The Imperial Truth
Page 12
The young lieutenant who was the son of a great general, he who was always a friend to the line-officers like me, who never wore his braids with arrogance but managed to be one of the common men even though he was not like the rest of us - he said he would oppose, and yet he did not. Of all of us, he had the best chance to rally the men, but he kept his silence. He had so very much to lose, after all. He would have fallen so far.
The braggart sharpshooter who always had the answer to any question, cocksure and handsome, never fazed by any challenge or upset. He carried himself with such utter confidence that I couldn't believe he wouldn't slice through any draconian edict like a sword point. He stood meekly, becoming a different, smaller man when the order came.
And then the bluff sergeant who always raged louder than I ever could, her jacket scarred by the number of times her rank had been broken and then earned anew. Her voice was strongest by any lights, but silent too in that moment. She was a crèche-mother, with two battle orphans as her charges, and I think she saw their faces that day, feared how life would go for them if she were gone.
It wasn't hard for my comrades to find an excuse to hate me. By accident of birth, I had already given it to them. A handful amongst the platoon - the sergeant and sharpshooter included - knew I had a touch of the sight on me. In combat, you come to learn such things from the soldiers who fight alongside you, whether you want to or not. Before, I had seemed like a lucky charm to them, some of the men even coming to me, secretive and hushed, to ask for a look-see over their aura. I couldn't work the gift like my mother had, but I tried, and it had been enough. In return, they had kept my secret from the Black Ships.
But now it was the reason to disown me. Someone whispered the word 'witch', and I knew that I would be executed first. All my life I had lived with the fear that the Silent Sisterhood would come to spirit me away, but now I saw that death would be the more likely outcome.
That night, I escaped the stockade with six others, and we found the resistance a day or two later.
'YOU WANT TO kill me,' he said. There was no judgement in the words.
'Yes,' I could not, would not, lie. 'Your kind brought horrors to my world. You destroyed everything I-'
I ran out of energy, and clutched the lasrifle to my chest. A boiling, churning hatred rose through me, and it made me feel strangely free.
The warrior smiled thinly. 'Not I, Ruafe Hecane. Those who did those things are oath-breakers, and my brothers no more.' He glanced at Breng. 'You. You know ship-tech, yes? Your skills are needed.' He walked back into the command centre and we followed him.
The dead were everywhere here, suffocated by the decompression. I saw where a viewport had been blown out, now made safe by a blast shutter. Too slow to save the bridge crew, it seemed.
Out of the windows there were alien stars and infinite blackness. Dallos's cards had played true after all - our ship was alone.
The legionary directed Breng to work at the drive control. 'Your vessel suffered damage in warp transit. The rest of the convoy left you here, becalmed. I was summoned to see you complete the rest of your voyage.' Again, there was the smile. 'This ship carries precious cargo. I would warrant that none aboard know just how important you are.'
'We're just soldiers,' offered Yao. 'Soldiers and whelps. Fodder for the guns and cubs to be culled.'
A shadow passed over the face of the Thousand Son. 'Never say that. No one who fights in the Emperor's name is without worth.'
I glared at him. 'The sons of Magnus march with Horus. I saw it. I saw the fiends and the freaks that your brethren conjured, the-'
'Daemons?' His utterance of the word seemed to instantly drain all heat from the chamber. 'Yes, you saw those things. All of you have seen them.' He shook his head, regretfully. 'Do you not yet understand, soldier? You see patterns. Can you not see this one?' He pointed with the silver staff, taking in all of the men. 'Each of you has the beginning of a greatness. You may call it a sight, or a gift, even a curse.' He walked forward and deftly plucked Dallos's cards from the man's trembling hands. 'You know the touch of the warp. This is what makes you valuable.' He glanced at Zartine. 'That, and one other attribute.'
'We have all seen them,' said Yao. 'The... horrors.'
'Every wounded man on this ship has,' said the warrior. 'Why else do you fear sleep? But that fear can be taken from you, in time.'
