Kran Deathsteel was a proud member of the Deathsteel clan, known for their battleragers and berserkers and a fearlessness in battle that terrified their enemies.
Unlike many of his brethren, Kran was a stone singer, an important position in the clan that spoke to the stone, drawing magic from it in times of need to strengthen the warriors of his clan in battle with the Elves, a race of cultists who worshipped terrible beings from a place known only as the far realm.
These Elves sought to conquer all around them, using the odd powers of their racial pact with the dread beings to cast offensive magic. Magic that could attack others with the elements. Such magic was unnatural and immoral. Everyone knew some sort of magic, either minor or major, but to be able to harm others was forbidden by the gods.
These Elves, however, had turned their backs on the gods.
In the 84th year of his life, the Elven army came to his clans Kaer (or ancestral fortress), intent on wiping his noble clan from the annals of history. This was done because his older brother had spoke to the stone and had it guide him into the forest home of the Elves, where he stole inside their castle in the dead of night and killed one of their princes in single combat. His brother, knowing his life was forfeit, sang to the stone and caused the building to tumble down around him, destroying a swath of forest in the process.
He had done this great deed because an treacherous Elven archer had murdered their father not two months hence.
So it was that the Elves came in force, and the battle was joined. The Dwarves relied on siege engines and divination magic to accurately target command tents. The Elves relied on their blasphemous battle magic to assault the first gate repeatedly, until finally the stone could bear no more, and the Elves blasphemed again by stepping onto his clan's hallowed ground.
For every Dwarf that died, a hundred Elves went to their fate, to make introductions for them to the Raven Queen.
It mattered not, however, for the Elves seemed to have unlimited numbers, and so the Dwarves were slowly forced back, to the Second gate, which held for eleven days against intense and continual fire; an entire cadre of stone singers collapsed, pouring their life essence into repairing the walls. Their sacrifice was not in vein, however, as it allowed for an orderly evacuation to the Third Gate, which was held by veteran stone singers, battleragers, and priests of Moradin.
Third Gate held for over a month, but was disabled by Dwarves who were weak willed and allowed Elven magic to control their bodies. They opened the gate, and the real battle began: the battle for Citadel Steel.
It was during this battle that Kran found himself cut off from the front line, having sung to the stone and used it to empower his axe. In an instant, the corpses of a half-dozen elves littered the ground in front of him, and this forced the Elves to pause for just a moment, until the Elven warlock strode forward. He wore a medallion of bronze shaped into a baleful eye around his neck, and as he reached the front of the host he touched his amulet and began to speak in a tongue that seemed to radiate madness. Kran tried to charge, but felt his limbs pulled down by the stone around him. As he plodded forward, step by agonizing step, a circle began to form around him, a perfect black circle. He was a stone's throw away from the warlock when the circle snapped shut and Kran fell, roaring defiantly.
As he fell, he took his axe, an artifact of his clan, and slammed it into the wall of the circle, trying to slow his fall. The axe began to melt, but it did bite the wall, and his descent slowed, until it finally stopped, leaving a jagged tear in the side of this place he found himself falling in.
Nature, however, abhors a vacuum, and with a terrible rushing of air, Kran was pulled into the rift, spinning for what seemed both an eternity and an instant, before he crashed to the cold stone floor and was still.
When he came to, a group of albino men were snapping the manacle on his left wrist shut and pulling him roughly to his feet.