How many millions called this steel and stone metropolis home, never knowing it was just one among dozens across the globe?
‘Is this the Emperor’s Palace?’ asked Miska.
‘No,’ said Alivia. ‘This is just a space port.’
‘On Terra?’
‘Yes, what do you think?’
‘It’s very… grey,’ she said.
‘And the air tastes bad,’ added Vivyen, without lifting her head from her storybook.
Jeph took Alivia’s hand.
‘We made it, Liv,’ he said. ‘Did you ever think we’d see Terra? The Throneworld.’
‘No,’ said Alivia, looking up at the mountains. ‘I didn’t.’
She’d intended never to set foot on this world ever again.
Alivia looked away from the peaks as a hulking tracked vehicle with a cupola-mounted heavy stubber ground to a halt at the foot of the lander’s embarkation ramp. The rumble of its engine set Alivia’s teeth on edge.
‘Our chariot awaits,’ said Alivia as a uniformed, dark-skinned man with Terran features and a serious demeanour stepped from the vehicle’s interior.
He climbed the ramp towards them. From his disciplined bearing, Alivia knew he was, or had once been, a soldier. But in his close-fitting body glove and thick damask cloak, he looked more like a courtier.
Or a spy like John.
Whoever this man was, he looked woefully out of place in the industrial bustle of the sprawling port.
‘Alivia Sureka,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she replied, well aware he wasn’t asking.
‘My name is Khalid Hassan, Chosen of–’
‘I know who you are,’ said Alivia.
That caught him off guard.
‘You do?’
Alivia shrugged. ‘I mean, not you personally, but I know what you are. You’re one of the Sigillite’s errand boys, aren’t you?’
He grinned and said, ‘John said you would be truculent.’
‘Truculent? Nice,’ said Alivia, nodding towards the tracked vehicle. ‘A Saturnyne-pattern Aurox? Bit over the top, isn’t it?’
‘My master merely wishes to ensure the safety of you and your family,’ explained Hassan, turning and taking a half-step towards the rumbling vehicle. ‘If you’ll come with me…’
Alivia tilted her head to the side, as though considering his offer that wasn’t really an offer.
‘Actually, I don’t think I will,’ she said.
Hassan smiled, but she saw the steel beneath it.
‘My master was quite insistent.’
‘I’m sure he was, but I’m not getting in that Aurox.’
Jeph released her hand and stepped forward.
He jabbed a finger into Hassan’s chest, and Alivia winced, half expecting him to break Jeph’s wrist.
‘I don’t know who you are,’ said Jeph, ‘but Alivia says she’s not going with you, and you can’t make her. And that’s that.’
‘Please, Mistress Sureka,’ said Hassan. ‘Let’s not have this become something it doesn’t need to. I am quite prepared to compel you to come with me if needs be.’
Alivia heard the tramp of weary feet behind her as hundreds of the refugees from Molech emerged, blinking, into the daylight of Terra.
Alivia glanced over her shoulder as they came on like a tide.
Some sobbed, others laughed, yet more looked to her with rapt expressions of unbridled devotion.
They swept down the embarkation ramp, and Alivia let herself and her family be carried along with them. Clustered around the base of the embarkation ramp were port staff and grey-robed adepts with data-slates, blank manifests and genealogical records.
Alivia smiled back at Hassan, who shook his head and returned to his Aurox. She had a feeling she hadn’t seen the last of that one, but he was a problem for another day.
‘Are we safe now, mama?’ asked Miska, as they approached the nearest of the grey-robed adepts.
‘I think so, dear-heart,’ answered Alivia. ‘For now at least.’
The masked adept held a data-slate and stylus out to her.
‘Welcome to Lion’s Gate Space Port,’ he said.
About the Author
Graham McNeill has written many Horus Heresy novels, including The Crimson King, Vengeful Spirit and his New York Times bestsellers A Thousand Sons and the novella The Reflection Crack’d, which featured in The Primarchs anthology. Graham’s Ultramarines series, featuring Captain Uriel Ventris, is now six novels long, and has close links to his Iron Warriors stories, the novel Storm of Iron being a perennial favourite with Black Library fans. He has also written the Forges of Mars trilogy, featuring the Adeptus Mechanicus. For Warhammer, he has written the Warhammer Chronicles trilogy The Legend of Sigmar, the second volume of which won the 2010 David Gemmell Legend Award.