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He was skulking.
Hardly his favorite form of information gathering, but needs must. He’d tried listening in through the vox network at first, but found the comm lines that served the Navigator’s sanctum too well isolated and too regularly purified by the tech-priests for his modifications to go unnoticed long. After that failure, he’d moved to placing physical recording devices within the sanctum but found that, too, unsatisfactory. When he’d returned to collect the hidden dataslates, he’d found them dark and lifeless, their machine-spirits having long since fled, unable to withstand the glow of the immaterium that so often bathed the room. And thus, he was reduced to the oldest and lowest form of information gathering, the one he favored the least – skulking outside the door like an unwanted child. At least his biomancy allowed him to sharpen his hearing enough that he was not forced to crouch on the ground and press his ear to whatever slight gaps he might find between door and bulkhead. A small mercy.
The subjects of this hasty and unpleasant investigation were the Lord Captain and Lady Navigator themselves. He would not have bothered debasing himself for any of lower rank than they. But debase himself he must, for intelligence on the supposed affair of the heart between the Rogue Trader von Valancius and the future Novator of House Orsellio could only prove useful to the Inquisition. He had thought it to be no more than a petty flirtation, just the usual sort of diversion that occurred between highborn lords and ladies. All that lay between them was words that were nothing, meant nothing.
Or so he’d foolishly believed, up until he’d heard that the Lady Cassia had gifted the Lord Captain an immortalium. He’d learned of it, to his dismay, when the Lord Captain had spoken of the gift to his High Factotum. An immortalium was no mean gift; even members of the highest echelons of the Imperium could not expect to see more than ten in a lifetime, let alone to receive one. It was, without a doubt, an indication on Lady Cassia’s part that she considered their relationship far more than a diverting bit of coquetry. Heinrix had upbraided himself silently, jaw clenched, as he’d half-listened to Danrok’s explanation of the custom’s origins. His own petty desires had blinded him to the true depth of the attachment between the Lord Captain and their Lady Navigator, at least on her side of the pairing. Such failings were unforgivable in an agent of the Inquisition. It would not, could not, happen again.
He'd held his breath, waiting for Malakai’s answer. To see what they would do, now that they knew the full meaning behind the gift. His eyes flickered over their face, along the lean planes of their body, searching, desperately, for some hint at their thoughts. Had he underestimated their bond from both directions, and missed too the profundity of Malakai’s admiration for her?
Upon the completion of Danrok’s explanation, they had looked off into the distance, over in the direction of the bridge where Lady Cassia spent most of her time. And they had smiled one of the crooked and genuine smiles that he had come to associate not with the Lord Captain, but with Malakai. Malakai, who had kind eyes and a cutting sense of humor; Malakai who was a far better regicide player than him but kept inviting him to play anyway. Malakai, who steadfastly did not speak of their time at the Scholastica; Malakai, who became nervous whenever his hands were too long out of their sight. And the smile that they had directed Lady Cassia’s way, though they surely could not have seen her from the place they stood, had been so warm and lovestruck as to leave the rest of the bridge feeling icy cold in comparison. His oldest wounds, healed though they were, ached with the chill. His first fumbling attempts to patch up those holes with biomancy had left the new nerve endings too sensitive, too reactive to even the slightest thermal disappointment. He had thought… but it did not matter what he had thought. Only that he had missed information that the Inquisition might have use for.
That was why he found himself here, two weeks hence, skulking outside the Navigator’s sanctum. Earlier that morning, Lady Cassia had rushed onto the bridge, delight evident on her elegant features. “Malakai – oh, I mean, Lord Captain,” she had called. “Please allow me to thank you for your most generous gift. The library you have added to the sanctum far exceeds the library on Eurac V in breadth, though obviously a voidship’s library cannot hope to compete with it in depth, at least on certain subjects. Oh!” Cassia had lifted one hand to her mouth, her delicate skin flushing rose-petal pink. “That is to say, I mean, that I did not ever expect it to have the same depth a library curated by my family for generations. I did not intend to insult your gift! It is wonderful, truly! I have already spent an hour dithering over which volume I ought to read first.”
Malakai had taken her hands in theirs and looked up at her, giving her another of their crooked smiles. “There is no insult taken,” they had replied. “I was prepared to warn you that it was but a pale shadow of the grand libraries I remember from my Grandmother’s household, but you are right. This library is young yet, we must give it time to come into its own before we judge it too harshly, yes? It gladdens me to hear you praise its first, fumbling steps so. I asked the High Factotum to ensure there were volumes on a wide number of subjects, so you might browse as you pleased.”
