“I could save them some time,” Curth said, “if they spoke to me. I’m a trained medicae, and I’ve been working here under these conditions for a long time. Various toxic compounds derived from natural sources here in the swamp habitat have remarkable properties that could benefit the Imperium. Anticoagulants, counterseptics, and several extracts that have particular efficacy in dealing with agues and xenos-derived infections. But that’s it. There’s no secret here. No miracle protection against taint. You resist the touch of Chaos by resisting it. You resisted. I resisted. And Gereon resists.”
She stopped her cleaning work and faced Gaunt. She was so thin and so ill he found her painful to behold.
“You did a noble thing Ana,” he said, “staying here to help these people. I’m not leaving you behind again.”
“Good,” she said. “I think I’m done. I think I’m worn out. I’ve prayed you would come back, Ibram. I know you promised, but there were no guarantees. It’s just something that kept me going. But I’ve entertained no romantic follies of a happy ending. Just an ending, that’s all I want now. An end to this. This place has nearly killed me.”
She sighed. “Is Dorden with you? Is he still alive? I’d like to see him. It would be good to see him.”
“He’s at Cantible.”
She nodded. “Turns out, I have a limit,” she said. “I’ve devoted my life to helping people, as a medicae. I left Vervunhive to serve the Guard, and left the Guard to serve the people here. They say that good works and selfless effort are their own reward. But this has been honor, without relief. It has taken me beyond a limit for selflessness I didn’t know I had. I am not rewarded by what I have done. I do not feel a better servant of the God-Emperor for it. I hate this, Ibram.”
“It’s over,” he said.
VII
Beltayn reported that the transports he’d signalled were inbound. A flight of Valkyries would be on station within a few minutes. Gaunt nodded, and went over to Criid and Mkoll.
“Is the section ready?”
“We’re ready to go,” said Criid, her face bandaged. “I’ll be glad to leave.”
“Make sure Curth gets on board,” Gaunt said to Mkoll. He walked through the waiting Ghosts, speaking briefly to some, and reached Eszrah.
“Are you coming with us?” he asked.
The Nihtgane nodded. “I am unkynde,” he said after a moment, struggling slightly to form his Low Gothic words, “and this world is ending.”
“Geryun, itte persist longe, foereffer,” said Gaunt.
Eszrah shook his head, and walked away down the platform walkway, heading out of the camp.
“Ten minutes!” Gaunt called after him. “If you are coming with us, you’ve got ten minutes!”
Eszrah looked back and nodded. Then he carried on his way, along the path into the swamp woods.
* * * * *
“With your permission,” said Gaunt, “I’m moving my force out and returning to Cantible.”
Welt was in one of the large habitents that the Inquisition had erected, reading through data-slates. Envoys, analysts and Inquisition troopers came and went. The place was well lit, and insect repellent devices hummed and crackled around the roof posts.
“The Emperor protect you,” the inquisitor replied. “Thank you for your contribution.”
Gaunt shrugged.
“I believe the work here will take some time,” Welt said, still distracted by the documents. “A grand undertaking, but a worthy one. Early results seem to confirm what we suspected.”
“Which is?”
“The resistance fighters, especially the Sleepwalkers, are the key. Their knowledge of the Untill’s biology is a vital tool. That’s why we needed you to make contact with them, of course. I’m sorry you felt used, Gaunt, but we needed to bring them out, and that meant utilising someone they would trust. I can’t imagine how long it would have taken to locate them in this wilderness otherwise.”
“For the record,” Gaunt said, “you’re wasting your time.”
“I know your feelings, Gaunt,” Welt replied. “If there’s even a chance, a hint of a chance, I must pursue it. It would be a crime against the Throne if I didn’t. Can’t you see that?”
“I suppose so.”
