Ghal Maraz

by Josh Reynolds

  Perhaps Ephryx was a fool and did not realise his actions only strengthened her resolve. Or perhaps he knew full well that she would never give in to him and tormented her out of spite.

  ‘No,’ she said to him every night. ‘Never.’ And so she was taken away again.

  Ephryx’s patience wore thin. For the next twenty days she was confined to a cold cell. Foul food and stagnant water was all she was given. This she forced herself to eat, for she was still hopeful of opportunity and would not let her strength dwindle. None came. Awful screams broke her sleep.

  The enchanted window came with her, magically set into the dripping metal of her cell wall, and her view of the world remained. Through it she saw Ephryx’s armies of slaves labouring in the Shattered City, melting its grand arches of steel and adamant and recasting them as giant plates bedecked with grimacing faces and spikes.

  Over Ghal Maraz, they raised a cairn of lead, and then around that a stone keep. The foundations of a giant tower were being laid to encase the keep when she was moved again.

  For the next ten days she was subjected to physical torments. Nothing that might mar her body permanently, for her beauty Ephryx coveted above all other things save the hammer, but excruciating nonetheless.

  Still she would not yield.

  ‘I can make it stop. I will make it stop. Be mine, join with me and rule this land,’ said Ephryx on the final night. ‘Help me, guide me. Chaos does not have to be excess. We can coax beauty from the world.’ He had become more wan than before, and on his forehead were the buds of horns. A mark of favour from his dark master.

  Celemnis burned with fever. Her red hair was matted, her body filthy. Every muscle ached.

  ‘No,’ she said, her voice made little more than a croak by thirst. ‘There is no beauty to be had from evil. Even if I were to sell my soul to Tzeentch, if I were to embrace his madness myself, then still I would not submit myself to you, Ephryx. I will never be yours.’

  Ephryx snarled.

  ‘Poor Ephryx,’ she said. ‘The whole of the realm might fall under your spell, but I will not.’

  Ephryx’s face hardened. ‘So be it.’

  He performed a series of conjurer’s gestures, and a large crucible appeared. Above it was a cage shaped to hold the human body. Silent torturers stood either side, their heads horned, faces hooded. A jet of warpflame hissed from thin air to warm the crucible, and the iron of it glowed as prettily as roses. From the crucible’s gaping mouth came the unmistakable smell of molten silver.

  ‘By your own favoured metal will you be killed,’ said Ephryx. ‘I shall boil you in it, and coat your corpse in it, and make of you a statue. You shall stand where all other statues have been cast down. There you shall watch for all time the city you so loved. Your beauty will be mine to enjoy, and my victory your torment. Now, you have one last chance. Join with me, and rule forever, or die in agony and suffer for an eternity.’

  At that point Celemnis’ resolve wavered. She looked upon the end Ephryx had devised for her with mute horror. The sorcerer leaned forward in his golden throne, keenly anticipating her surrender.

  She stood tall, and shook her head.

  He threw himself back in his throne pettishly.

  ‘Very well! Executioners!’

  They came for her and strapped her into the cage, and hung it out over the bubbling metal.

  ‘Ephryx!’ she said.

  He looked sidelong at her.

  ‘Victory is fleeting. The day will come when I shall return, and I will play my part in your downfall. This I swear.’

  ‘Impossible,’ he said.

  She laughed. ‘Magic blows strongly in this age of Chaos. Your lord unwittingly makes wizards of us all! This is your doom and mine, Ephryx. Ask your master.’

  ‘I would have made you a queen,’ he said bitterly. He jerked his hand down. The cage dropped.

  Ephryx found Celemnis’ screams were not to his taste, and he was glad when they were over.

  Celemnis’ death did not pass unremarked. In Sigmaron, in Azyr, upon the half-finished tails of the Sigmarabulum which embraced the world fragment of Mallus, the Bell of Lamentation tolled. The God-King Sigmar looked up from his labours. Mallus quivered, pulsed, and pulled in on itself, diminished by another victory for Chaos. A moan went up from Azyrheim far below.

  Sigmar looked to the shrunken world fragment, half visible through the tracery of his great endeavour. Soon the tendrils of iron and steel would reach for each other, close all gaps, and hide the secrets of his plans until they ripened to fruition.

