?Only the fallen elves of Naggaroth revelled in this time of suffering. As drops of blood fell to the loamy earth of Avelorn, cold laughter echoed from the crooked towers of the druchii?s accursed cities of dark iron and bloodstained stone.Leading his army of invasion against the gates of Lothern, the Witch King himself, greatest and most hated son of Ulthuan, bellowed with laughter astride his midnight-skinned drake perched atop the Glittering Lighthouse. The ocean boomed and crashed far below him, but his mirth drowned the noise of the furious water.In her gaudy pavilion of debaucheries before the embattled Eagle Gate, Morathi the Hag Sorceress whipped her devotees into bloody paroxysms of opiate-fuelled madness before bathing in a cauldron of their hot blood.
As the Chaos moon of Morrslieb veers wildly off course, the Old World is wracked by a series of bizarre plagues. From a lofty spire of the Celestial College, the Empire's Grand Astromancer, Caspar Vyborg, scours the heavens for an explanation, seeking guidance in the stars. But as the Empire sinks further into madness and violence, his order is forced to search stranger places than the night sky - the investigation leads them to the grave of a long-dead sorcerer named Razumov and an ancient, half-remembered prophecy. Caspar decides that his only hope is to complete the dark rituals that killed Razumov centuries earlier, but as Morrslieb waxes full and ferocious magical storms begin to tear the very fabric of reality, Caspar learns the true, terrible nature of Razumov's tomb.
For thousands of years, the Golden Pool has been a source of malignant energy within the forest of Athel Loren. The wood elf spellweaver Ywain, secretly entrusted with the stewardship of this magical fulcrum, prophesises the coming of a terrible enemy to the ancient realm ? even now, the undead hordes of the Black Seer Huskk Gnawbone approach. As the elves marshal their forces against him, the power of the pool grows and an eternal evil rises to corrupt even the very forest itself.
