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The Skull Harvest - Graham McNeill

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THE SKULL HARVEST

Graham McNeill

Dead, glassy eyes stared up at the bar patrons from the floor as the rolling head finally came to a halt. It had been a swift blow, the edge of the killer’s palm like a blade, and the snarling warrior’s head was ripped from his neck before the last words of his challenge were out of his mouth.

The body still stood, its murderer grasping the edge of its crimson-stained breastplate in one gnarled grey fist. Blood pooled beneath the head and squirted upwards from the stump of neck. The body’s legs began to twitch, as though it sought to escape its fate even in death. The killer released his grip and turned away as the body crashed to the dirty, ash- and dust-streaked floor in a clatter of steel and dead meat.

The excitement over, the patrons of the darkened bar returned to their drinks and plotting, for no one came to a place like this without schemes of revenge, murder, pillage and destruction in mind.

Honsou of the Iron Warriors was no exception, and his champion’s bloody display of lethal prowess was just the first step in his own grand design.

The air was thick with intrigue, grease and smoke, the latter curling around heavy rafters that looked as though they had once been part of a spaceship. Irregular clay bricks supported a roof formed from sheets of corrugated iron, and thin slats of harsh light, like the burning white sky of Medrengard, shone through bullet holes and gaps in the construction.

The killer of the now headless body licked the blood from the edge of its hand, and Honsou grinned as he saw the urge to continue killing in his champion’s all too familiar grey eyes and taut posture. It called itself the Newborn, and was clad in tarnished power armour the colour of wrought iron. Its shoulder guards were edged in yellow and black, and a rough cloak of ochre was draped around its wide shoulders. It was every inch an Iron Warrior but for its face; a slack fleshmask of stolen skin that was the image of a man Honsou would one day kill. Stitched together from the skins of dead prisoners, the Newborn’s face was that of the killer in the dark, the terror of the night and the lurker in the shadows that haunts the dreams of the fearful.

It turned towards Honsou and he felt a delicious shiver of vicarious excitement as he glanced at the dead body on the floor.

‘Nicely done,’ said Honsou. ‘Poor bastard didn’t even get to finish insulting me.’

The Newborn shrugged as it sat across the table from him. ‘He was nothing, just a slave warrior.’

‘True, but he died just as bloodily as the next man.’

‘Killing this one might make you the “next man” to his master,’ said the Newborn.

‘Better he dies now than we end up recruiting him and he fails in battle,’ said Cadaras Grendel from across the table as he finished a tin mug of harsh liquor. ‘Don’t want any damn wasters next to me if we have to fight anything tough in the next few days.’

Grendel was a brute, an armoured killer who delighted in slaughter and the misery of others. Once, he had fought for a rival Warsmith on Medrengard, though in defeat he had transferred his allegiance to Honsou. Despite that switch, Honsou knew Grendel’s continued service was bought with the promise of carnage and that his loyalty was that of a starving wolf on a short leash. The warrior’s face was a scarred and pitted nightmare of battered flesh, his cruel features topped with a close-cropped mohican.

‘Trust me,’ said the warrior next to Grendel, ‘the Skull Harvest weeds out the chaff early on. Only the strongest and most vicious will survive to the end.’

Honsou nodded and said, ‘You should know, Vaanes. You’ve been here before.’

Clad in the midnight-black armour of the Raven Guard, Ardaric Vaanes was the polar opposite of Cadaras Grendel; lithe, elegant and handsome. His long dark hair was bound in a tight scalp-lock and his hooded eyes were set in a face that was aquiline and which bore ritual scars on each cheek.

The former Raven Guard had changed since Honsou had first recruited him to train the Newborn. Honsou had never fully believed that a warrior once loyal to the False Emperor could completely throw off the shackles of his former master, but from what Cadaras Grendel had told him of Vaanes’s actions on the orbital battery above Tarsis Ultra, it seemed such concerns were groundless.

‘Indeed,’ agreed Vaanes. ‘And I can’t say I’m happy to be back. This isn’t a place to come to unless you’re prepared for the worst. Especially during the Skull Harvest.’

‘We’re prepared for the worst,’ said Honsou, leaning over and lifting the severed head from the floor and depositing it on their table. The dead man’s expression was frozen in surprise, and Honsou wondered if he’d lived long enough to see the bar spinning around as his head rolled across the floor. The skin was waxy and moist, the iconic mark of a red skull branded into its forehead over a tattoo of an eight-pointed star. ‘After all, that’s why we’re here and why I had the Newborn kill this one.’

Like his warriors, Honsou had changed a great deal since his rise to prominence had begun on Hydra Cordatus. His unique silver arm was new and a bolt-round had pulverised the left side of his face, leaving it a burned and bloody ruin and making a glutinous, fused mess of his eye. That eye had been replaced with an augmetic implant and as much as he had changed physically, Honsou knew that it was nothing compared to the changes wrought within him.

Vaanes reached over and lifted the head, turning it over and allowing the blood to drip down his gauntlets. Honsou saw Vaanes’s eyes widen as he touched the head, his nostrils flaring as he took in the scents of the dead man, while running his fingers over the cold flesh.

‘This was one of Pashtoq Uluvent’s fighters,’ said Vaanes.

‘Who?’

‘A follower of the Blood God,’ said Vaanes, turning the head around and tapping the sigil branded on its forehead. ‘That’s his mark.’

‘Is he powerful?’ asked Grendel.

‘Very powerful,’ said Vaanes. ‘He has come to the Skull Harvest many times to recruit fighters for his warband.’

‘And he’s won?’

‘Champions that don’t win the Skull Harvest end up dead,’ said Vaanes.

‘Killing one of his men ought to get his attention,’ said Honsou.

‘I think it just did,’ said Grendel, nodding towards the bar’s door with a wide grin of anticipation.

A towering warrior in armour that had once been black and yellow, but which was now so stained with blood that it resembled a deep, rusted burgundy, marched towards their table.

Grendel reached for his weapon, but Honsou shook his head.

The warrior’s helm was horned and two long tusks sprouted from beneath the visor of his helmet. Honsou couldn’t tell whether they were part of his armour or his flesh. The same symbol branded into the head was cut into the warrior’s breastplate, and his breath was a rasping growl, like that of a ravenous beast. He carried an axe with a bronze blade that dripped blood and shone with the dull fire of a smouldering forge.

The warrior planted his axe, blade down, on the floor and banged his fist against his breastplate. ‘I am Vosok Dall, servant of the Skull Throne, and I have come to take your life.’

Honsou took the measure of the warrior in a heartbeat.

Vosok Dall was former Astartes, Scythes of the Emperor by the crossed-scythe heraldry on his shoulder guard, but a warrior who now killed in the name of a blood-drenched god that revelled in murder and battle. He would be strong and capable, with a hunger for glory and martial honour unmatched even by those who still fought for the Imperium.

‘I thought your Chapter was dead,’ said Honsou, pushing himself to his feet. ‘Didn’t the swarm fleets turn your world into an airless rock?’

‘You speak of events that do not concern you, maggot,’ barked Dall. ‘I am here to kill you, so ready your weapon.’

‘You see,’ said Honsou, shaking his head. ‘That’s what you followers of the Blood God always get wrong. You always talk too much.’

‘No more talk then,’ said Dall. ‘Fight.’

Honsou didn’t answer, simply sweeping his axe from beside the table. The blade of the weapon was glossy and black, its sheened surface featureless and seeming to swallow any light unfortunate enough to touch it.

Honsou was fast, but Dall was faster and brought his own axe up to block the strike. The warrior spun the axe and slashed it around in a bifurcating sweep. Honsou ducked and rammed the haft of his weapon into Dall’s gut, spinning away from his opponent’s reverse stroke. The blade passed millimetres from his head and he felt the angry heat that burned within the warp-forged weapon.

He took a double-handed grip on his axe and widened his stance as Dall came at him. The warrior of the Blood God was fast and his roar of hatred shook the very walls, but Honsou had faced down more terrifying foes than Vosok Dall and lived.

Honsou stepped to meet the attack, throwing his arm up to block the blow. The axe slashed down and bit deeply, the blade stuck fast into Honsou’s forearm. Like the Newborn and Cadaras Grendel, Honsou wore the naked metal colours of the Iron Warriors, but the arm struck by Vosok Dall’s axe appeared to be incongruously fashioned from the purest, gleaming silver.

Dall grunted in shock, and Honsou knew this warrior would expect anything he hit with his axe to go down and stay down.

That shock cost him his life.

