The Path of Heaven

by Chris Wraight

  And yet the oath had been made. The promise could not be broken.

  Seeing Mortarion’s fall had been enough, as had the visions of ruin on Prospero. Horus had swapped one tyrant for others, ones that would eventually devour him. If it had been a mistake to pretend the warp never existed, it was an even greater one to believe the words of those who dwelled within it.

  The lines had been drawn. All that remained was to put each side to the test.

  Jaghatai turned away from the vista, back towards the candlelit chamber. Silhouetted under the arch beyond Qin Xa’s memorial altar was the outline of Jubal Khan. He had not moved, waiting for the command to approach, until then standing as still and silent as stone.

  ‘Come,’ ordered the Khagan, walking past the altar and descending a shallow flight of stairs. Jubal fell in alongside him, and together they entered another chamber below the observation level. There, rough-cut sandstone walls were hung with calligraph-scrolls. Fires burned in lined circular pits, just as they had done in the old Talskar realms. The lightning strike of the Legion had been inlaid in gold over the far wall, and the metal glinted from the dancing flames. Hides hung tight from wooden racks, scraped clean, as taut as sinews.

  ‘Did you see him fall?’ asked the Khan, reaching for a goblet of halaak – the fermented lactose that only a Chogorian’s constitution absorbed without challenge.

  ‘No, Khagan. We were sundered by battle.’

  ‘He was brought home by the sorcerer.’

  ‘He was.’

  The Khan took a long sip, savouring the acrid taste. ‘They tell me the Kalium Gate was mined.’

  ‘Fleet augurs detected them once we were close,’ said Jubal, standing stiffly before his master, his hands by his sides. They looked similar, those two – the hooked nose, long oil-black hair, earth-dark skin. ‘We could not have used the portal.’

  ‘So you called off the attack.’

  ‘The numbers were too great. If the Gate had been intact, then–’

  ‘You would have fought on further, hoping to turn the tide. And still lost.’ The Khan had already studied all the battlefield reports, and had gauged every tactic employed by every detachment. ‘Just as you said – the numbers were too great. It was well that you withdrew when you did, for they are getting better at reading us.’

  He stared into the depths of his goblet. The murky liquid gazed back.

  ‘Khagan, are you angered?’ Jubal asked, cautiously.

  ‘Angered?’

  ‘It was another loss. The keshiga…’ Jubal trailed off.

  The Khan felt a spasm of pain, and paused before replying. ‘Qin Xa took a thousand souls with him. He more than accounted for himself. That is all we can hope for, is it not?’ He looked up directly at Jubal. ‘We could huddle together, hoping to avoid danger in numbers, and perhaps the war would pass us by. Or we could strike at the enemy where he travels, trusting to fate to guard our souls.’ His lips pressed together, as close as he got to a smile, though he did not entirely hide the hurt. ‘The wind blows east, the wind blows west. Our fortunes will change.’

  He moved over to two stools, arranged as the Altak war-chief would have had them – low to the stone floor, criss-crossed lengths of wood, slung with cured hides. Each one was far larger than the old mortal-scale warlord-thrones, built for the outsized bulk of the Legiones Astartes. The Khan gestured towards one, and sank down into the other. His long limbs, clad in a crimson kaftan, stretched out lithely over the leather.

  Jubal did as he was bid, though uncomfortably. Like most of the ordu, he preferred to stand, or take the saddle.

  ‘I need a new keshiga,’ the Khan said.

  ‘Namahi is a fine choice.’

  ‘I have not yet spoken to him. I wished to speak to you.’

  Jubal looked even more uncomfortable. ‘Khagan, you do me too much honour.’

  ‘Too much honour?’

  ‘More than I deserve.’ Jubal looked up to face him. ‘The Master of the Keshig is your right arm. He is your sword. He must know your mind like none other. I was not on Chondax, nor Prospero. There are others with better claim.’

  ‘Hasik is gone. Jemulan is gone. The list is shorter than you think.’

  ‘What of Tachseer?’

  ‘What of him?’

  ‘There are many in the brotherhoods who would wish it for him.’

