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  Shriekstone - Evan Dicken

  About the Author

  An Extract from ‘Gloomspite’

  A Black Library Publication

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  Shriekstone

  Evan Dicken

  ‘Oi! Tell the Loonking, you gits skulking by,

  That here, rotting in the gloom, we lie.’

  – Author Unknown (Wilvar Bowrisson translation)

  ‘Grimnir will avenge me.’ The fyreslayer died laughing, wheezing through a grin gone wet and crimson as Ratgob worked his moonslicer deeper into the stunty’s miserable guts.

  The loonboss scowled down at the red-bearded corpse. In his reign as High Creeper of Shriekstone he’d gutted plenty of duardin – heard everything from screams to death oaths.

  Never laughter, though.

  With a grunt, Ratgob tugged his moonslicer free and scuttled over to watch the slaughter.

  His lads were doing the Bad Moon’s work. Mobs of black-robed grots surrounded the surviving fyreslayers, poking with rusty blades as the stunties bellowed in their ugly, hard-edged tongue. Ratgob had spied the nasty brutes earlier in the evening, climbing the switchback that led to Shriekstone’s corroded gates. The fyreslayers had been careful, but the mountain had eyes. Ratgob caught the fools in a double ambush, letting them slaughter a mob of malingerers while he crept from one of the many secret passages that honeycombed Shriekstone.

  The thought made the loonboss smile – no one out-creeped the High Creeper.

  ‘Spook! Spook!’ The call went up, and Ratgob’s glee curdled as the shaman was borne forward by staggering slaves. Festooned with bells and clacking bones, Vishuz Spookfinger perched precariously upon the skull of a giant cave squig, jabbering and howling. The lads parted before him, shrieking as they crawled over one another in their hurry to escape the shaman’s ire.

  Unarmed and bloodied, the last stunty struggled to its feet to glare up at Spookfinger.

  ‘Stab ’im!’ The shaman crooked a knobby hand at the fyreslayer. ‘Saw off his filthy beard!’

  One of Spookfinger’s loons charged from the mob, mouth foaming with madcap as he raised his notched spear.

  Ratgob’s moonslicer took the lad’s head clean off.

  ‘You ain’t the Creeper.’ Ratgob stepped from the gloom. ‘I say who gets shanked and who don’t.’

  For a moment, Ratgob thought the shaman would leap from the skull and rip him apart. The air between them hung thick as the spore fields in the lower vaults of Shriekstone.

  At last, the shaman gave a mocking bow. ‘You’re da boss.’

  Ratgob regarded him through narrowed eyes. Give a git a big skull and he starts getting big ideas. Wouldn’t be long, now. When the time came, Ratgob only hoped Spookfinger tried something more original than a knife in the back.

  The loonboss turned back to the surviving stunty. ‘Why you creeping ’round my mountain?’

  ‘You speak our tongue?’ The fyreslayer’s face twisted into a look of disgust.

  Ratgob shrugged. ‘How else am I gonna boss my slaves ’round?’

  The stunty looked like it was about to get surly, so Ratgob set it straight with a good poke. Once the worst of the bleeding had stopped, the loonboss asked his question again.

  ‘Grobi filth, we shall stomp your miserable bones to powder.’ The fyreslayer gave a wracking cough, spattering his beard with dark blood. ‘By Grimnir’s fist, the ur-gold of Lachad shall be ours again!’

  ‘Lachad?’ Ratgob ran his tongue across his jagged teeth. ‘Never ’eard of it.’

  ‘We stand in the Magmahold’s very shadow.’ The stunty gestured at Shriekstone’s summit. ‘Foolish skaz, flee back to your wretched holes. Runefather Thunas-Grimnir the Unflinching has summoned the Lachad Lodge. Our Lofnir brothers stand with us. A dozen fyrds have sworn vengeance before the Oathflame.’

  Ratgob scratched his ear. ‘Y’wot?’

  ‘A host the likes of which Ghur has not seen in an age!’ The runes embedded in the stunty’s miserable hide shone as it jabbered at the surrounding mob. ‘We will come in our thousands, our tens of thousands. There will be no place to hide, no hole safe from our axes. Flee! Before the Lachad Lodge crushes–’

  ‘Enough of dat.’ Ratgob dragged his moonslicer across the stunty’s throat. Grinning, the loonboss spun on his heel, arms spread wide. ‘All right, lads, let’s get this lot dressed for dinner.’

  Although the gits set to with a will, Ratgob could not help but notice the mutters and sideways glances. It was a safe bet none of them understood the stunty’s words, but all the shouting had them spooked.

