by William King
'What do you mean?'
She giggled. 'These are said to be used by... sorcerers for...' she paused and he could almost see her changing her mind about what she was going to say.
'...for certain arcane rituals.'
It was not the first time Justina had hinted about knowledge of the arcane. He sometimes wondered if she were trying to lead him on to ask about it. There were rumours about certain proscribed cults that she had alluded to. Most people would not even dare mention them. It was not something he wanted to think about.
'This may be the first of many.'
Now she did look a little shocked. Her eyes widened slightly. 'That is not likely. Dreamstones of this purity are very rare, and they come only from the eldar themselves.'
He told her of his suspicions concerning the strangers. She smiled more, showing small, sharp teeth that reminded him of a predatory animal at the moment, a mink or a devilcat. 'I am serious now, Janus,' she said. 'Upon my life I am. You must tell me all you know about these strangers, and tell me everything they said. Everything. I will not help you otherwise.'
This was a side of her Janus had never seen before. She sounded completely sincere and utterly serious. And unless he was a much poorer judge of character than he thought himself to be, she was masking a deeper excitement. He paused for a moment to consider his position. The merchant in him wanted to examine this from all angles, to see what he could find out before proceeding. He wanted to make sure he was giving nothing away, and see if there was any way to take advantage of what she had.
It never did to give in to threats in a negotiation. On the other hand, he did need her help desperately and she knew it. Or did he? Surely there would be others willing to take those dreamstones off his hands. Maybe not. Not with the syndics' ire focused on him, and Fat Roj on his trail. He would need a front through which to sell, and she was just the person to act as one. She knew everybody and every shady thing in Medusa.
But there was no way he was going to tell her everything Auric had said. He was not going to tell her about the voices in his head or the dooms the stranger said lay in wait for him. Perhaps he could give her an edited version, leaving that out. Suddenly he wished he had not drunk all the golconda laced wine earlier. He knew it put him at a great disadvantage now. Should he tell her that Auric wanted to go to the Eye of Terror? Did he want to admit that he was certain that Auric and Athenys were eldar? His mind reeled. Somewhere in the back of his head voices gibbered. Something loosened his tongue.
'They are eldar,' he said. They want to go into the Eye. To Belial IV.'
She looked electrified now and a look passed over her face that reminded him of a raptor contemplating a feast. She leaned forward, unconsciously straining like a hound at leash smelling prey.
'That they are eldar would make sense. In the end all dreamstones come from the eldar. They grow them somehow, although no one knows how. But why did they choose you to take them?'
'I don't know. Perhaps because I am a famed explorer,' he added with a touch of asperity.
'Why not take their own ships? There are eldar ships, after all.'
'You tell me—you know more of these things than I do.'
'Yes, oh famous explorer, perhaps I do.' Her tone was acid.
'In any case, he seemed certain I would do as he wished.'
'Certain?'
'He said he had foreseen it.'
'Did he now? Were those his exact words?'
'More or less. I thought him a madman, so I was not paying close attention.'
'Really, Janus? You did not pay close attention to someone who was offering you a governor's ransom in dreamstones for making a voyage? That is very unlike you. The wine and the golconda must be affecting you more than I thought.'
'Will you help me dispose of the gem—without any of my creditors finding out?'
'I am one of your creditors.'
'Yourself excepted then.'
'Yes. And I will set about it right away. I must make inquiries now. I will talk to you later.'
It was a dismissal. Janus was not sure he liked the sudden decisive way she got up to go. He could sense some underlying motive, something far more than a desire to help him or simply make money. It was something connected with the eldar, but what could it be?
No matter. The die was cast. With the money the dream-stone represented he could pay off his debts, get his ship back and wipe the dust of this wicked world from his boots. But where would he go?