Cassia’s answering smile had been beautifully sweet and shy, the picture of a true and uncomplicated affection. Her great swell of emotion must have overwhelmed her control in that moment, for he’d felt something twinge in his chest in time with the height of her smile. He’d coughed quietly, the signal they’d agreed upon to let her know when her powers were beginning to spill over. That had dimmed her radiance, though the pressure in his chest had eased only slightly. He planned to take a more careful inventory of his body once he had some downtime, to heal whatever it was within him that had been disturbed by the brilliance of their twin smiles.
“It is a truly marvelous gift,” she had repeated, “I could not have asked for one better. I barely know where to begin with it!”
“If you are interested,” Malakai had responded, still looking only at her, seemingly uninterested in any of the numerous other people on the bridge, “I did suggest that a few specific volumes be acquired, personal favorites of mine that I thought might be of either use or interest to you. If you aren’t certain where to start, perhaps a suggestion or two would come as welcome respite?”
The blatant partiality of the gesture had shocked him. Still shocked him. A Rogue Trader always had plenty of money to spend, but never enough time. For the Lord Captain to spend even a few of their precious moments directing subordinates to spare no expense in securing a gift for a single individual was one thing. Having the Lord Captain choose to spend time, time thinking of what a person might like, might use, might desire…
Malakai must care for Cassia very much.
The lady in question had lit up at the offer, letting slip what shreds of decorum she had salvaged at his urging. “Oh Lord Captain, that would truly be most wonderful!” It had almost hurt to look at her, so bright was her joy at Malakai’s offer. He had forced himself to endure it, to keep his eyes on them, this habitable planet nearly hidden by an incandescent sun.
The air had felt suddenly chilled; his chest suddenly numb. How could he have missed this? How could he have allowed this to slip beneath his notice? Clearly, he had allowed himself to be distracted by his own frailties, the lingering sentimentalism he had always sought to crush from his own bones. To have missed an affection so blatant and all-consuming that they did not mind declaring it not in private, as was appropriate, but in front of all and sundry! Perhaps that was deliberate, perhaps this was intended to warn off other suitors. Cassia would know the meaning of it, there was no doubt about that, but Malakai might be unaware of its connotations. They might not realize what they were saying to him, and to the rest of the bridge officers.
But Malakai had given the gift. Malakai had spent hours thinking of Cassia, of what she desired. They had done that for no other of their companions, of that he had been certain. They were fond of asking questions, yes, of trying to ferret out little bits of knowledge, of swiping little pieces of your heart and soul for their own ends. What little they gave of themself in turn came only in the form of shared looks, crooked smiles, and the brief warmth of a hand on your shoulder. Perhaps a warm flask of the tea you had once said you favored, pressed into your chilled hands on a cold planet. It did not come as more than that, as grand gestures made for all to see.
It had not come to him as more than that.
Not that it should have. Not that he ought to have expected it to. He was not here to befriend Malakai von Valancius, he was here to watch them in the name of the most Holy Inquisition, to report on their comings and goings, and to determine if they were a threat to the Imperium. That was only reasons this distinct partiality towards their Lady Navigator mattered. He needed to know exactly how close the two of them were, exactly how far they had taken this… relationship of theirs, so he might report upon it to Calcazar, who would know how to bend it to his service, and through that to the Imperium’s service. He was but a conduit, a thing fashioned for service. He should not be reaching with grasping hands for things that were not his to take, no matter the looks and shared touches.
“Then shall we go? It would be my honor to introduce these books to you, and you to them,” Malakai had said, offering her their arm, which she had happily taken. The two of them, named scions of great houses both, had turned and walked arm and arm to the lift, the bridge crowds parting before them, none willing to linger in their radiance.
“We shall,” he had replied, and followed after them.
Thus – the skulking. He leaned up against the bulkhead that separated the hallway from the Navigator’s Sanctum, aware of how suspicious he looked. Idle hands were, after all, the champions of heretics and demons, and it was not an empty hallway by any means. Numerous servants and surfs scuttled by, going about on the unimportant tasks that made up their unimportant lives. The occasional petty officer or stern-looking enforcer strutted by as well, but the rosette of the Inquisition displayed proudly on his chest kept all their eyes averted and their opinions on his presence in their own mouths. Just as they would not dare challenge one of the highborn, they would not dare with an acolyte of the Inquisition, lest they draw unwelcome eyes.
Confident that he would not be disturbed, he turned his gaze inward. Steadying his breath as best he could, given the importance of what he was about to witness, he let slip a few of the numerous bonds tied tight around the core of power that sat inside his abdomen, pressed up against the bottom of his liver. Each slip he timed to an inhale, the cool ice of his power flowing up through his veins to gather in his ears, with each exhale his hearing sharpened and expanded, until he could hear each breath, every brush of cloth; until the soft voices that had once eluded him sounded so sweetly in his ears. Until he could hear every whisper, every motion – until he heard it all, so clearly that he felt he was there in the room with them.
