‘You were more than a remembrancer,’ said Dorn. ‘Remember?’
‘I was something once,’ he nodded still starring into the darkness. ‘Once. Back before Ullanor, when there were no remembrancers, when they were just an idea.’ Voss shook his head and looked down at the parchment in front of him. ‘It was quite an idea.’
Dorn nodded and Qruze saw the ghost of a smile on the primarch’s normally grim face.
‘Your idea, Solomon. A thousand artists sent out to reflect the truth of the Great Crusade. An idea worthy of the Imperium.’
Voss gave a weak smile. ‘Flattery again, Rogal Dorn. Not completelymy idea, as you must remember.’ Dorn nodded and Qruze heard a note of passion in Voss’s voice. ‘I was just a wordsmith tolerated amongst the powerful because I could turn their deeds into words that could spread like fire.’ Voss’s eyes shone as if reflecting the light of bright memories. ‘Not like the iterators, not like Sindermann and the rest of his manipulating ilk. The Imperial truth did not need manipulation. It needed reflecting out into the Imperium through words, and images and sounds.’ He broke off and looked at the black ink stains on his thin fingers. ‘At least, I thought so then.’
‘You were right,’ said Dorn and Qruze saw the conviction flow into the primarch’s face. ‘I remember the manuscripts you presented to the Emperor at Zuritz. Written by you and illuminated by Askarid Sha. They were beautiful and true.’ Dorn was nodding slowly, as if trying to tease a response from Voss who was still looking at his hands. ‘The petition to create an order of artists to “witness, record and reflect the light of truth spread by the Great Crusade”. An order of people to be the Imperium’s memory of its foundation: that was what you argued was needed. And you were right.’
Voss nodded slowly, then he looked up and there was a hollow look in his eyes. It was the look of someone thinking about what they had lost, thought Qruze. He knew. He had worn it himself in many dark hours in recent years.
‘Yes, fine times,’ said Voss. ‘When the Council of Terra ratified the creation of the Order of Remembrancers, for a moment I thought I knew what you and your brothers must have felt, seeing your sons bringing illumination to the galaxy.’ He gave a dismissive snort. ‘But you are not here to flatter, Rogal Dorn, you are here to judge.’
‘You vanished,’ said Dorn in the same soft tone he had begun with. ‘In the moments after the betrayal you vanished. Where have you been?’ Voss did not answer for a second.
‘I have been telling the truth since your sons took me from that ship,’ he said, and looked at Qruze. ‘I am sure it is in their mission accounts.’
Qruze stayed silent. He knew what Voss had said to the Imperial Fists that found him, what he had been saying to his interrogators ever since. He knew, and Rogal Dorn would know, but the primarch said nothing. The silence waited until Voss looked at Dorn and said what the primarch had been waiting for.
‘I have been with the Warmaster.’
IACTON QRUZE KEPT his distance as the primarch watched the stars turn above him. They were in an observation cupola, a blister of crystal glass on the upper surface of the nameless fortress. Above them Saturn hung, its bands of muddy colour reminding Qruze of fat running through meat. Dorn had cut short the questioning of Solomon Voss, saying that he would return soon. He had said to Qruze that he needed to think. So they had come here to think beneath the light of the stars and the eye of Saturn. Qruze thought that Dorn had hoped that Voss would deny his earlier claim, that he would find a reason to set him free.
‘He is as I remember him,’ said Dorn suddenly, still gazing out at the scatter of stars. ‘Older, worn, but still the same. No sign of corruption to my eyes.’
I must do my duty, thought Qruze. Even though it is like stabbing a blade into an unhealed wound. He took a deep breath before speaking.
‘No, my lord. But perhaps you see what you want to see.’ The primarch did not move but Qruze sensed the shift in atmosphere, a charge of danger in the cold air.
‘You presume much, Iacton Qruze,’ said the primarch in a low growl.
Qruze took a careful step closer to Dorn and spoke in a level voice. ‘I presume nothing. I have nothing but one unbroken oath. That oath means I must say these things.’ The primarch turned and straightened so that Qruze had to look up into his face. ‘Even to you, lord.’
‘You have more to say?’ growled Dorn.
‘Yes. I must remind you that the enemy is subtle and has many weapons. We can protect against them only with suspicion. Solomon Voss might be as you remember him. Perhaps he is the same man. Perhaps.’ Qruze let the word hang in the air. ‘But perhaps is not enough.’
‘Do you believe his claim? That he was with Horus all this time?’
‘I believe the facts. Voss has been amongst the enemy, whether willingly or as a captive. He was on a ship enslaved to Horus that bore the marks of the enemy. The rest could be…’
‘A story.’ Dorn was nodding, a grim expression on his face. ‘He was the greatest teller of stories that I have ever known. There are billions in the Imperium that only know of our deeds by the words he wrote. You think that he is spinning a tale now?’
Qruze shook his head. ‘I do not know, lord. I am not here to judge, I am here to question.’
‘Then do your duty and question.’
Qruze took a breath and began to count off points, raising a finger for each one. ‘Why did he go to Horus if he is not a traitor? Horus slaughtered the rest of the remembrancers when he purged the Legions. Why would he keep one of them alive?’ When Dorn did not interrupt Qruze continued. ‘And an enemy ship, with a single man held safe within it, does not drift into the Solar System alone.’ He paused for a second, thinking of the thing that worried him most. Dorn was still looking at him, silently absorbing Qruze’s words. ‘It was not accident. He was returned to us.’
Dorn nodded, forming Qruze’s worry into a question. ‘And if he was, why?’
‘WHY DID YOU go to Horus?’ asked Rogal Dorn.
They were back in the cell. Solomon Voss sat by his desk with Rogal Dorn opposite him and Qruze standing by the door. Voss took a sip of spiced tea from a battered metal cup. He had asked for it and Dorn had assented. The remembrancer swallowed slowly and licked his lips before beginning.
‘I was on Hattusa, with the 817th fleet, when I heard that Horus had rebelled against the Emperor. I could not believe it at first. I tried to think of reasons why, to put it into some form of context, to make some sense of it. I could not. But when I realised that I could not make sense of it I knew what I needed to do. I needed to see the truth with my own eyes. I would witness it and I would make sense of what I saw. Then I would put it into words so that others could share my understanding.’
Dorn frowned. ‘You doubted that Horus was a traitor?’
‘No. But I was a remembrancer, the greatest remembrancer. It was our duty to make sense of great events in art. I knew that others would doubt or would not believe that the brightest son of the Imperium could turn against it. If it was true I wanted that truth shouted from the works of as many remembrancers as possible.’
Qruze saw the passion and fire flash through Voss’s face. For a moment the tiredness was gone and the man’s conviction shone from him.
‘You take much on yourself. To make sense of something that is senseless,’ said Dorn.
‘Remembrancers made what happened in the Great Crusade real. Without us who would remember any of it?’
Dorn shook his head gently. ‘A war between the Legions is not a place for artists.’
‘And the other types of wars we had been recording, were they more suitable? When all that had been built by you, by us, had been plunged into doubt, where else should I have been? I was a remembrancer; it was my duty to witness this war.’ Voss put his cup of spiced tea down on his desk.
‘I had started to make plans to get to Isstvan V by calling in favours and contacts.’ Voss’s mouth twisted as if chewing bitter words. ‘Then the Edict of Dissolution came through. The remembrancers were no more, by the order of the Council of Terra. We were to be removed and dissolved back into mundane society. Those already amongst the war fleets were no longer to be allowed to record events.’