by C. L. Werner
He leaned around, glaring once more at Puskab, fairly daring the plaguelord to protest his orders. Vecteek considered that the degenerates of Clan Pestilens must have at least a pawful of brains when Puskab wisely kept silent.
‘Dig-smash! Break-crush!’ Vecteek howled. ‘Up! Up into man-thing nest! Up to their streets and their cellars! Up to their granaries and their stockyards! Up to their homes and their temples! All-all belongs to Rictus! All-all belongs to Vecteek!’
Vecteek savoured the clamour of claws on bare rock as his underlings hurried to obey his diktat. The approaches were already prepared; before the next feeding cycle his sappers would be through. The tunnels would break up into the sewers beneath Middenheim. From the sewers, the skaven would filter into every cellar, dungeon and crypt.
The walls of Middenheim were tall and strong, built to keep out any foe. Any foe except the one who chose to ignore them. Now those same walls would imprison the people of Middenheim.
Would ensure that none of Vecteek’s prey escaped.
Chapter XVI
Altdorf
Kaldezeit, 1114
‘Open in the name of the Emperor!’ The command was shouted in a thick voice, punctuated by the hammer-like blows of a mailed fist against old timber. The speaker was a stocky, heavy-set being, shorter than a man but with a stoutness of build that lent him a decidedly powerful appearance. Heavy plates of steel were strapped above the mail he wore, and over his bearded head he wore a close-fitting helm adorned with swirling runes of silver and gold. Rings of gold were threaded through the plaits of his thick beard.
Beset by plague and disease, the collection of revenue had become a logistical nightmare for the Ministry of Finance. Taxmen died by the droves as they succumbed to the illness of their victims, their ranks decimated even more savagely than those of physician and priest. An attempt had been made during the spring of 1112 to employ men already struck by the Black Plague as excise collectors, but the effort had failed miserably. The plague-stricken collectors had spread the disease to every quarter of the city. Worse, with the spectre of Morr already hovering over them, they had proven less than stalwart about turning over the revenue they collected to Imperial coffers, skimming most of the money to squander on such pleasures as they might enjoy before the plague took them.
It was Emperor Boris himself who came up with a solution. Aware that the plague had ignored the halfling population, he had seized upon the theory that the Death was only affecting humankind. Soft-hearted and inoffensive, halflings didn’t have the stuff to act as tax collectors. Fortunately, there was another non-human community dwelling in Altdorf that did.
Their own business failing as the plague devastated their customers, many of Altdorf’s dwarfish community had responded to the Emperor’s summons. Soon an entire cadre of dwarf taxmen were stalking the streets of Altdorf, exacting the Imperial tribute from great and small with the stubborn, harsh tenacity of their dour breed. True, the services of the dwarfs were more expensive than those of human taxmen — for one thing the dwarfs refused to accept Imperial coin after the gold content was reduced, forcing their wage to be drawn in raw nuggets and dust — but their role was essential to maintaining the financial stability of Imperial government.
The dwarfs adopted the grandiose title of ‘The Imperial Guild of Excise, Custom, Honour and Fidelity’, but to the people of Altdorf they were simply ‘Goldgather’s Goldgrubbers’. Though they were hated and despised universally, it was still a rare thing for anyone to raise their hand against one of the dwarfs. More than merely the act of defying Imperial law, it was the vindictive nature of the dwarfs themselves that held the abused populace silent. Injure a dwarf and the whole race would persecute the offender’s family unto the tenth generation. Dwarfs recorded their grudges in great tomes so that even the slightest insult would never be forgotten.
The few peasants abroad in the streets didn’t even turn their heads at the commotion on the doorstep of a once prosperous moneylender. They had become accustomed to shunning the house ever since the warning cross had been chalked across the door. Few even knew if the man or any of his household still lived, nor were any willing to risk the plague to find out. Once a week a corpse-cart would pass down the street and knock at each door. They would find out if anyone were still in there — it was what they were paid to do. The corpse-collectors earned a copper from the Temple of Morr for each nose they brought to the cremation pits outside the city wall.
