Desolane went to the day room to review security. Light spilled in through the barred windows. Assisted by a half-dozen warriors in enamelled green armour, three ordinals were sorting the report dockets and adjusting the light-pins on the chart table.
“Anything interesting?” Desolane asked.
One of the ordinals looked up. “A lively night, life-ward. Insurrectionists torched the temple in Phatima, and an underground cell assassinated two ordinals in Brovisia Town. A firebomb. Excubitor reprisals have been rapid and thorough. A decimation order has been placed on Brovisia Town.”
“Anything else?” Desolane wondered.
“This, from the south provinces,” said another ordinal, holding out a data-slate. Desolane took it and reviewed it. “Ineuron Town? Where the hell is that?”
“South of here, life-ward, in the marshlands, along the edge of the Untill. A minor farming centre. Last night there was a flurry of insurrectionist attacks. A great deal of damage. It is now contained.”
“You think so?” Desolane asked.
“Life-ward?”
Desolane tapped the slate. “Did you not study the detail? An excubitor patrol slaughtered in the farm lands. Las-weapons used. And a firelight against unknowns in the town itself that was so furious it woke the wirewolves there.”
“Local governance has control of the situation, life-ward,” said one of the ordinals.
“They don’t know what they’re dealing with,” Desolane growled. “Las-weapons? You simple fools! Since when has the underground been using las-weapons?”
The ordinals fell silent. They were powerful beings of great substance, but they quailed in fear before one of the Anarch’s own life-wards.
“Inform the office of the Plenipotentiary, but advise him we have the matter in hand.”
The ordinals bowed their heads and covered their mouths with one hand. “We serve the word of the Anarch, whose word drowns out all others,” they chorused.
“And once you’ve done that,” said Desolane, “get me Uexkull.”
Desolane waited for Uexkull in the annexe outside the day room. Two of the bastion’s antlered footmen appeared at the far end of the annexe, dragging the pheguth between them from the transcoding chamber. The pheguth was shivering and retching, barely conscious.
“Be careful with him, you idiots!” Desolane shouted. “Take him to his chamber.”
The footmen nodded, and began heaving the limp human up the marble stairs towards the tower room.
Fifteen minutes passed, and then Desolane heard boots thumping across the inner hall. Desolane rose, expecting Uexkull, but it was Mabbon Etogaur.
Desolane had divided feelings about the etogaur, but was prepared to admire him. Mabbon Etogaur had commanded many signal victories for the Anarch.
“Etogaur, good day,” Desolane said.
“Life-ward, my greeting. Is this fair time to talk with the pheguth?”
“Not the best. He’s been in transcoding all morning. He’ll be weak.”
“Even so.”
“Go on up. Wait for me, and I will take you in to see him.”
Mabbon nodded. “Thank you.”
The etogaur had been gone for five minutes when Uexkull arrived. Attended by a coterie of four Chaos Marines, Uexkull clanked down the long hall in his burnished power armour, vapour wisping from the smoke-stacks rising from his back. He towered over Desolane, but still made an effort to bow.
“Life-ward,” he creaked. Uexkull’s voice was hard as leather. Dry, stiff, calloused. “You sent for me?”
“Yes, magir. I’d like you to look at this.” Desolane handed him the data-slate.
Uexkull’s massive armoured hand took hold of the device almost daintily. He reviewed it. “Las-fire,” he creaked.
“Indeed.”
“A patrol annihilated.”
“It speaks volumes, does it not?” Desolane said.
“Ineuron’s a backwater.”
“Yes, but someone’s there. Probably because it’s a backwater.”
“Astartes?”
“No, I don’t think so.” Desolane said. The huge warrior looked disappointed. “But mission specialists. Guard. You know what to do.”
Uexkull nodded. “Find them. Kill them. Gnaw on their bones.”
“The last part is optional,” Desolane said.
“Consider it done, life-ward,” said Uexkull.
