The Warsmith roared in ecstasy and agony as unprecedented power engulfed him. His body swelled hugely, bloated by the maelstrom of energy that cycloned within.

  A ridged horn burst from his forehead in a welter of blood and tissue. The mottled spike writhed like a living thing, swelling and wrapping itself around his head. His skin darkened, taking on a loathsome scaled texture. His spine cracked and he screamed as it elongated and thickened, roaring as the shadows at his back solidified and the dark wings spread wide and flapped powerfully.

  The newly elevated Daemon Prince was lifted from the ground, hanging suspended before the horrified witnesses to its birth as the last of the psychic energy drained from its body in an explosive wash of power.

  Though he knew it meant death, Leonid raced towards the floating daemon, his sword raised to strike it down.

  The winged daemon turned its gaze upon him and he dropped to his knees as the sickening aura of the creature overcame him. Its monstrous form was utterly black, the nightmare depths of its form glittering with far-off galaxies and stars. He felt revolted just looking at the beast and rolled onto his side as debilitating cramps seized him.

  He vomited, feeling his guts contract again and dry-heaved, having nothing more to expel. He vainly tried to push himself to his feet, but the pain was too great, like a red-hot knife twisting in his belly. His men were also on the floor, their bodily functions rebelling in the presence of such horrific power.

  Leonid wept in pain, hearing the terrible, booming laughter of the daemon prince above him, the discordant noise sending jagged bolts of pain down his spine.

  He felt unconsciousness rising to claim him and tried to fight it.

  But he could not resist its balm and slipped into darkness.

  The fires still burned throughout the citadel as the first rays of morning crested the mountains and columns of tracked tankers rumbled through the molten remains of the Destiny Gate. Each tanker had been specially built for this moment, insulated and rigged with blast freezing mechanisms to preserve the precious gene-seed on its journey through the immaterium towards the Eye of Terror and Abaddon the Despoiler.

  The fallen Iron Warriors were already aboard the ships in orbit, the Chirumeks dissecting them even now to harvest their organs for implantation into the next generation of Iron Warriors.

  There had not been enough of Forrix to bring back and while stripping down the siege works, a party of slaves had found a rotting corpse in Kroeger's dugout. It was clearly that of an Iron Warrior, but if the body was Kroeger's, who had led the assault on the eastern bastion?

  It was a mystery that Honsou guessed he would never know the answer to, though in that, he was very wrong.

  Honsou watched the tankers as they made the slow journey through the blasted landscape of the plain before the citadel. The satisfaction of victory was tempered with a hollow emptiness from knowing that the foe was defeated and there were no more battles to be fought here.

  When the Warsmith had ascended to daemonhood, Honsou had prostrated himself before the daemon prince, prayers of devotion spilling from his lips.

  'Stand, Honsou,' commanded the daemon.

  Hurriedly Honsou obeyed as the daemon continued, 'You have pleased me mightily these last centuries, my son. I have groomed your hatred well and you have the seed of greatness within you.'

  'I live only to serve, my master,' stammered Honsou.

  'I know you do. But I know of your hunger to lead, to tread the path I have taken. It is clear to me now the course the future must take.'

  The daemon Warsmith drifted towards Honsou, its massive form towering above the Iron Warrior.

  'You shall be my successor, Honsou. Only you hold true to the vision of Chaos, of the final destruction of the false Imperium. Forrix had lost that vision of our ultimate destiny and Kroeger, well, he cast it aside long ago. I shall not name you captain, I shall name you Warsmith.'

  Before Honsou could answer, the Warsmith folded his midnight wings around his body, his form a sliver of impenetrable darkness.

  'The power of the warp calls me, Honsou, and it is a call I cannot refuse. Where I go, you cannot follow… yet.'

  The Warsmith's outline shimmered as he faded from the material realm into places beyond Honsou's understanding.

  He still couldn't believe it. Honsou the half-breed. Now Honsou the Warsmith.

  He turned from the wreckage of the citadel and made his way back towards the ridge that led down to the spaceport, passing a wretched column of blue-coated prisoners marching towards the prison hulks and a life of slavery. Honsou caught sight of a prisoner in a bronze breastplate with the shoulder boards of a lieutenant colonel, his battered features cast down in crushed resignation, and laughed.

  He quickly outpaced the prisoners, marching through the masterful contravallations Forrix had constructed around the spaceport, past the heavy, transport shuttles that were returning the surviving tanks and artillery pieces to the cargo hulks.

  The landing platforms were awash with men and machines preparing to depart Hydra Cordatus.

  He crossed the runways towards a shuttle idling on a far landing platform.

  An honour guard of Iron Warriors stood before the cavernous entrance to the vessel.

  'Your shuttle is ready, Warsmith,' said a bowing Iron Warrior.

  Honsou smiled and stepped aboard the shuttle without a backward glance.

  EPILOGUE

  The Adeptus Mechanicus vessel Mordekai's Light drifted in geo-stationary orbit above Hydra Cordatus, its smooth black surfaces dull and non-reflective. Its kilometre-long hull was sleek and quite unlike the ungainly vessels of the Imperial Navy.

  This vessel was designed for speed and stealth.

  Dark robed adepts of the Machine God ghosted through the incense-scented air of the command bridge, reverently tending to the arcane technologies of the massive starship.

  Standing behind the command altar at the end of a wide, veneered nave, High Magos Kuzela Matrada stared at the smouldering ruin of the citadel projected on the forward viewing bay. The great fortress was no more, its mighty bastions cast down, its walls reduced to rubble and, more importantly, its precious gene-seed stolen.

