Gotrek & Felix- the Third Omnibus - William King & Nathan Long

by Warhammer

  Felix wondered at their luck. Why had they encountered no resistance? Why were the Chaos warriors concentrating on the greenskins? An answer immediately struck him. They were the greater threat. They were, after all, a huge army compared to this small band. Perhaps the Chaos warlords had failed to notice the humans in their midst. If that was the case, Felix thought, it would only be a matter of time before they rectified this oversight.

  His premonition proved true, not a hundred strides from where he had it. The elf led them off the massive balcony along which they marched and into a huge chamber containing more strange pillars. These ones glowed with an eerie green light. Felix could almost sense the power flowing through them. The massive runes glowed along their length. From an entrance at the other end of the chamber, a horde of beastmen suddenly emerged. At their head was a black armoured Chaos warrior on whose chest blazed a glowing Eye of Chaos symbol.

  At the sight of the interlopers, the beastmen howled challenges and prayers to their dark gods and threw themselves forward. The warriors of Albion leapt to meet them breast to breast. Within moments a mad melee swirled among the pillars.

  ‘Stay close,’ said Teclis. ‘We cannot afford to get pinned down here. Time is getting very short.’

  ‘So is my patience,’ said Gotrek. Even as he spoke, he hacked down a wolf-headed creature armed with a massive spear, and then split open a goat-head from gizzard to groin. Felix parried the blow of another goat-headed giant and then stabbed over its spear with the tip of his sword. The creature shrieked as it leapt away to avoid being spitted. Its back came into contact with one of the glowing pillars. Immediately, its shrieks intensified and a terrible smell of burning flesh filled the air. As it toppled forward, Felix could see its shoulders and spine were blackened, charred meat. He almost felt like he was putting the thing out of its agony when he cut it down.

  Gotrek and Teclis pushed forward, dwarfish axe and elvish blade flickered in unison. Felix could see that Teclis was more than a match for even a master human swordsman, but his prowess fell far short of the dwarf’s. For every one beastman the elf cut down, the Slayer hewed down four. Still, Felix thought, for an effete wizard, the elf was not doing at all badly. Every now and again, he stopped and spoke a word of power and gestured. A bolt of energy lashed from his staff to disintegrate his foes.

  The three of them formed a spearhead behind which the warriors of Albion chopped their way through their inhuman foes. The dwarf and the elf were unstoppable at least by any power that currently opposed them. The folk of Albion were not quite so lucky. Even as Felix watched he saw the ranks around Bran thinning, clawed down by desperate beastmen. Murdo and Culum went to his aid, hewing their way through the monstrous ranks, bolstering up the hill-king’s guard and enabling them to fight their way free of the ruck. Gotrek and the Chaos warrior came into contact. For a few brief moments, starmetal axe clashed with hell-forged black steel, then the Chaos champion was down and his forces begun to retire in disarray.

  ‘Push on, push on,’ yelled Teclis. ‘We must get to the heart of the pyramid before it is too late.’

  Such was the urgency of his tone that not even Gotrek gainsaid him. Once more the pyramid shivered. The glow surrounding the rune-carved pillars grew so bright as to be almost dazzling and then swiftly faded. Where it touched, corpses or living, it burned. Felix hurried on, sensing the elf’s desperation and not liking the thought of finding its cause one little bit.

  The deeper they penetrated into the pyramid, the more difficulty Teclis had in keeping them concealed from spells of prying and warding. Once already his concentration had faltered and they had been seen by the orc shaman. The flows of magical energy were becoming chaotic, partially from the invocation of the powers centred on the temple and partially from the vast surges being unleashed by greenskin shamans and Chaos warlocks. The latter were tiny changes compared to the former, but under such conditions, they introduced uncertainties into the matrix.

  Each casting was like a tiny grain of sand shifting in a desert. Of itself it was nothing, but the tiniest piece of extra weight and pressure it created could cause a whole dune to tremble and fall into a new pattern. So it was here. Perhaps one day, if he lived, he would set his theories about this to paper. At the moment, he had other concerns.

