Scions of the Emperor Page 9

  'Geothermal energy,' said Curze, not looking at me. 'The whole city draws from it.'

  I looked closer and saw the lines of people still, being walked to the end of gantries above the flames before being pushed in, an endless stream of ragdoll silhouettes falling into the glow.

  'We brought our own fuel,' the primarch continued, finally looking at me.

  'They're still alive,' I sobbed.

  'No sense in wasting ammunition,' Sevatar said from behind me.

  I stood up, quaking from fingers to toes, but I let my rage steel my stare as I looked at Curze. He regarded me with one eyebrow raised.

  'I don't know how, but I will make sure that this gets out,' I told him tapping the recorder box of my pict-feed.

  'I'll help you,' said the primarch with a smile. He glanced at Sevatar and then dismissed the equerry with a flick of the head. 'I wanted you to see this. I was waiting for the area to be fully secure, as I'm sure you understand. I would hate myself if something unfortunate happened to you before you could take your recordings back to Terra.'

  'Why?' I asked the question, though I did not really want an answer, the single word encompassing so much confusion and so broad a horror I could not bring myself to think about it.

  'Why?' He leaned closer. 'Are you still recording?'

  I nodded dumbly. His face almost filled my vision.

  'Good. This is my message to the lords and ladies of Terra. You wanted to see the Great Crusade, Ennylin.' He straightened and opened his arms in an expansive gesture. 'This is it! Those great people of the Throneworld need to see this. Those that would wage war but do not fight it need to remember what it is they have unleashed. This is compliance, is it not? There will be no resistance when we have finished.'

  He stepped away.

  'And you will send this not only to Terra, but to me.' He looked over his shoulder, piercing me with his ebon gaze. 'Sights such as this will be broadcast to those that would refuse the Night Lords in the future. Let them make an informed decision when they choose to refuse us. How many lives will I save? How many of the Emperor's servants and my loyal legionaries will live because the enemy capitulates? When they see the price of non-compliance, who would dare withstand us?'

  'You are…' I could not bring myself to utter the word, the realisation of it was too horrible. One of the Emperor's primarchs was clearly insane, and the implications of that created a freezing void in my gut. I looked at him and saw a man entirely at ease with himself. He spoke with fluid gestures, no hesitation or inflection to betray the slightest guilt.

  'My father already knows this.' He directed me to look again at the mass burning and continued to speak. Tears clouded the view and I wiped them away out of instinct, not wanting to spoil the recording quality. 'The path of the righteous. The Emperor set me upon this course and I hear no condemnation from Him.

  'This is the conqueror's truth. The weak pretend there is compromise, that morality gives rise to the grey of acceptance and equivocation. They are misguided. I do the Emperor's work here. Life is binary. Truth or lie. Guilt or innocence.'

  His shadow fell upon me and I looked up into his face, seeing a demigod of death looming over me. His gaze did not move towards me, but up to the skies, as though seeing something else entirely.

  'Compliance, or death.'

  I watched Macragge City burn, listening to the panicked reports flooding down the Neetum Transitway.

  'Seven cohorts. Men who were loyal to Libanus, Gallan and Palatinus. They're murdering and burning. Captain Melotus says they were bribed. Bribed, Lord Guilliman. Killing for coin. What have we come to? They tore down the Tomb of Megaricus. They've lit fires all along the Proana Arch. They're fighting outside the Senatorum and Consul House.'

  Killing for coin. Every time I heard a grotesque, barbaric phrase like that it reminded me how different I was. I did not think like others. I was a breed apart. Where others saw pieces of a puzzle, I saw the whole. Whether it was military strategy, theology or philosophy, my mind seemed to function on a different level to my peers. Sometimes I found the thought reassuring, other times it troubled me. Why should I be so different? To murder, simply for financial gain, was baffling to me. It was the action of someone lost in the dark; blinded by ignorance and base, animal needs.

