Reidar Dawn-Walker

Reidar Dawn-Walker as of his disappearance in 015.M31 and return in Early M42

Reidar Dawn-Walker, once a sickly child, now Son of the Rout, Gift of Russ, Last Consul-Opsequiari of the Sixth, Jarl of the Black Cull and Butcher of Redoubt-6. An astartes whose legend nearly eclipses all others in the ranks of the Vlka Fenryka, Reidar climbed from the deepest depths of petty bitterness and spite to that of exemplar status in the legion, earning even the ear of the Wolf-Lord Leman Russ as one of his most treasured Einherjar.

Born to a tribe of coastal dwelling Fenrisians in the decade preceding Leman of the Russ' ascension as undisputed king of the planet, Reidar was among the first generation of new legionnaires in the sixth; bringing a cultural shock the Terrans who already filled the ranks. Tutored by one such member of the previously orphan Rout, Joskaerr Coal-Sash, Reidar ascended into the revitalised legion with a taste of the old Terran ways still on his tongue, a trait that would come to define him as the last of the Consul-Opsequiaris. With a growing tally of battles and the words of greats lining his saga, he became not only a warrior of renown, but a man who encompassed an intimate sense of raw, honest virtue; enjoying a reputation as a disciplined leader, stoic individual and invaluable source of sobering wisdom.

Regularly sent by his father as an envoy to other legions, Reidar enjoyed the special privileges of companionship within legions like the Dark Angels, Word Bearers, and Immortal Host; his tempered counsel appreciated by the brothers of Russ. These extended bonds of loyalty were so deep seated, so sealed in blood, that Reidar chose to follow Chapter Master Althalos of the Dark Angels in the wake of the Battle of the Alaxxes Nebula.

Presumed dead by his brothers, Reidar Dawn-Walker passed from the world of the living into the legends of the dead, the grief of the legion processed over millennia. Yet now, without prompting or warning he returns, and the Wulfen howl for their master.

### His Journey

#### Pains of Creation

Born to an average Fenrisian couple in a long-dead coastal tribe, Reidar was initially nowhere near the character he would grow to be. From the moment he had left the warmth of his mother’s womb, it was no secret to the tribe the condition he was in.

Narrowly saved from death during an intense labour, his own life was traded for that of his mother’s, his soul greeting the world as hers was pulled away to the next; and though Fenris’ people are hardy and enduring, they are also superstitious. To have such a difficult birth is foul to them, an insult to the child itself at the weakness of the mother, an insult to the community at the lack of virility in the father. Omen enough with the warnings of the tribe’s shaman before the labour, it was set from the day he took his first breath that he would never truly be one of the people.

A sickly child from the circumstances of his birth and isolated from the tribe, Reidar was only ever under the ministrations of his father, carried upon his back in both the danger of hunting expeditions and the arduous nature of village life itself. Once he could walk, his father would force him to do so if possible, determined to prove to both himself and the people that his child was not a failure; and If he did not walk, he would crawl regardless of the hardship. Though such methods were cruel, it worked to harden the callus of willpower inside the child at the cost of paternal love, teaching him to only rely on himself.

Years passed, hunts happened, skirmishes came and went, and the callus grew not just on the heart of the young Reidar, but also upon the flesh of the youth. Whereas others at his age had their fair share of trophies from skirmishes or great hunts, Reidar was covered in jagged, uneven scars, a boy that looked already like a man from the hardening of both heart and soul. From the mangled flesh of his hands, torn apart by the rocks upon which he crawled when he had to, to the indiscriminate littering of various wounds inflicted by sickness, animal, or otherwise; Reidar was a canvas which Fenris threw itself upon.

For all these things the child would endure however, one thing would ensure his ultimate damnation: the death of his father. It had happened on a hunt whilst Reidar remained in the village, still recovering from a fresh wave of fever that robbed his ability to walk. There the hunting party were, or at least so he was told, ascending one of the snow capped spines of Fenris when a harsh wind had begun to batter the side of the slope, the strength of it throwing the party about like puppets. The rope holding Reidar’s father had snagged on an outcrop when tossed around and had snapped instantly, sending him tumbling to his fate.

Already laid low by the fever, Reidar struggled to comprehend the loss of his father, a conflicting mess of emotion forming inside his gullet as memories played again and again in a vivid delirium. Yes, he may have been spared any further abuse from his father, but now he was directionless without that constant challenge, and more severely; he was vulnerable. For all the physical and mental assaults Reidar endured from his father, never did he have so much as a notion of others seeking him out due to the same man, who like his son was resentful at the tribe that tolerated their presence.

