The Last Stand

As Captain Idelaun and his Imperial Fists face a Chaos onslaught on the Hive Shrine of Pallatus, an unexpected intervention changes everything. This was a story I started working on for the Planetkill competition run by the Black Library, but it came too late for me to turn it into a full synopsis and writing sample, so I never submitted it. This story represents what I thought the BL might have been looking for - Space Marines in peril, pitched battle, big set-pieces, blockbuster action sequences and a twist in the tail. It is not my usual kind of story, but I have tried to take what I thought the BL template was and do something I liked with it. If you are looking for bolters and chainswords on this website, look no further... 16,100 words Writing time : 18 days Finished : 30th August 2007 Download as Word file

The pilgrim’s head sailed out of the bank of smoke, dragging ghostly streamers behind it. Captain Idelaun of the Imperial Fists did not see it as it arced overhead, his grim attention locked on the swarms of cultists in the courtyard below.

Idelaun and his five-man squads were crouched behind barricades at the top of the Manatine Chapel steps, bursts of pinpoint bolter-fire barely keeping the howling masses pinned down behind the shattered statues and pock-marked pillars. Return fire, when it came, was hasty and undisciplined. Perhaps the cultists had hoped the heavy stubber would allow them to break the Fists’ resistance, but Idelaun had lain it on its side in a pool of its former owners’ blood in the middle of the courtyard. Right now it seemed an irresistible lure, and Idelaun was happy to shoot fish in this particular barrel all day long. Flashes of movement, however, from behind the colonnades at the far end told him he had scant minutes before more heavy weapons gave the fish some teeth.

The head bounced off the massive wooden doors behind him, and the noise made him turn in a flash. Not a meaty thwok, but a heavier, duller sound. Metallic. The head – it was a young woman’s, Idelaun saw, as it bounced and rolled, gore-matted hair slapping as it painted the flagstones red – came to rest only a few metres away. The eyes were gone, replaced with thin metal rods and in the mouth-

“Grenade!” roared Idelaun, throwing one arm around the armoured waist of an oblivious Petrelli and driving them both to the ground.

Idelaun’s world vanished in a thunderclap of black. The floor slammed up at him as the ceiling hammered into his back, an avalanche of shattered stone that dressed him in rubble. His mouth filled with bitter ash. The blast from the detonation would have deafened and stunned any normal man who survived, but Idelaun barely took time to blink the stinging dust from his eyes before he rose to his feet. All around him, yellow giants shed rubble as they stood one by one, and the cultists screamed in dismay and – Idelaun smiled – fear. He could smell it. He still held his bolter, and he could think of no better riposte. He started firing again, catching a knot of heretics as they tried to right the fallen heavy stubber. The explosive bolts turned the men into an abattoir spoil-heap as more charged from the pitted stone pillars to try their luck. Renewed fire from the recovering Imperial Fists caught and spun them like red leaves in a thresher.

“Dorn’s teeth – thought we were Throne-bound!” gasped Petrelli, crouching behind the dense barricade of pews and confessionals he had helped erect just hours before. His shots peppered a marble font, the razor-sharp shrapnel giving a half-naked cultist something to scream about. “Perhaps today isn’t such a good day to die.”

“Great miracles have been promised from this relic we keep hearing of,” Idelaun replied, easily picking off a man trying to dash from pillar to pillar. Clearly the man’s idea of what was fast had never rubbed up against an Astartes. “Maybe that was one of them.” He spared a glance around the ruin the front porch of the Manatine Chapel had become. His craggy, scar-laden face didn’t show it, but he was surprised to see his three squads back on their feet. That unfortunate pilgrim’s head had been hollowed out and packed with explosives – it was indeed a minor miracle no-one had been killed. Which reminded him – “Sergeant Domovoi!” He pointed with his power fist to the smoke-shrouded wall at the side of the steps where the head had come from. “Take your squad and clear that breach! No more surprises.”

Domovoi, a surly giant of a marine with a heavy brow and a red, unruly beard that covered most of his face, nodded and slapped Brother Caradoc on his shoulder pauldron. Without a word Brother Caradoc turned his flamer and flicked the trigger. The backwash of heat baked the sweat on Idelaun’s face dry as the churning inferno took hold. The flames ceased with a sucking noise and Domovoi lobbed a krak grenade through the unseen hole. Moments later the blast pulsed through the black smoke and then Domovoi and his marines vaulted the barricade and charged into the breach. The sound of bolter fire was muted, as was the hush of the flamer. Screams echoed off stone.

“Report,” Idelaun said into his vox. The Arcade of St. Jude was on the other side of that wall, which meant it should be friendly territory, but comms had been as reliable as a guardsman’s aim under fire.

“Just one squad. We took care of them easily enough, but their friends are coming. Troop-strength, traitor PDF, moving up from the Palatine Gardens through the Arcade. They have an autocannon with them-” A curse in Low Gothic as heavy calibre shots hit ceramite. “And these ones know how to aim.”

They would be able to flank the Fist’s position at the top of the Chapel steps. The Sisters of the Argent Shroud had been holding the Gardens since yesterday morning, but forward comm-links were down and snipers had runners pinned. He prayed the Sisters had managed to fall back safely. Idelaun looked up. Once they had the Arcade, the advance forces would get into the balconies that overlooked the courtyard. They’d have elevation and a crossfire. What had been a secure and highly defensible position while the Gardens held out would quickly turn into a trap. He caught Sergeant Magyr looking at him, knew he was thinking the same thing.

“Would be a glorious last stand, Captain,” Magyr said with a wink. Magyr was young for a sergeant, and small – Idelaun would never describe a marine as ‘wiry’, but Magyr nearly fit the bill. Fresh-faced, confident and with an easy rapture about him, Magyr thrived on finding something to enjoy in every situation.

Idelaun shook his head, drops of blood and landslides of dust spraying from his tightly braided hair. The Fists would have to fall back. Again. This city, this world, was falling to the arch-enemy; only the Basilican and its treasury of relics and refugees remained. “True, Magyr, but this is not the time for glory. We’re here to buy the priesthood and their congregations time to evacuate, and that means slowing the enemy, not dying needlessly. Swallow your pride; there’ll be plenty of glory tomorrow.”

“I’m not so good going backwards, Captain.” Magyr stole a quick look from behind his cover then rose. Three bangs from his bolter and three cultists were left scooping their guts from the flagstones. “Might trip over my own feet.”

“You never were much of a dancer, Sergeant.”

“Well, you keep trying to lead,” Magyr laughed.

“Captain!” It was Sergeant Kuillen, crouched by a huge pile of plaster and stone fallen from the painted ceiling. It took Idelaun a fraction of a second to run the head-count, come up with the missing face. He cursed his levity. Throne! Not such a miracle, after all. “Brother Belder, Captain,” confirmed Kuillen, whose slab-like face and ponderous manner fooled many into thinking he thought as slowly as he spoke. “He must be under here.”

Anger was interrupted by a deep death-rattle, announcing that the heretics in the courtyard had finally moved up more heavy weapons of their own. The front of the barricade erupted in wood splinters and sawdust as the slugs chewed up the ancient hardwood. Idelaun glowered as a rocket-propelled grenade hissed inches past his face and detonated against the main doors of the Chapel. Shrapnel rang off his armour as more rockets hit the barricade and the huge doors.

The vox squealed as a sound like thunder rumbled through the hole in the wall. “Armour coming, Captain!” Domovoi had to shout to be heard above the din of cannon-fire. “Looks like a local Hydra-pattern from the traitor PDF. Four flak guns and a whole lot of plate.” His voice hardened. “They have the bodies of the blessed Sisters draped over the barrels.”

“Fall back, Domovoi.” Cold fury frosted Idelaun’s mind, but revenge would come in time. One look at the pile of rubble next to Sergeant Kuillen told him it would take hours to dig Brother Belder out. Entombed in sacred stone; there were worse places to be buried. “Magyr and Kuillen squads, fall back to the Chapel.” He saw the helms of his marines twitch as they glanced in his direction: none of them had much stomach for retreat, and neither did he. “We’ll set up an ambush for that armour further down the Arcade. I want these side passages mined. Domovoi, take up position at the barricades until we’re ready to go.”

Idelaun knelt by the stone mound that was Belder’s grave. He was struck by the odour of damp plaster and crumbling masonry as he primed and buried a melta-bomb. Let the dogs of this self-proclaimed Nihilarch learn the hard way to leave the Emperor’s fallen in peace.

Nods from Magyr and Kuillen told him the other booby-traps were in place. The Manatine Chapel behind them would fall to the traitorous forces of the Nihilarch, but it was but one of thousands of such Chapels, arrayed in a dizzying labyrinth throughout the famous Basilican, the towering Hive-Shrine of the Ecclessiarchy world of Pallatus. Behind Idelaun and the Fists were hundreds of hallowed miles of hallways, courtyards, arcades and atriums; a dew-dropped spiderweb of passages where every glistening jewel was another intricate palace of worship. At the pinnacle lay the transport bays and the last designated line of defence, where Idelaun and his Fists would sell their lives to give the transports time to leave. The Emperor protects, he thought, and today, so do we.

He heard the animal barks and howls of the cultists – still that note of rank uncertainty and fear, he was pleased to hear – as Domovoi’s squad broke off and ran for the side passage that led into the cavernous north aisle of the Chapel. The air inside was chill and crisp, smelling of old wax and stone smoked with incense; the sweat cooled on his brow and his armour creaked softly as it cooled. Idelaun shouldered the heavy door closed, and then leapt back in surprise, his power fist crackling.

“Did you see that, Sergeant?”

Domovoi grunted, scowling behind his thick, red beard as he drew his chainsword.

“Show yourself, coward!” Idelaun shouted, raising his bolter and turning in the gloom of the Chapel, seeking the fleeting shadow he had glimpsed as the door closed. The retreating squads turned and paused at his words. “Do you hide in the dark, warp-filth? Afraid to face me? Show yourself!”

