by Guy Haley
No lesser troops landed with the Titans. A burning wind rich with killing radioactivity and poison smokes whipped across the dead plains. Landmines took the place of blades of grass upon this world. The Titans detonated them by the hundred under each plunging footfall. Anything smaller would have been obliterated.
The landing continued as the Titans gathered. A score of liveries struggled to show themselves through mantles of accumulating sand. Blue, gold, red, green, cream, bronze, silver, white, orange… their heraldries were as glorious as any force of humanity’s history.
Communications with the strategos aboard the Red Tear were difficult. Vox boosting cut through some of the interference and jamming, but not all. The Legios were forced to negotiate with other Legios as they walked. They did agree on an order of march surprisingly smoothly. The import of the battle was clear to them all; now was not the time to argue. Mohana Mankata Vi sent her venator maniples out to the right wing, placing them without qualm under the direction of Legio Ignis, who held that flank in force. She herself remained in the centre of the army with other myrmidon formations. They split themselves by type rather than by Legio. Axiom maniples flanked the myrmidons, then venator types sent packs of Warhounds to the fore, bending the battle line into a formation like the head of a charging bull. Between the outstretched horns, a skirmish line of Imperial Knights a thousand strong was arrayed, like footmen in front of mounted lords in a war between godly houses.
Only to a primarch’s direct command would so many princeps and barons submit themselves so willingly, and then, perhaps, only to Sanguinius.
By then more ships were rising into the sky than coming in to land. Most of the Titans were on the field, then they all were. The last few drop-ships scrambled their way back into the air. The final explosions of an unfortunate, downed drop-ship sounded a starting cannonade for the army of giants, and they blared their war-horns as one.
When Mohana Mankata Vi gave the order, her voice was interwoven with those of twenty other Legio Grand Masters. ‘Legio Solaria,’ she said. ‘Walk.’
The Titans set out towards their target, their tread shaking the earth.
Twenty kilometres closer to the city, they found their enemy waiting for them.
Twenty-Four
The Quality of Angels
Sanguinius swept over the battle within the belly of a Stormbird. The port side access hatch was open, letting cold, thundering wind blast into the transit bay. The primarch stood hunched within the doorway, his hair whipping about in the airflow as he cast his keen gaze over the battle raging upon the plains. Hundreds of Titans engaged at close to point blank range. The massed formation of the first days of the battle had broken up into a knotted collection of skirmishes. Lone Titans duelled around heaps of burning war machines. Packs of Warhounds loped through storms of laser fire, relying on their speed to see them safe. Phalanxes of Warlords stood opposite one another, exchanging fire like soldiers of early black-powder cultures, doggedly holding their ground in the hope the foe would break first. Titans were never intended to fight like primitive braves. He imagined them grappling on the ground, weapons discarded, attempting to brain each other with rocks and fist.
Dozens of engines had fallen. As he watched, a circle of light burst upwards as a reactor went critical. It was bright enough to temporarily blind a mortal man, but Sanguinius stared unflinchingly at it as it grew and shrank back, winking out to leave a black, perfectly round scar upon the earth. More machines were dying with every hour.
Ahead was the reality-defying bulk of Nyrcon City. The void shields had collapsed around large parts of it, and the mountainous hive was under vicious bombardment from the fleet. Huge rents had opened in the side. Fires burned unchecked over hundreds of levels. Its defence lasers were mercilessly targeted by the Imperial fleet, but its galleries housed thousands of artillery pieces that showered the plain with explosive scatterings of metal, and the bastions of its walls were replete with the armaments of fallen god-engines.
He watched it all with a primarch’s wisdom, asking his pilots to bank one way or another so he could better examine details. He did not approve of what he saw, but war was not a matter of best circumstances. If one could choose the moment, disposition of forces and field of conflict, then there would be no war at all, he reminded himself. From a voxmitter mounted in his collar, a steady stream of reports came in from his fleet and armies. The attack on the Anvil had begun. Azkaellon had already penetrated the outer defences of the docks. Amit fought upon its voidal ramparts. The fleet saw off probing attacks from traitor flotillas. Measured by the standards of the day, the battle was going well, but the standards of the day were dire. The size of Horus’ armies in the Beta-Garmon cluster had shocked him. If this had been a compliance, they would have retreated and re-evaluated their plans. They simply did not have that option.
