The Warmaster

Twenty-Five: Executor

If anything, the level of activity in the war room was more furious than before. Marshal Blackwood had arrived, some thirty minutes earlier, relieved Cybon of command, and taken his place at the main strategium. The massive hololithic plates quivered with rapidly updating data streams. Van Voytz, Cybon and nine other lords militant were supporting Blackwood’s command and supervising the mass of personnel.

Gaunt stood in the doorway for a moment, surveying the commotion. Hundreds of men and women filled the main floor below him, and the upper galleries too – hundreds of men and women processing information, making decisions and determining the lives of millions more across the surface of Urdesh and its nearspace holdings.

Even from a distance, Gaunt could read the general trend of the incident boards. Their glowing plates prioritised the main crisis zones. Ghereppan in the south was a massive focus. Zarakppan was in dis­array. Eltath itself was clearly on the brink. Sub-graphics showed the seat of the fighting was in the south west, along the bay, and in the fringes of the Northern Dynastic Claves.

The Ghosts were in that mess somewhere. That’s where he’d sent them.

He drew a breath, and walked down the steps to the main floor.

Van Voytz saw him through the crowd, handed a data-slate back to a waiting tactician and came storming over.

‘The hell have you been, Gaunt?’ he snapped.

‘Achieving what you wanted, sir,’ Gaunt replied.

‘What does that mean? The hell you have! We should have moved two hours ago! This situation is beyond untenable and–’

‘I believe you wanted a viable warmaster,’ said Gaunt.

‘I wanted this done cleanly and quickly,’ replied Van Voytz, ‘and I’m having sincere doubts about your suitability. For Throne’s sake, you don’t play games with something this vital–’

‘You don’t,’ replied Gaunt calmly. ‘I agree. And I agree about my suitability too. But I’ve got you what you wanted. Just not in the form you expected, perhaps.’

Van Voytz began yelling at him again, loud enough to still the activity in the immediate area. Militarum personnel turned to look in concern. Cybon and Blackwood also turned, hearing the raised voice.

Gaunt ignored Van Voytz’s tirade. He moved aside and looked back at the main staircase.

Warmaster Macaroth walked slowly down the stairs, chin up. He hadn’t bothered to shave, but he had dressed in his formal uniform, the red sash across the chest of his dark blue jacket, the crest of his office fixed over his heart. Sancto and the other Scions flanked him as a makeshift honour guard, and Beltayn, Daur and Bonin followed in his wake.

The chamber fell silent. Voices dropped away. There was a suspended hush, and every eye was on Macaroth. The only sounds were the constant chirrup and clatter of the war room’s systems.

‘Attention,’ said Gaunt.

The several hundred personnel present shot to attention. The twelve lords militant made the sign of the aquila and bowed their heads.

Macaroth strolled past Gaunt and Van Voytz, and walked up to the main strategium. Tactical officers scooted out of his path. He picked up a data-wand, and flipped through several strategic views, making the light show blink and re-form.

‘This is a pretty mess,’ he said, at last.

‘Warmaster, we have containment measures–’ Blackwood began.

‘I wasn’t referring to the war condition, Blackwood,’ said Macaroth. ‘Well, only in part. I can see your containment measures. They are fit for purpose. I will make some adjustments, but they are fit enough. I had no doubt, Blackwood, that you and your fellow lords were perfectly able to prosecute this war. That’s how you were bred. That’s why you were chosen. Continue as you are doing.’

Blackwood nodded.

‘But it is clear you doubt me, don’t you, my lords?’ Macaroth asked. His gaze flitted from Cybon, to Blackwood, to Van Voytz, to Tzara. Each lord militant in turn felt the heat of his stare.

‘You doubt my fitness. My ability. My resolution. My methods.’

‘My lord,’ said Van Voytz. ‘I hardly think this is the time or place–’

‘Then when exactly, Van Voytz? When would be a good time for you?’

‘Warmaster,’ said Cybon, stepping forwards, ‘this is not a discussion to have in front of the general staff–’

‘They’re not children, Cybon,’ said Macaroth. ‘They’re not innocents. They’re senior officers. There’s not a man here who hasn’t been bloodied in war and witnessed first hand the miseries of this conflict. That’s why they’re in this room. They don’t have sensitivities that need to be spared from the uglier difficulties of warfare. Such as questions of command.’