Justina waited until the rogue trader had left before she allowed a smile of triumph to appear on her face. Could it really be possible that Janus Darke did not know the true value of what he had been given? She supposed so—after all, he had no idea of the true value of what he was becoming. He had taken the amulet without any hint of suspicion; little knowing that it forged a link between him and the great master that would soon be all but unbreakable. It had been a lucky day for her when she first encountered Janus, luckier still when she saw the potential within him, and had brought it to the attention of her superior in the worship of the cult.
She looked down at the dreamstone and felt the strange alien power within the thing. She did not try to draw on it. It would not let her. In fact it would harm her. The thing had been made to protect against people like her, against agents of the Lord of Forbidden Pleasures. If poor foolish Janus had known how to use it, it might even have protected him for a time. But then he did not.
And eldar too, she thought. What a night! The reward for those would be immense. More than anything else, her master desired the souls of eldar. She had much to report.
She studied her beauty in the full-length mirror and was pleased. She had come a long way from the back alleys of Medusa Warren on the strength of that and her indomitable will. All the way to chief priestess of the Cult of Pleasures on this world. She intended to go a lot further yet. She strode around the room making sure all the locks were in place. There was no way anyone could enter now. The doors were reinforced and a horde of ogryns armed with battering rams could not have battered their way through them.
She strode back to the mirror and felt the same thrill of fear and anticipation she always did when about to contact the master. She lit two tapers of hallucinogenic incense and breathed deeply, letting her mind relax, feeling the pulsing waves of pleasure pass through her body as she gathered her inner strength.
She closed her eyes and felt the tingle on her skin. She breathed in the sickly sweet perfume. She reached out with her left hand and made the sign of the horns as she passed her palm across the mirror and repeated the ancient words as she had been taught.
'Amat ti, amat Slaanesh. Amak klessa, amak Slaanesh. Amak Shaha Gaathon!' The ancient words from the language of daemons rolled off her tongue. As she spoke them she felt something twist inside her. She opened her eyes and saw that her reflection had started to shimmer and change.
As she watched, her reflection twisted and transformed itself into someone even more strikingly beautiful than herself but with a skin of purest alabaster, hair of brightest red. Small horns protruded from his forehead. Sharp fangs showed in a smile of ruby red. The eyes had no iris and no pupils, and glowed like lilac flames. A toga of sheer silk covered the vision's androgynously lovely form. As ever Justina felt the tug of attraction and loyalty and devotion. She had felt it ever since she had known her first caress from the master.
The chamber in the mirror was no longer her room. She could see dark red walls carved with all manner of erotic statuary which writhed with a slow stony life of its own. A naked girl and boy crouched at the vision's feet and looked up with adoring eyes before gazing out at Justina with jealous resentment. Beyond them, she could see a huge arched window, and through it the monstrously bizarre landscape of the daemon worlds. Huge chunks of the surface broke off from the surface, formed into great spheres and drifted up into the sky. Sometimes they became obscenely writhing suggestive shapes.
'What is it, slave?' asked the vision. 'What
do you desire of me?'
'I have news, Great Harbinger of Slaanesh. I have news, Lord Shaha Gaathon,' said Justina, allowing some of her adoration to show in her voice. She was proud that she did not sound too worshipful.
'Speak then, for I have other business to attend to.' The daemon stroked the head of the youth. Justina could see that his nails were long and sharp—like bird's claws.
'Darke has been approached by the eldar,' said Justina, and was pleased by the smile that played across her master's face. 'They have given him a dreamstone.'
Sudden anger swirled across the daemon's features. 'They must not be allowed to interfere, slave. The eve of my return approaches and my vessel must be prepared. We must have that man. He will be a vessel of rare power.'
Justina nodded, although fear suddenly filled her. Shaha Gaathon could be inventive in his punishments, and some of them contained not the slightest hint of pleasure. 'Darke suspects nothing, master. He has given the dreamstone to me, to sell for money.'
Warm laughter echoed from within the mirror. 'How foolish mortals are,' he said. 'To give away the one thing that might protect him.'
