Curse of the Wulfen

by David Annandale

  As the Wolf Lords left the Hall, Dragongaze drew Harald aside. ‘You’re worried,’ he said.

  ‘I believe the Slayer and I see very different omens in the Wulfen. He sees what we lost, and what we hope to have again.’

  ‘And what do you see?’

  ‘What we might become if we are not vigilant. I see what we might lose.’

  ‘You think the Wulfen are harbingers of disaster?’

  ‘I’m sure they are harbingers. I don’t know of what. That is my concern.’

  ‘Our meeting before the Murderfang…’ Dragongaze began.

  ‘Yes,’ said Harald. ‘I was thinking of that too. It is linked to Nurades. But how? What drew us there. Krom, a daemon laughed at us as we vanquished it.’

  Dragongaze was silent for a moment. ‘Yet you purged the daemons,’ he said. ‘You defeated the Ruinous Powers.’

  ‘Even so, the daemon laughed.’

  ‘Daemonic malice?’ Dragongaze suggested. ‘It sought to sow doubt.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Harald. He met Dragongaze’s eyes squarely, and did not hide the depths of his concern. ‘It succeeded.’

  At war in the world beneath sleep, above death. The struggle eternal. Ten thousand years now, fighting from plane to plane, an unending march.

  I tarry until you come again, father.

  The loss of the body is no loss of self. The agility of youth forgotten in the great hulk that fights in the kingdom above sleep. But here, in the land between, there is speed again. The fury of spirit matched to the echo of form. The echo of a sarcophagus, a coffin of false death and infinite war.

  All echoes here. Shadows of form and thought, cast by the weight of things in the other realm, the one above sleep. The roots run deep. The war runs deeper. So long without surcease, but what need for rest here, in the kingdom beneath?

  None.

  Only battle.

  On the echo ramparts of the echo fortress, fighting an enemy who are not echoes, whose flesh is the stuff of echoes.

  I must wake. I must speak to my brothers.

  A flood of daemons, a sea lapping at the hexagrammic shadow.

  There can be no waking yet. The sea is rising.

  The daemons must be fought.

  The prey tried to fight back. Lasgun fire struck the Wulfen. The beasts ran directly into the fire, roaring. They were twice the size of the puny human figures, and much faster. They ripped arms from torsos and heads from necks. Blood fountained across the scene of the massacre and paving stones shook under one monster’s feet as he rushed an opponent. He wielded an immense frost axe. He sliced the body in half with a stroke so powerful the blade buried itself in the wall behind then freed it and held it aloft with both hands. The slaughter was complete. The Wulfen pack howled as one.

  They looked up to the gallery where Logan Grimnar stood with the Iron Priest Hrothgar Swordfang. The Wulfen panted, their breath steaming, blood coating their muzzles and armour. They were surrounded by the torn flesh and scattered viscera of the training servitors. They were the image of mindless savagery.

  The beasts lowered their heads and took a knee, bowing to the supreme alpha.

  ‘Good,’ Grimnar said.

  That was enough. The Wulfen rose and loped from the training arena.

  ‘Their new armour looks well,’ Grimnar said to Swordfang.

  ‘Thank you, Great Wolf,’ the Iron Priest said. ‘Their Mark II relics were beyond repair. We completed the Mark VIII size modifications four days ago. They were reluctant to part with their remnants, but they have adapted.’

  ‘Has communication improved?’

  Swordfang’s servo-arms moved back and forth equivocally. ‘A little,’ he said. ‘Serkir, the one with the frost axe, is interesting. He is volatile. He can be almost articulate in short bursts. At other times, language escapes him completely. He understands more than most of the others, I think.’

  ‘A leader?’

  ‘He is subordinate to Yngvir. He might do well with his own pack, though.’

  Treaded servitors entered the arena from low access doors. Their arms had been replaced with floor-scraping blades. Blank-eyed, unemotional, they began the disposal of the bloody remains.

  ‘The weapons the Wulfen were using,’ Grimnar said. ‘I saw no firearms.’

  ‘No,’ said Swordfang. ‘They appear to have no aptitude or taste for them.’

