Текст книги "A Thousand Sons"

Автор книги: Грэм Макнилл

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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 31 страниц)

“Such a force of psychic might is too powerful for any normal mind,” said Uthizzar, reliving a painful memory. “I have felt this before.”

Ahriman read Uthizzar’s aura and knew.

“Leman Russ,” he said.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The Library/Flesh Change/The Peacemaker

THEY PUSHED HIGHER into the Phoenix Crag. Ahriman’s First Fellowship linked with Hathor Maat’s 3rd in a gorge of artisans’ workshops, and scout elements of the Prospero Spireguard joined them in a region of hollowed out silo peaks. Drop-troops of the Ouranti Draks, with their scale cloaks and reptilian helmets, had seized the districts above Ahriman’s position, and parted to allow the purposeful Astartes past.

Reports of the fighting came in a haphazard jumble: a close range firefight in the south-western subsids, a swirling melee involving six thousand soldiers across the lower slopes of a manufacturing region in the mountain’s rumpled skirts, artillery duels on the northern residential flanks, dizzying aerial jousts fought between the disc-skimmers of the Thousand Sons and the last of the shrike-riders.

The reports intersected and cut across each other in blurted outbursts. Ahriman was barely able to sift meaning from the chaos. Through all the reports of impending victory and the destruction of enemy forces, two facts were abundantly clear.

The Word Bearers were advancing slowly, much slower than he would have expected.

The same could not be said of the Space Wolves.

Leman Russ and his First Great Company had dropped directly onto the silver mountain’s highest peak, extinguishing its eternal flame and toppling the symbols of rulership. The hearthguard of the Phoenix Court valiantly opposed the surging, unstoppable force of the Space Wolves, but they had been torn to scraps and hurled from the mountaintop.

The defeated kings offered terms of surrender, but Leman Russ was deaf to such pleas. He had sworn words of doom upon the Grand Annulus, and the Wolf King would never break an oath for something as trivial as mercy. The Space Wolves tore down through the mountain, an unstoppable force of nature, their blades and bolts gutting the defenders’ ranks like a butcher with a fresh carcass.

Nothing was left in their wake, the mountain city a work of art vandalised by thoughtless brutality and wanton savagery. Behind the warriors of Russ was only death, and before them was their next target for destruction: the Great Library of the Phoenix Crag, where Magnus the Red and Phosis T’kar’s 2nd Fellowship stood in ordered ranks.

Finally, the Space Wolves rampage was halted.

AHRIMAN LED HIS warriors across a yawning chasm on a slender causeway that arched up towards a wide plaza before an enormous glittering pyramid of glass and silver. Many of its gilded panes had been shattered in the battle, but it was still a magnificent structure, like the pyramid temples of Prospero, albeit on a much smaller scale.

“Russ’ warriors made a holy mess of this place,” said Hathor Maat, surveying the damage done to Phoenix Crag. “I’m inclined to agree with you, Ahzek.”

“About what?”

“That maybe all this was a waste of lives,” said Hathor Maat, surprising Ahriman with the sincerity he heard.

This far up the mountain, Ahriman could see its summit, a sagging silver peak that belched smoke instead of symbolic fire. Fires burned across the mountain’s heights, and from his vantage point on the causeway he saw that the lower reaches fared no better.

Ahead of him, kneeling Astartes in the livery of the 2nd Fellowship defended the end of the causeway. The Astartes had their bolters levelled, and he saw the shimmer of kine shields distorting the air before them.

Lemuel Gaumon caught up with Ahriman. The man’s complexion was ruddy, and smears of blood coated his cheeks.

“What’s going on?” asked Lemuel, between greedy heaves of thin air. “Can you see the Wolf King? Are his warriors in trouble?”

“Something like that,” agreed Ahriman. “They are in trouble. I just do not yet know of whose making.”

Ahriman shared a glance with Uthizzar, but his fellow captain shrugged in bewilderment. That wasn’t good. If a telepath couldn’t fathom what was going on, then he had little chance.

“Come on,” he said, “let’s find out what’s at the heart of this.”

The warriors at the end of the causeway lowered their bolters at his approach, and Ahriman saw wide gouges torn in their shoulder guards. These were not the neat slices of shrike claws, they were the maim-wounds of chainswords.

The grandeur of the Great Library reared above him in a shimmering vitreous slope of polarised glass. A vast golden gateway led inside, and Ahriman took a moment to relish the thought of exploring its farthest depths to unlock this world’s secrets.

