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, bio-engineered 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.

THE TRIAL OF GABRIEL SETH,
ACT I

Gabriel Seth prepared himself for death, and stepped forwards.

The Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers entered the Forum Judicium and took his place at its centre. Shrouded in the depths of Baal, the chamber had remained unchanged from the day it had been carved into the rock. A vast elliptical space, it was reminiscent of the grand amphitheatres of ancient Terra. Towering rows of superimposed arcades formed the bulk of the structure, with each of the arches supported by a pair of Ionic columns. Angled buttresses carved in the likeness of Sanguinius provided further support and served as a reminder that it was his strength, his blood, upon which all undertakings were built. Higher up, held suspended in the space below the ceiling, a golden statue of the Emperor gazed down in silent observation.

‘I have not come here for your judgement.’

Standing beneath each of the arches was a Chapter Master. Each was a son of Sanguinius charged with commanding a Chapter of the Blood. A sea of red armour cast in every shade and hue, some rich like fresh-spilled blood, others ruby or swept through with crimson. Still others were clad in darkened scabs, the colour of scorched blood or the black of the curse. Seth cast his gaze over the assembled Chapter Masters, and found no friends among them. Their jaws were set like iron and their eyes carried the threat of violence. Seth felt a grin tug at the corners of his mouth, amused by the challenge inherent in their damning stares. ‘I am not here for your help.’ He spat the word, his eyes narrowing to slits. Whether any of them would act as a brother and not as a juror remained to be seen.

It was a rare and dangerous occurrence for so many Chapter Masters to gather in one location. Yet duty and blood demanded the risk be taken. The Judicium was no simple court. It existed only to arbitrate in the direst of circumstances. In such times the scions of Sanguinius were called upon to lend their voice to the shape of history, to stand and make a choice. More than once Seth had stood with the others, passing sentence on the future. A surge of guilt quickened his heart as he remembered the consequences of such occasions. Some decrees, some judgements when passed, were like the pulling of a trigger. They could not be undone.

‘I have come here in sacrifice alone.’ Seth upturned his eviscerator and planted it in the red rock of the ground. The weapon’s ragged teeth were caked in gore.

A ripple of disapproving murmurs echoed around the chamber.

Like his blade, death clung to Seth like a badge of honour. His armour was rent and scarred from recent conflict. His cloak was torn and stained by foul ichor. A fresh scar sat atop his brow. Another bisected his left eye. ‘You may damn me. You may swallow up my name in secrecy and remove my deeds from the histories of the Imperium. But–’ He ground his teeth, struggling to force his words through a knot of anger. ‘You will spare my Chapter.’

‘You are in no position to make demands, Gabriel.’ Dante was the first to answer. There was impatience in his tone but it carried neither threat nor aggression.

Seth glared up at the lord of the Blood Angels. There were none who had embraced Sanguinius’s angelic legacy as fully as Dante. Resplendent in his golden armour, its ornate plates polished to a mirror sheen, he stood as a beacon of hope. A noble protector who would rise above the curse. Yet for all his skill as an orator, Seth knew it to be a facade. Of all the Chapter Masters, Dante alone was helmed. A gilded death mask obscured his face, at once cruel and beautiful.

Seth released the breath he had been holding, easing the tension from his muscles. He both admired and pitied Dante. To be forced to hide his own rage behind such a mask would have driven Seth mad. That Dante endured it had always been reason enough for Seth to accept the Blood Angel as first among equals.

‘Dante is right.’ Castellan Zargo’s words were barbed with menace. ‘You will account for your deeds.’ The master of the Angels Encarmine thrust a finger at Seth.

‘I will,’ Seth barked, crashing a fist against his chest, his teeth bared. ‘My deeds. I will account for those. And with me it will end.’ His face twisted into a snarl, his lips struggling against the tightness in his jaw. ‘The Flesh Tearers will continue to fight in the name of the Emperor and of Sanguinius. You will do nothing to reprimand them nor bring stain to their honour.’ Seth took a step forward. ‘If you threaten my brothers–’ He advanced another pace, fixing Dante with a murderous stare. ‘If you spill a single drop of their blood in vengeance–’ He paused, wrestling his temper under control. What he had to say would not be dismissed as the idle threat of a madman. ‘I will kill every last one of you before my head leaves my shoulders. I will tear out your eyes and drink your blood dry. Know this. Know it to be true.’

‘You would threaten us?’ Zargo snarled.

‘Hypocrisy suits you ill, cousin.’ Seth’s quiet rage built in his throat.

‘How dare you–’

‘How dare I?’ Seth cut Zargo off, a murderous glint returning to his eyes. ‘You have summoned me here in threat of my life. All of you. My brothers. Did you think I would lie down and plead?’

‘And what of you, brother?’ The voice of Geron, the master of the Angels Numinous, was full of scorn. ‘What boon have you given us? Your actions have forced the attention of the Inquisition upon all of us. They claw at our door like hungry wolves.’

‘Agreed. You have damned us all with your actions.’ Orloc, lord of the Blood Drinkers, spoke up in support.

‘Arrogance and bloodlust are your only gifts to this brotherhood,’ said Geron.

‘There is one other gift I have for you,’ Seth snarled. ‘Come down here and claim it.’

‘Enough.’ Dante slammed his hand down on the balustrade, the ancient rock cracking under his gauntlet. ‘You have said your piece, Seth. Now you will listen to what we have to say.’

Dante gestured to Techial. The Chapter Master of the Disciples of Blood approached an ornate lectern that sat just above the amphitheatre’s floor. Techial had been appointed Chronicler. It fell to him to recount Seth’s sins, to detail the actions that had brought the Flesh Tearer to such a juncture.

Techial settled behind the lectern and unfurled a length of parchment. ‘Gabriel Seth, you stand before us a broken son, an orphaned brother. Here the lines of blood and loyalty do not flow,’ he read aloud, his voice filling the chamber with a sombre tempo. ‘Here, you will be judged.’

KNOW THYSELF

The Victus stretched out below Balthiel like an armoured continent. The Flesh Tearers flagship was a colossal vessel. Teeming with weaponry, it was possessed of a near-impenetrable hull, wrapped in kilometres-thick slabs of ceramite armour. By the Victus’s guns had the populace of a thousand worlds died, its lance batteries boiling away their atmospheres as its seismic torpedoes shattered their tectonic plates.

The Librarian stood in the observation tower, his attention fixed on the lone ship edging its way towards the portside docking bay. Its approach heralded more menace than the largest enemy battle group, promising a threat that no salvo could halt. The dagger-shaped craft was smaller even than a single barrel of one of the Victus’s close protection batteries, its void-black hull free of markings and insignia, a ghost ship – invisible save for the glowing, stylised ‘I’ that emblazoned its prow.

Harahel stood immobile in the launch bay, relishing the unusual quiet. The dozens of servitors and gangs of engineering serfs that worked the deck were absent. Plasma saws and arc welders lay discarded on workbenches. Two Thunderhawk gunships stood untended, awaiting refit and repair. Overhead, a squadron of Stormravens nestled in transport cradles, fuel hoses hanging like limp vines from engines in need of proper ministration. The silence was oppressive, punctuated by the whisper of the chamber’s air filters and the gentle hum of Harahel’s armour. To his left, Appollus’s power fist crackled as he tested its charge.

‘Seth should never have allowed this.’ Appollus seethed with displeasure, his mood as black as his armour.

Behind the angular grille of his battle-helm, Harahel grinned. As Company Champion it was his duty, if not his honour, to meet the arrivals. Appollus, on the other hand, was there as punishment. The Chaplain had pressed his point too hard, and it was unwise to tell the Chapter Master he was wrong. Seth would have Appollus remember his place. ‘What would you have him do?’ asked Harahel, his gaze fixed on the docking tunnel. His eyes followed the black craft as it drifted through the entry doors. ‘Defy the Inquisition?’

Appollus didn’t answer. As he watched the toothed slabs of the entry hatch slide closed behind the Inquisitorial shuttle; his jaw was set as stone.

The arrowed craft touched down in total silence. The technology powering its engines was derived from a xenos discovery, its capabilities far in advance of the thrusters that powered the Thunderhawk gunship in whose shadow the shuttle rested. A ramp emerged from the near side of the ship, widening from a sliver of metal to a slender plank that extended to the deck.

Appollus growled, ‘That vessel is no warship. They’ve sent a politician to judge warriors.’

With a faint hiss of pressure, a section of the hull slid away, revealing a doorway. A lone figure alighted onto the ramp, its heavy footsteps resonating around the chamber. A gilded heavy bolter replaced its right arm and shoulder, its barrel inscribed with intricate High Gothic. Its eyes were elongated brass optics that protruded from a diamond-encrusted face. A blue targeting matrix passed over Harahel’s armour as the gun-servitor scanned the deck. ‘Perhaps not,’ he said, touching the pommel of his eviscerator.

‘Clear,’ the servitor intoned, its soft cadence at odds with its mechanical exterior.

The air around the gun-servitor shimmered, and Harahel’s helmet cycled vision modes as its codifiers struggled to maintain focus. A fulgurant web of energy crackled in the air. The distortion cleared a moment later, and the rest of the craft’s occupants resolved into view at the base of the ramp.

Harahel bit down a snarl, his body willing him to attack.

+Calm yourself+

Balthiel’s voice pushed into Harahel’s mind. He ground his teeth, irritated by the Librarian’s intrusion.

+It’s a distortion field. He is not a psyker. Proceed+

Harahel massaged his temple as Balthiel’s voice faded.

‘The Librarian?’ Appollus asked.

‘Yes. I’ll be seeing our brother in the duelling cages.’

A persistent icon flashed on Appollus’s tactical display.

‘Pity,’ he said, and blinked the rune for stone to Manakel, ordering the Dreadnought to stand down.

Seth had been clear with the Inquisition – no psyker would be permitted to set foot upon his vessel. Manakel stood within the nearest of the docked Thunderhawks, ready to enforce the Chapter Master’s edict. Another time old friend. Appollus removed his helmet, cupped it under his arm and spat on the deck. The acid saliva bubbled on the metal with a hiss.

‘Let’s get this over with.’

Harahel echoed the Chaplain, mag-locking his helm to his waist, and approached the Inquisitorial warband.

Seven figures stood in loose formation on the deck, an inquisitor at their head. He wore golden power armour that shone as though fixed under a bank of luminators. The symbol of his office bisected his breastplate, its onyx finish mirroring the man’s dark eyes. Four warriors in artificer plate-mail flanked him. Each carried an oversized blade and storm shield. A slender woman in a crimson bodyglove, her fingers adorned with jewels, stood behind them. Her narrow eyes flitted between the Flesh Tearers and the final member of the party, a hunched savant whose crooked fingers dug through the folds of his robes for a data scroll.

‘I am Inquisitor Corvin Herrold of the Ordo Hereticus.’ The inquisitor stepped forward to meet them, folding his arms over his breast in the sign of the aquila.

‘Harahel, First Company Champion.’ Harahel clasped his fist to his breastplate in salute.

Corvin nodded and looked at Appollus next. The Chaplain said nothing, disdain etched on his face. His cold eyes studied the inquisitor. Corvin’s jaw tensed. Appollus heard the quickening thrum of the shield-warriors’ heartbeats, as their bodies prepared for combat. Appollus’s honed instincts could easily detect the subtle shift in posture that belied their intent. The Chaplain remained silent.

Harahel broke the stalemate. ‘Our lord awaits you.’

‘Of course.’ Corvin’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘Shall we?’ The inquisitor motioned his henchmen forwards.

‘Just you,’ Harahel barred the way with his massive bulk. ‘Your warriors stay here.’

‘Respectfully…’ Corvin gestured to the savant, whose brass eye whirred as he looked up from the data scroll. ‘I must bring my chronicler to record every detail of this engagement.’

Appollus stiffened at the inquisitor’s choice of words. If the inquisitor was there to engage the Flesh Tearers, then he had brought woefully inadequate forces.

‘No.’ Harahel didn’t move. ‘My lord will not forget a single detail of your meeting. Our scriptographers can transcribe it before you leave.’

Corvin only came up to Harahel’s breastplate. He had never been so close to a Space Marine before. ‘Very well,’ he said, nodding to his bodyguard to stand down and falling into lockstep with the giant Flesh Tearer.

Appollus lingered behind as Harahel left with Corvin. He eyed the savant scrawling on a data-slate. The neuro-quill trembled. The savant let out an involuntary whimper and tried to creep further into his robes. The Chaplain glowered. He would credit the serf who cleaned his armour with more backbone than that hunched wretch. Turning on his heel, he followed the inquisitor from the deck.

The Reclusiam was as much museum as place of worship. Venerable relics from the Chapter’s past decorated the curved walls, their sanctity maintained by stasis fields which were themselves artefacts from a forgotten age. The mosaic floor was crafted from the armour of fallen captains, the story of their demise ever present in the irregular tiling. Reclaimed honour-blades stood up like vicious candles in a moat of volcanic sand that bordered the pulpit. Seth knelt in the Reclusiam’s centre, naked save for an ashen tunic that draped his broad frame.

To Balthiel, his Chapter Master looked to be chiselled from the same immutable stone as the statues that stared down in judgement. Even fully clad in his battle garb, the Librarian knew he stood at no advantage over the hulking Flesh Tearer.

‘My lord,’ said Balthiel, dropping to one knee.

Seth remained still, his gaze fixed above. The dual visages of Sanguinius and the Emperor stared down at him, their likenesses engraved on the greyed armourglass of the ceiling that worked to diffuse the light from the single luminator. ‘He has arrived.’

‘Yes, lord. Harahel waits with him in your war-room.’

Seth didn’t reply. The Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers was unusually contemplative. Even without his gifts, Balthiel could have discerned his lord’s feelings of contempt towards their guest. Seth was a direct, brutal warrior that few could match. But the Inquisition was an insidious agency. It could not be stopped by blade or by anger. Its operatives could not be met head-on. Defeating them required patience and cunning – two concepts as alien to Seth as the charges that the inquisitor was no doubt there to level against him and his Chapter.

‘The Blood guide you,’ Balthiel rose and walked from the chamber, leaving Seth alone with his fathers.

Seth met the eyes of the Emperor. ‘Give me counsel.’ He paused, losing himself in the threads that cut across his progenitor’s armour. Imperfections served as a reminder that no defence was impervious.

‘Bind my rage.’

He turned to Sanguinius.

‘Give me the strength to endure this affront.’

Unlike the Emperor, Sanguinius was sculpted unarmed.

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

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

‘Bring me my armour.’

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

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

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

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

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

‘Leave us.’

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

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

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

‘No.’

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

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

‘I–’

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

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

Seth said nothing, his expression unreadable.

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

Seth stayed silent, his eyes fixed on the inquisitor.

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

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

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

‘Do I?’

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

Seth’s jaw tightened. ‘Is that so?’

‘Yes, I believe it to be the case.’

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

‘Yes, and–’

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

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

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

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

Seth ignored him and turned for the door.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

‘That was a mistake, inquisitor.’

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

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

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

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

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

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

++Recorder 10A9: Bay 17++

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

++10A9: Segment Ends++

Disbelief held Corvin’s tongue.

Appollus grinned.

‘You are alone, inquisitor.’

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

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

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

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

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

‘Emperor…’ Corvin’s lips trembled.

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

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

‘The restraints are for your own protection.’

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

‘Do you know who I am, inquisitor?’

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

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

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

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

‘No! No! Wait, no!’

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

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

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

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

‘Enough.’

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

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

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

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

Tears streamed from Corvin’s eyes as he sobbed between laboured breaths. His body trembled. Seth knelt down next to him, his voice little more than a whisper. ‘And you would dare call us traitors. We who channel this anger, this curse, each and every moment in which our hearts pump our father’s blood through our veins. We who endure this torment and yet stand ready to fight for humanity. You. You who cannot handle our pain for a heartbeat dare question our loyalty.’ Seth stood, snapping the restraints from their housings. ‘Leave and pray to the Emperor that you never cross my path again.’

Inquisitor Corvin Herrold lay among the corpses of his warband, thankful the shuttle’s pilot had been spared. The inquisitor couldn’t stand, let alone steer the craft. His nervous system was shot and his muscles were shivering from withdrawal as the remains of the Rage left him. Sweating with effort, he propped himself up. The symbol of the Inquisition stared accusingly at him as he adjusted the ring on his finger.

Who am I?

Tears soaked his cheeks as he searched for an answer. Grief pushed him to remove the ring from his finger and toss it away. He looked to the ceiling; the galaxy stared down at him through the translucent hull as they edged away from the Victus. No stars shone. Yet the darkness of the void was as a beacon of light compared to what he’d felt living inside the Flesh Tearers souls.

‘Emperor save us.’

BLOOD IN THE MACHINE

Captain Iago emptied the last of the contents of his stomach onto his boots and replaced his rebreather. The bloodied remains of his command squad covered his fatigues, mixing with the slick mud to stain the tan of his greatcoat a ruddy brown. It was only by the grace of the Emperor that he had not died along with them.

‘Emperor forge my soul with steel.’ Iago whispered the prayer and straightened, leaning against the trench wall for support.

All along the line, members of the 89th Regiment of the Armageddon Steel Legion were picking themselves up and mouthing their own prayers. The ork artillery attack had been brutally effective. Spheres of crackling energy had glided into the trenches, exploding in fulgurant flashes that had turned men inside out.

Iago winced as he coughed, hammering a fist into his chest in an effort to clear it. He ached to his war-weary bones. Every instinct told him to lie down, to curl up in the dirt and let the inevitable happen. Perhaps, if he had been on another world, fighting in another war, he would have. But Armageddon was his home. If he did not fight for it, then who would?

‘Captain… Captain, you have to see this.’

Iago turned to find a badly scarred trooper proffering a set of magnoculars.

‘What is it, trooper?’ Iago’s reply was punctuated by another fit of coughing.

‘I don’t know, sir. I think… Yonis thinks they’re angels.’

Iago took the magnoculars from the shaking trooper and carefully climbed onto the lip of the trench. ‘How far out?’

‘Three hundred metres, sir.’

Iago adjusted the magnoculars’ lenses. ‘Where? I don’t…’ He cursed as a squad of crimson and ashen warriors resolved into view. They stood as tall as the monstrous orks and were clad in brutal war-plate sealed by fist-sized rivets.

‘Space Marines…’ The words fell unbidden from Iago’s lips. ‘Thank the Throne. Space Marines.’

Iago refocused the magnoculars, zooming in on the nearest squad of the Emperor’s angels. Though he did not recognise the red livery of their war-plate, nor the toothed saw-blade on their pauldrons, Iago had no doubt they were there to deliver him. Emboldened by their appearance, he snapped orders to his warriors.

‘Dorcas, get that heavy bolter operational. Triano, I want a firing solution for the mortar team in two minutes. Osric, get your men ready to move up when the bombardment starts. We’re retaking the forward line. Prepare–’

‘Sir, incoming. Enemy aircraft.’

Iago turned his view skywards. A cloud of thick black smoke was speeding towards them. ‘Ork bombers. Cover! Find cover!’ Iago threw himself flat, muttering a prayer for protection as the snarling prows of the ork aircraft tore into view. He pushed his face to the ground, folding his arms over his head as weapons fire erupted in the sky above.

Two explosions rumbled in the air in quick succession. Iago looked up to see a hunched raptor shape above him, its flanks blood-red. Multiple weapons on its wings and prow flashed with lethal discharge, blasting apart the ork machines.

Iago got to his feet with newfound vigour. ‘The Emperor has sent more of His angels to aid us! Let us not be found wanting in their sight! Forward! Push forward! For the glory of Terra, forward!’ Iago had no idea what Chapter this second wave of Space Marines were from. He didn’t care. For the first time since the morning rotation began, Iago began to believe that he might live through the day.

The ork’s eyes were fist-sized fissures sunk deep into its gnarled face. Rage-red pupils strained at the centre of cancerous yellow sclera, glaring at Seth as though they might somehow break his hold. The Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers tightened his grip on the ork’s neck and leaned closer. ‘You fight with bestial fury, ork.’

The ork stank of stale sweat and freshly spilled blood. The stench of undigested meat hung on its breath, wafting from between the cage of broken incisors studding its gums.

‘But today, I will teach your kind the meaning of wrath. I will kill a thousand of your filth-breed before your blood dries on my gauntlets.’

The ork rasped defiance, its war cry ending in a strangled rattle as Seth tore its head from its body.

‘For Sanguinius, for the Blood, kill them all!’ Seth bellowed to his warriors and spun around, tearing his eviscerator from the dead ork’s chest, cleaving it through two more of the greenskins.

The orks came apart in a shower of gore and ruined flesh. Seth snarled, emboldened by the copper tang of their blood as it splashed across his face. He killed again, thundering his fist into an ork skull. The greenskin’s face broke with a harsh crack as its teeth spilled from its mouth. The sound of battle rang in Seth’s ears like righteous chanting. Yet it was as a whisper to the hammering beat of his hearts.

They pounded in his chest, louder than any boltgun, more visceral than any death-scream.

They were war drums, driving his limbs to battle with all the rage his father had bestowed upon him.

‘I. Am. Wrath!’

Beside Seth, the five members of his command squad cut into the mass of orks with the same unrelenting ferocity. The veterans Nathaniel and Shemal guarded his flanks, butchering their way forwards with a chainweapon in each hand. The Techmarine, Metatron, and the Company Champion, Harahel, were at the fore of the diamond formation. At the rear of the formation Nisroc blazed away with his boltgun, covering his brothers’ advance.

Nisroc growled, blasting apart an ork that was bearing down on him with a barbed cleaver. ‘Master Seth, to your left.’

At Nisroc’s warning, Seth pivoted, slicing his blade upwards to meet a powered claw intent on removing his head. His armour’s servos spat and whined in protest as he struggled against the ork’s bulk. A monster of sinew and aggression bolted into an oversized suit of war-plate, the greenskin stood head and shoulders above the Chapter Master. Seth ground his teeth, pitting all of his strength against the ork. Yet it was not enough. The crackling claw neared his head.

Seth’s hearts howled in his chest like caged beasts. In his mind’s eye, he stood in a sea of ork blood. He would not yield. He would rip the ork’s arm from its socket, drive his fist into its chest and pulp its wretched heart between his fingers. He would kill it, murder it. He would…

A status icon chimed on Seth’s retinal display – they had reached the designated coordinates. The interruption tore the Chapter Master back to his senses. Seth eased his resistance, dropping his weight, letting the claw carry his blade low before slipping forward and tearing his weapon through the ork’s thigh.

The greenskin roared in pain and slumped forwards. Seth allowed it no quarter, turning as he rose to drive his blade down through its back. The greenskin convulsed, spasming as the teeth of the eviscerator churned its organs to bloody offal.

‘Xenos filth. Be still,’ Seth spat, bringing his armoured boot down to crush the ork’s skull. The Chapter Master opened a company-wide channel and addressed his warriors. ‘Brothers, the Steel Legion regiments garrisoning the defence lines around the hive have been scattered. We will buy them the time needed to rally.’ Seth tore the powercell from his eviscerator and slammed a fresh one into place.

‘Master Seth.’ Nisroc gestured to the five golden figures descending towards them.

Seth finished hacking apart the ork he was duelling with and shot a glance skyward, and growled low. ‘Sanguinary Guard.’

Framed by wings of the purest white, they were clad in armour of polished gold. They wore ornate helms, glistening faceplates wrought into sneering smiles. The Blood Angels. First amongst the sons of Sanguinius, only they were arrogant enough to hide their rage behind masks of gold and brass.

Seth’s face crumpled in disdain. Beauty on the outside did not remove the beast within.

‘What do Dante’s dogs want?’ Harahel didn’t bother using a closed vox-channel.

‘Nothing good, brother,’ said Seth.

The Sanguinary Guard landed amidst a hail of bolter fire. The unexpected ferocity of the Blood Angels attack momentarily stalled the ork advance as their explosive rounds blew off limbs and pulped torsos.

‘Master Seth. I am Brother Anachiel, first Sanguinary Guard of the seventh cohort of Angels.’

‘There is no glory to be found here, cousin. Why have you come?’

‘I am here to extract you and your squad,’ said Anachiel.

‘Extract?’

‘Yes. Brother-Captain Tycho wishes you to come with us.’

‘Our mission here is not complete,’ said Seth.

‘This mission is folly. You cannot hold back the greenskins without more support.’

‘Then have Tycho send some.’

Anachiel grasped Seth’s pauldron as the Flesh Tearer made to turn from him. ‘You must come now. More ork craft are inbound to this location. We cannot delay any longer.’

‘If you lay your hand on me again, I will cut it from you.’

‘With respect, there is more at stake here than you realise.’

‘There is plenty at stake. Here. Now. If we leave the Guard to fight alone, they will die.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Do not patronise me, Blood Angel.’

‘This is no longer your fight.’

‘Until the Emperor rises from His Throne, I, and I alone, decide where we fight.’

‘You would serve your own bloodlust over the needs of the Imperium?’

‘Be careful, cousin. You did not bring enough warriors to test me.’

Anachiel thrust a mag-ascender cable towards Seth. ‘Uphold your duty and do as Tycho commands.’

‘The blood of those we leave to die is on your hands, angel.’

‘Save your piety. My humour is too ill to indulge your hypocrisy.’

Seth’s muscles tensed until they pressed at the limits of his armour. His jaw twitched as he imagined ripping his teeth though Anachiel’s flesh. The growling of his eviscerator was like a terrible siren, his blade demanding he cleave the Blood Angel in half.

Seth roared and threw himself into a press of orks; hacking, cutting, tearing until every greenskin within reach had been reduced to bloodied mulch. Seth tightened his grip on his weapon, crushing what remained of his rage between gauntlet and haft, and turned back to Anachiel. ‘Another time, Blood Angel.’ Seth snatched the mag-ascender from Anachiel. ‘To me, brothers. We are leaving.’

Captain Iago sank to his knees as he watched the Space Marine gunship shrink into the distance. The Emperor had deserted him. Left him to die in the dirt. Around him, his men died in short order, butchered by the orks as they overran their position.

Iago pulled off his respirator and let his head drop back onto his shoulders. Without its protection the toxic atmosphere would kill him in minutes. He smiled. He doubted he had that long.

‘Emperor… why?’ Staring up at the sheet-metal grey of the sky, Iago had time to shed a single tear before an ork blade tore through his back and ended his life.

‘Tycho. Why was I recalled?’ Seth entered the command chamber at a march, his words ringing out like bolter fire, an attack on the measured hum permeating the room. ‘What matter could not wait until we had secured Volcanus?’

‘Calm yourself, brother. All will be explained.’ Captain Erasmus Tycho replied without turning around. He stood with his back to the room, his attention fixed on the grey-blue tactical hololith dominating the chamber’s rear wall.

A torrent of tactical information scrolled across its flickering surface. Shifting clusters of red and green marked the positions of the ork and Imperial forces. Lines of attack and retreat overlapped one another, depicting estimated engagement patterns. Truncated Gothic sprang up under Tycho’s gaze, detailing temperature, wind direction and soil density. Ammunition and casualty numbers flickered like broken luminators as they continually updated in response to the flood of vox-reports spilling in from across the planet.

Though dedicated banks of tactical cogitators worked ceaselessly to assimilate the information and serried rows of servitors chattered away on heavy keys, collating and processing the data, it took a warrior of Tycho’s mettle to make sense of it. The Blood Angel’s enhanced physiology and decades of bitter experience allowed him to do the job of hundreds of Imperial tacticians.

Seth scowled at the sight of Tycho’s unblemished battleplate. Like Anachiel’s, it was polished gold and glistened under the white light of the glow-lamps studding the chamber. ‘You may call me brother when you stand beside me in battle, bleeding in the dirt instead of cowering here among these clerks and serfs.’ Seth threw his gaze around the chamber. He despised the throng of robed savants that stood huddled over data charts and holo-projectors. They were miserable wretches and his contempt for them was palpable.

A Sanguinary Guard stepped from one of the chamber’s many alcoves to bar Seth’s path. ‘Watch your tone, Flesh Tearer.’

Seth growled. ‘I have had enough of your kind today, cherub.’

‘Were we not at war, I would see you learn respect in the duel–’

‘Were we not at war, I would kill you,’ said Seth.

‘You…’

‘Enough.’ Tycho turned to fix Seth with his one good eye. ‘All of you, leave us.’

‘Captain.’ The Sanguinary Guard kept his eyes fixed on Seth as he dipped his head in salute to Tycho.

The chatter and hum of the command chamber bled away to silence as the chamber’s occupants filtered out, leaving Tycho and Seth alone in the room.

‘Dante has given me charge of this war, Seth. You will pay me the same accord you would him,’ said Tycho.

Seth grinned. ‘It is good to see there is still fight in you, brother. I had worried command was beginning to soften you.’ Stepping forward, Seth clamped his fist around Tycho’s vambrace in a warrior’s salute.

‘In this tumultuous time, brother, it is pleasing that you, at least, have not changed.’ The ire drained from the Blood Angel’s face as he spoke, yet Seth detected something more behind Tycho’s composed greeting. A bestial glint in his eye.

Seth had spent enough time in the company of the damned to recognise the black flicker of rage. He felt the numbing touch of sadness in his gut. Tycho was a great warrior, one who would not easily be replaced. His spirit was as strong as Baalite steel, but it would not be long before the captain was lost to bloodlust and madness.

Tycho tapped a button on the console nearest to him, activating an overhead hololith. ‘This is the Ephesus ore mine. It lies on an island to the south-west of the Fire Wastes. I need you to secure it.’

Seth paced around the image of the mine, in careful study. ‘The mine is inconsequential. There is nothing to be gained by securing it. If I withdraw my forces from Volcanus, the hive may fall…’ Seth turned, gesturing to the larger tactical hololith at the rear of the chamber.

Behind him, the chamber doors opened.

‘If that happens, the flank of Hive Prime will be exposed,’ said Seth.

‘You are correct, Gabriel.’ The female voice preceded a series of footsteps as the newcomer paced into the room. ‘But there is more at stake here than the fate of one world.’

Seth rounded on the woman. An Inquisitorial pendant hung around her neck. His face hardened. An agent of the ordos heralded nothing but strife. ‘You will address me as Chapter Master, inquisitor.’

‘My apologies, Chapter Master.’ The inquisitor moved past Seth to stand at the head of the room. ‘I am Inquisitor Nerissa. Here by order of the Emperor Himself.’

‘I doubt you had crawled from your mother’s womb when last the Emperor gave an order.’

‘I am an agent of the Emperor’s most holy Inquisition. Every act I undertake is by His order, whether He speaks the words or not.’

‘What do you want?’ asked Seth.

‘Why is it, do you think, that the orks have returned to Armageddon?’

‘I do not wish to understand the xenos, only to kill them,’ said Seth.

Nerissa smiled, though her face held no warmth. ‘If that were true, then I fear the Flesh Tearers would be no more than the bloody berserkers they are rumoured to be.’

‘Tread carefully, inquisitor. Your rank affords you a measure of protection, but you are not among friends.’

‘War does not continue to find this world by chance.’ Nerissa moved towards the hololith control panel as she spoke. Manipulating the controls, she brought the image of the mine into sharp relief. ‘Though they may not themselves know it, I believe that the orks have been drawn here. Summoned to the mine by a psyche more attuned to war than even the greenskins’.’ The hololith shivered as the mine faded away, dissolving to reveal what lay beneath it.

‘A Titan?’ Seth’s voice dropped to a whisper.

‘Yes, an Imperator-class to be exact, and it does not belong to the forges of Mars.’

‘The Archenemy has not set foot upon this planet in such force for thousands of years. Not since before Armageddon was resettled,’ said Seth.

‘That is true.’ Nerissa nodded. ‘But the terraforming process is not without flaw. Occasionally, elements are missed, the past buried beneath the new. It seems that when Armageddon was remade, we left something behind of the old.’

‘Are you certain?’

‘No, I am not,’ said Nerissa. ‘But it is rare that I have the luxury of certainty. If there is even the slightest chance that the Titan is buried there, we must move to destroy it before the orks find it. We have no idea what malicious sentience lies dormant within the Titan’s machine core. We cannot allow the orks to awaken it, or worse, move it to another world. Such a grave threat to the Imperium cannot be allowed to slip through our grasp.’

‘I will not abandon Hive Volcanus on a whim. When the hive is secure and the orks have been driven back I will reconsider your request.’

‘You misunderstand me. This is not a request.’

‘And you misunderstand our relationship. I am not beholden to you, inquisitor.’

+It saddens me, Chapter Master, that you would condemn your Chapter to extermination over something as trivial as a few million lives.+ Nerissa pushed her words into Seth’s mind.

‘Speak plainly, witch.’ Unlike Nerissa, Seth was no psyker, but the anger boiling through him cut her mind like a dagger.

‘If you refuse me… If you will not do your duty, then I shall ensure my colleagues in the ordos perform theirs.’ Nerissa’s eyes narrowed. ‘When was the last time you submitted a batch of gene-seed for testing, Flesh Tearer?’

‘You dare threaten me?’

‘I am an agent of the Throne! There is nothing I dare not, or cannot, do in my duty to the Emperor.’

‘Enough, both of you. Seth, Dante believes Nerissa to be correct. He would have you do this. I will redeploy Third Company to bolster Volcanus’s defences.’

Nerissa grinned.

‘Do not mistake me for an ally, inquisitor,’ Tycho growled. ‘If you threaten a descendant of Sanguinius again, I will smash your bones and cast you into the deepest pit of Baal.’

‘Very well, but only my honour guard and me. The rest of my warriors will remain in place until Tycho’s Blood Angels are in position,’ said Seth.

‘No…’

‘It is not up for discussion!’ Seth turned his back on Nerissa, his eyes lingering on the image of the Titan as it rotated on the hololith. ‘We will be more than enough.’

‘This is madness. We’ll never reach the mine in one piece,’ Harahel growled as the Vengeance shook under another burst of anti-air fire. The single red luminator mounted on the ceiling strobed in warning as shrapnel and las-blasts pawed at the gunship’s flanks, assailing her like a terrible storm.

