Mortarion materialised beneath a sky choked by crimson twilight.
His boots struck solid ground, but his unfamiliar legs failed to steady him.
He stumbled forward, arms spreading instinctively as his heels skidded across a surface that felt entirely wrong.
There were no cobblestones beneath him, nor dirt, gravel or fractured paving.
Instead, a seamless highway of black glass stretched through the ruins like a frozen river of obsidian.
The road had once been stone.
The Doom had subjected it to such unbearable heat that the surface had melted and fused together, preserving every ripple left by the catastrophe.
In places, vague shapes remained trapped within the glass.
Mortarion could not tell whether they were pieces of shattered masonry or the remains of people who had been caught in the destruction.
The heat struck him next.
It settled over his body like a suffocating cloak, heavy enough to make every breath an effort.
The air tasted of rusted copper, ash and rotten eggs.
Sulphur burned the back of his throat, while a thin layer of soot gathered upon his tongue.
Mortarion pulled the collar of his dark coat over his mouth.
His chest heaved as he attempted to draw clean air into lungs that seemed too small and delicate.
Every breath carried ash.
Every exhalation left a faint taste of blood.
Above him, the sun was little more than a pale, sickly disc buried behind a churning blanket of purple and grey smoke.
Flashes of distant red light pulsed within the clouds, though Mortarion heard no thunder.
The glow came from the volcanic fires that still raged throughout the shattered peninsula.
Nearly two centuries had passed since the Doom, yet Valyria had never stopped burning.
Mortarion lifted his gaze towards the horizon.
His breath caught despite himself.
The palaces and towers of the Freehold rose from the mist like the skeletons of dead giants.
They had not been built according to the plain limitations of ordinary stonework.
There were no simple walls, square foundations or straight lines.
Towers curved and twisted towards the sky like pillars of petrified smoke.
Bridges arched between distant spires without any visible support, while black stone balconies clung to the sides of structures hundreds of feet above the ruins.
The magic that had shaped them was dead, but its creations remained.
One enormous tower stood directly ahead.
Its upper half had softened during the Doom, causing the stone to sag in great weeping ripples.
It resembled a candle left too close to a flame, its once-perfect surface frozen midway through melting.
At its peak, the carved head of a dragon hung upside down.
Its jaws remained open in a silent roar, suspended from the tower by a narrow strand of fused rock.
One eye had melted shut, while the other stared down upon the ruins as though witnessing the death of its creators.
Other buildings had suffered worse fates.
A domed palace had been split through the centre, revealing hundreds of empty chambers stacked above one another.
The remains of a great arena had sunk partially into the earth, its tiers of seating descending towards a pool of glowing liquid.
Farther away, a tower leaned so severely that it should have collapsed centuries ago, yet some forgotten enchantment continued to hold it above the city.
An unnatural silence hung over the capital.
There were no birds circling the ruined towers.
No insects moved through the cracks in the glass.
Mortarion felt no wind against his skin, though the clouds continued to churn overhead.
There were no distant voices, no scraping claws and no crashing waves from the sea below.
The only sound came from beneath him.
A deep, rhythmic thrumming travelled through the glass road and entered his boots.
It was slow and powerful, repeating every few moments like the heartbeat of some buried colossus.
The Fourteen Flames were restless.
To Mortarion’s left, the ground simply ended.
A jagged chasm had torn through the centre of what might once have been a great plaza.
Broken roads and buildings descended along its sides before disappearing into the Smoking Sea.
Far below, the water boiled against black cliffs, glowing red where volcanic vents opened beneath the surface.
Wisps of crimson vapour rose from the sea.
They coiled over the edge of the chasm like ghostly fingers before dissolving into the poisoned air.
Mortarion stood within the cradle of Valyria’s ghost, a solitary living soul surrounded by the suffocating remains of a dead empire.
The knowledge Death had forced into his mind told him that the Valyrian Freehold had once ruled most of Essos.
Its roads had crossed continents.
Its dragonlords had commanded armies, wealth and sorceries beyond the understanding of the modern world.
Forty noble families ruled as an oligarchy, establishing a powerful realm in the world.
All of it had vanished within a single day.
The greatest empire in the history of this world had not been conquered by an external enemy.
It had been destroyed by fire and ash, whether that be through failed sorcery, divine intervention or forces that no surviving scholar fully understood.
