Lord of Undeath Page 23

  Silently, Lascilion drew away from the invisible watchers. He wasn’t certain how far from Amala’s skull the effects of the concealing magic would follow him, so he braced himself for that instant when his enemies would spot him and recognise their peril. Cautiously he advanced, gaze fixed upon Neferata and her companions. He would come upon them from the flank, angling his approach so that his presence would go unnoticed until the last possible moment even without Molchinte’s spell to hide him.

  When he was but a few yards away from his prey, Lascilion knew he was no longer under the veil of Molchinte’s magic. The discovery announced itself in the enraged howls of Alghor and Orbleth as they rushed at the lightning-men. Aware that the ambush would be lost to them either way, the champions of the Bloodking chose to at least eliminate what enemies they could swiftly. One of the black-armoured knights was struck down by Orbleth’s flail, a bright spark leaping from his body before it could crash at the champion’s feet. Another writhed upon the diseased length of Alghor’s vile sword, green tendrils of corruption worming through his mail.

  Lascilion charged straight towards the vampires. As he reached them, he drew Pain and Torment in a flash of murderous steel. One of the vampire knights was decapitated by the vicious sweep of Pain, his body writhing on the floor like a crushed snake. The second vampire dropped as Pain slashed across his middle, all but disembowelling the undead lord. Neferata alone now stood before him.

  The Mortarch of Blood raised her staff, sending a cascade of deathly magic slamming into him. Lascilion felt several of his teeth burst as the arcane energies ravaged him. The smell of his own burning hair was in his nose, tears of blood spilled from his eyes as they slowly boiled under Neferata’s assault. Too late, he appreciated his mistake. When he had confronted Neferata in Nulahmia, she had been exhausted by the demands of the battle. Now she was at the height of her powers and far more than his equal.

  If Lascilion had made a mistake, then so too had Neferata. She had focussed too much of herself in annihilating the warlord and kept too little of her power back to guard against other foes. While he languished under the Mortarch’s spell, Molchinte’s sorcery struck out at the vampire. Bolts of coruscating light raced through Neferata’s body, burning into her in a furious barrage. The first few bolts dissipated against the wards she had raised to defend herself, but the others drove home. Neferata was knocked back, thrown against one of the walls. Smoke rose from her branded flesh and blood streamed from the corners of her mouth. She turned to face her attacker, but even as she did, another blast of shimmering light tore the staff from her hands.

  Lascilion tried to rally, to subdue the weakened Neferata before Molchinte’s sorcery wrought even more havoc upon her. Even as he did, however, dark shapes came rushing up from the vault below. He saw more of the lightning-men, and this time, their helms bore the crests and halos that marked them as commanders of their kind. Alongside them another vampire rushed into the vault, a being of such fearsome aspect that even the Lord of Slaanesh felt a tremor of fear.

  His fear counted for nothing when a still more malevolent apparition boiled up from the sunken tomb. Spilling upwards in a cloud of blackness, a towering skeleton wearing a morbid crown commanded Lascilion’s gaze. All thoughts of Neferata and his depraved desires were forgotten as the warlord stared at a being that had become legend to the hordes of Chaos infesting Shyish. He didn’t need to be told who this creature was, for only the Lord of Death could evoke such terror in the heart of one who had consorted with the likes of Mendeziron and attended the court of Thagmok. Out from the domain of myth and rumour, Nagash the Accursed had returned.

  The Great Necromancer pointed his staff towards Neferata and immediately a blanket of darkness swirled around her, catching and absorbing the arcane fire Molchinte hurled against her. While Nagash shielded the vampire queen, the leaders of the lightning-men charged towards Alghor and Orbleth. Formidable as the Chaos champions were, they found themselves outnumbered by the ebon knights eager to avenge the comrades the pair had cut down from ambush.

  Into the tableau, a colossal shape lurched. A charnel reek preceded it, splattering through the air in a stream of foulness. The stink of blood, old and rancid washed across the crypt, causing even the faces of the vampires to twist in revulsion. A thunderous, slobbering step brought layers of mould crumbling from the ceiling. The obscene figure drew out into the light, revealing its awful aspect. Swollen, engorged with internal fluids, the thing possessed only the most mocking semblance of human form about it. The legs were short and stocky, veins bulging from the tanned skin to drip a slime of gore down knees and calves. The feet were an array of clawed pads, the hooked talons gleaming like knives as they scratched against the floor. The body itself was prodigious in its dimensions, many times larger than that of a man. Thick ropes of muscle had broken through the flesh, leaving wet strips of meat dangling from its damaged hide. One arm was little more than a withered stump flapping uselessly against the shoulder while its opposite was a tree-like bulk of sinew tipped by a bear-like paw.

