Basil nervously moved through his steps but did not miss a single one. He moved through them without thinking, having visualized them in his head time and again, as well as having tried moving his feet to the steps of each and every role. He felt the presence of the Black Council, the ruling body of Far Seers in the Black Library, at the edge of his mind and knew their Warlocks were standing ready but did not understand why as those aspects were not mentioned in the tome he had read from and studied. Basil had not seen Siân either, despite his attempts to while moving about the chamber.
His vision was filled with colours and movement instead.
Black and silver, red and gold, were all lit by an omnipresent starlight. Basil was surrounded by colours that moved hypnotically and which were joined by sounds that amplified the effect. As he moved among the colours and other players, his mind recalled the story of the Fall of the Aeldari as told in the ancient tome he had found by following Mistress Ilronanna's gaze.
Nine troupers danced around the chamber. Carefree and happy, and dressed in ancient fashions he had seen in The Dance, albeit modified and exaggerated to make them more visible to a crowd. Each wore pants covered with the ancient lozenge pattern of diamonds, the symbol of Cegorach, the Laughing God. Diamonds in black and gold, the colours of the Masque of the Horned Serpent. The Nine players represented the old race, how the Aeldari lived and breathed before their Fall began.
The Nine sang and danced, each moving about the chamber, before one by one approaching each of the other three players of the Dance. And as each approached one of the three, they each offered their praise and adulation to that player through dance and song. Praise and adulation for the three players performing their roles as the three chief gods of the Aeldari pantheon.
Three troupers danced around a tall and beautiful Aeldari woman. She wore a long and flowing gown that glowed like starlight, and her face was painted with great streaming tears which were visible from afar, for she was a Harlequin Avatar trouper and played the part of Isha, the Divine Mother of the Aeldari race. A Mother who shed tears for her children's suffering. The Avatar graciously responded to the dance and song offerings of her children. Each step executed exactly as presented in the text Basil had studied in secret for so long.
And another three troupers danced around a Harlequin Avatar outfitted as a great Aeldari warrior. A warrior dressed in red and bearing a great sword of flame, Khaela Mensha Khaine, the Aeldari god of War. The three troupers danced and sang before their god but he did not care. Khaine brandished his sword casually at his followers and dispersed them with a swing, yet they returned to him. Such was his fickle way, Basil recalled.
And the last three troupers danced and sang to Basil. He had been quickly dressed in red and gold by one of the stage hands, a red tunic with gold trim and a great gold cape with red trim that flowed behind him. A banner rose from his back in the shape of an Aeldari rune. The strokes which composed it spread out into a runic representation of wings for the rune was the ancient Aeldari representation for the Phoenix. Basil's golden bow of Aeldari manufacture had been placed onto his back, while into his hands had been placed a fearsome weapon. It was a Singing Spear, a force weapon similar to the Witchblade which he had witnessed Siân wield, but which was topped by the Phoenix rune with its spear tip protruding above. And as Basil danced and moved his Spear, it sang along, emitting a hum in perfect harmony with his movements. And to Basil the dancers made their most audacious presentations, for he had been dressed with the ancient Raiments of Asuryan, Lord of the Aeldari pantheon.
Basil followed the proscribed steps effortlessly as the songs and movements carried him along, pulling him into the Dance. One with the beat, and one with the players. One with their souls. Faster and faster the music played. The sounds grew louder to the point Basil felt his ears would burst and then louder still. Step after step, faster and faster, Basil danced with each of the Nine troupers as they took turns with their offerings to the Lord of their pantheon and then danced off somewhere alone or to one of the two Avatars portraying a god. Such was life for the Aeldari long ago, and Basil saw their images in his mind, images from tens of thousands of years before, and even longer, as he danced.
Then there was Darkness and all motion ceased.
A spotlight shone down onto the middle of the chamber where a single figure in purple and gold with a white daemonic horned-masque sat upon a gold and purple throne. Thoughts of what Basil had learned in his studies under Ilronanna, as well as his study of The Dance, cascaded through his mind. The figure was a Harlequin known as the Solitaire. Where he and the two Harlequins who held the title of Avatar were playing the parts of three members of the Aeldari pantheon, the Solitaire played the part of Slaanesh, She Who Thirsts, one of the Ruinous Powers. Only the most strong-willed of the Aeldari were capable of playing the part as the intense emotional part coupled with the near destruction of their people would drive lesser Aeldari insane. It was said that the soul of each who took the mantle of Solitaire was doomed, lost to She Who Thirsts, but that the Laughing God would duel the Ruinous Power for each soul, a wager so to speak. Sometimes the Laughing God would win and sometimes he would lose.
