Dark Apostle

Marduk fired his bolt pistol into the face of an enemy as he formed the complex words of a passage from the Enumeration of Convocation, an inspired work that blessed Erebus had crafted in the language of the daemon. He spoke the difficult words easily, his chainsword hacking into flesh and his bolt pistol blasting through bone.

A searing beam of white-blue energy from a Skitarii weapon caused the flesh and blood of several Word Bearers to boil within their power armour, and Marduk rolled to the side as the beam swept towards him, almost stumbling over the words of the complex enumeration. The results of such a slip could be catastrophic, but he picked up the incantation smoothly once again as he rolled to his feet, cleaving his weapon across the throat of another foe.

He barked out the guttural words of the enumeration, feeling the power of Chaos building, tapping into the excessive amounts of energy waiting to be released. Burias-Drak'shal's horned head lifted as the possessed warrior crouched over a kill, nostrils flaring as it scented the build-up of warp energy.

With a wave of his chainsword, Marduk ordered the warriors around him to form a circle, with him as its centre. The power armoured Chaos Marines of the Legion planted their feet, facing outwards, mowing down any that drew near their First Acolyte.

Burias-Drak'shal stalked through the maelstrom of battle. His whole posture was altered once the change had taken him. From a tall, proud and graceful warrior, he became a hulking, stooped, feral creature that oozed power and barely suppressed rage. He roughly shoved a Word Bearers warrior-brother out of his way to take his place beside the First Acolyte, who was drawing near the end of the enumeration, and planted his icon firmly into the ground.

Reaching out with one hand, Marduk gripped the icon, directing the building power of Chaos through its black metal. He gripped the icon tightly and closed his eyes, still speaking in the contorting language of the warp. When he opened his eyes they were as black as pitch.

He barked the last words of the enumeration and, in the moment of silence that followed, he and Burias-Drak'shal raised the icon high before slamming its butt down into the ground, steam rising from where it touched the earth.

The air around the icon shimmered as if with the heat of a star-engine and the long, spiked haft began to vibrate. A swirling vortex of darkness suddenly opened, and the surrounding air was sucked towards it. The kathartes screamed into reality from within the portal. Scores of them hurtled up into the sky from the rift in real space.

Their exposed muscles were slick with blood and they beat their powerful, flayed wings as they coiled overhead before descending upon the battlefield. They plummeted into the Elysians, talons curled forwards like those of an attacking bird of prey, hooking and ripping into flesh. Some men were grasped by the shoulders and lifted into the air before other kathartes screamed into them, ripping at them and squabbling over the pickings. Guardsmen were torn apart as the kathartes fought, and Marduk could feel the rising terror and fear of the soldiers, their resolve wavering.

'Fear not the devils! Faith in the Emperor will protect your souls!' came a shout from a leather-clad individual with wide, mad eyes and Marduk laughed at his folly. The man screamed an oath to the Emperor and shot down one of the katharte daemons. The shot broke one of its wings and it fell into the crush of men.

Marduk roared and leapt towards the figure, smashing aside those in his path, but the black-clad commissar was lost amongst the melee. Marduk swore in anger and continued to slaughter those around him.

Laron smiled as he saw the enemy surge forward. This was the moment he had been waiting for. He commanded his signal communicators to order the attack. They had stormed forward from their final defensive line. Now the sheer weight of the Imperials must surely prevail.

Laron raced back down the embankment towards the waiting Valkyries. He leapt aboard the closest aircraft and hooked himself onto the rappel line attached just inside the open bay door, nodding to Captain Elias. The aircraft's engines roared as it took off and the flight of thirty Valkyries rose just high enough to clear the embankment of the third defensive line before screeching over the heads of the frantically battling combatants in the no man's land below. The crewmen manning a pair of secured heavy bolters opened fire as the Valkyries swooped low over the field of battle. Laron's storm troopers, kneeling in the open doors and secured with rappel lines, fired their hellguns down into the melee, picking out targets amongst the chaotic battle surging below.