Gotrek and Felix: The Anthology

by Various

  Thanquol lashed his tail in amusement. Kaskitt had paid for his treachery and presumption. Boneripper belonged to him now, without any obligations to a wire-chewing scrap-rat and his larcenous schemes. Even the control valve the warlock-engineers had hidden among Boneripper’s gears, designed to shut the rat-ogre down should it be ordered to attack any skaven of Clan Skryre, was gone, disabled by dwarfish pistol-fire. The grey seer had impressed upon Krakul what would happen to him if he so much as thought about repairing that particular mechanism.

  Of course, that didn’t keep Thanquol from watching every move the warlock-engineer made. It didn’t matter if he had no idea what Krakul was doing with all his strange gizmos. The only important thing was for Krakul to think the grey seer knew what he was about. There was, after all, a chance that Krakul wasn’t the mouse-brain he seemed.

  Krakul frittered around with a nest of corroded wires and punctured tubes situated behind Boneripper’s metal chestplate. Thanquol could hear the tinker-rat tutting under his breath as he removed the damaged mechanisms. There was a distinctive green glow about the wires, and Krakul was careful to handle them only with a set of insulated tongs.

  Thanquol’s ears sank back against the sides of his skull, his head crooking back in a glowering gesture. He wasn’t about to listen to Krakul chide him about having Boneripper lug a large quantity of warpstone for days on end. The corrosion could have been caused by anything! Maybe some of the smelly fluids Clan Skryre used as coolants, or the warpfire projector built into Boneripper’s third arm. The lummox had suffered enough damage from bullets and boulders that almost anything could have leaked down inside its chest. The green glow emanating from the wires didn’t mean anything!

  Agitated squeaks rose from the tunnel outside Krakul’s burrow. Thanquol pulled aside the man-hide curtain which separated the workshop from the main tunnel. Across the narrow corridor, he could see other skaven faces peering out from their holes. He followed the direction of their gaze, his nose twitching as the smells of blood and fear-musk excited his senses. Greypaw Hollow sat beneath a forest and it wasn’t unusual for Warlord Pakstab to send groups of clanrats out to scavenge the wilderness for food and materials.

  What was unusual was for one of these expeditions to return in such a sorry condition. Thanquol could see the miserable little ratkin, their fur bloodied, their eyes wide with fright. Several of them bore ugly gashes and deep wounds, hobbling about on broken legs and hugging broken arms to their chests.

  Thanquol clapped a paw against his ear to stifle the shrill, wheedling voices of the scavengers as they reported their misfortune to a furious Pakstab. Whatever had befallen the fool-meat, whether they had scurried right into a troll hole or been stampeded by a herd of cattle, it was Pakstab’s problem. Another petty inconsequence that was far beneath the dignity of a grey seer to notice. Thanquol had more important things to occupy himself with.

  He was just turning his head to return to Krakul’s workshop when a particular whine froze him in his place. Thanquol felt a tingle of fear squeeze at his glands and a cold hand close about his heart. It was a shaking paw that drew the rat-skull snuff-box from his robe.

  The grey seer felt an intoxicating rush of warmth course through his body as he sniffed the pulverised weed, burning away the fear and allowing hate free reign. Thanquol gnashed his fangs, spinning about and marching out into the tunnel. Skaven heads vanished back into their holes as the enraged sorcerer stalked past.

  Had he heard right? He would find out! He would find out if these flea-spleened maggots had really seen what they had seen!

  The few skaven bold enough to emerge from their burrows to investigate the curious squeaks and smells of the returned scavengers quickly scurried out of Thanquol’s way as the sorcerer marched up the corridor. Even the armoured stormvermin, their claws wrapped about the hafts of hatchet-headed halberds, cringed when they saw the intense hatred blazing from the grey seer’s eyes and sniffed the murderous aggression in his scent.

  Grey Seer Thanquol brushed past Pakstab as though the warlord wasn’t even there. His paw trembled with rage as he closed his fingers around the throat of one of the scavengers. The little ratman’s eyes boggled in terror as Thanquol pulled him close.

