Contents

Cover

The Crystal Cathedral – Danie Ware

About the Author

An Extract from ‘Mark of Faith’

A Black Library Publication

eBook license

The Crystal Cathedral

By Danie Ware

Sister Augusta Santorus stood at the bottom of the wide stone steps, her scarlet armour gleaming, her head bared to the light. She had entrusted her weapons to the upheld tray of the little brass servitor and she carried only reverence and awe, as was proper in His presence. To bear arms in the house of the Emperor was blasphemy – after all, was His protection not enough?

In a line to her left stood her sisters, the squad’s black-and-white cloaks stirring faintly, though there was little wind in this carefully carved valley. Its rock walls were almost sheer and they glittered with crystalline fragments, reflecting the blue-green gleam of the planet above, hazed in its own atmosphere and glorious to behold.

But that was not what held the Sisters’ attention.

‘Truly,’ Sister Superior Veradis said softly, from the centre of the line, ‘one finds His miracles in even the darkest of places. Sing with me, my Sisters…’

‘A spiritu dominatus…’ They raised their voices in the Litany, their harmonies echoing back at them, chiming from the rock. The acoustics were flawless, and Augusta felt a chill go down her back.

The darkest of places…

This was Caro, the smallest moon of the planet Lena Beta, orbiting its blue-white star. And upon its bleak, rocky surface, there stood a miracle.

Forgotten for a thousand years, encased and defended by this carved, rock-walled gorge, it was a great, dark edifice, its bell towers and arches soaring over their heads. That much was imposing enough.

But the cathedral was also black.

Made from pure, black glass it was shadow, a cut-out, a great silhouette that took towering bites from the planet’s perfect curve. It was flat pane after flat pane, every one held in place by thin struts of dark flexsteel, every one glittering with myriad crystalline reflections. Warrior statues stood guard at its doorway, their strong faces bearing familiar fleur-de-lys tattoos, their carved armour bearing the mark of the Bloody Rose.

From the very first days of their order: their Sisters.

Augusta wondered if they judged her, her newness and inexperience.

Between the stone Sisters, the cathedral’s huge front doors stood open, and the squad could see that the building’s insides were also dark, lit only by the flickering, ruddy gleam of electro-sconces. Despite the gloom, however, the congregation already waited within.

‘We beseech Thee, destroy them.’

As the Litany came to an end, Veradis’ voice sounded in their vox-beads: ‘Witness our Sisters, Farus and Neva. The Accords of the Rose tell us that they defended this moon once before, a thousand years ago. Upon the site of their victory, and in the Emperor’s name, was this cathedral constructed. It is a true phenomenon, the only one of its kind.’

‘Yes, Sister.’ Augusta was still staring, transfixed by the wonder that awaited them, nervous of making any misstep.

‘Stand ready,’ Veradis said.

Ahead of them, the organ blasted the first notes of the hymn of greeting.

‘And move!’

The squad formed up, double file, and stamped crisply up the steps.

Her boots ringing from the stone, the young Sister Augusta marched with her chin up, her gaze straight ahead. With a rustle, the congregation came to their feet, their data-slates in their hands and already flowing with the text of the hymn. The slates’ pale light reflected from the people’s faces and throats – dignitaries all, their robes and jewellery sparkling.

Expectation rose from them like smoke.

At the aisle’s far end, the great Sol-facing window was as black as everything else, its images lost to opacity. The altar was a great block of dark stone, the organ-pipes all but unseen in the shadows of the steel-supported roof. Only the pulpit and the choirstalls retained any glimmer of light, and, as the Sisters approached, so the choir took up the words of the hymn, their harmonies shiveringly perfect.

The darkest of places.

Beautiful, incredible though this was, something about this great building made Augusta tense – it provoked a sense of anticipation, almost, a feeling of huge expectation. The squad were here as an honour guard, marking its reconsecration, but still…

In the pulpit, the deacon eyed her as if he could see her very thoughts. With a prayer for the unworthiness of the doubt, she lowered her gaze and remembered her humility.

Nodding sternly, the deacon joined the hymn. Broadcast out through the vox-coder, his bass boom rose to the black glassaic roof, its power making Augusta’s arms prickle. It seemed almost as if the hymn would shatter the building asunder, bring it down in a tumble of glittering and sharp-edged fragments…

Her tension grew sharper, whetted like a good blade.

Levis est mihi!

Show me the Light!

They came to the altar rail, and spread out to kneel. Augusta’s blonde hair fell over her face, but even as it did so…

‘By the Throne!’