  The thing’s head had sunk down into its torso, staring out with a nest of gigantic black eyes. Some mocking suggestion of a nose and mouth protruded just beneath the eyes. Blood bubbled up from the mouth as it cried out in a voice that filled Lascilion with horror, for it was the voice of Vaangoth, the champion of Khorne they had left behind in the tower. The bloodthirsty warrior had sampled too deeply of Nachtsreik’s phantasmal gore, drawing the attentions of the Blood God to him, filling him with the raw power of Chaos. At once, Vaangoth had become both exalted and debased, one of the abominable spawn of Chaos.

  ‘I follow,’ Vaangoth howled. ‘I bring doom. The Bloodking is come!’

  As the spawn cried out the last words, the entire crypt was shaken by a tremor that bespoke some immense violence inflicted upon the castle itself. Lascilion chided himself for his credulity. Thagmok hadn’t wanted him to merely lead Molchinte and a few assassins after the lightning-men. The Bloodking himself was following the warlord, bringing his full might against the foes he had used Lascilion to find.

  Lascilion looked upon the malignant spectre of Nagash. Thagmok was coming to claim the greatest prize in the Realm of Death, the one conquest even Archaon had failed to achieve. The Bloodking was coming for the Great Necromancer.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The cold shell of death magic closed around Neferata, guarding her against the sorcerous barrage conjured by the copper-skinned Chaos witch. It was a small thing for Nagash to fend off the magical assault that had come close to overwhelming his Mortarch. Powerful as she was, the attacking sorceress was but an insect beside the Lord of Death. There was only so much eldritch lore Tzeentch could pour into a human mind before it collapsed into madness. Nagash had no such limitations. He could feel the sense of shock that raced through the enemy witch when he intervened, her horror that her spells could so easily be brushed away.

  But it didn’t suit the Great Necromancer for the Stormcasts to learn the full extent of his might. Instead, Nagash was more interested in the extent of the strength the Anvils possessed. This ambush in the depths of Nachtsreik was an opportunity to see how a small group of the storm-knights fared against foes who could pose a real challenge to them.

  ‘Attend to the others,’ Nagash told Makvar. ‘I will obstruct the spells of their sorceress.’ The Lord-Celestant nodded and hastened to join his warriors. The other Stormcasts were already engaged with the two Chaos champions who had vanquished the Judicators left to guard the crypt.

  The bloated champion who bore the Mark of Nurgle brought his diseased blade slashing across the chest of the Liberator who rushed at him. The stricken Stormcast fell back, a black froth bubbling from the mouth of his helm as the daemonic energies within the Nurglesque sword raced through his body. The ebon knight collapsed, his hammer rolling free from his weakened grip. Nagash could feel the necrotic vibrations pulsating within the fallen warrior, r
eady to extinguish his life-force.

  While the Liberator languished on the ground, Knight-Heraldor Brannok interposed himself between the stricken warrior and the Chaos champion. Ducking around the sweep of the Nurglesque sword, Brannok held the invader back while Lord-Castellant Vogun hurried to the dying Stormcast. He held his warding lantern over the wounded warrior, letting its rays shine down upon him. Nagash was surprised to observe the necrotic vibrations falter, gradually receding as the healing light began to burn away the daemonic infection.

  Even with death so near, Vogun was driving it back. That was a power the Great Necromancer found more troubling than any he had witnessed heretofore, a power antithetical and oppositional to the very source of his own dark magics. If such power were harnessed properly, it could prove a threat to his dominion.

