Age of Sigmar: Omnibus

David Guymer Godless

Then

‘How long has it been, Jago?’

The old hermit that the Darvish hillmen called the Daemon Oracle wore a cloak of tamed shadow and spider-silk with the hood pulled close, obscuring his face but for the tip of his nose, the crescent-moon of his chin, and the dolorous timbre of his voice. The skin was scale-dry and blueish. He was cross-legged in the cave’s corner, the shadowed bowl of his hood drinking up the eerie fire. It gave off no warmth, no light. It wavered like a plant in a dark wind, a thing of oil and Ulgu.

‘How long has it been since such colour walked into the Tattered Lands?’ the Oracle asked.

Shahleah waited restlessly on bent knee, one arm lain across her armour’s golden lacquer. The sculpted piece depicted birds in flight, beasts at play, men and women in passion. The Oracle’s odd fire found every depression and crack, every lustfully staring eye and gluttonous mouth, and filled it with shadow. What was gold became brown, what was silver, tarnished, what was purple, deeper than black. The fine detail work was crusted with the grit of a long road, but it was once and always fine. Her ornate longsword rested point down, held in her other hands by the meandering fuller.

As was her way, she — and though verbal language lacked the nuance to describe, much less define, her gender, of late she felt like being a she — thought long and carefully before answering.

‘I’ll ask them, Jago,’ the Oracle muttered to the shadow-flame while Shahleah considered. Then he stopped whispering and appeared to listen. The fire flexed and flickered. Following the eerie exchange, she felt the dull, familiar absence in her heart. The Oracle looked up, eyes hidden, a row of pointed teeth catching the non-light and glinting. ‘What power brings you here, pilgrim?’

‘My own,’ Shahleah returned at once.

‘You misunderstand, you misunderstand. She misunderstands, Jago. This is perilous country for Seekers to walk without favour. To whom do you pray is what I mean. We are curious. When you are sore-pressed, when the road is run, when enemies abound and you wish with all your being for hellfire upon them, on whom — or on what — do you call?’

An ursine grunt rumbled from the cave’s entrance as Cruciax of the Blunted Knives stirred. ‘You are the Oracle. You should tell us.’

‘And if I cannot?’

‘Then we have other uses for those that have none. More… pleasant uses.’

Again that shadowed flash of grin under the cowl.

‘And when you call upon such powers?’ Shahleah interrupted. ‘Do they answer?’

‘Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don’t,’ came the Oracle’s reply.

‘Perhaps I have less need of such aid. Perhaps I would refuse it were it offered.’

The Oracle leaned forward and emitted a hiss of laughter. ‘And yet you search for Him.’

‘That is how the game is played. It runs its course and at the end it is won or it is lost.’

The ache that beat beneath her breast pained her again for a moment. It detested the stillness, the quietude. It urged her with its palpitations to scour these mountains on hands and knees and never be still.

‘I know games, Seeker,’ said the Oracle, ‘Jago and I play them often, and we know our part in yours, oh yes we do.’

An eerie whistle broke the Oracle’s meandering flow, and the hermit drew a spouted black iron pot from a tripod set up over the ivory flames. The scream gurgled away as he poured a turgid soup into a spidershell cup, thick steam hissing out to cloy at the cave’s walls.

‘This is a waste of time,’ Cruciax growled again.

Shahleah turned to glance over her sculptured pauldron.

Three of her most exalted champions hung just in from the wind under the cave’s craggy mouth, with Cruciax at the front. He was moodily tattooed in purples and blues that looked like bruises, clad half in ringed mail and half in the belts, buckles and straps that held it up and from which spikes of various different lengths and types protruded both outward and in.

Behind him and to his right, Prefuria stood straight and silent as the exotic, pincer-bladed lance in her hand. A fine dusting of gold around her face and her fingernails elevated her flawless good looks towards a personal apogee of perfection.

The third champion would surely, in other company, have been the first to catch the eye. Hel’ein’s beauty was staggering, but of a desperate, clutching kind. Her eyes drowned in yellow kohl. Her spiked hair razored back and forth in the wind. Her delicate short swords she held tight to her breast, and her cloak fluted over a suit of mirror-scales with hundreds of furtive, self-hating little caresses.

In any warband devoted to the Chaos powers, a leader governed by fear and respect, with patronage bestowed in divine favour and bought with glory. Not her. She led because no one else cared to. It wasn’t even apathy. They had their passions, their own ways of giving praise, but none like hers.

Cruciax’s eyes bulged from his hairless, painted face. They were full of pain, the memory of it and the hope of it, as he implored her. ‘He is a schemer. He won’t help us.’

‘The search has led us here,’ said Shahleah over her shoulder, and turned back to the Oracle. ‘We followed the flight of a one-winged raven into the high lands and across the river, and thence slaughtered the Darvish in a night of revels that turned the sky pink with omens, like a sunrise in a land of shadow. That trail we took, and it led us here.’

‘Can you help us?’ said Hel’ein, her whisper mouse-like.

‘We can,’ said the Oracle, slapping dry lips and slurping on his steaming spidershell. ‘I have seen the nightworld and spoken with shadow. I have mastered the ways of the not-yet-been. But such aid is not without price, and even with my guidance, you will need to call upon my aid. The Tattered Lands are deadly, doubly so for your kind that goes alone.’

‘Our kind?’

Shahleah asked the question, but she knew the answer already — both were steps of a long, arduous, but ultimately glorious game that had to be followed through if she was to keep on playing.

The Oracle cackled and took a slurp of broth. ‘The Godless.’

Now

The Tattered Lands were a place of vast, jagged peaks that shredded the clouds into inky rags and ripped them across a dim moon. The highest peak had no name — it was enough to know simply that it was the highest, and had taken the Seekers no more than a week of hard walking to reach from the Darvish Highlands and the abode of the Daemon Oracle. Weathered lumps of ancient stonework clawed up from the black grasses like the fingers of the anguished dead, the outskirts of what had once been a sprawling temple. For any of those features might the place have earned the name ‘the Tattered Lands’, but the epithet was for the torn, ragged souls that lingered in its ruins.

At first, Shahleah had thought they were shadows. Shahleah had led her Seekers from the mountainside and through the cracked frame of the long-rotted city gates, and from the moment they had stepped inside, they had been followed. They clung to walls, slipped around corners, had no faces. Many were shaped as men, but just as many, on furtive inspection, were not. They were hulking shapes, horns and tusks and plates, bodies out of all proportion to anything that could cast such a shadow.

There was no light. No sun, no moon, no stars. And yet they were all around them, inside every ruin and under every buried street. Before Shahleah had realised that they were more than mere shadows, they were surrounded.

And without a sound, they had struck.

The sword that came for her was as black as an eclipse, as difficult to place as a ghost’s hatred. It projected a chill, a bitter sharpness that required no physical edge with which to cut.

Shahleah bent back until her gauntlet knuckles caught her on the black marble flags. The blade whispered across her. She arched back up with a push of her supporting arm, spun away from a second darting sliver of chill, and stabbed back. Her undulating blade opened up the revenant’s chest and tore its shadow into the wind. She shrieked with satisfaction.

‘Come to me, shadow of mine!’ cried Hel’ein, somewhere close.

If asked before today, Shahleah would not have been able to say how you killed a shadow, but the conventional tools seemed to apply, and it was too late to think about it now. The second was still on her, and more slid silently in as she backed away from it.

These were all similarly man-shaped, but hunched and powerful, their shoulders armoured and spiked and their jaws heavy. Their weapons were similarly massive, the dark mirror of implements made for bludgeoning rather than aesthetic cutting. A dozen or more of them came at her at once, and she fended them off with a beguiling sequence of parries, each one a masterstroke rendered in gold.

The thrill of her situation made her heart beat fast. She was alive. Whatever value that life had, she favoured it over the only alternative. Even now.

Especially now.

A great blade wrapped in monstrous hands plunged towards her shoulder. She turned it aside on her vambrace and clasped her sword two-handed. With a word of power, the serpentine blade flickered into purpled flame. She filigreed the air with it. Shadows melted into ecstatic puddles as their constituent substance surrendered itself to the blade’s lust.

Each time the weapon’s daemon was unleashed, the effect it provoked was lessened. One day it would just be a sword, but that very impermanence was a gift that made it burn all the hotter.

With a sigh of sympathetic elation, she leapt onto a crumbling fountain and looked around. The decrepit marble monument was the centrepiece of a crossroads about two-thirds of the way up into the fallen city that the Oracle had sent them to. Rubble highways bore off onto streets lined with crumbling glories and packed with shadow. Cracked walls and gaping roofs spiked the mountain slope for several miles all around, the occasional tower or temple spire rising up to the tattered clouds. This place had once been great.

‘More!’ Cruciax bellowed. ‘More!’

Great sweeps of his bloodied chain smashed through the tide of shadow, but every so often he paused, as if on purpose, took the hit to his unarmoured quarter that his abrupt halt invited, then let rip a howl of agony and plunged back into the fray. His followers fought in the same bruising style. They were as tough as any blightking, vicious as any Goresworn berserker, but many were already dead or else crying out for the Dark Prince to reveal Himself for their final suffering.

On the other side of the fountain, surrounded by the pants and yells of her acolytes, Hel’ein’s twin swords clove shadows as if they were rags unbecoming of a queen. Her thralls screamed desperate praises, loud as mortal throats could — they cried their joy at the aural revelation that was steel on cold night and the symphonic grind of boots over marble. Hel’ein herself issued a moan, tongue pressed against the back of her teeth, and practically begged absent Slaanesh to come forth and witness her orgiastic fury.

The last road, which wound further up into the mountains, was held by Prefuria and her warband, Shahleah’s brilliantly armoured elite — the Godless.

Individually and collectively, they were perfect. Every warrior was a thing of beauty, clad in gold that had been etched, fretted, enamelled, and damascened to within an inch of its base utility. Together, they were collective worship through the perfection of form and action, the collaborative exigency of holy violence.

Shahleah brought up her sword and shouted a prayer. In the heat of the moment, it no longer mattered that no one heard. She picked her target.

A forked tongue of virile incandescence lashed across the crossroads and obliterated a pack of shadows that had been circling around behind the backs of the Godless through the skeletal frame of an ancient structure that leaned into the square.

At the same moment, a shade circled behind Cruciax and struck.

The warrior cried out and gasped as the shadow-knife passed through his back and erupted from his chest in a spattering of gelid gore. He looked at her, his eyes thanking her for not intervening. She returned it with a smile. They all had their own parts to play, and she would deal with the consequences as they came. That was the game.

Cruciax’s cry turned to bubbling laughter as the blade was withdrawn. It became a howl of unsatiated torment as one of his warriors cut the shadow down before the task was complete. The furious cry spread throughout his followers, and then into Hel’ein’s — the so-called Exendentals — as the shadows slowly broke off their attack and slunk back into their city. Hel’ein herself wept at the shallow and short-lived pleasure.

Prefuria pointed up the road she had defended. She didn’t speak. There, beyond the steepled black rooftops, the plated bronze minaret of the Astrosanct shone gloomily against the pervading dark.

Then

‘The shadows keep their own secrets,’ said the Oracle, waving a scaly hand over the lightless fire. The flickering shadows it gave off coiled about his fingers like worms pulled wriggling out of the ground. ‘That was why the Astrosanct was placed here in the Tattered Lands.’

‘Will we find Him there?’

Cruciax brooded by the cave’s near wall, at times appearing to admire the atavistic cave art, but always edging ever closer to where the Oracle sat behind his fire. The length of chain he carried rattled as he fed it through his hands, looped it, pulled it taut, let it go. Nothing so painless as a blade for Cruciax.

‘Do you think He could be so close and you would not feel it? Perhaps you would not, at that. How can we imagine what it is like to be like you?’

Cruciax growled, his chain taut. The Oracle sipped noisily at his broth.

‘Who built it?’ asked Shahleah.

‘An astute question, eh, Jago? She shows promise, this one.’ He looked up from his shadow-bound fingers and found Shahleah. He seemed amused. ‘Perhaps when your soul tires of your search, you might offer it to a master who values such qualities in his servants.’

‘I said who.’

‘I do not know,’ said the Oracle, as though ignorance was a rare gift. ‘It was already long ruined when I came here in search of solitude, and that was before the Age of Chaos. The talk of the wind is that it was here long before a world was raised beneath it. But the wind tells tall tales, is that not so, Jago?’

The shadow he addressed shifted but did not answer.

‘What is it for?’ asked Shahleah.

‘It is an observatory.’

‘Of what?’

The Oracle cackled. ‘Of everything. This is the darkest corner of a very dark realm. What light is here is light that you bring with you, and little of it escapes.’ He wrapped scaly fingers around his steaming spidershell and looked up into rapt, desperate faces. ‘The old priests viewed things from across the realms and from times long before the realms were made. The shadows of those things are in the Astrosanct still. That is what it is for. Nothing escapes.’

‘You mean—’

‘I mean that even I do not know where Slaanesh is, and you will not find him in the Tattered Lands, but if you can say with certainty that he existed at all, then you may yet catch his shadow.’

Now

The Astrosanct occupied the temple-city’s highest promontory; only a few hundred feet of shadow-weathered rock climbed further above the hemispherical courtyard that housed the observatory. The strange apparatus of the Astrosanct dominated the site. It was a minaret, comprised of brass plates assembled into interlocking spirals. Each plate was rendered with impenetrable pictographic script, beautiful in its complexity. Shahleah wondered how this awesome instrument must have appeared in use, crowded by priests and scholars, those spirals clanking past one another like the gear wheels of a world clock.

The impression faded and what she saw instead were shadows. She readied her blade, but these did not move. They were the shadows cast by the Astrosanct itself — the moon and stars, though skeined by this world’s layering shadow, were free enough above the cloud layer to shine.

The Seekers spread out over the courtyard, following the circumference of the boundary walls, as Shahleah and Cruciax made a line for the Astrosanct.

Those walls were also of brass and also beautiful. Shahleah caught sight of one of the Exendentals staring, entranced, at one such segment depicting a bulky saurian in a golden headdress.

‘I could imagine the Prince of Pain residing in such a place,’ Cruciax muttered grudgingly. Even he was intimidated by the spiritual oppression that hung over the observatory.

Shahleah nodded and continued on to the Astrosanct.

The base of the apparatus was a puzzle of rings and cogs and ideograms that seemed to hark to some other world entirely. A place of sun and jungle and reptilian monsters. In several places there were depressible panels marked with hieroglyphic designs. She pressed some at random. Nothing happened. Cruciax joined her, picking dried blood from his chain with the fingernail of his un-armoured hand.

It had not acquired the blood in this mausoleum city, Shahleah knew.

Not all of Slaanesh’s followers sought after their lost purpose as she did. Did Cruciax or Hel’ein know that their own despairing efforts to rouse their absent god might have cost them this chance? Who could say? The game was unpredictable — that was the glory of it. Shahleah suspected that the Prince of Excess would have had it no other way, and another opportunity lost would give her little sorrow.

‘We should have brought the Oracle,’ Cruciax grunted.

‘Maybe next time.’

Turning around, she looked over the twilit courtyard for any further sign of how the Astrosanct might be operated, or where the shadows it had collected in aeons past might be found.

Shapes twisted and coiled around the wall that circumscribed the courtyard, but always on the other side, as though the pictograms upon the walls somehow prevented them from passing. It was then that Shahleah noticed that even her own shadow had abandoned her. She shivered deliciously.

All around the courtyard, seeing that there was nothing for them here, her warriors dropped to their knees in lamentation. Some celebrated, revelling in the sensation of denial.

‘Be alert,’ she hissed, eyes on the shadows and the walls that held them back. She had the uncanny sense that they were not alone.

There was a throb in her temple, a flex in the penumbral skein, and a section of the boundary wall appeared to turn semi-molten and bulge as though pushed at from the other side. A wave of starlight breached the weakened barrier and a hulking saurian warrior, clad in bone and silver plate and wielding a feathered spear, stepped through.

The wall sealed seamlessly behind it in a snap of interlocking brass. At the same moment, a cold-blooded consciousness pressed its way into hers. There were no words, just pictures and sensations, a string of hieroglyphs etched in brilliant, brilliant pain into her mind. She saw searing light, tiered ziggurats of gold peopled by feathered priests, their servants, and their warrior cohorts. She felt isolation. Abandonment. Silent suffering. A final icon appeared. Two symbols, one of sun, one of moon, that she intuitively put together into a name.

Eclipse.

She snapped out of the communion with a stumble and slid her blade from its scabbard. Two-score more of these seraphon had emerged from the wall at intervals around them. Surrounded. With gut-wrenching roars, the glittering saurus warriors lumbered into a charge that crushed the grieving Seekers before them.

Cruciax turned with a cry and sprinted to meet the nearest saurian. Hel’ein called for her warriors. Prefuria did both with the hum of her pincer-barbed spear.

Shahleah ignored them. She had marked their leader, as he had marked her.

Amongst the first to have emerged, he was a head taller than his warriors, as they were a head taller than her. His scales were a pale, time-worn grey. Heavy plates of platinum inscribed with the phases of the moon encased his powerful body. The mace in his huge, sledgehammer fist was silver with spikes radiating from it like coronal filaments.

Eclipse, too, was beautiful in his way.

The ancient saurus built up speed as he charged, barging down first one of Cruciax’s warriors, then another, and then Cruciax himself, beaten aside like a leaf against the armoured prow of a ship as the oldblood swept up his mace. Only once Cruciax was down, his turn expended, did Shahleah act.

The saurus was still several sword-lengths away as she struck down with her blade and spoke the word to awaken its lingering daemonic essence. A pink ribbon of energy tongued forwards. Eclipse dropped a shoulder and raised an arm, his war-plate clearly hardened against magic in some way as the lash splattered against his vambrace.

It affected him though, even if only slightly, the potent wards almost overcome by the inimicality of the sensations being forced on his cold-blooded body.

‘It is a daily torment, is it not, to be left alone?’ she said, as she drew up her sword, taking the last thunderous second to set herself to receive the charge.

With a roar of rage the silver-clad juggernaut slammed into her. For a moment, it felt as if the layers of her armour had been pressed together and driven into her chest like a hammer. She felt her feet leave the ground. For a second she flew. She landed on tiptoes, already back-pedalling, bleeding off the unwanted momentum. She whipped up her sword and smiled.

‘You must take pleasure where you find it.’

The heat taken out of his attack, Eclipse launched his mace at her instead, a swing that would have taken her head had she not been deft enough to step away and nudge it over. She turned with the parry and countered. Her blade scratched along the outside of the seraphon’s vambrace. Eclipse elbowed it contemptuously aside and delivered a punch in the mouth that sent her staggering backwards with a red smile.

She felt giddy, as though if she were killed now, she might just float away. Then, maybe, she would find Him. Her heart beat so hard she could barely hear.

The saurus came on with an overhead sweep intended to turn her into paste. She angled her blade across her shoulder and knocked the blow aside, creating the space to land a blow of her own. Her free hand made a lurid series of gestures as she punched the saurus’ armoured gut.

The aethyr blast erupted against Eclipse’s belly, lifted him off the ground and hurled him back. He smashed into the Astrosanct, the ancient apparatus buckling under his enormous mass and pinning him in place. Eclipse gave a roar of frustration, and the other saurus echoed it. Throwing caution aside, they hurled themselves at the remaining Seekers with an uncaring, empty fury.

They fought more like the Seekers themselves.

Shahleah strode towards the trapped oldblood as his warriors were cut down by blade and chain, dying in bursts of light. He struggled and bellowed, but the bent metal plating held him fast. Cruciax stumbled over to join Shaleah, wiping blood off his face and carrying what appeared to be a broken shoulder to add to his ruptured lung and dozen-or-so other slights. He eyed the struggling saurus with the same self-destructive hunger she saw in them all. His voice broke as he turned to her.

‘It is over. How much must we suffer for Him before He will stop denying us?’

Shahleah shrugged and beheaded the still-defiant Eclipse with a sweep of her blade. Starlight fell for the final time on this holy place, forgotten by its gods, as his corpse dissipated wispily into the sky.

Then, as ever

‘Which brings us to what we want.’

The Oracle drew himself up until he sat almost upright, down-curved nose and up-curved chin pincering the fire’s non-light like a scaly blue claw. ‘What I want. We will be the first to converse with Slaanesh when you find him.’

‘No,’ said Shahleah, firmly, without wanting or needing to explain why.

