He revelled in his agility, leaping rocks, darting around crags and racing down the icy slopes towards his prey. Flashes boomed in the darkness below, framing the genebred humans in orange, as they unleashed their weapons.
The Enfleshed felt no fear, only anticipation of the kill, of the skinning to come. His talons clacked and scraped of their own volition at the prospect.
Flesh…
It was as if his mind was being pulled apart, stretched taut in many directions at once – loathing, self-pity, feral abandon, ennui, self-satisfying sadism. He was Sahtah no longer; only the Enfleshed existed now.
One of the slaves was struck in the chest. The Enfleshed lost sight of it as it fell with a pseudo-scream. The storm of hot metal was intensifying the closer he came to the end of the slope. Something chipped his armoured shoulder, but he paid it no heed. To his left, another slave was destroyed. The Enfleshed smiled, or at least he did so in his mind – his rictus jaw was incapable of such expression – it meant more skin for him.
I shall devour you all…
He imagined hot blood coursing down his gullet, the succulence of ripe flesh rolling around in his mouth. It was intoxicating. A final thought penetrated the shattered remnants of his memory engrams as he leapt the final few metres to the kill.
I am lost…
The heavy shells burst hot and hard against his chest as the prey tried in vain to stop him, but the Enfleshed was not to be denied. His talons fanned in a killing arc, eager to eviscerate…
…when another figure emerged through the storm.
The light surrounding him was painful to the Enfleshed’s dead eyes. The aura seemed to expand, washing over the others in a wave of azure. It was fringed by crackling bolts of power, coursing over a growing energy dome like vipers. It struck the Enfleshed mid-flight and threw him back.
A scream tore from the Enfleshed’s throat and was echoed by his slaves, who felt it sympathetically. Pain snapped at his nerves, some real, some imagined – though he couldn’t tell one from the other. Blood, dried hard by the frost, cooked off his joints and servos in a ruddy haze. He tried to stand, poised to attack this newcomer and rend his face from his skull, but another bolt arced from the figure’s fingertips – his eyes were alive with power – and now the Enfleshed felt fear.
His chest was torn apart, his living metal body sloughing into slag. Sahtah, the Enfleshed – his head was so scrambled, he couldn’t tell who or what he was any more – felt his memory engrams exploding one by one. Though he grasped at it with his melted talons, he could not seize his fading identity. Sentience shrivelled and turned to dust like bones upon a pyre. Slumping to his knees, Sahtah felt oblivion approaching. It stirred a final thought in his destroyed consciousness, one that would echo for aeons.
Peace…
Tigurius regarded the steaming remains of the necron lord with contempt as it phased out. His storm had vanquished the other flayed ones too and the mountainside was disturbingly empty barring where his psychic lightning had scorched it.
He allowed the aura around him to fade and with the absence of the light, darkness swarmed in around them again.
‘Your intervention is timely and most welcome, Lord Tigurius.’
The Chief Librarian turned at the sound of Scipio’s voice. As he nodded, it took a moment longer for the fire in his eyes to die.
‘I was travelling the Sea of Souls when I witnessed you in peril, Sergeant Vorolanus,’ he said, motes of power still drifting from his lips and an unearthly resonance in his timbre.
Scipio bowed. ‘We are glad of it.’
Tigurius looked beyond the brother-sergeant and his warriors. ‘Who are these people?’
Drawn by the lightning storm, the human guerrillas and their Ultramarine escorts were standing a little farther down the path.
Scipio glanced over his shoulder where the humans had sunk to their knees before the Librarian.
‘They are our saviours, Brother-Librarian.’
Tigurius eyed them curiously, unconvinced. ‘Get up, all of you.’ He turned back to Scipio. ‘How so?’
‘One amongst them can lead us through the mountains, bypassing the necron picket lines.’
Tigurius considered this for a moment, before answering, ‘Bring the scout with us, the others we must leave behind.’
Scipio opened his mouth to protest, but the Librarian’s steady gaze, latent with psychic power, stopped him. He nodded then gestured to the humans. ‘Captain Evvers.’
