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This article, Crimson Prowlers, was written by Achilles Prime. Please do not edit or 'acquire' this fiction without the writer's permission. |
- "No one will ever know of the Blood that runs in my veins. It is no secret of the Path I have chosen to follow. The Warrior's Path. Honour is what directs my actions."
- — Fenrir Ghostclaw, Carcharoth of the Crimson Prowlers
The Crimson Prowlers are Successor Chapter that hails from the lineage of the mighty and powerful Space Wolves, created during the recent Ultima Founding in 999.M41. They were created as one of the first of many Successors, a whole line of descendant Fenrisian Chapters - the 'Sons of Russ' - capable of carving out a star empire the size of Ultramar. This was the vision: to be powerful enough to encircle the Eye of Terror completely, to prevent the Traitor Legions from daring to leave it ever again. The Crimson Prowlers, along with several other Primaris Successor Chapters, were created to help protect the Imperial sectors surrounding the Eye, and supporting Imperial worlds and the Inquisition as needed.
Like their Chapter's chosen totem - the Void Wolf - the fleet-based Crimson Prowlers have garnered a reputation as masters of void warfare. They continuously patrol around the Eye, ever-vigilant against encroaching threats from both Chaos and xenos raiders. Like apex predators, they stalk the dark depths of the void, striking their foes unexpectedly and savagely tearing them apart.
Chapter History
- "The moon is my sun, the night is my day,
Blood is my life, and you are my prey."- — A lokk of the Crimson Prowlers
Inception
The Crimson Prowlers are one of several Primaris Space Marine Chapters created from the lineage of the mighty and powerful Space Wolves, created as one of the first of many Successors. This whole line of descendant Fenrisian Chapters - collectively known as the 'Sons of Russ' - are capable of carving out a star empire the size of Ultramar. Following the end of the Horus Heresy, the Lord Commander of the Imperium, Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman, tasked Archmagos Belisarius Cawl to carry out his ultimate contingency plan - the Primaris Space Marines. Over the course of ten millennia, the rogue Archmagos continued his work uninterrupted, creating scions from the lineage of all nine Loyalist Space Marine Legions, including the feral Space Wolves. In the pursuit of his attempt to improve upon the original Space Marine template, Archmagos Cawl not only collected samples of the genomes of all twenty of the original Primarchs, including those deemed lost or as Traitors, but he also managed to refine the gene-sequence of several genetic lines, altering them to deliver the positive aspects without suffering from the genetic idiosyncrasies that plagued modern era Chapters.
From the VIth Legion, Cawl was able to create a whole line of Primaris Successors from the lineage of Russ. The Crimson Prowlers were one such Chapter. Taking recruits from the feral Death World of Fenris, Cawl successfully implanted a large intake of Fenrisian Aspirants. After receiving the rest of their genetic zygotes and organs, including several newly created Primaris organs, these newly created transhuman warriors were placed in stasis within large cryo-stasis vaults far below the surface of Mars, where they remained until such time, as the Imperium faced the darkest age in it's history. When the newly resurrected Primarch Guilliman awoke in the late 41st Millennium, he ordered Cawl to go to Mars and carry out the final stages of his ultimate contingency plan.
Thus, the newly created Primaris Chapters of the Ultima Founding were unleashed, to take the fight to the Forces of Chaos. One of these Chapters were the newly awakened Crimson Prowlers, proud inheritors of the legacy of the powerful Leman Russ. They deployed alongside the ranks of the Unnumbered Sons - formations of Primaris Space Marines created from a mixture of all nine of the Loyalist Primarchs' gene-lines, including those created from the lineage of Russ. They took part in several campaigns, preferring to fight alongside those Scions of Russ from the as-yet unnamed Dawn's Wolves. Following the end of the Indomitus Crusade sometime in the first century of the 42nd Millennium, the Unnumbered Sons were finally broken down into new Chapters. With the creation of the Dawn's Wolves, the Crimson Prowlers extended an invitation to their newly created brother-Chapter, welcoming them into the ranks of the collective known as the 'Sons of Russ', which have continued to stand eternal vigil over the worlds of the Eye of Terror.
Notable Campaigns
- "When the earth howled, the sky screamed, and the void wept blood."
- — Jarl Sigbald Kultann, Lord of Jarldom Elleve (Eleven) ("The Howling Rift")
- The Howling Rift Campaign (999.M41–001.M42) - As the final century of M41 burned into ruin, Hive World Ursbrecht XI lay on the edge of the Howling Rift, a vast and turbulent warp-canyon formed in the aftermath of the Great Rift's birth. Once a bastion of industry and Imperial might, Ursbrecht XI's moonbase colonies had become strategic lynchpins in the war for Segmentum Obscurus. But its location made it a magnet for the hungers of the xenos—and hunger came in the form of Splinter Fleet Ghorvash, a fast-moving biomorph strain that darkened the stars in clawed silence. Unlike the mindless rampages of other Tyranid organisms, Ghorvash employed cruel subtlety, drifting in sleeper tendrils through the Howling Rift and infecting systems before Imperial sensors could react.
By the time the moonbase hives of Ursbrecht XI began transmitting desperate calls for aid, it was already too late. Spore-ship nests and synapse nodes had rooted themselves beneath the crust of Lune Krag, the primary orbital colony. Within weeks, it became a hive of Tyranid breeding pits, spawning monstrous bioforms in vast, muscular chambers fed by the moon's mantle heat and the liquefied biomass of millions. Imperial attempts to assault the moons met utter annihilation, their fleet assets butchered by aerial hive-strains and bioplasma volleys fired from cavern-fused bio-artillery. The surface of the planet itself began to tremble as Ghorvash's tendrils rooted toward Ursbrecht XI's core, seeking to crack the world like an egg and feed its molten innards into the greater Hive Mind.
In response, the Crimson Prowlers were unleashed. A vanguard Chapter of the Sons of Russ, renowned for their hunting tactics and savage cunning, they had been tracking Ghorvash since its emergence in the shadow of the Rift. Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw deployed his fleet in a wide claw-arc formation, bypassing the Tyranid void screens to encircle Lune Krag in silence. Under cover of deep-space radiation storms, Reiver packs from the Svartrlogi, Ulfheljar, and Isrindr descended upon the corrupted moonbases. For two weeks, the Crimson Prowlers waged a ghost war through the hollowed catacombs and subdermal spawning layers - slaying Broodlords, collapsing spore-chambers, and assassinating synapse nodes with brutal efficiency.
But the Crimson Prowlers soon realized that Ghorvash had anticipated them. Deep within Moon Nest Varnyx, a bio-construct of grotesque scale - the Kral'vyr Engine - was revealed. A synapse spire-megalith fused with tectonic plate nodes, it had begun manipulating the moon's gravitic pull, preparing to collapse it into Ursbrecht XI as a planetary-scale impactor. No evacuation was possible. Billions of civilians still fought in the hives below. Realizing the fate of an entire world hung in the balance, High Jarl Carcharoth Ghostclaw issued the unthinkable order: to fire the Ragnarok's Eye.
The Ragnarok's Eye, an ancient relic of pre-Heresy destructive engineering built into the core of the Rauðr Skikkja, was a stellar-bore lance cannon intended to crack orbital superstructures or cripple blackstone bastions. It had not been fired in a thousand years - until now. Coordinated by Iron Thane Skalddor Gloomhammer and attuned by Rune Keeper Bulveye Galecaller, the ancient machine roared. A beam of burning red plasma, channeled by magnetic war-prayers and techno-incantations, lanced from orbit directly into the core of Lune Krag. The results were apocalyptic.
The beam ignited the Kral'vyr Engine, collapsing its artificial synapse matrix and rupturing fault-lines along the moon's crust. In moments, Lune Krag cracked apart like a rotting fruit, showering Ursbrecht XI in pyroclastic lunar debris and disintegrating the Tyranid nesting zones. The gravitational cascade triggered massive tectonic shifts across the planet's crust - but rather than break the world, the aftershocks annihilated the bio-tendrils Ghorvash had seeded into its mantle. Across the globe, Tyranid creatures collapsed or screamed into ash, cut off from the Hive Mind and devoured by feedback psychic convulsions.
In the aftermath, the Crimson Prowlers emerged bloodied, but victorious. Jarl Sigbald Kultann, commander of the campaign and Lord of Jarldom Elleve (Eleven) ("The Howling Rift") host, was given the honour of planting the Fang of Night - an obsidian war-standard - into the molten ruins of Moon Nest Varnyx. The fang was said to have pulsed with residual psychic fear, drawn from the extinction scream of the Hive Mind's splinter. The Chapter lost three Jarldoms' worth of warriors in the effort, and yet the galaxy sang of their deeds for decades to follow. It was a campaign not just of survival, but of obliteration—the Crimson Prowlers didn't merely drive back the enemy. They excoriated it.
The Howling Rift Campaign became the stuff of saga, marked into the memory-stone of Fangships and inscribed upon the Rune-Walls of the Rauðr Skikkja. It was said the howls of that war could still be heard echoing through the voidstorms near the Howling Rift, where shattered moons and silent Tyranid husks drift in bloody silence - eternal trophies of the Crimson Prowlers' wrath.
- "Let none sing false praises to twisted gods in the presence of the Sons of Russ."
- — Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw, High Jarl of the Crimson Prowlers
- The Banishment of the Bleeding Saint (005.M42) – In the erratic tides of the Vortex Expanse, a howling gyre of warpstorms and gravitic anomalies bordering the Cicatrix Maledictum, the Imperium had long forsaken hope of establishing stable control. Yet this maelstrom, far from the light of the Astronomican, was not unoccupied. Amidst the star-wracked gloom dwelled the Choirs of Joyous Pain, a decadent and terrifying Slaaneshi war-cult whose fleets drifted like silvered wraiths through realspace and warp alike. Known for their exquisite cruelty and blasphemous hymnals of madness, their presence marked the defilement of entire sectors - planets falling silent in waves of pleasure-murder, their defenders turned into glassy-eyed votaries of excess.
By 005.M42, the Bleeding Saint, a daemonic entity of legendary depravity, had emerged at the center of the Choirs' spiral-path. Her followers - a fusion of mortal cultists, corrupted voidsmen, and noise-maddened Heretic Astartes - were amassing for a ritual that would permanently bind her essence to realspace. Their fleet, a nightmarish procession of gilded warships, converged upon the cursed star-fane of Xenthros-Null, an orbital ruin of pre-Heresy design where they would tear open a hole in reality large enough to enthrone their dark muse.
The lynchpin of this warhost was the Seraphine's Dirge, an ancient Emperor-class battleship retooled into a mobile cathedral of carnality and torment. Lined with gold-plated vox-screamers and decked with the flayed skin of Imperial saints, the Dirge housed the psychic choir through which the Bleeding Saint's resonance bled into realspace. The rituals had already begun, warp flares spreading from its heart like sonar pulses. Once the binding was complete, a permanent Slaaneshi warp-fissure would be opened—turning the Vortex Expanse into a domain of excess and suffering beyond even the Great Eye.
But into this madness came the Crimson Prowlers. Having tracked the Choirs of Joyous Pain since the fall of Sanctum Vaekyr, the Chapter knew the consequences of allowing the Bleeding Saint's apotheosis. Their flagship, the venerable Rauðr Skikkja ("Red Shroud") emerged from the void alongside a strike force of five warships: Svartrlogi, Isrindr, Blóðulfr, Ulfheljar, and Draugrsverd. At their head stood High Jarl Carcharoth Ghostclaw and Rune Keeper Bulveye Galecaller, wielding ancient wards of banishment torn from the sagas of Fenrisian witch-hunts. Their mission was clear: purge the Choirs, silence the Saint, and burn the heretical fleet from the stars.
The battle was cataclysmic. The Choirs unleashed psychic bombardments and sonic resonance weapons that turned ship-crew into spasming effigies. But the Crimson Prowlers fought with cold savagery. Boarding actions led by Jarl Kregga Voidwolf of Jarldom Sesx (Six) ("The Black Hunt") saw the Joyous Dawn scuttled from within. The Svartrlogi launched a burning spear of Vargyrvættr ("Wulfenkind") warriors into the Bliss-Tomb, where they shattered a ritual chamber of the Saint's warpsingers in a feral bloodbath. Amidst this inferno, the Red Shroud held the line, exchanging fire with the Seraphine's Dirge, a duel of giants amidst an opera of screams.
