Brothers of the Snake Read online

  To most of the brothers, it felt like defeat. To most of the brothers, it felt like running away.

  It felt that way to Priad. He had never been so conflicted about an undertaking in his life. The warfare Damocles had weathered had been about the most intense he'd ever known, and the two battles they had fought had been unequivocal victories. Now, the phratry was simply consolidating its forces, and shifting its tactical emphasis to a more viable footing. It was the pragmatic and sober thing to do. Any commander believing otherwise was committing unit suicide.

  But still, they had met a foe so vast in numbers they could not overmaster it in formal war. Their achievement had been simply staying alive. And they were leaving Ganahedarak to its fate.

  On the wounded world below them, the human cities and townships had been abandoned, the populations fled into mountain fastnesses and hinterland retreats. Woeful, lingering doom was all they could look forward to. The kings of the south, and other potentates of Ganahedarak, as they became aware of the phratry's forced withdrawal, sent raging, indignant messages after them, which became more and more venomous and, when no response was sent, faded into desperate, begging pleas.

  The greenskins had also witnessed the extraction of the Iron Snakes. Though they had lost perhaps tens of thousands of warriors during the undertaking, no obvious reduction had been made in their sprawling hosts, and they gleefully celebrated the feat of turning the vaunted human champions to their heels. Across the ragged, pummelled continents, war horns and battle drums sounded out, raucous and frenetic. Huge vox-casters droned their triumphant trumpet blasts at the sky. Millions of swinekin voices ululated at the heavens, as if to shake the firmament down in pieces.

  The embarkation halls of the battle-barges stank of blood. Not a brother amongst Seydon's twenty-five squads or Petrok's relief force had come back unmarked in some manner, and many were gravely wounded, as were many of the ancillary forces of armourers and attendants who had supplied Seydon's warband. Great quantities of armour and materiel had been damaged, some beyond the point of repair. Several vehicles in Seydon's complement had been abandoned or destroyed, and most of those recovered were crippled and broken.

  The Apothecaries worked triage on the decks, stripping off armour to treat wounds, often ignoring their own injuries to work on the critical cases. Their efforts were bolstered by the physicians aboard the barges.

  There were the noises of movement and activity, and the moans of the wounded, but over all, a strained silence hung around the returning squads, the numbing ache of total fatigue and ground-down spirits.

  Seydon held counsel in the reclusiam of his barge, summoning all the captains and the squad officers. The Chapter Master had refused all attempts by his hand servants to wash him or bind his wounds. In his pitted, buckled armour, he sat on the central podium, caked in a drying residue of blood, both human and ork. Much of the human blood was his own. His face was a pale, drawn ghost inside the darkness of his cowl, and his breath came sharp and irregular through his exchanger tanks. His jigsaw cloak of polished wyrm-horn pieces had been ripped and torn, and loose fragments dangled from unravelling golden threads. His great lance, Tiborus, lay across his knees.

  As Priad entered the reclusiam, bare-headed, with the other officers, he mourned the distressing appearance of the great master. Seydon seemed so dreadfully bowed and hunched. The blade tip of Tiborus was nicked and buckled, and deep cuts had been gashed into its mighty shaft.

  Priad stared, for it was so seldom any brother apart from the highest ordinates got to see the Chapter Master in person. As he took his place in the ring of warriors, he found himself captivated by Seydon's left hand. Seydon had removed his gigantic gauntlet, and allowed it to fall onto the deck at his feet. His bare hand, so very large but so very human, was the first proof Priad had ever seen that Seydon was sheathed in flesh and blood like the rest of them. Priad hated himself for noticing that Seydon's left hand trembled slightly, as if palsied.

  How Ganahedarak had reduced them! It had forced even the Chapter Master, the legend that bound the phratry together, to expose his mortality.

  Slaves had lit myrtle, orub and camphor in the burners around the reclusiam, and perfumed smoke drifted through the cold air. Starlight twinkled in through the stained glass of the towering arches.

  The ring of warriors around the podium filled in and became complete. In their broken, gouged armour, the officers stood at attention. Some, like Priad, carried their buckled, scored helms under their arms. Some dripped blood upon the deck. The odour of sweat and filth and body matter, and the coppery stink of blood, quite overwhelmed the sweet smell of the incense.

