Two Sides of the Warp Token

by SCBM

A champion of the Skaven and an Imperial mercenary are drawn to a resurgence of power in the land of the Tomb Kings. Can they find common ground, or will their duty to their people drive a wedge between them? (F!Skaven x M!Human)

1. Chapter 1

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Chapter 1: The Call

Lord Gnawdwell had summoned her to his tower. This meant one of two things. Either she would be showered with praise and rewarded for her dedication to the clan, or he would smite her down with his majestic staff for that bearded-thing bread she'd stolen this morning. She was leaning more towards the latter on this one, as a healthy dose of suspicion had saved her life on almost thirteen occasions.

The steps leading to Gnawdwell's chamber almost reached her knees, forcing her to swing her legs up first in a sort of vaulting motion, the fine layer of moisture clinging to the black stone making her grip slippery. Mounted sconces illuminated the way up the twisting staircase, casting the charred stonework in acrid green hues. The dark, silky fur on her arms reflected the lights as she passed them, the sheen on her coat making her appear to shine. The malevolent colours were soothing, but her heart still hammered inside her chest as she made the climb.

It was hard to tell how high exactly the tower reached, but the corkscrewing staircase must have reached the very limits of the surface world. She could have examined the tower on her way in, but she'd kept her eyes downcast the entire walk. Not out of fear of death, of course, to be flattened by the Lord's most unholiest of staffs would be a great honour, but there were far worse punishments than mere death, something the Lord reminded his subjects of regularly.

At the peak of the staircase, a landing gave way to a momentous door, its surface reinforced with iron brackets and cruel spikes. If she were to triple her height, she would still be able to walk through it with room to spare. A pair of stormvermin stood guard nearby, the ratmen leaning on their halberds as they peered at her from behind their horned helmets.

Standing at just over six feet, they were an intimidating sight. The finest wargear the clan possessed covered them from head to tail, the pauldrons on the left guard creaking audibly as he turned round, shoving his weight into the door. Despite its sheer size, it swung inward on creaking hinges, and she slipped through the gap, tugging her hood higher to avoid making eye contact as much as possible.

She emerged into a vast, circular chamber, vertical slots in the walls revealing the sprawling burrows of the under-empire that lived beneath the tower. Tomes and scrolls lay stacked from floor to ceiling everywhere she looked, a few of the columns leaning unnaturally against one other, seemingly defying basic physics. She almost gave herself whiplash as her gaze flitted about the room, such a large amount of written knowledge gathered in one place was an amazingly disgusting sight.

She bent her head backwards over her body as the door slammed shut behind her, one of the stormvermin meeting her upside-down gaze through the sliver before closing her in, the sound of a turning lock twisting her chest into a knot. Her eyes darted to the narrow window on her left, and she briefly wondered if she could survive the fall if she opted to jump.

"Come closer, little runner. My patience is finite, yes-yes."

All immediate thoughts of escape left her mind as she straightened up, the firm tone of the voice drawing her across the chamber. She weaved around a pile of books, spying an ornate throne decorating the far side of the room. Metal and wood were moulded and bent into the approximation of a chair, with flowing red sheets providing some measure of softness. The fabrics were patterned with runes that looked like they'd been scratched on, the tapestries draped over the bones of Skaven and surface-dwellers alike.

In front of the throne was a table, its surface messy with scrolls and parchments. Standing over it was Lord Gnawdwell, his striking, emerald eyes lifting from a manuscript to meet her gaze. He wore a long, blue robe that bagged around his wrists and ankles, exposing his gnarled hands and feet, his skin sucking up against his bones. A hairy string tied around his waist sported all manners of charms and fetishes, and around his neck he wore a necklace, the teeth decorating it jangling noisily with each subtle movement he made.

He radiated magic, a sensation she could only describe as a cold so intense it almost burned washing over her. Despite his withered appearance, he stood tall and proud, moving with an ease that was at once powerful and relaxed.

Two more stormvermin stood vigilantly beside the throne, and Lord Gnawdwell raised a paw at them, curtly gesturing in their direction. Was that a sign to seize her? Cut off her head, maybe? The guards exchanged curious glances, but retreated without a word towards a balcony projecting out of the wall to the right. She sighed under her breath as they slunk out of sight, drawing up the courage to break the following silence.

"You bid-summon me, great one?" she chittered, snorting through her muzzle. She lowered herself to her knees, dipping her head in unfiltered reverence to appear as meek as possible. It wasn't a hard outcome, considering he was over twice her size at eight feet tall. When Lord Gnawdwell opened his hairy lips to reply, he spoke with much greater diction than anyone she knew, which she found both disturbing but inspiring at the same time.

"Clan Mors has need of you, little runner," he began, pacing around the table towards her. "Even one such as you must have seen the signs. The Great Clans are on the move, assembling warbands in the tunnels, preparing to march into the not-man-things lands."

"Why so far-far?" she asked, her muscles constricting beneath her fur as he stood before her.

"One of the Council members was given a vision," he replied, emphasising the last word by spitting out flecks of warpdust. "I'm not precisely sure who it was, as the clans failed to acknowledge the Mors seat and assembled without me, as they so often do. Cowards, all of them." His muzzle twitched as he snorted, his chapped lips turning up in a grin. "Of course, I was privy to the meeting regardless, I wouldn't let such petty creatures stop me from serving the Horned Rat so easily."

Lord Gnawdwell had spies in the Council that he was a part of? Truly his genius knew no bounds. "What vision say?" she asked, failing to supress her giddiness. Was she about to finally get her chance to serve the great Horned Rat too?

Though she'd kept her eyes locked to the floor, she could feel him regard her with his cold green eyes. "There was a time the Horned Rat's ambitions were are not for the ears of a lowly gutter runner to hear, especially one that is a breeder, no less."

Her glands squeezed until she felt a draining sensation prick her fur. She had kept her gender her most closely guarded secret, slaughtering those who'd found her out and thought she'd make an easy target. Logic demanded that she kill the Lord now, but he was twice her size, wreathed in magics that were more felt in the air than seen with the eye. He would smite her down before she could even lift a whisker. How did Lord Gnawdwell know? It took her a second to realise she'd answered her own question. This was the Lord of Clan Mors, he didn't need any further explanation than that.

"I can smell your fear-musk," he grumbled, closing his eyes as he leered closer, his muzzle twitching as he breathed her in. She wanted to flee, but just like in one of her nightmares, her body wouldn't obey her thoughts, and she could only close her eyes impotently as he gripped her by her shoulder.

"Your scent betrays you," he continued, and she winced as she felt his tail slide up her leg from somewhere behind her. "You are fortunate that very few are as attuned to the scent of a female as I am. Yes, I know what you are, I've been watching your strange journey through our ranks for some time now, right from when you escaped the breeding pits with the help of…. well, that hardly matters now."

He lifted away from her, his tail stroking her thigh one last time before departing. She released the breath she'd been holding in, her fear replaced with a kind of weary caution as he returned to the table.

"You're afraid I shall throw you back in with the other breeders, as you should be," he started, rummaging through his many parchments with his long fingers. "And yet, your ability to avoid detection for as long as you have speaks of your cunning. You may yet be as valuable to me outside of the breeding pits, as you would be inside them."

"M-My tail is yours, great one," she squeaked, bowing her head until it practically touched the floor. She wanted to plead with him not to discard her with the other females, but making requests of the Lord would just make things worse than they already were.

"It is the Horned Rat's tail," he corrected. "But, your loyalty to the Clan is recognised, and is one of the reasons I shall entrust to you the details of this vision. The Horned One spoke of an ancient weapon, hidden in the deserts of the not-man-things. Skavendom would benefit greatly if such an artifact was to return here to Skavenblight. Get up."

She did as commanded, Lord Gnawdwell gesturing for her to come closer as he cleared space on the table. She slunk over, peering round his bulky arm as he smoothed out the edges of a large scroll. Interestingly, the parchment wasn't woven from the usual materials, instead made of a smooth, white substance that was mostly free of wrinkles.

A bunch of mismatched shapes were etched onto the surface, and she couldn't make sense of what she was looking at. There were words engraved between the shapes, the letters so flowing and curvy that they hurt her eyes. Why the surface-dwellers didn't just adopt simple Skaven script, she did not know.

"This map shows the landmasses of the surface world surrounding Skavenblight, which is here in the middle. The not-man-things lands are here."

She followed his finger as he dragged it down the map, the land giving way to a large body of water. The continent wrapped around it to the right, the lands first giving way to wastelands, then to deserts.

"The Horned Rat told the Council of a temple located somewhere in this province," he continued, tapping at a spot near the heart of the barren wilderness. "Very few Skaven have travelled so far and lived, so our information on the area must rely on scavenged maps like this, and the foresight of the Seers."

"Am I to go-move there?" she asked.

"Of course you are, don't be stupid," he grumbled. "The Great Clans are already preparing their forces for the journey, and you will join this advance. However," he added, holding up a paw. "it is imperative that Clan Mors be the ones to lay claim to the weapon. The other clans, they see only a relic capable of furthering their own petty standing, and not as a fountain of power that would see the Vermintides wash across the entirety of the surface world. They would misuse its potential. Clan Mors must be victorious in this gambit, or we all face stagnation."

"We leave now-now?"

"We?" he scoffed. "No, you must face this task alone. The Great Clans have made a point that none from Clan Mors may join their forward groups. The Council knows if I were to gain possession of this weapon, they fear Mors would finally be recognised as a Great Clan ourselves."

"And finally get-take recognition from Council," she added, Gnawdwell nodding. "I will do this, great one. Work better alone, yes-yes."

