Dawn was starting to pale the sky when the nearest Earthshaker batteries began to fire. Firing chains were pulled. Shells were flung in ten-mile parabolas. Hydraulic pistons cushioned the recoil. Breeches were thrown open and new shells slammed into them as locking pins were pushed into place. Again, the chains were pulled, accompanied by a fiery snort as the forty-ton guns recoiled against the stacked dampers. It went on like this for the entire hour of the journey until the air was thick with clouds of black fyceline and the gun barrels glowed red with the heat of firing.

An onshore wind blew the hot air, rich with the combined scents of superheated metal and fuel, back over the sprawl of Militarum camps. Discarded gun barrels hissed and steamed within puddles.

Bendikt’s convoy drove through it all, right up to the cliff-top, where the Chimeras slewed sideways and came to a halt fifty yards from a rockcrete observation post dug deep into the tussocky grass.

A supplies official was there to meet him. He had the look of a Munitorum pen-pusher. Bendikt nodded. At an unseen signal, the bombardment suddenly stopped. Bendikt strolled out to the cliff, pen-pushers and officers in tow, and stopped an arm’s width from the edge. Wind flattened the grass. He stood rock-still, staring towards the island bastion he was here to take. Five miles of choppy steel-grey sea divided him from it.

‘How long does the bombardment usually go on for?’ Bendikt asked.

‘Four hours each morning,’ one of the Munitorum staff told him.

Bendikt was resolute. ‘That is not enough,’ he said. ‘We have fifty days. From now on, the bombardment will continue without cease. All day and all night.’

‘We do not have enough munitions–’ the man started.

‘You have stockpiled for years’ worth of shot, in line with the projected fall?’

‘Yes, sir. In ten years’ time.’

Bendikt put up his hand for silence. ‘Crannog Mons is falling in fifty days.’

The man’s mouth opened to object.

‘Silence!’ Bendikt snapped. ‘The bombardment will not cease. It will run continually until we have broken that rock!’

The accompanying generals stopped and stood with monoculars pressed to their faces.

Crannog Mons rose, blue with distance, straight up out of the mists that lay over the water. The island fortress was a masterpiece of Imperial manufacture. Its rugged cliffs gleamed in the morning light with a dull-grey shine like beaten steel. The cliffs were studded with pillboxes fashioned from the rock and reinforced with rockcrete and ferrosteel girders. The natural stone blurred with the smooth buttresses, barbettes and casements. Everywhere was pockmarked with gun slits and stepped embrasures. Over each bastion crackled the thin blue light of void shields.

Bendikt turned to his right. ‘And that is all that remains of the bridge?’

‘Yes, sir,’ an aide said.