  Every surviving officer was present. From Petrok's force, even Ryys had come, leaning weakly against Seuthis, his upper body wrapped with dressings bound tight and red-wet around the shreds of his missing limb. Others were just as mangled. Kryto of Aegis had lost his left hand and the flesh of the left side of his face. He carried half of his helm, a cloven half, in his right gauntlet. Mikos of Lakodeme, victor of Penses and Tribulation Rex, nursed a terrible stomach wound. Iklyus of Thebes, great hero of the Berod Fray, had suffered an amputation below the right knee, and leaned with effort on a sea-lance. Priad felt ashamed of his minor scratches and cuts, even though he was aware of the bruised tissue swelling and throbbing across his face from his left ear to his cheek.

  Seydon made a gesture, and Cyclion, the Master Chaplain, conducted the Rite of the Sharing of Water. Tall and mournful in his power armour, Cyclion's silver skull mask seemed entirely in keeping with the mood. At a gesture from him, boy slaves brought forth the eusippus, the copper death urns, and set them on the deck before Seydon. They were empty as yet, but soon they would confine the ashes of the fallen for the voyage home to Ithaka.

  There were sixty-one of them. Ten for Parthus squad alone.

  Priad swallowed hard.

  'Good counsel.’ said Seydon after a long silence, 'is the backbone of any phratry. We are victorious, yet defeated, valiant, yet disgraced, alive, yet broken. Like beloved Ithaka, this undertaking has a bright face and a constant darkness. I salute every one of you for your efforts and your courage. I order you to impart that salute to every brother in your commands. Any shame of failure is mine and mine alone.'

  'Not so, master-' Phobor began. The veteran captain looked like a vagabond, so torn and frayed was his once-proud plate.

  Seydon raised his bare left hand to hush Phobor. 'Mine and mine alone. Brothers, since the foundation of our phratry, there have been eighteen Chapter Masters, an illustrious lineage that it has been my duty and my honour to follow. Under them, and under me, the Chapter has won sterling victories and many laurels, and has suffered its defeats and routs, like any good company of warriors. Just as we relish the triumphs of Falling Star, Presarius, Ambold Eleven, Cornak or Far Hallow, and etch those deeds upon our fortress walls, so we regret such disasters as Beriun, Outward Kalenk or Forbrium. But never before have we seen a day like this. Never before have we taken victory and defeat in equal measure. Never before have we relinquished an undertaking, and left behind us a people crying out for our aid.'

  He rumbled into silence, murmuring 'Never before...' one last time. No one spoke. Seydon stroked his bare hand along the notched haft of his beloved lance. 'This drives against our oath, our ancient compact. This disgraces our bold claim of undertaking. For that error, I blame myself. Only in the time of Seydon has such a calamity befallen our order.'

  The Chapter Master lifted his lance and threw it onto the deck with such vigour that the weapon rolled away from him and came to rest at the feet of the ringed warriors. 'I must make amends, my brothers. I must find a way to turn this infamy into glory, for the sake of our spirit and our name. But I am at a loss to know how. We are the greatest warriors of our age. We can meet and squarely best every monster that rises against us in formal war. But we cannot match an endless foe. And the greenskins are without limit or end. Though we heap their corpses to the heavens and beyond
, still they will come.'

  Seydon lifted his head to look at his men, so that the light fell in under his heavy cowl and caught the line of his chin and cheek. There were beads of blood upon the white flesh.

  'So I look to you now, my warriors and my brothers, for counsel and answers.'

  No one spoke for a moment.

  'We have to think,' said Petrok finally. All eyes turned towards him. He was standing in the ring, his back hunched with pain. The wounds to his chest and stomach delivered by the warboss urgently needed attention.

  'So I have said, Librarian.’ Seydon answered. 'Perhaps time to reflect-'

  'No, master.’ Petrok cut in. 'I mean we have to think our way to victory. We have reached a place where every scrap of our martial prowess is worthless. We have to use our brains instead.’

  Several of the officers, including Phobor, sniggered in disgust.

  'Might is all we have.’ announced Myrmede of Ankysus. 'Might is what we do so well.’

  'This is no longer a matter for warrior brethren.’ said Seuthis. A fleet must be gathered. This is a duty for warships, in formation.’

  'Seuthis is right. Where infantry has failed.’ said Sardis of Lystra, 'we should take our vengeance by fleet action!'

  'Burn the orks and the worlds they tread upon!' cried Phanthus.

