by Nick Kyme
‘You come and speak with me,’ said Varr, slipping into the shadows, ‘if you find your shame and realise how you dishonour us. I can baptise your flesh anew.’
Both blades came to an abrupt halt with a shriek of angry metal. Varr had gone, so Xen’s caustic invective went unheard.
‘These scars are earned,’ he said to the darkness. ‘Mine by right. My honour. Why should I be a pariah?’
But when his indignation faded and the echoes of his declaration died with it, Xen sheathed his swords and went back to his brothers.
NINE
Noble sacrilege
Zau’ull knew he had transgressed. Alone in the deeps of the Chalice of Fire, he had besmirched the covenant of guardian and opened the repository’s seal.
The Armarium was so large that he could walk inside, and as he did so, passing through the pressure cloud vented by the door release, he found himself within a chamber unlike any other.
Here was the legacy of Vulkan. His last. Though he did not like to admit it, this place felt like a tomb and had an air about it redolent of finality and fatalism. Zau’ull had heard stories. He knew about the death of the Gorgon. When Numeon and his men had returned, having made an impossible journey through the Ruinstorm, they had brought grim tidings with them. The Iron Hands had fractured – some had broken completely – and now sought only death and vengeance. Vulkan’s death had affected all of his sons whether they knew or not, but Zau’ull hoped their father’s absence would not lead to despair.
‘It cannot,’ he whispered to the darkness, and allowed himself a little light. The cold illumination of internal lumens described five caskets fashioned of dark glass and adamantium. An exhibition of his father’s craft, he supposed. Though Vulkan had seen fit to give them each an appellation, Zau’ull did not know their names. He wondered if even T’kell did. Perhaps they would only be given them when it was earned.
But he felt something. The hand of the primarch had been upon these weapons of war. Some were small, even innocuous in their cradles and behind glass, whereas others had the shape of war engines.
It wasn’t to bask in his father’s reflected triumphs; that was not the reason for Zau’ull’s sacrilege. He did it in the vain hope that it would restore his broken faith.
‘Are you here, father?’ he asked softly of the shadows, standing in the middle of the false chamber.
Its walls were graven with images of the drake, of the fearsome beasts that dwelled beneath Nocturne and gave the Salamanders one of their cognomens. Each one glared without pity, without empathy at the fallen Chaplain desperate for some spiritual succour.
You are unworthy, they said.
‘I am Firefather!’ Zau’ull yelled and heard his voice echoed back. It rang hollow. ‘Vulkan… please…’
No answer came, save for the dull throb of the ship resonating through the walls. Even the phosphor-globes appeared to dim as if turning their light from him.
Zau’ull had sunk to his knees without realising, his outstretched hand touching a pane of dark glass mere inches from the artefact within.
Dark times had befallen them, and his brothers needed him, needed his faith and spiritual strength to uplift them.
‘How can I do that, father? How can I minister to them if I cannot minister to myself?’
He bowed his head, grief and anger turning his thoughts into a maelstrom. His hand against the glass became a fist, the metal of his gauntlet scraping against it as his fingers clenched together.
‘Father… answer me,’ he willed. ‘Answer me. Vulkan… heed your son. Heed me!’ he roared, wrenching back his fist to strike, when the crackle of the vox cut through the red fog that had fallen across his sight.
‘Firefather.’ It was Krask, hailing him over the vox. ‘You are needed.’
It felt like providence.
‘Speak, brother,’ he said, being careful to mask any residual emotion from his outburst.
‘Word has come from below, from the Forgefather. Renegades, Lord Chaplain, they have taken the Wrought.’
Feeling strength of purpose returning and a focus upon which to displace his wrath, Zau’ull stood up and raised his chin.
‘Muster your men,’ he said to Krask, ‘and have Shipmaster Reyne ready our drop pods.’ A forge ship it might be, but the Chalice of Fire still had some martial trappings. ‘Too long have we laboured under this curse! Too long have we been Unscarred. It’s time we bled again.’
Krask signed off with a rousing confirmation of his orders before Zau’ull severed the link.
