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Dramatis Personae

Forces of the Imperium

Captain Aajz Solari – Second Company, Raven Guard
Captain Kayvaan Shrike – Third Company, Raven Guard
Captain Synidus – Fifth Company, Raven Guard
Captain Feros Levitas – Eighth Company, Raven Guard
Captain Vaania Saalista – Nineteenth Company, Raven Guard
White Raven Jaspercation – Raven Guard
Codicier-Captain Stryker – Raven Guard
Captain Julius Bellerophon – Fifth Company, Ultramarines
“Wraith” Squadron – Dhar’hyyk Air Wing, Imperial Navy

Servants of Chaos

Lexinatus – Night Lords, Raptor Coven Champion and Sorcerer
Zso Sahaal – Night Lords, Exiled Lord

Chapter One

Zso Sahaal was not a man who liked to be kept waiting, after thousands of years caught in the Warp then centuries hunting down the Eldar pirates who had stolen the Corona Nox – the symbol of Lordship above the Night Lords – he wanted everything in the here and now. The fact the damnable sorcerer Lexinatus had kept him waiting angered him greatly, and in his rage he felt he would have struck a lesser man down for such insolence.

Lexinatus, however, was valuable. His works in mind control and thought probing were legendary, as was his hatred of his parent Chapter – the very people he had developed his talent trying to serve.

Zso paced the Apothecarion’s antechamber, his lightning-wreathed armour casting an electric-blue glow on the walls and illuminating the darkened room. Gritting his teeth, the Night Lord Commander flexed his hands and absent-mindedly extended the crackling energy blades of the Lightning Claws built into his gauntlets. Raising his hands, he stared intently at the blades that extended from his knuckles and smiled as he dimly recalled the blood they had spilled – Xenos, Humans and Astartes alike had met their demise on the sharpened points and every time battle loomed Zso swore the claws somehow knew they would taste flesh again.

As he stared at the weapons, the giant doors creaked open and the room was bathed in an unearthly green glow. Snapping his claws back into their sheaths, Zso turned to see the pale-skinned Sorcerer hobbling from the room – the sheer mental effort required to interrogate the prisoner had obviously worn on him greatly.

“What have you learned?”

“His will is strong…but I broke him…”

Zso folded his arms impatiently.

“That was not answering my question witch!”

Lexinatus recoiled away from his Lord as the taller Marine advanced towards him, nothing but sheer malice in his coal-black eyes.

“I…he has told me of the fortresses’ defences, garrison…everything…”

Zso nodded slowly, folding his arms as he took a moment to mull over what the mind probe’s findings meant.

“Shall I dispose of him Lord?”

“No…”

“But my Lord…the men grow uneasy around him…I fear they will not be able to prepare for the attack while he still lives…”

“SILENCE! I have spoken!”

The sorcerer nodded and left the room, leaving Zso alone with the naked and mutilated form of an Astartes tied to a cross-shaped altar. Days of endless psychic and physical torture had finally overcome his defences and left him little more then a gibbering freak.

As the Lord stared at the once-proud Marine, the tortured soul’s eyes met his. Zso watched as the Marine lifted his head and smiled an insane grin, his eyes filled with torture-induced dementia.

“Quoth the Raven…beware…we are coming!”

The ruined Marine began laughing hysterically and his head flopped back as the heavy doors began to close. Even a hardened fighter like Zso was disturbed by such a sight, and as the doors locked he fought to suppress a shudder running through his body.

Turning away from the doors, Zso stalked his way back to his chambers. He had mere months before the Umbrea Insidior arrived at the rendezvous point with the rest of the fleet where it would then proceed on to the Legion’s target. When he returned from his mission successful, he knew his Legion would once again flock to his banner and the pretender Kreig Acerbus would be banished to the Warp where he belonged…

“Once again we shall do battle my feathered friends…except this time not on the fields of Isstvan…war will come to your little tower…and soon all of Kiavahr and Lycaeum will subjugate itself to my rule…or face your fate…”

Chapter Two

Lightning flashed and thunder roared as rain hammered the desolate plains of Evora. The sounds of booted feet squelching in the mud and armoured vehicles rumbling over the remains of the Tau outpost was deafening above the din of the raging storm.

Codicier-Captain Stryker, Lord of the Raven Guard’s so-called “Disciples of Corax” pulled his blue-grey robe tighter around his armoured frame and folded his arms tightly across his chest as he watched his men embarking their Thunderhawk Gunships and massive cargo lifters. The summons back to the Ravenspire unnerved him, only the direst of circumstances ever required a Company of Raven Guard to withdraw from a combat zone before the campaign they prosecuted was complete. More unnerving was the news that Captain Levitas’ Eighth Company had also been recalled but orders were orders and the withdrawal signal came from the highest authority.

“My Lord?”

Stryker turned to face his second-in-command, Scout Sergeant Corvus Corvinus, or “The Hooded Crow” as he was known. The other officer was almost a century his senior and was rumoured to rival the Ultramarine Telion as a marksman.

“Worry not Brother-Sergeant…I am sure there is a logical reason for our withdrawal from combat operations…”

The Sergeant shook his head, the lenses of his multi-spectral tracker goggles lowing red and obscuring his coal-black eyes from the Codicier-Captain’s view.

“It is not the recall that bothers me Lord; it is the nature of our mission to this accursed planet that vexes me so. We come because this is rumoured to be one of the worlds our Lord Corax visited on his exile before disappearing into the Eye of Terror, but we find the world defiled by xenos filth. Worse still, the artefacts supposed to reside here are nowhere to be found and now we are to give up our search without coming close to our goal…”

Stryker did not move, the ice-blue lenses in his helmet darkening purple as he fought to contain the rising anger within him at the mention of the missing artefact. The psychically attuned armour hummed with power and the Force Sword belted to his hip glowed an unearthly red, unnerving the Scout Sergeant slightly but the man was indeed brave and did not allow his unease at the Psyker’s power to show.

After a few moments, the sword stopped glowing and the helmet lenses returned to their usual blue hue.

“My apologies Brother-Sergeant…you are right…leaving this world without recovering the sacred artefacts our Lord left behind is a cardinal sin but we have our orders and never let it be said that The Disciples of Corax ignore their orders in search of what some consider worthless trinkets…”

Corvus nodded.

“You may go Brother-Sergeant…our ships are waiting and we are expected at Deliverance soon…”

Corvus bowed and turned away, heading towards his squad of elite snipers who waited patiently for him at the boarding ramp of a Thunderhawk with streaks of grey camouflage painted over its matte-black finish. Stryker watched as they ascended the ramp and the Thunderhawk’s thrusters burst into life, the massive aircraft lifting into the sky on a streamer of flame and a roar of engine-wash.

Only when the Thunderhawk had disappeared from sight into the clouds did Stryker embark his own Thunderhawk. As the ramp locked upright behind him, Stryker sat cross-legged on the deck in the passenger compartment and closed his eyes – Force Sword across his lap. The roar of the engines and the vibrations of the deck plating helped ease him as he began to meditate on the orders he had received, and searched his soul for the logical explainations.