Grudgebearer

by Gav Thorpe

  ‘This is axe work, my king,’ said Fengrim, who had followed Barundin to the nearest female.

  Raising his axe, Fengrim brought the blade up and over his head and then into a downward stroke, as one might chop wood. The razor-sharp blade sliced through bloated flesh, peeling away the skin and revealing a thick layer of fat beneath. Another stroke opened the wound to the flesh and bone, spilling dark blood and globules of fatty tissue onto the crawling carpet of skavenspawn.

  A wave of stench hit Barundin and he turned away, gagging heavily. Although he could no longer see it, he still felt sickened by the wet chopping noise of Fengrim’s bloody work. A spouting wave of fluids splashed over the king’s legs; deep red and pale green life fluids stained the once-polished gromril of his greaves.

  Barundin raised his hammer and began sweeping it through the morass of squirming creatures around him, the slaughter of the vile skavenkin distracting him from the noisome sounds and smells of the broodmother’s grisly execution.

  The skaven attacked the brood chamber twice over the next day, but the dwarfs had moved up in strength and the ratmen were easily pushed back. Barundin agreed with Grundin that it seemed the skaven’s strength in the area had been thoroughly broken. With their breeding grounds taken, they would not be a threat from this quarter for many years.

  Engineers with casks of oil and kegs of black powder were brought in, and aided by dwarf miners prepared for the demolition of the many tunnels leading from the brood chamber. Already a pyre of burning skaven bodies was piled in the centre of the cavern, the oily smoke from the flaming carcasses filling the air with a choking fume.

  Miners dug holes into the sides of the access tunnels for charges to be placed, while the engineers measured and drew up plans, arguing about where to place the explosives, where to dig out the tunnels and burn away supports to bring the roofs down. As teams of dwarfs dismantled the ramshackle walkways and towers of the skaven, reclaiming what had been taken from them, Barundin toiled alongside them, cutting through planks and ropes, smashing apart timbers and poles to fuel the demolition work.

  Amongst the debris, Barundin found a stone ancestor face, looted from one of the miners’ halls. It was Grungni, ancestor god of mining, his beard chipped and mould-covered, his horned helm cut with crude skaven marks. Wiping away the filth with his fingers, Barundin realised that it had been seventeen long years since the battle of the Fourth Deeping Hall.

  Since their first victory, the dwarfs had been hard-pressed for many years, losing many of the mine-workings to the innumerable skaven assaults. Time and again they had been driven back, sometimes within sight of the central hold itself. Always Barundin’s resolution had held firm, and he would not give an inch of ground to the invaders without a fight. It would have been easy to abandon the northern passages and mines, to seal the gates and bar them with steel and runes, but Barundin, like all his kind, was stubborn and loathe to retreat.

  Losing the war of attrition, outnumbered by many thousands of ratmen, Barundin and his council had devised a plan. New workings had been dug to the east, where the skaven seemed fewer, perhaps wary of the goblins of Mount Gunbad that lay in that direction. Using these new tunnels, Barundin and his warriors had sallied forth several times, trapping the skaven between them and armies issuing from Zhufbar itself.

  Month by month, year by year, the skaven had been pushed back once more, into the Second Deep, then the Third and the Fourth. Six years ago, the Fourth Deeping Hall had been reclaimed and Barundin had allowed a month’s respite to celebrate the victory and for his host to rest and regain its strength. Young beardlings were now hardened warriors, and hundreds of new tombs had been dug in the clan chambers across the hold to house the dead the bitter fighting had claimed.

  Three years ago they had been able to first venture into the skaven tunnels, bringing death and fire to cleanse the verminous creatures from the mountain depths around Zhufbar. For the last year, the fighting had been sporadic and little more than skirmishes. Barundin was in no doubt that the skaven would gather their numbers again and return, but not for many years. Just as it had been over a century since the last skaven assault of Zhufbar, the king hoped that it would be decades before they came again.

  For three more days the dwarfs toiled, preparing for the destruction of the brood chamber. When it was done, slow fuses hanging from supports in the walls, fires flickering in cracks and holes dug into the tunnels walls, the engineers ordered the other dwarfs to return to Zhufbar. Barundin was allowed to watch, and was even given the privilege of lighting one of the touch-fuses.

