More tales of the Tau Empire from Black Library

THE TRANZIA REBELLION
A Space Marines and Tau Empire audio drama

DAMOCLES
A Space Marine Battles book containing the novellas ‘Blood Oath’, ‘Broken Sword’, ‘Black Leviathan’ and ‘Hunter’s Snare’
Also available as an MP3 audio book from blacklibrary.com

THE SHAPE OF THE HUNT
A Space Marine Battles audio drama

THE KAUYON
A Tau Empire audio drama

SHADOWSUN: THE LAST OF KIRU’S LINE
A Tau Empire novella

FIRE CASTE
An Astra Militarum and Tau Empire novel

COURAGE AND HONOUR
An Ultramarines and Tau Empire novel

Visit blacklibrary.com for the full range of Tau Empire novels, novellas, audio dramas and Quick Reads, along with many other exclusive products

It is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die.

Yet even in his deathless state, the Emperor continues his eternal vigilance. Mighty battlefleets cross the daemon-infested miasma of the warp, the only route between distant stars, their way lit by the Astronomican, the psychic manifestation of the Emperor’s will. Vast armies give battle in His name on uncounted worlds. Greatest amongst his soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bioengineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Astra Militarum and countless planetary defence forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus to name only a few. But for all their multitudes, they are barely enough to hold off the ever-present threat from aliens, heretics, mutants – and worse.

To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruellest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting gods.

Cymbals and drums sounded tinny and distant in the thin, cold air as they welcomed him to the new world. Looking down from the top of the ramp, the shuttle’s only passenger seemed surprised to find any kind of welcoming committee, even one as small and dispirited as this one, awaiting him. High overhead, twin suns lit the scene with a fierce glare but little warmth; what little heat there was to be had was being ripped away by a chilling breeze filled with fine, irritating dust. Gentle ripples of rust-red sand marked the edge of the landing pad and marched off towards the foreshortened horizon with monotonous discipline. A small collection of domes, blocks and stubby towers in the mid-distance constituted the apparent entirety of Arkunasha’s one and only colony, the handful of off-white shapes looking lonely and isolated on the too-wide canvas of an empty world.

The newcomer was tall and broad-shouldered, and showed scarification, unusual in a society with the capacity to heal any such blemish at will. A warrior, clearly, past his first flush of youth but still vital. There was a penetrating look to his dark eyes as he squinted through the glare and stinging dust at the welcoming party, wishing he had accepted a filter plug for his nasal slit when the shuttle pilot had offered him one. He beheld the tall, serene-looking profile of the colony leader and the squat shape of the chief engineer among a handful of others at the bottom of the ramp. One of the cymbal players, a wiry-looking fellow with blue facial markings, broke away from the small crowd and hurried upwards.

‘Please to be meeting with the exalted prince, great warrior, I, unworthy associate, will conduct you hence if willing?’

‘Of course, I…’ But the low ranking associate was already backing away and gesturing as if to draw the warrior forward on invisible strings. The bemused warrior followed him, his armoured toe-hooves clacking down the ramp and onto the first true ground he’d touched in weeks of travel.

‘To make introductions,’ the associate said, gesturing to the broad-shouldered warrior and the colony leader in turn. ‘This great warrior is Shas’o Vior’la Kais Mont’yr. This exalted prince is Aun’o T’au Vasoy Ty’asla.’

The warrior knelt before the stately aun’o and bowed his head before rising and addressing him.

‘Aun’o, I am flattered that you came to meet me but I would not have discomforted you so.’

The aun’o’s face was thin and high boned, virtually a T-shape with a narrow slit of a mouth at the bottom that radiated faint but constant disapproval. The aun’o’s mark of celestial devotion gleamed from the top of his nasal slit like a third eye. When he spoke his voice seemed dull and flat, a disinterested burr.

‘Nonsense, shas’o, it was only seeming for me to be present in order to make acquaintance and welcome you to Arkunasha at the first moment of your arrival.’

The associate cleared his throat and rattled his cymbals quietly before speaking again.

‘Also, great and exalted ones, here is honoured trustee fio’ui Ke’lshan.’ The portly engineer nodded stiffly to the warrior, who saluted him in return.

‘We shall have much to discuss, fio’ui,’ the warrior said politely, ‘and I hope we can work closely together for the protection of the colony.’

The flat-faced engineer gave a non-committal grunt at the prospect, eliciting the shadow of a frown on the warrior’s face. The associate smoothly broke into the moment of silence that followed.

‘Please to be moving to the concourse area where refreshments are now being served.’ Taking their cue the drums and cymbals rattled again as the water caste members began leading the way towards a torus–shaped structure nearby. The warrior refused to be immediately drawn after them, addressing a question to the associate.

‘And where are the warriors I am to command? I am surprised to find that they have left greetings, welcome as they are, to others, while absenting themselves.’

The aun’o answered directly, cutting across the associate’s platitudes even as they began.

‘The shas’la are sulking in their barracks after being refused permission to bring weapons along to a greeting. They declared that they would rather go naked than suffer the shame of being disarmed at the first encounter with their shas’o! This, on a world completely empty of any other living beings save for ourselves. Just whom do they propose to shoot, I wonder?’ The aun’o tittered briefly at the thought, before subsiding into an indulgent clucking. The frown returned to the shas’o’s face and remained there.

‘What’s that supposed to be?’

‘It’s a world, boss, the mekboss wants to go there.’

Ork Warboss Gorbag Gitbiter leaned forward, peering down at the wiry little gretchin before his throne. The gretchin quaked, the big shard of glass in its hands quivering and making the dirty yellow-brown ball on its surface bounce around uncertainly.

‘The mekboss, eh?’ Gorbag rumbled with a voice like stones tumbling down a shaft. ‘Well, I’m the warboss and I say where we go!’

The gretchin rocked back on its heels at the blast of sound and spittle flying from the impressively tusked jaws of the hulking warboss. It desperately wanted to chuck away the viewing glass and run off behind a console or into a duct, but it was smart enough not to try. The complex symbiotic relationship between the warlike orks and their smaller, weaker gretchin cousins has long depended on the quick wits and diplomacy of the latter. Thousands of years of genetic heritage conspired to keep the gretchin’s mind focussed enough to squeal out the words that might save it.

‘The mekboss said the ships are gonna break if we don’t go!’

The warboss paused at that. Glaring red eyes pierced the quivering gretchin with new interest.

‘What… did you just say?’

The gretchin’s healthy green pallor had gained a distinctly whitish cast, the world in the viewing glass oscillated tightly back and forth in its grip.

‘The mekboss said to tell you we got too many holes. Some are so big the boys are falling out and all the... the breathy stuff is leakin’ out.’

Gorbag thrust his mighty jaw out truculently. ‘Breathy stuff? You mean the air, you stupid little grot?’

‘Yes, boss!’

‘So we’re gonna be stuck there?’ Gorbag’s three-metre tall form seemed to sag at the prospect. No more reaving across the stars for him and his bloodthirsty crew of freebooters; they would be stuck on one stinking planet with no way off it and nothing to fight but each other.

‘No, boss! The mekboss says there’s metal on this world. We can fix all the holes an’ keep goin’!’

Gorbag seemed to swell up visibly at the prospect. He grabbed the viewing glass from the gretchin with a gnarled claw as big as its torso and glared at it with a rapacious gleam in his eyes. The gretchin failed to relinquish its grip quickly enough and ended up dangling from Gorbag’s fist by one arm.

‘Anything to kill?’ Gorbag demanded.

‘No, boss,’ the grot squeaked apologetically, ‘leastways nothing good.’

The shas’o found the warriors beneath his command awaiting him at their barracks, just as the aun’o had said. The warriors stood in ranks inside the quadrangle formed between their quarters, garages and armoury. Each was in full armour, the jointed plates giving them an insectile quality in the harsh glare of the twin suns. They held their pulse rifles upright before them, long-barrelled firing chambers pointing rigidly at the skies. Small mounds of windblown dust reaching up to their ankles showed they had been silently awaiting him for quite some time. The shas’o dropped his single carry bag with an audible clank before blowing out his cheeks in a long-suffering sigh.

‘And just what is the meaning of this?’ he shouted in a parade ground bark very different to the tone he had used with the aun’o and fio’ui. A fire warrior with the stripes of a shas’ui took a step forward and replied.

‘It is my responsibility, shas’o,’ the shas’ui said, their voice made slightly distorted by the audio pickup of their enclosed helmet. ‘Any punishment due is mine alone.’

A murmur of discontent rippled out behind the shas’ui as they spoke and the forest of pulse rifles swayed slightly in response. The shas’o raised a hand to silence it.

‘I am led to understand you all refused to leave your barracks unarmed? On the idea that it would shame you in my eyes not to greet me as warriors?’

‘The aun’o believes that with no enemies present our weapons are only a danger to ourselves and others, shas’o, The shas’ui replied cautiously. ‘The exalted one believes us too ill-trained and unreliable to bear arms.’

‘Enough! Put down your weapons at once!’ The shas’o barked. As one, the assembled fire warriors placed their rifles on the ground. ‘Now take off your armour. You heard me, every piece!’

The shas’o watched while the warriors more hesitantly unclipped shoulder guards and breastplates, thigh pieces and curved helmets. The shas’ui proved to be an attractive female with a fine scalp-lock, the others lost their uniformity and were revealed as a selection of males and females of a young age, few probably even close to their first trial by fire. The variety of their physiognomy showed that they hailed from a variety of different septs. There were some dark faces from Vior’la that were eyeing him with approval, a gaggle of pallid D’yanoi that look confused, several Sa’ceans that obeyed quickly and efficiently without hesitation.

Finally, each warrior’s weapon and armour sat beside them in the dirt and they stood shivering in only their undersuits. The shas’o walked over to the shas’ui’s neat little pile of equipment and kicked it over.

‘These objects do not make you a warrior!’ he shouted into her face. He stalked to another pile and scattered it, catching the owner’s look of horror as their cherished pulse rifle clattered to the ground. He laughed, a short, harsh sound within the confines of the quad, and pushed another warrior in the chest causing them to stagger back a pace.

‘The will, the ability to fight, to be a warrior, does not reside in your weapons, nor is it inside your armour unless you bring it there yourself! The warrior begins within, a warrior is one who still fights with whatever they have and with nothing at all if they must!’

The shas’o had their complete attention now; every eye was on him and he saw the unconscious flaring of nasal slits in approval on many faces. He bent down and drew two fighting sticks from his carry bag, ironwood rods as long and as thick as his forearm. He tossed one into the dust before the fire warriors and hefted the other in his fist.

‘Now… who among you is enough of a warrior to fight me for the right to put your armour back on?’

Two days later, a Devilfish personnel carrier skimmed over low dunes with all the smooth agility of its namesake, its graceful lines speeding across the sands. Inside, the shas’o watched the external monitors with interest, noting the tall double plume of dust snaking in their wake that would be visible for miles. He bore the pain of his bruises stoically, as did the five other fire warriors beside him in the passenger compartment.

He’d beaten all of them, one on one, even though it had taken all night and most of the next day. The smarter ones had waited until he was tired before taking their chances, managing to get a few telling strikes on him. Afterwards, the shas’o had fought them in pairs and groups to allow them a little revenge. Not bad, but some of them really were ill-trained and all of them were very inexperienced. More importantly, they were now thinking of themselves as warriors again, instead of scolded children. He turned to the shas’ui, raising his voice above the whine of the Devilfish’s ducted turbines.

‘No other living things on the entire planet?’

‘Nothing at all, not a plant, not an animal’. The shas’ui’s responses were clipped and coolly professional but the shas’o could tell that she was barely holding her excitement in check. The aun’o, in his ineffable wisdom, had virtually confined the fire warriors to their barracks for fear of accidents or unnecessary wear and tear on their equipment. The current reconnaissance run into the desert would be their first training hunt in months.

‘But our colony here is purported to extend over three quarters of the planet’s surface,’ the shas’o prodded.

‘That is something of an exaggeration, shas’o, the main colony is here in the Argap highlands. The fio have indeed established many other facilities but they are all small, highly automated and widely dispersed.’

‘Their purpose?’

‘Metal extraction and purifcation. The sands we are traversing bear huge quantities of metallic oxides mixed with silica and carbon. The fio believe them to be the detritus of a civilization that once covered this world.’

The shas’o blinked with surprise. ‘My briefing material said nothing about this, perhaps you jest with me, shas’ui?’

The shas’ui gestured at the red dunes sliding past on the monitors. ‘No, shas’o, I do not jest. The sands you see out there really are composed of rust. The fio don’t know whether the gue’la or or’es’la lived here, certainly it was a long time ago.’ She paused. ‘Permission to ask a question, shas’o?’

‘Granted– I value obedience, but ignorance is a weapon placed in our enemy’s hands. What is it?’

‘Your name – Shas’o Vior’la Kais Mont’yr. You’ve earned two adjuncts to your name already. You have seen battle and been named as skilful by your fellow warriors. You must have passed at least three trials by fire to achieve the rank of shas’o…’

‘I’m sure you have a question in there somewhere, shas’ui. What’s troubling you?’

‘It’s just… why would the shas’ar’tol send someone like you to a place like this? Surely you would do more good in an active conflict region than being crèche supervisor in some forgotten outpost.’

‘I go where the greater good commands, like any diligent student of the Tau’va,’ the shas’o replied. ‘If my seniors at high command believe I can have the most effect here, then that becomes my singular purpose and I give no thought to potential glories lost elsewhere.’

The shas’ui looked at him in frank disbelief, and seemed to be trying to deduce just who he had offended and how. She opened her mouth to ask another, probably even more impertinent, question when the Devilfish lurched suddenly, banking sharply to one side. The fire warriors were thrown against their restraining harnesses with a chorus of suppressed groans. On the monitors, the shas’o caught a glimpse of a yawning darkness amid the dunes that rapidly vanished down one side of the personnel carrier.

‘Canyon,’ the shas’ui explained. ‘Natural erosion cuts channels into the desert, they–’

‘I know– that part was in the briefing materials. It also means we’ve arrived at our destination. Prepare to disembark.’

The sand-laden winds had ground the exposed rim of the canyon to a pitted smoothness. Across the gap, the far cliff was marked with uneven bands of strata made up of a fantastic array of reds, browns and blacks. Thirty metres below, on the canyon floor, spires and mushrooms of basalt protruded from a bed of rust-coloured sand. Behind the shas’o, three Devilfish carriers lifted off in unison and turned their elegantly curved prows back towards base. Three bemused squads of fire warriors were left standing in the thick cloud of dust kicked up by their departing personnel carriers. They looked questioningly at the shas’o. He opened a common frequency to address them all.

‘Until now, you’ve only thought about these canyons as obstacles to be crossed,’ the shas’o told them. ‘We’re here to learn that they can be your best ally or your worst enemy. In this hunt, you must simply return to the colony without being tagged. The Devilfish will be patrolling the desert and hostile pathfinders and gun drones are in the canyons. Question one, which way do you go?’

‘Through the canyons, shas’o,’ the shas’ui responded promptly.

‘Very good,’ nodded the shas’o. ‘Now tell me why.’

‘The Devilfish would easily detect us and tag us in the open.’

‘You discount the threat of pathfinders and gun drones?’

‘No, but the pathfinders will require support to stop us and the Devilfish will be highly restricted if they enter the canyons. The gun drones can be outsmarted or outfought one on one as necessary.’

‘I concur with your theories, shas’ui. Now let’s go and put them to the test. Pay close attention because we will be performing another hunt out here tomorrow, with battlesuits.’

Pulse blasts criss-crossed the canyon in a flickering web of light. Every nook and cranny seemed to birth and receive its own false lightning faster than the eye could follow. After a week of successive hunts in the desert, the fire warriors were improving, the shas’o noted with approval. The blue ‘prey’ cadre in this hunt had turned on their pursuers and caught them with a classic mont’ka, a killing blow. The strung-out red cadre suddenly found their lead elements caught in a canyon too narrow to redeploy in. In thirty more seconds the surrounded warriors would be cut down and the red cadre would become prey.

The shas’o and his team leapt from the canyon lip eighty metres above, the flat plates of their crisis battlesuits gleaming in the bright suns. Blue-white stabs of flame from their shoulder-packs steadied their fall as the canyon floor rushed up to greet them. At the last second, their jetpacks kicked in and robbed them of their momentum, their duralloy leg-claws crunching into the sands in unison. The three-metre tall armoured suits raised arm-mounted weapon pods and rapid bursts of plasma rifle fire ripped into the firefight from a new angle.

The blue cadre ambushers were caught between the crisis suits and the red cadre survivors. Decisive action could still have saved them; enough were combat effective that a concerted attack on either the battlesuits or the reds might have still carried the fight. But the blue cadre’s cohesion had disintegrated when the crisis team landed. They panicked and fought their own immediate battles without regard to what was happening behind them. In a few seconds, the moment had passed and the red cadre carried the blue’s position. The blue’s hasty ambush became their last stand.

‘You cheated!’ the shas’ui was standing before the shas’o’s suit, glaring defiantly up into the monitor lenses that peppered its head. The shas’ui’s own light armour was discoloured where simulated plasma fire had killed her in the fight.

‘I’m sorry, shas’ui, in what way did I cheat?’ The voice came from the battlesuit’s external speakers, somewhere in its midriff.

‘You said that you would observe and take no part in the action!’

‘I did, but sometimes in combat you will also find things to be different to what you anticipated.’ The suit’s speaker made the statement flat and unaffected, yet it ended the shas’ui’s tirade as if she had been struck.

‘I apologise, shas’o. I did not mean to impugn your teaching.’

The heavily-armoured suit raised one weapon-mounted arm in a curiously lifelike gesture of conciliation. ‘No, it is I that should apologise, shas’ui. The reds were fairly caught, and credit is due to you for that. I felt there was no further lesson left to be learned there. However, there was still a lesson for you to learn. Can you tell me what it was?’

‘No rearguard,’ the shas’ui said bitterly. ‘When I was sure we’d caught them, I didn’t detail anyone to watch our back.’

The shas’o broadcast his findings on the hunt to all of the fire warriors present, reds and blues alike.

‘You have fought well, but with mistakes on both sides. Overlooking that a force of which you are unaware might come against you during an engagement is an easy mistake to make, just as easy as rushing headlong after a fleeing enemy and suffering a reverse. Natural eagerness to turn every weapon on the acquired target can obscure the need for a rearguard, or a reserve, to cover the eventuality that all does not proceed as hoped for. Learn from this.’

The shas’ui was studying the patina of simulated pulse rifle hits on the commander’s suit. ‘Are those mine?’ she eventually asked when the shas’o’s wisdom had been dispensed.

‘Indeed they are. Some nice grouping, shas’ui.’

‘I’ll get you next time.’

It took two more weeks of training hunts before the fio’ui took exception to the additional maintenance burden the fire warriors were incurring. As the shas’o returned to the barracks after dusk, he sighted the fio’ui’s dumpy form waiting patiently beside the gate post like some carved heathen icon.

They had been using battlesuits again that day, and the shas’o’s was close to the limits of its endurance. The suit’s armoured casing was streaked with smears of dust and its clogged servos whined plaintively with every step. They’d found that the crisis battlesuits were excellent for supporting the troopers in the close confines of the canyons, far more practical than the larger Devilfish or Hammerhead support vehicles. The only downside was the battlesuit’s limited endurance, which meant they would need to cache extra power cells to operate in areas remote from the colony.

The shas’o’s mind was filled with plans as he approached, but the sight of the fio’ui gave him pause. He halted the crisis suit and opened its chest cavity so that he could dismount and meet the fio’ui face-to-face. One of the earth caste would never be intimidated by a piece machinery, however martial its function, but it never hurt to show some politeness to another caste. The fio’ui was of the Kel’shan Sept, and so apt to be stubborn and mistrustful of outsiders at the best of times.

‘Greetings, fio’ui,’ the shas’o began. ‘You come without the por’la at your side. Am I to understand that this is a social visit with no call for negotiation?’

‘You understand wrongly,’ the fio’ui grumbled. ‘I have come to inform you that your… outings must stop. There is serious work to be done and my apprentices are being distracted by your indulgence.’

‘Training is no indulgence, fio’ui, if my warriors are to retain any value as a fighting force. Just as your own apprentices would not expect a mechanism to function if it was left unattended, I cannot expect my warriors to fight if they never lift a weapon.’

The fio’ui thrust his jaw out truculently and began again. ‘It must stop. The aun’o demands maximum output.’ Having evoked the name of the aun’o, the engineer closed his mouth and moved to leave, as if no more need be said.

‘Wait, fio’ui,’ the shas’o said. ‘Even absent the por’la can we not come to compromise?’

The fio’ui seemed a little shocked by the concept, but he paused to listen. Encouraged by his own boldness, the shas’o pressed his point further.

‘I have many pairs of idle hands on Arkunasha colony, not to mention numerous drones without true purpose. Teach my fire warriors how to perform their own maintenance schedules and I will have them assist in monitoring the extraction and purification facilities across the planet. You would exceed your estimated output in no time.’

The fio’ui’s heavy brow furrowed uncertainly as he wrapped his mind around the unfamiliar concept. His voice was still gruff but there was a gleam of hope in his eye. ‘The shas’la would refuse,’ he muttered. ‘You of the fire caste have always believed manual labour beneath you.’

‘Bold words,’ shas’o smiled, ‘some fire warriors would demand satisfaction for their bruised honour on hearing them. I am not so ignorant and I’m ready to shoulder my burdens alongside my brothers and sisters. The shas’la will obey my commands, and they are just as eager to be of more value to this colony. Only caste barriers prevent their willing contribution to it.’

‘Very well, shas’o, I shall consider your unorthodox proposal and discuss with my own kind. I… thank you for your time.’

The shas’o watched the chief engineer shuffle away through dim pools of illumination cast by the colony lights. He smiled to himself. Another opponent laid low by a surprise attack. After a time he went inside to prepare briefings for the next training hunt.

Fire and iron thundered out of the void with twisting, belching black trails chasing at its back. One, two, then three fiery meteors were vomited from the sullen skies, the clouds peeling back in ragged tatters where the smoking lances pierced them from above. Distance made the churning smoke and fire trails seem absurdly slow-moving as their burning tips crawled across the sky.

The shas’o watched the apocalyptic sight through the screens of the colony information center. A crisp line of characters at the bottom of the image announced that it was being relayed from a metal extraction and purification facility somewhere on the far side of the planet.

‘Still no word from the Vior’la Gal’leath M’shan?’ he asked.

The fio’la technicians hunched their shoulders helplessly. The only ship within communication range of Arkunasha colony had dropped off the grid hours before. All their attempts to raise it had met with stubborn silence. The fio’ui was clinging tenaciously to the idea of a meteor storm being responsible for the break in communications. He gestured sharply at the screens.

‘Meteors, see?’ the engineer grunted. ‘They’re starting to break up.’

A handful of smoking coals were indeed dropping away from churning masses and curving downward at a steeper trajectory. The shas’o shook his head as most of the smaller smoke trails corkscrewed and levelled out just before they hit the ground. One came rocketing straight towards the extraction facility, creating a momentary impression of something big and close before the image disintegrated into static.

‘Facility 7352 is no longer transmitting, fio’ui,’ one of the fio’la called apologetically.

‘Because those are Ore’s’la ships and attack craft, not meteors,’ the shas’o said quietly. ‘Fio’ui, I need you to tell your people to prepare for evacuation–’

‘You will do nothing of the kind, fio’ui,’ the aun’o’s voice rang out in the quiet information centre as he swept in through the outer doors. ‘There is no call for such precipitous action at this time.’

The aun’o stood at the entry surrounded by a small coterie of nervous-looking water caste members. His expression was that of a tutor finding his students engaged in some distasteful, and probably illegal, activity.

‘My apologies, aun’o,’ the shas’o replied somewhat tautly, ‘but the protection of this colony is my responsibility and I must advise immediate evacuation.’

‘Because a handful of pirates have landed on the far side of the planet? Something of an overreaction on your part. Understandable, I suppose – this must be very exciting for you.’

‘Apologies again, aun’o, but this is no mere handful of pirates. Or’es’la ships of that size carry tens of thousands of their warrior caste. I have insufficient forces to defeat them all when they locate the colony. We must remain mobile to stay ahead of the invaders until reinforcements can arrive.’

‘Don’t you mean if they locate the colony, shas’o?’

‘I mean what I say. It will only be a matter of time before the Or’es’la locate more of the extraction facilities, and believe me they will trace them back to us. They will travel any distance to find battle, aun’o – we must not be here when they arrive.’

Aboard the lead ork cruiser, Warboss Gorbag Gitbiter gripped the arms of his command throne and laughed uproariously at the sight of orks and grots being hurled around the ship’s bridge. Smoke and blasts of flame accompanied their thunderous progress through the skies. The vibrations running through the ship felt like a thousand jackhammers were being jammed against its patchwork armour plating.

Gorbag mashed random buttons on the arm of his throne until a frightened-sounding grot voice squeaked from a speaker grill in response.

‘Tell the flyboys it’s time to drop and give ‘em a boot up the arse from me,’ Gorbag growled happily. With nothing to kill on this planet, the landing was going to be the most fun part and he was going to squeeze out every bit of it. Distant clunks reverberated through the hull as landers and flyers dropped away from the giant ship with all the aplomb of baby chicks falling out of a large, ugly nest.

A chaotic selection of viewscreens flickered into life around the bridge, half exploding in showers of sparks before immediately going dead. Of the remainder, some showed only static, but others showed the juddering, leaping views from the noses of the ork flyers. Boring-looking sand dunes and rocks bounced around on the working screens for a few seconds before one was lit by the stabbing flames of nose guns firing. Gorbag’s attention snapped to the screen and his impressively-tusked jaws champed convulsively. A little sprawl of silvery towers and pipes in the desert was disappearing in a storm of explosions. Gorbag cuffed a nearby gretchin excitedly and sent him flying.

‘Something to kill!’ Gorbag roared, jabbing one clawed finger at the flickering image ‘Get us down there! Now!’

The desert horizon that had once been so crisp and clear was smudged with plumes of smoke. The or’es’la had been busy destroying every extraction facility they could find in this part of the world, apparently racing one another for the joys of reaching them first and destroying the handful of drones defending them. The shas’o glanced out to his flank, where two Hammerheads were churning through the dust, their dart-like hulls completely dwarfed by the long railguns they carried in their turrets. He looked down into the canyon lying diagonally before him, where fire warriors advanced through rocks and took up positions.

It had taken almost a week of strenuous argument to persuade the aun’o to allow the fire warriors out of the colony at all. Eventually the aun’o had conceded that at least tracking the invader’s progress was necessary, and some reconnaissance might be in order. If the aun’o had paid attention to the forces the shas’o had chosen to take on his ‘reconnaissance’ mission, he might have questioned his intentions more thoroughly. He had brought almost a full cadre; half a dozen fire warrior squads in Devilfish carriers, pathfinders, two crisis teams and a squadron of Hammerhead tanks as a ‘covering force’. Even so they were horribly outnumbered by the or’es’la in this region.

Flickers of light at the horizon caught the shas’o’s attention. He increased the optical gain on his battlesuit’s sensors in time to see several disc-shaped drones fly into view. Brightly glowing tracers chased them, kicking up spurts in the dust as the drones bobbed and weaved frantically to avoid them. A second later, the first of their pursuers leapt over the horizon on a belching tail of smoke, a crude looking or’es’la flyer with its nose aflame with twinkling gun flashes. The shas’o’s crisis suit immediately registered two high-energy discharges to his flank as the Hammerheads fired their railguns in unison. The flyer disintegrated into an expanding cloud of flaming debris an instant later. The rain of hot shrapnel was still falling as the horizon darkened with the arrival of the main enemy force.

The dark silhouettes of what seemed like hundreds of vehicles came streaming into view, a mobile mass of churning dust and metal. The two Hammerheads turned tail and fled, in accordance with their orders, turning their long railguns rearwards to menace their still distant pursuers. As the enemy drew closer, they became distinguishable as a column of tanks, bikes, guns and trucks mixed together without any apparent formation. They came on with the subtlety of a battering ram, completely intent on the vanishing Hammerheads and unaware of the fire warriors lurking on their flank.

Invisible markerlight beams fired by the pathfinders reached out to the onrushing horde to guide in a salvo of seeker missiles. The seekers were a precious commodity, one-shot self-guided weapons being launched from a trio of Devilfish hidden further down the canyon. The slender missiles flashed unerringly into their designated targets, ripping ragged holes in the column wherever they struck. The or’es’la dissolved into a chaotic mess of vehicles, charging in every direction, careening into each other, crashing into rocks and toppling down soft dunes. The rapidly-thinning horde spilled within pulse rifle range and the fire warriors’ bright volleys crashed out to immolate individual vehicles in dirty orange explosions. Submunitions from the disappearing Hammerheads blossomed over the scene almost as an afterthought, shredding the exposed or’es’la gunners and drivers in a storm of hyper-velocity shrapnel.

The remaining vehicles turned for the horizon and sped away as fast as their tracks and wheels would carry them, leaving perhaps half of their number as twisted wrecks on the desert dunes. The shas’o was tempted to lead his crisis teams into the field of burning wreckage to chase down the survivors to truly seal the victory. There would be no quarter asked or given by the or’es’la, and any that escaped now would fight again with renewed ferocity in their next battle. He checked his impulse and signalled the fire warriors to begin withdrawing to the waiting Devilfish. More smudges were appearing on the horizon all the time, showing that more or’es’la were converging on this position. It was time to leave and set another ambush elsewhere.

The link to Arkunasha colony was weak and uncertain, jumping and sliding as the signal bounced off the ionosphere. Even so, the aun’o’s disapproval communicated itself readily through the tiny screen in the shas’o’s battlesuit as he trudged through a shadowed canyon along with the rest of his weary cadre. Night was falling, the time when the or’es’la stopped moving and the shas’o’s dwindling force could quietly shift between sectors. Endless days and nights of ambushes and running fights had taken their toll on the shas’o’s endurance, and his patience.

‘I understand your concerns, aun’o,’ he said tiredly. ‘However, it is necessary for me to remain in action. As I explained before, should the or’es’la reach the colony, they will destroy it and kill everyone there. I can only ensure your protection by engaging the enemy–’

‘You overrate your personal importance,’ the aun’o chided, ‘even if what you say is true – which, frankly, I doubt – your shas’ui can command in your absence. Is that not a keystone of your warrior philosophy?’

‘Leaving an inexperienced shas’ui in command at this juncture would amount to a gross dereliction of duty on my part. My presence at the colony is completely unnecessary and would jeopardise my warriors.’

The tiny image bobbed and darted silently for a moment and the shas’o feared the aun’o was going to give him a direct order to return. The other tau’s high-boned face turned away for a moment as someone spoke to him from off-screen. After several moments the Aun’o turned back with a pallid look on his face.

‘A courier has arrived from the shas’ar’tol… they say no reinforcements are available at this time. Limited evacuation may be possible later, but for now Arkunasha colony is exhorted to resist to its last breath, for the greater good.’

‘For the greater good,’ shas’o agreed. He waited for the aun’o to say something else but the silence stretched on until he spoke again.

‘Aun’o, you must board that courier and leave the colony at once. I will accept no argument about this and, if necessary, I will return and put you on the ship myself. Your protection is my first responsibility and the dangers will only increase from now on. Leave now while you still can. I must attend to my warriors.’ The tiny head on the screen nodded abruptly in response and the image vanished.

The shas’o looked at the lines of fire warriors winding along the canyon on foot and felt an invisible burden lift from his soul. With the aun’o gone, he would have a free hand at last, no more negotiating and explaining every action. He turned his mind to current dispositions. The surviving Devilfish were out some distance away, scouting for the enemy and the Hammerheads were perched somewhere above on the dunes, keeping a watch for flyers. Their attrition so far had been light, but maintaining supplies of ammunition and energy cells was a constant concern. The supply cache they were approaching was one of the last that had been placed before the invasion and the only one close to what now amounted to the front lines. Risk of interception and limited resources meant most of the newer caches were only a day or two’s travel from the colony. Too close, but they had been left with little choice.

One of the fire warriors left the line and picked their way to where the crisis suits were labouring along the soft sand of the canyon floor to conserve their energy. It was the shas’ui, her armour flecked and chipped where she had been caught in an or’es’la shell burst that morning. The monocular eye-piece of her helmet gazed up at the shas’o’s monitor head in mute question until he opened a channel to her.

‘Word has arrived from the shas’ar’tol that there are to be no reinforcements,’ the shas’o told her simply. ‘We must fight on with what we have.’

‘Not long ago I would have said that was impossible, but these past weeks you’ve led the or’es’la around by their noses so well that I can’t see why we can’t do it forever.’

‘Supplies, mostly, and the or’es’la will learn to be less cooperative over ti–’

An urgent communications request from the Pathfinders was winking in the corner of one of the Crisis suit’s screens. The shas’o accepted it and was treated to a grainy view of the desert above. His stomach turned over at the sight and his exhaustion vanished. An array of dark brown shapes were moving through the gathering gloom, the sullen flames gouting from their exhaust stacks briefly illuminating their rusting armour and the swarming or’es’la warriors clinging to every vehicle.

‘Course?’ the shas’o snapped.

‘Closing on our position. They haven’t sighted us yet.’

‘Pull back into the canyon and let them pass, we can’t–’

‘Second group sighted, shas’o!’ The view spun to show another distant column converging on the opposite side of the canyon. ‘The first group are halting now, it looks as if they’re stopping for the night.’

‘Plant five photon grenades on maximum delay and pull back immediately.’

‘Acknowledged, shas’o.’ He closed the link and addressed the shas’ui on a direct channel.

‘Pass the word, shas’ui, I want the supplies recovered and brought back down the canyon as quietly as possible, no one is to engage the or’es’la.’

‘Shas’o?’

‘I have something much better in mind for them.’

The shas’o triggered his jet pack and bounded away down the canyon in a series of low, swinging leaps to stay below its rim. He reached the retreating Pathfinders and had them markerlight the position of their photon grenades up above. He turned and leapt for the opposite lip, using his remaining reserves of energy lavishly to thrust himself over the edge. Dark shadows blotted the frozen waves of dunes to either side of the canyon and were made hard-edged by guttering oil-fires lit by the or’es’la.

The shas’o levelled his plasma rifle and let rip at the closest targets. They were beyond effective range, but he loosed off several incandescent bolts into the gloom before jumping back down into the canyon. A moment later, the photon grenades detonated, their stark white flashes burning away the night vision of anyone looking for the source of the incoming fire. Fat red tracers buzzed across the canyon in both directions, followed by the distinctive crack-swish sound of larger projectiles.

The Crisis suit’s energy reserves were into the orange, but the shas’o leapt a short distance further along the canyon before mounting the opposite side and firing again. That provoked another wild burst of fire from the or’es’la, and in the brief moment he was above the lip of the canyon he glimpsed the insane crossfire already occurring between the two camps. He dropped to the canyon floor and left the or’es’la to their sport; with any luck they would keep shooting at each other all night.

‘O’Shovah?’ the shas’ui’s voice was unsteady, the pain of her shattered body edging the word.

Shovah meant ‘farsight’. The fire warriors had taken to calling him that during the desert campaign. O’Shovah, Commander Farsight, just a jocular nickname at first but it had grown into a watchword, almost a prayer. Farsight will see us through, Commander Farsight will outwit the or’es’la once again, they can never catch Farsight.

It seemed like a bitter reprimand now, trapped for weeks in the Argap highlands with no room to manoeuvre and endless hordes of foes surrounding them. Every day was another day of grinding siege, insane assaults, and casualties on both sides. The or’es’la died by the dozen for every fire warrior they dragged down, but each loss was keenly felt by the small band of defenders.

Now the shas’ui was among the fallen, another casualty ticked off the shrinking roster of colony defenders. She had been caught in an or’es’la rocket attack while dragging an injured comrade clear, her limbs shattered and torso pierced by randomly flying metal. It all seemed so senseless.

‘Rest easy, shas’ui,’ he said. ‘Another shuttle got through. You’re going to be evacuated.’

‘No!’ The shas’ui lurched on her narrow cot, trying to rise. ‘I will stay and fight!’

‘You will heal and fight another day,’ the shas’o, O’Shovah as he was coming to think of himself, said coldly. ‘Your injuries would impede you in battle to the point of uselessness.’

The shas’ui sank back, too weak to protest further, her eyes searching O’Shovah’s face. ‘Why don’t they evacuate all of us? Why are we still here?’

O’Shovah had no answer. The aun’o was gone, the colony ruined and most of its population killed or fled. There was no reason to stay but the shas’ar’tol insisted that they hold on. Reinforcements were trickling in, but they were barely enough to keep pace with the attrition incurred by the siege. No counter-offensive was possible, only endless positional warfare through the peaks and passes of the highlands.

‘I don’t know, shas’ui,’ he confessed. ‘We must place our trust in the greater good.’

Shells screamed down in ragged salvos, pulverising rock and throwing up towering clouds of dust at the edge of the colony. They were concentrating on the dugouts around the skeletal remnants of the workshops. Their howling mingled with the first explosions, and soon the fire warriors could hear nothing but the crash of explosions and the whickering of shrapnel.

In recent weeks the or’es’la had fallen into a pattern of hoarding up their ammo and loosing it all off before an assault. In terms of inflicting casualties, it was actually less effective than their old method of firing short, unexpected bombardments whenever a crate of shells was brought up, but it was a lot more unnerving. It meant the or’es’la were coming again.

O’Shovah crouched in his crisis suit inside a shelter he’d helped the Fio to dig for him at the head of a feature they’d dubbed the slipway. It was an erosion-cut channel leading down from Arkunasha colony to a nearby valley in the highlands. Windblown sand and dust from the plateau poured continuously down the slipway like a slow motion avalanche confined by high rock walls on both sides. The or’es’la had fixated on the area as the widest point of approach and it was already littered with half-buried wrecks left by their previous attempts to storm it.

O’Shovah crouched in his hole, feeling the bedrock tremble as shells burst nearby. He found that he trembled with it. The bombardment seemed endless, maddening. Shells of all calibres poured down and were joined by the howl of rockets just as it seemed it could get no worse. Red flames spurted up on all sides and flashes filled the air. The world seemed engulfed by roaring giants on every side.

Suddenly, the or’es’la barrage dribbled away to nothing, a few paltry shells whistling down as the towering smoke clouds began to drift away in the wind. Then he heard the roar of many engines and the rumbling sound of tracks. O’Shovah emerged from his shelter, far enough to see down the slipway, as around him, surviving fire warriors looked cautiously out from their own redoubts and bunkers. Perhaps four teams remained, holding onto a precarious horseshoe of positions at the top of the slope, with barely one team in reserve. Ugly or’es’la battle-tanks were crawling to the base of the slipway, five steel giants with groups of smaller vehicles ranged to their left and right. Behind them, another wave of at least twenty vehicles was coming into view, labouring hard in the soft sand.

O’Shovah was speechless. The enemy had never before attacked in such strength. A wave of improvised seeker drone-missiles flew past, plummeting into the approaching behemoths. Two of the leading vehicles crumpled in flames and were soon joined by others as two Hammerhead tanks began firing from the heights. The air was split by harsh flames as the duel was played out, the or’es’la firing at the blue-white flashes of the Hammerhead’s railguns. The first enemy tank was hit and burst into flames. A second, immobilised with track damage, continued to fire until it was hit beneath a turret by a railgun round. The shot tore the turret from the vehicle in a spray of sparks. Flames shot into the air, enveloping the crew as they tried to escape.

A call came in. ‘Infantry climbing the slipway, O’Shovah!’

From among the tanks appeared or’es’la warriors in blood-red armour. They were running up the slipway and making better progress than the slithering wave of vehicles. At an order from O’Shovah, precision pulse rifle fire swept across them, temporarily clearing the slope of running shapes. The Hammerheads were now firing in salvos. A dozen burning enemy vehicles lay scattered in the sand as testimony to their handiwork. The leading vehicles had climbed as far as a chain of tethered charges hidden in the slipway. Three were disabled with shattered tracks and the rest swung away to one side in apparent confusion. The second wave of vehicles began to climb the slope. Three took direct hits from the Hammerheads and blew apart, but the rest kept churning upwards towards the workshops with single-minded determination.

O’Shovah emerged from his shelter and signalled his surviving bodyguard to follow as he moved behind the protective glacis to reach the dugouts at the workshops. They loped along behind roughly-piled foam-metal blocks, already half buried by the sliding sand. Shells fired by the or’es’la hammered into the area. Red and yellow tracers from their secondary armaments buzzed around the fire warrior positions. A quick glance at his lateral monitors showed O’Shovah more vehicles climbing up on his right as he approached, while his two bodyguards loomed reassuringly in his rear view. O’Shovah leapt over the top of the glacis. Tracers streaked past him as he broke cover. He zig-zagged the battlesuit with surprising dexterity for such a cumbersome device, spotted a large, half-collapsed crater just below him and took cover in it. A moment later, his bodyguards were also in position above and below him on the slope.

Ahead of them, an or’es’la assault group was breaching the top of the slipway, moments away from overrunning the position. O’Shovah locked on to a vehicle and its surrounding infantry, punching a plasma bolt into the former and allowing a salvo of smart missiles to pick off the latter. More plasma bolts and fusion blasts from his bodyguards ripped into the flanked or’es’la. Almost simultaneously, a burst of heavy calibre slugs stitched across the upper torso of O’Shovah’s armour, pitching him out of the crater and sprawling him full-length in the sand. His systems displays were alight with warning indicators as he struggled to stand. His bodyguards moved to protect him. One was blown almost in half by a stray shell, his crisis armour bursting open like rotten fruit.

The shattered remnants of the assault group were running towards them with a truly enormous or’es’la in the lead. Darkness was sliding across the battlefield behind the charging alien like the shadow of death. O’Shovah sighted manually on the bestial-looking warrior and punched a plasma bolt into its torso. To his dismay the creature’s armour shrugged off the strike and it continued to surge forward with its hugely tusked jaws roaring thunderously. O’Shovah tried to fire his rifle again but found it inoperative, he tried to operate his jetpack and found that inoperative too. The or’es’la continued to charge forward, only metres away now.

A blaze of energy engulfed the or’es’la from above, brilliant white beams dancing from one figure to the next, leaving burning torches in their wake. Gazing up, O’Shovah laughed as he saw wide delta shapes blotting out the suns. The familiar silhouettes of Manta missile destroyers hovered above like guardian angels, finally enough of them to evacuate the whole colony.

The aun refused his requests for an audience immediately after evacuation. It was just as well; he’d been furious when he first saw the tau war fleet in orbit. That anger had cooled and hardened in the intervening time. He had visited the shas’ui and seen her adapting to her newly-grown prosthetics day by day. He had seen the other survivors of Arkunasha colony and mourned their dead with them. When the aun finally sent for him he came calmly enough.

There was a triumvirate aboard the Vior’la Gal’leath M’shan comprising Aun’o T’au Vasoy Ty’asla and two other aun, a male and a female, that O’Shovah did not recognise. They did not introduce themselves, nor speak at all when O’Shovah was conveyed to their veiled, opalescent sanctum. Instead Aun’o Vasoy smiled fondly at O’Shovah as he entered and bid his accompanying water caste associates to leave them. Only when they were alone did the female speak.

‘You have done well, shas’o. You bring credit to your caste and your sept. We understand that you are distressed by the casualties incurred under your command.’

She paused as O’Shovah shook his head.

‘Casualties are a fact of war,’ he replied. ‘I am distressed by being starved of reinforcements that evidently exist and the unnecessary hardships thereby inflicted on my command.’

The unidentified male aun spoke. ‘Surely it is not your place to question the strategies of the shas’ar’tol?’

‘It is my place to question poor strategy whenever I see it, and this strategy did not originate from my honoured colleagues at the shas’ar’tol.’ He paused to pull a flimsy sheaf of message transcripts from inside his tunic. ‘I checked.’

Aun’o Vasoy replied. ‘Your success in small unit engagements with the or’es’la has enabled the build up of large reserves. When the campaign to retake Arkunasha begins, it will be undertaken with overwhelming strength.’

‘In other words, you decided to throw away lives now for an easier victory later.’

‘As is our remit, for the greater good.’

There was an awkward moment of silence as O’Shovah failed to respond. Aun’o Vasoy seemed genuinely puzzled.

‘Shas’o, you act as if the war was lost, when your actions have virtually assured victory.’

O’Shovah dashed the transcript on the floor in sudden fury. ‘Because I was not told!’

The aun drew back from his anger, their eyes becoming hooded. O’Shovah breathed deeply, mastering himself before speaking again.

‘You allowed me and my cadres to fight in the belief that no help was coming while you sat in orbit doing nothing. With sufficient forces, I could have ensured that the or’es’la never even reached the colony!’

‘Possibly,’ Aun’o Vasoy admitted. ‘Yet your situation spurred you to the highest efforts. As you said yourself, casualties are a fact of war. Yet you minimised your own and maximised those incurred by the enemy. Is that not victory?’

‘Of a sort,’ O’Shovah admitted bitterly. ‘And yet superior attrition seems to be the lowest form of success to my eyes.’

‘Come now, you must lay aside your grief for your lost warriors,’ Aun’o Vasoy said reasonably. ‘You have the gratitude of the Tau Empire and the approbation of your fellow caste members. I understand that they have even gifted you a new name in celebration of your success.’

The warrior’s face had become an immobile mask. He revealed nothing of his inner feelings when he responded finally.

‘Indeed, they have dubbed me O’Shovah – Commander Farsight – for my alleged ability to see into the future, and I have pledged to them that in future times the Tau Empire will remember my name.’

War is not a binary condition. Despite superficial appearances to the contrary it does not begin or end with a single discrete event. There may be catalysts and culminations, but their antecedents and consequences – cultural, material and even metaphysical – extend through times past and future like ripples in a river that flows two ways. Accordingly, the war between the Imperium and the Tau Empire did not begin and end with the Damocles Gulf Crusade. That conflict was the first great blossoming of our enmity and it will not be the last, but we have now entered a subtler phase of the game. Fifty years have passed since the crusade. Nothing has changed. Everything has changed.
Here on the margins of the Damocles Gulf we are embroiled in a cold war, an intricate game of deceit, manipulation and coercion waged against a master player. It is a delicate struggle, but never make the mistake of thinking it any less inimical to the Imperium than the voracious depredations of the tyranids or the bleak pogrom waged by the necrons, for the tau are playing for the hearts and minds of mankind. If they triumph our species may survive, but its destiny will not.

– Aion Escher, Grand Master of the
Damocles Conclave, Ordo Xenos

SMOKE

Watch for the smoke of discord if you seek to light the flames of revolution.

– The Calavera

EIGHTY-ONE DAYS BEFORE UNITY, KLIEST

Kreeger found his patron in the scorched hilltop temple he’d taken to haunting since they’d gone to ground on Kliest four months ago. It was a broken place on a broken world and it suited Haniel Mordaine’s mood exquisitely. Of late, the disgraced interrogator had immersed himself in sketching the crumbling statue of Sanguinius Ascendant that loomed over the pulpit like a petrified angel, its wings spread wide to encircle the lost celebrants. It was primitive work, roughly hewn from the local granite, yet its brooding gravity drew Mordaine back day after day. Crumpled parchment littered the ground in testament to his increasingly frenzied attempts to capture the Angel’s essence, and he would sometimes cajole or harangue the effigy as if it were actively opposing his efforts. Kreeger took it all in his stride. Mordaine was a noble and Kreeger had watched over enough of his kind to know they were all crazy. It was probably something in their blue blood.

‘The conclave has our scent again,’ he called, marching up the nave without reverence or reserve. ‘It’s time to move on, duke.’

‘Again?’ Mordaine turned reluctantly from his work. His eyes were like bloodshot sores in the shadow of a handsome face. ‘Are you certain?’

It was an empty question because Kreeger was never less than certain of anything, but it was part of the ritual that had carried them from one failing world to another along the borders of the Damocles Gulf, always one step ahead of the Inquisition and ten more from hope. Perhaps half those worlds, Kliest among them, had been found wanting in their loyalty to the Imperium prior to the crusade, but all were paying the price in murderously increased tithes. Most would be stripped to the bone and abandoned within a scant few centuries.

It sends a message, Grand Master Escher had decreed. If your neighbour falls, you fall. Nothing stimulates loyalty like judiciously applied fear.

‘We need to be off-world tonight,’ Kreeger said, brandishing a sheaf of greasy identity papers. ‘I’ve wangled us passage on a Gulf freighter. No questions asked.’

‘Another cargo hold?’ Mordaine guessed sourly.

‘Fish tank,’ Kreeger corrected. Seeing his employer’s expression he pressed on quickly. ‘Relax, we won’t be sharing, duke. They’ll be filling up at the other end.’ He shrugged. ‘Can’t promise it’ll smell of incense and amasec, but…’

‘It will reek of a billion dead fish.’ Mordaine grimaced. ‘I despise fish, Kreeger.’

‘Lots of fish on Oblazt.’ The old soldier shrugged. ‘Fish, promethium and ice are about all they’ve got.’

‘Oblazt?’ The grimace became a frown. ‘The world with the floating hives?’

‘They call them anchor hives. Build ’em on platforms spiked deep into the ice so they don’t float. The Imperium’s been sucking promethium and fish out from under the ice since forever. There’s a whole ocean buried down there.’ As always, Kreeger had done his groundwork fastidiously. To his mind it was the trick to staying alive.

‘I’m not finished here.’ Mordaine gestured vaguely at the stone angel. ‘Anyway, perhaps it’s time to stop running.’ But there was no sincerity in his voice.

‘Oblazt is the subsector’s breadbasket and promethium wellspring in one,’ Kreeger pressed. ‘The kind of world the tau would make a play for.’

Mordaine hesitated, raking a hand through his lank, grey-streaked hair. ‘Do you have something?’

‘I’ve got a contact.’ Kreeger shrugged again. ‘He calls himself the Calavera.’

THIRTY DAYS BEFORE UNITY
ABOVE THE DOME, VYSHODD ANCHOR HIVE, OBLAZT

The roof of the world was a convex plain of dark rockcrete, blizzard-scoured and barren save for a scattering of blocky maintenance outposts and comms towers. A tracery of thermal capillary pipes shone dully beneath the surface, hissing and steaming as they dissolved the rapacious ice before it could take root. The resulting slurry flowed down the dome into the perimeter recycling trenches, then on into the hive’s reservoirs. Much of it would be superheated and pumped back into the canopy, a greatcoat against the cold. It was a crude but efficient system that maintained the ambient temperature of the city a few notches above freezing, but decades of neglect had taken their toll. Scattered mounds of hard-packed ice glazed the dome like glistening cancers where the hydrothermal network had failed, yet the outposts were dark and no servitors or icebreaker teams laboured across the surface to purge the blight. Such was the way of things on Oblazt in the wake of the Damocles Gulf Crusade.

Two figures surveyed this entropy-in-motion from the shelter of an antenna-spiked relay tower. Both were swathed in heavy grey thermal robes, yet they were otherwise unalike. One would have towered over a tall man, yet his shorter companion was the stranger of the two, for there was a subtle aberration in the set of his shoulders and posture that suggested an altogether inhuman heritage.

‘Their world ends, yet they do not see it,’ the alien observed. It spoke Gothic with the chilly precision of one who has mastered the language like a weapon. ‘This blindness is the lor’serra of your kind. The shadow truth of your nature.’

‘They are not my kind, traveller,’ replied the giant. ‘We parted company millennia before your kind possessed the wit to dream of touching the stars.’

‘Nevertheless you were forged from their bloodline, Iho’nen. Such bonds endure even after they are broken, like the ghost pains of a lost limb.’

‘You speak of your own wound,’ the giant called Iho’nen judged.

‘My wound is my purpose,’ said the traveller with glacial passion.

‘As is mine.’ But in Iho’nen’s voice there was no passion at all.

For a time they were silent, brooding on private shadows.

Finally the traveller spoke: ‘I walk the vash’yatol, Iho’nen. I cannot linger on this failing world. When do we begin?’

‘I have activated the Catalyst,’ the giant answered. ‘He is already here.’

TWENTY-NINE DAYS BEFORE UNITY
THE IRON JUNGLE

The locals called the inner skin of Vyshodd’s dome the Iron Jungle. Climbing through the gloomy industrial labyrinth bolted to the perimeter wall of Sector Nineteen, Haniel Mordaine felt it was an eminently fitting name. His path spiralled upwards, shadowing the dome in a tangle of catwalks and girders that heaved and groaned like an iron man bloated with corrosion. It was an arduous ascent, but he’d resisted the lure of the intermittent pneumatic lifts, preferring the certainty of a long, hard climb to the possibility of a short, infinitely harder fall.

If this architectural heresy kills me I’ll never know the truth of things, he thought grimly. I’ll never know the truth of him. Angel’s Blood, is this Calavera even a man?

For almost two months Mordaine had been lying low in a decrepit traders’ hostel waiting for word from their contact while Kreeger salved his anxieties with cheap Oblazti lodka and narcotic glitterfish oils.

‘The Calavera is in deep,’ his lieutenant had explained. ‘It’s the way he operates. How he sniffs out the rot.’

‘You make him sound like a dog, Kreeger,’ Mordaine had taunted.

‘A bloodhound,’ Kreeger had corrected, ‘the best the grand master had – and the only player in the conclave who buys your story. He’s all you’ve got, duke.’

‘And I’m grateful for his friendship, of course–’

‘Friendship?’ Kreeger had shaken his head. ‘No, duke, you’re useful to him. I’ve told you before, he thinks you’re the key to the real enemy.’

‘But I don’t know a damn thing!’

A shrug. ‘Maybe you don’t need to.’

And then Mordaine had tried the Question, as he’d done countless times before: ‘What is he, Kreeger?’

And as always, Kreeger had offered the same hollow answer: ‘Never met him. Nobody ever did except the grand master. All the rest of us ever had was a name.’

A name I never knew, Mordaine thought bitterly. I was your protégé, Escher – your damned interrogator – but you never trusted me with the identity of your finest operative. And if you concealed that then what else did you hide from me?

‘How did you find him?’ Mordaine had tried.

‘I didn’t,’ Kreeger had answered. ‘He found us.’

‘Yet the entire Damocles Conclave failed?’

‘Maybe because he’s been covering our trail.’

Watching over me as I scurry from one dismal backwater world to another like a frightened rat! Tugging my strings…

Mordaine snatched at a guardrail as his boot punched through a rust-riddled plate and sent fragments clattering into the abyss below. Frozen rigid, he waited until the shuddering walkway had steadied before gingerly sliding his foot free. Once again he cursed the Calavera for sending him on this lethal errand.

Word had finally come two days ago.

‘He’s found them,’ Kreeger had relayed. ‘The tau are here.’

‘On Oblazt?’ Mordaine had slurred through a lodka-soaked daze.

‘In this hive,’ Kreeger had said. ‘Whatever’s coming, it starts here. It’s time to step up and take control, interrogator.’

‘Interrogator…’ Mordaine had been ashamed of the sudden, gut-wrenching terror that seized him. ‘I’ll be exposed… The conclave will come for me.’

‘And they’ll find a man who’s done his duty.’ Kreeger had actually grinned then, but it was all teeth and no eyes. ‘This is where you make things right.’

‘I need to meet the Calavera.’

‘What you need is muscle. An army. This is what he wants you to do…’

And once again I’m dancing to the Calavera’s tune, Mordaine thought miserably as he resumed his ascent. And the worst, most damnable thing about it is he’s right! An army is precisely what I need.

Two levels further up, his army found him. The sentries surged from the shadows overhead, leaping between the swaying gantries with the wild yet graceful assurance of natural acrobats. Watching them descend, Mordaine understood why they’d made the dome’s canopy their eyrie. Oblazt might not be their home world, but up in this vertiginous web they were its masters.

Save for the quirks of fate, these warriors might have been enemies of the Imperium, Mordaine thought. Savagery runs dangerously deep in the blood of the Iwujii Sharks. After all, they’ve been bred for it.

The military harvested its recruits young on Iwujii Secundus, Kreeger had explained, fast-tracking children into soldiers through a state-sanctioned programme of internecine wars that culled the weak and brutalised the strong. It was a barbarous tradition that predated the planet’s assimilation into the Imperium, but one the Departmento Munitorum had been rather taken with, for the practice offered a steady stream of hardened troops for the Imperial Guard.

‘The Iwujii Sharks aren’t what you’d call well-adjusted regiments,’ Kreeger had warned, ‘but they live, breathe and bleed the Imperial Creed. You’ve just got to handle them right.’

Offering neither threat nor submission, Mordaine studied the men who encircled him. They were all slight of build, with burnished copper skin and ebony hair that hung about their shoulders in elaborately braided dreadlocks. Their features were striking, with high cheekbones and sharply canted green eyes. Most didn’t look a year past twenty and all exuded an energy that seemed to rage against stillness. They wore tight-fitting fatigues of viridian striped with crimson slashes like open wounds and a haphazard array of leather armour. The majority sported vambraces and greaves, one a pair of shoulder pads wrought with splayed claws, another a breastplate carved into the likeness of a snarling tree. These warriors were evidently Iwujii first and Imperial Guard second. They weren’t the kind of troops Mordaine would have chosen, but they were the only regiment stationed on Oblazt.

Regiment? One company, Mordaine calculated soberly. Just three hundred men to seize the reins of a hive and expose a xenos conspiracy…

‘My lieutenant sent word to your commanding officers,’ Mordaine declared, hesitating only a moment before committing himself: ‘I am Inquisitor Aion Escher, Grand Master of the Damocles Conclave. By authority of the Holy Orders of the Inquisition I am hereby sequestering all Imperial forces stationed on this planet to assist me in the prosecution of the Emperor’s justice.’

Keeping his movements slow and steady, Mordaine drew a heavy seal from his coat and brandished it like a defensive ward. The grand master’s seal – the seal he’d stolen after watching his mentor die.

I didn’t know, Escher, Mordaine swore. I didn’t know that girl was an assassin…

He quashed the guilt, drawing strength from the awe in the troopers’ eyes as they recognised the stylised ‘I’ emblazoned on the seal. For a few brief weeks his every word would carry the sanction of the Imperium’s most feared authority.

I can do this, Escher, Mordaine promised, though he didn’t know if it was an apology or a curse.

TOWARDS UNITY
ABOVE THE DOME

Veiled by the emptiness at the roof of the world, the outsider called Iho’nen watched as the Catalyst moved his design towards its apogee. The remote outpost he’d claimed and upgraded with xenos tech was awash with a fluid cacophony of information – tapped vox-communications and vid-feeds… economic and social statistics rendered as filigree neon algorithms and charts… a constantly updating parade of psych profiles… Iho’nen drank it all in like a giant data-devouring spider, assimilating, correlating and assessing a thousand facts every minute.

Days passed, yet he stood motionless, waiting as rigorously calculated probabilities crystallised into absolutes. Occasionally minor errors would manifest, prompting him to intervene through a reagent element, but this did not trouble him. It was the errors, or more precisely their correction, that kept him from becoming irrelevant.

His fellow outsider, the xenos, did not watch with him, for he was travelling.

THREE DAYS BEFORE UNITY
HÖSOK PLAZA, VYSHODD ANCHOR HIVE

The first steps had gone smoothly enough, Mordaine reflected. Both the Iwujii Sharks and the hive’s ruling oligarchy had acceded to his authority, albeit sullenly in the case of the Koroleva nobles. With his force swelled by the hive’s Ironspine Hussars, he’d launched himself into the hunt with the fervour of a man racing death, which of course he was. If he didn’t uncover something tangible before the conclave caught up with him, he would be finished. His life was almost certainly forfeit regardless, but there was still honour to fight for, and, somewhat to his surprise, he’d accepted that might be enough.

But everything hinged on finding the tau.

The spoor of the xenos permeated Vyshodd like a spreading disease. He’d discovered fragments of strange machinery in the manufactories – sleek, geodesic blasphemies that shrugged off dirt and sang with unholy life. Then there’d been the rogue tech-priest who peddled enhanced trinkets guaranteed to run for a lifetime without power-ups or prayer. Most unsettling of all had been the abominable xenos sculptures adorning a Koroleva pleasure mansion. The brash minimalism of those abstracts had been an affront to decent Imperial aesthetics! Individually they were petty heresies, but together they pointed to a systemic infiltration that had been eroding Vyshodd for years, possibly decades. And then there was Unity.

Unity – a simple, beautiful and perfectly ruinous lie.

Rumour had it that a common fishery worker had formulated the creed in her rest periods, scrawling her ideas on scraps of packaging then spreading them by word of mouth. The doctrine espoused such deviant notions as the right to free speech and the wholesale redistribution of wealth, wrapping them up in a muddled entreaty to embrace some kind of galactic fraternity. It was puerile nonsense, yet it had spread among the ignorant and the oppressed like wildfire, as insidious as any Chaos cult. Mordaine didn’t doubt its true origins so he’d focused on rooting out the leaders, but all he’d found were followers – hundreds of them – who insisted that Unity had no leaders. How could it, when it was ‘the Many of One’!

And throughout this dismal farrago there had been no word from the Calavera.

‘Silence is good,’ Kreeger would assure him. ‘Silence means you’re on track.’

‘Then where are the warp-damned xenos?’ Mordaine had railed. ‘I’ve got nothing the conclave won’t find themselves!’

With the hive’s detention facilities overflowing and the population growing restive, Mordaine had tightened the screws, first with punitive rationing and curfews, then finally a string of executions, but nobody had come forward with anything he could use. Instead… this…

How can so many be so blind? Mordaine despaired as he weighed up the crowd gathering in the square below. He was crouched on a rooftop overlooking Hösok Plaza, a sprawling, statue-studded court dedicated to Oblazt’s Imperial liberators. The symbolism of the venue was not lost on him, but it was the sheer numbers that appalled him. There were thousands of them, mostly scruffy manufactory bondsmen and icebreakers, but also a smattering of municipal clerks and free traders. All had daubed their foreheads with the concentric blue circles of Unity. Despite its simplicity, there was something inherently alien about the symbol that repelled him.

‘I speak for the Many who walk as One!’ someone called from the square – a tall woman with the gaunt, febrile features of a tormented artist. The crowd fell silent at her voice, as if at a prearranged signal. ‘We offer you the open hand of friendship. Stand with us against the bloated tyranny that has betrayed this world!’

Mordaine could almost taste the seductive xenos heresy lacing her rhetoric. Yet despite her words the woman in the plaza appeared neither ignorant nor oppressed. Oblazt’s ruling class was a race apart from the commoners and she had the look. Mordaine was unsurprised, for the most zealous prophets of change often rose from the ruling strata. Sometimes it was guilt that drove their heresy, sometimes merely ennui, but the Inquisition had long understood the perils of privilege.

‘Cast off the shackles of your dead god and bear witness to a living unity that embraces all as One!’ the demagogue implored.

‘The heretics spit in the face of Father Terra,’ someone hissed beside Mordaine. Armande Uzochi. Since Mordaine’s journey into the canopy, the young Iwujii captain had become his second shadow, devoting himself to ‘the great inquisitor’ with an awe that bordered on reverence. Unfortunately there was a rancid, tightly coiled violence about the man that made Mordaine’s skin crawl. He suspected Uzochi was quite probably insane.

The right man to have by my side today…

‘Give the order,’ Mordaine said, feeling disconnected – disconnecting himself – as Uzochi voxed the platoon leaders. Ranks of Iwujii Sharks rose along the rooftops like vengeful spirits, silent and watchful. There was a clatter of booted feet below, and white-uniformed Ironspine Hussars appeared at every egress from the square, lining up in neat formations. The crowd backed away, congealing at the centre of the square as if density might offer some safety, but the rebel speaker held her ground.

‘Truth cannot be silenced!’ she proclaimed, spreading her arms wide, palms open. ‘Every martyr you burn will forge two stronger heroes!’ Her eyes glittered a radiant azure, ignited by the passion of her belief.

Why did you choose me for this filthy work, Escher? Mordaine asked, as he’d done so many times before, but never of the grand master himself. You knew I didn’t have the conviction to stomach it.

Impossibly, the rebel seemed to be looking directly at him now.

‘An inquisitor must armour his soul in ice,’ Escher answered from the crumbling mortuary of Mordaine’s faith. ‘The ordinary mass of mankind is irrelevant, as are even the most exceptional individuals. It is the divine thread of our species that the Inquisition safeguards. All else is either expendable or inimical.’

No. Mordaine strangled the dry, dead voice in his head. You’re wrong, Escher. Otherwise what’s the point to any of it?

‘Captain…’ he began.

‘Purge the heretics!’ Uzochi bellowed, misinterpreting him. ‘For Father Terra!’

No! Mordaine tried to scream, but he had no voice and a heartbeat later there was a surfeit of screams as his army opened fire.

Kreeger was waiting for him in the stairwell, smoking a lho-stick.

‘Tell the Calavera I’m done,’ Mordaine said, stepping past him.

‘He’s going to come in,’ Kreeger called after him. ‘He has a few loose ends to tie up first, but–’

‘Too late,’ Mordaine said flatly.

‘Only a couple more days, duke.’

‘It was too late from the start, Kreeger.’ Mordaine turned, letting the rage well up in his chest like purifying fire. ‘We’ve been played – you, me and most especially your precious Calavera! Vyshodd was a trap. This slaughter… We’ve given the xenos exactly what they needed. We’ve proven the Imperium is a monster.’

‘Always was.’ Kreeger shrugged. ‘Just like all the rest.’

Mordaine faltered, his fury leeched away by the other’s indifference. Perplexed, he studied his lieutenant’s deeply seamed yet oddly bland face, trying to make sense of the man who’d been saving his skin for more years than he cared to count. Everything about Franz Kreeger was grey, from his gaunt complexion and the dusting of stubble on his scalp through to the barren alchemy of his soul.

His story was fairly typical of his breed: twenty years a storm trooper in the Guard, including a stint at the Cadian Gate, then secondment to an Inquisition taskforce to Phaedra, a world somewhere on the fringes of the Damocles Gulf, where he’d impressed the presiding inquisitor enough to win a place on his retinue. Later that inquisitor had become the grand master of the Damocles Conclave and later still he’d assigned Kreeger to support a promising new interrogator.

‘Keep him by your side, Mordaine,’ Escher had advised, ‘and he will keep you alive.’

This was certainly true. Without Kreeger, Mordaine would have stopped running long ago. Angel’s Blood, he wouldn’t have run at all.

‘This hive… This entire planet…’ Mordaine whispered. ‘It’s going to welcome the tau with open arms.’

‘We’re still in the game, duke,’ Kreeger said. ‘The Calavera has taken a prisoner.’ Then he offered a name.

Mordaine stared at him. And then he dared to hope.

FIRE

Once their hearts are ignited they will burn until hope itself has turned to ash.

– The Calavera

UNITY, VYSHODD ANCHOR HIVE

Liberation day dawned with a chain of synchronised explosions that levelled the nine Ironspine bastions, annihilating thousands of the Koroleva’s Hussars with surgical precision. Simultaneously insurrectionists rose up in the hive’s key facilities, fielding strange weaponry that outranged the archaic lasguns of the authorities. As the uprising spread its numbers grew exponentially, swelled by tens of thousands who knew they had nothing left to lose. After the atrocity in Hösok Plaza, few Oblazti harboured any illusions about Imperial mercy. Whatever hope they had lay in Unity.

But there was no hope.

The architects of the insurrection had made one fatal error, failing to consider the fragility of the anchor hive itself. The concurrent blasts that destroyed the Hussar bastions sent a shockwave of seismic proportions rippling through the hive’s foundations, shattering dozens of anchorspikes and placing the remainder under intolerable strain. With each passing hour more disintegrated, causing the hive to buck and heave like a ship in a storm, tearing entire blocks apart. Whatever the outcome of the rebellion, Vyshodd had been mortally wounded.

At the roof of the world, the outsiders’ hideout shuddered in sympathy with the hive’s death agonies, but neither occupant appeared concerned.

‘You did not foresee this instability, Iho’nen,’ the traveller observed.

‘It is irrelevant,’ his giant companion replied, shutting down the outpost’s power. This gesture was also irrelevant, but the centuries had made him fastidious. ‘The deviation falls within tolerable parameters.’

‘Unless the canopy collapses beneath us,’ the traveller suggested with a trace of dry humour. ‘Nevertheless, it pleases me.’

‘The devastation?’

‘Your fallibility,’ the traveller said seriously.