His sons thought the situation parlous too. Raldoron stood at Sanguinius’ side. There was just enough room for the equerry to see out past the gold-armoured primarch down to the battle, and he had formed his own opinion.
‘This is not an optimal strategic choice,’ said Raldoron, seeing something of what his genefather saw. ‘There are war machines dying down there that should be on Terra. We gain nothing by committing so many Titans to this battle. We shall lose more than we need to for a city of questionable strategic value.’
Sanguinius nodded. He had been pensive for so long now his sons had ceased to question his behaviour. There was no talk of his mood changing back, or even of comparing the old Sanguinius to the new. Quiet, brooding and distracted was how they had come to recognise their lord, a tendency that had begun at Signus and grown ever since, and although he had become more centred after the events of Davin, and more resolved, he had hardly grown more joyful.
‘You are correct, First Captain.’ Where Raldoron needed his helm’s voxmitter to be heard over the wind, Sanguinius did not. He was helmless, and spoke quietly, but his voice was heard by Raldoron and all the other Blood Angels within the ship – a touch of soul to soul that sound played no part in. ‘This is the only way. The Titan Legios bicker. We hardly have control over the situation in Beta-Garmon. We lead a fragile coalition. Horus has fear and fanaticism to weld his armies together. In divisive forces, further division is the worst solution. Here, together, the Legios have purpose, and share risk equally. This strategy serves more than tactical needs, but addresses the exigencies of morale, and politics.’
Raldoron made a dismissive noise that his golden helm amplified.
Sanguinius glanced at him, before returning his attention to the battlefield. ‘I know well your dislike for politics, but although you were made for war, you are wise enough to know that war itself is only an extension of the political, and a civil war is the most political of all kinds.’
‘Was it politics, my lord, that brought about this ruination? I thought it treachery.’
‘It was,’ said Sanguinius, choosing to ignore Raldoron’s challenging tone. ‘Though the politics of gods, it was politics still. Lord Dorn was right to send the bulk of the Titan Legios here. Can you imagine this carnage upon the surface of Terra? It is better that they fight and die here than extinguish each other before the palace. There would be precious little left if the whole of the Collegia Titanica were to settle its differences within sight of my father.’
‘These engines were always over-mighty. Did you not ever question the concentration of such power in the hands of the Mechanicum?’
‘Politics,’ said Sanguinius sadly. ‘You are a Space Marine. You are the killers of men – they are the shatterers of worlds. Each thing has its place.’ He paused. ‘But you think them ill disciplined, and that they might be more effectively employed.’
‘Yes, my lord,’ admitted Raldoron.
‘That is so, but do not blame them. These Legios are fractious only because they wish to survive. They too have their brotherhoods and their bo
nds. They look upon the prospect of a battle of this kind, and they see their order’s annihilation. They, like we, do not care for their own lives. They are faithful, worthy, and mightier than most men of any sort, but they are still men and women, and need to be treated as such. They accept gladly their own loss, or even the loss of all of their kind, but no one can easily sacrifice themselves while others are left unscathed. Not one of them would have agreed to commit themselves fully if their peers were given other duties. This is a fight of so great a magnitude, an extinction of machines, it undermines their discipline and their sense of duty.’
‘You say they are strong. The god-engines are, but their weakness is human.’
‘There is weakness in all the works of men. Yourself and myself included!’ said Sanguinius, rousing a little. ‘Neither you nor I would gladly sacrifice our own Legion for another without firm cause, and if asked to lay down our lives to the last Space Marine while our brothers in other Legions were kept to one side, we too would deem it unfair and cruel.’ He looked out over the wrecked plains. ‘That kind of thoughtlessness helped us into this hell. Would Perturabo have turned if his Legion had been shown a little more consideration? Would Mortarion, if his ego had been paid a touch more care? Curze too would have been capable of less harm had his madness been addressed, and it should have been. But it was not. We were made to be the lords of men. Our father trusted us too much to solve our own problems, and we fell so far short of his vision.’
