The sphere stretched downwards, taking on the shape of a doorway. Something moved deep within the gate. Sanguinius thought he saw a flutter, as rapid, constant alterations. He thought of the blurring succession of visions when he fell through the breach in the real on Pyrrhan, and he knew what he had to do.

Guilliman and the Lion were at the back of the chamber, squinting against the light. Their guns were trained on the portal.

‘This is a trap, Sanguinius,’ Guilliman called. ‘There is nothing else it can be.’

‘We were manipulated,’ said the Lion. ‘The enemy misleads you, too.’

‘You do not understand what I have seen,’ Sanguinius told them.

Curze still hadn’t moved. He was staring at the portal, though his face was a mask of agony.

‘I know what I must do, brothers,’ Sanguinius said. ‘This is the fulcrum. I will forge us a new fate.’

‘You cannot do this,’ said Curze. His voice was barely a whisper. There was something in his tone that was alien to the Night Haunter. His face was transformed. It took Sanguinius a moment to recognise what he was seeing and hearing in Curze.

It was horror. Horror that the Angel might destroy the bedrock of Curze’s existence. Horror that Sanguinius might prove the future was not written.

‘I must,’ Sanguinius replied.

He entered the portal.

The last thing he heard before the light enveloped him was the Night Haunter screaming.

Fifteen

Fifteen

By Eight, By Four

The portal flared with slicing, frozen brilliance. Then it faded, the edges pulling back until only a vertical tear remained. It suffused the chamber with dim light that cut the eye like a razor. Guilliman stopped with his right hand a hair’s breadth from the portal. He had lunged to grab Sanguinius and missed. He cursed. He looked back at the Lion. ‘This is impossible. Where is he?’

‘The warp?’

‘Impossible,’ Guilliman repeated. ‘This is madness.’

From the hall beyond the chamber, the Sanguinary Guard had pushed forwards. Azkaellon stood in the doorway. ‘Where is our lord?’ he demanded.

‘Beyond our reach,’ said the Lion.

Azkaellon rushed towards the portal.

‘Hold!’ Guilliman commanded.

The voice of thunder stopped Azkaellon. He faced Guilliman, shaking with fury. ‘I will not abandon my primarch.’

‘I do not abandon my brother,’ Guilliman said, his words rumbling still through the chamber. ‘But a blind leap through that portal does him no good. He made this decision. Respect it, and prepare for what may follow. He went in. You know what may come out.’

‘Daemons,’ Azkaellon growled. The word came to his lips more easily than it did to Guilliman’s.

‘Withdraw and stand ready,’ Guilliman told him. ‘We shall expect an enemy attack from this gate.’

After another hesitation, Azkaellon obeyed.