Three bottles of fine Caeban wine sat on a handmade table beside the bed, and red stains all across the sheets were testament to the wildness of its consumption. Raeven slipped his arm from Lyx's shoulders and traced a finger over the coiled tattoo behind her ear that was normally hidden by her auburn hair.
'Do you know how much trouble you'd be in if anyone saw that?' he asked.
'You've seen it' she replied.
'Yes, but I'm not going to report you for a cult tattoo.'
'Then why should I worry?' she said with a grin. 'You're the only one who gets to see it.'
'Not even Albard?'
'Especially not Albard,' she laughed, but he saw through her levity.
'You're not really mixed up with the Serpent cult are you?' Lyx shook her head and kissed him. 'Can you really imagine me dancing naked in the forest?'
'I am now. Is that what they do?'
'That's what they say,' said Lyx. 'That, and sacrifice virgins and mate with nagas.'
Raeven made a disgusted face. Like most people, he'd heard the rumours about the vile practices of the Serpent cult - their misguided belief in old gods and their abhorrence of all forms of authority. And like most people, he'd dismissed them as just that, rumours.
'Anything left to drink?' asked Lyx.
He reached over her to examine the bottles. All were empty, and he slumped back onto the bed with a sigh.
'No, it's all gone.'
'We drank it all?' asked Lyx, turning onto her side. She gave him a full-lipped smile as the movement pulled the sheets down her body. Raeven took a moment to savour the nut-brown colour of her flesh and the way it rose in goosebumps in the chill air of the high bedchamber.
'I'm afraid so,' he said.
'That explains why my head feels like one of your father's pet nagas is squeezing it.'
Raeven rubbed his eyes and ran his tongue around the inside of his mouth. Like Lyx, his skin was the colour of young oak, ridged by cut lines of defined musculature. He was slender where his brother was bulky, and toned where Albard could only generously be described as 'stocky'.
With nothing nearby to drink, Raeven reached up and pulled down a coiled pipe of leathery azhdarchid skin and sucked upon the copper end piece, until the smouldering embers in the bowl on the shelf above the headboard took light. He puffed a stream of aromatic smoke into the air, making a pillow of his arm.
'I doubt if old Oruboros or Shesha could even break an egg open, these days,' he said at last. 'It's a stupid comparison to make.'
'You know what I mean,' she pouted.
'I do, but you're prettier when you're sad.'
'That must be why you're so cruel to me.'
'One of the many reasons,' agreed Raeven, letting the soothing effects of the smoke ease away the disquiet he always felt when he woke in the same bed as Lyx. As enticing as her bodily charms and paramour's skills were, he couldn't quite rid himself of the feeling that there was something unnatural about their...
Their what? Lovemaking? Hardly, since there was little love lost between them.
Rutting had something of a ring to it, in that it perfectly encapsulated the frenetic violence of their coupling, but didn't quite express the frisson he took from its taboo nature. Raeven glanced over at the ring on Lyx's finger and almost laughed as his genhanced eyes read the betrothal inscription laser-etched upon its platinum surface.
'What's funny?' asked Lyx.
'Nothing,' he said. 'I just caught a glimpse of the vow Albard had inscribed on your ring.'
She pulled her hand below the sheets, and her face flushed. She shrugged.
'It's a nice ring, and you insist I keep it on.'
'Yes,' said Raeven, letting the smoking pipe coil back up to the bowl. 'I like to know what I'm defiling.'
She smiled and reached over to pull him towards her. Her fingers brushed over the steel-rimmed sockets bored through the meat of his body at his neck and spine. He saw her flinch at the cold, metallic presence in his skin, and took a moment to savour the look of distaste that flashed in her eyes.
'You don't like them?' he asked.
'No, they're cold.'
'You should be used to that by now,' said Raeven, pushing her down onto the bed. He leaned down to kiss her, but she turned her head to the side.
'Did it hurt?' she asked. 'When the Sacristans cut you open, I mean?'
Still supporting himself on his elbows, Raeven nodded. 'Yes. The Sacristans had us immobilised with muscle inhibitors, but father decided we would undergo the surgery without the benefit of painblockers, just like they did in his day. We were paralysed, but awake the whole time.'
