Chapter Text
Argel-Tal had fought in many battles and faced many tests of strength, yet he couldn't remember ever being so exhausted.
Beside him, Khârn drove on, unwavering, unfeeling, unaffected by the physical limitations of his body. And Argel-Tal had to keep up. It was either that or let his last brother die with a blade in his back. And he couldn’t fail another brother.
Not again.
Raum hissed his displeasure, and Argel-Tal fought the desire to snap at the daemon. He didn't have the energy to fight against both Raum's wishes and what seemed like Khârn's blatant attempts to get himself killed. He and his fellow World Eaters would charge straight into the thickest fighting, with no consideration for strategy or danger, and Argel-Tal followed lest he risk the realization of Erebus’s dire prophecy. He employed every ounce of his skill and battle-training as he fought both former brothers and brothers who could no longer tell friend from foe.
“I’m not your enemy!!” Argel-Tal shouted as Khârn attempted to throttle him for the second time that day. Seconds before, the last of a squad of Ultramarines had fallen, and through the red rage haze of the Nails, Argel-Tal was just another target. It was taking a long time—too long—for Khârn to recognize him, and Argel-Tal could see a second squad of Ultramarines cresting the hill not 50 meters behind them. He smashed his fist into Khârn's arm until his hold finally broke. The World Eater made a guttural, snarling noise, one Argel-Tal took for a noise of recognition, if not a direct apology, before spinning and charging forward. Argel-Tal kept pace with him, body aching and bleeding heavily from more wounds than he could count. He grimaced knowing more than a few of them he had received from Khârn himself. Yet this was a small price to pay for his brother’s life.
Argel-Tal couldn’t help but admire the audacity with which Khârn fought, and he laughed between wheezing breaths at the sight of his brother barreling into Guilliman’s sons with the all the efficiency and ruthlessness of a Land Raider. Khârn's wild swings staggered the Ultramarines at first, but then all their rigorous and doctrine-obsessed training kicked in, and they began taking advantage of lost-to-the-Nails Khârn's lack of technique. Though he was a skilled fighter under normal circumstances, the Nails stole Khârn’s reason and battle-sense and forced his genhanced body to compensate as he left himself open to attacks, his mind only concentrating on killing, killing, killing.
Ducking beneath one of Khârn's swings, Argel-Tal turned aside one blow with his spear and then caught another on his vambrace before the fury of the fight became too overwhelming for him to block all the blows with blades or armor. He took a bolt round to the side and felt a sword slice through the thin membrane of his wings. He spun and put the blade of the guardian spear through the throat of the Ultramarine sergeant responsible. He used the butt of the weapon to force another Astartes backwards while the dead sergeant was still sliding from the blade.
He and Khârn were hopelessly outnumbered, even with the Nails lending Khârn unnatural strength and stamina, and all around them the Ultramarines were pressing in, as inexorable as waves on a beach. Argel-Tal flicked his great wings outward, buffeting Guilliman's sons and forcing some back. He gritted his teeth as cuts on his wings reopened with his sudden movement, but he had more room to fight now, and he put down two more enemies in as many seconds.
Beside him, Khârn eviscerated an Ultramarine with three savage cuts, but the backswing of his chainsword ripped into Argel-Tal’s already bloody wings. The World Eater whirled, evidently surprised to find someone at his back, and his stance alone told Argel-Tal he was intent on killing this new enemy who was so close behind him. Argel-Tal ducked just in time, and Khârn's sword cut only air.
Stumbling, exhausted muscles screaming, the Word Bearer fought to regain his balance and as he did so, the guardian spear tumbled out of his numb fingers, skittering away on the rocky ground. Weaponless for a moment, Argel-Tal nearly found himself at the mercy of the Ultramarine captain. He fended off the man with his bare hands, until he could draw Iktinaetar. Even thus armed, he barely kept the Ultramarine at bay until Khârn barreled into him with a guttural cry. Argel-Tal stepped back, limping slightly from where the captain had nearly dislocated his knee. With each spike of pain, Argel-Tal reminded himself this was only a small sacrifice. His pain was temporary. His brother’s death would not be.
But each time Argel-Tal took a blow meant for Khârn, Raum hissed in displeasure.
We hunt elsewhere now. Leave Slayer. He does not need us. We belong with our brethren.
