You cannot find it, Justicar." "Why?"
"Because it is an idea."
From beyond the skull-studded inner doors of the chamber came a deep rushing, rumbling sound, like an earthquake. The Void Eye shook, dislodging some of the skulls nailed to the black walls. Some of the slaves quivered in fear, others grinned and whooped with antic.i.p.ation. The orks began a low, chanting death song, something ancient and primitive, and Alaric would not have been surprised if some of the killers like Gearth had joined in.
Tell me, Erkhar," whispered Alaric in the lieutenant"s ear.
"One day we will all be taken to the Promised Land," said Erkhar.
We do not know where it is or how we will get there, only that we will be delivered, but there is more to what I know. Only I and a few of the faithful understand. Some of the more... weak-minded would reject us if they understood. Their minds will be ready one day, but not yet."
The Hammer?"
The Hammer shows us that we were not placed on Drakaasi just to run away. It is a weapon to be used against the enemy. The Hammer of Daemons will be wielded by the faithful to punish the servants of Chaos. Do you see, Justicar? Do you see why it is so dangerous, why so many would despair to hear of it?"
Alaric couldn"t answer for a moment. There was genuine fear in Erkhar"s face. The Hammer represented something unexpected and powerful in the faithful"s patchwork religion.
The faithful just want to get off this planet," said Alaric, "but you know it"s not that simple."
The doors opened a crack and a thin line of purplish, polluted light slid into the chamber. Blood rushed through the gap, covering the floor in a shallow red pool. One of the orks howled like a wolf, and the others joined in. Some of the humans raised their voices, too, echoing the frenzied applause from the vermin packing the Void Eye.
"Correct, Justicar," said Erkhar. "One day the Hammer of Daemons will be delivered to us and we will raise it against the enemy. Only then will we in turn be delivered to the Promised Land. Do you see what that means, Justicar?"
"It means that the Emperor isn"t going to save you for free."
"It means that survival is not enough."
The doors boomed open. A thigh-high tide of blood flooded the chamber, knocking some men off their feet. Alaric saw Gearth dipping his hand into the blood and branding a b.l.o.o.d.y hand print across his face. Kelhedros drew his chainsword.
Erkhar turned back to his faithful. Take heart! These doors take us one step closer to the Emperor"s halls!"
"One step closer to death, boys!" shouted Gearth in reply, and the other killers laughed raucously. "Human blood doesn"t come cheap!
Let"s show them the price!"
There was an ocean of blood beyond the doors. The ca.n.a.ls must have been diverted to fill the whole Void Eye with it, and it churned beneath the hulls of a dozen ships of black timber, their sails daubed with bleeding runes. Already the blood bobbed with bodies and severed limbs. Fortified compounds separated the vermin in the stands from the dignitaries, and Alaric was sure he saw the bloated whitish form of Arguthrax squatting in its cauldron of gore.
The closest ship drew nearer. Arena slaves on board threw ropes through the door, and the orks grabbed them eagerly, hauling the ship in. Orks and killers were leaping onto its deck.
Across the arena, the scene was being repeated, but this time daemons were leaping onto the decks and scrabbling up the rigging, glowing-skinned creatures with shifting forms composed of teeth, claws, eyes and shimmering muscle.
It was a sea battle. The lords of Drakaasi had given the subhuman filth of Ghaal a different kind of murder to cheer.
The first ship was full and the next one drew near. Alaric followed Kelhedros onto it, along with several of Gearth"s murderers and Erkhar"s faithful. The blood churned beneath it and drew it away from the dock chamber, towards the centre of the arena where it would meet the daemon crewed warships. The crowds howled in antic.i.p.ation.
At least, thought Alaric grimly as he crouched down on the deck of the ship, the good people of Ghaal will not be disappointed.
NINE.
THE UNHOLY PITCHED wildly in the howling winds that suddenly sheared across the Void Eye. Alaric gripped the rail on the prow as the ship tilted. A couple of slaves fell from the rigging into the blood.