Grumbling into his beard, the dwarf glanced down at the moneylender’s name on the list he carried, noting the balance beside it. It was an appreciable sum, derived from the earnings the man’s business had enjoyed before the plague. A small thing like a pandemic would hardly justify a reduction in taxes. Besides, if the man felt the sum was unreasonable, he could protest to his noble lord. Allowing that his liege had survived the plague and hadn’t already fled the city.
Either way, the dwarf’s job was to collect. He repeated his summons, banging his fist so forcefully against the door that he bruised the wood. He drew back, waiting for any trace of activity. Frowning under his beard, the dwarf tilted his helmet up and pressed an exposed ear against the door. Years of mining in the Grey Mountains had honed the dwarf’s hearing to a superhuman degree, enabling him to detect the presence of ore simply by the sound his pick made when striking the wall, warning him of a cave-in by the softest groan from a support beam hundreds of yards up the shaft. By comparison, listening at a keyhole was simplicity itself.
Immediately, the dwarf’s ear caught the sounds of furtive shuffling inside the house. He leaned back, adjusting his helmet in place. Pejorative crept into his grumbling. So the cheats thought to hide in there and pretend they weren’t home, did they? Well, if they thought a dwarf could be dissuaded from his duty by such a facile deception, they were sorely mistaken.
Stepping away from the door, the dwarf thrust his shoulder towards it and lunged at it. The portal shook in its frame as his armoured weight slammed into the wood. Unfazed by the impact, the dwarf stepped back into the street, allowing himself a better start before charging into the door again.
This time the door collapsed under his impact, flying back on its hinges. The dwarf was propelled into the dingy parlour beyond.
Eyes adapted to the murk of mines and tunnels stared in disbelief at the scene within that parlour. If plague hadn’t claimed the moneylender and his household, they would have been better off if it had. The monsters that filled the decrepit building now certainly wouldn’t have been merciful to any occupants they found.
The parlour and what he could see of the rooms beyond were swarming with hundreds of skaven.
The dwarf drew his axe, set his feet and roared a prayer to Grungni. Then the vermin rushed at him in a chittering tide of fangs and blades. He cut down ten of them before he was crushed to the floor. After that, despite his heavy armour and his powerful build, it was only a few moments before the dwarf was reduced to an unrecognisable heap of dripping meat.
Dejected and dispirited, the peasants walking the streets had paid only the sketchiest notice to the dwarf’s invasion of the house. They paid far more attention to the horde that flooded out through the broken door. A few of them even had time to scream before the ratmen fell upon them.
It was a scene that was repeated all across Altdorf. From sewers and cellars, from abandoned homes and boarded warehouses, even from the holds of derelict ships, the ratmen came. With sword and fang the seemingly numberless horde rampaged through the streets. Wherever the skaven appeared, death and destruction reigned. The monsters were merciless in their depredations, devoid of any semblance of pity or restraint. Temples filled with the sick and dying became abattoirs in the wake of the chittering horde. Refugee camps erupted in flames as the ratmen surrounded them and put them to the torch, the agonies of those trapped within the ring of fire echoing hideously across the icy waters of the Reik.
Through the Kaiseraugen, the men assembled in the council chamber could
see the pillars of smoke rising from the burning city. Screams, roars, the bedlam of a city being torn apart wasn’t quite muffled by the thick panes of glass. Several Kaiserjaeger stood watch, shouting to the leaders gathered about the table whenever they spotted the enemy in the streets below.
Adolf Kreyssig considered the grim-faced men gathered around him. They were solemn, hardly daring to speak as the magnitude of the attack was borne home to them with each fresh report that made its way to the palace. One of them, the bewigged fop Emperor Boris had installed as burgomeister of Altdorf, sat slumped in his seat, sobbing loudly into a laced handkerchief. Fortunately for the city, the rest of its leaders were made of sterner stuff. Kreyssig had made certain of that when he’d purged the council and made his plans for war.
Duke Vidor shook his head and cast aside the slip of parchment he had been reading, a report from a captain in the Schuetzenverein. ‘The area east of the river is cut off,’ he declared. ‘The ratmen have demolished the bridges. Two-thirds of the army had their billets there.’
