The Last Hunt Read online

  Reverently, the zarts began to dismantle the armour, lifting it piece by piece from its wooden frame. Joghaten stood at the centre of the room and removed his kaftan; he spread his arms, allowing the serfs to ready him. First they plugged neural links and mem-circuitry spikes into the dermal ports that dotted his ­muscled flesh. The largest, inserted into the base of his skull, made him shudder slightly. To the links they added the under-armour of servo bundles and flesh-tight, responsive auto sinews. With the sealant clasps covering his joints and his black carapace fully interfaced, the two sweating serfs began to add the armour proper. The breastplate went first, front and back sealed with a thud of magnetic clamps and a faint whirr as the servos activated, linking the ancient battleplate to its wearer. Joghaten’s limbs were likewise soon sheathed in cold, unyielding ceramite, and his backpack clamped and activated, its power core lending the armour a throbbing, tooth-juddering vitality. He raised one hand and flexed his gauntlet. The reaction levels were still as good as ever.

  Last of all, his auto-responsive pauldrons were fitted into place, and the lar’ix pelt was draped across his back, hanging from his shoulders and down either side of his backpack like a cape.

  One of the zarts offered him his helm, eyes averted. Joghaten took it and mag-locked it to his belt. Like most White Scars, he preferred not to wear the constricting piece of wargear until combat made its protection an absolute necessity. He wanted nothing between his senses and those of his prey when the time came to kill.

  The armour was linked and fully functioning. Wordlessly, Joghaten nodded his thanks to the zarts, who withdrew to the edges of the room. The khan turned and paced to his trophy rack, his freshly donned battleplate whirring. His tulwars gleamed before him, drawing a tight, hawkish smile from the khan’s thin lips. They were hungry. He lifted both in turn and, without ceremony, slipped them into the soft, gold-tipped red leather scabbards that were then mag-locked to his hips, crossed over.

  He was prepared, a khan armed and armoured, a tribal chieftain ready for war. For a moment his gaze lingered on the crushed scraps of vellum and their foreboding scrawls, heaped against the wall. Once he would have filled a shelf with the calligraphy painted on his voyages between the stars. What had laid claim to his thoughts, had captured them so entirely as to bend his mind only to visions of annihilation? What called to him from oblivion’s depths? He shook his head and dismissed the serfs with a wave of his hand.

  Nightmares and prophecies could wait. It was time for war.

  The gods are coming to our world. Representatives and servants of His will, warriors crafted and fashioned after divine might, by a power far beyond our comprehension. They have been born to conflict, born to victory, all in His name! We will live to see what so many of our blessed forebears did not – these children of the heavens bestriding the grasslands of our steppes and the cloisters of our temples. Rejoice!

  – Septimus Traik,

  High Enunciator of the Emperor’s Voice,

  to the congregation of the Spur of Mankind Descended

  Chapter Three

  PLANETFALL

  TIME TO FURNACE SEASON PEAK [TERRAN STANDARD]: 109 HOURS.

  TIME TO PREDICTED PRIMARY XENOS PLANETFALL [TERRAN STANDARD]: 64 HOURS.

  The Pride of Chogoris, the Void,

  Darkand System

  The entirety of the Fourth Brotherhood’s leadership had gathered in the primary yurut dome of the Pride of Chogoris’ bridge. They stood in order of seniority – Joghaten overlooking the main hololithic chart, leaning against the inactive display’s edge, arms spread, flanked by Qui’sin and the brotherhood’s Chaplain, Changadai. The ageing reclusiarch had already donned his leering skull helm. Behind them were Joghaten’s bondsmen, his personal honour guard. Khuchar, the brotherhood’s champion, the only member of the Fourth whose curved dao had managed to draw Joghaten’s blood during a duel. Jubai, who carried the brotherhood’s standard, a long pole hung with horsehairs and clattering foebeast skulls. Dorich, the emchi healer. Tamachag, the riddle-loving veteran türüch, and Bleda, the brotherhood’s keen-eyed storyteller and wind whisperer. Behind them were the ten türüchs of the brotherhood’s squads, masters of the individual warrior bands that fought for their khan and the Emperor. Voyagemaster Tzu Shen presided over them all from his throne mount, seeing much despite his scarred eyes, a slight smile playing on his twisted lips.

