Hammer and Bolter 3

by Christian Dunn

  ‘I was on a trial,’ she said, frowning with concentration.

  The Matriarch nodded encouragingly.

  ‘The trial of Ordination. I had to find a piece of weirdstone to become a fully-fledged sister, or–’

  ‘Or be banished from the order,’ said the Matriarch, nodding.

  Fear quickened von Stahl’s pulse as she remembered how miserably she had failed. She saw Elsbeth’s pitiful funeral pyre in the Magdeburg Playhouse. She saw Wolff’s cruel mocking eyes as she stole the stone from around her neck and left her to die. Then, with a grimace, she remembered falling back into the boat, and struggling desperately with the rat-creature. She buried her face in her hands and groaned. ‘How am I here? I failed the test. I have no weirdstone. How is that you have allowed me back into the abbey?’

  The Matriarch was about to reply, but then paused, distracted by the sound of approaching footsteps. ‘I think you have your first visitor,’ she said.

  The door flew open and, to von Stahl’s horror, Wolff burst into the room. Disbelief drained the colour from both girl’s faces and each was momentarily at a loss for words. Then, recovering her composure a little, Wolff flew to von Stahl’s bedside, dropped to her knees and hugged her tightly. ‘Oh, Virtue, can it be true? Have you really returned to us?’

  Anger welled up in von Stahl, and she struggled to free herself from the girl’s grip, but Wolff wouldn’t let go. She spoke quickly. ‘I thought you had perished at the hands of that foul creature in the theatre. I never dreamt you were still alive.’

  Disgust and hatred filled von Stahl, but she couldn’t manage to interrupt the girl’s torrent of false concern.

  ‘I have been distraught thinking of you and Elsbeth. If it were not for the comforting words of the High Matriarch, I believe I would have lost my mind with grief.’

  At the words ‘High Matriarch’, Wolff looked meaningfully at von Stahl, and squeezed her a little tighter.

  The message was clear, and von Stahl’s heart sank. To receive words of comfort from the High Matriarch herself was a reminder of Wolff’s honoured position within the order. As a blood relative of the sisters’ most invaluable patron, Lady Magritte, Wolff had a special place in the High Matriarch’s heart, and if a lowly foundling like von Stahl were to accuse her of treachery, the claims would be dismissed out-of-hand as madness… or heresy.

  Realising the futility of her position, von Stahl gave Wolff no reply and simply slumped back weakly into her pillow.

  Wolff’s eyes lit up as she saw that she had been understood. Then, assuming once more an expression of concern, she turned to matriarch Ebner and said. ‘But what of the trial? Without a piece of the weirdstone she has failed, and cannot be ordained.’ With the ease of a practiced liar she squeezed a few tears from her eyes. ‘Which must surely mean that she will be banished from the order and sent back,’ she gulped, ‘into the city.’

  Von Stahl put a hand to her mouth to stifle a sob. Wolff was right. She had failed, and must now be banished, alone in the City of the Damned. The best she could hope for was a quick death at the hands of whichever of Mordheim’s terrible inhabitants found her first.

  ‘It seems so cruel,’ said Wolff, forcing more tears from her eyes, ‘that she has managed to return to us only to be sent away again,’ she looked searchingly at Matriarch Ebner, ‘but I presume there is no alternative?’

  The old woman looked carefully at Wolff. There was something strange in the girl’s manner, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. ‘Well,’ she said, ignoring Wolff, and taking von Stahl’s hand, ‘it seems that Sigmar has his eye on you, Virtue. You must have fought bravely indeed. When sister Schönau plucked you from the river, you were half-gutted. The boat you were drifting in was drenched with blood. Some was yours but luckily there was much more from whatever you had been fighting.’

  As the Matriarch spoke, images of the fight returned to von Stahl. She remembered how her rage at Wolff’s betrayal had given her renewed strength. She had fought furiously with the rat-creature as the small boat drifted slowly south down the Stir. With its blade stuck deep in her leg her opponent had found itself unarmed and after a merciless storm of blows from her steel whip, it had finally dived back into the river, leaving her weak and bleeding in the boat.

