178. A Moment in Time
Vox and Guilliman ate in silence for a while.
“May I ask you something?”, Vox inquired.
“Go ahead.”
“Did you meet the Emperor face to face since you have been brought back?”
The Primarch looked up at her for a moment and very slowly laid the cutlery he had been holding aside.
“Yes”, he said.
Vox lowered her gaze.
“He didn’t speak, did he?”, she asked quietly.
“Not a word.”
“The light flickers.”
“And conveniently, here are you offering to bring him back…”
“Do you want to hear about the risks?”
“Sure”, he said, keeping a blank face. “Flesh it out. Try to become believable.”
Vox smiled.
“I don’t have to”, she pointed out. “You do believe me. You just fear that I will fail.”
“I’m made to know no fear.”
“Which only means that you can’t deal with it when it occurs”, she pronounced the merciless truth she had encountered so often now.
“Well done, my lady”, Guilliman said in a soft tone of voice. “Humble to cheeky in under five minutes.”
Vox grinned
“Sanguinius inquires if you haven’t missed it.”
Now, he could not hide his amused smile anymore.
“I have”, he conceded. “And I would like you to postpone the list for a while. I feel too good-humoured to hear it just now.”
“I’ll gladly grant you respite, my lord”, Vox declared. “Will your conscientiousness do the same?”
“Let’s see”, he suggested. “First, tell me how you got a gloriana class star cruiser into high orbit right over an unstable world.”
“There were several crucial factors involved in this”, she explained. “One was that we came into the possession of a dead STC fragment a while ago. It had a blueprint for a different kind of gellar field in it. Also, we were so lucky as to befriend a whole swarm of tech priests. I didn’t understand what exactly they did but apparently this improved version stabilises the ship to a degree that it is far easier to get close to large gravitational centres. Since Custos is quite far away from its sun, the operation wasn’t simple as such but possible. The last factors are our navigator and our captain. He’s a Rogue Trader by the name of Casimiré Nostromo and the best navigator I have ever seen. Captain Anjella, on the other hand, is the best when it comes to crazy manoeuvres with ridiculously large ships. He piloted us right into orbit and she made the ‘Bride’ turn so that we could launch the pods within half a minute.”
“How did you yourself get down?”
“By drop ship together with Aegis as soon as we entered real space. I left them in low orbit to seek out Abaddon.”
“I would have liked to know of your coming in advance”, he mentioned casually.
Vox grinned.
“Seven hundred Astartes of an unknown chapter? All of them women? I bet you would have liked to see that coming.”
“I see your point”, he said and smiled amusedly. “And I have to admit that I admire your thinking. Coming to my aid from a position where you could have just as easily stabbed me in the back shows your loyalty very distinctly.”
“So very distinctly that it is just too good to be true?”, she asked provocatively.
“Yes”, he replied in the same easy manner. “I also admire how you presented your throat to me. Bringing in only your flagship, giving me the coordinates of the rest of your fleet, surrendering said ship to me…”
“Coming towards you with only my Ultramarines, risking my life to keep you alive…”, she continued.
“And Titus gave me Tiberius and Ferone without flinching”, he added.
“And now, I’m sitting here alone”, she concluded. “Looks a bit like trying too hard, doesn’t it?”
“I’m not sure, you can be too hard on me.” He hesitated under the surprised lifting of her eyebrows. “Mh”, he said then. “That sounded better before it was spoken.” He cleared his throat and shifted uneasily. “I’m very interested to find that I seem to be able to say stupid things.”
“I trust in your ability to do anything”, Vox teased him.
He looked at her for a moment.
“I am fallible and I think I proved that beyond doubt.”
Vox said nothing, just watched as she gave the bittersweet sting of compassion space inside her. She had pulled him back to life against his will and here he was, struggling to come to terms with it. He swung between happiness and despondency like a pendulum. Torn between the hope she had brought and the despair that had held him in its claws for too long.
“I would be interested to learn about your chapter”, he declared. “Specifically, I’d like to know how you are possible. Because, technically, you aren’t.”
Vox sniggered.
“Yes, that’s what my apothecaries tell me as well. The working hypothesis is that we are men whose bodies don’t care.”
“Men who look like women?”
“Sure. Is that a crime?”
“It might be heresy”, he said flatly. “I’ll talk to the priests.”
“Yeah, right”, Vox said, rolling her eyes.
“What makes you think I’m joking?”, Guilliman asked but Sanguinius detected the hint of approval in his eyes.
“The fact that you have never attended a prayer, my lord”, Vox said calmly. “And that you can’t stand us worshipping you, much less worshipping your father as the god he never wanted to be. Want me to go on?”
