“Spare me a recitation of my battle honours,” said the venerable admiral. “I know them better than you, and I don’t need reminding. You are welcome aboard the Vae Victus, but I’ll thank you to keep to your assigned areas of the ship. The fighting decks of a vessel of the Adeptus Astartes are no place for anyone not trained in Ultramar.”
Suzaku smiled and tilted her head coquettishly to one side, as though deciding whether to remind the Lord Admiral that she was an agent of the Inquisition, an organisation with carte blanche in its remit of protecting the Imperium. With a word, an inquisitor could requisition armies and fleets, depose planetary rulers or condemn entire star systems to death. Only a very brave or very foolish individual dared stand in their way.
Inquisitor Suzaku looked like she hadn’t yet made her mind up into which category Lord Admiral Tiberius fell.
“You are bold, Lord Admiral,” said Suzaku. “But I would expect no less from a veteran of the Battle of Circe. I will accede to your request.”
“It’s not a request,” said Tiberius.
Suzaku nodded and turned to the white-haired man beside her.
“This is my interrogator acolyte, Soburo Suzaku,” she said. Seeing the Ultramarines’ questioning looks, she added. “Suzaku is a common name on our home world.”
Uriel looked for any familial resemblance between the two, but the extent of Suzaku’s subtle augmetics made any examination pointless. He placed a hand on the Lord Admiral’s shoulder and said, “Inquisitor Suzaku, Sergeant Learchus will show you and your retinue to the quarters we have assigned you. They should be sufficient to your needs.”
“I am sure they will,” said Suzaku. “When do we translate into the warp?”
Tiberius answered her. “We’ll reach the fringeward jump point in two days, then it shouldn’t take us more than a week, warp-willing, to reach Calth.”
“And then we see how accurate your Librarian Tigurius is at reading the fate lines,” said Suzaku.
“He has never been wrong before,” said Uriel.
A shadow passed over Suzaku’s face. “There is always a first time,” she said.
SEVEN
THE CONVOY EMERGED from the tunnel and thundered along the wide roadway that curved over the flanks of the mountains. A Salamander Scout vehicle led the way, its main gun traversing to cover the bend ahead, a constant relay of surveyor chatter passing between it and the Chimera troop carrier following behind it.
A second Chimera followed the first, and a Salamander command tank was sandwiched between it and a third armoured carrier. Eight heavily laden trucks marked with the winged skull and crossed pistol symbol of the Munitorum drew up the rear, and a final Chimera took on the role of tail-gunner.
Two aircraft flew in overlapping figure of eight formation overhead, a Valkyrie assault carrier and a Vulture gunship, both painted in the pale blue and silver of the Espandor Defence Auxilia.
The convoy moved at speed, for the highways through the Anasta Peaks had proven to be a dangerous route for Imperial forces. Many convoys travelling from the planetary capital of Herapolis to the outlying cities of Espandor had come under attack within its narrow canyons and undulant slopes. The landscape was primal in its rugged splendour, high waterfalls and sprawling forests carpeting the jagged spire-like hills in swathes of green and crystal.
No sooner had the lead vehicle rounded the bend when it tripped a remote sensor and a dull cough of an explosion flipped it onto its side, a smoking hole punched in its underside. Rock dust and debris fell in a burning rain as the first Chimera gunned its engine, intending to punch through the ambush. Its tracks churned the road as it slewed around the deep crater torn in the roadway. A flurry of gunfire erupted from the timberline, sparking from its hull as the gunner providing top cover in the cupola swung his heavy stubber to bear.
Heavy calibre gunshots ripped uphill, tearing off branches and splintering ancient trees. Another explosion boomed and the surface of the road shuddered in a sine wave like a cracked whip. Cracks split the black surface and a huge section of road heaved upwards before plunging down into a giant sinkhole. The Chimera’s tracks bit the road, but it was too close and too fast to avoid falling into the giant crater the underground detonation had blown. It teetered on the edge for a moment before falling in, skidding over onto its side and coming to rest upside down.
