V3 Chapter 13: The Absolute Pressure of the Monarch of the Hunt
Duvette held down the hammering in his chest.
The feeling of being watched by an apex predator still coiled around him.
The Hive Tyrant on Cold Steel Ridge had not put this kind of pressure on him.
The Greater Daemon on Formal Prime's main world had not either.
Shalaxi Helbane merely stood there, and every nerve in his body was telling him to step back.
He could not step back.
All the Slaanesh daemons in the area were converging toward the plaza.
Daemonettes kept flooding through the rifts. Seekers drove down streets and along walls at full speed. More strange daemon shapes were forming in the light of the six towers.
Their targets were becoming increasingly clear.
Duvette.
And Yvraine.
Then, from above, through the sky that had been covered by the psychic vortex, came a rolling sound.
It pressed down from a great height, passing through the storm and shaking the ruins of every building in the area.
Everyone looked up.
Countless drop pods came down like burning meteors, crossing the psychic storm's interference at tremendous speed. They were descending at nearly vertical angles toward the ground, their outer casings bursting with sparks as they passed through the psychic storm.
"Reinforcements are here!"
Someone shouted through the channel.
The warriors present understood immediately.
The fleet in orbit had not abandoned them.
In the same moment the sound hit them, Duvette snapped Entropy's Song from his hip.
A deep red beam fired from the weapon and crossed the distance toward Shalaxi Helbane.
The Monarch of the Hunt produced a contemptuous laugh.
It did not take the beam head-on.
The tall hunting shape merely turned its body a fraction, and with a composure that was almost offensive in its elegance, stepped clear of Entropy's Song's beam.
Bolt fire immediately followed.
Ultramarines and Salamanders opened up simultaneously. Heavy bolts and melta weapons turned the street in front of it to rubble. But Shalaxi had already vanished from inside the fire pattern.
In the next instant, it appeared in front of the Ultramarines' forward rank.
The Soulpiercer drove forward.
The first Ultramarine was run through the chest. The second had only begun to raise his chainsword when the piercing talons tore him open. The third drove his pauldron into it bodily and was caught around the neck by the living whip, then flung backward into the wall.
Attacks fell on Shalaxi in return.
Blades cut toward it and were deflected by a layer of glossy, luminescent protection. Bolt rounds detonated close to its body and shattered the stone column behind it.
It laughed softly.
Every step appeared to be moving in time with music that no one else could hear.
With graceful, elaborate, and entirely lethal movements it sent one human at a time to the ground.
Astartes fell.
Astra Militarum soldiers were torn open.
The defensive line broke wherever it passed, and nothing in the engagement was a match for the Monarch of the Hunt for even a single exchange.
Large numbers of Slaanesh daemons followed in its wake and drove into the gaps it created. Daemonettes shrieked as they threw themselves into the breaches. The Salamanders burned them with flamers. Anderson drove his assault infantry into the openings to try to seal them.
Shalaxi did not slow.
It moved toward Duvette and Yvraine, humming something that landed between a whisper and an invitation.
Those had always been its only targets.
Every other life in the engagement was a footnote on a page it was not reading.
Duvette drew a slow breath.
He understood that only he could go forward to meet it now.
There was no Calgar here to help.
There was no power of the Emperor available to call on.
He had only himself.
And he was the only one who carried the Abyss of Ithaka—the only aura that could diminish this terrifying Greater Daemon's speed and reaction time.
He glanced at Yvraine beside him.
She already had the Crone Sword drawn. The tension of someone ready to fight was still on her face.
"I go first," Duvette said quietly. "Support me."
Yvraine looked at the mortal Commissar.
She knew Duvette had strength that went beyond any ordinary mortal. But against Shalaxi Helbane, it still seemed impossibly small.
"You will die."
"Then don't let me die too fast."
Duvette levelled the power sword and steadied his breathing.
Shalaxi appeared to register the mortal's intention.
The Monarch of the Hunt produced an amused laugh.
It spread its long arms wide, as though encouraging its prey to charge.
"Come then."
The voice drove directly into Duvette's ears.
"Show me why you drew the gaze of the Prince of Pleasure."
Duvette's eyes sharpened.
Every ability running through his body pushed him to his physical limit.
He charged at the Greater Daemon.
The ground cracked beneath his feet.
That force was enough to register, however faintly, with the Monarch of the Hunt.
The power sword swung at the spear.
The instant the weapons met, Shalaxi moved its wrist with minimal effort.
A glossy sheen along the shaft turned Duvette's blade off-line.
In the moment his form was deflected, the gap became visible.
There was no bridging the difference in their combat ability.
Duvette's swordsmanship was more than sufficient among mortals. Against the most perfect Hunter that the Prince of Pleasure had ever made, it was not close to enough.
The piercing talons behind it drove toward Duvette's vitals.
A sharp, clear sound.
Yvraine drove into the exchange and caught the lethal strike with the Crone Sword.
Shalaxi laughed again.
It moved through both of their attacks without effort, evading as though the effort cost nothing. The spear, the living whip, and the piercing talons all moved at once, pressing Duvette and Yvraine back repeatedly.
"Little new Bride of Death," Shalaxi said in a light voice. "Your life will end here."
