Bitter End Read online

  ‘Yes, sister.’ Anastasia left immediately to carry out her superior’s command and the Canoness stood for several moments longer, salt-tears running down her weather-tanned face.

  ‘The Order of the Iron Rose will stand to the last, traitors,’ she promised, raising her voice to be heard above the growing wind.

  The Red Corsairs had dealt with the pathetic human threat in short order. Even as the last guardsman died, pierced on the end of a chainblade, Huron Blackheart’s warriors had turned their weapons on the temple walls and gates. They had been erected over the course of many years by master craftsmen and artisans.

  What had taken humanity years to perfect and construct was levelled in minutes by four traitor Space Marines and their multi-meltas. The irony of that equation amused Huron Blackheart enough to make him laugh out loud.

  He had accompanied his forces to the surface of this world but had taken no part in the battle. He had stood to one side with Dengesha and his cabal of sorcerers, watching with displaced indifference as they butchered their way forwards.

  Another direct hit on the wall finally reduced it to molten slag, a huge cloud of pale steam billowing outwards from the destruction and coating the armour of the warriors in a fine film of grit. The Red Corsairs did not wait for their master’s order to proceed. They crossed the threshold of the sacred temple and met the second wave of PDF forces with renewed vigour.

  Dengesha moved forwards dispassionately, his cabal moving with him like a flock of birds flittering around their mother. Fighting independently, each warrior-psyker was capable of incalculable destruction. Fighting as a unit, they were imbued with such power that no mortal man could look upon the forces of the warp flowing from them and hope to survive.

  Dark lightning flickered from fingertips, fire burst from the palms of their hands and the very earth itself trembled where they trod. The sheer, raw power they exuded was tremendous and Huron Blackheart watched their performance with something akin to raw hunger on his face.

  Three guardsmen were incinerated with a blast from Dengesha’s fingers, their bodies catching fire as though they were nothing more than dead wood. They died in terrible agony, screaming and begging for mercy. Huron watched as their ravaged faces slowly melted, like candles burning down to the taper.

  Another unfortunate soldier was caught in the mesmerising stare of one of the Heterodox and found himself unable to move. With a press of psychic power, the sorcerer burst the guardsman’s brain like a ripe fruit. The man fell to his knees, blood and grey matter dribbling from his ears before he pitched over, face first into the dust.

  The winds had whipped up to a frenzy now, but these were no natural weather conditions. This was the work of the Heterodox and the winds carried maddening whispers, half-heard promises and dire threats. They blew from the very heart of the warp itself and plucked at the souls of men with ethereal claws. Some who were caught in its path went mad in an instant, hacking and slashing at phantasms only they could see or hear. Others stood their ground more firmly, litanies of warding on their lips.

  But each was slain. Each pitiful stalk was reaped and the more death and destruction there was, the more powerful the cabal seemed to grow until, with a feverish cry to the dark gods of Chaos Undivided, the Heterodox unleashed the true horror of their collective.

  From without, the sounds of battle echoed. From within, the sisters of the Order radiated a calm composure. A small order, barely one hundred Sisters of Battle had gathered together in the central chamber. They were all clad in armour similar to Sister Brigitta’s, although where hers was a burnished copper hue, theirs were a deeper colour, a reddish bronze that glinted in the light cast by the candles and sconces on the walls.

  ‘Our time here is short, sisters,’ the canoness began when she had Anastasia’s assurance that all were present. ‘Our enemy has breached the gate and they will soon dare to desecrate the most sacred inner sanctum of our beloved Order.’ Brigitta reached up as she spoke and braided her thick hair into a plait that hung like a rope down her back. None of the Order would go into battle with their hair loose. It was an affectation, but an important one. Brigitta’s visual reminder of the very physical pre-battle preparation instilled focus amongst the gathered sisters. In the ensemble, others mirrored her action.

  ‘We will not stand and allow that to happen. We will hold out against these intruders for as long as the Emperor gives us the strength. We will stand our ground until the bitter end. We fight the gravest of traitors, my sisters. We battle against fallen angels. Traitor Space Marines. And they bring witch-kin with them.’

