Akemi knew it was there – she could feel it.
Like the choking density of the town’s air, she could feel the presence of Chaos, feel it whispering in the back of her mind. It knew they were coming; it wanted them. It hungered for their company and for the blood-games that would follow. And they would scream before it was over.
The thought of it pulled her breath from her lungs.
Sister Akemi had never doubted the change in her calling, the shift from her novitiate classes in scriptology and linguistics to the lessons of bolter and blade. It had been a matter of faith, and unquestioned.
But this was her first real mission, the first time she had ever left the quiet security of the Convent Sanctorum for longer than her Trials of Ordination. And here she was, descending the last of the circling stone steps to the very bottom of the pit – the dark hole in Lautis’ heart.
She was a warrior of the Order, and she knew she should not be afraid.
But she could not help it.
‘Tenebris,’ Augusta said softly.
The Sisters’ suitlights went out.
In the sudden plunge of darkness, the walls offered a familiar glow. The same eerie green gleam that had lined the town lurked also down here, jagged patterns that glittered like veins, calling them onwards.
Akemi felt the shift in angle that was the bottom of the steps.
And a voice in the blackness spoke to them.
‘Ah, my Sisters. So at last you have come.’ With a boom like the command of a general, it said, ‘Let there be light.’
A rush of flame flared round the walls.
The protections in her visor prevented her from blinking, but Akemi took a step back, almost unable to stop herself from crying out.
Now, conjured to hot and flickering life, a huge firepit occupied the centre of the floor. It was piled high with skulls, the ones at the top recent, the last of their flesh now burning, the ones at the bottom so old that they were all but dust. Brass spikes ran around its outside, all pointing inwards and downwards – anything that was cast into that hole would have no way to escape.
The thought of it made her shudder.
But that was only the beginning.
Around it, the bases of the eight stone statues stood like monstrous pillars, their dancing shadows cast upon the walls behind. Before them, sconces stood in the stone, all of them bright with a rich, blood-red fire. And everywhere, the carvings ran with the blood from the pool above, the red seeping into the green. The ancient figures seemed to glint with hunger and glee.
But even that was not what made Akemi stop.
Before the pit itself stood three creatures, each one horned and scarlet-skinned. Their legs were back-bent, their arms heavily muscled, ending in outstretched hands and the talons of a predator. They made her heart shake in her chest – the fire and blood-walls limned them in power, in a slavering rage of cruelty.
They reminded her strangely of the hounds, and she did not need Augusta to tell her that these were their masters, the leaders of their hunt.
Each one carried a blade that shone with the same, unholy glare. Like a splinter of Chaos itself.
The voice said, ‘Welcome, Augusta. Your martial reputation precedes you – you are a true warrior of your Order.’ Its laugh rolled from the walls. ‘Now,’ it said. ‘Show me.’
Long tongues extending, the things licked their teeth.
‘Move!’ Augusta barked the order. ‘On the double. Let’s give ourselves some range, an open field of fire. We don’t want these things close!’
Skidding, her hand gripping her bolter and her boots going from under her, Akemi ran. Somewhere, something in her heart wanted to just keep running – to flee this place, flee this horror. Flee the writhing, shimmering colours of these creatures’ eyes and swords…
Confidunt in Eo, Akemi.
She believed.
Augusta was still shouting. ‘That statue – that one – put it at our backs!’
But behind them, the creatures, too, had broken into a run.
They were faster than Akemi had expected; they covered the ground so quickly that she barely had time to reach the statue, then turn to raise both bolter and litany like the twin flags of her faith.
But the incoming creatures didn’t care – they slowed down and bared their teeth at the Sisters, as if sneering. The squad fired and wounds appeared in the beasts’ chests and shoulders, mists of blood and steam pouring from their skin.
They did not stop. They came on like a promise – like they would tear the Sisters’ hearts out and cast their skulls into the pit.
In response, Augusta’s shout came over the vox. ‘Viola! Fire!’
‘From the begetting of daemons!’ With a shout of defiance, Viola loosed the full power of the thrice-blessed heavy bolter.