  To be fair, it had spooked Ratgob, too.

  He glanced at the sky, empty but for a few racing clouds. Stars moved against the flat black as the beastly constellations of Ghur fought their endless, nightly battles. Still, he could feel it out there, like an itch at the base of his skull, a jabbering buzz so faint Ratgob couldn’t be sure if he had imagined it.

  Some bosses claimed to feel the touch of the Clammy Hand, the buzz rising to a scream as the Bad Moon spoke to them. Surely it would have something to say about the stunty warhost stumping towards Shriekstone.

  Ratgob cocked his head. Nothing.

  ‘Yer done for.’

  ‘Wuzzat?’ Ratgob spun, moonslicer coming up. Spookfinger had hopped down from his squig skull to creep closer while the loonboss was thinking.

  ‘Nuffin’, boss.’ Spookfinger raised his hands. Face-to-face, the shaman was just a weedy git, all bony and squint-eyed. ‘Just wonderin’ what yer gonna do ’bout that horde of stunties?’

  ‘Never you mind that.’ Ratgob should have known the shaman spoke duardin. A glance at the mob showed the lads had almost finished stripping the dead stunties. Ratgob headed for the scuffle, wanting to get stuck in before they nicked all the best shinies and choicest chewy bits.

  ‘Seems important s’all.’ Spookfinger trailed behind. ‘Our bones gettin’ stomped to dust.’

  ‘Only nutters believe stunty gab,’ Ratgob snarled back. ‘They always lie.’

  ‘Shank me, dey must’ve brought every bearded nutter in Ghur.’ Ratgob squinted into the scryeball and gave a low whistle. There had been other stunties – small raiding parties filled with fools bound for Shriekstone’s slave pits and stewpots – but this was different.

  The bristling Bruteplains beyond Shriekstone crawled with red-crested fyreslayers, formations of half-naked stunties marching in a column that seemed to stretch to the horizon. At the fore roamed packs of frenzied, jabbering brutes, their spiked hair more garish than the glittering golden runes beaten into their flesh. Worse, Lachad Lodge did not march alone. Their stunty allies had brought teams of huge, shaggy crag sloths to drag cannons and organ guns, and massive airships floated overhead like corpses bobbing in a well.

  ‘Wuzzat, boss?’ Krudgit shifted with a jingle of glass bottles, trying to peer over Ratgob’s shoulder. Ratgob’s chief poisoner was tall for a grot, long-limbed and knobby kneed, almost spider-like in his proportions, with a head like a bloated egg sac and small, dark eyes the colour of rotten meat.

  ‘Nuffin’.’ Ratgob sat back from the scryeball, wiping off the accumulation of mould that filmed the greasy lens. Shriekstone once had dozens like it – the mountain covered with blinking eyes – but, over centuries, the High Creepers had plucked them out until only one remained.

  Couldn’t have the lads spying on each other, that was for bosses only.

  ‘Stunties comin’, ain’t dey?’

  ‘Nevva you mind.’ Ratgob flapped a hand at the poisoner’s bag. ‘What you got fer me?’

  ‘Distilled troggoth bile, viledust, ground splintermoss, and I got a new one.’ Glass shattered as Krudg
it dropped his sack and began to root amidst the vials. ‘My own special blend of double-strengf loonmist. One sniff an’ those stunties won’t know you from Gorkamorka.’

  ‘Good lad.’ Ratgob moved to pat Krudgit on the shoulder, but thought better of it. ‘Best get back to work, den.’

  ‘An’ the stunties, boss?’

  ‘Just leave ’em to me.’ Ratgob narrowed one eye. ‘An’ keep your gob shut. I need time to fink.’

  ‘Yes, boss. Course, boss.’ Krudgit gathered up his dripping sack and scuttled for the door.

  Ratgob watched him go. No chance of things staying quiet, but it would take time for the news to filter through Shriekstone – time the loonboss needed to grab his dosh and run.

  Filling a sack with his shiniest, most portable loot, Ratgob hurried along the mildewed galleries overlooking the great halls of Shriekstone. Once, the channels had flowed with nasty, glowing magma, but the fire had long ceased to burn, every fleck of gold scraped from the walls, every scowling stunty statue smashed to rubble. Now, the canals were home to spiders and other lovely oozing, crawling things.

  Shriekstone wheezed like a stunty with lungrot, the old ventilation system choked with delightful fungal growths. Ratgob had never figured out whether the mountain was one great sedentary beast or thousands of little ones, but the rocky flesh did make quite a satisfying squeal when you cut into it.

