Headtaker

by David Guymer

  Tiklisp pawed weakly at the ensorcelled blade until his arms went limp. The body slid from Sleek’s sword with a satisfyingly wet note.

  He bent down to collect the small skaven’s bag of loot. It was smaller and lighter than his own, and he could easily carry both. He turned to watch Ratklett’s approach, careful to conceal the stolen dwarfish weapon. The fangleader would undoubtedly demand it for himself if he should see it, and Sleek was going to need it if he truly wished to become warlord someday.

  The larger skaven looked as though he would protest Tiklisp’s killing, but in the end he merely shrugged. ‘More-more for us,’ said the fangleader, echoing the unlamented Tiklisp’s earlier sentiments.

  Sleek nodded excitedly, turning to hurry on his way. Passages branched off to left and right, both rising upward and sinking down. At each junction he paused briefly and sniffed, ignoring some, scampering down others, deep instinct and distant ratkin spoor drawing him ever further into the earth. Behind him, like a shadow in the dark, Ratklett said nothing. Sleek was thankful for the heavy pack across his shoulders that shielded him from a blade in the back. Nevertheless, he felt his fur itch, the mound of treasure piled atop his shoulders rattling invitingly before Ratklett’s following eyes like a red rag to an Estalian bull.

  He just needed a little longer. And then everything would be different. The Eight Peaks would have a mighty warlord, and generations of whelps would be taught to fear the name Sleek.

  His eyes roved the blackness, gleaming red pinpricks unravelling the shadow as though it were day. These were familiar tunnels again. They had come this way. He searched the ground in a panic. What if some green-thing had found it? It would be so typical of them to have stumbled upon it with their magpie eyes and moved it and…

  And there it was, nestling in the loose earth where he had left it like a golden egg.

  ‘Wait-stop,’ he squeaked, waving to Ratklett to slow as he stooped to pick the object from the ground.

  ‘What is it? What do you find-smell? Give-give. Ratklett is leader, I get the good-best to give the warlord.’

  Sleek tried to hide his pleasure as he thumbed the sliding switch in the object’s side before planting it in his superior’s paw.

  Irritably, Ratklett brushed his subordinate’s paw from his and raised the object to his snout. It was a brass orb, smooth and perfectly spherical, seeming to twist in his paw as interlocking cogs whirred in opposing directions. Curious, he gave the device a shake. It gave off a faint, tantalising whisper of warpstone, and it seemed to be ticking.

  He lowered his paw, glancing up to witness the rapidly receding shape of Sleek’s back, his waving tail offering an un-fond farewell.

  He looked back down as the ticking stopped. It was the last he saw before reality screamed apart in his paws and the world turned black.

  Let it be known to all that on this day the blackest of marks is made against the squatter king of Black Crag. By the most heinous of urk treachery did he breach the forgotten ways of Karak Azul to perpetrate the most egregious of crimes against King Kazador and the dawi of the Iron Peak. No oaths, no deeds, no acts of vengeance shall ever efface this shame. The king does brood, night and day, refusing both ale and rest, to the point where one less vigorous must surely wither. Even the rune-sealment of the last of those lost tunnels by Handrik Hallgakrin, captain of his Ironbreakers, summoned naught but outright prohibition of celebration until these wounds were repaid in the black blood of the urk.

  The king does seal himself from his subjects and will not speak on such matters, but the Grudge price must be set and so it shall be.

  For the desecration of the Third Deep: one thousand urk heads.

  For the lost lives of two hundred and thirteen dawi in defiance of such barbarism: two thousand urk heads.

  For the abduction of Queen Morga, the lustre of Azul, and those others of King Kazador’s blood: their safe return with five thousand urk heads, or the restoration of their remains to the Ancestor Chambers of Karak Azul and no fewer than six thousand of the greenskin dead.

  Of Kazador’s son, the king does forbid our speaking beyond the pages of the kron. The prince is no longer of sound mind and the king does command his confinement until he can be found recovered. Let it be known that that for the brutal shaming of brave Prince Kazrik upon the very seat of the Iron Throne itself, King Kazador will accept no price. May this grudge against the urk of Black Crag stand forevermore.