And each time, Argel-Tal would silence the daemon.
No. I belong at his side, he admonished.
Though, it was becoming increasingly difficult to do so as Khârn never seemed to tire, and the Nails’ song was never ending.
Argel-Tal was fading, despite the strength lent to him from his enhanced body and the daemon living inside him. In this most recent bout of fighting, he’d had to deflect as many blows from Khârn and the other World Eaters as he had from the Ultramarines. He ached all over, and could feel himself slowing and making mistakes as his exhausted body protested its continued abuse at the hands of both legions.
But he kept pushing, kept fighting, kept turning aside blade after blade.
This absolute menace of a man, he thought wryly to himself as, without warning, Khârn leapt from a rock outcropping and cannoned into an unsuspecting squad of Ultramarines with the intensity of an orbital bombardment. He slashed his chainsword left and right, decapitating one Ultramarine and slicing another open from sternum to hip.
Argel-Tal followed, his wings spread wide to slow his descent. They were too mutilated to allow him to truly fly, but at least he hadn’t crashed to the earth like an errant drop pod as Khârn had done.
At long last, the Nails ceased to sing; the battle had quieted for the moment, and the two brothers found themselves isolated from the rest of their forces. They were standing at the side of an overturned Land Raider that Khârn had single handedly destroyed. On the other side lay the bodies of the marines the crippled vehicle had disgorged right into the killing teeth of Khârn's chainsword.
Argel-Tal watched Khârn carefully; he knew the stages of the post-Nails crash.
First came the disorientation. Khârn's chest was heaving, and his eyes stared unseeing into the distance. After a moment, he pressed a hand to the side of his head like he was trying to remember something or ease the pain of one of his near-constant headaches. He looked back up, his eyes finding Argel-Tal, confusion and distress writ large across his features.
“We’re on Nuceria with your primarch fighting the sons of Guilliman,” Argel-Tal said, voice calm and steady.
Khârn had once confessed to him that the disorientation was possibly the worst side effect of the come down. Pain and weariness he was accustomed to and had been trained to overcome, but the heavy fog of confusion was an altogether different matter. He had told Argel-Tal it felt like drowning in a shallow pond of sludge: the way out was there, so close he could almost touch it, but breaking through the surface was a monumental task.
“It’s Argel-Tal," he continued, wanting more than anything to lay a steadying hand on his brother’s shoulder. "You're safe. There’s no one here but us.”
Next came the fatigue. Khârn was breathing laboriously, sucking in lungfuls of the soot-filled air, like he might never breathe again. His face was haggard, skin ashen grey and mottled with bruises. He listed sideways suddenly, his reflexes responding too slowly to catch himself. But Argel-Tal sprang into action, his own overtaxed muscles screaming as they took the brunt of Khârn's weight. Carefully, he eased Khârn down until the World Eater was slumped on the ground, his back resting against the side of the Land Raider.
Argel-Tal crouched beside him, still half on alert for approaching enemies. He hesitantly reached out and rested a hand on Khârn's shoulder. The World Eater stiffened but didn't shrug it off, either he was too weary, or his need for brotherly connection was no longer being savagely repressed by the Nails.
Last came the pain. The adrenaline and the flood of electrochemical pulses pumped into Khârn's body by the Nails began to leech away. Khârn's already difficult breathing grew ragged, and Argel-Tal knew his body was flooding with all-consuming agony. His face was tight and pale, and eyes that had finally looked clear and focused now stared unseeing into the distance, hazy with pain. He pressed a hand to one side with a barely suppressed wince.
“Let me see.” Argel-Tal was moving before Khârn could even respond. He eased Khârn's hand away from the wound and bent close to inspect it. It was deep, but clean—typical Ultramarine wound, Argel-Tal thought. He gave a small sigh of relief as he noted the blood had already begun to clot.
“Argel-Tal.” Khârn's voice was hoarse and barely above a whisper.
The Word Bearer looked down at his friend, wishing more than anything he could remove his silver faceplate and look Khârn in the eyes.
“Why are you here?” Khârn continued, voice growing stronger.
Argel-Tal huffed, “Fighting. Saving your life.”
“From the Land Raider?” Khârn jerked a thumb at the vehicle behind him, weary amusement in his eyes. “I’ve survived this long without you at my back in every battle. I think I can make it through one more.”
