False Gods whh-2

by Graham McNeill

  Horus struck the water and it exploded like shards of black glass.

  Flickering light filled the chamber with a cold glow, the cracked stone walls limned with crawling webs of frost, and the breath of the cultists feathering in the air. Akshub had painted a circle with eight sharp points around its circumference, on the flagstones in quicklime. The mutilated corpse of one of the Davinite priestess's acolytes lay spread-eagled at its centre.

  Erebus watched carefully as the priestess's lodge thralls spread around the circle, ensuring that every stage of the ritual was enacted with meticulous care. To fail now, after he had invested so much effort in bringing the Warmaster to this point, would be disastrous, although Erebus knew that his part in the Warmaster's downfall was but one of a million events set in motion thousands of years ago.

  This fulcrum point in time was the culmination of billions of seemingly unrelated chains of circumstance that had led to this backwater world that no one had ever heard of.

  Erebus knew that that was all about to change. Davin would soon become a place of legend.

  The secret chamber in the heart of the Delphos was hidden from prying eyes by potent magic and sophisticated technology received from disaffected Mechanicum adepts, who welcomed the knowledge the Word Bearers could give them - knowledge that had been forbidden to them by the Emperor.

  Akshub knelt and cut the heart from the dead acolyte, the lodge priestess expertly removing the still warm organ from its former owner's chest. She took a bite before handing it to Tsepha, her surviving acolyte.

  They passed the heart around the circle, each of the cultists taking a bite of the rich red meat. Erebus took the ghastly remains of the heart as it was passed to him. He wolfed down the last of it, feeling the blood run down his chin and tasting the final memories of the betrayed acolyte as the treacherous blade had ended her life. That betrayal had been offered unto the Architect of Fate, this bloody feast to the Blood God, and the unlovely coupling of the doomed acolyte with a diseased swine had called upon the power of the Dark Prince and the Lord of Decay.

  Blood pooled beneath the corpse, trickling into channels cut in the floor before draining into a sinkhole at the centre of the circle. Erebus knew that there was always blood, it was rich with life and surged with the power of the gods. What better way was there of tapping into that power than with the vital substance that carried their blessing?

  'Is it done?' asked Erebus.

  Akshub nodded, lifting the long knife that had cut the heart from the corpse. 'It is. The power of the Ones Who Dwell Beyond is with us, though we must be swift.'

  'Why must we hurry Akshub?' he asked, placing his hand upon his sword. 'This must be done right or all our lives are forfeit.'

  'I know this,' said the priestess. 'There is another presence near, a one-eyed ghost who walks between worlds and seeks to return the son to his father.'

  'Magnus, you old snake,' chuckled Erebus, looking up towards the chamber's roof. 'You won't stop us. You're too far away and Horus is too far gone. I have seen to that.'

  'Who do you speak with?' asked Akshub.

  'The one-eyed ghost. You said there was another presence near.'

  'Near, yes,' said Akshub, 'but not here.'

  Tired of the old priestess's cryptic answers, Erebus snapped, 'Then where is he?'

  Akshub reached up and tapped her head with the flat of her blade. 'He speaks to the son, though he cannot yet reach him fully. I can feel the ghost crawling around the temple, trying to break the magic keeping his full power out.'

  'What?' cried Erebus.

  'He will not succeed,' said Akshub, walking towards him with the knife outstretched. 'We have spirit-walked in the realm beyond for thousands of years and his knowledge is a paltry thing next to ours.'

  'For your sake, it had better be, Akshub.' She smiled and held the knife out. 'Your threats mean nothing here, warrior. I could boil the blood in your veins with a word, or rip your body inside out with a thought. You need me to send your soul into the world beyond, but how will you return if I am dead? Your soul will remain adrift in the void forever, and you are not so full of anger that you do not fear such a fate.'

  Erebus did not like the sudden authority in her voice, but he knew she was right and decided he would kill her once her purpose was served. He swallowed his anger and said, 'Then let us begin.'

  'Very well,' nodded the priestess, as Tsepha came forward and anointed Erebus's face with crystalline antimony.

  'Is this for the veil?'

