organised hundreds of such operations and could land ten thousand men and have them ready to march off in battle order in under
five hours.
Until they landed the Titans, the sheer mass of the tower was proof against their available weapons, and the Warsmith himself had
impressed upon Forrix the need for swiftness in this campaign. He could not risk bringing the massive bulk carriers, essentially
vast barrack ships, down into low orbit until the control tower was theirs. It was entirely likely that there were torpedo silos or
orbital batteries concealed within the mountains just waiting for the chance to down such valuable targets.
Once Kroeger had taken the tower he would begin the landings.
And then this world would burn.
KROEGER WATCHED THE Dreadnought rip the bludgeoned door from its frame and hurl the massive piece of metal through the air.
The mad howl of the machine echoed across the spaceport as its keepers dragged its massive bulk away from the low-ceilinged
interior of the tower.
He snarled and leapt through the shattered remains of the door, blood pounding through his veins in hot excitement. His bloodlust
was up, stoked by the infuriating delays in achieving entry to the tower. Screams and roars followed him, as a tide of armoured
killers poured inside the last bastion of the Imperial defenders.
Las-bolts burst around him and ricocheted from his armour, but nothing could stop his powerful form. Around fifty men defended
the internal space of the tower, cowardly wretches who had allowed their comrades to be butchered while they had prayed for a
deliverance that would never come.
Kroeger charged straight for the heart of the defence as Iron Warriors armed with gargoyle-mouthed heavy bolters took up
position either side of the tower's door, spraying the defenders' barricades with shells.
Five powerful strides and Kroeger was amongst the Imperial soldiers, chopping and hacking with his sword. Blood fountained and
cries of terror echoed from the gore-spattered walls as the Iron Warriors slew every man that stood before them. It was an uneven
struggle and as Kroeger wrenched his sword from the belly of the last man, it was with a snarl of displeasure. Where was the sport
to be had in slaughtering such weaklings? The lmperium had grown soft.
Not one of these soldiers could have stood on the walls of Terra in the last days and held their head high. Kroeger shook his head,
clearing his mind of ancient memories. There was battle still to be had.
ADEPT CYCERIN SAT at his monitoring station and awaited death. He listened to the shrieks of the dying echoing from the voxspeakers,
and felt his terror rise once more, suffocating in its intensity. His hands shook uncontrollably and he had not been able to
move his legs for the last few minutes. He was going to die. The logic stacks in his engineered brain could offer no other probable
outcome, no matter how often he pleaded and prayed.
The staff of the command centre huddled, shaking, at the far end of the room, holding one another as death approached. Koval
Peronus stood alone, holding a pair of laspistols pointed at the door. Cycerin was under no illusion now as to how flimsy a barrier
it truly was and was impressed by the determination that shone from his underling's features.
Suddenly the awful shrieks and clamour of battle ceased from below and Cycerin knew that the soldiers were all dead. Strange
how inviolable he had felt here, and how quickly that security had been stripped from him. Watching Peronus, he saw beads of
sweat gathering on his forehead, muscles bunching along his jaw-line and noticed the barely perceptible tremor to his arms. The
man was terrified, yet stood his ground in the face of insurmountable odds. Cycerin was no soldier, but recognised true courage
when he saw it.
Stiffly, he rose from his seat, forcing his trembling body to stand beside Koval Peronus. He may be about to die, but as an adept of
the Machine God, he would die standing before the enemy with chin held high. Koval turned his head as the adept stood alongside
him and smiled weakly, nodding briefly in gratitude for his superior's support.
He reversed the grip on one of his pistols and offered it to Cycerin.
'Have you ever fired a weapon in anger?' he asked.
Cycerin shook his head. 'I monitored the production of them in a weapons forge on Gryphonne IV for fifty years, but never
managed to actually fire one.'
He swallowed hard. It was the longest sentence he had ever uttered to one of his staff.
'It's easy. Just point and pull the trigger,' explained Peronus. 'I've set the power to maximum to give us a chance of actually hurting
one of these heretics, so you'll only get three, maybe four shots at the most. Make them count.'
