Chris Wright - Age of Sigmar - Omnibus

Skuralanx’s voice echoed almost painfully in Kruk’s head. He hissed and considered telling the daemon to go scurry up his own shadow. Then he looked at Vretch thoughtfully. One good thwack with the censer and his rival might simply come apart, given his state.

No, Kruk. For you there is a more glorious task, yes-yes… hold the enemy back, Kruk… do as you were born to do and fight . Rip them, tear them, choke them… for if you don’t, I shall surely do it to you, yes-yes. Vretch — follow my voice… bring me the prize.

‘I will protect them, O most portentous of pox-bearers, yes-yes,’ Vretch hissed, cowering back before Kruk’s beady glare. ‘Ours is not to reason why, no-no, ours is but to do and… and prosper, yes-yes! Skuralanx has used-tricked us, but for the greater glory of the Horned Rat. I know that now… we shall be pox-masters, yes-yes.’ He hugged the golden plaques to his chest. Thin streams of smoke rose where the strange metal touched his bare flesh, but he did not seem willing to let Kruk take them from him. His eyes were wide and mad, and Kruk wondered what had happened to his rival.

It wasn’t that he particularly cared, of course. But he did wish to avoid a similar fate, if possible. He shrugged. ‘Guard your prize then, yes-yes,’ Kruk said. ‘From the looks of you, I could simply take it from your rotting claws, but I will refrain.’ He gestured dismissively with his censer. ‘Go on then, scurry away. Your master calls. But when this is done Vretch… I will settle up with the pair of you, oh yes…’ He fixed Vretch with a glittering eye. ‘We will settle all debts.’

Skuralanx perched on the shoulder of Sigmar in the central chamber of the Sahg’gohl, and called out to Vretch, guiding the worm-ridden skaven to him. His sibilant tones echoed back at him from the curved walls and shattered dome of the chamber.

He hissed and rubbed the stumps of his broken horns. What he felt could not be called pain, as such, but it rankled nonetheless. That such a puling creature had been able to get close enough to harm him — to harm the mighty Skuralanx — spoke volumes about how badly his underlings had bungled things. He hoped that at least one of them would survive, so that he could have the pleasure of devouring them himself.

He could have gone to claim what Vretch had found himself, but his injuries had weakened him considerably. He would need every iota of his remaining strength to twist open the realmgate and escape. Yes, he had to conserve his strength.

Rain fell through the cracked dome and mingled with the lightning which occasionally crossed the floor in bursts. The radiance rising from the realmgate situated in the statue’s plinth cast long shadows across the faded and peeling murals which marked the curved walls. Scenes from Shu’gohl’s history were illuminated briefly before fading into darkness. Skuralanx had covered most of them in claw-marks and filth, for the sheer joy of it.

This place was his — or soon would be. As soon as Vretch delivered whatever he had found, Liber or otherwise, to him, he would depart, only to return at the head of an army larger even than the Congregation of Fumes had been… the Children of the Horned Rat would swarm over and through the worm, gnawing it hollow and making a warren-to-end-all-warrens from its bloated carcass. And nothing would stand in their way.

He gazed down at the realmgate, studying its design with his remaining eye. A matter of moments, yes, that was all it would take. Even if he didn’t understand the way the facets were locked together or what the symbols on them meant, he knew he could open it. Indeed, he had already begun. A portion of his cunning intellect was focused on the task, necessitating his remaining here, well away from Kruk’s doomed last stand. The daemon sniggered. He had saved Kruk’s tail often enough; now it was the plague priest’s turn to repay Skuralanx’s kindness.

Perhaps he might salvage the burly lunatic, before he departed. Vretch was in no condition to be of any further use, but Kruk… yes, let no one say Skuralanx didn’t pay his debts. Kruk had enabled his triumph — it seemed only fitting that he spare the brute.

But first… the Liber. He looked towards the causeway. He could feel Vretch’s agonised mind. The plague priest was on his last legs. He was rotting as he staggered through the ruined temple, leaving a trail of worms and mangled flesh.

It was a fitting irony, Skuralanx thought, that such a treacherous creature should die serving the master he’d sought to betray.

He’d known from the start that Vretch harboured ambitions above his station. It was one of the reasons he’d brought Kruk along… while Vretch was focused on his hated rival, there had been less chance of him coming up with ways to free himself from Skuralanx’s influence.

In a way, the daemon was almost sad that it was all coming to an end. Vretch and Kruk had been entertaining in their way. But better days awaited, greater glories and mightier triumphs. He chittered in anticipation and hunched forward, clawing at the statue. Soon… soon it would all be done.

Soon, Skuralanx, the Scurrying Dark, would unleash a pestilence like no other. And reap the rewards thereof…

Kruk scuttled across the plaza towards the causeway and the advancing star-devils and storm-things, the remnants of the Reeking Choir at his back. He felt neither fear nor pain, though he would feel both, he suspected, before the day was done. ‘Kill-kill, for the glory of the Great Corruptor! For the glory of your Archfumigant,’ he shrilled, slashing the air with his censer-gauntlet. ‘Keep them from the temple! Hurl them from the causeway!’

It would be a close-run thing, he thought. They only outnumbered their foes five to one, and those weren’t the best of odds. But he was Kruk — the Horned Rat had marked him for greatness. Why else would he have survived every misfortune that sought to waylay his one, true destiny? Tests! All of it — tests! To prove his worthiness in the eyes of the Great Witherer! He was Kruk, and he would spread the Effluvial Gospels into every nostril and lung, yes-yes!

He slammed into the enemy, wreathed in a choking murk. He caught the edge of a bladed shield and hauled himself up, so that he could brain the scaly warrior who bore it. The seraphon fell and Kruk flung himself forward. As he dropped, his jaws sprang open and he vomited a cloud of noxious gas. Seraphon collapsed, their scaly bodies sloughing away into nothing. Kruk staggered back as starlight flared and his cloud was dispersed.

Spears tore holes in his robes and slashed his flesh as the seraphon closed ranks, forcing him to backpedal quickly. He pointed a talon at one of the snarling saurians and the creature staggered as its body began to shrivel and rot. The rot swept through their ranks, killing half a dozen of them before its potency faded. Kruk cackled as he crushed a shrunken skull with his censer. ‘Die-die! Die for the glory of Kruk,’ he shrilled.

He heard agonised squeals and smelled burning hair as a blast of celestial energy incinerated a skaven to his left. Kruk spun to see a reptile, clad in a cloak made of brightly hued feathers, step through the ashes of the fallen skaven, a glowing staff extended before it. The skink met his gaze and cocked its crested head, as if in challenge. Kruk snarled and darted beneath the stabbing spears of the intervening seraphon. He sprang towards the feather-clad reptile, who released a second searing burst of light from its staff. Kruk bulled through the burning luminescence with a scream.

‘Kruk is to be killing you, star-devil,’ the plague priest shrieked, as he snatched up the reptile and slammed it back against a statue. ‘Not even you can prevent Kruk from achieving his destiny — Kruk will rise, like the vapours of death, and strangle all the world. Kruk will—’