Raiders swarmed from the trees, a mismatched host of savage kroot and corsairs in brightly patterned cloaks, ragged plates of armour and elaborate fright masks. Vile battle flags bearing a curved tulwar were carried by whooping warriors in tattered, patchwork uniforms, each bearing a bright blue headband, sash or belt. Hundreds of them spilled from the trees, firing wildly from the hip or hurling disc-like grenades into the battle. Heavy barks of powerful lasers stabbed out, slamming into the flanks of the remaining tanks in the convoy.
Defence force troops debarked from their Chimeras and began returning fire, filling the space between the two forces with sizzling blades of light and ricocheting hard rounds.
A bass thrumming filled the air as three heavily-laden skiffs swung around the bend in the road, skimming on rippling curtains of charged air. A cackling warrior in a grinning skull mask manned a heavy cannon on each prow. Streams of fire blitzed from the cannons, filling the air with a whickering storm of explosive rounds. Streams of shell casings spewed onto the roadway in a musical rain.
The first skiff exploded as a pair of missiles from the Vulture slashed downward and impacted in the centre of its deck. Its nose came down and ploughed a gouge through the road, spilling bodies and weapons as it rolled onto its side in a shower of bright sparks and flame.
No sooner had the gunners on the Vulture congratulated themselves on their kill when a trio of missiles spiralled up from the trees. The pilot wrenched his aircraft to the side and one missile arced over his canopy. Blisteringly hot flares popped from its rear quarter, decoying a second missile away, but the third flew straight into the intake on its port side and exploded.
The aircraft lurched and dropped almost straight down. One wing dipped and the burning aircraft slammed into the roadway with a thunderous explosion. Blazing fuel sprayed over the roadway, sending up sheets of flame. The Imperial vehicles began turning, but they weren’t trying to escape.
THE COVERINGS OF the trucks dropped. Instead of revealing tightly-packed crates of ammunition and war supplies, they were laden with a far more deadly cargo. The second and third trucks carried the ten warriors of Assault Squad Ixion, the fourth and fifth the gunners of Devastator Squad Tirian. With swift economy, the Devastators hefted their heavy guns and began shooting into the charging mass of enemy warriors.
Missiles and heavy bolter shells exploded amid the corsairs ranks, scything down a score of warriors in the blink of an eye. A warrior in a scarlet cloak and clad in armour of brilliant blue edged in gold leapt from the back of the lead truck and drew his Talassarian Tempest sword. Cato Sicarius vaulted to the road and raised his shimmering blade over his head.
“For Talassar and the Second!” he shouted, as his command squad landed next to him. Vandius unfurled the company standard as Prabian drew his power sword and Malcian fired up his flame weapon. A ragged mob of corsairs and kroot were advancing through the smoke, and Sicarius chose a kroot with a thick crest of yellow head spines as his first kill.
Without waiting for his warriors, Sicarius charged toward the thickest wedge of enemy as Ixion’s fighters clambered from the back of the truck and triggered their jump packs.
Gunfire reached up to them, but so fast and so unexpected was their assault that none of it came near. The unexpected presence of the warriors from the Ultramarines 2nd Company threw the enemy into disarray, but they were quick to recover and swiftly hurled themselves at this newly-revealed enemy.
The lines of Ultramarines and xenos warriors met in a roar of hatred, and Sicarius clove the Tempest Blade through the chest of the yellow-spined kroot, splitting him from neck to hipbone, before spinning and put
ting a plasma round through the face of another squawking kroot fighter. He grimaced with distaste as he dragged the blade free of the xenos creature. He had fought this mercenary species before, yet the stink of their vile bodies and grotesque appearance was no less repulsive. Prabian fought at his side, slashing and cutting with brutal strikes. No cunning or finesse in his blows, Prabian was a killer, pure and simple.
Scores of kroot surrounded them, a howling, shrieking mass of avian-featured savages. Their limbs were like whipping cords, and they wielded their bladed rifles and hunting swords with unnatural swiftness. One launched itself at him and its beak snapped on his sword arm as it rammed its blade into his chest. The metal shattered on the Eternium Ultra and Sicarius rammed his helmet into its face.
The beak crumpled and the creature fell away, but five more pressed in. His pistol took one down, his sword a second, but before he could kill again, Prabian was at his side. The company champion’s sword clove into a kroot warrior’s skull and before the dead xenos fell, the blade was ripped clear and beheaded another. Maldan cleared some space with precise gouts of ignited promethium as Sergeant Daceus drove the rest back with controlled bursts of bolter fire.