‘Then I will endeavour to disappoint you in future.’ Iho’nen threw the hatch open and gauged the shuddering dome. ‘It would be prudent to proceed swiftly.’

The hive was drowning in a swirling storm of smoke and snow, its harsh panorama of tenements and manufactories faded to coarse abstractions by the smog. Here and there angry reds and oranges bloomed among the dark blocks, marking the virulent spread of the fire. The streets were flooded with a deluge of citizenry, the dispossessed and the destroyers melded together into an amalgam mob by the impartial flames. They wailed and raged as they moved through the burning hive like trapped grubs, fighting and fleeing by turns.

High above the chaos, crouched on a girder like a bird of ill omen, Ujurakh, who his people called Sourblood, watched their terror and rejoiced. Although his perch swayed dangerously he was untroubled, for his blood was alight with the catastrophe. He had not felt so alive since the Empty One first brought him to this miserable world of ice and iron, many blood seasons ago.

A stir of movement on a rooftop below caught his attention. Curious, he craned his long neck sinuously, but the source eluded him. Clicking low in his throat with irritation he slipped beneath his perch, clinging on with his talons as he hung upside down, straining to pierce the snow-smog. Then he had them – a dozen prey beasts creeping across the flat roof, striving for swiftness and secrecy, but making a mockery of both. Half were dragging unwieldy cases while the rest flittered protectively around them with guns, and a taller creature hurried them along with a sabre. Ujurakh hissed with surprise, recognising one of the elusive high breeds of the city. Unlike the squat, pallid commoners he had been forced to hunt, this creature was tawny-skinned, with an arrogant bearing that spoke of easy command. Usually the high breeds kept to their fortified palaces, shielded from the squalor, but the fire had finally flushed them out. He guessed this one hoped to make its escape across the rooftops, never imagining that its path would carry it into Ujurakh’s hunting grounds.

What secret twists turn such proud enshrouded meat? Ujurakh wondered raptly. And what shifting, gifted shapes nest locked within?

He snapped his beak shut to catch the saliva pooling in his maw and considered: the Empty One had summoned him, but fate had cast this mystery in his path when the hunger was upon him. That he had gorged himself mere hours ago mattered not, for the hunger ebbed and flowed with the inconstant contours of the fleshweave. What to do?

Then the fugitives were directly below him and the time for doubt was past. Ujurakh drew his twin carving blades and hurled himself into the air with an ululating squawk of bliss. The prey beasts looked up, their flat, dull faces made duller by bewilderment, the surprise dissolving to terror as they glimpsed his lethal symmetry. A couple of the guards raised their rifles, but their movements were sluggish to Ujurakh’s fervent eyes. He twisted in midair, hooting as he danced around the languid flurry of their first las-rounds, knowing the first would be the last.

As the ground swept up to meet him, Sourblood flipped over, angling himself to strike one of the guards with his extended talons. The attack tore straight through his victim, sundering the man and splattering his comrades with blood. Ujurakh’s powerful legs bent to absorb the impact and launched him back into the air, pitching him over the heads of the panicked gaggle. As they turned with pitiful slowness he dived among them with a blade in each hand, a slashing, slicing predator among indolent cattle. They flailed about and screamed and died until only the highborn remained.

‘Please…’ the creature whimpered, throwing aside its sabre and falling to its knees. ‘It’s yours!’ It waved at the fallen cases that had burst open, scattering glimmering trinkets across the roof. Such baubles might have tempted Ujurakh once, but he was Sourblood now and beyond simple wealth. He had saved the high breed till last to test its mettle and found nothing but a snivelling hatchling. ‘There’s more…’

Disappointed, Ujurakh beheaded the beast with a scissoring, twin-bladed swipe and plunged his beak into the foaming neck. Though its spirit had been weak, its flesh was delightfully free of the fish and fire oils that tainted the common herd. The Sourblood croaked deep in his throat and fed.

The wind was a constant companion outside the dome, yet Sergeant Thierry Chizoba could still hear the hive’s death screams. Then again, maybe it was the wind itself that carried the screams so far. It was certainly malicious enough.

Oblazt. Even the name is bitter, he mused. It is no world for the Iwujii.

The sergeant flicked his lho-stick away and continued his patrol, keeping close to the walls of the maglev terminus where it was a fraction warmer. Like every building on Oblazt, the station was a monolithic slab of crumbling rockcrete, but behind its derelict façade it had been kept in pristine condition by an army of tech-priests and servitors. Their true charge was the vehicle within, a Chain Engine big enough to whisk away every aristo in the city if things got too hot. Chizoba had once walked the length of the titanic train, counting over two thousand strides as he marvelled at its wrought-iron hide and brass-girdled portholes. There were nineteen carriages in total, suspended well above head height on a splayed skirt that shielded its magnetic suspensors. Wheels weren’t good enough for this monster! It would soar over the ice on a tide of blistering energy while the gargoyles perched along its crenellated heights glared their contempt at the land below. Chizoba could almost taste the patina of spite that enamelled the train. It was an old engine that had borne witness to myriad sins, both sweet and sour. Their unquiet residue ran through its cogs like phantom blood.

It is a proud and vicious beast, Chizoba had sensed with a shudder. Dangerous.

How the bluebloods had raged when Inquisitor Escher had seized their secret engine for his headquarters, but they weren’t going to argue with three hundred Sharks!

Except we’re less than half that now… Chizoba cast a baleful glance at the storage shed where the bodies of his comrades had been stashed like frozen meat. We knew something was coming, yet Grandfather Death took us like un-blooded fools!

He’d been on the dawn watch when the hive had broken out in a rash of explosions, as if hit by an orbital bombardment. Moments later the station concourse had been awash with the pneumatic rhythm of gunfire and Chizoba had dived for cover as a hulking abomination forged from metal and bloodless flesh stalked from the terminus, spitting bullets from the barrels fused to its arms. More of the living dead machines had emerged from the hangar, bearing down on the nearest Sharks like Grandfather Death’s heralds. Over a hundred men had been lost before the last of the combat servitors went down. Doubtless the attack had been the work of the cog priests who tended the train. There was no telling how many of the machine-worshipping scum had turned traitor – or why – because they’d all vanished by the time the fighting was done.

Another tremor shook the ice and Chizoba eyed the dome of the hive warily. An hour ago there’d been a thunderous splintering and a fissure had split the canopy wide open, ejecting torrents of black smoke into the roiling sky.

How long can we wait for the captain? Chizoba mused. We bled to hold on to that damned train. It owes us a ride out of here.

His eyes wandered guiltily to Lieutenant Omazet. She was kneeling outside the warehouse, chanting the death rites for the fallen, as was her sacred duty. She was an officer, but her authority ran deeper than any mundane rank could convey for she was also La Mal Kalfu, a priestess who had dedicated herself to Father Terra in his darkest aspect as the Midnight Judge. Her kind were rare and revered among the Iwujii and the Third Company was graced by her presence, but the troops feared her more than any commissar.

She is a blessed curse, Chizoba thought. He was reluctant to disturb her, but with the inquisitor and the captain absent she held authority here. She turned as he approached, breaking off the ritual to freeze him with her terrible, eyeless gaze. He knew the black pits of Adeola Omazet’s eye sockets were just a contrivance of lens-grafts and paint, but when combined with the skull tattooed across her face the effect was uncanny. Besides, his spirit knew the truth of her.

‘You have a question, Thierry?’ she asked softly. He shivered at the sound of his name on her lips. It was customary for La Mal Kalfu to address their charges by their first names, lending their words an intimate threat.

‘Do you think they still live, lieutenant?’ he croaked.

‘I believe they do,’ Omazet said. ‘And we will stand vigil until they return.’

He bowed his head, knowing she’d seen through to his true question: When can we flee this place?

‘Faith is best served blind, Thierry.’ She returned to her sacrament, dismissing him. There would be no flight.

His eyes raw with smoke, the hem of his scarlet greatcoat smouldering, Mordaine staggered through the burning streets, struggling to keep up with his surviving troops. The trio of Sharks dodged or leapt the debris in their path without breaking stride while he stumbled around it, wheezing hard. He’d lost sight of Kreeger and Uzochi a few blocks back, when they’d got tangled up in a skirmish between some desperate Hussars and what seemed like a whole sea of rebels. After that their orderly retreat had become a frantic race for the terminus.

‘Back up!’ the lead Shark yelled. ‘That whole block’s coming down!’

There was a rending screech as the upper storey of the building ahead sheared away and came tumbling down, ricocheting between the neighbouring tenements like a colossal, infernal die. Mordaine skidded to a halt, flailing wildly for balance.

‘Down!’ someone snarled, shoving him to the ground as blazing fragments sizzled overhead, decapitating one of the troopers and almost tearing another in half. The third lost a leg at the thigh and whirled about like a one-legged dancer until another shard ripped a tunnel through his chest.

‘Up!’ Mordaine’s saviour rose beside him, looking like a wiry scarecrow in black flak armour. Kreeger.

‘I told you this was a bad idea, duke,’ the veteran said.

Yes, you did, Mordaine admitted. His lieutenant had argued sternly against re-entering the hive, urging him to sit tight and wait for their ally, warning that the Calavera had insisted on it. That had been the tipping point for Mordaine and he’d insisted on leading an expedition into Vyshodd to assess the uprising. It had been irrational but, after the string of humiliations he’d endured in the Calavera’s name, the need to defy his shadowy benefactor had been irresistible – and disastrous. They’d turned back as soon as they’d run into the first mob, but it had already cost them dearly.

It was necessary, Mordaine thought furiously. I am nobody’s fool.

‘We should get moving, duke,’ Kreeger said, watching him quizzically.

‘I thought you’d fallen, Kreeger,’ Mordaine said, but it was a lie. He couldn’t imagine this grey man dying. He gestured at the rubble-choked avenue they’d been following. ‘Is there another way to the terminus?’

‘This is a hive.’ Kreeger shrugged. ‘There’s always another way.’

Sourblood… The Empty One’s call stirred inside Ujurakh’s skull, a brittle but insistent whisper like the echo of something unforgettable forgotten. Lost in the rapture of his feeding he tried to ignore it, but the whisper became a whine, threatening the bright, obliterating pain that bound him to his master. Once he had mocked pain, as all great warriors did, but that was before he’d learnt what pain truly was. That did not lessen the rage and shame he felt at his bondage, though he doubted any of his blood kindred would have endured the torment any better. Blood kindred? He had none. They had named him Sourblood and cast him out!

Ujurakh realised his feast had grown quiet. The summons had numbed his palate to the delicate riddle of the flesh. Furious, he surged to his feet, letting the silent meat slip from his beak. Once again the Empty One had stolen his joy. With a squawk of disgust, he sheathed his blades in their leather harness and sprang into motion, sprinting for the parapet. He leapt at the last moment, soaring over the gulf to crash down onto the adjacent rooftop. Without pause he hurtled on, skittering over the frozen skin of the burning city, chasing the beacon that chained him.

‘Sergeant,’ a trooper called. ‘You need to take a look at this.’

Keeping low, Thierry Chizoba crept over to the squad crouched by the gates of the terminus. They’d reinforced the position with the company’s precious heavy bolter to cover the icebound expanse between their sanctuary and the great dome.

Chizoba squinted, trying to make out the figures approaching through the fluttering weave of snow. There were two of them, both clad in grey robes, their faces hidden in arched cowls. They were walking at a measured pace, seemingly untroubled by the soldiers watching them. One seemed impossibly tall, yet it was the other one that troubled him most deeply. There was something wrong with its gait, a subtle hop, almost as if its joints were deformed. Or built differently to those of a man…

‘There will be someone else coming,’ the inquisitor had warned before he left. ‘You’ll know them when you see them.’

‘Go get the lieutenant,’ Chizoba ordered, unsure why he was whispering.

Keeping low, Kreeger peered round the junction ahead. They’d almost reached the outer wall of the dome when a babble of voices had slowed them to a crawl and they’d found a throng of Oblazti gathered in the next street. Perhaps a desperate Koroleva captive had led the mob here or perhaps it had been blind chance.

‘How many?’ Mordaine whispered, already certain the answer was too many.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ the veteran said. ‘We’re out of time. We have to go through them.’

‘Kreeger…’ Mordaine began uneasily.

‘Surprise and shock,’ his lieutenant interrupted. ‘We hit them hard and push through to the terminus. Don’t stop for anything.’ He unclipped a strangely fluted grenade from his bandolier. ‘When the numbers are against you…’

His words were drowned by a clamour of gunfire and shouts from the street behind them. Mordaine spun and saw a ragged band of Sharks charging towards them with Armande Uzochi at their head and what looked like half the hive on their tail. The Iwujii captain was laughing wildly as he snapped off shots at his pursuers.

‘I guess we’re done with surprise,’ Kreeger muttered, twisting the casing of his grenade. ‘Shock’ll have to carry it.’

He hurled the explosive into the adjacent street and ducked back. There was a bright flare and a whoosh of heat and then he was moving again. ‘Go!’ Bolt pistol in one hand, shock maul in the other, he leapt round the corner before the concussion had faded. Mordaine drew his pistol and followed.

‘Tears of Sanguinius…’ He stopped in his tracks, appalled by the carnage in the next street. The grenade’s blast had sounded insignificant beside the cataclysm tearing the hive apart, but it had exacted a terrible toll in the close-packed avenue. Through a haze of dust he saw bodies everywhere, charred and smoking. Those who could still stand were staggering about blindly, clutching at faces that had been scorched to the bone.

‘Quit dreaming, duke!’ Kreeger yelled from somewhere up ahead.

As the dust settled Mordaine saw the blast had only broken half the mob. Further along the street at least thirty still stood and Kreeger was already among them, swinging his maul like a madman. The survivors were sluggish with shock and armed with makeshift weapons, but their numbers would be telling once they rallied. All sported the concentric circles of Unity on their foreheads, marking them as wilful traitors rather than hapless folk caught up in the chaos. Suddenly that austere icon seemed to symbolise so much – lies within lies, encircling and constricting Mordaine’s own fate into an unbroken and unbreakable spiral fall…

If I die here the Imperium will remember me as a traitor, he realised, if it remembers me at all. He wasn’t sure which possibility troubled him more.

Filled with bleak rage, he set his antique laspistol to rapid fire and charged the mob. He was no marksman, but skill mattered little against such numbers, especially when a man was wielding an Argent Repeater. Kreeger had often mocked the baroque weapon as a vanity piece, but it was vindicating Mordaine’s faith now.

Only the thread matters, Escher’s words spun through Mordaine’s head, over and over, like a mantra of exoneration for the lives he was ending. Only the thread…

Smoke billowed abruptly from his pistol’s casing. As Mordaine fumbled with the setting a hulking rebel swung at him with a masonry-tipped pole. He flung himself backwards and the block whipped past his face with an inch to spare, then came arcing back like a pendulum. This time it whirled over his head as he slipped and crashed onto his back, mercifully holding on to the Repeater. As his attacker loomed over him he levelled the pistol with both hands and fired. The weapon whined and died. The rebel grinned as a bolt-round tore through his skull from behind.

‘I told you to keep moving, duke!’ Kreeger yelled, offering his hand. ‘We–’

A spike erupted from his throat, spattering Mordaine with blood. Kreeger’s eyes rolled down to peer at the tine jutting from his neck, then swivelled back to Mordaine like painted glass orbs. There was no fear in them, not even shock or pain, just a profound ambivalence. Stunned, Mordaine saw Kreeger try for a shrug. Then the spike was yanked free and the grey man toppled into oblivion.

Were you always dead inside? Mordaine wondered numbly. Or did something make you that way?

Mordaine rolled aside as Kreeger’s killer, a one-eyed fishery worker, jabbed at him with the blood-slick harpoon. Desperately the interrogator feinted a roll, grabbed the spike and thrust back on it. Taken by surprise, his foe skidded over, losing his grip on the weapon. Screaming holy obscenities like a possessed man, Mordaine swung the harpoon about by its spike, striving to keep the traitors at bay.

With an ululating war cry Armande Uzochi leapt past him, whirling his heavy-bladed machete like a crazed dancer. A handful of Sharks followed, one stopping to haul Mordaine up as he passed. The interrogator glanced round and saw the pursuing horde was almost upon them. There was a mania driving that sea of wild, broken faces that had nothing to do with the ideals of Unity.

The tau will never understand us, Escher had once observed. They cannot because they lack our infinite capacity for insanity.

‘Inquisitor!’ Uzochi snapped. ‘We must go!’ The captain was radiant with violence, his sharpened teeth stained with blood.

At least Kreeger never enjoyed the killing, Mordaine thought vaguely.

Ujurakh vaulted over the wall of the station compound and flattened himself in the snow, listening for sentries. He could hear the prey beasts jabbering in the distance, but none were close. Predictably they had all flocked to the main gate, drawn only to the obvious threat.

Such blunt unthinking eyes with which they see with and seem to be like, the Sourblood mocked. Their thoughts are as flat and feeble as their faces!

After leaving the hive he’d set out across the ice and circled back, approaching his destination from behind, as the Empty One had instructed. For once he’d been grateful for his master’s call, for without it he would have been swallowed by the white nothingness. Keeping low, he crept towards the building ahead, seeking the great engine his master had described.

Thierry Chizoba steeled himself as he returned to the gates where the robed giant waited, looming over the Sharks like a harbinger from the old tales. The stranger’s face was shrouded inside his cowl, but he was obviously watching the road to the hive, indifferent to the shadow he cast. Only Lieutenant Omazet seemed unaffected, but then she was a shadow creature herself.

‘I have secured the prisoner,’ Chizoba reported, ‘and Ironfingers has awakened the engine’s machine-spirit.’

‘They are coming,’ the grey giant said. His voice resonated with a sibilant metallic harmony, doubtless due to a helmet of some kind, yet it was surprisingly soft. Not at all the kind of voice Chizoba would have expected from a Space Marine, for surely the stranger could not be anything else.

‘I see nothing,’ Omazet said.

‘My eye sees truer than either of yours,’ the giant answered.

Mordaine hurtled round another corner and suddenly he was past the canopy and racing straight into the biting teeth of the blizzard. He could see the dark smudge of the terminus ahead, just a few hundred metres away. Uzochi was still at his side, but the other Sharks were gone, devoured by the gestalt beast at their back.

It will follow us out onto the ice, Mordaine sensed, and on into perdition.

He heard Uzochi yell the watchword as the station’s defenders came into sight. They were just vague sketches in the white maelstrom, and poor ones at that, for one of them seemed unfeasibly tall. As Mordaine tried to make sense of that deviant figure the rest opened fire. Las-bolts and solid rounds hissed past him, leaving steaming contrails in the flurry. He glanced round and saw the front ranks of the mob fall, but the rest surged on regardless – numberless – uncoiling from the hive like a serpent.

Even if we reach the train, the Dragon of Vyshodd will overtake us…

And then a small sun detonated behind him, washing the swarm with flames and beheading the serpent. The shockwave hurled Mordaine forwards and smashed him into the ice with a bone-crushing force then sent him tumbling towards darkness.

His back was on fire! Frantically he rolled over, screaming as his shattered ribs protested. Gasping breaths of jagged glass, he spat blood onto the ice. Blearily he saw Uzochi stagger past. The captain was howling with pain as he fought to cast off his blazing coat. Then Mordaine heard other, angrier howls as a pack of survivors lurched out of the smoke. Their flesh was blackened, but the murder in their eyes was undimmed.

You were right, Escher, Mordaine thought. When we fall, we fall hard.

An explosive mechanical roaring erupted over the wind and the damned were torn asunder. Dazed, Mordaine turned his head and saw a robed giant striding towards him. It was wielding the Sharks’ heavy bolter as a mortal man would wield a rifle. The warrior spun about at the waist, scything down the traitors with blunt efficiency. Uzochi crashed down beside the reaper and caught sight of its hooded face.

‘Grandfather Death comes for us!’ he cried. Mordaine couldn’t tell if it was terror or rapture that moved the captain, but in that scream he heard the last thread of the captain’s frayed sanity snap.

Then the stranger was standing over Mordaine and he understood that Uzochi was right, for it was death incarnate. The wind had whipped away its cowl, revealing a stylised bronze skull whose eye sockets were melded into a single dark aperture. A crystal orb burned in the recess, embedded just above the bridge of its nasal cavity, lending the harbinger a cyclopean aspect.

‘Calavera,’ Mordaine whispered, knowing it must be so.

ASH

After the inferno has devoured itself, fall to your knees and scour the ashes, for that is where you will find Truth.

– The Calavera

SEVEN HOURS AFTER UNITY, UNDER THE SHADOW

The broken man opens his eyes as he is carried into the hanger. He is almost overcome by terror when he sees the train squatting on the maglev track, for it looks like a titanic serpent – and wasn’t a serpent hunting him just moments ago? But then he remembers that the vengeful serpent was made of flesh while this one shines bright silver. He even remembers that such serpents are called Chain Engines because they link the anchor hives of Oblazt. And then he also remembers that he cannot breathe and the terror returns twofold as he begins to choke on his own blood.

‘Will he live?’ a woman with the face of a skull asks as he slips away…

He joins Grand Master Escher in the brig of the Enshrouded Eye, the flagship of the Damocles Conclave. His mentor has brought him to see a tau prisoner captured at the tail end of the crusade. It is a tall, almost skeletally thin being that Escher calls an ethereal, one of the tau ruling caste. The creature regards him through the glass walls of its holding cell, assessing him as if he were the prisoner and it the captor. Its stillness runs blood deep, giving it the appearance of a surreal statue, a distended parody of a man forged to embody absolute serenity. Or superiority.

‘Tell me, interrogator, what do you see?’ Escher asks from the shadows. The question paralyses the broken man for he is both repelled and fascinated by the xenos prisoner. He understands that this is a test because everything Escher asks of him is a test, but even after years of service he has no idea what the ageless ancient wants of him. Perhaps it is Escher’s blindness that makes him so impossible to read.

‘Yes, what do you see, gue’la?’ the ethereal echoes, its voice penetrating the glass with shocking clarity. Is it mocking him?

‘I…’ Pinned between the scrutiny of two inscrutable beings, the broken man hesitates. ‘I see the unclean,’ he says. ‘I see a xenos monstrosity.’ Though his answer is not false he knows it is inadequate and so it chokes him and there is…

Pain beyond endurance! He opens his eyes and sees that Death has sliced him open and is rummaging about inside his chest, searching for truth.

‘You are killing him,’ protests the skull-faced woman, but he cannot tell if there is concern in her rebuke.

‘A rib has punctured his lungs, lieutenant,’ whispers Death, whose face, naturally, is also a skull. ‘He will drown in his own blood if I do not work it free.’

Another shadow lingers behind them both, little more than the transient impression of a dark man whose pale face is a geometric confluence of incandescent scars. He regards the patient with something that might be pity or contempt or perhaps nothing at all. One of his eyes burns with fever, the other, a corroded augmetic, with unholy fire.

‘It’s a lie,’ the stranger tells him wordlessly.

Then something snaps inside the broken man’s chest and he screams and the wraith is gone, banished to a deeper darkness where a daemon bell tolls.

Death looks up and appraises the broken man with a single eye of liquid glass. ‘Pain is an illusion, Haniel Mordaine,’ he says.

My name? Death knows my true name, Mordaine despairs as he falls into a memory of bright azure eyes and…

The hauntingly beautiful woman he has just introduced to Inquisitor Aion Escher blossoms with blades and strikes him down, unravelling his mentor into a meaningless spiral of blood and bone. She has murdered the grand master before Mordaine has even finished introducing her as his new data specialist. Then she turns to him with a smile like silver slaughter, but Kreeger puts her down with a bolt round before she can take a step.

‘She was an assassin,’ Mordaine says flatly. ‘I brought an assassin aboard the Enshrouded Eye.’

‘We have to go, duke,’ Kreeger replies as he searches Escher’s body.

‘Go…?’

‘Fast and far from here.’ The mercenary nods in satisfaction as he finds the inquisitor’s seal. ‘These are gene-coded, but it won’t hurt to have it.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Like you said, you brought an assassin on board the grand master’s ship,’ Kreeger explains as if he is talking to a child. ‘In the Inquisition’s eyes that’s going to make you a traitor or a fool.’ Somewhere an alarm begins to wail. ‘So, do you want to live?’

I can’t die, Mordaine gasps at Death, even though he knows mercy is a mystery to such a being.

‘No,’ whispers the one-eyed harbinger. ‘That would be wasteful.’

FROST

Truth is cold, yet it burns brighter than any delirium. Be wary, for it is the most pernicious of all vices.

 – The Calavera

ONE DAY AFTER UNITY, THE GHOSTLANDS

The maglev train swooped through the white nothingness of the wilderness like a ghost engine haunting a phantom world, invisibly harnessed to the single track embossed into the ice. Despite its speed it moved in almost total silence, only the low-frequency hum of its propulsion drive and the soft crackle of magnetically charged particles exposing it as a contrivance of the material world. Flickering indigo fire played about the ribbed skirts of its undercarriage, illuminating the narrow gap between its grooved suspensor plates and the track. Few folk on Oblazt understood the technomancy that kept the train suspended an inch above the rail and none possessed the skill to repair it. It was old tech, dating back to the first colonisation of the planet.

Such things did not concern the Sourblood. It was the thrill of speed that had lured him out onto the hide of the machine. He crouched atop the rear carriage like a penitent gargoyle, his talons gripping the gabled hull and his arms thrown wide to embrace the screaming wind, exhorting it to scour away the filth of the hive.

The blood of the flat-faces runs thin, he rejoiced, but their machine runs with fire in its belly!

Ujurakh had already explored the length and breadth of the vehicle, travelling via the roof to evade the flat-faces as he mapped its narrow territories. There were nineteen carriages in total, trailing behind the sheared wedge of the drive cabin like a string of carved boxes. Each was linked to the next by a cantilevered platform that twisted and turned with the contortions of the track. The flat-faces would never linger at these exposed intersections and none had ventured onto the roof. They were not fools, Ujurakh had decided, but they were overly fearful of the cold. He would use that against them when the time came. And it could not come soon enough…

Twice already he’d almost surrendered to the urge to snatch a lone straggler as it passed between the carriages. Would they miss one flat-face among so many? But he already knew the answer that really mattered: his master would notice.

Wait, the Empty One had commanded, stamping the edict into Ujurakh’s skull with the promise of pain. Wait.

TWO DAYS AFTER UNITY

Slumped in a chair beside his cabin window, Haniel Mordaine stared gloomily at the frozen tundra of the Ghostlands. It was impossible to gauge the Chain Engine’s velocity against that featureless limbo. He might as well be watching an endlessly looping vid-feed, yet despite the monotony he knew the train was devouring the distance to Yakov all too quickly. Yakov Hive, where the spaceport lay. Where the conclave would be waiting for him.

I’m not ready. I need more time.

‘Two days,’ he whispered. ‘I lost almost two days.’ He hadn’t mustered the courage to examine his bandaged chest yet. The pain told him all he wanted to know.

‘Your wound was most grievous, inquisitor,’ Lieutenant Omazet said, hovering behind him like a sullen spectre. ‘Without Captain Calavera’s talents you would be a dead man.’

‘Captain Calavera?’ Despite his discomfort, the appellation amused Mordaine. Although it was by no means an unlikely title for a Space Marine, it didn’t ring true for his tenebrous patron. It was too honest.

‘I did not know your contact was an Astartes,’ Omazet said. Was there a hint of accusation in her voice?

‘An Adeptus Astartes,’ Mordaine corrected. Abuses of High Gothic had always irked him. ‘You didn’t know because I chose not to tell you, lieutenant.’ And because I didn’t know either, damn him! ‘How is Captain Uzochi doing?’

‘He keeps to his cabin, chastising himself with shadows and solitude,’ she said. ‘An Iwujii officer bears a scar on his soul for every Shark he loses.’ She paused, pointedly. Reprovingly? ‘We lost many Sharks at Vyshodd, inquisitor.’

‘Give me numbers, please,’ he said, avoiding her gaze.

‘All told, the Third Company now fields just eighty-two Sharks.’

They both knew what the numbers meant: the Third was no longer viable. If the survivors ever returned to their regiment they would be reassigned to other companies. For the Third it was the end, for its captain something more shameful.

‘I regret your losses,’ Mordaine said quietly. Particularly the ones who died to satisfy my pride… ‘They were fine soldiers.’ She said nothing and he pressed on swiftly. ‘And this?’ He said, indicating the comms report.

‘Captain Calavera asked me to pass it on to you,’ Omazet said. ‘He communicated with the telepathica temple at Yakov privately.’

‘I see. Well, I believe it’s time I had words with the good captain.’ Mordaine’s ribs ground in protest as he rose from his chair. He grimaced as his head spun and Omazet’s face divided into a pair of grinning skulls.

‘Are you strong enough to walk, inquisitor?’ the skulls asked. Coming from them, it sounded like an allegation.

‘The Emperor’s work… won’t… wait on our pleasure,’ he wheezed, fighting down the nausea. ‘Duty is strength.’ He picked up the laspistol she’d brought him. It was a poor replacement for his Argent Repeater, but needs must.

‘Haniel,’ she called as he turned to go.

‘Yes, lieutenant,’ he said.

Haniel? He froze. How does she know my name? Damn those infernal lenses she wears! How can you read someone when you can’t see their eyes?

‘Haniel Mordaine,’ she murmured. ‘That is what Captain Calavera called you when you lay at Grandfather Death’s threshold.’

‘A man in my position acquires many names,’ he said dismissively. ‘Surely this doesn’t surprise you?’

She inclined her head. ‘As you say, inquisitor.’

‘Then don’t presume to question me again.’ As he stalked from the room he heard her tasting his name on her tongue, testing it for truth.

The Sourblood lay prone, wedged into a ventilation shaft above a softly lit chamber that occupied an entire carriage near the front of the train. His elongated head was pressed against a grille in the ceiling, twisted sideways so he could observe the space below with one baleful eye. It was a brazen hall, hung with obscene depictions of flat-face mating rituals and clotted with silk carpets and plump-cushioned chairs that begged to be shredded. It sang to him of cheap vanity and shallow hungers, conjuring up the grovelling lordling he’d gorged upon in the hive.

What thin, insignificant rhythms they entwine about themselves and think for a wonder, he sneered. The fleeting feeder dreams of grubs!

Intriguingly the throng of flat-faces gathered below appeared to agree, for they were treating the shameless carriage with open contempt, spitting and spilling their food with abandon as they feasted and caroused. Their leader, a short but powerfully muscled brute with a missing ear who the others called Chee-zoba, had named the place their ‘mess hall’ and his kindred had laughed and striven to make it so. Ujurakh had taken an instant liking to Chee-zoba. For a flat-face he had spirit and wit. When the time came he would make for good eating. Indeed, all the kine in this herd had a vitality that suggested they were not native to this flavourless waste world.

Unbidden, the hunger unwound itself in the hollows of his gut, urging him to tear aside the metal veil he lurked behind – to tear it aside and tear into them! A thick rope of drool slipped from his maw and splattered the shoulder pad of the flat-face directly under him. Ujurakh tensed, but neither the creature nor its comrades noticed the blunder. Furiously, he fought against the hunger, loath to abandon his spying. Curiosity was in his nature, as it should be for all his kind, for how else could a Shaper tease out the secret threads of the fleshweave and steer his people down a potent path? Already too many bloodlines had been doomed to stagnation by the apathy of timid Shapers. No, such as he could never be too curious, no matter what his kindred might say.

Never too curious, but perhaps incautious, he admitted.

The Empty One had commanded that he remain in hiding, and his master had a way of picking out every little transgression. No, these creatures’ antics were not worth the price of his displeasure. Reluctantly Ujurakh slithered away.

‘You are filthy, Akoto!’ Sergeant Thierry Chizoba snapped. Startled, the trooper who’d invited his reprimand looked up from his cards and reached for the shoulder Chizoba was pointing at. He grimaced as his fingers found the slime coating his armour. His comrades sniggered and one of them called to a skinny figure perched by a window: ‘Hey, you sneeze on Akoto again, Rémi?’

The accused trooper looked round, wiping guiltily at his wet nose. ‘Not me,’ he muttered with a lopsided grin.

‘Go back to your stargazing, Rémi,’ Chizoba said gruffly. No matter where he was, ‘Krazi’ Rémi Ngoro could always see the stars. The shiver fever had hit him hard after their arrival on Oblazt and it had messed up his head, but he was still the best cook in the company. Not that he had much competition any more…

So many lost, Chizoba mused as he regarded the men sprawled about the saloon carriage. His brothers had delighted in making the place their own and spitting in the face of the bluebloods who’d let the hive fall to heresy. Such decadence would have been unthinkable on Iwujii Secundus, where every infant entered the meat grinder of the Childe Wars as an equal and emerged a warrior, a slave or not at all.

‘It wasn’t me, sergeant,’ Rémi insisted, tugging at Chizoba’s sleeve. ‘It was the rain.’ He jabbed at the ceiling. ‘I saw it in the window… like a mirror.’

Chizoba nodded vaguely. He had no idea what the man was talking about, but that was often the way with Krazi Rémi. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘It was the rain.’

Mordaine hesitated at the threshold of the Imperator suite. There was a musty, dust-wreathed odour permeating the gold-panelled cabin that unsettled him almost as much as its grim occupant. The Space Marine’s bulk seemed to fill the space, though it was by no means cramped. The plush furnishings had been demolished and stacked neatly in the adjoining corridor, along with the door and much of its frame. The Koroleva oligarchs had not designed their luxury suites with giants in mind.

‘You know who I am,’ Mordaine said bluntly.

‘I do,’ answered the Calavera. He stood facing the doorway as if he had been expecting his visitor.

Which he probably was, Mordaine guessed. ‘Are you a Chaplain?’ he asked, indicating the giant’s bronze death mask.

‘I am not,’ the Space Marine answered. ‘Throughout the years I have served in many capacities, but never that.’

‘But your mask… the skull?’

‘It is my own emblem. Its significance is personal.’

‘Then I’d be obliged if you’d remove it,’ Mordaine said as he entered. ‘I prefer to address a man face to face, especially when discussing matters of consequence.’

‘I cannot.’

‘Surely there’s no need for secrecy between us?’ Mordaine spread his hands expansively. ‘You and I are allies and men of high standing in the conclave–’

‘Your standing is that of a traitor and an assassin, Haniel Mordaine,’ the Calavera said without rancour. ‘In the conclave’s eyes you are an outcast.’

‘But as you are well aware, I am entirely innocent of the murder of Grand Master Escher.’

‘Entirely?’

‘I…’ The words arrived stillborn in Mordaine’s throat. It was as if the Calavera’s crystal eye could see through to his soul.

And who’s to say it can’t? Mordaine thought uneasily.

‘Your Chapter…’ he hesitated. He could see nothing of the Space Marine’s power armour beneath that ashen robe, but there was an undeniably magisterial quality about him, as though he’d been forged for judgement, not merely execution as most Space Marines were. Suddenly it all made sense. ‘Are you of the Grey Knights, Calavera?’

Are you my judge?

The hatch of the saloon car swung open and a tall figure stepped inside. Its viridian greatcoat gusted in the wind as it regarded the mob of Sharks sprawled about the chamber. Warmth and sound leeched from the room as the men noticed the newcomer framed in the open doorway.

‘Lieutenant…’ Sergeant Chizoba began uncertainly, but she silenced him with a low hiss. The Sharks lowered their eyes as she approached – La Mal Kalfu, Father Terra’s pitiless handmaiden incarnate.

‘The spirits of our brothers still wail at Grandfather Death’s gates, riven and raw with sacrifice,’ Lieutenant Omazet said, passing through the men like a scythe of cold, condemning clarity, ‘yet you cavort in this chamber of iniquity.’ Her voice was little more than a whisper woven into the wind, yet every man in the carriage heard it. ‘You dance like ghuuls on their unquiet graves.’

They needed this! Chizoba wanted to protest. After the carnage and the betrayal, they needed something. But he knew such excuses were rooted in false pride and her castigation was well deserved. ‘The fault is mine,’ he declared solemnly.

The lieutenant’s bone-trimmed laspistol appeared to fly into her hand and Chizoba raised his chin, determined to die with honour, but her arm snapped out at a right angle as she fired. There was a hiss of molten glass as the las-bolt punched through a window. Without pause she swept her arm about in an arc, channelling her contempt into flashes of green fire that wove between the frozen Sharks, sometimes close enough to scald their flesh. When she was done, every window in the carriage had been punctured. Though the thick glass held, it was crazed with livid, melted craters.

‘Purge this temple of vice,’ Omazet commanded, holstering her weapon.

Without hesitation Chizoba lifted a heavy chair and hurled it through the nearest window. As the glass shattered and the snow rushed in his comrades surged to their feet, howling with righteous fury. Eager for redemption – eager to please her – the Sharks seized the degenerate baubles of the bluebloods and assaulted the windows as if they were the vile, corrupting eyes of the warp.

‘Your questions are irrelevant,’ the Calavera said. ‘I am not your concern.’

‘No?’ Mordaine said, trying to cover the edge in his voice. ‘Forgive me, but I find that difficult to accept.’ He brandished the comms report Omazet had given him. ‘You’ve summoned the Damocles Conclave to Oblazt. They will be waiting for me.’

‘Yes.’

‘Yes.’ Mordaine was aghast. ‘Is that all you have to say? You’ve betrayed me! I’ve crawled through fire and ice doing your dirty work…’

‘Six days remain to you,’ the Calavera interrupted.

‘Six days to sweat blood and beg for your mercy, is that it?’

‘Six days to find your answers and redeem your honour.’

Mordaine never saw the Calavera move, but suddenly the warrior was looming over him, so close he could make out the delicate strands of verdigris veining his bronze mask. So close that he realised his power armour was deathly silent.

‘Your prisoner awaits,’ the skull breathed.

‘Prisoner…’ Mordaine echoed blankly. He wanted to back away, but that merciless eye transfixed him. The cabin felt oppressively hot and he realised he was sweating heavily. It felt pathetic in front of this austere, desiccated being.

Prisoner… The word washed indolently into focus through the murk in his head.

‘The prisoner,’ Mordaine said, more forcefully this time. ‘That wasn’t a lie? You actually have the renegade?’

‘That is for you to determine, interrogator.’

‘None of this adds up…’ Mordaine’s words trailed off as the nausea flooded back, spurred on by a jagged tightness in his chest. That was when he noticed the rivets along the sides of the Calavera’s mask. That grim visage was nailed to the giant’s own skull.

‘Who are you?’ Mordaine whispered.

‘A fellow seeker after truth,’ said the warrior. Then with unsettling, untrustworthy concern: ‘I regret that you are still weak, Haniel Mordaine. Sometimes I forget how fragile mortals are.’

That’s a lie, Mordaine sensed in a flash of insight. You never forget how vulnerable we are beside your kind. You relish the knowledge. Suddenly the sense of crushing age radiating from the Space Marine was intolerable. It hung about him like an ethereal stench, a malaise of the spirit that stirred something to wakefulness inside Mordaine. Something other. For a fleeting moment he felt like a stranger inside his own head, hanging on to his body by a fraying cord of consciousness.

I cannot die… The thought wasn’t his own.

Horrified, Mordaine turned his back on the Calavera and lurched into the corridor, clutching at the handrail running along the wall. The carriage tapered ahead of him, stretching out in a gently undulating river of windows and doors veined with throbbing gold and red velvet. He knew the train was gliding over the ice, frictionless and whisper smooth, yet he felt like a man caught in a storm-wracked sea. He retched, deep but dry, and threads of inky darkness crawled at the periphery of his vision.

‘Do you require assistance?’ the Calavera called after him.

‘That… will not be necessary,’ Mordaine rasped.

I want nothing from you. He shoved his forehead against a window, screwing his eyes shut as the frigid glass cooled his fever. I won’t give you the satisfaction. Breathing deeply, he waited for the nausea to subside.

‘I need to make preparations,’ he lied, longing for the sanctuary of his cabin, where he could surrender to the darkness without shame. ‘For the interrogation.’

‘I understand.’

Of course you do, you smug…

‘Tomorrow…’ Mordaine said. ‘I’ll begin tomorrow.’ He opened his eyes and saw a face gazing back at him through the frosted glass – an abstraction of grey flesh stretched taught over a serrated wedge of bone and deeply recessed black eyes. And were those quills? The phantasm was gone before he could decipher it, abandoning the glass to his own broken reflection. He stared at the gaunt relic, wondering what else was staring back at him through those shadow-crowded eyes.

‘Do you see something?’ the Calavera asked, and Mordaine realised the giant was standing beside him.

‘Nothing,’ Mordaine said. But something sees me.

THREE DAYS AFTER UNITY

Oblazt was a world of darkness, but its ice wastes shimmered with a dull, diffuse light, like the last flicker of a failing lumen bulb spun out eternally. The locals claimed it was reflected starlight, but Lieutenant Omazet didn’t believe it. She could taste the hunger behind that anaemic radiance and she knew the Ghostlands were well named.

It is almost as if this debased engine has carried us into the twilight realm of Grandfather Death, she thought. Perhaps we all fell at Vyshodd and never knew it.

She dismissed the dark notion and focused on the gloomy corridor ahead. Someone, presumably the captain, had smashed every one of the glow-globes lining the passage, leaving only the pallid haze from the windows to illuminate her path. Uzochi had claimed this carriage when they boarded, refusing both succour and guidance, demanding only solitude. He’d looked like a man drowning in a poisoned dream.

He bleeds shadows as an untended wound bleeds pus, she mused with regret. Like all the Sharks she was fiercely loyal to her commander, but she had long suspected that Uzochi was like a tautly drawn bowstring – dangerous, yet also very brittle.

But is he beyond redemption? Omazet wondered as she arrived at the locked door of his cabin.

‘Captain,’ she said, tapping on the door. ‘Armande… We must talk.’ There was no response. She knocked again, harder this time. Something creaked above her head and she looked up sharply, squinting in the gloom. The ceiling was an ambiguous blur of grey panels and dark grilles, devoid of… She frowned. Had something moved up there? No, that made no sense.

There was a murmur from behind the locked door and Omazet put an ear to the enamelled wood. Someone was pacing about in there like a caged animal.

‘Captain!’ she called, rapping on the wood. The pacing stopped. Growing impatient, Omazet switched to the insidious, damning lilt of La Mal Kalfu: ‘Armande, hear my breath and heed me, for I name you wayward, wordless and shaken-hearted. Craven-haunted, you’d spit on your oath…’

So it went until she heard a chuckle from within, rancid with anguish. A moment later the bolt was drawn back and a crack of shadow appeared in the doorframe, confining a bloodshot eye.

‘Captain?’ she asked. The eye blinked at her without recognition. ‘Armande?’

‘Is he with you?’ It was the hoarse rattle of a man who hadn’t slept in days.

‘Is who with me?’

‘Grandfather Death,’ he whispered, as if fearing to say the name aloud. ‘I know you are his disciple, woman. You paint your face in his image.’

‘I serve Father Terra and no other.’ She frowned. ‘Armande, you have invited doubt into your heart…’ As she reached for the door the eye widened in fury.

‘I’ll not parley with his lackeys!’ he hissed. ‘Tell him to come himself if he wants my soul.’

‘Armande–’

‘Tell him!’ The door slammed in her face.

Omazet growled, a primal release of tension. She realised her pistol had slipped into her hand, as if demanding that she fulfil her most sacred duty.

He is no longer fit to lead us, she judged. It would be a mercy.

And yet some indistinct, malformed intuition held her back. She turned and stalked away, eager to be gone from this shadowy carriage.

The saloon car had been eviscerated and sacrificed as a penance for the sins of its patrons, yet the Ghostlands had transformed the gaudy chamber into a vision of almost ethereal beauty. Krazi Rémi stood at the entrance, bewildered by the frost-wreathed opulence. It looked as if the carriage had been frozen in time.

Like starlight made into stuff, he thought reverently.

He roused himself with a shake of the head. Such foolishness had earned the mockery of his brothers, but he was going to prove them wrong. He’d come back here to chase the rain. His thoughts were a raggedy jumble these days, but he was pretty sure rooms weren’t meant to rain.

Nodding to himself, the scrawny Shark crept towards the place where he’d seen it happen, his boots crunching through the vitrified strands of carpeting. His breath hung about him like smoke, testifying to the cold that gripped the carriage. If he lingered here overlong he’d end up as another piece of frozen furniture.

Rémi grinned when he saw the suspect grille in the ceiling, delighted that his memory had clung on to it. Hunting about, he spied an overturned table. The ice had welded it to the fabric and there was an audible snap as he pulled it free. He froze, but nobody came so he pressed on with his quest. Grunting with effort, he dragged the table under the grille and climbed up. The panel’s screws were frozen tight and his gloved hands were clumsy, but he worked at them with his knife until the grille came loose. Sliding it aside, he poked his head cautiously into the shaft above, shining his torch first left then right. Nothing. He sniffed. There was a heady stench lingering in the space, like the spoor of a wild beast. He hesitated, wondering if this would be enough for the others. Minutes passed as he tested the possibilities. No, it wouldn’t be enough, he decided unhappily. Nobody would believe him. He needed more.

With a sigh, Rémi hauled himself up into the ventilation shaft.

He chose a direction at random, working his way along the shaft until it terminated at the carriage wall. What? Oh… There was a hatch above him. He squirmed onto his back and shoved, gasping as it came free and he was bathed in bright light. He was staring up at the sky and it was full of stars. Real stars, not the glittering lies that crowded his head like beggar’s diamonds. He drank them in, marvelling that the blizzard had eased off and granted him this clear sky. Even so, it was bitterly cold and he knew he had to get moving before he froze up in the shaft.

I should go back, he thought, but the stars sang to him, urging him to race them across the top of the world. No… No, it wasn’t the stars… It was the wind, a glacial whispering mistral plucked from the air by the speeding train. Rémi sat up, popping his head through the hatch to watch the tundra surging past on either side like a fleeting yet perpetual memory of whiteness. His breath froze, glazing his face with frost as he tried to remember who he’d been before the shiver fever had filled his head with smoke.

I should really go back, Rémi decided as he hauled himself out onto the roof of the carriage. The metal was frost rimed and slippery, but he felt no fear because he was a Shark and his balance was sharp, even if his mind wasn’t. Anyway, the carriage was wide enough for a man to walk ten good paces to either side before reaching the edge. True, it slanted sharply after just one pace, but he’d be fine if he kept to the central spine.

His hunt forgotten, he picked his way cautiously across the ribbed hull, delighting in the iron gargoyles perched along his path. They were turned outwards to ward off evil so he couldn’t see their faces, but he could imagine them, ugly orkoid brutes with sharp eyes and sharper fangs, angry at being stuck out here to freeze. They had a point about that because the cold was something terrible up here. He could feel it drinking his skin dry and sucking the breath right out of him, eager to carry his soul away…

He stumbled and yelped, almost slipping from the level spine of the roof. Those ten good paces to either side weren’t looking so good any more. One misstep and he’d be sliding down the roof like a man caught in a waterfall. He froze up, wheezing hard and shivering uncontrollably as the Ghostlands flashed past on either side.

Got to get back inside, he realised, out of this killing cold.

He frowned, peering at the trail of carriages ahead. There was a dark shape moving at the far end and even at this distance it didn’t look right. As he watched, it came rushing towards him like an insect, scuttling on all fours and leaping the gaps between the carriages in great hops, becoming more manlike with every step. And then it was close enough for Rémi to see that it was nothing like a man at all. It was a gargoyle come to life and its face was a lot worse than the ones he’d imagined.

His heart pounding like a caged animal, he remembered that he’d come out here to hunt. Whatever else he was or wasn’t, Rémi Ngoro was a Shark.

Steeling himself, he reached for his laspistol. His fingers closed on empty air. Maybe the gun had slipped loose during his crawl or maybe he’d forgotten it. He hoped it was the first. It didn’t really matter any more, but it was all he had left.

Closing his eyes, Krazi Rémi turned away from the horror and stepped onto the slippery, sloping surface to his right, proving he wasn’t crazy at all.

‘How long, Iho’nen?’ the traveller, who had become a prisoner, demanded from the shadowed confines of his cell.

‘Not long, but it is a fragile process,’ the giant, who wore his many names like a shroud of half-truths, answered. ‘I did not anticipate that his body would become so damaged. His final foray into the hive was unfortunate.’

‘Is this error also within your acceptable parameters?’ the prisoner asked.

‘Not if he dies,’ the Calavera admitted.

ICE

And after it has beguiled, tormented and betrayed you, Truth will reveal itself as nothing more than another lie.

– The Calavera

FOUR DAYS AFTER UNITY

It is time, the Empty One’s decree bled into Ujurakh’s skull.

Unbound, the Sourblood surged from his lair in an empty promethium tank and scuttled into the ventilation system. Finally freed from the hateful shackles of meekness, his mind burned with the possibilities for wreaking ruin upon the flat-faces. It would have to be done with stealth and swiftness, for they were many and the Empty One’s schemes prohibited open conflict. Ujurakh did not understand this stricture, but it did not trouble him unduly for he was a tangled creature himself, drawn to the craft rather than the brutality of slaughter. The hunger soared alongside him, seeking to deny him this dignity for it cared only for the feast, but he leashed it and made it his weapon rather than his conqueror.

Oh, we’ll feed deep and well, springing loose the hidden spiral seeds of their flesh, Ujurakh promised, but we’ll weave our carnage with whisper-light perfection!

He scurried from carriage to carriage, sometimes through vents, sometimes across roofs, peering through windows or grilles at his blind prey, assessing numbers and positions, measuring movements and distances, assembling the scattered pieces of the plan he’d devised during his concealment.

And finally, he was ready.

‘A whole day!’ Mordaine bellowed as he stormed into the Imperator Suite. ‘You let me sleep through an entire day!’

‘It was necessary, Haniel Mordaine,’ the Calavera said. He was waiting at the centre of the chamber, exactly as he’d been waiting the first time. ‘Without respite your body would have shut down catastrophically.’ The Space Marine appraised him as a man might assess an insect with a broken wing. ‘Even now your metabolic insignia indicate your condition is significantly impaired.’

Mordaine faltered, his fury diminished to bluster now that he was face to face with this eldritch being again. As always, the Calavera’s logic was maddeningly irrefutable. He forced himself to stare into that cyclopean eye, wondering why he’d never challenged its nature before. Surely it couldn’t be a conventional…

‘It is an augmetic of rare and resplendent provenance,’ the Calavera answered.

‘What…?’

‘Your eyes betray your thoughts as mine cannot, Haniel Mordaine.’

They were silent for a time, while Mordaine fumbled for the courage to press the challenge. Do I really want to know this truth now?

‘I want to see the prisoner,’ he demanded instead.

‘As you will, interrogator.’ The giant offered the ghost of a bow.

‘You agree?’ Mordaine couldn’t conceal his surprise.

‘Yes. It is time.’

At a grand thirty-one years, André ‘Ironfingers’ Pava was far and away the oldest man in the company, but maturity had only cemented his status as an outsider. Very few Sharks expected to see twenty-five, let alone their thirties. Indeed, surviving to such a ripe old age was regarded as vaguely scandalous among the Iwujii, but there was no getting round the fact that Pava was too useful to lose, so one commander after another had kept him out of harm’s way – even Armande Uzochi, who was the craziest he’d ever served under. While this cosseting didn’t endear him to his fellows, they weren’t blind to his talents. Who else could they turn to when their guns or pict recorders played up? The Iwujii regiments had few tech-priests attached to their ranks, so a man with a knack for machinery was a precious if unloved commodity.

Pava hummed to himself as he monitored the control panel in front of him, delighting in the tangle of levers, wheels and intricately carved dials. While the deeper secrets of the Chain Engine’s workings would always elude him, he had its shape now. It had taken some experimentation, but he’d eventually divined the right input mantras to awaken its machine-spirit and beseech it to soar across the ice. Afterwards he’d continued to refine his stewardship through trial and error, relying on his gift to win the engine over. It was an invigorating process and he realised he’d never been so happy in his life. Up front in the drive cabin he was a world away from the dirty looks and veiled insults of his so-called comrades.

Something thudded heavily onto the cabin’s roof. Perplexed, Pava peered through the slanted viewport, trying to penetrate the white noise of hail and darkness. He heard a scrabbling overhead, then a clatter as the intruder slithered onto the access platform outside. Whoever was out there, they were now between Pava and the rest of the train. It suddenly struck him how isolated he was up front in the drive cabin.

He was fumbling for his laspistol when the hatch was flung open.

Sergeant Chizoba threaded his way through the silent throng of troopers packed into the barracks carriage, vigilant for any sign of laxity as he made another headcount. Some men knelt in prayer, while others sought wisdom in the scriptures of Father Terra, reading their spiritual primers with solemn frowns. Those who’d been inducted into the disciplines of the Jade Chord sat in contorted postures, their eyes closed as they meditated upon their transgressions. After the debacle in the saloon car they’d all woken up to the dissolution stalking them since they’d boarded.

Sometimes I feel the engine itself watches us like a fell spirit, Chizoba mused darkly, testing and tempting us with a thousand glittering snares. A silver serpent…

His former negligence still mortified him, but the seeds of corruption had been insidious and fertile, from the lascivious images adorning the staterooms to the fine spirits and exotic delicacies packed into the cargo carriages. But worst of all was the dazzling, hoarded wealth! Many of the Sharks had filled their pockets with loot in the first days, weighing themselves down like swine fattened on gilded muck, but Chizoba had put an end to it, standing watch as each thief cast his baubles overboard.

The serpent hates me for that, he decided, but it fears me too.

He’d reached the front of the carriage now, counting sixty-three Sharks in total. Taking into account the ones posted along the train there should have been sixty-four. Rémi was still missing. The fellow was probably sleeping off one of his shiver fits, but nobody recalled when they’d last seen him and Chizoba couldn’t help worrying. He hesitated, unwilling to disturb his comrades’ devotions.

I’ll find him myself, he decided. It’s past time I did the rounds anyway.

With a sigh he reached for his fur-trimmed greatcoat.

Hunched over the blood-spattered drive console, Ujurakh yanked a lever at the end of the sixth row, completing the pattern the Empty One had placed inside his head. Somewhere at the tail end of the vehicle magnetic clamps would be releasing, leaving the rearmost carriage hanging by a thread. That thread would require a personal touch to sever.

And so machines are unwoven and splayed wide open for the fools they are!

The sabotage delighted him, for the unravelling of things, be they fashioned from flesh, metal or mind, was the true calling of Sourblood. With a hoot of glee he leapt to the cabin door, lingering at the threshold to savour the sweet aroma of liberated flesh in the air. He had wrought fine work here.

‘Sacred Throne!’ a voice hissed behind him.

Ujurakh spun round and found himself face to flat-face with a kine beast standing on the access platform. He lunged before the patrolling sentry could reach for its weapon, his serrated beak ripping away the creature’s face in a snap of crimson as his twin blades slammed into its shoulders, pinning it rigid. Ignoring its convulsive kicks, he lifted the pinioned ruin and cast it overboard with a squawk of rage.

The sentry’s sudden appearance here infuriated him. He’d timed his attack to interweave precisely with the flat-face patrols, yet this fool – this defiler! – had surprised him, tarnishing the perfection of his plan! Riding the wave of his rage, the hunger heaved within him, urging him to linger and feed on the driver’s carcass. Ujurakh slammed the hatch shut before the scent wafting from the cabin overpowered him.

One master already claims my shame. I’ll be bound by no more!

He leapt for the roof of the next carriage, straight into the teeth of the gale. His anger had made him careless and the blizzard snatched him as he landed, spinning him towards the edge of the speeding train. His talons scrabbled for purchase on the icy hull as the maelstrom howled and tore at his quills. Desperate, he crouched and sprang forwards, crashing down at the centre of the carriage and hugging the roof like a spiny limpet.

Blood-blind fool! Ujurakh cursed himself. Then he was moving again, scurrying on all fours towards the rear of the train.

‘I’m going to do the rounds,’ Chizoba told the sentry standing beside the exit of the barracks car. ‘I may be gone a while.’ He swung the hatch open and the squall rushed in, dusting the interior with snow. A few hours ago the night had been quiet, but the blizzard had returned with a vengeance. The sergeant scowled, barely able to see the carriage ahead through the churning snow. Suddenly leaving this sanctuary seemed like the worst idea he’d ever had. But what if Rémi had hurt himself?

Reluctantly Chizoba stepped out onto the connecting gangway and slammed the hatch shut behind him, cutting himself off from the living. Alone in a swirling white void, he looked down and saw more whiteness rushing between the slats of the platform under his feet. The sense of unreality was oppressive. Though the Chain Engine was a goliath it sped through the maelstrom in almost total silence. Chizoba knew some kind of technomancy kept it floating above the track, but it didn’t feel right. The engines he’d ridden back home were rickety contraptions, wedded to their tracks like a cranky old couple, but this one felt like a ghost train.

An infernal engine forged to ferry an army of the damned into the warp…

He yanked down on the lever of the door ahead. It didn’t move.

A silver-clad snare for the wicked and the unwary…

Fear caressed his spine, feather-light and frigid. He imagined himself trapped between carriages, unable to go forwards or backwards as his blood froze and his flesh crystallised into a glass sculpture. Would his men laugh at his folly? He tugged again.

The sentry standing outside the prisoner’s cell was obviously terrified. He was the youngest Shark Mordaine had seen, surely no more than sixteen. How long had he been alone in the holding carriage? Alone with the xenos behind that iron-shod door…

‘Has the prisoner caused any trouble?’ Mordaine asked him. The youth shook his head, unable to get a word out.

Is it me he’s frightened of? Mordaine wondered. Or is it the grey giant standing beside me?

‘The xenos is secure,’ said the Space Marine. ‘Fortunately the Koroleva equipped their transport with admirable incarceration facilities. One might say they had foresight.’ There was a trace of humour in that deathly voice, but it only enhanced its inhumanity. In that moment Mordaine knew that he truly hated this ancient being.

‘Then you may leave us,’ he said curtly. He expected some argument, but the Calavera merely inclined his head and strode away. With a momentary howl of wind and a slam of metal he was gone from the carriage.

He wants me to do this, Mordaine realised. That’s what he’s wanted all along. He glanced at the Iwujii youth, seeking a last moment of human camaraderie. ‘What’s your name, boy?’ he asked.

‘Mifune, sir.’ The guard wouldn’t meet his gaze.

It is me he’s terrified of, he realised. Haniel Mordaine, the dread inquisitor! Absurdly the boy’s fear lent him courage.

‘See that I am not disturbed, Trooper Mifune.’

Mordaine unlocked the cell door.

With an angry screech the stubborn lever gave way and Chizoba staggered into the next carriage. As he hauled the hatch shut behind him he heard something clatter across the roof above, as if in sympathy. He held his breath, listening with his back against the door, straining against the muted wail of the wind.

‘I’ll not let the unquiet spirits of this engine unman me,’ Chizoba said, challenging the gloom. Maybe it was crazy, but sometimes a man needed to hear a human voice, even if it was only his own. ‘There’s nothing here that faith can’t rout. In fact there’s nothing here at all!’

Ashamed of the dread that had almost overwhelmed him, he advanced into the narrow aisle ahead. It passed through a warren of sealed storage vaults that bore the silver crown icon of the Koroleva. The bluebloods had situated this cargo carriage further upfront than the barracks, valuing their chattel over their troops. They wouldn’t travel without an army of thugs to back them up, but they liked to keep them out of sight. Unfortunately this had obliged Chizoba’s brothers to occupy the tail end of the train. He didn’t know why that sat so badly with him, but…

There was a metallic groan behind him. He spun round, drawing his pistol in the same moment. The hatch he’d come through had swung open and snow was billowing into the carriage in languid, spiralling flurries. Chizoba crouched, levelling his weapon at the door, watching it rock back and forth in the wind like a beckoning hand. He waited, his hackles rising at its incessant creaking.

Nothing. It’s nothing.

‘Thierry, you’re raising ghosts from the shadows!’ he chastised himself. Once again the sound of his voice was like a flash of good sense in the darkness. Obviously he’d not shut the damned hatch properly.

‘You a man or a boy?’ he chanted. ‘Predator or prey?’ It was the first mantra of the Childe Wars and it spurred him into action. Holstering his pistol he marched back to the door and reached for the handle. ‘Blade or blood?’

The wind lashed out and snatched away his hand. He stared at the gushing stump, frozen by superstitious terror. Then the wind surged into the carriage and he saw it was a predator.

As the Calavera had promised, the prisoner was secure. The tau sat rigidly on the floor, its back a few centimetres from the windowless outer wall of the padded cell. A bulky robe obscured the alien’s form, but Mordaine could tell that its legs were knotted into a lotus position that would have defied human physiognomy. The alien’s hands – only three fingers and a thumb to each – were clasped in its lap, bound by heavy manacles. A chain tethered these to a ring in the wall, restricting the captive’s freedom to half a metre. It was a crudely effective device, yet Mordaine was not reassured. This was one of the most dangerous aliens known to the Imperium.

And I’m the one who’ll bring him before the Emperor’s justice, he thought. Surely it will be enough to exonerate me. If this is really him…

Mordaine lingered in the doorway, studying the xenos. It was quite unlike the ethereal his mentor had captured all those years ago. While that being had possessed an empyrean grace, this one was muscular and broad shouldered, with a warrior’s bearing. However, the most striking differences were in the face. Whereas the ethereal’s had been long and delicate, this creature’s was square-jawed and severe, with cobalt skin tones that darkened to charcoal at its vertical nostril slit. A stylised white circle inscribed the right side of its face, framing its eye with geometric precision. He couldn’t begin to guess at the alien’s age, but he sensed it was in the prime of its life.

Can this really be the Scourge of Damocles? Surely he would be older…

Then the prisoner opened its eyes and Mordaine was no longer so certain.

‘You may enter,’ it said.

Crouched between carriages, Ujurakh wrenched on the lever controlling the last of the couplings securing the barracks car. With a hiss of servos the massive pin retracted, cutting the rear carriage loose from the train. Crowing with satisfaction, the Sourblood sat back on his haunches and watched as the snowstorm swallowed the receding box. The amputated car’s forward momentum might carry it along the track for hours, perhaps even days before friction sapped its impetus. It was a waste of good meat, but it was necessary. Ujurakh wondered whether the stranded flat-faces inside would devour each other before the end came.

‘You are the inquisitor,’ said the xenos, playing the opening Escher had always favoured, making a statement out of a question and claiming the initiative.

Beginning the game without hesitation.

‘I would stand to face you,’ the prisoner continued, ‘but it is impractical.’ It lifted its manacles pointedly as Mordaine closed the cell door. ‘You understand these hold me only because I tolerate it.’

The xenos spoke Gothic with patient, almost pained precision, as if constraining its thoughts to accommodate an inferior shape, but the authority in its voice was undeniable. It was an alloy of contradictions, alight with passion, yet aloof with calculation: the voice of a master player.

‘I don’t have time for games,’ Mordaine said brusquely, trying to regain ground. ‘You will answer my questions or you will suffer.’

‘I am a warrior. Suffering runs in my blood like fire. I welcome it.’ The prisoner was regarding him intently. Sizing up the mettle of its opponent. ‘Do you not share such a bond with pain, gue’la?’ Are you not a warrior?

‘So you believe that pain is a virtue, xenos?’

‘I believe the conquest of pain brings strength.’

‘And I believe I have walked into the wrong cell,’ Mordaine mocked. ‘I expected to meet a fire warrior, not an ethereal.’ It was a sly strike, but the prisoner didn’t rise to it so he pressed on. ‘I thought your craft was war, not philosophy.’

‘If you believe the disciplines are distinct then you are ignorant,’ the xenos said evenly. ‘Or incompetent.’

I would certainly be a fool to think you a common warmonger, Mordaine conceded. To his disgust he was already tiring, as if the alien’s mere presence was draining him. I’m not ready for a drawn-out duel…

‘Come closer, inquisitor,’ the xenos said. ‘I offer you no imminent peril.’ The infernal thing is baiting me! ‘Let us talk as equals.’

Uncertain whether accepting the challenge would register as strength or weakness, Mordaine stepped forward… then hesitated. Which is certainly weakness, damn it! Angry, he forced himself to move, stopping a few paces from the prisoner. He should have appeared masterful, but his tension diminished him while the alien’s tranquil repose elevated it. Wise to the power game, it didn’t even raise its eyes, staring instead through his midriff.

‘We are not equals,’ Mordaine said without conviction. ‘I am a servant of the God-Emperor of Mankind, cast in the mould of His… divine… aspect…’ His hands were trembling uncontrollably so he clasped them behind his back – tightly – as if he were hanging on to himself. ‘You are a xenos heretic, enslaved by the deliriums of a debased technology that will betray you. You are nothing.’

‘Then why are you afraid of me, gue’la?’

The statement was so ripe with truth that it took Mordaine off-guard. As he floundered for a riposte he felt enervating tendrils unfurling inside his skull. The secret other buried inside him was stirring again.

No, Mordaine railed at the indifferent abyss. Not here… not now.

‘I…’ he breathed as breath failed him. The cell walls unfurled and swam away, as if seeking a more captivating configuration. His legs felt like hot wires sheathed in wax. Any moment now that inconstant flesh would melt, leaving his bones unable to bear their burden alone. Now the xenos was looking up at him, its black eyes drinking in his weakness dispassionately.

‘I…’ Mordaine gasped as his legs buckled.

The Sourblood tore another crimson strip from the carcass of the flat-face called Chee-zoba and crammed it into his beak, savouring the pungent flavour. After the poor fare this planet had served up, such flesh was intoxicating! Worlds shaped the taste of their meat and this creature had been spawned on a vibrant, full-blooded planet – one not unlike Ujurakh’s own home world. As he chewed on the meat it rendered up fleeting impressions of wet green heat and red fury. He hadn’t tasted the like for many seasons! There had been a time when he had always fed well, travelling from one battleground to another with his kindred, trading their might for pay and flesh, but then the Empty One had come with false bargains and forbidden meat…

Warp-kissed flesh, tender, terrible and irresistible with promised displeasure!

Ujurakh shuddered at the memory of fragrant coral flesh and delicate, deadly pincers. Possessed, the Empty One had called the twisted, drooling captive he’d offered the Shaper. The sacrifice had shrieked in ecstasy when Ujurakh carved it open, then moaned in dissonant harmony while he glutted himself on its willing meat, enslaved by a hunger beyond anything he’d known before. Its essence had flooded his palate with myriad rival passions as he fought to unwind its truths and thread them into his own weave, but it was like trying to catch the lightning with his talons or extinguish the sun with his breath!

Too many possibilities entwined within infinite impossible tangles…

The Empty One had waited until Ujurakh collapsed, overwhelmed by the cacophony of sensations. Then he had summoned the kroot’s kindred and denounced their Shaper as a Sourblood, a degenerate who would taint their bloodline to sate his base cravings. They had called for his life then, but the Empty One had bought it from them and taken Ujurakh as his slave, burying his voice deep inside the Shaper’s skull and binding him to an invisible purpose that had carried them across countless worlds. Now, for the first time in so very long, Ujurakh could taste the joys of his old life.

Lost in his feasting, the Shaper didn’t see the skull-faced female enter the dark cargo carriage. It was only when her torch beam lashed him that he awoke to the threat, but by then she was already firing. He sprang backwards and the las-bolt intended for his head took him in the abdomen, scalding him to the bone. Screeching in agony he retreated, flitting frantically from side to side in the narrow aisle as she stalked after him with her pistol levelled. A bolt caught him in the right shoulder… another in the left leg… a third burned away the quills of his crest. He hurled himself at the gaping doorway behind, flailing out to catch the guardrail of the gangway beyond, but his scorched arm was without strength. He yelped as his grip failed and he toppled over into nothingness.

Lieutenant Omazet approached the open hatch cautiously, keeping her pistol levelled, but the avian horror was gone.

So was the barracks carriage.

Hissing through her teeth, she stared at the void where sixty men had been. We have been betrayed, she thought bitterly. I don’t know how or by whom, but I don’t doubt it for a moment.

Biting down her rage, she approached the shredded wreck that had been Thierry Chizoba. The beast had dragged him to the centre of the carriage so it could feast away from the cold, leaving the hatch open for a quick flight if it was disturbed.

But its unholy appetite was its undoing, she realised as she knelt beside the sergeant. His face was contorted in a rictus of agony, eyes wide and staring with shock. His right hand was missing, along with most of his chest.

‘We were already so few,’ Omazet murmured as she closed Chizoba’s eyes and traced the sacred aquila across his forehead. Now we are nothing at all.

