by ich du
The passage ended fifty paces later in a doorway through which shone the red glow of the main cavern. Reiner and the others eased forward to peer through. The doorway came out just behind the two massive furnaces. The slaves that fed the fires and their overseers were less than three long strides from the door. Reiner could have spat on them. Instead, he looked toward the mine-head, just beyond the furnaces to the right. It was close. A short sprint and they would be within its shadow and away, but that sprint was fraught with dangers.
At least a dozen Kurgan guards stood between them and the mine head, and there were a hundred within easy call. Reiner frowned. If only there was some way to distract them, to draw the attention of the entire room for the few seconds they needed to dart through unnoticed.
And just as he thought it, a great, almost musical, crash sounded through the cavern. Every head looked up, Kurgan and slave alike. The crash came again. Reiner craned his neck and saw to the left, a Kurgan beating a cracked gong, hung from a rope, as out of the wide door that led from the sleeping quarters came a procession of slaves staggering under the weight of huge steaming cauldrons they carried on long poles.
The overseers barked orders to their work parties and motioned them toward the centre of the cavern where the kitchen slaves were setting the cauldrons. There was no need for orders. The slaves downed tools and flocked toward the stew pots like wolves running down a deer, licking their lips and fighting each other to be first in line.
Pavel turned away, shuddering.
'Don't blame them, lad,' said Reiner. 'Blame the fiends who drove them to it. Now pull yourselves together. We daren't miss this chance.'
The furnaces were deserted. Reiner and the rest darted around the right hand one, taking cover behind its great bulk. They were instantly drenched in sweat from the heat that radiated from it. To their left the cave wall narrowed to the blackness of the mine-head. They crept along it, crouching low.
Halfway to the hole they ran out of cover. They would have to make the last thirty feet out in the open. Reiner stood on his toes to see where the Kurgan were. All of them seemed fully occupied at the stew pots, the overseers reaching in and stealing the choicer bits of flesh from the slaves. He turned to the men.
'Ready, lads?'
Everyone except Oskar nodded.
'Keep him pointed in the right direction.' Reiner said to Gustaf, then took one last look toward the centre of the cave. 'Right,' he said. 'Run.'
The men ran fast and low, Gustaf holding Oskar down by the scruff of the neck. The run lasted only a few seconds, but it seemed an eternity to Reiner, who swore he could feel the eyes of every Kurgan in the cave turning towards him. But as they sprinted into the black mouth of the mine no shouts echoed down the cave, no gongs crashed, no arrows rattled off the rocks around them. They reined to a stop twenty paces into the shadow and looked back. No one was coming after them.
'We make it, hey?' said Giano, smiling.
'Aye.' said Pavel dryly. 'The first step in a thousand-league journey.'
'Less of that, pikeman!' growled Reiner, unconsciously mimicking Veirt. 'Now come on. I want to be well away from here.'
'As do I.' said Hals.
They started down the long dark passage, not yet sure enough of their surroundings to light torches. Behind him, Reiner could hear Oskar whimper as the blackness closed in completely around them.
TWELVE
There Is No Good Decision Here
AFTER A HALF hour of utter darkness and silence it seemed safe to light torches, and all breathed sighs of relief. All except Oskar. The soothing effects of Gustaf's draught were wearing off and he began to look around uneasily and mutter about, 'The weight. The stone. There is no air.'
'Why ever did you decide to become a soldier, gunner?' grumbled Hals. 'Is there nothing you ain't afraid of?'
'I never meant to be a soldier,' murmured Oskar, slurring a little. 'I was m'lord Gottenstet's secretary. I wrote his correspondence for him. Read it too. Illiterate, the old fool. But one day...' he sighed and stopped.
The others waited for him to continue, but he seemed to have forgotten he was talking.
'One day, what?' asked Pavel, annoyed.
