Fear to Tread

by James Swallow

  Thick smoke that ran black and crimson engulfed the battle zone, cutting visibility down to almost nothing; and yet at odd moments the clouds would part as if they were part of a staged performance, if only to show the legionaries the towers of the great temple of bones looming large in the distance. The inertial mag-compass display in Cassiel’s helmet was constantly shifting, making it hard to find a heading. In annoyance, he had torn it off and thrust it into the hands of Kaide, the Techmarine, demanding he repair it. Kaide insisted the helm was working perfectly.

  Leyteo dared to peer over their cover and snipe off a trio of rounds at a black dog-beast that came toward them barking and snarling. It died in a mess of innards, and Cassiel swore that he could see a twinkling mist dissipate from its cooling corpse.

  The sergeant rested against the speeder wreck, his heavy backpack pressed to the steaming metal. He checked his ammunition and scowled. It was enough for now, but he had no idea of how long it would be before resupply. Cassiel considered picking up a weapon dropped by one of the cannon-fodder zealots, but the gun was for human hands, and it would be a like a toy to a legionary; that, and the fact that the grip was coated in some kind of perfumed slime that seemed to exude from the weapon itself. He glanced around at the dozen or so other Blood Angels who held their places around the wreckage. All were sullen and withdrawn, offering nothing.

  A cold, steady drumbeat of dread was working its way through Cassiel’s thoughts, and he could not stem it. He had seen the great winged creature, the Bloodthirster, sweep across the face of the suns as it passed over them, diving back toward the bone cathedral. The shadow it cast was not just the absence of light, but an eclipse of sense and reason. In the moment he had fallen under its darkness, the veteran had never felt so alone, so isolated from his battle-brothers. For a legionary it was a little-death with a horror all of its own.

  Under it all, the echo of the shock had not faded. Cassiel had not spoken of it to Kaide or Leyteo, at first because they were knee-deep in killers but later because he had no words to express it. The sergeant didn’t need to ask if they had felt it too – one look into their eyes and he saw the mirror of his own hollow gaze. A great, baleful firestorm had burned briefly away in the heart of the fighting, and Cassiel had heard death-screams in the singing of the blood in his ears. He did not know what it meant.

  Footsteps drew them all to their guns as a battered youth in scout armour staggered out of the smog and into the midst of the group. His gun was clogged with blood and viscera where it had been used like a club, and there were deep claw-cuts across his face and neck, wounds that did not seem to be clotting. The scout bore the sigil of the 72nd Company, barely visible through the impact dents on his chest plate.

  ‘Ho, brother,’ said Leyteo. ‘Where is your squad?’

  The scout ignored the question. ‘He’s dead,’ said the youth. ‘It killed him. I saw it.’

  ‘Who?’ Kaide asked, but Cassiel’s throat tightened. He instinctively knew what the youth meant.

  ‘No,’ snapped the sergeant. The shadow was falling over him again. ‘No! The Angel lives! He cannot be killed!’ Cassiel grabbed the scout by the gorget and pulled him off-balance. ‘You are mistaken!’ he bellowed. ‘Say it!’

  ‘No,’ came the reply. The scout offered no resistance, and that made Cassiel’s fury burn even hotter. In that moment he felt his control slip away and he readied his fist to strike the youth with a blow that would crush his skull. ‘No,’ he repeated.

  ‘Stay your hand!’ The command was a rough shout, and a figure in black came forward through the mist, brandishing the sparking rod of a crozius. Legionaries stood back as he approached, and Warden Annellus’s scowling helm surveyed them all with grim intent. Cassiel released his grip, but his fists went tight with unspent hatred.

  ‘Hold, brothers,’ Annellus insisted, casting around. ‘Our master lives. I know this for fact.’

  ‘How can you?’ demanded Kaide. ‘The vox is contaminated by enemy signals and subterfuge. There has been no word–’

  ‘I know here!’ The Warden slammed his fist against his chest. ‘You all felt the…’ He paused, struggling to find the word, ‘…the darkness pass, didn’t you? And even now, the echo of it claws in our minds.’

  Cassiel nodded. He couldn’t deny it. There was a malaise out here, working on all of them. Silent and unseen, stoking their rage with every passing moment.

  ‘We have to get away from this place,’ muttered the scout.