‘Too long have I suffered…’ he whispered, reaching for the glass and hoping it was Vulkan’s hand that guided him as he took what was imprisoned behind it.
TEN
The Drakes hunt
The gunship came in low, using the ruined city to mask its approach and taking care to stay out of augur range. Once it had reached the very edge of the point where it could be detected, the Thunderhawk slowed and banked before coming to a halt. It hovered a few feet above the ground, spilling eddies of dust away from the downdraught of the humming turbines keeping it aloft. A side hatch opened, and five figures stepped out, dropping to the ground before disappearing into the ruins.
Then the gunship climbed, the turbines spinning faster until it had cleared any obstacles. The thrusters kicked in and it joined the second Thunderhawk as they sped for the encampment not far off on the horizon.
‘How long until Krask and his Terminators make planetfall?’ Zandu asked, shouting into the vox as he vied against the engine noise whipping through the hold.
‘Via drop pod insertion, it will be fast,’ T’kell replied, his voice a crackling machine-like echo in Zandu’s ear. ‘Their landing is timed to coincide with our assault.’
‘We are less than twenty minutes out.’
‘Then you have your answer.’
Zandu nodded then switched channels.
‘Xen.’
‘We are close,’ the legionary replied. ‘Make sure you ram it down their throats.’
‘You have eighteen minutes.’
‘Understood.’
The link went dead and Zandu sagged, a little grateful for the guide rail as he held on. He was out of his harness, standing with boots mag-locked to the deck. They all were. The rad-counter of his retinal lens display had reached several thousand rads. Enough to kill a mortal man within hours.
Vulkan had no Destroyers amongst his ranks; he had forbidden them because of the sheer ruination such warriors caused, but, during the Crusade, Zandu had seen them. Radiation weapons were only one of the means used to end the enemies of the Imperium. Back then it had almost felt necessary, but now it was horrific. He remembered an Iron Warrior who had just returned from the front, having unleashed phosphex and intense radiation bombing as part of his unit. The legionary looked grim enough in his war-torn armour, streaked in dirt and blackened by fire. The Salamanders were a relieving force, intended to lift the burden of the war for a while so the Iron Warriors could refit and resupply for battles elsewhere. Their association had been fleeting, but it stuck with Zandu because of what he saw when the Iron Warrior removed his helm.
It had been hot in the warzone, and the last stretch of it was a dense tranche of jungle, hence the Salamanders and their Pyroclasts. Zandu knew back then it had to have been stifling in that legionary’s armour. So, when they were returning from the front and realised that relief had arrived, the Iron Warrior took off his helm in spite of the biting flies and the heat that trembled in the air that stank of sweat and blood. He drank it in, through a mouth with six teeth. The others had fallen out, like much of his hair. His eyes were sunken, his flesh too, and it carried an almost waxy sheen that glowed faintly in certain light.
He had smiled when he had noticed Zandu looking at him, an ugly gesture yet still worthy of pity.
‘Welcome to the war,’ he had said in the death rattle of a condemned man.
Bone, flesh, hair, every cell of this legionary had been irradiated and it was to
be his doom. A Space Marine was hardy but he was not invincible. Most would die anyway, in battle, but this one was not so far from duty’s end and he was returning victorious. He had smiled again to Zandu when no reply was forthcoming from the Salamanders legionary, ironically perhaps, but the image of his grim and skeletal visage had been forever seared onto his memory. He recalled it again now, as he tasted the blood in his mouth and smelt it in his nostrils. Wet metal, like old copper, filling his every sense and dispelling the myth of immortality.
Apothecary Fai’sho from Zandu’s squad looked over at him, questioning even through his retinal lenses.
‘Brother-sergeant?’
Zandu made an effort to stand straight and appear strong.
‘I am fine. Hold to your purpose, brother. War will be upon us all soon.’
Fai’sho nodded and looked away, but Zandu kept his eyes on the rad counter and his armour’s insistent integrity warnings.
Red. Red. Red.
Xen stalked through the ruins of the dead city. He passed through domiciles and commercia districts, through narrow streets and wide plazas. The people were all dead, but the corpse of their city lingered, reluctant to expire except perhaps towards entropy.