‘No,’ growled Cruciax at almost the exact same time.

Prefuria tightened her grip on her spear until it squeaked, and from beside her, a moment later, the fragile echo, ‘No.’

‘Can you speak with the shadow?’ asked the Oracle. ‘Have you spent two full ages of this world learning their secret ways? I would ask them the answer, but this is no secret knowledge and I fear that they would laugh.’ He hissed. ‘I despise their laughter.’ He snapped his hooded gaze to where Cruciax moved towards him around the edge of the cave wall. ‘Do not think me alone, Seeker. Do not think me vulnerable. I am not like you. I am never alone.’

‘No,’ Hel’ein repeated softly, unnoticed.

‘Try me.’ Cruciax’s chain was garrotte-wire tight. ‘Your pain or mine, do you think I care?’

‘I care,’ said Shahleah. ‘The decision is mine.’

Cruciax bared his bloody gums and snarled at her from the corner of his mouth. ‘You do not find the Prince of Pain by looking. He does not lie in some temple waiting to be found. He must be invoked. He must be appeased.’ His eyes appeared to expand as his neck took the tension in his chain. Punishment spikes bit into his swelling musculature until its powerful definition was made red with blood. The metal links groaned one against the next. ‘Your pain or mine, Tzeentchian.’

For a moment, the Oracle said nothing. The air grew cold. Shahleah felt a throbbing in her temple, and frost began to pick along the grime crusting her plate. Vapour billowed from Cruciax’s mouth.

‘What say you, Jago: our pain…’ The fire set in front of him shivered and began to mutate, taking on the shape of something spine-tailed and avian, like a one-winged raven. ‘Or his?’

The shadow familiar flashed across the room like an arrow. Cruciax swung at it but it took him under the chest, picked him up and pushed him back against the wall. He struggled and cursed, but the shadow pinned him there. The Oracle cackled.

‘No!’

Shahleah turned towards the scream. Hel’ein was already halfway across the cave. By the time the Oracle had turned as well, the woman had her swords drawn.

‘He is my flesh, my passion,’ she said. ‘He is my Dark Prince. He will not heed callow words.’

The Oracle choked and brought up a scaled hand. ‘Changer, here my pr—’

Hel’ein cut it off at the wrist, then impaled him through the heart with the follow-through of her other blade. ‘No,’ she hissed, and stabbed him again in the belly, lifting him off the ground. ‘No.’ She withdrew both blades and he fell in a heap. He gurgled wetly, smearing the stump of his arm on the ground, and Hel’ein dropped down to straddle him, fending off his hand and raising her swords. ‘No. No. No.’

‘Wait,’ wheezed Cruciax. The tattooed man staggered towards them. Bits of residual shadow clung to him and claw-marks hatched the unarmoured quarters of his torso. He brandished his chain. His hands were so slippery with his own blood that he had it wrapped around both fists to keep it held. ‘Let him suffer.’

Shahleah took a deep breath and quietly sheathed her sword.

‘Are you going to stop them?’ spoke Prefuria haltingly, her voice deep and imperfect.

‘The game will play as it plays. It has happened, and we will face what consequences we must.’

‘And what if he is right? What if we need him to find Slaanesh’s shadow?’

A slow and pleasant smile spread across the Godless’ face as she gave the question due consideration. ‘Then we will keep on looking.’

Gav Thorpe The Lord of the Cosmic Gate

‘And unto the ninth positional lies the gradient of the damned, invested by the decayed septet of the incongruent ratio…’ muttered Rikjard of the Many Numbers. He consulted his grimoire of archaic formulae, flicking through the tattered pages with fingers tipped with bird talons. Though his claws made it easier to gouge the faces from the foes of all-blessed Tzeentch, the clarity of Rikjard’s notations had suffered since the All-seeing Master had seen fit to gift him with such digits. ‘Ah, here it is, with the Conglomerations of Aesthetics. Aelf-lore, ripped from the mind of their great calculist himself, Narruthias of Telemor.’

Beside him, its head no higher than his waist, Rikjard’s thautomaton familiar buzzed and clicked. The lensed eyes looking up at him reflected a moon-round face and scalp feathered in a rainbow of colours. Innards composed of tiny, ratcheted wheels whirred as the thautomaton raised its four dagger-tipped arms and tipped its head to one side. Black sparks of corrupted energy flashed along wire-veins and sparkled on the edges of its serrated killblades.

‘Yes, soon enough,’ Rikjard told his artificial companion. ‘The field of battle awaits.’

The sleeve of his robe slid back as he raised a hand to encompass their surrounds, the material like fish scales, tinkling gently with the movement. His gesture swept across a landscape of polygonal hills and valleys, curving upwards without a horizon to form the inner surface of a sphere. At the centre, far above his head, eight small stars revolved around each other in complex orbits. If he could but align them he would open the Cosmic Gate, the fabled Panoramicon that led into the heart of Tzeentch’s domain.

Walls and towers of many-coloured crystal littered the lands of the Thousand Portals, refracting, reflecting and channelling the light of the Chaos suns to create bridges of rainbows, shadow-gates and half-seen castles of chromatic power.

In the far distance, if it could be called such in a self-enclosed globe of reality, another shape lingered on the edge of vision — an immense vista of endless curtain walls and bastions, glass-sided towers and crystalline monoliths. The Crystal Labyrinth of Tzeentch, abode of the Great Architect itself, to which the Thousand Portals had once been a mere outer bastion.

Rikjard stepped to one side, just a few paces, but his view changed completely in those steps. The juxtaposition of light and dark, the play of illumination through the prismatic landscape shifted everything, creating forests of ruby-leaved trees and lakes of shimmering gold fed by a river that frothed over angular rocks of marble-like stone. The vision beyond changed also, revealing a new facade of the Crystal Labyrinth that lay beyond the Halosphere — the mystical boundary that both powered and imprisoned the energies of the Thousand Portals.

‘Beautiful…’ murmured Rikjard. The thautomaton juddered slightly, its part-mechanical, part-magical brain unable to process the concept.

With a simple incantation, Rikjard drew forth his army from where they waited in the Cascading Rocks in the realm of Chamon. The tramp of many feet and the jingle of war harnesses accompanied their arrival. Knights riding steeds armoured in shimmering silver scales led the vanguard, their lances tipped with nine-tailed pennants in red and purple. They wore all-enclosing plate, black as granite, decorated with curlicues of gold and studded with gems that glowed with inner fire. Full helms, topped with crests in the shapes of dragonets-rampant and rearing serpents, hid their faces, the gleam of red and blue lighting the shadows within their visors.

The heavy cavalry wheeled as a single regiment towards Rikjard, while the mounted warriors behind broke into smaller groups, fanning out across the ridgeline and into the steep-sided valley in front. They wore brightly patterned tunics strengthened with hexagonal scales or tight-ringed mail. Their horses snorted vapour in the cold of the Thousand Portals, leaving trails of mist in their wake.

The infantry came next, a seemingly unending line of men and women dedicated to Tzeentch. Clad in myriad styles of armour and costume, they were drawn from across seventeen regions of the Realm of Shadow and the Realm of Metal. The homes they had left behind were now no more than blasted wildernesses in the wake of Rikjard’s infernal crusade. Some were hulking fighters wholly devoted to the service of the Great Architect, but many others were tribal warriors sworn to Tzeentch only by their allegiance to Rikjard.

With them came beasts, some nearly recognisable, others monstrously mutated caricatures of their former bodies. Strange things squawked and lumbered, flapped and shrieked before the goads and whips of beastmasters, flanked by the rumbling scythed wheels of chariots whose drivers wore masks fashioned in the likeness of golden hawks.

Every fighter, whether smooth-limbed, armoured behemoth or twisted spawn, was bound in loyalty to Rikjard. Upon their brows or set into their chests, each being sworn to Tzeentch was marked by a fist-sized gem, many-faceted, glinting with every colour of the spectrum. Each stone emitted a wisp of black smoke, as though it still seared the flesh with which it had been magically fused. Legend from Rikjard’s birthplace, the Chasms of the Endless Pyre, said that the gems were blood drops from the cosmic serpent itself, shed when Tzeentch duelled with the titanic star-beast. Each one turned into a stone when it fell into the Mortal Realms, and they were scattered far and wide through time and space. They were both reward and threat, granting the boon of Tzeentch to the bearer, yet bidding them to obey the will of the Great Architect’s chosen lord.

To prove his dedication to the Ever-Changing Overlord, Rikjard had laboured for half a lifetime. Recovering so many drakestones from the ashes of his homeland had been an arduous task, for which he had been rewarded with Tzeentch’s mark. Yet this task had been just the first of many near-impossible feats Rikjard had achieved to earn his current status.

Rikjard did not like the term ‘minions’ — it demeaned the great conquests and accomplishments of his subordinates — but in truth that was their role. Many thought they might accompany him through the veil of the Halosphere and into the Night of Eternal Knowledge, but such belief was a delusion — one that Rikjard had not spent any effort to dispel, it was true.

Only one could make that journey. The mystical formulae were singularly specific in that respect. All calculations returned with a value of one — no more, no less, no fraction or multiple thereof.

And Rikjard would stand in that place and look upon the wonder of all the realms and know the last piece of the Eternal Equation set forth by Tzeentch to bind the universe together. With such power, Rikjard believed even Archaon and his possession of the Allpoints would be rendered inconsequential.

‘We risk much,’ Rikjard told his uncomprehending mechanical bodyguard. ‘The gods themselves have elevated the Everchosen above us. They have tried already to thwart my ambition, but their resistance only strengthens me, for is not all ambition the sweetmeat of glorious Tzeentch? To climb above Archaon is to stand directly in the gaze of the Great Powers. My patron, my saviour, cosmic Tzeentch shall be preeminent, all others laid to slavery before the all-consuming will of the Ultimate Arbiter, and I shall be the Right Hand of Illuminated Destiny.’

A crackle of flames and a flicker of colourful shadows betrayed the presence of another creature arriving at Rikjard’s shoulder. He did not turn immediately, but continued to admire the view as the glorious construct-world resolved into new forms with the slightest tilt of the head or sway of the body.

‘How do you see it? Is it as magnificent to your daemon eyes?’ he asked, finally glancing back at Tzarathoth, the Tzeentchian herald that commanded Rikjard’s immortal allies. It was almost humanoid in appearance, an ever-shifting form of multicoloured fire and wreathing magical vortices. When the daemon replied, its voice sounded like a distant shriek echoing through a small space.

‘It is anathema to us,’ said Tzarathoth. ‘The reviled star-crawlers have broken it. When they took the Thousand Portals from beneath the gaze of All-Seeing Tzeentch they cursed it, damned it to this perpetual darkness of unillumination. This is not the light of the Universal Inconstant, but the burning of the stars of benighted Azyr.’

‘When the Panoramicon is open, all shall fall beneath the gaze of the Great Changer once more,’ said Rikjard. He consulted a different page in the Metamathicron. ‘According to my Theory of Interstability, declining Azyr and ascendant Chamon with a partial revealing of Ghur is the perfect moment to strike. When the Celestial constellations are dispersed, their power will be weakened and the Starmasters will be sluggish and slow to respond.’

Blinking slit-pupil eyes, Rikjard surveyed the landscape with a more dispassionate gaze. He calculated the inclines and vectors of the converging light rays, triangulating the intersections in a nine-dimensional mystical framework. The Cosmic Gate was no simple realmgate; it was not merely a bridge between two locations. It was a hallway that led between any realm, and into the domains of almighty Tzeentch. Like its godly creator, it was ever-changing — by the time one knew the direction from which it might be entered, its orientation had changed. The Eternal Equation held the answer to predicting the infinitely complex sequence required to ensnare the energies of the Halosphere and force open the Cosmic Gate.

‘There! From that focal point I can make the breach.’ Rikjard indicated a shimmering hill of sapphire above them and to the right, topped by a seven-walled keep. He smiled at Tzarathoth. ‘Summon your daemonic legion — we march to glory!’

The herald nodded, the black orbs of its eyes moving from the sorcerer to the objective. A wisp of flame parted in a grotesque approximation of a grin.

‘Praise Tzeentch!’ Tzarathoth raised its incorporeal arms in supplication, its voice becoming an ululating cry that grated on Rikjard’s hearing and throbbed in his gut. The air around the daemon moved like a glitter of particles that coalesced around its form, first manifesting into a long staff of fire in its upraised hands and then cladding its body in sliding plates of daemonic armour with surfaces that glistened like red oil. It rose into the air and beneath its feet emerged a great disc edged with curving blades and jutting spines. It bore Tzarathoth into the sky on a trail of sparkling fire.

Where the sparks fell, the ground set alight, each flame growing into a new form, reality splitting with a crackle and hiss with each arrival. The first to break through into the Thousand Portals were more heralds — on foot, riding upon their discs, or carried through the air on flaming chariots pulled by howling sky-sharks. These Tzeentchian champions from the Silvered Sands added their calls to those of Tzarathoth, bringing forth daemons in their hundreds, in every manner and form that Rikjard had ever known, and several more he had never before catalogued.

Ranting and shrieking, burning figures and swooping predators ripped through the boundaries between realms. Arcane conjurations spilled across the sky in streamers of multi-coloured flame while pink and blue droplets fell in fiery rain, every Tzeentch-blessed globule bringing forth a new cackling horror.

Rikjard did not pay much attention to the unfolding daemonic spectacle. In his mind he reconfigured his calculations with each new appearance. He tracked and assimilated the Chaotic legion’s multitudinous warriors, estimating the impact of so much magic on the diverging mystical currents that swirled around the Thousand Portals, finessing his predictions.

‘It’s all a matter of mass, balance and trajectory,’ he explained to the thautomaton. ‘Actions and reactions. A tipping point. When all is in motion, that will be the key that unlocks the Cosmic Gate.’

The daemons were gathering about their heralds, moving effortlessly across the ever-shifting landscape in a purple, pink and blue tide. Rikjard’s army was still streaming through from beyond, but he could delay the advance no longer. The Star-spawned Ones would wake soon, and he had to be in position to take advantage of their response.

Lifting a clawed hand, he waved his mortal army forward. Ten thousand jewels glittered like stars as his mental command throbbed into the minds of his followers. Drums rolled, horns blared and trumpets sounded the advance.

Rikjard felt the change before he saw or heard anything. His host had crossed less than a quarter of the distance to the focal point where he would later be able to align the facets of the Panoramicon. The gibbering and mewling of the daemons, the crunch of boots and rattle of armour hid the subtle ripples spreading through the magic-saturated air of the Thousand Portals. He sensed the disturbance as a hundred tiny perturbations in his calculations, minute fractal cascades giving rise to improperly disproportionate divergences.

Change.

He knew it so well. The Master of Change was his lord and guide, but it was not the hand of Tzeentch that extended over the Thousand Portals. It was the touch of the Star-crawlers, the thieves that had taken the Cosmic Gate from the Great Architect in the distant eons of prehistory.

They had a name, a mortal appellation that did nothing to convey the wholly interdimensional horror of their antithetical nature. The Slann. Starmasters. Heavenly lords dedicated to the purging of all that was and could be. A cleansing blandness that would stop the worlds in their orbits and split the realms from each other for eternity, trapping all in the cosmic amber of stasis.

All around him the lands were changing again, trenches and walls springing into life, towers fading and new fortifications and great shimmering bastions emerging from the mists. His attention was drawn to a newly-revealed wall of faceted opal a few hundred paces ahead, in which another of the Thousand Portals was revealed, and beyond it a maelstrom of swirling energy. Light from no mortal star spilled across the entangled landscape, polluting the rays of the region’s own miniature suns. Shadows wove complex shapes against this white illumination, quickly resolving into a phalanx of blue-scaled saurus.

These warriors-dreamed stood as tall as Rikjard’s most powerful fighters, lizard-like with yellow eyes and bright fronds along their bone-flanged skulls. They bore curved shields of scaled hide furnished with sharpened bones and gold edging. They wore more celestite star-gold upon their limbs in the form of torqs and anklets, vambraces and necklaces, decorated with sharp fangs and portentous glyphs. They advanced in unison, clawed feet scratching at the hard rock of the Thousand Portals.

Rank after rank entered through the gate, forming from the light itself by the will of their slann commander. Rikjard had been expecting their arrival — his success depended upon it, in fact. All the same, he was taken aback by the sheer ferocity of their presence. The impact of their appearance on the swirl of concentric computations forced the sorcerer to make swift and radical adjustments to his calculations.

Other wells of light were erupting as more of the Thousand Portals opened, each producing a fresh cohort of fanged, horned warriors. Around these tight regiments of brutes darted smaller skinks, rapid and nimble, their bows, javelins and blowpipes at the ready.

Looking over his shoulder, Rikjard witnessed more of the slann’s host bursting into reality through portals behind his army. Their appearance did not shock him, for he knew well the reputation of the Cosmic Warriors and the ways of their Starmasters. He was prepared for his foe’s ability to arrive unfettered by geography — not that, here in the Thousand Portals, such physical considerations were really necessary. Nothing here was permanent, all was reflection, distortion, shadow and light. Rikjard raised his silver-wrought wand, its head gleaming yellow. The gems set into the helms of several regiments of his most heavily armoured warriors responded with their own ochre glow as the Chosen turned towards the rear to defend against the unfolding seraphon assault.

‘Where are you?’ Rikjard whispered, scanning left and right across the prismatic landscape. Behind the advancing regiments of saurus warriors, a nimbus of golden light became a streaming river of silver-and-blue starlight, coiling about itself like an endless serpent. Larger shapes shifted in the chromatic oscillations, metamorphosing from indistinct shadows to immense beasts of war as they crossed the boundary threshold between realities.

Bellowing and snorting, a pair of tower-sized bastiladons stomped through the breach. Upon the bony plates along their backs they carried arcane celestial engines — one bore a device wrought with the sigils of the long-dead ancestors of the seraphon, the other a gold-shimmering gem as large as a man, with edges that glittered in the light of a unseen star. They were flanked by teams of skinks that were herding bright-skinned salamanders and spine-encrusted razordons.

Screamer-pulled chariots and daemon-fire flamers led the counter-attack, soaring over the heads of streaming columns of horrors with ecstatic leaps. Spurts of blue and pink flames engulfed the front ranks of the saurus, spattering from the reptiles’ raised shields in drops with tiny, laughing faces. War clubs and swords studded with celestite roundels and shards tore at the screamers as they swooped through the dream-warriors, slashing with spiked tails and running barbed fins through the scaled flesh of their foes. From the first of the flaming chariots, Tharkziz the Undenying unleashed bolts of daemonic power, creating a whirlwind of fire that seared through the assembled ranks of the slann’s soldiers.

Tharkziz was followed by more daemon chariots, each carrying a hulking flamer that spat pink fire from maw-tipped arms. The blue horrors that accompanied them jabbed down at the saurus with spears forged of solid flame. The saurus snarled and leapt, using their teeth-edged shields to tear at the undersides of the screamers, their jagged mauls and axes crashing against the bodies of the daemonic chariots. In the wake of Tharkziz’s attack, fire crawled across hide shields and gilded armour, eating into blue scales and muscled flesh. With shrill whines and bestial snarls Chaos daemon and seraphon fell to each other’s attacks. Horrors, screamers and flamers exploded into fountains of dissipating energy, while the saurus returned to the Celestial Realm in flashes of polychromatic light that were reflected and distorted over and over by the mirrors and prisms of the Thousand Portals.

With another thought, Rikjard despatched a portion from the left wing of his army through one of the nearby portals. Savage horsemen and ambling, many-limbed spawn disappeared beneath a rainbow-like arc of black, blues and purples, to emerge from a half-seen gateway beyond the salamanders and razordons. Skinks scattered like leaves before a storm as riders fell on them with whooping battle cries, while misshapen spawn thrashed into their bestial charges with clubbing blows and whipping blade-appendages. Acidic fire and volleys of deadly spines greeted the marauding cavalry and bloated mutants, but Rikjard cared nothing for the deaths of his followers.

‘Show yourself,’ he muttered, signalling for Tzarathoth to split his host in an attempt to encircle the seraphon still streaming from the first celestial gateway. ‘This is not a battle you can win from afar.’

Hooves thundered and claws scraped on unyielding marble as the Tzeentchian knights charged at a wave of saurus mounted atop reptilian cold ones. Lances shattered bloodily against scaled skin while celestite-tipped spears pierced plates of ensorcelled armour. Steeds that were not wholly equine, canine or feline sank steel teeth into the exposed flesh of the cold ones, ignoring the raking claws that scattered the gilded mail coats of the knights’ mounts.

