by Various
You know. Like in real wars.
Dan was actually the first to broach this idea in the series, way back in his novel Legion. It dealt with some of the less traditional methods employed by Alpharius and his sons, but also led to two slightly incorrect assumptions for a lot of readers: firstly that the Alpha Legion only engage their enemies in spec-ops and subterfuge; secondly that the Alpha Legion were the only group in the Imperium ever to do this. It’s a standard military tactic, and the Legions are the military.
In compiling this anthology, I was also reminded just how much influence James Swallow’s work has had on the rest of the Silent War. It was in Nemesis that he really prised the lid off, with Imperial Assassins and rogue operatives working behind enemy lines and information itself being used as a weapon. It made a lot of sense, therefore, for him to revisit some of his older characters and see how they might fit into this new kind of struggle. The face of the Imperium is changing, and the Knights Errant are far from the only new faction to emerge...
The complexity of the series has actually become a virtue in this endeavour – characters are confused and in the dark about a lot of things, just as the readers and authors (and editors) sometimes are, at least to begin with. It can take a bit of confusion over a particular plot line or an individual’s motivations to highlight another great storytelling opportunity. The inspiration behind Anthony Reynolds’ novella The Purge actually came out of a Q&A session at the Black Library Weekender in 2013, when someone asked why Sor Talgron was apparently allowed to roam free on Terra after the Word Bearers were declared traitors!
The story was certainly worth telling, tying in as it does to The Flight of the Eisenstein, The Lightning Tower, The First Heretic, The Outcast Dead, Butcher’s Nails and Betrayer. Once again, it’s another great tale that looks all the way back to the start of the series and addresses the unknown elements required to make the Horus Heresy more exciting, rich and diverse. Secret battles. Twisted allegiances. Contingencies put in place for the final battle.
All of this Silent War stuff has been around right from the start. We just didn’t have a name for it back then.
And names have power. Just ask the Grey Knights.
When they come to exist, of course.
Laurie Goulding
December 2015
About the Authors
Domiciled in the East Midlands, C Z Dunn is the author of the Space Marine Battles novel Pandorax, the novellas Crimson Dawn and Dark Vengeance and the audio dramas Trials of Azrael, Ascension of Balthasar, Terror Nihil, Bloodspire and Malediction, as well as several short stories.
John French has written several Horus Heresy stories including the novellas Tallarn: Executioner and The Crimson Fist, the novel Tallarn: Ironclad, and the audio dramas Templar and Warmaster. He is the author of the Ahriman series, which includes the novels Ahriman: Exile, Ahriman: Sorcerer and Ahriman: Unchanged, plus a number of related short stories collected in Ahriman: Exodus, including ‘The Dead Oracle’ and ’Hand of Dust‘. Additionally for the Warhammer 40,000 universe he has written the Space Marine Battles novella Fateweaver, plus many short stories. He lives and works in Nottingham, UK.
Nick Kyme is the author of the Horus Heresy novels Deathfire and Vulkan Lives, the novellas Promethean Sun and Scorched Earth, and the audio drama Censure. His novella Feat of Iron was a New York Times bestseller in the Horus Heresy collection, The Primarchs. Nick is well known for his popular Salamanders novels, including Rebirth, the Space Marine Battles novel Damnos, and numerous short stories. He has also written fiction set in the world of Warhammer, most notably the Time of Legends novel The Great Betrayal. He lives and works in Nottingham, and has a rabbit.
Graham McNeill has written more Horus Heresy novels than any other Black Library author! His canon of work includes Vengeful Spirit and his New York Times bestsellers A Thousand Sons and the novella The Reflection Crack’d, which featured in The Primarchs anthology. Graham’s Ultramarines series, featuring Captain Uriel Ventris, is now six novels long, and has close links to his Iron Warriors stories, the novel Storm of Iron being a perennial favourite with Black Library fans. He has also written a Mars trilogy, featuring the Adeptus Mechanicus. For Warhammer, he has written the Time of Legends trilogy The Legend of Sigmar, the second volume of which won the 2010 David Gemmell Legend Award.
