Текст книги "Vulkan Lives"

Автор книги: Ник Кайм

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Текущая страница: 7 (всего у книги 23 страниц)

CHAPTER EIGHT

Shattered

‘When brother fights brother, it is called rivalry. When brother kills brother, it is called succession.’

– Valdrekk Elias

Eighteen dead bodies cluttered the street below.

Fifteen of those bodies were Traoran, and were wearing black and red robes over their urban attire. Narek barely noticed them, but the three warriors clad in power armour that joined the cultists in death sent a tremor of consternation across his jawline.

The quiet hunt was over. Despite Narek’s misgivings, Elias had gathered his dogs from sects around the city and unleashed them without thought or knowledge of what fate he had consigned them to. Cultists were everywhere within Ranos. They had paved the way for the Legion’s arrival, softened the prey before the kill. It was a task well suited to their limited talents.

Against legionaries, however, they had come up drastically short.

One of the humans had tripped a hidden wire alarm, unleashing a chain of explosives embedded in the road. Flash bangs went off simultaneously, filling the narrow street that was crowded by buildings either side with light and smoke. A secondary group of incendiaries went live three seconds later, front and back of the patrol, effectively bracketing them into a kill box. In the last short minute that remained of their lives, the cultists panicked and the legionaries fell back on training, forming a defensive perimeter in the middle of the street. The saboteurs had factored this reaction into their trap as a pair of auto-slaved sentries cycled up.

Muzzle flash had cut into the smoke as heavy fire chugged relentlessly from the pair of Tarantula mounts secreted at either end of the street. The concealment of the guns was effective, as was the entire trap. Even Narek hadn’t seen the wire or the sentries and wondered privately if he was actually losing his edge.

Disorientated, some of their dead already lying broken before them, the cultists were ripped apart in seconds. Narek’s brothers didn’t last much longer. Power armour was staunch protection but even it couldn’t hold up against enfilading fire at close range from a pair of autocannons.

The end result was bloody and quick.

Narek and Dagon survived by virtue of the fact that they were above the metal storm, maintaining overwatch from a rooftop. Narek had been about to make contact with his brothers when the trap was sprung and death was unleashed.

As he looked down on the carnage, Narek scowled.

‘Beliah, Zephial, Namaah, all dead. Haruk also. Tell me, brother,’ he said, turning to Dagon, who had just returned from street level, ‘who must I kill to avenge them?’

‘The trap was good,’ Dagon replied. ‘Very good. Even on the ground, I would have had difficulty seeing the wire.’

‘Frag-belt?’ asked Narek.

Dagon nodded. ‘And some heavier explosives too. Armour-breaking.’

That would be the secondary burst they had seen and felt from the rooftop.

‘Naturally. And the sentry guns?’

The two tripod-mounted Tarantulas were spewing smoke. Tiny sparks erupted sporadically around the gimbal joint that linked the tripod mount to the gun stock. Narek had disabled them, but not before they had shredded Beliah, Zephial and Namaah.

‘Slaved to an automatic firing routine, based on motion detection,’ said Dagon.

‘So they had no intention of staying to watch the bloodshed.’

‘No, but I found this.’

In Dagon’s open palm was a small metallic device. It was disc-shaped and a red light in its centre winked rapidly.

A sensor.

Narek took it, examining the device in his hand.

‘They might be few but they are certainly well equipped.’ He glanced back down at the street. ‘And have a talent for disruption.’

‘Saboteurs?’ Dagon asked.

‘Definitely. The broken Legions have turned to guerrilla tactics to prosecute their war.’

‘They might just be a vanguard. How can you be certain?’

Narek’s eyes returned to regard the sensor.

‘Because it’s what I’d do.’ He paused, turning the sensor disc over in his hand as if scrutinising it would reveal his enemy’s secrets. Narek surveyed the urban skyline, paying close attention to the nearest buildings.

‘What is it?’ asked Dagon.

Narek’s gaze lingered on the shadow of a cooling tower in the distance.

‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Watch the street, I have to tell Elias what we’ve found.’

Dagon nodded and headed back down.

When he was alone again, Narek activated the warp-flask. After a few seconds, Elias’s warp-form materialised. He was cleansing his ritual knife, preparing it for the next kill.

‘ You interrupt me with good news, I hope. Sacrificing an entire city is painstaking and I have a lot of work to do yet before we’re done.’

‘Your reinforcements are all dead.’

‘ A little profligate, don’t you think? Those were the only warriors close to your location.’

‘It wasn’t my decision to send them.’

Elias’s tone grew suddenly barbed. ‘Remember who you’re talking to, Narek.’

A vein in the hunter’s neck throbbed but he held back his anger.

‘You are my master, Dark Apostle.’

‘ I gave you purpose, huntsman. Don’t forget that.’

‘It is a worthy one. I will not.’

‘ What of the cults? They should have risen up by now. Use them. The city is in my thrall.’

‘The mortals are dead too.’

Elias looked displeased, but kept his agitation checked.

‘ What happened? I thought you were just tracking the human.’

‘We were. But that “someone else” I mentioned decided to get in our way.’ His gaze went back to the cooling tower. ‘One of your worshippers sprung a trap our enemy had laid for us. They’re of the Legions.’

‘ You’re certain of it?’

‘Yes.’

‘ You’ve seen them?’

‘No, but every sign points to our former cousins. No human kills Beliah, Zephial and Namaah like that. It just doesn’t happen. Not to them. Even I didn’t see the tripwire.’

Elias sneered. ‘ You’re losing your edge.’

‘That is possible, I suppose.’

‘ There are no Legion forces concentrated in this region of space. It’s precisely why Lord Erebus sent us here. We were supposed to be undisturbed. Who are they?’

‘Remnants, I think. Survivors banded together and performing their own operations.’

‘ Dregs from Isstvan?’ Elias sounded nonplussed.

‘I believe so, yes. I want to take a closer look to be sure.’

Elias paused, as if weighing up the import of that.

‘Nothing can prevent what we’re doing here, Narek. The outcome of the war could hinge on the cosmological shift we effect here.’

‘It’s fortunate that I am not empty-handed, then.’

‘ You have what they took from the catacombs?’

Narek held it up in his other hand.

‘It’s a spear. At least the tip of one.’

Elias’s eyes seemed to brighten. ‘ Sharpen ours, blunt theirs…’

Narek frowned, confused.

‘ Bring it to me at the ritual site,’ said Elias. ‘ The rest of our brethren are returning with fresh mortals to blood, and I would examine it before they arrive.’

‘What should I do about the Legionary infiltrators? They still have the human we were tracking.’

‘ They are of no consequence for the moment. Bring me the weapon, Narek. We will run down these broken wretches later.’ Elias smiled with self-indulgent malice. ‘ We will make them wish they had died on the plains of Isstvan with the rest of their kin.’

‘Of course.’ Narek was about to sever their connection when Elias interrupted him.

‘ What’s it like?’ he asked.

Narek turned the spear over in his hand. It was short, the spearhead not much larger than a combat knife in terms of its length and width, with a broken shaft that was roughly half that. To look upon it, it was unremarkable, a perfect mineral fossil fashioned into a single spear-like fork. Grey, almost metallically smooth, with a sharp edge. But when Narek held it, he could feel the thrum of power contained within and see the flash of energy coursing continually along its length as the light touched it.

‘Godlike…’

Communion ended and Narek was left alone with his thoughts. It did not anger him that three of his brothers were lying dead in the street below him; to call it anger was too simple a word for his emotional state at that moment. Even the death of Haruk, who he despised personally, required response. It was more like an itch, a sense of something unfinished, an imbalance to redress.

He decided he would not return with the spear straight away. It went against orders, but it was duty that motivated Narek, not the whims of the Dark Apostle. First and foremost, he owed something to his brothers. Besides, he wanted to see the face of his enemy.

