Telmar frowned and reached for his sword. ‘I think I have had just about enough of you, Apothecary.’ He seemed determined to have his satisfaction. Such fire could be useful, but it had its time and place.
‘Chief Apothecary,’ Fulgrim corrected, gently. The two Space Marines looked at him. ‘I have decided to promote Fabius to a rank equal to his responsibilities. That means that he outranks you, Kasperos. Thus, it is not seemly for you to challenge him, being of lesser rank.’ That would settle it, for now. It might even provoke some ambition in Kasperos.
Telmar stared at the primarch. He wrenched his hand away from the hilt of his blade and nodded tersely. ‘My apologies, Chief Apothecary,’ he said.
Fabius ignored him. He looked at Fulgrim. ‘I have done nothing to deserve such an honour, my lord,’ he said, his voice hollow with weariness. ‘My efforts have been… imperfect. Flawed.’
Fulgrim looked down at him. ‘And I say that you have earned it.’ He looked around. ‘We are all imperfect,’ he said slowly. He knew he must choose his words carefully. Whatever was said here would filter back through the Legion, one way or another. The wrong word, and all that he had so carefully rebuilt might collapse anew. ‘But perfection is a process. It is the fruit of the highest branch.’ He raised his hand for emphasis. ‘That is why we are here, my sons. This world is the beginning of our climb. The fruit sits above us, just out of reach. We will climb until we have it in our grasp. But climb we must, lest our imperfections damn us to mere adequacy.’
The others were nodding now, hesitantly.
‘Eight, against the assembled might of a world,’ Fulgrim said. ‘Leman boasts of eight hundred. Horus, eighty. We shall show the wolves of Luna and Fenris both what true killers look like. Here, in this fire, shall we be reborn. Here, all old sins will at last be forgiven. All failures expunged.’ He turned back, meeting Fabius’ gaze.
‘We approach the final ascent. Let us climb it swiftly, and with grace.’
Fifteen
the hammer-strikers
Two Stormbirds sped through the dawn light. Fulgrim waited impatiently in the command compartment of the Firebird, watching as the hololithic map of Byzas responded instantly to real-time data-feed uploads. The planetary situation changed for the better with every passing hour, but it wasn’t perfect. Not yet.
In the week since Bucepholos’ failed coup, the renegade patricians had either surrendered or retreated into the hinterlands. Those who’d surrendered had turned over a third of their property and territorial holdings to the Gubernatorial Throne, and offered up their youngest children as hostages to the 28th Expedition. Continental army troops were currently occupying the lands of the rest. By the time this affair was done, the Hereditary Governor would once again be the most powerful individual on the planet, and the stranglehold the patricians had on Byzas would be broken.
But there was still one final lesson to be taught. And a bloody one, at that.
The renegades had retreated into the Anabas Mountains, seeking the safety of the crags and hollows. The mountains were dotted with bastions and refuelling stations - a legacy of the wars that had spelled the end of the Gubernatorial Triumvirate, so many centuries ago. One by one, those bastions had been found and eliminated. Continental army airships prowled the skies, and the mountains were burning from the constant rain of phlogiston bombs. Slowly but surely, the renegades had been forced westward.
‘The western provinces are in open revolt,’ Abdemon said quietly. ‘They’ll find support there, if you’re right about where they’ve holed up.’
Fulgrim nodded absently. ‘I am.’ He tapped a point on the map, enlarging the cartographic detail. A red dot flashed. Sabazius-Ut-Anabas. ‘It has cultural significance. The walls are thick and high, and its wells are deep. You noted the camouflaged refuelling station set in the crags above the monastery? It was new. The Sabazian Brotherhood have been planning to use it as a staging point for some time, I’d wager. Now, it’s the last stop before they retreat across the mountains, to lick their wounds and regroup.’
‘I can’t believe they’d risk it. We know about it. How can they think it’s safe?’
Fulgrim shrugged. ‘Simple. They don’t. But it’s safe enough, if they’re only worrying about the continental army.’ He glanced at the lord commander. ‘Why do you think I’ve held us back from participating until now?’
