Trial by Blood

by Andy Smillie

  ‘Bind my rage.’

  He turned to Sanguinius.

  ‘Give me the strength to endure this affront.’

  Unlike the Emperor, Sanguinius was sculpted unarmed.

  A second truth – the sons of the Angel needed no weapons to smite their enemies. Seth bowed, touching his forehead to the floor. ‘Paschar.’

  Outside the Reclusiam, a serf eased himself to his feet. His knees and hips ached from days of inaction, making him feel old beyond his twenty-six Terran years. ‘Yes, liege?’ Paschar rasped, his throat hoarse from lack of water.

  ‘Bring me my armour.’

  There were no chairs in the chamber, forcing Corvin to stand while he awaited Seth. Unlike the ostentatious command thrones and strategiums found on Imperial Navy battleships, the Flesh Tearers war-room was barren, empty save for a circular table that sat at its centre. Corvin removed a gauntlet and ran his hand over the table’s surface, flinching at the touch of cold steel. A sterile chill permeated everything on the Victus, an atmosphere exacerbated by the lack of heating and the grilled walkways. His nose was numb from the cold, his breath fogged in the cold air.

  The Flesh Tearers were seemingly unconcerned with those who didn’t share their enhanced constitution. The grinding of cogs stirred Corvin from his thoughts as a pair of heavy brass doors swung inwards, their hinges worn from centuries of use. The doors had seemed immense, unnecessarily so, until Seth stood between them. His armoured bulk was massive, easily filling the double doorway. As the Chapter Master strode into the room, a crimson cloak trailed behind him. An iron halo framed by bronzed wings sat atop his backpack, adding to his deific stature. His armour, though more intricately worked than Harahel’s, was as perfunctory as the war-room. Brutal rivets locked together robust plates.

  Corvin regarded Seth’s face. The Chapter Master’s angular jaw looked capable of taking a direct hit from a power fist, and was in stark contrast to his own patrician features.

  ‘Lord Seth,’ the inquisitor said, bowing. ‘I thank you for granting me an audience.’

  The inquisitor wielded the power to scour the life from an entire sector. He could marshal battlegroups and bombard civilisations out of existence. Yet before the Chapter Master he was but a child, easily dispatched by a casual flick of the wrist. Corvin was afraid, Seth could smell it. He looked past the inquisitor to Appollus and Harahel.

  ‘Leave us.’

  The two Flesh Tearers startled Corvin as they departed. He’d almost forgotten that they were there. Their faces sealed within their helms, they’d been standing in the corner, as lifeless as the many statues they’d passed on the way from the hangar. Corvin fought down the urge to run out after them as the doors ground shut, leaving him alone with Seth.

  ‘Speak your piece, inquisitor, I have wars to attend to.’

  ‘You…’ Corvin struggled, his throat felt dry. ‘You Space Marines are hardly known for your civility, but I see you are as cold and efficient in matters of peace as you are reported to be on the battlefield.’

  ‘No.’

  Corvin frowned. ‘No?’ He started pacing in an effort to increase the distance between them without looking weak.

  Seth was not fooled. ‘No, inquisitor. You are mistaken.’

  ‘I–’

  Seth turned with the inquisitor’s movement, filling the space between them without taking a step. ‘There is no peace amongst the stars. Here, or anywhere else.’

  ‘How true,’ Corvin nodded, thankful the cold was keeping the sweat from his brow. ‘Well then, to the matter at hand.’ He managed to speak with a measure of composure. ‘As I’m sure you’re aware, this is not the first time my ordo has had cause to question the actions of your Chapter.’

  Seth said nothing, his expression unreadable.

  ‘The Eclipse Wars are well documented. All actions accounted for. Except,’ Corvin paused, ‘Honour’s End…’ He spoke slowly, letting the words hang in the air.

  Seth stayed silent, his eyes fixed on the inquisitor.

  Nerves sucked the moisture from Corvin’s mouth. He coughed, clearing his throat. ‘According to the official report, the Flesh Tearers were instrumental in defeating the Archenemy.’

  ‘I have seen the report. Make your point.’

  ‘Yes, I’m quite sure you have. And like you, I too know of the greater truth.’

  ‘Do I?’

  ‘The Flesh Tearers, warriors under your command, your brethren, killed hundreds of Imperial citizens. Hundreds. In cold blood. All innocents.’

