Just saw Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2, now I'm verging on hype-overload! This just makes me all the more determined to finish the first book, and so I shall. The Ultramar Campaign's underway!
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An icon will fall.
A god will awaken.
A Primarch will rise.
Yvraine, Prophetess of the Ynnari, shared that troubling vision with Eldrad Ulthran of Craftworld Ulthwe. Peering into the many directions the winds of time may take was a taxing endeavor, all necessary to understand what fate must the Aeldari seize. The Dark Emissary of Ynnead, now allied with the Farseer of Craftworld Ulthwe, remained confused at the many things she saw, unable to comprehend the events that would surely follow in the years to come.
She foresaw the return of Horus Lupercal, the Monster of Cthonia and Butcher of Ullanor, one of the greatest enemies of the Imperium of Man. Plucked from the abyss by the Mon'Kei Emperor, his very involvement in the battle for Cadia changed the course of history in ways no mortal mind could understand.
The galaxy will burn.
She saw a vision of what might have been, had he remained lost in the Warp. Where Cadia fell before the might of the Despoiler, where the Eye of Terror swallowed up the world and split the cosmos in two. Ultramar was next, and only through the timely intervention of the Ynnari did the Celestinians have hope of seeing tomorrow.
Through the hand of Ynnead, Roboute Guilliman awoke, brought back from the brink to lead the beleaguered forces of mankind against the coming apocalypse. She saw them standing side by side, fending off the forces of the Enemy until the wrath of Abaddon was swayed. An alliance of Aeldari and Mon'kei? Unthinkable! But through this path of fate began the long road that would inevitably plunge the galaxy into oblivion.
Their involvement sparked a chain of events that led into the death of the human race, birthing a new god of Chaos that meant doom for all life in the galaxy.
"There is more." Eldrad whispered, sensing his companion retreat from the revelations. "Stay with me, that you may understand."
Yvraine took a deep breath, then closed her eyes, opening her mind once more to the visions of fate.
She saw the future of this path of time, where Horus has redeemed himself in the eyes of his people, uniting mankind once more as in the days of the Great Crusade. He was different now, open-minded in a way that she could never think a human could be. From here, the vision became clouded and uncertain. Yvraine saw Horus leading the forces of the Imperium across the galaxy, claiming it all for mankind and trampling all beneath the iron treads of the Imperial War Machine.
She saw the Emperor, mortal form decaying from the parasitic energies of the Golden Throne yet growing in strength in the Warp. At his command, Horus marched deep into the realm of Nurgle. He took the goddess Isha from her prison, spirited her away from the God of Rot, and brought her before his father. With the Aeldari Goddess of Life at his side, the Emperor's mortal body regained vitality, and so remained in the material universe to further guide his people. With the Emperor at the helm, the God of Rot was slain, his reign over Death and perverse vitality ended as the Pestilent Realm was shattered to the core, his very essence serving as fuel for the new gods of the Imperium.
"Impossible." Yvraine murmured, amazed and horrified at the notion that the Emperor was able to accomplish such a feat. A Dark God, one of the Ruinous Powers, killed? Could that even happen?
She saw her people, the Ynnari, ally themselves in desperation with the Imperium when they could not face She-Who-Thirsts alone. Here, the vision grew ever more clouded, and Yvraine decided she had had enough.
The Prophetess' heels clacked loudly in that empty chamber as she paced around, still coming to terms at what she had seen. "There is no third path? Our involvement shall be the death of us all? Is that the fate of our people, and our hope lies solely on mankind?"
"It is difficult to grasp, I know this personally when I first saw the vision." Eldrad replied. "The matter no longer involves choice, we can only act as fated."
The first steps had been taken upon the road of reconquest. Macragge was free of Chaos taint. Guilliman wished to press on, consumed by his desire to drive the Ruinous Powers from Ultramar. However, those he led needed time to regroup and consolidate. Countless wounded required attention. Hundreds of war machines needed repair.
Guilliman was wise enough to give his followers the time they needed. Meanwhile, Imperial reinforcements gathered around Macragge. Braving the Warp Storms raging through local space, Space Marine craft by the dozen assembled above the Ultramarines homeworld. Delegations from many Primogenitor Successor Chapters of the Ultramarines had ploughed through the Empyrean, risking terrible danger to see for themselves that the Primarch had returned. Novamarines, Sons of Orar, Genesis Chapter and countless others joined the growing throng, kneeling before the Primarch and swearing allegiance to him.
