A Throne of Blood and Ash

    Azazel’s eyes flashed open. Saturated images flooded her vision. The slightest color burned inside her retinas. Where was she?

    Before the thought even finished, a wave of pain washed over her, like she had just been plugged back into her own body. With hearing came headache, and a splitting one at that. Before she could hear anything beyond a muffled staccato rumbling, her vision took shape. Auburn twilight filled a crumbling sky, and the sun hung its head low. Of course, it couldn’t be seen beyond the smoke. Every so often, white flashes lit up the sky. Azazel only remembered her home, many parsecs away.

    Azazel rolled her head to the left. Before her, her splintered arm smeared a brushstroke of her own gore on the ground. She tried to clench the fist that ought to be there, though she couldn’t quite feel it. Torn muscles moving through and against shattered bone, but she was too dazed to comprehend. It was coming back to her now. About 20 paces beyond her, Azazel saw a pair of burly figures clad in disparate fatigues wrestling over something. She heard their grunts clearly, as well as the shells flying overhead.

    Azazel rolled her head to the right. The right side of her body was half-covered in earth, likely thrown up by an artillery shell. Azazel could see that she was in some earthen fortification. Further on, in the distance, she saw walkers and carapace tanks advancing slowly. Explosions, and the awful screams that followed, flooded her eardrums. Azazel looked quizzically at the carnage before her. Another figure keeled over the earthwork trench. A fragshell had cut his body to ribbons. A carmine flush plastered the inside of the pit.

    That drew Azazel’s attention to another figure, that had been much closer than the wider battle. This one was a lionkin, though his mane was tattered and his face scrunched up in pain. His fatigues were those of the enemy, and in his hands he held his own entrails, cut from his belly by Fate herself and left for him to ponder and grieve. The sight of the cat made Azazel’s hand flinch, and she could feel something hard in it. She wriggled her arm free of the dirt, and she saw that in her hands was her sidearm, a 2200 Series Magpistol. The groans of the cat were terrible, and the occasional blast of fragshells or exploding armor were Azazel’s only reprieve from his wretched wailing.

    She remembered now.

    She was at war.

    She raised her magpistol. Two shots ended his weeping. A third ended his pain.

    Azazel raised herself to look to her left again. Her back and arm were seized immediately by agony, as of the nerves themselves being pulled towards the earth. She collapsed on her back again, head towards the sky. She looked down and saw a railspike in her belly. Did she catch that before or after she lost her arm? She turned her head to the left again and saw the two figures more clearly now. A cat was kneeling over an elf, beating his head in with a club. The elf’s outstretched arms showed that he had long since died. The bloodshot eyes of the cat were locked on the mutilated body as he continued raging against the corpse of his foe. He had gone hysteric.

    She summoned her strength again and rolled her right arm and pistol to her left side. It was an easy shot. One round cut open the cat’s jaw. The left half was shattered, and the right half hung loosely from his head. Another round struck under his left eye, crushing the bone and blowing off the left side of his head.

    The cat’s body slumped to the ground as Azazel lay there, magpistol raised. She let her arm rest across her chest and felt a gentle whisper creep over her. The railspike was quite deep in her guts, and stuck in something important. The pain gradually ebbed away, and her missing arm was no longer a thought on her mind as she turned her head once again to the auburn sky. She could hear a carapace tank engine roar as it crawled over the trench she was in. The battle line had long since passed her position. In favor of the enemy, perhaps. Azazel wondered, briefly, as the smoke turned the sky darker and darker, why she killed them. She wondered why she had to die in a dirt hole fighting for a rock she had never heard of before. Her eyes grew heavier, and she acquiesced. Her breaths grew shallow, uncountable, until she let go, into the same sleep as her enemies.

---

    Hastalorn was indeed a rock, little more than a wayplanet in a desolate part of Imperial space. Millions found Hastalorn to be their bitter grave, even though they were all born off-world, whether they hailed from the brimming industrial worlds of the Imperial Core or the lush and agrarian Realms of Cain. Hastalorn was barren of all but its thin atmosphere, but its system stood astride multiple trade routes that crossed between the Athas and Nuul arms of the galaxy. One of the two stars that bridged that gap held Hastalorn, and all trade and communication in Castle Sector depended on who controlled that planet.

