Afterwards, when sight had returned to each of them, they stood motionless in their communal chamber. Each warrior’s armour was dusted with a fine layer of ash: all that remained of Garisath after the blinding flash of plasma release.
‘You made your point.’ Harugan growled his disapproval, and even the smallest movement – a gesture towards Dal Karus’s weapon – sent dust powdering off his armour plating. ‘Nothing left to salvage now.’
Dal Karus answered by nodding down at Vejain. ‘Some salvage exists. And we are not led by a madman. Take heart in that.’
The others came forwards now, treating Vejain’s body with little more respect than they’d show to an enemy’s corpse. The body would be dragged to the apothecarion, where its gene-seed organs would be extracted. The armour would be machined off into its component pieces and divided among Vejain’s brothers.
‘Now you lead,’ said Yan Sar.
Dal Karus nodded, little pleased by the fact. ‘I do. Will you challenge me? Will any of you challenge me?’ He turned to his brothers. None answered immediately, and it was Yan Sar that replied again.
‘We will not challenge you. But retribution beckons, and you must lead us to it. First Claw killed Tor Xal.’
‘We have lost three souls this day. One to treachery, one to misfortune, one to necessity.’ Dal Karus’s own beaked faceplate was a Mark-VI helm of avian design, painted a dull red to match the others of Third Claw. Snaking burn scars were branded deep into the composite metal. ‘If we go against First Claw, we will lose more. And I have no wish to fight the prophet.’
He didn’t add that one of the reasons he’d killed Garisath had been in the hope of avoiding the fight now threatening them. ‘We are no longer of Halasker’s companies. We are the Branded, Third Claw, of the Exalted’s warband. We are Night Lords, born anew. A new beginning. Let us not baptise our genesis in the blood of our brothers.’
For a moment, he believed he’d swayed them. They shared glances and muttered words. But reality reasserted itself with crushing finality mere seconds later.
‘Vengeance,’ promised Yan Sar.
‘Vengeance,’ the others echoed.
‘Then vengeance it is,’ Dal Karus nodded, and led his brothers into the very battle he’d murdered Garisath to prevent.
Soon after the accord was reached, the remaining members of Third Claw stalked down the central spinal corridor of the prison deck, blades and bolters in gauntleted hands. What little light existed on the Covenant of Blood played across their armour, and shadows pooled in the black rune brands burned into the war plate.
Voices ahead, from behind the closed bulkhead leading into a side chamber.
‘Do we ambush them?’ Yan Sar asked.
‘No,’ Harugan chuckled. ‘They know we will not let Tor Xal go unavenged. They are already expecting us, I am sure of it.’
The Branded moved closer to the sealed door.
‘First Claw,’ Dal Karus called, taking pains to keep any reluctance from bleeding into his voice. ‘We have come for you.’
Cyrion watched his auspex’s monochrome display screen. The hand-held scanner clicked every few seconds, giving a wash of audible static.
‘I count seven out there,’ he said. ‘Eight or nine, if they’re bunched up.’
Talos moved to the doorway, uncoupling his bolter from the mag-lock plating on his thigh armour. The weapon was bulky, rendered ornate by bronzing, bearing two wide-mouth barrels. He still felt a stab of reluctance to carry it so openly. Its bulk didn’t discomfort him, but its legacy did.
He called through the sealed door. ‘We’ll settle the blood debt with a duel. Xarl will fight for First Claw.’
In the chamber, Xarl gave a dirty laugh behind his faceplate. No answer came.
‘I’ll deal with this,’ Talos said to First Claw. He blink-clicked icons on his retinal display, summoning up the runes for other squads in the vox array. The Branded, Third Claw, flashed active.
‘Dal Karus?’ he asked.
‘Talos.’ Dal Karus’s voice was low over the occluded vox-channel. ‘I am sorry for this.’
‘How many of you are out there?’
‘An interesting question, brother. Does it matter?’
Worth a try. Talos took a breath. ‘We count seven of you.’
‘Then let us settle on that. Seven still outnumbers four, prophet.’
‘Five, if I free Uzas.’
‘Seven still outnumbers five.’
‘But one of my five is Xarl.’
