smouldering wreck, its components fused together, the source of the burning smell.
“You think…?” began Palinev, in disbelief.
“I think,” said Blonsky, “that a single las-beam was fired at this machine — and it must have
been fired from inside this compartment.”
Barreski appeared in the hatchway to find seven pairs of eyes staring at him. “What the hell
happened here?” he asked. “Did someone fire a lasgun?”
“We were about to ask you the same question,” said Steele.
“You’re the one who’s supposed to be on watch,” said Pozhar. “You and Grayle.”
“You didn’t see anyone?” asked Anakora.
Grayle had appeared at Barreski’s shoulder. “There was something,” he reported. “Another
mutant, I think. I tried to follow it, but I lost it. I don’t know how it got away, it must have moved
like lightning.”
“So, you let this mutant lure you away from the ship?” asked Steele.
Barreski shook his head firmly. “Grayle went after the mutant. I went as far as the top of the rise,
to keep an eye on him, but I never left sight of the lander. There’s no way anything could have got
near this hatchway without my seeing it.”
“Are you certain about that?” asked Steele. He indicated the remains of the vox-caster, still in
Blonsky’s hands, and Barreski’s face fell as he saw the damage for the first time. “Because if this
was not the work of an intruder…”
“Then one of us is a traitor,” said Blonsky.
“Now steady on,” said Gavotski. “Let’s not jump to conclusions, shall we?”
But Blonsky insisted, “The evidence speaks for itself. One of us must have woken, found
himself unobserved and taken the opportunity to destroy the vox-caster, our best hope of being able
to complete this mission.”
54
“Why are you looking at me?” cried Pozhar. “I saw you, you were looking at me as you said
that. You’ve done nothing but criticise me, and question my loyalty, since we climbed into the
Termite.”
“I think you are more concerned with your personal glory,” said Blonsky, “than with serving the
Emperor. I consider that a dangerous attitude.”
“Even if that were true,” said Gavotski, “it doesn’t make Pozhar the guilty party.”
“You’re just accusing me,” said Pozhar hotly, “because you have something to hide. Well, how
about it, Blonsky? I didn’t see you when that mutant attacked me. What were you doing when
Borscz died?”
“He was fighting alongside me,” said Anakora. “He played his part.”
“Yeah?” said Pozhar. “So, maybe we should look at you then. Maybe we should ask how you
managed to survive Astaroth Prime when no one else in your company did. Oh yeah, I know all
about that, Anakora. I remember your name.”
“Sergeant Gavotski is right,” Steele broke in. “None of us is above suspicion.”
“Well, Grayle and I can vouch for each other,” said Barreski.
“Can you?” asked Palinev. “I… I don’t meant to imply anything, it’s just… well, you know that
Grayle couldn’t have snuck in here, but can he say the same for you? He must have taken his eyes
off you to search for that mutant.”
“I’ve known Barreski since basic training,” said Grayle, “and apart from anything else, the last
thing he’d do is harm one of his precious machines. It was him who found the vox-caster in the first
place, remember?”
“Then there is our comrade Mikhaelev,” said Blonsky, “who has had nothing to say for himself
so far. In fact, it is rare that he voices his thoughts — but when he does speak, he says more than he
thinks he does.”
Mikhaelev turned purple, and spluttered, “I have always followed orders.”
“But you have not always agreed with them, have you? Tell me, Mikhaelev, how greatly does it
bother you that the Emperor considers your life less valuable than that of a man like Confessor
Wollkenden?”
“There’s one possibility none of you has considered,” said Steele. “The traitor could be me.” His
quiet words brought down a heavy silence, as he had known they would.
“You all know about the augmetics in my brain,” he continued. “My heart may not have been
corrupted by Chaos, but what if my head has been?”
Their initial shock dispelled, the Ice Warriors rushed to assure their commander that they
couldn’t believe it, that the Emperor would allow no such thing to happen. He raised his hand to
stem their protests.
“I’m just making a point,” he said. “We know nothing for sure — and until we do, we can gain
nothing by hurling accusations.”
“Colonel Steele is right,” said Gavotski. “I am pleased with the way this squad has bonded so
far. We must not jeopardise that. We will fight again tomorrow, as comrades, and we need to be able
to trust each other.”
