Karag Durak Grudge

by David Guymer

  ‘Do they not know that the mighty Queek hears all?’ added another.

  ‘Yes-yes, fool-fools! What treachery do they plot together?’

  ‘Ska is untrustworthy. Do not leave him alone.’ Queek’s newest and freshest head hung from his trophy rack by a dark shank of hair. Listlessly, its sunken features turned from side-to-side, its eyes blank and ever watchful.

  Whispering warm words, Queek reached up a paw to caress its sallow cheeks. It had belonged to a human adventurer named Torsten, but now it was the property of the Headtaker. Queek was glad for it. This one was new, but it was insightful. Ska Bloodtail could not be trusted.

  Queek swiped the fangleader again, his claws drawing blood. ‘Stupid-Ska. You clumsiest clanger of all. Skratch go alone and Skratch hurry back.’ He turned to the scout, licking his lieutenant’s blood from his claws as he spoke. ‘Go-go, fast-quick.’

  Skratch leapt to attention as if shocked, scampering away with suspicious enthusiasm into the upwardly sloping passage.

  Queek tapped his footpaw impatiently. He had never liked waiting.

  It felt like he had been waiting an inordinately long time. Damn that Ska, he thought, for talking his warlord out of sending someone to keep an eye on that useless scout. He glared at the traitorous underling, but the fangleader kept his eyes – and his thoughts – firmly to himself.

  ‘Moulder-thing,’ he snapped, finally out of patience. ‘Come now, quick-quick.’

  The packmaster raced to the warlord’s side, dropping to one knee as he offered his unguarded throat. It was the first time Queek had deigned to take a proper look at the beast handler; his cowled muzzle was riddled with infected cuts and barely healed scars. He reeked of rat musk and warpstone, masking his own scent and leaving Queek wondering whether the rat-man was displaying the appropriate degree of terror as befitted an encounter with so fearsome a skaven as he. He was prepared – just this one time – to accept the violently shuddering shoulders of the packmaster as respect enough.

  ‘I will tolerate no more failure, Moulder-thing. Your pets had best-best succeed where traitor-Skratch could not.’

  ‘Moulder hunter-rats find-find anything, mighty warlord.’

  ‘Pray-pray you speak true, Moulder-thing.’

  Without releasing the packmaster from his sight, Queek reached under the scarlet plate of his left vambrace, claws probing as though in pursuit of a particularly cunning flea.

  ‘Ah,’ he declared. ‘Here-here.’

  Withdrawing his paw, he presented the object to the incredulous packmaster. There, hanging from the warlord’s claws on a length of cord, were two shrivelled digits, dried and pickled and pungent. The packmaster reeled from the smell, blinking away tears.

  They were fingers. Dwarf fingers.

  Queek thrust the grisly relics into the packmaster’s unwelcoming paws. ‘Take-show to your rats. If you succeed then soon I have all five, and you will have your weight in warpstone.’

  The packmaster gasped with sudden greed, darting back to his waiting beasts, holding aloft the shrivelled digits like some kind of charm. The rats sniffed them excitedly, exploring their taste with sharp flicks of their tiny, slobbering tongues.

  With a sudden gesture, the packmaster pulled the cord away, secreting it amongst the voluminous pockets of his cloak. The rats huffed and whined, raising onto hind legs and pawing at their handler’s legs in dismay. He shoved them aside with an impatient sweep of his tail, focusing their simple minds with a sharp crack of his whip. ‘Find-find,’ he hissed.

  Like an explosion of tooth and fur, the rats billowed outward in an expanding wave; sniffing, tasting; some scratching against the tunnel walls while others tried to burrow under the rusted rubble. Then, as if the packmaster had issued some psychic command, the rats ceased their chaotic behaviour – raising their damp noses in unison they turned their eyes upwards, following the incline of the tunnel. As a single, living tide, the mass of rats flooded forward, sweeping past the grinning skaven.

  ‘We are close-close,’ he said, turning to Queek, his previous fear forgotten. ‘They know-smell their prey is near.’

  Queek pushed the packmaster aside, drawing his weapons with gleeful anticipation.

  ‘No-no Moulder-thing. My prey.’