“No, you’ve hit the nerve well enough”, he said and seamlessly went back to the topic at hand. “Sounds like a gene anomaly to me.”
“Your brother agrees”, Vox said and frowned in puzzlement while she shuffled through Sanguinius’ understanding of a complex world.
“And you know what he knows?”, Guilliman inquired politely.
“I’m having trouble believing most of it”, she admitted. “But, yes.”
The Primarch chuckled. It was a pleasant noise Vox noted on the side.
“I would like to take you to Mars and have the biologi look at you.”
“Gladly”, Vox said. “We have survival rates of over two thirds. I’m told that this is exceptional.”
“It is!”, Guilliman confirmed and actually showed a little surprise.
“This comes with an extensive selection process though.”
“Of what nature?”
“I don’t know”, Vox said. “I just know that we have an entire caste of priests, wandering the Jericho Reach to find us. I can give you access to all the knowledge our chapter has collected so far.”
“But?”, Guilliman prompted, picking up on the way she hesitated.
“I would like to ask a favour in return”, Vox conceded. “The Wings of War were founded after the Jericho Reach was cut off. We never were authorised by Terra. I want us to become legal before anyone seriously poses the question of heresy.”
“I might be able to arrange that on Terra”, he said cautiously.
Vox nodded.
“Consider it my legacy. I don’t think I’ll survive Terra but I want my sisters to go on fighting after I’m gone.”
The Primarch cocked his head and watched her closely. Suddenly, Vox felt noticed. Just like she felt for him, he picked up on her troubles and concerns. It was odd to see that in a stranger.
“If you’re already there, you might as well tell me”, he said softly.
“I will be able to provide details a few days before we reach Terra”, she informed him. “Together with Sanguinius I can technically see that far but with a warp jump in between, there are simply too many possibilities and timelines yet.”
He nodded, watching her attentively.
“What I can tell you right now, however, is that I will rip open a rift when I try to revive the Emperor.”
Guilliman watched her for a long time.
“It seems to me that you really think, I’ll help you”, he stated. “Don’t you think concealing that fact from me would have improved your chances?”
“I don’t want to lie to you”, Vox said truthfully. Concealing a certain other fact was weighing heavily enough on her mind. “I’ll welcome and support any other plan that might be forthcoming”, she added meekly. “But so far, I don’t think we have much of a choice. He is dying.”
Vox was eternally grateful that he spared them both the denial of this statement. Having Titus disbelieving her when he had found her in the cave, had been bad enough. Had the Primarch closed his eyes to this reality, she would not have known how to react.
“So, you’ll exchange more than just your life for his?”, Guilliman asked, meaning that a rift opening in the palace on Terra would claim tens of thousands of lives.
“To say that I’d do anything to get the Emperor back is a lie”, Vox replied quietly. “But everything this side of corruption I will aspire to. I will sacrifice myself, my loved ones, every warrior and person even remotely willing to follow me and everyone in the way. All I can say is that I’d prefer that order.”
He looked at her and his face had gone hard and cold. His dark-blue eyes watched her intently.
“I’ve met someone like you once.”
“Who was that?”, Vox inquired, even though she and Sanguinius both had a very clear idea of who he was talking about.
The Primarch looked away.
“I will not say his name”, he said. “My lady, that’s a dangerous path you are walking.”
“Yes”, she said simply. “And now that you know, you’re on it right beside me. You heard what I want from you.”
“Everything I hear and see is meant to convince me that I can trust you”, he said and there was bitterness in his features. “How far will you lead this dance?”
“Until you are convinced or decide otherwise”, she said.
“And you will gladly die if I do so?”, he snapped.
“Yes”, she replied calmly.
Guilliman’s unwavering gaze rested on her in silence for a long time. Finally, Vox stood up under this gaze and came around the table. Had his eyes been hard and repulsive before, now something in their expression called her closer. He was so controlled, so strong, so composed and still, she could see the cracks all over him. Not only for the things she had felt in him and not only because Sanguinius knew his brother. There was a feeling about this Primarch. A black, leaden despair that burned under her skin and swept through her soul like the frost of a thousand lonely nights under the uncaring stars.
Standing next to him, she was only a little taller than he was sitting down. He looked up at her.
“I find myself wanting to trust you”, he said and his tones and face were under full control. “Your promises are good. They are precise and garnished with enough blood and despair to sound realistic. I want to believe that.”
Vox reached out. First, she laid a hand on his shoulder then, she came closer and very slowly and gently took him into an embrace. He did not resist or comment, just slung his mighty arms around her and closed his eyes while he pressed his ear to her sternum.
