Not much to be proud of, but they were alive.
‘So, what now?’ she asked him.
Martak shook his head, a wry expression playing across his wrinkled brow. She could tell what he was thinking. Plans would have to be made. Schwarzhelm might yet live. Valten might still carry Ghal Maraz. There were mysteries to delve into, and at some stage someone would have to go back into the Palace, searching for any remains of the… event. They had all seen the tides of gold, and they had all heard the roar of the storm, and they all knew that it had changed everything, and that a new power had been birthed in Altdorf beneath the comet’s glare.
For now, though, it was too soon.
‘I do not know, sister,’ Martak said, clutching her hand tight.
The two of them sat next to one another after that, looking out onto the aftermath of the apocalypse, sharing silence.
Altdorf was destroyed, shriven to its foundations, and there would be no rebuilding. The old city was gone – its garrisons, its theatres, its chapels, its taverns and its storehouses, swept into nothingness.
The End Times had come, but they had not brought the utter destruction the gods of the North desired.
The old stories had ended, their power gone and their magic decayed. Now new stories would be told, but where they would lead, and who would tell them, even the wisest could not tell.
About The Author
Chris Wraight is the author of the Horus Heresy novel Scars, the novella Brotherhood of the Storm and the audio drama The Sigillite. For Warhammer 40,000 he has written the Space Wolves novels Blood of Asaheim and Stormcaller, and the short story collection Wolves of Fenris, as well as the Space Marine Battles novels Wrath of Iron and Battle of the Fang. Additionally, he has many Warhammer novels to his name, including the Time of Legends novel Master of Dragons, which forms part of the War of Vengeance series. Chris lives and works near Bristol, in south-west England.