“The roots of the trees?” she suggested, glancing back towards Jonas for confirmation.
“Petrified, like the trees themselves,” agreed Jonas.
Meritia knelt smoothly, tracing her fingers along the length of one of the roots. She paused, retracing a section. “There’s a mark here,” she said, looking more closely. “It’s a rune.” Running her fingernail around the curves etched into the stone, she tried to recognise its shape in the near-darkness. It was familiar. “Jain’zar,” she said, turning to face Jonas as she realised what that meant.
“There’s another one further down,” replied Jonas, pointing towards another root a few metres further along the tunnel. “And there, another.”
A sound in the chamber behind them made Jonas turn, only to see the lithe figure of Ptolemea rising to her feet in the cone of light that flooded down from the ceiling, from which she had just jumped.
“Sister Ptolemea,” said Jonas, bowing slightly in welcome. “I am delighted that you could join us. We appear to have found something rather interesting.”
As he spoke, the librarian walked forward towards Ptolemea and thought he saw a look of discomfort cross her face. When he closed within a few strides, the Sister stepped deliberately out of the light, throwing her face into darkness.
“Is there something wrong, Sister?” asked Jonas, genuinely concerned.
“No, Father Jonas, everything is fine. Just a slight fever: probably the residual effect of the journey—I am not a well-seasoned space explorer. Most of my work keeps me enshrined in the sacred librariums of our convent, as you might imagine,” explained Ptolemea, keeping a distance between her and the librarian.
“I see,” replied Jonas evenly, watching the pale-skinned Sister edge her way deeper into the shadows, not entirely convinced by her story. The confidence and assertiveness of her previous demeanour had all but vanished. “I trust that the effects will be temporary and painless.”
“Thank you, father,” she answered. “Now, tell me about your latest finds.” She swept her arm around the unusual, subterranean chamber. “What manner of place is this?”
“It appears to be the petrified remains of a ritual chamber of some kind—at one time it was constructed out of trees. You can see the fossilised trunks in the walls.”
Ptolemea was walking around the circumference of the room as she listened, dragging her fingers across the remains of the trees as she went.
“I wasn’t aware that Rahe’s Paradise was ever a densely wooded planet,” she said, pausing as the thought caught up with her.
“Yes. It was once a jungle-world, in the long distant past, before some form of natural disaster cracked the planet’s crust and flooded the atmosphere with sulphur. The volcanoes and the desert were the results of that cataclysm. At one time, it would seem that Rahe’s Paradise was a type of paradise after all,” smiled Jonas.
“How long ago?” asked Ptolemea, her face still turned to the wall as her fingers traced the shapes of some of the script cut into the stone tree trunks.
“Long ago. When the great missionary chaplains first arrived here, the jungles had already been gone for millennia. They found Rahe’s Paradise more-or-less as it is today. Our monastery was built on barren land.” Jonas peered through the dusty shadows at the elegant back of Ptolemea, unsure why she made him feel uncomfortable. Something about her had changed. “Is this information not available to your order on Bethle II?”
“I have no idea, father,” she replied, turning to face him at last. “I had very little time to check our records before I came here.” She paused. “Where is the Sister Senioris? There is something that I would like to discuss with her.”
“She is inspecting a tributary tunnel, which appears to be the entrance to a larger subterranean network of chambers and tunnels, running through the magma layer. She’s…” His words trailed off as Ptolemea strode past him towards the mouth of the tunnel. Instead of turning after her, he stood for a moment, irritated at the abrupt return of the young Sister’s brusque manner.
“Father!”
Jonas turned and rushed over to the tunnel’s entrance, finding Ptolemea on her knees next to Meritia’s prone body, her hands clasped around the older woman’s face. Taking in the scene in an instant, Jonas planted his hand onto Ptolemea’s chest and pushed her away. He stooped down over the figure of Meritia, resting his scarred and rough cheek against her lips to feel for her breath. It was faint, but it was there. She had lost consciousness, but she was alive.
