Contents

Cover

Chosen of Sigmar – Extract

A Black Library Publication

eBook license

Chosen of Sigmar

Matt Westbrook

The torrential rain finally ceased as the first figures began to emerge from the mouth of Splitskull Pass. They did not wear the sea green, white and gold of the Argellonites Chamber of the Celestial Vindicators. They were stout, savage-looking creatures wrapped in bands of yellow-painted iron. Some strode on foot while others were mounted on fearsome, tusked beasts.

‘He has fallen then,’ said Eldroc.

‘As we knew he must,’ said Lord-Celestant Thostos Bladestorm, standing at the Lord-Castellant’s side upon the battlements of the Manticore Dreadhold. ‘Let us hope Lord-Celestant Argellon took as many of the orruks with him as he could, before the end.’

Eldroc nodded. Even as they spoke, the essence of Mykos Argellon was being carried home upon the celestial storm, back to the halls of Azyrheim. There he would be reforged anew, to be sent out once more against the forces of Chaos and darkness. But immortality did not come without a price. The Lord-Castellant glanced at Thostos. His friend was the living embodiment of such sacrifice. Once he had been a thoughtful, introspective man, a counter-balance against the raw fury and desire for vengeance that was the hallmark of the Celestial Vindicators.

The Reforging had taken that from him, had hollowed him out until all that was left was the fury and the need for retribution.

‘He will fight beside us once more,’ said Eldroc. ‘He is strong. He will be remade, and he will emerge through the flame as a better man.’

‘No,’ said Thostos, and his voice was soft yet filled with surety. The Lord-Celestant turned to Eldroc, and looked him in the eye.

‘It will break him,’ he went on. ‘He will enter the storm and it will break him down, tear him apart until there is nothing left of the man he once was. This is the sacrifice we made, brother. We are all here because we swore the same oaths. We knew there would be a price. It is one worth paying, for what we must do.’

Without another word, Thostos made for the interior stair that would take him down to the inner courtyard of the fortress. Arrayed at defensive positions around the Dreadhold were the two hundred and fifty men at his command, securing weak points and stacking barricades at the breached main gate that would hinder the orruks’ progress if they decided, as they inevitably would, on an all-out frontal assault. Two-score of that number faced in the opposite direction, a wall of sigmarite that guarded the Manticore Realmgate, the structure that the Celestial Vindicators had been sent here to secure.

Eldroc and Thostos crossed the inner courtyard, and made their way up the wide stair atop of which lay the gate. The structure stood on a wide plinth carved into the mountain, and it was here that the Stormcasts had organised their defensive position.

‘Keep up your guard,’ said Thostos, as they passed the men. ‘The forces of Chaos may come pouring through this portal at any moment.’

The Lord-Relictor Tharros Soulwarden knelt before the structure, still working the magic that would cleanse the taint of Chaos from the portal and allow the Stormcasts to pass through.

‘He has not spoken or moved since the daemonic incursion?’ asked Thostos.

‘No, my Lord,’ said Liberator-Prime Arestes, a stolid, reliable warrior known for his lack of humour as much as for his skill at arms. ‘But the gate’s fell light dims by the moment. Whatever the Lord-Relictor is doing, it is quelling the power of this Chaos-warped thing.’

‘But not fast enough. Our time has run out,’ said Thostos. ‘The orruks march on us, and we have not the men to hold back their numbers.’

‘The fortress can hold out a little longer,’ said Eldroc. As Lord-Castellant, he was responsible for the fortification and defence of locations that the Stormcasts had claimed. ‘We have little choice in the matter. We must give Tharros as much time as he requires, and hope that Sigmar is watching over us.’

Thostos nodded. ‘You will defend the wall, Lord-Castellant. I shall take the gatehouse. Despite the damage to the main gate, we can bottleneck them there as long as the ramparts remain clear.’

Eldroc nodded, even though he knew as well as his Lord-Celestant that they could not possibly hold out. Oh, they would bleed the orruks, they would make them pay a heavy price for every inch of ground, but in the end it would not be enough. The sun broke through the clouds once more, rising behind the great statue of Archaon, and the figure’s shadow fell across the valley floor ahead of them.

Atrin Eagle-Eye found that not an inch of his body was free from pain. He tried to focus through the haze of agony. He had fallen a great distance, hurled to his death by the mortal witchkin that called itself Xos’Phet. Yet, as the stabbing pain that arced down his spine and throbbed through his legs was quick to remind him, he was not in fact dead.

