‘I am a marquis and a cabinet minister,’ this Eduardo replied churlishly, but, with everyone else kneeling, he finally relented, though his distaste was plain on his features. Despite being angered by the little fool’s insolence, Grimm hoped Captain Alvez had not registered it. But, of course, the captain had.
‘You,’ boomed Alvez, pointing a rigid finger at the man. ‘Stand and approach me.’
Eduardo suddenly looked a lot less arrogant. Paling visibly, he gulped and pointed to himself with an expression that said, ‘Who, me?’
‘Hesitate a second longer, vermin, and I will repaint my gauntlets with your blood,’ Alvez rumbled.
The other nobles kept their eyes firmly fixed on the rockcrete as Eduardo stepped forward as commanded. A dark, wet stain spread down the left leg of his trousers. His earlier self-assuredness had vanished completely now.
‘Who are you, worm?’
The man seemed genuinely surprised at the question, as if surely the captain should know who he was. Didn’t everyone?
‘I am Eduardo Corda, of House Corda, Marquis of Paletta, Vice Minister of Education.’
Captain Alvez loomed over him like a storm cloud about to unleash its thunder on all below. ‘Education, you say? Perhaps I should educate you on the fragility of your pathetic little life. Do you think your status, or the history of your house, grants you special liberties with one of the Emperor’s own Space Marines?’
Eduardo Corda now looked ready to weep.
‘Answer!’ snapped Alvez, the word cracking like a gunshot.
Grimm suspected that, if the foolish Corda had not already emptied his bladder, he would have done so right then. But perhaps he underestimated Corda, for the marquis licked his lips, took a steadying breath, and stuttered, ‘G-great are the Adeptus Astartes of the Crimson F-fists. I meant no offence to your lordship, and I apologise if any was taken. But I am a member of the Upper House of Nobles. It is not fitting for a man of my station to take a knee. I come from an old and respected line.’
Alvez thrust his head closer. ‘No,’ he hissed. ‘You are an idiot. Perhaps your line will end with you. In fact, that sounds best all round.’ He turned to Grimm and added, ‘Sergeant, pick him up.’
Grimm stepped forward immediately and gripped the man’s collar with one hand, lifting him easily into the air. Corda’s feet now dangled a metre above the ground. It was then that Lady Maia spoke. She was still kneeling, but she raised her head to look Alvez in the eye.
‘I beg you, lord. Do not kill him. He is unworthy of your forgiveness and, in offending you, his actions bring shame on the entire Upper House, but he serves a senior member of my cabinet and will be difficult to replace.’
Alvez looked at her, silent for a moment. Then, he said, ‘Do not think me so eager to kill the very people I was sent here to protect. For this transgression, he will not die. But all must bow before the Crimson Fists. There are no exceptions. I care not at all for your institutions and your notions of high status. These things are less than nothing to me. Remember that. In the coming days, you will have my protection because the Chapter Master commands it. No other reason exists. Were I commanded to kill you all, I would complete my task in a heartbeat, without a moment’s remorse, and nothing in this galaxy save the word of Pedro Kantor could stop me.’
He turned back to Grimm, and said, ‘The marquis has soiled himself, sergeant. He requires a bath. See to it.’
Grimm didn’t need to ask what the captain meant.
‘At once, lord,’ said Grimm, and he began walking back towards the Farrio Bridge, holding Eduardo Corda out in front of him as if he weighed little more than a handful of trash.
When he judged he was far enough from Captain Alvez to risk murmured speech, he said to Corda, ‘You must never go near him again. Do you understand, fool? It was only the governor’s intervention that spared you today.’
Corda was stifling sobs as he answered, ‘A mistake, my lord. I swear it. I meant no harm. I… I inhaled the smoke of the ceba-leaf an hour ago. I had no idea…’
For a moment, Grimm felt the urge to strike the man. Ceba-leaf. It caused disease and mutation in one’s children. Why the wealthy continued to abuse it was a mystery to him. He had heard all the excuses. The universe was a dark and brutal place, they said, and it was true, but other poorer men managed fine without the self-inflicted curse of such narcotics.