  The loonboss ran his fingers along a balustrade gone soft with moss. It seemed a shame to leave all this. A Creeper with no Shriekstone was no Creeper at all.

  The mountain spread before Ratgob like an algal bloom. Gits scuttled through the gloom carrying picks, sacks and shovels; others prodded coffles of gaunt stunty slaves or led huge segmapedes loaded down with baskets of meat to toss to the squigs in the pits gouged into the floor of the central hall. As long as a troggoth was tall, the great insects trundled along on scores of legs, mandibles snapping at the occasional grot who ventured too close.

  Great stone pillars supported the cavern roof, rickety scaffolds and rope bridges hanging between them like the web of a mad arachnarok. Once, the pillars had borne the faces of long-dead stunties, but, over many years, the gits had hacked the stone into more pleasing visages –Blisterblade Grothammer, Shkrug Neverchosen, Morg Six-Knives and dozens of High Creepers Ratgob couldn’t recognise. Only the cruellest, most tricksy gits ruled long enough to see their faces completed.

  Inevitably, the loonboss’ gaze was drawn to his own monument – barely a shadow on stone, the beginnings of a chin and handsomely hooked nose hacked into the scowl of some ugly stunty king. There would be no time to finish, now.

  With a snarl, Ratgob scuttled deeper. Beyond the columned halls lay miles of tunnels, straight passages criss-crossed by hundreds of pleasantly twisted snickelways. Fungal beds filled the old vaults. Ratgob’s lungs tingled at the heady mix of spores that hung over the vaults, but he drew no pleasure from it. The invaders would probably burn the groves of gourmet mushrooms and scour the intricate lichen murals from the walls.

  ‘Stunties got no appreciation fer art,’ the loonboss muttered to himself as he crept along the gallery that ringed The Pit, careful not to dislodge any loose rocks. In the old days it had been where the stunties emptied their rotten guts after too much brew, but generations of slime and accumulated filth had blocked off the sluiceways, The Pit itself now home to a horde of slumbering troggoths.

  Ratgob paused, squinting into The Pit. The troggoths might have something to say about fyreslayers smashing up the place. Unfortunately, the trogghorde was just as likely to munch on grots as stunties.

  From the darkness below came a low rumble, a tremble in the stone that was either a troggoth shifting in its sleep or the slow flow of magma deep down below the mountain. An uncomfortable reminder that, while Shriekstone had been dormant for generations, it had once roared with burning, bubbling fire.

  With a shiver, Ratgob hurried away. As he moved through the deeper caves, he noticed a change in the hold – a skulking silence that seemed to press around him like a damp blanket. Shouts and titters gave way to furtive scampering, and Ratgob spied more than one pack of gits darting into the darkness, bulging sacks slung over their shoulders.

  Word of the stunties had got out. The lads were abandoning Shriekstone.

  Still, Ratgob hesitated. The sight conjured a strange tightness in the loonboss’ throat. He had been runted here, scrapped his way up through the mobs, and shanked more grots than he could remember. The thought of his mountain filled with nasty, bearded brutes set the loonboss’ fangs aching.

  With surprise, Ratgob realised he was not going to run – not yet, at least.

  He shook his head. ‘A Creeper without Shriekstone is no Creeper at all.’

  With a sigh, the loonboss hefted his moonslicer and went to rally the lads.

  Ratgob leaned against the rear wall of the vault, partly to have something solid at his back in case things took a bad turn, but mostly because it concealed a secret escape tunnel.

  It was proof of the lads’ unease that only a few tussles had broken out among the mess of bosses, foregits, nutters, loonchiefs, spikers, eviscerators and fraudmarshals that crowded the mossy treasure vault deep within the bowels of Shriekstone. They clustered in a tight knot near the entrance, well out of reach of the giant cave squigs chained to the walls.

  Dirty gold winked in the torchlight, piles and piles of the stuff scraped from every wall, statue and cranny over generations – all the dosh in Shriekstone, or at least all the dosh the High Creepers had managed to nab. Ratgob enjoyed dragging stunty slaves down to the vault, letting them see all the gold so he could watch the mad hunger in their eyes become terror as he fed them, one by one, to the guard squigs.

  Ratgob took a deep breath. This was it – he either convinced the bosses to stay and fight or they ate him. Simple, really.

  ‘I’m High Creeper!’ Ratgob pushed from the wall, spreading his arms as if to gather the treasure close. ‘You fink I’m just gonna scamper and let the stunties nab all dis?’

