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Prologue

Low clouds scudded across the clear blue sky of Tarsis Ultra, drifting in the light breeze that bent the fat stalks of corn stretching in all directions as far as the eye could see. The air was warm, scented with the pungent aroma of crops ready for harvest.

A tall, high-sided vehicle lumbered through the gently waving fields on a road of hard-packed earth, flashing blades on extended tilt arms efficiently scything the crops on either side into a huge hopper on its back. The sun had yet to reach its zenith, but the hopper was almost full, the harvester having set off from the farming collective of Prandium before dawn’s first light had broken.

Smoke from the harvester’s engine vented through a series of filters and was released in a toxin-free cloud above the small cab mounted on its frontal section.

The harvester lurched as it veered to one side before one of the cab’s two occupants pulled the control levers away from its more reckless driver.

‘Corin, I swear you drive this thing like a blind man,’ snapped Joachim.

‘Well I’m never going to get any better if you keep taking the controls from me,’ said Corin, throwing his hands up in disgust. He ran a gloved hand through his unruly mop of hair and stared in annoyance at his companion.

Joachim felt his friend’s glare and said, ‘You almost had us in the irrigation ditch.’

‘Maybe,’ admitted Corin. ‘But I didn’t, did I?’

‘Only because I took over.’

Corin shrugged, unwilling to concede the point, and allowed Joachim to continue driving the harvester in relative peace. He removed his thin gloves and flexed his fingers, attempting to work out the stiffness in his joints. Holding onto the juddering control columns of a harvester and trying to guide it around the huge fields was punishing work.

‘These gloves are useless,’ he complained. ‘They don’t help at all.’

Joachim grinned and said, ‘So you haven’t padded them out yet?’

‘No,’ replied Corin. ‘I was hoping your Elleiza would do it for me.’

‘I wouldn’t hold your breath, she already runs after you like she was your wife.’

‘Aye!’ chuckled Corin. ‘She’s a good lass. She looks after me well, so she does.’

‘Too well,’ pointed out Joachim. ‘It’s time you got your own woman to look after you. What about Bronagh, the medicae in Espandor? I heard that she was sweet on you.’

‘Bronagh. Ah, yes, she’s a girl of rare taste,’ laughed Corin.

Joachim arched an eyebrow and was on the point of replying when the world exploded around them. A thunderous impact struck the side of the harvester and both men were hurled against the cab’s interior as the giant vehicle lurched sideways. Joachim felt blood on his scalp and reached for the controls as the harvester began to tip.

He pulled back on the column, but it was too late, the left track slid from the road into the ditch and the entire vehicle rolled over.

‘Hold on!’ yelled Joachim as the harvester toppled onto its side with a crash of twisted metal. Broken glass showered them and Joachim felt a jagged edge slice open his temple. The harvester slammed down into the field, hurling giant clouds of corn and dust into the air as it toppled onto the dry earth. Its enormous tracks ground onwards, churning air as the engine continued to turn over.

Almost a minute passed before the side door of the cab swung open and a pair of booted feet emerged. Gingerly, Joachim lowered himself out of the cab and splashed down into the knee-high water of the irrigation ditch that ran between the road and the field. He landed awkwardly and cursed, clutching his bruised and gashed head. Corin groggily followed him into the ditch, cradling his arm close to his chest.

Wordlessly, the two men surveyed the damage done to the harvester.

The hopper was a twisted mass of buckled metal, smoking fragments and the stinking residue of burned corn all that remained of its centre section, where it appeared that something immensely powerful had struck.

‘Guilliman’s oath, what happened?’ asked Corin, breathlessly. ‘Did someone shoot at us?’

‘I don’t think so,’ replied Joachim, pointing to a pillar of white smoke billowing skyward some hundred metres further into the field. ‘But whatever it was, I bet it’s got something to do with that.’

Corin followed Joachim’s pointing hand and said, ‘What the hell is it?’

‘I don’t know, but if it’s a fire, we’ve got to get it out before the whole crop goes up.’

Corin nodded and clambered painfully back into the harvester’s cab, unclipping a pair of fire extinguishers from its rear wall and dropping them down to Joachim. With some difficulty they climbed the sloping rockcrete wall of the ditch, Joachim turning to pull Corin up as he reached the top.

Hurriedly, they made their way through the field, their passage made easier by virtue of the long, dark scar gouged in the earth that led towards the column of smoke.

‘By Macragge, I’ve never seen anything like this,’ wheezed Corin. ‘Is it a meteor?’

Joachim nodded, then wished he hadn’t as hot stabs of pain thundered in his head. ‘I think so.’

They reached the lip of the crater and pulled up in astonishment at what lay within.

If it was a meteor, then it didn’t look anything like either man imagined it might. Roughly spherical and composed of a leprous brown material, it resembled a giant gemstone rippling in a heat haze. Its surface was smooth and glassy looking, presumably from its journey through the atmosphere. Now that they could see it clearly, the two men saw that it wasn’t smoke that billowed from the object in stinking waves, but steam. Geysers of the foul smelling vapour vented from cracks in its surface like leaks in a compressor pipe. Even from the edge of the crater they could feel the intense heat radiating from the object.

‘Well it’s not on fire, but it’s still damned hot,’ said Joachim. ‘We need to cool it down or it could still set light to the crop.’

Corin shook his head and made the sign of the aquila over his heart. ‘No way. I ain’t going down there.’

‘What? Why not?’

‘I don’t like the look of that thing, Joachim. It’s bad news, I can feel it.’

‘Don’t be simple all your life, Corin. It’s just a big rock, now come on.’

Corin shook his head vehemently and thrust the fire extinguisher he carried towards Joachim. ‘Here. You want to go down there, then go, but I’m going back to the harvester. I’m going to vox Prandium and get someone to come out and pick us up.’

Joachim could see there was no arguing with Corin, and nodded.

‘I’m going to take a closer look,’ said Joachim. ‘I’ll be right back.’

Slinging an extinguisher over each shoulder, he picked his way carefully down into the crater.

Corin watched him until he reached its base and turned back the way they had come. He touched his wounded arm, wincing as pain flared just above his elbow: it felt broken. He glanced over his shoulder, hearing a loud hissing, like water being poured on a hot skillet, but continued walking.

The hissing continued, followed by an almighty crack.

Then the screaming started.

Corin jumped, spinning around as he heard Joachim shriek in agony. His friend’s scream was abruptly silenced, and a keening screech cut the air, utterly alien and utterly terrifying. Corin turned and sprinted back towards the harvester, fear lending his limbs extra speed.

