Hi all,
For as much as the Adepta Sororitas features in the lore of 40k I feel they still lack a defining novel in the way that other factions do (particularly the Iron Warriors and Night Lords). Will the upcoming novel “The Rose at War” change this? It’s too early to tell, but GW did share an excerpt from the upcoming book on the Community site, I hope you enjoy!
The freighter hung still, a tiny silhouette against the vast, striped curve of the planet’s ring. Along both sides of her underbelly, glitters of lumens showed her saviour pods, their rail-gun launchers silent. In rows above, the hydraulic doors of her gunnery decks were sealed tight against the void. The light of Denar Alpha caught her vox-antennae and flashed briefly from her oculus deck, revealing the scarred and serious face of her captain. Had it penetrated further, following the patient thrum of the frigate’s engines, gliding smoothly along her access tunnels and companionways, down past her hatches and ladders, it may have reached the deepest, darkest recesses of her belly. Not her fusion reactor, burning still as it blessed the great ship with life, not her chapel and its holy statues, but the dark bilge of her inner hull, and the things that floated within.
Here, it might even have paused, touching the marching ranks of ferrocrete pillars, the rusted walkways, the broken wires and tumbling sparks. And it may have stopped completely at the sound of a sacred hymnal, echoing harmoniously out across the water.
‘A spiritu dominatus
‘Domine, libra nos…’
Wading through the icy stillness, there came an arrowhead of five red-armoured figures, each with weapon in hand. Five suit-lights shone outwards, angled through the darkness, and at their head, a single auspex glimmered green. Black-and-white robes trailed behind each one, making ripples upon the water’s surface and soaking up the filth. It had been twenty-five Solar years since the schola, but still Sister Superior Augusta Santorus felt a fierce and holy joy at the advance of her squad, and at the purity of the Sisters’ battle-hymn.
‘From the lightning and the tempest…’
Around them, almost too deep to hear, hummed the chest-shuddering echoes of the ship’s void-engines. The Star had travelled safely from the Convent Sanctorum on Ophelia VII and Augusta thanked Him for the frigate’s strength and spirit.
And for the blessing of this, their newest mission.
‘Our Emperor, deliver us.’
A flare of excitement, a prayer of pure wonder. For the first time in over a decade, the Star carried her not outwards, to planets of invading xenos or the heave and slobber of the Foe, not to worlds of chemical darkness and death all overgrown, not even to ruined cathedrals and their horrific and bloodstained depths. Not this time.
This time, He called her inwards, to the closest outskirts of Segmentum Solar and to Opal, a world of shrines and light.
‘In His name, Sister Superior,’ her canoness had said, ‘you have striven hard, and well. You have fought His enemies in every segmentum, and you have returned with honour. You have faced loss, and grief, and bloodshed, and horror. And now, He has a different task for you.’
Elvorix Ianthe had a soul of pure courage, and the austere restraint of the lifelong warrior. But – unless Augusta had imagined it – she had almost been smiling.
‘A task,’ she had said, ‘that will surely speak to your heart.’
The Star’s engines rumbled as she shifted slightly, aligning herself with the planet’s orbit, and settling to her place. Soon, the Sisters would disembark, attaining planetfall by mid-afternoon. Their mission was brief, and should conclude within the day; they would find few enemies here.
No, here, they would find only Him – and the skull of Saint Veres, most blessed hero and martyr. He who had cast down the traitor ecclesiarch, and saved his world of Opal. The skull dated to the Age of Apostasy itself, and, due to reports of rising unrest in the planet’s Capital, Augusta must retrieve it for safekeeping.
On the other side of the formation, Sister Viola Taenaris, always the hothead, muttered an unseemly curse.
‘Where are they?’ she said, over the vox. Her thrice-blessed heavy bolter, its barrels inscribed with a filigree of sacred prayers, glimmered in the dying sparks’ light.
On point, Sister Caia de Musa shook the auspex, and twitched a shrug. ‘They are staying low, I think.’
The air was cold and dark and bitter, frosting like crystals on Augusta’s pauldrons. It creaked with titanic emptiness, with odd, cold resonances that made her skin prickle. Things bumped at her legs: rotting things, eyeless things. In places, the dripping sparks spat like irregular rainfall, each one glinting briefly then fizzling to a soaking end. Some struck her scarlet armour, flashing brilliantly as they died. Others hit her bolter, the chainsword at her hip, or made tiny char-marks on the roses of her robe.
‘They will be ahead of us,’ Augusta replied. ‘If they came down the delta quadrant ladders, then the auspex will pick them up.’
‘Maintain your vigilance, my Sisters,’ said Sister Alcina Leiva, the squad’s second. From Viola’s far side, she sounded curt and wary. ‘They cannot be far.’
‘Sister Melia,’ Augusta said. ‘Watch the rear.’
‘Yes, Sister.’ Next to the Sister Superior, Sister Melia Kaliyan gripped her flamer, and turned her suit-light to the darkness behind.
Caia moved forwards slowly, Augusta and the squad following. The water dragged at the Sister Superior’s shins and her mag-fastened chainsword, but her hands on the bolter were steady.
‘From plague, temptation and war…’
‘Hold.’ Caia stopped, the light of her auspex glinting. Exposed and with no cover, Augusta dropped to one knee, ordered the others to do the same. The five of them knelt in silence as the thick bilge stirred and slapped.
‘Our Emperor, deliver us.’
Things turned to the surface, bobbing and bloated things, but they were dead – they were of no matter, and Augusta took a full three seconds to scan her surroundings. The space was almost incomprehensively huge: a monstrous hollow, its walls and roof unseen. Grey pillars stood soldier-like, endless ranks of them, dwindling into the distance. Some still spilled light, tiny pools from half-broken lumens that reflected in the water; others had shattered panels, or broken screens. Still more had rusting ladders and sagging metal gantries.
Ideal lines of sight for the undetected foe.
‘Sister Caia,’ Augusta said. ‘What is our situation?’
Caia moved her auspex through a one-eighty scan. ‘Nothing, Sister. Nothing that looks like the enemy, and no sign of an incoming threat.’
‘Scan again,’ said Alcina, her tone grim.
Caia repeated the action, with the same result.
‘Still nothing, Sisters,’ she repeated. ‘And the spirit of the auspex works truly. I can only assume that they are out of range–’
‘Or they are stationary,’ Viola said.
Alcina gave a faint, thoughtful snort. ‘We know they are here,’ she said across the squad-vox to Augusta. ‘But we do not know how they are deployed. Or how they will attack.’
Augusta did not respond. Under her helm, sweat itched on her fleur-de-lys tattoo.
‘From the scourge of the Kraken…’
She tightened her grip on her bolter.
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