by Andy Clark
With a fleshy surge, the daemon’s severed claw sprouted again from the stump of its wrist, now clutching a long blade of blackened bone.
Stepping over Kaleb with a single stride, it swung its sword and sent slain Sisters tumbling through the air. Its hissing incantations drove others mad, tearing at their own flesh in an orgy of wanton destruction. Levinia recoiled as Sister Eleanor and Sister Jalayne reeled past, the latter sinking her teeth hungrily into the former’s face.
‘No,’ shouted Levinia, firing until her bolter clicked dry. ‘He is with us always!’
Casting the weapon aside, the canoness charged headlong at the daemon. She ducked the swing of its blade and hacked her sword into the meat of its leg, seeking to sever the limb.
Keening in fury, the daemon recoiled, serpent-fast, and aimed a kick at her. Levinia threw herself aside, rising to her feet between Kaleb and the abomination that had come to claim him.
‘You shall not have him,’ said Levinia, pointing her sword at the thing towering above her.
‘Slaanesh shall have him,’ it hissed, leering down at her with its beautiful, hideous features. ‘And you, my delicious morsel, will be mine.’
Its eyes were black pools, fathomless, fascinating. Levinia fought the thing’s corrupting gaze, but it swallowed her as surely as if she had plunged headlong into a lake of oil. The sweet stink of its musk filled her senses, awakening dark, horrible longings deep in her soul.
‘Emperor,’ she gasped, her sword point wavering, lowering. ‘Where are you?’
‘He is dead…’ whispered the daemon, reaching out for her.
Then, from above, the Saint struck like a thunderbolt.
The Unsung crouched in a half-circle around Kassar’s position, firing into anything that came close. Their enemies were busy destroying one another, and Khârn could be heard bellowing furiously from across the chamber. The entire cathedrum shook and shuddered, candles raining down as their grav-impellers shorted out. A bloody mist was billowing through the entrance arches.
Then a winged warrior fell upon the daemon from above.
‘That’s an angel,’ said Haltheus flatly. ‘Kassar, they have an angel. This is getting ridiculous.’
‘That’s the distraction we need,’ replied Kassar. ‘Formation Baphamet, secure then exfiltrate by the western arch. Kyphas, find me a route to landing pad nine. The beacon will be boarding his shuttle after all.’
They rose and advanced. Skaryth and D’sakh took the lead, the former firing his bolter, the latter unsheathing the colours and slashing them through anyone too slow to clear his path. Skarle, A’khassor and Makhor followed, blazing fire into their enemies. Behind them came Kassar, Haltheus, Kyphas and Krowl, who still carried Phaek’or over one shoulder. Thelgh came last, snapping off shots at any who tried to come at the Unsung from behind.
This had been a war pitting the forces of Khorne against those of the Imperium, and no one expected to see warriors in the colours of the Alpha Legion in their midst. The Unsung used that to their advantage, capitalising upon the confusion that played across their foes’ faces, gunning them down or running them through before they could react. The battle was anarchic, desperate, all shape to it lost. For Kassar and his brothers, it was perfect.
Ahead, the angel and the daemon fought furiously. The winged warrior was far smaller than her opponent, but she leapt and spun, taking to the air on metallic wings and plunging in on the attack again and again. Her blade flashed in the light of the beacon, biting through unclean flesh and spattering black, stinking ichor with every blow. Two other figures had joined the onslaught, Seraphim who fought in perfect concert with the angel and maintained a steady hail of explosive bolts.
The daemon was suffering, Kassar saw. Its perfect flesh was rent and spewing ectoplasmic slime. Its magnificent armour was buckled, its silks torn. Still it fought, hissing in fury, looming covetously over the helpless beacon. Its blade stabbed out and impaled one of the Seraphim, passing right through her midriff and bursting out between her shoulder blades.
The angel leapt high, aiming a kick at the daemon’s face and staggering it, then dropping down and severing its sword arm at the elbow. It stumbled back, then shrieked in fury and unleashed a storm of kaleidoscopic warp energies. The second Seraphim dropped from the air, nothing but a blackened husk encased in smouldering armour plate. The angel was blasted backwards, metallic wings glowing, flesh flickering with flames. She gave a mighty shout, and the empyric energies were banished as she lunged at the daemon again.