The interplay of attack and counter-attack was unfolding quickly, every movement and manoeuvre, every small victory and defeat changing the parameters of success. Rikjard’s wand left silver trails as he moved his forces with the deftness of a Domination player. His uncle had taught him the strategies of the game even as he had instructed Rikjard in the secret wisdom of mathemagics. To Rikjard, the Thousand Portals were the board on which he played, each regiment of friend or foe a piece to be positioned exactly, every loss an alteration to the complex equation scorched through the thoughts of the Lord of Many Numbers. Possibilities came and went with each passing moment, and all the time the Thousand Portals shifted and turned, air becoming rock, rock becoming air, hills becoming valleys and walled castles becoming yawning chasms. In places, the ground opened to swallow up entire regiments, only to deposit them seemingly at random across the enclosing spheroid landscape.

But this was not random. There was purpose and design behind every displacement. Tzeentch was the Emergent Phenomena, the pattern within the pattern, the predictably unpredictable integer. Rikjard was so close to mastering the Eternal Formula, but he needed the Starmaster that commanded the enemy to show itself. Only then, with the input of the celestial spawn, would he be able to fully unlock the marvels of the Thousand Portals.

Screeches from above drew Rikjard’s attention away from the converging, intermingling lines of Chaos followers and seraphon. From within the orbit of the captive infant suns, a new celestial rift had opened, spilling forth a flock of reptilian flyers. The terradons followed a storm of glittering javelins hurled by their riders, each missile a deadly thunderbolt as it crashed into the heaving daemon horde.

Rikjard heard a peculiar noise over the cacophony of war. He turned, seeking the source of the strange croaking. Sensing his unease, his familiar clashed its dagger-hands, eager to kill. The discordant shrieking of ripperdactyls grew louder as a squadron of the winged beasts circled closer, nostrils flared, the tips of the riders’ spears glinting with captured moonlight.

Something small hopped past the sorcerer’s foot — a toad no bigger than his fist, a pungent smell drifting up to Rikjard’s nostrils from the warty intruder. He had not noticed its arrival, but now recollected the barely-felt pop of magic that had heralded its summoning.

He looked at the innocuous amphibian and then back at the ripperdactyls. The vicious reptilian flyers, their hunting cries cutting across the clash of armies, arrowed down through clouds of golden mist directly towards him, as if drawn by the presence of the strange toad.

Grimacing, Rikjard swept out his wand and unleashed a blast of magical flames that incinerated the leading beasts and their riders. Fire crawling across its wings, another dived through the onslaught and snatched up the thautomaton, ignoring the rasp of its blades along its long beak as it lifted the animated machine and carried it away.

Rod in one hand, blade in the other, Rikjard fended off the spear-thrust of the next rider and dodged the snapping of its mount’s sharp beak. An instant later, the sky filled with blinding sparks as a flight of screamers swept into the ripperdactyls. Celestial predators and daemonic sky-sharks whirled and snapped around each other, ascending in a mass of fangs, barbs and talons, showers of blood and ichor spilling down onto Rikjard like rain.

He pressed on, mentally commanding his army to follow, despatching more and more of his forces through the interlaced portals to divide and surround the enemy. The seraphon likewise manoeuvred through the ever-changing pathways, coming together in knots to baulk his advances, using the portals to charge into the flanks of his warriors or retreat from the assaults of his knights and their monstrous companions.

He checked his position, now unable to see the castle towards which he had set out, but confident that he was close to the location from which he would be able to align the Thousand Portals and open the Cosmic Gate. The equation burned brighter, codifying and solidifying like congealing blood, becoming a thing of raw substance yet possessed of naked power.

The ground bucked, toppling mortal and daemon alike. The captive stars spun wildly about each other and a fresh star burst into existence in their midst. Rikjard looked away, temporarily blinded. Blinking away the after-image, he looked at the new orb of white fire. He could see with his wizard’s gaze that it was not truly in the region of the Thousand Portals, but burned at the end of an infinitely long tunnel, its energy forming a funnel into the space between the celestial domain and the Realm of Chaos where the Thousand Portals were trapped.

The Starmaster appeared instantaneously, with a crack of pressurised air and a boom of thunder that rolled around the sphere of the Thousand Portals, echoing and distorting in an impossible fashion. The slann’s bulbous form, so like a gigantic amphibian, belied the near-infinite knowledge and power Rikjard knew it possessed. It floated upon a palanquin forged from the corpses of dead stars, inlaid with glyphs of pure celestite that surrounded the star-spawn with a halo of deadly and protective light.

The daemons howled and bayed at the arrival of their aeons-old foe. Abandoning all pretence of adhering to Rikjard’s plan, they threw themselves towards the slann, desperate to slay the Harbinger of Order. The seraphon responded with equal ferocity, spurred by the cold intellect of their creator-summoner.

All appearance of subtle interplay vanished, the delicately brutal game replaced with a frenzy of bloodletting and ceaseless carnage. Warriors and daemons fell beneath the celestite-shod feet of rampaging monsters while beams of celestial energy scythed along the rows of daemon and mortal, turning bodies to ash, hurling the inhuman back into the void of their creation. Skink priests borne aloft by feathered cloaks became fulcrums for the magic of the Starmaster, coruscating pulses of energy and coronas of protective power turning the crystal lands into a kaleidoscope of ever-shifting energy.

Daemonic infernos engulfed regiments of saurus guards and storms of mutating power swept aside skink skirmishers, turning them to quivering blobs of flesh. Subjected to the battery of Tzeentchian curses, touched by Chaos-born fires, skin became glass, muscle become stone, metal became writhing flesh. Tree-like growths sprouted from the solid ground to impale and tear with jagged crystal branches.

Into the maelstrom pushed Rikjard, his knights charging again and again, bludgeoning a path through the seraphon, their numbers rapidly dwindling. The Lord of Many Numbers did not care for their fates — their purpose was to die for him and nothing more. The equation shortened as he drew closer to his goal. The possibilities and endless permutations dwindled as destiny and reality converged to the single point he sought.

Buoyed up by the death and destruction, the power surged and frothed around Rikjard like surf on a rocky shore. The slann had been both the lock and the key, as he had known it would be. It was the anchor that tied the Thousand Portals to their prison between realms and Tzeentch’s will was the blade that would cut them adrift again.

Triumphant, head buzzing with the near-complete formula, Rikjard ascended the flat slope of the hill, seeing again in the corner of his vision the edifice he had first spied on entering the Thousand Portals. His feet left the ground. Rikjard seemed to step on air, but from another viewpoint he ascended on steps of light, spiralling up to the heights of the insubstantial tower. He felt close enough to reach out and touch the slann’s gate.

Instead he raised his silver wand, making the last adjustments to the disposition of his servants.

With these final movements, and accompanied by the death throes of stegadons and the cries of wounded warriors, the Thousand Portals aligned.

At first there was light, white and blinding, It separated, splitting again and again, dividing into every shade of the spectrum both visible and beyond. Like glass shattering, the light fell away, leaving an abyssal blackness, the darkness of the utter void.

Rikjard felt the Cosmic Gate open, sensed it with every part of his being — the unfolding of dimensions, the ripple of energies spreading away and then returning, converging on a central point inside his skull.

He saw the star at the far end of the slann’s gateway and the last piece of the equation resolved into his thoughts, its secret ripped from the heart of the alien sun.

‘I know it!’ Rikjard cried, his voice echoing through time. ‘The power is mine!’

The star grew brighter, hotter.

Closer.

Rikjard had the sensation of movement. Falling. More than that, he was being dragged, pulled toward the slann’s star-home. From within, he would shatter the barriers between realms and take his place at the right hand of Tzeentch.

Formless took on form and the solution to the Eternal Equation made itself known to him.

0 = ∞

He considered this for a moment.

∞ = 0

There had to be some mistake. There could not be infinite nothing. What could that mean?

The star pulled him in, and the answer came to him as its fronds lapped at his dissipating body and soul, scattering the particles of his form and thoughts.

Infinite nothing. More than death. Less than life. Oblivion.

He had been wrong.

Rikjard of the Many Numbers felt a sense of utter failure, but only for a moment, and then he was no more.

The slann Xalanxymanzik blinked once and sent a telepathic signal to its skink-manifestations that the battle was to cease. The Thousand Portals fell silent as the seraphon disappeared, their memory-forms collapsing back into celestial potential as Xalanxymanzik returned his thoughts to the domain of his origin, leaving behind the trappings of mortal, constructed thought.

Abandoning the Chaos daemons and men to their self-defeating machinations and conflicts, the Starmaster folded itself back through the dimension bridge to the celestial void. The battle against the one called Rikjard had taken much effort, and the solution to unlocking the Cosmic Gate had almost been revealed.

But not this time.

So to age-long slumber Xalanxymanzik returned, its drifting thoughts moving towards ever-more esoteric domains as physical concerns faded. A dream-shard split from its near-dormant musing and fell like an insubstantial feather, borne far upon cosmic winds until it descended into one of the Mortal Realms and touched upon the mind of a human. There it nestled, awakening thoughts never before conceived.

Perhaps this time the mystic formula would unravel itself and the Cosmic Gate would open, revealing the innermost power of Tzeentch, and laying the heart of the Great Architect exposed to attack. Nurtured by its human host, the Eternal Equation started to grow again, fuelled by a hurried, desperate, mortal ambition that the slann could never possess. The essential component, the missing variable.

The Chaos factor.

Guy Haley The Cristal of Fate

Duke Phostrin, lord of the Sky Shoals, spoke. ‘Are you sure this will work, wizard?’

‘Yes, yes! Of course.’ The sorcerer Chalix clasped his long hands together in front of his chest and hunched in a manner that might have been a bow, had he ever shown any sort of deference to Duke Phostrin before. Phostrin contemplated the scrawny sorcerer for several hostile seconds. Chalix responded with a sharp-toothed, servile grin.

‘Do you have it, or do you not?’ the sorcerer asked.

Phostrin beckoned. His Chosen, five warriors almost as lordly as he, stepped into the chamber.

‘Vulcris, Barthon, Hurios, Dweft and Magazzar,’ said Chalix, naming them. All in the tower chamber were blessed by their god, but the gifts that Tzeentch had bestowed on the warriors were different to those given to the seers. Chalix was small, emaciated, his bones sharp through his blue skin. The Chosen of Phostrin were massive, swollen far beyond their natural size by magic, clad in gleaming armour of metallic purples and greens, featureless helms hiding their faces.

Vulcris and Dweft came forward, bearing a wriggling bag, which they dumped on the floor in front of the sorcerer. A pained whimpering came from inside.

‘Don’t hurt it!’ said the sorcerer. ‘How is it? Is it beautiful? Is it a fine offering for our lord?’

‘We chased the damn thing all over the Russet Isle,’ said Phostrin. ‘We nearly had it when the tribe there dared defy us. Too many of them grow rebellious as the news of Sigmar’s invasion reaches them, and these were no different. Once they were dealt with, Vulcris here nearly fell to his death when the creature tried to escape up the Marrond Cliffs. It cost us a lot of effort, so it had better be right.’

‘Well then, well then, let me see!’ said Chalix impatiently. Vulcris hauled the sack upright and tore the cloth open. He and Dweft tugged the sack down, revealing the head of the misshapen thing inside, and stepped back.

The sex was impossible to tell. Its head was a distorted ellipse, thicker and heavier at one end than the other so that the creature held it to the left. At the thinner right side, the lips of three small mouths smacked and squirmed over misshapen teeth. Seven eyes, two of them milky with blindness, were situated at random around its lopsided face. Only the nose was in the place nature intended, and it was twisted severely.

‘Exquisite!’ said Chalix. ‘Beautiful, beautiful!’ To admire his prize in full, he yanked the sack down and away. The mutant wore a tunic of rough cloth. It had three arms, very thin, tipped with three-fingered hands. Wiry hair covered the scalp, shoulders, and legs. The legs were well formed and muscular, but the feet were over-large for the body. The mutant flinched as Chalix wrapped his long fingers around its warty chin and tilted its malformed head upwards.

Behind the wizard was a tall mirror framed in glittering silver, a thousand representations of Tzeentch’s holy servants moulded into the metal. It caught the light shining through the chamber’s colonnade, so pure and sharp at the summit of the tower, and cast it up into the domed ceiling. Ripples of light moved around the frescoes there, as mobile as the reflections cast off Anvrok’s silver rivers. Phostrin avoided looking at the ceiling, wary of what the patterns might say to him. Instead, he took in his own reflection, large behind the simpering wizard. The patterns with which Tzeentch had marked his skin were bright upon his face.

Chalix stepped aside so that the mutant might see itself.

Fearfully, it blinked and made a sorry moaning. Thick yellow tears trickled from one of the blind eyes. Chalix grinned maliciously at its woe.

‘Oh, oh, do not cry! You are much blessed by our lord Tzeentch,’ said Chalix. ‘You are perfect! Such random change wrought upon you, you will be a very fine offering to the Changer of the Ways.’

The mutant mewled at him and tried to pull away. Chalix would not let go.

‘We have all we need, Lord Phostrin. We may begin!’ Chalix said. The mutant cowered as Chalix released its face. The sorcerer reached into his long sleeves, and drew his hand out as a closed fist. ‘See, see!’ he said to the mutant. ‘See! I will not cause you pain. Look!’ The mutant frowned, twisted nose sniffing.

Chalix opened his hand, revealing a handful of glittering powder. ‘Pretty, isn’t it?’ Chalix nodded encouragingly, and the mutant bent closer.

Chalix blew hard, sending a cloud into the mutant’s face. It spluttered, its eyes rolling back in their many sockets, and it fell to the marble floor.

‘Yes, very good!’ chuckled Chalix. He shuffled to a chest in the corner of the room and took out a small box full of coloured chalks. ‘You have done well, Duke Phostrin. I shall pay you handsomely, yes, just as we agreed. Much armour and weaponry will be yours.’

‘Just see it is so. How long is this going to take, Chalix?’

‘Patience, patience!’ said Chalix. He knelt on the marble by the mutant and opened his chalk box. ‘Before sundown, yes. Then we will be ready.’

Phostrin glanced at Vulcris. The leather of the warrior’s gloves creaked as he shifted his grip on his weapon.

‘Enjoy, sit! Eat, drink,’ said Chalix. An alcove lit up, and inside was a table stacked with fruits and flasks of wine. ‘You eat, while I work.’

Phostrin jerked his head to the side. His warriors left the food alone. They went to the door and took up guard. Two set themselves to watch on the nine thousand stairs of the tower. The others stayed within, fixing their featureless masks on Chalix. The sorcerer hummed to himself, arrogance rendering him immune to their hatred. Phostrin went to the windows, with their many telescopes, to survey the Hanging Valleys of Anvrok.

Chalix’s tower reached thousands of feet from a small island at the edge of the Sky Shoals — Phostrin’s duchy. Away from the great lands of Anvrok, Denvrok and Kantruk, the Hanging Valleys broke into smaller pieces shot through with rich veins of metal that formed a vast archipelago in an ocean of limitless sky. The islands were fuzzed with vegetation all over, for the circular track of the sun brought it to shine on both the top and underside of the islands. A mighty continent could be seen thousands of leagues away as a grey, featureless bar, but it was to the three chief lands of the Hanging Valleys that Phostrin’s attention was drawn. He put his eye to one of the wizard’s instruments and squinted through a crystal lens.

Storm clouds boiled with fury over the three larger countries. Anvrok was ramparted by the towering peaks of the Vaulten Mountains where, in ages past, watchtowers had been established. They had been long ruined, but now they were rising anew. Tiny flakes of colour blinked upon them, bright pennants streaming in the wind. The distance was too great to make out their emblems, but their presence spoke their message clearly enough — these lands belong to Sigmar.

Phostrin panned the telescope along the ridge until it lighted upon Argentine, the celestial drake. The fires that warmed the metal sea of the Great Crucible were at war with themselves, the old scintillating colours lately twisted through with pure white flame. The beast was unquiet, its gargantuan body coiling and uncoiling in silent agonies as Chaos and Order fought for his soul. It was but a matter of time, thought Phostrin. The crystal cockatrice, Vytrix, would doubtless be next. All the lands about the great serpent had been taken or were contested. Over Argentine’s gaping jaws, the rim of the Great Crucible also sported the banners of the God-King.

‘Anvrok fallen, the Crucible taken. Denvrok under assault,’ said Phostrin. ‘Maerac and King Thrond dead, Kairos banished, Ephryx destroyed… Our turn will come soon enough.’

‘If we are successful, that will never happen,’ said Chalix, intent on the circle. ‘Have faith, Duke Phostrin. The Great Changer’s plans are many layered. Now hush! I work quicker without interruption.’

Phostrin returned his attention to the conquered lands, scanning them for any glimpse of Chaos’ resurgence. He could find none, though he stared until his eyes were weary.

The sun sailed to light the underside of the Hanging Valleys. Darkness came to the tops of the larger lands, but the isles were too small to block the sun and so true night never ventured to the Sky Shoals. The strange lucidity of the lowered sun shone up around the islands, casting tall cones of darkness skywards. Chalix’s chamber took on the hue of blue shadow. Only the mirror shone bright, as if still caught in full sunlight.

‘There!’ said Chalix. He stood, dusting off his hands, and surveyed his handiwork; a series of ornate circles interlocking across the floor.

‘So your drawing is done. How much longer until we can enter the Oracle’s sanctuary?’ grumbled Phostrin.

‘Not long. The spell itself is relatively simple,’ Chalix said. ‘It is the preparation that takes the time.’

‘And this will open the way to the realm of Kairos?’

‘Oh yes,’ said Chalix. He returned his chalk box to the chest and took out a long knife. He unsheathed it, holding its length up to his critical eye. It was slightly curved, half an inch wide, thin as a cruel whisper and many times sharper. Satisfied, he went to the mutant and rolled it onto its back with his foot.

‘The Great Oracle was careless. It is natural one so high in Tzeentch’s esteem would not consider defeat, but he should have, oh yes. Now he is gone, his lair is open to all who have the appropriate offering, the right equipment and the correct expertise. You provided the two material ingredients, whereas in my humble personage resides the most important component of all — knowledge!’

Chalix knelt and drove the knife into the chest of the mutant. The creature was so stupefied it managed only a single gasp to protest its death. Blood pooled on the floor as Chalix pulled a dark heart from inside, cutting away connective tissue until it was free. He bent over this misshapen organ to whisper something Phostrin could not make out but that hurt his ears to hear. Chalix finished his crooning, drew back his arm and hurled the heart with all his might at the mirror.

‘A twisted heart for a twisted heart, great Tzeentch!’ he shouted.

The heart vanished with a bang. Glass exploded out into the room. Phostrin raised his hand to protect his face, but the glass never struck. It stopped in midair then flew backwards, the moment of explosion reversed. The glass did not fit itself back into the frame, but formed into a faceted arch, glittering with tainted rainbows.

The mirror became a door. A corridor of glowing crystal lay beyond, going up a series of uneven stairs. Cool, dry air blew outwards. A horn winded somewhere far away.

Chalix nodded happily at his efforts. ‘The gate is open, yes!’

Phostrin put on his helmet and drew his sword. Chalix passed through the portal fearlessly, lifting his robes as he stepped over the pool of blood. The Chosen followed, Phostrin coming last.

A cracking and tinkling filled the tunnel.

‘It is as if we are inside the remains of the mirror,’ muttered Vulcris. ‘And the shards of glass shift under us.’

‘You are closer to the truth than you realise,’ responded Chalix. ‘This is the outer edge of Lord Tzeentch’s Crystal Labyrinth, part of, but separate from it. Nothing is as it seems here, all is illusory, a perverted reflection of a shadow of a thought. We must not tarry in finding Lord Kairos’ lair, we will be noticed before long. The Realm of Chaos is no place for mortals.’

Chalix set off up the stairs, Phostrin and his chosen men following. The way forwards and the way back looked identical, the direction of travel impermanent and tricky to judge. Phostrin could not tell if up was up and down was down, or whether the party had been turned about and were returning again to Chalix’s lair. In the walls, a million images rippled. More than once, Phostrin felt eyes on him, and turned quickly to find his own reflections moving independently of his actions. Dark shapes moved behind the treacherous images, creeping under the glassy surface to suddenly shoot past, leaving draughts of perfumed air in their wake. The Chosen became wary, mighty though they were. Unlike them, the mage sallied forwards indefatigably, unworried.