The battle had begun as soon as the slaves were on board. The wind had thrown the ships across the blood sea. The blood churned with predators who dragged down the slaves who fell in, and Alaric saw chewed corpses being thrown out of the blood into the stands where Ghaal"s spectators tore them apart. It had happened so quickly there had been no time to organise the slaves on the ship.
They had time only to hold on and hope that the blood did not claim them. The opposing ships, crewed by daemons, were launched from the far side of the arena to an enormous cheer from the crowds.
"We"re gonna hit port side!" yelled Gearth, who was armed with a pair of rusty daggers, and holding on to the fore mast to keep from being flung across the deck.
"Which way"s port?" asked one of Gearth"s killers.
There!" replied Gearth, pointing. "Didn"t your dad never tell you nothing?"
The Unholy was drawn around towards the opposing ship. The name etched below its prow proclaimed it as the Meathook. Red-skinned daemons danced on its pitching deck.
"Grapples ready!" shouted Gearth.
"We"re going aboard?" asked Erkhar, who was holding on to the deck rail close to Gearth.
*We go to them," said Gearth. "If you wanna die, you just sit back and let them come to us."
"He"s right," shouted Alaric. "If we let them pounce we"re dead.
Erkhar, get the faithful to draw in the Meathook. Gearth, get your men ready to board."
"Just try and stop em," said Gearth. With a grin on his blood-spattered face he looked completely at home.
The slaves had found a number of ropes with grappling hooks below decks. Erkhar"s faithful, muttering desperate prayers to the Emperor, got ready to fling them across to the enemy ship as the Meathook closed in.
Elsewhere, the sea battle was close and extremely b.l.o.o.d.y. The orks were having the time of their lives as their ship, dubbed the Soulbleed, had rammed the daemon-crewed Wrack. It was impossible to tell who was winning, since both the greenskins and daemons were whooping with joy as they cut one another to pieces. The daemons on the Soulbleed were led by a huge creature: a dog-faced, muscular horror armed with a huge axe, who stood on the stern slicing up anything that came close. Alaric spotted the brand of a six-fingered hand seared into the daemon"s chest.
The third slave ship, the Malice, was in the process of sinking, its slaves scrabbling up the tilting hull. The daemons on the ship that had rammed it, the Gorehallow, were diving into the blood to circle the sinking Malice like sharks and drag down any slaves who fell in.
It was the clash of the Unholy and the Meathook that would decide whether the slaves or the daemons triumphed for the delight of Ghaal"s hordes.
A handful of hooks found purchase on the Meathook. A volley of arrows whistled across from the Meathook in reply. Alaric took cover as an arrow thunked into the deck beside him, and he saw that it was not an arrow at all but a dart shaped insec-toid creature, mandibles working as it bored into the wood. One of Erkhar"s faithful screamed and stumbled backwards with one of the creatures embedded in his chest. He had dropped one of the ropes attaching the Unholy to the Meathook and Alaric grabbed it, putting all his weight into dragging the two ships together. Alaric"s enhanced muscles burned as the prows of the ships swung together, and with a screech of breaking wood the two ships collided.
Gearth stood up, brandished his blades, and howled. The murderers followed him as he ran for the prow and leapt across.
More arrows streaked into the Unholy, but the a.s.sault had already begun. The daemons were dropping their bows of bone and leaping with teeth and claws into the fray. Gearth cut off a tentacled arm, and slit open a belly, charging on through the slick of glowing, burning entrails. The daemons on the Meathook were sinewy and cruel faced, with tiny burning eyes and axe-like faces full of teeth.
They grew new limbs and reformed to sprint spider-like through the rigging or along the side of the Unholy"s hull.
Alaric jumped the gap between the ships. A daemon leapt down from the rigging onto him. Alaric didn"t even draw his sword, simply grabbing the daemon by a wrist and an ankle, tearing it in two, and throwing it into the blood churning below.
Gearth skidded into place beside him. One of his knives was gone, probably buried in the skull of a daemon. He was covered in smouldering gore, for these daemons bled scalding embers as well as blood.
