[center] [i]"I don't understand," The Admiral had insisted, after one too many, "Surely the Emperor has the technology to treat conditions such as this. Why does Primarch Magaera not simply have this defect corrected?" Everything stopped. They were all looking at him. The hag leaned close, and spoke, in that dreadful voice of hers. "The Lady," she said, with the most terrifying softness you can imagine, "is not [b]defective.[/b] Nor is she in need of [b]correction.[/b]" She stands up, rests her hands on the table. "...Though perhaps you [b]are.[/b]" He knew the awful mistake he had made. It was clear in his blanched face before he made his excuses and ran. Me? I kept my fethin' mouth shut, refilled my drink and tried to forget my own name.[/i] --Remembrancer Kessig, Apocrypha[/center] [center][i][b]ALWAYS WATCHING[/b][/i] --Graffiti, Byzanthrian reconstruction zone[/center] [hr] It hung in darkness, a hidebound tome of some dry, unnatural blue, its cover branded with a twisting sigil and embossed with the image of a single closed eye. It was impossible to look away. [i]Do not ask which creature screams in the night. [/i] Gradually, the eye embedded in the book's cover opened, revealing a glimmering blue iris, a warped, goatish pupil. The symbol began to burn. The book's latches unhooked of their own accord, falling loose with a faint metallic jingle. [i]Do not question who waits for you in the shadow. [/i] Slowly, inevitably, the tome began to creak open. [i]It is my cry that wakes you in the night[/i] The cover turned with a sepulchral groan. The first page was almost visible. Something slithered within it. Something she did not want to look upon but could not turn away from. She struggled to speak, but there was no sound. [i]It is my body that-[/i] A great golden hand struck down upon the flickering tome, slamming it shut. The thunderclap that resounded from it boomed through the black void, joined by an enraged, animal scream that tore her mind from sleep. [hr] Lydia Magaera sat upright upon her couch, gasping soundlessly, her heart thudding in her great chest. She was in the foundry's observation tower, its lights dimmed, its consoles darkened and arrayed with white and black candles in their place. The wax had burned low, the slender radiance guttering. She had claimed the iron bower for a time of contemplation before the rites and libations of departing. Had she fallen so easily into sleep? The conquest of the Ork machine must have wearied her more than she believed. She rose, composing herself, looking upward and taking a long, quiet breath. A short jump, and her hands gripped an embossed crossbeam that would have been a body's length out of reach for any normal woman. Muscle tensed beneath olive skin as she lifted herself from the floor, straightening her legs out in front of her at a perfect 90-degree angle, holding the position without as much as a quiver. It was not the first unsought vision she had endured. But it had been different from the others. More alive. More [i]aware[/i]. Changing shape and darting into shadow when she groped for it in memory. She had sensed hunger, and death. Some great disturbance had reached through the stars, stretching out its hand. Perhaps seeking her. Perhaps not. Still the certainty lingered that there had been some great secret upon that page. Something that had been kept from her, beckoning. Insisting. Hard, quiet anger burned in the Lady's eyes. Meat in a trap. She was not a fool. Such [i]gifts[/i] had too high a price. She lowered herself from the beam and pressed her hand to the floor, inverting herself and balancing one-armed, bending one leg acutely behind her with her other arm. She was her father's child. She did not waver in the belly of Asphodel, and she would not waver now. She lifted her head at a familiar mental shadow, wordlessly announcing itself as it drew near. She responded tolerantly, beckoning it in, straightening her leg and bending the other. The wheels built into the great doors rotated and slid away, the barriers parting to admit the first chief librarian, Mnemosyne, the telepath, robed and shrouded in her dark armor. She was pale as death, her face creased and aged, and her eyes, always hidden beneath the shadow of her priestess's hood, were a sere, unnerving yellow. Thick cables ran from the sides of the cowl, linking her brain to Threnos's memory banks when aboard, physically tethering her to the ship's library. Forgetting was a luxury she had long ago denied herself, and some said that it was this, and not a quirk of her genetic treatment, that had drained her vitality so. "Lady Magaera... is all well?" Her cracked voice, so disturbing to those not accustomed to it, was uncertain. "We felt..." Lydia nodded, not turning to look at the withered librarian. She hesitated a moment. [i](Tall, pillared cavern in a great, green field. Dark entrance cold with dread.)[/i] "Ah." The shadowed hood stopped mid-turn, the dry voice guarded, yet strangely mollified. "Yes. I understand." [i](Wryly evocative memory. Great shield embossed with monstrous female visage. Blood trickling from its surface.)