As the Bleeding Saint began to manifest fully into realspace - her image a glistening horror of bleeding wings and choired throats - Carcharoth gave the order. The Nova Cannon, forbidden and revered, buried deep within the Red Shroud's reactor vault, was brought online. Calibrated by Iron Thane Skalddor Gloomhammer, with psychic alignment provided by Bulveye Galecaller, the cannon was not aimed at the Dirge's weapons, engines, or bridge - but its warp-core, the beating heart of the saint's summoning. With a single apocalyptic flash, the Nova Cannon roared.
The beam punched through the void like the spear of Morkai himself. It pierced the Seraphine's Dirge from prow to stern, detonating the warp-core in a scream of unreal light and daemonic thunder. The Bleeding Saint's form shrieked as it was torn apart mid-materialisation, her cries devoured by the implosion that followed. The Choir fleet collapsed in panic—many scuttled themselves, or fell into the gravity wells of the Expanse. The Dirge disintegrated in a thunderous nova, reduced to nothing but stellar dust and howling warp-echoes.
The Banishment of the Bleeding Saint became a watershed victory - not just for the Crimson Prowlers, but for the Imperium Nihilus. The Choirs of Joyous Pain were shattered, their god-form denied, and the Vortex Expanse was spared damnation. For their deeds, the Crimson Prowlers were hailed as Wolves of the Void-Wyrm, and new tales of Carcharoth Ghostclaw's hunt were sung wherever sons of Russ gathered beneath stars both bleak and burning.
- "We do not kneel to fire; we hunt it, we wield it, and if need be—we burn with it."
- — Carcharoth Ghostclaw, High Jarl of the Crimson Prowlers, addressing the Vulcanian Circle
- The Blood-Fire Accord (006.M42) – In the wake of the Banishment of the Bleeding Saint, the Crimson Prowlers emerged as a dominant force in the Imperium Nihilus. Their decisive destruction of the Choirs of Joyous Pain had earned them acclaim, but also drew the wary eyes of other Imperial forces who questioned their unorthodox tactics, shadowy deployments, and increasingly independent operations. Chief among these were the Ember Drakes, a 3rd Founding Successor Chapter of Primarch Vulkan, whose stalwart adherence to the Codex Astartes and commitment to safeguarding civilian lives often placed them ideologically at odds with the more predatory, pragmatic Prowlers.
The point of contention emerged on the dead world of Gath'Zul's Ember, a shattered forge-colony nestled within the volcanic belts of the Ashen Lament Nebula. Both Chapters had responded to conflicting astropathic distress signals sent from the planet - one indicating a xenos infestation, the other a warp anomaly—but found only ruin and misdirection. The Ember Drakes, led by Fire Lord Tytus Xu'sia, established a relief outpost and began system-wide reconstructions, treating the signals as an echo of distress. However, Jarl Svengar Icenheart of the Crimson Prowlers claimed the world had been seeded by a sleeper cell of Alpha Legion operatives using false signals to lure in vulnerable forces for ambush. With no xenos or traitors immediately present, tensions escalated between the Chapters.
The "Blood-Fire Accord" was brokered as a means to resolve the territorial and operational conflict without open warfare - an ancient Fenrisian tradition known among some of the Primaris sons of Russ as the "diplomatic duel." This duel, conducted not with weapons or blades, but with gestures of dominance and symbols of power, was a contest of will, resolve, and presence. The Prowlers, wary of being constrained or questioned by stricter interpretations of Imperial command, saw the Accord as both a political manoeuvre and a statement of self-rule. The Ember Drakes, meanwhile, viewed it as a chance to reaffirm Imperial unity and avoid a costly conflict among the Emperor's finest.
The rendezvous occurred in high orbit over Gath'Zul's Ember. The Ember Drakes battle barge Pyroclast Aeternum, flanked by three strike cruisers, took position above the planet's equator. In response, the Crimson Prowlers arrived with a dread procession of warships - led by Rauðr Skikkja, clad in gleaming crimson and black steel and adorned with the skull of a slain Hive Tyrant. At its heart hung the weapon that had made the Prowlers infamous - the Ragnarok's Eye, the nova cannon that had annihilated the Seraphine's Dirge and silenced the Bleeding Saint forever.
In a silent display, the Ragnarok's Eye was trained - not fired - upon the Pyroclast Aeternum. Its targeting array locked for several tense minutes. No words were spoken over vox-channels. No banners were exchanged. But every sensor aboard the Ember Drake's ships registered the message clearly: We do not submit. We do not yield. We stand ready. Within the Red Shroud, Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw stood cloaked in void-leathers, arms crossed, watching through the panoramic bridge as the sable-clad ships slowly adjusted position, acknowledging the Prowlers' supremacy in this contested sphere without a single plasma flare exchanged.
The accord was struck in silence. The Ember Drakes, acknowledging the possibility of Alpha Legion trickery and the tactical relevance of the Prowlers' network of shadow-agents and pattern trackers, agreed to stand down and pull back their reclamation effort. In turn, the Crimson Prowlers offered no interference to Ember Drakes operations in the southern expanse of the Nebula and granted them full recovery rights to a cache of abandoned Mechanicus relics uncovered near the ruins of Forge-Cluster Theta-Sirr. Thus was the balance maintained—tense, cold, but resolved without blood.
Though no weapons were fired, the Blood-Fire Accord would be recorded in the Crimson Prowlers' saga-stones not as a negotiation, but a victory of will. The use of Ragnarok's Eye was deemed controversial in wider Imperial circles, but within the Sea of Stars and across the blackened warfronts of the Imperium Nihilus, it sent a clear warning to all: the Prowlers would not be tamed by decree, nor shackled to the strictures of the Codex. In the dark, they hunted - and when needed, they roared. In time, this encounter would be seen as a turning point. The Crimson Prowlers, while still loyal sons of the Emperor and Russ, cemented their identity as nomadic apex predators, Chapter-law unto themselves. The Ragnarok's Eye would never fire again...but it would be aimed many times in the years that followed.
- The Múspellsheimr Excoriation (010.M42) - In the dark years following the destruction of Cadia and the catastrophic birth of the Great Rift, the Imperium Nihilus was left isolated, fractured, and vulnerable. Countless worlds were consumed by warp storms or overrun by the Archenemy. Amid this chaos, the Helheim System - domain of the Bloodied Hunters Chapter - was swallowed in a tide of madness. At the heart of the system, the flame-wreathed death world of Múspellsheimr, home of the Chapter and seat of the fortress-monastery Eldjötnarheim, stood defiant against a mounting tide of heresy and bloodshed. For nearly a century, the Bloodied Hunters battled back incursions and hunted down emergent cults across the system, purging darkness wherever it emerged. But it was not enough. The storm was coming. The attack began without warning, heralded by a sky that bled fire and moons that wept blood.
From a warp-breach torn above the scorched moon of Vaerangr, an immense Khornate warhost burst into realspace: The Goretide Reborn, a brutal legion of warbands led by the monstrous Daemon Prince Vorgarax the Red-Fanged, once a World Eaters champion, now a daemon-lord clad in living brass. His forces were composed of heretical Astartes, mutant thralls, and entire daemon legions conjured from the hate-soaked realms of the Blood God. The system's outer worlds fell in days - Valdrholm, Brundok's Maw, and the forge-ring of Krass IV were drowned in oceans of gore. Survivors spoke of blood-furnaces and gladiatorial slaughter-pits, of entire hives turned into skull-pyramids.
The Bloodied Hunters responded with grim determination. Recalling all Great Companies currently on their Hunts, Great Hunter Ásbjorn Kveld-Úlfr declared the Oath of the Final Circle, a sacred vow to defend Múspellsheimr to the last warrior. Drop-shields blazed as ancient war-engines were awakened, and Eldjötnarheim's halls rang with the oaths of battle-brothers eager for the honour of a beautiful death. The Bloodied Hunters fought across every volcanic plain and craggy peak, their crimson-marked helms glinting in firelight as they clashed with howling Berzerkers and gore-drenched daemonkin. The skies burned with drop-pod trails, and warcries echoed across the obsidian wastes. But the tide could not be stopped.
The defenders were pushed back, system by system, until only Múspellsheimr remained unbroken. And even it stood on the brink. It was at the darkest hour, with Eldjötnarheim under siege and the Eye of Terror casting its baleful gaze overhead, that salvation came. Jarskaði Talare Ulfrich Thunderhowl of the Dusk Howlers had received fragmented astropathic warnings of the conflict. Disobeying conservative orders to remain on their border patrols near the northern Cicatrix front, the Dusk Howlers launched an unrelenting warp-push to reach Múspellsheimr. Alongside them came the Crimson Prowlers, led by Formaðr Úlfr Goði Hvoth Moonheart and Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw, arriving in blood-streaked ships like fangs cutting through the flame-choked void. These savage cousins of Fenris descended into the warzone with a fury unmatched, their arrival a clarion call that set the heavens ablaze with hope.
The battle that followed became legend - the Rite of the Three Fangs, some called it. The Dusk Howlers struck like storm-wracked wraiths, shattering Khornate artillery lines and breaking daemon packs with psychic-laced fury and thunderous melee. The Crimson Prowlers, ever the spectral hunters, harried the rear lines and struck from the ash-choked forests of Múspellsheimr like ghosts of flame and fang. The Bloodied Hunters, their fury renewed by the arrival of their kin, surged forth in a counteroffensive of primal ferocity. The three Chapters fought not as strangers but as brothers long-separated, their styles distinct but perfectly interwoven - savagery, precision, and righteous wrath in lockstep. The turning point came when Vorgarax was finally confronted beneath the shattered statue of the Emperor at the Valley of Cinders, where he was cast down by the combined might of in a duel of cataclysmic proportions.
In the wake of victory, as the ashes of their homeworld cooled and the warpstorm's grip finally slackened, the Bloodied Hunters declared a grand feast in the Great Hall of the Slain, deep within Fangspire Bastion. The three Chapter Masters - Great Hunter Ásbjorn Kveld-Úlfr of the Bloodied Hunters, Draugoloth Einar Nighthowler of the Dusk Howlers, and Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw of the Crimson Prowlers - drank deep from mead horns carved of kraken bone and swore eternal brotherhood in the light of the Allfather. They carved a pact not in ink, but in scar and oath and sacred steel, vowing to stand eternal vigil over the Eye of Terror and come to one another's aid in times of dire need. Thus was born the Sons of Russ, an unofficial but resolute confederation of Space Wolves successor Chapters who stood united by shared blood, shared war, and shared purpose. The Múspellsheimr Excoriation, though a campaign of great loss and suffering, became a forging fire through which new bonds were born. Ever since, whispers of the Three Fangs circulate across Segmentum Obscurus - grim warriors in grey, crimson, and ash-black, who carry the wrath of the Wolf King across a shattered galaxy, and howl defiance into the dark.
Recruitment Worlds
Frozen Bastion
Nestled in the black gulfs beyond Segmentum Obscurus, where even astropathic echoes are drowned in the screams of the warp, the death world of Freya turns slowly beneath a bruised and fractured sky. Freya is situated to the north-westernmost border of the Segmentum Pacificus, along the border of the Segmentum Obscurus and near the Halo Stars. The Freyan System is located to the galactic Northwest of the Eye. Freya is therefore at the forefront of the Imperium's defence against the foul denizens of Chaos. It is a world locked in eternal winter - a jagged wasteland of iron peaks, storm-churned glaciers, and oceans choked with frost floes the size of hive-cities. Temperatures plunge to -80°C in the day and lower still when the long night sets in. The winds howl with such fury that they strip the flesh from the unprotected in minutes, and the very air burns with needle-like shards of ice. It is here, amid this savage cold, that the Crimson Prowlers gather their future warlords.
Freya is a world utterly inimical to human life. Scattered human populations, descended from ancient colonists long since abandoned by the wider Imperium, cling to survival in subterranean hive-burrows hewn from the rock beneath the ice. These clans revere the Crimson Prowlers as living demigods - hunters born of steel and fire who descend from the void to test the strong, cull the weak, and carry away those rare few who survive the Rite of the Fanged Path. These trials begin when a child reaches their twelfth cycle; they are cast out into the frostlands with only a knife, a furskin, and the name of a prey-beast to claim. Those who return after seven nights - bearing a trophy and a fresh scar - are taken to Æsirhold for deeper trials. The rest are never spoken of again.