  A palpable ripple of dismay ran through the sisters. They had stood proud against countless enemies. Aliens, cultists, even a preceptory of Battle Sisters who had lost their way, and they had always triumphed. They had fought alongside Space Marines many times. But the Order of the Iron Rose had never fought against them.

  Brigitta raised a hand for silence and she got it immediately. From outside the fortified walls of the temple, the muffled sounds of gunfire and terrible, bloody death could be heard, filling in the pauses in her impassioned speech.

  ‘We are the beloved of the Emperor. We are the Sisters of the Iron Rose. We stand as a reminder that the flower of that name is protected by thorns. We will not allow these foul traitors to reach out and pluck us from existence without exacting our payment in blood first.’

  She raised her bolter to her shoulder and cast her eyes around the assembled battle sisters. ‘We will make our stand in the rear courtyard. If we draw the whoresons out into the open, they may exact less damage on our temple.’ It was unlikely, and most of the Order knew it, but they were words that encouraged her sisters. Brigitta was under no illusions; the battle that was coming towards them could well be the last thing any of them saw. But they would die as they had lived, defending the Emperor’s legacy.

  The clouds above the temple boiled, swirling together in a dark mass of intangible horror. The wind was now a gale, screaming its unnatural, elemental fury across the surface of the planet and whipping up the detritus from the fallen walls into plumed, choking columns. Lightning coruscated within the cloud and as it moved, it picked up dust and debris, including corpses of the fallen.

  The Chaos-driven maelstrom moved with almost agonising slowness across the battlefield. Beneath it, the earth split and wept streams of tar and sulphur. Those who still stood were either knocked from their feet by the quaking of the ground beneath them, or they were caught up in the storm’s passage and sucked, screaming, into its abyssal depths.

  From what remained of the temple walls, valiant surviving forces turned the defence guns on the cabal who stood as a pack, their hands raised, palms upward, to the skies that bubbled overhead. Each of the twelve was the perfect mirror image of the others. Whilst all were wearing horned helms, their stance was arrogance itself.

  The armoured turrets roared defiance and one of the sorcerers was destroyed, his torso chewed apart by the stream of high-velocity shells. The cabal did not change position but, as one, their heads turned towards the weapons mounted on the wall.

  Dengesha made a slicing motion with his hand and the winds changed direction and increased speed, moving with impossible haste towards its new target.

  Sister Brigitta stood defiant amidst her battle sisters. She was a woman who had lived a life filled with devotion to the Emperor who she loved every bit as much as she cared for every woman who stood around her. Their honour and courage now, in the face of overwhelming odds, was a reward unlike any other.

  From the youngest novice to Sister Anastasia, with whom she had fought in many engagements, she knew each one of them. She knew their life histories. She knew their hopes and she knew their fears. She was no psyker, but you could not live your whole life within an Order and not gain remarkable skills of perception.

  She loved her sisters and though she may die here today, that love would bring her faith and the strength to stand her ground.

  Her thoughts
were wrenched back to the present as she heard the echo of a crashing thump in the distance. The sound of weapons being brought to bear against the gate.

  ‘They come,’ she said, her voice low and soft, yet carrying such authority that every one of the Order stood straighter. There was the sound of weapons being readied, of magazines being slammed into place, of swords being drawn from sheaths. There were overlaying, incomprehensible litanies and prayers.

  Another sickening crump against the gate.

  ‘We will stand defiant,’ Brigitta said, raising her bolter above her head. ‘Ave Imperator!’

  The battle cry was echoed, but was drowned out by the sound of an explosion that blew in the ancient, stained crystal windows as the enemy breached the gates.

  ‘Be ready! Hold firm! Do not doubt in yourself for one moment. Trust to your sisters and trust to your blessed weapons. A morte perpetua. Domine, libra nos!’

  Battle cries were torn from their throats and one hundred Battle Sisters took up arms and prepared to make their stand.

