Tales of the Old World (93 page)

When Vaust reached the door, he was panting heavily for breath. “They’ve
found another body,” he gasped.

Twenty knights had gathered in the hall of the east wing when Mikael and the
others arrived, Count Gunther and his retinue amongst them. They encircled the
body of a slain knight and the Morr worshippers had to force their way through.

“Back away,” ordered the count, fighting to get past the throng of knights.
“Holy Sigmar,” he breathed. The knight lay slumped within an alcove, his face
covered in shadows.

Reiner and Sigson appeared amidst the crowd. The warrior priest went
instantly to the dead knight, crouching down to examine it.

The knights fell abruptly into silence. Mikael heard mutterings of
discontent. Valen and Vaust closed in around him, Halbranc at their back. Reiner
kept his cold gaze on Sigson but held his sword hilt ready.

“He has been strangled,” Sigson told the count. “With some force—his neck
is broken.” Sigson carefully tilted the dead knight’s head, searching for
another mark. Light spilled onto the corpse, illuminating the face.

“By the hand of Morr,” Vaust gasped. It was the knight he had confronted in
the corridor.

“You argued with this man,” said Garrant, accusingly. “Where were you
tonight?”

“I was restless,” Vaust admitted, “So I toured the east wing.” He cast a
sideways glance at Reiner. There would be repercussions from this. The captain
took disobedience very seriously.

“And you met up with this knight,” Garrant continued, “to settle your
differences.”

There were angry murmurings from the Sigmarites. Mikael felt the same tension
he had back in the corridor with Halbranc.

“No. I saw no one,” Vaust protested through gritted teeth.

“
You
drew swords first,” Garrant said. “I saw it with my own eyes.”

Some of the Sigmarites nodded in agreement. Mikael noticed that the count had
moved to the back of the group, Bastion alongside him.

“Is the chamber intact?” he heard Count Gunther mutter above the increasingly
belligerent Sigmarites. The captain nodded.

“You killed him,” one of the knights from the crowd spat suddenly, stepping
towards Vaust. Valen put him down with one punch.

The hall exploded into chaos. Three Sigmarite knights waded forward to take
on Valen, but Halbranc and Reiner intervened. Halbranc smashed the first two
into the crowd, while Reiner brought the other to his knees with a powerful
uppercut. Several of the knights of Sigmar bellowed battle oaths and charged in,
weapons drawn.

Mikael drew his sword. Valen and Vaust followed his lead.

A pistol shot rang out, reverberating around the mighty hall. Lenchard stood
upon a table, smoke rising from the barrel of the weapon.

“Cease!” he commanded. “Listen.”

From outside there was a sound like thunder.

“The river,” Count Gunther realised suddenly. He turned to Garrant. “Gather
up all the men,” he said. “If the bank breaks the flood waters will take this
keep and us with it.”

Garrant nodded, gave a last dark glance at the knights of Morr, and started
bellowing orders.

Reiner approached the count. “This is what Krieger has been waiting for,” he
said. “To slip away and kill again in the confusion.”

Gunther looked him in the eye. “I need every man on that river bank.”

“Then let us help.”

The count hesitated at first then nodded. “Very well.”

Reiner turned to his knights and gestured for them to follow.

As they were leaving Mikael saw Gunther conversing with Bastion once more.
“Take two men,” he said, “and guard the vault—lock it.”

Mikael had no time to linger and left the hall to join his comrades. Again
the strange stench of death assailed him.

“This place reeks of the dead,” Mikael whispered to Halbranc.

“Careful lad,” said the giant, “they’ll be blaming us for that too,” he
added, smiling.

Thunder raged in the heavens and lightning split the blackness.

Mikael carried two heavy sacks of sand towards the breach in the bank. At the
river there was chaos.

A cart lay on its side, sinking into the earth. Men heaved at it, trying to
free the thrashing horse trapped beneath. Others held ropes onto workers wading
into the river itself with sacks and rocks. Workers and knights battled
together, heaving great clods of earth into the raging river flow. A great train
of them moved from the keep to the riverbank, bringing earth in barrows, pails
and tools in an effort to save the keep and the town. The rain battered men down
as they struggled to lift the sodden earth, digging the crude trenches ever
deeper to divert the water.

