by Darius Hinks
Vatrenus’ Sanguinary Priest, Brother Casali, was attempting to treat the man’s wounds with the medical equipment attached to his wrist armour, a bulky device called a narthecium, bristling with syringes and blades. He was moving with great care. The drugs in his narthecium were not intended for a mortal man, much less a skeletal wreck of a mortal man. Casali was clearly having some success, though. By the time the rest of the group reached the scene, the priest’s breathing had calmed and he was looking up at his rescuers with less mania. He was so wasted and filthy that he looked as though he had been exhumed rather than saved, but there was something proud in his features that, along with his gore splattered beard, marked him out as a man of importance. Antros imagined that he must have once been a great leader or prophet, before being brought so low. At the sight of Confessor Zin the priest cried out, blood spraying from his cracked lips.
‘Brother!’ he said, his voice little more than a croak. ‘This valley is tainted! Do not leave me here! Take me back the way you came. We must get word to the Labyrinth!’
Zin hurried over and dropped to his knees, cradling the skeletal man in his arms. ‘What monster did this to you?’ he said, his voice full of outrage.
The man tried to sit up, but the Sanguinary Priest held him down and shook his head.
Zin nodded in agreement and encouraged the priest to lie back. ‘What is your name, brother?’ he said. ‘What happened here?’
The man lay back, clasping Zin’s arm, clearly terrified of the Blood Angel. ‘Prester Brennus,’ he said, pausing to look for a sign of recognition in Zin’s face. Seeing none, he continued. ‘We must leave here and take word to Arch-Cardinal Dravus. He must know that Tarn Abbey has fallen to the Enlightened. The Unbegotten Prince was here!’
Mephiston appeared out of the darkness, his bloodless face lit up in the torchlight.
The man gasped in terror and tried to back away.
‘Calm yourself,’ said Zin. ‘There is nothing to fear, Prester Brennus.’ He lowered his voice to an awed whisper. ‘This is the Astra Angelus.’
The name clearly meant nothing to the man, so Zin tried another tack. ‘He is Mephiston, the Chief Librarian of the Blood Angels. He is one of the Adeptus Astartes.’
The mention of Adeptus Astartes clearly did mean something to the man, but nothing that lessened his fear. If anything, he looked even more terrified.
‘Enlightened?’ Mephiston asked, looking at Zin for an explanation.
Brennus shook his head, confused. The movement caused him to pass out and his head lolled back on the arms of the Sanguinary Priest. His eyes rolled back in their sockets, almost entirely bloodshot, and he let out a rattling moan. He looked like a collection of bones hurled to the ground as part of a divination rite, held together by a thin layer of skin and little else.
The Sanguinary Priest placed the man on the ground and slid a device under the skin of his forearm. It looked to Antros like one of the tools used in the Librarium scriptoria for illuminating texts: a flat, sharpened spike of metal, like a stylus. Casali muttered a few words as it broke the man’s skin and then he pulled the blade out again, sputtering a few droplets of green, viscous chemicals as he did so.
The priest’s eyes opened and he lifted his head to continue talking, seemingly unaware of the interruption.
‘Where have you come from?’ Prester Brennus asked Zin, looking past him and making out the rest of the group for the first time. ‘How have you not heard of the Enlightened?’
‘We only arrived here today, brother. We have travelled here from Baal.’
‘Off-worlders?’ gasped the man. ‘How is that possible?’ He tried to point at the sky. ‘Since the Miracle, we have been unable to contact anyone.’ His voice teetered on the brink of tears. ‘It is over a year since we heard from the synod. We did not even know if the Ministorum still endured.’
‘I am Confessor Zin, Accensor Prophetic of the Luminous Throne, and I can assure you with all my heart that we very much endure. You may have been isolated by this Miracle as you name it, but you have never been forgotten. With every day that passed we have been working towards a time when we could step on these holy rocks and return them to the God-Emperor’s light.’ Zin gestured at Mephiston. ‘Every seer and prophet in the Cronian Sector has been granted a wondrous vision.’ Zin’s eyes burned in the dark. ‘A vision of an Astra Angelus who will lead us through the veils that surround Divinus Prime so that we may rid you of this curse.’ Zin paused for breath. ‘We are here to save you, brother.’