  The dwarf mines shook with the detonations which rumbled on for many hours as caves and tunnels collapsed. There was no cheering, no celebration from the dwarfs. Seventeen years of desperate war had left them ruing the evils of the world and feeling sombre for the fallen.

  It was the first time Barundin truly understood himself and his people; the long march of centuries eroded their lives and culture. There could be little joy in the victory, not only for its cost, but for the fact that it was nothing more than a respite, a pause of breath in the unending saga of bloodshed that had become the lot of the dwarfs for four thousand years.

  The golden age of the ancestor-kings had passed, the silver-age of the mountain realm had been swallowed by the earthquakes and the greenskins. Now Barundin and his people clung to their existence, their hold half-filled and full of empty halls, the ghostly silence of their ancestors’ shades wandering the corridors and galleries, mourning for the glories of the past.

  But though he understood better the plight of his race, Barundin was not without hope. While those older and greyer than he were content to grumble into their beer and sigh at the merest mention of the old times, Barundin knew that there was still much that could be done.

  First and foremost, he resolved as he lay that night in his chambers, he would lead Zhufbar to the conquest of Dukankor Grobkaz-a-Gazan, destroying the grobi as they had vanquished the skaven. It would take a while to rebuild, but within twenty years, perhaps thirty, the halls of Grungankor Stokril would again be filled with good, honest dwarf lights, and the gruff laughter of his people.

  It was with some surprise that Barundin received a message from the Engineers Guild the next day. He had not yet sent word to them to continue on their war production so that the army might be rebuilt for the invasion of Dukankor Grobkaz-a-Gazan. He was, the message told him, politely invited to attend a meeting of the Engineers Guild High Council that night. It was worded as a request, as befitted the king, but not even the king refused the Engineers Guild in Zhufbar. He ruled, if not by their consent, then at least by their acceptance. Larger than any of the clans, and essential to the running of the hold, the Engineers Guild wielded its power lightly, but it wielded it nonetheless.

  Barundin spent the day overseeing the withdrawal of warriors from the north passages, and spent much time with Tharonin, discussing the reopening of the mine workings so that ore and coal could be sent to the smelters again, which had run low on many supplies during periods of fighting with the skaven.

  So it was armed with this good news, and a light heart, that Barundin dressed that evening. A guild meeting was a formal occasion, part committee meeting, part celebration dedicated to Grungni and the other ancestor gods. Barundin decided to leave his armour upon its stand. This was perhaps only the third or fourth time he had not worn it in seventeen years. It would be a good sign to his people, their king walking through Zhufbar unarmed, safe in his own hold.

  He dressed in dark blue leggings and a padded jerkin of purple, tied with a wide belt. To say that the years of war had made him lean would have not been entirely true, for all dwarfs have considerable girth even when starved, but his belt was certainly a few notches tighter than it had been when he had taken to the throne of Zhufbar. His beard was longer and now hung to his belt, a source of private pride for the king. He knew that he was young for his position, too young in the eyes of some of his advisors, he suspected,
but soon he would be able to use belt-clasps to secure his beard, a sure sign of growing age and wisdom. By the time the grobi of Dukankor Grobkaz-a-Gazan had been sent running back to their holes in Mount Gunbad, he would have the respect of them all.

  Warriors from the guild, bearing shields with the anvil motif of the Master Engineers, came for Barundin in the early evening, to provide escort. He knew the way, of course, but the formality of the invitation had to be respected, and due ceremony observed.

  They led him down to the forges powered by Zhufbar’s waterwheels, which had continued their slow turns all through the fighting, never once stopping, the lights of the furnaces never dimming. It was a credit to the engineers that they had done so much with so little for those seventeen years, and Barundin decided to make a point of complimenting them to this effect. He was about to ask them for just as much effort for another potentially long war, and a little flattery would never harm his cause.

  Having passed through the foundries they came to the workshops, hall upon hall of benches and machinery, from the finest clockwork mechanism to the mighty casting cranes of the cannon-makers. Even at this hour, it was alive with activity – the clinking of hammers, the buzz of heated conversations, the whirr and grind of whetstones and lathes.

