Warden of the Blade

by David Annandale

  The eye burned and burned, consumed by the holy inferno. Its matter pulled back into the recess it inhabited. The Grey Knights kept up their bolter fire, and the cleansing flame still poured from their hands. The purge struck deeper and deeper into the cathedral. The drain was enormous. Crowe felt how ephemeral his life was, how thin his existence in the currents of the vast forces of the cosmos. But he was also the conduit of great power, and he wielded it in the name of the Father of Mankind. He would give himself to incineration if that was what was asked of him.

  He was the willing sacrifice.

  His submission to duty gave him power. Free of doubt and temptation, he was the perfect vessel. Where he sensed his brothers’ psychic strength nearing exhaustion, he gave of himself. The wall of flame did not falter.

  Burning and burning and burning.

  The cathedral reared up. The towers reached for the sky, mindlessly pleading. There was no answer from its dark god. Perhaps the daemonic creature had been abandoned. Perhaps it was not heard. Perhaps its god could do nothing for its creature.

  The fire burned, and then it ended all at once. The light went out. Where the eye had been, there was a deep, circular abyss. Smoke poured from the blind void. The maws fell silent. The cathedral froze at the extremity of its lunge. Its animating force vanished. Hide became simple stone once more, stone held in a position it could not physically sustain.

  The cracking rumble of a rockslide warned the Grey Knights what was coming. ‘The abomination falls!’ Crowe called in warning and triumph.

  ‘And us with it!’ Sendrax answered, eager to ride out the monster’s death.

  The cathedral slumped forwards. The centre of the roof snapped in half. The towers, outstretched, collapsed like a petrified sky on the streets of Egeta. Buttresses crumbled as the front half of the cathedral slammed down. The impact broke the bones of its supports. The vacant ruin of the rose window jerked downwards, stopped, then began its last fall as the façade broke apart from the base upwards.

  Crowe saw a strange grace in the first seconds of the collapse. He rejoiced to witness the triumph of the Purifiers.

  Then he was falling through a dying mountain. He knew the fall would not kill him. There was too much duty left unfinished.

  Vendruhn woke to the rumble of the cathedral’s destruction. She dragged herself upright against the overturned, crushed wreckage of her Chimera. She wiped blood from her eyes and looked to the west. She saw the monster fall from supplication to ruin. Dropping shells lit the sky as they smashed into its stone corpse.

  ‘General?’

  She turned her head. The movement sent shooting pains down her neck and spine from the base of her skull. Her body felt like a mass of contusions. She could move, though. She was bleeding from a gash in her forehead, and something was stabbing into her left side, but she thought she could walk.

  Sergeant Barratz ran up to her. ‘General,’ he repeated, ‘we couldn’t find you. We feared…’

  ‘I’m all right, sergeant,’ she said. Her ears were ringing. She could barely hear herself. She wondered how long she had been unconscious. Too long, if the cathedral had made it across the river. She didn’t ask. Instead she said, ‘How do we stand?’

  ‘We lost half the armour,’ Barratz told her. ‘And at least a third of the infantry.’

  Bad, she thought. We are still in the fight, though.

  She took in her surroundings more clearly. Being thrown clear of the hatch had saved her life. Her crew had not been as fortunate. She grimaced, acknowledging their loss to herself, then moved on. There was no time for the luxury of mourning. Around low rubble heaps, soldiers were firing into the darkness. The remaining Chimeras were manoeuvring into formation in the most open area.

  ‘Enemy movement?’ Vendruhn asked Barratz.

  ‘Some. Not a great deal. Still less since the…’ He trailed off as he glanced in the direction of the cathedral. ‘Since it began to walk. Even less now.’

  Vendruhn distrusted the good news. The heretics and daemons had vanished in large numbers shortly before the cathedral had risen. There was a connection. That much was obvious. But where had they gone?

  ‘Do we have a working vox?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, general.’

  ‘Any word from the palace’

  ‘They are not under attack yet. The main threat is now down.’

  ‘So they’re sounding optimistic.’

