Fear And Fire Part 2

'It is not our place to question their ways. said Miriya. 'The Ecclesiarchy works to ensure that the veneration of the G.o.d-Emperor meshes with the doctrine of each and every planet. Some distasteful anomalies of belief are inevitable.'

'Fortunate then that our order is here to show the Nevans the way'

'I have never believed in fortune,' Miriya said dis-tantly. 'Faith is enough.'

'Not enough to find Vaun. replied Ca.s.sandra in a morose voice. 'He tricked us, played us for fools.

Miriya looked at her squadmate. 'Aye. But do not punish yourself, Sister. Canoness Galatea will wish to reserve that pleasure.

'You know her of old, yes?'

A nod. 'She was once my Sister Superior as I am yours. An unparalleled warrior and a true credit to the legacy of Saint Katherine, but perhaps a touch too inflexible for my liking. We would often dis-agree on matters of our credo.

Ca.s.sandra could not keep the fear from her voice. What do you think will become of us?'

There will be a cost for our lapse, of that you may have no doubt. Inwardly, Miriya was already rehearsing the plea she would enter, offering to fall on her sword and take all the blame for Vaun's escape rather than drag Ca.s.sandra, Portia, Isabel and poor Iona down with her.

Her Sister gripped the edge of the stone battle-ments tightly, as if she could squeeze an answer from them.

'This apostate torments me, Sister Supe-rior. By the Throne, how could he have simply vanished into thin air? The escape pod Vaun stole from the Mercutio was found on the commerce sta-tion, witnesses saw him there. But the only ship he could have been on was that rattletrap scow we boarded. She shook her head. 'Perhaps... perhaps he hides still on the orbital platform? Waiting for a warp-capable craft to leave?'

'No. Miriya pointed at the ground. 'Sub-orbital craft are plentiful on the station. Vaun took one and madeplanetfall. He came here. It is the only expla-nation.

'To Neva? But that makes no sense. The man is a fugitive, his face is infamous on every world in this system. Any rational person would find the first route out of this sub-sector as fast as possible.

'It makes sense to Vaun, Sister. The witch's arro-gance is so towering that he believes he can hide in plain sight. Mark me well, I tell you that Torris Vaun never had any intention of escaping from Neva. He wanted to come here.

Ca.s.sandra shook her head. 'Why? Why take such a risk of discovery?'

The sun dropped away behind the Shield Moun-tains and Miriya turned from the balcony. When we learn the answer to that, we will find him. She beck-oned her Battle Sister. 'Come. The Canoness will be waiting.

The boat rode in the swell, making good speed across the narrows, the lights of Noroc long since vanished over the stern. The first mate rose into the untidy flying bridge and gave the sailor on watch a jut of the chin, like a nod.

'Asleep. he whispered, and the sailor knew who he meant. 'Fast asleep but still I'm adrift around him.

The sailor licked his dry lips, chancing a look back through the open hatch at the shape beyond, hid-den under the rough-hewn blankets. The atmosphere on the little fishing cutter had turned stale and leaden the moment they'd taken the pas-senger aboard. Wish I could sleep. he muttered. 'Men been getting bad dreams since we left port, is what they say. Seeing things. Reckon he's a witchkin, I do.

The first mate blinked owlishly. He was tired too. 'Don't you be saying what you're thinking. Keep a course and stay silent, lad. Better that way. Get us there quick-like, all be gone and over.

'Oh aye-' The words died in the sailor's parched throat. Out of the windscreen, across the bow of the cutter, there was a dark shape rising from the ocean.

A razormaw, ugly as Chaos and twice as hungry. He'd never seen a fish so large, not even a deader like in the docker pubs where big stuffed heads and jawbones decorated the walls.

The sailor threw the wheel about in a panic, turn-ing the boat on a hard arc away from the razormaw's grinning mouth. Ice water pooled in his gut. The thing was going to swallow them whole.

You wastrel throwback, what are ye doing?' The first mate smacked him hard about the temple and shoved him away from the helm. Trying to capsize us?'

'But the razor-' he began, stabbing his finger at the sea. 'Do you not see it?'

'See what? There's nothing out there but ocean, boy'

The sailor pressed his face to the window. No razormaw floated, arch-backed and ready to chew the boat apart. There were only the waves, rising and falling. He spun about, glaring at the sleeping man alone on the cot. For a moment, he thought he heard soft, mocking laughter.

"Witchkin. repeated the sailor.

