Shadow Captain - David Annandale Read online

  Alathannas’s relief was as evident as his tension had been. Krevaan began to feel contempt for this warrior, along with suspicion. He was giving too much away. He should not be so easily read by an opponent. ‘You will liaise?’ Krevaan asked. He looked beyond Alathannas to the eldar host. One figure stood apart, its armour more ornate. You, Krevann thought. You are the commander.

  The warrior said something to Alathannas, and though Krevaan could not understand the words, he sensed that they were spoken for his benefit. The voice was female, and rich in authority.

  Alathannas acknowledged the commander with a solemn nod. To Krevaan, he said, ‘I will be the bridge between our people.’

  ‘You understand that you are standing on Imperial soil?’

  ‘I do. We all do.’

  The agreement was too quick in coming. I see, Krevaan thought. You were passing by, noticed the orks invading an Imperial world, and decided to give your lives in an act of transcendent selflessness. Alathannas was lying.

  Krevaan added that fragment of information to his store. Then he said, ‘Then I believe cooperation is possible. Speak to your commander. We should discuss our next move.’

  ‘Did he believe you?’ Eleira asked when Alathannas returned. She removed her helmet.

  ‘He will work with us, autarch.’

  ‘That is an equivocation.’

  ‘I apologise. I don’t know whether he believed me or not. He has extraordinary self-discipline.’

  ‘For a mon-keigh.’

  Alathannas bowed his head. ‘I used body language that should have been interpreted as great eagerness and a certain naiveté. If he thinks his judgement superior to mine, I think he will trust me more. Or at least distrust me less. But I could not tell what he was thinking. I have failed in that regard.’

  Eleira drummed her gauntleted fingers once against her armoured thigh. ‘You have had much experience with the mon-keigh on your travels, ranger. I would have thought it useful at a time such as this.’

  ‘I have never encountered a human like this one.’

  ‘Then we are hardly better off.’

  ‘With respect, autarch, we are still alive, capable of fighting, and the orks have not taken the city.’

  ‘But now the forces of the mon-keigh are involved.’

  ‘The city was always in their hands. What is different? With their help, we might be able to stop the orks.’

  ‘That is not our only goal,’ the autarch reminded him. ‘You are far too sanguine about the human occupation. I wonder if you have been too long within their influence.’

  It was difficult to remain upright beneath her gaze. Defiance was out of the question. Eleira’s centuries were visible in the scars she had acquired in countless battles. Their lines, most faint, some fresh, made her face a tapestry of war, and accentuated the sharpness of her skull. Her age was most apparent, though, in her eyes. They had accumulated so much experience, so much pain, and so much anger, that they were the colour of cold metal. They had had all hope scoured from them.

  Alathannas chose to think that this absence was an error. He had no illusions about humans. They were a race of violence and waste, one that could be trusted to act, with demoralising consistency, against its own interests. That self-destructive instinct would make them merely pathetic if it did not also have catastrophic results for the rest of the galaxy. Alathannas knew all this, but he had also encountered individual humans who shared his desire to hope. Small as those slivers of optimism were, they were no less real. The alliance he had just forged was of the moment, yes. It was driven by necessity, riven by mistrust. But it had already produced a tangible result. That was worth something.

  He wished he could be certain what it was worth.

  ‘If you think my judgement is flawed,’ he said to the autarch, ‘then disregard it. But please consider the fact that we are having this conversation. If these humans had not arrived, we would have failed in every aspect of our mission. We would be dead, and the orks would be in the city. How long would it be before what we fear came to pass? The effect on the orks is already great. It is calling them. They–’

  Eleira held up a hand, silencing him. ‘What do you take me for?’

  ‘I–’

  ‘Do you think I am unaware of our situation?’

  ‘No, autarch. I know that you are.’

  ‘Then spare me your lectures.’ She gestured to Passavan, who stood a few metres behind. The farseer left the side of his jetbike to join them. As far down the path of the seer as he had travelled, he was still young. There was still a healthy materiality to his frame and his flesh. ‘Your evaluation of our current path,’ Eleira said.