Freya's fauna is no less lethal than its climate. The Hrímúlfr, or Frost-Wolves, prowl the tundra in matriarchal packs, hunting the migratory megafauna known as Giant Stalkers - quadrupeds whose hides resist las-fire and whose blood freezes in sluggish, glittering slush. Deep within the glacial fissures, the abyssal serpents called Jörmungandyr slither through tunnels of black ice, erupting without warning to crush armored convoys or entire settlements. Some among the Prowlers believe these creatures are warp-tainted, or perhaps ancient weapons seeded by some pre-Imperial force. Whatever their origin, their bones line the feast-halls of the Crimson Prowlers, proof of their dominance over even the most unnatural apex predators.
At the heart of this death world rises the fortress-monastery known as Æsirhold - a bastion of fire and myth carved directly into the icy cliffs of Mount Skjoldheim, the tallest of Freya's peaks. Half-buried in glacial stone and half-burned by the impact of a fallen starship (rumoured to be a pre-Heresy Luna Wolves vessel), Æsirhold bristles with macro-lance batteries, storm-casters, and void-beacons visible from orbit. Its halls are lit by the crimson glow of geothermal vents and the flicker of oil-flames, and its walls are carved with the saga-runes of every Crimson Prowler ever to fall in battle. At the center of the hold lies the Hall of the Last Hunt, where aspirants are tested in ritual combat, and the bones of failed recruits are stacked high beneath the red banners of the Jarldoms.
Despite Freya's strategic value and brutal effectiveness as a recruitment world, the Crimson Prowlers have long refused to centralize their power here. The Nomad-Predation doctrine forbids such rootedness, for the Chapter was born of exile, pursuit, and the eternal hunt. Only a small garrison, composed of veterans too wounded for prolonged void service or of Throne-sworn Initiates awaiting ordination, remains to guard the hold and oversee the Trials. Freya is not the heart of the Chapter, but its whetstone - a place where blades are honed, where blood is spilled in rites older than the Imperium itself, and where the Crimson Prowlers remember what it is to be predators in the night.
Freyan Clans: The Howling Bloodlines
Though scattered and few, the tribes and clans of Freya are as vital to the Crimson Prowlers as the gene-seed that quickens their flesh. These human descendants of long-lost colonists have adapted to the world’s endless cold, their cultures forged in hardship and ritual. Though largely insular, the Crimson Prowlers honor their ancient blood-bonds with the Clans, choosing aspirants from among them and often returning victorious brothers to them in the event of death, to be burned on ice-barges beneath the stars.
Freya, in truth, is no mere recruitment world. It is a crucible - a realm where only the fiercest, most cunning, and most enduring can survive long enough to be claimed by the Crimson Prowlers. Its Clans feed the Chapter not only with warriors but with a cultural foundation steeped in myth, survival, and reverence for the eternal hunt. Æsirhold, like the prow of a starship half-buried in ice, is both a bastion and a blade - watching the void with frost-bound eyes, ever seeking prey.
The Bearclaw Clan (Björntann)
Hailing from the subterranean warrens of Thrym's Hollow, the Bearclaw are known for their immense strength, thick-boned stature, and reverence for the Sky-Fanged Father, a thunder god mythos believed to be inspired by pre-Imperial weather monitoring satellites. Bearclaw aspirants are often recruited as assault specialists or Dreadnought candidates due to their hardiness. The Crimson Prowlers maintain a pact with the Björntann matriarchs, honoring them with tribute hunts and thunder-feasts.
The Skyhowlers (Skjagál)
Nomadic clans that live on the frozen sea-floes of Grendl's Maw, the Skyhowlers worship the moons and the howl of the frost-winds. They are swift, lightly built, and extremely perceptive - qualities that lend themselves well to reconnaissance roles and infiltration-based missions. Skyhowler aspirants often become Scouts or Reivers, their speed and low-light vision honed from youth. Their spiritual leaders - wind-speakers - maintain fire-pits that burn day and night, said to be able to call down moonlight visions.
The Ironfangs (Járntennr)
Clans born within the rusting ruins of Hive Kalmarok, the Ironfangs are a grim, silent people who strip old Mechanicum war-engines for heat and survival. They venerate the machine-spirits in strange, half-forgotten rites that blend Omnissian cant with ancestor-worship. Their members tend to produce Iron Thanes and vehicle crews, and a small number of Ironfangs are seconded to the Wyrmhearth Forges as thrall-priests. Some whisper that the Ironfangs know the true name of the Vigil of Honour's machine-spirit.
The Wyrmcallers (Ormbjód)
Clad in serpentskin and bone, the Wyrmcallers are a fire-obsessed mountain people who live near the lava vents of Surtur’s Breath. Known for their warped traditions and trial-by-blood rites, they are seen as borderline heretical by many in the Imperium—but the Prowlers know strength when they see it. Their aspirants are fearless, almost mad in battle, and often form the backbone of the more berserk assault units. Their tattoos are ritually seared into the flesh with hot brands, and some claim their shamans can taste warpstorms in the air.
History of Freya
When the isolated world of Freya was initially discovered by an Expeditionary Fleet during the Great Crusade, it was deemed inimical to life, but despite the odds, descendants of the original human colonists not only managed to survive the harsh planetary ecosystem, but to thrive. The original colonists barely survived, holed up in their spacecraft against the the world's deadly elements and fauna. Only a small minority managed to learn the necessary skills to survive such a harsh and deadly world, skills that saw them through the horrors of Old Night for millennia. By the time of the Great Crusade, the surviving colonists had reverted to a feral state.
When this deadly world was rediscovered during the dawning of M31, Imperial observers found this frigid planet to be inhabited by native barbaric tribes. Their skills at surviving on Freya came to the notice of the the newly constituted Departmento Munitorum, whose purview was to maintain the Emperor's armies in perpetuity by unifying Imperial supply and recruitment structure for the Imperialis Auxilia. The logisticians of the Departmento Munitorum quickly realised the native Freyans were of hardy and strong stock, and would make excellent Imperial Army soldiers dedicated to service in some of the galaxy's most hostile planetary environments, particularly those that were sub-arctic in nature. Following the end of the Great Crusade and the Age of Darkness that followed, the majority of these regiments were wiped out due to high attrition rates. With the Imperium in shambles following the Horus Heresy, the Freyan System soon became forgotten, and the people of this backwater system were left to their own devices for ten millennia.
With the destruction of the fortress world of Cadia during the 13th Black Crusade in 999.M41, a great tear in reality occurred, ripping a titanic warp rift known as the Great Rift across the width of the galaxy, which spread from the Eye of Terror to the Hadex Anomaly on the Eastern Fringe. This allowed the denizens of Chaos to overrun several Imperial systems located near the Eye of Terror, including the worlds of the Freyan System. Though travel and communications between many Imperial system were greatly affected by the formation of the Great Rift, all was not lost.
In response to the emerging Forces of Chaos throughout the galaxy, the recently resurrect Primarch Roboute Guilliman, launched his Indomitus Crusade. He revealed his ultimate contingency plan, unleashing the gene-crafted transhuman warriors known as the Primaris Space Marines, to help aid the beleaguered worlds of several Imperial systems. One such strike force was composed of the newly created Crimson Prowlers, a Space Wolves Successor Chapter comprised entirely of Primaris Space Marines. They helped aid the beleaguered worlds of the Freyan System, breaking sieges and sweeping away the Chaos invaders to bring hope back to the desperate Imperial defenders.
A typical example of a Freyan village
The Chapter found the people who inhabited the worlds of the Freyan System to be of incredibly strong and hardy stock, and had developed superior reflexes compared to baseline humans. Testing their minds and bodies in soul-destroying trials to determine if there was any evidence of corruption caused by their isolation from the rest of humanity, the Crimson Prowlers ultimately deemed them free of deviancy or Chaotic taint. Consolidating their gains, the Crimson Prowlers found the inhospitable terrain, weather and deadly creatures of the various worlds of this backwater system provided an ideal recruiting ground for future potential battle-brothers. Claimed the worlds of the Freyan System as their demesne by right of conquest, the Crimson Prowlers built Æsirhold, the mightiest and the first of many such Chapters Holds, upon the icy death world of Freya.
Æsirhold
The mighty citadel, Æsirhold, of The Crimson Prowlers. Pictured, is Drengr Gate
The Crimson Prowlers have no Chapter homeworld, and instead opt to live within their large Crusade fleets of Strike Cruisers, Battle Barges and Escorts. They are ever vigilant, and are always ready for battle which is why they have chosen to remain a highly mobile, fleet-based Chapter. The Crimson Prowlers do establish and garrison Chapter Holds on every world they conquer or reclaim, which provide a training base for new recruits for the Chapter and to act as staging points for further Crusade fleets. On the world of Freya, located at the center of the planet's largest continent, Niflheimr ('Abode of Mist'), the great citadel of Æsirhold (the 'Warriors Hould') is hewn into the cliff face of the tallest mountain, within Freya's highest peaks, known as the Blackskull Peaks.
This mighty citadel is nearly the size of a regular fortress-monastery, and can harbour the entire Chapter when the need arises. With only a tiny fraction of the bulk of this vast peak, the faint glow of lights can be seen from afar, piercing the gathering dark of the dwindling atmosphere. The Freyan tribesmen mark this dire place with trepidation, for they believe it to be the realm of the Einherjar - the 'Sky Warriors' - as the abode of the demigods. In Freyan mythology these 'Sky Warriors' are those who have died in battle and now serve at the right hand of the All-Father Himself. This mighty peak is known as Jǫtunnheim, the 'Giant One', which is surrounded by lesser summits clustered around it. Full of precipitous drops and deep crevasses, only those who have trod their secret ways between the peaks as Aspirants, know how to safely traverse towards the Chapter's formidable citadel. The Crimson Prowlers have cunningly built some hunt-ways out of solid stone, while others are merely bridges of ice that will collapse at the slightest application of weight. Some of these ways lead true, taking a hunter from the clefts in the shadow of the summits down towards the plains far below, where their prey dwell. Others are false, leading an interloper to their doom, as they lead into the darkness of several caves inhabited by the deadly creatures of Freya, and are riddled with ice-gnawed bones, despair and their inevitable doom.
Clad in armour of immense thickness and strength Æsirhold and is cloaked by powerful void shields comparable to the mightiest Imperial Navy warship. All along the peak are concealed potent defence lasers and automated servitor gun emplacements cut into cliff face of the mountain itself. These ancient weapons are capable of blasting apart blasting apart even the most heavily armoured spacecraft from orbit. Those foolish enough to attempt a ground assault would be considered suicidal at best, as Æsirhold possesses two external gates, known as the Árvakr Gate ('Early Riser' Gate) and the Drengr Gate ('Warrior' Gate), built high up on the sheer sides of the mountain. These two gates connect at opposite ends of the internal region of the fortress known as the Svellborough ('Stronghold of Ice'). These two gates were built to overlook entirely bare approaches, made up of huge causeways of stone, each kilometres wide and worn smooth by the endless gnawing of stone by the Blackskull Peaks' high winds.
Should an enemy attempt to undertake a massed advance upon these approaches, they would provoke a massacre. Even if by some miracle an enemy was somehow able to reach one of these gates, which in themselves are formidable and colossal structures constructed of granite, adamantium and ceramite, which bristle with all manner of deadly weaponry including - twin-linked bolters turrets, static plasma cannons and missile launchers. Over its short existence, Æsirhold has stood inviolable while the Forces of Chaos have dashed themselves against it.
Notable Locations
- The Hall of the Last Hunt - The spiritual and martial heart of Æsirhold, the Hall of the Last Hunt is a great feasting and testing hall carved from obsidian and ice-stone, lined with banners of ancient campaigns and the skulls of slain war-beasts and traitor champions alike. Here, aspirants are tested before the assembled Prowlers - ritual combat, endurance trials, and oaths of iron are witnessed beneath the ever-burning Rite-Flame. The central dais, known as the Redfang Altar, holds the relic-tooth of a now-extinct abyssal drake - a creature said to have slain three early Crimson Prowlers before it was brought down in the Great Hunt of Yrdrasil's Spine.
- The Wyrmhearth Forges - Beneath the Hall lies a vast magma-warmed forge complex known as the Wyrmhearth, where Iron Thanes and mortal Forge-Wrights labor beside chained servitors and roaring combustion engines. Reclaimed from the still-burning core of the Vigil of Honour, these forges are sustained by geothermal heat and arcane machine-spirits half-placated by centuries of whispered canticles. Here are crafted the sacred bolt weapons, runeblades, and frost-rimed armour of the Chapter. The Clawborn Armoury, guarded by a trio of hulking Dreadnoughts, holds the relic weapons of the Chapter's ancient warlords.
