The Emperor's Legion (Watchers of the Throne #1) - Chris Wraight Page 0,111

Astronomican’s failure, nor understood the means by which it was eventually restored. It may be that Raskian had been able to resolve some mechanical problem, either in the Throne itself or the mighty conduits that linked it to the fortress, though he never claimed credit for it if he had. The resumption of the beacon may have had something to do with Guilliman’s sojourn in the Throneroom, although he also never spoke about what he had seen or done in there, at least with me, so that whole episode must remain pure conjecture. Whatever the reason, though, its return gave us more than a means to reconnect with a sundered galaxy – it gave us hope again. Even when we discovered the full scale of the disaster inflicted upon the far reaches of our Imperium, and truly understood the nature of what would come to be called the Cicatrix Maledictum, the very fact that we had proof of His continued presence among us was enough to banish the worst of our despair.

In the short term, though, the Astronomican’s recovery only gave us more problems. We had already lost scores of astropaths to the effects of the Great Rift, and many weakened survivors were killed when the great psychic torrent burst back out into the universe. Information on the state of the Imperium was still scanty at best, and it took time for us to gather any data on just what had taken place during our blindness. The more we discovered in those early days, the more we realised just how bad things had become for us. There was no hope of recovering Cadia. Other warzones, such as the great meat grinder of Armageddon, had also passed far beyond our ability to stabilise. The supply of Black Ships, on which the

Throne’s creaking mechanisms depended, had been critically disrupted both by the turmoil in the warp and Valoris’ unilateral co-option of the Sisters of Silence. Survival had been achieved, that was for sure, but it began to look as if we had done nothing much more than that.

But then, just days after those events, came the second great turn of fate. The Lord Commander returned at last from the hidden Throne, ready to resume the work of his great commission. In years to come that day was marked with nearly as much reverence as the long established Sanguinala, signalling the very beginning of the Indomitus Crusade and the titanic effort to recover what had been lost. At the time, though, we had little inkling of any of that. Indeed, the entire enterprise was almost derailed before it had even begun. Despite what had taken place on Luna I had not expected to be a part of any of it. Once again, in a development that perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised by, I was entirely mistaken.

I had gone to visit the man who had started it all, Kerapliades, in his citadel of dreams.

The Master of the Adeptus Astra Telepathica dwelt in one of the stranger domains within the Palace, a haunt of warp eddies and psy-shunts set under a great dome of black glass. Many of those within the structure were blind, a result of the soul-binding that scarred all astropaths, and most of the rest were tainted in some way by the wearing effects of the empyrean. Uniquely among the Palace’s many fortresses, the hundreds of heavily armed guards within Kerapliades’ realm were chiefly there to keep an eye on those inside, rather than out.

As I hurried to meet the Master, I could see the toll that had been taken on this enormous and secretive kingdom. Most of the cells were empty, there was blood on every deck, and the sound of repeated screaming could be made out coming from the pit-levels below. Those I passed in the narrow, turning corridors regarded me with the hostility of the besieged from under heavy cowls.

Kerapliades met me in his command nexus, a blister of armourglass and Geller-shielding placed high up on the north rim of the Scholastia Psykana’s curving outer perimeter. Hundreds of scribes, many hard-plugged into baroque stations of wheezing complexity, worked away in near silence, their augmetic fingers clattering on runeboards. Black-armoured sentinels with beast-snarl face masks prowled across galleries and bridging gantries, watching every move the scribes made, forever poised for the first twitch or spasm of possession.

‘So here we are again, chancellor,’ the old man said dryly. Like all of us, he looked preternaturally decrepit, even more so than