“Down to Catarhactes or up to the Ceraph’s throne, they who travel fastest, travel alone.” -Iscarneth proverb
Behind them, Zaleria burned, and before them, Hycis too. The Remnant had meant to forge a lasting peace, and now lay shattered upon the anvil of war.
The Library of Galaeron had not been Knight-Incantor Attica’s first battle, not really. The things they witnessed there had brought fleeting memories into sharp focus, yet each was but a page torn from a tome they knew-not the name of. They held their duty tight, yet duty was a cold mistress, a fact they remembered well, even though they knew not why. They’d left Horith’s Hall behind in the dead of night; Azyr’s armies knew their business, and needed no guiding hand now that battle had been well and truly joined. They sought those with answers beyond the Library's burned volumes, those who had lived before they had, presumably, died.
Those who could tell Attica who they had been, if not who they were now.
The Waaagh! had come for Zaleria and the Tetrarchy which held court there. Attica did not doubt the Remnant’s tenacity, but they knew there would be no victory. They’d found them alone in the audience of a loathsome creature, wracked with delusion and beset by the hallowed dead in retribution for its blasphemy. They’d run the beast through with Sigmarite steel, and gathered up the Tetrarchy without a word of protest.
The Shimmersea churned with the passage of Rogue Idols beneath their boat, and Attica shed the blue and silver plate of the Tempest Lords lest they be swamped beneath its weight, tossing the armor overboard until nought but their arming robes and their Mask Impassive remained. They feared that, should they shed the mask too, they would never again bring themself to heed their duty. Still, the skulls said nothing.
They would make Iscarion in time, but appearing as no more than debris was the saving grace that prevented their discovery. So they drifted, even as Kaptin Sharkbiter’s hulks bore past them toward Mallon’s Folly and beyond, seemingly heedless of Mogrek’s other battles now that the Shimmersea had been won.
***
Across the Prime Dominion
The Vermindoom had sundered distant Aqshy, heralding ruin upon Sigmar’s domain on a scale not seen since the dawn of the Age of Chaos. Every corner of the Mortal Realms found themselves in the shadow of the Horned Rat’s ascension, and even as the defenders of Hel Crown were slaughtered, so too did the Skaventide wash across the Prime Dominion.
Clan Eshin Deathmaster Mikot
Mikot had long served Clan Eshin, and that itself was a testament to the Deathmaster’s skill. His Night Runner clawpack had swarmed down the cables suspending the massive Kharadron shipwreck. Mikot had seen the type before, of course, but they were rare outside the Skyports. The stunty technology was pathetic like that; if they built their boats too big, they’d fall out of the sky. Clan Skryre technology was not so… limited. They had been sent to kill a particular Grey Seer who had fallen out of line and struck out on their own. Mikot knew all Skaven had grand notions- he’d killed enough of them for theirs- but this one had proven especially odd. Not that it mattered; they’d be dead soon enough, just like all the others.
Minutes later, Mikot found himself bruxing in frustration. The Grey Seer wasn’t here, even as the siege above them shook even this rotting hulk. The Deathmaster hadn’t realized his victim was so deluded as to lead from the front. Even as they made to slip away, one of his Gutter Runner sentries sounded the alarm. They had company.
Company, as it turned out, was an exceptionally big and old orruk, his brutes and ‘ardboyz heavy with looted swag, hooting and hollering as they returned their gains to the belly of the Undesired’s new stronghold. Mikot drew his weeping blades; perhaps one of them could tell them where to find his intended kill.
Arch-Warlock Skrikt “Krol” Stormfire
The city-things had thought themselves smart to fight them in the tunnels, thus proving how stupid they were. The tree-thing aelfs had proven themselves cunning and fast, but he’d yet to see any outrun a Doomwheel. The singing stunty things were troublesome: they were well-acquainted with heat and tunnels, forcing him to use warp-grinders to open new arrowslits in the walls, roof and even floor through which to bathe the advancing Fyreslayers in warpfire hot enough to even burn away the golden ghost-things that came from out of the walls.The cannibal-things were easy to kill by comparison, especially as they gladly charged ratling guns and warpblasters heedless of their own casualties. Most astoundingly, they did this without anyone forcing them from behind!
Stupid-stupid indeed, thought the Arch-Warlock, and signaled for his Stormfiends to be unleashed.
Master Moulder Gratt Stinkfinger
Gratt whipped the loping, heaving mass of rat ogors beneath him as they passed by. His adversaries were Chaos-touched themselves, which perhaps explained their temerity to attack his surprise attack by surprise! Hundreds of clanrats had died before, beneath and behind the enemy’s cavalry charge, not that their lives mattered. What mattered was that a score of his own unmatched creations now lay dead beneath the enemy’s berserk onslaught, too! Gratt caught sight of a slight woman screaming incantations, and chittered in anger. The darkoath witch would die screaming for her impudence, too!
Nearly a dozen of the Master Moulder’s useless Packmasters came stumbling over each other, all pointing to the sky and chittering warnings. Breaking through the smothering fog came Sigmar’s lightning-warriors, clad in grey-blue and gold plate and riding drakes. Gratt hissed, and whipped the Packmasters instead until they scattered. He didn’t like risking the Abominations if it wasn’t necessary, but apparently, it had just become necessary…
High Clawlord Thrikepius Stormwhisker
The din of battle was music to Thrikepius’ keen ears. He was proud of how far away he could hear a battle, and today was no different. It was a sweet song, and the melody told him all he needed to know about the battle’s progress. Well, that, and the steady stream of reports brought to him by disgraced underlings. If the news was good, he might be merciful, and allow them an honorable return to the front rank of a clanrat regiment, and if the news was bad, they still served to keep his gnawbeast well-fed.
The reports chittered on about wicked, stabbing aelf she-things in purple and black. Thrikepius asked the runner if the aelf-things still bled red; upon confirmation, the Clawlord instructed the runner to instruct the Stormvermin to stab them harder and more often. When a runner claimed they’d been stopped still by a wall of brass-and-steel storm-things, the Clawlord had blasted the messenger’s guts out with his ratling pistol and then sent another runner to instruct his Stormvermin to stab them harder and more often. When that runner came back and told him about different storm-things in black and gold, the Clawlord had the unfortunate’s legs fed to his gnawbeast, and then had two other couriers carry him back to the front to instruct his Stormvermin to stab the new storm-things harder and more often.
