+Interesting. Perhaps we’ve been linked with her too long, and too often.+
+Agreed.+ I turned back to the inquisitor. ‘Mistress, how are the Wolves reacting to the ordos’ decision?’
Captain Castor didn’t bother to rise from his feet. ‘I can answer that, sir.’ He tapped several keys on his throne’s armrest. ‘The Wolves’ flagship has been broadcasting this signal to our fleet for the last three hours, on automated loop.’
I listened as the Great Wolf’s voice resolved from the static. ‘…sition vessels. The voice you hear is that of Jarl Grimnar. I request that you stand down from these plans of yours. Take this request in the spirit in which it’s offered. It would be unfortunate if I had to repeat it as a warning. This is the Fenrisian warship Scramaseax, to all Inquisition vessels. The voice you hear is–’
‘They don’t sound happy,’ Darford pointed out, from his place at Annika’s side. His rifle was over his shoulder.
I ascended the steps to Talwyn’s throne, taking my own place on the dais. ‘We are dealing with a Chapter that has, on several occasions, suffered censure from various dioceses of the Ecclesiarchy, as well as come under investigation by members of the Inquisition itself. They’re proud souls, and they have every right to be furious at how our masters are dealing with this world. But they’re being naive if they think anyone will heed those words.’
Malchadiel followed me up, his awkward gait drawing eyes from all across the chamber.
‘But what if they react… unfavourably?’
‘They won’t.’
‘But if they do?’
I didn’t want to consider it. That way lay madness. ‘Talwyn.’
‘Aye, sir.’
‘Show me the fleet, please.’
‘Aye, sir. Occulus, sweeping reveal across the fleet. Auspex to track, sing back every signal.’
It didn’t take long. Even in the months since the Great Beast’s banishment, most of the vessels to arrive had been long-haulage cruisers for Imperial Guard troops. There must be close to a million fresh soldiers on the surface, not even counting the several million survivors.
Seeing all those ships gave me a thought I couldn’t shake free.
+What if we’d waited?+ I sent to Mal.
He laughed from across the dais, as if I’d said something amusing out loud. More eyes turned to him, which he devoutly ignored.
+So many answers exist to that question, brother. The flaw in such reasoning is that there are no wrong answers. You could say that the fallen primarch’s very unholiness demanded we act as soon as we were able, to banish such corruption from humanity’s empire – and you’d be right. Or you could say it was better to lose a hundred knights than a whole world of innocents.+
+I’d have said the same only a few months ago.+ I didn’t turn to look at him as we conversed. One of the many advantages of telepathic communion was the ability to focus on other things at the same time. +But look at what the ordos are planning. Why did we rush into that battle and kill ourselves by the dozen, if the Inquisition was going to decide to sterilise and cull the population anyway? We lost one hundred knights for a populace that are doomed to misery and extermination, despite our sacrifice. I see no justice in that, Mal.+
+When you put it like that… It does rather make the blood run cold.+
+I think I understand what Annika means. In such a light, the Wolves’ reaction – already noble enough – takes on another layer of righteousness. They’ve lost warriors, too. How many of them died in glory, only to learn now it had all been in vain, defending a doomed population?+
Malchadiel sent back the impression of a weary smile. +I have no answer for you, brother. I wish I did.+
I suddenly wanted to speak with Brand Rawthroat, though I doubted it would do any good.
Captain Castor announced his findings with a stern expression. ‘The fleet numbers at twenty-eight vessels capable of void warfare, sir. Eight are Titan interceptors and warships, wearing the Chapter’s grey. The Karabela brings the total to nine. A full sixteen are Fenrisian, belonging to the Wolves, including the capital ship Scramaseax. The remaining three are Inquisitorial cruisers, including the Imperial Navy vessel Corel’s Hope, commandeered for this operation by Lord Inquisitor Ghesmei Kysnaros.’
So the Wolves outnumbered us in the void. Significantly. With sixteen ships, that surely represented almost half of their Chapter fleet.
‘And the Imperial Guard troop ships?’
