Lucius laughed as he remembered Solomon Demeter's death. 'Demeter is dead, of that I am certain.'

'How can you be so sure?'

'Because I killed him,' said Lucius. 'He happened upon me when I was despatching the warriors assigned to defend the eastern ruins of the palace and happily joined in when I shouted to him that I was under attack.'

Eidolon smirked as he understood. 'You mean Demeter killed his own men?'

'Indeed he did,' said Lucius, 'with great gusto.'

Eidolon let out a burst of laughter, and Lucius could feel the lord commander's attitude thaw a fraction at the irony of Solomon Demeter's final moments.

'And Ancient Rylanor?' asked Eidolon, leading him further along the Gallery of Swords to the entrance to the apothecarion.

'I don't know for sure about that,' said Lucius. 'After the bombing, he took himself off into the depths of the Precentor's Palace. I never saw him again.'

'Not like Rylanor to run from a fight,' noted Eidolon, turning a corner and marching down a parchment lined corridor that led to the grand staircase of the ship's central apothecarion.

'No,' agreed Lucius, 'though Tarvitz did say something about him guarding something.'

'Guarding what?'

'He didn't say. Rumour was he'd found some kind of underground hangar, but if that were the case, then why didn't Praal use it to escape when the Legions arrived?'

'True,' agreed Eidolon. 'It is the nature of the coward to flee rather than fight. Well, no matter, whatever Rylanor's purpose, it is irrelevant, for he is buried beneath thousands of tonnes of radioactive slag.'

Lucius nodded and gestured down the stairs. 'Apothecary Fabius… what exactly is he going to do to me?'

'Is that fear I hear in your voice, Lucius?' asked Eidolon.

'No,' said Lucius, 'I just want to know what I am letting myself in for'

'Perfection,' promised Eidolon.

The corridors of the Pride of the Emperor were never quiet now, hastily rigged mesh speakers blaring a constant cacophony of sound from La Venice. After hearing a taster of the Maraviglia's overture, Fulgrim had commanded that his vessels be filled with music, and the weirdly distorted recordings of Bequa Kyn-ska's symphonies echoed along every hallway, day and night.

Serena d'Angelus made her way along the dazzlingly bright corridors of Fulgrim's flagship, lurching from side to side like a drunk, her clothes stained with blood and ordure. The remains of her long hair were greasy, and matted clumps of it had been torn out in her ravings.

With the completion of the paintings of Lucius and Fulgrim, she had found herself without inspiration, as though the fire that had driven her to undreamt of highs and lows had burnt itself out. Days passed without her moving from her studio, and the months since the expedition had arrived in the Isstvan system had passed in a blur of catatonia and horrified introspection.

Dreams and nightmares had played out in her head like badly cut pict-reels, images of horrors and degradation she hadn't known she was capable of visualising, tormenting her with their intensity and hideousness. Scenes of murders, violations, desecrations and things so vile that surely a human being was incapable of indulging in them without losing their sanity, played out before her like some madman's fever dreams laid out for her unwilling scrutiny.

Occasionally she remembered to eat, not recognising the wild, feral woman she saw in the mirror or the scarred flesh that greeted her every morning when she awoke, naked in the ruin of her studio. Over the weeks the suspicion grew in her mind that the repeated visions that plagued her in the night were not simply delusions… They were memories.

She remembered weeping bitter tears as her suspicions were terrifyingly confirmed the day she had opened the stinking barrel in the corner of the studio.

A reek of decomposing human meat and acidic chemicals hit her like a blow, and the lid clattered to the floor as she saw the gooey, partially dissolved remains of at least six corpses. Smashed skulls, sawn bones and a thick soup of liquefying flesh sloshed around the barrel, and Serena vomited uncontrollably for several minutes at the horror of the sight.

She dragged herself away from the barrel and wept piteously as the full abhorrence of what she had done threatened to overwhelm her already fraying sanity.

Her mind had teetered on the brink of madness until a name had surfaced in the miasma of her consciousness, a name that gave her an anchor to cling to: Ostian… Ostian… Ostian…

Like a drowning woman clutching at a branch, she had pulled herself to her feet, cleaned herself up as best she could and stumbled, weeping and bloody, towards Ostian's studio. He had tried to help her and she had rejected him, seeing now the love that had motivated his altruism and cursing herself for not realising it sooner.

Ostian could save her. As she reached the shutter to his studio, she only hoped he had not forsaken her. The shutter was partially open and she slammed her palm against the corrugated metal.

'Ostian!' she cried. 'It's me, Serena… please… let me in!'

Ostian did not reply, and she beat her hands bloody on the shutter, screaming his name and sobbing as she cried and begged for his forgiveness. Still there was no reply, and in desperation she reached down and lifted the shutter.

Serena stumbled into the dimly lit studio, detecting a dreadful, familiar smell even before her exhausted eyes made out the loathsome sight before her.

'Oh, no,' she whispered as she saw the grisly sight of Ostian's body impaled upon a glittering sword blade protruding from a wondrous sculpture of the Emperor.

She dropped to her knees before him and screamed, 'Forgive me! I didn't know what I was doing! Oh, please forgive me, Ostian!'

What remained of Serena's mind finally buckled and collapsed inwards at this latest atrocity. She pushed herself to her feet and placed her hands on Ostian's shoulders.

'You loved me,' she whispered, 'and I never saw it.'

Serena closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around Ostian's corpse, feeling the sharp tip of the sword between her breasts.

'But I loved you too,' she said, and pulled herself hard onto the sword blade.

TWENTY-TWO

World of Death

The Trap is Set

Maraviglia

Isstvan V had been, so the exterminated Isstvanian myth-makers believed, a place of exile. Stories told that, in a time consigned to legend, Father Isstvan himself had sung the world into being with music for his Warsingers to hear and interpret. Father Isstvan was, it seemed, a fertile god and had spread his seed far and wide across the stars, nameless mothers bearing him countless children with which he had populated the first ages of the world.

Such allegorical concepts became night and day, the seas and the land, and countless other aspects of the world in which the Isstvanians lived. Within the Sirenhold, great towers and enormous murals had told these legends in great detail: intricate dramas of love, betrayal, death and blood, but these were gone forever, burned and pounded to oblivion by the Warmaster's bombardment.

Such wrath was no stranger to the myths of Isstvan, which told of the children of Father Isstvan who turned from his light and led their hosts against their benevolent sire. A terrible war followed. The Lost Children, as they came to be known, were finally defeated in a great battle and their armies destroyed. Instead of slaying his wayward children, Father Isstvan banished them to Isstvan V, a desolate place of black deserts and ashen wastelands.

Upon this nightmarish place of darkness, the Lost Children were said to brood upon their expulsion from paradise, bitterness twisting their beautiful countenances until no man could look upon them without revulsion. These monstrosities were said to dwell in cyclopean fortresses of black stone where they dreamed of returning to wreak vengeance on their enemies.