by Andy Clark
‘On my oath,’ she replied vehemently.
Danial and Luk’s Knights broke away from the fight, loping across the plaza as Word Bearers fire whipped around them. The two loyalist steeds pounded up the steps of the generatorum and, in a shower of rubble and wreckage, ploughed headlong through the sundered doorway.
Jennika spotted Gerraint Tan Chimaeros, his steed pouring smoke from one cracked shoulder guard. His back was to her as he fired shells at the oncoming Porphyrion, all semblance of a battle plan destroyed by the giant Knight’s rampage. Tolwyn’s stolen blade crackled at his side.
‘You’ll suffer for that insult,’ she hissed. ‘For House Draconis and the Emperor.’ Blade raised, power surging through her steed’s motive actuators, Jennika charged.
Fire Defiant lunged forward at Jennika’s mental urging. It growled deep within its primal engine-heart, sensing its pilot’s anger and hate. The ghosts of her throne had receded into the depths, recognising that this fight, this moment, belonged to Jennika alone. She was going to kill Gerraint Tan Chimaeros.
‘Sire Markos,’ she voxed as her steed slammed past two Chimaeros Knights and struck sparks from their armour.
‘Yes, milady?’ came Markos’ gruff voice in return.
‘I will kill Gerraint,’ she said. ‘You eliminate the Porphyrion.’
‘Gut that grox-loving traitor like the swine he is.’
Jennika fed power into her motive actuators, and her steed lumbered through the grinding, crashing melee. The target-distance tally in the corner of her vision sped downwards. Lock runes shimmered and choral notes chimed through her cockpit, announcing that her battle cannon had a clean shot. She ignored them. She would meet him blade to blade, as the Code demanded.
Three hundred yards to Gerraint’s Knight.
A Chimaeros Knight Warden loomed up, hammering gatling fire across her path into Lady Eleanat’s shields. Jennika sidestepped her steed, smashing its shoulder guard into the traitor Knight. Sheared metal crashed to the ground, then she was past, still loping towards her target.
Two hundred yards.
The Porphyrion crushed a Chimaeros Knight into the flagstones with one huge foot, its shield flickering as shots rebounded from it. More Chimaeros steeds fired upon it, desperate to bring down the monster that was butchering them.
One hundred yards.
Dunkan fired again, blitzing shots through the Crawlers, blowing two of the machines to pieces and detonating Sire Rikhardt’s Knight.
Forty yards.
Jennika decreased her speed to a steady stride, opened her vox, and hailed her hated enemy.
‘Gerraint Tan Chimaeros,’ she barked, blaring the challenge through her vox amplifier. ‘Turn and face me, traitor.’
‘Lady Tan Draconis,’ replied Gerraint, sounding disappointed. ‘Still fighting your brother’s battles for him? You would have made a worthy queen.’
Despite everything, he sounded calm, assured. Jennika felt the draconsfire flare hot.
‘No, sire,’ she replied, slowing further and approaching carefully. ‘My brother trusts me to win this battle, while he attends to the war. Were you any kind of real king, you would understand that. But instead I name you heretic, traitor and outcast. Not just from your House, but from your world. I name you Gerraint Kar Adrastapol, and on my brother’s behalf I sentence you to death for your crimes.’
Gerraint had turned to face her, but had prudently kept his shield angled rearwards in case the Porphyrion’s erratic fire should come their way. Around them the Knights of their two Houses blasted and battered at one another, but Jennika and Gerraint stood alone for the time being. None would interfere with their duel.
‘Dramatic,’ said Gerraint dryly. ‘But ultimately meaningless, little girl. I have the crown. I am High King of Adrastapol, not your whelp of a brother.’
Jennika bristled with anger.
‘My brother is the rightful heir to the throne of Adrastapol, firstborn son of–’
‘Firstborn son of a liar and a thief,’ roared Gerraint, cutting Jennika off. ‘He took my brother’s life. He took the throne. He took…’ Gerraint stopped himself, and when he spoke again he was calm and assured once more. ‘But then, all this happened when you were but a squireling, and barely even that. These are not your crimes, my lady, and for what it is worth I am sorry that it is you and your brother who must pay for them.’
Jennika felt her desire for knowledge war with her need for revenge. Like her brother, this conflict had left her with a great many questions about the father that she thought she had known. This man, for all that he was a traitor, had been Tolwyn’s friend once. She could ask him, and had a frightening sense that he would answer truthfully, whether she wished him to or not. Shaking off the sick temptation, Jennika remembered the desperate fight going on around her. Answers were not why she had come here. She had a duty to discharge.
