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Shiprats – Extract

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Shiprats

C L Werner

Carefully, the heavy-set duardin warrior raised his weapon. His eyes narrowed, fixating on his victim. He appeared unfazed by the gloom of the darkened hold, his vision sharp enough to pick out a marrow-hawk soaring through a thunderstorm. The duardin judged the distance, allowed for the air currents that buffeted the moored aether-ship and estimated how much strength to bring to bear against his foe.

The shovel came cracking down, striking the deck with such force that a metallic ping was sent echoing through the hold. Drumark cursed as the target of the descending spade leapt upwards and squeaked in fright. The brown rat landed on his foot, squeaked again, then scampered off deeper into the hold.

Furious, Drumark turned and glowered at the other spade-carrying duardin gathered in the Iron Dragon’s hold. Arkanauts, endrin-riggers, aether-tenders and even a few of the ship’s officers gave the angry sergeant anxious stares.

‘Right! Now they are just begging to be shot! I am getting my decksweeper!’ Drumark swore, not for the first time.

Brokrin, the Iron Dragon’s captain, stepped towards Drumark. ‘You are not shooting holes in the bottom of my ship,’ he snapped at him. ‘We have enough problems with the rats. If you go shooting holes in the hull we won’t be able to take on any aether-gold even if we do find a rich cloud-vein.’

Drumark jabbed a thumb down at his boot. ‘It peed on my foot. Only respect for you, cap’n, keeps me from getting a good fire going and smoking the vermin out.’

‘That is some sound thinking,’ Horgarr, the Iron Dragon’s endrinmaster scoffed. He pressed his shovel against the deck and leaned against it as he turned towards Drumark. ‘Start a fire in the ship’s belly. Nothing bad could happen from that. Except the fifty-odd things that immediately come to mind.’

Brokrin shook his head as Drumark told Horgarr exactly what he thought of the endrinmaster’s mind. No duardin had any affection for rats, but Drumark’s hatred of them was almost a mania. His father had died fighting the pestiferous skaven and every time he looked at a rat he was reminded of their larger kin. It made him surly and quick to anger. This would be the third fight between the two he would have to break up since coming down into the Iron Dragon’s holds. Unable to find any aether-gold, the ironclad had put in at Greypeak, a walled human city with which Barak-Zilfin had a trading compact. The grain the city’s farmers cultivated was well regarded by the Kharadron and would fetch a good price in the skyhold. Not as much as a good vein, but at least there would be something for the aether-ship’s backers.

At least there would be if the rats that had embarked along with the grain left anything in good enough condition to sell. There were more than a few Kharadron who claimed that the Iron Dragon was jinxed and that her captain was under a curse. Sometimes he found himself wondering if his detractors were right. This was not the first time Brokrin’s ship had suffered an infestation of vermin, but he could not recall any that had been so tenacious as these. Whatever they did to try to protect their cargo, the rats found some way around it. They were too clever for the traps old Mortrimm set for them, too cunning to accept the poisoned biscuits Lodri made for them. Even the cat Gotramm had brought aboard had been useless – after its first tussle with one of the rats it had found itself a spot up in the main endrin’s cuppola and would claw anyone who tried to send it below deck again.

‘These swine must have iron teeth.’ The bitter observation was given voice by Skaggi, the expedition’s logisticator. Tasked with balancing profit against expense and safeguarding the investment of the expedition’s backers, every ounce of grain despoiled by the rodents stung Skaggi to the quick. He held a heavy net of copper wire in his hands, extending it towards Brokrin so he could see the holes the rats had gnawed. ‘So much for keeping them out of the grain. We will be lucky if they do not start in for the beer next.’

Skaggi’s dour prediction made Drumark completely forget about his argument with Horgarr. He looked in horror at Skaggi. An instant later, he raised the shovel overhead and flung it to the floor.

‘That is it!’ Drumark declared. ‘I am bringing my lads down here and we will settle these parasites here and now!’ He turned to Brokrin, determination etched across his face. ‘You tell Grundstok thunderers to hunt rats, then that is just what we will do. But we will do it the way we know best.’

Skaggi’s eyes went wide with alarm, his mind turning over the expense of patching over the holes the thunderers would leave if they started blasting away at the rats. He swung around to Brokrin, his tone almost frantic. ‘We will be ruined,’ he groaned. ‘No profit, barely enough to pay off the backers.’

Drumark reached out and took hold of the copper net Skaggi was holding. ‘If they can chew through this, they can chew their way into the beer barrels. Me and my thunderers are not going dry while these rats get drunk!’

The sound of shovels slapping against the floor died down as the rest of the duardin in the hold paused in their efforts to hear what Drumark was shouting about. Many of them were from his Grundstok company and looked more than ready to side with their sergeant and trade spades for guns.

‘The rats will not bother the beer while they still have grain to eat,’ Brokrin stated, making sure his words were loud enough to carry to every crewman in the hold. How much truth there was in the statement, he did not know. He did know it was what Drumark and the others needed to hear right now.

‘All due respect, cap’n,’ Drumark said, ‘but how long will that be? Swatting them with shovels just isn’t enough and we have tried everything else except shooting them.’

Brokrin gave Drumark a stern look. ‘I’ve said it before, and now I’m saying it again – you are not shooting holes in my ship.’ The chastened sergeant held Brokrin’s gaze for a moment, then averted his eyes. The point had been made.

‘What are we going to do?’ Gotramm asked. The youthful leader of the Iron Dragon’s arkanauts, he had watched with pointed interest the exchange between Brokrin and Drumark.

‘I know one thing,’ Horgarr said, pulling back his sleeve and showing the many scratches on his arm. ‘That cat is staying right where it is.’ The remark brought laughs from all who heard it, even cracking Drumark’s sullen mood.

Brokrin was more pensive. Something Drumark had said earlier had spurred a memory. It was only now that his recollection fell into place. ‘The toads,’ he finally said. The newer members of the crew glanced in confusion at their captain, but those who had served on the Iron Dragon before her escape from the monster Ghazul knew his meaning.

‘Some years ago,’ Brokrin explained to them, ‘we sailed through a Grimesturm and a rain of toads fell on our decks. They were everywhere, even worse than these rats. You could not sit without squashing one or take a sip of ale without having one hop into your mug.

‘To rid the ship of her infestation,’ Brokrin continued, ‘we put in at the lamasery of Kheitar. The lamas prepared a mixture of herbs, which we burned in smudge pots. The smoke vexed the toads so much that they jumped overboard of their own accord.’

‘You think the lamas could whip up something to scare off rats?’ Gotramm asked.

Brokrin nodded. ‘Kheitar is not far out of our way. There would be little to lose by diverting our course and paying the lamasery a visit.’

‘Kheitar is built into the side of a mountain,’ Horgarr said. ‘Certainly it will offer as good an anchorage as the peak we’re moored to now.’

Skaggi’s eyes lit up, an avaricious smile pulling at his beard. ‘The lamas are renowned for their artistic tapestries as well as their herbalism. If we could bargain with them and get them to part with even one tapestry we could recover the loss of what the rats have already ruined.’

‘Then it is decided,’ Brokrin said. ‘Our next port of call is Kheitar.’

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A Black Library Publication

First published in the Black Library Events Anthology 2017/2018 in 2017.
This eBook edition published in 2019 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustration by John Michelbach.

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ISBN: 978-1-78999-610-4

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