by Nick Kyme
Tigurius was glowing. A tumult of lightning coursed across the sigils inscribed onto his armour, illuminating their designs, and fed into the force rod. The eye sockets within the skull at its tip were bleeding power ferociously. Arcane instruments – keys, chains, scrolls, all of the Master Librarian’s esoteric panoply – rose up with the quickening energies infusing him. It was as if they were partly magnetised and lifted in response to the sudden polarisation.
He lifted. Tigurius levitated off the ground, tiny thunderbolts striking the earth below his feet and leaving burn scars in their wake. A series of runic sigils lit up across the hard features of his face, unseen by the naked eye but visible with the tapping of his power.
‘I am a servant of the Chapter Librarius. My body is a conduit. My will is dire and filled with the fire of retribution!’
A split-second of silence persisted where all was still and time itself simply ceased. It broke loose the instant the storm was released like a pent-up current rushing through an opened flood gate. Lightning pulsed outwards in a wave, ripping into the artillery, turning their living metal into slag and destroying them utterly. It cooked off the rest of the explosives placed by the Ultramarines and jets of fire leapt from the ground edged with a viridian lustre.
It burned the necrons too, immolating those close enough to the nexus of the storm, banishing wraiths who vanished like frost before the winter sun.
The light died as quickly as it had manifested. Tigurius slumped to his knees, his strength all but spent.
Scipio scrambled up the ridge. The Librarian waved him off.
‘I am alive.’ But he was also clearly weak. Tigurius’s eyes grew penetrating. ‘The veil is lifted. I can see.’
Ultramarines were emerging through the ice-fog. Brakkius and Garrik, the latter carrying his missile launcher at ease. Largo was just behind him. He carried something too, across both arms, but he was obscured by the others and Scipio didn’t see what it was. He was more concerned with Tigurius.
‘My lord?’
‘The veil is lifted,’ the Librarian repeated. His eyes were glassy, trance-like, ‘and the future unfolds, like a diamond with all possible roads laid out in its facets.’
Scipio came close, put a hand gently on Tigurius’s shoulder. ‘My lord,’ he whispered, beseeching knowledge.
‘A hero will fall, struck down by a fatal blade,’ he breathed. ‘Futures kaleidoscope, one tumbling into another, fragmenting and resolving again. The images shatter but this is immutable. In all the facets, it is the same.’
‘Who will fall, my lord? Whose protection must we look to?’ The others had gathered around him, all barring Largo, drawn by Scipio’s urgency.
Tigurius’s eyes became clear. He seized Scipio’s wrist in a fearsome grip. ‘It is Sicarius!’
Something cold filled Scipio’s chest and made his movements leaden. Prescience was the Master Librarian’s greatest psychic talent. He was seldom, if ever, wrong.
Sicarius will fall. The words inside Scipio’s mind didn’t seem real. He shook off Tigurius’s hand, allowing the Librarian to slump, and turned sharply. ‘Are we close enough to contact Kellenport?’ he asked Brakkius.
‘Not while we’re in the mountains.’
Scipio looked down at Tigurius. There’d be no psychic communion either.
The comm-feed crackled in Scipio’s ear. It was Octavian. ‘Last of the charges primed. What is happening, brother?’
‘Full evacuation from Thanatos Hills, effective immediately,’ he replied.
‘Are we under attack?’ asked Vandar across the feed.
‘Negative, but dire news has reached us. Captain Sicarius is in peril.’
Scipio was on his feet. ‘Help him,’ he said, and rushed past Brakkius and Garrik as they moved to assist Tigurius.
Cator was up and held out his hand. He looked saddened. ‘Wait–’
‘There is no time, brother.’ Scipio was about to dismiss him when he caught sight of Largo again. This time he saw the Ultramarine carried a body, a still and inert body.
A second spike of cold jabbed into Scipio. This time it was soured by guilt.
‘What?’
Largo bowed his head, looking down on the recumbent form he cradled. ‘Most of the guerrillas are dead. The humans simply weren’t made for this fight.’
It was a woman in his arms, a cold and lifeless woman.