He'd been in the Sanctum before, though not since its latest addition. Still, it was enough for him to picture it in his mind’s eye. Their voices were loud enough that they must have been standing in the antechamber, which seemed a likely place for the new library, the better to protect the rare and precious books it contained from the seething energies of the warp. To his ear, they were seated, their voices brushing up to his ears from a low angle, and close, judging by the errant brush of cloth against cloth – though not so close as to cause a scandal. The Lady Navigator’s ever-present servant was there as well, his breaths quieter and more distant than the others. Likely tucked off in a corner so as to not impinge upon the moment. He was pleased that the Lord Captain was taking pains to keep Cassia’s reputation pristine, even in private, and that he would have no sordid goings-on to report to the Inquisition. Or at least, none yet.
“– settled on these three to start,” Malakai said, and he heard what sounded like the slide of well-oiled leather against leather. Displaying their finds for Lady Cassia’s critical eye. Good. He had not missed much.
“To have made so many suggestions to the High Factotum, it seems to me that you too must be quite fond of books,” he heard Lady Cassia say.
“You seem to have me dead to rights, Lady Cassia.” He could hear the smile in the words. Of course Malakai was fond of books. They always had been, even as a child, according to his reports. And even now they were never seen far from one – he knew them to spend every planetary shuttle trip with a book in hand. Sometimes he thought that they must have read every book in the sector – they appeared just as familiar with the writings of the obscure Maguses that Pasqal was always referencing as they did with the bawdy romance pamphlets Jae favored. “I’ve always enjoyed the chance books give you to escape into another life for a time. To be someone else somewhere else. To see something beyond your own walls.” There was a faint edge of nostalgia to their voice that brought to mind faraway eyes. Though he could not see it, he was certain that the slightest of wrinkles had formed between their brows, as it was always wont to do when they were lost in thought.
A quick rustle of cloth reached his ears, telling him that they had given themself a little shake. “Or, often as not, to borrow a little bit of knowledge from one far more acquainted with the subject than I.”
“I find myself quite in agreement, Lord Captain,” Lady Cassia replied. “During my time on Eurac V I often relied on books to help me escape the monotony of the station. Life on the station was so dull, and without books I would have had precious little to keep me occupied. I’m sure you are familiar, having grown up on a voidstation yourself.”
“Of course,” Malakai answered, but something in the tenor of their answer did not strike his ear quite right. It felt too quick, too light and easy after the heavy nostalgia of their earlier words. He grimaced. Were it any other, he could reach out for their heart, feel if it had sped up to beat a liar’s dance. But Malakai was different. Any time he tried to peer into their body he was met with only a thrice-damned buzzing that made his mind feel weak and heavy, like an arm gone numb from vibration. He could find the shape of them, but nothing more. There was no detail. With them, he was adrift in the void – left to rely on their words and his own guesses at the meanings behind them. The repulsion was so complete that he struggled even to pinpoint their injuries in battle, leaving him desperately searching them with his limited human eyes for anything he might mend. When he had asked if it was deliberate or innate, the Lord Captain had given him a tight smile and said nothing, while Werserian had hurried him away with surprising speed.
He couldn’t even see them now, couldn’t look into their eyes and see whether they darted away from his or held steady, couldn’t watch to see what emotions flickered across their face. He had only their voice and their words. But he knew them. He’d scoured every document he could find on them, pieced together their history, their family, their past loves and past hates. And his careful observation and thorough research had borne fruit. Once they had been untouchable, unknowable, as remote and distant to him as the life and family he had once thought to be his due. More akin to a statue of a saint in a public square than a real person – something that could only be aspired to, implacably perfect and beautiful. But he had learned how to pierce the veil, to tell when they were uncomfortable, were happy, were dissembling. He had watched the statue impossibly, implausibly, come to life and regard him in turn. To speak back to him, from up on their high pedestal. And something in the tone of their voice, in the quiet noise of cloth on velvet that brought to mind the slight shifting motions they so often did when uncomfortable, made him think of quick flashed smiles and things left obviously unsaid.
And they were dissembling; he was sure of that. Because while Malakai and Cassia had both grown up on voidstations, he knew the similarities in their circumstances ended there. While Cassia had been raised as the pampered heiress of House Orsellio, Malakai had spent their early years in the slums of Footfall, scrabbling in the dust with thousands of other lowborn serfs. Even the youngest children worked, running messages, cooking, cleaning, or minding even younger children. The common rabble never lacked for things to do, for their labors were as unending as their lives were short. As a child, Malakai was like to have read only in stolen moments, hidden in nooks and crannies from those who sought to put a stop to such idle and unnecessary pursuits. Surely Lady Cassia ought to have realized that?
“It is pleasant, I think, to spend time with someone whose tastes and experiences are a close match for one’s own,” Cassia said. “I find it lends itself to an easy and agreeable air that is so often lacking in more mixed company. Wouldn’t you agree, Lord Captain?”
