Battle Of The Fang

by Chris Wraight

  The encircling army had coalesced into two hosts, one for each Gate. In the vanguard came the heavy artillery, ranks of them, rolling on heavy treads and churning up the snow. There were big mortar launchers among them, and vehicles bearing demolisher cannons, and still more with gigantic plasma weapons mounted high on their lumbering chassis. Further back came even heavier vehicles, swaying like drunkards as they ground into firing range. There were mobile launchers with whole frames of sleek missiles hoisted into firing angles, and vast superheavy assault tanks with siege cannons protruding from bloated turrets.

  Between them came the troop carriers, the Chimeras of the mortal troopers and the Rhinos and Land Raiders of the Traitor Marines. There were hundreds of the former, only a handful of the latter. Even so, the first wave of the enemy boasted more manpower than Greyloc had left in the entire fortress, and he knew there were many thousands more held in reserve.

  Above the advancing ranks swooped the wings of gunships, flying low and in tight formation. There were bigger atmospheric ships hovering further out on whining engines, each packed with weaponry, poised and ready to sweep over the battlefield.

  Somewhere amid that sprawling tide of men and vehicles were the sorcerers, the fallen Space Marines who commanded the whole edifice. They were the key, the handful of witches who held the corrupting power of the warp in their armoured hands.

  It was an intimidating force, the last residue of one of the Emperor’s own Legions of Death, an army capable of bringing a world to its knees.

  But Fenris was no ordinary world, and its denizens were incapable of being intimidated.

  ‘Unleash,’ ordered Greyloc.

  At the Wolf Lord’s command, the flanks of the Fang erupted.

  Bolts of plasma and heavy las-fire scythed out across the ice, crackling with enormous, terrible energies as they lanced to their destinations. Heavy bolters thundered out from a hundred positions on the slopes, hurling mass-reactive rounds over huge distances. Autocannons spooled up, spitting lines of armour-piercing shells deep into the enemy columns. Missiles screamed out of their silos, hurtling high into the frost-clear sky before plummeting down into the ranks of the invader.

  The oncoming tanks responded as soon as they came into range, and a hail of fire returned, crashing into the walls of the mountain, showering it in an inferno of exploding promethium and detonating shells. The inferno kindled even as the rain of plasma from orbit, the steady column that had shaken the mountain for days, was intensified, and the entire summit of the Fang was bathed in a shifting curtain of flame.

  Greyloc remained on the exposed platform, unmoving, watching calmly as the shields before his position absorbed the incoming punishment. An enemy missile spiralled up out of the sea of destruction, exploding only metres from him, sending rippling shockwaves across the void barrier. He stayed motionless, focused on the unfolding barrage below, looking for any sign of weakness or unbalance.

  The Thousand Sons advance was neither rash nor unprotected. Even as the Wolves emptied their fury at the oncoming army, the fire was met with the glistening discharge of shields. Something, some sorcery, was warding the tanks from harm. The barrier wasn’t perfect – columns of armour were already smouldering and broken – but it was enough to prevent the annihilation of the vanguard. In their wake, the troop carriers were getting closer.

  In a hail of flickering plasma-spikes and explosions, the gap between the Gates and the Thousand Sons closed. Every round of fire from the Fang destroyed a rank of heavy weaponry on the ground, but for every broken chassis another tank took its place, rolling over the burning, twisted metal. The causeways were gradually covered with a carpet of crawling ironwork, throwing fire back at the batteries mounted above them, gaining metres with each painful, wreck-strewn advance.

  Then the aerial attack commenced. Wings of bombers and heavy gunships swooped in across the high faces of the Fang, strafing the gun emplacements, weaving between the lines of flak and anti-aircraft fire. With every pass, aircraft were downed by the defending guns, streaking back down to earth in trails of smoke, spinning into their own troops and carving ruin in their destruction. But with every pass, another defensive battery was reduced to ruins, or another void shield was put under critical strain, or another stream of shells was diverted from the onslaught on the land.

  The air began to choke from the plumes of rolling, ink-black smoke. The view from the gates was gradually lost. The vista turned from one of cold, clear perfection into a vision of burning, charred desolation. The growing walls of smoke dimmed the light of the sun, locking the mountain in a pall of closing shadow.