  ‘What did you smell-see?’ Thanquol hissed. ‘Speak-squeak! Quick-quick!’ The only sound the crippled ratman could make was a wet rattle as the grey seer throttled him. Absently, Thanquol released his choking clutch, glaring as the dead skaven toppled to the floor. The temerity of the worm-fondler to die when the mighty Thanquol had questions to ask him! Out of spite, the grey seer kicked the corpse in the head, then turned his attention to the other scavengers.

  ‘You!’ the grey seer pronounced, pointing a claw at one of the ratmen, a portly creature missing an ear, half his tail and most of one paw, each of the injuries so fresh that black blood leaked from his wounds.

  ‘Mercy-pity!’ the ratman whined, awkwardly falling to his knees and exposing his throat in a gesture of submission. ‘No-no hurt-harm, most merciless of priests, great gnawer of–’

  Thanquol ground his fangs together, in no mood to be flattered by this fool-meat. ‘What did that to you?’ he snarled, jabbing the end of his staff into the scavenger’s mangled paw. The wretch squealed in agony, quivering on the floor. Thanquol lifted his head, casting his eyes across the other scavengers.

  ‘We smell-track man-things in forest,’ one of the scavengers hastily spoke up. ‘Many-few man-things carrying many-many strange-meat in wheel-burrow. We try-fetch food-fodder from wheel-burrow.’

  Thanquol’s eyes narrowed with impatience. He didn’t care a lick for any of this. ‘What kept you from stealing the food?’ he demanded, smacking the quivering skaven on the floor with his staff. The fresh squeal of pain had the desired effect. The other scavenger couldn’t finish his story fast enough.

  ‘Breeder-thing see us!’ the scavenger cried. ‘Call-bring much-much man-thing! Fight-kill much-much! Many-many die-die from one-eye and dwarf-thing!’

  Thanquol swatted the quivering skaven again as he slowly strode towards the talkative scavenger. ‘A man-thing and a dwarf-thing did this to you?’ he growled. He raised a claw to emphasise his next point. ‘With one eye?’

  The scavenger’s fright had risen to such a state that he couldn’t speak, simply bobbing his head up and down in a desperate effort to appease the fearsome sorcerer.

  Gotrek Gurnisson and his mangy man-thing, Felix Jaeger! By the malicious malevolence of the Horned One!

  Vengeance boiled up inside Thanquol’s black heart. The grey seer rounded upon Pakstab, pointing a claw at the startled warlord’s nose. ‘Get-fetch your battle-rats!’ the enraged sorcerer snarled, foam dripping from his mouth. ‘Great enemies of skavendom have hurt-harm your valiant scouts! I will avenge their injuries upon these heretic-things with your army!’

  Pakstab blinked in confusion. His whiskers trembled, his eyes narrowed with suspicion. Thanquol could read the warlord’s thoughts. He wanted no part in fighting whoever had savaged his scavengers. He certainly wanted nothing to do with Thanquol’s vengeance.

  Hissing a curse, invoking one of the thirteen forbidden names of the Horned Rat, Thanquol gestured with his staff at one of the injured scavengers. An emerald glow suffused the metal icon fitted to the top of the staff. The same green glow surrounded the doomed scavenger. The ratman had time to shriek once before his body collapsed into a pool of steaming green mush.

  ‘We march-kill enemy-meat now!’ Thanquol screamed, turning his blazing eyes back upon Pakstab. The warlord nodded his head with an eagerness that was obscene. That was the beauty of a gratuitous display of destruction magic: there was never a need to repeat it.

  Thanquol turned away to leave Pakstab to gather his warriors. He could be confident that Pakstab would marshal his forces quickly. After all, the warlord would be right there beside Thanquol when they made the attack. Anything that happened to the grey seer would happen to Pakstab too.

  Worse, Thanquol
promised, if Gotrek and Felix slipped through his paws! What he would do to Pakstab would be such a horror that his screams would be heard in Skavenblight!

  As the grey seer stalked back down the tunnel towards Krakul’s workshop, he barked orders at the tinker-rat, using a bit of his magic to magnify his words so that they carried into the farthest corners of the burrow.

  ‘Fix-finish Boneripper, wire-nibbler! I want my rat-ogre on its feet and ready to kill-slay!’ Thanquol brushed aside the curtain, fixing his imperious stare on the warlock-engineer. Krakul’s eyes might have been hidden behind his goggles, but there was no mistaking the frightened posture and smell of the tinker-rat.

