Deathfire

by Nick Kyme

  A few battle-brothers were left behind to hold the bunkers and protect Vulkan. The Techmarine Covenant, along with Gargo, remained also to man its static guns. The rest broke up into battle formations. Tactical support squads bearing flamers poured forwards in the vanguard, whilst heavy support squads made for the flanks or higher ground. Behind the vanguard came a clenched fist of veteran Firedrakes. There were scarcely fifty of these warriors but with the presence of Nomus Rhy’tan and Artellus Numeon, they were formidable.

  Bolter-armed battle-brothers flanked them either side. It would be their job, along with the vanguard, to deliver the veterans into the heart of the fighting where they could cause the most damage.

  Nigh-on eight hundred Salamanders crossed the fire-blackened plain where the sand had turned to glass and crunched beneath their booted feet. A terrible host bayed and clawed before them, rending vehicles and stomping warriors to dust.

  ‘We are heading into that?’ asked Zytos, incredulous. ‘I have killed many of those beasts. Smaller, yes, but the vein of enmity between us runs deep, I think.’

  The drakes of Nocturne were rampant, and laid about them with abandon. Scores of tanks and hundreds of legionaries lay broken by their rampage, though monstrous carcasses stained the earth too. All was left to rot in the pitiless sun.

  ‘I doubt they will remember you, brother,’ said Numeon, his mood lighter than it had been in many months. It felt good to stand with a war host again.

  Across the Draconius Gate the vox-horn sounded over and over, heralding the call to arms.

  Mauled by Nocturne’s oldest denizens, the Death Guard were reeling and their armoured battalions all but vanquished. When the Salamanders hit them hard, they reeled again.

  But these were still warriors of the XIV and they had numbers on their side in spite of the beating they had taken.

  Slowly, they began to reorganise. And as the Salamanders came in at close quarters the beasts began to relent. As savagely and suddenly as they had begun, the drakes returned to the earth without need of encouragement.

  The Death Guard rallied. Artillery sections hustled into formation, tearing gaps into the Drakes’ vanguard. Talons of Contemptors that had survived the monstrous assault began to lay down fire.

  Lascannon and culverin beams speared into the Dreadnoughts, cutting them apart. Overhead, the sound of quad mortars from the Draconius Gate broke across the plain, dropping heavy payloads into the still reforming rear ranks of the Death Guard. The ‘thud guns’ were well named, and their thunderous salvoes kept the enemy legionaries from forming a counter-charge.

  The rally of the XIV Legion stuttered and struggled to find purchase. Every time their defiance arose, it was quickly crushed as flame units closed in and burned away all resistance.

  Heavy bolters, autocannons and missile launchers maintained a dense hail of fire from the high ground and embedded gun emplacements on the walls. One ridge line exploded as a Death Guard plasma cannon section managed to retaliate, killing several Drakes, but the Salamander heavies were dug in well and survived.

  As the Death Guard cannons moved up for a second barrage, they were swallowed by a lava trench that yawned open beneath them. Other legionaries clad in scorched white plate were blinded by erupting steam vents, only to be cut down by the host of implacable Firedrakes.

  Even with its scaled denizens fought off and now quiescent, the earth itself still seemed to rebel against the invaders.

  The deadly unpredictability of the terrain eventually began to tell, and as the Death Guard’s superior numbers dwindled and the Salamanders continued to carve them up piecemeal, Nomus Rhy’tan led his veterans to their rival command section. But it was Numeon who caught the gaze of their leader across the fierce melee.

  Laestygon felt his fragile grip on Nocturne weakening. In his mind’s eye, he saw his banner in tatters, faded in ignominy.

  Then he railed against it. None had fought as hard as he. Death and defeat had risen to try and claim him over and over again, but he had resisted. He would resist it again now.

  I will be remembered, he thought, striding across the bitter, choking sand plain. On this rancid world, I shall make an indelible mark in history.

  As he took a slatted view of the carnage through his visor, Laestygon realised there was no subtlety to this fight, that fine tactics would not win the field. It had become a dirty scrum, a brutal close-quarter engagement. This style of warfare he knew. He had fought it his entire existence.

  Behind the mask of his war-helm, Laestygon smiled.

