Chapter 198 - Horus's Former Worries
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"The Battle of Ullanor."
Horus's voice was quiet, like a man reading aloud a name he'd kept sealed away for too long.
He stood before the viewing port of the Bucephelus, arms folded across his chest, gazing through the thick armored glass at the stars beyond.
Armageddon, once called Ullanor, rotated slowly not far from the fleet. Its continental plates, brown and gray-green stitched together, drifted in and out of view through breaks in the cloud cover.
"A war that left its mark on me. One I can't forget." He paused. "None of the glorious campaigns of the Great Crusade could compare to it. I loved that battle. And at the same time, I deeply hated it."
The Bucephelus was unusually quiet.
Loken and Cullen had gone to handle Legion affairs. Curze had retreated to his own flagship early, holed up with his books. Fulgrim was down in the training halls with his Emperor's Children. Near the bridge, only Kaelen and Horus remained.
The Wolf King had shed his heavy power armor, rare for him, and wore only a simple set of civilian clothes. The gold ring on his finger caught the lamplight and threw back a soft, warm gleam.
Kaelen leaned against the railing by the viewing port and listened.
"I can understand the hatred," Kaelen said. "It came from not knowing what came next?"
"You could put it that way, my friend." Horus dipped his head slightly. "I was exhilarated when that war came, because it was going to be the most glorious stroke of my entire command career. Like the climax of a magnificent symphony — every movement building toward it, every melody converging on it. And when the climax ends..."
His fingers turned the gold ring, slow and absent.
"It means the piece is over. The Great Crusade was that symphony."
Kaelen didn't rush to fill the silence.
He waited, and Horus kept going.
"Back then I kept thinking — once Ullanor was finished, once the Emperor returned to the Imperial Palace on Terra, could a Great Crusade without him still be called the Great Crusade?" The Wolf King's voice dropped. "After that, there would be no more territory worth conquering. No opponent on the scale of the Ork empire. Never again."
"A time of peace," Kaelen said.
"Yes." Horus nodded. "And I realized I was built for war."
He turned around. A trace of self-mockery tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"Back then I wondered, was I the only one without a plan? After the Great Crusade, what would they all do, where would they go? Every one of my brothers had an answer. Even frenzied Angron had his own ideas."
Genuine surprise crossed Kaelen's face.
"You're not joking?"
"Don't look so shocked, my friend." Horus let out a soft laugh. "I spoke with him once, in a rare moment of calm. Angron told me he wanted to go back to Nuceria. Kill every slave-master on that world. Free everyone still wearing chains in the fighting pits. That was what he wanted."
Kaelen shook his head, clicking his tongue.
"I never would have expected that from him. Though I suppose it tracks." He paused. "What about the others?"
Horus's gaze went distant and soft, like a man leafing through an old photo album, turning page by page past faces long since swallowed by ten thousand years.
"Sanguinius said he'd take his sons back to Baal. He wanted to gradually restore the ecology, push forward his mutant reformation program. He hoped that one day Baal could become a normal world, a place where people could grow sweet, edible grapes. Not those wild varieties so sour they make even an Astartes grimace. Because then, he said, the wine would finally have some sweetness to it."
Horus's gaze moved on, unhurried.
"The Khan and Mortarion each had their own plans. Dorn and Vulkan, the people of their homeworlds were still waiting for them. And Guilliman, well, needless to say. He was determined to manage his little five-hundred-world kingdom in perfect order, every planet running as efficiently and prosperously as Macragge."
He paused. A hint of teasing crept into his voice.
"As for Russ and the Lion, I doubt either of them lost a single night's sleep over it. They were Father's most loyal tools, through and through. No divided hearts, no complications. And Lorgar?" A short breath, almost amused. "He'd carry on being his missionary self. Probably write something even thicker than the Lectitio Divinitatus."
"I was different." The lightness faded. "My homeworld, Cthonia. I felt nothing for her. No attachment at all."
"The Emperor's warships were my home. My entire childhood, my entire adulthood, spent in the Great Crusade. There was nowhere else for me to go."
"I told my sons to read more, learn more, find something to do when the war ended. And then when I turned that same question on myself..."
The words dissolved into a long, heavy sigh.
He picked up the glass from the table and drained it in one swallow.
Kaelen watched him quietly.
He didn't look like a demigod right now. He looked like a man at a late-night table, emptying his chest out to a friend.
"Feeling lost in a life transition is perfectly normal." Kaelen reached up and clapped Horus on the shoulder. The height difference was what it was, even standing, he barely cleared the seated Horus by a head. "Don't think being a Primarch gets you out of it. Unless you're not human. Because this is exactly the kind of thing only humans think about. And when the pressure builds and the emotions pile up, the Chaos Gods can smell it from a mile away, big boy."
Horus lifted his eyes. Something complicated moved through them.
"And now?" Kaelen pressed. "Still feel that way? The galaxy is crawling with enemies of the Imperium. By the time you're done fighting your way through all of them, who even knows what year it'll be."
"Not anymore." The Wolf King's face eased back into a smile, not self-mockery this time, but the settled kind, the kind that comes after clarity. "I've completely let it go. Finish the task in front of me. Everything else, not my concern, not my business."
"Classic Leman Russ work-logic."
"Exactly."
They looked at each other and raised their glasses. The crisp clink of glass rang out across the empty bridge.
Then Horus set his glass down, and his expression shifted.
"What about you, Kaelen?" His voice was quiet. "When this war ends, will you leave?"
Kaelen's hand stopped mid-air, glass still in it.
Horus was no fool. His instincts were razor-sharp, and always had been.
Over these past days, he had long since worked out that Kaelen didn't belong to this universe. Didn't belong to this timeline. Didn't belong to any category he could properly put a name to.
He hadn't said a word about it. He'd simply held the answer in reserve, waiting for the day Kaelen chose to say it out loud himself.
And now, what he was asking wasn't "Who are you."
It was "Will you go."
Kaelen was quiet for a moment.
"Uh... honestly, I don't know. Maybe once all the loyal Primarchs have returned, that's probably when I'd leave? Who knows."
He shrugged, pitching his voice light, trying to smooth over the weight of what he'd just said.
"But we'll part ways eventually, won't we? Like you said, every piece of music ends."
"Will you miss me, Kaelen?"
Kaelen blinked.
"I figured you'd ask me to stay."
"You know me. That's not who I am." Horus shook his head. "I respect you. The same way you respect me."
Kaelen thought about it. Actually thought about it, for a few genuine seconds.
Then he looked up, a sly curve catching the corner of his mouth.
"Oh, definitely. After everything we went through together on Rys and Cadia, how could I not miss you, Mister Ogryn?"
Horus went still for a half-second.
Then he laughed, the exasperated kind, the kind that gets dragged out of you against your will.
"Is it really that funny? You're still going on about that?"
"How is it not funny?"
Kaelen's mouth had no brakes now.
"And don't forget Cullen — he's an Ogryn too, you know."
"He's Ogryn Number Two."
"Right, right, Ogryn Number Two." Kaelen nodded with great solemnity. "But above both of you there's still one more. The red-skinned Ogryn, Magnus. Now there is a being who truly possesses the legendary, earth-shattering wisdom of the Ogryn."
The next second, laughter filled the bridge of the Bucephelus.
Two friends. One sitting, one standing. Both doubled over.
Outside the viewport, Armageddon kept its slow turn. The war was still out there waiting. The galaxy was still burning. But right now, none of that mattered at all.
➤ Next: The Iron Hands Diplomatic Delegation
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