Unsheathing his gladius and putting the spear in the empty scabbard, Narek opened a vox-feed to Dagon.

‘I tire of this rooftop, brother.’

‘ What do you suggest?’

‘Beliah, Zephial, Namaah and Haruk are slain. We should honour the dead.’

‘ I’m listening.’

‘Let’s go hunting.’

Numeon looked unimpressed.

‘Is that name supposed to mean something to me?’

‘No, it isn’t,’ said Grammaticus. ‘Not to you. But what I am doing here should.’

‘And what is that, exactly?’

‘I think I know why the Word Bearers are here, and why you’re here too.’

Domadus twitched, his hand straying to a bolt pistol holstered next to his right hip before a shake of Numeon’s head stood him down.

‘Keep talking,’ said the Salamander.

‘Are we in danger here?’ Grammaticus asked. ‘Your… friendseemed agitated when he left.’

‘Immense danger, but I told you to keep talking,’ said Numeon. ‘What do you know?’

Grammaticus dragged his attention back, trying not to imagine what could present immense danger to a Space Marine, and said, ‘I think they are defiling this place. I think the Emperor came here long ago, and they are tainting that with their craft.’

Numeon came closer, until Grammaticus could smell the ash on his breath.

‘And what craftis that, John Grammaticus?’

‘Am I right?’

Numeon narrowed his eyes. ‘What craft?’

‘You know of what I speak. You want to stop them, don’t you? You are no longer Legion, that much is obvious from your battered weapons and armour. I doubt there are more than twenty of you. I saw your landers. How many can they carry? Enough for a ground war?’

‘Ninety men at capacity,’ Numeon replied, ‘but their holds were sparsely occupied when we made planetfall, you’re right about that.’

Numeon stooped to grab the scrap of parchment still wedged underneath the chair leg.

‘We are here to disrupt their efforts but have no plans to fight a war.’ He showed Grammaticus the paper. It was a propaganda poster, one denouncing the rule of the Imperium and citing Horus as the true Emperor of the galaxy. ‘Rebellion was festering here long before the Word Bearers came. We must prevent them from tainting it further.’

So Traoris was in the thrall of the enemy. But revolt was very different to willing service to the Primordial Annihilator. Grammaticus imagined secret cults, formed over years of Imperial rule, slowly chipping away at the foundations of society, and their sudden and terrifying rise when Horus defied his father’s will and embraced an old evil.

‘Rebellion is one thing,’ said Numeon. ‘Conversion to the dark power Horus now serves is another. I don’t understand it fully but I have seen some of what it can do. Turn men into monsters, and twist once noble hearts to baser instincts. Every world liberated during the Great Crusade is facing a battle for its soul. Traoris teeters on the brink of an abyss. I am here to ensure it doesn’t fall in.’

‘That seems a difficult aspiration.’

‘And yet, here we are.’

Grammaticus was emphatic. ‘I needthat spear.’

‘Even if I wanted to, there’s no going back for it now.’

‘Have you considered that you could serve a greater purpose?’

‘And help you?’

‘Yes.’

‘And why, John Grammaticus, would I do that?’

‘Because what I’m doing here concerns your primarch.’

‘What did you just say?’ Numeon’s eyes narrowed.

‘Vulkan.’

The Salamander bunched his fists. ‘I know the name of my primarch. Explain yourself.’

‘The spear I found is not a spear as such. It’s a fulgurite, a fork of lightning crystallised in rock.’

‘I also know what a fulgurite is,’ said Numeon. ‘Tell me now what this has to do with Vulkan.’

Grammaticus licked his lips. ‘Do you believe that your primarch is dead?’

Numeon did not hesitate. Something akin to hope flickered in his eyes. ‘No.’

‘He lives, Numeon. Vulkan lives.’

‘How do you know this? Where is your proof?’

‘You said you believed he was alive.’

Numeon’s patience was ebbing and he snarled, ‘There is a difference between belief and fact. Why would you say this if you have no evidence?’

