'All by the hand of Horus,' said Garro, fighting off the sickness in his heart.
They stood there for what seemed like hours, watching the fires cross continents and raze cities as the Warmaster's flagship orbited above it all, the lone arbiter of Isstvan Ill's destruction. Time fell away as the two Astartes stood witness to the distant slaughter.
At last, a loud chime sounded through the chamber over the frigate's inter-craft vox net and shattered the silence. 'Captain Garro to the bridge.' It was Carya's voice, low and toneless. 'We have a problem.'
Nathaniel finally turned from the windows and walked away. Decius remained a few moments, his eyes glittering, before he followed suit, running to keep up with his commander.
Baryk Carya couldn't bring himself to look out of the bridge's forward viewports. The slow death of the planet below was abhorrent to him, a brutal act that went against every fibre of his being. He had not taken an oath of fealty to be part of such horror. He scanned the chamber and found Maas glaring at him from the vox alcove, still gripping the message slip the shipmaster had given him. He advanced towards the junior officer, working to maintain his outward mask of authority. 'Is it done?' he demanded.
'I…' Maas grimaced. 'I have sent the signal you ordered me to send, sir.'
The young man's displeasure was clear on his face, although Carya could have cared less for his unwillingness to broadcast what was an outright lie. The master snatched the paper from his grip and shredded it between his fingers. The message had gone to Terminus Est with Grulgor's command rune carefully forged by Vought. In terse phrases that he hoped would emulate the speech of an Astartes, Carya had informed First Captain Typhon that Eisenstein had suffered a weapons malfunction that prevented it firing on Isstvan III. It was a poor ruse, as thin as the paper he had scribbled it on, but it would buy them time.
'What you have done will cost you your rank/ hissed Maas in a sullen voice. 'You are upon the verge of open mutiny against the Warmaster's command!'
'Get your terms straight, boy/ retorted Carya. 'Mutiny is when the enlisted men take over a vessel. When the ship's master does it, it's called barratry.'
'Whatever name you give it, it is wrong!'
'Wrong?' Carya's anger went white-hot in an instant, and he grabbed Maas by the scruff of the neck, dragging him from the alcove and across the bridge. 'Do you want to see wrong, boy? Look at that!' He forced the vox officer's face towards the viewports and the distant carnage. He gave him a half-hearted shove. 'Get back to your damn station, and keep your thoughts to yourself!'
Vought came to his side. 'Sir, your pardon? The other ship, I have confirmed it. It's on an approach vector at full military thrust.'
'Within gun range?'
She nodded. 'I've taken the liberty of getting a firing solution, although that earlier trick won't work this time. If we kill it, the whole fleet will see.'
The bridge hatch irised open and the commander of the Seventh Company entered with one of his men, his eyes hollow. 'Shipmaster,' said Garro gravely, 'is there a matter of urgency?'
He nodded. 'There is. Racel, show him.'
Vought manipulated the controls on the hololith to display a close-range globe of space around the frigate. A red arrowhead was moving steadily towards the vessel. 'Another Thunderhawk,' she explained, 'on an intercept vector.'
'Tarvitz?' asked the other Astartes, the one called Decius. 'Has he been in orbit all this time, or returned from the surface?'
Racel shook her head. 'No, this ship's idem codes are different. The designation is Nine Delta. It belongs to the Sons of Horus, assigned aboard the Vengeful Spirit!
'He knows,' said the vox officer. 'Horus knows what happened here. He's coming to-'
'Shut up, Maas!' snapped Carya.
'He could be right/ said Decius.
Garro ignored the hololith and went to the viewport, searching for the transport with his own eyes. After a moment he pointed. 'There, I see it.'
'Captain, what are your orders?' The shipmaster shifted uncomfortably, perturbed by the strange sensation of events repeating themselves. This was how it had all begun, with a lone Thunderhawk, with Tarvitz and his warning.
Some emotion Carya couldn't identify crossed Garro's face like a cloud passing before the sun. Then he turned on his heel and marched to the communications panel. Without preamble he snatched up the vox pickup and spoke into it. 'Thunderhawk gunship, identify yourself Garro glanced back at Vought and threw her a look that said be ready.
A throaty voice thick with a Cthonian accent growled from the speaker. 'My name is Iacton Qruze, formerly of the Sons of Horus.'
'Formerly?' repeated Garro.
'Yes, formerly.'
Decius nodded to his commander. 'I know of this one, sir, an old campaigner, past his time, the third captain under Horus. They call him "the Half-Heard".'
Garro took this without comment. 'Explain yourself,' he demanded. Carya found that his hands were tight, his knuckles bloodless with the tension.
He heard the agony beneath the veteran's next words, even through the crackling hiss of the vox channel. 'I am no longer part of the Legion. I can no longer be a party to what the Warmaster is doing.'
The battle-captain held the vox away and rubbed at his face.
'It could be a rase/ insisted Vought. 'That transport could be packed with Astartes from Horus's ship!'
'Let them come/ growled Decius. 'I would prefer honest battle to all this subterfuge.'
'Or perhaps a bomb
'No.' Garro's voice brought silence. 'She is aboard. He does not lie.'
She? Carya's brow furrowed. Who is he talking about?
'There are refugees on that vessel, I am certain of it. Open the landing bay and prepare to take the Thun-derhawk aboard,' he ordered.
The blocky ship manoeuvred uneasily into the capture cradle and the thrusters flared out. With grinding hisses, the deck servitors worked the manipulator arms to bring the Thunderhawk forward and down on to the same grating where Garro and his men had arrived less than a day ago. Hakur and his squad were ready with their combi-bolters cocked and aimed, but Garro refused to draw a weapon. He saw Voyen and the others watching him carefully, the question clear on their faces. They thought him mad to do this, he realised. He would have said the same in their place.
He did not blame them, but then they did not see as he did. Even Garro himself found it hard to articulate the compulsion he felt in his heart. He had knowledge. That was it. Although he could not explain it, he knew with absolute certainty that the ship before him carried a cargo as precious as the warning he had dedicated himself to delivering. The dream… It all came back to the dream.
The Thunderhawk's forward hatch spat atmospheric gasses and yawned open, allowing four figures to disembark. At the head was a craggy, aged warrior in the power armour of the Sons of Horus. He walked with the same stiff pride Garro had seen in a hundred other Cthonian Astartes, but his expression was one
of sorrow, of a soldier who had seen too much. He bore the signs of recent combat, new wounds still wet with freshly clotted blood, but he paid them no mind.
'So you are Garro,' he said. 'Young Garviel spoke of you once or twice. He said you were a good man.'
'And you are Iacton Qruze. I would like to say well met, captain, but that is as far from the truth as it could be.'
Qruze nodded heavily. 'Aye.' He paused for a moment and then met Garro's gaze. 'You'll want this, then, I suppose.' The old warrior held out his bolter and the other Astartes tensed at the motion. 'Take it, lad. If you mean to end us, then do it with this, if that is to be the way of things. We can run no further.'
Garro took the gun and handed it away to Sendek. 'I'll have it cleaned and returned to you,' he said. 'I fear I will need every able man in the coming hours.' The captain stepped forward and offered Qruze his hand. 'I have a mission to take warning of Horus's perfidy to Terra and the Emperor. Will you join me in this?'
'I will at that/ Qruze said, accepting the gesture. 'I pledge my command to your mission, such as it is. I'm afraid all I have to offer from the Third Company is a single Luna Wolf, getting along in his years.'
'Luna Wolf?' repeated Decius. 'Your Legion-'
The old soldier's eyes flashed with anger. 'I'll not be known as a Son of Horus again, mark that well, lad.'