The Emperor's Legion (Watchers of the Throne #1) - Chris Wraight Page 0,108

we yearned to throw off.

We will likely not return from this, I signed, to be sure she understood.

You say they are Black Legion, she countered. If that’s right, then I care not.

We began to spread our message, working only with those we ­reckoned would be sympathetic. We avoided those who had served in the League of Black Ships, for their loyalty to the Adeptus Terra was absolute and if the High Lords had told them to remain on-world then they would do so slavishly. The most promising recruits were those like us, the cast-offs and the long-term renegades, many of whom had suffered from raids similar to that launched against Arraissa and also burned to avenge them.

I don’t know, even now, whether those many attacks were all linked to the Circlet. It may be that the Black Legion saw us as unique threats to their general strategy and made sure to finish as many of us off as possible before we became aware of it, or it may be that we were simply there, isolated and ripe for the taking. For myself, I think there must have been a connection. I cannot think it random that those from whom I took that map were also working with those who ransacked my convent, and it was this artefact that remained our only link to what was already unfolding.

By the end, we recruited thirty-two of our number; thirty-two Sisters who were so disillusioned with our treatment that they would willingly become involved in a raid that was both illegal and likely to result in our swift deaths. I found that both heartening and moving. We had all lived our entire lives in an Imperium defined by fear and the foolish adherence to central authority. One ironic consequence of our neglect by that authority was that we had never been infected by its most pernicious effects, and were as close as any of our species ever came to having a mind of our own.

The hour came. We armed ourselves and marched en masse to the hangars. We were lucky that our fortress was in such disarray – there were few guards on station, and little more than an ad hoc mechanism for summoning and discharging landers. Some token resistance was offered from the garrison commander and a scattered squad of his troops, but a very gentle application of our more unpleasant null-projection techniques soon had them vomiting energetically over the rockcrete and clutching their migraine-split temples.

I had still not heard from Valerian. I never doubted his honesty, but it occurred to me that he would have run into far stiffer resistance than I would have. Perhaps he had failed in securing the void transport that he’d intended to. I began to consider whether we would have to make use of the semi-ruined Cadamara, which still hung in high orbit but was only barely void-worthy. Erefan would still take an order, I knew, though Slovo might be a different matter. I didn’t even know for sure that he remained on board, or even if he were still alive.

I voxed the Custodian over the classified channels he had given me, then took my place in the lander. We boosted the thrusters and took off, clearing the open hangar exit and pulling steeply up into the atmosphere.

I looked out of the armourglass portals as we ascended, watching the spoil-grey sprawl of Terra spread out beneath us. The scars of the battle were clearly visible, a black straggle of burned earth that spread out for many square kilometres. For a brief moment I had a perfect view of the Palace itself, that colossal accumulation that was more continent than city, and realised only then just how vast it was. The place must have housed millions upon millions of defenders, against which our hastily assembled band was almost infinitesimally unimportant.

But it wasn’t, of course. A part of me knew that even then.

We pulled into orbit, and the view from the portals sank into inky black. Voidcraft were clustered there in huge numbers, more than would normally have been the case, since so many had been pulled back from outer-system patrol. Immediately Adeptus Arbites system runners began to hail us, and a Naval destroyer bearing the ident Superlative began to turn towards our locus.

I saw the challenge-hails multiply on our forward augurs, all of them demanding a full-stop and transmission of exemption credentials.

We were a long way from the Cadamara. Reva looked at me, and I knew what