He blinked as a fiercely painful sensation built within his skull, as though hot needles were being pushed out through his eyeballs.
'Oh, no...' he whispered, as he realised what was happening, and looked up into the face of Leonid, whose gaze betrayed the same knowledge that had just come to Uriel.
'God-Emperor, no.' wept Leonid. 'Not again, please no, not again!'
'What is it?' said Pasanius.
Before Uriel could answer, they heard the Heart of Blood roar in sudden awareness, sounding like a cry of unexpected pleasure.
'My old nemesis...' it rasped as the very air in the chamber became saturated with an electric tang of ozone and sulphur. Uriel felt his stomach heave and gripped onto the side of the bulldozer as the Hall of the Savage Morticians seemed to... shift...
The ground now felt soft and loamy underfoot, a weeping red fluid seeping upwards where his weight had forced it from the dark earth. Uriel looked up, already knowing what he would see.
Above him, a lacerated crimson sky, flecked with cancerous, melanoma clouds boiled, wheeling carrion creatures circling and awaiting their chance to feed. A familiar mad screaming, like the wails of the damned, echoed painfully, but it was nothing compared to the misery he had already seen in this place, and he pushed it aside.
Fleshless, bony hands reached up through the dark earth and Leonid kept his eyes shut tightly, holding onto Larana Utorian. Rippling spirals of reflective light coiled from the walls of the chamber, twisting the image of the rock behind like a warped lens. The walls seemed to stretch, as though being sucked into an unseen vortex behind, Until there was nothing left but a rippling veil of impenetrable darkness, a tunnel into madness ringed with screaming faces.
Brazen rail tracks coated in crusted blood ran from the previously impermeable walls of the chamber, streamers of multi-coloured matter oozing from the cracked rock.
With no eternal barrier to stop it from reaching its hated rival, the Omphalos Daemonium manifested within the walls of Khalan-Ghol.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Roaring from the mouth of the tunnel like a dark force of nature, the Omphalos Daemonium thundered into the Halls of the Savage Morticians. The armoured leviathan's mad structure was doubly hateful to Uriel now that a suspicion that had been nagging at the back of his head was horribly confirmed.
'It knew...' he snarled.
'Knew what?' said Pasanius, shouting to be heard over the howling roar of the Omphalos Daemonium's arrival. Uriel ducked back as the swirling red tendrils of smoke that were the hallmarks of the Sarcomata slashed past, carried onwards by the passing of the colossal daemon engine. It came to a halt before a newly-raised platform of bloodstained rockcrete with the sound of squealing iron and brazen roars, hissing souls escaping from its billowing stacks in shrieking waves of pain.
'It knew we would try to defy it.' said Uriel, sick with the realisation that they had been used. 'It knew we would try and destroy the Heart of Blood.'
'Then why did it send us here?'
'Because now that the psychic barrier Obax Zakayo spoke of is down, it can manifest within Khalan-Ghol. Remember the tale Seraphys told us? These daemons are ancient enemies and now the Omphalos Daemonium will wreak its vengeance upon the Heart of Blood for trapping it within that daemon engine.'
Pasanius turned as the Heart of Blood stepped from the crimson lake, its slaughter of Honsou's psykers complete and the promise of battle with its ancestral foe drawing it towards the seething engine. The brazen machine heaved with power and red mist writhed around its thick plates as the heavy door to the interior heaved open and the Slaughterman stepped onto the platform, the thick, clanking iron plates of his armour dripping with a black, oily residue.
The daemonic Iron Warrior was as huge as Uriel remembered it, its bulk made all the more massive by the extra plates of armour welded and bound to its fabric over the millennia. It still wore its charred and blackened apron, stiffened with ancient blood and reeking of cooked flesh and blood.
A crown of dark horns sprouted from its battered helmet and Uriel was not surprised to see that it still carried its murderous, iron-hafted billhook, the blade broad and crusted with aeons of bloodshed.
The Heart of Blood roared with mirth as the Slaughterman stepped into the Hall of the Savage Morticians.
'Is this what you are reduced to?' it bellowed. 'To wear the flesh of your gaoler?'
'Only live flesh left to me.' barked the Slaughterman. 'Enough words. I rip your warpself apart!'
