by Guy Haley
‘The Ultramarines are led by Polux of the Fists, and his pet warsmith. Their expertise in siegecraft is evident in what they have achieved.’ Skraivok activated a subsidiary hololith projector. A smaller version of the mountain was called into being. ‘These cave mouths have been blocked by engineered rockfalls. I suspect that many of them are blinds. We are attempting deep auspex, but the beacon throws off virtually all our scans. You saw what happened when your fleet arrived to our rendezvous and they ignited the beacon permanently, my lord.’
A sneer was all the acknowledgement Skraivok received. The initial lighting of the Pharos had sent out an electromagnetic pulse so far into the void that it had affected their ships right on the edge of the system. ‘They have retained several entrances, but these are small and in inaccessible areas, easily held by a small number against a far larger force.’
‘Our force, you mean,’ said Grukeer the Vile, captain of the 89th. ‘A force that is getting rapidly smaller.’
‘Let the man speak!’ said Gesh wearily. ‘I am in no hurry for another assault, but time is wasting.’
‘They are also sallying out. Our scouting parties are continuously harried.’
‘Define “harried” for me, Skraivok,’ said Krukesh acidly.
‘More of our long-range patrols to the upper mountain or into the caves do not come back than do,’ said Skraivok simply. ‘That is what I mean by harried.’
‘Have we a better idea of their numbers?’ said Jufeener Paladan, of the 19th.
Gesh spoke again. ‘Not really. If we assume a full company split between the platform and the castellum, a hundred or so might have escaped into the mountain. There is also the Mechanicum contingent, but that is pathetically small, and not of the Taghmata. Some small number of mortal troops, but they are negligible in effectiveness. Perhaps half the civilian population also fled into the caves. We have not found them. I myself have come up against Legionaries of the Imperial Fists. And there are also some indications of mixed squads of other Legions loyal to the False Emperor?’ He asked this of Varakesh, a brutish captain whose face was a knotted mess of plasma burn scars.
Varakesh nodded. ‘Token numbers, nothing more.’
‘Now, if we assume no more than two hundred legionaries, and perhaps a dozen Mechanicum constructs, perhaps the same amount of auxiliaries…’ Gesh tapped at the hololith’s control slab. Orange glowed at various points on the mountainside. ‘These are the entrances to the mountain that we know of. This is the optimal tactical disposition, but of course we do not know which of these are true entrances, and which are decoys. Nor do we have any idea of the internal layout of the mountain.’
‘What did the captives say?’ said Krukesh.
‘That the mountain is honeycombed by endless caverns,’ said Gesh. ‘None have ever been far inside. Superstitions, and simple fear of being lost. Further to that, Guilliman enacted an order barring access to the mountain over a century ago. Images, writing, even drawings of the mountain were prohibited by decree, so I can say, well…’
‘None of them know anything,’ concluded Krukesh for him.
‘No matter how hard they were questioned, no, my lord,’ conceded Gesh. ‘They speak of light burning from the caves at dawn and dusk, and strange dreams that affect all on this world. These are not natural phenomena. The mountain is probably a device. I surmise it was discovered here, not built by the Primarch Guilliman. It is old, this thing.’
‘This fortress atop the mountain is keeping our air support away,’ said Skraivok. He pointed to the Emperor’s Watch. ‘A concerted orbital beam strike should bring it down. If we were to destroy it, we might be better placed to land directly upon the slopes or upon this promontory here, but they have been firing anti-ship missiles from the cavities, so I would not assume easy success even should we destroy the fort.’
‘There is to be no heavy fire upon the mountain,’ said Krukesh. ‘We have no idea what equipment might be housed in that fort. We could destroy what we have come to take for our own.’
‘The enemy themselves brought down large parts of the mountainside,’ pointed out Paladan.
‘All rock, none of the glass tunnels, so far as we can ascertain,’ said Gesh.
‘They have the advantage of familiarity,’ said Krukesh. ‘They are in a position to know which pieces can be safely broken, while we are not. How are the pattern testers for teleport assault faring?’