'They promised him more, master.'
The laughter stopped as if cut off with a knife. 'Is it possible they have some inkling of our plans?' he asked. 'It would not be the first time their accursed seers have interfered in the Great Masque.'
'I do not know, master,' said Justina, her unease deepening.
'Of course, you do not, slave,' said Shaha Gaathon, in a tone so filled with affection that Justina knew that she would soon be rewarded. They are the most subtle and devious of mortals, and their seers more than most have some insight into their roles in the Masque. What are they offering him this bounty for?'
'They wish to be taken to Belial IV, great master.'
'What?' The daemon's voice was like thunder. Intense rage boiled in his expression. The mere mention of Belial IV had disturbed him greatly. Behind him lightning lashed the ever changing landscape visible through the window arch. 'Are you certain?'
'That is what Janus Darke said, great master.'
'They must be seeking to interfere in the Ascension. Why else would they go there, now, after all these millennia?'
Justina was not entirely certain she followed what the master was saying. She had no idea what the eldar could be up to.
'I must think upon this, Justina. Await my pleasure, meditating on the thousand sublime and intimate caresses as you do so.'
'As you desire. I await with pleasure, master,' said Justina and she composed herself to receive her daemonic master's instructions when they came.
FOUR
AMBUSH ON THE BRIDGE
Janus Darke stepped out of the airlock and into the polluted streets, noticing as he did so two shadowy figures detach themselves from the mouth of the nearest alleyway and make to follow him. He lengthened his stride, placing one hand atop the butt of his bolt pistol and making sure that the knife he kept in the wrist sheath was loose enough to drop into his hand if he needed it. He wished he had brought a couple of bodyguards with him, but he had chosen, foolishly as it now seemed, to visit the palace on his own. He cursed himself and his drunken folly on the mad day he had thought he could recover his fortune on credit at Fat Roj's gaming tables.
It was dark. Flickering gaslights, effluent overspill of Medusa's factory hives, illuminated part of the street. Ahead of him, he could see the huge skyscraper cathedral of the Emperor, a massive temple to the faith of mankind's saviour that Janus did not really want to look at right now. Not that he had much choice. By design it was the largest and most imposing structure visible, its triple spires talons on a great claw that ripped the underbelly of the smoggy clouds.
Dampness and industrial toxins gave the air a distinctive tang. All around loomed the huge multileveled buildings of the Freeport. Great stone bridges encrusted with gargoyles, barnacled with sculpted icons, linked them at all levels. Resting his hand on the balustrade for a moment, he could look down into the misty chasms below and see the lights of distant houses on the lower terraces. Across from him through the smog he could see the smudged yellow lights of another gigantic hive cone. It was like looking at a distant island rising vaguely from a mist-covered sea. He risked a glance back the way he had come, hoping for a glimpse of his mysterious pursuers, but the mist had swallowed them.
Raucous laughter sounded nearby. Looking around he could see a group of drunken youths, garbed in the latest fashion of the nobility, long leather coats with head obscuring cowls, massive wide sleeves, tight pantaloons and high boots. They were drunk. One of them walked along the stone barrier lining the bridge ignoring the hundred metre drop to one side, swaying and pausing to take bows as his companions egged him on.
More sober citizens in the rough spun tunics of industrial thralls watched them warily, their expressions half envious, half fascinated and more than a little full of hope that the young idiot might fall. None of my business, Janus told himself. He turned and strode off along the bridge.
Massive statues loomed over him every hundred metres. They depicted the Emperor, his primarchs, Imperial saints, governors of the hive world, holy men and heroes who had left their mark on the face of Medusa over the past ten thousand years. Looking up through a ragged rent in the clouds, Janus caught a glimpse of the stars. They were not the familiar constellations of his childhood, but the weirdly glowing clusters that marked the proximity of the Eye of Terror.