    So it was that when Caladesh rebels set their eye upon Hastalorn, the full might of the Empire fell upon that empty rock. The “cats,” as they were so called, broke free from Imperial rule only a few centuries after they were conquered and enslaved. A newly-minted slaver-baron class was raised from their kind, and those barons enjoyed great opulence. The liberties and imperial coin enjoyed under Isra XXV Avamoore were curtailed slowly by his successors, until the barons were a stone’s throw from the chains themselves. Indeed, the loss of privileges stung worse than placing the irons on their own kind, so the slaver-barons refused the Imperial tax in the year 4530, and for nigh a century the war has raged.

    His Stolid Grace, Arch-Magister Marius Bosgrim, of dwarven stock, was appointed by the emperor to manage the slave revolt. Billions of volunteers and trillions of draftees were flung into the furnace over the course of eighty-nine years, draining Imperial coffers and leading to unrest and famine across the Thousand Worlds. Imperial influence over the Stars of Barbary dwindled to nothing as more resources were diverted to end the war, to little avail.

---

    “We need air support, now!” Griff screamed over his commlink.

    “Reinforcements are en route. Hold your position.”

    Griff’s head was blown off by a Caladesh slug before he heard this. His blood splattered onto a pale elf, but the anticipation of the advancing Caladesh line preoccupied him.

    The morning sky shone through the ghostly fog that hung over the battlefield before Fort Arn. The advancing armor gave forth a low hum that rumbled across the field, even at this distance. The earth was black with dew and blood. A cold wind carried the stench of corpses for many miles. The greedy soil of Hastalorn had all-too-eagerly received the flesh sacrifice of soldiers from every corner of the empire. Dreams, oaths, and blood were offered upon the her altar, and the ever-hungry gods of war turned Hastalorn into a throne of blood and ash.

    The elf’s brigade, the 405th, was just one more in a long line that had landed at Fort Arn to aid in its defence. This recent cohort was ten brigades, each ten-thousand strong, and they had held the position around Fort Arn for five weeks, much longer than predicted by the staff logisters. To the best of Finn’s memory, from rumors about camp and things overheard from officers, only forty-thousand men were left.

    Finn clutched his magrifle. He wiped the sweat from his brow, smearing the dwarf blood on him and giving his pale complexion and drab uniform a curious splash of color. His magrifle and thousands of others were perched on the southern line, bracing for the assault from behind plasteel fortifications. The artillery positions at the redoubt behind them had been firing nonstop for the last four days. Finn looked to his squadmates. Under the control of the great machine called war, that phantasm of duty and coercion, was all not well? The horror of contemplating the alternative was too much for him. A philosopher was not prepared for the cold business of killing. It was, after all, business that led him here, right? The business of putting chains back onto slaves, the business of forcing their labor to extract profit, Finn supposed. A profit he never saw in the slums of Eden. Finn saw the wind carry away the fog to at least a mile out, revealing the bed of bones and debris that lay south of the line.

    One of the men called out. Through the fog, a glittering sea of yellow flashes was seen, like the midday sun over the ocean. After twelve seconds, fragshells and chembombs hammered the imperial line. The din of battle had begun in earnest, and the enemy could not be seen. The imperial line buckled under the weight of the ordinance. Hard hit positions reformed to minimize frontage, and the battle-hardened soldiers, veteran in all but rank, did that which they were drilled to do to stay alive.

    Arbis, Finn’s squad leader, blew his whistle for them to maneuver to the rail cannon. Finn rose with about twenty others and followed through the fire. Finn jogged along the line. Even his rebreather helm couldn’t keep out the acrid taste of the blightgas. He saw the whole body of men reared to strike. Casualties were routine during fire, but the abyss which he and these men were flung into was blacker than any death offered by the field.

    The squad arrived at the rail cannon position, which was hit the hardest. Not a single elf, dwarf, or human survived the opening battery. Those that weren‘t ripped apart by shrapnel were contorted in agony, with a black film coating their mouths and eyes. Finn knew that the blightgas was one of the more unpleasant ways to go.