Anthony Reynolds is the author of the Horus Heresy novella The Purge, audio drama Khârn: The Eightfold Path and short stories ’Scions of the Storm‘ and ’Dark Heart’. In the Warhammer 40,000 universe, he has written the Space Marine Battles novel Khârn: Eater of Worlds, alongside the audio drama Chosen of Khorne, also featuring Khârn. He has also penned the Word Bearers trilogy and many short stories. Hailing from Australia, he is currently settled on the west coast of the United States.
Rob Sanders is the author of The Serpent Beneath, a novella that appeared in the New York Times bestselling Horus Heresy anthology, The Primarchs. His other Black Library credits include the Warhammer 40,000 titles Adeptus Mechanicus: Skitarius and Tech-Priest, Legion of the Damned, Atlas Infernal and Redemption Corps and the audio drama The Path Forsaken. He has also written the Warhammer Archaon duology, Everchosen and Lord of Chaos along with many Quick Reads for the Horus Heresy and Warhammer 40,000. He lives in the city of Lincoln, UK.
James Swallow is best known for being the author of the Horus Heresy novels Fear to Tread and Nemesis, which both reached the New York Times bestseller lists, The Flight of the Eisenstein and a series of audio dramas featuring the character Nathaniel Garro. For Warhammer 40,000, he is best known for his four Blood Angels novels, the audio drama Heart of Rage, and his two Sisters of Battle novels. His short fiction has appeared in Legends of the Space Marines and Tales of Heresy.
Chris Wraight is the author of the Horus Heresy novel Scars, the novella Brotherhood of the Storm and the audio drama The Sigillite. For Warhammer 40,000 he has written the Space Wolves novels Blood of Asaheim and Stormcaller, and the short story collection Wolves of Fenris, as well as the Space Marine Battles novels Wrath of Iron and Battle of the Fang. Additionally, he has many Warhammer novels to his name, including the Time of Legends novel Master of Dragons, which forms part of the War of Vengeance series. Chris lives and works near Bristol, in south-west England.
An extract from I Am Slaughter.
The Chromes were relatively easy to kill, but they came in ferocious numbers.
Eight walls of Imperial Fists boxed one of their primary family groups into a scrub-sided valley east of the blisternest, and reduced them to burned shells and spattered meat.
Smoke rose off the hill of dead. It was a yellowish air-stain composed of atomised organic particulates and the backwash of fyceline smoke. According to the magos biologis sent to assist the undertaking, sustained bolter and las-fire, together with the chronic impact trauma of blade and close-combat weapons, had effectively aerosolised about seven per cent of the enemy’s collective biomass. The yellow smoke, a cloud twenty kilometres wide and sixty long, drained down the valley like a dawn fog.
The magos biologis told Koorland this as if the fact had some practical application. Koorland, second captain of Daylight Wall Company, shrugged. It was a non-fact to him, like someone saying the shape of a pool of spilled blood resembled a map of Arcturus or Great-Uncle Janier’s profile. Koorland had been sent to Throne-forsaken Ardamantua to kill Chromes. He was used to killing things. He was good at it, like all his company brothers and like every brother of the shield-corps. He was also used to the fact that when things were killed in colossal numbers, it left a mess. Sometimes the mess was smoke, sometimes it was liquid, sometimes it was grease, sometimes it was embers. He didn’t need some Terra-spire expert telling him that he and his brothers had pounded the Chromes so hard and so explosively that they had vaporised part of them.
The magos biologis had a retinue of three hundred acolytes and servitors. They were hooded and diligent, and ha
d decorated the hillside with portable detection equipment and analysis engines. Tubes sniffed the air (this, Koorland understood, was how the magos biologis had arrived at his seven per cent revelation). Picting and imaging devices recorded the anatomies of dead and living Chrome specimens alike. Dissections were underway.
‘The Chromes are not a high-factor hostile species,’ the magos told Koorland.
‘Really?’ Koorland replied through his visor speakers, obliged to listen to the report.
‘Not at all,’ the human said, shaking his head, apparently under the impression that Koorland’s obligation was in fact interest. ‘See for yourself,’ he said, gesturing to a half-flayed specimen spread-eagled on a dissection stand. ‘They are armoured, of course, around the head, neck and back, and their forelimbs are well formed into digital blades–’
‘Or “claws”,’ said Koorland.
