Deep within the Vengeful Spirit lay a room utterly at odds with the warship around it.
It was an old-fashioned space almost entirely sealed away from the universe, its walls clad in dark brown timber panels of a kind all but extinct within the Imperium. A faint oily sheen lingered in the grain.
A thick, dark red carpet covered the floor, its stitching dense and meticulous. Footsteps upon it produced no metallic echo.
A heavy desk stood in the center of the room, its surface fashioned from a single slab of polished dark stone. It had originally come from a quarry on an Agri World that had since been conquered, and now rested here.
Enormous bookshelves stood against the walls, lined with volumes bound in leather and metal. The emblem of the Sons of Horus Legion was embossed on every cover.
The bindings of most books had begun to crack, and the edges of their pages curled slightly. Clearly, they had been read again and again.
A finely crafted metal drinking set stood in one corner, beside a Crystal Goblet with half a mouthful of amber liquor remaining inside.
There were no tactical charts here, no Holographic Projection, no floating data terminals, no geared analyzers.
Only books, drinking vessels, carpet, the scent of wood, and dim, warm lighting, nestled quietly within the enormous warship covered in turrets and Macro-cannon batteries.
Horus sat in the broad chair behind the desk.
He leaned back slightly, his left hand resting on the armrest and his right holding a wineglass, its sides catching the warm light.
His face appeared almost serene, but his eyes were like undercurrents hidden beneath still water, slowly shifting with an inscrutable mixture of scrutiny and calculation.
"The battle of Bakka was lost?" Horus quietly repeated the news.
There was