Astra Militarum

by David Annandale, Justin D Hill, Toby Frost, Braden Campbell (epub)

  He listed the dead – the higher ranking ones anyway. Creed bowed his head. Each name brought back the memory of the gory trophy on the Excubitoi Castellum’s bridge.

  He looked round to see Kell carrying a shot glass and a bottle. He took the glass and knocked it back.

  He felt warmth spread through him. ‘Thank the Throne,’ he said quietly.

  ‘So that is the situation,’ Warmaster Ryse concluded. He looked grave. ‘As far as we know there have been no other landings. Admiral Elen has locked the planet down. I have sent an astropathic signal to the High Lords on Terra. We await their response.’

  Creed listened in silence to the responses. They all focussed on the Volscani, expressing disbelief that they could have masterminded such an attack. Creed handed his empty glass back to Kell. Kell returned it refilled. Creed knocked it back again.

  ‘This wasn’t the work of the Volscani,’ he heard a voice say.

  Creed’s thigh stung. He realised he had stood up, and as everyone was staring at him, he realised that it was he who had spoken. He cleared his throat.

  ‘My men killed General Klief of the Volscani. We killed Luciver Anckor, who was with them as well. Both men died in the first hours of the battle, and it continued without them. They were not the masterminds here. They were pawns. Decoys.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ General Gruber demanded.

  Creed spoke simply. ‘This is war on a scale we have never seen. This, gentlemen…’ He paused to look around the room. ‘This is a Black Crusade.’

  There was a murmur of disapproval. ‘Hush!’ Gruber said.

  Creed would not stay silent. ‘Yes. Fellow officers, we are not fighting a heretic general or a small warband of traitor Space Marines. We are facing the most ancient of enemies. Abaddon the Despoiler.’

  Ryse scowled. ‘You should not speak that name,’ he said.

  ‘If not naming him would help us, I would not. But let us all be clear. This is the scale of the threat against us. It is the Imperium’s most ancient foe.’

  ‘Can it really be him?’ A tall, trim equerry in the polished breastplate of the Cadian 101st spoke in an awed whisper. ‘After so long. How can he still be alive?’

  ‘I do not care to know the ways of heretics,’ Creed said. ‘But I am sure we have all seen things that should not be. That reason tells us cannot be. All we have are our lasgun, our armour, and our faith in the Emperor.’

  Creed felt the mood of the room waver. He stared at the officers. ‘I warned you all about this yesterday. None of you listened, despite the evidence. I have no supernatural powers. All I have is the strength of my faith. The power of my troops. The courage of a soldier.’

  Warmaster Ryse stepped forward. ‘I did not bring you here to argue. I brought you here because we have a great duty upon our shoulders. We have always had two governors on Cadia so that if one was killed the other could rule. Now we are leaderless. Both of them are dead. Until the High Lords appoint another, we need an interim governor.’

  ‘You are suggesting yourself?’ Gruber asked.

  ‘No.’ Ryse sighed. ‘I have been warmaster for seven years. To command Cadia now… It would be too much.’

  ‘Then who?’ Gruber turned to face the room. ‘General Flowerdew?’ The one-eyed commander of the Cadian 910th Airborne regiment shook his head. One by one Gruber went about the room, picking out officers. Each one shook their head. He studiously ignored Creed. At last Gruber turned back to Ryse. ‘Then I humbly submit myself.’

  ‘No,’ Ryse said. ‘I think not.’

  ‘Then who?’ snapped Gruber.

  Warmaster Ryse sighed. ‘I do not know.’

  A voice piped up from the shadows. ‘May I be permitted to speak?’

  Creed knew the voice and turned as the figure stepped out from the shadows. It was Commissar Aldrad.

  Even Lord General Gruber straightened up as the commissar stepped forward. Old habits died hard, and commissars were figures of fear, even ones so young.

  Aldrad stopped in the middle of the room. His uniform and his very visible injury gave his words gravity. ‘I am not a Cadian. I am not even technically a Guardsman. But I alone here represent the Militarum Tempestus.’ He lifted the stump of his arm. ‘I saw the battle unfold today from the sharp end. I fought all the way from the fens to the very bridge of the Excubitoi Castellum where we found the governor dead.’ He paused and looked around.

