#12 The Rebirth of the False Apostle
The origins of the False Apostle prior to his soulblight existence are currently shrouded in mystery. The furthest back history has thus far told is to a renowned Paladin of the vampiric Order of the Blood Drenched Rose, but his nature has since changed profoundly. Having acquired (but suppressed) the flesh-eater curse in addition to the soulblight, he was subsequently defeated by the Anvils of the Heldenhammer. Well aware of the difficulties of truly destroying an undead creature such as this, the Stormcast Eternals took precautions to secure his remains.
However, as poetic justice for her betrayal of the False Apostle, The Apostate was sent to free him. Under the cover of a diversionary attack by the Procession of the Foolish Martyrs, she and the glaivewraiths who had once been her fellow spies penetrated the Gravewalkers' vault where his body was securely interred. There she succeeded in transferring his immortal remains into a Black Coach sent by Lady Olynder. Thus did Nagash intend to return the False Apostle to his disciples that he might share in the eternal punishment of the Foolish Martyrs. However, even the plans of the Lord of Undeath may be thwarted.
For Nagash had underestimated the extraordinary nature of this particular vampire. Back when the Paladin came to Glymmsforge as the self-styled Apostle, his very soul had already become a battlefield. His soulblight nature waged constant war upon the flesh-eater within to fight off the degeneration into abhorrence. This took extraordinary willpower and the battle was fought at great cost, with the False Apostle's soul being split into two natures: soulblight and abhorrent. Until his defeat at the hand of Thaddeon Ven Denst, the two were held together with the soulblight in control. But with his fall, the halves of his soul separated. Thus, when The Apostate transferred the False Apostle's remains into the Black Coach, she released more than one entity from captivity.
When the Court of the Sanguine Rose saw that the Procession of the Foolish Martyrs was accompanied by the hearse of their beloved Apostle, they desired nothing more than to throw themselves into the fray alongside their late leader. The Bishop also discerned that this was the vehicle by which his Master would return, for, when the False Apostle had infected the Bishop with his curse, it had brought with it visions. During his long recovery under the ministrations of the Abbess, the Bishop had dreamt prophesies of the resurrection of the Apostle through just such a conduit.
And so it was that, as the Procession of the Foolish Martyrs carried the False Apostle's hearse into battle, they were joined by the Remnant Court of the Sanguine Rose. The zeal and passion of the False Apostle's followers (both alive and dead) was vigorous and their fighting caused the winds of death magic to blow so strong that the False Apostle began to stir in his casket. The internal war between soulblight and abhorrent was renewed, but this time it was the flesh-eater half of his soul which triumphed. At the height of the battle, part of the being who had been the False Apostle - and before that the Paladin, and before that no-one knew who - was restored to physical form.
Though his abhorrent soul was potent, his new flesh was weak, and he lay unnoticed among the corpses at the end of the battle. A massive, undead, chiropteran scavenger descended onto the charnel fields and approached to feast upon his body. But the flesh-eater reached into its mind and subdued the terrorgheist to his indomitable will. Clambering up onto its back he compelled it to fly to Barfunweltz Cemetery where he might recuperate among the tombs before revealing himself to his faithful remnant.
But he had been changed. He would no longer be their False Apostle, for his soulblight soul still lay within the Empty Hearse.
He would return reborn. Their False Messiah.
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