‘Poorly, my lord,’ said Hakar of the Deep, captain of the 104th, with a surly tone. A teleport assault on the main chamber would bring the battle to a swift close. Upon his efforts depended the lives of his brothers, and they were not backward in reminding him of it. ‘The mountain is impermeable to every kind of probe we can conduct. Our forge serfs and Mechanicum allies repeatedly attempt a lock upon the chamber we are sure is at the peak by the funicular terminus. But whenever we scan the mountain, any part of it, it is as if there is nothing there.’
‘There must be something,’ growled Krukesh.
‘We cannot see it. Our astropaths can do no better,’ said Hakar apologetically. ‘The mountain is unreadable, a spatial and psychic blank.’
‘Warpcraft?’
‘It is something else,’ said Hakar.
Krukesh looked at his underlings in turn. They returned his regard with almost as much contempt. Skraivok hid his glee. Krukesh was taxing what fragile unity he had brought with him with this attack. It was becoming clear curiosity and ambition rather than necessity drove his strategy to take the mountain. The Night Lords were no strangers to the shedding of blood. They enjoyed it immensely, providing, of course, it was the blood of strangers. Spilling their own so freely was not to their liking, and for the last day they had been bleeding heavily.
‘We will continue with my plan. We shall assault all the entrances simultaneously,’ said Krukesh. ‘They cannot defend all of them equally. That way we shall break them.’
‘They can defend some of them very well, my lord,’ said Gesh dryly.
‘You are warriors,’ shouted Krukesh. ‘Some of you will die, but we will prevail. Is that not the prosecution of war?’
‘Rather a lot of us will die,’ corrected Gesh. ‘And not all of us are comfortable with that. This beacon is important, that is clear to us all. We should smash it, now, before we are overwhelmed in counter-attack.’
‘Are you disobeying me, Gesh?’ said Krukesh. Two Atramentar came into the command tent, summoned wordlessly by Krukesh from outside. They stood at his shoulders, the helm lenses of their massive Terminator war-suits fixed upon Gesh. Heat washed off their power plants, the thin skin of their energy fields glowed with residual radioactivity. ‘Draw up your plans. Submit them for my approval tomorrow by nightfall. We attack by darkness. Tread carefully, Gesh, you can be replaced.’
‘As can you,’ Gesh muttered darkly. He stalked out of the room. Three of the sixteen captains present went with him. More pointedly looked away from him at this display of defiance. Skraivok stayed rooted to his place. Ever the loyal servant, he thought bitterly.
‘In the alternative, any one of you who finds a way into that mountain will be richly rewarded,’ Krukesh said. ‘Now go! About your business!’
With many a sharp look at Hakar, the claw masters of the Night Lords filed out. Not one spoke, either to their fellows or to their commander. The air was heavy with intrigue.
Now this, thought Skraivok as he followed them out into Sotha’s sultry evening, is getting interesting.
Skraivok made his way back through the camp to his own command. Day retreated. Sunlight filtered through the Ruinstorm stained everything a deep red. Vehicle exhaust tainted the air, and draughts of fierce heat wafted out everywhere from power units and engines.
They were doing this properly, the old way, their camp a temporary city constructed to methods older than the Great Crusade. Modular barracks stood in neat rows, thrown u
p in the space of hours by dedicated serf teams. Each company’s sub-camp centred on its armoury buildings. A defensive wall of prefabricated sections defined its edge. The grid pattern of Sothopolis helped. How kind of the Ultramarines it had been to leave most of their city as bare lots. There had been no need to prepare the ground. All they had done was knock down a few fences, and everything was ready for them to move in.
The Night Lords had laid out a landing zone at the very centre, abuzz with the comings and goings of small craft. A line of lights in the sky delimited the stacked flightpaths of the vehicles bringing more equipment down to the spaceport. Heavy trucks rumbled in and out of the four gates. The camp had all been planned and laid out with customary Space Marine efficiency, although not many Legions would have cared for the Night Lords’ decorations.
