by Warhammer
‘Back to the boats!’ snapped Max, and he motioned for two of the stronger Reiksguarders to take Claudia from Felix as he and Gotrek and the rest of the party raced towards the shore.
It was difficult to see for more than ten paces in the freezing torrent and the gathering dark. Even so, all could see the flickering glow that silhouetted the last dune before the beach, and they hurried up the shifting sandy slope with anxious speed.
Felix was one of the first to the top, just behind Aethenir’s elves, and he looked towards the source of the light. Out on the sea, the Pride of Skintstaad was a roaring pyre of sallow green flames – too far gone to even think of trying to save it.
The others joined him on the crest, Max, Claudia and the men gasping and wheezing from their run. Gotrek just stared, the green fire reflected in his single eye.
Claudia choked and wept. ‘No! Why didn’t I see it sooner?’
Felix was wondering the same thing.
Max pointed down to the beach. ‘To our boats. We must go help the survivors.’
Felix and the others nodded and started trotting quickly down to the boats, calling for the sailors to take up their oars, but though the boats were there, the men who had rowed them ashore were nowhere to be seen.
‘Where in Sigmar’s name have they run off to?’ growled Reikscaptain Oberhoff.
Then one of his Reiksguard pointed to the water. ‘Look!’ he said. ‘The crew! They’re swimming ashore!’
Felix looked where he pointed. It was hard to see through the rain, but he could make out the lumpy shapes of heads bobbing in the water, moving closer to the beach. Some of them were crawling through the surf.
‘Praise Manann,’ said one of the other Reiksguard.
But Felix frowned. Had there been so many crewmen? He only remembered a score at the most. There seemed to be twice that many heads in the water. ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Aren’t there too many?’
The others looked again, blinking in the downpour.
Aethenir stepped back. ‘Those aren’t men,’ he said. ‘They are…’
With a feral hiss, the first wave of swimmers rose from the breaking waves and ran at the party on the beach – dark, crouching forms with water dripping from their piecemeal armour and their matted fur. Dagger teeth flashed bone-white in the gloom. Red eyes glowed. Rust-grimed spearheads glinted green in the light of the burning ship.
‘Skaven!’ roared Gotrek. He charged into the surf, drawing his axe from his back and sweeping it around him savagely. Skaven heads and limbs and tails spun away from skaven bodies to splash in the water.
The men and elves did not follow the Slayer‘s example. They fell back, shouting and drawing swords as dozens of the horrible creatures rose from the sea and scrabbled towards them, swinging wide around Gotrek and up the beach like a black tide. Felix backed off and fought alongside the others, separated from the Slayer by the seething wall of fur, filth and fangs. Spearheads flashed out of the glistening gloom, invisible until almost too late. Felix parried desperately, and slashed back, but it was like striking at shadows. A hoarse cry of pain came from his left – a curse from his right.
Felix was having a hard time getting his bearings as he fell in with the Reiksguard. Why skaven? Why now? What did they want? And where had they come from?
Then, with a shout of strange words, Max thrust up a hand and a ball of brilliant white light crackled into existence above his head. The skaven cringed back in the harsh illumination, chittering fearfully.
The Reiksguarders, hardened veterans of the recent Chaos invasion, did not flinch from this magic, nor did the elves. The Reiksguard fell in shoulder to shoulder, their swords and shields working in unison, while beside them, the elves attacked in a spinning, whirling fury, their long blades chopping through spears and furred limbs with equal ease as further spells from Max’s hands shot past them and blasted the ranks of skaven with orbs of scintillating light that made them shriek and fall and writhe on the ground. But though the glowing ball made the vermin easier to see and kill, it also showed just how many there were. Felix’s heart thudded as he looked out over the milling carpet of ratmen that covered the beach, while still more rose from the waves. There seemed no end to them.
The harsh light illuminated all their most hideous attributes – the patchy, scrofulous fur, the pustule-plagued snouts, the soulless black-marble eyes, the horrible, hissing mouths, the revolting trophies that dangled from their necks and belts. Nausea constricted his throat as he slashed viciously at them, all his disgust and fear of the vile creatures turning into a seething rage. His first stroke opened a ratman’s stomach in a spray of blood and viscera, then he removed another’s arm on the back swing. He buried the blade in the skull of a third, kicked it free and spun to face more.