"That is one of the reasons why I have chosen you," he replied. "Of course, alone does not mean you will be short of company. I have no doubt the other Clans have sent spies and assassins of their own to get to the weapon first. I had considered smuggling you onto one of the Clan Skurvy fleets gathering at the port, but in such confined spaces, your breeder-musk would doom you. You must travel by land, keep the sea to your right as you journey south, and you will reach the not-man-things lands in time."

"What relic-thing look like?" she asked, daring to glance up at him. He went to reply, then hesitated, scratching one of his curved horns idly.

"That is where my knowledge becomes… limited. The Seers perceive it as a staff, while the other Great Clans claim it to be a sword or knife or rifle. I have no doubt you will know the relic when you see it, its influence on the winds of magic will draw you, among others, to its location."

"Others?" she echoed, Lord Gnawdwell giving her a weary glance.

"It is not just the Skaven who are aware of the weapon's emergence from the sands," he explained. "Man-things, green-things, strange-things and dead-things, we would be fools to think we are the only ones who are aware of this resurgence of power."

"Then, I have no time to lose-waste," she answered.

"Indeed not," he replied, giving her an approving nod. "Yet, it would be unwise of me to set you loose without first preparing you. Two gifts do I have for you. Hold out your paws."

He shifted through more scrolls, and when he turned around, he was clutching a case to his chest. He placed it in her outstretched arms, and after she flashed him a questioning look, she pried the lid open with a claw.

The inside of the case was laced with a horribly soft material, and resting upon it were two of the finest daggers she'd ever laid eyes on. The handles were wrapped in dark leather, the black material contrasting with the silver blade. At the tips of their harsh points, the blades glowed a sickly shade of green, not unlike the torches that lit this very chamber. A glowing rune was pressed into the blades just above the handguards, the hum of magic weaving itself through all her senses.

"Weeping daggers, plucked from the latest Eshin assassin who tried to infiltrate my tower," Lord Gnawdwell explained, watching her lift one of the weapons. It was practically weightless, her paw wrapping comfortably over the handle. "No amount of armour can withstand their bite. They should prove much better than what you're used to."

He handed her a pair of scabbards, and she slotted the weapons inside them, the sound of metal scraping on metal filling the chamber. She stowed them on her belt, watching the Lord turn around once again.

"Next, something for your journey across the surface world."

"Already gave two gifts," she started. He turned on her, opening his muzzle to speak, pausing when he saw she was holding out the pair of daggers to him.

"Those are… a collective one," he explained. The next item he gave to her appeared as two circles connected by a strap, her cloaked reflection peering back at her in their glass surfaces.

"The sun is hard on the eyes, especially in the following seasons," he continued. "These goggles will shield you from the elements, among other benefits I will let you discover on your own."

She pushed the elastic strap over her furry ears, resting the lenses against her eyes, the world taking on a baleful green quality, the edges of the lenses making everything in her peripherals stretch. She had fun using them to distort Lord Gnawdwell's face for a few moments, then settled them on her brow.

"There is one last boon I can grant you," he continued, grinning when she tilted her head at him. "You need a name. Not the one the ratwives or your mother gave you, but a title befitting of your new station as my newest blade. What to call you, what to call you…"

She squirmed with barely contained excitement as he paced left to right. To be granted a title from the Lord himself was an unthinkable gift, but she couldn't help but feel a bit of shame at being so eager to replace the one she currently had. Her earliest memory was of her name being whispered into her ear by her mother, and forsaking her parent's gift felt... wrong.

Perhaps she didn't have to get rid of it for good. She could take both names, and use one or the other depending on her whims. She supressed a grin upon recognising her own ingenuity, and at managing to outwit the great Lord Gnawdwell. But then she remembered he could read minds and her glands vented with fear-musk again.

"You will be called… Skyseeker," Gnawdwell announced in a very non-mind-reading tone. "On account of your insistence on escaping the way of the breeder. Rise, she-blade, and bring Clan Mors its deserved prize."

Her heart welling with anticipation, she rose to her fullest height, baring her teeth in a grin. This mission would be nothing like the warrens, where she'd spent her life butchering her way to some semblance of freedom. The very Horned Rat himself would speak of her exploits when she returned, the name Skyseeker would be chanted by all the clans. It would be glorious.

"I will not fail-lose, great one," she assured.

"See that you don't," Lord Gnawdwell replied, turning his back on her. "the breeding pits have been… underperforming as of late, and we need more luscious mates if we are to keep our numbers stable for the wars to come."

She trembled on the spot as he walked to his throne, laying his arms across the boned armrests as he leaned back, fixing her with a commanding look.

"I shall have someone bring you provisions, and escort you to the surface," he continued. "Remember, tell no one of your mission, slay anyone who gets in your way. The Great Clans, even your fellow Mors brothers, must not discover you. Your life, and your success, depends upon your secrecy."

She cocked her head in confusion, but nodded her understanding at the Lord. Treachery among Clan Mors didn't happen often, except for the times when it did. It was one of the many reasons the Great Clans saw Mors as weak, that their members didn't slay their superiors as a show of strength as theirs did.

"The next time I see you, Skyseeker, I expect you to be climbing my tower, weapon in paw."

He called for his guards to return, one of them escorting her from the chamber. Skyseeker gave Lord Gnawdwell one last nod before the doors sealed behind her, she and the stormvermin clambering down the oversized steps of his tower.

-xXx-

The under-empire was livelier than Skyseeker had ever seen before. Through every shaft and cavern she scuttled through, she would be greeted by the sight of thousands of toiling skavenslaves, ferrying minerals in their pitiful arms to the factories and workshops, chimneys and exhaust ports spewing satisfying amounts of soot. Ominous lights flickered above and beyond the burrows surrounding the Mors district, the sprawling grottos pockmarked with holes and dens from which the fuelling fires of warpstone spewed forth.

To travel through Skavenblight was to cling to the shadows, using any jutting piece of stone as cover from the merciless Overseers that prowled the tunnels, flogging and abducting anyone they came across into their workforces, but today the streets of the under-city were packed shoulder-to-shoulder with Skaven. Clanrats stood in giant lines leading into the byways, filing into burrows with nothing but loincloths, and then emerging with basic, but sturdy wargear strapped to their shoulders. Skaven with some measure of authority whipped groups numbering in the hundreds into staggered formations, while the firing ranges were abused by marksmen practising their aim.

Gnawdwell was right, in his ever-infinite wisdom. The Vermintide was being readied.

Skyseeker knew which tunnel networks led out of the city, despite the narrow caverns being incorrectly marked by illiterate skavenslaves. Paths that led towards the lower levels were marked UP, while side passages that led to suspicious dead-ends promised FREE FOODS. Skyseeker was too clever to fall for these masterfully-crafted traps, this was why Lord Gnawdwell had chosen her for this mission, after all.

While most of Skavenblight was protected by natural barriers of earth and rock, fortifications still rose to protect the clan districts making up the heart of the under-city. Warp lightning cannons watched vigilantly over the main passages that approached the districts, covered by battlements that were draped with banners displaying the symbols of various Great Clans. Skyseeker and her accompanying stormvermin passed between one of the main gates protecting the heart of the city, one of the gunners posted up on the towers scoping down at them with his long rifle as they made their way into the outer-city, where the caverns opened up hundreds of feet wide and tall, the occasional polluted lake obstructing the sprawling shantytowns that occupied them.

The clanging of metal and the beating of wardrums filled the stenchful airs of the vaulted galleries, the ground riddled with the pawprints of the millions of Skaven who used these city limits to flood the rest of the world. Smiths handed out swords and pikes to the gathering armies, their blades still hot from the forge, while the marksmen raced back and forth, checking their cartridges and swapping out damaged or mismatched parts of their guns. Soon the full might of Skavendom would invade into the world of the surface-dwellers, but being surrounded by such vast forces did little to comfort Skyseeker. None of these ratmen belonged to Clan Mors, they were her adversaries in her mission, and the fact their guns weren't turned in her direction was only a temporary reprieve.

Eventually her progress through the winding passages brought the sounds of war to a low hum, then a gentle background buzz as the tunnels trailed higher and away from the under-city. As she passed the last handful of nests that clung to the very limits of Skavenblight, her bodyguard stopped, his armour creaking as he shuffled on the spot.

"This as far as I go-go," the stormvermin grumbled, pointing the tip of his halberd down the passage ahead. "This way take you to surface. Great Clans leave many float-things you take-steal."

It annoyed her that her protection was leaving so soon, but she would have to learn to survive on her own eventually. "Our Lord promised me food for mission," she muttered. "You have-have?"

Something flashed in the stormvermin's eyes, but she missed it as he avoided her gaze, reaching for his belt, and withdrawing the smallest slice of cheese she'd ever seen. Such an amount could hardly feed a pup for an hour, let alone a fully grown she-blade like herself.

"Where is rest?" she demanded, darting her eyes about the ground, thinking the guard might have dropped it. "Need more for journey-mission!"

"You insult great Gnawdwell's greater-er offer," he snapped back, making a show of angling his halberd in her direction, the blade glinting in the low light. As if the Horned One was watching their exchange, a distinct grumbling noise filled the tense air between her and the stormvermin, Skyseeker cocking her head towards its source – the guard's stomach.

"You greedy-thing!" she snarled, regretting ever feeling protected in this stormvermin's presence. "You eat Skyseeker's food!"

"N-Needed it for walk here!" the stormvermin defended. "Left you your half! We make good bargain, yes?"

She didn't know how much half would be, but it had to be more than one pawful of mouldy cheese. "You give food back, now-now," she said. "Or I-"

"Or you what-what?" he snarled, swinging his halberd with practiced ease, pressing it against her neck. "I guard great one, kill many sneaky-things like you. I already eat-eat, you take half and go now."

Skyseeker shied away from the blade, feeling a drip of blood pour from her flesh as he held it against her fur. She was about to crawl onto her knees and plead for forgiveness when she hesitated. Was she stupid? Lord Gnawdwell had prepared her for this dangerously important journey, she couldn't let him down before even leaving the caverns of Skavenblight!