  Seth’s jaw tightened. ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Yes, I believe it to be the case.’

  ‘Then again, you are mistaken. The citizens,’ Seth spat the word, full of a warrior’s contempt for the weak, ‘you speak of had succumbed to the taint. They had become pawns of the Archenemy. They were righteous kills.’

  ‘A claim, I believe, that can be neither confirmed nor denied, seeing as your forces left no one alive to testify to the facts.’

  ‘Choose your next words wisely, inquisitor.’ Seth’s voice was edged with menace.

  Despite his instincts urging him otherwise, Corvin held his ground.

  ‘It is not my words which trouble me, Chapter Master, but those of Brother-Sergeant Jorvik of the Space Wolves.’

  A low growl rumbled from Seth’s throat at the mention of the Wolves. Corvin backed up a step.

  ‘Your forces engaged the Space Wolves, did they not?’

  ‘They attacked us. Assaulting our rear like cowards.’

  ‘They fought to protect the populace of the hive.’

  Seth clenched his fists. He could feel his pulse drumming in his veins, hear its roar as it called him to blood. He was going to kill the inquisitor, rip his head from his shoulders and crush it between his fingers.

  ‘Please,’ Corvin held up his hands, trying to placate the seething Chapter Master. ‘My purpose here is only to understand your actions, to hear your side. Not to pass judgement.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Seth’s voice was like the bark of a heavy bolter.

  ‘Yes, and–’

  ‘Then understand this,’ Seth closed the distance between them in a heartbeat, lifting the inquisitor up by his gorget so that their faces were level.

  Corvin let out a gasp, locking his hands around Seth’s vambrace in a futile attempt to break the Flesh Tearer’s hold.

  ‘This Chapter has served the Imperium since before you crawled mewling from your mother’s womb. It has stood at arms and bled almost unto extinction, while you treat us with suspicion and doubt, dishonouring the very warriors who have died to ensure you yet live.’ Seth tossed Corvin to the ground. ‘I am done with your questions, inquisitor.’

  ‘You dare…’ Corvin began as he regained composure, and his feet. ‘You dare strike me?’

  Seth ignored him and turned for the door.

  The inquisitor lunged forwards, anger robbing him of prudence. ‘To turn your back on me is to turn your back on the Throne!’

  Seth spun around, murder in his eyes. ‘Be careful, inquisitor. My patience has its limits.’

  Corvin opened his mouth to speak. Seth didn’t let him.

  ‘You have fifteen minutes to leave my ship. Through an airlock or on your own vessel, it matters not.’

  The access panel winked green. The savant retracted his data keys and took a step back as the doors hissed open. Skulking in the corridor, he pressed against the wall. A row of luminators stuttered overhead, following the line of the passageway as it snaked round to the left. He crept forwards, keeping to the shadows, the folds of his cowl camouflaging him in the darkness.

  The three previous corridors had been deserted, but he could not afford a mistake. His mission was too important for laxity.

  At the end of the corridor, he negotiated another lock and climbed down a service ladder to the deck below.

  Stepping from the ladder to a metal grille floor, he rolled his shoulders back, easing out the tension and standing straighter than he’d
done in months.

  Almost there. The thought sent a surge of adrenaline through his system. Victory is never further from your grasp than the instant before you claim it.

  He took a steadying breath, remembering the maxim his master had taught him. He pressed on.

  His steps became more assured, his stride lengthening as his legs remembered their former power. Splaying his fingers, he flexed his hands, throwing off the malaise that had settled on them. The final door was before him.

  He pulled off his robe to reveal a dark suit of segmented armour, and set about shedding the rest of his disguise. Unclamping the brass augmentation from his eye and screwing it into the haft of the blade that hung from his waist, he reached into a velvet pouch to produce the last piece of his true attire.

  Running his finger across the debossed ‘I’, the real Corvin Herrold slid the Inquisitorial signet ring onto his index finger and pressed the door release. With a slow, deliberate grinding, the doors came apart.

  Darkness greeted the inquisitor as he stepped into the corridor beyond. No luminators shone, the gloom was total, thick and impenetrable.

  ‘Emperor walk with me.’ Activating the portable luminator on his gauntlet, the inquisitor pressed into the passageway. The door growled shut behind him.