The creatures juddered under the full suppression; they shook and they staggered, but that was all. Furious, Viola kept firing, kept singing the litany so the words, too, would drive the creatures back.
One took a round in the leg, blowing it apart. It faltered and fell, hissing at them, daring them to go closer.
‘Leave it,’ Augusta barked. ‘Viola, concentrate your fire, one target at a time. The one on the left!’
‘But, Sister! I can kill–!’
‘Follow the order!’
Flinching at Augusta’s tone, Viola switched targets, letting the left-hand creature take the full force of the weapon. The things were getting close now, and Akemi wanted desperately to quail away from them. She could feel the tension in her throat rising – she wanted to scream to release the pressure.
She kept singing.
Augusta shouted, ‘The rest of you, take out the injured one!’
Gunfire and harmonies rang from the rock. Akemi resumed shooting, trying to hit the injured creature’s weak points – its joints, its eyes. Beside her, Caia shot with her uninjured hand, holding her auspex in the other. The wound in her elbow was swollen, and the auspex flickered and flared.
She cursed the thing, slung it back on her belt, and concentrated fully on the bolter.
But the closest creature was almost on them now. Eyes burning brighter than the fire, it raised the blade as if to cut them down. Panicked, Akemi felt a powerful urge to switch targets, to shoot it before it could reach them, but she knew she had to follow her orders, focus…
With a rasp, Augusta started her chainsword and stepped out to meet it.
Over the vox, the litany came from her in a low, angry rumble – like a threat of incoming thunder. Akemi had admired Augusta’s steel resolve, her unwavering faith, her utter fearlessness – but this… to stand blade to blade against this creature of Ruin, against such ferocity and rage…
The creature paused. It splayed its talons and bared its teeth; its tongue curled and rolled. The sword in its hand glowed like red hell; as Augusta brought her own blade up to cut the thing open from hip to shoulder, it parried, and hard. Sparks sizzled on the stone.
‘Akemi!’ The command was Jatoya, and it made Akemi jump. She raised her pistol once more.
Beside her, Viola had the heavy bolter braced against her shoulder. Her target creature was moving through a mist of its own blood, still taking round after round – it had slowed under the onslaught, but that was all. And Viola’s anger was as high as Augusta’s, raging completely and without limit. The litany roared from her, and Akemi could feel it – the surge of it in her heart and her soul, the pure zeal of the Sisters’ rage.
She found herself joining the shout, both furious and praising, as if daring the fear to come back. She shot, and shot again.
The injured creature snarled at her. Struggling to stand, it looked up and met her eyes. And then, suddenly, she couldn’t see – only the darkness, only the brass hooks, embedded in her skin, only the seething writhe of Chaos. She cried out, unable to help it – her shouts torn down like a dropped banner. The flash was too strong, overwhelming–
Jatoya’s gauntlet struck the side of her face – not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to make her jump. ‘Your orders were to keep firing!’
‘Aye!’ She aimed her bolter at the thing’s other knee and pulled the trigger. She saw the round strike its flesh – blow the back of the joint clean out of its leg.
It stumbled further and spat in pain; a drool of saliva ran from its teeth.
‘Domine, libra nos!’
Akemi found the litany coming from her mouth in celebration, now, in harmony to the thundering rage of her Sisters. Facing the daemon, her courage and anger were annealing, fusing suddenly into something new and bright. It felt like a forging of her faith into a new weapon, a new light. She was a Sister of the Bloody Rose, a follower of Saint Mina, a Daughter of the Emperor, and this was why she’d been called.
Beside her, Viola was still shouting, still shooting; smoke was starting to come from the heavy bolter. But Viola’s aim was good; she dropped into a kneel, leaned back, braced the weapon against her shoulder…
Akemi saw the weapon start to overheat, saw the rounds hit the thing clean in the face. And she saw the daemon finally waver – too much damage, too many wounds. It staggered to its knees, then toppled, twisting in the air in the same way that the hounds had done, becoming a spiral of detonating blackness.
And then it was gone, and the red mist was all that was left.