- The Skaldcrypts - A maze of vaults and subterranean rune-chambers, the Skaldcrypts house the Chapter's saga-scrolls - etched in ferrostone or carved into the ribs of great beasts. Here, the Chapter's Rune Keepers chant the war-sagas and blood-oaths of past campaigns. Each Jarldom maintains its own vault of legends, but the deepest recesses contain scrolls from the earliest days of the Chapter's founding. Aspirants who fail their trials are sometimes offered a place as Cryptbound Skalds, tasked with maintaining the memory of those greater than themselves.
- The Fangwatch - Atop Æsirhold's tallest tower stands the Fangwatch - a star-temple, observatory, and ancient comms-array from the Luna Wolves vessel. From here, the Crimson Prowlers track the movement of traitor fleets and strange xenos signals across the void, using rune-interpreted augur lenses and constellation-chant rituals. The Fangwatch is also used for the Naming of the Claws, when a newly initiated Prowler is granted his true war-name beneath the light of Freya's twin moons.
Freyan System
The Freyan System is a frostbound star system located deep within the Void-Fang Expanse, a perilous region of Segmentum Obscurus wracked by warp-storms, stellar anomalies, and xenos incursions. Once considered marginal and near-forgotten in Imperial records, it has since become a bastion of resilience and mythic terror under the aegis of the Crimson Prowlers. The system orbits a swollen red subgiant star - Járnsol ("Iron-Sun") - whose ruddy light never warms the worlds beneath it. Many of the planets within are icebound, geologically violent, or host to strange flora and fauna. Warp riftings occasionally tear through the void-lanes, and ancient xenos wreckage is scattered in deep orbit, believed to be remnants of long-dead wars. Amid this hostile domain, the Crimson Prowlers carved out a sacred empire of war, oath, and honour. The Crimson Prowlers rule this system not as distant protectors, but as warrior-kings and god-hunters. Each of their recruit-worlds is woven into the Chapter's mythic cycle, and each bears its own beast-spirits, rites, and place in the Eternal Saga that defines the Prowlers' honour-culture.
Each secondary world sends its strongest to Freya every thirty years in a ritual called The Pack-Summons of the Iron Moon, a great celestial alignment when Járnsol dims and the blood-star Ymirheimr rises. Here, the most promising youths from Úlfrgard, Wúlfheim, and Eldjötnarheim must survive The Saga-Hunt, a rite of brutal survival and team combat under the eyes of the Úlfr Goðar, Einherjar, and Rune Keepers. Those who survive are not merely selected - they are claimed by saga, their deeds written into living myth, their spirits bound into the fabric of the Chapter's spiritual machine. Those who fail become nameless bones beneath the ice. There is no dishonour - only the certainty that not all are born to howl forever.
Departmento Cartographicae pict-file of the icy death world of Freya.
Freya - The World of Trial and Flame
Classification: Death World (Feral)
Role: Primary Recruitment World & Ritual Heart
Tithe Grade: Aptus Non
Climate: Polar-Feral with tectonic upheaval and glacial plateaus
Notable Features: The Draugrfells, The Vargyr Spines, The Iron Holt of Fenrir
Freya is the lifeblood of the Crimson Prowlers' spiritual identity - a howling death world of glacial mountain ranges, fire-choked volcanic rifts, ash-seas, and tectonic wastelands roamed by predatory megafauna. It orbits a larger gas giant, Járnviðr, and is tidally locked—one side bathed in permanent twilight, the other in eternal frost. The world is populated by tribes of feral humans who live short, brutal lives in mountain-fastnesses, frost-caves, or beneath geothermal vents. Life on Freya is constant trial: to live is to hunt, bleed, and kill. Many Freyan tribes worship the Crimson Prowlers as the gods of the sky-beasts—winged war-bringers who descend amid flame to carry away the worthy.
Each decade, the Chapter sends down Trial Packs of Astartes and Wolf Priests to test, observe, and challenge the fiercest youths. These trials are mythic contests against ash-wyrms, ice-gorgons, and one another - conducted beneath the burning skies of the Blood-Moon Eclipses. Those who survive are taken not merely as warriors, but as wyrd-blooded brothers - believed to have been born under the gaze of the Wolf-King himself. The great citadel of Æsirhold (the "Warriors Hould") is hewn into the cliff face of the tallest mountain, within Freya's highest peaks, known as the Blackskull Peaks. Here, new recruits are made, blood-oaths are bound, and the dead are entombed in howling rites of fire and song.
Departmento Cartographicae pict-file of Úlfrgard
Úlfrgard - The Crag World of Skyhowlers
Classification: Death World (High Altitude)
Role: Secondary Recruitment World
Tithe Grade: Aptus Non
Climate: Razor Crag Terrain, Lightning Storm Belts
Notable Features: The Skyfang Spires, The Hanging Cliffs, The Thunder-Haunt Peaks
Úlfrgard is a jagged world of sky-blasted mesas, highland storms, and deep-cracking cliffs shrouded in semi-perpetual lightning. Its gravity is slightly lower than Terra's, but the atmosphere is dangerously thin, and sudden thunder-tempests sweep across the plateaus like divine punishments.
Tribes on Úlfrgard are cliff-dwellers and wind-walkers, who raise massive wolves and bat-like avians to hunt and traverse the storm-haunted heights.
Combat here is three-dimensional - death comes from above as often as from the blade. The Chapter favors Úlfrgardian recruits for roles in Reiver packs, jump assault formations, and Voidborne Claws trained for boarding and air-drop assault missions. The Crimson Prowlers' presence on Úlfrgard is marked by a fortress-monastery carved into the jaw of a sky-beast fossil, known as The Maw of Kjarvik. From there, Iron Thanes and Binding Priests descend to claim the strongest and most agile candidates during the sacred ritual of the Cliff Duel, where aspirants must knock their rival from the crags without falling themselves.
Departmento Cartographicae pict-file of Wúlfheim.
Wúlfheim - The Frozen Redoubt of Beasts and Storms
Classification: Ice World (Survivor-Class)
Role: Secondary Recruitment World
Tithe Grade: Aptus Non
Climate: Sub-Zero Global Permafrost, Tundra & Ice-Locked Ocean
Notable Features: The Frozen Deeps, Beast-Tusk Ranges, The Harrowed Maw
Wúlfheim is a brutal land of perpetual frost and white death. Vast plains of tundra stretch into the horizon, dotted by mammoth-ivory cairns and ice-choked forests stalked by frost-trolls, hell-bears, and spectral fauna with no Imperial classification. Its people are nomadic war-clans, riding atop tusked megafauna or massive sleigh-beasts, waging seasonal battles over sacred hunting grounds.
Recruits from Wúlfheim are hardy survivalists, bred for endurance and pack-discipline in the face of overwhelming natural threat. They are often selected for Devastator and Siege roles, though many become Icewalkers - a specialised class of scouts and heavy-support battle-brothers who navigate extreme conditions with slow, wrathful precision.
The Chapter maintains a remote ice-bastion called Svartholl, located at the very pole of Wúlfheim, where the aurora never dims. Here, trials are conducted in the Harrowed Maw, a system of frost-caves said to connect to something far older than the Imperium. Wúlfheim's warriors fear no pain - they are taught that to freeze to death while hunting is a worthy end, but to survive it is a mark of destiny.
Departmento Cartographicae pict-file of Eldjötnarheim.
Eldjötnarheim - The Inferno World of Living Flame
Classification: Volcanic Death World
Role: Secondary Recruitment World
Tithe Grade: Aptus Non
Climate: Lava plains, magma rivers, superheated storms
Notable Features: The Fireblood Mountains, The Flame Hollows, The Burning Crucible
A world of elemental fury, Eldjötnarheim is a violent volcanic world constantly reshaped by planetary upheaval. Earthquakes, lava bursts, and ash-storms scour the surface daily. Life persists here only in hardened calderas and basalt strongholds. Its name derives from ancient Fenrisian: "Home of the Fire-Giants."
The tribes of Eldjötnarheim worship fire as a sacred predator and test their youth by casting them into the Flame Hollows, where they must hunt and kill a Burning Serpent before they suffocate. These people are fierce, temperamental, and instinctive killers—ideal candidates for Aggressor packs, assault marines, and the Furnace Blades, the Chapter's elite flame-wielding breachers. The Crimson Prowlers maintain a lava-forge bastion, the Burning Crucible, manned by Iron Thanes and Heat-Cultists of the Forge. Trials here are brutal: aspirants must retrieve a relic-iron shard from the fire rivers, and not even cry out if burned. Those who pass are said to be "kissed by the fire-jarl" - blessed by Morkai to carry wrath like flame.
Chapter Recruitment
The Crimson Prowlers recruit primarily from Freya, their sacred death world and spiritual heart, but also claim tithe rights from the fierce peoples of Úlfrgard, Wúlfheim, and Eldjötnarheim, the harsh and deadly secondary worlds of the Freyan System. These worlds, settled after the Chapter's conquest during "The Ordeal" - an ancient and brutal war of pacification - are populated by descendants of the warrior-clans of Novaya Zemlya and Niflheimr, worlds now long gone to ruin, Chaos, or Inquisition-sanctioned flame.
Each of these worlds is now tightly woven into the Crimson Prowlers' mythic cycle. Their people live by axe, claw, and blood, shaped by saga-lore, beast-worship, and the constant presence of death. Upon them walk the shadowed emissaries of the Sky Warriors - the "Choosers of the Slain." Clad in ebon-black plate and often hooded with rune-etched pelts, these grim figures are whispered to be spirits, gods, or ghosts. In truth, they are the Wolf Priests of the Chapter, watching from frost-ridged hills, volcanic ridges, or storm-beaten crags for acts of true valour.
The Chosen are not selected for strength alone - but for their madness, rage, and saga-worthiness. Those who leap into the jaws of monsters, slay ten foes to protect one kin, or laugh in the face of death itself are taken - even if their bodies are broken or dying. These fallen warriors are spirited away by the Sky Warriors into the black-bellied ships that split the heavens like fire. These youths are destined to become Einherjar - chosen sons of the Wolf-King Russ, and children of the Hunt Eternal.
The Ordeal
A young Freyan male is stunned by the approach of the Einherjar
Before they may earn the right to receive the gene-seed of the Great Wolf, all initiates undergo the first crucible of transformation: "The Ordeal." This ancient rite is conducted on Freya, upon the southern continent, a savage and shifting landscape of volcanic ridges, ash wastes, and glacial barriers. The initiate is stripped naked and given only a knife of blood-iron, forged from the scrap of ancient battle-plate and blessed by the Úlfr Goðar. He is then cast into the Wyrdshore, alone and without aid. From there, he must travel across the Barrier Range, battle through the Ash-Wastes of Grímhall, and survive the predatory beasts of the Fire-Pine Wold. His final destination lies at the southern pole: "The Obelisk," an ancient and jet-black monolith of unknown origin.
This structure, known as Morkai's Mirror by the Wolf Priests, is a psychically active relic believed to be either a remnant of ancient xenos sorcery or a buried Warp-vein scar sealed by the Emperor's own hand. It functions like a one-way soul-window - revealing to the initiate a glimpse of the Warp, and more importantly, the hatred it holds for all mortal life. Those who survive this vision are often found unconscious, bleeding from the eyes, but alive. Their hatred for Chaos burns ever deeper from that moment on.
Once recovered by Chapter thralls or Rune-marked initiates, the aspirant is sedated and the first stage of gene-seed implantation begins. The pain is unimaginable - but the survival rate is shockingly high due to the sheer natural resilience of those born on the Freyan worlds. When the neophyte awakes, it is within the Scout Hall-Barracks, conveniently placed near the Chapter's hearth-kitchens. "The Ordeal," visions, and gene-seed awakening leave them gripped by a howling, monstrous hunger - a symbolic echo of their new spiritual bond to the eternal hunt. Fed to gluttony, the initiate is then presented before the Senior Instructor - often a veteran Pale Hunter, Voidwolf, or Binding Priest - who begins the initiate's Saga of Preparation.
The Trial
The final crucible before full acceptance is known simply as "The Trial," but it is anything but simple. This exhaustive gauntlet of testing spans 13 days, 13 hours, and 13 minutes, reflecting the Chapter's sacred numerology and the binding of the Thirteen Jarldoms. The Trial includes:
- Written Sagas - Memory, lore, and tactical reason.