‘Wallowing cogs and bloated whaleships, sir. Twenty of them. None are battle-capable. At least, they can fire their little guns all day and night, and not scratch us even on a gamble.’
If everything should somehow go wrong, the Wolf and Guard vessels outnumbered us three to one. Even with the troop transports being effectively worthless in a void war, the odds weren’t in our favour.
I thanked him and looked back to Annika. ‘Despite their protests, the Wolves are still collared by Imperial Law, mistress.’
She bared her teeth in something that wasn’t a smile. ‘I hope you’re right, Hyperion.’
Annika departed the bridge, and her warband followed. Darford had a nod of acknowledgement for me, the Khatan a smile, and Vasilla a soft prayer. Clovon gave nothing more than a look, and Merrick refused even that. His cyber-mastiff stalked at his heels.
+How is your back?+ I sent to Malchadiel once they were gone.
+On fire. Don’t worry about me, brother. I believe Captain Castor is about to ask you for…+
‘Orders, sir?’ asked Talwyn.
I watched Armageddon turn and burn on the occulus. Right now, even as we waited in orbit, entire city populations were being rounded up. What were they being told? What honeyed lies were being poured in their ears, to get them to go willingly into a program of sterilisation and forced labour camps?
I’d thought we were dying for these people. I’d believed we were selling our lives to purge this world of evil.
Instead, we’d fallen in droves, purely to preserve a planet’s industrial infrastructure, so Armageddon could keep churning out ten million battle tanks a year in the care of a new colonist population. I wasn’t sure that was worth so many lives, though I could almost imagine Dumenidon arguing with me.
The armies of mankind need those weapons, he’d say. What is the loss of one world against all those that would fall without Armageddon’s armaments?
And he’d be right, but the truth would still taste foul. This was why Galeo forever advised us against questioning our leaders. Too many truths. It wasn’t our place to choose the right one. It was our place to heed what we were told.
‘We wait,’ I said to Talwyn, ‘and hope our masters have thought this through.’
NINETEEN
THE FIRST TO FIRE
I
The Wolves weren’t fools. They knew what lay in store for the valiant defenders of Armageddon. Powerless on the ground, it still didn’t stop them attempting to halt the herding of the population into wilderness labour camps. Reports started to reach us of Wolves threatening Inquisitorial storm troopers, and convoys of civilians never reaching their assigned refugee camps. If the Wolves were hiding them, they were doing so with a cunning that defeated orbital surveillance.
The Karabela was ordered to align its auspex scanners groundwards, and join in the search. I wasn’t certain I wanted them to find anything at all. The scale of the purge felt wrong, and I was already weary of paying lip service to it.
I refused to walk the surface, and not only because Lord Joros’s orders demanded I remain in orbit. I had no desire at all to stand with my brothers, or the legions of Inquisitorial storm troopers, corralling the deluded, innocent souls from their cities.
I learned the lies we were telling them, though. That, more than anything, left the foulest taste on my tongue. The truth came from Lord Joros himself, though he met my disgust with dispassion when we discussed the matter over the vox.
‘The Inquisition is already at work,’ he said of the he
rding. ‘The cities are emptying under watchful eyes.’
‘What lies are we feeding them, lord?’
‘Be mindful of your choice of words, Hyperion.’
‘I will, Grand Master. I would appreciate an answer, though.’
‘They are being told the cities must be temporarily evacuated for sacred cleansing. Then the people will be allowed to return. Guardsmen will, of course, watch over their homes and belongings, sparing them from looters.’
I laughed at the falsehoods, not bothering to hide my bitterness.
Annika was the one to enlighten me about the sterilisation. I didn’t thank her for it, either. She came onto the bridge almost a week after I had last seen her, and fixed me with her pale blue eyes.
‘Would you like to know how the ordos are rendering an entire population sterile?’
No. I had no desire for that knowledge – none at all. How would it help?
‘I would rather not know, mistress.’
