Franz Lohner's Chronicle - The Other Damned Count

An absent-minded man of mysteries, Franz Lohner relies on his bulging journal to keep track of occurrences, intrigues and arguments around Taal's Horn Keep. Sometimes his notes are even useful, believe it or not. The Franz Lohner Chronicles are extracts from that journal.

One of the benefits of our little forays into the Chaos Wastes is that I’m learning all sorts of interesting things. Take the notorious Count Mordrek the Damned. It’s a name I’ve heard scores of times over the years, and always in connection with the bloodiest of battles. Sometimes he wins, sometimes he loses, but he’s always back again after the curtain call, ready to give it the full Brass Keep beatdown all over again.

You see, Mordrek – if that’s really his name – is the recipient of a nasty little gift that scholars call “Living Damnation”. Catchy little name, ain’t it? The Chaos Gods just won’t let him die, it seems, though they’re certainly ready and willing to make his life miserable. Plenty of Chaos worshippers find themselves accumulating all manner of grisly mutations over time, be they useful – if unsightly – things like horns, tails, wings etc. or simple blemishes, goitres or revolting cosmetic accessories, like fur, scales or translucent skin.

I knew a fellow with translucent skin once, back in my mercenary days. Terrible card player. Every time he bluffed, you could see right through him. But I digress.

Mordrek’s not only functionally unkillable – it’s not so much a series of deaths and resurrections he experiences as it is a succession of pauses – he’s in a state of constant physical and mental flux, poor bugger, always teetering on the edge of becoming a Chaos Spawn. It’s a wonder he can make conversation at all, though I’m told he does. Erudite speaker, in fact – which most northlanders ain’t – with a flair for dramatic, purple prose … if in a maudlin, self-loathing kind of way.

I’ve lost my thread. Why did I start talking about this? That’s right! The Chaos Wastes.

So it turns out we’ve actually found the bugger’s fortress! I’ve been hearing rumours for years, but it’s not as though you get a lot of reliable witnesses passing south through the Chaos Wastes. Not ones you’d trust with a knife, or even a spoon. But yes, the legendary fortress of Count Mordrek the Damned is still out there … and like him, it’ll probably be around until the end of the world, which by my reckoning could be any time now.

I couldn’t tell you how, or why, but Mordrek’s fortress is every bit as resolute as its master. Knock it down, and it grows right up again, ready to face the next assault. We could do with a few of those in the Empire, I can tell you. Save a lot on building costs, it would, especially when the greenskins start tromping around and looking to cause mischief.

An immortal castle up in the northlands is simply asking for trouble … and at the moment, that trouble comes in the form of our conniving little ratman friends. Right now, they’ve got the whole area locked down in an endless siege. Either the skaven can’t take a hint, or they’ve seen opportunity in those cursed ruins. Maybe it’s the spoor of magic, or maybe that they can’t resist the challenge of casting it down. Doesn’t matter much to me. Every ratman that dies in the siege lines is one less ratman for us to kill.

I wonder if Mordrek knows his fortress is taking a beating? I must ask the Five to keep an eye out for him.