Age of Sigmar: Omnibus

The Argent Falls plunged from the edge of the crucible, falling miles through the air in a wide sheet. The surface was silver, but the orange glow of smelting was visible in the folds of the liquid. Where the falls struck the rock of Anvrok, gobbets of precious metal splattered across the mountainside, and a wide area around the river’s headwater was covered in globular formations of pure silver. The remains of catcher channels could be seen half-buried in the metal. These ruins of industry were far below the Stormcasts, who looked down onto them from a high road.

Beyond the falls was a little more of the land of Anvrok, then the mountains stopped abruptly and the skyvoids began. The road they were on curled downwards, closer to the falls, before it crossed a bridge over a ravine. Smaller roads led off to the works there, and then the main road rose up again to a township on a crag opposite the army, as ruinous as every other city in Anvrok. At the brink of the cliff the circular platform of a dais rose up on an artfully coiled staircase. Six statues of dragons stood around its circumference.

Vandus was close to Ionus and Celemnis, and heard his Lord-Relictor speak.

‘A dragonfate dais?’ Ionus said. ‘How can that aid us?’

Celemnis pointed a long-nailed finger at the dais and disappeared.

Vandus waited a moment before calling out. ‘Has she departed?’

‘No. I sense her still,’ Ionus replied.

Vandus rode up beside him.

‘I am glad. She is a good ally.’

‘She is in great pain,’ said Ionus matter-of-factly. ‘This place must have been fabulously wealthy. I have seen many dragonfate shrines, but never one rendered in solid silver.’

Calanax made a growling purr.

‘Calanax approves. This is a fitting honour to the great drakes. Silver is favoured by them.’

Vandus stroked between Calanax’s horns. ‘And yet, against the barbaric hordes of Chaos, the protection of their old gods availed them little. There is only one god who can stand before the Four, and that god is Sigmar. What would the Silver Maiden have us do, I wonder?’

‘Let us consider the question upon the dais,’ said Ionus. ‘The answer may come to us there more easily, and that is where she pointed.’

‘We cannot all go — look at the road. The town is small.’

‘We should not go alone. We have suffered several ambushes already. Summon Thostos and let his Warrior Chamber come with ours. He is deeply involved in this affair,’ said Ionus.

Vandus nodded. He raised his hand and horns blew. The Hammerhands and the Bladestorms came forward. Together, they went down into the valley and up into the ruined town of Silverfall.

The rumble of the Argent Falls drowned out all other sound. The heat of the silver was intense, and Vandus marvelled that men had lived there at all. Roofless houses and workshops stretched up the mountainside behind the crag for some way, exhibiting that mix of duardin and mannish craftsmanship that was the hallmark of Anvrok’s dead civilisation.

They reached the dais. The base of its supporting stair rose from a village square and a low wall edged it, but much of it had fallen away, leaving a dangerous drop to the rocks and silver accretions below.

‘Thostos, Ionus, Andricus — come with me onto the dais,’ said Vandus.

No sooner had he said the words than a deeper roar undercut the thunder of the Argent Falls: the unnatural grind of machinery. It came from thin air.

‘To arms!’ he yelled.

‘Another bloody ambush,’ growled Andricus. ‘Judicators! To higher ground. Liberators, shieldwall.’

All around the assembled brotherhoods, slivers of green light split the air. Green-black drills ground through each, ripping wide the fabric of reality before withdrawing.

‘Stormfiends!’ said a Liberator. ‘Skaven!’

His warning was cut short by a hail of bullets. Giant, rat-like monsters shouldered their way out of the tears in the weft of the world. Some bore multi-barrelled guns in the place of fists, and they fired as they came. Dozens of Stormcasts were shredded, falling to their knees before disappearing in blurs of azure lightning. Behind the gun-beasts came more giants, these armed with whirring drills and grinders. They bowed their heads and charged.

‘Stand ready!’ called Vandus.

‘Judicators, loose!’ yelled Andricus.

A storm of bolts spat through the air, felling one of the giant rat monsters. It collapsed face first into the dirt with a pitiful grunt, revealing the swollen-headed rat-thing bonded to its back. This twisted ratling mewled horribly until a hammer stroke ended its misery. Liberators charged the stormfiends. Those warriors that were not knocked flying by the swipes of the creatures’ arms rained hammer blows upon knees and ankles, hoping to bring the giant beings low. Vandus drove Calanax into the fray, but the stormfiends proved more than a match for the Lord-Celestant and his steed, and they were driven back under the shadow of the dais. The stormfiends grunted in recognition, seeming to single him out, and soon Vandus was surrounded by three of the things.