Astragoth Ironhand

Astragoth Ironhand is the eldest and most powerful of all the living Sorcerer-Prophets, High Priest of Hashut and a figure of dread across the whole of the Dark Lands. For centuries he has wielded the fire of the Father of Darkness, and for centuries it has been killing him: the god's curse creeping through his body until, but for the machine that carries him, he would long ago have frozen into a lifeless idol.

That machine is his triumph and his humiliation both. Astragoth's legs and much of his torso have turned entirely to stone, and so his priests have bound the living statue of his lower body into a great steam-driven harness of iron and brass that hauls him, hissing and grinding, to the altar and the battlefield alike. He rules from within it still, his withered arms and burning mind wholly undimmed, and no rival has yet grown bold or strong enough to unseat him.

He is a creature of pure, patient malice, having outlived every enemy and most of his allies through sheer refusal to complete the god's slow work of petrifaction. Astragoth clings to power and to life with equal, iron-fisted tenacity, and each day he does not turn wholly to stone is another day the young Sorcerer-Prophets must wait, and scheme, and burn with envy of the Ancient who simply will not die.