by Gav Thorpe
With the Dark Angels pounding into the caves ahead of him, Demor stashed the stun charge and set off after them. Buzzing lanterns threw bright yellow light across the interior, starkly illuminating seams of blue and green and gold in the walls.
There was nothing else in view – no bedding, no food, no kind of stores at all.
A formless apprehension slowed Demor as he took in this information. His instincts urged caution and he drew his pistol again, auto-senses flicking through the different spectra to see if there was anything hidden in the cave.
Turning his head, he looked back to the entrance. There were wires attached to the rock.
‘It’s a tr–’
The detonation cut off his warning. The mountainside collapsed onto him, sealing the caves with a tumbling, crushing wall of rock. In Demor’s last moments before a tonne of limestone broke open his helm and flattened his skull, the vox came alive with the shouts of the Dark Angels.
First surprise, and then their death cries.
From the cupola of the Whirlwind missile launcher, Parestor could see directly across the bridge into the heart of Madupolis. The ironwork crossing had been targeted once already by Illyrian dissidents, their home-made explosive insufficient to the task of toppling the heavy-gauge engineering.
Built across a canyon six hundred metres deep, the Madupolis highway linked eastern Illyrium to Macragge Civitas, a vital ground connection for the Dark Angels’ and Ultramarines’ forays into the mountains. Master Daevios had made it abundantly clear in his briefing that the security of the entire operation depended upon maintaining surface supplies to the patrols and garrisons pushing into the heart of the Hera’s Crown mountains. Parestor was not one to take any task lightly, even if an entire armoured company protected Madupolis around him.
‘I would wager we could baulk even the Iron Hands’ armoured fists from this position,’ he voxed down to the driver, Metrital. ‘What chance for hill bandits and petty gangsters?’
‘Just keep a keen eye, nothing comes down that road without the signal from Sardeon’s checkpoint.’
‘Affirmative,’ replied Parestor, turning the missile pods back towards the highway to the north-east.
A few minutes passed and then he saw a plume of spray from a vehicle moving quickly towards them. He could see nothing of the vehicle itself, but the size of the cloud behind it was considerable. Parestor activated the vox.
‘Sardeon, we have incoming. No permit transmission received. Confirm status.’
The vox hissed with static but no reply.
‘Sardeon, respond!’
Still nothing came back. Parestor switched to the general channel and broadcast the high alert signal.
‘This is Xiphos three-epsilon with incoming heavy vehicle. Checkpoint unresponsive. Request fire clearance from Order Command.’
The reply came a few seconds later, from Master Daevios’ provost, Hastenral.
‘Vehicle has been designated a threat. Target with full effect.’
‘Acknowledged, order command.’ Parestor switched to the internal vox. ‘How stupid do they think we are?’
‘Maybe they think we’ll hesitate?’ Metrital replied with a laugh.
Parestor armed the missile system, its high-powered surveyor array locking on to the approaching vehicle in milliseconds. The hum of the targeters grew to a whine as the missiles zeroed in on the heat from the truck’s exhaust. Parestor could see it now, half a kilometre away, a flatbed piled high with barrels and crates.
‘Crude,’ he said, and pressed the firing stud.
A four-missile salvo roared from the pods, arcing above the highway. Miniature cogitators in the projectiles calculated the incoming truck’s velocity and direction and cut their dive accordingly. With a final stab of blue plasma they plunged almost directly down in a tight cluster, hitting the cab and flatbed in unison.
Promethium plumed outwards as the storage vessels in the back of the truck exploded, sending a fireball hundreds of metres into the air. The explosion scattered flaming metal across the surface of the highway, trails of burning fuel licking across the dull black surface.
‘Contact the armoury, we are going to need something to move that wreck,’ Parestor told Metrital. ‘Command should send out a gunship to see what has happened to Sardeon’s squad.’
There was no reply.
‘Metrital?’
Parestor disengaged the cupola targeting link and pushed himself down into the hull of the Whirlwind. He ducked beneath the rails of the autoloader running across the top of the space, heading towards the driver’s compartment.