‘Brother Harahel is right.’ Metatron tapped the Stormraven’s hull in an effort to appease the craft’s machine-spirit. ‘The fighting only intensifies as we head north. We cannot continue in the air.’

‘Fortunately, Flesh Tearer, that is not our intention,’ said Nerissa.

‘Then perhaps, inquisitor, you will dispense with this facade and enlighten us.’ Seth spoke slowly, struggling to stay calm.

Clad in sapphire battleplate, the inquisitor was a striking figure, far more imposing than the loose-robed woman Seth had met in the command centre. ‘Secrets are the armour of my order, Chapter Master. You will forgive me for not throwing off their protection until necessary.’

‘If Chaplain Appollus were here, he’d remind her that only death brings forgiveness,’ Harahel’s voice crackled over the private squad channel. Like the rest of the Flesh Tearers, the Company Champion’s face was hidden behind his helm.

‘We are only travelling as far as the defence line at Sreya Ridge, where we will rendezvous with the 11th Armoured and travel the rest of the way on the ground.’ Nerissa tapped a dial on her gauntlet and a hololith sprang from it to fill the space in the centre of the gunship’s hold.

Metatron sat forward, studying the hololith as a series of icons and vector-tags detailed their route from the ridge to the ore mine. ‘The orks have crippled the infrastructure. There is no bridge, inquisitor. We cannot reach the mine overland…’ Metatron paused as details of the Imperial forces stationed at Sreya scrolled over the image. ‘The Validus…?’

‘You are astute, for a soldier,’ Nerissa grinned. ‘The Validus is void-shielded and stands taller than the deepest recorded furrow of the Boiling Sea. It will carry us to the mine.’

‘What of the 11th? The Validus cannot carry them all,’ asked Metatron.

‘She does not mean to take them with us,’ said Seth.

‘The 11th will cover our advance and buy us enough time to complete our mission,’ said Nerissa.

‘And what of them then? The plains north of Sreya are overrun by heavy ork war-engines, and more than a battalion of their towering idols. The 11th will perish without the Validus’s support.’

‘It seems you have answered your own question, Chapter Master.’

‘Pilot, turn us around.’ Seth got to his feet and turned towards the cockpit.

‘No! Stay on course. This is my mission, my command.’ Nerissa stood, barring Seth’s way.

Seth growled. It took every ounce of his restraint not to rip the inquisitor’s head from her shoulders. Around them, Nerissa’s retinue tensed in apprehension, their hands edging towards weapons. The two females, bound in tight leathers, wielded slender power swords, their faces hidden behind masks of skin. The larger of the males was covered in crude tattoos and the litany of penance had been burned into the flesh of his left arm. The fourth was more machine than man, the lower part of his face and most of his torso replaced with augmetics.

Nerissa had come ready for war, but if she thought that even warriors as dangerous as these would buy her a single second against his wrath, she was gravely mistaken.

‘Arrogance has made you foolish. The ridge is under heavy assault. The entire region is embroiled in a full-scale engagement. We’ll be blown from the air before we get within a kilometre of the Validus.’

‘I have diverted a squadron of Vendettas and a wing of Thunderbolts to cover our approach. The orks will have more than enough to worry about.’

‘And who were they supposed to be covering? Who else have you left to die?’

‘I don’t know, and I don’t care,’ said Nerissa.

‘The lives of the Emperor’s servants are not yours to waste.’

‘They are! That is what it means to be of the ordos. I would sacrifice every man, woman and child in this sector to do the Emperor’s work. It is a shame you do not share the same clarity of purpose, Flesh Tearer.’

‘Know this, inquisitor.’ Seth’s voice dripped with menace. ‘It is only my oath to Dante that keeps me from ripping your heart out.’

‘You–’ Nerissa began, trailing off as the gunship shuddered violently and a slew of weapon impacts rang out against its hull.

‘Lord, the fighting is even heavier than anticipated. We cannot slow down enough to land. We’ll be too easy a target for the ork guns,’ the pilot’s voice crackled over the comm.

‘So much for the air cover.’ Seth turned his back on Nerissa, moving to the rear of the hold and slamming his fist into the assault ramp’s release catch. ‘Equip jump packs. We’ll drop the rest of the way.’

‘What about them?’ Nisroc gestured to the inquisitor and her retinue.

‘You needn’t worry about me, Flesh Tearer,’ said Nerissa. ‘My gifts will see my team and I safely to the Validus.’

‘I’d sooner place my life in a servitor’s hands than trust to such gifts,’ Metatron muttered over the private squad channel as he hefted a jump pack onto his back.

‘Given the choice, brother, I’d rather we walked.’ Harahel double-checked the mag-clamp on his own jump pack, and moved to the ramp.

Below the gunship, the Sreya plains were a mosaic of fire and steel. The battle tanks of the 11th Armoured were spread out in a thin defensive line in a bold attempt to hold an area they did not have the resources to contest. An innumerable horde of ork vehicles swarmed towards them, tearing across the desert in a chaotic mass of gunfire and exhaust fumes.

Ahead of the Imperial line, the Validus strode forward, a mountain of metal and plasteel bent on the orks’ destruction. An Imperator-class Battle Titan, the Validus was a monument to the achievement and arrogance of man. As much city as war machine, it was capable of housing entire platoons in its armoured legs and torso. Its top deck spread out like a mammoth landing pad, as though it carried a slab of the world on its shoulders. Crenellated buttresses and armoured spires grew up from the platform. Studded with battle cannons, las-batteries and missile silos, they housed more firepower than a small army. Yet they were little more than defensive trinkets when compared to the Titan’s primary weapons. When the Validus attacked, it did so with purpose.

The colossal weapons mounted under the Validus’s shoulders blazed like miniature suns as they fired, annihilating entire columns of ork vehicles and burning great furrows in the earth.

‘It is glorious, is it not, brother?’ Metatron stood on the ramp, transfixed by the might of the Validus.

‘I’m just glad we are not here to kill it,’ said Harahel.

‘Yes, thank the Blood for small mercies.’ Nisroc was not joking. Outside the gunship, carnage reigned.

Ork anti-air batteries spewed a constant stream of rounds skywards. Ork and Imperial fighters dogged each other, stitching the clouds with tracer fire. Clusters of aerial mines detonated in a wash of flame. The air between the Flesh Tearers and the Validus was a morass of shrapnel, las-fire and explosions. Jumping was madness.

‘The Blood protects.’ Harahel touched his blade to his helmet and locked it to his armour.

The gunship bucked hard, threatening to toss the Flesh Tearers into a free fall. Dark smoke rolled over its surface, its engines ignited by a rocket strike.

‘Go. Now.’ At Seth’s command, the Flesh Tearers leapt from the gunship. Nerissa followed them. Wrapped in a sphere of flickering energy, the inquisitor and her warriors fell through the clouds like leaves trapped in a plasma bomb. Seth jumped last.

An instant later, the Vengeance exploded.

‘By the Blood,’ Seth snarled as the blast wave punched him into a sharp dive. Burning shrapnel pelted his armour like iron hail. Flame washed over him, scouring away the litany parchments that adorned his pauldrons.

Warning icons filled Seth’s display, his altimeter spinning down towards zero as the Validus’s deck sped up to meet him. Seth watched it near, unwilling to slow his descent until the last possible moment.

He activated his jump pack, gritting his teeth against the force as the booster roared into life and arrested his fall. Seth slammed into the Titan’s weapon platform, flexing his knees to absorb the impact. The servos in his leg armour whined in protest, sparking as a fracture spread up his left greave.

‘Report,’ Seth commanded over the squad channel.

‘On board.’ Harahel was the first to respond.

‘On deck,’ said Metatron.

‘I live,’ said Nisroc.

‘I am to your south, lord,’ said Nathaniel.

Seth listened to the chorus of vox acknowledgments as he called up his squad’s ident-icons and locations. There was one missing. ‘Brother Shemal?’

The vox-link hissed with silence.

‘He is lost to us,’ said Metatron.

‘Sanguinius keep him,’ said Nisroc.

‘Sanguinius rip the heart from every one of these accursed greenskins,’ Harahel snarled.

Seth bunched a fist in rage, and opened a comm-channel to Nerissa. ‘This had better be worth it, inquisitor.’

Nerissa ignored the Chapter Master and addressed the Titan’s pilot. ‘Princeps Augustus, new orders.’

The Validus stepped into the ocean. The Boiling Sea had not been named in irony. More chemical mess than body of water, it was fed a constant stream of corrosives and pollutants by the waste pipes servicing Armageddon’s hives and manufactoria. Super-heated by the toxic mix, the sea never cooled. The Validus remained unbowed as the sea did its best to beat back the intruder, weathering the barrage of rolling waves that broke against its torso.

‘Enginseer Luag, status.’ The calm note of Princeps Augustus’s voice was in stark contrast to the violent waters enveloping his Titan.

‘Integrity is holding, princeps. Ablative plating will dissolve in less than two days, Terran standard. The hull and superstructure are under no immediate threat.’

‘Very good. Alert me if the situation changes.’

‘Aye,’ said Luag.

‘Advancing, tactical stride.’

The Validus pushed on, lurching unevenly as it struggled for footing on the undulating sea bed. The water displaced by the Titan’s monolithic bulk surged up around it, rising into a simmering wall before crashing down over the Fire Wastes.

Seth listened in silence as the Validus’s sensoria fed the death-screams of the 11th Armoured to his helm. The lucky ones died quickly, swept into the sea, dissolved before they could scream. The others, the unfortunate, were soaked by the corrosive liquid. Cast across the plain, they were left to die an agonising death as their skin bubbled from their bones.

‘Such a waste,’ Nathaniel snarled, unconcerned with who heard him.

Seth turned his gaze to Nerissa. Her face was impassive, as steely cold as her actions. ‘You would use the tools of the xenos to do the Emperor’s work?’ He gestured to the pendant hanging around the inquisitor’s neck. It was a single oval gem, the colour of darkness and blood. He had seen its like before, affixed to the breastplates of the accursed eldar.

Nerissa glanced down at the gem. ‘A weapon is a weapon, is it not? It is the wielder that is important.’

‘Perhaps. But the worth of a warrior can be judged by the weapons they use to make war.’

+So what then is your worth, Chapter Master? What will history remember of a warrior who deploys black-armoured beasts to fight his battles?+

Seth grimaced, suppressing a growl as Nerissa forced her words into his mind. +Be careful to what you turn your thoughts, inquisitor. You of all people should know that a mind that wanders in dark places is soon lost.+

A thunderous tremor ran up the Validus’s spine, shaking the deck as the Titan reached the ocean floor and stopped.

‘We’ve reached bottom.’ The princeps’s status report drew Seth’s attention, breaking the baleful silence between him and Nerissa. ‘The terrain evens out from here. Proceeding at one-half striding speed. Estimated arrival in twenty-three point eight five minutes.’ The Validus’s commander’s tone was flat. To him, war was a perfunctory task. He acted devoid of emotional intent.

Seth’s thoughts turned to his Flesh Tearers, to the rage that flowed through their veins. It was the Chapter’s secret. A truth each of them was charged with concealing, yet its touch made them more honest in deed than any of their allies. Unlike the princeps, their actions were all emotive. Unlike the inquisitor, they did not pretend to be anything but monsters.

‘Contacts,’ the Validus’s tactical officer announced as the shrill chime of warning sigils rang out from his console.

‘Number and direction?’ asked the princeps.

‘Fourteen, fast moving, from the north-west.’ He paused. ‘Correction. Eighteen, and there are a dozen more coming from below.’

‘Below?’ asked Seth.

‘The orks have been using submersibles to cut off our supply routes over the sea,’ said the princeps. ‘It does not seem to trouble them that their craft eventually corrode in the water.’

‘Harahel, Nisroc, stand ready,’ Seth voxed the Flesh Tearers stationed in the vaulted bastions that were the Validus’s legs. ‘You have incoming.’

A shower of glowing metal spat and flickered in the gloom, sparking to the floor as the orks cut their way into the Validus.

‘Men of the Emperor, prepare yourselves!’ Harahel shouted the command, bolstering the spirits of the thirty or so Steel Legion troopers who stood with him and Metatron in the vaulted hold-space of the Validus’s right leg. Locking his helm in place, Harahel watched as the Guardsmen checked the charge of their lasguns and fixed blades to the ends of their barrels.

‘Their time would be better spent readying their souls,’ Metatron said over the comm.

‘What?’

‘You know as well as I do, brother, that they are as good as dead. It will only be by the grace of Sanguinius that any of them survive the next ten minutes.’

Harahel cast his gaze over the Guardsmen. Metatron was right. Clad in cumbersome enviro-suits, their movements were slow. It was a cruel irony that the equipment designed to keep them alive if the chamber flooded would likely speed them to their deaths. At best they would provide a distraction, something to keep the orks from swarming the Flesh Tearers. He turned to face the Techmarine. ‘It is unlike you to be so tenebrous, brother.’

‘Forgive me. I am… distracted. This Titan…’ Metatron gestured around and above them. ‘The Validus is unlike any machine I have encountered. Its spirit is unknown to me. It speaks only to the princeps, and he is as fallible as all men. I do not enjoy trusting to his intentions.’

‘Then it is a good job you were blessed with the strength to kill those who would abuse such trust.’

Metatron gave a grunt of amusement.

‘Here they come.’ Harahel motioned to the increasing flow of water.

Rivets spat and popped as they shot from their housing, ripping through the bodies of the closest Guardsmen.

Harahel moved his head, narrowly avoiding one of the heavy bolts. ‘Stand firm. No one flees. Kill until killed.’ He thumbed the activation stud on his eviscerator.

The Guardsmen lent their voices to the weapon’s roar, hurling battle cries and oaths of vengeance.

Boiling seawater burst into the chamber, pushing through the fissure made by the ork cutters and tearing a wide rent in the adamantium bulwark. The Guardsmen screamed as the water swept them back and away from the centre of the room, slamming them into the walls. Undisciplined volleys of las-fire struck the walls as the troopers panic-fired.

Propelled by modified jetpacks that had spinning rotators in place of thrusters, the orks followed the water inside.

‘Bring them death!’ Harahel roared and powered forward into the press of orks.

The metal and fabric suits worn by the orks were like something from the ancient annals of man. Translucent, domed helms covered the orks’ faces, a crude system of valves and thick pipes providing oxygen. Harahel snarled as he drove his fist through one of the domes, shattering it and crushing the face of the ork behind it. Harahel’s muscles burned with effort as he tore his blade through the water into the torso of an advancing ork. He reversed the stroke, snarling as the teeth of his weapon ripped apart another of the greenskins.

Blood. There was no blood. No blood on his armour. No blood choking his blade. The accursed sea swallowed the ork arterial fluid as quickly as he shed it. He snarled and killed another and another, butchering a dozen orks in quick succession. Still the water robbed him of his prize, diluting the blood, drawing it away from him. He killed again, reaching out with his hand in a desperate effort to grab hold of the blood as it spilled from the orks’ veins. ‘Must I turn the sea red?’ Harahel roared as the blood slipped away from him. Drawing his bolt pistol, he emptied a clip into the orks, grinning as their bodies burst like crimson clouds in the water. He would not stop. He would not tire. He would have his blood.

Seth knelt on the deck, bracing himself as it shuddered under the wrath of the Validus’s defensive weaponry. Above him, a squadron of ork bombers converged on the Titan, carrion intent on feasting. Submerged in the ocean, with only its buttressed towers visible above the waves, the Validus seemed an easy target.

It was not.

Where a Warlord- or Reaver-class Titan would have been almost defenceless against such an attack, the Validus’s towering spires housed more than enough firepower for the task in hand.

Seth turned his attention to the angular gantries ahead of him.

Rain and seawater lashed the deck in an unceasing barrage, conspiring with the night to make visibility poor. But he knew the ork assault teams were out there. Even above the wind, the bark of thunder and chatter of weapons fire, he could hear the low growl in their throats.

Unbidden, the killer inside the Flesh Tearer growled in response.

Lightning tore across the sky, throwing splinters of light across the deck. Between jagged flashes, Seth glimpsed the yellow eyes and ragged teeth of more than a dozen greenskins. He smiled.

The orks roared and charged towards him.

Springing to his feet, Seth swung his eviscerator up and flicked the activation stud. He barrelled into the orks, denying their attack momentum, feeling his heartbeat quicken as bones broke against his armoured bulk.

Snarling, Seth tore his blade through a wide arc. The vicious stroke maimed a trio of orks, ripping out their guts and bathing him in blood. He reversed the motion, hacking the blade back down, butchering two more of the greenskins. He attacked again. Another ork died, its torso shorn in half.

His blade rose and fell, churning muscle and bone into sodden gobbets. He attacked and attacked and attacked, relentlessly cutting and bludgeoning, striking without any thought of defence, ignorant of the blows that hammered against his armour.

Seth snarled as he found his blade blocked by another. He pressed down on his opponent, feeling the other’s weapon begin to buckle.

‘Lord, it is I, Nathaniel,’ Nathaniel stammered, driving his second chainsword under Seth’s blade in an effort to stop it inching towards his face.

Seth couldn’t hear Nathaniel. He couldn’t see the aquila on the other Flesh Tearer’s breastplate. Lost to his bloodlust, all he could hear was the sound of battle, all he could see was the blood yet to be spilt.

‘Lord… Seth…’

Seth roared and tore his weapon free from Nathaniel’s, punching it down into the deck. He knelt against his sword, gripping the haft as though crushing it might bring him solace, and deactivated his armour’s auto-senses. His helmet display blinked dark, plunging him into silent isolation, cutting him off from the world, shutting out the violence. ‘Sanguinius, clad me in rightful mind, strengthen me against the desires of flesh.’ Seth ground his teeth, struggling through the litany. The beast in his breast shuddered, hammering a final blow as it felt his will shackle it. ‘By the Blood am I made… By the Blood am I armoured… By the Blood… I will endure.’

The mine was a smouldering ruin. The vast geared systems of belts that carried away the rock had been reduced to a tangled mess of twisted metal. Dark columns of smoke drifted up from scattered piles of ore that lay heaped around iron transit caskets. The energy-rich mineral deposits would burn for weeks, warming the bodies of the dead Steel Legion troopers who covered the ground like spent shell casings.

‘We are here. Now what?’ asked Seth.

‘We need to descend to the absolute bottom. The main tunnel should take us past half way. Beyond that, we’ll run into the exploratory lines. We should be able to use one of them to travel the rest of the way,’ said Nerissa.

‘Should?’

‘It is the nature of mines that they change on a daily basis. The last set of schematics I managed to secure were over three months old. Now that we are here, we should be able to procure a more accurate set.’ Nerissa indicated a damaged console to the right of the doorway.

‘Metatron, see what you can do,’ said Seth.

The Techmarine approached the console and pulled a pair of data-cables from a recess in his gauntlet. ‘It’s functioning, but the display is beyond repair. Give me a moment and I’ll route the data to my helm.’ Metatron manipulated several of the dials on the console. ‘According to the senior excavator’s last log, GSN-V is the deepest burrow. It is almost nine kilometres down.’

‘What is the time stamp?’ asked Seth.

‘It was recorded two hundred and sixty hours ago,’ said Metatron.

‘That is a long time. How can we be sure the tunnel is still open?’ asked Harahel.

‘We cannot. It is just a chance we will have to take,’ said Nerissa.

‘I do not like trusting my fate to chance.’ Harahel hefted his eviscerator as though to emphasise his point.

‘You are a fool to think it has ever been any other way, Flesh Tearer.’

Harahel took a pace towards her in threat.

‘Enough,’ said Seth. ‘Let us go.’

‘Be on your guard. It looks like the orks overran the mine. They may not have left.’ Seth spoke as they passed a string of dismembered corpses.

‘Orks I can kill. I’m more concerned with all these tunnels. A wrong turn and we’ll be wandering around here for weeks,’ said Harahel.

‘I am certain the data I extracted was accurate,’ said Metatron.

‘Let us hope so.’ Seth cast a sidelong glance at the inquisitor. It would not bode well for her if his warriors remained trapped underground for any length of time. Without an enemy to kill, their frustrations would soon get the better of them. ‘Pick up the pace.’

Plasteel beams shadowed them from overhead as they moved through the mine. Reinforced arches and cross-tunnels intersected their path every hundred paces. Twice they had to stop to dig through piles of rubble that blocked their path before they reached the base of the main tunnel.

‘Which way now?’ Seth indicated the arterial passageways and smaller feeder tunnels that wound off in every direction.

‘We should head–’

‘What was that?’ Nerissa interrupted the Techmarine, instinctively raising her weapon.

Seth snarled. ‘Orks.’

Without another word, the Flesh Tearers took up defensive positions. The burr of chainswords growling on idle broke the silence. A heartbeat later, a roar, primal and alien, responded.

The orks had found them.

Harahel took first blood. ‘Contact!’

His voice was quickly joined by the others as the orks engaged them. The Flesh Tearers opened fire as orks poured from every tunnel and cross-tunnel connected to their position.

‘Hold formation. The first of you to break will pay with his life,’ Seth snarled as he fought down his own urge to abandon his position and charge headlong into the mass of greenskins.

In the close confines of the cavern, the thunderous staccato of weapons fire was deafening. The howl of the orks and the roar of the Flesh Tearers was like the voice of some terrible storm.

‘We cannot stay here,’ said Nerissa.

‘She is right.’ Nathaniel emptied the last of his rounds into a charging ork, reducing the greenskin to a ruined mulch. ‘If even one of us falls they will overwhelm us.’

Seth ignored them, his attention fixed on his own blade as it tore the guts from an ork.

‘Master Seth. We must move.’

Seth grinned at the panic in Nerissa’s voice and cast a glance towards her. Defensive wounds scored her arms and face. Two of her retinue lay dead beside her. The other two were bleeding badly.

‘Seth!’

Seth roared in frustration. ‘Metatron, which way?’

‘Here.’ The Techmarine indicated a narrow tunnel sloping down to their left.

‘Go. I will hold them here,’ said Harahel.

‘No. There are too many even for your might, brother,’ said Seth.

‘Perhaps.’ Harahel grinned and tore his weapon through another ork. ‘But we cannot fight a withdrawal. A single detonation inside that tunnel will see us buried.’

Seth knew he was right. ‘We will return for your body. Your bloodline will not end here.’

‘See that you do.’

‘The Blood protects.’ Seth banged his fist against Harahel’s pauldron in salute and withdrew into the tunnel.

With the Chapter Master clear, Harahel threw a grenade up towards the ceiling. The detonation sealed off the tunnel, leaving him alone with the orks. ‘Who dies first?’

GSN-V was a ragged borehole that plummeted sharply down into the earth. It grew narrower at irregular intervals, forcing the Flesh Tearers to hunch over and advance in single file. Unlike the main tunnel, there was no lighting studding the ceiling, forcing Nerissa and her warband to navigate by portable luminator.

‘We can go no further.’ Seth spoke for the benefit of Nerissa, who was several paces behind him.

‘The Titan should be directly below us.’ The inquisitor knelt down and ran her hand across the coarse earth. ‘Arija.’ She motioned to the tattooed warrior.

The man stepped forward, placing a flat metal cylinder on the ground. Twisting it securely into the earth, he depressed the activation stud on its side.

‘Stand back,’ said Nerissa, as the device began to charge.

The cylinder flashed azure as the noise built to a crescendo, emitting a pulse of energy that lanced down into the ground. The earth and ore-rock underneath the device began to crack, turning to powder and crumbling away to reveal a plate of green-brown adamantium.

‘Brother Metatron,’ said Nerissa. ‘Your plasma cutter, please.’

The Titan had been buried face down, leaving them to enter through its back so that they walked on the internal walls while the flooring stood erect behind them. The ventilation-cyclers and atmos-scrubbers had long since fallen silent and the air was a stale mix of pungent decay. Cobwebs clung to every surface. Piles of grey dust, the powdered remains of organic matter, tumbled like sand where they disturbed it. It was not unlike the Validus. A maze of tight corridors and grilled walkways dissected its interior, allowing begrudging access to the god-machine’s manifold sections.

‘It still functions.’ Metatron indicated a flickering bank of luminators. ‘Does it have a name?’

‘Not one I am willing to share with you, Flesh Tearer,’ Nerissa sneered.

Seth snarled. ‘How much further?’

‘We are almost there. The bridge should be on the other side of the next bulkhead,’ said Nerissa.

‘Pick up the pace. Let us be done with this.’ The desire to avenge Harahel gnawed at Seth’s bones like a starved beast. He itched to be back in the mine, killing orks.

‘This doesn’t feel right,’ Nisroc’s voice crackled over a closed channel.

‘What do you mean?’ asked Seth.

‘Look around you. There are no heretical markings, no crude blood sigils.’

Seth stopped walking. The Apothecary was right. He had been so consumed with the desire to avenge Harahel, to kill the inquisitor, that he had missed it. The baleful miasma, the sickening air of perversion that permeated everything the Archenemy touched, was absent. The Titan had not been tainted.

‘We are here,’ Nerissa announced as she entered the bridge. Arija and the remaining woman followed her in.

Seth looked past them, studying the ruined chamber. Sparking cables hung like limp vines from smashed consoles. The husked remains of the Titan’s crew lay slumped against the vast oculus that was the Titan’s left eye. The armourglass lens was badly cracked, stricken with wide fissures. The symbol of the Legio Annihilator glared back at him from the upturned ceiling.

‘Arija, get what we came for and plant the charges,’ said Nerissa.

‘Wait. Stop.’

Arija ignored Seth, pulling a device from his belt and connecting it to the princeps’s jacks. A second later, his head vanished in a cloud of red mist as an explosive round detonated his skull.

Nerissa rounded on Seth to find his bolt pistol levelled at her face. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I am tired of your lies, inquisitor. This Titan is not a weapon of the Archenemy. Tell me why we are here or I will rip your face from your skull.’

‘You dare–’

‘Now.’ Seth fired again, and the female warrior flanking Nerissa came apart at the midriff as the bolt-round tore through her abdomen.

Nerissa turned to face the woman’s ruined corpse, and smiled. ‘Ah, that infamous Rage of yours, Seth. I had wondered how long it would be before it surfaced.’ Nerissa held up a hand to placate Seth as he advanced on her. ‘Whether it is loyal to the Throne or not, we cannot allow this Titan to fall into the hands of the orks. It must be destroyed.’

‘You cannot deny the Imperium a weapon such as this. We will send word to Mars, and have them excavate it.’

‘Such a small mind. Another war machine will make little difference to the fate of the Imperium.’ Nerissa spread her arms. ‘This Titan is ancient. It is older even than that barbaric symbol you wear on your pauldron. It stalked battlefields ten thousand years ago when the galaxy was forced to its knees by your depraved cousins.’ Emboldened by her conviction, Nerissa took a step towards Seth. ‘Knowledge is the only weapon worth possessing and I will not lose this find to the asinine secrecy and inane bureaucracy of Mars. I will know what this Titan knows. I will unlock the secrets from its mind.’

Seth was silent for a moment, his anger momentarily crushed by the weight of the inquisitor’s words. ‘No. Knowledge corrupts. It is far more terrible than a simple weapon. It is justification. Too much knowledge, too little knowledge. Knowledge was the catalyst for the most devastating civil war mankind has ever faced. We cannot risk inviting such a war. I will not let you siphon the datacore.’

‘Are you worried about what I might find? About what I might uncover about your precious bloodline? Perhaps your progenitors were not who you think. Perhaps they aided the Archene–’

Seth fired, depressing the trigger before the last syllable could leave Nerissa’s lips.

The round detonated an inch in front of the inquisitor, exploding against a shimmering energy field. ‘I had hoped this moment would come sooner. Ghaar-gor kharnn ar-vgu raah.’ Blood spilled from Nerissa’s mouth as the dark words tore from her throat. The eldar gem on her breast began to vibrate, radiating a piercing light as Arija’s and the dead woman’s bodies drifted up from the ground.

Seth and his warriors opened fire. ‘Psychic wretch,’ he cursed as the rounds impacted against the shield of energy surrounding the inquisitor.

The floating corpses shuddered once and exploded, bathing the Flesh Tearers in blood and viscera. Seth grunted in pain as the psychic shockwave slammed him back into the wall. Pain. Pain that was not there lanced through his legs as his mind heard his bones snap. He fell to the floor.

He made to stand and stopped, casting his eyes around. He was on a warship, an ancient vessel far grander and mightier than any he had stood upon. Its plasma core thrummed with restrained fury, its walls rippled with power. Seth could hear the familiar sound of battle ringing from the ship’s many corridors. He reached for his weapon.

Powerful hands that were no more real than the injury to his legs locked around his throat. They squeezed, gripping tighter, throttling the life from him. He struggled and tried to prise them away, but they were too strong. Death. Death and darkness closed in around him. He stopped struggling, giving up as his rage gave way to sorrow, to shame. Seth knew he had failed. He knew that this was where he would die. Unless…

Seth roared to his feet, and drove his combat knife into Metatron’s jaw. Blood. Blood would wash away his shame. Blood would ease his anguish. Seth advanced and kicked his foot into Metatron’s chest. He would kill and kill and kill. He would kill death itself if it came for him.

The Techmarine rode the blow’s momentum, rising and firing. The first shot went wide. The second struck Seth in the gut, blasting off a chunk of his armour and opening his abdomen. Seth barrelled into Metatron, dragging him to the ground. Pinning the Techmarine beneath him, Seth delivered a series of punishing hammerblows to his face, smashing his helm and cracking his skull. Pulling the knife from Metatron’s jaw, Seth plunged the blade into his torso, stabbing him again and again, working the knife until it broke against the Techmarine’s hardened ribs. Tossing the ruined weapon away, Seth drove his fingers down under the Techmarine’s gorget and broke it off, exposing his throat. Ripping off his own helm, Seth sank his teeth into Metatron and tore out his larynx. He relished the taste of the chemical-rich blood as it filled his mouth and warmed his throat.

Harahel grunted with effort, pulling Seth from Metatron and tossing him to the ground. ‘What madness is this?’ Harahel demanded as he watched Nisroc wrestle with Nathaniel. ‘Has the Rage claimed you all?’

Seth rolled to his feet, snarling, blood-slick saliva dripping from his mouth, and charged Harahel.

Harahel angled off, avoiding Seth’s grasp, and ripped his eviscerator across the Chapter Master’s thigh.

Seth kept coming.

‘Be still, damn you.’ Adjusting his grip, Harahel smashed the flat of his weapon across Seth’s face. The blow shattered the blade and knocked Seth to the floor.

Seth’s vision swam. He was barely conscious. At the edge of his vision he saw Nisroc. The Apothecary had a bolt pistol pressed to Nathaniel’s face.

Nisroc fired. He continued to fire, blasting chunks from Nathaniel’s corpse until Harahel’s foot connected with his head.

‘Harahel… I thought you were dead.’

‘No such luck.’

‘The inquisitor…’

‘She is gone.’

‘Why?’ Seth glared at the hololith, his eyes burning into the image of the woman who stared back at him.

‘Consider it payback.’ Though she had changed much of her appearance, there was no mistaking the contempt that flickered in the woman’s eyes. After weeks of hunting through the shoal of vessels orbiting the Armageddon system, Seth had found Inquisitor Nerissa Lekkas. Docked aboard the Emperor’s Gift, she was awaiting clearance to translate out of the system.

‘For what?’ Seth growled, clenching his fist in front of his chest as though the act might squeeze the life from Nerissa. ‘What debt do we owe you?’

‘Inquisitor Corvin Herrold,’ she said.

‘I have met many of your kind, inquisitor. I rarely remember their names,’ Seth lied. He remembered Corvin. The inquisitor had come with deception in his heart and heresy on his lips. He had sought to undo the Flesh Tearers, to expose their curse. Corvin had sought answers in dark places. Seth had given him a taste of true darkness.

‘Do not mock me, Flesh Tearer.’ The image of Nerissa swelled to fill the hololith as she stepped closer to the Emperor’s Gift’s pict-transmitter. ‘Corvin was my master. My teacher. You broke his mind. You left him a shadow of the man he was.’

‘Whether I remember him or not is unimportant. What matters, inquisitor, is that I remember you.’

Nerissa laughed. ‘And you have come to kill me?’

‘Yes.’

‘You are a fool, Flesh Tearer. If you board this vessel, I will force you to butcher everyone on board. Your actions will sign the death warrant of your Chapter.’

‘I do not need to board you.’

‘You would open fire?’ Nerissa shook her head. ‘I think not. Your ship lies in the visual arc of a dozen Imperial warships. If you as much as power up a single weapons battery, I will have them obliterate you. We are even. Leave it at that.’

‘We will meet again, inquisitor,’ said Seth.

‘No, we will not.’ The image shuddered and dissolved as Nerissa terminated the comm-link.

‘Sanguinius feast on her soul.’ Behind Seth, Harahel snarled and thundered his fist down into a console. ‘She is right. If she leaves the system, we will never find her.’

‘I know,’ said Seth. ‘Open a channel to Chaplain Zophal.’

‘I stand ready, lord,’ Zophal’s voice crackled back over the comm.

The Mortis Wrath lay on the far side of the flotilla, hugging a debris field at the very edge of the system. The Flesh Tearers strike cruiser was void-black, an indistinct warship whose insignia and allegiance had long since been scoured away.

‘Do you have range?’ asked Seth.

‘Yes, lord, but we cannot destroy the inquisitor’s vessel without risk. The Light of Terra and the Redeemer are both within visual range and are scheduled to translate with the Gift.’

‘Then we cannot fire. We will be excommunicated, hunted as heretics.’ Scar tissue shone raw around Nisroc’s left eye socket. He had torn his eye out, given it in penance for killing Nathaniel.

Seth sighed. The Light of Terra and the Redeemer were medical transports. Their holds were crammed with tens of thousands of wounded. ‘Nisroc is right. There can be no witnesses. Zophal, launch the assault torpedoes. Kill them all.’

