by Warhammer
‘Very good,’ he gasped, returning the device. ‘But can you help us see a physician?’
Otto pursed his lips primly. ‘Of course, Felix. You are my brother.’
‘And Elissa?’
‘Her too.’
It’s amazing how money smoothes all paths, Felix thought, looking around Doctor Drexler’s chambers. Without the use of Otto’s name, he doubted the servant would have let him through the doors of the doctor’s luxuriously appointed townhouse. Felix had to admit that it was quite a place.
On the oak-panelled walls were framed certificates from the Universities of Nuln, Altdorf and Marienberg, as well as hand-written testimonials from maybe half the crowned heads of the Empire. A massive portrait of the good doctor painted by the famous Kleinmann beamed down impressively from the middle of them all. Of course, for the fees that he charged, Drexler could certainly afford the services of the great portrait artist.
Felix glanced over the doorway. The doctor and Elissa were in his consulting room. Felix had been left outside for the moment. He rose from the comfortable leather armchair and looked around.
Along one wall was a collection of large glass jars which would not have been out of place in an alchemist’s shop. The bookshelves were lined with musty leather-bound tomes. Felix picked one up. It was Johannes Voorman’s Der Natur Malorum. A first edition, no less. The pages had been cut, which meant that someone around here had read it. It wasn’t just window-dressing, straight from the bookbinders. Felix examined the other titles and was surprised to discover that only half of them were medical or alchemical in nature. The rest dealt with a variety of subjects, from natural history to the motion of the Spheres. It seemed that the doctor was indeed a well-read man.
‘You are a scholar, Herr Jaeger?’
Felix turned to find that Drexler had emerged from the consulting room. He was a short, slender man with a narrow, friendly face and a short, well-trimmed beard. He looked more like a successful merchant than a doctor. His robes were as rich as Otto’s and there was not a sign of blood stains anywhere. Felix could not even see the traditional pot of leeches.
‘I’ve read a little,’ he admitted.
‘That is good. A man should always improve his mind whenever there is an opportunity.’
‘How is Elissa?’
Drexler took off his glasses and breathed on them, then polished them on the hem of his robe. He beamed reassuringly. ‘She is fine. She has a summer cold. That is all.’
Felix understood why the rich were so willing to pay for the services of this man. There was something hugely reassuring about his quiet soft-spoken voice and his calm, certain smile. ‘Not… not the plague then?’
‘No. Not the plague. No buboes. No lesions. No suppurating ulcers of the skin. None of the usual symptoms of any of the greater plagues. Of that I am sure.’
Elissa emerged from the consulting room. She smiled at Felix. He forced himself to smile back. ‘I understand that you were exposed to a plague bearer yesterday, Herr Jaeger,’ the doctor said, suddenly all seriousness.
‘Yes.’
‘Best have a look at you then. Let me see your arm.’
For the next few minutes the doctor performed all manner of arcane rituals the like of which Felix had never seen. He touched his wrist and counted, while keeping track of a chronometer on the wall. He tapped Felix’s chest painfully. He looked into Felix’s eyes with a magnifying glass.
This was not what Felix had expected. Where were the scalpels, and unguents, and leeches? Was this man some sort of charlatan? He was certainly most unlike any doctor or barber Felix had ever encountered. His robes were not filthy and crusted with dried blood, for one thing. And the man was tanned, unusually so for a man who spent most of his life indoors. Felix mentioned this fact and Drexler looked at him sharply.
‘I have spent time in Araby,’ Drexler said. ‘I studied medicine at the great School at Kah Sabar.’
Felix looked at the wall. There was no diploma there from any Arabyan university. Drexler obviously understood his train of thought, for he laughed. ‘They do not give degrees in Kah Sabar! By the time you leave you are either a healer or you are not. If you are not, no piece of paper will make you one.’
‘A fair point. But what did you learn there that you could not learn here in the Empire?’
Like all of its citizens Felix considered the Empire to be the most advanced and enlightened human nation on the face of the planet. He could not conceive that there was anything the Arabyans had to teach one of its people. The elves and dwarfs, certainly – but not the Arabyans.