But it wasn’t true. There were at least a dozen troopers further along the train, along with Old Man Pava and the boy Mifune. And of course there was still Armande, if he could be roused from his madness. They weren’t many, but they were still Sharks and together they would take vengeance. Determined, Omazet rose and hurried towards the next carriage. As she reached for the handle the hatch swung open and a vast shape was silhouetted against the snowstorm.

‘Captain Calavera,’ she said as the Space Marine entered the carriage, hunching to pass through the doorway. She backed away instinctively, not lowering her gun, though it was a stunted weapon against the armoured giant.

Why do I feel I might need it? Omazet wondered uneasily as the newcomer rose to fill the narrow space. And why is his arrival so timely?

‘We have been betrayed,’ she told him. ‘We must reverse this engine without delay. If we are swift we may yet deliver my brothers from the winter’s embrace.’

The Space Marine regarded her silently. His crystal eye was very bright in the gloom, yet it cast no light of its own. Omazet saw that it was a many-faceted orb, inset like a jewel in the dark recess of his visor. Beside his dread aspect, her own contrivance of tattoos and lenses seemed like cheap chicanery. How she envied him that face! Such a visage would make her one with Mother Kalfu herself…

Mesmerised, she stood rigid as the Calavera took a step towards her.

Mordaine’s world melted back into focus, as sticky and seeping as the pool of blood congealing around his head. A drum was pounding between his ears, beating furiously against the wet gash in his forehead as if trying to hammer a way out.

I must have fallen on my face, he thought blurrily. It’s a miracle I didn’t break my nose. He hauled himself to his knees, groaning with the strain.

‘I feared you dead, gue’la,’ a voice said beside him. He turned and saw the xenos prisoner watching him. Angel’s Tears, he’d fallen right by the creature!

Unable to suppress a moan of revulsion, Mordaine crawled away, feeling foolish – impossibly, unforgivably foolish – and collapsed with his back against the cell door, breathing hard. He reached for his holster, already knowing the weapon would be gone and – no, it was still there!

Why? Closing his eyes, he slowed his breathing, grasping for answers. The xenos could have reached out and throttled me while I was senseless. Why am I still alive?

Growling low in her throat, Omazet tore her gaze from the Calavera’s siren eye. The giant halted and she heard something that might have been a sigh. The sound was like a sirocco fluting through a time-riven ruin. In that breath she knew he had come to her as Grandfather Death.

‘Why?’ she asked. She doubted her candour would surprise him, but it might earn her a measure of respect. ‘Why turn on us?’

He stood motionless, contemplating her request.

‘We are both warriors,’ she urged. ‘If I am to die here then grant me the dignity of truth. Why?’

‘Because you would interfere, lieutenant.’

‘In what?’

‘In a matter that has been engineered with absolute rigour,’ he said, betraying a hint of pride. ‘Your company has served its purpose.’ He made to advance.

‘Wait!’ she said quickly, hunting for something, anything to delay him. ‘Do you truly see through that orb?’

‘Not through it,’ he said softly. ‘The Aphelion is not a lens.’

‘But you see with it?’

‘More than you can possibly conceive.’ Suddenly the pride was gone, leaving only an ineffable weariness. ‘I have no surcease of sight, Adeola Omazet.’

‘It is a curse then?’

‘It is what it is. As am I.’ He took a step forwards. Omazet took one back.

‘What you are is a heretic,’ she challenged.

‘From a narrow viewpoint.’ Another step forwards.

‘You have turned your back on Father Terra’s light!’ Another step back.

‘Light blinds, absolute light blinds absolutely.’ Forwards.

‘Is that how you lost your eyes?’ Back.

‘It is how I came to see.’

‘How long was I out?’ Mordaine asked hoarsely.

‘Not long.’ It was a vague answer yet an honest one, he sensed.

‘Why didn’t you kill me when you had the chance, xenos?’

‘It would have served no purpose.’

‘Vengeance doesn’t interest you?’

‘Against you?’ The alien’s nostril slit dilated with wintry humour. ‘Enmity must be earned, gue’la. My people do not hate blindly, as yours do.’

‘Your people?’ Mordaine taunted, scrabbling for an attack. ‘Who exactly are you speaking for? You’re an outcast.’

‘You presume much and understand nothing.’

‘Then enlighten me,’ Mordaine offered. ‘Haven’t you turned your back on the ethereals and built your own little empire in the Damocles Gulf?’

‘In dark times empires arise around warriors of substance,’ the xenos said without obvious pride. ‘Fire purges the old and forges anew. So it goes.’

‘And what exactly are you forging?’

‘Such knowledge will not save you, Haniel Mordaine.’

The blood drained from Mordaine’s face. Did everyone know his damned name? How…? The Calavera? But why would he tell this xenos renegade anything? Where do the lies begin or end?

‘Name your Chapter,’ Omazet said as she backed away from the giant, ‘so I might curse its memory.’

‘I have no Chapter,’ answered the Calavera, advancing, ‘for I am Legion.’

And so it went, their words slicing back and forth as their steps carried them inexorably towards the emptiness waiting at the other end of the carriage.

‘What do you fight for?’ Omazet asked finally, stepping out onto the connecting gangway that no longer connected to anything.

‘Some might call it the Greater Good.’

‘You have betrayed your blood to serve a xenos heresy?’ Omazet had to shout over the wind, yet the Calavera’s whispers slipped through it like serpents.

‘Oh, a Greater Good than theirs…’ The notion appeared to amuse him. ‘Call it the greater Greater Good, if you will.’ He raised a cautioning hand as her finger tightened on the trigger of her pistol. ‘Do not imagine you can put my eye out as if I were some absurd monster of legend. The balance of the Aphelion exists outside the material sphere. You cannot touch it.’

‘I can try.’

‘Make the attempt and I will kill you.’

‘And if I don’t, you will spare me?’ she challenged.

‘I will offer you a choice. Die here… or take a leap of faith.’ He swept an arm towards the white void behind her.

‘We are both outcasts, gue’la,’ the xenos said, ‘but I have chosen my path. I know myself. What do you know?’

Nothing, Mordaine confessed. I don’t know why Escher elevated me to become his acolyte or why he was murdered or even what I want from you, xenos. And worst of all, I don’t know what’s happening to me.

‘You are an enemy of the Imperium of Man,’ he declared, striking for safe ground, ‘but to your own people you are immeasurably more repellent.’ I have to go on the attack! ‘Shas’O Vior’la Shovah Kais Mont’yr,’ he said, pronouncing each meticulously memorised component like a curse, ‘I name you traitor.’

‘Make your choice, lieutenant,’ said the Calavera.

‘You offer me death either way!’ Omazet snarled.

‘Perhaps, yet my vassal beast endures.’ The Calavera tilted his head attentively. ‘I hear it still, failing and faint, but too hungry for life to accept death.’ That cold jewel of an eye fixed on her again, weighing her up. ‘Are you weaker than a xenos savage, Adeola Omazet?’

‘Why take the chance that I might survive?’ she demanded.

‘Perhaps because you have impressed me,’ the Calavera said, ‘or perhaps because the improbability of it intrigues me.’

Omazet didn’t believe either explanation for a moment. This monster had sloughed off such sentiments long ago. All of it – the pride, the dry humour, even the weariness – were merely after-echoes of emotion. Inside that bronze skull only austere purpose remained. A purpose he believed she would serve equally well through life or death.

‘I will live, traitor,’ she promised. ‘And I will prove you wrong.’

Then she spat in his eye and jumped.

‘Do you deny it?’ Mordaine pressed. ‘Or is the name too shameful for you to acknowledge?’

The prisoner made no answer. Its expression was unreadable.

‘Confess.’ Mordaine lashed out, trying not to let desperation seep into his voice. ‘You are O’Shovah.’

You have to be, or this is all for nothing.

‘You are–’

‘I am,’ the xenos said.

Mordaine closed his eyes and let the void take him once more.

VOID

Gaze into the Void and you will see yourself glaring back.

– The Calavera

There were voices in the darkness, prowling the silence like wolves, hounding Mordaine towards wakefulness though he sensed this was not their intent.

‘… and what of the remaining gue’la troops?’ one was asking.

‘I have accounted for them all save their captain,’ answered a resonant whisper. ‘He was gone from his quarters when I purged the vessel.’

‘Your plan bleeds errors as the aun breed lies, Iho’nen,’ the first voice said.

‘It is the nature of things,’ the whisperer called Iho’nen replied. ‘The Primordial Annihilator taints all endeavours with escalating imperfection, hence foresight is a potent but inconstant craft, traveller.’

‘Yet it is your chosen craft, is it not?’ the traveller observed dryly.

‘As it is yours, but one must adapt to the changing tides of the maelstrom.’

‘I am a hunter. To my mind a beast that cannot be mastered is best slain.’

‘That has always been the way of warriors,’ Iho’nen acknowledged, ‘but you must become more than a warrior if you aspire to master fate.’

‘Fate is an excuse for weakness,’ declared the traveller. ‘The strong forge their own paths.’

‘Your path may yet forge a monster, Mont’shasaar.’

‘That is not my name,’ the other said coldly.

‘Not yet and perhaps never,’ Iho’nen conceded, ‘but you acquired its shadow on Arthas Moloch when you took the Dawn Blade.’

‘The Dawn Blade is a weapon like any other.’

‘Like no other,’ Iho’nen said intently.

‘Then you advise me to discard the blade?’ the traveller challenged.

‘No, that time has passed and you must reap the storm you have sown.’

‘As it should be, Space Marine.’

Space Marine? Mordaine thought hazily. That whisper? Calavera… As he tumbled back towards darkness he sensed one of the presences approach. His eyes opened fleetingly and he saw the xenos prisoner appraising him.

‘I think you are wrong about this one, Iho’nen,’ it said. ‘He is broken.’

The ventilation shafts reeked of a sour animal stench but they were the safest paths through the narrow warzone of the train, so Armande Uzochi had claimed them without hesitation, just as another predator had done before him. The crawlspaces had kept him hidden and mobile even when Grandfather Death was dangerously close, as he was now.

Lying supinely above the prison carriage, Uzochi held his breath as the one-eyed Space Marine carried the inquisitor from the alien’s cell. Slumped senseless in the giant’s arms, Mordaine looked like a dead man and Uzochi wondered what torments he had endured in Father Terra’s service. His eyes widened in horror as he saw the xenos captive emerge from the cell a moment later, stretching its limbs as if to shake out the indignity of confinement.

Horror turned to outrage as Uzochi remembered how these abominations had destroyed his company piece by piece, first in the hive through the uprising they had engineered and finally in the confines of this bedevilled machine, hunting down his men one by one. He had watched from above as Grandfather Death killed young Mifune, snapping the terror-stricken boy’s neck with the indifference Uzochi would have shown a rat. Instinct alone had saved the captain, compelling him to hide before the cull had begun.

How did our La Mal Kalfu meet her fate? Uzochi wondered guiltily, remembering how he had rebuked her. I was weak…

The giant carried Mordaine into a cell further along the carriage, but the xenos lingered at a window. Fleetingly Uzochi considered slipping down behind it. With fortune and faith he might take the creature unawares then make his escape before its ally returned.

No, he decided, weighing up the alien with a shrewd hunter’s eye. There will be no surprising that one.

He’d have just one chance at vengeance so he’d best make it count. This wasn’t the moment. Besides, patience was a hunter’s truest virtue and virtue would be his penance for failing Adeola Omazet. Uzochi let the tension slip from his muscles and waited.

… DAYS AFTER UNITY

Mordaine drifted towards wakefulness like a drowning man washed ashore, unsure whether the ocean had expelled him too late. Though the torment in his chest had subsided to a dull ache, his head was bloated with furtive, insistent voices. They whispered from a deep shadow stratum of memory, urging him to embrace an annihilating, irrefutable truth, like buzzing flies drawn to carrion dreams.

What’s happening to me? Mordaine pleaded with them.

‘Focus your thoughts, interrogator,’ another, harsher whisper answered, silencing the shadow babble. ‘Your prisoner awaits.’

Mordaine opened his eyes and saw the Calavera standing over him like a graven statue. Has he been there all night? The thought repelled him, but revulsion turned to confusion as his surroundings registered. Why am I in a cell?

‘I have relocated you to the penal carriage for your own safety, interrogator,’ the Calavera explained. ‘Our enemies have infiltrated this transport.’

‘The Iwujii…?’ Mordaine asked through parched lips.

‘Regrettably they have fallen,’ the Space Marine said.

Fallen to invisible enemies on a speeding train in the middle of nowhere? Mordaine thought listlessly as he hauled himself from the bunk. You don’t even care if I believe you or not.

‘I will stand watch,’ the Calavera said. ‘You must attend to your duty, interrogator.’

Yes, I must, Mordaine agreed, otherwise the voices in my head will begin to shout. And I don’t want to hear what they have to say.

As he shrugged on his jacket he noticed his laspistol was gone.

The young sentry was also gone and there was no replacement outside the prisoner’s door. Mordaine didn’t question it, but he knew he was alone with his enemies now.

‘You grow weaker, Haniel Mordaine,’ the alien said as he entered. ‘Ask your questions before you expire.’

‘And will you answer honestly, xenos?’ After all, what do you have to lose?

The prisoner considered the question. ‘I will.’

He’s admitted the name, Mordaine thought, but that means nothing. I have to be certain it’s him.

‘Farsight,’ he murmured, testing the name as Lieutenant Omazet might have done. ‘What’s in a name, xenos?’

‘To a tau, everything,’ the alien replied. ‘Bloodline and sept, caste and rank and conquest.’

‘Conquest? Surely that’s solely a matter for the fire caste?’

‘You misunderstand conquest, gue’la. A diplomat of the water caste might earn the name Softsword for the gentle blade of her flattery, an artisan of the earth caste–’

‘I understand the principle,’ Mordaine said curtly, ‘but I’d wager you don’t hold all conquests in equal esteem.’

‘Those of the fire caste have primacy,’ the xenos agreed, ‘for without our strength all others would be dust in the wind.’

‘And what conquest does Farsight honour?’

‘It exemplifies the first and finest precept of the Shas’va.’ The alien’s black eyes shone with icy pride. ‘I know my enemy as I know myself, indeed better, for my foe is but a shallow shadow of myself. I see as he sees, think as he thinks – and act upon his actions before he knows them himself.’

‘Is that what you’re doing now?’

‘You would be a fool to think otherwise, interrogator.’

‘Then tell me, xenos, what action will I take now?’ Because I’m damned if I have any idea myself…

‘You will know when you find me waiting for you there, gue’la.’

So it began.

Inevitably they talked of the Arkunasha War, where Farsight’s shrewd harrowing of the orks – be’gel he called them – had earned him his epithet. Mordaine expected more pride, but instead the xenos grew sombre as it recalled the campaign.

‘It was a long and bitter conflict,’ the alien said. ‘Many fire warriors were lost in the rifts of that blighted world, yet I cannot deny the beauty of it.’

‘Beauty?’ Mordaine asked. ‘In a world of rust and killer sandstorms?’

‘Not in the world, gue’la – in the war.’ The alien’s eyes dimmed with remembrance. ‘The be’gel live for war, embracing it without question or justification. They fight for the joy of fighting alone.’

‘And you admire them for this?’ Despite himself, Mordaine was intrigued.

‘No. They are beasts, but I respect their purity of purpose,’ the prisoner said. ‘After Arkunasha the water caste painted the be’gel as mindless primitives, diminishing them with words to salve the Empire’s anxieties, yet this was only a half-truth. I have waged war against the be’gel many times, but even in that first war I recognised they were neither foolish nor predictable. They adapt and prosper by instinct alone, becoming stronger with every loss they suffer. On Arkunasha we exterminated generations in a handful of years, yet they spawned faster than we could cull them, each wave adapting more swiftly to the battlefield than the last.’

‘The Imperium is eminently familiar with the orkoid threat–’ Mordaine began, but the xenos ignored him, caught up in the tide of its memories.

‘The veterans were the most dangerous,’ it continued. ‘Those who endured across many seasons borrowed Arkunasha’s strength, growing skin of hardened oxide that shielded them from the rust devils and razor storms that scoured the deserts. We called them be’kalsu, the iron beasts. They stalked us from the heart of the storms, hidden from the sharpest eye or scanner, turning the hazards of the land against us. Many were torn apart as they rode the tempest, but this only made the survivors more reckless, more lethal.’

The xenos paused, steepling its fingers in contemplation.

‘I remember watching from the sheltering ridge of Mak’lar when a monster cyclone spat out an army of spinning, flailing bodies, hurling them to the ground like the rocks the be’gel use to travel the stars. Most were killed instantly, but those that lived were still laughing when we finished them, broken yet unbroken. If the be’gel were capable of loving anything other than war, I believe it was Arkunasha.’

‘And you?’ Mordaine asked on impulse. ‘Did you also love Arkunasha?’

‘It was an honest war,’ the xenos answered obliquely, ‘until the end.’

‘Surely the end was a great victory?’

‘It was a stolen victory.’

‘I don’t understand. The Tau Empire defeated the orks decisively.’

‘I was not there, gue’la.’ For the first time Mordaine sensed the rage so tightly leashed within this glacial being. ‘Towards the end there were… difficulties. We walked on a knife edge, but I could see the shape of victory, so close I could almost grasp it.’ The xenos clasped its manacled hands, as if in supplication. ‘With reinforcements I knew I could crush the be’gel within another season so I requested a fresh hunter cadre.’ The prisoner’s knuckles cracked with tension. ‘The Empire sent an assassin.’

‘They attempted to kill you?’ Mordaine was stunned.

‘They attempted to kill my authority,’ the alien hissed. ‘They believed I had grown arrogant and wilful, straying from my prescribed place in the Greater Good. Aun’Shi himself came to Arkunasha to censure me, though I was too trusting to recognise this at the time. He commanded me to withdraw before I won the war.’

‘And then the Empire returned and won without you,’ Mordaine guessed, beginning to understand. ‘You were cheated?’

‘I was punished!’ The xenos lowered its hands, breathing deeply as it reasserted its iron discipline. ‘The aun will not tolerate the ascension of another caste. They feared I would become a beacon of dissent for the fire caste.’

‘Was that your intent?’

‘It was not.’ There was unmistakable pain in the alien’s voice now. ‘I believed in the aun. Completely. Every sacrifice I demanded of my cadre on Arkunasha, every drop of blood swallowed by the red sand and every death scream stolen by the red wind… It was all done for the Greater Good.’

This is the heart of his story, Mordaine sensed, suddenly eager. I’ll end the speculation and the theories. The Imperium will know the truth of this renegade from his own lips…

‘But surely the ethereals – the aun – they must have recognised your loyalty,’ Mordaine speculated, sifting through the few facts known to the Inquisition. ‘After the Damocles War they elevated you, made you first among the fireblades…’

‘They fashioned me into a masterful slave,’ the xenos hissed, ‘a pliable figurehead to bind and blind the fire caste with fool’s glory.’

‘But you were the supreme commander of the tau military engine.’

‘My authority extended no further than the will of the aun! I was a puppet saviour, my every word and gesture scrutinised and filtered by the water caste, my past rewritten and my future decided by committee!’ The alien’s expression contorted, becoming an abstraction of rage. ‘But I was the fortunate one, gue’la. They caged my dying mentor’s mind in a machine and cast my shadow sister and brother into stasis so their talents would never be lost to the Greater Good.’ It lowered its head, as if drained – or shamed – by its fury. ‘All of them obeyed without question, even Shaserra, who was the fiercest of us all.’

The Imperium has demanded such sacrifices of its servants for millennia, Mordaine reflected, yet this xenos butcher is outraged by the notion. Does that make him naïve or magnificent?

‘Was that the turning point?’ Mordaine pressed. ‘The event that soured you to the Empire?’

‘Among the tau loyalty is not so readily broken,’ the alien said softly. ‘There are no turning points, only fissures that multiply and swell until nothing remains of what was. I accepted my comrades’ doom as I accepted my own, but in my heart I began to question.’ The alien’s eyes locked on Mordaine’s own, unsettling in their intensity. ‘And true questions invite annihilating, irrefutable truths.’

An annihilating, irrefutable truth…

Mordaine stared at the alien. Its words had echoed the whispering carrion choir that haunted his memories.

‘Truth is a betrayer, is it not, Haniel Mordaine?’ O’Shovah said.

Yes, Mordaine agreed, uncertain why.

‘It is time,’ the Calavera decreed.

Mordaine crawled from his bunk and spooned down the thin gruel his keeper had prepared, knowing it wouldn’t begin to sate him.

‘Our supplies were lost with the Guardsmen,’ the Space Marine had explained. ‘I can offer you nothing else.’

It was a lie, Mordaine knew. Another manipulation. The bastard wanted him half-starved and pliable, yet strong enough to continue the game.

But what are the rules? What’s winning and what’s losing here?

‘I believe it’s him,’ he said listlessly. ‘I believe it’s O’Shovah.’

‘With belief comes clarity and clarity forges purpose,’ the Calavera instructed.

Perhaps that’s so, Mordaine agreed uncertainly. The pandemonium of whispers haranguing him had certainly diminished. No… no, that wasn’t quite right… They hadn’t so much diminished as contracted, coalescing towards a single persistent voice that was at once utterly unknown, yet achingly familiar.

‘Your prisoner awaits, interrogator,’ the Calavera said.

Mordaine paced the confines of O’Shovah’s cell, trying to quell his hunger with motion. It was the fourth day of the interrogation and he was intimately familiar with the hateful space now. He didn’t have much time left. He had to raise the stakes.

‘Tell me about the Dawn Blade, O’Shovah,’ he said, almost casually. The Imperium knows nothing of his notorious sword, yet it has come to symbolise our darkest fears about this renegade.

‘The Dawn Blade is a potent weapon,’ O’Shovah said evenly.

‘But a sword is a strange weapon of choice for a tau, is it not?’

‘The be’gel taught me otherwise on Arkunasha.’ The alien’s lips curled sharply. The expression might have been a smile or something else entirely. ‘I killed their leader in single combat with a blade.’

‘So you embrace new tactics… new ideas…’ Mordaine suggested reasonably. ‘The gifts of the Ruinous Powers, perhaps?’

‘I am not a fool, gue’la.’

‘Chaos can make fools of the wisest men, O’Shovah.’

‘I am tau,’ the other said with dignity. ‘I have gazed into the abyss of Vash’aun’an, which you call the warp, and faced its poisonous spawn. It holds no sway over me.’

‘Are you quite certain of that, Mont’shasaar?’ Mordaine goaded. He nodded at the alien’s twisted expression, feeling a brief, blessed flicker of dominance. How splendid it was to be on the other side of a revelation for once.

‘You talk in ignorance,’ O’Shovah said, his nostril slit flaring with anger.

‘And perhaps you choose your confidantes without caution,’ Mordaine said. ‘He told me the name, you understand… the Calavera.’ He turned his back as the alien searched his face, keeping the lie close to his chest. ‘Mont’shasaar… I know the name, but not the meaning.’

The prisoner made no reply.

I’ve hit a nerve as raw as the sword, Mordaine sensed. Perhaps more so… ‘Why are you so afraid of a name, xenos?’

‘I fear nothing,’ O’Shovah said frostily, ‘but I have told you already – to the tau a name is everything. To be misnamed is a grievous insult.’

‘Then tell me about Arthas Moloch instead,’ Mordaine offered. ‘That’s where you stole your warp-tainted blade, isn’t it?’

‘The blade was chosen,’ the xenos said, closing its eyes with finality. ‘And I will not talk of that world.’

They spoke again the next day and the day after that, until day and night coiled into a single tangle of barbed debate and dreams of debate.

I fence with O’Shovah in waking and sleep, Mordaine thought or dreamt, so perhaps it’s all one and the same.

Dimly he recalled the Calavera telling him he had only six days to find his answers, yet surely six days had passed long ago. The windows of the penal carriage were opaque with frost and he had seen nothing of the outside world since his trial began. Was the ghost engine even moving or had it stalled in limbo?

Are we damned to repeat this shadow play eternally? Mordaine mused, too weary for fear any more. Besides, the wise whisper seeping from his memories – leeching his memories – promised him this wasn’t so.

Look a little deeper into the darkness and you will see the light…

And so I step onto the game board once again and I see that the alien’s manacles are gone. He has grown indifferent to the ruse, as have I, for only our duel matters now, though why that should be I still don’t understand.

‘This Shas’va you keep alluding to…’ Mordaine faltered, rubbing at his raw eyes. ‘The Inquisition has no record of it. At least none that I’ve seen.’

‘The Shas’va is the Path of Fire,’ O’Shovah said. ‘It is my own path.’

‘You’ve invented your own philosophy?’ Mordaine asked, intrigued despite his exhaustion.

‘I have invented nothing. I seek truth and codify it as I find it.’ O’Shovah paused, judging his next words carefully. ‘My cadre is strong and my enclave is secure in the hands of my fireblades, so I have chosen to enter vash’yatol, the long walk between the spheres.’

‘Walk to where?’

‘I travel, Haniel Mordaine,’ the xenos said passionately, ‘between worlds and stars and stranger realms that I cannot yet name, passing among the hopes and fears of a thousand cultures like a shadow of smoke, gathering fragments of truth and meaning.’

‘And the Calavera is your guide?’

‘One cannot be guided on the vash’yatol,’ the xenos said stiffly. ‘Iho’nen is a fellow seeker of truth.’

‘So he told me,’ Mordaine said. Then on impulse: ‘Iho’nen… Why do you call him that?’

‘It is the name he chose,’ the alien said, then anticipating Mordaine’s next question answered: ‘It is without meaning.’

‘How can that be? You claimed meaning was everything in a tau name.’

‘He is not tau. The name has no referent.’

‘I’ll take a literal translation then.’ Mordaine gave a sickly grin. ‘Humour me.’

‘There is no levity in it,’ O’Shovah said, puzzled by the colloquialism. ‘Iho is simply one who eats, but nen…’ It closed its eyes, considering. ‘Nen is the wound that scars both the body and the mind. A betrayal of oneself or a fall from one’s path.’

‘Eater of Sins?’ Mordaine ventured, convinced by the taste of it. ‘Not a name I’d put my faith in.’

‘It is empty wordplay.’

‘You don’t believe that,’ Mordaine said fervently. ‘The Calavera does nothing spuriously. We both know it.’ Impelled by an ambiguous fellowship he leant forwards. ‘How did you meet him?’

The alien cocked its head, regarding him thoughtfully. ‘I cannot deny that I was troubled by Arthas Moloch, interrogator.’ O’Shovah paused, as if expecting a zealous attack, but Mordaine was silent. Satisfied, the xenos continued. ‘Though I looked upon the abyss as an outsider, unmoved by its allures, the knowledge of its existence alone cast a hungry shadow. Old truths leave deep scars when they are revealed as lies,’ he extended his hands, palms upwards, ‘and the path to new truths is riven with deeper lies. I sought silence and solitude to rediscover my clarity of purpose.’

Sometimes I can hear the Calavera speaking right through you, O’Shovah, Mordaine realised. ‘And you found a fellow traveller,’ he prompted.

‘Iho’nen came to me in the wilderness,’ the xenos answered, ‘and showed me that the wilderness was an entire galaxy.’

We’re all puppets to that ancient monster, Mordaine despaired, but who’s pulling his strings?

‘Tell me, O’Shovah, what truths has he promised you?’

‘Those that unite hearts and minds and worlds,’ the xenos declared with dignified passion. ‘I will not go to ground while the galaxy burns, Haniel Mordaine.’

‘So you united Vyshodd Hive,’ Mordaine scorned, letting the fleeting fellowship slip away. ‘How noble of you, great Farsight!’

‘It was the tyranny of your Imperium that seeded this world’s revolution and made it such fertile ground for the aun. I merely quickened the seed.’

‘So you could watch a city die?’

‘So I could know its fall,’ O’Shovah corrected, ‘and to vex the intrigues of the aun. Despite their posturing they fear open war with your Imperium. They believe they are not ready. I know they will never be ready.’

‘And you are?’ Mordaine mocked.

‘I am not. That is why I walk the vash’yatol.’

‘So you can figure out how to win your great war?’

O’Shovah’s expression clouded with an emotion the human couldn’t decipher. ‘Mont’shasaar,’ the xenos said softly, ‘it means the Terror That Burns Dark.’

‘I don’t follow you.’

‘I do not walk the vash’yatol to learn how to win, Haniel Mordaine,’ O’Shovah said. ‘I walk to decide what I will do after I have won.’

‘Your prisoner awaits,’ intoned the Calavera.

And again… And…

‘Inquisitor,’ someone whispered in the darkness.

Drifting on the shallowest currents of sleep, Mordaine tried to make sense of this strangeness. His existence had narrowed to two voices and a whisper, yet this intruder was neither of these.

‘Inquisitor, you must rouse yourself!’ the anomaly insisted.

Mordaine opened his eyes and saw a vague shape in the gloom.

‘Grandfather Death watches over you like a raptor,’ the stranger said. ‘I could not reach you before, but he converses with the xenos tonight.’

‘Uzochi…?’ Mordaine wheezed, dredging the name up from somewhere impossibly distant. ‘Armande… Uzochi.’

‘Rouse yourself, my brother,’ the man said urgently, glancing at the door. ‘We cannot linger here.’

‘I thought he killed you all.’ Mordaine clutched Uzochi’s arm, testing his reality. ‘I thought I was the last.’

‘The last but one,’ Uzochi confirmed, ‘and our betrayer has stalled this daemon engine in the Ghostlands to finish his work.’

‘I suspected as much.’ Six days trailing into forever…

‘Inquisitor, I have hungered to move against the heretics,’ Uzochi said fervently, ‘but I have nothing to touch Grandfather Death.’

‘Nothing…’ The presence of another soul in this nightmare, even a madman like Uzochi, energised Mordaine. It was proof that his enemy was not omniscient.

There must be a means of confounding him, he thought feverishly. Escher would see it and Escher chose me to be his heir. And with that realisation came sudden clarity.

‘Captain Uzochi,’ he said, ‘I think there’s a way…’

‘Your prisoner awaits.’

Mordaine avoided the Calavera’s gaze as he rose, taking care to keep Uzochi’s laspistol hidden under his jacket. The weapon would be useless against the Space Marine, but it was an anchor to reality and he clung to it.

I’ve been fighting on his terms, but today I’ll break the rules of the game.

‘How long have we been travelling?’ he asked on impulse.

‘We are almost at journey’s end, interrogator,’ the Calavera said.

Yes, I believe we are, Mordaine agreed.

Peering round the doorway of an adjoining cabin, Armande Uzochi watched Grandfather Death lead Mordaine towards the alien’s cell. Over the weeks Uzochi had mastered the constricted territory of the train, learning its secret paths and rhythms with deadly care, for his life had depended upon it. Sometimes the grey giant would come looking for him, passing through the carriages one by one and scouring the shadows with his all-seeing eye, but each time Uzochi had slipped away and clung to the outer skin of the engine, shivering in the churning cold until the hunt was over.

But today I am the hunter, he thought.

The Space Marine reached for the cell door.

‘Wait,’ Mordaine said. ‘I must gather my thoughts first.’

The Calavera turned and the interrogator took an involuntary step back.

Not backwards, you fool! Mordaine chastised himself. He needs to be looking the other way. He walked past the giant, feigning deep contemplation.

‘Your prisoner awaits,’ the Calavera called to his back.

‘Then let him wait a little longer,’ Mordaine said lightly. Denying that dismal, eternal phrase made his heart soar. ‘After all, he’s only a prisoner.’

‘A prisoner of singular importance.’

‘Then why is he wasting time with me?’ Mordaine swung round with Uzochi’s laspistol in his hand. Doubtless Escher would have abhorred such melodrama, but Mordaine was drunk on defiance. As he expected, the Calavera was unperturbed.

You’re so sure of yourself, aren’t you? Mordaine thought with mounting anger. How long have you been haunting the galaxy, spinning lies and pulling strings to bring down great men like Aion Escher?

‘Your weapon is ineffectual,’ the Space Marine observed.

‘Is it?’ Mordaine asked, pressing the barrel against his own temple. ‘I’m neither blind nor stupid.’ Though I’ve been both too many times before! ‘You want me alive or I’d be long dead.’

Over the giant’s shoulder he saw Uzochi steal into the corridor.

Predator or prey? The exultant Iwujii mantra spun through Uzochi’s head, cycling over and over as he crept towards Grandfather Death. Blade or blood? The weapon in his hands was heavy, abundant with sacred fury. Man or boy?

The inquisitor’s advice had proven sound. Trawling through the nobles’ storage berths, Uzochi had found real treasures among the empty relics of wealth – a cache of antique armaments that had probably seen little use in their masters’ hands. Casting aside exquisite blades and pistols, he had finally stumbled upon a bulky object wrapped in velvet. His breath had caught when he tore aside the cloth and saw the meltagun. The weapon had been inscribed with gold filigree, but such frippery wouldn’t diminish its wrath. Even an elder nightmare like Grandfather Death would succumb to its purifying fire.

Predator or prey…

‘You used me to get to the grand master,’ Mordaine accused, keeping his eyes locked on the Calavera – holding his gaze for once. ‘I know Kreeger was your creature, along with the assassin that killed Escher, but I was the lynchpin, wasn’t I?’

A sigh bled from the bronze skull, low and liquid. To Mordaine it sounded perversely like satisfaction.

‘The assassin was not mine,’ the ancient whispered. ‘The grand master was mine.’

Mordaine stared at him, trying to make sense of the answer. ‘That’s a lie,’ he denied. It has to be, otherwise there’s nothing left.

‘We infiltrated the Damocles Conclave almost two decades ago,’ the ancient continued. ‘Its remit is of interest to us.’

‘We…?’ Mordaine was still reeling. ‘No… No, the grand master was an honourable man. He was nobody’s pawn.’

‘Indeed not,’ the Calavera agreed. ‘Aion Escher was a significant and valued piece. A cardinal at the very least.’

‘You expect me to believe…’ Mordaine faltered as he saw Uzochi halt a few paces behind the Calavera and level a massive-barrelled gun. ‘Wait!’ Mordaine cried urgently, hoping to stall them both while he rallied his thoughts.

The Shark hesitated, his gaunt face twitching as he glared at his ally.

By Sanguinius, the man has found a meltagun, Mordaine realised. It surpassed his best hopes. He can send this devil’s soul to the warp! But if he does I’ll never know the truth…

‘Wait,’ he repeated. ‘If not you, then who? Who commanded Escher’s murder?’

‘The grand master acquired many enemies during his tenure,’ the Calavera said. ‘Perhaps agents of the Tau Empire or a rival faction within the Inquisition… Or perhaps someone opposed to his true loyalties.’ His implacable eye seemed to fix directly upon Mordaine’s soul. ‘His loss would be regrettable.’

‘Would…? Escher is dead. I saw him die myself.’

‘Yet a mind may outlive its vessel if the eventuality has been prepared for,’ the Calavera said, ‘and if a psychically resonant host has been nurtured to fill the void.’

‘What host?’ Mordaine demanded. ‘There was no…’

No!

‘Tell me, Haniel Mordaine, did you ever wonder why the grand master chose a dilettante like yourself as his interrogator?’ the Calavera asked. ‘A man of modest talents compromised by many vices.’

Because he believed in me! Mordaine wanted to shout, teetering between hope and terror. Because he recognised the honour beneath my shame!

‘Did you ever question why he kept you close above all others?’ that insidious whisper slithered on, cultivating doubts that had always been there, waiting to be unearthed. ‘Why he shared so many mysteries and revelations with an acolyte who lacked the wit to comprehend them?’

Because he saw greatness where others saw only mediocrity!

‘Why he still haunts your thoughts like the imminent shadow of your true self? An annihilating, irrefutable truth,’ the Calavera said, driving the blade home.

All the tests and the rituals and that ceaseless, soul-wracking assessment…

Uzochi was going to shoot! Mordaine saw it in the madman’s glassy, hate-ravaged eyes. He fired first, his pistol surging up as if of its own accord. The Calavera made no move as the bolt seared past him and punched through Uzochi’s forehead. The Shark’s mouth gaped open, spilling smoke as his gun crashed to the ground. He stared at Mordaine, but his eyes were empty. There was nothing behind them any more. That vacant condemnation transfixed Mordaine long after the corpse had toppled, for it signified what he’d always been himself: a vessel devoid of substance.

But no longer… The pistol slipped from his grasp and hope followed it.

LIGHT

All roads end in ruin, yet not all ruination is equal. The fall may reap the Void or it may see the Light.

– The Calavera

‘Will I die?’ Mordaine asked some time later. He hadn’t moved. Uzochi’s sightless eyes still held him in thrall.

‘You are not possessed,’ the Calavera answered. ‘Your mind has been imprinted with the template of another, but Aion Escher’s spirit is gone. You will experience changes as the new pattern asserts itself, but your self will remain.’

‘But will it still be me?’

‘I cannot answer that, Haniel Mordaine.’

‘I don’t even know if it was me that shot Uzochi,’ Mordaine said bleakly. ‘Why would I do such a thing?’

‘Because you want to live.’

Do I? Mordaine wondered. Or is that the other?

‘All of this…’ He gestured vaguely at everything and nothing. ‘My exile with Kreeger, the fall of Vyshodd and that infernal interrogation… You engineered it all to awaken the sleeper inside me?’

‘It was one of many synchronous, intertwined objectives,’ the Calavera said. ‘Each facilitated the other. As the revolution galvanised your quickening, so your presence sparked the revolution and both served to enlighten another significant piece. Farsight.’

‘No.’ Mordaine shook his head, appalled at the immensity of the ancient’s conceit. ‘I won’t accept it. You couldn’t possibly contrive such a thing. There are too many variables, too much scope for chance to play havoc.’

‘Your prisoner awaits,’ the Calavera declared. ‘Is that not so?’

Hesitantly Mordaine opened the cell door. The room beyond was empty.

‘The threads of fate will twist, fray and sometimes snap in the winds of Chaos,’ the ancient warrior said. ‘You are correct that nothing is certain, but much is likely for one who can see.’

‘You knew…’ Mordaine was aghast. ‘You knew I would defy you today.’

‘I knew nothing, but suspected much.’

And seeing changes what is seen, Mordaine thought, though he doubted the intuition was his own.

Later still, Mordaine asked about the xenos.

‘He continues his journey,’ the Calavera answered.

The interrogator didn’t question how or where the alien had gone. The answer would prove a mundane revelation alongside the others. Instead he asked the question that really mattered: ‘Was he truly O’Shovah?’

‘Would you trust my answer?’ the Calavera asked in turn.

‘What would you gain by lying?’

‘What would you gain by a truth you cannot recognise yourself?’ the ancient countered.

Mordaine closed his eyes, seeking to sever himself from the cat-and-mouse ritual that bound him. He found refuge in pragmatism: ‘What happens now?’

‘The mechanisms of this transport are rudimentary,’ the Calavera said with merciful directness. ‘You will master them without difficulty.’

‘To what purpose?’ Mordaine asked, aloof and sightless.

‘You will continue your journey to Yakov Hive, where the conclave’s retribution force awaits your command, interrogator.’

‘My command?’ No emotion. No investment. ‘I was under the impression the conclave had condemned me…’ Mordaine stopped, quelling a flicker of anger. ‘That was another lie, wasn’t it? I was never implicated in the grand master’s murder.’

‘Indeed not. You were operating covertly to draw out his enemies.’

‘You’ve been covering my tracks from the start,’ Mordaine said levelly. ‘There was no hunt.’

‘Only your hunt,’ the Calavera corrected. ‘A hunt which has exposed a xenos conspiracy that extends to the heart of the Tau Empire. It was fine work. I envisage you will be elevated to the rank of inquisitor within two years.’

‘And you’ll have your cardinal back on the board.’ Mordaine opened his eyes and confronted the warrior with detached hostility. ‘What if I change sides, Calavera?’

‘You will not. Once you recall the reasoning behind your allegiance you will make the same choice again.’

‘You expect me to believe your intentions are benevolent?’

‘I expect you to recognise that I offer the least of all probable evils.’ The giant inclined his head. Perhaps there was genuine respect there. Then he turned and stalked towards the carriage door.

‘Where are you going?’ Mordaine called after him, feeling a stab of perverse terror at the prospect of his tormentor’s departure.

Tormentor or mentor?

‘I continue the war, Haniel Mordaine.’ The Space Marine yanked the hatch open, awakening the storm outside. ‘Do not linger alone in the Ghostlands,’ he warned. ‘There is danger here.’

The giant stepped into the bleached fury outside, becoming a shadow and then nothing at all.

All roads lead to ruin, but at the end of a very few there may be Light.

It was another stray intuition from the restive sediments of intellect embedded in Mordaine’s mind, but the next impulse was entirely his own.

‘O’Shovah,’ he called into the wind and white darkness, ‘wherever you are, xenos, may the God-Emperor watch over you.’

Smiling bleakly at his heresy, Haniel Mordaine turned his back on the void and went in search of his own annihilating, irrefutable light.

It was not the sound of the door opening that roused him from his meditative trance. Nor was it the muffled cheers from the stadium below, or the sharp clacking of Cerraine’s stiletto boot heels as she approached his hexcage. It was the rumbling of his stomach. He chastised himself and kept his eyes closed, his back perfectly straight. His hands rested on his knees, palms turned upwards. She had food with her. He could smell it. A stew of some kind. Rich broth. Soft vegetables. A delicious spice he could not place. Greater Good, he was hungry.

‘I brought you something special today. Not the usual fare.’ Even through the translator device, her voice was the essence of cordiality.

No! He would not break down. Not now. He remained perfectly still and focused on his breathing. With each exhalation, he knew, rescue was one second closer. Someone would come for him soon. Then he could eat.

After some moments, she started tapping her foot. ‘Don’t you think this has gone on quite long enough? I mean, starving yourself in protest – it’s ridiculous.’ She laughed a little.

He gave no reply, made no movement. At his unresponsiveness, the friendliness in her voice bled away. ‘What does this prove? Who gains? You think this somehow impresses me?’

Inwardly, he smiled at her frustration. Her true self was showing. His passive resistance was finally having an effect. His hope grew.

‘Well, it doesn’t. Hunger pains are quite out of fashion, not fit even for the groundlings. Now eat, Aun’Shi.’ He could hear a clattering as she passed the bowl through the bars of the hexcage. ‘You have a matinée performance shortly. You’ll need your strength.’

At last, he opened his eyes. Certain other species in the galaxy would have described her as coldly beautiful, he supposed. Like all Var Sin’da, she was tall and lithe. Her skin was like alabaster, with high cheek bones, and dark, almond-shaped eyes. Her ears were delicate and pointed. She was elaborately costumed in multiple layers of glossy, bladed armour and silken robes. A belt made of entwined barbed wire hugged her slim hips. Her blonde hair fanned out behind her like the plumage of some fantastic bird and her translator was fashioned as a golden brooch engraved with lascivious silhouettes. Beneath her heavy makeup, her lips were tight. Her eyes burned with anger. All pretences of concern had been dropped. At last, he thought, we have come to a place where we can deal plainly with one another. Demands can be tabled. Negotiations can begin.

‘I will no longer kill for the pleasure of your patrons,’ he said. His voice was low and rough from dehydration.

Cerraine’s painted eyebrows arched. ‘Is that so?’

‘It is so.’

‘Then what will you do?’ She gave a slight smirk. ‘Bait the clawed fiends? Dance like a Solitaire?’

He refused to be goaded or insulted. ‘I will do nothing,’ he croaked. ‘You will open the door to this cage, and you will release me. You have no other choice.’

Cerraine looked down and shook her head. It seemed a sympathetic gesture, but he knew better. Sympathy was not to be found in the Var Sin’da.

‘Aun’Shi,’ she lamented, ‘how little you know me.’

He gathered saliva and cleared his throat. His voice regained some of its strength. ‘I know you very well,’ he said. ‘I know that before you acquired me, you had no independence: you were in the servitude and shadow of others. I know that you have since become wealthy because of me, and that I am quite popular with your audiences.’

Cerraine’s jaw tightened. He took it as a sign of agreement.

‘I also know,’ he continued, ‘that you dare not kill me, for it would upset said audience members, and in turn, cost you not only your fortunes, but quite possibly your life.’

A conflux of emotions raged inside of her: anger at his insolence, frustration at her inability to find a hole in his logic, fear at the possibility of losing her celebrity status. ‘I’ll have my beastmasters force-feed you,’ she said with practiced haughtiness.

Aun’Shi shook his head. ‘Such a thing is incompatible with my physiology. I would choke and die.’

The corners of her ruby-stained lips twitched. ‘Then I’ll hang you from a gibbet, and charge the people to watch you starve.’

‘You have already admitted that even the most lowly patrons would consider that to be poor entertainment. ‘Better a good day in Shaa-dom than a bad review in Commorragh’’.

She bristled upon hearing the old theatrical axiom. Mostly because it was true.

‘Therefore, since I refuse to participate in your shows any longer, and to murder me would bring about your downfall, you have no choice. You must set me free.’ His argument concluded, and he settled himself once more to wait for her reply.

Behind them, the door opened slightly and the pale, heavily-scarred face of Skelban, Cerraine’s stagemaster, peered in. ‘M-M-Mistress,’ he stammered, ‘this is the five m-m-minute call.’

Cerraine’s eyes never left the tau. ‘We may have to hold,’ she answered over her shoulder. ‘It seems there’s a slight problem with the talent.’

‘Hold?’ Skelban gasped. ‘But… But…’

Cerraine ignored his protestations and pressed up against the bars of Aun’Shi’s cage. ‘You know, no one in this city is irreplaceable,’ she growled, ‘and you’re certainly not the last of a dying race. What’s to stop me from simply finding another one like you?’

‘M-M-Mistress Cerraine,’ Skelban had now hobbled into the room to stand behind her. The victim of one haemonculi flesh sculptor after another, everything about him was hunched and broken. ‘We can’t hold the show…’

‘There are no tau in the Empire who can match my martial prowess,’ Aun’Shi replied. ‘My background and training make me unique amongst my people. That’s why the Aun’t’au’retha chose me.’

Her eyes flicked up. The little blue alien had given her an opening, and with instincts like a panther, she seized on it.

‘Chose you for what?’

‘M-m-mistress…’

‘What were you doing on that frozen, desolate ball they found you on?’ Cerraine pressed.

Realising that he had let something slip, Aun’Shi did not reply, but Cerraine had hit a nerve and she was determined to tear the truth free from him.

‘Were you in exile? On a mission of some kind?’

‘Mistress!’ Skelban yelled.

Cerraine turned on him with lightning speed. A knife had appeared in her hand. ‘I said hold the curtain!’

‘But, M-M-Mistress,’ Skelban looked pained, ‘Cidik is in the house.’

Her face became frozen. ‘Master of the Revels, Cidik?’

‘Yes! If we don’t begin on time…’

Cerraine hushed him with a wave of her manicured hand. As important as it was to keep her customers happy, it was doubly so for Cidik. As a minister of Vect, the ruler of all Commorragh, it was his job to superintend each and every gladiatorial game and bloodletting performance. If it were found lacking, say, by starting late, he could close her down with a word.

‘A slight change,’ she said to Skelban. ‘Start the show, but have the beastmasters parade the spinebacks around the ring first. That will buy a few minutes for you to bring up the other three from storage.’

‘But M-M-Mistress, everyone is expecting to see him.’ Skelban pointed at Aun’Shi with a bony, elongated finger.

‘And they will,’ she purred. ‘Now go, quickly.’

Skelban shuffled out with surprising speed. When he was gone, Cerraine withdrew a small device from her cleavage and turned back to face the hexcage.

‘Aun,’ she said slyly. ‘In your language it means “priest”, yes?’

‘It has many facets, that word.’

‘Priest being one of them?’

‘A more accurate translation might be “shepherd”.’

‘Shepherd. Even better. You have a responsibility then to protect your flock from harm. You would lay down your life in order to spare theirs.’ She pressed her palm against the bars of his cage, muttered something he couldn’t quite catch, and then stepped back.

‘You are free,’ she said.

Aun’Shi remained perfectly still, sensing a trap. ‘I am free to go?’ he asked cautiously.

Cerraine shrugged. ‘Free to go. Free to stay. The door will automatically release in one minute, and then we shall see.’

‘See what?’

Cerraine smiled with wicked delight. ‘Why, see where your loyalties lie.’

She squeezed her thumb against the side of the small device. The hexcage began to descend through the floor on a lengthening chain. A moment later, Aun’Shi found himself high above the darkened arena. The lights were lowered in preparation of the show. Everything was cast in gloom, but Aun’Shi was quite familiar with the space by now. He had, after all, spent most of his time here since his capture. It was like being inside a tall barrel. As he had come to understand it, the architecture was considered classical among the Var Sin’da. They called it a playhouse. He knew it to be a killing floor.

The main fighting area was covered with white, hard-packed sand, the better to show off the spilled blood and viscera of the performers. From experience, he also knew that there were trap doors hidden underneath from which trained monsters and automated killing machines would randomly burst. The walls were filled with recessed seats, stacked in multiple levels; the wealthiest patrons sat up top where they could be seen by everyone in attendance while those with less to spend had to sit closer to the ground. There was a single, large archway cut into the ground level through which slaves or monsters entered and their piecemeal remains could exit. Across from that was the gallery: an open platform decorated with lavish couches and chairs where Cerraine would seat and entertain important guests. Directly above that was a proscenium filled with musicians.

He was still descending through the darkened air when the cage jerked to a stop. An announcer’s thunderous voice called out his name and lights bathed him. From somewhere out beyond the blinding haze, a crowd cheered. He had not been exaggerating when he had told Cerraine that her audiences loved him. It was true. He was unique, and therefore, he supposed, of great interest to beings who thought they had seen it all. Moreover, he was on a winning streak. They thrilled to see him pitted against ever more difficult foes, and when he survived to fight another day, their fervour grew. They filled the seats to see if this was the day it all came to an end, and if it wasn’t, they were still satiated by the carnage he wrought. Throughout Commorragh he was billed as Ainn tonesh geyse, the ‘fighting blue man’. Each battle was expected to be his last, but time and again he walked away. The Var Sin’da loved him for that in their own sick fashion.

His eyes adjusted quickly and he looked below to see what they had prepared for him this day. On the sands a trio of hulking beasts clawed at the dirt and howled in blood lust. Their backs were covered with long spines. Their eyes were wide, black saucers. Thick metal collars were fixed around their necks and lengths of barbed chain held them in place. Aun’Shi had seen this many times before. The bottom of his cage would vanish momentarily, and the second his feet touched the ground the collars would pop off. After that, it was unscripted, impromptu violence. Either he would die for the audience’s amusement, or kill for their pleasure.

From the orchestra came a complex drum beat, followed by the shrill bleating of horns. The spotlights twisted around and stabbed their beams down at the large entryway. Its doors had opened, and through it came a flat hovering platform. A large cube of some kind, draped entirely in purple satin, rested atop it. Four beastmasters, nearly naked save a few strategically placed pieces of armour, escorted it into the centre of the arena. Then, with great pageantry, each of them grabbed a corner of the fabric and pulled. The purple cover came away in equal quarters to reveal a large cage underneath.

Aun’Shi started. Inside the cage were three tau.

They were of the earth caste: shorter than he was and broad across the chest. Their hands were large and their limbs were thick with muscles. Their faces were covered in cuts and bruises, and their eyes were wide as they tried to take in the incomprehensible scene around them. Their clothing had degenerated into rags, but he recognised them all the same.

They were supposed to have been his rescuers.

Arthas Moloch.

The world was cold and bleak: a mottled sphere of grey rocks and white ice fields. Even the sun in the sky had long ago sloughed off its heat and light, until only a brown dwarf remained. Had he not been following in the footsteps of another, he never would have come here. It was a planet that one came to only if one had a specific reason for doing so. Aun’Shi’s reason was to better understand Farsight.

Shas’o Vior’la Shovah Kais Mont’yr, more commonly and simply called Commander Farsight, had been one of the greatest tau military minds to ever live. More than two centuries ago, he had led the effort to repulse gue’la invaders from the Imperium of Man. The last of that resistance was routed here, from Arthas Moloch, and the Tau Empire claimed victory. It was a fantastic moment in history, a triumph of the Greater Good over the uncivilised barbarity of the galaxy. But instead of returning home to bask in well-earned honour and glory, Commander Farsight took a cadre of his closest men and left. He turned his back on everything he had fought to protect, headed out beyond the Damocles Gulf, and established his own enclave peopled entirely by members of the fire caste. He who had so valiantly upheld the Tau’va in battle, had in his final act, completely undermined it.

The loss of so beloved a figurehead, and the unanswered mystery of why he had turned renegade, whittled away at tau society in the years that followed. Many wondered whose example was to be followed: the ethereals who taught that individuality pales in comparison to the needs of the greater whole, or Farsight, whose final message to the Empire was that its people should seek their own paths? At last, the situation had become untenable. Farsight’s influence was more widespread than ever, despite his absence. And so, the tau leadership decided to repatriate this wayward general: to bring him back into the fold and by doing so, unite a fractured and divided people. Someone would have to travel out beyond the security of the Empire, find Commander Farsight, and extend the hand of brotherhood. That person was Aun’Shi.

Aun’Shi had spent his life in an obsessive struggle to understand others. He had immersed himself in the specialities of the tau castes. He had studied in depth every alien species the Empire had come into contact with. Now, he had to understand Farsight. Aun’Shi was determined to go where he had gone, to experience what he had experienced. Only then could they deal plainly with one another. So, he had come to Arthas Moloch.

The tau leadership had forced upon Aun’Shi everything they thought he might need. He left the Empire with a starship full of weapons, diplomats, and equipment, a bodyguard of highly decorated fire warriors, and even a young ethereal to act as his adjutant. The moment his shuttle touched down on the planet’s surface however, he told them all to go home. This, he said, was a journey for himself alone. Even though they were aghast, everyone complied, save for his bodyguards, who claimed that their oath to protect him couldn’t be broken under any circumstances. He nodded, instructed them to guard his ship, and left them standing ankle-deep in the snow.

He walked a short distance to Colony 23, a town established by the earth, water, and air caste members Farsight had left behind two hundred and thirty-two years previous. This was a town on the very edge of tau space, far removed from the regimented, civilized heart of the Empire. Everything had a makeshift, frontier feel to it. The space port, as such it could be called, was nothing more than a large field with a single control tower and communications dish. The streets were wide but unpaved. The buildings were low and round and obviously prefabricated. Aun’Shi liked the place immediately.

The Hall of Records, when he found it, turned out to be the cargo container from an interstellar transport. It had been converted into a three story building. The exterior still bore the markings of Farsight’s final expedition, faded to near illegibility. Inside, a trio of water caste tau, older even than he, were more than happy to regale him with tales of the past. The Commander had gone west, they said, a day’s journey or so to a nearby ice field. There, at the bottom of a canyon, he found a cluster of ancient alien ruins. Exactly what happened next wasn’t recorded, but the aftermath certainly was. Farsight returned from the ruins, gathered up only the fire caste, boarded the vessel that had brought everyone here and left.

‘Alien ruins,’ Aun’Shi mused as he sipped a cup of warm fish juice offered him by one of the scholars. ‘Of what origin?’

‘That is difficult to say,’ came the reply. ‘Arthas Moloch is covered with many such sites, and not all of them built at the same time or by the same species. The ones in the northern reaches, for example, are frighteningly huge in scale, square, blocky, and many millions of years old. Others are twisted and crumbling heaps of stone. A few are smooth and aesthetically pleasing, and so pristine they might as well have been built yesterday. There are even structures on the moon. Arthas Moloch has apparently been something of a galactic crossroads for many untold ages.’

‘If that is where Farsight went,’ Aun’Shi told them, ‘then that is where I must go next.’

One of the archivists laughed lightly. ‘That will make Gue’run happy.’

‘I’m sorry, who?’

‘Fio’vre Gue’run.’

‘Overseer of alien buildings?’ Aun’Shi repeated. It was a title he’d never once come across.

‘A name he gave himself,’ another of the record keepers said. ‘Gue’run is of the earth caste. He fancies himself a master of xenothropology and a student of alien architecture. He spends nearly all of his time camped out at one site or another.’

‘Only returns here to Twenty-Three a few times a year,’ the third archivist said. He was blind in one eye and had lost most of his teeth. ‘Gathers supplies, has some equipment repaired, finds a few apprentices foolish and young enough join him and then goes back out into the wild.’

‘And why should my arrival make him happy?’ Aun’Shi asked.

All three of the water caste tau laughed.

‘Because,’ said the toothless one, ‘he’ll finally have someone to talk to who hasn’t heard all his stories.’

The next morning, Aun’Shi procured a transport and sped off across the frozen wastes. The feeble sun was setting as he approached the excavation site. He stopped the skimmer just outside the perimeter of the archaeologist’s camp, gathered his pack and began to walk. The fabric of his travelling robes retained most of his body heat, but even so he hunched his shoulders against the increasing wind. Tiny ice crystals stung his eyes.

Dark and threatening shapes began to loom around him. The tau buildings were tiny, cream-coloured domes huddled against enormous, curving, alien structures and vertical glacier walls. He stopped when he noticed someone loping towards him. It was a tau, presumably of the earth caste, whose stoutness was comically exaggerated by the thick layers of thermal clothing he wore. He carried a portable glowglobe that bathed everything in the immediate area in pale yellow hues.

Aun’Shi raised his right hand in formal greeting. ‘Tau’monat,’ he shouted over the wind.

‘Tau’monat’la!’ the other replied. He ran within arm’s length and then stopped panting heavily. His wore a wide and excited grin, and looked around with childlike expectation. ‘You’ve come at last. Where are the spare parts?’ he asked.

Aun’Shi shook his head. ‘I’m not here to deliver anything, if that’s what you think.’

‘You’re not?’ The young tau’s face fell.

‘Did no one at Colony Twenty-Three inform you that I was coming? The esteemed gentlemen in the Hall of Records, perhaps?’

The youth shook his head. ‘We have no communications array. The overseer says that isolation sharpens one’s observation skills. We requested additional equipment some time ago, and when the perimeter sensors picked up your vehicle, I assumed…’ he trailed off in bitter disappointment. Then he frowned. ‘Who are you then?’

For a moment, Aun’Shi considered lying. Whenever other tau knew that there was an ethereal in their midst, they felt compelled to put on great shows of hospitality and compliance. All he wanted was to be left alone to explore these ruins and delve into Farsight’s mind.

‘My name is Aun’Shi,’ he sighed at last. Personal preferences, he reminded himself, rarely served the Greater Good.

The apprentice’s eyes grew wide, and he bowed deeply. ‘Aun,’ he breathed. ‘It is an honour to receive you, unworthy as I am.’

‘Perhaps we could go inside?’

‘Certainly!’ The young tau stretched out his arms, and waited. Aun’Shi sighed again, then shrugged off his pack and gave to the apprentice. Together, they walked through the gathering dusk towards the nearest building.

‘What shall I call you?’ Aun’Shi asked.

‘I have yet to choose a name, aun.’

‘Well, you are only at the beginning of your life’s journey,’ Aun’Shi said, as paternally as he could. ‘There will yet be time.’

‘Overseer Gue’run has, for the meantime, christened me as Fio’la Cha’la. You may call me that, if it pleases you.’

Aun’Shi thought the name spoke more about the one who had given it than the one who bore it. Cha’la literally meant ‘action creature’, or in the tongues of other species, ‘go-to man’.

They came in out of the wind and cold into a dome-shaped room filled with crates and equipment. Enough space had been cleared to accommodate two computer workstations. A connective tunnel led off into spartan sleeping quarters. A ceiling-mounted heating unit struggled to make the room tolerable. Huddled over one of the workstations was a burly earth caste tau. A black visor covered his eyes. Cables ran from it to a glove on his right hand. He made a flicking motion in the air, leafing through a stack of papers that only he could see.

‘Did that courier bring us a new baryonic imaging scanner, Cha’la?’ he said absently.

‘Regrettably, no,’ Aun’Shi replied.

At the sound of the unfamiliar voice, the visored tau looked up. ‘And why not?’

‘Because I am not a courier.’

Gue’run removed his visor and let it clatter to the desk. He glowered at Cha’la for letting an apparent stranger waltz into his research site, and then demanded, ‘Well, who are you, then?’

Aun’Shi bowed his head. Even though he himself was of a far higher social standing, he was a visitor here. It was right for him to show deference to the head of the household. ‘I am Aun’el Viora’la Shi.’

Gue’run’s face went slack for a moment before he charged around his desk to greet Aun’Shi. In his haste, he forgot to remove his interface glove, and the visor, still attached, dragged across his workstation. Pieces of white stone and electronic scraps scattered across the floor. ‘It is a great honour,’ he gasped. ‘A great honour. I am Fio’re Gue’run. Welcome, Aun’la, to my humble research outpost.’

‘Aun’Shi, please.’

The Overseer paused at the invitation to address one so high above him as a familiar. ‘As you prefer,’ he said slowly. ‘To what do we owe the visit?’

Again Aun’Shi hesitated, wondering exactly how he should answer. His assignment to find and repatriate Commander Farsight was not technically a secret, but neither did he want the whole Empire to be aware of it. There was a very real possibility that it would come to nought, and he hated to raise up the people’s hopes only to dash them further. ‘I am on a fact-finding mission,’ he said carefully. ‘My search for insight has apparently led me here.’

Gue’run’s face lit up, just as the three old archivists had predicted it would. ‘If it is facts that you seek, then I would be only too happy to provide them.’ He began pulling at the fingers of the interface glove. ‘Cha’la here will prepare a meal while I take you on a tour. You will doubtless wish to see the structures I have excavated firsthand.’

Before anyone could even reply, Gue’run had grabbed a heavy coat from next to the door and charged off into the arctic night. Cha’la smiled weakly, bobbed his head, and excused himself. Aun’Shi took a deep breath, and went back outside.

‘I have been told, Gue’run,’ Aun’Shi said as he jogged to catch up to the rotund scientist, ‘that this planet has played host to a wide and varied number of alien species over the centuries.’

Gue’run gave a look of pleasant surprise. He sealed up his coat and pulled a pair of thermal gloves from out of the pockets. ‘The aun has been told correctly. Arthas Moloch contains ruins from at least twelve different races. It seems everyone stopped here to visit at one time or another. Most fortuitous.’

‘How so?’

The sun had vanished now, and the two of them walked beside a string of tiny glowglobes. The lighted path led away from the habitat domes and down beneath the glacier. The biting wind was stifled.

‘Well,’ Gue’run answered, ‘we get to study the peoples of the galaxy without leaving the comfort of the Empire. Perhaps the aun is unaware that I have spent half my life on this world. Fifteen local years. I’ve put names to several of this world’s visitors.’

They came around a corner and entered a spacious chamber hollowed out of the ice. Large glowglobes made it as bright as noon. In the middle of the space sat an ornate machine crowned with sensors and blinking lights. Part of its side had been pulled way, and an earth caste tau sat before it, prodding it with tools. Aun’Shi was more taken with what lay beyond however. The wall of ice was not a typical pale blue or white. It was red. From top to bottom, it seemed as if the glacier had been coated with melted, crimson wax. Jutting out from this was a single, curving structure the colour of pale bone. A large platform, made of the same material, emerged at the bottom. The immediate impression was that he had stumbled across the rent flesh and exposed rib of some ancient and titanic beast.

Gue’run noted Aun’Shi’s shock. ‘Ah, yes,’ he chuckled, ‘the Blood Wall can be disturbing when first seen.’

Aun’Shi licked his chapped lips and recovered himself. ‘The Blood Wall?’

‘That’s what Cha’la called it when we first discovered it. The name has regrettably stuck, even with me. Although it appears the ice is made of frozen blood, I can assure the aun that it is not. The discolouration is natural and actually caused by iron oxides and hypersaline water flow.’ He crossed his arms and looked quite pleased with himself.

Aun’Shi was unable to shake a sudden and powerful sense of foreboding. He gestured up at the alien structure that emerged from the ice. ‘Natural or not, who would choose such a site to build?’

‘The original occupants left few records behind. This archway, and several other similar buildings, formed an outpost of sorts, I think.’

‘You think?’ Aun’Shi knew as soon as he spoke that his voice carried too much of an edge.

Gue’run shrank back slightly. ‘It’s a guess, aun, but a very educated one. I assure you. Core samples taken from the surrounding ice indicate they abandoned this place more than thirty-five thousand local years ago. Over time, this chamber froze solid, but I have been using coherent particle beams to melt the ice and map the internal circuitry of the arch. In fact,’ Gue’run frowned, ‘we should be doing so now. Please excuse me, aun.’

Gue’run stormed off towards the machine, and began a hushed but furious conversation with the other earth caste tau. Aun’Shi followed behind slowly. Perhaps it was the stifled atmosphere inside the ice chamber, or the disturbing wall of blood, but he felt as if he were moving through a dream. He craned his neck and looked up at the arch. The surface wasn’t smooth he saw, but finely pitted. It wasn’t just the colour of bone. It was bone. Or something very much like it. There were species in the galaxy that utilised such biotechnology, he knew; peoples ancient and unknowable. Contact between them and the tau was infrequent to say the least, but Aun’Shi had spent a lifetime in study. His brain was filled to bursting with obscure reports and references.

Gue’run was still interrogating his fellow scientist. ‘Bentu, you are supposed by running a spectrographic scan of the crystals imbedded in the platform section,’ he hissed. ‘Why is this not being done? Can’t you see we have an important visitor?’

The seated tau struggled to his feet. His environmental suit was rimed with frost that flaked off as he bowed. ‘Forgive me, fio’vre. I was performing the scan. Everything was going well. Then the feedback pulse hit.’

‘Feedback? What feedback?’

‘I don’t know. An energy signature from the arch itself. It overloaded the scanner, and I’ve been trying to repair it ever since.’

‘Why didn’t you inform me of this earlier?’

‘You said not to bother you unless it was important.’

The light from the glowglobes dipped for a moment.

‘What was that?’ Gue’run sounded more annoyed than concerned.

Bentu seemed embarrassed. ‘There have also been increasing power drains. I don’t know why.’

‘Gue’run,’ Aun’Shi said, ‘This archway, this entire structure, was completely encased in ice until you began thawing it.’

‘Yes, aun.’

‘So, all of this was inaccessible during Farsight’s time?’

‘Farsight?’ Gue’run gaped. ‘Well, uh, yes. Completely cut off. If you’d like to visit the surface ruins, the same as he would have, I’d be only too happy to…’

The glowglobes went out again, and this time they did not return. For a moment, the only illumination came from the blinking error message on the scanner’s display screen. Then, the Blood Wall seemed to radiate a flickering blue light that turned everything in the ice chamber a sickly purple. The three of them turned just in time to see a swirling vortex of energy appear. It stretched from the apex of the bone arch down to the flat platform, and looked like a pool of quicksilver turned on its side.

Creatures were now standing on the platform. Aun’Shi did not know how it was possible, but they had simply appeared. They were silhouetted by the flowing energy field behind them. Four of them looked like oversized canines whose skins had been removed. The other three were whip-thin, bipedal humanoids. In their hands they held a variety of nets and barbed spears. What clothing they wore was skin tight and adorned with blades and spikes. A flock of bird-like creatures broke through the silver pool, making sounds like screaming babies. They circled around the top of the chamber, pecking at one another.

Aun’Shi had dedicated entire decades to the study of the races that dwelt in the dark places out beyond the Empire. These had to be the Var Sin’da, the ‘dark raiding ones’: piratical monsters who struck from the shadows, took what they wanted, and vanished back from whence they came. To his knowledge, they had never been seen in tau space until now.

The hounds snarled as the three lanky figures surveyed their surroundings, and noticed the tau simultaneously. They said something in their native language, and smiled wickedly.

Aun’Shi shrugged off this thermal robe and walked a few steps forward. From his belt, he unclipped a heavy cylinder. With a flick of his wrist, it telescoped outwards from either end, forming a long, bladed staff. He twirled it like a windmill, and then spread his arms wide. Over his shoulder, he called out to Gue’run. ‘Take my skimmer. You and your men get back to Colony Twenty-Three. Tell them what’s happened.’

‘What about you?’ Gue’run cried.

Aun’Shi squared his shoulders. ‘I’ll be fine,’ he said, more to himself than in reply.

Gue’run and Bentu scrambled back towards the tunnel entrance. Two of the Var Sin’da moved as if to go after them, but Aun’Shi matched their steps. He shook his head, sure that his posture spoke clearly across any cultural gulf.

