Penitent

by Dan Abnett

  ‘Harlon said as much,’ I replied. ‘And I have seen it for myself enough times now. In the end, none of us matter in the face of the cause. I will consider myself reprimanded. But do not mistake my compassion for heretical sympathy. I may have been schooled by heretics, but by their twisted logic I was raised to believe in the Throne. I am a servant of the God-Emperor, Gideon, and out of my past, I come to you, and to Him, a penitent.’

  We had gone out of the nameless house into the small gardens behind it. It was early still, the sun yet rising across the rooftops and spires of the city. The gardens, once ornamental, had run wild through years of neglect, but the light was the colour of spun gold, and there was mist and some birdsong. It seemed almost tranquil, as though no menace had been at our door but an hour before.

  I had expected him to seem tired, and in need of rest and recuperation after his monumental display of force, but he was vital and eager, as though he had expended but a tiny fraction of his strength.

  ‘You see,’ he remarked, ‘why I prefer to use my mind with restraint. Here in Queen Mab… indeed everywhere… any manipulation of the warp causes ripples. The more you use such powers, the greater the force of them, then the greater the reaction. I am a weapon against the dark, Beta, but I am also a beacon that summons it. We must keep ourselves guarded and hidden, for we have few friends on Sancour. I would appreciate it if you would not chide me on such matters again.’

  ‘Who were they?’ I asked. ‘The–’

  ‘I think we are wise to avoid saying the name,’ he replied. ‘Through sorcery, they had charged the very words with power, so that their very title could not be taken in vain. Let us call them… the visitors.’

  ‘So they were sorcerers? The… visitors.’

  ‘One of them, at least,’ he said. ‘Of significant ability.’

  ‘Do you know who they were, though?’

  ‘Not precisely. But the accent of their leader was distinctive.’

  ‘Yes, I thought so.’

  ‘I have heard it before,’ he said. ‘It was the accent of a soul born and raised in a city called Tizca.’

  ‘Where is that?’ I asked, for I was sure I knew the names of all the cities on Sancour.

  ‘Not on this world,’ Ravenor said. ‘It stood on a world far away, a long time ago. The city is gone, and the world is dead. The planet was called Prospero.’

  I felt cold suddenly, despite the coat Nayl had lent me.

  ‘But that–’

  ‘Indeed,’ he said.

  ‘That was a traitor-world of the ancient days,’ I said. ‘You speak of the infamous Fifteenth Legion.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Then… he was Astartes?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Ravenor replied. ‘I do not know what form or guise the men of Prospero take these days, but the accent was assuredly that of Tizca, and the Fifteenth were notorious sorcerers. We know other Traitor Legions are afoot on Sancour, rivalling each other in their attempts to either deny or join the Yellow King.’

  ‘Chase said as much.’

  ‘He did. I am alarmed, but not at all surprised, that the Thousand Sons of Magnus are part of that intrigue.’

  At the rear part of the small gardens, beyond a crumbling wall, a flight of weathered and overgrown steps led down to the Footstep Lane ­holloway that ran behind the back of the property. We descended into that phantom and abandoned pathway, where empty buildings gazed upon us silently from either side. It was, perhaps, too early for the vicious warblind gangs to be abroad. In the pale, low sunlight, the holloway was eerily peaceful, the derelict ghost of a city that had once been.

  ‘Verner Chase’s admissions were the most important,’ Ravenor said. ‘He spoke of the Cognitae as all but dissolved, put to flight by the Yellow King. The balance of power has changed, and our enemy is recomposing his forces, which suggests the Yellow King is on the verge of accomplishing his great work. Chase stated he was.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So our timetable has changed,’ he replied, drifting slowly across the weeds and broken cobbles. ‘Our investigation here has lasted years, and has been patient and careful. Eisenhorn’s was too. Years of work have got us this far. The unravelling of this mystery has been going on for more than the span of your life. And it has been the only safe way to proceed. But if the King’s work is close to fruition, then we are running out of time. We are, I think, now obliged to act with greater urgency and directness, though I am loath to do so. We must apply brute force.’

