'I beg to differ,' said Onyx. 'I can see his soul burning with the light of purpose.'
'Vaanes, shoot him!' shouted Uriel, twisting in Onyx's grip and closing his eyes as bolter shells filled the air around him with a deafening roar. He felt Onyx shudder as the bolts struck him. Amid the gunfire, he heard the warrior laugh, and cried out in pain as he felt Onyx's middle talon stab forwards to punch through his throat and embed itself the wall.
The talon was ripped free and he slid down the wall, blood pouring from his neck and armour in a scarlet wash before the Larraman cells were able to clot his blood and stem the wound. Uriel gasped, the breath rasping in his throat, and he realised his trachea had been completely severed. Uriel closed his eyes as his vision greyed and his body fought for oxygen, his chest hiking convulsively. He fought to stay focused, knowing that to slip into unconsciousness was to die, and shifted his breathing to the third lung grafted to his pulmonary system. His altered breathing pattern shut off the sphincter muscle that normally took in air and he gulped down a great breath as his enhanced physiology took over.
Onyx spun beyond the hail of shells, landing behind the Space Marines with an atavistic howl of bloodlust. His claws swelled to become monstrous golden swords and three Space Marines were hacked apart in as many blows. His face swelled and rippled, black horns curling from his temples and gleaming lines of augmetic body parts becoming visible within his form as the daemonic entity within Onyx took complete command of his body.
His eyes blazed and Uriel could see the beast he had become was eager to do them more harm, but before he could enact it, his entire body shuddered and the daemon-thing Onyx had become retreated back into his flesh, the golden swords writhing and sliding back into his hands.
Even as Uriel watched, Onyx's original form was restored before his eyes.
Onyx let out a long breath and dropped to one knee, but before any of the warrior band could take advantage of his momentary vulnerability, the undulating forms of the Exuviae roared like black tidal waves and bore down upon them. Uriel struggled to rise, but the bubbling, animated pollutants swept over him, pinning his arms and holding him fast within their grip.
Dull, mindless eyes ruptured from the toxin-flecked matter, blinking idiotically at him and he heard the repulsed cries of the surviving Space Marines as the Exuviae swallowed them in their stinking, foetid embrace.
With Onyx leading the way through the interior of Khalan-Ghol, the delirious architecture seemed to resolve itself in response to his very presence. Where the chaotic nature of its plan had led Uriel and his battle-brothers a merry dance through its shadow-haunted streets, it eased the path of the daemonic creature and his shambling, slithering following. The Exuviae roiled along the cobbled streets with a grotesque, rippling motion, bearing their immobile charges within their odious, fluid bodies.
Only Uriel, Pasanius, Vaanes, Seraphys, Leonid, Ellard and nine other Space Marines had survived to reach this far within the fortress, but Uriel knew that so long as he drew breath he could not forgo his death oath. The soot-stained thoroughfares of the fortress soon fell away to reveal their ultimate destination: the centre of the fortress and the great tower of iron.
Whether it had been a trick of perspective or the illusory power of Chaos, Uriel did not know, but he was shocked speechless by its sheer immensity. Its summit was lost to sight beyond the writhing purple clouds above and it was impossible to see the entirety of its width. Twisting, crooked towers sprouted from its sides, overhanging forges spewed thick toxins into the air, swooping winged things clustered around dark rookeries and evil lightning crackled from slitted windows. A high wall surrounded the base of the tower, its ramparts thick with Iron Warriors and gun turrets.
A huge gate of black iron with a tall, armoured barbican to either side defended the entrance to the tower and as Onyx led them towards it, the dread portal swung open with a scream of deathly anguish. The Exuviae carried them through the dark gate, and as they were borne along the passageway, Uriel saw scalding steam gusting from the spiked murder holes in the roof.
Emerging from the oppression of the gateway, Uriel gaped in dark wonderment as he saw that the tower did not sit upon the rock of the mountain at all, but was impossibly suspended over a giant void that mirrored the dead sky above on hundreds of immense chains. Each link was as thick as the columns that supported the great portico before the Temple of Correction and as they were carried towards a bridge, Uriel saw that the tower also plunged deep into the void for thousands of metres.