“Nevertheless,” said Blonsky, “I would request that the colonel search each of us for signs of
mutation — and that, for the rest of the night, we have one man standing sentry outside this ship,
and two inside.”
Pozhar pretended to be asleep.
Anakora and Mikhaelev were sitting nearby, Steele having agreed to Blonsky’s suggestion that
the guard be increased. Pozhar didn’t want them to see that he was awake, couldn’t let them suspect
that his conscience was troubling him. The back of his right hand itched, but he didn’t dare scratch
it.
55
He didn’t know why he had done it.
He had woken from a vivid and troubling dream, had perhaps been half-dreaming still. It had
taken him a minute to work out where he was, to identify the shapes around him as those of his
comrades, to see the vox-caster on the floor beside the hatchway, to remember…
In the dream, Steele had contacted the Imperial Navy on that caster. They had told him that the
search for the confessor had become too dangerous, that they were sending another lander for his
squad, that Cressida was to be left to its new masters. The details were hazy, but Pozhar thought he
remembered an army of cultists and mutants, laughing. Laughing at the Ice Warriors as they turned
their backs on their mission, as they turned and ran.
He had acted on instinct. He had seen that Grayle had abandoned his post. No one was watching
him. It had all been exactly as Blonsky had said: one las-beam, one squeeze of his trigger. He hadn’t
even thought about the sound it would make. As the other Ice Warriors had woken, Pozhar had
dropped back onto his blanket and pretended to be waking too, although his heart had been
hammering in his chest and he had felt a cold flush down his back.
His right hand was itching like crazy now. He shifted his position, carefully, until he could reach
it with his left. Steele and Gavotski had searched everyone, again as Blonsky had suggested. Pozhar
had been certain he would pass their inspection, but still he had felt relieved to be given the all-clear.
The verdict had reaffirmed his belief in himself, reassured him that although he couldn’t explain
what he had done, he had done it for the right reasons. For the Emperor.
His questing fingers found the back of his right hand, and Pozhar froze in horror as he felt
something unfamiliar, something strange, something that had not been there an hour ago: a tuft of
fur.
56
CHAPTER TEN
Time to Destruction of Cressida: 23.53.42
The first avalanche was a small one.
The Ice Warriors had been expecting it. Still, all they could do was brace themselves as the snow
shifted beneath their feet — and hope, of course, that this small slide would not trigger a bigger one.
They had faced a choice this morning: take the well-trodden roads to Mangellan’s stronghold,
the erstwhile Iota Hive, facing the likelihood of more encounters with the enemy en route, or
attempt to approach through treacherous, snow-laden hills. Steele, being unlike many other
commanders, had opened the question to debate. It had been the only time so far today that his
troopers had spoken more than two words to each other.
The accusations of the previous night hung like a dark cloud over them. Even Palinev, although
still scouting ahead, reported back more frequently than he had done yesterday, as if thinking that
too long an absence might arouse the suspicions of his comrades. He might have been right.
Everyone was watching each other, and Steele could hardly blame them. He was watching too.
They waited for the snow to settle, and then they moved on in silence.
As they rounded the edge of a hill, the contours of the land brought the hive back into view, just
a few kilometres ahead of them. The sight made Steele’s stomach turn. Every horizontal surface of
the city was thick with snow, every vertical plane iced over. It looked unreal, like a life-sized model
sculpted from the ice. There was no doubt at all that the Chaos infection of Cressida had Iota Hive in
the firmest of grips, had corrupted it beyond all hope of reclamation.
This morning, Steele’s squad had agreed that they stood a better chance against the perils of
their environment than they did against more of Mangellan’s followers. Even Pozhar had not argued
too strongly for a full-frontal approach to the hive. In fact, he seemed unusually subdued, although
whether this was due to the events of last night or to his damaged gun arm, Steele could not say.
He was starting to wonder if they had made the wrong choice.
His men had all been brought up on Valhalla; these surroundings looked almost familiar to them.
They thought they knew all the perils that the snow and the ice could bring, were alert for the
warning signs — and if the worst should happen, as it had on the frozen lake, then they thought they
knew how to minimise the consequences. A squad from any other world would have been dead by
now; for the Ice Warriors of Valhalla, this was just a morning stroll.