Raldoron was shocked by his father’s insights, and would have deemed them close to treasonous if they had not been uttered in so measured a way, or by so perfect a being. Sanguinius saw this, as he saw Raldoron’s unswerving loyalty, and his love. It pained the primarch to know that Raldoron and many of the others would have followed him into damnation if he had chosen the other path presented him. That his Legion marched so faithfully towards a different sort of hell sickened Sanguinius, but there was no other way.
‘We followed the Emperor’s lead, my lord,’ said Raldoron.
‘Look not to the Emperor and expect perfection. My father is mighty, and good, and wise, but He is a man. Nobody is infallible. Such false faith gave us certainty when there was none.’
‘Then perhaps He should have discouraged our faith,’ said Raldoron.
‘He tried,’ said Sanguinius. He looked to the sky. The sun was a smear in the yellow, against which attack-craft warred like moths battering against a curtained casement deep in the night. He smiled with bitter, inner knowledge. ‘Hubris is a trap for us all – that is the last certainty when all others are gone. There are no more certainties in this galaxy, my son. Only hubris, and only war.’
‘This is a better war than most.’
‘It is one we need to fight. These armies that flock to the system, they might follow Guilliman, but he is not here, and would they obey the Lion, Russ, or the Khan, or even Dorn? I have to be here. This is my place, for now. I will not say it is my destiny, for I defy the concept, but it is my rightful role, and I choose it without qualm.’
He stirred, remembering similar words spoken by his brother, Leman Russ, not so long ago. Where was the Great Wolf now? he wondered. Perhaps he was dead. No word had come from him or his Legion since he had left to face Horus. Were they all doomed to that same mistake? Both he and Russ believed fighting the Warmaster to be their fate.
His wings flexed. The movement was a wordless signal to his Sanguinary Guard, who took the ornaments looped over his wings’ wrists and handed the primarch his golden helm in preparation for flight.
‘While the majority of my brother’s Titans are here, we can press him elsewhere. The Khan’s Ordu wounds his armies, bleeding him with a thousand tulwar cuts. Horus is not here, but we can hurt him. We shall retake Nyrcon City, and this world, and so stabilise the front. The more time Horus expends in fighting us in the cluster, the more likely our ultimate victory becomes.’ He held out his right hand. The Blade Encarmine was presented to him, and he clasped its hilt. Into his left he took the glorious Spear of Telesto. ‘The battle for the Anvil goes to plan. Azkaellon and Amit will deliver the star fortress unto me. We shall take this city.’ He turned from the side door and marched through the transit hold. Sanguinary Guard stood as he passed, their artificial wings unfolding in readiness to follow the primarch.
‘Open the rear ramp,’ Raldoron ordered. The side door closed. The ship tilted as the pilots adjusted to the change in airflow, then again as the rear ramp, large enough for a tank to drive down, was pushed wide by gleaming pistons. Sanguinius walked to the very edge and stared down at the maelstrom, his wings slightly spread to help him maintain his balance. There was never a time when the primarch did not have poise. He was perfection itself, incarnated in human form.
‘Time to show our hand.’ He searched the ground from the open ramp, post-human vision scouring the battlefield for a place to make his appearance. Sanguinius understood almost as well as Fulgrim that there was an element of theatre to war. ‘War is art. One must make a statement with it, or it cannot be called art at all.’ A conflict caught his eye, a fight within the wider fight of surpassing majesty. ‘There.’ He pointed his sword to where a pair of Imperators faced off against one another, dozens of Titans of varying sorts in support, like kings attended by their knights, or the pieces upon a regicide board. Their liveries were caked in brown dust, dulling the colours, and yet, though all involved were made to the same plan, by the same science, there was no mistaking which side each Titan belonged to. The way they moved was different. Traitors strutted. Those loyal to Terra moved with a machine’s solidity, less fluid perhaps, but purer in motion.