  Greyloc calmly checked his helm display, noting the positions of his Wolf Guard, the locations of the Rune Priests, the deployment of his key assets, the state of the defence he had designed and put in place.

  And now comes the test. The Hand of Russ ward us.

  Then the Wolf Lord turned from the platform, his claws bursting into whip-curling life, shimmering with twin disruptor fields, and made his descent to the Gate level, ready to meet the tide of fury as it broke.

  The sound of hammers was everywhere. It ran through the chambers, resounding in the stone, vibrating in the deep shafts, echoing in the hidden vaults. Even over the aural compensators built into her helmet, Freija found the incessant, banging tumult disorientating.

  ‘I see why it was named this way,’ she said grimly.

  The Iron Priest nodded.

  ‘It is glorious,’ he replied, and there was no trace of sarcasm in his vox-filtered voice.

  They were standing on the edge of a precipice, far down into the Hammerhold. Ahead of them ran a single bridge of stone, flying out across the abyss, six metres wide and without a rail. It disappeared into the gloom and haze of the distance. Hundreds of metres down, in the huge cavern spanned by the bridge, a vision of Hel had unravelled. Gigantic, hulking furnaces, each the height of Warlord Titan and twice as wide, threw off clouds of blood-red light. Channels of heat-blackened stone carried rivers of fire from one inferno to the next, passing through wheels of iron and plunging pistons. The silhouettes of servitor-thralls, their wire-studded spines curled over from hunching, crept between the colossal machinery, checking flickering pict-readouts and tending brass-lined cogitator banks. The vast space hummed with a low, rumbling activity. Along clattering conveyor belts amid the forges, Freija could just make out the embryonic shells of vehicle plating, artillery barrels, even body-armour parts.

  And then there were the hammers. They were borne by rows of muscle-enhanced, metal-ribbed, faceless servitors, chained to their adamantium anvils by segmented nerve-conduits, endlessly working, endlessly beating. There were ranks upon ranks of them, more machine than human, moulded into mindless golems by the uncaring arts of the fleshmakers. They were the perfect workers: tireless, uncomplaining, hugely strong, content to hammer away in the pits of fire until death from exhaustion gave them a final release.

  Not much of a life.

  ‘We are wasting time,’ said Arfang, prompting his personal servitor retinue to limp across the bridge. The Iron Priest strode out after them, leaving Freija and kaerls scurrying to match the pace.

  ‘Who supervises them?’ asked Freija, unable to take half an eye away from the toiling legions down in the haze of fire and heat below.

  ‘They need no supervision,’ replied Arfang coldly. ‘They only know one way to serve. Do not disdain that, huskaerl – without them our warriors go to war empty-handed.’

  ‘I do not disdain them, lord. I just had no idea there were... so many.’

  ‘And that troubles you?’

  It did. It troubled her more than she would ever admit to him. It troubled her that legions of half-dead, semi-mechanised slaves had been toiling under her feet for as long as she’d been alive. It troubled her that she didn’t know where they came from, nor why she’d ended up as a huskaerl and they’d ended up as forge-meat. It troubled her that she knew so little of such things, and that the ways of the Aet
t were so arbitrary and clouded in a fog of tradition that only the Sky Warriors had any access to.

  ‘I am merely curious,’ she said.

  ‘A dangerous instinct. Be careful where it takes you.’

  It took nearly ten minutes of solid walking to traverse the yawning forge-halls. Arfang set a punishing pace, one that the servitors struggled to match. Even Freija found her battle-trained muscles aching by the time the far side neared.

  The bridge terminated as it reached a cliff of rough-hewn rock. An iron-lined door had been carved into it, crested with the sign of the two-headed wolf Morkai, the guardian of the dead. The image looked old, far older than anything in the Hould, and the edges were smooth from the hot, wearing winds. The doorway was open and there were no guards. A single, isolated green light winked at the base of the heavy frame.

  Disruptor field.

  Arfang gave a flick of his finger and the light switched to red. He strode on. The tunnel beyond was pitch-dark, unlit by torches, glowglobes or fire-pits.

