Road of Skulls (Gotrek and Felix Book 13) by Josh Reynolds

Author:Josh Reynolds [Reynolds, Josh]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Black Library
Published: 2013-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

10

Karak Kadrin,

Baragor’s Watch

The explosion rocked the chamber and though he’d been prepared for it, Felix was sent flying. He struck an outcropping and slumped, dazed by the sudden rush of sound and fury. For a moment, the air was filled with an almost solid bombardment of noise and destruction and Felix scrambled about on his knees, his hands clapped to his ears as a flood of stone dust billowed through the chamber. The echoes of the explosion faded, and Felix caught the groan of collapsing stone as he cautiously removed his hands.

The antechamber was large, almost the length of the outer wall of Karak Kadrin. The explosion had been like a precise blow, tipping the first in a row of pegs. Bodies tumbled into the gash opened in the roof even as that gash split and spread like cracks running across ice. Gotrek had been correct, the ground above was weak; what age and disuse alone had failed to do, the explosion had accomplished. Vast flat stones, formerly part of the roof of the Underway, slammed down against the road, creating rough ramps, even as Gotrek had predicted. Even as Felix staggered to his feet, dwarfs covered in dust and grime shook themselves free of the devastation and the Slayers charged up the makeshift ramp, scrambling part of the way then running with their weapons swinging.

Dazed Chaos marauders who had somehow not fallen were slapped aside, and dead ones were trampled. The bodies of the latter littered the floor of the chamber three-deep, and Felix was forced to clamber over them, his stomach rebelling at the sight of what the force of the blast had done to them. Even the hardy men of the Chaos Wastes were as nothing before the power of the explosion that had ripped open the ground beneath them.

The dwarfs moved surprisingly quickly, following the Slayers. The miners had given a number of the latter sturdy metal ladders that could be carried rolled up and then unrolled when needed. The Slayers had done so as they reached the top, and the rangers followed them, climbing swiftly. Felix went up with Koertig and Axeson. Both men had been abandoned by their Slayers.

The climb was arduous, despite the relative shallowness of the slope. The dwarfs managed it easily, but both Felix and Koertig were sweating and shaking by the time they reached the top. At some point during their travels, the sun had begun to rise, and thin daylight pierced the heavy cloud of dust and smoke that the explosion had thrown into the air. He emerged from the oppressive silence that followed an explosion into the clangour of battle. His eardrums ached and Karaghul was in his hand, though he didn’t recall drawing it.

The devastation was breathtaking. The explosion hadn’t simply opened a hole in the battlefield. It had gouged titanic talon marks through the already ruined outer keep, ripping the bastion open like a savaged lamb. Felix could not even begin to comprehend what the reverberations had done to those distant portions of the Underway.

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