  'Should we burn Ganahedarak?' asked Petrok.

  'If that's what it takes to rid the Reef Stars and fulfil our undertaking!' Sardis replied curtly.

  'Burn all those people...?' Petrok sighed.

  'They're dead anyway!' Phobor muttered.

  'Let the orks suffer the Chapter whole!' cried Medes of Skypio, drawing assent from his brothers. 'Twenty-five squads? Thirty? Let them face one hundred and flee to the dirt that spawned them!'

  Aye!' Iklyus called out. 'Turn the phratry loose and burn them to hell!'

  'Would you magnify this misery, Brother Iklyus?' Petrok asked quietly. 'Thirty squads and we take home sixty-one urns? Would there be anyone left alive to carry the urns home to Ithaka if we turned all one thousand of us upon the greenskins?'

  'You repudiate our skills.’ snapped Medes.

  'If such fatality is where your thinking gets you, Petrok.’ Phobor tutted, 'I'll stick by my muscles.'

  'You do that,' Petrok snarled back, earning hisses from the ring of warriors. 'The orks are strong and hardy, resilient to injury, and countless. Are we not swift and clever? Are we not beings of culture and ingenuity? Must we descend to their level and play them at a brute game we cannot win?'

  'Give me the Chapter at arms and I'll show you how we can win!' Medes exclaimed.

  'If I gave you the Chapter at arms, dear brother,' Petrok replied, 'you would show me a thousand dead heroes.'

  Medes, bullish and heavy-set, the master of celebrated Skypio, the finest warrior in the phratry and captain of the finest squad, took a step towards Petrok. The officers around him dragged him back by his arms.

  'Not here!' Cyclion warned, pointing the haft of his thunder hammer at the pair the way a school master would point with his cane at unruly pupils. 'Bite your tongues and hold your rage, or I will drive you from this holy place!'

  'My apologies, Master Chaplain,' Medes said, cooling.

  'As Brother Medes says,' Petrok smiled, 'his apologies.'

  Medes surged forward, stung by the insult, and only the strong hands of Phanthus and Phobor restrained him.

  'That's enough!' Seydon growled. 'Bad enough we reel from the orks, I'll not have us fighting ourselves. Petrok, my kind brother, retract your slur to Brother Medes.'

  'I will not, master.’ Petrok said. White fury gripped the still-restrained Medes. The other officers glared in dismay at Petrok's insubordination.

  Seydon rose. 'The devil is in you, boy.’ he said, stepping towards Petrok.

  Then let's hear what the devil has to say for himself.’ a low, grating voice echoed from the shadows. Seydon looked round and sighed. He sat down again. 'You're awake, then, master Autolochus?'

  'I'm always awake.’ the voice replied. 'Noise you idiots make, it's hard to slumber.’

  Hydraulic pistons hissed in the gloom, and the warrior ring parted respectfully to admit the new figure. He towered over them, clomping forward on his thick bionic legs, his huge grey chassis casement draped with ancient, flaking pennants. The venerable dreadnought Autolochus took his place in the ring of warriors.

  'I say, let's hear Petrok.’ Autolochus said, his voice gusting dry and toneless from the synthesisers in his bodywork. A veteran captain in his age, Autolochus's battle-mutilated remains had been cased, with honour, in the dreadnought mechanism for perpetuity. An ultimate weapon, like all dreadnoughts, Autolochus was kept in hibernation for most of the year, woken only for triumphs, or ceremonies.

  Or crises.

  Yes.’ said Medes, shrugging off the hands restraining him, 'like master Autolochus, I would be intrigued to hear the complexities of Petrok's scheme.’

  Autolochus pivoted his huge metal bulk around so that his ocular sensors regarded Petrok. 'Let's go, Librarian. Make it good.'

  Petrok nodded to the huge, sentient war machine. 'I have been plagued with dreams this last month. Pivotal dreams, in which the manner of our deliverance... excuse me, the deliverance of the Reef Stars... has been foretold.’

  'When a Librarian dreams.’ Autolochus rumbled, 'it pays to listen. If I'd listened to Nector, I wouldn't be four tonnes of scrap metal.’

  Some of the officers laughed.

  'The dreams of a Librarian count.’ Medes offered, 'but all I've heard from Petrok is rubbish about using our brains.’

  'Rubbish is all I have.’ Petrok assured the company. 'Disjointed, dislocated nonsense about... about a set of jaws and about Priad.’

