'So, what were you before?' asked a low voice in a conspiratorial whisper, after the overseer had moved on.
Varnus glanced surreptitiously at the man next to him. They were now chained together, since the poor soul who had been chained in between them had just been dragged off. He thought that he recognised the man from somewhere, but he couldn't place the face.
'Enforcer,' said Varnus quietly.
'You got a name?' whispered the man.
'Varnus.' A whistle blew, and the slave gangers pushed themselves to their feet. 'Yours?' he risked, whispering.
'Pierlo,' said the man quietly.
Marduk was first off the Thunderhawk, striding purposefully down the assault ramp as it was lowered from the stubbed nose of the gunship. He removed his helmet and breathed in deeply. The air was thick with pollution, smoke and the taint of Chaos, and he smiled. Much had changed since he had left the city of Shinar.
For the past weeks he had been engaged against various PDF armies far from the city, ensuring that there was no military power upon the planet with the strength to launch a counter-attack against the Word Bearers. While there were still dozens of areas of resistance scattered across the planet, there was no single force that would prove a threat.
The skies were scarred with dust and smog, and the first cautious rumbles of thunder rolled across the marred heavens. The fires of industry were burning fiercely in the city below.
The palace had changed. The spires and towers that had once formed the silhouette of the bastion had been ripped down, replaced with brutal spikes and barbed uprights, and corpses were strung up all over them. Marduk saw that the skinless forms of the kathartes, the daemonic, cadaverous furies that accompanied the Host, were perched amongst the corpses. The vicious harpies screeched and fought amongst themselves for the prime perches. The powerful air defence turrets had been returned to activation, and they scanned the heavens. That was good: it would not be long before the Imperial fleet arrived.
Purple-red veins pulsed beneath the surface of the once plain, pale grey, plascrete walls of the upper bastion, and Marduk was pleased to see the symbols of all the great gods of Chaos artfully painted in blood on the walls of the galleries he passed through.
He nodded to the honour guard flanking the vast glass doors, and walked past them out onto the large, opulent balcony. Jarulek, surveying the ruin of a city below, did not acknowledge his approach.
Marduk strode to the Dark Apostle's side and knelt down beside him, his head lowered. After a moment, Jarulek placed his hand upon the kneeling warrior's head.
'The blessings of the dark gods of the Immaterium upon you, my First Acolyte. Rise,' said the Dark Apostle. 'You return having accomplished that which I requested,' he said. There was no hint of a question in the remark, since there would be no need for Marduk to return had he not completed the task appointed him.
'There is no fighting force upon Tanakreg that can interrupt the preparations, my lord,' said Marduk. 'I bring with me near to five hundred thousand additional slaves to aid in the construction.'
'Good. The slaves of this planet are weak. More than a thousand of them perish every day.'
'The Imperials are all weak,' said Marduk emphatically. 'We will smash those soon to arrive, as we smashed the pitiful resistance on this planet.'
'I have faith that you are correct, we will smash these new arrivals. Individually they are weak, yes,' said Jarulek, 'but together, they are not so. It is only through division that we weaken them. This is why we must always propagate the cults. When the Imperium fears the enemies within its own cities, that is when it is the most vulnerable.'
'I understand, my lord,' said Marduk, 'though I do not believe that your Coryphaus sees it so?'
'Kol Badar does not need to. He is the warlord of the Host, and he fulfils that role perfectly. Rarely has the Legion seen such a warrior and strategos,' he said, turning his disconcerting gaze towards Marduk for the first time since they began speaking. 'He brought in well over a million slaves from his attacks against the cities in the north, you know,' said Jarulek softly, watching his First Acolyte carefully. 'He is and always will be a better warrior than you.'
Marduk tried to remain composed, but his jaw clenched slightly. He saw the dark amusement in Jarulek's eyes. The Dark Apostle kept watching him, seeming to Marduk to enjoy making him feel uncomfortable, as he always did.
'You still feel the shame, don't you?' asked Jarulek, cruelly.
'I could have beaten him,' said Marduk, 'if you had given me the chance.'
Jarulek laughed softly, a bitter, cruel sound. 'We both know that is a lie,' he said.
Marduk clenched his fists, but he did not refute the Dark Apostle.
Jarulek placed a forceful hand on one of Marduk's battle-worn shoulder pads and turned him towards the view over the rained city.
'Beautiful, is it not? The first stones of the tower have been laid, the ground consecrated with the death of a thousand and one heathens, and the blood mortar is setting. The tower will breach the heavens, the gods will be pleased, and this world will be turned inside out.' He turned towards Marduk, a hungry smile on his scripture covered lips. 'The time draws near. "As Sanguine Orb waxes strong and Pillar of Clamour rises high, the Peal of Nether shakes, And Great Wyrms of The Below wreak the earth with flame and gaseous exhalation. Roar of Titans will smite the mountains and they shall tumble. Depths of Onyx shall engulf the lands, and then exposed shall lay The Undercroft, Death and Mastery."'
The First Acolyte's brow creased. There was not one of the great tomes of Lorgar that he had not memorised in its entirety, nor any of the scriptures of Kor Phaeron or Erebus that he did not know word for word. As First Acolyte, he was expected to know the words of the Legion as well as any Dark Apostle did. Any time that he was not killing in the name of Lorgar or aiding the Dark Apostle in the spiritual guidance of the Legion was spent in study of the ancient writings, as well as the required ritualistic penitence, self-flagellation and fasts. He prided himself on his knowledge of the Sermons of Hate, and the Exonerations of Resentment, as well as thousands upon thousands of other litanies, recitations, curses, denunciations and proclamations of the Dark Apostles through the history of the Legion. He had spent countless hours poring over pronouncements, predictions and prophecies witnessed in ten thousand trances, visions and dreams. Marduk had even studied the scrawled recollections and scribed ravings of those warrior-brothers possessed by daemons, words straight from the Ether, seeking the truth in them. And yet he had never before heard the prophecy that Jarulek quoted.
'It is not written in any of the tomes within the librariox aboard the Infidus Diabolus,' said Jarulek, seeing the look on Marduk's face. 'Nor is it written anywhere within the great temple factories of Ghalmek or the hallowed flesh-halls of Sicarus. No,' said Jarulek smiling secretively, 'this prophecy is scribed on only one tome, and it resides in none of those places.'
Marduk felt his frustrations grow.
'A fleet of the great enemy draws close,' hissed Jarulek, his eyes narrowing.
'I have felt no tremor in the warp indicating their arrival,' said Marduk, knowing that he was particularly sensitive to such things.
'They have not yet left the Ether. But I feel their abhorrent vessels pushing through the tides of the warp. They will arrive soon. I have sent the Infidus Diabolus back to the warp.'
'You do not wish to engage the enemy fleet as it emerges?' asked Marduk.
'No.'
'You do not seek to engage them in the warp?' he asked, somewhat incredulously.
'No, I have no wish to risk the Infidus Diabolus in a futile battle of no consequence.'