by George Mann
The bird gave a shrill, deafening cry as it launched itself forwards, throwing its full weight behind the manoeuvre as its powerful neck snapped around, its beak opening wide as it moved in for the kill.
Koryn jumped, twisting in the air and arcing his back, his lightning claws flashing.
The bird pivoted on one foot, its vast jaws snapping shut centimetres from Koryn’s face. It staggered forwards, unable to halt its own momentum, and Koryn thrust his talons at its head, scoring three great furrows in the creature’s beak.
The terror bird howled in rage, drawing itself up to its full height as it turned around for another strike. Koryn was waiting for it, however, and rushed in close, slashing viciously across its belly with the aim of disembowelling it before it could attack again.
He felt the bird’s flesh part with ease, but the sight that greeted him caused him to reel back in dismay. The creature’s intestines spilled out in a steaming heap, but they were black and wasted, infested with writhing maggots.
The stench hit him like a blow to the face and he staggered away, bringing his talons up in defence. The bird, apparently none the worse for having its guts spread across the forest floor, darted forwards again, trailing its organs across the ground. Its beak struck Koryn’s left pauldron and sent him spinning to the ground. He landed on his back, the creature looming over him, its beady eyes intent on its kill. It was dripping dark, thick blood from the ragged wound in its belly, and it spattered on Koryn’s helm, obscuring his view.
The bird’s foot slammed down on his chest-plate before he had time to roll out of the way, and he felt the crushing weight bear down upon him, the ceramite flexing as it fought to spread the load across his ribs. The bird was not attempting to crush him, he realised, but to pin in him place while it readied itself for the kill.
Koryn focused on remaining calm, on planning his next move. He had seconds before the bird took his head off with a snap of its razor-sharp jaws. Practically an eternity to a Raven Guard.
His options were limited. His right arm was pinned beneath one of its talons. His left arm – still burning with pain from where the metal spar had impaled him earlier – was wedged up against the root of a tree, and he couldn’t get enough leverage with his legs to roll.
With a grunt of pain, Koryn forced his wounded shoulder to flex, feeling it pull in protest as he moved it in a way it was never intended to move. He gritted his teeth and pushed harder, twisting it until he could feel the joint almost ready to give.
Almost simultaneously, the bird arched back, widening its jaws, and Koryn’s arm popped free with an audible crack.
He took the bird’s leg off with a swipe of his lightning claws, moving with almost preternatural speed in order to roll out of the way before the creature’s torso came crashing down on top of him. It smashed into the ground with the full force of the blow it had been intending for Koryn, screeching in pain and frustration.
Koryn sprung to his feet, turning quickly to face the thrashing beast. It was clawing at the ground with its remaining talons, its beak churning the earth as it attempted to lever itself up.
Now that he was standing over it, he could see that the creature had succumbed to the same fate as the rest of the life in that infernal forest. Parasites crawled over its entire body, burrowing in and out of its necrotic flesh, nestling beneath its feathers. The reek of death was thick and cloying. The bird had been infected by the traitor’s plague.
No wonder the thing had proved difficult to kill: to all intents and purposes, it was already dead. He reached down and separated its head from its torso with a quick, sudden gesture. Its body shuddered, and then its remaining leg finally ceased twitching. Its flesh continued to heave and crawl with the movement of the diabolical parasitic creatures, but Koryn had no time to pay them any heed.
Behind him, the forest was alive with the sounds of battle. All around him his brothers had engaged the birds. Close by, Corvaan ducked and weaved in a dangerous dance, armed with nothing but a combat knife and a burning hatred for the pestilence that had infected these once graceful creatures.
Across the clearing, Avias was shredding two of the beasts with repeated bursts from his bolter, while behind him Grayvus was wrestling another to the ground, hacking at it with his blade and sending shreds of brightly coloured feathers drifting into the air.
