by Henry Zou
Then, just like that, the Ironclad latched the cage and left. There had been no reason, no provocation, no warning. Creaking on cabled chains they were hoisted back up, along with the bleeding corpse of Varim. Throughout the ordeal, no one made a sound. Silverstein, pressed against the body, could not look away. His bioptics watched the heat signature slowly fade, and the pulse signs taper flat to nothing.
Aridun, the smallest of the Medina Worlds, was at once both ancient and new. Six thousand years ago, the planet had suffered mass extinction. The atmosphere was eroded and its alignment to its satellite suns had bleached the planet, evaporating the great ocean basins and baking the soil with a shimmering curtain of heat. This change birthed new flora and fauna, evolving to flourish under the primordial environment. It was a new dawn only six thousand years old.
Across the ash plains were the remnants of prehistory, the crushed bones and fossil dust painted in hues of faded sepia. Where oceans once lay, vast tracts of evaporite deposit sprawled into salt flats.
On the southern belt of the horizon, a dry savannah of dunes formed the core of Imperial settlement. At least there, the seasons were temperate enough to sustain thousand kilometre reefs of cycads, ferns and ginkgoes.
The structures of settlement here predated Imperial colony. Known as the Fortress Chain, the cities formed a line of strongholds, strung out across the southern savannah. They were twenty-three city-states in all, Percassa, Argentum, ancient Barcid, dead Angkhora and nineteen others, each twenty kilometres apart in a line of squat stone chess pieces. A rampart wall four hundred kilometres long connected the walled cities in a defensive grid. The wall itself, an earthen rampart of lime and sandstone, was simply known as the Fortress Chain. Bombasts and mortars peered from embrasures that stretched across the horizon like a stone rind. It was the only bastion of civilisation and, indeed, fertile life on Aridun.
Sparsely populated and lightly garrisoned, it was odd that Aridun was the least ravaged by war. Thus far and for reasons unknown, the Archenemy incursion had been probing and sporadic. The deployment of the Ironclad was limited; CantiCol reconnaissance estimated seventy thousand enemies at most, judging by drop-ship disposition. Even then, most had been driven away from the inhabited southern belt by the chain’s aerial defences, into the Cage Isles and scorching wastelands many kilometres out.
It was on the temperate belt in the ninth chain-fortress of Argentum that Roth and the Overwatch Task Group found the Temple of the Tooth.
Roth straightened the sapphire folds of his brocaded silk robe, a fine piece of attire he often wore at rest. It had been less than a week since they had arrived on Aridun, but it was remarkable how a bath, a shave and few days of sleep had made the conflict on Cantica seem decades past. Roth stepped out into the elevated temple rooftop, his toes warmed by the soft, loamy clay tiles. Over the low parapet of the temple walls the roof offered an expansive view of the southern savannah belt. For the past two mornings, the temple priests had suggested Roth seek meditative solace on the temple walls, to recuperate himself. It was sage advice, as the landscape seemed to banish doubtful thoughts and the sharp worrying stones of his mind. Out there, bars of floral green wreathed the outskirts of the Fortress Chain. Narrow canoes meandered from the swamplands and up the city viaducts, wending towards the market districts. Further out, herds of sauropods, grey reptiles long of neck and thick of limb, grazed on the sprawling vegetation. Silverstein would have loved to hunt here, Roth thought.
The temple itself, as befitted its namesake, resembled the cusp of a human molar. An edifice constructed entirely of mud, it was a circular monument crowned by a ring of minarets some forty metres in height. Every year, before the mild rainy season, new mud would be smeared over the old walls. The city’s plasterer guilds were the only masons deemed worthy of this task.
Work started only on an auspicious day, determined by star-gazing, religious debate and when the mud in the canal channels was of the right consistency. The foundations would be blessed amid holy prayers, a mixture of Imperial verse and local incantation. Each phase of reconstruction was marked by ritual.
Once a monastic retreat, the Temple of the Tooth was now a convalescence run by the priesthood of Saint Solias. It was a genteel facility, the gymnasium and courtyards filled with the murmuring, resting infirm. Inquisitor Barq could not have selected a more suitable location for their rendezvous. After the ordeals of the past month, it was the least he could do in order to function in his official capacities. Roth had spent only two days at the convalescence, most of it in deep sleep. Nourished by the restoring meal of potted rice simmered in poultry broth, his vigour was already renewing and his wounds healing.