Mortarion found that almost insulting.
He lowered his gaze towards his hands.
They were pale and unscarred, with long fingers that had never closed around a weapon until moments ago.
He flexed them slowly, testing the strength in each joint.
“This body is weak,” he muttered.
The voice that emerged was his, though younger and less imposing than the one he remembered.
It possessed none of the roughness earned through decades of shouting commands across battlefields.
His former body had been the product of relentless discipline.
He had trained every day regardless of injury, exhaustion or weather.
His shoulders had been broad enough to carry armour that lesser men struggled to lift.
Scars had covered his chest, arms and back, each representing a battle survived or an enemy defeated.
He had stood seven feet tall and towered over nearly everyone he encountered.
This body was almost a foot shorter.
It was not unhealthy.
His limbs were lean, his posture naturally straight and his bones appeared properly formed.
Yet there was little muscle beneath his clothing.
His shoulders were narrow, his arms untested and his breathing had already become strained by the poisoned air.
He appeared to be a youth standing upon the threshold of manhood.
Mortarion searched the memories Death had placed within him, separating knowledge of his new existence from the history of the world.
He had not replaced another person.
This body had been created for him, complete with an age and bloodline that would withstand scrutiny from magic, maesters and those capable of recognising Valyrian ancestry.
He was sixteen years old.
His pale skin possessed the near-translucent complexion associated with the blood of Old Valyria.
Silver-white hair fell past his shoulders, disturbed only slightly by the warm currents rising from the chasm.
His eyes were violet, though the stare within them remained as cold and lifeless as it had been in his previous body.
Born in the year 95 after Aegon’s Conquest, he had entered the world in 111 AC.
Mortarion knew what that date meant.
The war in the Stepstones was approaching its conclusion.
Prince Daemon Targaryen and Corlys Velaryon had fought for years against the Triarchy, attempting to secure the shipping routes between Westeros and Essos.
Daemon had named himself King of the Narrow Sea, though his little kingdom rested upon barren islands, contested waters and the loyalty of men who expected to be rewarded.
Soon, the prince would return to King’s Landing and surrender his crown to his brother.
The knowledge carried political significance, but Mortarion felt no immediate interest in the affairs of distant princes.
Daemon Targaryen, King Viserys and the lords gathered around the Iron Throne were names in a history that had not yet become his concern.
They possessed armies, wealth and dragons.
Mortarion currently possessed a sword, an untrained body and the poisoned ruins beneath his feet.
His first priority was survival.
His second was establishing a defensible position from which he could summon the ten thousand Unsullied Death had promised him.
Bringing an army into Valyria without food, clean water and shelter would only transform disciplined soldiers into ten thousand corpses.
The provisions accompanying them would last a year, but they still required somewhere to store those provisions.
They would need barracks, training grounds, workshops, latrines and access to a reliable source of water.
They would also need ships if Mortarion intended to leave the peninsula in force.
Before any of that could be achieved, he had to understand where Death had placed him.
Mortarion examined the surrounding ruins more carefully.
According to the knowledge within his mind, the Valyrian peninsula had been shattered into numerous islands during the Doom.
He appeared to be standing upon the largest and most central of them, though the ancient maps were no longer reliable.
Entire sections of the old capital had collapsed into the Smoking Sea, while volcanic upheaval had created new cliffs, ravines and stretches of blackened land.
Many structures remained submerged beneath the water.
Great towers could supposedly be seen below the surface when the smoke briefly cleared.
Mortarion had no intention of searching them.
Entering the Smoking Sea without a ship would be suicide.
Even with one, the boiling water, poisonous fumes and unpredictable currents made exploration needlessly dangerous.
Whatever treasures rested beneath the waves could remain there until he possessed the resources to retrieve them properly.
The ruins upon land offered more immediate opportunities.
Valyrian steel weapons might remain hidden within collapsed armouries.
Libraries could contain fragments of knowledge spared from the Doom.
Vaults belonging to dead dragonlords might still hold gold, gemstones and artefacts.
Even intact stone and metal would be valuable once labourers arrived.
One prize stood above the others: Aurion Belaerys.
Aurion had been one of the few dragonlords absent from Valyria when the Doom occurred.
Upon learning of the Freehold’s destruction, he had declared himself the first Emperor of Valyria.
He then gathered thirty thousand Qohorik men and marched into the ruins, presumably intending to reclaim the old capital and establish his authority over whatever remained.