'Eh?' said Oskar. 'Oh... yes. Well, one day I was with m'lord as he was surveying some land he owned. He wanted to build a, a hunting lodge I think it was. And while the surveyor was using his plumb line and his measuring sticks to calculate distances and heights, I was guessing, and coming right almost to the foot. I picked out far away things that the surveyor needed his spyglass to make out. "Sigmar's lightning, lad," says Gottenstet. "Y've the making of a fine mortar man." And nothing would do but he must send me to the Artillery School at Nuln. Me! A scholar! I tried to tell him that though my eyes might be strong, my insides were weak, but he would have none of it.' He shrugged. 'Of course I didn't help matters by coming out top of my class. I liked the work: making the sightings, calling out the degrees, but on the field...' He shivered and hugged his shoulders. 'Did you ever see the fire from the sky? The thing with the mouths.' He looked around him suddenly as if waking up, his eyes widening as he took in the close stone walls, the low ceiling. 'The weight,' he murmured. 'Sigmar, save us, the weight. Can't breathe.'
Reiner grimaced, uncomfortable. 'Gustaf, give him another sip, will you?'
THE CORRIDOR SANK deeper and deeper into the mountains. Occasionally corridors branched off to the left and right, iron rails gleaming away into the shadows. Some were barricaded off and the party could see evidence of cave-ins behind them, but there was no confusion on which way to go. The deep tracks of the cannon's wheels always pointed the way.
A while later the iron rails began to sing, and soon after came a metallic rumbling. The company doused their torches and ducked into a side tunnel. After a moment a train of carts rolled by, full of ore, each pushed by a team of shackled slaves, their eyes dull. A Kurgan overseer reclined in the first cart, a lantern at his side.
Franz cursed under his breath once they'd passed. 'So many of them, and one of him. Couldn't they strangle him? Dump him down a shaft?'
'And then?' asked Reiner.
The boy grunted with frustration, but couldn't answer.
As the train's rumble faded, it revealed nearer sounds: the thud and chunk of picks biting into rock, the crack of whips, the barking of hounds. They stepped back into the main corridor and looked forward. A faint light picked out distant sections of wall, the glint of rails.
Reiner looked at the cannon's wheel tracks, running straight ahead and sighed. 'It looks as if the warband marched beyond the work party. We will have to take side corridors around them and hope we can find the tracks on the other side. Keep the torches dark. We'll travel by the lantern only.'
They continued forward in the main tunnel until the reflected light became bright enough for them to be able to see each other's faces, then began hunting for cross corridors. The sounds of mining came mostly from the left of the main tunnel, so they edged right, taking thinner tunnels and winding crawl-ways.
After a time they found a promising corridor that paralleled the main corridor. It was nearly as wide and had rails running down the centre. These seemed both newer and cruder than the rails they had followed from the ironworks. The sounds of mining reached them only as echoes here, and came more from their left than from in front of them. Reiner began to feel almost hopeful. As long as they could find a way back to the main tunnel from here, there was a good chance they would pass the work party without incident.
But just as he thought it, the rails began to ring and rattle. There were carts coming. Reiner groaned. 'Speak of evil...'
There was a small side tunnel up ahead. Reiner pointed to it. 'In there. It has no rails.' They hurried into it. It ended after thirty paces in a round, dug-out area with no other exit - a dead end.
'Right,' said Reiner. 'We'll wait here until they pass.'
The echoing rumble of wheels grew suddenly louder, and the torch glow much brighter, as if the a
pproaching carts had turned a corner. The men faced back to the wide corridor, hands on their weapons. Giano shuttered his lantern and hid it behind him. As they watched, a procession of four heavily loaded carts passed by their hiding place. A Kurgan guard followed the carts, torch in one hand and a huge hound on a leash snuffling along at his side.
The Kurgan walked on, kicking pebbles, but the hound stopped, sniffing at the mouth of the tunnel. The Kurgan tugged on his leash, but the hound refused to move.
Reiner's shoulders tensed. 'Go,' he whispered under his breath. 'Go. Go!'
The Kurgan stopped and cursed the hound, jerking its leash. The hound snarled at him, then began barking down the corridor.
'Sigmar curse you, heathen,' muttered Hals. 'Beat that cur. Make him heel.'
But the Kurgan had decided that the hound was on to something and came forward warily, the hound still barking and straining at his leash.
Reiner and the rest backed out of sight into the round chamber. 'Better kill 'em quick,' whispered Reiner, drawing his sword. 'But no guns, or they'll all be down on us.'
