Yes we are, Sanguinius thought. Distance was a lie, space was an illusion, and yet there was a truth to proximity. The Sable had come near enough to die, and the Red Tear was nearer too. The weight of the phantom’s shadow oppressed him. The bridge felt insubstantial, and time was slippery. The halls of the Vengeful Spirit tugged at him. If he let them, they would pull him into them. His fist tightened around the Spear of Telesto with the effort of holding his consciousness in the here and now. Micro-visions of his final moments flickered across the surface of his mind. They stabbed him, each blow like the jab of a monomolecular blade. And as the shadow’s weight grew heavier, it took on a new character. It became the inevitability of fate. It was the grasp of his doom. That which had not yet occurred took on the certainty of the past. Sanguinius stared at the black shape on the tactical screen as if it would resolve itself not into the form of an identifiable ship, but into his death. His end was coming. It marched towards him, the one absolute in an ocean of flux. It was almost upon him, and it would not tell him if his death would have any meaning, or simply be miserable, pointless, his corpse just one more added to the heap piled up before Horus’ victory. He could know nothing except how he would die.

Fate would not be changed. Destiny was unalterable.

The fist clamped tight around him. The shadow of hopelessness spread across his sight.

The fleet’s barrage continued without pause. The power to destroy civilisations reached out for the phantom, and found nothing. The pict screen shuddered, ship positions realigned and the cruiser ­Laudem Sanguinum was far ahead of the formation, in the lee of the great shadow. The phantom lashed out, its weapons fire represented by the hololiths as dark, streaking claws. The Laudem vanished.

The shadow grew again. The abyss of foretold death opened up before Sanguinius. It was ready for him. It would not be denied. Choice and hope died in its maw.

Unless…

The possibility had no shape. It barely had existence. It was no more than a sliver, a thin, trembling slash of silver in the darkness. It flashed at Sanguinius, a glimmer so slight he might have missed it, yet so insistent he had no choice but to turn to it.

Unless…

Unless what? The sliver trembled like hope. He could not articulate it. He did not know where the embryonic thought came from, or where it might go. If he looked at it too closely, it might vanish. But it was there, real, a silver scratch in the night of destiny. Unless, unless, unless… A seed of possibility. The tiniest deviation in the march of the inevitable. His spirit lunged for it, cutting through the phantom’s grip with razored wingbeats.