‘Haltheus, A’khassor, grab the beacon,’ said Kassar. ‘The rest of you, cover.’
They trampled the bodies of the slain as they surrounded Kaleb and his anointed conveyance. Kassar squinted against the radiant light that seemed to emanate from the man’s very flesh. Mere yards away, the daemon and the angel battled on.
‘There’s some kind of impeller lock engaged,’ said Haltheus. ‘Give me a moment to profane its routines.’
‘Can’t we just carry the damn thing?’ asked Makhor, firing his bolter into the roiling melee around them.
‘Do you see how delicate this machine is?’ asked Haltheus. ‘If we start manhandling it, we’re going to rip out tubes, cables, whatever else. We’ll kill him.’
‘And he’s no use to us dead,’ said Kassar.
‘Who… who’s there?’
Kassar glanced down and saw the canoness, kneeling amidst the bodies near the beacon. She turned sightless eyes towards him, oily tears weeping from them, black veins radiating out from their sockets.
‘Dysorian?’ she asked. ‘Is that… you?’
Hexling twitched, crooning at him to slay the canoness out of hand. Kassar ignored the urge. He’d seen her fight selflessly, and had been impressed. Besides, he was no Khornate butcher, and this blinded warrior was clearly no threat. Instead, he ignored the canoness and kept his bolter trained on the fight around him.
‘My faith,’ she said, her voice cracking. ‘It failed me for… just a second… Dysorian, this is my punishment. You must bear the burden now, captain. You must take him to safety.’
Kassar glanced down at the canoness again, frowning, then looked up straight into the eyes of the beacon himself. He felt a vertiginous lurch as the holy light of the man’s gaze bored into his mind, and Hexling squealed and squirmed in his grip. He felt panic threaten to choke him, and with an angry snarl he lashed out, striking Kaleb in the temple with his blade’s pommel. The man convulsed, his eyes rolled up, and he slumped in his restraints.
In that instant, his radiance winked out.
‘Kassar!’ exclaimed A’khassor. ‘What in the warp are you doing?’
‘We need him alive, not conscious,’ said Kassar angrily. ‘Haltheus, hurry up.’
Haltheus gave a triumphant shout, and the anointed conveyance hummed as its impellers disengaged. In the same instant, there came a terrible shriek, a cry of agony and rage so piercing that Kassar’s auto-senses locked out, while the stained-glass window was shattered by the soaring resonance. As its shards fell, so too did the daemon, its head struck from its shoulders with a swing of the angel’s sword. Its body toppled, coming apart as black filth and scads of foaming flesh, splattering the flagstones and sizzling as it dissolved. The sweet stench of corruption was momentarily overwhelming.
‘Move,’ said Kassar, and his brothers responded. Haltheus and A’khassor guided the anointed conveyance, the rest of the Unsung forming a tight ring around them, guns blazing.
Kassar expected the angel to strike at any moment. Battle Sisters ran at them, frantic to stop them, but they were far too few, and as they turned their backs upon the Khorne worshippers, so they were hacked down.
Bloody mist parted before them as they ran. The arch grew closer. Shots rang from their armour, and several of the Unsung staggered, but none of them fell.
By some dark miracle, with the la
st of their enemies still intent on hacking one another apart amidst the rain of falling glass, they were going to escape.
Then a charging figure emerged through the bloody murk, running straight at them, armour scorched, flesh bloodied, massive chainaxe screaming.
‘Blood for the Blood God!’ roared Khârn.
‘Oh… Throne,’ said Haltheus.
They couldn’t evade. They couldn’t retreat. They had no gleaned secrets, no leverage, no advantage to use.
They had only one option.
‘Shoot him,’ barked Kassar, and he and his warriors opened fire with everything they had.
Khârn ran through the firestorm with his head down. Bolt shells fractured his armour. Thelgh put a round through his shoulder. A’khassor’s plasma pistol burned a glowing crater in his gut. None of it was enough, not even close.
Skaryth was smashed aside with the flat of Khârn’s axe, chest plate cracked. Skarle fired Gift one-handed, wreathing the Betrayer in flames, but Gorechild swung around, unstoppable, and Kassar cried out in anger as Skarle’s head was hacked from his shoulders. The strange Alpha Legionnaire crumpled, his blood jetting over Kassar as he died.