Argel-Tal shook his head. “The dozen Ultramarine blades I turned aside today beg to differ.”
Khârn waved one hand dismissively. “Help me up.”
“That’s it?” Argel-Tal asked. “No ‘Thank you, dear brother, for saving my life?’” His faceplate was still firmly in place, but he knew Khârn could hear the smile in his voice.
The World Eater grinned broadly, looking for the first time that day like the brother Argel-Tal had come to cherish. “Dear brother?” He gave an incredulous laugh. “Have Lorgar’s pious preachings made you go soft?”
Argel-Tal opened his mouth to give a stinging retort, but at that moment, Khârn lunged forward and tackled him to the ground with a clang of ceramite. A bolt shell detonated above them, right where Argel-Tal had been standing.
“Now you owe me again,” Khârn chuckled.
And so the battle raged on. Back to back, they fought in waist deep water, through countless more waves of Ultramarines, and in the churned up earth at the feet of Syrgalah as she and the other Warhounds took on the mighty imperial Titan. All to find themselves here, waging war in the bloody rain atop a defeated god-machine.
Once the blood rain had begun, Argel-Tal knew the battle for this world was over. Guilliman and his sons had lost, and Lorgar’s Ruinstorm had been unleashed.
He slumped against the battlement far above the last remnants of fighting, and watched blue-clad warriors retreating in the face the combined might of Lorgar’s ruinous powers and Angron’s unbridled fury His wings, sticky with blood, fell limply at his back, and his armor was slowly healing into painful scabs.
“Some savior you are,” came a voice from behind him. Argel-Tal turned to see Khârn grinning, like they hadn’t just been through some of the bloodiest fighting either of them had ever seen.
“That last skitarii would have skewered you like a rat on a stick if I hadn’t been there.”
Argel-Tal just turned back and rested his head on the railing. “I saved you about a dozen times on our way up here, so I only have myself to thank.”
Khârn, in a rare gesture of brotherly affection, raised a hand to slap Argel-Tal on the shoulder, but couldn’t find a spot that wasn’t broken or bleeding, so he kept his hand to himself. He joined Argel-Tal at the railing.
“I’m not dead.”
“So I see.”
“So much for the prophecies of Erebus.”
Argel-Tal shook his head. “Apparently, prophecies can be denied.”
Khârn had nothing to say to that. “I should see if I can make contact with the Conquerer. I’m sure Lotara will want an update.”
As Khârn's footsteps receded, a new set appeared: ones Argel-Tal had been expecting.
“You were wrong, Erebus,” he said without turning.
The Deceiver. Kill! Kill, kill him, Argel-Tal. He cannot be trusted. I want to kill him. Raum’s rage spiked in the presence of the First Chaplain.
Argel-Tal ignored the daemon and looked out over the broken city only half listening to Erebus' monologue about Khârn's future. He let his mind wander, thinking of the battle still raging below, of Khârn, of Cyrene, of the greater war yet to be waged against the Imperium.
Distantly, he heard Erebus speak his name with a strange inflection. Before he could respond, the seething daemon within him leapt to the fore; his lapse in concentration had given Raum just what he needed to seize control.
Raum didn't seem to have anticipated Erebus’s traitorous action, for he didn't avoid the blade, but his deep suspicion and hatred of the Chaplain was their saving grace.
With a howl of rage and pain, the daemon contorted, grabbing Erebus’s hand and diverting the dagger’s path by just a hairsbreadth. It was enough to turn a lethal blow into just a deadly one, but Erebus was strong and even Raum was weakened by the day’s fighting. The daemon’s clawed hands shook as he tried to force Erebus’ backwards.
The Chaplain laughed softly. “You’re too weak, Argel-Tal.” His eyes flicked down to the blade and then back up to Argel-Tal’s helmeted face. “In every one of the Ten Thousand Paths, you are too weak in both mind and body. Too weak to overcome Cyrene’s regrettable death. Too weak to see past your love for the World Eater.” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “You will be too weak to do what is needed to win the war, my boy.”
Raum screamed again, his slithering voice now mixing with Argel-Tal's. “Deceiver! Deceiver! I will have your blood.” He trailed off into incomprehensible ranting, each word laced with pain.
Erebus laughed again, and then with insulting ease, began to slide the dagger deeper into Argel-Tal’s body.
