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The sin to which I am confessing is the most despicable and dangerous of all. The sin of thought. Thought is a distraction from service; thought is a back door carelessly left open to invite the Archenemy. I should know that; I do know that! Yet despite my best efforts to better myself, to temper myself into the dynasty’s unbreakable shield, the thoughts find their way in.
It all began when Her Ladyship, the new Rogue Trader, asked me about my past. A reasonable line of inquiry for any new leader coming into her own, in a region of the Expanse so far from her old home, surrounded by so many new faces, each tangled in a political web generations in the weaving, which she was not yet privy to. I, of course, endeavored to respect her curiosity. I answered each question truthfully and to the point. But… But the way she phrased them; the way she addressed me when she said she wanted to know more about me… She referred to me by my rank, as is proper — but before that word, she… She used the word “my”.
She called me hers.
Of course I am hers. As the ship is hers, as the sacred Warrant is hers, as the colony worlds we are yet to reach are hers. I should have acknowledged that and moved on to the next matter of the day… But I thought on it more than is appropriate. More than is right — more than is righteous.
I went astray.
That short, tiny word pierced me like a lasigun; it carved a wound in me that I can still feel. Burning.
The sensation only worsened the next time Her Ladyship addressed me like this. What makes it all the more shameful, all the more vile, is that this second instance was a mere slip of the tongue. Her Ladyship was clearly not quite in control of her faculties, after partaking in the sinister rites of the Bloodspun Web — I warned her not to be so reckless, not to jump between the turbine blades, but she insisted she had to do it. Of course she did. Uprooted from the life she had once known, she has always sought kinship among her fellow Voidborn, from the Vox Master to the assassins in the deepest bowels of our ship. Can I fault her for that? Can I even presume to dissect the thought process of the Rogue Trader herself? I do not know.
I do not know.
I must be going mad.
Certainly, my head spun with utter madness when she swayed against me, still affected by the fumes the death cultists had had her breathe in for their ritual… She cupped my face in her hand, and looked at me with heavy-lidded eyes, and said my first name. With “my” in front.
A horrifying transgression again all protocol, I know. And thank the Throne she does not remember doing that. But I do. Sinfully, unforgivably, I do. I always will. I remember the sweetness of my name on her lips. The assertion that I was hers.
I replay this recollection in my mind in my darkest, basest hours as I lie sleepless in bed. Every pulse of heat that rushes through me at the thought brings me nothing but shame and disgust with myself. Yet I cannot stop. I…
I want her to call me that again. I want to hear that I am hers while her hand rests on my bare chest, feeling how the sound of her voice stirs my heart. I want to watch the most minute motion on her beautiful, beautiful face as she pronounces my name; to capture it and never let go. I want to taste that sweetness even stronger, deeper; I want to steal it from her very tongue. I want to show her just how right she is to claim me as hers; I want to offer acts of service far beyond anything I have done in her name thus far. I want —
Heart plummeting, a collar of suffocating ice suddenly locking around his throat, where just moment ago, a vein pulsed frantically with red-hot blood — Abelard Werserian freezes… And then hastily erases the vox message he has been so painstakingly recording for the confessional.
What was he thinking! This cannot come to light! Even with the voice scrambling graciously used by the acolytes to obscure the identity of the sinners that spill their souls out to them; even with all the precautions he took to avoid directly referencing his rank and his name — “my Seneschal,” Her Ladyship called him; and then, in a lapse of sound judgment, “my Abelard” — he cannot allow others to hear this.
Firstly, who does he think he is, gossiping about how the Rogue Trader acted under the influence! His soul still feels like untethering itself from his body when he thinks back to Idira grinning slyly at the stumbling, disoriented Rogue Trader and drawling something outrageous about her being “adorable”… The nerve! Surely, he cannot stoop down to that level!
And secondly, what if the rot that nestled within him, the seedling of Chaos he is not taking proper care to smother — what if it spreads to whoever plays back his confession? This cannot stand. Even if his… fantasies were nothing but a harmless diversion — he is the Seneschal, damn it! And old enough to be the Rogue Trader’s... by the Throne, he cannot even begin the calculations!
No.
These impure thoughts will stay where they belong. In a cage of tightly gritted teeth.
***
“Thank you once again, Your Ladyship, for tracking down these disturbing confessions!” Initiate Kiotus half-sings, making such a grandiose sign of the Aquila that one might think he is about to take off the ground and fly into the aether.
A lopsided tic of a smile touches Astra von Valancius’ pallid features. As Voidborn, she is built out of odd, stretched-out lines and awkward angles, looming almost xenos-like over most of the people around her. If Kiotus truly were to float off on the wings of his religious fervor, she would have easily grounded him with a small pat on his head.
“It was no trouble, truly. Though I am still quite… perplexed about why you’d find the confessions disturbing. There’s nothing wrong about feeling that good people died before their time, or caring for orphans… And I truly wish those lop-eared kleppas were not extinct. I wonder what environment they would have lived in; perhaps on a rocky mountainside, with plenty of shallow caves for shelter —”
She shakes her head, as if reprimanding herself for inevitably swerving towards her most beloved subject: rocks. Close behind her, as always, Seneschal Werserian furrows his brow, almost imperceptibly. Perhaps he would have liked to side with Kiotus over her; or perhaps he regrets not getting to hear more rock ramblings (he is, after all, one of the few people in the inner circle who withstood an entire torrent of theories about the curious asteroid fragment on display in the late Lady Theodora’s study).
“Well, Your Ladyship,” the Initiate clears his throat, twiddling his thumbs in front of his pristine robe. “Those were the confessions that stood out to me the most. If we were to go through all the dozens of love confessions as well —”
Lady Idira Tlass, who started demonstrably acting like she was dozing off the moment she set foot into the chapel, perks up with mischievous interest. The Seneschal, meanwhile, turns pale.
“Love confessions, you say?” Lady Tlass asks, eyebrows raised.
“It is truly nothing,” the Initiate hurries to reassure the Rogue Trader’s most esteemed retinue. “Ever since Your Ladyship has started showing more leniency towards the… lessers in our flock, we have had an influx of messages with… quite crudely worded praise of your beauty. We thought it best not to distract you with such trifles; unless, of course, you would like to dispatch enforcers and punish the insolence…”
Like a long-legged bird taking a drink of water on the rice terraces of an agri-world, the Rogue Trader throws her head back… And laughs.
The sound is loud enough that poor Kiotus nearly leaps backwards into the confessional’s cogitator. Yet the Lady Navigator, also a near-constant companion on the Rogue Trader’s journey, appears to sense no mirth in it. She cocks her head to one shoulder, also bird-like, and studies Lady Astra with unblinking crimson eyes.
“That coil of black-blue sadness around your laugh…” she whispers softly. “I am so sorry. I know how you must feel.”
At last, the Rogue Trader catches her breath.
“What an absurd idea! I am probably further from beautiful than we are from Terra! Those poor people are just trying to get in my good graces… Probably because they are starving. I must do another inspection at the enforcer outpost to see if the bastards started stealing ration cards again. Well, thank you for the entertainment, I suppose”.
With a tap of two fingers against her signature naval hat, she departs to do more of her voidship rounds. Her retinue follows suit, and only the Seneschal lingers, with an expression that Initiate Kiotus would have best described as “heartbroken”… If it were any of his business.