Dal Karus grunted reluctant acknowledgement. ‘That is indeed so.’
‘How did you come to lead Third Claw?’
‘I cheated,’ said Dal Karus. With the words spoken as simple confession, he offered no justification, nor any excuse. Irritatingly, Talos found himself warming to the other warrior.
‘This will bleed us both,’ Talos said.
‘I am not blind to that, prophet. And I did not spit on my allegiance to Halasker just to die on this crippled ship mere months later.’ There was nothing of anger in Dal Karus’s voice. ‘I do not blame you for Uzas’s... instability. I dealt with Tor Xal for long enough myself that I am all too familiar with the affliction of taint. But the blood debt must be paid, and the Branded will not settle for a duel of champions. My own actions may have annihilated any lingering worth in that tradition among us, but even before I acted, they were howling for revenge.’
‘Then you shall have your blood-price,’ the prophet said with a rueful smile, and severed the link.
Talos turned back to his brothers. Cyrion stood at ease, his weapon in his hands, only his slouched shoulder guards giving any indication of his reluctance to leave the chamber. Mercutian could have been carved from granite, so dark and motionless as he stood unbowed by the massive cannon in his fists. The heavy bolter’s cavernous barrel thrust from a skull’s open maw. Xarl clutched a two-handed chainblade in an easy grip, leaving his bolt weapons locked to his armour within quick reach.
‘Let’s get on with it,’ he said, and even vox-corruption couldn’t hide the smile in his voice.
Mercutian crouched, tending to his heavy bolter. The cannon was as unsubtle as Legion weaponry could be: wrapped in industrial chains and capable of vomiting a brutal rain of fire from its fat throat. ‘Third Claw will use bolters over blades. If Tor Xal is dead, we won’t have much to contend with once we stand within sword’s reach. Getting into sword’s reach will see us dead, though. They’ll cut us to pieces with bolter fire.’ He sounded as maudlin as ever.
Xarl barked a laugh and spoke in his gutter Nostraman. ‘Smoke grenades as soon as the door opens. That buys us a couple of seconds before their preysight re-tunes. Then we’ll bring blades to a gunfight.’
Silence reigned for a moment.
‘Free me,’ the last member of First Claw snarled.
Four helms turned to their brother, slanted red eyes judging without a trace of human emotion.
‘Talos,’ Uzas spat the name as he trembled, forcing his speech through clenched teeth. ‘Talos. Brother. Free me. Let me stand in midnight clad.’
Something black trickled in a wet leak from his ear. The stink of Uzas’s skin was cringingly ripe.
Talos spoke the words as he drew the relic sword from its sheath on his back.
‘Release him.’
V
REVENGE
She found Septimus in Blackmarket, and saw him before he noticed her. Through the thin crowd, she watched him as he talked to the gathered serfs and crew. The scruffy fall of his hair almost covered the bionics on the left side of his face, where his temple and cheek had been rebuilt with subtle augmetics of composite metals, contoured to match his facial structure. It was a degree of surgical sophistication she’d rarely seen outside of the wealthiest theocratic covens and noble families of Terra’s tallest spires. Even now, the other humans looked upon him with a varied clash of dislike, envy, trust and adoration. Few slaves aboard the Covenant wore their value to the Night Lords so
openly.
With the communal market chamber less crowded than it had been before the Siege of Crythe, it was also less stifling and oppressive. Unfortunately, without the press of bodies, it was also colder – as cold as the rest of the ship. Her breath misted as she watched the crowd. The attendant hunched alongside her seemed content to mutter to himself.
‘I thought we’d captured more... people,’ she said to him. When he turned blind eyes up to her and didn’t answer, she qualified her statement. ‘The new slaves from Ganges. Where are they?’
‘In chains, mistress. Chained in the hold. There they stay, until we leave dock.’
Octavia shuddered. This was her home now. She was an undeniable part of what went on here.
Across the chamber, Septimus was still speaking. She had no idea what he was saying. His Nostraman came in a whispering flow, and Octavia could make out maybe one word in ten. Instead of trying to follow the thread of what he was saying, she watched the faces of those he spoke to. Several were scowling or jostling their fellows, but most seemed placated by whatever he was telling them. She smothered a grin at his impassioned sincerity, the way he turned to people with a gentle gesture to make a point, the way he argued with his eyes as well as his words.
