Slaadh chortled. ‘Yes, Lord.’

  They were interrupted by the sound of a deep, booming horn, which emanated from the central tower. Almost at once the atmosphere inside the fortress changed. Warriors who had been gleefully taunting the captured tribesmen drew their axes and blades at once, and rushed off to form into their kill-packs.

  The Bloodreavers began to holler and howl, like dogs promised fresh meat. Memno, one of Varash’s chosen Blood Warriors, hurtled from the tower, pulling on his horned, grilled helm as he ran.

  ‘Lord,’ he said, and his eyes were shining with joy. ‘Warriors in turquoise armour. Not orruks, but larger than men.’

  Varash cursed. ‘Sigmar’s whelps,’ he spat. ‘Very well, let them come. To the walls.’

  By now the inner courtyard was swollen with blood-mad killers, twitching and growling as the voice of the Lord of Skulls filled their heads with promises of torn flesh and spilt blood. The bloodlust was so thick about the fortress that Varash could almost see it as a tangible cloud over their heads. His ruined eye ached, and he delighted in the pain. It promised much.

  He ascended the stairs of the central tower, pushing past the dull creatures that Xos’Phet used as his servants. He despised the things. They stank of the sorcerer’s weakling magic. One blocked his way at the iron door leading out onto the tower, so he grasped its head and snapped its neck with a satisfying crunch, then hurled the broken thing down the stairs.

  Out on the battlements, Xos’Phet was putting the finishing touches to his twisted masterpiece. Three orruk shamans had been crucified at the far end of the tower. Over the course of several weeks they had been mutilated and otherwise prepared according to the profane texts.

  ‘They live, still?’ said Varash, as one of the things gave a low groan.

  ‘Oh yes, most resilient creatures,’ said Xos’Phet. ‘And powerful, of course. Their latent magic is degenerate and savage, but it will serve my purpose. There.’

  The sorcerer finished cutting into the orruk’s flesh, and stood back to admire his work, wiping a bloody knife on the hem of his robe. The creature’s tough, green hide was now covered in runes and symbols that meant nothing to Varash, but still set his teeth on edge. The work was fine, as legible and neatly inscribed as any book. Xos’Phet was nothing if not a perfectionist.

  ‘The enemy comes,’ said Varash. ‘Are you done, witchkin?’

  The sorcerer gave him a sickly, yellow-toothed smile.

  ‘Indeed, Lord Varash,’ he said. ‘Let us begin.’

  Varash felt a surge of excitement. This was it, his chance to end the threat of the orruk tribes and to earn the favour of the Everchosen. He had seen Archaon’s fury when the Dreadhold had been overrun, when the great statue erected in his honour had been defaced with the image of the greenskins’ idiot gods. When the burning hooves of the Blood God’s eternal servants burned the grasslands of the Roaring Plains to cinders, then the name of Varash Sunken-Eye would be spoken of in awe in the halls of the Varanspire itself, the dread fortress of Archaon. Perhaps such a feat would even earn him his rightful place in the Varanguard.

  He stood at the wall of the tower, overlooking the inner courtyard. From here he could see the hateful glow of the Manticore Realmgate, the ravenous essence that dwelt within its shifting, roiling depths already sensing the promise of spilled blood. Soon the sorcerer’s ritual would draw the full power of the ancient structure forth, and he would have his grand army. Let the weakling minions of Sigmar be the first to fall before him.

  As the Stormcasts rushed towards the fortress wall, the first of the missiles began to fall. The crude projectiles of the human defenders, javelins and thrown axes hurled from the battlements, did little against the fine armour and shields of the Celestial Vindicators. Yet as they drew closer, the Dreadhold’s true defences roared into life.

  The leering daemonic skulls carved into its surface began to smoulder, eyes burning with baleful light. This light grew in intensity until it burst forth from the carvings in a shower of white flame. Arcing jets of molten fire spat into the midst of the Stormcasts, searing and melting sigmarite, enveloping warriors in shrouds of flame. Celestial Vindicators went down, screaming in agony as the daemonfire devoured bones and turned their flesh to cinders.

