‘They feel like part of me,’ he said with a shrug. ‘Like they’ve always been a part of me.’
‘Albard’s are infected,’ said Lyx, rubbing the skin around the neural connector, and Raeven saw her breathing was becoming heavier. ‘He has me rub counterseptic poultices on them several times a day.’
‘Does he like that?’
She shook her head. ‘No, he hates it.’
‘Good,’ said Raeven, kissing her and feeling her body respond to his touch.
Later, with Lyx asleep, Raeven slid from his bed and padded softly across the floor of his chambers. This high in the valley, the air was cold, but thick mallahgra pelts hunted by his grandfather in the jungles of Kush kept his feet pleasantly warm. Sweat cooled rapidly on his skin, and he pulled a sea-green robe edged in xenosmilus fur around his naked body. Beyond the louvres, he could hear the sound of the city preparing for the day’s celebrations – the excited hubbub of tens of thousands of voices.
Though Raeven was hundreds of metres above the city in one of the three Devine Towers, he fancied he could still hear the cosmopolitan mix of accents as the people gathered there came from all across the world to honour the Becoming of Lord Devine’s sons. Merchants from Loquash would be haggling with the painted men of Aenatep. Artisans of the Clockwork City would unveil their ticking, mechanical marvels – hoping to avoid the attentions of the Sacristan Guard – while the various Houses would no doubt be parading the best and bravest of their knights, boasting of their great hunts and the productivity of their satrapies. And the people of Lupercalia would bear this intrusion of so many thousands to their city with the stoic surety that not one of the newcomers could hold a candle to House Devine.
Raeven pulled back the heavy drapes and pushed out through the louvred shutters to the stone-walled balcony beyond, as though the city were his and his alone.
The stepped expanse stretched out before him, filling the width of the valley from one side to the other and cascading down its length to the fertile plains below. Colourful structures of every conceivable shape, size, height and orientation jostled for space amid streets that bore the qualities of the Emperor’s Legions that had brought this world back into the embrace of the Imperium.
Where the Lion had raised the Dawn Citadel in the tapering reaches of the upper valley, the streets around it were rigidly arranged in an unbending grid pattern. And where local geography interfered with that plan, it had been engineered away by the Mechanicum. Lower down, the streets were woven together like intricate knotwork, the free-flowing yet ordered nature of this street-plan said to be a representation of Lord Horus’s war-making. The Khan had chosen not to make his mark in stone, and had instead taken himself into the wild places and high mountains. No one knew exactly what legacy the primarch of the White Scars had left, though fireside tales whispered that he had spoken of secret things to the tribes and noble Houses that existed at the edges of the world.
The one portion of unity amid the chaotic nature of the city’s plan was the Via Argentum, a laser-straight processional that climbed the length of the valley from its wide-mouthed opening to the rocky fortress built into the ochre stone of the mountain. Raeven held a hand over his eyes and looked up at the artfully shaped peak, less a geological feature than a man-made statement carved into the face of the world.
Arms slipped around his waist, and Raeven smelled the jasmine oil Lyx liked rubbed onto her skin. He could feel that she was naked, and he wondered if he had time to take her back to bed before his mother came to fetch him.
‘Are you nervous?’ she asked.
He looked at the marbled dome of the citadel, the early morning sun catching the copper banding between the coffered azure panels. He shook his head, angry that she might think him afraid of what this day promised.
‘No,’ he said, pushing her away. ‘I have been prepared for the Ritual of Becoming since my tenth summer. I know who I am, and I’m ready for whatever happens. If a dullard like father can go through it, then I don’t think I’ll have any trouble.’
‘I heard that the firstborn of House Tazkhar died and that his three brothers went mad after they went through it.’
‘House Tazkhar?’ sneered Raeven. ‘What do you expect from nomadic dung-burners who can’t even build a proper city? Some shit-smeared shaman masquerading as a Sacristan probably poured holy naga venom into their neural connectors.’
‘You shouldn’t get angry,’ said Lyx. ‘You need to be calm. The Throne Mechanicum imprint is based on your neural state at the moment of connection.’
Raeven rounded on her and laughed, a bitter bark of derision.
‘And you’re a Mechanicum priest now, are you? What other pearls of wisdom do you have for me, or does your insight only stretch to the blindingly obvious?’
Lyx pursed her lips. ‘You are in a foul mood this morning.’
‘I am what you make me,’ he returned. ‘I always have been.’
Lyx’s hand flashed out to slap him, but gene-manipulation in the male bloodline of House Devine over the centuries ensured that Raeven’s reaction speed was far faster than hers. He caught her hand and twisted the arm savagely around her back. He pushed her back into the room and threw her face-down upon the bed. She turned to face him as he opened his robe, her expression the same mixture of revulsion and devotion she’d worn since childhood.
Before he could do more, the door to his chamber opened and a statuesque woman in a flowing dress of iridescent scales swept imperiously within. She wore a headdress of nagahide, and a number of venom-blinded servants followed in her wake, each bearing a selection of outfits for him to choose from.
‘Mother!’ said Raeven, planting his hands on his hips and sighing in exasperation. ‘Don’t you knock anymore?’
Cebella Devine shook her head and wagged an admonishing finger. ‘What mother needs to knock at her son’s door on the day of his Becoming?’
‘Clearly not you,’ said Raeven.
‘Hush now,’ said Cebella, running an elongated fingernail across the sculpted lines of his chest. ‘You don’t want to be angry with me. Not today, of all days.’
‘Spare me, mother,’ snapped Raeven. ‘Lyx has already given me the benefit of her extensive knowledge on the matter.’
Cebella’s expression hardened and she turned to face the young girl on the bed, who stared back at her with withering contempt.
‘Get dressed, Lyx,’ said Cebella. ‘It is inappropriate for you to be here today.’
‘Just today?’ Lyx laughed.
‘If you plan to be Raeven’s Adoratrice consort, you need to start acting like one.’
‘Like you are to Cyprian?’ hissed Lyx, her fingers curled into fists. ‘I hardly think so.’
‘Get out,’ said Cebella, her face a granite mask. ‘Albard will be here soon. Take the servants’ tunnels and don’t let me see you until after matters are concluded.’
‘With pleasure,’ said Lyx, visibly controlling her fury and gathering up her clothes. She slipped them on with practiced speed and, fully attired, sashayed to Raeven’s side to plant a kiss on his cheek. ‘Until later.’
Cebella snapped her fingers and said, ‘Someone open the drapes. This room smells like a brothel.’
‘Well, you’re the expert there,’ Lyx muttered, throwing a final barb and darting past Cebella to vanish though the door.
‘Right,’ said Cebella, turning her critical gaze upon her son. ‘Let’s see if we can make you vaguely presentable.’
Several hours later, clothed in expensive silks of black and ocean green, layered sashes of crimson and blue, and tight-fitting cream trousers tucked into knee-high riding boots with tall heels, Raeven followed his mother down the full height of the tower. She was reciting a list of the various dignitaries who were here to mark his and Albard’s Becoming. He tuned her out, thinking back to the night he’d spent with Lyx. As always, the memory stimulated a curious mix of shame and pleasurable guilt.