‘Many things, my friend. Including the fact that we have no monopoly on wisdom and that much of what our doctors teach is simply wrong.’
‘For example?’
‘Well… I do not bleed my patients. It does more harm than good.’
Felix was at once relieved and shocked. Relieved because like most people he dreaded the physician’s scalpel. Shocked because the man was obviously a charlatan! Everybody knew that bleeding was essential to release the foul humours in the blood and speed the patient’s recovery. And yet, Otto had claimed that this man was the best doctor in Nuln and had cured more people than all the other surgeon-barbers put together. Furthermore, Drexler did seem like a profoundly civilised and educated man.
‘Do you think I have the plague?’ Felix asked suddenly, surprised at the fear and anticipation that filled him as he waited for Drexler’s reply.
‘No, Herr Jaeger, I do not. I think you have a slight cold, nothing more. I think most of the people in this city who think they have the plague probably have the same, and I think that the panic such beliefs cause will be more harmful than the plague itself.’
‘You don’t think the plague is real, then?’
‘Oh I certainly believe it’s real. I think many people will die from it, as the summer heat comes on, and more people come in from the country. But I know you do not have it, nor do any of the wealthy people who come to see me. If you did, you would already be dead or dying.’
‘That would make it easy to diagnose,’ Felix said dryly. Drexler laughed again.
‘I will give you and Fraulein Elissa the same herbal pomanders as I gave your brother and his family. The herbs are a protection against plague emanations, and I have cast a few spells on them as well.’
‘You are a magician as well as a doctor, then?’
‘I am a healer, Herr Jaeger, and I use whatever means best help my patients. I dabble in enchantments of a protective sort. I cannot utterly guarantee their effectiveness, you understand, but they should help if you are exposed to the plague.’
‘I thank you for that.’
‘Don’t thank me, Herr Jaeger. Thank your brother, after all he is paying my bill.’
Just as Felix turned to go, he noticed that Drexler was staring at him hard. His face had turned pale and his eyes hard.
‘What is it?’ Felix asked.
‘The… the sword you carry. Would you mind telling me where you got it?’
‘Not at all. It belonged to a friend, a Templar of the Fiery Heart named Aldred. He died and I took it, hoping one day to return it to his order. Why do you ask?’
‘You were a friend of Aldred’s?’
‘We travelled together in the Border Princes. He was on a quest when he died.’
‘I knew Aldred. We were friends for a long time. We studied in the Sigmarite Seminary together. I had not heard word of him in a long time.’
‘Then I am sorry to be the bearer of such bad news to you.’
‘He died well?’
‘He died like a hero.’
‘It is what he would have wanted. I’m sorry to have bothered you with this, Herr Jaeger.’
‘No, I am sorry to be the bearer of such bad tidings.’
‘He seemed like a very nice man,’ Elissa said. ‘And so wise. Very reassuring.’
‘What did you say?’
Felix looked up at her. He was disturbed by the
coincidence that Drexler had known the dead Templar, and he felt vaguely guilty about not having made a greater effort to return the blade. Still, it was a very fine weapon, and it had saved his life on more than one occasion.
‘I said, he was very reassuring.’
‘Very.’ Felix looked at her sourly. She had been singing the doctor’s praises all the way back to the Blind Pig and her hand had never strayed very far from the herbal pomander. Felix wondered if it was possible that he was jealous. He actually agreed with the woman but admitting it was difficult for some reason. Elissa seemed to sense this. She looked up at him and smiled teasingly.
‘Why Felix, are you jealous?’
Why did women seem to have such an uncanny instinct for these things, he wondered – even as he muttered his denials.
Gotrek looked up as they entered the tavern. He held a rolled tube in one massive fist. He tossed it straight at Felix.
‘Catch,’ he said.
