synopsis

 

The planet Eostra is a paradise portrait. A sublime oasis secreted away upon the fringes of Imperial space and largely isolated by unreliable warp currents. To its inhabitants it provides and easy life given to idle pursuits and revelry, detached from political meddling and the threat of war. Never the less, Eostra’s lustrous facade is not without its stains, and there is one which stands to resurface and consume its future.

Captain Jorais Valder of the Emperor’s Children has arrived in orbit aboard the grand cruiser Dirge of Malice under the guidance of the foul sorcerer Lebachus. His company are not typical warriors but noise marines, devotees of sonic excess and the minstrels of death and destruction. These are savage and ruthless fighters capable of tearing men to pieces and warping reality with the insanity of their twisted musics.

They come to Eostra seeking what the locals refer to as the world-harp, an ancient artifact of unholy origins. Though the playing of the harp now sustains life on the planet it was never intended as such. Centuries ago the instrument was fashioned by a cabal of crazed artisans, its impossible songs meant to draw in the fabric of the empyrean to envelop the planet and drag it from material space into the realm of chaos.

A number of vessels bearing Imperial Guard regiments bound for deployment elsewhere have been separated from the rest of their flotilla by the violent warp currents surrounding Eostra. They immediately head planetside at the first signs of the chaos attack to reinforce the megre defenses at the planetary capitol, Avalaun. This is unexpected but of no account to Valder, simply more blood to spill on the path to his prize.

Valder presses the attack in earnest, his forces split to assault the capitol from two sides. The ferocity of his noise marines along with the infernal magics of the sorcerer Lebachus visit ruin upon the Imperial troops. With only minimal losses they battle to the shrine of the world-harp in short order. Ever-increasing warp interference has all but cut off battlefield communications but Valder knows his men will do their job and proceeds with the rites to bring the world-harp back to its original purpose without pause.

After a brief while there is an urgent call outside the shrine and Valder returns to the tainted daylight to behold an unbelievable scene. The rain has picked up, thick and heavy now and Valder realizes with rising fury as he looks towards the south where his second strike force should be, it is not rain at all.

Mycetic spores fall from the sky in droves and where his men should have been advancing to the south he sees only an oncoming mass of indistinct forms. The Tyranids are upon them, utterly undetected until now amidst the disturbance of local warp activity.

Valder spits a curse and orders the remainder of his men to fall back in a defensive cordon. Let the alien filth come, he will take them to the warp with him. The infernal rites continue unabated, the contorting song of the harp struggling to rise above the chatter of chitinous limbs rushing up the stairs towards the shrine.

‘By the warp, cease your sniveling you worthless toad.’ A voice laced with silver and venom whipped smoothly across the ship’s command deck. There was a cultist, his horribly malformed body hunched over an auspex, pattering away in the most loathsome fashion. He squealed at the rebuke and redoubled his agitated drivel as a great section of the command bridge’s shadowed rear wall seemed to come to life and approach him.

‘Heed the Sibylite’s words, wretch! Silence yourself!’ The harshly-filtered voice of a giant cased in twisted plates of black and green bellowed, a bolter raised in armored hands for emphasis. It was a hopeless cause, for with every admonishment the creature’s piteous mewling only grew worse. He attempted to curl himself around the auspex console, burying his face against it as the traitor marine glowered over him.

The woman had risen from her seat and began to approach the anxious cultist, her sinuous form all but naked. A belt around her hips draped plates of armor down her thighs and there was a translucent shroud of black which clung upon her limbs. The meager garb flowed about her body like a gentle breeze, breathing libidinous whispers into the air as it gilded across the grotesque tapestry of her flesh. Wicked scars wove incomprehensible patterns across nearly every inch of her pale skin save for half a head of black hair which hung down limply across one shoulder.

With an almost imperceptible touch, she raised a hand to the massive chest of the damned Astartes accosting the frightened whelp. The black slits of fierce violet eyes contracted sharply as they turned upon the marine and the giant warrior lowered his weapon and silently drew back to his shadowed post as if he’d never been there at all. Free from the threat of an eminent and painful death, the cultist looked up though still cringed visibly as the woman’s hand settled down upon the crook of his neck,

‘M-Mistress Veshna. There is Sssomething… there is…’ The frightened creature lisped raggedly with lips that were little more than flayed flaps of skin. He stammered, unable to find the presence of mind to explain and simply jabbed a crooked finger at the auspex screen.

