by Warhammer
‘I do not know, elf. Nor do I wish to speculate further.’
‘As you wish,’ said the elf. ‘I will tell the others to get some rest. They will need all their strength for the morrow.’
The path wound down the far side of the mountains, into the hidden valleys. They all moved cautiously, not quite believing that the elf’s spells shielded them as he claimed. They had not seen any orcs this morning, but you never knew.
‘Are you sure your magic is working?’ Felix asked. ‘I can see no difference.’
The elf gave him a strained smile. ‘You are within the ambit of the spell.’
‘How does it work?’
‘It misdirects prying eyes and divinatory magic. Only if someone comes within a dozen strides of us will they notice us. Now if you please, until we are under cover of the trees, I must concentrate on maintaining it.’
As they moved, Felix noticed a change in their surroundings. The air was warmer and there was a foul putrid scent to it, worse than any decay he had smelled back in the swamp. As they descended, it became wetter and there was more vegetation. At first only a few gnarled black trees clung to the mountainside with their roots intermingled with the stone and soil. These proved only to be the first sentries of a vast army of vegetation, a horde of mighty trees and bushes. None of them looked remotely normal. Fungus blighted their branches. Creepers strangled them like serpents. Strange animals scampered along their huge boles. Enormous glistening spiderwebs caught the dim sunlight. Felix felt no urge to see the creatures that had spun them.
Gotrek looked upon them and spat. ‘I hate trees almost as much as I hate elves.’
Teclis laughed. ‘What have trees ever done to you, Gotrek Gurnisson?’ he asked. Felix wondered if the elf liked living dangerously. The Slayer was not someone you provoked lightly.
Gotrek glared back. The men of Carn Mallog moved silently now. A few had shucked their furs as the heat increased. Bran moved alongside Murdo and Siobhain. A faint sheen of perspiration glistened on his face. He looked nervous and slightly shifty. Whatever he might once have thought, it was obvious that he did not like the idea of going any further into this corrupt place. Felix could not say he blamed him, for he had finally recognised the faint tingling brimstone taste in the air.
‘Warpstone,’ he murmured. ‘This is not good.’
‘You are correct, Felix Jaeger,’ said Teclis. ‘It is indeed the bane of the ancients.’
Felix looked at the elf. For once, he knew he was in the presence of someone who could answer his questions, and unlike the Slayer, who seemed to enjoy lecturing. ‘What is warpstone?’ he asked, aware that he was not the only one listening. His question seemed to have gotten everyone’s attention.
‘The raw stuff of Chaos,’ said Teclis. ‘Solidified, congealed, distilled, some combination of all three. It is the pure product of dark magic.’
‘I saw a skaven once consume the stuff,’ said Felix.
‘Then it was a most unusual skaven, for warpstone is very poisonous even to mutants such as the ratmen. I have read that some of the Grey Seers can absorb quantities of a refined form and draw energy from it. If so, I cannot imagine that they would remain sane or healthy for very long, although their sorcerous power would be immense.’
Felix thought of the ratman sorcerer he and Gotrek had so often encountered. The elf’s description would easily fit such a creature.
‘Warpstone comes from Morrsleib, the Chaos moon,’ said Murdo. ‘Chunks of it break off and fall to earth in great meteor showers. Such showers regularly land on Albion. Something seems to draw them. Perhaps the stone rings. Perhaps that is their purpose.’
‘I do not think so,’ said Teclis, but seeing the look of vexation on the old man’s face, he corrected himself. ‘Let me rephrase that. I believe that Morrsleib may well be made of warpstone, and certainly such meteor showers as you describe have been corroborated by many elvish chroniclers, but I do not believe Morrsleib is the sole source of warpstone. It is merely a huge, strange astronomical phenomenon. And I do not believe the stone rings were made to attract the meteors, although they may well do so. I believe they have another function.’
‘You could well be right,’ said Murdo, obviously not wanting to argue with the elf.
‘This is all very interesting,’ said Felix, ‘but I am rather more concerned with the effects that the stuff may have on us.’
‘There are only minute traces in the air,’ said Teclis. ‘And one way or another, I doubt we are going to be here long enough for it to have much effect on us.’