“Trying to win this without us?” said Daceus, his augmetic eye seeming to wink at him.
Sicarius grinned and shook his head. “I wouldn’t dare.”
“Damn right,” said his sergeant, speaking with the easy informality of warriors who have fought side by side for decades.
Booming explosions and thudding beats of heavy bolter fire ripped through the enemy ranks and a strafing hail of shots sawed through the wrecked skiff as enemy warriors took cover behind it. Sicarius looked up in time to see the Valkyrie swoop down, its engines transitioning from conventional flight to hover mode. Storm-troopers armoured in blue stood in the open hatches, itching to take the fight to their enemies.
A slender man in black armour with an eagle-visored helm stood in their midst, a combat shotgun slung around his shoulders. “Looks as if Governor Gallow wants to get in on the action,” said Daceus.
“Learchus said he was game,” replied Sicarius.
“Looks like he was right.”
Howling gales of downdraft sent up clouds of dust and cleared the smoke from the burning vehicles. Sicarius saw the surviving two skiffs easing themselves from the cover of the wrecked skimmer, bringing their main cannons to bear on the aerial assault carrier.
“Sergeant Tirian, take out that damn skiff before the good governor gets his backside shot out from under him.”
“Targeting now,” replied Tirian, and, moments later, a pair of missiles streaked overhead to slam into the prow of the skiff. Blooms of fire punched into the vehicle’s hull and it slewed to the side, a rippling line of tracer fire zipping wildly from its prow cannon and going wide of the governor’s aircraft. The vehicle sank to the road’s surface, its hull crumpling as its keel broke in two.
“Ixion,” said Sicarius. “Get aboard that skiff and get me survivors.”
“Understood,” responded Sergeant Ixion.
THE BATTLEFIELD WAS secure, the renegades dead and their corpses piled high on makeshift pyres. The kroot were disposed of downwind, the stench from their burning bodies too alien and too rank to be tolerated. Two skiffs were broken-down hulks, their hulls peppered with bolter craters and missile impacts. Defence Auxilia dragged the bodies of the enemy soldiers who’d tried to flee from the woods and flame units burned them to cinders.
No trace of such unclean warriors would be allowed to remain on Ultramar’s soil.
The third skiff had fled after witnessing the horrendous destruction wrought upon the second at the hands of Ixion’s assaulters. Dropping onto its buckled decks with roaring chainswords and booming pistols, the Assault Marines had made short work of the surviving crew, killing all but two warriors in a bloody melee that lasted just seven seconds.
“You were right,” said Governor Saul Gallow, a handsome man with an unruly shock of sandy brown hair and a winning smile. “They couldn’t resist such a juicy target.”
“Their commander was reckless,” said Sicarius. “They had attacked the same way the last three times and were sloppy.”
“Sloppy?” said Gallow. “They fought hard. We lost twenty men and several vehicles.”
“Acceptable losses,” said Sicarius. “The enemy now know we are not afraid to take the fight to them, and that will make them wary. And wary enemies are already beaten.”
Gallow shouldered his shotgun. “I hope you’re right,” he said. “We’ve lost six cities already, and they don’t seem beaten.”
“That’s because you are thinking of mortal warfare,” said Sicarius. “The Adeptus Astartes are fighting alongside you now. We do not fight like you.”
“I remember,” said Gallow, “I fought alongside Sergeant Learchus and the 4th Company.”
“Against greenskins. This is warfare of a very different kind.”
“I know that. I am not a fool, Captain Sicarius,” said Saul Gallow. “I am a planetary governor of a world of Ultramar, appointed by Lord Calgar himself.”
“Be that as it may, your forces are subordinate to mine. This world is an Ultramarines world. Understand your place.”
“I understand it well enough, Captain Sicarius,” Gallow assured him, an edge of steel to his voice. “But this ambush has cost lives, Cato, my people’s lives. I want to know they are not dying in vain. Lord Calgar would not want that.”
“Lord Calgar wants victory,” said Sicarius, irritated at the governor’s use of his forename. He made his way to where Sergeant Daceus had secured the two prisoners, and Gallow had to jog to match his strides.
