The high-marshal looked on. ‘Who speaks for the Imperium?’

‘I will,’ said Arcadese. He’d removed his breastplate and pulled the torso portion of his mesh under-layer away. Grotesque bionics were revealed beneath, a legacy of Ullanor where he’d fallen in battle to the greenskin. He’d been comatose and hadn’t witnessed the Emperor’s last war, his greatest victory. Instead, he’d awoken to a world that no longer made any sense.

Heka’tan smiled, starting to remove his own battle-plate. ‘Can’t you tell he’s the natural negotiator?’

II

THEY STOOD BEFORE the clave-nobles wearing borrowed robes.

‘We are a sight to stir even the Sigillite to laughter,’ Arcadese had remarked upon their apotheosis to diplomats.

Persephia had rejoined them later, having disappeared with the equipment to ensure it was properly stored.

Though they still wore their boots and mesh leggings, the fact of being unarmoured still rankled at the Ultramarine and he took the artificer to one side when she returned. ‘I need you to do something for me…’

The rest of his request was lost to the sound of the great doors to the auditorium closing behind them.

After a loud, concussive boom, a quintet of sombre figures emerged in the sepulchral gloom. They were under-lit by a dimmed lantern array that cast haunting shadows over their faces, and seated on a dark balcony. In a gallery looking down on the auditorium floor and the petitioners was a host of shadow-veiled faces – lesser nobles of Bastion, their politicians and leaders. Judges all.

In the darkness, the vast auditorium’s form was only hinted at. Heka’tan discerned more hard edges, square and functional. The air smelled of stone and steel. The chamber was much more than its name suggested. It had multiple levels, corridors and conduits. Labyrinthine, the auditorium was just a part, and a small one at that. The Salamander’s gaze rested on the other petitioners.

‘Hard to believe Horus sent an iterator and not a Legion.’

Arcadese looked over at the oleaginous men and women clustered around a besuited central figure. ‘I thought the enemy had disbanded the remembrancers, like us.’

‘Horus is a conqueror, brother. He wants his victories to become a part of history.’

‘Aye,’ Arcadese agreed, bile rising in his throat at the sight of the craven humans, ‘he seeks immortality, and to assert his cause is righteous.’

Heka’tan muttered, ‘Tell that to my cold brothers on Isstvan.’

The Ultramarine was only half-listening. His gaze went to a benighted balcony, high in the auditorium’s vaults opposite the clave-nobles. ‘Don’t be sure the Warmaster hasn’t sent warriors. Our ship didn’t crash itself.’

A brazier ignited with azure flame, ending the conversation on a tense note, and illuminated the form of the high-marshal standing in the middle of the auditorium floor.

‘All attend,’ he boomed, his voice augmented by a vox-hailer unit attached to his mouth like breathing apparatus. ‘Senate is in session.’

Arcadese scowled at the ceremony. Fighting the ork would be preferable to this. ‘Take me back to Ullanor,’ he grumbled.

III

VORKELLEN AFFECTED A serious and professional air. Inwardly, he was ecstatic. This was hisbattlefield, a war in which even against the Legion he had the surer footing.

He eyed the Ultramarine briefly. ‘I will destroyyou,’ he whispered. He needed no Legionaries. What use were they? All their strength and power would only go so far; hearts and minds could not be manipulated by brawn.

‘The Emperor sends warriors to do the work of ambassadors,’ Insk smirked.

‘Indeed,’ Vorkellen agreed, averting his gaze when he noticed the Salamander was looking at him. ‘An abject failure.’ He chuckled mirthlessly. To see them humbled, without arms or armour, was delicious.

The clave-nobles were addressing the assembly, explaining to all that this was a negotiation to decide the fealty of Bastion and its armies, for Horus or the Emperor. Both sides were permitted to petition for their allegiance and based on their arguments Bastion would make its choice. The losers would be granted immunity until they had returned to their starships, then they would be considered an enemy combatant and treated as such.

As they arrived first, the representatives of Horus were permitted to speak first.

As the high-marshal retreated into the shadows, Vorkellen stepped forwards.

‘Our Lord Horus is portrayed as a monster and a tyrant by some. That is not so. He is a warmaster, a warrior-general who seeks only to unify mankind under a single rule. Pledge your allegiance to Horus and become part of that unity,’ he said, ‘I will tell you of tyrants, of butchers and massacres most foul. On Monarchia, where the Emperor’s hubris turned to madness…’

IV

HIGH UP IN the vaulted auditorium echelons, far from the audience, a shadow stirred. Ready and in position, it contented itself to watch. For now.

Tyrants

I

VORKELLEN THRUST OUT an arm, ‘Behold.’

A hololithic image materialised in front of him from a sub-projector in the auditorium floor. It depicted a glorious city of temples, spires and cathedra. Even in the flickering haze of the hololith’s resolution it was possible to pick out statues of the Emperor, great arches of veneration carved in his image.

‘Monarchia…’ Vorkellen said again, leaving a pregnant pause, ‘…before the Legion of Roboute Guilliman levelled it.’

A second projection crackled to life, replacing the first. This was of a sundered ruin, little more than a smoking crater where civilisation had once existed. Bodies were strewn across the wreckage, those too foolish or adamant, or too afraid, to leave.

‘Devastation.’ Vorkellen announced it like a death knell. ‘And for what reason? Why was this massacre sanctioned by the Emperor, beloved of all?’ He opened his hands in a plaintive gesture. ‘ Love. The people of Monarchia dared to show their love for their Master of Mankind, they dared to honour and revere him, and this was their reward – death.’

He eyed the Legionaries, his gaze studiously accusing. This was theirfault too. They were hiswarriors, his butchers.

‘And look,’ said Vorkellen, his eyes going to the Imperial representatives, ‘one of the Ultramarines warriors is with us. The Thirteenth Legion, those who consider themselves above all others, the very template that their fellow Space Marines should aspire to conform too, are the slayers of innocent women and children.’

II

ARCADESE GLARED, observing the self-assured gait, the undercurrent of arrogance in the iterator’s expression, the finery of his attire and the many expensive rejuvenat surgeries employed to preserve his youth. Vanity and confidence bled off him like an invisible fluid.

He clenched a fist. It washis Legion at Monarchia, though he himself had not been present.

‘Stay calm, brother,’ whispered Heka’tan. ‘He is trying to anger you.’

Arcadese nodded. He would not rise to it. All eyes turned to the Ultramarine then, inviting his riposte.

‘The citizens of Monarchia were given ample time to evacuate. We are not monsters. We–’

The iterator cut in. ‘So the Thirteenth Legion did not perpetrate the destruction of Monarchia and the subsequent massacre of much of its population?’

‘They were warned,’ Arcadese growled. ‘Monarchia practiced proscribed religion. Idolatry is the path to damnation. They would not see the light.’

‘An intriguing turn of phrase,’ Vorkellen bit back. ‘Isn’t religion the true path to enlightenment?’

‘It is not a question of theological debate. This is law. Monarchia was–’