‘Something, you say. What sort of “something”?’ Veshna’s voice was sultry croon and she felt another quake ripple through the seated heretic as her hands cradled his head back against her stomach. Putrescent eyes glazed over and rolled back as she tilted the cultist’s tattered face up to look at her, ‘Survivors?’ She queried gently, tracing the point of an elongated black fingernail along the side of the man’s neck.’ The attention sparked the return of his accursed sniveling mewls,

‘N-No, my mistress. A machine, perhapsss… s-surely no one could have sssurvived.’ He trailed off with a pitiful whimper.

‘Surely not.’ The witch purred as she curled her hand around the man’s upturned jaw, holding his head back to her. The cultist’s body began to tremble fiercely as dark, sickly blood gushed down over his bare chest. His eyes hung wide and enraptured with Vashne’s black nails embeded deep within the side of his throat. The time had finally come, she thought, feeling the delicious warmth seeping freely across the backs of her fingers, ‘Unless the great power deemed it so.’

With an abrupt, moist sundering Veshna’s claws tore across the man’s neck, dashing nearby consoles with flecks of gore and bathing his torso in a rush of his own putrid ichor. As she stepped back, the cultist’s head flopped limply over the back of his chair, his mangled face wrought in a rapturous expression while his limbs continued to quiver uncontrollably.

She turned away from the twitching body, slitted pupils struck wide with some sublime sense of arousal which brought a delicate laughter to her lips. The Sybilite’s bloodied hand lifted up to her face and one black nail, like a scriptor’s quill, began composing in bloody ink. The scar patterns across her cheek siphoned away the sanguine etchings like a networks of parched roots, leaving radiant likenesses of profane symbols burning upon her skin. With a pleasant sigh the witch’s eyes fell closed and she placed one bloodied nail across her lips thoughtfully,

‘Arashi, my sweet, it has been far too long.’ The lurid whisper roiled out upon air and empyrean alike

Edict of Blood

‘Is this for certain?’ The voice of Brother-Captain Raul Stavian ground out roughly, clinched with the gravity of what he was being told. The vast hall around him stretched on vacantly both before and behind, imparting a sense of isolation to even the greatly armored Astartes and his lone companion. Beyond soaring windows of patterned glass, the warm crimson light of a mid-day sun threw down pools of fire across the tiled floor. He came to a halt at the centre of one, leaving his coal-black eyes to seek out the source of the light. As its touch spread across battle worn features he took some vague comfort in the harsh, glaring light of Reila’s sun, so much akin to that of his homeworld. The muscles in Brother Stavian’s jaw twitched as he attempted to process his thoughts, leaving the recollection of Cestus to dwindle away.

The woman walking next to him drew to a halt as well but said nothing to break the silence which had settled into the hall. Though nearly twice dwarfed by the size of the great Astartes her own presence rose to match it evenly, stern and resolute as befitting a Daughter of the Emperor. Embre Caelus, Sister Superior to the holy Order of Our Martyred Lady, turned her own gaze towards the window. That the vibrant scarlet and black of her livery robes stood complementary to the Chapter colors of the Red Ministers was pure happenstance; it was by no such incidence the two of them shared the same charcoal eyes and flame-touched hair,

‘It struck me quite so when I first arrived here as well.’ Sister Embre spoke gently, as if careful to preserve the quietude. Yet Even in such mild tones the harsh inflections of a Cestian tongue mirrored those in the Captain’s own voice, ‘The hue, the warmth…’ She trailed off a moment before continuing, ‘And yet you can look to the sky and there is the sun, brilliant and fierce… not shrouded behind clouds of filth and blood.’ Stavian formed the beginnings of a grin as his kinswoman spoke. Though the words ushered a notion of condemnation towards the place, there was an unmistakable tone of reverence and longing for the severity of their homeworld ingrained beneath them.