‘Then you are doubly a fool, and must stay out of my way, also, lest you wish to die.’
‘I don’t,’ whined Corda. ‘I don’t wish to die, by Throne!’
‘Can you swim?’ growled Grimm.
‘I… what?’
‘Can you swim, oaf?’
‘I… yes. I mean, I swam a little as a child. I…’ Looking out beyond the bridge, it suddenly dawned on Corda what was about to happen. ‘In Terra’s holy name, please. Don’t do this. You don’t have to.’
They were approaching the wrought-iron balustrade at the side of the bridge. A few more steps and Grimm came slowly to a halt right beside it. ‘I will cast you into the shallows close to the south bank. You will only have to swim a little. Unless you are as hopeless as you look, you will survive. Show proper reverence to your betters next time. If my lord believes you have not learned your lesson, he will kill you on sight.’
Corda was opening his mouth, about to reply, when Grimm leaned back, put his considerable physical power into an overhand swing, and launched the Vice Minister of Education out over the waters of the River Rynn.
As good as his word, he put the whining noble fairly close to the shallows by the bank, but in truth, not as close as he had planned.
The man immediately began coughing and splashing in a great panic, and Grimm could tell that it was no act.
Good, he thought. Let the Emperor decide whether you live or die.
He turned back towards the captain and saw that the nobles had been dismissed. As they backed away from Alvez with their heads bowed, they looked extremely dismayed.
Grimm met his captain halfway back to the Land Raider.
‘You told them of the Waaagh, my lord?’
‘Briefly,’ said Alvez. ‘There was no time to elaborate. Word has just come through from Arx Tyrannus, Huron. The ork ships are already here.’
‘In-system?’ asked Grimm. ‘It cannot be!’
‘It is.’
Alvez clambered up the side of the Land Raider and lowered himself down into his cupola again. Once Grimm had done the same, and the vehicle began to move off in the direction of The Cassar, Alvez raised his voice over the growl of the Land Raider’s engine.
‘Be ready, sergeant. The killing will soon begin.’
Twelve
The Blockade, Rynn’s World Local Space
‘Bring us around. Get me a forward-firing solution. I want our prow batteries locked onto that destroyer before she fires again!’
Ceval Ranparre sat atop his massive command throne, on a dais that extended to the back wall of the ship’s bridge. In the work-pits below him, his subordinates were frantic, a thousand voices talking at once, half of them in Binary, the machine-language of the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Another massive impact shook the ship, the third such blow in a minute, scattering charts and data modules all over the metal decking. Ranparre felt the artificial gravity flicker for the briefest instant, and knew from long experience that his battle-barge, The Sabre of Scaurus, must have been hit amidships, close to where the critical systems were located. The ship’s shielding was heaviest there, but it couldn’t take impacts like that for long. The void shields would give out soon. The Adeptus Astartes and Imperial Naval ships were outnumbered a hundred to one, and more of the ugly, scrappy ork vessels were bleeding into the system every minute the battle raged on.
We weren’t ready, thought Ranparre. The line was still forming. Of all the blasted xenos in the galaxy, only orks would try a jump as psychotic and self-destructive as this.
He had seen the worst effects of breaching re
al space so close to the planet already. At the beginning of the engagement, a number of neatly-severed prows had tumbled past him, bleeding breathable atmosphere and lifeless alien bodies into the freezing void. Some of them would impact on the planet with all the explosive power of a long-range, high-yield missile. There was nothing Ranparre and his crews could do about that. Blasting those wrecks to pieces would only turn one deadly mass into many. Besides, every last bit of offensive firepower at their command was needed to fight off the greater threat of the manned alien vessels that were trying to fight their way through. It was already clear to him that the blockade was pathetically inadequate. Such numbers!
Ranparre had several centuries of space battle experience behind him. Under his command, the ships of the Crimson Fists had saved over a dozen worlds without the need to drop any troops on the surface. Rebels, traitors, heretics, xenos, even warp-filth… Ranparre had beaten all kinds of enemy craft in high-orbital and deep-space combat. But he had never, in all his unnaturally long life, faced the kind of numbers that the Arch Arsonist of Charadon was throwing at the planet now.