She flinched at the thought of being cut open by the iron-faced priests of Mars and their lickspittle Sacristans. Raeven felt his jaw clench at the memory of the procedure, strapped in a bronze gurney in the depths of the Sanctuary as he and Albard faced each other across the expanse of bottle-green ceramic tiles and sterile steel.
'I suspect father expected me to scream, but I was damned if I'd give him the satisfaction.'
'What do they feel like now?' she said, probing the edges of the sockets in his flesh and sliding her fingers inside, despite her avowed distaste.
So like her to express squeamishness one moment, naked interest the next. She'd been like that the first time he'd taken her to his bed, pleading with him that what they were doing was wrong, but coming back night after night for more of the same.
'They feel like part of me,' he said with a shrug. 'Like they've always been a part of me.'
'Albard's are infected,' said Lyx, rubbing the skin around the neural connector, and Raeven saw her breathing was becoming heavier. 'He has me rub counterseptic poultices on them several times a day.'
'Does he like that?'
She shook her head. 'No, he hates it.'
'Good,' said Raeven, kissing her and feeling her body respond to his touch.
LATER, WITH LYX asleep, Raeven slid from his bed and padded softly across the floor of his chambers. This high in the valley, the air was cold, but thick mallahgra pelts hunted by his grandfather in the jungles of Kush kept his feet pleasantly warm. Sweat cooled rapidly on his skin, and he pulled a sea-green robe edged in xenos fur around his naked body. Beyond the louvres, he could hear the sound of the city preparing for the day's celebrations - the excited hubbub of tens of thousands of voices.
Though Raeven was hundreds of metres above the city in one of the three Devine Towers, he fancied he could still hear the cosmopolitan mix of accents as the people gathered there came from all across the world to honour the Becoming of Lord Devine's sons. Merchants from Loquash would be haggling with the painted men of Aenatep. Artisans of the Clockwork City would unveil their ticking, mechanical marvels - hoping to avoid the attentions of the Sacristan Guard - while the various Houses would no doubt be parading the best and bravest of their knights, boasting of their great hunts and the productivity of their satrapies. And the people of Lupercalia would bear this intrusion of so many thousands to their city with the stoic surety that not one of the newcomers could hold a candle to House Devine.
Raeven pulled back the heavy drapes and pushed out through the louvred shutters to the stone-walled balcony beyond, as though the city were his and his alone.
The stepped expanse stretched out before him, filling the width of the valley from one side to the other and cascading down its length to the fertile plains below. Colourful structures of every conceivable shape, size, height and orientation jostled for space amid streets that bore the qualities of the Emperor's Legions that had brought this world back into the embrace of the Imperium.
Where the Lion had raised the Dawn Citadel in the tapering reaches of the upper valley, the streets around it were rigidly arranged in an unbending grid pattern. And where local geography interfered with that plan, it had been engineered away by the Mechanicum. Lower down, the streets were woven together like intricate knotwork, the free-flowing yet ordered nature of this street-plan said to be a repres
entation of Lord Horus's war-making. The Khan had chosen not to make his mark in stone, and had instead taken himself into the wild places and high mountains. No one knew exactly what legacy the primarch of the White Scars had left, though fireside tales whispered that he had spoken of secret things to the tribes and noble Houses that existed at the edges of the world.
The one portion of unity amid the chaotic nature of the city's plan was the Via Argentum, a laser-straight processional that climbed the length of the valley from its wide-mouthed opening to the rocky fortress built into the ochre stone of the mountain. Raeven held a hand over his eyes and looked up at the artfully shaped peak, less a geological feature than a man-made statement carved into the face of the world.
Arms slipped around his waist, and Raeven smelled the jasmine oil Lyx liked rubbed onto her skin. He could feel that she was naked, and he wondered if he had time to take her back to bed before his mother came to fetch him.
'Are you nervous?' she asked.
He looked at the marbled dome of the citadel, the early morning sun catching the copper banding between the coffered azure panels. He shook his head, angry that she might think him afraid of what this day promised.