Crucified, skinless civilians, some still clinging to agonised life, were arrayed around the perimeter on metal crosses. It reminded Skraivok very much of past compliances, Cheraut in particular. On seeing this perhaps the Lord of Macragge would regret the humbling of Curze by his brother Dorn.
A deep pang of nostalgia surprised him. He fought against it. He had no sympathy for the Emperor’s wars, not any more. The Night Lords had done their duty, and been looked at askance for the methods the Emperor had ordered them to use. Always they had been regarded as villains of the blackest degree, even though their terror tactics preserved far more lives than the cleaner warfare of other Legions. As monsters was how they were seen, and so monsters were what they had become.
As Curze had always told them, they could not escape their nature. They had always known who they were.
Skraivok steadfastly ignored how, as time passed, the newer recruits from Nostramo revelled in the carnage and did not see it as a grim duty. He tried not to remember when things were different, when atrocity was performed for a higher purpose and not for atrocity’s sake.
As Curze had also said, things cannot be any other way than what they are.
He had heard the likes of Kellendvar talking of how the Night Lords were stronger than all the rest, that they would go forth, cast down the lying Emperor and live as princes among men.
As he smelled the burning flesh, the stink of blood and fear-voided bowels, he knew in his hearts that could never be. They were monsters. He was a monster. How odd to view oneself so; no man ever sets out to be a monster, and yet here he was. Monstrous.
Things cannot be any other way.
Skraivok passed into the square grouping of his company barracks. The full complement of buildings had been erected, because that was the way things were done. Never mind that only half the racks would ever be occupied in those brief hours the Space Marines slept. Screams came from one of the vacant barracks, followed by ugly laughter. Part of him wanted to go in and see what was happening, to partake of the entertainment. Another part of him was sickened, a part that grew weaker by the day.
I am tired, he thought. His quarters had been erected and awaited, a modular building half the size of the barracks. The banners of his company flapped outside.
The doors recognised him and opened. He stepped into the cleansing room, where warm water hosed down his armour from every angle. Still dripping, he went into his arming chamber. There four silent servitors removed his armour. Skraivok had not had an equerry for a long time; there was no one he trusted enough.
Dressed in simple robes, he went into his personal chamber, a large enough space scented by three braziers of lazily smoking incense. Metal floors were cold under his feet.
His serfs were frightened of him enough not to be a danger. They scurried about, forever on the edge of terror, fetching him food and drink. Some of it was simple stuff taken from the silos of the conquered. It was a pleasure to eat after so long consuming the Umber Prince’s emergency rations.
Sensing him satisfied, his serfs withdrew to whatever hovels they occupied in the slave camp outside the walls. Skraivok called up the Umber Prince to grill Shipmaster Hrantax about the progress of the repairs. He baited his servant, but was mostly pleased by his progress. The orbital facilities the Ultramarines had were modest, but far better than nothing. There was a pile of data-slates on his desk, fresh orders and casualty reports. They could wait. He prepared to retire, for he had had no natural sleep for days. He remembered his days as a youngster, those times of revels when the halls of his ancestral home were full of adults, every one a danger to him. The last week had been like that, constantly on his guard.
‘Even monsters need to sleep,’ he said to himself.
A low chuckle had him spinning round. A horrible noise, guttural and feline, as much full of pain as amusement. Skraivok had fought his share of xenos over the centuries. This laugh was unlike any other he had ever heard. It was not human, and it was not alien.
Inhuman, that was the word.
His hand went for a weapon that was not there. Then his fist clenched, and anger took control.
‘Berenon! What are you doing in here? I did not hear you enter.’
The Librarian stood behind a brazier of glowing incense coals. His face was in shadow, and he stood awkwardly, his knees twisted sideways. He leaned against the wall for support.
‘You did not hear me enter,’ said Berenon. His voice was affected in some way, deep and raspy, the suggestion of the same feline growling beneath it.
‘Are you injured?’ said Skraivok.
‘No,’ said the Librarian.
