Lord of the Night

'More than enough! You'd understand if you hadn't turned from His light.'

He smiled, genuine warmth appearing on frozen features. 'And can there be an Emperor, without an Empire?'

'No, but—'

'No. They are intertwined. One billion billion souls despise you. A single soul — so you say — loves you. You don't think this a bitter ratio?'

'Without the Emperor's love there is nothing. Vacuus Imperator diligo illic est nusquam.'

She was reduced to parroting lessons of her youth, and the Night Lord's slow smile told her that he knew it.

'I used to think the same,' he said, as if conceding a generous point. Then: 'Once.'

She racked the gun meaningfully, trying to find a reserve of conviction in her voice.

'Spare me your attempts at corruption. My faith is stronger than steel!'

He leaned down from his tall perch, eyes brimming with earnest curiosity. 'Why do you fight me,' he asked, 'when we are the same?'

'I'm nothing like you!'

A petulant rage gripped her then, the last vestiges of her tattered pride spreading wings of outrage at the very suggestion of her likeness to that... that devil... and before she could stop herself she'd squeezed the trigger of the apparated weapon.

The shot struck the crucified figure in his side, tearing a strange slash of flesh clear, to boil off into the sky, dissolving as it went, and in this curious inner-realm what flowed from the rent was not blood, but light.

He gave no sign of pain.

'Of course you are,' he hissed, and any trace of shock was gone now, any sense of childish bewilderment was lost. Now his eyes glimmered with guile. 'You are the unclean filth that serves in His name. You are the hated one. They fear you, and they loathe you, but still they use you...'

'No, no...'

'Yes. They use you up until you cease to be useful, you understand? And what then, little witch? You think they will thank you?'

'It's... you're wrong... it's not like that...'

'The only difference between us, girl, is that where you still wear your yoke of slavery, my master broke me free!'

Mita almost roared, sudden venom choking her mind, clearing the clouds of doubt that the Night Lord had sowed. 'Free?' she snarled. 'You got your freedom by turning to Chaos! You got your salvation from Heresy, warp take you! That's not freedom — that's insanity!'

Such calmness in his face. Such ancient sadness.

'You're wrong, child. We were never slaves to the Dark Powers. We fought beneath a banner of hate, not of corruption.'