Given his past; it was inevitable that he could name many of them. They were, after all, the signposts that marked the paths between the stars. There was Gorgon, ill-famed red star of destruction, where an Imperial fleet piloted by Hogun Belisarius had vanished pursuing the retreating hosts of Chaos. There was Chimera, whose sun's rays were said to cause mutation in any who spent time on the surface of the nine worlds surrounding it. And there was Belial, most ill-famed of them all, said to be a haunted place covered in the ruins of a lost race, steeped in ancient evil. A place marked on the charts of the First Survey as Forbidden, under interdict of the Ecclesiarchy.
What had those long-dead starsailors found there, Janus wondered? And why did Auric and his companion want so desperately to get there that they were prepared to pay a governor's ransom on the off-chance that he might take them? He shook his head, it was not his concern.
In his youth, perhaps, he would have jumped at the chance of doing what they had asked. Then his head had been filled with dreams, and he had loved nothing more than tales of the Great Crusade and the Age of Exploration, when the ships of the Navigator Houses had surveyed the systems that were to become part of the Imperium of Man. Then he had been obsessed by the idea of frontiers, and transcending limits, and seeing all of those out of the way places shunned in these later, more cautious times. He had hungered for those things almost as much as he had hungered to overcome his lowly background, almost as much as Simon Belisarius, his Navigator, had.
Perhaps that was a sign of the flaw that was in him too. Perhaps he should have spotted it at an earlier age. Perhaps he would have been able to avoid the path that had brought him to this place, to a world a thousand light years from home, and a future that promised only oblivion or something far worse. What was it Auric had said? A hundred paths lead from this place and ninety-nine of them lead to destruction. Something like that, and he supposed true enough in his case. It had not always been so; once every road had seemed a highway to fame and glory.
From the instant he had seized his moment and rallied the Imperial militia defending Crowe's Town from the orks, when their officers were all dead, a fortunate star had seemed to blaze down on him. In one moment of decision, he had gone from being a callow nineteen year old clerk in the office of Sansom & Sansom, Imperial traders, to being a hero. He had rallied first the militia and then the defenders of Crowe's Town, preserving the defence long enough for the Blood Angels to arrive and break the siege.
Even now a momentary sensation of triumph warmed him as he recal
led those days of glory. At the time they had not seemed so glorious. He could remember the pinched, hungry faces of the defenders, counting their few remaining bolter shells, bullets and power packs. He could remember breaking up knife fights where men tried to kill each other over raw half gnawed carcasses of rats. He could remember the bellows of the great bull orks as the green-skins stormed the defences time after time.
Bullets had whizzed round his head. The old longsword that still hung in his cabin had been chipped and notched in hand-to-hand fighting. By the Emperor, those had been the days. He had held the defence together by force of will. He had encouraged the weary defenders with rousing speeches when morale was low. He had killed those who spoke of surrender out of hand, knowing that there could be no surrender to that bloodthirsty horde out there. He had discovered within himself a genius first for tactics, in the house-to-house skirmishing then for overall strategy as the older men, leaderless until then; had listened to his ideas; then for organisation and logistics as the virtual rule of the town had fallen into his hands. He had discovered an ability to anticipate the plans of his foes that was almost magical and, looking back now, he saw that perhaps this had foreshadowed what was to come. He pushed that thought swiftly aside.
It still seemed almost amazing to him that the soldiers had been prepared to listen to a boy who had no more experience than basic militia training, and what he had read in his small cot in the scribe's building of Sansom & Sansom in his few hours of leisure. But they had. The officers were dead. The rich merchants behaved like sheep. The corrupt governor had fled, later to be found dead in the burned out wreckage of his aircar in the steaming jungle, a chest containing all the revenues of the treasury still clutched in his skeletal fingers.
It had been then that he had realised that whatever it was it took to lead men—the look of eagles, the mantle of command, the voice of authority—he had it. And he had enjoyed having it. Once you experienced such a thing, you could never go back to obscurity, never relinquish your authority.