Through the doorway he noticed Metrital flopped over the controls. The side of his helm had been hacked open, the ceramite still smoking slightly from the blow of a powered blade.
He heard the clang of the access hatch behind him shutting, a moment before he noticed the winking lights of the melta-bombs attached to the spare missiles above his head.
Progress had been slow, but steady. Captain Neraellin had seen the reports from some of the other field commanders – Paladins and Masters who had been less circumspect in their approach to taming Illyrium. They had made great headway initially, but now many of them had slowed to a halt, overextended, cut off from orbital and air cover by the winter that had enveloped the north and eastern peaks of the Hera’s Crown mountains.
Neraellin had preferred a more systematic approach, new to the level of command that had been thrust upon him. He had sensed the impatience of his junior officers, who had seen glory being snatched away from them for every kilometre the other columns advanced in front of them. Only his aide-de-militant Hexagia had shown total confidence in his approach, but her support was little comfort amongst the patient but knowing looks of his staff.
‘This will secure us Land Speeder coverage as far as the Clotrunis Ridge,’ Hexagia told him, handing over a data-slate with a map of the surrounding valleys and mountains.
‘I know,’ Neraellin replied. ‘I positioned it.’
Two Thunderhawk heavy transporters were descending in unison, a massive prefabricated launchpad and command station slung between them on dozens of high-tensile cables. The installation of the cestrus strongpoint would give his company’s Land Speeders and jetbikes a staging post for forays further into the mountains, its powerful augur array helping them negotiate the rough weather. Nearly one hundred and fifty tonnes of metal, ceramite and ferrocrete.
As much as a staging post, it was a stamp of Imperial authority. Illyrium would not rebel again.
The same weather that vexed the pilots had delayed deployment of the cestrus by three days, and Neraellin knew his warriors were chafing like hounds at the leashes, but they were not party to the series of disasters that had started to beset the more advanced columns. With the arrival of the cestrus, Neraellin’s company would have mobile outriders to clear the path for the armoured advance. He would not be ambushed like his brothers.
The Thunderhawks were moving their immense payload across the valley, ready to set it down on a flattened tier on the eastern flank, opposite the small town of Thiaphonis that clustered along the edges of the valley entrance.
Something bright lanced up from the buildings of the town, stark against the grey of clouds and stone. Neraellin could scarce believe what he had seen. A moment later the vox erupted with warning chimes and the shouts of his warriors.
‘Lascannon, somewhere near the forum square.’
‘Where are they? Coordinates, sergeant?’ Neraellin barked back.
‘We took a hit, port wing!’
Looking up, the captain saw smoke issuing from the flank of the closest transporter.
‘We cannot evade, captain,’ the pilot continued. ‘By the teeth of the Nemochian Serpent, I can see another on the roof of the granaries!’
Another beam of light sprang up from a different direction, lancing through the tailplane of the damaged Thunderhawk. It yawed to port, the cestrus swaying violently beneath. The sudden movement dragged
the other transport down, bursts of plasma from its jets betraying the other pilot’s attempts to stay level. The first lascannon fired again, a dozen support cables parting violently as the blast seared through them
‘Open fire!’ Neraellin shouted over the vox.
‘Where, captain?’ Hexagia asked, looking towards the streets of Thiaphonis on the opposite slopes. ‘With what? There are thousands of people in the town.’
Neraellin had left Caliban with the Lion and fought beneath the primarch for decades. Though he had never caught the eye of his master, he had made his way up the ranks with the same deliberate pace he had recently brought to the suppression of Illyrium. He had fought in hundreds of battles, commanded a starship and slain countless xenos, demented human survivors of Old Night and even former brethren from the traitor Legions.
None of it had prepared him for the moment.
His brain function was reduced to a trickle, faced with the decision of opening fire on the town. The logical part of him knew that he had to order the strike. If the Thunderhawks crashed on Thiaphonis, hundreds would be slain anyway. But to order a deliberate attack on a civilian centre strained every oath he had every sworn.