  'Who's Priad?' Medes asked, pretending not to recognise the name.

  'Brother-sergeant of the Notable Damocles.’ Autolochus rasped. 'Your arrogance does you no favours, Medes.’

  Priad felt a sudden fluff of pride. Autolochus knew him, knew his name and station.

  'Oh, that Priad.’ Medes said. 'Speak up. Brother Priad. Tell us how you feature in these dreams.’

  'I-' Priad coughed. 'I... well, there was a meadow, and also a black dog...' He paused. His voice sounded pathetic and thin.

  'Now we're getting somewhere.’ Phobor mocked.

  Petrok held up his hand to gently silence Priad. 'My dear brother and friend Priad doesn't understand this. I don't understand this. But I declare to the band of warriors here, if you let me go from here, with Priad, to Baal Solock, we will secure a victory for you. For the Reef Stars.'

  'How?' asked Iklyus.

  'I don't know,' replied Petrok. 'Not yet.'

  'You'll be doing something there, will you?' taunted Medes. 'Using your minds?'

  Many of the warriors in the ring laughed.

  'Just a while back.’ Priad said quietly, 'on Ithaka, out on the Cydides Isthmus, my Apothecary, Khiron, ventured to me that the time of brawn and force of arms might be waning. The petitioners we were training lacked all martial vigour... lacked the guts, as Khiron put it. But still, and I admit this with a happy heart, they outsmarted us and won the drill. They bested Damocles squad.'

  'Not hard.’ Medes crowed.

  'Don't make me come over there and hurt you, brother.’ Priad said. 'The petitioners bested Damocles squad, and I'm proud to confess it. They outplayed us with their minds. Weaker than my brothers, they out-thought us. We were playing a simple, martial game, a physical exercise. The cheese run, you remember that, don't you, Brother-Sergeant Bylon?'

  Bylon, sergeant of Veii, nodded.

  'The petitioners couldn't match us, muscle for muscle, so they changed the rules and won. Khiron said to me that maybe brains represented the future. The rise of brains and the fall of brawn. I said I was sorry, as brawn was all I had.'

  This raised a sympathetic laugh from most of the officers.

  'I don't know why I'm telling you this. Gods, I don't even know why I'm spe
aking aloud in the presence of our Master and Lord Autolochus. But I know battle, and I know how the most curious patterns can form out of the randomness of war. I believe Petrok is right, and I believe I am somehow part of that pattern. Me, and the meadow and the black dog. I don't know how, but I'd like to go to Baal Solock and find out. I'd like to use my mind for once. I envy Brother Medes for not needing one.'

  'You bastard, Priad!' Medes spat.

  'Oh, now you remember my name.’ Priad smiled.

  You little-'

  'Shut up, Medes.’ said Seydon, rising to his feet again. 'Petrok, undertake this with Damocles. The Bullwyrm is yours to command. If you come back empty-handed, then don't come back at all. That's my word on this. The rest of you, see to your wounds and your men. We'll counsel war again at the edge of the system. I will consider full deployment in-'

  He paused. 'How long to Baal Solock and back, Librarian?'

  'Forty days.’ replied Petrok.

  'Forty-five.’ contradicted Autolochus.

  'Fifty days, then. After that, I raise a fleet to full deployment of the Chapter House, death or glory.’

  'We will not fail the phratry in this.’ Petrok said.

  Til make sure of that.’ Autolochus grumbled. The dreadnought clanked around to face Petrok squarely. 'It's been a long time since I last did anything useful. I'll be coming with you.’

  XVIII

  Drive engines flaring, the fast cruiser Bullwyrm ploughed on through the airless winter of the stars.

  Every man of Damocles had accompanied Priad, even Natus and Dyognes, weak from their wounds. Dyognes was a shadow of his former self. Once a virile youth as robust and energised as Xander, he now walked with aching steps, his breathing chopped and curtailed, his skin sickly. It would take many months of recuperation, as well as augmetic and bionic surgery, to restore him to battle prime, and even then that recovery was not guaranteed. There was a chance that Dyognes's career as a phratry warrior was done, and he would spend the remainder of his days amongst the ancillary staff of Karybdis.

  'Let me come.’ he had said to Priad, when the brother-sergeant offered him the chance to return to the fortress moon with the main force. 'This may be the last undertaking I make with plate upon my back.’