Time became elastic. Phostrin could not gauge how long they climbed before the way divided into dozens of tunnels that shifted position when not watched.

‘Which path is it, wizard?’ said Phostrin.

‘Wait,’ said Chalix. ‘All is in hand.’ He reached into his robes, and pulled a chain out. On the end was a small blue feather. He cupped his hand protectively around it. ‘A single plume from a Lord of Change. It will show the way.’

‘It will trick us,’ said Magazzar.

Chalix clucked and shook his head. ‘It is enchanted. Much blood was shed to gain it, and very terrible bargains I struck to learn the secret of how to perform this magic. But know the secret I do.’ He watched as the feather swung to stillness. It turned so that the quill indicated an otherwise unremarkable tunnel.

‘This way!’ he said, and forged on without hesitation.

The stair levelled, opening into a cavern whose dazzling walls stretched up and down until they were lost in a haze of glaring light. A slender bridge of glittering crystal leapt up from the tunnel’s end, crossing to the far side where another way opened, a blue blemish on the glow.

‘Ah yes, all is as described!’ said Chalix eagerly. ‘Come!’ he waved them onwards as he mounted the bridge. ‘Be wary here, it is slippery.’

Magazzar went at the rear. As he stepped upon the bridge, a single, ringing note chimed from the crystal of the cave. The light turned from bright white to a deep red. From the depths built a shrieking scream.

‘Hurry now!’ said Chalix. He picked up his skirts and increased his speed to a trot. Duke Phostrin and his Chosen followed, their heavy tread shaking the fragile bridge. There was barely space for Phostrin to place his feet side by side. The screaming grew louder. Magazzar looked over the edge, then yelled out a warning to his comrades at what he saw. Phostrin turned to see Magazzar’s head torn off by a blur of colour. Blood sprayed from his ragged neck and he toppled from the bridge. More of the shapes followed. They screamed, raking at the travellers with whipping tails. Vulcris lashed out with his axe, chopping into one of the creatures. Damaged, the creature tumbled away, unbalancing the Chosen warrior. He wavered at the brink but Phostrin grabbed his cloak and hauled him back, his own feet slipping on the glassy material.

‘Daemon beasts, Kairos’ guard dogs,’ said Phostrin. The creatures sped past the bridge in a tight shoal, their dire screams echoing endlessly through the cavern.

‘They are coming again!’ said Hurios.

‘Stand ready!’ commanded Phostrin. The chosen planted their feet firmly apart on the length of the bridge, weapons up. This time they were prepared. The screamer shoal dived at them, broad bodies undulating eagerly. The Chosen hacked out, slaying several, dodging the lashing tails of those that sped on overhead. Then the creatures were past, streaking for the far side of the cave.

‘Run!’ shouted Phostrin. They ran as fast as they dared. The wizard was nearing the end of the bridge.

Twice more they stopped to cleave screamers from the sky. As the beasts passed them by again, they ran on. In this manner they reached the far tunnel. Phostrin passed through first, then Vulcris, Dweft, Hurios and finally Barthon. As Barthon came through the entry, the screams grew loud for the final time. Barbed tails punched through his chest, jerking him backwards.

‘Aid me!’ he shouted. Dweft dived to grab his hand but Barthon was yanked from his feet and hauled skywards before their fingers could connect. The creatures’ flight slowed, and they formed a mass around the doomed warrior. They cruised around and around, darting in to snatch morsels of their struggling prey.

‘Barthon cannot be saved,’ said Dweft.

‘Why does the mage not use his magic?’ asked Hurios.

‘It will bring more doom on us,’ said Phostrin. ‘Swords and martial might are all that will serve us here.’

Barthon had ceased moving. Blood drizzled from the writhing mass of screamers as they fed.

Vulcris shrugged. ‘More pillage for the rest of us, then.’

They travelled for days, or so it seemed, and yet they needed no food or water, or other comforts of the body. Chalix led them through a forest of shivering stone, into a place whose sky was the surface of a placid lake where strange, glowing things swam. They climbed staircases that did not end but joined top to bottom. They spent days in a labyrinth where their own voices mocked them from afar. From there, they passed into a freezing wasteland of salt spires, where they were assailed by capering pink daemons, each one slain splitting into two lesser, miserable blue creatures. These things were numerous but cowardly and fled when Phostrin slew their champion.

Time and mind were warped. Phostrin lost track of the order of events. Days lasted seconds, seconds took years. When it was they came to the end, Phostrin could not tell. A day or a century might have passed. All he knew was that he blinked, and they were done, standing at the opening to a mean cave set into a soaring yellow cliff. Outside, a plain of flawless green glass stretched away in every direction, giving out a lurid light.

‘We are here, the lair of Kairos,’ said Chalix. The sorcerer seemed older. He had a haunted look.

‘I see nothing,’ said Vulcris. He stepped forwards. Chalix put out an arm to stop him but the Chosen pushed it aside. ‘I am tired of waiting, destiny is here.’

‘Wait! There are final wards that must be dealt with!’ called Chalix.

‘I am tired of waiting,’ said Vulcris. ‘Destiny is here.’

‘Hold him back!’ ordered Phostrin.

Hurios and Dweft moved to stay their comrade, but their efforts made no effect, and they were pushed before him across the slick glass.

‘I am tired of waiting,’ repeated Vulcris, his voice hollow and leaden. He pushed onwards, as if Hurios and Dweft were not there. ‘Destiny is here.’

Phostrin ran from the cave entrance to join his men, leaning between them to push against the chest of Vulcris.

‘He is bewitched!’ shouted Hurios.

‘I am tired of waiting,’ repeated Vulcris.

‘Too late! Back, back off the glass!’ called Chalix. ‘Something comes!’

‘Destiny is here,’ said Vulcris.

Phostrin looked over his shoulder. A dark shadow was emerging from the numbing light of the glass plain. A warrior, coming towards the cliff and the cave mouth.

‘Heed the wizard. Leave him,’ Phostrin said. ‘Get off the plain.’

Hurios fell as he let go of Vulcris. Dweft stumbled away. Phostrin threw himself out of Vulcris’ path. Vulcris marched forward steadily, no faster and no slower than when the others had made their futile attempt to arrest him.

Phostrin made it back to the edge of the glass plain and took refuge in the cave. They watched the warrior approach Vulcris. Phostrin squinted against the light. The warrior was familiar.

‘It is Vulcris also!’ he exclaimed. ‘He has been doubled!’

The warrior was garbed exactly as Vulcris, identical in every respect saving only that what was left on Vulcris was right on his doppelganger, and vice versa.

‘A mirror image,’ said Hurios.

The warriors stopped a sword’s length apart. They raised their axes, and attacked.

Eight times they swung identical blows at each other, eight times the hafts of their twinned axes knocked together. On the ninth, the axe heads sailed past each other, burying themselves in the chests of Vulcris and his double. They threw back their heads and screamed, exploding into roaring pillars of light that shot away on far horizons before becoming one with the unvarying glow.

‘Look! Blood is spilled, the final key,’ said Chalix.

Reality blinked. The plain was gone. A chamber, as many-planed and angular as the interior of a diamond, was there in its stead. Every facet held a staring, avian eye. A golden statue of Lord Kairos occupied the middle of the chamber. Floating above the spread wings was a thumb-sized crystal, black as midnight. Chalix hurried towards it greedily. The eyes in the walls narrowed in scrutiny.

‘The heart of Kairos Fateweaver, the Crystal of Fate! See, it has nearly reformed. We are here in the nick of time,’ he whispered.

‘Where is the treasure, wizard?’ demanded Hurios. ‘We were promised enchanted weapons, devices of great power.’

Chalix snatched the crystal from the air. ‘Wait! With this, anything is possible.’

Hurios and Dweft angrily paced the shining space. Their search was short. Apart from the crystal and the statue, the chamber was empty.

‘How will you pay?’ demanded Dweft. ‘There is nothing else here!’

‘Speak, wizard,’ said Phostrin. He raised his sword. The three warriors surrounded the sorcerer. ‘What of our bargain?’

Dweft and Hurios tensed, ready to fight. Chalix smiled wickedly.

‘Here is the payment you so desire!’ he shouted. He held up the crystal. Lines of jagged darkness stabbed out, transfixing Dweft and Hurios. They were transformed instantly into crystal statues rooted to the chamber floor.

‘Such fools,’ Chalix scoffed. ‘Do you think I would share any prize with the likes of—’

Chalix’s eyes widened. His mouth dropped open. With a tearing noise, Phostrin’s sword emerged through his stomach, the point dripping coppery blood. Phostrin reached round and took the crystal from Chalix’s weakening fingers.

‘Chalix, I thank you for bringing me this.’

Phostrin wrenched the sword free. Chalix fell to the ground with a cry. As the sorcerer’s life fled, Phostrin held up the crystal, captivated by the lights glinting from its surface.

‘You… You were not transmutated?’ gasped Chalix.

Phostrin threw his helm to the floor with a clatter and looked down at the dying mage. ‘Thanks to my great-grandfather.’ He tapped a ring upon his gauntlet, a simple silver band. ‘He passed this down, and a certain scroll bearing grave secrets. You thought to trick me, Chalix, trusting to my ignorance to ensnare me. You sorcerers are all the same, dismissive of your betters. I know what this can do.’ He held up the crystal and smiled. ‘The soul of a daemon, and now it is mine.’ He closed his hand around it.

‘Give it to me… Phostrin… Before it is too late!’ gasped out Chalix. Blood slipped from his mouth. He reached out his shaking hand.

‘I think not. You and your ilk have had your own way in the Anvrok Valleys for too long. It is time for a new order, comprised of men of substance.’

‘You do not know what you are doing!’

‘Oh, but I do,’ said Phostrin. ‘I have a plan. The daemons of our lord are the only ones who hold any fear for you, are they not Chalix? I have seen you creep and fawn over them. I have seen you plead for their favour. I intend to become one myself. I will consume this heart and be made anew. Then I shall return to Anvrok and deal with your filthy kind. I will speak directly with Tzeentch himself, without intermediary. I will reign supreme over the lands in the name of the Great Changer, and the lords of the isles and the valleys will return to their rightful position as rulers, not slaves to a wizard’s whims.’

He held the crystal high. The eyes in the cave’s facets peered at him intently. ‘When that is done, I shall gather all their armies and drive Sigmar’s hosts back from our lands, for the greater glory of Tzeentch.’

Chalix coughed up a welter of dark blood. Phostrin saw that he was laughing.

‘You are a fool. You know nothing of the true nature of Chaos. A daemon cannot be a lord of men. You know nothing of what—’

Phostrin’s sword swept down, splitting the sorcerer’s forehead. Chalix fell back and said no more.

‘I am a fool but you are dead. Who is the winner?’ Phostrin held up the crystal between finger and thumb. Power radiated from it, distorting the air as rising heat shimmers. ‘If only I had mead to wash it down with, it would go more easily,’ he said.

He placed it into his mouth. His tongue sizzled, but he felt no pain. With great difficulty, he swallowed it down, feeling its sharp edges scrape his gullet all the way to his stomach.

For a few seconds, he stood unaffected. Then, sudden agony gripped him. He bent double and howled. A fierce tingling took hold of his body, sharp and painful as a million needles driving in and out of his skin. He screwed his eyes shut, and the world became a timeless sheet of white pain.

An aeon passed, or so it seemed, and then was gone.

Phostrin found himself balled into a low crouch. Carefully, he unfolded his new self and raised huge arms before wondering eyes. His flesh had become a dark, mottled purple. Long talons tipped his fingers. A strange sensation troubled his shoulders, and he shook. A pair of great bat’s wings snapped open. In the crystal of the cave, his new face was reflected, long and spurred, crowned by a trio of scimitar horns. A smile exposed broad teeth. He explored his new face with his hands. Power cracked at the contact of flesh, and he laughed. On muscular legs he stood tall and breathed deep. Using the crystal wall as a mirror, he surveyed the new cage of his spirit from top to bottom.

He was well pleased by what he saw.

‘Power, power!’ he roared. ‘Let us see the petty sorcerers of Anvrok defy their new emperor! I will slay any who refuse my rule.’

He turned about, seeking the way out so that he could return and begin his reign. Thinking he had mistaken the placement of the door, he turned again. With a dawning horror, he realised it had gone. Every facet of cave was the same as before, each framed its peering eye, but where the entrance had been was a smooth panel of crystal. He went to it and beat on it. It did not yield. Screaming, he pounded harder with his fists, raging until something caught his eye.

He pressed his face close to the surface. Beyond the reflections and the staring eyes, he could see through the glass-like material.

On the floor of the space outside was Chalix’s body, as huge as a gargant. Phostrin’s head darted to the side. There were the contorted glass statues of Hurios and Dweft, also seemingly enlarged. Beyond them was the darkness of the door, made cavernous and distant. His prison was an exact replica of Kairos’ lair in miniature.

With ultimate realisation, he looked down. Through the distorting effects of the crystal floor, he could make out the golden statue.

He was trapped in Kairos’ heart.

A rustle of robes and a dry, doubled chuckle came from outside. The eyes in the crystal’s walls blinked, and then there were only four. These too vanished, replaced by an enormous claw that gripped the crystal and lifted it high. Phostrin staggered as the crystal tipped and he was brought to the scrutiny of two wrinkled faces.

Kairos Fateweaver looked within.

‘He does not see what I see,’ said one head. ‘What his fate shall be.’ It clacked a massive beak in mirth.

‘Shall I tell it? He did not know his fate when he set out, he does not know it now,’ said the other. Both heads regarded the trapped Phostrin with amusement. ‘Or shall we leave it for a surprise?’

‘Kairos!’ said Phostrin. His new hands spread on the crystal, not mighty, but tiny, the hands of a homunculus. ‘Release me!’

Kairos tutted and shook the crystal. ‘Lord Kairos I am! I am your master. You will address me correctly.’

Phostrin was flung about the chamber and crashed into the wall painfully. Kairos finished his shaking.

‘You are dead, my lord,’ Phostrin said.

‘It did not listen to its sorcerer. I cannot die, little one.’

‘I never do,’ said the other head. ‘I have seen.’

‘I am eternal, I have ever been, and ever will be.’

‘But you have to reform,’ said Phostrin. ‘Chalix said, he—’

Both heads croaked with laughter. ‘How can a constant be unmade? I have no beginning.’

‘And I have no end,’ concluded the second head. ‘How can a circle be made a line?’

‘I am a daemon, I am your equal! I consumed your heart. You have no right to imprison me,’ said Phostrin.

The heads laughed uproariously.

‘You misunderstand,’ said the first head. The larger cave began to dissolve into streamers of prismatic light, taking the dead Chalix, Hurios and Dweft with it.

‘As there are orders of precedence and of degree for men, so there are orders of precedence and degree for daemons.’

‘You saw our kind in your world, and misunderstood. They were lone ambassadors. This is our domain,’ explained the other head.

The last vestiges of the cave vanished. Kairos beat his mighty wings and soared over a landscape of hard angles and dazzling light.

‘Behold!’ he cawed. ‘The Crystal Labyrinth of Tzeentch!’

A pane cleared in Phostrin’s prison. An endless landscape of twisting crystal caves greeted his eyes, teeming with the daemonic servants of Tzeentch. They spread away, filling the labyrinth, spilling out of the Realm of Chaos, out of the Mortal Realms and beyond into eternities uncountable. They plotted, setting themselves against mortal worlds, the servants of other gods, and each other. He recoiled from what he saw, but he could not unknow it. He was of their number and their concerns were now his. Their knotted plans whispered in his mind. Here was hell for him, an eternity of scheming, worse by far than the hegemony of mortal sorcerers.

‘No! No! Release me!’ begged Phostrin. ‘I have no wish to be part of this, I will rule over the Hanging Valleys of Anvrok, and take them back for Lord Tzeentch! This is my service! I swear it will be done!’

‘Tsk tsk,’ said Kairos. ‘I do not foresee that for you. Such a petty patch of reality you offer the Great Changer. You insult him.’

‘Our dreams oft lead us to ruin,’ said the other head to Phostrin. ‘It is not entirely your doing. You may thank your great-grandfather. He was most diligent in holding the gifts we gave him, passing them from son to son. Now this scheme is done, a fresh one begins. I have need of a new servant. You will suffice. Your place is here, forevermore. You are reborn a daemon, but you achieved your position by trickery,’ said one head.

‘Lord Tzeentch approves, but there are rules,’ said the other.

‘Rules all in the Labyrinth must obey!’

‘For nine eternities and one day must you serve me,’ said Kairos. ‘Only then will you have earned the power you stole. Now, first to the Whispering Pandemonium. There shall we begin your education. Only when you have experienced pain and madness beyond the ken of mortals shall you be ready to proceed to the next torment.’

‘Little by little, we will tear your soul away until you are wholly Tzeentch’s,’ said the second head.

Laughing, Kairos brandished his staff and swooped away over the infinite intrigues of Tzeentch’s realm, carrying the screaming Phostrin away.

Graeme Lyon The Eighth Victory

‘For the glory of the Blood God, death comes to you!’ Krev Deathstalker’s voice rose above the clamour of battle as he brought his great axe down on the gleaming silver armour of the Stormcast Eternal at his feet. The warrior rolled away and the axe bit into blood-soaked earth. Krev roared and pulled it out, batting away the Stormcast’s strike.

He took a step back and looked at the warrior. His armour was ruined, the shining silver plates dented and scuffed, mud and gore obscuring the symbols of the hated God-King that adorned its surfaces.

The Stormcast raised his sword and hammer and readied himself for Krev’s attack. The impassive gilded mask he wore gave no emotion away, but Krev would have sworn the warrior was smiling.

‘Death seems to be keeping his distance,’ the Stormcast said, his voice echoing strangely from behind the mask. ‘Maybe he waits for you.’

Krev swung his axe, and the Stormcast deflected it with his sword and brought his hammer round in a smooth arc that missed Krev by a hair’s breadth. The silver-armoured warrior pressed on, and Krev was forced back, step by step, desperately parrying the Stormcast’s blows. He kicked out, his boot catching the Stormcast’s shin. The warrior fell, giving Krev a moment’s reprieve. He circled the Stormcast and hefted his axe.

The silver warrior got back to his feet and spun around. His cloak flared and bolts of magic in the form of shimmering hammers flung themselves at Krev. He battered one away with his axe, but the others struck home, and he grunted in pain. The Stormcast pressed forwards again, and a punishing blow knocked the axe from Krev’s hands. Then he felt pain as the sword sliced into the meat of his leg and forced him to one knee. The Stormcast dropped his hammer, kicked Krev’s axe away and took his sword in both hands.

‘Thus will end all tyrants,’ he intoned, his voice sepulchral. ‘Sigmar decrees—’

He was cut off as a huge beast barrelled into him, knocking the sword from his grip and him to the ground. Krev smiled and pulled himself to his feet.

‘Well done, my pet,’ he said. The flesh hound howled, then bounded off in the direction of more enemies. Krev stooped and picked up the Stormcast’s fallen sword.

‘Sigmar decrees, does he?’ he hissed down at the mud-caked armoured warrior. ‘When you see him, tell him Krev Deathstalker spits on his decrees.’

Krev swung the sword and parted the Stormcast’s head from his shoulders. The head rolled for a moment, then both it and the warrior’s body dissolved into shimmering particles of light. Krev threw down the sword as it too discorporated. There was a flash and a sound like thunder, and the Stormcast vanished.

Krev looked around for more foes, but it seemed that the battle was all but won. He saw Garsa battling a knot of winged Stormcasts. The skullgrinder’s anvil swung in wide arcs on the end of its chain, catching the Prosecutors and pulling them from the air. Elsewhere, twin deathbringers fought back-to-back, axes whirling and shields parrying the huge lightning-wreathed hammers of a handful of Retributors.

Most impressive of all was Koroth, the tribe’s head deathbringer. The horned champion led a group of blood warriors against a line of Stormcast Liberators. Wherever his great ruinous axe fell, a Stormcast died.

‘Truly, Khorne favours him,’ said a voice behind Krev. He turned, axe raised, and saw the tall, rangy form of Drane, his remaining slaughterpriest. The old man’s axe was bloodied, and gore streaked his face and chest.