A complicated array of cables and tubes peppered Ckrius’ head as he lay strapped to the adamantium tablet in the Implantation Chamber of the Litany of Fury. They covered his eyes, ears and nose, forcing his senses to remain active and jamming them full of new types of pain. The pipe that ran down his throat prevented him from making any noise, and the stimulants that were jetted into his ears and open eyes riddled his brain with suggestions of terror.
As the neophyte lay rigid with psychological horror, the apothecary worked feverishly in the massive cavity that it had opened up in his chest. The boy would have no idea about the violations that his body was suffering, since his brain was already overloaded with directly inserted agonies that would have been inconceivable to him only hours earlier, despite the unspeakable traumas of the last few days.
The apothecary had reopened the healed scar down Ckrius’ chest and rebroken the ribs that had already knitted back together. The boy’s entire sternum was cracked open and folded back while the shrouded figure of the apothecary inserted a series of new organs. The first, a large zygote that had to be inserted somewhere in the digestive tract, was the preomnor organ, which would act as a predigestive stomach for the Marine, bolstering his system against poisonous or indigestible materials so that he could extract maximum nutrition from them without suffering any ill-effects. It was an important organ for survival in some of the most inhospitable parts of the Imperium.
Whilst working on the digestive tract, the apothecary also inserted the complicated little omophagea implant in between the thoracic and cervical vertebrae. It would function in partnership with the preomnor organ, filtering out the essential genetic material from animals and organic substances that contained information about the survival mutations undergone by an organism to succeed in their particular climate. The Marine would eventually be able to verbalise these mutations, understanding them consciously after eating any part of a living creature.
From the smoke-filled darkness of the observation chamber, Captain Ulantus watched the implantations taking place. The Litany of Fury was already in orbit around Trontiux III, but he wanted to ensure that Ckrius survived the next round of zygote implantations before he took a landing party down to the planet’s surface to start the Blood Trials. So far, the boy had responded remarkably well to the hideously accelerated process, and Ulantus was secretly full of admiration for his resilience.
It was not only Ckrius who was being rushed. Ulantus had received a constant stream of communications from the Imperial Guard regiment on the ice-planet of Lorn V. It seemed that the orks had received considerable reinforcements, and it now looked as though a full-scale invasion might be underway. Imperial Guard Captain Sturnn of the Cadians 412th had now made an official request for assistance from the Blood Ravens. He had intimated that there was more at stake there than the security of the local population—indeed, the Cadians were not local to the Lorn system and had been dispatched to Lorn V with their own agenda. Ulantus was concerned enough to send off a message to Captain Angelos, requesting that the Third Company might be able to depart Rahe’s Paradise early and send assistance to Lorn. However, the astropathic communication had received no response from the Commander of the Watch. Not for the first time, Ulantus cursed the cavalier nature of the revered captain.
As Ulantus’ head raced with thoughts, the apothecary lifted a large, tubular, bloody organ from a tray next to the neophyte. With two other hands, it pushed aside the already cramped organs in Ckrius’ ch
est cavity, making space for the multi-lung just above the primary heart, where it would be inserted directly into the pulmonary system around the trachea. When this organ started to function, Ckrius would finally be freed from the nauseating effects of the toxic and poisonous gases that wafted around the Implantation Chamber, as the multi-lung would filter out the poisons for him.
With an abrupt movement, the apothecary snapped shut the gaping wound in Ckrius’ chest, folding the ribs closed and pressing the sternum back together again, leaving a lead weight resting on the join to keep it pressed together. The cloaked figure then turned and nodded sharply at Ulantus, indicating that the procedure was now finished for the time being.
At once, Ulantus turned and strode out of the observation chamber, heading down to the launch bays of the Litany of Fury, where his Thunderhawk was already loaded and waiting for him to lead the landing party down onto Trontiux III. For a number of reasons, the Blood Trials would be particularly fast and efficient this time.
