Malkk, True Plaguemaster of Clan Festerscar

Hey all!  Looking forward to getting in on the action here with the narrative internet campaign that we are running.  Should be a good excuse to get more paint on my models and work out some of the various stories that I have always wanted to tell through my models.  I will be running a Clan Pestilence Skaven army - the Festerscar Clan - under the direction of the great Plague Priest Malkk, a character from my gaming throughout 8th edition.  So without further ado, lets get the story going in the city of Alpines, far to the East in the Realm of Beasts.....

*********

In a dimly lit inn within the city of Alpines, the great scholar Opstrum of the House Painad quietly stared down at his wine.  The stories were beginning to surface again. Messengers to the far western corners of the realm of Ghur were beginning to show the signs of Rongeur Caedis.  The blood seeping from the eyes and tongue, the auditory hallucinations, and - Opstrum shuddered at the thought - the sleep spasms.  Men wracked in agony for weeks at a time, trapped in eternal nightmare.  Those that survived woke into a state of complete insanity.  

Luckily, the sick had been limited to those who traveled the trade routes with the Fyreslayer lodge, Lofnir and those that traveled to the far reaches of Eppon and the watchful eyes of the Eagles of Sigmar.  The people were beginning to fear for their own lives.  Letting out a sigh verging on disgust, Opstrum looked to the large clock that quietly marched forward through the weight of time and scowled.  His informant was running late.  At this hour, the only other patrons of the inn were a few Nightwatchmen who were keeping their drink safe from the incursion of chaos by consuming as much as they could and those already too drunk to get off of their stools.  Opstrum made to leave, his mind already calculating the various possibilities for his next informant to the west.  As he approached the door, a heavy hand pushed it open from the other side.  Blood streaks ran down the door from his hand.

"My gods man, what happened to you?"  Opstrum was horrified.  The ranger was covered in crimson lifeblood, his keen eyes dulled by the horror of what he must have witnessed. The ranger fell to the floor with a loud thud and the bar went from hushed conversation to being utterly devoid of even the smallest noise.  There, stabbed deep into the back of the ranger, was a jagged blade.  A scarp of coarse parchment, soaked through with blood, was attached to the blade.  Opstrum slowly bent down to tear the scroll off of the dead man's body.  Quivering, he raised the scroll to the light and the color drained from his face.  There was but a single, terrible rune etched into the parchment. "You, Night's Watch.  Fetch a healer, go quickly."  The selected man bolted through the door.  Opstrum turned slowly to the rest of the inn.  "My dear fellows, if you have loved ones within the city, I would go to them.  We have just been marked for death by an enemy I thought lost to legend..."  Opstrum thrust the parchment into the dying fire of the inn, his face awash with devilish shadow as the words slid from his mouth like a poison. "The Plaguemaster..."

*********

"The burrowing reach of Skaven is felt throughout the mortal realms by all creatures. They bring with them the blight and plague of a thousand poxes and shed blood enough to fill the Dragon Sea a thousand times over.  They are the harbingers of the apocalypse, the vermintide ascendant.  There are few names amongst the Skaven that are well known to the scholars of the University of Carcasonne.  There are legends older than the stars themselves that tell of one known as The Scarlet Heade-Reapyr and one of the greatest leaders of all Skaven-kind, Thanqulious, the Ripper of Bones.  Little is known about these ancient scourges, as they are much older than any written records here at the University.  One creature that is extremely well known is a creature by the name of Malkk Festerscar, leader of his kin the Festerscar Clan and beholden to the title of 'Plaguemaster' for reasons unknown.  It is believed that this creature is responsible for the declaration of the Rongeur Caedis Crusade against those who did not worship the Great Horned Rat, bringing with him the wars of the Plaguetouched and the invasion of the Red Butchers...."

- Le Livre des Abominations, Volume II, Chapter XIII 

by Headmaster of Chaotica Studies

Opstrum Painad

********

Festerscar Tunnels

12th Day of the 13th Month

Malkk was brooding, as he often did.  The fool-things thought that, since they had cleared the tunnels of the wretched Hixaq hives that had killed almost two thousand of his best warriors, they were free to become fat-lazy and that their conquests were complete.  But they were not.  No, Malkk snarled, there was much to do to prepare this realm for the blessings of the Great Horned Rat.  Malkk slid from his pulpit and walked out towards his gathered Clan.  The clamor of hundreds of thousands of rats speak-squeaking to each other was a deafening buzz that carved into the very soul of any creature that was there.  Malkk stood patiently before the Clan, his foul mood only getting exasperated in the enveloping sound.  The Clan failed to notice that their master was awaiting their complete and undivided attention.  Even Malkk's "faithful" taskmasters seemed to be avoiding direct contact with their master.

Malkk's blood began to boil.  Chittering a prayer to the Great Horned Rat, he raise a claw towards the closest brood of clanrats in milky green robes and spat the final syllable through choking clouds of fluorescent green smoke.  He belched forth an impossibly large fog towards the unfortunate souls that had earned his displeasure.  The cloud tore at the unfortunate underlings' eyes and throats, causing them to fall to the ground in a torrent of agonizing coughs.  The caverns went silent but for the last few pitiful coughs from the ranks of the dying clanrats.

Malkk's eyes blazed with unholy green light as he looked upon his hordes. He raised his hands up above his head and began to speak in a voice that was not fully his own.  "Warriors of the Festerscar Clan, hear-listen to me now!  A time for great war-plague is upon us!  We are the chosen of our great masters in the Council of Thirteen to bring the World Sickness to this land of beasts!  We, the Clan of Festerscar, are the holy warriors of our great master who decree-squeaks that we scurry-march forward into the Realm-land of Beasts and kill-stab the unholy, stomp-squish the unrepentant, and burn the rest that will not kneel-hide from our great god!"  Thunderous chittering in excitement greeted his stirring oratory.  "First, we must scurry-march to the south from our great tunnels to the lands of the Deathworld forest - we must seek-claim the great Felonwood Mushrooms in order to mix-make the great World Sickness.  So, go quick-fast my Clan!  We march with the first chime of the 13th day!"

Malkk swept his robes away from him as he turned, the great chants of "Plaguemaster! Plaguemaster! Plaguemaster!" booming in his ears.  A puss-filled smile crept at the corners of his snout.  The plan-scheme was put in motion....

*********

Deep within the Realm of Chaos, two figures peered into the boiling cauldron of virulent slop as the vision faded into the bubbling mass.  The first figure clad in rotting flesh and sucks of bile encrusted filth turned to his large verminous counterpart.  "Lord Corrupter Vepseudal, you have done well with this minion.  I will inform my master at once."  The diseased creature waded off into the distance, leaving the Verminlord to contemplate the events that he had just set in motion.....

*********