"Wait-wait!" she said, holding up one paw pleadingly as the other reached for her belt. "I take half, that fair trade."

For a moment she thought the stormvermin was onto her ploy, but he nodded his agreement, holding his halberd one-handed as he prepared to throw her the food. When he was at his most distracted, she seized her moment, grabbing the haft of the polearm and shoving it away, withdrawing one of her weeping daggers at the same time. The small blade made a sinister whistle as she swung it in an upward strike, cleaving the halberd in twain without even the faintest hint of resistance.

The stormvermin watched with a confused expression as he held up his half of the halberd-turned stick, his eyes bugging out as Skyseeker rushed him down, drawing her other dagger out of its sheath. The war-snarl she loosed was cut short as the stormvermin brought his broken weapon down on her head, her skull throbbing with pain as she spun on the spot. She quickly recovered from her daze, knocking aside the stormvermin's halberd as he batted at her again, her hood flittering as he forced her to retreat.

She couldn't let herself be kept at a distance like this, so she ducked underneath the next blow, her elbows and knees touching the ground as she scurried into dagger-distance. Speed had been her ally since birth, and she wasn't weighed down by armour like he was, she could out pace him as long as she was careful.

She felt the air rustle her fur as the stormvermin swiped at her while backing up, Skyseeker ducking out of the way as she lunged at him. She flipped a dagger into a reverse-grip, and sliced the ratman across the belly. The corrosive point of her weapon shimmered as it pierced his wargear, dark blood dribbling out of the fresh crack in his armour.

"You give back food now!" she snarled over the ratman's pained cry. "Or I cut-slice it out!"

"Stupid sneaky-thing!" the stormvermin shot back. He swung his halberd, but too late did she realise it was a feint, and she felt a furred fist smash her across her muzzle. Holding her throbbing face in one paw, she swung the other out wildly, hoping to catch the stormvermin on her corrosive blade again, but he stepped out of the way, planting a foot on her ribs and sending her reeling.

Her ankle caught on a protruding rock, and she tumbled onto her rear, warding the stormvermin off with her knives when he advanced on her. When he made to strike at her again, he faltered, clutching at his wounded stomach as he shot her a dirty look.

She took the opportunity to turn tail, scuttling into the shadows of the cavern, slipping her weeping blades into their sheaths so their green blades didn't give her away. Her dark fur melded into the darkness, and she took cover behind a rock, peering over its jagged surface as the stormvermin taunted her, telling her to stop hiding as he jabbed his halberd in random directions like he was chasing off ghosts. He came dangerously close to her hiding place at one point, but he soon grew tired of searching, the wound she'd cut into his stomach bleeding more and more as the minutes passed.

Struggling to keep his guts from spilling, he turned around, rushing back in the direction of the city, vanishing from sight as he rounded the corner. When she was sure he was gone, Skyseeker took a moment to run a palm down her face, catching her breath. She knew the dangers of this mission would be many, but to be attacked so early, and by a fellow Mors clan member no less... Just how was she supposed to survive this journey? Had Lord Gnawdwell made a mistake choosing her as his champion?

No. He was never wrong. Everything he did was a calculated move, and having this gluttonous stormvermin escort her was no different. This was a trial! A trial to test her will and ability, and she had succeeded by living through an assassination attempt! All for practice, surely, though it felt very real to her…

Whatever. She had passed the Great Gnawdwell's test, and was all the stronger for it. She was ready for anything now. Commending the Lord's limitless wisdom, she stalked back to where she and the stormvermin had fought, spying something colourful on the ground nearby. In their practice bout, the stormvermin had dropped the pitiful hunk of cheese. She stooped down to pick it up, wiping the dirt and filth off, and stuffing it greedily into her mouth. The rancid taste made her tongue sting, but she didn't care, the walk and the resulting fight had drained her stamina to its limits.

Once she swallowed the tiny meal down, she checked she had all her belongings, kicking the broken half of the halberd away as she continued up the sloping passage.

-xXx-

Skyseeker felt the surface world before she saw it. What seemed like a soft caress touched her from the front, making her dark fur roil like warpfire flames as the barest of breezes filtered down the tunnel, cooling her muscles that still burned from her fight with the stormvermin.

She hated it.

She also hated how the air was unusually free of the normal fumes that laced the scents of Skavenblight – sulphur, carrion, faeces – instead the stench of wet soil invaded her senses, and it was only through rasping out quick breaths through her mouth was she able to withstand it.

As if it couldn't get any worse, a pinprick of light made her eyes water, the end of the sloping tunnel finally coming into sight. The white dot contrasted with the black rocky walls, slowly growing in size until she neared a yawning maw of daylight. Steeling herself, she crawled closer, poking her head out from below a lip of earth, exposing her face to the sun.

Her urge to convulse was forced back as she beheld the sky, for reasons that should be obvious. While she detested the way the light made her eyes itch and her fur itchier, she couldn't deny the sheer openness of the heavens intrigued her. It simply had no limit, stretching on and on to the limits of her vision, blocked only by the mountains lining the horizon, as silver as Lord Gnawdwell flawless fur. It wasn't uncommon for Skaven to behold the surface world, as armies could only travel for so long underground before they must attack the surface-dwellers directly, but for a female, whose breeding pits resided in the lowest levels of the under-cities, it was a rare privilege indeed.

She finally managed to pull her gaze down from the heavens, noticing a dirty shimmering effect rising from the bumpy ground, the image reminding her a little of the smoke that billowed from the factories below. Where the world around Skavenblight was rock and ash, instead the surface was riddled with strips of filthy water and banks of dirt that resembled bubbles, a few stubborn thickets desperately clinging to life on these tiny islands. Skyseeker was dumbfounded that anything could live under the harshness of the sun. The sky was doing its best to hide the white ball behind its protective layer, but its harsh rays still managed to filter through the haze overhanging the landscape.

She could spy a few gnarled-looking things sprouting up from the patches of land on the other islands, plants that resembled fingers rising four or five Skyseeker's high, but the glare of the light made seeing anything in the distance an effort, even when she squinted. Then with a start she remembered the goggles, digging incessantly into her brow this entire time!

Commending her mighty Lord for his foresight, she pulled the lenses over her eyes, her vision tinting into the subtlest of greens as she adjusted the straps, bringing the light down to a tolerable level. She could feel buttons built into the sides of the goggles, but decided to leave their functions untested for now, she needed to do more scurrying, and less ogling.

The sound of wood knocking together drew her attention to the right, and she spied a fleet of odd constructs tied to a stake driven into the soft dirt nearby. They bobbed lazily in the murky water, some large enough to house a warband, some barely large enough to hold one or two Skaven. The constructs were shaped like bowls, but longer than they were wider, made up of long, wooden logs that looked like they'd been ripped off the battlements that walled the undercity.

These must be the float-things the stormvermin mentioned. There was maybe a dozen of these shantycraft moored to the island, Skyseeker hopping over to the smaller craft, picking the one that was only leaking a little bit. The knot tying it to the stake was too complicated to unwind, so she just cut the rope off with a dagger, the craft rocking back and forth as she flopped clumsily on board.

She took up a paddle, and proceeded to use the wrong end to draw the craft out into the river, her head corkscrewing around as she tracked the islands for enemies. When she was a safe distance from the burrow she'd emerged from, she decided to test the depth of the river, her paddle, and her paw, disappearing beneath the water line before she felt the bottom. When she pulled her arm back, her fur was sticky with filth that was darker than her fur. What sorts of creatures might call these marshlands home? Perhaps she shouldn't put her paw in anymore…

Skyseeker paddled further up the snaking river, stopping when a sinister ring carried over the bog, loud and powerful. She turned her head, seeing a collection of pointy shapes reach into the mists in the distance. Their profiles reminded her of fingers, and as though they were bowing in reverence, each one was angled towards the broadest shape in their centre – a tower so impossibly tall it touched, then pierced the very skies themselves, its peak capped by a giant brass bell.

She watched as the Bell of the Horned Rat swung from side to side, so agonisingly slow there was almost a minute's pause between each ring. When the capper clashed with the Bell, Skyseeker could see the air itself tremble upon the sound, the cheers of hundreds of her fellow Skaven carrying on the wind shortly after.

She paused as she watched the Shattered Tower for a few moments longer, knowing it would be a long time before she looked upon its maddening greatness again, if she even lived through her journey to the desert-lands at all.

She resumed her paddling, already missing the tight, protective walls of the under-city.

-xXx-

The hours ticked by as Skyseeker paddled through the marshlands, weaving her craft between the bubble-like islands that poked up through the muck-ridden water. Besides the Shattered Tower at her back, she could see structures dotting the quagmire's horizons – iron mills that churned in lazy half-circles, the creaking of wood ery loud in the still air. It was hard to tell if they were ruins from ancient times or were being operated by some unseen group, but she didn't want to waste time detouring to find out.

Dead leaves and wilted branches littered the snaking riverbed she travelled, Skyseeker crushing them with her paddle as she navigated the marsh. The vegetation here consisted of spiky thickets that reached no higher than her knees, and twisting branches that looked sharp enough to be daggers in their own right, but as she moved further from the heart of the bog, she began to notice a new addition to the plantlife. From the clusters of reed beds clinging to the islands, tougher bushels rose higher, their bleached bodies contrasting with the black stumps nestled between their colourless leaves.

Curious, she pushed her boat in the direction of one of these strange plants, her craft groaning as it knocked against the shore. Glancing over her shoulder, she reached out, chopping part of the plant away, turning it over in her other paw. Recognition flashed in her eyes, this was black corn, a deplorably tasteless but bountiful foodstuff found all over Skavenblight. Was this where it came from? It was surface world, plant food? How disgusting!