Its gaze rested on the Crone Sword.
"That blade as well will be offered to the great Prince of Pleasure."
Then it truly began to attack.
The Abyss of Ithaka was working.
Shalaxi's speed was genuinely reduced.
But it was still too fast.
Even slowed, it was faster than both of them.
The spear came in. Duvette turned aside and took a deep cut across the shoulder from the tip.
The living whip swung out. Yvraine rolled clear and still took a line of blood across her arm.
The piercing talons came from behind. Duvette blocked with the power sword and was driven to one knee by the force of it.
Within only a handful of exchanges, both of them were covered in wounds.
Duvette barely avoided a thrust aimed at his chest, and felt something cold settle in his thinking.
It was difficult to accept that this was only a projection. If the true form arrived, they would already be dead.
A strike came with devastating momentum.
Yvraine took the living whip full force and was launched backward, striking broken stone steps. She forced herself up, still holding the Crone Sword.
Shalaxi did not follow her.
The Monarch of the Hunt levelled the speartip at Duvette.
"Now. Starting with you." Its voice was soft. "Interesting mortal."
As it began to move forward, a broad figure stepped in front of Duvette.
Markus had broken through.
All thirteen Black Shields had finally forced their way through the daemon tide's encirclement and formed a wall between Duvette and the Greater Daemon.
"Commissar, fall back!"
Markus's voice came through his helmet.
Duvette forced himself upright.
The Black Shields had bought him a brief window.
He had been holding Silence back. With Yvraine close beside him, activating it risked disrupting her Ynnead-derived power and potentially exposing her to Shalaxi at the worst possible moment.
Now, he had no more room to hold it back.
Silence deployed.
An indescribable blankness descended on Shalaxi Helbane in an instant.
The Monarch of the Hunt let out a pained shriek for the first time.
The connection between the hunting shadow and the six towers was severed for one brief moment. The Prince of Pleasure's blessing was suppressed. The Warp's music went silent for a short, absolute second.
The Black Shields attacked immediately.
Three came in from the flanks, shields and power swords driving toward Shalaxi's knees and the sides of its waist.
Shalaxi shrieked and moved through them at speed that, even suppressed, bordered on the imperceptible, passing between them like something that existed only at the corner of vision.
In what seemed like a single exchange, three Black Shields had been critically wounded. Their power armour was torn open, blood hitting the floor, and they could not rise again.
Shalaxi then moved again at full speed toward Duvette, who had managed to stand. The Black Shields who tried to hold its path were thrown aside one after another, critically wounded, as though the Monarch of the Hunt's full fury had briefly stripped away even the suppression.
In the end, only Markus remained. He raised his storm shield in front of Duvette.
The Soulpiercer struck the shield face with absolute speed and force.
The storm shield blazed with light and held for less than a second before the speartip drove through.
The spear punched into Markus's chest. Shalaxi flicked its arm casually, and the body on the speartip was thrown backward and hit the ground.
"Markus!" Duvette's shout tore from him. The status reading went critical in an instant. He had not expected Silence to fail to weaken the Greater Daemon, had not expected it to enrage it further.
Just as the Monarch of the Hunt's furious spear was about to run through the mortal who had the power to genuinely irritate it, a storm of Volkite beams and plasma bolts fell from the other side of the engagement.
The fire physically separated Duvette from the Monarch of the Hunt.
Shalaxi stepped back several paces with complete ease, clearing the dense fire pattern.
Duvette snapped his head around.
Tens of thousands of cold blue lights had appeared inside the daemon tide.
Drop pod casings split the ground open. Hatch panels blew off. Silent metal shapes walked out of the settling dust.
Men of Iron.
Duvette understood at once.
This was Cawl's work.
The ancient war machines showed their true nature in combat for the first time.
They had no fear. They had no emotion.
The daemons' whispers could not lead them astray. They would offer no despair at the moment of destruction.
The daemonettes' laughter found no audience for the first time.
The Men of Iron opened fire in silence.
Volkite beams cut through the daemon tide. Plasma bolts punched through Seekers and Fiends. Entire daemon formations burst apart under the fire, and subsequent energy weapon volleys swept through what remained.
This time, the Men of Iron had only one target.
Daemons.
Shalaxi turned and looked at the war machines. For the first time, its laughter carried something that was not pleasure.
At the same moment, Yvraine saw an opening from across the plaza.
She pushed herself upright with the Crone Sword as support.
Blood ran from the corner of her mouth.
She raised the Crone Sword above her head and called out at the top of her voice.
"I am the Daughter of Death!"
"I am Yvraine!"
A cold, still power expanded outward from her body.
In that moment, every soul of the dead in the Tarentus capital who had been in the process of being drained by the towers turned toward her.
They did not return to life.
The breath of death drew them free from the Prince of Pleasure's pull.
The wailing that had been feeding the towers paused, then surged toward Yvraine like a tide reversing.
Shalaxi's head turned sharply.
The Monarch of the Hunt's attention finally left Duvette.
It looked toward the Aeldari Emissary of Death.
Yvraine held the Crone Sword in both hands as the dead gathered behind her.
Her voice carried through the storm, her eyes focused with a force that had no adequate name.
"You will not take them."
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