Idelaun was almost a shadow himself, his scarred face invisible in the darkness. Exposure to a toxic atmosphere on Inkanyamba IV had turned his skin matt black, as deep and perfect as the inky vacuum of space. He looked terrifying, and he knew it. “Show yourself!”

But the shadow had gone, just like all the shadows Idelaun and his men had seen flickering in the corners of vision since the siege of the Basilican had begun. Only a few at first, but now more and more with each passing day, growing clearer and clearer each time.

Chaos forces were battering down their walls, but it seemed some of them were already inside.

#

Magyr gritted his teeth and glared at the comms unit in his gauntlet as if he could crush it with pure will-power alone. “Just the whispering, Captain. I still can’t get through on any channels. Nothing but damn whispering since we left the Manatine Chapel.”

Idelaun put a steady hand on the veteran’s shoulder. It was not just the comms situation; something else was troubling his sergeant. If there was time later, he would find out what it was. He raised his voice. “Children of Dorn, your attention.” All heads and helms turned to him. “Communications are still corrupted, and I doubt we’ll get them back any time soon. We must assume that the evacuation proceeds, but for all we know all other positions are fallen and we are the only ones left alive to fight.” He smiled. “Good. As our brothers were the last line on Terra so long ago, so shall we be here on Pallatus. Ambush and fall back, lead them a merry dance. Magyr here-“ Idelaun slapped the squad leader’s bald head, getting a curse for his troubles, “-can tell you all about dancing! We will be like ghosts, and we’ll make them fear their own shadows. We will make this Nihilarch pay for every inch of this great Basilican and, when we finally fall back to the last redoubt – well, if there is no-one there to welcome us, then we will make such a last stand that every Chaplain will preach of it before every battle for the next thousand years. We will make a last stand that Dorn himself will be sorry he missed.” He raised his power fist. “To the glory of Dorn, and to Him on Earth!”

The marines returned his salute, their shouted words echoing into the emptiness of the lightwell far above their heads.

Idelaun signalled to Kuillen and then Domovoi, who strode over, map-slate at the ready. “Show me, sergeant.”

Wordlessly, Domovoi enjoined the machine spirit to model their position in the 129th Tier of the Basilican. The Arcade of St. Jude was a long way behind them, the Hydra a smouldering heap of bent metal, the corpses of the Sisters enraptured in sacred immolation from Caradoc’s flamer. The battle had moved on, and the Fists had retreated deeper into the Basilican. On the map, chapels and cathedrals shone like stars in the firmament, each of them representing a natural chokepoint.

Kuillan spoke first. “One of the pilgrim leaders, who gave me this,” his gauntlet brushed a purity seal of folded orange parchment on his breastplate, “said that there is no priest, alive or dead, who has been in every chapel of the Basilican. There are many not even on this or any other map; tiny ones, hidden in the walls, known only to a few. Large ones, lost for centuries. Even some hidden within other chapels. The Basilican itself is over ten thousand years old, and started as just one small house of worship on the edge of a forest. Since then, all this has been built.” He shrugged. “It is said one Confessor spent his life here, one week of devotion in each chapel. He died aged one hundred and ninety two, and never visited the same chapel twice.”

“At that age,” Idelaun said with a gleam in his eye, “he could have spent a year kneeling in the same pew and never realised it. But, still,” he said, enlarging the display and marvelling at the intricacy of the architecture, “there may be some truth in that. This holy place is a warren, and we must use it to our advantage. To the business at hand – we’re running out of pre-entrenched positions. We have to be creative.”

Dorn spoke in Idelaun’s ear, telling him of the Chapel of St Icosis. Idelaun listened in respectful silence, motioning bluntly to the others when they tried to interrupt. When Dorn had finished, Idelaun bowed his head. “Thank you, Lord. A superb trap.” He selected one of the lights on the map-slate, then addressed the squad leaders, furious with them for trying to speak out of turn. “Lord Dorn advises…”

It was when he saw the looks in their eyes that the dream broke. His Primarch, Rogal Dorn, had been standing at his shoulder, speaking to him, and he had thought nothing of it. His Primarch, who had not been seen for ten thousand years.

“Captain.” Domovoi frowned. “Are you unwell? Are you injured?”

“Tell me what you saw,” Idelaun hissed, staring at each of the three men. In the faces of Domovoi and Kuillen he saw blank puzzlement, but in Magyr he saw-

“Magyr. What just happened? What did you see?”

Magyr shook his head furiously, inner conflict like pain on his face. “I – I saw nothing, captain. You were quiet, thinking and then – but…”

“But you have seen something?” Idelaun pressed, grabbing his sergeant with both hands, pressing him up against a crumbling chimney flue. “Tell me!”

“I – I am – there may have been a trick of the light. I – I cannot…”

“You are among friends, sergeant. More – you are among brothers. Speak freely, but speak fast.”

Magyr took a deep breath. “I thought I saw Him, captain. A few hours ago.” His eyes found Idelaun’s, pleading to be believed. “He spoke to me, and it seemed like the most natural thing in the world. Until it was over.”

“Who?” said Kuillen, looking from one to the other, as Domovoi scowled.

“The Primarch,” snapped Idelaun, never taking his eyes from Magyr. “And you said nothing?”“What was there to say, captain? That I was broken? A liability?” A brittle laugh. “That the next time we faced the enemy I was going to draw my sword and charge into their ranks and save you the trouble of granting me release?”

“What did he say, brother?”

“Do not make me do this, captain. Let me take my chainsword and find a glorious death while I still know my own na-“

“What did he say!” Idelaun thundered. Silence fell within the lightwell as the Fists stopped what they were doing. With considerable effort, Idelaun lowered his voice. “What did he say to you?”

“That…that he had given us all the time he could. That he had one last task for us to perform…”

“And?”

“That we must follow the shadows. We must go where they gather. We – we must not let them take it.” Magyr fell to one knee, his head bowed. “Forgive me, captain. If I am mistaken, then my mind is gone, and I beg you for release. If I am not mistaken, then I have withheld a message from – from Him. Either way, I have failed you and the Chapter utterly.”

The despair on Magyr’s face turned to shock as Idelaun went down on one knee, and looked his squad leader in the eye. “There is no shame here, and you were not mistaken, brother. Praise Him on Terra, but the Primarch spoke to me too. It sounds impossible to believe.” He grabbed Magyr’s arms and stood, hauling his squad leader to his feet. “But I do. I believe it with all my heart, just as I believe He spoke to you.”

He turned to address the encircling Fists. “Twice now, in this holy place, our Primarch, Rogal Dorn, has spoken to us. He spoke first to Sergeant Magyr and then – moments ago – he spoke to me. I swear this by the Oath I took to the Chapter and to Him on Terra.” He waited, letting the truth of it sink in, both to him as well as to his men.

One by one, the marines knelt in silent prayer, until only he and Magyr remained standing. The momentous significance of what was happening made his head feel light, and he pressed his hands to his face, amazed to see them come away wet with tears. “Mark this moment, brothers. Let your souls embrace it, for we will all be called upon to give witness when our Chapter learns of this. Now listen – the Primarch has warned us of these shadows, that grow more numerous by the hour. He has anointed us with the task of stopping them. But to do so means abandoning our position here, and letting the enemy pierce into the heart of the Basilican unopposed, so He has also told us where and how to blunt them. We must go to the Chapel of St Icosis, my brothers, and we must move fast. Praise Dorn!”

As one, the marines stood, raising their bolters. “For Dorn!”

“For Captain Idelaun!” Magyr barked, striding forward.

“For Captain Idelaun!”

Idelaun gathered his squad leaders as the marines moved off towards the spiral ramps at the far end of the lightwell. “Miracles and messages from the Primarch – these are things I would rather have Chaplain Gense deal with, when all’s said and done. I am a practical man. This relic of the Ecclessiarchy – what do we know of it?”

Magyr shook his head. “Nothing, captain. It is simply called the Fragment of the Basilican. The Ministorum protect it like no other.”

Domovoi nodded. “Many miracles have been performed in its name. But I have never seen so much as a replica of it. I had my doubts it even existed, but now…”

“It’s as old as the oldest Chapel in the Basilican,” added Kuillan. “That pilgrim leader spoke of it endlessly, but all his tales and legends boiled down to nothing more than what has been said here.”

The four men looked at each other. It was Idelaun who spoke. “Chapter lore tells us that Dorn was here, during the Great Crusade. He was injured, and stopped here to recover. But it is not thought he left anything behind. Certainly nothing that could be called a relic.” His face darkened. “If the Ecclesiarchy have been hiding a relic of Dorn Himself…”

“We must go where they gather,” Magyr repeated. “We must not let them take it.”

Idelaun turned and ran after the marines, his squad leaders pacing behind him.

#

It was only later, when Captain Idelaun saw his brothers were truly dead and that no-one in the Basilican would survive, that the reaction of the World Eater made any sense. It had begun, as had so many times in his long life, when the course-grained boredom of waiting had snapped into focus with a simple word.

“Movement.” Petrelli’s voice came low over the vox.

“Let them come,” cautioned Idelaun, making one last check on his ambush. The Chapel of St Icosis seemed oddly familiar to him. It had the usual cruciform layout, of course; a long, narrow nave crossed at the far end by the transept, beyond which lay the pulpits and the altar. Idelaun had found cover on a choir balcony half way along the canyon-like nave; to his left, the narthex with its many doors through which the enemy would come; to his right, the pulpits where the heart of his ambush lay. Then he realised why it was so familiar – the vertiginous nave reminded him of the Cathedral of the Blessed Martyrs on his homeworld, where he had been presented to the harsh-faced clerics of the Ministorum as an indentured orphan. He had spent his childhood years in a chapel such as this, flogging the flagstones each morning with cold, grey water, before the Chapter found him. With a start, he realised he could no longer remember the name of his homeworld. Chiding himself for his pointless reminiscence, he checked his squads’ positioning – the teeth of the trap he, and Dorn, had set.

