sleeping.’
The tangential shift had Felix blinking to keep up.
‘Often in my dreams I am flying,’ Max went on, insistent as a night breeze. ‘I am high, riding above the clouds. The peaks of mountains rise through them like islands. I can feel the wind on my…’ his hand rose hesitantly from the page to feel the edges of his hood, ‘…my face. Where the cloud breaks I see the world beneath me turn dark. Roads shrivel. Forests mutate before my eyes. The cities of Chaos sink into the earth. I am alone, but I hear a voice whisper to me. It is a woman’s voice, and she calls to me by name, though I do not know her. She tells me that it does not have to end this way.’
‘Enough, Max,’ said Felix, reaching across to touch the wizard’s arm. Despite his ashen, ghostly appearance, the man felt entirely normal to the touch. His once ivory-coloured robes were stiff, tailored for battle. His arm was warm.
Felix and Max had never been the closest of friends. The wizard’s lecturing manner had often grated, his empiricism starkly at odds with Felix’s hopelessly romantic outlook, but their philosophical differences would undoubtedly have proven fodder for endless debates in taprooms the world over had it not been for Ulrika. Even now, with hindsight and perhaps even a little wisdom, Felix found it difficult to unpick the tangle of hurt feelings, petty arguments, and jealousy that had ultimately defined his relationship with her and, as a consequence, with Max.
There was an element of masochism in dwelling on such things – such times – with the world the way it was, but though he lived through an age of gods and monsters Felix was, whatever that now meant, still only human.
‘Always my journey ends in the same place, deep inside the ancient heart of a mountain. There is power there, power that I cannot describe, but I feel good to be there. The magic is calm, bound within rocks that have not seen change in ten thousand years. I know that I am where I am meant to be. You are there too, Felix. And the Slayer.’
‘Me?’
A nod of the hood, a cold breeze that gave Felix shivers.
‘I had always suspected that your steps were guided by a higher power and now I am convinced of it. They have brought you here, together, to these mountains and at this time. It is through the two of you that they will show their hand in this war.’
Felix shook his head sadly. Max was mad. He saw it now.
‘I saw your death,’ Max hissed.
Felix’s scepticism vanished under an existential chill. ‘You saw what?’
‘Sometimes it is yours, sometimes Gotrek’s, as if fate itself remains undecided. But for some reason I do not grieve when I see it, for I know that this is how the world will be saved.’
For what felt like a long time, Felix merely stared at his old friend. The wagon rumbled beneath them. The wizard swayed on his bench like a lonely tree in a mountain wind. Felix wanted nothing more than to tell Max that he was being ridiculous, perhaps shake some sense into the man, but for some reason he dared not. He was still a dangerously powerful wizard after all, and a broken one at that. The silence between them stretched. Felix’s thoughts returned him to a prophetic dream that he himself had once had. He had been asleep at his desk in his brother’s Altdorf townhouse when he had dreamt of fighting alongside Gotrek and Ulrika on the floodplains of Praag. As it ultimately turned out, it had been accurate almost blow for blow in his dreams. He had not had the time to devote much thought to it since, but now he wondered.
Had it been destiny guiding his steps as Max suggested, perhaps towards some ignoble end in the lonely heights of the Middle Mountains?
With a creak of creased leather, Max eased the pocketbook shut and held it out to Felix. No Grail Knight of Bretonnia had ever been presented with a relic invested with such portent.
‘You have been through too much together for it to count for nothing now,’
The tangential shift had Felix blinking to keep up.
‘Often in my dreams I am flying,’ Max went on, insistent as a night breeze. ‘I am high, riding above the clouds. The peaks of mountains rise through them like islands. I can feel the wind on my…’ his hand rose hesitantly from the page to feel the edges of his hood, ‘…my face. Where the cloud breaks I see the world beneath me turn dark. Roads shrivel. Forests mutate before my eyes. The cities of Chaos sink into the earth. I am alone, but I hear a voice whisper to me. It is a woman’s voice, and she calls to me by name, though I do not know her. She tells me that it does not have to end this way.’
‘Enough, Max,’ said Felix, reaching across to touch the wizard’s arm. Despite his ashen, ghostly appearance, the man felt entirely normal to the touch. His once ivory-coloured robes were stiff, tailored for battle. His arm was warm.
Felix and Max had never been the closest of friends. The wizard’s lecturing manner had often grated, his empiricism starkly at odds with Felix’s hopelessly romantic outlook, but their philosophical differences would undoubtedly have proven fodder for endless debates in taprooms the world over had it not been for Ulrika. Even now, with hindsight and perhaps even a little wisdom, Felix found it difficult to unpick the tangle of hurt feelings, petty arguments, and jealousy that had ultimately defined his relationship with her and, as a consequence, with Max.
There was an element of masochism in dwelling on such things – such times – with the world the way it was, but though he lived through an age of gods and monsters Felix was, whatever that now meant, still only human.
‘Always my journey ends in the same place, deep inside the ancient heart of a mountain. There is power there, power that I cannot describe, but I feel good to be there. The magic is calm, bound within rocks that have not seen change in ten thousand years. I know that I am where I am meant to be. You are there too, Felix. And the Slayer.’
‘Me?’
A nod of the hood, a cold breeze that gave Felix shivers.
‘I had always suspected that your steps were guided by a higher power and now I am convinced of it. They have brought you here, together, to these mountains and at this time. It is through the two of you that they will show their hand in this war.’
Felix shook his head sadly. Max was mad. He saw it now.
‘I saw your death,’ Max hissed.
Felix’s scepticism vanished under an existential chill. ‘You saw what?’
‘Sometimes it is yours, sometimes Gotrek’s, as if fate itself remains undecided. But for some reason I do not grieve when I see it, for I know that this is how the world will be saved.’
For what felt like a long time, Felix merely stared at his old friend. The wagon rumbled beneath them. The wizard swayed on his bench like a lonely tree in a mountain wind. Felix wanted nothing more than to tell Max that he was being ridiculous, perhaps shake some sense into the man, but for some reason he dared not. He was still a dangerously powerful wizard after all, and a broken one at that. The silence between them stretched. Felix’s thoughts returned him to a prophetic dream that he himself had once had. He had been asleep at his desk in his brother’s Altdorf townhouse when he had dreamt of fighting alongside Gotrek and Ulrika on the floodplains of Praag. As it ultimately turned out, it had been accurate almost blow for blow in his dreams. He had not had the time to devote much thought to it since, but now he wondered.
Had it been destiny guiding his steps as Max suggested, perhaps towards some ignoble end in the lonely heights of the Middle Mountains?
With a creak of creased leather, Max eased the pocketbook shut and held it out to Felix. No Grail Knight of Bretonnia had ever been presented with a relic invested with such portent.
‘You have been through too much together for it to count for nothing now,’
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