  The maelstrom ripped the guns from their mountings as though they were plants placed in dry soil. The guardsmen who had manned them were pulverised by the shrapnel from the destruction as the howling, unholy winds ripped the turrets into nothing more than shards. Mangled pieces of weaponry tore through their bodies, cutting them to ribbons and, in one young soldier’s case, decapitating them. The spiralling morass of metal and ruined flesh added its mass to the storm and above the temple, the skies began to rain droplets of blood.

  At the final gate, Huron Blackheart’s traitors had set melta charges against the armoured portal. The blocky devices clamped to the towering hinges with a metallic clang and the Corsairs withdrew. The bombs detonated with a wash of heat and an earth-shattering explosion that rocked the ground.

  Slowly, Dengesha’s cabal ceased the link with their powers and the violent, raging winds began to subside. The first obstacle had been overcome. The second – and their objective – lay behind the devastated walls.

  The Chaos sorcerer turned his helmeted head towards Huron. ‘You must not kill her,’ he said through the vox-bead in the Tyrant’s ear. ‘If she dies, her soul will be as good as useless to us. Do not let your barbarian horde rip the Order apart without first isolating the mark.’

  A twitch of irritation showed on Huron’s face. ‘I am not completely without intellect, Dengesha.’ The fingers that were wrapped around his massive battle axe tightened visibly. The sorcerer’s face could not be seen, but Huron could sense his smirk. ‘I will be taking care of dear Sister Brigitta myself.’

  ‘My sincerest apologies I did not mean to imply you were anything but knowledgeable in the ways of warp majesty, my lord.’ His sarcasm was biting and Huron turned away from the sorcerer cursing the necessity of their temporary association. It would be over soon. The Order of the Iron Rose would be obliterated and he would take his prize.

  He comforted himself with the thought. In due course, his familiar would feast from a soul most worthy of its hunger.

  Striding across the courtyard, Huron surveyed the damage with an approving expression. What remained of the gate was barely recognisable as any sort of portal. Broken spurs of plasteel jutted in all directions and the metal composite that had been mixed into the gate for reinforcement was little more than dust. Occasionally, more dust would fall in a pathetic clump from the walls either side of the former door.

  The Red Corsairs strode forwards, warriors with a clear objective and purpose. In the eyes of the Imperium, they were renegades. But they were still Space Marines and the regimental mindset came easily to them. Until the fighting started, at least.

  ‘Listen to me, my Corsairs,’ said Huron across the vox. ‘When we locate the sisters, do not touch their leader. She belongs to me.’ He addressed the entire group, but knew that not all of them would truly hear him. ‘The toys we have despatched thus far have been an easy enemy and they will have sent out the word for aid. By the time that aid arrives, there will be nothing left but a smoking ruin.’

  A few scattered roars of approval drew a nod from Huron. ‘What we will come up against in there will be more challenging, but do not falter. We come to take a prize that will make us even greater than we are. The Imperium of Mankind and their pathetic Corpse-Emperor will rue the day they ever named us traitor.’

  There were grunts of acknowledgement across the board, some coherent, others less so. Just as his band of renegades were drawn from a vast background of different Chapters, so their levels of sanity varied. Huron cared little for the butchers amongst his followers. They served a purpose in war but when it came to more delicate matters, they were an encumbrance.

  Fortunately, he had enough sane followers to keep the borderline berserkers in check.

  ‘Then we move with all haste to the final stage of our action here. Find the sisters. Kill those you must, but leave the canoness alive.’

  Without further hesitation, the Red Corsairs streamed into the sacred Temple of the Blessed Dawn.

  They rampaged through the temple without thought for preservation. Marble floors cracked and split beneath their heavy tread. Chainblades chewed through statue and carvings alike, making firewood of huge portraits of sisters and saints. Some riches were left intact. Over the years, the Red Corsairs had all developed an eye for goods that would please their lord and master for, it was said, his collection of Imperial relics was beyond compare. They would retrace their steps before they departed and gather up such treasures, along with the weapons of the fallen. For them, that was the most valuable reward.