  ‘Those swords and axes, they look familiar. But I don’t recognise them from our arsenals.’ They were too huge. They were impractical for any warrior who wasn’t as outsized as the Wulfen.

  ‘They are from our walls, Great Wolf.’

  Grimnar blinked, surprised, as he realised what Swordfang meant. Immense relic weapons had hung on the walls of the Fang for millennia. Grimnar had regarded them as he did the heroic tapestries. They were heraldry, ornamentation, ancient objects to be honoured.

  ‘What inspired you to take them down?’ he asked.

  ‘Serkir seized the axe himself as we crossed a hall to the training grounds,’ Swordfang said. ‘He cut a statue in half with it. He seemed familiar with its balance. So did the other Wulfen when I ordered the gathering of other such weapons. They wield the weapons as if the blades were forged for this express purpose.’

  ‘What are you suggesting? That they were already in their current form ten thousand years ago?’

  ‘I do not think so. The remnants of the power armour they wore show signs of stress, suggesting they burst through it when they changed.’

  Grimnar frowned. ‘I do not understand.’

  ‘Nor do I. Then there are the grenades. I instigated a full search for all relics scaled to the proportions of the Wulfen. We found many swords and axes. Enough for the entire company, should all the brothers be found. The grenades, however, are not just suited to the hands of the Wulfen. They are suited to their brains.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I was not sure the Wulfen would be capable of using explosives. Firearms are too complex. Nevertheless, we included the grenades in the trials. We discovered they are not on timers.’

  ‘Impact fuses?’

  ‘No. An impulse trigger.’

  ‘Those are very rare,’ Grimnar said.

  ‘These are rarer still. I attempted to operate one. I cannot. But the Wulfen can do so without difficulty. The triggers associated with these grenades are attuned to the specific neural patterns of the Wulfen.’

  Grimnar digested this in silence for a long moment. ‘What do you conclude?’ he asked Swordfang.

  ‘I cannot conclude anything,’ Hrothgar answered. ‘We are faced with two possibilities. Either the phenomenon of the Wulfen existed in our deep past, though there are no records or tales of their existence, in or out of the Thirteenth Company…’

  ‘Or?’

  ‘Or these weapons were forged in anticipation of the coming of the Wulfen.’

  The thought stole Grimnar’s breath. Had this moment been building for ten thousand years? ‘They were foretold?’ he asked.

  ‘I know of no such prophecy.’

  ‘Nor do I.’ That did not mean none existed. So much had been forgotten over a hundred centuries. If in some way the Wulfen were not just returned but long awaited, then Ulrik the Slayer’s interpretation of the omens must be correct.

  Grimnar did not want to contemplate the implications if the Wolf Priest were wrong.

  The launch bays of the Fang vibrated with the roar of gunship engines. Squad after squad embarked in the assault craft. The bays were open and the wind of Fenris shrieked inside, freezing the skin, biting deep, stirring the blood to the hunt and to war. The sky beyond was streaked by the contrails of the gunships that had already left, ascending to the strike cruisers waiting at low anchor. One Great Company after another departed Fenris to set sail on this most portentous of hunts.
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  All but the Tenth. The Drakeslayers would remain.

  Krom Dragongaze stood on an observation platform above the bay, unblinking in the backwash of motors and the merciless fangs of the wind. He stared into the bay. He did not turn his head until, in the corner of his eye, he saw Grimnar approach. Then he faced the Great Wolf.

  ‘The Fang is yours,’ Grimnar said.

  ‘While all the other Wolf Lords depart on this most vital of missions.’

  ‘Fenris cannot be left undefended.’

  Krom lowered his head in acknowledgement. There is no need for a Wolf Lord to remain as castellan, he thought. Or for an entire company to be sidelined.

  As if reading his mind, Grimnar said, ‘I gave this task to you and the Tenth for a reason.’

  Krom waited, saying nothing.

  ‘You were reckless on Alaric Prime,’ Grimnar said.

  So this is punishment for the Sanctus Reach, Krom thought.

  ‘I need to know you will keep faith in your oaths,’ said Grimnar.

