by Dan Abnett
‘Whose idea was that?’ asked Guilliman.
‘Auguston’s. It also helped that Holguin of the Dark Angels stood with him during the address and added his voice to the statement.’
‘For that we can be thankful,’ said Guilliman. He glanced along the length of the room. Through open doors, in an adjacent part of the Residency, he could see the Lion sitting alone, deep in thought.
‘Have the confined officers interviewed,’ Guilliman told Caspean. ‘Make it a polite but firm de-briefing. Make sure their story matches my brother’s. This may well be an accident, but I want to know how it happened.’
Caspean saluted, his mailed fist clunking off his breastplate. He turned and left the chamber.
Guilliman turned and looked at Valentus Dolor. The tetrarch was waiting attentively by the windows.
‘An accident?’ Guilliman asked.
‘A strange one,’ Dolor replied, ‘but why would you not trust his word?’
‘Because he is the Lion.’
‘He seemed mortified.’
Guilliman snorted. ‘He had a drop force loaded and waiting. A readied invasion. As he received my toast and sat at my table, he had an assault force of four companies set to fall upon this city.’
‘Consider, my lord,’ said Dolor, ‘if the situation were reversed, and we stood, at fleet-strength, off the proverbial green shores of Caliban, would you not have done the same? Would you not have had your finest prepped to move without any delay if the need arose?’
Guilliman did not reply.
‘I think you would,’ said Dolor with a sad smile. ‘In fact, I know you would. The core values of theoretical and practical would not have allowed you to do anything else. These are dark days, the darkest we have known. The events of this night are his fault.’
Guilliman shot another glance down the length of the chamber to look at the brooding Lion.
‘My brother?’ he asked.
‘Yes, but not the one you stare at,’ said Dolor. ‘I mean the Warmaster. This blight of conviction, this loss of faith, this caution and suspicion that means that the proud sons of the greatest family in the cosmos cannot trust one another… It is down to him and what he has done.’
Guilliman realised he had clenched both of his fists. He forced himself to uncurl them.
‘I believe I would have shown more trust in him than that,’ he said.
‘Would you?’ asked Dolor. ‘Do you? The long shadow of the Lupercal means we play our cards closer to our chests than ever. We keep our secrets tight. Have you, for example, told your brother of the one who resides, howling like a bedlam fool, in the medicae hall?’
‘I have not,’ Guilliman hissed, quickly raising his left hand to excuse his spark of anger.
‘Then think of your secrets and the reasons you keep them, while you examine his.’
‘Good counsel as ever, Valentus,’ said Guilliman. ‘Wait upon me here. I think it is time my brother and I talked more frankly.’
Dolor made his salute and a respectful bow of his head. Guilliman walked through the doors into the chamber where the Lion sat. The Lord of the First occupied one of the large-scale chairs. A fire had been lit in the chamber’s grate, and the Lion was intently watching the flames as they softly consumed the wood.
What was he thinking? Of forests, dark forests beloved by him, similarly consumed? It was a burden. Guilliman reminded himself that at least he knew the fate and status of his home world. What fears filled the Lion’s heart when he thought of his forested fortress, now presumably inaccessible beyond the Ruinstorm’s wrath?
‘Not the evening of feasting and good comradeship I was expecting,’ said Guilliman.
‘Nor I,’ the Lion agreed, looking up.
‘How much would you have needed, brother?’ Guilliman asked. He walked to a side table and poured wine from a jug into two goblets of frosted white glass.
‘How much what?’ asked the Lion.
‘Provocation,’ said Guilliman. ‘How many lines would I have had to cross? How many failings would you have needed to detect in me and my Legion?’
‘What, to attack you?’
‘Yes. It may indeed have been prudent, brother, but you came to my world fully prepared to strike at me if I was found wanting. Your men were loaded and ready, your pods primed, the vectors set. You have admitted to my face that you came here with no qualms about sanctioning me if I was found fit to sanction. So what would it have taken?’
The Lion took the goblet that Guilliman proffered.