Smooth and swift, Viola turned the smoking bolter on Akemi’s injured creature and blew its head clean from its shoulders.
Another detonation, and it, too, was gone.
Akemi wanted to raise a prayer of thanks, or relief – but the fight was not over. There were still two struggling figures, silhouettes against the firepit.
To one side of them, the last of the creatures was circling the Sister Superior, swift and light on its feet, and grinning through razor-sharp teeth. As Akemi watched, Augusta spun her blade one-handed and struck at it, once, twice. And each time, the creature’s blood-shining sword parried the blow with a harsh, metallic crash.
The chainsword scraped and grated. Sparks flew.
Over the vox, Jatoya said, ‘Remember Hephaestus?’
Puzzled, Akemi glanced at the others.
No one moved.
Only Jatoya.
As Augusta shifted, forcing the daemon to turn to face her and expose its back to the Sisters, the second-in-command dropped one shoulder and broke into a run.
She hit the creature full-on.
It tried to keep its feet, failed. And as it hit the floor, Augusta stepped forwards and took its head straight off its shoulders. The resulting detonation covered both women in gore – but it, too, had gone.
The chamber was silent.
Nothing moved.
Only the running teeth of the chainsword.
Only the dancing crackle of the flames.
And then, the voice began to laugh.
Rich and deep and dark, the laughter came from all around them. Akemi could not see the owner of the sound, but she realised that the creatures they’d faced were just more minions.
There was something else down here.
Something bigger.
‘Impressive,’ said a voice. ‘A display like that is almost worthy of a Champion of Khorne.’
‘Coward!’ Augusta shouted the word to the stone. ‘Come out and face me yourself!’
The laughter twisted, the sound harsh and unpleasant – whatever it was, she’d made it angry. It snarled, its voice now layered with many tones. ‘Stay your tongue, wench. I’ll deal with you soon enough.’
Muttering over the vox, Jatoya commented bleakly, ‘Wench, is it? I’ll pull out its lungs and make it eat them.’
Augusta made no comment. Instead, she shouted, ‘I’ve cut down your hounds, creature, your bloodletters, your cultists. What else can you bring me?’
‘Very well.’ It sounded amused. ‘I think you’ve earned your boon.’
With a rumble, the wall before them came down.
Akemi was on the floor, scrabbling frantically away, her mind shrieking something that might have been a prayer.
The thing filled her vision, her head, her thoughts. It choked her with the reek of blood and death; it kicked its way through the rubble as if the rock were nothing but sand, and it paused on the far side of the fire. She had understood that these beasts existed, but had never believed, never even begun to imagine, what that could actually mean.
The thing was almost as tall as the chamber, its matted and filthy fur clad in brass that flashed in the firelight. Great wings framed it in darkness and power. In one hand, it bore an axe, the notched blade longer than Akemi was tall. In the other, it bore a huge, brass-spiked whip. It lashed the thongs around its head, the harsh noise snapping from the walls.
Akemi was dimly aware that the rest of the squad had fallen back, that the hymnal had faded from the air. Her mind screamed only terror and absolute, utter incomprehension.
And then she heard a voice.
Augusta’s voice.
‘Et Imperatoris nomen, non vereor vobis.’
In the Emperor’s name, I do not fear you.
Her tiny, armoured figure silhouetted by the monster, the Sister Superior had stood her ground. Unflinching, she took up the hymnal once more, her words cold and strong.
They came over the vox like a blessing, and Akemi realised that she’d fallen. Ashamed of herself, she scrabbled upright, her bolter still in her hand. Other voices were joining the recitation, now; she raised her own, striving to remember her electric rush of faith from before.
But the monster only laughed at them. The noise seemed to come from all around it, from out of the very rock. ‘Are you Mina, little girl? I think not. Greater warriors than you have faced this death, Augusta,’ the voice said. ‘Greater swordswomen than you have failed. They faltered, and they fell, and they begged for their lives.’ It hissed at her, mocking. ‘And they were drained, blood and soul, and their skulls cast upon the flames. And now, Augusta Santorus, you think yourself the equal of your betters? You will die screaming.’