  Freija adjusted her night-vision visor, and the walls were picked out in a grainy pale green. Though well-used to the cold and dark, she gave an involuntary shudder as she passed the threshold. The chill seemed deeper, somehow, more permanent and invasive. As they walked, the sound of hammers receded, replaced by a dead, frigid silence.

  They went down. A long way down. Freija saw holes loom up in the walls of the tunnel; tributary corridors, from which the air sighed in frozen gusts. Soon the way forward became a choice from many options, and the path began to twist back on itself, writhing through the deep roots of the mountain. At all times the tunnel remained wide and tall, and a Rhino could have been driven along its length with ease.

  She began to lose track of time, and certainly of how far they’d come. The utter dark, and the cold that sank into her bones, gave a strange sense of dislocation to that forsaken place. It was temptingly easy to imagine the rest of the galaxy simply ceasing to exist beside that eternal, primordial darkness.

  When the first noise came, it had her scrabbling for her skjoldtar and her heart hammering. It was unearthly, a low, purring growl that ran down her spine like mercury on glass. She saw her kaerls tense up, sweeping the muzzles of their weapons across the walls.

  ‘What was that?’ she hissed.

  The Iron Priest kept walking, untroubled.

  ‘I told you, huskaerl,’ he said. His booming voice rang from the walls. ‘There are dangers in the dark. Keep your weapons primed, and let no harm come to my thralls.’

  Freija swallowed down her expletive. The Iron Priest was annoying her more than ever.

  ‘Worry not, lord,’ she said, her jaw tight. ‘We are here to serve.’

  ‘I am glad that is how you feel.’

  Freija took a quick look over her shoulder. In the far distance, far up the snaking tunnel, she saw two points of light. She blinked, and they were gone. The chill in her bones intensified.

  What has been done down here?

  And then they were walking again, down and down, further into the deep dark, an island of heart-warmth in an infinite ocean of utter, endless emptiness.

  Morek worked his way up through the Jarlheim levels, keeping his head down as he went. Most of those he passed were heading in the other direction, hurrying to where the fighting was fiercest. The few going his way were mostly gunnery crews heading for their rotations on the anti-aircraft batteries.

  The vibration of the outgoing fire patterns made the elevator shaft shake as he ascended.

  How is that even possible? We are hundreds of metres within the mountain. What forces are being unleashed out there?

  The suspensor floated behind him in the steel cage, carrying the prone body of the Grey Hunter. Though it seemed disrespectful, Morek had failed to resist the urge to look at the fallen Sky Warrior.

  Aunir Frar’s face had been exposed when the Long Fangs had removed his helm in the Land Raider. It was proud, severe, sharp-edged. Mature fangs glinted from his open mouth, and the jawline was extended into the lupine profile of a veteran warrior. Perhaps he’d been angling for elevation to the Wolf Guard. The Red Dream still had him in its grasp, and his breathing was shallow, almost non-existent. Parts of his plate had been ripped away, revealing over a dozen deep stab-wounds, including a horrifying, artery-severing gash across the neck. If Frar had been a mortal, there would have been no life left in him to save.

  The elevator rattled to a halt. Morek hauled open the doors and exited, pulling the suspensor along behind. Ahead of him were the chambers of the fleshmakers. There were signs of aversion etched into the stone lintels. A caustic, antiseptic smell stung his nostrils. Ahead, the dull red firelight of the Aett was replaced with harsh white lumen-strips. There were tiles on the wall and metal tables covered in instruments of surgery. Unlike the rest of the Wolves’ lair, which was littered with totems and bleached animal skulls, the Wolf Priest’s dwellings were pristine, cold and unadorned.

  Morek entered, squinting against the bright lights, keeping the suspensor close. There was noise from further in, but no immediate sign of anyone about. He kept walking, passing more rows of metal tables, walking through more rooms full of equipment he could barely guess the purpose of. Alongside the machinery of surgery and physical augmentation, there were long banks of ancient-looking cogitators, lined with bronze cases, humming gently.

