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In the Depths of Hades – Nick Kyme – Extract

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IN THE DEPTHS OF HADES

Nick Kyme

Vinyar turned and saw a third warrior standing by Sergeant Tuurok. Like the other Malevolents he was clad in bile-yellow and coal-black armour and moved with a predatory grace. His helmet was loosely attached to his belt, not mag-locked but held by a strap of leather. Though still battered, some of his battleplate looked more robust than the rest, as if it were an amalgam and not a concomitant suit. Scraped paint revealed some of the nature of who it had been taken from – black with a white templar cross.

He wore his hammer strapped diagonally across his back – its haft jutted out above his left shoulder guard, the head visible just past his right hip. He looked battle-worn but vital, and was less scarred than Vinyar. Shoulder-length, pearl-white hair framed his face, giving the warrior a pseudo-angelic cast, but there was hate enough in his dark eyes to drown nations.

The sight of him brought up something unpleasant in Vinyar’s throat and hardened the captain’s barricade of clenched teeth.

‘Kastor,’ he said, almost snarling.

Amongst the Malevolents, the Vilifiers were the elite. Few in number, they were drawn from all ten companies, even the Scouts, and represented the most brutal fighters in the Chapter.

Kastor was their commanding officer.

‘We can breach the crater that has confounded your men,’ said Kastor, evenly.

‘And do what exactly once you’re in there?’ asked Vinyar.

Scarcely five strides separated them and, although they were brothers-in-arms, they came across more like two fighters preparing to duel.

Kastor snorted, as if the answer was obvious. ‘To rescue the hostages, of course.’

Vinyar’s gravelly, roaring laughter sounded incongruous coming from the stern captain and drew several glances from nearby Guard officers who dared to look at him.

‘That is amusing,’ he conceded. ‘I would dearly like to see you try, Kastor. Perhaps the death that’s owed you will finally seek you out.’

‘Perhaps, captain.’

Vinyar’s sardonic humour vanished, replaced by rancour. ‘I am not your captain,’ he uttered darkly.

‘No, you aren’t,’ Kastor replied, making it clear in his tone exactly what he thought of Vinyar’s supposed authority over Hades, and his orders. ‘So this conversation is really just a formality, isn’t it?’

Looking Vinyar in the eye, he whistled loudly.

Four warriors in the yellow and black of the Malevolents stepped out into the rain from where they had been hiding amidst the throng. They had been almost invisible until summoned. The Guardsmen standing around them, suddenly finding a quartet of hulking Space Marines in their midst, immediately jerked in surprise.

One of the four eyed up the soldiers through his vision slit, glowering silently.

Two others stood stock still, their stalker-pattern bolters hanging casually over their shoulders.

The foremost Vilifier, the only one who went without his helmet and who had a youthful look about him, nodded to Kastor.

‘Penetrating this camp was easy,’ said Vinyar, able to mask his surprise at the sudden appearance of the veterans. ‘You’ll find the ork den harder to crack.’

‘Do I have your concession then, brother-captain?’ asked Kastor. He glanced at Tuurok, who seethed impotently at the other sergeant about to usurp his mission out from under him.

Kastor afforded him a thin smile, which only enraged Tuurok further.

Vinyar ignored the histrionics. ‘I thought you didn’t need my sanction, brother?’

‘Nevertheless…’

Every fibre of Vinyar bristled with the desire to teach Kastor a salutary and punishing lesson for his arrogance. Ideally, it would be a permanent one, but he let it go. This time he had overreached himself. The orks would have him, and the dirty little thorn who had been poaching warriors from Vinyar’s ranks for over two decades would, at last, get what was coming to him.

The captain stepped aside, ushering Kastor towards what he hoped would be his doom.

It was only when Kastor had walked past him that Vinyar uttered a churlish rejoinder.

‘Watch your back, Kastor.’

‘Oh, I don’t think I’m the one who needs to look over his shoulder,’ replied Kastor without even glancing back.

‘Arrogant cur,’ spat Vinyar, muttering. He was about to vent his ire on Kastor’s men but when he looked over to where they had been standing they were already gone, vanished into the rain and the dark.

Only the bellows of the greenskins remained, loud and bestial on the wind.

Though Vinyar hated Kastor with every iota of vitriol he could muster, he wondered if the orks knew what was coming. And for the first time since the war, he smiled.

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