by Andy Hoare
Kor’sarro shielded his face from the silver flames, but he refused to retreat. He was here, and so too was Voldorius. Only one of them, he vowed, would leave.
After a moment the leaping flames had died down, ghostly wisps of unnatural fire licking across the stone floor. An explosion sounded nearby as the flames reached one of the tech-adepts’ machines. Though the central conflagration was quieting, smaller, secondary fires were being touched off all around.
‘It is ended,’ Kor’sarro growled. ‘I am come for your head.’
Lord Voldorius studied Kor’sarro’s face, his head cocked as if he were listening to something that no mortal could possibly hear. Then the daemon shook his head and snapped his mighty black wings.
‘I have not failed,’ Voldorius suddenly roared, drawing his huge black sword. ‘Not if your broken body is cast before me!’
‘He has failed!’ came the voice of the woman on the surgical table. ‘The Bloodtide is destroyed…’ her voice trailed out with a note of madness.
Voldorius turned to face the woman, and took a step towards her, his sword raised.
‘The Bloodtide?’ Kor’sarro repeated. All-but-forbidden lore imparted to him by the Storm Seers came to his mind. The legends of Voldorius bringing about the death of entire sectors, slaughtering billions in a single night…
‘You sought to resurrect the Bloodtide?’ he spat. ‘No.’
Voldorius paused, flames licking around his feet. Another of the ritual machines exploded, showering the woman’s body with sparks.
‘He’s failed…’ the woman called, her voice now shrill with madness. ‘He’s failed…’
Voldorius exploded into violent motion. He raised his black sword high, shadow radiating from it as light shines from a lantern. He brought the huge blade down, but not upon the figure restrained on the surgical table. He brought it instead into a mighty horizontal sweep that struck the base of the statue of the Emperor Triumphant with a titanic impact.
Stone exploded in every direction and a crack cut across the statue’s base. Voldorius turned on Kor’sarro and raised his blade above his head to strike the White Scar down.
Kor’sarro raised Moonfang as he moved to avoid the worst of the blow. The sacred blade turned the daemon’s strike, though only barely, the black sword scything the air scant millimetres from Kor’sarro’s face.
The black blade struck the stone floor, jagged cracks spreading out from the impact. The entire platform shook, forcing the combatants to brace their feet.
Kor’sarro saw his opportunity, and took it. He lunged inside the daemon’s reach and put every ounce of his strength into a mighty upwards thrust.
Moonfang sank into the daemon’s midriff, a flood of black ichor spilling out around its grip and staining Kor’sarro’s armour. He twisted the blade savagely, then withdrew it, leaping back, raising the sword high and preparing to strike the deathblow.
The entire cathedral shook as the sound of tortured stone filled the air.
Kor’sarro made ready to strike again, but the deep wound he had just inflicted was healing before his very eyes. The bestial face of the daemon prince was split by a leering grin of triumph.
‘You cannot slay me, scarred one!’ Voldorius bellowed over the ever-increasing sound of crumbling rock.
Kor’sarro drew breath to reply, but his words stuck in his throat. The towering stature of the Emperor Triumphant was collapsing downwards in a shower of masonry.
‘Maybe I cannot,’ Kor’sarro growled, ‘but there are higher powers than me…’
A huge splinter of rock detached from the statue’s flank and slid downwards as if in slow motion, falling directly towards the daemon prince.
But the falling splinter of statue would crush the woman too.
As swiftly as Kor’sarro discerned her fate, he determined to avert it. As a hundred tonnes of rock descended upon Voldorius, Kor’sarro dived forwards. In three steps, he was at the surgical table. With no time to spare, Kor’sarro tore apart the restraints, cast his arm about the woman’s waist and threw himself forwards as the splinter crashed down.
In that instant, the entire world exploded. The splinter shattered into a million smaller fragments and the ground trembled as if a starship had crashed to earth. The entire cathedral was suddenly filled with the dust of a hundred tonnes of rock pulverised by the impact. Instinctively, Kor’sarro used his armoured body to protect the exposed form cradled in his arms, for the rock shrapnel sent up by the impact would have slain her as surely as if he had left her to die upon the table.