It took him a moment to find them all, their cover was so effective. Splashes of yellow broke up the velvet blackness of the Chapel of St Icosis; stark chromatics of danger that the approaching enemy would not see. There was something about the Basilican – or perhaps about him, ever since the message from Dorn – that had affected his senses, he realised. The red trim on Kuillan’s armour had a lustre like ruby; the grooved stone beneath his boots seemed as insubstantial as a cloud; the old air of the chapel folded around him in scents of sandalwood and greaselamp; his bolter was seen as through a brilliant lens, so clear and sharp the edges seemed like razors.

He felt acutely aware of the spiritual here, enveloped by the soft-worn stone of the chapel, the line between now and forever faint and porous, fortified more by his soul than his mighty armour. With the enemy coming and trusted comrades like Brother Belder falling all around, it was hard not to consider death in a place such as this. Death for any Imperial Fist was a purely functional concern, the end of duty and thus the last act of the dutiful, but he felt other possibilities opening to him the longer he spent in the glory of the Basilica. He placed a hand on the coloured gem-glass between the balusters of the parapet, marvelling at how it had pooled in its lead frame, miniature dust-covered waterfalls of frozen green all along the balustrade. Gem-glass may be hard and brittle, but over the millennia it would flow like water. As with many things, there was a lesson there for a warrior.

More movement on the auspex, picked up by the hidden eyes Kuillen had placed along the approaches to the chapel; a pattern oddly familiar amid the blinking ochres of the pulsing datamancer. No sound from the invitingly open portals of the narthex – they should be able to hear human scouts, even good ones, at this range. Which meant that whoever was coming wasn’t-

“Hold,” he said, raising his bolter as he divined the secret the auspex had been struggling to convey. It was a Fists’ fast scouting formation. “Mother War sends our brothers to join us.”

The briefest flash of yellow as a huge shape slipped through the open doorway on the broad south aisle before finding stillness in what little cover remained. The temptation was to test his trap, see how far they got before spotting the ambush, but there was no time to play childhood games of hide and go kill. He stood, letting his armour scrape polish from the balcony as more yellow giants froze in the shadows beyond the doorways.

“Hail, brother below,” he called. “Captain Idelaun of the Third Company, with my two friends; position and surprise. If it is sanctuary you seek, then the priests have long gone.”

The marine on the chapel floor rose grudgingly as others came through the opening behind him, bearing the markings of the Seventh Company, guns still held warily. He recognised Brother Sergeant Korian as the marine looked up at him.

“Greetings, Captain Idelaun. Sergeant Korian of the Seventh. I had heard you were dead.”

“Not likely, Brother Sergeant. I don’t make a habit of stumbling into traps.” Idelaun meant the comment to sting; Korian was a sound sergeant, but an unimaginative plodder who would have found his place among the rank and file had he been in Idelaun’s company. Korian did not seem to notice the rebuke, however, his pale face drawn and tense.

“I would have your counsel, Captain. The enemy is on our heels, but I need to speak with you.”

Idelaun knew immediately the source of Korian’s troubles; there was a voice within him now he was fast learning to heed. “They are coming because we have led them here, and they think the way to the heart of the Basilican lies beyond, but why are you here, Korian? Seventh Company should be two quadrants east of here. The last I heard your positions were under heavy assault from the World Eaters.”

“Captain. May I ascend and-?”

“No.” Stern, but not severe. “Answer the question.”

Korian’s expression reminded Idelaun of Magyr’s earlier that morning, and he saw the young sergeant edge from behind a pilaster to watch the encounter. “We were – I was – told to come here.”

“By whom?”

In Korian’s hesitation Idelaun saw the soul of a man who could not accept the impossible. He spared him his stuttering confusion and offered what consolation he could. “Have no concern, Brother Sergeant, but rejoice. Dorn has spoken. You are not the only ones to hear the Progenitor and join us.” Idelaun’s bolter pointed the way to a bank of secondary pulpits at the far end of the canyon-like nave of the chapel, rostrums ornately decorated with carved ivory. Armoured forms were barely visible in the gloom. “Alfar and Sleipnir Devastator Squads from Ninth Company, and Apothecary Wethlan. All have found themselves cut off from the chain of command and have heeded the same call to assemble here.”

“More movement,” warned Petrelli.

“Korian – you and your marines will join Domovoi – there, among the gallery of saints – and follow his lead.” As the Seventh Company sergeant turned towards the narrow stairwall Idelaun called out again. “What word from the rest of the Basilican? Do we still hold the upper tiers? The relic halls?”

“Nothing but Chaos interference on comms, Brother Captain, for nearly a day now. Foul whispering.”

“And the shadows?”

“Growing in number, though to what purpose I do not know. They grow thicker, more – more real.” Korian shook his head to dislodge the disbelief, but Idelaun knew he would fail. “This battlefield makes no sense, captain. One minute the enemy fight with purpose and co-ordination, the next they turn on one another and attack empty arcades and undefended bunkers. And now this. Words from – from…”

“All in good time.” The last thing Idelaun needed was the unease of a hide-bound man infecting the rest of his forces. “As you were, Brother Sergeant.” Idelaun watched as Korian’s squad settled quickly in cover amongst the rows of statuary behind the choir benches directly across from his own position.

The auspex told a tale of perfect clarity – more movement than its spirit could measure, meaty pulses blotting the small screen. Did it hunger as he did? He felt a surge of affinity with the spirit of the tiny device. A vanguard of elite troops, headed by Traitor Marines, were spearing for the huge thoroughfares that the sacred Chapel of St Icosis guarded. He triggered his vox, speaking softly but urgently.

“The foe is before us, and heaven shining over us. The Primarch is watching. Let him rejoice as we plant his standard in the once-beating hearts of those who seek ruination for mankind and seek to oppose He who cannot be opposed. They are vulnerable in the courage of their ignorance. Let today be a lesson to them. Praise Dorn.”

The whispered refrain was lost as they came in a din of stomping boots, shattering flagstone and bestial snarls of blood-drenched fury; assault troops of the World Eaters, berserkers from the mouth of Hell. The Dozen Portals of the Blessed that led into the chapel were not enough for these abominations, and bricks and mortar flew as chainaxes, fists and even heads were used to smash through the wall of the narthex. As if some charnel sewer had broken open the stench of blood filled the long, narrow nave of the chapel, and Idelaun wondered that the very stones of this holy place did not cast themselves at the intruders as punishment for their blasphemy.

At their head strode a giant; head down, shoulders hunched, ready to plough his way to glory through fields of flesh. Behind him trailed a bridal train; white skulls and meat hooks clattering off the stone; hollow drums beating out a bedlam of despair.

On they came, heedless of anything but the red promise of killing that called to them from the heart of the Basilican. They smashed everything in their path, hacking great gouges from stone columns and jade arches as they passed, their battle fury re-directed at a lifeless world that refused to bleed before their rage.

Idelaun gloried Dorn and the Emperor with every traitor’s head he took, but butchering these frothing madmen would be a personal pleasure.

“The big one,” he whispered into the vox. “At the front. His corpse is mine, and mine alone.”

Behind the fifty or so World Eaters – close enough, but not too close – came the shock troops of the traitor forces of Pallatus. Only men, but hardened to killing and fortified by the horrors of the Chaos gods that flensed their minds of sanity. Ending such as these would be a kindness.

This was the moment of greatest danger, Idelaun knew. He had no doubts about any of the marines from his company, but Seventh Company were reserves – most of the marines with Brother Sergeant Korian were newly minted from the Scout Company. If there was one thing an inexperienced warrior would get wrong at an ambush, it was the belief that the enemy had seen him. He prayed for Dorn to speak to them and fill their hearts with resolve. His own house was in order – his breathing shallow, to prevent the plates of power armour rubbing; his purity seals oiled so they would not rustle. The ossuary containing the trigger-fingers of ten of his armour’s previous occupants packed with soft cloth to prevent the intricately carved bones clacking together. Nothing – bar Korian’s squad – had been left to chance.

At the Crossing, where the long nave met the transept, the World Eaters split without discipline or command into two ragged swarms, heading for the massive exits at either end. Idelaun felt the tension in the warriors ranged on either side of him as the World Eaters reached the doors.

The Chapel of St Icosis had never been built with war in mind; the un-armoured keystones of both arches shattered as the krak grenades placed there detonated. There was a double-snap and then a great roar as hundreds of tonnes of masonry plugged both exits, entombing many of the World Eaters. Vast clouds of dust and ash rolled from the arms of the transept into the nave.

Then, as the roar echoed, the bolters of Alfar and Sleipnir Devastator Squads opened up. Dug in among the deep cover of the secondary pulpits and Honour Throne they looked down upon the troops milling in panic amid the four colossal piers of the Crossing. The remaining World Eaters were the initial targets, and even as they charged the source of the incoming shots, many were torn apart by the disciplined fire.

The human troops rallied fast, scurrying for what scant cover Idelaun’s men had been forced to leave and, as return lasfire stitched the air, the heavy bolters positioned at either side of the pulpits added their steady thunder. Four discrete streams of shells ripped bloody swathes through the charging World Eaters and caused mutilation and mayhem in the still-scattering ranks of traitor troops behind them. But the World Eaters, blinded by fury, charged the guns that had fired on them first, and the neglected heavy bolters exacted a terrible and glorious price in those first few seconds.

Idelaun sensed the blood rising in his men; the deep-seated instinct to rise and add their fire to support their brothers at the far end of the chapel. No words were needed, though; the Sons of Dorn were also the Sons of Reason, and the unthinking frenzy of the World Eaters was as incomprehensible as it was abhorrent to them.

More human troops – including four-man squads hefting long-barreled guns on tripods – were pouring through the shattered wall of the narthex to Idelaun’s left, but in trying to come to their comrades’ aid they were simply driving them forward and into Alfar and Sleipnir’s fields of fire. Idelaun let them come.

The last of the World Eaters fell, screaming his hatred to the last, his body blasted into bloody smears as the lines of heavy bolter fire scissored into him. Without pause the Devastator squads’ massed fire swept across the four piers of the Crossing. Wherever they touched, blood blossomed and stone flew, but the human troops numbered in their hundreds. Experience and training – and fear of their masters – would tell soon enough, and they would have fire superiority over the embattled marines in moments.