The warrior tugged at his weapon, but the blade was stuck fast and Honsou swung his axe in a mighty downward arc, hammering the glossy black blade through the top of his foe’s skull. The axe smashed through Dall’s helmet, skull and neck before finally lodging in the centre of his sternum.

Vosok Dall dropped to his knees and toppled onto his side, his dead weight dragging Honsou with him. Dall’s entire body convulsed as the malevolent warp beast bound to Honsou’s axe ripped his soul apart for sport.

Blood fanned from the cloven skull in a flood of crimson, and even as Dall’s soul was devoured, his grip remained strong on his weapon.

A bright orange line, like that of a welder’s acetylene torch hissed around the edge of where Dall’s axe was buried in Honsou’s arm and the weapon fell free with a crescent-shaped bite taken from it. Even as Honsou watched, the fiery lustre of the blade faded as its power passed into Honsou’s weapon.

Where Dall’s blade had penetrated Honsou’s arm was unblemished and smooth, as though it had come straight from the silversmith’s workbench. Honsou neither knew nor cared about the source of the arm’s power to heal itself, it was enough that it had saved him once again.

He rose to his full height, standing triumphant over the dead body of Vosok Dall as the patrons of the bar stared in amazement at him.

‘I am Honsou of the Iron Warriors!’ he bellowed, lifting his axe high over his head. ‘I am here for the Skull Harvest and I am afraid of no man. Any warrior who thinks he is worthy of joining me should make himself known at my camp. Look for the banner of the Iron Skull on the northern promontory.’

A man in a battered flak vest with a long rifle slung over his shoulder and a battered Guardsman’s helmet jammed onto his rugged features stood up as Honsou made his way to the door.

‘Every warlord that comes in here thinks he’s got a big plan,’ said the man. ‘What’s so special about yours? Most of them never come back, so why should I fight for you?’

‘What’s your name?’

‘Pettar. Hain Pettar.’

‘Because I’m going to win, Hain Pettar.’

‘They all say that,’ said Pettar.

Honsou shouldered his axe and said, ‘The difference is I mean it.’

‘So, who you planning to fight if you live through the Skull Harvest?’

Honsou grinned. ‘The worlds of Ultramar are going to burn in the fires of my crusade.’

‘Ultramar?’ said Pettar. ‘Now I know you’re crazy; that fight’s suicide.’

‘Maybe,’ said Honsou. ‘But maybe not, and if it’s not a fight worth making, then this galaxy has run out of things to live for.’

The mountain city simmered with tension and threat. Warriors of all size and description thronged the paths, squares and narrow alleys that twisted between the city’s ramshackle structures of brick and junk. This close to the Skull Harvest, the city’s inhabitants were on edge, hands hovering near the contoured handles of pistols and skin-wrapped sword grips. Honsou could read the currents of threat as clearly as the transformed magos, Adept Cycerin, could read the currents of the empyrean and knew violence was ready to erupt at any second.

Which was just as it should be.

The sky was the colour of a smeared borealis, swirling with unnatural hues known only to the insane. Lightning flashed in aerial whirlpools and Honsou tore his gaze from the pleasing spectacle. Only the unwary dared stare into the abyss of such skies and he grinned as he remembered his flesh playing host to one of the creatures that dwelled beyond the lurid colours.

The streets were sloping thoroughfares of hard-packed earth, and Honsou scanned the crowds around them for an old enemy, a new rival or simply a warrior looking to make a name for himself by killing someone like him.

Hawkers and charlatans lined the streets, filling the air with strange aromas, chants and promises, each offering pleasures and wares that could only be found in a place this deep in the Maelstrom; nightmare-flects, blades of daemon-forged steel, carnal delights with warp-altered courtesans, opiates concocted from the immaterial substance of void-creatures and promises of eternal youth.

In addition to the swaggering pirate bands, mercenary kin-broods and random outcasts, lone warriors stood at street corners, boasting of their prowess while demonstrating their skills. A grey-skinned loxatl climbed the brickwork of a dark tower, its armature weapons flexing and aiming without apparent need for hands. A robed Scythian distilled venom before a gathered audience, while a band of men and women in heavy armour demonstrated sword and axe skills. Others spun firearms, took shots at hurled targets and displayed yet more impressive feats of exceptional marksmanship.

‘Any of them taking your fancy?’ asked Cadaras Grendel, nodding towards the martial displays.

Honsou shook his head. ‘No, these are the chaff. The real warriors of skill won’t show their hand so early.’

‘Like we just did?’ said Vaanes.

‘We’re new here,’ explained Honsou. ‘I needed to get my name into circulation, but I’ll let Pashtoq Uluvent build it for me when he comes against us.’

‘You had me kill that man to provoke an attack on us?’ queried the Newborn.

‘Absolutely,’ said Honsou. ‘I need the warriors gathered here to know me and respect me, but I can’t go around like these fools telling people how powerful I am. I’ll get others to do that for me.’

‘Assuming we survive Uluvent’s retaliation.’

‘There’s always that,’ agreed Honsou. ‘But I never said this venture wouldn’t be without some risk.’

They made their way through the streets of the city, following a path that took them through areas of bleak night, searing sunlight and voids of deadened sound where every step seemed to take a lifetime. Coming from Medrengard, a world deep in the Eye of Terror, Honsou was no stranger to the chaotic flux of worlds touched by the warp, but the capricious nature of the environment around the mountain was unsettling.

He looked towards the mountain’s summit, where the mighty citadel of this world’s ruler squatted like a vast crown of black stone. Hewn from the rock of the mountain, the entire peak had been hollowed out and reshaped into a colossal fortress from which its master plotted his sector-wide carnage.

Curved redoubts and precisely angled bastions cut into the rock dominated the upper reaches of the mountain and coils of razor wire, like an endless field of thorns, carpeted every approach to its great, iron-spiked barbican.

Honsou’s Iron Warrior soul swelled with pleasure at the sight of so formidable a fortress.

Mighty defensive turrets protected the fortress, armed with guns capable of bringing down the heaviest spaceship and smashing any armada that dared come against this place.

Even in its prime, Khalan-Ghol could not have boasted so fearsome an array of weapons.

Ardaric Vaanes leaned in close and pointed to a nearby gun emplacement aimed at the heavens. ‘Big guns never tire, isn’t that what he always says?’

‘So it’s said,’ agreed Honsou, ‘but if what happened on Medrengard taught me anything, it’s that fortresses are static and it’s only a matter of time until someone attacks you. This place is impressive, right enough, but my days of fortress building are over.’

‘I never thought I’d hear an Iron Warrior say he was tired of fortresses.’

‘I’m not tired of fortresses, Vaanes,’ said Honsou with a grin. ‘I’m just directing my energies in bringing them to ruin.’

Honsou had based his warriors on a northern promontory of the mountain, a site that offered natural protection in the form of sheer cliffs on three sides that dropped thousands of metres to the valley floor. Under normal circumstances, it would have been a poor site for a fortress, as it could easily be blockaded, but Honsou had no intention of staying for any length of time and his warband had cleared the promontory of its former occupants in a brutal firefight that had seen them hurling their captives to their doom as an offering to the gods.

The Iron Skull flew over Honsou’s temporary fortress, a graceless collection of gabions fashioned from linked sections of thick wire mesh lined with heavy-duty fabric and filled with sand, earth, rocks and gravel. A line of these blocky gabions stretched across the width of the promontory, and yet more had been stacked to form towers where heavy weapons could be mounted.

In truth, it was more of a defensive wall than a fortress and wasn’t a patch on even the lowliest Warsmith’s citadel on Medrengard, but it was as strong as he could make it and should suffice for the length of the Skull Harvest.

An adamantine gate swung outwards as Honsou and the others approached, the guns mounted on the blocky towers either side of it tracking them until they passed inside. Two dozen Iron Warriors manned the walls, their armour dusty and scored by the planet’s harshly unpredictable climate. The remainder of Honsou’s force was spread throughout the camp or aboard the Warbreed, the venerable ship that had brought them here and which now moored uneasily among the fleets in orbit around this world.

Honsou marched directly to an iron-sheeted pavilion at the centre of his camp, itself protected by more of the blocky, earth-filled gabions. His banner snapped and fluttered in the wind, the Iron Skull seeming to grin with a mocking sneer, as though daring the world to attack. Grendel, Vaanes and the Newborn followed him past the two hulking warriors in Terminator armour guarding the entrance to the pavilion. Each of the giant praetorians was armed with a long, hook-bladed pike and looked like graven metal statues, their bodies as inflexible as their hearts.

