by William King
Gotrek fell silent for long moments. “ ’Tis certainly a deed worthy of a Slayer.”
It sounds like absolute madness, Felix thought. Somehow he managed to keep his mouth shut.
“Snorri thinks so too.”
Then Snorri is an even bigger idiot than he appears to be, thought Felix, and the words almost burst forth from his lips.
“Then you will accompany me to the Lonely Tower?” Varek asked.
“For the prospect of such a doom, I would follow you to the mouth of Hell,” Gotrek said.
That’s good, Felix thought, because it sounds like that’s exactly where you’re going. Then he shook his head. The dwarfs madness was beginning to infect him. Was he actually taking all this talk of journeys to the Chaos Wastes seriously? Surely this was just tavern talk and the fit of madness would pass by morning…
“Excellent,” Varek said. “I knew you’d come.”
TWO
MARK OF THE SKAVEN
The bouncing of the wagon did nothing for Felix’s hangover. Every time a wheel hit one of the deep ruts in the road, his stomach gave a troubled lurch and threatened to send its contents arcing out onto the roadside hedges. The inside of his mouth felt furry. Pressure was building up inside his skull like steam within a kettle. Oddest of all, now he had a terrible craving for fried food. Visions of fried eggs and bacon sizzled through his mind. Now he regretted not having taken breakfast earlier with the Trollslayers, but at the time the sight of them throwing back piled plates of ham and egg and chomping on great hunks of black bread had been enough to turn his stomach. But now he was almost prepared to commit murder for the same food.
It was some consolation to him that the Slayers were more or less silent, save for grumbles in dwarfish which he assumed concerned the awfulness of their hangovers or just how plain dreadful human beer was. Only young Varek seemed cheerful and bright-eyed, but then he ought to. Much to the disgust of the other two, he had stopped drinking after three ales, claiming that he had had enough. Now he guided the mules with sure tugs of the reins and whistled a happy tune, oblivious to the dagger-like looks his companions aimed at his back. At that moment, Felix hated him with a passion which could be explained only by the intensity of his hangover.
To distract himself from that, and from thoughts of the awful adventure that was surely to come, Felix gave his attention to their surroundings. It was indeed a beautiful day. The sun was shining brightly. This part of the Empire looked particularly productive and cheerful. Huge half-timbered houses rose from the surrounding hilltops. Thatch-roofed cottages, the homes of the peasant labourers, surrounded them. Big splotch-sided cows grazed in enclosures, bells tinkling cheerfully on their necks. Each bell had a different tone, which Felix deduced was to enable the herdsmen to track each individual cow by sound alone.
Alongside them a peasant drove a gaggle of geese along the dusty track for a while. Later, a pretty peasant girl looked up from the hay she was forking into a stack and gave Felix a dazzling smile. He tried to muster the energy to smile back but couldn’t. He felt like he was a hundred years old. He kept his eyes on her until she disappeared around a bend in the road though.
The wagon hit another rut and bounced higher.
“Watch where you’re going!” Gotrek growled. “Can’t you see Snorri Nosebiter has a hangover?”
“Snorri doesn’t feel too good,” the other Slayer confirmed and gave an awful muffled gurgle. “It must have been that goat and potato stew we had last night. Snorri thinks it tasted a bit off.”
More likely it was the thirty or so jacks of ale you threw back, Felix thought sourly. He almost said this out loud, but even through the misery of his hangover a certain prudent caution stopped him. He had no wish to be cured of his hangover by having his head chopped off. Well, maybe, he thought, as the wagon and his stomach gave another lurch.
Felix gave his attention back to the hard-packed stony earth of the road that jarred and juddered along beneath them, trying to focus his mind on anything except the awful churning in his stomach. He could see the individual rocks jutting out of the ground, any one of which looked like it could break the wagon’s wooden wheels if hit at the wrong angle.
