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Warsphere – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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Warsphere

By Darius Hinks

Zhain sneers as she approaches, looking at the mess. The trackers are hunkered on the floor, framed by a shaft of green light that slices down from a broken gantry overhead. The doorway we are standing in is constructed in the same style as the rest of the ship – crudely hammered metal that has been twisted and warped to resemble the tendrils of a plant. It feels like we are surrounded by vines or the roots of a vast, metal tree. Zhain toys with her whip as she watches the kroot eat, running a finger over the barbs.

‘Savages.’

I understand her disdain. The kroot are nauseatingly primitive. They are avian, bipedal wretches of extremely limited intellect. They are physically strong, however, and they fight without any trace of fear. It is easy to see how they have carved a place for themselves as hired guns. They have killed another sentry while we lagged behind and, by the time we reach them, they’ve already eaten half the remains. The entrance to the chamber is a mess, draped with innards and splashed with blood.

Eating is all they seem to be interested in and they invest it with an almost holy sense of ritual, screeching prayers as they cram innards into their beaks. I have never encountered a species with such a peculiar, obsessive relationship with food. They cast some pieces aside, spitting curses, then cradle others with reverence, treating them like sacred relics. They take some of the smaller bones and thread them into the quill crests that crown their heads, sniffing them repeatedly as they do so.

There isn’t much left of their prey, but from the carcasses I deduce that they were the same hulking, bestial sentries we encountered in the outer chambers. They must have broken free of restraints to attack the kroot because there are traces of collars and muzzles scattered in the gore. The ship’s guardians are huge, ferocious predators, but the kroot have made short work of them with their rifles, firing the rickety weapons with surprising skill.

Employing the kroot is demeaning. I am as repulsed by them as Zhain. But her bile feels like a criticism of me. I give her a sideways look.

‘Perhaps you think it was a mistake to bring them?’

The rest of the kabal arrive just in time to hear my words. They falter, glancing from me to Zhain, hearing the threat in my tone. They grip glaives and rifles, hunger flickering in their eyes as they sense danger.

Zhain bares her teeth in a cold smile and puts a hand on her hip, twisting her lithe form like a dancer. Light plays across the contours of her tight-fitting bodysuit.

‘Of course not, archon. Their ancestors built this wreck. Employing them as trackers makes perfect sense. Your thinking in this matter is as clear as ever.’

I stare at her, letting a tense silence play out. Every inch of her bodysuit is barbed with poison but it’s her intellect that I have to watch out for; her guile has elevated her through the ranks of her lethal sisterhood. She is dangerous. And wonderful. There is a delicious tension in all our exchanges.

I smile back, relishing the threat in her eyes, then walk on through the doorway and into the main part of the chamber. It is crowded with knotted pipework and cabling. It looks more like the heart of a jungle than the inside of a warp-capable starship. The air is blood-warm. Banks of steam roll between metal boughs, and the bulkheads are coated in rust. The link between the ship and my trackers is obvious. The barbarism of the kroot is writ large in the architecture of the place. The shapes are so ugly and confusing that it takes me a moment to realise we are on an embarkation deck. There are various landing craft picked out in the shafts of emerald light. Most of them are slumped on their sides, hulls and armour plating ripped away, exposing their insides, giving the impression of flayed carcasses. A few are still intact and they are of a peculiar, circular design, like the domed crowns of trees.

‘What did you call it?’ I say, glancing at the kroot called Grekh.

The creature looks up, meat hanging from his beak. ‘What?’ His voice is a harsh caw.

‘What, archon,’ says Zhain, toying with the handle of her whip again.

Grekh stares at her, his eyes blank.

I wave at the huge chamber that surrounds us. ‘What did you call this wreck?’

‘Warsphere. Void-city. It was woven in the highest eyries of Akchan-Kur.’

‘Warsphere.’ I study the convoluted design of the bulkheads. Every inch of the metal has been worked into knots and loops. Columns fan, treelike, to cradle a distant ceiling, and the metal branches have been moulded into totemic shapes. Hawks rise from filigreed flames, feathered gods glare at battlegrounds, talons morph into spear-tipped phalanxes. The images are ugly and crude but I see pride in Grekh’s face as he follows my gaze. He thinks I am impressed.

I almost laugh out loud. It is amazing to me that such species can take pride in anything. They are mites, burrowing through the corpse of our past glories, but they are blind to their insignificance – they think they have created a civilisation. I wonder, idly, how I will dispose of the kroot once they have led us to our goal. My first thought had been to simply gun them down, but perhaps it would be worth taking them home to the Dark City, back through the Thorn Gate. It might be amusing to study them and discern their darkest fears. To find out what would really hurt them.

‘Move!’ snaps Zhain, waving her barbed whip at the far side of the landing deck. ‘The archon has not employed you to eat.’

The kroot look pained by the idea of leaving their meal but they have enough sense not to argue, grabbing their rifles and loping off across the deck. Their quills rattle above their heads as they move and I seem to remember reading the quills are the reason they excel at tracking: they grant the kroot a kind of sixth sense that links with their other senses, making them unusually perceptive. There is a logic to it. Creatures of such poor intelligence could only have survived so long through a quirk of physiology.

