Night Lords Omnibus Read online

  The Rhino’s name in High Gothic was Carpe Noctum. ‘Seize the Night’.

  The tank that had carried Seventh Claw since the Legion’s founding on pre-Imperial Terra died an ignoble death, expiring with a twisted, protracted groan of tortured metal. The Warhound Titan stood for half a minute, its splayed right foot-claw grinding the tank into the street. The greatest injustice was that the tank had met its end in such an undignified manner purely to spare the Titan’s ammunition reserves.

  You’ll pay for that, Adhemar swore. You will bleed and scream and die for that.

  The Titan finally raised its foot clear of the wreckage, scraps of bent metal falling from its talon-toes. In its wake, still in the behemoth’s shadow, the crushed hull of Carpe Noctum looked especially pathetic. It was impossible to reconcile the image of miserable ruin with the great-hearted, indomitable tank that had raced him into battle a thousand times and more.

  Seventh Claw was dead. Heart and soul. Even if he and Mercutian somehow survived the next few minutes, they were destined to join one of the other Claws in the ragtag remnants of 10th Company.

  Adhemar watched the lumbering Titan stalk down the avenue, hunkering left and right, coming closer with each pounding tread.

  ‘Mercutian…’

  ‘Aye, brother-sergeant.’

  Not brother-sergeant after this. Not a chance. ‘We need to find Ruhn and Hazjarn. They had melta bombs.’

  The Warhound thundered past.

  Adhemar froze, back pinned against the wall. A great shadow fell across him as the Titan blocked out the moon. It stood only thirty metres away, pistons hissing and venting air pressure – a beast breathing, sighing after a long hunt. Its back was to him now, as it stared down the avenue, seeking targets. Another dull clang rang out as its echolocation auspex sought returning signals of movement or heat. The wolf was sniffing for prey.

  ‘Repeat, sir.’

  ‘Ruhn and Hazjarn. They had our melta bombs.’

  ‘They’re useless with the Titan’s shields up. You know that.’

  ‘They’re our only chance. We could mine the road ahead of it. Have you got anything better to be doing, or did you come here in midnight clad just to die with the others?’

  ‘I’ve got Ruhn on my locator, sir. But not Hazjarn. Can you see him?’

  ‘I can’t see anyone’s signals; my helm is damaged. I saw him fall when the hab block came down on us. I know where to dig, but we’ll need to be fast.’

  ‘I’ve got no life signs from anyone except you and I,’ Mercutian said.

  Not at all surprising, Adhemar thought, watching the Titan panning left and right on its torso axis. The sound was like thunder in a valley.

  ‘It’s facing away. There’s a sixteen second break between its auspex signals. The scanner wave will pass over us within the first second or two. Move only three seconds after the damn thing clangs. Freeze the moment you hear it pulse.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  They waited for several heartbeats, until the dull ring chimed once more. More windows facing the street shattered under the reverberation.

  One. Two. Three.

  ‘Move.’

  The transporter handled with weighty sluggishness compared to Blackened. Although the Thunderhawk variant was marked by a more skeletal mid-frame, it cradled the bulky shape of the squad’s Land Raider in its underside hull claws. The weight counted. Septimus felt it in every bank and turn.

  Septimus brought the flyer lower, streaking over the tips of hab blocks, stabiliser thrusters burning hot. Go too low, and he risked entering the Titan’s weapon range before they knew for sure where it was. Stay too high, and their auspex wouldn’t give an accurate return on where the enemy machine was.

  ‘I’m getting significant thermal flare at the end of a major avenue just north of here.’

  The voice of his master came over the vox. First Claw waited within their battle tank. ‘Pull in low, release clamps at the other end of the avenue. If you get killed while causing the distraction, I’ll lose my temper, Septimus.’

  He grinned. ‘Duly noted, lord.’

  The transporter’s stability engines burned hotter and angrier as they took the vessel’s weight in full, all forward thrust lost as it coasted lower to the ground, between the stunted remains of Titan-killed hab blocks. Engine wash blackened the street below.

  Six hundred metres or more down the avenue, the Titan saw them. The Warhound reared around, back-jointed legs easing it into an awkward reverse turn. Its arms rose in lethal salute.