Bands of Thousand Sons warriors defended the ends of a number of other causeways, each one leading back to the bulk of the mountain. Magnus the Red stood at the edge of the plaza, his armour a blaze of gold and crimson. His curved sword was bared and his entire body crackled with aetheric fire. Behind Magnus stood his ancient scribe, and Ahriman was amazed that the old man had survived the fury of this fight.

Phosis T’kar ran over to Ahriman, his heqa staff alive with hissing lines of energy.

“Ahzek, Hathor, you took your time,” said Phosis T’kar.

“We got here as soon as we could,” snapped Hathor Maat.

“You’re both here now, that’s what matters I suppose. Any sign of Khalophis?”

“No,” said Ahriman. “He is crystal-joined with his robots. It is hard to pinpoint his location when his consciousness is so dispersed.”

Phosis T’kar shrugged.

“Fine,” he said. “We’ll need to deal with this situation without him.”

“T’kar,” said Ahriman. “Tell me what is happening! We heard a psychic shout more powerful than anything I’ve ever known.”

“It was Leman Russ,” said Uthizzar. “Wasn’t it?”

Phosis T’kar nodded, turning and indicating that they should follow him.

“Most probably,” he spat. “Killed almost every Athanaean in my Fellowship, and most of the ones that aren’t dead are reduced to drooling lackwits.”

“Dead?” cried Uthizzar. These warriors were not of his Fellowship, but as Magister Templi of the Athanaeans, they were as much Uthizzar’s as they were Phosis T’kar’s.

“Dead,” snapped Phosis T’kar. “That’s what I said. Now stop wasting time. The primarch calls you to his side.”

Ahriman put aside his anger at Phosis T’kar’s brusqueness and followed him to where Magnus stood at the end of the widest causeway.

“Where is the Wolf King?” asked Lemuel.

Phosis T’kar looked down at the man with disdain.

“Answer him,” said Ahriman.

“We don’t know for sure,” said Phosis T’kar, “but he is on his way, thatwe do know.”

Magnus turned at their approach, and Ahriman felt the force of the primarch’s anger. His flesh seethed with life, pulsing red just beneath the skin, and his eye was a similarly belligerent hue. Magnus’ stature had always been one of variable proportions, but his rage had made him huge.

Ahriman felt Lemuel’s fear, but was surprised not to feel any from Mahavastu Kallimakus before realising that the man’s will was suppressed by a mental connection to the primarch.

“Who would have thought it would come to this?” said Magnus, and Ahriman put thoughts of the primarch’s scribe from his mind.

“Come to what?” asked Magnus. “What is going on?”

“That,” said Phosis T’kar, pointing down the length of the causeway.

A wedge of Space Wolves massed at the end of the causeway, led by a warrior in a leather mask whose eyes were chips of cold, merciless flint. Their blades were bared, and a pack of slavering wolves hauled on thick chains, desperate to rend and tear.

“Amlodhi Skarssen?” said Ahriman. “I don’t understand. Are they attacking us? Why?”

“No time to explain,” said Phosis T’kar. “Here they come!”

THE CHARGE OF the Space Wolves was a thing of great and terrible beauty.

They advanced in a great wave of clashing armoured plates, beating shields and waxed beards. They did not run, but came on in a loping jog, their feral grins, exposed fangs and lack of haste speaking of brutal confidence in their abilities.

These warriors didn’t need speed to break through their enemies.

Their skill at arms would be enough.

Ahriman’s horror mounted with every stride the Space Wolves took towards the Thousand Sons. How had these warriors, so recently their allies, become their enemies? The chains holding the snarling wolves were let slip and the monstrous beasts sprinted along the causeway.

Phosis T’kar took up position in the centre of the Thousand Sons line. His fellow warriors of the Raptora cult knelt to either side of him.

“Kine shields,” ordered Phosis T’kar, extending his hands before him. The air before them hazed as the force shields rippled to life.

“Give those wolves something to think about,” said Hathor Maat, as his Pavoni conjured writhing electrical storms in the path of the bounding wolves. Hastar took up position beside Hathor Maat, his gauntlets crackling with potent lightning.

“There is to be no killing, my sons,” said Magnus. “We will have no blood on our hands from a fight that is not of our making.”

The crackling webs of lightning paled as Hathor Maat diminished their power, though Ahriman felt his reluctance.

“My lord?” begged Ahriman. “Why is this happening?”

“I secured the Great Library with the Scarab Occult,” said Magnus, “but Skarssen’s Great Company arrived right on our heels. They sought to destroy the library. I stopped them.”