  ‘They are.’

  She pointed to the nearest Chimera. ‘That is the new command vehicle. I want a vox-officer and the unit in it. We make for the parvis.’

  ‘General?’

  ‘I want to see where the enemy has gone.’ She needed more information before deciding her next move. The cathedral had fallen, so the Grey Knights had that sector of the conflict in hand. If the situation at the palace was calm, there was perhaps a chance to learn how best to press the advantage.

  And where did they all go?

  The journey up the hill was direct, following the straight-line path of the monster’s march of devastation. The militia’s progress was slowed by collapsed buildings, many still burning. Attacks were minimal. There did not appear to be any daemons left in the destroyed eastern sector. There were only heretics, and just scattered groups of those.

  Where are they?

  The column, bleeding, badly wounded but still proud, reached the parvis. Vendruhn called a halt at the edge of the foundations. She climbed down from the vehicle and approached the huge crater.

  In the days that followed, she would reflect with a stab of pain that she had already known what she was going to see.

  The pit was deep. The remnants of the cathedral’s support columns stood in it like broken teeth. Staircases spiralled in from nowhere, descending to rubble-strewn halls. Thousands of burned bodies lay in the ruins. They were mutilated in ways that went beyond being crushed. There were hints of patterns in the dispositions of the corpses. The arrangements hurt Vendruhn’s mind, and she instinctively averted her gaze before the meanings became clear.

  ‘Get back,’ she ordered the militia. ‘No one approaches this pit without my authorisation.’

  Being careful not to let the patterns seize her attention, she looked along the walls of the pit. She wished she did not know what she was looking for. But old memories of even older rumours had surfaced. She had no choice but to listen to them.

  She walked along the edge. At the western end of the pit, she found what she had feared. Tunnels ran from what had been the crypt, to judge from the smashed sarcophagi. They headed west, underground.

  The stories, forgotten since childhood, were true. There was a subterranean path, unused for many centuries, linking the cathedral to the palace.

  The ringing in Vendruhn’s ears grew worse. She felt a sudden pressure as if she were becoming deaf. Then she realised she was responding to silence. The artillery guns at the palace had gone quiet.

  She ran back to the Chimera, shouting for the vox.

  It was too late. The palace, too, had fallen silent.

  The cathedral fell.

  Otto had watched its approach, felt the beat of every ponderous lurch as a blow to his heart, to his hope, to his faith. He could not understand how such a thing could be. Its existence contradicted all the teachings he knew of the Imperial creed. If this should be, what was true?

  The cathedral had crossed the river. It had closed in on the palace’s hill. It had ignored the artillery. His orders had resulted in the destruction of his city to no purpose.

  And then the blue flame had come. High in the façade of the cathedral, purity had flared into life. And when the light faded, the monster fell. The cathedral collapsed, losing all recognisable form. It ended as a huge mass of rubble. It lost all terrifying meaning. The Imperial creed declared that this obscenity could not be, and so the lightning of truth brought it
low. The Emperor forbade the existence of the monster, and the monster died.

  Otto’s faith reasserted itself. He fought back tears of gratitude. He did not have the time to indulge in the luxury of weeping. He had a war to conduct.

  Waclav said, ‘What are your orders for the guns, Lord Governor?’

  There was no point in bombarding the corpse. ‘What reports do we have of other enemy activity?’ Otto asked.

  ‘A few isolated incidents on this side of the Rybas. We believe more have been seen on the east side, but contact with General Glas’ forces has been difficult. They have suffered heavy losses.’

  ‘Is…’ He almost said my daughter. He caught himself, and respected her office and his. ‘Is General Glas still living?’

  ‘We have no definite word.’

  Otto nodded. ‘As soon as you do, I want to know.’

  ‘Understood.’

  ‘As for the guns…’ He thought for a moment. ‘Resume interdiction fire aimed at the east embankment. We will stymie any attempts by the enemy to make the crossing.’ It was the same tactic that had run its course before, but he chose to believe the foe had been sufficiently weakened to make it effective once more.

