Eleaxus the Flawless, Master of the Flawless Host, grinned as he watched his beauteous reflection in the silver mirror, his forked tongue tasting the perfumed air. Delicate, beautiful fangs snapped shut as he retracted the snake-like tongue, before enunciating his words, every syllable utterly perfect.

‘We go to Tzarinus,’ he said, watching as the daemon-navigators took his orders, obeying his every command as the other Marines of the Flawless Host punched in co-ordinates, instructing the daemon-things aboard the ship to go to Tzarinus. The Narthecios was on his back, as always, ceaselessly pouring in incredibly potent combat drugs that allowed him to ignore the most terrible of wounds. A phial of potent liqueur was there, distilled from the vital fluids of a million innocents and dedicated to Slaanesh, the rune of that terrible god marked on the surface of the phial.

Platinum-blond hair framed eyes as black as the void, his unearthly beauty readily apparent. The Blade of the Flawless was in his hand, envenomed with the most potent toxins in the galaxy, a masterwork of art, its scabbard formed from the leather of flayed flesh and its hilt of pure gold and diamonds. Its blade was formed of platinum, a daemonette of the Dark Prince bound forever within. The blade knew that he was its master and would not, could not resist against the will of Eleaxus. He grinned again. Soon they would make planetfall, and then he could have things to kill.

+++

‘Governor Romulus, I’m being serious here,’ Enforcer-General Marius said.

‘Why should I care, Enforcer?’ Romulus questioned. ‘This cult is of no importance to me.’

‘They were attempting to summon...something...and it killed them all. We have a potential daemon running loose in the city.’

‘Of what importance to me is this puny, minor cult?’ Romulus said. ‘I shall send in the PDF, and they shall kill it. Before long, I’ll have its head on my wall!’

Marius was tired of this. The Governor was decadent and uncaring – he didn’t care about Tzarinus’ security at all. A single lone daemon was cause for concern – it could always bring in reinforcements from the accursed Immaterium, and was a great threat to the security of Tzarinus. And the cult was most definitely bigger than this – how many people could be part of it? How many strings could they pull? And that was the part that most worried Marius.

That was the part that most terrified him.

+++

The runner from the Astropathic Choir was tired and out of breath by the time he arrived at the Governor’s Palace. A vast Imperial-Gothic structure burnished in silver, so that when the sun’s rays struck it would shine like fire, it loomed over him like the schola he had grown up in. And as he walked through the door, the interior was no less sumptuous.

Tapestries hung on the walls, which had been bedecked laboriously with red and gold velvet, depicting great scenes from the long and blood-filled history of Tzarinus. Holo-portraits of past governors loomed over him, their imperious gaze filling him with dread.

As he walked into the Governor’s sanctum, he noted the figures standing alongside Governor Romulus. First was Enforcer-General Marius, wielding a golden power-maul as his symbol of office. There was the PDF General Thaddeus, his hair a neat military cut and greying near the temples. Finally, there were a gaggle of heirs, claimants, nobles and sycophants, each with the same avaricious look in his eye toward the Governor’s seat.

‘A Chaos battleship has been detected on the edge of the system,’ he declared gravely. ‘Tzarinus has but hours to live.’ At this, the gaggle of heirs and claimants went into a state of absolute panic, until Thaddeus shouted something amidst the din that calmed them down.

‘We may all die,’ he said. ‘But we will die fighting. We will die standing. And we will die wounding our enemy to the greatest extent we are capable of. We have sent, via astropathic choir, a call for help. We have but to wait, and then our enemy will be destroyed, although our world may die with them. The Emperor is with us.’

+++

Eleaxus watched the general’s speech through the telescreen, mocking laughter filling his voice. He would kill this fool soon. At least he would provide a worthy challenge before he died.

He watched boredly as the meagre, pathetic orbital defences were extinguished, reduced to debris in moments by the Violator’s lances, ripping through their soft armour and dooming the men within to a flame-filled death.

A mad cackle passed his lips as he marched off the command throne and down to the landing bays. He heard the screams of men and women as their essences were distilled into liqueurs and combat drugs, but didn’t care. They were worthless to him now, except as a source of combat drugs. He had explored every avenue of vice and debauchery, and taken them to the fullest – that was true devotion to the Prince of Chaos, far greater than praying in a weak-walled temple to a pathetic god that did not answer your prayers and was nowhere when you needed him most.

Ulixis, one of his Chosen, bowed before him as he entered the drop-pod. There were six in total, the number of the Dark Prince. Ulixis, Sarinius (a psyker), Arisanius, Remius, Toranius and Avitus. This would be good.

The drop-pods crashed down in the city, smashing into the ground. One in particular crashed right in front of the palace, Eleaxus and his Chosen exiting it as they marched toward the doors. He strode imperiously toward it, kicking it down. ‘Burn it to the ground,’ he said, gesturing to the Chosen with a flamer, Arisanius. He unleashed its fury, cooking people alive and burning them to death, setting the whole palace on fire in moments. Holo-portraits shorted out, tapestries fell burning, crashing to the floor, everything burning to ashes in seconds. Eleaxus laughed, then advanced towards the Governor’s sanctum, the Blade of the Flawless drawn. He was ready to kill.