Neither Aurion nor his army was ever seen again.
The histories treated his expedition as a warning against entering Valyria.
Mortarion saw it differently.
Thirty thousand men could not vanish without leaving equipment behind.
Armour, weapons, wagons and supplies would have been abandoned wherever they died.
Much of it would be ruined after nearly two centuries, but valuable metal might remain recoverable.
Aurion himself had possessed something Mortarion wanted.
The former dragonlord was said to have worn a suit of armour forged from Valyrian steel.
Few such suits had ever existed, even at the height of the Freehold.
One had later been discovered by Euron Greyjoy, though Mortarion did not know whether it had belonged to Aurion or another long-dead Valyrian noble.
If Aurion’s armour could be found, Mortarion would claim it.
Its practical value was obvious.
Valyrian steel was lighter and stronger than ordinary metal, providing exceptional protection without burdening the wearer.
Mortarion’s weakened body could not comfortably carry the kind of plate armour he had worn in his former life, but a Valyrian steel suit might allow him to fight as he once had.
The armour also had political value.
Mortarion intended to establish a new lineage.
The sudden appearance of a High Valyrian youth would invite suspicion unless accompanied by a convincing history.
He could claim descent from a dragonlord family that had survived the Doom in secrecy, preserving its blood while waiting for an opportunity to reclaim its heritage.
Aurion’s possessions would strengthen that claim.
A suit of Valyrian steel, relics taken from the Freehold and a living dragon would provide evidence few could easily dismiss.
Mortarion did not need every scholar to believe his story.
He required only enough uncertainty to make challenging it politically inconvenient.
A lineage did not need to be true.
It needed to be useful.
The beginnings of a plan formed within his mind.
He would explore the ruins, locate a secure stronghold and gather whatever resources he could safely recover.
Once he possessed a suitable base, he would summon the Unsullied.
Their arrival would allow him to expand his search and begin rebuilding part of the island.
Ships would follow.
Then trade.
Then recognition.
Mortarion would not enter the wider world as a wandering boy asking nobles for protection.
He would emerge from Valyria as the head of a restored dragonlord house, commanding ten thousand soldiers and possessing a dragon.
Others could decide whether to accept his lineage while standing beneath Anaxion’s shadow.
Mortarion rested one hand upon the hilt of his sword.
Death had provided the weapon with a dark leather sheath strapped across his back.
The blade was too long to wear comfortably at his hip, especially in his current body.
Its weight pulled against his shoulders even while sheathed.
He would need to adapt.
Experience remained within his mind, but muscles did not grow from memory alone.
His reflexes expected strength and reach that this body did not possess.
A movement that had once been effortless might now leave him overextended.
An attempt to overpower an enemy could result in failure if he misjudged his physical limits.
Until he trained, caution was essential.
Mortarion looked towards the nearest cluster of ruins.
Broken dragon statues marked the entrance to a wide avenue that wound between several leaning towers.
Beyond them stood a lower structure whose thick walls appeared largely intact.
It might once have been a military barracks, storehouse or administrative building.
It was as suitable a place to begin as any.
He adjusted the sword across his back and tightened his coat around his neck.
“Let us begin,” Mortarion said.
He took his first deliberate step into the ruins.
Mortarion advanced slowly, placing each foot with care.
The glass road was slick in places, while cracks concealed beneath ash threatened to trap an ankle.
He avoided walking close to damaged walls and remained alert for falling stone.
Many of the buildings had endured nearly two centuries of volcanic tremors.
Some were held together by ancient sorcery, while others could collapse without warning.
Mortarion did not possess enough knowledge of Valyrian architecture to distinguish between the two.
He entered the first structure through an opening where a pair of bronze doors had melted into the floor.
The interior was dark and unnaturally warm.
Veins of red light travelled through cracks in the walls, illuminating a chamber filled with collapsed pillars and fused furniture.
Carvings of dragons covered the ceiling, their wings intertwined around scenes of conquest.
Mortarion studied them briefly before continuing.
Several adjoining rooms contained little of value.
Shelves had burned, metal had melted, and stone tablets had cracked beneath the heat.
In one chamber, he discovered rows of blackened shapes seated around a long table.
They might once have been people.
Mortarion did not approach closely enough to confirm it.
A staircase ascended towards the upper levels of the structure, but half the steps had collapsed.