  In response, the Judicators knelt and loosed the latent celestial energy that coursed through their heaven-forged weaponry. Great, glittering arcs of lightning smashed into the tower, crumbling the cursed stone and sending chunks of shattered masonry tumbling to the ground. While those warriors wielding powerful boltstorm crossbows turned the fortress’s deadly defences to rubble, skybolt bows sent a cascade of light pouring over the perimeter wall to find its home in the tainted flesh of the Dreadhold’s defenders. Smoke rose from the battlements where the devastating barrage of lightning scorched and burned the unworthy.

  Shields raised and clattering under the incessant rain of projectiles, the Liberators pushed towards the great gate of the Dreadhold. The sky boiled above them, blood-red clouds swirling and reforming furiously, thunder bursts rolling across the battlefield, almost drowning out the calamitous sounds of battle. Then a sudden, violent crack split the air, louder even than the hammers of the great forges of Azyrheim. Tendrils of violent scarlet energy trailed across the main tower of the Dreadhold, wrapping around its surface like a cluster of vines. Mykos Argellon turned his eyes to the heavens, and felt a soft tapping sound on his mask and across his armour.

  The blood rain fell. Inside the Dreadhold, the warriors of Khorne whooped and shrieked with joy at this sign of providence from their monstrous master. They turned their faces to the sky and let the iron taste roll down their tongues. They beat their chests and brandished their weapons and howled. Above them, the sky darkened and swelled, and the tendrils of fell energy crept over the edge of the tower. The sorcerer Xos’Phet stood upon the battlement, laughing in delight.

  ‘It begins!’ he chortled. ‘The gate swells in power. Now we must feed the link between this world and the other.’

  He looked at the prisoner that the gorepriests held, a straggle-haired man with wide and frightened eyes. ‘This is your task, my friend. You are truly blessed.’

  The knife was in his hand in a flash, and he cut the man’s throat with one swift motion. The prisoner’s eyes rolled back in his head, and the gorepriests hurled him into the oval pit at the centre of the tower. Blood spilled, and seeped through the grilles cut into the floor.

  ‘Fetch me another!’ said Xos’Phet, grinning widely.

  Despite the rain of projectiles and the blood that now churned the earth and bogged them down, the Celestial Vindicators pushed to the main gate, a monstrous slab of iron covered with foul symbols and wrapped in dust-dry human skin.

  Here the phalanx of shield-bearing Liberators peeled apart, allowing the breaching teams to rush through. First came the Knight-Heraldor Axilon, and the men cheered to see him raise his war horn, the blessed instrument of Sigmar that all of his rank carried.

  ‘What say we play an old Azyrheim tune for this Chaos filth?’ he roared above the clatter of weapons and the belching fire of the wall defences. He raised the horn to his lips.

  The note that issued forth was one empowered by the fury of Sigmar’s storm, a pure wave of destruction that swelled the heart of the faithful and echoed in the ears of the damned as a promise of obliteration. The strong metal of the castle gate crumpled in the face of its awesome power, as if struck by the armoured fist of a towering giant. The gate was bound and reinforced, and it was not breached, but in the wake of Axilon’s strike, the tall warriors of the Paladin retinues that carried wondrous starsoul maces came forwards, and began to beat a furious rhythm on the ruined surface. Explosions of storm-light marked each strike. Shards of metal and chunks of stone fell, and the gate groaned under the assault. Axilon even found time for a theatrical bow as the Celestial Vindicators beat their shields and chanted his name.

  Rusik watched as, one after another, his people were led to the slaughter. This next one was of his own retinue, and his eyes were full of terrified anger as the pallid, nightmarish creatures that served the sorcerer dragged him over to the pit of corpses.

  The knife tore flesh, and Rusik did not look away.

  ‘Betrayer,’ hissed a voice at his back, and he turned to see Alzheer, leg bloodied and one eye swollen shut with blood. She gripped the bars so tightly that her hands were white. ‘Faithless, murdering scum.’

  He turned away as the next prisoner was dragged forwards.

  ‘You are right,’ he said. ‘I am faithless. My faith died along with my family and my friends.’

  ‘And murdering others gives you peace?’

  ‘There is no peace,’ he spat. ‘Nowhere. There is only war and bloodshed. An eternity of slaughter that will not cease and cannot be quelled. Varash and his men understand that, and so do I.’

