Nighthaunt – Warscrolls

Many a Knight of Shrouds takes to the battlefield atop an ethereal steed, favouring the speed and killing power of such a baleful creature. They cut a fearsome sight as they order their procession forward in a gushing tide of ectoplasm, spurring them on to take their vengeance against the living.

Soaring through the night atop his cadaverous winged steed Kyllaron, the Grimhailer tracks down those who would use magic to extend their mortal lifespans. He is the reaper of souls, but his necrotically empowered scythe is not his deadliest weapon: with a pinch of his bony fingers, the Grimhailer snuffs out a candle atop his steed, instantly extinguishing the animus of one who displeased the Great Necromancer so that their corpse falls lifeless to the ground.

The scythe-wielding horrors known as Cairn Wraiths were once mass murderers or cruel executioners, mortals who developed such a taste for killing that upon death their unquiet spirits rose from the underworlds to continue their spree of terror and eager butchery.

As mortals, the Guardians of Souls dabbled in the dark arts of undeath, but after realising they trod a perilous downward spiral, they stepped away – a weakness of morality that the Great Necromancer neither forgot nor forgave. Upon their deaths, Nagash remade these former magic users as unliving conduits for the necromantic energy they once spurned.

In life, each Knight of Shrouds was an arch traitor who chose to betray their people in order to delay their own inevitable doom. Nagash interpreted their treason not as cowardice, but as wisdom, seeing value in commanders who understand that to resist his will was madness. Seized upon death and remade into cloaked wraiths, the shroud-knights now lead the hosts of the Nighthaunt into battle.

The Krulghast Cruciators are nightmarish even amongst the ranks of the undead, and their malice is distilled to an almost elemental sadism. Upon their bent backs, they carry the torture racks that finally broke them, for each Cruciator died during horrific bodily punishment and is keen to visit the same fate upon their foes.

The Craven King sits upon a grand throne and wears an imposing crown of dark iron, but these are nothing more than worthless trinkets; Kurdoss Valentian will never know a moment of true glory, for his reign is nothing more than a farce and his gestured commands can be disobeyed without consequence. The twin heralds who hover at their monarch’s side do not regale him with tales of his triumphs but instead mock and denigrate him. Endlessly tormented by their words yet unable to lash out because of the sorceries that bind him, Kurdoss seeks an outlet for his immortal anguish in battle.

The Mortarch of Grief is an avatar of misery and tragic fate, the dreadful result of Nagash’s experiments to see how much sorrow he could pour into a single soul. Once, she was a cruel mortal queen of the city-state Dolorum, disguising her murderous ambition behind a veil of false tears. Taken by Nagash and remade as a spectral monarch, she now feels everything she professed to and more. Sheer, entropic sorrow radiates from her like a crushing wave, causing plants to wither and warriors to collapse in paroxysms of horror.

Bearing the notched axes of their former trade, the Lord Executioners are sent to claim the lives of those who have escaped the justice of Nagash. The spirits of the wrongfully executed drift around these gheists, crying out their anguish even as they intercept blows meant to harm their slayer. Even in life these figures were held in fear, for their calling was that of the headsman, a role they performed with sadistic relish.

An arch poisoner, a Lord Vitriolic creates all manner of potions that they hurl at their foes. Fear-inducing gases, scorching acids and spirit-withering elixirs are all part of their deadly alchemical arsenal each baleful concoction blighting the soul as well as the flesh.

Should a Scriptor Mortis learn the name of a one who has slighted Nagash, they will note it down, assigning the offender's soul to a fitting underworld. With a final flourish of their quill, the Scriptor can bring their target's existence to a sudden end. The condemned may strive to banish their sinister judge before the sentence is carried out, but given the presence of the other Nighthaunt drawn to the gheist's flickering witchlight candles, this is easier said than done.

Spirit Torments are Nagash’s spectral gaolers. Lords of the Great Oubliette, a continent-sized underworld honeycombed with freezing dungeons and pitch-black cells, they trammel the life force of the slain into the massive padlocks they bear. Escape from these eldritch clasps is all but impossible – it is said they are even able to capture the discorporating energies of Stormcast Eternals before they can return to the heavens.

Tomb Banshees are apparitions of revenge who have dwelt long upon the dark deed that robbed them of their life, love or contentment. A single hate-filled scream from a Tomb Banshee can freeze the life from even the bravest warrior.