  ‘I remember defeating that… that vermin, but then nothing.’ She looked up desperately at the matriarch. ‘And I have no stone. I have failed.’

  The old woman rose from her chair, and fetched something from a small table beneath the window. She handed it to von Stahl with a smile. ‘When sister Schönau pulled you from the boat, she had to remove this from your leg.’

  Von Stahl looked at the long sacrificial knife. She remembered with a shudder the leer on the creature’s face as it thrust the blade into her leg. Then, a dawning realisation washed over her and she smiled back at the matriarch.

  ‘What is it?’ demanded Wolff, snatching the blade from her. ‘Just a knife? What’s so special about that?’

  Von Stahl continued to smile as she pointed towards a small dark stone embedded the blade’s hilt. ‘Weirdstone,’ she said.

  The Inquisition

  ++Open vox-net++

  My most esteemed Lord Inquisitor,

  Though our losses were heavy and many sacrifices made in the name of Him on Earth, the daemonhost who goes by the alias Aaron Dembski-Bowden now dwells in a cell beneath our fortress outpost here on the Eastern Fringe. Although our torture of the subject is still in its early stages, useful information has already been gleaned and it is my great pleasure to communicate it to you.

  Interrogator Kerstromm Ordo Malleus

  What are you working on at the moment?

  Same thing that I’m always working on: a master plan to miss every deadline I’ve ever been given. Right now, both my screens are a patchwork mess of several windowed Word.docs, emails and .pdfs. I’m finishing Blood Reaver, the second in the Night Lords Trilogy, and making sure it answers some of the questions left open at the end of Soul Hunter, while also matching up with the events that happen in ‘The Core’, the short story in Fear the Alien which, for bizarre reasons I can no longer remember, I set after Blood Reaver. It’s tougher than it sounds, because being organised is anathema to me. I like to make life hard for myself.

  What are you working on next?

  Two major projects. The first is one of Black Library’s limited edition novellas, set as part of the Horus Heresy series. That’s got a working title of Cybernetica, following a Sons of Horus Techmarine in his dealings with the corrupted Mechanicum aboard the Warmaster’s flagship. The second is my next novel, which dances between three working titles: The Emperor’s Gift; Sons of Titan; and Someone Help Me Name This Book. That’s going to be the first in a new Grey Knights saga, and I couldn’t be more psyched about starting it. It’s the Grey Knights, man. The best of the best of the best, dealing with threats to humanity that no one else in the galaxy is even allowed to discover, upon pain of death. If you don’t think that’s cool, then you and me simply can’t be friends.

  Are there any areas of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 that you haven’t yet explored that you’d like to in the future?

  Loads. It’s a big playground, though - you’ve gotta respect the fact that other people got there first, and have as much right as you to claim X, Y and Z. So while I’d love a crack at one of the Big Four (Blood Angels, Ultramarines, Space Wolves, Dark Angels) it’s not something I’m exactly crying over. I have way too much coming at me, anyway. I’d really like to do a love story based around Orion and Ariel, the Wood Elf king and queen, from their beginnings as asrai to their seasonal ascension to their people’s spiritual avatars. I’d freaking love to do a series chronicling the rise of the Black Legion and Abaddon’s position as Warmaster of Chaos. On a smaller scale, a short story about Andrej, the stormtrooper in Helsreach, and his search for Domoska in the hive city’s ruins. A lot of people keep asking me about that one.

  What are you reading at the mo
ment? Who are your favourite authors?

  Right now, I’m reading Dragon Haven, by Robin Hobb As it happens, she’s my favourite author. I always have a few books on the go at once, which are currently The Stone and the Flute, by Hans Bemman, and The Clash of Fundamentalisms, by Tariq Ali. One of my favourite books is The Thirteen and a Half Lives of Captain Bluebear, which (along with Dune) I tend to read once a year. I feel another round with that beast of a book coming on. I’m sure everyone’s reading Prospero Burns right now, but lucky scamp that I am, I read it over half a year ago. Amazing novel, but a bit too recent for a re-read.

  Which book (either BL or non-BL) do you wish you’d written and why?