Impressed with his own tactical genius, Thrikepius watched with great satisfaction as a new batch of messengers was rounded up from those who’d been caught running away.
Plague Priest Rikatt Scabscratch, Loathsome Rodent of the Horned Bell
Rikatt was confident. Specifically, he was confident that his robes and bandages were foul enough that none of the plague monks around him could smell his fear musk. This, of course, was not true, but they feared the plague priest too much to give him any impression otherwise. The tree-things had come from above, riding on the orruk-thing’s rickety airships! Since when did tree-things make friends with orruk-things?! Had Rikatt come out from his gnawhole to find the Realm’s turned upside down?
Even worse, the ghost-things were immune to their most virulent poxes! Sure, they would melt flesh into a blistered slurry, but these were souls bearing swords. Their scythe-things had cut through scores of his censer bearers in minutes, unaffected by the billowing clouds of rot and smoked blisterpus.
This was a test. That had to be it! Simply a chance to prove his devotion. The plague priest was so caught up in his madness, he didn’t even notice his plague monks “respectfully” allowing him to lead the next charge.
Clawlord Nelatt Greyfur of Clan Skweepus
It had all been going so well, too. The Waaagh!-things had destroyed them utterly. Nelatt had gotten greedy: the spoils from Mogrek’s follower camp had simply been too promising to pass up. The carpet firebombing of their gnawholes should have been the first indication that something was amiss, but Nelatt didn’t become Clawlord by becoming discouraged after a setback. He’d brushed off the pit-traps and boltboy ambushes as simple prudence; no stash worth looting would be entirely undefended.
The troggherd had presented a problem, but Nelatt had never met a problem he couldn’t solve with enough warp lightning cannons. Unfortunately, the troggs turned out to be the first, and things had become especially bad when all the ratling guns and warpfire throwers he’d sent to put down the troublesome beasts got obliterated by a leadbelcher barrage.
And, all that was before the ogor’s butcher-things had overturned their great pots and sent a flood of blood-gravy washing through the Clawlord’s ranks. Those that didn’t drown were marked, the non-inconsiderable senses of the ogors and orruks turning what remained of Clan Skweepus into casual dining.
No, this had not gone well. Nelatt steeled himself, betraying none of his misgivings in front of his loyal and last remaining littermate Neleep Greyfur. No, he would learn his lessons privately, and next time-
Nelatt couldn’t even scream as the blade severed his windpipe. “Dumb, Nelatt. Very dumb. You were never the most clever Greyfur, were you? Just the biggest. Neleep leads Clan Skweepus, now.”
Clawlord Neleep Greyfur tore his jagged dagger from his kin’s neck, looking down without pity or remorse as the liege lord he’d faithfully served for years bled out before him.
“Neleep will do better than you ever did.”
***
Amisra
Perched upon the cliffs overlooking Amisra, choppy winds whipping all around them, Blisterpaw looked out over the small settlement. It was a smuggler’s outpost more than anything, once used by the Undesired to run contraband to various surface-side ports. A crude palisade had been built around it, and the skaven leader could see the few defenders peering nervously over the wooden walls. Their Stormcast allies had left, chasing Little Wren. Lightning blasts rising to the heavens hours before told him that they had found her. The militia that remained would see green lights on the hilltops and little more, he was certain. They had no way of knowing what was about to happen to them.
With a cruel wave, he signaled to his warplock engineers, who cackled gleefully and began pulling levers on the bank of cannons arrayed across the hillside. Warp lightning grew in the brazen guts of the artillery pieces, spinning faster and faster, then leapt into the air. The screech of the blasts was an unearthly banshee wail, followed by a thunderous clap as air rushed to fill the void created by the lightning, and the explosive burst of the palisade walls bursting apart in flaming ruin. Screams of pain and cries of alarm sounded distantly, but Blisterpaw was already moving down the hillside. Below them, the defenders, if any were left that could still see, would be watching glowing eyes and runes of green rising from the hillsides around them. Dozens of Idols, striding on concert, marched on the burning settlement. There would be no fight, not a real one at least. All Blisterpaw had to do was pick over the ruins.
Amisra Destroyed
Edraele
The last few refugees were hurried through the gates of Selennar City moments before the heavy doors swung shut. For days they had been streaming in from the outlying villages of Edraele, trails of smoke showing the progress of the invaders. Now the orruks stood only a field’s length away. Shadowsplittaz and Sea Spears hurled taunts back and forth, showing off the loot each had taken from the ravaged countryside and bragging of the carnage they would wreak on the city. Behind the blustering orruk lines, a wall of Idols stood. Their utter stillness and complete silence was somehow more terrifying when seen against the bellicose horde, poised like an avalanche waiting to break.
Upon the walls of the city, Vaska of the Black Rose stood alone. No reinforcements would be coming. No bombard support would be offered. Her black flag snapped in the wind, its solitary rose a flash of colour against a sky churning and darkening. The storm would be coming soon, and the orruks would no doubt be attacking before it broke. She gripped her sword tighter. If this was to be the end, then so be it. Let her shed the last of her blood in defence of the Iscarneth, as she had once sworn. Let this burn away the shame of her past.
She felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned to see a spectral form standing beside her. Its features were a haze, yet the sigil of the Dornayar blazed brightly on its breast.
“The spirits of this land remember your oath,” it said, its voice distant yet clear. “We served the people of this land, not thrones or kings. Serve them now, and be freed.”
All along the wall, glowing forms appeared, standing alongside her warriors. Shoulder to shoulder, the honoured dead and the dishonoured risen, united once more in a common purpose.