But now, without that fear of repercussions from the youth’s single parent, the elders of the tribe made their long awaited move. Wasting no time due to Reidar’s weakened state, the warriors of the tribe subdued the sickly adolescent after some ferocious, albeit short-lived resistance, and the answer to the question of what to do with him was immediate. Having seen themselves as underhanding the Gods for too long with their begrudging acceptance of Reidar’s existence, a ritual of sacrifice was to be made upon the volcanic island chains far to the north, the tribe resolving to rid their history of the cursed child.

Boarding their longboat and braving the raging seas of Fenris, the voyage was dangerous and lengthy, but its success was still secured. Pinning Reidar down upon the igneous sands once they reached one of the planet’s geological blisters, the visage of the two headed wolf God Morkai were cut into his face; the deed done by the very shaman who had mourned his birth. Giving their last words of condemnation the crew left him there on the shoreline, setting sail to make the perilous return home.

*Staring into the grey, rain streaked skies that looked back pitilessly at him, Reidar lay motionless on the beach of some unnamed, damned rock, blood weeping from the fresh carvings in his face. The pain was sure, present in more ways than one; from the cold flames that followed the esoteric tracings upon his face, to the sharp, sting like sensations covering his skin and the ever-present ache of punished bone and tired muscle. Reidar felt the physical toll on his body worsened by the condition of his soul.*

*Nothingness was what filled him in that moment. It was a moment that was indiscernible in length amid the worsening storm above and salt spray of the depthless sea that was swallowing the world before him. A suffocating, unbound presence had its jaws yawning wide in anticipation to devour what tattered pieces remained of the broken child, and as its yellowed fangs gently began to kiss his skin whispering promises of the void, a great sorrow began to fall on the youth that was splayed out before its mercy.*

*Finding no pity in the sky as he realised these falling tears were not for him, the ingrained memories of his father’s character retched in his gut, giving its all to reject the apathy that had suddenly threatened to end what was Reidar. As if his eyes could see for the first time, he saw that the Wolf Gods stared down at him with a gaze that told of what weight they were placing on his shoulders. Something shifted, and acrid bile burned a new creed into the lining of his stomach as he convulsed, expelling the poison of what he once was. The fangs receded, pain returning tenfold.*

*Forcing his frail body into compliance, Reidar clawed his way up the obsidian sands to complete his destiny; Morkai beckoning him to undergo the final chapter of his life.*

Clambering over the edge of the jagged shore, Reidar found himself an outsider against the landscape before him, an outcast in a place of enduring natural solitude. New-born hills rolled over the land, crashing in blackened waves like the icy sea behind him; the ground itself carpeted in a thick moss that spared only the most rugged sections of rock from its embrace. Distantly, plumes of ashen smoke came from what Reidar presumed was the centre of the island, rising into the cage of heavy clouds; the distant rumbles of creation felt beneath his feet. Taking a deep breath of air that tasted of salt, rain and sulphur, the youth stumbled aimlessly into the soaked wasteland, forks of lightning looming on the horizon.

The first days were indiscernible from night as time became forgotten, the torrential downpour covering the island, flooding the lower reaches of it. It was the season of fire from what the outsider could remember, a time of transformation for the whole planet – and soon that came to the island. The natural caves and hollows from previous magma flows that he used for shelter were constantly shifting, collapsing and being reshaped, the land offering no permanent place for him to find rest against the onslaught. Pain accentuated every moment, but the stranger continued on; an unknown weight on his shoulders. Though destructive, each colossal wave that battered the edges of the island brought food in the form of fish dashed against the shore, and each intensifying eruption drove small mammals from their burrows. It was around the fifth day that the Wolf’s Eye finally glared through the blanket of rain, revealing a person and land distant from what was left behind by the tribe.

Covered in dirt and muck as well as half dried blood, Reidar had become an atavistic figure reminiscent of the legends of the Fenrisian peoples. Adorned with a hooded cape made of furs and skins taken in his hunts and armed with a spear he created from volcanic glass and driftwood, he appeared as something that was more bestial than human. His behaviours had changed too, for half starved and maddened by his sickness, visions swam within the bloodshot mirrors of his eyes – uncertain myth becoming reality. Figures reminiscent of the dark guardians of the underworld stalked the island, hunting the man-beast; the whispers of the Wolf-Gods still echoing in his head as he caught glimpses of them on the horizon.