Mikael slung down a second sack. Straightening his back and wiping the
moisture from his brow, he looked up at the keep. A flash of lightning cast it
in stark silhouette. It was a dark and forbidding image. Another bolt lit up the
night and through the lashing rain, Mikael thought he saw a figure, away from
the river, creeping up a shallow embankment towards the keep. Blinking back the
rain and buffeting wind he looked back again, but the figure was gone. He trod
back up the shallow rise to the keep.

Halbranc was in the courtyard.

“Works up a sweat eh, lad?”

Mikael nodded. His muscles burned, they’d been fighting the flood waters for
over an hour.

They headed towards the cellars, through a trapdoor in the courtyard and down
shallow steps, where supplies of sand bags and barrows were kept.

Mikael stopped part way down the stairs. “Something is wrong,” he said.

“What is it, Mikael?” Halbranc drew his short sword, searching in the half
darkness.

Mikael advanced slowly. The torches set in the cellar walls spluttered and
cast flickering shadows. The floor shimmered and moved.

“It’s flooded,” Mikael said, taking the last of the steps and plunging, waist
deep, into the water.

“Can you smell that,” he whispered. The storm outside was dulled down here,
resonant and foreboding. Suddenly the rest of the knights seemed very far away.

“Smells like death.” Halbranc watched the darkness ahead.

An ill-feeling grew in the pit of Mikael’s stomach as they waded through the
flooded cellar.

“Wait,” he hissed. Something was floating down towards them on a light
current. Mikael drew his sword.

The thing drifted into the corona of light cast by one of the torches. It was
a man’s body, partially decomposed.

“Another knight?” Halbranc asked, covering his mouth at the stench.

“I don’t know,” Mikael said, leaning in close. “His neck is broken,” he
added, looking back towards Halbranc, “and I’ve smelled this stench since we
arrived. This man has been long dead.”

A shadow passed over the entrance to the cellar above.

“Down here!” Halbranc bellowed.

Four men entered the trapdoor into the cellar; Lenchard followed by Count
Gunther and two of his knights.

“We may have another victim,” Halbranc told them, picking a torch off the
wall to illuminate the man’s rotting features.

Gunther’s eyes grew wide and fearful. “That’s Karl Krieger,” he rasped.

“Then we are looking for the wrong man,” Mikael told them.

Realisation dawned upon the count’s face. He plunged into the water, pushing
past the templars of Morr and the floating corpse. “The vault,” he muttered,
wading down the flooded corridor, fuelled by anxious desperation.

Mikael sheathed his sword and followed. After a few minutes they reached a
corner, around it a shallow slope led up to a massive iron door. Count Gunther
stopped. The rain outside throbbed against the walls as the door swung open on
creaking hinges.

At Mikael’s urging, they moved towards the door. Halbranc gripped it and
heaved it open.

Inside was a simple stone room. At the centre rested an ornate throne,
encrusted with jewels and worn gold filigree. At the foot of the throne lay
three dead knights. Mikael recognised one of them as Bastion. They had all been
strangled.

“Just what did you bring back with you from the desert?” Mikael asked Count
Gunther, drawing his sword.

The count turned on him, initially shocked the templar even knew of it then
said, “My father… Falken Halstein…”

In the thick shadows at the back of the room, something stirred. Stepping out
of the gloom was a creature that resembled Gunther. Its tarnished armour bore
the emblem of the fiery heart. Its flesh was desiccated, worn to shrivelled
leather by the hostile conditions of the desert. As it lumbered towards them,
its eyes flared with remembered hate.

It came at Gunther. The Sigmarite knights rushed forward to protect him.
Swinging its mighty arm, the creature smashed one of the knights into the wall
with a sickening crunch of bone. From a rotting scabbard it drew a rusted sword
and ran the second through, lifting him screaming into the air. As the beast
withdrew its sword, the knight slipping off like discarded meat, Halbranc
charged at it, hacking down two-handed upon its arm but his blade rebounded.

“Its skin is like iron,” he cried, fending off a blow that almost knocked him
down. Mikael went to his side.

The creature held up a withered hand. Mikael couldn’t move, halted by the
malevolent will of the undead knight. It spoke with a voice that held the weight
of ages. “I am Setti-Ra. A reign of terror shall sweep your lands and beyond at
my rebirth. Slumbering legions will rise once more and bathe the deserts in
blood. Kneel now before me.”

