Obsidian – Graham McNeill

	 
	Sunset fell over the peaks, drawing its light back over the mountains as the Thunderhawks dropped onto the platforms hidden by cunningly wrought spurs of rock. They had come down fast and hard from orbit, but warily, like scavenger beasts approaching feast-prey that should be dead, but might yet have life within it.

	Captain Daegan straightened his cloak as vortices of turbulent air threatened to tear it from the midnight curves of his battleplate. Behind him, two squads of Sable Swords formed up as he strode down the assault ramp to the landing platform. He kept his helmet hooked at his belt, one hand resting on its freshly-forged smoothness, the other on the textured grip of the bolter he had yet to fire in anger.
	'No one here to greet us,' said Kaas, the youthful Apothecary with a disappointed grunt.
	"Would you welcome those who are to replace you?' asked Carden, Daegan's equerry and personal champion.
	'Enough,' said Daegan. This is a solemn business we are on. Do not sully it.'
	Both warriors nodded, understanding they had overstepped their bounds.
	Daegan stepped from the shadow of the Thunderhawk's fog of exhaust fumes and atmospheric venting. The platform was deserted, as he had suspected it would be, but he knew that those who called this place home were watching them even now.
	Before him, a towering portal of timber and bronze stood unbarred, like the gate of an abandoned fortress that has long since been sacked. This was no war-way, but a ceremonial entrance, a route within the mountain that reached nowhere of strategic value. Its appearance was decorative only, a means of inspiring awe in the easily impressed.
	Daegan set off towards the portal, Kaas and Carden neatly falling into position at his sides, and the squads of black-armoured warriors marching in perfect lockstep behind him. Carden bore a shield of black in one hand, emblazoned with twin crossed swords in ivory, while his other rested on ; the pommel of a dark sabre belted at his waist. Kaas bore a dipped banner with the same heraldic device, a badge of honour that was yet new and felt ancient at the same time.
	They were not the first to bear this device, but they would do it honour.

	They are here,' said Leuthar.

	'I know,' replied the vox-amped tones of Brother Thade. 'I could have killed them a dozen times as they dropped from orbit.'
	'They are brash and untested,' said Leuthar. 'Young, as you once were.'
	A bark of augmitted laughter was Thade's reply. 'I was never young.'
	'There are none of us young any more,' sighed Leuthar, settling his sword at his hip and hoping he would not have to draw it.
	'No,' agreed Leuthar. 'Death ages us all.'

	The exterior of the mountain reeked of abandonment, and the interior no less so. Beyond the portal, a chamber with its vaulted roof lost in shadows echoed to the sound of their footfalls, where it ought to ring with the clamour of warriors preparing to sally forth on war-making. Dust hung heavy on the hooded statues and only the flickering glow of trimmed lumen- flames illuminated the once grand vestibule.

	A floating skull encased in electrum hovered in the centre of the chamber, its eyes unblinking blue orbs. An oil-burning lantern hung from the skull's jaws, and it flitted away with a hum of a miniature repulsor field as they approached. Daegan and his warriors set off after the skull as it floated just ahead of them, leading them ever onwards, through cavernous hallways and empty processionals.
	The bobbing skull plunged deeper and farther into the mountain. Shadows retreated from its lantern, and the sightless eyes of the statues followed them as they descended grand stairways and triumphal avenues that no longer resounded to the battle chants of departing warriors and returning heroes.
	A thousand warriors once lived and trained here, and the void of their presence clung to the interior of the mountain like an unwelcome blight. Daegan felt the aching sense of loss that bled from every stone of the mountain.
	'Death shrouds this place,' said Kaas, echoing Daegan's thoughts. 'We should not plant our flag in so ill-favoured a place.'
	'Much honour was won by the warriors who dwelled here,' pointed out Daegan.
	Kaas shook his head. 'New beginnings should not start with death, no matter how nobly won it was.'
	Daegan wanted to disagree, but his orders were without ambiguity.
	At length, the skull brought Daegan to a grand assembly hall, its gleaming walls painted with the colours of a dozen stained glass windows illuminated by an ingenious system of reflector wells that brought light into the heart of the mountain.
	Thirty warriors armoured in silver stood ranked on a stepped rostrum at the far end of the chamber, bathed in the ruddy embers of the dying sun. A Dreadnought towered over them, a proud Chapter banner fluttering in an unseen wind that filled the chamber like a sigh of regret.
	'I am Brother Thade,' said the Dreadnought. 'Master of the Astral Knights and lord of Obsidian.'
	'Brother Captain Daegan of the Sable Swords, First Company.'
	'You come to claim stewardship of our fortress-monastery and all its chattels?'
	'I do,' said Daegan. 'As decreed by the Emperor and the High Lords of Terra.'
	The Dreadnought stepped down from the rostrum and said, 'An ignoble end to a litany of honour few can equal. This mountain has been home to the warriors of the Astral Knights for a hundred lifetimes and it has seen the Imperium's greatest heroes march to war through its gates. Tell me why I should yield such a place to you.'
	'Your numbers are too few to bear the burden of rebuilding your Chapter,' said Daegan, marching to stand before the Dreadnought. 'Your Chapter Master is dead. As are all your knights.'
	'You tell me what I already know, whelp,' snapped Thade, and Daegan felt his warriors tense. This had always been the most likely outcome, that the decimated Chapter's survivors would not accept their fate.
	'Our brothers gave their lives so that billions would be spared the horror of the World Engine, and this is our reward?' roared the Dreadnought. To be stricken from the records and our holdings given to warriors with no history, whose blades are yet unblooded?'
	Daegan shook his head. The Sable Swords may yet be young and untested, but we are not without honour and not without reverence for those who have gone before us.'
	'Just words,' said Thade, looming over Daegan, his fists thrumming with power. 'What deeds do you offer to match them?'
	The Dreadnought could crush him in the blink of an eye, but Daegan met its steely gaze and said, 'I offer you the chance to continue the proud tradition of your order. Take ship from here and ply the stars as the Astral Knights once did, before they set down roots in stone and iron. Fight on in the Emperor's name until you can fight no more.'
	The Sable Swords stepped aside, leaving a path to the chamber's exit.
	'And when that day comes,' said Daegan, 'know that in death your duty has ended.'