Prester Brennus dragged himself into a sitting position, gripping Zin’s forearm with one hand and pointing at the crucified corpses with the other. ‘Then you should know how we have been betrayed. These murders are all the work of the false prophet. He calls himself a prince, while preaching death and violence against his own kind!’ The cadaverous priest was spitting and snorting as he gripped harder, his bony fingers sinking into Zin’s meaty flesh. ‘He has torn us apart with his hateful creed.’
‘The Unbegotten Prince?’ asked Mephiston from the shadows.
The priest flinched at the sound of his voice and replied to Zin, rather than the Chief Librarian. ‘No one is sure where he came from. Some say that he was once a simple anchorite, living in the caves beneath Volgatis, but there is nothing priestly about him that I could see. If he ever had any true faith, he has abandoned…’ Brennus paused to cough up another thick, crimson gobbet, grimacing at the sight of his own blood before continuing. ‘He claims that his followers have given him that absurd, sacrilegious title. They call him the Unbegotten Prince and claim that he was not born, but sent to Divinus Prime as a fragment of the God-Emperor’s being – a divine avatar that fell from the sky.’ Brennus sneered. ‘Vile. Irreligious. Such posturing is worse than…’ he waved weakly at the eagle cages, ‘than these monstrosities.’
Mephiston glanced at the city looking down on them from the far side of the valley, its pale dome still visible in the moonlight. ‘And this Unbegotten Prince – what is his creed?’
Prester Brennus replied to Mephiston without turning to face him, his face contorted by disgust at what he had to convey. ‘He says that everything we believe is a lie. That all our centuries of devotion, honouring the Vow, was a mistake. He claims that tradition is nothing, that permanence is nothing, that–’
‘Permanence?’
‘Yes. The prince beguiles his followers. He tells them that we can only serve the God-Emperor by abandoning our strictures and tenets, by changing and rethinking everything we do.’ Brennus looked at Zin. ‘He mocks us, confessor! He calls us slaves to hieratical dogma. He says that we must learn new ways to think, new ways to be. “Progress through change,” he says.’ The disdain dripped from his lips. ‘Change!’
Mephiston watched him closely and then looked back at the distant dome of the abbey.
‘The abbey is lost,’ groaned Brennus, his voice growing weaker. ‘You must change your route. Whatever lies beyond those gates is not fit for honest eyes.’ He pawed at Zin’s robes again. ‘You must take word to the arch-cardinal. Tell him what has been done here.’
‘But what of Cardinal Vectis?’ asked Zin, looking up at the city. ‘Is he still in there?’
Brennus shook his head and clawed at his blistered scalp in distress, sending rivulets of fresh blood down over his face. Then he pointed at one of the nearby crucifixions. ‘They showed the cardinal no more mercy than the rest of us.’ His anguish give him a renewed burst of vigour and he spoke clearly again. ‘Leave this valley, brother. Do not think of those poor souls up there. There is nothing to be done. The prince may be leading his cultists to the Labyrinth by now and the priests there could still be saved. If you hurry to the arch-cardinal, you can warn him that the abbey has fallen. He still has time to recall his full strength to the Labyrinth and prepare his defences.’
‘The Labyrinth?’ asked Rhacelus, keeping a distan
ce from the priest, as though not wanting to be tainted by his pitiful condition.
Brennus peered into the darkness over Zin’s shoulder, dismayed to see other hulking giants looming over him.
‘You know of the Labyrinth, surely, confessor?’ he said to Zin.
Zin nodded and turned to Rhacelus. ‘Mormotha. The capital. Seat of the arch-cardinal. The locals call it the Labyrinth. It is there that I have asked your Chief Librarian to lead us. If we can reach Mormotha I can consult with my brother and find out what has befallen Divinus Prime.’ He looked around for Mephiston and saw that the Chief Librarian was still studying the ruined city.
‘Lord Mephiston,’ said Zin, ‘will you do as my brother asks? Mormotha is four or five days’ march from here.’