  ‘No,’ said Annellus, removing his helmet so he could look them in the eyes. ‘There is nowhere we can go that this will not touch us. If we falter or lose focus, the enemy will use it against us.’ His eyes flashed. ‘So pity their mistake, my brothers. They took the worlds of weakened men by coward’s subterfuge. They fail to understand that now it is the IX Legion they face instead.’ The Warden raised the crozius. ‘They seek to enrage us? They have done so. But it will be these monsters that pay the price for daring to unchain our hate!’

  A roar of approval erupted from Cassiel’s lips, and the echo of it came from all the legionaries about him.

  It served to mask the doubts, for the moment, at least.

  The wind moaned through the shattered armourglass of the command deck’s portals, carrying with it the skirl of gunfire and other, less identifiable sounds from the distant battle. Captain Raldoron held the wireless vox-augur to his ear, listening to the device as it scanned back and forth across the tactical communications channels, struggling to find something to lock on to. Every signal was the same – a wash of bubbling static that at first seemed random, but after a moment’s scrutiny became a pattern like mocking laughter or atonal hymns.

  Raldoron’s patience snapped and he spun about, hurling the device across the bridge with such force that it exploded into fragments against the far bulkhead. The mute servitors working at makeshift repairs to the command consoles paid no heed to the captain’s moment of unexpected fury, but there was no mistaking the judgement in the eyes of Azkaellon, who had chosen that moment to enter the chamber.

  The First Captain glared at the Guard Commander, daring him to make comment, but Azkaellon seemed only weary. The expression seemed out of place on the warrior’s hawkish face, and it told Raldoron all he needed to know about the primarch’s current state.

  ‘The Legion is in disarray,’ he said, after a moment. ‘The battle in orbit fares little better than the melee on the wastes. Signals are erratic and garbled. Entire companies are out of contact or else ignoring direct orders to disengage and fall back.’

  ‘I cannot blame them,’ Azkaellon said quietly.

  Raldoron’s eyes narrowed. ‘This is not who we are. There are reports of legionaries killing everything in their path, fighting without heed or direction. It is wrong! The Blood Angels are not Russ’s dogs or Angron’s feral savages!’

  ‘No,’ said the Sanguinary Guard, his hard tone returning. ‘We are worse than them, for we hide it beneath our noble guise. We keep our fury chained. Small wonder then, that it burns brighter when finally given release.’

  The captain strode angrily across the command deck, shaking his head. ‘You excuse this?’ He jabbed his finger toward the broken windows and the wasteland beyond. ‘The enemy wounds us and so we lose control in a heartbeat? I say no!’ He drew close to Azkaellon, his words rising into a shout, his fists clenching. ‘Is that the Angel’s way, brother? Is that what he would want from his sons?’

  ‘Look to yourself,’ he shot back. ‘We all feel the wrath, every son without question.’

  Raldoron’s rising anger robbed him of words and he turned away with a hissing snarl. The captain smacked his armoured fist into his palm, grinding ceramite against ceramite.

  Azkaellon fixed him with his cold, steely gaze. ‘We must decide now how we shall proceed, you and I. With Lord Sanguinius laid low and the Council of Angels scattered, it falls to us to take joint command of the Legion.’

  The First Captain was stopped dead by the
Guard Commander’s statement. He was right, of course. But still it felt like disloyalty to say it aloud. ‘Very well,’ he said, biting out the reply.

  ‘The primarch is the Legion is the primarch,’ said Azkaellon, repeating the words that were laser-etched in High Gothic about the neck-ring of his golden armour. ‘His life must be preserved over all else. We must remove him from the malign influence of this foul place, fight our way free of the Signus Cluster.’

  ‘You want to run?’ Raldoron could not keep a sneer from his words. ‘This ship cannot lift. The Techmarines in the engine halls have only just managed to place the reactor core in quietus. You would have us leave the flagship behind for the enemy to pick clean?’

  ‘Evacuate the primarch to another vessel,’ Azkaellon went on. ‘Unshackle the core. The Red Tear’s death was not prevented, only postponed.’

  ‘And what of the legionaries left behind?’ snarled Raldoron. ‘There are not enough auxiliary craft to take them all, even if we could pull them back here!’ He prodded the Guard Commander in the chest. ‘You callous bastard! You would sacrifice our own?’