  The corridor was different from the others. The panels of the floor were warped and dented, rusted from disuse. The ventilation grilles had been welded shut. The air was rank and stale, ripe with blood and faeces. The walls were dotted with hatches, each leading to small cells. None were occupied, broken manacles the only clue that they ever had been.

  ‘Where are you?’ Corvin whispered to the darkness as he passed another set of cells, their doors slack on battered hinges.

  Noise from further along the corridor pushed Corvin into a crouch. He held his breath, straining to hear. The noise was indistinct, faint. A less experienced operative might have mistaken it for ambient background noise, emitted from one of the warship’s many systems. But Corvin had supervised the interrogation of hundreds of heretics, put thousands more to death. He was more familiar with the sounds of pain than he was with his own voice. He drew his inferno pistol, its primed muzzle glowing amber-hot, and took a cautious step forwards. The screaming grew in intensity as he approached another set of cells. This time the doors were sealed.

  Corvin listened. Pained, angry cries emanated from within. But there was something else – a hoarse roar that sounded almost feral. A sound like nothing Corvin had heard from the throat of a man.

  The inquisitor reduced the focus of the luminator beam, tightening it on the nearest of the cell doors. He moved up against the wall. The door was fusion-bolted shut; there was no way to prise open the lock. Pressing the nose of his pistol to the first of the two hinges, he fired, melting the bond in a flare of superheated metal. He aimed down and shot out the second, swinging round to kick the door in an instant later.

  A roar. The sharp rattle of chains. A black-armoured beast rushed at him. Corvin fired twice, recoiling against the wall of the corridor. He heard his attacker slump back, the chains clattering as the tension on them eased. The noise from the other cells intensified, as though the beasts sensed the carnage nearby; or perhaps, Corvin thought with a shiver, they smelled his fear.

  Guiding the luminator into the cell, the inquisitor took his first proper look at the beast inside. He grinned in satisfaction. It was as he suspected, a Space Marine – though not as he had previously known them. The beast was a dark parody of the Imperium’s superhuman champions. Corvin activated his pict-recorder.

  Swollen veins threatened to push through the skin of its forehead and neck. The scleras of its eyes were gore-red, and its throat emitted a continuous growl as it writhed on the floor. It wore black armour emblazoned with blood-red saltires. Tattered, blood-soaked scrolls hung from its pauldrons and breastplate.

  ‘Subject shows remarkable resilience.’ Corvin zoomed in on the gaping holes he’d blasted in its chest, before raising his pistol and shooting it in the face. The Space Marine slumped backwards and lay still. ‘But not to head shots.’

  ‘That was a mistake, inquisitor.’

  Corvin spun around and fired. The opposite wall glowed faintly, scorched by the melta blast.

  ‘To have come here under false pretences, to have killed one of my flock.’ The voice in the darkness was closer this time.

  ‘Show yourself, daemon!’ Corvin tapped his luminator, expanding the beam to encompass the corridor. Appollus’s leering skull helm appeared from the darkness. In terror, Corvin pulled the trigger. The Chaplain was quicker, crushing the weapon between the fingers of his power fist, and shouldering Corvin to the ground. The inquisitor rolled, letting the momentum take the sting from the blow.

  ‘You have uncovered a secret.’ Appollus advanced on him. ‘Our secret.’ The Chaplain let the haft of his crozius slide down his hand until the flanged head hung a few centimetres from the floor. ‘And like all secrets, its knowing comes with a price.’

  ‘It is you who shall pay the price.’ Corvin unsheathed his sword, energy arcing along its blade. ‘I have summoned my warriors. We will commandeer this vessel, and you and your kind shall answer for your perfidy.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Appollus growled in contempt as the inquisitor retreated. He reached out to tap a pict-viewer on the wall.

  ++Recorder 10A9: Bay 17++

  A Space Marine tore his eviscerator from a shield-warrior’s chest, the weapon’s teeth churning his torso to red mist. The giant Flesh Tearer reversed the grip, driving his blade through the back of a prone figure clad in golden armour. The rest of the Inquisitorial warband lay dead at his feet, now unrecognisable as anything more than a pile of orphaned limbs.

  ++10A9: Segment Ends++

  Disbelief held Corvin’s tongue.

