The anthology kicks off with one of the best in the bunch, “Dark Compliance” by John French. A frame story, it tells of Horus' general Argonis ordering a planet to bend the knee. When the planet's leader refuses, Argonis proceeds to tell the story of the last time a planet failed to capitulate. Giving the planet's leader a taste of things to come, it is dark compliance, indeed. While overall a straightforward story, the frame gives the story appreciable nuance. Another John French piece, “Now Peals Midnight” is more symbol than story. It exists to portray one moment, and for that I wish it had been located at the end of the anthology, but so be it.
“The Painted Count” kicks off a pair of Guy Haley stories. In Curze's absence, Skraivok attempts to deal with a cursed sword while negotiating a fight for control of the Night Lords. It results in an overblown plot device which leads to a partially obfuscated scenario. (Why not just kill him?). “Duty Waits” is a stronger, more impacting effort. Where Slaves to Darkness showed Chaos wrecking havoc within the traitor legions, “Duty Waits” shows things are equally unstable on Terra. The Imperial Fists make patrol after boring patrol, waiting for Horus' arrival, only to have their boredom interrupted—not by slavering demons, rather something more human in form. It's written in the present tense, but Haley makes it work.
An asynchronous story at first blush, “Dreams of Unity” by Nick Kyme eventually reveals itself to have symbolic parallels relevant to the time just before Horus's arrival on Terra. About a primitive, leather-clad thunder warrior, the arc of his tale speaks of events (shortly) to come. “Children of Sicarius” by Anthony Reynolds is a bluntly written, minimally effective story about Kor Pharron. Despite the potential for an evil vs evil tale, Reynolds struggles to make it meaningful.
Rob Sanders contributed a pair of stories to the anthology. “Myriad” is a post-Titandeath story (yes?) in which the Mechanicum fights back against the Dark Mechanicum threatening to infest all of Mars. Another titan story, “The Ember Wolves” is a single titan battle from beginning to end. As is important with these stories, Sanders does a decent job conveying the scale of the behemoth fighting machines.
“Exocytosis” by James Swallow is the de facto title story of the anthology. It stars two key secondary characters, Typhon (Death Guard) and Luther (Dark Angels) and a near history-changing encounter the pair have. Typhon has to deal with a strange smell and extra flies buzzing around body. His fate, however, is already sealed. This is followed by a trio of Gav Thorpe selections.
In “The Grey Raven”, Balsar of the Raven Guard has been sent by Corax to Terra to meet Malcador and face the master psyker's judgment. It utilizes a far fetched, common idea in stories, but is executed well. “Valerius” is another selection that is more vignette than story. It tells, in situ, of a battle lost and the beliefs of the commanding captain directing the doomed troops.
And finally is Chris Wraight, whose four selections close the anthology, beginning with “Blackshield”. After dozens of novels and volume after volume of short fiction, this story proves the series still can offer something surprising and subtle. It is the tale of a squad of traitor space marines bent on revenge—but not against who you may think. The vendetta not well planned, the squad find themselves on a planet rife with toxic swamp gas and fighting for their lives. The atypical structure combined with air of mystery make for a unique story in the HH series. If the dialogue had a bit more subtlety, this would be magnificent. “The Last Son of Prospero” is a delicately tense story about a Thousand Sons marine lying on Malcador's operating table. The marine is covered in lesions, and the Sigillite tries to heal him. But Jaghatai interrupts, sending the scene into chaos—but does wrap up a sub-plot of The Path to Heaven. Another internal fight for leadership in the void of their primarch, “The Soul, Severed” tells of Eidolon's fight for leadership of the Emperor's Children in Fulgrim's absence. For Eidolon fans only, as otherwise it's a less than average offering.
In some ways, Heralds of the Siege offers a better end point to the Horus Heresy series than The Buried Dagger. I understand and agree that The Buried Dagger offers a stronger symbolic note to end the series before heading to Siege of Terra, but Heralds of the Siege contains several of the scenes readers would expect to exist leading up to Horus' assault on the Solar System. Where Slaves to Darkness, for example, sees a coalescing of evil, Heralds of the Siege gives a broader spectrum updates on what many of the legions are doing as Horus enters the system. Overall, the quality of fiction is decent. There are a couple better than average stories and a couple of duds. By and large it is the minimum of what readers familiar with the series have come to expect. I'm on the edge of declaring this required reading for people skipping through the series, but only if you're following secondary character sub-plots.
The following are the sixteen stories anthologized in Heralds of the Siege:
Dark Compliance by John French
Now Peals Midnight by John French
The Painted Count by Guy Haley
Duty Waits by Guy Haley
Dreams of Unity by Nick Kyme
Children of Sicarius by Anthony Reynolds
Myriad by Rob Sanders
The Ember Wolves by Rob Sanders
Exocytosis by James Swallow
The Grey Raven by Gav Thorpe
Valerius by Gav Thorpe
The Board Is Set by Gav Thorpe
Blackshield by Chris Wraight
The Last Son of Prospero by Chris Wraight
The Soul, Severed by Chris Wraight
Magisterium by Chris Wraight
No comments:
Post a Comment