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City of Knives; Chapter 1-Things You Should Be Knowing
Topic Started: 17th May 2007 - 09:05 PM (273 Views)
daemonic badger
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Veteran/OAP
K’rishnik slowed his heartbeat down to an almost imperceptible level. The Eshin assassin was crouched behind one of the tombstones that littered the landscape. Slowly, he leaned slightly out of the shadows, to get a good look at his quarry. The human brigands were wandering cautiously among the graves. The assassin frowned, it was almost unheard of for humans to wander this far East.
The sun was skimming the tall peaks of the mountains, and the ancient cemetery was clothed in shadows. On the far side he saw several other members of his squad, countless others were also waiting, hidden from view. The human-leader was nearing the hidden entrance to the Clan’s tunnels. Slowly K’rishnik drew his katana from its sheath. The steel sung an almost imperceptibly high-pitched note.
One of the humans stopped, and the Eshin held his breath. They looked poor and beaten, with bushy beards and haunted expressions. “Ya’ hear summin’ cappin’?” The bearded man at the head of the party merely grunted in response. “I don’ like this place,” he grunted, “In an’ Out. We need ta’ keep moving.”
K’rishnik nodded to his squadron, and the squadron opposite, led by his second-in-command, Tenchi. The human nearest him shouted in alarm as scores of shadows leapt from cover and unleashed their weapons on the unsuspecting humans. The one who’d spoken to their leader went down first, a shuriken lodged in his throat, bleeding onto the parched ground.
“Leave man-thing leader alive!” he shouted over the din of battle, as he quickly dispatched another human with a merciless slash to the throat. Several of the humans dropped their weapons and fell to the floor, throwing up their arms in surrender. K’rishnik noticed that sounds of resistance had ceased. He looked down his knife at the expose throat of the man kneeling at his feet. Around him several Eshin members also had knives to the throats of the other men.
“You…” he hissed, “Are you-you the leader?” the man was too terrified to respond, but managed to nod. K’rishnik beckoned a gutter runner over. “Tie him up. Bring him in front of Congress.” The rat rushed to obey, binding the man’s hands with rough, gnawed, skaven rope. “But…my men” the man whispered hoarsely, tears coming to his eyes. The assassin looked at him with contempt. He’d never understood the man-thing’s affection for their fellows.
K’rishnik nodded to the other Eshin. “Kill-kill them,” he uttered expressionlessly. He grabbed the man-thing by it’s chin and hoisted him to eye-level. The assassin fixed a cold-unmoving eye on the human. A trail of blood sprayed across the man-thing’s face as all around them the screams of the dying filled the air.
“Ya’ Bastard!” the man screamed at K’rishnik. The assassin responded by beating the man in the face with his closed fist. “Listen to me-me!” K’rishnik screamed, spraying the man with spit. “Your men’s-things lives, they were-were mine! Your life-life is mine! So if-if you want to keep your pathetic-stupid life! You show me-me respect, you hear-hear me?” the man whimpered. K’rishnik threw the man-thing to the floor. “Tie him up. We’re leaving.”


Master Moulder Kremlin shut his ears to the screams that echoed throughout his laboratory. He was finishing writing a manuscript on Giant’s organ transplants, and the bellows of the infuriated titan chained down were distracting him. He had been working for the past year on the project, and the giant that his underlings had managed to ensnare was the fruit of his efforts. It would be a shame to kill him.
Another roar ricocheted around the room, so Kremlin arouse, grumbling complaints. He donned his gloves, and picked up a warpstone shard from the side. The Giant beast had had its chest ripped open, a combination of warpstone and rat’s hearts sustaining it and warping it in equal measures. “Hush, little one,” he whispered and held the shard close to the giant’s head. The nauseating aura erupting from the shard had no effect on the moulder after years of mutating, but it proved too much for the giant, and he passed out.
Around the warren lay other experiments of Kremlin, several prized Rat Ogres, a couple of Clanrats gifted with mutations and transplants from Chaos Dwarf slaves. He sighed and sat back down to the paper. Life in the Clan was tiring, but the sheer range of creatures he was able to experiment with made it worthwhile.
The rat cast a critical eye over his prized possession. Clumps of unhealthy, green fur were erupting all over the thing’s body and its nails were long and hooked. The Giant-thing was at least 20 skaven tall, and a dozen times more powerful than even the large rat ogres. As soon as Kremlin had found a way to reliably sustain the creature, and bent it to his will, he would have a powerful minion.
Without warning, the cruel edge of a blade pressed against his thick neck. He gulped nervously, “Mort?” he called out hopefully. The pressure on his neck was released, and he spun on his feet. Greeting him was an Eshin assassin, clothed in black robes, only a black-furred snout and a sly grin visible. “Getsss you-you every time, if-if I’d been so inclined you’d be bleeding-dying on-on the floor right now-now.”
Kremlin ran a thick paw over his neck. “Well-well, me and my-my throat are most grateful that I’m-I’m not,” he said, smiling. “To-to what do I-I owe the pleasure of-of your company?” The Master Assassin returned the smile with a wicked grin. Kremlin and Mort were the heads of Moulder and Eshin respectively in the Clan, occupying two of the Seats of Congress. The two had formed a temporary alliance, mutually beneficial as they both agreed to share information and assets.
“Jussst honouring our-our agreement. Thought you’d-you’d like to now, that my sssubordinate recently captured a Human raiding party. Word is-is they’re fleeing a Chaos Dwarf invasion.” Kremlin couldn’t help grinning at the prospect of trying out his beasties and cultivating new subjects.
The assassin looked over Kremlin’s shoulder at the gruesome giant that lay on the floor. A wicked forked tongue flicked out over the assassin’s pale lips “Operational, yet?” he asked, nodding at the mutated goliath. “Soon,” promised Kremlin. “Very soon.”


Metro took a deep breath and tightened his grip on his sword. The Force had received word that some of the Nurgle cultists that had been plaguing the city were about to perform a summoning ritual, and unfortunately it was their job to stop it. Metro was a grizzled veteran of many raids, as a huge scar etched on the side of his face could testify, but never with daemons involved.
Behind him were a dozen fully trained Stormvermin, bedecked in plated armour, but for once numbers weren’t enough to calm his fears. A rough wooden door was crudely attached to the tunnels, and an eerie light shone underneath the doorway. He turned around and signalled to the rest of his crew. Three seconds, then an iron-shod boot slammed the door down and they stormed into the chamber. Metro stopped, numb with terror.
The whole room was splayed with Nurgle symbols, bedecking the walls, drawn in blood spiked with pus and disease. A torch was hanging on the far side of the warren, a dirty green scrap of fabric clothed over it, casting a spooky green light over the whole chamber. But the most horrifying thing was in the centre of the room.
Mounted on a crude wooden stake was a festering body, wracked with disease. Ugly yellow boils erupted all over the skin, and clumps of fur were falling to the ground. The face’s skin was warped and peeling, almost beyond recognition. But not quite. Metro heard the distant sound of vomiting. “Holy s***! That’s-that’s Krill!” someone shouted. Krill was an officer sent with a large group to investigate the cultists. It was then that it occurred to Metro that a good proportion of the diseases ravaging the body were probably highly contagious. “Get out-out!” he screamed, “Get the hell out of here!”



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