"About d.a.m.n time!" cackled Gearth. "Just like home!"
Alaric drew his sword and took stock of the situation. Gearth"s charge had taken half the deck, but there were daemons everywhere. More were emerging from below decks, but these were not warriors, they were shrieking creatures of skin and bone, flapping like startled birds.
There"s something below decks," shouted Alaric above the din.
These were just keeping it down there."
"Good!" replied Gearth.
Daemon corpses rained down. Kelhedros was somewhere up in the rigging, and Alaric could hear the scream of his chainblade through daemonic flesh.
The Meathook was a trap. The Unholy had run into it, but Alaric could not have stopped it. The only way to deal with it was to fight on through.
The deck heaved. Men and daemons were thrown into the blood.
The stem of the Meathook splintered and burst into the air, shards of blood-soaked timbers flying everywhere. A scaled shape ripped up out of the ship: a sea serpent far longer than the Meathook, dredged up from some Emperor-forsaken trench in Drakaasi"s oceans and coiled up inside the ship, goaded until it was angry and ravenous.
The serpent looped up into the air above the ship, crashing through the rigging. Its head, a fanged horror fringed with tentacles, plunged back into the deck amidships, and the Meathook split in two. The rear half tipped to stern and filled with blood. The prow did not begin to sink straight away, buoyed up as it was by the Unholy alongside it.
Alaric stood on the prow of the shattered Meathook, sword out, trying to follow the snake-like movements of the sea monster. It snapped at the rigging, picking up a daemon in its mandibles and tossing it down its throat. A slave, one of Gearth"s killers, followed, stabbing haplessly at the thing"s vast jaws as he disappeared down its gullet.
Oozing green eyes ringed its head. One of them settled on Alaric.
The serpent reared up and arrowed back down at Alaric. The Grey Knight dived to one side as its neck slammed down onto the prow of the Meathook. The remains of the ship sagged under the impact, and the Unholy listed with the weight. A tentacle whipped around Alaric"s leg and dragged him towards the yawning jaws of the serpent.
Alaric kicked out, shattering a tooth. Foul blood sprayed everywhere. In desperation, he braced with his arms as the jaws closed around him and held the sea serpent"s mouth open, bathed in its stinking, rotting breath, writhing flagellae in its throat trying to snag his feet and drag him down.
Alaric yelled as he fought to keep his elbows straight. He could hear screaming below him as the slaves and daemons already swallowed were forced through the serpent"s corrosive guts. His sword was still in his hand, but to use it he would have to stop bracing the serpent"s jaws and its teeth would come crunching down on him.
The whine of a chainblade cut through the serpent"s roar. Blood sprayed over Alaric as the tip of a chainsword bored down through the top of the serpent"s jaw. The serpent convulsed, and Alaric planted a foot against a huge fang and kicked himself free.
Alaric skidded onto the deck of the shattered Meathook as the serpent reared up in pain. A figure was flung off the top of its head and landed near Alaric, just keeping its footing on the blood-slick wood.
It was Kelhedros, the alien.
"Xenos," said Alaric, "you saved me."
"It benefits none of us if you are dead."
We can"t beat that thing," said Alaric, looking over at the serpent, which was demolishing what remained of the Meathook"s stern.
"No, we cannot, but this battle is over. The winds have changed. If we cut the Unholy free we can get it back to the dock. It was the serpent they wanted to see."
Alaric followed Kelhedros"s gaze towards the crowd. They were frenzied with delight to see the serpent swallowing slaves and daemons alike. They were shrieking their approval of the orks and daemons butchering one another on the Wrack, too, which was being driven closer to the wreck of the Meathook. Alaric could see Arguthrax in the crowd, wallowing in his cauldron of gore, and surrounded by slaves close to the wall that encompa.s.sed the mock ocean of blood. He could see Duke Venalitor, too, pale and dignified among the crowd, as he watched his slaves providing entertainment for Khorne"s faithful.
"Cut the Unholy free! said Alaric. "Get them to safety."
"And you?" asked the alien.