  ‘We would risk exposure,’ I said. ‘And we may find ourselves helpless in the face of the King’s power.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But we must trust ourselves. And each other.’

  Something odd happened to the holloway as he spoke. It seemed to me that the light around us smudged, and for a moment I saw the world as though through a window pane smeared with grease. Then the derelict structures of the holloway, and the narrow sunken lane itself, disappeared and we were walking, instead, down the wide and magnificent boulevard of a towering city in bright sunlight. Behind us, some towering monument stood against the clear sky.

  ‘Do not be alarmed,’ he said.

  ‘Did you do that?’ I asked.

  ‘I did. Forgive me. Sometimes I find it reassuring to walk in places where I have walked before.’

  ‘This is a memory?’

  ‘Yes, Beta.’

  ‘You have brought me into your memories?’

  ‘I have entered my memories to compose my mind. I have brought you with me, for I thought you might enjoy the view.’

  I smiled. ‘This is not Sancour,’ I said. ‘Is it… Tizca?’

  ‘No, no,’ he replied. ‘It is, I suppose, the world on which I grew up. The world that made me. This is how I remember it, all those years ago.’

  ‘In such detail!’ I marvelled.

  ‘Beta, I have left many details out. But I find it reassuring, and I thought it only fair. You have allowed me to pass into your mind, and examine your memories. I am returning the favour. Regard it as a gesture of trust.’

  I breathed in. The air was cool, and smelled nothing like the city air of Queen Mab.

  ‘So, what do we do?’ I asked. ‘Surely the first goal is still to find a way into the City of Dust?’

  ‘It is. And we know that is possible, because of your experience in Alace Quatorze’s house.’

  ‘But Feverfugue is gone to fire,’ I said, ‘and I have not been able to duplicate the effort anywhere else. Freddy Dance, and his visions of other stars, seems a more profitable line of–’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Ravenor, ‘but there is no telling if he knows anything, or is able by any means to show us a way in. The Dance investigation was promising, but it was taking too long, and I fear it is no longer viable.’

  ‘So, then? What?’

  ‘There are two lines of possibility that I believe may be more fruitful and more immediate,’ he replied. ‘The first is the Cognitae. From Chase’s confession, it’s clear that the Cognitae enjoyed, at least until recently, direct dealings with the Yellow King. This suggests they had some access to the City of Dust.’

  ‘Yes, but that may now be denied.’

  ‘It may. But Chase’s mistress, this “Zoya Farnessa”, the woman he died protecting, is now so out of favour with the King that she dared to seek the aid of Eisenhorn. She is senior Cognitae. If anyone might know a way in, it’s her.’

  ‘And I know who she is,’ I said.

  The Chair’s transponders made a noise that I understood as chuckling.

  ‘Yes, I thought as much,’ he said. ‘I saw a stirring of it in your thoughts. You recognise her now?’

  ‘I didn’t at first,’ I admitted. ‘Not when I first glimpsed her. But I have become certain it was someone I knew, disguised in a very skilled function. After hearing Chase speak, I am convinced. I be
lieve his mistress was once mine too. I believe she is Eusebe dea Mordaunt, once Mam Mordaunt of the Maze Undue.’

  ‘I think so too,’ he replied. ‘She raised you, trained you, trusted you even, and when she saw you placing your confidence in Eisenhorn, she believed he could be approached.’

  Yes, she raised me, and honed me, but she was never more than a stepmother to me, and a distant one at that. I wondered if Gideon was right, and Mam Mordaunt had trusted me more than I ever realised. Perhaps, even, had been more fond of me than I ever realised.

  ‘It’s possible I could serve as a key,’ I suggested, ‘and convince her that she must work with you. From Timurlin’s actions, it’s plain that the Cognitae have utter animus for the Inquisition, even in their hour of need. But we don’t know where she may be found.’