‘We are all favoured, Drane. We have now won seven mighty victories in the Blood God’s name against these celestial invaders. We are all exalted in His sight.’

‘We are, my lord,’ agreed the slaughterpriest. ‘And none more so than you. But even so… He is powerful indeed.’

‘And he serves me, priest. Does that not make me more powerful still?’

Drane said nothing for a time, eyeing Krev carefully. Finally he nodded. ‘As you say, my lord.’

The battle was over and the victory celebrations were in full swing. There had been feasting around the funeral pyre, the survivors feeding on choice meat from the fallen. Warriors now boasted of deeds performed in combat, compared fresh scars and competed in contests of martial skill.

But Drane was troubled. He sat apart from the revelry, considering the number of the dead compared to those left alive. He watched Krev, and he wondered what was to come.

Eventually, the warlord stood up to address the throng. All went quiet, and every eye was on Krev. He walked around the fire, gazing into its depths, and then looked around at the gathered warriors.

‘Seven victories have we won against Sigmar’s servants.’

There was cheering from drunken bloodreavers. Krev ignored it and raised his voice. ‘Seven mighty armies have they sent against us, and seven times they have been sent back to their heavenly home to answer for their failure before their God-King.’

He paused and looked around, catching Drane’s eye. The slaughterpriest saw something in Krev’s gaze, and looked away.

‘We stand on the edge of destiny, my Deathstalkers. Seven great victories… aye, that is the stuff of legends. But eight…’

He paused again.

‘Eight is a holy number, as we all know. We walk the eightfold path. Eight champions follow me and lead you into battle. Eight warbands make up our tribe. So what power will be ours when we have an eighth victory against this foe? How will Khorne reward us for honouring Him so?’

There were more cheers and chanting of the Blood God’s name.

‘I will tell you how, my friends, for the Blood God has spoken to me. He demands one more victory, one more great slaughter in His name. And when we secure it, I shall ascend to immortality. I will become a daemon prince and bestride the Mortal Realms like a colossus!’

As the cheering reached a fever pitch, Drane’s eyes sought out the other members of the Gorechosen, Krev’s champions.

The four deathbringers sat together. Each was newly ordained as a member of the Gorechosen, replacing heroes killed in the seven battles the tribe had fought over the past months. They were young and believed wholeheartedly in Krev’s vision for their future. Even now, they gazed at the warlord with rapt attention.

Garsa the skullgrinder sat amidst a knot of blood warriors. His expression was unreadable, but his eyes were fixed on Krev. Near him was Cheren, resting his broad back against the great icon of Khorne he carried into battle. The bloodsecrator looked as though he were asleep, though Drane was sure he was taking in every word.

Finally, he looked over at Koroth. Like Drane, he sat alone, at the very edge of the circle of flickering firelight. He was running a whetstone over the blade of his ruinous axe and glaring at the warlord with undisguised contempt.

‘That bodes ill,’ whispered the slaughterpriest to himself. ‘That bodes ill indeed…’

‘This cannot continue.’

Garsa’s voice cut above the tumult. The rest of the Gorechosen fell into silence as they turned to look at him. The celebration was over and the tribe had returned to their tents, save those who lay slumped unconscious, worse the wear for drinks or headbutting contests. Only the Gorechosen remained, drawn together by the need to discuss what would happen next.

‘Krev is our lord, Koroth. What would you have us do?’ said Drane calmly. The tall, lean slaughterpriest stepped forwards into the firelight and looked Garsa up and down. ‘Would you challenge him?’

Koroth was silent. Drane snorted dismissively and turned away.

‘I thought not. None of you would dare to test yourselves against him. You would not have done so months ago, and now, as he nears his apotheosis, you are even less likely to. Cowards, every one of you. You speak and speak, moan and complain, but will not act.’

‘You call us cowards, old man?’ demanded Koroth. ‘You, who can barely lift an axe, so far are you in your dotage?’

Drane laughed and turned to Koroth. ‘Do you care to test me, deathbringer? You fear to challenge our master, so you take out your frustrations on an old man?’

‘Don’t tempt me,’ the deathbringer growled, knuckles whitening as he gripped his axe.

Drane turned away from Koroth and addressed the rest of the Gorechosen.

‘Krev has led us to victory after victory, and he is not wrong about the reward that awaits him.’

‘What of the rest of us?’ asked Cheren. ‘Our numbers are few. Would our lord throw our lives away in pursuit of his own destiny?’

‘If we are to sacrifice ourselves to secure Krev’s ascension, then I will willingly give my life,’ declared Jiang. The young deathbringer’s eyes glowed with the light of a true fanatic, and Drane didn’t doubt that he meant what he said.

‘What of the rest of you?’ he asked. ‘If our lord’s victory requires you to lay down your lives, will you do so?’

There was a long silence.

‘No,’ growled Koroth eventually. ‘I will not. We have won these battles for him, and we will share in his victory, or take it from him for ourselves. I will challenge him. And I will defeat him.’

Krev emerged from his tent in the harsh morning light to find the eight warriors of his Gorechosen awaiting him. They were arrayed in a semicircle, with Koroth at the apex.

‘What is this?’ he asked. ‘What do you want, my champions?’

‘The course you are taking us on is madness,’ said Koroth softly. ‘I will have no further part in it. The battles we have fought have reduced our numbers to almost nothing. We need new blood if we are to shed more in Khorne’s name.’

‘We are on the verge of greatness, deathbringer,’ said Krev. ‘Surely you see that?’

‘I see that you care only for your own fate,’ the deathbringer replied. ‘As a warrior, that is fitting. As a leader… it is not. And so I challenge you, Krev Deathstalker. Face me in single combat for the leadership of the tribe.’

Krev stared into his champion’s face, and smiled. ‘Very well. We fight to the death.’

‘To the death,’ agreed Koroth.

Krev spread his arms and gestured to the gathered Gorechosen. ‘Well? What are you waiting for, deathbringer? You want my head… come and take it.’

Koroth lifted his axe and nodded. ‘Aye.’ He leapt, axe raised over his head, and brought it down in a scything arc that would have split Krev in two had it connected. The warlord sidestepped it calmly.

‘You are mighty, deathbringer. Exalted indeed. But you will not win this battle.’

Koroth snorted and lashed out, swinging the ruinous axe one-handed at Krev’s neck. The warlord ducked beneath the blow and punched the deathbringer in the stomach, knocking him backwards. The champion growled in anger.

‘Draw your axe and face me properly, Krev!’ he roared.

‘I have no need of my axe,’ Krev said calmly. ‘I have the favour of the Blood God.’

‘You are a fool, drunk on your own power and convinced of your immortality. I shall show you the lie of that!’ Koroth swung his axe again, catching Krev with the flat and knocking him flying. He rolled and swiftly rose to his feet. The pair circled one another, and Krev noticed that the rest of the Gorechosen had moved to surround them. He smiled and threw back his head, shouting to the heavens.

‘My lord Khorne, master of war, taker of skulls, spiller of blood, hear my prayer. Aid your devoted servant, prove to all present that I am in your favour. Strike down this upstart, and bring me victory.’

For a moment, there was silence. Koroth stopped pacing and just stared at Krev.

‘Is that your plan, warlord? Call upon Khorne to kill me because you cannot?’ He laughed. ‘You die now.’ He stepped forward, swinging his axe underarm, and caught Krev on the chest, tearing a long cut into his flesh. The warlord staggered back, and Koroth turned to the Gorechosen.

‘You see? This is what we follow. A coward who knows he cannot defeat me and in desperation calls for aid that will never…’

He trailed off as a rumble of thunder sounded, like the laughter of a god, and a shadow passed overhead. He looked up and saw a vast crimson cloud. As he watched, it began to rain. Thick drops of bright red blood fell, staining the earth where they landed. Krev stretched out his arms to welcome the shower.

‘You were saying, Koroth?’

The deathbringer shook his horned head and snarled. ‘Trickery. And how is this supposed to…’ His words became a strangled scream as the first drops of blood hit his flesh, which sizzled and burned. ‘What is… How did you…?’ The shower became a deluge and Koroth screamed as he was consumed, burned to ash by the downpour.

Krev stepped forwards and gazed at each of the seven remaining Gorechosen in turn. He gestured to the pile of ashes that had been his deathbringer.

‘Would anyone else like to challenge me?’

In the days that followed, the tribe prepared for their greatest battle, the one that would raise their lord to daemonhood and exalt them all in the Blood God’s eyes. Word of Krev’s victory over Koroth spread quickly, and it seemed that none now doubted that he was favoured by the Blood God, or that another victory would be theirs. Yet Drane was still troubled.

The deathbringer had been vital to the battles over the past months. Without his might, and with their reduced numbers, they would struggle against another Stormcast host. Krev knew that, so why had he let the deathbringer die? The slaughterpriest had tried to raise the matter with the warlord, but Krev had brushed his concerns aside with more talk of destiny.

Now the scouts had brought word of an army of Stormcasts marching from the shores of the Barren Sea, and there was no more time to ponder the question. Battle would be joined in a matter of hours, and the outcome was uncertain.

He looked along the battle lines. Once, there had been thousands. Now, there were mere hundreds, most of them unarmoured, ill-disciplined bloodreavers. Here and there stood knots of blood warriors, their axes notched and shields dented. Even smaller groups of wrathmongers daubed themselves in blood and offered prayers to Khorne. The remaining members of the Gorechosen were stationed along the line to lend their skill at arms and leadership to the warriors around them.

‘It won’t be enough,’ he said aloud.

‘It will, Drane,’ said Krev behind him.

‘My lord, we are too few. I have tried to ignore this fact and trust to faith, but my faith is in steel and my worship to the Blood God is done in battle. And I look at this army and know that steel will not be enough against Sigmar’s chosen.’

Krev shook his head. ‘You understand so little, slaughterpriest. Khorne’s favour is with me. I will ascend. And nothing else matters.’

Drane opened his mouth to reply, but Krev held up his hand. ‘You and I shall watch the battle from behind our lines,’ he ordered.

Horror engulfed the slaughterpriest. ‘My lord,’ he protested, ‘with so few warriors, our strength will be required. And to not fight—’

‘My word is final, Drane. Trust that I know what I am about.’

The warlord turned and stomped away, leaving Drane to his dark thoughts.

Battle was joined at dawn. The Stormcasts’ army was small, just a few hundred warriors, but each was huge, clad in near-impenetrable armour of a turquoise hue, and the power of the storm played about them and their weapons. At their centre was an immense figure, swathed in a crimson cloak and riding upon the back of a great armoured reptile. The figure gestured with his hammer and the Stormcasts began to march.

A mob of howling bloodreavers was the first to engage. They charged into the Stormcast shield wall, axes swinging. Stormcasts fell, but too few. For every one of the armoured warriors that returned to the heavens in a bolt of crackling lightning, five bloodreavers were gutted and left dying in the dirt.

The twin deathbringers were the first of the Gorechosen to die. They drove too far into the enemy lines, with too small a warband at their back, and were surrounded. They fought bravely and well, taking a score of Stormcast Liberators with them, but eventually they were cut down. Drane delivered the news to Krev. To his surprise and consternation, the warlord smiled.

‘They died well,’ he said. ‘What more could they ask?’

Cheren the bloodsecrator was the next to fall. He had planted his icon in the earth and defended it fiercely, a cadre of blood warriors around him. He called upon the power of the icon, invoking the wrath of Khorne. Around him, reality had split open and the Realm of Chaos had merged with the mortal world. The Stormcasts attacking him were immense warriors with axes the size of a man, which could dismember several warriors with one mighty strike. As the ground became brass and the air filled with sulphurous fumes, their progress had slowed, but it was not enough. They struggled forwards, cutting down blood warriors with every step, and eventually Cheren was overwhelmed. He died with his axe in hand and Khorne’s name on his lips. With his death, the left flank of the Deathstalkers crumbled and victory looked increasingly unlikely.

Drane returned to Krev’s side.

‘My lord, I beseech you, let me join the battle. We face defeat unless—’

‘You will join the battle when I tell you to and not before, slaughterpriest.’

‘My lord, I do not understand your strategy.’

Krev turned on him, eyes blazing. For the first time, Drane noticed the nimbus of power that surrounded the warlord. He bowed and stepped away as dark suspicions began to form about what Krev was doing.

On the right flank, the skullgrinder and his small warband of wrathmongers came up against the leader of the Stormcast host. Garsa’s first swing of his anvil was a good one, caving in the skull of the beast on which the Lord-Celestant rode and throwing him to the ground. A follow-up strike met the Stormcast’s hammer, giving the warrior time to rise to his feet. He threw off his cloak and faced the skullgrinder, while his bodyguard, armed with rune-inscribed polearms, duelled with the wrathmongers.

The battle between the Lord-Celestant and the skullgrinder was long and gruelling. With each swing of his anvil, Garsa caved in sigmarite armour plates and broke bones, but the Stormcast stayed standing. Where his hammer struck home, crackling lightning burned the skullgrinder’s flesh. Both warriors slowed as the fight dragged on, and eventually, Garsa dropped his weapon and launched himself at the Stormcast with a roar of inarticulate rage. He tore the turquoise helmet from the warrior’s head and grabbed his throat, lifting him bodily from the ground, squeezing. Even as bones popped and his throat was crushed, the Stormcast used the last of his strength to strike one more time, and the head of his hammer obliterated the skullgrinder’s torso in a discharge of celestial power.

Both warriors fell to the ground. The Stormcast’s body disappeared into a crackling arc of energy that shot skywards, and Garsa was trampled into the dirt.

The remaining two deathbringers fell as the Stormcasts overran the rest of the Deathstalkers. Their deaths were not glorious, but they were bloody.

‘Do you understand now, slaughterpriest?’

Drane turned to see Krev standing behind him, axe in hand. The warlord appeared larger than ever, and the power that had played around him now seemed to infuse his entire body. The priest shook his head slowly.

‘No, my lord. This is no victory. And yet, the power around you is palpable. Whatever your plan was, it has succeeded.’

‘Almost, my old friend. Only one last thing remains to be done.’ The warlord raised his axe, and suddenly Drane understood.

‘This battle was never going to be your eighth victory,’ he said. ‘We were.’

Krev nodded as he advanced. ‘Khorne cares not from whence the blood flows, as you know well. He accepts the deaths of his followers as readily as his foes. And sometimes they are preferable. He thirsts for skulls, Drane, and they are one thing he cannot get from these Stormcasts.’

‘The battles we won were to draw Khorne’s attention to you,’ the slaughterpriest said. ‘The real sacrifice was the skulls of your champions.’

‘Eight skulls of worthy heroes, given in battle. The first he claimed for himself when I asked. That was when I knew for sure.’

‘The duel,’ Drane said.

‘Yes. And now he has another six. Only one remains, slaughterpriest. Yours. Will you give it willingly, or will you fight me?’

Drane took a deep breath and raised his axe, gripping it tightly in both hands.

‘I will fight you, Krev Deathstalker. My honour will allow me to do nothing else.’

‘Good,’ smiled Krev. ‘Die well, Drane.’

Meros Oathkeeper, Lord-Relictor of the Celestial Vindicators, held up a hand to halt the advance of the Judicators around him.

‘Hold,’ he ordered. ‘What is happening up there?’

On a ridge behind the shattered remnants of the Chaos force, two figures clashed in single combat. Both were huge, one thin and rangy, the other bulky and glowing with barely suppressed power. Both fought with impressive skill, swinging huge axes with speed and grace, dodging and weaving like pugilists.

‘They turn on one another,’ scoffed Iator, the Judicator-Prime. The warrior raised his bow and nocked an arrow. ‘Shall I finish one of them, my lord?’

Meros shook his head. ‘No. This feels like something in which we should not intervene.’

He would live to regret that decision, though not for long. As he watched, the bulkier figure gained the upper hand, lashing out with a blow that cut through the haft of the other’s axe and knocked him back a step. It was followed by an upwards strike that split the thin figure from groin to collarbone. He fell to the earth and the victor threw down his axe and began to laugh.

The aura of power around him grew blinding, and Meros was forced to look away. He could feel a change in the air, and his senses screamed danger.

‘Shoot him,’ he screamed. ‘Kill him before—’

It was too late. The figure’s laugh became a scream, of pain and rage and… triumph? The light faded and Meros looked back. The warrior’s skin was sloughing away, muscles melting and veins unravelling, forming a cloud of bloody matter around the figure. His bones stretched and warped, growing and becoming coated with what looked like brass. The bloody cloud grew and closed back in on the enlarged skeleton, clothing it once again in muscle and flesh, slick and blood red.

‘Daemon,’ Meros breathed. ‘Daemon! Take it down!’

The Judicators took aim and fired, but their arrows melted as they came close to the figure. It laughed again, and now the sound was booming and inhuman. The newly birthed daemon prince turned to Meros and grinned, revealing rows of sharp fangs in a bloody maw. It gestured, and an immense axe coalesced in its hand.

The daemon prince raised the axe into the air.

‘Come forth, children of the Blood God!’ it roared, and from nowhere stepped creatures of blood and brass, lean and long-limbed and carrying barbed swords. Rank after rank of them materialised, brought into the Mortal Realms through the thinned barrier between reality and Chaos.

‘This battle is lost,’ Meros yelled. ‘Fall back, brothers. Fall back!’

They retreated, but Meros couldn’t tear his eyes from the daemon prince. It rose into the air, carried by great black wings, and swooped down towards him.

Meros Oathkeeper was dead in an instant. He didn’t even have time to raise his hammer.

Krev Deathstalker, daemon prince of Khorne, pulled the Stormcast’s head from his body and cast it aside as it dissipated. Around him, a horde of daemons poured from the Blood God’s realm, laying into the celestial warriors with their hellblades. They fought bravely, but the daemons were too many and the Stormcasts too few after their conflict with the Deathstalkers. All too soon, the battle was won.

The eighth victory was his.

Josh Reynolds The Last Gift

Ompallious Zeyros swept his silvery glaive out in a wide arc, removing the Rotbringer’s flabby sword-hand at the wrist. The obese warrior gave a grunting sigh and reached for Zeyros with his remaining paw.

‘Too slow, my fat friend,’ Zeyros said as he twisted aside and thrust the edge of his glaive through a rusty join in his opponent’s fungus-covered cuirass. Warm pus spurted from the wound and the Rotbringer seemed to deflate, even as he toppled forward. Zeyros tore his glaive free and spun it deftly, cleansing the blade. It had been a gift from a daemon of his acquaintance, and was as light as one of her feathers.

All around him, his servants finished off the last of the pestilential defenders of the crag-fortress known as the Rot-Horn. Cackling, pink-limbed horrors, their chest-faces twisted in manic amusement, hurled daemonic fire as oath-sworn warriors clad in armour of amethyst and lapis lazuli hacked down bloated blightkings with ensorcelled blades. The Rotbringers had sought to bar their entry to the inner chambers of the keep that clung like a stony boil to the highest peak of the mountain range.

‘But they have failed. Do you hear me, Ephraim Bollos? Or is it Lord Rotskull?’ he shouted, casting his words into the mould-shrouded corridors which spread out around him, echoing strangely. ‘Whatever you call yourself, I am here, as is your hour of reckoning.’

He received no reply. He had expected none. Still, a worm of doubt wriggled within him. ‘Is he here, Tugop? Is my foe here, or has he already fled, as he did at the Black Cistern?’ he asked, glancing at the blue-skinned horror crouched on a nearby statue. Tugop was little more than a collection of lanky limbs and a monstrous head twisted in a sullen grimace, but he was loyal, in his way. As loyal as a daemon bound in chains of ritual and blood could be.

‘Or as you did at the Pallas Ghyredes, Ompallious Zeyros?’ the daemon murmured dolefully. ‘He is here, for all the good it shall do thee,’ he added quickly, at Zeyros’ glare.

‘And what does that mean, daemon?’ Zeyros demanded.

‘Only that thy fate is come, and all possible paths have narrowed to but one, Ompallious Zeyros,’ Tugop said, as he extended one impossibly long arm and patted Zeyros’ shoulder in apparent sympathy. ‘Tread carefully, and stay to that path which the King of Manifold Paths hath chosen for thee.’

‘And victory will be mine?’

The blue horror gave a sad chuckle. ‘Who can say? Not I, not I.’

He…llo…ol…d…frie…nd.

The old familiar voice echoed up out of the fungal growths on the body at his feet. They flexed like the mouths of fishes gasping for air, causing the corpse to shudder.

