by Warhammer
‘Impetuous youth,’ Halgar mumbled from his seat on the rock, puffing smoke rings agitatedly. ‘Beardlings,’ he muttered, despite Rorek’s gnarled leather skin and broad beard making him at least a hundred, ‘no respect for tradition.’
It took Rorek almost an hour to climb the two hundred and twenty feet to reach the edge of the parapet. By the time he did, the sun had all but faded in the sky as the engineer scrambled over it. Rorek gave a short wave to indicate his success and then disappeared from view. All the dwarfs could do now was wait for Rorek to try and open the gate.
‘I have travelled far to reach the hold of my kinsdwarf,’ Uthor remarked, ‘but to venture from the Vaults, across Black Fire Pass no less, that is indeed a perilous journey and Redmane, to my understanding, was not your clan brother.’
The dwarfs had set up camp outside the gate upon the roadway, far enough from the edge of the mountains to ensure they were not surprised by a grobi ambush or unknowingly preyed upon by some other beast. Like the rest of their kin, they had little need for shelter, hardy enough to weather even the harshest conditions, though the lack of a roof, together with several tons of rock, above their heads was a little unsettling.
Uthor sat facing Lokki. Both dwarfs had their weapons laid in front of them, their hands locked around stout tankards, and were seated on their shields. They had made a small fire, surrounded by a thick belt of stones. If they were to attract the attention of grobi, they would do so with or without the flames in their midst. Besides, greenskins hated fire, as did many other denizens of the night – it would be a useful weapon, if it came to it.
The dwarfs were arranged so each could look over the shoulder of the other at the high crags into which the main gate of Karak Varn was wedged, should any threat present itself.
‘Halgar and I...’ Lokki began, looking towards his venerable mentor. Halgar was nearby, and sat unmoving on the rock, his eyes fixed forward, unblinking. His hands were sat upon his lap, restfully. Uthor followed Lokki’s gaze and saw the statuesque longbeard for himself.
‘He bears many scars,’ he said, noting the lack of fingers on Halgar’s right hand.
‘He lost them long ago, but won’t speak of how. At least he never has to me,’ Lokki told him.
‘Is he… all right?’ said Uthor, a hint of concern in his voice as he continued to regard the still form of Halgar.
‘He’s sleeping,’ Lokki explained with a thin smile.
‘With his eyes open?’
‘Grobi will as sure as kill you in your bed as on the battlefield, he always taught me,’ said Lokki.
‘Truly, the wise have much to teach us.’ Uthor nodded his deepest respect in the direction of the slumbering longbeard.
‘Halgar and I,’ Lokki tried again, once he had Uthor’s attention, ‘are here on a debt of honour,’ he explained. ‘Almost nine hundred years ago, during the War of Vengeance, Kromkaz Vargasson, my ancestor and grandsire of Halgar, was ambushed on the way to Oeragor by a band of elf rangers.’
At the mention of elves, Uthor hawked a great gobbet of phlegm into the fire where it sizzled briefly.
‘The elves were swift and cunning,’ Lokki continued, the glow of the fire casting his face in increasing shadows with the gradual onset of night. ‘Four of Kromkaz’s kin lay dead before a shield was raised, an axe drawn, and yet still more fell,’ Lokki went on, repeating by rote the tale that Halgar had taught him. ‘Hiding behind their bows, they herded Kromkaz and his warriors into a narrow defile and my ancestor would surely have died – he and his warriors – were it not for miners from Karak Varn. They emerged from a hidden tunnel, part of the Ungdrin road, at the ridge from where the elves had Kromkaz pinned. The miners, dwarfs of the Copperhand clan, fell upon the elves, chasing them from their hiding places. His foes revealed, Kromkaz ordered his warriors to attack and the elves were crushed. Kromkaz reached Oeragor that day. They fought alongside the Copperhand clan and witnessed Morgrim, cousin of Snorri, son of the High King, slay the elf lord Imladrik,’ Lokki said, and the reflected glare of the fire made his eyes seem as if they were ablaze. ‘We come to honour that debt, to repay the dwarfs of the Copperhand clan and the hold of Karak Varn.’
Uthor nodded solemnly, wiping a tear from his eye as he did so.
‘Great deeds,’ he said, his voice slightly choked. ‘Great and noble deeds.’
‘Ho there!’ the distant voice of Rorek broke the reverie.