There was an autogun in the cab, and he desperately wished he’d brought it with him.

He stumbled along the gouge torn in the earth, tripping on a buried root and falling to his knees. The thump of heavy footfalls sounded behind him. Something large and inhumanly quick was speeding through the corn. He could hear snapping stalks as it came nearer and nearer; Corin was in no doubt that it was hunting him.

He moaned in fear, stumbling to his feet and running onwards. He risked a glance over his shoulder, seeing a blurred form ghost from sight into the swaying corn.

The tread of something large seemed to come from all around him.

‘What are you?’ he screamed as he ran.

He ran blindly, bursting from the corn and yelling as he fell headlong into the irrigation ditch. He landed hard, cracking his elbow against the rockcrete, swallowing a mouthful of brackish water as he screamed in pain. He scrambled backwards, spitting water and shaking his head clear.

He looked up as a dark shape blotted out the sky above him.

Corin blinked away the water in his eyes and saw his pursuer clearly.

He drew breath to scream.

But it was on him in a flurry of scything blows that tore him apart before he could give voice to it.

A lake of blood spread from the dismembered corpse. Corin’s killer paused for the briefest second, as though scenting the air.

It scrambled easily up the slope of the ditch and set off in the direction of Prandium.

One

The Basilica Mortis was home to the Mortifactors.

The ancestral home of the Mortifactors Chapter of Space Marines rotated slowly in the wan light of Posul and her faraway sun, its surfaces craggy and mountainous.

For nearly ten thousand years, since the Chapter’s founder, Sasebo Tezuka, had been led here by the Emperor’s tarot, the Mortifactors had stood sentinel over the night world of Posul, and since that time, these holy knights of the Imperium had trained members of their warrior order within the walls of their orbiting fortress monastery.

In appearance, it resembled some vast mountain range cast adrift in the void of space. The Imperium’s finest tech-priests and adepts had come together to create this orbiting fortress; the Basilica was a marvel of arcane technical engineering that had long since been forgotten.

For millennia, the Mortifactors had sent warriors from the Basilica Mortis to fight alongside the armies of the Imperium in the service of the divine Emperor of Man. Companies, squads, crusaders and – three times – the entire Chapter had been called to war, most recently to fight the orks on the blasted wastes of Armageddon. The honours the Chapter had won rivalled even those of such legendary Chapters as the Space Wolves, Imperial Fists or Blood Angels.

At full occupation, the monastery was home to the thousand battle-brothers of the Chapter and their officers, with a supporting staff of servitors, scribes, technomats and functionaries that numbered seven and a half thousand souls.

Vast docks jutted from the prow of the adamantium mountain, spearing into space with slender silver docking rings rising from the jib. Two heavily armed Space Marine strike cruisers were berthed in the docks, with smaller, Gladius frigates and Hunter destroyers either returning or departing on patrol throughout the Mortifactors’ domain. Battle-barges, devastating warships of phenomenal power, were housed in armoured bays deep in the bowels of the monastery, terrible weapons of planetary destruction held in their silent hulls.

A beacon, flaring in the darkness upon the furthest jib of the docks, reflected the light from the hull of an approaching strike cruiser. The ship slipped gracefully towards the darkened fortress monastery, escorted by six rapid strike vessels of the Mortifactors. Ancient codes and tortuous greetings in High Gothic had been exchanged between the ship’s captain and the monastery’s Master of the Marches, but still the Mortifactors were taking no chances with security. The ship, the Vae Victus, drifted slowly, powered only by attitude thrusters that controlled her approach to the docks.

The Vae Victus was a strike cruiser of the Ultramarines, the pride and joy of the Chapter’s Commander of the Fleet, and normally travelled with a full panoply of escort craft in her wake. But the ships of the Arx Praetora squadron lay at anchor near the system’s jump point, forbidden to approach the ancient sepulchre of the Mortifactors.

The ship’s structure was long, scarred by thousands of years of war against the foes of humanity. A cathedral-like spire, braced by ornamented flying buttresses, towered over her rear quarter and, in deference to the Mortifactors, her guns and launch bays were shuttered behind their protective blast shields. The portside of the vessel’s prow gleamed where the shipwrights of Calth had repaired the horrendous damage done to her by an eldar ship, and the insignia of the Ultramarines shone with renewed pride from her frontal armour.

As the Vae Victus drew near the Basilica, her prow swung slowly around until her starboard was broadside to the mountainous fortress monastery. Here, she hung silently in space until a flurry of small pilot ships emerged from the Basilica Mortis and swiftly took up position on her far side.

Other ships, bearing vast mooring cables, each thicker than an orbital torpedo, flew out to meet the Vae Victus and attached them to secure anchor points as the pilot ships gently approached the portside hull of the Ultramarines vessel. Little more than powerful engines with a tiny servitor compartment bolted to its topside, the pilot ships were used to manoeuvre larger vessels into a position where they could dock. A dozen of them gently nuzzled the Vae Victus, like tiny, parasitic fish feeding on a vast sea creature, and flared their engines in controlled bursts. At last, their combined force overcame the inertia of the larger ship and, slowly, the Vae Victus eased towards the Basilica Mortis, the thick cables reeling her in and guiding her towards the enormous, claw-like docking clamps that would moor her safely to the fortress monastery.

Deep within the starship, armoured footsteps and the distant sound of the pilot ships on the hull were the only things to break the calm, meditative silence of her corridors. Well lit by numerous electro-candles, the marble-white walls seemed to swallow sounds before they had a chance to echo.

The gently arched walls were smooth and spartanly ornamented. Here and there along their length, tiny niches, lit by a delicate, diffuse light, held stasis-sealed vessels containing some of the Chapter’s holy relics: the thigh bone of Ancient Galatan, an alien skull taken on the fields of Ichar IV, a fragment of stained glass from a long ago destroyed shrine or an alabaster statue of the Emperor himself.

Four Space Marines marched towards the starboard docking bays where they would at last be able to set foot on the Basilica Mortis. Leading the delegation was a bald giant, his skin dark and tough as leather, with a network of scars criss crossing the left side of his face. His features were drawn in a scowl of displeasure, his eyes darting to the corridor’s roof at every groan of metal that came from the hull, imagining the damage the pilot ships were inflicting upon his vessel.

Lord Admiral Lazlo Tiberius wore his ceremonial cloak of office. The stiff foxbat fur ruff surrounding his shoulders chafed his neck and the silver cluster securing it to his blue armour scratched his throat. He wore a wreath of laurels around his forehead and the many battle honours he had won glittered on his breast, the golden sunburst of a Hero of Macragge shining like a miniature sun.