  The noises grew. He was getting closer to activity. As he turned a corner, he entered a larger chamber, domed-roofed and even brighter than the others. There were huge, heavy tables there too, and some were occupied. Two Sky Warriors lay on them, both conscious, both being operated on by teams of leather-masked thralls. The mortals worked quickly and deftly, slicing open flesh, pinning back muscle, working at the wounds with needle-probes and pain-suppressants. They all wore iron visors with bottle-green lenses, each of them flickering with points of light.

  ‘Mortal,’ came a deep voice, and Morek turned to face it. A Wolf Priest, one of Wyrmblade’s acolytes by his look, strode up to him in night-black armour, his exposed hands covered in blood. ‘State your business.’

  Morek bowed. ‘I was charged to bring this warrior, Aunir Frar, into the care of the Lord Wyrmblade.’

  The Wolf Priest snorted.

  ‘You think he’d be here? When the Aett is under assault?’ He shook his head. ‘We’ll take him. Go back to your station, rivenmaster.’

  Even as the Priest spoke, thralls flocked around the suspensor, dragging it alongside one of the metal tables. Steel threads were inserted into the prone body and scanning devices angled over the wounds. The Wolf Priest turned to his new charge and began to direct the operation.

  Morek bowed. He turned and withdrew, walking back through the empty chambers of the fleshmaker’s domain as quickly as he could. Something about the place unnerved him. The aromas were foreign, utterly unlike the smells of hide and embers he’d been born into.

  Too much light.

  He went through another room, then turned left, passing between open slide-doors. He went several more paces before realising he’d come the wrong way. The chamber he’d entered was smaller than the others, though still lined with clinical white tiles. There were three huge tanks in the centre of it, each filled with a translucent fluid. The vessels were cylindrical, no more than a metre wide but running the whole height of the room. Machinery clustered at the base of them, ticking and rattling rhythmically.

  He knew he should look away, but the contents of the tanks held him. There were bodies floating in them, dark outlines of men suspended in the liquid. Huge rib-cages, bunched-muscle arms, thick necks. The profile was that of a Space Marine, heavy and powerful. They didn’t move, just hung, swaying slightly. Dimly, Morek could make out snaking coils of respirator tubes hanging down and covering their lower faces.

  He turned away, knowing he’d come too far, suppressing his curiosity.

  The curious mind opens the door to damnation.

  It was as he did so that he saw the meta
l table, over to the left, away from the main beams of the strip-lumens. His eyes locked on what was on it, and stayed there.

  Slowly, almost unconsciously, Morek felt his feet propelling him towards the table. He passed the tanks by, their contents forgotten. He couldn’t look away then, couldn’t turn back.

  On the metal slab was a body, or perhaps a corpse. There was no breath in its gigantic lungs – at least, not one he could discern. It was like the others, naked, stretched out on its back, arms straight by its sides.

  Morek felt the sense of wrongness immediately. For a moment, he couldn’t work out what, precisely, was so troubling about the corpse – he’d seen many before – but then he paid more attention.

  The forearms were smooth, almost hair-free. The fingernails were no longer than his own. The jawline was square-cut and blunt, but with no signs of lupine distension. There was no room in that mouth for fangs, just mortal dentition.

  Morek moved closer, feeling his breathing quicken slightly. The corpse had its eyes open, blank and unseeing.

  They were grey like his, with a pupil like a mortal’s. There was no extraneous facial hair across the thick-set face, no heavy bone-ridge across the brow. The musculature was still there, rigid and heavy-set across an outsize skeletal frame, but it was blank and featureless.

  Whatever this thing was, it was no Space Wolf. It was a sham, a simulacrum, a mockery.

  Morek felt sickness well in the back of his throat. The Sky Warriors were sacred to him, as sacred as the world-soul, as the spirits of the ice, as the life of his daughter. This was an abomination, some dreadful meddling in the changeless order of things.

  He took a step back. From behind him, back in the operating theatre, he heard the movement of thralls as they struggled to save the life of Aunir Frar.

  This is forbidden. I should not be here.

  His sickness was replaced by fear. He’d seen the look in the eyes of the leather-masked thralls, and knew the reputation of the fleshmakers. They did not forgive trespasses.