‘Yes, lord.’

‘The Blood cleanse us.’

Seth turned from his warriors and paced to his flagship’s oculus. Outside, in the darkness of the void, he could just about make out the Emperor’s Gift, The Light of Terra and the Redeemer as their engines built up enough energy to translate into the warp.

By now the assault torpedoes launched from the Mortis Wrath were attached to the ship’s hulls. Inside each, a squad of Death Company waited to be unleashed.

When the trio of ships jumped into the warp, they would take the Death Company with them. The black-armoured warriors would breach the hulls and massacre their way through the ships. They were berserkers. Butchers possessed of an unrelenting bloodlust. They would hack, kill and murder until there was no one left.

‘We are vengeance,’ Seth whispered and grinned darkly.

The inquisitor’s mind tricks would not work on those already lost to madness.

‘We are fury.’

When there was no one else left, the Death Company would turn their wrath on each other, on the ships themselves. In their rage, they would erase all evidence of their deeds. Seth felt the tension ease from his body as he watched the ships jump. He felt no regret. He would seek no forgiveness for his actions, offer up no penance.

Nerissa’s disregard for the lives of Imperial soldiers had appalled him because it had been unnecessary. But she had been wrong to think him above such actions. He was an angel of death, lord of murderers.

‘We are wrath.’

FROM THE BLOOD

Balthiel’s serf lay dead on the floor, his body chalk-white from exsanguination. Arterial fluid had run from his orifices until his veins were empty. Hoarfrost rimed the chamber walls. Unnaturally frozen air molecules cracked like agitated ice. Balthiel knelt in the centre of the lightless cell, oblivious to the serf.

‘By his Blood, am I made.’ The Librarian trembled as he spoke, forcing each word through bloodied lips. It took all of his focus, all of his training to stay conscious. Pain that he thought he could never have endured wracked his body. His hands ached from gripping the floor, his fingers dug knuckle-deep into the steel.

The unknown figure stepped towards Balthiel.

‘By his Blood, am I armoured.’

Blood trickled from Balthiel’s nose, striking the floor with a regular rhythm. He heard each droplet as it fell. They thundered in his mind like the firing of a siege cannon. Weeping, he held the trance; he would see the end of the vision this time. He had to. He would know the face of his tormentor.

The shadow-fire obscuring the figure filtered away…

‘By his Blood…’ Balthiel shuddered, crying out in pain. Smoke exuded from his pores and drifted off his skin in a black-grey pall.

A black-armoured Space Marine stood before Balthiel. Its battleplate resembled his own, but it bore the bloodied saltire of the damned upon its pauldron. It laughed. The humourless sound swelled in Balthiel’s mind, the persistent rumble of a storm-wracked sky.

‘By his Blood, shall I triumph.’ Balthiel’s voice was a tortured whisper.

The Space Marine removed its helm, exposing its true face. It was a red-skinned beast. A daemon. Still laughing, it opened its fanged mouth and roared. ‘From the Blood are monsters born.’

The psychic vision faded, throwing Balthiel up and back against the wall. He collapsed to the floor. Before darkness took him, the Librarian tapped the last of his strength and called for aid. ‘Apothecary…’

‘Master Zargo, Brother Arjen.’ Balthiel clamped his fist to his breastplate, saluting the two Angels Encarmine. ‘Chapter Master Gabriel Seth sends his regards.’ Balthiel entered the strategium proper, joining Zargo under a grey-blue hololith projection of the Stromark System.

‘I see Seth at least had the good sense to avoid this conflict,’ said Zargo, a snide smile stretching his lips.

Balthiel hid the annoyance from his face. He’d fought alongside Zargo and his Chapter before. Of all the sons of Sanguinius they were the most aloof, displaying a contemptuous disregard for the weak. Their arrogance surpassed that of the Blood Angels themselves. Balthiel held Zargo’s gaze. The Chapter Master’s haughtiness did far more to mark him as an Angel Encarmine than the winged Chapter symbol on his left pauldron.

‘My lord is needed elsewhere,’ said Balthiel.

Castellan Zargo grinned, a glimmer of disappointment in his eyes. He would have enjoyed sparring with the Flesh Tearer. Zargo turned to the strategium’s sole human occupant. ‘Leave us.’

Admiral Vortimer’s face crumpled. He was master of the Emperor’s Fist, the largest warship in the Epeyrion battlegroup, and this was his war room. Vortimer pulled his shoulders back in an effort to regain some dignity, and glared up at the three giant warriors. Each took up the space of four of his officers as they stood around the tactical console. The Space Marines’ crimson armour purred as they examined the hololith.

This was not the first time Vortimer had encountered the warriors of the Adeptus Astartes. On Pleuvus Seven, he had borne witness to the speed and ferocity of a White Scars assault. Still, it seemed impossible that even a superhuman could manoeuvre clad in such heavy battleplate.

Awe, and if he was honest, fear, held Vortimer’s tongue in check. He made the sign of the aquila, clicked his boots together and left the Space Marines to their task.

‘It is as well he is gone,’ said Arjen as the door closed on the admiral. ‘The drumming of his coward heart was growing tiresome.’

Even a passive reading of Arjen’s mind revealed the malice behind his jest. It would not be long before Zargo’s First Captain succumbed to the rage boiling in his blood. Of that, Balthiel was certain. ‘My orders are to secure Stromark Prime,’ said Balthiel. He looked to Zargo.

‘Yes, we will enter the Stromark system together. You will drive for Prime while we take Secundus.’ Zargo manipulated the image. Blue orbs depicted the sister worlds. Each planet had been a bastion of industry, charged with supplying the Emperor’s armies with the weapons needed to prosecute their campaigns of reclamation. The petty feuds that had long existed between their rulers had escalated to a system-wide conflict and could no longer be ignored.

‘Governess Agrafena has fortified her palace well.’ Zargo indicated the line of reinforced positions framing the palace. ‘There’s a dense network of anti-air batteries and surface-to-low-orbit missiles. We cannot risk Thunderhawk deployment.’ Several threat sigils sprang up across the hololith as Zargo spoke.

‘Teleporters?’ asked Balthiel.

‘The palace is void shielded. Drop pod assault is the only option,’ said Zargo.

Balthiel studied the hololith, executing the mission in his mind. He had led hundreds of such attacks on enemy positions. There were always casualties. ‘Losses are likely to be significant.’

‘You must find a way, Flesh Tearer. The Axion campaign will stall, perhaps even collapse, should the Stromarkians continue to focus their efforts on destroying one another. You must ensure compliance, the Emperor demands it.’

‘Why not send an assassin, murder the perfidious weaklings in their sleep?’ suggested Arjen. ‘We belong on the front, killing orks.’ Arjen drew his hand through the hololith, distorting the image.

‘Were it only that simple, brother.’ Chaplain Appollus stepped from the shadows of the corridor, his black armour seeming to coalesce from the darkness.

‘Chaplain.’ Zargo greeted the Flesh Tearer coldly, annoyed by the contempt in his tone.

Arjen said nothing.

Balthiel suppressed a smile, reading Arjen’s desire to kill Appollus even as the Angel Encarmine formed the thought. +Not with a dozen of your brothers.+ The Librarian pushed his words into Arjen’s mind.

‘There is more to this conflict than the greed of two individuals. The Stromarkians have long been rivals. This war runs in their blood.’ Appollus adjusted the hololith. Prime spun into sharp focus. ‘We must crush their spirit. We must remind them that the needs of the Imperium are of more importance than their own petty concerns of state.’ Appollus tapped the keys on the tactical console. The hololith shuddered. The image resolved to show several clusters of red orbs that blinked over Stromark Prime, indicating primary bombardment targets. ‘We will drown the Stromarkians’ arrogance in a tide of blood.’ The hololith continued to change as Appollus spoke. Its cogitators extrapolated landing sites and predicted enemy casualty rates, illustrating the destruction Appollus and his Death Company would wreak upon Stromark Prime.

We cannot repeat Honour’s End. Seth’s words rang in Balthiel’s mind. He stared at the Chaplain. Appollus’s eyes were as dark as his armour. Balthiel remembered his vision, the black-armoured daemon etched into his memory, and shivered. The Death Company were a terrible force to behold, their unrestrained fury the stuff of nightmares. Tendrils of icy foreboding stabbed at Balthiel. They were about to unleash terror upon Stromark. Such a massacre would not be without cost.

Balthiel reached out tentatively with his mind, probing the Chaplain’s thoughts. He saw nothing. Appollus’s intentions were hidden behind mental barriers as fierce as the skull helm he wore in battle.

The Librarian turned back to the slowly turning image of Stromark Prime, his eyes lingering on the civilian casualty numbers as they continued to count upwards. ‘The Blood grant me strength,’ Balthiel mouthed.

Death’s Cowl bled into real space, exiting the warp in a shimmer of fractured light. The vessel’s hull stretched to infinity, defying all laws of artifice, before snapping to its original proportions. Tendrils of ethereal fire clung to the Cowl’s ashen flanks as it powered towards Stromark Prime, a final echo of the nightmare realm that the Flesh Tearers strike cruiser had traversed.

‘Range?’ Chaplain Zuphias’s voice boomed across the Cowl’s command bridge like the rumble of thrusters. Even by Space Marine standards he was ancient, his oil-black armour scrubbed clean of insignia by the ravages of time.

‘Seven minutes to optimal firing distance, liege.’

‘Nine minutes to deployment range, liege.’

The surveyor and tactical serfs spoke near simultaneously, a practice Zuphias insisted upon. On the battlefield, he had commanded hundreds of warriors, interpreting an unceasing barrage of sensory information, while he fought blade-to-blade with his enemy. He would have his warship function at maximum efficiency. There was no place in battle for civility.

Zuphias nodded, and opened a vox-link. ‘Chaplain Appollus, you have less than nine minutes. Be ready.’ In response, an acknowledgment sigil flashed on Zuphias’s retinal display. Zuphias stared across the monastic expanse of the bridge. Below him, dozens of serfs scurried around, performing the myriad tasks necessary for the strike cruiser to function. He pitied them. They existed as echoes of the warriors they delivered to battle. The serf’s ashen robes were a poor substitute for the dark armour worn by the Death Company ensconced in the lower decks. The saw-toothed blades wrought into the floor of the bridge were no more than a homage to the Chapter symbol all Flesh Tearers carried on their pauldrons.

Zuphias looked up and growled, glaring through the real space window as Stromark Prime edged closer. He would give his primary heart to be making planetfall with Appollus and his battle-brothers.

It was true that he commanded the power to obliterate planets, to cut a bloody path through the stars. But naval engagements were detached, passionless things that left him as cold as the void they were fought in. Zuphias yearned for the immediacy of personal combat. To once again hear the bark of a boltgun, to feel it judder in his hand as it spat death. He wished for nothing more than to taste the sharp tang of supercharged air as his crozius struck down an enemy. He sighed; such things would never again be his to experience.

A monstrous, red-skinned daemon clad in fire and bronze had mortally wounded Zuphias in the Lypherion campaign. Khorne’s mightiest child, its axe a burning totem of murder, the daemon had shattered Zuphias’s bones and bisected him with a single stroke of its blade. Only his tenacity and burning anger had kept his twin hearts pumping until the Apothecaries found him. They had interred him in the Cowl’s command throne, keeping his body alive through a regimen of electroshocks and bio-fluids. Zuphias was to be transferred to a Dreadnought sarcophagus on his return to Cretacia, given an armoured body in which to continue his battle against the enemies of his Chapter. But operational requirements had necessitated he remain on the Cowl. Now, after more than six decades, he could no longer be removed from the vessel.

Zuphias looked down at the bundle of wires and cabling that replaced his legs. This was to be his fate until oblivion claimed him.

The chamber’s luminators flickered as the ship sensed its captain’s frustration.

‘Enemy contacts, liege. Closing.’ Klaxons wailed overhead, ringing out as the surveyor relayed the information.

‘Show me,’ Zuphias growled.

‘Yes, liege.’ The surveyor tapped a series of dials on his console, activating the tactical hololith. The panel of green light flickered as it resolved to hang in the air above Zuphias.

The Chaplain’s eyes narrowed as he studied the hololith. A pair of warships and a shoal of support frigates were moving to intercept them. He looked to each of the warships in turn, bringing them to the forefront of the image with a thought. The Cowl’s machine-spirit analysed their engine signatures, displaying a raft of tactical data, including the offensive and defensive capability of each vessel. The Pride of Halka was a Lunar-class cruiser, the Emperor’s Guardian a Dictator-class whose energy output suggested it was carrying a full complement of Starhawk bombers. Three Cobra-class destroyers were trying their best to hide among the modest flotilla.

To the front of the chamber, a communication serf spun round from his console to address Zuphias. ‘My liege. They have sent a request to negotiate over the comm-net.’

‘Vox silence, hold course.’

‘Liege?’ The comms serf had spoken without thinking. He felt his throat go dry as too late he realised his error.

‘We are not here to settle a dispute,’ said Zuphias, bunching a fist in anger. ‘We are not arbitrators. We are the chosen of Sanguinius, the Angels of Death, and we have come to deliver judgement.’

Sweat glistened on the comms serf’s brow as he stammered through a reply. ‘Yes, liege. Forgive me.’

Zuphias could have killed the serf for his insolence. He knew of several of his brothers who would have done so for less. But he needn’t expend the effort; the serf would not live long.

He did not learn the names of his human crew; to do so would be a waste. Their time on the Cowl was short lived. It was a vessel unlike any other. Home to the bulk of the Flesh Tearers Death Company, it was tasked with but a single objective – to bring ruin to the enemies of the Emperor. The human mind was unable to cope with the miasma of anguish that saturated the ship. Most killed themselves within two Terran years.

Appollus stared down from the gantry. Below, twenty ashen-armoured Death Company warriors stood in ranks of five. Each awaited the command to board the drop pods that stood on deck like giant black teardrops, ready to bring sorrow to the Stromarkians.

Serfs drifted between the rows of the Death Company, anointing their armour with lubricating oils and unguents of warding. Appollus regarded the nearest serf as its body quivered. A neuro-cable threaded through the serf’s crimson robe, connecting its brain to its spinal column. The serfs were all lobotomised, little more than drones. Appollus felt his grip tighten on the gantry’s support rail. His warriors deserved better. But no sane man could be coerced to stand so close to the murderous Space Marines. The Death Company were cursed, the walking dead: their bodies intact, their minds consumed by the Rage. Without the burden of conscience, all that remained for them was to ensure that they didn’t enter death’s embrace alone. Appollus was honoured to lead them in their final charge.

In the eaves of the chamber, the Chapter’s cherubs began intoning the prayers from the Iraes Lexican.

‘Our wrath shall be unceasing.’ Appollus echoed the choir, reciting pertinent lines. Uncoiling his rosarius, the Chaplain began the moripatris, the mass of doom. The service was traditionally held on the eve of battle, to draw out those among the Flesh Tearers whose rage threatened to take them and fold them into the ranks of the Death Company. Appollus had never needed the moripatris to identify his flock. Even before his induction into the Chaplaincy, he had always been able to look into the eyes of his brothers and measure their spirit. ‘Flesh is ephemeral, wrath eternal.’

Appollus used the moripatris in his own way, combining it with the teachings of the Iraes Lexican to churn his warriors into a fervent rage. They would fight possessed of an unshakable purpose, ignorant of even the most grievous wounds. They would set about the foe with the strength and vigour of a Cretacian jungle terror. They would slaughter unto death.

Searing spears of light flickered out across the void to stab at the Death’s Cowl’s prow as it powered towards the Stromarkian fleet. The vessel’s shields rippled and flared, failing under the vicious onslaught.

‘Status?’ asked Zuphias.

‘Shields collapsed, liege. Cycling again now,’ said the tactical serf.

At range, the Stromarkians had the advantage. Their warships were studded with huge turrets, each housing quad-banks of energy projectors that spat concentrated beams of destruction. Such lance weaponry enabled them to easily outdistance the Cowl’s weapon batteries.

‘Helmsman, more speed,’ Zuphias snarled as the Cowl shook under another lance strike, and leaned forward in his throne. ‘Get us closer.’

‘Yes, liege. All ahead full,’ said the helmsman.

Zuphias took a calming breath and sat back. ‘Follow this attack line, take us through them.’ Manipulating the hololith controls, he indicated a course that would bring the Cowl through the middle of the Stromarkian vessels. It was a bold, aggressive move, one that would expose the Cowl to a withering hail of broadsides. But it would allow Zuphias to close the distance quickly and prevent the Stromarkians from manoeuvring away.

A slew of warnings scrolled across his retinal display. Trajectory assessments, collision predictions and damage projections cautioned him against his course of action. He blinked them away with a snarl. He would trust to the discipline of his crew, to the Cowl’s speed and the metres-thick layers of armaplas and ceramite plating that wrapped its hull, to bring them victory.

Zuphias growled as another barrage of lance strikes struck the Cowl, burning through the outer layer of ablative plating to scar the strike cruiser’s flanks. He stared out through the real space window, his eyes fixed on the distant outlines of the two Stromarkian vessels. More than ten thousand souls cowered inside each of their hulls. He would kill them all.

‘By the Blood,’ Balthiel snarled as the drop pod bucked in its cradle. He felt helpless as the Stromarkian guns continued to hammer the Cowl without answer. Mag-harnessed inside the assault craft, the Librarian was indebted to the capriciousness of fate. He hoped Zuphias knew what he was doing. Even from the bowels of the ship, Balthiel could feel the Chaplain’s anger, his desire to rend, to kill. It boiled through the ship like an inferno, smouldering at the edge of Balthiel’s thoughts.

The Death Company could sense it too. Balthiel fought down the urge to draw his force sword as he thought of the five death-armoured killers who shared his drop pod. He had never been so close to a squad of the cursed. Under normal circumstances, only a Chaplain was considered to have the strength of mind and purity of spirit to accompany the Death Company into battle. A tangible air of mortality followed them. It drove even the soundest of warriors mad and dragged them into the Rage’s embrace.

Balthiel took a breath and relaxed his muscles. He was no Chaplain, but he had little choice. Without the aid of his gifts, the Death Company would never make it through the air defence batteries guarding the skies above the governess’s palace. Deploying further out would allow the defenders valuable time to bolster their lines. Appollus had been clear: Stromark Prime had to die in a day.

Craning his neck, Balthiel regarded the Death Company to his left and right. Their crimson optics glowered in the low light and, together with the incessant snarls that rumbled in their throats, reminded Balthiel of the Night Terrors. Figures of Cretacian folklore, the Terrors were said to stalk the darkness. They awaited the unwary, boiling away the soul of a man with a single glance before fading into the shadows. Balthiel’s unease grew as he thought again of the black-armoured daemon that haunted his dreams.

Balthiel felt the Death Company grow angrier in response to each jarring strike against the Cowl. He sensed their desire to be free of the drop pod, to be vambrace-deep in their enemies’ entrails. They were the most terrifying warriors Balthiel could conceive. He had seen the sons of Angron humbled by their battle fervour, and borne witness to the terrible violence the enraged Flesh Tearers were capable of.

But he did not fear them. He feared no one.

Balthiel’s disquiet was rooted in the weakness of his own flesh.

His burden was great. As a son of Sanguinius, he feared the Flaw, the blood lust and the madness, the promise of succumbing to the Rage and joining his brothers in the black armour of death. As a Librarian, he feared the moment of laxity that would see his soul devoured by the things that hungered in the warp.

Balthiel growled in frustration. He was twice cursed, destined to succumb to the monster within or the daemon without. He focused on the Death Company, on their anger. He listened to their hearts beating, pounding in their chests, racing to thrust blood around their murderous veins.

Balthiel felt his own pulse quicken in response. He craved the charnel drumming of his twin hearts, the visceral immediacy of combat that filled him with a clarity of purpose and armoured him against doubt.

He would kill until killed. Duty demanded it, but his soul willed it.

Zuphias ignored the red warning sigils that flared across his console. If the Cowl was functioning well enough to complain, then they were far from dead. ‘Power the bombardment cannon, target the carrier.’

The Cowl’s single, prow-mounted bombardment cannon was a mammoth weapon, accounting for almost thirty per cent of the strike cruiser’s mass. The heaviest armament carried by any Space Marine ship, it was designed to pulverise cities from high orbit but worked just as well against enemy vessels.

‘Yes, liege.’ The gunnery serf made the necessary adjustments to the targeting cogitators, gradually feeding power to the bombardment cannon’s firing cells. In the depths of the Cowl, a thousand indentured workers pulled on the metres of thick chain that lifted the magma shells from their housings and loaded them into the weapon’s breech, an onerous task that took them less than a minute under the stern direction of the gang-master’s neural whip. ‘Weapon ready. Target acquired.’

A reverberating thrum shook the Cowl from prow to stern as its primary weapon cycled to full charge.

‘Fire,’ said Zuphias.

The Cowl shuddered as the bombardment cannon unleashed its wrath, sending a salvo of magma warheads burning towards the Emperor’s Guardian.

The Dictator-class’s shields flared like a new-born star, overloading as the first of the warheads struck home. The remainder rolled over the carrier in a tide of destruction, stripping the hull and destroying the superstructure. Secondary explosions erupted along the Guardian’s length, blanketing its outline in flame.

‘Target hit, liege. Shields down, engines disabled. Vessel crippled,’ said the surveyor.

Zuphias kept his eyes fixed on the tactical hololith as the surveyor serf relayed the damage assessment. The Dictator-class was defenceless. Its engines were leaking plasma, a blue mist that bled away into the void. What little of the carrier’s crew survived the conflagration would soon die from exposure.

The Cowl’s master snarled. ‘Fire again.’

The Emperor’s Guardian was a drifting hulk. It posed no further threat to the Cowl. The mission dictated they expend their efforts elsewhere.

The gunnery serf turned to Zuphias, his objection dying in his throat. The Chaplain’s scarred flesh was pulled drum-tight over his face, as though his bones fought to break free of it. The bionic ocular that sat in place of his right eye shone crimson, while his skin was cast into blue relief by the hololith. The serf swallowed hard. ‘Liege, yes, liege.’

The deck shook under Zuphias as the Pride of Halka raked the Cowl with its lances. Zuphias growled; they should not have been able to fire again so soon. He consulted the data streaming across the tactical hololith. The Stromarkian vessel had diverted energy from their engines, decreasing the recharge time of their weapons. They sought to punish the Cowl for the damage wrought on the Emperor’s Guardian.

Zuphias grinned. Such careless indulgence of anger would cost them.

‘Ready to fire, liege,’ said the gunnery serf.

‘Finish them.’

Without the protection of its shields, the Emperor’s Guardian was defenceless against the wrath of the bombardment cannon. The magma shells slammed into its hull with fierce intent, pulverising its armoured skin. Secondary explosions erupted from within the vessel as fire consumed everything. It broke apart from port to starboard, shattered by the merciless barrage.

The two pieces of the ship tumbled away from one another, falling towards Stromark Prime like flaming heralds of the fate that awaited the world. A wing of hastily launched bombers raced away from the dying carrier, their ident-runes flashing on Zuphias’s tactical display as they burned at full thrust.

Zuphias grinned. It was a noble effort, but their flight was in vain. He watched with grim satisfaction as one by one they blinked dark. Bubbling explosions and secondary detonations had continued to wrack the aft section of the Guardian until the ship’s warp drive ruptured. The bomber wing was annihilated by a halo of expanding plasma as the Guardian’s death throes overtook it.

The Cowl shuddered as a hail of las-fire and solid projectiles hammered its starboard side, forcing Zuphias to brace himself against his throne. Below him, a handful of serfs jerked back from their stations, killed by an electrical discharge. The shock had blackened their skin and left flames licking their robes.

Five more willing servants stepped from the wings of the bridge to take over from their fallen comrades.

‘Liege, we are in weapon battery range.’

Zuphias was pleased by the replacement gunnery serf’s dedication to duty. He seemed unperturbed by the blood that smeared his console or the smell of charred flesh. ‘So it would seem,’ said Zuphias. Broadside for broadside, the Cowl was outgunned. The Halka’s hull was pockmarked by gun ports and weapon housings, each ready to unleash a hail of tank-sized shells upon the Flesh Tearers vessel. ‘Helmsman, new heading.’

The Halka’s directional thrusters faltered, emitting a guttering flare as they tried to react to the Cowl’s sudden course shift. With her engines running below optimal, the Stromarkian vessel was left to flail in the void like a beached sea mammal as the Cowl manoeuvred.

The strike cruiser turned, presenting only its armoured prow to the Halka’s guns.

Zuphias felt his muscles bunch in anticipation as the Halka grew to fill the real space window. At such close range, he could make out every detail of the ship’s gilded hull. Its armoured skin had been finely wrought into towering basilicas, pious bulwarks against the dangers of the void.

Zuphias scowled. He had no intention of trading blows with the Stromarkian vessel. He was going to ram it.

The shrill call of klaxons rang out as the Cowl bore down on the Halka.

‘Brace! All hands brace!’ The surveyor serf’s voice crackled through every vox on the Cowl, warning of the imminent collision with the Halka.

The Halka’s shields hissed and cracked, overloading as the Cowl pushed into their embrace. The Stromarkian vessel’s guns fell silent, its crew dumbstruck by the insane manoeuvre and unable to adjust their aim in time. The Halka’s metal hide buckled and crumpled as the Cowl’s armoured prow slammed into it. Explosions rippled out from the point of impact, racing ahead of the Flesh Tearers vessel, heralds of the carnage to come.

‘Bring them death.’ Zuphias drove the Cowl deeper into the Halka, using the serrated armour of his vessel like a gargantuan chainblade to mutilate the Stromarkian ship. The Flesh Tearers ship continued forwards, ripping along the Halka’s flank until it was wedged in place, tangled in the mess of destruction.

Breaches opened up across the Halka, its hapless gunnery crew sucked into the void like withered chaff. Fire washed though the ship, scrubbing entire decks and mushrooming out through lesions in the hull to illuminate the destruction.

‘Now. Fire.’ Zuphias slammed his fist against his console.

With the Cowl’s weapons batteries pressed against the Halka’s ruined hull, every shot found its mark. A torrent of missiles, las-bolts and plasma rounds savaged the Stromarkian vessel, stripping its armaplas bonding and broiling its innards.

The Halka’s hull fractured, breaking off in chunks under the unremitting onslaught. Internal detonations wracked the vessel from prow to stern, signalling its end.

The weight of firepower ripped the Cowl free from the Halka.

‘Helmsman, full reverse. Shields,’ said Zuphias.

The Cowl’s weapons fell silent, its shields flickering into life a microsecond before the Halka’s engines imploded.

The Pride of Halka detonated in a blue flash. Adamantium blast shutters locked down over the Cowl’s real space window, protecting the bridge crew from the piercing brightness. The shock wave crashed through the shields, and broke against the hull.

‘Report?’ Zuphias sat forward in his throne.

‘Shield generators are disabled. Hull integrity failed on decks seven, eighteen and thirty,’ said the surveyor.

‘My brothers?’ asked Zuphias.

‘Assault bay is secure.’

Zuphias nodded and looked out through the real space window as the shutters receded. Nothing but debris remained of the Stromarkian battleship. ‘Target the frigates. Kill everything.’

Jurik walked as fast as he dared, weaving his way between the military and clerical staff that rushed past him in the opposite direction. It angered him that they paid the halls they moved through so little respect. The Primus was a palace like no other. A jewel of architecture and sculpture, it was founded by their forefathers and had been the seat of leadership on Stromark Prime for ten thousand years. Though the governor’s palace on Stromark Secundus was considerably larger and better defended, it could not claim the same grandiosity as the Primus.

Jurik slowed as he reached the Hall of Remembrance, his soiled boots sullying the marble floor. ‘Forgive me,’ he said, glancing up at the stone sculptures that lined the walls. He stopped at the end of the corridor, smoothed down his tunic, and ran a hand through his hair. Taking a breath, he pushed open the vaulted glass doors and stepped into the royal receiving chamber.

Soft, haunting music played on wooden stringed instruments wrapped the vaulted room in a blanket of calm. ‘Governess.’ Jurik bent to one knee as he addressed the ruler of Stromark Prime.

Governess Agrafena stood with her back to Jurik, her attention fixed on the red-crested birds that fluttered between the trees outside in the palace gardens. Clad in a black bodyglove overlain with a mesh of refractive armour, she was not as Jurik had come to expect. Her long locks had been tied back, hidden in a tight ponytail that draped her back like a scabbard. Instead of the golden sceptre of her office, she carried a slender sword and rested her hand on its golden hilt. ‘At another time I would have had you flogged for this interruption.’

Jurik stayed silent, a bead of sweat forming on his brow.

‘What do you have to report?’ Agrafena motioned for Jurik to continue.

‘The fleet, governess. Our fleet is gone.’

‘And our divisions? What news of them?’

Jurik faltered before answering. ‘Gone, too. They are all gone, my lady.’

Agrafena turned, fixing Jurik with a granite stare. ‘Gone? Explain yourself, footman.’

Jurik allowed himself a quick glimpse of his ruler’s face. Her eyes were hard, as they always were, her skin ice-smooth like the northern lakes. A mist of ruby and crimson coloured her cheeks, and though it did little to warm her demeanour, Jurik almost smiled. It lifted his spirits to see that she had not lost herself completely to the chaos ruling around her. ‘My lady, our armies have been scattered, destroyed. Every soldier beyond the shield… everyone outside the palace… is… they’re all dead.’

Agrafena stared at him for a moment, her eyes unwavering as she received the news that her world had been reduced to a mortuary. ‘The Brigade Halka?’ Agrafena asked after her personal regiment. The thousand elite warriors who protected the Primus.

‘Captain Aleksander and his men stand ready, governess…’

‘Then we shall win the day. We shall show the Secundians our true mettle. The Brigade Halka has never been bested. These walls never breached. Never. I will not yield to them, Jurik. I will condemn all to ash before I make peace with those treacherous cowards.’

‘You cannot mean…’

‘I mean exactly that.’

Behind Jurik, the noble visage of Stavros Halka, her father, looked down upon her. The oil on canvas portrait of Stromark Prime’s most celebrated leader hung over the chamber’s far wall, next to the family crest. Stavros had been a great tactician, a peerless swordsman and beneficent ruler.

Agrafena lingered on the painting, finding her own face in her sire’s. She would not disgrace his memory by failing, whatever the cost.

‘Forgive me, governess… but it is Space Marines we face. The Emperor has sent His immortal champions to destroy us. We cannot… we cannot best them.’

‘Lies!’ Agrafena lashed out with her arm, striking a crystal sculpture of Stromark Prime from its place on the mantel. The irony was not lost on Jurik as the fragile globe shattered across the floor. ‘Everything can be killed.’ Agrafena spread her arms, gesturing to the dozen members of her honour guard that stood watch around the chamber. They were gene-bulked warriors, armoured in thick carapace and carrying heavy plasma rifles. She lowered her voice. ‘You need only find the right weapon.’

‘Balthiel.’ Appollus’s voice burst across the vox-link, shaking the Librarian from his reverie. ‘I am not against dying today, brother,’ the Chaplain’s voice thundered. ‘But it shall not be because you failed to do your duty.’

‘Patience,’ said Balthiel. ‘I will not be able to hold the shield for long. We must wait as long as possible.’

‘You sound like Zargo. The coward waits in orbit around Secundus while hundreds bleed to save him sullying his hands. He is a disgrace to our warrior bloodline.’

‘You cannot force his hand, brother,’ said Balthiel.

‘Have you ever known anything that I cannot force?’ Appollus let the words hang for a few seconds so their meaning would properly sink in. ‘Just don’t wait too long, Librarian.’

Balthiel bit down a reply. He understood Appollus’s agitation. It went against everything the Chaplain stood for to trust his life to a psyker.

Warning runes twinkled like bloodied stars from the drop pod’s ceiling as another barrage of anti-aircraft fire barked at its hull.

Balthiel opened a comm-channel. ‘Brother Jophiel.’ He looked up as he spoke. Back on board the Cowl Jophiel was watching, monitoring Balthiel through the pict-recorder mounted on the wall of the drop pod. ‘You are my keeper.’ Balthiel stared down at the remote melta charge locked to his thigh. ‘Do not hesitate.’

The light on the pict-recorder blinked twice in acknowledgment. Balthiel closed his eyes. ‘Emperor, defend my soul this day of battle. Let my weaknesses be overcome by Your strength that I may serve the Chapter.’ The temperature inside the drop pod plummeted as Balthiel reached out with his powers. A layer of unnatural frost formed on the walls, crusting the Death Company’s armour as Balthiel eased his consciousness from his body.

The shield of Sanguinius, as it was known amongst Balthiel’s order, was a psychic barrier, a physical manifestation of a Librarian’s will. He knew of no one who had ever attempted to manifest the shield on the scale he prepared to. Drawing on such power was dangerous. His soul would blaze in the warp, a refulgent feast for the denizens of that daemon realm. Should he succumb to their seditious whispering, should the foul powers take command of his flesh, Jophiel would end him.

Free from his flesh, Balthiel’s mind ghosted through the cold ceramite of his armour, pushing out beyond the drop pod to hang in the Stromarkian air. Above him, a dozen dark stars were burning downwards. He let his mind wander over them, the way Cretacian children ran their hands through acaulis bushes. Appollus and the rest of the Death Company’s minds shone like hot embers, their thoughts fixed on the slaughter to come. Balthiel pulled back, turning his attentions to the ground below.

The palace void shield shivered violet-blue as another piece of the Emperor’s Guardian finished its fall from orbit and dissolved against it.

The Stromarkian defence guns flared from under the shield’s protective mantle, spewing a torrent of explosive rounds towards the Flesh Tearers assault force.

Balthiel turned his back on the weapons to look up at the drop pods. He held out his hands. Thread-lines of golden energy grew from his fingertips, weaving into a shimmering blanket that expanded to fill the air beneath the Flesh Tearers vessels.

The Librarian focused on the barrier, strengthening it with his mind. It was as unbreakable as his spirit, an indomitable shield without flaw or weakness. It could not be breached by man or daemon. Unless he was weak. Unless he was flawed.

