Tales of the Old World

by Marc Gascoigne

  It was a horrific and awesome sight. Beside him, he heard Kleinhoffer call out in fear, but he cared not.

  They flew straight towards the aurora, picking up speed as they went. They passed over a flight of dragons that seemed frozen in place so slowly did they move compared to the steed of Tzeentch.

  Now von Diehl could make out a vast dark hole in the sky. It was as if the firmament were a painting and someone had torn a square from the canvas to reveal another picture beneath. He peered into a realm of flowing colours and pulsing lights, an area where the natural laws which governed the physical universe no longer applied. Von Diehl pointed the bone wand towards the Chaos Gate and the steed surged forward in response. They crossed the threshold into a new and darker universe.

  “Lothar,” Kleinhoffer murmured, his voice full of awe. “I believe that this must be—”

  “Yes,” von Diehl replied distantly, “we have entered the Sea of Souls.”

  For a moment their steed paused on the threshold between the two worlds and von Diehl stared into what was the final and strangest realm of Chaos.

  Off in the farthest distance, further away than the stars, he saw the things that he decided must be the Powers. They were vast eddies and whirlpools of luminescence, bigger than galaxies. Their twists and flows illuminated the Sea of Souls. Was that mighty red and black agglomeration Khorne, wondered von Diehl? He noted how its spiral arms of bloody light seemed to tangle with long pastel streamers of lilac and green and mauve. Could that be Slaanesh? It was like watching two nests of vipers fighting.

  Then he made out a third pulsating mass that was clearly greater than the many lesser ones in this vast realm. It writhed and pulsed obscenely, and something about this one made the hair on the nape of his neck bristle. From his instinctive reaction he knew that this one had to be Nurgle.

  Yet another form came into view. It was the most complex and convoluted of the gigantic structures of energy and he knew it to be Tzeentch, his ultimate goal.

  These were clearly the Powers, the Four Great Ones and the many lesser. And this was the true realm of Chaos.

  Beside him, Kleinhoffer clutched at his sleeve in panic. “Lothar, what is happening?”

  Von Diehl understood the old man’s confusion. His own brain was reeling under this sudden influx of sensation. “Our human minds are adjusting to the Sea of Souls,” he said happily.

  He realised that they were not seeing the whole of this twisted realm. Their human minds were not capable of it. Instead, they were simply imposing their own ideas of scale and form and function on a place where these did not apply. It was a staggering thought.

  Much closer than the Great Powers were tiny points of light that von Diehl somehow knew were the souls of mortals. They glittered like stars. Cutting a swathe through them, like a shark through a shoal of fish, von Diehl could see a long streamlined creature, all sucker mouths and questing antennae, a soul-shark. It devoured the small panicky shapes as they swam towards their distant, unseen destinations.

  Again he felt Kleinhoffer’s hand on his sleeve. “Lothar,” the old man cried in a frightened voice. “Lothar, look down!”

  Beneath their feet, their daemon-steed had changed shape, so it now resembled the soul-shark. It, too, feasted upon the glittering souls as it swept ever on.

  Von Diehl was not surprised. The beast was dangerous. He did not doubt that it would devour the essence of both of them if it could. Very softly, he chanted the words of a spell he had prepared. A thin line of radiance streamed from his bone wand, a pink-hued light that was indescribably richer here in the Sea of Souls. As the light touched the steed it opened up a delicate channel between their steed and himself.

  As the creature fed it passed the merest trickle of that energy to him through the channel his spell had created. The energy flowed through von Diehl’s veins like liquid ecstasy. He breathed deeply and sucked the pure essence of magic into his lungs. It was a totally exhilarating experience.

  “It cannot harm us,” he reminded the terrified old man. “Not as long as it is compelled by the binding spell.”

  But Kleinhoffer only stared down with a look of utmost horror on his face, as if the steed were already dining upon his lower limbs.

  The daemon-thing surged forward once more. Von Diehl felt that whatever awesome velocity it had achieved in the mortal world was nothing compared to what it was doing here. It seemed as if the creature was capable of traversing the universe.