  On the other side of sealed gates, the denizens of a dozen hells beat their fists upon doors that would not open. The tolling of the bell focused Sigmar’s thoughts on all those trapped outside Azyr, those who must suffer the age of Chaos while he completed his work.

  He returned his attention to his forge, and his tears fizzled on hot metal as he took up his tools again.

  Chapter One

  The Age of Sigmar

  Now…

  Vandus Hammerhand crouched in a world of light. He was alone, naked, bereft of comrades. Was he dead? Had the measure of godly power bestowed upon him been taken away? Was he Vendell Blackfist once more?

  The glow dimmed. Vandus straightened. He had returned to Azyr, and stood within a quenching chamber. His sight took a moment to return; the light had been dazzling and the chamber was now dark. First he saw stars shining through an aperture at the apex of the dome, then he held up his arm and the starlight glinted from muscles larger and more powerful than those of any mortal man. His physique was still that of a Stormcast Eternal, and his skin was unmarked by the forge burns of his former life. He had not met death, not this time. Relief rose in him, and he felt ashamed that he had feared his power gone. Power was what the followers of the Four craved, not the Stormcasts. For the warriors of Sigmar, there should only be vengeance.

  He thought back to Aqshy, to his plea to the skies as he had stood within the arch of the Gate of Wrath. Sigmar had struck him down as he had requested, but rather than destroy his bodily form it appeared that the God-King had taken him up to Azyr, just as he had centuries before. He only hoped that Korghos Khul’s realmgate had been destroyed by the storm bolt that had effected his escape, and that the battle for the Brimstone Peninsula had not been lost for his sake.

  Light of a different sort grew. Shining shapes resolved around Vandus, burnished plates of golden armour that orbited him in stately dance. Vandus reached for them with a thought. Lightning leapt out from his skin to the armour plates, pulling them sharply into place until he was clad in the raiment of a Lord-Celestant once more.

  A twinge affected him. Strange thoughts intruded upon his dressing. He felt there was a hollow space in his mind, as if in returning home he had chanced upon an unknown door and opened it to find an empty room pregnant with disquiet.

  Vandus shook the sensation off, and called upon his war-mask. The visor, shaped into the impassive face of a judgmental god, slid into place. Vandus extended his hand and the hammer Heldensen crackled into being from nothing and clapped into his grip. The Lord-Celestant raised his other hand and grasped at the night sky, pulling down his cloak of star-silk from the heavens.

  Outside, a trumpet note sounded, high and sweet: a summons. Sigmar called for him. The doors of the quenching chamber peeled themselves back. Vandus stepped outside into a long, curved corridor where many identical doors were set. Magical lamps burned with unchanging light in alcoves all the way along. Like everything else in Sigmaron and the Sigmarabulum, the corridor was beautiful.

  Vandus was met by Knight-Heraldor Laudus Skythunder and Lord-Castellant Andricus Stoneheart, his friends and fellow offi­cers, lords of the Hammers of Sigmar and its primary Warrior Chamber, the Hammerhands.

  Laudus hung back, his silver horn tucked under one arm. Stoneheart was of a more demonstrative character, and
he grabbed at Vandus’ upper arms and peered at him in wonder. His helmet was open. The battle armour topped with Andricus’ cheerful face instead of the blank war-mask of the Stormcasts made for an incongruous sight.

  ‘You’re alive then, lad?’ said Andricus. He unexpectedly embraced the Lord-Celestant. ‘Good to see you, Hammerhand. We feared you lost.’

  ‘Sigmar promises us an eternity, Andricus. I was taken from the battle whole and unharmed.’

  Andricus stepped back. ‘Of course he does, of course. But we did not know for certain if you would survive the energies of the gate. You were snatched from the very jaws of the Realm of Chaos! And there have been…’ He shook his head, then forced a smile back onto his heavy features.

  ‘What?’ asked Vandus. ‘Why do you look at me so strangely? It is I, Vandus who was Vendell! The Hammerhand! Come, my friends, what did you fear?’

  Andricus and Laudus shared a look. ‘Now’s not the time,’ said Andricus. ‘There’s much to discuss. We have been summoned again.’