  ‘As you will,’ Waclav said. His usual calm was returning to him. He seemed once again like a man sure of his ability to discharge his responsibilities and protect his Lord Governor.

  The background booming of the guns stopped.

  Otto frowned. ‘I gave no order…’ he began. Then he heard gunfire and screams coming down the corridors outside the throne room doors. The sounds of battle, and unholy songs.

  And there was a voice he knew. It was Rannoch’s. Only it was too loud, and strangely multiplied, as though a choir of Rannochs approached.

  ‘Otto!’ the Rannoch voice called and mocked. ‘Otto! Otto, Otto, Otto! We have business together! We are called upon to dance! Will you join me? Will you not? Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you, will you, will you see?’ As the voice drew nearer, it became less and less human. It was something that sounded like Rannoch only for its own amusement.

  Waclav paled. He turned with his squad to face the doors. They raised their lasrifles. Otto pulled his laspistol from its holster. He had not pulled the trigger in half a century. He dreaded the futility of doing so now.

  The doors crashed open. Abominations burst into the throne room. Beasts with horns and hooves smashed aside the tacticarium tables. They impaled Otto’s honour guard with scorpion tails. Lithe horrors that suggested the female form distorted by talons and pincers stalked forwards on either side of the thing that laughed with Rannoch’s voice. They pounced on more of the guards. The daemons set to work, and Otto shuddered at the screams of blood and joy that came from the troops. Waclav moaned as a daemon lashed him to the ground with a whip. The air was filled with an overpowering scent. Otto felt his knees weaken with terrified desire.

  The Rannoch-thing was the worst of all. It was the tallest of the daemons. It bent down to pass through the doorway, and when it straightened, it stepped over its minions as if they were beneath notice. It was thin, though its misshapen body rippled with corded muscle. It had four arms. Two ended in clawed hands. The third, on the left, was a huge pincer. The fourth was a bone spur as long as a spear, and edged like a sabre. The right hand kept opening and closing, grasping at air as if possessed by hunger. The torso of the daemon had mouths. They snapped their teeth and laughed, and all their voices were Rannoch’s. The mouth over the belly, in the curve of its lips and the lopsided superiority of its smile, horrified Otto with its familiarity. That mouth, he was sure, truly was the cardinal’s. The daemon’s head, atop its elongated neck, was narrow, and even in its monstrosity possessed an elegant silhouette that suggested artistry and pain. A serpentine tongue licked out, tasting the air with delight.

  Where the daemon walked, desire followed and gathered around its limbs in a mist.

  The daemon wore the mask. Otto could not tell if the jewelled relic was an ornament or now part of the daemon’s flesh. The sublime artefact still called his eye, lured his senses and broke him with nauseated awe.

  ‘Otto,’ said the daemon in the sonorous, sensuous, musical, Rannoch-not-Rannoch voice.

  ‘Otto! Otto! Otto!’ the mouths echoed in different timbres, but with the same intonation, and one voice – the voice which issued from the mouth that looked so familiar – truly was Rannoch’s, his words quivering in the fusion of pleasure and pain.

  ‘Look upon the wonders come to your world,’ said the daemon, spreading its arms.

  ‘Wonders! Wonders! Wonders!’ cried the mouths.

  ‘Rannoch…’ Otto whispered. Before the enormity of the cardinal’s crime, he could do no more than plead to a man who no longer existed. Something clunked on the floor beside him. His hand, cold yet prickling with anticipated sensation, had dropped his pistol.

  ‘Your cardinal was a useful fool,’ the daemon said. (‘Fool! Fool! Fool!’) ‘But he has served his purpose. So has his name.’ (‘Name! Name! Name!’) ‘Here is a new name. One you shall worship.’

  And all the mouths cried, ‘Mnay’salath! Mnay’salath! Mnay’salath!’ They shrieked the name in a perfection of agony.