‘That’s very reassuring,’ said Felix. He resisted the urge to point out that while the elf was most likely protected by his magic, the rest of them were not.
The path wound lower down the mountainside. The foliage surrounding them thickened. From the undergrowth came many strange grunts and snuffles and the sounds of huge beasts moving among the branches. Bran’s warriors became visibly more nervous. The tension increased. Gotrek’s head swung from side to side as he scanned the undergrowth for threats.
‘I can see why the giant became corrupt,’ said Teclis, ‘if this was his dwelling place. A thousand years here would warp anybody’s mind.’
‘If their mind was not already warped to start with,’ said Gotrek pointedly.
‘His physical form may well have mutated as well,’ said the elf, ignoring the Slayer.
‘In what way?’ Felix asked, his mouth suddenly dry.
‘He will most likely be larger and bear many stigmata of Chaos. He may possess many mutations that will make him harder to kill.’
Felix thought about the troll he and Gotrek had once fought beneath the ruins of Karag Eight Peaks. Someone had chained a bit of warpstone around its neck, and all of the things the elf had described had happened to it. Felix wondered at the depth of the wizard’s knowledge. He seemed to know a lot about many things. I suppose it’s one of the advantages of living for centuries and being a powerful sorcerer, he thought. It would be something worth noting when he came to write his chronicle of the Slayer’s adventures, though. Some scholars would be willing to pay for that sort of information alone, although Felix was not sure he wanted his work to interest those sorts of people. It made the book of interest to witch hunters and the Imperial censors too. Perhaps he would just leave it out then, he thought.
The thin layer of earth covering the rocky path thickened as they descended into the valley, and as it did so it transmuted into a horrible blackish-brown mud that clung to Felix’s boots and made sucking sounds as he raised his feet to walk. Something wet and slimy touched his face. He shuddered, thinking of the fingers of drowned men or the tentacles of some particularly obnoxious monster. Instead he saw it was only a creeper dangling from the branches above. The branches arched overhead now, forming a passageway through the dense forest that surrounded them. Felix marvelled at the change in environment. Only a few hours ago they had been shivering on the misty heights. Now they were in a warm near-jungle that reminded him of tales about the Dark Continent he had read as a youth. The silence deepened. He could hear his own breathing. He felt certain that something terrible was about to happen.
The long moments drew themselves out, slow as slugs sliding their way down a wall. He let out a long breath, filled with his own sense of relief. He walked forward and found himself on the edge of a huge puddle filled with brown and muddy water. The edges of the earth came up like those of a cup to hold it, and there was something obscurely familiar about the shape.
He shook his head wondering why a massive outline seen here in the wild back country of Albion should seem familiar to a city boy from Altdorf. Slowly the realisation filtered into his brain, slowly the enormity of what he was seeing descended onto his mind. He told himself that it could not be so. It was merely random chance that had caused the pattern to look as it did.
‘It is a footprint,’ said Teclis.
‘Aye,’ said Gotrek with a certain grim satisfaction. ‘That it is.’
‘And what’s your point, manling?’ Felix considered what he had just said, realising that he did not want to believe that anything so huge could walk the earth clothed in the shape of a man. On the other hand, just because he feared an encounter with such a creature did not mean it could not exist. In the past he had encountered many huge monsters, why not a giant?
He tried to remember whether any of the noises they had heard earlier might have been the tread of such a monster. How could he tell? What was the point of speculating? Instead he considered the thought of encountering such a creature, trying to scale the thing in his mind. At best he would come up to its calf. Striking it with his sword would be like a child attacking him with a pin. It could lift him one-handed, take off his head with one bite. Hastily dismissing the image from his mind, he turned to Teclis and said; ‘I hope you know some spells for controlling giants?’
‘The giants of Albion are wilful creatures, and very resistant to magic, so it is said.’
‘And yet these Chaos mages control one.’
‘Perhaps those reports are incorrect. Perhaps the creature is pacted to Chaos. Perhaps they have access to spells I do not, Felix Jaeger. I am one of the greatest of wizards, it’s true, but I do not know everything.’
