(Music: Jonny Maudling; Lyric: Byron)
Spears agleam in the dying sun,
The blood is spilled, the battle's won,
From the icy throne the God-King shall rule,
When nine stars kiss the moon o'er Ultima Thule.
(Old Northlander war-song, found in the ancient scrolls of Volmyr)
THE FINAL PART OF VORYN HELMSMITER'S JOURNEY INTO THE ICE REALM...
Blood drips from my frost-encased sword, forming a crimson blossom upon the ice...
My limbs cold, becoming as one with the massing snows... my eyes nearly frozen closed.
For how long had we travelled? The memory grows dim, lost in the cruel, searing storm-winds.
And now, at last... our quest is at an end.
With the blessings of the elders we began our journey beyond the great veil of shadowed glaciers...
They spoke of a prophecy foretold, an ancient and glorious legacy.
A quest for the realm of legendary lost to man since bebofe even the Star-Lords descended...
Now, only I survive, my blood spilling to the ice, turning to crimson crystal upon the deeply frozen earth.
Elder sorcery crackles and hums all about me, coursing throught the sky, the snow...
As grim destiny approaches with the freezing boreal gales, and this ancient prophecy unfolds...
PREDICATION OF THE ELDERS:
Go, follow the witch-lights in the northern night sky, beyond the great silvern mountains...
Let the sacred moon-crystal be your guide, beware the sentinels at the Caverns of Eternal Mist...
Spears agleam in the dying sun,
The blood is spilled, the battle's won,
From the icy throne the God-King shall rule,
When nine stars kiss the moon o'er Ultima Thule.
Swathed in moon-frosts, in icy winds our blazon flying, Iron gleaming 'neath the stars, black skies ablaze with astral fire. White wolves (like silent spirits) haunt us, ever northwards, the ice-gem leads us, glimmering, Powerful spells entwine the shrine of legendry, mighty gates of frozen splendour looming, When the moon and stars shine as one upon the snows, the ancient ice-gate opens, the prophecy is fulfilled!
Towering, ice-encrusted forms lumber forth from the freezing mist, (Their eyes shimmering with a fiendish, eldritch malevolence...) Our steel is raised against their weapons of gleaming crystal, And the virgin snow is rendered crimson by bloodshed in a searing storm of slaughter. (Wounded, dying, my flesh rent by weapons no human ever forged or wielded, I am beckoned forward by a strange, alluring force from beyond the veil of swirling mists...)
Shadows, images form in the glittering runecarved walls of this glacial chamber, Secrets frozen within the timeless vaunts of eternity... The throne of the time-lost ice realm, entwined in the mantle of such searing star-born power... This frozen, aeon-cloaked seat of immortal majesty... (of an empire forged long before the vast seas rose in devouring fury!) What shimmering swords raised in combat once sang with the glorious clamour of steel on steel? What splendid banners, billowing in the icy gales, once heralded the march of these invincible silverclad legions to the blood-swathed embrace of epic battle? The glory of untold thousands of years past... this ethereal legacy of mighty Ultima Thule. The frozen eyes of immortal kings watch me... such dark splendour!
THE GUARDIAN OF ICE AND SHADOW:
The grim Ice-Gods sleep in these frost-bound tombs, illumined by the caress of lunar fire,
And the kiss of star-gleam from the stygian void...