‘Damned pilot ships,’ muttered Tiberius. ‘She’s only just out of the yards at Calth and now they’ll be buckling Emperor knows how many panels and arches.’

‘I’m sure it won’t be as bad as you think, lord admiral. And she will see worse before we are done with Tarsis Ultra,’ said the warrior immediately behind Tiberius, the captain of the Fourth company, Uriel Ventris, his emerald-green dress cloak billowing behind him.

Tiberius grunted. ‘As soon as we get back to Tarsis Ultra I want to put into dock at Chordelis and check. I’ll not take her into battle without making sure she is at her best.’

As captain of the Fourth company, one of Uriel’s titles was Master of the Fleet, but in recognition of Tiberius’s greater knowledge of space combat, he had deferred the position to the lord admiral, who had taken on the role with gusto. There was no dishonour in this, as the warriors of the Ultramarines followed the teachings of their primarch’s holy tome, the Codex Astartes, which stressed the importance of every position being held by those most suited to it, regardless of station. Tiberius and the Vae Victus had fought together for nearly three centuries and Uriel knew that the venerable lord admiral would make a better Master of the Fleet than he.

In the month since the destruction of the space hulk, Death of Virtue, the ship’s artificers had done their best to repair the damage Uriel’s armour had suffered, replacing his shoulder guard and filling and repainting the deep grooves cut by alien claws. But without the forges of Macragge, it was impossible to completely heal the damage.

Pinned to his green cloak was a small brooch with an embossed white rose, marking Uriel as a Hero of Pavonis, and below this a number of bronze stars were affixed to his breastplate.

His face was angular, the features classically sculpted, but serious and drawn. His storm-cloud eyes were narrow and heavy-lidded, the two gold long-service studs on his left temple shining brightly below the darkness of his cropped scalp.

Uriel’s senior sergeants marched in step behind him, Pasanius to his left and Learchus on his right. Pasanius easily dwarfed the others; his armour barely able to contain his bulk, despite the fact that much of it had come from an ancient suit of irreparably damaged Terminator armour. Both he and Learchus wore the green cloak of the Fourth company, and like their captain, sported brooches bearing the white rose of Pavonis.

Pasanius wore his blond hair tight into his skull and though his face was serious, it was also capable of great warmth and humour. His right arm gleamed silver below the elbow where the tech-priests of Pavonis had replaced it following the confrontation with the ancient star god known as the Nightbringer in the depths of that world. Its monstrous scythe had sliced through his armour and bone, and despite the attentions of Apothecary Selenus, the tissue touched by its glacial chill was beyond saving.

Learchus was a true Ultramarine. His heritage was flawless and of the finest stock, his every stride that of a warrior born. During their training, he and Uriel had been bitter rivals, but their shared service to the Chapter and the Emperor had long since overcome any such rancour.

Lord Admiral Tiberius tugged at the fur ruff around his neck and adjusted the laurel wreath at his temples as they rounded a bend in the corridor and approached the docking bay. A ringing clang that sounded throughout the ship told Tiberius that the docking clamps of the Basilica had them secured.

He shook his head, saying, ‘I’ll be glad when this is over.’

Uriel could not bring himself to agree with Tiberius. He was eager to meet these brothers of his blood, and the threat they were soon to face on Tarsis Ultra made him doubly glad the Vae Victus had come here.

Split from the Ultramarines during the Second Founding, nearly ten thousand years ago, the Mortifactors were descended from the same lineage of heroes as Uriel himself.

Ancient tales told of how Roboute Guilliman, primarch of the Ultramarines, had held the Emperor’s realm together after its near destruction at the hands of the treacherous Warmaster Horus, and how his tome, the Codex Astartes, had laid the foundations of the fledgling Imperium. Central to those foundations was the decree that the tens of thousands strong Space Marine Legions be broken up into smaller fighting units known to this day as Chapters, so that never again would any one man be able to wield the fearsome power of an entire Space Marine Legion. Each of the original Legions kept their colours and title, while the newly formed Chapters took another name and set out to fight the enemies of the Emperor throughout the galaxy.

An Ultramarines captain named Sasebo Tezuka had been given command of the newly created Mortifactors and led them to the world of Posul, where he established his fortress monastery and earned many honours in the name of the Emperor before his death.

Despite their shared descent from the blood of Guilliman, there had been no contact between the Ultramarines and the Mortifactors for thousands of years, and Uriel was looking forward to meeting these warriors and seeing what had become of them, what battles they had fought and hearing their tales of valour.

An honour guard of Ultramarines lined the columned approach to the starboard docking hatches and the four warriors passed between them. A thick, golden door with a locking wheel and Imperial eagle motif beneath an elaborately carved pediment lay at the end of the honour guard. A brass-rimmed light above the door flashed green to indicate that the passage ahead was safe and as the Ultramarines approached, a cybernetically altered servitor on tracks rolled forward to turn the wheel. It turned smoothly, steam hissing from the vacuum-sealed edges.

The door lifted from the hatch with a decompressive hiss, and slid aside on oiled runners, revealing a long, dark tunnel of black iron that led towards a dripping portal ringed with black skulls.

Icicle fangs hung from the jaws of the skulls and moisture gathered on the stone flagged floor of the docking umbilical. Tiberius shared an uneasy look with Uriel, who moved to stand alongside the lord admiral.

‘Doesn’t look particularly inviting, does it?’ observed Tiberius.

‘Not especially,’ agreed Uriel.

‘Well, let’s get this over with. The sooner we are on our way back to Tarsis Ultra the happier I will be.’

Uriel nodded and led the way along the docking tunnel. He reached the door at its end, which was formed from the same dark iron as the rest of the tunnel. Behind them, the pressure door slammed shut, sealing with a booming clang. A rain of melting ice pattered from Uriel’s shoulder guards, running in rivulets along the scores in his breastplate and soaking the top of his cloak. He raised his fist and hammered twice on the door, deep echoes ringing hollowly from the walls. There was no answer and he raised his fist to strike the door again when it swung inwards with a tortured squeal of metal.

Dry, dead air, like the last breath of a corpse, soughed from inside the Basilica Mortis, and Uriel caught the musty scent of bone and cerements. Inside was darkness, lit only by flickering candles, and the chill of the internal air matched that of the docking tunnel.

Uriel stepped through the skull-wreathed portal and set foot in the sanctum of the Mortifactors. Tiberius, Learchus and Pasanius followed him, casting wary glances around them as they took in their surroundings.