He felt around, and his hands touched a mushy, viscous substance. He lay on a bed of the stuff, and could smell its pungent, chemical odour. Slowly, his eyes adjusted to the darkness, and the faint glimmer of lichen on the walls revealed a forest of fungi that stretched far into the distance. Glancing up, he could see the stone chimney through which he had fallen. Water dripped down to fall on his armour, and he pulled off his war-mask for a moment to let the downpour cool his face.

‘Well, warrior of Azyr,’ he muttered. ‘You’re a long, long way from home.’

Suddenly, the memory came back to him. His brother Judicator, Oreus, blasted into nothingness by a ray of fell magic. Retributor Callan, burning and screaming, claimed by the foul minions of Xos’Phet. And what of Alzheer, the mortal priestess of the nomadic tribespeople? He had no idea where she had gone, but if the creatures that the sorcerer commanded were still roaming these caverns, she was in terrible danger. He had no time for the luxury of rest. There had to be some way back up to the site of the ambush. From there he could track Xos’Phet down, rescue Callan, and wring the scrawny witchkin’s neck in the process.

With an effort that sent a fresh wave of torment rolling across his frame, Atrin hauled himself to his feet. His left arm was stiff and painful, probably broken in a couple of places. His head rang with what felt like a minor concussion, and one ankle would barely support his weight. He still had his gladius, but there was no sign of the boltstorm crossbow he had carried.

Half crippled. Lacking a weapon. Lost in a subterranean maze of caverns.

‘Sigmar, I could use your favour now,’ he sighed.

Atrin drew his gladius and began to push through the field of mushrooms. There were wide, thin plates of fungi that felt almost springy beneath his boots, and massive, bell-capped specimens as big as trees. The smell of the place was powerful, but not entirely unpleasant – sickly sweet, with a lingering bitter aftertaste that sat upon his tongue. After a few minutes of pushing through these thick stalks, Atrin was met with an unyielding wall of stone. With little else to guide him, he decided to follow it along, and hope by some miracle that it led to a way out of the chamber.

After at least an hour of stumbling through the cavern, the pain in his arm growing worse and worse by the moment, Atrin had a stroke of good fortune. A narrow tunnel – a tight squeeze for the tall and broad Stormcast – curved around in a spiral, heading upwards. There was the hint of a stair carved into the slippery stone, and Atrin began to feel that this was no natural complex he was travelling through. He could see no signs of civilisation down here, but the mushroom forest in that wide, open chamber, with its adjoining access route, had all the hallmarks of mortal cultivation.

The thought reignited his determination. If humans, or some other cultured race had once dwelt down here, it was far more likely that there was a way back to the upper tunnels.

It was as he dwelled on this pleasant thought that something long, thin and dripping with acidic mucous coiled itself with vice-like strength around his neck.

How many orruks were left to rot in the slaughtering ground of Splitskull Pass, Eldroc had no idea, but the army that loped out to cluster at the foot of the Dreadhold seemed undiminished. They hooted and hollered, swaggering towards the fortress with eager grins on their foolish faces. In the midst of the mob, the Lord-Castellant spotted what had to be the leader. The brute was half again as tall as an average orruk, a monster wrapped in heavy iron plate topped with trophy skulls and relics, clutching a wicked cleaver stained red with the blood of slain Vindicators. It was by some distance the biggest orruk Eldroc had ever seen.

‘When they fall within our range, kill that one first,’ he said to the leader of the Judicator retinue that lined the wall alongside him. ‘Hit it with everything you have.’

‘Aye sire,’ said the Judicator-Prime at his side.

He doubted it would be that simple to kill such a monster, but in his experience orruks gathered around their strongest and most brutal specimens. Take off the head, and the rest of the mob would begin to fracture and self-destruct. At least that was the theory. For such simple-minded, warlike brutes, orruks could be dangerously unpredictable.

‘They’re bloodied, sire,’ said Lorrus. ‘Plenty of the creatures left, but Lord-Celestant Argellon and his warriors certainly dealt some damage before they fell.’

Eldroc could see that the man was right. Though the orruks were full of their race’s usual post-battle cheer, more than a few of the creatures now coming towards them bore the scars of their encounter with the Celestial Vindicators. Bodies dropped as the great horde crossed the plain towards the fortress, the adrenaline surge of combat no longer enough to hold them upright.