At Desolane’s instruction, the footmen had taken the pheguth out onto the terrace. The fresh air and sunlight seemed to rouse him from his sickness a little, but there was still a palsied droop to one side of the pheguth’s face that concerned Desolane. Perhaps they were pushing the transcoding too hard. The life-ward would consult a master of fisyk.
The terrace was a machicolated parapet crowning a huge talus at the north end of the bastion. The grey stone of the talus dropped away three hundred metres into the dark and ragged gorge beneath. From the terrace, unaided, it was possible to see nearly a hundred kilometres out across the heartland. The mountains rose, hard and angular, to all sides, and off to the west climbed higher than the perilous bastion itself, forming great, snow-capped summits that framed the distance in veils of icy mist and bright low cloud.
Beyond the rampart mountains, the vast farmlands of the midland bocage covered the land to the horizon with a lush green patchwork.
Desolane brought the pheguth a cloak. It was chilly on the exposed terrace, with a fresh, buffeting wind. The life-ward was sure that the pheguth would do nothing foolish, but instructed the footmen to lock the pheguth’s ankle-cuff to an iron ring.
“You think I might end my life, Desolane?” the pheguth asked. “Hurl myself into the oblivion of the gorge below?”
“I think it unlikely,” said Desolane. To have suffered and contended with so much only to submit now would seem… weak. And I do not believe you are a weak man. However, even strong men have moments of weakness, and the transcoding has not been kind.”
“You’re right,” said the pheguth. “Oblivion is quite attractive to me just now.”
“Perhaps conversation will divert your mind. The etogaur craves audience.”
The footmen led Mabbon Etogaur out onto the terrace. One carried a tray of refreshment. Then Desolane withdrew, leaving one footman to watch the entry.
Mabbon Etogaur looked out over the towering scene for a moment, then offered his pale, soft hand to the pheguth as he had done the day before.
“Sit down,” said the pheguth. Mabbon took a place at the other end of the iron bench.
“How is your health, sir?” he asked.
“Not as rude as I would like. I’m sure the psykers are trying to be gentle, but every session leaves me feeling as if I have been adrift in warp space.”
“Transcoding is a necessary evil,” said Mabbon. “Why do you smile, sir?”
“It surprises me to hear you use the word ‘evil’. I am well aware of its importance. My life depends upon it. If my mind cannot be transcoded, and its secrets unlocked, I am of very little use to you or your masters.”
“I believe you will be useful to me,” said Mabbon.
“Indeed? What shall we talk about then?”
“The one thing we both know,” said Mabbon Etogaur. “Soldiering.”
Ana Curth rinsed her mouth with the last water in her flask and spat in the weeds. They’d been confined to the grain silos for a day and a night, and the rancid dusty interiors—which by day became hot, sweltering, rancid dusty interiors—had made her hoarse and plugged her sinuses. She hoped to the God-Emperor that prolonged exposure to yeast mould and other airborne spores had not complicated the agues they would all be suffering from soon.
It was good at least to be outside for a spell. Bonin had found a small stone well at the edge of the ramshackle properly from which issued water that, if not exactly potable, could be efficiently refined using the decontam tabs they carried in their packs. Curth, desperate for air, had volunteered to go and fill all the water bottles.
br /> It was nearly midday. The sun was harsh and bright, and she was grateful for the shade along the track. Sickly trees clustered together along the side of the muddy yard, and insects sizzled in the merrymach and the hanging flowers. The yard, the morass, was slowly baking hard in the sunlight and exuding a strong, fecal odour. A stronger scent still came from a plank-covered silage pit halfway down the track.
But her mood was better, and it wasn’t just the open air. After a night of waiting, they’d got the message by vox just before dawn. Curth had been beginning to think that they’d never see Gaunt or Mkoll again. The sounds that had been coming from the town during the night…
Even Rawne had seemed alarmed. On another occasion, the news that Gaunt was dead and he was in charge would have been like all his paydays rolled into one. But not here. Not now.