Inside, he screamed the command to attack the forum and granaries, knowing it was what the Lion would do. The words would not leave his lips.
Squads with jump packs were spearing into the town, but they would not arrive in time. How long did it take to recharge a lascannon? How many seconds had passed since the last shot had been fired?
The decision burst through his thoughts like a stream of tactical data swamping his visual display.
‘All forces, target grids five-six-seventeen through five-eight-seventeen. Full effect!’
The thunder of cannons reverberated across the valley a second later accompanied by the shriek of ascending rockets and the thud of self-propelled mortars, but the command had come too late. In the seconds before the centre of Thiaphonis was engulfed by a maelstrom of fire another white lance stabbed out, hitting the damaged transporter’s main engine block. The updraught of exploding munitions sent billowing black smoke across the valley even as the Thunderhawk twisted sharply, losing altitude.
The second Thunderhawk ejected its tow lines to avoid being dragged down, leaving the cestrus to pitch forty-five degrees as it fell. Neraellin turned his eyes away from the impending catastrophe, but he could still see the reflection of the crashing strongpoint reflected in the horrified gaze of Hexagia. The cataclysmic noise of the impact was carried out on a shockwave that ran the entire width of the valley, bringing with it a wall of snow and broken masonry.
Neraellin threw himself across Hexagia, standing over his adjutant as ice and stone cracked against his armour and thudded into the sides of the vehicles around him.
The tumult lasted only a few seconds, but it seemed much longer.
Stepping back, Neraellin was relieved to see his aide unharmed, her face reddened by the cold blast but nothing worse.
His relief died quickly as he turned back towards Thiaphonis. The town was wreathed in smoke and dust, but he could see flames starting to lick up the sides of the taller buildings. A gash a kilometre wide had been torn through the centre of the settlement. He watched the clock tower toppling into the central forum, sending up another wave of debris and smog.
Protecting Hexagia seemed scant consolation.
Even before Holguin handed over the report, the Lion knew that it was more bad news. The voted lieutenant’s body language screamed reluctance as he reached out with the data-slate, eyes averted, body tilted towards the door as though wishing to depart immediately. All of his actions since coming to the new audience chamber had been that of a man approaching his own execution.
Sanguinius and Guilliman sat to the Lion’s left. The Lord Warden had watched Holguin’s arrival intently, doubtless coming to the same conclusions as the Lion. The regent emperor sat with one elbow on the arm of his throne, stroking his lip with a pale finger. It was impossible to know if his thoughts were in the hall or directed elsewhere.
‘Just tell us,’ said the primarch, ignoring the proffered slate.
‘Another attack, my lords,’ said Holguin, stating the obvious.
‘Illyrium is aflame,’ said Guilliman. ‘I am surprised that there has been only one.’
‘No, in the civitas, my lords,’ Holguin quietly added. He offered the data-slate again. ‘Please, my lords, watch this. A visual capture from a legionary of the Thirteenth.’
The Lion plucked the data-slate from Holguin’s fingers and the voted lieutenant gratefully retreated a few paces. The primarch activated the projector so that all three of them could watch the recording.
It started peacefully enough, crowds moving past a checkpoint, the legionary scanning back and forth across the throng of people. In the corner of his vision was a large statue.
‘The Illyrian Monument,’ said Guilliman.
They continued watching as a young woman approached the legionary, a heavy shawl about her shoulders. He almost did not notice her emerging from the press of people. Suddenly she threw herself at the Space Marine, her arms flung wide, revealing cylindrical canisters slung beneath her cape.
The feed was silent but the Lion could read her lips.
‘Illyri beo… fata?’ he murmured as he watched the display fill with the expanding white flames of exploding promethium. He ended the projection and tossed the data-slate back to Holguin.
‘Long live Illyrium,’ Guilliman answered. ‘The old tongue of the mountains. Do you still think this is Curze’s work?’
