Praetorian of Dorn

by John French

  What are you afraid of?

  He stepped towards the door. The warrior came into focus. He wore yellow-and-black battleplate, draped with a white surcoat. A sheathed sword hung at his waist, and his face was as cold and unmoving as carved ice.

  The warrior gestured for Kye to go in front of him, and they began to walk down the long corridor. The doors of the cells on either side remained closed.

  It took them an hour to reach the arming chamber. There the serfs gave him his final skin. His nerves buzzed as the armour activated. He remained silent, and the yellow-and-black-armoured warrior watched him without blinking. When it was done, they put his bolter in his hands. The ready-lights on the casing lit as his fingers curled around the grip.

  Fully loaded, he noted. Now I truly am the weapon they have made me. A tremor of ghost pain flared in his right arm, and he had to clamp down on it. He looked at the other warrior.

  ‘I am ready,’ he said. The warrior nodded and led him onwards.

  X

  There were twenty of them. Twenty in burnished yellow armour, their boltguns held across their chests, their heads bare. Kye saw Yonnad as he fell into position. Their gazes touched, and slid away from each other. They had trained together since Archamus had fallen, but had only talked in abrupt bites of tactical information. Kye understood why. What was there to say?

  An open archway waited before the twenty. Two warriors stood to either side of the doorway, drawn swords resting point down at their feet. Both warriors wore white surcoats crossed with black. Coals burned in iron braziers clamped to the door’s pillars, but the chamber beyond was dark, as though the door led to oblivion.

  They waited.

  And a light appeared in the dark beyond the door. A flame flickered to life, grew and reached upwards. From where Kye stood, the fire seemed to hang in the dark.

  ‘Approach and enter,’ said one of the warriors by the door. The twenty walked forwards and crossed into the blackness beyond. The chamber grew in the light of the fire at its centre. Black granite pillars rose to a shadowed height, the light strong enough to give only an impression of a domed ceiling. The walls were bare, the stone smooth and unblemished. Black iron poles jutted from the upper reaches of the walls. The whole space felt empty, as though it were waiting.

  The twenty formed a broken circle around the flames, which burned in a wide bowl set on a frame of brushed copper. They all watched the yellow tongues as they reached up into the air.

  ‘Welcome.’ The voice rolled through the air, echoing off the bare stone. Kye recognised it though it had been a long time since he had last heard it. Rogal Dorn stepped from the dark. He looked around the circle of twenty, his eyes catching the light of the fire.

  ‘One day, the names of every warrior of the Legion will line these walls, and the banners of victory will hang above the heads of those who stand where you stand now.’ He paused, turning his gaze to meet that of the twenty. ‘But you will be the first. You have brothers already scattered across the stars, tens of thousands of warriors who fight the war that you will join. In time all of them will come here and make their oaths. But you are the first. The first to become warriors of my flesh and blood since I took a place at my father’s side. Twenty. Twenty from thousands. Twenty with the strength to reach this point.’ He nodded carefully. ‘I know you all, every detail of your path here. I have watched you. I have seen your strength and will. But...’

  He paused, and Kye felt as though Dorn’s words and presence were wrapping around him alone, as though he were the focus of a lens, as though his skin were charring under the light of a sun.

  ‘You will need greater strength, and greater will than that which has brought you this far. You are warriors in a war to change existence. Our Great Crusade does not serve vanity, or pride. It serves mankind. Illumination, the light of reason, and freedom from the dark – that is what we bring. That is my father’s gift to the galaxy. We exist to see mankind fulfil a destiny where the savagery that we were raised from is lost to memory.

  Humanity has a destiny. We are not that destiny, but we will be its creators. There is no higher purpose, no greater meaning to our lives than this task. If it demands our suffering, we will bear that pain. If it demands our lives, then we will go to our deaths knowing that we die for the future. If victory demands eternity from us, then we will give it. We will do all this and never flinch from the path, never doubt, never turn away from the truth, or from each other.’

  Dorn stared into the fire, and, for a second, Kye thought he could feel the heat of it reflecting from the primarch’s gaze.