They stood in a long chamber, seated statues running along its length and its ceiling shrouded in darkness. Faded, mouldy banners hung from the walls. Water pooled behind them as it splashed in from the docking tunnel. Ahead, a softly lit doorway set in a leaf-shaped archway provided the chamber’s only other visible exit.

‘Where are the Mortifactors?’ hissed Pasanius.

‘I don’t know,’ said Uriel, gripping the hilt of his sword and staring at the statues either side of him. He approached the nearest and leaned in close, sweeping its face clear of dust and cobwebs.

‘Guilliman’s oath!’ he swore, recoiling in disgust as he realised that these were not statues, but preserved human corpses.

‘Battle Brother Olfric, may his name and strength be remembered,’ said a deep voice behind Uriel. ‘He fell in combat with the hrud at the Battle of Ortecha IX. This was seven hundred and thirty years ago. But he was avenged and his battle brothers ate the hearts of his killer. Thus was his soul able to go on to the feast table of the Ultimate Warrior.’

Uriel spun to see a robed and hooded figure standing in the doorway, his hands hidden within the sleeves of his robes. From his bulk, it was plain that the speaker was a fellow Space Marine. A pair of brass-plated servo-skulls hovered above the man, a thin copper wire running between them and dangling metallic callipers twitching as they floated into the chamber. One carried a long, vellum scroll, a feathered quill darting across its surface, while the other drifted towards the Ultramarines, a red light glowing from a cylindrical device slung beneath its perpetually grinning jaw.

It hovered before Uriel, the red light sweeping across and over his head, and he had to fight the superstitious urge to smash the skull from the air. The skull moved on from Uriel to Pasanius and then to Learchus, bathing each of their heads in the same eerie red light. As it reached Tiberius, the lord admiral reached up angrily and swatted it away.

‘Damn thing!’ snapped Tiberius. ‘What is the meaning of this?’

The skull squealed and darted back, rising into the air and hovering just out of reach. Its twin followed it, pulled up by the copper cable that connected them.

‘Do not be alarmed, lord admiral’ said the figure in the doorway. ‘The devices are merely mapping and recording a three-dimensional image of your skull.’

Seeing Tiberius’s confusion, the robed Space Marine said, ‘So that upon your death, it may be placed in the position that most suits its dimensions.’

Tiberius stared open-mouthed at the figure, who pulled back his hood and stepped forward into the light.

His skin was the colour of ebony, his dark hair pulled back in long braids and woven with coloured crystals. Four golden studs glittered on his brow, his full features and dark eyes sombre as he addressed the startled Ultramarines.

‘I am Brother-Chaplain Astador of the Mortifactors, and I bid thee welcome, brothers.’

This was not what Uriel had expected of the Mortifactors. After announcing himself, Astador had turned and marched from the chamber of corpses without another word, leaving the astonished Ultramarines to follow. The two servo-skulls floated alongside their master, bobbing just above his head and Uriel wondered what other technological artefacts the Mortifactors utilised. The Ultramarines shunned the use of servo-skulls, preferring that the mortal remains of fallen Imperial servants be interred whole that they might sit at the right hand of the Emperor complete.

The halls of the Mortifactors were gloomy and silent as a tomb. Every portal and chamber they passed through bore more skulls and only now, as he looked closer, did Uriel realise that none were carved or fashioned by human hand. All were real, bleached and dusty with age. Though they saw no inhabitants of the fortress monastery in their long journey, the silence was broken by occasional snatches of hymnal dirges and sombre chants of remembrance.

Uriel’s sense of bewilderment rose the further they penetrated this dismal sepulchre. How could warriors of the same blood as his dwell in such a morbid place? How could these sons of Guilliman have deviated so far from the teachings of the primarch? He increased his pace until he was level with Astador.

‘Brother Astador,’ began Uriel. ‘I do not wish to cause offence, but has your Chapter suffered a great loss in its recent history?’

Astador shook his head in puzzlement. ‘No. We have returned from the world of Armageddon with much honour and the bones of our fallen. Why do you ask?’

Uriel searched for the right expression. They needed the help of the Mortifactors and the wrong words could dash any hopes of aid. ‘The halls of your monastery suggest your Chapter is in mourning.’

‘It is not like this on Macragge?’

‘No, the Fortress of Hera is a place of celebration, of joy in the service of the Emperor. It echoes with tales of courage and honour.’

Astador was silent for a moment before replying. ‘You are a native of Macragge?’

‘No, I was born on Calth, though I trained at the Agiselus Barracks on Macragge since I was six years old.’

‘And would you say that you were shaped by your homeworld?’

Uriel considered Astador’s question. ‘Yes, I would. I worked on an underground farm from the day I was able to walk. They breed them tough on Calth, and you either buckled down and worked hard or you felt the birch across your back.’

‘Did you enjoy your life there?’ asked Astador.

‘I suppose so, though I barely remember it now. It was hard work, but I came from a family who loved me and cared for me. I remember being happy there.’

‘And yet you gave it all up to become an Ultramarine.’

‘Yes, in Ultramar everyone trains to be a soldier. I discovered I had a natural talent for war, and I swore that I would be the best warrior Macragge had ever seen.’

Astador nodded. ‘You are who you are because of where you come from, Captain Ventris, so do not presume to judge me by your own standards. The world below us was my home, and until I was chosen to become one of the Emperor’s warriors, I knew neither sunlight nor joy. These things do not exist on Posul, only a brutal life of darkness and bloodshed. I took three hundred skulls in battle before I was chosen to become a Space Marine and since that day I have killed the enemies of the Emperor. I have since seen the sun, yet still I know no joy.’

‘A Space Marine needs not joy, nor glory,’ said Learchus. ‘Service to the Emperor shall be his wine and sustenance, and his soul shall be content.’

Astador stopped and turned to face the veteran sergeant.

‘You quote from the Codex Astartes, sergeant. We have grown beyond the need for such dogma and forge our own path from the wisdom of our Chaplains. To be bound by words set down an age ago is not our way.’

The Ultramarines halted in their tracks, horrified by Astador’s casual blasphemy. To have the holy writings of Roboute Guilliman dismissed so lightly was something they never expected to hear from the mouth of a fellow Space Marine.

Tiberius was the first to recover his wits and said, ‘Forgive us, Brother Chaplain. But it is surprising for us to hear one whose lineage can be traced back to the blessed primarch speaking in such a manner of the Codex Astartes.’

Astador bowed in respect to Tiberius.

‘I apologise if my words caused offence, lord admiral. We venerate the primarch, just as you do. He is our Chapter’s father and all our oaths of allegiance are sworn to him and the Emperor.’