  ‘The skein is tangled with disaster.’

  When Eleira turned to look at the farseer, her lips thin with displeasure, Alathannas saw how exhausted she was. ‘I could have told you that myself,’ she said to Passavan.

  Passavan bowed his head. ‘I understand. I wish I could be more precise. But the path we are walking is so frayed, so crossed with conditions and divergence, that any outcome beyond the most immediate is impossible to divine.’

  Eleira snorted. ‘I can divine that if we open fire on the force before us, we will be annihilated. You will have to do better. I need to know if this path has a chance of succeeding where it matters most.’

  Passavan said, ‘There is a chance.’ He did not sound happy.

  ‘But?’

  ‘The route there is so reliant on elements beyond our control. There is very little we can do at this stage to be assured of its outcome. The alliance that lies before us is, however, the only path that has even a remote possibility of success.’

  ‘We will have to walk carefully, then.’

  ‘Yes. I will guide us as much as I can. But no matter how cautiously we tread…’

  ‘Yes,’ said Eleira. ‘That might not make any difference.’ She looked at the humans on the other side of the square. ‘Well. So much for choice, then.’ To Alathannas she said, ‘Do what you can to earn their trust. Without it, much more than our lives is forfeit.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  The task he had set himself was futile. Behrasi knew this. Even so, he tried to divine the reasons behind Krevaan’s move.

  Eighth Company was back at its original base in the land to the south of Reclamation. Behrasi stood outside the command tent, waiting for the Shadow Captain to finish speaking with the commanders of the other missions. Contact had been re-established with Temur Khan and the White Scars. This was a good sign.

  Being outside the city, with the eldar inside, on the other hand, was less reassuring. The situation was also too bizarre for Behrasi to dismiss it as a disaster. They had not been forced out, after all. The departure had been Krevaan’s decision. It was the most baffling one that Behrasi had ever known him to make. ‘The orks have a long road to travel,’ Krevaan had said, as the Raven Guard and the eldar discussed strategy. ‘But they will come. We need a more detailed sense of the environs.’

  The leader of the eldar had said something to Alathannas. ‘The city must be protected,’ he had translated.

  And then Krevaan had said, ‘We will leave it in your care.’ The reaction among the other Raven Guard was one of acute discomfort. The move went against every instinct. It had also not gone over well with the authorities in Reclamation. Governor Kesmir had come to meet Eighth Company as it marched towards the southern exit from the city. He had been accompanied by Cardinal Reithner. The ecclesiarch had been apoplectic.

  Krevaan had stood and listened to the duo’s remonstrations for precisely one minute. At the sixty-first second, he had said, ‘My decision is final.’ Then he had resumed walking, and ignored the indignant squawks of the two mortals. They had howled, and the selfishness of their fears had been so clear that Behrasi had, for a moment, rejoiced in the fact that he and his brothers were leaving these
two bellowing non-combatants to what they believed to be their fates.

  Now, though, his concern had returned with a vengeance. Around him, most of the other sergeants were pacing. Some spoke in groups of two or three. Others kept their thoughts to themselves. Caeligus moved between all of them, demanding answers that none could give. At last, he reached Behrasi’s position.

  ‘What is he thinking?’ Caeligus said.

  ‘You don’t really expect me to know that.’

  ‘Do you realise what we’re risking?’ Caeligus wasn’t listening. ‘How can we walk away from–’

  ‘Brother,’ Behrasi interrupted. He clamped a hand on Caeligus’s shoulder, hard enough to jolt the other out of his rant. ‘Yes. I am aware of the risk.’

  ‘We have to do something.’

  Behrasi hissed, ‘What are you saying?’ Now he was furious. Caeligus was one very small step away from outright mutiny.

  The other sergeant seemed to realise this. He looked at Behrasi as if he hadn’t been seeing him properly until this moment. ‘Your pardon, brother,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what I was saying.’

