Free Helsreach by Aaron Dembski-Bowden Page A

lizard’s hide. Almost unbreakable. There’ll be plenty who survived that crash, I promise you.
    ‘Send a Titan,’ Commissar Falkov smiled without any humour whatsoever, and the room fell quiet. ‘I am not making a jest. Send a Titan to obliterate the wreckage. Inspire the men. Give them an overwhelming victory before the true battle is even joined. Morale among the Steel Legion is mediocre at best. It is lower still among the volunteer militia, and barely existent among the conscripts. So send a Titan. We need first blood in this war.’
    ‘At least get Barasath’s fighters to scan for life readings,’ Tyro added, ‘before we commit to sending any troops outside the city.’
    Throughout all of this, Grimaldus had remained silent. It was his silence that eventually killed all talk, and had faces turning towards him.
    The knight rose to his feet. Despite the slowness of his movement, his armour’s joints emitted a low snarl.
    ‘The commissar is correct,’ he said. ‘Helsreach needs an overwhelming victory. The benefit to morale among the human forces would be considerable.’
    Sarren swallowed. No one around the table enjoyed Grimaldus pointing out the difference in species between the humans and the genetically-forged Astartes.
    ‘It is time my knights took to the field,’ the Reclusiarch said, his deep, soft voice coming out from his skull helm as a machine-growl. ‘The humans may need first blood, but my knights hunger for it. We will give you your victory.’
    ‘How many of your Astartes will you take?’ Sarren asked after a moment’s thought.
    ‘All of them.’
    The colonel paled. ‘But surely you don’t need–’
    ‘Of course not. But this is for appearances. You wanted an overwhelming display of Imperial force. I am giving you that.’
    ‘We can make this even better,’ Cyria said. ‘If you can have your men stand in formation before they move out of the city, long enough for us to arrange live pict-feeds to all visual terminals across Helsreach…’ she trailed off, a pleased smile brightening her features.
    Falkov slammed a fist on the table. ‘Let’s get started. The first charge of the black knights!’ He smiled a thin, nasty grin. ‘If that doesn’t light a fire in the heart of every man breathing, nothing will.’
    Priamus twisted the blade, widening the wound before wrenching the sword clear. Stinking blood gushed from the creature’s chest, and the alien died with its filthy claws scratching at the knight’s armour.
    Within the crashed ship, stalking from room to room, corridor by corridor, the Templars hunted mongrels in the name of purification.
    ‘This is bad comedy,’ he breathed into the vox.
    The reply he received was punctuated by the dull clang of weapons clashing together. Artarion, some way behind.
    ‘Fall back, damn it.’
    Priamus sensed another lecture about vainglory in his future. He walked on, his precious blade held at the ready, moving deeper into the darkness that his red visor pierced with consummate ease.
    Like vermin, the orks scrambled through the tunnels of the wrecked ship, springing ambushes with their crude weapons and snorting their piggish war cries. Priamus’s contempt burned hot on his tongue. They were above this. They were Black Templars, and the morale of the puling humans was none of their concern.
    Grimaldus was spending too much time among the mortals. The Reclusiarch was beginning to think like them. It had galled Priamus to stand in ranked formation for the pict-drones to hover around and capture the knights’ images, just as it galled him now to hunt the scarce survivors of this wreck. It was beneath him, beneath them all. This was work for the Imperial Guard. Perhaps even the militia.
    ‘We will draw first blood,’ Grimaldus had said to them all, as if it was something to care about – as if it would affect the final battle in any way at all. ‘Join me, brothers. Join me as I shake off this disgust at the stasis gripping my