The End Times | The Curse of Khaine

Prologue

This is where it all began, before history was recorded. A forest raised from sacred ground by the gods themselves, seeded by the Great Powers that shaped the world. Beneath jade and golden boughs, the elves were taught how to manipulate the energies that permeated the world and its surrounds: they learned magic.

A matriarch ruled over them, and in time she became known as the Everqueen, her immortal spirit reborn into her offspring with each passing generation. These were times of accord, of peaceful bliss and innocent harmony.

Let us be honest and call it what it was: grave naivety.

There were other powers, far older and greater than the tutors of the elves. They had been wronged, their domains trespassed upon, their authority stolen by upstarts. In their anger they laid low the Old Ones and staked their claim to the world.

Mighty was their anger and terrible were the hosts they poured forth to conquer the lands crafted by the usurpers. The pure magic of the timeless aeons was broken, split into the Eight Winds, and the gods of the elves were laid low, exposed as powerless figments. One power ruled, and one power alone: Chaos.

The daemons were their servants. The elves suffered the daemons’ wrath more than any, for the elven isle, the realm of Ulthuan, was steeped in the magical energy that sustained the avatars of the Chaos Powers. Great was the torment and slaughter visited upon the Everqueen and her followers, and in the strife of the elves the Great Powers drank rich from despair and hope, fear and rage.

Yet the dominion of Chaos was not to be.

Not then.

Aenarion, spear-wielder, scale-clad, dragon-rider, united the elves and fought the daemons. Sacrificing himself in the flames of Asuryan, Aenarion was reborn as a figure of myth, the Phoenix King, and his presence was anathema to the daemons.

Even so, Aenarion’s defiance was not enough. Still the daemons came.

Caledor the Dragontamer, magic-wielder, mage-lord of the southern mountains, allied his cause with Aenarion and the two great leaders of the elves stemmed the tide of Chaos for a millennium.

And this was not enough.

Already imbued with the power of one god, Aenarion sought the aid of another when his beloved wife Astarielle the Everqueen was slain, and he believed his children dead also. Aenarion took the Sword of Khaine from its bloodstained altar upon the Blighted Isle. The Widowmaker, the Bane of Gods, the Deathshard. Nothing, not mortal or daemon, could stand before his ire.

But bloodshed alone could not defeat the power of Chaos. Strife is their fodder, war their platter. It was Caledor Dragontamer that devised the true path to victory. He constructed a network of standing stones upon Ulthuan, making a pattern of monoliths and lodestones that created a magical vortex, siphoning the energy of the daemons out of the mortal realm.

At the end of the war, Caledor and his mages were trapped within the vortex they had created and Aenarion was mortally wounded as was his dragon, Indraugnir. The Phoenix King’s final act was to return the Sword of Khaine to its shrine upon the Blighted Isle, but neither king nor faithful steed was seen again.

So the victory of the elves should have been. The daemons were banished, trapped in the Realm of Chaos and the Northern Wastes. The elves should have claimed dominion over the world and ruled benevolently as the inheritors of the Old Ones and Chaos would have been thwarted.

Chaos is not so easily defeated.

What they could not win with war, the Old Powers sought with guile. The whispers of the Chaos Gods polluted the counsel of the elves as they sought to choose a successor to Aenarion.

The princes met in the Glade of Eternity, a great amphitheatre of trees at the centre of which stood a shrine to Isha, the goddess of nature, matron of the Everqueen. Grown of twining silver roots and branches, with emerald-green leaves festooned with blooms in every season, the Aein Yshain glowed with mystical power. By the light of the moons and the stars, the First Council convened, bathed in the twilight of the open skies and the aura of the blessed tree.

Morathi and Malekith were there. Dark-haired and coldly beautiful, the seeress wore a dress of black cloth so fine that it appeared as a diaphanous cloud that barely concealed her alabaster skin. Her raven hair was swept back by bands of finely-woven silver threads hung with rubies, and her lips were painted to match the glittering gems. Slender and noble of bearing she stood, and bore a staff of black iron in her hands.

Malekith was no less imposing. As tall as his father and of similarly dark eyes, he wore a suit of golden mail, and a breastplate upon which was embossed the coiling form of a dragon. A long sword hung in a gold-threaded scabbard at his waist, its pommel wrought from the same precious metal, a dragon’s claw grasping a sapphire the size of a fist.

With them came other princes of Nagarythe who had survived the fighting on the Isle of the Dead. They were dressed in their fine armour, and wore dark cloaks that hung to their ankles, and proudly bore the scars and trophies of their wars with the daemons.