‘Because it is true, and because I am giving you my word.’

‘Which is worth what?’

Grammaticus held up his hand, as if surrendering.

‘Please. You asked for the truth and I am giving it to you.’

‘You would say anything to save yourself.’

‘True, but I am not lying to you. Have your psyker scry me again if you like – you will see I don’t speak falsely.’

Numeon looked like he was considering that, when he asked, ‘What does this spear have to do with Vulkan?’

‘I honestly don’t know. It is tied to his fate somehow. I was merely tasked with coming here to retrieve it.’

That was a lie; at least part of it was, but Grammaticus knew his masters had given him all he needed to shield his mind.

Numeon frowned. ‘Tasked by whom?’

‘It’s difficult to explain.’

Domadus’s vox crackled and Grammaticus caught the murmured intonation of a voice on the other end of it.

‘Try,’ said Numeon and was about to say more when Domadus approached him.

‘Pergellen is back with Shen’ra and wants to see you.’

Numeon nodded in return. ‘Say nothingof this to anyone else.’

Domadus nodded. ‘And what of him?’ he asked, drawing a short-bladed sword from his belt. Grammaticus didn’t like the cold look in the Iron Hand’s eye. ‘I could silence him now. It would end his seditious talk. He also knows our whereabouts, some of our strength.’

‘I’m not sure yet if it is seditious…’ Numeon paused, thinking. ‘Besides, he knows nothing, not about us anyway.’

‘He would complicate our mission,’ said Domadus.

‘It’s a risk I’m prepared to take. He knows something, Domadus. I want to know it too.’ He turned towards the Raven Guard.

‘I will watch him,’ said Hriak, unfolding his arms slowly like he was unfurling his wings.

‘Domadus,’ Numeon added.

‘No one gets in or out unless it’s with your say so.’

‘No, I was going to say, don’t let Hriak hollow the human out. I want his mind intact for questioning later.’

‘You wound me deeply,’ uttered the Raven Guard.

Numeon frowned. ‘Was that sarcasm, Hriak? You sounded almost as warm as Domadus.’

The Iron Hand laughed loudly and stepped aside.

Numeon nodded to them both, turned his back and left the room.

‘I felt safer when I was on my own,’ Grammaticus said with half-hearted humour, glancing from the stoic figure of the Iron Hand to the menacing spectre of the Raven Guard.

Hriak didn’t share Sebaton’s humour and glared back at him through the slits of his battle-helm.

‘You were,’ he rasped.

After a short walk through an access corridor and the old manufactorum bunk room, Numeon arrived at the printer’s abandoned refectorum. It was a largely barren space, tiled grey underfoot and with a few benches and tables upturned at the room’s edges. A short skirmish had unfolded here, the loyal citizens of Ranos ultimately on the losing side. Amidst the spilt food stains, there were also patches of blood.

In the middle of it all, waiting for the Salamander, stood Pergellen.

The Iron Hand was lean-faced, his eyes concealed behind a steel visor with a single retinal band across its surface. The lights were out in the refectorum, making the visor glow lambently in the darkness. Pergellen’s only other bionic was his left hand, which ground noisily as he used it to grip Numeon’s wrist. His hair was black like jet, and cut close to his scalp in the same manner as his deceased lord and father’s had been.

Over his shoulder on a strap Pergellen had a long-barrelled sniper rifle. It was his deadly aim that had killed the Word Bearer in the warehouse, although from such close range that wasn’t exactly a challenge. He’d wanted to use the warehouse as his nest from which to keep a lookout, but hopes for that were ruined as soon as the human had burst in.

‘You looked troubled, Artellus,’ he said to Numeon.

‘It’s nothing.’ Numeon smiled to cover the concern that had obviously crept over his face, and returned Pergellen’s grip in formal but comradely greeting. ‘I’m glad to see you back. Where’s Shen’ra?’

‘In the yard with the others,’ he said flatly.