  ‘But for one man in this room, I guarantee that none of us would still be alive. One man commanded Cadia today. It was not Governor Porelska. And it was not you, Lord General Gruber. Nor, with the greatest respect, was it you, warmaster. I have no doubt you defended your Leviathan with great skill and courage, but while you were fighting a private battle here, one man brought the shattered forces of Cadia together. One man combined the Imperium’s resources. One man pitted himself against the enemy.

  ‘And he won. Yes, we lost much today. But we were not defeated. We achieved a great victory. We stand.’

  ‘Who are you talking about?’ Gruber asked.

  ‘Warmaster, lord generals, I nominate General Ursarkar E. Creed, Castellan of Kasr Rorzann, for the post of interim governor of Cadia.’

  There were cheers from scattered officers, but Gruber stepped forward. ‘You cannot be serious, Commissar.’

  ‘I am,’ Aldrad said.

  Warmaster Ryse let out a long breath. He turned to Creed. ‘Ursarkar, you have always been a fine and loyal servant. I have learned to trust you more than any of my other commanders. I think this commissar has spoken truly, and I will heed his recommendation. And so I ask you, will you lead us in this, our hour of greatest need?’

  ‘No,’ Creed said. ‘I do not want to be governor of Cadia.’

  ‘Ursarkar,’ Ryse said. His voice teetered between affection and exasperation. ‘This is a great honour we are offering you.’

  ‘No, it is not,’ Creed said. ‘You want to hold me up like a puppet. Cadia needs a commander who has the ability to lead.’

  Ryse slammed his good hand down onto the table. ‘Damn it, Creed. What do you want?’

  ‘What I want is simple, Warmaster Ryse. That I alone rule Cadia until the forces of Chaos are driven from this planet, and from this system.’

  ‘That can’t be done!’ Gruber roared. ‘You want to be a dictator.’

  ‘It can be done,’ Creed said. ‘It has before. A rank exists. What Cadia needs, gentlemen, is not a governor, but a lord castellan.’

  There was stunned silence.

  Creed stared them all down. ‘It is what Cadia needs. She demands it of us.’

  Bodies were piled five deep all along the side of the Excubitoi Castellum as Lord Castellan Creed led his commanders to the bridge. It had been sluiced down to get rid of the blood, but it still stank of slaughter. He paused at the threshold of the command deck. He could hear the Cadian troops below. Each crowd had its own note, and this one sounded angry, confused, hurt, leaderless.

  Creed had no words ready. He looked around. Warmaster Ryse stood next to him. Kell stood right behind Creed, the banner of the Cadian Eighth in his hand, furled tightly around its pole. He smiled grimly and Creed returned the gesture and stepped over the threshold. He walked alone to the railing, and looked out and down. Arc lumens lit the crowd. The note of the murmuring changed a little as he showed himself. It was expectant now.

  Creed felt something being placed in his hand. He looked at it, and saw that it was a voice amplification unit. He swallowed.

  ‘Men and women of Cadia,’ he started. He did not know what he was going to say, but he knew he had to say something. ‘We lost many today. Friends. Sons. Mothers. Daughters. Comrades. We withstood fire, bombardment, treachery and cowardice. And we did not flinch. We did not turn to ask if another would step up and take our place. We stood, we fought, and we strode forward into battle.’
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br />   As he spoke he felt the note of the crowd changing, and for the first time, he had a feeling that Abaddon had not won that day. Yes, he had decapitated Cadia, but Cadia had a new head. And it was stronger, fiercer, more deadly. As the cheers died down, Creed waved a hand.

  ‘Today the High Command have asked me to serve as Lord Castellan of Cadia. I have accepted this weighty honour. Today we have driven the enemy from our home. But the months ahead shall be hard. I offer you nothing but blood and battle. This is our part in a war that has lasted ten thousand years. And today, brothers and sisters, today we – you – have won a great victory that will be remembered for another ten thousand years, or as long as the Imperium of Mankind shall last!’

  Creed left the crowd cheering as he walked back inside.

  ‘Lord Castellan.’ Castor saluted and fumbled in his breast pocket for a thick silver case, which he opened. Inside were lho-stubs. ‘The finest that the Munitorum has to offer,’ he said.

  Creed took one, and bit it between his teeth as a lucifer was struck and puffed it to life.

  ‘You asked for the maps to be brought here,’ Castor continued.

  ‘Yes,’ Creed said. ‘Thank you.’

