What you are seeing is creation’s own shadow, where every mortal emotion and urge takes immortal form. You are sailing through seas made of psychic energy and liquefied sorrow. You are cast adrift in the heaven and hell of a million mythologies, Argel Tal.
This is where every moment of hatred, disgust, wrath, joy, grief, jealousy, indolence and decadence manifest as raw energy.
This is where the souls of the dead come to burn forever.
Orfeo’s Lament gave a horrendous shudder, and the sound of wrenching metal ran through the deck beneath them. Torgal and Xaphen went to their knees – the former with a gutter curse, the latter with an indignant grunt.
In the storm beyond, more images took shape. Hands pressed against the glass, leaving discoloured smears. Faces, warped by screams, aching in their familiarity. The shadow of something, something vast and dark and cold behind it all, sweeping past the ship like a whale passing in the deepest ocean.
For a moment, Argel Tal’s breath misted in the air. Frost beaded his skin. The shadow passed, and kept passing, disturbing the crashing energies with its immense, half-formed bulk.
A void leviathan. Fear would draw it closer, and this vessel would disintegrate in its jaws. But it passes, hunting other prey. In many of the futures I saw, it turned upon us, and your lives ended here. In three of those futures, Argel Tal, you were laughing as you died, dissolving in the energies outside the ship.
He was not laughing now.
‘This is hell.’ Argel Tal no longer struggled to see the faces shrieking in at him, nor the hands clawing at the glass. He could see nothing else. ‘This is the underworld of human imagination.’
Do not be blinded by dogma. This is the Primordial Truth. Creation’s shadow. The layer behind the stars.
The Word Bearer breathed a single word as he watched the sea of screaming souls beyond.
‘Chaos.’
The daemon’s maw twisted into a grin. Now you begin to understand.
Argel Tal sipped the water. It was brackish on his tongue, and distastefully warm. It was also the fifth such cup to sour in his hands like this, and he had the unsettling notion that it was his own body curdling the water.
‘We soon reached the first world,’ he said. ‘Melisanth. The world had no human name, but in ancient days, the eldar-breed xenos... they named it Melisanth.’
Lorgar’s flowing script recorded each word. ‘The eldar? What is their role in all this?’
‘Now? They have no role. They are the galaxy’s memory, fading night by night. But once, this region of space was their most precious dominion – the heart of their empire. Their decadence brought us forth, from our realm into this one. We watched their worlds burning in spectral fire, and we tore their souls apart in claws of spirit and flesh.’
‘Argel Tal.’
‘Every sensation was new to us. We were newborns in the material realm. Blood fed us. Pain fuelled us. You cannot know what it is like to grow stronger when a creature suffers nearby. To swell with power when parents watch their children burn. To grow in size and intellect with each sin you inflict upon mortal flesh. To know more of the universe’s secrets with each soul you swallow.’
‘My son... Please.’
‘But I was there, Lorgar. I saw these things. I did these things.’
‘You are Argel Tal. You were born on Colchis, in the village of Singh-Rukh, to a carpenter and a seamstress. Your name means “the last angel” in the dialect of the southern steppes tribes. You are the youngest warrior in the Legion ever to inherit the mantle of company captain. You once bore swords of red iron – the blades of your predecessor – which you lost in service to your primarch. You are Argel Tal, a Bearer of the Word. You are my son.’
The Word Bearer looked down at his skeletal hands. ‘Sire,’ he said softly. ‘Forgive me.’ Argel Tal managed to meet his primarch’s eyes, infinitely grateful that he saw no judgement in those grey depths.
‘There is nothing to forgive.’
‘You knew more of my life than I realised.’
Lorgar smiled. ‘All of my sons are precious to me.’
Argel Tal rubbed at his sore eyes. ‘Ingethel told us that our changes would begin at the ordained time, when the galaxy burns. But I am losing myself now. Is this the ordained moment already? Is the galaxy aflame? None of my memories are my own, father. There’s a copper taste on my tongue, like the echo of blood. Perhaps this is fear. Perhaps this taste is the fear so many poets and archivists have written about.’ The captain laughed, the sound hollow and humourless. ‘And now I speak my valediction.’
‘It need not be a valediction, Argel Tal. That cannot be decided until the tale is told.’
SEVENTEEN
A Dead Empire
Revelations
Genesis
Ingethel gestured at the planet with a crooked claw.