  There were some mutters from the crowd. Grot eyes glittered in the darkness, gazes sharp as knives.

  ‘Krudgit.’ Ratgob gestured at the poisoner. ‘You gonna just leave your venomenagerie? Pull up your deff garden and take it wiv you?’

  All eyes went to the poisoner, who shuffled from foot to foot, nervous at the attention. ‘No, boss.’

  ‘An’ you, Rankfish.’ Ratgob nodded at a scarred foregit standing near the front of the pack. ‘Spent yer life cuttin’ tunnels into this mountain. What you fink the stunties gonna do wiv all that?’

  Rankfish scowled, knuckles whitening on the haft of his sharpened shovel.

  ‘Dey gonna knock ’em in.’ Ratgob clanged his moonslicer against the wall, and the mountain gave a delightful screech. ‘Ruin everyfing!’

  ‘No stunty is settin’ one greasy boot in my ’oles!’ Rankfish shouted back, the other foregits shaking picks and cracking their whips.

  ‘Magrot, Filthmiser, Throttle!’ Ratgob shouted over the noise, picking the three nastiest bosses from among the mob. ‘You scrapped hard for everyfing you got – big names, bigger knives.’

  The bosses grinned as laughter rippled through the crowd of grots.

  ‘Fancy skulking back down to the tunnels?’ Ratgob asked. ‘Tusslin’ wiv other mobs for scraps? Gettin’ kicked around by ratsneaks and orruks?’

  That earned snarls from the bosses, many spitting at the mention of orruks.

  ‘We gots it good ’ere, real good. Dis mountain is ours.’ Ratgob scraped the blade of his moonslicer along the wall, and the stone gave a low, pained moan. ‘It’s ours. An’ no zoggin’ stunty is gonna take it away!’

  Ratgob slapped his chest for emphasis, but instead of cheers a hush fell over the crowd. He glanced over to see Spookfinger standing atop his squig skull.

  ‘Lot of stunties out there, boss.’ The shaman cocked his head. ‘Lot of axes, lot of guns, lot of beards. Maybe too many, I fink.’
br />   Ratgob considered giving Spookfinger a good poke. Instead, he smiled. ‘I’ve got a plan to sort those stunties.’

  ‘Mind sharing it, boss?’

  ‘So youz can steal it? I fink not.’ The loonboss gave a nasty grin as a stroke of genius hit. ‘Bad Moon told me just what to do.’

  ‘The Moon…’ Spookfinger’s eyes narrowed, ‘spoke to you?’

  ‘Course it did.’ Ratgob lifted his moonslicer to point at the ceiling. ‘It told me what to do – wiv the stunties, wiv you.’

  The shaman crossed his arms. ‘You ’spect us to believe you’z been touched by the Clammy Hand?’

  Ratgob tried not to snicker as he gave a solemn nod. ‘It also told me it was sending us a treasure trove! Erry one of dose stunties is a walkin’ pile of shiny bits. You lot will be up to your necks in dosh!’

  ‘We gets to keep it all?’ Krudgit glanced at the other bosses, yellowed fangs bared in a half-snarl.

  Ratgob shrugged. ‘Dat’s what it said.’

  ‘You ’eard the Creeper!’ Rankfish raised his pick. ‘Get out dere and nab every git still skulking ’round Shriekstone.’

  Krudgit started the cheer, but it was not long until the others joined in, grinning as they looked at the treasure, short-sighted as stunty slaves. Shouting and jostling, the bosses charged from the chamber.

  ‘Clammy Hand?’ Shaking his head, Spookfinger watched them go. ‘Pack of nutters, all of ’em.’

  ‘Go on, run.’ Ratgob let his grin turn ugly. ‘See how far you get.’

  ‘I’m stayin’.’ Spookfinger gestured at his slaves to heft the squig skull, then shook a bony finger at Ratgob. ‘But only cuz I hate stunties more’n I hate you.’

  Scowling, the shaman was carried from the vault. It was only when the flap of running feet had faded that Ratgob allowed himself to sag against the wall. He had won over the lads, but what he really needed now was a cunnin’ plan – more than one, actually.

  There were a lot of stunties outside.

  Shriekstone’s clammy gates shook from the impact of skycannon and volley gun shot, raining bits of scrap on the unfortunate gits who had been ‘volunteered’ to defend the entrance. The rock lobbers and bolt flingers the lads had managed to drag over had been unable to do more than keep the small fleet of airships that bombarded the gate from drawing too close. Ratgob’s best archers sat farther back in the cavern, ready to feather any grot who tried to run.