The engineer was nowhere to be seen. Lokki and Uthor got to their feet, and took up their weapons and armour.
Halgar blinked once and was awake, the old dwarf standing up as if he’d never been asleep.
Uthor kicked out the fire and went over to stand expectantly beside Lokki and Halgar, outside the great gates.
‘About time,’ Uthor muttered. Halgar’s low grumblings were indiscernible, though Uthor thought he caught the word ‘wazzock’.
‘What are you doing stood over there?’ came the engineer’s voice again, echoing throughout the canyon.
This time all three turned in the direction of the sound. Still there was nothing. With Lokki leading them, the three dwarfs moved cautiously away from the great gate and towards where Rorek’s voice was coming from. Negotiating their way around the right-hand side of the gate, to where one of the long galleries of statues was arrayed, they saw Rorek’s head about fifty feet up and poking over a shallow lip of stone. Such was the ingenious geology – part natural, part dwarf-made – of the stone overhang that were it not for the fact that his voice had guided them and that his head was sticking out, the engineer would have been invisible.
‘Take this,’ he hollered from above and shortly afterwards a trail of rope came down to them.
One by one, the trio of dwarfs climbed up a stark, flat face of rock that got them to a short ledge from where Rorek’s seemingly disembodied head was watching them keenly.
When they found the engineer, he was sat inside a narrow, dank-looking tunnel. Only a dwarf, and one that was being particularly observant, would have been able to detect the opening. Stretched over the narrow ledge, Rorek was holding up an ironbound grate, thickly latticed and stained in brown and yellowish hues that were visible even in the fading light. A trail of darkly stained water, long since dried up, fed away from the opening into a shallow rut in the ledge and was carried in long streaks down a section of the rock face, away from the statues.
‘I have found our entrance,’ the engineer said proudly.
‘Wazzock!’ bawled Halgar, cresting the ledge. ‘You have found the tunnel to the latrine.’
Uthor wrinkled his nose when he noticed the concealed pit far beneath the grate.
Unperturbed, Rorek crept back from the ledge, retreating back into the tunnel to allow the others to pass. ‘I could not operate the mechanism to open the great gate, try as I might,’ he explained, ‘and this was the only other way in. I’ve disarmed any traps but you’ll have to duck, though.’
Lokki went in first, pausing for a moment at the mention of traps, but traversing the short ledge quickly. Halgar followed, grunting and muttering all the while. Uthor brought up the rear, gathering the engineer’s rope up after him and giving it back to Rorek, along with the rest of the engineer’s possessions.
The latrine grate slammed shut in their wake. Rorek bolted it shut from the inside, before ramming down a heavy-looking second gate. Three clockwise turns of a stylised, bronze ancestor face wrought into the wall completed the ritual and was accompanied by the dull retort of more, hidden, locks. ‘Just a short crawl to the outer gateway hall,’ the engineer said and started off down the narrow tunnel. It was disgusting; a long dark yellow stain ran down the middle of it and the walls of the tight space were encrusted with dried filth. The stink of it was palpable.
‘I have smelled urk less foul,’ Halgar grumbled again as the dwarfs set off after Rorek.
True to Rorek’s word, the dwarfs emerged from another iron grate into the outer gateway hall. It was a fairly spartan room, but
vast, designed to accommodate huge throngs of dwarfs as they entered from the main gate. Any nobles, craft guild masters or other notable dignitaries could then be received by the lord of the hold in the audience chamber that resided at the bottom of a lengthy stairway connecting it to the outer gateway hall.
‘This is how I found it,’ said the engineer. The chamber was deserted and barren save for a dwarf helmet resting forlornly on its side in the centre of the room. ‘Not mine,’ Rorek added.
‘Draw your weapons,’ Halgar growled, glancing first to the gate on the left and then to the gate on the right – beyond them were the barracks, where a throng’s warriors could be housed temporarily. Lastly, his gaze fell to the gate at the far wall, that which led to the stairway.
Axe in hand, shield raised, Lokki said, ‘We head for the audience chamber and make oaths to Grungni that we are not too late.’
Beyond the next gate the long stairway wended down into the darkness, great columns of stone carved with clan symbols and runes punctuating it. Though lit by hulking iron braziers set at regular intervals, the shadows cast upon the stairway were long and could hide any number of lurking dangers.
The dwarfs moved swiftly and in single file, two watching the left, and two the right, until they reached the entrance to the audience chamber.