The necron elites were tough, but Praxor’s blade would not be denied. His power sword hummed as it cut through the thickened carapace of one, finding the crucial systems that animated it. He plunged the crackling blade deep, until hilt met the simulacrum of metallic bone, and the creature phased out. His Shieldbearers were fighting hard too. Close-range bolter bursts flashed in the encroaching night. A stream of liquid promethium lit a blazing conflagration in the enemy ranks. They moved together, with Sicarius and his Lions as their inspiration.
Despite the dark cloak drawn over his thoughts, Praxor felt uplifted and galvanised by his lord’s presence. Before such glory, death would be a lauded thing destined for the annals of eternity. From his advanced position and proximity, Praxor had a good view of his captain.
Sicarius was imperious as he killed. The Tempest Blade flashed like a lightning bolt captured in his fist, unleashed time and again in a storm of righteous anger. It was easy to see why so many followed him, why he was spoken of in the same breath as Agemman and even Lord Calgar. He was ambition and arrogance, he was skill and courage personified, he was guile and reckless bravura. He was Ultramar.
Daceus and Gaius Prabian went before him, hewing a route through the necrons in order that Sicarius find his enemy, the one who led the mechanoids. Agrippen applied a similar fervour to his efforts; smashed necron bodies erupted with every swing of the Dreadnought’s power fist, phasing out in mid-air before they could land. At such close quarters, he eschewed his plasma cannon and instead utilised the heavy flamer mounted to his armature. It scorched a ruddy line across the silvered necron hordes, burning their armour black. One fell beneath his foot and he crushed it.
‘For Macragge and the Lords of Ultramar!’
Overhead, Praxor caught the flaming contrails of Ixion and Strabo as they duelled with the flying necron gun-platforms. One of the Assault Marines fell like a downed comet, wreathed with emerald fire, his armour flaking away before he crashed out of sight into the melee below.
Elsewhere, the Devastators at the back of the line were cutting furrows into the enemy.
Sergeant Atavian punched the air in triumph as his lascannons tore an arachnid construct in half. Bursts from the other heavies scattered the smaller beetle-like creatures, melting their bodies with intense microwaves or engulfing them in bright plasma.
Everywhere the Ultramarines pushed and fought like the Legion warriors of old, those who had trod the same earth as Guilliman. But despite their heroics, more and more necrons were spilling through the sundered defensive wall and into Xiphos. Only one thing would break the deadlock and Praxor saw it.
It stood taller than the others, wreathed in archaic vestments that hinted at a royal heritage. The necron overlord’s gilded metal body shimmered, half-silvered by the moon, its ochroid nature only revealed in the flash of nearby weapons fire. Encircling its skull-like visage was a crown, a red gemstone in the centre. A blue pectoral hung around its neck and torcs banded its arms. Clenched in its skeletal fist was a rippling pole-arm, glaive-edged and wrought with alien iconography. As its gaze alighted on Sicarius, the overlord’s eyes flared.
‘I am the Undying, I am doom incarnate…’
Sicarius holstered his plasma pistol as he faced down the overlord. He wanted to be on even terms with the monster. It was a moment long coming, but now arrived he was ready.
‘We are the slayers of kings,’ he spat, the words grating through his vox-grille. A crackle of energy coursed up the length of t
he Tempest Blade.
He would wreak such carnage against this thing.
Sicarius advanced, signalling his Lions to stay back. For a moment he thought he might have to kill the overlord’s honour guard too but the Undying ordered them aside.
It was strangely martial, even ritualised.
Sicarius struck the first blow. Chopping with the bluntness of a broadsword, he cut into the overlord’s arm. The Undying was fractionally slow to defend itself and a narrow gouge was scraped across its pristine metal. Split torcs cascaded like a fountain of unlocked treasure. A modulated cry was torn from the necron’s rictus mouth but its face betrayed no emotion.
The glaive swept out in a wide arc, preventing the Ultramarine’s follow-up. He parried, hot sparks dancing off the clashing blades before the combatants parted.
Sicarius came again, aiming a thrust for the necron’s midriff which was turned aside by glaive’s long haft. A punch dented the captain’s battle-helm and he staggered, before firming up his stance and rolling away a blow heading for his gorget.
