The Emperor read the determination on his face. He smiled with pride. ‘You are surprised to have reached this juncture, Sanguinius. That is to your credit. It is to my shame that I did not realise from the start what had to be done.’ He shook His head sadly. ‘I was blind when I named Horus the Warmaster. It should have been you. It should always have been you.’ His eyes looked off into the vague distance, pained by the vision of the billions of lives lost in the war, and then back at Sanguinius. They grew bright with joy. ‘You are the Angel,’ he said. ‘You have the wings of divinity. Long may the Imperium soar with you.’

‘I will serve…’ Sanguinius began. He stopped. The Emperor’s last words rang false. He had never heard his father use the word divinity in that fashion. It had always been a term of contempt, a reminder of the ignorance that was humanity’s lot before the Imperium shone the light of reason across the galaxy.

Joy stuttered. Hope wavered. The visions of the triumphant future fractured. A flaw ran through them. On Terra, when the traitors surrendered, why had he been the one receiving their capitulation?

The loyalist fleets retaking the fallen worlds and completing the work of the Great Crusade, how had they grown so large in so short a time? As he examined the memory, Sanguinius saw what he had not taken in before, or perhaps had expected too easily. The fleets of the IX Legion were the greatest of all.

‘What’s wrong?’ the Emperor asked.

The light of the future radiated from Sanguinius. His actions brought victory. His blow shaped the Imperium. Traitors and Emperor alike recognised him as the ruler of the order to come. Every triumph flattered his pride.

Sanguinius looked around the cloister. He was sure he had never seen it before. That did not mean the cloister did not exist. But the lack of memory disturbed him. The colonnade and the garden of fountains were too perfectly suited to this conversation.

A conversation where the Emperor was too deferential to Sanguinius, too quick to blame Himself for the tragedy of the war. His majesty was lacking. Sanguinius had felt so much joy to be in his father’s presence again that he had not questioned the presence. And again, his pride had blinded him.

A cold trickle of dread ran through his blood.

‘What’s wrong?’ the Emperor asked again.

‘Everything,’ said Sanguinius. ‘This is not real.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ the Emperor agreed. ‘Not yet. It falls to you to make it real.’

‘You are not my father.’

The breeze over the garden grew cooler, stronger. Sanguinius’ wings rustled.