Maeleum Datum : ?.?
There are no kings in the Eye of Terror : even proud Horus dares only claim the title of Prince. The same is true among daemons, though there are legends of ancient, powerful Daemon Kings, who ruled over kingdoms stretching across the stars.
If such beings ever existed, they are gone now, slain by those who oppose the corruption of the Warp or cast down in ages past by Gods that brook no rivals to their absolute dominion over the Neverborn. But though there are no kings among daemonkind, there still exists an aristocracy of Hell, made up of the Ruinous Powers' most exalted slaves. Daemon Princes and Greater Daemons, the lords of their own infernal hosts : warlords and courtiers of the Great Game of Chaos, forever dancing to the tune of the Dark Gods. Across the Eye and beyond, their names and titles are whispered in the darkness, and inscribed upon parchment and stone by the hands of madmen.
A conclave of such beings was gathering on the daemon world of Hak'Lor'Ven, where a trillion lost souls were trapped in a single moment of betrayed hope. As the tides of the Eye shifted, the daemon world was left unchanged, an eternal monument to the folly of the ancient race that had thought to cheat the Dark Gods of their due, in an age before the Fall of the Eldar. The infernal nobility met high above the fields of frozen souls, atop the remnants of the tower upon which the ill-fated ritual that had doomed this world had been conducted.
There it was that the Daemon Lords who met on Hak'Lor'Ven's highest point, gathered from across the Eye of Terror to discuss matters of pacts and vengeance. They were exiles all, chased from their own domains by the armies of the Traitor Legions, these upstart newcomers to the Great Game. As the Legion Wars had raged, the sons of the renegade Primarchs had sought to draw every resource available in the Eye of Terror under their control. With blade and sorcery, they had conquered daemon world after daemon world, heedless of the ancient treaties and rights of conquest that had seen them divided between the children of the Pantheon after the birth of the Dark Prince.
The tower was vast beyond mundane engineering, raised at the apex of a civilization that had reached too far and touched its doom on the other side of the Veil. The platform upon which the Daemon Lords met was nearly a kilometer in diameter, and host to hundreds of crystallized statues. There was space enough for all seventy-two infernal lords to manifest, though some of them had assumed shapes less enormous than those they usually favoured as a concession to the needs of the gathering. Each of them had come alone, leaving their followers at the base of the tower, where already they had begun to kill each other for sport. It did not matter to the Daemon Lords even if they all wiped themselves out – this gathering, this infernal conclave, was far more important.
Never had so many Daemon Princes and Greater Daemons of different choirs met in the Materium, and rarely had this happened even in the Eye of Terror, or even in the Realms of Chaos themselves. The sheer diversity of the gathering was a sign of the scale of the disturbance introduced by the Traitor Legions into what passed for the balance of power within the Eye.
The being known as the Sovereign of Starless Nights was a figure of absolute blackness in which shone the light of the stars as seen from its homeworld, before it had stolen them and driven its own people into a pit of existential dread so powerful they had destroyed themselves. For ages uncounted it had reigned over the husk of that world, cloaked in eternal night, until the rise of Slaanesh had pulled it into the Eye of Terror, where the Sovereign had been overthrown by a cabal of champions bearing the Eye of Horus as their banner. After a long period of discussions, intrigues, alliances and betrayals, the Sovereign had emerged as the representative of the seventeen Tzeentchian Daemon Lords present at the conclave.
Of the seventy-two, the chosen of Khorne numbered the least. None of the Blood God's champions had retreated before the advance of the Traitor Legions, and most of those who had been forced out of their worlds by either sorcery or defeat had been co-opted by Angron's crusade in the Radiant Worlds, where the Lord of the Red Sands battled the Anathema's light-forged angels in an endless slaughter. But a few had come to Hak'Lor'Ven all the same, their fury at being defeated through cowardly means surpassing even the pull of Angron's call to eternal war. There were eight of them, as there should be, and the one who came to speak in Khorne's name was the mightiest of them all – again, as it should be. Vangash'hagash the Ever-Bloody would have been classified by the Diabolists of the Traitor Legions as a Bloodthirster. Once, it had ruled over the daemon world of Kathalon, endlessly fighting against the legions of Tzeentch – until a cabal of Horusian Sorcerers led by Ahriman himself had bound its Tzeentchian rival to their service and crafted a ritual that had forced the Bloodthirster to depart from the world and prevented its return for as long as their banner flew upon its captured stronghold.
