for them – the Chelandion cleared orbit and made the warp. Once they were away, we returned to that vortex of paranoia and disorder that passed for the Imperial administration at that dark time. The Council was riven between an increasingly despotic Haemotalion and a rump of more reasoned voices, all of them occupied with overlapping and competing attempts to claw back some level of control over the Palace’s vast and complex machinery of government.
As the days passed and no repeat of the great daemonic incursion took place, some achievements were accomplished. A temporary defence line was re-established over the ruins of the Lion’s Gate, and rebuilding even began. Punitive raids were launched into the burned-out wreckage of the eternal city, and several hab-zones were tentatively retaken by forces loyal to the Throne. We established contact with a number of other contiguous regions where order had never quite been eradicated, and the prospect of resuming our old habits of iron control began to dangle tantalisingly before us.
Throughout all of this, I remained preoccupied with that final conversation with Valerian and Aleya. I had little doubt that my words had been instrumental in their decision to subvert the Lex and take ship. Such a thing had never been heard of, and if the truth of it were ever to emerge then my life would likely be forfeit. I didn’t care too much about that, of course, but I did remain anxious that my intervention might not have been the right one. After all, what did I know of the Emperor’s Will? How could I even begin to offer opinions about such a subtle and obscure subject? If I had ever had any claim to importance, it was as a politician, not a scholar. I wondered often if I should have stuck to what I was good at.
I consoled myself that, despite the precedent being broken, the possible harm done was slight. It was a single ship, no more than that, just a way for me to spite Haemotalion’s knee-jerk ban and allow those who had fought bravely the right to find their own path to death. If the Sister was right about a coming assault on that ring of worlds then they would be swept aside by it, just as Harster had been, though at least they would end their lives as he had done, on the offensive.
Another concern made itself apparent during those days. Once the terrible shock had worn off, whispered voices began to be raised concerning the assault on the Lion’s Gate. Clearly it had been the work of some power of nigh-infinite malevolence, but if so then it was something of a mystery why it had failed. For all the terror it had inspired, the creatures had not got close to the Eternity Gate, and I felt that even in the absence of the Lord Guilliman they would never have done so. Was it merely a statement of intent, then, to show that no worlds were beyond their reach now? Many began to advance that thesis, taking some comfort in the fact that we had nevertheless endured it. I, though, continued to have nagging doubts, as if we were missing something important and dangerous, though I could not quite put my finger on it.
I might have made more of both doubts, had two things not happened that once again turned everything inside out. The first was the great development that we had all been fervently hoping for – the Astronomican’s signal flickered, then went out again, then finally re-emerged. I heard the news first from Kerapliades, who voxed me triumphantly as the first signs of return began to flow into the astropath’s choir-towers. At first I hardly dared to believe it, but the Master of the Astronomican himself issued official confirmation soon afterwards, sending the news via secure channels to his peers on the Council and their senior advisers. The fortress lit up, and great columns of pent-up energy snarled around its iron crown as they had done before.
Jek and I both raced to the balcony of our tower and looked up into the skies, which were already beginning to clear. It was impossible not to cry out with relief and elation at the dissipation of that oppressive curtain of bloody swirling. Never had I been so pleased to see the familiar steel-grey shroud of our old poisons return to enclose us, and we embraced and kissed and laughed like fools.
I never discovered the cause of the