“The liberation of Gereon was always going to be painful, Gaunt. A place that has suffered like this doesn’t just pick itself up, dust itself down and get back on with it. It will take years. Centuries, perhaps. Gereon may never be what it was. But you must look at the positives. At least there has been a liberation. High Command regarded Gereon as an entirely lost cause until we presented good reasons for coming here. And if I find what I am looking for, the future of mankind will be more secure. Don’t bother yourself with the whys and wherefores, colonel-commissar. You got the liberation you wanted.”
“I’m not sure what I wanted anymore.”
Welt sniffed. “Carry on, then.”
Gaunt made the sign of the aquila, and left the habitent.
Away from the illuminated camp, and the light falling through the canopy space cleared by the Inquisition, the Untill was dark and green and quiet. Amphibians called and plopped in the algae-surfaced water. Moths billowed in the mist-threaded air. Insects crawled on the dark root balls and gnarled branches.
Eszrah carefully collected bark samples into one of his old gourd pots. His jars of wode, moth venom and other tinctures were now almost full again. This, he knew, was his last chance ever to replenish them. What he collected now would have to last a lifetime.
He heard a splash, and looked around. Sabbatine Cirk was walking towards him, shin deep in the green water. He stood up and watched her coming closer.
She came to a halt facing him, and looked up at his face, his eyes screened by Varl’s old sunshades. Eszrah had trouble reading people’s expressions, but it seemed to him that she wanted to say something and apparently couldn’t. After a moment, she reached out her hand, slipped it into his leather satchel, and drew out a single reynbow quarrel. It was a short iron dart, the point caked in venom paste.
She looked back up at Eszrah’s face, and half smiled. Then she turned and walked away into the swamp.
Eszrah watched her until she was out of sight. He heard the sound of jets from the landing clearing, and knew he was running out of time. He crouched down to collect the last few things he wanted: a particular herb, a particular snail, a beetle with a red diamond on its wing cases.
He was busy sealing the last gourd flask when he realised he was being watched. There had been no sound, but he felt eyes upon him. He looked up.
The man was standing amongst the trees facing Eszrah, so still and green and quiet that he seemed to be a tree himself, or a hanging bough. He was very tall, and slender, and clad in the wode of a Nihtgane, but he was no Nihtgane that Eszrah knew. He held a fighting staff in one hand, and the filthy remains of a camo-cape were wrapped around his shoulders.
He was staring straight at Eszrah.
“Histye, soule,” Eszrah said, rising.
The man calmly raised one hand and put a finger to his lips. Eszrah nodded. The man was looking past Eszrah now, looking in the direction of the camp.
Eszrah turned his head to see what the man was looking at in particular.
When he turned back, the man had vanished, as if he had never been there.
In the pale light of the clearing, the Ghosts splashed out to board the waiting Valkyries. The noise of the fliers’ engines was shrill, and shook the glade. The water shivered. Brostin and Derin helped Larkin cross to the vehicles. Gaunt saw Criid escorting Curth. Inquisition officers with light batons were marshalling the Valkyries, and directing them to their take-off point. Lamp beacons had been bolted to the trunks of trees around the clearing.
Gaunt had wanted to speak to Landerson before he left, but the entire partisan contingent had been interned prior to interview. The Inquisition was keeping them in a series of huts, under guard, and Gaunt didn’t want to jeopardise walking out with C
urth by making a fuss.
“Eszrah?” he yelled over the jet noise. Mkoll shook his head.
“I told him we were going,” Gaunt shouted.
“There!” Mkoll yelled back. Eszrah had materialised in the trees, and was jogging to join them.
“Come on!” Gaunt called. “We nearly had to extract without you!”
The three of them hurried to the nearest Valkyrie, where the Ghosts already on board reached down to pull them up through the hatch.
“What were you doing out there?” Mkoll yelled to Eszrah.
Eszrah calmly raised one hand and put a finger to his lips.
She heard the rising echo of the jet engines as the Valkyries climbed out of the landing clearing. The din faded, and the quiet of the Untill re-established itself.
The camp was a smudge of light in the distance, like a swamp light flickering beyond the trees. Where she was, it was so black the trees were like anthracite and the air like oil. Tiny white moths fluttered in the air like blossom. There had been white blossom like that in her family orchards once, all those years ago.