With fire and sorcery, the plague planets of the Nurglite Neverborn had been cleansed so that the Traitor Legions could harvest their resources for their own use. Orbital bombardments had razed cities of rot and rust, and Sorcerers had stalked the ruins and burned everything down, banishing the wounded daemons back into the Empyrean while their will reached out and forced out their influence. Only where the flag of the Fourteenth Legion flew were the scions of the Grandfather safe, for of the nine Traitor Legions, only the sons of Mortarion were willing to share their domains with the pestilent Neverborn. By their very nature, the champions of entropy were anathema to the sons of Primarchs who sought to build their empires within the Eye of Terror, and so they found themselves hunted by all Chaos Marines, only rarely bound into servitude and containment instead. Twenty-one Lords of Decay had gathered to Hak'Lor'Ven, the tower beneath their feet straining as the curse of unchanging permanence cast upon it by the Gods struggled to resist the pull of entropy. Speaking for the scions of Plague was Kog'Hevor, the Bestower of Sorrow. Unlike most daemons of Nurgle, the Bestower did not resemble the grotesquely bloated figure of the Plaguefather himself, but was instead a tall, skeletal figure clad in a hooded cloak woven from the life-strands of the countless millions it had slain through spreading the gifts of Nurgle.
Since the Fall of the Eldar and the opening of the Eye, the scions of Slaanesh had held dominion over the greatest number of daemon worlds, though their initially complete control had only waned as the other three Ruinous Powers sought mastery of this priceless territory. But though the Dark Prince's holdings in the Eye had been on the decline since the Great Game had begun in his grave-birth, the children of Slaanesh were still the most numerous faction among the dispossessed Daemon Lords. Their pleasure palaces and fields of pain had proven poor defences against the brute military force of the Legions, and though defeat was an experience to be savored as much as any other, so too was revenge for every slight inflicted upon them. Nineteen daughters and sons of the Youngest God had heeded the call to gather, and the one who spoke for them was Ilkerya, Duchess of Delightful Agonies. She had come to the gathering in the shape of a tall Eldar female, the image of one of the Soul-broken's ancient goddesses tainted only by her missing eyes, which wept tears of blood and within the empty depths of which gleamed a hungry light. In her hands, she held the broken remnants of her sword, which had been ruined by the Dark Apostles of the Seventeenth Legion when they had conquered her world in the name of Lorgar and the Crimson Accords.
Seven other Daemon Lords were of no easily recognizable allegiance. These were the children of Chaos Undivided, who paid fealty to none of the individual Powers. They had all once walked the galaxy as mortals, for it was only by elevating those of their champions who had earned their combined favor that the Dark Gods could tolerate creating Neverborn not bound to them. Like the daemon kings of old, there were stories that spoke of such creatures, spawned in the earliest days of the Primordial Annihilator – but they were stories and nothing more, not any longer. The seven stood together, isolated from the rest of the daemonic courts, for they were ever a breed apart – marked for a special kind of greatness even among Daemon Lords, while at the same time forever looked down upon for their mortal origins. First among them was a being called the Lord of Gears, a humanoid shape in a crimson cloak with a multitude of eyes peering out from its hood, set between ever-turning brass gears. It had been human, during the Dark Age of Technology, and though its dominion was far from the Eye of Terror it had still been usurped, stolen from it by one of the most successful cults created by the Horusian ships who had slipped through the Cadian Gate at the Proclamation.
It was the Sovereign of Starless Nights that spoke first.
Daemons do not speak in any mortal tongue when communicating with one another. Even those who originated from the ranks of the living are creatures of raw concept and emotion, given form by their animating will and aspect by the nightmares of those who behold them trying to make sense of something that has no place in the Materium. When the children of Chaos communicate, on those rare occasions when they can tolerate another's presence, they do so in their own way, which only tangentially resembles what mortals think of as language. To creatures such as they, there is no such thing as idle chatter, no wasted words or meaningless banter. Like the Dark Gods they are fragments of, they exchange concepts and ideas rather than words, and every single one of them holds the seeds of damnation. But the surface of their exchange can be translated, however imperfectly, into something comprehensible by mortal minds.
