Space Marine Battles - the Novels Volume 1 Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Table of Contents

  Warhammer 40,000

  Hunt for Voldorius – Andy Hoare

  Illustrations

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Helsreach – Aaron Dembski-Bowden

  Illustrations

  Part One

  Prologue

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  Chapter V

  Chapter VI

  Chapter VII

  Chapter VIII

  Chapter IX

  Chapter X

  Chapter XI

  Chapter XII

  Part Two

  Chapter XIII

  Chapter XIV

  Chapter XV

  Chapter XVI

  Chapter XVII

  Chapter XVIII

  Chapter XIX

  Chapter XX

  Chapter XXI

  Chapter XXII

  Chapter XXIII

  Epilogue

  Rynn’s World – Steve Parker

  Illustrations

  Prologue

  Part One

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Part Two

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Part Three

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Epilogue

  Fall of Damnos – Nick Kyme

  Illustrations

  Prologue

  Act One: Emergence

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Act Two: Salvation

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Act Three: Sacrifice

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Battle of the Fang – Chris Wraight

  Illustrations

  Prologue

  Part I: Old Scores

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Part II: Waking the Dead

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Part III: The Closing Noose

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Part IV: The Crimson King

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Legion of the Damned – Rob Sanders

  Illustrations

  Anno Incognita

  Prologue

  Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Part Two

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Part Three

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Part Four

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Mysterium Fidei

  Epilogue

  Wrath of Iron – Chris Wraight

  Illustrations

  Prologue

  I: Planetfall

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  II: Underworld

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  III: The Machine-Spirit

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Death of Integrity – Guy Haley

  Illustrations

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  Malodrax – Ben Counter

  Illustrations

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  Pandorax – C Z Dunn

  Illustrations

  Prelude

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

 
; Part Two

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Interlude

  Part Three

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Part Four

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Interlude

  Part Five

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Postlude

  About the Authors

  Legal

  It is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die.

  Yet even in his deathless state, the Emperor continues his eternal vigilance. Mighty battlefleets cross the daemon-infested miasma of the warp, the only route between distant stars, their way lit by the Astronomican, the psychic manifestation of the Emperor’s will. Vast armies give battle in his name on uncounted worlds. Greatest amongst His soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bio-engineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Astra Militarum and countless planetary defence forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus to name only a few. But for all their multitudes, they are barely enough to hold off the ever-present threat from aliens, heretics, mutants - and worse.

  To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruellest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting gods.

  Hunt for Voldorius

  Andy Hoare

  ‘Once in every quarter century, the masters of the White Scars Chapter gather in the highest spire of their Chapter-Fortress, high atop the Khum Karta Mountains, to conduct the auspicious Rites of Howling. During this most solemn of rituals, the names of all those foes that have yet to be slain are read aloud, lest the proud and savage Sons of Chogoris ever forget their sworn duty to hunt down the enemies of the Emperor and of their mighty primarch, the honoured First, Lord Jaghatai Khan.

  The fell deeds of each enemy are recounted, and great and terrible oaths are sworn. But no vow ever undertaken has been as binding, nor as solemn as that made by Kor’sarro Khan, fifty-first Master of the Hunt and Captain of the Third Company of the White Scars. For it was upon the centennial feast of the ascension of the Chapter’s current Great Khan, the honoured Kyublai, that the name of Kernax Voldorius was read aloud for the final time.

  The name of this most vile of daemon princes appears in the forbidden histories and the folklore of a thousand and more worlds, though none save the most highly placed amongst the Lords of the Imperium know the truth of his deeds. So too was he known by other names upon a thousand more planets. On Kento he was called the Vindictor; on Loran, the Unyielding Storm; and on cursed Blindhope, the Executioner. The Elder-Lords of the Seven Outer Marches named him the Hand of Night; the Sentinels of the Eye, the Curse of Lost Gods. It is said that only the Hidden Masters of the Ordo Malleus know the daemon’s true name, and that seven of their number have fallen to his blade attempting to use it to gain power over him.

  But of all of the evils this being had committed, the name of one is whispered across a hundred sectors. It was the deed that caused the mortal Kernax to be granted ascension by the fell powers of the empyrean, and to take his place as a daemon prince of Chaos. Two thousand years ago, Voldorius brought about the wholesale slaughter of billions of souls, when he invoked the power of an ancient weapon created by madmen during the long lost Dark Age of Technology.

  That weapon was the Bloodtide.

  And so, Kyublai commissioned Kor’sarro to bring him the head of Kernax Voldorius, that it might be taken back to Chogoris, where according to the ancient ways of the White Scars, it might be encased in living silver and mounted upon a lance to be set upon the road to Khum Karta. Only then would the name of Kernax Voldorius be struck from the hunt. Only then would Kor’sarro Khan’s duty be done.

  Thus, Kor’sarro Khan, Master of the Hunt, undertook the greatest of challenges, a hunt that had defeated so many of his forebears, a hunt that would take him to every corner of the Imperium and beyond, over the course of a decade and more.

  The Hunt for Voldorius.’

  – Omniscenti Bithisarea, Deeds of the Adeptus Astartes, Volume IX, Chapter XXV, M.40 recension (suppressed)

  Chapter 1

  Thunder in a Clear Sky

  ‘Release in ten,’ the pilot announced calmly over the vox-net. ‘Drop bay portal opening.’

