Sebaton was standing at the edge of the drainage basin, a hook and net in his hand, ready to scavenge. He rooted himself to that spot, like an anchor in time, and replayed it over and over. Stepping into the water, feeling the brush of fingernails against his naked skin. The burn as they gripped. The five red weals left behind, a hand grasping, entreating another child to come down into the water and join the rest of the damned.

Lightning split the sky, dark and forbidding. Standing ankle-deep in the murky water, Sebaton sheltered his eyes, but the storm continued to rage behind them.

‘Do not resist…’ bellowed the thunder.

Sebaton held on, just as the drowned boy clung to his ankle.

He groaned, ‘Let me go,’ his voice that of a child’s and an adult’s at the same time as two realities collided.

‘Please…’

‘Let him go.’ The voice was distant at first, recalling Sebaton from the brink of unconsciousness. The pain abated, his eyes opened again, but the sense of violation remained.

The Librarian, Hriak, was standing in front of him. The dark lightning had gone from his hand.

He hissed, ‘He’s a psyker, Leodrakk.’

So that was the Salamander’s name then, Sebaton assumed.

‘What did you find, Hriak?’ asked Domadus.

‘Despite trying to obfuscate it with some childhood trauma, he is not who he claims to be. He found something in some ruins, in a sector of the city far from here. But I don’t think he has it any more.’

Leodrakk changed places with Hriak to continue the interrogation.

‘Those traitors are here for a dark purpose. For some reason, they were also looking for you. Now,’ he said, raising his bolter so Sebaton was staring down its ugly, black maw, ‘I will ask you one final time. Who are you and what are you doing in Ranos?’

Sebaton realised then that the situation he was in was much more grave than it had first appeared. He hadn’t been rescued, he had simply traded one potential captor for another. These warriors were loyal servants of the Emperor, but something had broken inside them. They were verging on desperate, even fatalistic. Wounded, and not only physically. They were the kind of scars that would never heal, like the five tiny marks on Sebaton’s leg.

Sebaton sagged in the chair, but looked the Salamander in the eye.

‘I am Caeren Sebaton. I am an archaeologist, and I came here to excavate relics.’

‘No more lies or I’ll kill you here. Now,’ Leodrakk warned, priming his bolter. ‘We didn’t survive the betrayal of Isstvan with a great deal of patience. Speak truthfully!’

Leodrakk’s hand was suddenly around Sebaton’s throat and lifting him out of the chair. As the ground fell away beneath him, Sebaton felt his larynx being slowly crushed.

‘ I can’t… speak… with your hand… around my throat,’ he croaked, feet dangling in mid-air.

Snarling, Leodrakk threw the man down. Sebaton sprawled, bouncing hard off his right shoulder but landing with some grace on all fours. Scurrying backwards into a corner of the room, he thought about using the ring, but the three warriors had him cornered.

He saw Domadus properly for the first time. The Iron Hand was heavily cybernetic. Most of his left side had been reconstructed, the mechanism of his body visible through the gaps in his black armour. His throat and lower jaw were completely augmetic, and puckered scar-tissue ringed the area around where his left eye should have been, but where instead a red lens flashed as it refocused on its target.

Mag-locking his bolter to his thigh, Leodrakk advanced on Sebaton. They were in pain, all of these warriors, and like anyone in that position they wanted to lash out.

‘I’ll crush the truth out of you.’

A fourth figure stepped into the light, the one whom Sebaton had seen observing from the shadows. ‘Stop.’

Leodrakk faced the legionary angrily. ‘It’s under control.’

Now Leodrakk had turned, Sebaton saw the chunk of bone tusk jutting from his armoured hide. It was split, little more than a stump.

The legionary who had interrupted was a Salamander too, and wore fine-crafted armour like his comrade’s, but had his helmet clamped to his thigh. His hair was cut into a red crest that perfectly bisected his scalp. A scar throbbed under his right eye, but he wasn’t blind in it, nor did it ruin his noble countenance.

‘No, you lost control when you nearly choked him, brother.’ He gestured to the door. ‘Shen’ra is outside. Something tripped the sentries.’

Leodrakk suddenly looked concerned.

‘Both guns?’

‘Sensors, Tarantula sentries. Everything.’

‘How far out?’

‘First marker.’

Sebaton had no idea what they were talking about, but it sounded serious.

Leodrakk’s anger returned with interest. ‘All the more reason to put this one in the fire.’

‘I hope he’s speaking metaphorically,’ said Sebaton.

‘He is,’ said the other Salamander, but Leodrakk didn’t give that impression at all.

‘We make him talk. Tell us everything he knows,’ he snarled, clutching the grip of his sidearm.

‘By force-feeding him your bolter?’

‘If necessary!’

‘Out,’ the other Salamander said, flatly.

‘What?’

‘You heard me, Leo. You’ll kill him if you stay in this room. I can see it in your eyes.’

Leodrakk’s eyes were burning with the heat of a firestorm. His knuckles cracked and for a few seconds he stood his ground before capitulating.

‘Apologies, captain. I forget myself.’

‘Yes, you do, Leo. Now leave us.’

Leodrakk did as ordered, prompting Domadus to guard the door behind him.

After watching his brother go, the other Salamander crouched down at Sebaton’s eye level.

‘You seem a little more civilised than your companions,’ said Sebaton without a trace of belief.

‘I am not,’ the other Salamander assured him. His voice was deep, cultured. It shared some commonalities with Leodrakk but possessed the authority of true command. ‘As you can see,’ he gestured to his visage, ‘I am a monster. Much worse than Leodrakk. He is more temperate than I.’

‘What about your psyker?’ Sebaton nodded to the Raven Guard, who had folded his arms and taken to watching quietly from a distance. Sebaton still detected some latent psychic activity, like a mental polygraph gauging his every response.

The Salamander looked askance at the other legionary.

‘No, his manners are worse than my own. Given his own way, you’d be dribbling the last dregs of your sanity into your lap right about now.’

‘I would prefer to avoid that.’

‘That’s up to you. We are now being hunted, just like you are. Our time here is finite before we’re discovered. Our enemy’s scouts have already tripped the first of our alarms. So, you can appreciate I would prefer this to be concluded quickly. My name is Artellus Numeon, and I lead this group. The lives of the men in it are my responsibility, which is why Leodrakk would not have killed you without my say so. It’s also why Hriak hasn’t cored out your head like a piece of fruit. I, however, answer to no one in this place and I willkill you in the next four seconds unless you give me a reason not to.’

Sebaton’s head still hurt from the psychic probe and between this maniac and the psyker preparing to eviscerate him mentally, he was running short of options.

Just like Nurth all over again.Stepping out of that airlock, he’d thought that was an end to it but they brought him back. Again. To do this.

I am a spy, not an assassin. And as for the mission… Well, that would require something incredibly special.

Sebaton knew he really had no choice. Trust this Numeon, or die here. But then would that really be so bad? Even if he did, would that really be an end to it? He suspected not.

‘We were excavating, that much is true. We found something. An artefact. It’s very old, very powerful, and your enemies want it.’