‘Mindless butcher!’ roared Kassar. ‘I am Alpharius, and I am your death!’ He hurled himself at Khârn, swinging Hexling in an overhead cut. The Betrayer parried the blow, staggering back at its ferocity. Kassar swung again, aiming to lop off Khârn’s head, but again Gorechild turned the blow aside. Then Khârn snarled in rage and swung a blow of his own that Kassar barely parried. He was propelled backwards by its force, crashing into D’sakh, and the two of them went down in a clatter of armour.
Khârn revved Gorechild and clashed the axe’s haft against his chestplate. Then he looked up, past them, and let out a long, low growl.
‘The angel…’ he rasped.
Celestine swept down, swinging her blade in a fiery arc of judgement. Her strike met Gorechild with a resounding clang, and Khârn was driven aside. Celestine hammered the Betrayer’s guard with a blistering string of blows, darting, stabbing and hacking, driving him back step by step.
As she did, Kassar and D’sakh found their feet. A’khassor knelt over Skarle’s fallen body, his reductor whining as it cracked open the fallen warrior’s chestplate to extract his gene-seed.
‘Do we shoot them?’ asked Haltheus.
In that moment, Celestine shot a look back, over her shoulder, straight at Kassar. Her face was unreadable, but her intent was as clear to him as if she’d spoken aloud.
‘No,’ said Kassar. ‘No. Exfiltrate.’
Leaving Skarle’s fallen body, the last of the Unsung ran for the eastern arch. They passed the fight ignored; Khârn cared only about the angel he fought, and she sought only to hold his attention for as long as she could.
Bursting through a billowing crimson fog-bank, Kassar saw the arch ahead of them. A scattering of cultists stood in their way, ripping and battering at the fallen remains of a penitent engine. The Unsung fired a tight volley, blowing the mortals off their feet, and swept through the archway into the corridor beyond.
Celestine fought with speed and skill. She fought with determination, and a desire to see her enemy fall. Even though she knew that he wouldn’t. Even though she knew that for her, this path, this incarnation ended here.
She was satisfied, for the Emperor’s will had been done in this place, but she wept golden tears, for as the beacon’s light went out, so the Tsadrekhan Unity would wither and end. Already she sensed the shadows gathering, the storm growing worse, darkness rushing in from the void to fill up the absence where light had lived. Billions were about to die, or worse.
Yet the dawn could not come without the darkness. Day could not be born anew without first vanquishing the night. She knew this as surely as she knew that the Emperor had meant to see the beacon in the hands of Kassar and his brothers, rather than let it fall to the worshippers of Khorne, or Slaanesh.
It was a grim equation, a measure of how desperate the Imperium’s plight had become, but Celestine trusted her Emperor. For thousands of years, across dozens of lifetimes, he had never, ever led her wrong. He would not do so now.
She had faith.
And so, as her strength failed her, as Gorechild’s ringing blows numbed her arms and drove her to her knees, she did not despair. As Khârn smashed the Ardent Blade from her hands, and ripped the beautiful wings from her back, she knew only satisfaction for her task, and sorrow for all those martyred to see it done.
And as he swung Gorechild high, and struck her head from her shoulders, Saint Celestine felt only blessed release.
The Unsung pelted through the corridors of the convent prioris at a run, guiding the anointed conveyance as fast as they dared. A terrible, sawing note rang through the air, and in every corner the shadows churned and coiled.
‘In retrospect,’ shouted Haltheus as they ran, ‘I think knocking him out was a bad idea, Kassar.’
Kassar didn’t respond. In his mind’s eye he saw the final, piercing gaze of the angel, and heard again the words of the blinded canoness.
‘You must bear the burden now, captain. You must take him to safety.’
‘I owe them nothing,’ he whispered fiercely. ‘Damned corpse worshippers. They’re no better than the Dark Gods. I owe them nothing!’
‘Didn’t catch that, captain,’ said D’sakh.
‘Nothing,’ barked Kassar over the sounds of rumbling and moaning, explosions and screams. ‘Just keep running.’
