So this was it, Ch’an thought, as he leant on his cane and took the first steps down.
He had come straight from Mu’gulath Bay, a vampire of a planet that had sucked blood deep into its earth. After the noise and violence of that world this place was silent and white and frozen. But what he noticed most was the stillness of the air. Given ten tau’cyr or so, the earth caste could make this place habitable. A hundred tau’cyr and it could even be a pleasant place, worthy of colonisation. Maybe even as sublime as his own home world of Au’taal: a gentle place of lakes and rivers, and mountain retreats where the ascetic could retire to contemplate the Greater Good. Other tau considered them lazy, but there had been nothing lacking in the warriors he had fought with.
It saddened Ch’an when he thought of how many of his sept – who were cultured and learned in all the arts of the tau race – had lost their lives on Mu’gulath Bay. It was for the Greater Good, of course, but he had started to have the feeling that the Greater Good would not include him, or the armies that he had sailed with nine tau’cyr ago.
He, at least, was still alive. But there were only so many times he could survive battle, and each time he fought he seemed to leave parts of himself behind. The last time had been the worst. It had been on Mu’gulath Bay, in the ruins of a hive, with thousands of gue’la refugees streaming from the burning city. The Imperials had fired indiscriminately, killing many of their own kind. He had been trying to protect them with his Stormsurge when he’d been hit. It was the enemy you never saw that were the most dangerous, he’d always said, and he’d ignored his own wisdom. Ch’an had spent so long in the rehabilitation ward, he had thought he would be refused permission to return to the battlefront. He had begged for active service, and in the end his commander had come to his bed.
‘You will be sent away,’ the commander said.
‘Back to Au’taal?’
‘No,’ his commander had said. ‘I cannot tell you where you are going. I can say nothing more.’
Ch’an had gleaned the rest from the earth caste technicians who’d brought him here. This was a forward training base, and he was to be both instructor and pupil. It was an honour, he reminded himself, as he caught a glimpse of a distant Stormsurge striding back to the domes of the base. But it wouldn’t be the same. He’d miss the thrill of being part of something vast and mobile, like the kauyon assault on Mu’gulath Bay when they had taken three hive cities in one day. He would miss the down-to-earth humour of the fire warrior teams he brought into battle; he would miss the thrill of swooping in and setting his stabilisers into the ground, and letting his gunner open fire.
By the time Ch’an had limped to the bottom of the ramp, the crowd were staring intently at him in that odd way the earth caste had.
‘I am Fio’ui K’or,’ one of them said. ‘We are Sept Ke’lshan. We are honoured to have you here, Shas’vre Ch’an.’
Ch’an thanked him and then the silence returned.
‘This way,’ Fio’ui K’or said, and bowed, and Ch’an limped after him.
Fio’ui K’or led him to where a skimmer floated, waiting, and helped Ch’an mount the steps and then closed the dome over his head.
‘I will bring you to the camp,’ Fio’ui K’or said. He climbed in beside Ch’an and fitted his three-fingered hand into the steering mechanism, and they accelerated away.
The tau flew across the crater field. Ch’an found it hard to go at their pace. He wondered, not for the first time, how the earth caste managed to get anything done. They moved so slowly, he thought. They thought slowly too. Ch’an tried to make conversation as they crossed the ice flats to the camp, but his heart wasn’t in it and Fio’ui K’or was a little staccato in his replies, and eventually they were passing a tethered krootox when the conversation faltered.
‘How many kroot are here?’ Ch’an said when he spotted the low shaggy yurts of the kroot camp, half buried into the ice.
‘A hundred,’ Fio’ui K’or said. His flat, dark face was impassive, hands fixed on the steering disc. ‘There are thirty-seven hounds, fifty-four kroot and nine krootox.’
‘They can survive the cold?’
‘They are from Yuun’chen. Ice world. Genome mixed with local fauna named Yuun’chen ice bear.’