‘Are you feeling better? You look morose.’
Roth turned and saw Celeminé emerge from a brass door at the conical base of a minaret. Much like Roth, she had shed her battlefield attire days ago and had not donned it since. She now wore a chemise of alabaster, her throat chased with white lace. Freshened, rested and reposed, Roth thought she looked absolutely radiant.
He bowed deeply. ‘Celeminé. I am fine, thank you.’
She glided in close and pretended to pick a loose thread from his collar. ‘Don’t lie, Roth. You’re certainly not very good at it. What’s on your mind?’
Roth sighed. Although he had first thought Celeminé too young and too green to be an inquisitor, he now knew better. She was sharp, perhaps much sharper than he. More than that, despite her demeanour she was a hellcat in a firefight. Gurion had selected his colleague well.
‘It’s the ambush,’ he began. ‘The enemy, they were not the Archenemy. But more than that, they knew where we were going to be.’
‘You suspect an infiltrator,’ she said flatly.
‘I suspect,’ Roth said, choosing his words carefully, ‘that someone very high up in Imperial Command wants us dead. By all accounts, the Orphratean Purebred have been deployed in surgical strike roles by the Imperium since the onset of the Medina Campaign.’
Celeminé crinkled her nose and bit her lip-ring thoughtfully. It was a gesture Roth had grown strangely accustomed to.
‘You suspect Captain Pradal is the leak?’
‘He would be the most likely suspect, yes.’
Celeminé thought about this. ‘Or perhaps me? There is me, you know.’
Roth chuckled. He realised Celeminé was standing very close. So close that he could smell her cosmetic fragrance, hints of citrus and fresh milk.
‘If it were you who wanted me dead. Why don’t you kill me now? You could have shot me any time you wanted.’
She crinkled her nose again. ‘Or perhaps Silverstein? I mean no offence, Roth, but the puzzle fits. I’m sorry.’
The suggestion startled Roth. It had not occurred to him that Silverstein, old Bastiel, his primary agent, could have been the one to betray his whereabouts to the mercenaries. He had departed before the ambush, perhaps not on circumstances of his own choosing, but he had departed nonetheless.
‘There is a distinct possibility, yes. But–’
‘But?’
‘It would be immoral of me to regard a lost friend in such light without the Emperor’s own verification. I’d be a lesser man for it.’
Celeminé nodded. ‘I’d think less of you too. Don’t make me do that.’
Roth looked away. In the distance he spied a flock of winged reptiles, circling lazily on the solar currents. When he turned back he had recomposed himself.
‘Was there something you wanted to see me about?’
She smiled. ‘Yes. Inquisitor Barq has been waiting to see you since you arrived here. He said you both have much catching up to do in the gymnasium.’
‘The gymnasium?’
‘Of course,’ she said, taking him by the hand, ‘He’s been waiting for some time.’
Tugging him by his hand, she led Roth down the spiralling stairwells and helix corrido
rs of the temple.
They finally entered a cloistered court adjoining the main structure. Although the temple was four thousand years old at last census, the cloister was a recent addition of the plasterers’ guild. Balance beams, vaults and pommel horses sprouted from the packed dirt flooring while still rings and high bars swung from the ceiling like wooden fruit. They all served as excellent instruments of recuperation, but this early in the morning the courtyard was largely empty.
Empty but for Inquisitor Vandus Barq, limbering up at the centre of court. Although it had been decades since the progenium, Roth recognised him immediately – a young man with a wrestler’s build. His bull-neck and hulking shoulders tapered into a narrow waist wrapped in a lifting belt. The wrestler’s leotard he wore exposed forearms ridged in sinew and inked with tattoos. If Roth didn’t know him better, he might have mistaken him for gang muscle.
Barq looked up from his stretching as Celeminé drew Roth into the court.
‘Obodiah! My Throne – you’ve become ugly,’ smiled Barq as he clinched Roth in a crushing hug.