‘We are fury,’ Appollus’s voice snarled over the vox.

Blood ran from Balthiel’s nose and ears as the Stromarkian guns hammered his psychic barrier.

‘We are wrath.’ The Chaplain’s voice barely registered as Balthiel fought to maintain the shield.

‘Sanguinius, my father. Sanguinius, my armour. Aid me now.’ Balthiel’s body trembled as he forced the words through bloodied lips.

The drop pod shuddered as it tore through the palace’s defences, bucking violently as it struck the earth.

‘We are death!’ Appollus finished the axiom as the Death Company burst from the drop pods to taste Stromarkian blood.

The polished marble of the palace floor was slick with blood. The torn remains of governess Agrafena’s bodyguard lay strewn around the antechamber. The elite of the Stromarkian army were now little more than fleshy gobbets, churned up by chainweapons and blasted apart by bolt-rounds. Balthiel stood in the middle of the chamber, a halo of psychic energy glistening around his body as the quickening faded.

‘It is done,’ he said, exhaustedly.

Outside Balthiel could hear the roar of chainweapons and the harsh crack of bolt pistols as the Death Company continued to vent their rage upon the corpses of the Stromarkians.

‘Bring them to heel.’

Appollus slammed a fresh clip into his bolt pistol. ‘Not yet. Stromark Secundus has yet to be cleansed.’

‘That is not our fight.’

‘There will be no fight.’ Appollus gestured towards a heap of bodies at the far side of the room. One of them was moving.

Agrafena’s vision swam. She felt cold, weak. Shaking with effort, she pushed Jurik’s corpse from on top of her. The footman had taken a round meant for her. Touching a hand to her abdomen, Agrafena felt the sticky wetness of blood. Jurik’s sacrifice had been for naught. The explosive bolt had torn through his chest, showering Agrafena in lethal fragments. She was dying.

The governess didn’t spare the footman a second thought, her mind fixed on what she must do. She dragged herself up against the wall, wiping away blood from her lips. A wracking cough doubled her over. She gritted her teeth against the pain, bracing herself against the wall, and straightened. She would die on her feet and she would not die alone.

Balthiel snapped his bolt pistol up to fire.

‘Wait.’ Appollus grabbed Balthiel’s wrist, staying the Librarian’s hand. The governess had fought to the last. Even now, in the face of certain oblivion, she refused to accept what her body told her to be true. She would kill with her last action.

‘What are you doing?’ asked Balthiel.

Behind his skull mask, Appollus grinned darkly. The governess was one of his flock whether she knew it or not. ‘Wait… and watch.’

Agrafena bit down and depressed the data chip secreted under her tongue, opening a vox-link. ‘Omega One. Epsilon Nine…’ she struggled through the command, each word costing her more blood. ‘This is Governess Agrafena. By my father.’ Pain crushed the beauty from Agrafena’s features. ‘For our children. Launch.’

‘Brother…’ Balthiel looked to Appollus as the governess slid to the floor.

‘Zargo has yet to set foot upon Secundus,’ said Appollus. ‘They have deployed more Guard regiments and requested a further force to hold orbit so that they may depart the system. This will force Zargo to act, and expedite the resolution on Secundus.’

‘Brothers.’ Zuphias’s voice crackled over the vox, his communication distorted by the charged particles lingering in the world’s atmosphere, an after-effect of the orbital bombardment the Cowl had rained down upon it. ‘Surveyors detect a massive energy build-up on the near side moon.’

‘You knew?’ Balthiel looked to Appollus.

The Chaplain nodded.

‘I knew you were a bastard, Appollus…’

‘From the Blood are monsters born, brother.’

On Stromark Prime’s second moon, within one of the many mining complexes operated by the Halka consortium, thousands of long-dormant Apocalypse missiles rumbled to life. The missiles crested the surface, arcing round the moon’s orbit to burn towards the manufacturing and population centres of Stromark Secundus.

Above Agrafena, the marble visages of her ancestors stared down approvingly. A final bout of coughing sent her into spasms. Blood filled her mouth and trickled from her ears. She let her head loll to the side, and found her father’s portrait. The artist had done well to capture his rugged nobility. Agrafena gazed into her father’s eyes and smiled.

Her legacy would outlast his – her final thought, as the last Halka blood bled from her veins.

The gentle hum of the luminator was lost under the heavy chatter of keys being depressed in rapid succession. A hundred thousand servitors stood in regimented rows, tirelessly inputting the endless information that defined the Imperium of Man. The lobotomised serfs worked in total darkness, their augmented eyes having no need of the light.

Senior Clerk Mathias Wido was just as able to see unaided but he enjoyed the luminator’s warm glow. It made him feel more… human.

Mathias scribbled on the record slate with his data quill, double checking his calculations. Yes, everything was as he’d concluded. He placed the slate down on his desk and sat back in his chair.

The aged Jovian oak creaked as it adjusted to one of Mathias’s rare movements. His skin ached as his lips pulled to a line across his face in the closest approximation of a smile that he could muster. He’d checked the data thoroughly. The numbers had stayed the same: Three hundred billion, dead. Eight million structures reduced to rubble. A further fifteen million ruined. Seven continents declared uninhabitable. Four oceans boiled to dust. Some would describe this as a catastrophe. To the war machine of the Imperium it was merely an inconvenience. The population of Stromark would be recovered to acceptable production levels within only seven generations. Full output could be regained in as little as ten.

Mathias picked up the slate and closed the file, tagging the Stromark incident as an occasion of minor loss.

He paused, before pulling another data-slate from the pile towering beside his desk and beginning the process again.

THE TRIAL OF GABRIEL SETH,
ACT II

‘Your Chaplain forced my hand at Stromark. Killed millions with needless haste and callous disregard.’ Zargo’s voice was like the idling of a chainweapon, his earlier animosity given way to aggression.

‘Appollus did what was needed. You would have bled Guard regiments for months before committing to battle. Better we slaughter those too weak to have thrown off their oppressors than throw away the lives of those who would at least try,’ Seth answered with steely resolve.

‘And what of Corvin Herrold?’ asked Malphas. ‘It was your pride that damned the inquisitor. You could have killed him. Bought his silence with swift oblivion.’ The master of the Exsanguinators bristled with rage. ‘No. You had to prove that your will was stronger than his.’

‘It is!’ Seth roared. ‘It must be.’ He pressed his fists against his head in an attempt to blot out the rising pain in his skull, to stifle the anger that would rob him of all sane defence. ‘The curse ravages my Chapter. It steals my brothers and hands me monsters. It is as inevitable as death, and yet we fight. It would be far easier for us to lay down our arms and give in. To accept the madness and the freedom from guilt. Yet we fight on.’

‘A fight you have lost.’ Malphas thrust a finger at Seth.

‘This curse. It is all of our burden to bear.’ Seth spread his arms, encompassing the assembled Chapter Masters. ‘Yet through fate and fortune not of our making, we face it in different degrees. You, Malphas. I would have thought you more understanding. The curse claims your brothers almost as often as it does mine.’

Malphas growled. ‘You think I do not know?’

‘Then know that were it not for the blood in your veins, if your blood were as susceptible to the Rage as mine, you would be here now instead of I.’ Seth gestured to the chamber floor.

Malphas made to reply but found himself lacking for words.

‘The Exsanguinators are not on trial,’ said Zargo.

Seth looked to the Angel Encarmine and imagined gutting him. If he survived the day, there would be a reckoning between them. Of that he was certain. ‘We have not won the war against the Archenemy. They dog us every moment of our existence. The sins of our traitorous cousins demand we fight for atonement. We have lost entire worlds to the slaves of the old Legions, and yet never has this council gathered to discuss whether or not we should give up that fight.’

‘You dare say this?’ asked Techial. Tradition demanded the Chronicler remain silent but the Disciple of Blood was shaking with rage, his scarred features twisted into a cruel mess. ‘You sully our father’s name with such words.’ The wood of the lectern began to split and snap under Techial’s grip.

‘Spare me your rhetoric, Disciple.’ Seth turned from him with a snarl. ‘The curse is as real a threat as anything the Eye spawns.’

‘I agree with Techial. This is heresy,’ said Orloc.

‘Is it?’ Seth shook his head. ‘The Archenemy can be defeated. They can be killed. We will fight them with all that we are and we will kill them. We will kill them all if we must bleed the galaxy to do so. But the curse, the curse cannot be faced in battle. It cannot be brought to account. We have nothing to wage war against when it is all that we are.’

‘You are mistaken,’ said Lord Sentikan of the Angels Sanguine, his features hidden by a thick hood.

Seth shot him a glance in challenge. ‘And what truths should I accept from one who hides his face even from his own brothers?’

If the insult riled the Angel Sanguine he disguised it within the folds of his cowl, and spoke with a calm certainty. ‘Lord Mephiston is living proof of the victory that awaits. He emerged from the throes of the curse sane of mind and whole of body. He is hope enough.’

‘You are as a naïve aspirant if you believe that monster to be our salvation. Mephiston is an abomination. A wraith who should be clad in armour as dark as his soul.’

The remark sent a tide of discord washing through the chamber, drawing cries of sanction and outcry in equal measure.

‘And yet he does not butcher with the same abandon of your Flesh Tearers,’ Malakim of the Lamenters sneered. ‘Even those you deem fit to wear crimson make the butchers of my Death Company seem sane by comparison.’

Seth growled, allowing his anger to get the better of him. ‘And what would you know of battle, Lamenter? Look at you. Yellow in a room of red. A coward in a sea of blood.’

Malakim made to reply, but Dante cut him off.

‘Anger and despair, Seth. They saw the end of Nassir.’

Seth sighed, sobered by Dante’s words. Nassir Amit had been the first of the Flesh Tearers Chapter Masters. A brutal, vicious warrior, his deeds were great and many. He had fought in the Great War and conquered Cretacia, the world Seth now called home. Amit had been the best of them before his thirst for blood and violence had consumed him.

‘I have stood consumed by darkness and led an army of monsters in defence of the light. I have done what must be done to ensure the future of the Chapter,’ said Seth.

‘Your first duty is to the Emperor, whether you survive or not is of no consequence,’ said Geron. His face burned with disdain. Like the others of his Chapter, the Angel Numinous held the cursed in callous disregard. He loathed them, despised their weakness and the legacy it bore of their father.

‘My first duty is to Sanguinius and the sons he left me stewardship of.’

‘And what of your duty to us? What of your promise to me? Do you not remember your oath?’ asked Dante.

Seth looked to Dante. He said nothing. He remembered.

‘On the day of your rise to Chapter Master, you came to me. You came to me!’ For the first time, Dante’s composure slipped, his grip tightening on the balustrade. ‘You vowed to bring the Flesh Tearers to heel. To put an end to the violent outbursts, and the heedless, unnecessary slaughter. You were to bring honour back to the Chapter and glory to the memory of Sanguinius.’

‘I have fought to uphold that vow with my every breath.’ Seth shot forwards, advancing to the limits of the chamber floor. He glared up at Dante, the dark of his eyes reflected in the Blood Angel’s helm.

An uneasy quiet fell over the Judicium as with bated breath the Chapter Masters watched the Flesh Tearer and the Blood Angel size one another up.

‘Speak, then.’ Dante broke the silence. ‘Speak and let us hear of your efforts.’

BENEATH THE FLESH

‘I am His vengeance as He is my shield. I will deliver death to His enemies as He brings deliverance to my soul.’

Noise filled his world. An incessant thrum reverberated under his feet. The metal and ceramite around him squealed as angry thrusters were pushed to their tolerance. Bolts and arc-welded plates rattled as their construction was tested. A thunderous staccato of impacts rang like bolter fire against the hull around him. Yet in his mind, there was only silence: a sanctifying stillness, in preparation for battle. He would not be distracted from the consecration, his weapons would be ready.

‘Brother Maion, ready yourself.’

Maion lifted his head at his sergeant’s command and touched the blade of his chainsword to his temple, finishing the rite. He sheathed his weapon, and pulled the combat harness over his head, activating the mag-lock. ‘Ready, brother-sergeant.’

The Stormraven gunship powered through the void, its crimson hull charred and pitted from hundreds of recent atmospheric entries. The serrated black symbol on the gunship’s wing was almost indistinguishable from the scorch marks emblazoned on its flanks, eroded by the vengeful impacts of dense minerals and debris clusters. Flames licked the Stormraven’s surface, tracing a searing thread along its squat outline. It dived lower, pushing into Arere’s embrace.

The planet’s twin arid continents were turning from the system’s single sun. Had any of Arere’s citizens still been alive to gaze skyward, they would have marvelled at the descending gunship. The brightest light in the sky, Arere’s dead populace would have mistaken the Stormraven for yet another meteor, destined to crash into the desert-earth and forever change the maze of ravines punctuating the landscape.

‘Entry achieved.’ The pilot-serf’s mechanical voice crackled across the vox-link.

Maion juddered in his harness as the gunship knifed downwards, turbulent crosswinds breaking against the hull. Next to him, Harahel sat immobile, a massive eviscerator held across his lap. Maion smiled; it was a fitting weapon. Harahel was from Taci, a province of their home world Cretacia. The region was well known for the broad, well-muscled and aggressive individuals it bred, traits further amplified when they underwent the physiological enhancements required to transform them into Space Marines. Brother Amaru had replaced Harahel’s harness with one normally used to secure warriors in Terminator armour, in order to accommodate the Assault Marine’s bulk.

‘Bring up the tactical hololith.’ Sergeant Barbelo was on his feet, clasping an overhead assault-rail with a gauntleted hand. His face and shaven head were a mess of re-grafted skin and thick, serpentine scars.

‘A moment, brother.’ Amaru extended a bundle of data cables from his armoured-forearm and plugged them into a control slot in his seat. The Techmarine muttered something to the gunship’s machine-spirit and closed his left eye. The glowing bionic that replaced his right continued to shine like a targeting reticule.

The compartment’s luminators dimmed as a three-dimensional overview of Arere’s primary continent appeared in the middle of the deck, the blue-hued landscape hololithically projected by an optical lens mounted in the ceiling. With a thought, Amaru narrowed the focus on a line of canyons towards the north-east. A series of fortified buildings resolved out of the map.

‘Substation 12BX sits between the two walls of this canyon.’ The area changed colour to a deep crimson as Amaru continued, ‘The approach to the main entrance is overshadowed by a narrow gorge and high spires, landing improbable.’ The Techmarine paused as he calculated an approach. ‘We can land here.’ Amaru manipulated the image again and an octagonal courtyard sprang into view.

‘What of the enemy?’ Barbelo’s brow furrowed as his thoughts turned to battle, turning the deep lines of his forehead into shadowy ravines.

The image oscillated and zoomed out, the substation receding into the distance to glow faintly among the canyons. ‘We do not have real-time data but estimates would place enemy forces here.’ Amaru indicated the black mass surrounding the substation, representing the disposition of the Archenemy army on Arere.

Maion stared at the display, his muscles tensing instinctively at the mention of the Archenemy. Their forces had dispersed from their landing zones like an aggressive cancer, brutalising their way across the globe. The outpost was the last bastion of sanctity.

‘We have less than two hours until they reach the substation,’ Amaru stated plainly.

‘And if the worse has happened and our brothers are as we fear?’ Maion voiced what he knew the others were thinking.

‘That should be time enough to retrieve their gene-seed,’ Nisroc touched his narthecium in emphasis. The Sanguinary Priest’s gleaming white armour was in stark contrast to the deep crimson and black worn by Maion and the others.

Barbelo scowled. ‘That is not our primary mission, Apothecary. We must understand what happened on Arere, we must retrieve the compound’s data files.’

Nisroc felt his jaw tighten. ‘The Chapter is on the brink of extinction, recovering the gene-seed is paramount. I am bound by duty–’

‘Brothers…’ Amaru paused as one of the gunship’s many auspexes drew his attention. ‘We are closing on their augur range.’ The Techmarine looked expectantly at Barbelo. ‘We need to do it now.’

Barbelo glared at Nisroc. He knew as well as the Apothecary that the Chapter’s supply of gene-seed was critical. But the data files held vital information. Without them, they risked losing the entire Itan sector to the Archenemy. ‘They are our orders, and you will follow them.’

The Apothecary said nothing.

The sergeant took his seat and turned to Amaru. ‘You are sure this will work, Techmarine?’

Amaru nodded. ‘I sanctified this vessel myself. Its spirit is strong. It will not fail us.’

‘Very well, relieve the pilot.’

The hololith stuttered and dissolved as Amaru disengaged his cables and assumed the cockpit.

‘Prepare yourselves,’ Barbelo activated the mag-lock on his harness and clamped his helmet down over his head.

‘Emperor’s strength be with us.’ To his right, Nisroc locked his own helm in place.

‘Emperor’s strength.’ Maion joined the rest of the squad as they repeated the Apothecary’s words and donned their helmets. He felt his pulse quicken as hissing pressure seals locked his helmet to his armour, readying him for war.

‘It is done.’ Amaru moved at pace, taking his seat next to Barbelo. ‘The machine-spirit has us now.’

The gunship fell.

Amber warning lights lit up across the craft’s interior as the gunship surrendered to gravity. Maion was driven into his harness by the force of the descent, the metal bars gouging into the ceramite of his battleplate as the gunship plummeted towards the planet. The reassuring rumble of the gunship’s engines was replaced by the frantic chiming of the altitude counter that counted down to their doom. ‘Ave Emperor, stand with me and I shall not fail in your sight,’ Maion mouthed the prayer, banishing the thought that he was about to be crushed to death inside an armoured coffin. By the Emperor’s grace, he would meet his end on the field of battle.

‘Ten seconds,’ Amaru’s voice cut over the vox-link.

The Stormraven bucked violently as it fell. Even with the benefit of his Lyman’s Ear and the myriad other implants that were working to relieve the stress on his body, Maion struggled to stay conscious.

‘Five.’

Maion redoubled his grip on the harness.

‘Brace!’

The Stormraven’s thrusters fired on full burn, exploding downwards in a hail of fury as they fought to arrest the gunship’s descent. Their tumultuous roar drowned out the angry hum of warning runes and the whining collision siren. For the briefest of instants the world was silent and Maion was no longer falling.

A heartbeat later and the world was enveloped in noise. The Stormraven slammed into the ground, and Maion winced as he was driven up into his harness. The hull squealed in protest as fractures stabbed across its outer armour. The landing supports shattered, their metal struts fracturing on impact. Armoured glass broke from the cockpit and flooded into the compartment as dislodged rock hammered it. The gunship ploughed forwards, tearing a dark trench in the surface until its momentum was spent.

‘Egress!’ Barbelo was on his feet and out of his harness before the hull had stopped shaking, slamming his fist into the door release and motioning for the others to disembark.

The assault ramp lowered part of the way and stalled, its hydraulics spitting oleaginous fluid. Harahel barrelled forward, throwing himself at the stricken ramp. It slammed down into the earth with a dull thud, tossing powdered dirt into the air as the giant Space Marine rolled to his feet.

Maion pushed the catch on his harness. Nothing happened. The locking mechanism was broken.

‘Sit back, brother.’ Micos flicked the activation switch on his chainaxe and the weapon roared into life. He freed Maion with a casual downward stroke, his weapon’s adamantium teeth making light work of the harness.

‘You have my thanks, brother.’ Maion unsheathed his blade and followed Micos down the ramp.

Outside, beneath Arere’s starless sky, it was pitch dark and the elements conspired to impair visibility. Howling winds tossed grit and soil into a storm. Torrential rain fell in near vertical sheets. Neither fact mattered to Maion. His helmet’s ocular sensors filtered and illuminated the darkness, allowing him to see as clear as day.

Reams of tactical and situational data scrolled across his right eye, assimilated by his eidetic memory. The atmosphere was breathable. The Stormraven’s engines were cooling and unlikely to combust. His left pauldron had sustained mild damage during the landing but the servos were working within normal ranges. The squad had formed a perimeter around the stricken Stormraven. Their ident-tags and vitals hovered on the peripheral of Maion’s retinal display.

‘Stay alert! We may not be alone.’ Barbelo’s voice crackled over the vox-link.

Maion panned his bolt pistol around, scanning for targets. The outpost’s walls towered over them from all sides. He glanced at them briefly and a new set of data drifted over his helmet’s display. The base was designated Arere Primus. Its walls were an adamantium and ceramite compound, capable of withstanding a full-scale bombardment.

‘Stay in close formation, the storm is restricting comms,’ Barbelo’s annoyance was evident in his tone. ‘Amaru, can we extract in the Stormraven?’

‘Undetermined. I’ll need time to assess,’ the Techmarine’s reply rasped in Maion’s ear.

‘Atoc, secure the Stormraven while Amaru works.’

‘Harahel,’ Barbelo abandoned the hissing comm-feed, ‘lead us into the strategium.’

The towering warrior grunted in affirmation and sprinted towards the metres-thick blast door that sealed off the compound’s command and control centre.

Harahel ran a gauntlet hand over the access panel, wiping away the dirt.

++Internal Protocol Active++

A command rubric blinked through a veneer of rapidly settling dust.

++Terminal Sealed++

The words blinked at Harahel. He snarled and smashed his fist into the screen. ‘Brother-sergeant, the door has been locked from the inside.’

‘There are melta-charges and cutting equipment in the armoury,’ Maion recalled the information he’d assimilated during the briefing.

‘Apothecary, you and Micos cover our rear,’ Barbelo thumbed the power slide on his plasma pistol. ‘No one comes out of those doors. Maion, Harahel, follow me.’

The doors to the armoury unlocked with a hiss of pressurised gas. The toothed slabs slid apart and disappeared into the recess of the armoured frame. Maion followed Barbelo in, sweeping left as Harahel moved right. Maion grimaced as his helmet worked to filter out the putrid air. Evidence of battle was everywhere. Broken luminators stuttered in the ceiling, throwing jagged patches of light around the entrance chamber. Fist-sized holes studded the walls. Sparks cascaded from exposed cabling that hung in thick bunches. The metal of the floor was scorched and charred. Webs of blood and viscera clung to everything.

‘No bodies.’ Harahel voiced what Maion had been thinking.

‘The dead are not our concern. Keep your eyes open for the living.’ Barbelo aimed his plasma pistol towards the adjoining corridor and advanced to the rear of the room.

Maion nodded. According to the schematics, the passageway extended half a kilometre before a set of stairs would lead them down to the armoury proper. ‘Ideal place for an ambush,’ Maion said as he stared into the darkness of the passageway. ‘Luminators are out.’

‘Harahel, maintain position and assume overwatch.’

‘As you wish.’ Harahel hid his displeasure poorly, although he knew the sergeant was right – they’d be forced to advance down the corridor shoulder to shoulder; there’d be no room to wield his eviscerator.

Maion advanced into the darkness.

Harahel stood immobile, panning his gaze around the chamber. He could hear Maion’s footsteps as he moved down the corridor; the other Flesh Tearer was halfway to the stairs. He heard the fizz of the electrical cables as they spat in their death throes, and the shifting of metal – Harahel pivoted left as a grenade hit the ground. His ocular sensors dimmed, shielding his eyes from the piercing flash that flooded the chamber. With a dense clatter, half a dozen of the ceiling grilles fell to the ground. A cluster of figures in sodden fatigues dropped down after them and opened fire.

‘Contact!’ Harahel shouted into the vox even as a hail of las-fire pattered off his armour.

‘How many?’ Barbelo turned his head as the sporadic flash of weapons fire lit up the corridor behind him.

‘Contact front,’ Maion swung his bolt pistol up, advancing and firing as las-fire erupted from further along the corridor.

‘Micos,’ Barbelo summoned the other Flesh Tearer as he opened fire, following Maion into the enemy ahead, ‘assist Harahel.’ The sergeant didn’t wait for affirmation, deactivating his comm-link. He wanted no distractions; he wanted to be in the moment, to relish the kill.

Harahel’s attackers bore the Imperial eagle on their filth-encrusted chests. Traitors, he growled, grinding his teeth as a las-round struck his helm. Harahel clasped his eviscerator with both hands, twisting the handle to activate the power core. The weapon’s giant blade snarled into life, a physical manifestation of the rage churning through his veins. He ran at the traitors, heedless of the beads of las-fire that stung his armour.

Harahel grinned; the traitors were holding their ground. He tore the first of them apart with a savage upward swing that cut the man in half from groin to shoulder. Pivoting as the two halves of the man’s torso hit the ground, Harahel bisected another from hip bone to ribcage. A third died as he finished the move, chopping the eviscerator down through the man’s head and dragging it out through his ribs.

Maion counted fifteen muzzle flashes. The traitors had ambushed them with woefully inadequate numbers. The cowards were nestled behind some overturned supply crates and sheets of metal they’d dragged up from the floor. Maion stitched a line across the barricade with his bolt pistol. His enhanced hearing registered the changing sound as the mass-reactive rounds hammered into metal and blew apart flesh. Twelve muzzle flashes. To his left, Barbelo’s pistol hissed as it discharged, sending a flickering plasma round down the corridor. The barricade exploded in a blue flash as Barbelo’s shot struck home. Men screamed as superheated shrapnel perforated their bodies. Others were luckier, dying instantly as the round liquefied them. Maion knew that underneath his helmet, Barbelo was smiling. A dishevelled traitor stumbled over the corpse of his comrade, toppling onto the wrong side of the cordon. He struggled on all fours, scrabbling for a weapon. Maion shot him in the head.

Bathed in blood-spatter and faced with an opponent whose armour bore their comrade’s eviscerated innards, the traitors fell back. One held his ground, staring wide-eyed at Harahel and pulling a clutch of grenades from a harness. Harahel decapitated the man as he advanced on the others. The grenades fell from the headless corpse’s fingers. A cloud of flame and shrapnel washed over Harahel’s battleplate as they detonated. A slew of warnings lit up on the Flesh Tearer’s retinal display. Harahel blinked them away; his armour’s integrity was intact.

Ahead of him, the traitors had rallied behind a pillar. He could see the fear on their gaunt faces as he emerged unscathed from the billowing fire. Harahel heard the distinctive click of las power packs locking into place. It was insulting they thought the pillar offered any protection from his wrath. The huge Flesh Tearer growled, the metallic resonance of his helmet’s audio amplifier lending the sound a bestial quality. The stench of ammonia wafted on the air. He smiled, one of the traitors had pissed himself.

Harahel rushed them. He leapt the last few yards, swinging his eviscerator through the pillar as he landed. The blade showered him in sparks and pulped organs as it chewed through the metal of the column and into the bodies of the two traitors closest to it. The men died screaming, flesh ripped from their bones and tossed into the air by the churning adamantium teeth. Harahel ripped the weapon free, maiming another traitor as he drew the blade back to the guard position.

A scarred traitor screamed at him, lunging at him with a bayonet. Harahel sidestepped the attack and backhanded the man across his face, smashing his skull and sending chunks of his teeth spearing into the face of a heavy-set warrior who was fumbling with the activation stud of a shock maul. The man cried out in pain, dropping his weapon and clutching his ragged face. Harahel clamped his hand over the man’s head and squeezed, crushing his skull.

‘Cowards,’ he snarled, throwing the twitching body into the press of traitors as they scrambled away.

Five muzzle flashes winked at Maion from behind the barricade. The disorientated traitors’ shots flew wide. He sighted on the nearest of them.

‘Save your ammo,’ Barbelo held his arm out, blocking the shot. ‘We are almost upon them,’ he growled as a las-round ricocheted off of his rerebrace. ‘Sanguinius!’ Barbelo broke into a run, enraged by the pitiful attempts to kill him.

Maion stopped firing. Barbelo was lost for the moment, lost to a part of the rage they all shared. Chainsword roaring, he followed the sergeant into the press of traitors.

Barbelo dived over the barricade to land on top of a blood-caked traitor. Ribs broke under the impact, splintering into internal organs with a crunch. Barbelo drove his knee into the man’s face as he rose, crushing the traitor’s skull into the deck.

Maion went straight through the barricade, chopping his chainsword down through a scorched supply crate before reversing the motion and eviscerating the traitor that was using it for cover. Blood and viscera splashed across his helmet. His ocular sensors adjusted, allowing him to see through the flesh-mire. To his right, a stick-thin traitor turned to run. Maion threw his combat knife. The blade shot pierced the traitor’s back and went through his chest. The man pitched forwards as the blade clattered to the floor. Maion grinned ferally. He turned, searching for someone to kill, but Barbelo had beaten him to it. The sergeant punched his fist through a screaming man’s chest before stamping his boot down on the head of another, pulping it. Maion retrieved his knife as Barbelo stalked past him towards the armoury chamber, vines of intestine and bloody matter hanging from his gauntlet.

Nisroc listened to the exchange of weapons fire over the open vox-channel. With each broken retort he became more envious of his brothers. To be a Flesh Tearer was to be at the vanguard of the assault, to be elbow-deep in the enemy’s bloody remains, not holding the rear like some Imperial Fist strategist. His muscles swelled with blood and adrenaline as his body willed him to engage the enemy. Targeting reticules swam over his display as his helmet translated his mind’s unconscious need to fight. ‘Reclothe my mind, that it may temper the needs of my soul,’ Nisroc took a calming breath. Ascertain why Brother-Sergeant Paschar had not answered the summons to exfiltrate Arere. Locate and secure the squad or retrieve their gene-seed. Rendezvous with the fleet. Nisroc ran through the mission objectives, focusing his thoughts. He could not afford to lose control, too many had been lost to the Rage persecuting the campaign already. He cast a fleeting glance up towards the barren sky; there was something about this sector of space that left him ill at ease, something malevolent that hung in the darkness where the stars should be. Nisroc bit down another burst of adrenaline, he would not allow himself to succumb to the Thirst. He was a Sanguinary Priest; duty demanded he control his rage. To be lost in the throes of battle was to lose sight of the future. He lived to maintain the gene-seed and through it the Chapter. For without that precious link to their progenitor father, the Flesh Tearers had no future. ‘For the Chapter,’ Nisroc exhaled, emptying the last of the tension from his body – battle would find him soon enough.

Barbelo entered the armoury. Maion was about to follow but stopped as weapons fire erupted from within.

A noise like the birth of thunder filled the corridor as a heavy weapon roared. The sergeant jerked backwards as high-calibre rounds slammed into his armour, pitting the ceramite. His own shot went wide as a round clipped his gauntlet, the plasma blast scorching the ceiling. Barbelo dropped his chin and raised his shoulder as another torrent of rounds hammered him. Even as his pauldron cracked, the icon of the Chapter blasted from his shoulder in a shower of splintered ceramite, the sergeant took a step forward.

Maion recognised the harsh bark of an autocannon as the traitors poured fire onto Barbelo – the sergeant’s armour would not hold. Maion lunged forward, tossed a frag grenade into the room, grabbed Barbelo’s gorget, and pulled him back into the corridor.

‘You dare!’ The sergeant snarled at Maion, back-fisting him across the helm.

Maion staggered, cursing. With disciplined restraint he quashed the rage boiling up inside him. ‘Calm yourself, brother. To proceed would have been folly.’ Maion kept his voice level, but lifted his gaze to stare Barbelo in the eyes. He steeled his jaw, ready to receive another blow. But Barbelo’s posture shifted, and Maion relaxed as the sergeant regained control of his emotions. The traitors continued to fire, their shots spitting into the corridor to impact on the wall opposite.

‘You waste your time, brother,’ Barbelo motioned towards the doorway as more rounds zipped into the corridor. ‘They are entrenched behind a barrier. Your grenade will have done little more than chip the–’

Maion held up his hand, the firing had stopped. His enhanced hearing had heard the bark of every round as it tore from the autocannon’s barrel. His eidetic memory had catalogued every shell casing that struck the ground. The weapon’s magazine was still half full. The traitors weren’t reloading, they were baiting them.

Barbelo knew it, too. Incensed by their obvious ploy, the sergeant took a step towards the doorway. Maion grabbed his vambrace.

‘Brother…’ Maion knew that behind the red lenses of his helmet, the sergeant’s eyes were redder still, his pupils alight with rage. ‘You will die.’

Harahel knelt among the corpses, blood dripping from his armour, his weapon humming on idle, and watched the last of the traitors run for the doorway. The cowards would not make it. Micos’s ident-tag flashed on Harahel’s helmet display as the other Flesh Tearer approached the entrance from outside. Harahel saw the pilot light of Micos’s flamer as it shone in the gloom. Some of the traitors caught sight of the other Flesh Tearer and stopped running; they slumped to the ground in abject defeat. The others kept running, too lost in panic for rational thought. Harahel smelled their fear as Micos fired, blanketing the traitors in a sheet of burning promethium that washed away flesh and dissolved bone to ash. He watched them burn, frail wicks eaten up by a ravenous flame. The meek and the brave, they all died.

‘Are you injured?’ Micos asked Harahel over a closed channel. He knew his friend would not have wanted his condition shared with anyone save perhaps the Apothecary.

Harahel didn’t respond, his gaze remained fixed on the dying embers of the traitors. His twin hearts hammered in his chest like the pistons of a giant engine, fuelled by the tang of spilt blood that filled his senses. A boiling darkness cloyed at his mind, threatening to overwhelm his restraint. He tore his helmet off and roared, driving his eviscerator into the armoured floor. Gripping the hilt with both hands, he rested his head on the blade and prayed, ‘Emperor bless me with your temperament. Fill me with a righteousness inferno that I may burn away my bloodlust. Emperor keep me from the darkness of my soul.’

‘Outer room pacified, proceeding to your position,’ Micos’s voice came through the comm-feed in Maion’s helmet.

‘The corridor is clear. Move to our position and assist,’ Maion voxed Micos and turned to Barbelo. ‘Micos is on his way.’ The sergeant nodded, his comm-link still powered off.

