[Thanquol & Boneripper 03] - Thanquol's Doom

by C. L. Werner - (ebook by Undead)

  Klarak’s eyes grew cold as he thought about doom. Ikit Claw was gone, but there was still the threat of Thanquol hovering over Karak Angkul. If one skaven sorcerer had used magic to escape the Doomsphere’s destruction, it was possible the other had done the same. The only way to make certain was to go back into the cavern and dig out Thanquol’s corpse.

  “We’ll have to collect every scrap of barazhunk from the cave,” Horgar said. “Might take weeks to dig it all out.”

  “The Master Rune will have taken care of it,” Runelord Morag said. “Its power will have reduced the entire machine to dust.”

  “There is something just as vital for us to find,” Klarak said, his voice like an icy wind. “When I ran from the cavern, Thanquol was trying to shut down the Doomsphere.”

  “Clearly he didn’t,” Horgar said. “And if he stayed around any longer than you did, then the whole cavern must have come crashing down about his ears.” The hammerer made a graphic illustration by smashing a rock between his steam-powered gauntlets.

  “We can’t leave it to chance,” Klarak said. “We have to dig through the rubble and find his body.”

  “And if we don’t?” asked King Logan, disliking the worried look in Klarak’s eyes.

  “Then I’m afraid Karak Angkul is still in danger,” the engineer told him. “We’ve saved the rest of the Karak Ankor from the skaven, but our own homes are still threatened.”

  Thanquol hugged his arms against his sides, the chill of the void clinging to him like a cloak of frost. His empty glands kept clenching, trying to spurt the musk of fear, his mind racing with the raw terror of his passage through the aethyr. Every time he invoked his magic to sunder the veil between worlds he was certain he’d never emerge safely. The void was populated by numberless legions of damned spirits and ravenous daemons, each of them eager to ravage a mortal intruder.

  Never again! He’d never put himself at such risk again! Next time he would find some clean way out of his troubles, plan an escape route that wouldn’t end with him in the belly of a daemon!

  He hoped that Ikit Claw hadn’t been as fortunate. If the warlock’s spell had employed the same principles as Thanquol’s, then it might not be too much to hope that the traitor had paid for his crimes. Torn asunder by daemons, his spirit doomed to wander the void until it was finally devoured by some nightmarish phantom.

  The braggart weasel! Boasting about his vaunted science! Claiming his Doomsphere could reshape the world, place the skaven who possessed it at the very pinnacle of power! The useless contraption! What was the use of having a superweapon if the first time you tried to use it the thing blew up in your face?

  There would be a reckoning. Thanquol would lay this sordid scheme out before the Council. Clan Skryre would suffer for what they had done, threatening to upset the whole hierarchy of the Under-Empire!

  Thanquol forced himself to calm down long enough to take stock of his surroundings. His spell had sent him into the Underway, but his nose told him he was no great distance from the refuse piles outside Bonestash’s tunnels. He’d been forced to leave Boneripper behind when making his escape, but that was inconsequential. His faith in Clan Skryre technology had been shaken of late.

  Still, his journey to Bonestash wasn’t a complete loss. The two-scented traitor Skraekual was dead. The Hand of Vecteek was recovered. Thanquol still wasn’t sure about the artefact. The more he thought about it, the more wrong the thing felt. He’d certainly need to find a pliable dupe to harness its powers for him.

  Thanquol’s head jerked around as a curious scent struck his nose. Sniffing at the dank air of the old dwarf road, the grey seer was impressed by a heavy, musky smell. Skaven of Clan Mors, there was no mistaking their scent. Most likely refugees from Bonestash returning to see what was left of their homes.

  Thanquol straightened his posture, preening himself so that he would look his most intimidating. He wasn’t eager to make the long journey back to Skavenblight alone. A bit of brow-beating, some threats of divine retribution from the Horned Rat, and he’d have this pack of wretches eating out of his paw. They’d follow him straight back to the Shattered Tower if he told them to, though Thanquol’s recent experiences made him consider he’d only need to take them as far as the slave market.

  The grey seer’s whiskers twitched with uncertainty as the smell continued to grow stronger. There were certainly a lot of refugees. His ears could pick up the squeaks and snarls of a large number of skaven, the tromp of many marching feet, the rattle of armour and weapons.

