While Nyx was still mourning the loss of his 'beloved project', his brother Konrad Curze had embarked upon a path of judgement across the hive city.
The Emperor had, quite clearly, favoured Nyx. He had made no active effort to contact Curze — and the Night Haunter cared little whether the Emperor came calling or not.
After his separation from Nyx, a legend of the 'Night Haunter' had begun to coalesce, drifting through the hive warrens like a whispered contagion. At this juncture, however, it bore no relation to Curze himself.
He had not yet conducted those dreadful 'trials' as his prophetic self had done. Yet now, the 'Night Haunter' manifested frequently across the hive, committing atrocities both great and small — and upon each occasion, every shred of evidence pointed towards him.
Another imprint...
A figure dissolved into the darkness of the upper hive. This was the eighth time Curze had detected traces left by the other party. Yet whenever he drew close to the truth, the true perpetrator would vanish — like a phantom, like smoke.
Curze understood, with crystalline clarity, that he was being baited. Yet the Primarch's pride forbade him from retreating.
This technique... There is an inexplicable familiarity to it...
He harboured a faint suspicion regarding the killer's identity. His foresight, however, had remained stubbornly silent of late.
The Primarch's towering frame moved swiftly through the darkness. His destination: the manor estate of a nobleman who had descended to the underhive. Every strand of evidence Curze had meticulously assembled pointed to this aristocrat — and the man already featured upon Curze's judgement list.
No patrolling guards... Unnecessary, truly.
Curze crouched upon the pinnacle of an adjoining spire, gazing down upon the manor. From the exterior, it exuded lavish opulence. Yet it was quieter than he had anticipated. Not a single lumen-globe illuminated its windows.
Too late?
The unnatural stillness suggested he would, once again, return empty-handed. Yet the pursuit of truth demanded he probe deeper.
The Primarch descended from his perch. His landing was utterly silent. Curze touched the ground like a shadow returning to its native darkness. Approaching the manor's towering gate — several metres in height — he employed the same method, launching himself upward and clearing the obstruction with effortless ease.
Silence... Dead silence.
The darkness within the manor should have been a comfort to him. Yet as he moved through it, this familiar obscurity yielded no peace. He detected other breaths interwoven with the gloom.
Damn... The scent of corpses...
His nostrils flared, almost imperceptibly. The air was thick with the cloying stench of blood mingled with decomposing flesh. Curze inhaled both. His transhuman cognition rapidly disaggregated the olfactory data.
Thirteen... No. Fifteen cadavers.
Following the scent-trail, Curze located fifteen bodies scattered haphazardly about the manor's front gardens — among them, labourers who had been tending the flora, and the security personnel who ought to have been patrolling this perimeter.
The corpses were stiff, cold. The post-mortem staining was... pale. And, as with every scene associated with his phantom double, the faces of all victims had been precisely, cleanly excised.
The killer... He has not yet departed!
The instant this conclusion crystallised, Curze dissolved once more into shadow. He was possessed of a powerful conviction: this time, he was very close to the true perpetrator.
He moved through the manor like a wraith, chamber by chamber. As before, every servant was slain. Every face was removed. Yet on this occasion, the bodies of the household staff had been deliberately desecrated — toyed with, arranged in grotesque tableaux. These blasphemous acts kindled an unfamiliar flame within Curze's chest.
Wrath.
His investigation had confirmed the nobleman was no benefactor of the hive; his catalogue of crimes warranted death a hundred times over. Yet the majority of the manor's servants were simply wretches — abducted from the mid-hive or underhive, kept as playthings by the aristocracy on account of their comely features. By Curze's present calibration of justice, they did not merit such savage punishment for their master's transgressions.
The nobleman and his family... Where are they?
Curze had searched the majority of the chambers. The rooms clearly reserved for the noble lineage, however, stood empty. He had located no trace of the aristocrat or his kin — yet he did not believe they had survived the massacre.
One chamber remains.
Countless threads of evidence converged upon the banquet hall — the sole location Curze had, until now, deliberately avoided. The clues were almost blatantly conspicuous. The orchestrator behind this slaughter appeared almost anxious that Curze might turn away.
A trap...?
He knew no fear. He pushed open the doors of the banquet hall.
Darkness still reigned within. The stench of death assaulted him directly. Yet Curze's vision pierced the gloom with perfect clarity. The nobleman he had been pursuing was impaledupon a spear at the hall's centre, his body twisted into a grotesque cruciform arrangement. The corpses of his wife and children were scattered about his feet.
FLARE——!
The banquet hall's lumen-globes ignitedsimultaneously. Beams of harsh, actinic light converged upon the wall behind the impaled nobleman — as though directing Curze's gaze.
Upon the pale stone was assembled a mosaic. Countless faces — every soul who had inhabited this manor — arranged into the unmistakable sigil of the Night Lords.
Every face bore the same expression: abject terror.
Those empty eye sockets seemed to scream, in perfect unison:
FLEE.
In that instant, Curze was seized by a profound, almost overwhelming sense of dread. He understood: he had walked into a trap — meticulously laid, flawlessly executed.
"Are you surprised your foresight offered no warning, father?"
"It seems our gift does not please you."
Two Night Lords, clad in Tartaros-pattern Terminator armour, emerged from the shadows of the banquet hall's upper gallery. Their heavy footfalls echoed through the deathly silence.
Gift?!
A mosaic of Night Lords iconography — fashioned from the faces of countless innocents?!
Curze realised, with dawning revulsion, that since his encounter with Nyx, he had grown increasingly intolerant of such barbarism.
"You are unlike us, father."
"You have become... weak."
The two Night Lords trained their crimson tactical auspex upon Curze. They perceived the genetic resonance of the gene-seed — yet Curze's aura was almost pristine. His calm, disciplined demeanour provoked in them a sensation they could scarcely identify.
Nausea.
"What is your purpose?!"
Curze's voice rang through the banquet hall. It was not an enquiry. It was a command.
"Forgive us, father. We are not at liberty to answer."
"All we may tell you is this—"
"In accordance with the original mandate of the Eighth Legion: eliminate Konrad Curze — in the past! "
The instant the decree was uttered, the two Terminators vanished from their elevated position. Tartaros-pattern plate, when wielded by Night Lords who had mastered the art of stealth, permitted them to rival a Primarch in close-quarters ambush.
SHHK——!
Lightning claws rent the tiled floor of the banquet hall. One Terminator had materialised adjacent to Curze; the Primarch evaded by the narrowest of margins, a single rearward leap carrying him clear of the talons' arc.
Swift. But still within my capacity to counter.
"You cannot threaten me — even uncrowned."
BOOM!
Seizing the interval before Curze's landing, the second Terminator — concealed within the shadows — opened fire. A heavy bolter roared in the confined space. Muzzle-flare and overpressure shattered every pane of glass in the banquet hall.
The flames subsided. Curze's garments were singed, tattered — yet his expression, for the first time, shifted.
Their coordination is precise. One engages in close-quarters suppression; the other provides fire support from the periphery. And yet — they are holding back!
"You two..." Curze's voice was low, dangerous. "Is it because I am your father — you dare not commit your full strength...?"
"Or do you believe I am not yet worthy of your annihilation...?"
"Do you underestimate me — a Primarch?!