The Heart of Blood broadened its stance and raised its enormous axe, cracking its whip and roaring its bloody challenge to the Slaughterman. Thick red tendrils of smoke coalesced around the gigantic Iron Warrior, becoming solid things of dead flesh and immaterial energies.
'Sarcomata!' snarled Uriel, seeing the featureless daemon creatures that had carried them aboard the Omphalos Daemonium's horrific daemon engine. Eight of them attended their daemonic master, each wearing a grey, featureless boiler-suit and knee high boots with rusted greaves protecting their shins. They carried knives, hooks and saws and, from the loathsome snapping of their jaws, looked eager to use them.
Their disgusting faces were red and raw, like the Unfleshed, but where the Unfleshed still possessed qualities that were human, even if they were only rudimentary, the Sarcomata were utterly flensed of the mask of humanity. Their eyeless faces were crisscrossed with crude stitches above their fanged mouths, and their narrow, questing tongues licked the air.
Uriel expected some form of retort from the Heart of Blood, but words were not part of the equation when it came to daemons of the Blood God. The Heart of Blood cracked its whip again, the barbed tip scoring across the Slaughterman's chest in a slash of sparks. The iron-armoured daemon roared and hurled itself from the platform and the Heart of Blood leapt to meet it, the two mighty creatures hammering together in a blazing corona of fiery warp energy.
Machinery was crushed and great, iron pillars were smashed aside as the two powerful daemons tore at one another with a hate that had burned for uncounted aeons. Deafening shrieks of diabolical weapons echoed as the cavern shook with the violence of their battle.
Uriel hunkered down against the bulldozer, realising that more than just the daemonic battle was destroying this place. He felt a bass thump, thump of impacts against the rock and smiled to himself as he knew what was happening.
'Honsou's fortress is under yet another bombardment.' he shouted.
Pasanius looked doubtful. 'The shelling must be incredible to be felt this deep.'
'Indeed.' agreed Uriel. 'Toramino must be attacking with everything he has.'
Rock and machinery flew, hurled aside as the two daemons fell back into the lake of blood. Geysers of flaming blood and flesh were thrown into the air and a foul red rain began to fall as the daemons tore at one another.
'Come on!' yelled Uriel over the din. 'We should get out of here. Toramino's army will destroy this place soon and I do not want to be anywhere near these two creatures while they fight!'
'Where do we go?' asked Pasanius as chunks of rubble fell from the walls of the chamber, smashing to the ground and throwing up huge clouds of debris and smoke.
'Anywhere but here.' said Uriel, nodding to the long passageway that led to the elevator cage that had brought them here from Honsou's chambers. 'If that elevator is still working, we can get back to where that silver-eyed daemon thing brought us into the fortress.'
He knelt beside Leonid and said, 'We are going now, colonel. Come on.'
Leonid looked up through his tears and Uriel saw that the colonel was at the end of his endurance. The
colonel shook his head. 'No. You go. I will stay here with Larana Utorian.'
Uriel shook his head. 'We will not leave you here. A Space Marine never leaves a battle-brother behind.'
'I am not your battle-brother, Uriel.' coughed Leonid sadly. 'Even if she and I get out of this place we will not survive more than a few days. The cancers the Mechanicus infected
us with are growing stronger every day. It is over for us.'
Uriel placed his hand on Leonid's shoulder, knowing the man was right, but hating the feeling of betrayal that settled on him as he accepted Leonid's decision.
'The Emperor be with you.' said Uriel.
Leonid looked down into the face of Larana Utorian and smiled. 'I think He is.'
Uriel nodded and turned from Leonid as Pasanius said, 'Die well, Leonid. If we survive, I will light a candle for your soul to find its way home.'
Leonid said nothing, cradling Larana Utorian's wasted frame and rocking back and forth.
Knowing there was nothing more for them to say, the Ultramarines turned and ran towards the entrance to the cavern as more of the Savage Morticians' domain was brought down by the battling daemons.
Behind them, Colonel Mikhail Leonid and Lieutenant Larana Utorian of the 383rd Jouran Dragoons held each other tight and waited for death.
