Tales of the Old World (129 page)

“Herr professor, you were the one who taught me that it is those who seek to
hold back the advancement of knowledge who are blasphemous. You and I are men of
science. It is our
duty
to perform this experiment.”

Kleinhoffer adjusted his pincenez glasses and glanced at the leather-bound
volume which rested on the lectern standing beside the two men.

“De Courcy’s book is an important piece of scholarship, no doubt of that. But
Lothar, don’t you think that it wanders too close to the forbidden lore of
Chaos… towards the end?” He shivered. “His final chapter is almost the ranting
of a madman. Drunk on the wine of stars, false heavens, false hells, all of that
stuff.”

Von Diehl glanced at his tutor, fighting down his mounting impatience. It had
been Kleinhoffer himself who, years ago, had discovered
The Book of Changes,
written in Classical Old Worlder by the long-dead Bretonnian poet and
mystic, Giles de Courcy. Kleinhoffer had spent the rest of his life translating
it, worrying away at the cryptic symbolism until he was sure he had decoded it
correctly. By then, he had become the foremost authority on magic at the ancient
University of Nuln—and Lothar von Diehl, the single person in whom Kleinhoffer
had confided, was his most gifted student.

“True,” von Diehl said, striving to keep his voice calm and reasonable, “but
that should not deter us. As you yourself have said, all magic is based,
ultimately, on Chaos. The only way to tell if de Courcy was right is to perform
this ultimate ritual. And if it works, then it will lead us to the most profound
understanding of universe.”

“My boy, I am as committed to the project as you are but… but…” Kleinhoffer’s
voice trailed off.

Von Diehl stared at the old man’s pale, sweating face. “Herr professor, I
thought you understood when I suggested this experiment. The ritual is not
something that I can attempt without your help.”

The old man nodded shakily. “Of course, of course. It’s just that… Lothar, my
boy, are you sure it’s
safe?”

“Absolutely, professor.”

Kleinhoffer swallowed and once more glanced around the secret chamber in the
basement of von Diehl’s residence. Finally, he came to a decision.

“Very well, Lothar,” he said with reluctance. “I know how important this is
to you.”

Von Diehl allowed himself a brief sigh of satisfaction. “Thank you, sir. Now,
please, if you will take up your position.”

Von Diehl lifted the rune-encrusted wand which he had carved from a
beastman’s thighbone and advanced towards the lectern. He lit the braziers and
threw handfuls of cloying incense to fizz on them. As the echoes died away he
began the chant.

“Amak te aresci Tzeentch! Venii loci aresci Tzeentch! Amak te aresci
Tzeentch!”

Von Diehl’s chant rumbled on, seeming to gain resonance from the echoes and
the constant repetition. The fumes from the braziers billowed around him and
seemed to expand his perception. It was almost as if he could see the edges of
the world starting to ripple at the corners of his vision.

He continued to chant, visualising in his mind the form of the Tzeentchian
steed he was attempting to summon, filling in the details, compelling it to take
more concrete form. While doing so, he moved the tip of the wand through a
complex pattern, pointing it at every angle of the pentacle in turn.

The effects of the narcotic incense, the constant chanting and visualisation
distorted his sense of the flow of time. The ritual seemed to be going on for
hours. He felt himself to be a vessel for transcendent energies. Finally,
somewhere off at the edge of infinity, he sensed a hungry presence. He reached
out with the power of his soul and touched it. The being sensed him and began to
move closer, painfully slowly, seeking sustenance.

As if far off in the distance, he heard Kleinhoffer moan. The air was filled
with the burnt smell of ozone. Von Diehl opened his eyes. The room was lit by a
strange blue glow from the lines of the pentacle and circle. Sparks flickered in
the air and his hair was standing on end.

“Venii aresci Tzeentch! Venii! Venii!”
he yelled and fell silent.

There was a rush of air, a sense of presence and suddenly it was there before
them: the steed of Tzeentch.