  ‘The oaths you make today are to me, and through me to the Emperor, and through the Emperor to the future of all humanity. Remember them. Carry them in your breath and blood. They are everything.’

  Dorn stepped up to the fire and raised his right arm. The gauntlet snapped free from his hand. He clenched his fingers and thrust his fist into the flames. Kye watched them envelop the bare flesh.

  ‘Come,’ said Dorn. ‘Make your oath.’

  They stepped forwards one at a time and thrust their fists into the flames. The smoke of charring skin rose as they spoke their names and the words of the oath. None of them flinched, or showed any sign of pain. Dorn kept his hand in the flame throughout, his features showing nothing, his eyes focused on each of the warriors as they came forwards.

  Then Kye felt himself step up, his left gauntlet releasing. He clenched his fingers into a fist and met Rogal Dorn’s eyes.

  ‘Do you wish to give me your oath now, Kye?’ asked the primarch. For answer Kye thrust his hand into the flames. There was a fraction of a second, and then heat swallowed every sensation in his fingers.

  ‘I will give you my oath,’ he said. He could feel the gaze of the other twenty on him. ‘But the name that goes with that oath will not be Kye.’

  Silence echoed in the Temple, and he could feel the shock ripple through the other warriors, like the passing of a wave through deep water. Rogal Dorn’s expression did not alter, but Kye thought he saw something flicker in the depths of his eyes, a shadow cast by flame-light.

  ‘What are you afraid of?’ said Dorn softly.

  ‘That others will die for my weakness. That I will fail,’ said Kye. The skin of his hand was peeling away now, the sinew and flesh beneath blistering and charring. The pain had become blades of ice cutting into his finger bones. He kept his hand utterly still and held Dorn’s gaze. The moment went on, extending in eternal seconds.

  ‘There is always fear, even if we give it another name,’ said Dorn at last.

  ‘I know, lord.’

  Dorn held his gaze for a second more. ‘What name would you have?’

  ‘Archamus,’ he said. ‘My oath name will be Archamus.’

  ‘So be it,’ said Rogal Dorn. Then he opened his hand, reached through the fire and grasped the charring hand of his son. ‘So be it.’

  Part Two

  Guardians At The Gates

  One

  Arcus orbital plate

  Terra

  Kestros looked up when the door opened, and came to his feet as Captain Katafalque entered. The assault commander looked at him for a long moment, but said nothing. Katafalque’s armour was still scratched and gore-stained from the battlefield, and a scabbed wound bisected his left temple. His cold eyes bored into Kestros.

  Kestros remained at attention, his eyes fixed on the corner of the cell. Thoughts flicked through his head even as he held them back from showing on his face. He had been ordered to his cell as the company had withdrawn from Damocles Starport. No explanation had been given, just a direct order that brooked no clarification or question. He had seen no one since, save the servitors who had stripped his armour. The cell that he had been taken to was in an unused section of the orbital plate, half a kilometre from his brothers.

  ‘Why am I here, captain?’

/>   ‘I cannot give you answers,’ said Katafalque. Kestros knew it was the closest he would get to an apology, and he wasn’t surprised. He had expected none. ‘You are being seconded from my command, with immediate effect.’

  Kestros blinked. Katafalque watched him carefully. He considered what to say. This seemed like a rebuke, like censure, but if it was then it was for some deed he was not aware of. He disliked indirectness; there was no place for it in the Legion. They were warriors, not courtiers. He felt his annoyance rise in his blood and forced it to cool.

  ‘As you will it, captain,’ he said carefully.

  ‘It is not his will, sergeant,’ said a deep voice, and another warrior stepped through the door behind Katafalque. The warrior wore lacquered war-plate, and a black cloak topped with white fur hung from his back. Pistons and cables gleamed between the armour plates that partially covered the warrior’s right arm and leg. A mace with a black stone head hung at his waist, and he looked at Kestros with dark eyes set above a grey beard. Calm and control breathed off him as he moved.