Inside the pavilion, the walls were hung with maps depicting arcs of the galaxy, planetary orbits, system diagrams and a variety of mystical sigils scrawled on pale sheets of skin, both human and alien. An iron-framed bed sat in the centre of the space, surrounded by bare metal footlockers filled with books and scrolls. A trio of smoking braziers filled the pavilion with the heady scent of burning oils said to draw the eyes of the gods.

Honsou set his axe upon a rack of weapons and poured himself a goblet of water from a copper ewer. He didn’t offer any to his champions and took a long draught before turning to face them.

‘So,’ he began, ‘What do you make of our first foray?’

Grendel helped himself to a goblet of water and said, ‘Not bad, though I didn’t get to kill anything. If this Pashtoq Uluvent is as mad as all the other followers of the Blood God I’ve met, then we shouldn’t have to wait too long for his response.’

‘Vaanes? What do you think? You’ve fought in one of these before, what happens next?’

‘First you’ll be summoned to the citadel to pay homage,’ said Vaanes, idly lifting a book from the footlocker nearest the bed. ‘Then there will be a day of sacrifices before the contests begin.’

‘Homage,’ spat Honsou. ‘I detest the word. I give homage to no man.’

‘That’s as may be,’ said Vaanes. ‘But you’re not so powerful you can break the rules.’

Honsou nodded, though it sat ill with him to bow and scrape before another, even one as infamous as the master of this world. He snatched the book Vaanes held and set it down on the bed.

‘And after all this homage and sacrifice, what happens after that?’

‘Then the killings begin,’ said Vaanes, looking in puzzlement at him. ‘The leaders of the various warbands challenge one another for the right to take their warriors. Mostly their champions answer these challenges, for only when the stakes are highest do the leaders enter the fray.’

‘These challenges, are they straight up fights?’ asked Honsou.

‘Sometimes,’ said Vaanes. ‘The last one usually is, but they can take any form before that. You almost never know until you set foot in the arena what you’ll be up against. I’ve seen clashes of tanks, bare-knuckle fighting to the death, battles with xenos monsters and psychic duels. You never know.’

‘That mean I’ll maybe get to kill something?’ said Grendel with undisguised relish.

‘I can as good as guarantee it,’ replied Vaanes.

‘Then we need to know what we’re up against,’ said Honsou. ‘If we’re going to get ourselves an army, we need to know who we’re taking it from.’

‘How do you propose we do that?’ said Grendel.

‘Go through the city. Explore it and find out who’s here. Learn their strengths and weaknesses. Make no secret of where your allegiance lies and if you need to crack some heads open, then that’s fine too. Grendel, you know what to do?’

‘Aye,’ agreed Grendel, with a gleam of anticipation in his eye. ‘I do indeed.’

Honsou caught the look that passed between the Newborn and Ardaric Vaanes, relishing their confusion. It never did to have your underlings too familiar with your plans.

‘Now get out, I have research to do,’ said Honsou, lifting the book he had taken off Vaanes from the bed. ‘Amuse yourselves as you see fit until morning.’

‘Sounds like a plan to me,’ said Grendel, drawing a long-bladed knife.

Honsou was about to turn away from his subordinates when he saw the Newborn cock its head to one side and the inner light that lurked just beneath its borrowed skin pulse with a shimmering heartbeat. In the months they had fought together, Honsou recognised the warning.

‘Enemies are approaching,’ said the Newborn, answering Honsou’s unasked question.

‘What? How do you know?’ demanded Grendel.

‘I can smell the blood,’ said the Newborn.

The ground before Honsou’s defensive wall was littered with bodies. Gunfire flashed from the towers and ramparts, a brutal curtain of fire that sawed through the ranks of flak-armoured warriors who hurled themselves without fear at the gates. Sudden darkness had fallen, as though a shroud of night had been cast over the promontory, and stuttering tongues of flame lit the night as the two forces tore at one another.

The Newborn’s warning had come not a second too soon and Honsou had massed his warriors on the crude walls in time to see a host of screaming men emerge from the darkness towards them. They were an unlikely storming force, a ragged mix of human renegades of all shapes and sizes. Most wore iron masks or skull-faced helmets and their uniforms – such as they were – were little more than bloodstained rags stitched together like the Newborn’s skin.

They came on in a howling mass, firing a bizarre mix of weapons at the defenders. Las-bolts and solid rounds smacked into the walls or from the ceramite plates of the Iron Warriors. What the attackers lacked in skill and tactical acumen, they made up for in sheer, visceral ferocity.

It wasn’t nearly enough.

Disciplined volleys barked again and again from the Iron Warriors and line after line of attackers was cut down. Their primitive armour was no match for the mass-reactive bolts of the defenders, each a miniature rocket that exploded within the chest cavity of its target.

Heavy weapons on the towers carved bloody gouges in the attacking horde, but the carnage only seemed to spur them to new heights of fanaticism, as though the bloodshed were an end in itself.

‘Don’t these fools realise they’ll never get in?’ said Ardaric Vaanes as he calmly snapped off a shot that detonated within the bronze mask of a flag-waving maniac as he ran at the gate without even a weapon unsheathed.

‘They don’t seem to care,’ said Honsou, reloading his bolter. ‘This isn’t about getting in, it’s about letting us know that we’re being challenged.’

‘You reckon these are Uluvent’s men?’ said Grendel, clearly enjoying this one-sided slaughter. Grendel had allowed the enemy to reach his section of the walls before ordering his men to open fire, and Honsou saw the relish he took in such close-range killing.

‘Without a doubt,’ said Honsou.

‘He must have known they’d all get killed,’ pointed out Vaanes.

‘He didn’t care,’ said the Newborn, standing just behind Honsou’s right shoulder. Its unnatural flesh was still glowing and there was a hungry light in its eyes. ‘His god cares not from where the blood flows and neither does he. By throwing away the lives of these men, Pashtoq Uluvent is showing us how powerful he is. That he can afford to lose so many men and not care.’

‘Getting clever in your old age,’ said Grendel with a grin and slapped the arm of the Newborn. His champion flinched at Grendel’s touch and Honsou knew it detested the mohicaned warrior. Something to bear in mind if Grendel became a problem.

The slaughter – it could not be called a battle – continued for another hour before the last shots faded. The attackers had not retreated and had fought to the last, their bodies spread like a carpet of ruptured flesh and blood before the Iron Warriors compound.

The strange darkness that had come with the attack now lifted like the dawn and Honsou saw a lone figure threading his way through the field of corpses towards the fortress.

Cadaras Grendel raised his bolter, but Vaanes reached out and lowered the weapon’s barrel.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing, Vaanes?’ snarled Grendel.

‘That’s not one of Uluvent’s men,’ said Vaanes. ‘You don’t want to kill this one.’

‘Shows what you know,’ said the scarred warrior, turning to Honsou for acknowledgement. Honsou gave a brief nod and turned to watch as the newcomer approached the gate without apparent fear of the many guns aimed at him.

‘Who is he?’ said Honsou. ‘Do you recognise him?’

‘No, but I know who he represents,’ said Vaanes, gesturing to the looming citadel that dominated the skyline.

‘Open the gates,’ ordered Honsou. ‘Let’s hear what he has to say.’

Despite his earlier confidence, Honsou couldn’t help but feel apprehensive as he climbed the twisting, corkscrew stairs carved into the sheer sides of the rock face that led towards the mountainous citadel. The emissary led them, his sandaled feet seeking out the steps as surely as if he had trod them daily for a thousand years. For all Honsou knew, perhaps he had.

Honsou had met the emissary, a nameless peon in the robes of a scribe, at the gate of his makeshift fortress where he was handed a scroll case of ebony inlaid with golden thorns. He removed the scroll, a single sheet of cartridge paper instead of the more melodramatic human skin he’d expected, and read the tight, mechanical-looking script written upon it before passing the scroll to Ardaric Vaanes.

‘Well?’ he’d said when Vaanes had read its contents.

‘We go,’ said Vaanes instantly. ‘When this world’s master summons you, it is death to refuse.’

His message delivered, the emissary turned and led them through the squalid streets of the city towards the tallest peak, climbing steep stairs cut into the rocky flanks of the mountain. Honsou had brought Vaanes and the Newborn with him, leaving Grendel to finish the execution of the wounded attackers and keep the compound safe against further assaults.

The climb was arduous, even to one whose muscles were enhanced with power armour, and many times Honsou thought he was set to plummet to his death until the Newborn helped steady him. Their route took them across treacherous chain bridges, along narrow ledges and though snaking tunnels that wound a labyrinthine passage through the depths of the mountain and avoided the fields of razor wire. Though he tried to memorise the route, Honsou soon found himself confounded by occluded passageways, switchbacks and the strange angles within the bowels of the fortress.