  ‘My warriors wish for many things. I am not bound to grant them.’ The Khan took another sip. ‘Shiban was a poet, Yesugei tells me. Now he does not write, he does not sing, and he does not laugh.’ He swilled the cup around before him, watching the play of light on the rim. ‘I guard more than the ordu’s fighting strength, Jubal. There are those under my command who fight with the sun of the plains in their eyes. There are those who reflect the darkness of the enemy, for it has entered their blood. Both will kill at my command, but I take no joy, and never have, in killing without artistry. Do you see what I am saying?’

  ‘It will not sit well with those who name him Restorer.’

  ‘And that disturbs you.’

  ‘Not at all. So long as you know.’

  ‘Let them whisper.’ The Khan put the goblet down. ‘So we have it, then? You will not outright refuse me. I give you this honour and you will accept it, grudgingly, your feet dragged to my side like a whipped lad.’

  Jubal laughed, despite himself. ‘You reject my counsel, so what remains? My blade is yours, Khagan, as it always has been. But grant me one thing – I will not take the title. Qin Xa was the only Master of the Keshig you have known. I will not live in his shadow.’

  The Khan inclined his head. ‘So be it. You are the hunter, the slayer of beasts. Thus I name you Ahn-ezen, Master of the Hunt. How does that sound in your ears?’

  Jubal rose to his feet, and bowed low. ‘Khagan, it is fitting.’

  The Khan rose in turn, and drew his tulwar. He held it before him, letting the curved shadow fall over Jubal’s flame-lit face. ‘I shall hold you to the name. No more the Lord of Summer Lightning, but my huntsman. My wide-ranger, my bringer of trophies. You will bring honour to the Horde, even as the darkness falls.’

  ‘Be sure of it.’

  The Khan placed the sword’s edge against Jubal’s cheek, balancing it perfectly, resting it on the edge of the raised scar. ‘Let there be no illusion, the way ahead will be dark.’ Then he drew it away, flashing the steel against the firelight before placing it back in its ivory sheath. ‘We are running out of room, Ahn-ezen.’

  ‘All must change.’

  ‘Aye, it must. The storms hem us, we cannot run these raids any longer. I bring the ordu together, even those who once broke the law of the Altak. We shall meet this thing united.’

  ‘Then can you tell me, yet?’ Jubal asked. ‘What is your purpose?’

  ‘Not yet. I await tidings from my counsellor,’ said the Khan, a wry look on his scarred face. ‘I sense him now, he is close. In truth it was for him that I sent my sons into peril. If he brings the tidings we hope, then there may yet be a way to my Father’s side, and to the walls of Terra.’

  ‘And if not?’

  ‘If not, then we cannot leave the void,’ the Khan said, bleakly. ‘We shall die here, but we shall yet make it such a death as songs are sung of.’ He reached for his goblet and drained the last of it. ‘But the galaxy will know, before long,’ he said then, ‘one way or the other, that defiance yet exists in this crooked house of lies.’

  Ten

  She watched his eyes open. They flickered, then the lids parted, and he was looking straight at her.

  The lumens were set low, but he still winced. For a moment, he clearly had no idea where he was, and the panic reaction set in.

  She waited. He was secured to the bunk, there was a legionary stationed outside the cell on the Sickle Moon, and Yesugei was on the ship somewhere within mind-reach, so she had not
hing to fear. For all that, her mouth was dry. This was the final chance to salvage something from what had been her counsel.

  Once the man’s disorientation had subsided, and he realised he was on a starship, and that the woman before him did not obviously intend to harm him, he swallowed painfully and blinked.

  ‘Who are you?’ he croaked.

  Ilya passed him a canister of water. ‘General Ilya Ravallion, Departmento Munitorum. Who are you?’

  He drank greedily and handed the canister back for more. ‘You don’t know?’

  Ilya refilled it. ‘Tell me your name. It will be easier if you answer the questions.’

  He shrank back against the wall of the holding chamber. Ilya waited again. The man had gazed into the eyes of a corrupted Traitor Marine. His dreams would likely be bad for the rest of his life.