  Kestros blinked and then knelt, fist thumping into his chest as a salute.

  ‘Honoured Master Archamus,’ he said, careful to keep his voice devoid of the confusion now rolling through his head. Of all the warriors of the Legion there were many who held high honour: Lord Sigismund, Iapetus, Seneschal Rann; but Archamus was one of the First. One of the twenty warriors who were raised to the Legion by the primarch when he was reunited with the Emperor. With the death of Fleet Master Yonnad in the early days of the war, Archamus was now the last of that brotherhood. For over a century and a half Archamus had served. He had stood at Rogal Dorn’s side for the Legion’s greatest victories of the Great Crusade. One did not raise one’s gaze to such a warrior without being asked to.

  He stopped next to Katafalque and nodded to the captain. ‘Will he serve?’

  ‘He is my best. A little headstrong, but then you are used to that.’ Out of the corner of his eye Kestros saw his captain smile, the gesture as brief as a flash of lightning. Kestros blinked again.

  ‘Enough time and you grow to tolerate anything,’ said Archamus, his voice flat and humourless, and though he was not sure, he thought that the smile cut across Katafalque’s face again. ‘You have my thanks,’ continued Archamus. ‘I hope he serves me as well as you did.’

  For the first time in his years of service, Kestros heard Captain Katafalque laugh.

  ‘I hope he serves you better than that.’ Katafalque gave a swift bow to Archamus and then glanced at Kestros. ‘Bring us honour in wherever your duty takes you, brother,’ he said.

  Kestros bowed his head more deeply, but Katafalque had already turned and left the chamber.

  ‘Rise, sergeant,’ said Archamus, and Kestros stood. Archamus met his gaze. ‘This is not about a stain on your honour, nor that of your company. Nor is it about censure.’

  Kestros tried to read the old warrior’s face but could not. It was like trying to read the mood of a cliff from the shape of its cracks. He had a likeness of stone, like so many of the Legion. Kestros felt the question come to his lips before he could bite it off.

  ‘What is it about then, lord?’

  Archamus gave Kestros a glance that might have held either calculation or amusement.

  ‘Your Legion and primarch have need of your service,’ said Archamus.

  Kestros felt the words yank the breath out of his lungs.

  Archamus half turned towards the door, the machinery of his arm and leg whirring in the quiet of the cell.

  ‘Arm and armour yourself,’ Archamus said, and looked at the dark of the corridor beyond the cell door. A long second passed before he continued. ‘You have questions, but the answers cannot be given here.’

  Kestros blinked. A sensation that he could not understand or process was turning over in his stomach and spreading a shiver over his skin. There had been something in the old warrior’s face when he had looked at the dark, as though a thought had passed like a shadow across the inside of his skull. Kestros forced the disquiet from his mind and called for his armourers.

  Messalina debris drift

  Near-Terran void

  ‘What was that?’ hissed Incarnus, twisting in his harness as a deep, metallic clang echoed through the chamber. Myzmadra had been doing her best to rest, but now she was awake, heart beating fast.

  ‘Nothing,’ breathed Ashul, from next to the psyker. He had not moved, and still looked as though he were half asleep despite the noise. ‘Just stellar debris impacting on the outside. Most likely nothing larger than a seed grain.’

  ‘How do you know?’ spat Incarnus.

  ‘Anything larger and it would have ripped a hole. If it were anything really big and fast... well, let’s just say we would not be able to indulge in this conversation.’

  Incarnus hissed, his eyes swivelling between the walls. Not for the first time Myzmadra thought he resembled a lizard stretched into human shape. Part of her was enjoying the psyker’s discomfort, but she could not say that she shared Ashul’s apparent disdain for their current situation.

  The chamber was not really a chamber, but an airtight cargo slab, twenty metres high and wide, and twice as long. It was of the type used to convey volatile materials by the Jovian Void Clans. Now its only cargo was Myzmadra, Ashul, Incarnus and the five Space Marines.