A woman, the farthest forward in the group, who had now all got to their feet, looked up.
‘You’re with us. The others–’
‘Are coming with me,’ she said firmly, shaking her head. ‘I won’t leave them, not now.’
Tigurius glowered at her impudence. He released a little of his power into his eyes, which crackled with tiny lightning sparks. ‘You will obey. This is not a negotiation.’
The one Scipio had called Evvers cowered a little but stood her ground. ‘I need them. To get through the mountains. I need their skill. So do you.’
Tigurius didn’t like it. Being beholden to one human was bad enough. To be argued down as well bordered on intolerable. ‘I am tempted to ignite you like a flare, little human,’ he said. Evvers looked like she might shrink from the threat but stayed steady. Despite her obvious frailty, she impressed the Librarian.
He laughed, as alien and unusual a sound as Varro Tigurius was ever likely to make. ‘You have some courage in you.’ He slammed his staff into the ground. ‘Stay close. None of the Ultramarines here will be responsible if you fall behind.’
Evvers nodded. He could tell she was shaking and eager to be away from his penetrating gaze. ‘Same goes for you,’ she said, by way of rejoinder and went to marshal her troops.
‘She is… forthright, brother-sergeant.’
Scipio nodded in agreement. ‘I have never met a human like her.’
The drifts were lessening. Winds still howled around the peaks, chill and desolate. The storm wasn’t done, it would come again.
Tigurius watched Evvers leading her troops down the slope. ‘I saw into her mind. She carries much grief and anger, but believes she can master it and do what is asked of her.’ He turned his gaze on Scipio. ‘Do you believe it, too, Brother Vorolanus?’
Scipio’s eyes narrowed. ‘Do I believe what, my lord?’
‘Exactly as I asked.’
‘She will do her duty, as will I.’
Tigurius’s expression was neutral, he gave nothing away. ‘Then that is all any of us can be asked to do.’
‘What else did you see, my lord, in the Sea of Souls?’
Scipio had been there when Tigurius had tried and failed to identify the darkness plucking at the edges of his prescience. He knew it had disturbed the sergeant and now he wanted assurances. But the Librarian couldn’t provide them.
‘Nothing.’
‘There is no doom in our future, then?’
‘No, there is a tragedy to come but I cannot see it. A terrible will is blocking my prescience. For now, my eyes are blind, Scipio.’
The expression on the sergeant’s face told Tigurius he had only enhanced his misgivings. That could not be helped. A lie would not serve him, either.
They left the slopes after that. The valley where the rest of the Ultramarines waited was not far. If what Scipio said was true and the humans could indeed find a way through the mountains and the necron defence line then victory was possible. The artillery could be destroyed and a foothold gained on Damnos all in the same move. Tigurius only wished he could grasp the thread of his disquiet. A sense of foreboding weighed upon him still. His psychic flight had done nothing to dispel it. The dark shroud over his thoughts was heavy and obscuring. Perhaps when the mission was done and the Voidbringer vanquished that veil would be lifted. He only hoped that by then it wouldn’t be too late.
Chapter Sixteen
After months of continuous bombardment Adanar Sonne was used to the sound of the necro
n guns. They were a constant throb against the inside of his skull, a heavy-handed passenger demanding his attention. At the moment, the artillery was silent and it was the absence of their din that was unsettling him.
‘It’s like a lullaby, don’t you think?’
Corporal Humis frowned. Not long after the Ultramarines had defeated the necron vanguard, a curious stillness had descended on Kellenport. The silence of the guns in the Thanatos Hills could mean anything. Perhaps the Emperor’s Angels had destroyed them somehow and salvation would come from the stars in the form of an evacuation boat, or perhaps the necrons were merely preparing to unleash some greater horror. For now, the air was quiet… except for the screams.
‘I don’t understand, sir.’
‘Of course you don’t,’ Adanar replied. He was using the lull to tour the battlements, to check on their defences. Even if they were fated to die – and Adanar was certain this was the case – he would ensure they would go down fighting, in blood and fire. ‘You haven’t been on the wall as long as I have.’ He turned to look at him. ‘You don’t come from Kellenport, do you, Humis?’