Horus was not with him at the time, having busied himself with other matters regarding the borders outlaying the fringes of Subsector Ultramar. Celestine was with him too, offering her battlesisters to back up the Primarch as he cleared world after world of Chaos invaders.
While the armies of the Ultramar Reconquest were gathering, a further opportunity presented itself. It was the Arch-Consul of Magna Civitas - the closest Ultramar had to a conventional Planetary Governor - who suggested that a grand victory parade could be held, and its majesty recorded on pict casts to be sent far and wide through the Imperium. The Consul said that people needed the light of hope in this dark hour, a shining example of victory to renew their faith not just in the Emperor, but in Guilliman reborn.
The Primarch acceded to this demand, though it sat ill with his bleak inner mood. Guilliman saw the wisdom in it, but he accepted such aggrandisement only grudgingly. Mere solar days after victory was declared, a grand triumph swept up from the Titan Gate to the very steps of the Fortress of Hera. Thousands of war engines and millions of warriors presented their colours and raised cheers and horn blasts to the skies. A seething sea of the city's residents packed the crater-pocked processionals and plazas to watch the proceedings, and voices beyond count rang out as one to cry Guilliman's praise in a single deafening roar.
Standing upon a marble-columned platform with his closest lieutenants at his side, the Primarch dutifully presented the most magnificent spectacle he could for the assembled masses. The Arch-Consul himself presented Guilliman with a stunningly wrought laurel wreath crafted in gold, urging the Primarch to don the gilded crown at once. The moment Guilliman did so, he found his mind filled with thoughts of future glories. This paltry triumph would be nothing compared to the breathtaking spectacle of his galactic conquest. The Primarch's armies would be beyond number, their adoration for their heroic lord so great that they would die for him gladly. Planets, systems, whole Segmentums would be renamed in honour of he who had liberated them, and the whipped dogs of Chaos would flee before him like the curs they were. Statues would be raised to commemorate Guilliman's majesty, and eventually even the Golden Throne of Terra itself would be his to mount. The Emperor's most loyal son deserved no less an inheritance, and he would have his due.
It was this last thought that wrenched Guilliman from the wreath's insidious curse. With a gasp, he tore the gilded crown from his head and bellowed a command for the Arch-Consul to be restrained. It was Grand Master Voldus who grabbed the robed dignitary, and as his blessed gauntlets touched the man's flesh it sizzled and crisped. The din of the triumph was colossal, an ocean swell of noise that hid the Arch-Consul's shrieks as the illusions that veiled him were unmade.
Guilliman and his lieutenants recoiled at the misshapen mutant thing that was revealed. Bulbous and deformed, the keening, fleshy abomination wore a glowing amulet about its neck on a thong of human skin. As Guilliman stared in disgust at this cursed fetish, he heard a susurration hissing within his mind that he had not heard since that fateful encounter on Thessala ten millennia before.
In mocking tones, Fulgrim welcomed Guilliman back to his beloved Imperium. "Greetings, brother. I see you have recovered from that lovely slit I've made in your throat. Alas, I am disappointed that you've rejected my gift. The Crown of Glories would've improved that shabby excuse of armor that adorns your body." Many heroes great and pure had fallen to the trinket's blandishments, and Fulgrim had hoped that he could corrupt Guilliman in the same fashion. Yet the Slaaneshi Daemon Prince assured his brother that this was but the first of endless temptations that Guilliman would have to face. Laughing cruelly, he taunted that the Lord of Ultramar would never be able to trust any feeling of triumph or self-satisfaction again.
Disgusted, Guilliman drove his sword through the amulet and into the hideous creature that bore it, silencing the voice of the damned brother who had laid him low millennia past. Yet as the triumph rumbled on, Fulgrim's words continued to echo in Guilliman's mind. They would do so for many solar days to come.
Within the Realm of Pestilence, the Goddess of Life prepared herself for another session with her tormentor.
Yet, compared to the past millennia spent in that rusted cage, Isha found an inexplicable ebb of strength pulsate within her fading soul. Where once she consigned herself into this horrid fate of endless torture, pain and suffering, she now glared at the God of Rot with faint but existent defiance.
Nurgle grinned, showing the mass of yellow fangs lining the wide maw on his face, and held a bowl of freshly boiled broth extracted from the bloated livers hanging beside the Great Cauldron. Another gift for his lovely companion. His bulk slides across the cracked floor of the room, leaving an overpowering stench in the muck left in his wake as he approached the cage.
"Open wide, my dear." Grandfather Nurgle guffawed.
Isha retreats further into her cage, pushing herself far into the bars until the rusted edges bit into her skin. "No! Stay away from me!"