With previous wounds festering worse and his skin covered in swelling boils, the suggestions of unseen guides grew greater; and so he ventured deeper into the island to excise the poison. With each step the half-beast made further into the island, the more dangerous the land became – sections of rock and soil constantly shifted and lava breached the surface in countless places before forming rivulets of superheated rock. Stopping before he crossed into the region smothered by the ever-present ashfall, Reidar set to work in an agonising purgation.

Taking spines of smoking basalt in his knotted hands, he pressed them against his cuts and dug them into his boils, the Fire Wolf pressing him onwards to be forged anew along with Fenris. A process excruciating, Reidar performed it over the course of crawling hours, nearly passing out multiple times before he steeled himself to continue. This, though a saving grace from the internal threats of infection, was the tipping point, the time after this excision only bringing harder challenges to overcome. Now on an island largely without a food or water supply as tectonic upheaval began to ravage the region, the lava began to flow thicker as more spouts erupted from the earth, their herald of emergence being unpredictable earthquakes indistinguishable from tremors. Scattering both people and animals alike on Fenris in the chaos, this Season of Fire was one of the worst in living memory, as if Morkai himself was attempting to fight Lord Russ once more after his recent defeat.

As freshly made land bridges forged from the crust of the planet emerged, packs of Fenrisian Wolves and even other tribes driven from their native lands began to cross onto what was once the island; now rising above the seafloor. In the transformation of Fenris, the island had become a presence all could behold for tens of kilometres around; appearing as a silhouette of mountainous rock surrounded by Badlands of liquid stone. As each new arrival reached the highlands, a new opportunity was presented to Reidar, the tribesmen and animals fighting against one another and within their own ranks, desperate in the face of starvation and bodily drought.

As each clash happened, Reidar would stalk the warring groups waiting for the moment to strike so that he could reap some of their rewards. One after another, he pillaged the bodies and killed the remainder of the tribes whilst in unofficial accord with the wolves, the beasts picking at the scraps the animal-child would leave behind. This however is not to say that the wolves of Fenris had a pact with Reidar, for in repeated circumstances he found himself hunted by the wolves, barely managing to win the battle through sheer luck. Still, as each victory was won over the beasts, Reidar added more of their pelts to his body, forming a rudimentary armour that protected him from both the world itself and the newly arrived contenders. Weeks would pass, Reidar killing more of the foreigners.

All things cannot last however, and his killings of the roaming pack members was not unnoticed by the wider collectives. Reidar became the hunted as the wolves tightened their noose around his locale, cornering him in the centre of the infant mountains. Though the creatures did not outright kill him in their attacks due to his own defiance, it was clear it would be a death by a thousand cuts.

Resolved to die fighting, Reidar made his last stand near the volcano that still spewed forth molten rivers. Nearly dead already, he stood against the vengeful beasts, beating them away for a short time with his now ruined spear before being unable to stand from exhaustion.

*The leader of the pack, larger than the rest and raked with even more scars, approached Reidar with fangs bared.*

*He was laid against a steep slope of slate, a body of one of the pack gutted sloppily next to him, entrails spilled on the dirt. Reidar grimaced at the new challenger, growling as he weakly kicked dirt under his butchered feet. Puncture wounds lined his arms and legs from beating and stabbing the hunters, his improvised armour having yielded before the razor maws and knife-like claws of the pack.*

*The creature stopped before his face, sniffing the scent of blood and drool that caked the adolescent's face. Its jowls peeled back with a deep, mournful snarl, and its amber eyes were locked on Reidar's own, the sky in his eyes reflected the visage of the beast. Reidar spat in its face, cursing it weakly under his breath. It lunged, but then it tumbled to the side, the motion done in a blur indiscernible to the mortal's eyes.*

*Something huge clad in dark grey armour got up from the crumpled body of the once-alpha, its spine snapped in half by the sheer power of the impact. It drew an axe from the strange humming pack on its back, the size of it the height of Reidar. The mysterious warrior clicked a button on it, standing between the rest of the pack and the wounded child as the weapon screamed a horrible cacophony of noise. The wolves hesitated, but the giant figure didn't.*

*Lunging, it began to tear the rest of them to pieces in an display of cruel butchery.*

The strange warrior revealed himself as Joskaerr Coal-Sash, Consul-Opsequiari of Lord Russ' legion. The news was bewildering to Reidar. He had heard of the fighters that accompanied the god-like hero Leman Russ, but none he had ever heard of possessing the same kind of power, weaponry and armour that this one did.

Saved from certain death, Reidar held a life-debt to his saviour, and that he would fulfil in service to the Emperor.