  Kor’sarro Khan, Captain of the Third Company of the White Scars Chapter of Space Marines, and holder of the honoured rank of Master of the Hunt, turned his gaze from the command terminal to the scene outside the Thunderhawk’s canopy. Flashing red lumens made the inside of the strike cruiser’s drop bay appear as a scene from the underworld, putting Kor’sarro in mind of the tales the Chapter’s Stormseers told at the great feasts. The sound of wailing sirens added to the hellish impression, sounding like the lamentations of the damned. With a grinding rumble transmitted through the hull of the gunship directly to Kor’sarro’s bones, the great doors below the Thunderhawk ground open. In seconds, a deep, metallic boom passed through the strike cruiser and the doors were fully open, the Thunderhawk suspended by its drop cradle above the yawning opening.

  ‘Portal bay open,’ the pilot reported. ‘Release in five.’

  With the drop-portal open, Kor’sarro saw for the first time the surface of Cernis IV. From this height, the land appeared white and serene, glistening with scintillating reflections of the violet lights that danced in the upper atmosphere. As captivating as the lights were, the Master of the Hunt knew that what created them represented a terrible danger to the drop mission his force was about to undertake.

  ‘Release!’

  An instant after the pilot’s announcement, the huge metal claws holding the Thunderhawk above the portal sprang apart. The gunship dropped through the opening with gut-wrenching force, the surface of Cernis IV leaping upwards to meet it. Kor’sarro fought against the staggering G-force to raise his head and look upwards at the rapidly receding form of the strike cruiser, Lord of Heavens. He noted with satisfaction the release of the other four gunships, each holding its place in the formation.

  The Thunderhawks levelled out. Rather than dropping straight downwards, each now arrowed prow first towards the surface. Already, bright flames began to lick the leading edges of the gunships’ blunt forms.

  ‘Gravimetrics picking up turbulence, as predicted,’ the pilot said, addressing Kor’sarro directly. The Techmarines had warned of the disturbance the gunships would meet as they undertook the drop, an effect caused by the complex interactions of Cernis IV’s many natural satellites.

  ‘Compensate as you see fit,’ Kor’sarro replied. ‘But keep us on target.’

  The cockpit began to shudder, wisps of flame dancing across the outside of the armoured canopy. The Thunderhawks were effecting their drop on a heading that no ordinary human troops could undertake, for the gravitational forces would overcome them long before the drop vessels touched down. The White Scars were no mere humans, however; they were superhumans, genetically enhanced Space Marines whose augmented physiologies could withstand such forces and more.

  ‘They’ll never see u
s coming,’ Kor’sarro growled, his words drowned out by the roaring of the upper atmosphere as it burned against the gunship’s hull. Kor’sarro longed to feel the earth beneath his feet, to breathe the air of the world below, to engage his enemy and complete the hunt. Though masters of the lightning strike, the White Scars preferred to fight across the wide spaces of a planet’s surface. Kor’sarro always felt a notion he imagined was akin to helplessness during a planetary drop. As the buffeting increased still further and the cockpit shook with mounting violence, the captain gripped the arms of the grav-couch fiercely.

  ‘Approaching overlap point alpha,’ the pilot reported. Kor’sarro caught the note of concentration in the warrior’s voice, the only hint of the tension the Space Marine must have been experiencing.

  As the gunship dived on and the surface of Cernis IV swelled to fill the view from the cockpit, the shuddering reached a new pitch. Kor’sarro saw that six of the planet’s small moons were rising, and it was this that was inflicting the violent disturbance as the Thunderhawks raced onwards. Although the Techmarines had predicted the effect, there was still a risk that the titanic forces might prove too strong for even the mighty Thunderhawks. At a single word, Kor’sarro could order the gunships to change course, coming about to a new heading that would avoid the worst of the gravitational pressures. Yet to do so would be to abandon the best chance of taking the target by surprise, for none could expect an attack to come from the vector the White Scars were taking. The target was far too valuable to lose, and Kor’sarro would take any risk to achieve victory. His honour, and that of the entire Third Company, depended on it.

  ‘Entering point alpha!’ the pilot called out, his voice barely audible over the roaring against the hull and the violent shaking of the cockpit. The turbulence increased by an order of magnitude as the gunship entered the point where the gravitational influences of the moons converged. Kor’sarro imagined his body was being pulled in several different directions at once, and knew that it was only his genetic enhancements that kept him conscious. He knew too that his survival relied not only on the Thunderhawk resisting the immense pressures that strained its armoured hull to breaking point, but also upon the pilot’s own efforts not only to remain conscious, but to keep the vessel on its heading.

  ‘Terminal point alpha reached,’ the pilot announced through gritted teeth. There was no turning back now, even if Kor’sarro had been willing to order a change in heading. He mouthed a silent prayer to the Emperor of Mankind and to Jaghatai Khan, revered Primarch of the White Scars.

  The view through the canopy was now entirely obscured by rippling white flame as the atmosphere of Cernis IV burned against the armoured panels. Kor’sarro’s enhanced vision protected his eyes from damage. Warning klaxons wailed as the forces outside took their toll on the gunship’s hull, which groaned audibly as it was wrenched in multiple directions. The temperature inside the cockpit rose to that of a furnace as the vessel’s cooling systems laboured to maintain survivable conditions. Sweat ran from Kor’sarro’s brow, obscuring his vision as he looked to the pilot.