Kurdoss Valentian is a malevolent spirit known to all as the Craven King. This mocking epithet belies a cunning mind, for few can rival Valentian’s grasp of strategy and ruthless will to win. His mistress, Lady Olynder, has demanded that Ghyran be drowned in terror and her word is Valentian’s command. Brandishing his great sceptre, he orders his gheist armies into battle, his traitorous legacy inspiring them to commit fell deeds of their own.

All living beings dread the name of Nagash, the God of Undeath. Cruel and tyrannical, the overlord of Shyish intends to conquer the Mortal Realms and transform them into a lifeless Necrotopia, in which not a speck of dust moves unless it is by his will.

A chorus of pitiful, gurgling cries heralds the coming of Awlrach the Drowner, a murderous wraith borne across the lands on a funeral barque. This spectral vessel trails the tormented spirits of those Awlrach betrayed and killed as a mortal, sending them to a briny death in the guise of a friendly boatman. Such cruel and needless murder was pleasing to Nagash, who remade Awlrach as a hunched and towering gheist. He ordered his new servant to row forever across the Mortal Realms, slaying mortals and delivering their souls to the underworlds.

Dreadblade Harrows were once noble cavaliers in the service of an officer destined to become a Knight of Shrouds. They stood by whilst their masters betrayed their office, their people, even life itself. Outriders and bodyguards for the monarchy of the dead, they have become the Knights of Regret, riding incorporeal on the winds of Shyish to slay, discorporate and slay again without the slightest remorse.

Upon ghostly steeds, the Hexwraiths ride straight through their foes, turning blood to ice and snatching souls from screaming warriors. Once knights both proud and cruel, these ethereal killers are bound by Nagash to ride eternally, visiting pain and death upon the living in his name.

To be trapped in the jaws of death is to find a frantic, animalistic strength. It is a wild energy born of primal fear, usually accompanied by tight-throated screaming that seeks to deny oblivion with every iota of the sufferer’s soul. The beings known as Bladegheist Revenants are born of that terminal state; indeed, they are trapped in it, unable to escape those final moments.

Chainghasts are the servants and enforcers of the Great Oubliette. They are wrought from the soul-stuff of those who beseeched the gods to free them from imprisonment, whether it was justified or otherwise, but did not include Nagash in their entreaties. Their punishment is to retain a dim sliver of awareness, just enough to desire their liberty, yet be bound to obey and assist more powerful gheists in the capturing of mortal souls.

Chainrasps are the twisted spirits of transgressors who lived their last months locked in stocks or bound by chain and padlock; others had cruel metal masks nailed to their skulls or heavy weights tied to their limbs. Regardless, they all went to their deaths sure of longed-for oblivion – only to find the ruler of Shyish would alter only their form and not their fate.

The Craventhrone Guard are potent sharpshooters, their projectiles agonisingly drawn from their own essence. Their bolts always seem to find their targets, manifesting in flashes of spectral energy to strike down unsuspecting enemies. This is often to the impotent fury of their master, Kurdoss Valentian, who, denied the chance to rule, takes satisfaction only from combat.

Dreadscythe Harridans were healers and alms-givers in life. Upon their deaths, the Great Necromancer wrought a horrific transformation upon them, turning their hands into wicked scythe-blades that would instead lacerate and maim the flesh that they may once have sought to carefully stitch and soothe.

A Glaivewraith Stalker is an unstoppable force. Its long blade always points at the beating heart of its intended victim. Though it drifts slowly towards its quarry, it is inevitable that the hunter’s glaive will one day pierce the chest of its prey.

In life, Grimghast Reapers were arch-plotters and cautious schemers who sought to eliminate both rivals and friends without getting a drop of blood on their hands. As wraiths, they have been cursed to kill indiscriminately, reduced to little more than mindless weapons doing the Great Necromancer’s butcher-work.

In life, the Myrmourn Banshees sought arcane power for their own ends, failing to pay proper respect to the Great Necromancer. In death, they are cursed to consume magic with a horrible hunger, yet they can never use it themselves nor ever be sated. Wherever such energy blooms, the Myrmourn Banshees are drawn in like carrion feasters to a corpse.

Pyregheists are malevolent spectres obsessed with committing the living to the flames. They represent Nagash’s judgement at its most twisted, for each was in life an embalmer or cremator who sought to preserve the souls of mortals from the Great Necromancer. There can be no greater crime in Nagash’s eyes, and thus he transformed these holy men and women into pyromaniac nightmares.

