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The Horus Heresy



Dan Abnett

PROSPERO BURNS

The wolves unleashed

The Horus Heresy



It is a time of legend.

Mighty heroes battle for the right to rule the galaxy. The vast armies of the Emperor of Earth have conquered the galaxy in a Great Crusade – the myriad alien races have been smashed by the Emperor’s elite warriors and wiped from the face of history.

The dawn of a new age of supremacy for humanity beckons.

Gleaming citadels of marble and gold celebrate the many victories of the Emperor. Triumphs are raised on a million worlds to record the epic deeds of his most powerful and deadly warriors.

First and foremost amongst these are the primarchs, superheroic beings who have led the Emperor’s armies of Space Marines in victory after victory. They are unstoppable and magnificent, the pinnacle of the Emperor’s genetic experimentation. The Space Marines are the mightiest human warriors the galaxy has ever known, each capable of besting a hundred normal men or more in combat.

Organised into vast armies of tens of thousands called Legions, the Space Marines and their primarch leaders conquer the galaxy in the name of the Emperor.

Chief amongst the primarchs is Horus, called the Glorious, the Brightest Star, favourite of the Emperor, and like a son unto him. He is the Warmaster, the commander-in-chief of the Emperor’s military might, subjugator of a thousand thousand worlds and conqueror of the galaxy. He is a warrior without peer, a diplomat supreme.

As the flames of war spread through the Imperium, mankind’s champions will all be put to the ultimate test.



~ DRAMATIS PERSONAE ~


Primarchs RussThe Wolf King MagnusThe Crimson King The Rout Onn Gunnar GunnhiltCalled Lord Gunn, Jarl Tra Ogvai Ogvai HelmschrotJarl Ulvurul HeorothCalled Longfang, Rune Priest Bear AeskaCalled Brokenlip Godsmote Galeg Aun Helwintr Orcir JormungndrCalled Two-blade Ullste Erthung Redhand Oje Svessl Emrah Horune Najot ThreaderWolf Priest Fyf Amlodhi Skarssen SkarssenssonJarl VarangrHerald to Lord Skarssensson Ohthere WyrdmakeRune Priest Trunc Bitur Bercaw Imperial Personae Giro EmantinePrefect-Secretary to the Unification Council Kasper HawserConservator, also known as Ahmad Ibn Rustah Navid MurzaConservator Non-Imperial Personae Fith of the Ascommani Guthox of the Ascommani Brom of the Ascommani Lern of the Ascommani In the Past Rector Uwe


PART ONE

THE UPPLANDER


‘If I am guilty of anything, it is the simple pursuit of knowledge.’

— The Primarch Magnus, at Nikaea


‘Take but degree away, untune that string,

And, hark! what discord follows; each thing meets

In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters

Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores

And make a sop of all this solid globe:

Strength should become the lord of imbecility,

And the rude son should strike his father dead:

Force should be right; or rather

right and wrong

(Between whose endless jar justice resides)

Should lose their names, and so should

justice too.

Then every thing, includes itself in power,

Power into will, will into appetite.

And appetite, a universal wolf,

So doubly seconded with will and power,

Must make perforce a universal prey, and last eat up himself.’

— attributed to the dramaturge Shakespire (fl. M2), cited in the Prophecy of Amon of the Thousand Sons (chp III verse 230)


‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’

— unattributable (circa M2)