Macaroth looked at them.

‘Which one of you has it? Whose pocket is it in?’

‘My lord?’ asked Cybon.

‘The declamation of confidence. Countersigned, no doubt. The instrument to remove me from my post.’

A murmur ran through the crowd. Officers glanced at each other in dismay.

‘Hush now,’ said Macaroth. ‘It is perfectly legal. We’re not talking insurrection here. If a commander is unfit, he may be removed. The mechanism exists. My lords militant have been meticulous in their process. By the book. They have considered the matter carefully, as great men do, and they have made a resolution, and stand ready to enact it.’

He looked at the data-wand in his hand thoughtfully.

‘My fault,’ he said quietly. ‘My oversight. I have been well aware of your disaffection for years. Some of that I put down to thwarted ambitions, or differences in strategic thinking. I knew there was dissent. I knew that many were unhappy with my focus and my style of command.’

He looked up again.

‘I ignored it. I trusted in the loyalty of your stations. Whatever you thought, whatever our differences, you knew I was warmaster. That, I thought, was all that mattered.’

Macaroth put the wand down on the glass tabletop.

‘Not enough, clearly. Not nearly enough. And whatever awareness I had of your discontent, it needed one man to stand up and tell me so. To my damn face. To risk everything in terms of his career and future, his alliances and political capital, and simply tell me. That, I think, is loyalty. Not to me. To the office. To the Throne. To the Imperial bloody Guard.’

Cybon turned slowly to look at Gaunt.

‘You bastard,’ he rumbled. ‘You told him, you treacherous bastard–’

‘Treacherous, General Cybon?’ said Macaroth mildly. ‘I don’t think that’s a word I’d throw around, if I were you. And certainly not a word I’d expect you to use of the man you personally chose to replace me.’

He walked over to Cybon and looked up at the towering warlord.

‘Gaunt told me, because it was his duty to do so. You put him in a situation worse than any war he’s ever faced. Conflict of interest at the highest degree. Yet he served, as every good Guardsman serves. Served with unflinching loyalty to the Astra Militarum, to the oath we all uphold. He came and he told me. He simply told me, Cybon. He told me the depth of your unhappiness. He supplied the one vital piece of intelligence missing from my overview of this crusade.’

Van Voytz snarled and swung at Gaunt. Gaunt caught his wrist before the blow could land, and pushed back hard. Van Voytz ­stumbled backwards, collided with Kelso and crashed into the side of the strategium table. He steadied himself.

‘Is that where we’re going now?’ Gaunt asked. ‘Is it, Barthol? Open insurrection? Legal process fails, so you resort to violence?’

‘He just wants to break your face,’ said Cybon. ‘All of us do.’

‘All of you?’ asked Macaroth. ‘Everyone in this chamber? Really? My lords, officers, soldiers, now is the moment. If you would see me gone, then stand together. Now. Go on. I will accept your declamation of confidence and all your instruments of removal. Come to that, I will accept your blades in my back and your bullets in my brain. If I am unfit and you want me gone, get it over with.’

Macaroth closed his eyes, tilted his head back and opened his arms serenely as if to welcome an embrace.

‘For Throne’s sake!’ Van Voytz growled. ‘We are obliged to act! The crusade is failing! We’re losing this war! We must serve the declamation and rid ourselves of this infantile leadership! We must act for the good of the Imperium, in the name of the God-Emperor, and usher in a new era of clear and forthright command!’

Gaunt crossed to face him. He drew his power sword and lit it.

‘Do it, Barthol,’ he said. ‘But you go through me.’

‘You’re a thrice-damned idiot, Gaunt!’ Van Voytz raged, ‘You’ve ruined us all! We had a chance here. A chance to find new focus! Cybon, for Throne’s sake! We have to do this! We have to do this!’

‘Not like this,’ said Cybon quietly.

‘By legal resort, yes,’ said Blackwood. ‘Not by bloody coup. Never that way.’

‘Would you raise your hand against Macaroth?’ asked Kelso in dismay.

‘Step back, Van Voytz,’ murmured Tzara.

‘I have my grievances,’ said Cybon. He looked at Macaroth. ‘Throne knows, many. I am keen to discuss them. But I will not devolve to insurrection. Damn it, Van Voytz, he is the warmaster.’

