‘Since I am not in the habit of throwing away the lives of my crews, no, I will not,’ said Semper. ‘As Captain Salicar helpfully pointed out, the warships of the Space Marines are not to be underestimated, so our best course of action is to dispatch a provocateur force to goad the traitors onto the horns of our orbital guns. Our main fleet will remain within the umbra of the orbital batteries on the Karman line. Between the hammer and anvil of our static guns and the warfleet, we can gut the traitor ships before they can land so much as a single warrior.’
Despite his bombastic tone, Raeven liked the cut of Semper’s jib and nodded.
‘Do it, Lord Admiral,’ he said. ‘Dispatch the provocateur force and wish them good hunting.’
The cell had no furniture, not even a bed. A thin mattress lay folded in one corner, together with a chipped night-soil pot and a small box, like a presentation case for a medal.
‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost,’ said Mersadie, rising from her kneeling position.
Loken’s mouth opened, but no sounds came out.
This was the second dead person he’d seen, but this one was flesh and blood. She was here. Mersadie Oliton, his personal remembrancer.
She was alive. Here. Now.
She wasn’t the same though. The harsh light revealed faded scars tracing looping arcs over the sides and upper surfaces of her diminished skull. Surgical scars. Excisions.
She saw him looking and said, ‘They took out my embedded memory coils. All the images and all the remembrances I’d stored. All gone. All I have left of them are my organic memories and even they’re beginning to fade.’
‘I left you on the Vengeful Spirit,’ said Loken. ‘I thought you must be dead.’
‘I would be if it wasn’t for Iacton,’ replied Mersadie.
‘Iacton? Iacton Qruze?’
‘Yes. He saved us from the murder of the remembrancers and got us off the ship,’ said Mersadie. ‘He didn’t tell you?’
‘No,’ said Loken. ‘He didn’t.’
‘We escaped with Iacton and Captain Garro.’
‘You were on the Eisenstein?’ said Loken, disbelief and wonder competing for his full attention. Qruze had said little of the perilous journey from Isstvan, but neglecting to mention Mersadie’s survival beggared belief.
‘And I wasn’t the only one Iacton saved.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Euphrati got off the Vengeful Spirit, Kyril too.’
‘Sindermann and Keeler are alive?’
Mersadie nodded. ‘As far as I know, but before you ask, I don’t know where they are. I haven’t seen either of them in years.’
Loken paced the interior of the cell, raw emotions surging like a chaotic tide within him. Sindermann had been a dear friend to him. A mentor of superlative intellect and a confidante of sorts, a bridge between trans-human sensibilities and mortal concerns. That Keeler had also survived was a miracle, for the imagist had a real knack for getting herself into trouble.
‘You didn’t know she was alive?’ asked Mersadie.
‘No,’ said Loken.
‘You’ve heard of the Saint?’
Loken shook his head. ‘No. What saint?’
‘You have been out of the loop, haven’t you?’
Loken paused, angry and confused. She was not to blame, but she was here. He wanted to lash out, but released a shuddering breath that seemed to expel a heavy weight of bilious humours.
‘I was dead, I think,’ he said at last. ‘For a while. Or as good as dead. Maybe I was just lost, so very lost.’
‘But you came back,’ said Mersadie, reaching out to take his hand. ‘They brought you back because you’re needed.’
‘So I’m told,’ said Loken wearily, curling his fingers around hers, careful not to squeeze too hard.
They stood unmoving, neither willing to break the silence or the shared intimacy. Her skin was soft, reminding Loken of a fleeting moment in his life. When he had been young and innocent, when he had loved and been loved in return. When he had been human.
Loken sighed and released Mersadie’s hand.
‘I have to get you out of here,’ he said.
‘You can’t,’ she said, withdrawing her hand.
‘I’m one of Malcador’s chosen,’ said Loken. ‘I’ll send word to the Sigillite and have you taken back to Terra. I’m not letting you rot away in here another minute.’
‘Garviel,’ said Mersadie, and her use of his given name stopped him in his tracks. ‘They’re not going to let me out of here. Not for now, at least. I spent a long time in the heart of the Warmaster’s flagship. People have been executed for a lot less.’
‘I’ll vouch for you,’ said Loken. ‘I’ll guarantee your loyalty.’
Mersadie shook her head and folded her arms.
‘If you didn’t know who I was, if you hadn’t shared your life with me, would you want someone like me released? If I was a stranger, what would you do? Turn me loose or keep me imprisoned?’
Loken took a step forward. ‘I can’t just leave you here. You don’t deserve this.’
‘You’re right, I don’t deserve this, but you don’t have a choice,’ said Mersadie. ‘You have to leave me.’
Her hand reached up to brush the bare metal of his unmarked plate. Thin fingers traced the line of his pauldron and swept across the curve of the shoulder guard.
‘It’s strange to see you in this armour.’
‘I no longer have a Legion,’ he said simply, angry at her wilful desire to languish in this prison.
She nodded. ‘They told me you died on Isstvan, but I didn’t believe them. I knew you were alive.’
‘You knew I’d survived?’
‘I did.’
‘How?’
‘Euphrati told me.’
‘You said you didn’t know where she was.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Then how–’
Mersadie turned away, as though reluctant to give voice to her thoughts for fear of his ridicule. She bent to retrieve the presentation case from the ground next to the mattress. When she turned back to him, he saw her eyes were wet with tears.
‘I dreamed of Euphrati,’ she said. ‘She told me you’d come here. I know, I know, it sounds ridiculous, but after all I’ve seen and been through, it’s almost normal.’
The anger drained from Loken, replaced by an echoing sense of helplessness. Mersadie’s words touched something deep within him, and he could hear the soft breath of a third person, the ghost of a shadow in a room where none existed.
‘It isn’t ridiculous,’ said Loken. ‘What did she say?’
‘She told me to give you this,’ said Mersadie, holding out the case. ‘To pass on.’
‘What is it?’
‘Something that once belonged to Iacton Qruze,’ she said. ‘Something she said he needs to have again.’
Loken took the box, but didn’t open it.
‘She said to remind Iacton that he is the Half-heard no longer, that his voice will be heard louder than any other in his Legion.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Mersadie. ‘It was a dream, it’s not like it’s an exact science.’
Loken nodded, though what he was hearing made little sense. At least as little sense as answering a summons to war on the word of a dead man.
‘Did Euphrati say anything else?’ he asked.
Mersadie nodded and the tears brimming on the edge of her eyes like a river about to break its banks spilled down her cheeks.
‘Yes,’ sobbed Mersadie. ‘She said to say goodbye.’
EIGHT
The Eater of Lives / Confrontation / Hope in lies