  Joghaten and his bondsmen were silent, eyes on the oculus displays that charted the fleet’s final approach to Darkand’s high anchorage. Behind them the türüch talked. It was idle, boastful stuff, gruff words cut across by barks of laughter and crude jests, but the truth of it rang hollow. The past month had been difficult for the Fourth Brotherhood’s sergeants. The infractions and unrest among their warriors had in turn strained relations between them. Old tribal loyalties and feuds had been given time to fester. Joghaten knew that there could be no cure for the ailment besides the blade-glory and blood-fury of battle.

  The best of the türüchs had channelled their warrior’s passions between training bouts, focusing them on the arts all the peoples of Chogoris held dear – poetry and word craft, painting and calli­graphy. Others, like Gerel and Feng, had withdrawn to fight their own personal battles. Joghaten had seen it a thousand times before. Only Changadai had voiced concern at the khan-commander’s own apparent withdrawal. He was not privy to the visions and doubts that Joghaten had confided to Qui’sin. The khan had assured the old Chaplain that xenocide would bring his warriors back to their senses. The quicker they reached Darkand the better.

  The planet loomed now in the yurut’s vision port, a curve of russet browns and yellows dashed with whorls of atmospheric white, dominating the lower half of the display. Nearer, Joghaten’s genhanced eyesight could pick out the shapes of satellites, merchant cutters and monitoring stations. The Imperium’s government planetside was confined to Heavenfall, but it maintained a stronger presence in orbit, high above the oblivious nomadic tribes. System augurs and tithing stations clustered the agri world’s approach, their transmission acknowledgment rubrics shying away from the White Scars’ bursts of data code as the fleet neared high orbit.

  In Joghaten’s experience, unless the enemy was visible and tearing at the gates, the arrival of the Adeptus Astartes was always greeted with ill-disguised fear.

  ‘Hail them again,’ the khan-commander ordered, the words silencing his türüch. Tzu Shen transmitted the command to the vox-pits with a sharp wave of his sensor wand. The White Scars had been attempting to raise Heavenfall for the last fifteen minutes. The message request was transmitting and showing as received, but nobody was responding.

  ‘They’ll be panicking,’ Khuchar observed dryly.

  ‘We can only hope,’ Jubai responded. ‘Maybe it will sharpen their wits.’

  ‘Does this wait speak of a sharpened mind to you, brother?’

  ‘Quiet,’ Joghaten snapped. Shen had raised his wand once more.

  ‘They are responding,’ the voyagemaster said, one hand going up to the vox augmetics studding the left side of his skull.

  ‘Patch through to my personal link,’ Joghaten ordered. ‘Responses over the main vox.’

  ‘Understood, brother.’

  A moment later the domed space was filled with the hiss of static.

  ‘A moment to clean up the atmospherics,’ Shen said, passing on a string of terse commands to the vox-pit serfs. After a few heartbeats the static discord faded away. A voice spoke over the brass-wired vox-horns strung along the communications gantry overhead.

  ‘Hail and well met, Adeptus Astartes. This is Governor Harren, Imperial Commander of the world of Darkand.’

  ‘Hail, Commander Harren,’ Joghaten said, speaking into his own vox, linked to the ship’s powerful transmitter spine via the command uplink. ‘I am Joghaten Khan, Master of Blades and commander of the Fourth Brotherhood of the White Scars.’

  �
�We are honoured by your presence, lords. We… did not expect your arrival so soon. The Furnace Season is only just underway.’

  ‘Your chancellor, Tugan, has already informed you of our arrival?’

  There was a moment’s pause and the connection dipped.

  ‘He’s holding the link,’ Shen said. A moment later, Harren’s voice returned.

  ‘I was not informed of your arrival in-system, lords.’

  ‘Tugan did not tell you?’ Joghaten asked. ‘I spoke to him not four hours ago via hololithic transmission. Where is he?’

  Again, the connection dipped as Harren paused it, clearly conferring in private with someone else.