- Oral Rites - Honour code, tribal dialects, and myth recounting.
- Performance Acts - Weapon rituals, survival, kill trials, and combat rites.
Upon completion, the aspirant is brought to The Chamber of Silence, a pitch-dark vault lit by only one circle of searing white light. There, he stands alone as the Council—a convocation of Iron Thanes, Úlfr Goðar, Einherjar, and Rune Keepers - descends upon him with verbal assault. They hurl insults, accusations, and false judgments, designed to break his will and test his soul.
At the end, the High Jarl or his chosen speaker declares:
"You are found wanting. The sentence is death."
If the initiate breaks - he is cast out. If he remains stoic and defiant, standing resolute in the face of death itself, then his valour is judged true. He is then accepted not as a boy, but as a true son of Russ. His past name is cast aside, and he selects a new name, marking the beginning of his Saga of the Hunt.
Chapter Organization
The Crimson Prowlers are proud inheritors of Russ, and like their progenitors, they too, are structured quite differently than most Codex-oriented Chapters. In imitation of the Space Wolves, the Crimson Prowlers are organised similarly, utilising a unique Chapter stucture as well as ranks and specialist formation unique to their Chapter. The Crimson Prowlers maintain twelve Jarldoms (Great Companies), each one a veritable army unto itself, numbering many hundreds of warriors and maintain their own company armoury of wargear, equipment and vehicles (both ground and aerial attack). They are very tight-knight and value the bonds of brotherhood and kinship above all else, and maintain close ties to their fellow Sons of Russ Chapters.
Due to the wide-ranging nature of the Crimson Prowlers' mission and preferred fighting style, each Jarl's flotilla of vessels and strike craft are fully autonomous, capable of hunting alone for years if need be. However, several of these forces will gladly work in concert to harry and bring down high value targets should the need arise. Inevitably this had led to each Jarldom devoloping subtle variations in culture and fighting style. But despite their differences and being apart from one another for years at a time, the Crimson Prowlers have an unnerving (some would say uncanny) ability to conduct highly cooridinated assaults against their foes.
Officer Ranks
- High Jarl - The Chapter's High Jarl or 'Carcharoth' (Freyan for 'Red Maw') is the Crimson Prowlers' equivalent of a Chapter Master. The Carcharoth is chosen by acclamation from amongst the Chapter's Jarls upon the death of his forebear, and he will remain the Carcharoth until his own death.
- Jarl - A 'Jarl' is the Crimson Prowlers' officer who is the equivalent of a Space Wolves Wolf Lord or a Codex-equivalent Space Marine Captain who commands one of the 12 Jarldoms that comprise the full Crimson Prowlers' military force. A Jarl is always protected by a contingent of 'Varagyr' (the 'Lordsbane') specifically loyal to him. The Chapter's Great Companies are led by the 12 current Jarls, a number that includes the current Carcharoth Fenrir Ghostclaw. Much of the time the attrition rate for Jarls is fairly significant because of the Chapter's preference for close combat. However, some Jarls have managed to see their thousandth year pass in service to the Emperor.
- Thegn - A Pack Leader, known formally as a 'Thegn', is the Crimson Prowlers' equivalent to a standard Primaris Marine Lieutenant. They often act as the right hand of the Jarls by providing flexibility and helping to direct their battle-brothers in engagements. They will often lead part of a Jarldom when it is divided into two 'Packs' (Battle Demi-Companies) in order to spread their forces across multiple combat zones.
Specialist Ranks
- Úlfr Goði - Úlfr Goði (translated in Low Gothic as 'Wolf Priest') are a unique officer class within the Chapter. A combination of the roles of Chaplain and Apothecary found in other Chapters, the Úlfr Goði administer to the physical and mental well-being of the Chapter's warriors and also chooses the Aspirants for the Chapter from among the feral barbarian tribes of Freya.
- Sváfnirmaðr - Sváfnirmaðr (translated in Low Gothic as 'Slayer Man' or simply 'Baneman'; an executioner) is a unique specialist rank akin to a Chaplain-in-training who is assigned a role similar to a standard Primaris Judiciar. Not only are these hand-selected warriors chosen for their martial skill but for their undying faith in their gene-sire, Leman Russ, and the Allfather. Once they are selected, these chosen warriors assume a vow of silence. They preach to their fellow wolf-brothers through their valorous deeds and by slaying the strongest adversaries on the field of battle. When they march into the fray a Sváfnirmaðr wields an arcane device known as a Tempormortis, an hourglass-shaped device that is used to slow the progression of time in a limited area around an enemy unit, allowing them to kill their foes with ease. They make short work of their prey with immense Executioner Relic Blades, decapitating both heads and limbs from the bodies of those unfortunate foes who have the misfortune of crossing their paths. Once they have proven themselves worthy of having their deeds told in their Chapter's sagas, only then are they accepted to assume the role of a full-fledged Úlfr Goði.
- Rune Keeper - The Crimson Prowlers do not possess Librarians as such because of their great abhorrence of psychic abilities, which they equate with foul sorcery; instead, the Chapter maintains a number of Rune Keepers (known also as a 'Keeper of Runes') -- potent psykers who examine the minds of all Aspirants to the Chapter for any sign of Chaotic taint or treachery. Armed and equipped differently from Librarians, Rune Keepers do not wear psychic hoods and do not always carry force weapons, what the Crimson Prowlers prefer to call Runic Weapons. The Rune Keepers, however, are actually quite potent psykers in their own right and as fierce warriors as any man born of Freya.
- Iron Thane - The Iron Thanes are the Chapter's equivalent of Techmarines. Sent off for training at Mars with the Adeptus Mechanicus like all Techmarines, the Iron Thanes maintain the Chapter's equipment and forge all necessary replacement wargear. These 'Priests of Iron' are traditionally attached to the Carcharoth's Company and re-assigned to other fighting forces on a situational basis. Iron Thanes also have a place in the transformation and initiation of new recruits.
- Einheri - Chapter Champion equivalent, 'Einheri', means 'great champion' in Freyan Juvyk.
- Hreystimaðr - Company Champion equivalent, the title 'Hreystimaðr' means 'valiant warrior' in Freyan Juvyk.
- Merkiberar - Standard Bearer equivalent, a 'Merkiberar' means 'bearer of the standard' in Freyan Juvyk.
Line Ranks
- Claw Leader - A Claw Leader is the Crimson Prowlers' equivalent to a standard Space Marine Sergeant, who leads a 'Claw' (Squad).
- Wolf Brother - Known formally as 'Draug Bróðir' (translated from Freyan as 'Wolf Brother') are a Battle-Brother equivalent.
- Wolf Scouts - Scout Marine equivalent.
- Pup - Neophyte equivalent.
- Young Blood - Known formally as 'Droengiar' (singular 'Dreng'; translated from Freyan as 'Young Bloods') they are an Aspirant equivalent.
Specialist Formations
- Sons of Ymir - The Dreadnoughts of the Crimson Prowlers are generally ancient and wise warriors, who spend a great deal of time in dreamless sleep beneath Æsirhold. These were the first Terran and Fenrisian Aspirants of initial candidates who were inducted into the Primaris Project and eventually became the first Primaris Space Marines. Many of them can still recall when Russ still walked amongst men and of his powerful presence when they first boarded the transports that ferried them to the flesh labs beneath the surface of Mars. These venerable brothers are only awakened from their deep slumber in times of great need. These Dreadnoughts sometimes even lead forces of their fellow Astartes into battle in the absence of another capable war leader, or sometimes in deference to their ancient wisdom and extensive tactical experience.
- Deathsworn - Over time, as a Crimson Prowlers Pack takes casualties and gain experience, they pass through the ranks, and eventually the last few survivors make it into the vaunted ranks of the Varagyr. However, sometimes a Pack will suffer particularly harsh casualties, leaving a lone survivor who has not yet earned a place amongst the Lordsbane. These lone warriors are known to possess an air of vengeance and doom, for the horrors of witnessing their kin being cut down in the heat of battle causes many of them to become something hollow and murderous beyond reason. As vengeance incarnate, these so-called 'Deathsworn' are possessed with an all-consuming impulse to kill and kill again, and will stop at nothing to avenge their fallen kinsmen. Consumed by a strange blood-soaked ennui, they are driven to hurl themselves into suicidal assaults against the most monstrous foes or worthy enemies, intent on either earning great glory on behalf of their slain packmates, or earning a magnificent death in glorious battle. Only through their deeds of incredible heroism or sacrifice can such warriors atone for the 'sin' of survival and restore honour for his dead kindred. A small minority of those who succeed in their suicidal quests for atonement and survive are accepted into the Varagyr, while the rest have at least earned an honourable death in combat like their fallen packmates.
Wolf Packs
Crimson Prowlers Landayvan (Aggressors) and Gnarled Fangs (Veterans) of Jarldom For (Fourth) in battle.
Like their genetic forebears, the Crimson Prowlers utilise small tactical formations known as Wolf Packs which are comprised of specialised units and formations. They are often made up of a single squad of warriors or a small combined taskforce. The Crimson Prowlers have four primary types of Packs in the Chapter, including; the Wolf Claws, Pale Hunters, Gnarled Fangs, and the Lordsbane. There are also Wolf Scouts, who are an oddity amongst the Adeptus Astartes.
- Varagyr - The Varagyr ('Lordsbane') are the chosen warriors of the Carcharoth, hand-picked from his own Jarldom to form his personal Honour Guard and close companions in war and council. In battle they are a terrible sight to behold, a tide of Terminator Armour-clad hulks with beast skins draping their massive battle-plate, propelled by their transhuman strength and animalistic ferocity. Crashing into the battle-lines of their foes, they crush and kill their enemies before even drawing their fearsome blades to strike, anointing themselves in the blood of the vanquished.
- Kingsguard - Each Jarl maintains a cadre of elite Hearth Guard, comprising the very finest of the warriors under his command. Fenrir Ghostclaw is no exception, and maintains perhaps the largest Varagyr of all the Jarls, counting among its number many of the greatest warriors in the entire Legion. Ghostclaw's Varagyr is so large that it is split into several smaller Packs, many of which have earned great renown for their deeds, yet when they gather for war at the Red Maw's side they are collectively known as the Kingsguard. These Champions of Freya, the "Bloody Wolves of Ghostclaw," are always at the Carcharoth's call, accompanying him into every battle and commanding his armies when the needs of war call him away. Ghostclaw's Kingsguard defend him with their lives, and slay without mercy those who would raise blades against the master of the Crimson Prowlers. They are the shield and sword of the Carcharoth, fending off enemy attacks before landing the killing blow. To face the Kingsguard of Freya in battle is to face death itself.
- Gnarled Fangs - Gnarled Fangs are those few Primaris that have seen centuries of service in the Allfather's name. Proud and wise, hoary with age, they are endowed with lengthened canines that continuously grow as they age. Amongst their younger peers they command both awe and respect and are held in high esteem, even amongst the senior ranks of the Chapter. There are relatively few Gnarled Fangs within the Chapter as Crimson Prowlers often die in battle before reaching their first century of service, due to the violent nature of their existence. These stalwart warriors are known to stand fast in the face of overwhelming odds even after all others have fled or been slain.
- Pale Hunters - If a Wolf Claw survives the brutality of endless conflicts long enough, they eventually mature into seasoned Astartes and promoted to the ranks of the Pale Hunters. These are Veteran Astartes are the equivalent to a Chapter's Tactical Marines. The Pale Hunter packs form the bulk of the Chapter's warriors. These packs function as compact individual warbands that are largely exempt from the reliance on direct commands from higher. They are expected to deal with myriad challenges on their own if needs be, and above all to close with the enemy on their own terms - to seek and destroy. Like their genetic forebears, the Pale Hunters are deadly hunters who favour bloody, relentless wearing down of a foe, much as their namesake of Terran lore. In battle, no quarter or honour is offered to their prey, for their fate is one of remorseless cruelty after which death seems as a blessing to many.
- Wolf Claws - Wolf Claws are those newly inducted Astartes of the Crimson Prowlers Chapter and the equivlent to a Chapter's Neophytes or Scout Marines. Notoriously savage and fiercely aggressive, these young Astartes still struggle with the spirit of the wolf within. Hot-headed and impetuous, they bay for the blood of their foes, and are eager to get to grips in blood-soaked close-quarters combat in order to prove themselves in the eyes of their older brethren. The Wolf Claws serve as the Chapter's shock troops and spearhead the majority of their assaults. If they manage to overcome their bloodlust and survive the rigours of endless conflict, they eventually mature and become capable warriors, and are eventually raised to the veteran ranks of the Pale Hunters.