Rushing through the winding corridors of the monastery, Jonas held the slender, delicate arms of Ptolemea in one hand, almost dragging her along behind him as he searched for Gabriel. He barged past scurrying menials and bustling ciphers, as the human pledge-workers of the Blood Ravens on Rahe’s Paradise went about their daily business, apparently unaware of the events that were unfolding around them.
Eventually, Jonas burst through into the librarium, shouldering open the great doors and ploughing forward in an eruption of dust and light as Gabriel turned to face him. The captain was standing at the ornate wooden desk under the stained-glass windows. He was leaning over a set of maps and blueprints, calculating his defensive strategy.
“Ah, Father Jonas,” began Gabriel. “I assume that Prathios—”
“Captain, I have some unpleasant news,” interrupted Jonas, swinging the slight form of Ptolemea around from behind him and depositing her onto the floor between them. “Sister Senioris Meritia has suffered some kind of attack and is presently in a coma. I have secured her in her chambers and posted guards on her door.”
“What kind of attack?” asked Gabriel. “And where did it take place?” He was suddenly concerned that his plans to defend the monastery from the outside might already be obsolete.
“I am not sure what kind of attack it was,” confessed Jonas, glaring at Ptolemea on the floor. “But, it took place in one of the new tunnels down in the dig. Ptolemea was the last person to see her, and they were alone when it happened.”
Gabriel nodded at Jonas and then turned his gaze on the young woman at his feet. “What happened, Sister Ptolemea?”
“The Sister Senioris was already unconscious when I found her, captain,” said Ptolemea calmly, picking herself up and smoothing her body-glove over her hips. “I’m afraid that I can tell you nothing about what happened. Father Jonas and Sister Meritia had been working in the excavation for a while before I got there.”
“I see,” said Gabriel, holding her dark eyes for a few seconds longer than necessary. Something about her seemed different; she was somehow less defiant than the last time they had met, despite the precariousness of her position now. There was something open and vulnerable in her gaze.
“And what were you working on, Jonas?” he asked, turning back to the librarian.
“We have found considerable evidence that the site was once occupied by eldar creatures, captain. The upper layers of the excavation are certainly human, and most of the artefacts appear to be directly related to the history of the Adeptus Astartes on Rahe’s Paradise—albeit to a period before the arrival of Elizur and Shedeur. However, there is a lower level, where we found the tablet,” explained Jonas, indicating the wraithbone block on the table next to Gabriel’s plans, “which contains a mixture of the Imperial artefacts and those of the eldar. This presumably represents some form of transitional period in the history of the planet. The lower layers, to which we have just gained access, appear to be almost entirely composed of eldar findings. We have, literally, only just scratched the surface of that layer, captain.”
“Have you reached any conclusions about these findings, father?” asked Gabriel, wanting to hear the old librarian’s opinions before sharing the recent events with him—they might colour his interpretation of the evidence. It was clear that Prathios had not found him.
“Nothing concrete, yet. As I said, we have only just uncovered the layer.”
“Hypothesise,” requested Gabriel, with an edge of urgency.
“Very well. I suspect that Rahe’s Paradise was once an eldar colony—what is sometimes referred to as an Exodite World. It appears that something caused the eldar to leave the planet or to be wiped out. Without checking the dates in more detail, I cannot tell whether this event was a force of nature—such as the catastrophic climatic disaster that brought about the ruination of the jungles and pushed the volcanoes out of the planet’s crust—or whether the event was linked to the arrival of the Imperium, perhaps even to the arrival of the very first detachments of Space Marines, who appear to have built their monastery in the remnants of the woods atop the remains of an eldar facility. As you are well aware, captain, we have no records concerning the actions or even the existence of the Marines who occupied the fortress that we uncovered in the foundations of our own. I assume that they were Blood Ravens, but there is little evidence to support such an assumption, one way or the other. It is conceivable that they were involved in purging the xenos taint from the surface of Rahe’s Paradise.”
Gabriel nodded in admiration at the old scholar’s logic, and he could see that the librarian’s mind was at ease once more, having immersed itself in creative scholarship rather than bitter accusations towards Ptolemea.