On the few occasions they emerged onto the side of the mountain, Honsou saw how high they had climbed. Below them, the city shone like a bruised diamond, torches and cookfires dotting the mountainside like sunlight on quartz as the skies darkened to a sickly purple. Thousands upon thousands of warriors were gathered in makeshift camps throughout the city and Honsou knew that if he made the right moves, they could be his.

Any army gathered from this place would be a patchwork force of differing fighting styles, races and temperaments, but it would be large and, above all, it would be powerful enough to achieve its objective. And if the books he had taken from the chained libraries of Khalan-Ghol gave up their secrets, he would have something of even greater value than mere warriors to drown the worlds of Ultramar in blood.

The higher they climbed, the more Honsou felt his appreciation for the design of this fortress shift from grudging admiration to awe. It was constructed with all the cunning of the most devious military architect, yet eschewed the brutal functionality common to the Iron Warriors for a malicious spite in some of the more deadly traps.

At last, they emerged within an enclosed esplanade lined with pillars and crowned with what could only be the outer hull plates of a spaceship. The metal was buckled and scored from multiple impacts, the sheeting blackened and curved where the intense heat of laser batteries had pounded the armour to destruction.

A great, thorn-patterned gate stood open at the end of the esplanade and a hundred warriors in power armour lined the route they must take through it. Each of the warriors was armoured differently, a multitude of colours and designs, some so old they were the image of that worn by Honsou. Only one thing unified these warriors, a jagged red cross painted through the Chapter insignia worn on their left shoulder guard.

The emissary led them down this gauntlet of warriors, and Honsou saw Salamanders, Night Lords, Space Wolves, Dark Angels, Flesh Tearers, Iron Hands and a dozen other Chapters. He noted with grim amusement that no Ultramarines made up these warriors’ numbers and doubted that any of Macragge’s finest would be found in this garrison.

Beyond the gateway, the fortress became a gaudy palace, a golden wonder of fabulous, soaring design that was completely at odds with the external solemnity of its design. Honsou found the interior garish and vulgar, its ostentation the antithesis of his tastes, such as they were. This was not the palace of a warlord; it was the domain of a decadent egotist. Then again, he should not have been surprised, after all, wasn’t it his monstrous ego and megalomania that had brought the citadel’s builder low in the first place?

At last they came to a set of gilded doors, taller than a warlord titan, which swung open in a smooth arc to reveal a grand throne room of milky white marble and gold. The sounds of voices and armoured bodies came from beyond and, as Honsou and his retinue followed the emissary through, they saw the towering form of a daemonic Battle Titan serving as the backdrop to a tall throne that sat on a raised dais at the far end of the chamber.

A hundred captured battle flags hung from the vaulted ceiling and the chamber was thick with warriors of all sizes and descriptions.

‘I thought this summons was just for us,’ said Honsou.

‘What made you think that?’ replied Vaanes. ‘Did you think you were a special case?’

Honsou ignored the venomous relish in Vaanes’s words and didn’t reply. He had thought the summons was for him and him alone, but saw how foolish that belief had been. This was the Skull Harvest and every warrior gathered here would be thinking that he alone would be the victor.

He saw a profusion of horns, crimson helms, glittering axes and swords, alien creatures in segmented armour and a riotous profusion of standards, many depicting one of the glorious sigils of the Dark Gods.

‘Should we have brought a standard?’ hissed Honsou, leaning close to Ardaric Vaanes.

‘We could have, but it wouldn’t have impressed him.’

‘There is fear in this room,’ said the Newborn. ‘I can sense it flowing through this place like the currents of the warp.’

Honsou nodded. Even he could sense the lurking undercurrent of unease that permeated the throne room. The throne itself was empty, a carved block of thorn-wrapped onyx that would surely dwarf any man who sat upon it, even a Space Marine.

He turned as his instincts for danger warned him of threat and his hand snatched to his sword hilt as a looming shadow enveloped him.

‘You are Honsou?’ said a booming voice like the sound of tombstones colliding.

‘I am,’ he said, looking up into the furnace eyes of a warrior clad in vivid red battle plate that was scarred and burned with the fires of battle and which resembled the lined texture of exposed muscle. His shoulder guards were formed from an agglomerated mass of bones, upon which was carved the icon of a planet being devoured between a set of fanged jaws.

Upon a heavily scored breastplate of fused ribs, Honsou saw a red skull branded over the insignia of an eight-pointed star and knew who stood before him. The warrior’s blazing eyes were set deep within a helmet fashioned from a skull surely taken from the largest greenskin imaginable, and they were fixed on Honsou in an expression of controlled rage.

‘Pashtoq Uluvent, I presume,’ said Honsou.

‘I am the Butcher of Formund, the bloodstorm of the night that takes the skulls of the blessed ones for the Master of the Brazen Throne,’ said the giant and Honsou smelled the odour of spoiled blood upon Uluvent’s armour.

‘What do you want?’ said Honsou. ‘Didn’t you lose enough men attacking my compound?’

‘Simple blood sacrifices,’ said Uluvent. ‘A statement of challenge.’

‘You let your men die just to issue a challenge?’ said Honsou, impressed despite himself.

‘They were nothing, fodder to show my displeasure. But Vosok Dall was a chosen warrior of my warband and his death must be avenged with yours.’

‘Many have tried to kill me,’ said Honsou, squaring his shoulders before the champion of the Blood God, ‘but none have succeeded, and they were a lot tougher than you.’

Uluvent chuckled, the mirthless noise sounding as though it issued from a benighted cavern at the end of the world, and reached up to tap Honsou’s forehead. ‘When the Harvest begins, you and I shall meet on the field of battle and your mongrel skull will be mounted on my armour.’

Before Honsou could reply, Pashtoq Uluvent turned and marched away. Honsou felt his anger threaten to get the better of him, and only quelled the urge to shoot Uluvent in the back with conscious effort.

‘It’ll be a cold day in the warp before that happens,’ he hissed as the Battle Titan’s warhorn let out a discordant bray of noise; part fanfare, part roar of belligerence. The harsh wall of noise echoed around the chamber, reverberating from the pillars and reaching into every warrior’s bones with its static-laced scrapcode.

Honsou blinked as he saw that the throne at the foot of the Battle Titan was now occupied. Had it been occupied a moment ago? He would have sworn that it had been empty, but sat like a great king of old upon the onyx throne was a towering warrior in crimson armour edged in gold. A halo of blades wreathed his pallid, ashen face and his right arm was a monstrous claw with unsheathed blades that shimmered with dark energies.

A great axe was clasped in this mighty king’s other hand and his merciless eyes swept the warriors assembled before him with a searching gaze that left no secret unknown to him. At his shoulder squatted a chittering, reptilian beast that wrapped its slimy flesh around the vents of the warrior’s backpack.

The howl of the titan’s warhorn ceased abruptly and all eyes turned to the warrior king upon the onyx throne. Every champion in the room dropped to one knee at the sight of so mighty a warlord.

Huron Blackheart.

The Tyrant of Badab.

At length the Tyrant spoke, his voice booming and powerful. A voice used to command. A voice that had convinced three Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes to side with him against their brothers. A voice belonging to a warrior who had survived the death of half his body and not only lived, but returned stronger and more deadly than ever.

Though he tried not to be, Honsou couldn’t help but be impressed.

‘I see many hungry faces before me,’ said the Tyrant. ‘I see warlords and corsairs, mercenaries and outcasts, renegades and traitors. What you were before you came here does not interest me, all that matters in the Skull Harvest is who is the strongest.’

Huron Blackheart rose to his feet and stepped from the dais to move amongst those who came before him. The loathsome creature at his shoulder hissed and spat, the pigments of its mottled hide running from spotted to scaled and back again in a heartbeat. Its eyes were black gems, devoid of expression, yet Honsou sensed malignant intelligence behind them.

A warrior in the armour of the Astral Claws, the Tyrant’s former Chapter, followed behind Huron Blackheart and Honsou sensed a darkly radiant power within him, as though what lurked beneath the ceramite plates was something no longer wholly human.

Accompanying this warrior was a tall woman of startling appearance, with features so thin as to be emaciated. Her dark hair was pulled severely back from her face and cascaded to her ankles. Golden flecks danced in her eyes and her emerald robes hung from her thin frame as though intended for someone more generously proportioned. She carried a heavy ebony staff topped with a horned skull. Honsou recognised a sorceress when he saw one.

