The Absolution of Swords - John French Read online

  Grey and cyan fog rolled through the cavern, sinking from the roof, spreading between the cloth hangings. For an instant there was a muffled lull in noise. Then the screaming boiled up, rending the air as terror ripped from a hundred throats. Weeping and shouting blended with the cacophony, as the hallucinogen and terror gas flooded the cavern. Inside his mask, Cleander gulped the sanitised air. It tasted slightly metallic.

  Koleg bent down and began to gather up the rest of his equipment, then shrugged into a twin shoulder harness. A macrostubber sat in the left holster, and the pistol grenade launcher went into the empty right holster, the grenades into loops and pouches across his chest. Cleander scooped up his own collection of trinkets. Two heavy rings went onto each hand, a power dagger in a sheath onto his left forearm, and a patch over his left eye socket.

  Koleg moved over to the door in the pillar base. The thug’s key was still in the lock. Around them the sounds of panic rolled with the spreading fog. Cleander clicked a switch on the side of his mask, and his view through the visor snapped into cold black broken by splashes of red and yellow body heat.

  ‘We proceed?’ asked Koleg, drawing his macrostubber pistol from its holster. Cleander moved up next to him, and gripped the key. The lock turned smoothly. Cleander felt the door shudder as bolts thumped back into the frame. He pulled it wide. A flight of stairs spiralled down into the dark. Traces of green warmth moved in the blue-stained cold of Cleander’s sight.

  ‘We proceed,’ he said and stepped through.

  III

  Prior Prefectus Gul paused as he crossed the threshold of the western sub-chapel. Candles burned on the altar dominating the far end of the long chamber, filling the nave with the warm glow of flames, but leaving the rest to shadows. The candle in Gul’s right hand lit a circle of floor around him, but then slid off into the quiet gloom. Lumn had stopped three paces behind Gul, and waited, head bowed, arms folded in his wide sleeves. His face was wide, the flesh soft beneath his tonsured hair. In the low light the grey of Lumn’s robes seemed liked folded shadow.

  ‘Wait for me in the south transept,’ said Gul. Lumn bowed his head even lower, then turned and moved away into the darkness of the chapel’s main vault. Gul watched him go for a second. Lumn was his Silent Acolyte, an order whose entire existence revolved around serving the spiritual leaders of the Crow Complex. Conditioned to obedience and secrecy, the Silent Acolytes completed their novitiate training by having their tongues cut from their mouths. They were supposed to be utterly trustworthy, and Gul had never had reason to doubt Lumn’s devotion. But trust was a coin made of false gold.

  Gul stepped into the sub-chapel, and let the quiet of night gather around him. Like the rest of the High Chapel, it was almost deserted. During the day, Dominicus’ sun would rise through the sky, and its light would fall through the chapel’s windows and crystal dome, illuminating the faithful. Once the sun began to fall, the prayers faded and those who had been granted a place at twilight prayer left the chapel to sleep in silence. Only the members of the order of the Eternal Light moved amongst the pews and pillars, tending the candles that burned in the one hundred and eight shrines. As the second most senior brother in all the orders of the Crow Complex, Gul was one of the only other souls who saw the High Chapel in the dark.

  He liked the night. It was a sea of calm in the constant whirl that was the governance of the monastery complex. That you could only hear yourself think when this supposed place of peace was empty, was an irony that struck him every time he stepped into the High Chapel. Not that he ever thought of it as a place of true peace, nor of the blessings that were given within its walls as anything but empty lies. The Imperial Creed was a doctrine of blood and greed, and bloated power feeding on the fear of the faithful. The Emperor did not protect, and never had. He was a man who did extraordinary things, who had earned the Imperium he had created, but a man none the less. For all his power, one might as well take a hook and line to the sea and fish for truth as pray to the Emperor for deliverance, enlightenment or mercy.

