by Nick Horth
It reminded Callis a lot of the Excelsis docks, though somehow the place managed to be even less reputable. With no Freeguild patrols to keep even a cursory watch over the marketplace, the cutthroats and belt-cutters roamed freely, drifting through the river of people like sharks on the trail of spilled blood.
‘Charming place,’ said Shev, following behind.
‘I’ve got earth beneath my feet and the promise of liquor. As far as I’m concerned this might well be paradise.’
Several skinny, dirty street kids skittered past, and Callis felt a hand brush against his belt, searching for something to prise free. He grinned.
‘Not bad,’ he yelled after the retreating children. ‘But I’m afraid I’m a poor mark.’
The lead urchin, a small, freckled redhead girl with matted hair, turned and flicked him an obscene gesture, following up with several crude suggestions as to his possible ancestry. He gave her a wave, and she ran off through the crowd.
‘I knew you were a city boy,’ said Shev. ‘But I didn’t figure you as a guttersnipe.’
‘Benefits of a criminal youth,’ said Callis, with a grin. ‘I mixed with a bad crowd, so my mother used to say. Believe me, it came in pretty handy when I was in the city guard.’
‘You don’t have to tell me,’ Shev said, flashing him a wide grin of her own. She raised one hand, with a flat, round coin pinched between her thumb and forefinger. His last glimmering.
He gave her a mock bow, genuinely impressed.
‘The Square of Prophets was my domain,’ she said. ‘Plenty of old, fat merchants and priests wandering through, their pockets filled with all manner of interesting things.’
‘I had no idea I was speaking to a master of the craft,’ said Callis, as they walked on. ‘You grew up on the streets?’
‘I did,’ she replied. ‘Learned a few tricks from the best pickpockets and second-storey artists in Excelsis. That was a long time ago.’
‘You’re full of surprises,’ he said.
They trudged up a rickety, curving ramp that led them to another level of the port, a bazaar filled with stalls and great, circular tents. The crowds here were even thicker than in the hovels below, though it was clear that this was a place of business. Offers and counter-offers of merchants rang out over the general din of noise and hissing cook-pots, hawking all manner of illicit goods. Callis saw Excelsis-forged steels, barrels filled with wriggling, fork-tongued amphibians, and bales of sirigrash, a sickle-shaped plant harvested from the seafloor that the Excelsis city guard had long ago banned due to its occasional side effect of causing delusional madness in those who sampled it. In fact, as he glanced at the bewildering variety of produce on display, Callis noted a score of shipments and substances for which you’d earn a lengthy spell in the dungeons if you tried to flog them on the streets of Excelsis.
‘There,’ said Toll, as they reached the far end of the marketplace and emerged onto a wide, flat balcony that overlooked the greater city. Far in the distance, built upon a rising spire of bone and rusted metal, they could see the sky port. Four duardin vessels rested there in great berths, lit by sunlight that poured through holes in the shell of the dead behemoth. They were squat, powerful-looking airships, rippling with cannon and reinforced steel. From the deck of each protruded great, metal spheres, covered with vents and rivets. It seemed impossible that such a heavy vessel could ever stay in the air, but Callis had seen the skymasters of the Kharadron in battle before, and knew well just how agile and deadly their craft could be.
The lift that took them up to the sky port was a worryingly ramshackle construction of rusted cables, cogs and tow-ropes, manned by a surly gang of humans and duardin who lounged, drinking and playing cards. As Toll approached, they stopped their game, eyeing him curiously.
‘I would speak with the captain of those airships,’ he said, gesturing to the platform far above their heads. ‘Take us up.’
‘Want to speak to the cloud-beards, do you?’ snorted an old, grey-haired duardin with a metal hook on one stubby arm. ‘Hope you’ve brought plenty of coin, boy. They’ll have the shirt off your back before you can blink.’
‘You let me worry about that,’ said Toll.