The soft exclamation came from Veradis – startling from the severe and disciplined Sister Superior.

Before them, the very tip of the Sol window was touched with Lena’s rising light.

Augusta stared, rapt.

Slowly, the light spread down through the glassaic. And not only through the window; it pooled out through the walls, and across the great arched curve of the roof. It chased the darkness away, turning panes of shadow into panes of pure, blue-white light. Rainbows danced in the vaults of the ceiling; the ruddy gleam of the sconces paled as the pillars rippled with dazzling illumination.

They had known to expect this – as this tiny moon curved about its planet, as the planet curved about its star, so this, its singular conjunction, came again. It was the only time in a thousand years that the light touched the bottom of this valley, the site of the previous battle, and the glassaic of the building it now contained.

But still, the wonder of it…!

Augusta knew she should lower her head, but she could not look away.

Illumination flowed down through the great window, revealing Him in all His glory, His armour gleaming, His flaming blade upheld. The singing rose to a crescendo, a crashing celebration of His presence, and of the great victory that had taken place here. It carried a strong contralto line that picked up the thread of the Sisters’ own Litany.

Again, she shivered.

She could not avert her gaze, she was transfixed – the light continued to spread, making the polished brass of the organ pipes shine. It made rainbow patterns slide down the aisle; it brought a gleam to the circling cherubim, their metal eyelids clicking as they surveyed the scene below.

Overcome and breathless, bereft of the words of hymn and Litany both, Augusta could only watch.

The splintering of the roof took the Sisters completely by surprise.

And the screams rang like music.

‘This will be straightforward reconnaissance mission,’ Veradis had told them, in the back of the shuttle. ‘We are to attend the reconsecration of the great crystal cathedral, upon the mining moon Caro. The building is a true marvel, commemorating the victory of Sister Superior Farus against the xenos contagion that had infected Caro’s tunnels.’ She surveyed her squad, her expression stern. ‘You have studied your texts, I hope?’

The Arvus juddered as it hit the upper atmosphere.

Sister Leona answered, ‘Most certainly. Caro has an odd, elliptical orbit about its planet, pulled back once every thousand years before being flung out into the void once more. Its resources, however, are considerable, and, after the Great Crusade, the planetary governor deemed it enough of a blessing to be mined for its gemstones. It has brought its planet great wealth.’

‘Just so,’ Veradis said.

The Arvus continued to shudder. Augusta, her helm between her knees, held onto her straps and prayed – this was never her favourite part of a mission.

Sister Pia, the squad’s second, chimed in, reciting the text verbatim: ‘But lo! From the unsanctified places of the Emperor’s tunnels there came forth darkness unendurable, heresy manifest in claw and tooth, in hunger given form. And, though the humble servants of the Emperor’s mines gave battle with great bravery, the beasts were a seethe of cruelty beyond their ken, and thus, they were slain.’

Veradis nodded, approving. The pict screen in the back of the shuttle was showing the moon’s long orbit.

‘They survived long enough to call for help,’ Veradis said. ‘And Sister Superior Farus, may she rest in His grace, brought her squad to eliminate the menace. The crystal cathedral marks the site of our Sisters’ triumph, and the point at which the xenos infection was finally purged.’ Veradis paused, watching the pict screen and the slowly tumbling moon. ‘Caro’s atmosphere has been fully restored, and the mines will commence their formal reopening once the service has taken place. We are to attend this service, and then undertake our reconnaissance mission. Needless to say, my Sisters, extreme vigilance must be maintained at all times.’

‘Yes, Sister Superior.’

She gave Augusta a long look, ‘And no mistakes this time, Sister.’

Augusta looked at her red boots, shamed by the loss of her bolter on their previous mission. ‘I will make no errors.’

‘Good.’ Veradis’ tone was grim. ‘His eyes will be upon you. As will mine.’

The shuttle’s juddering smoothed as the vehicle settled to a level flight path. On the screen, the orbit-image had given way to a close-up of the moon itself, riddled with a familiar pattern of mines, chimneys and manufactoria. Across the bottom of the screen flowed the necessary data – hours of daylight, atmospheric components, pollutant levels, air temperature.

Next to Augusta, Sister Lucienne shot her a sideways look. Across their tight-beam vox-link she muttered, ‘Why do I bear a shadow in my heart, Sister? It is unworthy. And yet, there is something about this…’

Augusta glanced at her friend, but did not reply. The same shadow had crossed her also.