‘This is a historic moment,’ sneered Gotrek. ‘Perhaps the first time in recorded history an elf has ever admitted that. Be sure to make a record of that, manling.’
‘Be sure to make a record of everything,’ said Teclis. ‘If you survive.’
Somewhere in the distance, something huge bellowed. The cry was answered by the sound of horns and drums.
‘Not just giants, it seems,’ said Teclis. ‘It sounds like orcs and goblins as well.’
‘That’s reassuring,’ said Felix, as they pushed along the path.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The path ran on and on through the stinking forest. The mud grew thicker, but no more massive tracks were visible, a thing for which Felix was profoundly grateful. Instead the forest became more blighted, the trees more twisted, the animals more mutated. A deer with two heads came into view. Spiders big as a man’s fist and shimmering like jewels scuttled overhead. They forded a stream of blackish water in which faint glowing particles were visible. Felix guessed that the water here was contaminated with warpstone. His fear was confirmed when Teclis said, ‘Pass the word: do not drink of the water or eat anything found here, no matter how edible it might look.’
‘I don’t think anybody needed to be told that,’ said Gotrek.
‘You can never be too careful,’ said the elf. For once the dwarf did not disagree. The air became thicker and more oppressive with the sort of feel to it that often presages a storm. Suddenly Felix felt nostalgia for the clean air and cold rain of the mountains. He leapt from rock to rock across the ford, not wanting that tainted water to touch even his boots. What are you scared of, he asked himself? Mutated boots? The thought did not seem very funny. He had heard of stranger things in the haunted city of Praag. He cursed to all the gods. It seemed to be his destiny to visit all the worst places in the world. Just once he wished Gotrek’s quest would take them to the harem of the Sheik of Araby or the Palace of the Emperor. The way our luck runs, he thought, we would find them overrun with mutants or inhabited by evil mages.
Rain began to fall. It was warmer than mountain rain, and Felix did not like the way it touched his skin. Many of the drops had been filtered through the leaves and branches of those noxious gnarled trees. The gods alone knew what poisons they might contain.
He glanced again. Overhead he thought he caught the glitter of saucer-like eyes. He concentrated. Among the blotched green, he caught sight of a hideous snaggle-toothed face. Before he could say a word, a spear flashed out and smashed into it and a goblin corpse splashed down into the sucking mud.
‘I wonder how many more like that there are around here?’ he said. Siobhain retrieved her spear from the corpse. The warriors of Albion moved on. Felix had visions of wild-eyed goblin tribesmen peering from the murky undergrowth. It did nothing to improve his mood.
He forced himself to consider what was going on here. It seemed that they were not the only ones with an interest in the Temple of the Old Ones. Did the orcs intend to seize it for their own use, or was there something more sinister afoot?
Teclis shook his head. ‘I can see I will have to swathe us in the cloak of unseeing once more,’ he said.
‘Don’t strain yourself, elf,’ said Gotrek.
The last battered survivors of Gurag’s orcs limped into Zarkhul’s camp. He looked at their crestfallen leader. Kur was his name.
‘What happened?’
‘Gurag was killed by the elf. They made it past us. They are in the valley. They march on the temple.’
Was this the sign he had been waiting for, Zarkhul wondered? Perhaps. All of the tribes were gathered now, they had returned from capturing the stone rings and the shamans had harvested their power. Now seemed as good a time as any for the attack.
‘Get your swords out! You can prove your courage to us all. We are going into the city!’
A great roar arose from the gathered horde as his words spread like magic through their ranks. He was certain that even the most distant clans cried with one voice as they responded to his order. At such times as this the orcs would act as one body, could be wielded as one sword, and he was their leader.
Ahead of them lay the brow of the hill. Felix, Gotrek, Teclis and Murdo made their way up to the crest. They kept to the shadow of the trees and moved quietly although how anything might hear them over the constant lashing of the rain eluded him. At the brow of the hill, they could see that below them, the land cleared. It was wild, open and rocky all the way down to where the temple stood.
