Perturabo walked through the streets of Vharadesh, his gaze moving across the buildings on either side.
The City of Ash-Flowers had developed reasonably well. Technological standards weren't low — but compared to Olympia's architecture, measured to the millimetre with geometric precision, this place looked almost primitive by comparison.
Perturabo noticed certain details. At some street corners, there were small parks, and in their centres stood stone tablets densely inscribed with text.
The doctrines of the Covenant of Truth.
In front of these tablets stood small clusters of people — expressions mostly serious and attentive, speaking in low voices about something.
Perturabo glanced at Lorgar.
"Public debate grounds. Every day, people gather there to discuss doctrine, policy, development direction — anything at all."
"Sometimes arguments get heated enough that people come close to blows. Sometimes they reach consensus and leave in agreement. Nobody interrupts them. Nobody gets arrested for what they say."
A faint note of resignation crossed Lorgar's eyes.
"I actually asked them to stop needing things like doctrine altogether — but they kept it anyway."
Perturabo's mouth curved slightly upward.
"Interesting. Do they actually come to blows?"
"Occasionally. But they continue through debate afterwards, because truth doesn't sustain itself through violence."
Perturabo didn't agree with this.
"You're too idealistic. And this kind of arrangement is bad for governance. I would never spend this much time on something like this."
"People who think this freely will rebel sooner or later."
Perturabo was quite familiar with what educated populations eventually produced.
Every person had desires. When those desires existed without the pressure of survival to keep them in check, what their minds would turn to was anyone's guess.
Olympia had produced more than enough mine-slaves and mechanical servants — and those who died were still put to use in the Daemon Factory, stuffed into Hell-Talos engines and Daemon Engines.
The ones who had revolted had been thoroughly eliminated in both the physical and the Warp-metaphysical sense.
"Someone will step up to lead a rebellion — and it might not even be through force. It might be someone subtly twisting your doctrines and your policies, which is worse. You can never fully predict how dark a mortal's thinking can become."
"Every time you think you've killed the most depraved wretch imaginable, another one appears who breaks your understanding of what the floor actually is. I've met plenty of that type."
"Do you think a person who is accustomed to independent thought can be easily manipulated by someone else?"
But Lorgar answered this lightly, without hesitation.
Perturabo said nothing more. Lorgar simply hadn't encountered that kind of person yet. It was a pity that Erebus hadn't had much opportunity to demonstrate before Lorgar killed him — otherwise Lorgar wouldn't be quite so idealistic right now.
"Perhaps you're right. But I won't be using your approach."
They continued walking.
Perturabo saw a large circular building ahead — white stone throughout, a ring of windows at the top of the dome letting sunlight pour down into the interior space.
"That's the Debate Hall. The Covenant's largest gathering place. Public debates every week. Anyone can attend."
Perturabo stopped. Through the open doors, he could see rows of seats arranged in concentric circles — no raised platforms, no hierarchy of position. At the very centre was an empty floor with no podium, no chairman's chair.
He gave a small nod, then turned to look at Lorgar's golden eyes.
"Do you know, brother — this system of yours won't function in ninety-nine percent of worlds in the galaxy."
"What people genuinely need is a secure and orderly world where they can eat and stay warm. Their independent thought has no real value. What they need is food and work."
"You're too kind. You've given them an extraordinarily high degree of intellectual freedom — and that will produce thoughts in them that they should never have had."
"In Olympia, I use a completely different approach. I tell them what to do and what not to do. I give them work. I give them food. I give them shelter."
"All they need to do is comply. I require efficiency and their survival. That's sufficient. I don't concern myself with anything beyond that."
Lorgar looked at him. Those golden eyes held no anger or contempt — only something deeply sad. The Blade of Promise had long since been put away. He was now certain: this brother was beyond saving.
"So what does that make them to you? Tools? Machines? Livestock?"
"The old Colchis had far too many people like you in it."
"They were enslaved by the heretics. They didn't know what thinking was. They had lost the ability to choose and to be free."
"They only knew how to kneel and pray, placing their hope in gods that didn't exist."
"Right up until I began the war to change things, many of them didn't even know that simply living well was a right they were born with."