‘Ephraim,’ Zeyros said. ‘Where are you?’

Wai…ting…for…you.

A stinking breeze whipped past him, drawing him towards an archway curtained in foulness. A single slice of his glaive revealed the corridor beyond. He hesitated. He looked at Tugop. ‘The path?’ he asked, softly. The blue horror spread his oversized hands and shrugged. Zeyros shook his head in disgust. ‘Burn this sty to ashes. I will deal with its master.’ His warriors murmured their assent, as Tugop bowed.

As he stepped into the corridor, he heard daemons giggling behind him as they began to slap the damp stones with burning hands. There was little the servants of Tzeentch enjoyed more than destroying the bastions of rot beloved of Nurgle. That was why he had sworn himself to the iridescent banners of the Changer of Ways that day, so long ago. The day Ephraim Bollos had broken his oaths and cast down all that they had once served.

He strode along heavy flat foundation stones carpeted with bunches of mould. Humps of toadstools clustered between the flags, and wherever he stepped, clouds of spores billowed up. They clung to his armour and robes, staining them an ugly hue. The walls around him bulged with mushrooms and furry streaks that blended in hideous harmony to give shape to faces and hands and other, less identifiable things — crusted convolutions which resembled things no mortal eye should see.

‘Until, out of corruption, horrid life springs,’ Zeyros murmured. It was an old saying, folk wisdom from a people and a land lost to the foetid tide of history. His land. We were closer than brothers, you and I, he thought. We rode to war side-by-side. How many lances did we each break on behalf of the other, before you threw it all away?

Before they both threw it away, a treacherous part of him countered. He shied away from the thought. Whatever he’d done, he’d done in the name of necessity. But Bollos… Bollos had sold his soul for power. Life. Survival. The Jade Kingdoms drowned in filth, and Bollos had chosen to join it.

A familiar laugh, deep-throated and full, echoed out around him. That laughter had followed him, haunted him, for centuries. He stopped. The corridor had expanded, widening into a round chamber, full of ghastly life. Great toadstools and hummocks of fungus stood like courtiers before a heavy slab of a dais, surmounted by a crude throne.

‘Hello, my old friend… Come to see me at last?’ Ephraim Bollos wheezed. He had seen better days. His bloated, toad-like form lolled on the throne, armour creaking as it struggled futilely to contain the hideous shape within. By the light of phosphorescent fungus, Zeyros could see that the living corruption that filled the keep originated from Bollos and his throne. Webs of fungus and mould stretched from his limbs and horned skull to spread across the walls and floor, where they had thickened and flourished into a garden of filthy creation. ‘Welcome to my garden. I can feel the heat of your hate from here, Ompallious.’

‘As I can smell the stink of you, Ephraim,’ Zeyros said. His voice carried strangely in the chamber. The doughy fungus which clung to the walls seemed to absorb all sound, as did the spongy carpet of fluted shapes which squelched beneath his feet. ‘Then, you never were very clean. Even in better days.’

Bollos laughed. ‘Better days? Is that a hint of yearning I hear in your voice?’

‘Unlike you, my brain is not shot through with rot. My memories are as vivid as ever.’ Zeyros slashed a particularly unpleasant clump of fungus apart and was rewarded by a tiny scream. Bollos sighed.

‘Do stay your hand, Ompallious. I cannot bear their pain,’ he grumbled. ‘They are a part of me, and I, them. I am in every blossom and lump.’

Spitefully, Zeyros thrust his glaive into the trembling clump and gave it a savage twist. Thin squeals of agony, or perhaps simply escaping air, reached him. Bollos twitched on his throne. ‘Once, you would not have done that,’ he said.

‘Once, we would have traded blows, rather than words,’ Zeyros said. ‘Once, you would have welcomed this. But now…’

‘Now I am older and less inclined to bestir myself for petty displays,’ Bollos said.

‘Petty, he says,’ Zeyros said. ‘Do not mock me, Ephraim. We have known each other too long to play such games.’ He took another step towards the throne. The fungus seemed to shift and bulge, as if following him. ‘Ghyran, the Jade Kingdoms… they shudder beneath the star-shod heels of a new power. The fires of Azyr rage in the forests of rot, and your patron reels in agony. Nurgle loses his hold on this realm. It is a time of change.’

‘So it is.’ Bollos gestured with a wide, warty hand. ‘And so I am. All of this… it is me, my friend. Every toadstool, every cilium, born of my flesh, culled from my rotten bone. Behold, I give a gift of myself to the future. Life begets life. It was ever Grandfather’s way.’

Zeyros looked around, a queasy feeling in his gut. Bollos truly had become one with the filth of Nurgle’s garden. ‘It was ever your way to wallow in your own filth,’ he said.

‘You should not mock me, my friend,’ Bollos said, watching him approach.

‘We are not friends, Ephraim. Maybe once, but no longer, and not for many centuries. An ocean of blood separates us, and I would see you drown in it.’ Zeyros took another step. And another. The carpet of toadstools stirred beneath him.

‘Yes. And you sold your soul for the chance, did you not?’

Zeyros said nothing. Bollos’ wide, toad-like face split in a brown grin. His teeth were broken and mossy, and something that might have been a tongue moved behind them. ‘What price a man’s soul, eh?’

‘You tell me,’ Zeyros said. ‘Was it worth it, Ephraim? All that you’ve done, to me, to the others… was it worth it?’

‘Worth has a different meaning for every man, Ompallious. You taught me that. I sold my soul for life, eternal and without end, in one form or another. What did you sell yours for? That iridescent armour you wear? That glaive you carry? Or something else?’ Bollos sighed, his round eyes half-shut. ‘Did you bargain all of your tomorrows away for today?’

Zeyros paused, his foot on the bottom step of the dais on which the throne sat. The air was thick with spores and mould, and he coughed, trying to clear his lungs. Everything in the chamber stank of Bollos. ‘I did what was necessary, and no more,’ he said, harshly.

Bollos frowned. ‘Necessity and worth are often determined in the aftermath, I have found.’ He sat back with a ponderous groan. ‘In truth, I had hoped you would come. I can no longer leave this place, for I am as much garden as gardener now. What have we made of ourselves, my friend?’

‘We stopped being friends the day you…’ Zeyros fell silent. He shook his head, and raised his glaive. ‘You are a monster. And I am a monster. But only one of us will see tomorrow, Ephraim.’

‘And then what?’ Bollos said. ‘What of tomorrow, Ompallious?’

Zeyros stopped. He was but a glaive-strike from Bollos. ‘What?’

‘What of tomorrow, when I am dead? What then, for you? What shall you do without me, my friend?’

Zeyros stared at the loathsome countenance of the creature he had once called his friend. Memories, long buried under days of blood and regret, rose briefly to the surface and then sank once more. He had chased Bollos across the Jade Kingdoms for centuries. Is he right? What next, for me? The thought was not a pleasant one.

‘We stand on the precipice of greatness, you and I,’ Bollos rumbled. ‘I made you, Ompallious. I gave you the gift of life, as I give it to this place. I gave you a reason to live, when all hope was lost.’

‘If not for you…’ Zeyros began.

‘If not for me, you would have drowned in rot and the last memory of our people drowned with you. But you survived…’

‘For vengeance,’ Zeyros said. But still, the doubt was there.

‘Yes! I kindled the fire in you. And now, you are so much more than you were. We both are, cousin. The gods favour us, Ompallious. Why do you not thank me for my gift?’

‘Thank you? Thank you?’ Zeyros said incredulously.

‘You’re welcome,’ Bollos said, smiling cheerfully. ‘Without me to feed it, your flame will gutter out and become ashes. I would not see that happen to you, my friend. I will live on, in one form or another, and you will thank me…’

Zeyros snarled and flames of every colour and none flared to life along the curved blade of his glaive. ‘Here is your thanks,’ he hissed, as doubt gave way to anger. His glaive swept down and hacked into Bollos’ shoulder. Ephraim jerked and groaned. Spores billowed from the wound and crisped in the flames. A vast sigh, of sadness, perhaps, or satisfaction, rolled through the chamber.

Bollos made no attempt to defend himself. Zeyros hacked at him, tearing great wounds in the sagging body. As he hewed, flames spread hungrily across the ligaments of fungus, devouring them. And Bollos… Bollos laughed. Zeyros staggered back, breath rasping in his lungs. ‘Stop laughing,’ he said. ‘I will burn this place. Burn you!’

‘Burn it all, brother. Such is the cycle of it: life begets fire, fire begets ash, ash begets soil and soil begets life. Burn my garden, so that it might flourish,’ Bollos wheezed. Uncomprehending, Zeyros snarled and spat a single, incandescent word. The chamber was filled with light and heat and ash. Soon, the whole of the crag-keep would be the same. It would all burn, and his memories of Ephraim Bollos with it. The memories of his betrayal, the laughter which had haunted him, it would all be ash.

And then… and then…

He shook the thought aside and leaned forward, to watch as Bollos’ skull crumpled in the fire. The body twitched, and then a hand snapped up, catching him by the arm.

‘One… last… gift, my friend,’ Bollos whispered, holding tight to Zeyros’ wrist, breathing into his face. ‘I bequeath unto you… a future. Nurture it, as I have.’

Then, with a contented sigh, Bollos sagged back and surrendered to the flames. Shaken, Zeyros left the dais, backing away as his fire filled the chamber, and the fungus screamed. As he left, he idly scraped the filth from his armour. It clung stubbornly to the metal, and he wondered if he would ever get clean. He coughed suddenly, and felt a strange weight in his lungs. The smoke, he thought. He looked at his hand, covered in char… and spores. Bollos’ spores. He coughed again, and remembered Bollos’ breath in his face, and the things moving behind his mossy teeth. He remembered the air, thick with… what?

All of this, it is me, he’d said. Ompallious Zeyros coughed again.

And somewhere, Ephraim Bollos laughed.

David Annandale The Prodigal

The cave was a spiral through darkness, a narrow coil through the core of the mountain. To reach it meant finding a path through a maze of fissures. An impossible task, a barrier to anyone not native-born to the city of Lykerna. The route had been unused now for an age, for who would willingly leave the sanctuary in these terrible days? The people of Lykerna rested secure behind their walls, their city hidden within its mountains, its light concealed from the monsters on the plain. They rested easy. There was no one who would lead the monsters to them.

Except the monster who knew the way.

Graunos had not been a monster when he left Lykerna. Then he had been a victim, doubly cursed because no one but he had acknowledged his plight. Blessed by Tyrion, they had said. Blessed to share his burden.

‘There is light ahead, lord,’ said Therekal.

‘I can see that perfectly well.’

The slaughterpriest bowed his head in a quick apology before Graunos could strike it from his neck.

I can see, he thought. I will see Lykerna.

He would behold its spires for the first time in his life. And this day would be the last they would be seen by anyone.

Graunos rounded the final curve of the spiral. Behind him, the walls of the tunnel echoed with the dread rhythm of thousands of marching boots. The warband of the Brass Gaze had come to Lykerna — at its head, the weakest son of the great city, returned now in strength and wrath.

The cavern ended. Stretching from the precipitous mountainside to the gates of the city was a narrow bridge. There were no ramparts. Though it was wide enough for three warriors to march abreast, it traced a sinuous path through the air. Centuries before, when Graunos had crossed the other way, he had crawled its length on hands and knees, lest his blindness send him plummeting off the edge.

Now, with Khorne’s gift, he gazed upon the bridge, the gate, and the spires. His helmet was fused with his skull. No flesh remained between bone and brass. Graunos and his armour were one. His body was the strength of plate and spikes. His blood was the acid of the Blood God’s rage. His eyes were the graven stare in his helm. Khorne had rewarded him with sight, but it was vision with a purpose. Graunos saw only what must be destroyed, and how to bring it down.

And so he saw all of Lykerna.

The city was built of stone and light. Carved into the mountainsides surrounding the city were vast mirrors of polished marble. They were concave and convex, hemispheres and bowls, their slopes and angles and shapes as varied as the beams of light that struck them. Refracted, reflected, divided and magnified, the rays of Lykerna were a lattice of creation. They were the foundation of the city, suspending it in the air between the mountains, leagues above the distant ground. Lykerna was built upon light, and it was built with light. Every wall, every square, every tower and every palace was a shining composite of resplendent gold, marble and worshipful illumination. Soaring in its heights of pride and glory, the city exalted Tyrion in the totality of its being.

Graunos’ helm covered the top half of his skull. Below it, his face was stripped of its skin. It was exposed muscle, scarred and knotted, pierced with hooks of brass. It was the face of his pain and his hatred. It was a face of thorns. His sharpened teeth parted in a snarl of anticipation as he looked upon the meaning he would destroy and the meaning he would shape.

Meaning. It was the wealth of Lykerna. It was the reason the priests of the city had declared Graunos blessed. They had given thanks for his agony. They had held him up as proof of Tyrion’s favour. Graunos’ blindness had been no simple thing. Because he could see only darkness in the realm of light, his mind could not perceive the play of light. It could not see the symbolism inherent to the material of the world. Instead, all meaning shouted at him at once. Until Khorne had found him in his hate, his darkness had been an endless clamour, a pounding avalanche of significance. Everything had meant everything. There had been no peace, no surcease, no space for his own thoughts until, at last, his hatred had grown so large as to swallow up everything else.

Now he saw only what must fall and the new form that his rage would create. That was more than enough.

He walked onto the bridge. The light trembled beneath his tread. Darkness spread from every footstep, a contagion of night streaming through the veins of the span. It rushed ahead, greedy for the gates. Graunos began to run, charging toward the fulfilment of his vengeance and the preparation of a greater battle to come.

The war horns of the Brass Gaze blasted. Their howl was triumphant in its violence.

‘The towers sway at the sound of our horns,’ said Therekal, awed.

‘But they do not fall,’ Graunos said. ‘Not yet. It is our blows that will topple them.’

The bells in the spires rang out in alarm. The impossible was happening. The hidden city was under attack.

The bridge widened in the final approach to the gate. Here, Graunos paused. He threw his head back and bellowed. ‘Hear me, Lykerna! Your sacrifice has returned! I am Graunos, and I have come to cast you down!’

The bells still rang, yet it seemed to Graunos that a kind of silence fell for a moment over the city when he uttered his name. The Lykernan nobility revelled in the richness of symbols. He had brought them more meaning than even they had wished.

The gates were turning black from the contagion of his rage, becoming brittle. They opened, and the defenders of Lykerna marched to meet the Brass Gaze. Pennants of light and silk flashed in the wind. The warriors of the city were clad in silver armour and white robes. A fine backdrop for the blood to come. At the head of the phalanx was a luminark. Pulled by a brace of armoured horses, it was a reliquary as much as it was an engine of war. The ornate frame waited for Graunos to shatter it. Mounted on its roof was a cannon of light, a cone-shaped assemblage of lenses. An acolyte of Tyrion sat beneath the lenses and guided the horses. A wizard stood beside the largest lens. He was an old man, though his frame thrummed with contained power.

‘Graunos!’ he called. ‘Repent! It is not too late!’

Graunos recognized the voice. Ahnavias, the wizard who had urged him to accept his calling. Urged him to accept the curse of Tyrion.

‘It is too late for your city,’ Graunos hissed. He launched himself forward. Behind him came the thunder of his horde of wrath.

Ahnavias turned to the lens, chanting and casting his hands at its centre. The fire of purest illumination burst from the luminark. The beam sought Graunos. It came to turn his soul and being into an incandescent flash. Instead, it struck the blade of his axe of Khorne. The weapon’s name was Darkfall. The Blood God’s rune glowed crimson against metal of absolute black. The axe devoured the light.

Graunos pushed against the force of the assault. Ahnavias shouted. The beam intensified. Darkfall grew hot, burning through his gauntlet. Yet it took the light, the hunger of the daemon within it goaded by Graunos’ own hunger for revenge.

Then he reached the luminark, and with a single sweep of Darkfall, he shattered the forward lenses. The light dispersed with an explosion. A wind of glass shredded the skin of the acolytes. Graunos leapt aboard. He decapitated the first acolyte, then wrapped his armoured fingers around Ahnavias’ throat.

‘You will watch,’ he said.

He hurled the priest to the warband. Bloodreavers bound him in chains. They dragged him along. They made him see.

The struggle was brief. The Brass Gaze smashed through the defenders of the city. The blood of slaughtered warriors flowed along the bridge and dripped over the edges. And this was a mere prelude, a rivulet that soon vanished in a deluge. Graunos sent his legion through the city. He unleashed butchery so vast, cascades of blood plummeted from the windows of the spires. The light of Lykerna was submerged in waves of crimson. Thousands died, tens of thousands. The blood filled the streets. It covered the plazas. It coated the walls of the palaces and towers. It submerged the light.

The foundations crumbled.

And the city fell.

The drop was not rapid. It was a slow descent into the dark majesty of wrath. Lykerna collapsed in on itself like a closing fist. The towers smashed into each other. Stained glass shattered and became maws of jagged teeth. The city struck the stony ground of the valley, and towering, curved obelisks of brass thrust through the ruins, the gripping claws of Khorne’s domain.

Graunos stood in the centre of the city. He saw the change. He saw the new meaning, and though his work was good, his wrath was not assuaged. It never could be, perhaps not even if the day came at last when he drove his blade into the skull of Tyrion himself.

To the west, the sky flashed with lightning. The greater battle was coming.

Graunos looked down at Ahnavias, the last survivor of Lykerna, kneeling on stone. The wizard looked to the west.

‘Hope is coming,’ he said.

‘It is coming too late,’ Graunos told him. The warriors who thought to bring that hope would find instead ruins in the shape of gargantuan jaws.

‘Light is coming,’ Ahnavias insisted.

‘Then it will show me the shape of the doom I will create,’ said Graunos. With a dismissive blow, he severed the wizard’s head. He picked it up and turned its eyes toward the lightning. ‘Can you still see what is coming?’ he asked. ‘No? I can.’

War was coming. And it would find wrath waiting.

Graeme Lyon The Sacrifice

The vampire screamed as the dagger struck home.

Arioso chanted as he pulled the weapon out of the creature’s flesh and brought it down again. Nine times he cut, each slice carving part of an arcane sigil into the vampire’s chest. Dark blood slowly welled up from the wounds, filling the cramped chamber with a rich coppery smell.

‘You will regret this,’ the vampire croaked. Arioso ignored it and continued chanting, the syllables of power echoing around the ancient fane.

‘Your gods have no place in these lands,’ it continued quietly. ‘The only master of Shyish is Nagash.’

‘Nagash,’ repeated Kaemria, Arioso’s acolyte. ‘An old power, long since defeated. The Everchosen destroyed your master long ago.’

Arioso glared at Kaemria and she quieted. He made the last cut in the vampire’s chest and ended his chant. He looked down at his victim. It resembled a human, though its features were twisted and bestial. It lay on a stone slab, naked. Its arms and legs had been broken to prevent any escape attempt, and its pathetic form lay nearly still, other than involuntary twitches of pain. Even now, as it faced its own destruction, it sneered at the Chaos champion.

‘What have you to say, fool?’ it asked. ‘Do you believe that you can defy my master’s will here, in his realm? In a temple dedicated to him?’

Arioso considered the question. Nagash was one of the gods of myth, a being whose power had been broken alongside that of Sigmar, Alarielle and the rest of their ridiculous pantheon. The Mortal Realms no longer belonged to them. They belonged to Chaos, and so did this temple. The atrocities he and his warband had committed here in Tzeentch’s name had seen to that.

This was the last of many sacrifices — eighty-one to be precise — dedicated to the Changer of Ways in this place. The others had been the vampire’s servants, debased flesh-eaters, and the survivors of the battle Arioso had won days before. Each of the victims had been killed in a slightly different way, each sacrifice used to dedicate this place to Tzeentch in preparation for this moment.

Did Arioso truly believe that this was going to work?

‘Yes,’ he said, and brought the dagger down into the vampire’s heart.

‘In the name of the Changer of Ways,’ he intoned. ‘By the nine paths to knowledge, the nine mazes of mind and the nine forms of wisdom, I invoke the creatures of the Outer Dark. Nine times nine souls have I delivered to Thee, Lord Tzeentch. In return, one boon would I ask. Give me knowledge. Show me my path. Tell me my destiny. Send Your servants to light my way.’