The old duardin shrugged, and snapped his fingers. Two of his crew rose grumbling from their seats and made their way over to a great, barrel-like device covered in soot and grime. The greybeard gestured for them to stand upon the platform, and they obliged. One man hauled upon a great, brass lever built into the strange device, and it began to cough and smoke. Slowly, the great cogs next to the platform began to creak and rotate, with a grinding, squealing sound.
‘This does not look safe,’ said Callis, gazing up at the lip of the sky port above.
‘Calm yourself,’ said the old duardin. ‘We ain’t had an accident in at least a couple o’ days.’
His cackles were drowned out by the roar of the engine and the clattering of gears, and the platform began to rise. Callis badly wanted to hold on to something, but there were no rails. He watched with a distinct sense of unease as Shev ambled right to the edge of the platform and peered out over the side as the ground fell away underneath them.
With only a few heart-rending stalls and stutters, they finally made it to the edge of the sky port. Ahead was a veritable minefield of crates, barrels, containers, scattered tools and ropes. Working their way through this maze of detritus, hauling and stacking the cargo upon the decks of the docked sky-ships, were dozens of duardin dressed in black and red leathers. Even in the heat, Callis could see not a scrap of flesh beneath their heavy suits, and each wore an intimidating metal mask shaped in the image of a scowling duardin face. Ridged silver plates formed a beard, and across the eyes and mouth were perforated vents and lenses that resembled the scopes of Ironweld firing pieces. One of the duardin spotted them and made his way over, a hand resting upon the golden handle of a many-barrelled scattergun wedged into his belt.
‘Those lackwits below were very clearly instructed to ring the damned bell before they sent anyone up,’ he snarled. His mask turned his words into a metallic growl, but his accent was surprisingly clipped compared to most of the duardin that Callis had encountered.
Toll approached, hands raised.
‘I’m here to speak with Captain Bengtsson,’ he said.
‘Admiral,’ said the duardin. ‘Admiral Bengtsson, and he is disinclined to receive visitors while he is preparing for the fleet’s departure. In short, we are busy, and we have no time for any more “honest, above-board dealings” from smooth-talking conmen.’
‘He’ll want to speak to me,’ said Toll. ‘I represent the Order of Azyr, blessed seekers of his divine majesty the God-King. And I have an offer for your admiral that he will want to hear.’
The duardin eyed them for a long moment, then nodded.
‘Wait here,’ he said, and headed off towards the largest of the three airships. Up close they could see the magnificent craftsmanship of the vessel, the gilded panelling that formed the broad, deep hull, and the gleaming barrels of swivel-guns and rotary cannons that lined the gunwale. Callis whistled.
‘Serious firepower,’ he said.
‘The Kharadron do not believe in moderation in warfare,’ said Toll. ‘I’ve witnessed the results of an airship bombing run. Only rubble, fire and ashes left behind.’
Callis had spent his life around the guns and siege engines of the Ironweld engineers, and he had thought their weaponsmiths amongst the finest in all the realms. Yet these vessels made the inventions of the cogheads seem almost primitive. The largest was a broad, deep-hulled monster of riveted iron plates and layered panels of gold, marked by duardin runes and bearing the enormous sculpture of a stern longbeard god upon its prow. Its surface bristled with bombs and cannon of every conceivable variety. There was more firepower there than in an entire artillery detachment. A great engine-sphere rested on top of a squat cabin tha
t ran along the rear of the ship. The enormous metal orb was lined with vents and beaten panels of corrugated iron, and dotted here and there were opaque portholes that glowed with a faint, blue light.
‘Sigmar’s teeth, I can’t wait to fly on one of those,’ he muttered.
Shev raised an eyebrow. ‘So hurtling through the air on a lump of metal is fine, but a bit of sailing gives you the jitters?’
‘At least I know if I fall overboard I’ll be dead as soon as I hit the ground. Not splashing around in the dark with a thousand unspeakable horrors drifting ever closer.’
‘Unless you land in the water, of course.’
Callis shrugged, conceding the point.
The duardin who had addressed them strode up to a bolted door built into the side of the airship, and rapped on the metal with his gauntleted fingers. After a few seconds, the hatch opened, and the crewman hopped up a short flight of steps and disappeared into the vessel.
