Slaves to Darkness

by John French

  ‘What do you want?’ he asked.

  ‘Horus has not left his sanctum chambers for thirty-eight days.’

  Behind his still face, Maloghurst’s mind saw all of the thousands of servitors that moved through the Vengeful Spirit, all of the mechanical systems that layered its bones. It was tempting to think of them as uncaring of what they saw, but such a thought would be a mistake. They saw, and they answered to the Mechanicum.

  ‘That is not a matter that concerns you.’

  ‘That is incorrect. It concerns us. The magnitude of our concern is significant.’

  ‘The Warmaster is preoccupied with plans for the next stages of the war. You have seen the orders that he has issued.’

  ‘That you issued, equerry.’

  ‘The Warmaster prepares for the next great phase of battle. His preparations will not be disturbed. I speak for him.’

  Sota-Nul rotated her cowl towards where the remains of the metatron lay congealing and smoking on the floor of the deck.

  ‘Your words are incomplete in truth value. I hereby register our displeasure at your response and transmit a request that the Warmaster convene directly and personally with the Fabricator General.’

  ‘I will convey your message and displeasure to the Warmaster,’ he said. ‘And now you will leave me to my work.’ He met her nine-fold gaze and gave a single shake of his head. ‘This audience is over, and you will not attend on me so again.’

  For a second the tech-witch did not move, but then she rotated and began to drift into the dark that hid the distant entrance to the chamber.

  ‘The allies of the Warmaster are not blind, Maloghurst. You should be…’ Sota-Nul paused, and Maloghurst had the impression that she was searching for the word that would come next. ‘Concerned.’

  ‘I am…’ he breathed to himself as he heard the door reseal behind her. ‘I am.’

  Layak

  The Trisagion and the Vengeful Spirit met in the gulf between stars amongst the corpses of dead warships. Squadrons of battle cruisers flanked the Warmaster’s flagship. Hundreds of destroyers and frigates moved amongst them, darting like small fish around leviathans, guns armed and ready, auspex systems sweeping the debris-scattered dark.

  The Word Bearers fleet approached slowly, its lesser warships holding in tight formations as they broadcast litanies of praise and supplication. Their weapons remained cold, their auspex and targeting systems silent, their void shields deactivated.

  The Sons of Horus ships spread out around them, enclosing them, riding in close station, so close that their fire would strike before it was sensed by their targets. The Word Bearers held course. A blizzard of signals crossed the gap between the fleets. Identification markers were verified and code ciphers swapped and checked. The drone of the Word Bearers greeting ached in the background of every vox signal.

  ‘Glory undivided. Glory to Horus Lupercal, exalted and most high. Glory to the anointed of the gods. Glory…’

  On the words went in a waterfall of voices.

  The Word Bearers halted within fifty kilometres of the Vengeful Spirit. The lesser void-craft shifted position, folding back into the formation of an eight-pointed star. Thrusters fired across the fleet, burning yellow in the dark as they came to a dead halt.

  Only the Trisagion glided on, like a queen shedding her courtiers as she approached the throne of an empress. The Sons of Horus held back, letting her pass unescorted. Thrusters began to fire along her length, each blast scattering the ashes of a thousand slaves that had been herded into the engine vents to bless this meeting with their ends. The Trisagion halted at last and lay still, prow to prow with the Vengeful Spirit, the two separated by little more than a kilo­metre. There they lay for a long moment, two goddesses of devastation, alike in size and power but little else.

  A single Stormbird launched from the Trisagion’s prow hangar bays and thrust towards the Vengeful Spirit. Within its hull, Zardu Layak sat in the red-soaked gloom. Silence rolled through the vibrating air. Forty warriors of his Chapter of the Unspeaking filled the benches, their crimson armour powdered with ashes. Tapers bearing sacred symbols hung from their pauldrons. These were the Thrice Born, the chosen of his command. Their severed tongues, set in amber and threaded on strings woven from human hair, hung around their necks. His two blade slaves, Kulnar and Hebek, sat to either side of Layak, so still that they seemed sculptures. Only the black iron and gold hilts of the swords at their waists set them apart from the rest.