The Waaagh! sounded from across the field, roiling across the plain like an animal of its own, and in a great surge the orruks charged. Each crew was eager to breach the walls first, eager for blood and plunder, and they reached the city just as the first few fat drops broke from the sky above. Axes smashed into the barred gates, biting through and into the bones of the skeletal defenders beyond. Ladders and ropes were sent flying and hobnailed boots landed along the city’s walls. For all their enthusiasm, however, they were unprepared for the ferocity of the Black Rose’s counterattack. Vampiric skill and might slashed through their ranks, while the living defenders were bolstered by their ancestors’ presence. At the gate, spectral forms passed through the splintering barricade, their chill touch freezing the orruks’ lifeblood and spilling their heavy breaching axes from unfeeling hands. Attackers were cast from the walls, ladders smashed, and with a great bellowing cry the retreat was sounded.
As the orruks fell back, they were met by the heavy, lumbering strides of the Idols. The rocky behemoths crashed into the walls with a stony determination even the dead could not match. The sky, now black, split with a thunderous crack, and torrential rain broke loose. From then on, the battlefield became a kaleidoscope of darkness and colour. The glowing green eyes and glyphs of the Idols loomed from overhead. The faint purple outlines of the Dornayeth spirits. Crimson streaks of arcane lighting. A brief flash of lightning illuminated an Idol toppling precipitously backwards, a vampiric knight and Iscarneth militia captain clinging to its splintered face. Another flash showed an orruk brute’s choppa biting clean through a blood knight’s torso, cleaving steel and bone with equal savage glee. Amidst it all, a glowing redoubt of purple and gold held around the banner of the Black Rose and Vaska herself, unwavering as the spirit of the land.
An hour later, sun washed the plains before Selennar city. The storm had passed. Rain had mixed with the blood of the battlefield, and now hung like a haze in the air, evaporating away. The walls of the city were cracked, broken in dozens of places where the Idols had simply smashed through. Yet the walls of the people had stood. The spirits were gone, fading away like mist in the sun. The local militia, those that survived, were quietly patching their wounds or searching for the bodies of their comrades. Citizens moved among them providing water or care. Groups were already organizing to pull the rubble away and start filling makeshift barricades into the holes in the wall. The Black Rose stood apart. The memory of their misdeeds, of siding with Mithridates Alti, might always stay with them. The stories of what they had done, standing alone against the hordes of orruks and idols, would always be remembered by the people of the land. Perhaps that would be redemption enough.
Edraele Defended, Local Defences Heavily Damaged
Ellisar
Battle raged in the central square of Ellisar City, close and desperate. The city’s walls had fallen in the days before to an attack they had never seen coming, when tunneling pigs bore through their foundations and attacked the defenders from within. Goblin sappers had done the rest of the work, bringing the structures crashing to ground with thunderous aplomb. Dire wolves prowled among the ruins, dragging down those too slow or injured to escape, before herding the pigs deeper into the city streets. From that point on it had become a chaotic business of close quarter fighting street by street, house by house. It was a fight that favoured the brutal force of the orruks. Only the disciplined leadership of Asarora of the Storm’s Howl, striking at the invaders like a mirage before fading away once more, had kept it from becoming a rout. Instead, they fell back, step by step, to the square. There, back to back, there was nothing left to do but hold.
Iscarneth shield walls held each of the avenues into the square, their layered defences and long pike at last able to be brought to some semblance of order. Riflemen leaned out of the surrounding buildings, firing into the horde below, though the reports of their guns were growing rarer. What ammunition they had left had to be preserved, as firing into the horde achieved little. It was zombies that assaulted the walls now, raised up by Khataras Khan from the slain defenders at the walls. A fresh horror for the Iscarneth defenders, forced to kill their fallen comrades or watch them impale themselves on the long pikes, dragging them to the ground and opening gaps in the shield wall.
At the centre of the square, Koyou, Lethe and Asavash worked furiously, weaving prayer and arcane power together in a blistering array of power. It was no small feat they were attempting, and each could feel the mystic fires they wove fighting against the binding. If they strayed, if a hand so much as slipped, it could consume them all in an eternal conflagration without escape. Yet their minds did not stray, and their hands did not slip. Golden fire rose between them, first in a blaze, then in a torrent, rising in a whirling column high above the city. A cry resounded from within, and the aelemental fire split forth into a pair of great, blazing wings, spreading across the battlefield. A great Phoenix, golden red, rose from the column and circled above, raining burning sparks across the battered streets. Where each golden spark fell, the spirits of the fallen arose, shining in golden light and bearing a gleaming arcane spear. Where the sparks fell red and angry, they burned through zombies and orruks alike. The zombie horde shuddered to a stop, then collapsed, the anguished spirits animating them restored in the phoenix’s gold light. With a final cry, the Great Phoenix spread its wings and launched itself across the sky, off to awaken the dormant Phoenix Temples across the Prime Dominion.
Flanked by a golden honour guard of Phoenix Temple spirits, Lethe and Asavash charged through the rallying defenders and into the ranks of the orruks. Suddenly bereft of their allies and under assault from the sky and the ground, panic swept through the Waaagh’s masses. Orruks turned and fled, but the mass of their charge that had carried them through the earlier fighting had become an anchor. Too many to flee at once through the narrow streets, many were cut down as they tried to push their way back.
Koyou watched the assault from the town centre, exhausted from the ritual. The Iscarneth and their allies pushed the horde back down each of the major roadways, expanding outwards from their holding ground, growing farther and farther apart by the moment.
Koyou frowned a half second before a monstrous hand burst forth from the ground, wrapping around her and throwing her bone-breakingly hard into a cracked stone fountain. From out of the earth, a monstrosity pulled itself forth. Swollen flesh wrapped around blackened steel, the ghoul queen Silanore, Doom of Sylmare, tore free of the earth and roared into the heavens. At the centre of her chest, where Knight-Arcanum Attica’s blade had pierced her through, a roaring furnace of Aqshy’s fire had been set. Chug-wrought columns belched black smoke from her back, and her feral roar was joined by the screeching of superheated metals. Behind her, emerging from the tunnels bored beneath the city by Dur’Log’s hogs, came the Screaming Court and Azoth Realmgorger. A burning templar, still charged by the Phoenix’s touch, fired a bolt of golden fire into the monstrous ghoul queen, but it splashed across the blackened steel and was absorbed into the fires of Aqshy. A high-pitched shrieking that might have been a laugh came from the massive monstrosity, and with an almost contemptuous sweep of her claw she carved the templar into bloody pieces. Rumbling to motion with fire and smoke, the ghouls and ogors charged towards the backs of the pushing defender lines.
