Angels of Darkness - Page 18/26

'Are you saying that it was you who was responsible for the schism of our Legion, and not Luther?' Boreas gasped, unable to mask his disbelief. 'That is a grand and dire claim to make!'

'I did not say that,' Astelan said quietly. 'Rarely are the facts of history as convenient as written words pretend. Luther had the most to be aggrieved about, that is for cer­tain. He had been like a father to the primarch, his closest friend and ally. He had saved El'Jonson from death in the woods. And what did El'Jonson do to repay him? He banished him to Caliban, like the rest of us. He left him to rot while he sought glory for himself.'

'Luther was the Lion's guardian of Caliban,' Boreas said, starting to pace back and forth across the chamber. 'He had been honoured by the primarch, in showing such faith and trust in him to leave the protection of his homeworld in Luther's hands.'

'Luther was almost as great a commander of men as Lion El'Jonson,' argued Astelan. 'Though our primarch was gifted beyond compare as a planner and strategist, Luther knew the hearts and minds of men well, better than El'Jonson ever did. When the Emperor had first arrived, and the Dark Angels were given to El'Jonson to lead, Luther had wept that he was too old to become a Space Marine.'

'As did many of the knights of Caliban,' replied Boreas, stopping his pacing and looking directly at Astelan. 'That is why the Emperor sent his best chirurgeons and apothetechs, so that those who were too old for the primarch's gene-seed might still be given many of the benefits of our altered bodies, living long past their nat­ural deaths and capable of great feats of arms.'

'And so is it not even stranger that Luther should be left on Caliban, rather than leading those warriors on the field of battle?' asked Astelan, shifting his weight so that he could look at the Chaplain more easily. 'I think it is. I think that El'Jonson grew to be afraid of Luther, of his popularity amongst the troops, and so left him on Cal­iban where his star would rise no more.'

'These are the lies of Luther. They have polluted your mind, as they polluted the others who turned on their brethren.' Boreas's denial was absolute, his face set.

'For all his skills at fiery speeches and impassioned whispers, Luther was never and could never be a Space Marine,' Astelan pointed out. 'There were a few who listened to him, most of them of the new Legion. My Space Marines, while having the deepest respect for Luther and his great achievements, had served under the Emperor himself and owed their loyalty to him alone.'

'And so how did it come to pass that those supposedly loyal Dark Angels turned on their primarch and betrayed the Emperor, if they did not care for Luther's oratory?' Boreas asked, stalking forward.

'Because I stood up beside him and offered him my support,' Astelan replied in a hushed whisper. Doubt filled his mind for a moment. Had he not done that, would things have occurred differently? He dismissed the thought; the future of the Dark Angels had been set long before that moment.

'And why did you do that?' Boreas's voice cut through his thoughts.

'So that we could do what we were always meant to do - fight the Emperor's enemies and force back the dark­ness that surrounded mankind,' Astelan said.

'Explain.'

'The primarch was far away, continuing the Great Cru­sade, when we were brought word of terrible news,' Astelan told the Chaplain. 'Horus, greatest of the primarchs, the Emperor's own Warmaster, had turned traitor. Accounts were fragmentary, and infrequent but slowly we pieced together what had happened. We heard of his virus bomb­ing at Istvaan, and the dropsite massacre. Primarchs and their Legions were turning against the Emperor, and against themselves. It became impossible to tell friend from foe. We heard on more than one occasion that the Dark Angels had turned on the Emperor, or that Lion El'Jonson had been killed. There was talk of the Space Wolves fighting against the Thousand Sons, and of battle-brother killing battle-brother across the galaxy.'

'And so you saw the opportunity to turn traitor as well, to side with Horus,' Boreas accused him.

'We wanted to leave, to go and fight Horus!' Astelan's defiance was weak, his body failing the strength of his spirit. 'We could be sure of nothing except that which was in our own hearts. It was Luther who first spoke of us leaving Caliban and joining the fight to defend the Emperor.'

'Luther would have led you to Horus!' snapped Boreas. 'And what of the Lion's commands? Did the stewardship of Caliban mean nothing to Luther and you?'