The traitors’ weapons had fallen silent as the two Flesh Tearers waited out of sight, their backs pressed against the wall of the corridor. But there was no peace for Maion. His pulse filled his head like the tribal drum his villagers used to attract the roaming karcasaur at High Feast. His hands trembled like the ground beneath the giant reptile as it loped through the jungle. Every genetically-enhanced cell in Maion’s body wanted to rush into the room and tear the traitors limb from limb, to bask in their death throes and drink deep of their blood. Maion clenched his fist and struck the aquila sigil on his breast plate. ‘What nourishes you also destroys you. Either conquer your gift or die,’ Chaplain Appollus had spoken those words to Maion when he was but a novitiate. He focused on his battle gear as the Chaplain had taught him, testing the weight of his bolt pistol, the balance of his blade. Maion needed to be as they were: furious and unyielding in battle, cold and impassive in respite. He glanced at Barbelo. The sergeant would be struggling with his own blood-rage. Over his centuries of service, Barbelo had slain more enemies of the Throne than Maion and the rest of the squad had tallied between them. For Barbelo, the call to violence would be stronger, harder to deny. Maion considered what he would do if the sergeant gave in to his desires, if he–

‘I stand ready brothers.’ Micos’s voice drew Maion’s attention. The other Flesh Tearer glanced at Barbelo’s smashed shoulder guard but knew better than to ask after his sergeant’s wellbeing.

Barbelo nodded towards the doorway.

Maion thumbed the selector on his bolt pistol, switching it to full-auto. He stuck the barrel of the weapon into the room and opened fire. A man cried out as the explosive rounds tore across the chamber.

Micos swung low, sending a stream of fire into the chamber. The burning promethium swarmed over the barricade to feast on the cowards behind it. The traitors screamed.

Barbelo dived into the room. Maion heard him snap off three shots and the hungry growl of his chainsword as it cut into bone.

‘Armoury secure,’ Barbelo’s voice came over the comm-link a heartbeat later. ‘Apothecary, join us at once.’

Nisroc bent over the Flesh Tearer’s corpse. A gaping hole dominated the fallen Space Marine’s scorched breastplate. The flesh around it was fused with armour, a dark stain billowing out from the wound like a web. ‘Melta weapon or fusion-based explosive,’ Nisroc spoke for the benefit of his helmet’s data recorder, documenting his findings. ‘The high level of penetration suggests close range detonation.’ Nisroc extended a needle-like probe from his narthecium and stabbed it into the wound. Brother Haamiah, Second Company. Lines of biometric and biological data scrolled across Nisroc’s helmet display as the probe analysed the Flesh Tearer’s blood. There were traces of human flesh too, melded to Haamiah’s; a traitor had given their life to plant the charge.

‘Maion, if you would.’ Nisroc stood to give the other Flesh Tearer space.

‘My honour, brother,’ Maion nodded and knelt next to Haamiah’s body. Maion was the closest thing the squad had to a Chaplain. He had studied under the revered Appollus. Most of the Chapter had expected Maion to follow in the High Chaplain’s footsteps. But he could not, not yet. He wasn’t ready to accept that the Flesh Tearers were beyond saving. Maion bowed his head, ‘Emperor, your servant’s duty is at an end. Grant him peace.’ He made the sign of the aquila over his breastplate and rose. ‘I’ll wait for you in the corridor.’

Nisroc paused a moment. Of all the duties that were his to complete, this was the most important, the heaviest burden to bear. Only in death does duty end; the axiom may have been true for the soldiers of the Imperial Guard or the Sisters of the Adeptus Sororitas but not for a son of Sanguinius. In death, a Space Marine had one more thing to give. The transformative progenoids implanted in his body had to be returned to the Chapter, ready to be received by the next generation of aspirants. Only through the harvesting of the glands would the Flesh Tearers continue to survive. Without the precious gene-seed they would be unable to stand against the Emperor’s foes.

The Apothecary extended his reductor and punched the bladed tube into Haamiah’s neck. A jolt of energy rippled along the blade’s length as the moulded end closed around the first progenoid gland. With a wet hiss, the gland was sucked up through the blade into the narthecium. A green icon blinked in the corner of Nisroc’s helmet display. The gland had been recovered safely, and was being frozen for transport to the gene-banks on the Flesh Tearers home world. Nisroc activated his bone-drill; the second gland was harder to reach.

It had taken over thirty minutes to cut through the mag-seals on the strategium’s door and a further ten to fasten melta-charges to the piston hinges. Amaru had abandoned repairs on the Stormraven to oversee the work, directing Harahel as he wielded the industrial laser-cutter with the same ease as the others handled their bolters.

‘Ready to detonate, brother-sergeant.’ Amaru turned his back on the huge door and paced back towards the Stormraven. The Chaos forces were under an hour away and he still had much work to do.

‘Prepare yourselves,’ Barbelo’s order hissed in Maion’s ear as the storm continued to hamper vox communication. He checked the ammo-counter on his bolt pistol and activated his chainsword, its roar inaudible over the wind. To his left and right, his brothers were preparing their own wargear. Micos’s flamer hung by his side, its pilot flame would remain extinguished until they were inside. Maion shifted his weight to the balls of his feet, moving his weight forward.

‘Go!’ On Barbelo’s command Amaru blew the charges.

The hinges detonated in rapid succession, like the quickening heartbeat of a colossal beast. The door fell from its housing, slamming into the earth an inch from Barbelo and his squad. Under his helmet, Amaru’s mouth twitched in an approximation of a smile. His calculations had been perfect.

Maion was in motion before the doors had settled in the dirt. Adrenaline flooded his system as he powered into the strategium’s entrance chamber. A warning rune filled his helmet display. ‘Defence turrets.’ Maion’s warning came too late. Two automated weapons burst into life, pumping a stream of high-explosive rounds towards the Flesh Tearers.

‘Cover!’ Barbelo shouted the order even as he realised there was none. Whoever was cowering in the strategium had been waiting for them.

Maion winced, dropping to one knee as a round clipped his thigh. Barbelo threw himself into a roll as the weapons stitched a line towards him. Nisroc spun on the spot, turning his back to shield the gene-seed stored in his narthecium. Explosive rounds slammed into his backpack, knocking him to the floor. Micos’s world went dark as a round tore through his pauldron and broke against his helmet. Atoc bucked, dropping his bolter as his breastplate was pulverised by a fusillade of explosions.

Harahel ground his teeth as Atoc’s ident-tag disappeared from his peripheral display. ‘Forgive me, brother.’ He swung his eviscerator over his shoulder, mag-locking it to his back, and picked up Atoc’s body. ‘For the Chapter!’ Harahel raised the corpse-shield in front of him and ran flat out towards the guns. Anger drove him on as merciless shells hammered into Atoc’s corpse, the weapons ignoring the other Flesh Tearers to focus on the immediate threat of Harahel. Atoc’s armour broke like glass under the relentless assault, the dead Flesh Tearer’s head spinning from his body as his legs and arms were pulped.

Harahel roared as he closed inside both turrets’ sensor ranges. Dropping the stump of Atoc’s corpse, he swung his eviscerator round to shear the barrel off the nearest weapon. The gun exploded as the round in its chamber detonated. Harahel ignored the hail of shrapnel that cascaded over his armour, oblivious to the pain warnings blinking over his left eye. Cursing, he brought his blade down on the other gun, cutting through its ammo feed. The weapon continued to fire, making a tortured grinding noise as it cried out for ammunition. Harahel kicked it over, stamping on it until he’d flattened the firing chamber. ‘Weapons neutralised.’

Maion was on his feet, advancing with Barbelo towards Harahel and the stairwell that led to the inner sanctum.

Nisroc pushed himself up off the deck. A damage alert scrolled across his display. The shots to his backpack had damaged his armour’s power source. He checked the output. It would last an hour, two at best. ‘Micos?’ Nisroc’s vox went unanswered. He turned to the other Flesh Tearer.

‘I am fine, Apothecary,’ Micos snarled, throwing his ruined helmet across the chamber. ‘A flesh wound. ’

The Apothecary cast his gaze over Micos. A blackened hole sat where his right eye should have been and his face was a mess of dark scabs. ‘As you say, brother.’ Nisroc switched to his vox. ‘Orders, brother-sergeant?’

‘We advance on the inner sanctum. Secure the level beneath.’

Lasgun fire stabbed at Maion as he crossed the threshold into the command sanctum and peeled left. He raised his bolt pistol and shot two traitors in the chest. Their bodies snapped backwards, covering diode-encrusted consoles in blood and viscera. A third traitor opened fire, a bolter bucking in his hands and destroying a bank of data-screens as he struggled to adjust for the recoil. ‘The Emperor’s tools serve only his servants.’ Maion pumped two rounds into the man, plastering his innards across the wall.

Harahel entered behind Maion and moved right. Three men blocked his path. He shouldered them aside, decapitating two with a single stroke of his blade, and killing the third with a thunderous head-butt. Ahead, a panicked traitor struggled with a grenade launcher. Harahel tore the skull from the nearest corpse and threw it at the man. The macabre projectile shot into the traitor’s chest, cracked his sternum and stopped his heart.

Barbelo was the last to advance into the chamber. He moved straight forwards, sighting a traitor in a heavy overcoat wielding a plasma pistol. The man fired. The sergeant dropped his shoulder to avoid the shot. The plasma round burned through the air to melt the wall where his head had been an instant before.

The man fired again. ‘In the name of–’

Barbelo dodged left and fired, his round vaporising the man’s head and shoulders before the traitor could finish his sentence. ‘We will not hear the name of your heathen god, heretic.’ Barbelo fired again, his plasma round obliterating what remained of the treacherous commissar’s corpse in a crackle of blue energy. ‘Sanctum secure. Nisroc, status?’

‘They were keeping their wounded down here,’ Maion heard Nisroc’s report as it came over the comm-feed. ‘Resistance was minimal. Lower chambers cleansed.’

Nisroc entered the inner sanctum to find Amaru poring over the main data console. The Techmarine had nano-wires and connective fibres plugged into every available data jack.

‘Brother Atoc?’ Barbelo had his back to the door and spoke without turning around, his gaze fixed on a wall-mounted viewer.

‘His duty is at an end.’ Nisroc touched a hand to his narthecium. ‘His gene-seed survives. His death served its purpose.’

Barbelo turned to face the Apothecary, pausing before he spoke. ‘And his body?’

‘His–’ Nisroc faltered. Bodies, where were the bodies?

‘Micos.’ The other Flesh Tearer snapped his shoulders back at the sergeant’s summons. ‘Return Atoc’s corpse to the Stormraven, his weapon too.’

‘Bodies,’ the word tumbled from Nisroc’s lips.

‘What is it, Apothecary?’ the grille mouthpiece of Barbelo’s helmet did little to filter his annoyance.

Nisroc cast his gaze around the chamber. Harahel’s armour was pitted and scared. Maion’s cuisse was fractured. The dismembered bodies of traitors were strewn around the floor, a madman’s mosaic. ‘Where are the other bodies?’ Nisroc repeated the question straining at his mind.

‘What?’

‘There were ten of our brothers stationed here. We have found only one, Brother Haamiah. Where are the others? There was no trace of them on the lower levels or here in the sanctum. They must be somewhere.’

‘I agree with you brother, it is an oddity. But we do not have the time.’ Barbelo turned back to the monitor. ‘The enemy advances from all sides. Their vanguard will contact us in thirty-eight minutes.’

‘Then we must make the time. We must find them. We must retrieve their gene-seed and honour their deaths.’

‘And what if they are not here? What if they are as ash, carried from here by the blasted storm?’

Barbelo’s tone brooked no discussion but Nisroc persisted. ‘Then we shall mourn their loss and the loss of their gift. But we must first check everywhere. We must be sure.’

Barbelo turned to face Nisroc, his poise threatening. ‘The enemy outnumbers us thousands to one.’

Nisroc moved towards Barbelo. ‘Death means nothing as long as the gene-seed survives.’

‘And who will collect our gene-seed when we lie dead beneath the starless sky of this world?’

‘We must–’

‘No!’ Barbelo pressed his forehead against Nisroc’s. ‘Amaru has affected repairs on the Stormraven. Once we acquire the data from the base’s cogitators we are leaving. You have until then.’

‘Very well,’ Nisroc took a step back and made to turn away. ‘But know that I shall take no pleasure in reporting our mission as a failure to the High Priests.’

Barbelo snarled. Never had he failed his Chapter. His grip tightened on his chainsword. He should gut Nisroc. Stain the Apothecary’s white breastplate crimson with his own sanctimonious blood. Out of his peripheral vision he saw Maion and Harahel edge closer. The other Flesh Tearers had remained silent but Barbelo doubted they would stand by and watch him kill the Apothecary. A warning shone on his display as he threatened to crush the chainsword’s handle. He fought to bring his rage under control. Now was not the time. ‘Go then. Look for the others. We will do what we must.’

Nisroc dipped his head. ‘Thank you, brother.’

Barbelo growled, ‘Do not push me, Apothecary.’ His voice was void cold. ‘Harahel…’ The sergeant drew his gaze from Nisroc in an effort to calm himself. ‘Go with him.’

Harahel walked silently beside Nisroc as they approached the chapel annex. It was the only spine of the compound the Flesh Tearers had yet to explore. If any evidence of Haamiah’s squad remained then it had to be there. The chrono display in Harahel’s helmet clicked down to thirty. He turned it off, uncaring as to whether they made it off Arere before the Chaos advance struck. It didn’t matter if he fought here or redeployed to another world, as long as he fought, as long as he killed. Blood; the thought rolled into his mind like an invading army. Saliva began to build in his mouth, his nostrils flaring as they searched for arterial juices. Blood, Harahel hungered for blood.

‘We are here,’ Nisroc’s voice crackled in Harahel’s ear, breaking his stupor.

Harahel blinked hard, clearing the fog from his senses.

‘Is something the matter?’

‘No, I am fine.’ Harahel unlatched the eviscerator from his back.

‘Wait,’ Nisroc held up his hand. Stepping ahead of Harahel, he moved to the chapel door’s access panel and removed one of his gauntlets. He wiped the grime from the console and pressed his palm onto the biometric scanner. The ancient machine chimed green as it recognised Nisroc’s genetic code as that of a Space Marine. With a pressurised hiss, the arched doors to the annex swung inwards.

Harahel grunted and followed the Apothecary inside.

‘The enemy will contact us here first,’ Barbelo spoke as a hololithic representation of the compound rotated in the air between him and Maion.

‘I would have thought here a more likely target,’ Maion gestured to the curving walls that formed the east side of the central courtyard.

‘No, they will expect that area to be mined; more than a handful of detonations would bring the rock face down on top of them.’ Barbelo pointed to the compound’s main entrance way. ‘They will attack from here.’

Maion studied the hololith, the sergeant was right. Had the base been fully manned, then attacking down the wide avenues of the main corridors would have been suicide. Under current circumstances the wide avenues would allow them to enter in force and overwhelm the Flesh Tearers. ‘What is this area here?’ He pointed to a dark spot on the display behind the armoury. ‘It wasn’t on the briefing schematics.’

‘That area…’ Amaru paused as his implants sifted through the compound’s memory banks for an answer. ‘It’s a missile silo. Surface-to-orbit ordnance. No use against ground targets.’

‘We cannot hope to defend the entire complex, we will make a stand here,’ Barbelo indicated a group of passageways that sprung from the main corridors and ran to the courtyard. ‘We’ll collapse these four and split ourselves into pairs to defend the remaining two.’

‘Four against–’ Maion paused, turning to Amaru.

‘Four thousand and seventy-eight separate contacts.’

Maion grinned, ‘Seems there’ll be blood enough even for Harahel.’

‘I think I can help even the odds,’ the hololith changed to show the Stormraven as Amaru spoke. ‘The Stormraven’s hurricane bolters and missile launcher can be removed.’ The gunship’s weapon systems floated away from its hull, illustrating the Techmarine’s point. ‘It wouldn’t take much to reconfigure them as defensive turrets.’

‘What about the Stormraven?’ Maion’s face hardened. ‘The courtyard is uncovered, even a glancing hit from a siege gun and– ’

‘We needn’t worry about artillery,’ Barbelo interrupted. ‘I have fought this enemy before. They are like us.’

Maion glared at the sergeant. ‘You would liken us to the Archenemy?’

‘You have fought beside our Chapter’s Death Company?’

Maion nodded, his unease growing at the mention of the Chapter’s damned warriors. The Black Rage was a genetic curse that threatened to overwhelm all of the sons of Sanguinius. Once afflicted, a Flesh Tearer would be lost to battle lust, his sanity replaced by a desperate need for violence. Those that succumbed to the madness were inducted into the ranks of the black-armoured Death Company where they’d soon find redemption in death.

‘Like our coal-armoured brethren, the enemy we face is lost to bloodlust. They are fuelled by an insatiable rage, ever hungry for battle. They will want to taste our blood when they kill us.’ Barbelo tested the weight of his chainsword. ‘They will not attack from range.’

With the storm’s howl locked outside, silence permeated the chapel. Harahel moved ahead of Nisroc, his eyes adjusting to the change in light as a string of angular luminators hummed into life along the ceiling, filling the corridor with the hushed yellow glow the Imperial church reserved for religious buildings and the homes of cardinals.

Harahel smelled blood. He touched his thumb to the activation stud on his eviscerator, ‘Stand ready.’

Nisroc raised his bolt pistol, letting its scope feed targeting data to his helmet display. He knew better than to question Harahel’s instincts.

From the reception chamber, they entered the Hall of Solace, a long corridor with single-occupant prayer cells joining it every few metres. The two Space Marines stopped. Dried blood and fleshy matter coated the metal floor ahead of them, paving the way like the regal carpet of some warp-spawned fiend.

Nisroc knelt and extended a probe from his narthecium, using it to scrape away a fragment of gore. A line of genetic sequence flashed across his display as the probe finished its analysis. ‘Sanguinius gut them.’ The Apothecary slammed his fist into the ground, cracking the metal panelling. ‘This blood belongs to the Chapter.’

Harahel tightened his grip on his weapon as his pulse began to quicken. He swallowed hard in an attempt to stop salivating. ‘Blood calls out to blood,’ Harahel recited the battle mantra as he fought down the urge to tear apart the walls.

‘The main chapel lies at the far end,’ Nisroc spoke as the chrono display flashed a warning in his display. ‘Time is–’

‘Advance behind me,’ Harahel activated his eviscerator, the weapon’s barbed blades impatiently churning the air as they search for something to rend. ‘If anyone emerges, shoot them.’ Harahel spat the words through a pool of saliva. He dropped his weight and flexed his knees.

Nisroc nodded and slammed a fresh clip into his bolt pistol.

‘For the Chapter!’ Harahel broke into a run, the servos in his armour whirring as he picked up pace. The enhanced musculature of his thighs powered him forward at a speed that belied his bulk, an engine of ceramite and fury. ‘One, clear. Two, clear.’ Harahel looked left and right as he ran, updating Nisroc as his armour’s optical and audio sensors checked and recorded the disposition of each of the prayer cells in a heartbeat. ‘Three–’

Las-rounds stabbed at Harahel from either side.

‘Contacts, five through nine.’ Harahel kept running, ignoring the smattering of fire coming from the cells. Most shots went wide, his powerful strides carrying him past the cell openings before his attackers could take aim. A handful of rounds grazed his armour, picking the paint from his war plate. Harahel growled, the combination of his helmet’s vox amplifier and the hall’s acoustics amplifying his annoyance until it filled the corridor like the roar of some terrible beast.

‘Keep moving.’ Nisroc opened fire. His bolt pistol bucked in his hand as he sent three traitors sprawling to the floor, their heads blasted from their malnourished shoulders. ‘Your rear is secure.’

Harahel blinked an acknowledgement to Nisroc and pushed onwards. He was nearing the last cluster of prayer cells. His targeting overlay lit up with data, tracking the trajectory of the three fist-sized globes that rolled onto the corridor in front of him. ‘Grenades!’ Harahel bellowed a warning to the Apothecary, and threw himself into the nearest prayer cell as the devices exploded, avoiding the wash of flame and shrapnel that billowed out from them. He heard a muffled cry and a wrenching snap as the bones of the cell’s occupant broke under his immense bulk. Harahel snorted and picked the dead man up by his skull.

‘Harahel?’ Nisroc’s voice crackled in Harahel’s ear.

‘I am unharmed.’ Harahel emerged from the cell carrying the head of the dead traitor by the spinal cord, his gauntlet slick with blood.

‘The way is clear brother.’

‘No, there is one left, there,’ Harahel tossed the dismembered head into the cell opposite. A man screamed, firing on reflex as the head landed with a wet mulch.

Nisroc stepped into the cell, allowing his armour to filter out the smell of excrement. The man had the nose of his lasgun pressed inside his mouth. His eyes trembled as they looked up at the Flesh Tearer. The Apothecary growled. The man juddered, reflexively pulling the trigger. The single las-round blew apart his skull, painting the wall behind him with superheated brain matter. Nisroc turned from the corpse to find Harahel on bended knee, his helmet discarded at his side. The veins in the other Flesh Tearer’s forehead were threatening to push through his skin; his brow ran with sweat. Nisroc took a tentative step towards Harahel, his finger resting on the trigger of his bolt pistol.

‘Stay back!’ Harahel held a hand out to the Apothecary.

Nisroc resisted the urge to fire. ‘Control yourself! Now is not the time. The Archenemy has taken the lives of our brothers.’ He gestured to the arched doors of the chapel. ‘We must know what lies behind those doors.’

Harahel said nothing; saliva dripped from his mouth to burn away at the floor.

‘On your feet, Flesh Tearer! You can report to Appollus as soon as we return to the Victus, I’m sure he’ll welcome you into the Death Company. But right now, you need to get to your feet or, Emperor help me, I’ll put a bolt-round through that thick skull of yours.’

Harahel tilted his head to look up at the Apothecary, his eyes bloodshot.

‘On your feet.’ Nisroc proffered Harahel his helmet. ‘Use your rage for something useful, like getting through that door.’

Harahel took the helmet and locked it in place. ‘Never threaten me again, brother.’ He regarded the fusion marks on the chapel doors. Someone had welded them shut from the outside. He took a step back and then drove forwards, slamming his armoured shoulder into the weld-line. The metal buckled. Harahel brought his knee up and kicked out; the doors snapped inwards. A bank of suspended luminators stuttered into life as he stepped into the chamber.

‘Emperor save us…’

The mutilated corpses of eight Flesh Tearers decorated the curved walls of the chapel. Fixed in place by the blades of their chainswords, they hung like nightmare visages of the saints that decorated Cretacia’s Reclusiasms. Their armour was pitted and dented from numerous impacts and lacerations; their helms had been torn from their locking mounts, mangling their gorgets; all that remained of their faces were sunken husks, matted with bloodied hair.

‘Blood of Sanguinius.’ Nisroc fell to one knee, the desecration of his brothers’ flesh staggering him.

‘Blood will bring blood.’ With a grunt of effort, Harahel pulled the blade from the nearest of corpses. The dead Flesh Tearer’s remains made a dull thud as they dropped to the ground. Harahel stared at the deep hole in the chapel wall; the blade had been driven through the outer rock into the metal support behind. ‘It took great strength to do this.’

Nisroc nodded, and cast his gaze around the chamber. The plaster finish and faux-brickwork of the walls was undamaged. The flagstones that paved the way to the raised, wooden altar were unblemished save for a single dark spot left behind by an errant blood droplet. ‘They weren’t killed here,’ Nisroc pushed himself to his feet. ‘There’s no sign of battle. Someone brought them here.’ The Apothecary struggled to talk, grinding his teeth in rage. ‘Afterwards.’

Harahel snarled. ‘Brother-sergeant,’ he summoned Barbelo over the vox. Static filled his ear as he waited for a response. ‘Emperor damn this storm.’ The Flesh Tearer punched the wall, cracking it in a cloud of plaster-dust.

‘Report,’ Barbelo’s voice crackled back.

‘We have cleared the chapel annex.’ Harahel paused as another burst of static shot across the vox-link. ‘Eight of our brothers lie here.’

‘Status?’

‘Dead. All of them.’ Harahel turned his eyes from the corpses, his fists bunching in restrained fury as he glared at the aquila etched on the floor.

‘Show me.’

Harahel closed his eyes. He had no wish to look upon the massacre a second time. Activating his helmet’s visual feed, he panned his head around the room, streaming what his optics registered to the others.

For a long moment, the vox-link fell silent.

‘Nisroc, get what you came for. Harahel, meet us at the Stormraven,’ Barbelo’s voice rasped through another bout of static.

Six minutes. Time continued to count down at the edge of Maion’s peripheral display. The Archenemy’s army was almost at their door. ‘Let them come,’ he snarled, affixing the last of the melta-charges to the crossbeam that supported the ceiling. The charge was directional, and he’d taken care to make sure that the blast would travel down the corridor away from where he and Micos would be positioned.

‘Brother,’ Harahel’s voice rasped over a secure channel, ‘back in the armoury, we gutted the traitors without incident. The ones in the command centre put up no more of a fight.’

Maion knew where Harahel was headed. ‘Yes, I had the same thought.’

‘How could such, such filth,’ Harahel spat the word, ‘have overcome our brethren? Those weaklings could scarcely have lifted a chainsword, let alone driven it into solid rock.’

Maion brought the percentile counter that recorded the progress of the data-stack download to the forefront of his helmet’s display. It ticked down slow and deliberate, like a dying man’s laboured breath. ‘Emperor willing, we’ll live long enough to find out.’ Maion sighed and blinked the counter away.

‘Jetpack assault troops. Bearing down on the courtyard,’ Amaru’s voice cut across on the main channel, interrupting Harahel’s reply. The Techmarine was still jacked into the compound’s data banks in the inner sanctum and was observing the Archenemy’s advance through a remote-link with the Stormraven’s sensors. The Archenemy’s jetpack squad appeared as solid red blips that drifted over the landscape and grew in size as they neared. ‘I count six of them…’ Amaru’s voice trailed off as he worked a calculation. ‘Harahel, you will not clear the courtyard before they descend.’

Harahel emerged from the chapel annex and growled up into the blackness of Arere’s starless sky, his enhanced eyes searching for the tell-tale flares of jetpacks. ‘I see no enemy.’

‘I assure you brother, they are coming.’

‘They’re a vanguard, nothing more,’ Barbelo growled over the vox-feed, his impatience evident in every syllable. ‘Harahel, ignore them and get to my position. The main force will hit us in less than five minutes. Amaru, cover his advance.’

The Techmarine blinked an acknowledgment icon to Barbelo and concentrated on communicating with the Stormraven’s machine-spirit. The gunship’s sentient mind was silent, almost dormant. It resisted Amaru’s gentle interrogation, blocking his attempts to rouse it.

‘My skin for yours.’ The Techmarine invited the machine-spirit into his armour as he probed deeper into the gunship. The connection sent a spasm through his muscles as he gained access to the Stormraven’s weapon systems. Amaru teased power into the gunship’s turret-mounted assault cannons.

‘Battle,’ the machine-spirit whispered in the Techmarine’s head as it stirred to readiness.

The red blips pulsed on Amaru’s display as the enemy neared weapons range. He cycled the twin-assault cannons to firing speed, their multiple barrels whirring with a metallic hiss as the autoloader fed them rounds.

‘Enemy.’ The word growled from within the Stormraven’s machine soul, washing through Amaru’s mind like the strained rumble of thruster backwash. It was awake now, wearing the Stormraven like a suit of ceramite war plate, wielding its turret-mounted weapon with the same ease and precision that a Flesh Tearer hefted a blade.

A sound wave spiked across Amaru’s display as the Stormraven’s auditory sensors detected the roar of enemy jetpacks. The Chaos Space Marines were gunning their thrusters, slowing their descent.

‘Purge the heretics,’ the Techmarine urged the gunship to open fire.

The enraged machine-spirit obliged. The twin-assault cannon’s twelve barrels flared into life, lighting up the sky like miniature starbursts as they fired. Caught unaware, the Chaos Space Marines dived straight into the fusillade. The first three died in a heartbeat, their armour and flesh torn asunder by the unceasing hail of armour piercing rounds.

Harahel was two-thirds of the way across the courtyard when the assault cannons opened fire. He risked a glance skyward and saw the visceral red power armour of the Archenemy’s warriors. Their breastplates were shaped like cruel gargoyles and snarled at him from the darkness. A burst of rounds clipped the nearest of the Traitor Marines, blowing apart his thrusters in a shower of flame. The enemy warrior veered downwards towards Harahel, carried by what remained of his earlier momentum. The Flesh Tearer smiled and swung his eviscerator up through the stricken Chaos Space Marine’s ribcage, ripping him in two. Harahel kept moving, tearing his giant weapon through the body of another foe that slammed into the ground in front of him a moment later. The Flesh Tearer bit into his lip, relishing the taste of his own blood as he pounded towards Barbelo and the slaughter to come.

Amaru watched as the Stormraven continued to track and fire. He felt his pulse quicken to the hoarse wheeze of the assault cannon’s barrels as they spun. Several more of the red blips disappeared from his display, shredded by the gunship’s unerring fire. The Techmarine could feel the machine-spirit’s cold rage, its lust for violence and the gleeful abandon with which it massacred the enemy. He gasped, clutching the cables that linked him to the compound’s datastacks, and fought the urge to sever the link. He needed to be outside with the Stormraven, fighting, killing. His body began to tremble as he tried to restrain his urges. The download sequence was in its final stage, any interruption now would corrupt the data. Amaru dropped to one knee, screaming in rage as the machine-spirit’s emotions threatened to overcome him. ‘My work is iron, my will steel.’ The Techmarine held his clenched fist against the machine-cog on his left pauldron as he growled his way through the devotion. ‘I shall not falter, I shall not heel.’ Defend. He forced the order onto the machine-spirit and drew his mind away, severing the link to the gunship and the violence outside.

Panting hard, Amaru focused on finishing the protocol. ‘There is no truth beyond the data, it is the muniment of the future. Guard it well.’ Download complete, Amaru unplugged from the datastacks and completed the rites of remembrance, secreting the data-keeper within his armour. The Techmarine let out a slow breath as the after-shadow of the Raven and the compound fell away, and the confines of his world reasserted themselves.

Alone in his armour, he took reassurance from the cold, impassive touch of the bionics and augmetics that punctuated his body. Perfect where he was flawed, the machine components of the Techmarine would continue to function long after the Rage drove his flesh to destruction. ‘Download complete.’ Amaru voxed the update to the rest of the squad and pushed himself to his feet.

‘Nisroc, status?’ Barbelo’s voice crackled over the vox.

‘I need three minutes.’ Maion listened to the Apothecary’s reply as the chrono-counter on his display blinked down to one.

He stood immobile in the darkness. His gaze fixed on the heavy blast doors at the far end of the corridor, as the chrono display floating at the edge of his peripheral vision blinked down to zero. The attack had begun. If Barbelo was right and this enemy did indeed wage war like the Flesh Tearers, then they would have fallen upon the outer walls with all the fury of a scorned god. Maion imagined the scene outside, picturing the Archenemy’s forces as they descended on the compound. Vindicator siege tanks would have led an armoured charge, unleashing a devastating bombardment as accompanying Rhinos and Razorbacks disgorged frothing assault squads. With the siege shells exploding overhead, the assault troops would use melta weapons and crackling thunder hammers to finish the job, smashing an entry hole into the compound. Right now, the Archenemy would be tearing towards him and the others like a swarm of berserker locusts.

Yet the scene ahead remained unchanged, the blast door intact. The only sound Maion could hear was the gentle purr of his armour and the wash of his rebreather. His muscles twitched. The urge to break from his defensive posture and meet the enemy head-on was almost overwhelming.

‘The longer you stand, the more blood you can spill,’ Micos placed a calming hand on Maion’s shoulder guard, reading the other Flesh Tearer’s mood. ‘Save your fury, we’ll be steeped in their entrails soon enough.’ Micos thrust his chainaxe towards the blast door as a trio of sparks dripped to the floor.

Maion nodded, allowing Micos’s words to soften the call to violence that rang in his mind like the summoning gong of an ancient arena. The other Flesh Tearer looked odd in Atoc’s helm. Atoc; Maion’s anger returned in force as he thought of his brother’s death. His knuckles turned bone white inside his gauntlets as he squeezed his weapons, desperate for something to rend. Another burst of superheated metal flared in the gloom. He blinked away myriad tactical icons from his display; he was going to kill whatever came through the blast doors, nothing else mattered.

The drizzle of sparks tumbled into a downpour as the Archenemy intensified their assault on the door. A pulsing, amber line resolved into focus, bisecting the door from floor to ceiling.

‘Here they come.’ Maion crouched down, motioning for Micos to do the same.

The cutting stopped. The weld-line hung in the gloom, glowing and raw like a fresh scar. Silence filled the corridor, threatening to steal the last of Maion’s restraint.

An immense, metallic hand punched through the centre of the blast door. Pneumatic pistons hissed and spat as elongated fingers flexed in search of something to rend. The audio dampeners in Maion’s helmet worked to filter out the torturous screech of metal as the hand reached backwards, gripped the door, tore it from its hinges and dragged it backwards into the darkness. An instant later the hand, and the lumbering body it was attached to, bolted into view.

‘Dreadnought, corridor one,’ Maion warned, resisting the urge to open fire with his boltgun. He couldn’t afford to waste the ammo, and even the weapon’s mass-reactive rounds would do little more than scratch the paint from the armoured behemoth bearing down on him. A dread fusion of Space Marine and technology, the Dreadnought was more foe than he and Micos could stop unaided. The towering walker stomped over the wreckage of the door, emerging into the corridor proper, and opened fire.

Maion threw himself flat. ‘For the Chapter!’ he roared, thumbing the control stick Amaru had fashioned for him. On the ceiling above him, one of the missile tubes stripped from the Stormraven’s wings screamed into life, sending its payload burning on a plume of fire towards the walker.

The first of the missiles slammed into the Dreadnought’s sarcophagus and exploded, splintering its armoured hide. The missile’s secondary booster ignited a moment later, driving a tertiary charge in through the weakened armour plating to detonate in the Dreadnought’s core. Flame engulfed the walker, wreathing it like a burial wrap. Autocannon rounds tore across the walls and ceiling as the Dreadnought continued to fire.