Beside Akemi, Viola was still on her knees. She was reciting the hymnal like a woman demented, the same words, over and over and over. She seemed to be fiddling with something held across her lap. As Akemi leaned to see, she saw that she was reloading the heavy bolter with shaking gauntlets.
Jatoya had moved to stand at Augusta’s shoulder, another silhouette against the enormity and the flame. Caia and Melia were further away, but back on their feet. They faced the thing together, weapons in hands.
The daemon took a step forwards, and the whole chamber shook. It leaned down, teeth bared, its spread horns almost as wide as the firepit, and said, ‘Look at you, Augusta. At your bloodlust, at your fury, at your red armour all soaked in gore. Are you not just like us, Sister Superior? Are you, too, not a creature of warfare and death?’
She said, her voice flat, ‘I fight by the Will of the Emperor, and by His command–’
It laughed again, blasphemous and scornful. ‘I can feel it in you, Sister! I can feel your anger. Let it go. Revel in it! Like your saint before you, like your whole blood-armoured Order, you revel in rage, in the pure fury of the battlefield. You belong here! Lose your foolish faith, and join the darkness!’
Still reciting the hymnal, Augusta didn’t move. ‘That Thou wouldst bring them only death…’
The creature exhaled, a hiss of spittle and flame. ‘You still do not understand, little one. Did you not come here seeking truth? Seeking artefacts and icons? The building above us, that you so revere, was indeed raised in the name of your Saint. It is her statues that you have seen. It has shed blood in her name. Blood, to punish the heretic, blood to convert the unbeliever, blood for those who failed your Emperor, blood for those who did not bend their knee quite fast enough…’
‘That Thou shouldst spare none…’
‘But she did not build it, Augusta, nor did her followers.’ It paused, almost grinning. ‘We did. We have used her name to further the ancient powers of this place – we have made sure that every sacrifice made in the Emperor’s name fed us, kept us, strengthened us. That every act made in the name of your Saint has been what you would term a “blasphemy”. And for thousands of years.’ It was celebrating now, exultant in rage and power. ‘We hold a vial of Mina’s own blood here, taken from her last stand upon Hydraphur. That is the artefact that you first came here seeking. Do you want it?’
‘That Thou shouldst pardon none…’
‘We are the same, you and I. Linked by blood. Celebrate your skills, Augusta. Rejoice in them! Set yourself free from the bondage of your foolish faith!’
‘We beseech Thee…’
‘Stubborn as ever.’ The daemon sneered, scornful and angry.
‘…Destroy them.’
‘So be it,’ the creature said.
It raised the whip.
Listening to the daemon, Akemi had realised something else.
It had taken her a moment – in the first shock of terror, she had not known what was happening, but now her mind was back at the schola. She could see her old tutor, the text on the data-slate; she was scrambling after old information, after a half-forgotten novitiate class, so many years before. She faced the daemon, trying not to blink, watching its mouth as it spoke…
Or didn’t.
Its teeth were as long as chainswords, but that was not what she was looking for.
She was having the oddest sensation that the daemon itself was not speaking.
That its voice was coming from somewhere else.
She found herself scrabbling to remember – something. There was a piece of information that she needed, that she knew she had…
…but the daemon was filling her head.
Akemi clung to the words of the hymnal, and tried to clear her thoughts.
The whip coiled and snapped again, the sound sharp and harsh.
Remember, I must remember… Emperor, help me, help me clear my mind…
She was staring at the symbol on the beast’s armour, the symbol of the Blood God, the same one that had been engraved in the skin of Subul’s forehead…
Augusta said, quite clearly, ‘…destroy them.’
‘So be it.’ The beast stood upright, its bass laughter thundering like a rockfall.
But yes, Akemi realised, she had been right – it was not the beast that was laughing. Its huge fangs were bared, but the laughter was not coming out of its mouth–
And then, the memory hit her like the long ruler of her one-time novitiate tutor…
‘Sister!’ She shouted out loud and over the vox, desperate to make Augusta hear her. ‘Sister! I think… I think we may have a chance!’