The worlds of the Proteus system had surrendered, bringing another three planets, ten hive cities and nineteen billion people back into the Imperial fold. Macharius nodded an acknowledgement, turned and said something to another clerk, recommending the general in charge of the campaign for some honour or other, and walked on.

Two more uniformed clerks approached and saluted. Before they could even open their mouths to speak, Macharius rattled off orders, sending instructions to commanders who were five star systems away, instructing them on which cities to besiege, which worlds to offer alliances to and which governors to bribe. He had no difficulty dredging up any of this knowledge. It was all there in his head, all of the details of an infinitely vast campaign the like of which had probably not been fought since the Emperor walked among men. He ordered more reinforcements sent to aid them and kept on walking towards the furthest tables.

Sometimes he looked up and gazed upon the surface of the burning planet with a look of longing in his eyes. I felt a certain sympathy for him then. Macharius was a warrior, born to fight. He loved commanding this great force, but I suspect he missed the thrill of physical conflict, the feeling of danger, of taking his own life in his hands. His thoughts were drifting to those final battles taking place on the world beneath us.

I could tell that he wanted to be there. I could tell also that he had something else on his mind, something to do with his current obsession with prophecies and divinations and ancient relics that so exercised his mind when he talked with Drake. It was a topic that drew the two of them together, it seemed, although Drake has never struck me as a superstitious man. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Here on the galaxy’s furthest rim, superstitions were common. These worlds had been far from the Emperor’s Light for a hundred generations; all manner of strange, deviant and heretical faiths had sprung up, and all manner of weird beliefs had infected the populations. Some had even taken root among our own soldiers, although you would have thought they would have been immune to it. Clusters of prophecies had begun to gather around Macharius himself. That was easy enough to understand. The Lord High Commander appeared invincible, gifted with near-supernatural powers of foresight.

There were some who claimed he was blessed by the Emperor. There were others who thought he was a supernatural being himself. Reports had started to arrive of shrines being set up to Macharius on dozens of worlds and not just by those unbelievers whose temples to false prophets had been overthrown.

The ship shook. We looked at each other for a moment before we went back to pretending that nothing had happened. An officer in Naval uniform walked over.

‘A glancing strike to the void screens, Lord High Commander,’ he volunteered. ‘Nothing to worry about.’

‘I am not worried,’ Macharius replied.

‘I doubt they could possibly know this is the Imperial command vessel,’ said the officer. He clearly was more disturbed than Macharius as the possibility that they did occurred to him.

Macharius nodded and the officer pulled himself together, clicked his heels and saluted. As Macharius strode by, his mere presence seemed to reassure people. Worried frowns disappeared from the faces of scribes and star-sailors. Command must always look confident and that was something that Macharius managed supremely well.

We made our way towards one of the great command tables with utter casualness. Indeed, so relaxed was our approach that I knew that we were approaching the spot in which Macharius had the greatest interest. I had learned to read the subtle signals of his moods by then. Or perhaps I delude myself.