Basil's eyes were drawn to the gear and weaponry that bedecked the figure in the spotlight. Looking at its black coat, Basil recognized the Solitaire wore a holo-suit which would allow it to blend with almost anything or become a blur of light that would dazzle opponents as it moved. On its right wrist was a weapon known as a Harlequin's Caress, a weapon which emitted a phase field that not only allowed the Harlequin to reach through armour but even through an enemy's body to pluck out its heart. And on its left wrist was an item referred to as the Brathu-Angau in the Aeldari Lexicon, or the Harlequin's Kiss in Gothic. It was a weapon that shot out a monofilament wire which would penetrate an enemy's body and then rapidly unspool, liquefying the bones and internal organs of its victim. Basil remembered that Solitaires were some of the greatest Aeldari warriors and that every masque and troupe was a fighting force dedicated to the Laughing God's goals.
Next, four dancers appeared from behind the Solitaire's throne. He knew them as Harlequin Mimes, called Distaurs in the Aeldari Lexicon, and they played the roles of daemonic servants of She Who Thirsts, the Solitaire. And they danced to the Nine, moving with a sensuous grace which made Basil blush, and the music changed to match their movements. Each time a Mime reached one of the Nine and made contact, the player of that Nine immediately changed his dance from the carefree Aeldari style to that of the Mime, mimicking the sensuality of the pleasure daemons.
And so, the three members of the Nine who danced around Khaine danced away from him, leaving him alone to brood in his anger. And then the Mimes reached Basil and led away the three players of the Nine who were honoring him as the Phoenix, leaving him standing alone just as The Dance had foretold, his Singing Spear silent. But, when the Mimes reached Isha, something different happened. Two of the three nearly succumbed to the sensual attraction but saw the tears on Isha's face and fled.
Basil remembered the meanings of these parts and went over them in his mind. The Two who escaped were warned by Isha of their folly as her love for her children was more powerful than Asuryan's decree to not interfere in their lives. One player that escaped represented those who fled to the primitive worlds and became Exodites while the other player represented those who built the craftworlds and fled the heart of the Aeldari Empire when She Who Thirsts was born. The Seven of the Nine players who changed their dance to mimic the Mimes represented the Fall of the Aeldari from their grace under the Aeldari pantheon, the desertion of their gods to satisfy their own, ever more decadent, desires. Six of those Seven would die with the birth of She Who Thirsts at the conclusion to The Dance, representing the terrible destruction of Aeldari life with the Fall. And one would survive, representative of the Dark Aeldari, the Drukhari, the ones who keep themselves 'safe' from She Who thirsts by indulging their hedonistic and sado-masochistic desires to ever increasing degrees.
Three new players appeared on the scene dressed in black and covered with bones and skulls. They were called Margorach in the Aeldari lexicon, but referred to as Harlequin Death Jesters by the Imperial texts he had studied.
First, the Death Jesters approached Isha with the Solitaire following in their midst. Then, they broke into a blur of motion, and Isha fell to the ground, dead. The Jesters carried her body back to the throne and then proceeded to the Avatar playing Khaine with the Solitaire again in their midst, but this time moving with a snap to his step, expecting battle. And again, the forms set into a blur of motion. The Solitaire and Death Jesters dancing around the spinning Avatar who played Khaine. Blood flew through the air spattering everywhere, but the god of War fell too, with a flash of red light. A flash that, Basil remembered, was indicative of Khaine shattering and merging with of the Infinity Circuit of each and every craftworld. The Death Jesters carried the limp body of the Harlequin Avatar to the purple and golden throne.
The four players, Solitaire and three Death Jesters, turned and approached Basil as the music climbed higher and swifter.
Basil stared at them approaching and felt frozen, as if unable to move. He knew the steps to the Dance and that he was not yet to move, but felt he could not if he tried. And then Basil felt it, a welling of psychic power. The Council? What are they doing? Basil asked himself when he realized the source of the power.
Every Dance is different, and this Dance is no exception, Ilronanna's voice said into his mind. Use your bow, your spear, even your psychic power. Use every weapon at your disposal to win this battle as if your life depends upon it…because it does. Without hesitation, Basil snapped hold of the Warp.
At that moment, the Solitaire and Death Jesters sprang into motion.