The others armed themselves.
'We should draw 'em in,' said Hals. 'Get 'em from all sides.'
'Good idea,' said Reiner. 'Franz, you're the bait.'
'What?' said Franz, confused.
Reiner shoved the boy hard between the shoulder blades. He stumbled out of cover and froze like a rabbit, staring up the tunnel at the advancing Kurgan in wide-eyed terror. The Kurgan roared a challenge and ran forward, dropping the hound's leash and drawing a hand axe.
The hound bounded forward, baying savagely. Franz scurried for the back wall. 'You bastard!' he shrieked at Reiner. 'You dirty bastard!'
Pavel stuck his spear out across the opening at ankle height as the Kurgan and the hound charged in. The beast leapt it easily, but the norther fell flat on his face and Hals, Giano and Reiner stuck him with their spears and swords. Ulf swung his maul at the hound and knocked it sideways as it lunged at Franz.
The monster landed, snarling, and spun to meet this new threat. Ulf raised his hammer as it leapt, and jammed the haft between its gaping jaws, stopping its fangs from reaching his neck, but the beast was so massive it knocked the big man flat and began raking at him with its claws.
The Kurgan surged up, screaming fury and bleeding from three grievous wounds. Reiner was afraid they had another iron-skinned berserker on their hands, but fortunately, though as big as a bull, the guard was no chosen champion, only a ranker, stuck in the mines guarding slaves while others won glory on the fields of honour. Reiner chopped halfway through his windpipe and he died on his knees, breathing his last through his neck.
The hound was another matter. Franz and Oskar were slashing at it with their swords, but their blows couldn't penetrate the beast's matted coat. Ulf, on his back under the monster, was forcing its head back with the haft of his maul, but his straining arms were being shredded by its claws.
Reiner ran forward with Hals and Pavel. Giano dropped his sword and unslung his crossbow, drawing a bolt from his quiver. Gustaf kept out of the way, as usual.
Reiner slashed at the hound's back legs, severing its left hamstring. It howled and turned, but fell as it put weight on its dead leg. Pavel and Hals gored it in the side with their spears. Still it fought, twisting so savagely that Pavel's spear was wrenched out of his fever-weakened hands and cracked Hals in the forehead. The hound lunged for the dazed pikeman, but Ulf, freed of its weight, clubbed it with all his might, square on its spinal ridge. It dropped flat, its legs splayed. Giano stepped forward and fired his crossbow point blank. The bolt pinned the monster's head to the ground. It died in a spreading pool of blood.
'Nice work, lads,' said Reiner. 'Ulf, are you badly hurt? Hals?'
'Just a little swimmy, captain,' said Hals. 'It'll pass.'
'I've had worse,' said Ulf, grimacing as he examined his lacerated biceps. 'But not by much.'
'Just coming,' said Gustaf. He began opening his kit.
Reiner looked toward the corridor, listening for reinforcements, and froze, heart thudding, as he saw half a dozen faces looking back at him. The slaves were peering anxiously down the tunnel at them. Reiner had forgotten all about them.
'What do we do about that lot?' asked Hals, joining him.
Pavel looked up. 'Poor devils.'
'We must free them!' said Franz. 'Bring them with us.'
'You crazy, boy,' said Giano. 'They slow us down. We no make it.'
'But we can't leave 'em here,' said Pavel. 'The Kurgan'd kill 'em sure.'
Ulf grunted as Gustaf cleaned his wounds. 'The Kurgan will kill them regardless, whether now or later.'
'It's your decision, captain,' said Hals.
Reiner cursed under his breath. 'This is exactly why I don't want to lead. There is no good decision here.'
He chewed his lip, thinking, but whichever way he turned it, it was bad.
'Your best course is to put them out of their misery,' said Gustaf. 'They are no longer men.'
'What does a monster know of men?' spit Hals.
Reiner wanted to punch Gustaf, not for being wrong, but for being right. The surgeon always took the bleakest view of every situation, had the most cynical view of human nature, and so often turned out to be one Reiner should have listened to. Killing them would be best. The slaves were too weak to keep up, and would stretch their food supply much too thin, but Reiner could feel Franz's eyes hot upon him, and Pavel's one-eyed gaze as well, and couldn't give the order.