‘There’s a turbolift ahead,’ said Kyphas. ‘But I wouldn’t trust it.’ As if to emphasise his words, the electro-sconces along the corridor blew out as one, and red emergency lumen flickered to life. A screaming cackle echoed down the corridor, spiralling away to nothing.
‘Alternative route?’ asked Kassar.
‘Next left,’ said Kyphas. ‘We take a loading ramp up three levels, then cut through the equipment hangar and straight out onto landing pad nine.’
A trio of robed Battle Sisters burst from the turning ahead, shepherding a gaggle of scribes and menials between them. Two of the Sisters carried bolters, the other a revving chainsword. They cried out and raised their weapons, but the shadows convulsed around them and a terrible wet growl filled the corridor. The scribes screamed in terror as half-seen entities swept through their midst, ripping at them with talons made from embers and dripping darkness. One of the Sisters was lifted and smashed against the ceiling with bone-breaking force. Another fell, her head wrenched around by ethereal talons, while the last was snatched up by the whirling hurricane of shadows and borne away, screaming, into the gloom.
The Unsung looked at one another.
‘We really need to get off this planet,’ said Makhor.
‘Agreed,’ said Kassar. ‘Keep moving, brothers. And be ready for anything.’
Kassar led his Harrow through the dying spire. They rode out the convulsive shudders that ran through the structure, and smashed aside the few warriors that reeled into their path. Only when they reached the equipment hangar did they meet serious Imperial numbers. Battle Sisters and Tsadrekhans were spilling through the cavernous space, flowing between heaped crates and inert lifter servitors. Kassar watched them from a shadowed doorway, Hexling held to his chest.
‘It’s a full evacuation,’ he said. ‘They’re carrying relics, tomes, anything they can take with them.’
‘This world is doomed,’ said A’khassor. ‘The Dark Gods have been denied here a long while. Their vengeance will be swift and horrible, I don’t doubt.’
A dull boom rang from outside, firelight spilling in through the open shutters at the hangar’s far end. Khornate war cries rang out, and the Battle Sisters hastened forward, bolters up.
‘Could be our chance,’ said Kassar. ‘Move quickly, stay to the shadows at the edge, and be ready to shoot our way out.’
The shadows thicken
ed for a second, and a howling gale raced through the shelter. Kassar heard whispering voices upon it, hissing threats and promises.
He slipped through the doorway and into the cover of a towering equipment rack. Staying low, he ran along its length, his brothers following. Gunfire rattled and explosions boomed, getting closer by the moment.
He darted between stacks of macro-containers, then slid along the back of a decommissioned lifter, aquila-stamped tarpaulins flapping over its exposed innards. Another detonation echoed from the direction of the doors, and bloodthirsty howls rose and died away. The gunfire stopped.
Peering out, Kassar saw blazing wreckage, and corpses strewed the hangar’s exit. Rain slashed down, diluting the blood and damping the flames. The Imperial evacuees milled, some fleeing back into the spire in search of another route, others crouched in cover, staring with huge eyes.
‘There’s something out there,’ he said. ‘Can’t see what.’
‘The shuttle should be located six hundred yards from here,’ said Kyphas. ‘Pad nine is the third on the right. It’s a minute’s run at most, even with the conveyance.’
‘Ammo check,’ ordered Kassar.
‘Low to minimal,’ replied Haltheus. ‘We’ll be down to blades if we run into anything serious.’
‘Then blades it is,’ said Kassar. ‘We’re getting off this world, now, before the catastrophe overtakes it. No gods, no warlords.’
‘For the primarchs, and the Harrow,’ said his brothers, finishing the old war mantra.
Kassar rose and led the way past the gaggles of terrified adepts and menials, ignoring their wails of fear, and out into the driving rain.
The Unsung burst from the hangar doors at a run, guns up, and out onto a wide area of ferrocrete decking and metal bridges that linked landing pads to one another above a perilous drop. The rain hit them like a wall. The wind howled around them, a screaming chorus of the damned. Burning spires rose on every side, their gothic architecture ablaze, explosions billowing as they began to come apart. The clouds whirled in insane spirals, reaching down to claw at the frothing waves with tornadoes lit red and green and black. Lurid lightning raced through the clouds, forming eight-pointed star patterns the size of cities.