As the rituals demanded, each of them surren-dered their weapons to a grey-robed novice before they entered the chapel. The noviciates were just girls, barely out of the schola progenium on Ophe-lia VII, and they sagged beneath the weight of the heavy firearms. As Celestians, and with that rank, privileged, Sister Miriya and her unit were gifted with superior, master-crafted guns that resembled a votive icon more than a battlefield weapon, but as with all elements of the Adepta Sororitas's equip-ment, from the power armour that protected them to their chainswords and Exorcist tanks, every piece of the order's machinery was as much a holy shrine as the place in which they now stood.

The convent's chapel was high and wide, encom-pa.s.sing several floors of the building's sh.e.l.l keep design.

Up above, where the pipes of the organ ended and biolume pods hovered on suspensors, cherubim moved in lazy circuits, handing notes to one another as they pa.s.sed, the sapphire of their optic implants glittering in the lamplight.

The four women advanced across the chancel to where their seniors awaited them, falling as one into a kneeling position before the vast stone cross-and-skull that dominated the chapel altar.

'In the name of Katherine and the Golden Throne,' they intoned, 'we are the willing daughters of the G.o.d-Emperor. Command us to do His bidding.

It was customary for the senior Battle Sister pre-sent to let the new arrivals stand after the ritual invocation, but Galatea did not. Instead, she stepped forward from the pulpit and took up a place before the altar. Her dark eyes flashed amid the frame of her auburn hair. 'Sister Superior Miriya. When Prioress Lydia informed me that it would be your Celestians bringing the witch to us, I confess I was surprised. Surprised that so sensitive a prisoner be given to a woman of your reputation.'

Miriya spoke without looking up. 'Sister Lydia showed great faith in me.

'She did. Galatea let the breach of protocol go unmentioned. 'How shameful for her now, given your unforgivable lapse of judgement aboard the Mercutio!'I...' Miriya took a shuddering breath. 'There is no excuse. The culpability is mine alone to shoul-der, Canoness. I had the opportunity to terminate the psyker Vaun and I chose not to. His escape falls to me.'

'It does.' Galatea's cold, strong voice echoed in the chapel's heavy air. 'You have lived a charmed life, Sister Miriya. Circ.u.mstances have always con-spired to save you from the small transgressions you have made in the past, minor as they were. But this... I ask you, Sister. What would you do, if you were me?'

After a moment she replied. 'I would not pre-sume to have the wisdom for such a thing, Canoness.

Galatea showed her teeth in an icy smile. 'How very well said, Miriya. And now I find myself on the horns of a dilemma. A dangerous warlock is loose on this world and I need every able-bodied Battle Sister I can field to corral him yet the more severe interpretations of our doctrines would seem to insist that you be made to atone. Perhaps in the most final of ways.

Miriya looked up, defiant. 'If the Emperor wills.

The Canoness leaned forward and her voice dropped to a whisper. 'You do presume, Miriya. You always have.

'Then kill me for it, but spare my Sisters.

Galatea gave a grim smile. 'I'm not going to make you a martyr. That would excuse you, and I am not in a forgiving mood...'

The rest of the Canoness's words were lost in a sud-den crash of sound as the chapel doors slammed open.

A commotion spilled into the room as a troop of armsmen and clerics marched through. At their head was a tall rail of a man, draped in fine silks and priestly regalia. Red and white purity seals hung off him like the medals of a soldier, and the rage on his face matched the crimson of his robes. In one fist he clasped a heavy tome bound in rosaries, in the other there was the clattering blade of a gunmetal chainsword, the adamantine teeth spinning and ready.

Which of them is the one?' he bellowed, pointing across the book at Miriya's squad. Which of these wenches is the fool who lost me my prize?'

Galatea held out a hand to stop him, her face tight with annoyance. 'Lord LaHayn, you forget yourself. This is a place of worship. Shoulder your weapon!'

You dare defy me?' The high priest's colour dark-ened, the mitre on his head bobbing.

'Aye. Galatea shot back. 'This place is the sacred house of Saint Katherine and the G.o.d-Emperor. I should not need to remind you of that!'

There was a moment when LaHayn's wiry muscles bunched around the sword, as if he were preparing to strike but in the next the anger dropped from him and he stiffly forced the blade into the hands of a subordinate dean at his side. Yes, yes. he said, after a long silence. 'Forgive me, Canoness. I allowed my baser instincts to overrule the better angels of my nature.' He gave a low bow that was echoed by all of his retinue. When he came up, he was looking into Galatea's eyes with a piercing, steely gaze. 'My ques-tion, however, still stands. You will answer it.'

Vaun's escape is not so simple a matter that it can be laid at the feet of these women. said the Canoness, each word carefully balanced and with-out weight. 'An investigation must take place.

'The enforcers have begun an a.n.a.lysis. noted the dean.