  In order to avoid contributing to the maelstrom, he was drawing on the power contained in the staff, and his own personal energies and these were tiring in the extreme. He possessed certain powdered roots and herbs that would aid him, but preferred not to use them unless he absolutely must. The price to be paid for renewed energy was a loss of concentration and intellectual sharpness, and at the moment, he needed all his wits about him.

  His force was too small to risk it being caught up in another melee. Time was growing short. He needed to find the safest path to the heart of this labyrinth and confront the sorcerers at work there, and he needed the blades of the men and dwarf to shield him. He knew he was going to have to risk a spell of his own, and trust to the fact that any other mage present was most likely too caught up in the intricacies of battle magic to notice something as subtle as he was going to attempt.

  He gestured for the others to wait, closed his eyes and murmured the spell of All Seeing. At first, as always, there was no change, then slowly the frontiers of his perception began to expand outwards like a slowly inflating bubble. Suddenly he was able to stand outside himself and look down, seeing in three hundred and sixty degrees. He felt dizzy as his mind struggled to adjust to perceptions it had never been intended to deal with, to see things from a perspective no mortal normally viewed from. Had it not been for decades of practice and the discipline of centuries he doubted he could have done so. As far as he knew no human had ever achieved the mental flexibility needed to perform this ritual without the use of potent hallucinogenic drugs. Even then, he doubted the spell was very useful to them. Only elves it seemed could perform this, and the Old Ones who had taught them it, of course. Perhaps the slann could as well, but who could tell what that strange batrachian race were capable of?

  He realised that he was becoming distracted, as his mind sought to escape the pressure to which he was subjecting it. He breathed deeply, stilled his racing heart with a thought and let his consciousness continue to balloon.

  He became aware of all the corridors radiating away from his current position. He saw most were empty, but that in some beastmen raced and orcs moved stealthily. It seemed that nearby the battle for the pyramid had reached a new phase, of stealthy stalking, as each side sought to take the other by surprise. Outwards his perceptions raced like the ripples from a dropped stone racing towards the edge of a dark still pool.

  He saw pockets of savage conflict where orc and beastman battled. He saw shamans cast spells with wands of bone and warlocks respond with spells of subtle Tzeentchian intricacy. He felt the tearing of the fabric of reality these caused like a pain inside his skull.

  Onwards and outwards his vision ranged until he saw the whole pyramid as a vast seething ant-heap of violence and conflict filled with hordes of monsters bent on doing each other harm. He saw huge trolls and monstrous dragon-ogres. He saw bizarre limbless pit-bred monsters, all mouth and eyes, bouncing into battle with shrieking goblins on their backs. He saw harpies flap among the galleries and descend on bellowing black orcs to claw at their eyes with razor-sharp talons.

  There was much he could not see. Certain areas were shielded by strange runes. Others were blocked from his sight by dazzling swirls and flows of cosmic energy which blinded him when he attempted to concentrate on them. He forced his mind to drink in what it could and memorise what it must, and then he focused his attention on what he sought, the strange vast vortex of power that lurked deep in the heart of this mad structure.

  This part was easy. His attention was drawn to it like a moth to a flame or a drowning swimmer to the centre of a whirlpool. He saw the spells of warding set up to protect it. They were potent and strong but they lacked the subtlety and pow
er of the slann wards. With luck and skill and concentration he could avoid them. He sent his consciousness flowing along the intricate patterns, avoiding the mystical tripwires and pitfalls, trying not to set off any of the alarms. It felt like agonisingly slow, painful work, but he knew that in reality he was still caught in the moment between one heartbeat and another. In passing he saw the warriors who waited at the centre and the huge thing that stalked the heart of the pyramid, he sensed its primordial rage and hunger. Then at last his mind found what it sought: the central chamber, the heart of the madness, the place where the power flowed out of the world beyond and into the mortal realm.

  He saw a massive structure that somehow suggested a sacrificial altar slicked with blood and the controls of some intricate machine. He saw the piles of corpses that had been offered up to the gods alone knew what. He saw giant pillars at either end of the hall through which all the condensed and collected magical energy was focused, and he saw the vast and intricate web of forces that radiated out from this place and into hundreds of others. Here was one of the great nexi of the Paths of the Old Ones, perhaps the greatest, save for that vast abyss that gaped at the northern pole.