Sabbatine Cirk took out the reynbow quarrel. She held it in her hand for a while, and then pressed the venomed tip against the palm of her left hand until the skin broke.
With no splash, no murmur, and hardly any ripple at all, she slid down beneath the glossy surface of the lightless water.
VIII
Squally rain was beating down on Cantible when they arrived. The sky billowed with fat grey rain-clouds, and seemed soiled and dirty. There was a smell of thunder in the wet air.
The Valkyries came in over the town and dropped into a paddock west of the walls. The downpour made the battered buildings of the town seem more drab and lifeless than before. The paddock, and the neighbouring fields were soaking into an unhealthy mire.
Gaunt jumped out of the flier onto a field covered in puddles that were splashed and rippled by the rain. From the air, he’d seen the changes that had occurred in Cantible since he’d left. Repaired defences, the extensive facilities of the camp, the habitents and vehicles of the Inquisition. As the other Ghosts dismounted, he hurried with Mkoll to the edge of the paddock where Rawne, Baskevyl and Daur were waiting.
“Welcome back,” said Rawne.
“Anything to report?”
“Business as usual, sir,” said Baskevyl.
“Not our show any more, anyway,” said Rawne. “The Inquisition’s in charge.”
“Speak of the devil,” said Daur quietly.
Interrogator Sydona was approaching, flanked by his aides.
“This one’s in charge?” asked Gaunt.
“His name’s Sydona,” said Rawne.
“Does he always look so pissed off?” Gaunt asked.
“Now you come to mention it, no,” Rawne admitted.
Sydona came to a halt in front of Gaunt. Both men made the sign of the aquila.
“Gaunt?”
“Colonel-Commissar Gaunt, yes.”
“I am Interrogator Sydona. You have come directly from the Untill site?”
“You know I have.”
Sydona paused. “There have been urgent vox transmissions from the Untill site while you were in the air. My inquisitor, the Lord Welt, demands to know if you or any of your detail know anything about the events that have just taken place.”
“What events?” Gaunt asked.
Sydona looked a little awkward. “As I understand it,” he said, “at some time in the last hour, all the partisans detained at the Untill site for interview have gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yes. They have all disappeared. Despite the fact that the area where they were being kept was secure and under guard. Can you shed any light on this?”
Gaunt looked at Mkoll, who frowned and shook his head.
“I don’t believe I can,” said Gaunt. He started to walk away with his officers, but hesitated and looked back at the interrogator. “Tell your Lord Welt, I’m not finding them for him this time.”
IX
The next hab in the line was just like all the others. Halfway down street twenty-seven, it was a four storey residential made of rockcrete and grey stone. The driving rain made the flaking rockcrete look like putty. A litter of broken furniture and discarded household possessions lay on the rubble in front of the property. Inside, the rain had brought out a dank smell.
The stairways and halls ran the depth of the building. Rain ran in through the skylights high in the roof space, and pattered down into pools along the tiled hall. Caffran watched the drips falling like tracer rounds, bright and silver in the gloom.
“Hello?” Zweil called out.
They were getting tired and cold. “Lamp packs,” Caffran instructed. “You three sweep that way. You three, up there. Stay in contact.”
The section divided up. Harjeon, Wheln and Osket moved up the stairs. Neskon, Raess and Leyr went off to the right. Caffran continued on down the hallway with Leclan, Vadim and the old priest.
“Hello? Hello? I am an ayatani of the Holy Creed. I’ve come here to help you. Show yourselves. Everything will be all right.”
The rain dripped down around them out of the invisible roof. Their moving lamp beams wobbled and danced across the floor and the stained walls. In the corner of one room, they found a nest of old blankets and torn clothes that looked as if someone had been sleeping in it. In the next room, a dead man sat in a chair at a table, the corpse untouched for months, mummified.
They moved on.
“You feel that?” Vadim asked.
“What?”
“Really feels like we’re being watched.”
