~Ye Soldiers who Dauntlessly Crumble~
~804. M30~
~Segmentum Ultima~
~Bastonne~
~Amadeus DuCaine, Lord Thunderhammer, Slayer of the Unspeakable King, Legion Master of the Stormwalkers~
It was a curious thing, to look upon a world that shared a name with his venerable homeland and witness the manifold differences. Old Albyon of Terra was a harsh place, skies ever-filled with the choking black smoke belched from the iron keeps and lands stiff with freezing colds. A bare land, tormented by the black grasp of the Archtyrant that held sway for so long.
Their cousin-legion, the Duskraiders, were spiteful enough to put it at the forefront of their minds with their blood-red gauntlets. The younger battle-brothers only knew from stories, but the oldest veterans of the Stormwalkers knew well the harsh truth. Even with his defeat nearly half a century ago, the red right hand of Magna Albia had permanently warped all who dwelt in their homeland. There was nothing that his malignant grasp did not touch, and the choking air of industry and war had left all of them changed.
There was nothing left for their generation in Old Albyon, a generation warped by war, pain, and iron. The generation that came after them would be gentler, and with time Albyon might return to a gentle land. The warbands who had known the rule of the Black King were best served being put to war elsewhere, far from their venerable homelands, and used until they died.
It was why he had bent the knee when the Emperor had properly arrived, and told them his dream.
Because it was his dream as well.
A host of their greatest warriors, their ironside-soldiery and rumbling war-coffins, arrayed to create a killing field in the frozen ashlands. A giant, bereft of arms and armor, clad in robes of red and white. Voice rolling with distant thunder and the light of a sun crowning his brow. A heavy brow, one that understood.
+I seek a time in which warriors such as we are far from our homelands.+
+Homelands safeguarded for a thousand-thousand void-leagues in every direction, and the horrors of war far from our peoples. I seek to push back the endless night to the edges of all known space, where warriors such as we hold back the darkness with a great wall of steel and fire. I seek unification for mankind, and glory on battlefields ever-distant from what I seek to protect.++Tell me, honored warriors of Iron Albyon, do you not seek the same?+
Even decades from that day, that memory was wrought into his mind with perfect clarity. It was something that he could not forget, even if he wished to. And so Amadeus DuCaine, warlord of the DuCaine, had bent the knee to the Golden King. In doing so, he was taken and reforged into an ever-more lethal weapon and warrior, an Astartes, and made lord commander over one of the twenty grand legions of men now like him.
The Great Crusade was launched shortly after, Old Albyon was one of the last holdouts of resistance on ancient Terra, and with their oaths of loyalty it was soon time to move on. First to purge a mutant warband on Terra, a minor test of their new capacity before leaving to the stars. Then to purge yet more mutants who dwelt on Baal, in preparation to receive one of the Emperor's daughters to yet arrive.
They had met their Primarch soon enough, gene-mother and origin of their new strength, daughter of the Emperor and nigh-demigod in capacity. Lady Athena was harsh and unkind, but not cruel of intent or deed. Her mind was clever and her presence was dominating, clearly suited for war and duty.
She would be a fine Warqueen, in time, she was young yet despite her great stature, as were all of the Emperor's daughters. They had time to grow and learn, and he was confident in the abilities he had seen of her thus far.
Then they had been deployed, all warriors of the Emperor's fleet, to purge a planet known as Barbarus.
It was a reminder to those of Old Albyon, that hope was a fleeting and foolish thing, and that no matter their strength they could always be brought low. One-thousand of their number dead against horrors that seemed without end, with mere presence seeming to kill hope and bring ruinous despair. Fiends of bodies that should be frail with disease and limb-rot, but belied an immense and unnatural strength in arms and resilience to their lighter cannons.
In those moments, it felt like he was facing the Hollow Knights of dread Coudenbeith once more, and he roared orders instinctively. Mind returning to those black-clad specters and their wicked poisoned blades, greatest servants of the once-archtyrant that they would soon bring low.
Ten-thousand of their number wounded, limbs struck with poisoned and rotting magics quickly amputated on the battlefield, relying on the quick clotting of their new superhuman bodies to keep them firing from a distance.
Those quick amputations as policy had saved many from outright death, but had ensured that the Stormwalkers now had the most artificial limbs of any Legion. It was an almost nostalgic experience, looking upon so many of his men in cramped medical facilities, metal limbs in the process of being fitted to their flesh to replace what was lost on a cold and choking battlefield.
And now he stood upon a planet, far from Terra, in a realm that shared a name with his venerable homeland. Albion, they called the domain of their High King. He looked about at their ever-busy construction efforts, escorted by his honor-guard. He looked at their keeps and people, at their domains and their domiciles, at their lands and their labors.
This land was fair, its people kind, and war far from them.
He looked upon the statue of their High King, supposedly an exact replica of his true appearance in both scale and painted hues, hands resting on a great golden blade that was nigh-identical to the Emperor's own. 'Ro-Bo-Te', was his name. 'I Kill Evil', was his battle-name. His right gauntlet was red. His features fair, his eyes blue, his hair white-gold. Hues of southern Albyon.