‘I was stationed at the Zephyr Monastery, sir.’
Adanar smiled thinly. ‘Ah, protecting the priests and their relics.’ He carried on down the wall, saluting the officers blindly as he went. Humis followed in lockstep with his commander. ‘Well, your piety has got you this far, I suppose.’
Humis had no reply to that.
‘So, what’s left?’ Adanar was all business again as he regarded the fire-blackened remains of the Kellenport artillery.
Consulting a data-slate, Humis said, ‘Three uber-mortars and three long-nosed cannon, sir.’
‘Earthshakers?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And what of the Hel-handed?’
‘Still functional.’
Adanar nodded, satisfied. He already knew that the rail guns, cannon nests and emplacements were below thirty-five per cent. They were useful against infantry, but it was the really big guns that mattered – and they didn’t come much bigger than the Hel-handed.
‘Raise Sergeant Letzger on the vox,’ he said. ‘I want to see through the eyes of his god-engine.’
It took a further eighteen minutes to cross the battlements and meet with Sergeant Letzger. They passed strung-out squads of Ark Guard and conscripts on the way. All of Damnos, the remains of its entire population, had mustered in one last act of defence. The officers saluted, some even muttered greetings – many were just silent, contemplative of their fates. It seemed to Adanar that the army had thinned greatly since he’d last been around the wall.
A broad-shouldered, stocky man, Letzger was one of the few original officers to have survived the siege of Kellenport thus far and was the city’s, and the Ark Guard’s, gunnery master. Sweat-stained breeches, a pitted helmet strung with webbing and a flak jacket riddled with cigar burns painted a dishevelled picture of a man that Adanar trusted with his life.
‘Commander Sonne.’ Letzger saluted when he saw Adanar approach. His bare arms were covered in wiry black hair that failed to stop the Guard tattoos from showing through. His leather gloves were cut off at the ends, revealing oil-stained fingers. It didn’t stop Adanar from shaking the man’s hand after he returned his salute.
He appraised the cannon. ‘How does she fare?’
The Hel-handed was a massive artillery piece. It was so big that it had to be built into the very foundations of the city wall and had immense recoil dampeners and impact compensators wrought into its leg stanchions. The column-like barrel was telescopic and segmented in four places. It required a crew of six men to fire it. A team of three was needed to rotate the barrel. Its firing platform was large enough for half a platoon of Ark Guard to stand on. Kill markings ran down the barrel, a source of pride as well as an illustration of Letzger’s vengeance against the necrons that had invaded his world and murdered his friends.
Such engines were described as ‘Ordinatus’ by the Adeptus Mechanicus. This one had been fashioned and anointed by Karnak, but the tech-priest was no longer able to perform the rites of the machine – he had died in the early weeks of the invasion. The fact that Hel-handed had kept firing without pause or complaint was a testament to the fortitude of its machine-spirit. There was not a day went by that Letzger did not thank it for that.
‘Still operational, sir. The break in the bombardment has given us a little time to effect some minor repairs.’ Letzger nodded to the work crews halfway up the barrel reaffixing plates and the servitors welding sections back together. ‘She’s holding.’
There was a tang of ozone in the air. Adanar tasted it on the back of his tongue. The smell was in his nostrils. It was preferable to the stink of death, at least.
‘And the shield?’
Letzger breathed in. He genuinely enjoyed the acrid taste in his mouth.
‘Still burning out my nose hairs, commander.’ He smiled and his entire face seemed to crease up like an old rag. The stubble on his face was patchy and clumped with the movement of his features. Letzger really was an ugly brute.
Because of its size and importance, the Hel-handed was protected by a void shield. Such measures were usually only afforded for Titan god-machines but certain static installations like defence lasers and macro cannons also possessed them. With its sheer mass and destructive potential, the Hel-handed easily fell into that distinction. The void shield was the only reason it had not been rendered to scrap by the necron guns months ago.
‘You’ve come to sample the view, I take it?’ Letzger added.