  He could see now where all the Chaos warriors and beastmen were coming from. They were entering through the Paths of the Old Ones and emerging here. Even as he watched, a burst of energy told him of the arrival of another warband. He watched them immediately take orders from the wizards who controlled this place, and race outwards to do battle.

  Here then, at last, were the beings who had worked to open this place – near identical albino twins of vulpine aspect. One was clad in spun gold and the other in deepest black. He could sense at once that they were mages of vast dark power. Something linked them, a tie of blood and magic that reminded him of the one that linked himself and his twin, only greater. He sensed their malice and glee as they worked and realised that they were in no sense sane. They did not care if they destroyed this island or this world. Perhaps they would be glad. There was no way he could persuade them to stop, so that slim chance was gone. Two such as these were going to have to be overcome by force. He only hoped he possessed enough to do the work.

  Even as he watched he could see that one of them was working spells similar to his own to guide the forces of Chaos against the orcs. The other supervised the engine at the chamber’s heart, seemingly unaware or unconcerned that he had woken forces beyond his power to control.

  Teclis cancelled his spell and his consciousness immediately flowed back into the vessel that was his body. He shook his head and checked the spells of concealment he had laid over the party. Now more than ever they were needed. If one of those mages sensed them before they reached the innermost sanctum, he could throw enough of the Chaos warriors and beastmen forward to overwhelm them. He believed that his weaves were tight and effective. At the moment his greatest fear was that they would be reported to the wizards by one of their lackeys. Against that, haste was the only defence.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Zarkhul pushed on into the heart of the pyramid. He led his bodyguard out into this, the heart of the largest ziggurat. He was close to his goal. Soon he and his warriors would slay the interlopers who defiled the temple. They would cleanse this place in blood. He summoned the spirit power of his people and his gods and brought his blessing down on his warriors. Now, he thought, there would be a reckoning.

  Kelmain sensed a disturbance in the wards. He thought he had sensed one before but he had not been sure. The tides of power here were so turbulent that it had been hard to tell. This was different. This bore the imprint of greenskin magic and it was close, very close and immensely powerful. Somehow it seemed the orcs had found their way into the heart of the city. There were too many of them to be resisted, at least until reinforcements could be summoned. They needed time to calm the seething energies of the paths and bring them back under control, then once more they could summon aid. He needed all his remaining forces here to guard the Chamber of Secrets until that could happen. He cast the spell of summoning that would draw Magrig to him.

  Felix gasped for breath. The elf had led them at a fast trot through the labyrinth. Felix was not sure how he found his path and kept to it, but it seemed to be working. As they descended into the depths, they managed to avoid any more marauding bands of beastmen or orcs. Their way was clear. From the pressure in his head, he could tell they were getting closer and closer to their goal. Powerful evil magic was at work.

  From up ahead now, he could see a strange pulsing glow. It blazed brighter then receded almost to invisibility. More than ever he felt like a bug crawling through the chambers of some huge creature’s house. The scale of the corridors was oppressive. Large enough for even the dead giant to have moved through. What had been brought here, he wondered? Why did these ways need to be so large? Had the Old Ones brought ships down here? Or were they giants themselves? So many questions and so few answers.

  Suddenly from close by, he heard the sound of insane enraged bellowing so loud that it was almost earsplitting, and so terrifying he almost froze on the spot. Only a creature far larger than a man could have made that much noise. Only a giant. Moreover, even as he listened the screaming came closer, bringing with it the sounds of battle.

  Felix exchanged looks with Gotrek and Teclis. They knew what was coming too. The elf looked calm. Gotrek looked angry. His beard bristled and he ran his thumb along the blade of his axe until a bead of blood showed. The men of Albion looked poised for flight. This horror looked like it might prove the final one for their shattered nerves. They looked ready to break and run in a moment.