A sudden wind ruffled Arioso’s robes and he heard Kaemria gasp. The light in the chamber, dim as it was, vanished, and Arioso was plunged into a darkness greater than he had ever experienced, a darkness that was not merely the absence of light, but its opposite. He could feel a presence within the darkness, like a creature with many eyes viewing him from a thousand angles at once. It was as if the universe itself was looking inside him, laying his soul bare and devouring all his secrets. He wanted to scream, to cry, to curl up in a ball and soil himself.

He would not.

‘I am Arioso of the Midnight Sages,’ he said, each word an effort. ‘I am a child of the Benighted Enclaves. I was born and raised in darkness, and I fear it not. My will is inviolable. I have summoned thee, and thou wilt do my bidding, daemon!’

He forced his will out and the darkness receded, replaced with a sphere of blinding light. Something was at its heart, but he could gaze at it for only a moment before he was forced to look away.

‘Very well, mortal,’ said a voice. It was ancient and otherworldly, and it echoed strangely through the fane, as though the echoes came before the words. ‘You have performed the correct rites, and your will is strong. Your soul will remain your own, and I will grant you the boon you seek.’

A thrill ran through Arioso. ‘Yes,’ he breathed. ‘Show me my destiny, daemon. Show me the dark deeds I am to perform in Tzeentch’s name.’

Visions filled his mind. An army stretched across a valley of black volcanic rock, littered with great statues, their features worn away by time. Vast mountains stretched into a blood-red sky, their peaks disappearing into turquoise clouds that partly obscured a moon in the shape of a leering skull. Banners fluttered in a light breeze, each one marked with the twisting sigil of the Changer of Ways and the other Ruinous Powers. The army was the largest the champion had ever seen, tens of thousands of warriors… and it was his.

Arioso was at the army’s head, held aloft by a floating disc, golden and bladed. He was clad in robes of many colours over shining golden armour, and he held a flaming halberd in both hands. He gestured with it and his army surged forwards, heavily armoured warriors and bare-chested marauders all chanting his name as they charged.

The vision changed, and Arioso saw the enemy, a vast horde of green-skinned savages, outnumbering even the Tzeentch champion’s army. They wore furs and skins, and carried stone clubs and crude spears. Some hefted huge wooden bows, and volleys of arrows sped towards Arioso’s charging army. The savage war-chant of the orruks drowned out the Chaos host.

‘There are so many…’ Arioso breathed. ‘What is this, daemon? Are you showing me how I die?’

The daemon’s mocking laughter filled his mind. ‘No, Arioso,’ it said. ‘This is not your death, but your apotheosis. In the Valley of Fallen Gods, your army will be broken but you will pass beyond life and death. You will mix the ashes of the sacrificed with the blood of the ever-living and receive a reward beyond your imagination. You will become eternal, Arioso of the Midnight Sages.’

A thrill passed through Arioso. Eternal life. The power he could gather. The loss of an army would be nothing compared to what he would gain.

‘Where will I find this Valley of Fallen Gods?’ he asked.

‘It lies within the borders of Shyish,’ the daemon said. ‘Follow the signs that will be laid before you, and you will come to the place you seek, though the road will be long and arduous, and your trials many.’

‘And the greenskins?’

‘Watch…’ said the daemon.

Arioso watched. Time lost all meaning as he watched the battle unfold. He saw the strategy behind the orruk assault, the savagery of the primitive beasts belying the keen tactical mind that commanded them. As he watched the flow of the battle, he memorised every detail, knowing that it would be to his advantage when this vision became reality.

At the height of the battle, he saw his own shimmering form descend upon the orruk leader. He focussed on the huge warlord, who was riding a creature that resembled a great drake, long-bodied and with a pot belly. It had thick scales protecting its carapace, and great horns emerged from its head, above eyes that glittered malignly. Nestled between its swept-back wings was the orruk leader. He was thickly muscled and carried an axe the size of Arioso, which looked carved from a single immense bone. The greenskin issued a challenge in its guttural tongue, and…

…the vision faded. Reality returned. Arioso stood once more in the small chamber of the temple, and the stench of blood filled his nostrils again. The flickering light still danced at the heart of the chamber, even brighter than before.

‘What happens next, daemon? I must know how to defeat the creature,’ he demanded.

‘You have been shown what you asked, Midnight Sage. Now release me.’

‘No. You will show me more.’

The light flared, and the daemon’s voice grew to a deafening boom.

‘Release me, mortal, or I shall strip the living flesh from your bones and devour your soul, and destiny be damned.’

Arioso hesitated. Could the bound daemon do what it threatened?

‘It’s not worth the risk,’ he muttered to himself. ‘I release thee, daemon,’ he intoned. ‘By the ninety-nine words of power inscribed on the scrolls of the Midnight Sages, I send thee back to the outer dark.’

‘We shall speak again, Arioso,’ the daemon’s voice whispered.

The light flared again, momentarily blinding Arioso. Then all was dark, and silent.

‘M… master,’ said a voice eventually. Kaemria. ‘What was that?’

‘What did you see, my acolyte?’ he asked her.

‘A blinding light, my lord. I heard a voice, offering me power and secrets, if I…’ she trailed off.

‘If you betrayed me?’ Arioso asked.

‘Yes, master. But I would never—’

‘No, and you never shall,’ said Arioso, pulling the dagger from her chest. She fell backwards, a stain of bright red spreading across the brilliant blue of her robes.

He looked back to the altar on which the vampire had been sacrificed. The creature’s body was gone, leaving only a vaguely man-shaped pile of ashes.

‘The ashes of the sacrificed,’ Arioso mused. Drawing an empty vial from his robes, he gathered the ashes. He was going to need them.

It took nine years.

Nine years of searching the length and breadth of Shyish for the Valley of Fallen Gods.

Nine years of gathering warriors to his banner with promises of glorious battle.

Nine years of delivering on those promises.

There were battles beyond count, against all the foes that the Realm of Death could provide. Half-mad necromancers and their shambling hordes of zombies fell like wheat before the scythe of Arioso’s army. Bloodthirsty vampires with servants both human and undead were put to the sword and magical flame. Vast forces of bleached skeletons, animated by dark powers and wearing the raiment of long-dead cultures, were cut down, the bones broken to stop them rising again.

It was not only the walking dead who stood in Arioso’s way. As was ever the case, the forces of Chaos, in their victory, turned upon one another, for sport or glory in the eyes of the gods. His army clashed with servants of the other great powers, and even other followers of the Changer, eager to prove themselves against the legend that Arioso was becoming.

As he crossed the Realm of Death, he gained power such as he had never imagined. On a mountaintop on the fringes of reality, he had engaged in a magical duel with a daemon, which ended when he bound it to his service in the form of a gleaming golden disc like the one in his vision. Beneath the Plains of Frozen Breath, in the treasure vaults of an abandoned duardin stronghold, he found a halberd that burst into golden flame at his touch and consumed the souls of those it killed. At the heart of the Crimson Labyrinth, he had claimed a suit of golden armour from its previous owner. From horned helm to rune-marked buckler, it had protected him against the mightiest of heroes and most devious of traps.

He had become known as the Golden King, and warriors flocked to his banner, servants of not just Tzeentch, but all the Dark Gods. Even the verminous ratmen followed him, and their knowledge of the secret ways beneath the worlds had helped the host more times than Arioso could count.

In all that time, no one had known the location of the Valley of Fallen Gods. All Arioso’s attempts to summon the daemon once more had failed. In the end, it was the God-King Sigmar who pointed him in the right direction, in an odd way. In the final year of his quest, a storm had broken. A tempest raged in the skies above Shyish, and with it came a new enemy.

The Stormcast Eternals were something… different. They were an unstoppable force, sent to the Mortal Realms to liberate them from Chaos. Those in Shyish seemed to be on a mission, but that didn’t stop them from attacking Arioso’s army on sight, and they could never be fully defeated.

On their first encounter, Arioso had killed the leader of the army they fought, a towering warrior in turquoise armour who rode a great lightning-spitting drake. The figure had dissolved into light when his head and body parted company, and months later, he had returned, nearly killing Arioso in a duel high above a bottomless canyon. Arioso had survived only by fleeing, and in his flight, he had inadvertently found his goal, recognising the mountains from his vision.

So, at last, he came to the Valley of Fallen Kings. His army filled the valley, rank upon serried rank of Chaos warriors next to baying hordes of beastkin and warbands of hundreds of eager mortals. Bloodbound servants of Khorne rubbed shoulders with pox-ridden Rotbringers, and hunched skaven marched next to warriors dedicated to the Changer, clad in gold-coloured armour in imitation of Arioso’s own.

They chanted his name, ten thousand voices raised in worship of him. He was the next best thing to a god, and with the power that would be his when the battle was won, he could challenge the gods themselves.

At his command, the army began to march. In the distance, the greenskin horde roared and surged forward. Arioso climbed into the sky and looked down upon the battlefield as the vanguard of the armies met. The savage orruks crashed like a wave against the cliff of Arioso’s Chosen. The smaller creatures — grots — were the first to hit the enemy. Arioso recognised that the greenskin commander was using them to test the mettle of his foe.

Movement from the walls of the valley caught his eye, and Arioso turned to see gigantic spiders, hundreds of them, crawling down the mountainside and into the flank of his force, where the skaven lurked. The cowardly ratmen broke in the face of this unexpected threat, and the spider-riding grots pushed forward. Arioso swept down towards them. As he did, he painted mystical symbols in the air and muttered ancient syllables under his breath.

Reality split, and a host of daemons came forth. Multi-hued screamers swept in to surround Arioso, while gibbering horrors and fire-spewing flamers fell upon the unsuspecting spider-riders, driving them back. A shadow loomed over them as they fled, and a gigantic spider, its back crawling with grots holding on for dear life, leapt from the mountainside into the midst of the daemons.

The arachnarok tore daemons apart with its immense legs, and the grots jabbed with spears and fired crude bows. The daemons were implacable, but they were few, and the sheer size of the arachnarok took its toll. Arioso gestured, and the screamers peeled away, swooping down into the beast’s flank, their lamprey-like jaws taking hold and biting deep into the creature’s flesh.

It squealed and reared up, and Arioso struck, diving down and driving his blazing halberd into the Arachnarok’s exposed belly. It burst into flames, and grots jumped from its back, also ablaze. The massive creature thrashed and shook, and was eventually still.

Arioso turned to survey the battle. His forces continued to push on. A wing of knights had charged into a knot of spear-carrying orruks and were pushing through towards the chieftain on his immense reptilian steed. Arioso followed them.

‘If I kill the leader, victory will be ours,’ he told his golden disc, and it sped up in response, as eager to engage the foe as he was.

And so it was that at the heart of the battle, the Golden King and the orruk warboss fought. It was a duel that lived on in legend long after the battle was won, the survivors of Arioso’s army carrying tales of it across the Realm of Death and beyond.

Arioso swept down on the orruk’s steed, halberd raised to strike. He was ready for the orruk to parry his blow, or attempt to hit him first with his huge axe. Instead, the warboss reached up and grabbed Arioso’s disc mount, pulling it from the air. Arioso fell and rolled, pulling himself to his feet in time to see the orruk throwing the disc into a mob of rampaging greenskins who stabbed at it with their crude spears. He turned his attention back to the warboss, who gestured to him and spoke in his primitive tongue. Arioso couldn’t understand the words, but the meaning was clear. The creature leered at him and laughed, and Arioso nodded. Gripping his halberd in one hand, he slipped his buckler over his left forearm and leapt onto the head of the orruk’s mount. It thrashed and bucked, but Arioso stabbed his halberd down through the bony plates that covered its skull. The magical weapon pushed through chitin, flesh, bone and brain. The creature reared up, and the orruk chieftain was thrown from its back. He hit the ground and rolled, but Arioso didn’t see any more of him as he held on to the haft of his halberd, riding out the winged reptile’s death throes.

When it finally stilled, Arioso pulled his halberd free and turned, looking for the warboss. He found himself enclosed in a circle of savage greenskins, and with him, their leader. Close up, he was one of the largest beasts Arioso had ever seen, the muscles of his arms the size of the Chaos champion’s torso. The orruk stank of blood and sweat and savagery. It roared something at Arioso and battered one huge meaty fist against its chest.

‘I have no idea what you said, but assuming it’s a challenge, let’s finish this,’ Arioso replied, sending a surge of magical power into his halberd. It blazed with flame, and the orruk laughed. Faster than Arioso would have believed possible, the greenskin stepped forward and brought his huge axe down in an overhead blow that could have split an ogor in half. Arioso sidestepped it and lashed out with his halberd, which glanced off the orruk’s thick hide. The creature swung the axe in a scything motion, and Arioso ducked below, jabbing the halberd at the orruk’s midriff. It slid home, and stuck. The orruk jerked back, and the halberd was pulled from Arioso’s hands, the flames playing around it guttering out. He fell to his feet, and suddenly the axe was coming down at him. He rolled to the side and pulled himself up, glancing around for a weapon as the orruk charged towards him.

The greenskin roared again, hefting his axe. He swung around, and the haft of Arioso’s halberd, still embedded in the orruk’s belly, knocked into the sorcerer. He grabbed it, and it burst into flame again. The warboss reared back, roaring in pain, and Arioso saw his chance. He planted his feet firmly on the ground and pushed. The burning halberd burst from the orruk’s back, and the brute fell to his knees, dropping the axe. With a heave, Arioso pulled the halberd back out of the gaping wound in the warlord’s stomach and swung at his neck. The orruk’s head hit the ground.

From that point, the battle was all but over. A mob of orruks charged at Arioso, bent on revenge or proving themselves worthy to succeed their fallen leader, but none could match him, and eventually, the Chaos forces caught up with their master and drove the orruks back, breaking the horde and sending them fleeing, to be cut down like the animals they were.

In the aftermath, Arioso sent scouts to find what was at the valley’s other end. They came back with reports of a temple carved into the mountainside, decorated with arcane sigils and friezes of ancient warriors. After setting a guard to watch for any sign of the orruks returning, Arioso walked to the temple, a group of his Chosen around him, and entered it alone.

It was dark, as black as night, and the only illumination came from the flames of Arioso’s halberd. He walked through the structure, the only sound the echoing of his footsteps on the stone. At length, he found a door carved with an image of a chalice, and rising from it a creature of darkness, a nimbus of power playing about it.

He pushed at the door and it opened easily to his touch. Stepping through, he saw a simple altar, on which sat a chalice of black metal. The stink of blood hit him, and he smiled.

‘The blood of the ever-living…’ he murmured. From his robes, he retrieved a small vial. ‘I have kept you safe for nine long years,’ he said. ‘At last, the time has come. My apotheosis. From this day onwards, I will be changed. Immortal. My power will be beyond doubt.’

He pulled the stopper from the vial and held it above the chalice. His hand was shaking.

‘It’s funny. I feel like I should be saying something profound right now, but nothing comes to mind.’

He poured the ashes into the chalice.

For a moment, nothing happened, and then a cloud of blood began to coalesce. It rose up from the black chalice and formed into the outline of a man. Tissue began to grow around it, forming bones, capillaries and veins, then muscles, flesh and deathly pale skin. Black robes came into being around the body, and features grew on its face. Hideous, bestial features, yet with a hint of humanity. It stretched, with the crack of bones, and the creature smiled, revealing sharp white teeth.

‘I told you that you would regret sacrificing me,’ the vampire croaked.

Arioso was speechless, and paralysed by disbelief.

‘Were you expecting something else?’ the vampire asked, its voice mocking. ‘Perhaps you expected to become… eternal, Arioso of the Midnight Sages.’ The vampire’s voice changed on those last words, perfectly matching the voice from the cavern so many years before.

‘How…?’ Arioso managed, his tone incredulous. The vampire laughed.

‘I warned you, little conjurer. The Dark Gods have no power in Shyish. This is Nagash’s realm, and both life and death obey his commands, and his alone.’

‘Nagash is a dead god!’ Arioso screamed, panic rising in him. He looked for a way out, but darkness filled the chamber now, and his mind reeled from the vampire’s revelations and terror. ‘A relic from an age of myth!’

‘What is death to the lord of the underworlds?’ asked the vampire. ‘Nagash has returned from death a hundred times. Even now, he sits on his throne beneath the world and awaits the time when he will once more stretch out his hand and claim what is his.’ The vampire smiled again. ‘But you will do him for now.’

The vampire leapt, a sword appearing from nowhere in its hand. Numbly, Arioso parried the blow and swung his halberd in response. The vampire dodged and struck again, catching him a glancing blow on one leg.

‘How did you do this?’ he asked. ‘Why send me on this quest? Why here?’ Everything he had done, nine years of questing and conflict… It was for this?

The vampire shrugged and pressed forward with a flurry of blows that Arioso was hard-pressed to fend off. ‘Fun, maybe,’ it replied. ‘It was certainly the fastest way for me to return from death. The chalice contained my own blood. Mixing my ashes with it brought me back from beyond the veil. On my own, it would have taken decades or longer. I will confess though, that I thought you would find this place a little quicker.’ The vampire chuckled and stepped back.

Arioso screamed, a wordless articulation of his rage, and swung his halberd wildly. Before he knew what was happening, it was pulled from his grasp and he was in the vampire’s grip. The creature ripped the helmet from Arioso’s head and gripped his neck.

‘You will get what you were promised, Arioso of the Midnight Sages,’ he whispered. ‘Eternal life will be yours. Or, at least, eternal existence.’

The vampire started to chant in a language Arioso didn’t recognise, though he knew the cadence of a spell when he heard one. He tried to speak, but the vampire’s grip on his throat tightened and the words were choked to nothingness.

The spell ended, and Arioso’s vision began to fail. He realised that he couldn’t draw a breath and panic seized him.

‘Remember,’ the vampire whispered, ‘this was your own doing. Your thirst for power and your arrogance caused this. Such will always be the fate of your kind, for your gods care not whether you live or die. You are but pawns in their game. My god lives in every one of his servants. Nagash is the dead, and the dead are Nagash. You will see that soon, at least for a moment. You will serve me, and you will serve him. You will serve us forever, Arioso…’

Then there was only darkness and echoing laughter, and the chill of the grave.

Nick Kyme Unending Storm

Ghaar’eth, called Warson by his followers, beheld the storm in rapt silence.

His rivals were dead, reduced to blood and viscera at his feet and the feet of his warriors. A modest host, they had still prevailed. The hacked-up bodies of the Arcanites littering the Gargantua Ridge were testament to the Bloodwrought’s and Warson’s growing power and ambition. Soon, all of the Beastplains would be his, would be Khorne’s.

Until this. Until the storm…

It struck the sky with such vehemence, a storm without cessation that burned with furious azure lightning.

‘Skarku, what does it mean?’

The slaughterpriest paused in the flensing of skulls to crane his neck and look upon the darkling sky. An eldritch gloaming had fallen upon the ridge, throwing shadows across the huge, ancient bones from which it took its name.

‘It is a portent,’ he hissed between knife-sharp teeth. ‘A summons. Khorne calls us to further battle, Warson.’

Ghaar’eth felt it in his blood, the violent urge never sated. A strong wind ghosted across the ridge, ridding the air of the stench of blood and replacing it with something else. Rain… steel… lightning.

Grunting, Ghaar’eth put on his helmet of dark iron. A snarling effigy of Khorne formed its nosepiece and eye slits, rising into a crown of twin horns. It matched the brand seared into his face. Other brands marred his naked flesh — kill tallies and carved imprecations to daemons.

‘Leave those morsels,’ he growled to his warriors, reaching for his hellbladed axe, which stood embedded in the corpse of the Arcanite sorcerer-king.

His Bloodwrought reavers left the carcasses of the Arcanites and took up their weapons. Some murmured their displeasure, but the killing urge at the prospect of battle soon quelled any serious discontent.

‘The dark feast can wait,’ he told Skarku, who was tying a ruby-red skull to his belt. He had taken the Arcanite’s feathered war-mask too and used it to hide its former bearer’s rictus grin.

‘Khorne calls again,’ said Skarku.

‘Let the blood flow…’ Ghaar’eth replied, his eyes on the lightning cascading from the heavens.

After climbing down the ossuary path of the Gargantua Ridge and crossing the floating bone mesas of the Abyssal Bridge, Ghaar’eth and his warband reached the Varnagorn Valley.

Four immense totems rose from the red earth of this deep valley basin, so high they breached the clouds. None who climbed them was ever seen again. Rumours abounded that the totems, which were carved in the monstrous visages of leviathan beasts too large to have been wrought by mortal hands, were a gateway or bridge between worlds.