  Krom bristled. He struggled to remain silent. He succeeded. Just. Grimnar continued, ‘There is no question of loyalty or ability. The issue is discipline.’

  The urge to protest was strong. Krom’s frustration was motivated by more than slighted honour. The meeting at the Murderfang’s vault haunted him; the portents were multiplying. Though the Slayer’s talk of Russ’ return was compelling, it did not satisfy Krom. Harald’s part in the unfolding saga was already fateful. Krom had no doubt that more was to come. He and the Slayer had yet to learn their roles. The Wolf Priest would find the thread of his destiny in the Sea of Stars while Krom would remain here and wait. There was something he must do. There was a reason he had been among the three to be led to that encounter. It must have something to do with the Wulfen. How could he do what fate required of him, whatever that was, if he was cantoned on Fenris?

  No matter. There was no choice. The Great Wolf had spoken and Krom’s path was clear. He quashed his protestations and nodded once, his face immobile as stone.

  ‘I make my oath that Fenris will be secure,’ he said. ‘The Drakeslayers stand fast.’ He was called to this task, and he would fulfil it. Glory was as nothing compared to an oath and redemption.

  ‘I am pleased to hear it,’ said Grimnar. ‘A pack of the Wulfen will remain with you. Iron Priest Swordfang will continue his examination of them. There are many questions that need to be answered. We will not learn all of them on the Sea of Stars.’

  Krom nodded once more. He wondered how he should interpret the news that not all the Wulfen would depart. He watched Grimnar walk away. A minute later the Great Wolf appeared in the bay below, surrounded by Ulrik the Slayer, the High Rune Priest Njal Stormcaller, and the champion Arjac Rockfist. The legends marched up the assault ramp into the Thunderhawk that would transport them to the battle-barge Allfather’s Honour. The roar of the transport’s engines built to deafening levels, then it shot out of the launch bay.

  The fiery wind of its departure was the last one. Krom remained as he was, watching the final Stormwolves climb while the bay doors rumbled together, shutting out the gale of Fenris. Premonition crawled over his flesh. His hackles rose. When the doors clanged, the ring of iron against iron was the doleful slam of a sarcophagus lid.

  He knew then that fate would still find him.

  Part 2: The Hunt

  Chapter 3

  Whitestalker

  The mechanism had not moved in centuries. It was inert, an assemblage of cold shadow and utter immobility. Nonetheless, its daily care was observed as a duty sacred and vital. Armatures and spheres of brass and silver and gold gleamed in sepulchral perfection. Its gears were anointed with holy oil. In all the millennia of its existence, there had never been a single moment when it had been left unobserved.

  On this day, the Speculum Infernus moved.

  A data-servant called out in alarm at the first sight of action. A single cogwheel, a few centimetres across, stirred. Within seconds, its revolutions were a blur. Larger and larger nested wheels began to turn. From the eight corners of the great device, tall sceptres crackled with eldritch lightning. Inside the periphery, spheres rotated and travelled along complex, elliptical, intersecting revolutions. Fluted bronze pipes released scalding steam, giving voice to a hissing choir.

  An alchemy of movement, an omen of metal.

  On the north side of the Speculum, gargoyles of gold perched on a cluster of silver pedestals. Mechanical wings unfurled and jaws opened wide in expressions of blind hunger. Data-parchment streamed from between the fangs. The servants gathered the parchment, averting their gaze from its runes and sigils. The dooms inscribed thereon were not for them to understand.

  This was a mercy.

  In the Citadel of Titan, the Prognosticars of the Grey Knights gathered to read the dooms. The sanctified mechanism of the Speculum Infernus shook and scribed, steamed and prophesied. It told of warp storms. It revealed connections.

  The Grey Knights beheld the terrible confluence of events. They were forming a single immense shape, its meaning as unspeakable as it was inescapable.

  And then, even as the Great Companies of the Space Wolves spread out across the galaxy to gather their lost kin, the Brotherhoods of the Grey Knights departed Titan on quests just as grave and urgent. The Space Wolves travelled the lines of a pattern. The Grey Knights sought to arrest its manifestation.

