Warlord: Fury of the God-Machine by David Annandale

Author:David Annandale
Language: eng, eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Published: 2017-01-17T10:57:13+00:00

Chapter 9

Flames and Ashes

Governor Pheon Markos of Therimachus, cousin to Nevaeh and Hallard Eukrolas, now sole representative of the Eukrolas clan and by default lord-governor of Katara, was already in his bunker. Syagrius had come, at the governor’s request, to meet him at the palace, which stood on the highest of the city’s four hills, in the north west of the hive. Syagrius had expected to meet with Markos where they had spoken before, in the governor’s quarters. Markos had received the marshal, when the Imperial Hunters had first arrived at Therimachus, in a handsomely appointed study. The chamber’s twenty-foot vaulted window looked to the south east, over the enormous expanse of Katara’s largest population centre. The study was the space of a man who was a scholar at least as much as he was an administrator. The walls were lined with chronicles of Katara and exegetical texts. Markos served Syagrius an excellent vintage of amasec. The two men had discussed the conduct of the war in an atmosphere of calm and mature thought. Syagrius had come away from his meeting impressed.

He was not impressed now. Instead of taking him and the officious, sweating major domo hundreds of feet up into the clearer air of the hive, the grav lift descended five hundred feet beneath the foundations of the palace. It deposited them outside an immense vault door of reinforced adamantium plate.

The major domo placed his hand on an identity plate next to the door, stood still for a retinal scan and spoke into a vox-speaker, announcing Syagrius. After a pause, the door rolled aside into the granite and rockcrete walls. On the other side of the doorway was a guard chamber. The officers wore the uniforms of the Eukrolas family’s private militia. On the other side of the chamber was an even larger vault door. The sergeant and the major domo repeated the identification procedures, and when this door too opened, Syagrius entered a corridor that was disproportionately low for the imposing portal that covered it. The major domo led him into the bunker proper. The space was much more cramped than Markos’ study. There were shelves of books here too, but the governor’s desk was functional rather than ornate. All of one wall was given over to a shrine to the Emperor. Syagrius guessed many prayers had been offered to it over the last few hours.

In the centre of the chamber was a tacticarium table. Markos was pacing back and forth before it, on the far side from Syagrius. His eyes flickered between the marshal and the hololithic display. ‘Thank you for coming, Marshal Syagrius,’ he said. He spoke rapidly, and with a faint tremor. He was sweating. His fingers tap-tap-tapped the edge of the table as he paced. He did not look like the academically inclined aristocrat who had welcomed Syagrius to Therimachus.

Behind Syagrius, the massive door rolled shut once more with a reverberating boom. Markos did not relax in the slightest.

‘How can I be of service, governor?’ Syagrius asked.

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