Abaddon jerked backwards. The guardian beast landed in the space where he had been. He raised his power fist. The beast sprang at him, fore and mid-limbs wide, jaws open. It was quick – very, very quick. But he had killed quicker prey. He punched his fist into its mouth. The fist’s power field activated as it made contact. Its head exploded. Shards of silver and brain matter struck the tunnel walls. Its movement did not stop. Nerve clusters and brain segments drove it on. Damage runes lit in Abaddon’s helm as the beast’s limbs fastened on his arm and shoulder. He snarled and lifted the creature from the ground. It was twisting, its hind limbs reversing to arc up over its back like scorpion stings. Abaddon pivoted, battering it into the tunnel wall. Armour splintered. He could see the lightning wreathing the thing’s claw blades.

Heavy rounds tore through the thing’s body. Pulped meat and twisted metal showered in every direction. It lashed out. Abaddon brought up his bolter and fired a stream of rounds into it. Chrome and carbon splinters rang against his faceplate. He hurled the remains against the wall and dumped another burst of bolter fire into it before what was left of it could move.

‘Hard kills,’ growled Urskar, closing with Abaddon, reaper cannon still smoking from the fire he had poured into the beast. ‘But you didn’t need all that much help.’

Abaddon looked at the chosen warrior’s red helm. The silver-filled scars glinted across its snout, like teeth behind a grin. Abaddon laughed, the sound blending with the sound of gunfire. For a second he felt the weight of the moment lift; he had come back to the place that had made him, that had made the Legion that was everything; unlike that moment of birth he was not alone.

‘Will you ever be anything but a jackal, brother?’ he said over a direct vox.

‘I doubt it,’ growled Urskar. Then his head twitched as he looked beyond Abaddon. ‘I smell the dung of gods and priests.’ Abaddon turned to see Layak advancing down the passage. Shapes made of shadow and cold light spiralled around him. The blade slaves walked behind their master, swords drawn, bodies bloated with power as the daemons within the blades rode their flesh.

‘A last temple to old lies,’ said Layak, looking up at the doors.

Abaddon felt his lip curl but did not answer.

‘Breach it,’ he said. Reavers in black power armour ran forwards to clamp clusters of melta charges in place. Abaddon’s chosen formed around him, guns braced, weapons lit and sweating lightning.