‘Thank you, Lord…’ I managed to say, hearing my own voice. It sounded frayed. ‘Heresy… how? I–’
‘We are going to Bakka,’ said Covenant.
That cleared the fog fast. I looked at my master, frowning. ‘Lord…’
‘You should see him. If we can arrive in time you shall see him.’
I held Covenant’s gaze for a moment then. All my life has been service. First that service had a sound and weight, the links of chains rattling across the gun decks, dragged by muscle. Then it was the roar of the gun and the heft of cutlass and pike. Now it is the measure in words and choices, and in the will of one man. Covenant, cold as the edge of a sword, unflinching as the fall of a hammer. Those who have met him see the power he wields and perhaps the majesty of the office he holds: the manifest will of the God Emperor that humanity endure through the dark of our futures. He is a soul of control and supreme will. He is, and always will be, my friend. But he is not kind.
‘As you say, my lord,’ I said at last, then turned and left without another word.
Cardinal Abernath did not start out as he would end. None of us do. We look at great women and men and imagine that they must have always been so, that they leapt into being haloed by the greatness they would achieve. But we are all born, all shaped in the same flesh, and breathe and scream and laugh alike. The choices that we take may lead to sainthood or damnation, but we walk the road of those choices from the same low place.
Before the titles, and the honours, and the gilding of history written by those who were not there, Abernath was different. We both were.
It is difficult for those who have never served on a warship to know how much of life is ruled by sound. Down in the fume-filled decks and the reeking companionways there are no suns or stars or moons to divide time into days. Up on the command decks they might follow day and night watches and dim the lamps when the false night comes, but down beneath their feet a watch is just a bell that echoes through the gloom. Days are divided by the soundings of those bells, disaster marked by the cry of the klaxon, and the heartbeat of the world by the growl of machines and the rattling of chains.
I should have seen it coming. I had grown up in the bloody bowels of a hive, and the chain decks of a warship were not that much different; the mistakes that got you killed were just the same: little things, not paying attention, thinking you were safe, not seeing the knife coming until it was too late.
There were gangs down on the decks. No surprise really; there are gangs everywhere. Regiments, divisios, creeds, ordos, convents: in a way the whole of the Imperium is just like a hive gang stretched out across stars and billions of souls. On a loading deck, the gangs are divided by the chains they pull. Everybody on a chain belongs to that chain, there is no other way or option. There are dozens of chains, some with links as thick as your arm. The bigger the chain, the heavier, the bigger the gang and the stronger each soul on it. The names of the gangs came from the chains: the Blessed from the Blessed Emperor chain, the Iron Children from the Iron Eternal chain, the Kindly Ones from the Kindness of Service chain, on and on, dozens of them, all loathing each other with the strength that only humans can muster.
I had been an Iron Child since I went to the decks. It was one of the biggest chains and we had dominance over half the deck and a bunch of the lower decks too. I was a gang boss. I had reputation and a little power, all earned in the battles that washed through the decks. That was how you made your way up – by spilling the blood of others. Like I said, not much different from anywhere else, really. But there had not been a deck war for a while, not a full-blown fight. And peace breeds complacency.
I did not see it coming. I was on my own, a bad idea to start with, but I was in Iron Children territory by the main shell hoist, so I did not think there was anything to watch out for. I turned the corner into a companion way and ran straight into the point of a knife. The kid holding it just stood there, pale, shaking with terror at what she had just done, her blade in my guts up to the hilt, blood leaking out onto her fingers. For a second I just stood there, too, gawping at the kid. She had the open hand tattoos of one of the Kindly Ones on her arms. Cold was radiating through my guts. She jerked the knife, tried to pull it free, trying to stab me again. My hand clamped on her arm. She tried to twist free. The world was a smudged blur. I took a step forwards, stumbled and the gang-girl let go of the knife. Her face was a pale smear in my sight. I was falling, any word or cry just a gurgle in my throat. Just like that… just like the cord holding me up had been cut.