The crash was tremendous.

Glass splintered and tumbled, its edges glittering. A thousand dancing reflections spun across the shattered roof. People came to their feet, shocked, backing up…

As a huge, dark shape crunched to the floor amid a smash of fallen shards.

Instantly, reflexively, Augusta went for her bolter, but her gauntlet came back empty. Her heart pounding, she was on her feet, turning, drawing the small fleur-de-lys punch-dagger from the front of her armour.

Around her, her sisters were doing the same, each woman dropping to a guarded crouch.

In the centre of the nave, a colossal, savage monster bared huge teeth at the fleeing congregation.

The people were shrieking, now, gathering their robes and their families and scrambling out of the way. Panicking and shoving, they tumbled from its impact like ripples.

By the Light! Augusta stared at it, her hand tightening on her blade. What is that?

It was huge, pure savagery, and far bigger than the Sisters; its carapace was a glitter of spine-spiked darkness in the now brilliant rainbow light. It crouched, its tail lashing, whipping its head this way and that as it watched the fleeing, shrieking people.

The hymn had tumbled from the air like a broken thing. In the pulpit, the deacon raged, leaning down to rant like fanatic, ‘This is the house of the Emperor! There will be no defilement here!’

He rounded on the Sisters, blazing zeal and fury, but Veradis was already moving.

‘Squad,’ she snapped into the vox. ‘With me, by twos, watch each other’s backs. Leona, get to the vestibule and secure the heavy bolter.’ Aloud, she roared, ‘Get out of the way!’

The people, already scrabbling, had no need to be told. As the Sisters closed ranks and began to move, the crowd was stumbling over the seating, tripping and crunching over the fallen glassaic. The braver amongst them had been trying to build some sort of hasty barricade, but it was a pitiful attempt – the thing’s claws were as long as a Sister’s forearm and they lashed a lethal left-right, sending pews and bodies flying.

Snarling and screaming echoed loudly, the noises carrying as perfectly as the words of the hymn had done.

‘Sisters!’ Veradis barked the order aloud. ‘On the double!’

They broke into a run, their metal feet clanging a challenge. Each woman had her punch-dagger in her grip; in the lead, Veradis was using her free hand to pull the slower or less wary people clean out of her way.

The Litany came from her like pure, cold outrage.

From the lightning and the tempest!

The creature did not care. It was a boil of motion, a cyclone of violence. Its speed was terrifying. It was a harbinger of death, its tail like a whip, its claws ripping through flesh and stone alike. In a blur of speed, its huge maw bit at a fleeing dignitary. The man’s headless body ran another full step before it fell forwards, its ringed hands outstretched. Blood pooled from the neck.

The creature pounced again, picking up a robed woman and tearing her clean in half.

Shocked, horrified, her gorge rising with a toxic alloy of fury and nausea, Augusta almost skidded; she had to force herself to keep running, to maintain the Litany’s defiant song. The people were almost all out of the way now, but the creature was already flanked by piles of flung bodies, some of them only injured, desperate and struggling. Ignoring them, focused now on the Sisters, it slashed through the nearest heap and jumped on a fallen pew, all spine and spike and tail, a knot of shoulders and claws. Its shining head turned towards Veradis and it extended a long tongue, tasting the air.

For a split second, Augusta wondered if it was grinning at them.

But this was no time for such whimsical nonsense.

Our Emperor, deliver us!

The floor was slick with scarlet; it steamed in the bright, crystal light, and wreathed the monster like an aura.

‘Xenos.’ Veradis’ snarl didn’t even sound surprised. ‘We do not fear you, creature.’

The thing tilted its head at her, almost as if it understood.

From the pulpit, the deacon was still roaring: ‘Defiler! Slay it, Sister Superior, in the Emperor’s name!’

The creature leapt. Barehanded, bereft of both bolter and chainsword, Veradis did not hesitate. Fearless, she met it head-on, catching it as it leapt, and throwing it over and past her. It landed on its back, kicked frantically for a moment, and then righted itself.

It spun snarling, lowering its head at them.

‘Go, get out!’ Behind Augusta, Sister Lucienne was ushering the last of the people, pushing them towards the two side doors that led back out to the cloisters, and to the high, tight walls of the valley. Horrified, their faces etched in terror and sickness, streaked by blood and tears, they followed her directions, pulling each other away.

One of them, a young man barely older than Lucienne herself, clutched at her and said, ‘Why? What did we do to merit such punishment?’