'Emperor protect us…' breathed Uriel.
'You waste your breath,' said Onyx. 'You think he has any power in this place?'
Uriel disdained to reply, unwilling to further bandy words with one touched by the fell powers of the immaterium. A long basalt slab spanned the void, its surface worn smooth by the passage of uncounted marching feet, leading to an enormous gateway that pierced the tower itself. As they crossed the bridge, Uriel saw that it was fashioned from some deathly material, hissing and spitting as though fresh from the forge. Its scale was colossal: entire regiments would be able to march through and the tallest of Titans could pass beneath it without fear.
Onyx led them towards the gate, a smaller, rivet-studded postern granting them access to the tower's echoing interior. Uriel felt the power of ages past within the tower and its ancient malice was a potent breath on the air.
'Khalan-Ghol,' said Onyx proudly. 'The power and majesty of a living god helped forge this fortress, shaping it into a form pleasing to him, unfettered by any of the laws of nature.'
'It is an abomination!' snarled Pasanius.
'No,' said the daemonic symbiote. 'It is the future.'
The interior of the tower was no less horrifying than its exterior - vast dusty halls of bronze statues, huge, sweating forges that spat sparks and orange rivers of metal. A parching, stifling heat infused the tower, black moisture dripping from the shadowed vaults of the ceiling. Uriel could hear distant screams and heavy hammer-blows far below, louder and more powerful than he had heard thus far on Medrengard.
Crawling shadows, perhaps more of the Exuviae, lurked in the high cloisters, though the most numerous inhabitants of the tower appeared to be figures swathed in black robes, walking with a wheezing mechanical gait.
Red augmetic eyes scanned them with interest as Onyx led his coterie of Exuviae deeper into the tower, clicking brass limbs grasping towards them with a hissing hunger. Warped cog symbols combined with the eight-pointed star of Chaos were burned into their robes and gurgling algorithmic voices clicked between them as they tended to vast, dusty machines whose purpose was lost on Uriel.
As they passed a hulking, bronze construction with pumping, greased pistons and an armature-mounted pict-slate, a huge, hissing monster stepped from the shadow of the great machine to bar their way.
Onyx stiffened as the black-robed creature shuffled painfully into a pool of light and Uriel felt a creeping horror scrape its way up his spine at the sight of it. It moved awkwardly on six, spider-like legs of riveted iron, its body braced within an oil-stained exo-skeleton at its cenue. Where its flesh was exposed, Uriel could see that it was withered and dead, a patchwork of sutures running along raised ridges of bone. Its head was heavy and hung low on its shoulders, brass rods piercing the width of its skull and scaffolded by a cage of brass bolted to its temples. Its hooded face was a loathsome, parchment-coloured skull, the lower half gleaming metal and flensed of skin, its eyes replaced with whirring mechanical optical feeds.
Myriad transparent tubes pierced its flesh, running in gurgling loops around its body and hissing valves released noxious gusts as its chest heaved with the effort of breath. It reached forward to lift Uriel with long, augmetic arms, bulky with scalpels, drills and blowtorches.
Onyx stepped in front of the creature, his claws unsheathing.
'No,' he said. 'These ones are for the master of Khalan-Ghol.'
The beast hissed in anger, its clawed hands snapping in frust
ration and its drill bits whirring dangerously close to Onyx's head. It reached down to push Onyx out of its way, but the black-armoured warrior refused to be moved.
'I said no,' he repeated. 'It may be that the Savage Morticians will have them in time, but that time is not now.'
The creature appeared to consider this for a moment, before its hideous skull face nodded and it retreated into the shadow of the machine once more.
Onyx watched it go and, while his attention was elsewhere, Uriel struggled within the stinking prison of the beast that bore him, Pasanius and Vaanes, but it was no use, they were held utterly immobile. At last, sure the Savage Mortician was not waiting in ambush, Onyx sheathed his claws and led the Exuviae bearing his prisoners onwards.
Uriel's frustration grew with every darkened hall they traversed and every impossibly angled staircase they climbed or descended, unable to move so much as a single muscle. The maddening sound of hammering grew louder the further they travelled and the same emerald light that permeated the city beyond the tower grew brighter as their journey led them from passages and chambers raised by the hands of men into a vast fiery cavern edged with great steam-venting pistons.