Grand Master Leiber pulled at his long moustache, eyes closed as he pondered the dire news. ‘At least the heavy horse is stationed on this side of the river,’ he stated. ‘That leaves us roughly three hundred knights. More if we call upon the templar orders.’
‘The Black Guard have been surrounded by the cremation pits outside the walls,’ a wizened old count reported. A haunted look crept into his eyes as he considered the full message he had received. ‘Thirty knights against hundreds of those things. They won’t leave enough for Morr’s ravens to find!’
Prelate Arminus nodded in sympathy at the sacrifice of the Black Guard, closing his hand about the whalebone icon he wore around his neck. The priest’s voice was apologetic when he addressed the other leaders. ‘I fear that the Knights of the Storm are largely absent from the city. With the plague ravaging the river trade, many of them have been serving as marines on those vessels still braving the Reik. Merciful Manann watch over them all.’
Inquisitor Fulk of the Verenan temple drew back the heavy hood he wore, letting his sharp eyes rove across the faces of the men around him. ‘My temple stands ready to assist the city, but our strength is sadly diminished. The Black Plague has been most attentive.’ The grim priest tapped his fingers on the breast of his robe. ‘At best we might rally seventy swords if we left the temple unprotected.’ It was clear from his tone that he considered such a move to be sacrilegious.
Kreyssig decided to reject the inquisitor’s offer. The Verenans weren’t a martial order, their forte was hunting heretics. Torturers and executioners were quite capable of killing in cold blood, but he doubted if many of them were equally capable of hot-blooded killing, of fighting against an armed adversary. No, it was better to leave them in their gloomy temple and let them fare as their god saw best.
‘We have almost three thousand foot soldiers this side of the river,’ Kreyssig declared. ‘At the moment, they are scattered throughout, clumped in their training camps and isolated in their billets.’ He raised his eyes, staring out through the window. One of those training camps was built over the wreckage of Breadburg. From here, he could see a great column of smoke billowing up from that vicinity.
Vidor stood up from his chair, addressing the various nobles seated at the table. ‘By themselves, the knights will be of little use. The strength of heavy horse lies in the charge and there will be little opportunity for such tactics in the close confines of city streets.’ He turned, locking eyes with Kreyssig. ‘If we are to have any hope of driving the ratmen from the city, we have to mobilise our scattered foot troops, concentrate them into a single battle group. The ratkin may outnumber us, but those same close quarters will counter that advantage. Man for monster, even the lowest dienstmann is more than a match for the vermin. If we can concentrate our troops into bodies large enough to resist the numbers of the ratmen…’
Kreyssig nodded. From what he had seen of the skaven, they were a craven breed. They relied upon subterfuge and ambush to fight their battles. They had little stomach for a real fight. So far, the monsters had enjoyed success because they hadn’t encountered anyone in a position to seriously oppose them. Upset that tide of success even a little and it might hurl the entire horde into disarray.
‘What is your plan, Reiksmarshal?’ Kreyssig asked.
‘First we will use the Kaiserknecht and as many footmen as are available to penetrate down to the river,’ Vidor said. ‘Any peasants they find will be drafted as labourers. Once they reach the Reik, they will take every ship, scow and barge and lash them together. The ratmen destroyed the old bridges, so we’ll build a new one.’
‘It will take time to construct a pontoon bridge,’ one of the other generals objected. ‘I can appreciate the need to bring the rest of the army across the river, but until they are across the ratmen will have an even freer hand on this side of the Reik.’
The Reiksmarshal shook his head. ‘Not so,’ he stated. ‘Because while they are building the bridge, we will be using the rest of our knights to get messages to the brigades on this side of the river. If we can get all of them to converge upon a single position, concentrate our strength, we can resist the vermin until reinforcements can be brought across the Reik.’
‘You said the knights would be useless in city fighting,’ Grand Master Leiber pointed out.
‘I don’t need them to fight,’ Vidor returned. ‘I need their mobility, their stamina to win clear of the ratmen and reach our scattered troops. A humble task, I grant, but there will be time for valour and glory after we have the strength to mount a credible offensive.’