  Lorgar stood at the far end of the cabin, head bowed, his eyes closed. The air around him shimmered in time with his silent prayers.

  Layak felt the Stormbird decelerate and saw the primarch lift his head and open his eyes. A clang shivered through the gunship as its landing feet settled onto the deck. Layak stood, and as one the Unspeaking rose with him. The front assault ramp released with a hiss. Lorgar glanced over his shoulder.

  ‘The gods walk with us,’ he said.

  ‘And their will is our strength.’

  The ramp opened wide. Lorgar walked down into the light beyond.

  Layak followed ten paces behind, his staff tapping in time with his steps. His slaves and brothers followed in his wake.

  The hangar was empty of vehicles besides Lorgar’s Stormbird, the vast chamber running away to darkness. Sons of Horus filled that space, ranked in rows and squares, red eyes glowing from storm-green armour. Banners hung above them, all marked with the unblinking Eye of Horus woven in gold, silver and copper on black. Behind them stood the creatures of the Mechanicum, dark-robed and hunched, and beyond them were human soldiers, thousands of them, their faces lost to distance and shadow.

  False thunder rolled as the assembled warriors came to attention as one. Lorgar paused and bowed his head for a single second.

  Three Legion warriors waited in a loose group before them. Layak knew them all by sight and reputation: Falkus Kibre, looming in obsidian Cataphractii plate; Horus Aximand, his flayed and rebonded face a mask; and, at the centre, Maloghurst. The equerry to the Warmaster stooped beneath a bronze staff topped with a golden Eye of Horus. In the symbol-laced vision of his mask-helm, he saw Maloghurst’s aura ripple and billow like a tattered shroud.

  Whispers itched in Layak’s ears. +Khak’akaoz’khyshk’akami, Q’tlashsi’isso’akshami, Bahk’ghuranhi’aghkami.+

  He could see life force bleeding out of the equerry, even as the power of the souls fumed from him.

  Powerful, Layak thought. Powerful in every sense.

  ‘Honoured Lord Aurelian,’ said Maloghurst. Aximand and Kibre bowed their heads briefly. Layak noted the subtle observance of power, authority and formality. The sceptre in Maloghurst’s hand meant that he represented Horus in this moment. He spoke with the Warmaster’s voice and as such did not show deference to the primarch of the Word Bearers.

  Lorgar smiled.

  ‘Maloghurst and two of the Mournival, you do me high honour.’ The words were serene, and the warmth of sincerity rang clear.

  ‘The honour is ours,’ said Maloghurst.

  ‘The Beta-Garmon front is broken. The way to Terra is open, and the victory of truth is at hand. Yours is the hour. The gods know your names, and you are raised high by your deeds.’

  Aximand’s sword wound of a mouth opened to speak, but Maloghurst spoke before he could.

  ‘There is much to discuss. Please let us make you and your warriors welcome.’

  ‘My thanks. Please, lead on.’

  Maloghurst nodded and turned. Lorgar fell in at his side. Aximand and Kibre followed beside Layak. His two blade slaves held back, just a step behind. Layak felt the hooks on the inside of his mask dig deeper into his flesh as the warriors passed into the body of the Vengeful Spirit. The warp threaded its chambers and halls. It was already crawling through the bones of the ship. Half-born daemons scuttled at the edge of sight. The gods themselves ha
d walked these decks and now watched from the shadows. That was good – it would make it easier to plant the seeds that he had to.

  ‘I hope that my brother will be able to receive me as soon as whatever matter delays him is resolved,’ said Lorgar smoothly as they entered one of the ship’s main arterial passages.

  ‘Of course,’ said Maloghurst without hesitation.

  The buzz of active power armour and the tramp of armoured feet filled the moment that followed the lie.

  ‘If I may, Lord Aurelian,’ rasped Maloghurst. ‘While we are glad of your coming, this meeting was not expected.’

  ‘Does the meeting of kin and brothers need to be heralded? We are on the cusp of victory, Maloghurst. A victory that we all have fought to bring about. We must draw together in this moment, would you not say?’

  ‘Indeed. Messages were sent by the will of the Warmaster to that end, but they did not call you or your Legion here. The summons was to Ullanor.’