Maion fired again, sending another missile towards the metallic beast. A shrill cry resounded from the Dreadnought’s vox-casters as it raised its clawed arm in defence. The second missile’s primary warhead broke against the arm, blowing it apart in a shower of silver shrapnel. The remaining warhead burrowed into the Dreadnought’s flank, detonating with enough force to finish the job, destroying the Archenemy walker.

A blood-curdling roar filled the corridor as a tide of blood-armoured warriors swarmed over the Dreadnought’s corpse towards the Flesh Tearers. Micos roared back, pushing himself to his feet and striding forward to bathe the enemy in a jet of liquid fire. The Archenemy’s warriors ran through the flame, heedless of their bubbling armour and the flesh that ran from it like water.

Maion advanced to Micos’s right, his boltgun flashing in the darkness as he pumped a stream of rounds into the press of enemy. Each time Maion caught sight of a foe it forced a curse from his lips. Their red armour seemed in direct mockery of the sons of Sanguinius. Where Maion’s breastplate was adorned with the holy aquila and his shoulder guard carried the mark of his Chapter, the foe’s armour was inlaid with brass skulls and blasphemous runes.

‘We can’t hold here.’ Micos’s flamer stuttered and died, its fuel tank exhausted. Letting it hang on its sling, he drew his bolt pistol and continued to fire. In the close confines of the corridor he couldn’t miss; each round found its mark. He shot an enemy point-blank in the chest, then two more. At such close range, even power armour offered little protection, his bolt-rounds punching out through their backs in a hail of gore.

Maion stood level to Micos’s right, firing his boltgun on full-auto until the round counter flashed zero. There was no time to reload, the next enemy only ever a breath away. ‘Micos, down!’

Micos grabbed the nearest corpse as it fell to the ground and pulled it down on top of himself. Maion did likewise. Behind them, the hurricane bolter emplacement they’d fashioned from the Stormraven’s sponson weaponry opened fire. The noise was deafening as the three pairs of linked boltguns pumped a storm of shells into the corridor. Funnelled by the walls of the corridor, and pushed onwards by the press of warriors at their backs, the Archenemy were driven heedlessly into the salvo. They died in droves, their torsos pulped and limbs severed by the vicious onslaught.

Maion lay under the twitching corpses of half a dozen enemy. His pulse was racing, his twin hearts echoing to the call of the hurricane bolters. The smell of blood and burnt flesh was choking. He was lying in an expanding pool of blood that dripped from all around him, congealing into a puddle of thick, viscous fluid that threatened to swallow him.

‘Emperor, fashion my Thirst to your unbending will.’ Maion focused on the data overlaid on his helmet display, turning his thoughts to the tactical challenges that an endless horde of berserker foe presented, and away from the bloodlust burning in his veins. The weapon emplacement’s ammo-counter was racing towards zero. ‘Two seconds.’ Maion subvocalised the warning to Micos and slammed his last clip into his boltgun.

With a final thrum, the hurricane bolters racked empty. Maion shot upwards from beneath the corpse-cover. The Archenemy dead were heaped upon one another like red-armoured sandbags. Yet still they came. He opened fire, sending two more abominations to join the pile of dead that choked the corridor. The smell of promethium and burnt flesh flooded towards Maion as the enemy turned their flamers on their dead, burning a path towards the Flesh Tearers. The damning clack of an empty firing chamber drew a curse from Maion’s lips as his boltgun spat its last round. He discarded the spent weapon and gripped his chainsword with both hands. ‘I am His vengeance!’

‘Harahel!’ Barbelo tore his chainsword from an enemy’s ribcage as he shouted for the giant Flesh Tearer.

Harahel wasn’t listening, his attention fixed on the dismembered bodies of the three Chaos Space Marines he’d just slain.

‘Harahel, fall back!’

Harahel ignored the sergeant, launching himself back into the press of enemy. Ducking a whirring chainaxe, he shouldered an enemy warrior into the wall, pulping his skull between rockcrete bulkhead and ceramite pauldron. Harahel smiled and swung his eviscerator around in a tight arc, hacking into the onrushing press of red armour with a cold fury.

‘Emperor damn you.’ The other Flesh Tearer’s disobedience drew a curse from Barbelo’s lips as a roaring chainblade flashed out towards his neck. He leaned back as far as his balance allowed. The weapon’s teeth sparked as they grazed his gorget. Growling, he fired a plasma round into his attacker’s leering helm, vaporising the Chaos Space Marine’s head and torso. The headless body twitched backwards and disappeared in the press of red armour. ‘Harahel! When they cross the line, I will detonate.’ Barbelo let his smoking pistol drop to the floor, its power pack exhausted, and drew his combat knife. ‘Harahel!’

Harahel snapped his head around, sighting the sergeant. Barbelo was embroiled with two Chaos Space Marines, a blade in each of his hands as he fought his way clear of the melee. A bolt-round stung off Harahel’s shoulder guard. He ignored it, snapping the neck of a charging foe with a thunderous backhand and delivering a low kick that broke the leg of another. It went against his every instinct to move backwards. Faced with the immediate need to kill, duty was a secondary consideration. The rage that burned in Harahel’s veins was insatiable. Roaring like a madman, he continued into the enemy. Behind him, Barbelo went down under a flurry of blows.

Distressed bio-data filled Barbelo’s display. A stray round had clipped his helmet, dazing him long enough for one of the enemy to rake his midsection with a whirring blade and batter him to the ground. He tried to focus but his head was ringing. Pain lanced through him as a blade dug into his back. Gritting his teeth, he pulled a bolt pistol from beneath a corpse. Twisting, he fired it on full-auto, sending half a clip into his would-be executioner. The Traitor Marine juddered and fell as the rounds slammed into him. Surrounded and badly wounded, Barbelo knew he had little chance of regaining his footing. I am redeemed. Proud that he had remained master of his rage, that his armour had not been daubed in the black of madness, the sergeant clasped his hand tightly around the detonator. The Cretacian symbol for caution flashed across his display, warning him that he was within the blast radius.

‘In His name.’

Barbelo released the device’s pressure-clasp.

The melta-charges ignited, blasting apart the corridor’s support studs in a hail of shrapnel and filling the passageway with an expanding ball of flame. Harahel was tossed like a leaf in a hurricane as the explosion slammed him into the walls and ground. Strobing runes filled his retinal display, as fire washed across his armour, testing the limits of its ceramite plating. The screeds of warnings were in vain, Harahel unable to process them before the ceiling collapsed and his world went dark.

‘The gene-seed is secure. Moving to the Stormraven.’

Maion struggled to hear Nisroc’s voice over the pumping of his hearts and the roar of his chainsword as its teeth tore through another enemy. ‘Understood,’ he growled, turning aside an enemy chainaxe. He parried the weapon down to expose his attacker’s neck, driving his combat knife into the Chaos Space Marine’s windpipe. Maion immediately withdrew the blade and buried it in the face of another of the Dark Gods’ minions. ‘If we’re not there in two minutes, leave.’

‘Sanguinius guide you.’

Maion was in no doubt that the Apothecary would be leaving without him. The Archenemy had him surrounded. His armour had been struck clean of paint and insignia. Deep lacerations covered his arms and torso. His muscles ached with exhaustion. It would not be long before even his indomitable constitution gave out, and the enemy killed him. Only his rage kept him on his feet, allowing him to fight on, the insatiable need to rend powering his blows and staying death’s probing touch. In death’s sight, you are fury. In his colours you are reborn a reaper. None shall evade your wrath; Maion recalled the mantra Chaplain Appollus used to rouse the Death Company for war. Until now, he’d embraced only the edges of the beast growling inside him. Never daring to fully embrace the whispering voices that scratched at his mind. But here, on starless Arere, in the darkness of the corridor, Maion stopped resisting. He invited the red mist to descend to light up his world in a whirlwind of gore. He felt his rage swallowing him, the shadow in his mind–

A staccato of miniature explosions snapped Maion from his morbidity. He felt the press of enemy ease off behind, allowing him to take a step backwards. Risking a glance over his shoulder, he saw Amaru. The Techmarine stood in the centre of the corridor like a vengeful daemon, the quad arms of his servo-harness spitting death from an array of laser cutters and plasma burners. In his gauntleted hands, Amaru carried his power axe, Blood Cog. The Techmarine had forged the weapon himself upon his return from Mars. The axe’s sparking head was shaped like the gearwheel from a giant machine. A weapon of exquisite beauty and terrible power, it was imbued with all Amaru’s artisanship. Blood Cog rose and fell like the levers of an antiquated stenogram, as the Techmarine hacked down the Archenemy in brutal swipes that crackled on impact.

‘Quickly brother, fall back,’ Amaru called out to Maion as he chopped Blood Cog through another Chaos Space Marine, bisecting the unfortunate from shoulder to hipbone. ‘Fall back now.’

‘Micos.’ Maion cast his gaze around. He had long since lost sight of the other Flesh Tearer but his ident-tag still shone. He was alive, for the moment at least. ‘We can’t leave him.’

‘They will rally soon.’

Maion ignored the Techmarine’s caution, and bludgeoned his way past another assailant to where his retinal display indicated Micos should be. With a huge effort, Maion began tossing back the bodies of the Archenemy, until he spotted the familiar ashen helm of a Flesh Tearer. ‘I have him.’ Knifing his chainsword into the thigh of an onrushing foe, Maion grabbed Micos’s vambrace and dragged him from under a heap of corpses.

‘Can you carry him?’ Amaru’s question bore no insult.

Maion growled, tearing his blade free and beheading the wounded Traitor Marine. ‘To Cretacia and back.’ With a grunt of exertion, he hoisted Micos over his shoulders.

The Techmarine nodded and hacked the weapon arm from one of the Archenemy, before beheading him. Amaru’s fury was methodical, the aggression of his flesh tempered by the cold efficiency of his machine parts. Maion envied his calm, though he knew that someday the Techmarine’s rage would no longer be held in check. On that day, Maion would know pity for the enemies of his Chapter.

Pulling his axe from the chest plate of another Chaos Space Marine, Amaru tossed a glowing canister over Maion’s head. ‘Run.’

Harahel pushed himself off the ground, shrugging a pile of debris and a limbless body from his back. He felt his twin hearts quicken as they worked with his armour to pump pain suppressors through his bloodstream. Angry runes flashed on his display as his helm’s optics tried and failed to focus. The lenses were cracked. Stumbling to his feet, Harahel spat a curse and unclasped his ruined helmet. The Chapter’s armourers had their work cut out for them. He mag-locked the helmet to his thigh and paused while his eyes adjusted to the darkness. Thick silence hung in the air. It was in almost painful contrast to the cacophonous din of battle that preceded the explosion. Harahel listened for signs of the enemy but could hear nothing beyond his own shallow breathing. The blast had levelled the corridor, chocking it with collapsed rockcrete and the dead. The Flesh Tearer searched for his weapon, picking through the rubble and the bodies nearest him. ‘The mists rot you’, he said. Cursing in tired frustration, Harahel kicked a fallen Chaos Space Marine in the chest. The ceramite skull adorning the fallen warrior’s breastplate cracked under the blow. There was no trace of the eviscerator. His weapon was gone. Harahel staggered forwards, steadying himself on a dislodged support beam. There was movement up ahead. Two figures, one crouched over the other. He stepped towards them, unsteady on his feet as he fought to remain conscious.

‘Nisroc?’ Harahel cried out, delirious from the chemicals keeping him alive while his body healed itself. ‘Brother?’

He moved closer, stopping as the crouched figure’s armour resolved into focus. It was not the white of the Apothecary or the deep crimson of Barbelo’s garb, but a vibrant, arterial red. Harahel took a step forwards, and saw Barbelo slumped underneath the figure. The sergeant’s breastplate was peeled open, his organs scattered on the ground. Harahel bared his teeth and snarled.

The hunched figured turned and rose. Fresh blood stained his baroque armour, tracing the outlines of the ruinous brass symbols that adorned it. Skulls rattled on rusted chains as the Chaos Space Marine stood. He was a walking effigy of death. A vicious chainaxe barked to life in his hand.

Harahel gripped his helmet and strode towards his enemy, all thoughts of injury gone as rage invigorated him. He would avenge the sergeant. The traitor would pay in blood.

‘Skulls for His throne,’ the Archenemy warrior roared through the skull-shaped vox-grille of his helmet, and charged at the Flesh Tearer.

Harahel caught his opponent’s arm as he slashed down with the chainaxe, pivoting and smashing his helm into the side of the Chaos Space Marine’s head. He followed with his elbow, folding it into his opponent’s left ocular lens. The Traitor Marine roared as the shattered armourglass dug into his eye, and threw a panicked hook with his free hand. Harahel felt his jaw break as the gauntleted blow struck his unarmoured face. He struggled to keep a hold of the Chaos Space Marine’s weapon arm, spitting a glob of bloody mucous and teeth as he slammed his head into his opponent’s other lens. Pain shot through Harahel’s skull as his toughened skeleton protested at the cruel misuse. The Archenemy’s head snapped backwards under the blow, unbalancing him.

‘Die!’ Harahel roared and smashed his helmet into the Chaos Space Marine’s head. The enemy warrior’s grip on the chainaxe loosened. The Flesh Tearer struck him again, and again, using his helmet as a hammer, bludgeoning the Chaos Space Marine to his knees. The chainaxe clattered to the ground as Harahel battered his foe into unconsciousness. ‘Die!’ The Traitor Marine’s body went slack but the Flesh Tearer held him upright and continued to batter him. ‘Die! Die! Die!’

Only when his helmet was mangled beyond recognition, and his opponent’s head was nothing but bloody spatter on the wall, did Harahel let the body drop to the ground. The giant Flesh Tearer stood panting, the Archenemy’s blood dripping from his face. He growled, bunching his fists as he fought the urge to smash down the wall. ‘Strengthen me to the demands of blood. Armour my soul against the Thirst.’ Harahel looked down at Barbelo’s corpse. ‘Let me kill those who blaspheme against your sons.’ Calmer, Harahel knelt and unfastened Barbelo’s helm. ‘Forgive me,’ Harahel said as he locked it in place over his head. Both retinal displays lit up with sigils of bonding as the sergeant’s helmet synchronised with his armour. Harahel called up the squad’s ident-tags, thankful that his brothers were still fighting. Slinging Barbelo’s body over his shoulder and picking up the fallen chainaxe, Harahel made for the Stormraven. ‘Come, brother, there’s more blood to spill yet.’

The Stormraven was a burning wreck of charred metal and crumpled ceramite. The courtyard was compromised. Enemy assault troops sat perched on the upper gantries like sentry-carrion, their weapons searching for targets. Half a dozen more sat crouched on their haunches, nursing wounds the Stormraven had dealt them before its demise.

‘Wretches! Sanguinius drink you dry,’ Nisroc opened fire, pulverising the nearest enemy with a hail of explosive rounds. There was no place in a Flesh Tearer’s mind for dismay. If he were trapped on Arere, then he would kill his enemies until death came to stop him. The Apothecary dived into cover, throwing himself against a metal container as a slew of bolt-rounds and melta-blasts tore towards him in retort. ‘I’m in the courtyard. The Stormraven’s gone.’ Nisroc’s voice was punctuated with rage as he voxed the update. Movement to the left drew his attention. He opened fire, suppressing a pair of Chaos Space Marines that were trying to encircle him.

‘Sanguinius’s blood. What now?’ Harahel snarled over the vox.

Another torrent of rounds smashed into Nisroc’s cover, forcing him to crouch low as he reloaded his bolter. ‘We fight, we–’

‘I know a way,’ Amaru interrupted.

‘Explain…’ Nisroc trailed off. The enemy had stopped firing. On instinct, he subvocalised the Cretacian rune for haste to the rest of the squad.

‘Apothecary!’ The word rang out in a garbled roar, its syllables tortured by a voice unaccustomed to speech. ‘I will feast on your hearts and savour the seed of your brothers.’

At the corner of his peripheral vision, Nisroc saw four more Chaos Space Marines, their weapons trained on him. He ground his teeth in frustration. His only option was to face the challenger.

‘Not while I draw breath!’ Nisroc drew his chainsword and stood to face his opponent. The Chaos Space Marine was a giant, taller even than Harahel, his bronzed armour covered in egg-shell cracks where it struggled to contain his warped bulk. ‘Tell me,’ Nisroc said in a low growl. ‘Whose blood shall my blade taste?’ The Apothecary activated his visual feed as he spoke, transmitting the locations of the Chaos Space Marines in the courtyard to the rest of the squad.

‘Krykhan, Fist of Khorne,’ the traitor growled as he launched himself at Nisroc.

Amaru sprinted from the corridor firing, Maion close behind him. ‘Fall back to the missile silo.’ The Techmarine dropped to one knee to avoid a plasma round, the arms of his servo-harness whirring as they turned to return fire. The Chaos plasma gunner died in a heartbeat, dissected by the merciless cutting lasers.

Maion ran past the Techmarine, Micos draped over his shoulders. It irked him to be unarmed, but he hadn’t the time to find a weapon. Bolt-rounds barked at his heels and churned up the dirt as he moved. He spat a curse, desperate for a chance to return fire. Angry runes flashed on his display as shell fragments spattered off of his legs. ‘Where?’

‘Back through the armoury.’ Amaru was forced to shout over the din of bolter fire. ‘The rearmost corridor.’

Harahel felt Barbelo’s body jerk as bolt-rounds hammered into it. Growling, he took cover behind a shorn off section of the Stormraven’s wing. The orphaned appendage stood in the ground like a piece of industrial sculpture. A grenade exploded, showering Harahel in shrapnel. The noise reminded him of a Cretacian thunderstorm. Ahead, he saw Nisroc. The Apothecary was about to die. A massive warrior stood over the prone Flesh Tearer, his murderous intent obvious. Harahel growled, and stood to throw his chainaxe into the Chaos Space Marine’s back. The towering warrior roared, pitching forwards under the force of the impact. ‘Get up and kill him,’ Harahel snarled at Nisroc.

The Chaos Space Marine turned away from Nisroc, reaching for the axe in his back. The Apothecary summoned the last of his strength, shooting upwards to thrust his combat knife through his opponent’s neck. The Archenemy warrior’s body shuddered as his brain died. Nisroc caught the body before it could fall, pulling it around as a shield against the two Chaos Space Marines who immediately opened fire on him. He drew the dead warrior’s boltgun and put down his attackers with pinpoint shots. ‘Harahel, move! I’ll cover you.’

Too late, Amaru realised a Chaos Space Marine had landed behind him. His servo-harness sparked violently, its arms falling limp as the Archenemy warrior sliced through its control fibres. Amaru hit the release clasp and rolled away, pivoting as he rose to face his enemy. He spun forwards, tearing Blood Cog down through his foe’s shoulder and ripping it from his ribcage.

A round struck Maion’s pauldron as he cleared the threshold of the armoury. Another hit his abdomen. He fell, Micos toppling with him. He pushed himself onto all fours and tried to focus. Everything was faint, murky, as though he were a long way underwater. Pain forced a growl from his throat. His injuries were severe.

‘On your feet.’ Harahel grabbed Maion by his backpack and hoisted him up.

‘Micos…’

‘I have him.’ Harahel pushed Maion further into the armoury, stooping to gather up Micos.

‘Amaru, where now?’ Nisroc backed into the chamber, a boltgun barking in each hand.

‘Enter the third launch annex.’ Amaru pointed to the passageway leading from the rear of the armoury. ‘Go!’

Debris dust drifted into the missile silo, bathing the Flesh Tearers in powdered rockcrete. Amaru had used the last of the melta-charges to bring the corridor down behind them, creating a barricade between them and the Archenemy. He hoped it would give them enough time.

In the centre of the chamber stood a single, towering missile, its base disappearing down into the earth, its tip several stories above the control deck. A laddered gantry snaked around the missile, weaving between vines of cabling and fuel hoses to connect the deck with its upper reaches.

‘We don’t have long.’ Amaru pointed up towards the missile. ‘Quickly, into the nose.’

‘What?’ Maion stopped, unsure if he’d misheard the Techmarine.

‘It is a Mark-XV defence missile, the nose space is relatively empty.’ Amaru detached a plasma cutter from his pack and passed it to Maion. ‘Make entry with this and seal it once you’re inside.’

‘And you?’

‘I will remain here to ensure your withdrawal.’

Maion made to speak, but the Techmarine held up a hand, ‘The missile will not launch itself.’

The other Flesh Tearer nodded grimly and took the plasma cutter.

Amaru grabbed Nisroc’s vambrace as he walked past. ‘Wait.’ He held his axe out to the Apothecary. ‘The Chapter has lost enough this day.’

Silently, Nisroc clasped his hand to Amaru’s vambrace and took the proffered weapon.

The nosecone was cramped, only just accommodating the four Flesh Tearers. Nisroc had removed the gene-seed from Barbelo’s body while Maion had cut them an access hatch. They’d left what remained of the sergeant on the gantry. Maion bent the armoured panelling back into shape, heat-sealed it with the plasma cutter and squeezed his bulk between Harahel and Nisroc. Micos was still unconscious, and was only on his feet because there was no room to fall over.

‘We’re in.’ Nisroc opened a private channel to Amaru.

‘Ensure Tabbris sanctifies Blood Cog. Its spirit is strong; it will serve him well.’

‘It will taste flesh again,’ Nisroc answered. Tabbris was Amaru’s pupil, a novitiate Techmarine. That Amaru would cede him his weapon signified his faith in the novitiate’s abilities. Nisroc would see to it that the Master Artificer knew of Amaru’s wishes. ‘Death find you well, brother.’

Amaru said nothing. Extending a cable from his armour, he plugged into the firing console. Behind him, the forces of the Archenemy had already blasted through the rubble. He could hear them striding along the corridor. There was no time to perform the correct consecration or rites of firing. The missile’s machine-spirit was ancient. He hoped it would not be offended. Launch. Amaru sent the command to the missile. A tremor passed underfoot, rattling a canteen pack off a nearby workstation. Shrill klaxons screamed through the corridor as the warhead powered up. The Techmarine deactivated them. Sensors and bundles of thick cabling detached and fell away from the rocket as pressurised hydraulics moved it into the firing position. More rumbling. Fuel pipes retracted. Exhaust vents ground open beneath the floor of the silo. Amaru interrupted them, closing the grilles. The engines gurgled into life. More alarms rang out as the compound’s safety systems detected the block in the ventilation, Amaru overrode them, silencing the alarms and pushing the missile up thorough the shaft into the final position.

‘For the Chapter.’

A wash of flame erupted from the missile’s booster like the breath of an angry dragon, propelling it upwards on an expanding pillar of fire. Amaru’s world burned away in an instant, the temperature gauge on his retinal display flashing red as the thruster backwash broiled him. A second warning blinked across his vision for the briefest of instants before he, and everything else in the compound, was incinerated.

The maglift whispered to a stop. He stepped off into the corridor, his armoured boots making a dull thud as they contacted the deck plating. He paused for a moment while his enhanced eyes strained to adjust to the gloom. They could not. The walkway floated in complete, impenetrable darkness, shrouded by a long-forgotten technology that defied even the keenest of auspexes. To walk the passageways of this level was to know exactly where to tread, or to fall to your doom amid the ancient bowels of the ship. He continued along the corridor, making the turns instinctively, following the pattern imprinted in his eidetic memory. His pace quickened as he felt his ire rise, his warrior blood drumming in his veins at the frustrating tediousness of the journey. He stopped and drew a breath, calming his mind. He did not have the luxury of indulging his baser nature. Such things were his burden to bear and some secrets were not meant for the light.

A door slid open into a darkened chamber. He stepped inside and the door closed behind him. The faint glow of an idling pict-screen cast the face of the room’s single occupant into half-shadow.

‘Where did you find them?’ As always, his voice was dangerous, his pensive demeanour only ever a heartbeat removed from the violent rage that made him such an implacable warrior.

‘The strike cruiser Jagged Blade intercepted them just beyond the Arere system.’ Captain Araton stepped closer, the light from the pict-screen illuminating the crimson of his breastplate. The serrated blade emblazoned on his armour was thrown into menacing relief.

‘Survivors?’

‘Only three, lord. The fourth…’ Araton paused, unsure how to continue. ‘The fourth, Brother Micos, was killed in transit.’

‘Explain.’

‘He succumbed to… a rage. The others were left with little choice.’

‘The curse?’

‘Perhaps, but Nisroc believed it to be something more, something worse.’ Araton turned to a console and activated the playback on the pict-screen. ‘These feeds were extracted from the datastacks the squad recovered from the outpost.’ The captain stepped away from the screen, retreating into the darkness.

++Recorder 3: Sanctum: I808++

The sanctum was alive with motion. Men clambered behind consoles and data stacks as explosions wracked the chamber. A straggler was hit in the back, the force of the blow spinning him through the air, his torso a bloodied mess. The Guardsmen’s fatigues marked them out as the Angorian Rifles, the garrison regiment of Arere. A figure burst into the room, too quick for the pict-recorder to capture fully. It barrelled into a huddle of Guardsmen. They tried to run. A vicious chain-weapon struck out and sent a bodiless head spinning past the pict-recorder lens.

An officer stood up and screamed, motioning for his men to fall back. His battleplate was blackened and pitted, his creased face caked with mire. Shrapnel danced around him as mass-reactive rounds slammed into the console he was using for cover. He shouted again, dragging the man nearest him to his feet.

A jet of superheated flame blew over the console, incinerating both men in a wash of burning promethium.

++Recording Interrupted++

++Recorder 7: Barracks: I827++

Two squads of Angorian Rifles were taking cover behind a row of overturned kit-lockers. The barrels of their lasguns glowed hot as the troopers poured an endless stream of fire towards the doorway. Two objects flew in from off camera and exploded in front of the lockers. Ashen smoke filled the viewer.

It cleared to reveal a twisted mass of metal, the Angorians’ makeshift barricade in ruins. The corpses of half their number lay slumped lifelessly over the shredded lockers, shards of metal embedded in their flesh. A figure advanced from the doorway, his armoured back filling the viewer. The Guardsmen opened fire. Untroubled, the attacker fired back. The unmistakable muzzle-flash of a boltgun illuminated the Angorians as they flipped backwards, torn apart by the mass-reactive rounds.

The attacker turned his crimson breast plate–

++Recording Interrupted++

++Recorder 19: Armoury: I901++

A crimson-armoured warrior was sprinting down the corridor into a hail of las-fire, his breastplate scorched clean of insignia by its attentions. A bright muzzle-flash blazed into life up ahead. Heavy calibre, solid-state rounds began churning up the floor and walls as they stitched a line towards him. One struck his right pauldron. Splintered armour fragments struck the pict-recorder as he spun to the ground. The warrior rolled to his feet and continued into the gunfire, his weapon forgotten on the ground behind him as he disappeared from view.

The ruined corridor lay empty, battered ceramite flaking to the ground. The intensity of the gunfire lessened, sporadic rounds zipping down to the corridor. Then it died altogether. Within moments, the armoured warrior emerged from the end of the corridor. Blood pooled in the recesses of his damaged armour, which was pitted and cracked like the surface of a moon. His hands and forearms were thick with gore. Blood dripped from his fingertips, leaving a macabre trail behind him as he strode back towards his weapon.

++I901: Segment Ends++

++Recorder 12: Courtyard: I873++

A Flesh Tearer lay slumped against the wall, one of his brothers bent over him. The brother turned, withdrawing the blade he’d driven into the other’s heart. His helmet was gone, his face contorted into a bestial snarl. He made to rise and a searing plasma round struck his chest.

A shadow fell over the Flesh Tearer’s prone form. He pushed his hands into the dirt and tried to stand as a second plasma round obliterated his head in a stream of sparking gore.

The shadow grew larger until the Flesh Tearer’s executioner was right beneath the pict-recorder. The man looked up, straight into the lens.

The image froze as the viewer’s recog-system analysed the man’s face. The image blinked once as data began to scroll down the screen.

First Commissar Morvant, attached to the Angorian Rifles. Awarded Iron Faith honours for the Ivstyan Cleansing. Last posting Arere, Substation 12BX. Current status: Unknown.

The image blinked again and playback continued.

The man’s passive stare didn’t change as he raised his pistol towards the pict-recorder.

++Recording Interrupted++

The viewer clicked off, emitting a faint buzz of static as it returned to idle.

Silence persisted.

‘Destroy it.’

‘And Arere?’

‘Exterminatus.’ Gabriel Seth, Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers, turned on his heel and headed back into the darkness.

He had a world to kill.

TORTURER’S THIRST

‘I must know. I must know what lies beneath the flesh, what powers a man to draw breath when death is so much easier. I must inflict pain to level you, to strip away your falsehoods and pretences. I must show you yourself, so that I may know your secrets.’

– Torturer’s saying

Appollus echoed his jump pack’s roar as it drove him downwards. He landed hard, scattering a mortar formation and crushing their spotter beneath his ceramite boots. The enemy’s ribs cracked, the bone fragments spearing his innards while his organs drowned in blood. Appollus grinned. The other six members of his Death Company slammed to the earth in ordered formation around him. The backwash of their jump packs scoured the flesh from a slew of enemy warriors, filling the air with the rancid tang of burned flesh.

‘Bring them death!’

Appollus opened fire with his bolt pistol, dispatching a trio of the enemy in a burst of mass-reactive rounds. The Brotherhood of Change were everywhere. A teeming mass of mauve robes and onyx masks, they pressed towards him with unrelenting fervour. Appollus thumbed the fire selector to full-auto and fired again. A swathe of Brotherhood cultists died, their bodies blown apart, pulped by the explosive rounds. Yet they did not falter. Heedless of the losses inflicted upon them, the Brotherhood lashed out at Appollus like men possessed. The tip of a barbed pole-arm cracked against his shoulder guard. He sidestepped a thrust meant to disembowel him and jammed the muzzle of his bolt pistol into his attacker’s torso. A shower of limbs and flesh-chunks rained over his armour as he pressed forwards, spattering his black battleplate crimson.

The sharp tang of blood was suffocating. It was a siren’s call to the killer inside him, beckoning him onwards into the press of flesh. Another blade flashed towards him. He parried the downwards stroke with his crozius, and smashed his bolt pistol into the faceplate of another of the Brotherhood. The blow caved in the side of the cultist’s skull. Lines of brain-viscera clung to Appollus’s bolt pistol as he swung it round and opened fire on the endless mauve horde.

The Brotherhood had been human once. Scholars from the librarium world of Onuris Siti, their counsel was sought by all who could afford it, from cardinals to Planetary Governors. But the Sitilites had turned their back on the Emperor and his Imperium. They had sworn dark oaths to darker gods, burned their librariums to the ground and denounced the teaching of the Ecclesiarchy.

Appollus snarled as he gunned down another group of attackers. He could smell the taint of the warp upon them; it saturated them, drifting from their pores like a foul poison. A warning sigil flashed on his helmet display. He was down to his last round. He blinked it away with a snarl, and blew the head from a bulbous assailant whose torso was at odds with his rawboned legs; only a raw aspirant was unable to discern his ammo count by the weight of his weapon. Appollus mag-locked the pistol to his armour, and buried his combat knife into the distended neck of the nearest cultist.

Behind them, the guns of the Cadian Eighth continued to fire in a desperate attempt to hold the line against the Brotherhood’s advance. The snap of a hundred thousand lasguns crackled in the air like lightning, as a thousand heavy bolters continued their thunderous chatter.

Ahead of him, the Death Company were pushing forwards. Wielding their chainswords two-handed, they hacked a path through the Brotherhood’s ranks. Orphaned limbs tumbled through the air like morbid hail, ripped from ruined torsos by the adamantium teeth of the Death Company’s weapons. Still the enemy came, clawing and grabbing at their arms and legs. For all their rage-fuelled vigour, Appollus knew his brothers would eventually be pulled to the ground, drowned beneath the tide of flesh assailing them.

Appollus threw his arms out, his ceramite-clad limbs smashing ribs and shattering jaws. They needed to regain the initiative, to maintain momentum.

‘With me!’ Appollus growled over the vox.

He bent his knees, angling his jump pack towards the enemy at his rear. With a thought, he activated the booster. The cultist behind him died in a flash, incinerated in a gout of flame. Dozens more flailed around screaming, their flesh running from their bodies in a thick soup.

The raging thrusters threw Appollus forwards into a wall of enemy. He tucked his chin into his pauldron, using the shoulder guard as a battering ram. Bone broke, and necks snapped as he battered through the press of Brotherhood. A red status sigil blinked on his display – fuel zero. He pressed the release clasp and the booster fell away. Momentum carried him onwards another ten paces. He rolled, knocking over a handful of assailants, before rising to his feet to begin the slaughter anew.

‘Chaplain Appollus.’ Colonel Morholt’s voice crackled in his ear.

He ignored it and pushed onwards. His weapons blurred around him as he hacked off limbs on instinct. His blood hummed in his veins, his twin hearts bellowing, choirmasters propelling him through a chorus of death. This was what is was to be a Flesh Tearer. To lose oneself in the joy of slaughter. To maim. To kill. He eviscerated an enemy and tore the midriff out of another, stamping his boot down to crack the skull of a cultist whose leg he’d removed a heartbeat before. Thick gore splattered his armour, blood pooled around his gorget.

He felt lighter without the jump pack, and his progress through the forest of bodies quickened. But the Death Company were already ahead of him, churning the Brotherhood into fleshy gobbets that slid from their armour like crimson sleet.

‘Chaplain, you’ve extended the cordon. Pull back to your sector.’

