HH 51 - Slaves to Darkness

[b1soul]

So John French is "the man"

[Marshal Rohr]

Yes :D John French is the Man. I :cuss love this book. It’s restarted my engine.

[Heliomanes]

Just adding my voice to the chorus. This is a great book. Particularily loved the story of Zardu Layak, and the short but sweet Alpha Legion appearance. Both were handled tastefully and without the redundant pointers and additional explanations and hand holding that I've come to dread in all the fiction I consume these days.

[Ozeryk_Sleipnijr]

As a fanboy of the Space Wolves I was qute pleased to see Horus only recover from that grievous wound 2/3 into the novel. Russ stuck him good. Horus survived by a hairs thread.
Furthermore his sons murdered each other as a consequence of doubt and fear becaise of what Russ did to him.

Alas poor Logar betrayed for knowing the truth.

A good novel. I enjoyed it. Thanks Mr French.

At the end of the story I kept hearing the soft, mirthful laughter of Cegorach. Layaks mask was also very suspicious.

[Carach]

spoiler. alerts

[b1soul]

@Ozeryk

 

Thank the magical spear gifted by the Emp

[Rob P]

I'm about 45% in and finding it a little tough going at the mo.

 

I don't really like the IW obligatory bolter porn bits; and the other two strands are a little to shallow at the mo.

 

I do like the throwaway line about Lorgar looking for the truth rather than specifically for the gods

 

I did contemplate the audiobook, because sometime the action works bettter for me when it's audio. But it's not on amazon matchmaker yet.

[betrayer41]

Bout halfway through and it’s exactlt what I wanted this book to be I cannot put it down

[Nazguire]

This was a much better read than some of the most recent HH offerings.

 

The Perturabo arc let it down - come across as the GW mandated battle scenes for battles scenes sake.

[Calas Typhon]

Finally a decent Sons of Horus book. 

[Hit0k1ri]

As a fanboy of the Space Wolves I was qute pleased to see Horus only recover from that grievous wound 2/3 into the novel. Russ stuck him good. Horus survived by a hairs thread.

Furthermore his sons murdered each other as a consequence of doubt and fear becaise of what Russ did to him.

As a Space Wolves fan i'm quite dissapointed to see that now, thanks to Russ, Horus becomes complete slave to the Dark Gods...

[TheRealMcCagh]

Russ has a habit of accidentally helping Chaos. But it looks like all the 'What is Sanguinius supposed to do now that Russ opening the chink is Horus' armor' was a tad premature.

[Mellow]

I’ve not read this yet. But going on previous comments I am looking forward to it.

 

Hopefully the whole Sanguinius thing turns out to be nothing other than rumour and there was no chink in any armour for the Emperor to win with. Hopefully Sanguinius just gets his tears everywhere and Horus slips over the puddle giving the Emperor the chance for his kill shot.

[DarkChaplain]

 Did nobody mention the Telemachon cameo yet? Surprising. That one actually sprung out to me.

[MarineRaider]

I am the one voice saying the book was just "ok" to me. I just finished it. The Afterword sorta explained what he was going for but some things were just too nicely tied up and frankly if Chaos is this much of a mess there is no way Horus should have even cracked Dorn's outer defenses. These idiots have been slaughtering themselves how could they possibly have the numbers.....oh well.

 

Bring on the next one.

[Skalpynock]

So, is the Mournival by the end by of the book Abaddon, Aximand, Tormageddon, Kibre, or Abaddon, Aximand, Tormageddon, Ekaddon?

[TheRealMcCagh]

So, is the Mournival by the end by of the book Abaddon, Aximand, Tormageddon, Kibre, or Abaddon, Aximand, Tormageddon, Ekaddon?

Most likely the first. The very last name you mention probably died at the end.

[Marshal Loss]

Regardless of whether

 

Ekaddon

 

lives or dies, he was never appointed to the Mournival. This is made clear when Argonis faces the four at the end of the novel.

 

 

 

He had thought of (spoiler removed), then, and the conversation he’d had with the Mournival after Horus had summoned him.

Abaddon had been there, returned from his hounding of the Wolves, the Red Angel a fire-wreathed shadow at his back. The others – Aximand, Kibre and Tormageddon – had formed an arc around him, watching.

[Nazguire]

Ekaddon is almost certainly dead - nice twist that Argonis was his actual brother.  

[bluntblade]

Re numbers, it's noted in the FW books (though BL really should address it as well) that just as the Fists and later Scars and Blood Angels (and presumably the factions in Ultramar) are conducting accelerated implantation procedures on a massive scale (with horrendous failure rates to show for it), the Traitors have been doing so for longer. Bodt is an extreme example of this.