Galatea ignored him, concentrating on LaHayn. This cannot be left to the enforcers or the Imperial Navy.

Torris Vaun was the responsibility of the Adepta Sororitas, and we will find him.

The priest-lord's gaze drifted to Miriya and her troops. 'Unsatisfactory. While I applaud your deter-mination to amend the oversights of your Battle Sisters, necessity demands consequences. He took a step forward.

'In all things. Did not Celestine's arrival teach us that?' LaHayn smoothly shifted into a mode of speech better suited to a church ma.s.s with the common folk. This is a universe of laws. Actions beget reactions.

For all things, there are costs and penalties. His lined, hard face loomed over Galatea. There must be reciprocity.

'Lord deacon, I would ask that you speak plainly. The Canoness did not flinch from his gaze.

LaHayn showed a thin smile. The few survivors of the witch's escape, the man Vorgo and the others, they are to be taken to the excruciators to become object lessons. It occurs to me that perhaps a con-trite Battle Sister should join them, as an example of your order's devotion.

'One of my kinswomen has already perished in the unfolding of this sorry matter. snapped Galatea. "You would ask me to give you another?'

The dead one... Sister Lethe, yes? She is the most blameless of all, falling in honourable conflict to the heretic. Her sacrifice is not enough.

Miriya began to rise to her feet. 'I shall-'

'You will kneel, Sister!' The voice of the Canoness hammered about the chamber like a cannon shot, andby sheer force it pushed Miriya to her knees once more. Galatea's expression hardened. 'My Sisters are the most precious resource of my order, and I will not squander them to appease your displeasure, my lord priest.

'Then what will you do, Sister Galatea?' He demanded.

Finally, the Canoness looked away. 'I will give you your sacrifice. She gestured to her aide, a veteran Sororitas. 'Sister Reiko. Summon Sister Iona.

A gasp of surprise slipped from Portia's lips and Miriya shot her a look to silence her, but in truth, the Sister Superior was just as shocked to hear their errant squadmate's name spoken. From the dim shade of a sub-chancel, the woman called Reiko returned with Iona following behind. Her pale face looked down at the floor, her hair lank and unkempt. She seemed like a faint ghost of her former self, a faded copy worn thin through age and neglect.

In the aftermath of Vaun's escape, it was Isabel who had found lona alone in the cargo decks of th Mercutio. Her eyes were faraway and vacant, and th cool, intense will she had always shown in the Emperor's service was gone. Iona's physical injuries were slight, but her mental state... That was a raw, gaping wound, ragged and bleeding where the psyker had pillaged her mind to exercise his powers. It was not until much later that Miriya had under-stood what the witch had been doing when he casually despoiled Iona's psyche. Vaun had used her to test the gallows, and left her alive as a warning.

None of them had expected to see lona again. Her bouts of uncontrolled weeping and self-mutilation marked her as irreparably broken. Yet here she stood, still clad in her wargear. iVhat is this?' LaHayn asked. Tell him. said Galatea.

lona looked up and blinked. 'I... I am far from absolution. Lost to any exculpation. I offer myself to repentance.

'No...' Miriya was surprised by the denial that fell from her mouth. At her side, Portia's hand flew to her lips. Only Ca.s.sandra dared to whisper the terri-ble truth that all of them suddenly realised. 'She is invoking the Oath of the Penitent...' lona shrugged off her red robe and let it drop to the stone floor in a heap. Behind her, Sister Reiko silently gathered it up, never once looking upon the other woman as she trembled.

'Before the Emperor I have sinned. Iona's voice found a brittle strength and swelled to fill the chapel. 'Beyond forgiveness. Beyond forbearance. She blinked back tears. 'Beyond mercy.

Miriya looked to the Canoness, a pleading expres-sion on her face. Galatea gave her a tiny nod and the Celestians came to their feet, moving to surround lona. All of them knew the pattern of the ritual by heart.

Miriya, Portia, Ca.s.sandra and Isabel each took an item of Iona's wargear and armour, detaching it and casting it aside. As one they spoke the next verse of the catechism. "We turn our backs upon you. We cast off your armour and your arms.

'I leave this company of my own free will. lona continued, 'and by my will shall I return. Behind her, Reiko used a rough-hewn blade to rip the Sister's discarded robe into strips that Portia and Isabel tied over Iona's bare arms and legs. Ca.s.sandra strung barbed expiation chains across her torso and pressed seals bearing the words of the oath into her stripped tunic. 'I shall seek the Emperor's forgiveness in the darkest places of the night. intoned the woman.

Sister Reiko bent forward with the knife and reached for a hank of Iona's hair, but Miriya took the blade from her with a stony countenance. The Sister Superior leaned close and whispered in her friend's ear.

