The sky was the colour of grief, and spat rain like insults.

The voyage home to Vorlese from the Gallimo System had taken the best part of a month: considerably longer than the journey from Necro­munda would probably have been, but that was just the way the warp flowed. Chetta didn’t regret the detour, and had taken the time to make a full report on her best understanding of the nature of Gallimo’s fate to the representatives of the Adeptus Arbites as soon as she’d made planetfall in Ascension City, despite the fact that she was reasonably certain they wouldn’t have understood one word in three. It would undoubtedly be flagged for the attention of the Inquisition, and her stomach turned at the notion of one of them tracking her down for further questioning, but it was necessary.

Unfortunately, the delay meant that her late husband’s funeral and wake could not be held quickly and discreetly, as she’d have preferred. News of her bereavement had preceded her, and she’d come back to a boiling insects’ nest of activity. Most critically, various other houses had received enough notice to send their condolences – or gloatings dressed up as condolences – in the form of representatives too high-ranking to simply be acknowledged and then shunted away somewhere. And so they all assembled on one of the great dining roofs of the main palace of House Brobantis, under the oppressive sky, and proceeded to subtly posture at each other around the casket of black crystal where Azariel’s body lay, and where her two children, Felicia and Ranovel, wept over the father whose death she had arranged. It wrung at her heart to see them so distraught, but she would never have done it had she not been absolutely convinced that it was in their best interests.

‘How many are we up to?’ she asked quietly. She was dressed in a mourning gown of black lace, encrusted with midnight sapphires from the Night Mines of Amatryx, which left her right shoulder bare. Her veil was anchored in place by a blacksteel diadem set with black onyx stones, and she wore long, black silk gloves reaching to above her biceps. Her tachydon ivory cane was an appropriate fit with the ensemble, and in any case Chetta was far too stubborn to forgo her favourite walking aid for the sake of propriety. Besides, she needed it: the floor was slippery, because she’d instructed her servants to disengage the void shield which would have kept the rain off. If she had to put up with all these visitors, then she wanted them just as miserable as she was.

‘Four Novators now, my lady,’ DeShelle murmured back. ‘Balevolio…’

‘Stuck-up prigs,’ Chetta muttered.

‘Xan’Tai…’

Chetta grunted in mild surprise. ‘He’s a long way from home.’

‘The Celestarch of House Belisarius…’