    “Move the bodies! Ready the rail cannon!" shouted Arbis. Finn’s squad hastily moved the corpses and body parts out from the functional area of the emplacement. The men re-armed the cannon and Finn called out coordinates for the edge of the mist, which continued to creep backwards. Another fragshell struck their position, killing two and wounding three. Among the wounded was Damus, Finn’s bunkie. They had met at the recruitment center on Rescha Prime. Finn was a draftee. Damus had volunteered. He cried out horribly, his legs having been filled with hot tungsten. The squad medic pulled him behind the gun emplacement to be dragged to the autodoc later. If he was lucky, he’d die soon; if not, he’d never walk again, Finn thought.

    The carapace tanks emerged from the fog. Broad constructs, imposing as iron mastadons, pulled themselves through the fog on their tritanium treads. The roar of thousands of magrifles erupted from the southern line. Tiny sparks from the rail cannon’s vantage, Finn thought, but they did their work on any cat infantry that couldn’t shield themselves behind the tank line. Shardmines and rockets disabled and destroyed some of the carapace tanks, but the line continued to advance over the field of bones. Arbis looked through his binoculars and pointed out a black dome. Finn called out its position, and the men reoriented the gun.

    Behind the wall of green plated tanks and interspersed in the sea of caladesh soldiers were much larger vehicles, appearing as immense black domes, about one every mile or so. They crawled along the ground like giant ladybugs amidst a sea of aphids. Mag rounds and rockets were deflected or else exploded on its positronic shield, about twenty feet outwards from the construct itself. Flat, disc-shaped turrets rose from the surfaces of these menacing domes and fired heavy slug rounds. The imperial line groaned, but held fast. It wasn’t their first rodeo.

    The black dome targeted by Arbis’s rail cannon stopped moving. A matrix of plates moved along its surface, and a hole formed on the top, revealing a massive armament, the most fearsome of its arsenal. Arbis gave the command. The rail cannon heated up for a moment, then let off a piercing whine. A great tungsten shard flew faster than sound into the black dome. A cyan trail traced the shard’s path through the air. The dome construct’s shield pierced the shard, splitting it into thousands of long tungsten splinters that fanned out from the point of contact like a shotgun blast. The inner machinery was heavily compromised, and the unfortunate cats caught in the cone of fire beyond the shield were skewered by a dense net of metal spines. The dome stumbled backwards on its many legs, but the immense gun continued to power up. Arbis screamed for a reload. Finn hoped in vain that another railgun had targeted the dome.

    In response, the dome let out a large sizzling stream from its gun. Even from the emplacement, well behind the line, Finn heard the unmistakable scraping noise of plasma munitions flying through the air. The plasma splattered behind the line. By the emperor’s grace, the tungsten shard destroyed the plasma cannon’s aim. The earth behind the line was scorched black by the white-blue plasma, but no casualties were seen within the blaze. Other spots along the southern line burned bright blue; other companies weren’t so lucky. After the first plasma salvo, the caladesh armor and infantry collectively hastened their advance. The imperial soldiers braced for impact.

---

    Sundryn traced the shapes of the constellations, his mind conjuring forms that hugged the stars like rime. One glob presented to him as a butterfly, or perhaps a man with a large hat. Yet another smattering of lights looked to Sundryn like a tiger or bull. The boy couldn’t open his eyes wide enough. Above him was a particularly lovely red star. Sundryn’s mind wandered around this distant firefly, quietly blinking as if to say hello.

    In the distance, Sundryn heard the soft mewling of a house cat. That’s probably ol’ Bonny again, he thought. What a marvel that a cat could survive, let alone thrive in the winter time. Sundryn looked down at his boots, buried in snow. He took another gaze at the marvelous expanse above, then hurried home just as his mother started calling.

---

    The light rain fell on the region west of the Drish mountains that night, far to the south of Fort Arn. The sound reminded him of the rainy summers of childhood spent tending to his sick sister. How old would she be now, if elves lived that long? His family saw him once, after imperial service turned him into a living weapon. His mother recoiled in horror at the monster he had become. Sundryn did not like the rain.

    More’s the pity, for the rain did not abate before the operation was given the go ahead by Captain Hasov.

