Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

Eldroc’s advance swept clean the left side of the Dreadhold’s ramparts. Freed from their precarious, flanked position, the Liberators and Judicators on that side of the fortress began to recover and push back those orruks that remained. The Paladins began to lift up the heavy, dead bodies of the orruks and hurl them back over into the roiling mass of green flesh, relying on their sheer weight to crush the unfortunate creatures below.

The Celestial Vindicators burst through into the interior of the tower, hot on the heels of the fleeing mortals. Most of the soldiers ran for the great, wide stair that curved upwards from the interior hall, but one made instead for a strange device on the far side of the room. It resembled a great shell, several handspans across, the whorl spiralling out to join a funnel that ran alongside the great stairway, stretching to the roof above. Before Thostos could reach him, the warrior put his lips to this device, and an ominous note issued forth — a great, resonating blast that echoed around the structure loudly enough to shake the teeth.

Thostos reached the man and cut him down, but the damage had been done. Every single being in this place would be aware of their presence now.

He glanced up. Above the Stormcasts soared a dizzying spiral of hundreds of cells, each carved from a strange, metallic coral-like substance. The complex stretched on and on over their heads, so high that the very dimensions of the place seemed unfathomable. From the outside, there had been no indication of such a colossal space. The angle, too, was wrong — vertical instead of lying askew, as it had first appeared. Thostos felt the sway of vertigo, the nauseous resonance of sorcerous power. There was something else up there too, an orb of glowing light that bathed the walls in a silver-blue glow.

Arrows whipped down from on high, skittering off the armour of the Stormcasts. Those that bore shields raised them to fend off the barrage, while the Judicator bowmen returned with a volley of their own. Dozens of yards overhead, the spiral walkway with its ammonite guardrail rippled in explosions of light, and a shower of coral fragments and ruptured bodies toppled down the central column to burst upon the floor.

‘Forward!’ yelled Thostos. ‘To the summit.’

The Prosecutors rose into the air, circling their way up the main tower and unleashing devastating strikes with their celestial hammers, which smashed through crystal and stone-coral as if it were kindling. As each warrior hurled his magical weapon, he summoned one anew from the aether.

Those on foot began to advance. They moved slowly, checking each cell as they passed by. The bars were not metal, but razor-sharp spears of blue crystal stabbed deep into the floor. Each cell contained a rough stone slab set with leather straps. Most of the cells were empty, containing nothing but the dark stains of spilled blood, but in others they saw shattered skeletons, or pitiful, wasted figures that cringed and scuttled away in terror as they passed.

The sheer quantity of arrows loosed by the mortal guards above began to take its toll. A Judicator fell, clutching at his throat. As he toppled over the guardrail he turned once in mid-air before disappearing in a burst of light. Other Stormcasts fell to the floor, crashing back down the path to the levels below.

‘Do not stop for a moment,’ shouted Thostos, as his warriors began to pause in order to aid their stricken fellows. ‘We keep moving or we die here.’

And so they pushed on, floor after floor. Mortal warriors wrapped in silver chainmail and tattooed with blue ink rushed at them from anterior tunnels and guardposts. These men were hardy fighters, disciplined and resilient. They attacked Thostos and his men with measured skill, not the unbarred aggression of the Blood God’s faithful. They feinted forwards to hurl a volley of javelins and axes, then fell back and flanked from different angles. They used their knowledge of the tower’s hidden pathways admirably.

Yet for all their skill, they were still merely mortals.

Relius had lost his sword in the melee, dropped when an orruk had slammed its axe into his shoulder and split his flesh to the bone. They were perilously close to the inner courtyard of the fortress now, having been steadily pushed back by the unrelenting ferocity of the enemy assault. The corridor was thick with corpses, yet the creatures came on regardless, slipping over the ruined remnants of their dead. Relius slammed his shield into a leering face, felt bones shatter under the heavy sigmarite, and raised it high to deflect another falling axe.

‘We can’t hold this,’ shouted the Liberator at his side. Relius could not spare a glance to check, but it sounded like Vallus.

‘We must,’ he shouted. ‘If they break through it is over.’

Something struck his leg, and there was an explosion of agony. Foolish. The orruk he had smashed to the floor had not been killed, and it had sunk a cleaver into the flesh of his thigh. Relius cursed as his leg gave way. He held his shield over his face, and felt heavy boots force him further to the floor as another of the creatures vaulted over his prone form and deeper into the Stormcasts’ ranks. His world was a forest of struggling, kicking boots and splattered blood. He tried to drag himself upright, but there was simply no room. He was stuck fast, and would be until the enemy noticed him and drove an axe into his skull.

‘Glory to Sigmar!’ came a booming voice, resonating within the cramped gatehouse tunnel. ‘Not a single step backwards, brothers. Death to the enemies of Azyr!’

Through the chaos of twisting, flailing bodies Relius caught a glimpse of Lord-Castellant Eldroc at the head of a formation of Retributors.

He barrelled straight into the orruks, his wondrous halberd smashing and stabbing as he hacked a path for the warriors to follow.

They did so mercilessly. Of all the elite Paladin disciplines, it was the Retributors that most closely symbolised the Celestial Vindicators’ way of war. Simple, straightforward power, the fury of unleashed aggression. Vengeance dispatched with cold fury, and delivered with the killing face of a sigmarite hammer.

These warriors amongst warriors pushed through to the front of the melee, battering the enemy aside with thunderous swings of their two-handed weapons. Lightning arced in the narrow confines of the tunnels as the hammers impacted, pummelling iron armour into a shapeless mass, crushing skulls and scorching flesh.

‘Up you get, Liberator-Prime,’ said Eldroc, hauling Relius to his feet.

‘I am sorry, Lord-Castellant,’ he said. ‘I have failed. There were too many, and we could not hold them at the gate.’

‘Do not speak of failure again,’ said Eldroc sternly. ‘We were never going to hold a shattered gateway for long, especially against such numbers. You have killed as many of the creatures as possible, and that is all I could ask. Our hope now lies in the hands of others.’

The Lord-Castellant turned to him. Relius noticed that the man’s helm bore a nasty cut from temple to jaw, through which blood was seeping. Countless minor wounds covered his fine armour. It seemed that the fighting upon the walls had been no less fierce than down here.

‘Do not concern yourself, brother,’ said Eldroc, clapping him on the shoulder reassuringly. ‘I fear a minor scratch will be the least of our worries, come the day’s end. Here.’

Eldroc held out a gladius, and Relius accepted it. The weight of the blade was reassuring, and he clasped it tightly.

‘Onwards then,’ said the Lord-Castellant, hefting his halberd. ‘Let us see if we cannot thin the herd a little more.’

‘Onwards,’ shouted Thostos, sweeping another foe aside with his hammer. The mortal slammed against the wall and slid to the floor, leaving a trail of blood behind him.