The Chaos god's frame covers the cage as he pulls the door open, the ugly smile on his putrid face never leaving as he grabs a fistful of the goddess' hair and pulls her inward. "Just a sip, come now." He chuckles evilly, amused as the goddess struggles futilely to free herself from his grip. The bowl comes to her face, the fumes reaching deep into her flaring nostrils, but her mouth remains closed.
Annoyed now, Nurgle lets go of her hair and grabs on to her chin. The very touch of the God of Disease overwhelmed the aura protecting the goddess' flesh, and her cheek shriveled and rotted right under his fingers, opening the way for the gift to be poured through her clenched teeth!
Isha screamed in agony and retched at the foul taste of the acrid concoction. Nurgle lets go once the last drop was given, and shuts the cage, pausing to watch as the new disease takes form within the goddess' body. The smile on his face grows as tears fall uncontrollably from Isha's eyes, starting from mere trickles to rivers of crystalline waters that soon turned red with blood.
Her eyes puffed and turned dark crimson, festering then rotting completely from her sockets.
Through this new trial, the goddess found new strength and prevailed, impressing her captor by her resilience and judged that his new disease was worthy of dispensing into the material realm. Little did he know the seed of hope sprouting within the goddess' heart, of the image of the Emperor in her mind and of the memory of his touch. The cleansing aura restored her body, and Isha fell slack upon the bars, breathing heavily from her exertions.
With faint whispers, the goddess relayed the secrets to countering the new plague Nurgle was about to introduce to the world of men. With the fraying remnants of her powers, she reached out to the Primarch upon Parmenio.
Horus knelt upon the sands and reached down, taking a clump of the golden grains and grounded them between his fingers.
"You seem troubled, Horus."
"Oh, it is nothing." The Primarch replied, rising from the dust to greet the Saint. "Just remembering an old friend, of times past and what could have been."
The sands blow past his legs as the angel's wings flutter to bring Celestine down to solid ground, "You are thinking of Aggregius, am I wrong to assume as much?"
Horus nodded, "No, you land on proper footing. His loss leaves an ache in my heart that refuses to depart. I know I must focus on the task at hand, but still I grieve nonetheless. I've met many a man with a valorous heart as his, but few minds as the sergeant, he would've been proud to see Cadia still standing and the return of my brother Guilliman."
"Indeed. You have spoken with the Lord of Ultramar?"
"Yes, I have." Horus answered, "Things are better now between me and my brother. Now, all I have to do is wait for him to build his forces so we may move on in search of the other Primarchs."
"Do you have a plan where to head next?"
"At the moment I'm still thinking about it." Horus confessed, "I have yet to find reliable intel on the whereabouts of my brothers. If I have to guess, I will keep an eye on where the forces of Chaos converge on the most among the sectors. They will undoubtedly be as determined as we are in hunting down the remaining Primarchs."
"Or rather, to be precise, they will come to you." Celestine pointed out with a humorous smirk. "Your victories across the Segmentum Obscurus has earned you more than your fair share of hatred."
"Both within and without the Imperium." Horus agreed, "Either way works to the benefit of mankind. Traitor legions will fall before us, no matter their numbers or how far the Chaos gods extend their favor." A moment of silence was shared between the crusaders, a moment spent admiring the beauty in the landscape around them. "My my, what a sight. When I was young, spending the remainder of my youth alongside my father, he took me to places like this."
Celestine listened intently, receiving the rare insight on the nature of her god.
"It even reminds me of home." Horus said, gazing longingly across the plains of Parmenio. "Of beautiful Cthonia." The feral world was by all means inhospitable and far from beautiful, but not to the Primarch who called the colony home. Horus saw the good things in that violent hive-colony, having grown with the rabble and knowing the humble ground upon which the common folk treaded on day to day. It's all gone now, of course, all gone. But the memory lives on in the young clone. "I was sad to leave it behind, but my duty as a son is stronger than my attachment to home."
His eyelids lowered as his thoughts grew wistful, "I wish I never let my ambition blind me. What could have been...had I not veered from the path of righteousness? So many years wasted, so many souls lost..."
"My lord, do not give in to despair." Celestine said unto the saddened Primarch, "Remain with the happy memories, and let these be your guide. Dark days are upon us, and God-Emperor knows it will only get worse. Let not the Enemy find a tool to use against you."
Horus nodded again, "Yes, you are right. Thank you, Saint."
