Within the gaggle of Imperial servants, the Order of Remembrancers was also represented. Cataloguing, picting, scribing; some rendered the scene in art that would later be confiscated, others took personal testimony of the liberated where they could – this too would be redacted. No images or reports of the Crusade escaped into the wider Imperium without first being sanctioned. Capturing glory, the gravitas of the moment, that was the purpose of the remembrancers. Nothing more. Vulkan saw Seriph amongst the throng, carefully staying out of the way behind a squad of Utrich fusiliers.

Following his primarch’s eye, Numeon asked, ‘Isn’t that your human biographer, my lord?’

‘We parted poorly when we last met. Another effect of Curze’s presence on me, I am ashamed to admit. I will redress that.’ Vulkan started off towards the Munitorum encampment. Despite the cramped conditions, none stood in his way. ‘Have the Legion ready to depart when I return,’ he called to his equerry, who saluted behind him. ‘I wish to linger here no longer than is necessary.’

‘Yes, my lord,’ Numeon replied, and in a lower voice added, ‘You will find no argument here.’

Numeon’s gaze strayed from his primarch to the edge of the camps where a squad of Night Lords looked on. Wisely, they had chosen to pitch their landers far from the Salamanders’ muster field and were represented by a token force yet to join the others. There was no sign of Lord Curze.

The VIII legionaries mingled with the Munitorum officers, who gave every one of them a wide berth. This was also wise. Even with their skull-faced helmets concealing their expressions, Numeon could tell that the Night Lords were enjoying this petty act of intimidation. More than once, a legionary deliberately strayed needlessly close to the path of a busy clerk or scribe, forcing the poor individual to alter his course lest he be harassed or called to account under the glare of retinal lenses. The others not involved in these ‘games’ muttered snidely with one another at the obvious sport.

‘They’re goading us,’ said Varrun, appearing quietly at Numeon’s side with the rest of the Pyre Guard.

‘Our primarch,’ said Atanarius, noble chin lifted in the face of the VIII, ‘how does he fare?’

Numeon answered honestly, ‘The same as us. The Kharaatan compliance has left a bitter taste.’

‘They revel in it,’ offered Ganne, only half holding back a snarl.

‘I would see the smirks wiped off their faces,’ said Leodrakk, prompting a slow nod and muttered agreement from his brother, Skatar’var.

‘Aye,’ Varrun agreed. ‘In the duelling cages, I would measure their true worth as warriors.’

Only Igataron said nothing, silently glowering at the Night Lords.

‘They are still our brothers-in-arms,’ Numeon reminded them. ‘Our allies. Their cloth is not so different from ours.’

‘It is of a darker hue,’ snarled Ganne. ‘We all saw the slain in Khar-tann City.’

Numeon gestured to the human rebels being herded slowly into the Munitorum’s pens.

‘And here, the very much alive citizens of Khartor. It is a fact difficult to ignore.’

No one spoke, but the heat of anger was palpable between them and directed at the VIII Legion.

The Night Lords were not just there to cajole, however. Their legionaries ringed a third, much smaller encampment. This one was a prison of enclosed ceramite, warded by no fewer than three Librarians. It surrounded the xenos overlords who had enslaved this world.

Khartor had been the greatest of Kharaatan’s cities, its planetary capital. And it was here, when the Imperium returned with flame and retribution, that the aliens had chosen to make their lair. A coven of twelve had subverted the will of Kharaatan, a cautionary tale of the dangers of xenos collusion. Xenographers codified them: eldar. Long-limbed, almond-eyed and smouldering with arrogant fury, the XVIII knew this race well. They were not unlike the creatures they had fought on Ibsen, or the raiders that had once plagued Nocturne for centuries before the coming of Vulkan. The Pyre Guard were Terrans by birth, they had not experienced the terrors inflicted on their primarch’s home world, but shared his ire at the aliens in spite of that.

The natives of Kharaatan had worshipped these witch-breeds as gods, and would pay a price for that idolatry.

‘What persuasion could the xenos have used to press an entire population into service?’ Numeon wondered aloud.

‘Psychic subversion,’ said Varrun. ‘A trick to bend weak minds, favoured by the witch. How many worlds have we seen undone, thusly?’

Grunts of agreement from the other Pyre Guard met this proclamation from the veteran.

‘I can think of one very recent in the memory,’ uttered Ganne.

‘The tribes of Ibsen were victims, not cohorts,’ Numeon corrected him.

‘But how to choose which from which amongst this sorry lot?’ said Varrun, smoothing his ashen beard as if contemplating that very conundrum.

Army troopers and Munitorum staff were thronging the camps now as the citizens of Khartor were steadily divided. A sea of desert-tan fatigues and grey Departmento-issue uniforms swept between the Salamanders and the Night Lords, parting them. The legionaries could still see one another, as they towered above the humans, their upper torsos, shoulders and heads still visible.

Numeon had seen and heard enough.

‘Get to the ships and finish the muster. All shall be in readiness for the primarch’s return.’

The Pyre Guard were moving out when Numeon saw a flicker of activity in the third camp enclosing the xenos. He was half-turned when he noticed the flash of light in his peripheral vision, harsh against the setting sun, that described the Night Lords in monochrome. Suddenly, they were moving. Someone cried out and fell, his voice too deep and vox-augmented to be human.

Another flash came swiftly. Lightning. And not a cloud in the sky.

‘The psykers!’ snapped Leodrakk.

A muzzle flare erupted, the deep, staccato report of a bolter echoing across the muster field and the encampments at the same time. It traced a line through the masses, shredding blood and bone, sundering flesh as the hail of shells reacted.

A second flare was born, chasing the quarry of the first. Then a third and a fourth.

Numeon saw their prey, just as he saw the numerous Vodisian troopers and Munitorum clerks destroyed as they fell beneath the guns, collateral damage to the Night Lords’ efforts at recapture.

The eldar were loose.

Somehow, they had slipped the psychic noose put about their necks by the VIII Legion Librarians and were now running amok.

In the face of this unexpected carnage, panic swiftly followed. In seconds, the close confines of the camps became a crush.

Khar-tans fled, leaping over the barriers intended to funnel them towards their new lives, only to be gunned down as discipline masters shouted orders to open fire. Others fought, tearing at their new oppressors with bare hands and teeth. Cudgels and shock mauls were unsheathed. Some wept, the terror for them not yet over. Many were trampled in the stampede, taking Imperial servants with them. One clerk, slow to realise what was happening, disappeared in a surging mass of shrieking Khar-tans. A trooper was knocked aside accidentally, crushed against a ship’s hull. Blood fountained up its grey flank in an arterial spray.

‘Into the crowd!’ Numeon bellowed, leading the others in to restore order.

Behind them, the rest of the Legion had begun to move.

‘ Brother?’ It was Nemetor, hailing Numeon over the vox-link.

‘Breach the Munitorum’s cordon,’ Numeon shouted. ‘Get their pilots to move those ships. Tell them if they don’t, their precious mortal cargo will be crushed to death.’ He cut the link, letting Nemetor get to work.

The Pyre Guard formed up quickly into a spear shape, piercing the morass of bodies the Munitorum and Army seemed adamant would not spill out onto the desert.