The smile died on her lips as she saw one of the faces in the crowd, darkened by weariness. It was a face in mourning, and coping by wearing a mask of grim anger. Rather than interrupt Septimus, Octavia moved through the crowd, apologising softly in Gothic as she made her way closer to the grief-stricken man. He noticed her as she neared, and she saw him swallow.
‘Asa fothala su’surushan,’ he said, dismissing her with a weak wave of his hand.
‘Vaya vey... um... I...’ she felt a blush rising to her cheeks as the words stuck in her mouth. ‘Vaya vey ne’sha.’
The people surrounding her were backing away now. She paid them no heed. Given what was hidden beneath the bandana around her forehead, she was used to being ostracised.
‘I haven’t seen you since... the battle,’ she forced the words to her lips. ‘I just wanted to say–’
‘Kishith val’veyalass, olmisay.’
‘But... Vaya vey ne’sha,’ she repeated. ‘I don’t understand.’ She said it in Gothic in case her halting Nostraman hadn’t been clear enough.
‘Of course you don’t.’ The man made the dismissive gesture again. His bloodshot eyes were ringed by the dark circles of a mounting sleep debt, and his voice cracked. ‘I know what you wish to say, and I do not wish to hear. No words will bring back my daughter.’ His Gothic was rusty from disuse, but emotion lent meaning to the words. ‘Shrilla la lerril,’ he sneered at her with a whisper.
‘Vellith sar’darithas, volvallasha sor sul.’ The words came from Septimus, at the heart of the crowd. He pushed through the people to stand before the other man. Although the other slave was surely no older than forty, privation and sorrow had aged him far beyond his years – Septimus, as ragged as he was, was almost youthful in comparison. A brief flicker of greeting passed between Septimus and Octavia as their eyes met, but it was gone as soon as it showed. The artificer looked down at the hunched slave, anger in his human eye. ‘Watch your tongue when I can hear the lies you speak,’ he warned.
Octavia bristled at being defended when she still had no idea what had been said. She wasn’t a bashful maid, needing to be protected to stave off a fainting attack. ‘Septimus... I can deal with this. What did you say to me?’ she asked the older man.
‘I named you a whore that mates with dogs.’
Octavia shrugged, hoping her blush didn’t show. ‘I’ve been called worse.’
Septimus stood straighter. ‘You are the heart of this unrest, Arkiah. I am not blind. Your daughter was avenged. As poor a fate as it was, that is all that can ever be.’
‘She was avenged,’ Arkiah answered in Gothic as well, ‘but she was not protected.’ In his hand, he clutched a Legion medallion. It caught the dim light with treacherous timing.
Septimus rested his hands on the pistols at his hips, hanging in battered leather holsters. ‘We are slaves on a warship. I grieved with you at Talisha’s loss, but we live dark lives in the darkest of places.’ His accent was awkward, and he struggled to find the words. ‘Often, we cannot even hope for vengeance, let alone safety. My master hunted her killer. The Blood Angel died a mongrel’s death. I watched Lord Talos strangle the murderer, witnessing justice done with my own eyes.’
His own eyes. Octavia glanced automatically to see his human eye, dark and kind, next to the pale blue lens mounted in his chrome eye socket.
‘Tosha aurthilla vau veshi laliss,’ the other man gave a mirthless laugh. ‘This vessel is cursed.’ Murmurs of agreement started up. It was nothing new. Since the girl’s death, talk of omens and misfortune were running rampant among the mortal crew. ‘When the new slaves walk among us, we will tell them of the damnation in which they now dwell.’
Octavia couldn’t understand Septimus’s reply as he slipped back into Nostraman. She withdrew from the crowd, waiting for the gathering to finish, and at the edge of the huge chamber, she sat on an empty table. Her attendant trudged after her, as unbearably loyal as a stray dog she’d made the mistake of feeding.
‘Hey,’ she nudged him with her boot.
‘Mistress?’
‘Did you know the void-born?’
‘Yes, mistress. The young girl. Only child ever born on the Covenant. Dead now, to the Angels of Blood.’
