Honour Imperialis - Aaron Dembski-Bowden Read online

‘Then hear me now.’ Seth knelt awkwardly, sliding down his staff to the ground. Thade winced as he heard the psyker’s knees pop. ‘The heretics of the XIV Legion are here. That much we know. But we have seen only the edge of their efforts. They will rise against us in massive force, and they will do it soon. All signs point to this… this holocaust.’

  ‘The main force of the Reclamation is only weeks away,’ Thade said.

  ‘The tarot doesn’t deal in specifics of time. Only urgency.’

  ‘And this was urgent, I take it.’

  ‘The last time I had a reading of this intensity…’ Seth trailed off, meeting the captain’s eyes.

  ‘Home burned,’ Thade finished for him. Seth nodded. ‘Throne in flames, Seth. I’m just a captain. I’ll warn the lord general, but don’t expect him to listen. I need more. What did the Astartes tell you?’

  ‘That he shared the same visions of what was to come. That he warned the brother-captain, who in turn has his men ready for whatever darkness is coming. And he showed me why the Raven Guard loathe the Death Guard above all.’

  ‘One Astartes Chapter is the same as another to me. Except,’ he clenched his teeth, ‘the Flesh Tearers. Do you remember Kasr Hein?’

  ‘I am unlikely to ever forget that place, captain.’

  ‘Ugh. May the Inquisition take those bastards. So, what’s in this for the brother-captain and his giants in black?’

  ‘Simply put?’

  ‘That’s the way I like it best.’ Thade was on his feet now, buckling on his weapons and reaching for his helmet. ‘And it looks like I need to meet with the lord general as fast as possible, so putting it simply is putting it briefly.’

  ‘Vengeance,’ said Seth. ‘They want revenge.’

  Thade smiled his crooked smile. ‘Maybe we do have something in common, after all. Revenge for what?’

  ‘The Horus Heresy. Ancient grudges. Principally, the actions of the XIV Legion flagship, Terminus Est.’

  ‘I pray that accursed ship burns in holy fire,’ Thade spat. The name of the Traveller’s vessel was a curse word on Cadia, long-hated for the ravages it inflicted across Scarus Sector. ‘What did that damned ship do to the Raven Guard? Poison their world the way it poisons all others?’

  ‘No. Their hatred burns over other matters. Terminus Est was responsible for the destruction of the flagship of the Raven Guard fleet during the Horus Heresy. That ship was called Shadow of the Emperor.’

  Thade paused. His eyes met Seth’s.

  ‘The Raven Guard ship in orbit is called The Second Shadow.’

  ‘It is,’ Seth said.

  Thade breathed deeply. ‘This is starting to have the ring of something rather fateful about it.’

  ‘It is,’ the psyker said again. ‘I’ve… heard a voice, sir. On the night of the monastery battle. It was just a wordless scream for help.’

  Thade’s jaw tightened. This didn’t bode well. Sanctioned psykers hearing voices tended to be sanctioned psykers that ended up shot in the head for their own good a short time later.

  ‘Fear not,’ Seth smiled his weak, unattractive smile. ‘Brother-Codicier Zauren has heard the voice as well. He hears it still. We are hearing some kind of psychic plea from Kathur, and it is being answered by something off-world. Something is coming, of that we are certain.’

  ‘Go to Colonel Lockwood and tell him everything we just spoke of. I’ll meet you both at the lord general’s briefing room in fifteen minutes.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Rax, come.’ Thade was already moving to the curtained door, but stopped to look back. ‘Seth?’

  ‘Captain?’

  ‘Bloody good work.’ And with that, he left, the mechanical dog stalking at his heels.

  Thade was halfway to the lord general’s prefab command centre when he altered his course. He called over the first 88th trooper he saw – one of Taan Darrick’s men shining his boots outside a communal tent.

  ‘Trooper Cerdock.’

  ‘Sir!’ Cerdock made the sign of the aquila. Thade ignored the man’s eyes flicking to the silver on the captain’s helmet.

  ‘I need you to take a message to Colonel Lockwood.’

  ‘Anything, sir.’

