Warhammer Red Thirst

by Warhammer

  "In the end it became obvious that we could not hold the city so the tombs of our kings and the treasure-vaults were sealed and hidden by cunning devices. We abandoned this place to our foes."

  Gotrek glared at them. "Since then we have not been so foolish as to believe any place is secure from the dark."

  All through the long day, as they approached the wall, Felix realized how much the old structures had suffered. What, from a distance, gave the impression of ageless strength and sureness became, on closer inspection, just as ruined as the road upon which they travelled.

  The curtain wall blocking the road into the valley was four times as tall as a man and passed between steep, sheer cliffs. Signs of neglect were obvious. Moss grew between the cracks of the great stone blocks. The stones were pitted by rain channels and mottled with yellow lichen. Some were blackened as if by fire. A huge section of the wall had tumbled away.

  His companions were silent. The desolation cast a pall over the party. Felix felt depressed and on edge. It was as if the spirits of antiquity watched over them, brooding over the tumbled remains of ancient grandeur. Felix's hand never strayed far from the hilt of his sword.

  The cracked valves of the ancient gate had been wedged open. Someone had made a half-hearted attempt to clear the sign of the hammer and crown over eight peaks carved into the stone. Already the lichen was growing back into place.

  "Someone has been here recently," said Jules, studying the gates closely.

  "I can see how you earned your reputation as a scout," said Gotrek sarcastically.

  "Stay where you are," boomed out an unfamiliar voice. "Unless you want to be filled with crossbow bolts."

  Felix looked up at the parapet. He saw the helmeted heads of a dozen dwarfs looking down through the battlements. Each pointed a loaded crossbow at them.

  "Welcome to Carag Eight Peaks," said their greybearded leader. "I hope you have good reason for trespassing on the domain of Prince Belegar."

  Under grey-white clouds they marched through the city. It was a scene from after the day of judgement when the forces of Chaos returned to claim the world. Houses had tumbled and fallen into the streets. A fusty rotten smell came from many of the buildings. Evil-looking ravens cawed from the remains of old chimneys. Clouds of the gaunt, black birds soared above them.

  The score of dwarfish warriors accompanying them were constantly on the alert. They scanned the doorways as if expecting ambush. Their crossbows were loaded and ready. They gave the impression of being in the middle of a battlefield.

  Once they halted. The leader gestured for silence. Everyone stood listening. Felix thought he heard a scuttling sound but wasn't sure. He strained his eyes against the early evening gloom but could see no sign of trouble. The company leader gestured.

  Two armoured dwarfs moved cautiously towards the corner and glanced around. The rest formed into a square. After a long tense moment the scouts gave the sign for all clear.

  The quiet was broken by Gotrek's laughter. "Scared of a few gobbos?" he asked.

  The leader glared at him. "There are worse things than goblins abroad on nights like this. Be assured of it." he said.

  Gotrek ran his thumb down the blade of his axe, drawing blood. "Bring them on," he roared. "Bring them on!"

  His shout echoed through the ruins and was swallowed by ominous silence. After that even Gotrek was quiet.

  The city was larger than Felix had imagined; perhaps the size of Altdorf, greatest city of the Empire. Most of it was ruined, devastated by ancient wars.

  "Surely your own people did not cause all this damage. Some of it seems quite recent," Felix said.

  "Gobbos," Gotrek replied. "It is the curse of their kind that when they have no-one else to fight they fight amongst themselves. Doubtless after the city fell it was divided up among various warlords. Sure as elvish treachery, they'd fall out over the division of spoils.

  "In addition there have been many attempts to recapture the city by my kin and men from the Border Princes. There's still a motherlode of silver down there."

  He spat. "No attempt to hold the city has ever lasted. The dark has lain here. Where once it has been can never again be truly free of it."

  They entered an area where the buildings had been partially repaired and which now seemed abandoned again. An attempt to re-colonize the city had failed, defeated by the sheer immensity of the ruins. Under the walls of the great keep the dwarfs seemed more relaxed. Their leader grumbled the occasional order to keep alert.

  "Remember Lars," he said. "He and his men were killed while on the path to the great gate."