  ‘Zi’Mar sends his heralds,’ Alzheer said. ‘You see them for yourself. We are not alone. The light of humanity shines on, even in such darkness.’

  Rusik whirled, his dark eyes burning with rage.

  ‘They come now, when we are already lost,’ he shouted, and he could taste the blood rain seeping into his mouth. ‘We are already dead, woman, you are just too blind to see it. I will no longer hold on to what is lost. If this is our future, I embrace it.’

  Under the combined assault of Knight-Heraldor Axilon and the hammers of the Retributors, the gates fell inwards, and the Celestial Vindicators met the enemy face to face. The true enemy, not the simple-minded bloodlust of the enemy’s reavers, but warriors who had fully embraced the touch of Khorne. These were hardened killers, tall and broad, encased in ornate plate armour of imposing design and wielding vicious, jagged axes. They did not fall before the charge of the Stormcasts, but leapt and charged into the mouth of the storm, hacking and slicing, songs of devotion to their twisted god upon their lips.

  The two waves crashed together, the gleaming turquoise of the Celestial Vindicators and the spoiled-meat red of the Bloodbound warriors, and the carnage was total.

  Many Stormcasts fell in that initial clash, even their mighty warplate unable to defend them from the enemy’s wild, delighted frenzy. A screaming fiend with a bronze crest took the head from a Liberator with his twin axes, then was crushed under the heavy swing of a sigmarite hammer. Drooling and chortling, a warrior wearing a flayed orruk-hide cape ground a Celestial Vindicator’s face into the ground, hacking at the stricken figure’s back with a wide-bladed gladius as he did so.

  Mykos Argellon put his blade through the warrior’s back. The man gasped and choked, and Mykos kicked him free to sprawl in the dirt.

  ‘Push forwards, brothers,’ he shouted above the grind of battle. ‘Forge a breach!’

  They were in the gatehouse tunnel, which stretched for a dozen yards ahead, culminating in a wide staircase that led up. Dull red light shone down those stairs, telling Mykos that if they could push the enemy back they would emerge in the fortress courtyard, below the main tower. Easier thought than achieved. The forces of the Dreadhold outnumbered the two hundred fighters that Mykos commanded at least four to one.

  ‘They’re thick as a rat swarm in here,’ Axilon shouted, his own broadsword wet with gore, and a great rent torn across his breastplate. ‘We’ll not get past them easily, and more are on their way.’

  ‘Come on, Bladestorm,’ Mykos said, searching for a gap in the line where he could bring his sword to bear. ‘Where are you?’

  Up came the Prosecutors, over the wall of the Dreadfort, nimbly weaving past the poorly aimed missiles that were hurled their way. First, they cleared the ramparts with a flurry of their own. Lightning swept aside the throng of bloodstarved that garrisoned the wall next to the central tower. Celestial hammers and javelins hurled Chaos-warped figures to the courtyard, where they broke upon hard stone.

  No sooner had they struck than the winged warriors were on the move again. This time they dropped over the perimeter wall, swooping low to pass over the heads of the defenders, releasing more lightning-wreathed javelins. Howling in outrage, the Bloodbound charged after this new quarry, abandoning their attempts to get at Mykos’ force currently pushing through the main gate.

  It also drew their attention from the wall itself.

  Thostos Bladestorm and the ten-score warriors of his chamber hauled themselves up the grappling ropes, using the indentations and ornaments that covered the face of the Dreadhold to ease their ascent. Belatedly, they were spotted by the remaining defenders, who rushed to the spot on the wall that the Prosecutors had cleared and began to hack and tear at the ropes, and hurl spears down at the ascending Stormcasts in an attempt to dislodge them. Several of Thostos’ men were taken down by the volley of missiles, dropping like stones to land with a bone-shattering clatter on the hard earth below. Others were unfortunate enough to pass too close to one of the daemonic mouths, and burst into flame as the deadly trap covered them with flammable liquid.

  Try as they might, however, the defenders could not dislodge the heavy grapples or hack through the thick rope. Their blades met looping wires of hard metal woven into the hemp, which turned all but the heaviest axe blades. Spitting with frustration, the Chaos warriors hurled their last few missiles and waited for the heads of their foes to emerge above the parapet.

