“He’s a priest, too?” Ragnar asked dumbly.
“Not just a priest, Ragnar. Torvald was one of the first Rune Priests,” Torin replied. “He fought alongside Russ during the Great Crusade. Imagine that!”
“And you pitched him into the dirt as if he was a bare-chinned aspirant,” Haegr said, slapping Ragnar on the shoulder. “That was well done, little brother! He’s lucky he didn’t try to shake his axe in my face. I might have bitten it off and spat it at his feet!”
The young Space Wolf paid Haegr no mind, staring instead at the huge wolf-men patrolling around them. “They’re all wolf-bitten,” he said, “even Torvald. He has the mark of the Wulfen in his eyes.”
“According to the sagas, Magnus and the Thousand Sons escaped our wrath on Prospero by retreating through a portal into the warp, but Russ wasn’t about to let them escape so easily. He ordered the Thirteenth to give chase, and they disappeared into the fading portal, never to be seen again.” Torin shook his head ruefully. “It’s a wonder any of them are alive at all.”
“Ten thousand years,” Ragnar echoed, trying to make sense of all he’d heard. “What does Torvald want of us?”
“Not Torvald, he’s here at the bidding of his lord, Bulveye. Sigurd said we’re to head up into the mountains to meet with Bulveye and the rest of his warband. I expert we’ll learn more when we get there,” Torin said.
Ragnar met Torin’s eye. “How do we know we can trust them?” he asked.
The question surprised Torin. “They’re our brothers, Ragnar!”
“Even so, they’ve spent ten millennia at the mercy of the warp,” the young Space Wolf countered. “Who can guess what their motives are now?”
Torin shifted uncomfortably. “We’ll know soon enough. Torvald and his Wulfen mean to take us into the mountains, and I don’t think we have much choice in the matter.” The older Wolfblade rose abruptly to his feet. “Besides, we’re not exactly unblemished ourselves.”
Ragnar watched, bemused as Torin stalked away. Haegr shook his head and rose to lumber after his long-time friend. The young Space Wolf turned to Gabriella, a questioning look on his face. “What did Torin mean by that?”
The Navigator looked at Ragnar for a long moment, and then reached out and lightly touched his cheek. “It’s your eyes,” she said, a weary sadness in her voice, “they’re yellow-gold now, just like Torvald’s.”
At the same moment, many leagues across the shadow world, a crescendo of pain and suffering rose within the walls of the crimson temple as the energies of the great ritual approached a critical mass. A thousand sorcerers and initiates knelt on the stone floor of the cavernous hall, their hands outstretched to the altar of black stone and the bloody scraps of flesh that lay upon it. Their lips were cracked and bleeding, their throats raw and their eyes seared shut by the awful energies emitted from the burning eye that hung like a blasphemous sun above the sacrificial stone.
Hellish light fell upon Madox. He could feel the terrible favour of his primarch resting like a fiery mantle upon his shoulders. The sorcerer lord stood before the great altar, leading the intricate ritual in a cold, implacable voice. In one hand he gripped the stolen Spear of Russ, and it was through this sacred icon that Madox channelled the force of his unholy spell. It was the fulcrum upon which the ritual would act. Without it, the great spell would have been for naught.
Madox felt the minds of the lesser sorcerers in the room, each one shaping a specific part of the malediction that he would channel into the spear. The elements were slipping inexorably into place, like the workings of a vast and terrible engine. He could sense the moment approaching and his voice swelled with triumph.
The Space Wolves had carried the seeds of their own destruction from the very beginning. Very soon those seeds would bear bitter fruit.
SIXTEEN
Red Tide Rising
Torvald the Reaver drove the Wolves hard, leading them out of the dismal fields of the agri-combine and towards the slate coloured mountains to the north at a dead run. Despite his age, the Rune Priest was fleet as a deer. Ragnar and the other warriors had to push themselves in order to keep up. During the first hour the dark green fields of the combine were just a faint line on the horizon, and the empty plains were giving way to low, rounded foothills of dark stone and lifeless earth.