Had his armor been painted black and silver, had he been wearing a visored helm, had he bore a mantle of shadows and sword of evil, Amadeus would have mistaken him for the Black King himself. For that lord who turned barbarian clans into a nation of brutal iron and choking industry. He looked down, to read the speech carved into the foot of the statue. To read the last lines once more, at the bottom of the statue's base.
"Tell me, people of my new Capital. Tell me, people of Bastonne! Will you give unto me this?! Do you dream of brother-stars and united kingdoms?! Do you dream of silver that might one day be gold!?"
"Tell me, people of Albion! Do you share my dream!?"
He remembered the last words of the Unspeakable King, and the cold steel glare in those shadowed eyes. A rumbling growl behind a steel-visored helm. The last words of a man who tormented many, and a man that he had ended with his own heavy hammer. A corpse he had watched dissolve into liquid-dust.
"Our ability to destroy will always outstrip our ability to create, such is our curse and salvation."
"Our end, when it comes, will be writ by our own bloody hand."
He had yet to come to a proper conclusion of all the truths he beheld. In the end, it was not his place, he supposed. The burden of judgment was upon the Emperor, the golden king that the warriors of Albyon had put their faith into. They had only need to withstand whatever hell he led them into, so that all who stood behind them would not need to.
These hands of rusted iron would wrestle death away from their people, they were still strong enough to.
He removed one cold, heavy limb from the head of his warhammer, and took it up as a near-cane once more. Turning his head to his honor-guard, he commanded. "I am done here. Tell the fifth company they have my leave to begin their period of leave. They are still to obey all commandments of appropriate behavior."
"Aye, Lord DuCaine." The partially synthetic voice of Veteran MacDuff responded, throat nicked out by a wicked blade on Barbarus, only saved by his own quick response to reach up and tear his own throat out. He barely survived long enough to be evacuated and treated, and a replacement was quickly given to him. "Curious, isn't this?"
He nodded, well aware of what old MacDuff was referring to. "Aye."
"So what do you think, Stormbringer?" Another honorguard spoke up, Veteran Gregor, voice heavy with age but light with experienced amusement. Shoulders heavy with additional fire-arms mounted but currently offline. "Are we on the foothills of silv'ry-black Tay once more, ready to march against a red-handed king who rules a mountain-keep?"
He hummed, reaching up to rub one steel hand against his stubbled-chin. Cold and heavy, a familiar and comfortable thing.
"...Unlikely. It seems our lord is quite charmed with their high priestess and her bountiful tracts of land." Veteran Struan grumbled out with equal amusement, helm on his belt-hook. "Alas, the Imperial Truth needs revisions it seems."
"Enough of that Struan. Let's not speak ill of our Lord Emperor, it's not often he meets a woman nearing his stature." Veteran Ruar reprimanded, a smile audible in his voice and behind his helm. "I'm simply grateful these xenos don't stink of burning trash heaps. I am not so tolerant of wretched smells as ye are."
"Speak not ill of the Pitborn. They're good-natured sorts behind those squinting eyes and inked features." Struan responded, speaking of his occasional visits to gamble his pay away among the Eight Legion.
"That does little to change their smell." Came the dry response from Macduff.
Struan nodded his head back and forth, conceding the point.
"When the Emperor commands us to march, we will march." DuCaine finally spoke, bringing his honorguard to silence once more. "When he does not command us to march, we shall not march. This has been truth on Terra, on Baal, on Barbarus. It is no different here, upon Bastonne. They are Xenos, but our allegiance is not to words, it is to him, and he has not bid us to attack."
Satisfied nods abound, his honorguard accepting his words and authority without qualms. He checked his helm's display, for any new alerts delivered unto them, and saw nothing but the standing orders to remain on tentative standby for potential hostilities.
"In the meantime, I suppose we shall continue our observations?" Struan responded.
"Aye." DuCaine responded. "Supposedly the Xenos are hosting something of an open forum for those wishing to hear the words of their oldest war-construct. We shall attend to observe."
"Something like that was announced, wasn't it?" Ruar rubbed his chin in consideration. "Some manner of necromancy, an old soul animating one of their warwalkers according to Third Legion gossip. It reminds me of our war-coffins in a queer, sorcerous sense."
"Dreadnoughts, Ruar. The Mechanicum insisted on the updated terminology if you recall." Macduff responded
"Bah. The Mechanicum isn't here to be offended at using the words I know." Ruar responded with gruff agitation.
"But their machine-god is, supposedly." Struan responded, tapping at his own iron hand, another thing amputated in the aftermath of Barbarus.
"I'm quite confident the Lord Emperor doesn't care what words we use." Gregor grumbled.
"You're right, he's too busy on other matters, I'd imagine." Struan responded quickly. "Two great big matters, and how best to grapple with them."
A brief round of chuckling issued forth. DuCaine, setting an example for his men, only reacted with a quirk to his lips.
—
~The Everqueen, Vessel of Isha~
She was, after several days of observation, quite confident in her initial assessment. The Emperor of Mankind, father of the Godlings that had allied themselves to her little-kin, had some of the most beautiful eyes she had ever seen.
