‘You still have not told me why you are here,’ said Macharius. Something about his tone suggested that an explanation might well be a thing it was in the hill-man’s best interests to provide.
‘Our watchers saw you emerge from the city. They saw your ships come down on the field. The people wanted to know who you are and why you have come.’
‘We have come from the Imperium of Man to bring the Emperor’s Law,’ said Macharius. ‘We have come to drive back the xenos.’
‘You will make war on the eldar?’
‘Yes,’ said Macharius.
‘I will take word of that back to the People of the Mountains.’
‘Will you aid us?’ Macharius asked.
‘If you fight against the eldar, we will. If you recognise our ancient claim to these mountains, we will.’
Macharius simply looked at the hill-man. He was turning over possibilities in his mind. I knew he was thinking that he did not know whether the hill-men had a claim to these mountains or not. He took only moments to consider. ‘If such claims are just, I will support them.’
The hill-man smiled back at him. ‘They are just.’
‘That must be decided at a future date after all claims are weighed,’ said Macharius. He spoke slowly and clearly, making sure his every word was heard and understood. He was not going to commit himself or the Imperium to anything as small as some hill-man’s claim of truth.
‘If you are a just man that is enough,’ said the hill-man. ‘I will carry your word back to the People.’ He looked pointedly at the Guardsmen surrounding him. ‘With your permission, of course.’
Macharius nodded to them. The hill-man padded off into the night.
‘He may be a spy,’ said Drake.
‘Of course he is a spy,’ said Macharius. ‘But he has not learned anything here that he could not have from watching us from the hills.’
‘On the contrary,’ said Drake. ‘He has learned who our leader is.’
Macharius nodded. We changed our position. That night we slept within the hull of the Baneblade. For me, it was like old times. I found being inside the huge tank reassuring. It had been almost ten years since the destruction of Old Number Ten.
For the next two days, as we moved through the mountains we were aware of being shadowed by forces of men. They could not keep up with the speed of moving vehicles, but the road was winding and they seemed able to scuttle directly over the high mountain passes. There was always someone watching us, but they never made a hostile move against us. Eldar flyers assaulted our column but were driven off by our fighter cover.
On the last evening before we reached the Valley of the Ancients, the night was split by columns of light and pillars of fire. Macharius had ordered the bombardment to begin on the eldar in the valley and Blight had obeyed. His ship had taken up a geo-stationary position in orbit and lashed the xenos below.
I stood on a ridge overlooking the valley and studied the fury of the attack. Missiles blew massive craters out of the earth. Energy beams turned gigantic eldar statues cherry-red. There were no eldar to be seen through Ivan’s magnoculars.
‘Blight has probably killed them all,’ said Anton. His voice was flat in direct contrast to his cocky and assured manner.
‘More likely they have taken refuge in the tombs and shrines below,’ I said. ‘They are supposed to run for leagues down there. It’s what we would be doing. I don’t think they are any more stupid than we are.’
‘In Anton’s case that would not be possible,’ Ivan said.
‘Ha-bloody-ha!’
‘They’ll come back out when we get there, no doubt,’ said Ivan. The light reflected on the metal of his face, making it look like some daemonic mask.
‘Can’t say as I am looking forward to facing them,’ said Anton. It was probably the first time I had ever heard him admit such a thing. There was something about the xenos which spooked even a man of his limited imagination. I ran the magnoculars over the valley again. Some of the grounded eldar vehicles lay like smashed insect carapaces on the valley floor. It looked like the barrage was not completely worthless.
I felt an elbow nudge me in the ribs. Ivan was pointing at something, and I glanced in the direction indicated. I could see we were not alone on the ridge. There were groups of figures standing amid clusters of boulders, watching the hellish firestorm below. It took me a moment to realise that they were not our troops, but groups of hill-men, come to observe this demonstration of monstrous power. They did not do anything threatening, but it was worrying that they had managed to take up their positions so close without us noticing till the last second.
I tried to tell myself it was because all of our attention had been focused on the valley below, but that was not reassuring. I should not have allowed myself to do that, to concentrate on one thing to the exclusion of all others. Such a lapse could easily get all of us killed.
I turned the magnoculars on the hill-men. They were all robed and cowled and carried autoguns and lasguns. Their attention was as focused as ours had been on the valley below, but always in the groups at least one of them was on sentry duty and looking in our direction. I doubted that we would be taking any of them unaware. I thought about what they were doing. Maybe they had come to watch the slaughter of the xenos, but it was just as possible that they wanted to witness the effect of the bombardment. It would enable them to judge the weaponry we had available to us and its effectiveness.
In this they would perhaps be foolish. It would not be a wise thing to judge the might of the Imperium by the barrage laid down by a single ship, just as it would be foolish to judge the strength of its armies by the size of the bodyguard Macharius had brought. Then again, these were the only indicators the hill-men would have to work with.