Magnoculars only penetrated so far through the fog, but looking through the sights of Hel-handed was like peering through the eyes of a god.
‘Only if it won’t interrupt your labours.’
Letzger gestured to the machine behind him with a wide arm. ‘Go ahead, sir. Her gaze hasn’t wavered since the killing and death began.’
Humis balked a little at the gunnery master’s words. Adanar allowed himself some private amusement – Letzger’s pragmatism was infinitely preferable to the desperate hope of most of his officers. At least it was honest.
Mounting the platform, nodding to the crews who saluted him crisply, Adanar took up a position in the sighter’s chair and looked through the Hel-handed’s crosshairs.
Unsurprisingly, the view was fixed on the Thanatos Hills where the necron artillery was based. It was something of an unfair fire exchange but Adanar sensed the challenge was relished by Letzger’s old girl. The arc of pylons and heavy gauss-cannons blighted the rugged horizon line. Several years ago, when his family was still alive, Adanar had trained in the Thanatos Hills. His barracks were based at the old refinery. That too was in ruins now, little more than a blast scar on the ground. So much was gone, never to return.
He squinted through the sighting lens, careful not to alter any of the gunnery master’s measurements. He couldn’t tell why the necron artillery had stopped firing but he did see something moving to the west. It was on the fringes of his vision through the scope. Adanar turned to Letzger.
‘There’s something out there.’
Letzger gave the reports back to his chief engineer and took up the secondary sighter’s seat. He peered through the lens.
‘Eighteen degrees west,’ he bellowed into the vox-horn. Several metres above him, a trio of crewmen rotated the barrel precisely.
Letzger adjusted the scope, tweaking it for focus. ‘Clever bastards.’
Adanar had the same view but wasn’t seeing whatever the gunnery master was.
‘See the hill line?’ asked Letzger.
Adanar nodded.
‘Watch the peaks.’
Adanar stared. The drifts were blowing themselves out but despite that and the incredible range of the Hel-handed it was still hard to discern detail. He had seen something earlier, though, so he tried to focus on that. His eyes narrowed and he smiled.
‘They’re moving.’
‘Aye, it’s no hill line out there.’
‘Necron pyramids,’ Adanar asserted.
‘Trying to sneak up on us. Hoping we’d think the barrage was over and relax our guard.’
‘How close do you think they are?’
Letzger made some adjustments, consulted instruments. He also lit a cigar and puffed on it enthusiastically.
‘Too close.’ He started yelling orders at the crews, shouting out coordinates. There was a flurry of action as his men reacted. Letzger left the sighter’s seat and looked at Adanar.
‘We need to get you off the platform now, sir,’ he said politely.
Adanar matched the gunnery master’s salute and left with Humis. They were heading back down the wall when he noticed something else that gave him immense displeasure.
‘What is he doing on the battlements?’
Humis didn’t catch on immediately. Adanar had to point him out before the corporal understood.
Rancourt was on the walls, his guard detail with him. It looked like he was trying to inspire the men, but was getting strange looks and wary salutes instead.
Adanar scowled and thrust out his hand. ‘Get me Kador on the vox, right now.’
Sergeant Kador kept his voice low; the acting lord governor was only a few steps ahead of him and he didn’t want to be overheard. ‘He insisted, commander. I believe he wanted to do his part to galvanise the men.’
A stream of invective made Kador wince ever so slightly. ‘I understand, sir.’
There was more, and the sergeant could see by Commander Sonne’s hand gestures, as far away as he was on the battlements, that he was extremely displeased.
‘I will do so immediately.’
The vox link was cut abruptly and Kador gave the receiver cup back to his comms-officer. His face was as hard as Damnos ice. ‘Bring Governor Rancourt to me. Now.’
‘Never let it be said that Lord Governor Zeph Rancourt sat idle while his people suffered.’
Kador thought he looked knowingly officious in his robes and suspected the only reason the lord governor had ventured from his quarters was in fear of the ceiling falling in on him. Upon hearing of Corporal Besseque’s death, he’d been especially paranoid about that.
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