  As they raced along they passed other great rents in the fabric of the sea. Sometimes what von Diehl saw through them beggared his imagination. Worlds laid waste by war, hells presided over by false gods and heavens of endless serenity.

  Suddenly he sensed a change of mood in their steed. He looked back and understood why. They were being pursued. Other creatures chased them, creatures not controlled by any binding spell. More soul-sharks. They could devour their flesh and their souls.

  Kleinhoffer followed his gaze and cried out in alarm.

  The soul-sharks came closer, their great jaws gaping. They were fast, faster than their own steed, not hindered as it was by two human riders.

  Von Diehl raised the wand of bone and prodded the daemon with it. “Save us,” he commanded the thing. “Save us or you will never be free!”

  A wordless cry of mingled rage and despair echoed inside von Diehl’s skull. The daemon-steed suddenly veered and plunged through one of the gates.

  Reality rippled like the surface of a pond. They hurtled over a desolate plain on which great pyramidal cities sat. As von Diehl watched, great beams of force flickered between the pyramids. Some were absorbed by huge, thrumming black screens of energy, but one city was reduced to slag in an instant. Their mount swept into an evasive pattern to dodge the webs of force-beams. Several came too close for comfort but none hit them. Von Diehl watched one of their pursuers get caught in the cross-fire and wink out of existence. The others came on.

  Their supernatural steed raced through another gate above the greatest of pyramids. There was a sense of space stretching. Now they were above a hell of sulphur pits and dancing flames. Toad-like daemons pitch-forked the souls of some strange amphibian race into the volcanic fires. Von Diehl wondered whether this was real or the dream of one of the Old Powers. Perhaps it was a real hell of a real race brought into being by the imaginations of an alien people stirring the Realm of Chaos.

  Their steed dived into one volcanic pit. Beside him, Kleinhoffer screamed uncontrollably, surely convinced that the creature had betrayed them and that they were going to die. He covered his eyes with his hands.

  Von Diehl felt only exhilaration.

  Once more though they hurtled through a gate. Fewer of the pursuing daemons followed.

  They were in the blackness of space, hurtling through a void darker than night over a small world that had been re-shaped into a city. They raced by bubble domes from which creatures much like elves stared out. The workmanship of the buildings within the domes was as refined and delicate as spider-webs. They dipped and swooped into a great corridor holding another gate. Once more they vanished.

  Von Diehl had no idea how long the chase lasted. They passed through vaults where rebellious daemons plotted against the Powers; frozen hells where immobile souls begged for freedom; leafy Arcadias where golden people made love and dreadful things watched from the bushes.

  They swooped across worlds where great war-machines, shaped like men eighty feet high, fought with weapons that could level cities. They blazed along corridors in doomed hulks that had drifted for a thousand years in the spaces between worlds and where sleeping monsters waited in icy coffins for new prey. They zoomed across the surface of suns where creatures of plasma drifted in strange mating dances.

  But eventually their twists and turns through the labyrinth of space-time threw off the last of their pursuers, and they returned once more to the Sea of Souls.

  Their steed raced along the threads of the vast disturbance in the sea that was Tzee
ntch, picking their way along great arteries of energy until they came to the very heart of it all. They swept past great winged creatures which gave von Diehl knowing smiles. He felt as if the daemons were looking into his very soul and probing his innermost secrets. He did not care. He was exalted. He knew they were nearing the end of the quest and that soon they would both have what they had come for. Kleinhoffer was exhausted, his face bloodless. But the exhilaration of the chase and sharing their daemon-steed’s energy had only buoyed von Diehl up.

  They approached a mighty sphere of pulsing light. Colours danced and shifted on its surface like oil glistening on the surface of water.

  They drifted closer and slid into, then through the wall. Within was a huge being, larger than a castle. In form it was similar to a man although its head was horned. It possessed great beauty but the shifting lights of the sphere reflected dazzlingly off its no-coloured skin and the brilliance caused von Diehl to look away.