  Kell handed him a silver tankard. It was full of amasec. Creed barely tasted it as he stood over the table, pulled out the system map and saw it all as he had described it to Porelska just the day before. He saw the terrible brilliance of it all, all the regicide pieces not just of the war on Cadia, but of a Black Crusade like a many-tentacled creature seizing the Imperium in its grip.

  ‘The official records,’ he said. ‘All reference to traitor Space Marines must be extinguished. This was a treacherous attack by General Klief of the Volscani, aided by the traitor Luciver Anckor. Both were killed in the attack. The Volscani Caraphracts have been destroyed. Governor Marus Porelska died valiantly, fighting on the bridge of the Excubitoi Castellum.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Castor said gravely.

  Creed looked up and met the eyes of every man present. ‘You shall all keep to this official record. No one will speak of Horus’ scions on Cadia’s holy soil. Is that clear?’

  The men nodded. Creed leafed through the latest reports. He did not know how long he stood there. An hour perhaps. Maybe two. The other men were silent as he went through all the reports that Porelska had been keeping from them. Things were worse than even he had guessed. But as he stood and worked through the data sheets, he felt he was getting a sense of the enemy’s strategy.

  Strange asteroid activity in the Scarus System. Warp storms off Belial. Contact lost with Chinchare. Sabotage on Belis Corona. Uprisings on St Josmane’s Hope.

  He stopped at that and took a sip of the amasec. Arcady Pride. He smiled, and felt the eyes of the men in the room on him.

  ‘The Voice’ was on Saint Josmane’s Hope. He shivered and remembered the figure that had found him in the ruins of Kasr Gallan. ‘Get me Admiral Elen.’

  Castor nodded. He relayed the command, but paused. ‘There’s something else. The men want to rename the regiment.’

  Creed looked up.

  ‘What do they want to call it?’

  ‘Lord Castellan’s Own,’ Castor said.

  Creed half laughed.

  ‘Do they have your permission?’

  ‘Yes,’ Creed said. ‘If that is what they wish.’

  He took another sip, pulled out another chart and puffed on his lho-stub. He, a mere man, was pitting his skill against the most ancient evil in the galaxy. He drew in a deep breath and thought of all those who had died that day, of the men he had sent to certain deaths. If the Imperium of Mankind stood a chance, then here on Cadia the war would be won or lost. And to win it he had to be harder, crueller and more brutal than his foe.

  Creed could feel Cadia as if she was a spirit in the room, standing at his shoulder. Approving. Resolute. Defiant.

  ‘Where is Admiral Elen?’ he demanded.

  ‘Sorry sir!’ Castor brought a vox-unit. Creed took it.

  ‘Admiral. This is Lord Castellan Creed. There is heresy upon St Josmane’s Hope. You will order a fleet there and destroy the planet and all upon it. No. No evacuation.’

  The admiral questioned the order, and Creed repeated it. The room was silent, the atmosphere tense. Creed could only imagine what was going through the heads of the assembled officers.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, his voice harder. ‘Destroy St Josmane’s Hope and all on it, admiral.’

  Colour sergeant Jarran Kell listened dispassionately. It was chilling hearing his commander – his friend – commit a planet to extinction, but Kell felt hope flare within him too. Creed could win this. Kell now understood why he had always felt so strongly that he had to keep Creed alive. It was for this moment. Because Creed alone could save Cadia, and perhaps the Imperium.

  Creed put the tankard down and looked around. His gaze lingered on Kell. Kell nodded, and Creed nodded back.

  ‘Next,’ he said, and took another report from Castor’s trembling hand.

  About the Authors

  David Annandale is the author of The Horus Heresy novel The Damnation of Pythos. He also writes the Yarrick series, consisting of the novella Chains of Golgotha and the novels Imperial Creed and The Pyres of Armageddon. For Space Marine Battles he has written The Death of Antagonis and Overfiend. He is a prolific writer of short fiction, including the novella Mephiston: Lord of Death and numerous short stories set in The Horus Heresy and Warhammer 40,000 universes. David lectures at a Canadian university, on subjects ranging from English literature to horror films and video games.

  Toby Frost is the author of the novel Straken, about the eponymous Astra Militarum colonel. His other published work for Black Library includes the short stories ‘Lesser Evils’, ‘A Hero’s Death’ and ‘The Apex’, the latter two featuring Colonel ‘Iron Hand’ Straken. He has more tales of Straken on the way.

