Nemesis

It fluttered to a halt on an ornately illuminated page lined in gilt, purple ink and silver leaf. Words in High Gothic surrounded a sumptuously detailed picture repeating the image depicted in the jade frieze in the audience chamber – the Emperor granting the first Eurotas his boon. But Spear’s hungry gaze ignored the workmanship, turning instead towards a wet, liquid patch of dark crimson captured upon the featureless white vellum of the Warrant’s final page.

A single drop of blood.

He laid his hand on the edge of the case and let the daemonskin around his fingertips deliquesce, oozing into the weld holding the construction together. The heavy duty armourglass creaked and split down the seam, the malleable flesh pressing on it, shifting it out of true. All at once, a pane gave off a snap of sound, and the killer muffled it with his oily palms. The glass fell out of the frame and into his hand. He greedily reached inside, with trembling fingers.

Spear would rip the page from the ancient book, tear it out of the stasis field that had preserved it for hundreds of years. He would hold the paper to his lips and consume the blood, take it like the kiss of a lover. He would–

His hand reached for the pages of the Warrant of Trade and passed straight through it, as if the book were made of smoke. Inside the glass case, the tome seemed to flicker and grow indistinct, for one blinding moment becoming nothing but a perfect ghost image projected from a cluster of hololithic emitters concealed inside the frame of the cage.

The case was empty; and for a moment so was Spear, his chest hollowed out by the sudden, horrible realisation that his prize was not here.

But then he was filled anew with murderous rage, and it took every last fraction of his self-control to stop the killer from screaming out his fury and destroying everything around him.

4

After Lady Sinope had left her alone once more, Soalm remained where she was on the ridge and waited for the darkness to engulf her. The night sky, a sight that so often gave her a moment of peace as she contemplated it, now seemed only to veil the threats the old woman had spoken of. She shivered involuntarily and felt a cold, familiar pressure at the edge of her senses.

‘Iota.’ She turned and found the Culexus standing near the cave entrance, watching her. The dusky-skinned girl’s eyes glittered. ‘Spying on me?’

‘Yes,’ came the reply. ‘You should not remain outside for too long. There are ships in orbit and satellite systems under the control of the clan forces. They will be sweeping this zone with their long-range imagers.’

‘How long have you been watching?’

‘I do not believe He is the forgiving kind,’ she repeated, fingering the nullifier torc around her neck.

Soalm frowned. ‘You have no right to intrude on a private conversation!’

If that was meant to inspire guilt in Iota, she gave no such reaction. The pariah seemed unable to grasp the niceties of such concepts as privacy, tact or social graces. ‘What did the woman Sinope mean, when she spoke about “forces at large”?’ Iota shook her head. ‘She did not refer to threats of a military nature.’

‘It’s complicated,’ said Soalm. ‘To be honest, I’m not quite sure myself.’

‘But you value her words. And the words in the book.’

Soalm’s blood ran cold. ‘What book?’

‘The one in the chamber on the lower levels. Where the others gather with Sinope to talk about the Emperor as a god. You have been there.’

‘You followed me?’ Soalm took a warning step forwards.

‘Yes. Later I returned when no one was there. I read some of the book.’ Iota looked away, still toying with the torc. ‘I found it confusing.’

Soalm studied the Culexus, her mind racing. If Iota revealed the presence of the hidden chapel inside the rebel base, there was no way to predict what would happen. Many of Capra’s resistance fighters followed the staunchly anti-theist Imperial edict that labelled all churches as illegal; and she could not imagine what Eristede might do if he learned she had involvement with the Lectitio Divinitatus.

‘Kell will not be pleased,’ said the other woman, as if she could read her thoughts.

‘You won’t speak of it,’ Soalm insisted. ‘You will not tell him!’

Iota cocked her head. ‘He is blood kindred to you. The animus speculum reads the colour of your auras. I saw the parity between them the first time I watched you through the eyes of my helm. And yet you keep that a secret too.’

Soalm tried and failed to keep the shock from her face. ‘And what other secrets do you know, pariah?’

She returned a level stare. ‘I know that you are now considering how you might ensure my silence by killing me. If you make the attempt, there is a chance you may succeed. But you are conflicted by the thought of such an action. It is something your… brother… would not hesitate to do in your place.’

‘I am not Eristede,’ she insisted.

‘No, you are not.’ Iota’s face softened. ‘What is it like?’

‘What?’