A gleaming silver bridge crossed a great chasm in the floor, through which rose banks of hot, sulphurous fumes and the taste of beaten metal. Beyond the bridge was a colossal wall of dark, green-veined stone pierced by a great, iron gate. Studded with jagged black spikes, the gate was flanked by two daemon-visaged Titans, their armoured plates scarred by millennia of war. Uriel saw with loathing that the rippling kill banners hanging from their weapons bore the damnable symbol of the Legio Mortis.
'Behold, the inner sanctum of the fortress of Khalan-Ghol! You are honoured indeed!' cried Onyx, leading them across the bridge spanning the chasm. As they drew near the gate, it unlocked with a reverberating boom that shook the dust from the leering gargoyles clustered around the chamber's roof, and the Titans reached around to open the spiked portal.
Onyx led them through the gateway and at last Uriel and his companions came face to face with the master of Khalan-Ghol.
The walls within the inner sanctum of the fortress were of a dressed black stone, threaded with gold and silver and glistening with moisture. A score of tall, arched windows pierced one wall and the dead light of the sky was reflected as milky lines on the floor.
Surrounded by two score Iron Warriors and seated on a throne of silvery white sat a scarred warrior with close-cropped black hair, clad in a dented and heavily battle-scarred suit of armour. His face was cruel, set in an expression of arch interest, a long, recently healed scar on his right temple. Behind him stood the giant Iron Warrior who had incapacitated Uriel with the writhing energy whip.
'Get rid of the Exuviae, Onyx,' said the warrior.
Onyx nodded and turned to face the slithering monsters, the silver lines on his face flaring brightly and a silver sheened hiss escaping his mouth. Uriel felt the solidity of the creatures become less constrictive and toppled to the floor as their form became sticky and liquid once more. Their substance retreated from the light on the floor, reverting to their sinuous shadow forms. Like whipped dogs, they slipped into the dark corners of the hall before sliding out of sight through the great gateway and back into the mordant darkness of the fortress.
Briefly Uriel considered reaching for his sword, but when he looked up, he stared into the barrels of some forty bolters, their plated sides carved with obscene sigils and decorated with the eight-pointed star of Chaos. The Iron Warriors divested them of their weapons and indicated that they should approach the warrior on the throne.
As they neared, Uriel saw that the warrior carried a huge black war-axe across his lap and recognised him as the Iron Warrior he had first fought on his ascent up the breach. His sword had come within centimetres of beheading this fiend.
'I know you,' said the warrior, recognising him also.
'You are Honsou?' said Uriel.
An Iron Warrior stepped in and hammered the butt of his weapon across the back of Uriel's skull. He dropped to one knee, the wound on the back of his head opening once more and fresh blood soaking his armour.
Honsou nodded. 'You know of me, but I do not know you. What are you called?'
'You will learn nothing from us by force,' said Uriel, rising to his feet and massaging the back of his head.
'It is a simple question,' said Honsou, rubbing his fingers across the scar on his temple. 'I would know the name of the warrior who drew my blood.'
'Very well. I am Uriel Ventris and these are my warriors.'
Honsou looked beyond Uriel. 'You keep strange company, Uriel Ventris - renegades, traitors and runaway slaves.'
Uriel did not reply, realising that Honsou believed him to be nothing more than a renegade himself. Without insignia or markings, there was nothing to indicate that he was still a warrior of the true Emperor of Mankind.
His mind raced as he tried to think of some way to exploit the traitor's mistake as Honsou continued: 'How is it you know of me? Did Toramino tell you?'
'Who?'
'Do not play the innocent with me,' cautioned Honsou. 'You'll find I have no patience for it. You know who Toramino is.'
Still Uriel did not reply and Honsou sighed. 'There is no point in trying to be noble, I will learn what I want to know. If not now, then the Savage Morticians will extract it from you soon enough. Trust me, you would do better to tell me what I want to know now than to suffer at their hands.'
'I learned of you from Toramino, yes.' Uriel said at last.
