by Darius Hinks
Dharmia stopped leaping across the ruins and replied in nonchalant tones. ‘The Vow is my home.’ She looked up at the sky. ‘If I fail the Emperor, what else do I have?’
Abderos stared at the girl. Then he lowered his chainsword and nodded with a humbled expression.
Livia gave him one of her crooked smiles. ‘These Blood Angels… How tough can they really be?’
Abderos scowled furiously but, as his brothers stared at him with a mixture of amusement and hope, his grim expression started to falter.
‘Damn you all!’ he snapped, grinning as they burst into guffaws of laughter.
Dharmia dashed across the rubble and pretended to lunge at Abderos with her broken sword.
Livia grinned and nodded to the gates. ‘To Volgatis, my brave not-a-morons. I always find it’s preferable to arrive before the shooting starts.’
Chapter Ten
Librarium Sagrestia, Arx Angelicum, Baal
Confessor Zin entered the Ostensorio with the swagger of a triumphant king. He was flanked by a column of priests and subordinates, all wearing white lead on their faces and cradling a dazzling collection of holy relics. The priests in the front lines waved glinting censers, shrouding those behind in scented fumes, and by the time Zin emerged there was so much smoke that he seemed to be levitating up from the underworld. He was carried on an enormous sedan chair that was gilded and polished to such a sheen it blazed, flashing in the light of the myriad candles lining the procession. Above his head teetered a dazzling panoply of banners and standards, all portraying the same angelic, sword-wielding figure. Some of the priests struggled beneath the weight of naked flagellants mounted on long, wooden stakes, their emaciated limbs nailed to the coarse bark, decorating the white faces of those below with bright, blooming flowers of blood. As they bled, the flagellants rang bells and clanged cymbals, creating a dreadful, clattering din.
Gathered ahead of this gaudy procession, in the centre of the devastated hall, was a far more sombre group. Mephiston was waiting patiently before the brass monstrance, as cool and inert as the shattered busts beneath his feet. He looked immaculate, his intricately wrought battleplate polished to a dull sheen and his hands resting on the hilt of Vitarus, whose blade was dark and indolent, sensing no chance of bloodshed. Mephiston was flanked on one side by his equerry, the proud Epistolary Rhacelus, and on the other side by the eager-looking Lexicanium Antros. Behind the three Librarians were two squads of Blood Angels – battle-brothers of the Fourth Company, assembled in perfect, motionless formation behind Captain Vatrenus. Behind the Tactical Marines there was a Techmarine, his armour so laden with augmetics and the arcane machinery of the Adeptus Mechanicus that he looked like a mechanised beetle, looming in the shadows. His helmet was almost entirely obscured by measuring instruments and the rest of his armour was cluttered with massive servo-claws and drill bits as thick as a mortal man’s waist. Finally, there was a Sanguinary Priest, armed with an ornate chainsword and the sinister-looking medical instruments that marked him out as the keeper of his Chapter’s gene-seed.
All of the Space Marines were dressed for war, wearing full battleplate and cradling a fearsome array of weaponry. There was also a mortal in their number: Prester Kohath, whose emaciated, unconscious body was fastened to the rim of the Carpus Monstrance by thick, metal chains. He was naked and his body had been painted with a complex network of runes and symbols. Several bundles of cabling trailed from his skull, disappearing into the bowl of the monstrance.
As Confessor Zin made his brash, ostentatious approach, Antros could not help but notice the irony of the scene. For all Zin’s finery and pomp, he failed to match the silent authority of the Chief Librarian. Mephiston’s power bled out of him, reaching into the souls of even the most rabid supplicants, so that even as they chanted their catechisms they were straining to see the face of the giant waiting to greet them.
The parade came to a halt near the monstrance and Zin’s servants carried his sedan chair across the rubble, scattering strips of scented parchment across the stones as they went. They helped Zin from his seat and the corpulent priest knelt, attempting to genuflect before the Chief Librarian. He struggled, gasping, as his paunch robbed him of breath, until his servants rushed to assist him. Then he rose, his face paint glistening with sweat, and smiled with forced geniality.