As Huron Blackheart made his way through the crowds of warriors, Honsou saw that the size of the man’s throne was not simply an exercise in vanity; he dwarfed even the mightiest of his supplicants.

No wonder the piratical fleets that raided the shipping lanes around New Badab were the terror of the Imperium’s shipmasters. Blackheart’s reavers plagued the worlds of the Corpse-Emperor from the Tyrant’s bases scattered around the Maelstrom, bringing him plunder, slaves, weapons and, most importantly, ships.

The Tyrant and his bodyguards moved through his throne room and the warriors gathered before him bowed and scraped. Honsou felt his lip curl in distaste.

‘They worship him like he was a god,’ he said.

‘On New Badab he might as well be,’ said Vaanes. ‘He has the power of life and death over everyone here.’

‘Not me, he doesn’t.’

‘Even you,’ promised Vaanes.

‘Then I’ll be sure to keep my thoughts to myself.’

Vaanes chuckled. ‘That’ll be a first, but it doesn’t matter. That creature on his shoulder, the Hamadrya, is said to be able to see into the hearts of men and whisper their darkest thoughts in the Tyrant’s ear. Imperial assassins have tried to slay Blackheart for decades, but none have ever come close, the Hamadrya senses their thoughts long before they get near.’

Honsou nodded at Vaanes’s words, watching the unseemly displays of fealty and obeisance made by the various warlords and corsair chieftains. He looked across the throne room and saw that Pashtoq Uluvent also kept himself aloof from such toadying, and his respect for the warrior went up a notch.

Then the Tyrant turned his gaze on Honsou and he felt the blood drain from his face and a chill touch of fear run the length of his spine. It was a sensation new to Honsou and he liked it not at all. The Tyrant of Badab’s thin, lipless mouth smiled, exposing teeth sharpened to razor points, and Honsou found himself helpless before the warrior’s gimlet gaze.

The warriors parted before the Tyrant as he strode towards Honsou, the claws of his huge gauntlet alive with baleful energies and the Hamadrya hissing in animal rage.

Huron Blackheart was a giant of a warrior, his already formidable physique boosted by cybernetic augmentation and the blessings of the Dark Gods. Honsou’s head came to the centre of the Tyrant’s chest plate and though it galled him to do so, he was forced to look up to the lord of New Badab.

He felt as though he were a morsel held helpless before some enormous predator or a particularly rare specimen about to be pinned to the board of a collector. The Tyrant stared at him until Honsou felt he could stand no more, then transferred his gaze to the Newborn and Ardaric Vaanes.

‘This one is touched by the raw power of the warp,’ said the Tyrant, lifting the Newborn’s head with the tips of his claws. ‘Powerful and unpredictable, but very dangerous. And you…’

This last comment was addressed to Ardaric Vaanes and with the Newborn forgotten, the Tyrant turned Vaanes’s shoulder guard with the blade of his axe, nodding as he saw the red cross of the Red Corsairs.

‘I know you,’ said the Tyrant. ‘Vaanes. Late of the Raven Guard. You fight for another now?’

‘I do, my lord,’ said Vaanes, bowing before his former master.

‘This half-breed?’

‘The last person who called me that ended up dead,’ snarled Honsou.

Without seeming to move, the Tyrant’s claw shot out and punched into Honsou’s breastplate, lifting him from his feet. Honsou could feel the cold, dark metal of the claws digging at the flesh of his chest, the force of the Tyrant’s blow precisely measured.

‘And the last person who failed to show me respect in my own throne room suffers now at the hands of my most skilled daemonic torturers. They tear his soul apart each day then reclaim its soiled fragments from the warp and the process begins anew. He has suffered this agony for eight decades and I have no inclination to end his torments. You wish a similar fate?’

Honsou’s life hung by a thread, yet he still managed defiance in his tone. ‘No, my lord, I do not, but I am no longer the half-breed. I am a Warsmith of the Iron Warriors.’

‘I know who you are, warrior,’ said the Tyrant. ‘The immaterium gibbers with your slaughters and the corruption you have wrought. I know why you are here and have seen the path of your fate. You will wreak havoc in the realm of the Corpse-Emperor’s worshippers, but those you have wronged will shake the heavens to see you dead. Yet for all your arrogance and bitterness, you have something most others lack.’

‘And what’s that?’ spat Honsou.

‘You have a grand vision of revenge and the chance that you might succeed is all that stays my hand.’

Huron Blackheart then turned his attention back to Vaanes and said, ‘You wear my marking upon your armour, Ardaric Vaanes, but I sense that you serve a power greater than this half-breed. Just remember that the Dark Prince is a jealous lord and suffers no other masters but he.’

Blackheart sheathed his blades and Honsou dropped to the floor of the throne room, breathless and chilled to the bone from the touch of the Tyrant’s claws. The breath heaved in his chest and he felt the nearness of death as a cold shroud upon his heart. He looked up, but the Tyrant had already moved away.

As Honsou picked himself up, he saw the Tyrant’s sorceress stare with naked interest at the Newborn, her eyes lingering long over the stitched nightmare of its dead fleshmask. Blackheart climbed the dais to his throne and turned to address the gathered champions with his axe and claw raised above his head.

‘Any warrior who dares to bare his neck in the Skull Harvest should present his blade upon the Arena of Thorns when the Great Eye opens. Blood will be spilled, the weak will die and the victor shall benefit greatly from my patronage.’

The Tyrant lowered his voice, yet its power was still palpable and Honsou felt as though the words were spoken just for him. ‘But know this: the gods are watching and they will rend the souls of the unworthy for all eternity.’

In days that followed, Honsou’s warriors explored the city on the flanks of the Tyrant’s mountain, learning all they could in preparation for the violence to come. Warbands were identified and their warriors observed, for each warlord was keen to display the prowess of his fighters and champions.

Ardaric Vaanes watched the sensual slaughters of Notha Etassay’s blade dancers, a troupe of decadent warrior priests to whom no sensation of the blade was unknown and whose every kill was performed with the utmost grace and enjoyment. Notha Etassay, an androgynous beauty of uncertain sex, bade Vaanes spar with them and, upon tasting his blood, immediately offered him a place within the troupe.

With every battle he fought, Vaanes felt the vicarious thrill of the kill as every sensation of the graceful ballet of blades was channelled through every warrior priest. It was only with great regret that Vaanes declined Etassay’s offer of a bond ritual with the troupe.

Unimpressed with the delicate bladework of Notha Etassay, Cadaras Grendel left Vaanes and the Newborn to their sport and spent his days watching the blood games of Pashtoq Uluvent’s warriors as they hacked their way through naked slave gangs. Their victims were armed with little more than knives and raw terror, and such brutal murders were more to Grendel’s liking. Soon he found himself wetting his blades with blood in Uluvent’s arena. Such was his bloodlust that within the hour he was granted an audience upon the killing floor by Pashtoq Uluvent himself.

Those battle machines of Votheer Tark that could be brought up the mountain roared and rampaged, their engines howling like trapped souls as they crushed prisoners beneath their tracks or tore them limb from limb with clawed pincer arms. Kaarja Salombar’s corsairs staged flamboyant displays of marksmanship and sword mastery, but Vaanes was unimpressed, having seen the exquisite bladework of Notha Etassay’s devotees.

Honsou himself ventured little from behind his walls, his every waking moment spent in contemplation of the ancient tomes he had brought from Khalan-Ghol. What he sought within their damned pages he would not reveal, but as the days passed, his obsession with the secrets contained in the mad ravings committed to the page grew ever deeper.

The Newborn stayed close to Ardaric Vaanes, watching the killings and displays of martial ability with a dispassionate eye. It was stronger and more skilful than the majority of the warriors here, yet only recently had it begun to take pleasure in the infliction of pain and death. Differing angels warred within its mind; the teachings of its creator and the buried instincts and memories of the gene-heritage bequeathed to it by Uriel Ventris.

Of all the warrior bands gathered for the Skull Harvest, the Newborn was most fascinated by the loxatl, a band of alien mercenaries that laired in burrows hollowed from the sides of the mountain. Vaanes and the Newborn watched the fighting drills of the loxatl on a patch of open ground before these caves.

The leader of this brood-group was a kin leader who went by the name of Xaneant. Whether this was the creature’s true name or one foisted upon it by human tongues was unclear, but the Newborn was impressed by the alien mercenaries, liking their fluid, sinuous movements and utter devotion to the members of their brood.

Something in that kin-bond was achingly familiar and the Newborn wondered where the sense of belonging it felt came from. Was it responding to a memory buried deep within its altered brain or was this a fragment of the psyche the Daemonculaba had stamped upon it?

