Part 6 (1/2)

Miriya followed her gaze towards a group of youngsters and her brow furrowed. They were clad in crude approximations of Adepta Sororitas wargear, but made from simple cloth and cardboard instead of ceramite and flexsteel. One of the teenagers stumbled, clutching at her head to hold a wig of straw-like white hair that mimicked the tra-ditional cut of the Battle Sisters.

'I... I saw those youths in the street, when I was trav-elling to the convent. Is this some sort of game?'

Miriya gave a nod. The Games of Penance, as they are known. A reconstruction of great events from Saint Celestine's Wars of Faith. I have never seen them myself...'

'Look, there,' Verity pointed. 'Do you see those play-ers on the stage? What are they supposed to be?'

'Eldar,' Miriya observed, recognising the rudimen-tary capes and plumes adorning the fake armour of the actors. They are playing at the battle for Kodiak Prime, or something like it.' She failed to keep a gri-mace from her face. The whole performance was a caricature, a ridiculous spectacle that might have been comic if she had not found it so offensive. Miriya had faced the xenos in battle, and the eldar she had fought were terrifying deadly killers full of powerful grace and unstoppable speed - these moronic mimics in the ampitheatre were blundering jesters in compari-son, exaggerated and simplistic parodies of the real thing.

The crowd did not share her low opinion, however. The locals were chanting and whooping, spinning cel-ebratory banners over their heads or letting off small screamer fireworks. Over the loud hailers in the sta-dium the opening bars of the Palatine March issued forth, and the two sides in the imitation battle rushed at one another, screaming incoherent war cries.

This is a mockery,' growled Miriya.

'It is... disturbing,' admitted Verity, 'but not to the Nevans. This is their way of honouring the living saint.'

The Battle Sister's rejoinder was silenced as a clat-ter of gunfire rose up from the ampitheatre. Miriya's gauntleted hands tensed automatically at the sound of a hundred ballistic stubbers going off in ragged succession. All of the partic.i.p.ants in the ersatz skir-mish were firing on one another, but where she had expected them to knock each other down with paint sh.e.l.ls and powder rounds, there was the flat crackle ofbullets.

They are using live weapons...' As the Sister Supe-rior watched, one of the youths dressed as a Sororitas inexpertly discharged a salvo of shots into a boy on stubby stilts, the heavy rounds ripping through the wood and cloth imitations of eldar armour. Blood was already pooling on the arena's sands where figures from both sides had been cut down.

'Holy Terra!' gasped Verity, her hand flying to her mouth in shock.

Close by, one of the merchantmen from the cathe-dral clapped and let out a guffaw. 'What a magnificent effort this year. This Blessing will be one for the ages.'

Miriya rounded on him. They're killing each other.

The portly man's expression shattered under the Battle Sister's leaden stare. 'But... But of course they are.

That's how it is done...' He forced a smile. 'Ah, of course. Forgive me. You must both be off-worlders, yes? You are both new to Neva=and the festival?'

What kind of blessing demands you force your people to kill one another?' challenged Miriya.

'F-force?' said the merchant. 'No one is forced, honoured Sister.' He fumbled in the folds of his robes and recovered a fold of long papers from a hidden pocket. 'The partic.i.p.ants in the reconstruc-tion are all willing... Well, except for a few irredeemables from the reformatory and some asy-lum inmates.' One of the papers was a dark crimson, and he peeled it from the pack to wave it at her. 'Every citizen who received one of these dockets in the clerical lottery knows they are obligated to take part in the great re-enactment. We are all more than ready to do our part in penance!'

Miriya s.n.a.t.c.hed the red paper from him. Then tell me, sir, why are you here and not down there?' She jerked a thumb at the melee below them.

The merchant's face coloured. 'I... I was happy to present the church with a substantial forfeit dona-tion in my stead!'

You bought your way out with coin? How lucky for you that your coffers are deep enough,' she sneered. 'If only others were so fortunate!'

'Now see here,' the n.o.ble retorted, attempting to maintain a level of superiority. 'Those who endure the Blessing are praised and rewarded. Our finest chirurgeons attend them in the aftermath, and those whose fort.i.tude is lesser are buried with hon-ours!'

Barely able to contain her anger, Miriya turned away, her hand dropping unconsciously to the grip of her holstered plasma pistol. The sound and fury of the confrontation set her teeth on edge, trigger-ing old, ingrained battle instincts.

'Celestine. Celestinel' The cry came from one of the merchant's retinue, and the name was picked up and repeated by the crowd.

From a hidden hatch in the walls of the cathe-dral, a winged figure in gold emerged to fly over the ampitheatre, swooping like a bird of prey.

Verity watched the girl garbed as the living saint race over the blood-stained sands, a fat set of pulley-wheels in the small of her back connected by gla.s.sy cables to a rig on the suspended catwalks. The grey-suited workers pulled at levers and tugged spindles to work her like a puppet, and in turn her wings of paper feathers fluttered and snapped through the air. A heavy bra.s.s halo hung about her head, decorated with yellowish biolumes, and she had an oversized replica of the Celestine's blessed weapon, the Ardent Blade, secured to one hand by tethers.