  Thanquol reached into his robe and removed a little sliver of black cheese from his pocket. He stared at it for a moment, then glared at Krakul. ‘You have until my third nibble to fix Boneripper,’ the grey seer pronounced. ‘After that, I will burn off one of your fingers every time I take another bite.’

  Krakul was an eccentric, scheming scrap-fondler, but he had the good sense to know when a sorcerer was making an idle threat. With almost unseemly haste, the warlock-engineer leapt back to the stone slab, tools clattering against Boneripper’s metal chassis, as he hurried to finish the repairs.

  The confusion of smells emanating from the caravan threw each of the skaven into a state of anxiety and excitement. The good, familiar odours of oats and wheat, the appetising scents of horses and oxen, the reek of human sweat and the stink of iron and bronze; these all mixed in a single aroma that tantalised the skaven, made their bellies growl and their paws itch. The promise of full bellies and a bit of plunder was one that every ratman dreamed about.

  Still, there were other smells teasing the keen skaven noses. There was a heavy, greasy stench one old crook-eared ratman said was troll. There was a musky, reptilian fug none of the skaven could identify. There was a sinister coppery smell that reminded Thanquol of the abominations Clan Moulder kept in Hell Pit, though he wasn’t about to offer that insight to any of his yellow-spleened underlings.

  The other smells didn’t matter, because Thanquol had detected the scent he was looking for. It was that vile mix of tattoo ink and cold steel, animal starch and cheap beer, all wrapped around the dirt-stench of a dwarf.

  Gotrek Gurnisson! He was travelling with the caravan, and if he was there, then that damnable Felix Jaeger was with him! Thanquol didn’t know what trick of fate had thrust his two most hated enemies into his clutches, nor did he care. It was enough that the Horned Rat had smiled upon him and bestowed this delectable gift upon him. Before he was through with them, he’d offer the human’s two eyes and the dwarf’s single, blood-crazed orb as a burned offering to the Horned One by token of gratitude. Maybe he’d even teach them how to pray to the Horned One for mercy.

  Not that it would do them any good.

  When the humans made camp. That would be the time to do it. Their horses would be grazing, their wagons unhitched; at least some of their number would be sleeping. The skaven could set upon them and slaughter half the company before they had a chance to blink!

  Yes, it was a good plan. The audacity of Pakstab’s weasel-tongued track-sniffer Naktit to try and take credit for developing such a plan! Because the scout-rat had mentioned something of the sort first, he had the temerity to believe the same idea hadn’t already occurred to Thanquol! Why should a grey seer share his innermost thoughts with the sort of verminous rabble Greypaw Hollow dared call warriors? It had been sorely tempting to let Boneripper smash the creeping little nuisance into paste for his arrogance.

  But that would have been the petty, spiteful reaction of a lesser skaven. Thanquol was grand enough to be gracious and forget the failings of his underlings. With Gotrek and Felix nearly in his grasp, he felt magnanimous enough to ignore the stupidity of lesser ratmen. The Horned One had granted him a mighty boon; surely Thanquol could allow similar beneficence. Yes, he’d let Naktit keep his worthless little life.

  Unless something went wrong! If that happened, he’d have Boneripper squeeze the creepy little tick-tracker until his eyes popped out of his skull.

  It was early morning when the skaven started trailing the caravan, slinking through the dense thickets and close-set trees, always keeping out of sight while maintaining a clear view of the trail. The wagons were unusual, the sort of thing that even Thanquol with his vast experience and study of humans had never seen before. Their sides were painted in bright, garish colours, flags and pennants waving above them, bold words emblazoned on their sides. The horses and oxen which pulled the wagons were similarly arrayed, bright plumes fastened to their bridles and garlands of flowers tied about their necks. The men driving the wagons were also dressed in bright, gaudy clothing, sporting billowy breeches and vibrant vests and headscarves.