  'Yes,' said Akshub. 'It will confound his senses and he will not see your likeness. He will see a face familiar and beloved to him.'

  Erebus smiled at the delicious irony of the thought, and closed his eyes as Tsepha daubed his eyelids and cheeks with the stinging, silver-white powder.

  'The spell that will allow your passage to the void requires one last thing,' said Akshub.

  'What last thing?' asked Erebus, suddenly suspicious. 'Your death,' said Akshub, slashing her knife across his throat.

  Horus opened his eyes, smiling as he saw blue sky above him. Pink and orange tinged clouds drifted slowly across his vision, peaceful and relaxing. He watched them for a few moments and then sat up, feeling wet dew beneath his palms as he pushed himself upright. He saw that he was fully armoured in his frost white plate, and as he surveyed his surroundings, he lifted his hand to his face, smelling the sweet scent on the grass and the crystal freshness of the air.

  A vista of unsurpassed beauty lay before him, towering snow-capped mountains draped in a shawl of pine and fir, magnificent swathes of emerald green forests as far as the eye could see and a wide river of foaming, icy water. Hundreds of shaggy coated herbivores grazed on the plain and wide pinioned birds circled noisily overhead. Horus sat on the low slopes of the foothills at the base of the mountains, the sun warming his face and the grass wondrously soft beneath him.

  'To hell with this,' he said as he got to his feet. 'I know I'm not dead, so what's going on?'

  Once again, no one answered him, though this time he had expected an answer. The world still smelled sweet and fragrant, but with the memory of his identity came the knowledge of its falsehood. None of this was real, not the mountains or the river or the forests that covered the landscape, though there was something oddly familiar to it.

  He remembered the dark, iron backdrop that lay behind this illusion and found that if he willed it, he could see the suggestion of that nightmarish vision behind the beauty of the world laid out before him.

  Horus remembered thinking - a lifetime ago, it seemed - that perhaps this place might have been some netherworld between heaven and hell, but now laughed at the idea. He had long ago accepted the principle that the universe was simply matter, and that which was not matter was nothing. The universe was everything, and therefore nothing could exist beyond it.

  Horus had the wit to see why some ancient theologian had claimed that the warp was, in fact, hell. He understood the reasoning, but he knew that the Empyrean was no metaphysical dimension, it was simply an echo of the material world, where random vortices of energy and strange breeds of malign xenos creatures made their homes.

  As pleasing an axiom as that was, it still didn't answer the question of where he was.

  How had he come to this place? His last memory was of speaking to Petronella Vivar in the apothecarion, telling her of his life, his hopes, his disappointments and his fears for the galaxy - conscious that he had told her those incendiary things as his valediction.

  He couldn't change that, but he would damn well get to the bottom of what was happening to him now. Was it a fever dream brought on by whatever had wounded him? Had Temba's sword been poisoned? He dismissed that thought immediately, no poison could lay him low. Surveying his surroundings, he could see no sign of the wolves that had chased him through the dark forests, but suddenly remembered a familiar form that had ghosted behind the face of the pack leader. For the briefest instant, it had looked like Magnus, but surely he was
back on Prospero licking his wounds after the Council of Nikaeal?

  Something had happened to Horus on Davin's moon, but he had no idea what. His shoulder ached and he rotated it within his armour to loosen the muscle, but the motion served only to further aggravate it. Horus set off in the direction of the river once more, still thirsty despite knowing that he walked in an illusory realm.

  Cresting the rise that then began to slope gently down towards the river, Horus pulled up sharply as he saw something startling: an armoured Astartes warrior floating face down in the water. Wedged in the shallows of the riverbank, the body rose and fell with the swell of the water, and Horus swiftly made his way towards it.

  He splashed into the river and gripped the edges of the figure's shoulder guards, turning the body over with a heavy splash.

  Horus gasped, seeing that the man was alive, and that it was someone he knew.

  A beautiful man was how Loken had described him, a beautiful man who had been adored by all who knew him. The noblest hero of the Great Crusade had been another of his epithets.

  Hastur Sejanus.