On the far side of the skaven, Gotrek was doing the same, or trying to. The Slayer was as angry as Felix had ever seen him, for though he was surrounded by foes, he had no one to fight. The skaven scampered away from him like – well, like rats – and on his short legs he could not close with them. ‘Stand and fight, vermin!’ he raged as he ran backwards and forwards in the centre of an empty circle of sand.
Felix quickly found himself having the same problem. The skaven were staying behind their spears, prodding at him from a distance, but making no attempt to kill him. He lunged at a cluster of them, but they only parted before him, like water around a stone. He could not understand the behaviour. Skaven either fought with maddened fury or fled. There had never in his experience been anything in between.
Roaring with frustration, Gotrek gave up trying to close with passing ratmen and charged the back of the skaven line, cutting a hole through it with his axe. He only killed a few, for, as before, they jumped out of his way. The Slayer halted beside Felix, shaking his axe, his crest hanging limp from the pelting rain as he bellowed at their foes. ‘Craven ratkin! Give me a proper fight!’
But they did not. The skaven continued to shy away from them. Gotrek and Felix had almost no enemies facing them at their portion of the line.
The Reiksguarders and the high elves were not so fortunate. The swordsman beside Felix crumpled, impaled by a spear, and another lay face-down on the sand. One of the high elves was stepping back behind his comrades, his left leg a bloody ruin. Though the men and the elves seemed to be killing ten skaven for every one that fell on their side, there were so many of the beasts that it didn’t matter. The sheer mass of the vermin pressed the whole party back towards the dunes, step by inexorable step, and threatened to encircle it as well.
Behind the thin line of Reiksguard and elf warriors, Max wove trails of light in the air that expanded into a shimmering bubble of energy that encircled himself, Claudia and Aethenir. Within the circle, Aethenir motioned the wounded elf into the bubble and began making gestures in the air over his leg, while Claudia, looking terrified but determined, mouthed a spell and let loose a blast of lightning from her hands that caused the skaven front line to twitch and fall. So the girl had a use after all, thought Felix, uncharitably.
Just as he thought it, Claudia screamed. He looked back again. Gotrek did too. Bursting from the sawgrass at the base of the dune to their rear were black shadows, throwing metal stars and glass globes. Men and elves alike cried out as the stars bit into their limbs and torsos.
An elf warrior instinctively knocked a globe out of the air with his sword and it shattered. He and another elf went down as if shot, as green mist blossomed from the glass ball and enveloped them. The skaven hacked them savagely as they fell. Captain Rion and the other elves dodged back and covered their noses and mouths. The mist drifted into the skaven ranks and half a dozen collapsed. Two of the globes landed with a soft thud on the wet sand at Felix’s feet. He picked them up in one hand and hurled them towards the sea. They left a faint familiar odour on his fingers.
Gotrek snarled and ran at the star-hurling shadows.
‘Protect the wizards,’ cried Felix to the swordsmen, then raced after the Slayer.
But just as they were about to close with the murky shapes, a deep bellow rose above the noise of the rain. Gotrek stopped in his tracks and looked around. A massive black-furred, rat-headed creature, nearly twice Felix’s height and thick with mutated muscle, was bounding down the dune towards Max, Aethenir and Claudia. Max spun and shot a blast of light at it. The creature howled but did not slow. Claudia sent a bolt of lightning at it. It hardly seemed to notice.
The wounded high elf pushed away from Aethenir’s ministrations and limped to intercept it, his teeth clenched but his sword at the ready. Captain Rion and the other elf warriors looked back, but they were engaged with the skaven front line and could not break away.
Gotrek sprinted to get between the wounded elf and the rat ogre, his one eye blazing. ‘Mine, you chalk-faced thief!’ he roared. ‘Leave off!’
Felix ran behind the Slayer, but suddenly, with a jerk at his chest, he wasn’t running any more. He was flat on his back.