Pasanius flinched as a huge cascade of rocks crashed down beside him, hurling him off balance and wreathing him in powdery dust. He coughed and shouted for Uriel as everything became obscured in banks of smoke. 'Here!' shouted Uriel, and Pasanius made his way towards the source of the shout.
He tripped on something on the ground and rolled, putting his arm down to push himself back to his feet and falling flat as he remembered that there was no arm to take his weight. He cursed himself for a fool, then saw what he had tripped over.
The gurgling form of Sabatier painfully pulled itself towards safety, its twisted, deformed body, dusty and covered in contusions. A great crater had been gouged in its back where the creature that had stepped through the portal had shot it, but Pasanius was not surprised to see that Sabatier still lived. After all, it had survived Vaanes snapping its neck like a dry branch.
Bone still protruded at its neck from that wound and Pasanius flipped the repulsive creature onto its back as it mewled in pain and fear.
'Not so proud now, are you?' said Pasanius.
'Leave Sabatier! He never did any harm!'
'No.' snarled Pasanius. 'He just gloated while my friends were butchered like animals!'
The huge sergeant knelt on Sabatier's chest, his weight alone cracking the hideous creature's ribs. A horrid gurgling burst from Sabatier's throat, but Pasanius felt no remorse for its suffering. It had stood and laughed as Space Marines were killed and for that Pasanius knew it had to die.
Keeping it pinned with his knee, he gripped Sabatier by the neck with his remaining hand and heaved.
The mutant's neck stretched and Pasanius heard the crack of splitting tendons before he wrenched Sabatier's head clean off. Sabatier's mouth still flapped, but no sound came out.
Pasanius had no idea whether he had killed Sabatier, but didn't care. To have struck back at it was enough. He stood and spat on the twitching body, stamping repeatedly on its altered limbs to crush the bones to powder before turning and hurling the mutant's head back towards the lake of blood.
If Sabatier could live through this, it would have nothing left of its body to return to.
'What was that?' said Uriel, emerging from the cloud of dust and beckoning him onwards towards the entrance to the tunnel.
'Nothing.' said Pasanius. 'Just some rubbish.'
Leonid stroked Larana Utorian's cheek, tears spilling down his face as the burning pain that had been his constant companion since he had been taken from Hydra Cordatus sent another spasm of hot fire into his belly. He knew that he did not have much time left - the cancers had devoured most of him already - and, looking at Larana Utorian, she did not have much time left to her either.
They were the last of the 383rd and the fact that they would die together gave him great comfort. He thought back to the men and women of his regiment and the last time he had fought beside them at the fall of the citadel. They had been magnificent.
Castellan Vauban, a courageous and honourable warrior. Piet Anders, Gunnar Tedeski and Morgan Kristan: his brother officers. And not forgetting Guardsman Hawke, the worst soldier in the regiment, whose unexpected depths of courage had very nearly saved them all.
They were all dead, and soon he and Larana Utorian would be with them again.
Colonel Leonid looked up, hearing a sibilant hissing, and drew a sharp intake of breath as he saw the two daemons stagger from the lake of blood. Both were ravaged and battered, their armours torn and rent by the mighty blows they laid upon one another. The violence of their struggle had devastated much of the cavern and portions of it continued to rain down in avalanches of rocks and rubble.
The Heart of Blood reeled from a terrible blow dune to it by the Omphalos Daemonium... the Slaughterman... Leonid was not even sure he understood the distinction between these two beings, or that he wanted to even if there was one.
The daemonic Iron Warrior hammered its long billhook against the Heart of Blood's unguarded flank and hurled it backwards into a giant pile of mortuary tables and swinging cadavers. Bodies and debris clattered down amid the ongoing destruction and Leonid saw the Slaughterman turn and cast its gaze around the chamber.
No, Ultramarines, you do not escape my vengeance so easily...
Leonid cried out as he heard its filthy, loathsome voice in his head.
The Sarcomata shall feast on your souls for all eternity!
Leonid saw the eight daemons that were the servants of the Slaughterman dissolve once more into their smoky aspects, swirling in the air for a moment before speeding after Uriel and Pasanius.
'No!' shouted Leonid in rage. 'You will not have them!'