  Azkaellon met his anger with cold defiance. ‘There is much I would do for the life of Sanguinius. I deem you or I, or any brother who wears the crimson, expendable, if it means the Angel lives on! And I defy you to find me one warrior among the Legion who would not willingly cut their own throat to save him!’

  ‘I won’t allow it!’ Without conscious thought, the First Captain’s hand fell to the brass hilt of the power sword at his hip.

  ‘That choice has never belonged to any of us.’

  Raldoron shook his head, anger building anew. ‘The Angel gave his orders. It is our duty to fulfil them or to die in the attempt. Signus must be purged! His will be done!’ The sword sang as a measure of its length emerged from its sheath, and by reflex Azkaellon reached up to draw the glaive encarmine from his back-scabbard.

  The two warriors froze, their raw fury straining for liberation, blades singing as they drifted toward deadly release.

  Raldoron experienced a flash of black, abyssal dread – and he unclenched his hand, letting the sword drop back into place. Azkaellon warily did the same, and they stood glaring at one another, slowly reeling in their ire.

  At length, the Guard Commander spoke. ‘Whatever sorcery happened out there, whatever arcane power has been employed, it has touched us all, those proximate and those not. A fire has been kindled, Raldoron. It may consume us.’

  ‘How?’ He asked. ‘How could they know?’

  Neither of them needed to speak of the flaw; both had been there on the day long ago that Sanguinius had brought them to secret counsel, where he had revealed the sorrow that haunted him. The dark potentiality of a red thirst buried in each and every one of them, now dragged to the surface by… what? Magick and witchcraft?

  ‘If we cannot escape this place, we will succumb.’ Azkaellon frowned. ‘Look at us, brother. Fury is eating at us from within. It is only a matter of time before we become no better than the berserkers we dispatched in battle. We will fall into the company of death.’

  Raldoron closed his eyes, and saw armour painted over with ink-black.

  When he opened them again, a third figure was standing at the broken hatchway, clad in heavy robes.

  Before either of them could speak, he reached up and pulled back the hood over his head. ‘First Captain. Guard Commander. I would speak.’

  ‘You are Kano. The once-psyker.’ Azkaellon gave him a grave look. ‘How long have you been listening to our words?’

  ‘Long enough.’

  ‘What do you want?’ snapped Raldoron, distrust evident in his eyes. ‘This is no time for distractions.’

  ‘A number of my brothers have gathered,’ said Kano. He saw the two warriors share a look, both of them immediately understanding that he meant more by that word than just his fellow Blood Angels. ‘Some from the battle, some down from orbit.’

  Azkaellon eyed him. ‘You summoned them?’

  Kano shook his head. ‘We came because we knew we were needed.’

  ‘Too late,’ Raldoron said bitterly.

  ‘No,’ said Kano. ‘Not yet.’ He looked from one warrior to the other. ‘Azkaellon speaks the truth. A shadow falls across every legionary whose heart is Blood Angel, and that darkness has a source. I have seen it.’

  ‘By witch-sight?’ The captain challenged him to answer.

  ‘Does it matter, lord?’ Before Raldoron could reply, he pushed on. Kano put aside all doubts in his mind, concentrating on what he knew to be true, what he believed was right. Nothing else mattered now. Kano knew that with cold clarity. If there was such a thing as fate, then his would turn on the next words he spoke. ‘The temple of bones holds the heart of the daemon’s power in this world. If it can be found, it can be destroyed. The Legion will be freed from its own fury.’

  The First Captain glanced towards the ruined oval portal. ‘A battleground of madness lies between us and that objective. An army of monsters from the soul of all nightmares and our brothers caught upon it.’

  ‘It would be a crossing through hell, aye,’ said Kano.

  Azkaellon studied him coldly. ‘And what of the Angel? What have you seen for him?’

  ‘I can revive him.’ Kano said the words aloud for the first time, and he knew in his hearts that is was no vain hope, no idle boast. ‘We can revive him.’

  ‘The psykers…’ Raldoron was grim-faced. ‘If Sanguinius was felled by the power of the warp, then by the same he could awaken.’

  Kano nodded, fully aware of the door he was about to open – not just for himself, but his entire Legion. ‘These daemons are the spawn of the immaterium, and only by like powers can their influence be broken.’