"They had only just managed to escape from that suffering."
Lorgar paused, and his voice went slightly quieter.
"Perhaps your way is faster, and more efficient. But I would rather they become genuine people."
Perturabo laughed — a short sound, partly sardonic, but carrying more than a little genuine respect for this brother's willingness to act on what he believed.
"You and Roboute are somewhat alike in this."
"A brother of ours?"
"Yes. The Thirteenth gene-father, Lord of Ultramar. His territory is flourishing, his people live in stability and comfort, technology is advancing rapidly, the military has exceptional discipline. By the Imperium's own standards, Macragge is said to rival Terra in prosperity."
"He governs effectively. He has a firm hand. Most importantly, he has always remained rational — applying principles of fairness and justice in his policies. Of all our brothers, he's the most capable administrator."
"Power held without abuse, and a consistent commitment to fairness and justice — that brother must be a genuinely good person. He must be very well regarded in the Imperium and among our brothers?"
But Lorgar didn't receive a response this time. He looked up — and his breath caught in his throat.
Perturabo's deep blue eyes were looking at him sideways, the corner of his mouth very slightly raised.
The Iron Tyrant's natural inclination toward a grim and unsettling aesthetic, viewed from this angle, made it very difficult not to be mildly startled.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
Lorgar was genuinely puzzled.
"Nothing. I thought of something amusing."
They kept walking.
Verity walked at the back, roughly ten paces behind, watching the unfamiliar giant.
He was extraordinarily tall — even taller than her adoptive father by a significant margin.
But his presence didn't carry that aura of sacred light that made people want to kneel. What he carried was something different — a deeply unsettling quality. Not the terror of the heretics, but a terror that came from the weight of his very existence and his soul.
Verity hadn't encountered someone like him before. But from his conversation with her adoptive father, she'd been able to roughly work out who this was.
Her father's brother. A terrifying tyrant. Someone who regarded humanity as instruments. A man who loved controlling everything, and was proud of it.
"Verity."
Lorgar's voice came suddenly.
She moved forward quickly.
"Father."
"There's no need to continue evacuating the people. Let them come back."
Verity opened her mouth, started to say something, glanced at Perturabo standing beside him, then looked at her adoptive father's golden eyes — and nodded.
"If he wanted to kill us, there's nowhere to hide."
"Yes."
"You've raised her well. Loyal, brave, and clear-headed. A pity she's a mortal."
Perturabo watched Verity's departing figure and remarked on it.
"What does being a mortal change? She has been excellent — in some respects, even I can't match her."
A thread of cold anger ran through Lorgar's voice.
"Nothing particular. Just a matter of lifespan. She's undergone some enhancement procedures, I assume? From the technology you excavated from underground?"
"I'm not familiar with this area."
"Doesn't matter whether you are or not. Even the Imperium's best life-extension procedures can't keep a mortal alive past a thousand years. At some point she won't be able to continue."
"Flesh decays. But their will and spirit endure."
"I can help you."
Lorgar reached out and grasped Perturabo's arm.
"Brother."
Perturabo looked at those eyes shimmering with golden light. He found this somewhat interesting.
"I thought you had made your peace with this kind of thing."
"She's different."
"Her responsibilities are heavy, and she can do more for humanity — she—"
Lorgar found himself unable to finish. The scripture across his entire body seemed to move slowly and rhythmically across his skin. He went quiet.
"Even the Pontifex of the Covenant of Truth has personal attachments?"
Lorgar didn't answer. He walked ahead.
"Or is it that you feel you shouldn't, before your god, show such preference for a mortal?"
"There is no god!"
"Only beings that are somewhat more powerful than others!"
Lorgar seemed agitated.
But Perturabo watched the golden flames rising across Lorgar's body, and the moving scripture, and said nothing. Lorgar knew, however, that this brother could see through everything he was trying to hide.
"I can't be bothered arguing with you about this. Remember — when the Emperor arrives and you're standing in front of him, don't say what you just said to me."
"And remember this: the galaxy needs people like you. The Emperor needs you to eliminate every form of religion you encounter. Humanity does not need faith in any god."
