Now, we shall see whose children will survive!’ snarled Fulgrim, and came at his brother. Guilliman countered and parried, his mighty gauntlet batting aside Fulgrim’s swords as his own hunted through the cage of steel Fulgrim wove with his four blades, seeking out the tainted flesh behind.
Fulgrim snarled as the tip of Guilliman’s gladius nicked his skin. Rising up on his tail, he swept down with his swords in quick succession. Guilliman’s weapons found them all, turning them aside with economical movements. Nevertheless, he was sorely pressed. He had fought daemons of every kind on many worlds and bested them all. Fulgrim, however, was an unholy blend of primarch and daemon. In him, the energy of the warp was married to the wisdom of ancient sciences. He was part material god, part immaterial daemon lord, and his power was great.
Guilliman cut and feinted, using the Hand of Dominion to catch the sword wielded by Fulgrim’s lower-left arm. The unholy metal of the blade cut into the thick ceramite of the gauntlet, and corrosive poison spattered the Armour of Reason, eating into it with smoking ferocity.
Pain somehow afflicted Guilliman through his armour, as if his war-plate itself were hurt. A spicy agony burned up the nerves in his arm from his interface sockets. He gritted his teeth and twisted the gauntlet. Energy crackled and banged, and the sword snapped in two. Ichor pumped from its hollow innards. Strings of flesh tore free as Guilliman cast the broken tip aside. Fulgrim screamed as if his limb had been ripped off, and he recoiled. Guilliman fought against his own pain to slash hard with the Gladius Incandor, cutting deeply into Fulgrim’s swordless arm.
‘How dare you!’ Fulgrim screamed, rearing back. He lunged at his enemy and crashed bodily into him, knocking Guilliman from his feet. The Invictarus Suzerains thundered down the steps to join their lord, forming a shield wall about him as he scrambled up, but Fulgrim slithered into them, barging them from their feet and slaughtering them contemptuously, his swords lopping limbs off with every strike.
‘You will die!’ shouted Guilliman, and he surged past his last bodyguard as Fulgrim’s swords punched through the Space Marine’s shield, armour and body. He swung hard with his gauntlet, but Fulgrim was too quick and weaved to the side; the Hand of Dominion punched down and into the marble steps, pulverising three of them.
Guilliman span around, anticipating Fulgrim’s next strike, but the daemon had gone.
He searched for his brother in the conflict. Their two armies had met, and their struggles filled the Heliopolis side to side. His warriors and the Emperor’s Children were intermingled, the blue armour of the Ultramarines dotted within a sea of clashing colours and battleplate decorated with the stretched skins of the dead. Cones of sound visibly tortured the air, blasting Guilliman’s warriors from their feet. Blood fountained from breathing grilles as dying Space Marines coughed up shattered internal organs. A knot of white-helmed Terminators stood back to back, dealing death to any traitor that strayed near, while a wall of Ultramarines Second Company brothers advanced, guns booming, pushing back insane warriors.
War was everywhere, desperate and wild. The situation in the void was mirrored within the Heliopolis. His men were outnumbered. They would die.
First theoretical, Guilliman thought. Fulgrim is a prime evil in this world. First practical, I will kill him.
Second theoretical, he countered, you are angry. Second practical, you will throw your own life and those of your men away for nothing. You have failed in this campaign. Retreat.
A memory of Konor Guilliman, his adoptive father, flashed in his mind.
‘Control your humours,’ Konor had told him. ‘You are mightier in every regard than any man, and that includes your passions. Master them, or you will fail.’
Temper. There was always his temper. For most of his life, Roboute Guilliman had kept his emotions in check, but there had been notable occasions when he had lost his head. At Calth, and when Sotha was attacked. Or when he had arrived late to Terra. Or the early days of the Scouring… He would add this day to that record. Beneath his commanding exterior, Guilliman was seething with fury.
‘Fulgrim!’ he bellowed. ‘Face me!’
A whip-fast motion flickered to his side. Fulgrim sped through the melee, coming from the left. Guilliman barely had time to raise his sword before Fulgrim crashed into him, snarling incoherently, knocking him backwards.
‘You hurt me, you corpse-master’s lapdog.’ The last vestiges of Fulgrim’s humanity melted from his face as it transformed into a mask of pure hatred. ‘No one hurts me. No one beats me!’
He wrapped his tail around his brother primarch, constricting him with such force that his armour plate began to crack. Casting aside one sword, Fulgrim reached down and grasped Guilliman’s head.
‘You wanted to face me, so face me!’ he said, wrenching free Guilliman’s helmet, exposing his naked flesh to the air.
The stink of his corrupted brother made Guilliman gag. His head swam as the daemon primarch’s scent invaded his nose and throat, unmoderated by his battlehelm’s systems.
‘Pathetic!’ cried Fulgrim. He uncurled, flinging Guilliman aside. His wounded arm was already healing, crackling warp energies working in tandem with his primarch’s physiology to make him whole again. He conjured swords from poisoned mists to fill his empty hands and flew at the Master of Macragge.
Guilliman staggered upright, gasping. Every breath poured more of Fulgrim’s lethal perfume into his lungs, a poison so potent that it taxed his superhuman body. He parried, and parried again, but he could land no counterstrike and was forced back up the stairs.
A blow flung his arm wide. He never saw the blade that cut him coming.
A cold kiss across his throat, followed by searing agony. Arterial blood sprayed from his ruined neck. He clamped his hand to the wound, but it gaped beneath armoured fingers, and the blood would not stop. Poison crawled in where his blood flooded out. Already it affected him, numbing his lips first and making his eyes heavy. With supreme effort, Roboute Guilliman raised the Gladius Incandor for the last time.
‘How?’ he mouthed. His vocal cords were severed. Blood spilled from his mouth in place of words