'You do not have to do this.

lona looked back at her. 'I must. With just one touch he hollowed me out, did such horrific things... I cannot rest until I cleanse myself.

Miriya nodded once and said the next stanza aloud. 'When forgiveness is yours, we shall welcome you back. With sharp, hard motions, she cut off Iona's straw-coloured tresses until her scalp was bare and dashed with shallow scratches. 'Until such time you are nameless to us.

With that, the oath was sealed, and the Battle Sis-ters took two steps back before turning away from her.

Miriya was the last to do so, gripping the paring knife in her hand.

'See me and do not see. Iona sighed, speaking the final verse. 'Know me and know fear, for I have no face today but this one. I stand before you a Sister Repentia, until absolution finds me once more.

'So shall it be. Galatea bowed her head, and all others in the chapel did the same. Iona walked past them all, into the stewardship of a lone Battle Mis-tress at the chapel doors. The Mistress carried a pair of matched neural whips that crackled and hummed with deadly power. In her hand she held a ragged red hood. Iona donned it, and then they were gone.

LaHayn broke the silence with a grunt of content-ment. 'Not quite the price I would have demanded, but it will do. He gave a shallow bow and snapped his fingers to summon the dean. 'Until the Blessing, then, Canoness?'Galatea returned his bow. 'Until then, lord dea-con. His light be with you.

'And you. The priest's delegation filed out, leaving the Battle Sisters alone again.

The Canoness made a dismissive gesture. 'Leave me now. I will deal with your dispensation later.

The rest of the Celestians did as they were com-manded, but Miriya remained, still kneading the grip of the knife. 'Iona was unfit to take the oath. she said without preamble. 'It is a death sentence for her.

Galatea s.n.a.t.c.hed the blade from her grip. 'Fool! She saved your life with her sacrifice, woman. You and all your unit.

'It is not right.

'It was her choice. Willingly taking up the mantle of the Repentia is a rarity, you know that. Even Lord LaHayn could not deny the piety and strength of zeal Iona showed today. Her gesture casts away any doubt on the devoutness of your squad and our order...' Galatea looked away. 'And what other path was open to her? After suffering so terribly at the hands of that monster... Honourable death was her only option.

What did Vaun do to her?' Miriya swallowed hard. Even thinking about such a thing made her feel ill. What horrors must he have conjured to breach her shield of faith?'

The witch's way sees into the very core of a human soul. It finds the flaws that all of us hide and cracks them wide open. Pity your Sister, Miriya, and pray to Katherine that you never have to face what she did.

When she was alone, Miriya knelt before the altar and offered up an entreaty to the Saints and the G.o.d-Emperor to keep Iona safe. To become a Sister Repentia was to throw away all thought of survival and fight possessed by a righteous pa.s.sion. Ushered into battle by the whips of the harsh Mistress, the Repentia were the fiercest and most brutal of the Battle Sisters. Enemies lived in dread of their fearless a.s.saults as their mighty eviscerator chainblades blazed through heretic lines, and only in death or forgiveness would their duty to the Emperor end. Some said that they lived in a state of grace that all aspired to reach, yet few had the purity of heart to attain. Each day, each breath for these women was an act of self-punishment and penance in honour of the Golden Throne - and they turned their right-eousness into a weapon as keen as their killing swords.

Miriya had seen the Repentia on the field of battle in the past, but she had never expected to count one of her own among them. The purity of Iona's sacri-fice stabbed at her heart; it would take much to prove herself worthy of it. The Sister Superior resolved then and there that Torris Vaun would be brought to justice, or she would forfeit her life in the attempt.

CHAPTER THREE.

The hatch fell open like a drawbridge, allowing a perfumed gust of Neva's pre-dawn air to sweep in and scour the transport's cargo bay. The shuttle pilot eyed the three women standing on the lip of the hatch and rubbed at his face. He was wondering if there was some sort of special dispensation he could get from the Blessing for carrying Adepta Sororitas down from orbit. There had to be a little value to it, he reasoned.

They were holy women, after all. That had to count for something towards his yearly t.i.thes.

The tallest of the three, the ebony-skinned one with the curly hair, gave him a warning glance with her dark eyes. The pilot was smart enough to read it and pretended to make himself busy with a cargo web that was hanging loose. Better to let them complete their business without interfering. When she turned away again, the pilot stole another look at the trio. They had kept to themselves all the way down, talking in hushed voices at the back of the compartment while he had navigated the flight corridors to Noroc's port complex. Now and then, the winsome-looking one with the brown hair would sob a little, and the other one, tawny of face and elegant - by his lights, the prettiest of the three - would comfort her with whispers.