‘Injections,’ she said. ‘I’ve been down there. I’ve seen it myself. They’re given injections upon entry to the work camps. Men, women, even the children. They’re being told it’s to protect against disease. Instead, it’s ending millions of families, making them the last generation descended from this world’s original colonists.’
‘I told you, it is none of my business. My focus is the field of battle, not the aftermath.’ I felt on the edge of losing my temper with her, and it was difficult to remember a show of anger would achieve nothing. She’d come back after a week on the surface, purely to throw these accusations at me. As if this was my fault. As if I could do anything about it even if I wished to. ‘You’re the inquisitor, mistress. Your brothers and sisters are the ones doing this.’
She spat on the bridge deck. Strangely, the gesture wounded me, that she would show such disregard for Castian and the Karabela.
‘You’re a knight, Hyperion. There is nothing noble or righteous in exterminating an innocent population, yet you stand by and do nothing. All of you.’
I turned away from her, feigning a sudden interest in a control console. ‘If the deed is so objectionable to you, Inquisitor Jarlsdottyr, then perhaps you should do something about it. Venting your wrath at me serves no purpose, when you and the ordos hold all the power.’
‘I’ve killed before, Hyperion. I’ve murdered to keep secrets. A whole city sector once died by my order, burning up in fire from the sky, because I had to be sure a single cult was eradicated. But this is genocide. A global purge, for the basest of reasons, convenience. The troop transports will leave within the week, Grey Knight. What will you do then?’
I turned back to her, speaking through clenched teeth. Armoured as I was, I towered above her.
‘I’ll open fire on them and consign those brave souls to oblivion, as the Inquisition will no doubt order me to do. I’ll do my duty, Annika.’
‘You will address me as Inquisitor Jarlsdottyr.’
‘I will address you as traitor if you keep voicing heresy in front of me. The Inquisition speaks, and we act. It’s the way of things. You lecture me for what? Preparing to obey orders? Should I teleport down there with Malchadiel limping behind me, resurrect my dead brothers through the power of wishful thinking, and slaughter my way through a hundred thousand Inquisitorial storm troopers? Is that what you’d have of me?’
She met me bark for bark, to use her own phrase. ‘Think, Hyperion. What do you think Jarl Grimnar will do when the troop ships make ready to depart? The Wolves are weak on the ground, without the numbers to challenge the ordos. But in orbit? In orbit, where their fleet vastly outnumbers the Inquisition’s?’
I shook my head. ‘They wouldn’t defy us. It would be madness.’
She snorted, undeniably feral, and her lip curled as she turned away. Without another word, Inquisitor Jarlsdottyr left the strategium. The Khatan and Vasilla remained for a moment, just long enough to impart their own unique brands of wisdom.
The Khatan, for once, didn’t grin. ‘Just when I thought you couldn’t be any more useless at dealing with women, Two-Guns.’
What was I supposed to say to that? What did it even mean? ‘Why do you talk to me like this? You know I have no idea what you mean.’
She shook her head and left, seemingly unimpressed by my answer. Vasilla looked as close to nervous as I’d ever seen her. She forced a shy smile and made to leave herself.
‘Fortune be with you, Hyperion.’
That was no less confusing, for it had all the hallmarks of a farewell.
II
Three nights later, the first troop transport made its move.
The Trident of Ilmatha drifted into high orbit, the first step in readiness to leave the world of Armageddon behind. We watched it – Malchadiel, Talwyn and myself – on the Karabela’s occulus screen.
With no desire to increase the crew’s tension, which was already palpable, Mal and I did our best to display no emotion. Captain Castor had no such reservations. He sat in his throne, linked fingers against his lips, staring to the point of forgetting to blink.
‘Mark my words, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘This is about to become quite the shitpit of curse words and short tempers.’
The Trident of Ilmatha was a fat lady, modified for greater transport capacity according to the whims of the Administratum in whatever subsector it had first originated. Its capacity for void warfare walked the border between ignorable and laughable, with almost all its bulk given over to additional cargo holds, communal barracks and engine deck space.
I’d not seen many Guard transports, but she was singularly the ugliest vessel I’d ever laid eyes on, putting me in mind of a fat-bellied whale too awkward to swim unaided.