‘This is not punishment,’ she told him, her tone livid with suppressed outrage. ‘This is an abomination. And it will be purged!’

He nodded, though his eyes were as much glass as the great building itself.

‘Run!’ she told him.

But Augusta had reached the fight.

The thing was upright, all four arms mantled over its head; it was leering down at Veradis, its horrific teeth still bared.

Augusta looked up at it, gauging its weapons, its weak points, its potential attacks. Images lashed at her, memories of the schola’s lessons – but she could never have guessed that such a beast would be this cold, this utterly pure and focused.

And so fast!

Snarling, it lunged at Veradis with each set of massive claws, left and right, one after the other. They tore through her armour as if it were only grox-leather, ripping huge parallel dents in her breastplate and pauldrons; but the Sister Superior was indomitable, she did not falter or fall back. Still singing, rage and battle and defiance, she slashed with the dagger, a sideways lunge aimed at the joints in the beast’s armoured belly.

But it moved like a blur, too swift to see.

Another set of claws slammed down on Veradis’ shoulder, sending her spinning to the floor.

From plague, temptation and war!

Over the vox, Sister Pia barked, ‘Spread out!’

The Sisters separated to surround the beast, coming at it from all sides. Its head twitched to and fro as it followed them, its tail lashed at their boots.

Our Emperor, deliver us!

The thing hissed at them.

And then, almost faster than they could see, it exploded into motion.

It was like fighting a tornado.

Too strong, too many arms, too fast to follow. Glassaic crunched beneath their boots, the rainbow light still spreading over their heads – but they had no time to look up.

One savage tail-lash took Lucienne off her feet, dropping her with a thunderous crash. A slash of claws sent Pia reeling, her armour sliced like cloth. The thing’s strength was enormous, its ferocity brutal. The Sisters came it from every direction, but their daggers seemed to skitter off its carapace; it slashed and stuck at them, and their armour rent and buckled under blows too fast to follow. Pia lunged at its back, but it whipped around, lashing out with one huge arm to send her staggering back, slamming into the nearest pillar. As it did so, Augusta struck at its side but the thing’s hard chitin turned the point of her small dagger. The blow skidded, doing no harm.

She swore under her breath, and kept singing.

From the scourge of the Kraken!

From the corner of her eye, she could see that Veradis was back on her feet, though the Sister Superior had not closed back into the melee. Instead, she had discarded her dagger and held her position, watching the monster, her eyes narrow.

But Augusta could not stop to consider this – the thing whirled again, its tail knocking Lucienne flying for a second time. Its gleaming, foot-long teeth snapped at Augusta’s arm; its claws lashed hard at her cheek. She yanked her head backwards and it missed her, but only just. She felt the whack of wind as they passed within a whisper of her nose.

If those claws caught her, they would take her face clean off.

It followed the attack and leapt at her – one slash, and another, and another, each one slamming into her and making her reel. She raised her arms to defend herself; her ears rang with song and fury. The Sisters followed it, pressing in close, stopping the thing moving, preventing it getting away. Blades struck at it from all sides, but its arms were fast, knocking them aside, sending the squad skidding backwards, their boots screeching on the stone. Without their bolters they had nothing that could touch it, and it was almost as if it knew. Amid its chilling focus, it seemed to be mocking them.

The deacon was still shouting from the pulpit, almost frothing at the mouth. Augusta lunged again, hard enough to stick her dagger point first into the beast’s chest, but she lost her grip on the weapon as the monster whipped around. It turned too fast, taking the blade with it.

It snapped its teeth downwards at Pia’s shoulder. For an instant, they crunched on ceramite, then Pia dropped to one knee and they slammed shut on air.

An instant later, Pia was back on her feet, her song twisting into a vicious, stubborn curse.

How could they stop this thing?

Panic was beginning to swell in Augusta’s chest, though she would not succumb to it. How was this accursed thing even here?

Our Emperor, deliver us!

Beside her, Sister Pia raised the Litany once more. Clenching her gauntleted fists, Augusta closed again – but the beast barely even noticed. She might as well have been hitting the rock wall.

Then she saw her dagger, sticking from the thing’s carapace. She made a grab for it, catching it and pulling it free.

Snarling, the beast whirled again. It hurled itself straight at her, its teeth bared, all four sets of claws coming for her chest. She threw up her arms in a cross block, felt the force of its impact through her elbows and shoulders, but she could not stand in its path, it was just too big. It smashed her to the floor, hurled itself past her and spun, turning back to the squad.