She wanted to toss it in the marsh where it belonged, but thanks to that stormvermin, it was either eat or starve. Making sure she wasn't being watched, she sank her teeth into it, chewing wetly on the cob as she worked the corn from end to end, rotating it until she'd devoured the entire thing.

She tossed the spent cob over her shoulder, where it splashed into the water noisily, then brandished the dagger again, slicing off another piece, then two more. Then she decided to just decapitate the whole plant and dump it on the craft. She scoured another bed of reeds for more, culling the land until she had so much corn that the craft's rear half visibly sagged. The extra weight made the already difficult task of rowing even harder, but at least now she could grab a snack whenever she wanted.

She snickered at her newfound fortune, patting her bounty with one paw and paddling the craft deeper into the bog with the other.

-xXx-

It was around the time the sun had risen to its highest point, that Skyseeker encountered fellow Skaven. They were manning shantycraft not unlike her own, maybe ten or so vessels at a glance, rowing between the banks and harvesting any piece of black corn they could find. Strangely, not one of them consumed a single kernel, despite appearing so malnourished that she could see the shapes of their bones through their fur.

The slaves, for they had to be slaves if they wore nothing but loincloths to preserve their modesty, gave her strange glances as she rowed passed them. She must be quite the sight, having a craft all to herself while they had to share their crafts with up to a dozen other Skaven. Skyseeker placed a paw on a dagger as they leered at her, expecting them to jump on her craft at any second. She relaxed as they returned to their crop-picking, occasionally chittering and pointing in her direction.

She turned her gaze to the other groups of grain-slaves as she paddled. The bounty of corn on some of the craft was so tall they overflowed into the water, Skyseeker lifting a brow as one of the shantycraft drifted away from the reeds, one of the paddlers telling his companions that it was time to return.

Skyseeker cruised in their direction, watching the overcrowded raft slip behind one of the many desolate islands. They seemed to be in a hurry. Keeping at a safe distance, she paddled in their wake, soon coming upon a sight that made her fur crawl.

She was rowing into the shadow of a truly massive ship, but it was no shantycraft. It stretched at least a hundred feet from bow to stern, sporting giant sails that flickered as they caught on the wind. The ship was tiered, three levels of windows working their way up from the sloped hull to the deck, where she saw dozens, maybe hundreds of ratmen flooding this way and that. Some pulled on ropes and spun cranks, others ferried armfuls of corn towards the hatches that presumably led to the cargo hold.

The great slave-hulk didn't even shake when the shantycraft she was following crashed into the hull, Skyseeker watching as ratmen on the deck threw down a wide spool of netting. At the behest of senior Skaven, slaves climbed and leapt off the deck, taking the shantycraft's cargo and hauling it back up. Any of the slaves who dropped a single cob were beaten and then tossed to the waters.

Her initial shock of the sight morphed into fear as she noticed the flag dangling off the nose of the ship. Printed upon the flayed sheet of cloth was a Skaven pup, surrounded by a blood-red ring that resembled the walls of a pit-fight arena. She knew this not just because she was incredibly intelligent, but because the symbol of Clan Gritus was known to all as the ultimate slave-masters of Skavendom, and she was right in the shadow of one of their slave-hulks.

Her glands squashing with anxiety, she ran to the other end of her craft, nearly tripping over her bounty in her haste, her arms blurring as she started paddling back the way she'd come. She felt so exposed beneath the curious sky, and turning her back on the ship made it worse.

"YOU, CLOAKED-THING! Stop-stop boaty-thing!"

Skyseeker jumped out of her skin, tilting her head over her back to see another shantycraft was sailing towards her. Like the others, this one was packed with slaves maybe a dozen strong, but one of their number stood head and shoulders above the rest. He was draped in a red tunic that left his arms exposed, his brown fur matted with grime and ugly scars. He lifted one of his paws at her, while with the other he brandished a giant black whip.

"Where slave think it go-goes?" he shouted. "Think it can scurry and eat-eat Gritus food? Greedy-thing not know its place!"

Skyseeker found herself paralysed with fear. She had used the shadows to escape the stormvermin before, but it was a clear day out here, and her only avenue of retreat was the water, but she didn't know how to swim. What should she do?

"No take-take food-things," the slaver snarled, his raft drawing closer as his ratmen paddled. "Slave must be punished! Throw it in Gritus pits to teach lesson!"

"I-I am no slave-thing!" she squeaked, terror making her voice tremble. The stupid slaver must have thought her a grain-collector with all the black corn she was laden with. Why was food always getting her into trouble?

"It is now-now!" the slaver answered. "Slave-thing don't move one paw, or I cut it off!"

His craft was so close she could feel the waves rock the wood beneath her feet. Willing her glands to stop spraying, she spurred into action, jamming her paddle into the river and frantically rowing herself away. She was an assassin, not a slave, no matter what this stupid Gritus-thing said!

Her ears twitched as the air around her snapped, Skyseeker daring to glance back at the slaver vessel. The slaver was dragging the tail of his whip over the muddy water, her craft having just managed to stay out of his range.

"Faster, faster!" the slaver yelled, Skyseeker mumbling the exact same words. "Flay your filthy hides if you don't hurry-hurry!"

The slaver drove his foot into one of the grain-slaves paddling his craft, the ratman tumbling into the river with a squeak. The other slaves redoubled their efforts at this sight, though the loss of their comrade just meant more work for the rest of them.

"Food not for you, greedy-thing!" the slaver taunted. Skyseeker threw a cob of corn that smacked off one of his eyes, making him yowl as he brought a paw to his face. He flailed his whip again, and she flinched reflexively as the air above her head snapped with such force she could almost feel it.

The slaver vented his frustration on another poor slave, grabbing him by the shoulders and tossing him to the marsh in an underpaw throw. With their numbers dwindling, some of the other slaves started using their paws to contribute, but the mirky waters dragged on their furs, their efforts having the exact opposite effect. Skyseeker needed every advantage she could get, but she was but one Skaven, and they were gaining on her. She needed to lighten the load on her craft, or she'd be caught. But how?

She formulated a plan in record time. Setting her paddle aside, she drew a dagger from her belt, and sliced a portion of wood off the bow. Then, she sharped one end of the wood until it became a deadly point. Now the boat was smaller, thus its weight was smaller, plus she had a new weapon. The Horned Rat was undoubtedly praising her craftiness right now.

Inspired, she raised the improvised stake above her head, and chucked it in the slaver's direction. The burly ratman ducked out of the way, and the stake found its mark in one of his rowers instead, the slave slinking into the river without a sound.

Skyseeker chopped off another section of her craft, her spirits lifting as she could feel the vessel already beginning to lose its weightiness. She sharpened the severed parts and tossed them at the other craft, scoring another kill and sewing chaos in the slaver's crew as they scurried around the limited space, trying to throw off her aim.

Their paddling almost came to a stop as they shouted and wailed, fear-musk thick in the air, but her relief came to a quick end when the slaver rallied them up, issuing new orders.

"SWIM!" he commanded, shoving a pair of ratmen off the bow. "Don't let slave-thing escape-leave!"

Petrified faces peered up at her from the water as the slaves were tossed overboard, dragging themselves reluctantly towards her craft. She cut off yet another of the boards that made up the hull, then swung it across the snout of the closest swimmer, feeling a satisfying crunch travel up the wood. She must have lost half of the craft's mass by now, excellent! She should be able to outpace the bigger slaver craft in no time.

She brandished the wooden pole at the other slaves, who bobbed and sputtered between the two vessels. It was obvious they feared their master, but seeing a craft-wielding assassin like her was giving them pause for thought.

"Move your tails! Now-now!" the slaver shouted, swinging his whip into the water, more interested in punishing his crew then chasing her down. Skyseeker could probably clear off and he wouldn't notice, but she'd had enough of this stupid Gritus-thing, unsheathing a weeping dagger and throwing it, the slaver too busy flogging his whip to notice her weapon fly into his chest.

Before he had even dropped, Skyseeker was moving. She launched off her craft, her paws digging into the skull of a slave bobbing in the water between the two crafts, using him to launch herself a second time. Her tail just scraped the water, but otherwise she landed on the slaver's craft completely dry, standing over her adversary with a satisfied expression on her face.

"I am not slave-thing," she repeated, gripping the handle of her dagger that jutted from his broad chest. The slaver reached to grab his whip, but Skyseeker planted a paw on his arm to stop him. "I am… assassin-thing!"

The slaver opened his mouth, but she twisted the weeping dagger before he could speak, a wet gurgle leaving his muzzle before he went still. After pulling her weapon free, she rolled his body unceremoniously overboard, planting her paws on her wide hips as she watched him sink. She'd done it! She'd taken on a group of her enemies in broad, exposed daylight and lived! With her brilliant – no, masterful tactics now proven, she felt confident that she just might complete this mission Gnawdwell had entrusted to her.

Her smile faltered as she heard something crack, turning round just in time to see her original craft collapse in on itself. Her left eye experienced a twitch as she watched her black corn bounty sink beneath the waterline, swallowed up by the blighted mush. She might be a master assassin, but she had to admit her foresight could use some work.

At least she wasn't without transport, the irony of the situation not lost on Skyseeker as she took up a spare paddle, rowing the new shantycraft away. What few slaves that had survived the skirmish scrabbled over the wreckage of her former craft, and she hesitated as she watched one struggle to keep his head above the cloudy fluid. A group of slaves could prove useful on her journey, but Gnawdwell had told her not trust anyone, and she'd be a fool to not follow his astute advice.

Shaking her head, she continued on her way, but not before tossing the drowning ratman a spare paddle.

-xXx-

Skyseeker sailed until exhaustion, her head constantly twisting and turning as she checked her surroundings for enemies. It had taken many hours of sneaky paddling, but she'd managed to avoid confronting any more of the slave-hulk's crew, the massive Gritus ship vanishing from her sight as she continued her eastward journey.

