Engines of War Read Online Free

contaminated–’
    ‘–then why send us in at all?’ Corbin concluded. ‘What does the Imperium have to gain from a ground assault at this point? Why not just fire off a salvo of rockets from orbit, or blast the whole world to ashes? Stop the rot from spreading further?’
    ‘Unless,’ said Iunus, ‘perhaps there’s something about Orath, about this “breadbasket world”, that we don’t know?’
    ‘The captain doesn’t have to explain his decisions to you,’ Arkelius growled.
    ‘No, sergeant,’ agreed Corbin. ‘Of course he doesn’t.’
    He fell silent then – Iunus too – and Arkelius was left to his own thoughts again.
    The fact was that he couldn’t have told them anything if he had wanted to. He had put the same questions to Galenus himself earlier – and received the same curt answer. Whatever Orath’s secret was – because Arkelius, like Corbin and Iunus, was certain it must have one – it was considered too sensitive for his ears.
    A new voice crackled over the Scourge ’s frequency: their Thunderhawk pilot. He advised the Hunter’s tank commander and crew that – at last – he was putting them down. Arkelius acknowledged him gratefully, and told Corbin to restart the engine. For the second time, he realised that his driver had pre-empted his order.
    Runes blazed into life on the control banks around Arkelius, bathing him in a muted glow. He held onto his seat as the Thunderhawk decelerated sharply. A moment later, the Scourge of the Skies ’s chassis let out a groan of relief as the clamping arms released it.
    It fell the last few metres to Orath’s surface, and landed with a violent jolt.
    Raising his head, Arkelius peered through one of the vision slits above him. He saw more Thunderhawks, swooping down around his tank like giant metal birds. They laid their equally giant metal eggs, then shot away into the overcast sky.
    He couldn’t see much else, so he turned to his tactical displays for information. They had put down in a field, thirty kilometres to the north-west of their objective: Fort Kerberos, one of Orath’s former listening posts, now the Death Guard’s base of operations.
    Arkelius instructed Corbin to release the brakes and step on the accelerator pedal. The Hunter’s tracks spun for almost a second before finding traction in the ashy ground.
    Then, the Scourge of the Skies surged forwards. It smashed its way through blackened, wilting sorghum sheaves that grew almost as high as Arkelius’s main vision slit and crushed them into pulp beneath its armoured-metal weight.
    A new voice came over the vox-net: Captain Numitor of the Eighth Reserve Company. He instructed the Ultramarines artillery to form up into an arc, with their most powerful units – like the Hunters, the Scourge and the Stalkers – towards the rear.
    Eyes on his displays, Arkelius voxed directions to Corbin. The driver brought the Scourge around and manoeuvred it into position, on the right-hand flank of the most impressive array of artillery that Arkelius had ever seen: at least twenty tanks, by his count. They were flanked by a Predator Destructor ahead of them and a Stalker behind.
    In the field in front of the tanks, two hundred Space Marines were forming up too. They were loading up their bolters, performing litanies of accuracy and hatred over each shell. Arkelius felt a fleeting pang of jealousy, wishing he was out there with them.
    Behind him, Iunus was preparing the Scourge ’s weaponry.
    The next voice they heard was Galenus’s, voxing from the orbiting Quintillus . He reminded his brothers of their mission: to retake the captured fort, despite the fact that – according to the battle-barge’s scans – the Death Guard had reduced it to a ruin. Arkelius could guess what his two crewmates would make of that.
    The captain then gave way to the company Chaplain, who bestowed the blessings of the Emperor upon the assembled force. Then, at last, Captain Numitor gave the order that Arkelius had