  ‘Messages? I am afraid that the gods have not brought your words to me, but the winds of eternity guided me here, where I am needed.’ Lorgar glanced down at Maloghurst. ‘I am needed here, am I not, Mal?’

  Maloghurst’s face showed nothing, but the vision of him in Layak’s­ mask flexed and shimmered.

  ‘You are always welcome in the court of the Warmaster,’ said Maloghurst.

  ‘In his court? What must a brother dream to wake and find his brother a king?’ Maloghurst started to reply, but Lorgar raised a placating hand. ‘I will not speak of it here, but I must see Horus. For the victory that will be ours, I must see him.’ He paused again and let the quiet settle. Layak almost smiled. The primarch’s words were the perfect balance of strength, sincerity and humility. They tugged at the thoughts and humours like the fingers of a divine musician. ‘I am here to help, and I can help.’

  Maloghurst’s face remained fixed as they walked. The shadows and silence seemed to hold their breath.

  ‘The Warmaster appreciates your service,’ he said at last.

  Lorgar gave a sad smile.

  ‘And I live to serve,’ he said.

  Volk

  Volk spun the Lightning Crow low. The wall of the mountainside rose to meet him, its black mass swallowing the sky beyond. Fire licked the air around him. Ground units opened up as he passed low over the crags and valleys. He could see the teeth of the crenellated towers that capped the hills and the sloped fronts of the defence lines running down the mountain’s flanks.

  His helmet display was a blur of red warnings – threat markers, fuel status, ammunition status and communications integrity. Out across the mountainside the rest of his flight followed his lead, tumbling low to hug the ground as they ran back to the mountain’s shelter. He felt hard rounds and pulses of las-bolts slam into his wings. More red in his eyes.

  ‘Commander, enemy emerging on your tail,’ called his new wingman. Behind him the axe-blade shape of a Lightning in jagged red-and-yellow livery roared up from where it had been clinging to the other side of a stone ridge. Volk tumbled 786-1-1 over as lascannon fire burned past him.

  He could see the entrance to the hangar cavern, close but still seconds away, seconds that he might not have.

  Too far away, he thought. Too far by a long way.

  The Lightning was burning close on his tail. The target lock warning was rising in pitch.

  Volk triggered his forward thrusters. 786-1-1 flipped over. The force emptied the air from all three of his lungs. Blood drained from his head and limbs. The fuel warning joined the chorus of alarms. The Lightning held tight on his tail. Its pilot was good, very good even, perhaps one of those serving the Rogue Traders Martial that the Ultramarines had brought in to break the Iron Warriors at Krade. Lascannon fire burned after Volk as he dived lower. The mountainside was so close he felt as though he could reach through his canopy and touch it.

  ‘Stay with me,’ he hissed through clenched teeth. ‘Stay with me.’

  A whip-crack of las skimmed the tip of his left tail fin. The Lightning Crow bucked as though stung.

  A cliff of sheer black glass running across the mouth of a valley rose to meet him.

  ‘Stay with me…’

  The Lightning was close, hugging as tightly as a shadow.

  ‘Closer…’

  The cliff was a black wall.

  And for a moment the blackness before him and the scream of engines and the promise of death in his hands was everything, was the universe.

  The Lightning fired.

  Volk slammed 786-1-1 vertical, poured the last of its fuel into its engines and roared over the cliff edge. The Lightning followed, its own engines burning blue with heat.

  Two sets of turrets positioned on the top of the cliff swung up and fired. Four quad autocannons spat solid shots into the air. Explosive rounds streamed past Volk and tore the Lightning from the sky.

  Volk watched as the hangar cavern yawned wide in front of him. The defence turrets twitched back to stillness as he entered. 786-1-1 settled onto its landing pad just as a final alarm sounded to say that the last of his fuel was gone.

  Volk snapped free of his connection to the craft before its power had finished cycling down. His helmet hissed free. The smell of fuel and machine oil flooded his nose. He vaulted out of the cockpit as the canopy began to rise.

  ‘You look like a man with somewhere else he wants to be, commander.’ The voice made him turn. He kept his surprise from his face. The anger made that easier.

