by Darius Hinks
Whatever engines are contained in the tower are so powerful that the ground beneath us starts to judder and shift. Geysers of oil and smoke burst from the ground and the pipes that go down start crackling as energy blasts through them.
‘How long?’ asks Hakh, ignoring the tower and staring out at the lake.
‘Not long,’ mutters Khorlagh. ‘The beasts do not dare keep me waiting.’ A little pride creeps into his voice. ‘Such monsters are difficult to control. Many died before I managed to perfect the machines. Too much power and they’ll die. Too little and we’ll die.’
I wish that I could take his trident and plunge it into his chest. Whatever creatures are out there, they deserve a better fate than to be tormented by Khorlagh’s sweaty hands.
Khorlagh catches my furious expression and stares, as though seeing me for the first time. Hakh doesn’t notice; he’s too busy watching the cluster of chains that have begun winding back in from the lava. The lake hisses and booms as the metal lurches from the depths, glowing and sparking as it rises.
Khorlagh smiles proudly as his machines do their work. A few hundred feet away an island of coiled, scratched brass rises, an entire headland wrought of spiralling, pockmarked metal. As the chains drag it towards us I see Khorlagh’s monstrous slaves: towering, ox-headed beastmen, with brutal, swooping horns and four arms, all lashed to the sides of the metal island. There are hundreds of them heaving the great disc of brass from the boiling lake. Their bodies are crackling and smoking like roasting meat.
‘Ghorgons,’ says Hakh, with a hint of respect in his voice.
Khorlagh nods proudly.
‘How do they survive?’ I ask. ‘Why doesn’t the lava burn them up?’
Khorlagh nods at the pipes and chains joining the tower to the lake. ‘These engines have girded them with the wrath of the Blood God. It doesn’t protect them from the pain, but it certainly keeps them moving.’ He laughs and pats his whip. ‘They’re more daemon than beast now, but they wouldn’t dare defy me.’
‘How will we ride it?’ asks Hakh, staring at the quickly approaching island.
Khorlagh laughs. ‘With care. And getting on isn’t the only challenge.’ He points his trident at the clouds of ash overhead. ‘When my servants rise, they always bring a crowd with them.’
I look where he’s pointing and see nothing but embers, falling from the night sky.
Hakh clearly sees something more. ‘Ready your axes,’ he bellows, looking back at the Blood Creed. ‘We’re going to have some sport.’
‘I must prepare for the landing,’ says Khorlagh, heading back into the tower, yelling orders as he goes.
The ghorgons make a horrific sight as they haul the metal to shore, straining and thrashing at their bonds as gangways hurtle down from the tower, locking the island into place. Khorlagh’s men dash back and forth through the lava spray, acting out a lethal dance as they fasten more hooks and chains onto the limbs of the giant beastmen.
Then, suddenly, with a grinding screech, one of the ghorgons breaks free. It charges through the lava, bellowing and making straight for us. Dozens of Khorlagh’s men are smashed from the walkways as they try to halt it, thrown to their deaths in the lava below.
The ghorgon reaches the shore and does not pause, still running straight at where Hakh and I are waiting. I back away but Hakh just glares at the monster. It towers over him but he looks at it as though it’s no more dangerous than a stray dog.
Khorlagh cries a command and grappling hooks blast out from the walls of the brass tower. They slam into the ghorgon with such force that they punch through its chest and send it hurling back the way it came. It crashes to the ground, lifeless.
I glance at Hakh, wondering if the attack has deterred him in any way, but he barely seems to have noticed. His gaze is still locked on the far shore and the tantalising glint of brass that lies beyond the walls of the crater. I’ve completely ensnared him. My heart races but I try to calm myself. It’s not done yet. My visions have misled me in the past.
After what seems to me a painfully long time, Khorlagh’s slaves succeed in pinning the island down under a forest of staves, chains and walkways. The ghorgons heave and roar, unable to break their bonds, and Khorlagh appears from the tower, his skin-mask in complete disarray.
‘Be quick, my lord,’ he cries, waving us towards the walkways and rushing to meet us there. He points at the clouds. The embers now look more like shooting stars, rushing towards the lake. ‘We must board before they attack.’
