by Gav Thorpe
“There’s new tunnels, without a doubt,” said Tharonin with a shake of the head.
“Skaven tunnels?” asked Harlgrim.
“For certain. They have the rat reek about them, and there’s been spoor found. We’ve started finding bodies too, many of them, some of them little more than skeletons, picked clean by vermin.”
“How many tunnels?” asked Barundin.
“Seven so far,” said Tharonin. “Seven that we’ve managed to find. There could be more. In fact, I’d wager there are definitely more that we don’t know about yet.”
“Seven tunnels…” muttered Arbrek. He stirred the froth of his ale with a finger as he considered his words. He looked up, feeling the gazes of the others on him. “Seven tunnels—this is no small number of foes.”
Barundin looked at the faces of the council members, wondering which of them was going to be the first to mention the planned war against the goblins. They looked back at him in silence, until Snorbi Threktrommi cleared his throat.
“Someone’s got to say it,” said Snorbi. “We can’t march against the grobi while there’s an enemy at our doorstep. We must move against the skaven before we can deal with the grobi.”
There was a chorus of grunted approvals, and Barundin could tell by the looks on their faces that they were expecting his reply and were ready with their arguments. Instead, he nodded slowly.
“Aye,” said the king. “My saga will not begin with a tale of foolish stubbornness. Though it pains me beyond anything, I will postpone the war against Dukankor Grobkaz-a-Gazan. I will not be remembered as the king who reclaimed our distant realm and lost his hold in doing so. The throng that has been mustered for the march must be sent to the mines, and we shall root these vile creatures from our midst. Tomorrow morning, I want companies of warriors to go with the miners into the tunnels that have been found. We shall seek out their lair and destroy it.”
“It is a wise king that listens to counsel,” said Arbrek, patting Barundin on the arm.
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Barundin looked over at Thagri, the loremaster, who was taking notes in his journal.
“Write this,” said the king. “I said the war on the grobi was postponed, but I swear that when our halls are safe, the army will march forth to reclaim that which was taken from us.”
“You’ll get no argument from me,” said Harlgrim, raising his tankard. There were similar words of affirmation from the others.
From the hall, word was passed around the hold to the thanes of the clans. In the morning they would assemble their throngs in the High Hall, to be addressed by the king. There was much more planning and wrangling to be done, which lasted past midnight. With even his considerable dwarf constitution waning, it was a weary Barundin who left the audience chamber and walked back to his bedchambers.
The king could feel the mood of the hold as he walked along the lantern-lit corridors. It was subdued and tense, and each little creak and scratch drew his attention, suspecting some vile thing to be hidden in the shadows. Like the ominous oppression before a cave-in, Zhufbar was poised, laden with potential catastrophe. After the long weeks of preparation for war, the tunnels and halls were eerily quiet and still.
Barundin reached his chambers and sat wearily on his bed. He removed his crown and unlocked the chest beside the bed, placing the crown into the padded velvet bag inside. One by one, he removed the seven golden clasps in his beard, wrapped them and placed them next to the crown.
Taking a troll-bone comb from his bedside table, he began to straighten his beard, working out the knots that had gathered during his fidgeting through the day. He untied his ponytail and brushed his hair, before taking up three strands of thin leather and tying his beard. He stripped off his robes and folded them neatly into a pile on top of the chest, and then grabbed his nightgown and cap from the bed and donned them.
He stood and crossed the chamber to throw a shovel of coal onto the dying fire in the grate at the foot of the bed. As it caught, the flames grew and smoke billowed, disappearing up the chimney, which was dug down hundreds of feet from the mountainside above, barred by mesh and grates to prevent anything entering, accidentally or otherwise. He poured water from the ewer beside his bed and washed behind his ears. Lastly, he opened the window on the lantern above his bed and blew out the candle, plunging the room into the ruddy glow of the fire. His preparations complete, Barundin flopped back on to the bed, too tired to crawl beneath the covers.