"Survival is not enough," replied Alaric.
The Wrack drifted closer. Alaric could see the dog-faced daemon champion flinging an ork down from the stern. On the prow, the ork leader One-ear was building up a pile of broken daemons with a two-handed hammer.
Kelhedros didn"t hang around to see what Alaric was planning to do. The eldar leapt from the prow of the Meathook onto the deck of the Unholy and immediately set about cutting the ropes attaching the two ships together.
The front mast of the Meathook was almost horizontal as the prow half sunk further. It was pointing towards the approaching Wrack.
Alaric ran up it, struggling to keep his balance as his considerable weight tipped the mast down.
The Wrack closed further. The daemon champion bit into an ork, bright blood mnning down its scarred chest. The crowd in the stands was in a b.l.o.o.d.y frenzy, and Arguthrax bellowed his approval.
Alaric broke into a run. He reached the end of the mast and jumped.
The deck of the Wrack swirled below him. He was strong, but he barely made it. His chest thumped into the deck rail of the ship"s prow, and he grabbed with one hand, his other still holding his sword. With a final effort he hauled himself onto the deck of the Wrack.
One-ear looked down at him and grinned. The alien looked like it was having the time of its life.
Several other orks were still alive, enthusiastically wresding daemons onto the deck or hacking them up with cleavers.
The daemon champion fixed its eyes on Alaric. It was half again as tall as the Grey Knight, packed with muscle and drooling from its dog-like muzzle. It fought with claws and a barbed tail. Dismembered greenskins were piled up around its feet. A pair of ragged, leathery wings sprouted from its back as it snarled a war cry in its daemonic tongue and leapt up into the air.
The crowd cheered as the daemon charged, swooping down towards the prow on its wings. Its weight alone could crush Alaric onto the deck. Alaric moved faster than he had ever done. He dropped his sword and grabbed the mast that jutted from the prow of the Wrack. With a ma.s.sive effort, he broke it free, and turned it around so that the wooden point was aimed at the daemon"s chest.
Too late, the daemon tried to correct its charge. It beat its wings once to carry it over Alaric, but Alaric lunged, and the point of the mast hit the daemon in the stomach. The daemon"s weight forced the mast into it and it slid, dead weight, down the mast until its feet hit the deck. Impaled on the mast, stuck like an insert pinned to a board, it screamed.
Alaric pushed down on the broken mast and forced the daemon to its knees. The crowd adored it, and the orks cheered too. In the stand, Arguthrax scowled. The six-fingered hand branded on the daemon"s chest indicated that it belonged to Arguthrax. No doubt he had sent it to the Void Eye to help humiliate Venalitor"s slaves. As far as Arguthrax was concerned, the battle had not worked out as planned.
Alaric picked up his sword again. With a single b.l.o.o.d.y strike he struck the daemon champion"s head from its shoulders. Burning multi-coloured blood sprayed from the stump of its neck. Alaric let go of the mast and the daemon"s body keeled over to one side onto the deck. Alaric bent down and picked up its head.
One-ear saluted Alaric for a job well done. The other daemons on the Wrack keened, and the remaining orks plunged into them, tearing malformed limbs from bodies, and cutting torsos open. The sea battle in the Void Eye was emphatically over.
There was one more victory to win. Alaric stood up on the deck rail and drew his arm back. He had only just enough strength left, and he would have to be accurate. He didn"t know if he could do it.
The crowd cheered him, thinking this was a victory pose, and Alaric let their howls of delight give him strength.
He threw the head as far as he could. It was still snarling and glaring at him as it tumbled towards the stands. With a wet thump, it landed at Duke Venalitor"s feet.
Every eye in the arena followed it as it fell. Every eye turned to see the look of pure hatred on Arguthrax"s face.
The Wrack drifted back towards the arena entrance, where the slaves on the Unholy were already disembarking. The orks around Alaric were celebrating their victory, following his lead by hurling chunks of dead daemon towards the stands. One-ear bellowed a war cry and the other green-skins joined in.
For all Alaric knew, they were chanting his praises.