Yo, that Vulkan be spittin' that hot fire, son.

So after months of fucking nothing (beyond a fairly vague tweet from Nick Kyme), Heresy fans were given a treat yesterday...

Yes, book 32, the sequel to 'Vulkan Lives' and 'Unremembered Empire' is coming, in, like, two fuckin' months. AGES away! (Remember when we were told "Hey, by the way, we didn't mention it before but 'Unremembered Empire' is out this week!"? That seems a loooooong time ago now.) Ahh well, I guess it gives me time to read all Kyme's Heresy work again in preparation.

£25 is the price tag floated, so we can probably expect the hefty 500+ page count of 'A Thousand Sons', 'Vengeful Spirit' or 'Fear To Tread'. This could be a mixed blessing. 'Vulkan Lives' was average length but it felt drastically overlong and I really struggled to read it. But that was a book I read fresh off of reading the whole Heresy series for the first time. After the famine of 2015, I might be hungry enough for Nick's rather dry prose to seem a feast...

So, what will 'Deathfire' actually be about? From BL's website:

Vulkan lies in state beneath the Fortress of Hera, and yet many of his sons still refuse to believe that he is truly dead. After a seemingly miraculous rescue by the Ultramarines, Artellus Numeon, once captain of the Pyre Guard, urges the other Salamanders on Macragge to leave Imperium Secundus and return their primarch’s body to the home world of Nocturne – there to be reborn in the flames of Mount Deathfire. But Numeon grapples endlessly with his doubts and fears for the future of the Legion, while their foes seek to carve out new destinies of their own...

And from an email sent out from BL, with a slightly different synopsis:

In the wake of the cataclysmic events in The Unremembered Empire, Captain Numeon of the Pyre Guard experiences visions of Vulkan born anew in the furnaces of Mount Deathfire. An epic odyssey to Nocturne ensues. Beset by the Death Guard and Magnus the Red, can the Salamanders make it home through the Ruinstorm?

So we have a pretty good idea of what the setup will be, and I'm kind of confident that neither BL or Nick will throw us a curveball and have this be Vulkan's last voyage. No, this will most likely be a setup for his eventual return to Terra - well, if that's what they end up doing with the character (I got my suspicions). A corpse-carrying road-trip isn't necessarily a bad idea, and a small group of Salamanders defying Guilliman and going on a Viking-style quest for a borderline-impossible goal could be the framework for an excellent novel.

I anticipate that Vulkan will spend most (or all?) of the book as an inert corpse in a box, making Numeon our primary character. He wasn't always a character I felt massively engaged by, but the way his storyline was left hanging at the end of 'Vulkan Lives' always nagged at me, and now I guess we'll get closure, or as close as we can get in these books.

As for the Ultramarines... my bet is that Aeonid Thiel rescues Numeon - in fact, this would make a lot of sense as a topic for the apparently upcoming audio drama 'The Red-Marked', named for Thiel's unconventional group of Ultramarine guerrillas. That would be great, as I really like how Kyme writes him. And then, the return to Imperium Secundus; that'll give us some hints about how that story will progress, I hope, maybe even answer some of the annoying questions the last few stories set there have raised.

The Death Guard and Thousand Sons being the antagonists could be interesting, not least because I'd imagine they are almost as likely to kill each other as to kill some Salamander leftovers. I'm always keen on the Death Guard taking a prominent role in a Heresy novel, and Nick hasn't written them yet as far as I recall - so I'm quite intrigued to discover what his spin on them might be. As for the Sons, it'd be interesting to see what Nick would bring to that Legion too, and considering 'Crimson King' is probably up next, it could give some nice opportunities for some 'Prospero Burns' / 'Thousand Sons' split scenes, with the action playing out differently depending on the viewpoint character. Of course, the two factions may never interact, in fact, Magnus might just show up in magic ghost form and scream "NEW MIXTAPE DROPS 2015!" then disappear as everyone shits blood.

Concerns? Well, I don't know if more stories about Shattered Legion warriors "[grappling] endlessly with [their] doubts and fears" is really what the Heresy needs. In fact, we probably need a break from it. Salamanders doing it is probably going to be a bit more readable than yet more Iron Hands grinding their teeth about their moribund Legion, but... I dunno. I guess it could be an OK theme, if it's not one that 'Deathfire' doesn't lean on too much; the problem is I have little faith that Nick won't just run it into the ground.

And also... Numeon experiencing visions? I mean... is this going to be another 'awakened psyker' story? While I don't hate them as much as some Heresy fans seem to, I think we've maybe had enough of them for now - yet the idea of another character being granted visions by the Emperor also seems depressingly likely, as well.

I'm not sure I can really express how disappointed I am with this year's Heresy release schedule without coming across as a real whiner, but this goes some way to redressing the balance. Still, it does make me worry we might see only two Heresy novel releases this year - maybe just one, if Graham doesn't finish 'The Crimson King' in the next few months. I suppose it's unfair to complain - Black Library seem to be concerned with pushing the End Times series at the moment, and gods know those poor Warhammer Fantasy fans do need some attention, so it's good they're getting their due. I do feel a bit hard done by, though, especially when you consider the sheer volume of Heresy stuff that came out last year.

Ah well, the Warhammer World opening will probably give us a bit of a preview for the release schedule. I'm optimistic that 'The Red-Marked' is a likely audio release before 'Deathfire', and hopefully at least one HH novella to come out this summer... if nothing else, that Battle for Calth Forge World book is gonna be here soon.

AND WE OUT LIKE FULGRIM