'We... we'll free them, and... and offer them the choice to follow us or not.' He flushed as he said it, for it was a horrible equivocation, a mere sop to common sense. What other choice did the slaves have? He was dooming the men who depended on him because he hadn't the heart to kill men who were virtually dead already.
Franz and Pavel nodded, satisfied, but Gustaf made a disgusted sound and Giano groaned. The rest looked non-committal. Reiner fished the keys from the dead Kurgan's belt and started down the tunnel to the larger corridor.
Franz fell in beside him. 'That was a rotten trick just then, pushing me into danger.'
Reiner's teeth clenched. He was tired of feeling guilty. 'I had faith in you.'
'But I've lost a little in you,' the boy countered, then shrugged. 'Though you do a brave thing here.'
'I do a foolish thing here.'
The slaves edged warily back as Reiner and his men came out of the tunnel. There were sixteen of them, four teams to push the four carts, which were filled with waste rock. Each starveling quartet was shackled together at the ankles.
Reiner held up the keys. 'Don't be afraid. We're going to free you.'
The slaves stared, uncomprehending, and flinched back again as he approached them.
'Hold still.'
The slaves did as they were told. Commands seemed the only speech they understood. Reiner squatted and unlocked the four locks in turn. Franz and Pavel followed behind him, pulling the chain that linked them out through the slaves' shackles until all were free.
Reiner faced them. 'There you are. You are slaves no more. We welcome you to follow us to freedom, or... or to take what path you think best.'
The slaves blinked at him, eyes blank. Reiner coughed. What was wrong with them? Were they deaf? 'Do you understand? You're free. You can travel with us if you wish.'
One of the slaves, a woman with no hair, began to weep, a dry, scratchy sound.
'It's a trick,' said another. 'They mean to trap us again.'
'Stop torturing us!' cried a third.
'It isn't a trick,' said Franz, as the slaves whispered among themselves. 'You are truly free.'
'Don't listen to them!' said the slave who had first spoken. 'They only mean to catch us out. Go back to the work face! Warn the masters!'
He backed away from Reiner and began running back down the corridor. The others ran with him, like sheep running because other sheep were running.
'Curse it!' growled Reiner. 'Stop!' He grabbed at a fl
eeing slave, but the skeletal man squirmed out of his fingers. 'Stop them!' he called to the others.
'What are they doing?' asked Franz, confounded, as the others tried to corral the slaves. 'Why are they running?'
'They are lost, as I told you,' said Gustaf, sneering.
Pavel, Hals, Oskar and Giano grabbed a handful of the slaves and pushed them to the floor, but more were disappearing into darkness.
'Never mind why,' said Reiner, running down the hall. 'We have to shut them up before they bring their overseers down on us. Giano, bring the lantern!'
Reiner and Franz chased the slaves with Giano, Ulf and Hals running behind them, Giano's slotted lantern throwing dancing bars of light on the uneven walls. Reiner was surprised at how fast the slaves moved. He thought they would be weak from starvation, but it seemed that their constant labour had given them a wiry strength, and Reiner and the others had difficulty keeping up, let alone catching up, for the slaves seemed to know every inch of the tunnels in the dark.
'Come back, curse you!' he called after them, but this order they did not follow.
The slaves reached the main corridor and turned right. As he angled in behind them, Reiner could see the glow of torches up ahead. He put on a burst of speed and caught the last slave around the neck, bringing him down.
The slave cried out. The others leapt ahead, wailing, and scattered. Some continued down the main corridor. Some swerved into side corridors. All started shouting as loud as their rusty voices would allow.
'Masters! Masters! Help!'
'Interlopers, masters! Protect us!'
'They have killed our overseer!'
Franz darted into the first side corridor after two slaves, but Reiner collared him and pulled him back.
'Don't be a fool! We must stick together.'
'Too late anyway,' sighed Giano, as hounds began to bay and harsh Kurgan orders echoed through the tunnels. The thud of heavy boots began to converge on them.
Reiner groaned. 'Back to the others, quick.'
He turned and started running back down the corridor. Franz, Giano, Oskar and Hals following in his wake.