  Elsewhere, darkness laughed.

  Fimnir. Spartha IV. Dragos.

  The sites of the hunt. World after world engulfed by the sudden warp storms, their empyrean signatures so distinct and so identical that they seemed to be the flowerings of a single tempest.

  Hades Reach. Atrapan.

  The Great Companies fell upon worlds tortured by the revels of daemons. On every planet, billions of subjects of the Imperium had no hope until feral salvation dropped out of the skies, and rioting madness gave way to war.

  Suldabrax. Emberghul.

  Grimnar assigned strike force names to the companies. Sagablade. Whitestalker. Iron Hunt. Kingsguard. These were not individual crusades. They were the stepping stones of a single mission on a scale rarely mounted in the history of the Chapter. The struggle on each world was enough to inspire legends in the local cultures that would last until the Wolftime. The victories were the stuff of sagas on Fenris, but they were important only in the measure of the totality of the hunt’s success. The Space Wolves came to find the Wulfen. The crushing of the Ruinous Powers was a means to an end.

  The surviving populations who found themselves returned to the Emperor’s Light were fortunate bystanders. Had the storms that blighted their planets been of a different nature, their help would have had to come from other sources, if it came at all.

  On one world after another, the Space Wolves pushed back the armies of Chaos. The splintered 13th Great Company was gathered up. The Wulfen were transported to the rallying point in the Anvarheim system. Aboard the strike cruiser Coldfang, under the command of Battle Leader Hjalvard, the beasts were prepared to re-enter battle, integrated into the other Companies. The 13th, for now, could not function as a unified company.

  News of each success reached the other companies quickly. The Wolf Lords learned of the growing numbers of Wulfen in the ranks of their brother commanders. The victories urged Wolf Lords to greater feats.

  On the Alpha Fang, as Strike Force Whitestalker prepared for its campaign, Harald received the reports of the hunt. He watched the tally of Wulfen warriors climb, more of them all the time, their presence growing in the martial body of the Space Wolves.

  His unease grew.

  ‘We will find every Wulfen brother before any other Imperial force,’ Grimnar had declared.

  ‘This we swear,’ all the Wolf Lords had answered.

  If we succeed, Harald wondered, what then?

  He did not speak the ques
tion aloud. He had taken his oath.

  He came close to voicing the question once. During the Alpha Fang’s transit through the immaterium, he asked Canis, ‘What do you make of the Wulfen?’

  ‘Strong warriors,’ said the Champion.

  Canis was the most feral of the Deathwolves. He was perhaps the closest of Harald’s brothers to the Wulfen. Harald wanted to know if Canis felt more distance or kinship to the monsters.

  ‘Anything more?’ he asked.

  ‘The beast is strong in them.’

  ‘Too strong?’

  Canis did not answer right away, his heavy features deep in thought. That he had to think before answering, that he seemed uncertain, was disconcerting.

  ‘They control their frenzy,’ he said at last.

  ‘Aye, they do,’ Harald said.

  The conversation went no further, then. But as Harald was heading to the bridge to make ready for the drop back into the materium, Vygar Helmfang caught up to him and raised the question himself.

  ‘Lord Deathwolf,’ said the Wolf Guard, ‘I understand there is no question of the Wulfen’s loyalty.’ For now, hovered unspoken in the air between them. ‘But their nature…’ He groped for words. ‘Their form and their actions do not always coincide.’ Vygar grimaced, displeased with his own formulation.

  Harald understood what he meant. Any brother he had known who had even come close to resembling the Wulfen’s physical form had been completely consumed by battle frenzy. He could think of no case where a Space Wolf had been capable of anything approaching calm while in that state.

  They control their frenzy. Canis’ comment took on greater weight.

  Vygar was one of the oldest of the Wolf Guard. In the field, he fought with tenacious ferocity. He was also one of the best strategists in the company. Centuries of battle had tempered him into a warrior who understood the value of forethought. His experience and his caution were the qualities Harald prized in his strike force. And Vygar’s concerns were dovetailing with Harald’s own.

  ‘You believe their nature is much more complex than some might think,’ Harald said.