  ‘Chancellor Tugan’s whereabouts are currently unknown,’ the governor said eventually. ‘We are… extremely busy with preparations for the–’

  ‘Are you telling me he informed no one of our arrival in-system?’ Joghaten demanded. ‘That no preparations have been made for the evacuation of the steppe tribes or the defence of your capital?’

  ‘We were unaware any such actions were necessary, my lord. I have only just this moment returned from the Spur of Mankind Descended, where–’

  ‘Be silent,’ Joghaten snapped. ‘We do not have time for excuses. There is a xenos threat, vast beyond imagining, approaching this system. They could arrive from deep space in a matter of hours. You must prepare your peoples for total war. Bring the steppe tribes to the capital, and ready it for defence.’

  ‘The tribes are just ceasing their annual migration,’ Harren said. If he was worried, his voice didn’t show it – the tone remained completely level. ‘Locating and contacting them all would take days, and it would require even longer to bring them to Heavenfall. I doubt many would come at all.’

  ‘We will discuss that in person,’ Joghaten said. ‘We are making planetfall immediately. You are to make preparations for a full-scale planetary invasion. Enact all pre-coded Imperial protocols for a primary grade xenos threat.’

  ‘Of course,’ Harren said. ‘I am transmitting landing coordinates for the Pinnacle’s main skyshield landing platform to your capital ship immediately. I shall meet you there.’ There was a moment’s silence before the governor spoke again.

  ‘May I ask what xenos threat in particular we are to prepare for?’

  ‘The Great Devourer,’ Joghaten said, his grip on the edge of the hololithic chart tightening fractionally. ‘The tyranids are coming, Commander Harren. Pray to the Khagan and the Emperor that we have the strength to meet them.’

  The Pinnacle, Heavenfall

  For the first time in many years, the White Scars fell upon Darkand. They made planetfall as night encroached, while the sun’s last rays were spilling out over the golden grasslands. The darkening arch of heaven’s vault was slashed by fiery contrails as heavy gunships and faster escort flyers made their approach to the city on the mountainside. The stars themselves had increased in number with the coming night, the White Scars fleet presenting six new points of shining light as the warships moved into low orbit. Out on the steppes the tribes huddled around freshly kindled yat dung fires and stared up at the strange portents, muttering to one another in low, fearful voices.

  Joghaten watched the descent from the vision port of the ­Thunderhawk gunship Wind Talon. White cloud cover gave way to a vast expanse of yellow-and-green grassland, a rolling sea interspersed with jagged gullies, small valleys and rocky outcrops. As the gunship turned, a great mountain range swung slowly into view, its snow-capped peaks like a spiny ridge bisecting the plains. It was towards the edge of those peaks that Wind Talon soared, its engines vibrating the plasteel walls and restraint harnesses around the khan and his seated honour guard.

  A city materialised from the distant haze. At first it looked as though the slope of the final mountain in the great, jagged range ahead had suffered a landslide that had left its flank craggy and deformed. As the gunship drew closer, however, the regularity of the shapes covering the slope became more apparent. A city was nestled into the steep flank, thousands of buildings cut from yellow Darkand stone forming dozens upon dozens of tiers that laddered the mountain almost all the way up to its peak.

  Joghaten picked out structures he already knew from the briefing bursts – the great dome of the Spur of Mankind Descended, surrounded by the spires of the lesser basilicas and devotariums. The jagged administrative towers of the government district, the Pinnacle, opposite the temple district, and the squat, fortified bulk of the centrum dominus alongside the clustered antenna of the primary vox-hub, set high up near the mountain’s peak. Lower down were the red-tiled roofs of the Old Town, and the more modern, unlovely hab blocks near the base of the city. The entire precarious collective was ringed by a band of dark rockcrete, from the upper slopes all the way down around the outer hab blocks. Joghaten recognised the Founding Wall, the encircling line of bastions, bulwarks and parapets that marked the edge of the great slope-city and the start of the steppes.

