Victory Pointless

“Beloved… I am here…”

Farreskh raised her hand to her husband’s face and traced the edge of his metallic death-mask with her fingers.  Sensors in the necrodermis of her fingertips fed various datastreams into her consciousness.  Texture.  Temperature.  Solidity.  Structural integrity.  It was not quite touch.

Barrakhad the Black, First Blade of the Shakhana, said nothing.

“To see you was my first and only wish upon awakening, my Phaeron.”

She wondered if she truly loved him.  Did she?  Had she?  Memories of the time before biotransference were muddied, slippery.  But she recalled when she first came to this kingdom of thieves and killers she had felt… resentful, at first.  To be bartered away to this low-born barbarian king as payment – she later discovered – for the assassination of one of her father’s most high-profile enemies… it was a fate that did not befit a lady of such noble blood.

Of course, it was that very blood that had made her such a worthy trade.  Barrakhad had power, he had riches, and through those things he had united the warring clans of the Shakhana, carved out his own small empire of worlds and awarded himself the title of Phaeron.  But he both lacked and craved nobility.  By blending his lowborn blood with hers their offspring and by extension the dynasty as a whole would finally have legitimacy in the eyes of the Necrontyr elite.

She felt that he had resented her too; or at least, the necessity of her in a society where blood far outweighed achievement.

It had all been for nothing, in the end.  His dreams of legacy had died in the biofurnace along with their mortal bodies.

She could no longer remember his face.  But she had an impression that he’d been… handsome, in a brutish sort of way.  His manners were crude but he had been possessed of a certain rogueish charm and had been patient with her attempts to teach him courtly etiquette, even if she felt she had adapted to the life of a cut-throat better than he ever had to that of a noble.  They had warmed to each other, eventually, perhaps even grown to love one another.

“Lady Farreskh.  Nineteenth daughter of Arraghest of the house of Thokt.  Finger of the heavens, keeper of the secret blood, warden of the twelve moons of Athos-karr, dagger-bearer of…”  The beast before her continued to list her titles, but it was merely a formal statement of acknowledgement.  There was no feeling to it.  He trailed off, suddenly losing even the pretense of interest and his eyes snapped away from her to the thing that stood behind her.  “Chronomancer!  How long?”

Chronomancer Klotophis glided forwards, genuflecting in five dimensions.  At a flick of his hand a series of glowing glyphs appeared in the air, describing the course of the tomb-ship.  “Not long, your majesty.  After our diversion to retrieve Lady Farreskh we are back en route and will arrive at new hunting grounds soon.”

The Phaeron’s only reply was a deep metallic grunt.  His oculars returned to Farreskh, but there was only the faintest glimmer of recognition there.  None of the old charm.  Another flash of memory came to her – a Karasian flower-tiger that had been kept as part of her father’s menagerie back home.  Its eyes had been the same.  Burning.  Hungry.  Disinterested in all except its next meal and not overly concerned with its nature.

She let her hand drop and took a step back.  The body of the Destroyer Lord was painful to look at, a massive hunched thing of armoured limbs and fused blades.  Her own body was little more than a hollow mimicry of her flesh-form, she knew.  But it was all she had.  To distort it further… to do so willingly…  She lowered her eyes, masking it as a gesture of respect.

“I… thank you for granting me this audience, beloved… Lord Barrakhad.  However, there is much I must attend to.  I will leave you now, if it be your will.”

She still wasn’t sure if she felt love, if this metal body could feel love, but she felt the hollow cruelty of sixty million years of loss and the horror that there could still be more to lose.

Keeping her eyes lowered she walked slowly off the dias to where Klotophis and her escort of Lychguard were waiting.  They began a stately procession out of the audience chamber, Farreskh indicating with a gesture that she wished for Klotophis to accompany her.

“How long… has he been like this?”

“My lady, ever since his awakening his majesty has sought to… re-dedicate himself to the warrior path.  However it has only been the last fifty years or so that he has fully taken on the mantle of the Destroyer.”

“Speak plainly, Chronomancer.  His mind is gone.  How can he rule like this?”

“Ah, my lady, I would of course never seek to imply that his majesty’s powers of command have diminished.  But as his… interest has waned we of the Black Council have taken on some of the King’s more onerous administrative duties.  As protocol dictates.”

“How very… dutiful of you.  That must be a great burden of responsibility.”  There were chambers on the ship where the temperature was kept at absolute zero.  Farreskh’s demeanour was colder.  “But I return to find our court full of monsters and our coffers depleted.  Why was I not awakened?”

“We tried, my lady, we tried, but alas, there was a fault in your stasis-crypt.  It was simply not possible to safely awaken you earlier.  These things are sadly common.”

“How fascinating.” With a nod from Farreskh two Lychguard stepped suddenly out of formation, their hyperphase blades crossed nanometers away from the Chronomancer’s neck.  “You see, Klotophis, you speck of sklopendra dung, I know a little of the technomantic arts myself.  Enough to perform a basic diagnostic ritual on my sarcophagus when I awoke.  Enough to see it had been tampered with, set to never awaken.  If you or whichever of your fetid cronies it was had not overlooked the emergency seismic protocols I would have been trapped in there forev-”

Klotophis turned a ritual tile between his fingers.  Time froze, rewound.  The Lychguard uncrossed their swords from about his neck and stepped back into formation.

“-was I not awakened?”

Klotophis adopted a posture of humble contrition.  “I must apologise most profusely, my lady; we of the Black Council bear full responsibility.  We feared the king’s condition had been brought about by his awakening too soon and did not wish to risk the same thing happening to your most esteemed majesty.  So, we manually adjusted your stasis-crypt to extend your repose until such time as a cure for the Phaeron’s condition could be obtained.  I am overjoyed to see that such precautions appear to have been unnecessary.”

“How… fascinating.”  Farreskh studied him carefully.  She did not believe him, of course, but this lie was not such an insult to her intelligence that it warranted the Cryptek’s immediate execution.  “Is there such a cure?”

“Indeed, we believe so – and we are close to finding it!  The planet we are now approaching – Sangua Terra, its inhabitants call it – there is an artifact there of considerable power.  Our research suggests that it might be used to cure the Destroyer madness and restore King Barrakhad’s mind to its former brilliance.”

“Is that so?  Very well.  Let it be done.  But know, Klotophis, I am here now, I am very much awake and I am watching.  The slightest hint of betrayal and I will kill you, do you understand?”

The Chronomancer straightened, his deference falling away.  “And if you dare to interfere with our true plans for the device you shall die a thousand deaths each more painful than the last, you conceited Thokt corpse-jackal!”

He rewound time.

“I understand completely, your majesty.”