Spirit Hosts have but wisps of sentience. They are agglomerations of tormented souls that gather thick around locations or individuals redolent with Shyishan energy. It should come as no surprise that Spirit Hosts are commonly seen drifting alongside the Nighthaunt processions, for wherever the ethereal hosts roam, death and suffering is certain to follow.

Condemned by Nagash to wield the dread sword Terminus, the Wielder of the Blade seeks out those mortals that the Great Necromancer has determined to be guilty. No matter their crime, the sentence is always the same – a swift and brutal death. These pitiless gheists accompany the bearer of the sentient blade Terminus on their quest to punish those who have wronged Nagash. There are always three: one to sharpen the sword’s edge, one to bear the headsman’s block and a scriptor to sentence the condemned.

The Briar Queen was once incarcerated in the vaults of the Shyishan city of Shadespire, locked away for crimes too horrendous to mention. Since the coming of the Necroquake, she has been set loose upon the living, her remit to bring madness and terror to all who would evade Nagash’s punishments. The forsaken entities that trail in the Briar Queen’s wake have become infamous in Shadespire and beyond. Amongst them are the eldritch jailer known as Varclav the Cruel, the noose-throttled Ever-hanged and a ragtag group of evil-hearted Chainrasps.

Driven by a wraith and with the remains of a powerful necromantic being borne in its hearse-like carriage, the Black Coach seeks out sites of great slaughter and suffering. It swells with dark energies as it runs down its targets in explosions of gore, becoming a thrumming locus of Shyishian magic that draws ever more Nighthaunt to the battle.

Thundering through the Ghyranite forests and leaving a screaming trail of ectoplasm in its wake, a Black Coach is both bone-shattering war machine and unholy shrine. Its ghostly attendants screech blood-curdling threats as they brandish swords, tomes and necromantic relics – possessions of the undead tyrant who lies dormant within a coffin atop the great hearse.

This dread crypt is possessed of a malign sentience and drenched in amethyst magic. Its stones collapse and reconfigure as it haunts the enemies of Nagash inexorably across lonely moors and hillsides. Appearing as if at will out of the mist and shadow, it is a baleful silhouette in the darkness. Tortured spirits are harboured within its sepulchral confines, emanating grief-stricken malice. Their cries deeply unsettle living foes within earshot or act as a salve to embolden nearby Nighthaunt.

A looming, phantasmal hourglass, the Mortalis Terminexus can distort the very passage of time, its mere presence hastening the advance of the Nighthaunt processions. Should its flow be reversed, it can even undo harm done to the spectral forms of nearby gheists, much to the horror of their enemies.

The soul-hungering Shyish Reaper is the ultimate manifestation of finality and death. This is no lingering premonition of far-off doom, but a screaming scythe that arcs towards its victims with terrifying speed, hewing through their physical form and spirit alike.

The Vault of Souls is a spectral chest that hungrily draws into itself the spirits of those slain in its vicinity. Filled to overflowing and ever greedy for more, it eventually burst, violently expelling a storm of frenzied, harrowed gheists.

Of all of Behemat’s spawn, Gatebreakers are the most sinister, filled with the need to destroy. More specifically, these gargants harbour considerable ill will towards the metropolises raised by Sigmar’s folk. The sight of a glorious city, with its proud spires and resolute walls, awakens a bitter fury within these creatures. With a bellow of hate, a Gatebreaker advances on an enemy settlement without fear, shrugging off panicked arrows and cannon fire with little more than a malicious chuckle. Across the Prime Innerlands of Shyish, the name Big Drogg Fort-kicka is dreaded. Admittedly, this is as much for the Gatebreaker’s grievous halitosis – a side effect of eating decomposing corpses – as his skill at destroying cities. Drogg is known to many undead tyrants, who willingly offer him a portion of their servants to consume in return for his aid. Yet Drogg’s true goal has always been to get close enough to Nagash to clobber him in a show of strength. The Great Necromancer’s shattering at the hands of the Lumineth has set this plan back. Taking this as a personal insult, Drogg has vowed revenge. He eagerly hires his services out to any undead wishing to fight the aelves – and he has no shortage of clients.

Cado Ezechiar is an outcast and exile, and his destiny leads him on a path drenched with blood. Two companions accompany him on this dark odyssey. The first is the vampire warrior Sissendra, a ruthless and graceful killer who shares none of Cado’s self-restraint. The second is the Nulahmian death-priest Aurelias, a trusted servant of her majesty Neferata. There are few foes this trio cannot overcome.