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Assassinorum: Divine Sanction – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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Assassinorum: Divine Sanction

By Robert Rath

‘When the God-Emperor asks men to die, He does not ask them to die to satisfy His glory. Our Emperor is not vain. He asks men to die for each other.’

The confessor gripped the edge of the balcony, its cold white marble hidden under a velvet banner. His hands grasped the edge tight enough to leave marks on the material.

He paused, scanning the crowd that had gathered in St Lucretza’s Square, their faces upturned towards the pulpit balcony of the Apostolic fortress. They swayed and chanted. Counted prayer beads. Waved banners showing what manufactorum or far continent they hailed from. The throng stretched back through every avenue, until those present looked less like human beings and more like bullets crowding a conveyor belt at a munitions factory.

They had come to hear the New Confession. And they would get it.

The pulpit’s view of the plaza swam, distorted as a wandering servo-skull – one of hundreds that buzzed the square like dragonflies – veered perilously close to the triple-layer refractor field.

‘The Emperor.’ The confessor splayed his hands wide, face towards the sky. ‘The sanctified and revered Emperor, does not merely wish us to give our lives for Him…’

‘…but for all mankind,’ said Thacceus Velso, standing far enough behind the balcony that he was out of the crowd’s line of sight.

‘…but for all mankind.’ The confessor swept out a hand, as if taking in the whole of the multitude below.

A clever bit of emphasis, Velso thought, casually mirroring the confessor’s sweep of the hand. More natural overall, but slightly unorthodox. Most preachers would put the emphasis on mankind, drawing attention to the primacy of humanity. All was a call to the collective.

The confessor dropped his arms, worked his jaw as if thinking. ‘Is it not the Emperor’s will for us…’

‘…to elevate ourselves, our society, and our brethren?’ finished Velso, ensuring he pronounced breth-ren in two distinct syllables. He raised his right hand as he said it, fingers pressed together as if lifting a stemmed glass of wine.

Before him, the confessor did the same.

Hold it, thought Velso. One, two, three.

The confessor opened his hand, dropped it with a shrug, as if he’d gone too far. Conscious that he’d worked himself up into a froth, and slightly embarrassed by his own zeal. A humanising gesture. A bluff. A dramatic pause before dropping the final hammer.

‘For what does the Emperor want His subjects to bring about…’ Velso said, in perfect synchronicity with the confessor.

‘…except the greater good?’ finished Confessor Thuselah Illsandor.

Before him, the crowd wailed at the New Confession. The faithful made the sign of the aquila and held children in the air in hope of a blessing.

The only sound that carried over the acclamation was the crackle of the firing squads.

Not everyone believed in the Confession.

‘I’ve told you to stop doing that,’ sneered Mascelle Rask. The grid of her duelling scars twisted as she frowned. ‘We have one master of divinity already. Don’t need two.’

‘A sermon writer must know how his subject speaks,’ responded Velso, picking at the sleeve of his embroidered robe. ‘Our master is… well, he is masterful, isn’t he? I must work to keep up – just as you must work to keep him alive.’ He paused. ‘Speaking of which, how is that coming along?’ He glanced behind them, suppressing an insolent grin. ‘Any assassins lurking in this heated chamber, or are the real threats out in the cold?’

The mercenary sniffed, put a hand on the swept-hilt power rapier that hung at her hip. ‘I’m due to check the perimeter.’

‘If you must deprive us of your company,’ Velso jerked his head at the two hulking forms chained in the outer corridor, their backs to the room, ‘shut the doors on the way out. No one wants to see those monstrosities.’

‘They’re here for his protection. They can hardly guard him if they’re shut–’

‘The confessor dislikes their smell.’

The head of the Apostolic Guard set her jaw, considering, then snapped. ‘Do it yourself.’

Rask swept out, throwing her embroidered half-cloak over one shoulder to keep her rapier in easy reach. ‘Keep Leonine and Taurus ready,’ she said to the guard standing by the hulking forms as she passed. ‘Sentinel protocol. Sensors maximum.’

Velso rolled his eyes and followed her. He closed one of the heavy wooden doors, then the other, trying to keep his gaze low as he did, so as not to look at the two abominations. Still he saw their metal feet sinking deep into the woven carpet. Caught the stench of human waste, blood and funerary oil that emanated from their unwilling pilots. One had leaked, staining the hallway floor.