  Gul had not always known that the Emperor was not divine. Once he had been like all the other credulous fools. Now he held the truth locked inside his skull, hidden by competence and masked by piety. He could smile at a grossly fat prelate exhorting starving pilgrims to beware the lure of gluttony. He could watch the preachers dole out blessings while the devotional servitors followed them to collect coin from the grateful. He could do these things because he knew the truth. That core of secrets locked inside him gave him a strength that the Imperial Creed never had. He was a heretic, and he was blessed to be so.

  He stepped towards the sub-chapel’s altar, glancing at the candle that marked the time. His rendezvous with his contact in the Tenth Path was not until the next division, but he liked to arrive first. It gave him comfort, a veneer of control over what was happening. Besides, it gave him time to think. His footsteps echoed softly under the gaze of the stone saints lining the walls. It had been sixty days since his last meeting, and he had not expected to be summoned again so soon. Had something changed? What would be asked of him? Was there something wrong?

  He was a pace from the altar when the candle flames rippled. A breath of cold air touched the back of his neck. He whirled around, eyes going to the arch he had entered through.

  There was nothing there, just the distant light of torches falling in the main transept. Cold air gusted past him again, and the candles on the altar guttered. Somewhere a door banged shut. The air was still again, the dark in the sub-chapel almost total now. Footsteps echoed behind him, and Gul turned.

  ‘Who is there?’ he called, and the stone echoed back his voice in fading whispers.

  ‘...is there?’

  ‘Who...’

  ‘... there... there... there...?’

  The afterglow of the extinguished candle flames clung to his retinas as he turned and stared at the dark.

  ‘Prior Prefectus Aristas Gul,’ said a voice from behind him. He whirled back, eyes wide, mouth dry.

  Fire sparked in front of him. Gul flinched, but the flame held steady, a single tongue of orange in the black. The image of a hand holding a burning taper formed next to the light, and then the flaring light caught the outline of a hooded figure. Black and white checks ran around the sleeves of the red robes.

  ‘You should not be here,’ snapped Gul, his voice ringing high. He could feel cold snaking down his skin. ‘I demand–’

  ‘A scholar once told me that humans lit candles in prayer before they even knew they were not alone in the cosmos,’ said the robed figure. The hand holding the taper reached out, and put the flame to the wick of a candle. The fire caught. ‘Before they knew that their gods were lies, they still drew hope from that one small act.’

  Gul felt his mouth open to call out, but the words caught before they could reach his tongue. The robed figure turned. The bronze hand hanging on the robed man’s chest glinted. Gul’s frozen mind finally registered the colours and details of the figure’s robes. He could see the hilt of a sword and the butt of a gun projecting up behind the man’s hood.

  ‘You are not Abbot Crayling,’ he said, anger overcoming fear. ‘You are not of the Order of Castigation. Who are you?’

  A swish of fabric jerked Gul’s eyes to the arched doorway at the other end of the chapel. A slender figure in red robes stood outlined against the glow from beyond. Her hood was down, and he could see the ruddy ‘X’ crossing her face beneath a shaved scalp. A heavy step rang behind him and a hunched figure appeared from the dark, muscles and fat rippling under crimson fabric as the man hefted a double-handed hammer.

  His skin felt tight, his blood a racing beat of ice in his flesh. Fears and possibilities formed and spun in his mind: discovery, betrayal, escape. He should run. He should make for the small door behind the altar and flee. He should call out. Lumn might still be close enough to hear him. But he did not move or speak. Instead h
is mouth repeated the last words they had spoken.

  ‘Who are you?’ he breathed.

  The tall man with the sword across his back reached up and lowered his hood. The face beneath was young and strong, long black hair pulled back in a topknot above hard, dark eyes.

  ‘I am Covenant,’ said the man, ‘and I am here to offer you a chance of absolution.’

  IV

  Cold darkness swallowed Cleander as he descended the spiral stairs. The world was painted in blue in his infra-visor. Only he and Koleg stood out, their shapes yellow and red with warmth. They had closed the door into the sleeping cavern, and had been descending for long enough that they had left all light far behind. After a while he had switched to dark vision, but there were no scraps of light for it to gather, just a grey blur at the edge of sight. He had switched back to the blindness of infra-vision, and moved by touch, left hand running over the rough stone of the wall.