Abdemon nodded in understanding. ‘If they think you’re staying out of it, they won’t be expecting us to suddenly show up, without support, and ram our fists down their throats.’ He frowned. ‘Still - only seven of us. And two Stormbirds. To be fair, I wouldn’t expect it either. It seems like suicide.’
‘Suicide is for the foolish or desperate. I am neither.’ Fulgrim smiled. ‘I have been planning this for some time, and now is our moment to strut upon the stage, and show this world, and all the galaxy besides, what we are truly capable of.’ He reached out, as if to grasp the dot that represented the monastery and pluck it free of the mountains. ‘With this one, perfect blow, we shall humble this world and my brothers both. Then, our work can truly begin. This is the last first step, Abdemon. Are you ready?’
‘Born ready, my lord.’ Abdemon bowed his head.
‘What of the rest of you?’ Fulgrim asked, studying the rest of his sons. He’d brought everyone save Cyrius - the swordsman had been left to protect Pandion, despite his protests. While Nova-Basilos was firmly under the control of the continental army, Fulgrim was not so foolish as to leave the Hereditary Governor completely unprotected. Not this close to the end of things. Even the best-laid plans could be undone by the actions of desperate men. The Emperor’s Children had learned that lesson at Proxima.
Kasperos and the others looked every inch the demigods that the Emperor had intended them to be. Even Fabius had polished the gilt of his armour to a blinding gleam. Bandoliers of grenades and extra ammunition were strapped tight across their chest-plates, and their weapons were loose in their sheaths. Each of them was an army unto himself, armed to the teeth and ready for war. He could hear the hum of Quin’s power axe, and the whining growl of Fabius’ chain blade as it was activated.
The proximity klaxon sounded, and the compartment was bathed in crimson light. Fulgrim banished the hololith and stood. ‘Now, at last, we come to it. I claim the honour of first blood. Unless anyone has any objections?’
No one did. Fulgrim smiled and pulled on his helmet. He drew Fireblade and strode to the hatch. The seals hissed flat and the hatch popped open without protest. Wind howled into the compartment, tugging at his limbs and cloak. He ignored it and stepped into the opening. The mountains sprawled below, like a stretch of scar tissue on the body of some primordial giant. The turrets of Sabazius-Ut-Anabas were just visible, blanketed beneath the shimmering veil of an etherdome. The crackling energy field would hamper the gunship’s ability to land. It would have to be destroyed.
Without further thought, Fulgrim leapt from the open hatch of the Firebird, eager to come to grips with the shadows that had eluded him since his arrival. They had answered his challenge, fallen into his trap, and now, he would dispose of them.
Perfect.
As he fell towards the monastery, he counted airships. Large ones and small ones, anchored to the highest peaks by tensile cables, waiting to be refuelled and rearmed by the crews of men climbing up and down the craggy paths. He watched as the second Stormbird peeled away from Firebird and swooped towards the waiting flock, ignoring the streamers of anti-aircraft fire that streaked upwards to meet it. Its assault cannons opened up, puncturing refuelling tanks and ammunition crates, rather than the vulnerable shapes of the anchored airships. Fire erupted, dancing across the peaks. It crawled up the cable anchors, stretching flickering talons towards the airships.
The Stormbird banked and began to climb back towards the upper atmosphere as the first airship detonated with a sound like thunder. In moments, the entire fleet was consumed in a firestorm, and Fulgrim turned his attention back to th
e matter of his descent.
It could, perhaps, be seen as somewhat immature to engage in so rash a tactic as hurling oneself bodily into the heart of the enemy. Especially from such a great height, and at such speed. But there was also a great joy to be had in it.
In the end, for all his tactical and strategic acumen, he was still a primarch. A being such as had never walked the world before, and never would again. He exulted in it. He could bend steel, and survive unaided in a vacuum for hours. And he could do this. For the first time, and the last time, his foes would see a son of the Emperor unleashed. A greater honour he could not imagine. Thus, he folded his arms and let gravity draw him to his target, unresisting.
The arrival of the primarch rocked Sabazius-Ut-Anabas to its foundations. Fulgrim’s lean form pierced the crackling energy field of the etherdome with ease, and struck the courtyard like a mortar round. Men were hurled from their feet by the shockwave of his landing. The generators powering the etherdome exploded, filling the lower levels of the monastery with fire and smoke.
