laid him, eye closed. Felix stared at him uneasily, certain now that Gotrek’s unconsciousness had no external cause. It hadn’t been the fight, or the fall or the water. What was causing this had been in him for days – the poisoned black slivers from the axe of Krell.
The door of the cottage slammed open and Snorri limped in on his hammer-crutch, a keg on one shoulder and a mouldy sausage on a string dangling from his mouth. He spit it out, letting it fall to the dirt, and beamed.
‘Beer, young Felix! Beer!’
Felix was more interested in the sausage, mouldy as it was, but he stood and helped Snorri lower the keg gently to the ground, then went and collected two of the empty jars from the side board.
Snorri knocked in the top of the keg with his hammer, then took one of the jars from Felix and plunged it in.
‘Careful, Snorri,’ said Felix as the old Slayer made to down the jar in one go. ‘It might be spoiled like the stuff in the castle.’
Snorri paused, then took a cautious sip as Felix watched. A broad smile spread across his ugly face. ‘No, young Felix,’ he said. ‘It’s fine – for human beer at least.’
And with that, he tipped the jar back and drank it off, almost, it seemed, without swallowing. Felix dipped his own jar into the keg and filled it up. He inhaled as he brought it to his face, and the yeasty smell of the hops almost, brought tears to his eyes. He put it to his lips. Felix didn’t know what Snorri was talking about. It was the best beer ever brewed, better by far than the best carrot ever grown.
He drank a few delicious swallows, then lowered the jar and let out a satisfied sigh. After starving for so long, he would be drunk in seconds from the beer, but he didn’t care. It tasted too good.
A thought came to him and he looked at Gotrek. The Slayer had not been tempted from unconsciousness by a cabbage. Then again, who would be? But beer had been known to perform miracles of resuscitation upon dwarfs. Hadn’t Felix seen Snorri sit up out of the depths of a concussion at the mere mention of the word?
Felix knelt beside Gotrek and raised the jar. Snorri saw what he was doing and joined him, holding up Gotrek’s head as Felix tipped the jar and let a dribble of beer spill between his slack lips.
They waited.
Nothing.
Felix poured more beer into Gotrek’s mouth. It spilled out again and sank into his beard.
Snorri’s face, which until that moment had still worn the remnants of the smile the beer had placed upon it, fell wit
h worry. ‘Snorri has never seen Gotrek Gurnisson spit out beer before,’ he said quietly. ‘Snorri thinks something may be wrong.’
Felix nodded and sat down with a thump. ‘Snorri isn’t the only one.’
There had been times in Felix’s life when he had thought that there was nothing that could make a man more miserable than fighting for his life. At other times he had felt that the moments before battle, when dread and anticipation filled a man’s guts with cold fear, were the worst, and at still other times he had believed that nothing could make a man more miserable than regret, but now he knew that none of those miseries could even come close to the feeling of powerlessness that came when a man knew his friends were dying and in danger and there was nothing he could do about it.
With a stomach full of not very much sausage, but quite a lot of beer, he had managed at last to fall asleep near dawn, but it was not an easy sleep. It was full of dreams of running for Castle Reikguard to save Kat, but never getting there no matter how fast he ran, and other dreams of Gotrek getting up out of his sick bed, but not being Gotrek – not being alive at all – and turning on him with dead eye and axe glowing green. In some dreams, he reached Castle Reikguard at last, then ran through its halls, chambers and cellars, calling Kat’s name, but never finding her. In other versions, he did find her, but she was shuffling with the other undead, pointing stiff, grey fingers at him and whispering, ‘You did this. You left me behind.’
Sometimes he fled from her, ashamed. Other times, he ran to her, begging her forgiveness.
‘I will forgive you,’ she said in a hollow, faraway voice. ‘But you must let me feed.’
In the depths of his guilt, Felix agreed, and offered her his arm, which she accepted, and began to gnaw on with needle-sharp teeth, and hot, foetid breath. The pain was excruciating, but it was only what he deserved.
‘Wake up, young Felix,’ said Snorri. ‘Snorri thinks you’re having a bad dream.’
Felix blinked slowly awake, and Kat’s sad grey corpse-face was eclipsed by Snorri Nosebiter’s ugly pink one. Grey daylight was streaming through the cracks in the shutters, and there was birdsong in the distance. He hadn’t heard birds in… Sigmar, it felt like years.