He slashed downwards, cutting a jagged furrow in the necron’s torso. The glaive’s haft smashed against his pauldron before he could properly defend, numbing his shoulder. Sicarius backed up again but the monster would not relent.
The Undying was slow, ponderous even, but tough. Every blow was like being hit by a tank. Sicarius went in again, unleashing a hail of blows against the necron’s defences. The monster parried some, took others against its near-impervious body, before replying with a lightning-fast riposte that cut into Sicarius’s plastron.
As the captain cried out, Praxor was filled with a terrible sense of foreboding. He moved towards the duel, as did the Lions, but a warning glance from Sicarius held the veterans at bay.
The necron overlord was gathering momentum. The Undying whirled its glaive in a circular arc, spinning it end-over-end. With a viper’s speed, it snapped out, clipping Sicarius’s shoulder guard. He leapt forwards, forging the extra impetus into a double-handed blow that bit into the necron’s forearm. Still, the monster came on undaunted. Its cries of pain had turned to laughter.
Enraged, Sicarius threw himself at the Undying, hacking and cleaving with the Tempest Blade like it was an extension of his inner anger. He fought the Undying back a step and felt the tide turning…
…until a flash of energy from the necron’s open palm overloaded his retinal lenses and sent Sicarius reeling. Light, hot and emerald-tinged, filled the captain’s world. He backed off, blinded, tearing at the seals connecting his battle-helm to the rest of his armour, and ripped the headgear loose. Blinking away the after-flare, Sicarius had time to parry a blurred attack. The overhead blow pranged hard against his sword, forcing him to one knee.
Vision still adjusting, he tore the plasma pistol from its holster and snapped off a quick blast. It struck the Undying beneath the chin, forcing the necron’s head upwards and burning off part of its jaw. Staggering back from the kinetic impact, the overlord leavened the press of its glaive and Sicarius stood.
This was it.
He was about to ram the Tempest Blade into the Undying’s fleshless skull when something slammed into his side, stopping him.
Agony flared like a thousand burning needles in the captain’s flank. As Sicarius looked down, disbelieving, at the glaive embedded there he felt the world grow cold. A sense of weightlessness overcame him and he realised he was being lifted off his feet. The nerves in his fingers failed him and the Tempest Blade slipped free, clattering on the ground below beside his discarded battle-helm. Blood tanged his mouth, slipped over his swollen tongue like copper filings. He spat a gobbet and it stained the Undying’s gilded carapace.
As the war-scythe was driven deeper, the genebred champion gave up a cry of pain. Emotionless, the Undying looked on.
‘I am doom,’ he rasped as the shouts of others clawed for his attention. More cobalt-armoured warriors were coming for him.
Shucked desultorily off the glaive like a piece of offal, Sicarius crashed earthwards and lay still. Immediately, the Lions surrounded him just as the necron overlord’s honour guard closed too.
‘No!’ The word fell clipped and defiant from Praxor’s lips. He drove the Shieldbearers hard into the necron elites, splitting them apart so he could reach the side of his lord. It was to no avail. He lost Sicarius amidst the crowd of bodies, the image of a fallen sword next to a captain’s helm imprinted onto his mind.
He saw the banner, upheld defiantly by Vandius. Brother Malican was by his side. Daceus and Gaius Prabian led the line. They struck down two of the honour guard, exchanging a few blows before dispatching them. Stalwart as statues, they stood over Sicarius’s body and felled anything that came close. Venatio knelt behind them, working his ministrations. In Praxor’s heart, he knew it was too late. Sicarius was dead.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
By the time the Ultramarines reached the edge of the Thanatos Hills and left the mountains for good, Tigurius was coming back around. Strengthened by the force of his will, he stood straighter and was able to walk unaided, albeit by leaning on his staff.
Evacuation from the mountains had been conducted in silence. Led by Scipio and his Thunderbolts, the Ultramarines were driven by a frustrating sense of urgency. Their captain was likely in very real danger but until communication was restored they were powerless to do anything.