‘Perhaps your words are tainted with heresy,’ she replied coldly, ‘perhaps shame and dishonour have broken your mind. Or perhaps every word you speak is true. I honestly don’t care. You murdered my kin, broke the Code, and damned your House. You have rained such shame upon Adrastapol that it will take us years to recover from your perfidy, while the names of House Chimaeros and House Wyvorn will be scoured from history forevermore. And you killed my father in cold blood, you traitorous dog. The only crimes that I care about are yours, and now I’m going to kill you for them.’
‘So be it,’ began Gerraint.
A sudden volley from Gerraint’s battle cannon almost caught Jennika by surprise, but she was ready for his treachery. She brought up her Knight’s shield and took a backwards side-step, deflecting the shots into the ground. Fire Defiant rocked back with the kinetic force of the impacts, and attitude warnings shrilled in Jennika’s ears, but she smiled fiercely all the same.
Gerraint Tan Chimaeros had broken the Code. Just as she hoped he would.
‘My thanks, sire,’ she snarled, and opened fire. Two shells whipped across the intervening space to strike her enemy, whose shield was still angled arrogantly away from her. The first explosion blossomed at Therianthros’ shoulder joint, ripping the Warden’s battle cannon from its arm mounting. The second hammered into Gerraint’s torso plates, causing his Knight to stagger backwards with flames licking from its ruptured chest.
It looked as though the pretender king would fall there and then, but Gerraint was a veteran pilot of many wars. He swung one foot back, bracing his steed and preventing it from overbalancing.
‘Very good,’ growled Gerraint, ‘but now I’m going to kill you.’
Jennika smiled coldly.
‘You are going to try,’ she replied, before spurring her steed and charging.
Markos marched out across the plaza with Suset Dar Draconis and Tamsane Dar Pegasson in a widely dispersed arrowhead formation, affording them slightly more protection from Dunkan’s immense firepower.
The Word Bearers had disengaged and were returning to the generatorum. Consolidating while their enemies tore each other apart, he thought, or worse, perhaps aiming to stop Danial and Luk.
Ahead, the last two Wyvorn Knights fled their mad archduke’s wrath. Dunkan turned his guns on them in a blaze of light. The Porphyrion’s magna lascannons blew the legs from beneath one, while the second staggered, its generator riddled with flaming holes. The green-hulled Knight twitched, stumbled, and then exploded like an orbital warhead.
‘All right, my ladies,’ said Markos grimly. ‘We’ve seen what this thing can do. Try not to let that be you, eh?’
‘My thanks, Sire Markos,’ voxed Lady Tamsane dryly. ‘The thought hadn’t crossed my mind.’
‘How are we going to fight this thing?’ asked Suset, her voice tight with fear.
‘We outnumber our enemy, my lady. Also we’re of sound mind and body, while it sounds like whatever brains that idiot Tan Wyvorn had are leaking out of his arse. We surround him, fight as a pack.’
The Knight Porphyrion stomped around to fac
e them, and Markos felt its footfalls even through his Knight. He could hear Dunkan bellowing and screaming like an animal in pain.
‘I’ll go up the centre, keep the bastard’s eyes on me. Suset, flank left, try to get around its shield and burn its knees out with your thermal cannon. Polluxis has unbound its data wards, so watch for any system weaknesses on your auspex. Tamsane, you go right, get in close with your thunderstrike gauntlet. Hobble it.’
The two Knights voxed their compliance and swung their steeds out to the flanks, loping wide around their gigantic foe. Markos fed power into his steed’s actuators and prepared to open fire. Looking at the war engine looming over him, clad in the panoply of those who – until a few days ago – he had believed to be allies, he felt a moment of intense sorrow. He had walked his steed through the firestorms on Terrathos; he had hunted giant beasts and witnessed mindless ferocity during the Ork Wars; he had stormed the walls of the Stygiopolis during the battle for Hador’s Sorrow. But in all his years of warring, Markos had never seen a conflict as costly or as cruel as this one.
His instruments shrilled a warning as crackling energies built around the barrels of the Porphyrion’s magna lascannons. Markos swore and angled his shield, unleashing both his gatling cannon and Icarus array. Shots stippled the giant Knight’s ion shield, sending blue ripples flashing across its surface, but not a single round struck its target.
‘Oh bloody hell…’ grunted Markos.
The Porphyrion opened fire.