  Loken marched away from the temple, angry at what his brothers had done and furious with himself: he should have known that Erebus would have had plans beyond the simple murder of the Warmaster.

  His veins surged with the need to do violence, but Erebus was not here, and no one could tell Loken where he was. Torgaddon and Vipus marched alongside him, and even through his anger, Loken could sense his friends' astonishment at what had happened before the great gate of the Delphos.

  'Throne, what's happening here?' asked Vipus as they reached the top of the processional steps. 'Garvi, what's happening? Are the first captain and Little Horus our enemies now?'

  Loken shook his head. 'No, Nero, they are our brothers, they are simply being used. As I think we all are.'

  'By Erebus?' asked Torgaddon.

  'Erebus?' said Vipus. 'What has he got to do with this?'

  'Garviel thinks that Erebus is behind what's happening to the Warmaster,' said Torgaddon.

  Loken shot him an exasperated stare.

  'You're joking?'

  'Not this time, Nero,' said Torgaddon.

  'Tarik,' snapped Loken. 'Keep your voice down or everyone will hear.'

  'So what if they do, Garvi?' hissed Torgaddon. 'If Erebus is behind this, then everyone should know about it: we should expose him.'

  'And we will,' promised Loken, watching as the pinpricks of vehicle headlights appeared at the mouth of the valley they had only recently flown up.

  'So what do we do?' asked Vipus.

  That was the question, realised Loken. They needed more information before they could act, and they needed it now. He fought for calm so that he could think more clearly.

  Loken wanted answers, but he had to know what questions to ask first, and there was one man who had always been able to cut through his confusion and steer him in the right direction.

  Loken set off down the steps, heading back towards the Thunderhawk. Torgaddon, Vipus and the warriors of Locasta followed him. As he reached the bottom of the steps, he turned to them and said, 'I need you two to stay here. Keep an eye on the temple and make sure that nothing bad happens'

  'Define "bad".' said Vipus.

  'I'm not sure,' said Loken. 'Just… bad, you know? And contact me if you get so much as a glimpse of Erebus'

  'Where are you going?' asked Torgaddon. 'I'm going back to the Vengeful Spirit! '

  'What for?'

  'To get some answers,' said Loken.

  'Hastur!' cried Horus, reaching down to lift his fallen friend from the water. Sejanus was limp in his arms, though Horus could tell he lived by the pulse in his throat and the colour in his cheeks. Horus dragged Sejanus from the water, wondering if his presence might be another of the strange realm's illusions or if his old friend might in fact be a threat to him.

  Sej anus's chest hiked convulsively as he brought up a lungful of water, and Horus rolled him onto his side, knowing that the genhanced physique of an Astartes warrior made it almost impossible for him to drown.

  'Hastur, is it really you?' asked Horus, knowing that in this place, such a question was probably meaningless, but overcome with joy to see his beloved Sejanus again. He remembered the pain he had felt when his most favoured son had been hacked down upon the onyx floor of the false Emperor's palace on Sixty-Three Nineteen, and the Cthonic bellicosity that had demanded blood vengeance.

  Sejanus heaved a last flood of water and propped himself up on his elbow, sucking great lungfuls of the clean air. His hand clutched at his throat as though searching for something, and he looked relieved to find that it wasn't there.

  'My son,' said Horus as Sejanus turned towards him. He was exactly as Horus remembered him, perfect in every detail: the noble face, wide set eyes and firm, straight nose that could be a mirror for the Warmaster himself.

  Any thoughts that Sejanus might be a threat to him were swept away as he saw the silver shine of his eyes and knew that this surely was Hastur Sejanus. How such a thing was possible was beyond him, but he did not question this miracle for fear that it might be snatched away from him.

  'Commander,' said Sejanus, rising to embrace Horus.

  'Damn me, boy, it's good to see you,' said Horus. 'Part of me died when I lost you.'

  'I know, sir,' replied Sejanus as they released each other from the crushing embrace. 'I felt your sorrow.'

  'You're a sight for sore eyes, my boy,' said Horus, taking a step back to admire his most perfect warrior. 'It gladdens my heart to see you, but how can this be? I watched you die.'