  The transitway was crowded with people fleeing the violence, and my cohorts had to move frustratingly slowly to avoid killing anyone. Several times our armoured transports ground to a halt as panicked people struggled to move aside. No one wanted to get in our path, though. We made a fearsome sight still filthy from battle, and those that were able scrambled as far from our tattered banners as they could. I continued giving orders as we approached the city, processing information I knew no one else would register, but the phrase 'killing for coin' had summoned a memory.

  I was five and my father had taken me hunting. I knew why. Even then I could read people as easily as I read the military treatises in Deucalis Library. My father had seen me watching his generals and magistrates. He saw how I despised them. The greatest statesmen of the greatest city were idiots, blind to the most important resource on the planet - their own, needlessly oppressed people. They were fools and tyrants and, even aged five, I wanted to tear down the whole, hide-bound edifice. My father felt the same, I knew he did. But my place in Macragge was precarious and he was too wise to risk my life on a point of principle. So he took me away, to a place we both loved, to the cold, beautiful foothills of the Crown Mountains where we could breathe clean air and ease our fury by scrambling over rocks and scree. Away from the Senate, my father dropped the pretence that I was a normal child and we hunted together as equals. He laughed, as he always did, at the sight of my unfettered strength, proud of his strange little son. But then, when I saw him fall, grimacing at a gash on his arm, a dreadful truth hit me.

  We were not equals. We never could be. My father was not like me. The man who taught me about life was not destined to live. The flash of crimson on his tunic stalled my breath. One day, Konor Guilliman would die. He would leave me behind. Leave me with the fools and the tyrants. In that moment I became the child I usually only pretended to be. Tears filled my eyes and I placed my hand over his wound, wishing it away. He laughed, shaking his head - not in mockery, but reassurance. He took out a coin and handed it to me. His face was minted on one side and Consul Gallon's was minted on the other. He closed my hand over it, squeezing it tight.

  'Feel its strength,' he said. Strong as I was, I could not crush the metal. 'The coin is Macragge,' he said. 'Beautiful and unbreakable. Made to outlive us all. And while there is a Macragge, I will be with you, Roboute. My virtue is the virtue of Macragge. My strength is the strength of Macragge. This is not just my home, Roboute, it is my soul and it is my family. And it is your family, too. Macragge will endure. Macragge must endure. And as long as it does, you will not be alone.'

  'There's fighting at the Tyrsus Gate!' Captain Melotus sounded almost hysterical as we reached the city, and I gave him a warning glare. We had just crushed a revolt that had threatened the whole of Illyria, but seeing war in their own home was another matter. Again, my mind had leapt ahead, and I saw that the two conflicts were actually part of the same whole. The rebels in Illyria planned to overthrow the senate by throwing Macragge into chaos, and now we returned home to find rioting on the streets of the capital. Whoever was behind the first insurrection would no doubt be behind the second. I deployed my men with barked commands, but my mind was still elsewhere. Consul House had been attacked. Was my father there? He was no longer the man who had hunted with me in the Crown Mountains that day, but he was no less impressive. I pitied anyone who tried to take Consul House from him.

  I ordered five cohorts to the Proana Arch and five to the Senatorum. The rest I took with me to Consul House. It was dawn. Coral-coloured light flashed over domes and amphitheatres. It looked like the whole city was burning.

  We entered the ornamental gardens and I hesitated, struggling to hide my outrag
e. Even then, barely into my teenage years, I had fought several campaigns, justifying my father's trust with every victory, but I had never seen so much as a las-carbine fired in the capital. Now its friezes were splashed with blood and its colonnades were stained by smoke. I brought to mind the training of my seneschal, Tarasha, and recited her litanies, calming my breathing and clearing my head.

  The house was approached by a web of looping paths, designed to mirror the revolutions of the heavenly bodies: Macragge, Ardium, Laphis, Thulium, Mortendar and Nova Thulium, names of legend, sculpted from marble, set in fountains and circled by walls of yew so tall and meandering that they formed a labyrinth.

  The crackle of autocarbines rang out through the half-light.