  First Captain Forrix stood at the edge of the landing pad. The bulk of his Terminator armour made his sallow face seem shrunken in its collar socket. Dark eyes glittered above a thin smile.

  Volk did not answer. In truth he wanted to, but the reply that came to mind was not one to be said aloud to one of the Lord of Iron’s closest lieutenants. He stilled his thoughts. His nerves were still singing with the scream of weapon locks and the slam of G-force. Aggression and kill instinct held the beat of his hearts. He paused as a trio of servitors crowded around him to fix a power pack to his back. A weapon serf in black robes and a blank, wrought-iron mask held up his bolter. The man’s arms barely trembled as they braced to take the weight. Volk took it, racked the arming mechanism and clamped it to his thigh plate. When he was done, he finally looked up at Forrix, bowed his head briefly and made to turn towards where the rest of his flight were emerging from their craft.

  ‘Something vexes you?’ said Forrix.

  Volk turned, opened his mouth and closed it again.

  ‘Nothing that needs to be said here,’ he said carefully, inclining his head to the nearest serfs and Iron Warriors.

  Forrix looked at them and turned to move away.

  ‘Follow,’ he said.

  Volk stayed still for a second, then walked after the First Captain. They passed out of the cavern and into the main mass of the mountain fortress. Moisture dripped from the smooth walls of the tunnels they passed through. Servitors, human soldiers and serfs parted for them as they walked. Blast doors opened, and they descended in lift cages down shafts braced with rusting metal.

  The Onyx Mountain had been just a mountain before the coming of the Iron Warriors. Mines had run through the mountain’s bones, but within a week a warren of tunnels had been dug down to its root and up to its summit. Sub-fortresses and walls had been hacked into its flanks, and stores gouged into its heart. In a week. Such was the art of the IV and the Lord of Iron.

  ‘You are concerned that you are being censured further,’ said Forrix as they exited a macro lift into a plasteel-lined passage. Volk looked up as gun mounts in the ceiling swung around and aimed at them. Targeting beams sparkled over his armour. The guns cycled down after a heartbeat. ‘This is not censure, though you may deserve it.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For weakness, of course.’

  ‘Whatever the lord primarch wishes o
f me, I shall do,’ he said. Forrix shot him a hard look. ‘If he wishes my death by my own hand, he need only command it. The iron of my blood is his.’

  The First Captain’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Not all iron is forged alike,’ he said. Before them the tunnel ended in a door of yellow-and-black striped metal. A pair of towering figures flanked the portal. Shields the size of tank turrets hung from piston-driven hands, and vast hammers rested in their grips. Cold green light glimmered in their eye sockets as shoulder-mounted cannons rotated to track Forrix and Volk. These were the automata of the Iron Circle, machines crafted by Perturabo’s own hand to be his bodyguard, and their presence removed any doubt as to who he was being led to.

  ‘From Faith cometh Honour,’ said Volk.

  Forrix’s gaze was icy.

  Vast mechanisms clanked within the doors. Layers of metal peeled back one at a time until the way was open to the space beyond. After a second they walked through. The light of pict screens and holo-displays diluted the darkness within. Banks of machines and tiers of servitors wired into data cradles surrounded a central circular recess. Numerals and symbols scrolled without cease across the glowing screens and holo projections. At their centre, bathed in the cold light, stood Perturabo. Four Iron Circle automata stood around him, facing outwards, graven statues guarding a demigod of war.

  The primarch of the Iron Warriors did not look around as Forrix and Volk approached. Volk had not been in the presence of his primarch for months, not since the withdrawal from Tallarn; not since Volk’s censure for failing to confine Horus’ emissary. Perturabo had changed in that time. The bulk of his armour had grown. Bracing, armour plates and, above all, weapon systems had multiplied across his shoulders and limbs. The armour had a cold sheen to it, as though the metal were sweating a thin film of dark oil. His face was pale, the skin seemingly drawn over the skull beneath, the eyes points of reflected light in pits of shadow. He had been that way ever since he had come from out of the Black Sun, as though something vital had been drained from him and what remained was being ground down to a sharp edge.