Ruby beams hammered around him, flash-blasting the ferrocrete to glassy craters and pummelling his shields. One bolt slammed through and tore into Honourblaze’s right shin, sundering the armour plates and damaging his actuators. Another blast ripped the Icarus array from atop his steed’s carapace, before two more punched through his Knight’s torso. The herald swore profusely as systems burned out and sparks rained down upon his throne. The second salvo ripped through his cockpit, destroying his right instrument bank and scorching the flesh of his arm through his bodyglove. Alarms screamed. Plasma vented from somewhere behind him, burning through the cockpit floor behind the throne. Markos gritted his teeth against the pain of las-burns, eyes flickering across his instruments as his power readings fell and damage warnings lit up across the board. Honourblaze was badly torn up, limping on one damaged leg, reactor pushing the amber line towards an overload. His heat sinks were labouring, but he’d lost at least half of them. Still, thought Markos grimly, he was still alive, his steed was still up, and his ion shield still functioned.
So did his weapons.
‘Sorry, old girl,’ he muttered as his Knight shuddered in pain. ‘I feel it too. I know.’
‘Sire Markos, do you live?’ crackled Tamsane’s voice through Markos’ damaged vox-speakers.
‘Apparently,’ coughed the herald, trying not to inhale too much of the smoke that was starting to fill the cockpit. He fumbled for the rebreather hooked to the side of his throne, and pulled it painfully over his scalded face. ‘Not sure I can take another volley like that though, my lady.’
‘I fear you may have to, sire,’ came Tamsane’s terse reply. ‘It seems your steed’s survival has angered the beast.’
Ahead, through a stuttering veil of static, Markos saw the looming shape of the Porphyrion stamping forwards to meet him. The screams and howls coming from the engine’s vox amplifiers were a terrible amalgam of pain, rage and madness.
‘Oh Throne,’ growled the herald. ‘My overlay’s unravelled, and my sensorium’s reconsecrating. I can barely see a bloody thing. Tell me you’re in position.’
‘Almost,’ replied Lady Tamsane. ‘We’re drawing level with it now. Just hold the monster’s attention a little longer.’
Markos barked a mirthless laugh through his rebreather.
‘Certainly, my lady. I’m sure the spectacle of my Knight going up like a feastday pyre will keep Tan Wyvorn occupied, eh?’
With a dolorous chime, Markos’ sensorium returned to full clarity. Despite his bravado, the herald felt his insides clench in cold terror of the immense, armoured monster. Squealing power was already building around its lascannons.
‘My ladies, it has been an honour,’ he voxed, punching his gauntlet forward to strafe the monster’s shields. ‘Do me the courtesy of making my death worth it, eh?’ For a second he heard again his fateful words to Tolwyn on the day of the war council.
‘Let us both die bloody in battle,’ he muttered. ‘Got my wish, didn’t I, fool that I am? I’m sorry, my liege, I really did try.’
Markos shut his eyes as the howl of the giant Knight’s weapons built to a crescendo.
‘Sire Markos,’ crackled Suset’s voice suddenly through his vox, her voice urgent. ‘Fire on this segment of its shield, now!’
The herald’s eyes opened and he saw, flickering through his targeter, a rune-lit point on the Porphyrion’s shield. Instinctively he punched his haptic gauntlet forward even as the monstrous engine opened fire. Gatling shells ripped through a flicker of weakness in Dunkan’s shields, a keyhole that Suset Dar Draconis had located with her augmented sensors. Markos’ shots shattered his foe’s targeting imagers and caused the huge Knight to recoil.
Las-blasts hammered Honourblaze’s shield, blowing it out with an implosive boom. They tore through the Knight’s fist, reducing it to dangling scrap metal. They ravaged its chest plates and left thigh, crippling the machine entirely and leaving it immobile. They punched through the cockpit, and Markos screamed in pain as power surged and metal melted around him. Steam burst from ruptured conduits, and with a terrible wail the ghosts of his throne mechanicum vanished from his mind. Markos gasped into his rebreather, limbs spasming and eyes rolling as his neural connection was violently severed. Then everything went dark as the Knight’s power failed, and Markos knew no more.
Jennika parried furiously as the whirling teeth of her blade met the energised edge of Gerraint’s with an explosion of lightning. Shattered metal sprayed from the clash as the traitor’s weapon ravaged her own.
Cursing, Jennika wrenched at her controls, stepping deftly back before her enemy ruined her chainsword altogether. Black smoke billowed from its vents, and the Lady Tan Draconis scowled at its sudden grinding whine.
‘This sword,’ voxed Gerraint mockingly. ‘It’s a fine weapon. You should have taken that arm instead, girl.’