We are fragile things. You can be as strong as you like and something catches you in just the wrong place and you fall like a stone. We are like that, full of weaknesses that can kill us.
I remember things becoming very soft, sound and sight just running out like rope unravelling… I didn’t even fight it. I knew that I was dying but I didn’t fight. I think I found the thought peaceful. Just let things happen… no point any more, if there ever had been in the first place…
‘Come on now,’ said a man’s voice very close by. I tried to look up, to get up, to fight whoever this new enemy was. I did not move. Blurs of colour filled my eyes. I had not realised how little I could move, or how much blood I must have lost. ‘Good, very good – still fighting. You know for a moment you had me worried – even chance they did not hit anything really vital. The Emperor is fond of the dead, but prefers it if dying meant something, you know?’ said the voice. I wanted to say something but cold was creeping though me.
‘Over here!’ I heard the voice call. ‘Over here, you cursed sons and daughters of idiots, get him up, we have not got long – most of him is swimming on this deck!’
I think I remember hands lifting me, and then nothing much of anything.
I woke in a space that smelled of raw meat and sweat. I woke with a ball of pain where my stomach had been. I roared, a full-voiced cry that rolled with the agony and anger.
‘I wouldn’t do that,’ said the voice from close by, and somehow the sound – calm, sincere but somehow casual – made the shout wither to a croak in my throat. I looked around. I was in a butcher-brig. That was what the medicae wings for the higher-rated crew were called. They earned the name, too. There was not much tenderness in a butcher-brig, just a lot of blood, screams, and the sound of the bone saws. More people died in them than were saved by them, but their kind of care was more than you got on a loading deck. There you didn’t even get a chance to see if you could survive the treatment. How I had ended up here, I didn’t know, but there I was, strapped down to a cot. A mass of blood-stained cloth covered my gut.
A man with a black robe, its collar and cuffs edged by white checks, stood beside me. His face was narrow and solemn, his hair cut into an untidy tonsure. Beyond him I could see others lying on cots similar to mine. The walls were a mottled, gloss red. Wide drains with grille covers dotted the floor.
‘Quiet times in here…’ said the man following my gaze around the room. ‘Just the injured from a bilge riot and the usual set of accidents that seem to befall so many on a ship even when it’s not at war.’
I began to thrash around, trying to reach the buckles of the straps holding me down.
‘Don’t do that,’ said the man in robes, looking back to me. ‘There are a reasonable number of people with guns in this place, and most of them are not happy I brought you here. The rest of them are even less happy that you look like surviving that puncture in your gut. Give them too much of an excuse and I think they will ask for the God Emperor’s forgiveness rather than my permission to put a bullet in you.’
‘You’re…’ I began, putting together the man’s words and appearance. ‘You’re a script-monger. A cursed script-monger.’
‘I am a priest in the service of the God-Emperor of Mankind, yes.’
‘Why… why did you take me, priest?’
He blinked once and frowned, but his gaze held steady
on me.
‘I have a calling,’ he said at last. ‘I save those I can. That is my purpose, my sacred duty.’
‘So you go looking for the dying on the low decks and see if they can be saved, is that it?’
He did not even blink.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘So,’ I said, ‘you think that the Em-per-or, high and all mighty, has a use for me?’
‘You’re alive, aren’t you? That’s an indication, don’t you think?’
‘I don’t–’ I began, but he held up a finger. Even then, I had seen a lot of life’s crueller edge. I had seen someone kiss a hammer that had just crushed a friend’s skull. I had heard people make threats that I knew were red truth, and gone to greet them with a knife and a grin anyway. I had looked down the barrel of guns and wondered if they would bring the end at last. I had done all this, and yet that simple raised finger stopped the words before they could get free of my teeth.
‘You are here for a reason,’ he said. ‘Just as I am, just as we all are. Think about that. I have taken twenty-four souls on the edge of death just like you. All died. You show every sign of surviving. That means that the Emperor may see more worth in you than you believe.’