‘I wonder how it all works,’ said Shev, raising one hand to her brow as she squinted up at the enormous vessel. ‘How do you keep something so heavy in the air?’
‘I’ve heard Ironweld folk ask the same questions and get nothing but frosty glares in reply,’ said Callis. ‘They keep to themselves, do the sky-folk. Don’t appreciate people poking their nose into their affairs. I’m sure they’ll just love you.’
As they watched, a duardin in a bulky, armoured suit, much heavier than the ones his fellows wore, emerged on the deck of the rightmost ship. A metal sphere not unlike those mounted upon the airships ascended from the shoulders of the rig, attached to a large fin of corrugated steel. They looked on, astonished, as the duardin rose into the air, moving with unbelievable deftness and agility despite the bulkiness of his equipment. He came to rest upon the very top of the engine-sphere of the nearest vessel, one of the smaller gunships, and they saw the flare of a handheld torch as he began to hover over the superstructure of the vessel, welding and hammering panels.
‘If it’s not magic, I’ve got no idea how it’s possible,’ said Callis, shaking his head.
After several minutes, the hatch of the flagship creaked open, and the duardin re-emerged. He strode over to them, pausing every now and then to bellow instructions to his crewmates.
‘Admiral Bengtsson will speak with you,’ said the duardin, gesturing to Toll. ‘Alone. Stow your weapons. I’ll search your pockets, too. Never can be too careful where business is concerned.’
To Callis’ surprise, Toll nodded and removed his coat, handing it to the armoured duardin. The Kharadron whistled and two of his crew approached, patting the witch hunter down efficiently and with no thought for comfort. They removed his shoulder holster and the two pocket-guns he kept tucked in the metal cap of his belt, as well as a small armoury of blades and unidentifiable paraphernalia. Toll bore the thorough patting-down without complaint, safe in the knowledge that they missed several of his most subtle and lethal devices.
The Kharadron snorted with amusement as he rolled a small sphere of bronze in his hands.
‘You’ve no shortage of interesting toys, human,’ he said. ‘Impressive.’
‘I would be very careful with that, friend,’ said Toll, as one of the duardin passed his jacket back to him.
‘Gunnery Sergeant Drock,’ the leader said. ‘Grundcorps. Follow me.’
Callis and Shev made to follow, but Drock held up a hand.
‘Just him,’ he said. ‘You two wait here.’
‘This might take a while,’ said Toll. ‘Head back to the alehouse we passed, beyond the free market. The Drowned Rat.’
‘Appealing in name as it was in appearance,’ muttered Callis.
‘Just keep to yourselves and wait for me,’ said Toll, before turning to follow Drock towards the enormous skyship.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The great door groaned open, and Toll followed Drock into the depths of the ironclad. It was gloomy inside, a cramped tube of looming bulkheads and corrugated walls lit by foul-smelling lamps that cast a hazy orange light across the walls.
Toll passed chambers stuffed to the ceiling with crates, barrels, cages and other paraphernalia, lashed together with leather bindings and overseen by yet more masked duardin. They gazed impassively at him as he passed. It might simply be an illusion of the mind, but the interior of the vessel seemed far larger than he had expected. Everything was functional, utilitarian; there was not a stretch of wall or floor given over to aesthetics rather than practicality. Its smell was sharp and bitter, but not entirely unpleasant; the chemical tang of oils and work-leathers, sweat and hard labour.
Drock tramped up a short flight of corrugated stairs and came to another bulkhead, secured by a heavy door upon which was marked a series of runes that Toll could not understand. His knowledge of the skyfolk’s language was passable, but each of the Kharadron skyports had their own cultural subtleties and linguistic quirks. From the markings he had seen upon the vessel’s hull, Bengtsson’s crew hailed from Barak Zilfin, one of the largest of the skyfolk’s enclaves.