  Welcome, mortals, to the House of the Lord of Change!

  The voice spoke within the travellers’ heads. It was calm, polite and reasonable, but there was an under-current of malicious amusement.

  Von Diehl peered back at the great figure, looking up into glittering gem-like eyes. He thought that those eyes could take in the entire universe at a glance. Before it he felt as insignificant as a flea.

  “Thank you, lord,” he said gravely. He nudged Gerhardt Kleinhoffer with his free hand. The old man mumbled a greeting of his own.

  Why have you come here? boomed the voice. Why have you disturbed my servants who have other more important tasks to perform?

  “We have come,” von Diehl said, “seeking knowledge, lord.” He gestured at his companion.

  “Yes,” Kleinhoffer stammered after a moment, a dazed expression on his face. “That’s it. That’s why we’re here. Knowledge.”

  Knowledge. For what purpose do you seek it? To change yourself or your world?

  Von Diehl turned and waited for his companion to speak. The old man’s gaze went back and forth between his student and the gigantic being. His mouth opened and closed several times but no words emerged. Still von Diehl said nothing.

  “Neither,” Kleinhoffer blurted at last.

  Lothar von Diehl smiled and turned back to face the Power. “Both,” he said.

  Gerhardt Kleinhoffer blinked, and then finally appeared to realise what von Diehl had said. He jerked around to face von Diehl. His face was ashen. “Lothar, what are you saying? Have you forgotten the ritual?”

  So then, mortal, the gigantic being boomed, addressing only Gerhardt Kleinhoffer now. Why then do you crave knowledge?

  “I—I—” Kleinhoffer’s eyes bulged. He put his hands to his head, clearly wilting under the gaze of this enormous entity. “Lothar, for pity’s sake, help me!”

  Von Diehl raised both hands. “Lord, he seeks knowledge—for its own sake.”

  That is unfortunate. The creature smiled malevolently. Still, what does he wish to know?

  Again Gerhardt Kleinhoffer’s mouth opened and shut and again no words emerged. Smiling, von Diehl said, “Everything.”

  Suitably ambitious. So shall it be.

  Lord Tzeentch reached out and touched Kleinhoffer. The old man went rigid.

  At the same moment, von Diehl again murmured the words of the spell which had linked him to the steed as it had fed. Leaning forward, he pressed the tip of the bone wand to Kleinhoffer’s temple. Knowledge was flowing into his companion, filling him. And Lothar von Diehl intended to witness it—from a safe distance.

  A vast ocean of information cascaded into Kleinhoffer’s brain. Von Diehl glimpsed the birth of the universe and the Sea of Souls, the creation of stars and planets, the rise of races, the structure of molecules. He saw the universe burst into a great flood of change and understood the nature of the power that drove it relentlessly onwards. He saw that the universe was never still but constantly altering itself. He knew instantly that he could never know everything because there were always new things coming into being.

  Kleinhoffer’s face contorted as the flow of knowledge continued inexorably. His mind was drowning in a flood of information, far too much knowledge to cope with. It had stretched his mind to the breaking point and beyond. As if from a great distance, von Diehl sensed the man’s personality erode then finally collapse as he descended into screaming madness. And still the torrent of knowledge did not stop.

  Slowly, still clutching feebly at von Diehl’s tunic, the old man sank down to von Diehl’s feet.

  Enough, thought von Diehl, sensing his own mind begin to strain. Chanting the words of his spell, he drew back the wand, breaking the contact with the old man.

  Lothar von Diehl.

  He looked out at the vast unknowable being that was, or represented, Tzeentch.

  Your companion’s wish has been granted.

  “Yes, lord,” von Diehl replied, glancing down at the huddled figure at his feet. He smiled. “And I offer you thanks—on his behalf.”

  A rumbling sound issued from the creature before him that perhaps was laughter on a cosmic scale.

  And you, Lothar von Diehl. You have also been granted the gift of knowledge—knowledge that you may take back with you into the mundane world you came from.

  “Accept my gratitude for that gift also, lord.”