  The dwarfs immediately reverted to their stern watchfulness.

  Felix kept his hand near his sword.

  "This is not a healthy place," whispered Jules Gascoigne.

  As soon as they were through it, the keep's great gate closed with a crash like the fall of towers.

  The hall was bleak, its walls covered by threadbare tapestries. It was lit by strange glowing gems that hung from a chandelier in the ceiling. On a throne of carved ivory inlaid with gold sat an aged dwarf, flanked by lines of mailed, blue-tunicked warriors. He gazed down with rheumy eyes, his glance flickering from the Trollslayer to the humans. Beside the ancient, a purple-robed female dwarf watched the whole proceeding with a strange, serene intensity. From a chain around her neck dangled an iron-bound book.

  Felix thought he detected strain in the faces of the Imperial dwarfs. Perhaps dwelling in the haunted and run-down city had sapped their morale. Or perhaps it was something more; they seemed constantly to look over their shoulders. They started at the slightest noise.

  "State your business, strangers," said the aged dwarf in a deep, proud, brittle voice. "Why have you come here?"

  Gotrek glared back at him loutishly. "I am Gotrek Gurnisson, once of Everpeak. I have come to hunt troll in the dark beneath the world. The manling Felix Jaegar is my blood-brother, a poet and rememberer. Do you seek to deny me my right?"

  As he said the final sentence Gotrek hefted his axe. The dwarfish soldiers raised their hammers.

  The ancient laughed. "No, Gotrek Gurnisson, I do not. Your path is an honourable one and I see no reason to stand in it. Although your choice of brethren is an ill one."

  The dwarfish soldiers began to mutter amongst themselves. Felix felt baffled. It seemed as if Gotrek had broken some incomprehensible taboo.

  "There is precedent," said the robed dwarfess. The sounds of consternation stopped. Felix expected her to speak further, to expand on what she had said but she did not. It seemed enough to the dwarfs that she had spoken.

  "You both may pass, Gotrek, son of Gurni. Be careful of the gate you choose into the dark and beware lest your courage fail you." His voice held no hint of concern, only bitterness and secret shame.

  Gotrek nodded curtly to the dwarf lord and withdrew to the back of the hall. Felix gave his best court bow, then followed the Trollslayer.

  "State your business, strangers," said the ruler. Aldred went down on one knee before the throne and the others followed suit.

  "I have come on a matter concerning my faith and an ancient pledge of aid between your folk and mine. My tale is a complex one and may take some time to tell."

  The dwarf laughed nastily. Once again Felix sensed some secret knowledge that ate at the aged dwarf-lord. "Speak on. We are rich in no other commodity but time. We can spend it freely."

  "Thank you. Am I correct in assuming that you are the same Prince Belegar who led the expedition to reclaim this city from the greenskins twenty years ago?"

  Belegar nodded. "You are correct."

  "Your guide was a dwarfish prospector called Faragrim, who found many secret ways back into the city below the Eight Peaks."

  Once again the old dwarf nodded. Felix and Gotrek exchanged looks. It had been Faragrim who had told Gotrek about the troll-guarded treasure beneath the mountains.

  "Your expedition was accompanied by a young knight of my order, a companion of Faragrim
in his adventuring days. His name was Raphael."

  "He was a true man and a foe of our enemies," said Belegar. "He went with Faragrim on his last expedition into the depths and never returned. When Faragrim refused to seek him I dispatched runners but they could not find his body."

  "It is good to know you honoured him although I am downcast to learn that the blade which he bore was lost. It was a weapon of power and of great importance to my order."

  "You are not the first who has come here to retrieve it," said the dwarf woman.

  Aldred smiled. "Nevertheless I have sworn a vow to return the sword, Karaghul, to the chapter house of my order. I have cause to believe I will succeed." Belegar raised an eyebrow.

  "Before setting out on my quest I fasted for two weeks and scourged my body with purgatives and the lash. On Sigmarzeit last I was favoured with a vision. My Lord appeared before me. He said he looked with favour on my mission and that the time was near for the enchanted blade to be drawn again."