As we climb across ramparts and onto the trembling jetties I see crowds of Khorlagh’s slaves hanging from chains as they try to hold the ghorgons in place. As they crank their gears and shove their levers, the bonds tighten, finally silencing the monsters’ feral cries.
We’re only halfway across the gangway when there’s a scream of grinding metal and we are all thrown off our feet. Several of Hakh’s knights are hurled into the lava and, for a moment, I think I might follow them, but Hakh still has hold of me.
Another one of the ghorgons has broken free and is thrashing from side to side.
More slaves are thrown to their deaths before Khorlagh can reach the scene. He and several of his lackeys arrive carrying a long pipe that ends in what looks like a diamond harpoon. They fire the point deep into the ghorgon’s thick neck and it drops from view.
As they run back down the gangway, Khorlagh waves at figures lining the battlements of the brass tower. There is a flash of sparks and flame as they activate another machine and send a bolt of energy down the pipes. The metal crackles with power and the ghorgons twitch. The air crackles as they start to heave the island back into the lake.
Khorlagh grins as he runs back up the walkway, waving us on, towards the centre of the island.
The heat makes me feel sick and embers settle on my face as I run, scorching my skin, but the Blood Creed do not falter. Khorlagh leads us up an incline until I see where he’s taking us. There’s a scorched, blackened hole blasted right in the centre of the metal island. It has created a kind of walled enclosure lined with jagged terraces and trailing masses of chains. Khorlagh and his men wave us down into the scorched pit but the Blood Creed need no instruction; they flood down into the hole and begin fastening the chains to their armour. Hakh drags me down with him and binds me to his jagged plate armour with a thick chain.
We’re barely settled when Khorlagh gives another signal, eliciting more blasts of energy. There’s a clanging din as the Blood Creed are thrown to their knees, and I’m forced to cling onto Hakh’s armour. For a terrifying moment, I think we’re going to plunge beneath the lava, but the furious ghorgons keep the metal above the surface as it powers back out into the lake. Heat pours over me and I can’t seem to catch my breath. I try to rise and cry out, but then the world turns black.
When I come to, I’m on my back, looking at a mixture of stars and spinning embers. Hakh has gone, but I’m chained securely to a shard of heat-warped brass. At first, I think I must be delirious, the scene is so nightmarish. I’m surrounded by the howling, grunting ranks of Hakh’s knights, and they’re fighting for their lives. The air is teeming with huge, ferocious animals – snarling, feline monsters with great leathery wings and broad, slashing claws. Before my books were burned I spent long hours studying the creatures of myth and legend, and a name tumbles from my lips: manticores. They’re roaring furiously as they dive, tearing Hakh’s warriors from the metal, and feeding on them like gulls fighting for scraps.
The more the manticores kill, the more enraged their shrieks become. They hurl corpses into the lava and roar with bloodlust.
The manticores are almost as massive as the ghorgons but the Blood Creed are inhuman and utterly fearless. After the initial shock, they soon start to revel in the slaughter. They laugh at the terrifying creatures as they cut them down. Hakh has unshackled himself and climbed to the lip of the silver crater, s
urrounded by fumes and sparks. He’s like a captain at the prow of an infernal ship, howling as he cuts the manticores from the sky.
The beasts fight on, berserk, but the end comes quickly. As the last of them plunges to a fiery death, I lie there on the scorched metal, shaken by the horror my world has become. Chaos has tainted every part of the Khavall Steppe. Everyone I ever loved died at the hands of Hakh’s armies. Is revenge really enough?
As Hakh’s knights celebrate their victory I can think of nothing but Tylos, striding towards me through the flames, blazing with valour.
Chapter Twelve
Lord-Celestant Tylos Stormbound
As the Anvil entombs our foes, the fossil that destroyed it whirls away, leaving a tornado of dust and rubble as it hurtles across the steppe.
‘Follow it!’ cries Boreas, struggling to be heard over the din, battling through the falling debris to reach me.
The rest of my army emerges from the swirling clouds of dust, bloody but unbowed – looking for my command. As they stagger from the wreckage towards me, I’m distracted by the skeletal colossus filling the sky, blocking out the moonlight and shedding towers the size of mountains. Truly, this realm is full of wonders.