  I waved a cohort to one side of the maze and a second to the other. Then I signalled for the final cohort to follow me as I sprinted down the central path, tracing the orbit of Nova Thulium.

  I was halfway to the house when a soldier ran out to confront me. He had torn the insignia from his uniform and he was swaying, clearly drunk, as he staggered towards me, a gun resting loosely in his hands and leaves stuck in his hair. Three more soldiers followed in his wake, equally unkempt and unsteady.

  The first of them was an ogre of a man, so broad and powerfully built that his gun looked ridiculous in his meaty fists. He laughed as he lurched towards me, raising the autocarbine. Then, when he was close enough to see me clearly, he faltered, his face growing pale

  'Lord Guilliman,' he muttered, the sneer fading from his face. There were corpses in the distance. My father's guards. The man was a disgrace. He had betrayed his people and his uniform. He was a murderer. And the idiot was so thrown by my arrival that he was trying to salute me.

  I marched towards him, drew my broadsword and beheaded him.

  The drunks behind him were too shocked to react at first. Then they lurched into action, fumbling with their guns.

  I drew my pistol and gunned them down in a single, fluid motion. They dropped to the path with smoke rising from between their eyes.

  I stood there for a few seconds, pistol raised, waiting for their spasms to subside, waiting for more soldiers to arrive. None came, so I nodded to my men and we marched on past the corpses, making for the front of the house.

  There was a fierce gunfight taking place at the steps. A group of ragged soldiers, like the four I had just killed, were hunched at the top of the steps, firing wildly at a second group who had hunkered down next to an overturned ground-car. Its doors had been blasted off and there was smoke billowing from its engine, obscuring the figures shooting from the wreckage.

  Shrapnel kicked from the walls as a third group approached from the maze, guns blazing.

  I raised a hand, warning my men not to fire until I could make sense of the situation.

  The men on the steps were howling drunken curses as they defended the doors, so I marked them down as traitors. True sons of Macragge would never behave so poorly. The men by the truck were another matter - they were too shrouded by smoke for me to know if they were traitors or my father's men.

  The point became moot as a rocket screamed across the gardens, fired from the direction of the maze, turning the ground-car into a blinding column of flames.

  Shrapnel and sparks rushed towards me. My men ducked but I remained motionless, staring into the blaze. There was very little in the world that could harm me. I had learned that by the time I was ten. I kept much of the truth to myself. Even my father would have been shocked to know the full extent of my strength. On the rare occasion that something broke the surface of my skin, the wound healed itself in seconds, closing before my eyes. I was either a miracle or a curse; only time would tell which.

  Men reeled from the burning truck, robed in flames. I ignored them and strode towards the steps, raising my pistol.

  The drunks were so busy jeering at the burning men that it took a moment for them to notice me and, when they did, they were as confused as the men in the maze. Half of Macragge City hated me and half treated me like a saint, but no one in the capital met my gaze with any confidence.

  The drunks were still deciding how to respond to my presence when I opened holes in their skulls. They sprawled across the top of the steps, their guns clattering across the rockcrete.

  I waved for my men to tackle the group rushing from the maze. They were about to open fire when a familiar voice boomed through the smoke 'Roboute! Hold your fire!'

  'Gallan!' I cried, nodding for my men to lower their guns. We embraced, then he held me at arm's length and shook his head, his eyes glinting. 'I'm glad you're back.'

  Gallan was one of Macragge's two consuls. Alongside my father he was lord tetrarch of the senate and senior magistrate of Macragge's legislative assembly. He was an imposing figure, coming almost up to my chest with a powerful, physical presence that remained undimmed by age. He wore his golden ceremonial cuirass and helmet with the assurance of a man born into leadership. Most of Macragge's citizens would have bowed in his presence and struggled to speak. I just nodded to the carnage, 'Who did this?'

  He grimaced at the bodies and the smouldering ground-car. 'The very people it will hurt the most. The people your father's reforms were intended to help. The idiots took matters into their own hands.'

  My men flinched as explosions ripped through Consul House; detonating with such force that the ground juddered.