Shas’vre Ch’an nodded and leant his head against the domed windowpane. There were four of the new NG-4 terrestrial defence rigs – their low domes and twin-linked railguns an unmistakable silhouette. The farthermost one was at the top of a rocky crag that stood up straight through the ice, as if it were a spear that had been driven through the ice cap. At the top he could see what appeared from this distance to be the kind of flies found on gue’la worlds. Black, dirty, noisy.
The earth caste saw what he was looking at. ‘Vespid,’ he said.
‘Vespid?’
‘They come from the planet Vespid,’ Fio’ui K’or said without irony.
Ch’an nodded. Not very imaginative, he thought. They must have been discovered by one of the more dour sept worlds. ‘What are they like?’
There was a pause. ‘They are a little slow,’ Fio’ui said.
Ch’an nodded. And that was coming from an earth caste. He had fought with kroot on Mu’gulath Bay. He’d rather liked them until he’d found them squatting in the trenches, eating their way along the bodies of dead Imperial Guardsmen. He had never come across vespids before.
‘What do they eat?’ he asked.
The earth caste frowned. ‘I do not know.’
‘Not flesh, I hope.’ The technician kept his mouth shut. Ch’an left him alone for a while, then said, ‘This place is secret?’
‘Oh yes,’ Fio’ui said. ‘Very secret.’
‘So why all these defences?’
‘Just in case.’
‘Just in case of what?’
‘In case the enemy find us again.’
‘They found it before?’
‘Once. Yes,’ Fio’ui said. ‘We had to move. We cannot be found.’
Ch’an nodded. Experience had taught him that the more heavily defended a place was, the more someone wanted to find and destroy it. And now he knew they were being hunted he turned and looked about him. It was an instinctive movement, born from so long spent in deadly warzones. It was a dead warrior who did not check behind him.
Ch’an’s eyes scanned the starport, the kroot camp, the distant crags that rose up to the defence turrets, but he saw nothing.
They were nearly at the base. He closed his eyes for a moment, and wished he could hold this moment of peace and silence a little longer. From what he knew of a warrior’s life, silence and stillness never lasted long.
Tidings travelled faster than earth caste fio’ui, it seemed. As the transporter came to a slow halt alongside the main dome, Ch’an saw a crowd of fio’la workers staring up expectantly, their flat faces and wide nostrils flaring in the cold air. They had a slightly nervous air to them, their three-fingered hands clasped together in a gesture of honour and supplication.
‘This is Shas’vre Au’taal Ch’an,’ Fio’ui K’or announced. The fio’la looked on without blinking.
Shas’vre Ch’an felt foolish as he swung his leg over the side of the passenger compartment. He leant heavily on his cane as he limped down to the crowd and they stood back silently, watching him pass, the hero of Mu’gulath Bay. It was as if they could not quite believe he was still alive.
Sometimes he could not either. Ch’an set his cane and bowed.
‘Greetings, brothers,’ he said. ‘And what is your honoured sept?’
It was a formal greeting, perhaps too formal for a fire caste to use with fio’la, but the tau of Au’taal were famed for their manners, and he liked to keep these traditions up, despite everything.
‘Ke’lshan,’ their leader said. ‘We are all Ke’lshan. It is the honour of our sept to defend you all.’
�
��Indeed?’ he said, as if he were learning this for the first time.
It depressed him, to be honest, to learn that he was to be seconded to Sept Ke’lshan. They were a hard, dour bunch, with little room in their minds for arts or pleasure or harmony.
‘Honoured one. We were glad when we heard that you had survived.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I survived when many others did not.’
‘We all wish you much luck.’
‘Please,’ Fio’ui K’or said and led him towards the dome. ‘This way. The commander is keen to meet you.’
The command dome stood a little way off from the larger hab-dome. There were sandbags about its entrance, which kept off the wind.
Ch’an was led into an office, and through a door guarded by two fire warriors in the grey-and-black armour of Ke’lshan, yellow sept markings on the sides of their helmets and pulse carbines that were held close to their chests. As he moved towards the doorway, one of them stepped in front of him.
‘You cannot enter with that,’ the fire warrior said.
Ch’an shook them off. A voice from the office called out in question.