‘That Titan bears the mark-class Imperator in honour of my father. It is a disgrace to his name. Its personal designation is Axis Mundi, as if Horus’ plans for humanity will be the axis around which the universe shall spin. It will not be so. Both names are insults. It will fall by my hand.’ Through the distortions of his helm’s voxmitter, his voice was still beautiful.
‘My lord, it is not wise,’ said Raldoron. ‘The machine will shoot you down from the sky. It is too great a threat.’
‘That is why it must die. A mark, a sign, a show of Imperial strength. My traitor brothers put so much store in omens. I will give them a sign they can easily read.’
At Sanguinius’ order, half a dozen other Stormbirds flew into formation with his own. Shrapnel burst all around them as the city sought to down the primarch, but not one was touched. Still in formation, they banked around and swooped down at their target. The towers upon the Imperator’s back opened fire, streaking the air with las and shell, but the void shields of the gunships held, and they stooped like hawks upon their prey, their engines shrieking. ‘Put down with the others where you might do some good,’ said Sanguinius to Raldoron. ‘The ramparts, perhaps. I leave the decision to you, First Captain.’
‘You cannot, my lord,’ said Raldoron.
The engines screamed louder and louder. Explosions boomed around the ship. The void shields reacted with curlicued patterns of energy, and a smell of sweetness too close to rot.
Sanguinius spread his wings, and held aloft his sword and his spear. ‘I can do as I will, Raldoron, without fear or caution. You forget my father’s greatest gift to me. Through the foresight He gave me, I know I do not die here today.’
With those words, he fell backwards out of the Stormbird, turned, and stretched out his wings.
From the ships about, dozens of gold-clad warriors leapt after their primarch into the cauldron of war.
The heavens split over the bowed backs of a thousand Titans. A sacred luminance outshone the sun. The clouds cracked, and the sky wept tears of light. A lord of angels flew down from his high palace to bring justice to the betrayers. Arms spread, wings spread and gold-limned, he swooped across the field of iron. Guns roared and barked. Machine giants wailed their terrible, belligerent songs. All was thunder and death, but none cou
ld touch him. A mighty halo grew around his head, and a curious magic worked its spell upon the field. A trick of Beta-Garmon’s meagre light, or a conjuration of fatigued, machine-linked minds – however it occurred, all saw it, and those who did could never forget.
Sanguinius grew. He filled the air, swelling with otherworldly power, until his limbs encompassed all the heavens and the earth beneath, showing up the meanness of mortal life with his perfection. For the moments the vision lasted, he seemed in truth an angel of olden legend, not sprung from gene-forge at science’s command, but wrought upon the anvils of heaven by grim, loving gods to be the correction of wayward humanity.
To the princeps of the loyal Legios, he was a being of purest light, clean and invigorating, the herald of hope and peace. His sword was the bringer of regretful cuts, the precise amount delivered to bring about the end of bloodshed, then to be sheathed forever and drawn no more. In his radiance they all glimpsed anew the reason why they were fighting, forgotten by many weary and blunted hearts, and saw again the vision that had sent mankind away from its blasted home world and into the stars. Not for conquest, nor for material gain and the oppression of others for the sake of power, but to realise the grand designs of the Emperor, and bring harmony not only to mankind but to all other creatures who valued peace. Within the manifolds of their machines, not a few of them wept to be reminded of what could have been, and what had been lost.
For those he came for, the vision was dark. His panoply, spear and sword were bloody with the promise of vengeance to come. His eyes burned with furious judgement. The feathers of his wings screamed through the air, each one sounding a different accusation. To those who had fallen far from noble beginnings, he was a reminder of what they had abandoned. To those whose wickedness had threatened to overthrow them from the very beginning he seemed to speak directly, condemning them for their turpitude, and showing to them the depth of their crimes.