To further her good fortune, the sun's harsh glare had finally begun to abate, Skyseeker stretching her muzzle out in a yawn. Sleeping was a thing she constantly struggled to suppress, as the warrens of Skavenblight were even more perilous when one couldn't defend themselves. The marshes were no different. Even if she hadn't seen any wildlife so far, these bogs weren't uninhabited, who knew what would come after her once night settled.

Only when her exhaustion reached desperate levels, did she scour the riverbanks for shelter, finding that only the reed beds provided even a measure of cover, and she didn't fancy resting in the dirty waters. What she wouldn't give for a dank, Skyseeker-sized crevice to slink into for the night.

The thougth gave her an idea, and she steered her craft to one of the many islands. Hopping off the craft, she kneeled in the muddy shore, beginning to claw at the earth. While her arms were sore from all the day's rowing, the land was as soft as mush, her nails carving out a burrow that should conceal her, as long as nothing looked too carefully. By the time she was finished, she could feel her eyes burning with exhaustion, but at least she uncovered a worm during her digging, which she promptly consumed.

Her spirits slightly lifted, she squeezed into her burrow, having to curl into a ball to fit inside. Her energy was too depleted for her to clear out more room, but she liked the feeling of tight spaces anyway.

Checking to make sure no one had stolen her craft, she draped her cloak over herself, a sudden biting cold making her shiver. Strange noises carried on the wind from some unseen location, confirming her suspicion that at least something other than Skaven called these marshes home. She would need all the energy she could get on this quest, but in these unfamiliar, flooded lands, her imagination conjured up horrible monstrosities lurking in the waters, making the already troublesome task of resting even more difficult.

Stretching onto her back, she pulled her goggles off her face, wiping the grime off the lenses with her thumb. Perhaps now would be a good time to explore those buttons she discovered before. She pressed one at random, a noisy click startling her. She peered out into the marsh, holding her breath as she waited to see if some nocturnal creature would investigate.

When nothing came to eat her, she peered through the lenses, opening her muzzle in awe. The goggles had expanded the view, the rocks in the ceiling of her burrow ballooning in size. She wiggled her fingers in front of her face, her vision so magnified she could tell the shape of each fleck of dirt beneath her claws.

More buttons enhanced the filter even further, Skyseeker taking the goggles off to examine the wonderful device in more detail. It seemed that the buttons caused even smaller lenses to flick out from the side, each one shrinking until they were smaller than the pads of her fingers. How strange. A switch on the underside of one eye caused the frames to take on a brighter hue, fighting back the shades of darkness and replacing them with clearer whites and blues. She could see perfectly well in the dark, but perhaps pairing this with the zoom function, she would be able to spot threats from even further away now.

Before long she felt fatigue wash over her, and this time her fear of the marshes could fight it back no longer. She held her daggers close as it forced her eyes shut, sleep soon taking her.

-xXx-

It took several long days of rowing, but eventually Skyseeker could proceed no further on her shantycraft. The dirty riverbeds gradually began to recede until they were only knee-deep, the islands turning into long stretches of land, isolated tide pools breaking them up in places. She had reached the border of the marshlands.

The river she'd followed since her encounter with the slave-hulk came to an abrupt end, Skyseeker drawing her craft up to the bank on its far side. She placed her paddle by her foot, surveying the landscape with the help of her goggles' new abilities. Before her, the blighted lands continued for a while, until a wall of fog blocked her sight. The lands of the man-things lay beyond this obscuring haze, according to the map Lord Gnawdwell had shown her. Drawing up her flawless memory, she remembered the province was called… something beginning with a T. Or was it an E? No matter, it was a land belonging to savage surface-dwellers, she would have to be extra careful from here on out.

Although Skyseeker had never seen the marshes with her own eyes until now, they sheltered the home she had always known, and she felt a disconcerting sense of nostalgia as she readied to press on. She looked back the way she'd come, finding that the Shattered Tower that marked Skavenblight's location was far beyond her sight now, even with the aid of the goggles.

She gave the marsh one final glance, then stepped off the craft.

Chapter 2: Tilea

The land beneath Skyseeker's paws warped with every step. What was once malleable ground of the marshes began to solidify, turning islands of soft soil into mangled formations of rock. Where the nature in the marshes was withered, now she could see them blooming healthily between cracks in the granite. The hills of stone almost like natural defences to her, blocking the influence of the marsh from spreading any further.

Climbing one of the taller outcrops, Skyseeker shielded her goggles with a paw as she surveyed the way forward, the explosion of colour almost dazzling her right off her perch. Grey gave way to green and brown, the rugged terrain lushed with carpets of green stalk-looking things that waved in the breeze.

Even the gnarled-things that had permeated the quagmire had changed. They rose up healthily into the air like towers of wood, their branches furred over with leaves, as though some magical force had bestowed a curse of colour upon them. Snow-capped mountains put a stop to the stretches of green eventually, the land sloping into peaks so tall they rivalled the Shattered Tower in terms of height.

To say Skyseeker despised the change in scenery was an understatement. The marshes were a chore to navigate, true, but at least they didn't make her eyes want to bleed. It was only thanks to the goggles that she didn't have to forgo her sense of sight on this leg of her journey.

She descended into the beginnings of the rolling meadows, her heart thumping against her chest as the mist that had draped over the quagmire began to wane. From out of the overcast, the heavens took on a striking shade of blue, her mind struggling to balance her curiosity of the sky, and the pervasive sense of exposure it instilled in her chest. What kinds of creatures could stand all this sun and breeze and soft plants? They must be horribly mutilated if they could thrive in such a distracting ecosystem.

Skyseeker had heard descriptions of the surface-dwellers, savage-things with skin instead of fur, towering over even the largest of Skaven. They wielded weapons of steel and fire, rather than the clearly superior artform of Warpstone. Skavenkind greatly outnumbered the surface-dwellers, but what they lacked in numbers that made up for with cunning tactics and unwavering faith, fighting to the bitter end all in the name of their false Gods.

How much of this was true or not was hard to tell, and she pleaded to the Horned Rat she didn't get the chance to find out. To kill Skaven was one thing, but to fight creatures bigger than Lord Gnawdwell…

She shook these thoughts from her mind. A Mors assassin like herself would have no trouble avoiding creatures that needed so much sunlight. Just like in the Warrens, she would cling to the shadows wherever they lurked, slipping right between the legs of those who stupidly thought they could seek her out.

As she pressed on through the hills, she started to believe the lands might be abandoned. She expected the surface-dwellers to have constructed fortifications against the marshes, to have assembled armies to patrol the roads and hinder her progress, but there was nothing. A few crumbling ruins dotted the area, but they looked as decrepit as Skavenblight's tunnels, perhaps Lord Gnawdwell had exaggerated their threat? No doubt a calculated move to keep her on her toes.

A few more hours of walking proved her wrong. Strange constructs came into the limits of her view as she weaved between two hills, Skyseeker scrambling onto higher ground for a better look at them. Placing a paw on her goggles, she zoomed in on the objects, and after a few moments, she was looking upon what appeared to resemble a city, though she could be wrong.

The buildings were leaning against each other at peculiar angles, the quality of the masonry varying wildly from building to building. The clusters of buildings were separated by dozens of tiny islands, canals full of green water snaking between them. It appeared a little too much of a juicy target for artillery in Skyseeker's opinion, but perhaps the true city lay below, and this eyesore was just a decoy. Whatever her opinions of the surface-dwellers, their engineering was commendable.

Just before she prepared to move on, something moved through the meadows between her and the city, something big. She brought her goggles back one magnification, tweaking the dials randomly until she cleared up the image.

She glazed over a sea of gnarled-things growing across the land like scab over a wound, snivelling in annoyance as she tried to relocate what she'd seen. There! A group of her kin scuttled from hill to hill, turning their pink noses up as they scented the strange smells of this place. Skyseeker put their warband in the hundreds, and that was only the ratmen that she could see from this angle.

Rubbing her chin in thought, Skyseeker drafted up a plan in her head. Her Lord had said the Great Clans were already moving ahead of her, perhaps she could use them to her advantage? It was risky, but she'd rather travel this strange land with an army as opposed to being a lone-rat.

Glancing warily at the city, she headed in their direction, eager to relish in the feeling of safety in numbers once again.

-xXx-

The riveted plates of his sabatons squeaked as he raised a foot onto the raised lip of earth, shaking out his portable telescope and peering through it at the countryside. Great mountain ranges encircled the province of Tilea, rising up like monstrous teeth to the north and east. The Vaults were sturdy fortifications against the threats lying beyond them, but they were not impassible. There were many routes squiggling through the ranges, some well-known, some not, the stretching shadows playing tricks on his eyes as he searched the slopes.

"You up here again, Cap'n?"

He lowered his device with an annoyed click of his teeth, looking back to see a young man climbing up the path. He was dressed in a creamy-coloured gambeson with the Tilean coat of arms stitched over his vest. He vaguely recognised the scout from prior encounters, but couldn't recall his name.

"Expectin' trouble from the north or somethin'?" the scout continued, his eyes following the path of his telescope to the Vaults. "Can't rightly see the point of watching the passes like a hawk, sir. Dwarves are sittin' pretty in their mountains, and the greenskins are more interested in the Border Princes than us."

"Attacks often come from where we least expect, lad," he replied, pushing the two ends of his telescope together with his gauntlets. "What news do you bring?"

"The Commander sent for you," the scout answered. "he's in the war tent."

He nodded, stopping to pick his decorated helmet off a nearby rock. Feathers the colour of blood plumed out of the apex of the metal, plucked from an exotic animal not native to this province. Tucking the helmet under his arm, he gestured for the scout to lead on, the two moving down the path.