  ‘I was…’ he said. ‘I was called… Veil.’

  ‘Veil. Nothing else?’

  ‘He gave us names he liked. That amused him.’

  ‘Then what were you called before that?’ He looked panicked again. ‘It matters not. I shall call you Veil.’

  Veil drank more. He smelt foul, despite treatment in the apothecarion for the worst of his exposure. He had suffered several broken bones and severe mental trauma. It was unlikely he had slept for several days while on Herevail, and the pollution of that world was acute.

  ‘When we took you, you were wearing Nobilite robes,’ said Ilya. ‘House Achelieux. Can you tell me what your function was?’

  ‘No.’

  Ilya sighed. ‘Veil, whatever bonds of secrecy were placed on you are now gone. Your world is now gone. You will need to reconsider who to confide in.’

  Veil’s hands began to shake, and he looked up and around the walls of the cell like a hunted creature. ‘Where am I?’

  ‘The Fifth Legion frigate Sickle Moon.’

  ‘And what… were they?’

  ‘Your world was attacked by the Third Legion Astartes, the Emperor’s Children. Traitor Space Marines.’

  At the mention of the name, Veil shrunk back further, as if he could press himself through the metal walls. ‘They were…’

  ‘Do not think of that now. See, I am answering your questions. Now answer some of mine. What was your function?’

  Even then, it took him a long time to answer. The Navigator Houses were honour-bound institutions, and bonds of confidentiality within them were laid down strongly. They were also repositories of secrets, buried deep and locked away, and it was rare for those secrets to be probed, even under the duress of war. This was the first time she had ever had occasion to quiz a magister of the Nobilite, and, in truth, she had little idea how far she would get.

  Ilya waited for a third time. Veil would have to absorb what had happened and see for himself how far it nullified any orders he had been given in the past.

  ‘I was an… But you will not understand the terms.’

  ‘Try me,’ she said.

  ‘Ecumene-majoris, in tabulae via speculativa. Under charter from the Paternova. If you are in the Departmento, you should be able to find this information.’

  Ilya smiled. ‘That is a touching thought. How senior were you?’

  Veil took another swig. He was a calming down, though his fingers still trembled against the canister. ‘I have served ninety years. There are no more senior positions for those without the Oculus.’ He lost focus. ‘It was everything. The world. The Houses are like worlds. There is no outside, and–’

  ‘Concentrate, please,’ said Ilya, bringing him back. ‘You have been given drugs for your pain. I need you to think clearly. Why were you on Herevail?’

  ‘It was ideal.’

  ‘Ideal for what?’

  ‘Everything.’ He brightened, latching on to something he could speak with authority about. ‘It was a stranded world – you know this expression? No? High in the stratum aetheris, too high. Remember your fleet dispatch – your Navigator will have told you to break the veil a long way out. Perhaps it took you weeks to reach it. That cannot be altered. Herevail is remote from a portal absolute, and thus the harmonics are insignificant. Almost completely insignificant. When I first arrived, I could not believe it – they detected nothing, even Pieter could not. That was remarkable.’

  Ilya listened. Much of what he said made no sense to her, but that was not important – he was talking now, that was the main thing. And, unbidden, he had already said the name she sought, which boded well.

  ‘So, imagine you are doing what we are doing,’ Veil went on. ‘You could not wish for somewhere more suited. We were able to make great progress. There were charts, oh there were charts…’ He broke off, looking confused. ‘You destroyed the monsters?’

  Ilya nodded. ‘All killed. All those we could find.’

  ‘And so you took back Vorlax? There was a spire, close to the edge of the outer city. It had a double-crown, the mark of the House on the eastern side. Did you retrieve anything?’

  ‘All the cities were burned,’ Ilya said. ‘All the spires were ruined. I had explorator teams search Vorlax. There was nothing.’

  That made Veil recoil, as if stung. ‘So that is why they came,’ he muttered, disgusted. ‘To destroy it.’