Macaroth opened his eyes, and slowly lowered his arms. He smiled.

‘Put down your famous sword, Lord Militant Gaunt,’ he said. ‘I see only loyal men in this room.’

Gaunt glanced at Van Voytz, and then depowered and sheathed his sword. Blackwood took off his cap and his gloves and set them on the table.

‘You have my resignation, lord,’ he said. ‘My resignation for my part in orchestrating your removal. I cannot speak for the others, but I trust my colleagues will have the dignity to do the same.’

‘Oh, I don’t want your resignation, Blackwood,’ said Macaroth. ‘I don’t want your frightened obedience either. Resolving this isn’t so simple. I have been at fault. I have been absent. I have lost my connection with staff command. I aim to remedy that. I intend to take direct control of this battle-sphere and win this cursed war.’

He tapped his index finger on the glass plate of the strategium.

‘I am here now,’ he said. ‘Any man, any man present who finds no confidence in me can stay and have that lack of confidence disabused. Any who wish to go, go now. There will be no retribution. No purge by the Officio Prefectus. Just go, and you will be reposted to other zones and other sectors. But if you’re going, get the hell out now.’

He looked at Blackwood, Cybon and Tzara.

‘If you wish, stay. Serve me here. Don’t cower or meep weak platitudes of loyalty. Serve me here at this station. Bring me the insight and ability that made you lords militant in the first place. Help me as we fight for Urdesh and drive the Archenemy to ruin.’

The room began to stir. Officers began to move back towards the table.

Macaroth clapped his hands.

‘Come on!’ he yelled. ‘Move yourselves! This war won’t win itself! I need data revisions on zones three, eight and nine immediately!’

Tacticians and data-serfs began to scurry.

‘Get me oversight reports on Zarakppan!’ Macaroth demanded. ‘I want a link to Urienz on the ground. And set up a vox-link with Ghereppan immediately! I need to advise the Saint of our strategic approach. Blackwood, put your damn cap back on! Where’s that zone three data?’

The noise and mass activity resumed. At the heart of the war room’s reignited frenzy, Gaunt faced Van Voytz.

‘You made a mistake, Gaunt,’ said Van Voytz.

‘I don’t think so,’ Gaunt replied. ‘History will decide.’

‘I trusted you.’

‘As I have trusted you many times. The outcome is what matters, isn’t that what you always told me?’ Gaunt looked at him. ‘It may not come in the form we expect, and it may cost us personally in painful ways, but the outcome is what matters. For the Emperor. For the Imperium. Whatever price we as individuals pay.’

‘Damn you. Are you really throwing Jago back in my face? That was a necessary action! Sentiment doesn’t enter into–’

‘So is this. You heard the warmaster. Do your job, or get out. I just heard him calling for zone nine data.’

Van Voytz glowered at him. Gaunt turned away.

‘My lord warmaster,’ he called through the hubbub. ‘General Van Voytz had oversight of zone nine. I believe he has tactical advice in that regard.’

‘Tell him to get over here!’ Macaroth shouted back.

Gaunt turned back to Van Voytz. Van Voytz glared for a moment more, then pushed his way through the staff to the warmaster’s side.

‘Sir?’

Gaunt looked around and found Beltayn standing beside him.

‘What is it?’

‘Um, signal from transfer section, sir. Our retinue has just entered the safety of the palace precinct, with two companies in escort. Major Baskevyl asks to report to you at the earliest possible opportunity.’

‘Baskevyl? Tell him I’ll see him as soon as I can. In fact, send Captain Daur down to admit him and take his brief. Any word on the main Ghost force?’

‘Nothing, sir,’ said Beltayn. ‘Vox-control suggests there may be signal jamming in their sector.’

Gaunt nodded, and pushed through the press towards Biota.

‘Do we have an update on the Tanith First?’ he asked the tactician.

Biota took him aside to one of the hololith plates, and wanded through data.

‘They log as still in position, as per orders,’ he said. ‘Tulkar Batteries defence, at the east end of Millgate.’

‘They’re holding?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Contact?’

‘Heavy jamming, sir,’ Biota replied with a shake of his head.