  The greatly wronged king did then rouse from his grief to issue one mighty decree: half his wealth to any that returns his lost kin, and the pick of his own treasures to any that can avenge his son’s torture upon the squatter king. The thanes did each raise voice against so rash and unprecedented an oath, but the king, so mined of passion that even the wealth of Karak Azul could afford him no joy, was resolute.

  Thus is it recorded, and by Grimnir let it soon be done.

  – The Karak Azul Book of Grudges

  By Logan, Loremaster of Karak Azul, on behalf of King Kazador

  Chapter One

  Sharpwit was annoyed, and growing more so by the moment. He doubted the dolt knew who he was, but that just incensed him all the more. He should know. All skaven should. He fixed the mouse-faced functionary with his most intimidating stare.

  ‘What do you mean-say he is not here? He was sent messages every day since our leaving Skavenblight. He knows full well to meet-greet at this place at this time.’ To his increasing irritation the wiry, brown-furred skaven merely shrugged, betraying an infuriating lack of humility towards his betters.

  All around him, skaven pushed and jostled, filling the hall to overflowing with scrambling, biting, backstabbing bodies, their susurrant chittering an ocean of noise. This was one of the busiest routes in the entirety of the Underway, that vast tangled nest of tunnels that festered within the crust of the world. At its heart were the ancient routes of the dwarfs’ Ungdrin road, but since that race’s fall it had spread far and wide like an organic, cancerous thing. No skaven truly knew how many lairs and warrens could be reached by the Underway, for new routes opened every day while old ones – and some not so old – collapsed with equal regularity. Sharpwit would not mourn the countless lives snuffed out every moment in such incidents but, gazing upward at the monolithic pillars and vaulted ceiling that stood as sturdy today as they had seven thousand years ago, he was thankful that his life was currently in the hands of good dwarfish engineering.

  Taking a tight hold on the splintered grip of his crutches, he wove his head from side to side, striving for a good look at the damnable skaven, but the pest kept dodging away from his sole remaining eye. Sharpwit had long since resigned himself to losing what little sight he had left and the creature was blurrily lost in shadow. No matter. He would recall the creature’s scent and exact the most satisfying of reprisals at his leisure. He sighed, breaking into a fit of coughing that spattered the back of his balding paw with flecks of blood and gobbets of mysterious fleshy tissue. When the fit passed he flicked out his tongue to reclaim the lost flesh from his fur.

  Squeaking a muffled curse at the indolence of all skaven, he buried his paws in the pockets of his jerkin. A stunning azure trimmed with scarlet and black brocade, it was cut from the finest fabrics of dwarf and elf and human design and amended to skaven needs by the most talented slaves in Skavenblight. That alone should have alerted this dullard to his rank, but evidently Clan Mors bred them for brawn over brains these days. His ferreting paws settled on the object he sought. If the idiot would not respond to threats, he would respond to this!

  He withdrew the pendant and displayed it smugly to the skaven guard. It was a jet black disc with twelve claw-scratch symbols set into the outer circumference. Each denoted one of the mighty Lords of Decay and at its centre, shaped from ruby, was the thirteenth symbol, that of the Horned Rat himself. It symbolised the Council’s authority and should have had simple-minded cretins like this one begging to learn how they might please him. Instead, the skaven licked h
is lips with unchecked avarice, glancing shiftily at his companions in the rickety guard shack, the sole purpose of which seemed to be to extort outrageously inflated excise on the endless stream of traffic headed into the City of Pillars.

  Sharpwit felt their eyes on him, assessing his worth. He noticed a shift in the skaven around him as ratkin who had been trying to look inconspicuous admiring the architecture took full advantage of the guards’ distraction to make a break for the tunnels beyond their shack. The excise-rats squeaked threats and scrambled after them, the whole system descending into anarchy as those skaven more cautious still swarmed the gaps left by the busy tariff-takers. The brown-furred excise-rat ignored the snarling riot at his back as though it were all in a day’s work, which it likely was, and shuffled closer to Sharpwit.

  Sharpwit’s heart thudded arrhythmically. He knew what he looked like: a haggard hunchback with one eye gouged from his face amidst a mess of scar tissue, the other clouded with cataracts. He limped with the aid of a pair of worm-eaten crutches and had barely enough brittle, bleached fur on his withered frame to clothe the skinniest of whelps. He was old, but he was still an agent of the Council of Thirteen. He was their chosen. He bore their mark.

  Young skaven today, he thought disdainfully.