As they descended, the camp came into view. The band had set up next to a running stream that hugged the base of the hill, hundreds of tents bearing blue and white colours stretching out and below in uneven rings. Barricades of wooden stakes pointed out from the very edges of the camp, the perimeter lined with trenches to ward off any potential attack.

Scattered about the bustling camp were cleared spaces, where swordsman flourished their weapons in synchronocity as they went over basic stances. There were also fenced off areas penning in the livestock and the horses, as well as smithing areas devoted to the sharpening and tinkering of wargear, the sound of weapons scraping against whetstones present at all hours of the day.

The Captain dodged out of the way as a pair of soldiers marched some rowdy horses off the beaten track, the handlers stopping to salute as he passed them by. Campfires were sprinkled between the tents here and there, adding a pleasant scent of roast to the body odour and blood tainting the air. The men gathered around said fires were laughing and chatting as they ate their rations. The last few days had been mostly absent of warfare, resulting in a busier camp than normal.

After navigating the maze of tents a few minutes, the Captain stood before the larger tents that made up the heart of camp. Visually, the headquarters looked the same as the rest of the camp tents, but upscaled appropriately to mark its importance, and crowned with the Tilean coat of arms – a pair of crossed swords

The scout waited outside while the Captain pushed the flap aside, blinking his eyes as he adjusted to the gloomy interior. Carpet had been rolled out to give the war tent some decorum, parts of the sheet interrupted by the wooden beams keeping the structure erect. A round table took up most of the floorspace, candles casting wavering lights across a map of the immediate region, red and blue figurines placed upon some of the landmarks

Leaning over the maps was an older, but certainly not feeble man, dressed from feet to neck in silver plate armour. He pinched at his combed moustache as he slid one of the figurines across the map with a frown, his expression not changing as he looked up at the Captain.

"Ah, Captain Roderick, good morning."

"You wished to see me, Commander?" Roderick asked, nodding respectfully as he stopped beside the table, waiting patiently as the Commander moved one of the blue pieces further inland.

"Indeed. I have received a troubling report from our scouts watching the western flank. Yet another warband has slunk into the province, and is crossing the fields to Miragliano's immediate north.

"More rodents?" Roderick scoffed. He'd spit in disgust if not for the carpet. "That's the second Vermintide to cross the border this week alone."

"And more crawl out of the Blighted Marshes every day," the Commander continued, scratching in chin in thought. "Tilea has always been besieged by those blasted lands, but to this degree? I fear whatever it is that has the Skaven so riled up."

"Rats are opportunistic things," Roderick replied, waving a dismissive glove. "Even the slightest whiff of weakness can set them off. Do they plan on attacking the city?"

"Not according to their latest movements," the Commander explained, placing a hand on the northern half of Tilea. "This warband circles Miragliano from north to east, using the forests for cover, ignoring every inn and town they possibly can. Whatever their goal is, it is not here in the North. I'd put my money on them hitting one of the southern cities if I were a betting man."

"Has no one intercepted them?" Roderick asked, looking to the other figurines placed on the map. "What about the other mercenary bands?"

"They are more interested in butchering each other than to face external threats," the Commander replied with a shake of his head.

As usual, Roderick thought, but instead he said: "Then, it falls upon us to rid these lands of infestation. What are their numbers?"

"One thousand strong, perhaps more. Compared to the last Vermintide, this one seems to favour more weapon teams than shock troopers. They will make perfect targets for your cavalry, but we must lure them away from their infantry first."

"A sound plan," Roderick said. "What do you propose?"

The Commander explained the plan in detail, and when he was done, Roderick nodded in supressed enthusiasm. Whatever his opinions of the Tilean Commander, he was a born strategist. "We must move swiftly, however," the Commander continued. "lest the Skaven cross further afield and cause untold chaos to my lands."

"I'll assemble the knights immediately," Roderick said. He was about to turn away when the Commander held up a hand.

"Before you go, some good news. I've come to the conclusion that your service to the company has exceeded my expectations as of late. Bring Tilea victory this day, Captain, and I'll consider your debt repaid in full. You have my word."

Roderick's brow furrowed. In these lands, it was more convenient to trust a man's purse than his word, but he had little choice, and the Commander seemed an honest sort so far.

"The rodents are as good as dead," Roderick declared.

"One last thing," the Commander added.

"Yes, sir?" he replied, the prospect of freedom leaving him eager.

"I wish to know what these ratmen are doing," the Commander mused. "Why they pick now of all times to march east. This request may strike you as… unusual, impossible even, but if you can bring one of these Skaven back alive, you would be doing Tilea a great service. Do not compromise the lives of your men for this task, but if it's at all possible, bring one to me."

"I… I will make it so," Roderick replied after hesitating. The Commander didn't add any more, and he took that as a sign of dismissal, donning his helmet with a look of determination.

-xXx-

It wasn't very difficult to infiltrate the warband.

Right before making her move, Skyseeker had rolled around in a pool of mud for a few minutes, making sure each individual strand of her dark fur was caked in filth, setting aside her goggles and daggers so they stayed clean. They were gifts from the Lord himself, and she'd treat them as such.

Once she was sure her bredder-musk was hidden beneath the horrid stench of earth, she retrieved her gear, and stumbled through the underbush towards the warband's rearguard ranks. She'd watched the Skaven column for long while, waiting until they delved into the dense forests before making her move. The broken sightlines would make her incursion even easier.

She soon spotted a group of gutter-runners, stumbling over the many protruding roots as they struggled to stay in formation, Skyseeker hurrying towards them. She rushed a little too hard and fell clumsily onto her front as she tripped on a root, purely to help sell the image of course, but when she piled into the ranks, none of the ratmen even batted an eye in her direction, her relief palpable as she quickly absorbed herself into the masses. They probably thought her goggles were scavenged off some other dead Skaven, and as long as her prized daggers stayed hidden under her cloak, none would be the wiser. Another outstanding victory for Skyseeker.

While sneaking into the ranks was easy, maintaining her composure was not. Clanrats with authority over the slaves ensured that the stragglers kept pace with the warband, and her unit of gutter-runners was full of lazy welps. Whips were flailed across the scurrying Skaven, the resulting cracks bringing her straight back to the marshes when she'd killed that slaver. She had to fight the urge to sever the paws of the Skaven lashing the gutter-runners into shape. While her confidence had been boosted since the marshes, killing now would just draw more attention to herself.

With a resigned sigh, she swallowed her pride, flinching as one or two whips were sent her way, drawing stinging cuts on her back and arms. All for the mission, she told herself as she clutched her wounds, the pain would be worth it once she succeeded in her task.

Skyseeker couldn't get a good look at the warband's numbers until many hours of marching passed, when the procession crested a hill, leaving the rearguard at a higher elevation while the rest of the Skaven extended out and over the meadows like a furry stain of fecal matter. She could see scores of ratling gunners and jazzails composing the middle of the column, with a smaller, but no less numerous amount of clanrats heading the procession. Here and there, banners poked up from the army, the symbol of Clan Skryre catching her eye. That explained why there was so much ranged weaponry.

Doing a double-take, she realised this wasn't the only Great Clan banner she could see. There was also one of Clan Pestilens, even the Eshin symbol if she wasn't mistaken (which she never was). Her Lord had warned her about this, but actually seeing the Great Clans working together troubled her greatly. Mors was a powerful Clan, but not nearly enough to challenge an alliance on this scale, however fickle it might be…

Many hours of lashing and marching passed, the skies starting to darken, until finally word travelled up the column for an order to halt. Skyseeker collapsed alongside her fellow heaving gutter-runners, noting that even the Skaven flogging the ranks with their whips looked tired, though that was likely because they had hardly ever let up all day.

Minutes passed with no movement from the idling warband, Skyseeker taking the opportunity to shut her eyes. She tried imaging herself in her personal burrow in the warrens below Skavenblight, how her favourite stone felt so comfortable if she laid on it at just the right angle.

She was snapped out of her fatigue by the stomping of heavy footfalls, she and the other Skaven darting their heads round in search of the source. Something big was coming up from the forward ranks, she could see the heads of the ratmen part like water as a hulking figure stalked through the troops, the sound of a pained howl reaching her ears. Some of the more fearful gutter-runners whimpered as they turned their heads away, as though readying themselves for punishment. She would have asked them what was going on, if she wasn't shaking beneath her cloak as well.

The waiting was terrible, but soon the hulking figure was mere paces away, and she watched with a hanging jaw as what appeared to be a hand made of plates and gears shoved a pair of ratling gunners aside, the sound of cranks and winches very loud as a hush fell over the warband.

The figure looked like a Skaven in the most basic sense, as she could not see a strand of fur on it, save for the few whiskers protruding from beneath its sloped helmet. Out of the collar of its armoured neck, tubes snaked out to connect to a harness that probably weighed more than she did. The wargear was covered in all manners of valves and dials, the suit constantly squeaking and hissing as wisps of unknown gasses slipped out of the seams in its armoured limbs.

Mounted on its back was a giant tank, similar in design to the packs worn by the warpfire-throwers, the signature green glow of technomancy seen through the many eyepieces covering the machinery. It was big enough she could have crawled comfortably inside it, but the hulking figure showed no signs of discomfort.

One of its arms wasn't an arm, but a warp-blade, protruding from the spot where a Skaven's paw would be, the weapon linked to the harness by more pipes and devices she couldn't begin to guess the function of. The other arm, while somewhat the familiar shape of a paw, was instead entirely metal, ending in three flexible grippers tipped with dagger-sized claws. It was anyone's guess as to whether the Skaven's limbs were hidden beneath all the equipment, or completely replaced by these mechanical counterparts.