“I’m sure I would,” Malakai replied. “Now,” they continued swiftly, “about the books.” Heinrix felt his own eyebrows raise in surprise. Did she not know? Was Lady Cassia unaware that her beau had spent the first eight years of their life not as she had spent hers, in the warm bosom of a noble house, but living hand-to-mouth in the slums? Was he the only one between them to really know who Malakai had been, what they must have seen and felt? To lack that knowledge of their past was to lack a piece of them, a piece integral to the knowing of them in all their singularity. Or was this simply a poor attempt at flirting, a little bit of conversational awkwardness from one long isolated from any sort of society?
He was prevented from ruminating on the topic further by Malakai’s relentless focus on the topic of books. This did not come as a surprise to him – in the interest of information gathering, he had asked them one shuttle ride what book they were reading, and if they found it enjoyable. They had not stopped talking about it for near an hour, answering any and all of his questions with such earnest delight that he had found himself compelled each time to ask another just to see their disarming smile. A beautifully bound copy of the book had been waiting for him in his quarters after their next planetfall.
“This one,” Malakai said, fingers lightly brushing over a leather-bound volume, “is a biography of Celyrov Gaprak.”
Cassia gasped. “The one who painted the landscape in your throne room on Dargonus that I admired so?”
“The very same!” replied Malakai eagerly. “After you mentioned him, I remembered that I’d read his biography some years ago and found it utterly fascinating. Celyrov was a distant cousin to the main Gaprak line and was never expected to inherit, so he was free to travel and take up painting. He visited nearly every corner of the sector, traveling on merchant ships and pirate vessels, seeing things that had never been seen before and getting into scrapes all the while.”
“Oh, what an interesting man he sounds to be! I am ever so eager to find out more.” Cassia paused for a moment, her heart pumping harder, blood rushing to her cheeks. “You… you had so many responsibilities to attend to on Dargonus, and yet you took the time to remember which painting I said I admired?” She sounded nearly overcome at the thought of it. He could not blame her – to have Malakai’s undivided attention upon you, to know they thought of you, was a formidable thing. He’d known that they were brilliant, his reports had covered that much. But to experience their prodigious intellect brought to bear upon you was another thing entirely. The refreshments present at their regicide games had become ever more to his liking, Malakai noting silently each time what he ate and what he left behind. It was certainly dangerous, as their fixation on detail could easily spoil an agent’s cover, but he could not bring himself to disapprove of it, not when he had stood in its gentle warmth.
“I will admit to being blessed with a better memory than most,” they laughingly replied, the faintest sound of their finger tapping on their forehead reaching his ears with their words. “Truly, I’m simply happy that you are happy with the selection.” He could imagine the smile on their face with ease, the way their eyes scrunched at the corners when they were well and truly pleased, the slight duck of their head that accompanied the words. How it compelled you to answer with a smile of your own.
“Onto the next,” they said, the book thumping slightly as they set it down on a low table. “This one here,” there was a sliding noise, fingers against leather, likely as they proffered the title for inspection, “is perhaps somewhat more practical. It’s a tactical manual, written for Astra Militarum commanders charged with units that contain more than a single psyker, or need to coordinate with covens of Primaris psykers. While our particular circumstances are not quite identical, I still hope you may at least find it thought provoking, given that you are our chief battle strategist.”
A second brush of fingers against leather indicated that the book in question had changed hands, and the rustling that followed was Lady Cassia gently flipping through its pages. “Indeed I shall! I have read many tomes on military tactics, but none so specific to our current situation as this promises to be. I was led to believe that such circumstances as ours, with our abundance of psykers, are vanishingly rare. House Orsellio took great pains to ensure that every book on tactics was found for me, and yet I did not know such a book even existed! How did you come to learn of it, Lord Captain?”
Heinrix knew the book well. Few copies of it existed, and fewer circles still were interested in possessing one. But the Inquisition, for all its strictures, had always been willing to make use of any resources that found their way into its path. Tactics for High Psyker Units was if not well loved among Inquisition acolytes, at least well known. It suddenly occurred to him that he knew, too, how Malakai had come to know of it – the author of the manual, one Origos Phox, had been their mentor throughout their Primaris training. Even after the unfortunate incident that had led to the end of their training, the two had remained close during their tenure teaching at the Scholastica, where Origos had taken up the post of Head Lecturer. He had not remembered the name of the man who had authored the book until now.
A commotion down the corridor stole his focus for a moment, overwhelming the delicate voices he sought through the bulkheads with color and sound. Two servants appeared to have bumped into one another, scattering various pieces of cloth on the floor that they hastily scrambled to retrieve. He closed his eyes and redoubled his focus.