Fulgrim rose from the impact crater, his gilded panoply wreathed in smoke. He drew Firebrand with his free hand and fired. A running figure burst into flame, explosively burning to ash in moments. Fireblade slashed out, removing the head of another. Armoured figures charged through the smoke, heavy carbines growling. Automatic fire stitched across Fulgrim’s chest-plate and helmet, doing little more than drawing his attention. He spun, his volkite charger spitting heat.
One of the black-armoured warriors deflagrated, showering his companions with chunks of melted armour and burning meat. Shocked, they froze, and in doing so, sealed their fate. Fulgrim launched himself towards them. Fireblade wove a deadly pattern, and the men collapsed, their screams cut short.
Alarms blared, and officers cried out, trying to impose some sense of order on a situation spinning rapidly out of control. They’d thought their mountain fastness impregnable, and most of their weaponry was directed outwards, awaiting the approach of the continental army. Even if it had been turned inwards, it would have done them little good. Fulgrim was too fast, too deadly.
He raced through the courtyard, leaving a trail of carnage in his wake. Behind him, the Firebird was clearing itself a landing zone with its twin-linked heavy bolters. With the etherdome down, the gunship was free to land unhindered. Abdemon and the others would join him in moments. The thought excited him beyond all measure. He had fought beside his sons before, but this would be the first time he had done so without one of his brothers looking over his shoulder.
Fulgrim pivoted, kicking a soldier in the chest. Armour and bone crumpled as the limp figure was flung backwards to slam into a column. A bayonet shattered against his war-plate. Fulgrim back-handed its wielder, snapping his neck. They were nothing. Nothing. Where was the challenge here?
An anti-infantry weapon opened up from a nearby archway, and he staggered as the heavy-calibre slugs punched into him. Wincing, he pressed forward, ignoring the impact alarms that echoed loudly in his ears. The gunner was screaming curses as he depressed the rotating barrels, trying to halt Fulgrim’s advance. The loader scrambled backwards, courage broken. Fulgrim caught hold of the barrel and shoved it aside, ripping the gun from its frame. He sank Fireblade into the gunner’s chest, released the hilt, and finished tearing loose the gun. The grip was laughably small in his hand, but he easily got a finger around the trigger. It was a primitive weapon, barely deserving of the name, but it would serve.
Fulgrim turned, spraying the courtyard and those forces attempting to muster there. The weapon twisted in his grip like a petulant child until, at last, its ammunition drum ran dry. He tossed it aside and reclaimed Fireblade. Slugs whinged off his armour, ricocheting into the unlit recesses of the archway. As he ducked beneath the archway and into the monastery, his internal augurs scanned his surroundings, seeking his prey.
He’d keyed his sensors to the specific life-readings of those members of the patricians, as well as the members of the Sabazian Brotherhood with whom he’d come into contact. He could track them across the planet if he so chose. Some of them he would doubtless have to. But others had obligingly gathered themselves here. There was an old saying on Terra: cut off the head, and the body will die.
It had all been so artfully arranged. Perfect in its execution. He had forced the disparate factions into a single coalition. Many enemies had become one. And now he would behead that one, and end this revolt at a single stroke.
Perfect.
Fulgrim smiled a tiger’s smile as he paced through the corridors. He followed the electronic scent down curving stone steps, and through chambers that had been carved by the hands of the faithful. At any other time, he might have paused to study the mosaics that marked the walls and floors of these chambers. He might have examined the delicate carvings that wound around the pillars. Instead, he ignored them. There would be time for such things later. Perhaps he would even have the monastery broken down and rebuilt elsewhere, as a memorial to his triumph. He might even restore the statue of Sabazius, which now lay broken in the courtyard above.
All these thoughts passed through his mind as he descended. The vox crackled with the voices of his sons, and his helmet’s vid-feed showed him flashes of the massacre above. The Emperor’s Children fought pragmatically, using the fire and manoeuvre tactics they’d developed campaigning alongside the Luna Wolves to good effect. He cycled through the feed, leaping from one to the next - he saw Quin press forward, into the teeth of the enemy’s suppressive fire, holding their attention as Alkenex raced across a parapet above, thumbing the activator switch on a grenade.