  Without bothering to wait for his bodyguard, Queek charged after the streaming vermin, breaking into a loping run as he tore through the tunnel. The well-trained rodents seemed to take it in turns to pause, turn, and wait for him to catch up before haring off after the rest of the pack. Queek bounded after them with a wild abandon, barely noticing as he burst from the tunnel, his claws skittering across the smoothed stones as he adjusted his footing.

  As he ran, a shape began to emerge from the gloom: a great archway, flickering and indistinct like a desert mirage. Queek grinned. It was no illusion, and the light he saw came from no glimstone, he could smell the burning pine cinders of a guttering torch.

  Closing fast, he found the origin of the light. It was an opening, framed by a granite arch proudly embossed with runic script. It led onto another staircase that spiralled through a tight rise towards the peak of Karak Varn. Queek launched himself at the stairs, deaf to the crunch and splatter of tiny bodies beneath his footpaws as the mass of rats struggled up the steep climb.

  His heart pounded violently in his chest, as though it too yearned to take up Dwarf-Gouger and gorge itself on dwarf-thing hide. His mind was lost, drowning in a foaming sea of rage.

  ‘Queek comes for you dwarf-thing,’ he screeched. ‘This time there will be nothing left.’

  Ska clawed a string of meat from between his teeth, sniffing it briefly before tossing it back down his throat. The paltry scrap did nothing to soothe his hunger pangs.

  ‘Should we... follow?’ asked a nervous stormvermin whose name Ska had never bothered to learn.

  The fangleader scowled, turning his disapproving eyes on the unfortunate skaven. The stormvermin cringed, scurrying out of reach. Ska’s tail flicked angrily, tasting the air like a snake. ‘Mighty Queek deserves first taste of his prize. Is respect to give him good-good head start.’

  Slowly he drew his sword, his ears registering the subtle shift in pawholds on a score of halberds at his back. That was long enough. There was always the possibility that Queek might survive...

  He led the warriors across the hall after the hunter rats’ scent, taking it at an easy pace. The warlord would not thank him for exhausting his elite before they had the chance to fight. As they approached the stairway, he heard a faint note of anger from the shadow of the packmaster’s hood. Ska looked down upon the smashed and broken bodies of the hunter rats scattered around his paws. He bent to scoop one up, opening his jaws to it like a funnel and crunching down on its tiny bones. His eyes gleamed in the torchlight.

  ‘Come-come, before we too late to help poor Queek-Warlord.’

  Ignoring the sounds of more furry bodies forcing their way down ravenous throats and a murderous parting glance from the packmaster, Ska began his ascent.

  After several dozen turns around the corkscrew climb, he waved the trailing skaven to a standstill. He was convinced he had heard something – a scratching behind the walls? And he could smell something. Sulphur and saltpetre. Like the black powder devices of the dwarf-things.

  He watched as the packmaster placed an ear to the wall, his tongue loping from his muzzle in a terminal expression of curiosity.

  Ska’s jaw dropped in dawning horror. ‘Run!’

  Queek stumbled to a halt as the sound of an explosion roared through the tight rise. The steps beneath his feet trembled as though the mountain itself had come alive. He threw out his paws to steady himself on the walls, but they simply served as a conduit for the vibrations, running down his arms and rattling him against his armour like a stone trapped inside a skull.

  A stream of rock dust descended from the steps above, l
ayering his fur with a ghostly coat of granite. He sneezed, slamming a fist against his battered helmet to unclutter his senses. It worked, to an extent, the ringing in his ears becoming replaced by a din of a wholly different sort, the sound of a thing he craved more than any other.

  Battle.

  Skaven bodies threw themselves behind whatever cover they could. Ska struggled upright, offering thanks to the Horned Rat for leading him to that dead Ironbreaker all those years ago as he brushed a jagged spear of blasted masonry from the links in his gromril coat.

  The stairwell had been transformed, as though enveloped by some kind of mystic shroud. He could see nothing, smell nothing; the only sounds to reach his ears were squeaks of pain, muffled and distant as though from another world.

  As he lifted his snout for another sniff, an ethereal form burst from the haze swinging a giant pick-axe in two meaty hands, a curse fresh on his lips. Ska stumbled back, tossing into the dwarf’s path the only thing he had to hand. The miner’s weapon stove the headless torso of the packmaster, burying itself deeply into dead flesh. The dwarf swore as it tried to shake the body loose.