‘Check again,’ said Scipio as the icy fells gave way to a stretch of flat tundra. Perpetual blizzards roamed this part of Damnos, kicked up in squalls that moved from region to region on the arctic winds. Weather was still fouling the connection to their distant brothers.
Brakkius shook his head.
They marched on. Scipio spared a glance for Jynn. She was being carried on a makeshift stretcher by two of the surviving guerrilla fighters. The rest were dead, left on the plateau where the earth and rock would bury them. Scipio checked the distance from the plateau on his retinal display. A few more kilometres and they could detonate the charges that would obliterate the artillery station.
His thoughts went back to Jynn. He’d left her, abandoned her to this fate. It was the right thing to do, Tigurius was in danger. But he couldn’t shake the guilt that she and her troops should never have been there. Scipio was reckless and arrogant, believing they could take the necrons by surprise, sweep in and destroy the guns without casualty. He gave no regard to the potential loss of human life. It made him think of the earlier attack on the outpost and the death of Ortus. Brother Renatus, too, had lost his life on account of injuries suffered during that ill-fated assault. Again, Scipio’s lack of temperance had done this.
Iulus’s words, spoken long ago on the assembly deck of the Valin’s Revenge, came back to him.
‘You are becoming like him.’
He was right. Orad’s death had changed Scipio, although he was only now realising it.
He hoped that Jynn would live.
The comm-feed in his battle-helm crackled. Brakkius had made contact with the others.
Agrippen barged through the silver horde. Scattering the last of the necron immortals in his way, he descended on the honour guard. One he crushed in his fist; the other he burned, pressing the flamer so close it scorched his armature and stripped away the paint.
The necron overlord glared up at the Dreadnought, a hellish fire ignited in its eyes. Sicarius had wounded
it – the Undying’s face was caught in the flux of self-repair. Agrippen cared not. He smashed his power fist down upon it brutally, crushing the gilded overlord into ruin.
The destruction of their lord sent a massive shockwave rippling throughout the necron ranks. As one they began to fall back. The Dreadnought was not to be denied, though, and tore apart the mechanoids as they fled.
Assuming command, he drove the Ultramarines forwards. Only the Lions remained, surrounding their fallen captain protectively.
&nb
sp; They harried the necrons across the rubble and out into the wastes. In disarray, the automatons were easy prey. During the retreat, the warriors of Sicarius exacted their vengeance in a tally of enemies that scoured the earth and cleansed the area around Kellenport completely.
Iulus heard a cheer resound behind him as all the men of Damnos witnessed the necrons’ defeat. Like his battle-brothers, he was swept up in the moment. When he saw the Lions of Macragge arrayed around the slumped figure of his captain in a protective cordon his exultant mood ebbed. It was replaced by vengeance and the desire to vanquish the enemy utterly.
Stationed in the rear line of the army, alongside the Devastators, Iulus pushed his Immortals forwards. He caught Sergeant Atavian’s eye.
‘Sicarius has fallen.’
Like Iulus, Atavian gave nothing away. ‘Is he dead?’
‘They watch over him like pallbearers.’
The grating rasp of Chaplain Trajan interjected. ‘Rites will be spoken if he is slain. Now we must let our bolters and blades describe our litanies of hatred.’
He led them into the fleeing masses, crozius swinging. Iulus followed a little way behind. Atavian’s advance was slower still with the heavy guns.
A gauntlet reached out and snatched Iulus’s arm. He turned about to strike, believing a destroyed mechanoid had self-repaired, but it was Praxor. He wasn’t wearing his battle-helm and his eyes were wide.
Iulus said, ‘Brother?’
‘He is dead. I saw him fall with my own eyes. Captain Sicarius is slain.’
Iulus’s expression went from grief to resolution. ‘Then we avenge him.’
For over an hour the Ultramarines pursued the retreating necrons, all the way to the far border of Arcona City. Thousands were destroyed in the rout, the mechanoids unable to mount a defence or any kind of useful tactic that might have spared their losses. Without their overlord they were less than automatons, little more than directionless drones. Even the elites appeared locked onto a single course of action – full-scale retreat.