  ‘Clearly not.’

  Caeligus sighed. ‘That was frustration and ignorance talking. Not me.’

  ‘It was your voice.’

  ‘Yes.’ He paused, looking towards the lights of Reclamation. ‘But why, in the name of the Emperor, would he have us leave the city?’

  ‘The city is not the mission,’ Behrasi said. He felt that he was on the edge of revelation.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The city is not our mission. It never was. Remember the larger goal, brother. The orks are our target, and even then in the service of luring the Overfiend. In that context, the city is unimportant. We could achieve our strategic ends even if the city were destroyed.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Caeligus admitted. ‘But how is our greater purpose served by leaving the eldar in control?’

  Behrasi had no answer. He knew he was right, though. He struggled to grasp the truth that hovered just at the limit of his reach.

  Krevaan stepped out of the command tent. ‘Please join me, brother-sergeants,’ he said.

  Inside, the tacticarium table’s hololith was showing the landscape to the east and north of Reclamation. ‘The greenskins have been busy,’ Krevaan said. ‘So have our allies. Vox contact has been restored. The White Scars have destroyed their manufactorum on the moon. They have also managed to kill a powerful ork psyker.’

  ‘That is welcome news,’ Sergeant Klijuun said.

  ‘Not all of it is. The ork engineer escaped. Temur Khan believes that it has teleported to a planetside location.’

  Caeligus said, ‘I don’t see how a single ork tech is of much concern.’

  ‘This one is. You have paid attention to the tanks we have seen here?’

  ‘They do seem bigger and more resilient,’ Caeligus admitted. ‘But they are not indestructible.’

  ‘But do you know how the ork heavy armour has been arriving on Lepidus?’ Krevaan asked. ‘It was being teleported. Do you know what powered the teleporter? A device that turned dozens of captured eldar psykers into a massive battery.’

  ‘An ork did that?’ Behrasi was stunned.

  ‘In cooperation with the witch, yes.’

  ‘If the manufactorum is destroyed,’ Caeligus said, ‘surely the principal means by which this ork could trouble us are gone too.’

  Krevaan gave him a sharp look. ‘Do you speak from a position of knowledge, brother-sergeant?’

  ‘No.’ Caeligus looked defiant. ‘I am basing my conclusion on what we do know.’

  ‘What we know is that these orks are far more unpredictable, powerful and resourceful than we could have imagined. They had a Stompa on the moon. I, for one, would have been surprised by the sudden arrival of that war machine. Surprise is what we inflict on our enemies. I do not accept being subject to it.’ He turned from Caeligus and addressed the sergeants as a group. ‘We will assume that the greenskin engineer is here, and active in the ork campaign. Expect an increase in heavy armour.’

  Caeligus looked like he was on the verge of saying something more. Behrasi willed him to silence. Caeligus seemed to read his mind. He closed his mouth.

  Krevaan returned to the table. The hololith had a line running, tracing the circular route the ork army would have to take to get around the gorge. The greenskins had gone north from the fallen bridge. That meant dozens of kilometres before the land dropped enough for it to be possible to ford the river. After that, the orks would still have to travel far to the east as the north boundary of the city was a sharp escarpment. Even allowing for the faster speed of these orks, it was unlikely that the shortest route would bring them close to besieging Reclamation before daylight.

  ‘This,’ Krevaan said, ‘is what the expected route of the greenskins would look like. It is not good enough. We cannot expect anything of these orks. If our intelligence is not first-hand, and based on direct observation, it is useless. So we will observe. Brother-sergeants, your squads will fan out from the eastern gate of Reclamation. Sergeant Behrasi, your squad will attempt to intercept on the likely route. The rest of you will spread out further to the north-east. When one squad makes contact, the rest will close in.’ He held his hand out, palm up, fingers splayed. He slowly made a fist. ‘In this way, we will crush the greenskins,’ he said.

  ‘What will the eldar be doing?’ Zobak asked.

