A few moments later there was a crack like thunder. Ragnar was aware of the vibration of the distant explosion passing through the structure beneath his feet.
Down below, the Blood Claws celebrated. They gathered around a blazing fire and roared chants drawn from the epics of their people. They told of their deeds and the deeds of their ancestors. Some of them shouted out what they had done today, the number of heretics they had killed and the way they had killed them. He smiled at the innocence of their boasting. They were so proud of themselves and what they had done, filled with the simple pride of men who were being blooded, on their first campaign; feeling, for the first time, the thrill of war as it was waged between the stars. He knew that their boasting was as much to relieve tension as to impress their peers. All of them knew how many of their number had died today. All of them had taken part in the funeral rites which Ragnar had led. Now their task was done, they were coming to terms with the fact that they were still alive, that men, evil men, had tried to kill them, and that they had endured. Ragnar could well remember the shock and the thrill of that realisation himself. There were times when it seemed like only yesterday that he had fought in his own first off-world campaign. Everything had seemed simpler then somehow, before his rise to command, before the long series of adventures and wars which had seen him rise faster and further than any Space Wolf had ever done before. There were occasions when he wondered whether it was worth it, when he envied the Blood Claws their innocence. They did not yet know what it was like to feel the responsibility for another Space Wolfs death. All through the long evening, as the reports came in and the factory complex was secured, Ragnar had replayed the battle in his mind, wondering if there had been some way to do it differently, some tactic that would have prevented Olaf and the others from dying. But if there was he could not see it. This was war, and in wars men died, even Space Marines. Perhaps Russ and the Emperor could have done better than he, perhaps another commander could have, but there was nothing now he could do about it. What was done, was done. He simply had to accept that and put it behind him. Tomorrow the war would continue. Tomorrow a new battle would be fought. Still, at that moment, he longed to return to a simpler time, to the time when it had all seemed easy. But he reminded himself: it had only seemed easy. Even in his youth there had been losses, and horrors and intrigues. He let his mind drift back to the events he had been trying to suppress since his encounter with the sorcerer.
He gazed out into the night, remembering.

CHAPTER ONE


Along with his fellow battle-brothers, Ragnar stood at the entrance to the landing bay, his weapons bolstered, his newly acquired Blood Claw insignia displayed proudly on his shoulder-pad. They were all waiting for Inquisitor Sternberg to descend from his ship.

The Space Wolf took another deep breath and tried to calm himself. He knew that the monstrous vessel
before him was only a shuttle, not even one of the huge craft that plied the unthinkable distances between the stars, but even so the sheer scale of the thing was enough to take your bream away.