A fly landed softly, ticklingly, on the back of his hand and he swatted at it miserably. It eluded the blow with contemptuous ease and proceeded to buzz around Felix’s head. His initial effort had exhausted him and Felix gave up the attempt to strike the insect, only shaking his head when it came too close to his eyes. He closed his eyes and focused his willpower on the creature, urging it to die, but it refused to oblige. There were occasionally times when Felix wished that he was a sorcerer and this was one of them. He bet that they didn’t have to put up with hangovers and the disturbances created by fat-bodied buzzing flies.
Suddenly it got darker and slightly cooler on his face, and he looked up to see that they were passing through a copse of trees which had overgrown the road. He glanced around quickly—more from habit than fear—because these were the sort of woods that bandits liked to frequent, and bandits were not uncommon in the Empire. He wasn’t sure what sort of fools would attack a wagon which contained two hungover Trollslayers, but you could never tell. Stranger things had happened to him on his travels. Maybe those mercenaries from the night before would come back seeking revenge. And there were always beastmen and mutants to be found in these dark times. In his time Felix had encountered enough of them to be something of an expert on that subject.
To tell the truth, Felix thought, he would almost welcome taking an axe blow from a beastman the way he felt right now. At least it would put him out of his misery. It was strange, though, how his eyes were playing tricks. He was almost sure he could see something small and pink-eyed skulking amongst the undergrowth a little way back from the track. It was only there for a second and then it was gone. Felix almost called Gotrek’s attention to it but decided against doing so, because interrupting the Slayer’s recovery from a hangover was never a good idea.
And it really probably was nothing after all, just some small furry animal scuttling for safety as travellers moved by on the road. Still, there was something familiar about the shape of the head that nagged at Felix’s numb brain. He couldn’t quite place it just yet but if he thought about it long enough he was sure it would come back to him. Another great lurch by the cart almost threw him off. He fought to keep last night’s goat and potato stew within his stomach. It was a long fight and he only won it when the stew had battled halfway up his throat.
“Where are we heading?” he asked Varek to distract himself from his misery. Not for the first time he swore that he would never touch another drop of beer. It sometimes seemed that most of the troubles in his life had somehow begun in taverns. It was amazing, really, that he had not had the sense to realise this before.
The Lonely Tower,” Varek said cheerfully. Felix fought down the urge to punch him, more because he couldn’t summon the energy to do it, than from any other reason.
“Sounds… interesting,” Felix managed to say eventually. What it really sounded was ominous, like so many other places he had visited in his sorry career as the Slayer’s henchman. Any place called the Lonely Tower to be found anywhere in the Empire was most likely to be the sort of place no one in their right mind would visit. Fortifications in the middle of nowhere had a habit of being overwhelmed by ores, goblins and other worse things.
“Oh, it’s an interesting place all right. Built on top of an old coal mine. Uncle Borek took it over and renovated it. Good sound dwarfish workmanship. Looks like new. Better in fact, because the original work, human,—no offence—was a bit slipshod. It was abandoned for several hundred years till we came along, except for the skaven. Of course, we had to clear them out first, and there might still be a few lurking down in the mine.”
“Good,” Gotrek grunted. “Can’t beat a spot of skaven-slaughtering for sport. Clears up a hangover better than pint of Bugman’s.”
Personally Felix could think of dozens more appealing
ways of spending the time than hunting for vicious rat-like monsters in an abandoned and doubtless unsafe mine but he did not communicate this information to Gotrek.
Varek looked back over his shoulder to where his passengers huddled alongside their gear. They must have made a pitiful sight, for Snorri wasn’t any better equipped than Gotrek or Felix. His pack was as empty as a sailor’s purse after a spree in port. He didn’t appear to own a cloak or even a blanket. Felix was glad that he had his red Sudenland wool cloak to huddle under. He did not doubt that the nights would get pretty cold. He did not look forward to the prospect of a night on cold ground.
“How long till we get there?” he asked.
“We’re making good time. If we take the short path through the Bone Hills, we’ll be there in two, three days at most.”
“I’ve heard bad things about the Bone Hills,” Felix said. It was true. Then again, there were few places beyond the cities and towns of the Empire that he had not heard bad things about. At once Gotrek and Snorri looked up, interest written all over their faces. It never ceased to amaze Felix that the worse things sounded, the happier a Slayer looked.