  ‘Sending out scouting units as well, according to our agreement.’

  ‘Units,’ Behrasi repeated. ‘What about their main force?’

  ‘Remaining in the city. Protecting it.’

  ‘And what else will they be doing there?’ Caeligus demanded. His tone was accusatory.

  You really can’t help yourself, can you? Behrasi thought. Caeligus sometimes accused him of excessive caution. In moments like this, though, it was Caeligus who demonstrated excess. Behrasi took the example of the captain to heart. Action was based on information: the better the intelligence, the more devastating the attack. Behrasi sometimes wondered, as he did now, whether Caeligus’s desire for information only extended to the point of confirming what he had already decided.

  ‘Your question is an excellent one, brother-sergeant,’ Krevaan said to Caeligus. His patience was more withering than his earlier sharp tone. ‘Which is why I will be observing them.’

  Alathannas and Passavan walked a step behind Eleira. They were nearing the centre of the city. The human construction was becoming denser and more elaborate. The scale of the task ahead was increasing. So were its complexities. So were its risks.

  ‘They’ve changed so much,’ Eleira said. ‘I can see traces of what was once here, but our records will be useless.’

  ‘They were never going to be sufficient,’ Passavan pointed out. ‘This was a maiden world. The city was constructed, but never settled. As for what we seek…’

  ‘It wouldn’t be on the surface,’ Alathannas said.

  ‘Precisely. And all we know is what the surface once was.’

  Eleira stopped in an intersection. She turned around slowly. ‘How do they live like this?’ she said. ‘What have they done?’

  On three of the corners rose more of the human habitations. They were dark monuments of rockcrete. Their windows were like the firing apertures of fortifications. Faces appeared in some of them. They were suspicious, frightened, and furtive as rats. The people of Reclamation, believing themselves abandoned and invaded, sought strength in their prison-like homes. Relief sculptures of the double-headed eagle of the human Emperor dominated the façades. There were other figures, too, that Alathannas surmised also had some kind of religious significance. The overwhelming impression was of a race whose spirit was imprisoned by its manifestations of material power.

  On the fourth corner was a place of worship. In its massive, glowering oppression, it was
not different in kind from the habitation complexes, but merely in degree. It was worse. It was their inspiration. It was the enforcer. The eagle detached itself from the wall, became iron, and spread its wings over the portico. Humans, the ranger thought, spared no effort in celebrating what crushed them.

  And yet there were individuals who encouraged him to hope. Over the decades of his travels, there were humans whom he felt he could call friends. Those connections, impossible in principle, were the shining fragments that shielded him from despair. He did not expect friendship from the Raven Guard. But he had to believe in the chance of honest cooperation. If that existed, these orks might be defeated. The alternative was so dreadful, it had to be denied.

  Neither he, nor anyone else on this planet, could afford to believe in the most likely outcome of the war.

  ‘The changes are too great,’ Passavan said. ‘I cannot tell if the entrance we seek still exists. Perhaps it never did. We don’t know what happened to the Exodites who began the settlement. Their work was surely incomplete. If there were an entrance, the mon-keigh would have found it.’

  Eleira started walking again, moving up the street past the church. She was looking closely at the foundations of the buildings, at the vanishing traces of the eldar city that had stood here, and been erased by the millennia without ever truly living. ‘The question of the entrance is irrelevant,’ she said. ‘That is not what we are seeking. We need a location, first. Farseer, you carry our hopes.’

  ‘I wish I could fulfil them.’ Passavan’s grief was profound.

  ‘You must.’

  Passavan glanced at Alathannas as if looking for his support. ‘What you ask is beyond my reach.’

  ‘Merentallas and Elisath both know.’

  ‘And only they know. They have travelled the path of the seer much longer than I have. Their sight extends far beyond mine.’

  ‘If they are still alive,’ Alathannas said.

  Eleira ignored him. ‘We are all being tasked with the impossible,’ she told the farseer.