'No,' he said, pushing her away. 'I have been prepared for the Ritual of Becoming since my tenth summer. I know who I am, and I'm ready for whatever happens. If a dullard like father can go through it, then I don't think I'll have any trouble.'
'I heard that the firstborn of House Tazkhar died and that his three brothers went mad after they went through it.'
'House Tazkhar?' sneered Raeven. 'What do you expect from nomadic dung-burners who can't even build a proper city? Some shit-smeared shaman masquerading as a Sacristan probably poured holy naga venom into their neural connectors.'
'You shouldn't get angry,' said Lyx. 'You need to be calm. The Throne Mechanicum imprint is based on your neural state at the moment of connection.'
Raeven rounded on her and laughed. It was a bitter bark of derision.
'And you're a Mechanicum priest now, are you? What other pearls of wisdom do you have for me, or does your insight only stretch to the blindingly obvious?'
Lyx pursed her lips. 'You are in a foul mood this morning.'
'I am what you make me,' he returned. 'I always have been.'
Lyx's hand flashed out to slap him, but gene-manipulation in the male bloodline of House Devine over the centuries ensured that Raeven's reaction speed was far faster than hers. He caught her hand and twisted the arm savagely around her back. He pushed her back into the room and threw her face-down upon the bed. She turned to face him as he opened his robe, her expression the same mixture of revulsion and devotion she'd worn since childhood.
Before he could do more, the door to his chamber opened and a statuesque woman in a flowing dress of iridescent scales swept imperiously within. She wore a headdress of nagahide, and a number of venom-blinded servants followed in her wake, each bearing a selection of outfits for him to choose from.
'Mother!' said Raeven, planting his hands on his hips and sighing in exasperation. 'Don't you knock anymore?'
Cebella Devine shook her head and wagged an admonishing finger. 'What mother needs to knock at her son's door on the day of his Becoming?'
'Clearly not you,' said Raeven.
'Hush now,' said Cebella, running an elongated fingernail across the sculpted lines of his chest. 'You don't want to be angry with me. Not today, of all days.'
'Spare me, mother,' snapped Raeven. 'Lyx has already given me the benefit of her extensive knowledge on the matter.'
Cebella's expression hardened and she turned to face the young girl on the bed, who stared back at her with withering contempt.
'Get dressed, Lyx,' said Cebella. 'It is inappropriate for you to be here today.'
'Just today?' Lyx laughed.
'If you plan to be Raeven's Adoratrice consort, you need to start acting like one.'
'Like you are to Cyprian?' hissed Lyx, her fingers curled into fists. 'I hardly think so.'
'Get out,' said Cebella, her face a granite mask. 'Albard will be here soon. Take the servants' tunnels and don't let me see you until after matters are concluded.'
'With pleasure,' said Lyx, visibly controlling her fury and gathering up her clothes. She slipped them on with practiced speed and, fully attired, sashayed to Raeven's side to plant a kiss on his cheek. 'Until later.'
Cebella snapped her fingers and said, 'Someone open the drapes. This room smells like a brothel.'
'Well, you're the expert there,' Lyx muttered, throwing a final barb and darting past Cebella to vanish though the door.
'Right,' said Cebella, turning her critical gaze upon her son. 'Let's see if we can make you vaguely presentable.'
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, clothed in expensive silks of green and black, layered sashes of crimson and blue, and tight-fitting cream trousers tucked into knee-high riding boots with tall heels, Raeven followed his mother down the full height of the tower. She was reciting a list of the various dignitaries who were here to mark his and Albard's Becoming. He tuned her out, thinking back to the night he'd spent with Lyx. As always, the memory stimulated a curious mix of shame and pleasurable guilt.
When they reached the grand hall at the base of the tower, his mother turned her matriarchal countenance upon him and said, 'Have you been listening to a word I've said?'
'Not really,' he confessed, hearing the swelling sounds of cheering and celebration from the streets beyond the tower.
Before Cebella could berate him for his ignorant behaviour, a host of armed warriors swept into the hall, heavy brutish men, armed with a variety of ferocious-looking armaments designed to kill in a myriad of painful ways. Leading the warriors was a man clad in a heavy suit of gleaming silver fusion armour - the kind a man five centuries ago might have worn on the back of a horse, had he found one strong enough to bear him.
