Summation Part 6 (with links to Parts 1-5)
I can't remember the specifics, but regrettably, there was no retrospective for the Henge Hold Scrolls v2, which could have been useful to note how different their production processes were. Volume 1 was purely in-house and, as Matt Goetz described it, was at times 'writing by the seat of [their] pants', hence its dramatic turns, much more spontaneous flow, and concise presentation, being written to be a small batch of tweets per passage. Volume 2 was contracted out, obviously, or this post would not exist, and all the plotbeats had been laid out around the time Requiem was in production. Thus, all of volume 2 was written in one go before being edited to better fit the platform of publication, which made certain turns of phrase and scene changes odd, shall we say.
With thanks to PositronicWoman, as I'm not an X (the artist formerly known as Twitter) user and I know my submitted version is different from what was published (because the editing phase of production is a thing, we writers would be a mess were it not for editors).
Henge Hold Scrolls - Summation Part 7
(first published @hengeholdscroll on Twitter, December 2021)
(story by Jason Soles & Matt Wilson, creative direction by Matt Wilson, additional direction by Matt Goetz)
"My visions. I thought you had abandoned me. It was naive to hope that was true."
What is time? It seems to be losing meaning the deeper I peer, its strands fraying and stretching to the breaking point. Such power! In a single being, it bends the flow of her futures again and again for her people. For all people. What price will the world pay for her actions, for her sacrifice? And precisely what will she sacrifice to save so many? She features in every future I see, but only uncertainty surrounds her with each step she takes on her path.
I see the Mantle of Lacyr, whose fate was unknown for so long. The nearest strand tells me of its recovery and its return to Ios. Its inability to revive Scyrah, who was weakened so grievously, would cause Ghyrrshyld to use it for the follies of his experiments. He would ignore any objection from the pious among elves and take it as a purpose, one even he would have known was questionable. In another future, I see it in the hands of one whose heart will be darkly tainted by the tragedy soon to befall our people.
Hours…days…weeks… the farther from the Hold, the further the scrolls see, but the further from certain the realities within them are. Yet my vision takes in all without discrimination. A moment here and now. I see a day, months from now, in a part of Immoren where I have never set foot. There is too much for me to comprehend and not enough to make sense of any one thing I see. Memories come to me unbidden, so far apart in time yet connected by souls both present and not. It is little wonder they deem me mad.
The more I look, the more I see, and the less clear things become. Events are written down, but so much is missing. The runes appearing on the page are jumbled, messy, overwriting themselves as though recounting too many paths at the same time. Rushed, as if the many strands are compressed to fit within a mortal consciousness. There is much here to tell but not enough space to write it, not enough time to tell it. The futures of many are overwhelmed by others, fates of several are unknown in what I can decipher.
What is mortality to the divine? I cannot see what has truly become of my gods, for I wield no control over my visions. And yet one must ask: what is the fate of a god’s essence should a god die? The Divine Court was the conscious manifestations of the sun and moons. With their forms on Caen expired, their essence returns to whence it came, to be whole perhaps. So long did a fragment of the gods lay here, clinging to existence in the realm of mortals. But what next? I cannot say. I do not see it. I am not allowed to perceive it.
It is…done. My purpose here, the purpose I was given, is fulfilled. The visions tell me no more, and I have nothing left to write or convey.
***
Pure malice. It hungered. It raged. It yearned for slaughter. Feeding on the living was one thing, but this was new prey. The true prey. The Great Enemy was here, and it was ripe for destruction. All mortal eyes turned to it as its presence became known. It sensed the fear in those eyes. It should have delighted in the trembling, the cowering, thrived on it. But it ignored them and the smell of burning purest necrotite, the shriek of souls echoing in its wake. It paid no heed to everything except the infernal horrors before it. With a metallic howl, Deathjack charged at the nearest one. It slashed its claws into the demonic being’s chest, casting it down in a black mist of viscera. But these horrors were not what would feed it. What it consumed from the soul stalkers was not enough, merely appetizers. Deathjack howled again and found new victims, a nearby band of cultists. Indeed, the Skulls of Hate would feed deeply, for there was a greater well of souls upon which to glut. One that was near.
Deathjack feasted, but this was not the true prize. There was something close, something much better. It cast its gaze about, at last seeing what it had sensed. The titanic Guardian, overflowing with souls, captured by the Great Enemy. Those souls, they would be Deathjack’s, and being so close, its hunger grew insatiable. Petty creatures stood in its path, but nothing would stop it from reaching its goal. Deathjack advanced, the rage fueled from the Skulls of Hate driving it on. For here and now, it would vanquish this slave of the Great Enemy and relieve it of its burdens. It mocked the efforts of the little humans and their imperfect machines, and it mocked the aura of dread around the Guardian of Souls even more.
***
An irritating delay, Omodamos decided. The man in the machine was proving to be most resilient, and the Black Gate sensed something else approaching. Hesitation, though quickly suppressed, nagged at the infernal master as his maces reaped a steady flow of souls. The reinforcements these humans brought were of little value. What profit or enjoyment was there to be had destroying undead thralls?
“The arcanist in the machine gives you undue trouble,” Zaateroth observed to her colleague. “Make way. The Guardian comes to deal with him.” “I have the matter in hand myself,” he replied. “Whether you do or not matters little. It makes for the gate, and it will destroy all in its path.” Reluctantly, Omodamos retired from this fight, seeking fresh souls to cull.
***
“Is there no end to them?” Karchev growled as the infernal master retreated to be replaced by a pair of horrors the Greylord was sure he had split in two moments before. Having lost count of how many infernals he had destroyed, he then saw a new foe he could not ignore. He was backed up by massed fire from Winterguard rifles and the occasional volley of rockets. But the allies were retreating across the area around the Hold. That was only natural, for the latest threat was more than a match for any warcaster and their warjacks.