"Whatever you carry in your heart — all you need to do is take what you did on Colchis and expand it across the galaxy. Everything else, leave alone."
"No gods. Humanity doesn't need gods."
Lorgar didn't yet understand why that had to be done. But he would understand soon enough.
They kept walking.
"When I was young, I used to lie on that hillside for an entire day — from sunrise to sunset. When the wind came, I could smell the flowers. Hear the birds. See those golden wheat fields."
"At that time, I thought that was what the world was like. Beautiful, peaceful, full of hope."
The farmland had long since gone to ruin, overgrown with wild grass. The distant mountain peaks still stood — but the small house at their foot was gone, nothing remaining but a few broken stone foundations.
The war had destroyed it. Fire had consumed everything here.
"But later I found that it wasn't like that. Those demons wearing the faces of gods, those criminals committing all manner of depravity in the name of faith—"
"Do you know what I discovered when I was fighting across Colchis? The vast majority of those heretical sects had no actual divine power behind them at all. They were frauds — using vague and empty faith to manipulate ordinary people and satisfy their own appetites."
"Those people were deceived terribly. They lived their entire lives like pieces on a board, moved at someone else's convenience."
"Humanity should not be like that."
"I want to change that. So I have never allowed myself to become complacent. I don't want humanity to keep living that way."
"Then your task is still very heavy."
"Task?"
"Across the galaxy, there are countless worlds and planets governed by xenos and tyrants. Humans live in deep misery — in endless fear — praying to gods that don't exist, begging for help."
"And the Great Crusade exists to liberate those worlds."
"But the Imperium and the Emperor won't be the kind of sacred force you're imagining, Lorgar. I hope you're prepared for that."
"What do you mean?"
Perturabo looked up at the sky. In the Mandeville point, a vast fleet was about to translate out.
"You'll know very soon."
Lorgar stood at the entrance to the Temple of Truth, watching the warships in orbit, his expression complex. Perturabo stood beside him, hands clasped behind his back, looking in the same direction.
"They're here."
A Stormbird descended from the sky at speed — the personal transport Perturabo had built for the Emperor.
It landed in the city's main square. The ramp descended. The Emperor stepped out, with Valdor and a small Custodian escort behind him.
He wasn't wearing the iconic golden power armour today. Instead he had on a simple white robe, long hair loose over his shoulders, no laurel crown. He looked like an ordinary traveller.
But nobody could look at this slightly dark-skinned, entirely unremarkable-appearing middle-aged man and genuinely believe he was ordinary.
Something radiated from him — impossible to ignore, making people instinctively want to pledge loyalty.
Lorgar had gone still.
Looking at that face — nearly identical to his own — and the stirring that rose from somewhere deep in his genes, and the golden sun that had appeared again and again in his visions and his dreams—
He was standing in front of him.
Lorgar's body and the Blade of Promise at his hip trembled faintly. The scripture across his entire body blazed with light he could not suppress, making him look, for a moment, like a small sun.
"Tch."
Perturabo made a sound of derision. This wretched golden figure truly never changed.
"Father."
Lorgar dropped to both knees before his god.
"My son — welcome—"
Perturabo watched the Emperor's shameless performance and quietly acknowledged that another fine brother had been "corrupted."
"Did you find a Webway route into the Ultima Segmentum?"
With Lorgar occupied elsewhere, the Emperor dropped his divine posturing entirely and lay stretched out comfortably on a grassy hillside.
"No. I took a wrong turn. I was trying to find a route to the Maelstrom — the route maps didn't match the actual Webway, so we just kept going, and ended up here."
The Emperor blinked. Then he laughed without mercy.
"You got lost?"
"Vulkan told me several months ago that you'd gone out to explore. I assumed you'd finished opening up all the Eastern Fringe Webway routes by now — it had been so long without any news from you."
"You spent that long with your fleet drifting through the Webway, and now you're telling me you got lost?"
Perturabo's expression had taken on a distinctly greenish quality.
"The route map was wrong. That's not my problem."
"I told you those Aeldari couldn't be trusted. The route map was supposedly charted by their previous Grand Farseer — and you actually believed them?"