Felix snatched the tube out of the air and recognised it at once for what it was. The parchment was of the same crude weave as the earlier message they had received, the one which had warned them of the skaven attack on the College of Engineering. He hastily unrolled it, and was not at all surprised to find that it had been written in the same semi-literate scrawl:
Frends – be warned!! The evil trechrus ratmen of Klan Pestilens do plot to spred playgue in yoor city, may the Horned Rat gnaw there entrails for it. I do not no wher or how they plan to do this. I kan only tell yoo to be ware of the Kaldrun of a thousand poxes.
Yoor frend.
‘It was delivered when you were out,’ Gotrek said.
‘Same messenger?’
‘No, another beggar. Claims it was given to him by a monk.’
‘You believe him?’
‘I saw no reason not to, manling. I got him to show me the place where he had met this monk. It was close to spot where the last message was delivered.’
‘You think we should check out the sewers in that area?’
‘What are you talking about, Felix?’ Elissa asked.
‘Skaven,’ Gotrek said ferociously, and the girl’s face went pale.
‘Not those creatures which attacked the inn the other night?’
‘The same.’
‘What do they have to do with you and Felix?’
‘I do not know, girl. I wish I did. It seems like we have become involved in some feud among them.’
‘I wish you had not told me that.’
‘I wish you had not told her that,’ Felix said.
‘Do you think they will attack the Pig again?’ Elissa asked, glancing at the doors and windows as if she expected an attack at any second.
‘I doubt it,’ Gotrek said. ‘And if they do, we’ll just slaughter them again.’
Elissa sat down in a chair near to the Slayer. He cocked his head to one side and smiled, showing several missing teeth. ‘Do not worry, girl. Nothing will harm you.’
Gotrek was not normally what Felix would consider a reassuring sight, but his words seemed to calm Elissa.
‘Do you think the skaven could have anything to do with this new plague?’ Felix whispered, hoping that no one could overhear him.
‘Our ratty friend would like us to believe this.’
‘Then why hasn’t he told us any more?’
‘Perhaps he does not know any more himself, manling.’
Thanquol stared into his divining crystal. It was no use. He had no luck locating the plague monks and their accursed cauldron, and that in itself was not reassuring. A seer of his prowess, having invoked the proper rituals and made obeisance in the correct way to the Horned Rat, should have been able to detect an artefact of its power easily. Instead he had found no trace of it or its bearers anywhere. It suggested to Thanquol’s keen mind that they were using magic of their own to cover their tracks. He knew that Vilebroth Null was a powerful sorcerer in his own right, and must have invoked spells of bafflement. Further proof of his treachery – as if any were needed!
Of course the traitor would claim that he had used the magic to escape detection by the human authorities, but Thanquol could see through such transparent ruses. He had not been born yesterday. The plague monks were simply trying to keep themselves hidden from their rightful leader until they could implement their plan and claim unwarranted glory.
Thanquol knew he must prevent this eventuality at all costs – as well as enforcing the Council of Thirteen’s edict, of course. He would simply have to find another way of locating his prey. He wondered if the dwarf and his human ally had taken any action yet. Or were they too stupid to do anything without prompting from Thanquol?
Felix hurried through the darkness, his cloak wrapped around him. He stopped to cast a glance over his shoulder and to fumble at the pomander full of herbs at his throat. The smell of some fresh night soil which had been cast from the windows high above assaulted his nostrils. He dreaded putting his foot in it as much as he dreaded stumbling into one of the heaps of rubbish that lay decomposing in the street.
Why were all the houses not connected to the sewers, he wondered? Why did people still insist on dropping their rubbish and filth into the streets? He realised that his long trek through the wilderness with Gotrek had changed him. Until then he had been a lifelong city dweller and would never even have noticed the trash which packed the city streets. He paused for a moment to listen.
Was that the distant echo of footsteps? Was he being followed? He strained his ears for any noise but heard nothing.
He was not reassured by the silence. This was the wealthiest quarter of Nuln, but not even the rich went abroad in the darkness without a full quota of bodyguards. Robbers and footpads were everywhere. It was not just the prospect of normal everyday robbery that bothered Felix. Ever since the night of the skaven attack he had dreaded another ambush by the rat-men assassins. He felt certain that he had survived their last assault by pure luck alone, and he was all too aware how quickly someone’s luck could change.