  He lashed out with one crutch, catching the guard a crunching blow to the kneecap. The skaven squealed in agony and toppled to the earth at Sharpwit’s paws. Hobbling closer to the mewling ratman, he allowed his full weight to be borne by one crutch, using the other to stab vindictively at the guard’s shattered knee. Weeping with pain and contrition, the skaven tried to roll away, to shield his knee with his body, but Sharpwit would not let him, maintaining the pressure and forcing the penitent skaven’s knee into the ground. The guard howled, begging mercy, his cries working like magic to open an expanding hole in the otherwise unbroken press of dodging and hurrying bodies.

  From the corner of his eye he scanned for the other excise-rats, in case any fool should consider coming to their comrade’s aid, but they were nowhere to be seen. They had blended so successfully into the continually flowing masses of furry bodies that it was almost as if they had never been.

  He grinned cruelly, illuminating his face in the shadow-light of the warpstone prostheses that stabbed from his diseased gums, rising like menhirs above the blackened ruins he could not yet afford to replace. The injured rat jabbered unintelligible remorse, quailing like a man-thing child stolen from its mother. Good. That would be one more worthless rat taught to respect his elders.

  ‘Tell-squeak again where Queek is.’

  Queek gripped the haft of Dwarf Gouger tightly as the weapon smashed home. The impact thumped up his arm, a beautiful electricity that sent sparks of delirium flying through his mind. He watched the dwarf’s eyes go dark and savoured the moment. He squealed his triumph and wrenched back, heavy gauntlets of warpstone and scarlet steel grinding around the grip of the spiked maul that had embedded in the dwarf’s helm. His biceps strained, muscles rippling beneath coarse black fur. The dwarf rose partway off the ground, feet dangling, arms flapping like the wings of some overweight flightless bird before the gore-slickened spike at last came free. The lifeless body crashed to the ground between his footpaws.

  It was so beautiful.

  A scream dragged him from his reverie.

  Another dwarf fell, guts drooling over the blade of a halberd. He snarled at the unwanted interruption, hissing at a stormvermin as the dark-furred warrior tugged his weapon loose. The stormvermin slunk back and Queek glared after him. For an instant of confusion he forgot where he was, reality reasserting itself in a riot of colours and sounds; screams, blood, shattered armour, the scavenged, russet-dyed livery of his warriors as they ducked and flowed around the dour, grey-cloaked dwarfs, the ripple and crack of warplock jezzails. Of course, he reminded himself, another of the dwarfs’ mine workings.

  How many holes into the Eight Peaks would Belegar and his dwarfs burrow before learning that there was no hiding place from Queek?

  He could smell them.

  He took a deep breath, relishing the scent of blood and fear, all of it mingled with the delicious tang of warpstone. Rusted chains hung from the ceiling, swaying with the ebb and flow of battle, the corroded metal gleaming darkly with the reflected glow of a dozen fires. Great stacks of coal burned in pyres, although whether they had caught a stray warpstone shell or been deliberately set alight to upset skaven dark vision and cloud keen skaven noses was a mystery.

  The dwarfs had certainly been prepared this time. Rocks and scree and upturned carts had been piled into barricades, channelling the skaven hordes into killing zones and choke points to die by the axe and by the quarrel. Queek watched as a score of clanrats attempted to surmount one such barricade. Rather than defend their position, the dwarfs leapt clear and an instant later, just as the skaven were trilling their triumph, that section of barricade erupted in a geyser of rock shards and dirty flame. The explosive force of the concealed blackpowder device fired still-celebrating skaven high into the air. Body parts mingled with blasted rock, plummeting to earth like rain.

  Even standing a hundred tail-lengths from the blast, Queek staggered under the shockwave. The aftershock sounded thunderously through the ancient mine, echoing through arterial tunnels and buried shafts like a systolic rhythm.

  Queek took it all in and grinned. Yes, it was good to be Queek.

  His gaze returned to the ruined corpse at his footpaws with an expression almost of love. He crouched down, reaching out to paw at the auburn beard that had become tangled and knotted with blood. The gooey blood came away in his claws and he licked at it hungrily as he whispered: ‘Who kills you, dwarf-thing?’

  Lowering his head, he pressed his ear to the dead dwarf’s lips. He smiled at the words he heard, crooning with delight as he gathered the dwarf’s limp head into the crook of his arm, rocking the bloody thing like a fretful child. ‘That’s right, dwarf-thing. You kill-slay by Queek Headtaker!’