‘Chief Librarian,’ he said, ‘to meet you in the flesh is more than I ever dreamed possible. Your name has become a beacon of hope throughout the entire Cronian Sector and you can scarcely grasp how great an honour you do me by granting this audience. I would never–’
There was a clattering sound, somewhere in the darkness, as a rock dropped to the floor.
Zin faltered and stared into the shadows.
‘You have nothing to fear, priest,’ said Epistolary Rhacelus, distaste dripping from his aristocratic features. He raised his staff slightly and the shadows withdrew, revealing the towering sentries arranged around the walls of the Ostensorio – Librarians, watching the ruins in a silent vigil, the psychic hoods of their battleplate shimmering in readiness.
Rhacelus lowered his staff, allowing the shadows to return.
Zin attempted another forced smile, but he was clearly terrified.
Silence filled the chamber, broken only by the crackling of flames from overhead. The vast hall was lit by metal braziers, all of them borne on anti-grav platforms designed to resemble zodiacal beasts. Bronze dragons and copper snakes circled above the Space Marines, throwing animated shadows across Mephiston’s motionless face, giving the illusion that he was howling or snarling.
‘My lords,’ said Zin, after a few minutes, looking from one Space Marine to another. Masters of the Librarium. Have you read the missives we sent? Have you grasped the crucial role you are to play in the Wars of Sanctitude? All our observances have shown that only the Chief Librarian of the Bloodied Host can be our guide, that only you can lead us to our lost brother, Arch-Cardinal Dravus, so that my brethren and I will be able to lift the terrible malediction that has befallen our most sacred world. Your face has haunted the dreams and waking dreams of every priest who has set foot on Divinus Prime. You are the Astra Angelus that was foretold in The Book of Subjection. My Lord, I have not slept nor eaten for days, so great is my excitement at the thought of meeting you.’
Rhacelus raised an eyebrow at the words ‘nor eaten’ but remained silent.
Mephiston nodded at the grand procession arrayed behind Zin. ‘In honour of the old accords between this Chapter and the Ecclesiarchy, you may accompany us, but your brethren will not be required.’
Zin looked horrified. ‘Accompany?’ He was about to protest when he caught the warning in Rhacelus’ eyes.
He nodded meekly and allowed his entourage to be escorted from the hall. There were so many of them that it took nearly ten minutes for them to shuffle out, moving with far less theatricality than when they arrived. Nobody spoke as this exodus took place, but Zin mouthed a few prayers as he found himself quite alone with the Blood Angels.
Mephiston nodded and Antros stepped forwards. Since the revelations in the Chemic Spheres, Antros had been wrestling with a troubling question: could Mephiston be right about him? Was he destined to either save or damn the Chief Librarian? The idea of such a responsibility horrified him, but he could not rid himself of visions – visions of a peeled face and of Mephiston, surrounded by butchered priests. He sensed Rhacelus glaring at him and took a deep breath, determined to perform his role well, whatever doubts he might have about the future. He unrolled the scroll prepared for him by Scholiast Ghor and began to read from the handwritten document, his amplified voice booming through his helmet. ‘Lord Mephiston, Chief Librarian of the Bloodied Host, Consul Aetheric to Commander Dante, Interlocutor of the Sacred Lineaments, Warden of the Accurst, Master of the Quorum Empyrric, Keeper of the Fifteenth Basilica and Harbinger Vindicta, who is beloved of the God-Emperor and who regard
s everyone with fathomless insight, has made it known to all that, from this moment on, in all matters pursuant to the following interdict…’
As Antros’ words rang out through the shadows, Confessor Zin frowned, straining to catch every clause and sub-clause of the long, labyrinthine edict. Several times he shook his head, bewildered by the language, and held up a hand for a pause, but Antros simply continued with increasingly more strident language, until he reached the end of the document and held it out towards the priest. As he presented it, a pair of cherubs fluttered down from the broken vaults. Their faces were hidden behind expressionless, ivory masks and they both wore glittering golden haloes. They took the vellum, intoned some unintelligible oaths and gave it to Zin.