Four others followed in his wake, moving fast and keeping low in their bulky war-plate. The Mark IV variant was hardly made for stealth – that was the province of the lighter protection worn by reconnaissance Vigilators – but Xen moved with a grace that belied the weight and heft of his armour. His brothers emulated him, matching his movements expertly.
The south facing of the encampment was damaged. Unless the Mechanicum had already effected repairs, the section of wall opposite the entry gate would be festooned with wreckage and structurally unstable defences. The exploding promethium tanks cooked off by Varr had seen to it, at the time both a distraction and a punitive move to reduce the enemy’s combat efficacy. Now, it yielded further benefit… if Xen and his squad could move unseen and breach the wall’s cordon undetected.
Zandu would have to play his part, and Krask.
He paused and looked skywards. The storm continued to boil, and the night was shot through with iridescent purple and red. Soon it would burn with the contrails of drop pods and then the Wrought would be theirs.
Emerging through the dense ruins of a collapsed habitation block, Xen sighted the encampment. It loomed above most of the dilapidated structures left standing in the city, the slab of dark grey metal walls declaring its dominion. A crack zigzagged from its base to its apex. Shrapnel from the explosion choked the battlements under a swathe of debris and no watchtower overlooked it.
Xen battle-signed for a halt, and then opened up the vox.
‘Two hundred feet out.’
‘Confirmed.’
‘Advancing to final position.’
‘Await signal.’
Xen cut the link.
Three legionaries in drake-green war-plate silently awaited his next command, but Xen’s attention lingered on a fourth armoured in red.
‘Are you prepared for this, Forgefather?’
‘I have been prepared since the moment I donned this mantle,’ T’kell replied, clutching a fistful of the drake hide cloaking his shoulders and brandishing it at Xen.
‘I only meant as a Techmarine, you might not–’
‘Are you prepared, Vexillary?’
Xen nodded. ‘I suppose all of us are having to adapt now.’
‘Zandu asked you to watch me, didn’t he?’
Xen glanced at his comrades, who tried not to react. Then he nodded for a second time in as many minutes.
‘You do not need to,’ said T’kell. ‘Watch them.’ He gestured to the walls and the renegades the Salamanders legionaries knew awaited them within.
They moved out.
ELEVEN
Wolves no longer
Rayko Solomus had left the pit and was sitting on an ammo crate looking out from the battlements on the north wall. He saw the city ruins and the decaying horizon, and found himself unmoved. As he only half heard the menials toiling somewhere below and behind him, Solomus wondered how long he had been this way. Dead inside, bereft of feeling. Only when he held the torturer’s knife did a mote of true emotion return, and even that had been denied to him. The Mechanicum emissary had the Drake now.
‘He did not scream?’ asked Nevok, stopping to regard Solomus as he loaded a fresh shell into his weapon’s clip. ‘They certainly can take pain.’
Nevok stood sentry, waiting for the Salamanders to come. Sons of Horus stood at arms now, bolters at the ready, a squad of heavy weapons with their sights trained on the skies. Their subterfuge no longer any use to them, they would fight the Salamanders in open battle. They were bloodied, though. A row of dead lay in a makeshift apothecarion, waiting for Renk to remove their progenoids. Even the survivors had burns and scorched armour.
‘They are born unto it,’ said Solomus, ‘unto fire and death.’
Nevok nodded as he slipped in another bolt shell. ‘Have you seen their bodies? His scars had scars.’
Solomus drew his knife, admiring the sharpness of the blade. ‘He killed Hajuk, Morvek and Ezremas,’ he said, counting the legionaries off one at a time on his gauntleted fingers. ‘At the same time. He fought them, three against one.’
Nevok laughed as he slammed the clip back into his boltgun. ‘I seriously doubt that. The Drake was a fighter – anyone who is Legion could see that – but all three…’ He shook his head and scoffed, ‘Ezremas alone would have gutted him. These Drakes are warm-blooded, but they are not like us. They are weak.’