  ‘Not entirely true,’ Ravenor replied. ‘Timurlin refused to answer us, and resisted our efforts to make him reveal her whereabouts or even identity. His mind was strong, even in death, trained in psychologik techniques to deflect interrogation, and even the probing of a psyker.’

  ‘We were all taught such things,’ I said. ‘I would imagine the perfecti were schooled to an even higher degree.’

  ‘Quite so. But I was in his mind, and I am rather more capable than the interrogation psykers routinely used by the Inquisition. He would not answer, but as we pressed him on her identity, he could not help but think of the very thing he was fiercely guarding. It is a basic trait of human consciousness, a subliminal thing. Your mind is strong, Beta – try not to think about the scholam where you were raised.’

  I frowned, and did so. It was, of course, impossible. To cast what I wished not to think of out of my mind automatically made me think of it so I could focus on that which I wished to remove. The useless effort made me laugh.

  ‘You see?’ he said. ‘That mind function may be diminished by intense training, and the use of technique… mind-blocking, Tanser partitioning, the Galantine Method, even a fortified memory palace… but it cannot be removed entirely. Timurlin resisted to a very high degree, but I could see the shadows behind him.’

  ‘Behind him?’

  ‘In his mind. No face. He kept his mistress hidden with great skill, nothing more than a silhouette. He was so dedicated to her protection, other things seeped through.’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘If you’ll permit me?’

  I nodded.

  A picture slipped into my mind, like a slide into a magic lantern. I closed my eyes. It was quite distressing, for it was edged with pain, and distorted by Timurlin’s suffering. I could smell blood and fear. I saw a silhouette, perhaps female, it was hard to tell. It was a fuzzy patch of darkness. But there was something behind it. I focused on the image Gideon was sharing with me, ignoring the discomfort that accompanied it and the generally distressing sensation that something as live and slippery as a Toilgate eel had slithered into me through one ear and was roiling and squirming inside my skull.

  That which lay behind the silhouette was a place, like a poorly focused and overexposed pict: a haze of sunlight on a bright day, the smudged impression of rooftops, a spire here, a steeple there. It was hard to make anything out. It could have been any city, anywhere.

  ‘That tower,’ I asked, eyes tight shut, ‘is it Saint Clavin’s?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he replied. ‘But there are other things of interest. Two, in fact. Regard the steeple further away, to the left.’

  ‘I can barely make it out.’

  ‘But the shape of it, Beta?’

  ‘One tall steeple… with a flanking bell tower to the side. Is that Saint Marzom Martyr?’

  ‘I think it is. It’s very distinctive.’

  ‘Then we’re seeing it from the north…’

  ‘And what’s the other thing?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know, I… We’re seeing it from very high up. It’s a view from very high up, right across the city.’

  I opened my eyes.

  ‘So what’s north of Saint Marzom Martyr, and of sufficient altitude?’ he asked.

  ‘Stanchion House,’ I replied, with a smile.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘You see now the granular detail in which even matters of great scope must be inspected. The merest shadows and whispers, barely limned, can yet betray considerable truths.’

  The sunlight was warm on my face, though it was not Sancour’s sun. The great boulevard around us, a kilometre wide, majestic and empty, seemed a fine place, a place of hope, a great city of the Imperium. I wondered where it was and when it had been. It struck me that it was a place that represented the Imperium of Man at its best, a prosperous and dignified city, contained within strong bounds of law and justice, robustly free of the canker and decay that gnaws at the hem of our ancient civilisation. This remembered city, and every great place like it, on every Imperial world, exemplified the potential of the Imperium, and thus precisely represented the cultural ideal we worked to protect. All our efforts, and our pain, and our sacrifices, were given to safeguard such places, and to maintain the peace and aspiration of humanity. We toiled and struggled in the dark to keep these places safe. It was a salutary reminder of our cause, and I was grateful Ravenor had shared it with me. I imagined it was why he liked to visit it in his mind, to remind himself when work seemed exhausting and impossible.

  I had wondered why there were no people abroad in the place, on such a fine day, but now I saw some, just a few dots, indistinct, at the edges of the wide avenue. One figure stood where we were, out in the ­centre of the broad boulevard, and seemed to be walking towards us, but was yet far away.

