The Horus Heresy: Vengeful Spirit

The girls had been suspicious of Alivia at first, and rightly so. She was an intruder in their world. A rival for their father’s affections. But she’d won them over with her games, her kindness and her fantastical stories of Old Earth’s mightiest heroes and its magical ancient myths.

No one told a story quite like Alivia, and the girls had been captivated from the beginning. She hadn’t even needed to manipulate their psyches. And quite without realising it, Alivia found herself cast in the role of a mother. It wasn’t something she’d expected to relish, but there it was. They were good girls; cheeky, but with the charisma and wide eyes to get away with it.

Alivia knew Jeph wasn’t the reason she’d gone back to the hab, it had been for Miska and Vivyen. She’d never even considered being a mother, wasn’t even sure it was possible for someone like her. She’d been told she had greater concerns than individual lives, but when the first impacts hit Larsa, Alivia had understood how foolish she’d been to blindly accept that.

Every part of her mission was compromised by having attachments. She’d broken every rule she’d set herself when she first came to Molech, but didn’t regret the decision to become part of their family. If John could see her now, he’d laugh in her face, calling her a hypocrite and a fraud. He’d be fully justified, but she’d still kick him in the balls for it and call him a coward.

Vivyen looked over at her and smiled.

Yes, definitely worth it.

The girl got up from her box seat and came over to Alivia with a hopeful look in her eye.

‘Who’s winning?’ asked Alivia.

‘Miska, but she’s older, so it’s okay.’

Alivia smiled. Okay. One of Oll’s words. Another thing she’d taught them. They said it in the scholam, where the other children looked strangely at its unusual sound.

‘I can teach you a few moves if you like,’ said Alivia. ‘I was taught by the best. Could give you an edge.’

‘No, it’s okay,’ said Vivyen, with all the earnestness of a twelve-year-old. ‘I do lots of things better than her, so it’s good she has this.’

Alivia hid a smile as she saw Miska make a face behind Vivyen’s back and make a gesture her father wouldn’t approve of.

‘Are you all right?’ said Alivia, as Vivyen climbed onto the gurney. ‘It’s been pretty hard since we left Larsa, eh?’

Vivyen nodded. ‘I’m fine. I didn’t like it when the tanks were shooting at us, but I knew you’d get us out in one piece.’

‘You did?’

‘Yes.’

Alivia smiled. A child’s certainty. Was there anything surer?

‘Will you read me a story?’ asked Vivyen, tapping the gun-case tucked in tight next to Alivia. Even wounded, she hadn’t let herself be parted from it.

‘Of course,’ said Alivia, pressing her thumb to the lock plate and moving it in a way she kept hidden from the girl. She opened the case, feeling over her Ferlach serpenta to the battered storybook she’d taken from the Odense Domkirke library. Some people might say stolen, but Alivia liked to think she’d rescued it. Stories were to be told, not for sitting in an old museum.

The longer she owned the book, the more she wondered about that.

A dog-eared thing, its pages were yellowed and looked to be hundreds of years old. The stories inside were much older, but Alivia had made sure the book would never fall apart, never fade and never lose the old, fusty smell of the library.

Alivia opened the book. She knew every story off by heart and didn’t need to read from the page. The translation wasn’t great, and what she read often didn’t match the words written down. Sometimes it felt like the words changed every time she read it. Not by much, but just enough for her to notice, as though the stories liked to stretch and try new things every once in a while.

But the pictures – woodcuts, she thought – were pretty and the girls liked to ask questions about the strange looking people in them as she read aloud.

Vivyen pulled in close, and Alivia hissed as the synth-skin bandage pulled taut again.

‘Sorry.’

‘It’s okay,’ said Alivia. ‘I’ve had worse.’

Much worse. Like when the guardian angel died, and Noama thought she’d lost me when my heart stopped…

She ran a finger down the list of stories. ‘Which one do you want to hear?’

‘That one,’ said Vivyen, pointing.

‘Good choice,’ said Alivia. ‘Especially now.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Nothing, never mind. Now do you want me to read it or do you have any more questions?’

Vivyen shook her head and Alivia began.

‘Once there was a very wicked daemon, and he made a looking-glass which made everything good or beautiful reflected in it seem vile and horrible, while everything worthless and bad looked ten times worse. People who saw their reflections ran screaming from their distorted faces, and the daemon said this was very amusing.