Brothers of the Snake

  Dyognes cast. The lance went clean into the bull wyrm's right eye. It shuddered and writhed back.

  Priad had the final lance in his hands. He pulled his arm back and threw.

  It went right down the wyrm's gaping throat.

  As it fell, as it died, the bull wyrm blasted up vast wakes of water that smashed the skiffs aside and broke them on the stilts.

  The plume of wyrm-blood spread and marked the water for a kilometre square. The hookbeaks and scale birds rioted down to feed in their thousands.

  VII

  Ithaka. Proud Ithaka. Ocean world. Cradle of Snakes. The Apothecary kneels in the surf on the beach as the moon rises between the stacks of the Primarch's Causeway. Waves break around his bulky armoured form. He fills the ten copper flasks with the lifewater of the homeworld.

  It is time to ship out. The battle-barge awaits to carry them to a new undertaking. This is the last act before leavetaking, the Rite of the Claiming of Water.

  The Apothecary intones the litany, and the men of Damocles squad, each one in full armour, circle around him at the waterline, making the ritual responses. He hands each one his flask of lifewater. The last two go to the newest inductees, standing proudly in their polished war-plate. Dyognes. Aekon.

  The Rite is done. The Apothecary stands, screws up the stopper of his own flask, and slides it into his thigh pouch.

  'Ready, Brother-Apothecary!' asks Priad.

  'I'm ready, brother-sergeant,' says Khiron of Damocles.

  Part Six

  Blue Blood

  Undertaking To Lorgu

  I

  Bright as a serrated knife, daylight winking off its ridged bows, the Imperial barge fell away behind them until it was just a dwindling star beginning to set in the western sky. Far below, the shadow of their landing ship jittered and skipped as it pursued them across the parched, pink wilds of Iorgu.

  The land was cracked like scurf-skin, or like beach sand that had baked and crazed in the sun after the tide has withdrawn. Priad knew enough about Iorgu to understand that these seabeds had been dry for aeons and no tide would ever return. Every few dozen kilometres, they overflew a desert town or settlement: little clusters of white domes like brooches of pearls pressed into the pink dunes, or strung out along the lips of red-rock canyons, bone-white as crusts of air-dried salt.

  The lander shivered as altitude thrusters crimped and fired, nudging them northward. As the angle changed, rungs of golden sunlight stole in through the portholes and washed like slow liquid across the faces of the men on the starboard side.

  The warriors of Damocles squad were seated in restraint-thrones, back to back, five looking to port, five to starboard. They wore full

  Astartes wargear, except that their heads were bare. The ten, grim-visored helmets were suspended in hydraulic clamps above their thrones. Their weapons were locked in racks underneath their arm-braces.

  Priad slowly tore his gaze away from the desiccated landscape flashing by below and consulted the luminous red screen of the data-plate above his window. Bearing, height, airspeed, time to set-down...

  'Two minutes.’ he said. 'Activate armour.'

  A series of low whines answered him as ten M37 dorsal-mounted power units woke up. Priad immediately felt an enervating vigour throb in his ceramite-sheathed limbs; the reassuring surge of inhuman strength.

  'Is vital monitoring satisfactory, Brother Khiron?'

  'I have ten steady life-beats, brother-sergeant,' replied the squad's Apothecary promptly.

  'Ninety seconds.’ said Priad. 'Lock armour.’

  Hydraulics hissed and clanked. The ten helmets lowered onto the heads of the Marines. Most of the men wore their hair tied back or braided over their scalps, ready for helmet-fit, but Priad noticed how young Dyognes deftly scooped his glossy mane of black ringlets up under the lip of the descending helmet before it met the neck-seal and secured. Priad's own helmet clicked into place and abruptly he was breathing cool, internal air-supply and seeing everything through the bright green display of his visor optics.

  'Auto weapons check.’ Priad instructed, his voice an electronic murmur carried by the intersuit vox. The individual data-plates before them scrolled with diagnostic reports fed from their racked arsenal.

  'Run auto-sense target trial.’ he said.

  The plates flickered with rapid test patterns that measured and calibrated each Marine's targeting systems. Through his visor optics, Priad locked up six vari-range practice icons as they appeared on his data-plate, freezing each one in turn with a hard, white graphic cross. Satisfied, the plate responded by displaying a default aquila symbol. He muttered a prayer of thanks.

