Of all the loyal Space Marine Legions, the Sixth had suffered more than most and less than some during the Heresy. Never the most numerous of Legions, it had sustained heavy casualties at Prospero, before being bled further at the battle of the Alaxxes Nebula by the Alpha Legion. Then had come the attempt at striking down Horus at Beta-Garmon, and the carnage of Yarant. Less than ten thousand warriors of the Rout had survived, and they arrived at Terra to find the planet ravaged, the traitors fleeing, and the Emperor all but dead.
Driven by fury and shame alike, the Vlka Fenryka threw themselves into the grim warfare of the Scouring. Acting as the Emperor's executioners one last time, they purged world after world of any trace of daemonic infestation. The champions of the Sixth Legion struck down many infernal lords during that dark time, regaining some of the honor they perceived they had lost. Russ himself hunted for the Vengeful Spirit, his hunt being thwarted when he reached the Cadian Gate and realized that going further was meaningless suicide. For years, the Wolf King remained on Cadia, guarding the Gate until Dorn and his Imperial Fists arrived to turn the planet into an impregnable stronghold. Only then did Russ depart, returning to Fenris to rebuild his decimated Legion.
In the decades that followed the Scouring, the Space Wolves underwent a great many changes. Between Horus' manipulations of the Legion and the loss of the Emperor's guidance, they no longer felt confident that they could act as the Imperium's executioners, for neither Russ nor his commanders trusted the newly appointed High Lords of Terra completely. The certitude that came with being the axe of the Master of Mankind was lost, and the Wolves' image within the Imperium, that of blood-soaked barbarians, was now a threat to them. With fear of the Traitor Legions imprinted deep within Mankind's collective psyche, there was a real possibility that the Imperium itself would turn against the Sixth Legion out of fear born of incomprehension and the Wolves' own playing upon their dreaded reputation.
Drawing upon Fenris' sagas, the Great Wolves decided that, instead of killers, they would become heroes. No longer would they be the dread executioners, sent to crush those who defied the Emperor's laws : instead, they would be champions, slaying the beasts and monsters that threatened the Imperium's peace. New Legionaries were raised from Fenrisian stock, their minds filled with tales of the glory to be found hunting down the monsters that dwelled among the stars rather than with the brutal necessity of purging those who defied the edicts of the Golden Throne.
The rebuilt Great Companies took to the stars, fighting on the fringes of the Imperium against Ork empires and other xenos threats, while dispatching smaller groups of warriors to answer the pleas for help of isolated system. And slowly, over the course of decades, the reputation of the Sixth Legion in the wider Imperium changed, as the memories of the Great Crusade faded, replaced by those of warriors in grey warplate striking down xenos abominations. The threat of excommunication diminished, helped by the intervention of Sanguinius, who intervened before the gathered High Lords in 658.M31 to renew his trust in all of his remaining brothers' loyalty.
As the Inquisition grew and divided into those who sought to defend Mankind against the taint of the Warp and those who sought to protect it from alien influences and menaces, many Inquisitors belonging to the latter category developed tight bonds with the Sixth Legion. A few Fenris-born Inquisitors helped cement that relationship, and soon, it wasn't rare for Inquisitors to be accompanied by a small cadre of Vlka Fenryka warriors, acting both as bodyguards and kill-teams when necessary. On hundreds of worlds, Acolytes of the Ordos worked to uncover alien plots or xenos monsters, before calling upon the sons of Russ to eliminate the threat with bolter and blade.
Meanwhile, as his sons carved a new place for themselves in the new Imperium, in his chambers within the Fang, Leman Russ brooded. The Wolf King was tormented by guilt, wondering if he could have saved the Emperor's life from Horus had he not abandoned his chance to stand on the walls of the Imperial Palace in pursuit of the opportunity to kill Horus himself. Despite his brothers' best efforts, he could see the Imperium slowly descend into superstition and tyranny, growing ever further from the Emperor's vision. For a time, immersing himself into the rebuilding of his Legion and the diplomatic work of reforging the Imperium in the wake of Horus' treachery was enough to keep his mind from such dark thoughts, but as peace returned to the galaxy, there were no more distractions left. Then came the Proclamation of Horus.
Russ had known that the Warmaster wasn't dead. The Wolf King was well versed in the ways of destiny and fate, and he knew that, if Horus hadn't been slain by the Emperor, then he would not simply perish from his wounds or be slain by another traitor. Horus' wyrd was a tangled and cruel one, a doom that lingered over the future of all Humanity. And yet, Russ also knew from bitter experience that he could not hope to be the one who would end the Warmaster's life. He had tried that before, and it had failed then. Perhaps Horus was weaker now than he had been at Beta-Garmon, but so was Russ, his spirit drained by the exertions of the Heresy.