‘Yet you scorn his greatest work?’ snapped Learchus, clenching his fists.

‘No, my brother, far from it,’ said Astador, moving to stand before Learchus. ‘We look upon its words as the foundation of our way of life, but to follow its teachings without consideration for what we have learned and that we see around us is not wisdom, it is merely repetition. Repetition leads to stagnation. And stagnation dooms us.’

Uriel placed a hand on Astador’s shoulder and said, ‘Brother Astador, perhaps we should continue? We have come to speak with your Chapter Master and do not have time for theological debate. The world of Tarsis Ultra is under threat from the most deadly enemy and we would petition your master for his aid in the coming conflict.’

Astador nodded without turning, then spun on his heel and marched off into the darkness once more. Uriel released the breath he had been holding and unclenched his jaw.

‘Damn it, Learchus,’ he whispered. ‘We are here for their help, not to antagonise them.’

‘But you heard what he said about the codex!’ protested Learchus.

‘Uriel is correct, Learchus,’ said Tiberius. ‘We are all warriors of the Emperor and that is the most important factor. You know there are other Chapters that do not follow the words of the primarch as closely as we do. The sons of Russ follow their own path, and we count them as allies do we not?’

Learchus nodded, though Uriel could see he was not convinced.

Uriel’s gaze followed Astador as he continued onwards through the darkness of his fortress monastery. The skulls of fallen Mortifactors stared back at him from the walls. Uriel sighed. Certainly time and distance could change a Chapter a great deal, no matter how similar their ancestry was.

Astador turned and beckoned them onwards.

‘Come, Lord Magyar awaits.’

The Gallery of Bone was aptly named, thought Uriel as he stood awaiting the audience with Lord Magyar, Chapter Master of the Mortifactors. A carven cloister of bone surrounded a stone flagged floor paved with hundreds of tombstones. Niches set within the columns of the cloister contained skeletal warriors clutching swords and the entire, domed ceiling was formed from interlocked skulls, their eyeless sockets glaring down at those who stood within their domain. The four Ultramarines stood in the centre of the wide space enclosed by the cloister, Uriel and Tiberius to the fore, Learchus and Pasanius standing at parade rest behind them.

Mortuary statues of angels flanked a vast throne composed of the bones of long-dead Space Marines. Uriel could pick out individual femurs, spines and many other bones as well as grinning skulls leering from the armrests and above the tapered top of the throne.

A bone-legged table stood beside the throne with a flattened bowl of dark enamel atop it. Everywhere Uriel looked, death was venerated and exalted above all things.

Astador stood close to the throne, the hood of his black robe cowling his face once more.

A deep gong sounded, and hidden doors behind the throne swung silently open. The first of a long procession entered the Gallery of Bone. Dozens of hooded figures shuffled into the chamber, some swinging smoking censers, others chanting a sombre lament, but all with their heads cast down. One by one they took up positions around the chamber until each skeleton-filled niche had a living twin standing before it. Two Terminators in dark armour decorated with bone trim marched into the chamber, each carrying a long, wide-bladed scythe. Their helmets were carved to resemble screaming skulls and Uriel could well imagine the terror that these warriors must evoke in their enemies. The Terminators took up position either side of the throne as a winged skeleton, no larger than a child, flapped into the gallery on fragile-looking wings with thin, membranous remnants of tattered vestments fluttering between each of its wing bones. It settled upon the top of the throne and squatted there, silently regarding the shocked Ultramarines. Brass wire glittered at its joints and Uriel could see a tiny suspensor generator attached to the spine between its wings.

Uriel’s lip curled in distaste at the sight of the winged familiar as a tall figure, clad in armour of bone entered the gallery. His movements were slow and unhurried, every step considered and solemn. His breastplate was formed from long ribs, bent and fashioned into shape, the Imperial eagle at its centre as skeletal as the winged familiar that watched the proceedings below. Every piece of this warrior’s armour, from the greaves to the vambrace, cuissart and gorget was formed from bone. He carried a gigantic scythe, its blade silvered and sharp, the haft gleaming ebony.

Lord Magyar, for it could surely be none other, stood before his throne and bowed to the Ultramarines. His long, silver hair was tied in numerous crystal-wrapped braids reaching to the small of his back and his coal-dark skin resembled a lunar landscape, cratered and ridged with numberless wrinkles. A long, forked white beard fell to his waist, waxed into sharp points.

His eyes were dark pinholes and though it was impossible to guess the age of the Chapter Master, Uriel was certain he must have been at least seven hundred years old.

Lord Magyar sat upon his throne and said, ‘You are welcome, brothers of the blood.’

Uriel was shocked at the strength and powerful authority in the ancient warrior’s voice, but hid his surprise as he stepped forward and bowed.

‘Lord Magyar, we thank you for your welcome and bring greetings from your brothers of Ultramar. Lord Calgar himself bade me convey his regards to you.’

Lord Magyar nodded slowly, accepting Uriel’s greeting.

‘You come with dark tidings, Captain Ventris. Our Chaplains have seen grave portents and they have seen you.’

‘Seen me?’ asked Uriel.

‘Seen you drenched in blood. Seen you triumphant. Seen you dead,’ proclaimed Magyar.

‘I do not understand, my lord.’

‘Long have we known of your coming to us, Uriel Ventris,’ nodded Magyar, ‘but not why. Tell me why you have come to my monastery, brother of the blood?’

Pleased to be on a topic he could understand, Uriel bowed again to Lord Magyar.

‘We come before you in hopes that you will honour the Warrior’s Debt and join us in battle against a terrible enemy.’

‘You speak of the oath Guilliman swore on Tarsis Ultra during the Great Crusade.’

‘I do, Lord Magyar.’

‘Such an oath binds your Chapter still?’ asked Magyar.

‘Yes, my lord. As has been our way since the blessed primarch swore his oath of brotherhood with the soldier who saved his life, we are sworn to defend the people of Tarsis Ultra should their world ever be threatened,’ said Uriel.

‘Is it so threatened?’ asked Magyar formally.

‘It is, my lord.’

‘You are sure?’

‘Yes, my lord. A tendril of the Great Devourer is moving towards it and will attack soon. My warriors and I recently boarded and destroyed a hulk codified as the Death of Virtue that was bound for Tarsis Ultra. The accursed vessel was filled with genestealers and we fought them with courage. Upon returning to our ship, our astropaths detected the psychic disturbance known as the Shadow in the Warp moving towards us. The tyranids are coming, my lord. Of this I am sure.’

‘And what do you wish of me?’

