Hammer and Bolter: Issue 21 Page 6

  The First Captain’s grimace deepened and he dismissed his warriors with a sharp gesture. He gave one of them a glare. ‘Where is the Apothecary? I called for a savant an hour ago!’

  ‘Here, lord,’ said a voice behind him.

  Raldoron turned and found a legionary marching towards him across the rubble-strewn square, emerging from the smoke. The warrior’s crimson armour bore the white trim of a sanctioned Legion medicae, and from his battle plate hung narthecium packs, drug flasks and other flesh-cutter’s tools. His left gauntlet was heavily modified from the standard Mark II Crusade-pattern unit, bulky with the protruding barrel of a reductor. He wore the badge of the Prime Helix and there was a skull sigil on the brow of his helmet showing his status as an Apothecae Minoris, the most junior rank. A labour-servitor ambled after him, listing as it clumped over the uneven ground. The captain studied the Apothecary; he would have preferred a veteran to assist in this matter, but to re-task a more seasoned officer from their duties would have drawn undue attention.

  The new arrival gave a salute. ‘Reporting as ordered.’ He gave no sign of having witnessed the departure of the two primarchs, which was just as well. Fewer questions for him to dwell upon, thought the captain.

  ‘You will follow me,’ ordered Raldoron, ‘and say nothing.’

  They entered the fallen chapel and the Apothecary activated the illuminator mounted on his backpack. The cold ray of white light searched the chamber, picking out thousands of motes of rock dust suspended in the heavy air, before shimmering off the great liquid pool in the slumped spaces of the nave. Raldoron saw the beam venture towards the shadowed forms of the dead and he called out, dragging the young Apothecary’s attention and the light to the podium where Alotros’s body lay. The captain grimly stripped the dead battle-brother’s armour of all company marks and personal icons, until there was nothing to show who this warrior might have been or where he had served.

  ‘The progenoid glands,’ said the captain. ‘Remove them.’

  There was a moment of hesitation on the part of the other Blood Angel, but the faceless helmet showed no expression, and soon he was at work. The reductor gave a high-pitched buzz as it bit through exposed flesh, the tip digging into the corpse before it splayed open and snipped out the gene-rich knots of meat. Each progenoid was a collection of DNA metadata expressed in organic form, the raw code of the Blood Angels physiognomy rendered as flesh; similar organs were implanted in every legionary, each tailored to the particular traits and quirks of their brotherhood. They were the most precious resource of a Space Marine Legion, for each progenoid recovered from a fallen warrior would find new life in the body of the next generation of recruits. In that way, they would maintain a genetic lineage with those who came before them and those who would come after, as the organs manifested within them.

  The Apothecary reverently placed Alotros’s gene-seed in a hermetic capsule, but before he could drop it into a seal-pouch at his hip, Captain Raldoron reached out and took it from him.

  ‘What is your name, Apothecary?’ asked the officer, forestalling any reaction.

  ‘Meros, sir. Of the Ninth Company.’

  ‘Captain Furio’s command.’ He nodded. ‘A fine warrior. A company of regard.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. But–’

  Raldoron went on as if Meros had not spoken. ‘The men of the Ninth know how to follow orders. So I have no doubt you will follow this one.’ He fixed the young warrior with a steady glare. ‘Never speak of this moment. You and I were never here.’ He held up the capsule. ‘This does not exist. Say it.’

  Meros hesitated again, then spoke. ‘You and I were never here. That does not exist.’

  ‘This is our liege lord’s wish.’

  The other Blood Angel saluted again. ‘So ordered.’ He backed away a step as Raldoron beckoned the servitor to come forwards, making ready to gather up the corpse.

  But before the machine-slave moved in to do his bidding, the First Captain removed an object from his belt pack. It was a slab of inkstone from the night deserts of Baal Primus, and with quick motions, Raldoron passed it over the dead warrior’s armour, blotting out the crimson with a layer of glistening, smoky black. The action had a strange, ritual quality to it, a finality that deadened everything. However this battle-brother had met his end, it was in a manner that would be forever lost to the Legion’s chronicles.

  The captain whispered something, and Meros barely heard him.