‘Your ambition, Roboute. It was always your greatest strength and your greatest flaw. No two brothers more ambitious than you and Horus. It has seen you build an empire. If I had come and found you stealing another, then I would have struck.’
He rose to his feet and sipped the wine.
‘Honesty is your other great strength, brother,’ the Lion said. ‘Again, it is another strong trait you share with Horus.’
‘That name can only be spoken so many times within the Residency before I reach for my sword,’ said Guilliman.
The Lion laughed. ‘Quite so. But my point is a valid one. Before… before he fell, Horus was an honest creature. Noble and honest. I always thought of the two of you as very alike. Admire him or despise him, one was never in any doubt as to his ambitions. He was honest. He made no secret that he wanted to be the best of all, the first amongst equals, the first son by merit and not numerical fact. He wanted to be Warmaster. He wanted to be heir. His honesty was naked.’
‘But that honesty has gone.’
‘Indeed it has,’ said the Lion. ‘When he fell, however he fell, his honesty peeled away from him. He became a lord of lies, a great betrayer, a being capable of the worst deceit and falsity that we can imagine or even bear to think of. But you are honest still.’
The Lion looked at Guilliman.
‘When I came to you, you opened your heart to me. You told me of your fears, of the wounds you carry, of the principle and nature of your fight, and of your intentions for Imperium Secundus. That stayed my hand, to see the honesty in you still.’
He took another sip of wine. The goblet was made of white Servian glass, and it glowed like a chalice. It contrasted sharply with the dark gauntlet that held it, with the armour hued a shade of black known in the ancient language as calibaun. The goblet had more warmth in it than shone from the Lion’s pale skin. The wine looked like blood.
‘Part of your honesty, Roboute,’ he said, ‘was to remind me that I am not an open book. I have always found it hard to trust and be trusted.’
‘But you are admired and beloved–’
‘That is not the same thing at all. I have my secrets. Men may keep secrets for good reasons.’
‘Then if we are to put this behind us, and step forward from this day side by side as allies, I must open my heart further,’ said Guilliman. ‘There is something–’
The knock of a fist against the chamber door interrupted him. Guilliman paused, annoyed, wishing to unburden himself fully now that he had begun. Yet he knew full well that no one would knock without a pressing reason.
‘Enter,’ he said.
It was Niax Nessus, Master of the Third.
‘I apologise for the intrusion, my lord,’ he said, ‘but it is imperative that you see this. Also, your noble brother’s voted lieutenant wishes to speak with him urgently.’
Farith Redloss stood in the doorway behind Nessus, flanked by several of Gorod’s hulking warriors.
‘We will continue this conversation in a moment,’ Guilliman said to the Lion, drawing Nessus to one side and taking a data-slate from him. The Lion went to the door and stepped out to meet Farith Redloss. Redloss moved his lord down the hallway a little away from the bodyguards. He passed the Lion a data-slate marked with the First Legion’s icon.
The Lion read it.
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nbsp; ‘Tell me this is not so,’ he said.
‘It is confirmed.’
‘This? This is the cause?’ the Lion growled.
‘It took a gene-print to launch the assault. We have swabbed the device. It is confirmed.’
‘Then he’s on the surface?’
‘Ingeniously so,’ said Redloss. ‘He used the lives of our battle-brothers to make Guilliman throw open the door for him.’
The Lion’s lips trembled in rage. ‘Find him,’ he whispered.
‘Lord, I–’
‘Find him.’
‘The Ultramarines will not permit free movement in the Civitas precinct, My lord, so–’
‘Then be ingenious. Find him.’
Redloss nodded.
‘Will you tell him, lord?’ he asked. ‘Will you tell Guilliman?’
‘We cannot explain it,’ said Nessus to his lord in a low voice. Guilliman thumbed his way through the slate’s datalog for the third time.
‘A squad dead?’
‘Menius’s troop, in Barium Square, not less than thirty minutes ago. They were not just killed, they were silenced. They were torn apart.