Ahriman had the sickening feeling of events spiralling beyond control. Pride, ego and the primal urge for war had collided, and such blinding drives almost always had to run their devastating course before they could be halted.

The charge of the Space Wolves was an unstoppable, elemental power.

The Thousand Sons were an implacable and immovable bulwark.

What force in the galaxy could yoke these unleashed forces?

THE BOUNDING WOLVES were the first to feel the fury of the Thousand Sons. They bounded into the flickering web of lightning and their fur instantly caught alight. Howls of agony echoed from the mountainside as fur was seared from their backs. The wolves snapped and rolled in their frenzy to douse the flames. Two fell from the causeway, fiery comets streaking to their deaths far below. Others fled, while a hardy few pushed onwards.

None survived to reach the Thousand Sons.

The Space Wolves jogged through the wall of aetheric fire, their armour hissing and blackening, but keeping them safe from harm. Wolf-painted shields locked together, and swords the colour of ice slid between them. The cries of the beasts had died, replaced with a furious, ululating howl torn from the throats of Amlodhi Skarssen’s warriors.

Ten metres separated the two forces.

“Push them back!” ordered Magnus.

Phosis T’kar nodded, and the warriors of the 2nd Fellowship marched onto the causeway, kine shields matched against physical ones.

“We have to stop this!” cried Ahriman. “This is madness.”

Magnus turned his gaze upon him, and his primarch’s towering fury coalesced around him, a crushing rage as primal as anything felt by a Space Wolf.

“We did not start this fight, Ahzek,” said Magnus, “but if need be we will finish it.”

“Please, my lord!” begged Ahriman. “If we take arms against the Wolf King’s warriors, he will never forgive us.”

“I do not need his forgiveness,” snapped Magnus, “but I will have his damned respect!”

“This is not the way to get it, my lord. We both know it. The Wolf King never forgets and never forgives. Kill even one of his warriors and he will forever hold you accountable.”

“It is too late, Ahzek,” said Magnus, his voice haunted by some nameless fear. “It has already begun.”

The shields of the Thousand Sons clashed with those of Amlodhi Skarssen’s Space Wolves with a discordant squealing, scraping sound of invisible force meeting ice-forged steel. Space Wolves and Thousand Sons bent their backs to push one another back, a battle of strength against will.

No guns were drawn, as though both forces realised that this struggle needed to be settled with each warrior looking his foe squarely in the eye. They locked together, unmoving and as rigid as carved Astartes in a triumphal battle fresco, but it was a deadlock that couldn’t last.

Slowly, metre by metre, the Thousand Sons were being forced back.

“Hathor Maat!” ordered Magnus. “Take them down!”

The captain of the 3rd Fellowship hammered a fist into his chest and directed his ferocious will to aiding his battle-brothers. Hastar stood next to him as his fellow warriors of the Pavoni unleashed the full force of their bio-manipulation.

Unseen currents of aetheric energy sliced into the Space Wolves, blocking neural transmitters, redirecting electrical impulses in the brain and rapidly deoxygenating the blood flowing from their lungs. The effect was instantaneous.

The Space Wolves’ push faltered as their bodies rebelled. Limbs spasmed, heart muscles fibrillated and warriors lost all physical autonomy, jerking like the maddened dolls of a demented puppeteer. Ahriman watched as Amlodhi Skarssen dropped to one knee, his shield falling from nerveless fingers as his body refused to answer his demands.

The Wolf Lord’s teeth gnashed together, bloody foam spilling from the mouthpiece of his mask. Space Wolves thrashed in bone-cracking agony as their nervous systems were flooded with conflicting neural impulses. Ahriman despaired of the relish Hathor Maat took in this wanton display of power. The Pavoni had a reputation for venality and spite, but this was sickening.

“Stop this!” cried Ahriman, unable to contain his wrath. He ran forward and gripped Hathor Maat’s arm, twisting him around to face him. “Enough! You are killing them!”

Ahriman sent a blast of white noise into Hathor Maat’s aura, and the captain of the 3rd Fellowship flinched.

“What are you doing?” demanded Hathor Maat.

“Stopping this,” said Ahriman. “Release them.”

Hathor Maat stared at him, and then glanced at Magnus. Ahriman leaned in and gripped him by the edge of his pauldrons.

“Do it!” shouted Ahriman. “Stop it now!”

“It’s done,” snapped Hathor Maat, pushing Ahriman away.