Instead, Russ turned his sights to another goal. If his failure had contributed in the Emperor's fall, then he could atone for them by enabling the restoration of the Master of Mankind. With Horus and the other traitor Primarchs manipulating the population of the Imperium from the Eye of Terror, only the leadership of the Emperor could ensure that the corruption of Chaos could be kept at bay – and Russ would not trust on the Inquisition, let alone the Ecclesiarchy, to defend the gates of Humanity's soul.
After delegating most of his responsibilities to the Great Wolves, Russ delved into the accumulated lore of Fenris. He put aside his martial ways and embraced the more intellectual aspects of his transhuman nature. Using the contacts his Legion had built with the Inquisition, he arranged for restricted tomes to be delivered to the Fang, and sent parties of warriors to remote parts of the galaxy in search of knowledge from the Dark Age of Technology – and even older epochs.
The Wolf King worked in this manner for several centuries, developing partnerships with conspiracies of Inquisitors and even brokering deals with Craftworld Eldar, exchanging their lore for relics of their fallen empire or the mercy of Imperial forces. The vaults of the Fang were filled with ancient and alien wonders, yet still Russ seemed no closer to finding what he sought.
Perhaps his quest was in vain, or perhaps it would only have taken him a few more years – or a few millennia to complete. In the end, no one would ever know, for as Leman Russ had focused on salvaging the future of Mankind through the Emperor's resurrection, his Legion's old enemies sought to destroy him and all he had worked for.
In the year 666.M32 (a numerology which drew upon ancient human superstitions and fears), the Thousand Sons Legion launched its greatest military operation outside the Eye of Terror since the Siege of Terra. For decades, cultists and operatives of the Fifteenth Legion had worked through the Segmentum Obscurus. Pirate warbands drew forces away from Fenris, while distrust in the Sixth Legion grew as witches and demagogues sought to resurrect the old fears. Kill-teams attached to the Inquisition were ambushed by daemon-backed hunters who sought not to kill, but to capture, dragging their victims to secret lairs and laboratories. There, the Space Wolves were tortured using science and sorcery until they transformed into Wulfen, which were drugged and put into stasis.
As the schemes of the Thousand Sons reached completion, these maddened warriors were unleashed within the halls of Imperial power on a dozen highly-developed worlds. Driven to insanity by the torments they had endured, these Wulfens – who still bore recognizable Sixth Legion insignias – slaughtered hundreds of Imperial dignitaries before being put down. Terror seized these worlds as the images of the carnage were broadcast by treacherous agents.
With their circles of advisors whispering in their ears that they must take a stand or risk rebellion, the Governors of these worlds made their choice. Despite the growing panic, they did not dare openly declare war upon the Sixth Legion. Instead, they sent flotillas and soldiers to Fenris, to bring the bodies of the Wulfen before Leman Russ and demand answers from the Wolf King himself. Select diplomats were assigned to these fleets, and a tense calm descended in their departure.
These diplomats, however, were no loyal servants of the Throne, but agents of the Thousand Sons. As the ships made course through the Warp for Fenris, they enacted vile rituals and sabotaged the Geller Fields. Sorcerers of the Fifteenth Legion and their Rubricae troops manifested aboard the vessels, while plague of madness and mutation ravaged the crew and soldiers aboard. Elsewhere, dark rituals and conspiracies centuries in the making brought other forces to bear, as Daemon Princes of Tzeentch that had not stalked the galaxy for aeons were brought back into the Materium.
A new Black Crusade had begun, formed of the Imperium's own strength turned against one of its most loyal Legions through the machinations of the Thousand Sons. When the Warp opened at the edge of Fenris system and disgorged a horde of daemonships and tainted vessels, a single warcry echoed across the vox and the system's Aether : "Revenge for Prospero !"
Like befitted a Legion's home system, Fenris was well-defended, but while it had plenty of space stations and other defenses, its defenders had been slowly bled dry by the growth of piratical activity throughout the Segmentum. The Black Crusade smashed through the outer defenses, making for Fenris itself. In the Fang, Russ assembled the forces at his disposal – disparate elements of all Great Companies, as well as nearly the entire strength of the Thirteenth, returned from a brutal campaign against a Rak'Gol uprising. The Wolf King believed that the Fang would be the primary target of the invaders, but he was wrong.
The Chaos forces made planetfall all across the planet, and the Daemon Princes leading them began to build vast, nightmarish structures upon the ice and waters of the planet. These Chaos constructions strained the world's unstable nature even further, threatening to pull it apart. The scheme of the Thousand Sons was revealed : they sought to obliterate Fenris itself, dragging its pieces into the Warp where they would become the fiefdoms of the Daemon Princes that had joined the Black Crusade. Convinced that the hand of Magnus was behind this, Russ commanded his Rune Priests to find where the Cyclops was hiding – but they could not find him.