  Ska felt his blood come alive as his fingers tightened around the grip of his sword. He swung his weapon above his head and, bellowing like a gelded ox, decapitated the dwarf with a mighty downward sweep.

  Nothing fought harder than a skaven with nowhere to run.

  Above the sounds of shifting rubble, the shrill screams of his bodyguard fighting and dying filtered through the ash-choked space. Queek had fought and killed enough of the dwarf-things to recognise their sounds in combat – the whoosh and smash of heavy miner’s picks, and the guttural battle cries of the Khazalid tongue. Khazukan kazakit-ha!

  They had a set a trap for him? How good of Ska to keep his warriors back to draw the ambush from his illustrious warlord. It seemed that he had misjudged the depths of the fangleader’s loyalty, but then a warlord of Queek’s stature deserved nothing less.

  ‘Queek!’

  He froze, spinning on his claws to glare through the endlessly rising steps above his head as though the force of his hatred alone might sunder them. A strangled growl rose from his belly, shaking his body with a tremor of pure hatred.

  He knew that voice.

  His myriad trophies chattered in his ear, rattling on their poles as his shoulders trembled with rage. The idiot dwarf knew Queek came for him and yet still he was here. The creature’s simple-minded arrogance knew no bounds! To survive one encounter with Queek the Unrivalled was to push the limits of one’s luck to a preposterous degree, but to wish for a second...?

  ‘Do not run-run yet, dwarf-thing,’ he called. ‘The Headtaker comes for you!’

  Ignoring the fading cries of his bodyguard he leapt onto the next step, accelerating into a mad rush around and around the narrow spiral like a rabid rat chasing its own tail.

  The dwarf’s voice continued to fill the stairwell. Queek had made it a point of pride never to learn a single syllable of Khazalid, but there were only so many holds you could sack, kingdoms you could burn, and dynasties you could tear down before picking up a word or two. Grudge this, great grudge that, may his beard grow for all time, blah, blah, blah. Queek howled his own fury in answer as he rounded the final turn, already imagining the dwarf-thing’s heart pumping its lifeblood into his jaws.

  And suddenly there he was.

  Grimnar Halfhanded.

  The stout warrior stood at ease, a hand-axe held loosely in one hand. A beard as grey as steel spilled from the open face of a winged helm, the proud mess falling over a gromril breastplate to where it was tied off around his ample waist with a leather braid. Queek’s eye was drawn to the steel-rimmed shield strapped over the dwarf’s left forearm – it was painted blue and bore a simple rune resembling a white mountain. The warrior wore it over his mangled hand.

  The hand Queek had ruined for him.

  The dwarf did not stand alone. He was flanked by two massively built fighters, virtually naked bar tattoos and iron studs. The scent of orange dye and sweat-sodden hides rose from the slayers like musk. One stood ready with a giant warhammer while the second, brandishing a murderous pair of hatchets and with an enormous silver ring through its nose, stood slightly back.

  Grimnar paused in his recitation of grudges, the whisper of some glib remark half-formed on his tongue. He waved the slayers back. With a grunt of disappointment, they shuffled away, their wild eyes fixed on the skaven warlord.

  ‘I knew you would come for me, vermin-king,’ said Grimnar, his thick beard shifting into a smile. ‘Never treat with the thaggoraki, they said. Hah! I knew better. If there’s one thing more certain than the treachery of elves, it’s that a skaven will always betray his own... and that the Headtaker’s ego won’t allow the memory of defeat to walk free.’

  Queek spat, his knuckles whitening on his weapon’s grips. ‘Queek has never been defeated!’ He thrust his sword at the dwarf’s groin, hissing in fury as Grimnar’s axe parried it aside. ‘Queek will never be defeated!’

  Grimnar laughed, his mirth rattling his mail undershirt against his breastplate, but the dwarf’s humour soon died as his cold eyes hardened into a more deadly hue.

  ‘Today, countless Grudges shall be unwritten and, tomorrow, my ancestors in Karak Kadrin will remember me once again as Ironbeard!’

