Dante (Warhammer 40,000) by Guy Haley

Author:Guy Haley [Haley, Guy]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2017-03-03T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

The Red Council

998.M41

Asphodex High Anchor

Cryptus System

There were twenty-five chairs in the Chamber of the Red Council aboard the Blade of Vengeance. The total number required, should the entire council be gathered together at once. There were times when there were fewer than twenty-five members, but there had never been an occasion when there were more. At its fullest, the Red Council was made up of all ten company captains, and those captains with offices beyond company command, the Keeper of the Heavengate and the Warden of the Gates. Further seats were reserved for the Master of the Blade, the Exalted Herald of Sanguinius, the Sanguinary High Priest, the Chief Librarian, the High Chaplain and the Reclusiarch of the Lost. The remainder were drawn variously from captains assigned to command the mightier ships – always Blood Angels themselves – and whichever of the Chapter ancients remained lucid enough to pass on their wisdom. History had witnessed few occasions when all the Red Council had gathered together aboard one battle-barge, few even when all were present together on Baal, but there was a replica of this room on board the Bloodcaller, the Blood Angels’ other battle-barge, itself a copy of the chamber on Baal. The symbolism of what the council represented, and who was entitled to sit upon it, was more important than its actual membership. In practice the Blood Angels’ war council comprised whoever was available to represent the various sub-orders of the Chapter on any given campaign.

Filling much of the room beneath an armoured dome was a table, round so that the voice of every man might be heard. Though the throne of the Chapter Master was larger than the rest, it was not so grand as to set him apart. As with all the effects of the Chapter, the room was richly decorated, luxurious by the standards of the age. Banners hung around the wall. Bowls of loose rubies were set into the surface of the table before every chair, each gem a perfect blood drop marked at the atomic scale with the name of a lost brother. From the apex of the dome a huge, simple flag depended, bearing the Chapter badge of winged blood drop, black on red. Finely made rugs covered the floor. The paving they hid was also masterfully wrought: red-veined black stone cut into triangles and squares, arranged into complex geometries.

For the moment, the Chamber of the Red Council was quiet as the grave, lit with thick, bloody light that blurred the outlines of its fixtures. There was not a soul inside. It was the chamber of a stilled heart, red and black and lifeless.

The noise of steel on steel penetrated the gloom. The scrape of a key as long as an arm entering a lock designed to hold shut not just doors of earthly plasteel, but the gates of reality. Intersecting psychic null fields ensured no psyker or sorcerer could scry what went on within the chamber.

A stuttering whine followed. With an

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