“It is a rare book indeed, and not a well distributed one either. I’m not surprised it never made its way to your library. I only knew of it because I became familiar with the author during my time at the Scholastica.” They paused for a moment before continuing, a new warmth infusing their words. “He is a very interesting man, and a very opinionated one. His writing reflects a great deal of his personality, and I admit I am very curious to hear what you think, both of his strategies and of the man himself.”
He had to hold back a smile. He’d heard the man called eccentric, and his writing certainly seemed to support that interpretation – scolding and commending by turns as it was. He still remembered the long passage dedicated to praising and detailing a strategy in great depth, only for it to turn at the last minute and reveal that it had, in fact, failed in actual combat. The book had gone on to explain why, in even greater detail than before, that this outcome should have been obvious to any commander with “half a brain in his head” who knew how to pay attention, and any who hadn’t were more than welcome to put the book down and go off and die in a poorly planned ambush. He remembered sitting there goggling at it, wondering what on Holy Terra had happened to that man in his life to make him like that. He could practically hear Malakai’s laughter at the question, the hearty, genuine sort, the kind that made the whole room feel lighter. Malakai had to have stories, having worked and studied so closely with a man that could only be described as… high strung, if you were committed to being polite.
“I’ll tell you about him someday,” they said, amusement still ringing in their voice. He hoped so, hoped someday, over a regicide board and a pot of tea, that he might draw out their stories, and their laughter. There had been so much warmth in their voice when they had spoken of Origos, a whole sun compressed into a few short phrases. He wanted to know what it felt like to stand in even the outermost corona of that glow. Wanted to see what warmth would pool in their eyes, what true affection looked like on their features.
“And this last one,” they said, a halting note of embarrassment creeping into their voice, “is, ah, perhaps a somewhat silly choice. Are you fond of novels, Lady Cassia? Did you read many of them as a child?”
“Oh yes, Malakai! Novels were among some of my dearest companions on Eurac V,” Cassia said, beaming so brightly he could hear her smile in her words.
“Then perhaps there is some hope that you will enjoy this this particular novel, my Lady. It’s one I was quite fond of in my youth. It is almost certainly not as delightful as I remember it, though it will hopefully be a charming read nonetheless. But please do not feel any obligation towards it. I merely thought you might… ah, I do not know what I thought. Forgive me, this–”
There would be two spots of a deep red high on their cheeks, he knew. That was how they flushed when embarrassed, a rare sight to be sure, but most certainly one worth savoring. It was so rare to see the ever poised and controlled Lord Captain shaken, which only made it more mesmerizing on the rare occasions it did happen. He felt a smile tug at his lips at the thought of it. Even if he were to reassure them, promise that he was interested in this novel of theirs because it was theirs, because they had thought to offer it, because it was another piece to their puzzle that he might collect, the spots of color would remain, lending a heat to their face that would leave him breathless.
They laughed, a little breathily. Still nervous, then. “I’m glad that you consider it interesting,” they said, “if perhaps only for what it might say about me.” There was an eagerness to their words, a certain strain of shy happiness that surprised him, just a little. Malakai, for all their pleasant nature, was not a particularly forthcoming creature. They would inquire of you, of your past and your future and your family, and listen intently to all of it, commit it to the massive depths of their memory, but very rarely did they respond in kind. Oh, they spoke of themself and their duties, of their plans for the future, but it was all lightness and superficiality. A pleasant, enduring wall. But in those sweet, shy words there lurked something more. A desire to be known, to place some part of themself in the hands of another.
He wanted to hear about this book of theirs all the more for it. He knew all about them, of course. Every last detail of their life story was spread out before him in the orderly lines of the Inquisition’s report back in his chambers. And he remembered them well enough from the Scholastica – their grace, their confidence, their untouchability. The way they had held themself apart from him and the rest of the rabble.
Though they did not stand so far apart now. The thought alone sent a thrill through him, a rising warmth that he consciously ensured would not bring even a hint of heat to his cheeks. They were the bearer of a Warrant of Trade, one signed by the God-Emperor’s own hand, yes, but they were informal and familiar with their closest retinue. And from their every interaction he secreted away some new piece of knowledge, of character, anything that might better illuminate them. Anything he might use to make them smile or frown, so long as they did it because of him. Because they looked at him.
He heard the faint hissing of Malakai drawing a deep breath in through their nose, pausing a moment before releasing it. They would be wearing one of their pensive expressions, he knew, eyes slightly downcast as they gathered their thoughts. “It’s about a young boy,” they began slowly. Heinrix could see them perfectly, the faint smile that was playing around one corner of their mouth (the left, always the left), how they were fidgeting with the book, thumb tracing gently along the edge of the cover, back and forth, back and forth, pausing a little each time they found the corner, eyes darting to your face and falling to their own hands, over and over again. “He’s the son of a planetary governor. The planet is invaded by a xenos horde one day. The boy kills several xenos himself, but the onslaught is too great and some of his servants sacrifice themselves so that he might escape into the forest on his family’s estate.” There was the faintest wince to the words, as though they were only realizing their content as they were speaking them. Interesting.