Even in the gaping black vastness of space, there seemed no quarter that was not under assault, filled with ork craft scything inwards on angry trails of glowing plasma.
‘Order the Aurora and the Verde to close formation with us. I want the Aurora on our left flank, the Verde on our right. All forward batteries to target the command bridge of their flagship. If the beast Snagrod is aboard that vessel, we may still have a chance to end all this.’
From a row of stations sunk into the metal floor on the bridge’s right, one of the weapons coordinators called out, ‘I have your forward-firing solution, my lord. Permission to fire forward lances?’
‘Hold,’ said Ranparre. ‘We fire together with the strike cruisers. If that monstrosity has shields, we must hope to overload them at the very least.’
Seconds later, a comms-station operator on the left reported that the Aurora and the Verde had plotted their firing solutions and were awaiting Ranparre’s order to engage.
‘Give the signal,’ barked Ranparre. ‘All forward batteries… open fire!’
The central display screens in front of him crackled with blinding white energy as the massive weapons loosed their fury. Thick spears of light burned across ten thousand kilometres. A dozen small ork fighters and support craft caught between the two closing flagships were obliterated, simply wiped from existence. Then the lances stuck the ork flagship full in its gargantuan beast-like face.
‘Direct hit, all batteries,’ the weapons coordinator reported.
We could hardly miss, thought Ranparre. Just how big is that monster?
‘Damage assessment on enemy vessel,’ he demanded.
‘Unclear, my lord,’ replied another voice from the pit on the right. ‘Our forward auspex array has been badly damaged. Operating at forty per cent efficiency. Preliminary scans suggest enemy shielding absorbed most of the impact. Enemy still advancing with full offensive capabilities.’
‘How long till another charge builds up?’ Ranparre demanded. ‘I need our forward guns online again now!’
‘Does my lord wish to issue a call for further support?’ asked one of the comms-operators. ‘The battle-barge Tigurius is only twenty thousand kilometres away. Strike cruisers Hewson and Maqueda are six and nine thousand kilometres away respectively.’
Ranparre scanned the tactical displays in front of him, focusing on those that showed the situation to port and starboard. What he saw was utter chaos. The planetary blockade was fracturing in countless places as the ork vessels ploughed in amongst the Imperial ships on a hundred different assault vectors at once. Between the battle-line and the planet, space was glittering with ship debris and bright ordnance impacts. He found the Tigurius quickly enough by its ident-tag. She was leaking atmosphere from her port side, listing to starboard, harried by a swarm of ork assault ships, all far smaller than she was. The ork craft buzzed around her like angry wasps, peppering her sides with explosive slugs and energy weapons. She was in no position to lend The Sabre of Scaurus any kind of assistance.
His eyes picked out the tags CF-166 and CF-149 – the Hewson and the Maqueda. Both were engaged in heavy fighting. Even as he watched, the Maqueda‘s hull started to rupture. Desperate to take some of the foe down with him, her captain, Darrus Gramedo, must have ordered her brought around and onto a full forward-ramming course. Plasma streamed from her rear thrusters, and she ploughed headlong into the side of an ork heavy cruiser that had been launching relentless port broadsides at her from her two-o’clock position.
As Ranparre watched, the Maqueda‘s sharp prow bit deep into the side of the ork ship. The hulls merged violently. There was a ripple of bright flashes, then, as one, the ships imploded, collapsing in on themselves, every last light onboard winking out.
‘We’ve just lost the Maqueda,’ said a voice from one of the pits.
Ranparre turned his attention to the Hewson and saw that she, at least, was doing better. She rolled to her right and launched a blistering broadside just as a monstrous ork craft attempted to pass by overhead. The enemy’s iron belly was punctured in a hundred places, shedding thick pieces of bulkhead into space. Critical systems overloaded. An explosive chain reaction started, ripping the entire alien craft apart seconds later. As the space around the dying ship filled with spinning fragments, the captain of the Hewson ordered her crew to swing about for a portside volley against three ork light cruisers that had been flying in support.