Such talk roused Ghaar’eth to anger, and he had slain all of the rumour-makers who had ever strayed into his path. But when he saw the golden warrior stood between the four beast totems, as if having come from the very sky itself, he began to wonder if the fools whose skulls now arrayed his trophy rack were indeed speaking the truth.

It did not matter. As the golden warrior turned, his face an impassive mask and his movements suggesting strength, Ghaar’eth knew he had found a worthy warrior to match his wrath against.

Skarku bellowed incoherently at the golden one, spitting blood and phlegm as a fury overtook him.

Ghaar’eth cut through the slaughterpriest’s frenzy and cooled the boiling blood of all his warriors with the vehemence of his command.

‘Take heed,’ he uttered, his gaze never leaving the golden one who brandished a hammer and a shield struck with images of the celestial heavens the likes of which Ghaar’eth had never seen before. ‘This one is mine.’

He had fought and enslaved many other warbands, killed those too belligerent to submit to his yoke… the Three Eyes, the Serpentine, even those Fleshchanger Arcanites still wet on his axe blade. Never had he seen a warband with markings such as this. It burned his blood to imagine the martial contest this warrior now presented.

None would gainsay him — Ghaar’eth had killed all of his rivals in the Bloodwrought, so when he stepped forwards into the arena of the totems, he knew he would fight this champion alone.

‘Are you watching, my lord Khorne?’ he whispered, before gesturing to the golden warrior with his axe. ‘Stormrider…’ he shouted into the wind and the tempest, which had risen a beat since he had approached, ‘my axe craves your blood. Your skull shall adorn my temple of victories.’ With the lightning of the heavens coruscating across his golden armour, Ghaar’eth could think of the warrior only as Stormrider, and when he spoke, he did so with a voice of thunder.

‘And lo, did Sigmar see the foulness of Chaos and all it wrought in its manifold evil.’

Ghaar’eth frowned, ‘Sigmar?’ He laughed uproariously as the stormrider pointed his hammer at him and met the challenge. ‘Sigmar is dead! Khorne cut him down, sucked the marrow from his bones, and drank his blood ’til naught remained but a shrivelled corpse. Ha! You are not of Sigmar, wretch. Let me show you why…’

He hurled himself at the golden warrior, his axe swinging. Ghaar’eth’s first blow struck the warrior’s shield, releasing a clangour that seemed to resonate with the storm.

Leaping aside to avoid the return hammer swing, Ghaar’eth punched his fist spike into the golden warrior’s unprotected flank and was rewarded with a grunt of pain. The stormrider struck back, landing a blow against the Chaos champion’s shoulder guard that burned with the fury of lightning. Ghaar’eth recoiled, but shook off the pain to examine the rich wet fluid on the blade of his fist spike.

‘So you are flesh beneath all that gold. You bleed.’

Breathing hard, the golden warrior charged, shouting, ‘Azyr!’ He led with his shield, a crack marking the boss where Ghaar’eth’s axe had bitten deep, but the Warson turned just before the charge hit. He kept turning — legs bunching, axe swinging — in one seamless motion until he felt a satisfying crunch of plate and then bone.

‘You must realise something, Stormrider…’ Ghaar’eth told the golden warrior, who tried to stagger away. He couldn’t go far. The hellblade was embedded in the golden warrior’s back and Ghaar’eth clenched the haft like a leash.

A fount of blood erupted from the golden warrior’s mouth, and Ghaar’eth heard it spatter the inside the mask before it oozed down the warrior’s neck. The stormrider tried to reply, but fell to his knees instead.

‘These are Khorne’s lands,’ said Ghaar’eth, wrenching free his axe and eliciting a wail of agony from his foe, ‘and he has made me their keeper.’

‘Now…’ he added, taking the haft of his weapon in both hands and eyeing the golden warrior’s neck, ‘I shall take your—’

A blinding flash of light stopped the oath from being fulfilled as a lightning bolt streaked into the turbulent heavens, taking corpse and trappings both.

Ghaar’eth followed its path and saw that it led beyond the totems.

‘I smell war in this storm,’ he told his followers, who had gathered to witness his victory.

Sheathing his axe, he placed one booted foot against the totem, took a firm grip and began to climb…

The Lavasand writhed in agony as the maw-wyrm devoured the Bloodreavers who had slipped into its cavernous jaws and set the desert churning. They had sailed too close to the pull of the great beast, their oarsmen too slow and too weak to escape as the sand bled away into its mouth.

Their fellow Bloodbound laughed uproariously at this misfortune, the bellows of the Bloodwrought hiding their fear.

The maw-wyrm was a giant gullet, a pulsing, burning maelstrom that sucked in the hot sand only to belch it forth again in towering spumes of iridescent fire.

Not only a beast, though — it was also a gate into another place, another realm. Ever since he had climbed the totem and left the dark canyons of the Gargantua Ridge to emerge in the fiery hells of the Lavasands, Ghaar’eth knew the opportunities such a crossing could grant.

Followers, skulls, the favour of the Blood God.

A great many warriors had joined his warhost since he had defeated the stormrider and ascended the totems without fear or hesitation, but like Khorne, his yearning for blood and power were never sated. He wanted more.

Ghaar’eth rode the rust-metal hellbarge with the arrogance of a king, one foot on the deck and the other on its bladed prow. Keen to avoid the same fate as their eaten comrades, the oarsmen drove the ironclad hard, trusting to the blood-furnace at its heart to fuel the bone paddles at its aft and further their efforts at evasion.

They had to kill it before they could pass through it, this much Ghaar’eth had garnered since the fight had begun. Killing was in his marrow. It was like breath to one such as he, as his appearance would attest. Ghaar’eth’s armour, a gift from his lord Khorne, glinted in the red glow of the cinder-sun, and he brandished a cleaving-spear in one hand.

‘Here,’ he bellowed to the throng of warriors at his command, ‘see how the beast is tamed!’

As he threw the spear, shearing off one of the maw-wyrm’s tusks, he noticed a faint speck on the horizon.

A storm front.

‘Other warriors seek to keep us from our prize, Skarku,’ he muttered to the skull lashed to his belt. Skarku’s portents had been useful, his challenge to Warson’s rule less so. None would challenge him and live. He had sworn it to Khorne.

Eyes narrowing, Ghaar’eth walked to the very end of the prow, the hot and foetid breath of the maw-wyrm washing over him as the hellbarge circled the pit of flame. Another eruption threw fire and ash, some of it burning Warson’s armour, but he brushed it away as if it were a minor irritant. His attention was on the horizon. In the seconds that had passed, the speck had grown.

Somehow, it had become a cohort of winged warriors, blazing with the brilliance of a gilded sun. They came fast, armed with javelins. The one who led them carried a crackling trident. Ghaar’eth’s eyes narrowed as he recognized the leader, despite his unfamiliar shape.

His curse almost caught in his mouth, emitted as a breathless rasp.

‘Stormrider…’

Turning to his skullgrinder, he soon found his rage again. ‘Yaargen — bring them down!’

Lightning struck six times as the winged ones swooped upon the hellbarge, clutching spears of celestial fury. Five of Ghaar’eth’s blood warriors died instantly with those heavenly shafts impaling their bodies.

Only Yaargen survived, evading the blow before hurling his chained anvil. He struck one of the winged ones in the back, who crumpled and fell like a blazing comet. The warrior hit the deck of the hellbarge, but crackled back into the ether before any Khornate knives could fall upon him.

Ghaar’eth sprang off the prow and ran to the other side of the deck as the ship turned in the maelstrom and the winged warriors followed, eager to avenge their fallen comrade.

Yaargen reeled in his anvil, the metal steaming from the sheer heat of the Lavasands, and began to swing once more. He finished three arcs before a trident came screaming from the blood-red sky and ended his wrathful bellowing. Ghaar’eth called out to the skullgrinder’s killer.

‘Stormrider!’ he said. ‘It is you, isn’t it? Khorne has seen fit to send you to die by my blade once more.’

‘I am reforged,’ said the stormrider in reply, his lightning wings holding him level so he could look down upon Warson, ‘by Sigmar. It is by his hand that you and I meet again.’

Ghaar’eth laughed. So amusing, so arrogant, this golden one.

‘Then come, Stormrider,’ he said, stepping back and gesturing to the deck, ‘or will you fight me from the skies like a coward?’

A rivulet of power that might have been anger flared behind the eyeslits of the stormrider’s mask. He was momentarily distracted, having strayed too close to the maw-wyrm, and had to fly swiftly to avoid a pillar of flame spewed from the beast’s gullet. He was still turning when Ghaar’eth flung his cleaving-spear. Hurled with almost daemonic strength by an arm encased in blood-red metal, it pierced the stormrider and tore him open.

As the golden warrior wheeled erratically towards the gaping maw-wyrm, streaming blood and light, Ghaar’eth called out to him again.

‘Return to your feckless god, Stormrider.’

He watched as the dying warrior plummeted into the maw-wyrm’s gullet and smiled as the lightning burst of the stormrider’s death sparked violently beneath the sands. Smoke rose in a pall from the beast, its fiery undulations having now ceased.

The maw-wyrm was dead and the gate to another realm was Warson’s. It didn’t matter where it led, only that his crusade of slaughter could go on.

‘Row!’ he roared to the reaver oarsmen. ‘Take us down into the belly of the beast where the unending favour of Khorne awaits!’

Though the cold nullified most of the stench of the corpse-titans, it could not rob the air of its sulphurous reek.

Ghaar’eth snarled behind the daemon-mask of his war-helm, ignoring the hissed invectives of the creature bound within it. They only served to irritate the beast upon whose back he now rode, an armoured brute of blood and brass — another gift from Khorne.

Acid snow stung the few places where his bare flesh lay exposed to the elements. It hissed and scored his new blood-wrought armour, which was already notched from days of battle. The Corpulents were slain, rotting in the stinging tundra of this icy waste as he and his vast army marched across the backs of the corpse-titans. If these ur-gargants had ever lived, there was no sign of awareness in them now, other than their slow moaning tread as they crawled endlessly across the landscape through the shawls of snow. At the end of this journey lay another realm. Ghaar’eth had but to ride upon their backs to reach it.

‘Glory to Khorne…’ he murmured, exulting in his latest triumph, until he saw the causeway…

The route of the corpse-titans took them into a ravine across which lay an ice bridge, high and wide enough for them to pass beneath. An army of golden warriors stood upon the span, weapons held fast in their gauntlets, so still and apparently unyielding that for a brief moment he thought they might be statues. The illusion would have held were it not for the clarion of a trumpet.

Ghaar’eth roared as he realised the golden paladins were about to leap down in attack. His raised his axe high, bellowing to his men. ‘Turn this ice crimson and lay your offerings at the feet of the Brass Throne!’

Suddenly, the backs of the corpse-titans became undulant battlegrounds as the golden warriors descended. A thunderous cacophony shook the wretched shells of the ur-gargants, resonating through scabrous flesh and bone as the paladins landed and immediately formed up into ranks.

Spurring his beast, Ghaar’eth charged into the enemy’s ranks, his Bloodwrought hordes hard on his heels. A paladin died when he was gored by the Juggernaut’s brass horn. The horn punched through the warrior’s back with such violence it sent a spray of blood across the masks of his fellows directly behind him. With a snarl, Ghaar’eth cut the golden paladin’s head from his shoulders just before the lightning took him.

He rode on, heedless of the actinic fury roiling around him, and drove a second paladin under his beast’s ironshod hooves. As the squeal of crushed and yielding metal sounded over the battle din, Ghaar’eth’s eye was drawn to a figure with an arcing blue helmet plume and a lightning-forked facemask.

Ghaar’eth’s heart stopped as he realised who it was through the bloody melee.

‘Impossible…’ he breathed, as the ice in his veins melted into boiling wrath. ‘Impossible!’ he roared.

It could not be.

‘Stormrider…’

A mighty hammer, as long as he was tall, crackled in the paladin’s fist. He had already taken a fearsome toll upon the army of the Bloodwrought, and now, he turned his steely attention to its leader.

‘I see you, despoiler,’ he uttered with a voice as deep and resonant as a thunderhead. ‘You shall never be rid of me.’

He seemed colder now, the warrior of gold, as if an avatar of lightning were encased in that armour and not a man at all.

‘Not a man…’ breathed Ghaar’eth. ‘No man could live…’ He thrust his axe skyward, an imprecation to his wrathful lord. ‘Be thee immortal or some conjuring of the hated Changer, I shall have thy head, Stormrider!’

Swinging his axe in a wide, sweeping arc, Ghaar’eth spurred his beast through the battle towards his nemesis. None could impede him, and paladins and Bloodwrought both fell to his blade or his steed if they came into his path.

The clash, when it came, shook the ice scabs from the corpse-titan’s back where they fought.

Stormrider swung his lightning hammer, and where it met the haft of Ghaar’eth’s own hellforged blade, a storm was unleashed that turned the air white. Frenzied abandon met implacable vengeance as Khornate warlord and celestial paladin fought each other to an impasse. A cordon of the dead grew around them as their comrades sought to intervene but were destroyed. Bloodwrought warriors killed by the paladin piled so high they formed a wall of the slain, whereas a blackened ring of scorched flesh remained where Ghaar’eth had sent the paladin’s allies back to the heavens.

Soon, none dared the wrath of either fighter and they were left to duel between themselves.

Discarding all notion of defence, Ghaar’eth drew deep of his lord’s wrath and smashed his axe against the paladin’s upraised hammer haft.

‘Stormrider…’ he spat like a curse, breathless with exertion, ‘why… won’t you… die!’

The last blow split the haft of the paladin’s hammer in half, and the axe blade kept going until it embedded in the warrior’s chest. Even injured so grievously, he fought on, beating Ghaar’eth’s unprotected flank with what remained of the hammerhead. It lacked the potency of a blow delivered with both hands, but wrenched a cry of pain from the warlord.

Tearing his axe free, Ghaar’eth struck again and again, hacking the paladin apart, splashing his face and armour with blood until there was nothing left of his nemesis.

For a moment, the brutalised corpse remained on the back of the corpse-titan, and Ghaar’eth began to exult as he thought he had finally achieved a victory. But then the lightning came and, even as Warson tried to grasp the stormrider’s mangled faceplate, the paladin was delivered back unto the heavens.

The battle was almost over and, though the golden warriors had taken a heavy toll, the Bloodwrought had triumphed again. As the last of the paladins fell, the corpse-titans’ great pilgrimage neared its end and a new world beckoned. But as he held his burnt hand close to his body, Ghaar’eth’s eyes were on the sky.

‘Until we next meet,’ he hissed, ‘Stormrider…’

The clarion of hunting horns carried on the foetid air of the Endless Sump. The Bloodwrought, or what was left of them, had been running for days. Bloodied, battered, their will had almost broken.

‘Unkvar, are they close? Speak!’ Ghaar’eth asked his returning Gorechosen. Twenty had gone out, led by the deathbringer, but only four now stood before him.

Swathed in the rotting filth of the sump and a dozen red, festering wounds, Unkvar opened his mouth to answer when a forked trident speared through it from the back of his head. The words died in gargles and spewing blood before the last of Warson’s deathbringers expired.

‘To your blades!’ he cried, urging his men into a defensive circle, but moving was difficult. Not only was the sump a festering marsh that stretched as far as the eye could discern through its wretched miasma, it was also a charnel pit. Corpses of the unquiet dead writhed and rotted in its depths. They clawed at the Bloodwrought, too weak to overwhelm them but eager for their flesh and company all the same.

A deeper pit had claimed Ghaar’eth’s brass mount several leagues back, so he was up to his waist in the filth just like his men as he bellowed at them.

The Warson’s chosen blood warriors closed protectively about their lord, warily eyeing the shadows at the edge of their sight. A bile-yellow fug clung to this part of the marsh, having closed in around the Khorne worshippers with a malign sentience. Even the plague flies seemed less agitated, as if they knew what was abroad.

For a few moments nothing happened. Unkvar sank into the mire, devoured by the dead as his comrades hacked desultorily at the creatures to keep them at bay. A greater threat lurked beyond, and all eyes sought it.

As the buzzing of the plague flies ceased, Ghaar’eth knew the quietude was about to be broken. His prediction proved accurate as lightning bolts arced down through the fog and into the midst of the Bloodwrought.

Bodies flew burnt and broken into the air, the corpses of the sump rising with them as the crackling storm smote the ground so intensely it turned the marsh water into steam. As the lightning strikes ebbed, only a corona of blackened earth remained, and within it, a phalanx of golden warriors. An armoured shield wall stood in a perfect ring around a core of lightning archers, at their centre a lantern-bearer whose beacon seared the Bloodwrought, robbing them of their fury.

Seconds passed as both sides, separated by only a few strides, regarded each other with wary hatred, until Ghaar’eth held his axe aloft.

‘Kill them all!’

The crush of battle was savage and bloody. Ghaar’eth glared through the burning light, his skin blistering around his eyes where it reached him through the eye slits of his helm.

‘Stormrider!’ he roared, seeking out his old foe, but the lantern bearer was not the one.

He cut down a golden warrior who strayed too close, but drove deeper into the enemy’s ranks, trying to catch a glimpse of the one who haunted his nightmares.

‘Where are you, dog?’

He hacked down another foe, splitting the shield and sending a bolt arcing back into the filth-choked sky. For a moment, the yellow clouds parted to admit the lightning and Ghaar’eth caught a glimpse of a mesmerising firmament. As the darkness closed again, a shadow flitted across the stars so fast that Ghaar’eth almost missed it.

He blocked a hammer blow with the haft of his axe almost nonchalantly, dispatching its bearer. Seizing a nearby blood warrior by the shoulder, he hissed. ‘He is here. He has come for me at last.’

A foaming frenzy was upon the disciple of Khorne, but Ghaar’eth was heedless of the incoherent raging. His attention was on whatever roamed the skies above. He could feel it, feel him. His presence…

‘Where are you…’ he rasped, scarcely aware of the fact his warriors were doomed, ‘Stormrider?’

A great winged creature descended through the miasma, the tendrils of filth burning away from its refulgent touch. As he turned to face the creature, it took Ghaar’eth a moment to realise it was not a creature but another armoured warrior.

And as their eyes met, Warson knew his end had come at long last.

‘I’m here,’ uttered Stormrider coldly as he loosed the glittering arrow already notched to his bow.

Pain like a thousand knives coursed through Ghaar’eth as the arrow struck him, and he might have laughed at this tragic doom were it not for the agony.

‘You are dead,’ he spluttered as the lifeblood left his body and began to pool in the filth. Cold, dead fingers grasped at his armour but he fought them off blindly, unwilling to turn from his foe.

No triumph or exultation registered in the eyes of the stormrider, and Ghaar’eth could see them well enough through the gilded mask.

‘You are dead…’ he hissed, his last breath, his last words.

The stormrider gave him the last words he would ever hear.

‘I was.’

The Knight-Venator soared high above the Azure Plain, his star-eagle by his side. The rat-kin had been brutally routed, but their black-clad assassins had escaped during the carnage and now he and his companion sought them out amongst the fallen crystal statues of Azurite.

Just as the history of the city was now lost to time, the Knight-Venator had forgotten much of his provenance, even his name. Sigmar had given unto him the power of life immortal, but in return, he had lost what it meant to remember, his empathy and even emotion.

He thought of himself only as Stormrider and could not recall why.

It was only as he spied the warband advancing through the ruins, Chaos worshippers seeking easy prey in the aftermath of a battle, ignorant of the Knight-Venator’s watchful presence, that the faintest stirrings of a memory returned.

With a glance at his bird, the two speared down through gathering clouds. Drawing back his bow string, a celestial arrow forming at the gesture, he paused. Amongst the throng, a beast was staring directly at him. Such a foul creature. Half man, half monster. Scraps of rough hair like a mane patched its overly-muscled and mutated frame. Its skin shone red raw and spines protruded from beneath the flesh.

Incredibly, it alone had seen him, and though it was a mutated and malformed spawn, Stormrider saw the recognition in its single eye.

Rising up on its hind legs, ignoring the savage goading of the corpulent bloodstoker at its back, a long, black tongue slithered from the beast’s maw and it spoke in a tortured ululating bellow…

‘Stormrider!’

Eyes narrowing in the briefest moment of remembrance, the Knight-Venator took aim and loosed…