Six Trojan tank-tractors, painted in the Warmaster's colours and teamed together like horses pulling a state landau, came behind the chained pris-on ers, towing a vast flatbed trailer designed to transport a super-heavy tank. On the flatbed, shackled in adamite and encased in individual void shield bubbles, were the thirty-three psykers, the greatest trophies of all.
They were dim, contorted shapes, barely human, swimming in the milky green cocoons of the imprisoning shields. Along with the White Consuls guarding the tractor-team, two hundred astrotelepaths strode alongside it, mentally reinforcing the void bubbles that were damping the psychic fury of the captives. Frost coated the metal of the flatbed. More psychic ball-lightning drifted overhead.
Twenty thousand men and five hundred armoured machines of the Thracian Interior Guard formed the tail of the Great Triumph, marching under the dual standard of Thracia and the Warmaster.
After barely fifteen minutes of walking in the immense procession, I was utterly numb. The noise of the crowd alone vibrated me to the very marrow. My diaphragm shook every time the flypast came in low or when the great siege sirens of the titans blasted. The scale of the occasion was overwhelming, the sensory assault bewildering. Seldom have I been so in awe of the power of my species.
Seldom have I been so forcibly reminded of my place as a tiny cog in the workings of the holy Imperium of Mankind.
Following the mighty Avenue of the Victor Bellum, the Triumph passed under the Spatian Gate, a monolithic structure of glossy white aethercite. The memorial gate was so cyclopean, even the Titans passed under it without difficulty.
It had been raised to commemorate Admiral Lorpal Spatian, who had been killed in the early years of the Ophidian Suppression during the magnificent fleet action that had taken Uritule IV.
The inner part of the arch was painted with majestic murals depicting that event, and rose to a dome so high, a microclimate of clouds regularly formed under the apex. I had known Spatian personally, and like several others in the procession, I paused under the giant gate to pay my respects to the eternal flame.
No, that is not true. I had known Spatian, during the Helican Schism, but not at all well. For reasons I could not explain, I felt compelled to stop. I certainly had no great urge to honour him.
'Sir?' Ravenor asked as I stepped aside.
'Go on, I'll catch up shortly' I told him.
Ravenor moved on with the procession while I lit a votive candle and set it amongst the thousands of others around Spatian's tomb. The vast tide of the Triumph moved slowly by behind me. Other figures had detached themselves from the procession and stood nearby, paying silent homage to the admiral.
'Eisenhorn?'
I looked round, the voice breaking my reverie. An elderly but powerful navy officer stood before me, splendidly austere in his white dress jacket.
'Madorthene,' I said, recognising him at once.
We shook hands. It had been a few years since I'd seen Olm Madorthene – Lord Procurator Madorthene, as he was now. We'd first met
at Gudrun during the Necroteuch affair when he had been a mid-ranking officer in the Battlefleet Disciplinary Detachment, the navy's military police. Now he ran that detachment. He'd been a useful and reliable ally over the years.
'Quite an event/ he said, with a reserved smile. Outside, the horns of the immense Titans blared again and the noise from the crowd swelled.
'I find myself sufficiently humbled,' I said. The Warmaster must be loving it.'
He nodded. 'Uplifting, good for public morale.'
I agreed, but in truth my heart was not in it. It wasn't just the overwhelming cacophony of it, or my deep-seated reluctance to be here at all. Since Ravenor and I had stepped out to take our place in the Triumph, I had nursed a sense of foreboding that was growing with each passing minute. Was that what had made me pause here, under the great arch?
There's a look on your face,' said Madorthene. This isn't really your thing, is it?'