"Who knows how old that map is? It's only any use in regions they regularly travel. You genuinely expected them to guide you across the entire galaxy?"
"You absolute fool. HAHAHAHA—"
The vein on Perturabo's forehead was clearly visible. He was half a moment from putting his fist into this wretched golden figure, but the Emperor patted his shoulder.
"Though — in fairness, it's fortunate you did get lost. Otherwise nobody knows when we might have found Number Seventeen."
"He and the Seventeenth Legion are very important. There can't be any mistakes."
The Emperor's expression finally shifted into something more serious.
"Counter-Chaos specialist?"
"Yes."
"The blue bird had tried to leave something behind in his mind."
"What?"
The Emperor's eyes sharpened instantly.
"I dealt with it. Then went and gave that bird a good beating together with the others."
"That Warp disturbance a few days ago — was that you?"
"Not just me. Everyone pitched in."
"Why wasn't I invited?"
"I assumed you'd show up. You didn't even notice what was happening. I was planning to tear a piece of that bird off — but Nurgle and Slaanesh got in the way first. All your fault."
"How is that my fault?"
"How isn't it?"
"Listen, I—"
Verity watched her father board that magnificent Stormbird, something reluctant stirring in her chest.
"Why don't you go with him?"
Perturabo asked.
"I have my responsibilities here. Father won't be gone long — I'll manage Colchis properly and wait here for his return."
Perturabo felt she regarded Lorgar in something of the way his own sister regarded him.
Though the particular nature of her regard was somewhat less obvious.
"Do you think you'll still be here when he returns?"
Verity glanced at the giant beside her.
"What do you mean, my lord?"
Perturabo's gaze moved across a few pairs of eyes that had begun developing what could only be called unfriendly intent. With Lorgar gone, these people had lost their restraint.
"Without your father standing behind you as your support, did you really think you earned your position through ability alone?"
"Now that he's gone — all those who've kept themselves well-hidden are already eager to take what you've built. Possibly not through force at first. Possibly through something subtler than that — if they have that kind of ability."
The expression in Verity's eyes shifted — uncertain now. She hadn't lived through this kind of thing before. She didn't fully understand how evil people's hearts could be, or how low the floor actually went.
"Father will return. I'm still here. They won't be able to cause any real trouble."
But Verity's inner certainty wasn't as firm as her words suggested.
She felt, suddenly, that many of the people around her had become slightly less safe than before.
"You?"
It wasn't that Perturabo thought little of her — it was simply that this kind of situation was genuinely beyond a mortal's ability to stop alone.
"With Lorgar gone — how many of them do you think have already started quietly reviving the very heretical sects the two of you personally dismantled?"
"They wouldn't dare—"
"They would absolutely dare. They're already daring."
"Believe me or don't — by the time I leave here, they'll have started stripping away your authority. It'll be the first day of it."
"Then when Lorgar returns, there's a reasonable chance they'll even send someone to test him — to probe his limits, see whether there's profit to be made."
"This is entirely one-sided conjecture on your part, my lord."
Verity didn't believe these people had the nerve to move against her father. Every single one of them had felt his power firsthand.
"You still don't understand how greedy mortals are — what they're capable of doing for power. If you'd seen it, you'd understand: these people's wickedness is ten thousand times darker than any Chaos god."
Verity wanted to deny it. She had no effective rebuttal.
She looked toward the fleet still stationed in orbit, genuinely uncertain whether to request her father's help.
"The question is whether you want to follow Lorgar and leave — come back later to deal with them — or stay here and wait to be stripped of authority. Or worse, have someone psychically dominate you if they have that capability."
Perturabo spoke with a deliberate edge of menace. He was curious to see what this young woman would do.
A struggle moved through Verity's eyes. There were things she didn't know how to say to her father.
Tell him that certain people are likely to rebel, and ask him to stay longer, or kill the traitors before leaving?
She couldn't even convince herself that was a credible justification.
"I will stay here. If things genuinely unfold as you've described, and I do face persecution, then I hope you, my lord, will inform my father of the truth. I believe he will bring purification to Colchis again."
Verity spoke the words with absolute resolution.