Mephiston continued staring into the darkness. ‘Four days’ march. And how long ago did this Unbegotten Prince strike out for the Labyrinth?’
Prester Brennus was struggling to speak. ‘The abbey fell… It fell… two nights ago. He may have marched straight on… for the capital.’
Rhacelus stepped to Mephiston’s side. ‘And we have no transport. If the cultists have headed that way they would reach the city before us.’
Mephiston nodded. ‘Prester Brennus,’ he said. ‘Would we find vehicles of any kind in the abbey?’
Brennus nodded and then shook his head as he realised Mephiston’s intentions. He tried to look at Confessor Zin, but his eyes struggled to focus. ‘The abbey is lost,’ he managed to gasp.
‘It was,’ said Mephiston, glancing at Captain Vatrenus.
Vatrenus nodded in reply and waved his squads on, ordering them to advance boldly along the road, making no attempt to hide their approach.
‘My lord!’ exclaimed Confessor Zin. ‘Did you hear what he said? We must leave!’
‘Brother Casali,’ said Mephiston, ignoring Zin and glancing at the Apothecary. Casali nodded in reply and hauled Prester Brennus to his feet.
‘Take me to your abbey, priests. I will show you how the sons of Sanguinius deal with heretics.’
Despite the haunting silence that hung over the valley, there was no mistaking the violence that had recently befallen Tarn Abbey. The gates had been smashed and the triumphal arches were scorched and blackened. The windows that looked out at them were lightless and blind, but Mephiston raised his hand for the small column to halt. He looked up at the city for a while, silhouetted before its vast, ivory walls, then he nodded at Captain Vatrenus, who directed Squad Hestias with a silent, chopping gesture, ordering them to fan out around the outside of the building as he and the rest of the Blood Angels made straight for the gaping mouth of the abbey.
Mephiston and Rhacelus walked boldly towards the gates, flanked by Captain Vatrenus and the battle-brothers of Squad Seriphus. To Antros’ frustration, he was ordered to follow at a safe distance, acting as nursemaid to the two priests, one of whom could barely walk. He marched before Confessor Zin but he had to half carry Prester Brennus.
The group approached the sinuous, ornately worked fossils that used to house the abbey’s towering doors. To Antros it felt as though they were walking through the jaws of a skeletal behemoth, its vast, ivory mouth opening onto the darkness within. A terrible stink drifted through the portal – the harsh, acrid tang of burned hair and meat.
As the Librarians strode forwards, they raised their force swords, igniting them with a thought and splashing crimson light across the buildings within.
It was a charnel house. The light of their swords painted everything a nightmarish hue but, even in the broad light of day, the abbey would have made a brutal sight. The source of the smell was revealed. The square was heaped with blackened, charred corpses. Antros was so disgusted by the sight that it took him a few moments to notice what was so peculiar about the scene.
‘Nothing else is burned,’ he said as they picked their way through the remains.
‘Throne,’ muttered Zin, looking around at the porticoes and balustrades that surrounded them. ‘How can that be?’ The fire that had consumed the bodies had left no mark on any of the buildings. The gleaming skulls and ribcages that made up the walls and pillars were completely untouched by fire.
‘Warpfire,’ replied Antros, sensing the hand of a powerful sorcerer.
Confessor Zin’s face crumpled with fear as he saw the full extent of the massacre spread out before them. He recoiled, eyes straining in horror, clutching his medallion. ‘We must leave!’ he hissed. ‘Prester Brennus is right – there is nothing to be done here. We must go.’
Only Zin spoke of it, but they all felt the presence he was referring to. The aether-light of the Librarians’ swords had barely raked the steps of the first sacristy and the rest of the ruins were bathed in darkness, but the shadows were horribly animated. They all sensed they were not alone.
Captain Vatrenus ordered Squad Seriphus to spread out around the courtyard, scouring the butcher-slab streets for any signs of life. ‘Report, Sergeant Hestias. What do you see?’
‘We entered through the postern gate,’ said Sergeant Hestias. ‘No sign of movement. We’ve reached the bell tower now, to the east of the basilica. Nothing but corpses.’