[/i] "Sweet Whispers..." Mnemosyne's lip curled. "It is fortunate you compel the gifted to confront the truth of them so early. Alecto's whelp should be next, and sooner rather than later. I can [i]feel[/i] her hatred..." she whispered it, almost hungrily. "...Her body will welcome your blood, but Sibyline has foretold that she will inherit [i]more[/i]. She must be watched until her training is [i]complete.[/i]" [i](Faint question: Red-figure painting of a heavily-armored woman bending over a round pool. Sudden, deep crack running through the clay, bisecting her.)[/i] The librarian's hood paused, her pale lips twisting uneasily "...As well as can be expected, my Lady. She... takes her [i]food,[/i] if that pleases you." [i](Pity/Disgust)[/i] "...I know, my mistress." Mnemosyne's breath hissed through her teeth, "It is a thing for which justice can never truly be done -- though I feel the Eldar cowards will bear that wound for the remainder of their pitiful existence. [i]Ahh,[/i] and I sense the first legion carving some meat of their own. Ancient blood ripples through the aether even now." Lydia gave no response, completing her exercise and drawing herself back to her full height before moving to the vaulted observation window. The librarian paused, long armored fingers closing around her raven-tipped staff. "...Divine Lydia, what troubles you?" The Primarch folded her hands behind her back, gazing out over Harkonnen. The lights were being shut down, one after the other, in preparation for the funerary ritual. Her mind was closed, but Mnemosyne could feel the weight upon it, the tension within her like the lashing of a cat's tail. "The rites...?" she hazarded, "Nay, surely not. This is a day of glory, whatever price was paid. Your guidance was flawless, our sacrifices were few. Those who surrendered their lives did so gladly, and perished with your name upon their lips. This [i]is[/i] a victory that will echo through the millennia." [i](...Arrangement of golden pitchers overflowing with rich wine. Simple wooden cup, dry and empty.)[/i] "[i]Ahhhh[/i]..." Mnemosyne's head tilted back in consideration, the dim candlelight dancing in her pale eyes from below. "...The meeting with your [i]brother[/i] did not unfold as you had hoped." The giantess exhaled, silently. Frustration and reluctance twisted in her mental aspect. Her mind pushed the librarian away, gently. "Well, what did you expect? Too different." she shook her head, "Too different. Best leave that one to his own counsel. Wounded your pride, did it?" Magaera's silhouette continued to stare out over the darkening manufactorum, her mind walled off. Mnemosyne felt the air turning dry, like a gathering storm. She pressed on, knowing the dangerously thin line she walked but determined to see it to its end. "...You have brought the greatest world in this system under your father's heel. You have drawn the worst the Ork scum had to offer to its battlegrounds and in seven days wiped them from its surface like filth from a boot, and still you brood over a stilled tongue -- as if more wasted breath would change anything at all." The tension built unbearably. "...I see what you hide in your heart. You are [i]not[/i] alone. Thousands flock beneath your banner. You have all your legion. You have--" Her feet left the ground and the far wall slammed into her back, knocking the words from her body as the candles simultaneously snuffed out. The Lady turned on her, blue eyes hot and pitiless, and she was lifted higher, pressed harder, the unseen weight bearing down on her remorselessly, the dark metal of the wall creaking as it slowly warped with the horrible pressure. The librarian grasped uselessly at her throat, forced what air she could from her empty lungs, fighting to speak aloud through the breathtaking punishment. "You..." she gasped, drawing on all of her bitter determination in the face of the Goddess's anger. "...are [i]not[/i]..." Her armor creaked under the torturous compression. She forced one last, heroic breath as the pressure threatened to break her in two. "[i]...Gorseval![/i]" The pressure relased her immediately, and she slid from the wall, collapsing to the floor with a metallic clatter, clutching her throat and coughing bitterly. The titaness turned away sharply, braids swinging, fixing her eyes again on the twilight view from the observatory window. Her face was drawn with tightly concealed emotion. Remorse and pain washed out from her. The first chief librarian dragged herself to her hands and knees with trembling arms, a thin patter of blood dripping from her nose and lips. She heaved shaking breaths through her wracked lungs, slowly gathering enough strength to speak. "Forgive my temerity... beloved mistress..." she coughed weakly, pulling up her hood, "But I would sooner die at your hand offering you the truth... [i]hssst...[/i] than live an eternity with the knowledge... that I had failed you... [i]haah...[/i] in the smallest conscience." [i](Bleak aspect. Downcast eyes. Dark disc slowly moving to cover a vast white sun. Thin crescent of white fire flickering at its edge.)[/i] "I know, my Lady. I know the strength of the bond you share, but you are [i]not[/i] like him. You have compelled nothing, forced no one. You inspire and enflame. These girls turn to you as flowers seek the sun, and you offer them something the hollow universe would see them denied at every turn. They struggle and suffer for the right to transcend their weak flesh and mete justice at your heel." Lydia took a deep breath, mirrored by her ghostly reflection in the observation window. The eclipse lingered between them, paused at its midpoint. "[i]Tchh.