‘They are all related,’ said the Newborn, watching as the loxatl spun like fireflies through a series of lightning fast manoeuvres designed to showcase their speed and agility. ‘Would that not hinder them in battle?’

‘In what way?’ asked Vaanes.

‘Would there not be grief or horror if a kin-member died?’

‘I don’t think the loxatl think that way,’ said Vaanes. ‘It sounds obvious, but they’re not like humans. It’s a good observation though. I remember reading that in ancient wars, kings would sometimes raise regiments formed by men and women from the same towns, thinking it would create a bond of loyalty that would make them stronger.’

‘And did it?’

‘Before the killing started, yes, but when battle was joined and people began to die, the sight of friends and loved ones torn up by shellfire or cut to pieces by swords and axes destroyed any fighting spirit they might have had.’

‘So why do the loxatl do it?’ asked the Newborn. ‘If such groupings are so brittle, why do it? Surely it is better to fight alone or alongside those you do not care about.’

‘Yes and no,’ said Vaanes, slipping back into the role of mentor and instructor. ‘What keeps many fighting units together is the warrior next to him and the desire not to let your battle-brothers down. Shared camaraderie gives a fighting unit cohesion, but that needs to be alloyed to an unbreakable fighting spirit in order to avoid being broken when the killing starts.’

‘Like the Adeptus Astartes?’

‘Not all of them,’ said Vaanes bitterly.

‘The Ultramarines?’

‘Yes, the Ultramarines,’ sighed Vaanes. ‘You get that from Ventris?’

‘I think so,’ said the Newborn. ‘I have a desire for brotherhood with those I fight alongside, but I don’t feel it.’

Vaanes laughed. ‘No, you won’t in Honsou’s warband. It’s said the Iron Warriors were never ones for easy camaraderie, even before they followed Horus into rebellion.’

‘Is that a weakness?’

‘I don’t know yet. Time will tell, I suppose,’ said Vaanes. ‘Some warbands fight for money, some for revenge, some for honour and some for the slaughter, but it all ends up the same way.’

‘What way is that?’

‘In death,’ said a voice behind them and both the Newborn and Vaanes turned to see Huron Blackheart’s emaciated sorceress. The woman’s gaunt features were even more skeletal in the daylight, the brightness of the sky imparting an unhealthy translucence to her skin and reflecting from the gold in her eyes. Her robes shimmered and her hair whipped and twisted like a dark snake with the motion of her head.

‘Yes,’ said Vaanes. ‘In death.’

The sorceress smiled, exposing stumps of yellowed teeth, and Vaanes grimaced. The woman appeared young, yet the price she had paid for her powers was rotting her away from the inside out. ‘The Lost Child and the Blind Warrior, fitting I should find you observing the displays of an alien species whose thought processes are utterly inimical to humanity.’

Vaanes felt his skin crawl at the nearness of the sorceress. Within the seething cauldron of the Maelstrom, the terrifying power of the immaterium was a constant, gnawing presence on the edge of perception, but her proximity seemed to act as a locus for warp entities gathering like vultures around a corpse. Vaanes could feel their astral claws scratching at the lid of his mind.

He glanced over at the Newborn, seeing it twitch and flinch as though there was an invisible host of buzzing, stinging insects swarming around its face, but which it was trying to ignore.

‘What do you want?’ said Vaanes, gripping the Newborn’s arm and dragging it away from her loathsome presence. ‘I detest your kind and wish to hear nothing you have to say.’

‘Do not be so quick to dismiss what I have to offer, warrior of Corax,’ hissed the sorceress, reaching out and placing a hand on the Newborn’s chest.

‘Never speak that name again,’ snarled Vaanes. ‘It means nothing to me now.’

‘Not now, but one day it will again,’ promised the sorceress.

‘You see the future?’ asked the Newborn. ‘You know what is to happen? All of it?’

‘Not all of it,’ admitted the sorceress, ‘but those whose lives stir the currents of the warp are bright lights in the darkness. A measure of their path is illuminated for those with the sight to see it.’

‘Do you see mine?’ said the Newborn eagerly.

The sorceress laughed, a shrill bite on the air that caused the loxatl to halt their martial display and screech in rage. Shimmering patterns danced over their glistening hides and they vanished in a blur of motion, slithering and skittering across the mountainside to boltholes carved in the rocks.

‘The destiny of the Lost Child cleaves into the future like a fiery speartip,’ said the sorceress. ‘His destiny is woven into the tapestry of a great hero’s death, the fall of a star and the rise of an evil thought long dead.’

‘You speak in meaningless riddles,’ said Vaanes, dragging the Newborn away.

‘Wait!’ cried the Newborn. ‘I want more.’

‘Trust me, you don’t,’ warned Vaanes, seeing Cadaras Grendel marching towards them, his armour splashed with blood. ‘Nothing good can come of it.’

‘The Lost Child wishes to hear what I have to say,’ screeched the sorceress, barring their way with her skull-topped staff.

Vaanes unsheathed the caged lightning of his gauntlet-mounted claws and rammed the foot-long blades up into the sorceress’s chest, tearing up through her heart and lungs. She died without a sound, the breath ghosting from her lips in a sparkling, iridescent cloud and the golden light fading from her eyes. Vaanes sucked in her dying breath, revelling in the sensations of fear, horror and pain it contained. His entire body shook with the deliciousness of her soul and all thought of consequence fled from his thoughts at the ecstasy of the kill.

Vaanes lowered his arm and let her skeletal frame slide from the blades of his gauntlet. Her corpse flopped to the ground and he set off towards Cadaras Grendel with the Newborn in tow.

‘What was that about?’ said Grendel, looking over at the shrivelled body of the sorceress. Whatever force had animated her wasted frame had fled her body, leaving a desiccated husk of shrivelled flesh and dried bone.

‘Nothing,’ replied Vaanes, drawing a deep breath. ‘Forget it.’

‘Fine,’ said Grendel, gesturing towards the sky. ‘Honsou wants you back at the compound. The Skull Harvest is about to begin.’

Vaanes looked up, seeing the swirling colours gathering around a toxic swirl of amber, like a cancerous epicentre of a diseased whirlpool.

‘The Great Eye…it’s opening,’ he whispered as Grendel made his way past him in the opposite direction. ‘Are you coming back too?’

Grendel nodded, grinning with feral anticipation. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll see you in the arena.’

Vaanes didn’t like the sound of that, but let it go, wondering whose blood stained Grendel’s breastplate. The Iron Warrior looked down at the withered remains of the sorceress.

‘Did she try and tell your fortune?’ said Grendel, kneeling beside the sagging cloth of the sorceress’s robes.

‘Something like that,’ agreed Vaanes.

‘And you killed her for it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Too bad for her she didn’t see that coming.’

The Skull Harvest got underway, as all such gatherings do, with sacrifice. Framed by the towering majesty of a growling Battle Titan, the Tyrant of Badab tore the heart from a captured warrior of the Howling Griffons and hurled it into the arena, where it pulsed bright arterial blood onto the gritty sand until it was emptied.

The first day was taken up with the various champions’ warbands announcing themselves to the Tyrant, who sat upon a grand throne of bronze and amber, and the allocation of challenges. Blood feuds would be settled first and a number of champions bellowed the names of those they wished to fight in the name of avenging an insult to their honour.

Honsou expected Pashtoq Uluvent to issue such a challenge, but the red-armoured warrior had yet to appear.

‘I expected Uluvent to be here,’ noted Vaanes, as though reading his mind. ‘Champions of the Blood God are usually the first to arrive and begin the killing.’

‘No, Uluvent’s smarter than that,’ said Honsou.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I think he wants to wait until further into the Harvest before trying to kill me. It’ll be more of a triumph for him if he slays me after we’ve taken other warbands with our own killings. He’ll have his blood feud resolved and he’ll take all my warriors.’

‘Then he’s more cunning than most champions of the Blood God.’

‘Maybe,’ agreed Honsou with a smile. ‘We’ll see how that works out for him.’

‘And Grendel, where’s he?’ asked Vaanes. ‘I haven’t seen him since yesterday. He said he’d be here. The other champions will know that one of our inner circle hasn’t appeared for the beginning of the death games.’

‘Forget Grendel,’ said Honsou. ‘We don’t need him.’

‘I see him,’ said the Newborn, gesturing with a nod of his helmet to the opposite side of the arena. ‘Over there.’

Honsou looked over and saw the ranks of gathered champions part as Pashtoq Uluvent took his place on the circumference of the arena. The red-armoured warrior with the ork-skull helmet raised his red-bladed sword and a raucous cheer was torn from thousands of throats as his skull rune banner was unfurled.