  Into the dim light of the Underway, a vast army of ratmen marched into view. Thanquol could see from their banners and the designs on their shields that they belonged to Clan Mors. Belatedly, he remembered Rikkit Snapfang’s desertion. His worries that the warlord was going to tattle to his superiors had been well founded.

  The army came to a halt when the pickets caught Thanquol’s scent. Their leader pushed his way through the pack. Thanquol found himself staring at Rikkit Snapfang. The warlord stared back. It was all he could do, his eyes frozen in an expression of terror, his severed head spitted on a spike. Other decapitated heads grinned from the trophy rack lashed to the crimson armour of the army’s leader. Thanquol bruxed his fangs nervously as the dark-furred warlord glowered at him.

  The grey seer knew this warlord, the most fearsome of Warlord Gnawdwell’s henchrats. Within the Under-Empire, the name of Queek Headtaker was infamous. Tales were told about the warlord’s fits of violence and crazed bloodlust that would have a hardened Eshin assassin spraying the musk of fear.

  “Traitor-meat,” Queek snarled, pointing the spiked maul in his hand at Thanquol. The ranks of red-armoured stormvermin behind the warlord growled menacingly.

  “No! No!” Thanquol whined. “Loyal-true! Servant of the Council! Prophet of the Horned One!”

  Queek’s eyes lost none of their malignance. “Rikkit-meat says you betray Bonestash to Clan Skryre.” The warlord cocked his head, pushing one of his ears against Rikkit’s cold lips. “Yes-yes, he say-squeak you betray Clan Mors!”

  Thanquol grimaced at this display of Queek’s madness. He turned a hopeful look at the skaven warriors, but if any of them thought their leader was deranged, none of them were about to do anything about it. There was an empty spike on Queek’s trophy rack.

  “No! No!” Thanquol grovelled. “Ikit Claw is my enemy too. He try to trick-lie, but I find out what he was up to.”

  The warlord waved his paw and a dozen black-furred stormvermin closed upon Thanquol. The grey seer’s mind raced, trying to recall everything he’d ever heard about the Headtaker.

  “I can take-lead you to Karak Angkul,” Thanquol squealed. “Most of the dwarf-things are down in Bonestash. Their own burrows are unprotected.” Thanquol was gambling on the pathological hatred Queek was said to hold for all dwarf-things.

  The gamble paid off. Queek raised his maul, motioning for his stormvermin to stay back. “If this is a trick, you die,” he snarled.

  “No! No! No trick!”

  Queek grinned, lips pulling away from his fangs. “Good. Kill the traitor-meat, then we march on the dwarf-things.”

  Thanquol scurried between the advancing stormvermin. “Wait-listen!” he cried. “I have mighty sorcery! This is the Hand of Vecteek!” Thanquol brandished the artefact, hoping Queek would be intimidated by it the way Ikit Claw had. Unfortunately, it seemed the warlord had never heard of it. The stormvermin rushed at Thanquol, stabbing at him with their swords and halberds. The grey seer was forced to duck and dodge between their blades, desperately seeking any way past the closing ring of steel. His magic spent escaping the Doomsphere, he knew that only his cunning would save him now.

  “I can help you!” Thanquol shouted. “I can help kill-slay dwarf-things! I can call upon the Horned One to kill-slay all-all dwarf-things!”

  Queek uttered a savage cry. At the sound, the stormvermin fell back. The warlord approached Thanquol, his fierce eyes glaring at the horned priest. “Kill-slay all
dwarf-things?” he growled.

  “Yes! Yes!” Thanquol exclaimed. He held the severed paw of Vecteek up so that Queek could see it. “I can use this to call up great-mighty magic! Spells powerful enough to kill-slay all dwarf-things!”

  There was a fanatical gleam in Queek’s eyes. The warlord tilted his head, pressing his ear first to Rikkit’s lips, then to the toothless skull of an orc. Thanquol shuddered as he heard Queek whispering to his trophies, conferring with them, seeking their council.

  “Good-good,” the warlord decided. “Thanquol will help kill-slay dwarf-things.” Queek pressed the spiked end of his maul against the grey seer’s snout. “Make good magic, Thanquol. If you don’t…” Queek twisted the maul around, pointing to the empty spot on his trophy rack.

  Thanquol swallowed the lump in his throat. All things considered, he would rather be dealing with his good friend Ikit Claw again.