  ‘Imperial machine is acquiring target lock,’ Septimus voxed. ‘Twenty… Fifteen… Ten metres above ground.’

  ‘Ave Dominus Nox,’ Cyrion said over the channel.

  ‘Hunt well, Septimus,’ Talos added.

  ‘Claws detached!’

  Freed of its burden, the Thunderhawk transporter bucked skyward, overcompensating engines roaring.

  Warning runes flashed across his console screens. Target lock. The serf wrenched the guidance sticks to pull the flyer into a vicious roll. From the avenue below, streams of massive-calibre bolt shells sliced through his engine wake. He punched out at two levers either side of his control throne, and the protesting boosters cried out with fresh fury. The amount of thrust he was demanding from the transport was usually reserved for breaking back into orbit after a landing. To use it in atmospheric flight, to use in a cityscape…

  Septimus knew Blackened. He knew the Thunderhawk could’ve taken this and more. He wasn’t so sure about the transport. It juddered and creaked and whined all around him, complaining down to the rivets in its hull.

  Spires flashed by in a dizzying blur. Septimus climbed and brought the flyer into a sharp turn. As he lined up the nose with his target below, acquisition runes glimmered across his main data screen.

  The transport’s missile launchers came alive, pods opening like unfurling flowers.

  ‘I hope this works…’

  The treads of First Claw’s Land Raider had been in motion before it even hit the ground. They whirred and spun, chewing air, hungry to grind over the street’s surface.

  ‘First Claw!’ came a voice over the tank’s interior vox.

  Talos blink-clicked a tuning rune. ‘Adhemar?’

  ‘Talos, by the claws of our father… What are you doing here?’

  The Land Raider lurched as it crashed to the street, its cycling treads already tearing up the concrete at full speed. Cyrion, at the tank’s driving throne, turned the huge vehicle to the right, moving through a wide alley into a parallel side street. Within the tank’s gloomy, red-lit insides, the rest of the squad checked their weapons.

  ‘Take a guess,’ Talos replied, and pounded his gauntlet against the door release. Night swept in, temperature gauges on retinal displays falling as the chill wind hit their armour. Talos, Uzas and Xarl leapt from the moving tank, scattering into the ruined hab towers.

  ‘It’s not the scenery, is it?’ Mercutian’s voice crackled. ‘We’d have warned you away.’

  ‘We appreciate the effort, brothers,’ Adhemar voxed, ‘but even a Land Raider is scrap metal against a Warhound. We’re honoured you would join Seventh Claw in death.’

  ‘Silence,’ Talos barked. ‘Where are you in relation to the Titan?’

  ‘I could spit and hit it,’ Mercutian replied. ‘We’re in its shadow, with melta bombs to mine the road.’

  ‘Save them,’ the prophet ordered. ‘First Claw, move up through adjacent streets to link with Seventh Claw. Cyrion, bring Storm’s Eye in fast, just as agreed.’ There was no sense trying to hide the Land Raider. The Titan’s auspex would scent its heat and power source from a kilometre away.

  ‘You plan to take it down with your Land Raider?’ Mercutian whistled low. ‘A good death.’

  ‘Enough of your negativity,’ Adhemar snapped. ‘Brother, tell me you’ve landed with a plan.’

  ‘I landed with a plan,’ Talos said. He ran through the rubble-strewn street, sighting the Warhound as it unl
eashed withering rivers of fire into the sky. ‘The Titan is about to become the victim of an unpleasant distraction. When we strike from the sky, follow my orders exactly.’

  ‘Compliance, Soul Hunter,’ Adhemar said.

  The Thunderhawk transport was lightly armed compared to its troop-carrying gunship counterpart, but not entirely lacking in offensive capability. Wing-mounted heavy bolters made up the anti-troop complement of its weapons array, backed up by the capacity for six under-wing hellstrike missiles.

  Septimus had been flying the Thunderhawk Blackened for years, and had performed strafing runs on enemy positions many times in the past. This attack run was marked by several uncomfortable differences to his usual participation in a battle. First among these was that the transporter lacked the main cannon armament of the more familiar Thunderhawk. Secondly, it could withstand significantly less damage on its hull mid-sections. Thirdly, as Septimus ran the flight path adjustments through his conscious thoughts, he reached an ugly conclusion: This bastard turns like it’s underwater.