Finally, the rain of stone subsided and the dust began to clear. The once glorious statue lay broken and shattered. It was split into many pieces, some huge and still recognisable, others reduced to rough boulders. Upon the platform lay the fragment that had once been the Emperor’s upraised arm. Upon the stairs lay a portion of a leg, and along a fifty-metre stretch of the nave was scattered the remainder of the statue.
The combatants who had been fighting one another the length of the nave stirred, casting about for dropped weapons and blades. The slaughter would begin anew.
Kor’sarro set the fragile form held in his arms down, and stepped forwards, looking around for Moonfang.
The dust stirred.
The mighty form of Lord Voldorius reared from the billowing cloud, his wings, now tattered and ragged, unfolding overhead. Voldorius raised his black sword high above his head, his snarling face a mask of savage, daemonic fury.
A second figure rose from the dust behind Voldorius. Arcs of blue lightning spat to life and the air crackled.
The daemon prince faltered, his back arching. Searing blue light appeared at the centre of his chest, followed a second later by the tips of four razor-sharp talons. Voldorius made to turn to face his assailant, twisting his body to free himself from the talons.
At Kor’sarro’s feet, the woman lifted Moonfang from amongst the dust and rubble. Straightening, she raised the sword high.
Kor’sarro grasped the sword and turned towards Voldorius. As he did so, Voldorius was thrown backwards to fall face down across the fragment of the statue that had been the Emperor’s right arm. The black-armoured figure of Kayvaan Shrike rose behind him, his talon buried in the daemon’s back. The Raven Guard drove his talon even deeper into the body of his foe. An explosion of sparks went up as the blade piercing the daemon’s chest dug into the statue, pinning the daemon against it.
Kor’sarro raised Moonfang high in a two-handed grip. ‘Kernax Voldorius,’ he spat through bloody lips. ‘I claim your head in the name of the Emperor, and of the primarch.’
The sacred blade fell, cleaving the daemon’s head from his shoulders in a single strike.
‘Honoured be his name.’
By the time the fighting was done and the last of the daemon prince’s followers routed or slain, Kayvaan Shrike was gone. Kor’sarro had made to order his warriors to find the captain of the Raven Guard 3rd Company, for he demanded answers, but the Storm Seer Qan’karro had simply shaken his head. That was all the counsel the Master of the Hunt needed.
‘Where is he?’ Kor’sarro raged as he paced the debris-strewn nave of the Cathedral of the Emperor’s Wisdom. ‘And where are his men?’
‘Gone, huntsman,’ the Storm Seer said. ‘His mission here is done.’
‘What mission?’ Kor’sarro said, rounding on his old friend. ‘We shared objectives. At the last, we stood as brothers.’
‘Aye,’ Qan’karro replied. ‘But only so far as you shared the field of battle. Shrike was not simply here to liberate Quintus. He was not here for that at all.’
Kor’sarro halted in his pacing. ‘And you knew of this?’
‘I know of many things, huntsman,’ the Storm Seer replied, his heavily wrinkled brow furrowing as he regarded the Master of the Hunt. ‘But some knowledge is not to be shared. Other wisdom is only t
o be imparted when the time is right.’
‘He came for the Bloodtide,’ Kor’sarro said. ‘He knew Voldorius was attempting to awaken it. How?’
‘I told you that the sons of Corax walk their own path. That they bear the weight of ages upon their shoulders, did I not, Kor’sarro?’
‘You did,’ Kor’sarro nodded. ‘What of it?’
‘As we of the White Scars write the names of our foes in our epics, as the Great Khan names those who shall be hunted, so the Raven Guard etch the names of their foes upon their own souls. Each nurtures his hatred, cleaves to it above all else, so that one day, when he comes face to face with an enemy of his Chapter, he might unleash it, and strike that enemy down.’
