The Palace of the God-Emperor

Far from the gates leading to eldar lands, the children of Isha bent their efforts to their race’s salvation. The non-matter that made up the fabric of the tunnel was dim, sleeping. A minor branching to a nowhere world, none had trodden this path for many centuries, and it slumbered. The organic convolutions of the tunnel were barely wide enough to accommodate the party and their transport. It tapered away to nothing not far ahead, truncated by unnatural forces. A waysinger choir chanted interweaving melodies under the watchful gaze of Farseer Eldrad Ulthran, most ancient of his kind. Sorrow as thick as poison fog wreathed them all. To force an opening here spelled death to the eldar waysingers, and only a handful of their choir remained alive.

Shadowseer Lhaerial Rey waited with five more of Cegorach’s own for egress. The song rose and fell, become more complicated with every passing hundredth. The way remained shut. Dressed in their motley, the Harlequins made a play of lounging and preening as their kin expended their life force, a performance that celebrated through mockery the sacrifices of the others.

Though they seemed indolent, any who had seen the warrior dancers fight knew they could be up and moving, weapons in hands, in the blink of an eye. The other eldar — those on the path of mourning and service sent to bring the dying waysingers home, the warlock and the Dire Avengers sent to guard them — regarded the Harlequins with suspicion. Only the Dire Avengers showed no fear of them, but then they showed nothing at all.

The song of the waysingers faltered as another of their number collapsed, his soul fleeing into his waystone.

‘Sing your song!’ urged Eldrad Ulthran. He set his staff and bowed his ornate helm. The gems studding his wargear glowed with power as he poured more of his own might into the waysingers.

A gleaming slit ran down the side of the changeless stuff of the webway.

‘Your song is one of power and beauty. Success is within our grasp! Your sacrifice will be remembered for a thousand cycles,’ said Ulthran. ‘A final effort, brothers and sisters — your deaths bind a favourable skein for the fate of Ulthwé! Sing, and usher in the rebirth of our race!’

With a melodic shout, the last of the waysingers fell dead, her dying breath sung out to open the path. Twenty of them had paid with their lives so that Lhaerial Rey could do what she must do, and their corpses littered the webway. Those sent to watch over them radiated sorrow. Lhaerial Rey did not grieve. One day Cegorach would free them all from death.

The webway parted to reveal a dark and soulless place beyond.

Ulthran approached the shadowseer. Lhaerial leapt to her feet, performing an elaborate bow.

‘Take this token, given to me fifteen hundred cycles ago,’ said Ulthran. He held out a large, finely carved tooth hanging from a chain. ‘It will convince the mon-keigh of your deadly sincerity.’ Lhaerial Rey took the tooth and spoke her gratitude with a gesture. Ulthran pointed his staff at the portal. ‘Go! Go now! The door is open, but will not remain so for long.’

The webway spur convulsed in sudden peristalsis. The grav-barge that had borne the party there rocked, disturbed by shifts in the physics of that in-between realm. The attention of the Great Enemy pressed down upon the walls, whispering her seductive call to the annihilation of self that every eldar felt. The webway was damaged here, and perilous.