Perturabo found himself with a genuine measure of respect for her courage.
"Lorgar didn't choose you without reason. You're remarkable."
A small flat device appeared in front of Verity — the size of her palm, thin enough to carry anywhere without difficulty.
"I'm leaving one vessel in orbit around Colchis's moon. If you find yourself in real danger, this will let you contact them."
"If there's any corruption developing, I'll be able to sense something of it myself. When that happens, I'll come personally. Nothing will happen to you — I can give you that assurance."
"Thank you, my lord."
Verity pocketed the device.
"Live well. It's possible that someday you'll find that dying here would have been better than going out into the galaxy."
Verity was about to ask what that meant, but Perturabo was already gone.
"My lord."
"Will the Webway route experience further changes?"
"Typically only minor variations — nothing that should cause serious problems."
"I promise this won't happen again, my lord. I absolutely guarantee it."
Perturabo looked at Ivieria — the Farseer whose face was currently an expression of earnest deference.
"I hope so. You know what the consequences would be."
"Yes."
On the bridge of the Endurance, Calas Typhon looked at the devastating casualty data in front of him, and felt a headache building.
"Mortarion. What exactly are you doing?"
Also on the bridge stood an enormous figure in white armour — holding a great scythe, a heavy toxic respirator built into his faceplate, thick black fumes venting from the pipes at his back.
The fumes were an approximation of the toxic miasma on Barbarus's highest peaks. Mortarion didn't actually enjoy these gases, but they were the only thing that made him still feel like the liberator he had been on Barbarus.
The Imperium's tyranny and the Emperor's callousness had left him with a deep, abiding hatred for everything around him — and particularly for the Emperor's personal intervention in his final battle against his xenos adoptive father. That intervention had saved Mortarion's life. And Mortarion had found it deeply humiliating.
Because the Emperor had stolen his right to take his own revenge.
He was furious. He hated the Emperor. And yet when standing in front of the Emperor, he was struck utterly mute, like a quail.
He had even refused the Emperor's offer to help terraform Barbarus — because a voice in his mind kept insisting: this is oppression. You are still that pitiful piece on someone's board. You are still living in the shadow of your 'fathers.'
So Mortarion refused. He would not be controlled.
When he took command of the Death Guard, the sons who had long fought alongside the Emperor were not particularly to his liking. Despite the abuse he'd suffered at the hands of his xenos adoptive father — and the Emperor's complete lack of emotional intelligence — he had always treated his sons with genuine care. But his Barbaran-born sons were the ones he truly loved. The Terran-born were not, though he met his responsibilities toward them as a father.
And now, this tall and spare giant was standing in silence, enduring the reproach of an old friend and son.
"Galaspan could have been reclaimed through better means. We had options — ways to punish those tyrants that didn't require losses like this."
"Why did you rush into that war? Look at these reports — because of you, we've lost at least thirty percent of the fleet in this engagement, and nearly five thousand casualties."
"We could have resolved this without breaking a sweat."
"Just because you couldn't tolerate any pressure at all, you had to smash an entire Hive World into rubble?"
"I liberated them, Calas. Those people are free."
Mortarion pushed back.
"Liberated what, exactly?"
Calas Typhon had finally reached the end of his patience. Mortarion was genuinely a giant infant. On Barbarus it had been this way. On the interstellar stage it was still this way.
No ability to think things through before acting — impulsive and erratic. Nothing about this looked like a leader, or a Legion Master.
"Have you seen what those people look like right now? They don't even have stable shelter."
"Go there yourself and look — they're killing three people over a single meal. They'll disembowel someone for a place to sleep."
"Gang warfare. Corpses everywhere. The entire planet is finished."
"This is your freedom? You'd have been better off leaving them to be exploited and oppressed — at least they could have survived, however miserably."
Typhon's words were fierce, but Mortarion was unapologetic. He had liberated a world saturated in exploitation and misery, and the humans there had their freedom restored.
Was that not a good thing?
If he and his forces went back and involved themselves in that world's politics, how would he be any different from the oppressors who had come before?
Mortarion could never accept those terms. He would never become the kind of person he despised. Never.