The sinister princes of the north were arrayed with knives, spears, swords, bows, shields and armour wrought with the runes of Vaul, testaments to the power of Nagarythe and Anlec. Banner bearers with black and silver standards stood in attendance, and heralds sounded the trumpets and pipes at their arrival. A cabal of sorcerers accompanied the Naggarothi contingent, clad in robes of black and purple, their faces tattooed and scarred with ritual sigils, their heads shaved.

Another group there was, of princes from the lands founded by Caledor in the south, and from the new realms to the east – Cothique, Eataine, Yvresse and others. At the fore stood the young mage Thyriol, and golden-haired Menieth, son of Caledor Dragontamer.

In contrast to the Naggarothi these elves of the south and east were as day is to night. Though all had played their part in the war against the daemons, these princes had cast off their wargear and instead carried staves and sceptres, and in the place of war helms they wore golden crowns as symbols of their power. They were clad predominantly in white, the colour of mourning, in remembrance of the losses their people had suffered; the Naggarothi eschewed such affectation even though they had lost more than most.

‘Aenarion has passed on,’ Morathi declared to the council. ‘The Godslayer, the Widowmaker, he returned to the Altar of Khaine so that we can be free of war. In peace, my son wishes to rule, and in peace we would explore this new world that surrounds us. Yet, I fear peace now is a thing of memory, and perhaps one day to be nothing more than myth. Do not think that the Great Powers that now gaze upon our world with hungry, immortal eyes can be so easily defeated. Though the daemons are banished from our lands, the power of Chaos is not wholly exiled from the world. I have gazed far and wide this past year, and I have seen what changes the fall of the gods has wrought upon us.’

‘In war, I would follow no other king,’ said Menieth, striding to the centre of the circle formed by the princes. ‘In Nagarythe is found the greatest strength of arms upon this isle. The war is over, though, and I am not sure that the strength of Nagarythe lies in tranquillity. There are other realms now, and cities where there were castles. Civilisation has triumphed over Chaos on Ulthuan, and we shall take that civilisation across the seas and the elves shall reign where the gods have fallen.’

‘And such arrogance and blindness shall see us humbled,’ said Morathi. ‘Far to the north, the lands are blasted wastelands, where creatures corrupted by dark magic crawl and flit. Ignorant savages build altars of skulls in praise of the new gods, and spill the blood of their kin in worship. Monstrous things melded of flesh and magic prowl the darkness beyond our shores. If we are to bring our light to these benighted lands, it shall be upon the glittering tip of spear and arrow.’

‘Hardship and bloodshed are the price we pay for our survival,’ argued Menieth. ‘Nagarythe shall march at the forefront of our hosts and with the valour of the Naggarothi we shall pierce that darkness. However, we cannot be ruled by war as we were when Aenarion strode amongst us. We must reclaim our spirits from the love of bloodshed that consumed us, and seek a more enlightened path towards building a new world. We must allow the boughs of love and friendship to flourish from the roots of hatred and violence sown by the coming of Aenarion. We shall never forget his legacy, but our hearts cannot be ruled by his anger.’

‘My son is the heir of Aenarion,’ Morathi said quietly, menace in her soft voice. ‘That we stand here at all is the prize wrested from defeat by my late husband.’

‘But won no less by my father’s sacrifice,’ Menieth countered. ‘For a year we have pondered what course of action to take, since the deaths of Aenarion and Caledor. Nagarythe shall take its place amongst the other realms – great in its glory, yet not greater than any other kingdom.’

‘Greatness is earned by deeds, not bestowed by others,’ said Morathi, striding forwards to stand in front of Menieth. She planted her staff in the ground between them and glared at the prince, her grip tight upon the metal rod.

‘It is not to fall upon each other that we fought against the daemons and sacrificed so much,’ said Thyriol hurriedly. Clad in robes of white and yellow that glimmered with golden thread, the mage laid a hand upon the shoulder of Morathi and upon the arm of Menieth. ‘In us has been awakened a new spirit, and we must temper our haste with cool judgement, just as a newly forged blade must be quenched in the calming waters.’

‘Who here feels worthy enough to take up the crown of the Phoenix King?’ Morathi asked, glaring at the princes with scorn. ‘Who here save my son is worthy of being Aenarion’s successor?’

There was silence for a while, and none of the dissenters could meet Morathi’s gaze, save for Menieth, who returned her cold stare without flinching. Then a voice rang out across the glade from the shadows of the trees encircling the council.

‘I have been chosen!’ the voice called.

From the trees walked Bel Shanaar, ruling prince of the plains of Tiranoc.

One decision, poorly taken, and the defeat of the Chaos Gods was thrown away. One decision and the seeds were sown of a doom that was seven thousand years in the growing.

It is a cruel trick of Chaos that prophecy so often becomes self-fulfilling.

That was how it began.

This is how it ends.