The gunnery sergeant rapped sharply on the door, and there was a barely audible grunt from within. Drock heaved the door open, revealing a small, dimly lit chamber dominated by a huge ironwood desk. Surrounding this ornately carved piece was a thick jungle of towering paperwork – scrolls, tomes and charts of all description, stacked together in piles so immense it seemed they would crush a person if they were to fall. In the midst of this forest of fading yellow papyrus sat another armoured duardin, hunched over a desktop scattered with maps and aethermatic gadgetry, lit by an egg-shaped lamp of polished bronze that dangled from the ceiling on a copper cord.
Just as the rest of his crew, Admiral Bengtsson was clad in a full-body leather oversuit and a mask that entirely covered his face. His mask was by far the most ornate that Toll had seen, however. It was fashioned from gleaming gold, the lower portion forming a great, wedge-like beard and sweeping moustache, the upper half an imposing duardin frown. The eyes were sky-blue sapphires, the brow ridged with rivets of silver. It was an imposing visage, to be sure.
‘Well?’ barked Bengtsson. His voice was harsh and deep, with a faint lilting quality to the accent. ‘Time’s wasting, sir. I believe you had a proposition to bring before me?’
Toll removed his hat and stepped before the admiral’s desk. There was no seat. Bengtsson was clearly not a duardin who relished company.
‘Hanniver Toll, agent of the Order of Azyr,’ he said. ‘I am in pursuit of an individual who has committed untold crimes against the free city of Excelsis. I arrived here by sail, but I fear my quarry further eludes me with every passing moment. I require swifter passage.’
Bengtsson leaned back in his chair, making a steeple of his gloved fingers.
‘The Indefatigable is no passenger ship,’ he said. ‘Tell me, why should I interrupt a profitable trading mission for your convenience?’
‘As I said, I represent the Order–’
‘If the next words out of your mouth are an attempt to threaten me into compliance, I should warn you that the last human to offer me an ultimatum fell for hours before he struck solid earth,’ said Bengtsson.
Toll raised his hand in acknowledgement, and shook his head.
‘Not at all, admiral,’ he said. ‘My position affords me no jurisdiction over the skyfleets of Barak Zilfin. I am well aware of this. But I am in a position to greatly reward those who assist me in my attempts to bring this fugitive to justice. The Order does not forget its allies, admiral.’
‘Indeed?’ said Bengtsson. ‘Tell me, who is this fugitive you seek? Who is so important that an agent of Sigmar is sent so far out of his domain to see justice served?’
‘His name is Ortam Vermyre. Recently, he has gone by the title of the Golden Lord.’
‘Subtle fellow.’
‘He can be when the occasion calls for it. For decades, Ver
myre was the High Arbiter of Excelsis. There was no more important mortal soul in the City of Secrets.’
‘Until he opened its gates to a daemonic invasion,’ said Bengtsson. ‘I’ve heard tell of the sacking of Excelsis, Mister Toll, and of your traitor lord. I am aware of the sizeable bounty on that one’s head. But tracking criminals is not my business.’
‘Make it your business, and I can offer you more than coin,’ said Toll.
Bengtsson leaned forward. It was damned strange, dealing with someone without being able to look into their eyes. Perhaps that was why the Kharadron were such renowned masters of the mercantile arts. Still, Toll fancied that he could sense the duardin’s curiosity.
‘You know of Excelsis’ greatest export?’ he said.
Bengtsson waved a dismissive hand. ‘Of course. Secrets and lies, mined from the Spear of Mallus – a relic of the old world, if the legends are true. Slivers of the future, from which a man can make his fortune. Tell me, if the city is so rich in prophecy, then how is it that it contains such a multitude of beggars, drunks and liars? I’ve travelled to your City of Secrets, witchfinder, and I’ve no burning desire to return.’
‘The auguries are real,’ said Toll. ‘Some are little more than whispers, faint inklings of potential. These we allow the populace to trade and barter as they see fit, for alone they are all but meaningless. But there are greater truths that are mined from the Spear, admiral. Kept under lock and key at the behest of the Collegiate. Some are nothing that mortal souls could possibly contemplate, secrets of such shattering power that only the greatest minds of the age could hope to interpret them. Others are simply too valuable to be made public knowledge.’