“Go slow,” said Caffran. Leclan crossed the hall to another doorway and his lamp flickered round to illuminate more debris and filth.
“Careful,” Vadim hissed.
Zweil shuffled forwards and cleared his throat. “Hello? Hello? Is there anyone there? I am an ayatani of the Holy Creed and I’ve come to help you.”
They waited. Caffran held up a hand for quiet. They all heard the tiny scurry from beyond the doorway.
Caffran slipped through the door into the chamber beyond. The floor was covered with broken glass and torn paper scraps. The remains of a bed or couch rotted under a broken window. There was a door on the far side of the room, half closed.
Vadim swept in behind Caffran, panning his weapon.
“You smell that?” he whispered.
Caffran nodded. There was a slight scent of burning.
He moved across the room, and found something near the collapsed remains of the bed by the window. It was a small fire, made of twigs, still warm although the flames had been put out. A shrivelled Imperial Guard ration pack, stolen from somewhere, lay amongst the heaped twigs. Someone had been trying to warm up a meal.
Caffran was about to call Vadim over when something he had taken to be a heap of litter beside the bed moved and fled towards the other door. Caffran cried out, and tried to follow it with his lamp beam. Vadim raised his weapon.
“Don’t shoot!” Caffran called out.
Leclan and Zweil had entered the room. With Caffran leading, they moved towards the second door. It led into a storeroom, a small chamber of rockcrete with shelves along one wall and an old cold store pantry beside them. There were no other doors, and the window lights were just slits high up near the ceiling. There was a powerful reek of human waste. Caffran saw there was nothing on any of the shelves, except a collection of buttons and bottle caps, laid out in rows in deliberate order of increasing size.
There was no sign of anybody. Caffran moved his lamp beam around. Leclan came in beside him.
“Pantry?” he whispered.
Caffran nodded. The pantry door was pulled to, but it was large, a walk-in larder where meat could be hung. They began to approach it.
“Feth!” Caffran exclaimed suddenly. Something moved under the lowest shelf. He swung around and aimed his rifle and his torch beam down at the floor.
The child was very small, twis
ted with starvation and disease. He was dressed in rags and his skin was brown with dirt. His eyes seemed fantastically big and wild, and he shielded them, whining, when the lamp found him.
“Feth! It’s just a child!” Caffran said, bending down to get closer.
“Father!” Leclan called. Zweil and Vadim followed them into the storeroom. The child tried to climb deeper and deeper into the shadows under the shelving, making animal mews of fear.
“It’s all right, it’s all right,” Caffran called, reaching out his hand.
“Everything will be fine,” Zweil said. “You come out of there, my young friend, and we’ll look after you. Hello? Are you hungry? Do you want some food?”
Zweil glanced at the others. “Anyone got a ration pack? Dried biscuit rations? A sugar stick?”
“I have,” said Leclan. He leant his lasrifle against his leg as he opened his breast pocket and fished around.
The pantry door opened.
The excubitor who had been hiding inside had a las-lock. When it went off, the noise in the confined space was huge. Zweil screamed in surprise and shock. The las-round hit Leclan, and took off the side of his head. He rotated slightly as he fell, and broke some of the shelves under him.
Caffran opened fire and cut the excubitor down with a flurry of close range shots. The impact threw the servant of the Anarch backwards into the pantry.
After the brief, furious gunfire, the silence was shocking.
Vadim went to the pantry, checked it was empty, and put an extra shot into the excubitor’s head to be sure.
“Oh, feth… feth, feth, feth…” said Caffran. He crouched over Leclan’s body.
“Is he-?' Zweil asked over his shoulder.
“Vadim! Get the others! Go and get the others!” Caffran yelled.
Vadim nodded and ran out of the room. A moment later they could hear him shouting.
“It’s no good,” Caffran said. He sat back from Leclan. “He didn’t stand a chance.”
Caffran rose to his feet and looked at Zweil.
“What a mess.”
Zweil didn’t answer him.
“Father?”