‘For the love of the God-Emperor, please, I beg of you,’ Nazimir pleaded. Kersh looked to Epistolary Melmoch and found the psyker’s disarming smile waiting for him.
‘I hear enough of this God-Emperor from my Librarian,’ Kersh told them. ‘The love of our Emperor?’ Kersh marvelled. ‘You think yourself worthy of that?’ Nazimir fell to his arthritic knees. ‘You think you can earn his love through your worthless words? Your hives and palaces of soulless devotion? Your veneration of an empty idea? I feel the love of my father, as he felt the love of his. This flesh – these hearts – were made to feel. His blood courses through my veins. His loss lives on behind these eyes. He is more than man, but he is not a god. It is your fear that casts him as such. You are weak and foolish, and in your billions need him to be more than he is. But you are wrong, mortal. He is more than man for not being some all-powerful deity. His deeds are his own and we aspire to his greatness – not appropriate it, mythologise it and worship it as a shield against a galaxy of petty doubt, dread and pain. For his love I would do anything. I would obliterate this palace from orbit, for example.’
‘And you should,’ Chaplain Shadrath hissed with masked menace.
Nazimir gagged and vomited in his altitude mask. The stringy gruel dribbled out onto the throne room floor. Kersh looked from the Chaplain to the approaching convocate.
‘We ask only mercy, my lord,’ Clemenz-Krycek implored him.
‘But I won’t,’ Kersh said finally. ‘I will not destroy a world on a technicality.’ Shadrath turned away in silent disgust.
‘An Angel’s wisdom indeed,’ Clemenz-Krycek gasped and kissed the Excoriator’s gauntlet.
‘As the Fifth Company will not shirk their responsibilities on a technicality, either,’ Kersh said.
‘Rorschach’s World waits for us,’ Shadrath insisted. ‘It will not wait forever.’
‘Noted, Chaplain,’ the Scourge answered. ‘But Chapter Master Ichabod’s word has been given and we will honour it.’
‘Thank you, my lord. A thousand thanks,’ Clemenz-Krycek said.
‘Now, mortal,’ Kersh said, looking up briefly at the insensible ecclesiarch in the elevated throne above. ‘What does the cardinal ask of the Excoriators? Be brief – our patience wears thin.’
Clemenz-Krycek bent down and rifled the vomit-splattered robes of his pontifex. He extracted a data-slate and handed it to the corpus-captain.
‘The Keeler Comet blasts across the night skies of the subsector,’ the convocate said. ‘The crimson comet brings doom to all the planets on its path. This is well known. But it brings fear and madness to the region as a whole. An explosion of cultish activity. Insanity, violence, bloodshed. The statues of the Notre Dumas shrineworld bleed for the ungovernable atrocities committed there. Our sister cardinal world of St. Faustina is in uproar, with the enforcers forced to put down riot and rebellion with brutal force. The sanctuary worlds of Frau Mauro and Benedictus Secundus suffer blood cults and outbreaks of vampiric contagion. We have also lost contact with the Preceptor retreats on Caritas Minoris, Boltoph’s World and VII-Solace-Sixteen. We despatched the cloister-corvette
‘We are the Astartes Praeses,’ Kersh announced. ‘It is the Excoriators’ sacred duty to garrison damnation’s borders. What you speak of is not unusual in such regions. The Eye of Terror is a storm. Its immateriology is unpredictable and cruel.’
‘But the comet, my lord–’ Clemenz-Krycek insisted with his eyes to the floor.
‘Is a new manifestation, I grant you,’ Kersh admitted. ‘As you have observed yourself, however, we are the Emperor’s Angels. We are not investigators. We are not charged with keeping order on Imperial worlds. I suggest you pursue the advice of the Inquisition. If the local military forces on these worlds cannot cope, then the Ordo Hereticus will use its influence with the Imperial Guard to have regiments brought in-sector and assigned to peace- keeping and security duties.’