Kido Takara stood on the hills overlooking the city, watching the monstrous creatures pull themselves from the earth. She had sent a message to the capital asking for bombard support, but whatever was happening there was making communication difficult, and no Idols had appeared at the battle for them to hone in on. Her Exiled Blades had ambushed a group of skaven trying to move a warp lightning cannon into position to fire down on the defenders, and in a flash she was struck by an idea. With a quick word, her soldiers hauled on the long barrel of the cannon, turning it to face in the direction of the emerging chug horde. The aim would not be precise, but she figured that hardly mattered with skaven engineering. Offering a quick prayer, and knowing the damage she would cause if this went wrong, she raised the glimmerstone and yelled “FIRE WHERE THE LIGHTNING STRIKES!”, then kicked the firing lever.
A blast of warp lightning shot forth, blasting into a building beside the charging ghouls and ogors, showering them with debris but little else. A long moment passed, and Kido wondered whether the message had made it through, or if there was anyone left to even hear it. Then, a light appeared on the horizon, and the whistling sound of the great bombard blast descending. It smashed into the spot where the lightning cannon had struck, sending ogors and ghouls flying. A second, then a third blast followed, breaking the horde. Amidst the fire and destruction, Kido saw Silanore and Azoth disappearing into the tunnels beneath the city once more, driven off by the relentless blasts of the bombards, their armies devastated. Though it wrought a terrible destruction on the enemy, the bombards also leveled buildings, homes, anything and everything they touched. The people of Ellisar, deep in the hidden mines beneath her feet, would be safe for now, but in destroying the invaders the city had been left in ruins. Yet, thanks to them, there were those left who could rebuild in time, and that alone was worth the price.
Ellisar Defended, Local Defences Barely Survived
The Four Sisters
The small islands should have been easy prey for Prince Tahnuhada and his soul raiders. Isolated, its warriors called to fight the orruks on the walls of Iscarion, what chance would they have against the well-honed blades of the Akhelian? Instead of undefended villages, however, they found the cold, blackened steel of the Cult of the Blue Flame. Cruel and wicked as they were, raider weapons meant to inflict pain and terror on unarmed civilians were poor matches against hardened warriors, and with grim determination Jabathai’s disciples turned the raid into a slaughter. Prince Tahnuahada and his inner cabal turned tail and fled, leaving their thralls to be slaughtered to cover their retreat, yet had barely made it half way back to the Shimmersea when the titanic forms of the Hyakki Yagyō emerged from the sea and began striding up the beach towards them. Caught between slaughter and certain death, the Idoneth raiders had little choice but to turn again and flee into the forest.
The tranquil, verdant woods of Elesha had once been a place of peace and meditation for the Iscarneth. The war had changed that. Daemonic corruption hung rank in the air, foetid vapours clouding the upper branches. The trees had grown blackened and twisted, bent at odd and sinister angles. Craggy faces leered from their trunks. Spiders scuttled in the branches above, and the ground felt soft and rotten beneath the feet. Prince Tahnuahada and his warriors ran, heedless of the corruption. Blood slammed in the Prince’s ears, and he felt he could hear the gargants’ footsteps right behind him. There was a brief scream, and the warrior that had been at his side vanished in a shower of rotting leaves. There was a brief glimmer of light through the darkened boughs, and he burst out into a small clearing. Prince Tahnuahada’s heart stopped. Thirteen skaven clustered about in the clearing, forming a ritual circle. Green flames and smoke rose from bloody sacrifices, and in their midst, at the circle’s centre, rose a huge figure, horrific and glorious in its utter blasphemy, towering horns rising above its rat-like face. Its head turned, two bale-fire eyes fixing on the Akhelian Prince, and Tahnuahada screamed.
Not a single Idoneth emerged from those darkened woods.
The Four Sisters Defended
Lhoris
The flames of Ellisar to the south and Iscarion to the north darkened the horizons, yet it was a different red tide that descended upon the Great Shrine of Lhoris. Squigs in the thousands rolled across the landscape like a swarm of locusts, consuming everything before them, bowling through villages and sacred sites with gleeful abandon. It was not clear whether they had been loosed on these lands intentionally, or were merely another consequence of the Waaagh!’s presence in the Prime Dominion, yet it made little difference to the beleaguered defenders. The Fighting Legion of Hochazec fought a staggered retreat through the town streets, falling back to ordered check points and rallying around makeshift barricades. Marshal Aegrun struck out in valiant forays, throwing back the tide momentarily as civilians were marshaled back into the old Phoenix Temple, the last line of defence. As the Fighting Legion stood at last, side by side and shields locked against the tide, the keening shriek of eels cut through the jabbering of the squigs. Siorc Fishbane and the Bann èisg fell upon the swarm from above, cutting through them like wheat. A red light filled Siorc’s eyes, blood boiling and smoking as it rose off of him in crimson vapours. He fought like a daemon, and as his charge met the rallying Fighting Legion pushing in the other direction, Siorc lashed out viciously at them. Quickly, the Bann èisg pulled their leader back before any harm could be done. Marshal Aegrun stepped across the mangler squig he had felled, sword held warily in his hands as the erstwhile allies stood off from each other, before Siorc turned away and stalked off through the ruined town, muttering something about chasing down the Mooncaller. The bodies of squigs and defenders littered the streets, but the people had been saved, the stampede destroyed, and Lhoris saved.
Lhoris Defended
***
The Dawn Palace
At the heart of the Dawn Palace, Dariel stared at the war map, his brows furrowed in concentration. A chiming sound broke his reverie, and he looked across at the glimmerpool, its magical scrying surface a calm silvery sheen. The rune softly glowing at its side indicated that Caradryas was trying to communicate with him.
Dariel frowned. Caradryas was only a few floors below him, attending to the bombards. He would not expend the magics of the glimmerpool without great need. He waved a hand over the arcane relic.
“Dariel,” Caradryas said, his form appearing in the pool. “Its Mogrek! He’s … its … seen…” The quicksilver bubbled and churned erratically, the voice coming from the pool clipped. Green bands washed over the image, then with a lurch it fell silent and still once more.