Cycerin nodded, too scared to even reply. The pistol felt heavy in his hands, but reassuringly lethal. Let the enemy come, he
thought. Let them come, and they will find Adept Etolph Cycerin ready for them.
KROEGER CROUCHED AT the end of the corridor leading to the control room and watched as two Iron Warriors planted shaped
melta charges across the door's centre. They turned to him and nodded, retreating and taking cover as the timers activated,
detonating the charges in a ball of incandescent light.
Kroeger was momentarily blinded as his auto-senses darkened his receptors to compensate, but when they reactivated, he snarled
in satisfaction as he saw the door and half the wall had been obliterated.
Nothing came through the door, not a single shot, grenade, or warrior intent on dying with some measure of honour. Angry now at
having been cheated of the chance for glory, Kroeger smashed his way through the smouldering remains of the door, his bulk
Graham McNeill ?Storm of Iron?
taking a portion of the wall with him and wreathing him in smoke.
Two figures stood before him, pistols held wavering before them. Perhaps here he would find a foe worthy of his blade. He
grinned as he smelled their fear.
The smile faded as he saw that neither man was a warrior. One was a tonsured technician, while the other was one of the deluded
priests of the machine.
What then could they offer him that he had not already ripped from five score men already? The robed machine priest shouted and
fired his pistol, the blast punching a hole in the wall beside Kroeger. The technician fired a heartbeat later and Kroeger rocked
back on his heels as the impact blasted a crater in his power armour. Before the Imperial could shoot again, Kroeger was upon
him, backhanding his fist across his face and decapitating him in an explosion of blood and bone.
The adept fired again, the blast scoring across Kroeger's back. He spun, plucking the pistol from the man and tearing the hand
from his wrist. The adept dropped to his knees, open mouthed in horror as blood jetted from the ragged stump.
Kroeger drew his pistol, ready to finish off the fool, when a sibilant, velvet voice hissed from the blasted doorway.
'You would cost me my victory, Kroeger? That would be unwise of you.'
Kroeger spun, the blood surging to his head as he lowered his weapon.
'No, my lord,' he stammered, dropping to his knees, awed and humbled at the unexpected presence of the Warsmith.
The darkness within the room swelled as one of the mightiest leaders of the Iron Warriors entered to claim his victory. Kroeger
had a barely perceived vision of armour of darkest iron, almost black, and a ravaged face glowing with pale light. Horrible vitality
pulsed from that face. Kroeger fought to keep from vomiting inside his helmet, such was the force of his leader's presence.
The Warsmith's burnished armour was magnificent and, eyes cast down, Kroeger could see writhing shapes and leering faces
swimming up from its translucent depths. Their agonised wails clawed at the edge of his hearing, bound forever within the blasted
stuff of the Warsmith's body. His footfalls fell with the weight of ages, imbued with the authority of one who had fought alongside
the Legion's Primarch, the great Perturabo, on the accursed soil of Terra.
Wisps of ghostly smoke smouldered where he walked, each twisting like a tormented soul before fading into nothing. Kroeger
dared not look at the Warsmith without first being commanded, for fear of instant death at the hands of one of his infernal
Terminator bodyguards. They stood a respectful distance from their lord as he slowly circled Kroeger.
The Warsmith brushed his gauntleted fingers along his scarred armour and Kroeger felt intense clamps of nausea seize him in a
burning grip. Every cell in his body seemed to recoil at the Warsmith's touch and only through a mantra of hate did Kroeger
remain conscious. Though the pain was intense, he felt a powerful yearning for such power. What must it be like to command the
power of the empyrean, to have its unimaginable power pump through your veins like blood itself?
'You are reckless, Kroeger. Have ten thousand years of battle taught you nothing?'
'I desire only to serve and to kill those who would deny us our destiny.'
The Warsmith chuckled, the sound like earth falling on a coffin. 'Do not talk to me of destiny, Kroeger. I know why you fight and
it is not for anything so lofty as that.'
Kroeger felt blinding waves of pain lance through his skull as the Warsmith leaned in close to the back of his head.
'That you kill the lackeys of the corpse-emperor is enough for me, but have a care that your own needs do not interfere with mine.'
Kroeger nodded, unable to speak, again feeling the roiling sensation of the Warsmith's impending change wash over him. He
fought to retain consciousness.
