Only Ahriman remained, and even he looked drained.

With tears in his eyes, Magnus retreated from the scene of his crime and all but fled to the Pyramid of Photep, ignoring Ahriman’s shouted questions. Alone, amid the lies of his centuries of study, the red mist had fallen over his sight. He’d mocked Angron for his rages, but at the thoroughness of his destruction, he understood a measure of the satisfaction such violence could bring.

Magnus stood and walked from the ruin of his study, ashamed at his loss of control and needing to clear his head. The glass doors that led to his balcony were smashed, the glass lying in accusing shards that crunched as he stepped through the wreckage.

He leaned on the balcony railing, supporting his weight on his elbows and letting the cool wind ruffle his hair and caress his skin. Far below him, Tizca carried on as though nothing had happened, its people oblivious to the doom he had unleashed upon them all. They didn’t know it yet, but a terrible retribution would soon fall upon them.

What form that retribution would take he did not know, but he recalled the Emperor’s words at Nikaea, and feared the worst. People moved through Occullum Square and along the Street of a Thousand Lions, congregating in the many parks and Fountain Houses that dotted the western areas of the city where the bulk of its citizens dwelt.

The port was to the north, a walled area of the city built on the gentle slopes that led down to the curved bay. Golden beaches spread further along the coast before sweeping beyond sight into the Desolation. Hard against the flanks of the eastern mountains stood the Acropolis Magna, a raised spur of rock that had once been a fortress, but had long since fallen into ruin. A great statue of Magnus stood upon its highest point to mark the place where he had first set foot on the surface of Prospero.

How he wished he could take back those first steps!

Dozens of theatres clustered around the base of the Acropolis Magna, their tiers cut into the lower slopes of the rock, home to actors who strutted like martinets on each marbled proscenium. Five perfectly circular Tholus stood in areas of rolling parkland, open-air structures built according the principles of the Golden Mean. In the forgotten ages they had once housed temples, but were now used as sports arenas and training grounds.

Numerous barracks of the Spireguard dotted the city’s plan, and Magnus felt a twinge of regret for these men and women most of all. They were all going to die for the crime of being born on Prospero.

The cult’s pyramids dominated the skyline, looming from the gilded city like cut glass arrowheads. Sunlight reflected on them, dancing like fire in the polarised crystal. He’d seen the vision once before and had thought it allegorical. Now he knew better.

“All this will be ashes,” he said sadly.

“It does not have to be,” said a voice behind him.

Magnus turned, and harsh words died on his lips as he saw it was not an intruder that had spoken.

He had.

Or at least a version of him had.

The mirror hanging beside the doorway was broken, yet dozens of splinters still clung to the copper frame. In each of them, Magnus saw a shimmering reflection of his eye, one mocking, one angry, one capricious, another aloof. The eyes stared with sly amusement, each a different colour and each now regarding him with the same quizzical look.

“A mirror? Even now you appeal to my vanity,” said Magnus, dreading what this signified.

“I told you it was the easiest trap to set,” said the reflections, their voices slippery and entwined. “Now you know the truth of it.”

“Was this always what you wanted?” asked Magnus. “To see me destroyed?”

“Destroyed? Never!” cried the reflections, as though outraged by the suggestion. “You were always to be our first choice, Magnus. Did you know that?”

“First choice for what?”

“To bring about the eternal chaos of destruction and rebirth, the endless succession of making and unmaking that has cycled throughout time and will continue for all eternity. Yes, you were always first, and Horus is a poor second. The Eternal Powers saw great potential in you, but even as we coveted your soul, you grew too strong and caused us to look elsewhere.”

The reflections smiled with paternal affection, “But I always knew you would be ours one day. While suspicious eyes were turned upon you and your Legion, we wove our corruptions elsewhere. For that you have my thanks, as the Blinded One has lit the first fire of the conflagration, though none yet see it for what it is.”

“What areyou?” asked Magnus, stepping through the doorway to re-enter the wreckage of his chambers. Hoarfrost gathered on the splintered glass and his breath misted before him.

“You know what I am,” said his reflections. “Or at least you should.”

One splintered eye shifted, swirling until it became a fiery snake with multi-coloured eyes and wings of bright feathers: the beast he had killed beneath the Mountain of Aghoru. It changed again, morphing through a succession of shimmering forms, until Magnus saw the shifting, impossibly massive form of the shadow in the Great Ocean.

“I once named myself Choronzon to you, the Dweller in the Abyss and the Daemon of Dispersion, but those are meaningless labels that mortals hang upon me, obsolete the moment they are uttered. I have existed since the beginning of time and will exist beyond the span of this universe. Names are irrelevant to me, for I am every name and none. In the inadequate language of your youngling species, you should call me a god.”

“You were the one that helped me save my Legion,” said Magnus with a sinking heart.

“Save? No. I only postponed their doom,” said the shadow. “That boon is now ended.”

“No!” cried Magnus. “Please, never that!”

“There is a price to pay for the time I gave your sons. You knew this when you accepted the gift of my power. Now it is time to make good on your bargain.”

“I made no bargain,” said Magnus, “not with the likes of you.”

“Oh, but you did,” laughed the eyes. “When, in your despair, you cried out for succour in the depths of the warp, when you begged for the means to save your sons – you flew too close to the sun, Magnus. You offered up your soul to save theirs, and that debt is now due.”

“Then take me,” declared Magnus. “Leave my Legion and allow them to serve the Emperor. They are blameless.”

“They have drunk from the same chalice as you,” said the eyes. “And why would you wish them to serve a man who betrayed you? A man who showed you unlimited power and then told you not to use it? What manner of father opens the door to a world of wonder and then orders you not to step through? This manwho planned to use your flesh to save his own from destruction?”

The images in the glass changed once more, and Magnus saw the Golden Throne, its mechanisms wreathed in crackling arcs of lighting. A howling, withered cadaver sat upon the throne, its once-mighty flesh blackened and metastasised.

“This is to be your destiny,” said the mirror, “bound forever to the Emperor’s soul-engine, suffering unendurable agony to serve his selfish desires. Look upon this and know the truth.”

Magnus tried to look away, but the horror of the vision was impossible to ignore.

“Why should I believe anything you say?” he cried.

“You already know the truth of your doom; I have no need to embellish. Look into the warp and hunt for your nemesis. He and his savage dogs of war are already on their way. Trust yourself if you do not trust me.”

Magnus closed his eye and cast his senses into the seething currents of the Great Ocean. Its substance was agitated, and roaring tides billowed with tempestuous force. All was chaos, but for a slender corridor of stillness, through which Magnus felt the passage of many souls.