  ‘That’s not all that will be broken,’ grated Azkaellon. ‘What of the Nikaea Edict? The command of the Emperor of Mankind? Are we to go against him, and the rule of Terra? It will make us traitors!’

  Raldoron turned a solemn gaze upon his comrade. ‘Then so be it.’

  SIXTEEN

  Witch-minds

  Red Ghosts

  Threads

  ‘This will be dangerous,’ said Ecanus. ‘Some of us will die.’ He ran a hand over his bare scalp. His skin looked pallid in the sombre light of the medicae chamber.

  ‘And yet still we came.’ Brother Deon stood behind him, keeping to the shadows. Deon’s face was always hidden in the gloom of his hood, only one small sliver of his ruddy complexion visible to the rest of them.

  Kano found himself nodding. ‘None of us are ignorant of the price this will exact.’ He looked around the room at the seven other warriors who stood in a loose group, some in their battle armour, others in duty robes. They all shared a single trait: a look in their eyes that belied a deeper truth.

  We all saw the red angel, the angel of pain, Kano thought. And we all fear what it means.

  There was only one face missing, and the absence nagged at him. The Rune Priest Stiel was nowhere to be found. Kano was aware that Captain Redknife and his Space Wolves had gone out to join the advance on the Cathedral of the Mark, but that had been before the shock of the primarch’s fall. He had hoped his cousin from the VI Legion might stand with them in this act, but Kano had no idea if the dour Fenrisian was still alive.

  ‘We’re wasting time,’ said a rough, urgent voice. Novenus, the eldest of them, stood with his head bowed and his long, steel-coloured hair in an unkempt mess about his armoured shoulders. The old warrior’s armour was dusty and spattered with bloodstains that had yet to dry. He had walked in from the wastes with an empty bolter in his hand, leaving behind his brothers of the 57th Company to heed the unspoken call.

  Before him was Sanguinius.

  The primarch’s mighty frame, still armour-clad, lay across a cruciform operating stage under a battery of auspex arrays and illuminators. His wings, spread out beneath him, gave the impression of a great drift of snow holding him up, but the flawless white was marked with black scars of fire dam
age and the stark ruby of spilled blood.

  His repose was not the tranquil solemnity of the dead, but a darker sleep tormented by agonies that only the Angel could know. Sanguinius’s gallant aspect was acted upon by subtle tells of deep pain. His face was that of a dreamer snared by nightmares.

  Brother Salvator, a rail-thin and vigilant legionary from the 269th Company, stared at his master. The three long scars that went from his jawbone to his temple were livid. ‘I see this with my own eyes and I still cannot believe it.’ A few of the other warriors nodded in agreement. ‘How was this done, Kano? The Angel cannot fall! He is a titan, with strength to shrug off the blows of any foe!’

  It was Ecanus who answered. ‘This day Sanguinius does not suffer a wound to his flesh. He suffers the wounds to ours.’ He turned to Salvator. ‘Brother, our primarch is the soul of the Blood Angels. It has always been thus. We ride in the wake of his glory. But that path goes both ways. He feels our pain, as only a father could.’ He looked away. ‘And this is the result.’

  ‘The creature, Ka’Bandha…’ began Kano. ‘The blow it struck was nothing of this world. There was a power to it, a warp-taint.’

  Novenus nodded. ‘Aye, I saw the uncolour of that baleful fire in the sky.’

  ‘Five hundred battle-brothers dead, in the time it took to swing an axe blade.’ Kano let that sink in. ‘Captain Nakir and the sum of the bold 24th, all dead, and more with them. Sons from a dozen other companies. All murdered because they dared to come to their master’s aid.’

  ‘A whole company, gone. It was no happenstance,’ Ecanus added. He nodded toward the Angel. ‘This was a calculated act, to take him from the field and throw us into disarray.’ He shook his head. ‘The storm of anger that rages out there would not have gained such power so swiftly if Sanguinius stood with us.’

  ‘Then we must wake him,’ said Deon. ‘Bring him back to us.’

  Kano nodded and beckoned his brothers forward. One by one, they took up places in a ring around the primarch, each legionary taking a moment to prepare himself. It would be difficult at first; without their psychic hoods to regulate and channel their preternatural abilities, the gathering of former Librarians would need to call on the fullness of their strength of will to work together in meta-concert.