'It meant much to Luther, less to me as you might understand,' admitted Boreas. 'But how did we know what our primarch wanted us to do? Communication was shattered, and the intent of the Lion obscured by hundreds of light years and conflicting stories. He could have been embattled on some distant planet, or have sided with Horus, or leading the Emperor's defence, we did not know. And so we took it upon ourselves to divine our own path, for it was the only thing that we could do.'

'So what happened then? What caused the fighting?' Boreas stood dose again, his robes and skin bathed in the red light of the brazier, giving him a half-daemonic appearance.

'There were some among our number, newly raised battle-brothers who perhaps slightiy lacked the faith and zeal of the old Legion, who opposed our leaving,' Astelan replied.

'And so you attacked them, wiped out the dissenters.' Boreas's face twisted into a snarl as his anger grew again.

'It was they who attacked first, and revealed their treacherous intent with the death of hundreds,' Astelan corrected him. 'We had prepared everything to leave, and were embarking onto the transports to take us into orbit where the battle barges and strike cruisers of the Chapter awaited us. As the ships began to leave, the traitors struck. Their orbiting ships opened fire on ours, they stormed the planetary defence batteries and opened fire on the transports. Defence lasers blew the transports out of the sky and they rained down in pieces onto us. Some tried to continue into orbit, and they were destroyed by the enemy, while others were blasted into shrapnel as they attempted to land. Their strike was short-lived, how­ever, as we counter-attacked in force. Their ships fled, and those who had taken the batteries were driven out or killed.'

'So they acted to stop you disobeying the primarch's orders,' Boreas suggested.

'They had no right to!' rasped Astelan. 'I have already told you that the primarch's wishes were as unknown to us as the state of the war against Horus. Theirs was the sinful act, firing on us.'

'But you did not leave, did you?' Boreas pointed out.

'We could not,' Astelan said with a sorrowful shake of his head. 'We were afraid of what might happen if we left Caliban in the hands of the treacherous brethren. We could not leave until we were sure that Caliban was safe.'

'And how did you hope to ensure that?' demanded Boreas.

'Wе hunted them down, of course,' Astelan told him. 'They hid in the deep woods, and struck with hit-and-run attacks, but eventually our numbers took their toll and we thought them exterminated. For three months, our guns were silent and it was then that perhaps we com­mitted the only sin - that of complacency. Thinking our foe destroyed we relaxed our guard as we began to make preparations to leave once more. That was when they struck. They had hidden themselves away more thor­oughly than we could have ever imagined, in the most inhospitable places on Caliban. Without warning, they gathered their might and launched an attack on the star-port, taking several transports. Stunned, we did not react quickly enough and by the time the defence lasers were active, they were already amongst our fleet and we could not target them for fear of hitting our own ships. They concentrated their attacks on the largest craft in the fleet, my own battle barge, the Wrath of Terra. They stormed her, took control, and turned her immense guns and tor­pedoes on the rest of the fleet. The battle was short-lived, for the Wrath of Terra outclassed any vessel in orbit, and soon my Chapter's fleet was reduced to smoking wrecks.'

'And so you were stranded on Caliban, and those who had stayed true to their primarch had finally succeeded in preventing you from joining the Warmaster,' Boreas said, sharing some pride in the desperate act.

'It was not their final act,' Astelan said bitterly. 'They piloted the Wrath of Terra into Caliban's atmosphere, where she burned up and exploded into fiery fragments that rained down onto the surface. Plasma reactors trail­ing infernos exploded in the forests leaving craters kilometres across and sending dust and rock into the sky to obscure the sun. Fragments crashed into the cities and castles, destroying them, and the largest portion of the ship plunged into the southern ocean, creating a tidal wave that wiped out everything within twenty kilometres of the southern coast. Not only had they marooned us on Caliban, they wrought untold destruction upon the planet that had now become our prison.'

'If what you say is true, then how was it that you fired upon our primarch when he returned?' Boreas said accusingly.

'Caliban was then a ravaged, desolate place,' Astelan continued, his voice dropping to a barely audible mur­mur. 'The forests died, the life-giving energies of the sun blotted out by the clouds of dirt and ash that hung in the air. The world was slowly destroying itself, because we had failed to protect it from our own battle-brothers. You speak of shame, but it is nothing compared to the guilt we felt at that time, as the trees burned, and the light of the stars was taken from us.'

'But why the attack on the Lion?'

