‘Tell me, admiral,’ said Macharius. ‘How long can these storms last?’ It was clear that Macharius already had a clear idea of the answer. He merely wanted the other man to be on record.
‘They can last for decades, Lord High Commander,’ said Kellerman. ‘I would not get my hopes up about this happening any time soon.’
‘Thank you, admiral,’ said Macharius and cut the connection. He turned to Drake and said, ‘It seems the Navy is being obstructive.’
Drake studied him coolly. ‘I think he merely told you something you did not want to hear.’
Macharius shrugged. ‘That he did, but nonetheless, I suspect he is being deliberately obstructive.’
‘He would not be the first Navy commander to be so,’ said Drake, who obviously did not want to argue the point. He had chosen a more subtle line of defence.
‘This has been happening more and more lately,’ Macharius said.
‘A man in your position generates enemies,’ said Drake. ‘It is inevitable. I warned you about antagonising the magnates. I warned you that the lords of the Administratum would start seeing you as a threat. It looks like the first moves against you have begun.’
‘I want the Fist reclaimed,’ said Macharius.
‘I strongly suspect you will need to do that without the Navy’s help.’
‘They are not the only people with ships,’ said Macharius.
‘You will need a warship, and a very powerful one, if you intend to return to Procrastes.’
‘I believe I know where I can find one,’ said Macharius.
‘I was afraid of that,’ said Drake.
Chapter Eight
Emperor’s Glory looked exactly as you would expect such a world to look. The sky was clear and an astonishing shade of blue. The sun was bright and golden. Where there were no cities, the lands were pristine as a park. The cities were studies in imposing beauty.
The buildings had gleaming marble facings, and gigantic statues of saints and Imperial heroes filled the streets. At least in the upper city everything was clean and gilded and perfect looking. The people were richly dressed. Perhaps in the undercity, things were different, but we had not yet had either the opportunity or the desire to look. It was beyond a shadow of a doubt the richest planet I had visited, and it was getting richer by the day.
A fantastic stream of wealth swept in, borne on the tides of war. The spoils of a hundred worlds and a thousand ongoing campaigns were stored in great warehouses, piled in the halls of palaces, worn on the scabbard belts and chestplates of victorious Imperial soldiers.
The world was the sector capital now, standing at the hub of a cosmic crossroads where the supply routes of the crusade met. Men and materials flowed in from the Imperium. Tribute and loot accumulated until it could be shipped back to the heart worlds. In the meantime, everyone of any importance was taking a tithe of it. I suspected that several new ruling dynasties would be funded by the profits of this war.
You could see the evidence of the wealth when you set down on the space-field. It was as big as a city and crammed with ships of every shape, size and classification. Enormous warehouses lined the edges or lay beneath the blast pads of the landing zones. I watched one huge treasure argosy being unloaded as we marched down the ramp from the sub-orbital shuttle. I had seen several more through the portholes in the ship’s side as we waited to disembark.
Emperor’s Glory was the first world on which I had stood in a long time where the sky was blue, the sun was bright, the air was fresh and no one seemed all that keen to kill me. In the air at the space port, you could just smell the odd metallic tang I have come to associate with docked sub-orbital ships, a compound of cooling metal, drive ozone and recycled atmosphere being released from the locks to mingle with the local air as you emerged from the hatch.
I did not need my rebreather mask. Even after all this time the fact that I could think that still stunned me. I was born on a hive-world, where pollution was everywhere in the sealed corridors of the city. The external air beyond the hive was even more deadly. The idea that there was a place where you did not need to make sure your protective filter-mask was always available was still little short of miraculous to me. I could tell from looking at Ivan and Anton and the way they looked around with wonder that they felt the same way. Macharius just looked as if it were normal. His home world had most likely been like this. He certainly seemed at ease here.
A highly ornate airship descended on our landing zone. It was as big as a small orbital shuttle. and you could see that beneath all the gold-plating it was heavily armed and armoured. Even here in the new sector capital, seat of Macharius’s power in these conquered worlds, no one except the general himself was taking any chances with his safety.
We went down the ramp ahead of Macharius, weapons drawn, as if we were making planetfall on some rebel world. It was mostly for show, of course, but it meant we kept in practice. Drake and his storm troopers followed us down the ramp.
From the airship a horde of attaches and executive officers emerged, all moving towards Macharius, all carrying reports and petitions and missives that must be delivered only by hand. They swarmed together, almost elbowing each other out of the way as they moved forwards. We stood our ground as they came towards us like charging orks.
They appeared almost surprised that common soldiers would not get out of their way. We had done this before.
‘Make way for the Lord High Commander,’ the Undertaker said, in his flat, strange voice, and they halted. Almost any sane man would when confronted by his vacuum-empty eyes and emotionless manner. ‘He will speak to you in order of rank, when he reaches the palace. Now stand aside and do not obstruct the Emperor’s business.’
His manner made it quite clear that he meant what he said. It seemed perfectly possible that he would order us to shoot if these office boys did not get out of our way. They sensed it too and our way parted. They fell into line and followed us back onto the airship, though. I could already see them jockeying for position, claiming precedence, forming small cabals and alliances.
Suddenly I missed the cold violence of the war front.
The palace that Macharius was building would be one of the wonders of the sector when it was complete. So much was obvious as we made our approach. It was the size of a small city, built in a shape that suggested the aquila when seen from overhead. Hundreds of thousands of workmen swarmed over the sides of the structure: painting, sculpting statues and gargoyles, working on the enormous victory masks of Macharius worked into the walls.
Once, I had walked across a completed section of one of the roofs. There were hundreds of statues of Imperial angels there, regiments of them, ready to storm heaven at Macharius’s command. It had seemed to me to be a colossal waste. I was probably the only person who had looked upon them since the sculptors had departed for a new sector of the palace. I might well be the only person to do so until the end of time. Yet someone had seen fit to order them built. I wondered if it was some bureaucrat growing fat on contractor’s bribes, or an architect swollen with megalomania from being commissioned to build this monument to one man.
I wondered about all of it sometimes. What made Macharius sanction the construction of such a monument to his vanity? He was already the most famous man in the Imperium save the Emperor. His name would ring down the millennia for as long as mankind endured. What did erecting this titanic palace add to its lustre?
It was indicative, though, that something monstrously proud was growing within the Lord High Commander, something that needed this confirmation in plascrete and ceramite of his importance. Or perhaps I do him a disservice. Perhaps it was being built because that is what was expected of him. He was hardly the first Imperial commander, or indeed the first great conqueror, to leave monuments littered about the galaxy. I doubt that he will be the last.