‘Corpus-captain,’ the convocate said, ‘there is a small planet, out in the Andronica Banks, close to Hinterspace – a cemetery world called Certus-Minor.’
‘Go on,’ Kersh prompted.
‘Like the Preceptor retreats, we have lost contact with the cemetery world. We have stopped receiving astrotelepathic messages, and our last convoy of necrofreighters have not returned. Pontifex-Mundi Oliphant is both planetary governor and senior ecclesiarch of the cemetery world. The last few messages we did receive from him indicated that Certus-Minor was experiencing the same problems as other worlds with heretic cults. The very last, that his people had discovered a colossal monument, made of human skulls and bearing the markings of the Ruinous Powers.’
‘This giant monument just appeared?’ Kersh frowned. ‘I find that hard to believe. Were there no witnesses to its construction?’
‘I cannot answer to that. Pontifex Oliphant communicated fears that cultists operating on the planet might be trying to summon some unholy creature from the warp – that the object might be a gate or portal. He was instructed to quarantine the region around the object, establish a prayer-cordon and not interfere directly with it. He was told we were sending for assistance.’
‘You want us to destroy this dread monument?’ Kersh asked.
‘And whatever might proceed from the infernal artefact,’ Clemenz-Krycek replied. ‘We have heard nothing from Oliphant since – and that was over a month ago.’
Kersh looked at Epistolary Melmoch. ‘Opinion.’
‘This close to the Eye, anything is possible. I echo your concerns about this portal’s construction, but with the right tracts and dark knowledge a group of accomplished cultists might be able to achieve such a Ruinous wonder.’
Kersh looked to Ezrachi.
‘It is the Chapter Master’s wish that these obligations be honoured,’ the Apothecary commented, adding with a harsh edge, ‘no matter how foolishly these miserable wretches have acted in our midst. They are but mortal, after all.’
Kersh turned back to Clemenz-Krycek. ‘You went to a great deal of trouble to secure our involvement. What is the significance of this cemetery world?’
‘Certus-Minor is the birthplace of Umberto II – Ecclesiarch and High Lord of Terra. It is also the location of the memorial mausoleum containing his bones. It was the Ecclesiarch’s dying wish that he return. Such a prestigious burial ground is secured at a premium by the great and good of our fair Imperium. It is a holy place – we cannot allow the unclean to contaminate its sacred soil.’
Kersh considered the power and influence wielded by the families of the dead, their loved ones bound for a costly grave plot on the distant Certus-Minor. It was little wonder that the Ecclesiarchy on St Ethalberg had managed to secure the Excoriators’ involvement. Kersh felt a shoulder plate press against his own. It was Shadrath.
‘May I speak with you?’ the Chaplain hissed.
‘Proceed, Chaplain. We are all friends here now.’
Shadrath held on to his words and his fury a few moments longer.
‘We have intelligence of Alpha Legion activity in the Scintilla Stars,’ he stated, finally. ‘We have a small portal of opportunity. I suggest we take it. The Fifth Company’s finest hour waits for us on Rorschach’s World – not some miserable cemetery world in the lonely depths of Hinterspace. The Stigmartyr is there for the taking, but our sworn enemy will not wait.’
‘Nonsense, Chaplain,’ Kersh said. ‘It is the Alpha Legion of which you speak. Rorschach’s World is a trap and the intelligence allowed us by that most secretive of Legions is our invitation. We will be there for the taking. The trap will wait for us, Chaplain, for we have yet to spring it.’
‘Corpus-captain–’
‘Calm yourself, Chaplain Shadrath,’ the Scourge warned. ‘Before you do us both an injury.’ The Chaplain shook his helmet slightly before backing away. ‘Convocate. Pontifex,’ Kersh addressed the priests. ‘Chapter Master Ichabod’s word is his bond, as is mine. My Excoriators will travel to Certus-Minor, destroy this corrupt monument and anything that has issued forth from its darkness. I pledge no less but no more. Then, I hunt Traitor Angels in the Scintilla Stars as my Chaplain advises.’