  Most perplexing of all were the half-dozen cage-carts. These followed behind the other wagons, their contents hidden beneath tarps. The smells rising from them and the brief view of bars afforded by the trailing edge of the tarps, left no doubt that each cage held some living beast. Low growls, sullen snarls or angry howls rose from some of the carts. Most of the sounds were new to the skaven, though a few of the cries were familiar enough to send shivers down their spines. The old crop-eared ratman started whining about trolls again – at least until Boneripper stepped on his head. Fear was a useful thing, but only when the ratkin knew what they should be most afraid of.

  Thanquol peered through the bushes, trying vainly to spot his hated foes, but there was no sign of either Gotrek or Felix. The grey seer concluded the two were inside one of the wagons. It would be in keeping with their perfidious natures to hide themselves away.

  Taking a pinch of warpstone snuff, Thanquol resisted the burning desire to launch the attack immediately. He didn’t care that more of Pakstab’s clanrats would die in such an impulsive raid than in a carefully planned assault. It was the possibility that Gotrek and Felix might escape that stayed his paw. However much it vexed him, he would have to wait. Naktit insisted the time to attack would be when the caravan settled down to camp and it was Thanquol’s experience that humans, with their pathetic vision, wouldn’t travel at night. He could wait.

  As it transpired, however, he didn’t have to wait that long. Thanquol blinked in bewilderment when, just a little past noon, the caravan came to a halt. He watched in wonder as the wagons moved into a wide clearing and the men driving them began to unhitch their teams. There were still a good six hours of daylight left, a fact each of the light-sensitive skaven appreciated quite keenly. Surely the humans weren’t stupid enough to squander…

  Thanquol grinned, turning his eyes to the ground at his feet, envisioning the deep, dark burrow of the Horned Rat. Truly his god was favouring him! First to deliver Gotrek and Felix to him, then to make the stupid humans stop well before nightfall. The skaven could rest and recuperate from their forced march through the forest.

  The only thing Thanquol didn’t like was the size of the clearing. Every skaven was agoraphobic and the clearing elicited a feeling of unspeakable dread. The forest had been dense enough to be almost comforting, but all the open sky above the clearing was another thing entirely. It would be a bit better at night, but even so, the thought of all those stars glaring down at them like so many hungry eyes was something to make the glands clench.

  A few of the humans were sent away on horseback, galloping off down the trail. Thanquol dismissed them from his thoughts after snarling an order to Pakstab that no opportunistic sword-rat should bother them. He didn’t want the humans breaking camp when their outriders failed to return and they became uneasy. He wanted the stupid creatures to think themselves perfectly safe and alone until the very moment of the attack.

  For the second time, Thanquol blinked in disbelief. The humans that remained in camp were removing poles and an immense roll of canvas from one of the wagons. While he watched, they spread the canvas out across the clearing, then began to prop it up from beneath with the poles. It was unbelievable, but the humans were
constructing some kind of massive tent, effectively placing a roof over the clearing! Truly the Horned One had decided to recognise and reward his selfless and valiant servant!

  Gratitude to his god died on his tongue when Thanquol spotted two figures climbing down from one of the wagons. One was a tall human with long blond hair, the other was a stocky dwarf, his head shaved except for a single strip of ginger fur running down the centre of his scalp. Flecks of foam dribbled from Thanquol’s mouth as he glared at his hated enemies. His fingers closed around a nugget of warpstone hidden in the seam of his robe.

  It would be so easy! Bite down on the warpstone, draw its sorcerous energies into his body and unleash a spell of such devastation that the two blood-ticks would burst into a thousand gory fragments! All the humiliation and disgrace that these two had brought upon him would be avenged in one moment of sadistic violence!

  Thanquol let his paw fall empty at his side. It was too easy. Too easy for Gotrek and Felix. All the times they had meddled in his affairs… No, they wouldn’t get off so easy! For them, there would be no quick death.

  ‘Pakstab!’ Thanquol snarled. The warlord scurried forwards, his posture displaying a submissiveness rooted in fear, but his fur bristling with a far less docile resentment. The grey seer bared his fangs at Pakstab until the warlord was well and truly subdued.

  ‘Keep your tree-rats quiet,’ the grey seer hissed. ‘We wait until nightfall and the man-things sleep.’ He jabbed a paw towards the wagon where his enemies stood. ‘I want those ones alive!’