‘You will not try alone. We shall work our magics together, dream-of-Sigmar. We shall bring harmony to the great leviathan, and ease its agonies,’ the Starpriest chirped. ‘Align your thoughts to mine, and listen. We shall make whole that which is in disarray.’
As the skink spoke, the slann raised his long arms above his head and uttered a wordless croak of power. The amber sky turned blue, and the storm clouds thickened. Motes of azure lightning danced within them. The Dreaming Seer reached out towards the Lord-Relictor, and Zephacleas felt something indefinable and intangible pass between them. The slann’s eyes were wide open now, and there were stars within them. Seker and Takatakk raised their staves and began to chant in unison. Though one prayed to Sigmar and the other did not, their voices flowed together like rushing water, rising up towards the darkening sky. Through it all, the worm continued to bellow its agonies, until Zephacleas thought his eardrums might burst.
The air thickened with growing pressure, and the voices of the Lord-Relictor and the Starpriest shaped it and stretched it. Their words seemed to echo from every tower and stone in the Crawling City, redoubling in volume and strength. Overhead, the clouds had turned the colour of the void, and the lightning had become as stars.
The slann stretched out his hands and, for a moment, it seemed to Zephacleas as if the creature were larger than it was. A titanic shape, quite unlike the crude amphibian body it normally wore; something vast and serpentine, as wide as the world and as long as eternity. It stretched up, and fangs of starlight scraped the sky. A glittering cerulean rain began to fall across Shu’gohl — lightly at first, but then growing in intensity. It was not the rain which accompanied the Stormcasts as they went to war, but it was of Azyr nonetheless.
Zephacleas lifted his hands in wonder. Other Stormcast Eternals followed suit, as too did the mortals. It was a cleansing rain, as would purify both body and soul, and he felt invigorated as it splashed across his armour. Where it touched the ground, a pale steam rose from the worm’s flesh. The filth of the skaven was reduced to ash and their abominable structures sagged and decayed in an instant. The worm’s shuddering slowed, and its groaning faded to a dull rumble.
Seker stumbled, his staff nearly slipping from his grip. Zephacleas caught him and helped to steady him. ‘Easy my friend — you have truly worked a wonder this day.’
Seker shook his head. ‘Not… not me. Not alone. It’s— his mind, it was so vast, like nothing I have ever witnessed… his mind is a sun, and we but orbit it,’ the Lord-Relictor said, in a whisper. ‘I saw horrors and beauties undreamt of even in the halls of Sigmaron, and moments… like fragments of crystal, holding flickering images of places I did not recognize. His mind is as clockwork, built not of mortal matter but something else… he has played out this very moment a thousand times across a thousand years, honing it, pruning away those possibilities which displease him. We… No.’ He shook himself and pushed away from Zephacleas. ‘Forgive me, Lord-Celestant. I… I am myself again.’
‘You are worthy indeed, dream-of-Sigmar,’ Takatakk said, softly. ‘You have seen the Great Equation, though you cannot understand.’ The little seraphon patted Seker’s arm, as if in sympathy. ‘It is a great thing, to witness the all that was and is.’ A flying reptile shrieked overhead. Takatakk looked up, head cocked. ‘The vermin flee across the causeway. There is nowhere else for them to run. The Great Lord Kurkori’s dream is coming to an end.’ The skink looked up at Zephacleas. ‘We must march.’
‘And we will march with you,’ Zephacleas said. ‘We make for the causeway and the Storm-Crown. And we will end this once and for all.’
Lightning speared through the sapphire air and crawled across the ruins. It cascaded down shattered statues and washed over broken domes. The air stank of iron and heat and Kruk’s filthy fur stood on end. Lightning struck the causeway ahead, filling the air with dust and stone. Kruk pressed on, followed by the remnants of his congregation. He had to hurry, quick-quick. The enemy were close at hand. All of them.
Kruk could not say who he hated more at this point — Vretch or the star-devils. The storm-things were a close second, but they were as nothing compared to the continuing intestinal malignancy that was Vretch. The plague priest thrust his good claw beneath his robes and scratched furiously at himself. Worse than the nearness of his foes was the lack of his daemonic patron. Skuralanx had not appeared to him since the Setaen Palisades, and Kruk had begun to wonder if the daemon had abandoned his most loyal follower. What sort of master did that? No sort of master at all, Kruk thought. Kruk would never abandon his own followers, no-no.
The causeway to the temple wasn’t long or particularly wide. Broken statues lined its rail, glaring down at the scurrying skaven, and at its end, a ring of massive effigies occupied the plaza where the causeway intersected the heart of the temple. Kruk could see the broken dome of the central temple over the tops of the shattered outbuildings and something told him that was where he must go — and quickly. The enemy weren’t far behind them. They would soon finish off Skug and the others. Poor Skug… poor heroic, expendable Skug. Kruk shook his head. It was hard to find a lackey of that quality in these decadent times.
The causeway began to shake on its foundations and an elemental groan rose up, blasting his skull free of all thought. All around him, skaven released the musk of fear or fell onto their faces, screeching in terror. Broken statues toppled from their plinths, and one crushed a dozen plague monks into a foetid paste. Kruk alone maintained his claws during the quake, more because he wanted to be ready to run than from any innate obstinacy. Stubborn as he was, even he knew better than to try and fight a force of nature.
Overhead, the sky went dark and a burning rain began to fall. It stung his flesh and he waved his censer over his head in an effort to shield himself. The shaking slowed and finally stopped a moment later. Kruk cast a disdainful eye over his followers. ‘Up-up, fools. Up on your claws, quick-quick… we must hurry,’ he snarled, stumping towards the end of the causeway. If they could get in among the ruins, they might be able to ambush the foe. He glanced back at the ruins of his congregation — a few dribbling choirs of censer bearers, and thrice that of sorry-looking plague monks, some of them from Vretch’s procession. Barely a few hundred in all.
It would have to be enough. He had survived worse. He would survive this. The Congregation of Fumes would rise again. Kruk thumped his chest with his censer, hissing in pleasure at the moment of pain. He enjoyed it so much, he did it again, inhaling the fumes. Yessss, he thought, I shall rise like the pox-smoke, once the Liber is in my possession. I shall use that coward Vretch’s spine to stir my cauldron and wear his fangs around my neck. He snickered cheerfully at the thought.
Lightning struck the ground nearby, and his good mood vanished. He snarled defiantly at the sky. Yes, he would survive. And then he would kill this blasted worm and all who dwelt atop it.
‘Look,’ one of his followers chittered, interrupting his reverie. Kruk turned.
A huddled mass of rags and blisters lay weeping audibly at the foot of one of the statues which occupied the central plaza. A wide stain, dotted with tiny worms, marked the path it had taken to get there. The greasy trail led back into the ruins some distance, where a great hole gaped, its edges seared by lightning. Kruk stumped forward. He glared down at the shivering mass. Worms bored in and out of the cracked and weeping blisters which marred the visible flesh, and the whole mass stank of a sickness so potent it made even him hesitate. Kruk nudged the mass with a foot, causing it to roll over. It was Vretch.
The plague priest looked up, and by his expression, Kruk thought his was the last face the other skaven had ever wished to see.