Ahriman turned back to the Space Wolves, letting out a shuddering breath as the energies of the Pavoni diminished. The grey-armoured warriors lay on the causeway, their charge broken, their impetus lost. Amlodhi Skarssen struggled to his feet, battling against rogue impulses tearing through his body. Skarssen’s eyes were filled with blood, and his entire body shook with the effort of standing before his enemies.

“I… Know… You,” hissed Skarssen, fighting for every word. “All… Of… You.”

“I told you to stop this!” cried Ahriman, rounding on Hathor Maat.

“And so I did,” protested Hathor Maat. “I swear.”

Ahriman felt a ferocious surge of power beside him and saw Hastar shaking as hard as Amlodhi Skarssen. Ahriman reached into his aura and felt a hot pulse of terror mixed with aberrant energies.

With a sickening sense of horrified recognition, he understood what was happening.

Hathor Maat saw it at the same time, and they barrelled into Hastar, knocking him to the ground as he began thrashing in the grip of a violent seizure.

“Hold him down!” shouted Ahriman, tearing at the pressure seals of Hastar’s gorget.

“Please, no,” begged Hathor Maat. “Hold on, Hastar! Fight it!”

Ahriman tore off the warrior’s helmet and threw it aside, looking down at something he had hoped and thought never to see again.

Hastar’s flesh seethed with ambition, writhing and twisting in unnatural ways, the meat and bone of his skull bulging with fluid growth. The warrior’s eyes were terrified, uncomprehending orbs filled with red light, like coals from a smouldering forge.

“Help me,” gasped Hastar.

“Flesh-change!” shouted Ahriman.

He fought to hold Hastar’s body down, but the changes wracking his body were as apocalyptic as they were catastrophic. His armour buckled as the body beneath it expanded so furiously and violently that the breastplate cracked down its centreline, the flesh beneath alive with change. Energised veins of electricity threaded his pallid flesh, sheened with glittering hoar-light sweating from the agonised warrior’s suddenly malleable flesh.

Hastar screamed, and Ahriman’s grip slackened as the horror of Ohrmuzd’s death surged from the locked room of his memory. Hastar threw them off, his expanding body swollen with grotesquely misshapen musculature, encrusted growths, mutant appendages and slithering ropes of wet matter.

With the gurgle of wet meat and the crack of malformed bones, Hastar’s body was suddenly upright, though any semblance of limbs was impossible to pick out in his erupting flesh. Swelling bulk and crackling energy patterns writhed across his flesh, and his screams turned to bubbling gibbers of maniacal laughter.

“Kill it!” shouted a voice, but Ahriman couldn’t tell whose.

“No!” he shouted, though he knew it was futile. “It’s still Hastar. He’s one of us!”

The Thousand Sons scattered from Hastar’s terrible new form, horrified and terrified in equal measure. This was their greatest fear returned to haunt them, a horror from their past long thought buried.

Unchained energies whipped from Hastar’s appendages, his torso and legs fused in a rippling trunk of glowing, protean flesh. Frills of half-formed membranes flapped in unseen winds, and a hateful laughter bubbled up from vestigial mouths that erupted all across his flesh. Hundreds of distended eyes, compound like an insect’s, slitted like a reptile’s or milky with multiple pupils boiled to life and popped with wet slurps every second. No part of the creature’s anatomy was fixed for more than a moment.

A dreadful, wracking sickness seized Ahriman, as though his innards were rebelling against their fixed shapes, his entire body trembling with desire for a new form.

“No!” cried Ahriman through gritted teeth. “Not again… I will not… succumb! I am Astartes, a loyal servant of the Supreme Master of Mankind. I will not fall.”

All around him, the Thousand Sons were on their knees or backs, fighting the virulent power of transformation as it spread from Hastar with the speed of the Life-Eater virus. Unless this power was dispelled, they would all fall prey to the spontaneous mutations that had once nearly ended their Legion.

“I survived before,” snarled Ahriman, clenching his fists. “I will survive again.”

Determination gave him strength, and he flexed his mind into the Enumerations, distancing himself from the pain and his trembling flesh. With every sphere he attained, his mastery of his corporeal form increased until he could open his eyes once more.

His every muscle ached, but he was still Ahzek Ahriman, of sound mind and body. He glanced over his shoulder, seeing the Space Wolves coming to their senses on the causeway. Either they were beyond the reach of these transformative energies or they were immune to its effects. The damage the Pavoni had wreaked upon their nervous systems was coming undone, and Amlodhi Skarssen took faltering steps towards the Thousand Sons, his axe unsheathed.