Another claw strike, a reaching left-right, and Sister Lucienne was falling, dark fluid staining the rips in her armour.

In His name! You will not do this!

Sister Emlyn leaned down and pulled Lucienne out of the way. Augusta kept striking, slashing, singing, distracting its attention.

How was it here? Had it always been here, surviving a thousand years from the previous battle? Had it been waiting, hiding somewhere outside this valley, just waiting for the…

Waiting for the light.

By the Throne!

The realisation struck her like a claw. Of course. It had been here all along, dormant, curled about itself in patient stillness, and the very conjunction that had brought life and light back to the cathedral – it had touched this thing, and roused it from its stasis.

Had brought it, leaping, and tearing, and hungry, into their midst.

Furious at its sacrilege, at its presence, at the memory of their Sisters that it had now despoiled, she threw herself at it. The squad moved with her, all of them closing once more about its flanks.

Over the vox, Veradis barked, ‘Pia! Now!’

‘Aye.’ Her movements absolutely precise, Sister Pia grabbed the thing’s extended tongue in one red-gauntleted hand. With a single, deft twist, she wrapped it around her wrist and brought its head down into her raised knee. There was a sharp crack, and its teeth closed on its own flesh.

Gore and squeals spurted from its mouth.

The Sister Superior roared, ‘Leona! Fire!’

From the far side of the now empty nave came the unmistakeable metallic cocking of the heavy bolter.

Veradis bawled, ‘Down!’

Augusta was moving, even as the Sister Superior wrapped an arm over her shoulders.

They crashed to the floor together.

The thunder was tremendous.

A full directed burst roared across the air. It cut though the pews, through the glassaic, and though the chitinous hide of the monster. The heavy bolter boomed its song of death, the noise immense. White-light panes shattered as rounds blew them outwards.

On the floor, face down on the glass-pebbled stone and half-crushed by Veradis’ weight, Augusta couldn’t see – but she could hear the creature scream in pain and fury, hear it thrashing as the rounds bit home. She heard its claws as it turned and ran, hurling itself bodily across the nave and towards Leona.

But Leona was still firing, steady and unintimidated. Her voice over the vox sang defiance.

Bring them only death!

Veradis shifted, was back on her feet. Augusta, too, started to stand up. From out of the corner of her eye she saw Lucienne, bloodied and battered and rolling to back her knees; saw Sister Emlyn, shaking herself, but moving.

Saw Sister Pia, lying curled on her side, blood sliding from her mouth, her armour smoking from multiple holes.

What?

Only one weapon made scars like those.

In the vestibule, the heavy bolter was still firing, its muzzle tracking the incoming beast. Leona had stepped back, given herself the full range and rate of fire; the monster was spraying thick, dark blood, shuddering under the onslaught, but it was still coming, climbing over the pews as if nothing could bring it down…

But Sister Pia lay still.

Facing the monster, Leona was still singing, her voice rising as the thing closed on her; she was back to the wall, now, had nowhere else to go. The deacon was still in his pulpit, still bellowing orders…

But Sister Pia lay still.

Stunned, Augusta watched as the heavy bolter started to cough. Leona swore, knowing she was down to her last few rounds, but she still kept firing as the monster skidded the last pews out of its way…

But Sister Pia lay still.

‘By the Throne.’ Over the vox, Leona cursed aloud. ‘You’ll go down if I have to beat you to death myself!’ With a final rumble, the heavy bolter clacked loudly, and stopped.

The silence was suddenly tremendous, echoing in Augusta’s ears.

But – finally – the monster was down. Barely two feet from where Leona was standing, it had crashed to the floor, its chitin cracked, its arms splayed, its body coated in its own fluids.

Its rear claws kicked once, and were still.

The deacon cried, ‘Yes! Thank the Emperor!’ but they did not look up at him.

Because Sister Pia lay still.

Calmly, Veradis said, ‘Be sure, Leona.’ Her voice was full – victory, sacrifice, sadness.

‘Aye.’ Boots sounded as Leona walked over to the thing, her heavy bolter still in her hands. The single shot to its skull rang out like the last line of a hymn.

‘One round left in the chamber,’ she said, quietly. Like the presence of their small, hidden daggers, no one needed to ask her why it was there.

But Sister Pia had not moved.

‘Her death was not your doing,’ Veradis said, one hand on Sister Leona’s shoulder. ‘It was a risk, and Sister Pia understood. We fight as the Emperor decrees.’