- Bloodied Hunters - A subset of the Wolf Claws, this specialist unit is made up those Wolf Claws who are culled to become part of swift, hard-hitting, lightning assault force comprised of bike squads or land speeders. Well-suited to this role, Bloodied Hunters are tasked with relentless pursuit of tracking down and slaying particularly dangerous prey. Often, Bloodied Hunters will act as the eyes and ears of their Chapter in the field. They are also utilised for scouting missions and hit-and-run attacks deep behind enemy lines. The opportunity to sow massive amounts of destruction is too good of an opportunity for a Wolf Claw to pass up, therefore, they perform their duties with particular relish when granted the opportunity to do so.
- Void Claws - The Void Claws are another subset of Wolf Claws. This specialist unit is composed of those troublemakers from each Wolf Claw pack whose stubborness and headstrong character have earned them the dubious 'honour' of being rewarded by reassignment to a Void Claw Assault Pack. These jump pack-equipped heavy assault units perform the duties of a typical Primaris Inceptor Squad. Void Claws are granted the use of Mark X Gravis variant, void-hardened battle plate and equipped with a specialised heavy jump pack design which features duel cylindrical main thrusters and lateral manoeuvring jets. Armed with a pair of formidable Assault Bolters, the Void Claws operate primarily in the most hazardous and desperate spheres of warfare such as boarding actions amid the cold void of space and the forlorn hope of the first wave of attackers into a breached fortress. Such hazardous duty often proves lethal beyond endurance, even for warriors of the Primaris Space Marines. Despite the risks and the inherent danger associated with being a Void Claw, this offers a young warrior with the opportunity to indulge in their desire to charge headlong into the thick of battle. Bound and determined to prove themselves in the eyes of their elder brethren, Void Claws are unafraid and uncaring, soaring fearlessly into the skies or the freezing void of space, taking great joy in plunging into the enemy's midst and watching them crumble beneath their relentless tornado of firepower.
- Landayvan - The Landayvan ('Layers of Waste') are the equivalent to the standard Primaris Space Marine Aggressors and Hellblasters. They are heavy combat support specialists tasked with long-range fire support and are outfitted with modified suits of Mark X Gravis Pattern battle-plate, refitted to carry shoulder-mounted missile launchers that can be automatically reloaded from internal stores within their battle-plate. They also wield Flame Gauntlets that unleash blazing streams of promethium upon any foes foolish enough to face them in close-quarters. The Landayvan wade into oncoming enemies, able to mow a bloody path through even the largest of hordes. These deadly battle-brothers are often concentrated within the Chapter's siege warfare and artillery assets of a Jarldom. Other Landayvan are armed with Mark III Belisarius pattern Plasma Incinerators, and serve a similar combat function as the ancient Legion Tactical Support Squads of the ancient Legiones Astartes. They provide relentless covering fire to their battleline and close support brethren. This could be in the form of assassination of prime targets, counter-battery volleys, or the destruction of enemy armour. Through target selection, marksmanship, and the timely application of firepower, the Landayvan have often turned the tide of battle and snatched victory from the jaws of defeat.
- Wolf Scouts - There are those amongst the Crimson Prowlers who are wanting of brotherhood and instead prefer working in small elite cadres. These Primaris Space Marines are selected to become part of a Jarldom's Wolf Scout forces. These combat specialists are utilised in the role of Reiver Squads, and are tasked with reconnaissance, infiltration and lightning assaults. Specially trained and equipped to launch brutally effective and unexpected assaults, it is their primary role to identify and take out an enemy's command structure, its warlords, officers, priests, demagogues, or whatever form an enemy's commanders take, and slay them with a well-placed bolt round or their deadly, sharpened combat knives or power swords in close combat, while the chaos of battle rages around them. Unlike other Chapters who utilise raw Neophytes in this role, Wolf Scouts of the Crimson Prowlers are already veteran warriors. Each member of these Wolf Scout squads are outfitted in Mark X Reiver Power Armour. The suit's lighter-weight ceramite and streamlined design allow for greater mobility, and its servo-motors are engineered to be completely silent. Above all else, Wolf Scouts depend on stealth and secrecy to accomplish their missions, something that is normally anathema to the Sons of Russ, but whose function has been deemed a necessary evil, and has often times proven to be a highly effective tool of war.
The Wulfenkind
Crimson Prowlers Vargyrvættr Pack Mate Mórðvígvaldýr, Ferocious Hunter of the Blood-Red Rift, assigned to Jarldom Dekk-Tra (Thirteen).
- Vargyrvættr - The Vargyrvættr ('Wolf-Spirit') or 'Wulfenkind' are those Crimson Prowlers Wolf Brothers who have succumbed to the dark spirit and bestial nature that resides within the genetic legacy of those who hail from the lineage of the Wolf King. The Canis Helix invests those of Russ' Get with the acute predatory senses of the wolves native to their homeworld of Fenris, but this gift comes at a price: the Curse of the Wulfen. Those brothers who succumb to the curse degenerate into monstrous, malformed lupine-like Astartes, in most cases during their initial trials of induction. The Crimson Prowlers' harsh induction regime generally ensures that these individuals perish at an early stage in the process. However, in others, the curse might take many years to manifest, usually in the heat of battle.
Those brothers touched by the Were are banded together into the Jarldom Dekk-Tra (Thirteen), where their feral ferocity can be brought to bear en masse, as well as being contained for the safety of their fellow warriors of the whole Chapter.
When night falls the Wulfenkind are unleashed. Mournful howls emanate from the shadows, piercing the night, chilling the blood of their enemies and freezing them in their tracks. Answering calls sound in all directions, yet their source cannot be ascertained. The rearmost ranks of the foe are then dragged into the shadows, as their comrades open fire in all directions into the gloom. Soon more are set upon by the unseen enemy as the sounds of ripping, tearing and screaming can be heard.
As the last vestiges of discipline fail the remaining defenders are pounced upon by massive wolf-like creatures that hail from their darkest nightmares; their anatomies altered by the strange curse that assailes their bodies and souls alike. With fangs bared and claws outstretched, the doomed foe is savagely torn apart in a hail of blood and gore, leaving a bloody abattoir in their wake.
Perfectly adapted for the violence at hunt's end, these feral warriors are further girded for war by the Chapter's Iron Thanes, the Wulfenkind bear potent artefacts; stormfrag launchers hurl explosives into the midst of the foe, sewing panic and disorder, as these bestial creatures lash out with crackling claws, axes and hammers.- Jǫtunnvargyr - The Jǫtunnvargyr ('Jǫtun Wolf') are a subset of the Sons of Ymir whose spirits have become stained by excesses on the battlefield and unwarranted savagery. Even near death and interred in a Dreadnought sarcophagus, a warrior may yet succumb to the Curse of the Wulfen. Joints and servos twitch and spasm like a crazed animal's muscles as these Wulfen Dreadnoughts seek to maul and eviscerate. From emitters, baleful howls blare its rage and mindless hunger for violence, their chilling howls unleashing the inner beast in nearby sons of Russ. The Jǫtunnvargyr are hunters, lurching forward with massive Great Wolf Claws, axes and storm bolters, ripping foes apart with inhuman speed.
On the rare occasion when these fell brothers are loosed upon the enemy, the slaughter they leave in their wake is beyond anything a Crimson Prowlers warrior has ever seen, even by senior wolf brothers during their long lifespans. Scores of the enemy are left dead in the time it takes one to blink. All that remains is gore and ravaged piles of meat. When the Jǫtunnvargyr fight, the fury of the Primarch is upon them, for nothing else can surely match it.
These infamous war engines' stories are filled with ill omens, blood and death. Often, many of these warriors already possessed sagas relating deeds darker than most of their fellow wolf-brothers in pursuit of the foe. As a result, they have become gripped by the savage and unrelenting spirit of the beast within and become subsumed by the Spirit of the Wulfen. They are then assigned to the ranks of the Vargyrvættr ('Wufenkind').
Though these ancient warriors are valued for their great prowess in combat and always afforded the respect all Sons of Ymir are due, they are always looked upon as troublesome and ill-omened allies at best by the warriors of the Jarldoms. Due to this fact, they are never fully trusted as is normally due to such living ancients amongst the Get of Russ.
- Jǫtunnvargyr - The Jǫtunnvargyr ('Jǫtun Wolf') are a subset of the Sons of Ymir whose spirits have become stained by excesses on the battlefield and unwarranted savagery. Even near death and interred in a Dreadnought sarcophagus, a warrior may yet succumb to the Curse of the Wulfen. Joints and servos twitch and spasm like a crazed animal's muscles as these Wulfen Dreadnoughts seek to maul and eviscerate. From emitters, baleful howls blare its rage and mindless hunger for violence, their chilling howls unleashing the inner beast in nearby sons of Russ. The Jǫtunnvargyr are hunters, lurching forward with massive Great Wolf Claws, axes and storm bolters, ripping foes apart with inhuman speed.
Order of Battle
Like their progenitors, the Crimson Prowlers maintain their genetic forebear's unique organisational structure, consisting of 12 Jarldoms (Great Company equivalent) which contain battle-brothers of varying and often irregular strengths. Each Jarldom is based upon their own vessel of their mighty Chapter fleet, with the massive Apocalypse-class Battleship, Red Shroud, serving as the Chapter's mobile fortress-monastery and command vessel of the Carcharoth himself. Each of these Jarldoms is led by a Jarl, equivalent to a standard Space Marine Captain, who answers only to the High Jarl, the Carcharoth of the Crimson Prowlers.
Each of these Jarldoms is a fully self-contained, autonomous military force with all the troops, vehicles and wargear necessary to wage war, as well as possessing the spacecraft and necessary sub-orbital aircraft required to transport its troops and vehicles and launch planetary assaults when needed. Observers have reported that the Crimson Prowlers prefer the deployment of orbital interface craft, as their chosen realm of warfare is cold, lightless depths of the void. Self-reliant and headstrong, these autonomous formations maintain their own forges, traditions and customs. The size of each Jarldom varies in size and fluctuates rapidly due to attrition or extensive long-range deployments.
Carcharoth's Jarldom
The Jarldom of Fenrir Ghostclaw is fanatically loyal to its charismatic and cunning leader. Each warrior is extremely proud of his link to the supreme lord of the Chapter, and constantly vies with his peers for The Red Maw's favour. Fenrir firmly believes that a battle can be carried by a few heroes in the right place at the right time.
As of 999.M41, this is the current disposition of the Carcharoth's Jarldom, known as the "Champions of Freya":
Jarldoms
As of 999.M41, this is the current disposition of the Space Wolves' Great Companies and their Jarls:
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| Jarldom Dekk-Tra (Thirteen) ("Morkai's Chosen") | ||||
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Chapter Gene-Seed
The gene-legacy of Russ is proudly borne by the Crimson Prowlers. However, their gene stock appears to be stable and displays some interesting qualities. With the introduction of the genetic material from the Freyan warriors, the genome seems to have inherited their savagery and thirst for war as well as their more positive traits of steadfast loyalty. As proud inheritors of Leman Russ, they feel a strong sense of kinship with all those who share the Wolf King's genetic legacy. Like their forefather, they exhibit keen senses and instinctive aggression of born hunters, and though they rarely show the fiery emotions that mark out many of their kind, the Crimson Prowlers' struggle to contain their inner beast is no less intense.
With the advent of Primaris technologies first introduced to the Space Wolves it was hoped by the Chapter's Wolf Priests that the inherent bestial genetic flaw - the so-called 'Curse of the Wulfen' - would finally be overcome. It was their fervent hope that within the physiology of the newly received Primaris reinforcements presented to their Chapter, they would finally find the key to overcoming the unique effects of the Canis Helix. However, this was not to be, as after several decades many Crimson Prowlers warriors, like those unnumbered Space Wolves before them, were prone to becoming overwhelmed by their inner savagery during the heat of battle and descend into a berserk frenzy. For some, this state is only temporary and subsides after combat ceases; for others the transformation is irrevocable and complete. They transform fully into the feral lupine-like creatures known as Wulfen, and serve the Crimson Prowlers within squads of these fell creatures from that point onwards.
Chapter Combat Doctrine
- "The wolf begins to circle it's prey. Claws of black steel...
...fur as dark night.
Eyes glowing red...