‘I haven’t had the same luxuries you have had for the past months, no,’ acknowledged Roth, still clasping forearms with his old friend.
‘By all accounts, no you have not. Gurion has thoroughly briefed me on your misfortunes.’
Roth shrugged, almost dismissively. He looked around at the gymnasium and realised he could not remember the last time he had indulged in his daily routine of fist-fencing and callisthenics.
‘What is the situation here? On Aridun, I mean,’ asked Roth.
Barq flexed his wrists and rolled his jaw to warm it up. ‘I’ll tell you all about it while we spar.’
In a way it was their ritual. It was almost but not quite a rivalry that had developed ever since they were twig-limbed progena at the academy. In his day, Roth had been the champion tetherweight fist-fencer for his age group. He was slim but he was whippet-quick. Roth’s multiple knockouts over anchorweight fencers several years his senior were still the stuff of legend within the progenium dormitories.
On the other hand, Barq was a scrapper. He was well versed in the linear system of military self-defence developed for the Cadian regiments and its surrounding subsectors. His rough brawling style was complemented by progeniate-level wrestling. Chokeholds, leg-locks, armbars and neck cranks composed the core of his unarmed arsenal.
‘It’s been years, Vandus. Either you’ve got better or you’ve too much confidence,’ remarked Roth. He adopted a low fist-fencing stance, wide-legged, springing on his toes like a dancer. The lead fist was held straight forwards, poised like a swordsman in en garde. Across the dirt floor, his opponent Barq coiled up into a wrestler’s half-crouch, hands held up in front of his face.
‘Still practising that wimpy punch-fencing nonsense, I see.’
‘It is a gentlemanly pursuit,’ chided Roth. ‘Now, are you just going to taunt me or will you tell me how Aridun fares?’
Barq stepped in cautiously. ‘Aridun is at war. But with the slaughter across the region, Aridun is low-scale in comparison. The Archenemy have deployed mass aerial landings but the numbers aren’t anywhere near as overwhelming as on the other core worlds.’
‘How about the Ironclad motorised elements? They ran roughshod through Guard infantry back on Cantica.’ Roth punctuated his question by pirouetting off his back foot and snapping his fist into a double jab.
The blows stung Vandus on the nose, catching him off guard. Growling like a wounded bull, Vandus circled off to the right. ‘Archenemy forces have been mainly infantry. Vigilant aerial defence have limited their drop zones to the wilderness at least some three hundred kilometres out from the Southern Savannah.’
Seizing upon his pre-emptive blows, Roth glided forwards and uncurled his right hand in a straight cross. The blow connected with a satisfying snap against Barq’s upper jaw. In reply Barq lunged out with a looping overhand punch, throwing all his weight behind it.
Roth took a pendulum-step backwards. With forearms raised like pillars, Roth trapped Barq’s punch. It was a technique known as ‘sticking hands’. Besides its array of fist strikes, fist-fencing also contained a thorough syllabus of fifty-one hand blocks and trapping techniques. Roth believed he had mastered forty of them by the last count. Pulling Barq off balance with his trapping block, Roth disengaged and pedalled away.
‘What of the Medina Campaign? Does the defence hold across the system?’ Roth asked between sharp intakes of breath.
‘Worse than we’d feared. Of the half-dozen satellite worlds, only Sinope remains free and even then, recent weeks have seen some heavy fighting there. Kholpesh has mired to a war of attrition that we do not have the numbers to win.’
Barq shot in for a wrestler’s takedown, dropping to his knees with his arms outstretched. Roth had been waiting for his tackle – Vandus ate several more sharp punches. Tap-tap on the jaw and nose.
‘Which leaves me to ask. Why is my task group here? Gurion said I was needed,’ said Roth, his breath becoming more laboured. To give himself space, his feet glided in radially symmetrical spirals, confounding his opponent.
‘Because I requested you.’
‘I’m flattered, old friend,’ said Roth as he scored a jab right between Barq’s eyes.
Livid red welts were beginning to appear on the cheekbones and bridge of Vandus’s nose. He shook his head to clear it and continued to speak as if unscathed.
‘I’ve been here six months and I’ve unearthed a lot. I have a contact, a xeno-archaeologist who tracked down an item of interest being held for auction by a relic collector on Kholpesh.’