Leona’s lean, lined face was stone hard, her chin lifted, as if she kept any emotions to herself.

At their feet, Sister Pia lay crumpled upon a bed of shattered glassaic, her black hair spread out, her expression frozen in the bared-teeth determination of pure combat. All down one side of her armour there were the telltale holes made by the heavy bolter.

Her courage had enabled them to injure the beast, and had forced it to react to the weapon, rather than killing the rest of the squad.

They – and the people – owed Pia their lives.

Augusta knew that sacrifice was the greatest honour to which a Sister could aspire, but she had never before seen it in the field, and she stayed silent, looking down at Pia’s fallen form.

She seemed so small.

Veradis, however, was glaring at the deacon.

‘You declared this location secure.’ It was not a question.

The deacon had not lost his pompousness. He was a small, round man, and he puffed himself up before answering: ‘How was I to know that your long-lost Sisters had not purged this moon completely? The failure is yours, Sororitas, not mine.’

Veradis eyed him as if she would break him in half, but said nothing. Instead, she said to the squad, ‘Retrieve your weapons. I want every doorway guarded. There will be no service here until we deploy fully through the tunnels and ensure that there are no further,’ she eyed the deacon, ‘surprises.’

‘Aye.’ The Sisters did as they were ordered, but Augusta paused, Lucienne beside her.

‘Sister Superior, a question, if I may?’

‘Of course.’

‘This is the house of the Emperor. We do not bear weapons–’

‘You’re asking why He did not defend us, Sister?’ Veradis’ tone held a certain wry amusement, perhaps at Augusta’s inexperience. ‘As the Scriptures would have us believe?’

Feeling the gazes of both deacon and Sister Superior, Augusta looked down at Pia’s fallen body and nodded. ‘Is that so foolish a question? How could such a creature be permitted…’

The deacon glowered at her. ‘He does not come when you call, Sister…’

Veradis held up a hand, and he quietened, tapping his foot.

The Sister Superior said, ‘The xenos knows no respect. And what are we but His defence? What are we but His weapons? Twice now, you have faced foes without your bolter, and twice, you have triumphed. This is a test of our faith and mettle, like any other, wherever it may take place.’

Augusta stole a look at the now shining window, remembering the stone Sisters that stood at the doorway. ‘Our Sisters did not fail?’

‘That is not for us to judge.’ Veradis shot the deacon a sideways glare. ‘We only do as we are bid, by His presence. You may grieve for Sister Pia, in the proper time, but you must first follow your orders.’

‘Yes, Sister.’

‘Have no fear,’ Veradis said, her face softening to a rare smile. ‘Sister Pia stands before the Throne, and she does so in honour, her life given in battle.’ She glanced at the fallen creature, drawing Augusta’s attention and making the point. ‘We can only pray that, one day, we will be so blessed.’

About the Author

Danie Ware is the author of the critically acclaimed Ecko series, as well as numerous short stories. She lives in Carshalton, south London, with her son and two cats and has long-held interests in role-playing, re-enactment, vinyl art toys and personal fitness. These days, she juggles raising her son and writing books with working for Forbidden Planet (London) Ltd., where she runs their events calendar and social media profile. Mercy is her first short story for Black Library.

An extract from Mark of Faith.

Darkness surrounds me, complete and heavy. Suffocating. I cannot see. Cannot hear. I cannot remember, either. Not how I came to be here, or where I came from. Not who or what I am. I am nothing, and no one. Little more than a heartbeat, inside a hollow shell. I try to speak. To make a noise of this nothingness, but I am mute as well as blind and deaf. No words will come. No voice, save for that locked tightly inside my mind.

Please.

And then, a sound. A voice, answering my silent plea.

Evangeline.

The name falls across me like a cloak, and I know instinctively that it is mine. I know the voice, too, despite how distant it sounds. How distorted.

‘Adelynn?’

My Sister Superior’s name escapes my throat and disappears into the unbroken darkness. Adelynn answers me once again with my own name, but this time she sounds even more distant. More distorted. I start to run, though I cannot see. Though the darkness mires me and pulls at my limbs like deep, cold water. But then I see it. A tiny pinprick of golden light, growing larger and closer until it resolves into a shape. A stone pedestal, draped in crimson cloth. That is where the light is coming from, only it is not light at all. It is an object. A shield, cast in steel and gold and engraved with the image of an armoured warrior bearing blade and aegis with a ten-pointed halo around her head. My heartbeat grows loud at the sight of it, for it is not a shield at all. It is the Shield. The Praesidium Protectiva.