  Before they had a chance to strike, Goldfeather and his Prosecutors returned with another volley of storm javelins. Yet more defenders fell shrieking and burning to the floor, and in the confusion Thostos and his warriors hauled themselves over the lip of the wall. The Lord-Celestant whirled his hammer as he pulled himself up, crushing an opponent’s hand into pulp against the wall, and rolled over onto the rampart. He drew his blade, and began to hack his way through the staggered enemy towards the nearest stairway down to the courtyard.

  A reaver came at him, swinging a glaive at his neck, and the Lord-Celestant managed to get his hammer up in time to block. He reversed his grip on the weapon and struck low, and the man’s knee bent backwards. His opponent screamed and fell, and Thostos drove his runeblade into his chest.

  The lines had broken. Battle had dissolved into a wild melee, aside from a few pockets where the Stormcasts had managed to maintain a semblance of discipline. While Thostos’ warriors hacked into the rear of the Blood Warriors holding the gatehouse, the Argellonites pushed forwards relentlessly. Caught between the pincers of the two Stormcast forces, the defenders were forced back into the courtyard proper. Yet despite the Celestial Vindicators’ impressive gains, the enemy was not done. More and more reavers poured from the cliff tunnels behind the fortress, swarming around the huge Realmgate itself and crashing into the press of bodies, straining to get at the enemy.

  ‘Thostos!’ came a cry, and he turned to see Mykos at the foot of the wide stairs that led from the gatehouse into the courtyard. His fellow Lord-Celestant despatched an enemy warrior with a backhand swipe, and gestured to the main tower. The sky was now a patchwork of striated red lightning, broken only above the tower, where there now hung a circular vortex around which the baleful energy swirled. The build-up of pressure in the air was a physical ache that spread across the battlefield, a drying of the mouth and a ringing of the ears.

  As they watched, the vortex vomited a torrent of blood, a coruscating pillar of viscera that swirled and lapped at the edges of the tower, but remained in place, enclosing the structure like a gauntlet over a fist.

  ‘We must break through,’ yelled Mykos, above the cacophony of roaring liquid. ‘We must stop this, brother.’

  Thostos stood. He swayed to his left as a raging berserker hurtled past, narrowly missing the Lord-Celestant with a swipe of his dual axes, and barrelled into the thick of the battle, battering his way through to the steps leading up to the tower.

  Leering faces pressed against his war helm, and he hacked and smashed at them with warhammer and blade. He shoved, strained, kicked and levered bodies aside, accepting a dozen minor hits in his haste to break free. Suddenly his path was clear, and he saw the steps arc up over the gatehouse entrance towards the central tower. He leaped up them two at a time, lifting a filthy, tattooed mortal over his shoulder as he went, pitching the man over into the swirling melee below.

  On the other side of the gatehouse, Mykos Argellon made his own ascent. As he reached the tower entrance, a shadow fell across him. The figure was something from a nightmare. Impossibly tall for a mortal man, thin and long-limbed in a manner that made it look entirely unnatural. Its neck was stretched and corded with muscle, and a burnished skull on a chain of brass dangled over the creature’s chest. The monster held a great, two-handed axe in pallid, scarred hands.

  ‘You should not have come here, son of Sigmar,’ the Slaughterpriest hissed, and then he grinned wide enough to expose bloodstained, razor-sharp teeth. ‘But I am glad that you did.’

  ‘Silence, creature,’ said Mykos, raising his grandblade high. ‘Your bleating offends me.’

  The blood priest’s eyes narrowed, and with a bellow of rage he exploded forwards, axe swinging at Mykos’ neck. The Lord-Celestant stepped backwards and, rather than blocking, angled Mercutia to push the axe blade aside. Against any normal foe this would have opened up an opportunity as he struggled to get that heavy great axe back into position, but this creature was blindingly fast. He rotated the axe, jabbing with a spike attached to the bottom of the haft, and in an instant had it up and swinging again, this time a wild swipe at Mykos’ midsection.

  The Lord-Celestant picked that blow off too, and there began a series of lightning-fast parries, dodges and blocks. After several seconds the momentum played out, and each warrior took a step back, breathing heavily.

  ‘You fight well,’ said the blood priest, wiping blood from a gash than ran down the side of his angular face. ‘You would reap a fine skull-tally for the Blood God.’

 

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