At some unspoken command, the skinless hounds charged forwards. Aun’Shi flipped himself backwards to land on top of the bulky scanning machine where he couldn’t be surrounded. The monsters yelped and swiped at him. He beat their claws away with his staff. They tried to leap at him. Again he stopped them from so much as touching him. His weapon was a blur, moving left and right, blocking and sweeping. One of them launched towards him, its jaws gaping. Aun’Shi stepped back, swung his staff in a wide arc, and decapitated it. The remaining three beasts paused to re-evaluate their target. He let them regroup and jumped down, putting the scanner between himself and the monsters.

One of the Var Sin’da made a piercing whistle, and the flock of birds responded. They rocketed towards the tunnel, intent on catching up with Gue’run. Aun’Shi hurled his staff at them like a javelin, then broke into a sprint. The blade pierced one of the birds clean through, and dropped into Aun’Shi’s waiting hand. The rest raced back up to the ceiling, crying in protest.

The grins had vanished from the faces of the Var Sin’da. Instead they looked perplexed. The one standing in the middle barked out an order, and the other two charged forwards. The hounds and birds did likewise.

‘I’ll be fine,’ Aun’Shi reminded himself.

They hit him all at once with an avalanche of claws, beaks and blades. Nothing could find purchase. Aun’Shi gripped his staff loosely, tucking it in close to stop a spear, sweeping it high to strike a bird, jabbing it straight forwards to knock a hound away. He was the eye in a storm of violence. Their inability to hit him, let alone hurt him, made the two Var Sin’da boil with anger. They screamed obscenities at him. The birds wailed. The hounds roared.

Aun’Shi said nothing. His face was impassive. Even when a serrated blade at last slipped past him and gouged a deep hole in his arm, he stayed silent and focused. There were too many, he realised. He was only holding them off, instead of inflicting casualties. He tried to back up into the tunnel. In the closer confines, he thought, he might be able to focus on killing his foes, rather than simply stalling them.

One of the hound creatures snapped at his ankle. He reflexively kicked it in the face. His knuckles were scratched and bleeding, torn up by the birds. The wound in his arm began to burn terribly. His vision blurred. The spear, he thought. Something on the spear. Toxin. Very underhanded.

He was nearly to the tunnel when he lost all feeling in his right arm. The agony was spreading across his chest now. His skin felt like it was on fire. He tried to compensate, but his defence crumbled and he dropped to one knee. Something slammed into the side of his face, twisting his head. Blood sprayed from between clenched teeth. The world swam, and he went down. They kicked him in the spine, and something was chewing on his legs, but these were distant, secondary things. The knife wound consumed his thoughts. He had never felt such agony. The ice did nothing to soothe his skin.

After a few moments, he realised dimly that he was still alive. Cold, smooth hands were holding his head, rolling it from side to side. He fought to stay awake.

‘Thenalus nen ithyn?’ a voice asked. The words had a disturbing vibrato to them. After a moment, he was slapped across the face. ‘Chith’nai! Yinare theniben marj mol quaryon?’

One of his attackers was leaning over him. Aun’Shi focused his vision with all his might, and noted pointed ears, pale skin, and high cheekbones.

‘I don’t… I don’t understand you,’ he muttered.

‘Tyathe,’ the Var Sin’da replied. His fellows laughed at the shared joke.

Aun’Shi was dimly aware that they were binding his hands and feet with barbed chains. They felt sharp and cold. Then he was being dragged roughly across the ground. ‘What are you doing?’ he slurred. ‘Where are you taking me?’

Aun’Shi managed to lift his head. The archway and the flowing silver portal were looming close. He managed to spit out one final word before the agony of his wounds made speech impossible. ‘Why?’

The Var Sin’da leader stooped down over him once more. He patted the wound on Aun’Shi’s arm in an almost sympathetic manner. Then he pulled back, and punched the tau in the jaw.

His last thought before he lost consciousness was that he hadn’t failed in his duty as an aun. He had secured Gue’run and his men enough time to get away. They would find help in Colony 23, his bodyguards perhaps, and return to save him. All he had to do was wait, and stay alive.

At the sight of the three tau huddled together and terrified in their cage, the audience laughed uproariously. The band struck a tune and the beastmasters pranced merrily back towards the entryway. Aun’Shi gripped the bars of his hexcage until his knuckles turned white. Gue’run, Cha’la and Bentu hadn’t evaded capture after all. They’d never made it back to Colony 23. No one was coming to save him. His life was over.

He looked towards the gallery in despair. Cerraine was playing the hostess to several other Var Sin’da nobles, passing out goblets filled with golden wine. She threw back her head and laughed. Then she walked to the front of the platform. She had something in her hand which she raised. The audience quieted down in anticipation. At Cerraine’s signal, the cage containing Gue’run, Cha’la and Bentu collapsed. As they ran off the platform, the beasts were freed of their restraints. An excited cheer swept through the house. It was going to be an easy slaughter, and all Aun’Shi could do was watch.

No, he realised. He didn’t have to just sit up here helplessly. Cerraine had told him that his hexcage would be unlocked. Free to go or free to stay, she had said. He pressed on the bars in front of him. They swung away easily. It would be a simple matter for him to jump down to the sand below, slay the beasts, and save his fellows. He could also abstain from performing before the Var Sin’da, as he had sworn to do, but then he would be knowingly shirking his duty as an ethereal. Cerraine had surely known the impossible choice she had presented him with: to either betray himself or his people, but betray something nonetheless. No matter what he did in the next few seconds, he was beaten. Either by his actions or his inactions the crowd’s thirst for blood would be satiated.

The epiphany took his breath way. Aun’Shi saw that he had come to understand yet another alien species. The Var Sin’da were co’tau: anti-tau. Their existence was based entirely on selfishness and the misery of others, both physical and emotional. They were the absolute opposite of the Greater Good, and they had to be stopped.

They had to be destroyed.

He hit the ground and rolled. There were no weapons in the arena, he noted. Apparently, he was supposed to either fight the spinebacks hand to hand, or improvise. He chose the latter. He grasped a bar from the collapsed cage, and swung it around just in time to catch one of the monstrosities in the face. Part of its head caved in, spraying yellow ichor. It gave an ear-piercing cry and whirled. A spike-encrusted tail caught Aun’Shi in the thigh, tearing out hunks of blue flesh. He brought the bar down again in a killing blow, but the beast leapt back.

‘Aun’Shi!’ he heard Cha’la cry. ‘Behind you!’

The other two monsters, attracted to the scent of his blood, were circling around him. They charged in a loping gait, but Aun’Shi was ready. He leapt high into the air, and drove the bar through one of their quilled haunches. He let go of his weapon, rolled in the sand, and came up, panting. All three of the fiends were still alive. The one with half a skull gibbered horrifically. The crowd seemed delighted.

The earth caste tau had sheltered underneath the hovering dais. Aun’Shi scrambled to join them, as the sole uninjured beast charged forwards. It slammed into the side of the platform, causing it to rock violently. The monster spat and hissed, but was too large to reach its targets.

‘What will we do?’ Gue’run sputtered. ‘What will we do?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Aun’Shi admitted. He pressed his hands down over his gushing thigh, and looked about hastily. ‘I need a weapon.’

All three spinebacks were now circling the dais, trying to get at the tau. Things had come to a standstill. The audience was getting restless.

‘Does this platform have controls?’ Aun’Shi asked.

‘Yes,’ Bentu replied. He seemed the most collected of the three. ‘Some pedals and a manoeuvring stick.’

Aun’Shi tore a strip of material from his robe and tied it tightly around his leg. He winced as he cinched it. ‘Can you pilot it then?’

Bentu swallowed hard. ‘I can try. But how do we get out from under here?’

The spinebacks growled. One of them was lying on its side, pawing at the tau like a cat unable to reach a mouse. Its breath was foul and hot.

‘It was an honour to serve you, aun,’ Cha’la said quietly. Then he bolted out from underneath the dais and sped away across the sand. The spinebacks abandoned their efforts and bounded after him. The audience laughed to see the boy flee, and cheered joyously when the monsters pounced on him. They each grabbed a limb, and pulled Cha’la in grotesque tug of war. There were a series of ripping, tearing sounds as his body parts flew off in several directions.

‘Go! Go!’ Aun’Shi yelled.

The tau dashed out from their hiding place and climbed atop the platform. Pieces of purple material still flowed down off the sides. Aun’Shi and Gue’run grabbed the bottom of the cage. Bentu took precious seconds to look over the controls and then stomped down on one of the pedals. The machine lurched forwards.

A ripple of surprised laughter went through the crowd, followed by a smattering of applause. The dais was barely more than an enlarged, floating wagon. It was certainly no escape vehicle. Yet the fighting blue man and his little friends acted as if it was their salvation. Delightful.

The monsters looked up at the sudden movement and gave chase. In a matter of seconds, they were closing on the tau. Gue’run screamed at Bentu to go faster. The platform lurched again, titled wildly, and then rocketed forwards. The spinebacks surged to keep pace.

Up in the gallery, Cerraine spoke into the small device in her hand. ‘Skelban, let’s give them some obstacles.’

A moment later, several of the trap doors in the arena floor popped open. Short, flat-topped towers emerged, their bases ringed with blades. From nozzles near their crown, they began to spray thick green tar in long torrents. Aun’Shi had seen these before. They reminded him of the sprinklers used on his arid home world to help manicure lawns. Only instead of water, the Var Sin’da were using corrosive bio acid.

Bentu saw the towers appear and veered the dais to one side. The spineback with only half a head left caught a full jet of the deadly chemicals. It dissolved into two separate halves that twitched and kicked in circles.

The platform levelled out again and Aun’Shi turned to Gue’run. ‘Help me flip this!’ he yelled, indicating the bottom of the cage. Struggling to keep their balance, they dug their hands underneath the heavy frame, and lifted. Aun’Shi could never have done it by himself, but Gue’run’s earth caste arms were strong. With a loud grunt, they heaved the iron framework up. It wobbled for a moment, then came crashing down on one of the spinebacks, pinning it.

A stream of acid washed across the platform. Gue’run’s right leg vanished out from under him, leaving only frothing, purple goo. He screamed and tumbled backwards into space. The final spineback, which still had Aun’Shi’s improvised fighting staff protruding from its side, opened its jaws wide to snatch up this tasty treat.

Aun’Shi launched himself off the back of the dais. He tackled Gue’run in midair, knocking him clear. They hit the sand together and rolled for some distance before coming to rest. Aun’Shi looked up in time to see the dais crash into a wall. Acrid smoke was belching from the undercarriage. He couldn’t see whether Bentu was still alive or not.

Aun’Shi stood despite his shaking knees. The final spineback was circling around. Its head was low. Its tail whipped back and forth. The crowd was chanting.

‘Tonesh! Tonesh! Tonesh!’

He had lost a significant amount of blood, despite his makeshift bandage. Colours swam at the edge of his vision. Sweat dripped from his forehead. If this was going to end, then it had to be now.

‘I’ll be fine,’ he told himself.

His charge took the spineback by surprise. As it turned its head to the side guardedly, Aun’Shi leapt through the air. He extended his hoof and drove it straight into the creature’s eye. It exploded with a sharp cracking sound, covering his leg with ruptured jelly. The beast reared up and howled. Aun’Shi recovered himself, planted his injured leg in the sand, and kicked again with all his might. He caught the spineback square in the stomach, driving it backwards into an acid stream. Its head and neck dissolved. What remained of the body crashed down before him, vomiting forth blood and organs. The audience cheered.

Aun’Shi hobbled over to the corpse and yanked the metal bar free. The hexcage in which he had entered was being lowered from the ceiling and additional slaves were running out onto the field to begin cleaning up for the next event. He stood and watched as they gathered up Gue’run and hauled Bentu’s limp body from off of the platform. When they had been taken out through the main entryway, he stepped into the hexcage. The door swung shut and he began to rise up once more, his performance finished for the time being.

It wasn’t long before Cerraine came to see him again. By that time, attendants had stitched his leg wound closed and applied foul smelling salves everywhere else.

She leered at him. ‘Laria sana’yijel shuthel chos nai rukal,’ she said. A moment later, her brooch translated her words as, ‘I had a feeling you’d join in the fun.’

‘I’m fighting for survival,’ Aun’Shi replied tersely, ‘not entertainment.’

Cerraine pouted her lips and said, ‘It’s adorable that you still think there’s a difference.’

They stared at each other a moment.

‘What did the Master of the Revels think?’ Aun’Shi asked.

Cerraine’s eyes hardened. ‘Cidik thought it was… fine. Let’s just say he won’t be closing me down any time soon.’

‘So long as I do not give him a reason to, that is.’

‘You must be hungry,’ Cerraine said, abruptly changing the subject. ‘I’ll have food brought to you.’

‘My friends, as well.’

Her lips twisted in a sly smirk. ‘A bit of celebratory fun with your underlings, eh? I thought as much.’ She snapped her fingers. Gue’run and Bentu were shoved through the door. Like Aun’Shi, their wounds had also been tended to. The overseer had been fitted with a metal prosthesis.

‘I’ll leave you to it,’ she said. Before leaving, she paused dramatically in the doorway and added, ‘You two owe him your lives. Be sure to treat him well.’

No one spoke for some time. Finally, Gue’run broke the silence. ‘I know I should thank you for saving us, aun,’ he said, ‘but perhaps you shouldn’t have. Would not death be better than a life of slavery?’

‘I had thought that very thing,’ Aun’Shi answered. ‘However, I now realise that our duty to one another doesn’t end just because we’re no longer in the Empire. No matter where we go, the Greater Good is our strength and shield.’

‘Even here?’ Bentu asked weakly.

He laid a hand on each of their shoulders. ‘Especially here.’

Someday, somehow, he told himself, I will bring the righteous fury of our people down upon the heads of the Var Sin’da. From now until then, that is all I will strive for.

‘Do not worry,’ he reassured them. ‘I am aun. I will lead and protect you. Always.’

-BEGIN RECORDING-

We walk blindly along a knife-edge slicing into oblivion. If we misstep we fall from our path. If we walk true we fall with our path. Perhaps there is a difference, but I have come to doubt it. Nevertheless, I will honour the Greater Good and allow you to draw your own conclusions from the facts.

I have little time, but even in extremis one must observe the correct protocols. That is what it means to be a tau amongst savages. Whatever else I have lost to this diseased planet, I will not lose that. Therefore know that I am Por’ui Vior’la Asharil, third-stream daughter of Clan Kherai. Though I hail from a sept of worlds where the wisdom of the water caste is eclipsed by the ferocity of the fire caste, my family has served the Tau Empire with grace since the dawn of the first colonies. As I serve with this, my final account.

And so I shall offer you a beginning. Let it be the grey-green murk that is the perennial stuff of Fi’draah, my new world. As I stepped from my shuttle the planet seized me in a stinking, sweltering embrace and wouldn’t let go. Blinking and choking in the smog, I heard harsh voices and harsher laughter; then someone thrust a filtrator mask over my face and I could breathe again.

‘The first time is like drowning,’ my saviour said. ‘It gets better.’

I don’t recall who the speaker was, but he lied: breathing this world never got any better.

‘You have evidently made powerful enemies for one so young, Asharil,’ the ambassador said without preamble, peering down from the cushioned pulpit of his hovering throne drone. His voice was soft, yet vibrant. It filled the spacious audience chamber like liquid silk, the weapon of a master orator. His summons had followed directly upon my arrival and I was mortified by my dishevelled state.

‘I do not understand, honoured one,’ I blustered, stumbling between respect and revulsion for the ancient who presided over our forces on this remote planet. O’Seishin’s authority was a testament to the excellence of our caste, but he reeked of years beyond the natural span of the tau race. His flesh had aged to deep cobalt leather, barely concealing the harsh planes of his skull, but his eyes were bright.

‘This is a terminal world,’ he continued, ‘a graveyard for broken warriors and forgotten relics like myself, not a proving ground for the hot blood of youth. Who did you offend to get yourself posted here, Asharil?’ He smiled, but his eyes belied it.

‘I walk the water path,’ I answered, seeking the natural poise of our caste. ‘My blood runs cool and silent, so that my voice may weave–’ O’Seishin’s snort cut me short like a physical blow.

‘I am too old for wordplay, girl!’ He leaned forwards and a strand of spittle escaped his lips. ‘Why have you come to Fi’draah? Who sent you?’

‘Honoured one…’ I stammered, struggling to avert my gaze from the lethargic descent of his drool. ‘Your pardon, but I requested this posting. I have made a study of the language and customs of the humans,’ – I deliberately used the gue’la word for themselves – ‘and Fi’draah offers most excellent opportunities to deepen my insight.’

He appraised me with a distrust so candid it was almost conspiratorial, as if we were both willing players in a game of lies. A game that he was used to winning…

‘So you wish to test yourself in the field, Asharil?’ He smiled again and this time I saw humour there, though no humour I cared to share. ‘Then I shall not deny you. Indeed, I believe I have a most suitable commission for you.’

I will never know why O’Seishin became my enemy in that one brief meeting, but he proved to be the least of the blights awaiting me on this world.

Of the long conflict between the Tau Empire and the gue’la Imperium for mastery of Fi’draah, I shall not speak. Mysteries shroud the war like whispering smoke, but I learned little of them before O’Seishin dispatched me to oblivion. Of the planet itself I could say much, for I travelled its wilderness for almost five months, but I will content myself with a single truth: whatever you are told in your orientation, it will not prepare you for the reality of this place. To classify Fi’draah as a ‘jungle world’ or a ‘water world’ is to garb a corpse in finery and call it beautiful. Eighty per cent of its surface is drowned in viscid, lethargic oceans that blend into the sky in a perpetual cycle of evaporation and drizzle, wreathing everything in a grey-green miasma that seeps into the flesh and spirit. The continents are ragged tangles of mega-coral choked with vegetation that looks – and smells – like it has been dredged up from the depths. Stunted trees with fleshy trunks and bladder-like fronds vie with drooping tenements of fungi and titanic anemone clusters, everything strangling or straddling or simply growing upon everything else – fecundity racing decay so fast you can almost see it.

Whether Sector O-31 is the worst of Fi’draah’s territories I cannot say, but it must surely rank amongst them. The gue’la call it ‘the Coil’, a name infinitely more fitting than our own sober designation, for there is nothing remotely sober about that malign wilderness. A serpentine spiral of waterlogged jungles, it is the dark heartland of Fi’draah’s largest, most untamed continent. The war has left it almost untouched, but rumours haunt it like bad memories: of regiments swallowed whole before they could clash… Of lost patrols still fighting older wars than ours… And of ancient things sleeping beneath the waters…

Naturally, I dismissed such nonsense. My task was to cast the light of reason across this enigma and ‘unravel the Coil’ (as O’Seishin so artfully sold it). I was to accompany Fio’vre Mutekh, a distinguished cartographer of the earth caste on his quest to map the region. Fool that I was, I believed myself honoured! It was only later, when I saw how the Coil twisted in upon itself, that I realised the absurdity of our endeavour. I have often wondered whether O’Seishin is still laughing at me.

It says much about the nature of the earth caste that Mutekh approached his impossible assignment without rancour. A robust tau in his autumn cycle, he had a pompous manner that exasperated me, but he was utterly rigorous in his work. His assistant, Xanti, was a placid autaku (or data tech) who spoke rarely and never met my gaze. I believe he preferred the company of his neo-sentient data drone to his fellow tau.

The fourth and final person of note was our protector and guide, Shas’ui Jhi’kaara. A fire warrior and veteran of Fi’draah, she regarded the jungle with the tender distrust of a predator who knows it is also prey, and like many alpha predators she commanded her own pack: a dozen gue’la janissaries equipped with flak-plate and pulse carbines. They were all Imperial deserters, lured from the enemy by the promise of better rations rather than ideology, and despite the trappings of our civilisation they remained barbarians. Every night they gambled, quarrelled and brawled amongst themselves, but never in Jhi’kaara’s presence. Had they known I spoke their native tongue they would have guarded their words more closely. Listening in on their crude passions and superstitions, I marvelled that their stunted species had ever reached the stars.

Together we entered the Coil: earth, water, fire… and mud, travelling its strange waterways in a pair of aging Devilfish hover transports. Every few days Mutekh would spot a ‘notable feature’ and call a halt. Then we would spend an eternity recording some obscure geological phenomenon or ancient indigene ruin. As the cartographer updated his maps and the janissaries patrolled, the jungle would press in, watching us with a thousand hungry eyes that belonged to a single beast.

‘It hates us,’ Jhi’kaara said once, surprising me as I stared back at the beast. ‘But it welcomes us in the expectation that we will grow careless.’

‘It is just a jungle, shas’ui,’ I said, squaring up to the warrior. ‘It has no thoughts.’

‘You are lying, waterkin,’ Jhi’kaara said. ‘You see the truth, but like all your kind, you fear it.’

‘My kind?’ I was shocked. ‘We are the same kind. We are both tau.’

Her face was hidden behind the impassive, lens-studded mask of her combat helmet, but I sensed her sneer.

As our expedition stretched from weeks into months I came to detest every one of my companions, but Jhi’kaara most of all. While I recognised the place of the fire caste in the Tau’va, there was a coiled violence about her that disturbed me. Perhaps it was her hideous facial scarring or her playful contempt… But no… I believe it was something deeper. Like O’Seishin, she had become tainted by this world.

Taint. Such an irrational term for a tau to use; surely one better suited to the Imperial fanatics who condemn otherness for otherness’s sake? Perhaps, but lately I have come to wonder whether the fanatics may have it right.

It is time I told you of the Sanctuary of Wyrms.

‘What is it?’ I asked, trying to decipher the dark shape through its veil of vegetation. Squat yet vast, it rose from the centre of the island ahead, evidently a structure of some kind, but unlike any other we had encountered in the Coil. Despite the obscuring vegetation, its harsh, angular lineaments were unmistakable, suggesting an architectural brutality at odds with the flowing contours of our own aesthetics. Even at a distance it filled me with foreboding.

‘The Nirrhoda did not lie,’ Mutekh said, lowering his scope.

The Nirrhoda? I recalled the feral, mud-caked indigenes we had encountered some weeks back. Technically ‘indigene’ was a misnomer since the native Phaedrans were descended from gue’la colonists who had conquered this world millennia ago and then, in turn, been conquered by it. Squat and bowlegged, with huge glassy eyes and yawning mouths, they were primitive degenerates who wandered the wilderness in loose tribes. All were unpredictable, but the Nirrhoda clan, who followed the chaotic arrhythmia of the Coil, were notoriously belligerent. Yet Jhi’kaara had known their ways and won a parley for Mutekh, who had traded trinkets for shreds of truth about their deceitful land. One such shred had led us here.

‘They certainly did not lie about the wyrmtrees,’ the fire warrior observed sourly. ‘That island is infested with them.’

I had taken the gentle undulation of the towering anemone-like growths encrusting the island to be a product of the wind… Yet there was no wind… Now I watched their swaying tendrils with fresh eyes: at the base, each was thicker than my waist, tapering to a sinuous violet tip that tilted towards us, as if tasting us on the air.

‘Are they dangerous?’ I asked.

‘Their sting is lethal,’ Jhi’kaara said fondly, ‘but they grow slowly. These must be over a century old. That structure–’

‘Evidently predates the war,’ Mutekh interrupted with relish. ‘We must evaluate this discovery thoroughly.’ Something like avarice swept across his broad face, revealing another shade of taint: the hunger to know. ‘You will clear a path, please, fire warrior.’

Jhi’kaara turned the rotary cannons of our Devilfish upon the forest, shredding the rubbery growths into steaming slabs that seemed more meat than vegetable. The trees shrieked as they died, their warble sounding insidiously sentient.

‘It proved a poor sanctuary,’ Xanti said with peculiar sadness. I glanced at Mutekh’s assistant in surprise. He shrugged, embarrassed by my attention. ‘That is what the savages called this place: the Sanctuary of Wyrms.’

Then the janissaries went amongst the detritus with flamethrowers, laughing as they incinerated the flailing, orphan tendrils. One brute grew careless and a whip-like frond lashed his face as it flipped about in its death spasms. Moments later the man joined it in his own dance of death. It was the first time I saw violent death, but I was unmoved. Fi’draah had already changed me.

Unveiled, the building was almost profound in its ugliness. It was a squat, octagonal block assembled from prefabricated grey slabs that were as hard as rock. The walls tilted inwards to a flat roof that looked strong enough to withstand an aerial bombardment, suggesting the place might be a bunker of some kind. Circling it, we found no apertures or ornamentation save for a deeply recessed entrance wide enough to accommodate a tank. A metal bulkhead blocked the path, its corroded surface embossed with a stark ‘I’ symbol. Despite its simplicity, the sigil had an austere authority that deepened my unease.

‘I am unfamiliar with this emblem,’ Mutekh mused, running a hand over the raised metal. ‘Your thoughts, por’ui?’

‘It looks like a gue’la rune,’ I answered. ‘Linguistically it translates as ‘the self’, but in this context it probably has a factional connotation.’

‘So the gue’la built this place?’ Xanti asked.

‘Oh, I would most definitely postulate an Imperial provenance,’ Mutekh said, clearly enjoying himself. ‘Though it lacks the vainglorious ornamentation typical of their architecture, the configuration and construction materials are manifestly Imperial.’

‘Why would there be Imperials on Fi’draah before the war?’ Xanti seemed confused by the notion.

‘Why wouldn’t there be?’ Mutekh proclaimed. ‘Throughout the ages there have been Imperials almost everywhere. They are an ancient power that coveted the stars millennia before the Tau’va was revealed to us. There is no telling when they first came to this world. Or why.’

‘This place has the strength of a fortress, but not the logic,’ Jhi’kaara offered, speaking for the first time. ‘The walls are solid, but there are no emplacements or watchtowers.’

‘Perhaps they are hidden,’ I suggested.

‘No, remember this is a pre-war relic,’ Mutekh chided. ‘It was not constructed to keep an enemy out, but to keep a secret within.’

‘What kind of secret?’ Xanti asked loyally.

‘The kind that was worth hiding well!’ There was a glint in the cartographer’s eyes at the prospect. ‘The kind that is worth learning for the Greater Good.’ He slapped the bulkhead. ‘Open it!’

There was no obvious access mechanism, but Xanti’s data drone detected a biometric scanner embedded in the bulkhead.

‘For the gue’la it is a sophisticated system,’ the autaku murmured, his face lost in the dancing holograms projected by his drone. The small saucer-like machine hovered by the hatch, interfacing the mechanism with its datalaser and mapping it into territory its master could negotiate.

‘I doubt I could deceive this,’ Xanti said, ‘but it appears the seal has already been broken… and crudely reset.’ He looked up with a frown. ‘Someone has trespassed here before us.’

Despite the damaged seal, night had fallen by the time Xanti synthesised the correct trigger. Dead cogs ground into life and the bulkhead rose, groaning at this second desecration. A sour fungal fetor seeped from the dark maw, so dense it was almost visible. Some of the janissaries chuckled as I retched and fumbled for my filtrator mask, but their faces were pale. Jhi’kaara silenced them with a sharp gesture, but I felt no gratitude. Her sealed helmet spared her the stench we suffered. Where was the equity in that?

We entered the cavernous chamber beyond in a practised formation, with Jhi’kaara’s hovering gun drone taking point and the janissaries fanning out to either side. Our torch beams thrust back the darkness, but it clung to every corner and crevice like black cobwebs. The burned-out hulks of amphibious transports and machinery loomed on all sides, casting shadows across a graveyard of barrels and crates.

‘The invaders closed off the escape route,’ Jhi’kaara said, gauging the devastation. ‘They destroyed the vehicles and sealed the exit in case anyone slipped past them.’

‘Why did no one fight back?’ I wondered. ‘There are no bodies here.’

‘A good question, waterkin.’

Across the chamber the inner hatch lay amongst the detritus, shredded and torn from its recess. Jhi’kaara knelt and ran her fingers over the wreckage. The edges were curled into serrated whorls of tortured metal.

‘Power weapons,’ she said. ‘Chainswords.’

‘How can you be sure?’ I asked.

‘The teeth leave a pattern.’ She paused and looked over her shoulder, staring right at me. ‘Their mark is… unique.’ It was almost a challenge.

‘Unique?’ As if by their own volition my eyes were drawn to the ghost of a scar running down the faceplate of her helmet, a wound that echoed the rift in her own face. And suddenly I understood why she knew these weapons so intimately.

The destruction petered out in the corridor beyond, but the sense of oppression did not. It shadowed us as we passed through one deserted chamber after another, closing in as we moved deeper into the outpost.

‘Smaller teams would cover more ground,’ Mutekh protested. ‘Your caution is illogical, shas’ui. This place is long dead.’

But the fire warrior would not split our force, and I was struck anew by the differences between the castes. We worked together for the Greater Good, yet our natures were discordant. Mutekh and Xanti were creatures of reason, while Jhi’kaara was pure instinct. What did that make me?

I brooded over the question as we pressed on, passing through guardrooms and storerooms, the hollow tomb of a dormitory and a mess hall where food still waited on the table, fossilised and forgotten.

‘It took them unawares,’ Jhi’kaara murmured, ‘and it took them swiftly.’

‘It?’ I asked. ‘You mean the invaders?’

‘No…’ For the first time she sounded troubled. ‘No, I think this was something else.’

We found the first corpse in the communications room, propped up against the vox-console. Shrouded in heavy crimson robes, the mummified cadaver looked more machine than man. Its face was an angular bronze mask studded with sensors, seemingly riveted to the skull. A pistol was clutched in a bionic claw, the barrel shoved through the broken grille of its mouth. Its cranium had ruptured into a crown of splintered bones and circuitry.

‘He shot himself before the intruders reached him,’ Jhi’kaara judged.

‘Or because they reached him too late,’ I offered uncertainly. She glanced at me, waiting as I tested the intuition. ‘He’s the only one we’ve found. Perhaps that makes him different.’

‘He was certainly different,’ Xanti said eagerly. ‘Judging by his extensive bionics he was a Mechanicus priest, probably an important one. Unlike ourselves, the data techs of the Imperium aspire to become one with their machines.’

The autaku’s passion surprised me. Abruptly, I realised how little I knew about my companions. We had travelled so far together yet we were still strangers. Was it our castes that divided us, or merely our personal flaws? Uneasily, I put the question aside and concentrated on the facts.

‘Perhaps he summoned the invaders,’ I suggested.

Jhi’kaara considered it. ‘Perhaps he did, waterkin.’

And perhaps I am not the fool you took me for, I thought.

The elevator to the lower levels had been demolished and the hatch to the stairwell was welded shut from within, but that was no obstacle to our plasma cutters. Beyond, a metal staircase wound down into darkness.

Jhi’kaara’s gun drone led the way, levitating down the stairwell as we followed on the spiralling steps, its searchlight diving ahead into the abyss below. As we descended, the walls became brittle and powdery, sucked dry by silvery seams of fungus. In places the filth had erupted into cancerous fruiting bodies, but they were all desiccated husks, seemingly petrified in the moment of blossoming. The stench was dreadful and I kept my filtrator firmly in place. Mutekh and Xanti soon followed suit, but the janissaries suffered stoically, unwilling to show weakness before Jhi’kaara.

They are like dogs trying to impress their master, I thought.

At regular intervals we passed access hatches to other levels, and I realised the bulk of the outpost lay beneath the ground, like a buried mountain riddled with tunnels and caves. Some hatches were sealed, other gaped open, but we ignored them all. Exploring the entire complex would take days and none of us cared to linger here. Instead we pressed on, drawn by a collective sense that the answers we sought lay below. But when the drone’s light finally found the bottom of the stairwell we froze.

‘Emperor protect us!’ one of the janissaries gasped, but nobody reprimanded him for his atavism.

Our path terminated in a charnel pit. Dozens of cadavers were piled up below, mangled and contorted by violent death. The walls around them were pitted with deep craters, suggesting heavy gunfire, but it was impossible tell whether it was bullets or chainswords that had cleansed these dead.

Cleansed. It is another term that sits uneasily with the Tau’va, yet it is the right term, for these creatures were unclean. Despite their wounds and decades of decay, it was obvious they were only superficially gue’la. Their withered flesh was stretched taut across misshapen bones, thickening to gnarled plates at the ribs and shoulder blades. Many had double-jointed legs and scythe-like appendages jutting from their wrists. Their faces were atrophied relics in elongated, almost bestial skulls, the jaws distended by hardened, stinger-tipped tongues. Some still wore shreds of clothing, but most were naked.

They shed their clothes like redundant skins when the change came over them...

‘We should go back,’ I said with utter conviction. For once I suspected the janissaries were with me, but to my surprise they weren’t the only ones.

‘Asharil is right,’ Jhi’kaara said. ‘This tomb is best left buried.’

Mutekh hesitated. He was as repulsed as the rest of us, but leaving a mystery unsolved was anathema to him.

‘Unacceptable,’ the cartographer declared. ‘It is our duty to assess, quantify and record this anomaly. The Greater Good demands courage. Has yours failed you, fire warrior?’

Jhi’kaara stiffened. The tension passed through the janissaries in a sympathetic wave and I saw their weapons twitch reflexively towards the cartographer. Even Xanti noticed it, looking back and forth between the opponents with a confused expression that was almost comical. Only Mutekh seemed oblivious to his own peril.

‘I will continue alone,’ he pushed, ‘if you are afraid…’

I thought she would kill him then. I tried to intervene, to rise to my calling and smooth over the discord, but the words slipped away before I could marshal them. Instead, Jhi’kaara found a reserve of discipline I had not credited her with.

‘Fire always walks at the fore,’ she said. Without another word she stepped down amongst the corpses. And sealed our fate.

We followed the intruders’ trail of devastation through a maze of laboratories and workshops that soon became unrecognisable. The fungal veins riddling the walls had grown ripe here, erupting into groping, ropey strands like calcified viscera. Before it froze, the stuff had entwined itself about everything, melting the rigid Imperial architecture into soft organic shapes.

We are crawling through a diseased corpse, I thought, but what if it’s not dead, just forever dying? I fought to suppress the absurd notion, grasping for the clarity of the Tau’va, but in this cesspit it seemed a flickering, false hope.

The blighted dead were everywhere, snarled up in the weave where they had fallen. Shredded, pulverised or charred, they had died in droves as they swarmed against the incursion, and I found myself wondering at the lethality of their slayers. What kind of creature could carve a swathe through such horrors?

We found the answer in a ravaged infirmary where the invaders had suffered their first casualty. The fallen warrior was almost buried beneath a mound of mutants, but there was no mistaking his stature. Alive, he would have been almost twice my height and countless times my weight. Could it really be?

‘Space Marines,’ Jhi’kaara said with something like reverence. ‘And where there is one, there will be others.’

My breath caught as she confirmed my suspicion. I had studied accounts and pictures of the Imperium’s elite warriors, but they had seemed a distant, almost mythical peril. They were the stuff of nightmares, bio-engineered giants bred to be utterly merciless in the service of their dead Emperor. It was rumoured that a hundred of these monsters could conquer a world.

‘What were they doing here?’ I wondered, staring at the dead Space Marine in fascination. A helmet with a sharp, almost avian snout hid his features, but I could imagine the face beneath: it would be pugnacious and broad, with skin like toughened leather and a fretwork of scars and tattoos – a face not merely honed by war, but rebuilt for it.

Jhi’kaara gestured to the janissaries and they heaved the mutants aside, exhuming the warrior’s void-black power armour. Peculiarly, his left arm looked as if it were cast in silver, its shoulder pad carved into a stylised ‘I’ sigil inset with a skull. More incongruous still was the bright yellow of the opposite pauldron. For all his ferocity, this warrior’s grasp of aesthetics had been woeful.

‘I recognise this heraldry.’ Jhi’kaara tapped the angular fist inscribed on the yellow pad. ‘The Imperial Fists are old foes of the Tau Empire, but this…’ She indicated the silver pad. ‘This I have not seen before. And the Imperial Fists wear yellow armour, not black.’

‘Wait,’ I said, ‘this second symbol… Isn’t it like the one we found at the entrance?’

‘It is similar,’ Mutekh said, peering at the device, ‘but the inset skull is a significant deviation. There may be a connection, but careless assumptions are dangerous...’

‘Does it matter?’ Xanti asked. ‘The gue’la fanatics are all insane. Nothing they do makes sense.’

‘Know your enemy as you would know yourself,’ Jhi’kaara said, doubtless quoting some fire caste credo. ‘There is a mystery here.’

There was certainly no mystery about the Space Marine’s death: his breastplate had been cracked open like a shell and one of the mutants had virtually crawled inside his chest as it disembowelled him.

‘The Imperium sent its finest warriors to purge this crisis,’ Jhi’kaara murmured thoughtfully.

‘All the more reason for us to leave,’ I insisted.

‘No, we cannot.’ She stepped away from the dead giant. ‘Space Marines do not leave their fallen behind.’

‘I don’t see the relevance…’

‘Do you not? Think, waterkin.’

‘I…’ The realisation struck me like ice water. ‘You believe they failed.’

‘Whatever happened here…’ she said, sweeping a hand over the mutated horde, ‘we must be certain it is over.’

The trail ended at the uppermost tier of a subterranean amphitheatre. Our torches struggled to make sense of the vast space, picking out details but unable to capture the whole, leaving me with the impression of a gargantuan hive woven from grey strands. Hunched in a depression at the centre of the chamber was a pale mound. Thick cords of fungus sprouted from its base, multiplying and tapering as they spread out to insinuate themselves into every surface.

As we descended, it became apparent the mutants had made their last stand here, throwing themselves between the invaders and the heart of their hive, but one by one the Space Marines had also fallen. The first lay two tiers down, still gripping his chainsword though his head was missing. Like his comrade he wore black and silver power armour, but his right pauldron was completely different.

‘A White Scar,’ said Jhi’kaara, pointing out the crimson flash on the white pad. ‘They fought honourably on Dal’yth.’

‘There were Space Marines on Dal’yth?’ I was appalled by the idea of the Imperium penetrating so deep into tau space.

‘They almost took Dal’yth, waterkin.’ She chuckled dryly. ‘Among your caste some truths are left unspoken lest they wither your faint hearts.’ Despite her words there was no malice in her voice. We had achieved an understanding of sorts, she and I. Of more concern was the possibility that my own caste had lied to me. Was that really possible? Remembering the ancient manipulator O’Seishin, I found little comfort.

As we continued our descent Jhi’kaara paused beside each of the fallen Space Marines and examined his insignia solemnly: a blue raptor against white… A white buzz saw against black… She recognised neither of them, but she paid her respects regardless, for each had died hideously and heroically, surrounded by sundered enemies.

‘Why would they bear different cadre badges?’ I said, seeing how the riddle of their mismatched fraternity troubled her.

‘Cha’ptah badges,’ she corrected. ‘Space Marines call their factions Cha’ptahs.’ I frowned at her awkward pronunciation of the gue’la word ‘Chapter’. ‘And to answer your question, waterkin: I do not know. This co-fraternity contradicts everything I was taught about their kind. Space Marines adhere rigidly to their own clans.’

‘Perhaps they were forced to fight together,’ I suggested. ‘Maybe it was a penitence for some transgression. Or an honour.’

Neither theory was reassuring, especially since the dead mutants were growing more fearsome. Some bore no resemblance to the gue’la at all, looking more like the spawn of an entirely different, utterly aberrant race. A few actually dwarfed the Space Marines, their bulk covered in spiny exoskeletal plates that looked strong enough to withstand a pulse-round. All were mottled with a fur of silver-grey mould, but it was impossible to tell whether the fungus had grown upon them or from within them.

Abruptly Jhi’kaara stopped, gazing at one of the larger beasts. ‘I know what they are,’ she said quietly.

‘They are mutants,’ Mutekh declared, ‘evidently the product of some ill-conceived Imperial dabbling…’

‘They are Yhe’mokushi, beasts of the Silent Hunger,’ Jhi’kaara said. The reference meant nothing to me and the others looked equally mystified. She nodded, unsurprised. ‘A predatory species the Tau Empire has only recently encountered. These differ from the bioforms depicted in our orientation sessions, but diversity is in their nature. They are living weapons that can steal form as well as substance, becoming whatever suits their purpose.’

‘And they are hostile to the Tau Empire?’ Xanti asked uneasily.

‘They are hostile to all life save their own. Like locusts they exist only to consume and multiply, leaving nothing but dust and shadows in their wake. It is said the Imperium has suffered greatly from their depredations.’

We were silent. Here was another ugly truth hidden in the name of the Greater Good. Over the last few months my certainties had eroded away, revealing deception, obsession and horror. What else had been kept from me?

Down… further down… More dead Space Marines… First a golden beast’s head set against midnight blue, then another raptor, this one red against white.

‘You respect these warriors,’ I said, watching Jhi’kaara carefully.

‘I respect their strength, Asharil.’

But I sensed her admiration ran deeper. Jhi’kaara was an outsider amongst her own kind, closer to Fi’draah’s wilderness than the wisdom of the Tau’va. She was drawn to these warriors for their brotherhood as much as their strength.

By the time we reached the lowest tier we had found eight Space Marines. The last had succumbed at the periphery of his objective, his armour pierced in a dozen places by scything claws. Bizarrely he was still standing, his body wedged on its feet by the mass of corpses pressed against it. Even amongst his brothers he was a giant, but there were other differences. While the rest had painted their left arms silver, both his arms were silver – or more likely some stronger metal. Each was an angular augmetic, one terminating in a slab-like fist, the other in an intricate claw whose purpose was probably manipulation rather than combat. His personal heraldry was black, its symbol a stylised white gauntlet.

‘Iron Hand,’ Jhi’kaara declared. ‘Another old enemy.’

‘These would appear to be specimen containment units,’ Mutekh said, pointing out a pair of toppled glass cylinders that looked big enough to hold the largest abominations. Ropes of fungus were wrapped around them, squeezed so tight the reinforced glass had fractured.

‘The fools brought the Silent Hunger to Fi’draah,’ Jhi’kaara hissed. I was surprised by the fury in her voice. She sounded like her own world had been threatened.

‘So this place was some kind of prison?’ Xanti asked.

‘Not a prison,’ Mutekh said as he followed the web of pipes running from the cylinders to a corroded bank of consoles. ‘Remember the laboratories we passed through? No, this is a research facility. The Imperials were experimenting on these creatures. Perhaps they were seeking a means of communication…’

‘The Imperium does not seek communion with its enemies,’ Jhi’kaara said. ‘They were looking for a weapon.’

‘But why here?’ Xanti wondered. ‘Is it just a coincidence they came to Fi’draah?’

‘Many of the indigenous fungi are lethal,’ Mutekh speculated. ‘Perhaps they were attempting to synthesize a pathogen.’

‘Then they failed,’ Jhi’kaara said flatly.

‘We do not know that,’ Mutekh protested. ‘The techniques of the gue’la are riddled with superstition, but…’

‘The Yhe’mokushi strain was too strong,’ I said, surprised by my own conviction. ‘When the Imperials infected it… it devoured the fungus…’

Intuition, I realised. I am neither entirely a creature of reason nor instinct, but something subtler than either.

‘It became the fungus,’ I finished. ‘And then the fungus devoured them.’

My comrades stared at me, then their eyes wandered to the infested expanse around us. Jhi’kaara broke the silence: ‘Search the Space Marines,’ she ordered the janissaries. ‘Gather their grenades.’

‘What is your intent, fire warrior?’ Mutekh demanded.

‘We will complete our enemy’s mission.’ She indicated the monolithic puffball. ‘Sometimes the enemy of your enemy is the greater enemy.’

‘You will do no such thing!’ Mutekh was appalled. ‘We must ascertain what the Imperials discovered here.’ He looked to Xanti for support, but the young data tech avoided his gaze. ‘Autaku!’

‘I am sorry, fio’vre,’ his assistant muttered unhappily, ‘but whatever the Imperials found here… it did them no good.’

‘I will search this one,’ I said, heading for the nearest Space Marine.

‘I trust you know what a grenade looks like, waterkin?’ Jhi’kaara mocked gently. Then she was gone, heading for the upper tiers.

‘Cowards,’ Mutekh called after us. ‘You are all betraying the Greater Good.’

No, we are serving the Greater Good, I thought fiercely. Even if some of us have come to doubt it.

Biting down my disgust I dragged a corpse away from my chosen warrior, intent on reaching his utility belt. That was when I noticed the hum. It was faint, but its source was unmistakable: this Space Marine’s armour was still powered. Unsettled, I peered up at his archaic helmet. A flat visor covered the right side of his face, but the left was a tangle of bionics clustered around a jutting optical sensor. Up close he seemed more machine than man.

Iron Hand, Jhi’kaara had called this one…

‘Fio’vre, wait!’ The voice was Xanti’s, its urgency irresistible. I glanced round and saw Mutekh standing beside the puffball, a laser scalpel in one hand and a sample container in the other.

‘Wait!’ I echoed, but the scalpel was already descending towards the mottled surface. ‘Don’t–’

The puffball exploded like a bomb.

And that’s precisely what it is, I realised, a spore bomb, dormant but not dead.

There was no fire or fragmentation in the blast, but the concussion threw Mutekh across the tier, slamming him against the consoles with bone-breaking force. I saw his body rebound a heartbeat before everything was smothered in swirling grey smog. Clutching my mask tightly, I screwed my eyes shut and crouched, sheltering beneath the Iron Hand. The scattered janissaries cursed as the spore cloud rolled over them, then the curses turned to choked screams as their lungs drowned in filth. I heard them stumbling about as they fought to escape their torment. Someone opened fire blindly, his pulse-rounds sizzling as they ripped through the congealed air. Someone else screamed his last as a wild round struck him.

That was a mercy. The only kind remaining to these men...

I risked a glance as one of them fell to his knees alongside me. The toxic whiteout reduced him to a vague, flailing silhouette, but I could see his entire body heaving violently, as if in the grip of some bone-deep tremor.

Not bone-deep. This quake ran much deeper than that.

I heard his flesh seething as its muscles contorted into new shapes, stretching his skin taut in the struggle to contain the chaos beneath. Suddenly he screamed, spewing blood and spores as his back arched inwards at an impossible angle. The spine snapped – then snapped back into a sleek, predatory curve. Vicious spikes erupted along its length, racing to catch up with his rapidly elongating cranium. His arms shot out in a welter of shredded fingers, propelled by the bone scythes surging from his wrists. He tried to scream again and his tongue burst free, thickened and barbed, like a stinger-tipped snake.

It looks like there is a wyrmtree growing inside him, I thought wildly. Any moment now, the newborn hybrid would turn and see me…

‘Fio’vre! Where are you?’ Xanti called as he came stumbling through the mist, his faithful drone hovering beside him. He saw me and raised a hand in relief. ‘Asharil! Did you see–’

The hybrid leapt. Propelled by powerful, double-jointed legs it streaked through the air and was upon the autaku before he saw it coming. The bone scythes slashed down, impaling him through the shoulder blades and pinning him to the ground. His shriek was cut off as the beast’s tongue shot out like a spring-loaded blade and punched through his filtrator mask. His legs kicked about spastically as it wormed its way down his throat, stinging and seeding him with spores. The abandoned data drone twittered in confusion and a scythe flailed out and sent it spinning my way. I covered my head as the saucer smashed into the Iron Hand and toppled beside me with a forlorn squawk.

The smog had thinned out, the spores settling over the chamber like softly luminescent dust. By their pallid light I saw that none of the janissaries had escaped the change. Some were still going through the final trauma, but five were racing towards a solitary figure on the topmost tier. Jhi’kaara was kneeling, tracking the approaching hybrids with her pulse rifle. She fired, but her chosen mark darted aside with shocking speed. I imagined her cursing then, angry but not afraid. Never afraid… She fired again, then once more in quick succession, the first shot tricking her target into the path of the second. The round struck the hybrid mid-leap, throwing it to the ground in a writhing heap. Before it could right itself a third shot sheared through its skull. A kill, but it had cost her precious time.

With a chittering yowl one of the creatures leapt onto Jhi’kaara’s tier, but she ignored it, intent upon a more distant mark. Before I could shout a warning, her gun drone swooped from the shadows and lanced her aggressor with its twin-linked guns, almost tearing it in two. Whirling round, the saucer sped towards another hybrid, spitting fire, but the beast danced about in ragged avian bursts, bounding between the floor and the walls as it charged. At the last moment it rolled low and sprung up beneath the saucer, latching on to its rim. The drone spun about, firing furiously as it tried to dislodge its attacker, but the beast was too strong. I imagined the machine’s primitive logic core assessing probabilities and weighing up options. It found its answer within seconds and self-destructed, incinerating the hybrid from the waist up.

I had no more time to spare for Jhi’kaara’s battle. Done with its prey, Xanti’s attacker sat up on its haunches, sniffing the air while its victim writhed beneath it in the throes of change. I looked around, hoping for a fallen firearm… cursing myself for refusing to carry one… desperate for a clean death…

‘Power…’ The voice sounded like the wheeze of a dying machine. A machine that spoke Imperial Gothic… I looked up and saw the impossible: the Iron Hand had inclined its head towards me, its optic glowing a dull red, like a doomed sun. Beneath that merciless blaze water turned to fire and I became a creature of instinct. Grabbing Xanti’s battered drone I hauled, staggering under the weight as I raised it to the giant like an offering to some primal god. The burden was as much philosophical as physical, yet my path seemed clear.

The galaxy was tainted and taint had to be cleansed…

A metal tendril uncoiled from the warrior’s helmet, swaying about like a blind snake. Then it struck, its sharpened tip drilling through the drone’s casing with a whine of ruptured metal. A moment later the snake became a leech, burying itself inside the broken machine’s innards and sucking it dry of power. Power to re-ignite its master’s hatred.

Honest hatred!

I heard Xanti’s assailant rise behind me, but my world had narrowed to the awakening Iron Hand. I knew my sanity had gone, unravelled by O’Seishin’s lies and Fi’draah’s truths. All that remained was horror and the will to face it.

For the Greater Good…

The rest was a blur. The hybrid howled behind me and its kin answered from all sides. I spun round as it leapt, its virulent tongue extended towards me. The Space Marine’s fist met the beast in midair like a turbotram, punching clean through its ribcage. He cast the corpse aside as the others fell upon him in a chittering, screeching mob. There were four in all, fully transformed and almost mindless in their need to rend and tear and infect.

The first came head-on and died in a heartbeat, its skull pulverised by a pneumatic punch to the face. His armour grinding like rusted cogs, the warrior swung at the waist and grabbed another by the throat, squeezing until bone and cartilage collapsed into paste. In the same instant he rammed his manipulator claw between the jaws of a third. Its head convulsed violently as the claw became a whirling rotary blade inside its mouth. He yanked the tool free in a storm of shattered bones as the final hybrid vaulted onto his back, scythes poised to hack down. Before it could strike, a bolt of energy punched through its skull, throwing it from its perch. I glanced up and saw Jhi’kaara kneeling a few tiers above us, her rifle levelled.

Cleansed, I thought, every one of them.

‘Asaaar…haaal…’ The voice made my name sound like something dredged up from a polluted ocean. I turned as Xanti hauled himself up, using his malformed scythes like crutches. His movements were clumsy, crippled by the capricious mutation of his muscles, as if the fungus was baffled by tau physiognomy. His face had stretched into a death mask, the lower jaw almost touching his belly, but his eyes were unchanged, staring at me with agonised recognition. Pleading…

‘Asaaar…’ Xanti’s barbed tongue surged towards me. The Space Marine shoved me aside, but the stinger lashed my shoulder as I fell. A terrible numbness seized my arm before I even hit the ground. Dimly I saw Jhi’kaara vault from the tier above. She raised her rifle to her shoulder and advanced on the abomination, firing as she came. She didn’t stop until it was a charred ruin. Then she turned her wrath on Mutekh’s broken, spore-saturated body. The cartographer never stirred beneath the barrage. Perhaps he was already dead, but I doubt Jhi’kaara cared. The last thing I saw before consciousness slipped away was the dimming red light in the Iron Hand’s optic.

‘Power…’ he whispered. And then we both faded to black.

‘You were fortunate,’ Jhi’kaara said when I awoke. The numbness in my arm had faded, leaving behind a dull ache. ‘Its sting did not carry the infection.’

Then by unspoken consent we fed the Iron Hand, gathering the janissaries’ weapons and power packs and offering them up to his ravenous mechadendrite. Our ritual was without sense for the enemy of our enemy was destroyed, leaving only the enemy, yet we never hesitated. We were both creatures of instinct now, bound by an imperative stronger than the Tau’va.

‘How long have you waited?’ I asked the giant when we were done. The Imperial Gothic came easily to my tongue. It always had.

‘How…? Long…?’ His voice was slurred and electronic, the syntax broken. ‘Very – long…’

‘How did you survive?’

He turned his optic on me, weighing me up like an iron god. Abruptly the visor covering the right side of his face slid aside. In place of flesh and bone I saw a formless grey tangle riddled with electronics and corroded rivets.

‘The Flesh – betrays,’ he said, though he had no lips, ‘but the Machine – is faithful.’

I saw his doom then. His body had succumbed to its wounds, but his depleted augmetics had endured, cradling his consciousness as life slipped away. Half-corpse, half-machine he had stood frozen in this chamber for untold decades, burning with impotent rage as his dead flesh was consumed. Denied sleep or the deeper oblivion of death, he had watched as corruption blossomed within and without. I saw him descending into madness, then clawing his way back in the hope of redemption… then falling again. How often had that cycle repeated? And where did it stand now?

‘Your mission is complete,’ I said carefully, indicating the tattered spore bomb. ‘We destroyed the taint.’

‘You did – Not. This was – Nothing – just another Tendril – of the Corruption. I watched it grow – then grow stale – over the long – Long – long…’ He faltered as his splintered mind strove for coherence. ‘The Root – survives...’

He stepped towards the centre of the chamber, moving with surprising grace. We followed and saw the pit for the first time: a dark slash in the ground where the mega-fungus had bloomed. On closer inspection I saw it wasn’t a pit at all, but a steeply inclined tunnel, its walls resinous with fungus, like the aperture of a titanic blood vessel. Or a stalk…

The spore bomb grew from here, I realised, and the corruption is still down there, rooted deep in the ground.

‘The mission is – Incomplete.’

Like the Iron Hand’s mission my story is incomplete, but that is of no consequence. My purpose is not to entertain you, but to warn you. Jhi’kaara will carry this log out of the Coil and ensure that it is heard and heeded. This undying tomb must be quarantined lest we fail to destroy its voracious legacy. We? Yes, I have chosen to accompany the Iron Hand on his final duty. I am no warrior, but I can carry grenades and we will bear many into the unclean bowels of this place. Jhi’kaara argued against it, of course, telling me it was her duty to make the final descent.

‘You should bear the word and I the fire,’ she said, but it could not be.

You see, I cannot return. Jhi’kaara was wrong: Xanti’s sting did carry the contagion. Though his touch was fleeting I can feel the taint stirring in my blood like the promise of lies. I don’t know how long I have, but I will not hide in the darkness until the blight takes me. Besides, my corruption is more than blood-deep, for I have fallen from the Tau’va. I am no longer a creature of water or fire, nor indeed of sanity, but I can still serve. I shall descend into the pit alongside my enemy and purge the unclean… For the Greater Good.

-END RECORDING-

I am a warrior of the fire caste. I have seen the carnage of battle before, wherever the Greater Good has struggled to overcome the dark barbarity so prevalent across the galaxy. Death and destruction are distasteful, yes, but I now know the deeper truth. They are an inevitable by-product of our people’s civilising mission. They cannot be avoided, and thus must be embraced. That is a lesson not found in the curricula of the military colleges on Bork’an. That is something only my time here as Overseer of Cytheria could teach me.

The battle of Herzen Ridge is where it began. My enlightenment, that is, not our conflict with the gue’la rebels. That, as you well know, is a struggle that has dragged on for quite some time. We made great strides initially. By the third day of our occupation, we had destroyed an entire armoured regiment of the planet’s primary defence force, the warriors of the ‘Ka’Tashun Sept’. Yet, despite the fact that they had been decisively beaten in honourable combat, they refused to acquiesce. Remnants of their units retreated into the jungles and continued to engage us in a most uncivilised manner. They abandoned whatever standard military uniforms they might have once worn, making them visually indistinguishable from the gue’la citizenry who had submitted to our authority. They would remain hidden instead of openly presenting themselves, and would only attack vulnerable targets. So underhanded were their methods, so ignoble, that there existed no word in our language to describe it. My attaché, Por’el Tan’bay, eventually taught me the gue’la term for such violent opposition: ‘insurgency.’

What kind of a people would consider this an acceptable methodology? That’s the question I should have been asking myself all along; because the answer, when arrived at, would have clearly showed me the form my response should have taken. Instead, I dawdled. I tried to negotiate with them. I appealed to their reason. I hoped against hope that they would eventually come to their senses and see the futility of resistance. Then, I was called out to Marae’Taa Gorge.

For fear of Ka’Tashun snipers, I travelled via modified piranha. The normally open top of the skimmer was now covered by a thick, windowless canopy. Even the cockpit was completely sealed. My pilot navigated with the aid of vidscreens and cameras mounted on the hull. Thus, I was unable to see anything of the surrounding countryside as I drew close to the site, but I could imagine the scenery blurring past. We were far beyond the plains by now, heading into the jungle highland with its dark red foliage, raging rivers, and jagged, broken topography. To one side of me was the mag-lev line; the track, when completed, would link Cytheria’s two largest colony sites together with high-speed monorails.

Infrastructure. That’s what the Tau Empire brings. When I first arrived here, the gue’la lived in a shameful state with their machinery in disrepair and their urban centres nothing but crumbling ruins. They believed this to be quite acceptable, for they had never known otherwise. I began to change all that. Before long, Cytheria had clean water to drink and fresh food to eat. Ample power ran to structurally sound buildings. Still, the Ka’Tashun called us oppressors. They were doing so even as I travelled to the gorge. All morning, the airwaves had been filled with their pirate signal, claiming responsibility for the attack on the railhead.

‘The enemy is reeling,’ a voice proclaimed through the static. ‘Today, we have struck a decisive blow for freedom, and in the days and weeks to come, we will do it again and again. We will not rest until the xenos have been eradicated. Take heart citizens, for the Emperor is on our side. His wrath is coming, and will soon deliver us from the oppression of the Tau!’

No one had yet been able to discern the source of these transmissions. It was maddening.

The vehicle slowed, and the canopy opened. As I climbed out of the piranha’s rear compartment, I was immediately met by Tan’bay; typical of him to have arrived on the scene before me. I first met him the day the annexation of Cytheria began and had found him to be the epitome of the water caste ever since. He was always prepared with whatever pertinent information I might need, even before I myself realised that I required it. His demeanour was one of unchanging calm. He seemed never to show worry or doubt. When he spoke, his sentences flowed unceasingly, free from any pauses or interruptions of thought.

Tan’bay’s hands were folded inside the voluminous sleeves of his robe as he bowed in deference. In the sky, an orange sun beat down, but his enormously brimmed hat kept his placid face in shadow. True to his years of training in the fields of diplomacy and interspecies negotiation, he constantly referred to himself using majestic, plural pronouns. One could actually hear the capitalisation in his voice. It was as if, when he spoke, he did so on behalf of the entire Tau race.

‘The shas’o honours us with his presence,’ he lilted. ‘May it please him to hear our initial assessment of the events preceding his arrival?’

Tan’bay was standing so close that I couldn’t see past him. ‘What is it?’ I asked gruffly. I couldn’t recall the last time I’d had more than a few hours of sleep. ‘What’s happened?’

‘Our people have suffered yet another attack at the hands of the renegade gue’la of the Ka’Tashun Sept,’ he said. ‘A small contingent of fire warriors, assigned to guard the site, have fallen in battle, and will be remembered with all due honour for their valiant defence. The greater number of casualties consists of members of the earth caste; engineers and technicians involved in the building of the mag-lev bridge, which, to my lasting sadness, I must report has been effectively destroyed.’

I pushed past him then, and he dutifully melted off to one side. Marae’Taa Gorge, for those of you unfamiliar with Cytheria, is part of a massive chasm that bisects most of the continent. A river, which to my knowledge has never been named, rushes along the bottom. On average, the distance between the canyon walls is quite wide but in this one particular place, they are narrow. It was, therefore, a natural place to construct a crossing for the mag-lev system. I had seen the architectural designs months before. I am no expert, but I thought them to be quite aesthetically pleasing. The fio’o in charge of the project was smiling as he described it, but I doubted he would be doing so now. The completed portion of the bridge had been firebombed; hit repeatedly with rockets and shaped explosive charges. Where once there had been graceful, white curves and support pillars, there was now only a twisted, blackened thing; a metal skeleton that sent plumes of acrid smoke up into the air even as the superstructure bowed down towards the river.

Then I saw the bodies. The rapid response team was reverently arranging them into two groups, earth caste on one side and fire warriors on the other. Within these, the fallen were being further organised into rows and columns from those with the highest rank and station to the lowest. Later, in accordance with caste traditions as old as the Greater Good itself, the workers would be buried and the soldiers would be cremated. The order and civility of it all should have given me some sense of peace, but it did not. The sheer number of the dead overrode such feelings.

‘Four hundred and seventy-seven killed,’ Tan’bay said gently. ‘None wounded.’

I turned to face him. ‘You mean there are no survivors? Not one?’

The man’s face was impassive. ‘It is half the reason we requested the shas’o come in person.’

I blinked in the intensifying noon-day sun. ‘What’s the other half?’

Several buildings were still standing intact near the destroyed bridge. Tan’bay led me into one that, until recently, had been a facility for repairing heavy lifting equipment. It was now a makeshift field command. As we entered, several fire warriors of middling rank stopped their busy activities to bow. I was taken into a small office that contained two chairs set before a large vidscreen. On a nearby table lay a collection of metal tubes in varying sizes. As I seated myself, Tan’bay closed the door and dimmed the lights. He pulled a data crystal from some hidden pocket and, after inserting it into the machine, poured himself soundlessly into the chair next to mine.

The scenes that flicked past me were memory captures retrieved from damaged or destroyed security drones. They must have been stationed not only on the bridge itself but all around the compound, for the perspective was constantly changing. Through their electronic eyes, I watched with growing horror as the Ka’Tashuns launched their early morning assault.

No one saw the first barrage coming, but it was certainly audible. There was a series of muffled booms, followed by a high-pitched whistling. Many of the earth caste looked around in puzzlement, or turned to ask one another if they had heard the same thing. Then the first of the missiles slammed into the bridge’s support pillars. The structure shook and, as the workers began to flee, part of the deck twisted to one side. With a terrible, shearing sound, the entire thing sagged downwards. Those who had been trying to escape clawed frantically for handholds, but there were few to be found. Their eyes were wide as they fell off the bridge, tumbling down, down into the gorge to smash apart on the jagged rocks or drown in the churning water.

The element of surprise was now spent. Unlike the workers, our fire warriors were calm, disciplined. Within seconds they had formed into cohesive squads, and began to shoot back. Their pulse rifles tore the tree line to shreds with crackling beams of energy. Even the drones were firing now, following their programming and networking themselves into squadrons. Despite all this outpouring of fire, it was impossible to tell if any of the Ka’Tashuns were actually being hit, ensconced as they were in the jungle foliage. The quiet, ordered peace of the morning was now filled with the cacophony of battle.

There were small explosions all around. The ground was being cratered by some type of shell or heavy canister. Then two things happened. The workers began to clutch their necks and collapse on the ground and the heads of the fire warriors began to snap back sharply as, one after the other, they fell down dead. A fine, red smoke began to drift across the scene. At first, I didn’t understand what I was seeing. The fire warriors were being specifically targeted by long-range snipers; that much was obvious. But given the speed with which they were being cut down, the number of enemy marksmen hiding out there must have been great. The workers and engineers who had collapsed were now clawing the air, seemingly oblivious to everything else around them. Their eyes were bulging and their faces began to turn a deep purple. Suddenly, one of them shuddered so violently that I could hear his spine break. Something exploded from his mouth and nose. His body shook, and he was still. The same thing was happening to all of them now. Every Tau not wearing a suit of environmental battle armour was likewise dying in a suffocating, epileptic fit. The red smoke thickened as it drifted across the scene.

I looked over at Tan’bay. ‘Some kind of chemical agent?’

Tan’bay rolled one hand over in the air, a gesture he did often as if he were casting something away. ‘The Ka’Tashun Sept is widely known to employ hyperlethal poisons.’

‘Their snipers, yes’ I replied sternly. I had studied the Ka’Tashun’s methods and tactics down to the most minute of details. ‘But never like this. This is being delivered in shell casings. That implies portable mortars or shoulder-mounted launchers.’

The vidscreen was a panorama of death now. Hundreds of earth caste lay twisted and broken on the ground. Red foam filled their every orifice. My fellow warriors were also gone. Only the drones remained, but they were being quickly dispatched by volleys of lasers. Those that did not explode outright, wobbled as their flight systems failed. When they crashed, they recorded a world turned at odd angles, where the land and sky were reversed or completely knocked askew.

‘And in such a volume,’ I continued. ‘How could they produce so many toxins with their limited resources?’

‘We believe the compound to be organic in nature,’ Tan’bay said. ‘I regret to inform the Shas’o, it is also most abundant in the deep jungle areas of this world to which our foe has now retreated.’

With that, he rose and went to the table. He picked up one of the grey metal tubes and handed it to me. It was sealed at one end and had a diameter large enough to accommodate my forearm. A fine, red, powdery residue clung to the interior. I wiped some off with my finger and immediately felt a stab of burning pain.

‘These are sporepod blooms,’ I said with realisation. The interior of Cytheria’s major landmass was a steaming, foetid rainforest so thick as to be nearly impassable. It was home to all manner of biting, poisonous things, but few as bad as the hata’le bush. The fruit of this leafy, burgundy-coloured plant was a hollow pod about the size of a clenched fist. The slightest amount of pressure would cause it to spew forth its spores in a misty cloud. They were harmful to both tau and gue’la alike, burning any exposed skin they might land on, and causing haemorrhaging if ingested.

‘Indeed they are,’ Tan’bay replied.

‘They can be dangerous, but not deadly. Certainly not like this.’ I gestured towards the vidscreen where the slaughter continued to play itself out.

Tan’bay’s voice was clinically calm. ‘It appears that the Ka’Tashans have somehow managed to amplify the plant’s natural toxicity. The modified blooms are taken into the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract, where they begin to reproduce almost instantly. The victims not only bleed internally and go into toxic shock, but end up asphyxiating themselves as a hata’la bush literally takes root in their chest and nasal cavities. The sponge-like growth you see coming out of the victims’ mouths are actually their lungs being forced outwards by the expanding plant.’

‘How?’ I asked. ‘How could they have done this?’

‘To that, Shas’o, We regretfully have no answer. Yet one thing is certain. What you now face is a weapon that works on two levels. The first as seen demonstrated here, but secondly, and of perhaps a more pressing concern, is the fear that it will generate; fear among our populace, both tau and acculturated gue’la. Fear leads to distrust, distrust to disharmony, and that, as the shas’o well knows, is anathema to the Greater Good.’

‘Using fear as a weapon,’ I mused. The Ka’Tashun barbarity was physically sickening. I rose quickly, and turned to leave. Then I heard a voice speaking in the harsh language of the enemy.

‘Sir, this one’s still running.’

My head snapped back towards the vidscreen. One of the drones, whose camera eye was still functioning, had been lifted from where it had crashed. The image jostled for a moment, then came to rest on a gue’la’s face. His skin was painted thick with mud and some kind of red camouflage. His mouth and jaw were covered by a stubbly, animalistic growth of fur. His brow was dark and heavy, and his eyes blazed with a white-hot hatred.

‘Shas’o Rra?’ he sneered. ‘Can you hear me?’

I knew at once who it was by the insulting name he used. Only one person on Cytheria had ever called me that. Ezra Mihalik, the self-proclaimed leader of the Ka’Tashun Sept.

‘Of course you can,’ Ezra continued. ‘That diplomat of yours will drag you out here in the name of procedure. And what’s more, someone of your education, you’ll want to see this first-hand.’

Off-camera, there was the sound of laughing.

‘I’ll be brief. This attack was a test and, I think, a pretty effective one. You and all your forces have eight days to leave Cytheria. If you don’t, my men will release these spores into each and every population centre on the planet. And don’t think I won’t actually do it because my fellow humans would also be killed. You should know that, as far as I’m concerned, anyone who isn’t helping to resist you is collaborating with you, and they deserve what they get.