  Braden Campbell is the author of Shadowsun: The Last of Kiru’s Line for Black Library, as well as several short stories. He is a classical actor and playwright, and a freelance writer, particularly in the field of role playing games. Braden has enjoyed Warhammer 40,000 for nearly a decade, and remains fiercely dedicated to his dark eldar.

  Justin D Hill is the author of the Warhammer 40,000 short stories ‘Last Step Backwards’, ‘Lost Hope’ and ‘The Battle of Tyrok Fields’, following the adventures of Lord Castellan Ursarkar E. Creed, as well as ‘Truth Is My Weapon’, and the Warhammer tales ‘Golgfag's Revenge’ and ‘The Battle of Whitestone’ for Black Library.

  An extract from Yarrick: Imperial Creed.

  OBSERVE AND LEARN

  1. Yarrick

  I watched the deployment embarkation as if seeing one for the first time. There was a strong element of truth to that impression. During my years as a storm trooper I had taken part in many mobilizations, many invasions, but I had always been in the midst of the troop formations – one cog among thousands of others, marching into the drop-ships. Now, briefly, I stood apart from the great mass of the troops. I was on a balcony overlooking the loading bay of the Scythe of Terra. For the first time I saw the full spectacle of a regiment about to enforce the Emperor’s will. The perspective drove home the magnificence of the engine of war that was the Imperial Guard. Below me was the 77th Mortisian Infantry Regiment. The sons and daughters of the dying hive world of Aighe Mortis stood at attention in phalanxes of geometric perfection. They were no longer individuals. They were a collective entity, a massive fist as clockwork and unwavering in its precision as the limb of any Titan. I saw and understood how right and proper was the anonymity I had known before. I had been completely replaceable. I was still, only now I was required to understand why.

  This was what I was learning from my new vantage point, in my new identity, in my new uniform. The peaked cap and the greatcoat with its epaulettes creating an imposing silhouette, the colours of authority
and discipline embodied in the dress black and the crimson collar: this apparel obliterated the identity of its wearer as surely as had my storm trooper armour, or the khaki fatigues of the Mortisians. But where the troop uniforms merged the self into a force-multiplying whole, my garb stood out. Visibility was vital to the commissar. He had to be seen in order to inspire courage and fear. The clothes were the symbols of authority, of righteousness, of discipline. They were what bore the meaning of the rank. The actions that were carried out when they were worn had to be worthy of them, and were crucial to maintaining their power and honour. The actual individual under the cap was irrelevant.

  So I thought.

  I was not alone on the balcony. I was there with Dominic Seroff. Together we had been the terror of our dorms at the schola progenium. Smiling fate had seen us in the same platoon, inflicting terror of a different sort on the heretic and the xenos. Now, as I answered the calling I had felt for as long as I can remember, Seroff too had donned the black coat. I on the right, Seroff on the left, we flanked a legend. Lord Commissar Simeon Rasp had summoned us to witness the final minutes before embarkation. On a grand podium opposite the hull doors, Colonel Georg Granach held forth to the soldiers of the regiment, praising their faith and zeal, and prophesying martial glory.

  ‘Tell me what you see,’ Rasp said.

  I glanced away from the troops, and caught Seroff looking my way. Each of us was inviting the other to speak first and get it wrong. The set of Seroff’s mouth told me he was willing to let the silence stretch to embarrassing lengths. I knew his canniness. He knew my eagerness. I had already lost. It was simply a matter of recognizing that fact.

  Seroff looked too young to be a commissar. He had somehow made it through our dozens of battle zones without picking up a single scar. He still had the face of a joker. With his blond curls struggling to push his cap off his head, I wondered how seriously troopers would take him as a commissar. I sometimes wondered how seriously he took his role himself. The contrast with Rasp bordered on the grotesque. The lord commissar waited, impassive, for one of us to answer. His eyes did not move from the floor of the bay, but I knew he was watching us both. His hair, now invisible under his cap, was a close-cropped and dirty white. His angular features had a youthful strength thanks to juvenat treatments, but they had also been sharpened by long experience. He did have scars. The most noticeable was a harsh ‘V’ that ran the length of his cheekbones, coming to the point just below his nose. It was a souvenir of an encounter with the eldar. The xenos who had branded him had not survived.