Appollus barely registered the colonel’s pleas, his attention fixed on the lumbering creature that was trying to bludgeon him to death with a pair of crackling warhammers. Hemmed in on all sides by the press of enemy warriors, Appollus had no room to manoeuvre. He blocked his attacker’s opening swing with his crozius, the weapons sparking off one another in a haze of blistering energy. He felt his feet slide back under the force of the blow. The earth beneath his feet was slick, churned into a thick paste by constant bombardment and the hundred score warriors who had charged across it. He growled, sinking his weight through his knees to steady himself. The brute advanced on him, swinging again. Appollus stepped inside its guard and brought his head up into its jaw, grinning as he heard the sickening snap of bone. He reversed the strike, driving his forehead down into his attacker’s face. The blow cracked the creature’s faceplate, and it cried out in pain as the obsidian fragments embedded themselves in its skin. It dropped its weapons, reaching up to pull the shards from its flesh.

‘Die now!’

Appollus threw an uppercut into his foe’s chest. It spasmed hard, blood pouring from its broken mouth as the Chaplain wrapped his fingers around its heart. Appollus squeezed the organ, grinning as it burst in his grasp. He tore his hand free, beheading another of the Brotherhood before the brute had even collapsed to the ground.

‘Hold position! Emperor damn you, hold the line!’

Colonel Morholt’s voice became like a persistent whine in Appollus’s ear. He growled in response, deactivating his comm-feed even as he tore his crozius from another of the Archenemy’s pawns. His duty was to lead the Death Company in battle, to direct their fury to the heart of the enemy. Their rage was beyond his means to restrain, it could be sated only by blood. They had no place anywhere but at the enemy’s throat. Brother Luciferus had made that plain before dispatching them to this accursed planet. Appollus grinned. Never had the Flesh Tearers’ Chief Librarian spoken a greater truism. To pull back now would be to invite the Death Company’s wrath upon Morholt and the rest of his regiment.

A persistent warning sigil flashed on Appollus’s retinal display as his armour’s auspex detected incoming artillery.

‘Morholt,’ Appollus snarled.

Locking his crozius to his armour, he grabbed the nearest brute by its head. The hulking traitor voiced a throttled scream as Appollus threw himself to the ground, dragging the unfortunate down on top of him. His helmet’s audio dampeners activated to preserve his hearing a heartbeat before a staccato of explosions burst around him.

‘I am His weapon, He is my shield!’ Appollus bellowed the mantra through gritted teeth as the ground shuddered under multiple detonations.

The siege shells exploded in coarse bellows that threw dirt and malformed bodies into the air like sparks burning away from a firecracker. Flame washed over him, incinerating the screaming brute sheltering him and burning the litany parchments from his armour.

The heat liquefied the ground beneath him, his armoured bulk sinking further into the muddied earth. Biometric data scrolled across his retinal display as the bombardment ended. The concussive force of the blasts had strained his organs, but his armour had held and he was already healing.

A pair of faded ident-tags told him Urim and Rashnu had taken direct hits, blown into fleshy rain by the artillery barrage.

‘Rest well, brothers.’

When the battle was over, Appollus would gather whatever fragments of their armour remained and take them to the Basilica of Remembrance. They would be mourned, as would the loss of their gene-seed.

‘Cease fire!’ Appollus growled into the vox.

A burst of static shot back in answer.

Snarling, he pushed himself up out of the dirt, cursing as his gauntlets slid into the earthy soup.

‘Hold your fire, Morholt, or by the blood I will kill you myself!’

Appollus surveyed the destruction. The enemy dead carpeted the landscape, like purple reeds flattened by the wind. The remaining four members of his Death Company were scattered among a line of shallow craters to his left flank.

Las-fire flickered from the edge of the blast zone. The Brotherhood were starting to rally. An autocannon shell glanced his pauldron, spinning him down into the mud.

‘Forwards!’ Appollus roared as he regained his footing.

But the Death Company were already charging towards the Brotherhood, bolters barking in their hands as they advanced into a hail of las-fire.

‘We are anger. We are death.’

Fire burned in Appollus’s limbs as his legs pumped him towards the foe. Ignorant of the las-fire that licked his armour and the solid-state rounds that threw up dirt in his path, he charged towards the wall of enemy.

‘Our wrath knows no succour.’

Ten more paces and he would be among them. His gauntlets would drip in entrails as he ripped apart their blasphemous forms.

‘Our blades know no–‘

Something unseen struck Appollus in the chest, flipping him to the ground. He landed hard, a crack snaking along his breastplate. He groaned as he lifted his head, blinking hard to clear his vision. Pain suppressors flooded his system but did nothing to quell the searing pain in his skull.

The enemy stopped firing.

Grunting with effort, Appollus got to his feet. He stumbled forwards, but the ground swung up to meet him. Blood filled his mouth as his head struck the ground. Roaring with frustration, he pushed himself onto all fours. He would crawl if he had to. Only death would stay his wrath.

Ahead, the ranks of the Brotherhood stood immobile, taunting him.

Behind his skull helm, Appollus’s face was set in a snarl of pure hate. He cast his eyes over the traitors, searching for a sign of his Death Company. A flash of mirror-black armour among the mauve robes caught his eye. He made to look again, but in the same instant was yanked from the ground, tossed into the air and slammed back down with bone-breaking force.

Pain burned through him, as though a molten needle was being threaded into his very marrow. He couldn’t move, his limbs pinned to the earth, trapped beneath a huge, invisible weight. Patches of hoarfrost rimed his armour, spitting as they cracked and reformed. The stench of sulphur choked the air around him.

Psyker.

The thought formed in Appollus’s mind the briefest of instants before he glimpsed the mirror-black armour once more and darkness took him.

Filmy water dripped onto Appollus’s face, stirring him. His head ached in a way he’d not felt since Seth had struck him in the duelling cages. Easing his eyes open, he saw thick iron chains looped around his ankles. He was naked, strung up like butchered cattle, his head a metre from the ground. His wrists were shackled too, fixed beneath him by a chain that ran through a loop set into the bare rock of the floor. Appollus strained at his bonds, his muscles rippling with effort as he tried in vain to break the irons from the floor.

‘The blood grant me my vengeance,’ he spat, growling with frustration.

The light in the chamber was poor, uneven. The faint smell of promethium hung in the air, drifting from oil burners. Appollus strained his eyes, snatching glimpses of his surroundings in the flickering lamplight. The chamber was perhaps five metres across, its walls pocked and irregular, hewn from solid rock by axe and pick. The air was damp, and algae and moss clung to the walls in thick patches.

There was no sign of an exit. Appollus closed his eyes, his Lyman’s Ear filtering out the noise of the water as it continued to drip from the ceiling. Slowing his breathing, he quietened his heart, the drumming of his warrior-pulse dropping to a whisper.

The door was to his rear. His skin tingled at the light wisps of air that pushed into the chamber through the gaps at its edges. Someone stood just beyond it. He could hear the regular exhaling and changeless heartbeat of a bored sentry. There were…

Footsteps.

Appollus focused on their steady rhythm as they grew closer. Judging by the gait, his visitors were human. Two men, one with a limp.

The guard’s pulse quickened. Appollus smiled at his gaoler’s discomfort.

The footsteps stopped outside the door, and Appollus listened as the two men spoke to the fearful sentry. The blasphemous curs spoke in the tongue of the Archenemy. Appollus clenched his jaw. Though he couldn’t discern what they were saying, he recognised the tone well enough. The visitors were the guard’s superiors, his deference to them unmistakable.

The door opened inwards, the sound of its heavy latch sliding free a welcome relief from the ravaged consonants that ground from the men’s throats.

Appollus tasted the familiar tang of recycled air as the door opened. The chamber was underground; a ventilation system fed air in through the corridor. He concentrated on the air as it brushed against his skin and decided that the nearest circulation shaft was perhaps ten paces beyond his cell. The door clunked as it swung closed. It was thick, but with a sufficient run-up he was confident he could fell it.

‘Welcome, Chaplain.’

The speaker’s voice brought Appollus’s attention back into the room. The man stank of sulphur and day-old blood.

Appollus opened his eyes but remained silent. As a Chaplain, it was his duty to listen. To hear the sins of his brothers and distil their lies before they had even formed on their tongues. He had taken confession from the best of men, men of power and great strength. He had listened to the broken voices of terrible men, men whose twisted machinations had seen the end of civilisations, as they lay on his interrogation rack.

His visitor was neither.

‘You hold secrets, Chaplain.’ This time it was the second visitor who spoke. His voice was deeper than that of the first, and he struggled over the words as though unused to making their sounds. He bent down as he spoke, holding a long blade so that Appollus could see its blood-encrusted barbs. ‘Secrets that our master would know.’

The man wore the mauve robes of the Brotherhood, though he wore no mask. Instead, the skin of his face had been dyed oil-black. Gleaming slivers of glass sat where his eyes should have been, sparkling even in the low-light of the chamber.

Fratris Crucio.

Appollus recognised his visitor from the numerous engagement reports and after-action accounts he’d studied. The Brotherhood’s master interrogators were infamous throughout the Khandax warzone. Tales of their atrocities drifted from foxhole to foxhole, hushed whispers that crept along the trench line. Fratris Crucio, a byword for terror. Storm-coated officers of the Commissariat had adopted the stories as their own. It kept the men of the Imperial Guard fearful, alert; vigilance along the watch-line absolute. To be captured by them was to suffer a fate far worse than simple death.

Appollus spat in the torturer’s face.

The man tumbled back screaming, clawing at his face as the acid saliva burned away his flesh. His companion knelt down over him but did nothing to ease his torment, simply inclining his head and watching as the acid ate into his brethren’s eyes.

‘Your strength will not serve you,’ the torturer said finally, picking up the fallen blade and pushing it into Appollus’s ribs. ‘It will not last.’

The pain was excruciating but Appollus did not cry out.

It was the least of his worries. Pain was temporary, ended by absolution or death; a slight inflicted upon his body and no more. But what the pain stirred in him – the anger, the bloodlust – that was terror. It thundered in his veins, threatening to drown his organs in a tide of red and rage. He would not allow himself to succumb to the curse; such a fate had no end.

Appollus closed off his mind from the pain. He pictured the High Basilica back on Cretacia, his Chapter’s home world. Tens of thousands of candles burned along the stone edges of the basilica’s aisles. One flickering memorial for each Flesh Tearer who had donned the black armour of death. The red of the candle wax was used to seal the saltires and affix the litany parchments to the armour of every new Death Company Space Marine. As a novitiate in the Chaplaincy, Appollus had spent years tending to the candles as he recited the catechism of observance; a decade-long mass that armoured his mind and allowed him to walk among the damned of his Chapter, untouched by their madness.

He lost himself in the memory, beginning anew the observance as his torturers continued to violate his flesh.

‘He has said nothing, lord. He will not speak.’ The Crucio bowed as he entered the chamber, keeping his eyes fixed on the black curvature of his master’s armoured feet.

Abasi Amun, encased in full battleplate, sat on an immense throne wrought from the ore-rich stone of the cavern around him. He was still, unmoving, like a sculpture stolen from the grand halls of a monarch.

‘Nothing?’ Abasi Amun’s voice rumbled around the cavern. The metallic resonance of his helmet’s vox-caster sounded machine-harsh in the enclosed space.

‘He does not scream, lord.’

‘Then you have failed me,’ Amun said, standing.

‘No, no. Perhaps…’ the Crucio stammered, his mouth dry with fear. ‘Perhaps he knows nothing.’

Amun shot forwards in a heartbeat, flowing like black water across the chamber’s expanse to lift the torturer by his neck. The Crucio gasped, his hands grasping in vain at Amun’s gauntlet.

‘He hides something, a truth.’ With a flick of his wrist, Amun snapped the Crucio’s neck. ‘I sensed it on the battlefield, he keeps something from us,’ Amun continued, talking to the limp corpse in his hand. ‘I will know his secret.’

Amun brought the corpse closer and whispered. ‘I will know.’

Pain. Appollus awoke with a start, expecting the sharp kiss of a blade or the cruel attentions of a neural flail. There was no trace of either. A lone figure stood before him, cloaked in shadow. The jagged light from the oil burners seemed to avoid the figure, flickering around the edges of his form but never quite illuminating him.

Appollus bared his teeth in a growl. He needn’t see his enemy to know him. He could hear the figure’s twin hearts thump like an indomitable engine in his chest. The shadow before him was an Adeptus Astartes. Greatest among traitors, a true pawn of the Archenemy. A Chaos Space Marine.

Blood rushed to Appollus’s muscles as he tensed against his restraints. The hatred locked into his genetic code willed him to rend the figure apart, to strike him dead. He bit down a growl. There was something else, something more. It clawed at his mind like a burrowing rodent. He could smell it. Hiding among the pungent, oleaginous balms the Traitor Marine used to maintain his armour was the foul, corrupting stench of the warp.

‘Psyker,’ Appollus snarled.

‘You are observant, for a puppet of a false god.’ The Chaos Space Marine paced forwards, throwing off the shadows the way a man might remove a cowl. ‘Where you look only to the blood of your crippled father for strength, I have embraced the power of the great Changer.’ The Traitor Marine flexed his arms. ‘His limitless majesty feeds my veins.’

The warrior’s power armour was mirror-black, its edges rounded and its surface polished to an impossible sheen. Yet it reflected nothing of the chamber. Its smooth plates were devoid of Chapter insignia and symbols of loyalty. Appollus averted his gaze. The armour was hard to look upon. It was at once dark and formless, yet as solid as the rock walls surrounding them.

Appollus looked again; he had seen its like before. ‘You were there, in battle.’

The Traitor Marine dipped his head in mock deference. ‘I am Abasi Amun. How should I address you, Chaplain?’

Appollus looked up at Amun’s breastplate, surprised to now see his reflection staring back at him, though the tortured figure he looked upon bore little resemblance to how he had last seen himself.

The Crucio had been studious in their work.

The master torturers had administered a potent mix of toxins that had retarded his Larraman’s organ and prevented his body from healing as it otherwise might. Hundreds of deep lacerations and patches of dark bruises covered his body. Several layers of skin had been shaved away from his abdomen, exposing the dermis. His face was gaunt, sapped of its chiselled sternness. Appollus met his own gaze, looked deep into his own eyes. They burned back at him with fierce intensity, reminding him of what he already knew – he would never break.

Appollus focused on the darkness of Amun’s helm. ‘Have you come seeking repentance, traitor?’

Amun laughed, a booming sound, incongruous with his subtle, insubstantial presence.

‘My Crucio have broken many of your kind. But you, you defy me still. So close to death and yet you will part with none of your secrets.’ Amun moved behind Appollus. The pressure seals around his gorget gave a popping hiss as he unclasped his helm.

‘If your body will not give me the truths I seek, then I shall take them from your mind.’

Appollus snarled, his eyes fixed on the wall opposite him. ‘I warn you, traitor. To know my secret, is to forfeit your life.’

Amun grabbed Appollus, his gauntleted fingers a vice around the Chaplain’s throat.

‘You are in no position to make threats, Chaplain.’ Amun relaxed his grip. ‘Save your piety. These are the final moments of your existence.’ Amun removed his gauntlets as he spoke. ‘I will find my answers. I will offer up your soul to my master and leave your body to rot, like the kingdom of your father.’

Amun’s eyes crackled with eldritch lightning that leapt to his outstretched palms. He curled his fingers back. The energy coalesced into a flickering ball of white fire. The temperature dropped below zero as Amun muttered a prayer in an inhuman tongue. Blood ran from Appollus’s orifices as frost began to rime his limbs.

‘I know… no fear,’ Appollus muttered, forcing his tongue to work through the viscous fluid filling his mouth.

The fireball drifted from Amun into Appollus’s torso, breaking into a fulgurant web that coursed over his flesh then vanished beneath it.

Appollus screamed.

Amun ripped into Appollus’s mind. In an agonising instant, the mental barriers that had taken the Chaplain decades to erect were torn asunder. His way unbarred, Amun proceeded with more care. Haste or disregard would leave Appollus a dribbling husk, his mind ruined and his secrets lost forever.

The chains binding Appollus rattled like weapons fire as his body jerked. His skin rippled like water as half-clotted blood slid in thick clumps from his nostrils.

Amun cut deeper. He peeled away the surface thoughts that floated in Appollus’s conscious mind and prised apart the lies of memory. Blood ran from the Chaplain’s lips as they gave voice to a near constant stream.

Alone in the inner reaches of Appollus’s mind, Amun snarled. The Flesh Tearer was close to death, but the truth still eluded him. Abandoning his earlier care, Amun burned to the Chaplain’s essence. He would know, he must.

‘There…’ Amun’s mortal body mouthed the word as his psychic tendrils found the truth he had been searching for.

Even as he touched upon it, Amun knew he had made a mistake. The Chaplain had no knowledge of the wider Imperial forces, he knew nothing of troop dispersments or defence plans. His secret was far more potent, far deadlier. He concealed a rage, wrath in its purest form. A burning halo of fire that wrapped around his soul like a serpent. Amun tried to run, to withdraw his mind back to the safety of his body. But it was too late. The Rage had found a new home, a new vessel to enact its bloody will, and it would not be denied its prize.

Abasi Amun screamed.

The door swung open. Two of the Brotherhood burst in, their lasguns trained on Appollus.

‘Lord Amun…’

Abasi roared and ran at the guards, knocking them to the floor. A panicked lasgun-round scored Appollus’s thigh. Another clipped his bonds, burning a deep score in the metal links.

The guards screamed in desperate horror as Amun set about them. He was a starved creature, a cornered beast hunched on all fours. He growled, low and feral as he ripped the two cultists apart with his bare hands and sank his teeth into their flesh.

‘While I breathe, I am wrath.’ Appollus snarled with effort as he snapped the bonds holding his wrists and swung up to break the chains around his ankles. His shoulder crunched like split kindling as he hit the ground.

Amun rounded on him, saliva and bloodied flesh-chunks dripping from his mouth.

In full battleplate, the sorcerer was more than a match for the naked and battered Appollus. But under the Rage’s thrall, the Traitor Marine was frenzied, uncoordinated. Appollus had fought among such warriors for longer than most men lived. He could read Amun’s strikes before the warrior threw them.

Slipping a right hook, Appollus spun the lengths of loose chain dangling from his wrists around his fists, and punched Amun in the face. Blood fountained from his ruined nose, spraying Appollus’s face crimson.

The Chaos Space Marine struck back with a flurry of reaching swipes. Appollus rode their momentum, absorbing their impact on his arms, though a shooting pain told of a fractured humerus. He snarled, stepping inside Amun’s guard to deliver an uppercut. The sorcerer’s head jerked backwards. Appollus followed it, landing two consecutive blows, before grabbing the back of Amun’s head and pulling him into a head-butt.

Amun roared as he staggered backwards, lashing out with his foot at Appollus’s legs.

The ceramite boot cracked Appollus’s shin and knocked him to the floor. The Chaplain rolled to his feet, limping to keep the weight from his damaged leg and cursing himself for getting too close. He couldn’t afford to be careless, he had to keep his own bloodlust in check.

Amun growled as he regained his footing, a stream of saliva washing from his mouth to hiss on the chamber floor. The smell of Appollus’s blood was like a knife in his brain. He needed to taste it, to devour the marrow in the Chaplain’s bones, to savour every last scrap of his flesh. Roaring, Amun charged.

Pain ran like molten steel in Appollus’s veins as he darted forwards, turning around Amun to loop his shackles over the Chaos Space Marine’s throat. The movement brought him around and onto Amun’s back. He forced the chains tight, his arms burning with the effort as Amun fought to buck him.

Amun dropped to one knee, a gurgling roar dying in his throat as his windpipe collapsed. He thrashed at Appollus in a mix of panic and rage as the beast within him struggled against death.

‘Die, traitor.’ The words ground from between Appollus’s bloodied teeth as he wrenched Amun’s head from his shoulders.

Even in death, Amun’s body continued to fight, his adrenaline-soaked limbs twitching in denial as his corpse shivered on the ground.

‘Your place is at our enemy’s throat.’

Luciferus’s words resurfaced in Appollus’s mind as he watched Amun grind against the stone of the floor in the last spasms of his death throes.

‘Your blood be cursed,’ Appollus snarled, bending to retrieve Amun’s blade. He would speak with the vulpine Librarian when next they crossed paths.

Coated in blood, both the traitor’s and his own, Appollus was reminded of the crimson armour he’d donned before his ordination. ‘In blood we are one. Immortal, while one remains to bleed.’ Using his teeth to scrape a finger clean, Appollus guided a bead of saliva around his chest, burning the toothed-blade symbol of his Chapter into his breast.

The iron lift rattled to a stop with a sharp grinding of gears. Appollus threw open the mesh door and stepped into the corridor, leaving the crumpled bodies of two Brotherhood to bleed out behind him. He felt his pulse quicken as he thought of the moment his fingers had closed around the first’s aorta, and remembered the satisfying snap of the second’s neck. They were the third patrol he’d come across since his escape. He hoped they would not be the last.

‘His blood is strength.’ Appollus mouthed the axiom as he stalked, a little unsteady on his feet, along the corridor. The exertion of his escape had forced the bulk of the Crucio’s toxins from his system, adrenaline washing through him like a cleansing fire; dark scabs of crusted blood covered his torso where his flesh had begun knitting itself back together. But he still ached to his bones; a pungent sweat clothing his body.

Appollus touched a hand to his head, rubbing his skin-starved knuckles into his temples. The psyker’s touch still lingered in that pain. But pain wasn’t the only thing Amun had left him with. As he fought to stave off the Rage, the Chaos Space Marine had been careless. In his panic, he had let his surface thoughts spill out; a tumultuous wave of half-formed images that had bombarded Appollus’s untrained mind. The psychic noise had been like harsh bursts of static filtered through a howling gale. Yet Appollus had done more than hold on to his sanity. With iron-willed devotion and unyielding resolve, he had focused on his duty, on his brothers.

Appollus stopped as he reached a bend in the corridor, recognising every glint of ore in the wall ahead. Zakiel, Xaphan, Herchel and Ziel; the four Death Company were alive. If what he’d gleaned from Amun’s mind was true then they were languishing in a cell at the end of the corridor. He pressed his back against the wall, feeling his muscles tense as the sharp rock tore into his skin, and listened.

There were two of the Brotherhood patrolling the corridor. Appollus ground his teeth, feeling his anger grow with every thump of their traitorous hearts. He listened to the fall of their booted feet, to the clack of their weapons as they swung loose on straps. His pulse raced as the stink of their unwashed flesh drifted to his nostrils. A red mist mustered behind his eyes. A tremor passed through his hands, forcing his fists into balls of sinew. The urge to kill was great. He looked down at the Chapter symbol on his breast as he waited and let out a slow breath of calm. Rage was not yet his master.

He waited. He counted. Focusing on the guards’ footsteps, he waited until the distance was right.

‘I am death!’ Appollus rounded the corner and threw his knife into the chest of the nearest of them. Running, he caught the body on his shoulder before it fell, and charged towards the second. The man spun round, startled, sweeping up his lasgun and opening fire. Appollus felt his corpse-shield shudder as a half dozen rounds cut into it, and snarled as a round sliced the flesh from his bicep. A second later he barrelled into the guard, tackling him to the ground. Appollus recovered first, pinning the cultist beneath him and thundering a fist into his face. He hit him again and again, deaf to the cracking of bone and ignorant of the visceral lumps of brain matter that dripped from under the cultist’s mask. Only when his fist struck rock, did Appollus stop.

The reek of torture greeted Appollus as he entered the cell, hitting him as surely as any blow. He snarled in disgust, craving the air-filtering properties of his battle-helm. The four Death Company hung from the ceiling, chained in the same manner as he had been. He growled, angered by the extent the Crucio had violated their bodies. Ziel was in the worst state, the skin of his left forearm peeled back to reveal bone. Their eyes widened as he approached. They wanted to kill. Even over the stench he could smell their bloodlust. He wouldn’t keep them waiting. Raising the lasgun he’d stripped from the Brotherhood guards, he shot through their bonds.

‘Brothers.’ Appollus spread his arms. ‘I feel your thirst.’ He thrust an arm out, jabbing his blade towards the door, ‘The enemy are many, but they are flesh. We, are immortal lords of battle. We are wrath. We are death.’

The Death Company growled, shaking their limbs loose, their fists opening and closing as they sought to rend.

‘Kill until killed. Leave none alive.’

Appollus watched them go, surprised by how much effort it took not to follow them. He ached to join the Death Company in slaughter. The Brotherhood had wrought a terrible injustice upon him, and he vowed he would see it drowned from his memory by a river of their blood. But he had gleaned more than his brothers’ location from Amun’s mind, and he had another task to attend to first.

The cavern was immense. The largest by far that Appollus had encountered. Banks of luminators hung on racks of chain, suspended from the ore-rich rock of the ceiling. Plasteel panels had been bolted down over the rock of the floor to create something resembling a functioning hangar. Rusted supply crates were heaped in small clusters around the walls. At the far end of the chamber, an antiquated Stormbird drop-ship sat locked to the deck. Its oil-black flanks were polished clean of insignia. The armour on one of its wings had been peeled back, exposing the plasteel frame beneath. Fuel cables and pressure hoses hugged its sides like creeper-vines. Beyond it, a flickering energy shield kept out the infinite void.

Appollus stared through the electro-haze of the shield. The surface of the asteroid stretched as far as he could see, a pitted landscape of undulating rock and trenched gullies. If what he’d learned from Amun was correct, the damaged Stormbird was the only transport off this rock.

Shouldering his stolen lasgun, he moved towards the drop-ship. The weapon was lighter than he was used to, like a child’s toy compared to the reassuring weight of his bolter. The lasgun followed his eyes as he scanned for targets. A trio of Brotherhood cultists rounded the Stormbird. Appollus fired, killing them without breaking stride. He ground his teeth. He missed the reassuring bark of his boltgun; the clinical snap of the lasgun was far removed from the visceral booming of mass-reactive rounds.

Klaxons screamed from what sounded like every surface. Strobing red light filled the cavern and cast wicked shadows among the rock. The resounding thud of booted feet warned Appollus of threats to his left and rear. The Brotherhood were spilling into the chamber from every angle.

He snarled as weapons fire began competing with the klaxons, las-rounds cutting the air around him. Firing in blazing streams on full-auto, Appollus cut down the forerunners. He grinned darkly as the familiar tang of blood filled the air, and continued moving towards the drop-ship. The remaining Brotherhood approached with more caution, ducking back behind what little cover they could find. He counted at least sixty of them as he panned his weapon around, slamming in a spare powercell as the charge counter flashed empty.

To his left, an arm reached up to throw a grenade. He shot it off at the elbow. Its owner cried out an instant before the explosive detonated. Gobbets of flesh and bloodied robe fountained into the air. Fifty-seven. Appollus updated his mental tally as he ducked under the tangle of fuel feeds.

The Brotherhood stopped firing.

Appollus used the moment’s respite to assess his options. The Brotherhood had formed a firing perimeter. A few had unsheathed blades and were edging towards him. He smiled. They were waiting for him to break for the Stormbird, but he had never had any intention of boarding the vessel.

Appollus opened the intake valve in the nearest fuel hose and lifted the locking catch. Choking promethium vapour wafted out, forcing a cough from his lungs. Appollus ejected the powercell from his lasgun and struck it hard with the hilt of his knife.

‘He is my shield.’

Appollus dropped the sparking energy cell into the fuel pipe and ran. He ran with all the speed his enhanced physiology could muster. He ran like a man racing to the side of imperilled loved ones. He ran in the only direction the Brotherhood hadn’t refused him. He ran towards the energy barrier.

Shutting his eyes to protect them from the shield’s glare, Appollus threw himself through the barrier and out into the void.

Less than a heartbeat later, the Stormbird detonated, the promethium in its fuel tanks exploding outwards in a halo of fire.

Too late, the Brotherhood realised what Appollus had done.

The nearest of them were incinerated in the initial blast, vaporised where they stood. The others fled as best they could. Flaming shrapnel chased them across the chamber, tearing through flesh and bone with all the care of a maddened butcher.

Appollus watched as the rolling carpet of flame pushed out through the energy shield and vanished, its ire stolen by the airless void. He followed the fire’s retreat, diving back through the barrier and rolling to his feet.

Shards of burning metal littered the chamber. The broken and torn corpses of dozens of Brotherhood cultists were strewn about like discarded dolls. Some of the traitors were still screaming, thrashing around as their faceplates seared their skin, the thin metal superheated by the blast. The smell of cooked blood hung in the air, as tangible as the ground beneath Appollus’s feet.

Fire and the flickering, red light conspired to recreate the Hell described in ancient Terran myth. Appollus smiled as he strode through the carnage: that made him the Daevil.

The remaining Brotherhood staggered from cover, their robes singed and ragged. They moved without purpose, staring at the smouldering wreck of the drop-ship, gripped by disbelief at what had transpired. Appollus paced towards them. Smoke drifted in wistful columns from his limbs, his void-frozen skin singed by the heat of the energy shield.

A bleeding Crucio, his face knotted in confusion, glared at Appollus. ‘Fool. That was the only ship.’ The Crucio indicated a smouldering crater filled with tangled ceramite and plasteel plating. ‘You are trapped here with us.’ He spread his arms to indicate the rest of the Brotherhood who had recovered enough to ready their weapons. ‘When I’m done with you, all the pain you have suffered thus far in your miserable life will seem like an eternity of ecstasy. On your flesh I shall redefine the art of my sect. I will hear you beg for death, Chaplain.’

‘No, heretic.’ Appollus stopped ten paces from the nearest cultist. He took a breath and looked down at the knife in his hand. Pulling back his broad shoulders, he straightened to his full height and raised his knife towards the Crucio. ‘You are mistaken.’

At the rear of the chamber, a lift rattled and bucked to a stop, its iron grate swinging open.

‘It is you who are trapped here with us.’

The Crucio looked over his shoulder.

Behind him, Zakiel, Xaphan, Herchel and Ziel paced into the cavern, bloodied blades grasped white-knuckle tight in their murderous hands.

Appollus smelled the torturer’s fear and smiled.

‘Fear not, torturer,’ Appollus snarled. ‘You will not have time to beg.’

DEATH’S SHEPHERD

Four hundred million lie dead.

The world reeks of blood.

I can smell it over the ash-rich fires that light the horizon, over the putrid stench of the dead. It permeates the stale musk of the still-living, the last of the Zurconian Regulars who are gathered around me, poised for one final charge. Like a murderous siren it calls me back to war. My pulse speeds with every breath. I inhale the copper tang of a world soaked in arterial fluid, relishing it like a starving man might savour a meal. It has been almost an hour since I killed.

‘Children of the Emperor.’

I turn to face the Regulars. Their breath fogs the night air as they summon their courage, hearts thumping in their chests. The Guardsmen no longer resemble the soldiers I had joined a year ago. The fire in their eyes is no longer born of hope. Instead, it is a murderous ember, flickering with malice. The freshly spilled blood daubed on their faces, echoing the Chapter symbol adorning my pauldron, is neither their own nor the enemy’s. When the rations were exhausted, I had only been prepared to lead the strong.

‘Sons of Zurcon.’

Starved of ammunition, the Regulars wield their lasguns like clubs. Most have fixed knives and blades to the barrels, binding them with boot laces, webbing and belts stripped from the dead. Others clutch farming implements and improvised weapons. I move to stand at their head, and raise my crozius to the sky. The heavens are as coal-black as my armour, the light from the neighbouring stars secreted behind kilometres of choking cinder, a blanket of darkness thrown up by the magma warheads and apocalypse missiles used to prosecute this war.

‘My battle-brothers.’

Behind my skull helm, I grimace. The Zurconians are not of the Blood. They are not Flesh Tearers. They are no more my brothers than the enemy we face. It is a necessary lie. Courage will grant them far more protection than any flak-vest. It will keep them advancing when instinct screams at them to retreat. General and standard bearer. Warlord and preacher. I am both shepherd and slaughter master. Where I lead, few will survive, and so I armour them with falsehood.

‘Today, you redeem your world in the eyes of the Emperor.’

Downhill, across the plateau, a war-ravaged expanse of agri-soil scarred by artillery and churned to mulch by blood-stained boots, the Zurconian Royals are spread out before us. Heretics, mistaken in their belief that the old families deserved to rule in place of the Emperor-appointed governor. Trench lines, dugouts and gun pits cut across the landscape like a tortured mosaic. Piles of our dead pave a way through the minefields and razorwire. I smile. War is the greatest of all levellers, granting even the weak and the dying a chance to serve their Emperor. The previous dawn, I marched our wounded downhill to draw out the enemy positions and waste their ammunition. By my estimate, less than two hundred souls stood before us, only a fraction of which still had rounds for their weapons. The battle will not last long.

‘Today, you will prove yourselves worthy of a freedom bought with Cretacian blood.’

Centuries ago, Master Amit expunged the taint of the Archenemy and liberated the Zurcon system. Yet the nobles of the royal houses had chosen to repay our sacrifice with treachery. It was an error none of Zurconian blood would live to regret.

‘Bring them death!’

I charge. The fifty remaining Zurconian Regulars echo my roar and break into a run. It will take us three minutes to reach the trench line. Pinpricks of light stab towards us as the enemy open fire. Two men scream as they are cut down.

‘Spread out,’ I growl.

The Royals are battle-hardened. These are ranging shots, an attempt to find us in the darkness. They will save what remains of their solid-shot ammunition until we are close. Las-fire patters over my armour, as ineffectual as rainwater. I continue onwards, counting muzzle flashes, sprinting towards the largest concentration of enemy. My helm’s autosenses dim, protecting my eyes from the sudden bursts of light as the Royals open up with heavy bolters and autocannons. The ground churns up around me, whipped into the air by explosive rounds. The Regulars are dying. Their anguished cries compete with the bark of gunfire as they are torn apart, blasted to fleshy gobbets by high-calibre shells. A burst of rounds slam into my breastplate and pauldron, spinning me to the ground.

‘Kill until killed!’ I roar as I recover my footing. The attack must not falter.

An instant later I am among the trenches. I am fury is my only thought as I kill a Royal, crushing his head between my elbow and the trench wall. I kill another, driving my fist through his chest. Another dies to my crozius, his torso shorn in half by an upwards blow. I grin as bone snaps and men scream. Gore splatters my armour, pooling in the lacerations and bullet holes, cleansing me of war’s touch. I kill and I kill, cutting and bludgeoning, snarling in the torturous moments between kills.