‘This isn’t the work of the Dark Angels…’
‘It does not look like their handiwork at all, nor would that answer make much sense. Why this one incident if all the others stood down peacefully?’
‘Something else was in that pod,’ said Guilliman.
‘Indeed. Theoretical, it slew the original occupants and took their place. We’re analysing the blood found in the pod now.’
‘What has he brought here? What has he brought to my world?’
‘Your noble brother?’ asked Nessus. ‘My lord, this may be something he has no knowledge of. He–’
‘It was on his ship. It was in his pod. It killed his men. He must know what he has brought here.’
Guilliman looked at Nessus.
‘Inform Auguston. We raise our security status to Ready One, city-wide and in the Fortress. Mobilise in strength. Household and Legion. Scour Barium Square and the routes out of it. Gene-traces, footprints, blood trails, anything. Access security picters in the deme. Something or someone must have caught a glimpse. I want to know what this is and where it’s going. I want it found, and I want it stopped before it kills again.’
Nessus snapped off his salute and turned to leave the room. The Lion was re-entering.
‘What have you brought here?’ Guilliman asked.
‘I’m sorry? What?’ the Lion replied, pausing in the doorway.
‘If my face is anything like yours, brother,’ said Guilliman, walking up to him, ‘and I believe it is a great deal more open, then we have both been recipients of disturbing news. So, I ask again… What have you brought here?’
‘Farith Redloss was simply confirming the facts of the incident,’ said the Lion. ‘A mechanical failure, probably the result of storm damage. I wanted an answer quickly, and it has been provided. The pod drop was–’
‘No,’ said Guilliman. He took another step towards the Lion. ‘We just spoke, brother to brother, of the need for honesty. We spoke more freely than we have ever spoken. You told me that my honesty is why you stayed your censure, and admitted to me that you could be far too closed at times. We agreed that only true honesty would allow the Emperor’s loyal sons to stand against the darkness and drive it back. So we start. Now.’
Guilliman held up the data-slate that Nessus had given him so that the Lion could read the report on its screen-surface.
‘What is this?’ Guilliman snarled. ‘Tell me what you have brought to Macragge, or by the name of Ultramar, I swear I will put you through that wall.’
‘You will try…’ the Lion replied, stiffening.
‘Damn you, brother! Trust me and speak the truth now or we are done and finished! What have you brought to Macragge?’
The Lion sighed.
‘Konrad,’ he said.
The wall was high, high and mighty, but it was just a wall. Walls could be climbed, and gates opened. Veins could be opened too.
Less than a shadow, Curze rippled up the Aegis Wall like a black autumn leaf fluttered upwards by the night breeze. Above him, like a geometric mountain, towered the bulwarks of the Fortress.
The sons of Ultramar marched from this great bastion, so eager to boast of their prowess and their fortitude, so eager to celebrate their courage.
Curze reached the rim of the wall and vaulted onto the parapet. He looked back over the city below, a sea of lights. The night sky, with its one foul glowing star, shimmered behind the re-lit void shields.
Sentries on circuit were approaching. He could see them in his mind before he smelled the dry heat of their power armour. He opened a shadow, slid into its embrace and extended his claws.
He was inside the Fortress of Hera, inside the cradle of the haughty Ultramarines.
Tonight, at last – and long, long past time – they would know fear.
John woke. He was in a basement or cellar, tied to a wooden chair. There was a tang of blood in his mouth.
The Word Bearer sat facing him on a metal crate. His weapon lay across his lap in its case. John’s carrybag stood on the floor at his feet.
‘What do you want?’ John asked.
‘To renegotiate and then conclude the business we began on Traoris,’ said the Word Bearer.
‘Narek–’
‘Call me lord. Show me respect.’
‘I do not feel I am in a position to negotiate much,’ said John. His head hurt, but he reached out with his mind anyway. Perhaps…
No. It was futile. John’s initial suspicions had been correct. The torc around the Word Bearer’s throat was a powerful psychic hood. Narek had come prepared.