“Don’t fight it,” the Chaplain said, almost bored. “You cannot stop me.”
“No,” Raum rasped, sounding surprisingly lucid. “But he can.”
Before Erebus could even turn, a bloody gauntlet smashed into the dagger, snapping the blade and leaving the tip still buried deep in Argel-Tal’s body. The Chaplain leapt away, holding the broken weapon out in front of him.
Khârn stood there in the bloody rain, fist raised and ready to strike again, looking for all the world like a statue of an avenging god from the time before Old Night. Erebus took a stumbling step backward, but Khârn was fast. In a blur of movement, he knocked the Chaplain off his feet and sent him skidding along the metal battlements with a screech of ceramite.
Still sprawled on his back, Erebus reached up and felt at his face. He was bleeding heavily from his nose and one eye was beginning to swell.
Khârn stalked nearer, discarding his helmet as he did so, murder in his eyes.
“Wait,” Erebus cried. This was all wrong. He scrabbled backwards futilely, his previously immaculate armor acquiring scratches like a child collecting trinkets. The hand with the dagger was still held up in front of him, like the anathame's otherworldly powers could protect against the fury of a brother bereaved.
Khârn was almost on top of him now. The Nails were biting. Erebus could see it writ large across his face, and looking up into those eyes, Erebus saw his own death reflected back at him. There was nowhere on this god-machine Erebus could go that Khârn would not find him. Indeed, the legionary would hunt him to the ends of the galaxy to avenge the death of his brother.
“Get up.”
Khârn wrenched out his chainsword, but did not activate it. His death was to be a slow one, Erebus realized.
Panic rose in him. This was not in any of the Ten Thousand Paths. He was not meant to die here.
Khârn's eyes were wild as he hefted his weapon for the first of many strokes. But then he froze. Erebus saw something he could only describe as clarity crossing the World Eater’s face, as if the Nails’ call had suddenly vanished.
The World Eater looked back over his shoulder, and Erebus saw what had caught Khârn's attention: Argel-Tal had crumpled bonelessly to the ground.
Khârn looked back down at Erebus with utter disdain, and then turned his back on the First Chaplain, as if he were no more threatening than a child.
Erebus didn’t hesitate; he gripped the anathame in both hands and disappeared from the battlements.
Hurling aside the chainsword, Khârn sprinted to his brother’s side. He crashed to his knees and rolled Argel-Tal over onto his back. His brother’s faceplate had come off, revealing features—human features—pale with pain.
“Argel-Tal,” Khârn cried, snatching up one of his brother’s limp hands.
The Word Bearer’s eyes fluttered open. “Khârn.” His voice was barely audible, but he managed to squeeze Khârn's hand.
“Stay with me, brother,” Khârn said, desperately, “stay with me, I’m going to look at your wound, okay?” Still holding Argel-Tal’s hand, he rolled the Word Bearer on his side. The wound was small, innocuous, and should have clotted by now. But it hadn’t.
Instead, it was killing him.
His inspection hadn’t taken long—Khârn knew a fatal wound when he saw one—but when he rolled Argel-Tal back over, his brother was completely unresponsive. No amount of shouting or shaking could rouse him.
Clasping his hands over his mouth, Khârn dropped back on his haunches. Shock seized him, and he stared at his brother’s prone body. His face was wet, but whether that was from tears or blood rain, he didn’t know. The pain of failure rose up sharply in him. It was not him who was to die with a blade in his back; it was his brother. All those sacrifices Argel-Tal had made to ensure he stayed alive, and Khârn himself was unable to do the same. He threw his head back and howled at the sky, pain and rage giving strength to his voice. When all the breath had been expelled from his lungs, he collapsed forward, panting. He was about to force himself to his feet and carry his brother’s body back away from this hellish place when there was a faint hiss inside his head.
It was so quiet, Khârn thought he imagined it, or that maybe his ears were just ringing from the deafening sounds of the assault.
But then it came again, a whisper of static inside his own head. Like the crackle of a vox bead before someone began to speak.
+Sssslayer+
Khârn's head jerked up. +Raum?+ He asked the question in his own mind, unsure if the daemon could even hear him. He was never sure with the silent speech he and Argel-Tal used to use.