The remaining stone creaked when he tested it with one foot.
He withdrew rather than risk becoming trapped beneath the ruins.
The next building offered more promise.
It was a narrow spire connected to the main road by an enclosed bridge.
Part of its outer wall had fallen away, revealing chambers filled with overturned furniture and fragments of coloured glass.
Mortarion climbed through the breach and began searching the lower rooms.
He found several pieces of corroded bronze, the remains of a ceremonial mask and a silver cup fused to a stone table.
None justified the effort required to carry them.
A series of symbols had been carved into one wall.
Mortarion could read some of them.
The knowledge Death granted included High Valyrian, though the script appeared older and more complex than the form spoken in the modern world.
The inscription referred to a family named Azoryen and listed victories over several rival houses.
Another section had been deliberately destroyed.
The damage appeared to predate the Doom.
Even at the height of their civilisation, the dragonlords had sought to erase one another from history.
Mortarion continued deeper into the spire.
He had just entered a circular hall when a roar rolled across the ruins.
The sound struck with such force that loose fragments of stone fell from the ceiling.
Dust poured from the walls.
The glass road outside hummed beneath the vibration.
Mortarion froze.
The roar came from somewhere beyond the eastern towers.
It was deep, vast and unmistakably reptilian.
The sound carried across the island before fading into the distant smoke.
For a moment, Mortarion remembered another mountain.
He remembered Karaban rising from an ocean of treasure, its wings beating against the cavern walls.
He remembered clinging to black scales while the dragon hurled itself into the sky.
The memory of magma striking his body remained clear enough that his new skin seemed to burn beneath his clothing.
His hand tightened around the sword’s hilt.
The creature in the distance was almost certainly a dragon.
Death had promised that Anaxion would come to him after his arrival, but had offered no explanation of when, where or in what condition.
Mortarion could not assume that every dragon within Valyria belonged to him.
There might be wild descendants of creatures that survived the Doom.
Valyrian sorcery could have twisted them into something unrecognisable.
The roar might even belong to a beast that only resembled a dragon.
Assumptions killed more commanders than enemy blades.
Mortarion left the spire and moved towards cover.
He kept close to the ruined buildings, avoiding open plazas where anything flying above the smoke could easily see him.
No shadow passed overhead.
No second roar followed.
He continued towards the structure he had first noticed, altering his path whenever unstable ground or poisonous vapour blocked the way.
Twice he encountered clouds of yellow smoke rising from cracks in the glass.
He gave them a wide distance.
The route led him into a ruined courtyard.
Dragon statues had once surrounded the open space, perhaps honouring different houses or notable beasts.
Most had been smashed during the Doom.
Stone wings lay scattered across the ground, while severed heads stared from beneath layers of ash.
At the centre of the courtyard stood a dry fountain shaped like a coiled wyrm.
Its basin contained black water that reflected no light.
Mortarion did not approach it.
Movement stirred behind the statues.
Four figures emerged from the smoke.
At first glance, they resembled men clothed in the rotting remains of leather and mail.
Their backs were hunched, their hair hung in filthy clumps, and their movements came in irregular jerks.
Then the nearest figure stepped into the red light.
Grey and black scales covered half its face.
One eye had disappeared beneath a thick growth of cracked stone, while the other bulged from a narrow strip of diseased flesh.
Several fingers had fused together, forming a rigid claw.
Stone men.
They were victims of greyscale who had reached the final stage of the disease.
Whatever reason or humanity they once possessed had been consumed by pain and madness.
They wandered the ruins without purpose, attacking anything that came near them.
Mortarion did not know how they had reached Valyria.
They might have been members of a failed expedition, sailors cast ashore after a wreck or descendants of survivors who had somehow endured among the ruins.
The answer was irrelevant.
One touch could condemn him.
Greyscale spread through contact with infected flesh.
Children very rarely survived the disease, but adults never recovered.
The infection would harden his skin, spread through his body and eventually destroy his mind.
Mortarion had not crossed death itself to be defeated by diseased wanderers during his first hour in a new world.
He slowly drew the Valyrian steel sword.
The blade whispered as it left the sheath.
Rippling patterns moved across the dark metal, while the emeralds set into the skull-shaped pommel caught the crimson light.
Its weight immediately presented a problem.
Mortarion could hold it comfortably with both hands, but only just.