'Luther had taken up residence in Angelicasta, the Tower of Angels, largest citadel on Caliban and greatest fortress of the Dark Angels. I had taken personal com­mand of the outer defences and the laser batteries, from a command centre hundreds of kilometres away. When we received a signal that spaceships had entered orbit, we thought at first that the traitor ships had returned - the ones that we had driven off in the first battle.'

'And that is why you opened fire?' asked Boreas.

'No, it is not,' Astelan replied with defiance. 'It soon became clear that our primarch had returned. Luther contacted me to ask for my advice. He was troubled because he had intercepted a communication that claimed El'Jonson himself led the approaching ships. He did not know what to do, fearing the wrath of the Lion for what had befallen Caliban.'

'And what did you tell him?'

'I told him nothing,' Astelan said grimly. 'I gave the order for the batteries to open fire on the approaching ships.'

'You gave the command?' spat Boreas, gripping Aste­lan's throat and pressing him back against the slab. 'It was you who precipitated the destruction of our home-world? And you say that you have no sins to repent!'

'I stand by my decision,' Astelan replied hoarsely, ineffec­tually trying to prise away the Chaplain's vice-like grip. 'There was nothing else I could do. El'Jonson was going to wipe us out, for I suspected that the traitor ships had met him, and their version of events would have damned us all. Our beneficent primarch would have had us all killed for what had happened to his homeworld. I also feared that our primarch was no longer loyal to the Emperor. We had heard little of the exploits of the Dark Angels during the Horus Heresy, and I did not discount the thought that this was due to El'Jonson having sided with Horus.'

'So you fired because you were scared of retribution?' Boreas snarled, raising Astelan's head and cracking it back against the stone table.

'I fired because I wanted El'Jonson killed!' spat Astelan, pushing weakly at Boreas to free himself. 'My loyalty was first and foremost to the Emperor, and to El'Jonson a long way second behind that. It was my duty to the Emperor to protect the Space Marines under my com­mand - Space Marines that the Emperor himself had picked and raised, and who were now threatened by this primarch. Do you understand?'

'Not at all, I cannot comprehend the treachery that pulses within your heart,' Boreas said, letting go of Astelan in disgust and stalking away. He did not look at his prisoner as he spoke. 'To turn on your primarch, to wish him dead, is the gravest sin that you could have committed.'

'It was the primarchs who turned on the Emperor. Before their coming there had been no dissent, no civil war,' argued Astelan, pushing himself into a sitting posi­tion. 'It was the primarchs who turned the Legions against their true master, who furthered their own ambi­tions with the thousands of Space Marines under their command. It was the primarchs who nearly destroyed the Imperium, and it was Lion El'Jonson who had doomed Caliban with his own actions.'

'Your arrogance was fuelled by jealousy, lubricated by the dark lures promised by Luther!' Boreas roared at Aste­lan. 'You turned on your primarch in return for power and domination by the Dark Powers!'

'I defended myself from a madman who had already tried to destroy my Chapter and would not hesitate to do so again!' Astelan snarled back. 'I never swore to any Dark Powers, I was nothing but loyal to the Emperor! But I was also wrong.'

'So you admit it!' Triumph was written across Boreas's face as he swept across the cell towards Astelan.

'I admit nothing.' Astelan's words stopped Boreas in his stride, his elation turning to fury. 'I was wrong in believing that Lion El'Jonson sought a reckoning with me. It was his mentor and friend, Luther, that he was intent on destroying. It was Luther, steward of Caliban, his saviour, that El'Jonson had grown to hate, to envy. His actions prove my point! Did he not personally lead the attack on the Tower of Angels, while his ships bom­barded Caliban from orbit? Was he not seeking to destroy all evidence of his own weakness, striking out at those who had seen him for what he truly was?'

'The Lion had indeed heard of Luther's treachery and knew that to cure the malady, he had to act decisively and swiftly,' explained Boreas. 'He hoped that by striking at Luther, he could save Caliban from his evil influence.'

'When the missiles and plasma came screaming down from orbit, it was all too plain to see the primarch's intent,' Astelan argued. 'The seas boiled, the land cracked and the fortresses tumbled into ruins. I remember the ground lurching beneath my feet, and then tumbling into what seemed like a bottomless pit, before I lost con­sciousness.'