Mikael felt a terrible weight pressing down upon him. His legs were buckling
against it. He tried to mutter a prayer to Morr, but was unable. Halbranc was on
his knees; sweat coursing down his reddened face.

“Only fire and the will of Sigmar can purge the creature from this body.” The
voice of Lenchard was like crystal water as it broke the power of Setti-Ra. With
the burden lifted, Mikael arose. Halbranc struggled to his feet beside him. The
Black Knights backed away.

Around the chamber, the torches spluttered and died as the water lapped
languidly at their feet.

“We must get to higher ground,” Mikael said, “draw the creature out.”

“No.” It was Count Gunther. Sword drawn, he blocked the doorway. Mikael
noticed the creature’s gaze was fixed upon the count.

Lenchard saw it too. “He is under the creature’s thrall,” he growled.

Mikael pushed the witch hunter aside, parrying a blow from Gunther’s sword.
Behind him, Setti-Ra advanced.

“Keep it back!” Mikael cried, hearing the clash of steel as Halbranc and
Lenchard fought the creature.

Count Gunther’s eyes were covered by a milky white sheen. When he spoke, it
was as if he were the creature’s mouthpiece.

“The will of Setti-Ra be done, the living shall perish before his—”

The count collapsed to the ground before he could finish. Reiner stood behind
him. The other knights of Morr were with him. They had heard the commotion below
and gone down to investigate. The captain’s eyes grew suddenly wide and a
strange keening sensation resonated in Mikael’s skull. The young templar dove to
the side as, dragging Count Gunther clear, Reiner bellowed, “Down!”

Lenchard was smashed through the doorway and tumbled down the slope.

“Out. Now!” Reiner cried.

Halbranc backed out of the room, heaving Mikael with him as the beast
lumbered after them. “Seal the doors,” Reiner ordered.

Valen and Vaust pushed the doors shut as Sigson slid down a heavy, metal
brace. From within, the distant thudding retort of the creature’s blows could be
heard almost instantly.

Outside the vault, Mikael nodded his thanks to his captain who responded
coldly.

“That door will not hold it long, make ready.”

“Our swords won’t kill it,” Mikael said, “we must get to higher ground and
burn it.”

A sudden powerful blow echoed against the iron door as part of it bent
outwards.

“The barrel ramp…” Count Gunther muttered, sluggishly. He was slowly coming
round and rubbed his head where Reiner had struck him to break the creature’s
hold. “It leads to the hall above…” He pointed down the slope where a corridor
branched off.

Reiner looked over at it, then back at the count.

“It wants me dead,” Count Gunther said. “My father killed this creature long
ago; in me it sees him and desires vengeance. I can lure it.”

Sigson went over to the count, and helped him to his feet. “Can you stand?”

The count nodded.

Another blow from within the vault caused a hefty split in the iron. “We must
leave, now,” Reiner told them. “Vaust, lead them,” he ordered.

The young templar ran to the head of the group and back down the slope
towards the corridor Gunther had shown them, his brother following closely
behind.

Halbranc hefted Lenchard onto his shoulder as Mikael and Reiner went last
with the count. They were backing down the slope, a few feet from the vault,
when the iron door finally fell with a screech of twisting metal. Bolts came
free from the wall with a shower of dust and debris, and Setti-Ra stepped out
onto the slope, driven by primal instincts.

The knights of Morr goaded the creature on. They retreated up the barrel
ramp, making sure the creature saw where they were going. Ahead, Vaust smashed
through a trapdoor that led to the hall.

Crouched in the room above, the two brothers heaved an unconscious Lenchard
out of the cellars from Halbranc’s shoulder. The giant followed, then Sigson,
then Reiner, Mikael and the count.

“The creature is close,” the weakened count gasped. “There,” he said,
pointing to another archway.

Heaving the ailing count between them, Reiner and Mikael were right behind
the others who stood in the great hall. The tapestry of Falken Halstein loomed
large, about to witness his horrifying undead self.

Putting the witch hunter down, Halbranc hefted a massive torch from an iron
sconce. Mikael and Reiner did the same.