His arms possessed neither the endurance nor the control required for prolonged combat.
Wielding it one-handed was possible in the simplest sense, though any strike would be slow and easily redirected.
The stone men noticed him.
Raspy cries escaped their ruined throats.
The sound possessed neither language nor coordination, only rage sharpened by years of suffering.
All four began advancing.
Mortarion stepped backwards between two fallen statues.
The narrow gap prevented them from surrounding him and forced them to approach no more than two abreast.
His former body could have met the attack directly.
This one required intelligence.
The first stone man charged with both arms extended.
Its stance was clumsy and its balance poor, but its diseased body felt no fear.
Mortarion waited until it entered range before pivoting his hips and swinging the sword horizontally.
The Valyrian steel blade passed through the creature’s neck with almost no resistance.
Its head struck the ground and rolled beneath the ruined fountain.
The body continued forward for two stumbling steps before collapsing near Mortarion’s boots.
Dark blood spread across the glass.
The sword felt remarkably sharp.
Mortarion had no time to admire it.
Two more stone men charged together.
The first attempted to seize the blade while the second lunged towards Mortarion’s exposed side.
He withdrew a step and angled his sword defensively.
The movement came more slowly than he intended.
His shoulders protested against the weapon’s weight, forcing him to abandon the counterattack he would once have attempted.
The diseased fingers missed his sleeve by inches.
Mortarion shifted around the fallen statue, using its broken wing to separate the attackers.
One stone man climbed over the obstruction while the other circled towards the opening.
He attacked the one climbing.
The blade struck just above its knee.
Valyrian steel cut through hardened flesh, bone and the remains of its leather clothing.
The creature collapsed with a ragged howl, one lower leg hanging by a narrow strip of tissue.
Mortarion left it alive for the moment.
The third stone man had entered the gap.
It swung an arm towards his head, its stone-covered fingers capable of breaking bone even if the disease failed to reach him.
Mortarion raised his sword and redirected the strike.
The impact travelled through his wrists and into his elbows.
His new body lacked the strength to meet the blow directly.
Pain flared through his arms, and the blade nearly slipped from his hands.
He retreated again.
The stone man followed, dragging one stiff leg across the glass.
It attacked wildly, alternating between clawing swipes and attempts to seize him.
There was no discipline behind its movements, but its complete disregard for injury made it dangerous.
Mortarion allowed it to advance.
He watched the shoulders, not the hands.
The stone man raised both arms for another reckless strike, exposing the centre of its body.
He stepped forward.
The sword entered beneath the creature’s ribs and emerged through its back.
He twisted the blade, then pulled it free while moving away from the falling body.
The third stone man struck the ground.
Mortarion’s breathing had become heavy.
Three enemies should not have tired him.
In his former life, he had fought through entire formations while wearing full armour.
Now his arms trembled after only a handful of strikes.
He hated the weakness.
Hatred would not remove it.
The crippled stone man clawed its way across the courtyard, dragging its ruined leg behind it.
Mortarion prepared to finish it when the fourth creature appeared beside the fountain.
It had not charged with the others.
The remaining stone man moved more carefully, perhaps retaining some fragment of human instinct.
It used the fountain to hide its approach, then lunged when Mortarion turned towards the fallen creature.
The attack came dangerously close.
Mortarion twisted aside.
Diseased fingers scraped across the front of his coat but failed to touch the skin beneath.
His heel struck a broken piece of stone, disrupting his balance.
The stone man threw itself at him.
Mortarion fell backwards against the base of a statue.
He raised the sword between them, but the confined space prevented him from swinging it properly.
The creature reached for his face, its cracked nails inches from his skin.
Mortarion drove one boot into its chest.
His leg lacked the strength he expected.
The kick did not throw the creature away, though it created enough distance for him to turn the sword.
He thrust upward with both hands.
The blade entered the stone man’s chest where its heart should have been.
Its momentum carried it farther down the steel.
Mortarion turned his face aside as black blood spilt across the blade and ran towards the crossguard.
The creature shuddered above him.
Mortarion pushed it away using the sole of his boot, careful not to touch any exposed flesh.
The corpse rolled onto its side and remained still.
Silence returned to the courtyard.
Mortarion rose slowly.
His shoulders burned.
A dull pain ran through his right wrist, while his lungs struggled against the sulphurous air.
