He filed the sound in his lobe archives, and went about his duties, only occasionally disturbed by the sound of nails clawing at the metal hull.
The Blessed Lady really needed to put some clothes on.
She reached blindly over the edge of her bed, her hand patting the floor, questing until she found her robe. Cyrene was slipping the garment over her head when she felt Arric’s arms encircling her from behind.
‘It’s still early,’ he said, breathing the words against her neck.
‘Actually, I think you’re already late. That wasn’t the dawn chime, it was the signal for noon.’
‘Don’t joke,’ he said, pulling her closer.
‘I’m not joking.’ Cyrene ran her fingers through her hair, ignoring his as they quested over her. ‘Arric,’ she said, ‘I’m really not joking.’
He rolled out of bed with an ‘Oh,
Being in love with an officer could, at times, be an educational experience – especially ones that could swear in eighteen Gothic dialects.
‘Shit,’ he finished the tirade back where he started. ‘I have to go. Where the hell is my sabre?’
She faced him without seeing him. ‘I think it slid under the bed. I heard it scrape on the floor last night.’
‘Where would I be without you?’ Arric dragged the blade out from beneath the bed, and fastened the leather belt around his crumpled, unbuttoned uniform. ‘I’ll be back later,’ he said.
‘I know.’
‘Planetfall today,’ he said, as if it would somehow be news to her. The ship quivered around them, and she reached out to the wall, steadying herself.
‘I know,’ she said.
‘Though with this storm...’
‘I know,’ she said again.
‘How do I look?’ he spoke the words with a grin, always enjoying this oldest of rituals between them. Usually she smiled back. Not this time.
‘Like someone who is late for a meeting with fleet command. Now go.’
Argel Tal nodded to Major Jesmetine as the human officer half-tumbled through the closing doors.
‘I’m here,’ he called out. ‘I made it.’
His ochre uniform, marking him as a senior commander in the 54th Euchar Infantry, wouldn’t pass muster on a parade ground without some serious tidying up first. His black hair was in a similar state, and he’d not shaved this morning, either.
He regarded the others gathered in the briefing room, where they all stood around an expansive central table. Forty men, women and Astartes (the latter, he smirkingly liked to call ‘post-humans’) turned to regard him in turn.
Above them, the chamber’s illumination globes flickered as the ship shuddered again.
‘Sorry,’ said the major. ‘I’m here now.’
Several heads shook, while irritated mutters broke out. The officer took one of the few places left at the table, next to a Word Bearer captain. The charged hum from the warrior’s armour joints was ear-achingly loud up close. It made it a chore to hear the others’ voices.
‘Good of you to join us, Arric,’ Fleet Commander Baloc Torvus said, scowling down the table at the breathless major. ‘As I was saying–’
‘My apologies,’ the major interrupted again. ‘The servitors on D deck are struggling with the... elevator... gyro-cogs. Something of a nightmare, really. Had to run the long way.’
From across the chamber, the armoured figure of Chapter Master Deumos thudded a fist onto the table.
‘Be quiet
‘Sorry, sir.’ Arric saluted – the pre-Crusade fist over his chest, rather than the aquila.
Xi-Nu 73 turned his hooded head with a rattle of grinding gears. ‘There is no component in the ship’s construction matching the term “gyro-cog”,’ he noted.
Arric narrowed his eyes at the tech-adept.
‘I am aware,’ the Word Bearer lord growled, ‘that Major Jesmetine was lying through his teeth with very little skill. Torvus, get on with the details. We have a world to bring to compliance.’
Torvus began his summary, detailing land masses, population projections, and the disposition of forces. The people of 1301-12 were primitives, yet the entire Expeditionary Fleet was preparing for war: Army contingent, Astartes companies, Mechanicum forces – everything.
It all depended on first contact.
Arric listened to the things he’d already studied in the official reports. He caught the Word Bearer captain next to him glancing down.
‘Did you comb your hair with your fingers?’ Argel Tal asked.
The doors slid open before Arric could reply, but the retort would have been a rude one. Clad in ceremonial armour of chainmail and a breastplate of carved ivory, the primarch entered the war room.