The nearest ziggurat was as large as a hill, Felix realised. The temple complex covered an area as large as many human cities. Perhaps only the massive sprawl of Altdorf was larger among all the places he had visited. Over it hung an aura of immense antiquity and strangeness. He could easily believe that no human being had built this place, nor any being remotely man-like such as an elf or a dwarf. Huge glyphs were embedded in the sides; they were rectangular, right-angled mazes which somehow seemed to draw the eye into them. He had to fight to break his gaze away, to keep it from following the patterns. He felt that if he did so, all the way to the end, he might be gifted with strange cosmic insights, but they were not things he wanted. To understand those runes, he felt, might be to leave humanity and sanity behind.
A thought struck him. ‘Maps,’ he said.
‘What, manling?’ said Gotrek.
‘The runes are maps, of the paths, or of the structure of the paths, or something to do with the…’ he let his sentence drag to an end lamely. He realised he must sound like a madman to the others.
‘Perhaps you are right,’ said the elf. ‘It’s an interesting theory. Or perhaps they are wards. Symbols can bear within themselves representations of spells. They are patterns of mystical force. Dwarfish rune magic works in this way, I believe.’
‘Believe what you like,’ said Gotrek. ‘But this is getting us no closer to our goal.’
As if in answer to his words, the ziggurats shook. ‘And we are running out of time,’ said Teclis. ‘The power within is starting to run out of control.’
‘We go in?’ said Felix.
‘We go in,’ the others agreed. As they spoke, drums thundered around the valley. The orcs too appeared to have come to a decision. Murdo returned and spoke to his men, Bran to his. The maiden-guard hefted their spears and made ready.
Before they knew it, all were engaged in a wild rush downhill, running as fast as they could, using the rocks for cover. Felix was not sure why they did so. Some in
stinct made them want to cover that open ground as swiftly as possible. The walls of the ancient temple held no promise of shelter or safety and yet somehow they seemed preferable to being caught exposed in the open.
Just the sight of one man running was enough to get the whole nervous crew moving. As they approached the great stone structures he felt as if he was somehow being watched by some vast implacable presence within the temple of the Old Ones, and he wanted more than anything to get himself out from under its gaze as quickly as possible.
He felt almost relieved when he set foot on the first ramp leading up the side of the pyramid. He felt less than relieved when he looked behind him. The whole forest on the hills surrounding the pyramid was suddenly alive with orcs. They emerged from the vile woods in their thousands, whooping and chanting. What have we disturbed here, Felix wondered, knowing that there was no turning back? Against so many there was no chance of returning. Even as they watched, the orcish horde began to rumble downhill, moving with the irresistible force of an avalanche. Perhaps it was the gaze of the orcs we felt, he thought, but knew he was wrong.
‘There’s a doom for you,’ he said to Gotrek, gesturing back towards the mighty horde.
‘My doom lies within this pyramid,’ said Gotrek, his eyes fixed on the elf’s back. Felix was not exactly sure what he meant by that, but it reassured him even less than the sight of all those orcs.
‘What now?’ he asked Teclis.
‘Inside,’ he said. ‘We are close to the locus of all this power, I can sense it. Our quest is almost over.’
The battle-cries of the greenskins rose behind them. ‘One way or another, I think you are right,’ Felix said.
Felix gauged the size of the archway under which they passed. It was ten times the height of a man, large enough to let the giants of his imagination pass through. Wonderful, he thought. As if there was not enough to worry about already.
The place was lit by odd green lights set in the ceiling. They reminded Felix of the ones he had seen in the Paths of the Old Ones. The stonework too was reminiscent of that at the entrance to the paths, although on a far more heroic scale. Why had the mysterious Old Ones felt the need to built roadways so big here? What was it they had taken through from Albion that was so large? Or was his imagination simply too prosaic for the subject? Perhaps the arches were so huge for a completely different purpose. Perhaps there was some mystical significance to their size, shape and form that he simply could not grasp. Perhaps they were part of some sort of rune that could only be read by a god. Not that it mattered much at this hour, Felix thought. If those orcs get their claws on us, all such speculation will be ended. Filled with trepidation, he passed under the arch and into the vast gloomy corridors beyond.