C. Werner - Blighted Empire

Beside him, one of her slender arms closed around his own, Lady Mirella gasped in admiration as a stronger gust of wind set the entire crop dancing. ‘It is beautiful,’ she declared.

Mandred shook his head. ‘In a few weeks the crop will be harvested, then there’ll only be empty black earth clear to the wall.’ He sighed, regret catching in his voice. ‘This used to be the Sudgarten and it was filled with trees and shrubs. Songbirds used to flock here and there would be rabbits and squirrels capering about in the brush. We even kept herds of deer and only hunted them on Ulric’s holy days.’

The grip on Mandred’s arm tightened in an expression of sympathy. ‘Nothing lasts forever,’ she said.

‘Some things should,’ Mandred answered, still seeing in his mind’s eye the forest that had stood where only crops now grew. ‘Those trees had been there since before the first Teutogen crawled up out of the tunnels and reached the top of the Ulricsberg. Losing them felt… felt like betraying a trust.’

‘You kept your people alive through the winter,’ Mirella reminded him. ‘How strong would Middenheim be today if you didn’t have the resources to provide for yourself?’

Mandred turned away from the Sudgarten, and led Mirella back into the narrow confines of the Westgate, the densely populated district at the extreme edge of the city. Many of the refugees who had been permitted to settle atop the Ulricsberg had built their homes here, simple buildings of timber and thatch. The Middenheimers had struggled to impose some degree of order on the confusion of shacks and huts, but had eventually abandoned the effort as causing more trouble than it was worth. The resentment engendered by the programme had left a lingering mark in the hearts of the settlers. Indeed, it was considered inadvisable for any of the Middenheim nobility to wander about the Westgate without an adequate guard.

The prince, however, was the one exception to that rule. The people here might resent the high-handed authority imposed by Chamberlain von Vogelthal, but they also remembered Prince Mandred’s bold ride to save Warrenburg from the beastmen. It was ironic that an event that had brought him such severity from his father, an act that had cost the lives of many brave men, a thing which he himself regarded with guilt and regret, should have earned him a hero’s welcome among the settlers.

‘Yes,’ Mandred said as he and Mirella walked back along the edge of the Westgate, ‘we are strong. But what has been the price for that strength?’

Mirella frowned at the dour note in her escort’s voice. Tugging at his arm, she tried to divert his thoughts in another direction. ‘You said you would show me the dwarfs today,’ she reminded him. ‘I am eager to see their temple. Do you think they would allow us inside?’

The question gave Mandred pause. ‘Don’t they have dwarfs in Altdorf?’ he asked.

‘Oh, certainly,’ Mirella said, ‘but not like here. Altdorf doesn’t have an entire city of them under its streets.’

Mandred smiled at the statement. ‘Karak Grazhyakh isn’t exactly a city,’ he corrected her. ‘It’s more of an outpost, one of their strongholds.’ He became pensive for a moment. ‘To be honest, I’m not really sure how many of them are down there. Thane Hardin isn’t one of my father’s subjects, more like a friendly neighbour.’ He paused, picturing the dwarf’s perpetually grim visage. ‘Well, a neighbour anyway. The dwarfs pretty much keep to themselves and so long as they abide by my father’s laws when their business brings them into Middenheim proper, we are content to leave them alone.’

‘They do have some presence in the city, though?’ Mirella asked.

‘Oh, certainly,’ Mandred replied. ‘A few craftsmen who have set up shop here, though apparently they are either apprentices at their trade or dwarfs who couldn’t match the standards of their guilds. Either way, no dwarf would have anything to do with the goods they turn out, though they’re very impressive if you ask anyone else. Then there is the Dwarf Engineer’s Guild. They have a big stone building down in the Wynd with a big walled-off yard attached to it. They do a lot of testing with some foul-smelling black dirt that explodes when exposed to fire. Probably too scary to play with down below, so they moved operations upstairs.’

‘And the temple?’ Mirella persisted.

‘That’s down in the Wynd too, if anything even bigger and more imposing than the Guildhall.’ Mandred turned and stared in the direction of the building, though it was hidden behind the sprawl of the Southgate district which lay between the Westgate and the Wynd. ‘The dwarfs call the Ulricsberg “Grungni’s Tower”, and even before the first stones were set down to build the Middenpalaz, they were at work building a temple to their god. I’ve never been inside it. I don’t think any man ever has. The dwarfs are more tight-lipped about their religion than they are about anything else. But I can say that the exterior is absolutely magnificent. The entire face is marble, the stones set so close together that you’d think it was carved from a single block. Two immense statues stand guard before the entrance, one holding a chisel and the other an axe. I’ve seen dwarfs bow to them, so I think they must be connected to Grungni somehow. A giant door of ironwood banded in gold opens into the temple, and there’s always a smell of oil and coal wafting out every time it is opened.’

‘But you’ve never been inside?’ Mirella’s voice was soft, her mind caught up in the picture Mandred’s words conjured.

The prince shook his head. ‘No human has,’ he repeated. ‘I don’t know if anyone has ever had the temerity to ask. I do know now isn’t the time to start. The dwarfs have been even more touchy of late. They’ve become almost reclusive. Withdrawn. Something’s bothering them, though I’m sure a human will be the last to know what it is,’ he reflected.

For a moment, Mandred’s troubled mood infected Mirella, her eyes taking on a pained expression. The prince found himself caught in those eyes, sensed the empathy between himself and this aristocrat from the south. He shifted uneasily as he thought of Sofia and the row they had had.

‘Come along,’ Mandred said, deliberately misinterpreting Mirella’s attitude for one of disappointment. ‘Perhaps I can’t show you the temple of Grungni, but I can show you the temple of Ulric.’ Before she could say anything, he was marching her towards the north.

‘We’re going to Ulricsmund,’ Mandred called back to their tiny entourage. Beck and Brother Richter had kept their distance during the stroll past the Sudgarten, trying to remain discreetly unobtrusive yet near enough to be at hand if they were needed. At the prince’s call, Beck went dashing up to join the two nobles. Richter hesitated, a tinge of worry pulling at the corners of his mouth. It was almost with reluctance that he followed after them.

A reluctance born of much more than simple religious differences.

Carroburg

Hexentag, 1115

The guests of Emperor Boris gathered around the immense ring of black drakwood. Legend held that the round table dated from the time of King Otwin and had been gifted to the Thuringian chief by the druids of Rhya. The chiefs of the tribe had held council around the great table, planning their wars against enemies human and inhuman. After the coming of Sigmar and the absorption of the Thuringians into his Empire, Otwin’s table had been removed to the ancient fortalice overlooking the River Reik. Many towers and forts had been built and razed since that time, but the relic had endured, a valuable prize for whichever noble was given dominion over the Drakwald.