But as Gavotski had pointed out inside the glacier, the water on this world had been infected too.
And the snow and the ice didn’t always behave as it should.
The second avalanche was bigger. Much bigger.
Steele couldn’t blame anyone in his squad for setting it off. It started high above them, and came
crashing down at them like a tidal wave. It might have been a natural consequence of recent
snowfall upon hard-packed ice — but the timing of it, at least, was suspicious.
The Ice Warriors, minus Palinev, were spread out across a hillside, keeping a short distance
between each of them in case of just such an occurrence — but the avalanche was in the perfect
spot, and exactly wide enough, to threaten all eight of them.
Barreski and Grayle were at the greatest risk. They were closest to the centre of the flow, the
point at which the snow would be moving its fastest. They knew they couldn’t outrun it — an
57
avalanche of this size could reach a speed of two hundred kilometres per hour — but they used the
few seconds they had before it hit to make a sprint for its edge, as did their comrades.
Gavotski and Steele, who had been respectively leading the procession and following at its rear,
had the least far to go. Steele ran for all he was worth, but still it wasn’t enough. It could never have
been enough. He turned his back to the avalanche as it reached him, and prepared for the impact.
It felt as if a rug had been pulled out from under him. He maintained his balance for as long as
he could, but he was soon swept away. He pedalled with his arms and legs, as if swimming,
knowing that to resist the tide would be futile, attempting to ride it instead. The landscape flashed by
to each side of him, and Steele could only hope that he wouldn’t be dashed against something solid.
He was aware of Blonsky being carried alongside him — and of Anakora, who had managed to
grab a sturdy tree before the snow hit and was clinging to it for dear life, being left behind. He did
the best he could to keep track of them both, as he knew they would be doing for the comrades to
each side of them.
Steele went under several times, and his mind flashed back to the frozen lake. He was
determined not to be buried, not to lose consciousness again — and so, each time he was engulfed,
he kicked and he thrashed, and he put all the strength he had into his swimming stroke, and he
resurfaced.
After what seemed like an age, it was over. Steele was half-buried, breathless, but still able to
dig himself free and climb to his feet. He had only been carried a short distance, but his
surroundings looked very different to him now. The shifting snow had formed new contours, and
covered old landmarks. Closing his one good eye, the colonel reoriented himself by his internal
compass.
He found Anakora first, three hundred metres up the slope behind him, still holding onto her
tree, although she had been buried up to the chest. She was stronger than she looked, he thought.
She was also safe.
He couldn’t say the same for Blonsky. There was no sign of him. He had to have gone under.
Steele hurried to the spot at which he had last seen him, and soon found a single gloved hand
protruding from the snow, its fingers waggling in a feeble attempt to summon help. Fortunately, the
snow hadn’t set too hard yet, and Steele was able to scoop handfuls of it away, to reveal Blonsky’s
head. A minute later, he had freed an arm too, and he knew his trooper could do the rest for himself.
“G-Grayle,” gasped Blonsky, raising a hand to point — and, joined by Anakora, who had
managed to free herself, Steele repeated the whole process again, until a fourth Ice Warrior was
dragged spluttering to the surface. Fortunately, Grayle had been able to make an air hole for himself
as the snow had settled around him, otherwise he would have suffocated.
When the avalanche had started, Pozhar had been a few metres behind Sergeant Gavotski. However,
he was young and he was fast, and he had easily overtaken the older man. Relatively safe on the
edge of the flow, he had surfed the snow with consummate skill and exulted in the head rush it gave
him. In so doing — he had realised too late — he had quite lost track of his sergeant.
He had clambered over the freshly turned snow, yelling for Gavotski, his stomach churning with
the thought that he had failed this man of all men, his mentor, his sponsor. His hand had started to
itch again, beneath his glove, and Pozhar would have sworn that at that moment he could feel the
grey fur spreading across it.
He had located Gavotski at last, worried that he might have left him buried too long. He had
tried to dig down to him, but his bad arm had slowed him too much. Fortunately, Palinev had seen
the avalanche from ahead, and returned to assist him.