‘My Chapter is honour bound to defend these realms and I call upon the blood that flows between us for your aid. The tyranids are a monstrous foe and we will be sorely pressed to defeat them. With your valiant warriors by our side, we would stand a much greater chance of victory.’

Lord Magyar grinned, exposing brilliant white teeth. ‘Do not think to appeal to my warrior’s vanity, Captain Ventris. I know of this debt and the bond that exists between us full well.’

‘Then your warriors will fight beside us?’

‘That remains to be seen,’ said Magyar, beckoning to Astador.

Astador stood beside his lord and master, awaiting his command.

‘You will perform a vision-quest, Brother Chaplain Astador?’

‘Yes, my lord. As you command,’ said Astador opening his robe and allowing it to fall to the tombstone floor. His armour was the colour of spilt blood, dark and threatening, the trims formed in gold. Obsidian skulls adorned each shoulder guard. He carried a golden-winged crozius arcanum, his weapon and a Chaplain’s symbol of authority.

He leaned down and removed one of Lord Magyar’s gauntlets, placing it next to the bowl on the table. Next, he raised the razor edge of his crozius and slashed it across his master’s palm, allowing the blood to spatter into the bowl. Lord Magyar clenched and unclenched his fist repeatedly to prevent the blood from clotting until the bowl was full.

Astador lifted the bowl and offered it to Lord Magyar who accepted it with a respectful nod. The Chapter Master supped his blood and handed the bowl back to Astador.

The Chaplain lifted it to his lips and poured the blood over his face in a red rain. He drank deeply of his master’s blood and Uriel grimaced in distaste. What manner of barbaric ritual was this that required the blood of fellow Space Marines to enact? Had the Mortifactors become so debased that they had fallen into rituals more commonly associated with the Ruinous Powers? He glanced over at Tiberius.

The lord admiral’s face was unreadable, but Uriel could see the muscles bunched at his jaw and took his cue from him. Astador groaned and reached out a hand to steady himself. The bony familiar perched atop Magyar’s throne took to the air and flapped noisily towards the swaying Chaplain, catching the bowl as it fell from his slack fingers.

Uriel could contain himself no longer and shouted, ‘What is he doing? This reeks of impure sorceries!’

‘Be silent!’ roared Magyar. ‘He seeks guidance from our revered ancestors. Their wisdom comes from beyond the veil of death, unfettered by the concerns of the living. He seeks their counsel on whether we should join you in this fight.’

Uriel was about to answer when he felt an iron grip on his arm. Lord Admiral Tiberius shook his head slowly.

‘The Devourer comes from beyond the galaxy, and even by naming it, men betray their ignorance,’ groaned Astador. ‘The immortal hive mind controls its every thought. So many beings… A billion times a billion monsters form the overmind and there is none here who can comprehend its scale. It comes this way and seeks only to feed. It cannot be negotiated with, it cannot be reasoned with, it can only be fought. It must be fought.’

Astador dropped to his knees and vomited a gout of glistening blood, but the winged familiar was there and caught the vital fluid in the bowl. It flapped towards Magyar and handed him the blood-filled bowl before resuming its perch above the Chapter Master.

Lord Magyar locked eyes with Uriel and smiled, before drinking a measure of his returned blood.

Uriel heard Learchus retch behind him, but forced himself to conceal his revulsion.

The Chapter Master of the Mortifactors wiped a rivulet of blood from his beard and said, ‘The omens are not good, Uriel Ventris of the Ultramarines.’

Uriel’s heart sank, but Lord Magyar was not yet done. He rose from his throne and crossed the floor of the dead to stand before Uriel. The Chapter Master of the Mortifactors leaned over Uriel and offered him the bowl. Saliva-frothed blood swirled in its bottom.

‘Will you seal the pact of our brotherhood, Captain Ventris?’

Uriel stared into the bowl. The blood was bright scarlet.

He felt his gorge rise, but took the proffered bowl from Lord Magyar.

He raised it to his lips. Blood-stink filled his nostrils.

Amusement glittered in Lord Magyar’s eyes and Uriel felt anger flare.

He tipped the bowl, feeling the hot blood fill his mouth, and swallowed.

It slipped down his throat, and Uriel could taste a measure of Lord Magyar’s vitality and strength fill him. The blood carried the weight of ages in its hot, metallic flavour and Uriel gagged as a powerful vision of slaughter suddenly filled his senses, redolent with an eternity of death. He saw a pair of alien, yellow eyes and once again he felt the touch of the Nightbringer stab into his mind.

Lord Magyar took the bowl from Uriel’s nerveless fingers and turned to face Astador, who nodded.

‘We will honour the Warrior’s Debt, Captain Ventris. I shall give you a company of my warriors and Chaplain Astador to lead them. You shall fight beside one another as equals. The blood has spoken and you have renewed our bond of brotherhood.’

Uriel barely heard him, but nodded anyway, sick to the pit of his stomach.

But whether it was the blood or the memory of the Nightbringer, he could not say.

Two

The vast city of Erebus shone like a bright jewel in the flanks of the Cullin Mountains. It was built in a great wound in the rock, as though a giant had taken a shovel and cut a gigantic oval scoop into the south-western flank of the tallest peak. Set within a steep sided, rocky valley, fully nine kilometres wide at its opening, the city cut deep into the mountains for nearly forty kilometres. Bisected by the River Nevas, and home to some ten million people, Erebus was a crawling anthill and the most populous city of Tarsis Ultra.

Hab-units, factories, hydroponics domes, pleasure boulevards and other structures vied for space on the steep sides of the valley. Huge, teetering metal structures of glass and steel rose like metal flowers from the valley’s side, and almost every square metre of rock was built upon or bolted to. From the valley floor to the soaring majesty of the luxury habs and exotic spices of the flesh bars, every available sliver of rock was festooned with girders, beams, angles and unfeasibly slender columns, supporting an architecturally eclectic mix of styles that clashed jarringly with the simple, marble elegance of the ancient structures built by the Ultramarines ten millennia ago.

When Erebus City, as it had been known then, was constructed, it was a model of the perfect city, but a lot had changed since those heady days. Where once the city had served as an example of all that was good about human society, ten thousand years of continued expansion had taken its toll on its utopian ideal, bringing it closer to the grim reality of hives on worlds such as Armageddon or Necromunda.

Zooming sculptures of steel rose steeply above the sides of the mountains, each wrapped in hab-units. As each structure climbed higher and higher, accidents became more and more common. Lattices of steel would give out under the horrendous loads imposed upon them, tearing free of the valley’s side, to slide majestically down the rock face, pulling walkways, bridges and people with it until they crashed spectacularly to the valley floor in a jagged jumble of twisted metal, rockcrete and bodies.