Watching Mortarion fall into sullen silence again, Typhon was about to continue the reproach — but the words died before he could say them.
He looked at the casualty figures giving him a headache, and decided he simply didn't have the energy to keep yelling.
Hundreds of thousands of auxilia and nearly five thousand battle-brothers dead. Twenty capital ships gone. All to force through Galaspan's planetary shields in a war that should never have happened.
Now those casualty figures were published, and the Death Guard were still being told by Mortarion and the Emperor to continue the Crusade, while Mortarion continued to refuse to learn how to manage any of the aftermath.
The weight fell almost entirely on Typhon. Mortarion didn't like the Terran-born, and this time hadn't even brought them for the decapitation strike — the tension within the Death Guard between factions was worse than ever.
Several Terran veterans had already been filing reports about being assigned to guaranteed-death missions. Typhon had managed to suppress that, barely. And now Mortarion was taking this attitude.
If Typhon didn't have power problems, if he didn't have his own psychic limitations — he swore to himself he would make sure his boots introduced themselves to Mortarion's backside.
"Halt the Crusade for now. We need to return to Barbarus to refit. Fleet losses this severe — without Mechanicum resupply and personnel replacements, we need time to recover. My Lord."
Typhon's tone carried nothing but exhaustion and counsel.
"No. The Crusade cannot stop. The humans being oppressed out there still need us to save them. The xenos and tyrants still need us to remove them. The Death Guard will not halt the Crusade."
There was something else Mortarion hadn't said aloud — his brothers were all on the Crusade, and their records were already impressive. He didn't want to fall behind them. He didn't want to disappoint the Emperor, and he didn't want to be looked down upon by his brothers.
A small and fragile pride was making him extraordinarily contrary.
"Then you tell me — how do we conjure a fleet out of thin air? Do you want Voss and Grail'ha to physically grapple with enemy warships bare-handed? Or have them drop into landing pods without teleport homers, into the heaviest possible enemy fire, and just hope for the best?"
"Do you want to completely destroy your sons in a single engagement?"
Mortarion stood up. The toxic fumes and the blood rushing to his face were turning it an unpleasant shade.
"That's not what I mean—"
"Then what do you mean?"
"I—"
"Conjure me a fleet. Otherwise the Crusade is not happening."
"Calas — I am the Legion Master."
"A Legion Master who sends his sons to die for nothing."
Calas Typhon threw the disastrous reports directly into Mortarion's face.
Mortarion fell silent again.
"Then what do we do, Calas? The Crusade cannot stop. That is absolute."
"You—"
Typhon had lost all remaining irritability. He had no real grounds to refuse this man — his old friend, his gene-father.
"Hmm?"
Calas seemed to catch a sudden thought. He looked at Mortarion, a plan forming in his mind.
"What is it, Calas?"
Mortarion was confused.
"I have a way to acquire a fleet. Possibly even the heavy vehicles, equipment, and Terminator armour as well."
"What way?"
"You remember we encountered a Fourth Legion fleet recently?"
A trace of disdain crossed Mortarion's face.
He had heard of this brother. Recently returned, relying on his own overwhelming personal power to conquer world after world, with unclear entanglements with the Mechanicum.
On top of that, he openly defied the Emperor's edicts and Imperial Truth, played with Resentment Intelligence, had a very poor reputation, and rumours suggested he harboured grand ambitions toward the throne.
He was also personally a deeply terrifying tyrant — someone who exploited humanity as a resource.
Mortarion wanted nothing to do with this brother. If he weren't family, Mortarion would already have moved against that fleet.
"You're suggesting we just take that fleet by force?"
Mortarion's thought process had arrived, as always, at an angle Typhon hadn't anticipated.
"I mean we go and ask your brother for help. Apparently he's already—"
"Absolutely not. Out of the question. Don't even think it."
"Mortarion — I will not bow to a tyrant. Even if I fall from the Endurance and die, I will not go begging to someone like that."
"Let that idea go. It is absolutely not happening."
Mortarion's roar was loud enough to draw some of the Deathshroud over to investigate.
"Then are you telling your brothers to continue the Crusade in conditions this bad?"