The heavy bolter fire ceased; the tainted soldiers cheered, but it was only to give their wielders time to re-position. Two more marines broke cover either side of the High Altar, sending krak missiles into the midst of the dismayed traitors before vanishing again.

Still the enemy poured through the broken wall.

“Stem the tide,” Idelaun commanded. Above the narthex arced heavy arches of dolomite and girders of iron bearing statuary. Kuillen’s krak grenades brought them down in a great hammer of stone, the chapel once again resounding to the furious noise of destruction.

Before the survivors were even aware their retreat was cut-off, Idelaun stood. “Fire and move. Alternating squads.”

His bolter roared again and again as Magyr’s squad rose with him. Their shots took out the most heavily entrenched of the enemy and those nearest the meatgrinder at the far end of the chapel. Then he ducked back beneath the parapet as lasfire waved high over his head, already moving to his next designated position. Domovoi and Korian emerged from the choir, their squads decimating a platoon that was rushing to set up their autocannon. Then they were gone as Kuillan’s squad leapt from the sundered stonework above the narthex, chainswords screaming as they practiced flawless butchery on the now reeling enemy.

Idelaun leaned out from the side of an elevated lectern, his first four shots gutting a squad trying a flamer rush on the High Altar. The last bolt round hit the ammo tanks, lighting the darkness for an instant. A crimson spear melted stone and incinerated flesh as Alfar’s inferno pistol swept the lines of cover. As Idelaun ducked away the heavy bolters started up again, low to the floor of the chapel now, the long-range grazing fire reaching half-way down the nave, every shot finding a warm target in the packed central aisle.

The traitors were firing blind now, scores of wild shots spitting a hail of stone chips that fell around Idelaun and his marines like confetti. They were lost – trapped in the open, cut-off from reinforcements and retreat and surrounded by the most deadly warriors they could ever hope to face. Idelaun was not surprised in the slightest to see the terror in their eyes as they fell by the dozens, the flagstones below swimming in their worthless blood.

He was about to give the Devastator squads the order to move in when the heap of rubble the narthex had become burst open. Enormous chunks of stone toppled aside as the World Eater’s dreadnought dug itself clear. The mighty sarcophagus sat atop six mechanised legs, the undead face of the daemon-marine within visible behind clear amourplas. It screamed, and its amplified blood-lust hit the chapel like an earthquake, causing columns to fracture and stones eight feet across to plummet to the floor, killing dozens. Four arms radiated from the base of the horror; two wielding chainblades and the other two terminating in crackling claws with flamers set in their palms. Spikes adorned it, and severed heads adorned those.

A cry came up from the traitor soldiers: one word - “Barok!”

“Kuillen!” Idelaun barked into the vox.

“I see it, Brother Captain.” As ever, the words came as if Kuillen were on a parkland stroll.

“Korian – keep the traitors busy while his squad tackle that excretion of evil. Buy him a kill-zone to fight in.”

“Acknowledged.”

Korian seemed to have followed Domovoi’s lead and kept his squad moving. They appeared from a side chapel on the second level, and decimated the troops trying to fire on Kuillen’s men.

“Sleipnir – do you have line of sight to that thing?” Idelaun shouted.

“Not right now, captain,” came a reply that Idelaun had to struggle to hear over the earsplitting noise of the battle. Idelaun triggered his power fist and was about to race back down the length of the nave to assist Kuillan when he heard a familiar, blood-chilling cry from the north arm of the transept. More and more cries sounded – the World Eaters – the ones that had reached the booby-trapped arches. Buried, perhaps, but buried alive, and they too had dug themselves out. This was getting interesting, thought Idelaun.

A double crack from the direction of the Crossing; Idelaun watched in awe as one of the mighty piers of granite and jade slumped. Giant shadows of stone thirty feet high sloughed from the sides as it buckled, the groan shaking the entire chapel. Twin contrails of smoke led from the mortally wounded pillar back in the direction of the pulpits – Sleipnir’s Devastators had found a weakness in the architecture. With a bone-jarring crash the entire pillar plummeted into the Crossing, pulverising the troops sheltering behind it and sending a wave of destruction through the blood-soaked flagstones, soldiers half the chapel away knocked off their feet by the shockwave.

“I have line of sight now,” Sleipnir noted dryly, as two bright comets flared and sped down the nave.

“Kuillen – incoming!” shouted Idelaun. He got a glimpse of a marine (no helmet – was it Kuillen?) being tossed like a child's toy, but never got a chance to watch the outcome as dark red bodies charged from both arms of the transept, the blood-fury of the berserkers awful to behold. With a whoosh several of them took to the air on jump-packs including, Idelaun noted grimly, the giant who had led them into the chapel.

Explosions sounded from the ruined narthex and another colossal bellow shook the chapel's roots.

“Prepare for hand to hand, my brothers,” Idelaun warned, spotting Magyr’s squad further down the balcony and racing to join up with them. “Meet them with all the righteous fury of Dorn Himself!”

The World Eaters knew only the tactics of the bullet – straight ahead and kill until forced to stop. As the berserkers charged the Devastator squads from the flanks the airborne marines flew for Idelaun’s squads on the balconies of the nave, each howling fanatic simply jetting for the nearest Imperial Fist he could see.

Idelaun’s bolter found one as he closed like a missile, the shot tearing his left arm off at the shoulder and sending him slamming into the colonnades beneath, but his fellows avoided the curtain of fire more through damned luck than anything else and were on them in a howling blizzard of chainaxes.

Idelaun leapt sideways as one World Eater pivoted at the last second and hammered feet first into the wall beside Idelaun’s head, cracking the ivory panels. Without pausing the jump-pack thrusters flared again and the World Eater launched at Idelaun a second time, axes swinging in a fatal embrace. Idelaun swept his power fist across in a defensive movement and the World Eater crashed into a pile of choir stools, leaping back to his feet in an instant. He roared, and Idelaun saw his face was a mess of scar-tissue and appalling self-mutilation.

“Blood for the…!”

Idelaun had faced this abomination’s brethren before, and that was why he was so startled at the beast’s hesitation. World Eaters did not hesitate. So startled, it took him a moment to raise his bolter. Even more startled when he saw what looked like alarm in the World Eater’s eyes, a fraction of a second before his bolt round blew them out.

He whirled in time to see Magyr, one foot on his dead enemy’s breastplate, dragging his whirring chainsword out as the adamantium teeth chewed on the armour. Magyr caught his eye; raised one eyebrow in mock salute and – Idelaun nearly laughed – ducked in sudden shock as another World Eater shot overhead, chainaxe cleaving the air where the young sergeant’s neck had been.

The World Eater lost control and rammed bodily into Idelaun, sending the bulky captain sliding on his back along the grooved stone of the balcony, the enormous weight of the traitor marine on top of him. The World Eater screamed, his mouth filled with row after row of needle-like teeth, as the two men struggled to free their weapons. Idelaun craned his neck up and bit down hard on the World Eater’s ear, tearing a strip of ring-adorned cartilage from the side of the man’s head, but he just howled insanely and butted Idelaun, whose head cracked against the stone below.

It was only then that Idelaun realised they were still moving; the World Eater’s jump-pack was still at full throttle, grinding the both of them along the balcony like a rocket sled. He risked a look ahead – taking a savage blow as they both caromed off a pillar – and saw they were heading for a solid wall lined with statues. The World Eater had noticed, too, and with the whine of the afterburners Idelaun felt their speed pick up. Sparks sprayed, lighting the rushing parapet in monochrome. Blood drizzled on him; he grimaced and struggled to free his power fist. With a wrench he got it out from underneath the gibbering World Eater, who jammed his elbow on it, forcing it wide.

Idelaun grabbed for the parapet to halt the bone-snapping rush, but the green glass shattered and the oak splintered before the energies of his power fist. He could almost feel the wall, now, hear the sound of his body breaking. The World Eater howled and leered, preparing to jet upwards.

“Tell your Blood God I spit in his eye,” growled Idelaun as he dug his power fist into the solid stone beneath him and gripped the World Eater with his other hand, stopping him from flying free.

The pain in his shoulder was a white-hot nova as the power fist gripped the stone like an anchor and his body whipped around. He cried out through clenched teeth as the World Eater was torn loose with a high-pitched shriek only to die an instant later; his neck snapped and skull burst against the shattered legs of a nameless saint.

Idelaun shook his head and picked himself up, then ran to retrieve his bolter. “Kuillen, report!” Nothing. The heavy bolters of the Devastators had fallen silent, although it was hard to be sure the noise and mayhem were so great. Every Son of Dorn would be locked in brutal close combat with the World Eaters, now. Blocks of masonry the size of small houses plummeted to the ground near the Crossing. The loss of the pier had irretrievably weakened the dome and lantern above. “Kuillen! Report!”

“The thing is as about as dead as we can make it, captain. Thank Sleipnir for me, if he still breathes. More are coming – I can hear them under the rubble. They will soon have the way open again.”

And with the way open, reinforcements would arrive. This battle was not fought to be won – there were too many in the spearhead for that – but to blunt them and force them to seek another route. It was time to leave. Idelaun opened a channel on the vox to all his squad leaders. “Fall back! All squads, disengage and fall back.” He picked up his bolter then sighted up at the distant ceiling where the last of the krak grenades had been placed. The Imperial architects had built this chapel much too solidly to bring such a major element as the roof down with simple grenades, but that was not what they were there for. He swore. He couldn’t see them. He had put them there himself, and could have found them blindfolded, but he could not see them.

“Dorn’s teeth, where the hell…?” Then he saw it – the collapse of the pier had shaken a rib of the fan-vaulting loose. He had no clear sight to the pack of grenades, assuming their webbing still held them in place. A strong hand grabbed his shoulder and he span fast, stopping with his power fist inches from Magyr’s face. The sergeant’s ever-present grin grew fractionally.