  ‘Rest, brother,’ he told the fallen warrior. ‘You are in the company of death. I hope you find peace there.’

  Gilead’s Curse

  Chapter 8

  Nik Vincent and Dan Abnett

  You couldn’t think that was the end of the tale. There’s always more to come, and Gilead te Tuin Tor Anrok will be making new legends for new storytellers long after I am no longer of this world. Leave now, and you will miss the best of it… or the worst. It is true, I must rest often, but an hour’s sleep here or there is nothing more than anyone of my great age might expect to be allowed.

  Draw closer, for, if you give me leave to rest easy in my chair, and speak softly, I will preserve my strength and get to the end of the cursed tales before your patience runs out. There is nothing left to me now but the tale, and the telling of it at the proper pace. Heed or heed not, I can do no better.

  Laban did not want to sheath his blades all the time the Vampire Count was their companion, but he soon discovered that he would need hands, feet, knees, elbows, and in some places his fingertips to follow Gilead back above ground.

  Gilead led the way, followed by the Vampire Count, with Fithvael and Laban behind. They had fought the skaven long and hard, without sustaining a single meaningful injury between them. They were, nonetheless, weary, and as thousands of corpses were buried beneath as many tons of earth, rock, brick and dust, they faced the arduous task of finding a way back to the surface. The skaven were dead, or buried alive. They had lived below ground and had died below ground. There was nothing to be said about it, and no one to mourn them.

  Gilead found portions of tunnels and corridors that had not entirely collapsed, joined by voids and cavities that remained because of the integrity of the great dwarf structure, hewn from the earth and turned to obsidian crystal by the Rat King’s amulet. Gilead wove his way along tunnels, slid between fallen rocks and found cavities behind decaying walls that he dismantled one crumbling brick at a time.

  He was conscious, all the time, of the Vampire Count, of his gleaming red eyes on his back, but he felt no threat. The creature would not blindside him; it would not be in its best interests. He was more concerned about his young cousin, Laban, who might seize an opportunity to be a hero. Gilead owed the Vampire Count, not much, but, at the very least, a little respect for his dignity.

  At a particularly narrow fissure between the remains of a stone wall and a rock fall, the Vampire Count halted. Gilead had stepped easily through the gap, but, even sideways, the Count was wedged solid before a third of his body had passed to the far side. He turned to Fithvael, behind him, who shrugged.

  When the Count continued to look at Fithvael, the elf moved closer and began to examine his armour. It was old, but well-cared for, and of a standard human type with fastenings at the sides of the body and the insides of limbs that had not changed much over the centuries. The armour had been well looked after, by the knight’s squire a millennium ago, and by the Count for many scores of years. The ancient leather straps were supple, as tough as steel, but shaped by the hands that fastened them over decades. They must have been replaced many times, but the buckles and fastenings had been removed from old straps and reused on their replacements. The patina of a thousand years made the metalwork smooth and soft, and an impossibly deep colour. As Fithvael’s nimble fingers worked the buckles and straps, he realised that they didn’t feel clumsy and bulky in his hands as most products of human manufacture did. He wondered, for a moment, where they had originated, but it did not matter.

 
Fithvael eased the straps on the body armour down the Count’s sides, allowing him to become an inch narrower; it was enough to free him from the clutches of the walls to his chest and back, but did not allow the two parts of the cuirass to collapse far enough for him to pass through the gap.

  ‘You must remove your armour,’ said Gilead, ‘and quickly.’ Then he placed the palm of his hand on the low roof of the cavity he had climbed into and felt the pulse of the earth around them moving. ‘Help him.’ the elf urged his companions.

  The Vampire Count stood with his feet apart and his arms raised, and Laban and Fithvael worked one on each side of him to remove the metal pieces, after first disarming him of a small arsenal of weapons. Laban was surprised at how warm and smooth and ancient the elegantly curved and worked sheets of metal felt; nevertheless, he didn’t care to hold them for any length of time. He was also careful not to touch the flesh of the Count or the clothes he wore beneath the metal. He could feel no life, no warmth, no pulse. The armour was radiating more heat than the body inside it.

