'Our traditions are what make us who we are/ Garro offered quietly. 'It's right and correct that we hold to them.'

'In moderation, perhaps/ Typhon corrected. 'We should not allow ourselves to become hidebound by rules from a past that is dust to us now.'

'Indeed/ added Grulgor.

'Ah/ said Temeter. 'So, Ignatius, you hold on to tradition with one hand and push it away with the other?

'The old ways are right and correct so long as they serve a purpose/ Grulgor threw Garro a cold look. 'That pet helot you keep is "a tradition" and yet there is no point to it. There is a custom that has no value.'

'I beg to differ, commander/ Garro replied. 'The housecarl performs flawlessly as my equerry-'

Grulgor snorted. 'Huh. I had one of those once. I think I lost it on an ice moon somewhere. It froze to

death, weak little thing.' He looked away. 'It smacks to me of sentiment, Garro.'

'As ever, Grulgor, I will give your comments the due attention they deserve/ said Garro. He broke off as a figure in gold caught his eye moving through a shaft of light.

Temeter saw where Garro was looking and tapped twice on the shoulder plate of his armour. 'I told you Mortarion had brought company'

KALEB BUSIED HIMSELF with the sword cloth, folding the green velvet mantle into a neat square. In the alcove of the arming pit, Captain Garro's weapons and battle equipment were arrayed around him on hooks and wire-frame racks. Upon one wall, resting on steel spikes, lay the heavy silver ingot of his master's bolter. It was polished to a matt sheen, the brass detail glittering under the wan light of biolume glow-globes.

The housecarl replaced the cloth and wrung his hands, thinking. It was hard for him to maintain a clear focus, with the idea gnawing at his mind that the primarch was only a few tiers above him, up on the high decks. Kaleb looked up at the steel ceiling and imagined what he might see if the Endurance were made of glass. Would Mortarion radiate dark and cold as some said he did? Would it be possible for a mere man such as himself to actually look the Death Lord in the eye, and not feel his heart stop in his chest? The serf took a deep breath to steady his nerve. It was a lot for him to handle, and the distraction made performing his normal tasks difficult. Mortarion was a son of the Emperor Himself, and the Emperor... the Emperor was...

'Kaleb/

He turned to face Hakur. The seasoned veteran was one of the few Astartes who called the housecad by his given name. 'Yes, lord?'

'Mind your work.' He nodded at the ceiling, at the place where Kaleb had been staring. 'Sees through steel, the primarch does.'

The serf managed a weak grin and bowed, gathering up a cleaning cloth and a tin of waxy polish. Under Hakur's neutral gaze he moved to the centre of the alcove and set to work on the heavy ceramite and brass cuirass that rested there. This was a ceremonial piece that Garro wore only in combat or upon formal occasions. In tandem with the honour-rank of battle-captain, the decorative over-sheath sported an eagle, wings spread and beak arched, sculpted from brass as if about to take flight from the chest plate. Similarly, the rear of the cuirass had a second eagle as a head-guard that emerged from the shoulders when worn over the backpack of Astartes armour.

What made this piece unique was that its eagles differed from the Emperor's aquila. While the symbol of the Imperium of Man had two heads, one blinded to look at the past, one sighted to see to the future, the battle-captain's eagles were singular. Kaleb fancied this meant that they only saw into the time yet to pass, that perhaps they were a kind of charm that could know the advance of a killing shot or deadly blade before it arrived. Once he had voiced that thought aloud and received derision and scorn from Garro's men. Such thoughts, Sergeant Hakur had later said, were superstitions that had no place on a ship of the Emperor's Crusade. 'Ours is a war to dispel fable and falsehood with the cold light of truth, not to propagate myth.' The veteran had tapped the eagles with a finger.

'These are inanimate brass and no more, just as we are all flesh and bone.'

Still, Kaleb's hand could not help but drift to a brass icon on a chain around his neck, hidden inside the folds of his tunic where none could see it.

THE FIGURE WAS most assuredly female, lithe and poised, clad in a shimmering snakeskin over-suit of dense chainmail and a sweep of golden armour plate that resembled a bodice. A half-mask lay open at her neck, revealing an elegant face. Garro sometimes found it hard to determine the age of non-Astartes, but he estimated she could be no more than thirty solar years. Purple-black hair rose in a topknot from a seamless scalp, bare but for a blood-red aquila tattoo. She was quite beautiful, but what locked his attention on her was the way she moved noiselessly across the iron decks of tbe chamber. Had he not seen her emerge from the shadows, the Astartes might have thought the woman to be a holo-ghost, some finely detailed image cast from the projector.

Amendera Kendel,' noted Typhon, with a hint of distaste. A witchseeker.'

Temeter nodded. 'From the Storm Dagger cadre. She is here with a deputation of the Silent Sisterhood, apparently on the orders of the Sigillite himself.'

Grulgor's lip curled. There are no psykers here. What purpose could those women serve in the coming battle?'

'The Regent of Terra must have his reasons,' Typhon suggested, but his tone made it clear he thought little of what they might be.

Garro watched the witchseeker orbit the room. Her tradecraft was commendable. She moved in stealth even as she was obvious to the eye, passing around

the naval officers in a way that appeared to be random, even as Garro's trained sense understood it was not.

Kendel was observing. She was cataloguing the reactions of the people in the assembly hall, filing them away for later review. It made the Astartes think of a scout, surveying the land before a battle, seeking weak points and targets. He had never encountered a Sister of Silence before, only heard of their exploits in service to the Imperium.

Their name was well deserved, he considered. Kendel was silent, like the wind across a grave, and in her passing, he noticed that some would shiver without being aware of it, or become distracted for a moment. It was as if the witchseeker cast an invisible aura around herself that gave mortal men pause.

Garro watched her pass by the entrance to the assembly hall and his gaze was hooked by the shine of brass and steel upon two grand figures that stood either side of the hatch. Barrel-chested in highly arti-ficed armour, taller than Typhon, the identical sentinels blocked the steel door with crossed battle-scythes, the signature weapon of the Death Guard's elite warriors. Only the few personally favoured by the primarch were permitted to carry such artefacts. They were known as manreapers, forged in echo of the common farmer's harvesting scythe that it was said Mortarion had fought with in his youth. The first captain wielded one, but Garro recognised these twin blades immediately.

'Deathshroud/ he whispered. These two Astartes were the personal honour guards of the primarch, fated never to reveal their faces to anyone but Mortarion, even to the end of their lives. So it was said, the warriors of the Deathshroud were chosen by the

primarch from the rank and file men of the Legion in secret, and then listed as killed in action. They were his nameless guardians, never allowed to venture more than forty-nine paces from their lord's side. Garro felt a chill when he realised that he hadn't even been aware that the Deathshroud had entered the chamber.

'If they are here, then where is our master?' asked Grulgor.

A cold smile of understanding flickered over Typhon's lips. 'He has been here all along.'