Dozens of eyes peer suspiciously through the darkness at the pool of light that was the latest arrival amongst the many beings claiming to be Dwarves that now swarmed the upper levels of Karak Vlag. Their every word and movement rang true, but so it had innumerable times before, and every previous time it had ended the same way. Eventually these new interlopers stopped trying, and seemed to be waiting for some new plot to hatch. At long last what they had been waiting for is carried into the chamber that is the border between safety and danger, held atop the shoulders of four sturdy Dwarves, Runelight glinting off the steel and gromril that covers them, and placed in the center of that chamber.
The many illusions and glamours of the Daemons had often included a High King, usually come to laud them for their steadfastness. Sometimes the Throne of Power had been brought along too, the twinkling of the counterfeit Rune of Eternity filling their hearts with false pride and the seductive promise that the Karaz Ankor had not forgotten them. But this time, it was different. This time, the High King was not Alriksson. This time, the Rune of Eternity did not reach out to them but instead stood unmoving, a stark light in the darkness that was somehow realer than the stone that surrounded it. This time the High King bore something that the Daemonettes had never even tried to seduce them with: the Dammaz Kron.
"'In the year 6824, contact was lost with Karak Vlag as the forces of the Everchosen Asavar Kul made their way through High Pass,'" Thorgrim Grudgebearer reads, his voice carrying through the darkness. "'Extensive scouting in their wake revealed that Karak Vlag had been made to disappear, appearing to most scrutinies as though it was never founded.' It was decided that until new information came to light, the Grudge would be levelled against the Chaos Gods collectively, and against all that follow them." A slight squeaking echoes as an inkwell is unstoppered, and the nib of a quill is dipped into the royal blood within. "This is insufficient. The Karaz Ankor must know the being or beings responsible for the disappearance of Karak Vlag." The High King's gaze seems to penetrate the defences that the Dwarves of Karak Vlag were huddled behind, and afterwards each would swear that they were looked directly in the eye. "It is our duty."
All the Dwarves that stood between the Daemons and the Karak were those Longbeards old enough to remember another world, but the first Dwarf to emerge is an Elder even amongst these, who would likely be somewhere in his fourth century if the passage of time could still be known with any confidence. Perhaps his wisdom allows him to recognize the truth, or perhaps he is willing to surrender his life to the Daemons in the hope that this time, at long last, it was not a trick. In any case he approaches the Throne of Power, and when no evil springs from the darkness to carry him away, he begins to speak of the many evils inflicted upon the Dwarves of Karak Vlag in the lifetimes they had been trapped in the Warp.
---
By the time the recitation of evils is done, many pages have been filled and a second inkwell has been unstoppered and subsequently drained. The breath goes out of the Dwarves as the final dot marks the end of the final sentence, for by now they have emerged, one by one, to add their own wrongs to the tally. To have the crimes against them recorded does not bring them pride or comfort, but the weight of the Grudges within them now had a sense of rightness to them. They would still do everything in their power to set matters right, but should they fail or fall the Karaz Ankor would remember, and the Karaz Ankor would avenge. Even if it took until the end of time and the last drop of Dwarven blood to make it so.
"Now," Thorgrim says, running his eyes over the Longbeards before him, "tell me which of these Grudges have already been avenged, which Daemons you know to have fallen after performing the deeds I have recorded."
Silence fills the air, as glances go back and forth amongst the Longbeards as they roll the question around in their minds. They could tell of Daemons who had been slain, or at least wounded until they stopped moving and their essence melted away into the background matter of the Chaos realm. But all of that was lost in the long, timeless chaos of more years than could be counted straining to see movement in the darkness before it could steal away another Dwarf to be bewitched. More prominent, so much more prominent than any of those battles was the knowledge that each of them somehow held, and knew in their souls to be true: the intervention of the strange Zhufokrul, the severing of the flow of magic, the shattering of the imprisonment spell, and the battle where Slayer had cut down Slayer, and Dwarf and man and beast and Wizard and Dragon and even an Elf had inflicted vengeance upon each and every one of the Slaaneshi Daemons, scattering their essence across the mountain stone far from their native realm. They knew of the dangers she had risked in doing so, not just against the claws and blades of the Daemons, but also the many terrible fates that could befall someone who bends the energies of magic to their will. And they knew that she did so for no other reason than because it was the right thing to do. It was a strange and troubling tale, one that they could not explain their ability to tell, but every one of them knew it was true.
The Elder takes a breath, and tells High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer of the Wizard that each of the twenty thousand remaining Dwarves of Karak Vlag know to be their saviour.
