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  Mercy – Danie Ware

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  A Black Library Publication

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  Mercy

  Danie Ware

  The cathedral’s corpse was vast.

  Standing in its hollow heart, its darkness vaulted huge above her, Sister Superior Augusta rested one scarlet-gauntleted hand on the bolter at her hip. She said nothing, only scanned this icon of the Emperor’s might, searching for motion, for threat, for any remaining gleam of His Light.

  But there was nothing.

  This was Ultima Segmentum’s darkest corner, and little reached out here.

  Beside her, the missionary Lysimachus Tanichus was speaking in hushed tones. ‘From the last years of the Age of Apostasy, sister. Or so they say.’ His sibilance coiled in the dark, like echoes of millennia.

  Augusta gave a brief acknowledgement and walked carefully through the debris. The air was hot here, clammy with the overgrown jungle-marsh outside; twisted creepers had penetrated the cathedral’s crumbling walls and they writhed across the stonework like the tendrils of Chaos itself. Sweat itched at the fleur-de-lys tattoo on her cheek.

  ‘Sisters.’ She spoke softly into the vox at her throat. ‘Roll call.’

  Five voices came back through the darkness. Augusta’s retinal lenses tracked their locations: blips deployed in a standard sweep-reconnaissance pattern. Her squad were experienced – all except one – and she had complete trust in their worthiness, and in their love for the Emperor. Together, they had carried fist and faith across every segmentum of the galaxy.

  Tanichus, fiddling with his rosarius, spoke again. ‘The Emperor’s light had not touched this world in millennia, sister, not until I came here, carrying His name. The local townspeople told me of the cathedral. It’s a part of their mythology–’

  ‘I trust you’ve brought them Truth,’ Augusta said. Her authority was unthreatened by the missionary, but she needed to listen – the brief from the canoness on Ophelia VII had listed this world as a potential staging point for Chaos, invading from the Eye of Terror, for witchkin or renegades, for marauding xenos of every kind. Augusta was a twenty-year veteran, her bobbed hair and stern gaze both steel-grey, and her experience made her both sharp and wary.

  ‘Me serve vivere, sister,’ Tanichus said. ‘I live to serve.’

  ‘Sister Jatoya,’ Augusta said into the vox. ‘Anything?’

  Her second-in-command responded, ‘No, sister. If there’s anything here, it’s well hidden.’

  ‘Check everywhere.’

  ‘Yes, sister.’

  ‘Very well.’ Her touch still on the bolter, eyeing the decaying statues and pillars above her, Augusta gestured for Tanichus to keep speaking.

  But he told her only what she already knew: his history with the townspeople, and their rumours of the cathedral. The town held the place taboo, but they’d told Tanichus their local myth – that the ruin had a guardian, an armoured stone icon with a bloodied flower upon its chest. And Tanichus had carried word of this back to the Ecclesiarchy, and to the Sisters.

  A member of the Order of the Bloody Rose, Augusta had volunteered for the mission immediately – with the cathedral’s age, it was possible that the icon could be Saint Mina herself. ‘The Emperor has called me,’ she’d said to the canoness. ‘And I must go.’ Perhaps for more political reasons than visionary ones, the canoness had agreed.

  Her boots crunching over ancient, fallen masonry, Augusta climbed the steps towards the high altar. Ruin or not, she paused before the top and dropped to one armoured knee, her black cloak billowing and her hand tracing the fleur-de-lys on her armour.

  ‘Quantus tremor est futurus, quando attingit locum Lucis.’

  How great the fear will be, when the Light touches this place!

  She felt the missionary shiver as he, too, knelt. Tanichus was a talker, a good man to carry the Emperor’s word, but she was His daughter, and her task was clear.

  She would find this icon.

  ‘Did the townspeople tell you anything further?’ she asked, coming back to her feet. ‘You lived with them for several months.’

  ‘Only superstitions,’ he told her. ‘If this is your patron saint, sister, then we must find her without their help.’

