The First Heretic

Blessed Lorgar didn’t return to Imperial space right away. One of the fleet’s scout vessels was chosen to carry the primarch back to his main crusade fleet, and a grand event was held on every deck of De Profundis to honour the Urizen before he left.

And that was the lie.

I was there when the primarch bade farewell to his sons Xaphen and Argel Tal, and I travelled back to safer space with the new lords of the Gal Vorbak.

Lorgar, meanwhile, travelled the same path that the daemon Ingethel had chosen for his children.

With the Custodians blinded to his true destination, Lorgar went into the Eye.

His last words to Argel Tal will never leave me – not only for the events they set in motion, but for what they did to my friend, and how they changed him.

‘Take the truth to Erebus and Kor Phaeron. While I am gone, they will be the Legion’s lords, and they will orchestrate the spread of true faith in the shadows of my father’s empire. I shall return to them soon.’

Xaphen swore an oath never to fail his primarch.

Argel Tal did not. He spoke in a voice soft enough to break hearts, ‘We are heretics, father.’

Lorgar laughed his melodic laugh. ‘No, we are saviours. Is all in readiness?’

‘It is.’

‘Sail far and wide without me, but keep the Custodians away from Imperial listeners. Once you return to stable space, they will resume their astropathic contact with Terra. My father will suspect the truth if he knows we came this close to the galaxy’s edge, and suspicion alone will be enough to damn us. I cannot remain here to block their pet astropath’s reaching voice. Find a solution. Xaphen, look to the texts retrieved from Cadia. The rituals within them will provide the answer.’

‘By your word, sire.’

‘Keep his watchdogs alive, Argel Tal. There may yet be a means to win this war without bloodshed. But keep them silent.’

With his last words ordering the first of a thousand treacheries, the primarch boarded his vessel and left us.

What he saw within the Eye is the source of near-infinite speculation. Many of the Word Bearers came to me for weeks afterwards, wracked by dreams that barely faded when their sufferers awoke. The blood connection between Aurelian and his sons was a powerful one indeed, for what Lorgar saw with his own eyes, his sons witnessed in horrifying echoes.