...jewels from the pit of hell itself.
The giant wolf sniffing...
...savoring the scent of the meal to come."- — From the Freyan sagas.
As an itinerant hunting force that stalks the Sea of Stars, the Crimson Prowlers are innate huntsmen that prey from the shadows, encircling their foe unseen, until they are surrounded. Savoring the kill to come, without warning, they pounce upon their unsuspecting prey and tear their throats out. This strategem is reminiscent of the pack tactics utilised by the Fenrisian Wolves of their Progenitor's homeworld of Fenris.
Like their fellow Space Wolves Successor Chapter - the Wolfspear - the Crimson Prowlers were formed in order to be cast like the legendary Spear of Russ deep into the Imperium Nihilus and other forsaken reaches. They were also tasked with ranging far ahead of the main body of the Indomitus Crusade fleets in order to bring the Emperor's wrath to those benighted worlds that had fallen to the depravity and degradations of the Ruinous Powers since the formation of the Great Rift; a potent and deadly weapon during Mankind's darkest hour.
Arriving upon a world as a vanguard strike force ahead of other Imperial forces and agents, the Crimson Prowlers strike out on their own, seeking out and severing the chains of command, destroying the foe's deadliest assets and sowing destruction and chaos behind the enemy's lines. The Crimson Prowlers often endeavour to be the initiator of combat actions and prefer not to fight on the defensive. They attack without warning, penetrating deep into enemy lines before launching a devastating close range assault. It has been observed that this Chapter prefers to attack during the hours of darkness, where the element of surprise can be used to greatest effect, but even in the daylight hours, its ambushes and infiltrations have proven decisive in a number of engagements.
As the sun sets, bestial howls pierce the night all around an enemy's position. Casting glances in all directions, the Crimson Prowlers drag their prey into the shadows, picking off the enemy one at a time. Military discipline quickly breaks down as those that remain begin to fire their weapons on full automatic, emptying entire magazines into the gloom as they are set upon by the unseen enemy. Eventually, those sentries that have gone missing are found by their fellows, their bodies savagely ripped open or raked by savage claws.
It has been observed by few Imperial forces, that the Crimson Prowlers seemingly draw unnatural sustenance from the fear elicited from their foes. While it is true that the scent of panic does indeed stoke the cold fires in the Crimson Prowlers' eyes and intensifies their battle lust, they view the tormenting of their enemies as simply a means to an end, deriving no pleasure from it; the more fearful the prey, the more easily they can be outwitted and slain.
Chapter Beliefs
- "Fear not death, for the hour of your doom is set, and none will escape it."
- — Freyan Proverb
Although some considered the Crimson Prowlers of being comprised of nothing more than a bunch of uncouth and uncultured barbarians, in reality, nothing could be further from the truth. These fierce Astartes proudly carry on the traditions of Freya's highly ritualistic and distinctive culture. Much of their martial traditions are still maintained by the Crimson Prowlers, even after their induction into the ranks of the Chapter. Crimson Prowlers' Astartes constantly vie with one another, yearning to achieve the most victories or the highest kill tallies, in order to impress the Chapter's more venerable members, constantly striving to earn a place within the Chapter's sagas. Like the feral tribesmen they recruit from, the Crimson Prowlers value personal honour and physical strength at arms over all. Many Crimson Prowlers prefer to challenge enemy commanders to single combat in order to test themselves against the mightiest of enemies. Crimson Prowlers often seek out single combat with a foe they consider worthy of the honour, although more than a few Veteran Marines and commanders have fallen against particularly dangerous opponents this way.
Crimson Prowler Inceptor of Jarldom Elleve (Eleventh) during an aerial assault.
Thus, the Battle-Brothers of the Crimson Prowlers Chapter are known to exhibit a fierce resolve in the face of overwhelming odds and display an unstoppable drive to test themselves against all who would stand before them. Perhaps this feature of their character is a result of the beliefs instilled in each before he has even joined the Chapter, for the warrior tribes of Freya are fearsome and resolute indeed. The Crimson Prowlers feel an inherent need to punish the former Astartes of the Traitor Legions.
Freyan beliefs hold that when a warrior of Freya has proved his worth or is slain in glorious battle that they will earn a place amongst the honoured ranks of the Einherjar - the fell-spirits of the warriors who died in glorious battle and were raised from the dead; chosen to continue fighting by the side of the Emperor, (whom Freyans refer to as the 'All-Father') against the enemies of Mankind. According to the ancient Freyan sagas the 'All-Father' will face Hel (Chaos Undivided), the Goddess of Death and the underworld, and her other four aspects (lust, wrath, plague and transformation) and her daemonic hordes during the final days of all of creation, known as Ragnarök ('End-Times'). It is every Freyan's fondest wish to be judged worthy enough to join their God-Emperor in eternal battle.
Notable Crimson Prowlers
- Carcharoth (High Jarl) Fenrir Ghostclaw, "The Ash-Mantled King," "Lord of the Crimson Hunt" - High Jarl Fenrir Ghostclaw, known as Carcharoth to his foes, is a warlord of terrible renown and savage wisdom, the supreme commander of the Crimson Prowlers. A Primaris of the first wave of Ultima Founding, Ghostclaw quickly rose through the ranks due to a unique combination of feral instinct, tactical brilliance, and an uncanny spiritual resonance with the old sagas of Fenris. His personal saga is recorded in blood and ash - each victory more brutal than the last, yet all steeped in grim purpose.
Clad in modified Terminator Armour draped in the blackened pelts of warp-mutated direwolves, Ghostclaw wields the Claw of the Void Hunt, a relic power claw said to channel the hunger of the Great Beasts slain during the Fall of Shardheim. His helm, adorned with spectral wolf-ivory and ritual runes, grants him the appearance of a ghost-stalker - half man, half myth. His battle cry, "Blood to the Hunt, Death to the Unworthy," is enough to send entire traitor regiments into panicked retreat. Despite his ferocity, Ghostclaw is no mindless berserker.
He is known for his patience, often orchestrating feints and encirclements before striking like the jaws of Fenris itself. He believes the Prowlers are not merely warriors but the last avatars of old Fenris, born again in the black of space. His rule is ironbound but guided by the voices of his council, and his loyalty to Russ is matched only by his bond to the living mythos of his Chapter.
- High Rune Keeper Skalddr Draugerstone, "The Voice of the Wyrd," "Howler of the Dead Wind" - Rune Keeper Skalddr Draugerstone is the spiritual fulcrum of the Crimson Prowlers - seer, shaman, and guardian of the saga-rites. A towering, gaunt warrior whose presence chills even the bold, Draugerstone bears a face wreathed in storm-tattoos and a voice that echoes with arcane weight. His eyes are pale as glacier-ice, said to have looked into the Well of the Wyrd and returned with forbidden truths. Draugerstone speaks the ancient runes of Fenris as if they were fire and iron. He wields Stormhowl, a staff crowned with a living shard of psychically-reactive frost-crystal, torn from a warp-ice moon during the Campaign of the Six Wounds.
The High Rune Keeper is known for casting fate-winds before battle, marking warriors with charcoal and blood, foretelling whether they shall rise as heroes—or die as sagas. Even the High Jarl defers to his counsel before a war of annihilation. His chambers aboard the Frostmark, the Chapter's mobile rune-sanctum, are filled with whispering relics, skulls of long-dead Jarls, and preserved pages of vellum inked with flame-script. Draugerstone is said to commune with the spirits of the Primarch's slain wolves and walk the dreams of his kin to hunt the truth. He is the one who names the Chapter's rites, songs, and future leaders—and when he howls, even the Immaterium listens.
- Formaðr Úlfr Goði (High Wolf Priest) Hvoth Moonheart, "The Keeper of Souls," "Shepherd of the Blooded Dead" - High Wolf Priest Hvoth Moonheart is the Chapter's Formaður Úlfr Goði - chief among its soul-wardens and lore-carvers. A grim, silver-maned figure draped in the pelts of ice-lynxes and storm bears, Hvoth is both healer and executioner, apothecary and myth-priest. His name is spoken with deep reverence, for it is Moonheart who prepares the dead for their passage into the Hall of the Honored Howl, and it is Moonheart who collects the gene-seed from fallen warriors with sacred knives shaped like fang-blades.
A former Reaver Pack-Leader elevated to priesthood after surviving a daemon-wound that should have ended him, Hvoth now walks the thin path between spirit and flesh. His presence on the battlefield is marked by the tolling of a rune-etched bell and the chanting of ancestral oaths. He fights with The Fell-Talon, a crozius made from the frozen claw of a warp-beast, bound in faith-runes and vengeance prayers. His voice carries the weight of sagas, and his growls are said to calm even the most blood-mad Wulfen-cursed.
Hvoth oversees the Chapter's gene-seed sanctum - The Crimson Crucible - where initiation trials are held beneath starless skies and in sacred dueling pits. He alone is trusted to pass judgment on the soul-worthiness of new aspirants, and those found wanting are given the mercy of the flame. In times of war, he rides into the fray aboard a Thunderwolf named Njarvold the Iron-Haired, roaring hymns to Morkai and the Emperor alike.
- Iron Thane Skalddor Gloomhammer, "Bold Predator of the Slaughter-Fire Forge" - A thunderous mountain of plasteel and fury, Skalddor Gloomhammer is the Chapter’s senior Iron Thane—Master of the Forge, and keeper of the sacred war engines. Dubbed the "Bold Predator of the Slaughter-Fire Forge" by his forge-brothers, Skalddor is known for his unrelenting aggression, preferring to test weapons on the battlefield rather than in sanctified testing ranges. His skin is scorched, his beard iron-wired, and his voice is said to rattle boltguns into readiness.
Gloomhammer commands the Ironwardens, the Crimson Prowlers' elite Techmarine cadre and Dreadnought maintainers. He forged his artificer warsuit Mjarrbolt, a suit of red-black armor emblazoned with flame-burnished runes and hung with mechanical fetishes. In battle, he wields Slaughter-Fire, a masterwork thunderhammer charged by twin micro-reactors and etched with kill-names of daemon engines crushed underfoot.
He views every war as a proving ground, both for warriors and weapons. His forge-clan forges relics that howl when fired and spew flame in the names of the dead. Gloomhammer also personally communes with the oldest of the Chapter's Venerable Dreadnoughts, including Bjornkar the Ash-Blessed. The Iron Thane is a warrior-smith who fights as he builds: with terrible force, honor to the ancestors, and no patience for weakness.
- Einheri (Chapter Champion) Harandr Icefang, "The Mighty" - Known across half the Segmentum Obscurus as "The Mighty," Harandr Icefang is the Crimson Prowlers' Chapter Champion - a duelist, monster-slayer, and ritual defender of the High Jarl's honour. Clad in a heavily modified Gravis warsuit bearing the gaping fanged maw of a slain Void Drake, Icefang strides into battle as a living incarnation of Fenrisian war-myth. His blade, Wyrmsplitter, is a relic power sword forged from the rib of a void-beast that fell in the Karrak War.
Icefang earned his name after single-handedly slaying a Chaos Knight during the Battle of Thrymgate Hold, climbing its hull with his bare hands and tearing into the cockpit with only his frost-claws and teeth. Since then, he has served as a wandering blade within the Chapter, challenging enemy champions, traitor generals, and monstrous xenos warlords to single combat with ritualistic precision. He is the keeper of the Rite of the Red Duel, a sacred battle-oath invoked before each major campaign.
Though brash and prideful, Icefang is held in great esteem. He trains the young in the dueling pits of Eyr-Kall, the Chapter's mountain citadel, where he teaches not just skill, but spirit - the soul of the blade must match the blood in the heart. He carries the bone-tokens of every foe he has slain, tied in knots of hair and hung from his shoulderplates. To face Icefang in battle is to be weighed by the very spirit of the Crimson Prowlers - and often, to be found wanting.
- Merkiberar (Standard Bearer) Ogheim Blood-Ice, "Bearer of the Howling Banner" - Ogheim Blood-Ice, the Chapter's Merkiberar (Standard Bearer), is a living relic - a towering presence draped in centuries of honor and pain. Once a warrior of unmatched fury, Ogheim was struck down by a Daemon Prince during the Rending of Varkhaal's Gate. His body broken but his will unshattered, he was given the sacred duty of bearing the Howling Banner of Redfang's Oath, the war-standard woven with blood-thread and Fenrisian wolfsong fiber, blessed by the Rune Keepers themselves.