“We have to leave, captain, before they find the way up here. We’ve done enough, even without that,” he said, pointing up.

A streak of dark red flashed through the flickering fireworks of the traitor soldiers’ suppressive fire.

“You go, Magyr, with my blessing. I have an oath I must redeem.”

“But where are you going, captain?”

“With Dorn, sergeant. With Dorn.” And with that, Idelaun took two quick steps and leapt over the balcony.

#

Part 3

#

“Do not speak a man dead lest you will him so!” Sergeant Magyr’s face was dark with anger as he shouted.

Sergeant Domovoi’s punch was lightning fast, but Magyr managed to ride the worst of it. Even so, he was left on one knee, spitting blood and fury. Domovoi towered over him like thunder. “You think I will the captain’s death? Never say that to me! Never! But you saw that inferno – no-one could have survived!”

Sergeant Kuillan saw it in time; Brother Marley saw it too and between them they just managed to get their arms around the young Magyr as he launched himself at Domovoi, raging like a mountain bear.

As Magyr struggled furiously they hauled him backwards, slamming him against the cold stone of the martyrium, the obsidian seal cracking with the force. Domovoi, fury in his deep-set eyes, stalked towards them until Apothecary Wethlan put a hand on his breastplate.

“We wait for Captain Idelaun! He will come!” Magyr roared, heaving at the arms that held him fast. “By Dorn, he will come!”

They had rendezvoused under the Sheol Gate, each of the squads fighting their own retreats under fire. Alfar’s and Sleipnir’s Devastator squads had had the worst of it; not only had they the World Eaters to contend with, but they were dug in on the chapel floor and had to pull out under heavy fire from the remaining soldiers, collapsing the spiral stairs behind them as they went. If it hadn’t been for Captain Idelaun, thought Sergeant Kuillen, they might have been overwhelmed, but – he shook his head in silent admiration: the captain certainly knew how to capture the enemy’s attention.

He turned his own to the thirty marines gathered under the low barrel ceiling of the Sheol Gate, aware that the forces of Chaos were hunting for another way into the heart of the Basilican now the Chapel of St Icosis was denied them. Time, too, was their enemy in this race. “Remember that we are Imperial Fists,” he hissed in Magyr’s ear, “not World Eaters. You will control your passions, so that we can still tell the difference. The captain has many tricks Death does not know, but if he has bought our lives with his we must honour his sacrifice and move on.” He let go and Magyr pulled back furiously, pushing Brother Marley away.

“Look me in the eye, Kuillan,” demanded Magyr. “Look me in the eye and tell me the captain is dead, and I’ll follow you to Hell itself.”

Apothecary Wethlan stepped forward, his forbidding glare softened in the faint light of the sconces at the far end of the Gate. “We have all heard His words, Sergeant Magyr. Were he here, Captain Idelaun would be the first to tell us to follow the shadows, as Dorn commands. The Fragment is in danger, and the Ruinous Powers must not be allowed to seize it. Who can tell what corruption will be wrought with it? What heresies and damnation will follow upon it? All else is mere suffering and pain; the Will of Dorn is life and death incarnate and we fail to heed Him at our eternal peril.” Most of the marines nodded in silent agreement. Magyr's squad remained perfectly still. “We have bought ourselves time to reach the Relic Halls, but the enemy will find another way through. They could be here at any moment. These are the facts, brother.”

“And these are mine,” growled Magyr, ignoring Wethlan and fixing Domovoi with a glare. “I’ll kill any man who leaves, I swear it.”

The massive Domovoi shrugged and took a step towards Magyr, and at that moment a hammer blow sounded from behind the carved stone of the martyrium. The hairline crack in the tomb door grew to touch floor and ceiling as the graven image shuddered. Another hammer blow resounded, echoes rolling off down the long Gate.

Magyr leapt back, weapon in hand. Kuillen drew his bolter as all around him the marines trained their guns on the circular obsidian seal. Another hammer blow; the crack widened and flakes of black glass spalled from the surface.

Then Magyr lowered his weapon, laughter dancing in his face. At the same instant Kuillen knew why, and he lowered his bolter also. One glance told him his brothers felt it too. They all knew who was behind the burial seal.

With a final hammer blow the ancient stone gave way, and the halves of the door fell out to shatter thunderously on the smooth cobbles. Captain Idelaun stepped over the lintel, his powerfist spilling blinding blue-white energies over the rubble. With the pitch of the tomb behind him his fierce eyes blazed from the perfect darkness of his face like an avenging angel or a risen saint. Smoke shrouded him in ghostly gray and dying flames of phantom blue flickered on his scorched and battered armour.

“Angels and ministers of Dorn, defend us!” exclaimed Domovoi, a rare and exultant smile hiding under his beard, but his words were lost amid the shouts and cheers.

It was Sergeant Korian of the Seventh who spoke when the clamour died. “Greetings, Captain Idelaun,” he said with a wry grin. “I had heard you were dead!”

Magyr laughed as Idelaun nodded ruefully. “That’s happening a lot today, sergeant.” He turned to the sundered tomb, knelt and spoke a quick benediction to the bones of the martyr within. “Forgive me, but this servant of the Emperor had great need.”

He rose swiftly, and the assembled marines quieted at his sombre expression. He looked them over, but he already knew what he would see. Not one of them had fallen in the chapel. Not one. Old certainties were fading; other possibilities striving to be seen. The line grew thin indeed – was that what the World Eater had meant? “Korian – your marines were exemplary. Alfar, Sleipnir – the ambush would never have succeeded had it not been for the line your squads held. The Third Company is honoured to have fought beside you all.” He was pleased to see Magyr lead a cheer for the marines of Seventh and Ninth Companies. “More importantly – Kuillen – was I mistaken or did I see that pathetic excuse for a dreadnought pick up a sergeant of the Imperial Fists and fling him aside like a soiled tissue?”

“After what you were up to with that giant World Eater,” said Kuillen, “you're lecturing me about being thrown through the air?” The marines laughed. “Praise Dorn, I should have been killed, captain, but even before I hit the wall I knew I would survive, just as you knew you would find us all here. Dorn would not have sent us there if it was just to have us killed. He has a purpose for us, so I bounced off the wall, stood back up and we killed it.”

“Praise Dorn, indeed. Nothing broken?”

Kuillen shrugged. “The wall.”

“Of course it was; you hit it head first!” said Idelaun. “Enough – the shadows are heading towards the Fragment, and we have to stop them. Squads, move out.”

Magyr stood before Idelaun as the marines headed off towards the far end of the Sheol Gate. “Captain. No offense, but I’ve seen Plague Marines look healthier than you do.”

“It’s nothing. A few scratches. A few bruises. Some minor immolation. Dorn sends pain so that we know we are still alive. I can rest when I’m dead.”

“I was wondering if you heard – before you broke through the seal – if you heard what was said?”

Idelaun put a hand on Magyr's pauldron. “I heard Brother Heart arguing with Brother Head. Nothing more. Now take point, sergeant, find me the fastest route to the Relic Halls.”

He watched them go, wondering if he should tell them what the World Eater’s champion had said to him. He shook his head – even he didn’t know what it had meant, and it would only sow doubt in their minds. He made sure the last of the oil fires on his armour were out, bowed one last time to the violated tomb and moved off after his men.

#

His leap off the balcony had been neither suicidally rash nor a supreme act of faith. It was a calculated risk taken by a seasoned warrior who knew his men needed cover to withdraw.

But he knew that wasn’t true.

As he fell through massed las-bolts, he also knew that the Captain Idelaun who had stood at the top of the Manatine Steps a few days before would have been appalled. But something had happened – that man was gone; dead, perhaps, and his shade was Idelaun unbound.

Below: the faces of the corrupted troopers, faces frozen in horror as he plummeted towards them. It was the kind of impulsive recklessness he would have excoriated in his recruits and lamented in the battle-reports of the Space Wolves.

Then he landed squarely on the back of the World Eater’s massive leader and realised that impulsive recklessness could also be immensely satisfying.

The World Eater was already jetting upwards on full thrust. Idelaun’s impact made him veer wildly off-course, but the World Eaters engineered their jump-packs only slightly more sensitively than the greenskins did – it had almost enough power to lift a dreadnought and the two warriors shot upwards like a rocket from a pad.

Idelaun’s powerfist was uncharged – he had no desire to kill the World Eater champion. Not yet. With one hand locked onto the gold-edged heat-exchanger of the jump-pack, he grabbed one of the bright red turbine exhausts, keeping it pointed straight down, forcing the World Eater to climb. The stench of gore clung to the blood-blighted armour and he gagged at the miasma of corruption.

The World Eater roared in impotent fury, lashing futilely with his chain axe. Then he started to spin, rotating faster and faster, still blasting upwards, the mounting g-forces threatening to tear Idelaun lose. His vision narrowed to a red-rushing circle as the blood raced to his legs and feet, but he gritted his teeth and clung on, relishing the clarity of the pain. On the back of the jump-pack the hateful face of Khorne leered at him, and Idelaun fixed on it, his loathing of the Blood God a well of strength that no heretic could run dry.

The train of skulls the berserker had worn was torn apart as the World Eater spun like a rifled bullet, the meat hooks snapping and the bones hurtling outward to smash into powder on the chapel walls.

Then the champion stopped spinning and Idelaun had to force his bloodless arm to block a chain-axe sweeping backwards over the berserker’s head. The World Eater could put little force in the blow, however, and Idelaun ripped the chain-axe from his grasp and let it drop.

“Fight me, you pathetic coward!” the World Eater spat, trying to grab Idelaun. “You cower before the might of Khorne, and it disgusts me!”

Idelaun glanced up and joy filled his heart. The pack of krak grenades was still there – clinging to the shattered ceiling in their protective webbing. He reached for his bolter, but nearly lost it a second later as the World Eater jetted sideways, howling blasphemies.

A massive stone column loomed. Idelaun braced. The World Eater twisted at the last moment, ramming Idelaun into the stone with an impact like a Rhino charge. Pain exploded through his rib-cage; colourless lights blazed in his head, but still he clung on single-handed.