It took the form of a flat disc of sleek, silvery-blue flesh. The edges of
the disc were rimmed with small, sardonic eyes. It flickered about within the
pentagram as if testing the boundaries of its cage. After a while it seemed to
realise it was trapped and ceased to struggle, simply hovering in mid-air.

What do you wish from me, mortals?
asked a voice within von Diehl’s head.

“We seek knowledge,” von Diehl answered certainly. “We wish to travel across
the Sea of Souls and converse with He Who Knows All Secrets.”

Others have requested this in the past. To their regret. The minds of mortals
are fragile things.

“Nonetheless, we wish to go. Once we are safely returned here you will be
released from this compulsion.”

Very well. Advance, human, and meet your fate!

With no hint of trepidation von Diehl walked down the corridor of chalk which
connected the circle to the pentagram. He stepped over the side of the magical
sigil and put one foot on the creature of light. Surprisingly it supported his
weight. He felt a strange tingling pass through his foot and up his body.

I will take both of you,
the voice said in von Diehl’s head.
Both of
you or neither…

Von Diehl turned. Kleinhoffer had not moved. His lined face seemed to float
amid the darkness, lit from below by the glow from the pentagram.

“Herr professor,” von Diehl called urgently, “you must join me. Quickly now!”

Kleinhoffer licked his lips. A sheen of sweat had formed on his forehead.
“Lothar, I can’t! I just can’t!”

Anger pulsed through von Diehl. “The book is explicit. We must be two—or
else the steed can refuse to transport us, can break the binding spell. You
knew. You agreed!”

“I know, but—Lothar, forgive me, I’m old. Old and afraid.”

“But Gerhard, you’ve worked for this all your life. Ultimate knowledge.
Transcendence.” The old scholar shuddered.

“Join me,” von Diehl commanded. “Join me, join me, join me!”

Kleinhoffer sighed, and then, almost as if hypnotised, he shuffled down the
chalk corridor and took his place aboard the steed beside von Diehl.

Two,
the daemon said.
Two in search of knowledge. Now we go!
There
was a screaming rush of air, and the sound of a thunderclap.

Von Diehl looked down and found they were far above the city of Nuln itself.
He could see the University quarter with its aged, many-spired buildings. His
gaze wandered to the docks and the dark curve of the River Reik as it snaked
northwards. Although he was hundreds of feet above the tallest tower of the
Temple of Verena he felt no fear. Standing on the back of the Chaos-steed was
like standing on solid earth.

The daemon-thing began to accelerate but there was no sense of motion or of
the wind tearing at his clothing. He stood at a point of absolute calm. Only
when he looked down at the Great Forest rushing past did von Diehl get a sense
of their terrific speed.

In a few moments he saw an open glade where beastmen danced around a great
bonfire and a two-headed black-armoured figure looked on. He saw strange
monsters moving in the depths where no man had ever penetrated. Their steed
hurtled like a meteor until the ground was simply a blur. They gained height
until they were above the clouds. It was like skimming over a misty white sea
whose surface was illuminated by the twin moons.

Excitement flooded through von Diehl’s veins as they flashed along. He felt
like a god. It seemed to him that no one could ever have travelled so fast
before. The energy of the daemon passed up through his legs, filling him with a
tremendous sense of well-being. Perhaps it was the steed’s power which protected
them from the cold air, he thought. Through a break in the clouds he saw that
they were passing over a bleak steppeland only occasionally blotched by the
lights of cities. Surely they could not have reached Kislev already?

Soon after, he felt no such doubts. They were moving across snow-covered
tundra towards a bleak, stony land. The sky to the north was illuminated by a
dancing aurora of dark-coloured lights. They had entered the Chaos Wastes.

Below he could see great troupes of warriors fighting. Champions in the
blood-red armour of Khorne fought with dancing lascivious daemonettes. Enormous
slobbering monsters pursued fleeing beastmen. The land itself writhed as if
tortured. Lakes of blood washed across great deserts of ash. Castles carved from
mountains erupted from forests of flesh-trees. Islands broke off from the earth
and floated into the sky.

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.