  Of course, for that gift, too, there is a price.

  “I understand, lord, and one I am quite prepared to pay.”

  You will be bound to my service for eternity.

  Von Diehl bowed his head. Tzeentch the Great Mutator. Tzeentch the Changer of the Ways. “Willingly,” he said.

  Tzeentch, his chosen Power of Chaos.

  You will serve me in your world. You know what it is that I wish, that I thrive upon.

  “I know.”

  Once more there was a flickering in the air and the smell of ozone. The steed reappeared in the tiny cellar chamber, a glowing disc of light within the pentagram. This time it bore two riders, one standing, the other slumped at his feet.

  Lothar von Diehl stepped down from the daemon-steed. The secret chamber was just as he had left it. The Book of Changes still rested on the lectern, open to the page upon which Giles de Courcy had inscribed the secret of the ultimate ritual, the secret von Diehl had felt it wise to share only partially with his tutor.

  In his mind, the memory of the ocean of knowledge still glittered. He had glimpsed at least some of what was to be. Change was coming to the Old World. Elves returning from their long exile in the west, eager for trade, disrupting the nations of men. The Empire itself about to totter as, tempted by that elven trade, its wealthiest province sought to secede from its rule. And a hint, a deep darkness growing in the north. The ancient paths. A shroud removed, to be replaced by the bloodied fog of conflict.

  A truly moment for magic to take its place upon the battlefield, to become a weapon of war for the first time in recorded human history.

  Von Diehl laughed aloud. The battle magic spells were in his mind now, knowledge Lord Tzeentch had granted to him. He would have a considerable part to play in the events that were to come.

  Change.

  This was what Tzeentch, the Great Mutator desired—what any true servant of Tzeentch craved more than life itself. And outside this chamber was an entire world, crying out for change. Eager to begin his master’s work, von Diehl strode for the door.

  Behind him, sprawled across the pentagram, Gerhardt Kleinhoffer raised a thin hand. Pure madness gleamed in his eyes.

  “Seas of lost souls,” he mumbled as the door closed on his departing pupil. “False heavens, false hells. All is change and the dreams of Dark Gods.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Dan Abnett

  Dan Abnett lives in Kent, England. Well known for his comic work, he has written everything from the Mr. Men to the X-Men in the last decade. His work for the Black Library includes the popular comic strips Lone Wolves, Titan and Inquisitor Ascendant, the best-selling Gaunt�
�s Ghosts novels, and the acclaimed Inquisitor Eisenhorn trilogy.

  Mark Brendan

  Mark Brendan was immersed in his Bumper Book of Black Magic from an early age, and nowadays his writings are considered by many to be “a shame, a caution and an eldritch horror”. He lives in Yorkshire.

  Ben Chessell

  Ben lives in the near-Arctic climate of South Australia. He writes one-liners for White Wolf Publishing and Chaosium Inc. He is an avid gamer, and enjoys roleplaying and the Games Workshop game of fantasy football, Blood Bowl.

  Brian Craig

  Brian Craig is the author of the three Tales of Orfeo—Zaragoz, Plague Daemon and Storm Warriors—and The Wine of Dreams, as well as the Warhammer 40,000 novel Pawns of Chaos. He has contributed short stories to a range of anthologies, including the Dedalus Book of Femme Fatales, edited by Brian Stableford.

  Robert Earl

  Robert Earl graduated from Keele University in 1994, after which he started a career in sales. Three years later though, he’d had more than enough of that and since then he has been working, living and travelling in the Balkans and the Middle East. Robert currently lives in the UK.

  Jonathan Green

  Jonathan Green has been a freelance writer for nearly fifteen years. His work for the Black Library includes a string of short stories for Inferno! magazine and six novels. Jonathan works as a full-rime teacher in West London.

  Darius Hinks

  After a music career so disastrous it landed him in court, Darius Hinks decided a career in publishing might be safer. He secured himself a position working for the Black Library and over the last five years has written several short stories and the Warhammer background book, The Witch Hunter’s Handbook.