"Listen to my greatness, stupid minions!" a low, powerful voice called out, its owner obvious enough. The Warlock Engineer bobbed its helmet as it spoke, the grill fixed over its muzzle giving its voice a menacing effect. "The enemies of Clan Skryre are many in these tainted lands. They shall all die-die for the glory of Great Horned Rat. But first!" the machine added, warp-lightning travelling along a circuit wrapped over its harness. "Nap time!"

The exhausted warband's cries were equal parts pain and joy, the Warlock waving a mechanical arm as he ordered camp to be made, Skyseeker relaxing as he turned his back on her. The Warlock was so imposing, the blending of machine and magic as strange as it was unsettling.

Axes were handed out, the copious amounts of slaves taking them to the surrounding forests, hacking away at the tall wood-things. A few unfortunate ratmen were caught in the path of the felled plants, their shouts of alarm cut short as they were squashed. The sigh elicited much laughter from the rest of the warband – morale always spiked when food offered itself to the ration piles.

Skyseeker joined her fellow runners, hacking away at the wood-things with a handaxe and hauling the pieces towards the firepits, the Warlock casting a spell to ignite the wood once enough was gathered. The blazing fires fought back the encroaching darkness, Skyseeker looking out across the forest to see many other pits blooming across the area – there must be other spellcasters supporting the warband.

Cradling her rumbling stomach, Skyseeker made her way to the ration piles, and for the first time in her journey, nobody tried to steal from her. The warband had an abundance of rations, so all she had to do was wait until everyone else had eaten, then gather up her scraps.

After eating her fill of corn and a few strips of unrecognisable meat, Skyseeker searched for a spot to rest. The slaves were retiring to their freshly-dug burrows in drives, Skyseeker already hearing hundreds of snoring noises from the many holes in the earth. Skaven slept in piles to share warmth when they weren't killing each other, and while sleeping underground was an appealing prospect, Skyseeker wasn't about to trap herself beneath a hundred horny ratmen for the sake of driving off the cold.

She picked a spot far enough away that she wouldn't be disturbed, but close enough that she could run back to the safety of the warband if some nocturnal creature happened upon her. She could already feel numbness spreading down her limbs as she distanced herself from the fires, but nobody said her undercover mission would be easy.

As she crawled into the cover of a patch of ferns, she noticed that the sky had changed at some point. The bright blues she'd seen in the day had turned to black, though not quite as black as her fur. All across this new, vast canvas were points of glittering light, the sight enrapturing her. There had to be thousands of them, sprinkled throughout the heavens with seemingly no pattern or order. She wondered what they were, magical flares? Comets of Warpstone?

It felt odd to lay there and just… stare at the sky, but in a pleasing sort of way. She could almost forget she was in the nightmarish hellscape of the surface world, forget her rearing paranoia for a few brief moments, and just let her thoughts wander to nothing in particular. She tried to touch these twinkling points with her paw, but she couldn't reach them. Perhaps if she climbed that wood-thing over there she might be able to…

Despite her protests, fatigue crept over her, and she curled into a ball, the afterimage of the sky burned into her eyes as sleep took her.

-xXx-

The warband marched through the forests, armour and weapons clanking, paws skittering across the many pools of light painting the ground where the sun penetrated the dense canopy. Wood-things and ferns, that was all the surface world had to offer, the monotonous landscape quickly boring Skyseeker as the hours blended together.

Fortunately, it wasn't long before a landmark appeared, changing up the scenery. The land dipped into a vast trench, stretching from left to right, and sitting at its lowest point was a bubbling river. The water wasn't green like the underground ponds in Skavenblight, nor murky-brown like those of the marshes, but as clear as crystal, transparent enough that one could see the moss covering the submerged rocks. Did that mean it was poisoned? The skavenslaves leading the warband didn't seem affected as they crossed it, perhaps its contamination didn't affect her kind.

As her and the gutter-runners descended the slope, she spotted a Skaven running the other way from where they were marching, moving up the column's flank. He seemed to hold some measure of rank on account of the whip in his paw, but he looked as spooked as a slave, his beady eyes stretching out of their sockets as he threw his hands out.

"Man-things!" he shrieked, his limbs darting about like he was in the midst of a stroke. "Man-things on hill-mound! Warlock say make-form line here-now!"

The ratling gunner pairs hoisted their weapons above their wastes, their loaders keeping the machinery clear of the water as they formed ranks. At the front, the skavenslaves fanned out, creating a wall of bodies on the far bank, spears and swords aimed up the incline. Skyseeker could see the Warlock Engineer at the forefront, waving his mechanical arms as he shouted orders at his minions. She couldn't hear him, but in typical Skryre fashion, it was probably a rousing speech about how he'd kill them if the man-things didn't do it first.

Her and the gutter-runners were ordered to hold the left flank of the formation, her legs kicking up splashes of water as they took up position in the winding river. She peered up the slope, where maybe fifty paces of open ground separated the shore of the river and the top of the hill, the crest obscured behind dense clusters of wood-things.

Every rustle of leaves and creak of wood filled her with anxiety, her eyes flicking about as she scanned for her enemy. The urgency of the messenger implied an immediate attack, but there was nothing, and there continued to be nothing. She counted the seconds until they reached the hundreds, the tension in her chest reaching a boiling point when she counted to the thousands and then lost count.

"Where-where man-things?" she asked, trying to sound as male as possible and failing miserably to her own ears. She was asking no one in particular, but the runner on her left answered her.

"Patience!" he chided, tossing his knife from paw to paw and dropping it on the third throw. "Man-things always make us wait for attack-charge."

"They scared of Skavenblight-might!" another added, yowling in pain as a ranked ratman hit him with his whip.

"Silence!" the ratman snarled. "No talk, more wait-wait!"

And wait she did. She could feel the sun switch directions as more time passed, her feet freezing as she held her ground in the water, her face hot as the sun bleached her fur. This was no warband! All the tales she'd been told of Skryre's vast schemes of war involved overwhelming numbers and firepower, not standing around and doing nothing. She wanted to charge in and hunt the man-things down, but this was their territory, it would be easy to fall into a trap with no warrens or tunnels to fall back to if things went wrong.

The runner that told her to be patient eventually decided it was nap time, Skyseeker wincing as he had to be beaten awake. He wasn't the only one beginning to tire. The ratling gunners had nothing to brace their heavy weapons against, their thin arms trembling as they tracked the hill for targets. The warplock jezzails sitting far to the rear faired a little better, as they could rest their long rifles on their pavise shields and dose off when nobody was looking, but it was clear that restlessness was giving way to faituge, perhaps an intentional move on the man-things part.

Skyseeker lifted her head, exposing her teeth in a yawn, watching a flock of feathered-things flapped their wings overhead, soaring down to perch on a branch down the river to her left. As her boredom began to outgrow her lingering anxiety, it happened, and it happened quickly.

A low-pitched wail rang out over the forest, the noise coming from seemingly all directions. The uneasy sound soared in volume until it reached its pitch, oddly musical to her ears, and then as it deceased, gruff shouts from the undergrowth rose up to continue the foreboding call.

Skyseeker turned her eyes to the line of wood-things up the slope, watching figures emerge from between the roots. They were dressed in striking, bright colours that matched the sky, their wargear contrasting against the oppressively green surroundings. Some of their faces were covered in fur, while others were clean and naked, Skyseeker able to make out pink, soft-looking skin covering flat faces.

The man-things raised swords and shields, their war-cries making her fur stand on end as they charged out of cover and descend the slope. Some of the skavenslaves bounced on the spot, blibbering and crying, while others turned tail, batting aside their counterparts as they made to retreat. The latter of which were quick to be punished by the ranked Skaven, which helped to keep the former in check as their fellow ratmen were beaten for their cowardice.

"Ahead-forward!" a guttural voice called out somewhere to the right, one belonging to the Warlock. "Throw your pathetic tails onto them, minions! Quick-quick!"

Unleashing a call of their own, the skavenslaves advanced, thousands of scurrying feet leaving the water to meet the charge. The man-things were halfway across the open ground now, and more still were coming from out of the forest. They just kept coming, dozens reaching the hundreds, but the skavenslaves still vastly outnumbered them.

The crank of winding gears drew Skyseeker's gaze to the back ranks, the ratling gunners bringing their chain-guns to bear, their loaders begining to crank the warp-stream tanks. Dozens of rotary barrels began to spin, spewing bullets that started off slow, before gradually building up into unbroken streams of warpstone.

The firepower arced over the skavenslave ranks, splashing into the paths of the oncoming man-things. She watched as one of the surface-dwellers took a burst of warpstone to his chest, his war-cry cut short as he rolled to the ground, tens of the man-things forefronting the charge succumbing to the warp-hell.

The other man-things didn't falter, instead raising their shields over their heads, the warpstone barrage ricocheting off their concave surfaces. The ratling guns accuracy was much to be desired, so the weapon teams couldn't target their exposed legs reliably, only saturate the hill with overbearing firepower and hope for a lucky hit.

Skyseeker watched with glee as scores of the man-things were cut down, the ones lagging behind forced to lead over their fallen kinsman, but the charge didn't stop, the mass of blue and white figures spearing into the oncoming skavenslaves. As the two sides met, the clash of metal on metal was almost as loud as the barking of the chain-guns, Skyseeker's fear-musk spraying as a cluster of slaves was swept off their feet by a man-thing wielding a hammer the size of the average clanrat.

More of the man-things survived the warpstone suppression, hitting the skavenslave line with devastating force, their tall frames slightly obscured behind the scurrying troops. Skyseeker thought the ratling guns would cease fire, but that was not the case. The gunners angled their barrels lower, bringing their fields of fire over the skavenslaves, catching dozens of Skaven troops in the crossfire. She waited for the Warlock to order them to halt, but none came, a look of horror on her face as the warband suffered more casualties than the man-things did. Skyseeker knew that sacrifice was a way of life for her kind, but to see this display troubled her, and she thanked the Horned Rat that she belonged to the noble Clan Mors.