Dust sifted down as the grenade tore apart flesh and stone alike. Would anything be left, when he returned to the surface? Abdemon’s voice - stem and unyielding - surged across the vox-link, ordering Kasperos to hold his position. The legionary was singing softly to himself, a classical piece Fulgrim had last heard in the Sonnet-Gardens of Phoenicia, and timing his shots to the song, recreating its rhythm. Fulgrim smiled. No wonder Abdemon was annoyed. Such bursts of creativity were beyond the lord commander, and he lacked the patience to indulge them in others.
Carbines roared in the narrow corridor ahead of him, sharpening his focus. He was close. He plunged on, not slowing. Guards clustered, blocking off the corridor. They crouched behind a line of blast-shields and fired as quickly as they could work their weapons.
He dove head on into the storm of lead, trusting in his armour. He crashed into the shields, shouldering them aside. Men fell back, yelling unintelligibly. Fireblade darted out, and men fell. Fulgrim trod over the wounded as he filled the corridor with a glittering web of darting steel.
One managed to avoid the blade’s touch, and sought to halt the primarch’s advance with brute strength, wrapping his arms around Fulgrim’s waist. Fulgrim stared down at his attacker for a moment, contemplating the sheer, heroic insanity of the attempt. Then, with a laugh, he plucked the man up as if he were a child and cracked his skull against the ceiling of the corridor. Flinging the body aside, he pressed on.
By the time he reached the doorway they’d been guarding, the corridor had been stained red, from floor to ceiling. Fulgrim didn’t bother to knock. Instead, he let Firebrand announce his arrival. He ducked through the molten archway, easily avoiding the droplets of melted stone that fell steadily to the floor.
The chamber was larger than any of the others he’d passed through above. It was a veritable cathedral of stone pillars and sweeping archways - the very heart of the monastery, he suspected. Were the footsteps of Sabazius buried somewhere beneath the slabs of stone on the floor? He considered asking the crowd of men facing him, but decided against it. It might cheapen the moment.
His targeting array highlighted potential threats - one, two, four, eight, a hundred. A hundred men, scattered throughout the chamber. Waiting for him. ‘Well,’ he said, his amplified voice echoing through the chamber. ‘Here we all are.’
‘As you knew we would be.’ A Sabazian s
tepped forward, dressed in black, blade in hand. ‘As we knew that you would come.’
‘Were you waiting for me, then?’ Fulgrim lifted Fireblade. ‘How civil. But, I’m afraid the time for civility has passed. Now is the time for brute violence. Seas and messes of blood, as the old poets had it. A wine-dark sea, upon which an armada of corpses sails to the underworld.’ Fulgrim pointed his sword at the Sabazian. ‘That’s you, by the way.’
‘Perhaps. But we will not make our journey alone.’
Fulgrim laughed. ‘Brave words. Then, I expected no less.’
‘We showed this place to you for a reason, Phoenician,’ the masked figure continued. ‘Show your enemy a weak spot, and he will surely strike.’
The chamber echoed with the rattle of swords, and the harsh clack of weapons being readied. A dozen men or a hundred, it made little difference to Fulgrim. But there was something else. A sound, far below the register of the human ear. A hum. The same one he’d heard before, when he’d first visited the monastery. He’d mistaken it for a generator, then. Now he knew it was something else.
‘And you came, as surely as if we had invited you. Never wondering why. Belleros was right. You are a child in a god’s body, so eager to prove your superiority that you lose sight of your purpose.’
‘Quiet,’ Fulgrim said. He closed his eyes, trying to isolate the hum. It was familiar, that particular sound. He’d heard it before - not here. Somewhere else. Terra, perhaps. Memories of an ugly device, resting on one of Ferrus’ work-benches, surged to the fore. Ferrus had been showing him how to disarm a-
His eyes sprang open. They wouldn’t. They hadn’t. An unfamiliar sensation filled him. Not quite fear, but something close. Firebrand pulsed in his hand, melting a section of the floor as men scattered. The ancient mosaic laid there trickled away in molten rivulets, revealing a battered mechanism, sealed below. The shape was unfamiliar, but he recognised it regardless. There could be no mistaking such a thing.
Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix Page 18