  The tank-carrier dived, and dived hard, like a spear from the night sky cast at the cruellest angle.

  The Titan fired up at him. He could imagine its crew in their restraint thrones, unwilling to allow such a prize as an Astartes lander to escape its clutches, commanding their god-machine to send its anger skyward in a relentless hail of bolt shells, thousands at once.

  The transporter jerked away from its dive, rolling so hard the pressure slammed Septimus painfully against his throne. The inertia of his attack run would, if he kept this up for much longer, either kill him, tear the ship apart, or both. But the lance of lethal shells slashed past.

  Altitude meters chimed in alarm. Velocity readouts did the same. The vessel itself was screaming at him.

  Septimus dragged at the control sticks, ramming the thrust levers a moment later. The transport powered closer, its angle less insane. Septimus had held out as long as he could, not wanting to broadcast his intent, but the Titan crew had to know now. They would recognise this manoeuvre. Not a strafing run with the cannons. A bombing run.

  Talos crouched with Adhemar in the ruined ground floor of the hab block. With the walls almost completely levelled, they had an unopposed view of the street. Both warriors gripped plate-sized melta bombs in their hands, watching the Titan in the middle of the avenue as it fired into the sky.

  Adhemar, older than Talos and showing it with his head bare, grinned toothily at the prophet. ‘If this works…’

  ‘It’ll work.’ Talos was almost smiling behind his own helm, glad that Adhemar had survived the Titan’s initial assault.

  Above, the transporter began its howling descent, racing closer by the second. The Titan locked its legs for support, and opened fire with a fresh volley from its Vulcan bolter cannon.

  Septimus came in between the towers of hab blocks. Low now. Even lower.

  Low and close enough to graze the Titan’s shoulders with heat wash when he passed overhead. When only two hundred metres separated the knifing flyer and the firing Titan, as he heard dangerous clashes on the hull from shredding bolter fire, Septimus pulled back and climbed again.

  The Titan tracked its flight, but the ancient, time-honoured joints couldn’t keep pace with the speeding flyer as it nosed up into the final stage of its attack run.

  Septimus was holding to the thrust and altitude levers too tightly to risk letting go. The flyer was wounded, venting black smoke from several critical points, and he didn’t dare take his hands from the controls for a moment. Leaning sideways in his throne, he cursed the fact this ship was made to be piloted by oversized gene-forged Astartes instead of mortals. With a Nostraman invective, he kicked out at the clamp release console the very second his targeting rune flashed green, green, green.

  Septimus’s boot heel smacked the lever up from Secure to Armed.

  Aimed downward like six separate blades, the missiles spat from their pods and fell, howling, from the sky.

  At this range, near-suicidal as it was for the Thunderhawk, the Titan had no chance to intercept the missiles.

  The impact was a sight to behold. It burned into Talos’s memory as fiercely as it burned into his eyes.

  The missiles struck with savage force, hammering into the Titan’s void shields with the force of a falling building. They exploded as one, and the flare momentarily blinded the one Night Lord that couldn’t resist watching it all play out.

  Talos stared, seeing nothing until his eye lenses frantically cycled through filters to compensate for his blindness. Sight returned, blurred by smears of retinal pain, just in time for the Astartes to see the Warhound stagger back a step, its right leg moving back to support its tilting weight, clawed foot grinding into the ground.

  Its shields seemed fluid and malleable, swirling like oil on water, dissipating and sparking back to life as the internal generators strained to maintain the power feed to the void shield projector. Talos could almost see the tech-adepts working around the central column of the Titan’s juddering fusion reactor, like a spine running through its torso and beneath its dense shoulder armour.

  The Titan’s shield crackled and flared with a sudden burst of dissipating energy. Deep within its armoured body, a low and rising thrum built up, muted but still audible to the Astartes in hiding. The Warhound’s internal systems were bracing, feeding additional power to prevent a complete shield shutdown. Its voids were on the very edge of failure.

  ‘Night Lords,’ Talos voxed, smiling his crooked smile. ‘Move in for the kill.’