He looked down at himself. There was a noose of thin grey cord wrapped around his chest. His heart thudded with sudden recognition, even as he picked himself up and turned to look where the noose led. The attack in Altdorf! It had been the skaven! And the attack in Marienburg as well! The globes smelled the same as the gas that had knocked out everyone at the Three Bells! But why did the skaven want to capture them?
‘Loose me, you damned rope twirlers!’ bawled Gotrek beside him.
Felix chopped through the line with his sword and turned to see that the Slayer was similarly infested with nooses. One was around his neck, another looped around his left wrist and another around his right ankle. They did not stop him by any means, but they did slow him, and the wounded elf reached the rat ogre first, his shining blade parrying the monster’s massive claws with a deafening clang.
Enraged, Gotrek gathered up all the ropes that held him in one hand and pulled savagely. Black-clad skaven stumbled out of the shadows at the end of the ropes. Gotrek roared and charged them – then vanished into a pit that opened up in the sand below his feet.
Felix stared. One moment, the Slayer had been running full tilt, axe raised, the next moment he was gone, to be replaced by a dark hole in the ground with wet sand trickling down into it.
‘Gotrek!’ Felix ran to the edge of the hole and nearly fell in himself as the edge crumbled and fell down on the Slayer below. Gotrek clawed at the sides of the pit, half-buried in wet sand, as he tried to climb out, but the sand broke apart under his fingers and he sank back.
‘Hang on, Gotrek!’ cried Felix. ‘I’ll get you out!’
Just then a chittering from beyond the hole brought his head up. The black-clad skaven were running at him, holding what looked like a big leather bag. Felix grabbed the rope that was wrapped around Gotrek’s wrist and hauled on it one-handed while lashing out at the skaven with his blade, but the Slayer was too heavy and the sand too loose. The skaven danced back out of reach, then darted in at his back and cut the cord.
He fell back as the cord snapped, then rolled to his feet, on guard, panic rising in his chest. There was no pulling Gotrek out. Not with the skaven ambushers trying to stuff him in a sack. And with the Slayer out of the fight the vermin might win, and he and Felix would be taken prisoner. He shivered at the thought. That was an unthinkable outcome. He had to get Gotrek out, but how?
Then he saw the way. Unfortunately, it meant putting himself in the path of a marauding monster. Felix hacked around at the assassins, fanning them back, then raced through the rain towards the wounded elf and the rat ogre. The skaven scampered after him. To one side, the remaining Reiksguard and elf warriors had surrounded Max, Claudia and Aethenir, and were fighting desperately to keep the skaven horde from breaking through their circle.
Felix ran past them and hacked into the side of the massive rat beast as it swung again at the elf. It roared and turned to him, and the elf staggered back in relief. He was in bad shape, barely able to move on his maimed leg, and three fingers of his left hand were missing.
‘Fall back!’ Felix shouted, taking a step back and slashing at the assassins behind him. ‘Let me lead it away!’
The high elf nodded and stumbled aside as Felix waved his sword in the brute’s face. It bellowed and lumbered forwards, swiping at him with its massive claws. Felix ducked, then turned and ran, hacking down two of the bag-wielding skaven who were creeping up behind him, and looking back to be sure the thing was following. It was – too fast! Felix sprang ahead as the monster’s fists pounded the sand just inches from his heels, almost jarring him off his feet. The assassins scampered out of its path.
As he reached the hole, Felix bent down and scooped up another of Gotrek’s noose ropes, then dived forwards as the rat ogre’s claws whooshed over his head. He rolled to his feet and faced the towering rat ogre. It raised its arms and charged. Felix dodged aside, holding the rope and swiping at the ambushers, who were scurrying around the outskirts of the fight, still trying to put him in the bag. The beast stumbled into the rope. Felix quickly ran behind it, wrapping the cord around its legs, then got in front of it again, jerking the cord tight.
‘Come on, you overgrown sewer rat!’ he shouted, waving his sword. ‘Come and die!’
The monster obliged, striding forwards with a savage bellow as Felix dodged back. The rope around the rat ogre’s waist pulled taut behind him, and with an explosion of sand, Gotrek was dragged from the hole – by the neck!
Felix gaped, and nearly had his head taken off. He’d grabbed the wrong rope! Sigmar, had he strangled the Slayer?