‘Eight days, Shas’o Rra, or watch your people die.’ He looked away and nodded. The drone dropped back to the ground. From its new vantage point, I watched as several sets of boots walked away.

Tan’bay said nothing. Perhaps he was giving me time to think. Or perhaps there was simply nothing more to be said. I had one week to break the resistance. One week to somehow find Ezra Milhalik, and stop him. I’ll show you, I remember thinking. I am no ‘Commander Shadow’.

Ezra Mihalik had come up with his insulting name for me during our first and only negotiations. This was perhaps a month prior to the attack on the railhead. I was still suffering under the delusion that he was a logical being. So I sent out word that I would meet with Mihalik and try to put an end to the Cytherian conflict. A short time later, my offer was accepted. Two heavily muscled Ka’Tashun soldiers arrived at the gates of my compound. They were shirtless, dressed in heavy boots and camouflage-patterned pants. Each of them wore a bright red cloth tied around their heads. They were armed only with knives. One of them carried some kind of large communications device strapped to his back. They told the guards that they were envoys from the Ka’Tashun Sept come to see me, but were otherwise stoic and silent.

Once they had been disarmed and scanned, they were brought into a spacious meeting room where Tan’bay and I were already waiting. They placed the bulky device on the table in front of me, switched it on, and then stepped back with their hands clasped behind their backs. A voice began to emanate from a tiny speaker in the machine. It spoke in the choppy, harsh language of the gue’la. Fortunately, I spoke it too.

‘Are we good? Can you hear me?’ it said.

‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘I can hear you. To whom am I speaking?’

‘Why, this is Ezra Mihalik, commander of the fifty-sixth Ka’Tashun Company. I also speak for the few remaining members of two other Ka’Tashun companies, the twenty-sixth and fifty-first.’

‘I see. I take it then that you have chosen not to meet with us in person.’

‘You’re very perceptive,’ the voice replied.

I looked at the two Ka’Tashuns. Their faces were impassive, but behind their eyes, they were smiling.

Tan’bay leaned forwards and launched into his carefully prepared opening. ‘Commander, this is Por’el Tan’bay speaking on behalf of the Tau Empire, and may we begin by saying how pleased we are that you have agreed to negotiate with us, no matter the forum. If our two peoples can learn to live together in peace, then the benefits for both sides will, without doubt, be enormous.’

‘Emperor wept,’ Mihalik groaned. ‘Are you the guy in charge?’

‘If you are asking as to whether or not we are directly responsible for Cytheria’s pacification and regime change, then, no. If, however–’

‘Fine,’ Mihalik interrupted. ‘Then let me talk to the one who is.’

I sat forward in my chair and addressed the transmitter. ‘I am the person in command of our military forces.’

‘Ah, good.’ There was a creaking in the background as Mihalik leaned back into whatever he was sitting on. ‘What do I call you?’

‘I have not yet chosen a name,’ I said slowly. ‘You may address me by my rank: shas’o.’

Mihalik chuckled softly. ‘You… you have not yet chosen a name?’ he parroted. ‘What the hell does that mean?’

Tan’bay answered him with a lesson in protocol. ‘Personal names should only be used between family members and close friends. At all other times, it is proper to address others according to their station in life. The only exception would be for those who have earned the right to embellish their title with simple descriptors, certain achievements, or places of importance.’

‘And you haven’t any of those, is that it?’ Mihalik asked me.

I was anxious to move past such a personal subject. ‘I am a commander of the fire caste. Thus, you will address me as shas’o.’

‘You said that means ‘commander’, right?’

‘Correct.’ I had the growing suspicion that the voice on the other end of the radio had no intention of negotiating for peace. ‘Let us begin by–’

‘Just commander,’ Mihalik mused. ‘Nothing else. Because you haven’t chosen the name yet. Or because you haven’t earned it?’

I took a moment to consider my reply. Before I could say anything more however, Mihalik spoke again. His voice was low and direct.

‘They put you in charge of a whole planet, so this can’t be your first time out.’

I cleared my throat. ‘It is not. I have survived four trials by fire.’

‘But there was nothing in those four that stood out enough for you to add them to your name, huh? And if ‘trial by fire’ is tau for ‘tour of duty’, then how did you earn your rank with so little experience?’

‘Commander Mihalik,’ I began.

‘Oh, you can call me Ezra. I have a name.’

‘Ezra, then. If you must know, I was given the rank of shas’o when I graduated from the most prestigious military training centre in all the Empire. I may have only completed four trials, but I have studied the art of war for half my life. It would be a mistake for you to underestimate me.’ I smiled then, confident that the weight of my credentials would put this backwater rebel leader in his place.

‘So,’ Mihalik said after a pause, ‘you read about war in a bunch of books, and now you think you have what it takes to actually conduct one. You’re the shadow of a commander. You’ve got no substance. Hey, diplomat, how do you say ‘shadow’ in tau?’

If Tan’bay was as outraged as I was he didn’t show it. ‘Rra,’ he replied helpfully.

‘Then that’s what I’ll call you: Shas’o Rra,’ he said, once again speaking to me. ‘What do you think of that?’

‘I don’t care for it,’ I said between clenched teeth. ‘May we return to the subject of negotiating a cease fire?’

For a long moment the only sound coming from the machine was background static. The silence stretched out so long in fact, that I thought the transmission had somehow been cut off. I was about to ask Mihalik if he was still there when he spoke up.

‘No,’ he said flatly.

‘No what?’ I asked, puzzled.

‘No, we can’t discuss a ceasefire. You see, Shas’o Rra, you and I are a little bit alike. I’ve spent half my life studying war too. Only I didn’t do it in some nice, clean school. I did it in swamps, and jungles, and burning cities. I learned about wars by actually being in them.

‘So, in the interests of… diplomacy, I’ll give you a choice. You can either pack up all your men, all your little drones and all your fancy war machines and go back to wherever it is you come from, or you can stay here and try to take me on. You haven’t got what it takes to beat me, I know that now, but I promise you’ll get a real education while you try.’

‘I have two of your men here, Ezra,’ I warned him.

‘Yeah, good men. They volunteered for this mission. You know, what you should do is torture them for information and then kill them. But I figure you’ll just set them free. They’re unarmed, they haven’t done you any harm, and it would be the civil thing to do. But maybe you’ll prove me wrong. Either way, they’re prepared.’ With that, he signed off. ‘See you around, Shas’o Rra.’

I released his men.

It didn’t take long to discover where the Ka’Tashun were hiding. Their radio broadcast was easy to trace. At first, I thought this was strange. The enemy were very adept at relocating themselves and their dwindling supplies of weapons and equipment. Every time that our forces would locate and destroy one of their hiding spots, they would simply reappear days later in a new one. Only after I had met with Kor’el Che’rod did I understand.

Like all members of the air caste, everything about Che’rod was long and thin. A flex-screen map was spread out on my desk and he pointed to a highlighted area with a finger that was twice the length of mine. ‘Here,’ he said. His voice was a throaty whisper. ‘Herzon Ridge.’

I leaned in to get a closer look. Che’rod was pointing to a plateau in the deepest heart of the jungle. It appeared to be completely inaccessible.

‘You’re certain?’ I asked.

His face contorted slightly. ‘There is no doubt, shas’o. My pilots are most skilled. This is the location that you seek.’

I blanched. Of course he was certain. Kor’el Che’rod was not only a decorated veteran with far more trials to his name than I, but he was also many years my senior. How dare I question the validity of his actions like that? The lack of sleep was beginning to affect my judgment.

Tan’bay, seated in a corner, immediately came to my rescue. ‘We are certain the shas’o meant no disrespect,’ he said. ‘However, the stakes in this particular instance are so high that there cannot be the slightest doubt. We are certain the kor’el would agree?’

Che’rod’s eyes flicked from Tan’bay, to myself, and back again. ‘Indeed,’ he breathed. He squared his narrow shoulders and continued. ‘The renegade gue’la are broadcasting their propaganda across half the planet, utilising a transmitter far more powerful than any they have in the past. It was quite easy to triangulate its source. The location was then visually identified using orbital satellite imagery, and double-checked by multiple overhead fly-bys with barracuda-class fighters.’

Che’rod tapped the screen, zooming in on the ridge. A few outlines of buildings could be glimpsed through the otherwise unbroken canopy of red leaves. ‘According to records, these structures are a botanical research station, constructed by the gue’la and dating back several centuries.’

‘A botanical research station,’ Tan’bay murmured. ‘That would explain how the Ka’Tashan are able to produce so many altered sporepod blooms.’

‘Our sensor sweeps indicate the presence of between sixty and seventy personnel. There is no evidence of any vehicles or anti-air defences.’ His report concluded, Che’rod clasped his hands behind his back and waited.

‘This is most excellent, kor’el,’ I said, beaming. That arrogant fool, Mihalik, had let his pride cloud his actions. His braggart radio messages would be his undoing. Things were finally about to turn around on this accursed planet. ‘It would appear Herzon Ridge is where control of Cytheria will be secured once and for all, and the honour falls to you and your men. You may begin bombing at once.’

I could see it now. Plasma torpedoes would fall from the sky like a cleansing rain, and the cyclonic winds generated by the exploding cores would sweep the Ka’Tashun’s ashes away. It would be quick and painless. A far better end than they deserved. Who’s the shadow of a commander now, Mihalik? I thought.

Kor’el Che’rod was frowning. ‘With all due respect, shas’o, given the apparent nature of the gue’la bio-weapon, that would be most unadvisable.’

I narrowed my eyes at him, but a moment later understood. Of course. Whatever spores weren’t consumed in the initial explosions would be carried up into the atmosphere by the shockwaves. The prevailing winds would then spread them across half of Cytheria. No wonder then that Mihalik was unabashedly transmitting his location. He knew quite well that I daren’t vaporise his stronghold from the air.

‘Again, he mocks me.’

‘Shas’o?’ Che’rod asked, and I realised that I had been thinking out loud.

I cleared my throat to compose myself, and then nodded towards the door. ‘I understand, kor’el,’ I said. ‘You have executed your duties in this matter with honour and efficiency. Take my thanks to your men.’

Che’rod bowed his head, and left. I stared down at the map until my eyes were burning. The ridge couldn’t be attacked from the air, which left a ground assault as the only option. However, the jungle was far too thick for sufficient numbers of battle suits to operate in, and any fire warriors sent in on foot would simply end up as fodder for Ka’Tashun traps and ambushes. My enemy seemed untouchable. Perhaps Mihalik had been right after all. All my years of study on Bork’an had failed to prepare me for this type of scenario.

‘There is a gue’la expression,’ Tan’bay said softly after some moments, ‘that the shas’o might be wise to meditate on. ‘One cannot fight fire with fire’.’

I scowled at him. ‘That only proves what a backward people they are. Fire is the element of war. Soldiers should always be pitted against other soldiers. Anything else would be uncivilised.’

‘Then the shas’o would agree the axiom is incorrect, that in effect, the only way to fight fire is with fire? That like should be met with like?’

‘I would,’ I snapped without consideration.

Tan’bay pressed his fingers together, and lifted his head to gaze up at the ceiling. At the time, I took it to be a pose of contemplation. Now I suspect that he was intentionally avoiding eye contact. He inhaled deeply and said, ‘We are an enlightened people. The methods of fighting as have been displayed by our enemies on this planet are simply not in our nature, and that is well. However, there exist within the Empire certain other species who, owing mostly to cultural retardation, are not so civil. We have seen them in combat. They can be… quite effective.’

Outside, the sun was setting. The room began to darken.

‘Where was this?’

‘Along the eastern edge of the Empire. In our youth, we undertook a prolonged tour of the worlds beyond the Perdus Rift.’

There was a silence between us. Tan’bay waited. He was an advisor, not a military commander. His job was to offer avenues of action, to open doors. Whether or not I followed or stepped through was left entirely up to me.

‘Where is the closest War Sphere?’ I said at last.

‘As it so happens, there is one in-system.’

‘Contact it.’

Tan’bay’s robes rustled as he stood. He bowed his head and spread his arms wide. ‘It is an honour to serve the shas’o,’ he said.

When he was gone, I moved to the window and stared out across the grounds. Dark clouds were gathering across a violet sky. Out in the jungle, Ezra Mihalik was sitting atop Herzon Ridge, smugly thinking that he had beaten me. He was positive that I lacked the bloodlust required to shift him, and he was right. Such a thing was beyond a tau such as myself. Not so for the kroot.

During my officer’s training on Bork’an, I studied all of the tau’s various alien allies. The kroot were even taller than the air caste, but not at all fragile. Their limbs were taut with ropey muscles. Their skin was greasy leather. Their heads were crowned with quills and their faces dominated by a massive, serrated beak. They had a knack for picking up new languages and when they slept, they did so lightly, crouched together in large groups. They were also ferocious cannibals. They believed that by eating the remains of their fallen enemies, they could gain their strengths. This may have been more than primitive superstition, in fact. Scientists within the Empire were of the opinion that something in the kroot genetic structure did indeed cause them to take on the characteristics of whatever they ate. Despite decades of trying, no one had been able to break them of this particularly barbaric trait. Still, they were so adept in certain areas that commanders across the Empire were willing to turn a blind eye to it. Their homeworld, Pech, was covered in vast coniferous forests, and thus, they were renowned for their ability to move through even the thickest cover at great speed and in absolute silence.

They were exactly what I needed with which to fight the Ka’Tashuns. Fire with fire.

I planned to lead them myself. Allies though they may be, a people as primitive and uncivilised as the kroot must still be supervised. More importantly though, I was now determined to kill Ezra Mihalik personally. He would not be captured or subdued. Nor was he going to die in an honourable or gentlemanly way. I was going to shoot him into pieces and leave him in the jungle as fodder for the beasts. It was what he deserved.

For the next three days, I met with earth caste engineers and modified a stealth battle suit specifically for my needs. It was nearly completed when Tan’bay appeared to tell me that the kroot had arrived. Dawn was still hours away and the sky was pouring rain. I walked out of the mechanical bay to appraise them. There were forty in all. They stood barefoot in the mud, naked, save for a few scraps of leather armour. Their skin, the grungy brown colour of dead leaves, was exuding a greasy substance that made the rainwater bead and run off. They stank of dirt and sweat, salty and earthy. In their taloned hands they each clutched a long-barrelled rifle made of wood and tarnished metal. Some of these were adorned with clusters of feathers or glass beads strung on pieces of copper wire. Every one of them was capped with a primitive bayonet. Several canvas packs lay scattered about them. Off to one side, a pack of roughly two dozen kroot hounds snorted about in the sopping ground and nipped at one another viciously.

Tan’bay gestured, and one particular kroot stepped forward. He wore a string of half-chewed bones around his waist, and had applied some kind of white makeup underneath his left eye. Otherwise, he would have been completely indistinguishable from the rest. They all look alike to me.

‘Shas’o,’ Tan’bay announced loudly, ‘may it please you to meet Shaper Awl.’ I nodded slightly

Awl made a clicking noise from somewhere in the back of his throat. ‘We have sworn to fight for the tau.’ The pitch and tone of his voice was disturbingly melodic, like birdsong echoing up from the bottom of a well. ‘Their enemies are our enemies. Lead on. We will follow.’

‘I take it you have been briefed on the nature of this mission?’ I asked him. ‘You know our objective?’

Awl had no lips with which to smile. Instead he opened up his beak, and clacked his thick tongue against the roof of his mouth. ‘You shall have your prize,’ he said slyly. He whistled sharply to the other kroot, and they began to gather what meagre supplies they had. As they did so, Tan’bay moved to my side.

‘Good fortune to you, shas’o. We will take our leave now, and hope to see you again upon your safe return.’

‘Wish you were coming along?’ I asked, raising an eyebrow.

‘The shas’o has no need of us,’ Tan’bay replied. He looked at the kroot, then turned back to me. His face had a gravity to it that I had never seen before. ‘There will be no diplomacy where he now goes.’

A pair of drop ships waited on the nearby landing field. By the time I had encased myself into the stealth suit, the kroot had already clamoured aboard. I joined them, sealed the ramp behind me, and signalled for the pilots to take off. Within minutes, we were airborne, speeding over the plains towards the jungle lowlands. I spent the time in silence, checking and rechecking my suit’s systems. I synchronised its inbuilt positional relay to the satellites above, and studied our insertion route on my heads-up display. I ran a test on the integrated shield generator. Finally, I familiarised myself with the automatic stimulant injector, an experimental piece of technology that would flood my bloodstream with painkillers should I become wounded. The kroot, on the other hand, jabbered incessantly in their squawking, clicking, chirping native language. They made barking sounds that I assumed were laughter. Awl haphazardly poured some kind of thin oil all over his rifle, then produced a leather rag and began to work it into all the mechanical housings. He seemed to take no notice of how the others behaved until we were very near the landing zone.

The lights in the troop compartment changed from white to yellow, and we began our descent. Awl barked for his troops to get ready, and they immediately fell silent. The aft ramp opened, and within a minute, we were out. The engines flared as the drop ships rocketed away. I watched them vanish up into the heavy clouds above. When I turned back, the kroot were already moving swiftly into the thickening underbrush. I activated my suit’s adaptive camouflage and followed. It was not always easy. The kroot preferred to climb up into the trees and swing from limb to limb. The hounds kept pace on the ground. They raced from one trunk to another, constantly snorting and sniffing the air.

The rain had let up, but very little light managed to filter through the foliage above. I walked along the forest floor surrounded by a deep gloom. I saw increasing numbers of hata’le bushes, all of them picked clean of their sporepods. Hours later, as I pushed my way through a thorny shrub twice my height, I stopped to find Awl crouched on the ground ahead. His head was cocked to one side. All about him, kroot were clinging to the sides of the trees. The second he saw me, his clenched fist snapped up, and I froze. Without saying a word, he gingerly brushed at the ground before him. Buried just below the surface there was some kind of explosive device.

Awl spoke to his warriors in a rapid string of squeaks, and they vanished back up into the trees. He turned to me. ‘Plasma mine,’ he said quietly. ‘Short proximity sensor.’ Then, with a single bound, he too leapt back up into the jungle above. I carefully manoeuvred around the trap, all the while amazed how Awl had known it was there. I double-checked my scanners, but there were no telltales. Whatever materials the Ka’Tashuns had used to make their landmines, they did not register.

The afternoon was growing late and the rain had begun again when we arrived at Herzon Ridge. I cautiously moved forward and joined Awl, who was lying prone beneath a bushy shrub. I saw no sign of the other kroot, but knew that they couldn’t be far off. Awl pointed to his eyes, then flicked a talon forwards. Ahead of us was a rough clearing with three sizable buildings. The first was low to the ground and rectangular-shaped. It had a single large door set into one face, and only the thinnest of slots for windows. A tall, metal tower adorned with dishes was affixed to its otherwise flat roof. The second structure was an enormous glass-enclosed dome filled with plants and greenery; a multitude of cylindrical storage tanks that ran along one side of it. The third building, set apart from the other two, was actually more of a raised, flat area. It was octagonal in shape, and stood atop four squat pillars. Armoured walls hung from every side, but these look rusted and long since used.

‘Landing platform,’ I whispered to Awl.

He nodded, and pointed to the thickly shadowed area underneath it. ‘There are gue’la under there. Thirty or so by the smell. They must not like the rain.’

Switching my optics into the infrared, the enemy platoon sprang to life. The Ka’Tashuns, for reasons I had never been able to fathom, eschewed environmental combat armour. Their multiple areas of exposed skin therefore lit up my display in brilliant hues as they radiated their body heat. Oddly, when I looked back at the kroot shaper, he was nearly the same colour as the surrounding jungle. The disgusting grease that his skin exuded was apparently some natural adaptation for stealth.

‘More over there,’ I said, indicating the area between the glass dome and the building with the radio tower. Another thirty men milled about. Underneath waterproofed tarps, I noted the telltale shapes of two huge machine guns; blocky things that fired kinetic bolts the size of my fist. ‘I think they’re expecting us.’

Awl grunted. ‘We must strike quickly, and close the distance. We will stand little chance against their heavy guns. What is the shas’o’s command?’

‘We’ll divide in two. Take half your fighters and circle around to the left. Eliminate that unit near the glass dome. I’ll go with the others and clear out the area beneath the landing field. Then, we converge on the final building.’

Without another word, Awl slithered backwards and vanished into the undergrowth. I made my way as close to the elevated pad as I dared, and found twenty kroot waiting for me. A dozen hounds lay in the mud, panting softly. I was about to ask how it was they kept the beasts so controlled and quiet, when the jungle around me exploded.

I had no idea how the Ka’Tashuns knew that we were about to strike, but it didn’t matter. They opened up on us with everything they had. A mortar shell sailed up into the trees above me, and detonated. Huge shards of wood rained down. Lasers tore into the underbrush all around me, striking several of the kroot warriors. Their death screams were ear-piercing. A second shell of some kind landed directly amidst the hounds. The explosion lifted half of them high into the air and smashed them against the trees.

‘Go! Go!’ I shouted, but all the kroot still able to do so were already charging towards the Ka’Tashuns. I stood and ran into the clearing. I now saw that there were four groups sheltering underneath the landing platform. One of these contained a heavy weapon, and the kroot made straight for it. They leapt up into the air with their rifles clutched two-handed above their heads. Then they crashed down, caving in skulls and shattering limbs as they swung their weighted guns every which way. The remaining three Ka’Tashun squads backed up a few steps and prepped their rifles. I recognised the strategy. They weren’t going to rush in and try to help their comrades. Instead, they were going to let them die, sacrificing one small unit so that the rest could gun the kroot down in a massive, point-blank volley.

The stealth suit’s robotic exoskeleton amplified my every movement, and with a single bound, I had flanked them. The barrels of my burst cannon became a blur as I opened fire. Pulse blasts ricocheted off the nearest support column, and several of the Ka’Tashuns, forgetting about the kroot for a moment, ducked low. They searched about frantically, but my adaptive camouflage made me appear as little more than a moving blur, a ghost, a piece of the jungle come to life.

I am a shadow, I thought.

The kroot had finished slaughtering the heavy gun crew, and were moving towards a fresh target. More than a dozen Ka’Tashuns fired into them with their primitive laser weapons and sniper rifles. It had little effect. The kroot were like a wave of violence now, surging forwards and smashing into the foe. I continued to provide covering fire for them, but the truth was that they were doing fine without me. I gunned down the two gue’la closest to me and moved to yet another position.

There was one Ka’Tashun there that I took to be an officer of some kind. He wore a crimson rag tied over his hair, and his arms were covered with scars and tattoos. His sidearm was also larger and heavier than any of the weapons carried by the others. He levelled it and let loose with a bolt of plasma. It bounced harmlessly off of my shield generator, splashing across the surface of my battle suit in brilliant blue droplets. His face registered a look of stunned disbelief that was almost amusing. I let the burst cannon roar and he flew apart into gristly chunks.

For a moment, I stopped moving and drank in my surroundings. Lightning lit the clouds in ripples of purple. There were corpses everywhere. Many of the trees, I noted, were on fire, despite the pouring rain. Nearby, a pair of hounds were gnawing on a fallen Ka’Tashun. He was screaming obscenities and stabbing at them with his combat knife. They severed one of his arms and pulled off his face and he finally shut up. I watched several kroot use their rifles to sweep another man’s legs out from under him. Then they beat him relentlessly, breaking his limbs and pulverising his ribcage. Across the clearing, there was an orange flash as one of the few remaining rebels used his flame thrower. Several hounds caught fire. They ran around in circles as they burned to death, barking and whining. I saw Awl, in retribution, kick the man in the head with such force that it nearly flew off. Less than a quarter of his kroot were still alive, but those that were had formed a ring around the final Ka’Tashun.

For a moment, I thought it must be Ezra Mihalik, cornered at last, and my pulse raced. As I ran closer though, I saw that it wasn’t. He was just another officer, dressed similarly to the one I had blown apart a moment ago. He had a crimson head wrap and heavily tattooed arms. He held a sword in one hand that crackled and glowed, and in the other he had a pistol. His face was a portrait of defiance: his eyes narrowed and his teeth barred. He was a cornered animal. The last three hounds were circling around him, growling and snapping as they looked for an opening. It never occurred to me to put a stop to such cruelty. The kroot were delighted to see this sport, and I left them to it. I had prey of my own to find.

There was no movement in the glass dome. That left the flat roofed building as Mihalik’s only possible remaining location. The solitary door did not appear so thick or armoured that I couldn’t break it down, but I knew better. It would be trapped somehow, or would have a half dozen heavily armed men waiting just behind it. I followed the example of the kroot and simply avoided it altogether. I squatted down, then kicked out hard. The stealth suit’s augmented legs and thrust assist boosters sent me rocketing upwards. As I descended, I pulled my legs in tight, and fired my burst cannon at the building’s roof. When I landed, I again kicked out, crashing through the roof and landing in a crouch.

I sprayed the room. The pulse blasts sparked and snapped as they impacted on tables and chairs, blew through computer screens, shattered glass and overturned wooden supply crates. The ammo counter on my heads up display rolled backwards at a furious pace. Finally, I stopped. There was no one here. I was surrounded by all manner of destroyed electrical and scientific equipment, but a quick sensor check revealed it to be devoid of life. I briefly considered the possibility that the entire building was a trap of some kind; that it was about to explode and release the sporepod blooms across Cytheria. Then the audio pickups built into the suit registered something below me.

I saw now that there was a stairwell in one corner of the room. I moved to it and peered cautiously over the railing. Metal steps vanished down into a basement level. I amplified the background noise and heard the distinct sound of running feet. Of course, I thought as I descended after them, attack and run. That’s what you do, Ezra. No glorious last stands. No honourable self slaughter. Just run and live to fight another day. But not this time.

At the bottom of the stairs was a long hallway roughly hewn into the bedrock. Multiple doorways branched off to the left and right. I followed the sounds, passing unoccupied rooms filled with beds, and a sizable eating area where food still steamed on plates. There was an open doorway at the end of the passage. I moved towards it and was met with a volley of laser fire. Most of it was safely absorbed with the additional armour plating I had specifically installed into the battlesuit, but as I barrelled into the next room, I felt a white hot stab of pain in my left shoulder. Alarms lit up inside my face plate, informing me that my suit had been breached. Not a second later, there was a soothing, hissing sound as painkillers were automatically injected into my bloodstream, and topical medicines were applied to the wound.

I had charged into a generator room. Four huge, blocky fusion reactors provided cover for Mihalik’s small cadre of veteran bodyguards. There was a heavy-looking blast door set into the back wall. There was a control panel beside it, at which Mihalik was frantically working. I raised my burst cannon, but before I could shoot, his men had rushed me. Three of them tackled me around the waist, hoping to knock me down. I leaned in to their charge and braced my legs against the doorway so as to remain upright. The fourth man activated a long melee weapon with jagged, metal teeth that blurred into motion. He drove it down across my helmet. My face was stung from a hundred shallow cuts as my faceplate shattered, but again, the suit’s medical systems made even this pain a distant and irrelevant thing.

I cleared the chainsword out of the way with my burst cannon, then punched its wielder in the face with all the strength I could muster. His nose exploded with a spray of blood and a snapping of cartilage, and he stumbled back. To his fellows, I delivered a flurry of elbow strikes and low kicks until they too had been distanced from me. Before they could recover themselves, I shot them dead.

Mihalik froze in place. He had a pistol holstered on his hip, and a ridiculously oversized mechanical glove on one hand. The heavy door was open now. Beyond it, I could make out a vertical tunnel and a ladder. A warm breeze blew into the room.

His eyes flashed. ‘Well,’ he said slowly. ‘I guess you don’t plan to let me escape. Are you here to respectfully demand my surrender, then?’

I levelled my weapon at him.

‘Oh,’ he nodded. ‘Okay then.’

Mihalik dashed forwards with a speed of which I would not have thought him capable. He held one arm rigid across his body like a shield, while his other, the one bearing the robotic fist, wound up to deliver a crushing blow. Had the thing not been so heavy and cumbersome, he might well have killed me. However, its awkwardness worked to my benefit. I grasped his shirt and used his own momentum to throw him to the floor. He landed with a heavy thud, and tried to swing his armoured fist into my thigh. I stomped down, pinning it, and with a burst from my cannon, blew off his forearm. The mechanical hand skittered across the room.

The stump below his elbow fountained blood. He began gasping for breath, but I was taking no chances. With two powerful kicks, I broke both of his legs. Then, still holding him by his shirt, I began to drag him along the corridor and back up the stairs.

‘Wha… what are you… what are you doing?’ he sputtered.

‘I promised myself that I would leave you to the beasts.’ I said flatly.

Outside, it was still raining. The kroot were making a meal out of the dead Ka’Tashuns, tearing off pieces of them and shoving the meat, raw and dripping, into their beaks. When I emerged from the building, they rose to their feet.

I threw Mihalik down into the mud. Awl approached. He clacked his beak the way another creature might salivate before an especially delicious meal. The other kroot began to gather around. The rebel leader’s eyes grew wide as he realised how it was about to end.

‘Shas’o Rra,’ he panted. ‘I guess… I was wrong to… to call you that.’

‘No,’ I responded. ‘As it happens, you weren’t.’

I did not turn away as they ate him. Nor did I try to mentally block out his agonising screams. I simply stood there. I felt neither remorse, nor disgust, nor pity. I didn’t even feel a sense of satisfaction or poetic justice. I felt nothing. I was totally and absolutely cold inside. I embraced it then, the name the gue’la gave me. Mihalik had called me the shadow of a commander. He meant it as an insult, but I no longer saw it that way. I would be Shas’o Alo’rra – Commander Cold Shadow – and wherever the enemies of the Tau are hiding, I would be there… intangible… unfeeling.

There were other, smaller groups of Ka’tashun yet to be dealt with. So in the days that followed, I ordered that the remaining kroot, who had been in orbit until then, land on the surface of Cytheria. I unleashed them into the wilderness and gave them free reign to seek out and eliminate whatever resistance they found. For a time, it worked wonderfully. Their savagery was more than a match for the rebels, and their bellies grew fat with the flesh of the enemy. Cytheria became largely pacified. Recently however, I have received a number of disturbing reports. The kroot increasingly refuse to obey the orders of their tau superiors and have taken to wearing red scarves around their foreheads. They speak in the gue’la language when they think no one is listening. Perhaps worst of all, in my subsequent conversations with Shaper Awl, he has begun calling calling me Shas’o Rra.

‘A tau chooses neither its caste nor its true name. We are blood born to the first and borne by blood to the second, named for what we have done and might yet do. And like ourselves, our true names are not carved in stone.’

– The Tau’va

The warrior crouches in darkness, eyes locked on the softly glowing lenses of the helmet in its hands. Remembering. Seeking a name.

When I completed my training and stepped onto the Path of Fire I was summoned before the academy commander alongside my fellow shas’saal cadets for the Naming. Who better to decipher a warrior’s true name than the master who has honed that living weapon? While others were honoured for their endurance, or agility, or precision with arms, I was named for my skill in reading the hearts of my comrades: J’kaara, ‘the mirror’.

‘You have been their shining core,’ he said. ‘You recognise and draw on their strength, reflecting it back threefold.’

He predicted a path of leadership, confirming what I already knew, that I was first amongst equals. Yes, there was pride, but it was hard earned, for though there is no prejudice against females under the Tau’va, few of us burn brightly on the Fire Path. I dreamt I would eclipse Shadowsun herself.

She frowns at the memory – the arrogance of impossible youth past and the price that will never pass. Sighing, she strokes her helmet with calloused fingers. It has been with her since her first, all too sweet, taste of war.

A new-forged shas’la, I embarked on my first campaign alight with a conviction that did not flicker in the cold winds of war. Our enemy was the bhe’ghaal, a race of green-skinned beasts that infested vast tracts of the galaxy and made frequent raids into tau territory. They were a brutal, ugly species that lived for war, yet made a mockery of the craft, fighting in mobs that swept about the battlefield intoxicated by their own fury. We spun circles of death around them, luring them into one trap after another, decimating them from a distance with firepower they couldn’t hope to match, then falling back before they overran us with sheer numbers.

It was a flawless execution of kauyon that confirmed the tau mastery of war… and my own mastery of hearts, for though I did not lead by rank, my comrades followed me regardless, inspired by my example and my words. Indeed, words flowed so freely for me that our shas’ui joked that I must be a waterborn changeling!

I was beyond fear or doubt, certain of my place in the perfect geometry of the Tau’va – untouchable. And when the shas’ui fell, none were surprised that I was chosen to take his place. A veteran in my youth, I believed myself a hero. I was too young to understand that easy victories have no heroes.

She shivers as her fingers find the scar. Abhorrent. Reverent. She traces the shallow fault line from the helmet’s crown to the chin. It is a mere ghost of the rift that was once there, but its truth is undiminished.

Fh’anc… Dhobos… Po’gaja… More paltry worlds and petty wars fought against inept or feeble foes, more easy victories to burnish my pride.

Oba’rai…

A small planet on the fringes of the Second Expansion, Oba’rai was uncannily beautiful, its arid plains reminiscent of revered T’au itself. It was a natural home to the people, worthy of risk.

‘There are gue’la here,’ our cadre shas’o told us. ‘Their Imperium lays claim to this world, but their shadow has grown pale in this region, sapped by distant conflicts. If we strike swift and hard the Imperium will turn a blind eye.’

Gue’la – ‘hu-maans’… They were an ancient race steeped in belligerent superstition, yet they were neither fools nor savages. I thrilled at the prospect of facing a worthy enemy at last. Perhaps I would earn the rank of shas’vre here.

The disfigured helmet gazes back at her. Challenging. Accusing. It has been crudely repaired by her own hands, functional but ugly. An artisan of the earth caste could have restored it to perfection, but perfection would have been a lie.

The gue’la colonists fought fiercely, but their technology and tactics were primitive beside our own. Only their vaunted Imperial Guard gave us pause – a single regiment who had been promised the planet as a home if they could hold it. The shas’o offered them the opportunity to surrender, but his terms were harsh and they spat in his face. The outcome troubled me because they were honourable foes, but when I mentioned these doubts to my shas’vre, he laughed.

‘Do you believe the shas’o wanted them to surrender? This war calls for the Killing Blow, not the Open Hand – a clean sweep, not complications.’

She nods at her scarred shadow, acknowledging the moment when perfection withered and doubt blossomed – the moment when her true name became a lie.

The Guardsmen made their last stand in Oba’rai’s primary city, fortifying the walls and rallying a militia of thousands, but it was an empty gesture. Our stealth teams infiltrated the bastion and destroyed their artillery with surgical precision, leaving the defenders helpless against our long-range missiles and railguns. We razed the city without losing a single warrior, yet never once during that nightmare bombardment did the Imperials attempt to surrender. My comrades derided them for fools, but I was silent.

As I expected, the shas’o decreed we would take no prisoners. Scouring the ruins would be dangerous close-quarters work, so he unleashed the kroot, our alien auxiliaries, upon the broken city. They were bloodthirsty avian predators, little better than beasts, but loyal and perfectly suited to the task. And yet… The thought of those savages running riot amongst fallen warriors reviled me. If the rumours were true, the kroot had a taste for the flesh of their enemies…

She is no longer a shining mirror, but she is still strong and she still serves the Greater Good, not because it is perfect, but because everything else is less so. Now the strength she reflects is dark and fractured, so perhaps imperfection will be her key.

Even now I cannot explain the compulsion, but I disobeyed the shas’o’s edict and led my squad into the ruins, lying to them and playing on their trust, seeking something I couldn’t name. A swirling miasma of black smoke transformed the city into a shadow labyrinth haunted by charred corpses and twitching things that had no business being alive. Wordlessly we killed them as we passed. It was a mercy, yet I sensed my squad tightening with reflexive revulsion and felt their unspoken question: why? They were my closest comrades, the ones I hoped to swear the ta’lissera with, yet I had carried them into this filth, rubbing their faces in a carnage we tau prefer to keep at arm’s length.

Why?

As we pressed deeper, the moans of the dying echoed around us, sometimes broken by the gleeful hoots of the ravening kroot. In the city square we came upon a pack of the beasts huddled around a mound of corpses and I learnt that the rumours about our allies were true. One of them saw us and chittered, rocking back and forth on its talons, trailing red ruin from its serrated beak. Then it cocked its head and beckoned, sly and mocking, inviting us to join the feast. Two of my comrades retched inside their helmets as we backed away, stumbling in our eagerness to distance ourselves from these vile allies.

Lost in smoke and revulsion, I tripped over a corpse in a smouldering greatcoat and froze. The dead man’s eyes were wide open in a face scorched to the bone – looking right at me. Absurdly, his high-peaked cap was still intact, its melted rim fused to his skull.

Why? I might have asked it aloud, though of what I have no idea.

The gue’la surged up with impossible, hate-driven vitality, something bright and furiously alive buzzing in his hands, sweeping towards me. I staggered back, throwing up my rifle to block the blow and it was torn asunder in a storm of tortured metal that shook my entire body. I heard my comrades’ wild shouts and the burst of their carbines as the whirling chainblade kissed my helmet…

The warrior reaches up and touches the other scar, the one that can never be repaired because it cuts deeper than flesh or bone, proclaiming a darkness that was perhaps always there. Her comrades killed the ko’miz’ar a heartbeat before he killed her, but still a heartbeat too late. Afterwards, they were comrades no more and there have been none since. The flaw has made her an outcast amongst her own kind, denying her the bond of the ta’lissera, but it has also forged her into something more. Crouching in the darkness as the darkness crouches inside her, she finally names her truth: Jhi’kaara, ‘the broken mirror’.

On this spot, in the year of our Lord and Saviour 970.M30, THE IMMORTAL EMPEROR OF MANKIND and his Great Crusade touched down upon the surface of Diepr-3.

And when He beheld the verdant beauty of this world, He wept; and His tears fell into the waters of these lakes and made them Holy.

Blessed be those who partake of this water, for they shall gain strength and insight if they so need it.

And blessed be those to whom the Emperor hath entrusted this world.

May they never forget their most sacred of duties.

The ursaloth yawned and stretched his front paws as he emerged from his cave. He had awoken earlier than normal this morning. The sun had not yet come up over the eastern mountains and the valley was still cloaked in cool mists and murky shadows of blue. He sat down heavily on the damp ground and scratched himself. Part of him still yearned for sleep; spring was only a few weeks old and by all rights he ought to still be hibernating. Then his stomach growled with hunger and all other considerations were forgotten. He righted himself and plodded heavily down the hillside along a well-worn path that led to a nearby river.

His massive antlers brushed against the lowest limbs of the conifers as he made his way. Tufts of his thick black fur got caught in the brambles. He walked slowly because he was old and his knees ached on cool mornings like this one. He also walked fearlessly because, despite his advanced age, he was well aware that his massive strength and size would deter all but the most resolute pack of predators. He was the lord and master of this world, he knew, and a king ought not to rush himself.

To the east, the mountains were backlit with a pale lavender hue that steadily grew brighter and brighter. Then, quite suddenly, the sun rose over the snow-dusted peaks, and the world displayed its true colours. The face of the rocky cliffs wasn’t purple after all, but a deep crimson slashed through with burgundy. The forest threw off its inky cloak and became a patchwork of yellow and green, pristine and undisturbed. A sunbeam fell on his back, and the ursaloth shrugged contentedly.

At last, he came to the water’s edge, where the thick trees gave way to a space of stony ground. The river was flowing quickly, boosted by the melt running down from the mountain tops. It splashed and gurgled so loudly in fact, that his arrival went unnoticed by a flock of geese that had perched atop of his favourite fishing boulder. He gave a low growl to announce his presence, and the birds, skittish creatures at the best of times, took to the skies with a cacophonic flapping of their wings. Satisfied, the old ursaloth cautiously made his way up the boulder, then sat down and extended the talons on one of his massive front paws. He let it hover over the surface of the water and waited for the moment to strike. A school of fish were wriggling closer and closer.

The ursaloth licked his snout in anticipation and was about to strike, when a blinding beam of light stabbed upwards through the southern skies. He barely managed to raise his head to register it before it vanished. He blinked feverishly, but try as he might, he couldn’t clear the purple after-images from his eyes. He nuzzled his face against the water-slick coolness of his boulder, but that too provided no relief.

Then came a blast of wind, hotter than anything he had ever known. The limbs of the pine trees bowed severely. Several of their tops snapped and fell to the ground. This confused the ursaloth all the more; it was springtime and the summer storms were months away. When the blistering wind had passed and the trees had righted themselves, an unnatural quiet descended on the forest. The ursaloth, blinking away tears from his burning eyes, sniffed the still air. Beyond the stink of his singed fur, the world had a sour tang to it. Everything was seared and dry, as if the sudden wind had sucked all the moisture from the grass and trees.

He cocked his head and strained. His hearing wasn’t what it used to be, but he could make out a series of muffled booms. Now, there was a sharp whistling sound. It was high-pitched and soft; so soft as to be almost undetectable, but it was growing steadily louder. Then, he heard another one. And another. And another. What was happening here?

He splashed out into the middle of the river, his breakfast totally forgotten. Perhaps, he thought, the geese were coming back to steal his fishing rock from him. True, the geese never made sounds like this, but what other explanation was there? He craned his ancient neck and looked upwards, towards the sounds. What he saw made no sense at all.

Giant chunks of fire were raining from the sky. Their nuclei were wreathed in swirling yellows and oranges; long, red contrails stretched out in their wake, and behind that, trailed kilometres of black smoke. They made a screaming noise as they fell. Within moments, it was deafening. The ursaloth roared his displeasure. His was supposed to be an unchanging realm.

The ground shook as the first of the intrusive meteors impacted somewhere to the north-west. A terrible explosion rolled across the forest: a gut-wrenching, deep bass boom that stifled the king in mid-growl. The other pieces now finished their long fall, pummelling the world with their terrible mass and velocity. The old ursaloth stood midstream, paralysed, as again and again the stones beneath him rumbled and shook. When at last the worst of the earthquakes had subsided, he looked to the heavens again. The rain of gigantic fireballs seemed to be over with. Only smaller embers continued to fall, slashing blackened lines across the sky as he himself might shred the bark off a tree.

The bright morning sun was becoming obscured by a thickening haze of dust and ash and smoke. Birds of every shape and size were fleeing southwards. On either bank, long-legged deer rushed past. Small, furry rodents leapt from branch to branch in a mad dash towards safety. The ursaloth twitched his massive, runny nose. There was a bad smell on the wind, one that he had known many times. One did not live in the forest as long as he had and not encounter at least one wildfire. The other animals were correct to flee; the only thing to do in such a situation was to head towards the cool dampness of the lowlands. It was dangerous; the swamps were home to creatures that did not like to be disturbed. Yet, it was better than being burned alive. So, with watering eyes and an empty belly, he splashed south along the river bank. Behind him, the parched woods were quickly consumed by licking orange tongues and growing swaths of flame.

Some time later, he came to a place dimly remembered from his youth. Here, the land dropped away sharply and the river spilled over the rock ledge in a prismatic waterfall. The noonday sun was being smothered by a grey veil. What he could see of the horizon glowed dull red. It was, all of it, most unnatural.

He froze. Something alien was sitting in the river, very near the drop off. It was very large, about half as big as he, with a smooth surface and rounded edges. It had a shell of some kind that was brilliant white in the few places where it was not blackened and charred. It was half submerged, and around it, the water bubbled and steamed. The air was ripe with the stink of burned, otherworldly materials. He was about to take an investigative step towards it when suddenly, a portion of its shell popped off and it extended a stubby antenna. There was a light on the tip, bright blue in colour, which began to pulse rapidly. It started chirping shrilly like a baby bird.

It was more than he could stand. His entire world had been disrupted, and for no reason that he could comprehend. He roared at the mysterious thing to announce that he, not it, was the lord and master of these woods. Then he leapt from the bank and tackled it with his full bulk. The riverbed shifted under the blow, and they toppled forwards. Water rushed all around them. The ursaloth refused to let go however, and drove his talons through his enemy’s outer shell again and again. He was still doing so as they were both carried over the lip of the falls to tumble through empty space. Only when they crashed into the boulder laden pool below did he release his grip.

For a moment, the old beast was lost. There was no sense of direction, no up or down. Just frothing bubbles and roaring waters and a searing pain along his entire underside. At last his head broke the surface, and he slowly swam to shore. His paws and belly were badly burned from touching the intruder, and in the melee, it had managed to impale its blinking antenna into him like a very long wasp stinger. Still, it had been worth it. His dominion reasserted, he gave a final, triumphant roar before limping away into the underbrush.

Behind him, the object – burned, dented, and now perforated with holes – sank to the deep bottom of the pool, and began to fill with water.

Slowly, she realised that she wasn’t dead. Her people held no belief in an afterlife; one lived, and if one had lived well, one left behind a legacy. The dead were dead. They became nothing. They felt nothing. Yet, she could feel a liquid trickling down her face. Her entire body ached, and it hurt to breathe. Moreover, there was a sound like a dozen taps pouring into a bucket. She could hear and feel and, therefore, she must still be alive.

Pod, she thought groggily. Someone must have gotten her into her survival pod. She had no idea to whom she owed her thanks. Her last memory before awakening just now had been that of the command bridge exploding around her. Several air caste crew members had scrambled to get her to safety, and then the entire midsection of the ship had seemed to give way.

Instinctually, she reached up to wipe her forehead. Her fingers came away wet. With great effort, she opened her eyes. She expected to find them sticky with blood, and in a way she was correct. There was blood, but the cyan-coloured fluid was thin and runny. Diluted. Watery.

Water!

She snapped into full awareness and looked around. Being inside the pod was like being strapped tightly to a cushioned table and smothered by redundant layers of soft, white padding and sky blue, shock-absorbing gel liner. Everything about it had been designed to let her fall from the most unimaginable heights and survive. It could withstand infernal heat as well as intense cold, and its recycling system could provide her with weeks of breathable air. What it was not supposed to do, however, was fill inexorably with water, which it most certainly was.

‘Kor’ves?’ she cried out.

The computer intelligence built into the capsule had been gifted with the voice of a water caste member. Even in the face of utter disaster, it would remain calm and controlled and eternally reassuring, a true testament to the Greater Good.

‘Yes, Commander Shadowsun,’ came the reply. ‘What assistance may I offer?’

‘Report!’

‘Your atmospheric re-entry has been most successful. Regrettably, the capsule’s hull has suffered several breaches following its initial landing.’

She licked her fingers. The water was cold, but fresh. At least she wasn’t lying at the bottom of an ocean. ‘Where am I?’

‘On the daylight side of the planet designated il’Wolaho. Your exact geographic position cannot be confirmed.’

‘Why not?’

‘I have lost all contact with the remainder of the fleet, and there are no friendly satellites in orbit. Moreover, the survival pod’s uplink antenna has been forcibly removed post impact.’

‘Release the door,’ she said.

The pod made a trio of chiming sounds. ‘Unable to complete the requested function.’

She was taken aback. A kor’ves refusing a direct command? Impossible.

‘Release the door,’ she repeated. ‘That’s an order.’

For a few seconds nothing happened. She had the distinct impression that the computer was struggling with itself, assessing several directives against one another. Finally, it spoke again. ‘Unable to complete the requested function. The environment outside is potentially dangerous, given the nature of the local wildlife and the injuries you have sustained. It would be irresponsible to release you in such circumstances.’

She knew the computer was simply doing its duty. It was charged with keeping her safe and calm, and, perhaps most importantly, in one place until a rescue team could arrive. That was admirable in a way, but for all she knew, she was a sole survivor. She couldn’t afford to lie here calmly and wait. It was impossible to tell exactly how the pod had come to rest, but already her feet, legs, and back were soaking wet. She looked down her body. At this rate, the capsule would be completely filled in mere minutes. She flexed her shoulders, but the crash restraints held firm.

‘Please refrain from struggling, commander. It needlessly accelerates your heart rate and consumes the available oxygen that much faster.’

‘I’m going to drown!’ she yelled. ‘Open the damned door! Override code: Shadowsun, two-five-three-six-eight!’

‘Voice print confirmed. Command code verified.’ The pod made more chirping noises, but nothing else happened. ‘Request iiiiin progessssss,’ it slurred.

She had worked with kor’ves often enough throughout her career to know the garbled speech was a bad sign. ‘Thought-lock’, the earth caste technicians called it. The pod was convinced that she would die if it let her leave, yet equally certain that she would die if it forced her to remain. Unable to choose between two dead-end solutions, it was becoming paralysed into inactivity.

Everything below her chest was now submerged and cold. Her limbs were tingling. With numbing fingers she groped around the sides of the padded table. The seconds dragged by. Finally, she found what she was seeking. The water was below her chin.

‘Request iiiiin progessssss,’ the pod repeated.

She could barely feel the release handle, but she grasped it as tightly as she could. There was time for one final lungful of air and then the water crested her head. She yanked upwards with all her might. There was a muffled boom as the explosive bolts mounted on the exterior of the capsule detonated. The entire front section fell away suddenly, and the pod vomited out thick foam and gelsheets. The harness popped off her shoulders and legs, and from around her waist. She kicked out hard and swam towards the shimmering daylight above. She had no idea how deep she had sunk, but her lungs were burning by the time she broke the surface. The smell of wood smoke and a deafening roar of water assaulted her at once. Her head darted around, taking note of the dark green trees, the rushing waterfall and, finally, the rocky shore. Gasping and sputtering, she made her way to a sloping rock covered with moss. She dug in hard with her fingers and hauled herself up out of the water. Her hooves scrabbled on the slick rock, but eventually she managed to wrestle her way atop it and collapse onto her back.

The sun was a hazy smudge behind an obscuring grey sky. As she lay there, she eventually noticed that small objects were falling from horizon to horizon. They left fiery, smoky trails behind them.

That’s my ship, she thought detachedly. She cast her mind back, tracing over the events that had led her to this moment.

Hers had been the lead vessel. As Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Force, it was both her right and her duty to lead the way and, as it turned out, to take the first fusillade of fire. The air caste cartographers had named the planet il’Wolaho – the place of bright colours. From space it was a stunning patchwork of green, yellow, red, and blue; banks of white cloud traced shifting patterns across its face. She was not one to indulge in sentimentality, but even she had been forced to admit that it was lovely. Too lovely, she had decided, for it to remain in the possession of the human gue’la; only a tau could fully appreciate the aesthetics of this world.

Intelligence had informed her that il’Wolaho, or as the unimaginative locals called it, Diepr-3, was sparsely populated to the point of being nearly uninhabited. There were fewer than five settlements of notable size. It was also barely developed; there was little evidence of road works, canals, mag-lev lines, or the like. That had been surprising at first, since it was well known that the people of the Imperium craved social interaction to an unhealthy degree. What else could explain the way in which they would lump themselves together in a single living structure filled with hundreds of millions of their fellows, while at the same time leaving the remaining surface of a planet to go to rot and waste? ‘Hive cities’, they called them: filthy places run amok with violence and disease. What was even more surprising was the fact that il’Wolaho had an intact, thriving biosphere, because humans traditionally cared nothing for environmental protection. In fact, they were habitual polluters of the worst kind, tainting and toxifying everywhere they trod.

She now realised that in her zeal to take this jewel of a world away from a barbaric people, she had neglected the gue’la penchant for war. Even a modestly populated Imperial planet would naturally possess defences against a space-borne attack. She was fully prepared to deal with surface-to-air missile batteries, or perhaps waves of aerospace interceptors. However, the magnitude of the laser that struck her command ship as it began to settle into orbit had been wholly unexpected. It shot up from the surface of il’Wolaho like concentrated starfire. Within seconds, the vessel’s protective shields collapsed. The front third of the hull vaporised away into space. Stress fractures ran the length of what remained. The lights on the bridge flickered. Reports came flooding in from all sections. Everything forward of bulkhead eight was destroyed. Main power was going off-line. Weapons were useless. The gravity drive was non-responsive.

Others in her place might have stood there stunned. Not her. Even as the tumbling remnants of her ship began to slip helplessly into il’Wolaho’s atmosphere, she ordered the rest of the fleet to back away to a safe distance and to remain at station keeping. ‘You must attempt no rescue, repeat, no rescue,’ she told them. Whatever defence system the Imperials had in place, it would make short work of any vessel that strayed too close. For the Greater Good, they must not endanger their multitude in a futile attempt to save whatever few might survive an impending, hellish re-entry.

No sooner had she given out her final orders than three willowy air caste hurried over to her. She had to get to the survival pod, they had pleaded. Time was short. She sounded the general order to abandon ship, took one last glimpse of the planet spiralling up to meet them, and turned to go. Then, the entire room detonated.

Shadowsun sat up suddenly and looked down into the pool below the waterfall. A wave of pain shot through her ribs, but she paid it no heed. ‘Battlesuit,’ she whispered.

On her left forearm she wore a personal flex-screen. The paper-thin crystal data display curled around her sleeve like a wide bracelet. It had become cracked in the crash, and its surface was dark. When she pressed her finger to its surface however, it glowed back to life.

‘Interface with survival pod kor’ves,’ she instructed it. A second later, it blinked happily that it was now in contact with the drowned escape pod.

‘Kor’ves,’ she said loudly, ‘open the main compartment and unpack the drones.’

‘Request iiiiiin progresssssssss,’ came the response.

Shadowsun cursed and waded ankle deep into the river. She tried to peer into the depths of the pool, but the waterfall churned the surface such that she couldn’t see anything. She frowned. Her suit would be stowed in the rear underside of the pod, but with the computer still frozen, she would have to open the cargo door manually.

She wished bitterly that her people were better swimmers, but between hoofed feet and a small lung capacity, the tau form was simply not well suited to an aquatic life. She was unsure how long she could hold her breath, but there was little else for it. Her survival depended on getting into her suit and unpacking her drone assistants.

She surveyed her uniform. It clung to her body in sopping, constricting, ochre layers. She would be best to doff it. She peeled open the front and shrugged out of it, not even bothering to scan the area or make sure that she was alone first. She tossed it on a nearby rock, and then wrapped the flex-screen back around her forearm. She made her way out to the middle of the frothing pool, ignoring how her blue skin began to turn purple with chill. When she came to the spot where she was convinced the pod lay, she gulped, and dove.

At first, she saw nothing but curtains of tiny white bubbles. Then, surrounded by dim boulders, she made out the survival pod. It had landed nose down and right side up, she noted. That was fortunate.

Already her chest was pounding, and she had to fight the urge to claw her way back to the surface. She kicked clumsily around to the rear underside of the pod. The hull was badly battered and blackened, and it took her a seeming eternity to find the manual access pad. As she punched in her five-digit access code, a dark notion raced across her brain. The pod has lost power, she thought. There’s no way to open this door.

With a dull thunk, a large, square cargo door fell away. In the space beyond, an unblemished white machine waited patiently. It was folded down into a compact cube: a crouching suit of armour with its arms wrapped tightly around its knees. She grabbed hold of it and pulled. With agonising slowness, it toppled forwards. When it landed on the riverbed, it kicked up plumes of silt.

Shadowsun’s whole being ached for a breath of air. She glanced upwards. The surface seemed light-years distant. Even if she started now, she knew she would never make it. Her only hope was to get into the battlesuit. Frantically, she keyed her flex-screen to interface with the battlesuit’s systems, telling it to power up and unfold itself. Lights came on behind the frosted surface of the helmet. The arms uncurled, and the legs straightened. By the time the chest piece began to hinge outwards, Shadowsun was on the verge of passing out. She squeezed herself up and under the helmet, jammed her arms and legs into place, and signalled the suit to seal itself up again.

The armour settled into place. With a steady hum, the environmental cyclers flushed the water out. Shadowsun took a long, wheezing intake of breath, and coughed.

Many times throughout her career, she had pictured the memorial they would erect of her on T’au following her death. It would be placed before the Mont’yr Battle Dome, of course, where it would stand among the other heroes of her people, immortalised in six-metre-high white marble. Along the base would read her accolades – Shadowsun, daughter of Kiru, hero of the K’resh Expansion War, scourge of the greenskin barbarians, bulwark against the hive fleets.

She chastised herself for not unpacking her equipment faster. Whatever coda might be added to her future epitaph, today it had very nearly been: drowned naked in a river while trying to get into her battlesuit.

‘Father would not approve,’ she muttered.

With a quick burst from the suit’s jet pack, she righted herself. Along the bottom of her helmet a series of interface icons glowed. She locked her eyes onto the symbol for ‘Drone Control’, and blinked twice. A tree of choices feathered up across the inside of the face plate. She selected ‘Shield Drones’, and then ‘Activation Protocols’, and set the program in motion. On either side of the survival pod, large, mushroom-shaped machines popped up from out of the hull. They were festooned with bright blue lights, and from their tops, they each sprouted two thick antennae. While they settled into place beside her, she found the control pathway for the third drone. It separated itself from the upper rear section of the escape pod. From its underside, it extruded a long, inverted fin. Special issue only to commanders of high rank such as herself, this was the machine that would let her locate and communicate with any other survivors of the crash.

She flicked her gaze from left to right, closing the drone menus. Icons for each of her new companions now glowed along the main list choices. She locked her gaze on the command-link symbol, and asked, ‘Where are we?’

The inside of her helmet lit up brightly as a tactical map was overlaid upon it; numbers scrolled across the left side of her vision. Cross hairs came to settle on the southern edge of a mountain range. She stared at it for several minutes before finally giving up. The map meant nothing to her without a larger reference frame. The last time she’d seen the planet had been from orbit.

She blinked away the map from her display, and selected ‘Communications’ from the root menu. On a hunch, she chose ‘Tightbeam, Encrypted, Tau: Orbital’, and waited.

Unlike the survival pod, the intelligence built into the command-link drone was pure fire caste. Its speech was short and clipped. It dealt only with essentials. ‘Negative. No tau ships in range.’

Good, she thought. Her last order had been obeyed. The nearest vessel would now be several light-minutes away. Unfortunately, that also meant she was on her own. She didn’t have the equipment to broadcast that far.

She chose ‘Widebeam, Encrypted, Tau: Groundside’, and cleared her throat.

‘O’Shaserra calling all ground forces,’ she said.

She was answered with silence.

‘Repeat, this is Commander Shadowsun calling any and all surviving ground forces. Acknowledge.’

Again, there was nothing save the sound of her breathing and the mild hum of the battlesuit’s oxygen scrubbers.

She instructed the command-link drone to scan for tau signals on a rotating band. When surrounded by hostile forces, and vastly outnumbered, it was standard procedure for tau soldiers to keep changing their transmission frequencies every few minutes.

She tried one last time. ‘Commander Shadowsun calling any and all surviving ground forces. Acknowledge.’

At first, there was nothing. Then, she received an answer.

‘Authorisation?’ The voice sounded young. Whoever he was, he was correct to be suspicious.

She smiled, and recited her identity code.

The youth sighed. ‘Confirmed. It’s an honour, commander. We… we thought you were lost.’

‘I’m very much alive,’ she said. ‘Identify yourself.’

‘Shas’la Fal’shia Sabu’ro,’ he replied.

Shadowsun was pleased. A fire caste communications expert. Exactly what was needed. ‘Shas’la,’ she asked, ‘are you alone?’

‘Negative, commander. There are many of us here.’

‘Who has seniority?’

‘Uh… Shas’vre Bork’an Yo’uta holds the highest rank.’

A veteran soldier by his name. Shadowsun’s hopes continued to rise. ‘I would speak with him, shas’la.’

While she waited for young Sabu’ro to fetch his superior, Shadowsun went looking for her guns. Normally, her battlesuit carried a burst cannon mounted underneath each arm, but in order for it to be stored as compactly as possible, these had to be removed and placed in a separate storage compartment. She found them near the crumpled nose of the escape pod. Their long barrels were horribly bent, and their main mechanisms were smashed piecemeal.

‘Damn the waste,’ she spat.

‘I’m sorry, commander?’ asked a gruff voice.

She returned her attention to the data flow streaming across the bottom of her display. ‘Shas’vre Yo’uta, I presume?’

‘I am honoured,’ the voice replied. ‘What is your condition, commander?’

‘Alive with minor injuries,’ Shadowsun sighed. ‘I have a complete complement of drones, and my battlesuit is fully intact. My weapons, regrettably, were destroyed during re-entry.’

She could feel Yo’uta’s scowl across the airwaves. ‘Eighty per cent equipment survival rate,’ he said. ‘Deplorable.’

Shadowsun smiled in agreement. Whoever this shas’vre was, he was a perfectionist like her. They were going to get along just fine. ‘We can chastise the engineers later,’ she said. ‘I need a positional fix, relative to you.’

Yo’uta queried his own kor’ves. ‘Your battlesuit indentification marker registers as being one hundred and sixty tor’kan due west of us. I’ll lead a recovery team to your position immediately.’

‘A team? How many survivors do you have?’

‘Forty-eight in total.’

Shadowsun caught her breath; it was more than she had dared hope for. ‘What is their condition?’

‘Zero casualties upon landing,’ Yo’uta said proudly. ‘We are, all of us, fit and duty ready. Our materiel, on the other hand, is greatly reduced.’

‘Explain.’

There was a slight pause before Yo’uta spoke again. ‘You should be made aware, commander, that we didn’t land in individual escape pods. We came down in a Manta.’

Shadowsun’s eyes widened at the thought. The Manta was a combat transport of substantial size and enormous firepower. Her flagship had carried an entire wing of them.

‘It was a hard landing though,’ Yo’uta went on. ‘We took extensive damage when the command ship broke apart. The re-entry angle was far from optimal, and the forests here are very dense.’

Shadowsun got the idea. Yo’uta was trying to tell her that not only was the Manta crippled, but that it had arrived on il’Wolaho in a very obvious manner.

‘The indigenous population cannot have possibly failed to track our descent, even with their primitive technology. Our sensors have already detected three fly-bys by high-altitude aircraft, and we expect that very soon our location will be swarming with ground forces. I have, of course, issued orders to hold our position.’

‘I understand,’ she said. ‘Have you received word from any other landing parties?’

‘Yours is the only one.’

Neither of them said anything for a moment. The pause was filled by thoughts of the many, many fine tau who had died this day without even having the opportunity to take one of the enemy with them.

‘Like I said,’ Shadowsun whispered, ‘damn the waste.’ She cleared her throat. ‘Shas’vre, cancel my retrieval. You haven’t the men to spare. Send me your coordinates instead, and I’ll make my way to you.’

‘Commander Shadowsun–’

‘I said I’ll come to you,’ she snapped. She might have been unarmed, but she was far from being helpless. She had a battlesuit with full stealth capabilities and redundant protective shielding. More than that, she was Shadowsun, student of Puretide, daughter of Kiru.

If Yo’usa felt chastised, his voice didn’t reveal it. ‘Understood,’ he said curtly. A fresh stream of information scrolled along Shadowsun’s peripheral view, transmitted to her through the command drone. An updated map appeared in front of her.

‘Data received. I’m leaving now. I will maintain communications silence until I approach your position.’

She closed the channel with a flick of her eyes, ignited her jet pack, and rocketed up through the water. She made almost no noise when she landed on the shore, despite the weight of the suit. Once the three drones had come up out of the water and settled soundlessly into place around her, she headed off through the twisted, alien trees at a brisk pace. She was happy to put the waterfall behind her, but more than that, she realised, she was looking forward to a fight against the humans that had robbed her of her ship and murdered so many of her followers.

The forest was indeed very thick, just as Yo’uta had said. The trunks of the trees were twisted and covered with large burls. Their branches intertwined so tightly above her that it was oftentimes difficult to see the sky. Eons of fallen leaves covered the forest floor. Bushes and briars occupied any and all available space.

On the off chance that the humans were actually capable of intercepting tau transmissions, Shadowsun kept her comm channel closed. The journey, however, was far from silent. The sounds of the forest poured through her audio pick-ups in a constant stream. The wind rustled the leaves above her. Birds of innumerable types were chirping and honking. Small, furry creatures with luminous eyes crunched their way through the underbrush. She grew anxious after a while; worried for the soldiers at the Manta site, and fearing that she wasn’t moving nearly fast enough. Several times she considered using her jet pack thrusters to more than double her pace, but each time her father’s voice rang in her mind with one of his axioms.

Do all things once and properly. Time is a cheap investiture to ensure victory.

Although she could go bounding through the dense terrain at breakneck speeds, she might seriously injure herself. Despite her armour and forcefields, it would be all too easy to twist a joint or even break a bone. Yes, her people needed her, but she would serve no good by arriving in their midst in anything less than perfect fighting form.

The Manta had come down in a series of stony hills and, after some time, the land began to rise. The ground became stonier and the vegetation thinned to the point where she could see large patches of the sky through the limbs of the trees. Her sensor suite chimed, and she stopped in mid-step. Five gue’la aircraft were approaching from the south, flying very low and in a V-shaped formation. With a flicking motion of her fingers, she sent the command drone aloft. It deftly navigated its way through the forest canopy until it finally poked through the tallest branches. She activated the ‘Remote Viewing’ option in her console, gaining an instant panoramic view of the land.

The craft were rectangular, propelled through the air more by the brute force of turbines than any understanding of aerodynamics. Beneath their stubby wings, they each carried two enormous cylinders, which she immediately took to be bombs. A quick check reassured her that her battlesuit’s adaptive camouflage was in perfect working order. She wished again that her burst cannons had survived the crash. Designed to shred light infantry, they would have done little at all against an aerial attack, but even so, she would have been able to go down fighting. She braced herself for an inevitable eruption and shockwave.

Nothing came.

She checked her sensors again. The craft had passed her by and were continuing to the north-west. She frowned with confusion; the Manta lay eastwards. If she wasn’t their target, and neither were her men, where were heading? She made a twisting motion with one hand. The command drone spun around until she could see the enemy aircraft receding into the distance and towards a wall of fire. The entire horizon had been replaced by an orange haze that flickered and danced. Above it, a sheet of grey smoke slowly roiled and churned forward. The sky was taking on an unnatural colour, like that of faded roses. There was no doubt in her mind it had been the falling pieces of her flagship that had started the blaze. The ion drive alone, she thought, would have been like a weapon of mass destruction as it struck the ground and ruptured.

Inside her helmet, she watched as the five aircraft flew straight towards the monstrous blaze. She magnified the view just as they began to dump a fine red cloud out behind them. Seconds later, they wheeled around, payloads expended, and headed southwards again.

The command drone sank back down to sit near her shoulder. The humans were using retardant chemicals to try and staunch the fire, but why? There was no settlement nearby that needed saving, just more forest. Since when did the soldiers of the Imperium care one iota about environmental preservation?

She was no unfeeling monster. The wanton destruction of the forest both disturbed and angered her. It was waste compiled on top of waste. She pushed the feelings aside by reminding herself that the humans had brought this on themselves. If they had simply surrendered their planet to tau authority instead of trying to resist, then everything would have been fine.

She pressed on.

The afternoon was waning by the time she drew near her destination. Shadowsun emerged into a wide strip of land where the forest had been snapped in half and knocked flat. It was like a road, rolled out before her to the horizon and paved with flattened logs. The Manta had carved this, she surmised. Easily, she imagined the flat, broad transport dropping lower and lower, at first shearing off the tops of the trees, and then eventually making itself a landing strip. Yo’uta hadn’t been exaggerating. Even a species as technologically backward as the humans would have little difficulty following a trail like this.

Shadowsun decided that she was close enough now to risk reopening her comm channels. No sooner had she done so, then she was assaulted by a myriad of voices. Some were barking orders. Others were screaming. The background was punctuated by the sounds of weapons fire.

‘Sabu’ro!’ she yelled as she broke into a run. ‘Sabu’ro, report!’

She wove out into the area of flattened trees where there was no longer anything to get in her way. She sprinted a few steps, kicked hard at the ground, and engaged the battlesuit’s thrusters. She soared into the air in a long, bounding motion and landed a great distance away.

‘Commander!’ the young fire warrior responded. ‘Commander, our position is under attack!’

‘I’m almost there,’ Shadowsun grunted as she leapt again. The ground blurred beneath her.

‘Negative!’ came the voice of Yo’uta. He was breathing heavily. ‘We are surrounded and taking significant losses, commander. Do not endanger yourself. ‘

Shadowsun landed hard atop a fallen trunk. Her hooves left deep imprints in the wood. She crouched, and leapt again. ‘What did I tell you, shas’vre?’ she yelled.

The gruff voice gave no reply.