  As Wind Talon passed over Heavenfall the khan got a better view down into the city. With the exception of a central thoroughfare leading to the Founding Wall’s main gate, the streets were tangled and narrow. Old Town was a veritable warren, although the government area and temple district afforded slightly wider colonnaded walkways and squares. The gradient for the whole city was incredibly steep – cabled landcars, gleaming silver in the sunlight, transported people to the upper slopes, though the less affluent areas nearer the base had no such luxuries when it came to climbing the streets. Such a place would be a nightmare to assault. A nightmare, at least, for any enemy not as numerous and relentless as the tyranids.

  The Thunderhawk gunship almost filled the skyshield landing pad as it completed its final descent towards the Pinnacle, the harsh light from the strip lumens surrounding it making its thick white armour plates and red jags gleam in the gathering twilight. The other space port landing zones, sited close to the peak of Heavenfall’s mountain, were also receiving White Scars arrivals, while the brotherhood’s complement of armour – Predators, Land Raiders and a Whirlwind – were deploying to the plains beyond the Founding Wall. Wind Talon’s plasteel-and-adamantium bulk dwarfed the gaggle of Pinnacle dignitaries come to greet it.

  Joghaten stepped out through the steam venting from the ­flyer’s hydraulic fore hatch, his pace brisk. There was no time for ceremony. Before him an array of heavily robed officials stared up in palpable shock. Some gasped audibly when Qui’sin and the rest of his bondsmen emerged from the gunship behind him, heavy boots clanking on plasteel and ferrocrete. Joghaten had long ago stopped caring about the fear and awe that accompanied a human’s first encounter with a Space Marine.

  He picked out the face of Governor Harren from the briefing logs. The man was short and ageing badly, his rejuves beginning to fail. He was clad in the thick ceremonial gowns the Darkand government affected, apparently in an inaccurate mimicry of the kaftans worn by the White Scars. Alone among his flunkies, Harren did not appear overawed by the transhuman warriors towering over him. He met Joghaten’s gaze blankly for a second, before bowing his head and making the sign of the aquila.

  ‘Welcome to Darkand, lord,’ he said. His cultured Imperial accent was heavily at odds with the thick native Darkand drawl, itself the ugly bastard of the fast-flowing beauty of Khorchin. It bore a monotonous drone that seemed to match the governor’s dull look.

  ‘Earth and air be with you, governor,’ Joghaten replied brusquely. ‘We require a private audience, immediately.’

  ‘Of course,’ Harren responded. He gestured towards his dignitaries and they scattered before him, making way for the governor and the gods that accompanied him.

  The White Scars followed Harren and three of Darkand’s highest-ranking officials as he led them through the cloistered government district. The evening air was humid, and though the lichen-clad squares and statue-lined walkways were quiet, the discord of the city slope below drifted
through the heavy atmosphere. Robed clusters of shaven-headed adepts and ministers in their gowns and broad-brimmed hats grew quiet or paused their hurrying progress to stare at the entourage as they passed by. Only the ochre-armoured guards seemed capable of indifference, holding post at door arches and besides the ceremonial bust alcoves crafted into the sand-coloured walls.

  Harren delivered a series of code locks and identification cants at the top of a set of wide stone steps outside a heavily-guarded entranceway. Either side of the servitor-manned portcullis two great statues loomed, towering over even Joghaten. It took the Master of Blades a moment to realise they were both renderings of Space Marines, cast in alabaster; two vast White Scars set to guarding Darkand’s heart for eternity. The symbolism was unambiguous.

  ‘Where are we?’ Joghaten demanded as they passed beneath the portcullis and entered a wide, high antechamber. The ornate lumen orbs in their wall niches had yet to activate, and the last rays of light beaming in through the glassaic dome above were not enough to ward off the shadows creeping in from every corner. The sound of the Space Marines’ boots echoed off the polished flagstones underfoot.

  ‘These are the central government buildings,’ Harren responded. ‘The heart of the Imperial presence on Darkand. The centrum dominus is almost directly above us.’

  The governor’s words were heavily stilted, overly formal. Joghaten assumed the man was simply overwhelmed, yet alone among the humans the Master of Blades had seen so far on Darkand, Harren didn’t seem to exude terror at the presence of the Adeptus Astartes. Apart from the need to match the stride of the towering warriors, his pace was unhurried and his speech curiously droning and precise.