‘You think you’ve found the Old Kings?’
Barq shrugged. ‘Most likely not, but the relic dates back to the War of Reclamation and we may have a lead. Inquisitor Joaquim’s agents have contacted me and seem to think it’s important enough. I trust them, so it’s the most solid lead we have thus far.’
Barq took a big penetrating step and tried the tackle again. This time Roth pivoted on the balls of his feet and whipped a flurry of punches at Barq’s head. Six punches in under a second. Despite Barq’s thickly corded neck, the wrestler was visibly rocked. He bulled forwards, striking with a series of knees, elbows and looping punches. The two fighters traded, exchanging a barrage of haemorrhaging strikes.
‘Kholpesh – why not have Inquisitor Joaquim pursue it? He heads the Conclave Task Group on Kholpesh, does he not?’ panted Roth as he circled away.
Barq closed the distance between them with a sweeping low kick. He lashed explosively in a wide arc with his shin but missed as Roth quick-stepped. Suddenly vulnerable, Barq shelled up his torso as Roth snapped his lead fist at the now-exposed head. Body head, body head, just like he had been taught in the textbooks.
‘Haven’t you heard?’ Barq huffed between Roth’s shots. ‘Inquisitor Joaquim is dead. Three weeks ago, Archenemy mechanised forces made a concerted push for the outer shelf continents on Kholpesh.’ Barq paused briefly as a crisp hook cracked his ribs. ‘The Cantican Fourth and Twelfth division were routed. Joaquim was amongst those killed.’
Roth was shocked. The grave news startled him so much he didn’t even see Barq’s takedown. Roth was slammed around the midriff. His feet cleared the air before his body came crunching down hard on the packed earth below. Momentarily dazed, the air stunned out of his lungs, Roth blinked. The equilibrium in his ears swirled with vertigo. Celeminé shrieked something in the background, but Roth couldn’t make it out.
Then he began to choke. Barq was applying a forearm across the side of Roth’s neck, jamming his weight behind the blade of his ulna. The chokehold was cutting off his carotid arteries. Blood pressurised in his head, thrumming so hard Roth could feel the tremor behind his sinus passages. He was blacking out.
‘One for me,’ growled Barq with laboured breaths. ‘That’s an Ezekiel choke. The Kasrkin taught me that on
e.’
Abruptly the pressure eased. Barq eased his hand off Roth’s neck and the blood seeped back into circulation. Rolling off him, Barq slumped onto his back, breathing hard.
‘Joaquim is dead?’ Roth croaked. Propping himself up by on an elbow, he coughed.
Nodding, Barq gestured to Celeminé. ‘The three of us are all that Gurion has at his disposal. As far as the Conclave goes anyway.’
‘When do we leave for Kholpesh?’
‘As swiftly as possible. Tomorrow I will be travelling by sauropod train into the Eridu Marches and linking up with the xeno-archaeologist. You can accompany me if you’re feeling better.’
As she heard this, Celeminé stood up from the pommel horse she had been leaning against. ‘Sauropod train? I’ve never been on one of those,’ she said.
Roth shook his head. ‘I need you to stay here and keep close scrutiny on Captain Pradal.’
Celeminé looked decidedly crestfallen, but acquiesced.
‘Vandus, can we not travel by locomotive? I’ve heard Aridun has an excellent overland transit rail,’ asked Roth.
Inquisitor Barq’s mood darkened several shades. ‘The steam locomotives have been decommissioned. The railways are far too susceptible to Archenemy attacks.’
‘Aren’t the Ironclad forces stalled beyond the demarcation line beyond the Cage Isles and western wastelands?’ asked Celeminé.
What she said was true. The heavy concentration of las-silos and other anti-air defences had driven enemy deployment out beyond the Cage Isles. By reconnaissance reports, the fragmented islands were now teeming with Archenemy nautical forces. Shoals of iron submersibles, sea-barges and plated galleys filled the Cage Isle channels, their bellies swollen with cargo and enemy troops. Imperial outposts on the demarcation line harassed them with heavy ordnance, but the vessels sailed largely unchallenged, deploying forces freely across Aridun.