“The skaven from the mine used to haunt them, and attack travellers. They’d come down and raid the farms as well. Nothing to worry about now though. We’ve seen them off,” Varek said. “Snorri and I came all the way down here in the cart by ourselves, never sniffed a hint of trouble.”
The two Slayers slumped back into apathetic contemplation of their hangovers. Somehow Felix was not reassured. In his experience, trips through the wilderness never went smoothly. And something about the mere mention of skaven caused that rat-like shape he had noticed back in the wood to begin niggling worryingly at the back of his mind.
“You came all the way here yourselves?” Felix asked.
“Snorri was with me.”
“Are you armed?” Felix asked, making sure that his own longsword was within easy reach.
“I have my knife.”
You have your knife! Oh good! I’m sure that will be very useful if skaven attack you.”
“Never saw any skaven. Just heard a little scuttling some nights. Whatever it was, I think Snorri’s snoring scared it away. Anyway, if something attacked I have my bombs.”
“Bombs?”
Varek fumbled inside his robe and produced a smooth black sphere. A strange metal device appeared to have been glued to the top. He handed it to Felix who inspected it closely. It looked like if you pulled the clip on top, it would come free.
“Be careful with that,” Varek said. “It’s a detonator. You pull that, it tugs the flint striker which lights the fuse which sets off the explosive. You’ve got about four heartbeats to throw it, then—boom!”
Felix looked at it warily, half-expecting the thing to explode in his hand.
“Boom?”
“It explodes. Shrapnel everywhere. That’s assuming the fuse fires. It sometimes doesn’t. About half the time, actually, but it’s very ingenious. And of course, very, very occasionally they go off for no reason at all. Almost never happens. Mind you, Blorri lost a hand that way. Had to have it replaced with a hook.”
Felix swiftly handed the bomb back to Varek who tucked it back inside the pocket of his robes. He was beginning to think this mild-mannered young dwarf was crazier than he looked. Perhaps all dwarfs were.
“Makaisson made it, you know. He’s good at that sort of thing.”
“Makaisson. Malakai Makaisson?” Gotrek asked. That maniac!”
Felix looked at the Slayer in open-mouthed astonishment. He wasn’t sure he wanted to meet this Makaisson. Anyone who Gotrek could describe as a maniac must be crazed indeed. Could probably win prizes for their madness, in fact. Gotrek caught Felix’s look.
“Makaisson believes in heavier-than-air flight. Thinks he can make things fly.”
“Gyrocopters fly,” Snorri piped in. “Snorri been up in one. Fell out. Landed on head. No damage.”
“Not gyrocopters. Big things! And he builds ships! Ships! That’s an unnatural interest for a dwarf. I hate ships almost as much as I hate elves!”
“He built the biggest steamship ever,” Varek said conversationally. The Unsinkable. Was two hundred paces long. Weighed five hundred tons. It had steam-powered gatling turrets. It had a crew of over three hundred dwarfs and thirty engineers. It could sail at three leagues an hour. Such an impressive sight it was, with its paddles churning the sea to foam and its pennons flying in the breeze.”
It certainly sounded impressive, Felix thought, suddenly realising how far the dwarfs had taken this strange magic they called “engineering'. Like everybody else in the Empire, Felix knew about steam-tanks, the armoured vehicles which were the spearhead of the realm’s mighty armies. This thing sounded like it made the steam-tank look like a child’s toy. Still, if it was so impressive, he wondered, why had he never heard of it?
“What happened to the Unsinkable? Where is it now?”
There was a brief embarrassed silence from the dwarfs.
“Err… it sank,” Varek said eventually.
“Hit a rock on its first trip out,” Snorri added.
“Some people claim the boiler exploded,” Varek said.
“Lost with all hands,” Snorri added with the almost happy expression with which dwarfs always seemed to confront the worst news.
“Except Makaisson. He was picked up later by human ship. He was thrown clear by the explosion and clung to a wooden spar.”
“Then he built a flying ship,” Gotrek said, savage irony evident in his voice.
“That’s right. Makaisson built a flying ship,” Snorri said.