  Fithvael began the work of strapping the separate pieces of armour together to make a series of bundles that could be carried. For several seconds, the four of them could hear nothing but the sound of metal on metal, and of old leather being threaded through buckles. Then there was a low rumble, and a series of distant whumps

  ‘Fear not,’ said the Count, looking at Fithvael. ‘I will have no further need of my armour. There is but one fate remaining to me, to be fulfilled, and my nemesis will join me in battle equally ill-equipped.’

  ‘Your trust in me does me much honour,’ said Gilead, looking directly at the Vampire Count. He looked smaller without his armour, but equally stoic and serious. Somehow, the leather and linen garments that he wore beneath his armour showed only the marks and wear of polished metal. There were no rings of grime at collars or cuffs, no yellow sweat stains beneath the arms or low in the back. There were no oily finger marks, nor blood, saliva, nor any marks made by any bodily fluids.

  This was a knight who did not sweat, whose heart did not pound, nor bowels nor bladder open to humiliate him. This was a knight who had been taught how not to shed a tear as a child, and who could not shed one now, even should he desire so to do.

  ‘You should pass, now,’ said Fithvael, standing the Vampire Count’s breastplate upright against the nearest wall, as if it were some kind of memorial to the creature who had cheated death. There would be no other.

  The Vampire Count held out his hand to Laban, who was holding his weapons. The elf looked warily at the Count, and then to Fithvael, who shrugged, and finally to Gilead. There was another rumble, and silty dust began to fall onto the Count’s shoulders, marring his shirt.

  ‘Quickly, cousin,’ said Gilead. ‘Restore his weapons.’

  ‘But,’ said Laban, twisted the sheath of the sword in his hand, as if trying to wring something from it.

  ‘But me no buts,’ said Gilead. ‘Sir Knight will have need of his weapons before another dawn. We can do without our armour, but surely not our swords.’

  The Vampire Count bowed his head, and then looked into Gilead’s eyes as he took his weapons from the young elf.

  Without the armour, the Vampire Count was firm and sinewy, longer and leaner of frame than he appeared. He did not pass as easily through the gaps and fissures as the elves did, but a little manoeuvring, stretching a limb here, folding at the waist there, and he managed to keep pace with Gilead as they clambered up through ruined passages to reach the surface.

  When he saw light for the first time, Gilead blinked and smiled. He was on his hands and knees in a sharply sloping space, the brick floor kicked up, broken and uneven, buckled and shifted by the movement of earth all around. The shaft of light came inbetween two rocks above. It was little more than a pinprick that cast a pool of light on the floor below, no more than the size of a small coin, but slightly elliptical.

  ‘It is full sun,’ said Gilead, ‘the noon of the day.’

  The Vampire Count looked at Gilead and nodded.

  ‘There will be time enough,’ he said. ‘I shall remain below ground until the dusk.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Gilead.

  ‘You’ll have to get out, now,’ said Fithvael. ‘There is no path to bypass you, sir, and the boy is weary of the confines below ground.’

  Gilead crawled under the light, so that it shone an oval on his shoulder. Then he reached up and carefully began to remove bricks and rocks from close to his head, until his entire head and back was bathed in the hard northern sunlight. When the hole was wide enough to allow his shoulders egress, Gilead lifted his hands above his head and stood to his full height, so that half of his body was above ground. The space occupied by the Vampire Count, Fithvael and Laban below was thrust back into darkness as Gilead’s body shut out the light. The Vampire Count’s eyes gleamed and glistened in the darkness, apparently full of life after the draining effect the sunlight had produced in him.

  Gilead lifted himself out through the hole, and quickly unwrapped his cloak from around his body. He covered the opening with it, so that no more sunlight could penetrate.

  He had emerged in a shallow, waterless ditch that ran along the edge of a dry, dead field. No crops had grown there for years and the ditch, which had once been for irrigation, was sandy and smelled of dust. There was no cover, apart from the depth of the ditch and the hedgerow running alongside it; standing, Gilead could see and hear for miles, and he did not fear being seen. All was still and silent.

  A few moments passed, and then Gilead’s cloak lying in the bottom of the ditch began to bulge and move, as if it had a life of its own.

