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It had been a hard victory, but that made it all the sweeter. Of course, it had also left the primarchs of the Fifth and Fifteenth Legions absolutely filthy, and since Jaghatai Khan’s flagship had wound up on the opposite end of the solar system, they had retired together to the Photep, and the only shower large enough for them within orbital distance.
“I think I’m beginning to see the point of Roboute’s public baths,” Magnus said, and laughed at Jaghatai’s loudly unspoken reaction to the amount of time one generally spent sitting still in the course of a visit to a Macraggian public bath. “But it does provide a nice view, you must admit.”
“You’ll have to appreciate the view here while it lasts,” Jaghatai said, hands snagged in his hair. Magnus moved to help him with the tangle. Ah, the price of losing one’s helmet… But Jaghatai had made a very dashing sight without it.
“How did you manage to get leaves in your hair? I don’t think I saw a single plant on that world.”
He could have checked, of course, but there was little enjoyment to be had rooting around in his dear brother’s mind for such mundane information.
Jaghatai thought back. It had been a generally industrialized planet, true, but—“Palace gardens.”
“Ah, yes.” Magnus had been at the other end of the palatial complex, pinned down by an opponent that he had—perhaps—underestimated: the ruler of a world, stirring not to defend his kingdom but only to attempt to decapitate the invading army. It wouldn’t have worked, of course, even if he’d been the only head of that army—but all the same, Jaghatai’s arrival had been welcome indeed, messy hair, absent helmet and all.
With psychic hands he teased tangles from Jaghatai’s hair; with hands of flesh he stroked his scalp, and with both he held him, gently, as he leant in for a kiss.
All told, they didn’t spend much less time there than one did in a Macraggian bath. But Magnus decided not to point that out.