“The Indestructible,” Varek said.
Felix tried to imagine a ship flying. In the abstract he could manage it. In his mind’s eye, he saw something like the old river barges on the Reik, their sails filled, their sweeps tugging. It was powerful sorcery indeed that could do that.
“Amazing thing it was,” Varek said. “Big as a sailing ship. Wrought iron cupola. Fuselage almost hundred paces long. It could fly at ten leagues an hour—with the wind behind it, of course.”
“What happened to it?” Felix asked, a sinking feeling hinting that he already knew the answer.
“It crashed,” Snorri said.
“Crosswinds and some liftgas leaks,” Varek said. “Big explosion.”
“Killed everybody aboard.”
“Except Makaisson,” Varek said, as if this made a big difference. He seemed to think this was an important point. “He was thrown clear and landed in some treetops. They broke his fall along with both his legs. Had to use crutches for the next two years. Anyway, the Indestructible had a few teething problems. What do you expect? It was the first of its kind. But Makaisson has sorted them now.”
“Teething problems?” Gotrek said. Twenty good dwarf engineers killed, including Under-Guildmaster Ulli and you call that ‘teething problems’? Makaisson should have shaved his head.”
“He did,” Varek said. “After he was drummed out of the guild. He couldn’t face the shame, you know. They did the Trouser Legs Ritual to him. Pity. My uncle says he’s the best engineer who ever lived. He says Makaisson is a genius.”
“A genius at getting other dwarfs killed.”
Felix was thinking about what Gotrek had said about Makaisson shaving his head. “Do you mean Makaisson became a Trollslayer?” he asked Varek.
“Yes. Of course. He still does engineering work though. Says he’ll prove his theories work or die trying.”
“I’ll bet he will,” Gotrek muttered darkly.
Felix wasn’t listening. He was wrestling with another, far more troubling concept. Counting Gotrek and Snorri, that would make three Trollslayers in one place. What was Varek’s uncle up to? A mission which required three Slayers didn’t sound good. In fart, it sounded positively suicidal. Suddenly something that Varek had said earlier came sharply into focus in Felix’s mind, cutting through even the awful fog of his hangover.
“You
said earlier you heard scuttling,” Felix said, thinking of the small shape he had seen in the undergrowth. He was starting to have an awful suspicion about that. “On your way to meet Gotrek and myself.”
Varek nodded. “Only at night, when we made camp.”
“You’ve no idea what made the scuttling?”
“No. A fox, maybe.”
“Foxes don’t scuttle.”
“A big rat.”
“A big rat…” Felix nodded his head. That was exactly what he hadn’t wanted to hear. He looked over at Gotrek to see if the Slayer was thinking what he was thinking, but the dwarf had his head thrown back and was staring blankly into space. He appeared to be lost in his own thoughts and was paying not the slightest bit of attention to the conversation.
Rats made Felix think of only one thing, and that thing scared him. They made him think of skaven. Could it be possible that the foul rat-men had tracked him even here? It was not a comforting thought.
Felix sat beside the fire and listened to the tremulous whickering of the mules. The darkness and the occasional distant howls of the wolves made them nervous. Felix rose and ran his hand over the nearest one’s flanks in an effort to calm it and then returned to the fire where the others were sleeping.
All day the track had risen into the Bone Hills, which had turned out to be as bleak and unprepossessing as their name suggested. There were no trees around them, only lichen covered rocks and sharp hills covered by short stunted grass. It was fortunate that Varek had thought touring firewood with them or they would have spent an even more uncomfortable night camped out. It was cold in the hills, despite the summer heat of the day.
Supper had consisted of some bread bought at the inn back in Guntersbad and hunks of hard dwarf cheese. Afterwards, they had sat round the fire and all three dwarfs had lit their pipes. For entertainment they had the distant howling of the wolves. Felix found this marginally less depressing than dwarfish conversation which always seemed to rotate around ancient grudges, tales of misery long endured and epic drinking bouts. And horrifying as the howling was, it at least drowned out the sound of dwarfish snoring. Felix had drawn the short straw and won the dubious privilege of taking the first watch.