The two ventured back to the landing site where seven Thunderhawks awaited, bearing battle-brothers hailing from successor chapters of the Ultramarines. Guilliman had ordered a large detachment to accompany Horus in his mission ridding the subsector of remaining Chaos warbands to secure Ultramar until the gathering of forces was complete. Once that was done, their next goal will be to search for one of the two Primarch brothers based on the most accurate of reports.
The shadow of the Ravenlord was said to loom over the Eye of Terror, now a narrow slit in realspace by the nullifying effects of the Cadian Pylons. A bloody trail left in the wake of what could only be the remnant battle-brothers of the Space Wolves 13th Company. As told by the Chapter Master Logan Grimnar, their brother Leman Russ had disappeared through the Eye years before Corvus decided to embark on his long voyage of penance, a quest to find the Tree of Life to heal their broken father. These reports were not born of mere speculation, and the two brother Primarchs took them very seriously. Should Corvus ever halt his voyage of penance and return to realspace, their forces should undoubtedly be ready to receive him. Hope, of course, sprung to life in the hearts of the Ravenguard Chapter, its astartes brethren growing eager to meet their gene-sire once again.
Plans were laid out and relayed to the subordinates, Horus led the Imperial planetary defense forces of Parmenio to eradicate the Chaos traitor fleets lurking in the dark corners of the subsector. The derelict voidships were put to the torch, and interplanetary outposts were set up along the major traffic routes leading to and from the Segmentum Ultima. This came as great news to the Lord of Ultramar, and it pleased him to know his trust was well placed.
Then tragedy, as always, struck when such good fortunes seemed to pour generously.
A plague, virulent as is the nature of Nurgle's gifts, took hold of the populace and the loyalist soldiers at Horus' command. Throughout the Drohl, Talassar and Parmenio Systems, Ultramar Defence Auxilia found themselves weeping uncontrollably. In the midst of battle, warriors were blinded by endless streams of viscous, stinking tears that gummed their eyes open and soon turned them red raw. Overcome by sorrow, sufferers wailed and wept for solar days on end. In the worst cases, the so called "Weepers" were permanently blinded as their infected eyeballs festered and rotted from their skulls.
Having more than his fair share of dealings with the God of Rot when he was yet a prisoner in his own body in the Horus Heresy, the Primarch was quick to take action and used all means at his disposal to aid the people in the Parmenio systems.
The disease, soon named the Sorrow, or the Weeping Plague, spread with alarming rapidity. Its vector was believed to be an infestation of tiny, biting mites that were found amidst rations, squirming inside uniforms and ammunition packs, and even spilled from the pages of opened Imperial Primers. Nothing stopped the mites from multiplying, and no sanitary measure could long keep them out. The siege of Leotold's Keep collapsed thanks to the pernicious influence of the Sorrow, while the previously devastating Ravishol offensive ground to a halt as its human soldiery were reduced to blinded, wailing revenants. Furthermore, though they were not absolutely immune, only a very few cases had been reported amongst the ranks of the Adepta Sororitas. Some ascribed this to the presence of the Living Saint amongst the reconquest forces, but more believed that it was the enduring faith of the Battle-Sisters that protected them from sickness.
This was his gift, what made him different from the other Primarchs. While he was not the only one of humble origins, Horus was the only Primarch who maintained the state of mind of a commoner, and through this aspect of his character did the same compassionate nature of his father blossom.
There, at the moment when Horus found himself pursuing all options to aid his people, he heard the gentle whispers at the back of his mind. It came in the form of an idea, an inspiration from a higher power- a cure for the affliction. At first he regarded the thoughts with suspicion, knowing that the forces of Chaos were cunning in more ways than he cared to count, and was wary of the snares they might lay for him. The challenge was to know whether or not the trap was so, and that it was by the hand of the Enemy.
Though doubt weighed heavily on him, Horus did not conceal this inspiration from his companions, knowing full well how that ended up the last time he was in charge. Surprisingly, none objected, not even the most zealous of the Imperial leaders! Celestine herself declared the inspiration as godsent, a gift straight from the Golden Throne. Horus was skeptical, but deferred to the Saint's advice to use it, ordering the Medicus to begin synthesizing the vaccine.
From her cage in Nurgle's Realm, Isha smiled in satisfaction.
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Net's a bit choppy, so I don't know how long this takes to be seen onsite.
A/N Crom'Torak
Patience may not be one of your virtues, but I will ask you to have it just the same. I have a plan for your entry, and I'm afraid it will be a LONG way off, probably into the second book so that it ties in well with my plot. Also, should you insist on being in Horus' story I might have to make some changes in your suggestions ( don't worry, I'm not gonna tweak too much )