  ‘I do not think so. I do not think they came for you. If they had known you were there, they would have hunted you from the beginning, and you would not have evaded them.’ She remembered the scale of the devastation. Even a relatively minor Legion-splinter was capable of turning whole planets into slag, and the dead on Herevail must have numbered in the millions. ‘They are burning worlds, one by one, marking a route back to Terra. It was your misfortune to be in the way.’

  ‘Misfortune,’ mumbled Veil, numbly. ‘Not just ours. All lost, then.’

  ‘How long had you been working there?’

  ‘Three years.’

  ‘And before that?’

  ‘On Denel Five. A Nobilite sanctuary world. Before that, Terra.’ He allowed himself a blush of pride. ‘Have you seen the Palace? I have. I have walked the streets of the Regio Navigens, and seen where the Paternova, exalted be his name, dwells in splendour.’

  Ilya wondered what had happened to the Navigators’ Quarter now. In lockdown, no doubt, surrounded by growing fortifications. The vast old mutant at the heart of it all was probably being watched by a hundred of Malcador’s agents for the slightest twitch of insurrection.

  And vice versa.

  Like every element of the sprawling Imperial hierarchy, the Navigators were split in twain, their agents and lords straddling both sides of the great divide. How many of their Houses had gone over fully to the enemy? Was there any other institution, even including the Cult of Mars, that was less well understood by those outside its cabals, echelons and rituals?

  Veil stopped talking and looked at her strangely. ‘So how did you know?’

  ‘Know what, Veil?’

  ‘That we were being attacked.’

  ‘We did not. At least, we could not be sure.’ Ilya recalled the heated discussions with Yesugei, Jubal, the two noyan-khans. Only Qin Xa had been calm, accepting whatever outcome the Khagan adopted. It would be good to see him again, she thought, when they reached the muster-point. ‘You must know little of what has happened since you left Denel Five, so let me inform you. The war has grown. There are no places of refuge left, and soon the enemy will be at the gates of Terra itself. You are now among the White Scars Legion, who are still fighting. As far as we know, we are the only full Legion still fighting, though unless we can break free and see our way into the open void, we cannot know anything with certainty.’

  Veil took in the information soberly, sipping every so often from the canister.

  ‘I hide nothing from you – we are trapped,’ Ilya told him. ‘Warp storms block the principal routes back to the Throneworld. Four Traitor Legions are tracking us, and
have closed a ring of steel around us. Every attempt we make to break this ring has failed, and our room to manoeuvre grows narrower. The Khagan, the primarch, he has made an oath to reach the Emperor’s side before the final assault comes. That means a great deal to this Legion – they will die rather than leave an oath unfulfilled, but the universe has made it difficult. So every course is tried – we are fighting, not just for survival, but to reach the Solar System before the Warmaster closes the approaches.’

  ‘You speak of the Great Fracture,’ said Veil, nodding. ‘We tracked the course of the storms. We knew they were coming. Even he did not know how they did it.’

  ‘Yes, they are part of the problem, so our Navigators tell us. The enemy has other powers over the wider warp, and allies within it – that is the other part. And so we are hunting for the narrowest path to Terra.’ Ilya leaned forwards, crossing her legs. ‘Listen, Veil. When I was serving in the Imperial Army, I had many contacts in the Houses. I knew one Novator in particular. We served jointly during the Crusade and achieved much together. I assisted him with some logistical matters, and he disclosed more to me than was common for your kind. I came to understand that he was close to high-ranking figures at the Imperial Court, and that the things I was assisting him with were part of something much larger than he could tell me. I did not press him then. We remained friends, and I admired his work, and that was that.’

  Veil listened to her intently. His lower lip hung down by a fraction.

  ‘But I knew enough,’ Ilya said. ‘I knew that some great project was being enacted, and that he was a part of it. Perhaps only a very small part, but even that was so heavily guarded that I was left in no doubt of its importance. We parted ways long before the onset of the war, but I never forgot. The last I had heard, he had been due to take a posting at Denel Five. Eight months ago, we were there. It was deserted, all life erased, all spires empty. But it had not been invaded, for the war was at that point a long way off. Denel Five had been destroyed by its inhabitants. Why? I do not know. Perhaps you do.’