He cursed as he realised he could no longer see the grenades. “Is that all the sport you can offer?” he shouted. “Should I just kill you now and let the ghouls below howl over your corpse?”

With a blue jet and a whooshing roar the World Eater blasted away again, heading for the column opposite. Swinging his bolter as a hammer Idelaun knocked one of the thrusters out of alignment and the World Eater jerked sideways. They slammed into the pillar side on, knocking a great chunk of stonework lose.

They fell, the Chaos champion screaming with incoherent delight. He was truly insane, Idelaun knew, and would happily die knowing Idelaun was broken and dead beside him. The Blood God demanded blood; it didn’t matter who’s.

Idelaun unclipped the safety-line at his belt as they tumbled down the column. Insane, but not stupid. The berserker wouldn’t die if he didn’t have to. Probably, he prayed silently, as he snapped the karabiner in place over a steel loop in the World Eater’s heat-exchanger and let go.“For the glory of Dorn,” he cried, “and Him on Terra!” Let the Chaos scum think he was welcoming death.

He heard a roar of delight from the enemy soldiers below as the World Eater fired full afterburners and shot away from Idelaun’s plummeting body. The dark stonework hurtled past; the blood-drenched floor of the nave rushed up to kill him and then the line snapped taut and he was snatched upward like a fish on a line.

The World Eater’s jump-pack had plenty of raw thrust, but not only had Idelaun damaged one of the two nozzles but no World Eater, no matter how skilled, was used to piloting their jump-pack with an enormous anchor swinging wildly behind it. The champion screamed in rage as he fought for control, crashing into towering brass organ pipes and scoring deep gouges in the ancient stone behind with the unnatural protrusions on his armour. The first thing Idelaun would have done, he thought as he too slammed into the same collapsing pipes, was land, but the World Eater had sacrificed such thoughts when he sold his reason for blood-lust. Fury was keeping him aloft; and keeping Idelaun alive.

The World Eater described an involuntary half-loop, whipping Idelaun within touching distance of the ceiling over two hundred metres above the floor. He saw a massive chain hanging horizontally – each link thicker than his own wrists – and grabbed for it. He held on, anchoring the safety line, turning the World Eater into the weighted end of a hammer toss. The champion crashed into the fan vaulting, before something snapped further along the chain shaking Idelaun loose. He dropped into empty darkness before the line tightened again, whipping him away on another manic rollercoaster ride.

Something huge moved in the dark heights of the chapel. Over the roar of the jump-pack, the din of the battle below and the warm air rushing past, Idelaun heard rusted joints snapping loose, tonnes of metal creaking and groaning. Whatever it was, it was big and it was falling fast.

But the World Eater was more skilled than even Idelaun had realised, and he was gaining control of his jump-pack again. He dove for the chapel floor, picking up speed, Idelaun flailing helplessly in his wake. The World Eater pulled out of the dive at the last second and with an almighty crash Idelaun ploughed into the yellow and green flagstones, sending an explosion of granite and jade into the air. But he had activated his powerfist moments before, holding it in above his head, and as he was dragged across the nave, soldiers scattering left and right, the powerfist blasted the stones aside, protecting his skull from the worst of the impacts.

Then he was rising again, body wracked in agony, the plas-steel safety line frayed but holding. He opened his eyes and saw the World Eater manoeuvring for another pass. He would not survive that again, and the Chaos champion knew it, too. He got his first proper look at the traitor Marine hovering above him, saw his lips had been gnawed back to the gum-line and that his face was pierced all over with thick iron hoops.

“I will gut your weakling corpse and drink from your heart!” the World Eater spat, finally facing Idelaun for the first time, but even as he spoke Idelaun recognised the look in his eyes. The same look as the other World Eater only minutes ago. Alarm, yes, but also – triumph? “Khorne is already drinking your blood, coward! Blood for the Blood God! Blood for the Blood God!”

The Nihilarch’s forces took up the cry, the air ringing with their unholy chant. As Ideluan dangled, he realised the metronome of battle had stopped – his Marines must have completed their withdrawal. “Praise the Primarch,” he muttered, “and let Him welcome the souls of the fallen.” He saw the narthex had been re-opened, the rubble dislodged by two more of the horrendous dreadnaughts.

Screams rose behind him, then a noise like a rusted Titan groaning, then he felt the rush of warm air as a huge iron sphere on a chain swept past him. It was a thurible – a giant cage into which the Ecclesiarchy placed the worst criminals on Saint’s Days for the Ritual of the Botafumeiro. They would be burned alive, along with bales of incense to mask the hideous smell of their sin, and the smoke of their salvation would fill the chapel as the thurible swung back and forth. It must weigh over forty tonnes, he thought, just as the World Eater reached the same conclusion, but with a different aim in mind.

The thurible reached the apex of its swing near the ceiling and sped back towards them with a colossal moan of iron. The World Eater, his ruined face suffused with ecstasy at the coming orgy of destruction, jetted sideways. Idelaun swung helplessly after him, moving right into the path of the rushing thurible.

It was close enough for him to see the faces of the saints etched into its ribs when he triggered his safety-line, and let out a dozen metres of extra cable. He dropped like a stone. The thurible hit the line – it slipped upwards and caught around the chain. Idelaun and the World Eater might as well have been made of paper for all the difference their weight made to the holy pendulum, which swept on towards the floor of the chapel without so much as a shudder, ripping them out the air and dragging them both behind it.

Idelaun had let out just enough line – he was close enough to the thurible to reach it and he grabbed onto the intricate latticework of metal, hauling himself up on top as it hissed through the air. The World Eater trailed behind, dangling from the line attached to his now-useless jump-pack. Never had his screams of fury sounded so sweet to Idelaun’s ears.

Shots from far below zipped harmlessly past, the great bulk of the thurible concealing Idelaun from the ground troops. The shots stopped quickly – none wished to risk hitting the incandescent World Eater.

Crouching atop the thurible, Idelaun suddenly realised where the return swing would take him. Praise Dorn, indeed. All he had to do was hold on for another thirty seconds.

The thurible slowed as it approached the ceiling. The metal thrummed beneath his feet in protest, then it stopped and started to accelerate downwards again. With a start, Idelaun realised he could no longer see the World Eater.

“Blood for the Blood God!”

Idelaun scrambled aside just as the World Eater slammed into the thurible beside him, raving and wild-eyed. As the swing had reversed, his momentum had looped the tethered Chaos champion under the iron ball, out of sight, and up behind Idelaun.

“Praise Dorn!” Idelaun replied, elbowing the traitor squarely in the face, flattening his nose in a burst of blood. The blow dislodged his opponent, but also succeeded in making himself slide even further down the curve of the thurible. He stopped his death-plunge with a screech of metal as his boots lodged precariously against the upraised arms of an embossed saint.

The face of the World Eater was still visible, contorted in a rictus of rage, holding onto a protrusion in the thurible with his blackened teeth. He brought both hands up and slid his fingers through the rings set deep into his flesh. A moment’s pause as if savouring the ecstasy to come and then he threw his arms wide, ripping the rings with them. Blood spraying from the mutilated ruin left behind, quickly lost to the gathering wind.

“Blood for the Blood God!” he raved, then gripped an iron rib and leapt onto the top of the thurible. Idelaun hauled himself back up to face him, snagging his left leg on the safety line. The World Eater was still tethered and, in his rage, had not thought to cut the line. As the World Eater raised a boot to pulverise his face, Idelaun grabbed the line and hauled on it with all his strength.

The World Eater was jerked backwards mid-stomp and fell heavily, slipping and sliding as he scrabbled for a handhold.

The thurible was now sweeping only a metre or so above ground level at immense speed, and lasrounds pocked craters in the iron around him as the Nihilarch’s forces opened fire at near point-blank range. Ignoring the incoming fire he hoisted himself atop the thurible, grabbing onto the chain with one hand and drawing his bolter with the other.

His opponent had vanished over the side, but Idelaun could see the strain in the safety line and hear the howls of fury from below. The swing was slowing, he was nearly at the ceiling. He looked up – the grenades were fastened to the ceiling directly above him, just as he had anticipated. He took aim, waiting for the right moment.

It arrived, just as the thurible slowed to a halt only metres from the grenades – the World Eater appeared, whipped round by his own momentum once more and soaring through the air towards Idelaun. Soaring directly past the bag of webbing packed with grenades.

“Blood for the-”

“No – we praise Dorn,” Idelaun whispered as the krak grenades exploded with a single shot.

Shrapnel tore the World Eater apart in mid-air. A fireball blossomed as his jump-pack detonated. Idelaun wrapped his arms around the huge chain and ducked low as more shrapnel and shards of stone sliced into his armour and ricocheted off the thurible. As the ball picked up speed again he felt it ring like a church bell as massive pieces of masonry struck it, then he heard the gush of liquid over the rushing air, felt the wall of heat as the freed promethium hit the fireball and ignited, and knew he had succeeded.

Above the chapel ran the promethium lines that supplied this whole quadrant of the Basilican. The grenades weren’t enough to bring the ceiling down, but they were more than enough to shatter the ancient iron of the buried pipes.

Without sparing a look at the torrent of burning fluid gushing behind him, he gripped the chain as high as he could and activated his powerfist in a crackling blaze of energy. The thurible raced downwards once again into the shouts of victory that had turned into screams and cries of rage at the death of the World Eater. He grinned, knowing their suffering had only just begun.

He felt heat and smelled burning, and saw that some of the promethium from the shattered conduits had splashed onto the chain and was running down his armour. He could only imagine how he must look to the horrified troops below; the slayer of their champion, an angry yellow giant atop a plunging wrecking ball trailing flame and smoke, face as black as the depths of Hell; the undying Wrath of the Emperor descending from on high.

Impulsive recklessness was truly immensely satisfying.

“For the glory of Dorn,” he screamed at the top of his lungs, “and Him on Terra!”