‘Sire. He has brought this gue’la object. We cannot allow anyone to bring gue’la artefacts into this camp. It is procedure.’
‘What do you mean, you cannot allow?’
‘There might be gue’la objects within it. Tracing devices.’
Ch’an pushed the fire warriors from him. ‘There are no tracing devices within this jacket.’
‘Stand back,’ a voice called, and the two Ke’lshan fire warriors obeyed. Ch’an cast them a furious look as he pulled the black jacket over his shoulders. Their commander strode out. He took Ch’an in, and guessed correctly who he was.
‘Welcome to M’Yan’Ral,’ he said. ‘I am Fireblade M’au. We are honoured by your presence, Shas’vre Ch’an. But I am the commander here, on behalf of my sept. We are entrusted with your safety and all those on this camp. So, I am afraid you will have to give up this… trophy.’
Fireblade M’au had the nasal twang of a Ke’lshan warrior that grated on Ch’an’s nerves. ‘I have fought for our empire for longer than some of you have been alive, and this jacket has been with me every step of the way. If you want me here to train your crews, then you leave this with me. It is my totem.’ The urgency of Ch’an’s words surprised them all.
Fireblade M’au smiled and nodded. ‘We can make an exception for our honoured guest. Just this time.’ He nodded to the two fire warriors. ‘Show the esteemed warrior to his quarters.’
‘Sorry, shas’vre,’ Fio’ui K’or said as they crossed the well-trodden ice to the hab-dome.
‘It’s nothing,’ Ch’an said, but he was still shaking as they reached the hab-dome’s doors.
They passed through the doors, and there was a blast of warm air as they closed behind them. The dome wound down into the ice, with rows of dorms overlooking a central sunken Ke’lshan rock garden. It was a fairly standard design, with sublevels no doubt, where stores and ammunition could be kept. Ke’lshan was not known for foresight or originality.
‘We have nearly seven hundred students here. They are drawn from all the septs.’
‘So I heard.’
‘As you know, this runs counter to previous practice. Before now, septs tended to work alone. This was not harmonious. Most High One Aun’ui Hoo’nan wished the septs to work together in this. The need is great.’
‘That it is,’ Ch’an said.
Fio’ui K’or stopped for a moment. ‘Apologies, honoured one. You have been on Mu’gulath Bay. Is it a beautiful world?’
‘No. Not really.’ Ch’an paused. ‘It is polluted and foul. You know the gue’la.’
The earth caste nodded slowly and solemnly. ‘Yes. I hoped it would be beautiful. We have given so many lives. So much towards it.’
Emotion was rare in an earth caste.
‘It might be one day,’ Ch’an said. ‘Given time and work.’
Fio’ui K’or nodded. ‘You are from Au’taal. I always wished to see Au’taal.’
‘Maybe you will.’
‘I dream of it sometimes. It is the most radiant world, is it not?’
Ch’an had never imagined an earth caste dreaming. ‘Yes,’ he said after a moment’s consideration. ‘It is.’
Fio’ui K’or pressed his hands together, interlocking the four digits on each hand. ‘I hope to see it one day. But I do not think it will happen.’
They moved on, the brief flash of emotion passing, and Fio’ui K’or went back to facts and figures. They were probably safer ground. ‘The hab block is three quarters underground,’ he said. ‘It is better for insulation and protection. There is no way through the ice, and the camp is protected by six planetary defence turrets.’
‘Six? I only saw four.’
‘There are two more in the outer hills. They are the older NG-23 variety. Much bigger than the ones you saw.’
Ch’an knew the NG-23s. They were weapons of an impressive scale, with generators to match. But they were largely stationary once deployed, which made them increasingly unsuitable for the kind of warfare that the tau had developed. The newer versions were fitted with more efficient gravitational drives. On the flat they could move at half the speed of a Devilfish.
He realised that he had drifted off for a moment. Fio’ui K’or was still talking. ‘Have you seen the new XV9 battlesuits?’
‘No,’ Ch’an said. ‘I have not.’
