Deep within the Raven Guard Legion's flagship, the Gloriana-class Battleship Shadow of the Emperor, lay a room shaped entirely to the Primarch's will.
There were no viewports here, no lamps. Even the faint operating lights of the Cogitator terminals had been completely screened out.
Absolute, all-consuming darkness ruled this place, so thick it seemed solid, as though it could swallow even sound.
Corax was at the heart of that darkness.
He was neither standing nor sitting upright, but curled on the cold floor in the center of the room, in a posture almost like a roosting bird.
His tall, unusually gaunt body was slightly hunched, his arms wrapped around his bent knees. His signature, light-absorbing black Power Armour blended into the background, making him look more like a chance gathering of deeper shadows, or a giant raven with folded wings and its head buried against its breast.
His long, night-black hair hung loose and disheveled, almost completely covering his bloodlessly pale face, leaving only the taut outline of his jaw exposed.
He might have appeared silent, but within him lay a ruin after the storm had passed, with nothing left but scattered wreckage and biting cold.
Under the devoted care of his sons and the Apothecary, the psychological breakdown that had nearly torn him apart seemed to have passed. The bulwarks of reason had been reinforced, and the chains of duty once again bound the beast of madness.
Yet some wounds had not healed. They had merely been buried deep.
Bella, the frail girl who had given him a brief measure of comfort and human connection—the image of the moment she died, the instant the last light in her eyes went out, and his own uncontrollable hands that had wrought that terrible mistake...
These images haunted the depths of his