The thurible reached the lowest point of its swing, skimming the flagstones as fast as a jetbike. The torrent of burning promethium touched down, spraying agonising death all around. The enemy ran screaming in terror as ahead of him stood the two remaining dreadnaughts, claws scissoring as they longed to rip at his flesh. He let the chain take his weight and plunged his powerfist into the mighty lynch pin holding the thurible in place, tearing through the metal like foam. With an ear-splitting snap the pin broke and the forty-tonne thurible was suddenly lose at ground level with an unstoppable velocity.

The chain continued on its way, Idelaun clinging to the end single-handed, rising up and away from the devastation below as the burning promethium spread in torrents. The thurible skidded, sending fountains of stone and shattered pews into the air before slamming into both dreadnaughts with a crash like the world’s ending. Fireballs illuminated the massive cloud of dust and ash from within, burning cinders raining all around the thurible as it carried on unaffected before smashing through the re-opened narthex.

Idelaun let go, picking just the right moment to allow his momentum to carry him spinning through the air and crashing into the gallery of saints Domovoi had hidden in not an hour before. His armoured form decapitated statues and shattered icons before the wall behind finally stopped him, smashing open to reveal ancient tombs beyond.

With one final look at the searing inferno the floor of the Chapel of St Icosis had become, the waterfall of liquid fire lighting that holy place one last time before it fell to darkness, he turned and ran into the catacombs.

#

The head – it was a young woman’s, Idelaun saw, as it bounced and rolled, gore-matted hair slapping against the flagstones – came to rest only a few metres away. The eyes were gone, replaced with thin metal rods and in the mouth-

Captain Idelaun shook his head to dispel the phantom of memory. He was battle-weary and wracked with pain, yes, but his enhanced physiology should not betray him so easily. With an angry scowl he picked up the silver plated skull at his feet, dislodged by Alfar’s Devastators as they thundered past. Reverently, he replaced it on the shelves that lined this far part of the Sheol Gate and carried on.

Thousands upon thousands of gleaming skulls like shoals of mirrored fish flanked him as he ran, the sole remains of pilgrims interred in the Basilican over the centuries. Zephyrs of the mind were easily dismissed, but he couldn’t get the taste of bitter ash out of his mouth.

#

The Sheol Gate ended at the base of the Namunkar Well. The end of the Gate itself had been heavily fortified by the Idelaun’s Third Company and by the Fighting Tigers of Veda, but the fortifications were deserted.

From a distance: “Shadows, captain.”

Idelaun could see them, skulking in the darkness of the arches leading to the Namunkar Well. “Keep going. Let them try and stop us.”

They approached the Well, the shadows flickering in and out of existence all around them, dark firelight on the veil between the worlds. But that veil, Idelaun knew, grew ever thinner. A rending was coming.

“Do you know what the inscriptions mean, captain?” asked Sergeant Kuillen.

Three arches led into the Namunkar Well, and above each were words carved in an archaic form of High Gothic. Idelaun nodded. “They are questions, Brother. It is said by the priests here that they are asked of all the departed souls who pass before Him on the Golden Throne. Much time is spent disagreeing on the correct answers to give.” A snort conveyed his opinions of clerical dogmatics. He pointed as they approached. “‘Who is your Lord?’ ‘Who is your master?’ ‘What is your creed?’”

He paused, then spoke for them all. “Let us answer, Brothers, that they know the Fists are coming.”

As one the Astartes spoke as they passed beneath the first arch, their voices strong and clear and echoing far into the space beyond. “Lord Dorn, Primarch and Progenitor.”

The second: “He who reigns on Terra.”

The last, the words coming to them each unbidden and true: “We will not step back. We will not suffer cowards and traitors. We are the bulwark against the terror. We are the defenders of humanity. We are the Sons of Dorn!”

They passed out of the Sheol Gate and into the vertiginous Namunkar Well, a huge cylindrical space formed of milky marble and lined with columns and gargoyles. In the centre of the well towered a massive statue; the Avenging Scythe of Monkir. Four hundred metres in height and weighing as much as a naval frigate, the memorial to the crusading Cardinal who had conquered these worlds for the Ecclesiarchy dominated the Well. His famous silver scythe was raised high overhead while his pitiless gaze demanded judgement of all who gathered at his unshod feet.

Meeting the cardinal’s towering glare would have induced needles of vertigo in any ordinary man, and even Idelaun felt a sense of awe. Courage knows courage, he thought, recognising the face of a comrade-at-arms, and nodded his head in silent respect.

Wells such as this ringed this tier of the Basilican for kilometres in either direction, but only this one gave onto the Relic Halls. Entwined around the statue ran the only access to the halls above, a spiralling thoroughfare of glittering gilt and banners of regal silks lit by floating lux-bars. Idelaun could see shadows moving all along its length. He took the lead, passing Magyr without a word, and raced up the walkway.

#

The Relic Halls were dark, and the ornately plastered walls echoed softly to the Marines’ bootsteps on the scented wood underfoot. Each hall was a low dome of silver ribs, with jade-arched corridors and meandering stairs linking them to their neighbours. Each contained a reliquary of eye-watering beauty or graven solidity, watched over by a ring of rusted saints and mortared martyrs. Arranged in concentric circles, the halls grew larger as the Marines approached the hub, the largest of all the halls and the resting place of the Fragment of the Basilican.

The shadows were everywhere, moving in and out of vision from hall to hall.

“Where are the Frateris Militia? The Sisters of The Argent Shroud? The Ecclesiarchs Militant?” demanded Idelaun. “Where are the Fighting Tigers? Where are our Brothers?”

Yet for all Idelaun’s words, they had met their brothers, in ones and two, fractions of squads that had been cut-off from the chain of command in the outlying reaches of the Basilican during the heaviest fighting and come here, drawn by the words spoken in their hearts, making their way to the Fragment. Idelaun’s command now numbered over fifty Astartes, many failing to hide their joy as they were reunited with Brothers they once thought numbered among the fallen.

The shadows grew thicker, pushing at the unseen boundaries.

“I don’t like it, captain,” said Sergeant Domovoi as they passed through halls stripped of their relics. “If this is a trap, to draw the enemy in and slaughter them, why do we know nothing of it? Why do our Brothers not hail us? If everyone else is dead, why is the Basilican not overrun with the enemy? If they have withdrawn, why no booby-traps or dead-ends?”

But Idelaun said nothing, knowing that some questions could only be answered with faith, and praying that his was equal to the task.

Finally, the Hall of the Fragment, where the shadows crowded thickest. Through open gates of pure adamantium lined with rubies and down sweeping stairs of obsidian and brass, to the low dome of the largest hall, and the diamond-encased relic on the podium in the middle.

Captain Idelaun stopped as the shadows seethed, and the impossible loomed large. The veil started to rip.

“Prepare yourselves, Brothers,” he said, as the Marines spread out behind him.

The shadows darkened, wavering like mirages in the desert, then lightened, colour pouring into them at last. Rich reds and ochres; oranges and blacks; yellows and reds. Scratching on the distant edges of hearing turned into whispers; voices distorted from a lifetime away.

Magyr, drunk on the wonder: “There is nothing of the warp about this, captain, I am certain of it, but I am lost as to what it means.”

Idelaun nodded. Perversely, while the malignancy of the warp seemed different every time he encountered it, it also felt the same. Just as every lunatic was unique in his madness, but the same look of infectious horror haunted the eyes of each of them, so it was with the manifestations of the warp. And whatever this was, it was not the warp. “The Progenitor stands with us. Whatever we are here for, we are not here to fight.”

Domovoi, terse and reluctant: “These shadows are not daemons, captain.” He left the obvious alternative unspoken.

The whispers grew louder.

“…shadows are here…”

“…you must protect…”

“…weapons can harm them…”

“…just standing there…”

“They can see us,” growled Idelaun.

“Captain!” shouted Magyr in amazement, stabbing a finger at one of the largest shadows, still black, but blurred with a streak of yellow like paint in the rain. “Listen to his voice!”

The hall filled with the susurration of half-heard murmers as Idelaun strained to hear what had got Magyr so excited. Then he caught the words, spoken in a voice he had known for over sixty years. There was no mistaking the band-saw rasp – Idelaun had seen the throat that produced it hand-stitched with baling wire after a reaver’s blade had nearly decapitated its owner. “Chaplain Gense!” he exclaimed. “But how can he be among the shadows?”

“That one,” said Kuillen, pointing at an ochre ghost. “Ecclesiarch Apotheus, I swear it. He led the pilgrim delegation that brought us these purity seals on the eve of battle.”

“There,” added Apothecary Wethlan. “You can see the red hair, captain – it’s Brother-Sergeant Incavi of the Seventh.”

A voice rose from the soft babble, and Idelaun froze. From the shocked silence, he realised his Marines had heard it too. It was the voice of Brother Belder.

-he knelt by the stone mound that was Belder’s grave. He was struck by the odour of damp plaster and crumbling masonry-

“It can’t be,” Magyr whispered, the joy draining from his face. “We counted him among the fallen.”

Idelaun reached out to touch the shadow that was Brother Belder, and it was like waking from a dream. The line was all but gone.

He could see through his hand.

He held his gauntlet up to the light, and felt ice down his spine as he saw the light gleaming faintly through it. He turned to his comrades, and saw a company of ghosts. The line had been crossed, indeed, and it was they who had crossed it.

The head – it was a young woman’s, Idelaun saw, as it bounced and rolled, gore-matted hair slapping against the flagstones – came to rest only a few metres away. The eyes were gone, replaced with thin metal rods and in the mouth–

“He is here because he never died, Brothers,” said Idelaun as the awful truth became clear. “But we did. We are the true shadows.”

He might have expected a chorus of denial, but they saw one another with the same clear eyes as his. He might have expected shock or anger, but their hearts burned with the same fire of belief as his. In one moment of utmost faith, a moment in which the bonds of brotherhood had never been stronger, he saw them embrace their fate with all the resolve of the Men of Stone.

“At the Manatine Steps, captain,” said Magyr. “The bomb inside the head. It was strong enough to bring the roof down, and yet we all thought we’d survived. We should have known.”