The Warsmith turned from him and Kroeger sighed in relief. The master of the Iron Warriors stood over the still-twitching form of
the adept who'd shot at him. From the corner of his eye, he saw the blurry outline of the Warsmith bend and scrutinise the howling
adept with the bleeding stump.
'My sorcerer, Jharek Kelmaur, spoke of this man. The servant of the machine with only one hand. He is important to me, Kroeger.
And you almost killed him.'
'I… I beg your forgiveness, my lord,' gasped Kroeger.
'See to it that he does not die and you shall have it.'
'He will not die.'
'If he does, you will follow him screaming into hell,' promised the Warsmith, stalking from the room.
As his master departed Kroeger felt the nauseous contractions in his gut subside and pushed himself to his feet. He turned to the
mewling form of the bloodstained adept.
He lifted the whimpering man roughly by his robes and dragged him from the room.
Why the Warsmith should want this one saved was beyond him, but if it was his lord's will that the enemy be spared, then so be it.
FOUR
THE LAST SOUNDS of battle had faded as the commanders of the three grand companies of the Iron Warriors that had come to
Hydra Cordatus gathered at the behest of their lord and master.
The Warsmith stood, resplendent in his monstrous suit of power armour, pleased with the bloodletting wreaked in his name. His
three champions knelt before him, each man's armour spattered with blood, hued orange by the high midday sun. The Warsmith
ignored them, casting his gaze out over the blasted wasteland that had once been a spaceport. The devastated appearance was
deceptive, however.
Lumbering, earth-moving machines, brought down from orbit less than an hour ago, were already bulldozing wrecked aircraft and
drop-pods from the runways and landing platforms. Bodies were crushed under their grinding tracks or gathered up in vast dozer
blades and dumped unceremoniously in giant craters. He cast his eyes to the fiery sky, remembering the first time he had set eyes
on this world. Both he and the planet had been very different back then, and he wondered if those who called this place home even
Graham McNeill ?Storm of Iron?
knew how it had come to resemble such a pleasing vision of hell.
Far above him he saw a bloated shape, blurred and indistinct, but visible to his enhanced and changing eyes, floating in the fiery
haze of the upper atmosphere. The massive star-ship strained against the oppressive attraction of gravity, disgorging hundreds of
landing craft from its belly like some vast sow giving birth to her litter.
Each of this craft's spawn was hundreds of metres in length and crammed with a mixture of slaves, soldiers, ammunition,
weapons, siege engines, tools and all manner of materiel required for a besieging army. Forrix knew his trade and the Warsmith
was confident that this complex and demanding operation would proceed without problem.
He knew that time was his greatest enemy. Abaddon the Despoiler had bidden them complete this task before his great
machination unfolded in return for settling the debt of the Iron Warriors' withdrawal from his designs. To the Warsmith, the
Despoiler's plans reeked of the same betrayal that had forced their hand so long ago and driven them to the fold of the dark gods.
Perturabo had made the mistake of trusting one he thought was his friend and lord. The Warsmith would not make that mistake
himself.
Abaddon may have his plans, but the Warsmith had his own as well.
There was a pleasing synchronicity to his return to Hydra Cordatus. Just now, as he stood on the brink of greatness, he had
returned to the world where he had first put into practice the skills he had learned as a novitiate on Olympia.
What he had once helped create, he would now tear asunder.
He returned his gaze to his war leaders, scrutinising each in turn.
Forrix, captain of the foremost of his grand companies, with whom he had held the last gate of the Jarelphi Palace, who had led
the retreat from Terra and whose oath of loyalty had been sworn above the clone body of Horus himself.
His experience was second to none and the Warsmith valued his counsel above all others. The fires of glory had long since burned
out in his one-time brother, but ten thousand years of war had not dimmed his strength, the saturation of Chaos imbuing his
ancient frame with incredible power. His crafted suit of Terminator armour had been struck in the forges of Olympia itself, each
greave, vambrace and cuissart hand-tooled by artificers whose skill was now all but a whispered myth.
Beside Forrix: Kroeger, the young-blood, though such a term seemed laughable now, given that Kroeger had fought the long war
