The Crimson Fist by John French is the first of the original novellas. Told from the first-person perspective of Alexis Polux, commander of the Imperial Fists Retribution Fleet sent to Isstvan III, it narrates the Battle of the Phall system after the Retribution Fleet is trapped by Warp storms and attacked by the Iron Warriors, led by Perturabo. The account of the fleet battle in this novella is one of the best in the Heresy series, French's writing making the action seem immediate and visceral, but the action is also tempered by character moments on Terra between Rogal Dorn and Sigismund that give the novella depth and pace. The climactic battle is gripping, the forced retreat of the Imperial Fists and the failure of the strike team sent to execute Perturabo lending real tragedy to what should have been Polux's triumph. The final twist is identical to the one from Fear to Tread, but nevertheless The Crimson Fist is an excellent novella and a great introduction to the anthology.
The Dark King by Graham McNeill is half of a duology originally published as The Horus Heresy Chapbook. It explores Konrad Curze's motivations for turning against the Imperium prior to the Heresy, kept in confinement after savagely beating Rogal Dorn when he came to chastise him for excessive bloodshed during the Cheraut compliance. Killing his guards and escaping, Curze leads the Night Lords to Nostramo and commands the destruction of his homeworld before going on the run from the Imperium. Though more a vignette than a narrative, this short story casts light on some of the most defining moments in Night Lords history.
The Lightning Tower by Dan Abnett is the other half of the duology originally published as The Horus Heresy Chapbook. It is a character study of Rogal Dorn as he prepares the Imperial Palace's defences, exploring the primarch's sadness at the necessity of converting the palace into a fortress and following his introspection as he tries to discover what it is about Horus's rebellion that truly scares him. A thoughtful piece that captures the atmosphere on Terra in the lead-up to the Siege, it overlaps with the Terran scenes in The Crimson Fist but is really just a curio when read in isolation.
The Kaban Project by Graham McNeill was originally published as bonus content in the Collected Visions Horus Heresy artbook. It provides the backstory of one of the more unusual characters in McNeill's novel Mechanicum, a sentient war-machine created by the traitor faction in defiance of the Emperor's edict against the creation of thinking machines. Following an everyday adept named Pallas Ravachol who befriends the machine, it chronicles his flight across Mars after circumstances make him a liability to the machine's powerful creators. The plot is fairly predictable, but this is made up for by the scintillating insight it provides into everyday life on the Red Planet .
Raven's Flight by Gav Thorpe was originally one the Heresy series' earliest audio-dramas, provided in print for the first time. It chronicles the events leading up the Raven Guard's escape from Isstvan V, following Commander Branne and Praefector Valerius on Deliverance and Corax and the surviving Raven Guard on Isstvan. The sections set on Isstvan are the best parts of this story, the highlight being a Raven Guard ambush on a column of Iron Warriors. The story is fairly engaging, but like The Dark King it is more of a vignette than a narrative, depicting a single important event in a Legion's history without exploring it in-depth.
Death of a Silversmith by Graham McNeill was originally published in the 2011/12 Games Day Anthology. It follows the reflections of a famous, unnamed silversmith as he lies dying on the Vengeful Spirit, thinking back over the course of his long life and the events that led to his sadistic murder. The age of the character allows for a historical perspective on the Great Crusade and the circumstances of his death reveal how early the corruption in the warrior lodges began, but I imagine many fans would have liked this story simply because it features Hastur Sejanus, a Luna Wolves character whose appearance has become something of an easter egg within the series.
Prince of Crows by Aaron Dembski-Bowden is the second original novella and the final part of the anthology. The first longer Heresy piece to feature the Night Lords, it follows First Captain Sevatar as he struggles to keep the legion alive in the wake of a devastating Dark Angels attack which leaves Konrad Curze comatose and near-death. After making some drastic changes to the Legion's command structure Sevatar implements his own plan for its future before using his long-suppressed psyker powers to delve into Curze's mind. What follows is a sequence of flashbacks that amount to Curze's origin story, adding credence rumours I once read that this novella was originally slated to be part of The Primarchs. Shit then hits the fan when the Dark Angels strike again, and Sevatar's escape plan is ruined when Curze awakens and commandeers the First Company for a suicidal attack on the Dark Angels' flagship. Sevatar ends the novella imprisoned, Curze on the run through the Invincible Reason's lower decks. If this drastic ending wasn't be enough to make Prince of Crows required reading, this is also the novella that altered fan perception of the Night Lords Legion and made Sevatar one of the most popular characters in the Heresy series. It is superb.
Limited-edition novella review: Ravenlord
Every now and then Black Library decide to raise revenue by releasing a Horus Heresy story as a limited-edition novella, printing a small number of copies and charging exorbitantly for each. These novellas are then given a mainstream release years later, finally making them available to the vast majority of fans. Ravenlord by Gav Thorpe was the seventh of these novellas to be released, and follows the Raven Guard Legion as they fight to liberate the prison world of Carandiru from traitor control.
Ravenlord takes up the story of the Raven Guard after the events of Deliverance Lost and Corax: Soulforge. In this novella Gav Thorpe includes the full gamut of characters he introduced in Deliverance, making it feel more like a sequel than the narrowly focused Soulforge and illustrating the inclusive, rag-tag nature of the force Corax has built as he wages his shadow war against Horus. The action begins with the freedom fighters regrouping on the newly-liberated world of Scarato, where they are shocked by the arrival of Gherith Arendi, the commander of Corax's bodyguard who was thought dead at Isstvan. It is obvious that Arendi is hiding something, but information he provides leads the Raven Guard to Carandiru. The smaller actions fought in the build-up to the main offensive on the planet perfectly illustrate the Raven Guard method of war and the ways their allies have adapted to fighting alongside them, but final battle itself raises more questions that it answers.
The Raven Guard discover a hellish facility where captured loyalists are experimented being run by a traitor from their own legion, and that this closely echoes Corax's own experience with the Raptors is not lost on him. He confronts Arendi with his suspicions about the whole sequence of events, but after Arendi reveals the shameful secret of his escape from Isstvan Corax decides to trust him, leaving a question mark over the ending of an otherwise solid and entertaining novella.
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