‘So? I am going to become some chosen saint or powerful lord, is that it?’
The man smiled.
‘Many amongst my brethren would take that as heresy, or at the very least blasphemy. Luckily, I am more forgiving. And, no, I had rather more modest thoughts for your future.’
‘Yeah, like what?’
‘You are good at killing people, I can tell. And although you have a hole in you, most of you seems to be muscle. The Emperor has use for many types of instruments, but for now you might serve him well by defending this ship, by being one of those that keeps it and all the people on it safe.’
‘An armsman?’ I asked, and I confess that there was surprise in my voice. The contingents of armsmen on a warship came in many types and qualities, but they were several cuts above the chain haulers on the gundecks. Better food, a real berth, guns and armour and rank… all the good stuff. ‘They don’t take gun-deck scum.’
‘I have an understanding with the master-lieutenant-at-arms for the mid-port decks. He will take you.’
‘And what do you want from me?’
‘Nothing… well, maybe that you listen to me if I am passing by.’
I nodded slowly.
‘All right,’ I said at last.
The man smiled, and then stood. A haloed skull set in a bronze ‘I’ swung around his neck as he moved. He caught it and kissed it, bowed his head and then closed his eyes for a second as though in thanks.
‘What is your name?’ he asked when he opened his eyes.
‘You don’t even know who you…’ I began, and then stopped. ‘Josef, my name is Josef.’
‘Blessings to you, Josef. I am Abernath.’ And he put his hand on my shoulder, and nodded. ‘I believe that you might have much to give the Emperor.’
The Dungeon of the Doubted was designed in every way to make those who entered it feel the gaze of judgement they were under. Set at the hub of the wheel-shaped star station that housed the Ecclesiarchy enclave in the port system of Bakka, it was a form of torture just to walk its halls. All the corridors were narrow but the walls soared up to many times a human’s height. Images of penance and excruciation covered the ceilings, the eyes of the sinners and sufferers painted so that they followed those who passed beneath. Worse though was the light.
Illumination blazed from hundreds of candles and glow globes hung from every wall and ceiling. The light poured across the statues of blind angels that looked down on the chambers and corridors. There were no shadows to hide sin in such places, that is what they said. I have always found sin more ingenious than we give it credit for. The guards were robed in white and the lower portion of their faces hidden by iron masks in the shape of pleading mouths. Dark goggles protected their eyes from days spent in the endless light. They carried short metal staffs capped with clenched steel hands cast in iron. Keys and lengths of chain clinked at their waists. Technically none of them were part of the Ecclesiarchy. The old prohibition against the Ministorum keeping men under arms meant that the guards were lay brothers, followers of the faith rather than part of the priesthood. Most would be veterans of the Astra Militarum, Navy, or arbitrators, and they had taken oaths to imprison members of the priesthood accused of heresy or crimes against the Imperial creed. It was a duty they took with the utmost seriousness.
Here, in small cells, members of the Ecclesiarchy who might have strayed were kept confined. It was not a gentle place. The Imperium is an empire of faith, and the Ecclesiarchy is the keeper of that faith. The Emperor is not only god but also the Imperium. To stray, to become doubted, is not just to fail in the eyes of the Emperor, but to wound Him. At least, that is how the argument runs.
I walked alone through the dungeon. I wore the robes that marked me as a drill abbot attached to the schola progenium, but around my neck hung a tri-barred ‘I’ worked in copper that was the symbol of the Inquisition. I carried a great hammer across my shoulders as was my right by rank and role. No one tried to stop me. Covenant had sent word and his symbol around my neck was enough to answer any questions the guards had about my being there. Plasteel doors opened before I reached them, and guards stepped aside without a word. Occasionally I heard a cry or moan echoing down one the corridors. I glowered at the guards as I passed. I am not a believer in unthinking judgement or cruelty. The more I have seen of the true face of the universe and all that threatens mankind, the less I find I can stomach the pettiness of most cruelty.