‘I saw it,’ Kor’sarro said. ‘All of the daemon’s power fled at that moment.’
‘Aye,’ the Storm Seer replied, laying a hand on Kor’sarro’s battered shoulder guard. ‘But there was more. Voldorius was pinned against a fragment of the statue of the Emperor. His powers were naught compared to that.’
As he thought back to the last moments of the battle, Kor’sarro looked around for the woman who had passed Moonfang to him at that crucial moment. He had not had the chance to thank her, or to ensure her well-being.
‘She too is gone,’ Qan’karro said. ‘He took her.’
‘To what end?’ Kor’sarro spat, bitterness welling inside him. Had he been a fool to trust the Raven Guard? Was there more to the friction between the two Chapters than mere misunderstanding and hubris?
‘I cannot say, huntsman,’ the Storm Seer replied darkly.
‘Cannot?’ Kor’sarro said. ‘Or will not?’
‘I suggest you look to the future, huntsman,’ Qan’karro said, turning his back on the Master of the Hunt. As he stalked off along the nave, he turned at the base of the steps leading up to the altar. ‘Your hunt is done, and there will be much rejoicing. Other hunts will be declared, and yet more honour will be yours.’
Qan’karro raised his voice so all the survivors of the 3rd Company who were in the cathedral could hear. ‘This hunt, the hunt for Voldorius, is over!’ he bellowed, his voice echoing the entire length of the Cathedral of the Emperor’s Wisdom.
‘All hail Kor’sarro Khan,’ the White Scars bellowed as one.
‘Master of the Hunt!’
Quote
‘Thus was the head of Kernax Voldorius taken from that defiled place, and set before Kyublai Khan, Master of the White Scars Chapter, and his name struck from the hunt. As Kor’sarro Khan had sworn, the daemon’s skull was encased in silver by the High Chaplain, and mounted upon a proud lance. At the next Rites of Howling, the prize was set upon the road to Khum Karta, and Kor’sarro’s name was engraved upon the Great Tablet of Honour, so that it might endure for all time.
The deeds of Scout-Sergeant Kholka were sung by his neophytes throughout the Long Night of the Fallen, as they would be upon the anniversary of his death for a thousand centuries to come, so long as a single White Scar lived to recall his name.
So too was the name of Brother Kergis, at whose hand the wicked Nullus was slain, graven upon the marble tablet. A great convocation of Storm Seers was held, at which Qan’karro declared the evil of Nullus was still at large in the galaxy. Despite the bodily death of that daemon-kin, all knew that his evil was not yet done, and his name too was added to the list of the enemies of the Chapter, so a future hunt might bring him to justice.
Quintus was in time restored to the Imperium. The Space Marines surrendered its care to the Imperial Guard, and a great purging of the daemon prince’s followers was instigated. All who had entered the presence of the vile one were judged, and all were cleansed, their remains scattered to the winds. The statue of the Emperor Triumphant was restored, the sisters of the Orders Pronatus piecing it together, one fragment at a time, over the course of a decade until it stood once more in all its former glory.
But the greatest legacy of the hunt for Voldorius was, it was said, that White Scars and Raven Guard, so long estranged, had stood side by side as brothers. Though it may still be many centuries before old wounds are entirely healed and old wrongs entirely forgotten, the warriors of the 3rd Company of both Chapters called one another brother, for a short time at least.
Little did Kor’sarro or Shrike know that the names of Nullus and Voldorius would one day return to haunt the nightmares of men. But that is another tale, yet to be told…’
– Omniscenti Bithisarea, Deeds of the Adeptus Astartes, Volume IX, Chapter LV, M.40 recension (supressed)
About The Author
Andy Hoare worked for eight years in Games Workshop’s design studio, producing and developing new game rules and background material for the Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 games. Now working freelance writing novels, roleplaying game material and gaming-related magazine articles, Andy lives in Nottingham with his partner Sarah and way too many cats.
To the awesome staff of Nottingham City Hospital Oncology Outpatients
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Published in 2010 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd., Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK
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