  "Further - he told me that I would be aided by one of our ancient brethren. I interpret this as meaning a dwarf, for so are your people always referred to in the Unfinished Book."

  "I beseech you, noble Belegar, do not oppose my mission. My brother Raphael honoured the ancient vow of our faith, never to refuse aid to a dwarf, when he fell. It would be a mark of respect to allow me to recover his blade."

  "Well spoken, man," said Belegar. Felix could see he was moved, as dwarfs invariably were by talk of honour and ancient oaths. Still there was a hint of bright malice in Belegar's gaze when he spoke. "I grant your petition. May you have more luck than your predecessors."

  Aldred rose and bowed. "Could you provide us with a guide?"

  Once again Belegar laughed and there was a strange, wild quality to his mirth. He cackled nastily. "I am sure Gotrek Gurnisson would be prepared to aid a quest so similar to his own."

  Belegar rose from the throne and the robed woman moved to support him. He turned to hobble from the room. As he reached the rear exit of the chamber he turned and said: "You are dismissed!"

  From the window of the tower where the dwarfs had housed them Felix looked down at the cobbled street. Outside snow fell in feathery flakes. Behind him the others argued quietly.

  "I don't like it." Zauberlich said. "Who knows how vast an area lies below ground? We could search from now till the end of the world and not find the blade. I had thought the dwarfs guarded the blade."

  "We must trust to faith," Aldred replied, calmly and implacably. "Sigmar wishes the blade to be found. We must trust that he will guide our hands to it."

  An undertow of hysteria was evident in Zauberlich's voice. "Aldred, if Sigmar wished the blade returned why did he not place it in the hands of the three of your brethren who preceded us?"

  "Who am I to guess the Lord's motives? Perhaps the time was not right. Perhaps this is a test of our faith. I will not be found lacking. You do not have to accompany us if you do not wish."

  Felix noticed a cold green light in the distance. The sight of it filled him with dread. He beckoned for Jules to come over and take a look. By the time the Bretonnian arrived at the window there was nothing to be seen. The scout gave him a quizzical look. Embarrassed, Felix looked back at the discussion. Am I going mad, he wondered? He tried to dismiss the green light from his mind.

  "Herr Gurnisson, what do you think?" asked Zauberlich. He turned to beseech the Trollslayer.

  "I will be going down into the dark anyway. It does not bother me what you do. Settle your own quarrels."

  "We have already lost three-quarters of the people we set out with," said Zauberlich, glancing from Jules Gascoigne to Aldred. "What purpose would it serve to throw away our own lives?"

  "What purpose would it serve to give up, save to make our comrades' sacrifice meaningless?" replied the Templar. "If we give up now their deaths will be in vain. They believed that we should find Karaghul. They gave their lives willingly enough."

  The Templar's fanaticism made Felix uneasy. Aldred talked too casually of men laying down their lives. Yet he also had a calm certainty that gave his words compelling urgency. Felix knew warriors would follow such a man.

  "You took the same oath as everyone else, Johann. If you wish to foreswear yourself now so be it, but the consequences will be on your own eternal soul."

  Felix felt a wry sympathy for the mage. He himself had sworn to follow Gotrek while drunk, in a warm tavern in a civilized city, after the dwarf had saved his life. Peril had seemed remote then. He shook his head. It was easy to swear such oaths when you had no idea of the consequences. It was another to keep them when the path led to dismal places like Carag Eight Peaks.

  Felix heard approaching footsteps. There was a knock and the door creaked open to reveal the female dwarf who had stood beside Belegar in the throne room. "I've come to warn you," she said in her low, pleasant voice.

  "Warn us about what?" enquired Gotrek curtly.

  "There are terrible things loose in the depths. Why do you think we live in such fear?" she said.

  "I think you'd better come in," said the Trollslayer.

  "I am Magda Freyadotter. I keep the Book of Remembering at the temple of Valaya. I speak with the voice of Valaya so you will know what I say is truth."

  "Accepted," said Gotrek Gurnisson. "Speak truth then."

  "In the dark unquiet spirits walk." She paused and looked around at them. Her gaze rested on the Trollslayer and lingered.