“Take heart, children of Khador!” Karchev shouted, readying himself. “After today, immortality awaits!”
The lumbering Guardian approached, raising one of its titanic claws as it did so. Karchev swept Sunder back to prepare an appropriate greeting.
***
The hulking Guardian’s claw rose from the ground, revealing the remains of the Khadoran warjack-warcaster that had given the infernals’ advance so much trouble. She nodded in approval and silently commanded Omodamos to divert to the flank.
“I will defeat these dregs. More of their weak seek to flee. You must stop them,” the Weaver of Shadows ordered.
He obeyed and gladly. Satisfied, Zaateroth willed the Guardian farther toward the defenders’ lines, both human or mechanikal, and the gate that lay beyond. But with one fury-driven machine crushed into the ground, another appeared. This one—sleek, black, and demonic—was faintly familiar. Studying it, she saw it had been targeting the soul stalkers. The presence she felt within it was basking in the souls she was denied. Then recognition dawned on her.
“Destroy that aberration!” she shrieked.
The Guardian paused before it could rear up to emit its abyssal howl at the retreating humans. At Zaateroth’s furious command, it heaved its body to one side and watched as the Deathjack charged.
***
“We must have a care, for that nightmare may be enough to be the scourge of all Immoren,” Asphyxious said. “Any more than us? We have defeated more of these creatures than we care to count. This is merely one more,” Deneghra replied.
She added, “But this will be no different from the great machines of the Iron Kingdoms sent against us before. There will be an end to them—we know they bleed. We have bled them. Just one more effort to see out the day, and you will be god over what you perceive.”
“Thou seekest to reassure me,” he observed, “as though thou knowest my mind as I do.”
Deneghra flinched. “I claim no such thing, I know only your ambitions and designs for this realm.” “Thou dost share this ambition with me, no?”
***
Gleefully, the Skulls relinquished control. So many souls—why stop, why restrain? The ultimate prize lay within reach. From inside the Deathjack’s chassis, a manic metallic laugh emanated. Whether this shell survived or was destroyed, the Skulls would devour and delight without consequence. If necessary, they would quickly find a new shell as they had done many times before. So, it mattered not.
***
The Guardian lumbered over the remains of the mechanikal and flesh alike. Pressed by the colossal before her and its lesser facsimiles that swarmed the area, Deneghra fell back, accompanied by her slayers. Quicker than she could anticipate, the Guardian lunged forward. Its claw lashed out, gouging one of her helljacks. Deneghra was not quick enough to dodge aside as it crashed into her, pinning her beneath it. Before she could command the helljack to its feet, she felt the impact of the Guardian’s claw upon it. She could not move, held fast by the chassis. Her legs had been rendered useless. As the Guardian reared back to tear apart its latest victim, she concentrated and fled into the shadows it cast. Still, her vanishing did not go unnoticed. Turning to look at the Soulweaver as she suddenly reappeared, the colossal horror shifted its hulking form to focus its fury upon her. She had fled—but not far enough. Seeing her peril, Asphyxious swept down to gather her away. As he drew near, a claw slashed into the ground in front of him. Swerving aside, he retreated as it raised its maw, an abyssal howl issuing forth toward him. Asphyxious barely stayed in the air as the blast grazed him, temporarily robbing him of his arcane sense. A determined beat of his wings let him avoid the next attack as the Guardian turned back to Deneghra. Asphyxious was helpless as she tried to drag herself away only to be crushed into the ground. Mangled armor plates from her last slayer flew as each claw fell.
***
“Thou wouldst have been the inheritor of my legacy, Deneghra!” Asphyxious cried as he took flight, “But what hast become of thee, so wretched an end was not what I envisioned for thine future…dear child.”
On the battlefield below him, he could see nothing but corpses. Those he might have ruled over who could have made him the subject of their adoration were no more. The former lich lord saw little but the overwhelming advance of infernal forces, spearheaded by the Guardian. It had defeated all before it. First the half-man, half-machine of Khador. Then Deathjack, the terror of southwest Immoren, which even Asphyxious hesitated to exert his will over. And now Deneghra’s helljacks. And finally, Deneghra herself. There remains naught left here for me but blood and ashes, he knew. Alone, he could not defeat the colossal horror so, clasping his soul vessel close to him, he retreated toward the gate. He snatched a last glimpse at Deneghra’s shattered body. Malefactor, her spear, lay broken close by, alongside the spines torn from her armor.
Humanity was no more for Immoren but would be established in another world. There, Asphyxious would be its rightful god, where the gods of Caen would have neither presence nor influence. His choice made, he ascended higher, accelerating toward the gate and his destiny.
***
The lifeless arm twitched. The consciousness that drove it was still lucid. And it would not concede. Fingers curled, slowly dragging remains over bloodied earth and ruined flesh and scorched metal.
***
He was no longer here. Deneghra tired of waiting for the jabbering necrosurgeon to finish its work. She could only wait and command her last intact bonejack to range out to the limit of her control. The gate, she urgently thought, redirecting the stalker. She watched through its eyes as it bounded toward the gate, useless as a ship flashed with a brilliant light as it transitioned through to whatever lay beyond. Barely visible through the bonejack’s visual sensors yet as clearly as if he stood before her, she saw him. She watched as a winged clockwork form followed moments behind the ship. Deneghra slumped where she sat, deaf to the necrosurgeon’s words as she saw him disappear into the gate.
“Go. Be a god in an unknown world. This place will suffer for your departure.”
She shook her head and thought of other, pettier things. How fared Caine and his daughter? The girl would make a good warwitch when she returned. That was at least some consolation.