Inquisitor Volt and Gabriella managed to keep the pace for the first half hour, but the exertions they’d endured after the crash of the Thunderhawk quickly took their toll. The older Volt faltered first, his pace slowing and his breath coming in ragged gasps. He stumbled, on the verge of collapse, but two of Harald’s Blood Claws closed in on either side of the inquisitor and slipped their arms around his waist, carrying him along just as they would a crippled pack-mate. Gabriella lasted almost half an hour longer, but the sound of her pained breathing made it clear that she’d driven herself well beyond her physical limits. Before she could falter Haegr came up behind her and scooped the Navigator up in the crook of one arm, like a father might carry a child. Gabriella hung limp in the burly Wolfblade’s embrace, too exhausted to manage much in the way of protest.
The Wulfen, no less than fifteen of them, Ragnar was shocked to discover, loped along easily beside the warriors. They moved with a swift, fluid gait, clawed hands swinging and shoulders hunched, their wolflike heads held low as if to sniff for signs of danger. Their armour was dented and scarred from centuries of hard use, and Ragnar saw that many of their suits had been patched with scavenged parts. He couldn’t be certain, but some of the replacements looked to have been taken from the suits of slain Chaos Marines. Their strength and speed were incredible, but there was little intelligence in their golden eyes save for the fierce cunning of a predator. When Ragnar met their flat stares he felt his hackles rise with an instinctive challenge, and more, a sense of mutual recognition.
Is this my future? Ragnar brooded over the notion as they raced across the twilit plain. He thought of Torvald. The Rune Priest was wolf-bitten, but for all that he seemed capable of holding the curse at bay. There must be a way, the young Space Wolf thought. He couldn’t bear the notion that he was a prisoner to his fate.
There was only one person he could think of who could answer his questions. Gritting his teeth, Ragnar picked up his pace and sought out Sigurd the Wolf Priest.
Sigurd ran in the midst of Harald’s Blood Claw pack, just a few metres behind Torvald. The younger warriors had gravitated around the priest since his unexpected return, like iron to a lodestone, and they glared belligerently at Ragnar as he worked his way into their midst.
The Wolf Priest noted his approach with a single, forbidding glance. “What do you want, exile?” he said.
Ragnar gave the priest a sidelong glare. “All of us are exiles now, priest,” he retorted. “Our ship was destroyed, so there’s no chance of ever returning home to our Chapter and kin.”
Sigurd said nothing at first, although the priest’s stiff, silent demeanour told Ragnar that his point had hit home. Finally he said, “We saw the battle unfold above the shadow world, but could only guess at the outcome.”
“The Fist of Russ is gone, and many brave men are feasting in the Halls of Russ now,” Ragnar said gravely. “We detected a signal as we tried to make planetfall. Was that yours?”
“Yes,” Sigurd said. “Bulveye was against it, but I thought it worth the risk. Lookouts spotted the aerial battle and the fires of your crash, and Torvald volunteered to search for survivors.” The priest spread his hands. “The Wulfen caught your scent and led us to the agri-combine just in time.”
“It seems that the Wulfen saved you as well,” Ragnar said thoughtfully. Memories of the confused melee in the rebel command bunker flashed through his mind. “The last I saw of you, you were surrounded by daemons.”
Sigurd gave Ragnar a hard look, but reluctantly nodded. “It was a grim battle,” he agreed. “They came upon me all at once, rising out of the aether like ghosts. This world we’re on lies across Charys like a shadow,
allowing them to step between the two at will.”
“I know,” the young Space Wolf replied. “Inquisitor Volt and Lady Gabriella unravelled the mystery, which is what led us here in the first place.”
The Wolf Priest nodded in understanding. “The daemons seemed to take particular interest in me for some reason. Perhaps a priest makes a better trophy than a mere warrior,” he said ruefully. “I struck down several of the abominations, but to my shame the rest of them overwhelmed me. They pinned my arms and somehow dragged me back across the threshold into this nether realm.” Sigurd nodded to the towering form of the Rune Priest just ahead. “But the foul creatures didn’t realise they were being hunted. Torvald and the Wulfen ambushed the Chaos sorcerer and his daemons even as they ambushed us.”
Ragnar remembered the sight of the towering Wulfen grappling with the Chaos sorcerer in the vault beneath the rebel command bunker. “So Torvald and his warriors can cross between the worlds as well?”