  "When first we came here we numbered five hundred, with a few mannish allies. The only perils we faced were the orcs and their followers. We cleared this keep and parts of the upper city as a prelude to reclaiming our ancient mines."

  "We made forays into the depths, seeking the vaults of our ancestors, knowing that if we could find them word would spread among the kinsfolk and more would flock here."

  Felix understood the strategy. Word of a treasure find would lure more dwarfs here. He felt a little guilty. It had brought himself and Gotrek.

  "We sent expeditions into the depths in search of the old places. Things had changed from the ancient plans we memorized as children. Tunnels had collapsed, ways were blocked, foul new passages dug by orcs inter-connected with our own."

  "Did a dwarf called Faragrim lead any of these expeditions?" asked Gotrek.

  "Yes," replied Magda.

  Gotrek looked at Felix. "That much of what he claimed is true," said the Trollslayer.

  "Faragrim was bold and sought deeper and further than all others. What did he tell you?"

  Gotrek studied his feet. "That he had encountered the mightiest troll he had ever seen and fled."

  Dwarfs are not good at lying, thought Felix. It seemed impossible that the priestess could not tell he was hiding something. But Magda didn't appear to notice anything amiss.

  Felix thought back to the night back in Nuln, in the Eight Peaks tavern, when the awesomely drunken Faragrim had poured out his tale to Gotrek. The dwarfs had been so inebriated that they had even seemed to forget there was a human present and had talked excitedly in a mixture of Reikspiel and Khazalid. At the time Felix assumed the dwarfs were only attempting to outdo each other in telling tall tales. Now he wasn't sure.

  "So that is what frightened him - we thought it was the ghosts," said Magda. "One day he returned from the depths. His beard had turned pure white. He spoke no word but simply departed."

  "You spoke of terrors in the depths," interrupted Zauberlich.

  "Yes. Our patrols below soon spoke of encountering ghosts of ancient kin. The spirits howled and wailed and begged us to free them from the bondage of Chaos. Soon our early successes were reversed. What dwarf can bear the sight of kinsmen torn from the bosom of the ancestral spirits? Our forces lost heart. Prince Belegar led a mighty expedition to seek the source of evil. His force was destroyed by the lurkers in the depths. Only he and a few trusted retainers returned. They have never spoken of what they found. Most of our surviving folk departed to their homelands. Now barely a h
undred of us are left to hold this keep."

  The colour drained from Gotrek's face. Felix had never seen the Trollslayer display such fear before. Gotrek could face any living creature boldly but this talk of ghosts had leeched away his courage. The worship of their ancestors must be very important to his people, thought Felix with sudden insight.

  "I have warned you," said the priestess. "Do you now still wish to go below?"

  Gotrek stared off into the fire. All eyes in the room were on him. Felix felt that if Gotrek abandoned his quest then even Aldred might give up. The Templar seemed convinced that the Trollslayer was the dwarf of his prophecy.

  Gotrek clutched his axe so tightly that his knuckles were white. He took a deep breath. He seemed to will himself to speak.

  "Man or spirit, alive or dead, I fear it not," he said quietly in a voice that was not convincing. "I will go below. There is a troll I have to meet."

  "Well spoken," said Magda. "I will lead you to the entrance of the realm below."

  Gotrek bowed. "It would be an honour."

  "Tomorrow then," she said and rose to go. Gotrek held the door for her. After she had departed he slumped into the chair. He laid down his axe and clutched at the armrests as if he feared he would fall over. He looked very afraid.

  A huge doorway gaped in the side of the mountain. Above it, rising from the rock, was a great window set in the side of the mountain. The window was roofed with red-slate tiles, many of which had fallen in. It was as if a keep had been built and then sunk beneath the earth so that only the tallest parts protruded above the ground.

  "This is the Silvergate," said Magda. "The Silverway runs to the Upper Granaries and the Long Stairs. I believe the Way is clear. After that, beware!"

  "Thank you," said Felix. Gotrek nodded to the priestess. Aldred, Jules and Zauberlich bowed. The men looked very sombre.