Dariel looked out the nearby window, but hardly needed to confirm what he already knew. This much Waagh! magic building up could only mean one thing.
The horde had arrived. The Siege of Iscarion had begun.
***
Iscarion
The illusive city of Iscarion bore scars upon its shining visage. Some, older, remnants of Alti's assault at the climax of the last war, had been hidden away, built upon, but were still there with those with the eyes to see. Atop them were newer wounds, barely beginning to heal as hasty reconstruction efforts patched holes and cleared ruins, left behind in the wake of the near-annihilation of the Mooncaller's night raid. Today would see old scars reopened alongside new lacerations. The night raid had only been the precursor. Today, the war came to Iscarion in earnest. Dariel coordinated the effort from his tower, a frenzy of aides and messengers swarming at his word, the might of the X Fretensis mercenary company bolstering his guard. Renaya had her own battles to fight elsewhere in the Dominion. It would be outsiders who led this defence.
Despite the proximity of the great rent in reality left by the Bad Moon, Iscarion had been largely spared from the skaven assault, the rats preferring to venture after easier targets. This also meant that nothing stood between the Waaagh! and the city's walls. Except for one commander and his assembled lieutenants. Qarang Sarn would not cower behind city walls like a frightened pup; he was a warrior, and he would meet the foe’s charge head on. The warriors of the Dark Choosing trembled with anticipation for the chance at glory, well equipped and provisioned thanks to a timely supply drop organized by Khvath Slaveborn. Quick moving skaven scouts from the Laughing Rats were already scampering back to Sarn’s side to report that the enemy had been sighted. The Basalt Lord mounted his steed and rode out before his troops. “Now is the time for blood, for glory, and for death. It is time to prove yourselves worthy to stand beneath me, or to die in the attempt. If you should forfeit your sorry lives, then sell them dearly. No cowards are we, to wait for our foe to come, we meet it head on!” With that, Sarn spurred his bestial mount forward with a roar, his troops taking up the shout alongside him.
The swaggering march of the Waaagh! forces descending upon Iscarion faltered as the wall of roars, blades and kicked up dust hit their front line. Wapkagut reeled as he found himself fending off blows with his stikks, having decided to take the trip on foot rather than atop his great maw-grunta to better feel the beat of the Realms through his toes. Goregon-Zola of the Bronze had sought the warchanter out directly, seeking to cut the head from this wing of the assault and earn his glory in spectacular fashion. The cannibal lord pressed his advantage as the battle was joined all around him, his blade chipping away at the rock-hard bone clubs wielded by his foe. He grinned with sharpened, blood-flecked teeth as his foe appeared to stumble back, and by then it was too late. Wapkagut had been using his foe’s relentless assault to hammer out a beat of his own, blocking and countering and stomping at just the right moments to tune in to the rhythm of the battle. With a mighty roar, his good eye flaring with viridian incandescence, the warchanter loosed a pulse of pure Waaagh! energy, sending his foe reeling back and invigorating the orruks amassed around him. Chuckling, Wapkagut stepped over his fallen foe, and continued his march. All around him, the Dark Choosing found their initially overwhelming preemptive strike faltering as the waves of power unleashed by the warchanter cascaded through them. Regaining his feet just as the blades began to fall upon him, Goregon-Zola weathered the assault, reaping a bloody harvest from his orruk assailants, his cracked lips slick with blood as he tore chunks from his foes with his teeth, invocations to the god of blood spilling forth from his mouth. His imprecations were cut short when something else sprouted from his open maw. The crude, serrated spear wielded by Gazlok Blackstone blossoming in slick crimson from the champion’s skull. As he died, Goregon-Zola smiled. Khorne cared not from whence the blood flowed, and Goregon-Zola went to meet his god in a torrent of ichor.
Blackstone wrenched his spear free and spurred his gnashtoof, Darkmaw, on. They had almost breached the Dark Choosing’s lines now, and the walls of the illusive city were in sight. Sarn’s forces were not done bloodying the Waaagh!’s nose yet, however. The flanks of the horde crumbled as grots, orruks and ogors found themselves withering under the dark magics of chariot-mounted bray shamans from the Khimer Brayherd, followed by overwhelming strikes by the colossal ghorgon Orgus and his equally monstrous son Bongor. Separated by the vastness of the horde, Orgus nevertheless felt a sudden stabbing as, on the battle’s opposite flank, Bongor fell screaming beneath the wheels of an enormous lashed together siege engine. With a howl of pure animalistic rage, Orgus plunged into the lines of his foe, slaying dozens of orruks with each sweep of his muscle bound arms. The other flank rallied at the sight of the fallen behemoth, driving the bray-shamans back. Grukka Redtoof of Da Bestest Blades took particular glee in lobbing Bongor’s severed head directly into the path of one chariot, sending the screaming shaman flying. A thousand years of oral history were lost in a second as the shaman plummeted to his doom.
Syndir’s Shadowsworn Host were the last of the Choosing to sound the retreat, weathering the onslaught with blades in hand as the Waaagh! swarmed all around them. They had not prevented the foe from reaching the walls of Iscarion, but the foe’s advance had cost them dearly. Syndir himself was surrounded by dozens of orruk corpses, and, as he lopped the head from an ambitious killaboss, he felt the gaze of the Basalt Lord fall upon him from across the field. Looking up, his eyes locked with Sarn’s crimson gaze, his eye peering through cracks in his helm. Qarang Sarn gave the warrior a nod of approval before ploughing on through the ranks of the foe. Syndir would be sought out once this battle was done.
The Waaagh! had hoped to break their way into Iscarion through the city’s grand southern gate, a plan anticipated by the strategic mind of Princess Nox of Noctras. In preparation for such an assault, the Princess had organised the construction of a new outer fortification around the gate. Dubbed Fort NoxCastra and guarded by an array of members of the Iscari Dawnguard, this would be the next great obstacle in the Waaagh!’s progress. The charging horde found themselves under fire from Dawnguard gunners, the marksmen deadly efficient as they showered their foes in shot. Dunk Bloodmouth’s ogor leadbelchers struggled to get into range to provide counterfire as their advance was halted by the combined might of the Guardian Legion and Da Skullkrushas manning the barricades around the newly erected fortification. Even as they fought, attackers and defenders alike looked to the sky as shadows began to block the ever-present light of Hysh. Flying high above the battlefield and led by the iridescent form of the Mooncaller came the remaining ghost ships from the previous raid on Iscarion. Alongside them came G’jak the Savage, the great winged Bloodthirster, light glinting angrily from his enormous weaponry. The skies would not be uncontested however.