Despite his fatigue, sleep did not come easily, and Barundin lay fitfully on the bed, turning this way and that. His mind was full of thoughts, of the discussions of the day and the fell deeds that had to be done the next. As his weariness finally overcame him, Barundin sunk into a disturbing dream, filled with fanged, ratlike faces. He imagined himself surrounded by a swarm of vermin, scratching and biting, gnawing at his lifeless fingers. There were eyes in the shadows, staring at him with evil intent, waiting to pounce. Scratching echoed in the darkness around him.
Barundin woke and for a moment he was unsure where he was, the after-images of the dream lingering in his mind. He was alert, aware that something was not right. It was a few moments before he determined the cause of his unease. The chamber was pitch dark and silent. Not just the gloom of a cloudy night, but the utter dark beneath the world that holds terror for so many creatures.
Even the dwarfs, at home in the subterranean depths, filled their holds with fires and torches and lanterns.
Straining his eyes and ears, Barundin sat up, his heart thudding in his chest. He felt as if he was being watched.
The fire was out, though it should have burned through the night.
Moving slowly, he began to slide his legs towards the edge of the bed, ready to stand. It was then that he heard the faintest of noises. It was little more than a tingling at the edge of hearing, but it was there, a scraping, wet noise. In the darkness to his right, beside the dead grate, he caught a flicker of something. It was a pale, sickly green glow, a sliver against the blackness. Looking out of the corner of his eye, he saw a tiny dot drop and hit the ground.
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He heard rather than saw the figure move towards him: a fluttering of cloth, the scritch-scratch of claws on the stone floor. Unarmed, he grabbed the first thing to hand, a pillow, and flung it at the approaching shape.
Now, dwarfs are a hardy folk, and are not only able to withstand much discomfort, but take pride in the fact. They eschew the dainty comforts of other races, and their soft furnishings are anything but soft. So it was that the intruder was greeted with a starched canvas bag stuffed with a dozen pounds of finely ground gravel mixed with goat hair.
In the dark, Barundin saw the figure fling up an arm, but to little effect as the dwarf pillow thudded into its shoulder, knocking it backwards, its blade toppling from its grip and clanging to the floor. Barundin was off the bed and running full tilt by the time the foe recovered.
With a hiss, the creature leapt aside from Barundin’s mad rush, springing against the wall and hurtling over his head. Barundin tried to turn, but his impetus slammed him shoulder-first into the wall. Underfoot, he felt something snap, and his bare foot stung with pain. With a grunt, he turned to see the assassin dart forward, a knife in one hand. It was fast, so fast that Barundin barely had time to raise a hand before the dagger plunged into his stomach. With a roar, Barundin swept a fist backwards, smashing it against the ratlike muzzle of the creature, knocking it backwards.
“Hammerers!” bellowed Barundin, backing away from the skaven assassin until his spine was against the wall. “To your king! Hammerers to me!”
Barundin fended off another blow with his left arm, the knife blade scoring the flesh of his hand.
He could feel blood soaking into the fabric of his nightshirt and running down onto his legs.
The door burst open, spilling in light from outside, momentarily blinding Barundin. As he squinted he saw Gudnam Stonetooth running into the room, followed by the other bodyguards of the king. The assassin spun on its
heel and was met by a crunching blow to the ribs from Gudnam’s warhammer, sending it sprawling backwards. In the light, Barundin could now see his attacker clearly.
It was shorter than a manling, though a little taller than a dwarf, hunched and alert, and clad in black rags. A furless, snake-like tail twitched back and forth in agitation, and its verminous face was curled in a snarl. Red eyes glared at the newly arrived dwarfs.
The creature bounded past Gudnam, heading towards the fireplace, but Barundin launched himself forward, snatching up a poker and bringing it down onto the skaven’s back, snapping its spine with a crack. It gave a hideous mewl as it collapsed, legs twitching spasmodically. A hammerer, Kudrik Ironbeater, stepped forward and brought his weapon down onto the assassin’s head, crushing its skull and snapping its neck.
“My king, you are hurt.” said Gudnam, rushing to Barundin’s side.
Barundin pulled open the ragged tear in the nightshirt and revealed the gash across his stomach.