### Ways of War

Primal ferocity is that which gives the Space Wolves their power in combat, yet it is how they use it which is what defines their own style. Reidar is no exception. Choosing a different expression to the intent and energy within, the Dawn-Walker is famed for his cold, focused brutality, not in the slightest following some of his other brethren into displays of bravado or uncontrolled rage. Reidar, like the wolf, stalks his foe before engaging in the duel, circling and observing them in a defensive stance with his shield at the fore. Watching them for their weaknesses, their styles themselves and even their moods, Reidar only strikes once the foe has done so first, absorbing some damage before unleashing it tenfold.

What follows next is a torrent akin to the waves of a ruthless storm. One hit after the next, Reidar is unceasing in his strikes, giving no room for recovery and using all of his might behind each of his blows; be they delivered from *Tennr, Bulwark or* even the *Gauntlets of Morkai* themselves. Reidar's attacks are described as winding and unceasing even when blocked or parried, his assault never ending until your death, and it is said that when blades are met with the Dawn-Walker that your bones themselves shatter under his strength.

As a result of his youth, gene-seed and personally developed resilience however, Reidar can truly keep striking or taking blows for hours on end; his mind unwilling to let the aches and screams of his body interrupt his duel. In the event he is truly backed into a corner, this kind of torrential wrath is transformed into that of a desperate beast faced with death. Foregoing any defence, Reidar will unleash everything he has, tapping into the creature within him that is constantly suppressed. Though an impressive and deadly thing, this kind of fighting will leave Reidar without any hope of defending against further attacks, gassed of all his energy and totally focused on the attack.

#### Tennr

Reidar's primary and first received weapon in the Vlka Fenryka, *Tennr* is a bastard-type power sword, able to be used with either one or two hands depending on it's wielder's preferences. Forged as one of a dozen in the wake of Russ' founding, *Tennr* today is an incredibly rare kind of power weapon in the sixth legion due to its classless nature as a sword; the individuality of the weapon added to by Reidar over the Great Crusade.

In this light, *Tennr* possesses a wolf's head as the pommel of the handle, the guard of the weapon in fact non-existent in the tradition of the Fenrisian Blacksmiths - in similar tradition, down it's length the blade reads its own name in runic. Apart from its aesthetic and structural differences, *Tennr* is a relatively unremarkable blade whose legend is only enforced by the wielder.

#### Bulwark

Reidar's round shield, *Bulwark,* has been faithfully serving as Reidar's guard since his transferral to Mortis Zone operations at the behest of his mentor, Joskaerr Coal-Sash. Made by Reidar himself, the basis is crafted from the planks of a Fenrisian Alder, reinforced with layers of plasteel and then an adamantium rim and face. Strong and simple, *Bulwark* has weathered many would be death blows, the names of the most dire battlefields it has been wielded upon etched into the inner rim of the shield.

#### Skal-Un

The power dagger seen sheathed on Reidar's chest, *Skal-Un* is a holdout weapon that rarely sees use by Reidar in actual combat, but more often in sparring matches to challenge his own skill as well as ceremonial uses such as hunts or rituals. When *Skal-Un* is drawn in battle however, it is for the most dire of circumstances. Brought forward when the usage of other weapons is prevented or he has been disarmed, *Skal-Un* is an agile and often unexpected danger for the foe, usually drawn when they are about to deliver a vital blow.

#### Azuria

The plasma pistol that Reidar inherited from his old mentor, *Azuria* is an ancient thing by modern standards, an object long ago branded *Fabrus Excommunicata* by the precursors to the Adeptus Mechanicus. Carrying the same risks as its kindred in the 30th Millennium, *Azuria* is an unstable weapon, risking severe consequences if it is used to a large and consistent degree. Despite this fact, his own preferences of closing the gap to fight has actually meant that *Azuria* is in safe hands with Reidar, as the Space Wolf only ever uses it for the opening to an ambush or against tough foes such as Terminators, Armoured Vehicles or Witches.

#### Gauntlets of Morkai

Affixed to his armour after the events of the Battle of Kotti-Ran, the *Gauntlets of Morkai* are an ode to Reidar's calibre as Consul-Opsequari; also serving as a functional upgrade. With the complete breakdown of order within multiple packs of the sixth at Kotti-Rann, it was evident that Reidar needed to be armed with something non-lethal that could help discipline or subdue. The solution was the gauntlets. Built around shock-charge units, the embossed twin wolf heads are able to electrocute with their blows or even paralyze if the wielder wishes it.

### What Lies Without

*Archives Incomplete....*

-R