+Slayer. He dies, Slayer.+
+I know!+ Khârn snapped back. And then he paused. +How are you alive still?+
+The Deceiver did not use our name when he used the anathame. It is only killing Argel-Tal.+
+Tell me how to fix it.+ Khârn demanded.
Raum hissed softly, +It commands powers you cannot understand, Slayer.+
+I don’t need to understand it, Raum. I need to save him.+
Raum paused for such a long time, Khârn worried that the daemon was gone entirely.
+He dies, Slayer,+ the daemon rasped. +He dies in the shadow of great wings. The prophecy of the Deceiver will come true.+
Khârn glared upward, far above them the double-headed eagle of the Imperium spread its golden wings. With a snarl of rage, the World Eater raised his bolter and fired two precise shots. Crippled, the eagle toppled from its spire and shattered against the side of the great god-machine. The remnants of its wings rained down in ruin and along with them, Erebus’s prophecy.
“Prophecies can be denied,” Khârn grunted, echoing Argel-Tal’s words from earlier.
There was a long silence before the daemon spoke again. +The anathame broke off inside him.+ Raum’s voice caressed the inside of his head, and Khârn shuddered. +And since it was separated so traumatically from the rest of the weapon, the shard has lost some of its potency.+
The daemon’s voice shook. +Remove it, Slayer. Remove it now, and I can keep him alive.+
As gently as he could, Khârn rolled Argel-Tal over onto his stomach and inspected the tiny wound once more.
Before he could even begin to point out to Raum that Argel-Tal’s armor was in the way, the Word Bearer began to shed. There was no other way to describe it; the ceramite slid off his body like the skin on a snake.
Raum clearly felt Khârn's confusion, as the World Eater heard faint laughter inside his head.
Nevertheless, he bent over the wound once more, but even without the armor, there was no sign of the traitorous blade. All Khârn could see was Argel-Tal’s blood, oozing rapidly onto the cold steel decking. That flow of crimson sickened him in a way blood had never done before.
+Raum,+ he said, +Raum, I don’t know where the blade is. I-I can’t see it.+
Khârn didn’t know how he managed to sound so desperate in his own head, but he tried not to focus on that.
+I’ll guide you,+ came the reply, and with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, Khârn knew what he had to do. He pulled off his gauntlet for better dexterity and with a deep breath began to search the wound.
Raum’s voice inside his head was laced with pain, but the daemon continued to direct him.
+A little more to the right. Now further…further in.+
The blade seemed sentient. Every time Khârn felt like he must be getting close, the foul thing slipped away, easing deeper into Argel-Tal’s dying flesh. Raum’s voice was wavering now, on the edge of pain-induced panic. He reached up with one of Argel-Tal’s hands and clutched at Khârn's shoulder with a strength that was greater than any Argel-Tal’s fingers ever possessed. The ceramite buckled under Raum’s pain-filled grip.
+Almost…there…Slayer,+ he gasped, fingers scrabbling for purchase on Khârn's armor again with a desperation that made the World Eater suddenly nauseous.
Khârn had never been any good at being comforting. His brothers had never needed it and Lotara, he was fairly certain, would rather die than ask for reassurance from a space marine. Hell, he could count on one hand the number of times she had even sounded uncertain. But the part of him that had been human—once—could sense that Raum needed something.
He cleared his throat, a habit he had developed when he was uncomfortable, but one that was very much unnecessary here since he and Raum were using the silent speech.
How did one comfort a daemon? A creature that, as far as he knew, only cried out for death and destruction. He knew nothing of Raum besides the creature Argel-Tal became in battle. The daemon was ever only a small part of his brother, a personification of his ruthless side—the one that Argel-Tal tried to suppress beneath all that calm and pious bullshit.
+Raum,+ he began, awkwardly. +Thank you, you’re doing good. We’re—I’m sure we’re almost done…+ He trailed off, not feeling confident about his attempt in the least. Argel-Tal was so much better at this.
Khârn thought back to how Argel-Tal had been there for him just a few hours earlier in the day. He had been coming down off the Nails, a painful and disorienting process, but his brother’s reassuring presence and kind but grounding words had eased him out of the worst of it with minimal discomfort.
He shook off his reverie, realizing that he hadn’t heard a response from Raum.
+Raum?+ He queried uncertainly.
+Still here,+ the daemon rasped. +Though, no thanks to your attempts to smother me.+
Khârn scowled. +I was just trying to help.+
+Sure.+
+Shut up and help me get this shrapnel out.+ Khârn snapped.