  ‘And you,’ said Mnay’salath. (‘Otto! Otto! Otto!’) ‘You have a purpose to fulfil.’ It strode towards Otto and picked him up with its left hand. The pincer snapped and clicked beside his ear. Mnay’salath looked at its right hand, which opened and closed, opened and closed. ‘I am lacking,’ it hissed. (‘Seize! Seize! Seize!’) It carried Otto to the window. It held him up to look at the works of the burning city and the illusion of hope. ‘My prize is out there,’ Mnay’salath said. Its voice dropped lower, turning into an insinuating whisper. ‘You will help me claim it, won’t you?’

  Otto vowed to himself he would not. He would die before he betrayed Egeta. At the same time, he sensed there was nothing he could deny this horror. A claw scraped against the back of his neck, drawing blood, drawing shivers, the piercing jab suggestive of obscene secrets. The daemon knew Otto. It knew things about him he could not imagine being true.

  I will defy you, Otto thought. His will seemed so brittle and tiny. I will defy you.

  Mnay’salath laughed, and its mouths laughed, as if it heard his pathetic defiance and was pleased. It lifted Otto even higher. Its pincer smashed the glassteel with a single blow. The wind blew inside the tower, mixing smoke and ash with the daemonic musk. Mnay’salath stretched out its arms to the city. It dangled Otto over the huge drop to the roof of the keep.

  Mnay’salath shouted. Otto screamed at the sound, but he could not hear himself. The daemon’s voice was everything, a roar that reached across the entire city. It was the blast of immense, all-powerful desire. It was a command given power by final hunger.

  ‘Bring me the sword!’

  ‘Antwyr! Antwyr! Antwyr!’ shrieked the mouths in hysterical need.

  ‘Bring me the sword!’

  Chapter Eight

  CHAMPION

  Crowe kicked away the last of the rubble blocking his path just as the daemonic shout resounded across Egeta.

  ‘Bring me the sword!’

  He clambered out of the wreckage of the cathedral. Drake and Gorvenal had found their way out first. They moved to assist him. Crowe shook his head. He was drained from the energy he had used to kill the beast. He felt that effect far more than the physical damage he had sustained in the fall, and from the battering meted out by the massive blocks of broken stonework. He did not need help, though.

  He was less sure about Gavallan.

  The castellan had landed near him in the collapse. Crowe had led the way out, clearing the path. They had spoken little. Now Crowe turned back to the crude tunnel he had created. Gavallan emerged just as Sendrax crawled from the rubble a few yards away.

  ‘Bring me the sword!’

  Th
ere was a musical quality to the shout, as if it were the blast of an unholy fanfare.

  Antwyr responded with a renewed savagery of curses. Gavallan tensed, but did not stagger this time. He straightened and looked in the direction of the palace. As the rest of the Purifiers fought their way clear of the ruins, Gavallan said, ‘Brothers, our way forward is clear.’

  ‘The Black Blade is unhappy with that choice,’ said Crowe.

  ‘Good.’

  Gavallan sounded stronger than he had. Crowe was surprised, but grateful.

  ‘What are your orders, brother castellan?’ Sendrax asked. ‘Are we going to honour the daemon’s request?’

  ‘We are,’ said Gavallan. ‘Its summons gives us a target.’ His helm turned briefly to the cathedral. ‘We know what we seek is not in there.’

  ‘An aerial approach?’ Crowe suggested.

  ‘Yes,’ said Gavallan. He paused, looking up at the spire. ‘Knight of the Flame,’ he said to Crowe, ‘what can you see?’

  ‘Little from this distance, but the flow of the immaterium grows more turbulent in the direction of the tower.’

  Gavallan nodded, satisfied.

  The Grey Knights headed east from the cathedral ruins. The streets in the immediate vicinity were too blocked by debris for Berinon to land the Purgation’s Sword. They needed a more open area to board.

  There was movement in the openings of the manufactorum they passed. It was one of the few in the city. Almost all of the system’s industrial production was on Sandava III. The complex had become a refuge for civilians fleeing the destruction of the Administratum buildings. They gathered at the doorways and windows. They looked at the Grey Knights with desperation, and no longer with awe. Their faces were pale, pinched by the night.