  What happened next happened almost too quickly for the mind to comprehend. A huge shadow appeared far down the passageway, blocking out the ceiling lights with its bulk. From all around it came a whirlwind of screams and war-cries. These seemed like the reedy piping of swamp birds compared to the bellowing of the huge monster.

  Carried by its huge stride the giant was on them almost before they could react. Felix got a quick glance of the thing. It had once looked like a man, but that time had been long ago. Now it was warped hideously. Its proportions were almost dwarf-like. Its shoulders were immensely huge. Its legs like the boles of massive trees. The comparison was an easy one to make, for in one hand it held a club that was little more than the branch-stripped remains of a tree. But it was the face that Felix would remember in his nightmares.

  Once perhaps, it had borne the features of a nobly proportioned man, albeit one with a monumentally huge jaw. Now those features had run like melted wax, so that flabby jowls hung down almost to the creature’s chest. Idiot fury and pain filled its one good eye. Drool dribbled from between teeth the size of tombstones. The smell was appalling. It reeked like a legion of beggars who had spent all day trawling through a sewer for the vilest refuse. Felix started to gag.

  All around the creature were orcs and Chaos warriors, fighting with it and each other. The giant did not care. It lashed out with its club, reducing them to jelly-like smears. The force of its blows was irresistible. One would have been enough to smash a warship to flinders. As it moved, it stamped on the small creatures surrounding it, like a man might crush vermin underfoot.

  It took them in with one glance, casually smashed a dozen of the men of Albion to paste and passed on into the depths of the pyramid, leaving them trapped in the furious melee.

  ‘Quickly,’ said Teclis. ‘We must follow it.’

  ‘You’re joking,’ said Felix, blocking the blow of a massive orc, a second before Gotrek’s axe chopped it in two.

  The elf shook its head. ‘It is heading into the depths to the axis of power. It is being drawn there or summoned.’

  ‘Summoned?’ said Felix. ‘What could summon that?’

  ‘I do not know,’ said Teclis. ‘But I am sure we will find out.’

  Even as the elf spoke, the dwarf surged past him, hewing frantically, desperate it seemed to get on the trail of a monster worthy of guaranteeing his doom.<
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  Felix followed. There was nothing else to do.

  And so they came to the heart of the temple, to the secret chambers where the ancient engines of the Old Ones had been reactivated by the dark sorcery of Chaos. They emerged into a huge chamber where a dozen portals had opened. Through two of them emerged the warriors of Chaos, beastmen, minotaurs, harpies, iron-collared daemonic hounds, all the nightmare creatures Felix had hoped never to meet again. All around them were piles of dead bodies, both greenskin and beastman.

  Standing atop a huge altar were Kelmain and Lhoigor. One of them manipulated the energies by passing his hands over the controls of the ancient machines. The other appeared to be frozen. The giant loomed before him, listening to the seductive voice of evil. Immediately Felix saw why the creature had been summoned. Hordes of greenskins flowed through several other entrances to the huge chamber, enough to overcome even those temporarily guarding it. How they had got there Felix had no idea, but according to the men of Albion the greenskins had been at home here for centuries before being driven out, so perhaps they knew some secret way. Not that it mattered. It looked like he and his companions were going to be caught between the hammer of Chaos and the anvil of orcdom. There were thousands of foes in this chamber, and two of the deadliest sorcerers he had ever seen along with their enthralled gigantic servitor. He offered up a last prayer to Sigmar. He knew he was not going to survive this.

  Even as the thought passed through his mind, the walls shook. The runes along the walls glittered. The face of Lhoigor twisted as he tried to control the mystical backlash. Even to Felix’s untrained eye, it was obvious that he was not able to do it.

  Suddenly he understood what was going on and why there were so few Chaos warriors. The mages had unleashed forces they could not control. Through the open portals, Felix could see a seething sea of energy. It was slowly advancing through the portals, as inexorable and irresistible as lava. There would be no more reinforcements from the Chaos Wastes, Felix realised. They had most likely been swallowed by raw stuff of Chaos that flowed within the paths. He could not find any sympathy in himself for such creatures.