Seven minutes. Seven short minutes and I am forced to stop. Forced to slow my pulse, to drive the rage from my veins. The enemy are dead.

Three of the Regulars remain: Troopers Cesan and Booy, and Sergeant Artair. They stumble towards me, exhausted. They are all that remains of Zurconian blood.

‘We are saved,’ Cesan mutters, his eyes wide with disbelief.

I growl. I am no saviour. I am a destroyer.

I smash my crozius into the side of Cesan’s head. His skull bursts under the impact, showering Booy in clumps of brain matter. My reverse stroke kills him before he can react. Sergeant Artair drops to his knees.

‘W… why?’ he croaks, his voice as frail as his ruined body.

‘Why?’ I bark, lifting him up by his neck so that his face is level with my helm. ‘A man who sins in ignorance is twice damned, a fool who lacks the strength of mind to determine his own fate. I came here to honour Amit’s victory and remind you of the debt you owe the Emperor. Yet I find you have squandered your freedom and become weak with opulence. You have allowed the proud and the corrupt to take hold of your world.’

‘But we… we have won. We have taken vengeance on the Royals as you said we would.’

He is right. The Royals are dead. All of them. But vengeance, vengeance was never enough. I remove my skull helm, letting the terror in his eyes find the hatred in mine.

‘I am wrath,’ I snarl as I tear out his heart.

IMMORTALIS

I am dying. But this is not my first death. I have died twice before.

Blood. Blood was everywhere. It coated my armour like a second skin and hid the serrate symbol of my Chapter. It clogged the blunted teeth of my chainsword, silencing its adamantium roar. My brothers’ weapons had fallen silent too, their wrath extinguished on the bodies of the enemy. The greenskins lay waist high, a torn wall of corpses heaped around gore-filled craters. They had met us head-on, braying like maddened hounds as their crude weapons barked in their hands.

But they knew nothing of true fury. Nothing of the bloodlust that drives all sons of Sanguinius to war.

My own blood still thrummed in my veins, burning like the smouldering husks of the ork war-engines that studded the plain. A cloud of battle-rage hung over me, boiling my brain. Untempered anger wrenched a growl from my lips, demanding I kill again.

I obeyed without pause, slaying the nearest human in a heartbeat. The sodden plates of his carapace crumpled under a hammer blow of my sword. His body broke and tumbled. The pulse in my head quickened like a gleeful child as I slew another Guardsman. I killed another, then another and another. Humans die all too easily, I thirsted for righteous murder. Discarding my weapons, I began to bludgeon the fleeing weaklings with my gauntleted fists. Ignoring the beads of desperate las-fire that stung my armour, I wrapped my fingers around a head and squeezed. The tang of blood was like ambrosia. I bathed in the smell, relishing death’s visceral facet.

Something hard thundered into my helm. I felt my jaw snap. My vision swam. I stumbled, falling as I was struck again.

I had long believed that in death, darkness would claim me. Instead, I awoke to find that I was the darkness.

Clad in night-black armour, I stood mag-locked in place, trapped in a plummeting drop pod. Red saltires daubed my pauldrons and greaves, marking me out as one of the damned. A polished Chapter symbol was the only sign that I had once stood among the Flesh Tearers. Nine of my new brothers were with me. Their optics slashed crimson holes in the gloom. They growled in sympathy with the rumbling drop pod. A vicious snarl guttered from my own throat, a bestial noise I did not recognise. I felt my muscles bulge beneath my armour, swelling with the urge to rend, to maim, to kill. The altimeter above my head spun down towards zero. For an instant I saw it spin in reverse, counting upwards. Faster and faster, it tallied the lives I had taken and those I surely would.

The pod shuddered as its ferrite petals slammed to the earth. Released from my bonds, I rushed forwards, driven by my thundering hearts, down the ramp and out into the jagged light of battle.

The enemy were everywhere. Lithe warriors in porcelain armour fought with swords that crackled with azure lightning. Others, in thicker, segmented battleplate as dark as my own, fired explosive volleys into the distance. The porcelain aliens shrieked a battle-cry and charged towards us. I snarled, hatred bursting from my throat in rumbling waves. I could smell their fear, taste their dread at our arrival, and hear the weak thrum of their alien hearts. My sword arm rose and fell, rose and fell, possessed of its own murderous mind as I cut and hacked with a vigour I had never known. Orphaned limbs and broken torsos rained against me like a fleshy storm as I ripped through their ranks. My wrath was unceasing. They would all die. I would kill them. I–

Blood. Blood pooled in my mouth as a crackling sword speared my primary heart.

Darkness took me. Yet I was not dead. I was reborn, gifted a new life as death incarnate.

Tortured fragments seared my mind as I awoke entombed. Nightmare remembrances of neural drills, bonesaws and sacs of bio-fluid that had hung above me like a puppet’s strings. The Chapter’s Sanguinary Priests and Techmarines had interred me within the adamantium womb of a Dreadnought. A burning memory haunted me, the impotent horror I’d felt while strapped to their workbench. I screamed. A metallic roar sounded in place of my voice. My mortal form was shattered, my vocal cords long since atrophied. My world had been reduced to snatches of data bundles, fed to my brain through the sarcophagus’s sensoria. My actions were left to the interpretation of consecrated machine-levers and vox-amplifiers. I screamed again, smiling as I listened to the distorted roar.

I was steel and I was wrath, and nothing more.

A thousand klaxons wailed. Their incessant screeching roused my ire, drawing me from my slumber to a vaulted corridor. The broken bodies of Flesh Tearers and the savaged remains of human auxiliaries coated the floor in a sickly flesh-paste. Weapons fire thundered from every possible direction. I growled in response, slamming the massive power fists attached to my adamantium torso into the wall. I powered into an adjoining corridor, crushing the protruding vertebrae of a dozen creatures beneath the ridged plates of my feet. I roared, elated, as my audio-receptors replayed the snap of xenos spines, looping the sound into my cortex. A fresh horde of creatures leapt towards me. I caught one in my fist and pulped it with a thought, while flame spat from my other, washing away the rest of the brood and cleansing the corridor of their sickening taint.

A growl sounded from behind me. I turned, though not quickly enough. A monstrous creature, its mouth dripping acid-fire, barrelled into me. It mewled in pain as my fist struck its face, but continued to press me into the wall. Its claws, each as long as I was tall, tore into me. Yet I felt no pain as it pulled back from the embrace, bisecting me in one fluid twist. My parts thudded to the floor, like the spent shells of some mighty siege cannon.

My power cell is damaged. My brain function will soon cease. I shall not awaken from this final death, and I am glad.

THE QUICKENING

I am one, and they are many. But I will endure.

The bolt-round looms large as it pushes towards my head, sluggish as though traveling through water. I turn to the side and feel the heat of the shell as it scrapes past the flesh of my cheek. A half-step and the blade formed from my rage slices through the firer’s arm, shearing it off at the elbow. He is to blame for Spheris’s treachery. His lying tongue is the architect of the anarchy enveloping the world. I growl. The myriad faces worked into his baroque battleplate widen in anguish as my reverse stroke cleaves through his helm. I move past him as his corpse starts to topple.

Unarmoured, the human pawns of the Archenemy thought me easy prey. Pride granted me access to their innermost sanctum, a feat a thousand warriors could not have accomplished. I am no lamb to be slaughtered on the altar of a dark god, however; I am a beast twice cursed. I am Balthiel, Librarian of the Flesh Tearers.

The others are in motion, faces twisting to snarls, weapons angling towards me. Were I held in time’s embrace, they would kill me. Autogun shells would hammer into my body, blasting it apart as las-fire peeled away my flesh. I would be dead in moments. I am not bound by temporal law, however, my gifts setting me apart from the three dozen traitors crowding around me.

Thump… Thump…

I listen to the throb of their barely beating hearts, and to the sound of blood as it trickles through them. A sun gone nova, a pall of incandescent rage, I will their blood to burn hotter, to boil in their veins. I end them with a thought. The traitors explode in a hail of gore as arterial fluid bursts from their bodies. Their weapons spill to the floor, like leaves wilting from dying trees. A cloud of hissing droplets of blood drifts towards me, like a flurry of ghoulish snowflakes. I relish their touch as I press forwards, opening my mouth to savour them.

For weeks, I have been desperate to kill. The pain of longing has been like a needle in my mind, an itching thirst that no water will sate. The crew of the Wayward Lance, the trader vessel that delivered me to Spheris, the populace I’ve moved through, the ranks of this treacherous coven: all forbidden morsels, an indulgence victory would not allow. I rejoice at this release, the warm coppery tang of freshly spilled blood driving me to rapture.

Morchan’s corpse writhes as I pass it. The bastard psyker was the only one who could have divined my true nature, but his warning died on his lips as I summoned my gifts, pulling myself out of time. Without the strength to follow me into the future or root himself in the present, Morchan’s mind was torn apart, his body turned inside out by the psychic-temporal shift.

Only Governor Kadi Aren remains. His weakness has cost the lives of millions. He is the reason I am here. Beads of sweat begin to form on his brow as shock turns to terror. I taste his panic. His weapon is charged for firing. A blue halo rims its mouth as he grasps for the trigger. I snarl. He is too far away. Time is catching up with me. I will not reach him. Thrusting my hand towards him, I channel my rage into bolts of crimson lightening. They arc from my splayed fingers, flaying away the ablative plates of his jewel-encrusted armour, lancing into his flesh. A scream stretches his mouth as the eldritch tendrils peel the flesh from his bones and burn out his soul. The embers of Aren’s corpse flicker for a moment before vanishing. I gasp, salivating, my pulse building to a thundering crescendo as I drink the psychic backlash of his death.

Time pulls me close and I come to rest, panting. My enemies lie dead around me, but the battle is not yet over.

I have overused my gifts. I have drawn too long from the immaterium.

Dark smoke rises from my skin in waves. The din of distant battle is drowned out by the scraping sound of hungry claws.

‘By his blood am I made.’ I begin the catechism as the pain comes.

A thousand whispering voices threaten to engulf my mind. Creatures, daemons, nightmares made flesh, gnaw at the edges of my consciousness. Tongues of silk whisper idle promises and false truths. My flesh is ruined, flawed, yet it is all they ask in exchange for the end of all pain.

‘By his blood am I armoured.’

Blood, this time my own, runs from my mouth and nose.

I tense against the darkness enveloping my mind, feeling my bones break as the effort sends my body into spasm.

‘By his blood shall I triumph.’

I feel the warp creatures roar in anguish as my will pushes them away, armouring my soul against their touch.

I stifle a scream as stabbing pain splits my skin, tearing it apart like a tremor spearing through the earth. I collapse onto the blood-soaked cobbles. My eyes close as I drift into a sus-anic coma, trusting to the grace of Sanguinius that my brothers will find me before the daemons return.

I am one, and they are many. But I will endure.

THE TRIAL OF GABRIEL SETH,
ACT III

‘You destroyed Aere to cover the sins of your brothers.’ Malakim’s voice was void-cold, his eyes full of scorn.

‘I destroyed Aere to stop the Archenemy,’ Seth snapped, about to raise his fist in anger. He took a breath and relaxed the limb, uncurling his fingers. Temperance. Appollus’s warning rang in his mind. If you are to prove we are more than the berserkers they believe us to be, you must show temperance. Seth hid a smile. It was rare the wrathful Chaplain offered such counsel.

‘Did you indeed?’ asked Sentikan. ‘And was it the only way to seize victory, or just the only one fitting enough to cleanse the stain from your honour?’

Anger strangled Seth’s tongue, his reply a guttural growl.

‘You miss the point.’ Dante spoke for him. ‘Even caught in the throes of the Rage, the Flesh Tearers have accomplished much. They have snatched victory even at the expense of their own lives.’ The chamber fell into discord as the other Chapter Masters responded to Dante’s unexpected position. A clamour of charged exchanges fought to be heard as they argued over his words.

Seth remained silent, nodding to Dante. He had not expected the Blood Angel to speak in his defence, but he welcomed the interjection. Still, he would give his sword arm to look past the unreadable death mask and peer into Dante’s eyes. The Blood Angel was a warrior almost beyond compare, yet his skill with a blade was as nothing compared to his skill as a leader. But he was also inscrutable. Being blind to the motive behind Dante’s support made Seth uneasy.

‘Silence, brothers. Silence and rumination,’ said Techial, reading aloud the axiom of closing. In response, the others settled, though a host of hateful glances lingered to betray the heat of the debate. ‘The time of judgement approaches.’ He nodded to Dante.

The Blood Angel folded his arms across his chest in the sign of the aquila, and recited the catechism of observance. ‘Numinous Father. On virtuous wings you rose above the falsehoods to see fate’s truth. With knowing eyes you faced your end upright and unbowed. Imbue us with your clarity, your graciousness, your selflessness. Guide us in our deliberation. Let that which we forge here be for the betterment of all of us, your sons.’

‘Blood guide us,’ the others ended the catechism, speaking aloud as one.

Seth stared up at the distant ceiling, and the visage of the Emperor. Is it not enough that You are bound to the Throne, Lord? Must more of our strength be shackled?

A cascading clang snapped Seth from his reverie. The sound echoed around the chamber as each of the Chapter Masters crashed their fists against their breastplates.

The din faded, to be replaced by silence. A palpable stillness that held dominion over the Judicium for a hundred beats of Seth’s primary heart.

Techial spoke again. ‘Prepare.’

As one, the Chapter Masters drew their blades. The sound, a visceral rush of steel and adamantium, drew a smile from Seth. It was a striking sight: the greatest sons of Sanguinius armed and ready for war, each of them holding aloft a blade of the finest artifice, a relic as beautiful as it was deadly. Here was the greatest choir of the Emperor’s angels, and for the moment at least, he stood as part of them.

‘Give judgement.’ Techial barked the instruction, and planted his blade in the ground beside him.

There was no secret ballot or hushed congress in the Forum. Each of the Chapter Masters would account for his decision in open court, the truth of their inference ever known. As Chronicler, the honour of first petition was Techial’s. As first among them, Dante would vote last.

Seth glared at the sword standing beside Techial. Guilty.

Zargo could not move quickly enough, upturning his blade and planting it in the ground. A second guilty verdict. And so it continued as one by one the other Chapter Masters condemned him. Seth bit back a curse as even Malphas damned him. Only a handful of the Chapter Masters stood in his defence, tossing their blades to the chamber floor. The weapons clattered beside him. It was a symbolic gesture, a martial gift to help defend him from guilt.

All eyes turned to Dante.

‘Gabriel Seth, son of blessed Sanguinius. Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers.’ He paused, driving his sword down into the earth. ‘This council finds you unfit to bear such a title.’

Seth growled, the feral challenge of a cornered beast.

‘The Flesh Tearers will be broken up, a portion of their number subsumed by each of our Chapters and placed under the watch of our most steadfast Chaplains.’

‘What of me?’ Seth’s voice dripped with hatred.

‘You will remain here on Baal until madness or death claims you. You will–’

‘No. He will not.’

A startled hush fell over the chamber as a new speaker entered. Clad in blackest plate, dark-feathered pinions framing his back, Astorath was a figure of dread. The Blood Angels High Chaplain entered the chamber and stood shoulder to shoulder with Seth.

‘Astorath. You overstep your authority.’ Dante’s voice was a controlled growl, his every syllable cutting the air with menace.

‘No. I walk the line that is mine and mine alone to tread.’ Astorath turned his gaze over the assembled Chapter Masters. ‘I and I alone am the final arbiter of the curse and its victims.’

Seth watched Astorath as he paced the circumference of the Judicium, impressed by the Chaplain’s skill as an orator.

‘You are High Chaplain, Blood Angel, and nothing more,’ Zargo sneered.

‘Is that so?’ Astorath fixed the Angel Encarmine with a dead stare. ‘Then why do I detect hesitation in your voice?’

‘Your importance within our brotherhood is not in question, High Chaplain.’ Geron held up his hands in appeasement.

‘Your counsel is always welcome, Astorath,’ said Dante. ‘But you will not defy us in this.’

‘It is not defiance I bring, lord, but redemption.’

‘Redemption for whom?’ said Techial. ‘The Flesh Te–’

‘For all of you,’ Astorath snapped, his fist tightening on the haft of his axe. ‘I have come to stop you making a grave error this day.’

‘That is not for you to say.’ Sentikan spoke slowly, struggling to control his anger.

‘I am the Redeemer, Sanguinius’s chosen executioner. What is to say that I cannot find the darkness in your souls? Are you so certain that none among you should face my axe?’ Astorath levelled his weapon, panning it over the assembled Chapter Masters.

A chorus of angry retorts rippled around the chamber.

‘You would threaten us?’ Malphas seized the hilt of his upturned sword.

‘No, Exsanguinator. I offer only a reminder and a promise.’ Astorath spoke with a dead calm. ‘A reminder that in time the curse will take even the strongest among us.’

‘And your promise?’ Malphas kept his hand on his weapon.

‘That when it does, I will visit judgement upon you.’ Astorath’s eyes were as a starless night. Still, unfathomable and infinitely dark.

‘Why do you stand to Seth’s defence?’ asked Dante, his voice level. ‘He has troubled you, bloodied you, on more than one occasion.’

ASTORATH THE GRIM:
REDEEMER OF THE LOST

It has been a long time since I killed an enemy. Too long. A torturous burden for any warrior to bear. Yet I have not been idle. I have spent my decades steeped in blood. I have bent my talents to killing my brothers. A dark duty that has brought me here to this ashen waste. Hamenlina, a librarium world. Burned to cinders by the forces of the Archenemy as they sought to secure the knowledge contained in Hamenlina’s datastacks and parchment-text archives. Its towering structures, crammed together like vast volumes stacked on too small a shelf, remind me of the cathedrals and reclusiams of holy Baal.

These, though, are blackened by battle, reduced to striated ruins. The charcoal landscape is as a painting, rendered in shadow by death’s artisans. I drag my hand through a pile of grey brick dust, watching as it sifts through the fingers of my gauntlet to leave a trio of teeth in my palm. A solemn smile stretches across my face and I feel myself nod. This is a fitting place for angels to fight their last, a graveyard worthy of their bones.

I look down from my vantage point. Muzzle flare sparks in the distant gloom as the final shots of the war are fired. I feel my soul reharden itself against what is to come.

This war had not even begun when I started my journey here. The citizens of Hamenlina had not yet succumbed to the seditious promises of the Dark Powers when I boarded my vessel. Despite the improbable foresight that such certainty would require, I knew then that war would find this place, and that my brothers would be called to end it. I always know. It is a blessing that numbers foremost amongst my curses. The damned call to me. They reach across the cold vastness of space and time and beg for their souls.

From up here, amongst the desiccated remains of the Grand Oracle’s chamber, I can smell the taint in the cursed blood of those below me. There are five of them left. The others are already dead, felled in battle as they waded waist deep through the entrails of their foe. When first I was set on this bloody path, I had thought, hoped even, that battle might claim all of the damned, that I would not be required to bring them peace. I was naive. A few always survive. For what in this universe can stand against their wrath, if not me? They are a terrible force to behold, killers to their core. I touch a hand to my jaw, feeling the distended canines beneath my gnarled lips. I have not looked upon myself in almost a century, yet I know that my skin is ghoulish white, and that my eyes are pinpricks of blackness. To best these beasts, to fulfil my duty, my body and soul have become terror itself.

Yet I am not alone. Even stripped of holy boltgun, and set apart from my warrior brotherhood, I march to war with another. The Executioner’s Axe, an unimaginative name for an unimaginable task; a weapon born for this purpose. Forged by hottest fire and ancient blood, its tip is as hard as my resolve, its edge as lethal as my fury. I straighten and tighten my grip on the weapon as the muzzle flashes below me fade into the gloom.

It is time.

Lord Emperor, Father Sanguinius.

We confess our unworthiness.

We are unfit to stand in your name.

Our blood is weak, our victories failures.

In death, we repent.

I pray for my brothers, dropping from the spire as the final syllable leaves my lips. I fall in silence, my jump pack unlit, my wings spread to slow my descent. A crimson ghost against a blackened sky, I fall.

The rockcrete of the roadway cracks underfoot as I land. One of the damned turns and snarls at me, a craven sound of lust and hunger. I cut his head from his shoulders, my axe passing through his neck before his blood can form on the blade. Then the others turn on me. Their boltguns growl. I react on instinct, catching the corpse of the first as it tumbles, pulling it to me. It shudders as explosive rounds hammer into it. I drive forward as they blast their dead brother’s corpse apart, showering me in fragments of armour and gobbets of flesh.

Dropping my corpse-shield, I spin around to slice my axe through a forearm, twisting to strike again and claim another. I hear the dual clatter as the limbs and the weapons they’re holding fall to the ground. The other two continue to fire.

A round strikes my pauldron and I drop into a roll, twisting my axe so that its blade is angled away and its butt faces forward. Rising, I swing out, letting my hands slide to the edge of the haft to extend my range. The weapon hammers into my attacker’s face. I hear his neck break an instant before his body flips backwards over itself.

I growl, stumbling to one knee as a round rips across my side. The ki-clack of an empty chamber saves me more pain. The fifth roars and tosses his gun away. Gripping his chainsword with both hands, he charges. I stay crouched as he closes, reading his movements. He means to split my skull from brow to chin. He raises his weapon, shifts his weight. I act. He dies before he can strike, my blade bisecting him from hip to shoulder.

The pair I disarmed earlier have rallied. I hear them at my back, pressing towards me, their chainswords screaming for blood. I turn and parry their blows. They are formidable, but I am better. It is not arrogance or conceit, but truth that lends strength to my limbs as I batter them back. I was birthed to this slaughter the way a sun was birthed to burn nova. Had I no body, my soul would continue to fight until my fallen brothers were naught but bloodied mulch. Igniting my jump pack, I use its thrust to spin through a tight arc, and tear my blade across their chests. They falter, staggered by the wounds. It is all the time I need to remove their heads.

Brother Elogis, Brother Uvall, Brother Haures, Brother Sitri and Brother Asag. I unfurl a length of the tapered parchments hanging from my armour, recording on it each of their names as I drag their corpses into a pile. It is now, in the moments between death and oblivion, that my duty hangs heaviest around my neck. Such warriors as these will never receive a proper burial, they will not be remembered in the annals of their Chapter and their names shall go missing from the Hall of Heroes. They are lost, and they must remain so. It is I, and I alone, who will remember them.

Only in death.

I whisper, tossing a melta charge amongst their corpses. The explosive detonates, searing away their remains. I wait a turn of the sun, still in silent vigil, until the heat dissipates. Gathering up their ashes, I draw my palm across the Executioner’s Axe. My blood mixes with the ash and I smear the thick paste over my wings.

It is done.

Kneeling, I look to the sky and coil my rosary around my wounded fist.

Sanguinius grant me strength.

This time, I pray for myself. For these were the Flesh Tearer’s sons, and they will not die in silence.

GABRIEL SETH:
THE FLESH TEARER

Gabriel Seth sat alone, hunched in the gloom of the gunship’s hold. A thick, black shroud covered his armour, its wide hood hiding his face and the unfathomable rage that burned in his eyes. Head bowed, he lost himself in the vibrations running through the craft’s floor as it broke into Baal’s atmosphere.

‘Entry achieved. Proceeding to dock. Arrival in three minutes.’

The pilot-servitor’s voice washed over Seth. He had no need of the status report. This was not his first time on Baal. He had stood beneath its war-scorched sky a thousand times. He could derive his location from the subtle shift in the craft’s pitch, and knew, to the moment, how long it would take him to touch down: two seconds less than the servitor’s estimate. For this same reason, he had disabled the external pict-feeds and the tactical hololith. He had no need to look upon his surroundings, to see the red-rust deserts and the toxic wastelands that skinned the globe. Seth knew well the hell that birthed angels.

‘One minute.’

Seth sat back and rolled his shoulders, cracking his neck as he coiled and uncoiled his fingers. On his feet as the craft touched down, he depressed the hatch release. He stood a moment, listening to the rising growl of the blood in his veins as the gunship’s thrusters idled down to a whispered whine.

‘Imum-attero.’ He snarled the destruct command as the assault ramp touched down and he stepped out onto the concourse.

Behind him, the pilot-servitor juddered, stuttering incoherent machine code as its neural cortex burned out and its memory banks dissolved. Outside the Blood Angels, only the Chapter Masters of Sanguinius’s disparate sons knew the location of where Seth now stood, and so it had to remain.

Neither the ashen walkway he now trod, nor the vaulted Reclusiam it led to, existed. He walked amongst secrets, passing below structures formed by shame and dire loathing. Above him, thrust towards the heavens by fire-blasted plinths, towered noble statues of Baal’s ancient heroes. Each of them held a pair of weapons, one angled towards the sky and the other to the ground. They stood as immortal protectors, defending against the enemy within and the enemy without.

Seth took a step forward and stopped, his eyes drawn to movement on the nearest statue. Perched between the rivets of its pauldron were a choir of Erelim. The five Blood Angels Chaplains crouched in shadow, stalking him as he closed on the Reclusiam. Stripped of all insignia and adornment save the Chapter symbol emblazoned on their shoulders, they were as dark mirrors to the Sanguinary Guard that stood in the light with Dante. Even their skull helms had been daubed death-black and their jump packs had been framed by halos of darkest feather. Nothing but the glower of their crimson optics betrayed them in the half-light.

Seth shot them a murderous glare in warning, and with the slow care of a man drawing a blade from his own chest, shook his head. He would not be kept from the Reclusiam. If the Erelim interfered, he would kill them.

The door to the immense chapel was a baroque slab of plasteel and iron. Masked cherubs wielding slender scythes framed a passage engraved in ancient Baalite sanskrit.

What man could not do, the Emperor sent his sons to accomplish. They were an antidote to the weakness of flesh and the sin of mind that kept man from greatness. His sons he sent to bear the cost of life and death so that man may prosper. Such a heavy burden was as poison to the blood of his sons, and so the Emperor sent his Executioner to set the afflicted free.

Seth growled as he read the passage aloud. Words and poetic sentiment did not change the truth of a thing. A kill was a kill, a life a life, and an executioner a murderer by any other name. He looked up at the spires of gilded metal that disappeared into the sky. The Reclusiam had not been erected in the name of the Emperor’s greatness, nor did it stand to guide his flock. It had one purpose – to legitimise the killing of one brother by another.

Pulling off his gauntlet, Seth slammed his hand onto the bio-reader set into the door. The smooth panel hummed, blinking amber. A moment later the vaulted doors eased open, drawn back by the firing of hidden pistons that hissed with the release of pressure. As soon as they were ajar enough to accommodate his wide shoulders, Seth entered.

Inside, darkness greeted him, a still gloom that only the augmented eyes of a Space Marine could pierce unaided. His footsteps gave rise to a hollow, clicking echo as he paced forward. He didn’t look down; the sound of bone was a familiar one. He knew that skulls and not cobbles paved his way. The air was crisp-cold and fogged as he drew breath.

He continued to the centre of the chamber where a narrow, suspended staircase doubled back on itself thrice before terminating in a wide platform. A figure knelt at the platform’s edge, head bowed underneath a black marble sculpture of Sanguinius suspended by chains from an unseen ceiling.

‘Stand up,’ Seth barked as he started up the stairs.

The figure waited a moment before replying.

‘I had wondered when you would come.’ His voice was thick with age, and he spoke with the slow tempo of a man gripped by sorrow.

Seth cast off his cowl. His battleplate was scarred, pitted and rent from recent conflict. He growled, quickening his pace. His heartbeats rose in his chest, a primal call to violence that flushed his muscles with blood and begged for a release.

‘I would have thought it prudent for you to finish one conflict before coming here to seek another,’ the figure said, standing. He was barely visible, the gloom clinging to him like a second skin.

‘Do not make this worse with your feigned concern for my brothers.’ Seth’s voice was like the snarl of an arena beast as he paced up the last few steps.

‘This is my house, Flesh Tearer. I have told you before to mind your tone.’

‘And I have told you before, Astorath,’ Seth drew level with the figure, ‘that I will deal with my brothers in a manner of my choosing.’ His voice was a growled whisper, like the scraping of sand on flesh. ‘You will not kill another Flesh Tearer while I draw breath.’

Astorath’s face was as cold-calm as the grave. ‘The fate of the damned is not yours to decide.’ He took a step towards Seth, his dark, fathomless eyes glaring down at the smaller Space Marine. ‘And never forget that you draw breath only by the grace of the Emperor.’

Seth ground his teeth, quashing the urge to tear Astorath’s eyes from their sockets. ‘You think yourself apart from us. For all of this darkness…’ Seth gestured around them. ‘For all of the theatre you use to hide your true nature, you are still a Blood Angel. And we are all lost, cousin. None amongst the bloodline are above the madness. Not even you.’

Astorath bared his fangs. ‘I have walked with the damned–’

‘No!’ Seth roared, closing to within a blade’s thickness of Astorath. ‘You have not walked with them. You have stood above them, sneering down at them in arrogant indifference.’

Astorath’s composure slipped as a ripple of rage ran across his features. ‘I am untouched by the Blood’s madness.’

‘You think so, Blood Angel?’ Seth grinned. ‘You think it is sane to kill those of your own blood?’

‘I do what must be done to protect the bloodline,’ said Astorath, his voice the cutting sharpness of honed steel. ‘We cannot all simply indulge our weakness.’ Astorath bared his incisors in a cruel smile.

Seth smashed his elbow into Astorath’s chest, driving his weight forward to rock him back onto his heels. He used the momentum, grabbing onto Astorath’s pauldron with his left hand and using his right to deliver a series of hammer blows to his face. The first strike hit clean, the second broke something, the third–

Astorath fired his jump pack, shooting forward to clasp Seth’s head with both hands. He fired another burst from his pack, lifting Seth up before slamming him head-first down into the ground. ‘For all your strength, Flesh Tearer, for all of your anger and all your will to fight, you cannot best me. I am the chosen reaper of the lost.’ Astorath snarled and stepped away.

Seth struggled to remain conscious. Astorath was right. He felt as if he’d been hit by a thunder hammer. He pushed up to his knees. ‘I do not need to beat you.’ Blood and teeth spilled from Seth’s mouth as he spoke. ‘Only to stand against you.’ He got to his feet, wiping a hand across his lips. ‘Every minute you spend here is one in which you are not butchering our brothers.’

Astorath roared and charged him.

Seth met the Blood Angel head-on, locking his arms around him as Astorath drove them to the ground. He suffered three blows for every one he landed. Still he held on. His armour began to buckle and crack and he was forced to shelter his head against Astorath’s breastplate. Still he struggled, digging punches into Astorath’s back until he was rewarded with the crackle of a broken jump pack. With a grunt of effort, Seth arched his back, driving Astorath’s weight up, and rolled them off the platform.

The two angels fell.

They hit the ground like stones dropped from the heavens. The bones paving the floor broke and shattered, sending sharp fragments rising up into the air like grenade shrapnel.

‘If…’ Seth struggled to his knees as a raft of injury and trauma data scrolled over his retinal display. ‘If you harm another of my brothers, cousin, I will return, and I will not come alone.’ He rose unsteadily to his feet and began limping towards the exit.

‘You threaten Baal?’ Astorath roared, hammering his fists into the ground and pushing up onto his feet. Blood streamed from his nose, and pooled around his eyes. ‘The Blood Angels themselves? Have you gone mad?’ He forced the words though teeth welded together by rage.

‘I will do what must be done.’ Seth continued to walk into the darkness.

THE TRIAL OF GABRIEL SETH,
ACT IV

‘We are the Emperor’s avenging angels. We show no mercy. No forgiveness. We have been bred to bring only death. We are terrible to behold and our fury is the stuff of fire-swept legend. Yet–’ Astorath paused, letting his words hang in the air a moment before continuing. ‘There are terrors in the depths of the universe whose might eclipses our own, whose hatred we cannot comprehend. There are foes we must face who will cross the lines of honour and kinship that we cannot afford to break.’

‘Are you saying we need him?’ Zargo snarled.

‘Yes.’ Astorath’s tone was sudden, hard. ‘The Emperor in His infinite wisdom created many sons, each of differing aspect. If Zargo is our zeal, Malakim our redemption and Sentikan our protector, if you, Lord Dante, are our conscience, then let Seth be our blade. Let the Flesh Tearers be the teeth of that blade.’ Astorath turned to regard Seth. ‘He is a wretched berserker. His actions are ill-considered and rash. But we are in need of such mongrels if we are to triumph.’

For the first time in two days, silence filled the vastness of the chamber. Behind the unreadable visage of his death mask, Dante smiled. Wars, he knew, were won with weapons, not principles.

Gabriel Seth was nothing if not a weapon.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Andy Smillie hails from Glasgow and is best known for his visceral Flesh Tearers novellas, Beneath the Flesh, Sons of Wrath and Flesh of Cretacia. 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.

On a feral planet, the Flesh Tearers must master the dark legacy of their primarch Sanguinius if they are to prevail… and perhaps find a world worthy of being called their home.

For Eddie Eccles. Had I known that you were destined to ruin my life with a never ending barrage of awful puns, I’d have killed you years ago.

A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

Beneath the Flesh first published in Hammer and Bolter © 2012, Games Workshop Ltd.
Know Thyself first published in the 2012 Weekender Anthology © 2012, Games Workshop Ltd.
Torturer’s Thirst first published in Treacheries of the Space Marines © 2012, Games Workshop Ltd.
Immortalis, The Quickening, Astorath the Grim: Redeemer of the Lost and Gabriel Seth: The Flesh Tearer first published as eBooks © 2012–2013, Games Workshop Ltd.
Death’s Shepherd first published in the 2013 Weekender Anthology © 2013, Games Workshop Ltd.
From the Blood and Blood in the Machine first published as audio dramas © 2012–2013, Games Workshop Ltd.

This eBook edition published in 2014 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd., Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

Cover illustration by Marek Okon.

© Games Workshop Limited 2012, 2014. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-78251-671-2

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