Still, he felt the potential gravity of the situation warranted risking these benighted streets. He needed help and he knew of only one source that might be able to provide the sort of aid he required. The door he sought was directly ahead of him. Drexler was an expert on diseases and he might be able to tell Felix something useful, if the skaven really were behind the current outbreak of plague. He knew that the man would most likely think him mad, but he was prepared to take that chance. He was out of his depth, dealing with an enemy that could wield noxious plagues the way a man might wield a sword. What he needed was knowledge, and Drexler impressed him as the man who might have it.
He reached up and pulled the handle of the doorbell. He noticed that it was moulded in the shape of a grinning gargoyle’s head. In and of itself this was not unusual, but the appearance was disturbing here and now amid the night and fog. He heard footsteps from within the building and a peephole within the door rattled open. A faint glimmer of light appeared, level with Felix’s eye.
‘Who is it?’ asked a voice. Felix recognised it as belonging to Drexler’s servant.
‘Felix Jaeger. I need to see Doctor Drexler.’
‘Is it an emergency?’
Felix considered for a moment before replying, ‘Yes!’
‘Stand away from the door and be warned. We have firearms within.’
Felix did as he was told. He heard huge bolts being thrown and the barking of very large dogs. It was apparent that the physician took no chances with his own safety, and Felix in no way blamed him for this. Such precautions were only sensible in the great cities of the Empire.
‘Throw back your cowl and stand where I can see you.’
Felix did as he was told and the beam of a lantern was shone full on his face. He saw that the old man had recognised him.
‘Sorry, Herr Jaeger,’ the manservant said. ‘You can’t be too careful these days.’
‘I quite agree,’ Felix said. ‘Now please take me to your master. I have u
rgent business with him.’
Drexler sat by the fire in a huge study. The flicker of the flames underlit his face and made it look vaguely daemonic. He leaned forward with a poker and prodded the glowing coals until they collapsed, then added more from the bucket beside the fireplace. When he looked up, the flames were reflected in his glasses. The effect was eerie.
‘Now, how can I help you, Herr Jaeger?’ he said calmly, then smiled. ‘You do not appear to be ill. Is it the girl?’
Felix glanced around the room. The servant had already retreated, the thick Arabyan rugs absorbing his footsteps. It was an impressive chamber, even larger than his father’s library in Altdorf and with a far greater selection of books. Felix’s keen eyes sought out dark corners as if he half expected to find enemies there, then he turned and looked directly at Drexler.
‘What do you know of the skaven?’ he asked bluntly.
Drexler stiffened for a moment and then carefully placed his poker back in the stand. He took off his glasses, polished them on the cuff of his robe and gave every appearance of serious consideration to Felix’s question.
‘They are a race of rat-men, considered to be extinct by many scholars. Spengler thinks they were a sub-breed of human mutant. Leiber theorised that they might be the product of ancient sorcery. It is said that in ancient times they warred with the dwarfs but...’
‘I know they are not extinct.’
Drexler looked at Felix sharply. ‘You know?’
‘Yes. I have fought with them. They are here. In Nuln.’
Drexler sat back in his chair, placed his spectacles on the bridge of his nose and gripped an arm of the chair with each hand. ‘Please be seated. You interest me.’
Felix allowed himself to slump down in the chair facing Drexler’s. The heat from the fire had warmed one arm of it and made him uncomfortable. He pushed it away from the hearth slightly, before he started to speak. He told Drexler of his time in the sewer watch and their encounter with the rat-men in the tunnels beneath the city. He omitted only the fact that they had broken into the house of Fritz von Halstadt and killed him. He spoke of the skaven attack on the Blind Pig which he presumed was some sort of revenge attempt by the rat-men. He left out any mention that he and Gotrek had also fought with the rat-men within the College of Engineering on the night it had been burned to the ground. Drexler watched him with increasing astonishment. When Felix had finished, he spoke.