[Gaunt's Ghosts 13] The Iron Star.doc by Dan Abnett

Author:Dan Abnett
Language: hu
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction. warhammer 40000
Published: 2011-09-28T19:23:18+00:00

XVI

Ana Curth bent over her patient. Battlefield medicine was not a precise art. Her scrubs were smeared with blood.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “His vitals are bright and strong, but he seems to be slipping away.”

Dorden put his hand on her shoulder. “We’ve done all we can.”

“No.”

“Ana, we have hundreds of casualties to treat. Perhaps—”

“No,” she said, emphatically. “I’m not going to give up.”

“Look at his wounds,” Dorden said, nodding down at the stricken patient. “The Blood Pact has done its work as brutally as ever.”

“There’s still a chance,” she said, reaching for a clean scalpel. “There’s always a chance.” XVII

The etogaur uttered some abominable battle-cry, and expertly whirled his greatsword around his head and shoulders in a display of strength. It was a powered blade, and its gleaming length crackled with indigo sparks, like thread veins of electricity.

Gaunt’s bolt pistol was spent. There was no time to reload. That suited him fine. He wanted this to be sword work.

The etogaur rushed him. Gaunt raised the sword of Hieronymo Sondar to parry the first swing, and managed to do so, but the sheer power of the heavy blade’s impact jarred his wrist and forced him to brace his stance. The etogaur was fast. He evidently knew sword-play, and he revealed a master’s finesse, even though he was wielding a monstrous, heavy blade designed for wholesale slaughter rather than duelling.

Gaunt blocked three more quick blows, turning his sword with a dextrous touch. The etogaur was using the sheer weight of his blade for momentum, swinging each blow into the next, changing his grip on the double-handed pommel to swoop and turn the greatsword around his body for maximum kill power.

The etogaur brought the greatsword around in a bodyline cut. Gaunt stopped it dead with a flat-blade parry, and then drove back, robbing the etogaur of swing momentum. With brute force, the etogaur hefted up his blade, and tried to swing again. His sword was twice as long as Gaunt’s. He had reach. He had power.

His boots sloshing in the mire, Gaunt out-paced him, and turned around his left flank. The etogaur tried to turn, but Gaunt drove in a slice that the etogaur barely parried away. He was wrong-footed, unbalanced.

As the etogaur tried to regain his poise and bring his greatsword up, Gaunt ripped his sword in.

The weight of the blade cut through the greatsword’s grip. It cut through the etogaur’s right wrist, and severed all the digits of his left hand.

12

The etogaur uttered a bark of disbelief. He took a step backwards, blood squirting from his wrist stump and his dismembered hand. He stared at Gaunt through the eye-slits of his dirty gold mask, awaiting the finishing stroke.

Gaunt aimed his sword at the etogaur, tip first. “Run,” he said. “Run and tell them. The Ghosts of Tanith have come, and they will kill you all.”

The etogaur began to howl. He turned and stumbled away into the smoke, bleating out his distress and his terror.

Gaunt allowed himself a smile. He could feel tears of blood on his face.

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