The butchering only stopped when the ratling guns needed to reload, the weapon teams slapping fresh tanks of warpstone into the ammo packs. Some of the teams of two started arguing about how slow the other was being, resulting in a few short, but significant delays, as Clan Skryre relied upon their guns more than anything when it came to combat.

The skavenslave line began to visibly bulge inwards, as swords and spears flashed through the air, the towering surface-dwellers threatening to split the warband right down the centre. Skyseeker clutched her daggers until her paws hurt, she wanted to get in there, take her first man-thing kill, but no order to advance was given. There must be some tactical advantage having the runners stay put, but she'd never been in a warband before, and had no idea what that could be. All she and the other gutter-runners could do was watch the fight and slowly lose their nerves.

She was momentarily drawn away from the battle by a chirping sound, flicking her head round to spy the flock of feathered-things she'd noticed before. They'd flitted from their perch, the sounds of war failing to spook the tiny creatures until now. Strange. She glanced below their perch, her eyes widening as she caught movement from further down the river.

Emerging from the forests was another wave of man-things, carrying themselves upon the backs of strange creatures. Their mounts had four legs that ended in hooves, with elongated faces perched upon equally long necks, their manes of fur shaking as they galloped through the ankle-deep water. There were dozens of them, fifty at the least, their riders brandishing a mix of long rifles and spears.

Skyseeker's mouth formed a little 'o' of surprise as the mounts carried their riders swiftly into the flank, close enough that she could make out the eyes of the man-thing leading the charge. He was dressed in a suit of armour the colour of silver, the clanking sound of the plates overlapping the thunderous pounding of the charging mounts. His helmet was the same colour as his suit, except for the top of it, where it extended into a blossoming trio of feathers as red as blood. Most of his face was obscured behind a grill, all save for his eyes, peering out of a sideways-angled visor.

His arm shot out, a pistol in his grip, his limb snapping upwards as the top of it seemed to explode. This weapon wasn't like those the Skaven used, there was simply a spark of fire, a whoosh of air, and the gutter-runner to her left was dead, a bullet between his eyes.

Everything seemed to slow as she watched the rest of the riders raise their handguns, half of the gutter-runners still preoccupied watching the front to notice their approach. She thought she could feel the lead-rider's eyes meet hers for a second as he raised a spear with his other arm, angling it towards the closest gutter-runner.

Skyseeker flopped to the ground, choking on dirty riverwater as she clutched her head in her arms, the thunderous report of a volley making her ears ring. Gutter-runners fell around her by the dozens, dead before they even hit the ground, dark blood quickly dirtying the water. Those that survived the guns finally noticed the new threat, readying their weapons, but knives and daggers didn't stand a chance against charging riders, the man-things trampling into the Skaven, what little order they had crumbling beneath spears and hooves.

Darting out the path of an oncoming rider, Skyseekers crawled out of the river on all fours, the wet gravel pinching her elbows and knees. The ground was quaking, like a Vermintide was burrowing up from below the earth, the hooves of the man-thing mounts shaking the earth with their ferocious charge. Everywhere she looked, crisscrossing legs of the mounts filled her vision, and through them she could see her fellow runners being skewered on spears, or lifted off their feet by a thrown javelin, or crushed beneath the weight of the mounts.

Fear threatened to paralyse her, but she summoned up the willpower to keep crawling, the forest and the underbrush that hugged the riverbank promising cover and safety. Darting her head to the right, she spotted a rider descending straight towards her, the man-thing pulling the reigns of his mount so that she would be trampled in mere seconds.

Rising into a crouch, she lepat to the side, brandishing a weeping dagger at the same time. Holding it out sideways, she slashed the abominable mount across the flank as it passed by, drawing a cut across its smooth, brown hide. The creature wailed, tossing its head back as its thin legs gave out beneath it, its rider flung from his saddle. He hit the ground hard enough that the impact dented his plate armour, but the tough man-thing started to get back up, pushing his gloved hands into the silt.

Her tail flicking in anger, Skyseeker jumped on top of him, the man-thing grunting as she put her insubstantial weight on his legs. Keeping her dagger in the reverse-grip, she angled the blade down, and plunged it into his back with a snarl. The armour barely resisted the corrosive power of the weeping dagger, Skyseeker feeling a soft crunch as her weapon tasted his flesh.

The man-thing jerked, then relaxed, as limp as his dead mount. She ripped her weapon free, blood sprouting from the pierced point, jumping on the spot as she prepared for another rider to attack her. The rest of the charging man-things raced around her, giving her a wide berth, and at first she thought this was because she'd shown them how a breeder fought, but this was not the case at all.

As the stampede tore threw the gutter-runners, rather than turn around for another charge, the man-things spurred their mounts on, rebuilding their momentum as they prepared their weapons.

The runners had been butchered in mere seconds, and the occupied ratling gunners stood no chance. The riders clashed furiously into their ranks, ratmen keeling over with spears sprouting from their chests, cries of dismay carrying across the battlefield.

A great ball of green flame erupted as one of the riders damaged fired at an ammo pack, the flimsy machinery obliterating every Skaven and man-thing in a large radius around it. A few of the gunners had managed to reload in time, SKyseeker seeing a pair of riders caught in a cone of warpstone fire, but the man-things prioritised their targets, turning the powerful rear ranks into a group of unarmed, fleeing ratmen in seconds.

She heard the call to flee rise above the sounds of battle, as well as those ordering the Skaven to stay, Skyseeker watching as two opposing ratmen voicing these orders began to fight each other, while riders dashed from left to right all around them. Seeing no point in giving her life to a Great Clan, she chose to make for the cover of the forest, along with the rest of her fleeing kin.

She was paces away from the protection of the underbrush when the crack of a dangerously close shot rang out, followed by the worst pain she ever felt travelling down her arm. She tumbled to the ground, rolling a few times before her momentum brought her to a stop.

She nursed her ruined shoulder as she propped herself up, looking behind her to see the lead-rider ten or so paces away, his pistol trailing a wisp of smoke. The man-thing began to reload, Skyseeker baring her teeth at him as she drew her daggers out of their sheaths, holding them above her head in preparation for a throw.

The man-thing was almost done loading his handgun, when a mettalic, hulking figure stood between the two, swiping a giant warp-blade over its shoulder. It was the Warlock Engineer, his harness whistling as the internal clockworks powered the swing of the strike.

The plumes on the man-thing's helmet bobbing, the rider reared its mount back, the creature shrieking as the warp-blade missed its legs by a whisker, slamming into the ground it had been standing on a second ago.

"Eat-taste my warp-lightning!" the Warlock snarled, punching a switch on his harness. His arm-blade began to glow, streaks of lightning cocooning along the length of the weapon from hilt to tip. The man-thing shot him in the face, chips of armour falling away as the Warlock cradled his mask.

Instead of doing as the Warlock requested, the man-thing steered his mount away, narrowly dodging an electrified swipe of the empowered warp-blade. There was a swrod strapped to the man-things armoured back, and he drew it, holding it aloft and the Warlock moved in to cut him down.

It looked like the two were about to duel, when the man-thing kicked the flanks of his mount, riding out of the Warlock's reach. He began to shout something, drawing circles with the tip of his sword in a strange gesture, begingin to ride back down the length of the river.

The other riders began to follow suit, cutting down a few Skaven on their way to rejoin their leader. Were they retreating? Did they not want to face a breeder and a Warlock head-on? She couldn't blame them.

As quickly as they had arrived, the riders departed the battlefield, following the water until they vanished out of sight into the forest. The man-things engaging the slaves were also falling back now, most of the cowardly ratmen too afraid to take advantage and run them down. The warplock jezzails, free from the harassing riders, picked off the straggling man-things as they retreated, and with one last warpstone volley, the last visible man-thing was slain.

"Another pitiful enemy destroyed by the mighty Clan Skryre!" the Warlock cheered, raising his mechanical arms. The surviving Skaven cheered with varying degrees of enthusiasm, but the battle didn't appear like a victory to Skyseeker. For every dead man-thing, there were ten slain Skaven, and the weapon teams were all but decimated in the charge.

"Reequip yourselves, minions!" the Warlock shouted. "Clan Skryre will destroy these insolent man-things, make an example of them, yes-yes! All part of the Great Plan!"

The survivors of the warband began to pick over the corpses, Skyseeker joining them as she kneeled in the dirt. She had looted her dead foes her whole life, so she held no pity as she turned over the dead gutter-runners, looting the knives and stashing them in her belt. One could never have too many knives.

When she was loaded down with as many weapons as she could carry, she turned her attention to her wound. The stupid man-thing's bullet was still rolling around inside her flesh, the amount of blood rolling down her fur make her head dizzy. Washing it as best she could in the river, she bit off a part of her cloak, wrapping it around her shoulder and tying the two ends together. The pain was worse than any stab or cut she'd felt in her life, but at least the bleeding was slowing down.

"Time's up!" the Warlock shouted, his voice somehow amplified by his obscuring mask. "Forward march, minions! Find the man-things! The Horned Rat demands retribution!"

The Warlock ordered the warband to assemble, and Skyseeker took up her spot in the rearguard, her thoughts drifting to that man-thing with the feathered helmet. His mount had been so swift despite its immense size, and it gave her an idea. Such a speedy mount could cut down her travel time significantly, all she had to do was get her hands on one – the lead rider's would do. Of course, she didn't know how to control a mount, but she had a tried and tested solution that always worked whenever she needed something to go her way – threaten it with death.

"Follow their man-stink!" the Warlock ordered, smacking a skavenslave that wandered out of formation. "But do not fight-charge until I say so! I am hatching a brilliant scheme, and it requires complete discretion! If I hear so much as a squeak, you will all die-die!"