Yet even here at the bottom, amidst this constant turmoil of debris, people thrived.

The brooding underbelly of the city – the Stank – held twisting baroque corridors and chambers of anarchic splendour that gave sanctuary to the skum gangs – the outcasts and the lawless. The Adeptus Arbites, known locally as the Bronzes, had declared some of the wilder zones of the Stank as no-go areas and even the toughest members of the Arbites Execution squads took care to travel in groups, combat shotguns locked and loaded. Feral gangs roamed the depths of the Stank, scavenging what they could from the ruins of collapsed habs, production towers and each other.

Violent skirmishes would often break out as rival gangs battled for control of newly collapsed structures, eager to plunder their resources.

Or sometimes they fought simply for the hell of it.

Snowdog vaulted over the counter of the Flesh Bar. Bullets ripped towards him, blasting the wooden front to splinters as he rolled across it. He racked the slide of his shotgun and dropped behind the bar as bottles shattered and the mirror behind him exploded into reflective daggers. The barman screamed and collapsed next to him, clutching a bloody wound on his shoulder. Glass had cut his face open and red lines streaked his features.

Snowdog winked at the weeping man. ‘I guess this really isn’t your lucky day.’

The pounding music almost drowned the roar of gunfire. Six Wylderns carrying some heavy-duty weaponry had just walked in and hosed the bar, killing its patrons indiscriminately with bursts from automatic weapons. Who’d have seen that coming? Snowdog took a deep breath and crawled to the end of the bar. He shouldered his combat shotgun. Its blue-steel surface glinted like new, and now more than ever was he glad he’d killed the Bronze who’d carried it.

Screams and panicked yells filled the bar as people sought to make themselves scarce, desperate to avoid getting caught up in another of the gang wars that were becoming an all too common occurrence in Erebus hive.

Heavy blasts of gunfire echoed through the bar and more screams sounded. The music died as the speakers blew out in an explosion of sparks. People dropped, craters blasted in chests and bodies torn in two by heavy calibre shells.

Snowdog risked a glance around the side of the bar. Tigerlily was pinned down behind an overturned table, a throwing knife in each hand, and Silver had found shelter behind a thick steel column. He couldn’t see Jonny Stomp or Lex, but figured that one was too smart and the other too lucky to have been caught in the initial salvo of autogun fire.

Damned Wylderns! Life for a fledgling gang leader was hard enough without these crazies making it even more precarious. It was bad enough that the Bronzes came down like an iron hammer on anyone who broke the law – which meant just about everyone in this part of the hive – from their grim and imposing fortress precinct on the edge of the Stank, the worst of the city’s badzones. Not even the Bronzes would come in here without some serious hardware. But the Wylderns…

He couldn’t figure them out. He robbed and killed for money, and to be the top dog of the Stank, but these psychos just killed. There was no telling where or when they’d strike, bursting in with powerful weapons and blazing away until everyone was dead. Killing for profit he could understand, but he could see no reason for these massacres and that bugged the hell out of Snowdog.

‘Come out, come out wherever you are,’ shouted a Wyldern in a singsong voice.

Snowdog heard the snap of more ammunition being loaded and nodded to Tigerlily. Like a coiled spring, the young redhead rose and hurled a throwing knife with unerring accuracy. The thin blade plunged into the eye of the nearest Wyldern and he crumpled wordlessly.

Tigerlily ducked back as gunfire blasted sparking chunks from the metal table she sheltered behind. Her black catsuit had been torn by a spinning shard of the table and Snowdog could see she was really mad now. As soon as the Wylderns were distracted, Snowdog rose from behind the bar and yelled, ‘You picked the wrong bar to patronise, boys!’

He put another Wyldern down with his first shot and winged a second before they reacted and sprayed the bar with fire. Snowdog leapt aside, hundreds of bullets turning the bar to matchwood as he rolled.

Silver burst from hiding, a pistol in each hand. Her long, white hair was pulled in a severe ponytail and her ice-blue eyes were cold and unforgiving. She calmly double tapped another two Wylderns before spinning back behind the pillar, her long black coat billowing around her.

‘And then there were two,’ he muttered, seeing the sudden fear and confusion of the remaining two Wylderns. He stood and walked from behind the bar, sauntering into the middle of the blood-soaked killing ground. Bodies littered the place and it reeked of gunsmoke.

‘Didn’t expect this kinda welcome, did you?’ asked Snowdog. ‘We’re the Nightcrawlers, and you interrupted our business here.’

‘We’ll kill you all!’ shrieked one of the Wylderns, but there was no conviction in his voice.

‘I don’t think so, man,’ said Snowdog, catching sight of Jonny Stomp and Lex on the upper balcony of the Flesh Bar, circling behind the Wylderns. He shook his head. Where else would Jonny and Lex be but with the girls and sex drugs, sampling the wares before doing the job?

‘What do you say to you guys putting your guns away and letting us get on with this, huh?’ said Snowdog.

He could see their hesitation and knew he had to appeal to their sense of self-preservation before their stupidity or bravado could resurface. He said, ‘Look, no one else has to die here, okay?’

His voice was soothing and he slowly lowered his shotgun, taking in their high-priced clothing and coloured hair. Their faces were pierced with metal spikes and their full features spoke of healthy eating. Expensive looking electoos writhed up their arms and around their necks, throbbing in time with their racing heartbeats. These were rich kids on some narcotic high; he could see it in their eyes.

And suddenly it all made sense. They were thrill killers. Rich kids who killed because they were bored and because they could. But now that the tables had turned, the killing frenzy had gone out of them.

He continued to slowly walk towards the Wylderns and set his shotgun down on the bar. ‘You just want out of here in one piece.’

The Wylderns nodded and Snowdog spread his arms.

‘I can understand that,’ he said, ‘but it ain’t going to happen.’

His eyes darted up towards the balcony.

‘Now, Jonny,’ said Snowdog mildly.

The Wylderns registered puzzlement for the briefest second before all one hundred kilogrammes of Jonny Stomp landed on them, smashing them to the ground. Jonny swiftly rose to his feet and dragged the first Wyldern to his feet, snapping his neck with a dry crack and rounding on the other as he tried to scramble away.

‘No, please!’ he begged. ‘My family’s rich, they’ll give you any–’

‘Not interested,’ said Jonny and thundered his fist into the young Wyldern’s face.

Blood and teeth flew as Jonny beat the young man to death with his bare hands.