  'Set-down positions.’ Priad said finally.

  The thrones tightened their grips, clamping limbs, torsos and necks and rotating slightly into the lock-up position so that each

  Space Marine was firmly cradled and tilted back. As the thrones reclined, segmented blast shutters closed like eyelids over the window ports, shutting out the light.

  Thirty seconds. Priad switched his visor display to access the view through the lander's forward pict-readers. He saw emerald crags and a lime-green sky rushing past him, overlaid with rapidly changing graphics of trajectory, contour and flight path prediction. A column of numerical data crawled up the left side of the panorama. Priad knew the emerald rocks were really pink, and the lime sky really smoke-blue, but when the city came into view at last, he longed to know what colour that truly was.

  Outposts at first. Wide-spaced lines of towers set in the ragged basalt like fangs rising from a meatless jawbone. Thin ribbons of highways radiating out from the city. An outer ring-wall, tall and crenellated, then a great, shadow-filled ditch that the highways crossed on stilted stone viaducts. Steps of stone-built walls forming irrigated terraces teeming with lush doum trees.

  Then Iorgu City. Five hundred metre curtain walls, sloping gently inwards, smooth as ice. Defence towers sprouting like stalagmites from the wall's upper levels. Beyond the cyclopean wall, the hazy vista of the inner city: towers and steeples and domes clustered around the gigantic landmarks of the Imperial Basilica, the Royal Palace, the steeple of the Astropathica and, in the distance, the Sacred Mound, the only soft, organic shape in sight. The city was so vast that Priad was soon unable to take it all in with one look, despite the one-eighty degree sweep of his scope.

  A jolt. Braking jets. A rolling sensation of weightlessness as they decelerated hard, swinging south on a sustained burn of vertical thrusters. Now some of the towers were climbing past them, dwarfing them. Down below, on a wide platform of rockcrete ninety metres above the city floor, a star of landing lamps began to strobe-flash, the lights pulsing along the arms of the star towards the centre.

  Another judder of jets. A lurch.

  Fifty metres. Twenty. Ten. Two.

  There was a noise like an iron shutter falling, a violent jarring, and they were down.

  'Damocles! Disengage and deploy!' Priad cried.

  The thrones slammed back to vertical. Power feeds, monitor plugs and restraints disengaged in a series of pings and clangs. The hatches opened, lifting like trapdoors, five along each flank of the lander, and daylight flooded in.

  Sliding their weapons from the throne-side racks, Damocles squad strode out into the bright heat on the landing pad.

  This wasn't a combat zone, and they weren't expecting trouble, but even so they dismounted from the lander in standard assault pattern, covering each address with their bolters, sweeping and hunting for targets until Priad gave the word and they locked off their weapons and slung them up.

  The five men on each side turned and marched around behind the lander, coming together like the teeth of a zip to form a precise double-file.

  Dust swirled around them. They waited a moment as Brother Andromak raised the Chapter standard and fixed it between his shoulder blades so that it fluttered above his head. Then Khiron performed the water rites.

  'Advance!' said Priad, as soon as the ritual
was done. Ceramite-shod feet, marching in perfect synchronicity, rang on the rockcrete. The great brass iris hatch on the edge of the pad opened as they strode towards it. A tall, white-bearded man in an ornately braided dark jacket and white jodhpurs came out to meet them, flanked by an escort of sixty heavy guardsmen in patterned silk, spiked helmets with silver aventails, and salute-raised linstocks. The guardsman immediately to the officer's right held up a massive parasol of white canvas and rosewood to provide shade for his commander.

  'I am Seraskier Duxl of the Interior Guard,' the bearded man said. His face was lined from years in the sun, and nictitating augmetic filters of smoked plastic had slid down over his eyeballs. 'It is my honour to welcome the hallowed Astartes Iron Snakes to Iorgu City.’

  'The honour is mine, seraskier.’ Priad saluted, switching his suit-vox to speaker. His voice rumbled across the open pad. "We have come to do homage to your king.’

