Horus Heresy Word Bearers: The Blessed Sons

Howdy Guys and Girls :)

Today I want to share some progress on my Word Bearers - Zardu Layak and his possessed friends. 2 of my 10 Gal Vorbak are already finished *yay*

The Blessed Sons

The Gal Vorbak were said to be possessed of strengths and abilities far above those of other Astartes. It was said that each of the Gal Vorbak was host to some form of Warp entity, itself subservient to the greatest scheme plotted between Warmaster Horus and the nightmare powers beyond. In battle, this being came to dominate the mind and body of the warrior. His already mighty form would swell as hands turned into rending talons and jaws into slavering, fang-filled maws twisted beyond reason and reality. At Istvaan V, the Word Bearers' pact with the horrors beyond was sealed in a great ritual of carnage and betrayal.

Note: Dark Martyr. It is believed this warrior is possessed by a mighty servant of Khorne, as indicated by his face-mutation and scorpion tail.

Zardu Layak, the Crimson Apostle

Thrice-Born, The Binder of Souls, The Voice of the Unspeaking

Zardu Layak's true name is now lost, but it is recorded in his Legion's lore that he was once an officer of the Ashen Circle, a Terran by birth, and a devout destroyer of all that pertained to false superstition and errant creed. He oversaw the burning of a hundred temples and countless tomes of lies in the Emperor's service. That was until the Word Bearer's brutal censure by their ultimate master.

As Primarch Lorgar led his Legion into the wilderness after their punishment on Monarchia, Layak was contrite and ashamed, soul-sick and lost, and quickly a fervent convert to Erebus' and Lorgar's new teachings in which he sought solace, but even this did not fill the terrible void within him. So it was that when he began to receive visions in which he believed his Primarch spoke to him directly, he concealed them from others for fear his shame had driven him mad. In those visions the golden-skinned apparition ofLorgar bade him to reconsider his work, not to burn the books and lore he encountered, but to read them, covet them, to search in them for the hidden truths that the Emperor had not wished his sons to know. Word upon word, rune upon rune, glyph upon glyph was a new creature born, a creature who named himself from the Book of Lorgar, using the ancient practice of Sortilege, as Zardu Layak, "Eater of Wisdom", but who came to be known more swiftly by his Legion as the "Crimson Apostle" for his fiery raiment and the scalding blood in which he daily daubed his armour.

Assigned to the Chapter of the Ochre Gate as its apostle by Erebus, Zardu Layak quickly proved more than a mere voice of the First Chaplain. Soon the chapter began to seek missions of its own, away from its Legion for long stretches, and each time it returned it was further changed. Like a cancer, Zardu Layak had embedded himself deeper into its carcass, so that after a time, the Ochre Gate was no more and now the Chapter of the Unspeaking stood in its place, with Zardu Layak its de facto master. Though First Captain Kor Phaeron was disquieted by the Crimson Apostle's growing power, much of which he would keep hidden until the atrocity on Calth, Lorgar pronounced himself pleased by Zardu Layak and his devotion to the word of the Primordial Truth, assigning the Unspeaking and their master to command a key assault at Calth, though so changed had they become that complete concealment was needed for them until the hour came to strike ...

Hope you like them so far - more Gal Vorbak soon!

regards,

Lady Atia