“Ah, as I was saying, he escapes into the woods, surviving there alone for a week or so, before he runs into a unit of Space Marines who have come to take back the planet. He’s the governor’s son, and thus very familiar with the defenses of the planet.” Their tone took on a slightly dreamy, nostalgic quality. “Therefore, the unit decides to take him in, and he lives and travels with them as they use his knowledge and their might to recapture the planet from the xenos. The Space Marines teach him a great deal about how to fight and live with honor and the God-Emperor in his heart.”
How charming, he thought, that they should remain so attached to a child’s novel after so long. The thing was almost certainly no good, more propagandic slop than anything approaching actual literature. But something of their very obvious attachment to it brought a hint of warmth to his chest and tightness to his throat. They remembered and cared enough for a terrible book from their childhood to make a gift of it. That was the thing about them that he had found most shocking – their odd sweetness, their delicate charm. How, the more he learned of them, the more he wished to know.
They laughed. It was a self-deprecating sort of laugh, but one with enough genuine amusement and happiness to make him want to smile back. “Detailing its plotline aloud has certainly convinced me that it cannot be anything better than pure drivel. Why, it might even sink to the level of absolute rubbish! But I must admit to a terrible fondness for it all the same. It was one of the few books I had as a very young child, and I read it from cover to cover far more times than I care to admit.”
That went some way towards explaining their attachment to a book they knew to be unworthy of the paper it was printed on. He had assumed that when they spoke of a favored novel from their youth, they had meant something they had read after their adoption into the Evusarr household by Lady Ephrais. But that comment certainly made it sound like this book was a favorite of theirs from their even younger years before the deaths of their parents, back when they had still resided in the squalid depths of Footfall station. It was exceptionally rare for a peasant household to contain any books at all, let alone something so frivolous as a novel. He wondered where they’d gotten the thing. From their criminal connections, perhaps? He knew their grandmother to be a pirate of some renown, and while intelligence on her activities past and present was spotty at best, she was known to have visited her daughters on her occasional returns to Footfall. It would certainly make her the most likely source of such an unexpected item for one living in such conditions as those once inhabited by the Khar family. It did give him cause to wonder about the allegiances of their parents, for all that the Inquisition’s dossier had considered them honest, fearful citizens. If they were willing to accept stolen goods destined for those well above their station, what else might they have condoned? In the end, he supposed it did not matter. While the dead might not be innocent, they were certainly beyond the reach of any of the ramifications for guilt that he might dispense.
He did, however, make note to check whether or not the Lord Captain appeared perhaps a little too eager to deal with the Fellowship during their next sojourn to Footfall. Those raised in iniquity might, after all, require reminders of the righteous path. And the deliverance of such a reminder was most certainly within the Inquisition’s remit. How interesting it would be to turn the tables on them, to have perfect Malakai be the one on the receiving end of a lecture about their failures for once, instead of being the stick against which all the rest of them were measured, and found wanting. To remind them that he stood as their equal, now. He had to imagine that they would find it shocking.
“N-no, it’s just that, I, ah, for certain reasons, I was not afforded library access in my youngest years.” The sudden tight, breathy quality to their voice surprised him. “I only had what few books as were given to me personally.”
How odd. What a curious, circuitous statement – he had not heard what Lady Cassia had said to prompt it, but it tugged on his interrogator’s senses nonetheless. It was just the sort of technically true statement that was ever the province of the guilty. Many a man had said such a thing to him only to have it unravel entirely once they were under his thumb. There was no need for Malakai to be so reticent, unless Cassia truly was not aware of their less than gentle upbringing.
He let out a low chuckle. The Lord Captain, keeping secrets? Advocate of a better and gentler way Malakai trafficking in deception? It shouldn’t surprise him – every person had their vices, and everyone was guilty of something. Still, something in the dirty humanity of it thrilled him. Yet even as he did so, some long-buried and only recently revived part of his subconscious tugged at him. He liked the Lady Cassia. She was a charming young woman, the very best of the Imperium. She deserved better than to be deceived and to have him delight in that deception. But delight he did, even as he felt the waters of shame that would come later to drown him begin to lap at his boots.
“And please forgive me, my lady, for having taken up so much of your time with my self-satisfied ramblings. I must return to handle matters on the bridge, and so I take my leave of you,” Malakai said, a certain tightness continuing to thrum beneath their words. “It gives me great happiness to see you so enamored with this gift of mine, and I hope it continues to bring you joy for many turns. I hope, too, that you will find my selections, however meagre and odd they might be, at least somewhat pleasing.”