Sweat gathered beneath his clothing despite the dryness of the heat.
The fight lasted less than two minutes, yet it had revealed several serious weaknesses.
His body was too slow.
His reach was shorter than his instincts expected, and his endurance was poor.
The sword’s weight would become increasingly difficult to manage during a prolonged engagement.
Had the stone men possessed weapons or attacked with discipline, Mortarion might not have survived.
The conclusion infuriated him, but he did not ignore it.
Pride was useful only when it encouraged improvement.
Pride that rejected reality was merely another form of stupidity.
Mortarion examined his coat.
The fourth stone man’s fingers had torn shallow marks through the outer fabric.
The clothing beneath appeared untouched.
He removed the coat carefully and inspected every inch of exposed skin.
There were no scratches.
He had avoided infection.
Mortarion retrieved the sword without touching the corpse.
Dark blood covered much of the blade, though none seemed to cling to the Valyrian steel for long.
Thick droplets slid towards the point and fell upon the glass.
Death had instructed him to name the weapon only after it drew blood.
That requirement had now been satisfied.
“What shall I call you?” Mortarion murmured.
He searched the nearby ruins for something suitable with which to clean the blade.
A strip of decayed cloth hung from the remains of a banner beneath one statue.
He cut away an uncontaminated section, wrapped it around a piece of wood and used it to wipe the steel from a safe distance.
The bodies needed to be burned.
Leaving them exposed risked spreading greyscale to any soldiers who later entered the courtyard.
Fire would also prevent the smell of blood from attracting scavengers.
Mortarion possessed no flint, oil or other reliable means of creating a flame.
The heat beneath the ruins might provide an answer, but approaching an open volcanic fissure merely to dispose of four corpses would expose him to greater danger.
He memorised the location.
Once his army arrived, the courtyard would be cleansed properly.
Mortarion left before any blood or contaminated dust could reach him.
He continued through the ruins until he discovered a small chamber inside a partially collapsed gatehouse.
Its entrance was narrow, the ceiling appeared stable, and only one approach led inside.
It would serve as a temporary resting place.
He lowered himself onto a smooth piece of stone and placed the sword across his knees.
The emerald eyes within the pommel seemed to watch him as he considered possible names.
The blade resembled his former weapon.
Dreaded Deliverance had accompanied him through the conquest of kingdoms.
It had ended rebellions, killed kings and taken the heads of men whose names had once inspired armies.
Its mithril edge had severed both heads of Arathorn, the manticore of the eastern borderlands.
Mortarion had left it behind when he travelled into the southern mountains to kill Karaban.
The weapon had survived even if its master had not.
Perhaps it still rested within the imperial armoury, displayed as a relic beside the crowns Mortarion had captured.
Perhaps Emperor Aurellian had placed it above the throne and spoken of his fallen marshal as though they had shared some bond beyond usefulness.
The thought stirred no warmth within him.
Mortarion looked down at the dark Valyrian steel.
A new world did not require him to abandon every symbol of his old one.
Names carried power because of the deeds associated with them.
He would ensure this blade earned the reputation of its predecessor.
“Dreaded Deliverance,” Mortarion decided.
“May you serve me once more in this life.”
Another distant roar travelled across the ruins.
This one was closer.
Dust drifted from the gatehouse ceiling, while something vast moved behind the smoke above the shattered towers.
Mortarion rose and tightened both hands around his newly named sword.
A shadow passed across the doorway.
It stretched from one side of the ruined avenue to the other, swallowing the crimson light for several heartbeats before disappearing.
Mortarion stepped outside.
The smoke churned above the city.
For the briefest moment, he saw the outline of enormous wings circling beyond the melted tower.
Then the creature vanished into the poisoned clouds.
Whether it was Anaxion or another horror born from the Doom, Mortarion could not yet know.
The exploration of Valyria had only just begun, and already he had encountered one of the dead empire’s abominations.
Somewhere within the ruins waited the remains of Aurion Belaerys, the lost wealth of dragonlords and a beast whose roar shook the ancient roads.
Mortarion sheathed Dreaded Deliverance and resumed his journey.
He had conquered kingdoms with armies at his back and killed legends with weapons forged by the greatest craftsmen of his age.
Now he possessed neither strength nor followers, and the very air of this land sought to kill him.
For the first time in many years, Mortarion was not the most dangerous creature in the world around him.
He intended to correct that.