by Warhammer
‘I don’t know. Maybe he’s figured out how to make the talisman work for him and he wants us to walk into a trap.’
‘This is all just speculation, Felix.’
Felix smiled grimly. ‘This is a land that lends itself all too well to speculation.’
Max nodded his head in agreement.
The lantern flame flickered and went out. Felix cursed the gust of chill air and the shoddiness of the device. It looked as if it had been lighting the way for guests since the time of Great Plague. He moved through the darkened corridors, one hand out touching the wall so that he could find his way in the gloom, walking his fingers along the stonework to feel when they encountered a doorway. The cool plaster beneath his fingers reminded him of the simple silly games of his childhood, and he smiled a little.
He knew his room was the third door on the right from the top of the stairs. He had to hunch low because of the sloping roof of the inn. It reminded him of the cramped conditions on the airship Spirit of Grungni which in turn reminded him of Ulrika. The thought sent a little surge of pain through his heart. Suddenly he sensed a presence ahead of him in the gloom, and his hand slipped to the hilt of his sword.
‘Be calm, Herr Jaeger. It is only me,’ said Countess Gabriella. By all the gods, Felix thought, the woman must have eyes like a cat’s to be able to tell who he was in this gloom. ‘I would like a word with you in private, if that is possible.’
‘Certainly,’ said Felix wondering what exactly she meant by that. He had some experience of ladies requiring a private word at this time of the evening. You could never tell. Cool, dry fingers closed on his, tugging his hand away from the sword hilt, and she guided him with surprising strength through the corridors. He heard a key click in a lock, and saw her silhouetted in the doorway of her room. She was very slender, he noted drunkenly, but her figure was surprisingly good. She stepped inside and gestured for him to follow.
The chamber was the best in the inn, finely furnished in an antique fashion. A faint smell of cinnamon fought the mustiness in the air. Felix doubted this room was used all that often. The countess closed the door behind him, and he heard the key turn in the lock once more. He had a sudden panicky feeling of being trapped. She gestured for him to take one of the overstuffed armchairs and relaxed into one herself.
Felix remained standing, his sense of unease growing, as he listened to the wind whistle past the windows. He started as a particularly strong gust rattled the wooden shutters.
‘Do sit down, Herr Jaeger! I assure you I mean you no harm.’ The countess sounded faintly amused. Felix suspected this small, slight woman could do him a great deal of harm if she chose to, but he slumped down into the chair, and let his long legs stretch out towards the fire.
‘What is it you want to talk about?’
‘You appear to be a sensible man, Herr Jaeger, and you seem to have encountered more than your share of… unusual situations.’
Felix smiled wryly. He doubted that he would be following Gotrek Gurnisson around if he was the former but the latter was certainly true. There were times when he was surprised his hair had not turned white with the horrors he had seen. ‘Perhaps.’
‘And I think you are a discreet one.’
‘Is this a situation that requires discretion?’
‘Please, Herr Jaeger, this is not what you think. I am about to entrust you with a secret that might cost both our lives.’
Felix felt his smile widen. There was something about Sylvania that inspired the melodramatic as well as the terrible.
‘I assure you there is no cause for amusement.’
Felix could not help himself. He laughed. For a second the countess looked like she was going to rise and slap him but he waved her away. Felix spluttered. ‘No. Please I am sorry. It’s just here I am in a Sylvanian inn. Outside the wind scratches at the windows, the candles gutter and a beautiful woman is about to let me in on a terrible secret. I feel like I am in a Detlef Sierck play. If only a wolf would howl, things would be perfect.’
‘You have a very strange sense of humour, Herr Jaeger.’
‘It comes from reading too many tall tales when I was a youth. I am sorry. Please what is it you wished to tell me.’
‘First, can I ask you for your word that you will pass on nothing of what I tell you here unless I ask you to?’
Felix considered this. ‘As long as it would not cause harm to myself or my comrades.’