  At the far end of the workshops was a small stone door, no taller than a dwarf and wide enough for two to enter abreast. The lintel stone above it was heavy and carved with shallow runes in the secret language of the engineers. A brass boar’s-head knocker was set into the stone of the door; below it was a metal plate worn thin with centuries of use. One of Barundin’s guides took the knocker in his hand and rapped it onto the plate in a succession of rapid knocks. Answering taps resounded from the other side, to which the engineer replied with more raps of his own.

  A few moments passed and then, with a grinding sound from within the walls, the door slid to one side, dark and forbidding. The dwarf guards gestured for Barundin to enter and he did so with a nod, stepping through into the smoky gloom beyond. Another guard on the far side of the door nodded in welcome as the portal closed, rolling back into place on hidden gears.

  He was in the antechamber to the guildhall and could hear raised voices from the closed double doors ahead of him. A few small candles did little to light the darkness, but his eyes soon adjusted and he could make out the wheel-gears of the door locks mounted into the walls around him. Like all the work of the engineers, it was not only functional but a piece of artistic beauty. The gears were chased with golden knotwork and a thick bolt decorated with an ancestor head pinioned each cog. The chains glistened in the candlelight with oil and polish.

  ‘They’re ready for you,’ said the dwarf, walking across the room and laying his hands upon the door handles, giving Barundin a moment to collect himself. The king straightened his jerkin, smoothed the plaits of his beard across his chest and belly and gave the guard a thumbs up.

  Thrusting open the doors, the guard strode into the room. ‘Barundin, Son of Throndin, King of Zhufbar!’ bellowed the guard turned herald.

  Barundin walked past him into the great Guild Hall and stopped while the doors were closed behind him. The engineers were not so proud that they would try to outshine their king, and so their guild hall was smaller than Barundin’s own audience chamber, though not by much. No pillars supported the rock above their heads. Instead the ceiling was vaulted with thick girders crossing each other in intricate patterns, their foundations set within the walls of the hall itself. Gold-headed rivets sparkled in the glow of hundreds of lanterns, though the size of the hall meant that the furthest reaches were still swathed in shadow.

  In an island of light in the centre of the vast hall, around a fire pit blazing with flames, was the guild table. It was circular, and large enough for two dozen dwarfs to sit in comfort, although only half that number were now there; they were the twelve thanes of the guild clans, twelve of the most powerful dwarfs in Zhufbar. Each held office as the high engineer for five years, although this was regarded as a position of first amongst equals, a spokesman, not a ruler, hence the circular meeting table.

  The current incumbent was Darbran Rikbolg, whose clan in times past had been granted the title kingmakers for their efforts in supporting Barundin’s ancestors’ accession to the throne of Zhufbar. Before him was a large sceptre of steel, its head shaped like a spanner, holding a bolt carved from a sapphire as big as two clasped fists. The guildmasters, as the thanes were known, were dressed in identical robes of deep blue, trimmed with chainmail and fur. Their beards were splendidly trimmed and knotted, clasped with steel designs and imbedded with sapphires.

  ‘Welcome, Barundin, welcome,’ said Darbran, standing up. His smile seemed genuine enough.

  Barundin crossed the hall, the guildmasters’ eyes upon him, and shook hands with the high engineer. Darbran gestured to a seat at his right that stood empty, and Barundin sat down, exchanging nods with the guildmasters. The remains of a meal lay scattered about the table, as did several half-full flagons of ale.

  Catching the king’s gaze, Darbran grinned. ‘Please, help yourself. There’s plenty to go around, right?’ he said, grabbing a spare cup and emptying a flagon into it, handing the frothing ale to the king.

  ‘Aye, plenty of ale for all,’ echoed Borin Brassbreeks, thane of the Gundersson clan. ‘The guild would not have it said we offer a poor welcome to the king, would we?’

  There was much naying and shaking of heads, and Barundin realised that the aging dwarfs were already well into their cups. He wasn’t sure whether this was a bad thing; as when dwarfs get more drunk they are more susceptible to flattery and bribery, but their stubborn streak widens considerably and their ears tend to close. All in all, the king considered, what he was going to propose was more likely to fall better on drunk ears than sober ones.