  Augusta nodded. She gave her squad orders to structure their search, to move in a standard skirmish pattern throughout the cathedral’s cloisters and side-rooms. Sister Viola, the youngest, she ordered to stand guard at the fallen doors. Viola was new from the schola; she was high-hearted and eager to prove herself and that was all very well… but Augusta wanted her close.

  ‘Yes, sister.’ Viola, bolter in hand, returned to the doors and took her position, watching the huge and muggy writhe of the outside jungle.

  Over the vox, the Sister Superior recited the Litany of Mettle. Whatever was here, they would find it.

  In the cathedral’s transept stood a colossal thirty-foot statue, its broken hands raised in the sign of the aquila. It had been carved in full armour and, like all such things, it faced Holy Terra as if it still sought the Light.

  But if this was Saint Mina, then she had no face, and her insignia had long since fallen to dust.

  Augusta was scanning, carefully looking for age and identity, when the cry came from Viola at the doorway.

  ‘Sisters!’ The word was soft across the vox, but it carried the faintest of quivers. ‘I see movement!’

  Augusta felt the touch of adrenaline and inhaled, enjoying the lift, the first flush of faith – as her briefing had warned her, this was a dangerous place.

  ‘Be specific,’ she said, turning to crunch back out to the nave, the cathedral’s main aisle. ‘What do you see?’

  ‘Large force incoming. Seventy, eighty yards. Moving slowly, but heading this way.’ Her voice was taut with fear. ‘It’s hard to see them through the jungle.’

  Tanichus followed at Augusta’s shoulder. The missionary had unhooked his lasrifle and looked slightly queasy; she hoped he could shoot straight. ‘Sisters, to me. Kimura, to the doorway. Jatoya, watch the rear.’ Kimura carried the squad’s heavy bolter, and its faster suppression would be critical. ‘Viola, description.’

  ‘I can’t see well, sister, but they’re all shoulders. They’re huge!’

  ‘Space Marines?’ Jatoya’s tone was surprised. ‘Out here?’

  But Kimura was at the doorway now, weapon at the ready. Her voice came back over the vox, her tones shuddering with a rising, burning eagerness. ‘They’re not Heretic Astartes, sisters.’ The words were alight.

  ‘They’re orks.’

  Orks.

  If there was one damned xenos that Augusta loathed, it was the ork. Filthy, stinking things, slavering and disorderly; they were as much the enemies of the Throne as any witch or heretic. She could feel her faith unfurling in her heart like a banner – she had a chance to reclaim this holy place, at the edge of the segmentum…

  But Augusta’s ruthless discipline was what had kept her alive through twenty years of warfare. She could embrace the love of her Emperor and keep her thoughts clear.

  She reached Kimura at the doorway, and used her auspex to look outside.

  Immediately, she saw why Viola had made the mistake.

  Many of the incoming beasts were enormous, bigger than the Sisters, armour and all. But this was not the disciplined advance of highly-trained soldiers, this was ramshackle, and noisy, and slow. The orks moved more like marauders; they laughed amongst themselves, pushing and shoving and snarling. Their tones were harsh and their voices guttural.

  They were hard to see through the steam, through the festooned and looping creepers.

  But they were heading straight for the cathedral.

  ‘Sister!’ Kimura had reached the same conclusion – her voice was tense. Augusta saw her take a sight on the lead ork, anger radiating from her stance as if her armour burned with it.

  ‘Hold your fire.’

  For a moment, she thought Kimura would disobey, but Augusta’s command of her squad was too strong. Instead, Kimura paused, quivering, her finger on the trigger, tracking the orks as they approached.

  Behind them now, Viola’s breathing was swift in her vox. She was afraid – and Augusta understood.

  But still, the youngest of the squad had to control herself, and quickly.

  Swiftly, the Sister Superior gave orders for deployment. Kimura and Caia at the door, Viola and Melia at the front left archway, Jatoya, with her flamer, watching the rear. Augusta herself, Tanichus still with her, took position at the front arch to the right, its window long since put out by the creeper and shattered to forgotten dust.