The Sovereign began by stating once more the purpose of this exalted gathering. Though they had suffered at the hands of warbands from all nine exiled Legions, the Daemon Lords knew who was the source of their predicament, said the Tzeentchian representative. Horus, Warmaster of Chaos and self-proclaimed Prince of the Eye, had by his very presence altered the nature of the Great Game within the Eye. The mortal armies that had come to the Eye in the wake of the Gods' strike against the Anathema had been supposed to be broken, added to the ranks of the Lost and the Damned that populated the realm and made the playthings of the Daemon Lords.
Yet instead, these primates sought to become lords of their own. Horus' shadow and example loomed large, and if one mortal warlord, however exalted, could hold dominion over the Blessed, then why could not others ? By his presence, the Warmaster had made whole that which should have been sundered, either in his service or in opposition to him. This had to end, the Sovereign declared, to the grudging acclaim of its peers. The dominion of the Legions upon the Eye of Terror must be broken, and mortals made to remember their place in the hierarchy of the Gods' servants.
The Duchess of Delightful Agonies mentioned Aftermath, the city of cities, and the Masters who now ruled it. Horus' conquest of the Forge of Souls was yet another slight from the upstart, yet Ilkerya pointed out the opportunity it had created for them. The Masters would not have deigned join the efforts against Horus before – they had cared for nothing beyond their domain and the paying of the tithes by their horde of Soul Grinders. But now, all knew that they too had sworn revenge against the Warmaster. But Kog'Hevor shook its head. The Masters had already been approached : they had their own designs, their own plans and schemes, and would only join forces with other powers if those came to them as subordinates, not equals. Even in their exile, said the Bestower of Sorrow, they were prideful creatures, reflecting of their own origins. And besides, the Masters were known to the Warmaster : by associating themselves with the former lords of the Forge of Souls, the Daemon Lords risked drawing attention to themselves before they were ready.
Slowly, a coalition began to form, as the inherent hatred the Firsts of the Damned held for one another were eclipsed by their displeasure with the Legions who had usurped their kingdoms. What passed for infernal diplomacy was a dreadful thing indeed, and pacts that involved the doom of billions of souls were made as bribes. Months passed, turning to years, and still the discussion continued, progressing ever so slowly. Something which mortals may have called a charter was drafted, describing the terms and goals of the Convention of Hak'Lor'Ven. The Daemon Lords wrote it in blazing letters upon the flayed skin of dead Legionaries, and one by one all seventy-two signed it, investing part of their power into the charter, willingly binding themselves to it so that all would be forcefully bound to its terms in turn.
It was then that a great shadow fell upon the assembled Daemon Lords. The skies of Hak'Lor'Ven were suddenly shrouded in darkness, and from that darkness descended a tall figure, cloaked in the very fabric of night itself. This was Be'lakor, Master of Shadows and Firstborn of the Gods, eldest of all Daemon Princes, who had been elevated when the galaxy was young and the Old Ones had not yet faded from history into myth. Though his star had dimmed since the Dark Gods had elevated other champions to daemonhood, Be'lakor remained mighty, his cruelty and malice dreaded even by Daemon Lords.
There was a pause, as the seventy-two wondered if the Master of Shadows had come to add his strength to the Convention. The Master of Shadows glanced over the gathered Lords, his glare full of amused contempt. Then, without further fanfare, he snatched the Convention's charter and vanished.
There was a great uproar, rage and confusion mixed. It was the Sovereign of Starless Nights who first noticed that the heavens above Hak'Lor'Ven had changed. No longer did the burning lights of the Eye of Terror shone upon the Convention : instead, a uniform scarlet glow stretched from horizon to horizon, and the Daemon Lords were trapped beneath it, unable to escape from the daemon world.