‘Fireblade M’au has one. I will see if we can get one for you to try. They are impressive. You will think so too. Everyone thinks so.’
Fio’ui K’or touched a corrugated pipe that wound around the inner wall of the stairwell. ‘We have installed back-up generators here,’ he said. ‘We also have extra generators for the dome shield. You see, we have thought of everything.’
Ch’an said nothing. If experience had taught him anything, it was that expressions like that were always misplaced.
‘Here,’ Fio’ui K’or said when they got to the bottom, and they looked into a wide circular underground chamber, ringed with hab blocks, their neat, regular armourglass windows tinted against the glare. ‘I will let you go in and find your bunk. It is bunk number Y-445-A.’
‘Y-445-A,’ Ch’an repeated, and nodded, forcing a smile. ‘Thank you.’
All tau establishments were built and ordered to the same harmonious plan, so he knew what his room would be like before he got there, and he was not surprised: it was a tall and narrow room with four double bunk beds, two on either side of the cell. A thin lume-strip lit the chamber when the window tint was turned up to night levels. The only thing that did surprise him was the holo-vista of the Western Lakes on his home sept of Au’taal. The isles were wreathed with mist, and the ultraviolet tones had been enriched. Underneath was written in simple letters of an archaic style a line of poetry from a famous fire warrior named D’fu: The burning of this fire, the years run out too soon.
There was the low hissing from a sleeping warrior across the room. Shas’vre Ch’an threw his pack onto one of the empty beds and from the bunk above him there was a creak as a mottled head appeared, eyes widening in surprise.
‘It’s you!’ he said. Then he blushed a deep shade of purple, and fumbled with his greetings. ‘Apologies, master!’ he said. ‘We were not expecting you so soon.’
‘We arrived early,’ Shas’vre Ch’an said. ‘It is a good habit for a warrior to have.’
The other fire warrior sat up, swung his hooves over the side of the bunk, dropped onto the floor and bowed low.
‘Shas’vre,’ he said. ‘We are deeply honoured!’
Ch’an gave him a long look and the cadet blushed. ‘Apologies. My honoured name is Shas’ui Sa’cea H’an.’ H’an bowed low, his pigmentation on the ultraviolet scale cooling as he mastered his sudden burst of excitement. ‘I a
m a cadet. We are to be bonded.’
‘Are we?’ Shas’vre Ch’an said.
He tried to hide his discomfort. For an old timer like him, it felt wrong for warriors of different septs to be brought together like this, but Mu’gulath Bay had taken such a toll on the Tau Empire that this was what the ethereals had demanded. The other one blushed purple again and hung his head in an almost child-like gesture. ‘I was one of the top students to graduate from my intake of Ves’oni’Vash.’
Shas’vre Ch’an pursed his lips in a thoughtful manner. ‘So we’re sending infants and the ancient into battle together. There must be a poem in there somewhere.’
Whispers were running along the corridor. ‘Shas’vre Ch’an is here! Shas’vre Ch’an!’ There was a clatter of hooves as other cadets filled the doorway in a silent crowd. One of them reached out to touch the black leather overcoat that he wore. ‘We did not believe it, master, that you were really coming back to fight. A-a-after your wounds…’
‘I serve the Greater Good,’ Shas’vre Ch’an said. He made a low clacking sound, that was almost like a laugh. ‘The reports of my death were a little premature.’ He took off his overcoat, threw it onto the bed and sat down, grateful to take the weight from his damaged leg. ‘Now, when does training start?’
‘Class begins again after noontide.’
The look in Ch’an’s eyes gave away the fact he was not quite clear on whether noontide was close or not.
‘In three dec,’ H’an added helpfully. ‘But as you have just landed, perhaps we could ask the Commander M’au to let you rest until tomorrow.’
Ch’an grunted in appreciation. ‘There is no time to rest. I will start with you. But now, if you will excuse me, brothers, I have come straight from Mu’gulath Bay. I am a little tired. I shall lie down and sleep.’
Ch’an used both hands to swing his stiff leg up. He laid his cane by his side, pulled the black leather overcoat up over his body and closed his eyes.
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