False Gods

'How do you know?' asked Loken, his voice close to breaking. 'I just do. I have faith.' 'Faith?'

'Yes,' answered Aximand. 'Faith that the Warmaster is too strong and too stubborn to be brought low by some­thing like this. Before you know it we'll be his war dogs once again.'

Loken nodded as the howling downdraught of a Stormbird snatched his breath away.

The screaming craft hovered overhead, throwing up sheets of water as it circled on its descent. Landing skids deployed and the craft came down amid a spray of muddy water.

Before it had touched down, the Mournival and apothecaries had lifted Horus between them. Even as the assault ramp came down, they were rushing inside, plac­ing the Warmaster on one of the gurneys as the Stormbird's jets fired to lift it from Davin's moon.

The assault ramp clanged shut behind them, and Loken felt the aircraft lurch as the pilot aimed it for the skies. The apothecaries hooked the Warmaster up to medicae machines, jamming needles and hissing tubes into his arms, and placing a feed line of oxygen over his mouth and nose.

Suddenly superfluous, Loken slumped into one of the armoured bucket seats against the fuselage of the aircraft and held his head in his hands.

Across from him, the Mournival did the same.

To say that Ignace Karkasy was not a happy man was an understatement. His lunch was cold, Mersadie Oli-ton was late and the wine he was drinking wasn't fit to lubricate the gears of an engine. To top it all off, his pen tapped on the thick paper of the Bondsman num­ber 7 without any inspiration flowing. He'd taken to avoiding the Retreat, partly for fear of running into Wenduin again, but mostly because it just depressed him too much. The vandalism done to the bar lent it an incredibly sad and gloomy aspect and, while some of the remembrancers needed the squalor to inspire their work, Karkasy wasn't one of them.

Instead, he relaxed in the sub-deck where most of the remembrancers gathered for their meals, but which was empty for the better part of the day. The solitude was helping him to deal with all that had hap­pened since he'd challenged Euphrati Keeler about her distributing the Lectitio Divinitatus pamphlets –though it certainly wasn't helping him compose any poetry.

She'd been unrepentant when he'd confronted her, urging him to join her in prayer to the God-Emperor, before some kind of makeshift shrine.

'I can't,' he had said. 'It's ridiculous, Euphrati, can't you see that?'

'What's so ridiculous about it, Ig?' she'd asked. Think about it, we've embarked upon the greatest crusade known to man. A crusade: a war motivated by religious beliefs!'

'No, no,' he protested, 'it's not that at all. We've moved beyond the need for the crutch of religion, Euphrati and we didn't set out from Terra to take a step backwards into such outmoded concepts of belief. It's only by dis­pelling the clouds and superstitions of religion that we discover truth, reason and morality.'

'It's not superstition to believe in a god, Ignace,’ said Euphrati, holding out another of the Lectitio Divinitatus pamphlets. 'Look, read this and then make up your mind.'

'I don't need to read it,' he snapped, throwing the pamphlet to the deck. 'I know what it will say and I'm not interested,’

'But you have no idea, Ignace. It's all so clear to me now. Ever since that thing attacked me, I've been hid­ing. In my billet and in my head, but I realise now that all I had to do was allow the light of the Emperor into my heart and I would be healed,’

'Didn't Mersadie and I have anything to do with that?' sneered Karkasy. 'All those hours we spent with you weeping on our shoulders?'

'Of course you did,’ smiled Euphrati, coming forward and placing her hands on his cheeks. 'That's why I wanted to give you the message and tell you what I'd realised. It's very simple, Ignace. We create our own gods and the blessed Emperor is the Master of Mankind,’

'Create our own gods?' said Karkasy, pulling away from her. 'No, my dear, ignorance and fear create the gods, enthusiasm and deceit adorn them, and human weakness worships them. It's been the same throughout history. When men destroy their old gods they find new ones to take their place. What makes you think this is any different?'

'Because I feel the Emperor's light within me,’

'Oh, well, I can't argue with that, can I?'

'Spare me your sarcasm, Ignace,’ said Euphrati, sud­denly hostile. 'I thought you might be open to hearing the good word, but I can see you're just a close-minded fool. Get out, Ignace, I don't want to see you again,’

Thus dismissed, he'd found himself outside in the companionway alone, bereft of a friend he'd only just managed to make. That had been the last time she'd spo­ken to him. He'd seen her only once since then, and she had ignored his greeting.

'Lost in thought, Ignace?' asked Mersadie Oliton, and he looked up in surprise, shaken from his miserable reverie by her sudden appearance.

'Sorry, my dear,’ he said. 'I didn't hear you approach. I was miles away; composing another verse for Captain Loken to misunderstand and Sindermann to discard,’

She smiled, instantly lifting his spirits. It was impossible to be too maudlin around Mersadie, she had a way of making a man realise that it was good to be alive.

'Solitude suits you, Ignace, you're far less susceptible to temptation,’

'Oh I don't know,’ he said, holding up the botde of wine. There's always room in my life for temptation. I count it a bad day if I'm not tempted by something or other,’

'You're incorrigible, Ignace,’ she laughed, 'but enough of that, what's so important that you drag me away from my transcripts to meet here? I want to be up to date by the time the speartip gets back from the moon,’

Flustered by her directness, Karkasy wasn't sure where to begin and thus opted for the softly-softly approach.' 'Have you seen Euphrati around recendy?'

'I saw her yesterday evening, just before the Storm-birds launched. Why?'

'Did she seem herself?'

'Yes, I think so. I was a little surprised by the change in her appearance, but she's an imagist. I suppose it's what they do every now and again.'

'Did she try to give you anything?'

'Give me anything? No. Look, what's this all about?'

Karkasy slipped a battered pamphlet across the table towards Mersadie, watching her expression change as she read it and recognised it for what it was.

'Where did you get this?' she asked when she'd fin­ished reading it.

'Euphrati gave it to me,’ he replied. 'Apparently she wants to spread the word of the God-Emperor to us first because we helped her when she needed support.'

'God-Emperor? Has she taken leave of her senses?'

'I don't know, maybe,' he said, pouring himself a drink. Mersadie pushed over a glass and he filled that too. 'I don't think she was over her experience in the Whisperheads, even if she made out that she was.'

This is insane,’ said Mersadie. 'She'll have her certifi­cation revoked. Did you tell her that?'

'Sort of,’ said Karkasy. 'I tried to reason with her, but you know how it is with those religious types, never any room for a dissenting opinion,’

'And?'

'And nothing, she threw me out of her billet after that,’ 'So you handled it with your usual tact then?' 'Perhaps I could have been more delicate,’ agreed Karkasy, 'but I was shaken to know that a woman of intelligence could be taken in by such nonsense,’ 'So what do we do about it?'

'Vou tell me. I don't have a clue. Do you think we should tell someone about