  Appollus grinned.

  ‘You are alone, inquisitor.’

  ‘No, traitor, I am never alone. The Emperor stands by my side.’ Corvin’s blade flashed towards Appollus’s throat.

  The Chaplain slipped the blow, smashing his crozius into Corvin’s breastplate. The inquisitor flipped backwards, his armour cracking under the blow. ‘You have spent too long in the shadows. Judgement’s light has found you wanting.’

  Corvin tried to push himself to his feet, his chest alive with pain. He could barely breathe…

  Appollus yanked the inquisitor up by his hair. Holding him level with the soulless eyes of his helm, he drove a finger of his power fist into his enemy’s chest, cracking ribs. The inquisitor screamed.

  ‘Twice you shot my brother. Are you as resilient as he?’ The Chaplain stabbed a second crackling digit into Corvin, eliciting another tortured cry.

  ‘Emperor…’ Corvin’s lips trembled.

  Appollus pulled the inquisitor closer, the visage of his skull helm filling Corvin’s world. ‘He is not listening to you.’

  Harsh light shone above Corvin. He blinked hard in an effort to shake the torpor from his eyes, forcing them to focus. He tried to reach for his face but his arm was pinned. Shock snapped him to alertness. He was strapped into some sort of chair, his arms and legs bound by thick clamps. He struggled against the restraints, crying out as pain stabbed through his chest. His ribs were broken.

  ‘The restraints are for your own protection.’

  The Chaplain. Corvin remembered the skull helm. ‘You go too far, release me or–’ The inquisitor’s jaw cracked as something struck it. His vision swam, clearing to show the face of another Flesh Tearer looming over him.

  ‘Do you know who I am, inquisitor?’

  ‘Y-yes.’ Corvin stuttered; the granite face of Gabriel Seth was unmistakable.

  ‘You came here seeking truth, inquisitor.’ Seth gestured to Corvin’s right. ‘Let us show you our truth.’

  Beside Corvin, strapped to another chair, was a black-armoured Flesh Tearer, his armour daubed in red saltires.

  At Seth’s gesture, Balthiel removed his gauntlets. He stepped between the two cha
irs. Placing a hand on the forehead of the Death Company Space Marine, he turned to Corvin.

  ‘No! No! Wait, no!’

  Balthiel ignored the inquisitor’s pleading and completed the psychic union.

  ‘A cowardly mind is a weak mind. This will not take long.’ The Librarian reached out with his gifts. The Death Company Space Marine’s mind was incandescent. His anger burned, a pyre that called to Balthiel. He dove into the flames, until they surrounded him, shuddering at the power in the warrior’s blood. The Rage was absolute. The flames licked at his armour, trying to find a way to his flesh. The wards inscribed on Balthiel’s battleplate held, glowing as they turned aside the fire’s advance. He pushed down to the kindling that had given the fire life. Scooping up a pile of embers in his palm, he sought the inquisitor’s mind. It hid beneath layers of disguises and barriers. Corvin was well prepared, but Balthiel would not be deterred. He tore through the inquisitor’s mental defences with a savagery that would have killed an untrained mind, burrowing down past Corvin’s fears to his very essence. There, among the winds of the inquisitor’s soul, Balthiel let the embers fall from his hand.

  Corvin screamed. His cry became a guttural roar as the Rage overtook him. Blood rushed to his muscles, which began to convulse as adrenaline saturated his system. He would tear free from his restraints, kill Seth, wear his skin like a cloak, crush his bones to powder.

  ‘Die!’ Corvin growled, thrashing in the chair. Blood ran from his mouth as he bit deep into his tongue, one of his legs broke with a sickening snap as he tried to free himself.

  ‘Enough.’

  Seth ordered Balthiel to end Corvin’s torment, and close the psychic conduit he had created. After it was done, the inquisitor continued to spasm, his teeth rattling as he went limp in the chair. The effort of communion had taken a huge toll on Balthiel, who dropped to one knee, breathing hard.

  Seth rested a hand on the Librarian’s pauldron. ‘Return to your cell, brother. Rest.’

  ‘Yes, lord.’ Balthiel nodded and left the room.

  ‘Watch him,’ Seth voxed Appollus on a closed channel. The Chaplain dipped his head in acknowledgment and went after the Librarian.