Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

Vandus and Calanax faced Khul alone.

‘Now you will join Khorne, Blackfist, as a skull to be ground beneath his feet,’ snarled the Chaos lord.

Vandus and Calanax were forced back by Khul’s ferocious assault. Their weapons banged and flared from one another as each lord strove to bring the other low. Through Vandus’ concentration on the fight came the realisation that he and Thostos were alone, beset on all sides by the Khul’s Bloodbound. No weapon could harm Thostos, and the followers of Khul drew back from the duel between Vandus and the Khornate lord.

Still Vandus was being forced backwards.

A clatter of wheels came from behind. From the corner of his eye Vandus saw Thostos leap, and heard a bestial cry as something died. Then Khul barged Vandus aside, knocking him sprawling from Calanax. The Chaos lord’s axe slammed into the blade of another, staying it from slaying Vandus.

‘I said the Hammerhand was mine, Thrond!’ roared Khul.

‘My kingdom. Who are you to demand the head of our foe?’ Thrond asked.

‘Wizard’s puppet. You dare defy me? I shall add your head to the tally!’ Khul’s fury broke like a dam and he slammed into Thrond, knocking him from the back of his chariot. The two Chaos lords wrestled upon the blood-slick cobbles.

Thrond’s warriors let out a cry and turned upon the Bloodbound. The far side of the square erupted into fresh and furious battle.

Vandus stood, Heldensen at the ready. The Bloodbound parted before him, teeth bared. Their muscles stood out from their necks and their eyes glared. They strained like dogs on a leash, but they would not defy their master. They would not attack him. He was Khul’s alone to slay.

Thostos came to his side.

‘We must kill him!’ said Thostos. The desire for revenge burned coldly in his baleful eyes.

‘Do you not think I wish to slay him?’ asked Vandus. ‘Our duty lies elsewhere.’

‘Where is your desire for wrath and ruin?’ Thostos’ voice reverberated strangely behind his war-mask.

‘There is a time for vengeance. This is not it. One petty revenge can upset the chance for ten thousand greater victories. Come.’

Reluctantly, Thostos backed away from the horde.

‘This way!’ said Vandus, and pointed to a gateway barred by a portcullis. Calanax rejoined them, forcing his way through the melee. The Bloodbound of Khul would not fight him either.

‘Strange luck,’ Thostos said as Vandus remounted.

‘Let us pray it holds,’ said Vandus. Most of the warriors had backed away, going to join the fight with Thrond’s knights. A few remained, unsure. Vandus held his hammer in a guard, ready for them, but still they did not attack. More and more of them were glancing over their shoulders to the duel between Thrond and Khul.

Thostos broke the portcullis into pieces with one swing of his hammer and rushed through. Vandus came behind him on Calanax. No warrior of Khorne dared follow him.

‘The hammer is close!’ Vandus shouted. Before them was the tower of Ephryx, its side rent apart. Light blazed through cracks.

A deafening shout made him turn. Riding upon the platform of another chariot came a warrior Vandus recognised, Khul’s lieutenant, the bearer of the icon that had summoned the Realm of Chaos into Aqshy. The bloodsecrator carried his icon with him, blood boiling from Khorne’s rune in a crimson fog.

‘We sell our lives dearly, then,’ said Vandus.

Thostos snarled.

From the other side of this courtyard, daemons came capering. The two Lord-Celestants were surrounded anew.

‘I will slay you! I will cut your head free! I will spit on your corpse and dedicate your skull to Khorne,’ shouted the bloodsecrator. Spittle flew from lips bitten raw.

‘Khul has claimed my head,’ said Vandus. ‘Do you dare his wrath?’

‘Khul is weak! Sigmar is weak! Blood for the Blood God! The Lord of Skulls cares not from whence the blood flows.’ The bloodsecrator grinned savagely, exposing black teeth filed to points. ‘Do you hear that, feeble one? Your power is nothing compared to mine!’ He slammed his weapon against his heavily muscled, scarred chest and raised his icon to the clouds boiling impotently in the sky. ‘Do you hear? You are weak, Sigmar! Weak!’

In reply a mighty thunder boomed. The sky split with a bolt of blue as wide as a tower. It struck the wall, then again, opening up a fresh breach. The metal of the wall exploded. The breaches revealed the sea and the broadness of the crucible. Clouds raced around its rim, and light played there, bright and godly.

More lightning bolts slammed into the earth. The bloodsecrator and his tribesmen recoiled. From out of the light stepped a figure bearing an icon of his own, topped also with the emblems of death.

‘It is you who are weak, to fearfully sell yourself to the murder god,’ said Ionus Cryptborn.

A bolt of pure magic shot from his hammer and blasted the chariot. The metal of it withered, the draught beasts were slain, and the bloodsecrator was cast from it and lofted through the wall, where he fell flailing into the Silver Sea far below.

Light faded. All around Ionus stood a host of Stormcast Eternals.

‘Ionus! You are returned!’ said Vandus. ‘How did you manage it so quickly?’

‘I told you, my friend. Death has little hold on me,’ said Ionus.

Singing their praises to Sigmar, the Stormhosts charged.

The renewed crusade fought on, smashing daemon and mortal alike, until Vandus and Thostos forced their way through the fracture in Ephryx’s ruined tower and into the space it contained. A bizarre machine sat there, creaking and pinking as it cooled. There was the hidden keep, light burning from its riven walls.

‘Ghal Maraz…’ said Vandus breathlessly.

‘The sorcerer, Ephryx,’ said Thostos. The heat of emotion entered his voice, his deadened soul awakened by hatred.

The sorcerer had become ancient, bent with age. He hobbled as quickly as he was able from the machine, towards the iron doors of the inner keep. As he passed within, a wall of fire leapt up, encircling the keep. The sorcerer’s bodyguard moved to interpose themselves between the gates and the vengeful Stormhosts.

In the sky, the Shardgate was sinking, the infernal energies spilling from it now caressing the tower’s stump.

‘We are running out of time,’ said Vandus. But Thostos had already rushed ahead, a group of returned Celestial Vindicators at his heels, and was slaughtering his way through Ephryx’s bodyguard. Vandus went after, Calanax bowling over four of the hulking warriors.

‘Retributors, to the gates!’ ordered Vandus. Calanax forced his way through the bodyguard, Vandus smashing them to the ground with Heldensen. In short order there were no more Chaos slaves to slay. Protectors held the breach into the tower, preventing others from assailing the lords. Outside, bolts of celestial energy rained down.

‘Hurry!’ urged Vandus. The Retributors banged rhythmically on the gates with their lightning hammers. The flames crackled, the warplight racing over the vile carvings that covered their surfaces. The fire went out and the warriors attacked. The gates shook with each impact, but did not shift. The Shardgate continued its descent.

There came a louder bang, and the gate shuddered differently, shifting on its mountings. A wide crack sprang across it. Blue light shone out and the Retributors called out joyously. They struck harder, until another crack, then another, crazed the surface of the door.

Together with the light came the sound of chanting, words so evil they crashed around his skull. Vandus fought against the pain though blood ran from his ears.

With one last impact, the doors burst inward in a storm of iron shards. Vandus and Thostos ran in, drawing sustenance from the holy light that bathed the chamber.