At last I reached a corridor that had only a single door set in its far wall. A stone angel with a blindfold and sword sat above the door, serene in grey, veined marble. The guards at this door bore power maces and wore heavy silver plate. They bowed their heads as I approached. I did not return the gesture.
‘Open it,’ I said. They paused for an instant and then slotted long keys into two keyholes in the door. Mechanisms released with a thump of oiled metal and turning cogs, and the door hinged open. If the light in the corridors of the dungeon was blinding, then looking into the cell was like looking into a sun. Mirrors covered each wall and stab lights shone from the corners and ceiling. A man sat in the centre of the floor, his hands covering his eyes, manacles circling his wrists, chains running to cleats in the floor. I looked at him for a long moment.
‘Shut the lights off,’ I said. The guards shifted, hesitated. ‘Shut them off. Now.’
The lights in the cell cut out. The man on the floor did not move. His hands were still covering his face.
‘Give me a candle,’ I said. The guards hesitated again. ‘That one will do.’ I jerked a hand at a candle held in the hands of a sculpted cherub projecting from the wall next to the door. They handed it to me, and I stepped into the now-dark cell. The door closed behind me, and I heard the locks turn. The man on the floor flinched, but did not take his hands from his face. Carefully I set down the hammer and then the candle.
‘Your eminence,’ I said. Still he did not move. ‘Lord Cardinal…’ Gently I bent down and put my hand on his arm. ‘Abernath?’
He looked at me, then, or tried to. The light in the cell must have bleached his sight enough that he was halfway to blindness. He blinked as the small light of the candle touched his eyes. Moisture began to stream from their corners. He looked old, I thought, old, drained and with the hard edges exposed. I had not seen him for three decades, and he had not been young even when I saw him last. But what I saw in his face was not about time.
‘Josef?’ he said.
‘Yes, your eminence. It’s me.’
‘Why are you here?’
‘As your confessor, as your friend,’ I said. He let out a sigh, closed his eyes.
‘There is no helping me, my son, not now.’
>
I felt words of reassurance come to my lips, facts about the power that might be brought to bear on his behalf. I closed my mouth and my eyes moved over his face, reading the lines of expression beneath the wrinkles. I met his gaze.
That is the thing about serving the Inquisition; you never see the world, nor any of the people in it, in the same way again. Hardening, loss of innocence, true perception, it’s all the same, and utterly irreversible. An old soldier call Ianthe once told me that. She was not wrong.
‘Why can’t you be saved?’ I asked Cardinal Abernath, holding his gaze.
He gave a small, sad smile, and looked away.
‘Because I am guilty,’ he said.
I am not an inquisitor, though I have known many. Their burden is not one that I could shoulder. Their job is to look into the eyes of anyone they meet – ally, enemy, heretic and penitent – and weigh what they see against the survival of mankind. I believe that the human soul is flawed and dangerous and radiant and majestic, and I could not balance that against the weight of the future. Do not mistake me; I am a killer, I am a soldier, but I am a priest first, and while some see the God-Emperor we serve as filled with vengeance, I know His wrath as righteousness not rage, His power as a shield against the dark. I believe. I do not judge.
‘Are you shocked?’ asked Abernath.
‘I… I do not know,’ I replied carefully. Abernath nodded.
‘I could not tell,’ he said. ‘You have changed, Josef.’
‘Not really,’ I replied flatly.
‘You have,’ said Abernath, and looked up at me. He smiled, a genuine smile that you could barely see the sadness in. ‘A bit of distance, a bit of coldness, a bit of knowing that you are going to be careful what you say now, that you can’t just trust me like you used to.’ He motioned to the Inquisitorial symbol hanging from my neck. ‘It is a heavy thing to bear and a heavier thing to live with.’ He let his hand fall, looked at me, still smiling, and shrugged. ‘It’s good to see you, Josef. Truly, it is.’
Divination - John French Page 24