Sigurd frowned. “Were that possible, I would have returned to the battle straightaway,” he snapped. “No, the crossing is affected by sorcery. Sometimes it’s possible to be caught up in the spell and drawn across the threshold, but only for a moment.” He shrugged. “The Wulfen pulled down the sorcerer and tore him apart, and Torvald turned his axe upon the daemons besetting me. When the battle was done I tended their wounds as best as I could, and they treated me as one of their own.”
“But how did they come to be here?” Ragnar asked. “Torin says the Thirteenth Company was lost during the time of the Heresy.”
“Lost?” Sigurd seemed astonished by the notion. “Bulveye’s company was never lost, Ragnar. When a Wolf Lord is slain a new one is raised up to take his place. The same is true for the great companies, but a place for the Thirteenth remains at the table of the Great Wolf back on Fenris, as though they are expected to one day return. Think on that, Ragnar. The Thirteenth Company was sent into the Eye of Terror by Russ, and for ten thousand years they have continued their mission, regardless of the cost.”
The thought was a sobering one. Ragnar studied the grey, featureless mountains ahead and tried to imagine wandering them for ten thousand years, until Fenris was nothing but a distant memory. Unbidden, he felt the wolf within him stir. “Their honour has cost them dearly,” he said.
“Honour always does,” the Wolf Priest replied.
For a while, they ran on in silence. The footfalls of the Wolves were like a heavy drumbeat across the sloping plain, beating out a war-song in time to the baleful lightning overhead. Ragnar considered his words carefully.
“How does a man come to be wolf-bitten, Sigurd?”
The Wolf Priest shot Ragnar a sharp look, but abruptly relented as he met the young Space Wolfs golden eyes. He considered the question for a moment before he replied. “All of us have the wolf in our blood,” he said. “It sharpens our senses and gives us the glad rage of the berserker in battle, but like any wild thing it tests its bonds constantly, waiting for the chance to break free.”
Sigurd stared thoughtfully at a pair of Wulfen loping silently along beside Harald’s pack. “It is a constant struggle between man and wolf,” he said, “and not every soul is strong enough to keep the beast at bay,” The priest laid a hand on the Iron Wolf amulet at his breast. “We bind the beast with sacred oaths to Russ and the Allfather, and we of the priesthood purify our battle-brothers with rituals and devotions to strengthen their resolve. For most, that is enough.”
“Yet not enough for Bulveye and his warriors.”
Ragnar expected a pious retort from the young priest, but when Sigurd spoke, his voice was surprisingly compassionate. “It is not our place to judge these warriors,” he said with conviction. “Even the ancient Dreadnoughts must sleep between times of war, lest they succumb to their feral natures. How hard must it be to keep one’s soul intact after a thousand years of war, much less ten.”
The Wolf Priest shook his head solemnly. “It is a testament to their courage and honour that they have endured as long as they have.”
The young Space Wolf nodded thoughtfully. “But… is there no way to restore them?”
Sigurd stiffened slightly. Ragnar was straying into the proscribed territory of the priesthood. “The transformation is a gradual one,” he said guardedly, “but once begun, the process is inexorable. As the wolf within gains power, it exerts physical changes on the body.” He gestured to the Wulfen nearby. “Much depends on the will and the faith of the warrior. The degradation can be halted, sometimes indefinitely, but it cannot be undone.”
The priest’s words sent a chill through Ragnar’s veins. “Gabriella says that my eyes have changed colour,” he said numbly. “How much longer do I have?”
Sigurd frowned. “Truly, I do not know,” he said reluctantly. “Again, it depends upon the warrior. The process begins slowly, but accelerates as the wolf gains power.”
“How slowly?” Ragnar asked.
The Wolf Priest glowered at Ragnar. “Are you trying to shame me with my lack of experience?” he snapped. “I confess I do not know for certain. The curse usually strikes initiates hardest, because their minds are still adapting to the changes taking place within them. Once a warrior becomes a full-fledged battle-brother… the curse takes years for the transformation to take hold.”
“Years?” Ragnar exclaimed. “But I felt nothing before I returned to Fenris, just two months ago!”
Sigurd stared sharply at the young Space Wolf. “That’s not possible,” he said. “Even with an initiate, it takes at least a year for the first changes to make themselves known.”
“If I were wolf-bitten a year ago, Ranek would have known it,” Ragnar declared, “and I would have never been sent to Terra to serve House Bellisarius.”