  Chapter XVII

  “Mordin Grimstone has found his doom,” Thorlek said, a tremor in his voice. A path had been cleared through the worst of the rubble by Thane Erkii’s miners. Klarak and his aides had followed close behind, inspecting each of the crushed, mangled skaven carcasses, desperately hoping to find the horned carcass of Grey Seer Thanquol amongst the dead. It was ugly, nasty work, the sort to test even a dwarf’s resolve. Yet even the dwarfs could not repress a shudder when a pile of rocks collapsed under the miners’ picks and exposed the fearsome sight of the slayer’s death.

  By some fluke of chance, none of the crashing boulders and falling platforms had disturbed the frozen tableau. The skeletal bulk of Boneripper stood erect amid the destruction, its bony claws closed about the mutilated wreckage of the slayer’s body. Mordin’s face was contorted in an expression of agony, his lip bitten through by his own clenched teeth.

  The dwarfs reached for their weapons, waiting for the grotesque rat-ogre to turn upon them, but the skeleton remained stolid as a statue. Cautiously, Klarak approached the immobile monster. Muttering complaints about the engineer’s boldness, Horgar lumbered after his master.

  “Looks like Mordin killed it before it killed him,” the hammerer said, pointing at the axe buried in Boneripper’s skull.

  Klarak turned away from his inspection of the grotesque beast. “It wasn’t alive to begin with,” he said. “It’s another of the ratkin’s infernal machines.” He shrugged his shoulders. “As you say, it seems Mordin was able to destroy it, even if he was too late to save himself.”

  “Mordin Grimstone has found his doom,” Thorlek repeated.

  “Yes,” agreed Klarak. “But unless we find Thanquol’s body, we cannot be sure he’s had his revenge.”

  Thorlek and some of the miners attacked Boneripper’s bony claws, cutting away at the bladed fingers until they were able to free the twisted corpse of Mordin Grimstone. Reverently, they laid the slayer’s body upon their cloaks. He would be borne with honour back into the halls of Karak Angkul, from there to be sent on to Karak Kadrin and interred in the Shrine of Grimnir with other fallen slayers.

  Klarak and the rest of the throng redoubled their search. True to Runelord Morag’s words, there was no trace of the Doomsphere, not even a twisted beam or a crumpled plate, only a great heap of rust-coloured dust. A few plates of Barazhunk, excess that Ikit Claw had not used to create the shell of his machine, were uncovered. Of Grey Seer Thanquol, however, there was no trace.

  “He might be under one of the big rocks,” Horgar suggested.

  Klarak shook his head. “No, the vermin has escaped.” As he spoke, the adventurer’s voice became heavy and there was sombreness about his eyes. “The menace to Karak Angkul remains.”

  A dwarf runebearer, his body damp with sweat, came rushing into the cavern, glancing about the rubble with frantic eagerness. When he spotted Klarak, he dashed across the cave with an unseemly haste.

  “Klarak Bronzehammer,” the runner gasped when he stood before the engineer. “I have been dispatched from the Sixth Deep to bear ill tidings from King Logan.”

  The engineer felt his blood go cold at the runebearer’s words. King Logan, along with many of the dwarf warriors, had started a thorough search of the ratkin tunnels, scouring them for any lurking skaven, hunting through them for any caches of stolen gold or weapons looted from the fallen warriors of Karak Angkul. Only a matter of the greatest import could distract the king from the sombre duty of reclaiming the honour of the dead.

  “By the king’s decree, I repeat my message,” the runebearer continued. “A vast horde of skaven have risen up from the depths. They have swarmed past our defences in the lower deeps and now run amok through the Sixth Deep. If we would not lose the entire hold, the army must return at once.”

  “Hashut’s Bald Beard!” Horgar cursed, spitting the name of the profane Dark Father. “The filthy ratkin are above us! Between us and our homes!” Similar oaths of alarm and outrage echoed through the cavern as word spread among the miners.

  “King Logan has ordered all dwarfs to make speed through the tunnels,” the runebearer reported. “He does not hold out hope that the army can return in time to save the hold, but at least it will be there to avenge those killed by the ratkin.” There was an unmistakable tone of accusation in the messenger’s voice as he finished. Klarak wondered if that was also something the king had told him to convey.

  “The king is right,” Klarak said. “We will never reach the hold in time if we use the tunnels.” The engineer’s words brought roars of fury from the miners. He held up his hand, motioning for silence. “I said, if we use the tunnels. But there is another way. We can dig our own.”