  Outside, the orks advanced, oblivious. A fight had broken out amongst their number, cheered and jeered by those surrounding.

  Beneath her helmet, Augusta curled her lip – she had no fear of these beasts, whatever their numbers. Over the vox, she recited the Battle Hymnal and heard her sisters join her, avidly soft.

  ‘That Thou wouldst bring them only death,

  That Thou shouldst spare none,

  That Thou shouldst pardon none

  We beseech Thee, destroy them.’

  She felt Viola stiffen, felt her courage coalesce. She felt Kimura steady, ready to unleash His wrath on the incoming creatures and their blasphemous

intentions…

  ‘Wait,’ she said, again.

  The orks moved closer.

  Within heavy bolter range.

  Within bolter range.

  Any moment now, they would see the crouching Sisters, their blood-scarlet armour and their black-and-white cloaks…

  ‘Sisters, stay down. Kimura, on my command, full covering suppression. For the Emperor… Fire!’

  The orks had no idea what had hit them.

  Raiders and warriors alike, everything vanished in a hail of gore and shredding flesh. The heavy bolter howled in Kimura’s hands, and the jungle was ripped to pieces, leaves shining like shrapnel, trees and vines cut clean in half.

  One ancient trunk toppled over with a groan, but was stopped by a tangle of creeper. It hung there, creaking, like some huge executioner’s axe.

  Kimura’s voice came over the vox, louder now, ‘A morte perpetua, Domine, libra nos!’ The Hymn of Battle raged in tune with the furious barking of the weapon. The Sisters’ voices joined her, rising to crystal-pure harmonics as Kimura visited bloody destruction upon the orks.

  Augusta was grinning now, tight and violent beneath her helm. She knew this with every word in her ear, every flash in her blood – this was her worship, her purpose and her life. The Emperor Himself was with her, His fire in her heart, His touch in the creak and weight of her armour, in the bolter in her hand. She was here to unleash His wrath against the despoilers of this forgotten and holy place.

  And it felt good.

  At her other hip, her heavy chainsword clanked as if begging for release, but not yet… not yet.

  She heard Kimura’s singing ring with vehemence as the sister cut the orks to pieces.

  ‘From the blasphemy of the Fallen, our Emperor, deliver us!’

  But orks, despite many flaws, had no concept of intimidation. They had no interest in the Emperor’s wrath, no tactics, and no sense. Another force might have gone to ground, given covering fire, but not these beasts.

  Roaring with outrage, waving what clumsy weapons they had, they simply charged.

  Over the singing, Augusta shouted, ‘Kimura, fall back and reload! The rest of you, fire!’

  She raised her own bolter, aiming for the largest ork she could see. Greenskins had a very simple rule of leadership – the bigger the beast, the more control it wielded. And if she could take out the leaders, the rest would be easier to kill.

  The battle hymn still sounded and she added her voice once again, feeling the music thrill along her nerves like wildfire. A second wave of orks raged forwards, leering and eager.

  There seemed to be no end to them.

  The beasts were closing fast now, and she could see them clearly: their jutting teeth and green skin, their rusted weapons, their armour all scrappy pieces of ceramite and steel, scrounged from who knew what battlefields.

  One had a set of white pauldrons bearing the distinctive fleur-de-lys. Snarling, she blew it away.

  But their losses didn’t touch them; they picked up the weapons of their dying and their trampled, and they just kept coming.

  Bolters barked and howled in red-gauntleted hands. Tanichus took single shots with his lasrifle, picking his targets carefully. The jungle became a mess of blood and smoke and noise, but still the orks came on, slobbering and shouting, ripping through creepers and fallen trees. To one side, there was a lashing and a gurgle and half a dozen greenskins vanished, shrieking and struggling, below the surface of the marsh. Jeers and calls came from the rest, but they didn’t slow down.

  ‘There’s too many of them!’ The youngest sister’s cry broke the hymn’s purity and Augusta felt her squad waver.

  She raised her voice to a paean, a clarion call like a holy trumpet, allowing them no pause.