“Your conclusions are apposite, Jonas,” said Gabriel, taking some satisfaction in the way that the archaeological record was now confirming the apparently groundless suspicions that he had voiced about Rahe’s Paradise a few days earlier aboard the Litany of Fury. “You may not yet be aware that this outpost has now been attacked several times by eldar forces. Your own Scout Sergeant Caleb was merely the first to suffer such an assault: Prathios and I witnessed an ambush against the aspirants during the Blood Trials; Corallis’ sortie was attacked and Librarian Ikarus was killed by eldar warriors in the desert; and Sergeant Kohath has reported an attack against the Ravenous Spirit.”
“The Biel-Tan?” asked Jonas, apparently unwilling to reach the conclusion. “Of course, the Biel-Tan. It makes perfect sense,” he explained, as though giving voice to his thought processes. “From our previous encounters with these particular eldar, we know that they are unusually obsessed with trying to rebuild their lost, ancient empire. An old Exodite World like this one would be a logical choice for them, and I am sure that our presence here causes them much offence,” said Jonas, smiling with sudden satisfaction. “I can remember reading…” he trailed off as Ptolemea caught his eye and he was suddenly unwilling to reveal the source of his knowledge. “It is said that the name Biel-Tan might even mean ‘the resurrection of ancient days,’ because of their passion for this cause.”
“Doesn’t it strike you as odd,” began Ptolemea, who was following the conversation carefully, “that the Biel-Tan and the Blood Ravens would come into conflict on two separate planets, so far away from each other, but in such quick succession? Librarian Isador Akios informed me that your foes on Tartarus were also Biel-Tan—isn’t that right?”
She stared at Gabriel, waiting for a response. But, just as the captain was about to speak, a huge explosion made the three of them turn and stare out of the intricately patterned stained-glass window. One of the largest volcanoes in the range around the monastery had suddenly blown its peak, jettisoning clouds of sulphurous gas, dust, and molten rock high up into the troposphere. Streams of lava were already cascading down the sides of the mountain, and the red sun was being rapidly obscured by the black, mushrooming cloud.
“It has begun,” said Gabriel, snatching up his plans and striding down the ai
sle towards the great doors.
We are not yet in range for an attack, but the Bahzhakhain is poised, explained Taldeer, the projection of her face flickering slightly.
“I understand,” said Uldreth, pacing back and forth in front of the ghostly image of the farseer. He had remained on the craftworld and had watched as two separate fleets vanished off into the webway. He was resentful of his own position, and impatient for battle.
The mon-keigh will not succeed against the foul green-skins on Lorn. They have sent out a request for aid. Their nearest reinforcements are too far away, although the future indicates their presence in the present pathways.
“You are not there to assist the aliens, farseer, but rather to cleanse the planet. Do what you must, but do not trust the mon-keighs’ will or their resolve,” warned Uldreth, his lip curling into a snarl at the thought of any form of alliance with the Imperium, even as a temporary expedient.
He paused, not wanting to ask the next question. “And what of Macha? Do you have any news of her? She has not communicated with me since her departure.”
I cannot see her, confessed Taldeer, her face sad and forlorn.
“What do you mean?” demanded Uldreth, stopping pacing and staring into the apparition of Taldeer. “She is our farseer and head of the Council of Seers! Your bond with her cannot be broken by space!”
It has not been broken by space, Uldreth Avenger, but it has been broken, nonetheless. I cannot see her, and I can see nothing of the future of Lsathranil’s Shield. It is as though it has been erased from the future-past, hanging in the invisible limbo of the pure present.
“What does that mean!?” cried Uldreth, punching his fist into the wraithbone disc above which floated the image of Taldeer. “Was she right? Are you saying that Macha was right about the danger?”
I cannot see any danger, replied Taldeer without any reassurance. And I cannot see any safety. There is simply nothing to see there at all.
[Dawn of War 02] - Ascension Page 14