Zin peered at the tiny script in confusion, unsure what was expected of him. Then the cherubs fluttered away into the gloom, taking the edict with them.
Epistolary Rhacelus nodded to Antros and they turned to face the monstrance, raising their staffs and resting the metal heads on the lip of the urn-like relic. They began to walk in a slow circle, whispering what seemed to be a random assortment of vowel sounds.
Zin gasped, making the sign of the aquila.
At a curt nod from Captain Vatrenus, one of the Tactical Marines broke ranks and gripped Zin by the arm, hauling him up the cracked, marble steps of the dais. The Blood Angel said nothing as he deposited him at the edge of the platform, not far from the huge chalice, and turned to look back at the scene unfolding before them. Zin tried to move back down the steps, but the battle-brother’s grip was unyielding.
Pale fire coursed along the Librarians’ staffs, igniting the rim of the monstrance and causing the filigreed metal to flicker and glow. They continued circling and, as the tips of their staffs dragged along the rim, they created a haunting, metallic drone that grew louder with every step they took. The battle-brothers of the Fourth Company fanned out around the edge of the dais and, to Zin’s obvious dismay, they readied their weapons.
The droning sound became so loud that Zin clamped his hands over his ears, yelling unheard complaints as the vibrations shook his portly body.
‘I am the steel in the blade,’ said Mephiston. He spoke gently, but his voice rumbled through the chamber with seismic force, cracking some of the broken masonry.
Mephiston raised Vitarus and, as he did so, needles of red fire sliced from the darkness. Several of the Librarians dotted around the edges of the great hall had raised their staffs and were now linked to the Chief Librarian by strands of lambent power. The lines of psychic energy emanating from their staffs were magnified by Vitarus and united into a single column of fire, which Mephiston directed at the prone form of Prester Kohath. The blast slammed into the man and his flesh lit up as though covered in thousands of embers. He remained slumped and oblivious, showing no sign of pain, or even awareness of the ritual he was powering.
Zin was howling in panic now, but his words were lost in the din.
‘I am the blood in the heart,’ said Mephiston. Again, his soft tones rocked the chamber.
Lines of fire lanced out of the shadows, revealing more Librarians.
Mephiston channelled this new influx of power into Prester Kohath and the unconscious priest burned so brightly that Zin had to shield his eyes.
‘I am the heat of the flame,’ said Mephiston. He held his hand aloft and, as more Librarians joined their force to his, the Chief Librarian’s palm began to burn with psychic flame. Crimson runes ignited in the centre of his hand, shimmering like newly forged metal. The chamber shook with even more force as a column of blood tore from Prester Kohath’s chest and slammed into the blazing runes on Mephiston’s hand.
‘I am the blood of Sanguinius,’ said Mephiston, and the Ostensorio vanished.
Chapter Eleven
Divinus Prime
An animal howled in pain. The sound was tormented and strange, as though heard through water. For a few seconds, Lexicanium Antros thought it might just be in his head. Then he noticed that his suit was droning statistics at him, describing the status of his vital functions and the integrity of his armour, as though he had survived some kind of crash. The suit spoke of temperate environmental conditions and a life-sustaining atmosphere, and he realised that Mephiston’s blood rite had been a success – he was on the world that Zin had lost. He was on Divinus Prime. He opened his eyes but saw only a blinding whiteness. His eyes were adjusting quickly to the glare but he could see nothing clearly. He thought he could make out a forest spread out around him, but there was something oddly regimented about the rows of soaring, pale trunks.
There was another tormented howl, louder and more agonised than the first. Antros tried to move and managed to wrench an arm free with a crunch of breaking stone. He blinked several times, dimming his visor further and slowly revealing a dizzying sight – he was hundreds of feet up in the air, embedded in one of the structures he had mistaken for trees. As his vision continued to improve, he saw that they were man-made: sky-scraping, bone-white columns that were strikingly beautiful – pale, twisted spires, intricately woven from millions of spars and arches, giving each one the delicate, honeycombed appearance of a needle-shaped seedpod. It was only as he looked at the tower he was perched on that he realised the incredible truth: this forest of white towers, tumbling towards the horizon in every direction, was made entirely of bones. The planet was an ossuary, built on a scale that left him dazed. How many millions of bones must have been used to create this endless vista? He looked at the bones that surrounded him and saw how oddly liquefied they looked – every femur and rib slumped and merged with the bone below, sagging and looping like folds of lace. He tapped the bone beneath his hand, a contorted skull, and it crumbled at his touch. The bones had been petrified. They had been here so long they had been transformed into crumbling stone sculptures.
