Labyrinth of Sorrows by George Mann

Author:George Mann [Mann, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: The Black Library
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

DAED

‘It’s as if someone is leaving us a trail,’ said Daed, staring down at the ruins of a former Traitor Marine. ‘A trail marked in blood.’

The traitor’s wounds were still weeping dark, corrosive fluid that scarred the stone floor where it pooled, forming hissing spirals of vapour. This was the fourth scene of its like that they had encountered as they had passed through the winding tunnels, each of them alike, all lined with tributes to the long-forgotten dead.

‘Either that,’ said Bast, ‘or it is evidence that another faction are indeed here on Kasharat, searching for our prize.’

Daed nodded. He had yet to decide which he thought it might be. Either way, neither option offered him much comfort. Worse still, he could sense the warp-infested traitors all around him, elsewhere in the tunnels, seething like the poisonous vapour itself, like rodents scuttling about in the darkness. The notion filled him with a sharp sense of disquiet.

Something, or someone, had passed this way, tearing through the defences of the Death Guard to leave a path through the mausoleum complex. Whoever or whatever it was, they had enabled the Brazen Minotaurs to pass unmolested into the lair of the enemy. The only question that still concerned Daed was why. It felt somehow wrong that he hadn’t yet had cause to bloody his axe.

‘Captain?’

Daed turned to see Bardus watching the passageway behind them, eager for his attention. ‘What is it, Bardus?’

‘Listen.’

Daed concentrated, straining to hear anything in the echoing depths of the mortuary. There it was – a droning, buzzing sound, like that of a hovering insect.

‘I hear it,’ he replied.

‘Whatever it is, captain, it’s coming this way,’ said Bardus, hefting his bolter.

Daed smiled. Perhaps, finally, they had stirred the enemy in their nest. ‘Brace yourselves. Ready your weapons, I want to be prepared for them when they arrive.’

‘Aye, Captain,’ said Bardus, dropping to one knee and bracing himself against the tunnel wall.

The air here was thick and syrupy, denser than it had been even on the surface, and it obscured Daed’s vision, making it difficult to see what was coming, what diabolical thing was responsible for the noise. He longed for the clean air of Tauron, for the lush green forests, filled with prides of the black lions that prowled through the wilds in their thousands. He longed for the hunt, for the feel of one of the great beasts struggling in his arms as he wrestled it to the ground, burying his hunting knife in its heart. He thought then of what the Sickening would do to Tauron, and he raised his bolt pistol and power axe in defiance. That was what he fought for – to hold the forces of Chaos at bay, to protect the Imperium from its terrible taint. Kasharat was already lost, but the weapon he hoped to recover here might prevent other worlds from falling. Whatever it was that had lured them there, down into that vast mortuary complex, Daed knew then that he would defeat it.

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