  ‘Tell him that I will not be present for his meeting with Seth Roscrain and Lord General Maggrig, so they should proceed without me.’

  ‘Yes, sir. What should I say if the colonel asks where you are?’

  Thade turned in the direction of the sleek, dark ship resting not far from the Cadian tents. The stylised ‘I’ of the Inquisition stood out along the vessel’s flanks.

  ‘Tell him I’m taking the matter straight to the top.’

  The inquisitor sipped his amasec.

  Thade had never acquired a taste for the rich spirit but he had to admit, as his own drink hit his tongue, Inquisitor Bastian Caius had superb taste – and naturally, no shortage of money to appease it.

  ‘This is good,’ Thade said with feeling, taking another sip. ‘Actually, this is excellent.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ Caius said. While Thade had told his story, the inquisitor had reclined on the soft leather chair in this, his sanctum, which resembled something between a personal library and a well-equipped study. The room, with its wooden flooring, wine-red carpets and antique wooden desk, looked utterly out of place on the inquisitor’s dangerous-looking gunship.

  ‘My own psychic gifts are not inconsequential,’ continued Caius. He looked at Thade, and the captain felt his blood run cold at the hard, inhuman glare from the inquisitor’s real eye and the false ones alongside it. ‘But I do not read the Emperor’s Tarot. And I am surprised your sanctioned psyker does.’

  ‘He’s unique.’

  ‘In what regard?’

  ‘Firstly, Seth has survived longer than most sanctioned psy-advisors in the Imperial Guard. Secondly, I have no way of judging it myself, no comparisons to go by, but officially, his powers rank him in the top tier of psychically gifted individuals suitable for Guard service.’

  ‘Ah. Not just a rank and file bolt magnet, hmm?’

  Thade smiled at the inquisitor’s use of Guard slang. ‘Bolt magnet’ was a nickname given to sanctioned psykers due to the likelihood they’d be put down by a commissar ‘for their own good’.

  ‘He’s powerful, lord. And useful. He is tested every three months for traces of taint, and is always utterly clean. The results show his will is strong, even if his body is not.’

  ‘A bolt magnet with a touch of something greater, it would seem. It’s rare to see one of the Guard-assigned psykers do more than kill himself with his own psychokinetic energy discharges.’

  Thade said nothing. That had almost happened to Seth on several occasions. The most recent time had only been the year before, fighting heretics on the hive world of Beshic V, when the sanctioned psyker had half-melted an enemy tank with psychic lightning from the aquila atop his staff. The crew were cooked alive in their armoured tomb. Seth remained unconscious for a week.

  ‘Well,’ said the inquisitor at length, ‘I will speak with the lord general myself. And the good brother-captain.’

  ‘Thank you, lord. He mentioned… hearing a voice, as well.’

  Caius rose to his feet, fixing Thade with an unsettling gaze. ‘Talk.’

  ‘A cry for help, apparently being answered from deep space. He has consulted with the Astartes psyker and they agree on this. But they can provide no details beyond that.’

  ‘I will speak with your sanctioned psy-advisor as well. Where did he first hear this voice?’

  ‘The cathedral district. The night we moved into the Shrine of the Emperor’s Unending Majesty.’

  ‘In the shrine itself? Actually within the building?’

  ‘You’ll have to ask him. He seems unsure. His powers are erratic.’

  ‘Very well. Are you
r men ready, captain? We move out at first light tomorrow.’

  ‘We’re all ready, lord.’

  ‘Then I will see you at dawn, Thade. But before you go, where in the name of all that is holy did you get that cyber-mastiff?’

  Thade looked down at Rax, who was sitting in silence, scanning left and right with mechanical slowness. Logging the inquisitor’s bio-spoor as a null target was the very first thing Thade had done upon entering the room.

  ‘We defended the forge world Beshic V last year. My enginseer found the dog in the rubble of one of the great factories and repaired it as a personal project. The tech-priests used them as factory guards before the war there. When we shipped out, the governor of the city gave him permission to keep it.’

  ‘I suspect there were bribes involved.’

  ‘Why, you might just be right,’ Thade said.