“Sacred Hands of Dorn! We weren’t cut off from the chain of command at all,” said Idelaun. “The whispers we heard on the vox are just the same whispering we hear now. The sound of the living in the ears of the dead. Before the bomb, we saw the dead as shadows. When we joined them, it was the living we saw as phantoms.” The words of the World Eater, and the look on his face, were vivid in Idelaun’s mind. He had known. That warp-cursed beast had known. Idelaun laughed. Khorne may be drinking his blood, but Idelaun had no use for it any longer. I hope it gives you a belly-ache.

“We died at the Manatine Steps,” he said. “Brother Belder was the only one to survive. The others among us died elsewhere in the Basilican. But something happened to us – we rose and fought on, not alive but not gone, either. And the forces of Chaos saw us. They saw us as we see each other now, and they were terrified.”

“And Dorn spoke to us,” said Kuillen.

“Yes, to bring us here,” said Idelaun. “To perform one last duty that can only be performed in death. He said he had given us all the time He could.”

“We must not let them take it,” said Magyr. “The Primarch meant them, captain!”

The voices were clear now.

An old man, his stentorian preacher’s voice cracking under duress. “…the Blessed Rogal Dorn recovered from his wounds on this very spot, Chaplain Gense. The Fragment had been here long before then – a relic of the Dark Age of Mankind. The Keepers of the Fragment beseeched its power to cure him, drawing on what scant teachings remained of its art, but its spirit was weak from its long years of silence. Rogal Dorn gave of himself to succour the machine spirit, giving it the strength to work its purpose and balance the fatal humours of the body. But he would not let the Keepers use it on him. Praise the Emperor, but he insisted that its sacred spirit be turned to the others who came with him while he endured the great pain of his wounds. He saw them all healed in body and mind, some brought back from the brink of death, before he allowed the Keepers to bring it to him. He recovered and returned to the Great Crusade, declaring that Pallatus was precious to him and that so long as the Fragment remained on Pallatus the world would never fall to the enemies of mankind.”

The familiar rasp of Chaplain Gense. “No more of your prophecies, Father Priest. The transport is waiting, and every moment we delay sees another servant of the Emperor fall. Pallatus is lost. We will escort you and your servants to the landing tier. We will do it now.”

“They are not prophecies, Chaplain Gense! As the Emperor is my witness, I have not a wit dull enough to believe in such things. They are the promises of your Primarch. Pallatus will not fall while the Fragment remains – the Blessed Rogal Dorn himself said so, on this ground, over ten thousand years ago.”

“And you and I will have a reckoning, Father Priest, over just why the Ministorum has been hiding a relic of the Progenitor from His Sons, but if reason is failing you then trust your eyes, man! Pallatus has already fallen, and I will not feed Mother War any more of my Brothers and Sisters in defiance of the inevitable. The word has already been given to fall back.”

“You would deny the words of your Primarch?”

“You tread on dangerous ground, bell-ringer, and I will not warn you again! I would walk through the sun at His bidding, but these promises are not known to the Chapter, and I have only your word they were ever spoken at all. Pallatus will not fall, you say, but it has fallen. An Honour Guard of the finest warriors to turn back the tide, you say, but I do not see them. Are you going to conjure them from thin air?”

Dorn spoke to Idelaun, and his voice was everywhere. “There are many mysteries here, Son of Mine. Some the dead already know, but none are for the living. Keep my promise.”

The veil was torn…

…the line was lost…

…the living and the dead met for the first and last time.

Shape resolved in the shadows; arms and legs, heads and faces, armour and weapons. Men and women, dressed in the rich reds and ochres of the clergy; the oranges and blacks of the Ordinis Minora; the yellows and reds of the Imperial Fists.

Chaplain Gense, his proud face frozen between shock and amazement, had his Crozius Arcanum half-raised as Captain Idelaun and his company of ghosts appeared in the Hall of the Fragment.

Silence like glass.

With a cry to the Emperor Ecclesiarch Apotheus and his entourage prostrated themselves. The Imperial Fists behind Chaplain Gense removed their helmets and fell to one knee, placing their sidearms on the polished wood in front of them.

Captain Idelaun touched the purity seal on his chest and raised his clenched fist high, his Brother Marines following suit in parade-ground perfection. “A promise was made,” he said, his voice echoing with a solemn majesty, “by a man beloved to us all, and we are here to keep that promise. The souls of the fallen stand before you. We are the Honour Guard, chosen of Dorn, and you will leave this battle, and this enemy, to us.”

“To the glory of Dorn, Primarch and Progenitor, and to Him on Terra,” rasped Gense, face downturned. “Forgive me. I doubted the priest’s words. The lesson is a painful one, but deserved. My lack of faith will be redeemed, Chosen of Dorn. This I swear.” He looked up, pride gone, but devotion shining from his noble features. “Let us stand with you, Captain Idelaun, I beg you.”

Idelaun shook his head sadly. “The honour would be ours, but there is no room for the living in what is to come, and only the dead will people this world when the last blow lands. We will meet again, Brother-Chaplain, before the Throne where every warrior’s journey must end, but you must go, and give us this our last battlefield.”

Chaplain Gense stood slowly, as if in great pain. He nodded, then raised his Crozius Arcanum before him. “Hail the Chosen of Dorn! The fallen will forever be remembered as the Emperor’s finest.”

The Imperial Fists stood as one, and Gense’s words rang around the hall over and over again.

“The Chapter will never forget, Brothers,” the chaplain said. He gave the order to leave.

Ecclesiarch Apotheus and his retinue arose, chanting benedictions. As his servants left, none of them able to look Idelaun and his men in the eye, Apotheus stood behind the Fragment. “I leave it in your hands, Captain Idelaun.”

“And you will find it here when you return, Father Priest, the promise kept.”

“May the Emperor watch over you, and all of you, my sons.”

Brother Belder approached, his open, honest face buried in shame. “I had gone to get ammunition, captain, and heard the grenades go off. I fought on as long as I could, but – I left your bodies lying there, under the rubble at the top of the steps. There were too many dead, and I could not hold.” He threw his helmet away to clatter against the obsidian steps. “My life is forfeit for abandoning you all! Take it, I have no more use for it, and let me join you!”

“Your death is your last and greatest act of faith, so what you would have me seize, Brother Belder, is not mine to take. We fight for the Emperor, but we die for our Brothers. When your time comes die well for all of us, the living and the dead.”

Chaplain Gense stopped at the adamantium gates. “Brother-Captain Idelaun. It is said that faith must be blind to be true, but is it blasphemy to hope for a glimmer of light in the endless dark?” He pointed his Crozius at the case containing the Fragment. “Has the Primarch spoken to you, Brother? Have you heard His voice?”

Idelaun could see the longing in Gense, and felt the eyes of every Fist, living and dead, on him. How he wished he could soothe the man’s soul, but it could not be. “There are many mysteries here, Brother-Chaplain. Some the dead already know, but none are for the living.”

After a long pause, Gense nodded once, his face tight and downcast.

The voice of Brother Belder betrayed his churning emotions. “Mourn not the dead…”

“…but instead give thanks that such men ever lived,” finished Chaplain Gense.

Then they saluted and left, and the hall where the ghosts stood alone was cold and quiet.

Magyr bowed his head. “They won’t remember us, captain. It’s like a dream to them. They’re already forgetting what happened.”

“I know, sergeant. The veil tore, but only for a moment. Soon, we will be just the honoured dead to them, and they will scratch their heads at why they left without the Fragment. It will be just one more mystery for the priests to acclaim when they return.”

Idelaun placed both hands on the diamond case containing the Fragment. What looked like a torn scrap of chain mail lay within, but the rings were so fine as to be almost invisible. He stared at it, the endless patterns on its iridescent surface drawing him in, nameless colours dancing away, forever beyond reach. Questions of what it was and what it could do seemed to belong to another reality.

“He gave of Himself, the priest said,” wondered Idelaun aloud. “Perhaps something of His soul – the mighty soul of a Primarch – lives on within this relic of the Dark Age. And maybe something of us.” He turned away slowly, studying his hands. “Tell me, Brothers – what manner of ghosts are we, that can touch the world from beyond the grave?”

“Ghosts that can kill, captain,” said Sergeant Magyr, addressing them all. “We have seen that our weapons work on the Ruinous Powers well enough.” He grinned. “That – and that my Brothers are with me – is all I need to know.”

“Well said, sergeant,” said Idelaun. “Then we are become Death; the Shatterer of Chaos. Dorn does not disappoint.”

In the distance, the drums of war. The howls of men and the warped beings they served rang throughout the Relic Halls. Damnation approached on swift wings.

“Here they come, Brothers,” said Idelaun. “Make ready to greet them.”

Glimpses of movement through the many dark arches; daemon scowls, silhouettes of madness, fanged nightmares and slithering corruption. Something huge roared, like a bull elephant in a cave. Another mighty bellow answered with a frenzy of its own.

“I will take the Bloodthirster!” shouted Magyr as the floor shook with the fury of their approach.

“The one on the left?” asked Domovoi, drawing his chainsword.

“Don’t trouble yourself, old man,” grinned Magyr, as he did the same. “I’ll take them both!”

“But, captain – how long can fifty men hold back an army?” asked Sergeant Korian.

Idelaun laughed with blood-stained humour. “I don’t think you quite understand, Brother-Sergeant. Have faith.” He activated his power-fist and the blinding light sent shadows leaping away across the floor. “Sons of Dorn! It has been an honour! There will be no holding back. The blood of the damned will flood this world, and we will leave none alive in our wake. We will wade through their corpses all the way to the Nihilarch himself, and his corpse will be mine, and mine alone.” He raised his bolter high. “Tell me, Brothers – how long can an army stand against fifty men who are already dead?”

The Fragment sang. A light blossomed at the adamantium gate, the rubies spraying the walls with dancing droplets of blood. A giant figure moved within the light and the light moved in Him.

Dorn called them forth to war and, screaming His name, they rushed to join Him.

THE END

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