  ‘These catacombs run deep,’ he muttered after a while.

  ‘A fact that we knew at mission briefing,’ said Koleg.

  Cleander shivered, suddenly wishing that he had something more substantial than pilgrim rags to keep him warm. ‘It should not be this cold – there are no air currents, no running water. So why is it getting colder?’ he said. Koleg hesitated behind him. He turned, and looked at the soldier. Koleg’s shape was a bright rainbow of body heat.

  ‘The temperature is stable,’ said Koleg. ‘It isn’t getting colder.’

  Cleander felt himself become very still. Ice ran over his skin. In his eyes the colours of the infra-sight swam, switching and blurring. His teeth rattled against each other in his mouth. He turned back to the darkness beneath the next step. He reached out for the wall. His fingers slid into empty air. He flinched, but kept his hand extended. The cold bit into his bare skin. He moved his hand to the side, breathing slowly. His fingers touched stone. It felt warm, as though it had been warmed by the sun.

  ‘There is a door on my right,’ he said, carefully. ‘Follow the direction of my right arm.’

  Koleg moved close, hand macrostubber levelled, one hand on Cleander’s shoulder.

  ‘Ready,’ said Koleg.

  Cleander’s right hand flexed on the grip of his needler.

  ‘Moving,’ he said, and stepped into the waiting emptiness beyond the door.

  A deeper chill washed over him, as though he had stepped through a cascade of water. The view in his infra-visor flashed, bubbles of yellow and red heat popping against blue. He snapped the visor to normal vision. For a moment the black remained pressed against his eyes. Then light began to sketch a reality around him. A blue-green glow spread up columns framing eight openings set to either side of a long chamber. The columns supporting the arches were carved from a stone that glistened like glass. A long pool of liquid ran down the centre of the floor, its surface a black mirror. Cleander stepped forwards, and Koleg moved past him, pistol levelled, tracking between each of the archways.

  ‘This is it,’ said Cleander. ‘This is where they were bringing us.’

  ‘This is the target?’

  Cleander did not respond. His eyes flicked over the chamber. For a second he thought had seen something sinuous move under the stone surface of the wall, as though it were a sheet of glass opening on an ocean.

  ‘Who was it that the big lug said he was bringing us to see?’ said Cleander, softly. He was suddenly wishing that he had argued for a different approach in tackling the Tenth Path, an approach that included a platoon of his household mercenaries. Or a Space Marine strike team.

  ‘The confessor...’ said Koleg.

  Cleander turned to answer, and stopped. A tall, hunched statue stood under a white shroud at the far end of the chamber. The fabric stirred as though in a breeze. The scent of crushed flowers and spoiled meat brushed Cleander’s senses. Rage bubbled up inside him, staining his thoughts red. Whispers chirped at the edges of his mind, promising things he never knew he wanted. He shut out the thoughts and sensations.

  He knew what this was; the warp was close, shivering just beyond the skin of reality, feeling for a crack through which to pour. To others, even that touch would be enough to force them to their knees, eyes wide but seeing nothing. Cleander had touched the warp and seen its true face many times, and though he knew better than to think himself immune to its promises, he also knew himself well enough to see those promises as empty. He was not a good man, he was very far from a good man. He knew the power of wealth and lies, and enjoyed using both. He cared for few, and saw most people as expendable and worthless at best. He had no ideals, and his few beliefs all had a price. These were facts that he had never denied, but they were not weakness; they were armour against false desire.

  Koleg swayed where he stood, and then moved forwards, gun raised. Cleander stepped to follow, and then paused. He glanced up, and then back to the pool of water running down the centre of the room. The ceiling above was vaulted stone. Perhaps it had been the crypt of one of the first temples raised on Dominicus Prime, now buried deep beneath the mountain of stone that was the Crow Complex. Handprints covered the ceiling, hundreds of handprints in dried, dark liquid. Cleander paused.

  ‘Koleg,’ he said, carefully.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘The pool,’ said Cleander. Koleg snapped a glance at it, and then back to the space beyond his gun.

  ‘I see it,’ said Koleg.

