Last time we saw Vulkan, he crawled out of the earth in Nocturne after the planet swallowed Numeon in recompense. And that was book #32, which I evidently read in February 2023. I honestly didn’t think it was that long ago. I can’t imagine what people thought as they were reading the books upon release. So it’s been a spell, to say the least. But here we are, with Old Earth by Nick Kyme, Vulkan alive and well on Nocturne, and he knows he needs to get to Terra. However, he needs his brothers to think that he’s dead, so the best way to do that is NOT tell his sons he’s alive and use eldar webways to travel.
Don’t the people of Nocturne and the Salamanders have a grudge against the eldar? Is it because a member of the Cabal has granted Vulkan the path to Terra? Whatever, I guess Vulkan has to get from point N to point T in secret somehow.
This book is supposed to be the story of how Vulkan got to Terra, but that’s more of a side story than anything else. It’s also the most boring part of the whole book. The only time Vulkan’s journey is interesting is when he meets up with Shadrak Meduson of the Iron Tenth. Remember Shadrak? He was trying to unite the remaining Iron Hands and harry the traitors away from Terra.
Unfortunately, Shadrak has Iron Hands to deal with. The Iron Fathers, even Shadrak’s own Hand Elect, stonewall him at every turn. Part of it is that Shadrak has let Tybalt Marr of the Sons of Horus goad him into a vendetta. Another part, and probably the largest part, is that he’s Terran. We’ve seen this theme many times, such as with Nathaniel Garro and even with Astelan of the Dark Angels. Since Shadrak is Terran, he hasn’t embraced the whole “the flesh is weak” schtick that the Iron Hands cling to so much. In other words, he hasn’t voluntarily shed parts of his body for augmetics. How dare he not cut off the body parts the Emperor gave him for man-made cybernetics. The gall of this clown.
I was devastated at the end of Shadrak’s story. I want to blame the Iron Hands for abandoning him on Marr’s ship, but I also know there was only one way his story was going to end. For a Terran, he was awfully a lot like his father.
So, that eldar who helped Vulkan return to his sons and set him down the webway path? He is none other than Eldrad Uthran, the farseer who gave Roboute Guilliman his armor of fate nearly 10,000 years later. He’s also an eldar on a mission to kill off the members of the Cabal. Gahet and Slau Dha, the Cabal members who turned the Alpha Legion, are dead. Damon Prytanis? Dead. Eldrad isn’t able to do all of this himself, of course. He enlists Barthusa Narek, the Word Bearer from Deathfire who turned against the Word Bearers. He’s not exactly a Loyalist like Warsmith Dantioch, but he’s against his Legion turning to Chaos. In exchange for his help with eliminating the Cabal, Eldrad promises Narek he can get revenge on his former Legion.
I really hope that we get a book or at least a short story that picks up where Narek’s story ended, because BOY OH BOY does it hint that it will be good.
But I don’t think it’s in the next book, which is unfortunately another short story collection. I guess I should be thankful that I haven’t had one in awhile, but I really liked being on the full novel path for awhile. Unfortunately, it’s not the last short story collection either. Onward, ho!
Forty-seven books down, 7 to go.
Horus Hearsay is dedicated to Keri’s journey through the Horus Heresy saga. The chronicling of the Horus Heresy began over ten years ago, with currently 54 books in total, not counting The Primarchs series or the various short stories outside of the official anthologies. Horus Hearsay will only cover the main novels.
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