Spear of the Emperor (Warhammer 40,000)

Product Information

AD-B: It’s set over a century after the Great Rift tears the Imperium in half, and it’s set in Elara’s Veil, a region of space where – like most of the Dark Imperium – everything has gone to Hell. Literally. The Emperor's Spears are a Chapter on the edge of destruction, last watchmen over the Elara's Veil nebula. Now, the decisions of one man, Amadeus Kaias Incarius of the Mentor Legion, will determine the Chapter's fate.... What I truly love about this book is Anuradha as a protagonist, her insight to the Space Marines and ability to show how transhuman they really are. Without her very human thoughts, a different point of view, this book would become the standard, run of the mill, ‘bolter porn’ novel that Warhammer 40k is rampant with. The Emperor's Spears divert substantially from the organisational dictates of the Codex Astartes. They have a vast Chapter fleet, and specialise in air-to-ground warfare and orbital drop assaults. They are particularly mobile when it comes to deployment and redeployment, and are not short of air assets.

Great new novel from Aaron Dembski-Bowden chronicling the story of the Emperor's Spears, a Space Marine Chapter on the edge of destruction, last watchmen over the Elara's Veil nebula. Now, the decisions of one man, Amadeus Kaias Incarius of the Mentor Legion, will determine the Chapter's fate… They're interrupted by the appearance of a new ship bearing down on them - the Blade of the Seventh Son, a Celestial Lions ship! She fully expects to die in the oncoming ram, and all things considered is fine with this. She laughs as the end comes. To her fear and fury Kartash is also alive and denies her whole story. Since she's taken actual brain trauma no one believes her.

Contents

Amadeus Kaias Incarius, a brother of the Mentor Legion, is commanded to cross the Great Rift and assess the Spears' war-readiness, only to be drawn into the chaotic plight of a depleted crusade on the Imperium's benighted frontier. The decisions he makes, far from the God-Emperor's light, will decide the fate of the war-torn Chapter. Amadeus is the perfect contrast to the personable Space Marines of the Emperors Spears and he helps to carry the story in his own right; the story is as much his as it is the Spears and Anuradha's and it is through his development that the plot progresses, I get the feeling that he is the Marmite of the story though, for the reader, you’ll either love or hate him. This is similar to the way the Astral Claws, Lamenters, Mantis Warriors, and Charnel Guard wore the unique marking of the Maelstrom Warders to designate their role as sentinels over the Warp rift known as the Maelstrom. Sergeant Faelan (KIA) - Faelan of the Kavalei Tribe was a battleguard of the Emperor's Spears' 3rd Warhost. Faelan lost much of his face in battle and then had much of his head replaced by cybernetic prostheses. He was killed by a child Renegade psyker of the Exilarchy when the Chaos Space Marines of The Pure boarded the strike cruiser Hex. His gene-seed and Astartes organs were later used in the process to turn Vadhán into a Primaris Marine.

The Mentor delegation is then commanded to travel to the surface and meets Brêac of the Vargantes tribe, Lord of the Third Warhost (Warhosts roughly approximate to Companies - he's basically a Captain). He greets them coldly, Incarius most of all because the Mentor's colors are the same as the Star Scorpions, a previous ally of the Spears and now gone. They call him "False Scorpion." He is a little warmer to the Helots, and Incarius is a little miffed that Brêac asks for their names (Anuradha mentions that even among Astartes that Incarius and the Mentors were cold). He greats each ritually in turn, and grants them permission to walk the soil of Nematon and gives each a cloak. Elara’s Veil is torn between the Adeptus Vaelarii, the Sentinels of the Veil: the three Space Marine Chapters oathsworn to defend it, and the Exilarchy: the forces of Chaos swarming out of the Great Rift in an unending tide, desperate to take and hold territory. AD-B: All my stuff is, I hope, essentially historical fiction in the 40K setting. My go-to influences are any historical podcasts I can get hold of; a bajillion documentaries about various Bronze Age, Iron Age, and Dark Ages cultures; and any historical fiction you can name; if it’s been published, I’ve probably made some effort to get hold of it.The crafting of the Emperors Spears chapter; who this book is primarily about made for an interesting read in themselves. How they differ from Anuradhas experiences of Space Marine chapters (the Mentor Legion et al) makes for intriguing reading in itself, so often Warhammer 40k books are written about the Ultramarines it’s fascinating to read about successor chapters that differ vastly from the Space Marine ‘norm.’ The detail in which Aaron Dembski-Bowden delves into with the Emperors Spears is nothing short of inspiring and it is this attention to detail that goes brings Spear of the Emperor to those lofty heights in which I praise it. Each Warhost marks their azure armour with a range of Nemetese Ogham runes that are believed to comprise a mix of unit markings, honour sigils and other more esoteric icons.