  ‘How did you come to be here? You were not struck down?’

  ‘We were fortunate to avoid the agonies of death, my Lord-Celestant,’ said Laudus. He was altogether more aloof than the Lord-Castellant. Where Andricus spoke of his life as a peasant, Laudus had been noble born. They sometimes bickered over whose existence was the more honest. What was not in doubt was that they had both been heroes.

  ‘We returned to Azyr via the realmgate.’

  ‘The battle is won?’

  ‘Yes, son,’ said Andricus. He had been an old man when taken; to this he insisted he owed his cheerfulness. ‘We’ve all been invested with the power of the storm, but my joy doesn’t come from that,’ he was fond of saying. ‘I’m happy to see clearly, to get up from my bed without the crack of aching joints.’ When had he heard this, Laudus had pulled a face. ‘You’ll never understand how it is to be old now, my lads. And be thankful for it!’

  Certain habits of speech and manner persisted from Andricus’ prior existence: his custom of speaking to all as if they were years younger than he, for one. Vandus was half-convinced Andricus did it simply to annoy Laudus.

  ‘Korghos Khul’s armies have been driven back from the penin­sula,’ said Andricus. ‘His pyramid is cast down and his gate closed forever. More Stormhosts arrive every day. Our territory in Aqshy grows.’

  ‘I must have been absent for days.’

  ‘A week, my lord,’ said Laudus.

  ‘A week?’

  ‘Sigmar’s arts are mysterious,’ said Laudus.

  ‘None of us here know how long we were senseless when we were first gathered,’ said Andricus. ‘Why should it be any different this time?’

  ‘I must get back! Khul awaits me. I have failed to slay him twice, I will not fail a third time.’

  ‘You’ll have to put your own vengeance out of your mind,’ said Andricus. ‘We’ve a greater task at hand.’

  ‘We have been summoned to the palace. A new campaign awaits,’ said Laudus. ‘The palace is all abuzz. Sigmar is eager for something – none have ever seen him so roused.’

  ‘All the Hammers of Sigmar are here?’

  ‘All, my Lord-Celestant,’ said Laudus. ‘Those who fell are reforged. We are ready for war again.’

  They left the quenching chambers and came through obscure ways to the exposed surface of the Sigmarabulum. Once more it churned with industry. The quiet before their assault on Aqshy had been but a pause, and now the magics and machineries there worked hard again, healing and remaking those warriors who had fallen. Sigmar’s wizard-artisans and their helpers hurried about. They paid no attention to the demigods striding among them – such sights were unremarkable in this city of wonders.

  The Sigmarabulum gave off a nervous energy that had a man frantic to be about his work, and it stank of hot metal and magical discharge. However, its odd animus could not blot out the wider world around it.

  To their right loomed the sphere of Mallus, the world remnant. It had swollen in the wake of the Stormhosts’ first victories. The metal was glutted with magic, and the surface glinted with an iridescent sheen. To their left the heavens of Azyr opened. Nowhere in any realm was there a night sky more beautiful; it blazed with stars of all colours and sizes, jewels set upon sumptuous cloths woven from nebulae. Rising through it was the Celestial Stair, a slash of bright metal climbing impossibly high, its top anchored beneath the High Star Sigendil. A handful of Azyr’s many moons arced gracefully along their heavenly tracks, while the lands of the Celestial Realm slumbered below. Rivers glinted in lazy loops of beaten steel, and towns and villages were picked out by yellow dots of lamplight. Forests were seas of purplish black in the moonlight, and farmland an orderly miniature landscape wrought in silver.

  Vandus looked down on the land, and part of him yearned to enjoy its peace. He never could – that much had been made clear to him – but he could protect it so that others might live and grow old there. He did not resent his duty.

  ‘This way,’ said Laudus. They approached a trio of small realmgates set off to the side of the main roadway in the shadow of a giant foundry, glinting with soft blue light. The Stormcasts walked through this shimmer and emerged into a different place. Cool night scents hit them and crickets chirred in the dark.

