‘Leman Russ is on Terra,’ said Malcador.
I know. Even here, I can feel the Wolf King’s presence.
‘He brings word of the Lion. Twenty thousand Dark Angels are reportedly bound for Ultramar.’
Why does he not make haste for Terra?
Sweat ran down Malcador’s back at the strain of maintaining this connection. ‘There are… unsettling rumours of what is happening in Guilliman’s domain.’
I cannot see the Five Hundred Worlds. Why is that?
‘We call it the Ruinstorm. Nemo and I believe the slaughter on Calth to have been part of an orchestrated chain of events that precipitated the birth of a catastrophic and impenetrable warp storm.’
And what do you believe Roboute is doing?
‘It’s Guilliman, what do think he’s doing? He’s building an empire.’
And the Lion goes to stop him?
‘So the Wolf King says, my lord. It seems the warriors of the Lion stand with us after all.’
You doubted them? The First? Even after all they accomplished in the time before the others took up their swords?
‘I did,’ admitted Malcador. ‘After Rogal’s secret emissaries to their home world returned empty-handed, we feared the worst. But Caliban’s angels came to the Wolves’ aid when Alpharius threatened to destroy them.’
Alpharius… my son, what chance did you give my dream? Ah, even when war presses in from all sides, my sons still seek to press their advantage. They are like the feudal lords of old, scenting opportunity for their own advancement in the fires of adversity.
The regret pained Malcador’s thoughts.
‘Russ still plans to fight Horus eye to eye,’ said Malcador. ‘He sends my Knights to guide his blade and no words of mine can sway him from his course.’
You think he should not fight Horus?
‘Russ is your executioner,’ said Malcador tactfully. ‘But his axe falls a little too readily these days. Magnus felt it, now Horus will feel it.’
Two rebel angels. His axe falls on those deserving its smile.
‘And what happens when Russ takes it upon himself to decide who is loyal and who deserves execution?’
Russ is true-hearted, one of the few I know will never fall.
‘You suspect others may prove false?’
To my eternal regret, I do.
‘Who?’
Another long pause made Malcador fear his question would remain unanswered, but at last the Emperor replied.
The Khan makes a virtue of being unknowable, of being the mystery that none can answer. Some among his Legion have already embraced treachery, and others may yet.
‘What would you have me do, my lord?’
Keep watching him, Malcador. Watch the Khan more closely than any other.
‘I have never wanted to fly anything so much in all my life,’ said Rassuah.
Looking at the sleek, wedge-shaped craft with its jutting, aerodyne prow, Loken couldn’t help but agree with her.
‘I’m told it’s called Tarnhelm,’ he said.
‘Call it what you want, but if I’m not flying it within the hour, there’s going to be blood spilled,’ said Rassuah.
Loken grinned at her eagerness. He disliked aircraft on principle, but even he recognised something beautiful in the Tarnhelm.
Perhaps because it looked so utterly unlike any other aircraft in the Legiones Astartes inventory. The warcraft of the Legions were designed to be brutal, in appearance as well as effect. Their form followed function, which was to kill as quickly and efficiently as possible. Tarnhelm’s sleek lines spoke of an altogether different purpose.
Its basic structure was constructed around a central crew section with bulbous drive pods at the rear that tapered towards the prow and formed the ship’s delta-winged shape. Without any pennants or beacons, there was nothing to give any clue to its identity or affiliation.
‘What is it?’ asked Varren. ‘It’s not an attack ship or a guncutter; too few armaments. And there’s not enough armour for it to be a troop transport. One good hit is going to gut it. I don’t understand what it is.’
‘This is a craft designed to pass through the stars unseen,’ said Rama Karayan, and all eyes turned to look at him, as it was the most any of them had heard him say.
‘Why in the world would you want to do that?’ asked Callion Zaven, his expression as confused as Varren’s. ‘The point of the Legions is to be seen.’
‘Not always,’ said Altan Nohai. ‘What the Khan called a clever fighter is one who not only wins, but excels in winning with ease before the enemy even knows he is there.’
Zaven looked unconvinced. ‘Shock and awe becomes a lot harder when no one sees it coming.’
‘It’s got teeth, mind,’ said Ares Voitek, his servo-arms unlimbering to point out the barely visible seams of recessed weapon nacelles and missile pods. ‘But as Macer says, it’s not an attack ship.’
‘It’s a draugrjúka,’ said Bror Tyrfingr.
Seeing the looks of confusion among his fellow pathfinders, Bror shook his head and said, ‘Don’t you people understand Juvik?’
‘Juvik?’ asked Rubio.
‘Fenrisian hearth-cant,’ said Tubal Cayne. ‘It’s a stripped-down, simplified language. No subtlety to it – punchy and declarative, just like the warriors that speak it.’
‘Have a care, Tubal,’ warned Bror, squaring his shoulders. ‘A man could take offence at that.’
That seemed to confuse Cayne. ‘I don’t see how. Nothing I said was untrue. I’ve met enough Space Wolves to know that.’
Loken expected anger, but Bror laughed. ‘Space Wolves? Ha, I forgot that was your idiot name for the Rout. If I didn’t think you were being completely serious I’d rip your arms off. Stay by my side and I’ll show you just how subtle a Space Wolf can be.’
‘So what’s a draugrjúka?’ asked Loken.
‘A ghost ship,’ said Bror.
A grey-robed servile with augmetic implants worn around her skull like a tonsure had met the pathfinders in the docking bay, and she now led them aboard the Tarnhelm. The vessel’s interior was stripped back, with only the barest minimum of fitments that would allow it to carry crew.
Its astropath was kept in sealed cryo-stasis, and its Navigator had yet to be implanted in the tapered cupola on the dorsal section. The long-axis of the ship was a cramped dormitory, with alcoves serving as medicae bays, equipment stowage and sleeping areas. Individual crew compartments were set towards the rear of the craft, with a slender nave reaching from the communal areas of the ship to its tapered prow.
Rassuah made her way towards the bridge, while the rest of the pathfinders stowed their equipment in cunningly arranged lockers and weapon racks.
The Knights Errant had been extant only a short while, too short for any real traditions to bed in, but a custom that had been readily adopted was for each warrior to retain a single artefact from his former Legion.
Loken thought back to the battered metal crate in which he had kept his meagre belongings; the garrotting wire, the feathers and the broken combat blade. Junk to any other eyes than his, but there had been one item whose loss had grieved him.