Around them, the battle had devolved into confusion. Nighthaunts crawled over Stormcasts, pulling them down or slowing them long enough for the deadwalkers to do so. Lightning burst upwards again and again, as more warriors fell.
Worse, more deadwalkers were pouring into the plaza. Where they were coming from, Balthas didn’t know, but they were closing in on the Castigators on the temple steps, despite the impressive rate of fire produced by Quintus’ warriors.
As he snatched up his staff, he caught sight of the dark-clad spirit who’d killed Lynos. The armour it – he – wore was baroque and tattered, hanging off a body and limbs that were barely there. The blade in his hand was black, and gleamed like glass.
As if sensing his attentions, the creature turned to meet his gaze. The world seemed to slow and dim. The crash of lightning became a drawn-out rasp, and the screams of the dying and the dead merged into a great roar. Balthas was unable to look away as the creature began to stride towards him, moving normally despite the slowed nature of everything around them. Balthas could hear the rattle of tattered armour and the crackle of the purple lightning that seethed beneath it. ‘I know you,’ the creature said. Its voice boomed like thunder, drowning out all other sound.
That voice was familiar – painfully so. Balthas had heard it before, in the Chamber of the Broken World, echoing in his head as it did now. He had known the moment was coming, but there had been no way to truly prepare for the shock of it.
The thing before him was a blight on the aether – a storm, caged in shadows. The wrongness of it made his senses ache. It flickered eerily, moving out of synch with the world around it. It was a thing that should not be, the essence of one god enslaved by another. Within the confines of its monstrous helm, its features bled and shifted – first human, then a bare skull, then something in between.
‘I know you,’ it – he – said again.
Balthas raised his hand, and tried to draw the lightning to it. ‘And I know you, Thaum,’ he said, as weak energies flickered about his gauntlets. ‘I name thee Pharus Thaum, and bid thee–’
‘Silence,’ Thaum hissed, suddenly in front of him. His face stretched and wrinkled like canvas, lightning-scarred bone peeking through ravaged flesh. It was like a too-small mask, pulled over something horrid. Balthas took a step back as their eyes locked, and he saw…
Screaming, Thaum fell and fell and fell…
A child’s face, a girl… Elya…
A God of Death, tearing him asunder and remaking him…
A tide of fell spirits, sweeping up towards the Shimmergate, towards Azyr…
Thaum shrilled in pain and twisted away, breaking contact. ‘You,’ he rasped. ‘You hurt me before. You tried to make me something else – tried to take who I was…’
‘No, I tried to help you – Sigmar tried to–’
‘I said be silent.’ Thaum spun, sword raised. The black blade slashed down, slowly, so slowly, but as inevitable as nightfall. In its facets, Balthas thought he saw a skeletal face, leering at him, its eye sockets blazing amethyst. And that face was reflected in Thaum’s own – no longer that of a man, but a skull, stretched and warped as if something were growing within it. And he knew then what his failure meant.
‘No!’
Porthas struck Balthas, slamming him aside, breaking the spell. As Balthas fell, he saw the blade part Porthas’ helm like paper. The Sequitor-Prime toppled away, body shattering into starlight and lightning. The crooked spirit – the jailer-thing – swooped on the rising soul, chains clanking.
Enraged, Balthas instinctively caught hold of the aether and drew it taut. ‘You shall not have him,’ he roared. He slammed his fists down and lightning exploded upwards, driving back the spirits that pressed close all about him and sending the jailer-thing fleeing, its twisted form alight. Thaum too staggered back, shrieking in pain as the lightning tore at him.
Balthas rose and swept out his hand, ignoring the pain of the storm as it raged through him. Lightning punched Thaum backwards, sending the creature rattling across the plaza. Before he could pursue, a blow caught him across the back, knocking him to one knee. He heard the familiar cackle of the axe-wielding spectre, as it swept about him like a serpent readying itself to strike.
The axe came down, nearly taking his head off. He lunged awkwardly to the side, moving swiftly, trying to put some distance between them, so that he could employ his magics. He caught sight of his staff and shoved a deadwalker aside as he made to reach it. He whistled sharply, hoping that Quicksilver was still alive and able to hear him.
The spectre pursued him, the ghostly skulls swirling about it gibbering and muttering. ‘I know you,’ the spectre hissed. ‘One like you took my prince from me – drew him up and bound him in star-iron. Made a false king of him and set treacherous thoughts in his head. Theft. Treachery. By these crimes, and a thousand others, have you been judged. And the sentence – death!’
Balthas turned and interposed his staff. He caught the blade of the axe as it descended, and the storm surged through him, cascading across the weapon and up into its ghostly wielder. The spectre screamed, not in triumph this time, but agony.
A moment later, the axe exploded into white-hot shards. The spectre flew backwards, form blurring and rippling as the celestial energies coursed through it. The creature plummeted to the street, its smoky form shredded and coming apart. It clutched at itself in agony, as the broken shards of lesser spirits clustered about it. These parasitic phantoms shot towards him as he approached.
He heard a screech, and Quicksilver pounced on one of the phantoms, the aetheric energies curling about his beak and talons allowing him to pull the dead thing apart as if it were living prey. Balthas stepped past the gryph-charger, closing in on his would-be executioner. The spectre tried to rise, its form tattered and fading. ‘I will not… where is he… where is my prince?’ it shrilled, lunging at him, ragged claws extended. ‘Tell me!’
Balthas thrust his staff out, like a spear. The nighthaunt shuddered as the end of the staff punched through its chest. It clutched at him, and in that moment, the madness seemed to clear from its eyes. ‘Tarsem,’ it whispered. Balthas sent a pulse of aetheric energy through the staff and the nighthaunt came apart with a small, sad sigh.
Dead hands clutched at him as he pulled himself into the saddle, and tore at Quicksilver’s fur and feathers. The gryph-charger snarled and lashed out, crushing the deadwalkers. But more pressed forwards. Lightning erupted upwards across the plaza, as Stormcasts were pulled down by the dead.
‘They die as slaves. They will be reborn as something better.’
Balthas twisted in his saddle, as the words stung his ears. Pharus Thaum approached slowly, surrounded by chainrasps. Despite the din of battle, he could hear the ghostly warrior’s words clearly. Smoke rose from Thaum’s armour, but the creature seemed otherwise unharmed.
‘As you will be reborn. As I was.’
‘This is not rebirth,’ Balthas spat. ‘This is a mockery.’
Thaum laughed, and for a moment, it was as if another voice, deeper and greater, echoed him. ‘It is justice. In death, I was redeemed. My eyes were opened to the truth of things. I see now that I fought in service of a lie. In service to a false king. And I have returned to cast down his works, and salt the earth.’