  The Philosopher and the Wolf, by Mark Rowlands. It’s about a schoolteacher who, through various circumstances, ends up being the owner of a wolf, and spends the course of the book comparing his ape’s perceptions to the wolf’s canine ones. It’s pretty simple philosophy, but it’s beautifully written. Everyone’s got life unique life experiences to draw from and shape into stories, but I wish that’d been one of mine.

  Phalanx

  Ben Counter

  Chapter 4

  The beauty of Berenika Altis was a strange thing, like a work of art not understood. It had been built in the shape of an enormous star, two of its five points extending out to sea on spurs of artificial land. Each point of the star was devoted to a different trade, the five legendary guilds that had built and financed this city. The shape was a reminder of its original purpose as an exclusive retreat for those who deserved better than the other bleak, stagnant cities of the planet Tethlan’s Holt. At the centre of the star was the Sanctum Nova Pecuniae, once a palace existing purely for the beautification of Berenika Altis, and one that now served as the seat of government of Tethlan’s Holt.

  Fifteen days ago all communication had ceased with Berenika Altis. Eight million people had vanished. The planetary authorities, those who had not disappeared with the rest of the government, reacted as any good Imperial citizen did when confronted with the unknown. They sealed off the city, quarantined it, and resolved to pretend that it had never existed.

  The Doom Eagles were not satisfied with such solutions.

  ‘A brittle beauty,’ said Librarian Varnica as the Thunderhawk droned in low over the north seaward spur of Berenika Altis. The rear ramp was down and Varnica had disengaged his grav-couch restraints, holding onto the rail overhead to lean forward and get a better look at his target from the air.

  ‘I see only stupidity,’ replied Sergeant Novas. His voice did not sound over the gunship’s engines, but the vox-link carried it straight into Varnica’s inner ear. ‘A shift in the sea floor and two-fifths of that city would sink into the ocean.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Varnica, ‘that’s the point. Nothing speaks of wealth like spending a great deal of it on something that might be gone any moment.’

  ‘Looks like they got their wish,’ said Novas. ‘Eventually. It wasn’t the sea that got them, but something did,’

  ‘Quite the conundrum,’ said Varnica. ‘What a puzzle box they built for us.’

  As the Thunderhawk swooped lower, the streets were revealed. Each spur of the city had been dedicated to a different guild and though centuries of rebuilding and repurposing had followed, the original imprint remained. The Embalmers’ Quarter was arranged in neat rows, the buildings resembling elegant tombs. The Jewelcutters’ Quarter was all angular patterns, triangular sections of streets and many-sided intersections echoing the complex facings of a cut diamond. The Victuallers’ District was a gloomy, sheer-sided area of warehouses and long, low halls. The industrial feel of the Steelwrights’ Cordon was entirely an affectation, with rust-streaked metal chimneys and crumbling brickwork concealing the salons and feasting halls where the great and good of Berenika Altis had celebrated their superiority. The Flagellants’ Quarter, founded with the money taken from those who paid to have their sins scourged from them, echoed the flagellants’ frenzy with twisted, winding streets and asymmetrical buildings that seemed poised to topple over or slide into rubble. The Sanctum Nova Pecuniae held the disparate regions together, as if it pinned them to the surface of Tethlan’s Holt to keep them from crawling off to their own devices.

  The streets were visible now, the buildings separating into distinct blocks. The streets seemed paved with a haphazard mosaic of blacks and reds, the same pattern covering every avenue and alley.

  It was a mosaic of corpses.

  The smell of it confirmed the few reports that had reached the Doom Eagles. The smell of rotting bodies. It was familiar to every Space Marine, to every Emperor’s servant whose business was death.

  Varnica looked on, fascinated. He had seen many disasters. When not called upon to attend some critical battlezone, it was disasters that attracted the Doom Eagles. Some Chapters sought out ancient secrets, others lost comrades, others the most dangerous sectors of the galaxy to test their martial prowess. The Doom Eagles sought out catastrophe. It was less a policy of the Chapter’s command, and more a compulsion, a dark fascination as powerful as the pronouncements of the Chapter Master.