Pergellen was a serious soul, rarely given to humour. But he had also saved Numeon’s and Leodrakk’s lives on the plains of Isstvan V. So few of the Morlocks had escaped, so very few of the Clan Avernii left to continue its great and noble legacy.

When the shells were falling and the full horror of the betrayal revealed, it was Pergellen who had fought his way back to the drop-ships when others were losing their minds at the death of Ferrus Manus. It was Pergellen who had dragged Domadus’s unconscious form across the black sand, and he who had kept open a path to the transport. Many didn’t make it.

He and Leodrakk would have died on that field were it not for Pergellen. Their brothers in the Pyre Guard might well all be dead, but Numeon clung to the hope that they were not, just as he believed that Vulkan, too, still lived.

If what the human had said was the truth, then perhaps… He dismissed the thought at once, knowing it was foolish to place his hope in such a man.

Instead he asked, ‘How many days were we on that drop-ship, Pergellen?’

It was often where their conversations went at some point.

‘Fifty-one days, eight hours and four minutes,’ the Iron Hand replied.

They had been a mess of disparate units and Legions back then. Not all had survived the escape. Some were simply too badly wounded or had been dead when they were dragged aboard. Of the forty-seven legionaries that took flight on that vessel, only twenty-six survived.

They lived long enough to be reunited with the Fire Ark, a strike cruiser that had escaped the carnage – one of the few. It had not done so unscathed. Many of the crew were killed during that desperate flight. Wounded, weary, they had levelled what guns they had on the drop-ship emerging from that self-same chaos, not realising they were friends, not foes.

There were no legionaries aboard, not one. Every single able-bodied warrior that could don war-plate had been sent to bring the disgraced Warmaster to heel. It was extravagant, Numeon realised in retrospect – a means of showing force to force and hoping the latter balked in the face of the former. How wrong they were. It didn’t seem like extravagance now; instead, it smacked of ignorant sacrifice. And how Horus had prepared his altar for their willing offering. The blades of his traitors were sharp indeed on that slab of Isstvan V.

Since finding the Fire Arkand the brave but depleted crew aboard, they had lost three more legionaries. Numeon had allied them together, given them back some semblance of purpose. But it did not come without risk, and a vein of fatalism was growing in this company. He had expected it of the Iron Hands, but they bore the loss of their primarch with a quiet and steely determination that did the Medusans much credit. No, it was the Nocturneans, the sons of Vulkan, that suffered most. Of all the Salamanders, only Numeon believed. In his heart, he knew that his father had survived. The rest, despite his impassioned arguments, were not so convinced, and fought for vengeance instead of hope and a desire to serve.

Numeon knew these men were broken. Bereft of leadership, they would have destroyed one another, and with no way to return to their Legions they were cut adrift and aimless.

Yes, Pergellen had saved his life, but Numeon had to believe he could save this shattered Legion too.

‘What did you learn?’ he asked the scout.

‘Nothing good. Shen’ra’s sensors were tripped by a small patrol. I shadowed it for a while before the sentries cut them all down. It will certainly alert the enemy to our presence here.’

‘We knew the Word Bearers would find us eventually. What else?’

‘In addition to their legionaries, which I believe are significant in number, they also have many cultists. Seeds were sown here long before we arrived on the Word Bearers’ heels. The cults control most of Ranos now, and more Stormbirds are coming in from other parts of the city to reinforce the legionaries already on the ground. They are mustering close to this district. Too many for us to engage.’

Numeon cursed under his breath, ‘ Vulkan’s merciful wrath…’ He did not want to abort the mission, but it wasn’t too late to signal to the Fire Arkwaiting in high orbit. If they moved now, they could reach the gunships and their cruiser, but what then?

‘There was something else, too,’ Pergellen said, arresting Numeon from his thoughts.

Numeon narrowed his eyes, ‘More good news?’

‘Someone was watching.’

‘They saw you?’

‘Not us. They were watching their allies get gunned down by the sentries.’

‘Friendlies?’