At the heart of the clearing stood Cordae, silent and unmoving, a terrifying figure in his full totemic battle regalia. His crozius was balanced lightly in his right hand, which hung loosely by his side. Before him towered one of the immense birds, its beak poised no more than a few centimetres from the tip of his bird skull mask. The two formidable killing machines were regarding each other in silent repose, mirroring each other’s stance, their heads both cocked slightly to one side. It was as if there was some sort of affinity between them, as if Cordae’s bird spirit and the beast were somehow sharing a moment of understanding.
The stillness was utterly at odds with the crazed, intense combat that was taking place all around them, and Koryn wondered for a moment if Cordae actually planned to destroy the creature, or whether he hoped to achieve some other end. The Chaplain could at times be as difficult to fathom as the enemy themselves.
Koryn noticed Cordae’s hand tighten almost imperceptibly on the shaft of his crozius, and grinned. The terror bird was still watching the Chaplain intently, its eyes locked on his. Cordae held its gaze for a second longer, drew his breath, and moved.
The blow came so fast and hard that the bird was caught utterly unaware, and the crozius buried itself in its thick skull, spattering blood and bone fragments across the trunk of a nearby tree. The bird’s body rocked from side to side for a moment before crumpling to the ground with barely a sound.
Cordae yanked his crozius free, wiping it on the grass by his feet, and then turned to glance at Koryn, as if he had known all along that the captain had been watching his movements. He stood for a moment, as if waiting for some sort of reaction or response, and then, without a single word or gesture, he turned and darted off into the trees in search of other prey.
The sounds of the battle seemed to crash in on Koryn, and he turned, anxious to aid his brothers. Through the trees he saw flames erupt suddenly as Kayae doused one of the birds with his flamer and the hulking creature burst through the clearing, screeching in panic, its feathers alight with searing flames. To Koryn it looked like a mythical phoenix, burning up as it charged away into the forest leaving a trail of smouldering branches and burning undergrowth in its wake.
Closer to Koryn, Siryan was trapped in a deadlock with two more of the creatures, parrying one before turning to fend off the other, making little headway against either. He had lost his bolter and was defending himself with only his fists and his combat knife, and it was clear to Koryn that the two beasts were hunting in concert, trying to wear the Space Marine down until he made an error and left one of them the opening they needed.
Koryn decided it was time to even up the odds. He charged across the clearing to Siryan’s side, catching hold of the bough of a tree with his right hand and swinging himself up and around in a wide arc. Both his feet connected hard with the skull of one of the birds, causing it to squawk and stagger backwards, shaking its head. Koryn completed his orbit of the tree, dropping to the ground before the creature with his talons ready. He was breathing hard, adrenaline coursing through his veins.
‘A timely intervention, captain,’ said Siryan, dropping to one knee as the other bird lurched forwards and he feinted easily to the left. The beast received a sharp blow to the side of its head for its trouble, and it screeched angrily, kicking out at Siryan and raking his chest-plate with its claws, leaving deep score marks across the aquila that adorned his breast. Siryan plunged his knife into its belly in reply, but the creature simply reared back, pulling away from him with the weapon still buried in its guts.
Unarmed, Siryan circle
d warily, his fists at the ready, keeping his gaze fixed on his avian opponent.
Koryn had his own beast to worry about, however, and he strafed from side to side in time with the bird, watching its head bob with every movement, trying to predict the direction and timing of its next attack. The creature opened its jaws and hissed at him, its livid pink tongue wriggling in its beak as if of its own volition.
Koryn rushed it, spearing it through the breast with both lightning claws, jamming them deep inside its ribcage. It thrashed and shrieked, shaking itself from side to side in an effort to throw him loose. The stench of roasting meat filled the air as the energy discharge from his talons seared the creature’s flesh.
The bird gave a sudden, unexpected jerk, breaking Koryn’s momentary hold and flinging him against the tree that only moments before he had used to his advantage. He impacted hard, rebounding and rolling across the forest floor, accompanied by the shattered remnants of the brittle trunk that splintered beneath the blow.
The bird thundered forwards and lurched for him, twisting its powerful neck as it thrust its hooked beak towards his head. Koryn waited until it was nearly upon him, until the jaws were just beginning to part – and then struck, jabbing upwards with his right claw and skewering the beast through the skull, embedding his talons behind its massive beak. He yanked his fist back with an almighty effort, wrenching the bird’s beak clean from its head and allowing its bulky, twitching corpse to collapse into a heap across his legs. Blood spewed from the terrible wound where its face had once been.