  ‘So, we go to Stanchion House?’ I asked.

  ‘I believe it is worth the effort,’ Ravenor replied. ‘We’ll do it at once, today. If our suppositions are correct, and we can secure Mordaunt, or any senior of the Cognitae, then it will be of value.’

  ‘Agreed,’ I said.

  ‘But we will not waste long on it,’ he added. ‘If she’s not there, or other impediments are placed in our way, we abort, and give it up as a bad job. We don’t have the time for persistence.’

  ‘So then,’ I asked, ‘we would turn our attention to the second line of possibility. You said there were two.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And?’ I pressed.

  ‘The King Door,’ he answered.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  ‘I think that’s unwise,’ I said.

  ‘I know you do.’

  ‘I do not think it is a way into the City of Dust,’ I said, ‘or rather, I do not think it is a safe way in.’

  ‘I fancy there are no safe ways,’ he replied. ‘But a way in must be found, without delay, and it is by far the most promising option.’

  I sighed. His mind was set. In his way, Gideon could be quite as obdurate as Gregor. I looked around. The lone figure was closer now, wandering towards us, a long coat rippling in the wind.

  ‘You’ve seen into my mind,’ I said to Ravenor. ‘I let you do it. You saw the King Door–’

  ‘Yes, Beta.’

  ‘Then you must also have felt what I felt. It is hard to place in words, but that opening was not a… Not a place of entry. I felt a great dread of it, and Renner did too. We were anxious to escape the Below, Gideon, madly anxious, yet there was a doorway, and a dim vista beyond, and neither of us dared to step through it.’

  ‘I am aware,’ he said. ‘I have studied the impression it left upon you. Not so much a door as a window, perhaps? A vantage from which one may view what is beyond. But it was barred physically, it seems, by some ocean or sea. And by other things too. Nameless sensations of dread and foreboding that made you both recoil. It was a glimpse of an inhospit­able and dangerous boundary.’

  ‘Then it should be left alone,’ I insisted. ‘I came from it with the unshakeable feeling that it could not be crossed, by any means,
and that to try would be to invite doom.’

  The wind gusted on the boulevard. I heard banners flap and snap on the great monument behind us.

  ‘Yet, it was crossed,’ Ravenor said. ‘By your angel.’

  ‘One, he is not “mine”,’ I said. ‘Two, he is wrought of stuff beyond our mortality, and I think can endure much that we could not. Three, I think the effort all but killed him. He was blood-mad when he came to me, exhausted and tormented. He had been driven to escape, and had braved a crossing that was otherwise utter folly. I think he only made it by some miracle of chance or fortitude. Gideon, it was a hell that the likes of an angel risked everything to escape, and the effort drove him insane. I do not think we can duplicate his feat, and I believe it is reckless to try. I think the King Door was not made for mortal humans.’

  ‘Show me a better option,’ he said.

  ‘I can’t, but Comus was desperate and–’

  ‘And we are not?’

  I shrugged in frustration.

  ‘I have not pressed you, Beta,’ he said, ‘but you have kept the angel to yourself. I would like to talk to him directly, and examine his mind.’

  ‘He knows nothing, Gideon.’

  ‘Nothing he has told you. But from what you’ve said of him, I believe that his experiences, the undoubted suffering, has stifled his memory. He has made himself forget, so as to cling to what sanity is left him. I think he knows more than he realises, and through careful sifting of his thoughts–’

  ‘If you reach into his mind and try to unlock his memories, I fear you would tip him back into frenzied madness. We cannot risk that fury in our midst.’

  ‘No,’ he agreed. ‘I would have no choice but to terminate him.’

  I looked at the Chair sharply. He was not joking. In pursuit of his goal, he would think nothing of executing an angel, if that angel did not suit his needs. I wasn’t sure what was more troubling: that he would so calmly admit he would kill an Astartes-angel, or that he so confidently thought it was something he could do at all.