The well was a little stone post over a drain grate, with an iron tap fastened to the post. Curth found it easily enough, clutching the empty water bottles to her body to stop them knocking. She pulled a few strands of weed away and turned the tap. After a moment, brackish water began to spatter out.
She unstoppered the first flask, filled it from the flow, dropped in one of the tabs from her pocket, then rescrewed the top and gave the flask a good shake to mix the contents. That was one. She started on the second.
Just as she was about to start filling the fourth bottle, she heard a sound that made her turn off the faucet and listen in silence. An engine. She was sure she’d heard an engine from the direction of the road. Traffic had come and gone through the morning, and each time they’d laid low.
Nothing went past. Just her imagination then, or the sound of the splashing tap coming back from the leaves.
She picked up the fourth bottle and reached for the tap.
A hand closed over her mouth.
Curth went rigid with fear.
“It’s me,” a whisper said into her ear. “Don’t make a sound.”
The hand came away. Curth looked round. Varl stood behind her, his finger to his lips. He saw the question in her eyes and pointed towards the roadway. She couldn’t see anything.
Varl edged round the well. His rifle was slung over his back, but he’d drawn his autopistol. He beckoned her after him. She followed, forcing her feet to remember the basic stealth techniques Mkoll had drilled into her before the mission.
They moved into the thicker undergrowth under the trees. The road was a sun-bathed space beyond the black trunks. Varl suddenly went so still she almost bumped into him. He pulled her down until they were kneeling in the weeds.
A figure moved past on the road, little more than a silhouette. The silhouette had hard edges—a pack, a helmet, shoulder guards, a weapon. It was moving slowly in the direction of the silos. In less than minute, a second figure passed the same way.
This time Varl got a better look. Gleaming green combat armour, unit patches of a shouting or singing human mouth on the shoulder guards.
A military outfit.
Varl squirmed forward through the foliage and got a view out down the dusty, sunlit road. About two hundred metres down the rutted trackway, a quad-track troop carrier was parked in the shade of some mature talix trees. A squad of enemy troopers—Varl counted at least a dozen—was fanning out along the road towards the silo.
What was this? A chance patrol? A betrayal? Or had they somehow given their hiding place away? Varl screwed his body back into the undergrowth and thought hard for a moment. Curth was looking at him, rising panic in her eyes. He couldn’t risk the vox, even a simple mic-tap. The hostiles had comm-sets and might well be listening.
He beckoned her again, and they slithered back the way they’d come, heading down to the path where the well stood. They’d have to sneak back around through the yard and carry the warning in person.
Curth grabbed his arm. Another hostile had just stepped into view on the overgrown path, near to the well. They’d put part of their force in through the tree-line to encircle the silos. There was no way, no fething way in creation, that Varl could get himself back to the agri-plex now without being seen.
He closed his eyes. Think, man, think…
Varl cupped one hand around the other in a curious conjunction of grips and raised them to his mouth. Curth stared at him as though he was a lunatic.
He blew.
At the rear of the silos, Brostin stood in the shade of the eaves. He’d told Rawne he was going out to take a leak, but he really just wanted to quell his cravings. He slipped one of the lho-sticks from their waterproof packet and put it between his lips. Ven had been straight as silver about this: no smoking, under any circumstances. What Brostin wouldn’t give to light the thing. And not for the draw of smoke. Not so much. Really, what he craved to see was the tiny flame cupped in his gnarled hands. Larkin often called him a pyromaniac. Like it was a bad thing.
“Of course, you weren’t going to light that, were you?” Bonin asked quietly. Brostin started. Fething scouts, popping out of nowhere.
“Course not,” he said.
“Course not,” Bonin echoed, leaning against the silo’s side in the shade beside him.
“Just reminding myself of the feel of it.”
“That’s fine.”
Bonin suddenly straightened up, listening. “You hear that?” he hissed.
“What?”
“That. Just then.”
