Free False Gods by Graham McNeill

low.
    ‘Please, my given name is Erebus; I would be honoured if you would call me by it. We have no need of such formality here.’
    Loken nodded as Erebus joined him in front of the great, multicoloured vista laid out before them.
    ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ said Erebus.
    ‘I used to think so,’ nodded Loken. ‘But in truth I can’t look on it now without dread.’
    ‘Dread? Why so?’ asked Erebus, placing his hand on Loken’s shoulder. ‘The warp is simply the medium through which our ships travel. Did not the Emperor, beloved by all, reveal the ways and means by which we might make use of it?’
    ‘Yes, he did,’ agreed Loken, glancing at the tattooed script on Erebus’s skull, though the words were in a language he did not understand.
    ‘They are the pronouncements of the Emperor as interpreted in the Book of Lorgar and rendered in the language of Colchis,’ said Erebus, answering Loken’s unasked question. ‘They are as much a weapon as my bolter and blade.’
    Seeing Loken’s incomprehension, Erebus said, ‘On the battlefield I must be a figure of awe and majesty, and by bearing the Word of the Emperor upon my very flesh, I cow the xeno and unbeliever before me.’
    ‘Unbeliever?’
    ‘A poor choice of word,’ shrugged Erebus dismissively, ‘perhaps misanthrope would be a better term, but I suspect that you did not ask me here to admire the view or my scripture.’
    Loken smiled and said, ‘No, you’re right, I didn’t. I asked to speak to you because I know the Word Bearers to be a Legion with many scholars among their ranks. You have sought out many worlds that were said to be seats of learning and knowledge and brought them to compliance.’
    ‘True,’ agreed Erebus slowly. ‘Though we destroyed much of that knowledge as profane in the fires of war.’
    ‘But you are wise in matters esoteric and I desired your counsel on a… a matter I thought best spoken of privately.’
    ‘Now I am intrigued,’ said Erebus. ‘What is on your mind?’
    Loken pointed towards the pulsing, spectral light of the warp on the other side of the observation bay’s glass. Clouds of many colours and spirals of darkness spun and twisted like blooms of ink in water, constantly churning in a maelstrom of light and shadow. No coherent forms existed in the mysterious otherworld beyond the ship, which, but for the power of the Geller field, would destroy the Warmaster’s vessel in the blink of an eye.
    ‘The warp allows us to travel from one side of the galaxy to the other, but we don’t really understand it at all, do we?’ asked Loken. ‘What do we really know about the things that lurk in its depths? What do we know of Chaos?’
    ‘Chaos?’ repeated Erebus, and Loken detected a moment of hesitation before the Word Bearer answered. ‘What do you mean by that term?’
    ‘I’m not sure,’ admitted Loken. ‘It was something Mithras Tull said to me back on Xenobia.’
    ‘Mithras Tull? I don’t know the name.’
    ‘He was one of Jephta Naud’s subordinate commanders,’ explained Loken. ‘I was speaking to him when everything went to hell.’
    ‘What did he say, Captain Loken? Exactly.’
    Loken’s eyes narrowed at the first chaplain’s tone and he said, ‘Tull spoke of Chaos as though it were a distinct force, a primal presence in the warp. He said that it was the source of the most malevolent corruption imaginable and that it would outlive us all and dance on our ashes.’
    ‘He used a colourful turn of phrase.’
    ‘That he did, but I believe he was serious,’ said Loken, gazing out into the depths of the warp.
    ‘Trust me: Loken; the warp is nothing more than mindless energy churning in constant turmoil. That is all there is to it. Or is there something else that makes you believe his words?’
    Loken thought of the slavering creature that had taken the flesh of Xavyer Jubal in the water fane under the mountains of Sixty-Three Nineteen. That had not been mindless warp energy given form.