Heinrix knew that Lady Cassia must have given some response to Malakai’s words, surely, but he found that he could not recall it, too lost in the depths of his own speculation to give care to other matters. For here had come the swift and sudden retreat – ever the next line in the guilty man’s playbook. How many heretics and xeno-lovers had he seen turn tail and flee at the mere sight of the Inquisition? He was now rendered absolutely certain that Malakai had not been very forthcoming about their past. And reflecting upon their conversations, both those shared with him and those overheard, he found that he could not recall them ever mentioning their peasant’s life.
“Thank you for indulging me. I hope these books bring you many happy travels.” The rustling of their clothing indicated that they both rose with that statement, though Cassia slightly later than Malakai, as if she had not quite expected it. He drank it all in – the sound of their breathing, the pattern of their steps, the brush of skin against cloth as they toyed with the edges of the longer sleeves that they favored. Even in the depths of the hottest compartments, when all others had unbent enough to bare some skin they had remained entirely, stubbornly covered from neck to wrist. They plucked at the ends of their sleeves when they were nervous. They were breathing just a little too fast, a little too ragged for someone unbothered. Signs of guilt, all of it.
Even their footsteps were off; a slight stuttering to their rhythm that brought them, eventually, to a stop. Hand pressed to the wall, just above the button that would retract the bulkhead door, they paused, breathing still a little too fast, as though considering something. They took a single breath in – a deep one, and consciously even. They let it out in the same way, centering themself. “I truly do hope that this gift brings you happiness, Lady Cassia.” Their tone was new to him, one with undertones of a nervous energy that did not match those he’d heard before. Their words were clear enough that he knew they must be facing him as they said them, and thus not facing Cassia, even though it was her to whom they were theoretically speaking. He did not know what to make of it. Another beat passed, another moment of silence. “I find often, these days, that it is your happiness that precipitates my own.”
The enormity of such a confession left him dazed. Some ridiculous part of him wondered, for a moment, if they had known he was there. If they had known they were speaking directly to him. But the sound of the bulkhead door hissing open sent those traitorous thoughts scurrying. He wrenched his accursed power back down, returning his hearing to its natural state, leaving him bereft. He staggered forward down the hallway, adrift in a sudden sea of oppressive silence, ears ringing from the sudden loss of sensation. With his senses so reduced, he could no longer hear them; despite all the servants that still scuttered through the hallway he felt instantly, acutely alone. He planned to stumble back to his quarters, where he might sit in the dark and quiet as he carefully readjusted the delicate portions of his inner ear that required repair after such strenuous use.
But for all that he felt alone, he was not alone, and his few stumbling steps had not been enough to save him. He had allowed himself to be distracted, caught up in the use and enormity both of what he had been hearing, and thus he would face the consequences. Consequences that came in the form of the Lord Captain themself nearly running straight into him.
“Heinrix,” they said, sounding a little surprised, mouth parted. Though not quite as surprised as he would have expected, whispered the paranoid part of his brain, the piece of him reared by Calcazar and the other initiates.
“My apologies, Lord Captain. I was just passing by on my way to the bridge.” Falling back on instinct and the manners that had been ground into him from near the moment of his birth until it had all gone so awry, he offered them his arm.
He hated himself for it instantly. Stupid, stupid! What had he been thinking? This was the Lord Captain, not some noble lady on a garden stroll! And even then, that was no longer his role to play in this life. He was of that class no longer; his world did not have space for such things. But he could not retract the gesture, at least not immediately. He could only hope that the Lord Captain would not be too offended, that they would choose to see his slip in convention as just that – a slip and nothing more, one with no reflection on what he thought of them. He held his breath, counting the elongated moments until he might drop his arm and receive his tongue-lashing.
Malakai took it, looping one arm through his, resting a gentle hand on his forearm. But it was not the delicate position of a lady’s hand as she was being escorted about, which contained just as much air as contact. This was closer to a gesture of friends, of intimates, their elbows linked tightly.
“How convenient,” they said. “I’m heading that way as well.”
He cursed again the perpetual buzzing that kept him from reading the bodily cues he had grown so accustomed to. At least now he could see their face, though their expression told him little. Their voice, too, was even enough, though their words certainly seemed to carry more than a hint of suspicion. Even so, he reminded himself, it was no issue at all if they did suspect. He was here as an agent of the Inquisition, not as some lover scorned, and he was well within his rights to surveil the Lord Captain if he so pleased.
They began walking, still arm-in-arm, in the direction of the bridge. Ever polite, Malakai asked after him, after how he was feeling, if there was anything that he needed. He responded in kind, continuing on the same polite and proper topics. But his mind was elsewhere. Have you told her? he wanted to ask. Does she know you as I do? Can you truly claim to feel such sentiment for her when she doesn’t even know who you are?
He could not ask that, however, at least not outright, not without overplaying his hand. He settled instead for another, less important question. “I appreciate your continued invitations to Regicide, Lord Captain, and I look forward to our next match. Should I come prepared for the usual slaughter, or would you say that there is hope for me yet?”
