Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

‘Does it never rain in this hell?’ Othmar growled, fingers twitching on his sword.

Throl chuckled darkly. ‘None that would quench your thirst,’ he said. ‘The storms of Uthyr are things of boiling lead and ash. If you want water, we must stray far from our course.’

Othmar turned to glower at the wizard. ‘If you can endure, then so can I,’ he declared.

The wizard smiled at Othmar. ‘If I told you that the clouds you see on the horizon are simply fumes rising from the flames of Uthyr, would that cheer you?’

Othmar looked at the black expanse stretching across the sky. ‘Not particularly,’ he grumbled as he pressed on.

Deucius shook his head and waved his hand at the smoke. ‘It seems the worst is yet to come. It is hard to imagine a blaze that could create such smoke.’

‘The fires of Uthyr have been burning since the founding of Shaard,’ Throl said, his eyes gleaming with the memory of his vanished nation. ‘Even the Prismatic King could do little to tame this part of his domain.’

The Celestant-Prime laid his hand reverently against the head of Ghal Maraz. ‘The sorcerer may have failed to overcome this land, but the power of the God-King will overcome him. He will atone for his evils and confess his secrets. With the threat of Ghal Maraz before him, even a sorcerer might reveal the truth.’

A scowl formed on Throl’s face. ‘So long as he doesn’t confess his secrets too easily,’ he grumbled. ‘It has been a long walk from the swamp to be cheated of watching the Prismatic King suffer.’

Against all hope, the heat grew worse when the Stormcasts reached Uthyr itself. Each breath they drew felt as though it must sear their lungs. A mortal warrior would have cooked within his armour before he could begin the climb out from the sandy waste and onto the fields. A lesser metal than sigmarite would have become blisteringly hot from the mephitic atmosphere that surrounded them.

The fields of Uthyr were a scorched morass of cinder and ash, gutted and scarred by streams of molten lead and boiling copper. Geysers of volcanic fumes exploded from yawning pits, dancing in fiery gyrations as they billowed upwards. Great pinnacles of pumice, their faces carved into the tormented shapes of the damned, thrust themselves up from the hellish terrain, piercing the smothering miasma of smoke.

Thrusting its way through the fire and slag, supported upon ethereal peaks of shimmering heat, was a great tunnel of volcanic glass. Rippling with strange colours, exuding weird harmonics that wailed across the bubbling din of the fields around them, the glassy channel cut across the fiery terrain. The shifting intensity of the heat that supported it caused the tunnel to pitch and roll, undulating like some vast serpent.

‘There,’ Throl declared, pointing into the tunnel. ‘That is the foundation upon which the Prismatic King raised his Eyrie. That is the place to which his fortress must return!’

The Celestant-Prime gazed into the cavernous passage. Navigating it seemed impossible, an insurmountable obstacle. Yet he remained undaunted. The Prismatic King held the key to both the realmgate and the missing Thriceblessed. Whatever obstacles the lands of Shaard put in his way, he would achieve Sigmar’s purpose and confront the disciple of Tzeentch.

‘Then that is where our path leads us,’ the Celestant-Prime declared. He cast his gaze across the Stormcasts. ‘Have courage, brothers. However arduous the task, know that if it is Sigmar’s will that we succeed, then only our own lack of faith can bring us to ruin.’

Deucius bowed his head. ‘By the grace of the God-King, let none of us be found unworthy,’ he said.

‘Can we be certain that the Eyrie will appear where the wizard claims it will?’ Othmar asked. ‘It is only by his word that…’

‘His word has led us this far,’ the Celestant-Prime reminded him. ‘It is late to doubt him now.’ As he spoke, he turned and nodded to Throl. At every step, the wizard’s advice had felt right in a manner more compelling than conventional logic or wisdom. In a way he couldn’t explain, he knew they weren’t being led astray. Perhaps it was the wizard’s fierce desire for revenge, perhaps it was the hand of Sigmar upon the Stormcast’s soul, perhaps it was something deeper buried within his very essence: he couldn’t say — all that he was certain of was that when the dusk came, they would find the Eyrie standing just where Throl had promised them it would appear.

‘No mean feat,’ Othmar declared, fingers tapping. ‘A tunnel of black glass floating in a sea of flame.’

‘A simple task for those with a small and simple faith,’ Deucius said. ‘Cast aside your worry, brother, and rejoice that Sigmar has deemed us worthy of such a trial.’

The Celestant-Prime strode out onto the fields, feeling the burning rock searing at his sigmarite boots. ‘Rejoice when we are through the tunnel and the Eyrie stands before us,’ he advised.

The Stormcasts followed him out across the scorched crust of Uthyr. The burning rock splintered and cracked beneath their armoured weight, fraying and splitting with every step they took. At times ugly holes would appear, vomiting toxic vapours in a spray of steam. Once a great fissure opened as Deucius advanced across the field, nearly swallowing the warrior as the surface crumbled away. The Celestant-Prime flew to the Liberator’s side and pulled the imperilled warrior back from the edge, hurling him back with a display of his prodigious strength. The champion stared down at the roiling river of glowing magma that yawned below, appreciating how utterly the molten fire would have consumed his comrade.

‘The ground is too treacherous,’ Othmar cursed. ‘We will never reach the tunnel.’

Throl hurried towards the Celestant-Prime. Lacking the armour and superhuman vitality of the Stormcasts, the wizard depended upon his magic to guard him from the hostility of Uthyr. As he sprinted across the blackened ground, patches of rock disintegrated under even his comparatively light tread. ‘My spells can show you the way!’ Throl shouted to the hero.

‘Then use your magic!’ Deucius ordered the man.

Throl shook his head. ‘It isn’t so simple,’ he warned. Shifting his gaze back to the Celestant-Prime, he hurried to explain. ‘Only my magic protects me from the fire and heat. If I turn my mind to a new conjuration, I will lose my focus. The spells that protect me will dissipate.’

The Celestant-Prime nodded towards the magma flowing at the bottom of the fissure. ‘Without a safe path, many of us may be lost before we gain the stair. It may be that Sigmar has sent you to us to overcome this obstacle.’ He looked across the flames at the sinister tunnel. It seemed as distant as when they had first set out across the fields. ‘If one of us were to carry you, would you be able to turn your mind to the magic that will show us a safe path?’

The wizard scratched at his chin. His gem-like eyes blazed as he considered the Celestant-Prime’s words. ‘Maybe the God-King did allow our paths to cross,’ he mused. ‘Maybe it is fate that has cast us together. Yes, I think if you were to carry me across I could focus my energies on exposing a safe path through the fields.’

Deucius came between Throl and Ghal Maraz. ‘You are the bearer of the godhammer,’ he told the Celestant-Prime. ‘It is unseemly that you should be asked to carry the wizard alongside the holiest of holies. Let me carry Throl across the fields.’

The Celestant-Prime let his hand brush across the golden head of his hammer, feeling its sacred power crackle under his fingers.

‘It will be as you say, Deucius,’ the hero decided. He fixed his eyes on Throl. ‘Begin your conjurations, wizard. We must be through the passage before twilight.’