‘It was my father’s,’ replied Jennika through gritted teeth, circling her steed warily around her foe. ‘You’re not worthy to wield it.’
‘And yet, here I am doing just that,’ said the pretender king. ‘And wearing your father’s crown, also, just so that you know.’
‘Bastard,’ snarled Jennika, loosing a shell at her enemy’s helm. The shot exploded against Therianthros’ shield, angled now towards her. Since her initial shots, Gerraint had not allowed Jennika to land another blow. Fire Defiant, by comparison, was marked with deep, glowing gashes where the traitor’s blade had ripped through its hull. By giving her enemy an honourable fight Jennika had put herself at a severe disadvantage, and she fought not to rise to his taunts.
The pretender king stormed forwards and swung his energy blade in a scything arc. Jennika backpedalled, firing a second shell from her battle cannon. The round struck Gerraint’s shield, causing it to spark and flicker, stalling his attack. As Therianthros stumbled, Jennika stepped Fire Defiant in close and carved her roaring blade into her enemy’s torso. The blade’s teeth bit into armour plate, screaming with the effort of chewing through to the delicate systems behind it. Fire and smoke gouted, but Jennika swore vehemently as her damaged blade stalled. Caught in the thick metal of Therianthros’ hull, the damaged chainsword sputtered and smoked, unable to restart its engines, or to pull clear. Fire Defiant and Therianthros were locked together, helms almost touching while the battle raged around them.
Thinking fast, Jennika swivelled her heavy stubber with a haptic twitch. Staccato hammer blows rang out as a stream of shells battered the renegade Knight’s hull.
‘That won’t help you, lady,’ snarled Gerraint, his Knight straining to tear free of the weapon lodged in its chest. His energised blade crackled as Therianthros tried to bring it to bear, servo-motors whining as they were pushed beyond their limits. Jennika gritted her teeth as her stubber’s ammo counter dropped and the humming energy blade inched closer to her hull. She thanked the Emperor that she had severed her foe’s battle cannon early in the fight. If not, he would have disembowelled her with a single shot by now.
Sudden explosions shook Jennika in her throne. Warnings flashed and shrilled, and with a thunderous jolt her Knight was smashed away from Gerraint’s. The savage separation ripped metal tendons and snapped locking bolts, leaving her Knight’s blade wedged ponderously in her enemy’s chest. Jennika stepped rapidly back, angling her shield to absorb the hammering fire of an incoming Chimaeros Knight.
The Crusader limped in towards the fight. The traitor had lost one arm and its carapace weapon, and its torso was a mangled mess. Still it dragged itself closer, firing a sawing hail of shots from its gatling cannon. The Lady Tan Draconis’ shield flashed as it absorbed the impacts.
‘This is how you traitors fight duels now, is it?’ she spat over an open channel.
‘No,’ said Gerraint as his Knight raised its blade and stepped in close. ‘It’s how we win them. You have wasted enough of my time, girl. I’ve a war to conclude.’
Jennika could see, through the flashing hail of impacts, that Therianthros was pacing unsteadily around her flank, struggling to compensate for the weight of the weapon lodged in its chest. With weapons fire hitting her from the front, Jennika was hard pressed to turn and address her foe, but she had to do something before she was surrounded and torn apart. Her ghosts were muttering insistently in her mind, and amongst their words she saw a sudden chance for victory.
Swivelling her battle cannon, Jennika punched shots towards the Chimaeros newcomer. Both were aimed low, detonating at the Knight’s feet and gouging craters before it. Her assailant stumbled as the ground tore open, his hammering barrage interrupted as the Knight wrestled to control his steed. In that moment Jennika poured every ounce of power she could into Fire Defiant’s actuators. Dropping one of her Knight’s shoulders, she took three swift paces and crashed into Gerraint’s steed. Surprised, the traitor swung his energised blade and managed to carve a gouge in Jennika’s armour, but it couldn’t stop her momentum. Already thrown off balance by the broken blade jutting from its chest, Therianthros could not compensate for the ferocious impact. Explosions stitched the Knight’s legs and waist gimbal as overloaded actuators and compensator motors blew out, and with a terrible groan of stressed metal Gerraint toppled sideways. His steed crashed down upon the ferrocrete, its stolen blade pinned beneath it, and the traitor king was forced to frantically deactivate his weapon before it carved him in two. Bellowing in anger, Gerraint Kar Adrastapol was left sprawled where he lay, his steed twitching with secondary explosions.