  ‘It’s no secret the war with the skaven is all but over,’ said Darbran, sitting down heavily. He raised his tankard, spilling beer onto the stone floor. ‘Well done, Barundin, well done!’

  There was a chorus of hurrahs and a few of the thanes slapped the table with calloused hands in appreciation.

  ‘Thank you, thank you very much,’ said Barundin. He was about to continue but he was interrupted.

  ‘We showed ’em, didn’t we?’ laughed Borin.

  ‘Yes, we showed them,’ said Barundin, taking a gulp of ale. It was a little too bitter for his liking, but not altogether unpleasant.

  ‘Now that we’ve got all of this nasty business out of the way, things can get back to normal around here,’ said another of the thanes, Garrek Silverweaver. He wore a pair of thick spectacles that had slipped down to the end of his pointed nose, making it look as if he had four eyes.

  ‘Aye, back to normal,’ said one of the other thanes.

  Barundin gulped another mouthful of ale and smiled weakly. Darbran noticed his expression and scowled.

  ‘The war is won, isn’t it?’ asked the engineer.

  ‘Oh yes, well as much as it will ever be against that loathsome filth,’ said Barundin. ‘They’ll not trouble us again for many a year.’

  ‘Then why wear a face that would spike a wheel?’ asked Darbran. ‘You look troubled, my friend.’

  ‘The war with the skaven is over, that is true,’ said Barundin slowly. He had been rehearsing this for the whole day between his talks with Tharonin, but now the words jarred in his throat. ‘There is, however, the issue of the goblins still to be resolved.’

  ‘The goblins?’ said Borin. ‘What goblins?’

  ‘You know, Dukankor Grobkaz-a-Gazan,’ said the engineer sitting next to Borin, ramming an elbow into his ribs as if this would act as a reminder. ‘Barundin’s father’s dying grudge!’

  Barundin was pleased that they had remembered, but his hopes were dashed by Borin’s reply.

  ‘Yes, but we decided we can’t be having any of that, didn’t we?’ the old dwarf said. ‘That’s what we were just saying, wasn’t it?’

  Barundin turned his inquisi
tive glare to Darbran, who, to his credit, looked genuinely guilty and nonplussed. ‘We knew you would want to discuss this, and so made it one of our items of business for today’s meeting,’ explained Darbran. ‘We can’t support another war, not now.’

  ‘No, not now, not ever,’ growled Borin, who had only recently handed over the role of high engineer and was quite clearly not out of the habit. ‘For Grungni’s sake, there’s barely an ounce of iron or steel left. We can’t forge from the bones of dead ratmen, can we? It’s out of the question!’

  ‘The mines are reopened even as we speak,’ said Barundin, leaning forward and looking at the assembled guildmasters. ‘I have spoken to Tharonin and he assures me there will be ore aplenty within a few weeks. We’ll not let your furnaces grow cold.’

  ‘We know about your talks with Tharonin,’ said Darbran. ‘He might have promised his own mines, but there’s no guarantee the other clans will be back to work straight away. They’ve been fighting those bloody skaven for seventeen years, lad. That’s a fair time in anybody’s book. You don’t run from one war into another.’

  Barundin turned to the others, mouth open, but it was Gundaban Redbeard, youngest of the guildmasters at just over three hundred years old, who spoke first.

  ‘We know you have to fulfil your father’s dying grudge before you can go after that toad Vessal,’ said Redbeard. ‘But wait awhile. Let everyone catch their breath, so to speak. The clans are tired. We’re tired.’

  ‘Vessal’s a manling, he’ll not live forever,’ snapped Barundin, earning him scowls from the eldest members of the guild council. ‘Next year or a hundred years, the war with the grobi is going to be hard and long. Sooner started, sooner finished, isn’t that right? If we stop now, it will take us years to get going again.’

  His plea was met by blank expressions. They were not going to cooperate. Barundin took a deep breath and another swig of beer. He had hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but he had one last bargaining chip.