‘Someone has been here before us,’ Lokki hissed, standing on one side of the double gate that was slightly ajar. Uthor quickly took up a position on the opposite side, axe in hand. Halgar and Rorek waited pensively behind them, ready to charge in.
‘Make ready,’ said Lokki.
Uthor nodded.
The two dwarfs thrust the door open and charged into the audience chamber, weapons drawn and bellowing war cries. When they saw the dwarf wearing the massive warhelm sitting at a long oval table, the merchant thane bedecked in fine velvet and the dishevelled looking creature huddled in the corner, counting silver spoons into a burgeoning pack, they stopped abruptly and were lost for words.
‘How long have you been waiting here?’ Lokki asked.
The dwarfs were seated around the wood table, carved of mountain oak and inlaid with intricate runic designs rendered in gold. Introductions had been made and it had been quickly established that they were all there for the same purpose: to attend a council of war at the behest of Kadrin Redmane, to discuss the best way to rid the nearby mountains of the gathering greenskin tribes.
‘Three weeks, is as near as I can reckon,’ said Gromrund, his eyes fierce behind the faceplate of his warhelm. He was the only dwarf not to have divested himself of his helmet – a fact Lokki was wise enough not to press.
‘And you have seen no one in that time?’ Uthor chipped in, leaning back in his stool as he lit up his pipe.
‘I ventured a look up the great stair and even explored two of the clan halls, but there was no one. I returned to the audience chamber and waited as I was bidden,’ Gromrund explained. ‘I had hoped to be received by Lord Redmane,’ he added.
Uthor flashed a glance at Lokki, who then turned to the hammerer.
‘Kadrin Redmane is dead, slain by urk, may he sit at the table of his ancestors,’ he said grimly. ‘Halgar and I found his remains on the Old Dwarf Road at the edge of Black Water. The four of us buried him and his companions in the earth, under the shadow of the karak.’
‘Remains?’ said the hammerer. ‘How can you be sure it was Kadrin Redmane?’
‘He wore this talisman,’ Uthor told him, holding it aloft in the light cast by the torches in the room.
‘Dreng tromm,’ Gromrund muttered, bowing his head, momentarily lost in his thoughts. ‘Then we are too late,’ he said, grimly meeting Lokki’s gaze.
‘Many years too–’
‘Quiet!’ Halgar cut Lokki off before he could speak.
The sudden outburst spooked Drimbold, who dropped a gilded comb that he was using to preen the gibil from out of his beard.
Hakem’s expression showed that he recognised it, but before he could take it up with the Grey dwarf, Halgar was on his feet and stalking to the back of the room. He edged towards a stone statue of Grungni set upon a large octagonal base, axe in hand. Lokki followed him, knowing by now to always trust the longbeard’s instincts. Rorek waited just behind him and readied his crossbow. Uthor went the other way around the table, Gromrund right at his back.
‘What is that stench?’ the hammerer whispered, sniffing at the air.
‘It matters not,’ Uthor snapped, drawing his axe. ‘Make ready.’
Hakem followed them, the Barak Varr dwarf stealing a reproachful glance at Drimbold, who waited pensively at the table, clutching his pack.
Halgar stopped at the statue and listened intently. He motioned to Lokki. The thane came forward and examined the statue. Looking down, he saw something.
‘Rorek,’ he hissed, beckoning the engineer, who quickly joined him, shouldering his crossbow, as Halgar stepped to the side.
Rorek followed Lokki’s gaze to the octagonal base and noticed a strange configuration of carvings, slightly outset from the rest. Crouching down, the engineer carefully ran his fingers over the stone, seeking out any imperfections. He pulled a piece of the design out, a perfectly round dwarf head effigy and rotated it. When he pushed the head back into place, there was a grinding sound and the dull scrap of a sliding bolt of stone, then a small crack appeared at the lip of the octagonal base.
‘Help me lift it,’ Rorek said, getting his fingers beneath the lip. Lokki did likewise, catching on quickly to what the engineer wanted him to do. Halgar stood poised with Uthor, whilst Gromrund and Hakem had gathered torches and held them at the ready to be thrust at whatever lurked beneath them.
‘Heave!’ Lokki cried and the two of them lifted off part of the octagonal slab, revealing a small, darkened chamber within, below the statue itself, with several tunnels leading off from it. Inside, blinking back the glare of the torches was a dwarf, a thick, leather-bound book clasped to his chest.