Despite his misgivings, Russ knew that he had no choice. Already, the skies above the Fang were filled with crimson clouds, and blood and tears rained from the heavens as men and women were turned insane by unholy visions that haunted their every waking moment as well as their dreams. The earth shook, though it wasn't yet the season for it, and ancient monsters were rising from the depths to prey upon the terrified tribes. This seemed like the end times : the infernal structures had to be cast down before Fenris tore itself apart.
Taking his most elite warriors with him, Russ left the Fang and went on a pilgrimage across Fenris, hunting down the nine Daemon Princes and their followers. One by one they fell to his blade, banished back to the Realms of Chaos. As his quest went on, however, Russ grew further and further from the Fang, while communications with the warriors still stationed in the Legion's fortress grew ever more erratic as conditions continued to deteriorate.
It was then that Magnus' trap sprung. From the portal to the Underverse known as Syrtyr's Door, the Crimson King himself emerged, accompanied by a vast daemonic legion. As his sons and their allies laid siege to Fenris within the Materium, Magnus had led an invasion of Fenris' psychic reflection within the Sea of Souls. The disturbances this had caused had been noticed by the Rune Priests, but their significance had been lost in the face of the more obvious threat they faced.
"Your petty ancestral spirits are nothing but pale reflections of true power, as befits the pathetic creations of childish minds. Muspjall burns in the fires of Change, the souls of the unworthy dead now fuel for Tzeentch's great engines. And as for your Erlking … his tricks could not deceive me."
Declaration of Magnus the Red during the breach of the Fang
After laying waste to much of the Fang, destroying the Legion's greatest reserve of gene-seed and plundering the treasure vaults where Russ had stored the fruits of his agents' quests, Magnus withdrew. On the way back to Syrtyr's Door, the Crimson King sent psychic messages to Russ, taunting him with his many failures, telling him that he too would now know what it felt like to watch his home burn and be unable to protect it. When the Wolf King arrived to find the Fang aflame, his rage grew beyond measure. On the spot, he appointed his second-in-command Bjorn as the regent of the Legion, while he took the Thirteenth Great Company with him in pursuit of Magnus and his infernal host.
Russ and the entire Thirteenth Great Company vanished through Syrtyr's Door, which closed soon after, never to re-open again in spite of all the efforts of the Rune Priests. The Underverse of Fenris was in a state of total anarchy, with gods that had been worshiped by the planet's populations for millennia destroyed by Magnus' demonic horde. For entire generations afterwards, Bjorn and his brothers had to work with the Inquisition to examine the beliefs of the Fenrisian tribes, searching for any signs of Chaotic influence. Entire clans were exterminated, and daemonic spirits that had remained hidden on the planet after Magnus' departure were exorcised or bound within sites of eldritch power that were forbidden to all, their dark legacy recorded in new sagas.
Though Magnus returned to Sortiarius, there was no sign of Leman Russ. However, in the years that followed the battle of Fenris, rumors began to circulate within the Eye of Terror. These tales spoke of great, wolf-like beasts that hunted across the storm-wracked regions of the Eye, seeking the heart's blood of any who had ever fought under the banner of the Eye of Horus. They could be slain, but upon defeat would merely dissolve into black smoke, leaving no trace of their passing. According to the Neverborn that Sorcerers from all Traitor Legions summoned and interrogated, these were the dreams of Leman Russ and his lost warriors, manifesting in the Eye.
AN : this chapter was inspired by the Benandanti of Infernum, which are basically humans chosen by nature whose dream-forms are werewolves that appear in Hell to hunt down demons. You may think I am joking, but I am not. The setting of Infernum is amazing : there is a reason it inspired me to start this fic. The rest of the chapter was entirely built around the idea of creating their equivalent for this setting. By the way, did you know that there is no canon date for the Battle of the Fang, just that it happened in M32 ? In fact, I read somewhere that it's not even canon anymore. Can anyone confirm/deny that ?
I am on vacation right now, and I am going to try and publish one chapter every day until Halloween - and the next chapter of Warband of the Forsaken Sons before the end of the week, though that one is more uncertain. While the Angel War for the Roboutian Heresy is nowhere near complete (it's not even properly started), I have an idea for an interlude of sorts, like I did last year at the same period. I am thinking of writing several of those for the RH before the next big chapter, both to keep you interested and to set up several plot threads. The Angel War will take place all across the Sol system, so I have a lot of planning to do. There is a wall in my apartment where I have put post-its of the planets, their known moons/features, and the different things I am planning to happen there during the Angel War. It ... may look like something you would find in the house of a serial killer.
As always, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and await your feedback. A lot of you wanted to see more of the loyal Primarchs, and while I know this isn't exactly what you had in mind, I hope you still like what I did with Russ and his Thirteenth Great Company, as well as the place of the Wolves in the new Imperium.
Zahariel out.