It was long, but not deep, and had barely cut into the solid dwarf muscle beneath the skin. The wound on his arm was similarly minor, painful but not threatening.
Kudrik picked up the broken blade on the ground, gingerly holding it in his gauntleted fist. A thick ichor leaked from the rusted metal of the sword, gathering in dribbling streams along its edge.
The poison shimmered with the disturbing unlight of ground warpstone.
“Weeping blade,” the hammerer spat. “If this had wounded you, things would be more serious.”
“Aye,” said Barundin, glancing around the room. “Bring me a lantern.”
One of the hammerers went into the antechamber and returned with a glass-cased candle, which he passed to the king. Barundin stooped into the grate and held up the lantern, illuminating the shaft of the chimney. He could see where the assassin had cut its way through the bars blocking the duct.
“There may be others,” said Gudnam, hefting his hammer over one shoulder.
“Send the rangers out to the surface,” said Barundin. “Have them start with the waterwheels and forge chimneys. Check everything.”
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“Yes, King Barundin,” said Gudnam with a nod to one of his warriors, who strode from the chamber. “The apothecary should have a look at those wounds.”
As Barundin was about to reply, there came a sound from outside, distant but powerful. It was the low call of a horn, blowing long blasts, a mournful echo from the depths.
The king’s eyes met the worried look of Gudnam. “Warning horns from the deeps!” snarled Barundin. “Find out where.”
“Your wounds?” said Gudnam.
“Grimnir’s hairy arse to my wounds—we are under attack!” bellowed the king, causing Gudnam to flinch. “Rouse the warriors. Sound the horns across Zhufbar. Our foe is upon us!”
The tunnel rang with the sound of clinking metal and the tramp of booted feet as Barundin and a force of warriors ran down through the hold towards the lower levels. He was still tightening the straps on the gromril plates of his armour and his hair was loosely packed under his crowned helm.
Across his left arm, Barundin carried a circular shield of steel inlaid with gromril in the likeness of his greatgreat-great grandfather, King Korgan, and in his right hand he carried Grobidrungek—the Goblinbeater—a single-bladed runeaxe that had been in his family for eleven generations. Around him, the dwarfs of Zhufbar readied axes and hammers, their bearded faces stern and resolute as they quickly advanced.
Above the din of the assembling throng, shouts and horn blasts from further down the mineshaft could be heard, growing louder as Barundin pounded forward. The low arched tunnel opened out into the Fourth Deeping Hall, the hub of a network of mines and tunnels that delved north of the main chambers of Zhufbar, which branched out from the chamber through open square archways.
Here, Tharonin was waiting with the Gungrik clan, armed and armoured for battle. Thanes marched to and fro bellowing orders, assembling the battle line in the wide hall.
“Where?” demanded Barundin as he stepped up next to Tharonin.
“The seventh north tunnel, the eighth north-east passage and the second north passage,” the thane said breathlessly. His face was smeared with grime and sweat beneath his gold-rimmed miner’s helm. The candle in the small lantern mounted on its brow guttered but still burned.
“How many?” asked Barundin, stepping aside as handgun-bearing thunderers jogged past, the silver and bronze standard in their midst displaying their allegiance to the Thronnson clan.
“No way of telling,” admitted Tharonin. He pointed to an archway to the left, opposite which the army was gathering. “Most of them seem to be in the north passages. We’ve held them in the seventh tunnel for the moment. Perhaps it was just a diversionary attack, or maybe there’s more to come.”
“Bugrit!” snapped Barundin, glancing around. There were about five hundred warriors in the hall now, and more were entering with every moment. “Where’re the engineers?”
“No word from them yet,” said Tharonin with a shake of his head that sent motes of dust cascading from his soiled beard.
The hall was roughly oval, seven hundred feet at its widest point and some three hundred feet deep, running east to west. Through a series of low stepped platforms, it sloped down nearly fifty feet to the north and the missile troops of the hold were gathering on the higher steps so that they could shoot over the heads of their kinsdwarfs assembling in shieldwalls halfway across the hall.