‘Hammers of Sigmar!’ I roar, rising up in my saddle and pointing Grius at the disappearing fossil. ‘Witness a miracle! Witness the power of the God-King.’
Boreas staggers to a halt nearby and the rows of expressionless masks turn to face me.
I keep Grius pointed at the enormous skeleton crashing across the steppe.
‘The realms will kneel no more!’
I bring Grius and Evora together over my head and they erupt in a ball of holy fire. Faith and fury pour through my skin and armour, surrounding me in a blinding nimbus of light. ‘For the God-King!’ I cry, as Zarax rears beneath me, spewing lightning from between her gaping jaws.
The Stormcasts reel away from me, shaking their heads in wonder, even Boreas. Then, as Zarax tears off in pursuit of the skeleton, I hear them echo my war cry and join the chase.
At first the going is slow, as we struggle over the ruins of the Anvil. Most of its defenders are buried beneath a landslide of broken masonry, but every few feet I see a grim reminder of the warriors who seemed so unstoppable a few minutes earlier: twisted, bleeding hands jutting up from the rocks and lifeless faces, staring up at the sky, their skulls sheared apart. I allow Zarax to hurtle past most of them but there is one corpse, skewered on a fallen spire, that catches my attention. I rein Zarax in and look down at the still muttering warrior. It’s the champion with the skinless face. His body has been torn almost entirely in two by the piece of masonry but he’s still clinging to life.
At the sight of me he laughs and tries to rise, but he only succeeds in pouring his viscera across his broken legs.
‘You do not exist,’ he gurgles through a mouth full of blood. ‘The Blood God and I–’
Before he can say more, Zarax roasts him alive with a blinding flash of lightning. I make the sign of the hammer as he crumbles into ash, then urge the dracoth on.
As I leave the ruins behind I see that Boreas’ warnings were not exaggerated. The fossilised serpent is heading directly east, towards a shimmering line of fire that stretches across the entire horizon.
‘Lake Malice,’ I say out loud, recalling my brother’s description of the impassable lake. I would never let Boreas know, of course, but I have no idea how we will cross this final hurdle. Even god-forged Stormcast Eternals cannot simply wade through lava.
As it nears the lake, the skeleton is lit up in red and gold and I have the strange sense that we’re chasing a lost soul, plunging into the depths of the underworld.
I rein Zarax in and allow the others to catch up. Boreas is at the fore and I’m about to praise him for destroying the Anvil when he speaks.
‘Lord-Celestant,’ he says. His voice sounds angry rather than pleased. ‘Our passage through the Anvil was not bought cheaply.’
‘I understand, Boreas.’ I glance at the quickly disappearing monster. ‘Sigmar sees all. Whatever pain you’ve endured–’
‘Tylos, you don’t understand.’ He glances down at the relics hanging from his armour. ‘The price was the Kuriat.’
I can’t hide my shock. ‘The heart? Boreas, what do you mean?’
‘I bought our passage with it.’ He steps closer. ‘It was the only way. We’re almost out of time. The tempest was sent astray. If we’d spent any longer trapped in the Anvil–’
‘Yes,’ I interrupt. ‘I understand.’ Anger pounds in my chest and it takes all my strength to keep my voice calm. The Kuriat was the key to the Crucible of Blood. Without it, there’s no way we can seize control of the realmgate. For the first time since we landed, I feel the ghost of my past rising to challenge me. I grasp the hilt of my sword in an attempt to steady myself. I hear a harsh voice at the back of my thoughts: the brutal, honourless killer I was before the Lord of Storms tempered me. I grip the hilt tighter until my heart steadies.
Boreas watches my hand on the runeblade.
‘I had no choice,’ he says.
The rage passes. I am as true as Evora’s blade. I dismount.
‘Boreas, do you trust in Sigmar?’ I place my hand on his shoulder.
He nods.
‘Then trust in me. We both know what we must do.’
He grips my arm. ‘Brother,’ he begins, ‘I swear that there was nothing else–’
‘I know,’ I reply, returning his grip. ‘And we both knew it might come to this.’ I manage to keep my voice level as I consider the path left open to us. ‘There can be no return.’