  They were far above the forges and factories, upon the dark moon Dharroth. The Sigmarabulum was forged in the shape of Sigmar’s twin-tailed comet, two arms reaching to embrace Mallus. This black satellite formed the head of the comet, and it was here that Sigmaron, the palace of the Heldenhammer, was situated. Vandus, Laudus and Andricus emerged into the grounds on the path they called the High Road. Sigmar’s palace soared above them, as wide and sprawling as any city, its many domes and spires gleaming by the light of the moons.

  They made their way through the magnificent halls and vaults of the palace. Even the meanest chamber was monumental beyond anything Vandus could recall from his old life. Every stone was perfect, every decoration of the finest craftsmanship.

  They took paths followed only by others of their kind, corridors they must take as ritual prescribed. Down they went, past the Forbidden Vaults, their heads resolutely turned away. Their oaths demanded they never look upon the vaults’ doors.

  So it was that his companions did not immediately see Vandus stumble.

  The strange sensation he had experienced in the quenching chambers returned redoubled. Vandus went down to his knees, clutching at his head. His mind burst aflame with visions.

  He saw golden figures climbing endlessly up a glacier of precious metal, battles upon bridges that spanned an ocean of bubbling silver, and innumerable, wicked eyes glinting through a hole in the sky. He saw a two-headed winged shadow silhouetted before a portal of terrible power, and a tide of daemons. Holes ripped in the world’s fabric split the vision, clawed hands and needle-toothed snouts pushing through until nothing remained. Light burned them away, and he saw the sigil of the twin-tailed comet upon a hammer that shone brighter than any sun.

  ‘My lord!’

  The hammer.

  ‘Vandus!’

  Ghal Maraz.

  Vandus came to his senses with Laudus Skythunder clutching his shoulders.

  ‘Vandus? Are you well? What is happening?’ Laudus was saying.

  Andricus spoke quietly in reply. ‘It is the same as with the others. The reforged…’

  ‘Silence, Lord-Castellant. Vandus has not passed the gates of death. I will hear no more of your morbid talk!’

  ‘Vandus?’ said Andricus.

  Recovering himself, the Lord-Celestant looked to his fellows. Concern radiated from them both. ‘I’m fine,’ he said hoarsely. He got unsteadily to his feet, pushing Andricus’ hand away when he tried to help him. Once up, he marched on as steadily as he could, leaving the others to follow.

  Lord-Castellant sentries slammed their halberds a
gainst their chests as the three Stormcasts entered the throne room through doors fifty feet high. Within were the command echelons from a dozen Stormhosts, arranged in rows according to their rank and order either side of a carpet, a night-blue road that led from the doors to the celestial throne. Upon this, the God-King Sigmar sat tall in his majesty. The ceiling retreated up and away. Hundreds of feet overhead, carved panels shone, and it was as if the assembled host basked in the light of many suns.

  Sigmar smiled broadly as Vandus approached. Andricus was right, something had occurred. Sigmar’s manner betrayed his excitement.

  ‘Vandus, my favoured son,’ said the God-King. ‘I am gladdened that you are here with me again.’

  Vandus bowed his head. He dearly wanted to kneel, to show his pleasure at being in the presence of his lord, but the God-King had no time for sycophancy.

  Before the throne was another Lord-Celestant, clad in the turquoise livery of the Celestial Vindicators Stormhost, and he was kneeling.

  ‘Thostos has discovered something,’ said Sigmar. ‘All of you have performed well, my sons. I bring you here to share with you Thostos Bladestorm’s discovery and to set for you another task of great import.’

  The god turned his radiant eyes upon the kneeling Thostos, who had made no movement or sound.

  ‘Stand, Thostos Bladestorm!’ commanded Sigmar.

  Thostos slowly lifted his head and looked around him. He appeared confused.

  ‘We shall kneel no more,’ said Sigmar. He gestured, encouraging Thostos to rise.

  The Lord-Celestant of the Bladestorm got unsteadily to his feet.

  ‘You are reforged,’ said Sigmar. ‘Now tell me of Chamon.’

  Thostos paused before he began. When he spoke, it was falteringly. His voice sounded hollow behind his impassive war-mask. ‘There was… There was a fortress of magic. We breached its walls, only to die in a burst of unlight that was fought by a greater light.’