He stopped. Turned. His reflection glared at him from every direction. He had been led down a mirrored path, and everywhere he looked, a face he only dimly recognised looked back at him. He could see the skulls beneath their skin, and felt the amethyst heat of his own reflected gaze. And behind them, above them, in and out of them, something great and terrible crouched, its talons on his shoulders.
‘What…?’ He hesitated. The shadow behind him rose, its eyes blazing with cold fire.
Fool. Would you cast aside the chance at justice so quickly?
‘I have cast nothing aside. The child is…’
Nothing. She is nothing. A memory. A useless thing, well discarded.
As the words echoed in the hollows of him, he saw something else. A light, shining through the gaps in his war-plate. Not amethyst, but azure. He felt the twisting bite of lightning inside him, and snarled, forcing it down.
‘This place… It eats at me.’
Which is why you must not delay. Break the seals. Free the dead. Purify this place.
He reached out a skeletal hand, but his reflection did not mimic the gesture. Instead, it simply stared at him, as if in pity. The eyes – his eyes – blazed cerulean, and Pharus felt a flare of rage. He swept his blade from its sheath. The glass shattered, revealing a new path. He sheathed his sword.
‘Come,’ he said. ‘This way.’ He could hear the crackle of lightning, and the crash of sigmarite, echoing from elsewhere in the catacombs. The battle wasn’t over yet. But it soon would be. Then, then he would… What? He paused, trying to think. Trying to push past the rush of memories…
…the dead were everywhere in the streets, everywhere he turned…
…his halberd swept down, chopping through a door as dead hands caught at him…
…Elya wailing as something from the grave clutched her to its bosom…
…he raised his lantern, and there was thunder…
‘My lord,’ Dohl began, from behind Pharus, drawing him from his memories. The light of the guardian’s lantern washed across the mirrored slabs, doubling and redoubling in its intensity. ‘There are greater matters, at hand. Fate cannot be denied. It is…’
‘Inevitable,’ Pharus said, not stopping. ‘Then why do you fret so, guardian? What was it you told me – that such worries would pass?’ He slashed out, shattering another mirror to his left. He paused, staring at the mirror in front of him. Whose face was that, staring back? ‘If it is inevitable, then what I do here is of no matter.’
‘You lose sight of your purpose.’
No. It had not been him. Not him as he was, or even as he had been, but who he had been before the gods had taken an interest in him. Was that whose voice cried out, somewhere inside him?
It does not matter. There is no truth in the past. Only in the present. The past and future are nothing more than false promises. Your course is set. Certain. Hold fast to your purpose.
‘I will not be swayed from it,’ he said. But the memories…
…thunder, and the screams of the dead, as Azyr caught them up…
…thief, the spirit shrieked as it burned, thief…
‘I see everything,’ he said, staring at the glass and what it held. Another him, burning in the flames of Nagashizzar. One quick stroke destroyed it. As it collapsed in a mass of winking shards, he saw the shape that had been crouched behind it. Shapes, rather. Cats sped away, scattering into the catacombs. And among them, their queen. ‘Elya…’ She did not stop.
He loped after the girl, driven by something he did not understand. Spirits howled in his wake, drawn to the hunt by the light of Dohl’s lantern. Hunger warred with cold in him, and something else. A need greater than either. Around him, his reflection warped and stretched, as the thing that rode deep in his soul raged in fury.
Calys raced through the catacombs, moving as swiftly as she could. Grip ran alongside her, and they both followed a familiar shape – the scar-lipped cat that seemed to be wherever Elya was. The beast scampered through the crypts and ruins, moving swiftly. The cat had appeared, as if aware of who she sought, and Calys had followed it without thinking.
She could hear the thunder of battle all around her, but she ignored it. Balthas’ warriors had their duty, and she had hers. She concentrated on the cat. Grip gave a sudden squall and put on a burst of speed, racing ahead. Calys followed. She heard Elya scream, and cried out. ‘Elya!’
She turned, trying to follow the scream, but the labyrinth spun around her. Then, she caught sight of the light. An eerie glow, flickering among the tombs. She raced towards it, drawing her blade as she went. As she neared the light, she realised she was actually above it. She caught sight of Elya, climbing a statue.
Calys thudded across the half-sunken roof of a crypt and leapt. She slammed down near the statue. ‘Elya,’ she called out.
‘Calys,’ something said. Something that glowed with an eerie grey-green light.
Calys turned as the light washed over her, and saw something foul emerge from the dark, dragging its tomb-blade in its wake. ‘Calys Eltain,’ it said again, in a dull, harsh voice. ‘I know you. I… remember you. This place… it is making me remember.’ The thing straightened to its – his – full height. A thin, almost skeletal shape, clad in black-iron armour and ragged burial shrouds, its gaze bored into her. It’s voice, distorted as it was, seemed familiar.
‘You will not touch her,’ Calys said to the creature, warblade extended. She glanced up and saw Elya scrambling to the top of the statue. She turned her attentions back to her foe. ‘I will not let you.’
The dead thing laughed, a harsh croak of sound. ‘Calys,’ he rasped. ‘I think we have been here before, you and I.’ He tapped the side of his helm. ‘Do you remember? Or did Sigmar take that from you?’
Calys hesitated. ‘Remember what?’
‘The night I killed you.’
She blinked in sudden, sickened recognition, as she saw the flicker of azure lightning in the dead man’s gaze. ‘Pharus?’
Pharus surged towards her, more swiftly than her eye could follow. Their blades connected with a crash, and she was driven back, into a half-toppled pillar, losing her shield in the process. Nighthaunts swirled up around them, like a swarm of angry night-wasps. But they did not come any closer, retreating as the watching cats hissed and spat. Something about the animals kept them at bay. She caught hold of her warblade with both hands.
‘You’re the one who died,’ Calys said, trying to force him back. But he was strong. Too strong. The edge of the black blade pressed down towards her, despite her best efforts. Past his shoulder, she caught sight of Grip, crouched atop a crypt nearby. The gryph-hound was readying itself to leap, its eyes gleaming.
‘Before that,’ Pharus hissed, as his balefire gaze burned through her, down into her soul. ‘I remember it all, now. I remember that night, and your daughter’s screams, and I see you, not just this shell, but who you were before. I see the ghost of you, Calys Eltain. I see it, hiding in the false radiance of Azyr, and I will drag it out, into the true light. And you will thank me.’ He glanced up at Elya, who stared down at them in horror. ‘And you will thank me as well, child. You will be together again. You will have justice – both of you.’