[/i] If even [i]Victory[/i] doubts herself, what hope for the rest of us?" The dark librarian drew herself up, painfully, shuffling to the doors. "The rite is near, daughter of the Emperor. We must both prepare, and now it seems I must have this armor [i]mended[/i]. I beg you, my Lady: put this sorrow aside." Her mind opened to the Primarch, revealing genuine care. "Do not allow this dark dream to unbalance you." The doors opened and closed with a mechanical groan, the wheels turning and locking behind her. The Lady's honor guard stood flanking the corridor, staring at her in hushed silence. Mnemosyne wiped blood from her nose with the hem of her cloak, regarding them scornfully. "See to your duties, [i]children.[/i]" she scowled, making her way to the elevator. "...Leave [i]me[/i] to see to mine." [hr] [i] Salve, Regina, Mater misericordiæ,[/i] Lydia stared down at the slim bronze coin in her armored hand, her own carven face glittering on its surface in artistic profile, ringed by an old Asphodelic invocation of triumph. She turned it over, revealing the aquila, symbol of her father's house and mark of his empire. A newer minting, one made after her ascension to the stars. In the still twilight, a glowing ember settled into her open palm from above, burning from hot orange to dull red. She watched it die, dwindling into black against burnished metal and white ceramite. So bright and hot. So fragile and brief. [i] Vita, dulcedo, et spes nostra, salve.[/i] the Lady placed the coin beneath the dead woman's tongue, gently closed her mouth and pressed a white-armored finger to her pale lips. [i] Ad te clamamus exsules filii[/i] She raised her head, regarding the ringed ranks of the thirteenth legion, now the veterans of Harkonnen, and the envy of those who would come after them. They bowed their heads solemnly, save Polyhymna and her apprentices, who intoned the ceremonial dirge of departure. At a respectful distance, they were watched by hundreds of the victims of Killkrazy's rule, beholding them with silent awe. [i] Ad te suspiramus, gementes et flentes[/i] The manufactorum lay beneath a pall of grey ash, its lights dimmed in reverence, its fans and machines stilled in this moment of silence. Glowing embers drifted gently from above, their gentle fires flickering, fading and slowly going going out. And all around the Primarch, the dead were laid in ranks atop makeshift biers. Bodies swathed in white. Bloodless faces turned to the black sky. She walked amongst them like a pensive giant wading through a pale sea, bending to pay each their final respects and slip her obol beneath their silent tongues. She was trailed by the cloaked figure of the Keeper of Memory, who marked their name and deeds upon a scroll held by a floating homonculus. It was an old tradition, one her father had permitted her to retain. He understood the importance of commemorating the dead, even if belief in the Underworld, and the faceless oarsman who plied its shores, had long been done away with in his name. [i] In hac lacrimarum valle. [/i] As she held the final coin, the fire came upon her, the message ringing through the stars. Lydia lifted her head, expectantly. [color=a1a100]A council is being held. Gather on Ullanor Prime, at the tower once held by Overlord Urlakk Urg. You have two solar weeks before we start.[/color] The words were broadcast, declamatory, from her mind to the minds of her legion, solemn but radiant, a slow, bright dawn over a grim and silenced battlefield. From Lydia's mind, the waters of Asphodel parted, and the dead marched proudly into the sea, unafraid, with faces raised in peace and satisfaction. The 13th legion saluted and closed in, bearing away their fallen, reverently, into the waiting transport ships which would carry them to the isle of Erebus, and their final rest. Polyhymna's voice echoed throughout the manufactorum's address system as the first of the Thunderhawks lifted from the surface, kicking up whirlwinds of ash in the white shafts of light. "Victory is ours. The last and foulest head has been cut from the Orkish serpent, and the Emperor summons the Lady to his side. The Empire has triumphed, and all are now free, by her grace, to choose their path. Choose well, people of Harkonnen. For we will always be watching." [hr] They withdrew, and only Lydia herself remained, standing at the edge of the primary magma canal holding a golden ewer, lit from below by the distant fire. Alone, she upturned the vessel, pouring a red trickle of rich wine into the burning chasm. The heated air rose around her, rustling her skirts and playing at the loose strands of her hair. When the last drop had fallen to the depths of the planet, she stepped back, and turned to look at the gathered citizens, their eyes all upon her. Slowly, one of the young men in the front row lowered himself to his knees, followed by another. Gradually, like a quiet wave over a calm sea, the others followed suit, until every last one knelt before her distant figure. Their faces were solemn. Worshipful. Terrified. Lydia smiled, faintly, and turned toward the floodlit shadows of the departing airships.