Gaunt looked at the data display. ‘Throne,’ he murmured, ‘that’s a bloodbath. They’re right at the heart of it. I sent them right into the heaviest fighting in the zone.’

‘My lord,’ said Biota. He hesitated. ‘My lord, we have an unconfirmed report that a significant enemy advance is pushing along the south shore into Millgate. Your Ghosts, sir… They are the principal unit standing in its way.’

The transports rumbled in through the gatehouses, and entered the compound of the Urdeshic Palace. It was almost dawn, but the sky was choked with smoke plumes running north off Zarakppan and the burning mills. Munitorum staffers with light poles guided the vehicles to parking places on the hard standing, and cargo crews moved in to help the retinue unload.

‘How many are you?’ a Munitorum official asked Meryn. Meryn handed him the manifest list.

‘We have accommodation assigned in the west blockhouses,’ the man said. ‘The crews will show you the way.’

‘I need a medicae,’ said Meryn. ‘We have a concussion injury.’

The official waved over a medicae. Meryn pointed him to Fazekiel and Dalin, who were helping Felyx out of one of the trucks. He had a bedroll and a combat cape wrapped around him like a shawl, and looked pale and unsteady.

She, Meryn reminded himself. She.

‘Looks like you escaped the worst of it, captain,’ the Munitorum official said lightheartedly. ‘They say it’s a living hell down in the zones.’

‘Yeah,’ said Meryn. ‘We got away with it, all right.’

He looked across the crowd of off-loading personnel, the women and children of the retinue and the Ghosts escorting them. He saw Blenner, and tried to catch his eye.

But Blenner determinedly did not look back.

Elodie moved through the busy crowd in the half-light. She was still shaken. She wasn’t sure what had happened at the billet, but fear and shock still clung to her like a camo-cloak.

‘Yoncy? Yoncy?’

The girl was standing alone behind the trucks, away from the rest. Her shaved head seemed very pale and fragile in the gloom. They’d sponged the blood off her, but her shift dress was dark and caked with bloodstains. She hadn’t said much since she’d recovered consciousness.

‘Yoncy?’ said Elodie. ‘Come on, honey.’

Yoncy was staring at the fortress gatehouses, apparently fascinated by the sight of the massive gates as they slowly closed on their hydraulic buffers.

‘Yoncy?’ Elodie took her hand. ‘Come on, it’s cold out here.’

‘We’re home now,’ said Yoncy softly. ‘Home and safe. Just like Papa told me to be.’

‘That’s right,’ said Elodie. For a second, she heard the bone-saw shriek, an echo in the night. She shuddered. Just a memory. Just a sharp, brief recall of the night’s horror.

‘Come on,’ she said.

The gates slammed shut with a resounding boom. Yoncy sighed, and turned as Elodie led her away to join the others. The officials with light poles were leading processions of new arrivals across the compound.

As she was led along, Yoncy glanced over her shoulder at the thick darkness under the high walls of the yard. She frowned, as if she had seen something or heard something.

‘Bad shadow,’ she whispered. ‘Naughty shadow. Not yet.’

The fire rate coming at them was breathtaking. The whole sky over the shore was on fire, and las-rounds rained in like a neon monsoon. Two Ghosts directly beside Rawne had just been cut down.

‘Medic!’ Rawne yelled over the deafening hail of fire. There was blood on his face that wasn’t his.

‘We have to get closer!’ Pasha yelled to him, down in cover nearby.

Rawne knew they did. But they were outgunned at a ratio of about five to one. The agriboat fleet was swarming with Sek’s warriors, and they were laying down so much fire, Rawne couldn’t get any of his units past the sea wall. There was no way to call in air support, and the promised armour had never arrived. Runners from Ludd had brought him word that Criid’s companies were facing a meat-grinder in the throttled streets around Turnabout Lane.

‘If we could just get a foothold on those boats,’ Rawne growled.

Beside him, head down, Oysten nodded. But she had absolutely no idea what to suggest.

‘You’ll have to pull back!’ Curth snapped as she struggled to patch one of the fallen troopers. There was blood all over her too.

‘Yeah, right,’ Rawne replied. ‘Do that, and we basically open the city to the fethers.’

‘Have you seen our casualty rate?’ Curth yelled back. ‘Much more of this and you won’t have any troops left to pull back!’