Honsou chuckled. 'See Zakayo, Toramino has sunk so low that he stoops to the employ of mercenaries. So much for his high ideals of purity, eh?'
'Indeed,' said Obax Zakayo, circling Honsou's throne and lifting Leonid and Ellard with the powerful, hissing claws that hunched over his shoulders. Both men struggled in his grip, but were powerless to resist the giant's strength.
'I told you that you would be beneath my blade again, slaves.'
'Put them down, Zakayo, their blood is not worth spilling here. Put them to work in the forges.'
Obax Zakayo nodded and dropped the two Guardsmen, but remained beside them, his desire to wreak bloody harm upon them plain.
'Why are you within the walls of my fortress, Ventris?' said Honsou.
'As you say, we are mercenaries,' replied Uriel.
'They had passed through the bedlam portals and were attempting to make for the inner keep when I found them,' said Onyx. 'I believe them to be assassins.'
'Is that it, Ventris? Are you an assassin?'
'I am but a simple soldier.'
'No, you are not,' stated Honsou, rising from his throne and walking towards Uriel with a relaxed, confident stride. 'A simple soldier would not have brought his warriors alive through the bedlam portals or penetrated this far into Khalan-Ghol.'
Honsou took hold of Uriel's chin, turning his head from side to side, and Uriel saw that the traitor's arm was a black metal augmetic, its surfaces smooth like an insect's carapace. Its touch felt loathsome on his skin.
'Why are you on Medrengard?' asked Honsou, looking into Uriel's eyes.
Uriel met Honsou's gaze and the two warriors stared at one another, each daring the other to break the contact first. Uriel was a warrior of the Emperor of Mankind and Honsou a traitor: one just over a century old, the other having bestrode battlefields thousands of years past. Though a gulf of time and faith separated them, Uriel saw a warrior spirit within Honsou and a core of bitterness that was unsettlingly familiar.
Whether his presence in the Eye of Terror had heightened his senses or he felt some form of dark kinship with the master of Khalan-Ghol, he didn't know, but he saw with horror that there was not so great a difference between them as he might have thought.
He saw the same drive to prove himself the equal of his peers, the same frustration at being denied his rightful place through the blindness of others. Part of him admired Honsou's single-mindedness at pursuing his goals.
&nbs
p; But for an accident of birth, might they have stood together on the battlefield as brothers? Might Uriel have fought in the Black Crusades or might Honsou have stood shoulder to shoulder with brother Space Marines in defence of Tarsis Ultra?
He saw the recognition and admiration in Honsou's face, seeing that he too had understood their shared heritage.
'We are on Medrengard to fight,' said Uriel simply.
'So I see,' nodded Honsou. 'You fought well before my walls. I take it I have you and your warriors to thank for destroying Berossus's troop elevators?'
'Aye,' said Vaanes proudly. 'I cut the cable.'
'Then it is certain you do not serve Berossus, perhaps only Toramino…' said Honsou with relish. 'In any case, you have done me a great service! Without reinforcements, Berossus was unable to carry the walls. But for you, Khalan-Ghol might now be in his damn fool hands.'
Honsou circled the warrior band of Space Marines, taking the measure of each of them in turn. He stopped beside Pasanius and lifted his silver arm to more carefully examine its unblemished surfaces.
'This is fine workmanship,' he said. 'Your own?'
'No,' said Pasanius through gritted teeth. 'The adepts of Pavonis fashioned it for me.'
'Pavonis? I have not heard of that world. Is it a world of the Mechanicum?'
'No.'
Honsou smiled. 'You hate me, don't you?'
Pasanius turned to stare at Honsou. 'I hate you, yes. You and all your traitorous, bastard kin.'
Honsou circled behind Pasanius and wiped black dust and the filthy residue of the Exuviae from his armour, taking a closer look at the colour of the plates below. He returned to Uriel's side and examined his armour too.
'I see no insignia,' he said. 'What Chapter were you from?'
'What does that matter here?' said Uriel.
'I like the way you answered that.'
'How did I answer it?'
'Very carefully,' chuckled Honsou. 'Shall I tell you what I think?'
Ultramarines Omnibus (warhammer 40000: ultramarines) Page 86