  This was a true disaster. Not the side effect of a war, or a revolt that had turned bloody. It was a catastrophe from outside, beyond the context of anything that had happened on Tethlan’s Holt. The scale of death was appalling. Millions lay decomposing in the streets. And yet a part of Varnica’s mind relished it. Here was not only a mystery, but a scale of horror that made it worth solving.

  The Thunderhawk approached its landing zone, a circular plaza in the Embalmers’ Quarter. Like every other possible landing site, it was strewn with bodies. Fat flies whipped around the Thunderhawk’s passenger compartment as it passed through a cloud of them, spattering against Varnica’s armour and the eyepieces of his power armour’s helmet. He took it off as the Thunderhawk came down to land.

  The grisly cracking sound Varnica heard was the cracking of bones beneath the Thunderhawk’s landing gear. More crunched below the lower lip of the embarkation ramp as it opened up all the way. Varnica walked off the gunship onto the ground of Berenika Altis, pushing aside the bodies with his feet so he did not have to stand on them.

  ‘Perimeter!’ shouted Sergeant Novas. His tactical squad jumped down after him and spread out around the plaza. Within moments the foul blackish flesh of the bodies was clinging to the armour of their feet and shins, shining wetly in the afternoon sun. The filters built into Varnica’s lungs took care of the toxins and diseases in the air, but anyone without those augmentations would have vomited or choked on the air.

  Techmarine Hamilca was last out, accompanied by the quartet of servitors that followed him everywhere like loyal pets.

  ‘What do you think, Techmarine?’ asked Varnica.

  Hamilca looked around him. The tombs of the Embalmers’ Quarter showed no sign of gunfire or destruction, and the sun was shining down from a blue sky. If one cast his gaze up far enough, there was nothing to see but a handsome city and fine weather. The bodies seemed incongruous, as if they did not belong here, even though they were undoubtedly the remains of this city’s population.

  ‘It is a beautiful day,’ said Hamilca, and turned to adjust the sensors of his servitors.

  ‘One day,’ said Novas, ‘they’ll put your brain back in, tin man.’

  Hamilca did not answer that. Varnica knelt to examine the bodies at his feet.

  What remained of their clothing ranged from the boiler suits of menials to the silks and furs of the city’s old money elite. The wounds were from fingers and teeth, or from whatever had been at hand. Tools and wrenches. Walking canes. A few kitchen knives, chunks of masonry, hatpins. One burly man’s throat had a woman’s silken scarf tied around it as a garrotte. Its previous owner might well have been the slender woman whose corpse lay, broken-necked, beside him. They had killed with anything at hand, which meant the time between normality and killing had been measured in minutes.

  ‘It was the Red Night,’ said Varnica.
r />   ‘Can you be sure?’ asked Hamilca.

  ‘I admire your desire to gather evidence,’ said Varnica, ‘but I need see no more than this. It is my soul that tells me. So many places like this we have seen, and I hear their echo off the walls of this city. The Red Night came here. I know it.’

  ‘Then why are we here?’ said Novas. His squad was by now in a loose perimeter formation, bolters trained down the avenues of tombs radiating out from the plaza. Novas’s Space Marines were well drilled, and Novas himself possessed a desire to be seen doing his duty combined with a blessed lack of imagination. These qualities made his squad Varnica’s escort of choice. They could be trusted to do their job and leave the thinking to the Librarian. ‘The last time we came to a place touched by the Red Night, there was nought to find though we turned that place inside out. Why will Berenika Altis be any different?’

  ‘Just smell,’ said Varnica.

  Novas snarled with a lack of amusement.

  ‘Do not scorn such advice, sergeant!’ Varnica breathed in deeply, theatrically. ‘Ah, what a bouquet! Ruptured entrails! Liquefying muscle! They are fresh! Compared to the last places we visited it, these bodies are ripe! We have got here earlier than before, Novas. These bodies still have flesh on them. We are not picking over a skeletonised heap but sloshing through the very swamp of their decay. Whatever brought the Red Night here, there is a good chance it still remains in Berenika Altis.’