‘Just so,’ the magos went on, ‘especially in sub-adult and adult males. They are not harmless, but they are not a naturally aggressive species.’
Koorland thought about that. The Chromes – so called because of the silvery metallic finish of their chitin armour – were xenosbreed, human-sized bugs with long forelimbs and impressive speed. He thought about the eighteen million of them that had swarmed the valley that afternoon, the sea of silver gleaming in the sunlight, the swish of their bladed limbs, the tek-tek-tek noise they made with their mouthparts, like broken cogitators. He thought of the three brothers he’d lost from his wall during the initial overwhelm, the four taken from Hemispheric Wall, the three from Anterior Six Gate Wall.
Go tell them not naturally aggressive.
The Chromes had numbers, vast numbers. The more they had killed, the more there were to kill. Sustained slaughter was the only operational tactic: keep killing them until they were all dead. The rate at which the Imperial Fists had been required to hit them, the duration, the frenzy – no damn wonder they aerosolised seven per cent of their biomass.
‘Chromes have been encountered on sixty-six other worlds in this sector alone,’ said the magos biologis. ‘Twenty-four of those encounters took place during compliance expeditions at the time of the Great Crusade, the rest since. Chromes have been encountered in large numbers, and have often defended themselves. They have never been known to behave with such proactive hostility before.’
The magos thought about this.
‘They remind me of rats,’ he said. ‘Rad-rats. I remember there was a terrible plague of them down in the basements and sub-basements under the archive block of the Biologis Sanctum at Numis. They were destroying valuable specimens and records, but they were not, individually, in any way harmful or dangerous. We sent in environmental purge teams with flame guns and toxin sprays. We began to exterminate them. They swarmed. Fear, I suppose. They came flooding out of the place and we lost three men and a dozen servitors in the deluge. Unstoppable. Like the sub-hive rats, the Chromes have never behaved this way before.’
‘And they won’t again,’ said Koorland, ‘because when we’re finished here they’ll all be dead.’
‘This is just one of a possible nineteen primary family groups,’ said the magos biologis. He paused. Koorland knew that the magos intended to address him by name, but, like so many humans, he found it difficult to differentiate between the giant, transhuman warriors in their yellow armour. He had to rely on rank pins, insignia and the unit markings on shoulderplates, and that information always took a moment to process.
The magos biologis nodded slightly, as if to apologise for the hesitation.
‘–Captain Koorland of the Second Daylight Wall–’
‘I’m second captain of the Daylight Wall Company,’ Koorland corrected.
‘Ah, of course.’
‘Forget about rank, just try to remember us by our wall-names.’
‘Your what?’
Koorland sighed. This man knew more than seemed healthy about xenosbreeds, but he knew nothing about the warriors built to guard against them.
‘Our wall-names,’ he said. ‘When we are inducted, we forget our given names, our pre-breed names. Our brothers bestow upon each of us a name that suits our bearing or character: a wall-name.’
The magos nodded, politely interested.
Koorland gestured to a Space Marine trudging past them.
‘That’s Firefight,’ he said. ‘That brother over there? He’s Dolorous. Him there? Killshot.’
‘I see,’ said the magos biologis. ‘These are earned names, names within the brotherhood.’
Koorland nodded. He knew that, at some point, he’d been told the magos biologis’ name. He hadn’t forgotten because it was complicated, he just hadn’t cared enough about the human to remember it.
‘What is your name, captain?’ the magos asked brightly. ‘Your wall-name?’
‘My name?’ Koorland replied. ‘I am Slaughter.’
Click here to buy I Am Slaughter.
A Black Library Publication
Army of One first published as an eBook in 2012.
The Gates of Terra first published in Games Day France chapbook in 2012.
Distant Echoes of Old Night first published in Games Day Anthology 2012/2013.
Lost Sons first published in Black Library Weekender Anthology in 2012.
Grey Angel first published as an audio drama in 2012.
The Sigillite and Wolf Hunt first published as audio dramas in 2013.
Luna Mendax first published in Black Library Anthology in 2013.
The Purge first published as a hardback novella in 2014.
Templar and The Watcher first published as audio dramas in 2014.
Child of Night first published as an eBook in 2014.
Ghosts Speak Not and Patience first published as eBooks in 2016.
Hardback edition first published in 2016.
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