Her initial flattery had been a useful opener on her end. Both to judge the nigh-Asuryani near-god's reaction, and as a display of matched strength on her end. He had arrived with the song of his soul mighty and loud, overpowering all lesser songs in his vicinity, drowning out daemons in waves of gold. She, however, was undaunted. Her song was mighty enough to see through the light of his soul, to look upon the face behind the song. She was no lesser-hymn.
And she beheld eyes deep and filled with Ishan tones, bright and burning deep blue behind that crown of gold he forced onto his brow.
The reaction he had to her flattery was as tragic as it was complimentary.
A moment of naked confusion in those blue eyes. As if what he had heard was utterly beyond reasonable truth, and he needed a moment more to confirm what he had just heard. A basic appreciation for his gorgeous eyes being utterly alien to him. Then another moment to process the statement and look upon her. Then yet another moment to begin a measured response.
He had complimented her figure.
Almost a blunt observation more than returned flattery, voice filled with rusty tones behind golden fire. Eyes narrowed with concentration.
She had two thoughts at that moment. Her first being a quiet delight at being seen as a woman rather than an idol for the first time in many ages. The second being that it had been a very long time since the blue-eyed god-father had to return a simple compliment rather than an official praise.
Several days followed, as the diplomacies were held and she acted as a proper host (much to her little-kin's humorous panics) to the foreign king. She had done this many times before, she was well-practiced at acting as an upright lady. This was what she had been raised to do, she needed not any advice from a swaddling babe to entertain a young king. In that time, slowly working away at the hot-cold gold around the man, she had come to a rather sad conclusion.
He was long-lived, as the Eld of her days were. His kind was not, living mayfly lives of perhaps a century naturally. The one who called himself 'The Emperor' was an incredibly lonely young man.
"Your daughters approached me the other day, did you know?" She asked, cup of ambrosia in hand as she stood on the balcony of the Bastonne 'High Keep'. It was a rather cute construction, a little castle worked into a terrestrial mountain to overlook some of the surrounding lands for a Lann or two. "They had a request to arrange a meeting with one of my honor guards, with blue-clad Malwyrn."
The Emperor paused in reading one of the many letters that the godling-king had left for him, looking up with a quirked brow behind golden radiance. He was not currently wearing his armor, having since taken up his less martial garb of whites and reds, a man who foresaw great violence in his future. Though his personal guard were still arrayed around him, a dozen golden-clad warriors, each almost as tall as an Eld of her time was, and bodies bearing the evidence of hand-sculpting to refit them to their souls.
They were not the greatest example of fleshcraft she had ever seen, but the work bore such a unique set of design elements coming from an expert sculptor who had no tutor, each was quite the enthralling experience to look upon in its similarity-yet-strangeness.
"Did they?" The Emperor rumbled out in a measured manner, taking the offered glass of ambrosia. His blue-eyes swirled with blacks and greens. He did not trust her, or any of her people, not yet. She would need to charm him patiently to secure that. "I suppose it would have been Morrigan and Fulgrim then, who viewed the theater of your people yesterday."
She knew that he was currently keeping an eye on each of his daughters, for they were well within his domain of sunfire-truth. She did not contest this domain, that would most likely scare him away, and she would lose her catch. Instead, she indulged herself in the strange but thrilling experience of being utterly encompassed by the soul of another.
"Indeed. I have a proposal, if you would hear it for your final day on this world."
For he had been quite explicit on his plans to travel southwards, to bring his daughters with him for that leg of the trip and interact with them independent of all her people. He was currently taking measure of them through distant observation of their souls, but would want direct meetings soon enough.
This was the last day he planned to spend here, to give his soldiers a brief holiday. She had yet to secure her catch.
"Speak." He commanded, arrogant in the manner only youthful kings could be, not yet wearied by eons of withering rule.
"It would be much too disruptive to join that open forum, the chance for others to speak and question Malwyrn." She spoke coyly, fluttering her ears and rolling her shoulders in a manner that caught his eyes. Leaning forwards with childish-silver, she gave a performance-whisper. "So while they speak to my honorguard, let us go in guise elsewhere."
His eyes narrowed in black-hues. "...Where?"
Her eyes twinkled and she pointed two fingers up. "Fishing!"
He blinked, befuddled for a moment. She continued her explanation. "The oceans of this world's frozen north bear a mighty predator-serpent, Lindwurms the locals name them. I propose we hunt one together."
He spoke in faint, dry amusement. "And you are a hunter?"
She smiled in a wide manner, tilting her chin upwards. "No. But I am a fair fisher. I spent much of my youth catching shelled fish along a riverbank, you know?"
He looked at her for a long moment, then raised the glass of ambrosia in amusement and sipping at the offering. "I shall have to make my own judgment of that. Ready yourself for departure this evening, you shall lead me to these predator-serpents. Shall any of your guard be with you?"
"Nay." She spoke, amusing herself in the strangled cough beyond the doorway from her little-kin panicking.
The Emperor looked up to stare at her for another longer moment, before squinting and nodding. "Very well. My custodians will likewise remain then."
He had taken the bait.
Now merely to reel him in.