‘What is it, Berenon? If you bring me any other news than a way into the mountain, you can go away.’
‘I bring you an offer. Hear it out, lord of the night.’ Berenon drew in a long, difficult breath, and stepped into the light. His left foot dragged on the floor, his hand disturbed the hangings on the walls.
The Librarian lifted his head, and he smiled, an expression the miserable man was not known to employ. Not his expression at all, Skraivok realised with shock. Berenon’s face was slack and sickly grey. Ropes of drool ran from twitching lips. The eyes in that morbid flesh were changed, red orbs shot through with gold, with no discernible pupil, and they flicked tremblingly back and forth.
‘Gendor Skraivok!’
The voice was not the Librarian’s. The movement of his lips did not match the words. Skraivok had the awful sensation that it was the eyes that spoke, and not Berenon.
Skraivok moved behind his desk, snatching up the boltgun resting in a stand beside it. He levelled it at the creature in front of him. It made no move on him, and he held his fire.
‘You are not Berenon.’
The thing ran a long pink tongue over its teeth. These were Berenon’s own flat, grey human teeth one moment, the sharp translucent needles of an aquatic predator the next. Berenon’s mouth moaned.
‘You are astute. I borrow his flesh. A fine mind this one, strong and wilful. But the walls of the world are thin, and he has lost his way. It is not easy to talk to you so, but possible, yes. Possible.’
‘I have heard of members of the Seventeenth Legion who let the things of the warp into their flesh, to become their slaves. Are you such as they?’
‘Yes and no. I am less and yet greater. I need no permission. Erebus’ storm opens the way for the likes of me. Such a time this is! When our worlds might meet and freely intermingle.’
‘If you seek worship you will not find it. We are stronger than the others.’
‘You are haughty. You are… deluded…’ The last word came out as a long, drawn-out hiss.
‘We are not Lorgar’s monks. We will not bend our knee to you. You will find no worship here!’ shouted Skraivok. He waited for a response to his shouting, but sound in the room had taken on a dead quality, and he knew he could count on no help from elsewhere.
‘All will bend their knee to the lords of the warp. You think you are strong, but you are weak. You are of flesh. All things made of dirt and fire are feeble before the pow
er of Chaos.’
‘Come closer and I will show you how weak I am.’
‘You think yourself strong, like your master? I have had the measure of him, who fought with me in the realms of thought. He thinks me bested where I am not. At this moment he runs hither and thither upon the dustball of Macragge, pursuing errands not his own.’
‘Curze? Our lord is on Macragge?’
‘You call him lord still, this creature that would destroy you to sate his petty desires. Is he worthy of your fealty? You are not strong, Gendor Skraivok, but I can make you strong. I bring offer of alliance. Utilise what you may to our mutual advantage, for is that not the rule of the strong?’
‘I do not care for your conversation,’ said Skraivok. He lifted his bolter higher.
‘Hear me out. There is power in this shell, and it burns quickly. Send me back or watch me go and you will never benefit. I come to give aid only to the worthy.’
‘You are speaking to me.’ Skraivok’s palms were sweating. The presence of the thing inside his Librarian mentally pained him, a terrible pressure crawled at the back of his skull. Spots swam in front of his eyes. Phantom smells troubled him, no less so for their fleeting presence.
‘Your ambition is a blaze, your cynicism sweet wine. You are an acquired taste, Gendor Skraivok the Painted Count, but one that delights my palate. You are worthy. Together, you and I can realise your desire.’ Again that slender tongue licked teeth that were first one form and then another.
‘You offer me power, yet you require my help. You do not seem so powerful.’
‘This lighthouse is a thing of our ancient foe. It is a feeble candle against the inferno of the storm, but I see further. The storm will pass as all storms do. The beacon must be destroyed, or it shall one day be used as a weapon against us as it once was in aeons past.’ The creature laughed again. Berenon’s body convulsed with the effort of it hard enough to crack his ribs. Red tinted the saliva that ran from his mouth. ‘They tried so hard to best us, but where are they now?’