A surging wave of power erupted behind Ahriman and he rolled onto his side in time to see Magnus the Red step towards the hideously transformed Hastar. Unchecked energy had destroyed the warrior of the Pavoni, but it empowered Magnus. The creature Hastar had become reached out to Magnus, as though to embrace him, and the primarch opened his arms to receive him with forgiveness and mercy.

A thunderous bang sounded and Hastar’s body exploded as a single, explosive round detonated within his chest. Silence descended, and Ahriman distinctly heard the heavy tinkof a monstrous brass casing striking the ground.

Ahriman followed the trajectory the shell had taken, tracing a smoking line back to a giant pistol gripped in the fist of a towering giant clad in grey ceramite and thick wolf pelts.

The Wolf King had come.

A faded poem, last read in a dusty archive in the Merican dustbowl, leapt unbidden to Ahriman’s mind. Supposedly transcribed from a commemorative monument, it marked the beginning of an ancient and awesomely destructive war:

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,

Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled;

Here once the embattled farmers stood,

And fired the shot heard ’round the world.

SURROUNDED BY A pack of fur– and armour-clad warriors, bearing great axes and bloodied harpoon-like spears, Leman Russ approached the Great Library of Phoenix Crag. Though Ahriman had seen the Wolf King before, Leman Russ at war was an entirely different proposition to Leman Russ at peace. One was brutally fearsome and intimidating, and the other utterly terrifying, an avatar of destruction as monstrous as the bloodiest culture’s renditions of their gods of murder, war and death combined.

A living engine of destruction, Ahriman saw Russ clearly for what he was: pure force and will alloyed into a living weapon that could be aimed and loosed, but never called back.

The Wolf King reached the end of the causeway, and Ahriman saw Ohthere Wyrdmake at his side, the Rune Priest’s expression impossible to read. Together with his enormous wolves, Leman Russ marched towards the Thousand Sons. Ahriman expected the Wolf King to charge wildly towards them, to confirm every negative caricature his detractors painted, but he came slowly, with infinite patience and infinite fury.

His packwarriors awaited his return, aching to do harm.

All Ahriman could hear was the footsteps of Russ as he marched across the causeway. His stride was sure and measured, his expression set in stone. His frost-shimmer blade leapt to his hand, a weapon to cleave mountains. Magnus went to meet him, his curved golden sword bound with the power of the sun: Two war gods marching to battle, the souls of their Legions carried with them.

Ahriman wanted to say something, to halt this inexorable confrontation, but the sight of the two primarchs drawing together with murder in their hearts robbed him of speech.

Before either one could speak, a blistering sheet of light flashed into existence between them, a coruscating fire that shimmered with the light of the brightest star. Impossible images were thrown out by the light, faraway places and the bitter tang of incense, burned plastic and reeking generators that thrummed with power.

A hard bang of displaced air boomed from the mountainside, and the light was gone.

A broad-shouldered giant in battle armour of granite grey with skin of gleaming gold stood in its place.

“The Urizen,” whispered Ahriman.

“THIS ENDS NOW,” said the golden-skinned warrior.

He stood between Magnus and Russ like the arbiter of a fistfight. Ahriman’s previous impression of Lorgar was utterly dispelled as he looked upon the soulful features of the Word Bearers’ Primarch. His eyes were kohl-rimmed and filled with infinite sadness, as though he bore the burden of a sorrowful secret that he could never, ever, share.

Lorgar’s armour was dark, the colour of stone that has lain beneath the ocean for aeons, its every perfectly-nuanced plate worked with cuneiform inscriptions taken from the ancient books of Colchis. One shoulder-guard bore a heavy tome, its pages yellowed with age, fluttering in the disturbed air of his teleportation.

A cloak of deepest burgundy hung from his shoulders, and though he appeared unarmed, a primarch was never really without weapons.

Ahriman heard every word that passed between the three primarchs, each indelibly carved on his mind for all time. Their import would haunt him for the rest of his span.

“Get out of the way, Lorgar,” snarled Leman Russ, his veneer of apparent calm slipping for a moment. “This does not concern you.”

“Two of my brothers about to draw each other’s blood?” said Lorgar. “That concerns me.”

“Get out of my way,” repeated Russ, his fingers flexing on the hide-wound grip of his sword. “Or so help me—”

“What? You will cut me down too?”

Russ hesitated, and Lorgar stepped towards him.

“Please, brother, think of what you are doing,” he said. “Think of all the bonds of love and friendship that will be lost if you continue down this path to bloodshed.”

“The Cyclops has gone too far, Lorgar. He has spilled our blood and must pay.”