  The inquisitor nodded, all trace of good humour gone. ‘Very well. I will meet with Seth shortly. Dismissed, captain. See you at dawn.’

  Chapter IX

  Terminus Est

  The following day, as the weak afternoon sun began to slide lower in the sky, the Imperium of Man lost the war for Kathur.

  In the months after this chronicle’s conclusion, the Imperium would retake the shrineworld with almost no resistance. By that stage, the key figures of this record were, in most cases, killed in action.

  Imperial records would identify this date, this single day at the beginning of the Reclamation’s second month, as the turning point in the campaign. The personal logs of the soldiers on the surface said much the same, though in different terms. The recovered vox-record of events kept by Inquisitor Bastian Caius (deceased) of the Ordo Sepulturum stated the following:

  ‘Without the last-minute warnings given by Brother-Codicier Zauren of the Raven Guard, sanctioned psyker Seth Roscrain of the Cadian 88th and several of the Navigators aboard the Reclamation fleet, the orbital battle would have been lost before it even began. Their warnings, when taken as a whole, were enough to convince many of the flag-captains that there was at least the chance all was not as it seemed.

  We had no idea, of course. No idea from whence the threat would come. In the brief meetings I conducted with the late lord general, the available regimental officers and the flag-captains, the consensus that the main threat would rise from the surface. After all, the XIV Legion was already on Kathur. The pieces fit.

  On one level, it was true. The insurgence of Remnant and Death Guard forces within Solthane was on a level unseen before.

  But I had heard the voice. I knew something was coming from the warp. And though I warned the orbiting fleet to stand ready for battle, there was a certain laxity in their preparations. I was not enraged by this, but I admit to being disappointed. Several of the Navy officers had little fear that any threat would reach us before the main Reclamation fleet arrived – and several more simply did not believe a Chaos fleet would engage us over a world like Kathur. The Archenemy, they insisted, had already had its fill of the shrineworld. The corruption was complete, the blasphemy done, and the true threat was gone.

  So imagine our surprise when we learned the truth.

  Lord General Maggrig’s urgency to retake Solthane and land an initial spearhead force was admirable, but flawed. He paid the price for his eagerness. The fleet above us was far too small to repel an assault of that magnitude.

  And yet the defiance of the flag-captains whose vessels ringed the shrineworld was, for the ground forces, valuable beyond measure.

  The fury of their defence gave those of us on the planet’s surface the most precious gift possible, given the circumstances. The fleet captains could not buy us victory. All they could offer was time.

  The time to choose how we would fight back.’

  The recovered regimental journal of Colonel Jhek Antor (also deceased), Vednikan 12th Rifles, said much the same:

  ‘We’ve lost contact with the ships in orbit. Order has broken down. Under Lord General Maggrig’s orders, the remaining regiments have scattered into the city, dividing to minimise losses in case of orbital bombardment.

  What may have been a sound tactic in other theatres of war is a messy dissolution of strength here. The vox-network is savagely unreliable on Kathur – it has been right from the moment we made planetfall. Now we’re separated in a hateful, huge city filled with the dead, and we’re coming to realise just how much the vessels in orbit were boosting the vox signal with their onboard instruments.

  Vox quality has degenerated until it is all but useless. We fancy we can guess when one of our ships above has been destroyed, by the vox quality dropping another pitch.

  There was talk of something happening, something big coming to wipe us all out. The talk was right. The Emperor-damned heretic cult has risen up in anger against us. I curse the Remnant, curse the plague-slain, and curse the Death Guard that leads them both.

  Damn all that mess in orbit. Like we don’t have enough problems today.’

  The personal journal of Lieutenant Taan Darrick of the Cadian 88th Mechanised Infantry offered a much briefer summation:

  ‘I hate this planet.’

  As the early afternoon sun beat down on the capital of Solthane, three hundred men of the Cadian 88th were footslogging slowly through the expansive garden grounds of a reliquary spire that supposedly contained the fingerbones of Saint Kathur himself. They’d been in the field for over nine hours, having set out into the city at dawn.

  Inquisitor Bastian Caius was with them, his shoulder-mounted psycannon panning in mirror to the movements of his head.