‘You are a cautious man. That is good.’
‘It should also tell you I mean to keep my word as long as my conditions are met. Why make them otherwise?’
‘Quite,’ she said dryly. ‘Although it’s also the sort of thing a good liar would say.’
‘You are the one who asked me here. You are the one who wants to tell me secrets. You must already have some ideas concerning my trustworthiness.’
‘You are quite correct,’ she said. ‘I pride myself in being a good judge of men. In my life I have made very few mistakes on that score.’
‘You seem to be a woman possessed of formidable powers of judgement.’
Felix was quite serious. There was something about her that inspired respect. He steepled his fingers and leaned forward in the chair, resting his elbows on his knees. He looked at her closely, trying to study her features through the veil. ‘What exactly is it that you wanted to tell me.’
‘Tell me, do you believe all you have heard about the undying ones?’
‘In this place, at this time, I don’t have much else to go on,’ he said honestly.
‘Do you believe they are all what you would call evil?’
‘What I would call evil?’
‘Herr Jaeger, this is not one of your Altdorf university debates. We are not here to split hairs or discuss how many daemons can dance on the head of a pin. Time is getting short and many lives are at stake.’
Suddenly Felix had an inkling of where this was going, and he fought the urge to reach immediately for his sword. He doubted that it would do him any good if what he suspected was true.
‘You have very good control over yourself, Herr Jaeger, for a mortal. But rest assured if I meant you harm I would have done it before now.’
Felix looked at her in horror, as if a gigantic spider were seated in the chair opposite him, not a small and attractive seeming woman. He felt like he was very close to death. He was very suddenly sober.
‘A pity,’ she breathed softly. ‘Still to business. Not all of the undying are the monsters you believe them to be.’
‘I find that hard to believe,’ said Felix.
‘Why – because they drink the blood of humans to continue their existence? That does not mean they are all murderers. Believe it or not, there are many humans who give their blood willingly. You would be surprised by the number in your own Empire who have done so.’
‘I doubt that there is any wickedness done in the Empire that could surprise me.’
‘Don’t be so parochial, Herr Jaeger! What two consenting people do together in privacy is between them, providing they harm no one else.’
‘That depends on how consenting one of them is.’
‘I do not have time to debate the ethics of this with you. I need your help. A monster is loose and he must be stopped. You and your friends can do it with my help.’
‘Why should I trust you?’
‘You don’t have much choice. You need my help if you are going to find Adolphus Krieger and stop him before he becomes too powerful for anything short of the Lords of Chaos to stop. You need my help if you are going to free your woman from his influence. Which, to be frank, by now I judge is impossible.’
Felix felt his heart skip a beat. His mouth felt dry. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘Because by now she is either a bloodless corpse, hopelessly enthralled by him, or she is his consort, and I judge the latter option most unlikely unless she is a most unusual and striking woman.’
‘She is.’
The countess shrugged. It
was a human gesture but Felix felt as if he had just watched a spider shrug. He watched her with a kind of horrid fascination. He supposed a worm might watch a bird like that, or a rabbit a fox.
‘You are a vampire,’ said Felix. He felt proud of himself. He had wanted to say the words for minutes but forcing them out had seemed somehow dangerous. The countess clapped her hands together ironically.
‘Very good, Herr Jaeger, no one could accuse you of being slow on the uptake.’ Felix felt his fingers tighten on the pommel of his sword.
‘I should warn you this is an enchanted weapon. I do not know if it can affect your kind but I am willing to try if you provoke me.’
‘I know it is a magical weapon and a formidable one, albeit not nearly so formidable as that rather terrifying axe your friend carries. They are among the reasons I think you have a chance of stopping Krieger if you are quick.’
‘Why are you prepared to help us against one of your own kind?’