Mephiston had reached the bottom steps of the sacristy, still flanked by Rhacelus. The sanguine light of their swords washed over the steps and lit up the entrance. The doors were intact but they had been flung open.
Standing at the threshold, draped in shadow, was a man.
‘You’re not looking hard enough,’ drawled Rhacelus.
‘Shall we return?’ voxed Sergeant Seriphus.
‘Hold your positions,’ replied Mephiston as he began climbing the steps towards the figure.
‘Wait outside the gate,’ said Antros to his two wards and jogged across the square towards the sacristy.
‘Who seeks enlightenment?’ asked the figure at the top of the steps. The voice was friendly and full of warmth. The stranger walked into the light and Antros saw that he was massive, almost as big as Mephiston, and was wearing some kind of archaic, white power armour, edged with gold trim. Antros frowned as he studied the design – beautiful, baroque details that were not quite the same as Adeptus Astartes wargear, but still oddly familiar. It reminded him of the knights shown in the Librarium’s oldest friezes. The regal-looking warrior seemed to have stepped out of prehistory. There was a helmet at his belt, topped with a black, transverse crest and his heraldry was a stylised version of the Adeptus Ministorum symbol – a capital I emblazoned with a spiked halo and a skull. In the centre of his cuirass was an enormous sapphire that gleamed with inner light. He wore a gilded bolt pistol at his belt and had an exotic-looking sword in his hand – a falchion of some kind, its curved blade engraved with an intricate pattern of whorls and loops. All of this finery only served as a frame for the warrior’s beaming, jovial face. He had ruddy, tanned skin and black, perfectly straight hair that reached down to his waist, making him almost the reverse of the pale, white-haired Mephiston.
‘I am Pieter Zorambus,’ he said, smiling broadly. ‘And I bless you all for seeking guidance in such dark times. May I ask your names?’ He held out a hand to Mephiston in greeting, seeming genuinely delighted.
Mephiston studied the ebullient warrior in silence and a tense hush fell over the courtyard.
Zorambus continued smiling, but it began to look a little strained as the seconds rolled on.
Mephiston looked past him, into the shadowy interior of the sacristy. Then he did a strange thing: he stumbled slightly, as though unsteady on his feet. He looked back towards the gates and Antros saw that his eyes had filled with blood, just as they had in the Carceri Arcanum, but this time the red orbs were bleeding light, as though there were fire inside the Chief Librarian’s skull.
Antros was about to speak when Mephiston turned back to face Zorambus and raised his gun.
Zorambus’ smile changed to one of cheerful di
sbelief and he raised his hands in a placatory gesture.
Then his head jolted back, hit by a single shot from Mephiston’s plasma pistol.
Chapter Twelve
Tarn Abbey, Divinus Prime
The sound of Mephiston’s shot echoed around the city and Pieter Zorambus toppled backwards towards the doorway of the sacristy, arms flailing as the force of the headshot lifted his feet from the ground. Rather than collapsing, however, he remained suspended in mid-air, juddering like an oversized marionette. It was as though someone had paused a playback on a pict unit, looping the moment of his death. Antros had reached the other Librarians by now and saw what happened next with disturbing clarity. Zorambus shook with increasing violence until his outline began to shimmer and he started to vanish from view.
‘My lord,’ said Antros, but before he could say more, Zorambus’ violent fit ceased and the Blood Angels were left facing two Unbegotten Princes instead of one. They both smiled.
‘I understand your concern,’ said the two identical Pieters. Neither of them showed any sign of a head wound and both held up their hands in the same placating gesture. ‘But I believe we are trying to achieve the same goal. If we could exchange words rather than gunfire I could explain how we could work–’
Captain Vatrenus muttered an oath and unloaded several bolter rounds into the two warriors, sending them staggering backwards. Again, rather than falling, they shook violently for a few seconds and then duplicated.
‘We are all sons of the God-Emperor,’ said four Pieters, wearing matching smiles. ‘And we all desire to see His treasures unearthed. Whatever differences you imagine we might have, they can so easily be–’
There was a roar of bolter fire as the battle-brothers of Squad Seriphus unleashed a barrage of shells.