He was powerful and broadly built, jowly where his youthful physique was finally yielding to his father's genetics. The right side of his face was knotted with burn scars that had healed poorly over the years and his right eye had been replaced with an augmetic implant after a hunt for a rogue mallahgra had ended badly and its furious charge broke open his skull.
Albard Devine, firstborn scion of House Devine, shook his head at Raeven's attire. 'You are not war-clad.'
'Keenly observant as always, brother,' agreed Raeven with a curt bow.
'Why are you dressed like that?' demanded Albard.
His brother formed his words with great deliberation, as the hideous scarring made him sound like a simpleton if he spoke too quickly. Every time Raeven saw him, it reminded him how glad he was to be younger than Albard and thus spared the ritualistic burning of the firstborn male heir's face upon his coming of age.
'I am dressed like this,' said Raeven, 'because it's ridiculous that we need to wear that outdated armour all the way up to the citadel just to take it off again. Those reactors are so old, they're probably leaking radiation into your bones. Mark my words, you'll regret wearing that clanking monstrosity when you're trying to sire an heir.'
'The men of Devine have worn the argent plate since we first rose to rule this world,' said his brother, stepping in close and glaring at him.
'You will not dishonour our father by disrespecting their memory. You will wear the silver.'
Raeven shook his head. 'No, I think I'm fine the way I am.'
Albard's nose wrinkled in disgust as the scent of the flagrant oils worked through Raeven's hair finally reached him. Raeven saw a glint of recognition, and suppressed the urge to gloat at the thought of his brother recognising his wife's oils.
'You smell like you've been out whoring all night,' said Albard, circling around him.
'Well, now that you mention it, there was a lucky young lady...' said Raeven.
His brother's gauntleted hand snapped out to strike him. Raeven swayed aside.
'Come now, brother,' he said. 'You're nowhere near fast enough to hit me anymore
.'
Albard looked past him to Cebella, and Raeven hid a smile as he saw the depths of hatred and decades of mutual loathing that passed between them.
'This is your doing,' said Albard. 'Your viper's tongue has made your son a cocksure lout.'
'Albard, my son-' began Cebella.
Raeven's brother cut her off with a bark of anger. 'You are not my mother, witch. My mother is dead and you are just the whore that shares my father's bed and gives me unwanted siblings.'
The warriors behind Albard stiffened in expectation of Raeven's response. They knew him well enough to understand that he was not a man to be underestimated. Raeven's carefully cultivated air of urbane condescension and louche behaviour concealed a warrior of considerable skill, and many a foolish noble had only discovered that on the end of a charnobal duelling sabre.
'Careful, Albard,' said Raeven. 'A man could take offence at such an insult to his mother.'
His brother at least appreciated that he'd crossed a line, but it wasn't in Albard to apologise; another trait he shared with their father.
'Shall we get this over with, then?' said Raeven, marching past Albard and his entourage of heavily armed warriors. 'Father will be waiting.'
Cheering crowds lined the Via Argentum as the carriage drew them higher up the valley. Thousands of men and women thronged the streets around the processional route, and thousands more packed the rooftops and windows overlooking it. Raeven waved to his people, blowing kisses to the girls and punching the air with his fist for the men. Both gestures were pure pantomime, but no one seemed to care.
'Do you have to do that?' said Albard. 'This is supposed to be a momentous occasion.'
'Says who?' replied Raeven. 'Father? All the more reason for it.'
Albard didn't reply, and remained seated, staring stoically from the open-topped skimmer carriage as it plied its stately path uphill. An entire regiment of huscarl cavalry rode ahead of their floating transport, two thousand men in silver uniforms and purple-plumed helms. Each man carried a tall, glitter-tipped lance in one hand, with a fusil-carbine sheathed at their back. Another five regiments of masked infantry followed behind them, marching in perfect lockstep with glittering silver-steel banners overhead and freshly issued las-rifles carried upon every shoulder.
The Imperial Truth Page 7