‘Believe it or not, Herr Jaeger, we are as different and as fractious as humans. We are just a lot fewer. Most of us would prefer to live in some sort of harmony with your kind. You are far more numerous and in the past centuries have gained too much power for us to want anything else. Most of us wish to be left alone with our flocks.’
‘Flocks?’
‘Admirers, willing victims, whatever you wish to call them, Herr Jaeger. See – I am being frank with you.’
‘Fine. Most of you, you say.’
‘There are some who dream of a return to the elder days, who would have us rule the night as they believe we once did. Mostly they are young and don’t realise that we never ruled the night in the way they think. Things were never that simple.’
Felix’s mind reeled with all this new information. He had never considered that vampires might be as filled with fear of humans as humans were of them. What she was saying did make sense. Humans did have the numbers, and the ability to operate in daylight when the undying were weakest, and they did have powerful magic too.
The countess studied him for a moment, as if gauging the impact of her revelations, and then she continued to speak. ‘As I have said, there are those who believe that we should claim our ancient glories, no matter how often they are told that such things never were. Adolphus Krieger is one of them.’
‘I believe you.’
‘Good. We are making some progress.’
‘Tell me – does the count, and those other nobles at Waldenschlosse, know what you are.’
‘Yes. There is a pact between those Arisen who would avoid a return to the ancient wars, and the current rulers of Sylvania. We have no wish to see a pogrom initiated against us.’
‘What about Rodrik?’
‘He and his followers are part of my flock.’ Felix paused to digest all of this information. It was almost too much for him to take in. He found it difficult to believe that he was sitting here calmly discussing such a thing with the countess, and not either attacking her or trying to flee the chamber. A thought struck him. ‘So the count and his friends were concealing something from us.’
‘Why should he let you in on all of his secrets? You are strangers, after all. He has no reason to trust you.’
‘And you have?’
‘I have no choice. I know what Krieger is doing.’
‘And what exactly is that?’
‘He intends to unite all of the Arisen behind him and fulfil an ancient prophecy of our kind. A prophecy made by a madman and destined never to be fulfilled, but that will not stop Adolphus from trying.’
‘Given what you have already told me, it does not seem likely that he can do it.’
‘Herr Jaeger, he possesses the means to do it. You have seen it, touched it.’
‘The Eye of Khemri?’
‘If that is what you wish to call it. It would be better to call it the Eye of Nagash.’
‘Is it really so powerful?’
‘I believe it to be so.’
‘Why?’
‘It was created by Nagash to bind my people to him. It can call them over a great distance and compel obedience if the wearer is strong enough.’
‘If?’
‘You have doubtless heard tales of how the Arisen can impose their will on mortals.’
Felix nodded.
‘It takes a great disparity in willpower for the binding to take place and even then it is only temporary in most cases. To be frank, this is why I have not tried to bind you or your companions. I doubt it could be done without your consent, not without creating a blood bond. It is a less well-known fact that the Arisen can do the same to each other. Among its many gifts the Eye magnifies this ability in one attuned to it. It works far more effectively for one of us than it ever did for the Great Necromancer. Perhaps due to the affinities we have for each other. We are all, at base, of one blood after all. Whatever the reason, by using it Krieger really could summon us all and bind us to his will. In fact, I think he has already started the process. I feel a… tugging at the corners of my mind even as we speak. I do not doubt it will grow stronger over the next few nights as he grows more powerful.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Yes. I want to know what we face here.’
‘Herr Jaeger, I have lived a very long time. I have studied much strange and obscure lore and I have had many many centuries to assimilate it. Believe me, along with most of my kind I have an obsession with the Great Necromancer and his works. I have read all of the supposedly forbidden books – van Hal’s translations of the Nine Books of Nagash, the Book of the Dead, the Forbidden Grimoires of Tal Akhad. I have travelled to the ancient places to collect knowledge of him. I have walked the sands of the Land of the Dead and visited the pyramids of Khemri. It would take me more time than we have to explain how I sifted through all the lies and myths and distortions and eventually put together the pieces of the puzzle. You will just have to trust me when I say what I am telling you is true.’