For all these worthy kills, Ranparre saw too many gaps where the ork ships were getting through. The xenos were just too numerous to stop, and the biggest of all their ships was closing on his own, second by second, kilometre by kilometre. The Sabre of Scaurus would not have the advantage of range and accuracy for much longer.
‘Prow batteries at maximum charge in eighty-three seconds, my lord,’ reported the senior weapons coordinator.
‘Someone get me the captain of the Hewson,’ barked Ranparre. ‘And get me a direct link to Chapter Master Kantor at once.’
‘As you command, lord,’ said the closest of the comms-operators.
Dorn help us, thought Ranparre as he continued to process the nightmare on his tactical screens.
Dorn help us, we are lost.
Thirteen
The Upper Rynnhouse, New Rynn City
‘It must be a mistake,’ Baron Etrando called out. ‘An auspex glitch, surely. Martial law? It’s… it’s unheard of. Preposterous!’
Maia could barely hear him over the din the rest of the Upper Rynnhouse was making. The Speaker had called repeatedly for order, but the place was in an uproar. There were one hundred and eighteen nobles in the Upper Rynnhouse, twenty-six of whom were members of her cabinet, and every last one seemed intent on expressing his or her horror or denial at the very same moment.
Jidan Etrando was only three seats away from Maia. Any further and his words would have merged completely with the wall of noise.
‘There is no mistake,’ she called back. ‘The lunar tracking stations on Dantienne and Syphos both confirmed it before they went dead. The entire orbital defence grid is on combat standing. They are coming. There is no doubt of that.’
‘Why here?’ asked a young minister in the row behind her. ‘Why now?’
Maia half turned and saw that it was Bulo Dacera, Under-Secretary for Mining and Ore Processing.
‘They are aliens, Bulo. We are not supposed to understand them. The fleet will stop them before they can land.’
Those close enough to hear her went quiet now, and the silence spread until the noise in the plush, vaulted chamber died off to the level of a murmur.
The Speaker, whose ancient body was as much machine as man and was permanently hard-wired into the data systems that served the Upper Rynnhouse, could at last be heard properly. ‘In the name of the Emperor,’ he blustered, ‘you will remember yourselves. All matters, even such as this, must be handled with the decorum this no
ble establishment demands.’ He turned his sensor-studded head towards Maia.
She felt his electronic eyes lock onto her as he added, ‘If the governor wishes to take the floor, she will step to the Lectern of the aquila.’
‘I will take the floor,’ said Maia formally, and rose from her bench. Her steps were measured, presenting a confidence she did not really feel. The news of the Waaagh had rocked her. In her mother’s time, no conflict greater than a prison breakout had ever occurred. The sharp-tongued, cold-hearted female politico from whose womb Maia had sprung had taught her many, many things, most of them the hard way. But she had not prepared Maia for the possibility of an alien invasion that threatened the lives of every man, woman and child on the planet.
Maia was clinging desperately to her faith, but a voice at the back of her mind persisted in asking how the Emperor could let this happen to people who loved and honoured Him so?
She stopped behind the lectern and cleared her throat, then looked out at the nobles watching her expectantly on the benches to either side of the chamber.
They are as terrified as I am, she thought. More so, perhaps. I wonder how many believe this is punishment for their sins?
There had already been an incident with local law enforcement. Eighteen ministers had attempted to secure illegal outward passage on a fast ship. Had Captain Alvez not grounded all non-military craft already, Maia suspected she would be speaking to an empty room.
She told herself that she would not have fled. Situations like this were what the Crimson Fists trained for, what they excelled at. To turn back the enemies of man – it was the reason they existed at all. Pedro Kantor would not let her down.
For a moment, she turned her eyes heavenwards, staring up at the underside of the exquisite diamond dome. Through its panels, the sky was deep blue, the sibling suns already halfway towards the western horizon where the waters of the Medean would swallow them for the night. Painted on the inner surface of the largest and most central of the diamond panels was an image of the Emperor, looking down on the assembly with a face she had always thought stern but loving, dark locks framing His golden skin.
Space Marine Battles - the Novels Volume 1 Page 76