'And there lies the heart of the evidence against you, the overwhelming proof of your guilt!' Boreas bellowed. 'At the end, as tortured Caliban tore itself apart, your dark masters reached out to snatch you from death. As the world shattered, a great warpstorm erupted over Cal­iban and spirited you away, along with all those who had turned on the Lion. That is why you are guilty, that is why no amount of justification and argument can convince me of another intent behind your actions. The Ruinous Powers saved you and your kind, and scattered you across time and space so that we might not have our vengeance against you. Luther was as corrupt as Horus, as you all were! Admit this and repent!'

'I shall not!' growled Astelan. 'I renounce every charge you have laid against me! I have been loyal to the Emperor from the day I was first chosen to become a Space Marine, and I will stay loyal to the Emperor until my dying breath! Torture me, probe my mind with witch-powers! I refute your accusations! I see now what has become of the so-called pure gene-seed of Lion El'Jon­son! You have become creatures of shadow and darkness, and I do not recognise you as Dark Angels!'

'So be it!' Boreas declared, shoving Astelan back against the slab. 'I shall return, and I shall take up my blades, and my brands, and I shall call for Brother Samiel. Your soul shall know justice, whether you choose it or not. You have chosen the path of suffering, when you could have walked the path of peace and enlightenment.'

Boreas stalked towards the door and wrenched it open. 'Wait!' Astelan called out.

'No more of your lies!' the Chaplain snapped back, stepping through the door.

'I still have more to tell!' Astelan shouted after him.

The Chaplain stopped and turned around.

'You have nothing more I wish to hear,' he said.

'But you have not heard the full story,' Astelan told him, his voice dropping to a cracked whisper. 'You have not learned the truth.'

'I will find out the truth in my own way.' Boreas turned to leave again.

'You will not,' Astelan told him. 'Now it is your turn to decide, as must we all, which path your life will follow. Go now and return with your warlock and take up your implements of pain, and I will never divulge the secrets I keep within me. Not even your psyker will be able to probe them free from my soul. But if you stay, if you lis­ten, I will freely tell them to you.'

'And why would you do such a thing?' Boreas asked, not looking back.

'Because I wish to save you as much as you wish to save me,' Astelan said, pushing himself to his feet, gasping as pain flooded his body. 'Through pain and suffering, you will not hear my words, you will be blinded to the truth. But if you listen, as you asked me to listen, then you will learn many things you would not otherwise unearth.'

'What inner secrets?' Boreas turned. 'What more could you tell me?'

'An interesting thought, a concern of mine,' Astelan said, meeting the Chaplain's gaze.

'And what is that?' Boreas asked, stepping back through the door.

'Though we heard little at the time, and accounts of it afterwards are hard to uncover, I have learned as much as I can about the siege of the Emperor's Palace and the bat­tle for Terra at the end of the Horus Heresy,' Astelan explained as hurriedly as his ravaged lungs allowed. 'It is a stirring tale, I am sure you agree. There are stories of the exploits of the Imperial Fists holding the wall against the frenzied assaults of the World Eaters. There is praise run­ning into hundreds of pages for the White Scars and their daring attacks on the landing sites. There are even accounts, most false I suspect, of how the Emperor teleported onto Horus's battle barge and the two fought in titanic conflict.'

'What of it?' Boreas asked suspiciously.

'Where in all these tales of battle and heroism are the Dark Angels?' Astelan replied.

'The Lion was leading the Legion to Terra's defence, but faced many battles and arrived too late,' Boreas said.

'So, Lion El'Jonson, greatest strategist of the Imperium, who was never once defeated in battle, was delayed? I find that hard to believe.' Astelan's strength failed him again and he slumped back against the interrogation slab, his legs buckling under him.

'And what would you believe, heretic?' Boreas demanded.

'There is a very simple reason why Lion El'Jonson did not take part in the final battles of the Horus Heresy.' Astelan let himself drop to the floor, his back against the stone table, his eyes closed. 'It is beautifully simple, when you consider it. He was waiting.'

'Waiting? For what?' Boreas asked quietly.

Astelan looked into Boreas's eyes, seeing the curiosity that was now there.

'He was waiting to see which side won, of course.'

Boreas stepped into the cell, and closed the door behind him.