Velso turned the lock, leaving the confessor alone with his sermon writer.

Sycorax turned back to the confessor, reflecting how easy it was to play arrogant men. That was one of the earliest lessons in the Callidus Temple: take the place of someone unlikeable, and you’ll go undetected until the Emperor rises.

It had taken months to get this close. Sycorax had come into the city as a worker from the promethium rigs wearing a man’s face and body. Checked into a flop-hab and grew their hair out long and red, their body soft and appealing. Got a job serving at the tavern where the Apostolic Guard drank. Brought one back to the hab.

A girl and a guard went in – only the guard came out. That one was difficult. Apostolic Guardsmen kept close. Many had served in the same Militarum regiment before they heard the New Confession and defected. Knew each other in ways that were hard to replicate.

But Viridian was a city under stress. After curfew the streets flooded with anti-Confessionists building barricades and throwing promethium bombs. And each night, the Apostolic Guard went to work on them with shock mauls and choke gas. In that environment, it was not strange for a man to become suddenly distant and closed-off – so that was the mask Sycorax chose.

Sermon-writer Velso was easy by comparison. Arrogant and superior, he had no close friends. Velso had no doubt thought of himself as a complex man, but apart from moderate rhetorical skill, he was no challenge.

Confessor Illsandor was another matter. He was indeed an orator of rare talent, and Sycorax had dispatched and replaced Velso because his proximity to the confessor made close study of the subject possible. It had also given Sycorax brief glimpses into Illsandor’s duplicity.

She had only seen the t’au delegation once in the three months she’d been here. A door left open a moment too long, betraying a room of flat blue-grey faces and canny golden eyes.

She. That was a crucial benchmark. A sign the time was close. She was mentally identifying as a woman again, reverting to her real identity, not the male body she’d been wearing the past three months. Her psycho-indoctrination training ran so deep that during longer operations her assumed identities took over the conscious mind and her true self merged into the black waters of the subconscious.

But that time was over. Months of careful tradecraft would culminate today. Her studies were complete.

The confessor finished blessing the crowd, kissed the Emperor’s Skull on his vestments, and turned into the room.

‘That went rather well, Brother Velso,’ he said, cheeks rosy with cold.

‘A wonderful performance,’ Sycorax answered. She whistled, and Velso’s spider-legged writing desk clicked over to the confessor, bringing a carafe of spiced wine and a crystal goblet. ‘You should be proud.’

‘Save your praise for the Emperor.’ Illsandor poured a tall drink – sermons made him thirsty. ‘I am but His instrument.’

‘And according to this,’ Sycorax picked a tape-communique off the ambulatory desk, ‘Lady Falessca is now your instrument. The Promethium Guild has backed you and declared for the New Confession.’

‘Praise Him,’ Illsandor smiled. ‘Our planetary absolution continues. With the Emperor’s help, the rest of the Industry Lords should follow.’

‘You should thank them.’

‘For their support?’

‘For their neglect.’ Sycorax tugged at the sleeve of her robe, feeling the poisoned needle hidden there. ‘It’s always the same with revolution, isn’t it? The people have problems, obvious problems. Needs that those in power ignore, or declare themselves unwilling or unable to address. It precipitates a governance crisis, and that opens the door to people like us.’

‘My dear Brother Velso, the people have heard our New Confession. That is why they’re out in the street.’

‘The people are in the street because they’re hungry and disenfranchised,’ corrected Sycorax. ‘They would not have been so amenable to the Confession if the Industry Lords had given them a stake in the old order.’

Illsandor stared at his sermon writer, brow knitted in indignation. For a bare moment, Sycorax worried she’d pushed too hard, but then the confessor’s fury passed and he barked a laugh. ‘Of course. Yes, of course, you’re right, brother. Feed the belly, feed the soul, eh?’

‘I think it’s time we came clean with each other,’ Sycorax said. ‘We are partners in this New Confession, are we not? I need to know what the t’au offered you, and what you’ve agreed to.’

Because when I meet them, they will expect me to know, Sycorax thought.

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A Black Library Publication

First published in Great Britain in 2019 Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

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