Nemesis

threat beneath his words did not need to break the surface.

There was a moment of hush; then movement. Sire Vindicare was first, pulling

the spy mask from his face as if he were glad to be rid of it. Then Sire Eversor, who

angrily tossed his fang-and-bone disguise on to the table. Siress Callidus slipped the

silk from her dainty face, and Vanus and Venenum followed suit. Sire Culexus was

last, opening up his gleaming skull mask like an elaborate metal flower.

The assassins looked upon their naked identities for the first time and there was a

mixture of potent emotions: anger, recognition, amusement.

“Better,” said Dorn.

“Now you have stripped us of our greatest weapon, Astartes,” said Siress

Callidus, a fall of rust-red hair lying unkempt over a pale face. “Are you satisfied?”

The primarch glanced over his shoulder. “Brother-Captain Efried?”

One of the Imperial Fists at the door stepped forwards and handed a device to his

commander, and in turn Dorn placed it on the table and slid it towards Sire Vanus.

“It’s a data-slate,” he said.

“My warriors intercepted a starship beyond the edge of the Oort Cloud,

attempting to vector into the Sol system,” Dorn told them. “It identified itself as a

common freighter, the Hallis Faye. A name I imagine some of you might recognise.”

“The crew…?” began Sire Eversor.

“None to speak of,” offered Captain Efried.

Dorn pointed at the slate. “That contains a datum capsule recovered from the

vessel’s mnemonic core. Mission logs. Vox recordings and vid-picts.” He glanced at

Malcador and the Custodian. “What is spoken of there is troubling.”

The Sigillite nodded towards Sire Vanus. “Show us.”

Vanus used a hair-fine connector to plug the slate into the open panel before him,

and immediately the images in the ghostly hololith flickered and changed to a new

configuration of data-panes.

At the fore was a vox thread, and it began to unspool as a man’s voice, thick with

pain, filled the air. “My name is Eristede Kell. Assassin-at-Marque of the Clade

Vindicare, Epsilon-dan… And I have defied my orders.”

250

Valdor listened in silence along with the rest of them, first to Kell’s words, and then

to fragments of the infocyte Tariel’s interim logs. When Sire Vanus opened the

kernel of data containing the vid-records from Iota’s final moments, he watched in

mute disgust at the abomination that was the Black Pariah. As this horror unfolded

before them, Sire Culexus bent forwards and quietly wept.

They listened to it all; the discovery of military situation on Dagonet and the plan

to reignite the dying embers of the planet’s civil war; Jenniker Soalm’s rejection of

the mission in favour of her own; the assassination of Sedirae in Horus’ stead and the

brutal retribution it engendered; and at last, the existence of and lethal potential

within the creature that called itself Spear, and the choice that the Execution Force

had been forced to make.

When they had heard as much as was necessary, the Sigillite shouted at Sire

Vanus to cease the playback. Valdor surveyed the faces of the clade directors. Each

in their own way struggled to process what they had been brought by the Imperial

Fists.

Sire Eversor, confusion in his gaze, turned on the Culexus. “That freakish

monstrosity… you created that? For Terra’s sake, cousin, tell me this is not so!”

“I gave the orders myself!” insisted the psyker. “It was destroyed!”

“Apparently not,” Dorn replied, his jaw tightening. “But it is dead now, yes?”

said Sire Vanus. “It must be…”

Dorn’s dark eyes flashed with anger. “A narrow view. That is all your kind ever

possess. Do you not understand what you have done? Your so-called attempts at a

surgical assault against Horus have become nothing of the kind!” His voice rose, like

the sound of storm-tossed waves battering a shoreline. “Sedirae’s death has cost the

lives of an entire planet’s population! The Sons of Horus have taken revenge on a

world because of what your assassins did there!” He shook his head. “If the counterrebellion

on Dagonet had been allowed to fade, if their war had not been deliberately

and callously exacerbated, Horus would have passed them by. After my brothers and

I have broken his betrayal, the Imperium would have retaken control of Dagonet. But

now its devastation leads to the collapse of keystone worlds all across that sector!

Now the traitors take a strong foothold there, and it will be my battle-brothers and

those of my kindred who must bleed to oust them!” He pointed at them all in turn.

“This is what you leave behind you. This is what your kind always leave behind.”

Valdor could remain silent no longer and he stepped forward. “The suffering on

Dagonet is a tragedy, none will deny that,” he said, “and yes, Horus has escaped our