Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

‘Together,’ he roared again. ‘As one, brothers. As one!’

Theodrus bellowed in unison with his Lord-Relictor, chanting the names of the fallen and hurling them like curses at his enemies. He dragged a red-skinned daemon off its steed, first pummelling the rider and then breaking the beast apart.

Others were not so successful.

Ionus saw a clutch of Retributors brought down by half a dozen of the daemons. Some were cut apart by hell-forged blades, others were simply crushed to death. None survived, and the line shrank further.

Inwardly, Ionus groaned. They had been winning. Now it was beginning to unravel. He had lost sight of Skullbrand, but still felt the presence of the bloodsecrator. The red rain stained his armour, and robbed it of its lustre. Thunder rolled across the heavens again, but it was the voice of the Blood God, not the Lord of Storms. It began to wear upon him, slowly eroding his will.

A clutch of Stormcasts, Theodrus amongst them, flew back into the rear ranks. A massive daemonic steed and its rider ploughed in after them. The head of the beast snapped left and right, reaping limbs.

Only Ionus stood before it as it reared up onto its hindquarters.

As it crashed down, the sheer force of it almost took Ionus off his feet. In the end, he staggered, and barely parried a blow that rang against the haft of his relic-hammer. He felt his shoulder jar painfully, and grimaced behind his skull-mask.

Summoning the storm, he sent a bolt of arc lightning into the beast. Fearsome tendrils of crackling celestial magic coursed over its metal hide, but did little more than enrage it.

The rider swung again, and Ionus batted the blow away with his hammer. He countered by smashing the beast’s foreleg and, with some relief, saw the armour crack and its ichorous essence flow from the wound.

Stamping and snorting, the frenzied beast tried to crush him, but another paladin got in its way and fell instead. Ionus quickly moved closer so he was harder for it to see. Snarling and baying on the beast’s haunches, the rider had to fight to stay mounted.

Ionus struck again, another blow against the foreleg. This time the armour split apart, and viscous black lifeblood gushed forth as the daemon steed bellowed in pain. A third blow crippled it and the beast sank down sharply, pitching its rider forward and onto the ground where Theodrus crushed it with his hammer.

At the same time, Ionus rammed the hilt of his reliquary staff into the beast’s eye and drove it deep. He called upon the storm again, the bolt lancing down from a blood-red sky. No armour could protect the daemon steed now, sundered by Sigmar’s holy wrath.

‘We are failing, Lord-Relictor,’ uttered Theodrus breathlessly.

Blood warriors and bloodreavers clamoured for battle, hacking with furious abandon. Scattered amongst their swollen ranks were khorgoraths and even larger beasts now that the tower had given up its entire garrison.

‘Don’t give in to despair, Theodrus,’ Ionus told him.

But as the blood-rain anointed the Stormcasts in hellish red, Ionus knew they could not last much longer. He felt the presence of the tower sapping his strength as more fell beneath the armies of the Blood God.

A long shadow stretched out from the unholy tower. It fell across the Khornate host as if their lord had his eye upon them and granted them his favour.

Ionus looked to the tower, then to his foes. He saw a chance for salvation.

‘Praise Sigmar…’ he whispered, before he spoke to his brothers.

‘Theodrus, hold them off. Keep them at bay for as long as you can.’

Ionus left the fighting rank, the others closing the gap as he retreated into the depths of the Stormcasts’ slowly diminishing throng. Once there, the paladins encircled him and forged a small patch of earth in which the Lord-Relictor could pray.

On his knees, the reliquary staff in both hands, Ionus beseeched the Lord of Storms. His voice was a mere rasp in the tumult, but he fought to make it heard. Again, he invoked Sigmar and closed his mind to the savage imprecations trying to unnerve him.

He clutched the staff tighter, and shut out the din of battle around him.

‘Lord Sigmar, hear me…’ he prayed. ‘Bring forth your lightning, and allow me to be its vessel.’

A low rumble broke across the sky, not the hollow clamouring of daemons this time but the righteous voice of a God-King stirred to anger. It began slow, a distant flash to part the blood-red cloud, the wind rising to cleanse the air.

Ionus prayed harder, his fingers clenched so ardently that his knuckles ached.

‘Sigmar…’ he rasped, and felt another presence upon his shoulder — one that gave him strength. ‘ Sigmar! ’

A column of coruscating lightning roared from the heavens, so pure and bright that no servant of Chaos could bear look upon it. Daemons screamed in agony, whilst the mortal followers shielded their eyes. It hit the ground at the tower’s footings, blackening the earth. Not even a god-sent bolt could have smote Khorne’s monument outright, but Ionus had discerned its weakness. Where the lightning struck, fissures tore through the ground until it was wrenched apart.

An ominous cracking sounded, emanating from the tower. Brass squealed as it lurched against its own weight, leaning ponderously towards the chasm that had now formed beneath it. Seizing the chance, Theodrus and the Retributors who had fought through the throng of enemies slammed their hammers into the lurching footings of the tower.

Still blinded from the god-lightning, the host of Khorne was slow to react as the tower capitulated and came crashing down on them.

A huge pall of dirt and debris spilled up and outwards, as a great clangour of sundered metal resounded across the battlefield. In a single stroke, Ionus had tipped the scales of the fight. Bodies of mortals and daemons alike were crushed by the cursed stone of the tower, their limbs reduced to a mangled ruin. The foul stink of sulphur tainted the air as the bloodcrushers were banished, but it was the screams of the Bloodbound that lingered longest. Those that were left looked on aghast at what had become of their warhost and the magic of the storm-priest who had struck down the tower.

With the cheers of the Stormcasts ringing in his eyes, Ionus roared for them to attack.

Everything had turned. Even the dread rain had abated as a cool twilight, presaging the dawn, pierced the veil of ruddy cloud that had so besieged Sigmar’s chosen.

As the Retributors fell upon the survivors, they smashed what remained of the tower, breaking it apart with their hammers until it was shards and dust.

The surviving daemons fought on until even their fell lord deserted them and they dissolved back into the blood of the fallen. Many of the mortal followers fled, their will to live greater than their desire to fight and die for Khorne.

After a few hours it was done and there were none left to vanquish. A heavy toll had been paid for the victory, though, as nearly half of Cryptborn’s men had fallen.

If Threx Skullbrand lived, Ionus could find no sign of him. He was still searching through the rubble and the corpses when Theodrus approached him.

‘I witnessed the miraculous this night,’ said the Retributor-Prime, humbly kneeling before his Lord-Relictor.

As Ionus looked around, he saw they all were. Even the Prosecutors had taken a knee, their heads bowed in reverence.

‘We have triumphed,’ he said, raising his voice so all could hear. ‘And in so doing averted a great evil. But our task is hardly done and I shall ask more of you before the end.’

‘I speak for the chamber when I say we are yours to command, my lord,’ said a vehement Theodrus, ‘into the Realm of Chaos and back if so needed.’