  In the next moment, Nagash saw that he wasn’t alone in appreciating the menace posed by Vogun’s light. The Nurglesque champion Brannok fought lowered his guard, exposing himself to the Stormcast’s blade. As the sigmarite sword slashed across his swollen belly, however, what spilled from the wound was far from what the knight expected. Instead of gore and entrails, a swarm of snake-like worms splashed onto the floor. The grotesque parasites at once slithered away, speeding towards Vogun. Brannok stamped on one of the creatures, bursting it in a spray of stinking yellow ichor. He had no opportunity to attack the rest of the swarm, for the Chaos champion was swinging at him once again with his green blade, apparently indifferent to the gaping wound in his guts.

  Across the crypt, Huld and the remaining Liberator fought against the black-armoured Chaos champion with the flail. Despite their superiority of numbers, the Stormcasts were having difficulty slipping through the invader’s guard. The flail swung with expert precision, the chains coiling about the blades of their swords to twist them aside each time the knights thrust at its wielder. Even the purifying rays of Huld’s celestial beacon, the light that so discomfited Nagash’s vampire minions, had little effect upon this barbarous fighter. Certainly not enough to dull his ferocity.

  The impasse was broken when Makvar entered the fray. Coming at the champion from the flank, the Lord-Celestant swung at his adversary with his fearsome runeblade. Again, the invader turned and brought the chains of his flail whipping around to entangle and twist the descending sword. This time, however, the tactic brought electricity crackling up from the sigmarite weapon. Lightning sizzled up the flail and rushed into the champion’s body. The barbarian staggered back, smoke rising from the seared flesh inside his armour. In his hands, he held a gnarled length of iron that had been the grip of his flail. The bludgeoning skulls and the chains themselves lay scattered about the floor, many of the links melted by the electric discharge of Makvar’s runeblade. The stricken Chaos champion fell back, drawing an ornate dagger from his belt and reversing his hold upon the iron handle of his destroyed flail so that he might use it as a club.

  Nagash noted the fearsome enchantments bound into Makvar’s runeblade. He recognised the peculiar arcane craftsmanship of duardin smiths. Long ago, he had learned to his cost how potently such swordsmiths could infuse a weapon with aethyric power. He didn’t envy the Chaos champion the destruction that would soon be his.

  Yet before Makvar could close upon the invader, a new factor thrust itself into the battle. Lumbering through the doorway was a ghastly monster, a hideous spawn of Chaos. Nagash could see the rampant arcane energies shivering through the thing’s body, changing and mutating every organ and bone with each step it took. His witchsight revealed to him the murderous Mark of Khorne branded into the one bit of chest that had resisted the riotous transformation that swept through the rest of the abomination’s frame.

  More than that, Nagash understood how this monstrosity had come into being. He could sense the phantasmal harmonies that saturated the spawn and recognised them as part of the ghostly force that Mannfred had employed to build Nachtsreik. A slave of the Blood God Khorne, this creature had glutted itself on the spectral gore seeping from the walls until it lost whatever integrity of form it had once possessed. The thing had become carnage incarnate.

  A moment after it appeared, the spawn’s mouth made a savage utterance, declaring that the Bloodking himself had come to Nachtsreik. The next instant, the fortress trembled. Nagash knew it was from the impact of some tremendous projectile, though perhaps not something more destructive than those hurled against it by the skaven. The difference wasn’t in the missile, but in the castle itself. Just as the blood-soaked stones had responded to the Khorne champion, so too they were affected by the presence of the Bloodking. The necromantic resilience and regeneration with which Mannfred had infused his fortress had been disrupted. The fight in the Mortarch’s sanctum had weakened the resilience of his sorcery, stifling the adaptability of his fortifications. The Khornate spawn had further upset the arcane harmonies, establishing a sympathy not with Mannfred’s necromancy but with the bloodthirsty fury of Thagmok. For the first time since it was erected, Nachtsreik was vulnerable to the hordes of Chaos.

  Nagash turned away from Neferata, letting his protection waver. He had no time left to play with the Chaos witch. It was time to end things. As she felt him focusing upon her, the sorceress tried to evoke the arcane concealment that had guarded her and her companions through Nachtsreik. Nagash saw the mutant skull she used to form her spell. At a wave of his bony hand, the skull exploded into morbid fragments, several slivers burying themselves in the sorceress’ body. Stunned, she fell back behind one of the caskets strewn about the hall.