I smile as we leave the embarkation deck and hurry down a series of tunnel-like companionways. My warriors rush ahead, splinter rifles trained on the shadows. I think of my enemies back in Commorragh, drunk on intrigues and games, unable to see the bigger picture, lost in the webs of Asdrubael Vect. I know they will be deriding my journey out here to the Western Reaches. They lack ambition. While they content themselves with raids on merchant fleets and trading outposts, I have set my sights on something far greater: a galaxy-wide symphony of pain and torment the likes of which no one has seen before.

Zhain notices my smile and guesses my train of thought. Her tongue plays across her lips. ‘Imagine it. Imagine what we will achieve.’

‘We haven’t found it yet,’ I remind her, but I feel the same thrill of anticipation she does. After all my long centuries of life, I am finally going to stoke the fires of my soul.

The Warsphere is home to a group of alien scholars who have unearthed the location of one of the galaxy’s great mysteries: Vaul’s Anvil. They call it a Blackstone Fortress but I know what it truly is. An implement of death and suffering wrought on a divine scale. A razor that is sharp enough to open the throat of the galaxy. A weapon so powerful that even Vect will have to bend the knee to me. I shall turn Commorragh into my palace. No one will dare speak against me when I am the master of Vaul’s Anvil. The entire galaxy will be my plaything. The possibilities are dizzying.

‘We have to find the scholars first,’ I say.

Zhain nods. ‘It’s a huge ship.’ She peers up into the tortuous metal canopy. ‘Bigger than anything in our fleet.’

‘We need only explore a small section of it. According to the kroot, the scholars inhabit the innermost spindle of the vessel. The old command chambers.’ I call out to Grekh. ‘Isn’t that right?’

He nods back at me. ‘The scholars would die on the surface. So they restarted the Warsphere’s life support. They have hidden here for decades.’ He looks up at the murals on the pipes overhead. ‘But the Warsphere was here long before the scholars came. It must have crashed many hundreds of years ago. The elders say that when it was woven in the lodges of the Nine Peaks, Vawk the Huntress herself emerged from the heavens and–’

‘How far?’ I ask. ‘Until we reach the scholars?’

The kroot stares at me, then he replies in flat tones. ‘If we could travel unhindered, an hour, but when the scholars triggered the life support they also triggered the weapons.’

‘Yes, yes. We will need to circumnavigate some defence systems. There will be a few traps. I understand.’

Grekh nods. ‘The scholars do not wish to share what they have found. They have learned the location of something important. A treasure.’ He gives me an odd look. ‘I guess it is the reason you are here. And you are not the only ones who will come looking for it.’ He waves at a blackened hole in the wall, surrounded by what looks like melted bone. ‘They are trying to flee. They are attempting to repair the Warsphere.’

The kroot look at each other, making odd clicking sounds with their beaks, and I realise that they’re laughing at the idea of someone understanding kroot technology.

I am intrigued, sensing that this might be how I eventually play with these creatures – this misguided pride in their past could be used to torment them. I pick at the idea.

‘Even a race as dull-witted as the mon-keigh should have no difficulty mastering kroot technology.’ I kick at the hole in the wall and one of the totems collapses. Avian deities fall from the bulkhead and land at my feet, their wings in pieces.

One of the kroot croaks in outrage and draws back his rifle to hit me. Despite being over eight feet tall, the kroot are surprisingly nimble, quicker than humans, but they are not aeldari. I step aside easily. The rifle slams against a bulkhead, scattering sparks.

Grekh tries to drag his companion away, but he has barely taken a step before I draw my pistol and shoot. Grekh hisses as his friend slumps in his arms, blood rushing from the wound.

I take aim at Grekh’s face, pressing the pistol’s long barrel against his forehead, wondering if the creature will be foolish enough to try and retaliate.

Grekh makes absurd clicking sounds as he cradles his dead comrade, laying him out on the deck.

I grind the pieces of broken sculpture under my heel. ‘Your culture is as primitive as your technology.’ I wave at the jungle of metal that surrounds us. ‘I’m amazed this vessel ever flew, but I’m not surprised it crashed. I suppose that is why your species only manages to endure as slaves and bondsmen. Even amongst the lower orders of life, you have sunk to the bottom.’ I lean towards him. ‘Which is why I can kill your friend and you are powerless to do anything. You are little more than cattle, Dahyak Grekh.’

Grekh stares at me with his black, featureless eyes. He tries to hide his anger but I see from the set of his shoulders and his fast, shallow breaths that I have touched a nerve. He wants to hurt me. There is definitely fruit there for the picking. I promise myself that I will keep the creature alive so that I can take him back to my pleasure theatres in Commorragh.

‘Quickly,’ I say, waving at the corpse. ‘Leave that mess where it is. We have no time to waste.’

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A Black Library Publication

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Cover illustration by Mauro Belfiore.

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