  Below ground, Laban had insisted that the Vampire Count hand his weapons back to him. It did not matter that the Count would be weak in the sunlight and quite ineffective in a fight with Gilead. It only mattered that Laban keep his cousin safe and protected, and, to that end, if the Vampire Count was the next to pass out into the world above, as he must be, the young elf was not prepared to take any risks. He and Fithvael would not be able to climb out of the hole in time to fight off the Count if he chose to attack Gilead.

  The Vampire Count, naked of his armour and his weapons, lifted his hands above his head, as if in surrender, and pushed up through Gilead’s cloak. He preferred not to be exposed to the sun if it wasn’t absolutely necessary, as it made him feel weak and ill, sending chills through his body and slowing down his responses.

  Gilead watched as his cloak began to take on the shape of the man beneath it: first the hands and then the head and shoulders. Finally, the Vampire Count pulled the rest of his body up into the ditch and sat against the side of it, several feet from Gilead, never shifting or removing the cloak from around his head and torso.

  Then Fithvael and Laban emerged into the sunlight. Laban blinked and smiled. The sky was clear and grey and as bright as a northern sky could be with the sun directly overhead.

  When they were all in the ditch, Gilead touched the Vampire Count’s shoulder through the cloth of his cloak. The Count moved back over the hole, lowering his body into it, and disappearing, leaving the cloak covering the aperture.

  Laban reached out a hand to draw the cloak towards him, thinking that he would fold it and return it to his cousin.

  ‘Leave it,’ said Gilead. ‘Let him rest peacefully until dusk. I owe him that. We all owe him that.’

  The three elves climbed easily out of the ditch and set up a small camp close-by, shielded from the worst of the cold wind in the lee of the tall, sparse hedgerow. The straggling, thorny shrubs were pale and almost barren, but, in one or two places, Gilead was able to scratch the surface of the twigs and branches and find patches of green flesh beneath. The hedgerow was alive, if barely, so there must be enough plant material in the area to sustain them for a day or two, if the need arose. For now, they were content to rest and recuperate, and to prepare for what was to come.

  ‘My cousin,’ began Laban.

  ‘Cousin, indeed,’
said Gilead, smiling slightly and reaching his arms out to embrace the boy. Laban looked startled for a moment and then walked shyly into the embrace.

  ‘You honour me, my lord,’ he said, bowing his head.

  ‘You brought the boy, old man,’ said Gilead, embracing his mentor, servant and faithful friend for the first time in a great many years, for only the third time in their lives.

  ‘You are much changed, Gilead,’ said Fithvael, surprised by the unexpected warmth of their reception.

  ‘Not so very much,’ said Gilead. ‘Enough, I hope. Now, explain yourself, old man; why have you brought the boy?’

  Gilead, Fithvael and Laban talked, rested, ate and prepared.

  As Fithvael honed the blade of Gilead’s second blade, and Laban adjusted the cuffs of his shirt so that they would fall away from his wrists if he was wielding his blades, Gilead spoke to them of the amulet.

  ‘The boy,’ said Gilead. ‘I shall never forget that boy. “By Sigmar’s beard, it was always the skaven.” That’s what he said. It was always the skaven. He was wrong.’

  ‘The plague?’ asked Laban. ‘He thought the skaven had caused the plague? How could that be?’

  ‘It was not so,’ said Fithvael. ‘Gilead has told us that the boy was wrong. What he has not told us is why he was wrong, or why the boy believed that the skaven were responsible.’

  Gilead reached two slender fingers into the top of his boot and, a moment later, pulled out the amulet that had hung around the Rat King’s neck on the ribbon of plaited hair. He turned it over and over in his fingers, examining it. It seemed inert; it did not sparkle or glisten, nor did it seem to absorb and deaden the light that hit it. It was matt and darkly colourless. It looked like a rock, a pebble, perfectly elliptical, but unassuming.

  After looking at it for several moments, Gilead flicked it at Fithvael, who caught it deftly in his left hand, his right still holding the whet stone with which he was restoring Gilead’s blade in preparation for what was surely to come.