More mines exploded. As some bloodied survivors managed to push themselves through to the rubble slopes of the breach, they found themselves facing a barbed and spiked barricade of twisted girders hurled from above.
The attack floundered at the base of the breach, the ditch carpeted with bodies and blood. In the re-entrant angle of the Mori bastion, where the arrowhead shape of the bastion narrowed before rejoining the main wall, Leonid had placed cannons armed with shells filled with ballbearings, bolts and metal fragments. The first cannon fired, the shell bursting apart as it left the muzzle and spraying lethal fragments in an expanding cone. The remaining cannons fired seconds later and the attackers at the base of the breach were snatched away in the bloody storm, torn to ribbons by the guns' discharge.
Leonid shouted a warning to Major Anders in the Primus Ravelin, as the sheer volume of soldiers flooding the ditch finally managed to sweep around the flanks of the V-shaped outwork. But Piet Anders was ready for them, leading his warriors in a furious counter-charge. Battle was joined within the ravelin as the men of the Jouran Dragoons crashed into the disordered mob of soldiers, chopping them down with swords and bludgeoning them with rifle butts. Major Anders hacked a bloody path through the attackers with his blade, the ensigns bearing his colours fighting to keep up with the officer, killing anyone who came near.
The battle for the walls of the ravelin became fiercer as a giant of a man with a huge axe gained its ramparts. Huge and fat, his reach was long and he killed anyone that stood against him. Enemy soldiers bunched around the man, beginning to fan out along the ramparts in a fighting wedge that would allow yet more warriors to climb to the ramparts.
Leonid watched in desperation as the giant slaughtered the ravelin's defenders until a squad of Imperial Fists on the eastern wall counterattacked. A volley of grenades blasted a hole in the wedge and the squad's sergeant shot the axe-wielding giant dead, blasting his head from his shoulders with his plasma pistol. The defenders rallied and pushed the last of the enemy from the walls. Leonid let out the breath he hadn't realised he was holding.
The carnage below was terrible. The scale of such killing in so short a time was incredible. But despite the death-toll, the soldiers in red kept coming at the walls until every square metre of the ditch was covered in blood or bodies.
'They are brave, I'll give them that,' said Leonid, watching as another enemy soldier was shot dead as he clambered across the barricades below.
'No,' snapped Eshara, raising his voice to be heard over the din of battle. 'They are not brave. Do not ever give voice to such thoughts, Castellan. These traitors are heretics and know nothing of notions such as bravery and honour. They keep coming at our walls to die because they fear the wrath of their masters more than us. Push such thoughts from your mind. You must not allow yourself to identify with this scum in any way, lest you find pity staying your hand and pay with your life for that moment of laxity.'
Leonid nodded and returned his gaze to the massacre below. 'What purpose is served here?' he asked. 'They will never gain a foothold on the walls like this. It is madness.'
'They gain a clearer understanding of our defences, explode our minefields and clog the walls with dead.'
'Why don't the Iron Warriors come, damn them?'
'Do not worry, Castellan, you will get your chance to fight the Iron Warriors, but you may soon regret that wish.'
'Perhaps,' said Leonid, watching as a dozen soldiers managed to survive long enough to traverse the barricades below and begin scrambling up the breach. To either side of him, his platoon waited, rifles aimed in a line down the breach. Leonid swept down his sword and shouted, 'Fire!'
Thirty rifles fired in a perfect volley and the enemy were blasted backwards, flopping like boneless puppets as they cartwheeled down the breach.
For a further three bloody hours the enemy threw themselves at the wall before pulling back at some unheard signal, leaving over two and a half thousand men dead in the ditch. Not a single traitor had managed to climb the breach.
A hoarse cheer followed the traitors back to their lines as the weary Guardsmen hurled enemy corpses from the walls of the ravelin, and orderlies rushed from posterns in the Destiny Gate to carry back the wounded.
'Well, we survived,' said Leonid.
'That was just the beginning,' promised Eshara.
Captain Eshaka's words were to prove prophetic, as the soldiers of the Iron Warriors launched another two assaults on the walls. Thousands more died in the nightmare hell of the ditch, shelled to bloody rags, shot or blown apart by mines. On three occasions, the Primus Ravelin almost fell, but Piet Anders and the Space Marines managed to rally the defenders every time and take back the walls just when everything seemed lost.
Flanking fire from the face of the Mori bastion swept the face of the ravelin clear of attackers and as night fell on the first day of the escalade, Leonid guessed that some five thousand enemy soldiers lay dead in the citadel's ditch. The preliminary butcher's bill amongst his own men for today's fighting was estimated to be a hundred and eighty dead, with perhaps twice that seriously wounded. Of these wounded, perhaps a third would not fight again.
The Iron Warriors could afford to suffer such horrendous loss of life without fear, but Leonid could not.
Even if the Jourans could keep up such an impressive kill-ratio, the Iron Warriors would inevitably wear them down. Leonid knew he could not allow this battle to become one of attrition.
Under cover of darkness, he and Eshara descended from the walls, leaving the citadel through the Destiny Gate's postern and making their way to the Primus ravelin. Here they found Major Anders, his face blood and sweat stained, sitting with his men drinking a mug of caffeine.
'You've done well, men,' called Leonid. 'Damn well.'
The soldiers beamed with pride at their commander's words.
'But tomorrow will be just as hard, and I'll need your very best.'
'We won't let you down, sir,' said a soldier from the ramparts above.
Leonid raised his voice and said, 'I know you won't, son. You're doing fine here, and I'm damn proud of you. You've shown these curs what it means to take on the 383rd!'
The soldiers cheered as Leonid turned to Piet Anders and shook his hand.
'Nice work, Piet, but watch your left flank,' he cautioned. 'With the breach on that side, we can't bring enough guns to bear and more of the enemy are getting around it.'
Anders saluted. 'Aye, sir, I'll keep an eye out.'
Leonid nodded, confident in his officer's ability to hold the ravelin. He returned Anders' salute before he and Eshara returned to the citadel.
They visited Vincare bastion, the curtain wall, the breach and Mori bastion, heaping praise on the soldiers and exhorting them with tales of valour from the other sections of the citadel. Each body of men vowed to outdo the others, and by the time Leonid returned to his temporary billet in the gate towers he was exhausted and a little light headed from the amount of amasec his men had forced upon him.
He lay down on his simple pallet bed and fell into a dreamless sleep.
TWO
Jharek Kelmaur climbed the blasted mountain of Tor Christo, picking his way confidently across the rubble, despite the darkness. His head scanned from side to side, as though searching for something, while a red-robed figure followed behind him, hands clasped beneath its robes and head bowed. The robed figure's physique was swollen and disproportionate, with broad shoulders, grossly misshapen arms and a barrel chest.