The young priest thought it over, and his expression began to darken in consternation. “It’s true,” he said at last. “Something else must be at work here, but I confess that I don’t know what it could be.”
Ragnar nodded. “Perhaps Bulveye or Torvald can tell us,” he said, daring to hope that things were not as hopeless as Sigurd suggested.
“Perhaps,” the priest allowed. “We should reach the Wolf Lord’s camp in a few more hours. I expect we’ll learn a great deal then.”
They reached the first, wood-fringed foothills south of the grey mountains not long afterwards, and Torvald led the Wolves along the winding track of a dry streambed until they were hidden within the walls of a narrow, stony defile. Their pounding footfalls echoed crazily from the rocky walls as their course led north and east from one canyon to the next. The trail doubled back more than once, and without a pattern of stars to navigate by Ragnar soon lost track of where they were.
Within an hour Ragnar began to pick up the faint scents of other Wolves, and reckoned they were approaching the perimeter of the camp. His experienced eyes scanned the slopes of the rocky canyons through which they passed, but if there were sentries observing their approach he couldn’t detect them. Then, abruptly, the canyon sloped steeply upward and the path narrowed to a cleft in the stone barely wide enough to admit the broad Space Marines.
Ragnar felt a prickling sensation race across his skin as he worked his way through the pass. Once through the cleft he quickly scanned the close-set walls of the defile that surrounded him and saw a pair of iron bars that had been driven into the stone on either side of the pass. Skulls and iron tokens carved with runes hung from each of the bars, and a wave of invisible power radiated from them.
“Those are way-posts, part of Torvald’s system of wards,” Sigurd explained as he emerged from the cleft behind Ragnar. “They confound attempts to locate Bulveye’s camp using sorcery.” The Wolf Priest gazed upon the way-post with a mixture of awe and superstitious dread. “Torvald and his kin have learned a great deal during their long campaign in the Eye.”
The path to Bulveye’s camp had been carefully chosen, the approach forcing the Wolves to travel single-file and climb a steep, rocky approach into a high,
sheer-sided canyon. At the southern end of the canyon, Ragnar saw the first of Bulveye’s warriors: a pair of men crouching in the shadow of a boulder, covering the entrance to the canyon with a pair of plasma guns. Both warriors wore cloaks of tanned hide that had been covered in dirt and dust, and their motionless forms allowed them to blend in perfectly with their surroundings. Like Torvald, their long hair was thick and braided, and their beards hung halfway down their patched breastplates. They said nothing as the rescue party climbed past, studying them with cold, lupine eyes.
A little farther up the canyon a massive boulder had been rolled into a narrow place, creating a kind of dog-leg to prevent a clear line of fire into the area beyond. More warriors stood guard on the other side of the boulder, brandishing old, worn bolt pistols and ancient, nine carved blades. Their armour was decorated with intricate runes and carvings of battle scenes or voyages, and there were skulls or other battle trophies hanging from their broad belts. The warriors stared at Ragnar and the newcomers with frank but wary interest, stealing sidelong glances at one another and communicating in subtle gestures or nods.
More than a dozen metres further up the canyon they came upon a series of well-worn but serviceable wilderness shelters built alongside the rock walls. The camp looked as if it had been occupied for some time, and many of the shelters were marked with recent war trophies such as daemon talons and damaged pieces of blue and gold armour. More than a score of yellow-eyed warriors sat outside the shelters, cleaning their weapons or making repairs to their gear. On the surface, it looked no different from any other Space Wolf field camp that Ragnar had seen… except for the wary, challenging stares of the battle-brothers and the sense of history that stretched like an invisible tapestry across the camp and its inhabitants.
He’d felt such a thing once before, back when he was but a young lad plying the salt oceans of Fenris. His longship had been blown far off course during a storm, and they’d put in at a small island in search of fresh water. There they stumbled onto the camp of a small band of their clansmen who had been stranded there by a similar storm two years before. Ragnar still remembered the first time he’d set foot in their camp, and how the survivors had stared at him like a pack of wild dogs. They had lived in another world altogether since they had been lost, and their experiences had forged a bond that no one else could understand, much less share. It was a world in which he and his clansmen could not ever fully belong, and Ragnar felt the same sensation as he walked among the warriors of the Thirteenth Company.
[Space Wolf 06] - Wolf's Honour Page 23
