Aurelian

– Ancient Terran proverb

‘I wish, with every fibre of my soul, that I had killed him when I had the chance. That momentary flicker of disbelief and sorrow, that second’s hesitation for the abhorrence of fratricide, cost us more than anyone can measure. Horus leads the Legions into heresy, but Lorgar is the cancer in the Warmaster’s core.’

– The Primarch Corax

‘All I ever wanted was the truth. Remember those words as you read the ones that follow. I never set out to topple my father’s kingdom of lies from a sense of misplaced pride. I never wanted to bleed the species to its marrow, reaving half the galaxy clean of human life in this bitter crusade. I never desired any of this, though I know the reasons for which it must be done.

But all I ever wanted was the truth.’

– Opening lines of the Book of Lorgar, First Canticle of Chaos

PROLOGUE

HERALD OF THE ONE GOD

Colchis

Many years ago

THE ARCHPRIEST WATCHED from the cathedral window as his city burned below.

‘We should do something.’

His voice was a bass rumble, yet edged by a softness that smoothed his words into something almost delicate. His was a voice made to reason, to question, to reassure – not to scream and froth and rage.

The archpriest turned from the window. ‘Father? When will the fires stop burning?’

Kor Phaeron walked across the chamber, his wizened scowl deep-set on his face, like a scar cut into old leather. He busied himself with the scrolls on the central table, his thin lips moving as he read each one in turn.

‘Father? We ca

‘You have not spoken since we claimed the Cathedral of Illumination.’ The ageing man glanced over for the merest moment.

‘And your first words after wi

The archpriest was a young man, beautiful in a way that transcended notions of physical attraction. His tan skin gleamed with tiny tattoos of gold-inked scripture. His eyes were dark without being cold, and he could spend days without smiling, yet never seem sinister.

He turned back to the window. In his mind’s eye, he’d always pictured the crusade’s end in this very place, the avenues of the City of Grey Flowers flooded by cheering crowds, their joyous prayers reaching into the skies, shaking the slender towers of their former rulers.

The reality didn’t quite approach it. The streets were crowded, that much was true, but crowded with rioters, looters and clashing bands of robed warriors, as the last lingering remnants of the Covenant’s defenders fought to the last against the tide of invaders.

‘So much of the city is still aflame,’ the archpriest said. ‘We must do something.’

Kor Phaeron murmured to himself as he read the tattered parchments.

‘Father.’ The archpriest turned again, watching the older priest discard another scroll.

‘Hmm? What is it, boy?’

‘Half of the city is ablaze. We must do something.’

Kor Phaeron smiled, the expression ugly but not unkind. ‘You must prepare for your coronation, Lorgar. The Covenant has fallen, and the Old Ways will be cast down as blasphemy against the One God. You are no longer merely Archpriest of the Godsworn, you are the Archpriest of all Colchis. I have given you a world.’

The golden figure turned back to the window, eyes narrowed. Something crept into his voice then, something rigid and cold, a foreshadowing of all that would be in the centuries to come.

‘I do not wish to rule,’ he said.

‘That will change, my son. It will change when you see that no one else around you is as fit to rule as you are. In a moment of realisation, it will change out of your own selfless need. That is how it always works for men of power. The road to every throne is paved with good intentions.’

Lorgar shook his head. ‘I wish for nothing more than our people to see the truth.’

‘The truth is power,’ the other priest went back to the scrolls. ‘The ignorant and the weak must be dragged into the light, no matter the cost. It doesn’t matter how many bleed and cry out on the way.’