  'Yes,' agreed Sejanus. 'You did, but, in truth, my death was a blessing.'

  'A blessing? How?'

  'It opened my eyes to the truth of the universe and freed me from the shackles of living knowledge. Death is no longer an undiscovered country, my lord, it is one from which this traveller has returned.'

  'How is such a thing possible?'

  'They sent me back to you,' said Sejanus. 'My spirit was lost in the void, alone and dying, but I have come back to help you.'

  Conflicting emotions surged through Horus at the sight of Sejanus. To hear him speak of spirits and voids struck a note of warning, but to see him alive once more, even if it wasn't real, was something to be cherished.

  'You say you're here to help me? Then help me to understand this place. Where are we?'

  'We don't have much time,' said Sejanus, climbing the slope to the rise that overlooked the plains and forests, and taking a long look around. 'He'll be here soon.'

  'That's not the first time I've heard that recently,' said Horus.

  'From where else have you heard it?' demanded Sejanus, turning back to face him with a serious expression. Horus was surprised at the vehemence of the question.

  'A wolf said it to me,' said Horus. 'I know, I know, it sounds ridiculous, but I swear it really did speak to me.'

  'I believe you, sir,' said Sejanus. 'That's why we need to move on.'

  Horus sensed evasion, a trait he had never known in Sejanus before now and said, 'You're avoiding my question, Hastur, now tell me where we are.'

  'We don't have time, my lord,' urged Sejanus.

  'Sejanus,' said Horus, his voice that of the Warmaster. 'Tell me what I want to know.'

  'Very well,' said Sejanus, 'but quickly, for your body lies on the brink of death within the walls of the Delphos on Davin.'

  'The Delphos? I've never heard of it, and this doesn't look like Davin.'

  'The Delphos is a place sacred to the Lodge of the Serpent,' said Sejanus. 'A place of healing. In the ancient tongues of Earth its name means "the womb of the world", where a man may be healed and renewed. Your body lies in the Axis Mundi chamber, but your spirit is no longer tied to your flesh.'

  'So we're not really here?' asked Horus. 'This world isn't real?'

  'No.'

  'Then this is the warp,' said Horus, finally accepting what he had begun to suspect.

  'Y
es. None of this is real,' said Sejanus, waving his hand around the landscape. 'All this is but fragments of your will and memory that have given shape to the formless energy of the warp.'

  Horus suddenly knew where he had seen this land before, remembering the wondrous geophysical relief map of Terra they had found ten kilometres beneath a dead world almost a decade ago. It hadn't been the Terra of their time, but one of an age long past, with green fields, clear seas and clean air.

  He looked up into the sky, half expecting to see curious faces looking down on him from above like students studying an ant colony, but the sky was empty, though it was darkening at an unnatural rate. The world around him was changing before his eyes from the Earth that had once existed to the barren wasteland of Terra.

  Sejanus followed his gaze and said, 'It's beginning.'

  'What is?' asked Horus.

  'Your mind and body are dying and this world is beginning to collapse into Chaos. That's why they sent me back, to guide you to the truth that will allow you to return to your body.'

  Even as Sejanus spoke, the sky began to waver and he could see hints of the roiling sea of the Immaterium seething behind die clouds.

  'You keep saying "they".' said Horus. 'Who are "they" and why are they interested in me?'

  'Great intelligences dwell in the warp,' explained Sejanus, casting wary glances at the dissolution of die sky. 'They do not communicate as we do and this is the only way they could reach you.'

  'I don't like the sound of this, Hastur,' warned Horus.

  'There is no malice in this place. There is power and potential, yes, but no malice, simply the desire to exist. Events in our galaxy are destroying this realm and these powers have chosen you to be their emissary in their dealings with the material world.'

  'And what if I don't want to be their emissary?'

  'Then you will die,' said Sejanus. 'Only they are powerful enough to save your life now.'

  'If they're so powerful, what do they need me for?'

  'They are powerful, but they cannot exist in the material universe and must work through emissaries,' replied Sejanus. 'You are a man of strength and ambition and they know there is no other being in the galaxy powerful enough or worthy enough to do what must be done.'