  With a roar, the dwarf barrelled forward, swinging his axe in a crosswise slash for Queek’s midriff. Taken aback by the un-dwarfish speed and fury, Queek’s sword rose too sluggishly and Grimnar’s axe smashed into his right pauldron. The strength of the blow forced him to his knees, but the weapon’s edge turned on his warpshard armour, the dark suit’s quiescent malice coming violently alive. Green-black tracers arced outwards, earthing themselves in Grimnar’s axe and stabbing down into pliant flesh. The dwarf stumbled, his teeth clenched against the pain. Black steam rose from his axe-hand with the scent of charred meat, but Grimnar held his grip with a stubborn defiance.

  Queek’s chittering laugh preceded him as he dived forward, his sword coming around in a searing arc. Pre-empting the move, the dwarf swung up his shield, smashing it against the bone of Queek’s wrist. The warlord squeaked in pain, his fingers jangling, nothing more than the strength of his hatred keeping the weapon from flying from his paw.

  Grimnar took advantage of his momentary distraction, stepping in with his axe to unleash a barrage of short, controlled strikes. Queek spun away, his sword darting back and forth, a ceaseless blur of motion as it deflected them. He snickered as his sword rose and fell with mesmeric speed, the perfect shadow to Grimnar’s axe. All the while, Dwarf-Gouger probed for an opening, but Grimnar had faced Queek before and knew well the potency of the maul. Accordingly, the dwarf fought carefully and his eyes, alight with the cold anger of the Grudge, were ever watchful for the characteristic flicks and feints.

  Hissing in fury, Queek spun into a renewed attack, his twin weapons becoming a whirlwind of steel, hammering down blows like warpstone rain. Displaying a prowess that Queek’s otherwise brilliant memory had neglected to recall, the dwarf evaded or parried every blow that fell, but even Grimnar’s superior strength couldn’t keep himself from being swept ever back by the sheer ferocity of the attack.

  Side-stepping the downward sweep of Dwarf-Gouger, Grimnar countered, slamming the haft of his axe into Queek’s snout. Queek scrambled back a pace, blinking in surprise, his nose spouting blood. The two Grimnars before him blurred back into one, and with a harsh squeak, Queek thrust his sword for the opening in the dwarf’s helm. Grimnar raised his shield to block the strike, but his feet floundered as the expected pressure never arrived. Leaving his sword quivering in the longbeard’s shield, Queek took up Dwarf-Gouger with both paws and – spinning with the awesome weapon like one of Skarsnik’s hated fanatics – smashed Grimnar’s shield to splinters.

  The dwarf fell with an anguished cry, clutching his ruined hand as it fell from
what remained of his shield.

  ‘Die-die, dwarf-thing,’ Queek hissed, pouncing on the prone fighter with Dwarf-Gouger raised high.

  The dwarf rolled aside and the maul smashed the flagstone beneath him. Queek rose, shaking his head to fend off the sudden wave of dizziness, Dwarf-Gouger feeling oddly heavy in his paws.

  ‘Tired, are we?’ Grimnar sneered.

  Queek glared daggers at the hated dwarf, but his foe wasn’t even sweating, whereas he could barely stand still without his legs trembling. For the first time since catching the scent of dwarf-meat, he felt his hatred ebb. He caught sight of the two slayers, standing off from the fight, a nervous twitch spreading to his lips as he eyed their monstrous bulks.

  Grimnar followed his look and grinned. ‘There’s no escape for you, vermin-king. Even in death, I’ll have my honour.’

  Queek ground his teeth and cursed silently. He cursed the Horned Rat. He cursed Skratch for leading him into such an obvious trap. He cursed Ska for getting caught in an ambush when he should be here, at his warlord’s side. They would all suffer once he was done devouring this wretched dwarf-thing!

  And then he cursed the Horned Rat once more, for good measure.

  A vicious howl emanated from the mouth of the stairwell. Queek’s heart sank – it appeared that the dwarfs had finished with his bodyguard and now wanted to crown their day’s work with him. Yet, with his back to the stair, he was most puzzled by the expression of horror that spread across Grimnar’s bearded face until he heard for himself the shrill voice of Ska Bloodtail exhorting his stormvermin to butcher their fill of dwarf-meat.

  Wonderful, loyal Ska! Queek always knew that the fangleader would stand by him!

  For a moment, it seemed Grimnar forgot he stood not three paces from the most feared warrior in skavendom. The perceived insult stoked the embers of his hatred, filling his tired limbs with fresh strength. Squealing in incoherent fury, he lashed out with Dwarf-Gouger.