He missed Argel-Tal.
With palpable amusement, Raum continued guiding Khârn's fingers closer and closer to the sliver of dagger that was killing their brother, and finally, Khârn's fingers closed around an unsettlingly cold piece of metal. With a triumphant grin, he ripped the shard free.
His elation was short lived; the traumatic removal of the shard from inside Argel-Tal was not without consequences. Blood began pouring from the wound, faster and stronger than Khârn thought possible from a man mostly dead.
He pressed both hands to the wound, attempting to staunch the flow. The blood was thick and warm against his palm, and there was just so, so much.
How could one man lose so much blood?
“Raum!” he shouted, forgetting, in his panic, to use the silent speech. “Raum, you didn’t say it would bleed so much!”
He pressed down harder, feeling the Nails start to bite as he angrily willed the blood to stay inside Argel-Tal’s body.
+Raum, please,+ he said, feeling the daemon’s absence more starkly than ever before.
Had he killed him? Had he killed them both? Khârn gritted his teeth against both the rage and the sinking feeling of desperation in his stomach.
“Raum!” he cried out loud, not caring who might hear him, not caring that his voice shook like he was being rattled about in a stormbird.
The silence stretched on for an eternity. Khârn watched helplessly as blood continued to well up between his fingers and pour down Argel-Tal’s side. He felt sick, watching his brother’s life ebb away despite all he had done.
“Raum…Argel-Tal…please.” In the hopeless silence that followed, Khârn felt his chest tightening and his stomach growing cold.
No, no, no, no.
He had failed. Failed his brother in his time of greatest need.
The voice that finally answered him was not that of Raum, and it was the sweetest sound Khârn had ever heard or ever would hear thereafter.
“Khârn?” Argel-Tal’s voice was faint but unmistakably his. The unsettling rasp of Raum was nowhere to be heard.
Keeping one hand firmly on the wound, Khârn rolled his brother onto his back. Their eyes met and, for the first time in his life, Khârn felt like weeping with relief. The only thing that kept the tears from spilling down his cheeks was the raw fear in Argel-Tal’s eyes.
They stared at each other for a long moment. Argel-Tal was the first to break the silence.
“I dreamt,” he began, his voice more tremulous than before, “I was standing atop a roiling wave of blood, at my back was my legion, my primarch, my brothers, but I could not turn. I was being borne forwards on a wave of fate, hurtling towards—towards…”
He cut off, breathing hard. Khârn kept silent and offered his free hand. After a moment of hesitation, the Word Bearer took it, clinging on like a man in danger of being swept away by a riptide.
“I saw all my failings starkly wrought before me in the warp’s sickly and inexorable light. Cyrene and the custodian blade at her throat. The Gal Vorbak, all dead at Istvaan. The mortals and brothers whose blood I drank and whose flesh I ate aboard the Orfeo’s Lament.”
He gripped Khârn's hand tighter, breath laboring in his lungs, his bloody face streaked with tears. Khârn rubbed his thumb across Argel-Tal’s knuckles in what he hoped was a comforting gesture.
"And that wave of blood kept carrying me further and further from everything I cherish until I was alone in the undark of the warp with only the foul memory of my own deeds to keep me company." He swallowed hard and then whispered, "Where I belong."
Khârn had heard enough.
“Hey, hey,” he said firmly, bending to catch his brother’s eyes. “That is not true. Cyrene is safe and you were pitted against forces greater than any of us could have faced. Your warp ‘gods’ took this opportunity to torture you with falsehoods. I’ve got you, brother. I won't let anything happen to you."
Argel-Tal’s breathing was ragged and his eyes still looked wild. Khârn looked around anxiously for something, anything, to take Argel-Tal’s mind off his nightmare.
A flutter of movement caught his eye, and he saw the bright blue of an Ultramarine banner where it was caught on a protruding spike on the battlements just behind him.
He pulled Argel-Tal into a seated position, draping one of his brother’s arms over his shoulder to steady him, and began tearing the banner into strips.
“Only thing those fancy banners are good for.” Argel-Tal said with just a hint of his old, dry humor.
“That and target practice,” Khârn quipped as he slid closer and bound the still-bleeding wound as tightly as he dared. The blood was still oozing down Argel-Tal’s back, but the pressure from Khârn's makeshift bandage was slowly stemming the flow.