For many centuries, the Emperor's Spears have been focused on guarding the region of space known as Elara's Veil alongside the Celestial Lions and previously the Star Scorpions. With the former hounded by the Inquisition and the latter having been destroyed, this leaves the Spears as the Veil's sole sentinel. [3]While records on the origins of the Emperor's Spears are scarce, the first recorded encounter with the Chapter came in 594.M40, suggesting they have been defending the Imperium for perhaps a millennium and a half, making them relatively young by the standards of Space Marine Chapters. Great new novel from Aaron Dembski-Bowden chronicling the story of the Emperor's Spears, a Space Marine Chapter on the edge of destruction, last watchmen over the Elara's Veil nebula. Now, the decisions of one man, Amadeus Kaias Incarius of the Mentor Legion, will determine the Chapter's fate… Sergeant Morcant - Morcant of the Arakanii Tribe is a Battleguard of the Emperor's Spears' 3rd Warhost.

The novel’s narrator is Anuradha Daaz, one of his Chapter serfs, who has access to bunch of cool Mentors tech that most Chapter serfs wouldn’t get to touch. She chronicles the story of Amadeus fighting alongside the Emperor’s Spears. Desperation in recent solar decades has forced the Emperor's Spears into a more cooperative mindset, however. Necessity has forced their hand; with Elara's Veil in such danger from the Archenemy, pride can no longer come first. Now, survival must. The fact that it flowed relatively well and that there was quite a bit of interesting points throughout helped this score a two instead of a one. And I never thought I'd not enjoy an Aaron Dembski Bowden Warhammer novel. But then, everyone else seems to love this book, so perhaps I am just the incredibly one one out. That's reading tastes for you. Anuradha thinks she sees Incarius but instead to her horror discovers that she is facing one of the Pure - who wear almost the same colors as the Mentors! Of course, the symbol on the pauldron is different - it's a serpent circled around a world. Anuradha and Tyberia are equipped with shotguns with loads specifically designed to puncture power armor, they have vortex grenade launchers, iron bones, top quality cortical implants, blades, advanced carapace armor well above that of Scions, and more. The Marine they fight very nearly kills them both, tearing out Anuradha's advanced bionic eye for one.Captain Serivahn - Serivahn of the Vargantes Tribe is the flagship captain of the strike cruiser Hex. His body was painfully deformed, having partially rejected the Primaris Alpha and Beta phases of gene-seed organ implantation which had left him in constant pain. This was because the Spears of the Emperor had found the process of creating Primaris Space Marines difficult and not easily mastered even once they had received the technology from an Imperial task force. Many of the first aspirants to become Primaris Marines did not survive the process as a result. Serivahn was the first to do so, despite his resulting infirmities. But Serivahn's survival did allow the Emperor's Spears to further refine the techniques for the creation of Primaris Marines so that no others suffered Serivahn's fate. I feel a little like Spear of the Emperor is the first novel I wrote without really worrying about its reception. It wasn’t any easier or harder, and it took just as freaking long as they all do, but I felt like I was writing the kind of thing I like to read. It felt a lot more personal, for whatever reason. The scattered worlds of the Elara's Veil nebula were once protected by the oath of unity sworn by three mighty Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. The Star Scorpions were undone by flaws in their genetic coding. The Celestial Lions were ravaged by the Inquisition for sins they did not commit. Now, after hundreds of years, only the Emperor's Spears still keep their vigil. They are barbarian watchmen against the Outer Dark; bloodied but unbroken in their long duty. It’s definitely darker in tone. Anyone writing 40K has done dark/grim elements, but I tried to make this a concerted, careful theme of defiance in the face of annihilation, and the various emotions and melancholy that come with surviving a long, bitter war while those around you don’t.