They did not appear hostile. Given the behaviour of the eldar, that was understandable. I doubted the xenos wanted human allies, and it was very unlikely they had done anything to endear themselves to the hill-men. Quite the opposite seemed likely. Not that it mattered. The attack was going to come soon. Sooner, in fact, than I anticipated.
The ground shakes. Buildings glow with a cherry light as the fury of the orbital bombardment descends upon them. There is a certain primeval loveliness to the effect. Nonetheless, I am glad I have ordered my warriors to await the conflict deep beneath the earth or dispersed them through the mountains far from the points of impact. They move quickly and once the bombardment ends will be able to return in force.
They intend to clear the ridges around the valleys and occupy them, so much is obvious. I will let them take the heights for a time. The entrances to the valley are narrow and provide a choke point where I can ensnare my enemies. Once they are in, they will not find it quite so easy to get out.
The trap is set. I will let these presumptuous mon-keigh enter the valley, and once they are within, my forces will emerge from beneath ground and the surrounding mountains and trap them. Our fleet will make sure their warship cannot intervene. This valley will be their graveyard.
I watch the bombardment continue. It is as I suspected. They are not hitting the valley with the full force of their weapons. For whatever reasons they wish to spare the buildings, or perhaps take us alive. There is no other reason so powerful a force would have been dispatched to assault the valley. They could just have bombarded us from orbit. Perhaps they realise how deep this complex runs. There is no way even the most persistent onslaught from orbit could affect us in the depths. Indeed, the great temple I have chosen as my headquarters is strong enough to withstand the bombardment easily. The massive external walls are warmed by the blasts, but the effects are barely felt within at all.
All they can hope to do is keep us underground while they advance. The bombardment will have to cease at some point to allow the human troops to proceed. When that happens we will emerge and slaughter them.
Soon my ships will engage their warship, and this time it will be in earnest. The humans will have no way to retreat off-planet. The time
will soon be here when this farce will be ended.
We had no sooner returned to camp than we were told to report to the command vehicle. We raced there and clambered up the side of the Baneblade. Macharius was waiting, looking relaxed.
‘We are going to attack tonight,’ he said. We all of us looked at him. It was pointless asking why. He was commanding officer and in no way obliged to explain his decisions. I thought about all the trouble we had gone to setting up camp, building perimeters, setting sentries. We were in a camp which had given every indication of settling down for the night. Doubtless that was what any enemy scouts were intended to think. It even explained why we had been given leave to go off and observe the valley. Our enemies would anticipate that the barrage would rumble on all night and the attack would come at dawn.
Macharius returned to studying his maps. There were three ways into the valley, only one of which was suitable for super-heavy tanks. It was not a situation that Macharius would like. It made his approach too predictable. At some point the bombardment would have to cease and the enemy would know only too well where to mass its firepower to meet us.
I was surprised to hear orders sending masses of the armour to the east, to an approach where the valley’s entrance was a choke point through which our largest vehicles could not pass. I wondered briefly whether Macharius had gone insane. I could see the others had too. Maybe he knew something we did not. Maybe he intended to place us on the slopes overlooking the valley where we could fire onto the enemy within. I slid behind the controls of the Baneblade, invoked the rituals and listened to the thunder of the drives as they fired up.
It was going to be a long night.
Eighteen
I was back behind the controls of the Baneblade when we moved off, our force divided into three parts. At least half our number were taking the obvious route, the one accessible even to the heaviest of vehicles, the main road that led into the east of the valley. Two smaller flanking forces were moving up narrow roads in the hillside on either side of the main road. Artillery was to deploy on the heights overlooking the eastern edge of the valley. Air cover was being held ready for the moment when the barrage ended and the enemy emerged.
We headed to the eastern entrance to the valley, and our vehicle was in the fore. The command Baneblade was even more heavily armoured than a normal super-heavy tank, and Macharius always liked to lead from the front. I did not see what good it was going to do. Once we reached the narrow defile we would be like a cork in the neck of a bottle, stoppering the advance of every tank behind us.
Still, it was not for me to doubt Macharius. I concentrated on the path ahead. At first it was wide. Rocks cracked beneath our treads and the Baneblade rocked from side to side on the uneven ground. I turned us into the defile that led into the valley, and the walls of the cliffs closed in around us.
Down the line of the defile was a narrow slit through which an angry sky was visible. It looked barely wide enough for a man to walk through, but that was just me projecting my knowledge of its narrowness.
The lightning of the barrage split the night, turning the sky brilliant momentarily and then leaving everything seem darker, as if the onslaught itself cast a vast shadow over the mountains.
In the distance, I briefly saw a distant peak illuminated by one mighty flash before it turned once more into a massive, ominous bulk.
There was another flash, more brilliant than the last, and the ground shook as if we were in the grip of an earthquake. The Baneblade shivered.
And then all sound seemed to cease. The world was suddenly appallingly quiet after the thunder of the great explosion. I felt the pounding of my heart in my chest. I became aware of the Baneblade’s engines once more, and all the normal sounds you hear in the interior of an Imperial battle tank. All of them felt shockingly loud as my mind sought to adjust to the comparative quiet.
