As he ran towards the sounds of combat, he felt a shadow press in. It was just beyond the edge of his consciousness, yet it weighed on his hearts like a planetary mass. He knew, beyond the excuses of reason, that it was the same shadow that Mautus had detected. And it was immense.

The De Profundis splintered, and there were no good practicals.

‘Our first volley did that?’ Caspean said. ‘Too easy.’

‘We didn’t destroy it,’ said Guilliman. ‘We did exactly what they wanted us to do.’

For several moments, the fragments of the Word Bearers vessel stayed close enough together that they preserved its silhouette. It seemed to expand, the space between the pieces gradually widening. As the De Profundis closed with the Samothrace, it finally looked like what it was – a hail of jagged shards, a ship turned into shrapnel. Every sliver stabbed towards the Ultramarines battleship.

Guilliman read the contours of the trap, and cursed what he saw. The Word Bearers had closed off his options. If he redirected any power to the forwards void shields, he opened the ship to destruction by the Night Lords or the World Eaters. If he didn’t reinforce the forwards defences, he was going to be hit by hundreds of boarding torpedoes at once. All he had left was weapons fire.

‘Cavascor,’ he called on the vox. ‘Coordinated fire on the De ­Profundis. Cut down that swarm.’

‘So ordered,’ Iasus answered.

The Samothrace was already redirecting its artillery. The batteries of plasma projectors and macro-cannons threw up a wall of incandescent destruction. Torpedoes streamed towards the intact shapes of the rest of the Word Bearers fleet.

‘Up thirty degrees,’ Guilliman said. It was too late to evade. The impacts were seconds away. But evading even a few shards could make a difference.

The bow of the Samothrace began to rise above the ecliptic. The splinters of the De Profundis ran into the storm of fire from the two Ultramarines ships. The void flashed with the disintegration of fragments. The Samothrace drove into clusters of explosions. It shuddered as more Night Lords torpedoes struck the stern. The Cavascor tightened up with the battleship, trying to interpose its bulk with the long-range fire of the World Eaters. Guilliman heard Iasus over the vox, roaring defiance at the XII Legion. At this moment, the Chapter Master, one of the most thoughtful of Guilliman’s commanders, sounded more than ever like he was one with the aggressive companies of Destroyers he led.

Void shields strained. Through the oculus, their pulses seared the eye. Bursts of ignited plasma marched along the flanks of the warships. The splinters hit, and still more of them blew apart as they collided with the shields.