“You don’t have to decide now”, she said quietly.
“But there is nothing to decide”, he mumbled. “He is dying and nobody has come up with anything else.”
The breakdown Guilliman allowed himself was so quiet it hardly counted. He shivered for a moment and grabbed her a little tighter. That was all there was outwardly but Vox was too close to ignore the storm inside him. The endless strain, the abysmal dismay. The mere thought to pick up the pieces of a smashed empire yet again was unbearable already. The conviction that this time there would be too few pieces left exceeded it ten fold. Vox endured as best she could but for a moment her breath condensed in the air before she had regained control.
When they let go of each other she sank down on the sofa next to him. Rubbing her face revealed that she had shed a few tears under the strain. Wearily she tried to sort out her wings. Her slightly clumsy shifting made them both laugh and this made the tension subside a little.
“How good are your chances to survive?”, he asked after a while without looking at her.
“Not my first concern I have to admit”, she said with a shrug.
He leaned his elbows on his knees and looked down.
“The fire will die, the moment will pass, the brothers I knew will be dead”, he said as if reciting something.
“Leman Russ featuring a barrel of fenrisian ale after the Horus Heresy?”, Vox guessed without thinking about it.
Now, he turned to her and blinked a few times, emerging from wherever he had been.
“So, you can read minds without the fire?”, he inquired after a while.
“What? Yes, but… I didn’t try to… You’re telling me, I’m right?”, she asked in surprise.
“There probably was more than one barrel of ale involved”, Guilliman said. “Otherwise you are correct.”
“Oh.” She blinked, shuffling through Sanguinius’ memories of the Primarch of the Space Wolves. “That’s rather… something between sobering and intriguing. May I hear all of it?”
Guilliman closed his eyes and recited:
“I see the light dawning the battle is won,
The dead seem to wave their goodbye.
What we have called living, it is truly gone,
This knowledge, I cannot defy.
Everything rising it must rightly fall,
What’s blooming, it will soon decay.
I may be victorious but still overall,
What’s left here is bitter dismay.
The fire will die, the moment will pass,
The brothers I knew will be dead.
The dream of the future will shatter like glass.
It ends up in rivers of red.
This is but a moment, a moment in time,
A burden to silently bear.
The only thing left, that is certainly mine:
Is the hope that the path leads somewhere.”
Vox stared at nothing with stalled breath. Carried by Guilliman’s deep, vibrant tones the words of the poem had struck a chord inside her. She felt them like hearing a scream from afar. A desperate cry for connections lost, for warmth that had dwindled and she wanted to answer. She wanted to call out, wanted to make herself heard. She wanted to resonate out into the world to tell the writer that he was not alone after all but she knew too well that this was what a psyker could do only once.
When she raised her gaze, she found the Primarch watching her closely. There was a severity and sorrow in his face that should not have surprised her but it did affect her anew.
“One day”, Guilliman said. “A while after the battle for Terra, a few papers had gone missing from my desk in the palace. Leman was the only one who could have taken them. I confronted him and demanded them back.”
“He was calm, wasn’t he?”, Vox asked and thought of Corven. The rune priest, who never read or wrote if he could possibly help it, dived into deep wells of silence when he wrote his songs and the calmness he found there, emerged with him when he returned.
“Yes, incredibly so”, Guilliman confirmed. “We had always quarrelled but at this moment he was calm. He just looked at me, gave me the papers and walked away without a word. He had scribbled the poem on the back of them.” He paused. “I… Never told anyone about this.”
“Did you talk to him about it?”, Vox wanted to know insistently. Too occupied with all the emotions she had heard echoing in the words of the poem, she ignored this confession of confidence.
“No”, he said, curling up a bit while he shook his head. “We didn’t talk much in any case and I didn’t know what to make of it.”
Vox found nothing to say. In the desperation of holding on to something, she grasped Guilliman’s hand.
When he looked at her, for the first time she faced unconcealed emotion. Sorrow and regret and shame. Harbingers of a broken heart on the verge of transforming into helpless anger.
“Tell me, what you are thinking”, he demanded and squeezed her hand as if everything depended on this.
Vox struggled for words.
“I think you should have asked this of your brother, my lord”, she said very quietly.
“There… wasn’t time…”, he replied aggravatedly.
“No, of course not”, she conceded sadly. Carefully, she rubbed over his muscular digits enveloped in hers. “You had at least as much on your hands as he had. Still. I… would have wished for the two of you…”
“What?”, he prompted hoarsely.
“That you had found a moment in time.”
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Guide Me Through the Darkness by Julia M. V. Warren is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.