Be'lakor, in a feat of ritual sorcery made possible only by the unique conditions within the Eye of Terror, had used the Convention's charter as the keystone for a working of truly staggering scale. The Firstborn of Chaos had turned Hak'Lor'Ven into a jewel-like bauble, which he presented to Horus Lupercal as a gift and sign of alliance.
The Warmaster looked at the orb, seeing past its crystalline exterior and at the caged Lords inside, and smiled, before welcoming the First of the Damned to his court.
Like the Daemon Lords, Be'lakor had observed the rise of the Traitor Legions within the Eye of Terror. But where the possibility of being overthrown as the Gods' favoured in the Eye had driven the Lords to wrath, the Master of Shadows had seen opportunity instead. Be'lakor cared naught for being the first among the Dark Gods' servants : during the countless aeons he had spent as a Prince of Ruin, the Master of Shadows had long since grown to covet the power of godhood for himself. Horus, who wielded the might of all four Ruinous Powers yet was beholden to none, seemed to Be'lakor a path to the ultimate dominion he desired for himself.
For a time, Be'lakor remained on Maeleum, acting as one of Horus' advisors in matters related to the Neverborn. The Master of Shadows was not trusted, of course – Horus was no fool – but his knowledge of the intricacies of the various pacts and ancient covenants by which the Ruinous Powers were bound surpassed even that gleaned by Horus when he had ascended on Molech. With his assistance, the Warmaster was able to play upon the ever-present distrust and conflict between the choirs of the Dark Gods, and any possibility of a new daemonic alliance against the Warmaster faded away. Entire daemon worlds were lost to renewed warfare as immortal grudges were stoked once more, and the dreams of psykers across the galaxy were filled with dreadful imagery as the echoes of these conflicts reached them.
Eventually, however, Be'lakor vanished from Maeleum. None knew where he had gone, and those few who dared to ask Horus received only an enigmatic smile in response. Wild theories blossomed : some thought the Warmaster had destroyed or imprisoned the Daemon Prince after a failed attempt at usurpation while others believed that Horus had sent Be'lakor on a secret assignment. Regardless, the Firstborn of Chaos was not found, despite the best efforts of many of Horus' paranoid enemies (and not a few of his allies).
As for Hak'Lor'Ven, it remained within the Prince of the Eye's palace on Maeleum, a jewel laying on a cushion woven from the souls of the Warmaster's foes. Within, the Daemon Lords remained, and though they were exiled from reality and unreality alike they remained mighty and cunning.
By the terms of the Convention, they were proscribed from directly harming one another, save for the case of agreed upon duels – a clause which had been added to the charter in order to placate the Khornate Neverborn. And so they built kingdoms instead, dividing Hak'Lor'Ven between themselves. Together, a cabal of Daemon Lords found a way to break the crystal statues of the world's doomed inhabitants and bind the souls within, resurrecting that ancient species into a new form as their slaves – before the cabal split, and its secrets were spread among the seventy-two, now calling themselves the Exiles. Worshipped by these deceived creatures, the Exiles created new civilizations, each reflecting their own aspect of the Primordial Truth, and with those they intrigued and made war upon one another like gods from ancient myth. Some still sought a way to break Be'lakor's bindings and return to the Eye of Terror, but even those were forced to participate in the small-scale version of the Great Game that raged across the daemon world.
From the outside, looking upon the bauble, one could see the lights of these conflicts shine through the Firstborn's cage, and it was used as a conversation piece and an example of the dangers of defying Horus for visitors and diplomats from the other realms of the Eye. Yet it also remained under heavy guard, for Horus was no fool, and did not trust the gifts of daemons.
AN : Is keeping Hal'Lor'Ven within Horus' palace on Maeleum going to come back to bite him in the ass ? Who knows !
The concept for this chapter was inspired by the First Fallen from the Tabletop-RPG Infernum and the Palmerston Convention from Sunless Sea.
Next up and last of the three choices I gave you is War of the Infernal Suns. I am also almost done with the next chapter of Warband of the Forsaken Suns, which should be published this week-end barring unforeseen developments.
As always, I welcome your feedback on this chapter and your ideas for what might come next.
Zahariel out.