The Shield of Saint Katherine.

‘Evangeline.’

I look up from the Shield and I see her. Adelynn is standing on the opposite side of the hallowed relic to me. Uplit in gold, she could as well be a statue, were it not for her emerald eyes.

‘Are you ready?’ she asks me, and she gestures to the Shield.

It is a question to which there is only ever one answer, but this time I find that I cannot give it. Because I am not ready. Not for this. I try to tell her so, but even that proves impossible. All that I can manage is an empty oh sound. The very definition of nothing. Adelynn’s face turns wrathful, then.

‘Are you ready?’ she asks, again. ‘Are you ready?’

Adelynn repeats the question over and over and over until the sound of it surrounds me. It suffocates me, just like the darkness. I cannot bear it, nor the disappointment in her emerald eyes, so I scream for her to stop and I thrust out my hands to take up the Shield, but the very instant that my fingertips come into contact with the gold and steel, I catch fire. It blossoms on my fingers first, before blooming across my hands and up my arms, golden yellow and flickering. It tracks over my shoulders and engulfs my body and travels up my throat until I am consumed by it in the same way that the air around me is. The fire burns fiercely, melting my armour and searing my flesh. It blinds me with its brightness, and deafens me anew with a roar that is not the roar of the fire at all, but that same dreadful question rendered in an inferno’s voice.

Are you ready?

I wake with a gasp, lying flat on my back. Still blind, no matter how I blink. Still deaf to everything but the overloud beat of my thundering heart. My teeth are chattering and my body is trembling completely from my head to my toes. I am soaked with sweat. I try to cry out, but no words will come. No sound at all. I get up, but something mires me. I fall hard onto my hands and knees, completely unable to breathe. Someone takes hold of me, firm hands printing cold onto my feverish skin.

And then, a voice.

‘Be still, Sister. You are safe.’

It is a woman’s voice. One that I do not recognise. I try to speak. To fight her. But those hands hold firm and the voice speaks again.

‘Breathe,’ she says. ‘Just breathe.’

Left with little choice, I do as the voice commands me. I breathe. I allow myself to be still. And little by little, my senses return.

Touch, first. The cold floor under my hands and knees. Then sight. Bare steel treadplate, and my own hands, wrapped tightly in blood-speckled bandages. Scent. Incense and blood and the harsh tang of counterseptic. Other sounds filter in. I hear the click and hum of machinery, and the soft murmur of prayer. I am in a hospitaller’s ward. I exhale, slowly.

‘There we are,’ says the voice.

I look up at the owner of the voice. She is of the convents. Non-militant, but a Sister nonetheless. The hospitaller is pale as new marble, clad in robes as white as her hair. I cannot tell the colour of her eyes, because she will not meet mine.

‘You were dreaming,’ she says. ‘That is all.’

I try to tell her that I do not dream. That I haven’t since I was a child. Since before my Sisters and before Adelynn and before the convents. But all that I can make is the shape of the words. A rasp in my throat, like steel on stone.

‘My name is Lourette,’ the Sister Hospitaller says, her voice patient and calm. ‘Let me help you.’

I do not resist as Lourette helps me to my feet and sits me down again on the edge of my cot. This place is not so much a ward as a private room. The walls are clad with whitewashed flakboard and hung with linen drapes. Lourette gives me a plastek cup to drink from. The water is so cold that it makes me cough myself double. Lourette holds out a silvered bowl for me as I spit clots of blood and blackness into it until I can breathe again. When I do, I taste stale air. Recycled. All at once I know that I must be aboard a starship. That I am no longer on Ophelia VII.

At the thought of my home world everything returns to me. The Contemplation. The Last of Days. Losing my Sisters, one by one. I wait for grief to strike me, to sweep over me, but all I feel is emptiness.

‘Are you in pain, Sister?’ Lourette asks.

I wish I were. Pain is honest. It gives you focus. I am not in pain. In its place, all I feel is emptiness. That deceitful nothing. I cannot explain that to Lourette, so I just shake my head and ask a question in return. It takes three attempts, because my throat is so unused to speaking.

‘What ship is this?’

Lourette still does not look me in the eyes. She sets about changing my bloodied bandages with slow and deliberate care. Even that does not hurt.

‘The Unbroken Vow,’ she says. Her voice is soft and patient, with the clipped pronunciation of the convents. ‘It is a Dauntless-class cruiser sworn to the commandery of Canoness Elivia. We are holding at high anchor over Ophelia VII.’