  He could see their leader, the draconic officer clad in scales, cutting down warriors like they were little more than wooden staves.

  ‘There,’ he called to his Terminator veterans. ‘That one.’

  Numeon was well aware that Barbarans were lauded for their resilience, but even the sons of Mortarion could not withstand the beating they had just taken and hope to hold their ground against an equally tenacious enemy.

  Across the field of battle, the Salamanders crushed what remained of the Death Guard’s resistance until only its warlord and his loyal warriors were left.

  Nomus Rhy’tan bellowed like a urdrake, as Firedrakes met Death Guard Terminators.

  The clash was brutal, and veteran warriors fell on either side in the first few seconds of the fighting.

  Thunder hammers broke nigh-on inviolable war-plate apart as the Salamanders bludgeoned their enemies implacably. For their part, the Death Guard cleaved and stabbed with lightning claws. One drake was felled by a power fist, only for his killer to die under a hail of retaliatory blows.

  As the brutal skirmish unfolded, Rhy’tan and a clutch of warriors were drawn into combat against a Contemptor.

  Even Zytos had been pushed out of position by the lethal ebb and flow of the fight.

  It left Numeon alone to face the Death Guard warlord.

  As he met him across the corpse-strewn, wreckage-choked terrain, the Barbaran called out.

  ‘Are you the prophet, the one I chased across the storm?’

  He was bleeding from a dozen rents in his armour, and snarled with rad-scarred lips, his war-helm long gone. His retainers were almost finished, dispatched by Rhy’tan’s Firedrakes as the Lord Chaplain himself took apart the last Dreadnought.

  ‘To you, I am the ender of all things,’ said Numeon.

  Draukoros had bitten deep of the Death Guard, and though he was weary, the Pyre captain knew this was the one he had to kill.

  The Death Guard scoffed, as if he could reverse fate. His blade was slick with the blood of Numeon’s brothers. Numeon would ensure this foetid wretch would anoint it no further.

  ‘You should not have come here. It was an error. You lost your claim on my life when you let us slip through your dirty fingers, traitor. Look around you,’ he invited.

  There were but he and Numeon on this part of the field. Scores of bodies surrounded them, mostly clad in begrimed white. Numeon glanced at the Firedrakes about to encroach, warning them off. This was his enemy to kill.

  The Barbaran appeared unfazed by his sudden shift in fortune.

  He actually laughed, then formed an ugly grin through decayed teeth.

  ‘Know my name, drake,’ he said, as if about to claim conquest for Barbarus, ‘he who has set foot upon your soil. Who has brought death to Nocturne. Who will claim the head of your lord and father. Remember it. I am Malig Laes–’

  Draukoros thrust into the traitor’s neck, silencing anything further.

  As Numeon wrenched the sword free, the Death Guard dropped his blade, a chipped but sharp kukra, and tried to staunch the bleeding.

  Numeon cut off his head.

  ‘No one will remember you, traitor. Least of all me.’

  A bloodied Zytos joined Numeon on the battlefield as he cleaned his sword.

  As they clasped forearms, he swung his thu
nder hammer onto his shoulder.

  ‘Feels good to purge Nocturnean soil,’ he said, looking around at the carnage. His gaze lingered on the headless corpse of the Death Guard warlord, but only fleetingly.

  ‘And the desert will take their corpses.’

  Zytos smiled ruefully. ‘Xathen would have relished this battle.’

  ‘He, Var’kir, and everyone we have lost to get this far will be remembered. In Vulkan’s name.’

  ‘Aye, in Vulkan’s name.’

  With the defeat of their leader, the Death Guard were in full retreat.

  Rhy’tan emerged from the slowly dissipating smoke. Like the others, his armour was battered but his spirit soaring.

  ‘It seems Nocturne is quiescent once more,’ he told them both.

  ‘What of the Reaper’s Shroud?’ asked Numeon.

  ‘Warships are inbound from Prometheus, Vulkan’s Wrath and the Drakelord, to ensure Nocturne’s skies are ours again.’

  ‘Then there is but one task remaining,’ said Numeon as his eyes fell upon the forbidding Mount Deathfire. ‘Vulkan’s resurrection.’