‘Of course.’ The Lion looked to Sanguinius for a response, hoping for support, but the Blood Angel regarded him with an inquisitorial gaze. ‘What better screen for Curze’s activities than a populist rebellion?’
‘What point is Curze trying to make?’ asked Guilliman. ‘Leaving aside his demented love of theatrics, why would Curze anchor himself with the burden of a terrorist uprising? He must know that you will respond with even more force, driving him further underground.’
‘We should not give him what he wishes,’ said Sanguinius. ‘If it is Curze, he is provoking us for a reason.’
‘I concur, brother,’ said the Lion. ‘This rabble-rousing in Illyrium is a feint. The attack in Macragge Civitas shows that we have been placing too much emphasis on hunting Curze, when really we must concentrate all of our efforts in securing the capital.’
‘You think you can tighten security even more?’ said Guilliman. ‘Would you look to regulate even the air our citizens breathe?’
‘If I could…’ replied the Lion, ignoring the barb. He waved a hand towards Sanguinius. ‘We know what it is he seeks. He will come after us again, either alone or together.’
‘The more tyrannical the measures we take, the greater Curze’s sense of fulfilment,’ warned Guilliman. ‘He wants us to become him, to abuse the power we have been given. If we fall to such a lure, his own moral demise is excused.’
‘But he overlooks one important factor.’
‘What is that?’ Sanguinius leaned forward, intrigued. ‘We seek to rule others. What makes us different from Curze?’
‘We are right and he is wrong,’ replied the Lion.
Guilliman laughed without humour and the regent emperor sat back, disappointed.
‘Is it that simple?’ asked the primarch of the Ultramarines. ‘We sit on one side of a line and he the other?’
‘Always has it been the case,’ said the Lion. He remembered Holguin, who had been watching the exchange in silent acquiescence. ‘Little brother, what do you think?’
He looked surprised, caught unawares by the question. Holguin looked first at the Lion and then to Guilliman and finally Sanguinius.
‘Your assessment is correct, my liege. Nobody does a thing believing it to be wrong. There is no external measure for what is correct, only the judgement of our hearts and peers.’
‘Wise words,’ said Guilliman. ‘If a little equivocal. But it follows
from such a position that if we make laws, if we create boundaries to restrain others, we must be bound and held by the same strictures.’
‘Of course, Lord Warden,’ said Holguin. ‘Forgive my simplicity, I have spent my years studying the doctrines of war, not philosophy. I know that other principles hold sway in Macragge and my arguments would be deficient.’
To this the Lion had to laugh, and Guilliman smiled also. Holguin did not realise why he had caused such humour and looked from one to the other with dumb confusion.
‘Do not worry yourself, little brother. Tell us, wise Holguin, what you would do in response to these latest attacks. You have heard our argument, now make a judgement upon it.’
‘It is not my place…’ Holguin faltered under the Lion’s determined stare.
‘It is what I wish, little brother,’ said the primarch.
‘Very well, my liege,’ said the leader of the Deathwing. He took a breath. ‘I do not know whether Curze leads these attacks or not, but the response is the same. We cannot be drawn into escalating our presence in Illyrium. The winter worsens, and we fight on unfamiliar ground against a foe that knows every secret hole and lair in the mountains. The more we turn our attention to Illyrium, the less we spend on Macragge Civitas. What victory can we achieve there? If Curze is in control, he will not allow us to find him until he is ready. If not, then we deploy a Legion to fight a ragtag band of rebels. We do not march to their drum, but sound the beat ourselves. Our goal is the same, to defend the Imperial Triumvirate. All else is distraction.’
The primarchs greeted the pronouncement in silence. Holguin waited in trepidation for their response.
‘Your deputy has a keen mind,’ said Guilliman. ‘I could not have voiced it better.’
‘We are in agreement,’ said the Lion, again looking to Sanguinius for confirmation. He received a single nod in response. ‘We will withdraw to the borders of Illyrium and instigate stricter controls in Magna Macragge Civitas. Curze will have to come to us.’