‘Where do you want the troops to go?’ Inquisitor Fulk wondered. ‘It will need to be somewhere central, well within reach of each brigade.’
‘It needs to be a landmark that can be seen from some distance,’ one of the barons mused. ‘Something visible from wherever the soldiers may be.’
A brief debate ensued, many of the noblemen arguing for the Imperial Palace while others argued that doing so would cause the ratmen to bring their full force to bear against the palace.
It was the heretofore silent Arch-Lector von Reisarch who ended the debate. ‘The Great Cathedral,’ he said. ‘The spire can be seen from anywhere in Altdorf, and it is built at the very heart of Old Reikdorf. Rally the troops to the temple of Holy Sigmar, that they may take courage from His divine beneficence.’
Inquisitor Fulk and Prelate Arminus looked as though they wanted to challenge von Reisarch’s suggestion, angered by what they viewed as the Sigmarite’s shameless effort to aggrandise his god in the midst of this calamity. At the same time, neither of the priests could ignore the compelling logic behind the arch-lector’s argument. The Great Cathedral was ideally located and the peasants would take heart from the idea that they were defending Sigmar Himself by rallying to the temple.
‘The Great Cathedral, then,’ Kreyssig decided, ending the discussion. He nodded to von Reisarch. ‘You may tell Grand Theogonist Gazulgrund to expect me.’ It grated on Kreyssig’s pride to indulge the Sigmarites in this fashion. Condescending to the Grand Theogonist was to make a public display of the priest’s authority — authority that would appear greater than that of the Emperor or his appointed Protector. Still, it would be even more disastrous to allow the priest to fight the coming battle by himself. The people would remember who fought to save them and who stayed safe behind fortress walls.
Kreyssig was just about to dismiss the council when he happened to notice Baroness von den Linden’s cat. The brute had been lazing about on top of the table throughout the meeting, indifferent to the momentous events unfolding around it. Now, however, the cat was upright, its back arched and its every hair standing on end. As the animal began to hiss and spit, Kreyssig followed its frightened gaze.
He was just in time to see the dark shapes drop outside the Kaiseraugen, swinging on ropes from the roof of the palace. Before even his Kaiserjaeger could shout a warning, the swinging skaven smashed through the
window. Kreyssig covered his face as slivers of glass flew through the chamber.
The chittering shrieks of skaven drowned out the shouts of alarm and confusion that rose from the surprised councillors and generals. Moans of agony sounded from the direction of the windows as the fast-moving ratmen attacked the startled Kaiserjaeger. Other skaven rappelled through the shattered glass, hurling tiny orbs into the room. As each orb crashed to the floor, it expelled a billowing mass of choking fumes. The men reeled in the noxious vapour, struggling to escape the debilitating fog. The skaven, their faces wrapped in thick folds of cloth, scampered through the chamber, lashing out with crooked blades.
Kreyssig staggered back, trying to draw his own sword even as his body shuddered in a fit of violent coughing. One of the assaulting vermin uttered a feral growl as it spied him. Leaping to the top of the table, the murder-rat charged at him.
Abin-gnaw stuffed his scimitar back beneath his rat-gut belt and drew the lethal coils of his sacred strangler’s cord from beneath his crimson cloak. Squeaking an invocation to the Horned One, a murderous charm taught to him by no less than the Old Rat Under the Mountain himself, the killer cast the noose through the air, looping it about his victim’s neck.
Kreyssig gasped as the cord was drawn taut, as the little warpstone talisman sewn into the lining dug into his neck. He could feel his throat constricting, feel the air being squeezed out of him. Nimbly, Abin-gnaw jumped from the table, dropping down behind Kreyssig and forcing the human down into his chair. Pressing one foot against the back of the seat, the skaven used it for extra leverage, extra force to increase that deadly constriction.
Kreyssig struggled to reach the monstrous creature behind him, tried to twist his body so that he might at least slip free from the chair. Abin-gnaw, however, was too crafty to allow himself to fall within reach of the human’s groping hands.