  II

  'I had wished for more.’ Priad had said in the dim, tranquil vaults of the Chapter House on Karybdis. 'Ten months have I spent, reforging Damocles into a fighting unit, and we are ready. But the inductees, Dyognes and Aekon, have never seen actual combat, and Khiron, though I count myself blessed to have him as Apothecary, has not worked with the squad in the field. I had wished... I was hoping... for a combat mission.’

  'I trust, brother-sergeant, that every Iron Snake hopes his next task will be a combat mission.’ Profoundly deep, and without the merest glimmer of light, the voice of the Chapter Master had welled across Priad like the deep, oceanic volume of proud Ithaka.

  'Of course, my master.’ Priad had said hurriedly. He had not intended offence.

  'We are sworn to duty, the duty of the Astartes, enfranchised to us by the God-Emperor of our race. We undertake each duty as it comes, and we do not question it.’

  Priad had bowed his head. 'No, of course not, my master.’

  For a long moment, Chapter Master Seydon of the Iron Snakes had remained silent, a gigantic shadow in the dim light of the temple.

  'Our duty is to serve the Emperor.’ Seydon had intoned suddenly. 'Our specific duty is to protect the Reef Stars. Iorgu is a principal world in that region. A proud bastion of Imperial power. I lament that the long, wise rule of Queen Gartrude has come to an end. It is appropriate for our Chapter to send an emissary guard to attend the coronation of her successor. It would be disrespectful for the Iron Snakes to ignore the event.’

  'I realise that, my master.’

  'I have chosen Damocles to perform this duty. To march in the coronation train. To witness the crowning of the new king. To represent our interests and demonstrate both our unswerving loyalty and the permanence of our vigil. Do you question that choice?'

  'No, my master. I was only saying that I would have wished for something less... ceremonial.’

  'I would have tasked you to combat, Priad, but the Reef is quiet for now. I know how you yearn to baptise and test your squad in fire. Do this for me now and I will find you your crucible. How say you?'

  Priad's pulse had been thudding in his temples. He had managed a smile. 'Damocles will go to Iorgu, my master.’ he had promised.

  'We will get fat and slow,' Brother Xander blurted, dropping his helmet and then his gauntlets onto a chaise. Until Dyognes and Aekon had been inducted, Xander had been the youngest of Damocles, and he still liked to act the firebrand.

  'Fat and slow?' echoed Brother Pindor as he disengaged his own helmet. 'Really?'

  'Figuratively.’ snapped Xander. 'Pageants. Pomp. Feasting. This isn't what we were made for.'

  Scyllon and Andromak growled their agreement.

  'I tell you what, Xander.’ said Khiron, disconnecting his gauntlets and flexing his bared hands thoughtfully, 'this is precisely what we were made for.’

  Xander frowned at the Apothecary. Khiron had an excellent reputation, and no one in Damocles squad questioned his ability, but he was still a newcomer, a stranger in the place of beloved Memnes. They were still getting used to his straight-talking wisdom.

  'How so?' Xander asked.

  'I suppose.’ said Khiron, 'that you long for battle?'

  'That is our calling.’ Xander nodded.

  'When the God-Emperor wishes it. It is our forte but not our calling.’

  Khiron turned to face Xander. The young, dark-braided warrior had a proud, glacial face and towered a full head's height above the grey-haired Apothecary with his narrow eyes and jut-jawed, bear-trap frown.

  'Our calling is the Emperor's service, brother-boy. He wills that we fight, we fight. He wills it that we stand respect to a coronation, we stand respect. He wills it that we support a toppling temple on our shoulders, we brace and take the weight. And if he tells us to strip naked and stand on our heads, that we do too. That is what we were made for. To serve the will of the Emperor.’

  Xander looked away. 'I stand chastised, Brother-Apothecary Khiron.’

  Khiron chuckled and smacked the warrior's arm plates. 'You just stand, Xander. That's all he asks.’

  'The area is secure.’ Natus reported to Priad. The sergeant nodded. The area was secure. The area was also dripping with opulence. Five communicating private apartments on the sixtieth floor of the lorguan Palace, draped in silks and coshiori embroiderwork, lit by glow-globes and glass-fluted wick-lamps. Every item of furniture was gilded and carved. Vast windows of tinted glass overlooked the city sprawl below.

  We are their honoured guests.’ Priad murmured.

  What is... this?' asked Brother Aekon, regarding with some confusion a soft heap of cushions and silk-cased bolsters.