She lapsed back into silence for a while, watching Septimus arguing to quench all talk of rebellion. Strange, that on any given Imperial world, he would probably be a wealthy man with his skills in great demand. He could fly atmospheric and suborbital craft, he spoke several languages, he knew how to use and maintain weapons, and worked with an artisan’s care and a mechanic’s efficiency on reconstructive artificer duties. Yet here, he was just a slave. No future. No wealth. No children. Nothing.
No children.
A thought struck her, and she gave the little attendant another nudge.
‘Please do not do that,’ he grumbled.
‘Sorry. I have a question.’
‘Ask, mistress.’
‘How is it that all these years, only one child was born on board?’
The attendant turned his blinded face up to her again. It reminded her of a dying flower trying to face the sun. ‘The ship,’ he said. ‘The Covenant itself. It makes us sterile. Wombs wither and seed grows thin.’ The little creature gave a childish shrug. ‘The ship, the warp, this life. My eyes.’ He touched a bandaged hand to his threaded eyes. ‘This life changes everything. Poisons everything.’
Octavia chewed her bottom lip as she listened. Strictly speaking, she wasn’t human in the most pedantic sense – the genetic coding in a Navigator’s bloodline left her in an awkward evolutionary niche, close to being a sub-species of Homo sapiens. Her earliest years were filled with lessons and tutors hammering that very fact into her with stern lectures and complicated biological charts. Few Navigators ever bred easily, and children were an incredibly treasured commodity to a Navigator House – the coin with which to purchase a future. Had her life run its pre-planned course, she knew that after a century or two of service she’d be recalled to the family holdings on Terra and linked to another low-level scion from an equally minor house, expected to breed for the good of her father’s financial empire. Her capture had rather done away with that idea, and it was one of the aspects of this greasy, dimly lit slavery she actually considered something of a perk.
Even so, her hand strayed to her stomach.
‘What’s your name?’ she asked him.
The figure shrugged with a rustle of dirty rags. She wasn’t sure if he’d never had a name, or simply forgotten it, but either way no answer was forthcoming. ‘Well,’ she forced a smile, ‘would you like one?’ He shrugged again, and this time, the gesture ended in a growl.
Octavia saw why. Septimus was approaching. Behind him, the crowd was dispersing, going bac
k to their ramshackle market stalls or leaving the communal chamber in small groups.
‘Hush, little hound,’ the taller pilot smiled. His augmetic eye whirred as it focussed, the blue lens widening like a dilating pupil.
‘It’s fine,’ Octavia patted the hunched man’s shoulder. Beneath the ragged cloak, his arm felt cold and lumpy. Not human. Not completely.
‘Yes, mistress,’ the attendant said softly. The growling ceased, and there was the muffled click-chuck of a firearm chambering a round.
Septimus reached forward to brush a stray lock of Octavia’s hair behind her ear. She almost tilted her cheek into his palm, warmed by the intimacy of the gesture.
‘You look filthy,’ he told her, as blunt and cheery as a little boy with good news. Octavia leaned away from his touch even as he was withdrawing his hand.
‘Right,’ she said. ‘Well. Thank you for that observation.’ Idiot.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’ As she said the word, her attendant started growling at Septimus again, obviously registering the annoyance in her voice. Observant little fellow. She considered giving him another pat on the shoulder. ‘Still talking of rebellion?’
Septimus looked over at the diminishing crowds, masking a sigh. ‘It is difficult to convince them the vessel is not cursed when we’re being murdered by our own masters.’ He hesitated, then turned back to her. ‘I missed you.’
A nice try, but she wouldn’t let herself warm to that. ‘You were gone a long time,’ she offered, keeping neutral.
‘You sound displeased with me. Is it because I said you looked filthy?’
‘No.’ She barely resisted an irritated smile. Idiot. ‘Did everything go well?’
Septimus knuckled his scruffy hair back from his face. ‘Yes. Why are you angry with me? I don’t understand.’
‘No reason,’ she smiled. Because we’ve been docked for three days, and you haven’t been to see me. Some friend you are. ‘I’m not angry.’
‘You sound angry, mistress.’
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