  We turned to face a wall of flames, soaring up the columns and windows, scattering masonry across the gardens. I signalled for my men to fan out, keeping their weapons trained on the fire.

  'Is my father in there?'

  Gallan nodded. 'He's been holding the mob back for hours, but everything went quiet half an hour ago. I rushed over here as fast as I could.'

  'I've been trying to vox him since I reached the city,' I said. 'No response.'

  'Then we should move fast,' he replied, striding towards the steps and readying his weapons.

  The vox in my collar crackled into life, bringing news from my cohorts. They had encountered resistance on both sides of the building and were currently pinned down by overwhelming firepower.

  'Hold your positions,' I replied. 'I will deal with this. Make sure no one leaves the grounds.'

  The entrance hall looked like a slaughterhouse. Statues of former consuls were draped with bodies and the floor was dark with blood. Gallan and I both halted, appalled by the scene.

  'How could they?' muttered Gallan. 'In here, of all places?'

  I shook my head, trying to quell my growing furry.

  We rushed ahead, guns trained on the shadows as we approached a vast, double staircase that led to the staterooms above. Gallan took one flight and I took the other, with my men trailing after us.

  We were halfway up the stairs when soldiers opened fire from the doorway at the top. They were wearing the uniform of the household guard but, like the men outside, they had torn the insignia from their tunics.

  The handrail exploded beneath my fingers and I staggered sideways, thudding into the wall as I returned fire, splitting the gloom with a volley of las-blasts.

  Gallan ran towards the door, taking two steps at a time, firing into the darkness. My men followed suit, creating an inferno of noise and light, filling the air with shards of alabaster.

  There were screams and thuds, and the attack faltered.

  I righted myself and charged up the steps, entering the room just after Gallan.

  It was a long, tapestry-lined gallery and there were bodies everywhere.

  I sidestepped a shotgun blast that smashed into the doorframe then dropped my attacker with a headshot. Gallan waded into the fumes, firing fast, dropping more of them as I leapt onto a table that ran down the centre of the room, finishing off the few he missed.

  'Lord Guilliman!' cried one of my men.

  I looked back to see dozens of insurgents rushing up the steps, guns barking.

  I dropped from the marble table, shoved it over and kicked it across the room, sending it slammi
ng against the wall and blocking the doorway. Then I waved for my men to take positions behind it.

  'No one gets through!' I cried, before heading on into the next chamber with Gallan at my side.

  Behind us there was an eruption of explosions and battle cries as my men leapt to obey.

  We entered another long gallery, lined with colossal bookcases that soared up to a distant vaulted ceiling where plasterwork cherubs circled a painting of Old Earth. Gallan and I paused at the threshold. The lumen globes were unlit and Gallan squinted into the gloom. To me, darkness was barely different to light. It took me years to understand the obsession with illuminating our streets and palaces.

  'There!' I said, nodding to one of the four doors that led from the room. Figures dashed through the darkness in the hallway beyond.

  Gallan nodded and we rushed that way, scouring the shadows for movement.

  Gunfire screamed towards us and I heard Gallan curse, rolling behind the plinth of a statue.

  'Gallan?' I called, looking back.

  'I'm fine!' he cried. 'Keep going.'

  I marched down the centre of the room, ignoring the shots that howled past me. There is a strange thing about power. The more you have, the less you need. My reputation as unkillable spoiled the aim of even the most skilled marksmen. As I walked calmly to the huddled group at the far end of the room, shots tore through busts and architraves, kicking up a storm of plaster dust.

  The rebels were gathered beneath an archway that led into the next room. There were dozens of them, all gripping pistols and swords. If they had remained calm, I might have been in trouble. But I knew they would not. I glared at them, allowing my wrath to burn through my eyes, allowing whatever I was to shine through my skin.

  They panicked, some scrambling for cover, others rushing at me, guns barking. I dodged a few poorly aimed sword thrusts and sidestepped the flurry of las-fire, easily hacking down several of my attackers with casual, lethal sword slashes.