  Their plundering steps ultimately took them through the central chamber where the sisters of the Order had recently gathered. Dengesha nodded approvingly.

  ‘This will be a good place for the ritual,’ he said.

  ‘Then you remain here sorcerer, and make whatever preparation is necessary. We will seek out Sister Brigitta and I will bring her to you personally.’ Huron ran his tongue over his metal teeth in a parody of hunger. He swung his battle axe easily and it chewed its way through a beautifully painted rendition of some long-ago battle at which the Sisters had been victorious. Its shredded remnants dangled to the ground and the memory of the great war was lost after no more than a single stroke.

  The first two Red Corsairs to throw open the heavy door that led out to the courtyard were torn apart by incoming bolter fire. The Battle Sisters had kept their weapons trained on the exit and the moment it opened they had pulled the triggers instantly. The explosive rounds buried themselves in the armoured hides of the traitors and burst them apart in a storm of gore and ceramite shards. The bodies disintegrated messily but their sacrifice bought those that followed enough time to bring their weapons to bear and return fire. Four sisters were thrown backwards, unbalancing several more. Before they were back on their feet, the Red Corsairs had flooded into the courtyard and the fight began in earnest.

  The Sisters of Battle were greater in number than the Red Corsairs and their armour afforded them a degree of protection. But they were facing an undisciplined rabble whose tactics were unpredictable at best and unfathomable at worst. But the Battle Sisters held their position, clustered around the canoness like a sea of bronze with a copper island at their centre. They formed a circle around where she stood on the rim of a fountain, crying out orders to her warriors.

  The initial firefight did not last long. At a word from the Tyrant, the Red Corsairs pressed forwards, chainblades whining, and began to cut their way through the serried ranks of women. The ring surrounding the canoness grew tighter and smaller.

  The stink of ruined flesh and spent bolter rounds was strong in the air and so much smoke rose from the detonations that it choked the courtyard with a fog of bloody vapour and fyceline.

  ‘Courage, sisters!’ Brigitta’s voice was clear, like a bell sounding through the uproar. ‘Remember your teachings! You tread the path of righteousness. Though it be paved with broken glass, you will walk it barefoot…’
/>   Brigitta paused in the recital as she watched Sister Anastasia’s broken body fall to the ground. A grief unlike any she had ever known before passed through her with a shudder. She summoned up every ounce of her considerable inner strength and brought her bolter to bear on the hated enemy. Her voice rose through the noise once again.

  ‘Though it crossers rivers of fire, we will pass over them…’

  Her voice was strong and did not waver, but the strength of her armed guard was failing. Not through lack of zeal or fire; if she were to take any reward from this abysmal horror before her, it was that her beloved sisters died honourably and bravely. But it was failing through sheer loss of its numbers. What had once been a ring that had been several bodies deep now presented a barrier of barely a dozen of her sisters.

  A number of the traitor Red Corsairs had been felled, but their armour, better and more intricate than that of the Battle Sisters, deflected more and protected them for longer. Brigitta realised with a sinking heart that they were probably not even dead. That their enhanced physiology would aid their recovery and that they might rise to fight another day. And she despised them for it. She loathed their continued existence. To her mind, they represented the worst kind of faithless traitors the Imperium could have conceived.

  She abhorred them for tearing apart the temple, her home, the place where she had grown from a teenage girl to womanhood.

  She…

  …was bleeding.

  Brigitta tasted, for the first time in her life, a tremor of fear. It was seasoned with the coppery taste of her own blood as she bit her lip hard enough to put her teeth through the delicate skin. The flavour of her own mortality gave her enough strength to complete her fervent prayer.

  ‘Though it wanders wide, the light of the Emperor guides my – our – step.’ She slammed a fresh magazine into her bolter and, letting out a screaming roar of battle rage, unleashed her full fury at the encroaching enemy.

  At her feet, dead and dying sisters spilled blood and viscera across the courtyard stones. The image of their defeat burned itself onto her retinas and branded hatred on her heart. Tears of anger and terrible, terrible grief blurred her vision, but she did not – she would not – falter. Not now.