From behind the high walls of Iscarion, a behemoth rose. The colossal skyship dubbed the Dread Nautilus broke from its moorings, the ground crew, a mix of skaven and denizens of the Lux Umbra, scattered as scaffoldings came crashing down all about them. The ship’s newly painted hull shone in the incandescence of the Dominion’s sky, marked with its name and the grey spiral of the Undesired. Much of the crew was made up of former pirates of the Lux Umbra, their own ships lost to the advance of the Waaagh! in the lands below. The ship itself had been built from scrapped wrecks from the Shimmersea conflict, while the captain’s cabin was furnished with the salvaged remnants of the ruined Miscellaneum. The engines groaned in protest as Sleekit Fang’s packmasters spurred the wolf rats powering the warp generators to run faster in their enormous bronze wheels. Standing at the fore of the ship, warpstone-tipped staff in hand, was Grey Seer Likspit, the zealous deathmaster Ghostface at their side. With a wave of their hand, Likspit signalled the bristling weaponry across the deck and hull of the ship brought around at the enemy.
The motley assortment of weapons, crewed by Skryre skaven under Ghostface’s hire alongside piratical gunners and ogor scrappers, rocked the ship with recoil as they belched forth a volley of iron, warp-lightning and warpstone bullets. In an instant, G’Jak’s right wing was shredded, riddled with warpstone bullets from a hull-mounted ratling warpblaster aboard the Dread Nautilus. With a howl, the daemon plunged from the air, crashing down upon Iscarion’s high wall. With some effort, he rose, tearing the useless wing from his flesh and hurling it at the scrambling defenders around him before bringing his weapons about in a dervish of blood and iron. The sight of the Bloodthirster’s rampage enraged the Beastcast Cik Bloodhorn, awakening something of his former bestial nature. The urge to kill. By the time he reached G’Jak, the Bloodthirster was needled with innumerable spears and arrows, limping as his chaotic essence unravelled around him. With an animalistic bellow, Cik leapt up the flank of the daemon, dodging G’Jak’s attempts to swipe him off, before plunging his blade deep into the Bloodthirster’s skull. His foe crumpled beneath him, his robes stained crimson with blood, Cik Bloodhorn howled up at the sky.
The Mooncaller, for his part, was faring better than his sky-fleet, even now burning in the sky all around him. With a giggle and a twirl, he warped the air around him. The hail of bullets that coursed towards him found themselves suddenly reversed, hurled back at the ship from whence they’d come. Skaven and pirates alike hurled themselves to the deck as they found themselves under fire from their own weapons. With a glance at Ghostface, whom they had been attempting to fool into thinking they were secretly working to further the plans of the Great Horned Rat, Likspit felt an idea forming. Perhaps this foolish Vermindoom could be useful for something after all. With a grimace of concentration, the seer reached into the aether and pulled the coruscating energies of the Horned Rat that hummed through the besieged Dominion to themself, wreathing themself in power. Shadows and sickly viridian light crackled around the diminutive skaven, forming the silhouette of an enormous horned beast around them as they rose into the air above the ship. With a wave of their hand, Likspit unleashed a torrent of energy that tore a sickly rent into the very fabric of the air between themself and the Mooncaller. With a yelp, the once-grot was pulled into the rent, his chitinous flesh subsumed by a furry mass of waiting vermin. Hungry fangs tore into his hardened flesh from all angles as the Mooncaller fought to free himself. Then, with a great effort, he forced himself back into reality above his foe. The two sorcerers danced through the burning sky like avatars of their respective gods, one loved and the other loathed. Below, on the still reeling Dread Nautilus, skaven gazed up reverently at the apparent avatar of their fell god. Even Sleekit Fang, who had been scheming Likspit’s demise, couldn’t help but feel a pang of zealotry in his black heart.
Somewhere below, in a forgotten corner of Iscarion, something awoke. The great surge of Waaagh! energy had lit a spark in the almost-dead Karitha, once known as the Destruction Lord. The woman had persisted since being left for dead during the Mooncaller’s night raid on malice alone, and that hatred blossomed into something truly horrifying now. A swirling maelstrom of Waaagh! energy burst into life around the woman, tearing at the city around her. The screaming phantasm caught the attention of Veithan, the Waaagh!-Mother, who had been leading her Finkerz to join the battle proper after helping with the launch of the Dread Nautilus. With a shout, she motioned her boys towards the maelstrom that was tearing into buildings and defenders alike. As she closed on the anomaly, it began to resolve itself into something new and uncanny: a great green figure with the hideous face of a gore-grunta was forming from the cascading energies. Blade raised, Veithan rushed the creature that had once been Karitha as it attempted to solidify itself. Colossal fists battered the ground, Veithan barely dodging in time to grab onto one just as it lifted back up. The sorcerous skin burned like an accusation as Veithan clung on. Karitha attempted to shake her assailant off, but Veithan waited for just the right moment to launch herself, using the momentum of the creature's wild flailing to hurl herself at the thing’s heart, and the near-corpse of the woman at its centre. Her blade pierced, finding the heart within the heart, and Karitha screamed her final scream, the energies around her pouring into her killer. Veithan howled in pain as she was thrown back, an intricate lattice of new scars sprouting upon her skin where the sorcerous power had coruscated across her.
***
The Dawn Palace
The war room was alive with frantic motion, messengers running in and out, shouted commands echoing from the domed roof, and Dariel at its center directing the frenzy of motion. Amidst it all, he saw from the corner of his eye as Caradryas, breathing heavily, pushed his way into the chamber.
“Mogrek!” the Duke said, grasping at the air to catch his breath. “He’s not here!”