“What is it you hope to get out of talking to these wretches?” asked Gallow.
“I want to know their leader,” said Sicarius. “Slay the beast and the horde will die. It worked on Black Reach and I see no reason it won’t work here.”
“I thought you said this was a different kind of warfare to fighting greenskins,” pointed out Gallow.
“It is, but that principle never changes,” said Sicarius, regarding the two bound captives.
Both wore patchwork uniforms of vividly coloured cloth, a riot of pinks, blues, greens and gold. It was offensively bright, and Sicarius’ lip curled in distaste. To fight such abominations was bad enough, but to talk to them…
One man had been wearing a helmet fixed to his skull by bone hooks driven through the skin of his temple, and his head was covered in blood where it had been torn off. A strip of flesh hung down on his cheek with a stained hook dangling like a piece of vile jewellery. The other was similarly attired, yet his weapons and adornments were of superior quality. The defiance in his gaunt features marked him as some kind of officer. Both wore brilliant blue sashes, the only unifying aspect of their attire.
“Before I kill you, I want to know the name of your commander,” said Sicarius.
“Voshad nether yousan pothai!” spat the first and Sicarius backhanded him across the jaw with enough force to shatter teeth, but leave the jawbone intact.
“Understand this,” said Sicarius, kneeling beside the prisoner and placing the barrel of his plasma pistol under his chin. “You are going to die. Speak words like that again and your death will be slow and painful. Now I ask again, what is the name of your war leader?”
“We is Bloodborn. We tell to you of nothing,” hissed the officer, his words halting and unfamiliar, as though it had been many years since he had spoken Imperial language.
“Then you are no use to me,” said Sicarius. His pistol flared, and the top of the officer’s head vaporised, spraying his compatriot with boiling blood and brain fragments. The man cried out and struggled uselessly in Daceus’ grip as Sicarius turned towards him.
“Ustras mithoryushad merk!” he babbled, the words spilling out in a terrified babble.
“Gothic!” thundered Sicarius. “I know you understand me, now speak!”
“I serve the Corsair Queen,” cried the
man. His face crumpled in terror, and Sicarius smelled the acrid reek of urine. He shook his head at the man’s craven soul. “Does this Queen have a name?”
“Salombar,” sobbed the broken soldier. “Kaarja Salombar. She commands the Bloodborn host sent to despoil this world.”
“Bloodborn? What is that?”
“The holy army of the Eternal Powers,” spat the man, some of his courage returning. “The Corsair Queen is our prophet, and she will see you burn in the fire of our master’s wrath!”
“Don’t count on it,” said Sicarius. “And she is what? Human, xenos?”
The man hesitated. “Human,” he said at last.
“Don’t you know?” said Sicarius, pressing his gun to the man’s temple. The barrel fizzed as the weapon recharged.
“No one knows for sure! Some say she’s part eldar. She’s quick like them, but strong.”
Sicarius stood up straight. “Tell me more of this Corsair Queen. How many warriors does she have? What are her strengths and weaknesses?”
“She’s clever,” laughed the Bloodborn soldier, resigned to the fact of his death. “Cleverer than you if you think she’ll face you in a straight-up fight.”
“Who said I was going to face her in a straight-up fight?”
“You’re Ultramarine, that’s what you do,” hissed the man. “That’s all you ever do.”
“Shows what you know,” said Sicarius, and sent a searing lance of plasma into the man’s brain.
SYSTEM SPACE AROUND Talassar was thick with electromagnetic debris and blistering spikes of residual radiation as the Caesar eased its way towards the latest world to feel the invaders’ wrath. Accompanying the enormous battle-barge was a small fleet of frigates and destroyers, clustering close, like cleaner fish around an ocean predator. In the prow of the battle-barge’s strategium, Marneus Calgar tried to take in the scale of the battle fought around Talassar.
Crippled hulks drifted in high orbit in a decaying trajectory, and the flaring bursts of damaged reactors bled into the surveyor readouts, filling them with hissing washes of static. The deck crew and augur servitors fought to clean the imaging, but a lot of firepower had been unleashed, and such weapons left a brutal afterburn in their wake.