  Nagash’s skeletal fingers closed about the hilt of a sword as ancient and monstrous as himself. The wail of banshees and the shrieks of wraiths echoed in his mind as the Great Necromancer let the deathly pulse of Zefet-nebtar sizzle through his spirit. His own malignance flowed back into the Mortis Blade, establishing a fell harmony between them. As he stalked across the crypt towards his prey, the sorceress sent a coruscating bolt of Chaos magic rushing at him. Nagash whipped the necrotic head of his staff in front of him, spinning it in an arc of power that caught and dissipated the hostile vibrations. Striding through the vaporous residue of the witch’s spell, he closed upon the sorceress.

  The Chaos conjurer was utterly desperate now, summoning all her reserves of aethyric might, channelling reckless amounts of magical energy through her body, heedless of the strain she put upon her merely mortal flesh and spirit. She formed the rampant energies into a great shimmering ball of mutating harmonies and flung it at the Great Necromancer. As she did so, the fingers of her left hand melted away, replaced by fibrous growths more akin to fungus than flesh.

  Nagash caught the malefic spell with Alakanash. It would have been an easy thing for him to hurl its energy back upon the sorceress, but he had other plans for her.

  The Great Necromancer could sense Mannfred watching him as he raised his sword to strike the sorceress. The Mortarch of Night had been using his magic to drive back the Chaos spawn, but now there was a respite, a moment for him to observe his master in action. The vampire saw Nagash poised to strike. Nagash knew he also saw the black stone held tight against the hilt of Zefet-nebtar, the same glassy stone Mannfred had surrounded his sepulchre with – a fragment of which was yet hidden under the Mortarch’s armour.

  Feeling Mannfred’s jealous gaze on him, Nagash brought the Mortis Blade slashing down. The wards the sorceress had built around herself evaporated in an instant, winking out in a flash of purple light. Then, the black sword was shearing through her body, splitting her from crown to pelvis. Nagash could feel the Mark of Tzeentch pulsate with inimical energy as the witch’s spirit abandoned her dying flesh. The Great Necromancer’s pull proved greater, however. He could hear her scream of disbelief as her soul was dragged away from the waiting claws of Tzeentch and down into the black stone he held in his hand.

  As the hewn body of the sorceress wilted at his feet, Nagash looked towards Mannfred. He needed but a single glance to be ass
ured that the Mortarch had seen everything. The gleam in the vampire’s eyes bespoke a terrible inspiration. Nagash realised that his vassal had learned what he wanted him to learn.

  Now he only needed the opportunity for Mannfred to put the lesson into practice.

  All around Makvar, the crypt swayed and shuddered. It was more than the impact of the projectiles the besieging army outside the walls was hurling against Nachtsreik. The firmament itself was coming apart. Great sanguinary expulsions bubbled from wall and ceiling, spilling into the chamber in rivulets of gore. Clumps of bone rolled out from crumbling facades, clattering over the flagstones in a ghoulish tide. Clouds of wailing spectres billowed through the corridors, whipping around the Stormcasts and their Chaos foes before shrieking off into the darkness.

  The fortress was tearing itself apart. The murderous necromancy with which Mannfred had built it was now sinking into a sort of suicidal madness as it responded to the influence of the arch-murderer Khorne, the Chaos God of Carnage. Makvar wondered how exalted the Bloodking Thagmok was in his god’s esteem to inflict such destructive confusion on Nachtsreik.

  For the moment, the question would wait. Leaving Huld and the last Liberator to finish the black-armoured Chaos champion, Makvar rushed to intercept the injured spawn as it lumbered across the crypt towards Neferata. He saw Mannfred casting pulses of dark energy at the mutated horror, but the injuries he visited against it only seemed to make the beast even more crazed. The blood streaming from its wounds refused to splash onto the floor, but instead oozed back into the torn veins and slashed flesh.

  ‘I am the Anvil!’ Makvar cried as he rushed at the hideous monster. His runeblade lashed out in a flash of gleaming metal, hacking into the beast’s nearest arm. Lightning crackled from his sword as it ripped into the crimson flesh. The blood that erupted from the wound came as a gush of scarlet steam, rushing past him in a stagnant cloud. The spawn reared back, its head snarling in pain. The brute swung around, striking at Makvar with one of its cudgel-like fists. The blow missed him as he dived away, instead gouging a pit into the floor. Flagstones crumbled, exposing the catacombs beneath the crypt.