‘It seems I have little choice. Perhaps I should ask Max to join us.’
‘Perhaps later. At the moment, I would prefer this to remain between us and give you a chance to prepare your companions. It would be better for us all if they did nothing rash.’
Thinking of what Gotrek would do if he found out there was a vampire in their midst, that seemed the wisest course for the present to Felix. If the countess was a potential ally it would be best if her head remained attached to her shoulders. Or, he reminded himself, if she was very powerful, perhaps it would be best if the Slayer did not achieve his long-awaited doom until after Ulrika was free or avenged. He could see from the way the countess nodded that she already took his agreement for granted. Was she really so good at reading him, he wondered? He supposed that after living for centuries she might have gained such a gift for understanding mortals. He gestured for her to go on.
‘The Eye was created by Nagash in ancient times specifically as a weapon to be used against my kind, when he feared we might challenge him for domination of the ancient world. He even used it to bind some of the Arisen to his service. That is when we learned of the power concealed in it. Fearing what might happen, the rest of the Arisen fled as far and as fast as they could and hid themselves with whatever spells they could muster.’
Felix listened enthralled as she told tales of ancient intrigues, of the war between Nagash and the skaven and the eventual dispersal of the Great Necromancer’s treasures. She spoke of the disappearance of the Eye until its return in the possession of Mannfred von Carstein and how he used it to forge the undead force that fought the War of the Vampire Counts. She claimed it was the loss of the Eye at Hel Fenn that had ended those wars as much as the slaughter of the counts.
‘Of course, after the fact,’ she continued, ‘It is easy to see what happened. Most of the Arisen believed the Eye destroyed or lost forever after Hel Fenn and were glad. The Eye must have been found by one of the mortals after the battle, and he took it as par
t of the spoils of war, a memento of that terrible conflict. Not being a magus and having no idea of what it was he held, it became merely a family heirloom. Eventually some of the heirs, needing money, sold the collection and it came onto the open market. It then passed from hand to hand till it ended up in Andriev’s collection.‘
‘How did you and Krieger come to know about it?’
‘Alas, not all the Arisen believed the Eye lost. Some coveted its power. Adolphus Krieger was one such.’
Felix looked at her. And what about you, he thought? Did you want this thing for yourself? Again she seemed to read his mind.
‘There are some of us who feared the return of the Eye, Herr Jaeger. We feared the rise of another von Carstein. It would be the end for many of us and we are already too few. We cannot afford another War of the Vampire Counts.’
‘You are saying you have no interest in the Eye of Khemri yourself?’ Felix did not quite understand why he was taunting this woman who most likely had the power to kill him where he sat but he felt the need to do so. ‘If it fell into your hands you would not use it?’
‘I would do my best to destroy it, or at very least, take it to a place where it would not be found for a long time, if ever.’
‘Really?’
‘I don’t expect you to believe this, but I have sound reasons for not wanting to use the thing.’
‘And what would they be?’
‘The Eye was created by Nagash. It contains part of his power, his spirit, if you will. Over time it corrupts anyone who uses it and leads them to disaster. Nagash was jealous of his creations. They will not truly serve any but him.’
‘Surely Krieger knows this.’
‘Perhaps not and even if he does, perhaps he does not believe it. Or perhaps he believes he can master it. Or perhaps he is already subtly under the thing’s domination. He was close to von Carstein and was exposed to its influence centuries ago.’
‘Perhaps we should simply sit back and wait for this dire fate to overtake Krieger then.’
Felix wondered what he was going to do. There seemed little choice but to go along with her suggestions. Until she proved false she represented a potential ally and one who understood their enemy far better than they could hope to. Still, he realised he was reluctant to trust this undying predator. He felt rather like a deer trying to negotiate with a wolf. Perhaps that was why he felt the need to keep chipping away at her position.