“As I am sure you know, I am ever hope’s proponent.” They paused for a moment, thinking. He watched the beginnings of a smile tug at their lips, felt himself drawn in by the impish twinkle in their warm eyes. “But in your particular case even I must give way to our crushing reality. I’m very good.”
He allowed himself a rueful smile. They really were that good. “Perhaps we might try cards, then? If only to allow me to win back some dignity?”
Malakai smiled wide. Too wide. “I would love to play you at cards. What do you intend to wager?”
Heinrix had spent enough time with various units of the Imperial Guard to know exactly what sort of warning that eagerness conveyed. “Judging by your expression, it seems I would be a fool to bet anything I did not actively wish to be rid of,” he teased.
They laughed at that. They favored him with one of their genuine smiles, too, one where the left corner of their mouth pulled up a little more than the right, one that contained a flash of teeth and made the corners of their eyes wrinkle. All that, just for him. Being at the center of it felt like swallowing a sun, and he never wanted them to look away.
“I ought to have assumed as much. I certainly learnt all my best card tricks from the other students as the Scholastica.” A slight untruth. He’d learned some there, yes, but he’d picked up far more in Calcazar’s employ. Still, he could not think of a better lead in to the question he had been longing to ask since he’d first laid eyes on them and realized the Malakai von Valancius of his reports was also the Malakai of his Scholastica Psykana days. He’d watched them obsessively ever since, but they had never given him any indication that they remembered their connection, if it could even be called that. Brilliant, beautiful Malakai, praised by all their teachers, the model student, the golden child, the one they were all never quite as good as. He was not even sure that they had paid enough attention to the lesser students to even know his name, let alone remember him. But perhaps they just did not recognize him in this different and elevated role of his. Perhaps they did know him after all. And he had to know. He had to. He had to know if they realized that it was one of those lesser students that they had been forced to invite aboard their vessel, that they shared courtesies and games with, that they now walked arm-in-arm with. Who they now cared enough about to remember his favorite foods and least favorite regicide opening gambits. He took the plunge.
“You know, judging by your age I think we must have attended the Scholastica in quick succession. I wonder if we might know any of the same people?”
Their mood soured perceptibly, the smile slipping from their lips. The fingers on his arm clenched once, reflexively. “It’s possible,” they allowed, though they did not sound enthused by the prospect.
This response was well outside his expectations. He could not fathom why the mere mention of the Scholastica would upset them so. They had been the darling of all the professors during their time as a student, he remembered that well. And they had even returned there to teach, per his report. “You do not enjoy being reminded of it?” His voice sounded surprised even to his own ears.
The smile they gave him was painfully fake and pasted on. It left him cold. “We are both aware of how the Scholastica operates. Surely that cannot surprise you?”
Nothing in their response made sense. They had been treated the best of all of them, why did they insist upon acting like it had been some great misery? “You speak of it so coldly, but I know you to be an exceptional talent. They would not have treated you harshly. I highly doubt anything you endured there could honestly be called justification for that attitude. After all, surely it cannot have been worse than your years on Footfall station?”
A look of shock and confusion twisted their features as blood rushed to their cheeks. “How did you…?” All at once, they drew back their shoulders and dropped his arm like it had scalded them. They stared at him, eyes narrowed, shoulders back, chin up. The Lord Captain had arrived. “Ah. Of course. Whatever report you received on me was quite detailed, I imagine.” Their voice became colder still, and while they tried very hard to hide it, sliding their hands inside their voluminous sleeves, he could tell that their hands shook, and badly. “And I suppose I ought to have expected such callousness from an Inquisitorial acolyte.”
“I –, what –,” he stammered. He could not understand how this conversation had suddenly turned so hostile. He had certainly never seen them receive so much as a single punishment in all his time there.
In all his time there. But they had stayed on after he had left for his service in the Astra Millitarum, tapped for training as a Primaris Psyker. He felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. It had been near the end of that section of the report. He had not remembered, not then, too lost in his desperation to ask about the time they had shared. But their training had never been completed. It had instead ended early, abruptly, at the hands of two Inquisition Interrogators, who had left them in such a state that the report had noted that it was only due to their close, personal relationship with the expert biomancer Origos Phox that they had survived at all. “I was not, I did not–”
This time, their smile did not look pasted on. It was perfectly even, and perfectly unnatural. The Lord Captain’s public smile, that gave nothing, meant nothing. The one they gave while dealing with pirates and malcontents, obnoxious officers and overly familiar nobles. It was not a thing meant for anyone they might condescend to name so much as a friend.
“Please excuse me, Master van Calox. I have duties to attend to.” They swept off, leaving Heinrix with nothing to escort to the bridge but his shame.