‘No, I don’t think so. They disabled the Tarantulas. Shen’ra and I left shortly after that. I think they may have caught our trail from the warehouse and followed us.’

‘So, in all likelihood, they are coming here.’

‘Yes.’

Numeon’s face darkened. They had spent some time choosing a secure location to act as a base of operations. This district was mostly deserted. The gunships were far away, well outside the habitable zone. It was believed that at the edge of the city they would remain largely unnoticed by the enemy until they chose to act. Much of their plan hinged upon this assumption.

‘Any sign of their cleric?’ Numeon asked.

Pergellen shook his head. ‘No.’

The Salamander grew stern. ‘We’ve seen this before, brother. We failed at Viralis…’ As he spoke the name of this world, an image of corpse-filled streets, bodies defiled and mutilated in service to dark powers, came back to him. The traitors had left something else behind, too. The few survivors had been greatly changed, human no longer. They had become… things.Monsters, sleeved in flesh, that had crawled into mortal vessels and hollowed them out from within. The people of Viralis, an entire colony, were people no longer. Something else had taken their place, wearing them as a man might wear a suit.

‘We were too late for them,’ Numeon said, grimly.

‘We are not too late for Traoris,’ said Pergellen. ‘The cleric will die, but without the element of surprise we will need to draw him out. We won’t fail, Numeon.’

‘Ever since Isstvan. Since Vulkan…’ Numeon faltered.

Pergellen gripped his shoulder.

‘You told me you believe he still lives, Numeon. Don’t abandon your faith in that belief.’

‘I haven’t, even if I am the only one. I wish bitterly, though, that there was some sign, anything to give us hope.’ Again, he reminded himself that he could not trust the prisoner. ‘I have never felt this before… this… doubtthat I feel now.’

‘I have lost my progenitor. His body lies headless amongst a field of our dead. Yougive me hope now. I follow you as my captain. You gave us all a purpose beyond vengeful fatalism. If you must believe in something, believe in that.’

Numeon smiled – wearily, but honestly. ‘I do. I hold to it. How many times I wished I had died on Isstvan Five with my brothers and instead ended up here, trying to make sense of this madness, trying to do something that still matters.’

‘ This, here, now – this matters.’

Numeon nodded, finding strength.

The Iron Hand released his grip as the need for it faded.

‘I assume we are not staying here,’ he said.

Numeon shook his head. ‘This place is compromised. We’re moving.’

‘Will you inform the Fire Ark?’

‘No. It’s possible atmospheric communication could be intercepted. Then the zealots really will know where to come and kill us.’

‘Then I’ll summon our quartermaster to come and break down our gear.’

‘Thank you, brother. Tell Domadus I’ll be in the vehicle yard.’

‘What’s to be done with the human?’

‘He comes with us. He’s keeping secrets.’

‘Couldn’t Hriak prise his mind open and wrench them out?’

Numeon shrugged. ‘If we wanted him dead, I dare say he could. He’s watching him now.’

‘And do we not? Want the human dead, I mean. He’s a liability and will slow us down.’

Numeon shook his head. ‘You are a cold breed, you Iron Hands.’

‘I saved your life, didn’t I?’

Now the Salamander laughed, though Pergellen wasn’t making a joke. ‘You did, yes. I want to speak to the human again. He knows something. Besides, the cleric wants him. We might be able to use that.’

‘So he’s not a prisoner at all then,’ said Pergellen, ‘he’s bait. And you say I’m cold.’

Numeon replied without humour. ‘I’m pragmatic, brother. And I will do anythingto kill this Word Bearer cleric.’

‘Even if it means our lives and the life of this man?’

‘Yes, even that. I would sacrifice all of it to stop them, to prevent another Viralis.’

‘And that, Artellus, is why I saved you.’

The two warriors parted, the Iron Hand headed for the printing works where they were holding the prisoner.

As Numeon returned to the vehicle yard, he tried to remain focused on his address to the other legionaries, but two words kept repeating in his mind. He barely dared to hope they were true. Vulkan lives.