‘What the hell?’ said Spetnin suddenly.

Rawne looked up. The fire rate had just dropped dramatically. The wither­ing storm of las-bolts had reduced to just a few sporadic shots.

Rawne waited. A last few cracks of gunfire, then something close to silence.

He started to rise.

‘Be careful!’ Pasha snapped.

He rose anyway, and took a look over the chipped and splintered lip of the sea wall. A haze of gunsmoke lay across the rusting agriboat fleet. Some of the vessels were burning, and they all showed signs of heavy battle damage.

There was no trace at all of the enemy force that had been hosing them with shots a few minutes before.

‘The feth..?’ Rawne muttered.

‘It’s a trick,’ warned Pasha.

‘What kind of trick?’ Rawne replied. ‘One squad, with me. Pasha, reposition our units. Get them in better order in case this starts up again.’

Rawne slithered over the sea wall, surprised to find that no one shot at him. The rockcrete was dimpled with shot holes and wafting smoke. The settling fyceline was so thick it made him cough. Ghosts slipped over the wall with him. Weapons up, they scurried towards the dock and the condemned fleet.

His regiment’s gunfire and rocket assault had damaged all the boats in the vicinity. Rawne could hear water gushing in and filling hulls holed by tread fethers. He saw the enemy dead on upper decks, or hanging over broken railings. More corpses choked the low-water gap between the dock wall and the hulls.

‘Where the feth did they go?’ asked Brostin, his flamer ready.

Rawne clambered onto the nearest hull, stepping over enemy dead. Where the feth had they gone?

‘We have to listen,’ said Zhukova.

‘What?’

She moved past Rawne, and slipped down a through-deck ladder. He followed. Down inside the dark, stinking hull, she got on her knees and pressed her ear to the deck.

‘Movement,’ she reported. ‘Like I heard before.’

She looked up at Rawne, and wiped grease off her cheek.

‘But moving away from us,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘They’re retreating, back through the hulks. Back the way they came.’

‘I don’t get it,’ said Brostin, on the ladder behind Rawne. ‘Why’d they do that? They ’ad us dead.’

Rawne shook his head.

‘The only reason you’d call a withdrawal is if you’re losing,’ he said. He paused. ‘Or you’ve already won and got what you wanted.’

‘Colonel! Colonel Rawne!’

Rawne, Brostin and Zhukova looked up. Above them, Major Pasha was peering down through the deck hatch.

‘What is it, Pasha?’ Rawne asked.

‘You must come,’ she said.

Rawne hauled himself back up the ladder onto the deck.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘There’s a great mass of corpses down in the hold space here, colonel,’ Pasha said, pointing to the rim of a rusty catch-tank nearby. ‘Caober and Vivvo have climbed down to search, but most are too burned and disfigured to–’

‘Stop. Why did they go down?’

‘Because I found this on the deck,’ she said.

She held out a bloody object for him to see. It was a Tanith warknife, the blade broken.

Mkoll’s.

‘There is an old rank,’ said Macaroth. ‘From back in the days of the first crusade. Saint Sabbat’s crusade…’

‘My lord?’ asked Bulledin.

Macaroth shook his head and raised his hands dismissively.

‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘Take your seats. I was just musing to myself. I have spent a long time alone with history books. A long time musing over the details of the old wars, of Urdesh, of the Sabbat Worlds. I find myself thinking out loud.’

The lords militant took their places around the table in the Collegia Bellum Urdeshi. There were more than thirty of them present, and additional seats had been placed along the straight side of the vast wooden semicircle. Chairs scraped across the polished black floor with its golden inscriptions. Thousands of candles and lumen globes had been set to light the chamber, and the warding cyberskulls floated and murmured overhead.

‘Yes,’ said Macaroth, sorting through the reports and files placed in front of him, ‘a long time alone with history books. Too long, I’m sure you will agree, Cybon?’

Cybon coughed awkwardly.

‘Let’s review,’ Macaroth said. ‘Together, as a group, as staff. Further evidence, I hope, that I am eager to refocus my manner of command.’

‘My lord–’ Lugo began.

‘Don’t fawn, Lugo,’ said Macaroth testily. ‘Now, would anyone care to explain what occurred in the last two hours?’