Felix ducked to the side, forcing the rat ogre to stop and change direction. Its tail of rope went slack, and to Felix’s great relief, he saw Gotrek stagger to his feet, cursing and clawing at the noose that had cinched his beard to his neck.
The giant beast swung its claws again. Felix dodged back, then darted in under its massive arm and stabbed it between the ribs. The point sank deep. The thing roared and twisted, wrenching the sword from Felix’s hands and clubbing him to the sand with a flailing elbow.
It raised its fists over its head to deliver the death blow. Felix crabbed feebly backwards, weaponless and stunned, knowing he was dead. But suddenly the rat ogre was toppling sideways as its right leg fell away from its body in a shower of blood. It crashed down onto its back, thrashing and screaming. Gotrek stood behind it, his axe dripping gore. He raised his axe high, then chopped down through the beast’s bony skull with a sickening crunch. The muscle-bloated body went slack and Felix breathed a sigh of relief.
Gotrek levered his axe out of the rat ogre’s skull and ran at the skaven assassins, who were creeping in again. ‘You’ve got a funny sense of humour, manling.’
‘I grabbed the wrong rope!’ said Felix, staggering up and joining. ‘I didn’t mean to.’
It seemed, however, that the assassins had had enough. They scattered before Gotrek and Felix like cockroaches, whistling shrilly as they ran.
The whistle appeared to be a signal, for the mob of skaven that were still pressing the Reiksguard swordsmen and Aethenir’s retinue broke away from the battle and raced back towards the shore. The men and elves chased them, but the ratmen dived into the waves and swam strongly out to sea, their long snouts making streaming bow waves in the black water.
Felix stared after them as he and Gotrek strode down to the surf. ‘Where are they going?’ he asked. ‘Do they have a ship?’
Gotrek shrugged. There was no ship to be seen except the Pride of Skintstaad, now burnt to the waterline and sinking fast. ‘I hope they drown.’
Felix said a silent prayer for Captain Breda and his crew as he took a final look at the dying ship and turned back and surveyed the aftermath of the battle. Skaven bodies littered the beach, misshapen lumps of fur surrounded by clotted red sand. There were too many men and elves lying among the horrors, however. Two of the high elves were dead, gutted while knocked out by the skaven’s sleep gas. Four of the Reikland swordsmen were dead as well, impaled by skaven spears, and
a fifth was dying, a river of blood pouring from a deep gash on his inner thigh. Captain Oberhoff and two others were all that were left, and even they bled from numerous wounds. They knelt by the dying man, holding his hands and speaking comforting words to him as his face drained white and his head began to nod. Captain Rion prayed over the two elves that had fallen.
Max, Claudia and Aethenir were untouched. Their guards had done their job, and had paid for it. Aethenir cast spells of healing on the wounded elves, and Max waited for the Reiksguarders to finish saying goodbye to their companion so that he could do the same to them. Claudia knelt on the wet sand, soaked to the bone, staring around at all the carnage, blank with shock. Felix almost asked her how she was enjoying her freedom, but decided that was too cruel and held his tongue.
Max eyed Gotrek and Felix as they neared. ‘They were after you,’ he said, bitterly. ‘I should have remembered that you two always bring trouble with you.’
Felix shook his head. ‘I don’t understand it. What do they want with us? We’ve fought them before, but that was twenty years ago. These can’t possibly be the same ones, can they?’
Max shrugged. ‘Nonetheless, they want you, and they want you alive. You were the only ones they didn’t try to kill. I only hope they don’t come for you again until we have parted company.’
Felix nodded, fighting down a wave of guilt. Max was right. The skaven attacks had hurt everyone but their intended targets. He was about to tell Max about the attacks in Altdorf and Marienburg, when a glint of red and blue on the chest of one of the skaven assassins caught Felix’s attention. It seemed out of place amidst the rest of the ratman’s filthy possessions.
He stepped closer and toed aside the vermin’s ragged black garment. Threaded onto a dirty string around its neck was a collection of odd trinkets – bones, coins, a human ear, bits of amber and tin, and, in the middle of this trash, a gaudy gold ring, set with sapphires surrounding the letter ‘J’ picked out in rubies.