Koryn kicked himself free and stood, turning just in time to see Siryan stagger back, defenceless, as the other bird finally got the better of him, its terrible jaws snapping shut about his waist. Ceramite cracked and fractured as the beast lifted him triumphantly into the air, shaking its head as Siryan beat frantically against its beak with his fists. Then, before Koryn could react, it bit down viciously, severing Siryan neatly in two.
The two halves of the dead Raven Guard slumped from the bird’s dripping jaws, and it raised its head to the sky and screeched in bloody triumph.
Enraged, Koryn rushed forwards, bellowing loudly as he charged at the beast. His twin hearts pounded in his chest.
The bird, cawing loudly, turned about to face him, its tiny, useless wings twitching as it clawed at the ground, as if urging Koryn on, anxious for the battle ahead.
Koryn raised his claws, and then swerved suddenly to the right, ducking behind a tree as Kayae stepped out from behind the creature and coated it in a blanket of raging promethium. It screamed and thrashed about in torment as its feathers ignited, until, a moment later, it had been reduced to nothing but a living tower of flame. It staggered towards Koryn, blinded by the heat, and then keeled over into the mud, dead and unmoving. The flames continued to lick hungrily at its grotesque, rotten flesh.
‘It is done, captain,’ said Cordae, appearing suddenly at Koryn’s side. ‘The last of the birds is dead.’
‘So is Siryan,’ replied Koryn, quietly.
‘Indeed. I would be honoured to harvest his gene-seed and reclaim his corvia, if you’ll permit it.’
Koryn nodded his assent. He watched as Cordae circled the flaming pyre of the dead beast and dropped to his haunches before the ruins of his slain brother.
Nearby, Kayae stood watching, a stark silhouette against the firelight, the nozzle of his flamer still smoking effusively.
‘When he’s finished, Kayae, burn Siryan’s corpse. I will not allow the heretic’s rot to claim his flesh.’
‘Yes, captain,’ said Kayae.
Koryn flexed the tense muscles in his neck. Now they were nine, and they had yet to truly face the enemy. Fortane’s World had not welcomed its ebon-armoured benefactors. Nevertheless, he would soon be spilling the blood of traitors, and that would be retribution enough. That would be the means by which he honoured his dead kin.
Koryn stepped back into the shadows of the trees as Kayae moved forwards, readying his flamer. Siryan would burn, and so would the enemy. Even if Fortane’s World was nothing but a husk when they had finished.
Daed
Daed hoisted the two wriggling humans, one in each fist, and smashed their skulls together, spattering bone fragments and brain matter over his arms. He dropped the twitching corpses into a heap of quivering limbs and hefted his axe from where it was slung in a harness across his broad shoulders.
Behind the grille of his respirator, he bellowed wordlessly, equal parts fury and frustration.
He sensed motion behind him and swung around, his filigreed axe head leading the way. Another cultist slumped to the ground, sliced in half at the waist, spilled viscera heaping onto his muddy boots. The man’s blood gave off a foul, noxious steam as it fountained onto the muddy loam; evidence, Daed knew, of the vile infection coursing through his veins. Daed would have spat in disgust, had it not been for the fact he was wearing his helm and relied upon its respirator to filter the tainted air.
The enemy were all around him now, swarming in their multitudes. Daed laughed bitterly as he felled another of these former Guardsmen with a single, swift blow from his fist, collapsing the man’s skull. No matter their numbers, no matter how quickly they came at him, Daed would not fall. In his shining golden armour he was like a beacon on the battlefield, a flickering flame in the darkness, drawing the enemy towards him as though they were moths.
One of the daemon creatures came at him then, hissing its strange, unnatural curses, its poisonous tongue lolling from its mouth like a hungry, flapping snake. Its single, jaundiced eye blinked rapidly as if distracted by the sheer volume of flies that buzzed around its foul carcass. The stench was incredible, as if the beast was in fact a walking corpse, half rotted and warm, having been raised up from an ancient battlefield and given life.
