Age of Sigmar: Shadow Lord? Who Ordered That Hit?
The latest bit of Broken Realms fiction has been released, and it’s raising an interesting question…
Well, we knew that the Skaven would show up in the narrative eventually (they always seem to be at the big events, even if no one else sees them), but their patron is a bit of a hot topic, at least for me. The being that hired them is never explicitly named, only being called the Shadow Lord, but they are described as winged, red-eyed, and terrifying. Of course, in the world of Age of Sigmar, that can be SEVERAL people, so here are the top three figures I think it could be.
Be’Lakor
This seems like the obvious choice, considering that shadows are a bit of Be’lakor’s purview, and he is a Chaos leader, so it would make sense that he would contact the Skaven. However, I’m not really sure he has a dog in this fight, per se, as Archaon isn’t really challenged by Morathi’s ascension or Slaanesh’s release. While it’s possible he just wants things back to normal, I don’t think this is our guy, but I’d be happy to be mistaken. Be’Lakor is rad.
Malerion
This is the other obvious answer, and not only do I feel like it’s much more likely, it would make really happy. As I’ve said several times in previous articles, I’ve been a huge fan of Malekith and the Dark Elves for ages, and have been pining for a Malerion model/army since I started playing AoS. Malerion has a reason to fight since Morathi is trying to steal Ulgu from him, he’s almost certainly going to get his own book in the Broken Realms saga, and he may even have a deeper plan to go after Nagash, Archaon, or even Teclis or Sigmar. I really hope this is the Shadow Lord they’re meeting with, because as a fan of both Skaven and Malerion, it would be the alliance of my dreams, albeit brief.
Vlad
Admittedly this isn’t very likely since he’s big dead in the canon, but I’m not ruling anything out. If not Vlad, perhaps another powerful vampire lord looking to challenge the Necromancer or his Mortarchs for dominion over Death. With all the upcoming Death stuff, it would make sense, but only time will truly tell.
Who do you think it is?
