‘She slipped away a few moments ago.’
‘You saw her go?’ Calys demanded.
‘She went back.’
‘Back? Back where? How could you let her go? She’s just a child!’ Calys shook off Miska’s hand. ‘I must find her.’ She started back the way they’d come. ‘I made an oath.’
‘And does that oath outweigh your duty?’ Dathus said, sharply. ‘That child knows these catacombs better even than Pharus did. If she is hiding, not even the dead will find her.’
Calys whirled, denial springing to her lips. But before she could voice it, she heard the bells. They were ringing somewhere to the south. And beneath their clamour, the groaning of the dead. Not the pathetic things, trapped in their tombs, but the feral dead. Nighthaunts and nicksouls. Balthas caught her arm, and she looked at him.
‘There is no time,’ Balthas said.
‘She is in danger,’ Calys said, hoarsely. ‘I told Pharus – I swore to him that I would protect her. I cannot…’ Her words trailed away. ‘I swore to him,’ she said.
Balthas stared at her a moment, as if searching for something. Then, with a sigh, he released her. ‘Go,’ he said, softly. ‘And Sigmar go with you, sister.’
Pharus stared into the dying priest’s face, seeking some sign that the mortal understood. That in these final moments, he’d grasped the truth Pharus had brought him. That there was no salvation in Azyr, only in death.
But the priest simply died. And then… nothing. Pharus shook the body. He looked at Dohl, hovering nearby, the light of his lantern illuminating the slaughterhouse interior of the bell tower. The priests had put up a desperate fight, but prayers and silver alone were little match for nighthaunts. ‘Where is he?’ Pharus croaked. ‘Draw his gheist from him.’
‘Alas, my lord, I cannot. This place is warded with filthy starlight. It has poisoned the air and the soil. We can free those dead things already trapped here, but we cannot draw up the newly fallen. They are imprisoned.’ Dohl leaned close. ‘But that will change, once you have freed the ten thousand. This place will belong to Nagash once more, and the fallen will rise at your command.’
At the command of Nagash.
Pharus let the body fall. ‘At his command, you mean.’
Dohl bowed his head. ‘Of course, my lord. As you say.’
Pharus turned and grasped the hilt of his blade, where it jutted from between the shoulder blades of another priest. The sword resisted for a moment, before it allowed him to retrieve it. There was no blood, clinging to the edge, as if the facets of the blade had absorbed them. He stared into the facets, seeking a sign that all would be as Dohl had sworn. But he saw nothing save amethyst motes, swirling in the black.
Listen.
He paused, listening. From all around him rose voices, crying out for release. Some were unbearably close, while others seemed impossibly far away.
They call to you. Listen – hear the prisoners cry out for their liberator.
He did not sheath the blade. He would need it again soon enough. Above, the bells were still ringing, though all the priests were dead. Whether they were ringing in joy or sorrow, he did not know. Perhaps both. Joy of what was to come, sorrow at the loss of what had been. To be dead was to be trapped eternally between the two.
To be dead is to serve Nagash. Nothing more. Nagash is all.
‘And all are one in Nagash,’ he murmured. Outside of the bell tower, his nighthaunts were busy clawing at the crypts and tombs, opening those only protected by the weakest of wards. His army would grow, even if they could not draw up the spirits of those they had slain. ‘Get them moving,’ he said. ‘We must reach the tombs.’
Dohl began to speak, but Pharus ignored his exhortations. He drifted out of the shadow of the bell tower. The air trembled as the ground shifted. The patch that the bell tower stood on felt as if it was sliding out of position, and the path ahead vanished amid a sudden profusion of stone crypts and slabs. But he was not confused. He counted silently, and the path changed again, revealing itself.
This place has no secrets from you. That is why only you could do this.
The bell towers were one of the secrets to navigating the catacombs. Their position was fixed. In fact, most of the catacombs were physically fixed in place. But they gave the appearance of moving, thanks to carefully placed mirrors and illusory backdrops. Silvered chains rose from the dust as a section of stone slid out of place, blocking the route to a section of the nearby necropolis. Nighthaunts retreated, wailing disconsolately.
Pharus watched, trying to banish the voice that whispered urgently, just below the surface of his thoughts. It was the price he paid for remembering the way through this maze, but it was becoming harder to ignore, the further he travelled into the catacombs.
You will ignore it. Your purpose is set. Inevitable.
‘Inevitable,’ he said. He turned west and saw the catacombs fall away in a sea of irregular tiers. Storm-lanterns burned in the dark, tiny pinpricks of azure light. Their presence disturbed the black, and he felt a twitch of anger, somewhere deep in him.
The light of Azyr, the voice hissed. The light that bars the dead. You must snuff it.
The sands in his sword’s hourglass hissed, and he felt something in him draw him back around. Towards the heart of the labyrinth.
You will snuff it. You will douse the sun in shadow, and silence the stars.
First one step, then two. The need – the command – beat at his brain like the heat of a sun. Until he was striding along the avenue, followed by a storm of dead souls.
Dohl joined him. ‘You seem eager, my lord.’
Flood the catacombs, the voice murmured. Crack open all vaults, and set the prisoners free. Where death once ruled, let it rule again.
‘Send chainrasps to the east and the west, as we drive north,’ Pharus said, not looking at the guardian of souls. ‘I would not fight an organised enemy. Keep them looking in all directions at once.’
‘A wise plan, a keen plan, my lord,’ Dohl croaked. ‘We shall fight not as an army, but as a force of nature – a flood, a fire…’
‘A storm,’ Pharus said. He was moving swiftly now, not running but flowing. Dohl kept pace, the light of his lantern growing brighter, until it was almost blinding. Wailing spirits surged in their wake, filling the air and scrabbling across the stones of the ground. Some flew like birds or slithered like snakes. Others stalked on shattered limbs, or dragged broken gallows in their wake. Regardless of their appearance, they all crashed together and hurtled on, in the wake of the lantern’s light. Some of the eagerness that gripped Pharus held them as well, burning through them and driving them into new heights of frenzy.
They flowed in a wave of spectral energy across the avenue, and along the slope above and below. His followers passed through stone, and around the pillars with their glowing wards and between the lengths of silver chain stretched across the smaller paths. Bells had begun to ring, deeper in the catacombs, and he felt a flicker of satisfaction.
The flicker was snuffed, as something exploded in the midst of the chainrasp horde just behind him. The glare of lightning washed across him and broke the momentum of the advance. He turned, as smaller explosions swept across the slope above. Crypts tore loose from their foundations and slid down, gaining speed, until an avalanche of stone was rumbling down on the avenue.