  Rhy’tan watched Numeon for a few moments before he began walking away.

  ‘Brother-captain,’ he called. ‘After you have cleansed your war-plate and weapons, come and speak with me. I said there would be time for talk. That time is upon us.’

  Aboard the Reaper’s Shroud the alert sirens had reached a fever pitch.

  Fires ran rampant through the ship, its shields were down and according to its augurs two strike cruiser-class vessels were inbound from the Prometheus moon, where they had been docked.

  No hierarchy remained, no order existed. Only chaos.

  The last two Death Guard legionaries lay dead on the bridge, the blood from their torn throats and bodies still pooling. Inexplicably, their battleplate had provided no defence against the knife. It had cut them open as if they wore nothing but cloth instead of hardy adamantium and ceramite.

  None amongst the crew had dared stand in the Preacher’s way after that, and he had said nothing as he left.

  The only evidence of his existence was the absence of a ship, taken from one of the few launch bays that still functioned. Its destination was unknown to everyone, save its pilot.

  But as he flew the diminutive ship, Quor Gallek praised Lorgar for his deliverance and the powers of Ruin for the sliver of fulgurite still in his possession.

  Sixty-Six

  Into the fire

  Nocturne, the Draconius Gate, vault

  Nomus Rhy’tan waited in shadows, a flickering fire the only light in the humble vault. He stood before Vulkan’s casket, his eyes closed as if deep in thought, or mourning.

  ‘Lord Chaplain.’ Numeon’s voice ventured from the darkness.

  ‘Stand with me, brother,’ said Rhy’tan, his tone solemn.

  Numeon did as asked.

  ‘Tell me, Artellus, what do you see in that casket that others do not?’

  ‘I see my father and the potential for his return.’

  ‘Why? Because you want it to be so, you need it?’

  ‘Because it is. I believe it.’

  ‘You were equerry to our primarch, arguably his closest confidant in the Legion and sworn to protect him.’

  Numeon turned, frowning. ‘Are you saying I failed him?’

  ‘I am saying you may feel guilty for his death. I am saying your grief for his passing is probably more acute than any son of Nocturne. It does not surprise me that you cling to the belief in his resurrection.’

  ‘I cling to nothing. I know Vulkan will rise. I can feel it. Does the Promethean creed not preach rebirth? What of the Circle of Fire?’

  ‘It refers to spiritual rebirth, Numeon. As one is given up to the earth, only then can another rise. It is figurative. You are Vulkan reborn. In you, in us, are his teachings made immortal, his wisdom sacrosanct.’

  ‘Perhaps in such secular times that was true, but in ancient days could the Circle of Fire have referred to true resurrection? Our father is immortal, after all.’

  ‘Myths, brother, from a dark age of blood sacrifice that Vulkan himself put asunder.’

  ‘And what era is this then, if not a “dark age” where more than blood is sacrificed?’

  Rhy’tan sighed. ‘What did Var’kir believe?’ he asked. ‘I heard Sergeant Zytos make mention of him. I was his mentor, and as such he was amongst the Igniax, acting as spiritual advisor to you, was he not?’

  ‘Yes, he was also my friend.’

  ‘Indeed, but what did he believe? Whatever it was, he gave his life to see it done.’

  ‘I witnessed miracles. The hand of Vulkan at my shoulder.’

  ‘I have no doubt of that. Vulkan’s blood burns strongly in you, Numeon, but what did Var’kir believe?’

  Numeon’s expression darkened, but he refused to allow his doubts to resurface.

  ‘He believed that Vulkan was dead, and here on Nocturne he would find peace.’

  ‘And you don’t believe that.’

  ‘Vulkan must rise.’

  ‘For him or for you, brother?’

  Numeon scowled, and found his anger rising.

  ‘For the Legion, for all of us. For the war.’

  ‘And if, despite your beliefs, he returns to the mountain and does not rise, what then?’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  Rhy’tan smiled sadly.

  ‘No, I don’t think you do.’

  ‘Is there anything further?’ said Numeon, his anger turning into belligerence. ‘Deathfire awaits.’

  Shaking his head, Rhy’tan gave Numeon his leave.