The Sarcomata ignored him, too intent on their prey, until he remembered their hunger for corruption. Leonid pulled the frayed collar of his uniform jacket away from his skin, slashing the rusted edge of Larana Utorian's dogtags across a swollen, cancerous melanoma growing on the pulsing artery of his neck.
Polluted, dirty blood spilled down his skin, pooling in his collarbone and soaking his uniform jacket. He smelled its coppery, unclean stink and shouted, 'Over here, you daemon spawn! This is what you want, isn't it?'
Almost as soon as his polluted blood sprayed out, the smoky comets of the Sarcomata twisted in the air and sped towards him, scenting the malignancies devouring his body as the choicest sweetmeats.
Colonel Leonid slumped to his haunches and pulled Larana Utorian tight, reaching into his breast pocket and removing something round and flat.
'All dead, all dead, all dead, all dead...' whispered Larana Utorian.
'Yes.' agreed Leonid. 'We are.'
Red mist enfolded them, sickening and moist, then vanished in an instant, leaving the two Jourans surrounded by the cancer-hungry Sarcomata, their writhing-maggot touch stroking their swollen sicknesses.
The daemons bit and tore at their flesh and he cried out in pain.
For the briefest instant, his eyes met those of Larana Utorian, and he saw the last fragment of her mind reach out to him.
She smiled at him and nodded.
Leonid pressed the detonation stud of the grenade he had taken from the crushing machine next to Obax Zakayo, obliterating them and the Sarcomata in the white heat of a melta blast.
'No way out this way, Ventris.' said Honsou, gripping his axe and widening his stance ready for combat. The master of Khalan-Ghol and a score of Iron Warriors had emerged from the passageway just as the Ultra-marines had reached it, and Uriel saw that there was no way past them. The silver-eyed daemon-thing that had called itself Onyx stood apart from the Iron Warriors, its movements tentative.
An Iron Warrior with the brutal face of a killer and a mohawk stood next to it, a huge gun that resembled a bolter with an underslung melta pointed at the daemonic symbiote.
The cavern continued to rumble as the two daemons fought at its heart, but a stillness held sway here, as though the universe held its breath and awaited the outcome of this particular drama.
'It is over, Honsou.' said Uriel. 'Your fortress has fallen.'
'I can build another.' shrugged Honsou.
'This one wasn't really mine anyway.'
'True, but it's Toramino's now.' shouted Pasanius.
'Yes, or at least whatever his sorcerers and artillery leave of it once they have pounded it to rubble.' said Honsou.
The Iron Warrior pointed towards the ugly red skies overhead. Tell me though, is this your doing as well, or another of your master's sorceries?'
'My master?'
'Come on, Ventris!' laughed Honsou. 'The time for games is long past. Toramino!'
'We have no master save Lord Calgar and the Emperor.' said Uriel.
'Even now you play your games.' sighed Honsou. 'Well, no matter, it ends now.'
'Aye.' agreed Uriel, raising his sword before him. 'It ends with your death, traitor.'
'Perhaps, but you'll follow me into hell a heartbeat later.'
Uriel shook his head. 'You think that matters, amid all this? I will fight you and I will kill you. That will be enough for me.'
'Fight me?' said Honsou, spreading his arms to encompass his warriors. 'You think we're going to fight a duel? My warriors and I outnumber you ten to one! What makes you think I'd give you a chance to trade blows with me?'
The Iron Warriors aimed their weapons at them, knowing that blood was soon to be spilled here, but waiting for their master's command before unleashing death.
Pasanius leaned close to Uriel and said, 'You take the ten on the right and I'll take the ten on the left.'
Despite himself, Uriel chuckled and stood back to back with his oldest coMisterade.
'Courage and honour, my friend.' said Uriel.
'Courage and honour.' repeated Pasanius.
The two Ultramarines prepared to charge as the Iron Warriors cocked their bolters.
The Heart of Blood fell to its knees, the Omphalos Daemonium's billhook tearing into its warp-spawned flesh and opening a great gash in its body. Dark ichor spilled down its armour and its strength was fading: too long imprisoned within the depths of Khalan-Ghol had robbed it of much of its diabolical vigour and power. Another blow smashed into its chest, sending it hurling across the width of the chamber.