Before either of us can say more, an explosion tears the night open. Golden light flashes in the polished metal of my men’s masks. Boreas and I both turn to study this latest miracle.
The serpent has thrown its entire length across Lake Malice. The liquid sprays and hisses over bones as big as mountains and it is enveloped by a liquid heat haze.
‘You bought us a bridge,’ I say, turning back to Boreas with a laugh of disbelief.
He nods and, despite everything we face, I hear laughter in his voice too. But then he becomes serious again. ‘Not for long, brother.’
I follow his gaze and see what he means. Even through the haze I can see the skeleton smouldering and warping where it lies in the lava. As we stare, it raises its fanged skull and lets out a ghostly roar.
‘Move!’ I cry, leaping back into the saddle and waving Grius at the lake. ‘The Lord-Relictor has bought us a passage to victory. Our journey ends on the far shore.’
Zarax leads the charge, speeding me across the black rocks. Boreas and the others rush to follow as Drusus leads the Prosecutors overhead, scouting the night sky for signs of attack.
By the time we reach the shore, the skeletal serpent has left a trail of carnage. The area is littered with strange architecture – weird, domed houses built in the shape of bull-headed monsters, destroyed by the giant fossil. Zarax vaults over broken horns and shattered snouts. As we career through the strange scene, I get my first glimpse of those we’ve come to save: emaciated, wide-eyed mortals, cowering in outfits as ridiculous as their homes. They make a tragic sight and I raise my head, determined to show them what humanity can be.
As we near the lava, I see the remains of a bastion that must have been crafted by the same brutal hand as the Anvil. The smashed remnants show signs of jagged, taloned battlements and thick, brass walls. On the side facing the lake there is a pile of broken machinery – wheels and pulleys that were previously linked to great chains, now all gone, torn free by the impact of the bone serpent.
Zarax pounds on. As we near the bubbling lava, an intense wave of heat penetrates my armour. The skeleton is sinking fast, the fossilised remains slumping and snapping as the lava devours them, and I’m about to cry out a warning when Zarax makes the leap. The fossil’s
tail holds as her great, scaled bulk crashes down on it, and the Liberators follow close behind, clambering onto the splintering ivory arch as though they were simply crossing a brackish stream. Again, I’m hit by the incredible charge I’ve been entrusted with – what kind of warriors would follow me across this searing heat, with death only a single misstep away? Only those born of the God-King’s immutable will.
Unlike the others, I have only to hold my nerve as Zarax carries me towards the far side. As the bones jolt and crack under her weight, gouts of smoking lava lash out, but Zarax has the heat of stars running through her veins and she charges on, dodging every blast the furnace can throw at us.
Boreas’ fossil has lowered its head and I can clearly see our goal ahead – a flash of moonlit brass, glimpsed over a ridge of basalt. The Crucible of Blood is painfully close, but so is the dawn. The dazzling lava beneath me makes it impossible to be sure, but I can’t help thinking that the sky is getting lighter.
‘Faster!’ I cry, turning back to my men. They’re already showing god-like heroism by hurling themselves over these bones, but I will not face Sigmar as a failure. ‘We have to reach the Crucible before the sun rises!’
They pick up their pace, but fossilised bones do not make for easy footing. The paladins in particular struggle to heft their massive suits of armour over the crumbling vertebrae and the heat is now so intense that the fossil is starting to spark and flame. Soon the whole thing will be ablaze, but I’m forced to rein Zarax in halfway across and wait for the others to reach me.
I can feel the seconds ebbing away and it is a torment to sit powerlessly, so close to my goal. I cast my gaze out across the lake and see a shape rushing in our direction. There’s something moving through the lava, making for the burning skeleton.
‘Faster!’ I roar, looking back along the fossil. The vanguard of Liberators has almost reached me and the Judicators are with them, but the retinues of paladins are trailing way behind, with Boreas at their head. Drusus has led his Prosecutors down from the clouds to help. They are hovering over the struggling paladins, pounding their celestial wings as they attempt to lift their brothers over the crumbling, sparking bridge.