"Do you know the Old Tongue?"
Luca asked Adam as the pair emerged from Fortune's End and made their way back to Winterdale.
Adam nodded solemnly.
"Sic itur ad astra," he murmured. "Thus one goes to the stars."
"Then you know what that man meant," Luca said. His expression was grim.
Adam fell silent. He had an idea about what Morgan meant. But he wasn't sure.
Luca continued, "It is a phrase soldiers utter when marching toward a battle they know they will not return from."
"An acceptance of fate," Adam whispered.
Luca nodded.
"For the soldiers of the Imperium, to speak those words is to acknowledge that their lives might end on the battlefield, but their duty would endure beyond them. They would march forward regardless, knowing that the path before them led only to death.
"And so, when faced with an inevitable battle, they would exchange a final salute with their comrades and utter those words in the Old Tongue of man. Sic itur ad astra. Thus, one journeys to the stars."