  ‘Domine, libra nos!’

  Shrieking with fury, Viola resumed firing.

  But the orks didn’t care. They tore themselves free from the jungle’s tangle and threw themselves at the steps.

  The lead ork went backwards in a spray of crimson mist.

  The others were already boiling past it. Tanichus kept firing, streaks of light past Augusta’s shoulder. Augusta switched to full suppression and heard the bolters of the others, all growling in righteous fury.

  Yet the orks still came. They were like a rotting green tide, large creatures and small, no structure, no fear. They bayed and snarled like animals.

  The Sisters couldn’t stop them all.

  Fury rose in Augusta and was annealed to a magnesium-white flare of righteous wrath. You shall not enter here!

  Viola, afraid, screamed the words of the hymnal, the same verse, over and over…

  The advance stopped.

  Shredded leaves fluttered slowly to the rotting jungle floor.

  The orks had paused. Changing magazine with an action so reflexive she barely noticed, Augusta scanned them through her retinal lenses, wondering what in Dominica’s name they were doing.

  Had they just been overcome by the holiness of the cathedral itself?

  Somehow, she doubted it.

  She watched as the creatures at the front moved, taking cover behind toppled statues. She gave the order to keep firing and heard the bolters start again.

  The beasts knew the Sisters were here – and they’d responded.

  Smart orks? The idea was horrifying.

  Yet something down there – the warboss or whatever it was – had intelligence.

  It made her wonder if their presence was pure coincidence… and an odd chill went down her back.

  The lead orks had taken cover now, and the jungle was ominously quiet. Behind them, through the rising steam, she could see bigger figures, moving forwards. Several had stubby sidearms, luridly decorated; the weapons gave a steady bark of fire. Rounds chewed chunks out of the stone and made the Sisters keep their heads down.

  And one of them–

  ‘Get back from the windows! Take cover!’

  Her squad were already on the move, throwing themselves back. They didn’t wait for the ork with the rocket launcher to loose his leering-skull-painted missile… straight into the cathedral nave.

  Augusta hit the floor, taking Tanichus down with her.

  The world erupted in fire.

  She heard the whistling of shrapnel, felt the whoosh of heat that seared her armour and shrivelled her cloak to tatters. The orks would use the cover of the missile to gain entrance to the building, and she was back on her feet, even as the flame was dying.

  ‘Sisters! Roll call!’

  Tanichus was scrambling up, charred but unhurt – Augusta had covered as much of his unarmoured body as was possible. He was coughing, fumbling for his lasrifle amongst the settling dust.

  Five voices came back to her, making her thank the Emperor Himself for the courage and experience of her squad.

  The orks were on them now, piling through the doors, scrambling over the window ledges – if all else failed, Augusta would bring the building down in a final hail of rounds, and kill everything within.

  For the glory of the Emperor!

  But they were not done yet. They would fight with the Emperor Himself at their backs, and they would fight to their last breath.

  ‘Kimura–!’

  She started to give orders to fall back, for Kimura’s heavy bolter to cover them, but her voice was lost under the detonation of a grenade, impacting right at Kimura’s feet.

  The sister disappeared in a blast of smoke and fragments.

  Viola screamed. Chunks of roof tumbled to the floor. Tanichus scrabbled away on his backside, his rifle lost.

  Now, the orks were all over the nave. Augusta could see the smaller, darker gretchins, scuttling in among their boots, picking things up and shaking them and biting them, then scurrying gleefully away.

  Slinging the bolter, she drew the chainsword and started the mechanism.

  It snarled into life like pure impatience, eager for the blasphemers’ blood.

  Called by the rasp of the weapon, the Sisters were upon the orks with fists and feet and fury, punching one, kicking it to the floor, then ripping the axe out of its grip and using it on the one behind. Their armour, already red, slicked brighter with colours of death.

  But somewhere under the combat-high, Augusta was beginning to understand something: this was not just a random raid, it was too big, too clever, too strong. These orks had come here knowingly.

 

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