 

Presumably any failures which can be turned into daemonhosts or servitors are, just as the latter is standard procedure in the Imperium of 40K.

 

I forget which book - I believe it's from Extermination, Conquest or Retribution - explicitly says that the notion of each Legion starting with X number of Astartes and diminishing from there isn't actually what happened.

[Sandlemad]

Re numbers, it's noted in the FW books (though BL really should address it as well) that just as the Fists and later Scars and Blood Angels (and presumably the factions in Ultramar) are conducting accelerated implantation procedures on a massive scale (with horrendous failure rates to show for it), the Traitors have been doing so for longer. Bodt is an extreme example of this.

 

Presumably any failures which can be turned into daemonhosts or servitors are, just as the latter is standard procedure in the Imperium of 40K.

 

I forget which book - I believe it's from Extermination, Conquest or Retribution - explicitly says that the notion of each Legion starting with X number of Astartes and diminishing from there isn't actually what happened.

 

Yeah, this. We only see these wartime recruits occasionally - here with some of Volk’s squad, “blooded and tested on worlds like Hydra Cordatus, Nestoria, Tallarn” -  but it crops up. Bodt is the go-to example but Duty Waits had fresh IF initiates who had never left Terra and increasingly in the FW black book colour plates we see potted biographies of marines who never knew war that wasn’t against other astartes.

 

When we talk about heresy-era CSM veterans in 40k, it’s entirely possible that many of them had only been fighting for a year or two before Terra. Enough to make hardened fighters of anyone but not quite the Astelan-esque great crusaders the mind goes to first. It's curious, for every grizzled monster saying how the Emperor betrayed the legions, etc, there's another heresy-era marine for whom that is still second-hand knowledge learned from their elders when they were thrown into the grinder of Terra and the Scouring.

[A D-B]

 Did nobody mention the Telemachon cameo yet? Surprising. That one actually sprung out to me.

 

I actu-chuckled when I saw it.

[Calas Typhon]

Ekaddon is almost certainly dead - nice twist that Argonis was his actual brother.  

 

I thought it was pretty obvious when Ekaddon was first introduced that Argonis would be his brother, not sure if it was supposed to be a twist

 

[Biscuittzz]

 

Re numbers, it's noted in the FW books (though BL really should address it as well) that just as the Fists and later Scars and Blood Angels (and presumably the factions in Ultramar) are conducting accelerated implantation procedures on a massive scale (with horrendous failure rates to show for it), the Traitors have been doing so for longer. Bodt is an extreme example of this.

 

Presumably any failures which can be turned into daemonhosts or servitors are, just as the latter is standard procedure in the Imperium of 40K.

 

I forget which book - I believe it's from Extermination, Conquest or Retribution - explicitly says that the notion of each Legion starting with X number of Astartes and diminishing from there isn't actually what happened.

 

Yeah, this. We only see these wartime recruits occasionally - here with some of Volk’s squad, “blooded and tested on worlds like Hydra Cordatus, Nestoria, Tallarn” -  but it crops up. Bodt is the go-to example but Duty Waits had fresh IF initiates who had never left Terra and increasingly in the FW black book colour plates we see potted biographies of marines who never knew war that wasn’t against other astartes.

 

When we talk about heresy-era CSM veterans in 40k, it’s entirely possible that many of them had only been fighting for a year or two before Terra. Enough to make hardened fighters of anyone but not quite the Astelan-esque great crusaders the mind goes to first. It's curious, for every grizzled monster saying how the Emperor betrayed the legions, etc, there's another heresy-era marine for whom that is still second-hand knowledge learned from their elders when they were thrown into the grinder of Terra and the Scouring.

 

 

Corax has a part where a thousand or so new Raven Guard recruits and their ships reinforce Corax's fleet before the Battle of Yarant. They're given the moniker of the 'Black Guard' company, most likely laying down the roots for the RG successor chapter of the same name. The main take away for me from the short part was that it's implied that they've been trained specifically to combat and kill fellow astartes so it is mentioned in some parts of the BL universe. The implication comes from a short conversation with an officer of the new recruits and the fact that they've been inducted after the start of the Heresy.

[DarkChaplain]

There's also been the Tallarn audio drama / short story The Eagle's Talon, which has Imperial Fists with new dudes, and the veteran leader lamenting that they never knew anything different from brother vs brother warfare, and that from here on out, that'll be the norm while before it was unthinkable. And then there's the scouts in Pharos, too.

It's an interesting theme to look at. Heck, there's even a sorta throwaway line in Slaves to Darkness about anti-Space Marine ammunition, which has only been created/popularized those past years because there wouldn't have been a point in that specialized type of weapon with such a singular purpose before the civil war.