‘Throne, she’s an ugly bitch,’ Talwyn said, from his throne nearby. ‘It’d be a waste to shoot each other to pieces over a junker like her, wouldn’t it?’
‘It would be a waste to shoot each other to pieces at all.’
‘As you say, Sir Malchadiel. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.’
The Trident rose higher, beginning its slow, slow turn to face away from the world. She’d fire her engines to break orbit in a minute, perhaps two. If something was going to happen, it was going to happen soon.
‘What are the Space Wolves vessels doing?’ I asked.
Shora, the heavily augmented mistress of auspex, shook her head back at us. ‘Nothing, sirs. They’re not moving at all.’
I watched the fleet for another few moments, unsurprised when the vox crackled live.
+Here it comes,+ Malchadiel sent.
‘This is the Fire of Dawn to the Karabela.’
‘I hear you, Lord Joros.’
‘Hyperion, you are to escort the Trident of Ilmatha to the jump point past Pelucidar. Once it reaches the transit point and you’re out of auspex range from the fleet, you know what to do.’
‘As you command.’
‘In the Emperor’s name.’ The link went dead. In the silence that followed, Captain Castor looked at me, his eyes laden with meaning.
‘Orders, sir?’
‘Ready the engines for escort formation. Open a channel to the Trident of Ilmatha.’
‘Done, sir.’
‘This is the Karabela, to the transport vessel Trident of Ilmatha.’
A male voice crackled back with a short delay. ‘This Captain Farrisen of the Trident. We hear you, Karabela.’
‘We will be your escort to the jump point. Acknowledge.’
‘Negative, Karabela.’
Malchadiel and I shared a glance. +This isn’t good,+ he pulsed.
‘Forgive me, Trident. You have no choice in the matter. This order comes from the highest authority in the fleet.’
‘We appreciate it, Karabela, but the Runefyre has already been chosen to escort us.’
+Kill the link,+ I sent to Captain Castor. He did so, blinking at my sudden telepathy.
‘Done, sir.’
‘Follow the Trident, despite its protests.’ The ship shiver
ed as it woke, the engines opening up.
On the occulus, I watched the fat-hulled troop ship accelerating with all the speed and grace of a wounded mollusc. At this rate, it would take eleven hours to reach the safe transit point past the world of Pelucidar. By comparison, the Karabela alone might have reached it in less than one.
‘The Runefyre has fired its engines,’ said Castor. ‘They’re shadowing the Trident.’
I watched it taking place on the occulus, as the Space Wolves frigate – a tiny thing in comparison to the troop ship – took up a protective formation.
‘Don’t do this…’ I said.
‘Orders, sir?’
‘Maintain course. The Runefyre is no bigger than us. What are its capabilities?’
Malchadiel was the one to answer. ‘It’s a Gladius frigate, brother. Twenty thousand crew, perhaps a few thousand more. We outgun it, and could easily outrun it.’
‘They’re testing us.’
Malchadiel nodded. ‘I believe so.’
‘Open a channel to the Fire of Dawn.’ Once it was done, I realised I wasn’t sure what to say. The situation was unprecedented. ‘Lord Joros–’
‘We see it, Hyperion. We believe the Wolves are merely posturing. Keep to your orders.’
‘With all due respect, lord… If they aren’t posturing, what do you expect me to do?’
The delay was painful, and telling. ‘I expect you to do your duty, Hyperion.’
‘Grand Master, I cannot open fire on an Adeptus Astartes vessel. I will not be party to heresy.’
‘You forget yourself, Hyperion. Letting these Guardsmen leave this system alive is the basest heresy of all. You know what they’ve seen. Their lives were forfeit the moment they witnessed it. If the Wolves refuse to see reason, then they will share in the necessary fate.’
The link blanked out, terminated at the other end.
‘This is ludicrous.’
Malchadiel agreed with a nod. ‘The Wolves hold the cards. We need more ships to face them. They won’t stand down unless we offer a greater show of force.’
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