‘He did it,’ said a voice from behind them. Vosto Kurnan made his way up to the battlements via a metal stair that creaked under his armoured weight. ‘I saw him,’ he added matter-of-factly, coming to stand beside the other two legionaries.
‘Then why did you not intervene?’
‘They had done themselves enough dishonour without my defeat of the Drake making it worse,’ he said. ‘Besides, I hated Hajuk, Morvek and Ezremas.’
‘You hate everyone, brother.’
‘True,’ Kurnan said lightly, and looked askance at Nevok, ‘but I reserve an especial hatred for some. And they aren’t weak,’ he added. ‘You never served at Isstvan Five, you never saw them fight.’
Nevok looked at them both, nonplussed. ‘What? That was butchery, not service.’
Kurnan drew close. Nevok had his bolter by his side and fully loaded.
‘We had them, brother. The Ravens were abroad, guerrilla fighting even then. The Gorgon and his warriors… well, they were hell-bent on Fulgrim. But we had the Drakes, surrounded, outnumbered, at the mercy of the high ground and our entrenched artillery. You should have seen the Iron Warriors pummel them…’ He shook his head as if remembering the events he was describing in vivid detail. ‘Any other foe would have died and died fast, and they did,’ he said, and his voice grew low and more menacing, ‘but those Drakes refused to yield. They fought even as the bombs rained and their brethren fell in droves. Even when the Gorgon died and the Lord of Drakes fell soon after, and when the Raven fled… they kept on. And on. Some had lost limbs, others were impaled or blind, wounded beyond any reasonable capacity to function, even for legionaries.’
Kurnan backed off, but his eyes still burned into Nevok’s through his retinal lenses.
‘I have heard it said that when you kill one of Guilliman’s sons, you make sure he is dead. Vulkan’s sons… well, they just don’t die at all.’
‘Have no fear, Vosto,’ uttered Solomus, rising from the ammo crate, ‘I will kill any that you can’t.’
Kurnan glared.
‘I respect them, Solomus, as you would do well to.’
‘While you are affording them the necessary respect, I shall be gutting them, brother.’ Solomus held up his knife. ‘With this.’
Kurnan scoffed, unimpressed. ‘I hope you fight better than you interrogate,’ he said.
‘Ah, well,’ Solomus replied and the smile between
clenched teeth could be heard in his tone, ‘as you say, they are resilient.’
‘Yes, and they are coming. Here. Soon.’ Kurnan looked to the distant horizon, as if expecting to see them there.
‘Regulus is counting on it,’ said Nevok.
‘He needs them inside,’ Kurnan told him.
‘I cannot promise to be genial as I leave open the door, brother,’ said Solomus.
Kurnan faced him again. ‘You can rest assured they won’t hold back with us. They hate us.’
‘Betrayal has its cost, I suppose.’
‘Indeed.’
‘We should have hunted them down,’ said Solomus to Kurnan as he began to walk away.
‘Yes, we should, and now we’ll reap the profits of that arrogance.’
Kurnan descended from the rampart, leaving his brothers to their duty.
‘I expect it to be a bitter harvest,’ said Solomus.
He laughed, humming to himself as he toured the rest of the battlements.
TWELVE
As we have burned
Xen heard rather than saw Zandu’s signal. A gunship on a strafing run screamed out of the darkness and blew a section of wall apart with the last of its missile payload. The explosion turned the night fiery red as the contrails of rockets chased it away.
A second detonation erupted moments after the first, smaller and concealed in the slow-receding wake of the missile attack. Three krak grenades affixed to the south wall went off simultaneously and tore a fissure in the defences wide enough for a legionary to pass through.
Xen went first, climbing over the v-shaped breach and into the encampment. Smoke and the wreckage accrued from the first battle provided thick cover and the squad was able to advance unseen. After they had progressed only a few feet beyond the threshold, Xen ordered a halt.
‘Why do we linger, brother?’ asked Phokan, a legionary from Zandu’s depleted squad.
Ahead, at the entrance to the horseshoe-walled encampment, Zandu and the others fought ferociously. Bolters sang a deadly chorus, but the power armour worn by the Legions was made to be hardy and bore the brunt of fire from either side.