Shadowsun was close enough now to hear the battle through her external audio pick-ups. There came the familiar hiss of pulse rifle fire – a three round chuffing that she had known from childhood, and the reassuring sizzle of plasma rifles being fired from Crisis battlesuits. These were nearly drowned out though by the sounds of gue’la weapons. Their inefficient laser guns ejected hot air from their assemblies with a staccato cracking, and the large-calibre cannons they were so fond of thumped savagely. She took some hope in what she didn’t hear. There was no rumble of ground tanks, no massive detonations from tracked artillery and no whine of hovering airships. This was an assault by large numbers of light infantry with little, if any, mechanised support. It would attack in waves, with no concern for casualties, until its enemy was eliminated. It was typically human and painfully predictable.

Shadowsun crested a ridge of dirt ploughed up by the Manta’s landing. As she had done on countless battlefields before, she catalogued the details of the scene in a heartbeat. The Manta was tilted slightly to one side with its nose in the air, a deep sea creature dragged up onto a wooded shore and left to die. Its hull looked crumpled and charred. The topmost of its two rear hatches was open, and a long boarding plank extended to the ground. Around the base of the transport, the warriors had erected a perimeter of four staggered barricades.

The ground in front of them was littered with dead humans. They were dressed in knee-length, dark-green coats with bright yellow armoured plates along the front and back. Their boots and gloves were made of light-brown leather. Their discarded rifles appeared to have wooden frames. Shadowsun could instantly tell that they had indeed tried to storm the Manta en masse only to be cut to pieces by the superiority of tau technology. Having sent the equivalent of eight fire warrior teams to a pointless doom, the remaining humans had evidently now decided to withdraw to the tree line where they too could have some protective cover. Volleys of laser fire continued to pour down onto her men, but they weren’t doing much damage.

The walking machines, on the other hand, were.

Six of them were holding place just outside the woods. Their main body was little more than an open-topped, reinforced cage large enough to hold a single gue’la pilot. They had two back-bent legs and pipes on their rear quarters that belched black smoke. They looked pathetic to Shadowsun, a child’s interpretation of a battlesuit. There was nothing laughable about their armaments though. Four of them had been mounted with projectile cannons; the other two had racks of missiles slung beneath them.

Shadowsun engaged her booster pack and arced high over the carnage. At the apex of her flight, she deactivated the suit’s camouflage systems and landed in a crouch behind the barricades. Heavy shells whistled over her head, exploding into shrapnel as they impacted the Manta hull. Several tau soldiers, huddled down as low as they could, whirled around to face her. She raised her hands and retracted her helmet. Upon seeing her face, they quickly lowered their weapons.

‘Apologies, commander,’ one of them blurted. His ochre combat armour was adorned with a mix of white officer’s insignia and black scorch marks. ‘The shas’vre informed us you were coming.’

She glanced quickly up and down the line. Many of her men lay in crumpled heaps. Another round of cannon shells burst in mid-air. ‘Where is Yo’uta?’ she shouted.

‘Out there.’ The officer indicated the corpse-strewn field between the barricades and the tree line. ‘He and the other Crisis suits were trying to outflank the enemy soldiers when those walkers suddenly appeared, a complete surprise.’

Shadowsun shot him a look of incredulity.

‘They didn’t appear on our scanners. I don’t know why. If we’d only had some pathfinders to act as forward scouts, then perhaps…’

Shadowsun glanced down toward her collar where her command interface icons still glowed. She sent a signal out to all of the nearby tau officers. A tiny panel on the forearm of the soldier in front of her glowed blue, but there were no other responses. She closed her eyes and took a breath.

‘What’s your name?’ she asked.

‘Shas’ui Kou’to,’ he replied with a sharp nod of his head.

‘You’re in command until I return.’ The helmet of her battlesuit flipped down into place once more. The adaptive camouflage transformed her into little more than a blur. Then, with a burst from her thrusters, she leapt high into the air.

‘Covering fire!’ Kou’to’s voice bellowed to the tau over their shared combat frequency.

Shadowsun twisted in mid-flight, while behind her, the remaining tau popped up over the barricade and poured pulses of blue energy into the humans. Kou’to was taking no chances, she realised. Even though she was nearly invisible to gue’la eyes now, the shas’ui was making doubly certain that the enemy’s full attention would be directed away from her. She came down in the middle of a large crater where three tau Crisis suits lay in a jumbled heap. Their heavy armour was peppered with blast marks, but something else had dealt the fatal blows. Each suit had at least one hole in it large enough for her to put her fist through, with no exit on the opposite side. The humans were using heavy sabots that, should she somehow lose her defensive forcefields, would completely bypass her armour and detonate inside her piloting compartment. ‘Krak missiles’, they called them, because they were used to ‘crack’ hardened targets. Word play. Her jaw tightened. Any military that made jest of their equipment was disrespectful of their craft and worse than useless.

She quickly surveyed the weapon load-outs on the downed suits, forgoing missile pods and plasma rifles for something far more punishing. From two of the fallen, she removed a pair of fusion blasters. The flat, rectangular-shaped devices were typically reserved for destroying enemy armour. They fired a devastating beam of charged particles that incited chain reaction atomic explosions in whatever they hit. They were also considered a secondary weapon because of their extremely short range.

Perfect.

Within moments, she had attached the guns to the universal mountings on the underside of her suit’s forearms. She deftly scrambled out of the crater and sprinted toward the nearest human walkers. Three of them were clustered together, and as she approached they unleashed another barrage of cannon rounds and rockets at the tau position. The one with the missiles, the one that had likely killed her battlesuit officers, would be the first to be made an example of, she decided. The walkers remained unaware of her presence until she was so close that she could have reached out and slapped their sides. She depressed the activation studs on the blasters.

Twin streams of white light struck the underside of the machine, and a second later, the entire structure was engulfed in blinding energy. It seemed to collapse in on itself, sagging and melting as its molecular structure became superheated. One of the legs gave way, and the walker tumbled over onto its side. The cage covered its lone occupant in liquid metal, and even amidst the din of the battle, Shadowsun could hear the pilot’s final scream of agony.

The remaining walkers were taken aback. From their perspective, Shadowsun had appeared from out of nowhere. They tried to bring their cannons to bear, but she was already moving, dashing to the side. Heavy shells tore up the ground beneath her and bounced harmlessly off her shields. Then she was behind them. The walkers clumsily began to turn to face her, but she was already firing at them. She angled the blasters away from her body, and hit both of them at once. To her left, one of the cannons fell away like dripping wax. To her right, the pilot found himself blinded as part of his control panel vaporised before him.

Again she was in motion, leading them around and around. The blinded pilot shot at her in vain. His cannon shells splintered the trees. Shadowsun levelled both blasters at him. The bright beams cut the machine off at the knees, and it pitched over violently. She danced around the rear of the remaining walker, who spun desperately to keep her in check.

She was under fire now. Another group of walking machines had appeared to her right. They strode forwards across the corpses of their fellows. Shadowsun turned to glare at them, as their sabots and cannon rounds did nothing but burst harmlessly around her. From behind the barricades, Kou’to and his men stopped firing into the woods. In perfect unison, they swivelled and began shooting at the walkers closing in on their commander. Pulse blasts ricocheted off the rough armour-plating.

Shadowsun was indignant. She leapt up into the air and crunched down atop the weaponless walker. Beneath her hooves, the pilot stared up at her, slack jawed and stupefied. She didn’t even bother to look him in the eye as she fired both blasters into his lap. The shots punched clean through into the ground below, tearing the machine in half. Shadowsun was arcing through the air again, leaving only a pile of glowing slag in her wake.

As Shadowsun descended, she was peppered with shrapnel and struck full on by an armour-piercing missile. Again, her shields held firm. She came down near the crater with the fallen Crisis suits, and returned fire. She was farther down-range than she would have liked to have been, but she still succeeded in destroying one of them utterly.

The second group of walkers would not be so easily surprised. Human infantry were repositioning themselves just outside the tree line. They scuttled forwards, ducking low, quickly forming into ranks and files. The ones in front dove face first into the blood-soaked ground. Those behind went down to one knee. Far in back, she saw five others standing apart, providing moral support with the use of a large, green flag. There were a lot of them, Shadowsun admitted to herself, and they were lining her up in their sights. She returned her attention to the last two walkers. The infantry would be dealt with shortly.

For whatever reason, the machines couldn’t seem to hit their mark at all. Shadowsun repaid them for their incompetence by sprinting forwards, firing the blasters into both of them. One of them was gutted through the cockpit, but the one bearing the missile pod evaded her attack. As it spun, it fired into her. The blast was so close that as its missile detonated off her shields, the walker rocked backwards. Shadowsun rolled along the ground and sprang back up. She glanced quickly at her combat icons, certain that she had lost one of her drones. She had only two of the three symbols glowed contentedly.

Kou’to had ordered the fire warriors to begin thinning out the human infantry before they could drown Shadowsun in laser fire. Pulse blasts tore into the humans, but despite losing eight men, the gue’la remained steadfast and fired back. Their fusillade was like a wave of red light. It washed over the commander and her drones, obscuring them from sight. Kou’to and his men stood, horrified, certain that all was lost.

Shadowsun’s armour glowed as it tried to redirect what thermal energy it could. The interior of her visor became a collage of warnings and schematics informing her just where she was being hit and what systems were being damaged or destroyed. Her drone icons vanished. She closed her eyes and turned her face a fraction of a second before her face plate shattered inwards. Her face was slashed repeatedly. Heat leaked through the plating around her joints and torso. Her left knee buckled against her will. She could smell her skin burning.

Then, for the second time that day, she realised that she wasn’t dead. She opened her eyes. Her visor was a ragged, empty hole. Her suit collar flashed a dozen telltales and alarms. Smoke was filling the suit’s interior, and she could taste her own blood. But she was still alive.

A look of disbelief crossed the faces of the humans.

Rising slowly, Shadowsun peeled away her useless helmet and let it clatter into the mud alongside her tattered drones. Her vision was swimming, but peripherally she saw her fire warriors leaping over their protective barricade and rushing out to shield her. Without her having to utter a single word, they opened up with their pulse rifles. The human unit was ripped apart by flashes of light that cared nothing for their flimsy armour. Their heads flew back, and their limbs flailed. They fell in piles atop one another. For a moment, the handful who remained actually stood their ground, but then Shadowsun was bounding into their midst. She turned two of them into glowing embers with her fusion guns. She planted both her hooves into the chest of another as she landed. She could feel the reverberations in her ankles as the man’s ribcage snapped and caved in.

There were only two of them left now amidst the steaming corpses of their comrades. They tried to attack her using knives and bayonets, but the blades could find no purchase. She spun and struck one of them across the face with the flat edge of a fusion blaster. With the sound of breaking bones, a gush of bloody foam shot out of the human’s nose. He dropped heavily to the ground and died. The lone survivor tried once again to stab her, only to see his knife skitter over the surface of her battlesuit. Shadowsun whirled and drove a robotically augmented knee into his ribcage. His chest caved in and he fell among the dead, discarded and forgotten.

She turned her attention towards the tree line. Five humans were gathered there beneath a comically oversized standard. One of them was holding a sword with jagged mechanical teeth. The others had rifles. Their armour looked more substantial than that worn by the masses of dead infantry scattered about, and Shadowsun surmised that she was, at last, facing off against the gue’la commander and his bodyguard.

‘You are beaten,’ she shouted at them. Droplets of cyan-coloured blood flew from her mouth and spattered across her battlesuit collar. Behind her, thirty fire warriors waited calmly, their rifles at the ready.

The humans said nothing. They just glanced at one another. Their faces were unreadable.

Of course, Shadowsun realised. In preparing to go to war, she and the officers serving under her had schooled themselves in the language of the enemy. It was presumptuous to assume that the gue’la leaders had done anything likewise.

Four of the humans, including the one in charge of their flag, suddenly scrambled to lift their lasguns. The fifth was in the midst of yelling something when the tau pulled their triggers. Shadowsun watched impassively as the four bodyguards were shot down, their superior armour, in the end, proving insufficient. The final human, on the other hand, was spared by some kind of primitive body shield. It rippled as it managed to stop two of the three pulse blasts that struck him. Even so, he gripped his left arm and howled with agony as the third pulse slipped through. The mechanical sword fell away into the brush. Crimson spilled from between his fingers. He fell to his knees.

The fire warriors waited. Shadowsun slowly walked forward. She looked down at the wretched creature, and tried as best she could to wrap her bleeding lips around the thick words of his native tongue.

‘You are the commander?’ she asked.

His face, when he looked up, appeared to Shadowsun to be utterly lost. ‘Wha-what?’

Frustrated, she ground a hoof into the dirt. She spoke again in the human language, over-enunciating each word to ensure his understanding. ‘I asked, are you the commander?’

‘Hollett,’ he stammered. ‘Major, Diepr-3 Imperial Guard, serial number 58964-86542-4586.’

Shadowsun stepped back several paces. ‘You have squandered the lives of your warriors and been beaten in combat,’ she said to him. She glanced over her shoulder at Kou’to. ‘Get him up,’ she ordered.

With a nod, the shas’ui and two others slung their rifles over their shoulders, moved to the human lying in the dirt, and hoisted him onto his feet. He was several heads taller than they were when he stood. He was eye to eye with Shadowsun in her battlesuit.

‘Hollett,’ he repeated. ‘Major, Diepr-3 Imperial Guard, serial number 58964… no, wait...’ He swayed and continued to grip his wounded arm tightly.

Kou’to and his aides moved off to the side.

‘As an officer,’ Shadowsun continued, ‘you will doubtless wish to now die with honour. I will grant you such, which is more than you deserve, because I am tau.’

Shadowsun raised her fusion blasters. The human stared frantically. His jaw worked soundlessly and his eyes darted. At the last second, he recalled the word he was searching for.

‘Mu’mont!’ he screeched.

All the tau froze.

‘Is that right?’ he asked desperately. ‘Mu’mont? Mu’mont. No war, yes?’ He raised his free hand.

The barrels of Shadowsun’s fusion blasters dipped slightly. ‘Ya tau’sia?’

The human grinned with relief. ‘Yes,’ he blurted. ‘Yes. I can speak some of your language. A little. Little? Uh… shisa? Shisa tau’sia?’

‘How is it you can understand some of what we say?’ Shadowsun asked cautiously.

‘We’re right on your border. We monitor a lot of your civilian transmissions. I’ve picked up a bit, I guess. I was always good with things like that.’

Kou’to stared at Shadowsun. Her face was like stone and in that moment, he was entirely unsure of whether or not she would accept this man’s surrender or simply shoot him in half regardless. Given how grievous the tau losses had been this day, he suspected the latter. As the only other soldier of rank, it fell to him to ensure that his commander did not let her passions get the better of her. He moved to stand between the two of them, and hit the human, hard, across the face with the butt of his pulse rifle.

‘You will not directly address the commander, gue’la!’ he yelled. ‘Do you understand?’

The human spat blood, and nodded. ‘Yes. I understand.’

‘Shas’ui,’ Shadowsun said lowly, ‘step aside.’

Kou’to pretended not to hear. ‘When you speak, gue’la, you will speak to me, and only me, or else you will die. Do you understand?’

‘Yes,’ the human replied. ‘Whatever you say, just, don’t kill me. Please.’

‘Shas’ui,’ Shadowsun said with increased volume. ‘I ordered you to step aside.’

Kou’to deftly pulled the heavy pistol from out of the holster on the man’s hip and tucked it into his own belt. It was nearly half the length of the shas’ui’s leg, with multiple cooling ports and an assembly along its top that glowed brightly. He spun to face Shadowsun, and bowed. ‘The prisoner has been disarmed, commander. My team will take him into custody,’ he said.

Shadowsun continued to hold the fusion blasters out in front of her. No one moved. Even the vast forest around them seemed to pause. Then Kou’to signalled the two closest fire warriors to take the human away, dismissing everyone else with a nod. As they returned to the Manta, he shouldered his weapon and waited.

Slowly, the fusion blasters dropped. A long moment passed between the two of them. At last, Shadowsun looked down at herself and said strangely, ‘I’ve been wounded.’

Kou’to gestured towards the downed transport ship. ‘The commander will be attended to, of course. Lead on.’

Shadowsun turned and plodded towards the Manta. Kou’to followed at a respectful distance, but he never took his eyes off of her.

She exited her battlesuit at the base of the boarding ramp. Kou’to had a team of eleven fire warriors stand in a protective circle around her as she did so. With his head lowered so far that his chin touched his chest, Kou’to brought her a fresh set of clothing. She dressed quickly, snapped the flex-screen back around her left arm, and said, ‘It’s a bit large.’

Kou’to scarcely moved. ‘Forgiveness, commander, but it was taken from the body of one of the fallen. He was of wider proportion than you. This uniform represents our best efforts.’

Shadowsun cinched the waist as tightly as she could and started rolling up the sleeves. Even so, it hung on her like a shapeless mustard-coloured bag. ‘His contribution is received and appreciated. You may dismiss your men.’

Kou’to’s head snapped up. ‘La’rua, karae’na!’ he barked. The circle protecting the commander’s decency dispersed at once to continue policing the bodies of friend and foe alike. He produced a small brown satchel from his belt and passed it to Shadowsun. ‘Medical supplies, commander.’

She took it with a nod of thanks and removed a small vial marked ‘tissue rebuilder’ from the pouch. Twisting off the top, she pressed the tiny cylinder against the side of her neck.

‘Where is the gue’la?’ Shadowsun asked.

‘He is restrained and under guard,’ Kou’to replied.

She touched one of the many cuts to her face. The blood there was already congealing and the wound closing. ‘Shas’la Sabu’ro. Take me to him.’

Together they ascended the ramp. The Manta, despite its enormous size, had very little room to move around in. Its wings were entirely occupied with engines and integrated weapons. The central fuselage was divided into three parts: a command and control area designed to accommodate two air caste pilots, a rectangular storage bay in the transport’s belly that held large war machines like tanks and Crisis battlesuits, and an upper transport deck, which Shadowsun and Kou’to went to. The space was dominated by slotted couches along each wall and a median with additional seating on each side.

Shadowsun halted when she saw it. Kou’to answered her question about its intended occupant before she could even ask it.

‘The aun was not aboard when we were forced to leave the command ship,’ he said flatly.

Of all the disappointments she had suffered this day, the absence of an Ethereal was the greatest. ‘No,’ she muttered, ‘none of the aun would have had enough time to make their way to the flight hangars.’ She touched one of the many places on her brow that were sticky with congealing blood.

A diminutive tau strode past the captive human and down the aisle towards them. His ochre body armour was adorned with deep red markings. He cradled his helmet beneath one arm. In his other hand he held a rolled up flex-screen. He bowed deeply when he stood before his superiors. His eyes avoided Shadowsun, and he spoke to Kou’to.

‘Shas’la Fal’shia Sabu’ro puts himself at your service,’ he said rapidly.

Shadowsun appraised him. Sabu’ro was young, perhaps no more than ten or eleven. He must have scored very high on the aptitude tests to have been selected to serve aboard her flagship. ‘It is agreeable to see you, shas’la,’ she said. ‘What is the status of our communications?’

Sabu’ro glanced at Kou’to before answering. The veteran’s nod told him that it was all right to address Shadowsun directly.

‘Commander,’ he said proudly, ‘we are fully capable. Local tightbeam and interplanetary tachyon arrays are both at one hundred per cent.’

‘Are you able to contact the rest of the fleet?’

‘It has already been done. All ships are holding at station-keeping eight light-minutes beyond il’Wolaho’s moon, as per your previous instructions. Command of the armada has passed to Kor’el Kenhi’ta, who relayed the news of what transpired today to T’au via graviton data packet.’ He smiled. ‘After you last spoke to me, I made all vessels aware of your survival.’

‘Was that news also relayed to T’au?’

Young Sabu’ro seemed confused by the question. ‘Why would it not be?’

Shadowsun nodded, imagining what the reaction must have been back on the home world. First, news that a powerful warship had been destroyed with all hands lost. Then, later on, a second bulletin informing everyone that she and a handful of others were alive, but for the moment, non-recoverable. Shock, followed by sadness, followed by joy, followed by concern. The halls of the Aun’t’au’retha, the supreme council of Ethereals who presided over the Empire, must have been uncharacteristically lively this day. Once again, she blamed herself.

‘How many warriors are left?’ she asked Kou’to.

‘The survivors have been grouped into three fireteams, commander. There are also ten kor’ves gun drones remaining, two of which I have ordered to be refitted into shield drones for your use.’

‘The tanks?’ she asked, thinking of the two Hammerhead-class war machines that one would usually find secured in the bowls of a Manta.

‘Rendered inoperable during the landing.’

‘And the Manta itself is no longer flight-worthy?’

‘That is correct, commander.’

Shadowsun frowned deeply. With only herself, a handful of robots, and less than thirty infantry, their position here was untenable. The humans knew where they were, and would be sending another attack wave shortly; one which they were certain to be unable to resist.

‘We must leave,’ she concluded aloud. ‘Yet if we signal the fleet to evacuate us, the gue’la energy cannon will inflict even more casualties upon our people.’

‘That much is certain,’ Kou’to agreed.

‘Then it falls to us to destroy their defences. Have your men bring in our prisoner.’

As Kou’to signalled to the soldiers outside, the flex-screen in Sabu’ro’s fist made a loud beeping. The young man unrolled the computer display. He made it rigid with a snap of his wrist, studied it for a moment, and then announced, ‘Commander, there’s an incoming data packet addressed to you.’ He passed the flex-screen to Shadowsun. ‘A pre-recorded message of some kind, relayed through the fleet position.’

Il’Wolaho was nearly one hundred and fifty light-years away from the heart of the Empire. Real-time communication over such distances was impossible, even for a race as technologically advanced as the tau. Shadowsun took note of the time stamp as the bundle of words and decompiled themselves; whatever the nature of this message, it had been sent while her fleet was in translation from T’au.

‘It says here that this was made and received some time ago. Why am I only seeing it now?’

Sabu’ro shook his head as the recording began.

‘O’Shaserra,’ it said slowly and clearly, ‘This is Aun’va speaking. As leader of the Aun’t’au’retha, may I say that it brings great relief to all to hear that you have survived the destruction of your command vessel.’

Shadowsun couldn’t help but smile as the ancient Ethereal’s face swam into focus. His cheeks and lips were deeply lined. The skin above his eyes drooped. The braid of hair that sprouted from his chin was shot through with grey, and was so long that it dropped out of frame. She often thought that, had her father lived to a similar age, that he might have been much the same. Aun’va – along with her mentor Puretide – had guided her in every aspect of her preparation with a stern but gentle hand. She revered him, both as a superior and a mentor.

‘There was much distress when first we heard the news,’ the recording continued. ‘Much distress. These are trying days for the Empire, dear child. We face danger on many fronts, and for a time, we were afraid that we had lost all three of Kiru’s daughters.’

Shadowsun’s smile collapsed. There was a sudden sickness in her core. She tilted her head, certain that she had misheard that last sentence.

Aun’va’s face was grim. His long mouth was severely downturned. ‘Yes. I regret to inform you, O’Shaserra, that word has reached us from two other theatres of operation; your sisters have given the ultimate sacrifice for the Greater Good, and have been killed in the line of duty.’

She felt numb.

‘Shas’el Ty’res had been selected to provide security for some very important earth caste research, far beyond the borders of the Empire. For security reasons, which we are sure you will understand, we cannot disclose the exact location. Despite our best attempts at peaceful delegation, a massive conflict erupted involving several other races. The operation had to be cancelled. We are told that she gave her life so that others could escape to safety.

‘Shas’el Oru’mi was slain by Var Sin’da pirates on the planet Tash’Var. All reports state that she was working to prevent them from capturing the Ethereals residing there, and that she alone is credited with more than fifty-two confirmed enemy kills. Her position was overrun. She was wounded and evacuated to the medical complex in Mikaz City. She received the best of care, but the poisons used by those damnable creatures are quite virulent, and she died three days later.

‘We have personally seen to it that both of their remains were returned to T’au. A special funeral ceremony has already been held, but now that we have news of your survival, its final vows have been suspended.’

Shadowsun’s face was slack. She had incurred two and a half years of time-debt travelling out to the fringes of tau space. While in transit, not only had her sisters died, but she had missed their funeral as well. She gave a short, hysterical laugh, then slowly handed the flex-screen back to Sabu’ro. He accepted it delicately, as if its edges had suddenly become lethally sharp, and tried to avoid looking at it as the recording played on.

‘Your father was a man of greatness: a magnificent warrior and a shining example of the Greater Good. That is why he was granted leave to raise a family himself, and why you have that right as well. All the Empire was saddened by his death. Yet, we took solace in the knowledge that his legacy lived on through his daughters. Again, all the Empire grieves, and now we have only you, O’Shaserra, in which to find our consolation. You are the last of Kiru’s line.’

Shadowsun half sat, half fell onto one of the couches. Her hands felt cold. Her head began to pound. She found that she was suddenly unable to remember what her sisters had looked like.

‘Obviously, we must discuss the question of what happens next. Therefore, it is imperative that you return to your battlefleet,’ Aun’va concluded. ‘The occupation efforts can be left to others for the time being.’ The Ethereal sighed and, perhaps unsure of what else to say, ended the recording.

Kou’to was torn. His instinct was to offer Shadowsun some kind of condolence, yet doing so would be a massive breach of protocol. Unable to decide what to do, he simply stood stoically by and watched her stare off into space.

Shadowsun’s head made an almost imperceptible shake, refuting a statement whispered in her ears alone. She gave a broken, breathy sigh, and looked at her hands.

At the far end of the room, two fire warriors appeared with Hollett between them. His head was bowed and his wrists were tied together by a thick, plastek restraint.

Kou’to glanced over his shoulder, and cleared his throat. Shadowsun looked up. When she saw Hollett, her face hardened.

‘You, gue’la!’

Hollett lifted his head at the sound of his own language. He looked first to Shadowsun, and then at Kou’to. ‘Tell her my name is Hollett,’ he said. ‘Cordel Hollett.’

‘You are a gue’la barbarian,’ Shadowsun scowled as he marched towards him, ‘and a coward. It matters not what your name is. You lost all right to it when you chose surrender over death.’

Hollett’s eyes lowered. ‘I’m no traitor,’ he muttered.

She stood with her hands on her hips. Now that she was no longer in her battlesuit exoskeleton, Hollett towered over them all. His posture, though, was stooped and deflated. The tau woman might have knocked him over with the slightest of ease, it seemed.

‘I have been told to leave this place and to rejoin my battlefleet,’ she said. ‘This order comes from the highest possible authority, and cannot be denied.’

‘I see.’

‘If, however, I instruct a vessel to come and collect me, your defence laser will destroy it before it even enters the atmosphere.’

Hollett said nothing, sensing that he and Shadowsun were heading towards a disastrous impasse.

‘I therefore ask you, as one commander to another, will you grant permission for a rescue vessel to take myself and my surviving soldiers back out into space? Will you deactivate the cannon long enough to allow for this?’

‘Commander, no!’ Kou’to snapped. Shadowsun silenced him with a raised finger.

Hollett licked his lips. He didn’t know the little blue alien woman personally, but he knew her type. Oh yes indeed. She was a fighter, through and through. She was cold and hard, gifted and prideful. He could not imagine what it must be like for her now, having to ask her enemy for permission to retreat.

‘I can’t,’ he sighed.

Shadowsun was on her feet in a flash. Her face was tight. Her fists were clenched. Her fury was a tangible thing radiating around her.

Hollett found himself actually backing up a step. He raised his bound hands in front of him. ‘I wish I could,’ he cried. ‘Believe me. Letting you leave would solve a lot of my problems today. But it’s not up to me.’

‘You are the commander,’ Shadowsun grated. ‘If you order the cannon to be deactivated, it will be so.’

‘No,’ Hollett said. ‘I’m not the commander. I mean, I am a commander, but I’m not the highest ranking officer on Diepr-3. I can’t order something like that.’

Shadowsun appraised him coolly. ‘You are the N’el Shas’O?’

‘The what?’

‘The secondmost important.’

‘Oh. Uh… yes.’

‘Then I must bring my request to your superior.’

Hollett’s face grew hard, and something in the tone of his voice took Shadowsun aback. ‘No, you won’t,’ he assured her.

‘Our equipment is fully capable of broadcasting…’

‘I’m not talking about your radio!’ He took a deep breath before continuing. ‘I’ve served under Colonel Falkens for more than fifteen years. If you try to negotiate with him, he’ll kill you. If you send your ships within range of his guns, he’ll destroy them. If you try to hide from him out here in the wilderness, he’ll track you. Falkens doesn’t understand things like charity or compassion. He doesn’t believe in compromise, and he sees everything weaker than him as something to be degraded and abused.’

‘Can you be so certain?’ Shadowsun asked quietly.

Hollet’s eyes narrowed. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘He’s like you.’

Shadowsun seemed to consider that for a moment. ‘Then I will have to destroy it. You will provide Shas’ui Kou’to with a list of its weak points and vulnerabilities.’

‘You’re going to attack the defence laser?’ Hollett gave a snort and shrugged weakly. ‘That’d be suicide. You haven’t enough troops. Not from what I’ve seen. The heavy bolters alone will cut you to pieces by before you even get into range.’

‘Heavy bolters,’ Shadowsun chewed the alien words slowly, recalling the large-calibre automatic machine guns the phrase described. Regrettably, the human was correct. An attack using nothing but light infantry would be doomed to failure. She would need more firepower.

Turning to face Sabu’ro, she began speaking once more in her native tongue. ‘Shas’la, contact Kor’el Kenhi’ta.’

‘At once, commander.’ The young soldier’s fingers flew across the surface of the flex-screen. Hollett looked around uneasily.

Seconds later, Sabu’ro bowed slightly at the waist and handed the flex-screen to Shadowsun. The display was filled with the image of an air caste tau in his early thirties. His uniform robe flared at the shoulders, and above him floated a large, clam-shaped device. The crown of his head nestled inside the machine, connected by glowing fibop cables and neural relays. His eyes, large and luminous, darted about, preoccupied. The Kor’el was deep in tacflow, Shadowsun knew. Information from every vessel in the armada was pouring into his brain, sifted and prioritised by banks of computers, and displayed on his hard-wired ocular implants.

‘Commander Shadowsun,’ he wheezed. Like all members of the air caste, his voice was thin and breathy. ‘I am… at your service.’

‘Kor’el, there are new orders from T’au. From the Aun’t’au’retha as a whole and Aun’va specifically. I am to evacuate this planet and rejoin the fleet. All other considerations are rescinded.’

Kenhi’ta’s head dipped oddly to one side, giving him a quizzical look. Shadowsun knew that he was, in fact, plotting course directions, scanning weapon readiness reports, and worst of all, calculating potential losses.

‘We must comply, of course,’ he said at last. ‘However, the presence of the gue’la defence weapon will make such an operation… very costly.’

‘Agreed,’ Shadowsun said curtly. ‘Therefore, we will attempt to lower the cost. You are hereby ordered to move the fleet into position above il’Wolaho, and begin bombardment of the energy cannon and surrounding area.’

She could feel Kou’to staring at her. He obviously disagreed with this course of action, but of course, was too bound by his place in the chain of command to comment on it. She turned her hands over slightly in the air and tried to reassure him. ‘We will lose several ships to be certain,’ she said lowly, ‘but in return, we will crush the gue’la resistance entirely. It’s an acceptable trade.’

Kou’to swallowed bitterly, and nodded.

‘What’s happening?’ Hollett asked him.

‘Not now,’ Kou’to growled.

On the flex-screen, Kenhi’ta appeared to look at the ceiling. He wiggled the fingers of his right hand, manipulating data only he was privy to. ‘Blanket saturation of the area… redundant shock wave radii… secondary effects of thermal wash... elevated nucleotide counts. The collateral damage to the planet will be… considerable.’

Unlike the tau soldiers, who spoke in rapid, crackling bursts, the space captain’s sentences were ponderous and drawn out. There was more than enough time for Hollett to identify a word or two. He spoke to Kou’to again. ‘Damage? What damage? What the hell are you planning?’

Shadowsun turned ferociously. ‘Since you give me no other choice, Hollett-la, I am ordering my people to vaporise your defence cannon from orbit.’

Hollett went very pale. ‘But, you’ll destroy half the continent. You’ll kill everyone living there.’

‘You should be thankful then for your imminent promotion.’ She returned her attention to the flex-screen.

‘No!’ Hollett screamed. He lurched forwards, bound hands raised to strike at Shadowsun. Kou’to’s men caught him around the waist before he touched her, and threw him against the bulkhead.

Shadowsun appraised him coldly.

‘I have…’ Hollett choked. He blinked several times, shook his head, and started again. ‘There must be another way.’

To the flex-screen, Shadowsun said, ‘Stand by, kor’el.’ She turned to Hollet. ‘Provide me with another option then.’ Fleetingly, she wished that she had a member of the water caste present. Negotiations and diplomatic discussions were their speciality.

Hollett searched the floor for a moment. ‘I wasn’t lying before,’ he mumbled. ‘It would be suicide to attack the defence laser with what you’ve got here, and I can’t order them to stand down.’ He laughed sadly. ‘In fact, I can’t order anyone to do anything anymore. I’m as good as dead to them now. But if it wasn’t able to hit anything, if it couldn’t actually lock on to any of your ships as they came to get you, would that be good enough?’

Hollett took their silence as an invitation to continue.

‘The defence laser receives its targeting data from our primary communications array. It’s a separate installation, built some distance from the main colony. Fairly remote, actually. I guess because it’s staffed by a lot of psykers and astropaths. Anyway, I could take you there. Get you inside. I have retinal access to the building. You can call for retrieval, and everyone just walks away.’

‘We still intend to annex this world,’ Shadowsun snapped. ‘No amount of… co-operation… will prevent that.’

Hollett raised his chin. ‘I only care about protecting my home.’

Shadowsun looked down the length of the empty room. Outside, beyond the open hatch, the forest was filled with lengthening shadows.

Home. Images of vacant rooms and echoing hallways flitted through her mind as she suddenly wondered what would become of the ancestral estate on T’au. The thought of having to go back there and inventory her sisters’ things, alone, made her weak in the knees, but there was no one left to help her.

‘Agreed,’ she said to Hollett.

She turned to Kou’to and began speaking in her own language again. ‘Prepare the fireteams to move out as quickly as possible. We will follow the human to his people’s communications centre, secure it, and evacuate from there.’

‘Has the commander considered the possibility that this is some kind of trap?’

Together they looked at Hollett as the two tau guards jostled him down the boarding plank. ‘I think not, shas’la,’ she replied. ‘He’s not so great an actor.’

Kou’to bowed and left.

‘Sabu’ro,’ she said sternly, ‘you understand that we cannot allow our technology to fall into the enemy’s hands. The Manta will have to be destroyed. ‘

The youth looked sad. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘I will ensure that the fail-safes are properly set. But, commander, once they go off, we will lose our only uplink to the fleet.’ He indicated the flex-screen still clutched in Shadowsun’s hand.

‘We will have to make do until we gain control of the human equipment. Now, prepare the detonators. There’s not much time.’

When Sabu’ro had hurried away, she lifted the display. Kenhi’ta continued to stare blankly and wiggle his fingers, waiting patiently for her to resume their conversation. ‘Kor’el, did you hear all of that?’

‘I did.’

‘Very shortly, we will fall into a communications blackout. If all goes well, you will hear from me again. However, if you do not, your orders are to take the armada and leave this system. Bypass it entirely. Do not attempt to retrieve me.’

‘Understood.’

She licked her lips before continuing. They were rough and tasted of drying blood. ‘Also, please send the following reply via graviton packet.

‘To Aun’va and all esteemed members of the Aun’t’au’retha: Previous message received and understood. Evacuation considered impossible so long as gue’la primary defence weapon remains on-line. Am leaving now to render said weapon ineffectual. Have left further instructions with Kor’el Kenhi’ta.’

She paused. You are the last of Kiru’s line, Aun’va had said.

‘Personal addendum: If I am eventually rescued from this place, you should be made aware that I am considering following my father’s example and taking the Taal Saal’Y.’

Kenhi’ta’s face suddenly became entirely focused on Shadowsun. ‘Commander,’ he said in a shocked whisper, ‘are you certain?’

‘Considering,’ she restated firmly. ‘Only considering. End recording and transmit to home system.’

‘Success in your endeavours, commander,’ Kenhi’ta breathed. He winked out of existence as Shadowsun returned the flex-screen to supple mode and rolled it up in her hands. She walked out to the top of the boarding plank. The light was strange now. To the west, the sun was setting in amber hues, but a similar, more sinister glow spanned the entire northern skyline. The fires must be truly gigantic by now, she thought. Below, her soldiers were hurrying back and forth, gathering what they needed for the journey. She saw Hollett, still under guard, sitting forlornly atop an empty supply crate. His eyes were closed, and his lips were moving. Was he praying, she wondered.

Again, she thought of the humans’ unfathomable religious beliefs, of their deific protector, of their surety in a life after death. It was ridiculous, all of it. The dead were dead, she reminded herself. Only legacies survived the end of life. That was the way of things.

The density of the forest forced them to march in a long column, Shadowsun led the way. Two drones, recovered from the downed Manta, hovered over each of her shoulders. The remaining eight had been networked together and sent ahead to act as scouts. Every once in a while, they could be heard snapping their way through branches and disturbing the local wildlife. Sabu’ro walked next to Shadowsun. He had linked his flex-screen to the drones’ optics and relayed their movements to her as often as he could find an excuse to. Behind the commander, Kou’to and ten other soldiers marched in double file. They pushed Hollett ahead of them, his hands still bound. The remaining fire warriors, divided evenly into two teams, took up the flanks.

When they were some distance away, Shadowsun called them to a halt. The sun had set, but the sky, when glimpsed through the branches, was a dim, crimson sheet. The fire warriors crouched down amidst the underbrush while the drones circled the perimeter, ever vigilant. Sabu’ro unrolled his flex-screen, snapped it rigid, and waited for the order. With a nod from Shadowsun, the young shas’la keyed in the detonation sequence, followed a moment later by two confirmation codes.

From the north came a soft thump and a thunderous rumble as the Manta’s fusion engines were set to overload. They were too far away to see the explosion or the expanding sphere of gas and plasma that were now all that remained of the landing site. Still, Sabu’ro’s shoulders slumped slightly in despair. Shadowsun said nothing, although she sympathised. Destroying the Manta and everything in it was the tactically sound thing to do, but still, she hated to consider the loss of materiel. It seemed like such a waste.

She turned to Kou’to. ‘We’ll be continuing through the night,’ she told him, ‘so tell the men to eat now. They’ll need their strength.’

Kou’to bowed slightly. ‘Yes, commander. May I get you something as well?’

Shadowsun was staring off into the dark spaces between the trees. ‘I’m not hungry.’

Kou’to did not push the issue. He passed along the instruction to the other tau, who quietly produced silver pouches from their kits. They shook them and then tore off the top. Steam escaped into the night air and they began to heartily eat the long green noodles within. He himself removed the cap from his water flask. The container was nearly empty when he shook it, and he knew that those of the men were not much better. He tipped his head back and drank it all. It was better, he knew, to stay fully hydrated rather than weaken himself by trying to ration it.

Hollett was sitting with his back against a knotted tree trunk, his wide-brimmed hat pulled low over his eyes. Kou’to walked silently over to him, and held one of the silver pouches aloft. The human looked up at him.

‘Water,’ Kou’to said. ‘We’re going to need some soon. Is there a drinkable source en route?’

‘There are streams and pools all around here.’ Hollett gestured to the woods.

‘Sabu’ro tells me that our personal filters are insufficient to strain out all of the soil contaminants and bacteria.’

‘Oh, yes. It’ll make you very sick.’ He smiled slightly.

‘Is there a cleaner source somewhere? Answer me, and you’ll get something to eat.’

‘What are we having?’

‘Nim ko’nai.’

‘I have no idea what that is.’ Hollett thrust his chin toward Shadowsun. ‘What’s gotten into her?’ he asked.

Kou’to bristled at the audacity of the question. The personal goings-on of any tau, especially those of the commander, were of no business to a human prisoner.

‘I don’t understand, Hollett. Do you want me to strike you?’

‘Do you want to go thirsty?’ Their eyes locked. Somewhere nearby, a troupe of nocturnal tree dwellers began crooning in harmony.

Kou’to weighed the need to keep his warriors at peak performance against Shadowsun’s right to privacy. In the end, he realised that the Greater Good compelled him to answer Hollett’s initial question. It still felt like a betrayal however, no matter how logically he justified it.

‘Her sisters died’ he said tersely.

‘Oh. Up in orbit?’

‘No, they were serving elsewhere in the Empire.’

‘Serving? So, they were soldiers too? ‘

Kou’to frowned. ‘How could they choose to be otherwise?’ he asked incredulously. Then it occurred to him that Hollett, as a mere gue’la, would have no idea to what he was referring. ‘The commander and her sisters were the daughters of Kiru,’ he clarified, ‘a very powerful and well respected warrior whose lineage has shed its blood for the Greater Good since the days of the First Expansion. After he died, the three sisters took up his legacy, as was their duty.’

Hollett nodded. ‘The things we do for family,’ he muttered.

‘Water source,’ Kou’to growled.

‘What? Oh, yes. If we continue to the south-west,’ Hollett pointed off into the dark forest, ‘we should come to the Brevo river. It’s much more suitable. By daybreak, I should say. Maybe a little after.’

Kou’to tossed the silver pouch into the human’s lap. Then he turned and strode back toward Shadowsun. The commander had moved off and was standing underneath a low bough. She had detached the fusion blasters from beneath the arms of her battlesuit and leaned them up against a tree trunk. As Kou’to approached, he saw her remove a small vial from a compartment on her hip, twist off the top, and press the tiny cylinder against the side of her neck. Kou’to slowed his pace until she was finished injecting herself. He had no wish to interrupt and possibly embarrass her. She suddenly glanced over her shoulder and caught his eye. Kou’to looked sharply away.

She sniffed in the gloom. ‘Tissue rebuilder,’ she said. ‘My head is still hurting. From when my helmet imploded.’

‘Of course,’ Kou’to replied stiffly.

‘Was there something you needed?’ She returned the empty tube to its compartment.

‘The prisoner has agreed to lead us to a source of safely drinkable water.’

‘En route to our target?’

‘Yes, commander. There should be little deviation from our primary course.’

‘Good,’ she sighed. She looked up into the branches for a moment. ‘I… I appreciate you taking it upon yourself to associate with him,’ Shadowsun said at last. ‘The dishonour must weigh heavily on you, but for the time being, we need the human’s co-operation.’

Kou’to bowed. ‘I serve the Greater Good in all things,’ he said. ‘My personal feelings are of no consequence.’

‘Do you have any siblings, shas’ui?’ The suddenness and intimacy of the question took both of them by surprise.

‘Two brothers and a sister,’ Kou’to replied.

‘And a family of your own?’ Again, Shadowsun couldn’t believe that she was asking such personal questions. Where was her professional detachment?

‘Y’ana and I were partnered six years ago. She has bestowed me with four children.’

‘Well,’ Shadowsun murmured, struggling to regain control of her thoughts, ‘when we finally leave this planet, I will be certain to contact them and tell them of the good works you have performed here.’

Kou’to took that as an invitation to leave, spinning on his heel and returning to his men. As he passed near Hollett however, he froze. There was a sound on the wind, a distant whooshing that grew steadily louder.

‘Aircraft!’ Sabu’ro hissed.

With a flick of his hand, Kou’to ordered everyone to combat readiness. The fire warriors dropped their water flasks and food packs and hoisted their long pulse rifles to their chests. Glancing over, he saw that Shadowsun had reactivated her stealth field, all but vanishing into the shadows. For several moments, the sound increased somewhere in the skies above them. It reached a crescendo, and then receded into the distance.

‘Valkyries,’ Hollett whispered.

‘Searching for us?’ Kou’to replied.

‘Could be. Could be fighting the fires, but I doubt it.’

Shadowsun stepped out of the gloom next to them. ‘Get the men up, Kou’to,’ she said. ‘We’re moving on.’ She pointed angrily at Hollett. ‘Don’t let him leave your sight.’

They walked for hours, stopping only a few times to rest and even then, for scant minutes. All throughout the night, the red sky hung menacingly over them. No one spoke. A wind was at their backs, carrying with it an increasing miasma of ash and smoke. Shadowsun preoccupied herself by constantly checking and rechecking her command icons, whether they changed or not. The medicine had diminished, but didn’t entirely abate, the throbbing in her skull. The faster they neutralised the defence laser and got back to civilisation, the better.

Dawn approached, and the sky beyond the forest canopy lightened from red to orange. Shadowsun and Hollett were the first to emerge from the trees, followed by Kou’to and Sabu’ro. The four of them stood on the edge of a grassy knoll. In the near distance, a large lake reflected the fiery sky, its waters calm. A wide, paved road stretched off towards the south, eventually vanishing into the thick forest again.

‘Well now,’ Kou’to sighed, ‘this is a place worth fighting to preserve.’

‘It’s beautiful,’ Sabu’ro nodded.

‘All except for that,’ Shadowsun said, pointing.

Lording over this scene, perched high atop a heavy, square pedestal, was a colossal statue. It depicted a human wearing an unwieldy yet intricately decorated suit of armour; birds of prey had been incorporated into his massive shoulder plates, the left hand was sheathed in talons, and carved faces stared from out of his knee guards. The figure depicted was helmetless, his head bowed. His right hand covered the face. Metre-high words were carved into the base, explaining how he was weeping with joy instead of sorrow, and that his tears, having fallen into the lake, had somehow imbued the water with supernatural properties.

It was the most ungainly thing the tau had ever seen.

‘Sweet God-Emperor,’ Hollett began muttering under his breath. ‘Forgive Your servant his sins, and remember I am just a man.’

‘What?’ Kou’to’s helmet cocked to one side.

Hollett kept this rapt gaze on the gigantic statue. ‘The Litany of Forgiveness,’ he replied.

‘Who is that supposed to be?’ Sabu’ro asked.

‘That is my saviour, the Immortal Emperor of Mankind,’ Hollett said. ‘He stood there once. Actually stood there. His footprints are preserved beneath the memorial. He came down from the heavens, and surveyed the land, and He pronounced it good.’

The three tau were silent for a moment, so confused by the reverence in Hollett’s voice that they didn’t know quite how to respond. Finally, Shadowsun tossed her long hair and snorted.

‘Your saviour had no sense of style.’

Fire burned behind the Guardsman’s eyes, but Shadowsun ignored him. ‘Is the area clear?’ she asked Sabu’ro. The young shas’la nodded after consulting his equipment, and she began to stride across the grass.

Kou’to spoke into his tightbeam. ‘Team one, secure the perimeter. The rest of us will go down to the lake and fill our flasks.’

‘What are you doing?’ Hollett suddenly yelled.

‘We’re getting water,’ Kou’to answered.

‘No! This isn’t what I meant.’ Hollett started to panic as more of the fire warriors emerged from the forest. ‘There’s a river. About an hour’s walk from here. You can drink that.’

Shadowsun stopped and whirled around. ‘Shas’ui, silence the prisoner.’

‘Hollett-la,’ Kou’to snapped, ‘be quiet!’

‘You can’t! It’s sacrilege,’ Hollett cried. ‘Damned xenos!’

Shadowsun spun towards Hollett. Her intention was clear to Kou’to, who swept the Guardsman’s legs out from under him and began to pummel him with the butt of his pulse rifle. The human grunted and rolled over onto his side, curling his legs up to his chest. Kou’to stopped and, panting, called back, ‘The prisoner has been silenced.’

Shadowsun surveyed the two of them, and then continued towards the lake once again. Kou’to peeled off his helmet and watched her go.

‘That’s twice now. What, is it your job to hit me so she doesn’t have to?’ Hollett moaned.

‘The commander would have killed you if I hadn’t beaten you first. I can’t let her dishonour herself so.’

‘Very kind of you.’

Kou’to looked down at him. ‘Don’t mistake duty for pity,’ he snapped. ‘We do our best not to commit wanton murder, even in the fires of war. But if you don’t mind your place, our options will be limited. Do you understand?’

Hollett struggled to his feet. His arms hugged his chest and he stooped severely. ‘It’s holy water,’ he managed to say.

‘Your beliefs are ridiculous to us,’ Kou’to said, ‘but perhaps you can take consolation in the fact that you at least tried to stop us.’

Hollett grunted, and together they slowly followed behind Shadowsun.

When she came to the water’s edge, the commander stopped. The fusion blasters left her hands full, and she would have to disarm herself in order to drink. She ejected the guns, which fell soundlessly into the grass, and then knelt down by the crystal lake. She dipped a gloved hand into the water and raised it to her parched lips. The water was sweet and cold, and it bathed her throat like nectar. Greedily, she drew more and more, stirring up the surface with expanding ripples. After four handfuls, she took note of her reflection. Her forehead and chin looked distorted and her eyes seemed to swim.

I look like Oru’mi, she mused, and her chest heaved without her consent.

The youngest of Kiru’s daughters was beautiful. Everyone said so. She had hair as black as the void and a soft and round face dominated by expressive, watery, red eyes. Their father often said that of the three of them, it was Oru’mi who most resembled their mother. Ty’res remained neutral after hearing such a slight, and voiced no opinion on the matter. Shadowsun, the steel-tempered eldest, scoffed at such mawkishness. Oru’mi could be their father’s favourite all she wanted, it didn’t change the fact that she was always on the verge of tears.

In fact, the last time she had seen her, she had been crying. Their father had died only days previous, and the three of them were now charged with going through the family estate, selecting which of Kiru’s possessions were to be kept and which were to be sent to the military museums. Oru’mi had argued fervently with Shadowsun over each and every item. She had wanted to keep them, no matter how miniscule.

‘You can’t get rid of that,’ she would whine. ‘That’s part of father’s legacy.’

‘No,’ Shadowsun replied coldly, ‘it’s just a thing. We’re his legacy. We don’t need cast-offs to remember him. Someday you’ll understand that.’

‘But… but…’ Oru’mi blathered. Seeing the eldest sister’s impassible face, she called for help. ‘Ty’res!’

Ty’res stayed true to her non-confrontational middle-child nature. ‘Work it out for yourselves!’ she yelled.

In the end, Shadowsun had claimed that as Kiru’s first-born, she had an inherent veto over the others. They purged nearly everything. A great and suffocating pall descended over the ancestral home. Shadowsun, Ty’res and Oru’mi made a concerted effort not to encounter each other as one by one the rooms were shut up, and their furniture, murals, and tapestries were sealed in stasis fields. A week later, the house contained almost no evidence that their father had ever lived there at all. The three sisters stood outside the front gate, giving terse goodbyes to one another before heading off to their individual combat assignments. Oru’mi’s feelings got the better of her, and she broke down in tears. Ty’res put an arm around her. With a pleading look, she invited Shadowsun to do the same, but instead of joining them, Shadowsun had simply turned and walked away, thinking that her coldness made her strong.

It was difficult for Shadowsun to picture Oru’mi as a military leader, but in the years since, she had obviously become so. Tash’Var was a frontier planet, she knew, far from the home world. Its citizenry were hardy and resourceful, and perhaps amidst such people and out from underneath the protective wing of her family, the girl had blossomed. Aun’va had said that she had been defending members of the Ethereal caste from enslaving alien pirates. That was noble and heroic by any measure. But the poisons used by the Var Sin’da caused agony beyond description. Shadowsun wondered grimly if Oru’mi had cried like a version of her younger self as she lay in a hospital bed, dying by degrees.

Her chest lurched again. Shadowsun squeezed her eyes tightly shut. You didn’t get as far as you have by being weak. You will not break down, she told herself. They’re dead, but you are not. Now get to work.

She forced herself back to her feet, then opened her eyes and looked around. Kou’to and Hollett were approaching. The smoky wind had picked up again. Fire warriors collected water or stood guard alertly. The drone squad circled high overhead. Smoke continued to choke the sky, and a young boy stood beneath a drooping tree with leaves the colour of silver.

She gave a start. He was a tau male, perhaps four or five years of age, broad across the shoulders and narrow-waisted. He wore dark brown, loose fitting trousers and an ochre jacket with short sleeves. His forehead was high and noble, his eyes were bright and intelligent. He had a fine, narrow chin, and a short braid of hair that hung to just below his left ear. He smiled at Shadowsun, beckoned to her with a wide swing of one arm, and then turned and ran into the woods.

‘Did you see that?’ Shadowsun asked weakly before realising that no one was standing close enough to hear her. ‘Kou’to!’ she hollered.

The shas’ui sprinted over to her. ‘Commander, what’s wrong?’

‘I saw a boy,’ she said and pointed towards the silver-leafed tree. ‘Standing just over there by the edge of the woods.’

‘A boy? You mean a human scout?’

‘No, he was tau. He was wearing a shas’saal’s uniform.’ She took a few steps forward. A notion, the only one that might have explained the child’s sudden appearance, flashed across her mind: he was obviously another survivor from the crash. She whirled around angrily. ‘Why wasn’t I informed that a fire warrior cadet unit had been assigned to my flagship?’

‘Commander,’ Kou’to was utterly confused, ‘I know of no such thing.’ He brought his forearm close to his helmet and spoke into his tightbeam. ‘Sabu’ro, query. Were there…’ He paused at the sheer ridiculousness of the question. ‘Were there any children aboard the commander’s vessel?’

The answer was immediate. ‘Negative. Absolutely none.’

Kou’to shifted his rifle strap uncomfortably. ‘Commander, the current situation is very stressful, and you haven’t slept since–’

‘I saw him!’ she snapped, and began running towards the tree line. Behind her, Kou’to searched the sky in a sudden panic and called out after her. The heads of several other fire warriors also jerked around to see what the sudden commotion was. Shadowsun left them all behind with a short burst from her suit thrusters. There was no trace of the child beneath the drooping tree, not even a set of hoof-prints in the soil. She looked around, suddenly desperate to prove that she hadn’t been hallucinating.

‘It’s all right,’ she called out. ‘You don’t have to hide. We’re not going to hurt you.’

Shadowsun glanced over her shoulder. ‘He was right here,’ she yelled. Kou’to was sprinting toward her. Sabu’ro trailed behind struggling as he carried her bulky fusion blasters.

It was only then, as Kou’to screamed her name over the tightbeam, that she became aware of the whining sound of turbines. Out of habit, she looked to her icon display, but the command drone no longer existed and her head-up display had vanished along with her helmet. She turned and looked back towards the lake just in time to see a wing of aircraft – the flying crates that Hollett had called ‘Valkyries’ – crest the trees above her. There were three of them, and they immediately began to shoot down the drone squad. The little machines stood no chance against the superior range and volume of fire. They exploded into clouds of twisted metal and rained down into the clearing. Pulse rifle beams leapt up into the air as the perimeter guards opened up, but the machines were out of range. They banked high now, preparing for another pass.

Sabu’ro passed the fusion blasters to Shadowsun, who scrambled to reattach them to the arms of her battlesuit. Kou’to had his rifle in his hands and was barking orders over his communicator. ‘All units, return fire.’

The Valkyries were swooping over the lake again, firing lasers and heavy bolter rounds into everything they saw. Several of Kou’to’s men were cut down mercilessly. Once more, the other fire warriors did their best to shoot the enemy flyers, but their pulse blasts continued to fall short.

Shadowsun hefted her remounted fusion blasters and grimaced. ‘We haven’t the range,’ she said to herself. Opening her tightbeam channel she called out, ‘Into cover, everyone! Whatever you can.’

‘Hollett!’ Sabu’ro gasped, pointing back down the slope.

The major’s two ever-present bodyguards were shoving him towards the base of the massive statue. He stumbled and nearly fell. Each one took a shoulder and threw Hollett forwards. He hit the rough stonework just below the last words of the inscription, and whirled around. The Valkyries were beginning a third pass. The two guards, still out in the open, were hit by a flurry of bolter shells that tore them limb from limb.

‘We can’t lose him,’ Shadowsun gasped, and before either Sabu’ro or Kou’to could object, she was rocketing across the grass in a bounding leap. Her adaptive camouflage tried its best to hide her, but as the gunships circled around once more, they spotted her. Lasers and heavy shells tore up the ground around her and made her shielding reverberate. Her shield drones whirled around her, putting themselves in harm’s way in order to preserve her life. First one, and then the other, exploded into metallic ribbons, their passing marked only by an extinguished icon on her interface collar. With her last few steps, she spread her arms wide and covered Hollett with the battlesuit’s bulk. Lasers pounded into her back, but the armour held firm. Sweat fell from her brow. Breathless, she met Hollett’s wide-eyed face. She snapped around to survey the skies.

The Valkyries were screeching upwards. Their wings wobbled and it seemed to Shadowsun that their pilots were on the verge of losing control. This manoeuvre was obviously sudden and unexpected for them, and in a flash, she understood why.

She glanced at her communications icon, and opened an unencrypted wideband channel. She raised her fusion blasters threateningly and as clearly as she could, shouted in the gue’la language, ‘Break off now, or I’ll destroy it!’

‘What are you doing?’ Hollett cried from behind her.

The aircraft soared up into the ashen sky, collected themselves, and began to orbit in a wide circle above the lake. Their torrent of fire ceased. Tense seconds passed until at last a voice came through the tau communicators. It might have easily belonged to a trained baritone, deep and soft and almost pleasing, but Shadowsun could feel the chilling malevolence lying just beneath the surface of it.

‘Move away from the statue,’ it said. ‘Now.’

‘To whom am I speaking?’ She replied.

The smooth voice ignored her question. ‘Move away from the statue,’ it repeated, ‘or I’ll open fire.’

She smirked. ‘And risk destroying the Emperor’s footprints,’ she chided. ‘I think not.’ Her tone became serious once more. ‘Answer my question.’

‘My name is Emmett Falkens, leader of the Dieprian Mountain Men. And you are?’

‘O’Shaserra.’

The voice on the radio repeated her name slowly, lasciviously playing over every syllable. It trilled the r’s in such a way as to make her physically ill. ‘Commander Sun Shadow, I believe. Or do my translational skills fail me?’

‘Shadowsun,’ she corrected. Her throat was suddenly very dry, and she feared that she no longer sounded threatening or authoritative.

‘I see,’ Falkens said smoothly. ‘This world does not belong to you, Shadowsun. You are trespassing. I take a dim view of that. Moreover, you killed many of my soldiers yesterday; fine boys who were simply defending their home from unwelcome intruders.’

‘And you murdered hundreds of auxiliaries when you destroyed my ship.’

‘Non-combatants,’ Falkens sniggered. ‘That’s rich.’

She swallowed hard. ‘You will clear the skies immediately and allow us to be on our way, or I will turn this abomination of a statue into molten slag.’

Falkens’ disrespectful laughter vanished. He considered the situation in silence. ‘I don’t entirely believe you,’ he said at last.

With a quick swipe, she burned a glowing slash across the inscription. The word ‘insight’ liquefied and ran to the ground in orange rivulets. She heard a commotion in the background, the Valkyrie pilots and a collection of other human passengers gasping and swearing.

‘My next shot destroys it all,’ she barked. Her voice was strong. She felt bolstered by the reaction of Falkens’s men.

The background expletives ceased. Falkens took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Finally he said, ‘All right, you win a temporary reprieve. We will meet again, Shadowsun. You may count on it.’

With that, the Valkyries banked and roared away to the south. Shadowsun watched them recede into the distance. Behind her, Hollett rose to his feet.

‘Mountain Men?’ she asked.

‘A double-edged regimental nickname.’

A gust of wind brought fresh smells of smoke and ash. The fire-storm was creeping closer.

‘You spoke true, Hollett-la. Your shas’o is formidable. He waited until we were out in the open and then attacked with a reach superior to ours. He understands mont’ka.’

‘What?’

She surveyed the lake shore. The bodies of nearly a dozen fire warriors lay scattered about. ‘The killing blow,’ she translated. ‘From here, which way is it to the communications relay?’

Hollett came out from behind her to stand by her side. He gestured towards the road. ‘Just follow that. It curves to the west for a bit, but swings back southward at the Long Drop.’

Shadowsun grunted. ‘Kou’to,’ she said switching back to an encrypted tightbeam, ‘We’re moving on. Record the names of the fallen, and then join me. We’ll be leaving on a course due south.’

‘Understood, commander.’

‘No, I told you,’ Hollett said with a shake of his head, ‘the road detours to the west first.’

‘We’ll not be following the road.’ Shadowsun locked eyes with Hollett. ‘Travel along a single, predictable path, hedged on both sides by dense cover? You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Hollett-la? To lead us into another ambush?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘It’s simply coincidence that we are attacked the moment we stepped into clear view, then? You had nothing to do with it, I suppose?’

‘I’ve been helping you this whole time!’

‘Which only proves how disloyal and untrustworthy you are! No, I will not listen to any of your advice anymore, thank you. If you suggest a thing, I will circumvent it and do the opposite. We will travel directly southward, through the cover of the trees.’

‘That would be a mistake.’ Hollett’s voice was deadly serious.

‘So says my enemy prisoner.’

Fire warriors began emerging from the tree line. Sabu’ro knelt by one of the fallen, and began typing information on his flex-screen while Kou’to looked on.

Hollett’s head bobbed in frustration more than agreement. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Fine. We go straight south. Why not? Obviously you have nothing better to live for.’

With that, he walked toward the water and sat down among a cluster of reeds. He snapped one off mid-stalk, and began to pluck brown, fluffy seeds from the top. He cupped them in his palm before blowing them out across the surface of the lake. He did not see the look of introspection that came over Shadowsun’s face.

South of the sacred lake, the land sloped downward. The forest lost none of its density however, despite the rockier ground. The roots of the trees, unable to plunge into deep soil, spread outwards in a thick, interwoven tangle. Shadowsun and Sabu’ro took the lead. Kou’to walked a few paces behind them with Hollett at his side. To their left and right, the remaining fire warriors picked their way through the gnarl of undergrowth. The going was tough and slow. The tau fought constantly to avoid slipping or falling, their hooves scrabbling to find purchase on the incline. Exhaustion was setting in for everyone.

‘If only we still had the drones,’ Sabu’ro lamented. ‘We would have a better idea of what lies ahead.’

‘There’s no point in pining over lost things,’ Kou’to chided. ‘We will simply overcome, and make do.’

‘Of course, shas’ui.’ The young warrior patted the metal cylinder on his belt containing his rolled up flex-screen. ‘It’s just that without them, I feel that I am not contributing my full share toward the mission’s success.’

‘Do not doubt yourself,’ Kou’to said paternally, then added sharply, ‘and do not go begging for compliments.’ His eyes flicked to Shadowsun and back to Sabu’ro. The youth looked away sheepishly.

Shadowsun had been silent for a long time, lost in thought. She was aware of the others speaking around her, but their words were distant and half-heard. As she trudged slowly between the snaking roots, Hollett’s jibe turned around and around in her mind, seeking purchase until, at last, she found she was engaging in conversation with herself.

Do I have anything more to live for, she wondered?

Let’s examine the record, another part of her replied.

Memories played out for her like a holovid. She recalled her initial military schooling. Her selection for special command training following an unprecedented inspection visit by Aun’va. Battling greenskin barbarians in the jungles and deserts of the planet K’resh. Engaging the spore ships of the ever-devouring Y’he in deep space. Arriving in orbit of il’Wolaho.

Wait, she told herself. That’s just a list of military achievements.

She sifted through them again and again, trying to find an alternate theme with increasing desperation. But there was no escaping it. Her career and her life were one and the same. And why shouldn’t they be? She was a member of the fire caste. An exemplary member. A marriage partner, children, a home of her own; all these trappings and trivialities of everyday life she had sacrificed in order to become a paragon. In her, Kiru’s legacy and that of all his progenitors had been elevated to glorious new heights. Her actions served the Greater Good for hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of tau. Wasn’t that enough?

Obviously you have nothing better to live for.

She had spent nearly twenty years, a full half of her life, at war. One day, her memorial would grace the Walk of Honour outside the Mont’yr Battle Dome, and future generations would speak her name with reverent whispers. But the awe would come from the children of strangers, for Kiru’s line would be at an end. She couldn’t let that happen. She had a familial duty. But what then of her career, of the Empire that depended on her so? What of her duty to it?

This burden was never supposed to fall to me.

No?

No! I had my own plan. I worked harder than anyone and I achieved it. I upheld father’s legacy. It was left to Oru’mi and Ty’res to carry on his line.

But they’re dead now.

And left me to do everything.

It is your duty.

Duty here, duty there, she thought. We have no lives. Just obligations. We’re never allowed to simply do what we want.

Then the question is obvious. What do you want, Shadowsun?

I don’t know, she snapped.

The answer that came back was so gentle in its tone that she stopped in her tracks, certain that it hadn’t come from her. But it had. Yes you do, it said.

‘Commander, what’s wrong?’ Kou’to asked. He and the others had likewise ceased walking.

‘Are you picking up something?’ Sabu’ro pointed anxiously at her battlesuit collar.

She looked at the two of them. ‘You should be made aware,’ she said slowly, ‘that I have sent a reply to T’au informing them that, following our rescue from this planet, I am considering the Taal Saal’Y.’

Their faces went slack, except for Hollett who looked on, confused at their words.

Kou’to nodded and lowered his head mournfully. Sabu’ro however, swiftly removed his helmet and stared Shadowsun in the eye.

‘You can’t!’ he exclaimed.

Kou’to barked at the insolence. ‘Shas’la, mind your place!’

Shadowsun waved a fusion blaster to quiet him. The young warrior’s face was despondent, she could see, and perhaps rightly so. After all, he had just been told that one of his heroes was thinking about quitting her job.

‘Considering, I said,’ she told him. ‘But strongly considering.’

Sabu’ro looked as if he were on the verge of tears. He blinked rapidly, and then put his helmet back on. He squared his shoulders manfully and said, ‘I understand. Thank you for telling us.’ Then he added, ‘If I may say so, commander, you will make an excellent mother.’

Shadowsun’s face broke into a weary smile, and she began moving forwards again. Sabu’ro followed by her side, step for step, but Hollett paused.

‘Taal Saal’Y’, he asked Kou’to. ‘What’s that?’

‘You wouldn’t understand,’ the shas’ui said curtly.

Hollett stared at him, waiting for a more satisfactory answer. Kou’to sighed at his obstinacy, and continued.

‘How would you say it?’ he rolled a hand in the air, searching for the right translation. ‘“To preserve one child”. It’s a policy we have wherein the last surviving member of a family may be excused from dangerous service in order to carry on the line.’

‘And she’s going to take it?’

‘She hasn’t made up her mind.’

Hollett gazed down the hill. A tiny laugh escaped his lips.

‘Is something funny?’ Kou’to growled threateningly.

Hollett shook his head. ‘Oh no,’ he said earnestly. ‘No. Someone like her, that’s not funny at all. That must be one hell of a tough choice.’ He began walking again.

Eventually, the land levelled out once again. The ground became progressively more wet, and the composition of the forest began to change. Instead of the towering, twisting trees and delicate flowers, there instead grew short, ugly trees with foliage like spider silk and bark the colour of rusting metal. Water began to pool in their tracks. By late afternoon, they were in sucking mud halfway to their knees. A fine, white mist began to settle all around them.

‘Did your Emperor weep when he saw the beauty of this swamp?’ Kou’to asked Hollett.

The Guardsman paid the slight no heed. He looked around, eyes wide. His skin was clammy and beaded with sweat. ‘Just make sure you all walk slowly and gently. No sudden moves. And tell her that as well.’ Hollett gestured towards Shadowsun. ‘Her armour’s way too heavy to be stomping around in here.’

‘Why?’

Hollett coughed and wiped his mouth with the back of his bound hands. ‘You can’t smell that, can you, with your helmet on?’

Kou’to shook his head no, but Shadowsun called back over her shoulder. ‘I can. Smoke. Ash. It’s been getting stronger all day. I would guess that the highlands we’ve passed through are all burning fiercely.’

Hollett surveyed the air. ‘Yeah, we’re pretty much surrounded by it now.’

She stopped and leaned heavily against a blotchy orange trunk. ‘Perhaps Colonel Falkens should focus more on fighting fires and less on fighting me.’ She took a long drink from her water container and then sighed. She felt fatigued down to her very bones.

‘Never happen,’ Hollett said.

Kou’to sat wearily on a fallen log and massaged the knee plates of his armour. His rule to Hollett about never addressing the commander directly was apparently forgotten beneath a burden of weariness. ‘Why say you so?’ he asked.