“Mmm. Yeah, Just a treecrake. Nesting, probably.”
Bonin drew his pistol. “Get inside. Tell Rawne.”
“Tell Rawne what?”
“Since when were there Tanith treecrakes here… or anywhere else, for that matter?”
EIGHT
Close to the well, the enemy trooper paused and looked round into the undergrowth. He’d heard the odd, warbling call. He raised his weapon to his chest and began to advance.
Varl and Curth lay as flat in the brambles and weeds as they could. Slowly, very slowly, Varl slid his warknife out of its sheath.
The armoured trooper stopped suddenly, glancing down. Curth knew exactly what he’d seen. Ten Guard-issue water bottles on the grass beside the well.
Bending, the trooper reached up to activate his helmet vox.
Varl slammed into him, knocking him off his feet. The silver blade plunged in but glanced sideways off the shoulder armour. The trooper fought back, shoving Varl sideways. Undeterred, Varl punched the knife up under the helmet’s chinstrap. The trooper rolled away, clutching his throat. Blood was pouring out more copiously than the water had flowed from the tap. The man got upright, gurgling. Varl grabbed him by the shoulders and slammed him, face-first, against the top of the well post. There was an ugly crunch.
Varl caught the deadweight before it hit the ground and dragged it into the undergrowth. Then he went back for the water bottles, pausing briefly to make the call again.
Silently, spurred by quick hand signals, the troop patrol came up around the silos. Insects ratcheted in the noon heat. The heavy boots of the combat detail made only slight, dull sounds on the dry earth. Some fanned out along the front of the silos, others slipped down the track and came around the rear, panning their weapons. In teams of two, they came up to the flaking doors of the silos.
The long field ended in a line of trees, and was covered down its entire length by rotting propagation frames around which soft fruits had once been trained. A rotten organic mulch festered in the trenches under the frames.
Cirk took a quick bearing and moved the team into cover in the field’s hedge. They crouched down with her, two of her own cell members, as well as Gaunt, Mkoll and Landerson.
“We’re close,” she said. The road’s beyond those trees, and the agri-plex is down that way, about a kilometre.”
Mkoll nodded. That agreed with his own mental map, which was seldom wrong. The shifting forests of Tanith bred an unerring sense of direction in its sons.
“We should have range now,” Gaunt said. He adjusted his micro-bead.
“One,” he said. There was a pau
se.
Then a single word reply. “Bragg.” Then the vox channels went entirely dead.
“We’ve got trouble,” Gaunt said to Cirk.
* * * * *
The patrol commander, who bore the distinguished rank of sirdar, moved down the track from the road, checking his team’s disposition. He was sweating in the heat inside his taut combat armour and presently wished a doom upon this stinking world worse than the one his kind had already visited upon it. His unit, along with a dozen like it, had been called up from the Ineuron garrison first thing that morning with orders to sweep the surrounding countryside. A job for excubitor crews, not combat troops, surely? Still, the alerts in the night had been extreme, and word was the martial response had been ordered by a senior ordinal. Another report said that Uexkull himself was en route to take charge, and the last thing the sirdar commander wanted was to be found shirking his duties by that monster.
They’d searched six deserted farmsteads that morning already. This one promised no more than the last, but the sirdar had remained true to his briefing. They’d left their transport back down the road and advanced on foot in a quiet, spread operation.
He reached the yard, and was about to give the signal to enter. The pincer squad had now moved up from the treeline ditches, and the place was pretty much surrounded, although it seemed as if one of the squad was missing. Lost in the woods, probably. The sirdar decided that when the trooper turned up, he’d shoot him himself and save Uexkull the bother.
He raised his hand, then paused. He’d distinctly heard a vox signal, and it wasn’t from his squad. Only the resistance had vox-sets…
The sirdar commander felt a prickle of anticipation. They were on to something. He drew his sidearm, and then made three quick hand gestures: contact suspected, lethal force, go.
His troops went in.
* * * * *