  They had broken Terra’s atmosphere and rendezvoused with a small system ship making runs between the void docks. Their shuttle had settled into a sealed bay holding only the container and a cluster of servitors. They had moved to the slab-sided box and been sealed within. An hour later they had been dumped into the void on the edge of a debris drift and left to spin, like the billions of other pieces of stellar refuse clogging the solar void. Myzmadra did not know what they were waiting for; her mission information had long run out by this point.

  The five Space Marines treated the situation with total indifference. Most of them remained silent and stood, or sat, mag-locked to the wall. She had begun to notice differences between the five of them now that she had been granted the opportunity to observe them.

  Phocron moved without cease, as though he would vanish if he was truly still. Even in the shuttle he had turned his head to take in every detail of his surroundings. His movements were always smooth and precise, though; they just never stopped. He had been stripping and reassembling his weapons continuously since they had entered the container. His equipment and armour was a uniform dull indigo, without mark or adornment, though his primacy was undoubtable. He was tall, though the magnitude of Space Marine physiology made it difficult to judge just how much larger than the rest he was.

  The one with the meltagun was called Kalix, and he wrapped stillness around himself like a cloak. He had not moved at all since they had entered the container. A serrated crest ran down the centre of his helm, and his armour plates were lacquered with a subtle pattern of scales. The more she watched Kalix, the more she wanted him to move; his stillness was like a pressure on her eyes.

  Orn kept close to Phocron like a shadow. Slightly shorter than the others, his armour still held the dust of the Gobi wastes in its grooves. His face was broad, and his cheeks dotted with fine scars in the shapes of stars. He and Phocron spoke often, but while she heard what Phocron said, Orn never spoke above a whisper.

  The last of those she had dug from the dirt was called Hekaron, and was the most unusual of them all. While Phocron and Silonius looked near identical, Hekaron grinned at the world with a face that was a mass of bright green lizards tattooed in luminous dye. Rows of black pearls on silver rings hung above his right ear and eyebrow. He had pulled his helm off as soon as they were out of combat and had not stopped smiling since. His teeth were sharp and gleaming.

  Then there was Silonius. The newcomer had talked little and remained on the edge of the others while being one of them. At first she wondered if that was simpl
y because he was a newcomer to a group of bonded warriors, but that was not it. As she had watched them, she had realised that Phocron, Hekaron, Kalix and Orn had no special bond. The Legion had buried them beneath the earth of the Gobi wastes years ago, but if they had known each other before, they gave no sign. They worked smoothly together, but that could be a product of their training, rather than familiarity. Silonius was not an outsider, but he seemed separate, as though he was passing through their company, as though he was waiting for something.

  He glanced at her, perhaps sensing her gaze, and she met his eyes for a moment and then looked away. She thought of the item she had brought with her, wrapped in ballistic cloth and carried with her wherever she went, her own fragment of a secret she did not understand.

  ‘Any idea how long we are going to drift here?’ said Incarnus. ‘There is only so much air we can breathe before this place becomes a very unusual coffin. Of course, that might be the idea...’

  ‘If the Legion wanted you dead, it would already have brought it about,’ said Phocron. Incarnus froze. ‘All of us are here because we still have a purpose.’

  Phocron’s perpetual movement had fallen away. All of the legionnaires were now looking at Incarnus, eyes and helmet lenses locked on him.

  ‘Of course,’ said Incarnus. Myzmadra could see his throat move under the rubber of his void suit collar as he swallowed. ‘Of course.’

  Phocron nodded and turned his gaze away. The rest of the legionnaires followed suit a second later. Myzmadra shivered. For a second the differences between the five warriors had vanished. They had been one, a single predator with a united will and intent.

  ‘Silence and patience might be a better approach to making friends,’ drawled Ashul. Incarnus looked as though he was going to answer, when the entire container rang and shook. The legionnaires moved in an eye blink, helmets locking in place, weapons readied. A series of clanks shook through the metal walls, and then became a stuttering series of clatters. ‘I think the wait is over,’ said Ashul. ‘Either that or everything is about to come to an abrupt end.’