"They are Death Guard. The most resilient Astartes. The glory of the—"
"Then send them into the Macro-cannons and Nova Cannons yourself. Go on."
"Go!"
Mortarion retreated back into the corner. His breathing became heavier.
Calas Typhon felt something approaching genuine sympathy — then remembered the sheer bloody-minded stubbornness of the man in front of him, and for once, didn't speak first.
"What do I have to do?"
In the end, Mortarion — unable to bear using his sons' lives as currency for victories — spoke first.
"We go now. Apparently the Lord of Iron has already relocated his home system to another location — and it's not far from where we are."
"From what I've heard, his warships and vehicle assets are so numerous that even the Martian Mechanicum can't keep up. And since you're his brother — you should be able to get a reasonable number of warships out of him one way or another. Filling out our current fleet strength shouldn't be difficult."
"Given the current state of our fleet — if you play the situation well in front of your brother, we might even get extra supplies on top."
"Play the situation? You mean act miserable and beg?"
Mortarion shot to his feet. Sensitive and deeply proud, he could not accept this.
"So what? Which matters more — your dignity or the fleet? Your pride or your brothers' lives?"
"So I'm going to be crawling in with a begging bowl?"
"There are people who'd love that option and don't have it. Even the Fabricator-General visits the Lord of Iron in person — you can grit your teeth and endure this."
Mortarion fell silent again. The two of them sank into another long, wordless pause.
Toxic gas poured from the respirator and the vents at his back, filling the bridge with thick fumes. Neither Mortarion nor Typhon paid it any attention.
"Then what exactly do I have to do?"
Mortarion finally gave in. Typhon exhaled quietly — the man not clinging to a losing position was already progress.
"You need to have a proper bath, Mortarion."
"Excuse me?"
"Calas — are you certain this is actually going to get us a fleet?"
The tall, spare Mortarion was now in a large white robe, scrubbed absolutely clean from head to foot.
He had spent three days bathing to clear the accumulated residue of toxic gas from his skin. Under Calas's supervision, he had even permitted mortal beauticians to do whatever they deemed necessary to his appearance.
The result was this — a look he found deeply and persistently wrong.
The truth was that a Primarch's foundation was genuinely exceptional. Mortarion, still retaining a full head of soft black hair, had finally revealed—
What a Primarch was supposed to look like.
There was a quality to him now — a melancholy prince aesthetic — that actually made the Deathshroud unable to look away. Grail'ha and Typhon had both stared for some time the first time they'd seen him.
"Exactly like this. And when you get there, I need you to—"
"Actually, forget it. You don't need to do anything complicated. Just stand there. After the greetings are done, leave everything to me and Grail'ha. Watch my eyes for cues."
After Calas's extensive preparations, the Fourteenth Legion now had a thoroughly "devastated" appearance. Even the Endurance had been dressed up to look "battered and barely functional" — a sight that caused genuine distress to the Terran veterans and to Mortarion alike.
If Calas didn't pull this off, they were all going to have a very frank conversation with him about it.
"My lord, the Fourteenth Legion has arrived at the outer system. They're transmitting a request for an audience."
The logic engine's voice came from nearby. Perturabo, who had been examining an Eldar Titan, blinked.
He looked toward the Mandeville point where the "damaged" fleet was translating out — Death Guard Astartes in various states of apparent disrepair, including several Terran veterans in Mark I armour.
Perturabo was genuinely curious what Mortarion was trying to accomplish here. And the level of apparent effort put into presentation.
If the Legion was supposedly this wrecked, why did the Legion Master look like he'd just stepped out of a formal occasion?
"Tell them to bring their ships to our dry docks for repairs."
"Yes."
"The Lord of Iron agreed."
Typhon looked at Mortarion.
"Now it's all down to you, Legion Master. Whether we get the fleet supplemented — and possibly more supplies on top of that — depends entirely on how you perform in front of your brother."
In truth, Grail'ha and the others hadn't agreed with this plan. What kind of arrangement was this — sending their father to go and play on his brother's sympathies to extract equipment?
But when Typhon threw the casualty figures in their faces, they had silently and voluntarily become participants in this operation against their father's dignity.