***
Iscarion
As chaos rained in the sky above the city itself, all eyes were turned away from the back line of the battle. This was the perfect moment for the Armies of Azyr to launch their own desperate plan. From the sky, a rain of metaliths descended upon the unsuspecting foe under the command of Pyrotheurge Gaherian. Dragons swirled through the air around them, protecting them from counterattack. Among the draconic defenders was Pertinax, scion of Baron Krogg, elated to fight alongside his draconic kin for the first time. The metaliths hit the Waaagh! like a celestial rain, each slaying scores of foes. From atop the fallen metaliths, the might of Azyr rumbled forth like thunder. The Astral Templars under the command of Questor Prime Salvestra Beast-Stalker charged into the disarray of the reeling foe, supported by the mercenaries of the Gleaming Host. Though some fell, bursting into lightning as they went, for each lost Templar, ten times that number of orruks were put to the sword. Within the faltering rabble, one figure stood firm. Markela Vyrkos called forth necromantic energies as the stormcast closed upon her position, her own troops of zombies and skeletons suddenly bolstered by the reanimated corpses of the orruks felled by the Astral Templars. Salvestra suddenly found herself utterly surrounded by corpse-monsters. All around her, her stalwart warriors burst into lightning, and she herself was being rapidly overwhelmed by the sudden onslaught. When she fell, it was with a prayer to Sigmar upon her lips. And that prayer seemed to find its answer in a new arrival.
A lone figure in robes and mask impassive trudged towards the back line. Wordlessly, they raised the bundle in their arms, four skulls emerging from the cloth and hovering, eyes glowing with violet energy. They formed a diamond about their former bearer, who raised a hand that crackled with azure lightning. They twisted their hand into an arcane sign, sending the magic coruscating between the four floating skulls of the Tetrarchy, whose jaws clattered open in unison, emitting a dirge amplified by the power of their Stormcast ally. As one, the dead who had just been bearing down on the remaining Astral Templars turned, their eyes fixed upon the Waaagh! and their blades raised. As Attica watched their new undead army march into the lines of orruks and towards Iscarion, they felt a pounding in their skull and the horrible feeling that they were walking across their own grave. They suppressed a shudder and resumed their march, relieving the embattled Astral Templars as they went.
At the battle's fore, the assault faltered as the waves of the Tetrarchy’s dirge washed over the attackers. They felt their spines freeze with unnatural fear, compelled to turn and run. From behind Fort NoxCastra, emboldened by the call of their patrons, the forces of the Remnant sallied forth triumphantly, ploughing into the ogors of the Coalcut Tribe who had just arrived to aid Dunk Bloodmouth in his assault on the fort. They had only just succeeded in breaking down NoxCastra’s gates when they found themselves suddenly swarmed by the Armies of Oldstone, the nighthaunt hitting the embattled ogors like a tidal wave of spectral blades. Beyond them, the skeletal warriors of Amarna's Expeditionary force clattered as they charged the fleeing orruk lines, while the vampiric Greyblood host unleashed swarms of fell bats and dire wolves to hunt down the foe. The siege had been broken before it had truly begun, and the Waaagh! retreated in panic.
The dust had barely settled, the survivors barely let out a sigh of relief, when the parting gift of the Waaagh! was revealed. With a thunderous roar, the Gnawbomb exploded in the Palace of Dawn. Green fire blew out windows and cracked the foundations of the ancient building, and with a horrendous sound of wrenching metal two of the three bombards broke loose from their moorings and toppled calamitously into the ground. Despite it all, the Dawn City still stood, but its guns had been silenced.
Iscarneth Alliance Victory
***
The Dawn Palace
Ceraph Dariel beheld what was left of his garden. It had been weeks since he’d last worked the soil; some plants had grown wild, or lay heavy with rotting fruit, while others had withered without care… and everywhere, weeds, pests and parasites from across the Realms had taken hold. The metaphor and its irony were not lost on the Ceraph.
Before him were the leaders of his allies. The Tetrarchy, the Mithridates Bir, Iki, Uc and Dort, each rested upon a pillowed chair, placed there by an equerry named Shella whom they’d quickly dismissed. To one side was the Basalt Lord Qarang Sarn whose very presence reeked of corpse-ash, and across from him the Knight-Incantor Attica, who shifted uncomfortably in the presence of their opposite. Between them was Likspit the Grey Seer, their eyes shifting between the others as though deciding whether fight or flight was the more prudent course of action. All had been gathered from the battlefield.
Close behind him followed twenty of Atressa’s most capable pupils, each a warrior without peer across the Ceraphate, save for each other. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust them, it was just that he didn’t trust them. Perhaps Likspit was on to something, after all.
“Your little war has proven to be the crucible I had hoped for, Dariel,” the Basalt Lord spoke freely, the only warlord present who did not appear ill-at-ease. “My Dark Choosing bears fruit ripe for plucking.”
“Azyr’s armies have suffered bitter losses here,” Attica interjected grimly.
“Not even my Hedonites play music so sweet to my ears, pawn,” Sarn responded, mirthful and mocking. Attica turned, fists clenched, and took a step toward the Varanguard.
“Enough,” the Ceraph barked, holding up a hand. “We’ve no time, and important information.” Some distance away the doors to Dariel’s botanical sanctuary swung open, and three figures passed through; Warden Renaya and the former Satraps, Caradryas and Iden. “My advisors will speak to you, and together we shall bring resolution to this conflict. My lord Iden…” Dariel nodded respectfully as the newcomers reached them, Renaya and Caradryas taking places at their Ceraph’s side. “Speak. Tell them what you told me.”
Iden gave a respectful bow in return, and addressed those assembled. “We owe our Dominion and our very lives to the craven Soulblight vampire Mithridates Alti. Although we could not have known it, that wretched creature led us-” Iden gestured to Dariel, Renaya and Caradryas “-to this place. Through his puppet the first Ceraph Eresiel, he provided sanctuary and prosperity even as the Ten Paradises tore themselves apart. There was, of course, a price to pay: our people were meant as livestock to feed the Soulblight, simple cattle to raise and butcher for their red kind. Yet, this was not Mithridates Alti’s design, and he did not act alone.”