I looked again, and it came to me that the mouth of the defile had suddenly widened.
‘Increase speed to maximum, Lemuel,’ said Macharius. I did as I was told.
Objects started to ping off the front of the Baneblade, making a grating sound. Something slowed us, and I realised we were encountering physical resistance as we smashed through large boulders and chunks of rock and broken statues, some of which we were grinding to dust beneath our treads.
I concentrated on holding our line. I could hear Macharius responding to incoming reports over the comm-net, and it dawned on me what he must have done. The bombardment had been concentrated near the cliffs overlooking the valley entrance. Under cover of it, siege engineers had been rushed forwards and planted demolition charges. The charges had detonated, opening the bottlenecks and leaving only rubble, which could be pushed aside by a sufficiently powerful vehicle such as a Baneblade.
We had gained an entrance to the Valley of the Ancients. I wondered how much good it would do us. Suddenly, contrails of fire lit the night. Thunderhawk gunships were dropping like meteors from orbit to aid us. The Space Wolves rode trails of plasma down from the sky in search of battle. Their course would take them somewhere into the middle of the valley.
It was as I had suspected – they were using our attack to cover their own.
The bombardment has stopped. That means the attack will soon begin. I smile, thinking about the trap I have prepared for these arrogant interlopers. Soon they will learn the meaning of terror. Soon I will feast upon their delicious agony.
I notice the changes in the topography of the map. My opponent is clever. He has used explosives to blast a clear path into the valley at what should have been a choke point. He has outfoxed himself. My plan does not rely on choke points. It relies on letting my foe into the Valley of the Ancients, on leading him on and letting him think he is victorious, only to crush him at the moment when he believes victory is within his grasp.
It has always been my greatest pleasure to lead my foes on like this. There is something that appeals to the vanity of every commander, to think that he is crushing his enemy; so few of them realise that they are not as clever as they think.
It is a mighty force my enemy has assembled. I can see the blocks that represent massive armoured vehicles moving into the valley and taking up position on its edges. They are getting ready to pour a hail of fire onto what they think are defenceless targets. I have left enough of my force within the valley to lend plausibility to this interpretation of the data. In truth, I do not have enough warriors left here to oppose my enemies directly, although I have a contingency plan in mind should things go wrong. All we really need to do is withdraw beneath ground into the subterranean labyrinth that runs so far beneath the temple complex.
I order my warriors to open fire on the incoming enemies. We must put up at least a token show of resistance in order to draw them in. They will be expecting some opposition and some opposition they will have.
I feel a surge of glee when I contemplate the punishment I will inflict upon these arrogant vermin. I will have their commander within my grasp. I have given orders to ensure that he is preserved so that I may feast upon his life force as it slowly drains away under my torture implements. Such a consummation is to be devoutly wished for.
The ground vibrates. The roar of weapons fills the air, audible even through my helmet. It is a reminder that battles are not followed merely in the mind, that all of those symbols dancing in the air in front of me represent real objects, real people, real bodies being reduced to pulped flesh and jellied bone.
Part of me wishes to rush out there into the chaos of battle and reap lives. I tell myself that there will be time enough for that later, that I must content myself with more intellectual pleasures at the moment.
I notice something new. On the display, flickers of yellow light are descending upon the valley from above. This is not at all what I expected; not cumbersome armour and fast-moving air support but something else.
The flickers descend with awesome speed. Their descent is aimed at exactly this temple, as if they knew where my
headquarters was and intended to take it.
I contemplate the possibility of treachery and dismiss it immediately. None of my warriors could possibly have had anything to do with these human apes. Could prisoners have escaped? Impossible! Perhaps some of the primitives above have scouted out our positions. There are tribes in those hills who spy on us. Even so, how could they know where I was? It is most likely pure chance. Nonetheless, it could prove fatal.
In the time it has taken me to assemble these thoughts, the attackers have completed their descent and I can detect the stutter of weapons on the roof of the temple complex. I hear screams and howled war cries. It looks as though I will get my wish after all; there will be some physical combat. I smile and unlimber my weapons. It will be a pleasure.
Looking down into the valley I saw the gods. Some of them glowed from the heat absorbed from orbital las-hits. They shimmered in the gloom. There were dozens more of them, carved from stone. In the darkness they were massive presences, humanoid, gigantic; something from a time before men had walked this world, when it had belonged to others, not as we.
The largest statues stood on a massive plinth in the centre of the valley, at the exact central point. To the north, a vast face had been carved into the side of the mountain. It looked down on everything, a blank, inhuman, mocking mask. Sheer cliffs surrounded the valley. In alcoves carved in their rock faces, more alien gods stood. Three massive temple buildings, curved in the eldar fashion, dominated the north-west, north-east and southern parts of the valley.
I could see that the gods were not human and had not been carved by human hands. They were the gods of our enemies.