For all Daed knew, that might not have been far from the truth. Whatever it was, it was an abomination, the foul spawn of the warp, and it had no place on Fortane’s World. It had no right to be alive.
The creature moved with an awkward, shambling gait: too slow to pose any real threat of injury. Still, Daed knew that even the slightest lick of its ensorcelled blade would mean a festering, painful death. Or, more likely, a round from his own bolter to the head.
The daemon lurched at him, swinging its poisoned blade in a wide, upward arc, as if attempting to decapitate him. Daed raised his axe to parry the blow, battering away the creature’s weapon. He retaliated with a low kick, aiming his booted foot at the creature’s distended belly in an effort to send it sprawling to the ground.
Instead, his foot sank inside the daemon’s bloated flesh with a sickening crunch, burying his leg up to the ankle. He almost lost his footing as the daemon staggered back, dragging him with it and threatening to overbalance him. He threw a hand out to catch himself and managed to stay upright. He tugged at his foot, trying to pull it free. The sticky, malleable flesh of the creature quivered and gave, but would not yield.
The creature, still emitting its weary litany of ancient, blasphemous words, seemed hardly to notice the Space Marine’s boot in its guts, however, never taking its single, baleful eye from its target. It raised its weapon once more, grasping the pommel with both hands and hefting the blade above its head.
Daed dropped his axe and twisted, using the trapped limb to give him purchase. He pivoted, reaching around and sliding his bolt pistol from its holster. He fired indiscriminately into the creature’s face, pulping the eye and flensing the soft, pulpy flesh from the cartilage beneath.
The plaguebearer toppled backwards, carried over by the weight of its blade and wrenching Daed’s boot free in the process. It came away with a gloopy pop, slopping innards and freeing a swarm of strange, rat-sized creatures that had evidently been dwelling inside the daemon’s guts. They scampered away, mewling pitifully.
Daed paused, stooping to retrieve his discarded axe. The daemon was still muttering to
itself, as if the words – whatever they were – were somehow sustaining it. He cut off its blinded head with a single blow to the neck, silencing it forever.
The autocannons mounted on the bastion walls began to chatter again, filling the sky with a storm of explosive rounds. The bark of their thunderous fire was deafening, drowning out even the nearby screams of the dying.
Behind Daed, one of the Brazen Minotaurs’ Razorbacks detonated with a blinding flash as its fuel tanks ignited, punctured by the onslaught from the bastion’s defensive emplacements.
The enemy troops fell upon the resulting breach in the barricade within seconds, and Daed saw two of his golden-armoured brothers torn from their positions by sheer weight of numbers. They fought valiantly, despatching scores of the Chaos troops, before succumbing to the overwhelming odds and disappearing from view.
Daed turned on the nearest squad of enemy militia with renewed ire. His brothers were dying, and he would not allow their sacrifice to be in vain. The odds were against them, but the Emperor was at their side.
The last push had proved to be disastrous. The five Razorbacks had led the charge, pushing the barricade forwards, churning up great furrows of earth and riding roughshod over large numbers of the enemy. Brazen Minotaurs had followed in their wake, slaughtering the survivors and chanting hymnals as they drew closer to the plascrete skirts of the bastion itself.
Daed had not anticipated they would gain so much ground in a single push and had urged the Razorbacks onwards, hopeful that the enemy forces were finally showing signs of weakening beneath the constant vigilance of his warriors.
His hope had turned to disappointment, however, when a few moments later he had realised his folly: the Chaos forces had been luring them closer to bring them within range of the bastion’s turret-mounted heavy weapons.
The first casualty had been one of the Razorbacks, the tank blossoming into flames as the autocannons had shredded it with their opening salvo. Daed did not yet know how many of his brothers had been cut down by the ensuing torrent, but he had seen Toros dance backwards with the impact of repeated shots, before dropping heavily to the ground. Before he had been able to run to his brother’s side, the barricade all around him had erupted in a series of explosions and he had been forced into cover.