  Smoke rose from the dormant caldera of Mount Deathfire. A low rumble persisted in the depths beneath a sharp refrain of crackling magma and the slow dissolution of rock, as if the mountain itself were in mourning.

  Ash and cinder gathered in the wide craggy basin where the sons of Vulkan had mustered in solemn ranks. They bore their drake-hide cloaks proudly – the mantles fluttering in the hot, sulphurous breeze – and their war-helms were clasped in the crooks of their arms.

  Fewer than eight hundred souls had gathered to bear witness, a paltry gathering but all that the Salamanders could muster in such beleaguered times. Every one bore the brander’s mark that would remember this deed. None had received it before, for to witness the death of the primarch was unique.

  Amongst them stood Numeon and those who had made it through the storm.

  A mournful tattoo sounded above the strident bellow of the mountain, drummed by the Salamanders rapping their knuckles against their pauldrons. Anvils placed around the edge of the caldera rang out in unison as Gargo and the other black-smiters brought hammer against steel.

  Vulkan’s body lay upon a bier of granite, at last divested of its casket. The hammer Dawnbringer lay across his chest, still clenched in his fists. The fulgurite, a thorn in his flesh, the fell spearhead that had ended Vulkan’s immortal life, remained impaled in his heart as a grim reminder of his mortal death.

  Ceremonial chains wrapped around Vulkan’s arms and legs, torso and neck. Four strands trailed from the body, fed through thick iron links bolted into the igneous rock at the four cardinal points. Promethean creed held these chains would bind the warrior’s spirit to his body, so both would return to the flame together and be given back unto the earth as one.

  Head bowed in solemnity, Nomus Rhy’tan stood before the bier. At his raised fist, the drumming and the chiming of anvils ceased.

  For a few moments, there was just the rumbling of the mountain and the low moan of the wind. Then Rhy’tan began to speak. He used the old tongue, the language of the ancient tribes, as he appealed to the mountain and the earth to accept their adopted son and return him to Nocturne.

  ‘In ash, shall he be delivered,’ uttered Rhy’tan, ‘his flame undim
inished. We who stand on the precipice of destruction, bear witness to his passage.’

  Slowly, the chains began to unfurl as legionaries around the caldera took up their weight.

  A cadre of Firedrakes, two at the feet and two at the shoulders, heaved Vulkan up from his bier of stone and held him aloft until the chains had been pulled taut enough to support his body.

  ‘Lord of Drakes, saviour of Nocturne, glorious son of the Emperor of Mankind, Vulkan, we commit you to fire.’

  Rhy’tan spoke the words and the Firedrakes released Vulkan’s body as it was slowly drawn out into the heart of the caldera.

  Smoke billowed up from the maw of the mountain, wreathing his armoured form where it lay suspended by the great chains. Gradually, inexorably, Vulkan was lowered into the deep pit.

  Captured flame reflected in his polished war-plate, which had begun to blacken with the heat.

  ‘In the heart of the mountain you shall burn eternal, a beacon for those who remain, a reminder of your teachings and wisdom.’

  As the links fed through their rings of iron, the body descended until it was lost from sight and its weight tugging on the chains was the only evidence of its continued existence.

  ‘Unto the anvil, oh Lord of Drakes! Our father and primarch!’

  Rhy’tan reached down to thrust his hand in the burning ash at his feet.

  All except the chain-bearers did the same, before daubing the hot ash across their faces in the sigil of resurrection. It did not mean a literal revivification but rather symbolised a rebirth in kind or spirit.

  As the burning ash seared their flesh, the Salamanders bellowed Vulkan’s name so the earth would remember it and heed them if they ever had cause to invoke it.

  Pulling the obsidian hammer from his back, Rhy’tan struck the bier and split it in half.

  The chain-bearers let go and Vulkan plummeted into the mouth of the volcano. The fire took him, and it was done.

  Sixty-Seven

  Circle of Fire

  Vulkan had not risen.

  After nine days, he had not returned. He remained as ash, at one with the earth. Nocturne mourned, its mountains quiescent, its deserts and ash plains silent but for the susurration of the wind. Nothing stirred, no rock or scrap of earth. The sun rose and fell, the great beasts of the deep slumbered.