  Colonel Lockwood and Major Crayce were just rolling out of the main encampment, kilometres away, thundering to their own objectives with a force of seven hundred men in rumbling Chimeras.

  Lord General Maggrig was within the main encampment itself, inside his command tent rather than the more formal prefab structure he used for briefings, poring over maps of Solthane and directing junior officers to move icons on the table charts to represent the positions of his forces.

  Brother-Captain Corvane Valar was deep in his daily meditations, kneeling in a simple robe of black marked with his white Chapter symbol on the breast. He was in his private quarters within the belly of the Astartes strike cruiser, The Second Shadow.

  Brother-Codicier Zauren was on the Shadow’s bridge, in full war plate. As space exploded before him and disgorged the Archenemy host, he shook his head with a rueful smile and whispered two words, too quiet for his helmet vox to amplify.

  ‘We’re dead.’

  The exemplar of the orbital defence was not (as might be expected from an Astartes strike cruiser) The Second Shadow. That honour fell to the Imperial Navy vessel Depth of Fury, commanded by Captain Lantyre Straden.

  Straden had been one of the captains to take heed of Inquisitor Caius’s warning and to firmly believe the threat would come from the warp, not from Kathur’s surface. So when the sirens started wailing and several of the limbless servitors connected to the navigation consoles began to babble and moan in alarm, Straden was not in the least bit surprised.

  ‘Well, well, well,’ he said at the blossoming warp vortex, bearing witness to the Archenemy ships spilling from the wound in space. Steepling his fingers, he lounged in his command throne, watching the view-portal for several beats of his calm heart.

  ‘Sir?’ asked a naval rating. Straden smoothed his greying moustache with his fingertips and nodded to the bridge officer. A grim grin creased his thin lips.

  ‘All power to the nova cannon.’

  Terminus Est tore a hole in the stillness of space, ripping back into reality with hull-shaking force. The ship screamed forward through realspace, trailing warp-tendrils of psychic fog the colour of madness.

  It was beyond big. The Herald’s flagship was bloated and vast, built to be a battleship beyond reckoning and swollen by Chaos in the ten mille
nnia since it first drifted from the orbital docks of the forge world that birthed it. Its ridged surface bristled with a thousand disease-caked cannons, each ready to fire. Its gangrene and grey hull was cooking as the last vestiges of the warp’s psychic touch fizzled away, burning the organic filth coating the ship’s metal skin. It took several seconds for the coldness of space to reassert material physics over the ship once again. The flames of corruption slowly flickered out, extinguished by reality.

  Like flies around a corpse, lesser ships orbited Terminus Est, still clinging close to the flagship but already beginning to form into attack groups. In the wake of the great vessel and its interceptor parasites, bulky cruisers emerged from the agonisingly bright slit in the universe.

  Three. Ten. Nineteen. And still they came, vomited forth from the empyrean and streaming trails of psychic fog as reality gripped them once more.

  On the reeking bridge of Terminus Est, the creatures bonded to their stations hissed and shrieked. Typhus rose from his throne and leaned on the guard rail surrounding his podium.

  ‘Surround them. Allow none to enter the warp.’

  It was an unnecessary order. The Chaos fleet had broken from the immaterium a considerable distance away, but the severity of their emergence warp-wound would play hell with the Imperials’ navigation systems. Interceptor fighters were already being scrambled. No Imperial vessel was going to be able to flee what was coming.

  ‘Report,’ Typhus burbled. The answer came from a mutated thing half-fused to its scanner console. Its voice was utterly human, though punctuated by hacking coughs.

  ‘A cluster of twelve troop barges… Six Sword-class frigates in orbital spread… Two Dauntless-class light cruisers in a defensive ring… Five Cobra-class destroyers… One Dominator-class cruiser in high orbit…’

  ‘They are nothing to us. But that,’ pointed Typhus, aiming his Manreaper scythe at the cavernous viewscreen. ‘What is that?’

  ‘Astartes strike cruiser, great Herald...’ the once-human creature choked out. ‘Identified as The Second Shadow, Raven Guard allegiance–’