‘It is a miracle that he managed to hold on as long as he did against such numbers,’ said the Lord-Castellant. ‘We must endeavour to match his bravery.’

From below his position, he heard the creaking of iron, a great scraping sound as something heavy was dragged across stone. His blood ran cold. Who had opened the main gate? The moment they saw such a breach the orruks would hurl themselves at it in force, and all would be lost.

‘Lord-Castellant,’ came a shout from Judicator Samius, who was pointing at the open ground before the fortress. Eldroc rushed forwards.

There was Thostos Bladestorm, hammer and blade in hand, marching out alone towards the roiling horde of green flesh.

‘Thostos,’ whispered Eldroc.

Click here to buy Chosen of Sigmar.

A Black Library Publication

Published in 2016 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustrations by Mac Smith and Johan Grenier

Chosen of Sigmar © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2016. Chosen of Sigmar, GW, Games Workshop, Black Library, Warhammer, Warhammer Age of Sigmar, Stormcast Eternals, and all associated logos, illustrations, images, names, creatures, races, vehicles, locations, weapons, characters, and the distinctive likenesses thereof, are either ® or TM, and/or © Games Workshop Limited, variably registered around the world.
All Rights Reserved.

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-1-78572-129-8

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

See Black Library on the internet at
blacklibrary.com

Find out more about Games Workshop’s world of Warhammer and the Warhammer 40,000 universe at
games-workshop.com

eBook license

This license is made between:

Games Workshop Limited t/a Black Library, Willow Road, Lenton, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, United Kingdom (“Black Library”); and

(2) the purchaser of an e-book product from Black Library website (“You/you/Your/your”)

(jointly, “the parties”)

These are the terms and conditions that apply when you purchase an e-book (“e-book”) from Black Library. The parties agree that in consideration of the fee paid by you, Black Library grants you a license to use the e-book on the following terms:

* 1. Black Library grants to you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, royalty-free license to use the e-book in the following ways:

o 1.1 to store the e-book on any number of electronic devices and/or storage media (including, by way of example only, personal computers, e-book readers, mobile phones, portable hard drives, USB flash drives, CDs or DVDs) which are personally owned by you;

o 1.2 to access the e-book using an appropriate electronic device and/or through any appropriate storage media; and

* 2. For the avoidance of doubt, you are ONLY licensed to use the e-book as described in paragraph 1 above. You may NOT use or store the e-book in any other way. If you do, Black Library shall be entitled to terminate this license.

* 3. Further to the general restriction at paragraph 2, Black Library shall be entitled to terminate this license in the event that you use or store the e-book (or any part of it) in any way not expressly licensed. This includes (but is by no means limited to) the following circumstances:

o 3.1 you provide the e-book to any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.2 you make the e-book available on bit-torrent sites, or are otherwise complicit in ‘seeding’ or sharing the e-book with any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.3 you print and distribute hard copies of the e-book to any company, individual or other legal person who does not possess a license to use or store it;

o 3.4 you attempt to reverse engineer, bypass, alter, amend, remove or otherwise make any change to any copy protection technology which may be applied to the e-book.

* 4. By purchasing an e-book, you agree for the purposes of the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 that Black Library may commence the service (of provision of the e-book to you) prior to your ordinary cancellation period coming to an end, and that by purchasing an e-book, your cancellation rights shall end immediately upon receipt of the e-book.

* 5. You acknowledge that all copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights in the e-book are, shall remain, the sole property of Black Library.

* 6. On termination of this license, howsoever effected, you shall immediately and permanently delete all copies of the e-book from your computers and storage media, and shall destroy all hard copies of the e-book which you have derived from the e-book.

* 7. Black Library shall be entitled to amend these terms and conditions from time to time by written notice to you.

* 8. These terms and conditions shall be governed by English law, and shall be subject only to the jurisdiction of the Courts in England and Wales.

* 9. If any part of this license is illegal, or becomes illegal as a result of any change in the law, then that part shall be deleted, and replaced with wording that is as close to the original meaning as possible without being illegal.

* 10. Any failure by Black Library to exercise its rights under this license for whatever reason shall not be in any way deemed to be a waiver of its rights, and in particular, Black Library reserves the right at all times to terminate this license in the event that you breach clause 2 or clause 3.