Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

Incensed, the plague priest thumped the barbican with his staff, and unleashed a putrescent light from the warpstone crystal mounted atop it. One of the winged Stormcasts was caught full-on by the blast. Amethyst armour corroded as the flesh within turned black and gangrenous. What was left of the warrior tumbled from the air to land with an undignified splat. Azure lightning roared upwards from bubbling remains, and Squeelch flinched back.

‘Haaaa, yes-yes, that’s the way, Squeelch,’ Kruk screeched. ‘Kill-kill, rapid-quick!’ He thrust out his censer. The smoke spewing from it billowed abruptly, shredding and reforming to become a massive claw. Kruk swung his arm, and caught one of the storm-things in the smoky talon. The warrior struggled, trying to smash his way free. Kruk rotated his wrist, and the claw tightened, enveloping the warrior in its noxious grip. The storm-thing’s struggles became more frantic as the poisonous vapour filled his lungs. Then, abruptly, he went limp.

Kruk chortled and let his victim fall. ‘They die easy,’ he grunted, looking for more prey as lightning crackled upwards from the dissolving body. Skug knocked him aside as a glowing arrow thudded into the barbican where he’d been standing. Kruk smacked Skug away with a curse and clambered to his claws. More arrows rained down, impaling skaven where they stood. Death fell across the barbican, marked by glowing contrails.

As Squeelch ran back and forth, trying to avoid the shimmering arrows, he caught sight of the sky-archer hovering over the barbican, his crackling wings holding him aloft. The warrior’s armour was more ornate than that of his hammer-wielding followers, and his arm was a blur as he loosed arrow after arrow in rapid succession.

Squeelch flung himself beneath the frame of a plagueclaw, narrowly avoiding losing the tip of his tail. Kruk was not so lucky. The plague priest screeched as an arrow pinned his tail to the rampart. He staggered as the second tore through his robe, somehow missing anything vital. One of the winged Stormcasts swooped low, hammer raised as if to remove Kruk’s head. Despite being pinned, the plague priest was in no mood to surrender to fate. The smoking censer that had replaced his claw lashed out and caught the winged warrior in the head, dropping him twitching to the parapet.

At Kruk’s shriek of command, Skug and the rest of the Reeking Choir swarmed over the downed warrior. A moment later, the censer bearers were thrown back by a crackling bolt of lightning, which speared upwards to streak towards the heavens.

By now, the miasma of the whirling censers was rising into the air, and skaven swarmed across the barbican. Fanatical plague monks clambered up the plagueclaws, slashing wildly at the winged Stormcasts if they drew too close.

Kruk tore himself free of the arrow that pinned his tail, even as it dissolved into motes of light. He shook his censer-claw at the winged shapes in a show of defiance, as the plagueclaws continued to fire, filling the air with boiling clouds of sickness. Squeelch stuck his snout out from under the plagueclaw and gave the ground a thump with his staff.

The bodies of the fallen skaven began to twitch as the lice and maggots that occupied their robes were wracked by the transformative energies of his spell. The insects became humming flies. At Squeelch’s gesture, the flies rose up in a massive, buzzing cloud and roiled towards the Stormcast Eternals, shrouding them in biting, stinging swarms. The winged warriors darted skywards a moment later, leaving both the flies and the barbicans behind.

Squeelch’s triumphal chitter was cut short as Kruk hauled him out from under the catapult and held him aloft with his muscular claw. ‘Stop wasting time, fool-squealer,’ he snarled. ‘Destroy this city — destroy everything! For the glory of the Horned Rat!

The seraphon did not immediately react to Zephacleas’ greeting. As he stood waiting, he studied them. While he had never encountered them before, others had, if only briefly, most notably in the Gorevale, as well as the Fortress of Embers on Obsidia Isle. Never before had the seraphon remained after the battle was done. Always, in his admittedly limited experience, they vanished in beams of starlight, returning to wherever it was that they came from.

But not this time. This time they waited, though Sigmar alone knew for what.

Zephacleas saw a plume of fire rise up over the Dorsal Barbicans, and knew that the Far-killer had begun his attack. Impatience won out over discipline, and he took a step towards the seraphon. The saurian warriors raised their glittering spears with a thunderous rattle. He stopped, gripping his weapons more tightly, ready for whatever might come next. The little saurian in its feathered cloak met his gaze. He felt a chill, and tensed as it raised its staff.

The ranks of the seraphon split, allowing a large shape to amble through. It was massive, far bigger and bulkier than the saurus warriors around it. The creature stalked forward, slamming its war-mace against its curved shield. It bellowed in challenge. Zephacleas instinctively bellowed back. The creature glared at him, its nostrils flaring. It was larger than any Stormcast Eternal, and twice as broad. Its turquoise scales were interrupted by weals of pale scar tissue, criss-crossing its wide torso and marring its face. It slammed its star-metal war-mace against its shield again and lurched forward.

Instinctively, Zephacleas caught its blow on his sword and struck its shield with his hammer. It gave a chortling grunt and came at him again, more swiftly this time. They traded blows, moving back and forth between the two forces. Within moments, however, Zephacleas realised that the creature was only playing with him. Anger surged through him, and he pressed the attack, trying to bring it to its knees — whatever game it was playing, he was in no mood for it. But the seraphon caught his fiercest strikes on its shield or turned them aside with its war-mace, matching him blow for blow.

Abruptly, it stepped back. Arms spread, it turned its back on him and roared. Zephacleas lowered his weapons, sensing that the game, or perhaps test, was over. The little skink advanced to meet its champion, then stepped past to where Zephacleas stood. It cocked its head.

‘Sutok has tested you,’ it chirped. ‘You glow with the light of Azyr. You shine like the stars in the dark between realms. Great Kurkori has thus decreed that we will speak.’ It swung its staff back, indicating the seemingly slumbering slann on its floating throne.

Zephacleas waited. The skink eyed him. ‘The stars change. The skies burn. The war remains the same,’ it chirruped. It raised its claw in a complex gesture. ‘Always the war. Great Kurkori dreams always of war. The last war and the first.’ The skink straightened abruptly. Its head swivelled, gazing at its seemingly insensate master. ‘Never to wake, only to dream, until dream’s end.’ It turned back, fixing Zephacleas with a beady eye. ‘You are part of it?’

‘I…’ Zephacleas began, wondering how to answer. Then he nodded. ‘Yes.’

The skink’s crested skull twitched and dipped, reminding Zephacleas of one of the flightless predatory birds of the Savannah Kingdoms. He smiled at the thought, but only briefly. Those birds were larger than a man, and deadly. In his mortal days, the armoured knights of the kingdoms had tamed them to ride in battle. The skink chirped wordlessly, and he wondered whether it knew what he was thinking.

‘Will we dream together?’ it said, after a moment. ‘Will we dream of war? Of death, to the scurrying vermin?’

Zephacleas nodded in understanding. ‘Aye, and gladly.’ He extended his hammer. ‘We fight to free this city from the vermin which infest it, to free its people and the great beast upon whose back they ride.’