“BLOOD SPILLED THROUGH misunderstanding,” said Lorgar. “You must calm your fury, brother. Anger is no one’s friend when hard choices must be made. Let it cloud your mind and all you will have when it is gone are regrets. Remember Dulan?”

“Aye,” said Russ, and his thunderous expression mellowed. “The war with the Lion.”

“You brawled with Jonson in the throne room of the fallen Tyrant, and yet now you are oath-sworn brothers-in-arms. This is no different.”

Magnus was saying nothing, and Ahriman held his breath. Two such mighty beings facing one another with their aggression simmering so close to the surface was the most dangerous thing he had ever seen.

“Should we do something?” hissed Phosis T’kar, looking to Ahriman for guidance.

“Not if you want to live,” said Ahriman.

Titanic energies were bound within the immortal flesh of these warriors, and the tension crackling between them was razor-taut. Ahriman could feel their awesome psychic presences pressing against the lid of his skull, but dared not open his senses.

“You would stand with the Cyclops, Lorgar?” said Russ. “A wielder of unclean magicks? Look at the corpse of that… thing over there, the one with my bullet in its heart. Look at that and tell me I’m wrong.”

“An instability of gene-seed is no reason for two brothers to go to war,” cautioned Lorgar.

“That is more than just unstable gene-seed, it is sorcery. You know it as well as I. We all knew Magnus was mired in the black arts, but we turned a blind eye to it because he was our brother. Well, no more, Lorgar, no more. Every warrior of that Legion is tainted, wielders of spellcraft and necromancy.”

“Necromancy?” scoffed Magnus. “You know nothing.”

“I know enough,” spat Russ. “You have gone too far, Magnus. This is where it ends.”

Lorgar placed a golden hand upon his breastplate and said, “All the Legions wield such power, brother. Are your Rune Priests so different?”

Russ threw back his head and laughed, a booming roar of great mirth and riotous amusement.

“You would compare the Sons of the Storm with these warlocks?” he asked. “Our power is born in the thunder of Fenris and tempered in the heart of the world forge. It comes from the strength of the natural world and is shaped by the courage of our warrior souls. It is untainted by the corruption that befouls the Thousand Sons.”

Now it was Magnus’ turn to laugh.

“If you believe that, then you are a fool!” he said.

“Magnus! Enough!” barked Lorgar. “This is not the rime for such debate. Two of my dearest brothers are at each other’s throats, and it grieves me to know how this shall disappoint our father. Is this what he created us for? Is this why he scoured the heavens looking for us? So we could descend into petty bickering like mortals? We have greater destinies before us, and must be above such lesser concerns. We are our father’s avatars of conquest, fiery comets of righteousness set loose to illuminate the cosmos with his glory. We are his emissaries sent out into the galaxy to bear word of his coming. We must be bright, shining examples of all that is good and pure in the Imperium.”

Lorgar’s words reached out to all who heard them, the fundamental truth they contained like a soothing balm. Ahriman was ashamed they had allowed things to spin so violently out of control, seeing the true horror of this situation.

Brother against brother. Could there be anything worse?

The golden primarch seemed to shine with inner light, his skin radiant and beatific as he spoke. Hearts once raging were now calmed. The Space Wolves lowered their blades a fraction, and the Thousand Sons’ defensive posture relaxed in response.

“I will not stand by and let him destroy this world,” said Magnus, lowering his khopesh.

“It is not yours to save,” snapped Russ. “My Legion discovered this world. It is mine to do with as I see fit. Its people had a choice: join us and live, fight us and die. They chose to die.”

“Not everything is so black and white, Russ,” retorted Magnus. “If we destroy everything we encounter, what is the point of this crusade?”

“The point is to win it. Once it is over, we will deal with what is left.”

Magnus shook his head, saying, “What is left will be in ruins.”

Leman Russ lowered the ice-limned blade of his sword, his killing fury stilled for now.

“I can live with that,” he said, and without another word, marched from the causeway.

When he reached its end, he turned to face Magnus once more.

“This is not over,” he promised. “Blood of Fenris is on your hands, and there will be a reckoning between us, Magnus. This I swear upon the blade of Mjalnar.”

The Wolf King slashed the blade across his palm, letting brilliant scarlet droplets of blood spill out onto the cracked ground. He threw back his head and howled, and his warriors added their voices to their master’s cry until it seemed the whole mountain was howling.

The mournful cry rose to its tallest spires and echoed in its deepest valleys, a lament for the dead and a grim warning of things to come.