A dispenser tucked under her waist spat out a stream of paper slips, each one printed with a devotional message and a t.i.the voucher. People in the crowds tussled and s.n.a.t.c.hed at the air trying to pull them from the night winds.

The psuedo-saint fell low and her sword clipped the heads and torsos of a dozen men in eldar cos-tume.

The blade was just for show and too blunt to sever a limb; those it struck were concussed or reeled away with broken bones.

Verity watched, and she felt queasy. It was not that she was frail or unused to the sight of spilt blood, but the malicious theatre with which this spectacle was unfolding made her uncomfortable. On the moons where she served in the wards of the hos-pices, there had been stories of the things done in the Emperor's name on Neva - but there were always such stories on the outer worlds, and Sister Verity was never one to place too much credence in rumour and insinuation. She wished now that she had paid greater mind. The wanton disregard for human life at play here jarred with the very core of Verity's vow to the Order of Serenity and her life's work as a Sister Hospitaller. The oath she had sworn the day she entered the Sisterhood returned to her: First, do no harm to the Emperor's subjects. Take pain from those who revere Him, inflict it only on those who stand against His Light.This is a harsh universe. she heard the merchant remark to one of his cronies. 'It is not by chance that our church and our festival reflect the truth of that. After all, if no blood were shed this day, in what possible way could we hope to show the Emperor our devotion?'

A flurry of motion drew her eye. On the gantry a few metres below, the men in grey were panicking.

Aged, overworked metal snapped with a percussive crash and cables whipped free, slas.h.i.+ng one man across the chest and throwing another over the cat-walk's rail and down to his death. The girl playing Celestine was suddenly jerked out of her pattern of flight and reeled upward like a hooked fish. The sword dangled from her fingers, and in horror, Ver-ity saw where the gla.s.s cables looped about her head and neck. If the crowds in the stands under-stood or even cared what had happened, the Hospitaller had no idea but she saw clear as day the face of the costumed girl in abject terror as she started to choke.

Sister Verity reacted without conscious thought, and vaulted over the edge of the balcony. Boots sc.r.a.ping on stone, she slipped down the sheer face of the cathedral and landed on the catwalk. She was running to the trapped girl before she was even aware of Miriya calling after her.

The merchant and his troupe of perfumed dandies actually broke out in laughter when the Hospitaller jumped, and it took much of Miriya's self-control not to toss one of them after her. Shooting them an iron-hard glare, she followed the woman down to the gantry, shouting her name, but Verity did not seem to hear her, intent instead on the luckless girl caught up in the wires beneath the catwalk.

The workers who had not been struck insensate or dead by the broken cables were of little use, and she forced them aside. The catwalk squealed and com-plained beneath her every footfall, flecks of dust trickling off ancient joints. The shattered pulley mechanism lowed like a dying animal, and Miriya's hand shot out to grab a support as the decking began to tilt. The framework was rife with rust and decay.

Verity! We are not safe here.' The Hospitaller was already pulling the girl up. -She was ashen-faced as she worked to unwind the cabling from the youth's pale, bruised neck. 1 think she may still live...'

In reply, the catwalk let out a shriek of buckling steel and listed sharply. All at once, the costumed girl fell away from Verity's grip and Miriya bounded forward to snag the Sister Hospitaller before she went along with her. Their hands met, the Battle Sis-ter clutching a handful of Verity's robes and then the gantry broke apart.

It was centuries old, and maintained as well as it could have been, but artisans and technicians were not the most favoured of castes on Neva and even in the ampitheatre of the Lunar Cathedral, there were never enough skilled hands to service all of the church's machinery. Steel and bodies fell through the air and crashed into the wood and fibre of the false eldar domes, straight into the middle of the arena.

Galatea's knuckles turned white where she gripped the stone bal.u.s.trade. 'In Kafherine's name, what is she doing?'

At her side, Sister Reiko peered through a small monocular. 'An accident, Canoness? I do not think this was intentional-'

'Now, this is an interesting development.' Gover-nor Emmel's words cut off Reiko's speech as he approached, his retinue trailing behind him and the lord deacon at his side. 'My dear Canoness, if your Battle Sister wished to take part in the games, she had only to ask.

'Governor, I fear that a mistake has been made. Galatea spoke quickly. 'Perhaps if you would con-sider a pause in the proceedings?'

Emmel made a face. 'Ah, that would not be pru-dent. The rules of the fete are quite clear on these matters.

The re-enactment must be played out to its conclusion without interruption. There would be much discord if I tried to halt it.

'Perhaps even a riot. ventured Dean Venik.

The governor cupped his ear. 'Listen, Canoness. Do you hear? The people are enraptured. They must think this is some surprise performance in lieu of the witch they were promised.

'Perhaps not a mistake after all. added LaHayn. The G.o.d-Emperor moves in mysterious ways.

Emmel nodded and clapped his hands. 'Oh, yes, yes. You may be right!' His eyes sparkled with the idea of it. 'I wonder, an actual Sister of Battle on the field? What a game that will be!'

'With respect, governor, Sister Miriya may be injured, and she was not alone. Sister Verity is a Hospitaller, not used to combat. Galatea's words were intense.

LaHayn accepted this with a dismissive nod. 'I am sure the Emperor will extend to her the protection her vocation merits.