  Cleander stepped forwards, kneeling slowly. He stared at the black gloss surface. The water beneath was black, and Cleander could not tell if that was because he could not see through it, or if it was perfectly clear and he was looking down into an abyss.

  ‘It reflects nothing,’ he said, and reached out to touch it.

  ‘What are you doing?’ called Koleg.

  ‘The confessor,’ he said. ‘That is what is supposed to be down here. The first steps of damnation are always wrapped in the costume of piety – isn’t that what Josef keeps on saying? So when all those lost souls come down here, they come to confess. And why do the pious confess?’ His fingers were just above the surface. ‘To be washed clean.’

  He touched the water.

  Circles spread across the pool, struck the sides and rebounded. Water lapped over the edges.

  ‘Is this wise?’ said Koleg as he moved next to Cleander.

  ‘No,’ said Cleander, and the word was a puff of white in the suddenly freezing air. ‘But if I was wise I would not be here in the first place.’

  More water was splashing out of the pool as its surface began to chop and heave. A low moan ran around the chamber, and Cleander looked up for a second. When he looked back, it was into a face floating beneath the surface of the water. He leapt to his feet. Koleg spun.

  The face was pale, the flesh fat under blue-veined skin. Silver hair swirled around it, billowing in the water. Its mouth was open, tongue pink between white teeth. The eyes were closed as though in sleep, or peaceful death. Cleander tried to move, to bring his needler up, but he was frozen in place, eyes locked on the image forming beneath the waves. A torso appeared beneath the face, then arms and legs. Lines of stitched scars criss-crossed flesh. Silver tubes ran into the tips of its fingers and ran off into the depths. Cleander’s heart was a paused beat in his chest. The face in the water opened its eyes. He had an impression of colour swirling around ragged pupils. Ice was spreading across the floor from the pool edge.

  Help,+ said a voice that echoed in Cleander’s skull. +Help me.+

  He felt his limbs moving, felt himself bend down to the water, reaching beneath to pull the figure out into the air.

  Free me.+

  ‘Von Castellan!’ shouted Koleg, close but so far away. ‘Stand back, now!’

  Please,+ whispered the voice in his head.

  A hand gripped Cleander’s arm and yanked him back. He swore, surged up, confusion and anger roaring through him. Koleg s
hoved him away, and Cleander’s eyes cleared.

  Figures stepped from the black spaces of the archways. Tatters of soaking cloth hung from them. Jagged circle tattoos slid over the exposed skin of their arms and necks. Darkness shone from the marks, shredding light, fuming night. Grey ash powdered their faces. Their eyes were closed, and frost breathed from their lips. Serrated knives and barbed chains hung from their hands.

  Koleg fired. A tongue of flame ripped from the macrostubber. The shroud covering the shape at the end of the chamber billowed, and the lost pilgrims, who had found their way along the Tenth Path to a revelation that they could no longer escape, leapt forwards in a blur of sharp edges.

  V

  ‘What are you talking about?’ said Gul, his eyes wide as he stared at Covenant. He could feel calm draining from him. ‘This is a gross violation of–’

  ‘The Tenth Path,’ said Covenant softly.

  Gul breathed out, mind racing through what was happening.

  Covenant turned back to the altar, reached out, and lit a second candle from the first.

  ‘Three years ago someone came to you and asked you to help him keep a secret,’ said Covenant. ‘He said to you that he saw a connection between you both, a shared vision of the truth. You were scared. You wondered how someone could know thoughts you had never spoken to another soul.’

  Gul felt his hands start to tremble.

  ‘Are you...’ he said. ‘Are you with him?’

  ‘He said that you were right, that the faith you had turned from was false, that there was nothing divine in the universe beside what we made, that to believe otherwise was to create your own prison. He said that everything you had been told was a lie.’ Covenant’s eyes stayed fixed on the twin candle flames. ‘And then he asked you to serve, to help others who saw the truth, to protect them, and give them aid and shelter. And that is what you have done, prior. You have found ways of hiding people, of diverting funds, and deflecting attention from a cult that you have never seen.’