‘Because he’s got something to prove, I suppose.’ The Guardsman shrugged. ‘He’s a Mountain Man.’ He struggled to clear his throat and surveyed his captors. He could see that many of them were nearing the breaking point. This march was pushing them to the limits of their endurance. It was for him as well.

‘Ah, yes,’ Shadowsun recalled. ‘Your sept’s unflattering identification.’

Hollett’s lip curled. ‘Double-edged nickname, I said.’

Shadowsun was suddenly intrigued. It was the first time she’d seen any hint of backbone in her prisoner. ‘Explain it then.’

The wisps of smoke were beginning to irritate Hollett’s eyes. He rubbed them, smearing mud across his face. ‘The Emperor gave it to us,’ he began. ‘It’s an old name, dating back to the lost times before the Great Crusade. The original Mountain Men lived in pristine wildernesses, far from any cities. They were very tough and self-sufficient. They were able to recognise what creatures to eat and which to leave alone. They could manoeuvre through the thickest forests and knew how to use the land to their advantage. But the more civilised people of the day, the ones who lived in cities and such, didn’t see them in the same light. To them, the Mountain Men were wild, unkempt, uneducated.

‘We’re a lot the same. To the rest of the Imperial Guard, we’re something of a laughing stock. I mean, our regiment is relegated to this one planet. It’s a beautiful planet, mind you, a genuine treasure of the galaxy. But that doesn’t change the fact that we’re committed to an eternity of guard duty. We aren’t sent to fight in major conflicts, and no major conflict ever found its way to us.’

‘Until now,’ Shadowsun said softly.

Hollett looked at her. ‘Yesterday was the first time anyone could recall the defence laser being fired. Ever. The soldiers on this planet have been dreaming all their lives for someone like you to come along. They can’t wait to fight you. They can’t wait to kill you, all of you, in the most brutal ways possible. Because, finally, they get to show the Imperium what they’re made of. And if the cost for doing so is the worst wildfire in recorded history, then so be it.’

‘What about you?’

Hollett’s eyes narrowed as he considered his answer. Something in the distance seemed to catch his attention and his head snapped away. ‘I know what’s important,’ he said cryptically.

One of the fire warriors on the perimeter threw his fist up into the air, a signal that something was amiss. Pulse rifles clicked to readiness. Shadowsun pointed from Kou’to to Hollett, and the shas’ui nodded once. The air carried a mixture of snapping, crashing, honking, and screeching. And the sounds were coming closer. Shadowsun took a few steps forward, and was nearly run down.

The herd was hundreds strong and seemed to come out of nowhere. It rushed forwards, pouring over the tau like a living, liquid thing. Shadowsun lost sight of everything else as she became surrounded by a flood of brown flesh. The beasts whipped past her in a blur, but she could make out their general shape. They ran on four, comically elongated legs. Their bodies were long and thin, and covered by tan fur and white spots. Some of them had heads crowned by a ring of twisting horns, while others had a pair of tails that lashed back and forth. Their eyes were huge and wild. They frothed at the mouth. The sopping ground was being ferociously churned up with their passing, and their trampling was like thunder.

Shadowsun was grazed several times by their passing, each blow dizzily spinning her around. Then, one of the creatures ran blindly into her at full speed. Her battlesuit possessed one final shield projector, and there was a blue flash as it reacted to the sudden impact. The creature spun away. Shadowsun landed face-down in the mire. An arm’s length from her, another of the creatures became hopelessly mired. As it brayed and struggled to get back up, its fellows paid it no heed whatsoever and trampled it into bits of red meat and broken bone. Then, as suddenly as they had come upon her, they were gone, crashing their way through the swamp with terrified abandon.

The mud felt cool against her face, and Shadowsun had to fight the urge to simply fall asleep where she lay. Her arms and back were bruised where the stampeding creatures had slammed the plates of the battlesuit into her flesh. Somewhere in the distance she could hear the moans and shouts of the others. She was dimly aware of someone kneeling down next to her.

Through fluttering eyes, she saw the tau boy crouched beside her, still dressed in his cadet uniform. When he saw her face, covered with its mask of brown slime, he giggled. Shadowsun attempted to lift herself, but her arms were like rubber. ‘Who are you?’ she muttered weakly, and then collapsed again.

‘Commander, it’s me,’ a voice said gently. ‘Sabu’ro.’

She opened her eyes to find no trace of the boy. Rather, the young shas’la was kneeling beside her, helmet off, his brow furrowed with concern. When he struggled to help her up, she wobbled slightly.

‘Commander, are you all right?’

She surveyed the scene to make certain that no one else had been seriously hurt. Fire warriors were helping each other up from out of the mud. She wanted to tell him no, that in fact she felt as if she were falling apart. But it was a commander’s duty to elevate and maintain the morale of those under her, and so for the Greater Good, she lied.

‘Never better,’ she told him.

‘Oh no, no, no, no no,’ Hollett was muttering. ‘Stupid, damned bovids.’

‘What were they running from?’ Sabu’ro asked, trying to ignore the panicking human.

She cleared her burning throat. ‘The fires, I would think. Perhaps there’s enough moisture in this place for it to be a natural refuge...’

Her voice trailed off as the ground began to shake. In the mud puddles around their legs, the water began to ripple. Something was smashing its way through the trees in pursuit of the fleeing herd. Something huge.

Kou’to trudged out into the middle of the bog. ‘Ires shas’ka momyu!’ he shouted. Raising a fist, he signalled the fire warriors to ready weapons and arrange themselves into ranks around him. ‘Sabu’ro,’ he snapped, ‘guard our prisoner.’

The young shas’la slogged back towards Hollett, pulse rifle in hand. The Guardsman was glancing at the ground, his face stricken with panic. The surface of the bog seemed to be boiling now. He looked to Kou’to and screamed, ‘Get out of there, you idiots!’

‘Sabu’ro!’ Kou’to barked. ‘Quiet him!’

Sabu’ro’s fingers squirmed uncomfortably against his rifle. ‘Please, Hollett-la,’ he hissed.

Hollett ignored him. ‘Then give me back my gun!’ he shouted.

Kou’to was bowled over by the audacity of the request. ‘Shas’la, I ordered you to quiet the prisoner!’

Whatever was coming was nearly upon them.

‘At least give me the chance to defend myself!’

Shadowsun glanced over to Sabu’ro, and noted his reluctance. With augmented strides she stomped over to the tree against which Hollett had pressed his back. Sabu’ro stepped aside as best he could. The commander wound back to deliver a brutal bludgeoning, but she never got the chance. The trees behind her splintered amidst a thunderous crash, and a creature, one of the largest any of them had ever seen, strode into their midst.

It was larger than a tank and stood on four, broad legs. Vast, solid antlers sprouted from its head. Its long fur was a mass of dark brown, broken only by a peculiar V-shaped patch of light tan across its neck. Something was impaled in its flesh: a long metallic rod that trailed wires. Its blue eyes were tiny in comparison to the rest of its features, but they stared brightly from underneath a colossal brow. It lifted a titanic paw up from the mire, and swiped the air with five curved talons. When it bellowed, the creature’s face seemed to open wide enough to swallow a person whole, and the sound rattled the branches.

‘Ursaloth,’ Hollett whispered.

The beast lowered its face, and the antlers became a shield wall as it charged forward. Kou’to’s men fired their rifles as it came on, but to no effect. The ursaloth seemed to deflect or absorb their every blast. It plowed into the fire warriors like a runaway monorail, and reared its head. Half of the tau went flying, smacking into nearby trees and falling limply in the mud. Shadowsun whirled around and leveled her fusion blasters, but Kou’to and the remaining warriors were trying their best to hold the beast in place. They beat at its legs in a flurry of pathetic blows, and blocked her line of sight. She couldn’t fire without the risk of killing one of her own, and il’Wolaho had already claimed enough of her people’s lives.

‘Get clear!’ she hollered.

Something stirred beneath her hooves. Hollett’s yells were lost in the din as the swamp erupted from below. The swarm of things that emerged from the mire were vaguely serpentine, and twice the size of her battlesuit. Their heads were their most prominent feature, with spherical eyes perched high atop their skulls and a mouth that occupied the rest. A pair of bony flippers protruded from behind their jaws, tipped with wickedly curved claws. Their mouths gaped. Their teeth were tiny needles, ineffectual for biting or chewing. They were covered with soft, rubbery, greenish-grey skin. They began pouncing and crawling over the fire warrior teams, over the ursaloth, over Sabu’ro and Shadowsun.

‘What are they?’ Sabu’ro cried.

‘Fen skulks,’ Hollett replied. ‘Oh, Throne…’

Shadowsun ignored him and fell into combat mode immediately, firing her blasters. A pair of skulks burst disgustingly as if their bodies were nothing more than taut bags filled with water and blubber. Their guts sprayed in all directions, painting her suit in grey ichor.

There was no time for anyone to notice Hollett. As he scrambled up the tree beside him, the razor-edged bark tore his overcoat in many places and slashed his arms and legs. With a grunt, he hoisted himself up into a notch between limbs and looked at his hands. Blood was pouring down his sleeves from the cuts he had suffered across his palms. Suddenly, he had an idea. While the tau fought their multitude of assailants, he began to saw his restraints back and forth across the branch between his thighs. A moment later, the bands popped, and he was free. He reached down to his belt, and depressed a button on one of the innocuous metal boxes attached there. There was a crackle all around him as his refractor field leapt into place. He had free hands, and protective shielding. Now all he needed was a weapon. Elevated above the carnage he scanned the scene.

Far to his left, the second team of warriors quickly tried to bring their guns to bear on the new threat. But their barrels were long and awkward, and the fen skulks’ reflexes were faster by far. They snapped off a flurry of pulse blasts. Their targets twisted and writhed out of harm’s way. Energy bolts wildly tore through the razor trees and vaporised the spider silk fronds above. Kou’to and his diminishing number of men could not even be seen for the writhing mass that covered them. Above them, the ursaloth gave a mighty swipe of its talons, cleaving several skulks in half.

Below Hollett’s dangling feet, Sabu’ro raised his rifle to his helmet and fired a single, well aimed energy bolt into a nearby cluster of the creatures. The shot tore clean through one of the monstrosities and the thing fell, spasming and spewing. Shadowsun launched herself forwards to meet them, the thrusters of her suit sending up a plume of mud. She landed and brought the flat edge of the fusion blasters down on the nearest thing’s head. Its gelatinous skull caved in, coating her arms with fatty blobs of flesh and ruptured eyeballs. The remaining five surged ahead. Enormous mouths snapped. Claws scrabbled over the surface of her suit. She raised her arms to shield her face and locked her knees to prevent being bowled over. Unable to deliver any kick attacks, she felt as if she were fighting in a pool of glue, partially restrained and capable of moving only in slow motion. A claw missed her eye by the slimmest of margins, tearing a ragged slash down her cheek. She shoved the weight of the suit against the swarm and tried to hold on. When a pair of jaws swallowed her right forearm, she fired the fusion blaster down the attacker’s throat.

Hollett took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He had tried to warn her. Diepr-3 was no death world, but it still possessed its share of dangers. The boggy lowlands in particular were a haven for several carnivorous life forms, with the fen skulks being some of the worst. The snake-like amphibians would lie beneath the muck for days at a time in a state resembling hibernation. They leeched some basic nutrients through their skin, enough to keep them alive, but not enough to truly satisfy. Whenever they detected large vibrations in the mud, they would come awake and attack the source. A small platoon of men on foot could travel through the swamps with only a slight risk of waking the monsters beneath, but the thudding of a sentinel walker or other heavy machines would send them into a feeding frenzy. In this case, it had been the bovids – stupid, flighty things – that had roused the skulks. The ursaloth had only made things worse, stomping around with its terrible bulk. For that matter, he wondered detachedly, what was the Highland King doing this far south, and so far out of his element?

As if responding to Hollett’s thoughts, the ursaloth roared and shook itself like a wet dog. Fen skulks flew off in all directions. Then, bellowing its dominion, it charged forward, head lowered, antlers plowing a massive furrow through the bog. Kou’to’s remaining warriors were buried beneath a tidal wave of loam and stomped flat by paws broader than their shoulders. The shas’ui himself was pushed along helplessly, his rifle lost and his hands desperately grasping for something to hold on to. At last, the ursaloth crashed into a particularly wide razor tree. Slime and water cascaded. The trunk snapped in half with a sound like thunder. Hollett caught a glimpse of Kou’to’s broken body as it sailed through the air and crashed into the underbrush. He swung his leg over the side of his perch, cut himself once more on the bark, and dropped to the ground.

Shadowsun continued to struggle against the fen skulks. Dimly, she realised that young Sabu’ro had joined her in the fray, sweeping the air with the butt of his rifle in an attempt to keep the monsters away from his commander. She clapped the fusion blasters together, crushing a fin between them, and then drove her knee into a mound of gelatinous flesh. The last of their attackers darted forward. Its tail wrapped around Shadowsun’s body. Its gaping face lurched to the side. Sabu’ro suddenly gave a sharp cry. His right arm had vanished at the elbow, swallowed by the frothing skulk. He held the spurting stump aloft and stammered incoherently. The front of his armour was stained dark blue.

Shadowsun risked dispatching the thing with a shot from one of the fusion blasters. The monster seemed to catch fire beneath the skin and erupted in a shower of goo. The heat melted a section of her suit’s frontal armour. She whirled around to catch Sabu’ro as he stumbled.

‘Vesa!’ she cried. ‘Vesa!’

She glanced up to see the ursaloth surrounded by a fresh mass of fen skulks, stomping and roaring. The bodies of her fire warriors lay scattered about the bog, broken and torn piecemeal. Not one of them moved or responded to her calls for help. Rather, it was the gue’la that grabbed Sabu’ro around the waist and hoisted him over his shoulder.

‘We need to go. Now!’ he yelled. He jerked his head towards the rampaging giant. ‘While he keeps them busy!’

‘The others…’ Shadowsun began weakly.

Hollett was already pushing through the swamp with wide strides. ‘They’re all dead. Even Kou’to. I checked.’

Shadowsun followed Hollett through a growth of dusty yellow-coloured shrubs and past a thick copse of razor trees. The Guardsman seemed to know exactly where he was going, and he made great strides through the mud. Sabu’ro’s blood left a spreading swath of aquamarine down the back of Hollett’s greatcoat. He groaned weakly as he was jostled about. Shadowsun tried to offer encouragement.

‘Remain strong,’ she told him, ‘you still have much to contribute to the mission.’

After some minutes, they began to climb up and out of the swamp. The mud was replaced by drier ground, scattered with rocks. A creek rushed along nearby. The water was thick with ash and dust. The ursaloth’s rampaging could still be heard on a wind that reeked of carbon. Hollett dropped to his knees in the midst of the stream, and put Sabu’ro down against the bank. He plunged his hands into the filthy water, and splashed his face. His breathing was laboured. Sweat ran freely down his face and left dark stains under his arms.

‘Little guy’s heavy,’ he muttered.

Shadowsun had stopped a few steps away. Her face was contorted. ‘The air,’ she said, ‘it’s getting very bad.’

‘Because we’re close to fires,’ he panted. He stood and began to remove the yellow sash he wore around his waist.

Shadowsun opened her palms and made a shrugging motion. The fusion blasters dropped into the grey water. She knelt down next to Sabu’ro and removed his helmet. The young tau’s face was pale. His eyes rolled about. ‘I need something to staunch the wound,’ she said.

Hollett thrust the golden cloth at her. ‘Here.’

She grabbed it without comment and clamped it with both hands over the stump below Sabu’ro’s shoulder. ‘Hollett-la, on my hip there is a small compartment. Get the cylinder inside, remove the cap, and hand it to me.’

As the Guardsman began to do so, Sabu’ro shook violently, looked up at his commander and said, ‘I’m so sorry… so sorry.’

Shadowsun shook her head. ‘There are no personal setbacks,’ she quoted, ‘only steps forward for the Greater Good.’

Sabu’ro managed to smile weakly. ‘Aun’va’s words.’

Hollett passed the tiny silver tube to Shadowsun, who pressed it into the side of Sabu’ro’s neck. She did not notice as Hollett then took several steps backward, opened his coat, and slowly pulled a cumbersome object from the small of his back.

‘I’ve given you a tissue rebuilder,’ Shadowsun told Sabu’ro. ‘It will help to seal the wound, and rejuvenate your blood supply.’

‘The commander should… leave me behind. I will… only… slow you down.’

‘Too many lives have been cut short already. Yours will not be one of them. Besides, I will need your expertise at the gue’la communications array to contact the fleet. We have to keep going.’

Sabu’ro closed his eyes. Shadowsun cupped some water in her hand and tenderly drizzled it over the young tau’s face.

‘Will he live?’ Hollett asked quietly.

‘I believe he will,’ she said as she examined the makeshift compress. Sabu’ro’s blood had turned the sash a bright green.

‘Good. Then get up slowly, and turn around.’

Shadowsun scowled and whipped her head around in fury. ‘I do not take orders from–’

Her eyes widened. Hollett was standing astride her discarded fusion blasters, leveling a massive pistol at her. It glowed from within and wispy tendrils of steam escaped from exhaust ports near the muzzle.

‘This fires plasma,’ he said flatly.

Shadowsun swallowed in a dry throat. She knew the term. One shot from Hollett’s sidearm would likely puncture her battlesuit, and annihilate her within it. She lay Sabu’ro’s head down on the bank, and slowly rose to face the major.

‘Where did you get that?’ she asked dumbly.

‘Took it from Kou’to,’ Hollett replied. He did not blink. His hands were rock steady.

She was stunned to realise that she had absolutely no idea what to do. Never had she so quickly and easily lost control of a situation. All her life, it was she who was the one in control. ‘What now, then?’

Hollett raised his chin. ‘“You have squandered the lives of your men, and been defeated.” Isn’t that what you said to me?’

All the strength seemed to drain out of her. ‘Yes.’

‘“And as an officer, you will doubtless wish to now die with honour.” Something to that effect.’

‘Yes.’ She was thankful for the rigidity of her battlesuit. Its reinforced joints would ensure that she was standing when she died.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. The creek gurgled around their ankles. The air was hot and heavy.

‘I’m not going to kill you,’ Hollett announced. ‘Emperor knows I’d love to. Emperor knows that I should. But I can’t.’

Shadowsun didn’t move. ‘I am to be your prisoner then?’

‘Tempting, but also no. Doing either of those things will have only one effect that I can see, and that is, to back your people up there,’ he gestured to the sooty sky above, ‘into a corner. If you’re captured, they will try to rescue you. If you are killed, they will feel compelled to avenge you. In either case, they will bring that armada into low orbit and dump on us with everything they have. Oh, sure, they’ll take a few losses. Maybe a lot. But in the end, they will destroy the defence laser and the colony around it with… I don’t know… whatever doomsday weapons you people employ. The seas will boil, the forests will be incinerated, and everything I care about will just be dust on the wind.

‘So, I’m going to take the only option left to me. I will get you to the comms array. I will take the planetary targeters off-line, and I will let your friends in space come down here and collect you. But for this, there is a price.’

Shadowsun sneered. Here it was revealed at last: the self-serving greed that was the cornerstone of every gue’la life. ‘You are hoping for some kind of clemency, Hollett-la? You think that by co-operating with us, you will gain favour when we annex this planet into the Empire?’

Hollett shrugged. ‘I won’t be around,’ he said. ‘You’re going to relocate me off-world.’

She was physically taken aback. ‘What?’

‘It doesn’t matter where, so long as it’s sparsely populated and far away from here.’

‘I don’t care what you say, you are a traitor to your kind, Hollett-la. A spineless, snivelling coward.’

‘I should just leave then? You and your one-armed sidekick can wander the burning countryside and hope that you find what it is you’re looking for? Maybe while you’re at it, you’ll stumble across another Imperial officer willing to get you inside.’

Shadowsun’s eyes narrowed.

‘That’s what I thought.’ He lowered the pistol to his waist. ‘Make no mistake. You’re no better than I am in this mess. We’re both equally guilty of collusion with the enemy. So, do we have a deal?’

Shadowsun was reluctantly impressed. She had taken Hollett for a simple turncoat, a man too weak to accept death before dishonour. But she had sorely underestimated him, she saw that now. There was something driving his actions, something far more than simple self-preservation.

‘Why are you doing this?’ she asked earnestly.

‘Do we have a deal?’ he repeated.

Her mouth worked as if she tasted something sour. ‘Dao,’ she replied at last. ‘H’ai mesme ‘hee vash.’

Hollett waited.

‘Yes,’ she hissed in translation. ‘We are joined in a purpose.’

He stepped back so that he was no longer directly over the top of her weapons. ‘A bit long-winded, but good enough for me.’

Shadowsun cautiously walked forwards and reattached the fusion blasters to her battlesuit. They hummed softly as the power couplings clicked into place. She and Hollett regarded one another for a moment, each half expecting the other to squeeze a trigger or depress an activation stud.

‘We’d better get him up,’ Hollett said, indicating the place where Sabu’ro lay. He splashed his way down the creek, picked up the helmet, and then hoisted the young tau up on to his hooves. Sabu’ro stood wobbling midstream. Hollett pressed the helmet into his hand.

‘Nuni,’ he slurred.

‘You’re welcome,’ Hollett grunted. With a glance to Shadowsun, he began sloshing down the creek once more. ‘It’ll be better if we stick to the water now,’ he called.

Shadowsun extended an arm for Sabu’ro to lean on, and together, the two of them moved after Hollett. To the west, the sun set on a burning world.

The air grew worse as they travelled. The creek was joined by others until they were traversing down a narrow river. On either side of them the forest was a tangled wall of silhouettes shot through with flecks of orange. After an hour of staggering along, they passed their first flaming tree. Hollett double-checked his refractor field and surveyed Shadowsun. ‘How insulated is that suit?’

‘Less so without a helmet,’ she conceded, ‘but the shield generator is still intact. It will do.’

‘And Sabu’ro?’

‘His armour is fully environmental.’

‘Good, because we’re about to walk right through it.’ He dug into one of the deep pockets of his greatcoat and produced a large handkerchief. He dunked it into the water, and began to tie it around the lower half of his face.

‘I see now why you warned me against travelling directly south,’ Shadowsun said. ‘Surely though, you must agree that taking the road way would have been just as perilous.’

‘It’s all on fire now, so it doesn’t much matter. They were going to die no matter which way you chose. This is a lose-lose situation.’

‘Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t. Isn’t that a proverbial saying among you gue’la?’

‘Pretty much.’

She shook her head in disgust. ‘What a negative species you are. Everything is bleak and dismal. You have no sense of optimism or hope.’

‘So you say.’

‘Oh? Something gives you a reason to go on, does it?’

Hollett said nothing, refusing to take the bait. He resumed moving.

Shadowsun followed while trying a different tactic. ‘With lives so grim, I can see why il’Wolaho would be considered a treasure.’

‘Eel-walla-what?’ Hollett frowned.

‘Il’Wolaho. Our name for this planet. It means “the place of bright colours”.’

‘This planet already has a name.’

‘It will be changed shortly. When we pacify it, make it a proper, civilised world and remove any unwanted or disruptive elements. First thing I will tell the engineers to do is to drain that swamp and exterminate those snake creatures.’

Hollett smiled behind his impromptu mask. ‘The fen skulks? Yeah, have fun with that.’

‘Or that other monstrosity, the one that killed my warriors.’

‘The ursaloth?’

‘Whatever you call it.’

‘They aren’t monsters,’ Hollett said.

‘They are from what I’ve seen.’

‘No, no,’ Hollett waved his pistol in the air. ‘That one’s just been driven out of his natural habitat by the wildfires. He’s scared and confused and lashing out blindly. You know, you should feel lucky to have even seen one, especially one that old.’

‘Perhaps a zoo then. We could capture and transfer them to the Central Menagerie on T’au for all the people to come and wonder at.’ She surveyed him coldly.

‘Do whatever you want. Like I said before, I won’t be here.’

Before long, there were burning trees on both sides of the river. The flames grew thicker until it was nearly as bright as noon. All that could be heard was a crackling rushing sound as the air was heated and sucked upwards. Orange light filled every empty space. It played across the surface of the water and stained the sky above. The temperature was oppressive. It wormed its way through armour and energy shields alike. They stumbled often and it seemed that their progress was slow. Time and direction seemed to have vanished. There were only fires and heat and the river which they blindly followed.

When they at last came to a strip of rocky, open ground where there was no forest and nothing to burn, the three of them collapsed. They could hear the roar of a waterfall, and for a dizzying moment, Shadowsun was convinced that she had simply come full circle, that her survival pod was lying nearby, still thought-locked and filled with water.

‘We’re near the Drop’, Hollett finally managed to say. He peeled off his handkerchief revealing a red and blistered face. ‘There should be a cliff not too far off, and a bridge.’

Shadowsun left Sabu’ro and managed to claw her way atop a nearby boulder. Behind them, the wall of fire cast more than enough light to see by. They were very close to the edge of a wide chasm, just as Hollett had said. To the west, a single bridge reached across the gap. The far side was quiet and dark.

‘Nothing’s burning,’ she panted. ‘On the far side of this canyon, there’s nothing burning.’

Hollett sat up shakily. ‘The Drop will act like a natural fire break,’ he said. ‘You see that tall hill beyond the bridge?’

‘Only just.’

‘The comm relay is at the top of it.’

‘Then what are we waiting for?’ She dropped down with a heavy splash.

The three of them followed the lip of the canyon westward until the bridge was nearly in front of them. A large stone archway anchored it on this side, with a similar structure on the opposite end. From the tops of the arches, huge curving cables ran down to the deck. A low guardrail ran along each side. Shadowsun surmised that the structure was wide enough to accommodate only a single vehicle at time, or perhaps four people walking abreast.

There was no sign of anything or anyone else, and so they began to cross. A cool wind blew up from the canyon below. Hollett and Shadowsun both breathed it in deeply. The bridge swayed slightly beneath them. Hollett saw the look of panic that instinctually came over Shadowsun’s face, and laughed.

‘It’s supposed to do that. If it was built completely rigid, then the wind would cause it to crack.’

‘How long has it stood here?’ Sabu’ro asked.

‘It was built during the first settling. The support structure is made of whiskered adamantium though, so I wouldn’t worry. It would take a melta weapon to do any damage to it.’

‘Still, this must be terrifying to drive over,’ Shadowsun remarked.

‘That’s why anyone who has to come out here does it by Valkyrie. There’s a landing pad on the far side of the relay station. Your people can use it when they send a shuttle to come get you.’

They approached the midway point where the four enormous support cables came to their lowest point. Sabu’ro wandered over to touch one. He tried unsuccessfully to peer over the top. ‘How far down is it from here?’

Hollett laughed again. ‘Far,’ he said.

Shadowsun froze. The sensor suite in her battlesuit had sprung to life with a half a dozen indicators. Without a head-up display, she couldn’t identify them easily, and so she peered into the orange-hued night.

‘What?’ Hollett asked. ‘What is it?’

Another sound was steadily rising on the wind, a high-pitched whine that all three of them recognised from their first night in the forest. Aircraft were approaching fast and from somewhere high above them. Hollett searched the skies in a panic.

‘I can’t see them!’ Sabu’ro wailed.

‘They must be high up,’ said Hollett.

‘Moving fast,’ Shadowsun confirmed. ‘They’re nearly on top of us.’

The three of them broke into a run, desperately dashing toward the far side of the causeway. The turbine engines screamed somewhere above them, and then faded slightly. A multitude of new sounds came rushing towards them, like hands being run quickly over a silky fabric. Ten gue’la soldiers dropped out of the sky in a perfect formation, blocking their path. They wore heavy combat armour. Their helmets had bright-green lenses for eyes. A stubby machine poked up over each of their shoulders, connected to a power supply worn on their backs. Their rifles were short and heavy looking.

‘Don’t move, xenos!’ one of them barked.

Hollett stopped short and whirled around, only to find that twice as many men had come down behind them. ‘You!’ they hollered. ‘Hands up where we can see them!’

A wash of bright lights stabbed onto the scene from above. A Valkyrie was slowly twirling its way down to the deck. It landed behind the team in front of Shadowsun. The stubby wings of the machine grazed the suspension cables to either side of it. Shadowsun squinted in the harsh light as a lone silhouette emerged from a door in the vehicle’s side.

‘I told you that we’d meet again,’ called a voice from beyond the glare.

‘Falkens,’ Shadowsun sneered.

The colonel sauntered forwards as a man might walk through a garden. His hands were clasped behind his back. He wore a uniform much the same as Hollett’s, with a sabre of some kind that banged against his hip as he moved. In the backlight, Shadowsun could barely make out a hawkish nose, a pointed chin and high cheekbones. To either side of him trailed yet more troopers. By her count, there were now at least forty of them, all heavily armed and armoured.

‘Colonel Falkens,’ he corrected in his smooth, almost seductive voice. He shifted to one side slightly. ‘Hollett?’

‘Hello, sir.’ Hollett’s voice was very low.

‘So that was you we saw down by the Lake of Tears. Some of the boys here said so, but I told them they must be mistaken. There’s no way that Cordell Hollett would allow himself to be captured. He’s much cannier than that.’

There was a ripple of laughter among the soldiers. Falkens stepped close enough that Shadowsun could see his entire face. His eyes were bright, and there was a smile on his lips, but the expression was cold and merciless, a predator toying with a cornered prey. ‘Damn, but you’re predictable, Cordell. Aside from the main colony, this is the only place worth heading for on the entire continent. Did you really think that I wouldn’t anticipate such a move?’

‘Actually,’ Hollett said, ‘there was a small part of me that hoped you might be out trying to stop the fires. You know, like we’re supposed to?’

Falkens dismissed the comment with a wave of his hand. He turned to Shadowsun and studied her features. ‘How about you? Would you care to surrender? Throw yourself on my mercy, perhaps?’

‘I would not. Nor do I actually believe that you would spare me if I asked.’

Falkens leaned back on his heels. ‘Yes. You’re right about that. Still, it might be entertaining.’ Again the soldiers laughed. A few called out insults. Falkens drank it in merrily. ‘No? Are you certain? All right then.’ He spun and started to rejoin his men. ‘Bit of an anticlimactic ending to things, but so be it. Squad one, squad four, ready weapons!’

Twenty rifles jerked into position. Hollett and Sabu’ro were dumbfounded. Shadowsun was not.

‘So that’s it? You’re just going to have your men shoot me down?’ she called to Falkens.

‘I believe I’ve already established that,’ came the smug reply. ‘First rank, second rank, aim!’

She spread her arms wide in invitation. ‘Why don’t we finish this properly then, one commander to another?’

Falkens gave a dismissive snort. ‘I wouldn’t dirty my blade.’

‘I guess it’s true then what they say about the Mountain Men. You’re not warriors. You’re just uniformed gardeners.’

The crowd went silent for a moment. Then one of the soldiers near Falkens shouted, ‘Go get her, colonel!’ and the others responded in kind with shouts and chants. Falkens stepped forwards once again. He drew his sword from the scabbard with an exaggerated flourish. Tiny blue sparks, like miniature lightning bolts, ran up and down the blade.

‘At ease, boys,’ he yelled. ‘Enjoy the show.’

Shadowsun took several steps back. Outside of her battlesuit, Falkens would have a definite advantage over her. Humans were, she hated to admit, possessed of faster reflexes than tau. The augmented movements of the suit however, made her faster and stronger than any normal gue’la. Even so, when Falkens lunged at her, it was with a swiftness that nearly caught her off guard. She pivoted to the side. The blade thrust past her chest, slicing only air. Falkens recovered, and Shadowsun followed by plowing a hoof into his lower abdomen.

The colonel flew backwards and hit the deck of the bridge with a loud thump. The bystanders gasped and cursed. Falkens kicked himself upright. His eyes flicked to the dent in his chest plate, and then he glared at Shadowsun. Behind him, the troopers shouted encouragement. He approached more cautiously this time. The two combatants began to circle one another.

‘That’s one, little girl,’ he scowled. ‘There will not be another.’

‘You talk too much.’

‘Do I?’ Falkens’s blade slashed the air twice more. Each time Shadowsun managed to evade it.

‘You understand mont’ka,’ she retorted, ‘but your arrogance makes you sloppy.’

As if to prove her wrong, Falkens thrust his sword towards her left hip. Shadowsun once more moved to dodge, only to discover too late that the colonel had been throwing a feint. With a twist of his wrist, the crackling sword flipped over and cut high and to the right instead. Her integral forcefield was also fooled, it seemed. The armour near the top of her arm parted effortlessly. Blood spattered across her shoulder, and began to rain down her arm.

Falkens leapt back gracefully into a guard position, his body turned to one side and his sword before him protectively. Shadowsun charged. The colonel dropped low, rolled out of the way, and slashed at one of her legs.

Shadowsun whirled around. She caught a glimpse of Sabu’ro and Hollett standing nearby, their faces etched with fear. Two indicators were blinking wildly on her battlesuit collar. She glanced down and realised to her horror that her left leg was deeply cut. The interior padding of the suit expanded to put pressure on the wounds, but too little avail. Blood was gushing freely from a long rent in her leg plates.

Falkens’s men were cheering loudly now, their passions roused by this unexpected entertainment. The colonel’s face was a mask of concentration, with no hint of levity. Shadowsun went back on the offensive, closing the distance between them in a heartbeat. They were nearly chest to chest as she began pummelling him with the flat edges of her fusion blasters. His personal shield flared brightly again and again as it absorbed the blows. She drove a knee into his gut, and when he doubled over, she tried to flip him over her shoulder.

Falkens somehow twisted out of her grip and rolled away to the side. He came up low, but disoriented. He reached out with his free hand and steadied himself against one of the bridge’s massive suspension cables.

Shadowsun’s leg was buckling beneath her as she turned to face him. She couldn’t feel the fingers of her right hand anymore either. The cuts were very deep, she suspected. Perhaps all the way to the bone. Her battlesuit evened the gap between them, but she had to concede that Colonel Falkens was simply a more skilled melee fighter than she. Without thinking, she aimed both fusion blasters at him and fired.

Falkens’s eyes went wide. The back of his coat burst into flames as he barely managed to dive out of the way. The trunk-like cable against which he had been crouched melted clean through. There was a titanic crack as it snapped free of the bridge and flew up into the night sky. Shadowsun rotated to find her target, but as she did, the entire bridge rocked violently, as if some giant, invisible hand were suddenly shaking it. The world pitched to the right, and her leg seemed to liquefy. She fell to one knee, and looked up just in time to see Falkens. He was backlit by the harsh floodlights of the Valkyrie. A nimbus of white surrounded his head and shoulders. He wound back, and drove his sword downwards.

The blow was so precise, and the blade so wickedly sharp, that for a moment there was no pain. Falken’s planted a boot on her chest and jerked his sword free. Shadowsun tried to stand, but all the air seemed to have been sucked from her lungs. She collapsed to the pavement and lay there gasping, while on her collar an amber warning light flashed.

The watching soldiers went into hysterics. Falkens raised his gore-stained weapon in the air triumphantly, and smiled. He turned in a circle, basking in their praise. His coat-tails were still on fire.

Shadowsun managed to draw a breath, only to cough. Blue blood shot out from her mouth and nose. Falkens strode over the top of her, his sword lowered towards her neck. He swept his arm back to deliver a decapitating blow, and that was when she heard Hollett cry out.

The major dove, tackling Falkens around the waist and driving both of them to the deck. Electric sparks flew from the places where their two shields touched, and Hollett began beating the colonel about the head and face. Falkens tried to raise his sword. Hollett grabbed his wrist. With barred teeth they grunted at each other savagely.

Falkens planted a heel in Hollett’s stomach and kicked out. The major sailed up into the air and hit the pavement hard. He scrabbled away on his hands and knees, and quickly got to his feet. Falkens rose and wiped his bloody nose on the back of a gloved hand. ‘You traitorous heretic!’ he screamed. ‘Collaborator!’

Hollett held up his hands. ‘You can’t kill her, Emmett!’ he cried. ‘You don’t understand…’

Falkens didn’t reply. He simply charged and cut the air with his sword. Hollett scampered back, but the bridge was now sagging diagonally, and he tripped. Falkens kicked him in the side. Hollett, his fists clenched together, swept the colonel’s legs out from under him and pounced. Falkens rolled and sprang to his feet, panting heavily.

‘Look who found his spine,’ he spat.

‘I never lost it.’

They charged one another. Hollett grabbed Falkens’s wrist again, and twisted, trying desperately to keep the crackling blade away. Falkens, grimacing like a wild man, slammed his forehead into Hollett’s nose. The cartilage snapped with a sound like a gunshot, and Hollett’s face became awash with blood. He staggered back, stunned. Falkens lunged and drove his sword through the centre of the major’s chest, paying heed to neither armour nor shield.

Hollett made a gasping noise and went to his knees first. Falkens withdrew the sword and stepped back. The major slumped over on his side. An arm’s reach from him, Shadowsun continued to fight for every breath.

Falkens did not bask in triumph this time. He did not parade before his men, nor do anything to enhance the theatricality of the moment. He simply stood there, bent painfully at the waist, as breathless as his vanquished foes.

‘Don’t…’ Hollett struggled to say. ‘Emmett… you’ll kill us all…’

‘No,’ he said as he righted himself and placed his free hand over a wound near his hip, ‘not all. Just you. You, and your two friends.’ He hobbled closer, his sword nearly scraping the surface of the bridge.

‘Hollett-la,’ Shadowsun managed to say. ‘Grab hold.’

Rolling over, Shadowsun aimed both of her weapons at the second suspension cable. The beams were blinding as they vaporised their target. Tiny residual explosions ripped up along the length of the support structure. The bridge shook.

Falkens jerked his head around, trying to piece together what had just been set in motion. His jaw went slack. ‘Get off the deck!’ he screamed in a voice that was far from controlled. He turned and began to sprint back towards the Valkyrie. ‘Oh, God Emperor! Get clear, all of–’

Then, with an ominous grinding noise, the entire bridge began to fall. The end closest to the wildfires heaved and pitched sharply downward. The remaining support cables, anchored on the side of the communications array, groaned and stretched. Wide, jagged cracks raced up towards the Valkyrie. In several places, the rockcrete surface exploded outwards as metal support struts and huge, iron-red girders erupted through it. Within seconds, everyone was sliding.

With a burst from her suit thrusters, Shadowsun slowed her descent enough so that she could catch a jutting beam and not be impaled upon it. She hugged it with both arms. Between her hoofs she could see Falkens’s men, the ones who had blocked off the way they came. They flailed helplessly, scrambled to find something to save them, and fell headlong into the black depths of the gorge.

The bridge lurched and fell again. It was nearly vertical now, a roadway built by a madman, with one end attached to the top of a cliff and the other hanging freely in space. She craned her head upwards. From her perspective, it was raining bodies. Hollett had managed to latch onto a guardrail, wrapping a forearm around one of the bars, and jamming his foot between two others. His other hand was clenched in Sabu’ro’s. The shas’la dangled perilously.

With agonising slowness, the Valkyrie toppled and began to slide. It plowed over at least twenty of Falkens’s elite troopers before becoming caught in a tangle of wires and beams. Some troopers bounced along the blacktop, screaming. Others impacted against the tumbling wreckage with sickening wet sounds, and then plummeted silently into the Drop.

The Valkyrie engines roared to life. The transport lurched again and twisted slightly. Like a bird caught in a net, it rose up only to have the cabling of the bridge drag it down again. Through the cockpit glass, Shadowsun saw Falkens at the controls, manically trying to extricate it from the collapsing structure.

She refused to let him get away. Not too far above her she noted a place where part of the guardrail had bent inward. Three of Falkens’s men had lodged there in a twisted heap. She let go of the beam from which she was hanging and rocketed upward with a long burst from her battlesuit thrusters. She landed amidst the bodies on the little shelf, fell on her hands and knees, and spit a wide, blue stream of blood from her mouth. Then she wearily pointed both her fusion blasters directly at Falkens.

The colonel pulled back on the Valkyrie’s controls with such ferocity that the cords in his neck stood out. The awkward machine whined in protest, but began to finally move up and out over the gorge. Bits of stonework and cabling were caught up in its landing gear and wrapped around its wings and tail.

As it passed over her, Shadowsun fired.

The beams struck the transport’s belly. The armour-plating simply ceased to exist as its molecules flew apart. White-hot lines of heat radiated out from the impact point. The very air inside the cockpit and passenger compartments became superheated and caught fire. The Valkyrie spun like a child’s discarded toy. Shadowsun was certain that she caught a glimpse of a hand pressed against the pilot’s canopy before everything exploded in a mass of shrapnel. Huge pieces of machinery fell into the Drop, trailing auburn flames behind them. When they at last hit bottom, the sound was distant and muffled.

How long she lay there on the makeshift alcove she didn’t know. It was a labour just to breathe, and the night breeze felt cool and refreshing against her skin. Finally, she heard Hollett calling out to her from somewhere nearby. She lifted her head.

‘Oh, good. You’re not dead,’ Hollett said dryly. He and Sabu’ro were climbing up the guardrail with agonising slowness.

‘No,’ she murmured. ‘Not yet.’

‘Can you make it up to the top, commander?’ Sabu’ro asked.

Shadowsun nodded weakly, and drained the blood from her mouth again.

The sun was rising when the three of them at last crested the cliff top. Across the Long Drop, the fires continued to rage. They lay there, completely spent, and watched the forest burn. Finally, Hollett stood and began limping up the winding path that led to the communications array.

‘Let’s go call your friends,’ he said.

The landing field was in chaos. All along the rockcrete the ochre shuttlecraft of the tau had landed and disgorged their passengers. Fire warriors swarmed everywhere. Earth caste scientists unloaded equipment and stacked supply crates. Water caste merchants took inventory of their wares. A few pilots from the air caste examined their vessels or made minor repairs. From every flagpole hung long, mustard banners proclaiming that the inhabitants of il’Wolaho – formerly Diepr-3 – were now under the jurisdiction of the Tau Empire.

Shadowsun displayed a banner as well: a waist-length purple cape hung over her left side. It was the official symbol for a tau in mourning. Sabu’ro walked proudly beside her. He wore a new suit of combat armour decorated with the insignia of a shas’ui. His helmet rested in the crook of his left arm. They passed into the shadow of the defence laser. The massive building reached up into a heaven streaked with grey clouds of smoke.

Shadowsun pointed through the crowd ahead of them. Through the throng she could see Hollett standing beside a large pile of suitcases and trunks. He wore knee-high boots, a simple pair of grey trousers and a brown leather jacket over the top of an off-white shirt. His plasma pistol rested in the holster on his hip. A large, white bandage etched with silver circuitry stretched across the bridge of his nose.

The two tau came to a halt. Sabu’ro gave a shallow bow of greeting. ‘Greetings, Hollett-la’, he said merrily. ‘How are you feeling?’

Hollett touched his nose and said, ‘You know this thing is just about healed? Those medics of yours sure know a thing or two.’ He looked at Shadowsun. ‘How’s your leg?’

Shadowsun merely thrust out a small digital readout. ‘Your transfer data,’ she said. ‘Show this to the pilots, and they will ensure that you get where you are going.’

Hollett accepted the pad, and tucked it inside a breast pocket. ‘And where is that, exactly?’

‘Colony Twenty-three,’ Sabu’ro answered. ‘I chose it myself. The port is sparsely populated, but multicultural. I thought that you might encounter other humans there from time to time.’

‘Nuni,’ he said.

‘You might not be so thankful when you get there,’ Shadowsun sneered. ‘It’s the epitome of desolation.’

Hollett looked over at his stack of belongings. ‘I’m sure we’ll make do,’ he said, and gestured with his fingers. A girl of perhaps five or six years cautiously leaned out from where she had been hiding and looked up at the blue-skinned aliens. She was long-limbed and thin and pretty. Her light-brown hair was cut to just above her shoulders. Her hazel eyes were wide with mistrust. She clutched a well-worn, four-legged, stuffed animal toy to her chest. She darted out from behind her cover, and latched herself to Hollett’s side.

‘Daddy, who’s that?’ she whispered loudly. Hollett hoisted her up in his arms and held her tightly. He bounced her lightly, told her to never mind, and kissed her cheek.

Shadowsun’s expression fell. ‘Your daughter?’ she croaked.

‘Janaya, yes.’

‘Where was she all this time?’ Sabu’ro inquired.

Hollett licked his lips and cast a glance towards Shadowsun before he jerked his head towards the dormant defence laser. All around its heavy base were nestled the hab-blocks of the citizenry and the barracks of the former Guardsmen.

‘We had a communal dormitory over there.’

Sabu’ro gasped with realisation. ‘If we had... if the fleet had fired on this place from orbit…’

From behind the four of them came a long, undulating wail, like a lamenting foghorn. They turned to see a small army of earth caste tau struggling to manoeuvre a massive cage up the boarding ramp of a cargo shuttle. Inside the enclosure, the ursaloth bemoaned his fate.

‘The king has been dethroned,’ Hollett muttered grimly.

‘What’s going to happen to him?’ Janaya asked.

‘I’m not sure, sweetie. I think he’s getting a new home. Like us.’

The flex-screen wrapped around Sabu’ro’s left forearm emitted three sharp chirps. He read the display, and whispered, ‘Commander, it’s Kor’el Kenhi’ta’s vessel. They have received a data packet from T’au, addressed to you.’

‘My shuttle is close by,’ she replied. ‘Have them transfer the message there.’

She took one last look at Hollett as he cradled his daughter.

‘Was it for this?’ she asked, but the former Guardsman’s only response was to hold the girl tighter. Shadowsun marched away through the crowd without another word. Sabu’ro started to follow, saw how Janaya buried her face into Hollett’s shoulder, and felt compelled to say something.

‘The ursaloth will be well cared for, I’m sure. The Menagerie is home to some of the most skilled xenologists in the Empire.’

Shadowsun was already standing just inside the open hatch of her shuttle. Sabu’ro joined her in the darkened interior, and activated a large viewscreen on the curving bulkhead.

‘We’re ready down here,’ he said.

The wrinkled, wizened face of Aun’va appeared. He was seated behind a grandiose, white desk. A towering hat was perched upon his head.

‘O’Shaserra, I hope that this message finds you not only alive and well, but victorious in your endeavours. The Aun’t’au’retha received your previous transmission, and have discussed it at length. The council acknowledges that you are well within your rights to take the Taal Saal’Y. Indeed, your retirement from active service in order to focus on a family is likely the wisest course of action. The Empire as a whole would suffer a great loss if Kiru’s line were to come an end. Therefore, if you wish to return home, you will be welcomed with all honour.

‘But I speak now, not on behalf of the Aun’t’au’retha, but for myself. Shadowsun, when I first met you, when you were just at the beginning of your caste training, I knew then that you would be one of the rare ones, one of those legendary few who push our entire race forwards with their actions. I did what I could to help. I used my influence to ensure that you received the most dangerous and difficult assignments, because the sharpest blade is tempered in the hottest forge.

‘Your father knew all of this, incidentally. Not only that, but he approved. He could never tell you himself, but he was very proud of you. He once said “in that girl, I see all of my best qualities and more”. That’s why he gave you your name. You eclipsed him while also being the light of his life.

‘I will understand if you choose to come home. But I also encourage you to rule your fears, and not be ruled by them. But you and I know that there is also a Greater Good. It often demands sacrifice and loss, but in the end, it is the wiser, better path.

‘Regardless of your decision, the Aun’t’au’retha and I eagerly await word from you.’

The image faded out. Neither Shadowsun nor Sabu’ro moved.

‘Let’s get out of here,’ she muttered.

Sabu’ro’s face was etched with anticipation and worry. He swallowed and managed to voice the question burning within him. ‘Back to T’au, commander?’

She walked to the boarding hatch and surveyed the throng swirling about on the landing field. A cool breeze filled the shuttle with memories of smoke and fire. She saw Hollett seated on one of his trunks, cradling Janaya in his lap as she played with her stuffed toy. She saw that the ursaloth’s cage was nearly stowed away. She saw the tau boy standing at the base of the boarding ramp. He was dressed as before, in his crisp cadet’s uniform. His black hair-braid framed his face. Once, lying in the bog, she had asked who he was, but there was no need now. She knew who he was.

He was her boy.

You would have been E Rra’E – ‘Shadowsun’s son’. Others would have smiled whenever they heard your name. How ideal, they would say. Perfect alliteration. Balanced spelling. Even a clever homophone. You would have had all of my best qualities and more, a perfect inheritor of Kiru’s line. You would have eclipsed me, and I would have been so proud of you.

The boy regarded her forlornly and motioned for her to step down from out of the shuttle and join him. She thumbed the control panel next to her. The hatch swung shut, sealing away the noisy scene.

‘Why would we go home when there is so much still left to do?’ she said, answering Sabu’ro.

Behind her, the young shas’ui broke into a smile. ‘I’ll set course to rendezvous with Kenhi’ta’s vessel at once,’ he said, and headed to the cockpit with proud strides.

In the silence and isolation that rushed in, she placed a hand against the smooth metal door. Her head sagged and her body was wracked by three hard sobs. Tears splashed onto the tips of her hooves.

‘I’m so sorry, child,’ she whispered. ‘I just can’t.’

Then she drew a ragged breath, sniffled, and straightened her uniform. Oh, Oru’mi, she thought, wouldn’t you laugh to see your big sister right now. She spun on her heel and followed after Sabu’ro. There was work to be done for the last of Kiru’s line, she told herself. Important work. A Greater Good.

Moments later, the shuttle rocketed skywards. Shadowsun caught her reflection in the viewport as she watched the landing field recede. Her eyes were dry. After all, the boy on the planet below hadn’t really existed. And now, she realised, he never would.

The kauyon was called. The order was given. The hunt began.

Lightning split the sky. Fire raged unchecked, consuming the planet’s manufactories. Halfus burned. Storms raged in the heavens as descending troopships displaced the atmosphere.

The Tau Empire desired to liberate this world, this so-called bastion of the Martian priesthood.

They were here to free this place, to cast away the blind dogmatism offered by the distant heart of the Imperium. The choice was simple: live free, in harmony with the Greater Good, or die.

The humans, lost and blind in their belligerence, hidebound to ancient and obsolete traditions, rejected the Tau’va. Guns fired where words were offered. Screams shouted where peace was given. Silence reigned where dialogue was called.

The priesthood of Mars, as the gue’la called themselves, rejected the Tau’va with violence, with shouted prayers. Ambassadors were returned to the tau bloody and broken, executed before being allowed to speak. Accusations of fomenting rebellion were levelled. The tau, minds set upon this course, upon this planet, answered with weary hearts. This forge world would be brought into compliance with the Tau Empire, its forges repurposed, its people liberated in accordance with the Tau’va.

Shas’vre Fal’shia Bas’reh Valel paid no mind to this. Words still rang in his mind. His orders, delivered by the shas’o himself, were issued without preamble, without flattery. They were simple.

‘Hunt,’ the commander had said. ‘Teach the gue’la the price of rejecting the Greater Good.’

Vre’valel had nodded, content with his role and assured of his place in the greater conflict. His own relayed orders were just as simple.

Now he strode through the ruins of the human city. Fire warrior teams bowed with respect as he passed, something akin to awe flashing in their eyes. He paid them all no mind.

He passed a team of Broadsides hunkered down behind the tumbled brick walls of some gue’la structure. They ceased their railgun bombardment until he was past, guns dipped out of respect.

To these, his cousins, Vre’valel offered quiet words of encouragement.

Then he was past them, into the deeper parts of the night, through the powerless city streets.

Talaska Yones stared out into the dark Halfusian night, safe and secure within the Indomitable Iron. She could see nothing through the smoke and the dust and the fire. Even with the straining sensors of the Leman Russ’s auspex equipment, there was little to see. They passed beneath a towering half-cog structure, a sacred symbol to the Halfusian Mechanicus. She quickly made the sign of the cog against her breast.

Were she fully human, she might have cursed, but Talaska Yones had ceased to be fully human two decades ago. The Mechanicus, praises upon them, had excised parts of her brain and body and replaced them with the certainty of the machine. So Talaska Yones did not curse. She only muttered a prayer to the Omnissiah and to the Indomitable Iron’s blessed machine spirit.

The voice of the tank’s commander, Enri Harnold, bubbled at her in machine cant. It was phrased with polite markers, but the message was stern and emotive. ‘What can you see?’

Talaska Yones responded, appending her message with deference and discipline, ‘I see nothing, honoured sire.’

Harnold nodded in satisfaction, a curiously human gesture for a man missing almost sixty percent of his flesh-body. ‘Good,’ the commander of the Divine Right muttered to himself. They were far behind the front lines, far away from the xenos, but it never paid to be too cautious.

The tank trundled off into the night.

Two minutes later it was dead. The first casualty. The first to fall.

Talaska Yones, Commander Harnold, none of them knew what killed them. None of them saw it. None of them heard it.

One second they were alive. The next, they were a smoking ruin.

Four hundred metres to the right, advancing down a parallel street, was the Delta-88B. Adept Gurolf Pryce was using the Delta-88B’s sensors in an attempt to pierce the fog of war, pollution and industry that drifted about his own tank. The atmosphere of Halfus, never clear of industrial pollution, had grown worse since the xenos arrived, since the rioting menials put half the blessed manufactora to the torch.

They passed between two of those manufactora now, massive and imposing in the night, brick structures stamped from the same pattern, prayer banners burning in the breeze.

Adept Pryce cursed. The words he said were gutterspeak, scraps of code, and offensive merely by existence. They betrayed a deeper sense of unease, a deeper sense of emotion and a lack of blessed logic in the adept.

He received admonishment from the tank’s commander, but these were softened by attached signifiers expressing sympathy. ‘Emotive responses are unbecoming to servants of the machine.’

Adept Pryce murmured his apologies and continued to scan the route ahead. Bouncing artefacts jittered and capered on screen, resolving into buildings, or feral menials crouched down side streets.

Pryce watched the screens before him with augmetic eyes, clicking and whirring, while what remained of his brain scanned the rudimentary manifold for possible returns. The system malfunctioned, fuzzing in and out, rife with interference.

Something zipped across the manifold, something small and bowl-shaped and impossibly fast. His eyes did not see the same object. He tagged it and packaged the data for review by the commander.

‘What is…?’ the commander began.

He never finished his question.

Pryce never answered.

Plasma lanced into the Leman Russ, breaking apart the Delta-88B. Pryce, the commander and the crew atomised.

The Theorem was lagging behind. Some stubborn part of the machine-spirit, irritated at being awoken so soon after birth, refused to move at full speed.

Reggis Qerat, noospheric officer of the Theorem, was busy trying to explain the problem to his commanding officer on the battalion command Baneblade, Alpha-01A. He winced as static washed out his aural feeds.

‘The 88B has vanished,’ hissed Treyor Gant, sensorii for the Theorem.

‘Explain,’ demanded Commander Luver Whyatt.

‘It’s just gone, sir,’ Gant replied, aghast at the lack of knowledge. Horror rippled through the tank. The lack of knowledge was both disturbing and terrifying.

Qerat attempted to set aside the conversation, to discard the unwelcome emotions washing through him. He focused on the blessed task assigned to him. He returned to his continued conversation with the officer on the Lament. Static again washed into his ears, but now Qerat swore he could hear something under it, something that sounded… other.

He was about to warn his commander, to ask for clarification when two shots hit the tank abeam.

The Theorem ceased to exist.

Vre’valel smiled. It was not a smile of gloating, nor a smile of arrogance or even victory. Such things were beneath one devoted to the Tau’va, beneath him, more fitting for the gue’la he hunted.

His drones surged ahead searching, reporting. In truth he did not need them. The gue’la made no attempt to hide their passage.

Two had already fallen by his hand. Destroyed in the name of the Greater Good, cast down for their rejection and their slavish adherence to a doctrine of intolerance.

Their machines, their ‘tanks’ to use the humans’ ugly tongue, were brutal things. They were creations of arrogance and brawn, little different than the ramshackle machines constructed by the be’gel. They were rattling vehicles of stark lines, dark colours and belligerent intent, nothing like the clean, sweeping curves of a Fire Caste machine, proud with the colours of Fal’shia and the Tau Empire.

Gue’la scattered before him, falling upon their knees at the sight of him and his machine. Screeches broadcast across the communications network, the signature of hunting kroot while the more clipped and professional tones of advancing fire warrior stealth teams kept him abreast of the greater battle abroad. Other voices were noticeable for their absence, as was only proper.

The drones chattered at him as they scouted, providing a detailed map of the surrounding region and the approaching armour column. Vre’valel’s eyes narrowed in concentration as he adapted his plan, his kauyon, to the situation at hand. He issued fresh orders.

He smiled his lipless smile, blue flesh crinkling at the motion.

‘Theorem, be advised you are falling behind. Increase speed and join the line.’ Yuriah Kelt, commanding officer aboard the Alpha-01A, was sick of saying that, sick of hearing Qerat’s worthless apologies. Annoyance, so strong it overwhelmed his emotional dampeners, surged through his systems.

Then the feed to the Theorem vanished. There was no explanation, no report, no hint. Kelt’s irritation grew. Then he noticed something that washed away his annoyance with apprehension.

Two other machines were missing. Kelt tried raising the Indomitable Iron and the Delta-88B on the vox. No responses.

Kelt apprised the tank regiment’s commander, Magos Philis Hurosse, of the situation. Hurosse, arrogance flushing through the noosphere, ordered the Alpha-01A to continue its course. The xenos could not possibly harm such a mighty machine, a Baneblade in the service of the Omnissiah. It was a massive thing, crafted in now defunct forges by Halfusian tech-priests long dead. The 01A rumbled down no particular street, no particular path. It had no need for roads. It made its own. They felt ashamed for punching through the blessed forges, for bringing harm to the planet’s function. They could only pray to the Omnissiah that He would forgive them this sin.

Something akin to pandemonium swept through the Lament, flooding its systems and crew. Tanks were dropping, blessed machines, holy in the eyes of the Omnissiah and His faithful, dead and destroyed without warning, without response.

Outrage and chaos. The tank commander, the battalion head, senior enginseers all were shouting in Lingua Technis and Gothic. They were not afraid for their own safety. Their lives were sacrosanct, protected by the Emperor and the Omnissiah. What brought them to outrage, what brought them to fear, was failure. The deaths of so many blessed machines smacked of failure, smacked of a task left unfinished.

The lights and smoke censers swung and swayed, casting crazed shadows through the hazy interior. Yuriah Kelt frantically searched for the Theorem and found no sign of the tank. The machine was dead. He felt this with the deep certainty of instinct and therefore reviled the feeling. He cycled through the Leman Russ displayed on the auspex.

Two more tanks, two more blessed machines, disappeared from the display before Kelt. The Machine Triumphant and the Delta-86F, mighty Leman Russ tanks, the pinnacle of Imperial and Mechanicus perfection, dead and gone.

Magos Hurosse thundered into the vox demanding something, anything, some small hint that he had control of this situation. He received no response.

Tense minutes passed, tense minutes in which another Leman Russ died. Kelt heard it die this time. Heard it die with his flesh ears. All aboard the Lament did. The lights flickered in sympathetic loss, the machine spirit manifesting the sympathetic pain. Feedback screeched through aural plugs. Static danced along the interior. Pain, electric hot, flooded the crew’s systems. The thing, whatever hunted them, whatever dared challenge the might of the Imperium and the Mechanicus, was close.

Kelt raged, as close to apoplexy as it was possible for a servant blessed by the Omnissiah with extensive augmetics to be. His binaric cants were clipped things, appended with the most urgent and forceful signifiers. Kelt could feel his rage bleeding into the manifold and it affected others within the Baneblade as well. Underlying the rage, underlying that heady emotion, was something deeper, more primal. Kelt realised with a start what it was, for he felt it too. He felt it seeping into the manifold from all in the Baneblade.

The feeling was dread.

Fear made the gue’la weak. Fear made them uncertain, made them commit mistakes. ‘Cull the herd’ demanded the doctrine of the ancient progenitors of the fire caste on T’au, his ancestors. Set the prey to running, to hunkering down. The Imperials reacted exactly as he expected. Tanks were beginning to clump together, beginning to form frightened clusters as they advanced.

This new machine, his new warsuit, was perfect for this purpose, perfect for this hunt.

The guns, his guns, whined as they spooled down.

He stepped over the burning wreckage of the dead gue’la tank. A massive carving, shaped like a human skull, half-machine, half-bone glared down at him, a mark of gue’la superstition.

He could hear his next target rumbling away, streets down, plumes of smoke spitting up from primitive engines.

Vre’valel smiled again. He smiled as he killed, smiled at a task accomplished well, at the advancement of the Greater Good.

Kelt whispered hushed orders into the vox. He urged the Leman Russ commanders to cluster together, to seek safety in numbers.

Even as he did so, he watched tank signifiers wink out, lost on the auspex. The Yllcos Device, STC 1186, Pride of Land, Halfusian Pattern YY245, Glory of Mars all died impotent. None sighted their killer. None fired back in anger. Forty-eight machines remained.

They caught the first sight of the predator hunting them three minutes later.

A junior tech-adept approached Kelt, mumbling honorifics in Lingua Technis, clutching a pict in sweaty palms. Kelt snatched it with an extended mechadendrite.

‘Is this confirmed?’ Kelt demanded, staring wide-eyed at the printout.

The tech-adept responded, affronted, before remembering whom it addressed. ‘The machine is certain. There was no interference.’

Kelt inloaded the data onto the noosphere.

With part of his brain, Kelt analysed the data, parsing it, applying blessed logic to the image. The rest of his brain was dedicated towards keeping the battalion moving to the front line.

Thunder rumbled outside. Thunder or something else dying.

Kelt flinched and what remained of his organic features grew pale. Unbidden, the object captured by the pict emerged into his consciousness.

It was tall, tall and vaguely humanoid. The smoke curled around it like a diaphanous robe, revealing and concealing in the same moment. The sight was horribly intimate. Flashes of light split up the smoke from various points on the humanoid shape. The thunder of guns, so many guns, so many weapons. The humanoid shape should have been reassuring, should have been comforting, but the figure was not squat. This was no Adeptus Astartes dreadnought, no blessed machine crafted by loving human hands.

What he could see of the thing was all clean lines, rounded intersections and malign otherness. The machine, the enemy, the predator that stalked them, had penetrated their lines, moving past the front, striking deep into the manufactorum districts. It was blunting their advance, keeping them from moving forward. What’s more, it was picking them off, killing them, denying them their duty.

The dread afflicting the manifold intensified as Magos Hurosse, safe in the main spire, made his own identifications and conclusions.

The tech-priests redoubled their prayers.

The prayers were reassuring. The twinned tongues of Lingua Technis and High Gothic curled serpentine around each other, drifting through the vox, drifting over the tank’s speakers. They provided a comforting counterpoint to the hammering bangs coming from outside.

They sounded like drums, like rage and anger.

Commander Eryn Berthick, hunched over his station, was half blind. Fire flared. Lightning stabbed. Faces howled in the outer pict viewers.

He could not see their companion, the Delta-66Z, through the thronging menials in Citizen’s Recreational Location 867-AF. His only hint that it was there was the constant vox burbling of Lingua Technis coming from his counterpart in the 66Z.

‘Desist and disperse,’ he announced. His voice was calm, despite his inner turmoil.

The menials ignored him.

‘Folly of Innovation, Why have you stopped?’ whispered that machine-brained bastard, Kelt, in the clipped professional tones of an experienced enginseer. The man had abandoned too much of his humanity to the purity of the machine. While Berthick aspired to such heights, he could not help but loathe the man for his callousness, for his logic. Some day, Omnissiah willing, Berthick would be the same. For now, though, he retained some connection to his humanity.

‘Labour menials, honoured sire. We are swamped by labour menials,’ Berthick said, trying to sound contrite. They were everywhere, thronging the open spaces, mouths wide, voices loud, screaming for rights, screaming for the dissolution of their oppression.

Kelt’s response was a non-verbal scree of nonsense data, the Lingua Technis equivalent of a derisive snort.

‘You will advance,’ Kelt ordered.

Berthick canted his compliance. Their progress was slow at first.

‘Desist and disperse,’ the commander tried once more. Again he failed.

He nodded to one of his subordinates and the bass roar of side-mounted bolter sponsons commenced. The tank rocked as it ground over menials too slow to scatter out of the way.

He could hear the Delta-66Z doing the same.

Berthick, ridden with guilt at the wanton slaughter, began to relay recorded tech-prayers.

He was still praying, still broadcasting, still killing, when something thudded into the Folly of Innovation from the back.

The Leman Russ lurched forward, treads screeching as they failed to latch on to the rockcrete surface of the road. Crew flew from their seats, interface sockets spurting oil and blood as they were violently disconnected. Sparks flew as machine systems failed. The machine spirit growled from the engine, then coughed, wheezed and sputtered out.

The screen blinked at him in angry red letters.

Rear armour hit.

Eryn Berthick felt blood and oil dribble down his face, smelled the rich fluid in his nose, tasted it on the air with multiple inbuilt sensors.

‘Dead. We’re all dead,’ someone moaned, half wailing with despair and fear.

Berthick dragged himself forward, his mechanical legs broken and unresponsive. He was searching, hoping, praying, that some function yet remained within the Folly of Innovation. The power flickered.

He could hear a fierce whining sound from outside. Heavy footfalls thumped into the ground. Something came close, some cursed thing.

The commander’s hands stretched before a console. He wept as he failed to reach.

The screen before him flickered as outer pict-viewers cycled through default modes. They saw nothing and transmitted nothing.

Berthick screamed with effort as he felt his life fade out.

Finally, he reached the console.

He shook as he typed, as he ordered the machine to perform its holy purpose.

The pict-viewers outside ceased their trembling and began to function.

They were still transmitting a minute later when the xenos machine outside opened fire and terminated the Folly of Innovation.

Kelt watched as the enemy machine killed the Folly of Innovation, screens flickering as the machine spirit processed the images. It stood, staring down at the outer picters, its own inscrutable lenses clicking and whirring. It took one step forward, flames backlighting it. The tiny head cocked to the side as if puzzled. Muzzle flare distorted the image, but the looming xenos machine was the same deep red as the previous image. If there were differences in between this machine and the one in the pict before, Kelt did not notice them. Logic dictated that they must be the same. He searched for some inkling of humanity, some anthropomorphic quality that would make it familiar.

There was nothing. The machine was so different, so other, so xenos, that it nearly broke the Mechanicus adept’s mind.

But Kelt smiled. Something akin to joy spread through the manifold. They had spotted the machine, the picts clear as they could be amid the night and the fire. What was more important, however, is that they now knew where it was.

The bait was set. The kauyon, his hunt, his mission, neared completion. The gue’la had proved easy to predict.

They believed him to be in a gathering space, a square portion of the city devoid of buildings. He could hear their chatter over their crude communications networks. He paid no attention to the words. He listened only to their tone, to their panic.

They tried to hide it beneath crowing victory calls. They thought him cornered. They thought him easy to kill. They were wrong.

Vre’valel would teach them the error of their ways, the price of rejecting the Greater Good.

His treads were heavy, for this machine lacked the perfect subtlety of a stealth suit. He had no need for stealth now. He wanted the gue’la to know that he was near, to know that death claimed them. Each beat of their hearts would be a gasping thump declaring that the extent of their mistake was known.

There was no real passion behind this. Fear was merely another tool of the hunt. There was no hatred felt for the gue’la, only sadness, only a peculiar form of regret. To reject the Tau’va was madness, madness bred from wilful ignorance.

But it was not his role to question. His shas’o had spoken. The gue’la were dead. Their world belonged to the Tau Empire.

All that remained was to teach them this.

The Halfusian Pattern 436 was the first to enter Citizen’s Recreational Location 867-AF. It was the first to die. The xenos machine fired once. The accuracy was stunning. Bright plasma, painfully blue and white, lanced straight up the 436’s gun barrel and immolated the crew within.

Two other tanks entered from different side streets, guns already firing, machine prayers broadcast loud from external voxes. Third off the Line and Machined Glory joined them, their own guns speaking, their own voxes transmitting the same holy prayers.

The xenos machine stood unmoved, undaunted. Plasma streamed from mounted guns while drones rotated in complex configurations before it. Each shot from the Leman Russ impacted against a shimmering shield.

Each shot was answered by the warsuit.

It wheeled and turned, killing everything it faced.

Leman Russ tanks were reduced to burning scrap metal.

Kelt, minutes away in the Alpha-01A, listened, watched and trembled.

He screamed from his command throne, reverting to the flesh-voice of his youth, stress overwhelming his augmented brain. ‘Kill it!’