Breng stood up, nodding to the drive console to show he had done all that he could. 'Ready.'
'The Navigators still live, safe in their isolation.' The legionary pointed out toward the ship's bow. 'We will set a course. The Regent of Terra, Lord Malcador himself, has need of those aboard this ship. He prepares, and you will all be part of his design. You... and the children waiting below.'
'How?' I asked, even as the pressure of an answer built itself in my mind's eye. 'What good are broken soldiers and war orphans to the Sigillite?'
'Your wounds will be healed. Those fit enough, young enough to bear the glory, may aspire to see their bodies remade, as I once did.' He touched his chest. 'You... we can be reborn in new purpose.' 'But why us?' asked Dallos, his hands knitting.
'You know why,' said the legionary, his gaze returning to me.
I don't know if the words that came next were from some place in my own thoughts, or if the Thousand Son made me speak them for him, but they were true and undeniable. 'Horus has brought a new kind of war to the galaxy. Bolters and lasguns won't be enough to end it. A different kind of weapon is needed.'
'Aye.' The great figure nodded gravely. 'And those who do not perish in the tempering will be those weapons. You, and hundreds of others - lost child, common man and legionary alike, gathered in silence and secreted aboard ships like this one. Each soul in this room, aboard this vessel, has been declared dead. The lives you lived before this are as dust. Malcador has commanded this. So shall it be.'
Zartine was pale. 'Wh-where are we going?'
The legionary strode up to the navigation controls and laid his great hands upon them. 'A moon orbiting a ringed world, in the light of Great Sol itself. A place called Titan.'
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Aaron Dembski-Bowden has written several novels for Black Library, including the Night Lords series, the Space Marine Battles book Helsreach, The Emperor's Gift and the New York Times bestselling The First Heretic for the Horus Heresy. He lives and works in Northern Ireland with his wife Katie, hiding from the world in the middle of nowhere.
Nick Kyme is the author of the Tome of Fire trilogy featuring the Salamanders. He has also written for the Space Marine Battles and Time of Legends series with the novels The Fall of Damnos and The Great Betrayal. In addition, he has penned a host of short stories and several novellas, including 'Feat of Iron' which was a New York Times Bestseller in the Horus Heresy collection The Primarchs. He lives and works in Nottingham.
Graham McNeill has written a host of novels for Black Library, including the ever popular Ultramarines and Iron Warriors series. His Horus Heresy novel, A Thousand Sons, was a New York Times bestseller and his Time of Legends novel, Empire, won the 2010 David Gemmell Legend Award. Originally hailing from Scotland, Graham now lives and works in Nottingham.
Rob Sanders is a freelance writer, who spends his nights creating dark visions for regular visitors to the 41st millennium to relive in the privacy of their own nightmares, including the novels Atlas Infernal and Legion of the Damned. By contrast, as Head of English at a local secondary school, he spends his days beating (not literally) the same creativity out of the next generation in order to cripple any chance of future competition. He lives in the small city of Lincoln, UK.
James Swallow is a New York Times bestselling author whose stories include the Horus Heresy novels Nemesis, Fear to Tread and The Flight of the Eisenstein, along with Faith & Fire, the Blood Angels books Deus Encarmine, Deus Sanguinius, Red Fury and Black Tide. His short fiction has appeared in Legends of the Space Marines and Tales of Heresy, along with the audio dramas Heart of
Rage, Oath of Moment and Legion of One.
Gav Thorpe is the New York Times bestselling author of 'The Lion', a novella in the collection The Primarchs. He has written many other Black Library books, including the Horus Heresy novel Deliverance Lost and audio drama Raven's Flight as well as fan-favourite Warhammer 40,000 novel Angels of Darkness and the epic Time of Legends trilogy, The Sundering. He is currently working on a new Dark Angels series, The Legacy of Caliban. Gav hails from Nottingham, where he shares his hideout with the evil genius that is Dennis, the mechanical hamster.