Countless thousands of bodies were stacked beneath him in this single, huge column. He saw the skeletons of humans and other creatures he did not recognise, in such incredible numbers that they had become a kind of morbid, abstract art – a gleaming exposition of death, baking slowly under a heavy, somnolent sun.
As Antros grew accustomed to the disorientating angle, he realised why he had mistaken the fossil sculptures for trees. As well as a central trunk, hundreds of bodies wide and thousands deep, there were countless ‘branches’ jutting out over a flat, sun-baked scrubland that stretched out below him. The scale of the construction was staggering. Even if Antros ignored the grim nature of their contents, the idea that someone had built structures of this size was bewildering – they equalled even the greatest basilicas and fortresses of Baal.
Antros tore his gaze from the surreal landscape and saw that his legs were sunk inside a carefully designed architrave, constructed from a coiled loop of spines, and one of his arms was trapped in an elegant turret formed from hundreds of ribcages.
The pained howl echoed through the bones again, and he wrenched his arm free. Chalk dust enveloped him as he clambered onto a balustrade and looked out across the fields of white spires. There was no sign of the others. Had he arrived here alone? Mephiston had warned them all that even he had never performed such an ambitious blood rite before – translating several beings through the immaterium, using nothing but his force of will. It was dangerous to say the least. But Mephiston had a way of making the impossible seem commonplace. None of them would have dreamt of doubting him. But what if he was the only one who had reached Divinus Prime intact? What if the others had been left in the Ostensorio?
As Antros scoured the landscape for a sign of them, it occurred to him that this might not even be Divinus Prime. But, if it was… If this was Divinus Prime, then the responsibility had fallen to him. He would have to discover what had hidden the Cardinal World from view. Mephiston would be relying on him to make contact with the rest of the Imperium.
‘Lexicanium Antros,’ said a voice from above.
He
looked up and saw a Blood Angel, entangled in a grand archway formed from a single, enormous ribcage. He saw from the warrior’s armour markings that it was Battle-Brother Mandacus. The bones that had trapped Mandacus must have once belonged to an equine creature, but of a species far larger than a horse, because they dwarfed the Blood Angel. Mandacus was shaking violently and he had his hands held over his head. He was staring at the silent bone cities that surrounded them.
‘Quick,’ he said, his voice contorted by pain. Antros realised that Mandacus was the source of the bestial howling he had heard. He was in agony. ‘Get me out of this.’ Mandacus’ voice was barely intelligible. ‘I’m inside it.’
Antros saw that, from the waist down, his armour had merged with the stone, and where his body met the petrified bones there was a quickly spreading skirt of blood, vivid and shocking against the white stone. He was bleeding to death.
Antros began hauling himself up the tower towards him, but the weight of his power armour caused the chalky fossils to crumble, slowing his progress as Mandacus began to howl again.
‘I am the blood of Sanguinius,’ said a quiet voice.
Reality blurred, as though shaken in a tumbler of water.
The bone tower vanished and Antros was back in the Ostensorio again. The Librarians around the edge of the hall were lit up by their blazing staffs. He could see their souls, hunched over them in the form of spectral angels, wings spread and eyes burning with empyrric fire.
Antros was about to cry out to them, to explain what had happened to Mandacus, but before he could talk the Ostensorio was gone.
He found himself on a broad transitway – a road of chalky, white stone, rippling with the heat of a late afternoon sun, blurring the horizon with heat haze.
He was once more surrounded by the bone trees, but now he was looking up at them from ground level. The size of them warped his perspective as he craned his neck to see their pinnacles. They seemed to bend, leaning over him like tired old men stooping to examine the ground.