  “Guildmaster Thori is right,” Thane Erkii snarled. “You are mad! Even with your steam drill, we’d never move enough rock to get back into the upper deeps ahead of the skaven! We were lucky the tunnel from the smelthall waited until we were out from under it before it collapsed!”

  “And we’ll need still more luck if we are to save Karak Angkul.” Klarak turned and faced the runebearer. “Tell King Logan that I know a way we can reach the upper deeps ahead of the ratkin. Tell him we will use the skaven’s own digging machine to burn our way through the mountain.”

  The runebearer looked unconvinced, but bowed his head and hurried away to take Klarak’s message back to the king. Klarak shifted his attention back to the sullen miners surrounding him. “We’ll have to fetch the skaven drill from the cave where they abandoned it.”

  “Klarak, it took two of their rat-ogres to push that thing,” Thorlek objected.

  “I know,” the engineer said. “It’ll mean a fair bit of exercise for all of us, but that machine is the only chance we have to cut past the skaven and get ahead of them.”

  “And what about Thanquol?” Horgar asked, dropping the boulder he had been moving.

  Again, a grim cast crept into Klarak’s eyes. “Unless I am much mistaken,” he said, “I think we will find him leading the ratkin against our homes.”

  The smell of blood in the air made Thanquol’s mouth water. Fresh blood! Dwarf blood! The grey seer’s stomach growled as his mind formed the image of dwarf-steaks garnished with mushrooms and sautéed in skalm, perhaps with just a hint of squeezed bat thrown in for added flavour. He’d wash the meal down with a strong warp-wine, preferably of at least ten-generation vintage. The best warp-wines were those that made the drinker eager to devour the warp-worm hiding at the bottom of the bottle. The really good ones were so old that the warp-worms could fight back.

  Shrill screams disturbed Thanquol’s culinary day-dream. Angrily, he turned his eyes on a mob of crimson-armoured stormvermin. The ratmen were dragging a fat old dwarf breeder from between a pair of monstrously oversized beer kegs. There was a little mewing thing clutched in her arms. The grey seer snarled an oath at the stormvermin, demanding they lower their swords.

  The fangleader bared his teeth, not the slightest trace of deference in his posture. “Warlord say-tell all-all dwarf-thing die-die!” the black-furred ratkin snapped. In the next moment, the blades of th
e stormvermin came chopping down into the dwarf breeder and her whelp.

  Thanquol bruxed his fangs, his eyes narrowing with hate. Queek was a lunatic and so were all of his warriors! Since reaching the dwarfhold, the vermin had gone completely amok, rushing about in a frenzy of bloodlust! What happened to traditional skaven values! What became of simple practicality! He’d led them into the dwarfhold for a regime of pillage and plunder, not to watch a pack of crazed beasts butcher and burn everything they came across!

  Sadly, the grey seer stared down at the butchered mess at the base of the kegs. Dwarf pups were worth their weight in warpstone, deemed an exquisite delicacy back in Skavenblight. Dwarf breeders weren’t easy to come by either, and notoriously difficult to keep. But Thanquol had never turned his genius to the problem of mating dwarf-things in captivity. Certainly with an intellect such as his own devoted to the problem, he’d find a solution in short order. Indeed, if the dwarf-things produced only a few litters a year, he’d have enough dwarf pups to corner the market. He’d become the wealthiest meat-grower in Skavenblight!

  More screams banished Thanquol’s ambitions. He glared at another gang of stormvermin rushing down the hall in pursuit of a long-haired dwarf breeder. Of course, there’d be small chance of becoming a prosperous dwarf-herder if Queek’s idiots kept killing everything!

  Once again, Thanquol gnashed his fangs and lashed his tail. Had a skaven ever been given such an amazing opportunity? An entire dwarfhold ripe for the taking! And Queek’s maniacs were just throwing it all away!

  When Thanquol led the army up through the old mines and the tunnels of the lower deeps, following the route of his previous expedition into Karak Angkul, the skaven had encountered only the most marginal of resistance. Dwarf pickets scattered throughout the mines, sentinels who were supposed to bear word of any attack back to the upper levels of the hold. The watchers had been spread too thin, however, never arrayed in the numbers necessary to delay Queek’s horde long enough to allow any messenger to be dispatched to carry the warning. The dwarf wasn’t born who could outrun a skaven, and the spectacle of watching a pack of enraged ratmen drag down a fleeing messenger had been one of the great amusements on the march up from the mines.