The information sinks in slowly. Canoness Elivia. Like so many of my Order, she was far from Ophelia VII when the Rift opened and the darkness descended.

Very far.

Dread settles over me like a shroud.

‘How long have I been here?’ I ask.

‘You have been under our care for six weeks,’ Lourette says. ‘We kept you dreaming so that you could heal.’

I take a breath that hurts. Six weeks of slumber, as my world burned beneath me. Six. Weeks.

‘Then, the cardinal world?’

I say the cardinal world but I think my home. I steel myself, expecting Lourette to tell me that it is gone. Burned and broken to nothing, like my Sisters. But she doesn’t. Instead, Lourette smiles a small smile.

‘It was spared at the final hour,’ she says.

I remember the thunderclaps. The golden light that I mistook for the God-Emperor’s final mercy. ‘By who?’ I ask.

Lourette stops in her work and makes the sign of the aquila. Her bloody hands begin to shake, and the moment before she speaks seems long and charged, like the quiet before a storm breaks.

‘By Roboute Guilliman,’ she says softly. ‘The God-Emperor’s son is arisen.’

I feel blinded all over again at her words. Unable to catch my breath. My skin begins to burn as though I have a fever. I start to shake, too. From my core outwards.

The God-Emperor’s son.

‘Arisen,’ I say, because it is all that I can say.

Lourette nods. She does not try to prevent me when I pull away to make the sign of the aquila, too.

‘The primarch came from Terra, and brought with him a new crusade to wrest back what has been taken from us by flame and by sword. Countless warriors follow with him. The Adeptus Astartes. The Silent Sisterhood and the God-Emperor’s own Custodian Guard.’ Lourette takes a breath. Another awestruck smile pulls at her scarred face. ‘And our Sainted Sister.’

Her words settle slowly on me. The God-Emperor’s son arisen. The Silent Sisters and the God-Emperor’s watchmen treading the stars. Saint Celestine, returned.

‘It is a miracle,’ I say.

Lourette goes back to removing the bindings around my arms. She still has not looked at me directly. Another long moment passes before she speaks again.

‘I have heard the same word whispered about you, now and then,’ she says.

I blink. My eyelids are still sticking. ‘Why?’

‘Because of how they found you. Ablaze, but alive.’ Lourette finishes unwinding the bandage from my left arm and lets it drop onto a silvered tray in loops. ‘I have never known a soul to be burned the way you were and live, much less heal.’

I look down and see where my skin has run and set again from the touch of the warpfire. In places, I am patchworked to stark white, all of the pigment gone. There is no blood, though.

No pain.

‘And then there is the matter of the mark,’ Lourette says.

‘Which mark?’ I ask, because there are so many.

Lourette finally looks at me, then, and the expression on her face makes me wish she hadn’t. Her limpid eyes are wide with fervour.

‘You do not know,’ she says. ‘Of course you do not know.’

She stops her work and goes to fetch a mirror-glass from one of the equipment trays. She holds it up in front of my face, and I notice that her hands are trembling now too.

‘Do you see?’ Lourette asks.

I take the mirror-glass from her and look at my reflection, and the patchwork that the warpfire has made of my face. All of the pigment is gone from around my eyes and across my cheeks, leaving bright white streaks against my skin that almost look like wings.

‘It is the God-Emperor’s mark,’ Lourette says. ‘A blessing.’

I stare at my reflection. At the shape of the eagle, so clearly writ into my skin. It is the God-Emperor’s mark, just as Lourette says. A blessing.

‘Do you see it?’ she asks.

I nod, because I cannot speak. Because I can see the mark, but I cannot feel it. I cannot feel anything. I am nothing, and no one.

Just a heartbeat, in a hollow shell.

I realise that Lourette is still speaking, her words hurried by zeal.

‘The God-Emperor saw you, Evangeline,’ she says. ‘He sent His son to spare you. Graced you with His mark and His favour.’

I put the mirror-glass face down on the cot and ask Lourette the only question I can think to ask. The only one that matters.

‘And my Sisters?’

Lourette frowns, taken aback by my words, and the implied dismissal in them. ‘They were lost,’ she says. ‘All save for one.’

My thoughts slow to a crawl once more. It is all that I can do to ask her who survived, and Lourette’s frown only deepens when she says the name.

‘Ashava,’ she says.

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A Black Library Publication

First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

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