  The warlord bared his fangs and plunged them into the dwarf’s throat, spitting out ringlets from its gorget as he gnawed down to the spine. There was a snap of bone and Queek felt the head fall slack in his lap. Gripping it with both hands, he tugged, twisting from side to side as it fought wetly against his strength, strands of flesh and ligament sucking loose as it came free.

  Queek stood, raising the dripping head so it was level with his own. Its eyes stared emptily into his and he returned its gaze, tracing a claw over the contours of its face. He held his newly claimed trophy aloft, showing it the battle that raged around him. ‘Tell them, dwarf-thing!’ he yelled. ‘Tell the Eight Peaks that invincible Queek comes for them!’

  An insistent whisper worried at his ear, and he cocked his head to listen. He reached up with his sword paw to offer a reassuring pat to the three gnawed skulls that followed proceedings. From atop wooden spars affixed to a stanchion on his pauldrons, the skulls followed the battle with keen interest. ‘Yes-yes, you are right. Dwarf-thing falls too easy. Only strongest-best can come-stay.’

  Opening his fist, he allowed the fresh head to roll free, already forgotten as it bounced clear, rolling between a clanrat’s legs and out towards the continuing carnage. Queek shoved the skaven warrior out of his way. ‘What do you wait for, coward-meat? Queek shows how dwarf-meat die-die!’

  Perhaps two dozen dwarfs, barely a third of what they had once been, stood shoulder to shoulder, shields locked into a wall of iron. Axes and hammers flashed over the shield wall as spear-rats ventured too close. Furry bodies and broken spears fell in pieces at the dwarfs’ feet as the line edged ever backward, the rhythmic beat of dwarfish boots on rock like a drumbeat in time to the dwarfs’ retreat.

  Queek barged his way through the milling skaven, those too craven or too wily for the front ranks, and, with a shrill challenge, flung himself bodily onto the shield wall. He saw a pair of eyes widen as he shot from the press of clanrats: icy blue gimlet stars beneath an iron helm, white beard frothin
g from the open face. The dwarf ducked and angled his shield to meet Queek’s strike. The warlord’s spiked maul drove hard into its steel boss, cleaving through the shield as if it were ratskin parchment, the steel rim buckling around the old dwarf’s pulped fist. The longbeard gritted his teeth in dour defiance and spat in Queek’s face as the warlord followed through, running his serrated blade through his belly.

  He had the nagging thought that there was somewhere else he was supposed to be, but he buried the thought along with Dwarf Gouger in the helm of another dwarf.

  He was Queek, and he was always exactly where he wanted to be.

  Sharpwit stepped away from the squirming functionary at the sound of armoured paw-steps clanking from his rear. The instinct to spin around and grovel was immediate, but he suppressed it with a great effort. He struggled to ignore the seep of musk down his inside leg, cursing aged glands and wizened sphincters both. The flesh between his shoulder blades crawled, seeking sensibly to cower from imagined blades beneath what scraps of fur remained.

  But he held firm, with only the barest shiver of effort. It was important they remember who he was.

  At the last moment, point made, he turned, his milky eye appraising the three muscular skaven. Even after several days on the Underway, Sharpwit struggled to tell them apart. Their fur was as white as the hides of tunnel-bred man-thing slaves; their ears, paws and tails an anaemic pink. They were albino stormvermin, the elite warriors of the Thirteen, the best of the very best, their presence as much a seal of authority as the token he carried in his paw. The warriors were mute, the better to keep their masters’ secrets, but they bore with them a wordless ferocity that would have had Sharpwit quivering with glee at the power at his command.

  Would have, he thought resentfully, had they been at his command.

  Behind the broad shoulders of the albinos, Sharpwit noted the approach of the extravagant palanquin of their glorious leader. From Sharpwit’s vantage it seemed to ride the skaven masses like an ocean barge, swaying with the footsteps of its bearers. The effort of eight wiry skavenslaves bore it aloft and two score more trailed with bowed heads in its wake. The bare-furred chattels dragged behind them great mats woven from the black bulrush stalks of the Blighted Marshes, bearing crates heaped with warptokens, weapons, supplies and other assorted sundries required by the Council’s emissaries.