Kelt fed tanks into the square piecemeal, trying to overwhelm the xenos battlesuit, following the orders of the regimental command magos.

He was sending them like grox to the slaughter.

Options appeared on the manifold, suggested logic parameters, detailed plans for similar situations. Kelt watched as Hurosse dismissed them all one by one. The magos inloaded only rage, shunting all true logic.

The battalion converged on the square, engines rumbling, treads screeching, turrets thundering, machines dying.

‘How much longer until we kill the damn thing? How many more minutes until we hit the square?’ Kelt demanded, flesh-voice quivering.

‘Two minutes, honoured sire,’ came the reply from a robed enginseer.

Kelt nodded, his command throne gripped tight with metal hands.

Kelt dedicated part of his vocal functions to whisper benedictions to the Omnissiah, praying for more speed, praying for victory, praying for death.

With swift haptic commands, Yuriah Kelt sent more men and more machines to their deaths.

The test had begun. This was it, the climax of his kauyon.

This was what the hunters called the Rai’kor Kau’va, the Moment of Perfect Patience. The moment of exposure, of endurance. The hunt lived or died here.

More of the gue’la machines challenged him. More of the gue’la machines died. But with every second, their numbers grew. With every second he stood more chance to be hit, to be slowed down.

Vre’valel’s smile became a grimace. His accompanying drones chattered at him, their intelligences excited.

What they reported did little to ease Vre’valel’s mind, to ease the tension of the moment.

He blinked to shield his eyes from another tank’s death, railgun discharge ringing.

Another.

The tank flew backwards, burning, splintering, dying. It erupted in a mushroom cloud of flame and dirty smoke.

Another.

The gue’la vehicle ceased all forward momentum. Smoke, dark and greasy pouring out of interior compartments.

Another.

The cannon rotated on his left arm, spitting death, plunking into the gue’la machine. The human tank blazed with fire as fuel tanks combusted.

Each dying, each exploding in a dozen different permutations.

Some died with screams, others with deafening sounds. Some merely froze, smoke emerging from ports in the hull. But what mattered was that each was dead. Each was silenced.

This was a challenge the gue’la could not ignore, not while he stood before him, the object of their wrath, of their emotion. Missiles thudded down into them, killing them. The gue’la did not note the direction they came from, only the destruction they wrought.

The capacity of the Riptide battlesuit for destruction was prodigious, its tactical applications perfect for this moment. The height, the sheer promise of such a machine was almost intoxicating. It was graceful in a way that could not be equalled. The majesty, the righteousness, of the Tau’va spoke through his will.

Vre’valel grimaced, but the smile lurked beneath, waiting to emerge.

The bait had been taken. The kauyon was ready.

The gue’la machines died, but the true prize, the true purpose of this hunt was almost within sight.

The faster Leman Russ tanks rushed forward, pushed in to face the warsuit, to bring it down. They were failing. They were dying.

Kelt was drooling now. The magos’s eyes twitched. The only sign of continued intellect was his presence on the manifold, the continued hissed cants directed to the crew.

Kelt could not stop shaking, irritation flashing through his mind at the frailty of his human psyche.

Dread consumed the manifold. It was a living thing, a growing thing, spreading like infection. Corrupted data corroded the manifold in its wake.

Five tanks, five glorious machines remained. They were the Machine’s First Law, Alpha-45X, Forgefire, the Standard Pattern, and of course the Alpha-01A. The other tank commanders chattered at him, nagging, seeking his attention. Kelt could give them no response. They were afraid. Their armour was vulnerable. Yuriah Kelt felt glad that he sat within the 01A, its armour proof of the manifest destiny of man and the benevolence of the Omnissiah.

The smaller machines clustered around the Baneblade like juvenile bovine around their mother. The arterial they advanced down, the largest road that entered the square, trembled beneath their combined treads.

Kelt could see the flashing ahead, the smoke drifting from the battle. Five hundred metres until entry.

Three hundred.

One hundred.

The Standard Pattern entered first, almost cautious, fearful. The xenos machine made no movement, just stood. Its very existence was a naked affront to the sacred machines of the Omnissiah and His ordained servants, the Adeptus Mechanicus.

The 45X followed close, edging into the square, shouldering aside the burning wreck of the Folly of Innovation.

Kelt was silent aboard the Alpha-01A, suddenly unwilling to open fire.

The other two escort tanks rolled in, forming up, two to a side with a gap in the middle.

The Alpha-01A did not so much as slide into the gap as conquer it, dominating the space. It sat there, full of menace, full of threat, bristling with killing power.

Silence owned the interior of the Baneblade, of each of the Imperial machines. The smell of sweat, the significance of every movement, every sight, every sensory input, each of these took on new meanings.

Everyone within stared at Kelt as the magos twitched. Everyone in the Baneblade waited with hushed breath, sweat trickling, the ritual smoke oppressive and cloying.

Finally Kelt made some small movement, a slight twitch of his hand. Accompanying it was a quiet order on the manifold, a series of numbers in Lingua Technis.

All the remaining tanks opened fire.

The moment arrived.

The Rai’kor Kau’va was ended. The Moment of Perfect Patience passed, the near-climax of the mon’wern’a. Now was the time of the true hunt, the trap to be sprung. The gue’la had taken his bait.

Vre’valel gritted his teeth as his Riptide rocked backwards. One foot splayed behind him, granting him balance.

He was forced back. A shell broke through the whirling drones, impacting against the suit’s shoulder. The concussive force rippled through the suit’s systems, pain sympathetically lancing into his own shoulder.

One step back.

A missile flared from the back of the large gue’la machine. One of the shield drones, chattering rudimentary messages to its fellows, intercepted the missile. The ensuing explosion blinded Vre’valel for a microsecond.

Two steps.

Another tank round broke through. Wrenching metal sounded loud, screeching. Vre’valel grunted a single exhalation, an expression of pain.

Two shield drones exploded. The kinetic impacts taxed the shield to its limit, blowing out drones. The shield was dangerously close to failing.

He twisted at the waist, attempting to minimise his profile, attempting to manoeuvre. The suit warned him, warned him of the rate of fire, of the number of seconds it could sustain this bombardment. He did not have much time left.

Another of the shield drones died in a storm of sparks.

Vre’valel transmitted a single word. The word was simple, as simple an order as Vre’valel had ever issued. ‘Come,’ he said through a grimace.

He received no acknowledgment. There was no need for one.

Smoke, vapours given off by the crude propellants in the gue’la armour, obscured the square, left it coated in a blanket of greasy grey.

He returned no fire. He merely waited the attack out, waited for the gue’la fire to slacken as he knew it would. Their sensors were crude things, easily disrupted by adverse conditions.

The thunder of guns slowed and then ceased. Gue’la tank commanders were trying to find him, to see if he was dead, to ascertain the efficacy of their own craft. They waited for the smoke to clear.

Shas’vre Fal’shia Bas’reh Valel did not.

Fire flared as missiles deployed, trailing brightness through the thick grey smoke. Five missiles, crafted by the genius of the Earth caste, guided by the perfect technology of the Tau’va, lanced towards the gue’la machines.

He could hear them screaming. Two desperately tried to break away, to run, to survive this doom that came for them. Their treads squealed as they reversed.

It availed them nothing.

The missiles altered their course and struck down with clamorous fury.

This was a nightmare. This was the doom waiting for servants of the machine who failed in their function. This was punishment made manifest.

The air reeked. It stank of fear and panic and dread.

They were dead, killed by the xenos machine.

Kelt uncontrollably trembled, shook, moaned.

‘How?’ someone asked, over and over again. Kelt focused on the voice, saw its source: a robed enginseer carved in half by whipsawing cabling. The electrics still sparked in the pool of blood and oil surrounding the dying woman.

Their four escorts were dead, slain without exacting any vengeance.

Yuriah Kelt, tech-priest of the Mechanicus, commanding battalion magos aboard the Alpha-01A, stared without seeing. The man, shocked, aghast, appalled, stumbled to his feet. He didn’t remember falling.

He sucked in a juddering breath.

A console exploded, sparks flaring against the darkness. Bodies lay everywhere while servitors mumbled for now defunct orders.

Fires spat. Pitch flowed. Oil dripped.

Someone gibbered nearby, a scree of numbers and letters; jumbled, senseless, useless data. Kelt stumbled through the crew compartment. Each new blink/click of his eyes bringing with it a new sight of devastation and destruction. He saw the severed head of a tech-adept, still mouthing words, still trying to exload data.

A disembodied arm clutched at a haptic interface, metal fingers still drumming at the keys. Others crawled through the space, alive, bewildered, wounded.

The manifold was a dead thing, collapsed, gone.

Lights strobed.

On.

Off.

On.

Off.

Red and black, throbbing, as insistent as any migraine. Kelt felt a thrum of joy. The Alpha-01A yet lived, its armour proof against the predatory corruption of the xenos, its machine spirit doggedly refusing to succumb.

The lights returned with a start. The air scrubbers kicked in, bringing with it the faint hint of smoke, but the Alpha-01A resumed blessed function.

The tank jerked forward.

Magos Kelt barked out orders in holy machine cant. His voice was assured, steady.

The guns opened up. The Lament answered again.

Vre’valel weathered the incoming storm. The last gue’la machine thundered towards him, driving through the smoke.

Vre’valel felt no panic, felt no emotion. The mon’wern’a, the killing blow, the end of his kauyon, this was that moment.

Unseen in the barrage, unwitnessed by the gue’la, flew two sets of drones. Their deep red paint was unbattered, unchipped by gue’la guns. They chattered at Vre’valel.

The shas’vre’s smile returned, dry blue flesh crinkling.

Behind the drones, striding down streets that minutes earlier saw the Imperial armour advance, came the rest of his ta’ro’cha, their weaponry still smoking, vapours still sliding off their shoulders.

The Imperial tank fell into stunned silence, guns smoking. The main barrel dipped, almost an acknowledgement of defeat. The tau Riptides dipped their own guns in turn, an acknowledgment of the tenacity of their foe.

They opened fire. The combined might of the Tau’va spoke through their guns. The Alpha-01A died as it was born: in fire.

Vre’t’olku, her heart burning, was the first to speak. Her words were filled with the passion that ruled her, that made her a productive member of the fire caste. ‘Blind fools,’ she said.

Vre’valel said nothing. He waited and observed.

Vre’karayyim, second of the ta’ro’cha, displayed the naiveté of his thoughts, of his race, with his response. He articulated the regret and sadness they felt at the necessity of their war. ‘Why do they resist, shas’vre? Why do they reject the Tau’va?’

Vre’valel waited a moment before responding. He allowed them to ruminate on their thoughts, on the ideas they espoused.

‘Because they are blind,’ he finally answered. ‘They lack patience. They are old. We are young.’

Words hissed across the cadre’s communication network, seeking him, and his ta’ro’cha. They were needed, the orders claimed. Another gue’la armour column had been spotted. Another threat to the hegemony of the Tau’va needed blunting.

Shas’vre Fal’shia Bas’reh Valel strode away from the burning wreck of the gue’la vehicle. He did not wait for the rest of the ta’ro’cha to join. He trusted in their following.

‘Come,’ Vre’valel said. ‘The kauyon begins again.’

The fire warrior’s face was frozen in the agony of dying. Strung up on a section of electro-wire, his body was a broken tangle of flesh and scorched carapace. He spasmed, twitching like a macabre puppet as the electrical current played through his limbs. The white moon motif on his ruined shoulder guard was barely visible but marked the warrior as belonging to the Seventh Hunter Cadre.

‘Ta’ma,’ Kal’va cursed. He gritted his teeth in impotent rage. He had never mastered the art of detached observance. Honour demanded that he deliver mercy shots to those still clinging to life. It pained him to stand idly by and watch those of his caste suffer. The sniper took a breath and steeled himself. There was nothing he could do.

He was nowhere near the massacre site.

Kal’va tapped the dial on the back of his glove. In response, the image the spotter drone was overlaying onto his helmet display changed, panning out to give him a wider view of the valley.

The tau dead stretched in every direction. Tens, dozens, hundreds of broken bodies were strewn across the bloodied earth. The ruined hulls of Hammerhead tanks and Devilfish carriers lay in smoking craters. Of the enemy, there was no sign. The Hunter Cadre had been ambushed and destroyed before they could respond.

At Kal’va’s direction, the spotter drone shifted location and moved north up the valley. The drone stopped a few feet from its original position, its auto-sensors focusing on movement ahead.

He couldn’t see what the drone did. A pall of smoke and dust hung in the air, conspiring with the dense rock and foliage to obscure the target. Switching to the visual feed from the secondary spotter, he caught the first glimpse of his prey.

Seven Imperial tanks were snaking their way through the canyon. Two bipedal walkers kept pace, one on either side, protecting the flanks. Three of the tanks had squat turrets, while the other four were troop carriers with little in the way of offensive weaponry. Each was painted in hues of green and brown that masked them against the landscape.

‘Ta’ma va’ra,’ Kal’va growled as he watched one of the walkers clamber over a broken Crisis battlesuit. Looking down at his controller, a cluster of blue icons flashed quizzically as his squadron of gun drones awaited orders.

‘Patience,’ he muttered. ‘Patience.’

The drones were not advanced enough to respond to voice commands. Kal’va spoke for his own benefit. Only those of the fire caste who could temper the flame in their breasts rose to the rank of sniper, but the urge to fight first and gather intelligence later never truly left them.

Tasking the secondary spotter drone to follow the convoy, Kal’va switched to the feed being transmitted from a third drone.

Hovering just below the cloud layer, the drone was well placed to make out the inscriptions on the tanks’ hulls.

‘Cadian 101st. Emperor’s Wrath. Foe Bane.’

Kal’va mouthed the words as the drone relayed them to him, forcing his tongue around the unfamiliar sounds. Unlike the envoys and traders of the water caste, he had only the most basic grasp of the human language – just enough to track targets.

The drone ignored the middle tanks; their hulls carried numbers, instead of names.

‘Terra’s Guardian.’

Kal’va recorded the name of the rearguard vehicle and rotated the altitude dial on his drone controller.

The Imperial convoy shrank into the distance as the image on his display panned out, the tanks merging into a single geometric shape as their outlines blended together.

Tapping the dial again, Kal’va ordered the hovering spotter drone to climb into the atmosphere. The image continued to zoom out, the convoy receding until barely visible, a single blip on a display that mapped the entire region.

Kal’va already knew that the tanks were headed for the Imperial base. The ethereals believed that they sought to reinforce it before the tau could muster another attack. He didn’t care about the reason, as long as they passed within range of his rifle.

Manipulating the information on his display, he plotted the convoy’s most likely trajectory. Human protocol was rigid, predictable. Extrapolating their path was a simple matter. When negotiating hostile territory the humans always took the fastest route that presented the least resistance, travelling in as straight a line as possible. In this case, the convoy would cut through the Arav’la Pass and turn left over the Gal’ta Plains.

‘Ma va’ra,’ Kal’va swore again. He needed them to turn right.

Never chase the prey. Better to adjust its course. Kal’va instinctively touched the helmet mag-locked to his belt as he remembered Sas’la’s words. He wished that his team leader had managed to follow the path he had advocated.

EARLIER

Kal’va pressed his eye to his scope, knowing that Sas’la and Or’shara did the same. Viewed through the blue lens, the human buildings appeared softer than their rough-hewn designs should have allowed. Unlike the smooth domes fashioned by the earth caste, the humans built in harsh angles.

The tau warrior listened to the wind as it blew through the long grass that concealed him. If they stood that long, the wind would erode the human structures and strike them until their corners were smooth and their hideousness was worn away. He ground his teeth in disgust. It was just like the humans to waste time standing against the inevitable.

‘I have no shot,’ Kal’va whispered into the audio receiver in his helmet. Slowly he rolled to his right.

Pinning down a single individual amongst the throng of labourers, soldiers and vehicles swarming the stronghold was proving no easy task. For three days he had observed the human base, waiting for a clear shot at the target.

For their part, the humans had not been idle. Under the direction of their yellow-armoured allies, they had steadily improved the compound’s defences, widening trench lines, bracing redoubts and erecting firing positions.

‘My honour blade for a spotter drone,’ chimed Or’shara’s voice in Kal’va’s ear. The other sniper was secreted in the long grass eighteen spans to his left.

‘Were we so blessed… No shot.’

Kal’va moved again, continuing to flank right. Had the base not been studded with sensor towers and weapon turrets, then a pair of spotter drones would have located the target and extrapolated the optimal firing position. It had been a long time since Kal’va had needed to hunt the old fashioned way.

‘Visual. The target is in the upper concourse. Sas’la, you should have the angle.’ Or’shara’s voice preceded a raft of tactical data, pinpointing the target’s location on Kal’va’s helmet display.

‘He is obscured. I cannot get a shot. I am moving closer.’ Sas’la’s tone was measured but Kal’va knew that he was anxious. Their team leader had not been the same since the massacre at Yu’vra. Commander Jol’Monn had been his mentor. His death had scorched Sas’la’s spirit, robbing him of stillness. He needed to kill the enemy commander. Nothing else would settle his disquiet.

‘Stay where you are, Sas’la,’ hissed Kal’va. ‘Any further and they will detect you.’ He felt a knot of apprehension as the blip denoting Sas’la on his helm-display moved towards the enemy formation. ‘Sas’la, stop.’

The words had barely left Kal’va’s mouth when weapons fire erupted from the compound.

‘Ve’na!’ Cursing, Kal’va adjusted his scope and took aim at a group of enemy firing at Sas’la.

‘Stay hidden!’ said Sas’la. ‘On the blood of the auns, stay down!’

Kal’va’s finger hovered on the trigger of his rifle. The Imperial base was swarming with targets. He could kill dozens of them before they pinpointed his location.

‘I will fire and withdraw, distracting them from you,’ he said.

‘I am not the mission, Kal’va. Remember the mission,’ said Sas’la. ‘Kal’va!’

‘I hear.’

Kal’va eased his finger from the trigger. Even with his support, Sas’la’s chances were slight. He would not dishonour his shas’ui’s memory by ignoring his final command.

‘The earth keep you,’ he whispered.

‘May your fire always burn,’ Sas’la replied.

Kal’va tracked Sas’la as he rose from under a clump of leaves and ran directly away from him and Or’shara. Kal’va’s heart pumped faster with every step Sas’la took, as though it were he himself running for his life.

Dozens of human soldiers in green-brown fatigues spilled from the base in pursuit. Sas’la kept running, his rifle clutched tight to his chest, the gap between him and his pursuers widening as they scanned for emergent threats. If he was lucky he would make it into the forest, and felt the calming swell of hope as he began to think that perhaps–

Five yellow-armoured warriors descended on pillars of fire, landing in tight formation around Sas’la. Without pause, he swung his rifle up to fire. No sooner was it shouldered than a roaring chainsword stung out and sheared the barrel in half.

‘The fire consume us both!’ shouted Sas’la.

Kal’va’s body tensed as he watched Sas’la reach for the grenade on his belt.

‘No!’ screamed Kal’va.

A single round struck Sas’la full in the face, punching through his armoured helm and driving his brains out through the back of his skull.

NOW

Kal’va unclipped Sas’la’s helmet and turned it over in his hands, running his fingers over the ragged hole in the faceplate.

‘Your lessons were well learned, shas’ui,’ he said, touching the helmet to his temple before he respectfully replaced it on his belt.

Turning his attention back to the drone controller, Kal’va activated the squadron of shield drones he’d dispatched to the Arav’la Pass ahead of the human convoy. It was a risky strategy, but he was certain that the drones’ power output was too slight to register on the human scanners.

His helm’s tactical overlay flickered as it updated. Kal’va allowed himself a smile. The display showed no change. The icon denoting the convoy continued to blink as it edged towards the pass. He watched it a moment, taking joy in the deception.

Kal’va adjusted the drones’ power output, pushing it up past maximum. The shield drones flashed onto his overlay, their increased energy signatures making them appear like a squadron of battle tanks. The drones would soon overload and short out, but Kal’va was confident they’d last long enough to convince the humans to alter course.

He cycled back through the visual feeds from the spotter drones overlooking the convoy. It had stopped. Activating the nearest drone’s vocal sensors, Kal’va scanned the rear-most carrier for sound. There was a hiss of static before fragmentary words resolved in the human language.

‘By the Emperor…’

‘We’ve stopped.’

‘We can’t be there already.’

The voices sounded confused. They were without clarity or purpose. Kal’va cut the feed and directed the drone to scan the next carrier.

‘Trooper, vox ahead and find out what in the Emperor’s name is going on.’

The voice was authoritative but Kal’va detected anxiety. It was not the one.

‘Enemy formations detected ahead.’

‘How many?’

‘Hard to tell, sir. Looks like a squadron of vehicles. Could be armour.’

The third carrier was a hive of audio signals, but there was too much indecision – the target would have been firmer, more decisive. The drone shifted its scanner to the lead carrier. All that Kal’va could hear was a faint whisper of static.

‘Nothing?’ he muttered to himself as he edged the drone closer to the convoy, trusting in its stealth field to disguise its presence. Easing his fingers across the control panel, Kal’va fine-tuned the drone’s sensors.

A small spike of data chimed on his display as the drone picked up a trace of audio. Kal’va examined the signal. It was as if the sound was locked within something that sat inside the vehicle: a shell within a shell. He smiled.

‘Found you.’

Sending the drone back into the clouds, Kal’va watched as the bipedal scout vehicles split off from the convoy. Sentinels. The walkers were moving at speed towards the phantom energy signatures he’d created.

‘Predictable.’

Sending the drone gliding after them, Kal’va watched as the clumsy walkers bounded across the plain towards his over-charged shield drones. The drone fed Kal’va a stream of audio from the walkers.

‘One grid out, no enemy contact. Advancing.’

The hydraulics and pistons in the walkers’ legs fired bursts of gas that made them sound like a pair of panting kroot hounds as they sped up.

‘Approaching grid two.’

A warning glyph stained Kal’va’s display as the walker’s weapons cycled for firing.

‘Turning into grid three.’

Kal’va let his hands dart across his control console, activating the three heavy gun drones that lay in wait for the walkers. The drones glided up from the ground like leaves in the wind. Idling at attack height, the drones performed system checks and cycled their burst cannons. The weapons were primarily designed to shred enemy infantry formations and were unlikely to critically damage the walkers, but burst cannons threw out a blistering number of shots and made a lot of noise, making them more than adequate for Kal’va’s needs.

The three blue signals on Kal’va’s display blinked twice: the drones were ready.

‘For the Greater Good,’ he said.

Using the markerlight on the hovering spotter drone, Kal’va fed targeting information to the gun drones and ordered them to attack.

The three drones sliced through the air in front of the walkers, burst cannons chattering into life as they dowsed them in a hail of energy bolts.

‘Enemy!’ The lead pilot thumbed the trigger on his control stick and let loose with his autocannon.

‘Left!’ The second walker spun in an attempt to track the drones, stitching a line of carnage across the hillside with its blazing weapon.

The drones split up, encircling the walkers, firing and displacing before the pilots could draw a bead on them.

The lead sentinel pilot voxed a hurried update to the convoy.

‘We’re under heavy fire. Multiple enemy units dug into the hillside. They have us surrounded.’

‘Classification?’

‘No confirmed visual. All we can see is the flash from their Emperor-damned weapons!’

The two sentinels formed up back to back, turning clockwise together in a brutal dance as their weapons continued to kick out rounds.

‘Enemy armour?’ asked their commander.

‘No sign of any yet. Best guess, infantry with light munitions.’

Kal’va switched his viewer to the targeting feed from one of the gun drones. Cutting the power to the drone’s weapons, he routed all of its energy to its propulsion system, and propelled it at full speed towards the sentinels.

‘Victory through sacrifice,’ said Kav’la. Tapping on the controller, he ordered the drone to self-destruct.

It exploded before it could collide with the lead walker.

‘Correction,’ said the lead sentinel pilot. ‘Heavy rounds incoming. Possible armour.’

‘Pull back,’ ordered the commander. ‘Regroup now.’

‘Sir.’

The walkers stopped firing, turned around and loped back towards the convoy.

Rejoined by the bipedal vehicles, the convoy abandoned their previous route and headed towards the forest.

Kal’va’s spotter drones fed him a constant stream of information as they tracked the Imperial vehicles.

The terrain was rough, forcing the tanks to slow to a crawl. The ground was marred by deep craters and the remnants of the massive trees that had once covered eighty per cent of the planet’s surface. The wood from their trunks was ideal for reinforcing the assortment of earthworks popular with humans, and a great many of them had been felled over the course of the conflict.

The convoy slowed further as it advanced, hindered by the wreckage of both tau and Imperial battle tanks.

Kal’va recognised the markings on one of the ruined Hammerheads – a black circle bisected by a crimson spear. It belonged to the Kais’shi, an elite fire warrior cadre who excelled in armoured warfare. The humans would have suffered in taking the pass.

He watched the convoy as it traversed the forest and emerged in the low-sided valley beyond. A kink in the rockline forced the tanks to slow almost to a stop, their hulls sparking as they squeezed along the narrow path.

‘Lead stopping. Watch for threats,’ said one of the humans inside the vehicles.

The lead battle tank signalled back down the line as it slowed to a stop. The path immediately ahead of the convoy was barred by the burned-out shell of a huge battle tank and the rotting carcasses of dozens of great knarlocs.

‘Emperor’s Wrath, clearing a way through.’

Kal’va listened to the vox transmission from the lead tank as it broke formation and rumbled forward, its hull-mounted weapon setting the ground ablaze. Great sheets of liquid fire washed harmlessly over the wrecked tank hull, robbing the knarloc carcasses of their flesh and turning their bones to ash.

Angling its dozer blade, the Emperor’s Wrath crashed into the side of its stricken cousin, its tracks spitting mud into the air as they struggled against the dead weight of the massive vehicle. After several moments, the smaller tank edged the wreck aside enough to allow the convoy to pass.

‘Obstruction cleared. Checking ahead.’

The Emperor’s Wrath continued forward while the rest of the tanks waited, the walkers buzzing up and down the convoy’s flanks like impatient vespid.

‘Not long now,’ Kal’va said to the sniper drone hovering by his head, patting its rail rifle by way of emphasis.

The Wrath stopped in front of a line of tooth-shaped barriers and voxed its report.

‘Armoured tank traps ahead,’ hissed the feed from the spotter drone.

‘Pull back seven yards,’ said a new voice across the comms, deep and resonant. The Wrath pulled back.

Kal’va smiled and tasked one of the spotter drones to survey the forward transport. The feed on his helm display distorted for a moment as the drone refocused. The hydraulics at the base of the carrier’s door fired, lowering the ramp until it met the earth with a dull thud that tossed dust into the air. There was a figure in the doorway, bent double in order that the carrier could accommodate its massive bulk. The figure straightened and strode down the ramp.

Through his drone, Kal’va looked closer. The giant was encased in sun-golden armour, his breastplate stamped with an ash-black eagle. Impossibly large pauldrons crowned his titanic shoulders, the left emblazoned with a single black fist.

Kal’va had been right before. The lead carrier contained his target.

Space Marine. Highly resistant to damage. Heavy ordnance and rail weaponry recommended. He ignored the tactical data streaming from the drone and touched his hand to Sas’la’s helmet, his fingers lingering over the hole in the faceplate. He knew exactly how dangerous they were.

The Space Marine pulled out a hand-held device and began scanning for threats. As a precaution, Kal’va shut down all of his low-level drones, leaving only the one in the sky active. He knew of more than one pathfinder team who had thought themselves hidden in ambush, only to be detected and slaughtered by Space Marines.

Kal’va felt his fists bunch in controlled rage, the barking round that had ended Sas’la still ringing in his mind.

You must be the scope, never the muzzle. Passive and observant, it is you who must show who death can take. Kal’va let Sas’la’s words calm him. The shas’ui had always known how to temper his subordinate’s fire.

‘The earth keep you with me,’ he whispered.

‘Scans are clear,’ said the Space Marine. ‘No explosive devices detected.’ The huge warrior approached a fallen knarloc that lay slumped over the tank traps, and clamped his crushing gauntlets around the beast’s face.

The spotter drone detected the faintest hint of sound as micro-servos in the Space Marine’s armour lent him the strength to drag the beast out of the way.

The giant figure knelt next to the trap and used his hands to dig away some of the earth around its base. A warning flashed across Kal’va’s display as the warrior affixed a bulky cylinder to the tank trap. Ignoring it, he watched as the Space Marine took a step back.

A moment later, the charge detonated, obliterating the tank trap and showering the area with fiery rock and bone shrapnel. Kal’va winced as he remodulated the drone’s transmitter.

‘Commander K’yna, the humans have passed the final obstacle,’ he said.

‘You have held them long enough,’ said K’yna. ‘We have exited the area. I free you from duty. Now do as you must.’

Kal’va nodded and cut the feed. There was nothing more to be said. He would have his vengeance.

EARLIER

Sas’la’s body hit the ground, the blip denoting him on Kal’va’s display blinking out.

‘Kal’va, follow!’ bellowed Or’sha as he rose from concealment, his rail rifle tucked tight against his chin.

‘Or’sha, don’t!’

‘By the Eternal Circle!’ Or’sha’s first round struck Sas’la’s killer in the chest, blasting a chunk from his armour and rocking him backwards. His second finished the job, cutting clean through the Space Marine’s neck.

‘Dar’va,’ spat Kal’va as he pushed up onto his feet. He would not let Or’sha die alone. ‘For the Greater Good!’

The pair of snipers advanced through the long grass at pace, firing with every step. Sas’la’s murderers turned to respond, but were overwhelmed by the torrent of rail rounds that crashed against their armoured breastplates, shoulder guards and helmets. They died without firing a shot.

‘Or’sha!’ Kal’va motioned to their west as threat icons swam onto his display. ‘Enemy.’

As one, he and Or’sha pivoted to their left, ejecting the spent power packs from their rifles and slamming in fresh ones without breaking stride.

‘There!’ Or’sha motioned to the press of yellow armour emerging over the ridge.

Three more Space Marines were caught off guard and gunned down, dead before they could react. The rest took cover behind some large rocks and returned fire.

‘Keep them pinned,’ grunted Or’sha.

Kal’va fired another round. ‘We cannot stay here,’ he said.

‘What do you suggest?’

‘We go forward.’ Kal’va detached a photon grenade from his belt and threw it over-arm towards the Space Marines. The grenade exploded in a cacophony of sound and multi-spectrum light. The Space Marines stumbled from cover, disorientated, and fired blind.

Kal’va and Or’sha dived forward under the fusillade of rounds, rolling as they landed, rising with their weapons ready. Sighting down their rifles, they executed the remainder of the Space Marines with cold efficiency, firing single rounds through each of their skulls.

‘Forward,’ urged Or’sha. ‘We can still engage the target.’ He pivoted to his right and turned back towards the human compound.

Kal’va nodded, fed his last power pack into his rifle and kept pace behind Or’sha. He wondered how much further they would get.

A blue flash tore through the trees ahead of them, striking the ground beside Or’sha and burning away the meat of his thigh. He called out in pain as the wound forced him onto one knee.

Red warnings filled Kal’va’s display as the number of enemy approaching grew by the second.

‘Kal’va, finish thi–’ Or’sha was cut short as a bolt-round exploded through his chest.

‘No!’ Kal’va opened fire, ignorant of his dwindling ammunition as he blasted away at the trees. He ceased firing as his rifle chimed in warning. He had only one round left.

A hulking figure emerged from between the ruined trees. Its segmented armour was thicker, forged of heavier plate than that worn by the other Space Marines, and the colour of spilled blood.

A strobing identification icon blinked on Kal’va’s helm display – the target had come to him.

‘Duty and vengeance,’ he said.

Sighting between the giant Space Marine’s glowering eyes, he fired.

His round burst in the air a hand’s span before the target, absorbed by a crackling energy field.

The Space Marine laughed, raising his glowing pistol and sending a bolt of blue energy towards Kal’va.

NOW

Kal’va ignored the warning, still lost to the past. He had never stopped questioning how he had managed to survive that day. That the auns had willed it should have been enough. But something within him needed to know what had drawn the Space Marines away. He needed to know that his fate was determined by his skill and his rifle.

The second chime broke him from his reverie – the convoy was approaching.

‘To see and not act is to dream,’ he recited. ‘To act is to burn with life. In the auns’ name, we light the fire.’ He whispered the oath of battle and activated the remainder of the drone squadrons he had deployed around the valley.

To his left, a sniper drone whistled twice, requesting targeting information.

‘Patience, Two,’ he murmured, stroking the sleek curve of the drone’s body. ‘You will kill soon.’

He worked the dials of the drone controller, marking deployment coordinates and attack trajectories for the sniper and gun drones, and directed the trio of shield bearers to form a loose perimeter around him.

The drones chimed in acknowledgement and glided off to fulfil his commands.

Leaving the controller at the top of the ridge, Kal’va eased down onto his belly, and crawled down the embankment to his rifle.

Nestling the weapon against his cheek, he activated the scope. Looking through the scope, he saw the enemy for the first time. Despite himself, he was impressed that the convoy had held formation over such trying terrain, the troop carriers remaining sandwiched between the battle tanks and the walkers stalking their flanks.

‘Steady as earth.’ Kal’va began the rite of firing. ‘Fluid like water.’ He reached forward with his left hand and stroked the rifle’s barrel. ‘Whisper like air.’ Making a final adjustment to the scope, he activated the gun’s underslung markerlight.

‘Burn like fire.’

Kal’va closed his eyes. When he opened them again the lead battle tank was centred in his sights. He fired the markerlight, tagging the tank, then each of the others in turn.

A little over a mile away, a Sky Ray gunship whispered into life.

Its thrusters gently nudged it up off the rock bed, dislodging the layer of sand that had settled on it, and manoeuvred it into firing position.

The gunship’s turret rotated, its missile rack tracking towards Kal’va’s markers. One after another, the six seeker missiles blazed into life and shot into the air.

Kal’va stared at the convoy and waited. It would take the missiles time to reach target acquisition altitude, and more again for their onboard target locks to calculate the optimum attack trajectory.

Next the missiles’ boosters would cut out, removing any trace of their energy signature, leaving them to plummet towards the ground. At the last possible moment, the boosters would reignite, burning with the full fury of the fire caste as they sped the missiles towards their targets.

Kal’va activated the light dampener on his scope.

The first missile darted out of the clouds and hit the lead battle tank in its weaker rear armour.

The warhead detonated on impact, reducing the tank to a crumpled mess of flaming metal.

The second missile swung around the treeline and struck the right-side tracks of the rear battle tank.

The blast flipped the vehicle. It landed hard, crushing its own turret and triggering a raft of secondary detonations that blew out its exposed underside.

The rest of the convoy began reacting, fanning out in panic, while two of the transports stopped. Ten humans rushed from each, their weapons raised, and formed a cordon around the command transport.

The third missile roared down from the sky on a pillar of fire to strike the roof of the final battle tank, smashing its turret and multi-barrelled weapons.

‘Timing…’ Kal’va grinned, the heat from the flames setting off the tank’s ammo reserves.

The nine Guardsmen nearest the tank were torn apart, shredded as the high-calibre slugs tore through their bodies. The squad’s sole survivor sank to his knees, his face bathed in blood and fleshy matter.

Kal’va whispered the axiom of mindfulness.

‘It is a careless warrior who allows himself to be burned by his own flame.’

Gripped by panic, the twin walkers opened fire, their weapons churning up trees and undergrowth as they searched the valley for vengeance.

Their crazed fusillade came to an abrupt end as a missile slammed into each of them.

Their ruined legs remained upright for a moment, twitching briefly before collapsing.

The sixth and final missile struck the command transport, demolishing the fore portion of its hull and enveloping the aft in fire. The transport’s door blew open, propelling from the vehicle like an expended round.

Kal’va watched dispassionately as a huddle of humans in uniform half leapt, half fell out of the doorway. Two of them clung to the ground, rolling around to douse the flames that were licking across their clothing.

The tau warrior tracked the human officer, reading his lips as the soldier waved his weapon around and demanded an explanation. The remaining humans formed a huddle around their commander, weapons tracking in every direction.

Tagging the officer with his markerlight, he squeezed the trigger of his rifle.

The sniper drone fired before the gun’s trigger had even reset. In a flash the officer’s torso came apart, vaporised by the rail round. For a heartbeat the Guardsmen didn’t move, fixed in place by the sudden carnage. Then they opened fire. Frantic, undisciplined volleys hammered into the hillside as the humans tried in vain to end the nightmare they had stumbled upon.

Kal’va ignored the humans and focused his attention on the single remaining transport. Its engines had slowed to idle, its turret panning for targets.

‘Show yourselves,’ he breathed, fighting the urge to break from cover and blast his way inside the vehicle. He had come too far to throw his life away now, but perhaps he had been hasty. Perhaps he should have taken the target out with one of the seeker missiles.

No. He would see the target with his own scope and look into its monstrous eyes when he killed it. At this, Kal’va tightened his grip on his rifle.

A few moments later, his patience was rewarded. The transport’s ramp dropped to the ground and five yellow-armoured giants emerged in quick order, fanning out to cover the angles and appraising the situation down the barrels of their heavy guns.

If he had not hated them with every fibre of his being, Kal’va would have admired them. Where the humans were frightened, cowering behind whatever cover they could, the Space Marines stood in the open, untroubled by the death and destruction wrought around them.

‘Cease fire,’ barked one of the Space Marines. Lost to panic, the humans ignored him and continued their fight.

Kal’va watched as the Space Marine moved to the Guardsmen. Clamping his gauntlet around the barrel of one of the human’s weapons, he pulled it from his hands.

‘Cease fire! Do not waste your ammunition or I will expend mine on you.’

Faced with a more immediate threat, the humans eased off their triggers.

Kal’va studied the Space Marine. Judging by the elaborate insignia and raft of parchment adorning his pauldron, he was the squad leader. Yes, Kal’va nodded to himself, he would be the first to die.

‘We are being manipulated. We must–’

At a command from Kal’va, his drones attacked. Crisscrossing each other in a deadly ballet, they strafed the Imperial forces with a hail of photon grenades.

The Guardsmen fell to the ground, screaming in agony as the grenades exploded amongst them with ear-splitting violence. Blood streamed from their eyes and ears as the sensory overload tore at their sanity. A few managed to clamp their hands over their ears and screwed their eyes shut; most spasmed on the ground, throttled by their own nervous system.

The drones’ pulse carbines finished the job, executing the twitching Guardsmen with bursts of lancing plasma.

A pair of heavy gun drones darted out of the treeline and engaged the Space Marines, their burst cannons blazing on full auto.

The Space Marines returned fire without pause, engaging the drones with practised precision even as their armour chipped and cracked under the attentions of the tau weaponry.

One of the drones exploded, hammered from existence by a hail of bolt-rounds. Another banked sharply to avoid the same fate, sending the last of its ammunition chewing up across the squad leader’s shoulder guard and into his helmet. The Space Marine slumped to the ground, his body and face a mess of bloody holes.

Kal’va shifted his attention to the carrier as its turret-mounted weapon spat super-heated laser towards the circling gun drones.

He took aim at the weapon, tagging the space between two of its spinning barrels with his markerlight.

Behind him, a sniper drone fired. The rail round punched through the gun’s barrel, sending a ripple of explosions traversing back along its length to the turret base.

A second detonation within the tank sent a plume of ashen smoke sparking from the back of the vehicle.

Kal’va stared at the carrier’s open hatchway, his finger hovering over his rifle’s trigger. Another of the Space Marines emerged a moment later, striding down the ramp, heedless of the flames dancing over his armour. A line of script ran across the top of Kal’va’s display, confirming what he already knew – this was Or’sha’s killer. The target.

‘Patience will pierce even a rock.’

Kal’va let the words ready his mind and put down his rifle, unslinging Or’sha’s from across his back. Activating the weapon’s scope, he settled back into the firing position, adjusting slightly for the extra weight of the weapon.

Or’sha had equipped his rifle with an enlarged power pack, enabling it to fire rounds at a higher than standard velocity. Through habit, Kal’va checked the shot counter, though he knew the answer – only a single round remained unfired in Or’sha’s weapon. One shot, one target.

‘As the auns will it,’ he whispered. He smiled at the nature of fate and sighted down Or’sha’s rifle. Three of the Space Marines remained, finishing off his gun drones and forming up around the target.

‘Ver’re!’ Kal’va cursed. A clean shot was unlikely. He activated the rifle’s underslung markerlight and slaved two of the nearby sniper drones to it – they would aim at what he aimed at, and fire when he fired.

Kal’va took aim at the target’s breastplate, drawing an imaginary line through the intervening Space Marine. It was the thickest point of the armour, but the easiest to hit. A calculated risk, and one that the overcharged rifle went out of its way to offset.

A blue rune flashed in the corner of Kal’va’s helm display. The sniper drones were now almost equidistant from the target. Their shots would impact near simultaneously.

He made one final adjustment to the drones’ positions to account for wind speed and the increased velocity of the round he would be firing.

‘Vior’yr.’ Vengeful kill – the ancient word left Kal’va’s lips without conscious thought as he exhaled and fired.

The trio of rail rounds raced through the air. The first struck the intervening Space Marine, shattering his breastplate and passing out through his back. The second speared through the hole in the Space Marine’s torso to strike the energy field enveloping the target. There was a flash of blue lightning as the shield flared and failed.

Kal’va’s round struck home last, punching into the Space Marine’s chest and toppling him to the ground. The two remaining Space Marines reacted instantly, somehow able to track the final round to its point of origin.

Kal’va scooped up his own rifle and rolled right as the Space Marines’ weapons chattered to life. Still rolling, he tagged them both with his markerlight and initiated the pair of sniper drones’ fire and move protocols.

The drones darted from cover, one firing while the other moved, leapfrogging around the Space Marines. The humans were caught by surprise, one of them beheaded in short order as a rail round tore through his pauldron and neck.

The surviving Space Marine managed to unload a salvo into one of the drones, blowing it out of the air before the other shot him through the knee. He stumbled forward, catching himself with his free hand, and continued to fire.

In his moment’s respite, Kal’va caught sight of the target.

The enemy pushed himself to his feet, its chestplate still smouldering from the heat of the rail round.

Kal’va opened fire but the target was too fast and ducked inside the ruined transport for cover. A warning flashed across his display as the other sniper drone was damaged.

Feeding another power pack into his rifle, he targeted the wounded Space Marine, blowing off his weapon arm at the elbow. The weapon clattered to the ground with the Space Marine’s finger still clamped around its trigger.

The target bounded down the transport’s ramp with a glowing pistol in one hand and what looked like some form of launcher held over his opposite shoulder.

Kal’va fired. The shot missed, stabbing into the earth as the target dived forwards. Rolling onto his feet, the target swung his pistol up and blasted apart the remaining sniper drone before levelling the launcher.

Kal’va felt his heart race as he scanned the area. There was nothing but light trees and small rocks, all insufficient cover to shelter himself behind. In desperation, he hit the recall button on his squadron of shield drones. They hurtled towards him at maximum acceleration as the target fired. Kal’va directed them into a curving line in front of him, their energy shields overlapping with a crackle.

Less than a heartbeat later, the missile exploded, hammering his makeshift energy barrier.

EARLIER

The Chamber of Bonding was lit by a single brazier, an echo of the flame that burned in the breast of all the fire caste. Situated in the very centre of the chamber, its glow cast spectral faces across the rock of the walls and reached as far as the low ceiling.

‘It is smaller than I had imagined,’ said Or’sha.

Kal’va nodded, but said nothing. Like Or’sha, he had not set foot on a sept world since taking up a weapon. The rough-hewn, brutal cavern was in stark contrast to the clean lines and smooth decking of the warships on which he had spent his life. Breathing deeply, he filled his lungs with the thick incense that swam in the air.

‘We stand on honoured Vior’la, on the earth that birthed the warrior caste. We walk amongst the ghosts of heroes. What we do now, we do not do lightly.’ Sas’la paused a moment to let the weight of his words settle. ‘Come.’

As was his right, Sasl’a walked ahead of Kal’va and Or’sha, leading them down through the cavern and up onto the Eternal Circle. Carved into a raised dais of rock hundreds of years before, the circle had the same dimensions as the ones Kal’va had seen etched into the ceremonial hangars of the warships he’d served aboard. It was the focal point for all bonding rituals, a reminder that a warrior’s spirit had no beginning and no end.

‘Only in fire can a weapon be forged.’

Sas’la crossed into the centre of the circle and tugged on a length of brass chain connected to the brazier. The action opened a small shutter set into the brazier’s base, allowing a single ember to fall to the ground.

The errant flame ignited the oil that pooled in the recessed outline of the Eternal Circle.

Kal’va stepped over the flames, welcoming the heat, and knelt together with Sas’la and Or’sha. As was tradition, the three sat equidistant from one another, formed as a targeting triangle set within the circle of a rifle’s scope.

‘Ancestors bear witness. Auns honour our vow.’ Sas’la gestured for them to begin, and the three bowed to one another before unsheathing their bonding knives. ‘My life is your life, and your life is my life.’

Kal’va drew his knife across his chest, cutting a deep gash across his heart. Breathing through the pain, he passed his blade to Sas’la as the shas’ui gave his to Or’sha.

‘My strength is your strength, and your strength is my strength,’ intoned Or’sha. With Or’sha’s knife, Kal’va cut into his bicep, drawing the blade down his forearm. The pain was intense but honour demanded silence.

‘My path is your path, and your path is my path,’ he said. He took Sas’la’s knife and made the final mark, a thin line across his forehead. He could feel his rising pulse beating in his neck, its thrum threatening to overwhelm him. Accepting his own blade from Or’sha, he slashed his palm, clenching his fist to squeeze three drops of blood onto the ground.

‘With blood we strengthen the circle and our bond with those who have bled before us,’ said Sas’la.

Kal’va and Or’sha responded as one: ‘As the auns will it.’

Keeping his head bowed, Kal’va struggled to his feet. The Ta’lissera Va was complete. They were as one being; bonded in mind, body and spirit. The Eternal Circle could not be broken, all would live or die.

NOW

Kal’va opened his eyes and saw nothing. The piercing flash of the shield drones overloading had shorted out his helmet’s optical array.

He coughed violently, feeling the bones in his chest grind in response. Fighting through pain worse than any he had faced, Kal’va unclipped his helmet and let the blood that was filling his mouth drip onto the ground.

Struggling to lift his head, he stared up at the sky. Its blue-grey reminded him of the Chamber of Bonding. He thought of Sas’la, of Or’sha…

…of the target. The target was coming for him.

Kal’va propped himself up on his elbows, scanning for his rifle. There was no sign of the weapon.

Thick mucus dripped from his mouth as his organs began failing.

‘Great auns accept me,’ he breathed as he eased himself down onto his back, closed his eyes, and listened to the footsteps as they drew nearer. Slowing his breathing, he fought to hang on to what little life he had left. He did not need long.

Kal’va knew the target was standing over him. He had felt the slight change in temperature as its bulk cast a shadow over him. He opened his eyes to stare up the barrel of the Space Marine’s pistol.

‘Where are your filthy accomplices hiding?’ the target’s voice rasped through his damaged helmet. His armour was scorched and battered, its crimson hue worn and tarnished.

‘I… am…’ The words cost Kal’va more blood as he convulsed between syllables. ‘…all.’ He looked down at his belt, finding Sas’la’s helmet still locked to his hip.

‘One?’ Kal’va was unsure if it was surprise or admiration he heard in the Space Marine’s voice. ‘Do not lie…’

The Space Marine’s helm sparked as it malfunctioned, its glowering optics flickering and dying like the final embers of an inferno. The giant removed it; beneath it, he looked even more monstrous. His jaw had been replaced by a plate of metal, wires bulged beneath his greyed skin like veins and his eyes shone red with augmentation.

‘Tell me where they are and I will kill you cleanly.’ The target’s voice was harsh and gnarled. It reminded Kal’va of the giant compressors that the earth caste used to terra-form rock.

‘Sas’la… Or’sha…’ Shaking, he reached across his chest and grabbed the hilt of his bonding knife.

‘I would not have credited you, xenos, with such courage. Never have I met one of your kind who doesn’t hide behind his rifle. You are a weak race of cur killers.’

Tears of agony streaming down his face, Kal’va drew his knife from its scabbard. The Space Marine lowered his pistol and drew an axe from across his back.

‘Perhaps you are just too stupid to know when you are dead?’

The Space Marine’s weapon’s hummed into life, a sparking energy field enveloping its thick blade. He raised the weapon to strike.

Kal’va looked down, turning his knife in his hand, angling the blade towards his own chest.

The Space Marine paused.

‘You prove me right, xenos. No warrior would yield his life while there is still blood in his veins. Perhaps it is as well you favour this end. I have little wish to sully my blade with your craven flesh.’

Kal’va took care to wrap each of his fingers around the hilt of his blade.

‘For the Greater Good.’

With the last of his strength, he tightened his grip. The hilt flashed once, marking the Space Marine’s face with a targeting light.

‘No!’ Rage crushed his features, and the Space Marine raised his pistol to fire as his head exploded in a hail of brain-matter and bone fragments.

Kal’va looked up, watching as the body toppled, convulsing, to the ground. Offering his thanks to the sniper drone who had taken the shot, he slumped back.

He had lied to the Space Marine. Since the day he had been born, he had never been one, had never been alone. For that was what it meant to be tau. To be a single piece of the greater whole. The Greater Good. The thought brought Kal’va warmth as he smiled and closed his eyes.

‘A warrior with no enemies can win no victories. Do you accept this as true, fire warrior?’

‘Yes, aun,’ I reply with a nod. Keeping my eyes low, I follow the trail of the ethereal’s robe as he paces around me.

‘A fire warrior is an instrument of the Greater Good. He has no enemies but those who would stand against it.’

‘A second truth, aun.’

The ethereal stops and looks at me.

‘Yet you, Kal’va, you sought enemies of your own. You acted to take the life from those who took from you.’

‘With honour, I killed those who stood against the Greater Good,’ I protest.

‘You killed for revenge,’ says the ethereal. ‘You, a valued instrument of the Greater Good, were almost lost for selfish cause.’

I tense then, awaiting the cold stroke of the aun’s honour blade. It is no less than I deserve.

‘Still,’ he says, ‘there is no shame in such an act while it aligns with the needs of the whole.’

He pauses, as if considering.

‘But what now, fire warrior? Your enemies are dead, and your victories are behind you.’

I make to speak, but find my voice lacking.

‘As has been the truth since the beginning, the Greater Good shall be your salvation,’ the ethereal continues. ‘It has many enemies, Kal’va. I would have you fight for it. Through its triumphs you may still find honour and victory. Even death cannot defeat you, so long as the Greater Good prevails.’

‘The Greater Good lights all fires,’ I say. ‘Only with fire can a blade be tempered, the keenest blades to win the battle.’ I press my palms together and touch them to my head in respect. ‘What enemy would you have me face, aun?’

‘Time, Kal’va. You must help us defeat time.’

I let myself fall, dropping from the Kass’Kor to victory, and to death.

Above me, the Orca drop-ship recedes from view as its thrusters punch it back up into the stratosphere. Below, ashen clouds, thick with the debris of war, rush to envelop me.

‘Check weapons for readiness.’

Shas’ei’s voice sounds in my comm-feed. There is a burning disquiet in his tone. A rawness I am certain I am the source of. I listen as Vas’la confirms his status.

‘Weapons primed for firing.’

Unlike him, I am new to the team, and I am not honour bonded to Shas’ei. I will remain bound to Or’shara and Sas’la until I join them in death. It is no less than they deserve and what true Ta’lissera Va demands.

‘My life is your life, and your life is my life,’ I say.

I let the words of bonding focus me as I flex my right arm. My suit responds to firing speed, spinning up the barrels of my burst cannon, mounted like a vengeful vambrace. A series of icons stream across my display, denoting ammunition and temperature.

The fusion blaster welded to my other arm hums to full charge as I close my fist.

It is a strange, removed sensation to pilot a Crisis battlesuit. To wield weapons that can reduce rock to sand and yet be unable to feel the cold of their alloy or the warm vibrations of their energy cells.

Another icon blinks onto my display, indicating my flamer as fuelled and functioning. I cannot feel its weight. Perched on my shoulder, the suit bears its burden. It is then that I realise what it is to be shas’ui. To have survived as I have, to have killed as I have. It is to be numb to the heat of the fire burning in your breast.

It is in that moment that I miss the weight of my rifle.

I deactivate my suit’s internal stabiliser and steel myself against the rush of the descent. Closing my eyes, I bathe in a welcome flood of adrenaline. I am as a flaming meteor raining down upon the enemies of the empire.

‘Kal’va, confirm readiness.’

Shas’ei’s voice snaps me back to the moment. I reactivate my suit’s stabiliser.

‘Ready.’

Clear of the cloud’s embrace, I get my first glimpse of the ground. Our research centre is a grey stain that mars the green of the landscape. Around its perimeter, a wide curtain of open land is choked with bodies and the scorched shells of vehicles.

Flashes of pulse rifle fire erupt from behind the walls of the compound.

‘We should take care not to obscure the defenders’ sight arcs.’ A series of alternate deployment locations scroll over my display as Vas’la speaks.

‘The fire warrior garrison will be dead before we impact,’ says Shas’ei. ‘Hold descent.’

I look again to the walls of the compound, seeing fewer weapon flashes this time. Shas’ei was right. The horde of green monstrosities swarming towards the compound is endless. The fire warriors have only moments left. My display updates as Shas’ei tags the shuttle descending in our wake.

‘The earth caste need five rai’kor to evacuate the prototype,’ he says. ‘In the name of the auns, we will grant them that.’

Five rai’kor. It is a lifetime in combat, where each moment is earned with blood. I look to the compound walls as the final trace of pulse fire falls dark. Lifetime. A blessing we have precious little of.

I activate my suit’s jetpack and halt my fall. I fire my boosters, uttering the words of Cleansing Descent as targeting icons swarm over my tactical display.

‘We are the fire. Only death shall extinguish our flame.’

As I hit the ground, I harden my jaw against the imagined force of the impact. My suit hisses and clacks in protest, the leg hydraulics bunching to absorb the shock and pincered feet cracking the stone of the courtyard beneath me.

‘For the Greater Good!’ I shout.

The enemy are everywhere, hulking, green monsters with sinews as thick as my arms, and blood-red eyes that strain in their sockets. The closest opens its mouth, loosing a bestial cry of rage to herald my death. It bares its yellowed incisors, levels a rusted cleaver and rushes at me.

I open fire. The ork dies, torn apart by the energy rounds spinning from my burst cannon.

The rest of the horde erupts then, shaken from their stupor to brutish vigour by the other’s death. I turn my cannon on them. They come apart in irregular gobbets, their flesh churned and shredded.

The tide of green thins, but I am offered no respite. A pair of gargantuan wretches stride into the gap, towering head and shoulders over the others. Thick, metal plating covers their bodies, bolted to their musculature and welded to their skin in a haphazard approximation of armour.

I feel a flicker of frustration as their makeshift war-plate turns aside my fusillade. The orks grin with malice, breaking into a heavy-stepped run. Fulgurant energies crackle over the weapon-appendages fixed to their arms as they close on me. I hold my ground. Their confidence is misplaced.

It is my turn to grin as the pair vanish, incinerated by dual blasts from my fusion weapon. The horde pauses a moment, transfixed by the hissing trail left by my gun as it boils away the water in the air.

Amused by their kin’s demise, the orks erupt in cruel laughter as they charge towards me. They are a rolling wall of sinew and blade, and I feel the reactive joints of my suit’s pinioned feet adjust as the ground shudders under their tread. Still I remain free of the freezing touch of fear. Too eager for the kill and packed too tight in their frenzied clamour, it is now that the orks are at their most vulnerable.

My flamer roars as it brings them agonising death, bathing the orks in a sheet of liquid fire. It is a mercy that the enclosed environment of my suit spares me the stench of their skin; they melt to flesh-gruel as it runs from their bones.

Even in the face of such horror, the orks come still. Driven by bestial stubbornness, they bear down on me with unyielding vigour.

‘Ma va’ra!’ I spit the curse and pace backwards, firing with everything I have.

The orks crash into the wall of rounds, flame and heat, spraying me with their blood. Still they come. They die, and die and die. But I labour under no falsehood. I am not winning. I take another step back, and another, losing ground with every reverberating thump of my cannon. My ammo counter races to zero, speeding downwards far faster than the mission counter.

Four rai’kor. Still a lifetime.

I am alone, again. Shas’ei and Vas’la are dead, their ident-icons hanging dark on my display. Yet in place of the cold touch of sorrow or the burning desire for vengeance, I taste only the ashen cloy of frustration. Their lives were sold for almost no time at all.

Three. The number on my mission counter flickers down. I pull back to the main blast-doors, using my suit’s bulk to block the orks’ path into the research silo. A monstrous beast shoulders its way through the horde and bears down on me.

I open fire.

Despite the wound it suffers, the ork barrels forward, slamming into me. I topple, and it lands on top of me, a twisted snarl creasing its face. Warnings fill my display as its crude weapon carves chunks from my armour. Hoping that my thermo-shielding is still intact, I fire.

Flame washes over us both and the ork dies, dripping off me in viscous clumps.

I rise into a torrent of bullets and return fire, guiding my flamer across the press of greenskins. Three more of them fall before a heavy blade cleaves through my weapon. I twist, driving my fusion blaster into my attacker’s head. He dies.

I fire again, killing another of the armoured behemoths as they lumber towards me. It was my last charge. Not that it matters. My bones rattle as another withering fusillade slams into me. My suit hisses and whines as the ork slugs break it apart, smashing its power core and dropping me to my back.

Pain lances through me, replaced in moments by a numb wetness as blood spills from my abdomen.

I struggle to stay conscious as an ork stamps down onto my chest, pinning me under his boot. He thunders a fist into his breast in triumph and reverses the grip on his knife. I glance at the mission countdown as he prepares to plunge the blade into me.

Two.

The number twists in my gut like the cruellest of taunts. I have failed. The orks will overrun the base and plunder the empire’s technology. I close my eyes and wait for the pain that will mark the end of my trial.

The familiar snap-thrum of pulse fire opens my eyes. I look up to see the ork’s body shudder and topple away, riddled with holes. To my left a lone fire warrior, an arm missing at the elbow, his rifle balanced across a dead ork, continues to fire. His eyes burn with the rage I thought long lost to me. I tap the eject protocol and my suit opens.

Prising myself from my harness, I crawl towards the fire warrior, fixed on the embers in his eyes. I ignore the death at my back as I move, pulling myself across the floor hand-span by agonising hand-span.

The counter on my belt chimes one, and I find the strength to quicken my advance.

The fire warrior is dead when I reach him. I prop myself up on his corpse and swing his rifle around. As the familiar feel of its stock settles against my chin I realise that I am no longer alone.

I am Kal’va, warrior of the Greater Good, and I will kill with all the fury of those who have come before me and of those who will come after. I open fire. An ork dies, his head exploded. Another dies, and another. I change the power pack between breaths and fire again.

Moments – they are now all the earth caste need. I reach under the fire warrior’s corpse for another power pack and–

I feel pain, and then I am in the air, hanging limp from an ork blade. He pulls me closer to his face, grinning. I smile back.

Over the rumble of the ork’s laugh, beyond the clamour of the horde around me, I hear the thunder of shuttle engines.

Victory. In the name of the Greater Good, I know victory one final time.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Author of the Path of the Dark Eldar series and the related novella The Masque of Vyle, along with the Necromunda novel Survival Instinct and a host of short stories, Andy Chambers has more than twenty years’ experience creating worlds dominated by war machines, spaceships and dangerous aliens. He lives and works in Nottingham.

Peter Fehervari is the author of the novel Fire Caste, featuring the Astra Militarum and Tau Empire, and the Tau-themed Quick Reads ‘Out Caste’ and ‘A Sanctuary of Wyrms’, the latter of which appeared in the anthology Deathwatch: Xenos Hunters. He also wrote the Space Marines Quick Reads ‘Nightfall’, which was in the Heroes of the Space Marines anthology, and ‘The Crown of Thorns’. He lives and works in London.

Braden Campbell is the author of Shadowsun: The Last of Kiru’s Line and Shield of Baal: Tempestus for Black Library, as well as several short stories including Tantalus. Braden has enjoyed Warhammer 40,000 for nearly a decade, and remains fiercely dedicated to his dark eldar.

Joe Parrino is the author of a range of Warhammer 40,000 stories, including the novella Shield of Baal: Devourer, the audio dramas Alone, Damocles: The Shape of the Hunt and Assassinorum: The Emperor’s Judgement, and the short stories ‘Witness’, ‘The Patient Hunter’, ‘Nightspear’, ‘In Service to Shadows’ and ‘No Worse Sin’. He lives, writes and works in the American Pacific Northwest.

Andy Smillie is best known for his visceral Flesh Tearers novellas Sons of Wrath and Flesh of Cretacia, and the novel Trial by Blood. He has also written a host of short stories starring this brutal Chapter of Space Marines and a number of audio dramas including The Kauyon, Blood in the Machine, Deathwolf and From the Blood.

An extract from 'Blood Oath' by Phil Kelly, taken from ‘Damocles’

A thousand decapitated heads. One for every battle-brother in the Chapter.

By the time they had left Tarotian IV, the Third Company’s kill count had been closer to a million. He had killed over a hundred rebels himself. It was often the case. But like all White Scars, Kor’sarro knew the value of symbolism, and a round thousand was enough to make the point.

He wanted to be there to see them. An ending, of a sort, a cauterising of the wounds the Chapter had sustained on Tarotian IV.

Kor’sarro Khan stared out into the heat haze of Plain Zhou. From his vantage point within the highest eyrie in the fortress-monastery, it felt like he could see to the edges of the world. His topknot of greasy black hair flew erratically in the thermals, its thick strands mimicking the victory pennants waving high above.

Though the khan’s narrowed eyes flicked from scrub to bunker to a herd of stallions galloping in the distance, his hands had their attention elsewhere. Calloused fingers worked mechanically but precisely at the balcony’s edge, always in motion. The tip of the khan’s curved dagger scratched like an awl, carving the Khorchin word for ‘seeking’ onto the side of a dormant bolt shell.

Forty-nine more of the deadly little cylinders shone in the evening sun, ranged along the balcony neat as dominoes. Those to the khan’s left were finished, and those to his right were bare. Three full crates hid in the shadow of the buttress arch, the tiny golden curls of swarf around their bases rolled back and forth by a playful wind.

The thud-stride-thud of Sudabeh crossing the eyrie yurut’s rugs in full battleplate made the khan’s cheek twitch. He placed the last of the unfinished shells to one side.

‘Sunning yourself between hunts, my khan?’ said the newcomer.

‘Stormseer. Your… gifts.’ Kor’sarro looked at the sky for a second. ‘They are wasted here.’

‘Anyone with half a nostril could tell that you’ve been standing in the sun. If you ever run out of promethium, you could scrape your skin and use the run-off to feed Moondrakkan’s engine instead.’

‘Ha!’ shouted the khan, grinning and clenching his fist in triumph as if Sudabeh had helped him solve a difficult problem. He would not take the Stormseer’s bait today, he was in too good a mood for it.

Like all White Scars, Kor’sarro loved to feel the play of the elements first hand. For the last three hours he had been meditating in the boiling heat of Quan Zhou, clad in little more than loose white fatigues. His olive leather-like skin practically glowed, shining with oily sweat.

The khan raised a thick bare arm covered in zigzag scars, revealing a tuft of armpit hair that protruded from the sutured edge of his torsal glove. ‘Have a proper sniff then, naysmith.’

‘I respectfully decline your generous proposal,’ said Sudabeh, using the formal Chogorian dialect. Both men chuckled, two sets of white teeth sparkling in the sun. They had been Space Marines long enough to know that moments of humanity were to be treasured, no matter how simple. In fact the simpler they came, the better.

The khan pulled a cube of meat the size of his fist from one of the ammunition crates, picking off the largest bits of swarf before taking a massive bite. He turned to face his old friend, stale blood running down his long black moustache as he chewed loudly. Eyebrows knitted in mock concern, he motioned the Stormseer forward, his frown fading to a wet red grin.

Shaking his head in resignation, Sudabeh joined his captain on the balcony. He looked up at his distorted reflection in the silvered, eyeless skulls that were spitted on pikes along the balcony’s edge. Most of the trophies were human-sized, but the largest was the size of a Land Speeder.

To the south, a large gunmetal lander was lowering its bulk towards the perimeter of Third Bronze Yurut. The squat ship’s backblast sent waves of plains-dust outwards in concentric circles before its striped underskeleton finally touched down.

‘Cargo?’ asked Sudabeh, squinting through the dust.

‘Trophies,’ the khan replied around a mouthful of raw meat.

The bulk lander’s front jaw lowered with a distant hiss of hydraulics. One at first, then a dozen, then hundreds upon hundreds of human heads poured down the ramp towards the yurut wall. Though the first to emerge bounced and rolled as if freshly taken from the neck, those spilling over the rear part of the lander’s jaw slopped over in a state of advanced decomposition. Their smell was unpleasant on the wind, but the khan’s stomach growled in appreciation nonetheless.

‘Heretics,’ said the khan, savouring the word. ‘Tarotian IV.’

Sudabeh nodded thoughtfully. He watched the servitor work teams retrieve the disembodied heads by the armful and dump them onto the vector carriages parked along the bronze yurut’s walls. Inside each carriage, wizened eyethieves rode the cupolas upwards towards the lances that jutted up from the wall’s crest. As they went, they took it in turns to stoke the carriage’s braziers and burn each trophy’s sockets clean with a length of red-hot iron.

Out past the dropsite, steed-beasts broke from distant herds. They galloped in to fall upon those heads left unattended, gnawing strips of meat from faces and scalps before the low blast of the lander’s horns drove them away. Part of Kor’sarro longed to be back in the saddle at the head of his tribe, hurling his spear into the flank of some doe-eyed zellion or marauding felid with a taste for human flesh.

‘Spit it out, then,’ said Kor’sarro.

‘My khan?’

‘You didn’t hide your scars under battleplate just to come out here and bait me, Stormseer. My temper’s not that tight.’

‘Of course,’ said Sudabeh, his tone suddenly formal. ‘The astropathic choir has a message for you, my khan. The Third Company is needed on Agrellan immediately. We are to eradicate a tau infestation, as loudly and as memorably as possible.’

‘Out of the question,’ replied Kor’sarro, but there was doubt under his tone. ‘You told me yourself, the Tarot indicates that Blackheart’s renegades draw closer with every passing hour. We are needed here, to defend our home world.’

‘Our elders have decided that our duty lies elsewhere, my khan,’ said Sudabeh. ‘Many other companies are ready to repel the Red Corsairs. Chogoris will endure without us, I can feel it. Quan Zhou will stand.’

A wordless pause stretched out, both men staring upwards as if Huron Blackheart’s fleet would glimmer into being at any moment.

‘Tau,’ sighed the khan. ‘So we face their cursed weapon-magicks again.’

‘Indeed,’ said Sudabeh. ‘I believe they seek to use the planet Agrellan as a staging post in order to seize the mineral-rich tithe worlds on the cusp of the Damocles Gulf.’

‘Agrellan,’ the khan continued, fingering his long moustache. ‘Dovar System, yes?’

‘Correct again.’

‘Ha. Terrain?’

‘Unremarkable, for the most part. Technically a hive world, but mostly scorched deserts and open plains.’

The khan’s grisly smile reappeared, bits of meat bleeding between his teeth.

‘Anything else?’

‘It’s haunted,’ said Sudabeh, matter-of-factly. ‘The place was subject to Exterminatus centuries ago. The Malleus alone know why.’

‘No doubt they do. The stain of Chaos is not easily erased.’

‘As you say. Reading between the lines of the data-slate, it seems the virus bombs left a highly toxic legacy. The planet still bears the marks of its former death, both physically and spiritually.’

‘Ghosts, then,’ said the khan, shrugging. ‘Common enough.’

‘Not these ones,’ the Stormseer replied.

Click here to buy Damocles.

A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

The Arkunasha War first published in Hammer and Bolter Issue: 9, 2011.
Fire and Ice first published in this edition.
Aun’Shi first published in 2014.
A Sanctuary of Wyrms first published in 2013.
Commander Shadow first published in 2011.
Out Caste first published in 2012.
Shadowsun: The Last of Kiru’s Line first published in 2013.
The Patient Hunter first published in 2013.
The Kauyon and The Tau’va first published as audio dramas in 2014.
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