‘The Archenemy has withdrawn into the Zarakppan basin,’ said Kelso. ‘And also has fallen back from the southern edge of Eltath. Mass withdrawal. Immediate and focused. They are outside the bounds of the city. They are present and more than ready to resume assault. But they gave up ground.’

‘More than that,’ said Urienz. His face was still speckled with petrochemical dirt from the journey back to Eltath. ‘They gave up significant advantage. They had us by the throat, and they let go.’

‘I said explain not describe,’ said Macaroth. ‘The enemy let us go. Sek let us go. Another few hours, and they would have been into the southern hem of the city, and the east. We would have fallen to them… or at least been caught in a fight so disadvantageous it would have cost us bitterly just to survive.’

‘I believe we would have had to call in the fleet,’ said Grizmund. ‘I appreciate that’s a sanction we wish to avoid, but it would have been neces­sary. We would have had to begin sacrificing the forge world’s assets to purge the enemy.’

Macaroth nodded.

‘We would, I fear,’ he agreed. ‘But something changed. Something turned the enemy back, despite his gains and advantage. With respect to the valiant Guardsmen fighting this action in all zones, it wasn’t us. Not our doing. We didn’t win. We survived because they allowed us to live. Chief tactical officer?’

Biota stepped up to the table. He was one of a number of senior tacticians waiting in the candlelit shadows beside them.

‘My lord?’

‘Does tactical have any wisdom?’ asked Macaroth. ‘Any data at all to explain the change of heart? Did we do something we’re not aware of? Did we, for example, take down a significant senior commander and cause–’

‘My lord, there is no evidence of anything,’ said Biota. He cleared his throat. ‘Except that… it is postulated by a number of parties that the enemy had… achieved his goal. Whatever Sek wanted, he got.’

‘For now,’ said Cybon. ‘They’re still out there.’

‘If Sek got what he wanted,’ said Macaroth, ‘we have no idea what it was. I’ve read the reports concerning the trophies Gaunt recovered from Salvation’s Reach. The so-called “eagle stones”. Intelligence and the ordos believed those were his primary objectives, yet they remain in our custody. The enemy never even got close to the site where they are secured.’

Macaroth looked at his staff.

‘I want answers, my lords. I appreciate our stay of execution, but it troubles me deeply. I want answers. I want to understand this, because if there’s one thing I hate it’s an absence of fact.’

A Tempestus Scion entered the chamber and handed a message slate to the warmaster.

‘Hmm,’ said Macaroth, reading. ‘A link has finally been established with our beloved Beati in Ghereppan. Perhaps she and her lords can furnish us with some information.’

He looked at the Scion. ‘I’ll be there directly,’ he said. The Scion hurried out, and Macaroth rose to his feet. The lords militant began to rise too.

‘No, as you were,’ he said. ‘I want you thinking. I want ideas. I want ­theories. We need something. The fight for this world isn’t over.’

He started to walk out, then paused and turned back.

‘There is an old rank,’ he said, thoughtfully. ‘Back in the day. The warmaster or his equivalent was aided by a first lord. An executor who formed a link between the supreme commander and the command staff. Sabbat herself had one. Kiodrus, you know? Now Saint Kiodrus. History tells us this. Books, Cybon. I fancy I will reinstate this role. It will help mend and facilitate my connection with you great lords. I am not good with people. I don’t like them. I feel I shall let someone do that job for me. Someone to keep you informed and keep you in line on my behalf. Keep me in line too, no doubt. He will be defacto leader, and my chosen successor should the fates take me. Warmaster elect.’

He looked at Cybon.

‘When will you announce this post, my lord?’ asked Cybon.

‘Now,’ Macaroth replied. ‘And you know who it is, because you chose him yourselves. He’s the ideal candidate, for no better reason than he doesn’t want to do it. Ambition can be such an encumbrance.’

He looked at Gaunt.

‘First Lord Executor Gaunt,’ he said. ‘Kindly proceed with this meeting while I am gone. I want answers, remember?’

He strode away. The thousands of candle flames shivered in his wake.

Gaunt sat back. He looked up and down the table at the faces ­staring at him. Bulledin, Urienz, Kelso, Tzara, Blackwood, Lugo, Grizmund, Cybon, Van Voytz…

He cleared his throat.

‘Let’s begin, shall we?’ he said.