Snowdog turned and lifted his shotgun from the bar, resting its barrel on his shoulder. He took a deep breath now that the fight was over, running a hand through his bleached and spiked hair as he leaned on the splintered bar.

Flickering neon bathed his rugged features in an unhealthy glow and glass tinkled as it fell from shattered frames.

He rapped his knuckles on the bar. The dazed barman rose to his feet, hands clasped on top of his bloody head.

‘Okay, man. Now where were we before all this unpleasantness?’ said Snowdog.

He grinned ferally. ‘Oh yeah, now I remember. This is a raid, hand over all your money.’

‘Good takings?’ asked Lex, eyeing the pile of cash on the upturned crate.

Snowdog eyed Lex suspiciously. ‘Good enough, Lex.’

He pushed the money back into his small backpack and rose to his feet, flipping open a carton of bac-sticks and dragging one out. He pulled a brass lighter from his pocket and lit the aromatic stick, drawing in a lungful of smoke. He lifted the backpack by the straps and dumped it on his iron bedframe.

Snowdog sat on the bed and watched as Lex shrugged and sloped off to join Jonny Stomp in the front room of their current hideout. Night had well and truly fallen and the glittering lights of the valley sides shone in through the holed roof and windowless frames. There was a sharp chill and Snowdog could feel a harsh winter coming on the air.

Lex was a problem. Snowdog knew it would only be a matter of time before Lex got himself killed. Normally, Snowdog would have cut him loose and moved on, but no one knew explosives like Lex. The things he could cook up with everyday items were beyond belief and many of the Bronzes had cause to regret an over-eager pursuit of the Nightcrawlers when they’d run into one of Lex’s booby traps.

Lex didn’t say much about where he came from, but Snowdog had seen a cog-toothed tattoo on his upper arm and guessed he’d once been apprenticed to the tech-guilds that worked the factory hangars and forge temples further down the valley. He’d come to them nearly six months ago and it didn’t take a genius to figure out why he’d been kicked out of the guild. Lex was an addict, probably had been for years, permanently strung out on kalma or spur and was too dumb to realise that routine chem-screens would pick them up.

He banished Lex from his thoughts and rested a hand on the score from the bar. There was enough here to pay for some real big guns, then they could really carve themselves some turf. And he knew just the guy to get those weapons from.

Yeah, it had been a good heist, but the Wylderns had stolen the show and that bugged him. How was he supposed to build the Nightcrawlers into the most feared and respected gang in the Stank with practically no one left alive to spread the word? Perhaps they should have let the last Wyldern live, but Snowdog quickly dismissed that thought. Trying to stop Jonny Stomp from killing someone when his blood was up wasn’t a healthy option if you wanted to stay alive yourself. The big man was a stone-cold killer, pure and simple, but he was useful and trusted Snowdog utterly.

Which just went to show that Jonny wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box, but Snowdog would take what muscle he could get. He took a last draw on the bac-stick then dropped it on the floor, crushing it out beneath his boot. He stretched and lay down on the bed.

Snowdog was of average height, but was blessed with a wiry musculature that belied his whipcord-thin body. He wore tiger-striped combat fatigues, tucked into a heavy pair of boots he’d pulled from a dead Bronze and a white t-shirt with a faded holo patch of a mushroom cloud that expanded and contracted as he moved.

The score at the Flesh Bar would keep the wolves from the door, but he’d need to think of another pretty soon if he was to keep his crew together. They would follow him for as long as they thought he was good news. But he needed a regular gig that would keep the cash flowing with the minimum amount of effort.

He looked up as he heard a tap on the doorframe and smiled as Silver strolled up to the edge of his bed and sat beside him.

‘Some day, huh?’ she said.

‘Some day,’ agreed Snowdog. ‘Where’s Tigerlily?’

‘She went off to a pound club with Trask,’ answered Silver sleepily. ‘Kominsky’s, I think.’

‘Maybe I’m getting old, but this pound music is something I just don’t understand. Loud music I get, but it’s like a sonic assault on the senses.’

‘A lot of people like it,’ pointed out Silver. ‘Hell, even I don’t mind it.’

‘So why didn’t you go with her?’

‘I couldn’t be bothered with Trask. You know what he’s like with stimms.’

‘Tigerlily obviously doesn’t mind.’

‘That’s cause she’s too young and dumb to realise what a loser he is.’

‘You’re cynical tonight.’

Silver smiled and Snowdog felt himself loosen up as she bent down to kiss him.

‘I’m tired,’ she said. ‘And besides, what can Trask do for me that I can’t get better from you?’

Snowdog chuckled, remembering the last time Trask had gotten overly amorous towards Silver after a heavy night on the stimms. The poor bastard hadn’t walked straight for a week afterwards. He decided to change the subject. ‘How’re the rest of the troops?’

Silver shrugged, ‘Okay, I guess. Lex is getting antsy and Jonny wants to head out to bust some heads. He keeps talking about taking on the High Hive gangs.’

Snowdog chuckled. ‘They’re gonna find Jonny face down in the sump if he thinks he can take on the High Hive gangs. Tell him he’d better stick to busting up Jackboy parties if he knows what’s good for him. We ain’t ready for that kind of action yet.’

Silver yawned and slid off her long coat, pulling her albino-white hair free of its ponytail and allowing it to spill around her shoulders. She climbed over Snowdog to lie with her back to the wall, laying her arm across his waist and resting her head on his chest. Snowdog kissed her forehead and put his arm around her shoulders.

‘Did you notice that there weren’t any citizens’ militia units around the Flesh Bar?’ asked Silver, pushing her hand beneath his t-shirt and running her fingers through the hair on his stomach.

‘Yeah, I did. That was kinda weird, wasn’t it?’

‘I wonder where they were? Normally you can’t move in the upper valley without seeing at least a few of them.’

Snowdog nodded slowly. ‘I don’t know, but now you mention it, the whole city has been pretty wired recently, on edge. I seen a lot of Bronzes, but it’s been pretty quiet in the way of soldiers. I wonder why? And those Wylderns. Normally they’d never dare hit a bar that close to the High Hive.’

‘What do you think is going on?’

‘Damned if I know, hon, but if it keeps the militia and the Bronzes off our backs, then I’m all for it.’

Snowdog could not have been more wrong.

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A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

Leviathan short story first published in Inferno 34 © 2003 by Games Workshop Ltd.
Warriors of Ultramar published in 2003 by Games Workshop Ltd.
This eBook edition published in Great Britain in 2015 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS UK.

Cover illustration by Hardy Fowler.

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