With clanking thuds, a traction locomotive puffed into sight from the eastern gateway, pulling with it three limbered war machines. Two were cannons, their polished barrels shining in the light of the hall’s gigantic lanterns, suspended from the ceiling a dozen feet above the dwarfs’ heads. The third was more archaic, consisting of a large central boiler-like body and flared muzzle, surrounded by intricate pipes and valves: a flame cannon.
Engineers clad in armoured aprons, carrying axes and tools, marched alongside the engine, their faces grim. A bass cheer went up upon their arrival. The engine grumbled to a halt and they began unlimbering their machines of destruction on the uppermost step.
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“Hammerers, to me!” ordered Barundin, waving his axe towards the archway leading to the north passages. He turned to Tharonin. “Care for a jaunt into the tunnels to have a look-see?”
Tharonin grinned and signalled to his bodyguards, the Gungrik Longbeards, who fell into step beside the king’s hammerers. The two hundred warriors marched across the platforms and down the steps, winding between the gathering regiments. Above the dwarf army, now over a thousand strong, golden icons shone and embroidered pennants fluttered, and the murmuring of deep dwarf voices echoed around the hall.
Ahead the tunnel was dark and forbidding. Tharonin explained that they had extinguished the lanterns to prevent the retreating warriors from being silhouetted against the light from the hall.
Barundin nodded approvingly and they paused for a few moments while warriors were sent to light torches and lanterns to carry into the darkness. Suitably illuminated, they continued forward.
The tunnel was nearly twenty feet wide and just over ten feet high, allowing the dwarfs to advance ten abreast, Tharonin at the front of a five-wide line of longbeards, Barundin leading his hammerers. The sounds of fighting grew even as the noise from the hall behind them receded into the distance. Side tunnels, some no bigger than two dwarfs side by side, branched off from the main passage, and as they reached a fork, Tharonin signalled to the left. The shouts and clash of weapons echoed from the walls in odd ways, sometimes seemingly behind the group, other times quiet and from one side or the other.
It soon became obvious that they were on the right course though, as they started to find dwarf bodies littering the ground. Their jerkins and mail coats were ragged and bloody, but there were piles of dead skaven too. The human-like rats were scabrous things, their fur mangy and matted, their faces balding and scarred. Those that wore any clothing at a
ll were dressed in little more than rags and loincloths and their broken weapons were crude mauls and the occasional sharpened hunk of metal with wooden handles. Most seemed to have been killed as they ran away; vicious axe wounds cut across shoulders and spines, hammer blows marked into the backs of heads and shattered backbones.
“These are just slaves,” said Tharonin. “Fodder for our weapons.”
Barundin did not reply immediately but looked around. Skavenslaves were cowardly creatures, herded into battle by the goads and whips of their masters. He knew what little there was to know about the foe, having read several of the old journals of his predecessors and accounts from other holds. If the skaven had intended to break through into the upper reaches, slaves were a poor choice of vanguard, no matter how expendable they were.
Barundin stopped suddenly, the hammerer behind him cannoning into his back and causing him to stumble.
“Halt!” Barundin called out over the apologies of the bodyguard. The king turned to Tharonin with a scowl. “They’re drawing us out. The fools have followed them into the tunnels.”
Tharonin glanced over his shoulder with sudden concern, as if expecting a horde of ratmen to burst upon them from the rear. He tapped his hornblower on the shoulder.
“Sound the retreat,” he told the musician. “Get them to fall back.”
The hornblower raised his instrument to his lips and blew three short blasts. He repeated the note three more times. After a few moments, it was answered by another call from ahead, repeating the order. Barundin gave a satisfied nod and ordered the small force to turn around and head back to the Fourth Deeping Hall.
*
As they passed back into the hall, Barundin peeled away from his hammerers and waved them on, stopping to admire the sight. The Fourth Deeping Hall was packed with dwarf warriors from each clan and family, standing shoulder to shoulder, gathered about their standards, drummers and hornblowers arrayed along the line. Fierce axe dwarfs of the Grogstoks with their golden dragon 42