‘You want it,’ said John. ‘Take it.’
Narek did not reply for a while. He kept his gaze fixed on John Grammaticus. Then he put aside his cased rifle and reached down to the carrybag. He took a bundle out of it, unwrapped it, and held the fulgurite spear up in the half-light. It didn’t look like much: a forked spearhead of dull grey mineral, unfinished, no longer than a gladius.
But it was a piece of the Emperor’s psychic lightning, fused into a fulgurite in the sands of Traoris. It was a weapon of extraordinary power. With it, one could kill a god.
Or, most certainly, one could kill the son of a god. Even the one son-of-a-god who was impossible to slay otherwise.
‘It is potent,’ said Narek. ‘I can feel the life in it, the power. It is… godlike.’
‘It is a fragment of divinity,’ said John. ‘Or something as close to divinity as we will ever know.’
‘I could take it, and leave you dead,’ said Narek.
‘This is entirely what I expect,’ said John.
Narek turned the spearhead over in his hands.
‘One thing has become clear to me,’ he said, ‘through my pursuit of you here and on Traoris. This is a powerful weapon, but you… you are a notable being too. You would not have been charged with the recovery and use of this if you were not something… special.’
‘I’m just an agent for–’
‘You are a Perpetual.’
John faltered. ‘I–’
‘So old, so rare, so forgotten. You are the legend of a legend, the myth of a myth. But the Word Bearers are the keepers of the word and the lore, and in our histories are even the ghosts of myths remembered… the old ones. The long-lived ones. The eternal kind. The first and last. The Perpetuals.’
‘It’s more complicated than that,’ said John, ‘a lot more complicated than that in my case. I–’
‘The details don’t matter,’ said Narek. ‘I know what a Perpetual is capable of. I understand. After all, we are all proof of what the oldest and most powerful Perpetuals can do.’
‘What is that?’
; ‘Build an Imperium.’
John let his head drop and he exhaled slowly.
‘Just kill me, Narek,’ he said.
‘Has your life been so endless that you long for death?’
‘I know when I’m beaten,’ John replied.
There had been a flash of truth in the Word Bearer’s remark. John was tired. But death was not a permanent state in his case. The Cabal saw to that. If he could goad Narek enough, death might become an escape route and–
‘The spear is powerful, John Grammaticus,’ said Narek, ‘but I fancy it is even more powerful when one of your kind wields it. So you become, you see, part of the weapon.’
‘There is some truth in that,’ said John. There seemed little point lying.
‘Then I will take you both, you and the spear. As one, you will be my weapon, for the purpose I have ordained.’
‘And what would that purpose be, Narek?’
‘Respect!’ hissed the Word Bearer.
‘What would that purpose be, my lord?’ asked John. ‘I know why I want the spear. I know what deed is expected of me. What do you intend to do with it?
‘I intend,’ said Narek, ‘to perform holy work. I intend to cleanse the soul of my Legion of the daemonic pollution that contaminates it.’
He held up the speartip. Despite its dull finish, they could both see the tiny flashes of power that coursed through it.
‘I intend to save the Legion of the Word Bearers,’ said Narek, ‘and you are going to help me accomplish that.’
‘How?’ asked John Grammaticus. ‘What exactly do you intend to do?’
‘I will cleanse the soul of my Legion,’ said Narek, ‘by seeking out and slaying Lorgar Aurelian.’
‘My lord. My lord, no!’ Gorod cried.
‘Curze?’ Guilliman roared. With one hand he had smashed the Lion back into the wall. He held him there by the throat. ‘You brought that monster to my world?’
‘Unhand me,’ said the Lion.
‘Answer!’
‘I have not resisted you, Roboute, but you molest me. Unhand me or we will swiftly discover which of us is the superior combatant.’
‘My lord!’ Gorod repeated. The bodyguard had closed around them, hoping that they would not be obliged to drag the primarchs apart. They did not want to lay a hand upon their master, the Avenging Son.