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Loken lowered his guard completely. The Warmaster?'
'He wants you in. Told me to tell you that himself. He appreciated your work. He admired your sense of honour. "Tarik," he said to me, "if anyone's going to take Sejanus's place, it should be Loken." That's what he said.’
'Did he?'
'No.’
Loken looked up. Torgaddon was coming at him with his axe high and whirling. Loken ducked, side-stepped, and thumped the butt of his tabar's haft into Torgad-don's side, causing Torgaddon to mis-step and stumble.
Torgaddon exploded in laughter. 'Yes! Yes, he did. Terra, you're too easy, Garvi. Too easy. The look on your face!'
Loken smiled thinly. Torgaddon looked at the axe in his hand, and then tossed it aside, as if suddenly bored with the whole thing. It landed with a clatter in the shadows off the mat.
'So what do you say?' Torgaddon asked. ЛУЪа! do I tell them? Are you in?'
'Sir, it would be the finest honour of my life.’ Loken said.
Torgaddon nodded and smiled. Yes, it would.’ he said, 'and here's your first lesson. You call me Tarik.’
IT WAS SAID that the iterators were selected via a process even more rigorous and scrupulous than the induction mechanisms of the Astartes. 'One man in a thousand might become a Legion warrior.’ so the sentiment went, 'but only one in a hundred thousand is fit to be an iterator.’
Loken could believe that. A prospective Astartes had to be sturdy, fit, genetically receptive, and ripe for enhancement. A chassis of meat and bone upon which a warrior could be built.
But to be an iterator, a person had to have certain rare gifts that belied enhancement. Insight, articulacy, political genius, keen intelligence. The latter could be boosted, either digitally or pharmaceutically, of course, and a mind could be tutored in history, ethic-politics and rhetoric. A person could be taught what to think,
and how to express that line of thought, but he couldn't be taught how to think.
Loken loved to watch the iterators at work. On occasions, he had delayed the withdrawal of his company so that he could follow their functionaries around conquered cities and watch as they addressed the crowds. It was like watching the sun come out across a field of wheat.
Kyril Sinderma
Sinderma
To sum up, for I've been speaking far too long.’ Sinderma
He shrugged.
'I don't believe so. "My truth is better than your truth" is a school-yard squabble, not the basis of a culture. "I am right, so you are wrong" is a syllogism that collapses as soon as one applies any of a number of fundamental ethical tools. I am right, ergo, you are wrong. We can't construct a constitution on that, and we ca
He looked out across his audience. A number of hands were raised.
There?'
'Liars.’
Sinderma
'I was thinking bullies, or demagogues, Memed, but "liars" is apt. In fact, it cuts deeper than my suggestions. Well done. Liars. That is the one thing we iterators can never allow ourselves to become.’
Sinderma
Truth and lies.’ Sinderma
A ripple of amusement washed across the hall.
'Great actions have shaped our society.’ Sinderma
to murder, it hung upon us like a disease, like a shackle ball. I'll tell you what religion was... No, you tell me. You, there?'
'Ignorance, sir.’
Thank you, Kha
His audience laughed. Sinderma
'Religious faith. Belief in daemons, belief in spirits, belief in an afterlife and all the other trappings of a preternatural existence, simply existed to make us all more comfortable and content in the face of a measureless cosmos. They were sops, bolsters for the soul, crutches for the intellect, prayers and lucky charms to help us through the darkness. But we have witnessed the cosmos now, my friends. We have passed amongst it. We have learned and understood the fabric of reality. We have seen the stars from behind, and found they have no clockwork mechanisms, no golden chariots carrying them abroad. We have realised there is no need for god, or any gods, and by extension no use any longer for daemons or devils or spirits. The greatest thing mankind ever did was to reinvent itself as a secular culture.’
His audience applauded this wholeheartedly. There were a few cheers of approval. Iterators were not simply schooled in the art of public speaking. They were trained in both sides of the business. Seeded amongst a crowd, iterators could whip it into enthusiasm with a few well-timed responses, or equally turn a rabble against the speaker. Iterators often mingled with audiences to bolster the effectiveness of the colleague actually speaking.
Sinderma