‘Ralkan,’ he mumbled, half-crazed, trying to ward off the bright light with his hand, ‘Ralkan Geltberg,’ he repeated, louder and with greater lucidity. The dwarf’s eyes were pleading as he added, ‘Last survivor of Karak Varn.’
CHAPTER THREE
Skreekit wrung his paws together, and fought the urge to squirt the musk of fear. Beneath filth-caked robes, daubed in the bloody symbols of Clan Skryre, the skaven’s fur was moist with sweat. A furtive glance at another agent, a warlock of low breeding, drowning in his own blood from a dagger thrust in his lung, and he found his voice at last.
‘Three hundred warp tokens, four cohorts of warriors for protection against Clan Moulder and a hundred slaves is our price, yes. Make deal, quick-quick,’ Skreekit blathered.
Standing before the warlock, in a dank chamber edged in filth, dirty straw, and other signs of skaven habitation, was Thratch Sourpaw. He called it his ‘scheming room’ but in truth it was merely one of the many antechambers appended to the subterranean warren of the skaven. The black-furred warlord of Clan Rictus sneered his dissatisfaction, looking at Skreekit down his long snout and revealing an old, but horrific, wound on his neck. Coarse, brown stitching was still embedded in his flesh, made visible by the pink scar tissue. Thratch’s cold reddish eyes picked out something behind the nervous warlock, who had just soiled his robes further.
Thratch watched as something detached itself from the cavern wall at the agent’s back, a layer of swiftly moving shadow, silent and at one with the darkness. There was the sound of metal tearing flesh and blood exploded from the warlock’s mouth, spraying the dirt-encrusted stones in front of him with crimson, a jagged blade punching through his chest. The knife was withdrawn savagely and Skreekit slumped forward. Sheer terror twisted his face, lying in a puddle of his own filth and viscera, blood bubbles bursting on his froth-drenched muzzle as poison ravaged his innards.
Thratch was one of the many warlords of Clan Rictus as well as dwarf slayer, goblin killer and conqueror of Karak Varn. Clad in thick metal
armour, wreathed in a fine patina of rust, stray black tufts of his fur eking out beneath the pauldrons and vambraces, he looked formidable. The warlord knew this and played on it as he approached the last of the three warlocks that had come to make deals with him.
‘Now,’ the warlord said, signalling for his assassin, Kill-Klaw, to emerge fully from the shadows, certain there would be no attempt on his life. The Clan Eshin adept obeyed dutifully and lingered at the warlock’s side, just enough so the skaven was aware of his presence, just enough so the warlock couldn’t see him.
‘You build device for me, yes-yes.’ Thratch pointed a claw towards a crude design he had scratched on the wall with the spike he had instead of a paw – the three warlocks had winced as he had done it. ‘Your promise-price,’ he demanded.
The last representative of Clan Skryre gulped audibly before he answered – a half glance at the lurking assassin.
‘One hundred warp tokens, two cohorts of warriors and… fifty slaves,’ he ventured.
Thratch loomed close, hot breath making the agent’s eyes water.
‘Accepted, yes,’ he hissed, a long and terrible grin wrinkling his features.
‘What happened here, brother?’ Lokki asked, his tone soothing.
Ralkan sat in front of him, still. He was fairly diminutive, even by dwarf standards, and the great tome he clutched to his breast only made him seem smaller still.
‘Red eyes,’ he murmured. ‘Red eyes in the dark… everywhere.’
The crazed dwarf wore the scholarly robes of a lorekeeper, one of the few chosen to chronicle and remember all the great events of a hold – its deeds, its heroes, its grudges. A talisman bearing the rune of Valaya hung around his neck – it seemed the goddess of protection had heeded his pledges. He wore a series of belts and straps over his scribe’s attire, Lokki assumed they were designed to secure the book should the lorekeeper require the use of his arms. The dwarf’s beard was dishevelled, wretched with dirt and encrusted filth, as were his skin and nails. He looked wasted and thin, like he could do with a good meal inside of him. How long he had been there, hiding within a warren of tunnels, scrabbling in the dark, Lokki could only guess. Rorek was in the secret chamber beneath the statue of Grungni at that very moment, trying to ascertain how far the tunnels went and how many there were. Of the others, Uthor and Halgar were with Lokki, while Gromrund and Hakem stood guard at each of the entranceways. Drimbold sat sullenly in the corner, occasionally glancing at the way out of the audience chamber, before returning to his thoughts.