    Fire fell from heaven. The stars gleamed dismally, blinking lazily through smoke blacker than space. In a breath, they were upon them. The screams, the faces, the terror in their eyes; it all blended together. The terrible visage of the men of iron moved stop-motion through muzzle flashes. Thither, a body shudders as its life leaves, convulsing one final time.

    In the brief spasms of light, he saw the bodies wrenched open by his brothers. The horror of their work was only felt in the deepest recesses of their hard hearts. With each breath, their lungs were pricked by static needles. The rage they visited upon the caladesh, hidden beneath layers of corrugated flesh and xenomorphic mutation, was not without remorse. Still, they killed, for killing was all that was left of them. His Austere Majesty had shaped them, formed these men into beasts. They had no home save the battlefield, no hearth save the fire of war.

    Admidst the killing, Sundryn’s inhuman form was given pause. A hole in the clouds. Above him shone a curious red star. Faint was its ghostly glimmer, and for a moment, he heard ol’ Bonny shuffling about the snow.

    In a few short minutes, it was finished: a thousand corpses tread upon by the Beasts of Barbary.

    The sirens blared. Calls about their camp of incursion. More flames to be snuffed out.

---

    In a deep space arcology, far above Terra, a lone dwarf perused his library. He stood on a chrome-colored, balcony-like structure that was encased in plexiglass. Beyond, was the terrible majesty of the blue rock, spanning the horizon. His cold library was filled with papers, and a single terminal sat alone at a desk facing Terra. The dwarf himself, draped in a fine red robe that hid a suit of a most elegant design, stood before his bookshelf in silence.

    Footsteps echoes through the empty halls of the space station. They grew louder and reverberated softly against the drab chrome walls. The footsteps weren’t nearly as loud as the quiet between them. A caladesh serf, dressed in the most exquisite livery apportioned to her kind, entered the library. She stood in the doorway, waiting for her master to acknowledge her. The dwarf was transfixed by a particularly weighty tome, but moved to place it on the far desk.

    “You are well come, Athri,” the dwarf said. The characteristic rough texture was refined by decades of administrative work, far from ancestral mountainhomes mentioned in the annals of dwarvenkind. The serf entered the office, carrying a platter. Upon it was a large vessel with steam issuing from its spout, and two lacquered cups. The gentle tittering of the cups, that ceramic on ceramic, filled the room as Athri walked towards the desk. The cat was old, though not as old as the dwarf, whose face bore many lines beneath the arcane techno implants. The dwarf sat, and motioned for her to sit as well. The dwarf looked at Athri, perched upon herself before him, almost regal in bearing. He smiled.

    “Surely you did not walk from the scullery to watch me drink my tea. Pour for us.” Athri gave a knowing smile and proceeded to pour tea into the two cups. She placed one before the dwarf and took one for herself.

    “How goes the day, master?” she asked. Life in courts had not quite shaken off her earthy caladesh accent. The dwarf turned to look out to space.

    “The arch-magistrate is a fickle posting.” The dwarf took a sip from his cup. “One never gets used to navigating endless reports, and the Throne makes great demands. I have little to show for it, save the gallons of ink I must have used by now.”

    A subdued titter was the servant’s response. She eyed her master carefully.

     “These damned cats are making a fool of me,” he said slowly, pondering the brown tea in his cup. Tightening his ever-so-slightly slackened back, he relaxed somewhat. “But the posting is not without its benefits.”

    The dwarf removed a folder from his desk and placed it before Athri. In it were the culmination of years of back room dealings and intrigue.

    “I suppose even those dogs at court are owed a few favors for all they’ve done for me," he said.

    The dwarf retrieved from his desk another requisition letter. Stamped with the seal of the Arch-Magister, it contained the orders to the generals of staff in Castle Sector for further troop movement into Hastalorn space. About thirty billion soldiers from nearby systems were to descend upon Hastalorn anew after it had been lost. He slid the letter in front of Athri.

    “Deliver this to the secretariat,” the dwarf said. He put his hands on the folder. “Send this to the darling Chief Minister Wisylith with my regards.”

    “Of course, master,” said Athri. She put down her empty cup, and took the files and the letter before walking out of the library. The dwarf turned his chair to face Terra. His eyes fell upon a faint red star in the distance as he sipped his tea.