to him. He used the full force of his status, and the fear it generated, to go where he pleased and demand anything of anyone to achieve his goals.
In my experience, the heavy-handed, terror-inspiring approach closes as many doors as it smashes open. Frankly, it didn't surprise me to learn he had already been on this planet for a full eight months.
He looked at me as if I was something he had almost stepped in. 'I am discomforted when I see inquisitors holding to the soft, cunning ways of the radical. That way heresy lies, Eisenhorn/
That made me start. I consider myself, as I have reported, very much of the puritanical outlook. Staunch, hard-line in my own way, though flexible enough to get the job done efficiently. Yet here was Voke gauging me as a radical! And at that moment, next to him, I felt I may as well be the most extreme, dangerous Horusian, the most artful and scheming recon-gregator.
I tried to push past that. "We need to share more information, inquisitor. I'll take a guess and say your investigation somehow involves the Glaw family/
Voke said nothing and showed no response, but I felt his assistant tense psychically behind me.
'Our work is indeed clashing/ I went on. 'I, too, am interested in House Glaw/ In short, simple terms I laid out the matter of Eyclone's activities on Hubris, and drew the connection to Glaw and Gudrun by way of the mysterious Pontius.
I had his interest now. 'Pontius is just a name, Eisenhorn. Pontius Glaw on the other hand, is long dead. I served with worthy Angevin in the purge that destroyed him. I saw his corpse/
Yet here you are, investigating the Glaws anyway/
He exhaled slowly, as if making his mind up. 'After Pontius Glaw's eradication, the House of Glaw made great efforts to distance itself from his heresy. But Angevin, rest his immortal soul, always suspected that the taint ran deeper and that the family was not free of corruption. It is an ancient house, and powerful. It is difficult to probe its secrets. But from time to time, over the past two hundred years, I have turned my eye to them. Fifteen months ago, prosecuting a coven on Sader VII, I uncovered traces which suggested that particular coven, and several other minor groups, were collectively being run by an all but invisible parent cult – a cult of great scope and power, old and hidden, stretching across many worlds. Some traces led to Gudrun. That Gudrun is the Glaw's ancestral home was for me, too much of a coincidence/
'Now we make progress/1 said, sitting down in a high-backed chair and pulling on a shirt Bequin brought to me from my chamber. Aemos poured six glasses of amasec from a decanter on the dresser. Taking one as it was offered, Voke sat down opposite me. He sipped, contemplatively.
His assistant refused the glass that Aemos offered and remained standing.
'Sit down, Heldane!' Voke said. 'We have things to learn here/
The assistant took a glass and sat in the corner.
'I hunt out a cabal controlled by a notorious facilitator/1 continued, 'a cabal set on performing an abominable crime. The trail leads to Gudrun and the Glaws. You do the same with another heretical cell-'
'Three others, in fact,' he corrected.
'Three, then. And you see the shape of a far greater organisation. From the facts as they stand, we are both approaching the same evil from opposite sides.'
He licked his lips with a tiny, pallid tongue and nodded. 'Since coming to Gudrun I have rooted out and burned two heretical cells. I am reasonably sure of the activities of another nine, three here in Dorsay alone. I have allowed them to fester as I observe them. For months, they have seemed bent on preparation for some event. Abruptly, a matter of weeks ago, their behaviour changed. This would have been around the same time as your confrontation on Hubris.'
'Eyclone's undertaking was also great, with extensive preparatory work. Yet, at the eleventh hour, something either went wrong or plans were suddenly changed. Though I defeated and destroyed him, his plans were really thwarted by the fact that the Pontius didn't arrive. What has your work revealed of House Glaw?'