  'A bed.’ replied Priad.

  'For sleeping?'

  'Indeed. There are ten of them, two in each room.’

  'Salt of Ithaka...' Aekon said. 'I would drown in that softness.’

  'The Iorguans don't really understand what we are, do they brother-sergeant?' said Khiron. 'They give us beds and fine state rooms.’

  'And food.’ said Priad, gesturing to a long side table where platters of fruits, breads and sweetmeats were arrayed. The bio-engineered metabolisms of the Astartes warriors could go without conventional rest or regular food for weeks. If pushed, a twenty-minute restorative nap, which could be taken upright with armour locked, and an intravenous nutrient pack, could prolong their operational capacity.

  'We are gods to them.’ Priad said. 'Legends from the stars. Most citizens of the Imperium go their whole lifetimes without seeing one of our kind in the flesh. They presume us to be men, yet fear us as deities of war.’

  'I would not disabuse them of either notion.’ said Khiron.

  'Maybe you see now why our attendance here carries so much weight.’ Priad said to Xander. Why even ten of our Chapter coming here and paying homage to the new king is a significant event. The folk of Iorgu will remember this time. The day the Adeptus Astartes set foot on lorguan soil in person to acknowledge their king.’

  At nightfall, a nervous troop of palace guards came and summoned them to audience. The sky outside had turned purple and the golden towers of the city glimmered in the last rays of the setting sun.

  Damocles had polished their armour to a sheen and wiped away the last traces of dust. A terrible hush fell on the huge audience hall as they marched in, three abreast, with Priad at the head. Five thousand people – nobility, dignitaries, city lords and servants – gazed at them in awe. Trumpets suddenly blared a fanfare and many people jumped.

  Led by Seraskier Duxl, a royal party approached to inspect them. Various silk-wrapped nobles with tall, soft hats; beautiful concubines in costumes made only of precious stones; brute bodyguards who looked like youths next to the towering, immobile Space Marines.

  And the king elect: Naldo Benexer Tashari Iorgu Stam, by the grace of the Golden Throne. A boy, Priad noted with disappointment, just a chinless, excited boy with a too-long neck and watery, inbred eyes. The furs and gold that clad him were worth the annual economy of some frontier colonies, and were so heavy, teams of silver
-painted children had to carry the train. Naldo himself floated on a suspensor plate that surfed him across the tiled floor.

  'I am honoured,' he said, his voice nasal and reedy, 'that you... mighty warriors attend me here.'

  'Lord king.’ Priad said, tilting his head to look down at his majesty. Priad's words rolled like distant thunder from his suit's speakers, and some of the guests shivered or gasped. 'In the name of Seydon, master of the Iron Snakes, in the name of the God-Emperor of Mankind, and in the name of my beloved Chapter, I greet you and do you homage.'

  He knelt, power-armour joints whirring softly. Even on one knee, he was at eye-level with King Elect Naldo. His majesty's face was a pale green blob in Priad's optics. Unbidden, automatic target graphics framed Naldo's visage with white crosshairs. Priad dismissed his visor's treasonous suggestion and the icon vanished.

  Naldo was looking up and down the ranks of Damocles with adolescent delight. 'You are all the stories speak of... and more! Giant warriors, all identically cast from the same great pattern!'

  Priad hesitated. Identical? How could this child not see the differences? Dyognes and Xander tall like oaks, Kules short and broad, old Pindor and the noble bearing of Khiron, Aekon thickset, Natus with his bionic arm, Scyllon whip-thin and supple as a lance, Andromak sturdy like a sea cliff.

  We are meaningless, he thought, a cipher. That's how they all see us. Interchangeable giants, replications without character. The wargear masks us so.

  'Rise, warrior.’ Naldo said, relishing the opportunity to give a Space Marine an order. Priad got up.

  'Join our festivities. Mingle freely.’

  The king elect and his entourage moved away. Conversation began to start up again, and musicians began to play.

  'Mingle?' Priad voxed suit-to-suit. 'What in the Emperor's name does that mean?'

  III

  They stood attentive and still for two hours as the gala swirled around them. Some guests ventured close and admired them as if they were statues. A few stole closer and risked touching their armour for good fortune or simply on a dare.