Standing beside Uluvent was Cadaras Grendel, his armour streaked with fresh blood and his chainsword unsheathed. The Iron Warrior shrugged and raised his sword to lick wet blood from the blade.

‘Grendel’s betrayed us?’ said Vaanes, his voice thick with anger.

‘It was only a matter of time,’ said Honsou. ‘To be honest I expected it sooner.’

‘I’ll kill him,’ snarled Vaanes.

‘No,’ said Honsou. ‘Grendel and I will have a reckoning, but it won’t be here. Do you understand me?’

Vaanes said nothing, but Honsou could see the anger in the warrior’s eyes and just hoped the former Raven Guard would be able to restrain the urge to strike down Grendel for now.

‘I don’t understand you, Honsou,’ said Vaanes eventually.

‘Not many people do,’ replied Honsou. ‘And that’s the way I like it.’

A warrior in bronze armour emblazoned with the skull rune of the Blood God made the first kill of the day, disembowelling a champion in spiked armour who Honsou saw was hopelessly outmatched in the first moments of the duel. The slain warrior’s head was mounted upon a spike of black iron beneath the Tyrant’s throne.

The warband of the defeated warrior now belonged to his killer, their loyalty won through the display of greater strength and skill. Such loyalty could be a fragile thing, but few gathered here cared for whom they fought, simply that they fought for the strongest, most powerful champion of the Skull Harvest.

Ranebra Corr’s sword-champion slew the hearthguard of Yeruel Mzax, a clan warrior of the Cothax stars. The clan-laws forbade Mzax to fight under the leadership of another and he hacked his own head off with an energised claw attached to the upper edge of his gauntlet.

Votheer Tark’s battle engine was a hulking monster that had once been a Dreadnought, but which had been altered by Tark’s Dark Mechanicum adepts into the housing for a shrieking entity brought forth from the warp. It tore through the warbands of three champions before finally being brought low by one of Pashtoq Uluvent’s berserk warriors who fought through the loss of an arm to detonate a melta bomb against its sarcophagus.

The daemon was torn screaming back to the warp and the lower half of the berserker was immolated in the blast. Even with his legs vaporised, the berserker crawled towards Huron Blackheart’s throne to deposit the defeated engine’s skull-mount.

The Newborn won two duels on the first day of killing; crushing the skull of Kaarja Salombar’s corsair pistolier before he could loose a single shot, and eventually defeating the loxatl kin-champion of Xaneant’s brood group. This last battle was fought for nearly an hour, with the loxatl unable to put the Newborn down, despite exhausting its supply of flechettes into its opponent.

A daemonic creation of Khalan-Ghol’s birth chambers, the Newborn’s powers of regeneration were stronger in the warp-saturated Maelstrom and each wound, though agonising, was healed within moments of its infliction.

Exhausted and without ammunition, the loxatl eventually pounced on the Newborn, using its dewclaws to tear at its armour, but even its speed was no match for the Newborn’s resilience. At last, the hissing, panting beast was defeated, drained and unable to defend itself when the Newborn crushed its neck and tore its head from its shoulders.

As the fighting and killing went on, warbands began to agglomerate as their champions were slain and armies formed as the most powerful warlords drew more and more fighters to their banner.

Cadaras Grendel fought with his customary brutal remorselessness, winning several bouts for Pashtoq Uluvent, and Honsou could see Ardaric Vaanes’s fury at this betrayal simmering ever closer to the surface. To dilute that anger, Honsou sent the former Raven Guard into the arena while the Newborn healed and Vaanes eagerly slaughtered warriors from three warbands, one after the other, bringing yet more blood-bonded fighters into Honsou’s growing army.

Honsou himself took to the field of battle twice; once to slay a pirate chieftain armed with two razor-edged tulwars, and once to break a kroot warrior leader who fought with a long, twin-bladed stave he wielded with preternatural speed and precision.

As the Newborn strangled a towering ogre creature with its own energy whip, winning a hundred of the brutish monsters to Honsou’s banner, the fourth day of killing drew to an end.

The armies of three champions were all that remained.

Pashtoq Uluvent’s force of blood-hungry skull-takers, Notha Etassay’s blade-dancers.

And Honsou’s Iron Warriors.

With the victories he and his champions had won, Honsou’s force had grown exponentially in size, numbering somewhere in the region of five thousand soldiers. Scores of armoured units and fighting machines, as well as all manner of xenos and corsair warbands were now his to command. The swords of seventeen warbands now belonged to Honsou and, by any measure of reckoning, he had a fearsome force with which to wreak havoc on his enemies.

Pashtoq Uluvent had amassed a force in the region of six thousand fighters, while Notha Etassay had procured five thousand through his exquisite slaughters. Any one of these forces was powerful enough to carve itself a fearsome slice of Imperial space and enjoy a period of slaughter unmatched in its previous history.

But the Skull Harvest was not yet over and the Tyrant’s rule decreed that there could be only one champion left standing at its end.

Darkness closed in as the three warriors stepped into the arena, clad in their armour and each armed with their weapon of choice. Honsou’s arm glittered in the torchlight that surrounded the arena as baying crowds of warriors cheered for their respective champions.

The three warriors marched to stand facing one another in the centre of the arena and Honsou took the opportunity to study his opponents, knowing his life would depend on knowing them better than they knew themselves.

Notha Etassay wore a light, form-fitting bodyglove of rippling black leather with buckled straps holding strategically situated elements of flexible plate. The androgynous champion sashayed into the arena and performed a scintillating pre-battle ritual of acrobatic twists and leaps while spinning twin swords of velvety darkness through the air. Etassay’s face was concealed by a studded leather mask with scar-like zippers and tinted glass orbs that glittered with wry amusement, as though this were a meeting of comrades instead of a duel to the death.

Pashtoq Uluvent planted his sword in the bloody earth of the arena and roared a wordless, inchoate bellow of ferocity to the heavens. His armour dripped with the blood of sacrifices and the flesh-texture of his armour seemed to swell and pulse with the beat of his heart. His eyes were like smouldering pools of blood within his helmet and he reached up with a serrated dagger to cut into the meat of his neck.

The champion of the brazen god of battle hurled the dagger away as blood began leaking from the open wound.

Honsou narrowed his eyes. ‘Giving up already, Uluvent?’

‘If I cannot kill you before my life bleeds out, then I am not worthy of victory and my death will honour the Skull Throne,’ said Uluvent.

‘Don’t expect me to do anything like that,’ said Honsou.

‘I don’t,’ replied Uluvent. ‘You are the mongrel by-blow of melded genes wrought in desperate times. You are a creature without honour that should never have been brought into existence.’

Honsou controlled his anger as Uluvent continued. ‘One of your champions has already sworn himself to me, but I will kill you quickly if you submit to my dominance.’

‘I don’t submit to anyone,’ Honsou warned his enemy.

Notha Etassay laughed, a high, musical sound of rich amusement. ‘Whereas it’s something I do rather well, though I prefer to be the dominant one in any intercourse.’

‘You both disgust me,’ snarled Uluvent. ‘It insults my honour that I must fight you.’

The howl of the Battle Titan’s warhorn echoed across the arena and the cheering warriors fell silent as the Tyrant of Badab rose from his throne to address the gathered champions, the Hamadrya curled around his thigh like a vile leech.

‘Tonight the Skull Harvest ends!’ said Huron Blackheart, his voice carried around the arena to the furthest reaches of the mountain. ‘One champion will be victorious and his enemies will be broken upon the sands of this arena. Fight well and you will go forth to bring terror and death to those who betrayed our trust in them.’

The Tyrant of Badab locked eyes with each of the three champions in turn and raised his mighty clawed gauntlet. ‘Now fight!’

Honsou sprang back from a decapitating sweep of Pashtoq Uluvent’s axe, swaying aside as Etassay’s black sword licked out and sliced into his shoulder guard. Honsou’s black-bladed axe lashed out in a wide arc, forcing both opponents back and the three champions broke from the centre of the arena.

Etassay danced away from Honsou, swords twirling and face unreadable behind the leather mask, while Uluvent hefted his sword in a tight grip, watching warily for any movement from his opponents. Honsou knew Uluvent was the stronger of his foes, but Etassay’s speed was ferocious, and who knew what power rested in his dark blades.

Honsou’s axe was hungry for killing and he felt its insatiable lust to wreak harm running along the length of its haft and into his limbs. Or at least one of them. The power residing in the silver arm he had taken from the Ultramarines sergeant was anathema to the creature bound to his weapon.