  The machine-spirit housed within the immense bulk of the VIII Legion Land Raider Storm’s Eye had been honoured time and again for its aggression. Scrolls and pennants marking dozens of glorious victories moved in the wind as they hung from its hull. On treads that had churned the earth of countless worlds, it powered from the side street, acting as much on its own bloodlust and instinct as it was obeying the suggestions from the flesh-master at the controls.

  Its prey… Its prey was immense. Storm’s Eye sensed the boiling heat of the Titan’s plasma reactor; felt the fierce pressure of the giant’s glare as it drew a target lock. Yet Storm’s Eye, the soul of the machine, knew nothing of fear, nothing of retreat, nothing of cowing to intimidation. It tore into the avenue, treads crushing and grinding the rockcrete beneath its weight, flanking the towering foe.

  Storm’s Eye clawed and spat at the larger predator – its spitting venom was a withering hail of high-calibre bolt shells from its hull-mounted turret, its talons raking the enemy’s flesh were Kz9.76 Godhammer-pattern lascannons, each side turret unleashing eye-aching beams of merciless laser energy from two barrels slung side by side.

  It clawed and clawed and clawed, ripping at the prey’s fragile shimmer-skin, tearing at the half-seen protective shield.

  Something burst. The shimmer-skin. Storm’s Eye’s talons had peeled the final layer of shimmer-skin away, leaving the foe cold and exposed. The enemy staggered with violent kinetic feedback as something broke within its body.

  Storm’s Eye heard the flesh-masters shouting to one another. It sensed their blood-excitement and shared their hunt-hunger. The joining of battle-hate pushed the tank’s soul even harder. Its claws ached with death-heat. The cooling touch of maintenance would be a blessed relief after this hunt.

  The prey was still strong, and it was still fast. The flesh-master guided Storm’s Eye at hunt-kill speed across the avenue, reversing from the larger foe without ceasing fire. It was a battle to keep the tank’s hull-body away from the murder-claws of the colossal predator. Like a shark seeking prey, Storm’s Eye moved left and right in a weaving motion, engine-heart burning hotter and hotter, claws tensing and hissing with the killing heat.

  The foe finally turned fast enough. No longer prey… No longer threatened…

  It roared its own reply at Storm’s Eye, machine-soul to machine-soul, and with the wrath of a predator-god, it clawed back.

  Talos vaulted another broken wall, sprinting acr
oss the avenue into the shadow of the firing Titan. With its Vulcan bolter cannon chattering a thunderstorm of shells at the Land Raider’s retreating form, the enemy war machine had a greater threat to worry about than the Astartes at its feet. Still, it knew they were there. A clanging auspex return from the Titan sent warning runes flashing across Night Lord retinal displays, but even as the towering foe turned and sought to crush its weakling prey, the weakling prey was already acting.

  Talos was the first. Aurum crackled with energy in his fist before a single slash carved a malicious streak through the armour and engineering of the Titan’s ankle. Even one-handed, the blow would have felled a tree or carved a mortal in half. Talos’s own gene-enhanced strength, amplified tenfold by the artificial muscle fibre of his war-plate, was the pinnacle of mankind’s genetic manipulation coupled with some of the Machine Cult’s closest-guarded secrets rediscovered from the Dark Age of Technology.

  The golden blade sliced and sank into the armour plating, biting deep into the mechanics beneath. This alone was nothing, a pinprick of a wound caused in a heartbeat’s span. Talos snarled with effort, his muscles unused to being so tested as he wrenched the blade deeper, impaling and sawing through the cables and rods and pistons that served the Titan as tendons.

  Machine-blood spat from the carved metal, sheeting Talos with discoloured lubricant and oil. Its next auspex pulse sounded like a wail. With a replying cry of exultant anger, Talos slammed his other hand against the jagged wound he’d carved. There was a hollow clunk as the melta bomb adhered fast.

  Adhemar and Xarl were next, clamping their own explosives to the wound’s edges. Talos was already sprinting to safety as Mercutian slammed his incendiary home. He sighted Uzas.

  Uzas, who was not laying his explosives with the rest. Uzas, who stood under the towering, stamping Titan and fired his bolter up at the war machine’s chin. Did he think small-arms fire was ever going to puncture a hole in the armour of a Titan? Did he think the crew within that head-cockpit felt his gunfire as anything more than a whispered irritant against the hull-skin of their walking sanctum?