Mithridates Dort raised her voice, simmering with rage and resentment. “My grandson was desperate, and led astray with honeyed lies by the Undying King’s own wayward progeny, known to us in better times as Mannfred von Carstein. This is known.”
“Just so,” Iden acknowledged. “You speak the truth, but not the whole truth. Alti did not know of this place, but the Mortarch did. Deep in my vaults, hidden even from my own eyes, I found it. The reason for this place, from start… to finish.”
***
Mallon’s Folly
Mogrek stood atop a stone tower, gazing down across the Prime Dominion. He could see the lights of Iscarion on the edge of the horizon, a red glow of fire and destruction. That was good. Let his horde and the Iscarneth have their fight there if it kept them happy. It was never the fight that mattered.
He turned, his vision sweeping the lands and out into the void of light beyond the edge of the Dominion. There was nothing here between them and the Perimeter, where the raw magics of the realm tore reality apart and where once, in ancient times, titan-beasts of raw magic had raged. Nothing but the black orb of Noctis.
They called this place Mallon’s Folly now, had built aelven architecture around it, but the bones of the tower were older than Iscarneth. They had stood there in ancient times, when he had walked these lands at Gorkamorka’s side, when Sigmar had arrived in Hysh to join them in hunting down the Perimetral titans. Dhar Uzhaard, they had called these lands then, the Gathering Place. If the tower had a proper name, he did not know it, but the prism that stood atop it had not changed. The winter’s light that poured through it shot across the void, and was swallowed by the darkened sphere. By the Nullstone shell that Sigmar, in his retreat, had cast across it.
Mogrek raised the Longblade and the fires of Aqshy answered, raging along its length. Reaching upwards, he laid the tip against the side of the prism. Fire leapt across its surface.
He remembered the words of the Wanderer, spoken so many centuries past to the Iron Sage. “Forge for him a blade great and long, made with mighty runes and primordial fire, with the power to break down the gates of Azyr.”
The light streaming from the prism turned red, and where it struck the black shell of Noctis it began to curl and smoke.
It would take time, and all the might the Son of Gorkamorka could muster, but he had more than enough of both. Around him, five great Idols, his oldest and most powerful, were anchoring themselves around Dhar Uzhaard, just as they had done in ancient days to pave Sigmar’s way into these lands. Waagh! energy rippled through the air, leaping from each to the other, forming a web, and all feeding into him.
The first cracks appeared in the Nullstone shell, and the pure white of the realmgate shone from within. The Gates to Azyr were before him.
***
The Dawn Palace
Attica clutched at their head, falling to a knee. Pain ripped through their skull like fire, searing away even the light of Azyr. Memories, their - no, his! - memories of another time, of a connection through life and death, of what bound him to this place.
“Mogrek,” he managed through gritted teeth. “He’s doing something to Noctis. I can see a tower, and a crystal…”
“Strange,” said a skull that might have been Uc, staring closely at Attica from its eyeless sockets.
“Tell me everything,” said Caradryas.
“He is calling up the fires of Aqshy, sending them into the orb. It’s burning, burning away the darkness…” he stopped, reaching out a steadying hand to a broken flowering bed.
Caradryas and Iden shared a quick look. “Then its true. It was a realmgate after all.”
“What will happen if he opens it,” asked Renaya, cutting into their reverie.
“If he breaks the Nullstone shell, it will send a shockwave across islands. Typhoons, hurricanes. The outer isles might lose their coherence and crash into each other. For any that survive, without the pull of the Nullstone, the energies of the Perimeter would soon destroy them. We might be safe in Iscarion by the Cararhactes, but the rest of the of the Dominion would be lost.”
“Then what can we do?”
“Destroy the gate.” Sarn suggested.
“Impossible, look at the glimmerpool,” Dariel said. The quicksilver surface had resolved itself into an image of the isle of Merlara. Five huge Idols had anchored themselves around the island, and a conduit of power ran between them and into the tower.
“Then we destroy the Idols first. How many bombards are functional?”
“One, and barely. Too many shots and it will shake loose from its foundation.”
“We’ll have to do it the old fashioned way then,” Renaya broke in. “Five teams, one attacking each of the Idols. We bring enough of them down, and we’ll have enough for a single shot of the bombard, right at Noctis itself. Blow up the realmgate, and the problem is solved.”
Silence greeted her words. Caradryas’ head hung on his chest, deep in thought. “Its possible. Without the magical feedback from the gate opening, there would be no shockwave across the Dominion. We’d still have to deal with the long-term loss of the Nullstone shield, but …”
“But we’d be alive,” Renaya finished. “We’d have a fighting chance.”
“I can open a Gnawhole, get us all there quickly,” Likspit said.
All eyes turned to Dariel. The Ceraph thought to himself, quiet and still, then nodded.
“Do it.”
As Renaya and the others departed in a frenzy of preparation, Dariel set aside his sword-belt and took up his trowel: the night was young, and would bring no rest. His thoughts returned to Eresiel, the first Ceraph, who had struck a bargain with a Soulblight vampire to give his people a future. In Dariel’s Ceraphate, Eresiel’s hope had been realized, and the Satraps had killed him for it anyway.
Would his own bargain be remembered any more kindly?
***
Knight-Arcanum Attica knew their duty, and they would see it done. Duty was the only thing that mattered. Everything else…
“Knight-Arcanum,” the words spoken by a soul without a mouth to form the words. “we ask but a moment more of you.”
“Enough has been asked of me,” Attica spat in return, regretting the words even before they’d finished speaking. Why had they come so quickly?
“Then we ask you to allow us one more thing, Knight-Arcanum,” Mithridates Bir responded, her tone gentle and even. “Remove your mask.”
Attica was taken aback. Not once during the flight from Zaleria to Iscarion had they done so. Not once since they’d come to the Prime Dominion, save to eat or wash. Not even at rest had Attica ever removed their Mask Impassive.
“Your mask,” she insisted, as Attica stood rooted to the spot, mouth dry and tongue numb to answer. One hundred thousand questions passed in the blink of the eye, until finally, slowly, with fumbling fingers shaking and unsure, Attica undid the clasps and let Sigmar’s facade fall from their face.