This stage of a battle would be where each warrior sought to gauge the measure of the other, searching for signs of weakness or fear to be exploited. Honsou knew he would find neither in these two opponents, warriors hardened by decades of war and devotion to their gods.

Every fibre of Uluvent’s being would be dedicated to killing in the Blood God’s name, while Etassay would seek to wring every sensation from this bout. Winning would be secondary to the desire to experience the furthest excesses of violence, pain and pleasure.

Honsou cared nothing for the thrill of the fight, nor the honour of the kill. This entire endeavour was a means to an end. He cared nothing for the piratical schemes of the Tyrant, nor honouring any one of the ancient gods of the warp.

Etassay made the first move, leaping in close to Uluvent, his dark swords singing for the red-armoured champion. Uluvent moved swiftly, swinging his own sword up to block the blows and spinning on his heel to slash at Etassay’s back. But the champion of the Dark Prince was no longer there, vaulting up and over the blade in a looping backwards somersault.

Honsou charged in, swinging his axe for Etassay, but the warrior dropped beneath the blow and smoothly pivoted onto his elbow, swinging his body out like a blade to take Honsou’s legs out from under him.

Uluvent leapt towards Honsou as he fell, the red-bladed sword thrust downwards at his chest, but Honsou scrambled aside and the weapon plunged into the earth. Etassay’s boot thundered against Uluvent’s helmet and the roaring champion of the Blood God fell back, leaving his sword jammed in the ground.

Honsou pushed himself to his feet and furiously blocked and parried as Etassay spun away from his attack on Uluvent and came at him with a dizzying series of sword strikes. The champion of the Dark Prince was unimaginably fast and it was all Honsou could do to keep himself from being sliced into ribbons. His armour was scored and sliced numerous times and he realised that Etassay was playing with him, prolonging the battle to better enjoy the sense of superiority.

Honsou’s bitterness flared, but he fought against it, knowing that Etassay would punish him for even the smallest lapse in concentration. Instead he forced himself to concentrate on exploiting the warrior’s arrogance. Etassay thought he was better than Honsou and that would be his downfall.

Out of the corner of his eye, Honsou saw Uluvent circling them, waiting on a chance to reclaim his sword with a patience the Blood God’s warriors were not known for. Honsou kept himself close to the weapon, forcing Uluvent to keep his distance. One opponent he could handle. Two? Probably not.

At last Etassay seemed to tire of Honsou and said, ‘Let the other one have his blade. This contest is tiresome without his colourful rages.’

Honsou did not reply, instead turning towards the sword embedded in the sand and hacking his daemon axe through the blade. Uluvent’s sword shattered into a thousand fragments and Honsou sensed Etassay’s petulant displeasure through the studded mask.

Etassay leapt towards him, but Honsou had banked on such a manoeuvre and was ready for it. He hammered the pommel of his axe into Etassay’s sternum and the champion dropped to the ground with a strangled, breathless cry.

Honsou heard Uluvent make his move and turned as he stamped down hard on Etassay’s chest, hearing a brittle crack of bone. Uluvent slammed into Honsou and they tumbled to the sand. Honsou lost his grip on his axe as Uluvent’s gauntlets fastened on his throat. The two warriors grappled in the bloody sand, pummelling one another with iron-hard fists.

Uluvent spat into Honsou’s face. ‘Now you die!’

Honsou rammed his knee into Uluvent’s stomach, but the warrior’s grip was unbreakable. Again and again he slammed his knee upwards until at last he felt the grip on his throat loosen. He managed to free one arm and slammed the heel of his palm into Uluvent’s skull-faced helmet. Bone shattered and the bleeding wound in Uluvent’s neck was exposed, spattering Honsou’s helmet in blood.

Honsou slammed his fist into the wound, digging his fingers into Uluvent’s neck and tearing the cut wider. His foe bellowed in pain and rolled off Honsou, rising unsteadily to his feet and lurching over to his followers to retrieve another weapon with one hand pressed to the ruin of his neck.

Honsou stood, groggy and battered, and set off after Uluvent, snatching his axe up from the ground next to the groaning figure of Etassay. He ignored the Dark Prince’s champion, the warrior was beaten and probably in throes of ecstasy at the pain coursing along every nerve ending.

Honsou felt new strength in his limbs as he followed Uluvent. The warrior had torn off his shattered helmet and Honsou saw his face was hideously scarred and burned. Blood squirted from where Honsou had torn his neck wound further open, but the pain only seemed to galvanise Uluvent as he bellowed for a fresh blade.

Neck wound or no, Uluvent was still a fearsome opponent and armed with a fresh weapon, could still easily kill Honsou.

Cadaras Grendel held a wide-bladed sword out towards Pashtoq Uluvent and Honsou held his breath…

Pashtoq Uluvent reached for the weapon, but at the last moment, Cadaras Grendel reversed his grip and rammed the blade into the champion’s chest. The tip of the weapon ripped out through the back of Uluvent’s armour and the mighty warrior staggered as Grendel twisted the blade deeper into his chest.

Uluvent roared in pain and spun away from Grendel, wrenching the sword from his grip and dropped to his knees. Honsou gave him no chance to recover from his shock and pain, and brought his axe down upon the warrior’s shoulder. The dark blade smashed Uluvent’s shoulder guard to splinters and clove the champion of the Blood God from collarbone to pelvis.

Stunned silence swept over the gathered crowds, for none had ever expected to see Pashtoq Uluvent brought low. Cadaras Grendel stepped from the ranks of the Blood God’s warriors to stand next to Honsou as the blazing fire of Pashtoq Uluvent’s eyes began to fade.

‘Sorry,’ said Grendel with a grin. ‘Honsou may be a mongrel half-breed, and even though I know you’ll lead me to a bloodier fight, I think he’ll lead me to one I’ll live through.’

Uluvent looked up at Honsou with hate and pain misting his vision. ‘Give… me… a blade.’

Honsou was loath to indulge the champion’s request, but knew he would need to if there were to be any shred of loyalty in the warriors he would win from Uluvent.

‘Give it to him,’ ordered Honsou.

Grendel nodded and reached down to drag the sword from the defeated champion’s chest in a froth of bright blood. He held the weapon towards Uluvent, who took the proffered sword in a slack grip.

‘And… my skull,’ gasped Uluvent with the last of his strength. ‘You… have… to take… it.’

‘My pleasure,’ said Honsou, raising his axe and honouring Pashtoq Uluvent’s last request.

With Pashtoq Uluvent’s head mounted on the spikes below Huron Blackheart’s throne, the Skull Harvest was over. Hundreds had died upon the sands of the Tyrant’s arena, but such deaths were meaningless in the grand scheme of things, serving only to feed Blackheart’s ego and amuse the Dark Gods of the warp.

At the final tally, Honsou left New Badab with close to seventeen thousand warriors sworn in blood to his cause. Pashtoq Uluvent’s warriors, and those he had won, were now Honsou’s, their banners now bearing the Iron Skull device.

Notha Etassay had survived the final battle and had willingly sworn allegiance to Honsou after hoarsely thanking him for the exquisite sensations of bone shards through the lungs.

Huron Blackheart had been true to his word, and the victor of the Skull Harvest had indeed benefited greatly from his patronage. As the Warbreed broke orbit, numerous other vessels accompanied it, gifts from the Tyrant of Badab to be used for the express purpose of dealing death to the forces of the Imperium. In addition to these vessels, the ships of the defeated champions formed up around Honsou’s flagship to form a ragtag, yet powerful, fleet of corsairs and renegades.

Battered warships, ugly bulk carriers, planetary gunboats, warp-capable system monitors and captured cruisers followed the Warbreed as it plotted a careful route through the Maelstrom, away from the domain of Huron Blackheart.

The sickly yellow orb of New Badab was swallowed in striated clouds of nebulous dust and polluted immaterial effluent vomited from the wound in real space as the fleet pulled away, and Honsou recalled the final words the mighty Tyrant had said to him.

Blackheart had pointed his dark-bladed claw towards Ardaric Vaanes, Cadaras Grendel and the Newborn as they boarded the battered Stormbirds ahead of Honsou.

‘Kill them when they are of no more use to you,’ said the Tyrant. ‘Otherwise they will only betray you.’

‘They wouldn’t dare,’ Honsou had said, though a seed of doubt had been planted.

‘Always remember,’ said Huron Blackheart. ‘The strong are strongest alone.’

A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

Published in 2009 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd., Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK

Cover illustration by Hardy Fowler

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ISBN 978-0-85787-215-9

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