  The scale of this disaster did not bear thinking about and the repercussions would reach to the very highest and mightiest on Mars and Terra.

  A light flashed on the pict-tablet before him and he swept his bronze hand across the runes beside it. An interference filled image swam into focus on the tablet, the hooded face of Magos Sarfian, staring up at him from the surface of the planet below.

  'Well?' demanded Matrada.

  'You were correct, high magos. The laboratorium is empty and the gene-seed gone.'

  'All of it?'

  'All of it,' confirmed Sarfian.

  'Have you found any survivors?'

  'No, my lord, only corpses. From the wreckage and sheer level of destruction we have discovered, it is evident that the battle was fierce indeed.'

  'Have you removed all evidence of our blessed order?'

  Sarfian nodded. 'The cavern has been purified with fire and melta charges set.'

  'Very well, return to the ship and we will cleanse the entire site from orbit.'

  'Yes, my lord,' said Sarfian.

  Matrada shut off the link and opened a channel to his ordnance officer. Yes, this was a disaster, but he would ensure that no one would ever find out about it.

  'Lock in co-ordinates and prepare to fire on my order.'

  Guardsman Hawke stumbled down the rocky slopes of the mountains, dehydrated, malnourished and suffering from second-degree burns. He'd watched as the enemy had seized the citadel, butchering the last remnants of his regiment, helpless as the battle raged in the darkness. With the citadel's fall, the enemy had pulled back from the valley and left Hydra Cordatus with the same speed and efficiency with which they had arrived.

  Never in his whole life had Hawke felt quite so alone. With the departure of the enemy forces, the silence was unnerving. The constant rumble of artillery and explosions was gone, as was the distant screaming of men in battle. Only now, with it absent did Hawke realise how omnipresent it had been.

  Not a soul moved on the plain below and he decided that enough was enough. He scavenged a few unspoiled ration packs from the torpedo facility's crew quarters as well as some hydration tablets and, thankfully, some detox pills.

  With the battle over, he began the long trek to the valley floor, a skinny shambling wreck, covered in dust and blood. Quite what he intended to do when he got there, he didn't know, but knew that it sure beat staying in the mountains.

  It was on his third day's travel, as he rested in the shadow of a tall boulder, that he saw the ship. It roared low along the valley before vanishing to land beyond the smashed walls of the citadel.

  Though he knew he was too far away to be heard, he shouted himself hoarse, scrambling downhill at a furious rate. The fact that he was almost a day's journey from the citadel didn't occur to him, and soon he was breathless and exhausted, his head pounding in pain.

  When he recovered, he set off once more, filled with fresh determination. He travelled for another five hours across the treacherous terrain of the mountains, when he heard the whine of the ship's engines once more.

  Hawke watched the ponderous craft rise up from the distant citadel and angle itself towards the crimson sky.

  'Oh, no,' he moaned. 'No, no, no… come back! Come back you bastards! Come back!'

  But the crew of the ship ignored his pleading and the craft shot upwards on a burning tail plume. Hawke dropped to his knees as the craft vanished from sight, weeping and cursing its crew.

  He was scanning the sky, desperately hoping the ship would return, when the first orbital lance strike lit up the sky with unbearable brightness and streaked through the atmosphere to impact on the citadel.

  He sat bolt upright as a massive explosion mushroomed from the citadel, scrambling backwards as a cascade of light fell from the sky, enveloping the citadel in blinding explosions.

  Hawke watched, horrified as the barrage continued for another three hours. By the time it was complete, there was nothing left to indicate that the citadel had existed at all.

  He slumped onto his side, closing his eyes as the weight of the last few weeks crashed down upon him and he realised he was trapped on Hydra Cordatus. He squeezed shut his eyes and rolled onto his back as exhaustion finally claimed him.

  Rough hands shook him awake and he grunted in pain as he felt himself being dragged to his feet. He tried to open his eyes, but they were gummed with dust. All he could make out were blurred, yellow forms and shouted questions. Shapes either side of him held him upright as an insistent voice nagged at him.

  'What…?' he slurred.

  'What is your name?' repeated the voice.

  'Hawke,' he managed, 'Guardsman Hawke, serial number 25031971, who the hell are you?'

  'Sergeant Vermaas of the Imperial Fists strike cruiser Justitia Fides,' said a voice in front of him.

  He felt hands lifting his dog-tags from beneath his uniform jacket.

  Hawke blinked his eyes and turned his head, seeing two giants in yellow power armour either side of him, a third standing before him without his helmet. Even in his exhausted state, Hawke recognised Space Marines and wept in relief when he saw the boxy shape of a Thunderhawk gun-ship sitting on the plain behind them.

  'Where is Captain Eshara?' demanded Vermaas.

  'Who?'

  'Brother-Captain Alaric Eshara, commander of the Imperial Fists Third Company.'

  'Never heard of him,' said Hawke.

  Vermaas nodded to the Imperial Fists either side of him and Hawke was marched roughly towards the gunship as the Space Marines boarded ahead of him.

  'Where are you taking me?' he asked.

  'We're taking you home, soldier,' said Sergeant Vermaas.

  Hawke smiled and stepped aboard the Thunderhawk.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Hailing from Scotland, Graham McNeill narrowly escaped a career in surveying to join Games Workshop, where he worked as a games developer for six years. In addition to seven novels of carnage and mayhem, Graham has also written a host of short stories. He lives in Nottingham, England.

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  Graham Mvneill, Storm of Iron (warhammer 40000 )

 

 

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