Now that Argel-Tal no longer seemed to be in danger of dying, Khârn took stock of the rest of him. Unsure of what else to do in the face of so many wounds, he pulled a canteen of water from his belt and began to gently clean and bind them as best he could. Even with the Laramann cells working to clot and heal his wounds, the beating Argel-Tal’s body had taken was clearly more than his Astartes-enhanced system could handle at once.
As Khârn was reaching around to reach a particularly nasty cut on his side, Argel-Tal leaned forward and dropped his forehead onto Khârn's shoulder. Khârn expected him to move once the final knot was tied, but Argel-Tal did not; he remained slumped, clinging to the World Eater like a frightened child to its mother. Khârn only hesitated for a moment before bringing his arms up around his exhausted and clearly still shaken brother.
Without his armor, Argel-Tal felt small, almost fragile. Khârn could feel every heaving motion of his chest as his brother struggled to cope with his ordeal. He lowered his face into Argel-Tal’s hair, not caring that it was damp with sweat and blood-rain. There, locked together with half his face buried in Argel-Tal’s hair and half Argel-Tal’s pressed into his armor, Khârn finally felt whole, despite the circumstances.
Still a little chastened by Raum's blunt rejection of his attempts at comfort, Khârn was reluctant to say anything. He didn't want to make Argel-Tal feel worse. But the longer his brother remained motionless in his arms, the more Khârn felt compelled to speak.
"Hey," he began as softly as he could. "You're okay. Raum and I got you all patched up. You'll be back to hounding me about the Eightfold Path in no time."
Argel-Tal didn't respond.
"Too soon for jokes, hmm?" Khârn made his voice gentle. "It's okay, brother. I've got you." Almost unconsciously, he began to rub one hand across Argel-Tal's shoulders where the most mild of his wounds had already knit back together.
At that, Argel-Tal melted completely, pressing his face into the space just above Khârn's gorget. The angle was awkward, and it took Khârn a second to realize that Argel-Tal, either consciously or unconsciously, had sought out the sliver of exposed skin at Khârn's neck—that most precious and tender of connections.
Khârn pried off his other gauntlet and carefully cupped the nape of Argel-Tal's neck. The skin was clammy and cold from blood loss, and Khârn felt his heart skip a beat as he remembered just how close he had come to losing his brother. He awkwardly threaded his fingers through the hair at the base of Argel-Tal's skull and massaged tiny circles into his brother’s whip cord tense muscles.
Argel-Tal hummed softly, sending little vibrations along Khârn's neck.
"I'm here," Khârn kept speaking, letting words spill from his lips, hoping to give his brother a point with which to ground himself. "I’m right here. I'll always be here."
With Argel-Tal still pressed against his chest, it was a little awkward for Khârn to reach his vox bead, but he managed it, and Lotara’s crackling voice sounded in his ear.
“So you are alive,” was the first thing she said.
Khârn ignored that. “Lotara, I need immediate evac. I’m sending you my location now.”
There was a long sigh over the vox. “I’ll see what I can do. You’re not the only one who needs it, Khârn.”
“I’ve got Argel-Tal,” Khârn replied, knowing his brother had made a good impression on the captain of the Conqueror with his quiet competence and earnest manner. “And we need an apothecary.”
She responded quickly, “I’ll do my best, Khârn. Hold tight.”
When the stormbird arrived, Khârn was ready and standing on the battlements of the titan, Argel-Tal cradled in his arms. His brother had protested weakly at first, but, as Khârn had pointed out, he was in no condition to exert himself. And now he lay as if asleep in Khârn's arms, his head resting on the cold metal of Khârn's shoulder guard.
Khârn climbed aboard, careful to avoid jostling the man who—at this moment and forever— was most precious to him. He held Argel-Tal to his chest the entire ride back to the Conqueror, unwilling to let go of his brother for even a moment.
The thought of how close he had come to losing Argel-Tal turned Khârn's stomach, and as he looked down into Argel-Tal’s pale, but peaceful features, he counted himself very lucky, if there was such a thing, to have such a devoted brother at his side. Khârn hoped he could always be there for his brother in the same way. A part of him knew, as their paths took them to different parts of the war, a day would come when he could not.
But it was not this day.