Ogheim's armor is pale steel inlaid with ghostly blue runes, a color reserved for the living who walk among the dead. His right arm, rebuilt from ice-forged ceramite, never tires in holding the banner aloft - even in the fiercest warp storms or under the heaviest fire. The standard itself is no mere sigil - it emits an auric field of defiance, amplifying the war-cries of his brothers and boiling the blood of the cowardly. Where Ogheim walks, the line holds.
He speaks rarely, his voice roughened by the cold of death's shadow, but when he does, warriors fall silent. It is said his presence alone steadied the Crimson Prowlers during the Dooming of Eridahl, when half the fleet was sundered in a warp breach. Aboard the Wyrmhowl, his personal Thunderhawk, Ogheim leads the Banner Guard - elite warriors sworn to live or die by the blade and the howl. To see the banner fall would be to see the Chapter break...and so, it has never fallen.
- Jarl Korrik Bloodfang, "Grim Wolf of the Moonlit Brotherhood" - Jarl Korrik Bloodfang is the unflinching heart of the Crimson Prowlers' Jarldom Onn (One) - "the Moonlit Brotherhood" - a formation renowned for night-fighting, surgical precision, and tenacity under extreme duress. Bloodfang himself is a silent terror in battle - stoic, cold-eyed, and relentless. His scar-laced face is a mask of lunar ritual tattoos, earned in the Rite of Shadows after slaying three Wyrmkin alone beneath the twin moons of Obrix Delta.
Clad in sable and crimson battle plate laced with silver-etched runes, he wields the Fang of Voel, a relic frost-axe that hums with psychic resonance. Korrik is rarely seen without his helm, whose pale glow and breathing hiss have earned him the nickname "The Whisper in the Ice." His tactics favour ambush and bladeplay, using the shadows of warzones like a cloak. The Moonlit Brotherhood under his command excels in decapitation strikes, stealth drops, and protracted attrition campaigns under adverse conditions.
Despite his quiet demeanour, Bloodfang holds deep devotion to the Chapter's mythic traditions. He leads the Lunar Sagas, ritual recitations performed beneath moonlight or by starlight projection aboard voidships, where warriors recount the tales of their hunts. To serve under Bloodfang is to learn the value of patience, death dealt without fury, and the silent howl that comes just before the kill. His warriors say he smiles only when bleeding—and that he has never once taken a step backward in battle.
- Jarl Ulfven Felltooth, "Brooding Stalker of the Untamed Totem" - Jarl Ulfven Felltooth is a wild-eyed, wolf-spirited leader whose primal savagery in combat is matched only by his deeply philosophical approach to the hunt. As master of Jarldom Twa (Two) - the "Untamed Totem" - Felltooth commands the most unorthodox and spiritually volatile of the Jarldoms - a force known for wielding the fury of the Wulfen Curse as both weapon and warning. Ulfven himself walks the line between warrior and beast, donning a mix of power armor and ritual hide, with his right pauldron shaped like the snarling maw of a Thunderwolf.
Once cast out into exile for slaying a brother in a blood-fevered trance, Felltooth returned years later clad in the pelt of a daemon-warped Freyan alpha-beast and bearing the recovered Wolf Totem of Old Jarn. Rather than punishment, he was elevated by the High Rune Keeper himself - deemed chosen by Morkai and a bearer of sacred wrath. Ulfven's weapon, Ragetooth, is a brutal twin-fanged chainblade shaped after his own war-crest, stained black from the blood of corrupted Astartes.
Felltooth's warriors follow a path of totemic devotion - each pack linked to a beast-spirit from Freyan lore, whose traits they emulate in battle and ritual. His command rituals often involve the Howl-Vision, a collective trance where warriors bind their senses to their ancestral archetypes. Many consider him half-mad, but his results are undeniable: during the Gorevale Campaign, he led a berserker flanking force through warp-fog to annihilate a Dark Mechanicus forge-altar in a single blood-mad night.
- Jarl Skvorn, "The Mountain," "Brooding Slaughterer of the Freezing Maelstrom" - Few warriors match the sheer physical might and cold fury of Skvorn, the Jarl of Jarldom Tra (Three) - "the Freezing Maelstrom." Called "The Mountain" by his kin, Skvorn is a towering juggernaut clad in custom-pattern Mk X Gravis armor, reinforced to withstand the catastrophic elemental conditions of warzones like the glaciated hellscape of Thrymr 7, where he once stood unmoved against a whiteout storm for six days while holding the line alone.
Skvorn is not known for speech; he speaks through action, weight, and silence. His warhammer, Maelstrom's Promise, is as much a siege device as a weapon - a multi-headed thunderstrike artefact blessed in the molten blood of a Salamander relic forge. His combat doctrine is rooted in immovability, favouring hammering frontal assaults, fortress-breaking, and attritional siegecraft that grinds enemy resistance into ruinous frost and ruin.
His Jarldom is renowned for its immovable defense lines, use of exo-grav fortification assault squads, and storm-wall bombardments. Ritualistically, Skvorn's warriors do not howl before battle - they let their silence speak. They are the "Still Howl," the frost beneath the foot, the storm before the scream. Skvorn's command chamber is carved from the fang of a continent-sized ice-beast, and he holds court in silence, speaking only when a warrior's tale is truly worthy.
- Jarl Haakir Warganger, "Feral Punisher of the Icewind Citadel" - Jarl Haakir Warganger is a flame-tongued warrior-philosopher - equal parts beast and storm, a master of both precision strikes and large-scale battlefield misdirection. As the warlord of Jarldom For (Four), his Jarldom specialises in climate-shift warfare, null-field incursions, and thermal drop assaults. Haakir is bold and charismatic, infamous for rallying warriors mid-battle with ritual verses of blood-oaths carved into his own flesh, bleeding while laughing in the face of the storm.
He carries the Twin Blades of "Frost" and "Ember," named "Skrækir" and "Gneista," ancient paired weapons forged in the flame-chasms beneath the Icewind Citadel itself. His helm bears dual fangs - one cracked, one whole - to symbolise his nature as a creature of balance between fury and order. Once a Voidbound Reaver known for reckless fury, he mastered restraint through grueling trials in the Gilded Hollow, the subterranean frost-forges where failed warriors are sent to atone.
Haakir trains his warriors to embrace dual-nature combat: fire and ice, patience and sudden savagery, ranged precision followed by melee slaughter. He orchestrates The Spiral Hunt, a ritual combat where aspirants must slay their prey through patience and misdirection rather than brute force. Those who pass are marked by a frost-tattoo along their spine. He is as respected as he is feared, and his personal arrival to the battlefield often marks the beginning of utter chaos and collapse for enemy cohesion.
- Jarl Fjorn Umberfist, "Grizzled Lord of the Deadly Saga" - The oldest of the current Jarls, Fjorn Umberfist is the Chapter's living memory, a warrior whose saga is so long it is recited in four parts across the Feast of the Five Hunts. His fists - augmetic relics carved with spiraling kill-runes - have broken the spines of Tyranid bio-titans and Chaos Dreadblades alike. A master of close-quarters devastation, Umberfist leads from the front like the brawlers of old Fenris, heedless of pain, roaring defiance into the storm.
Jarldom Fyf (Five), under his command, serves as the "Saga Guard," a reserve elite who bolster faltering lines, reinforce victories, and deliver decisive counterattacks. Fjorn refers to his warriors as the "Last Verse," implying that their arrival signals the end of all things for the foe. He wields the "Rimebreaker Gauntlets," crafted in part from the bones of slain daemons, and his signature tactic - the Fist of the Wolf-King - is a shock-charge formation that ruptures enemy defences like a comet impact.
Fjorn is also keeper of the Saga-Chain, a relic scroll-device that records the oral histories of the Crimson Prowlers. He personally inducts new Jarls into the Hall of Flame when they rise, branding their name into the hearth-ring of the Chapter's Great Hall. His voice, when raised in war-song, is said to shake the hulls of ships. To march beside Fjorn is to walk into death with pride, for the saga always ends with fire and a clenched fist.
- Jarl Kregga Voidwolf, "The Shade-Lord of Voidfang Deep" - Kregga Voidwolf is a figure of mythic dread among the Crimson Prowlers. Draped in blackout armor etched with void-runes and ragged starmantles, Kregga is the master of Jarldom Sesc (Six), a formation of spectral hunters and anti-xenos interdiction units that excel in shipborne sabotage, zero-light warfare, and long-range pursuit.
Born under the blood-moon on Fenris and raised by an outcast brotherhood that dwelt in the shadow of the Moonfang Chasm, Kregga grew up silent and half-feral, speaking first in wolf-howls before human tongue. His ascent through the ranks was unorthodox and bloody; he was one of the first Crimson Prowlers to breach Necron tomb-fleets during the Ossuary Drift War, carving his name in the flensing steel of a Cryptek's skull with his power-claw, Nightgrin.
Kregga's warriors wear darkened plate and eschew open ceremony. They are the "Black Hunt," silent as the warp's breath, striking from nowhere and vanishing just as fast. Their rituals are held in soundless chambers, with only gesture, oath-sign, and scar-rune exchanged. Kregga himself rarely speaks - when he does, it is said his voice causes even the ship spirits to go still. He is the shadow of the wolf - the cold breath before death, and the death that never comes into the light.
- Jarl Kreggak, "The Red" - A stark contrast to his kin in the shadows, Kreggak the Red is fury given form - a broad-chested, fire-maned warrior clad in burnished sable and crimson armour trimmed with black-gold fangs. He is the "Headsman of Carcharoth's Ire," the executioner-warlord who serves the High Jarl's personal wrath. Kreggak leads Jarldom Sepp (Seven) - "The Axemen," a martial host renowned for their brutal enforcement of Chapter judgment and their devastating close-quarters siegecraft.
Wielding the "Skullcleaver," a two-handed executioner's axe bound with the jawbones of traitor captains, Kreggak favors the Trial of the Bleeding Gate - a strategy of storming key bastions with overwhelming force and ritual fury. During the Penance of Orlong IV, he personally led a breach charge through a traitor bastion wall while afire from promethium, emerging charred and roaring, dragging the heads of three fallen Chaos Lords behind him.
He enforces discipline not with rebuke, but with public duels and ritual punishments. His warriors are often chosen for their rage—tempered through fire and blood - and serve as Judgement Packs who execute the Chapter's vengeance where necessary. His Jarldom is feared within and beyond the Chapter, but even his fury is bound to honour. When the High Jarl must deliver an unanswerable message, it is Kreggak who speaks - through steel and flame.
- Jarl Sturmgard Helsdawn, "Brash Warrior of the Red Brotherhood" - Jarl Sturmgard Helsdawn is the youngest of the twelve current Jarls, but his rise has been meteoric - and controversial. Known as the "Brash Warrior of the Red Brotherhood," Helsdawn leads the vibrant and ferocious Jarldom For-Twa (Eight) that specialises in rapid deployment, orbital strike campaigns, and glory-bound spear assaults. His warriors, dubbed "the Red Brotherhood," are zealous and prideful, often pushing the limits of discipline in their pursuit of honor through valour.
Clad in a flame-etched jump pack and wielding the twin relic sabres "Dagsverðr" and "Hrafnsorg" ("Dawnfang" and "Ravensorrow"), Sturmgard is an artist of war in motion. He believes the battle itself is the saga - the moment of impact the truest proof of the soul. He encourages his warriors to compose Oath Verses before each battle, to be shouted at the moment of their first kill. It is said that his voice echoes longer than any bolter roar.
Though not yet proven in long war, Helsdawn has gained the grudging respect of his peers by executing high-risk assaults with breathtaking efficiency. During the Shattering of the Rift Maw, he descended through atmosphere fire to slay a Genestealer Patriarch mid-ritual, emerging drenched in ash and ichor, singing his saga even as Úlfr Goði (Wolf Priests) tore parasites from his flesh. He represents the Crimson Prowlers' future - brash, burning, but dangerously bright.
- Jarl Faffnr Jörmungandyr, "Malign Spirit of the Wulfen's Rage" - The monstrous Faffnr Jörmungandyr is the Crimson Prowlers' most feared Jarl - a living echo of the Wulfen curse, who has not succumbed to madness but has instead forged it into doctrine. Standing nearly a head taller than even his Primaris kin, Faffnr is layered in brutal plate carved with claw-marks, tusks, and fangs. His eyes glow with a baleful, unnatural yellow, and his voice is a constant growl beneath each word. Jarl of Jarldom Tra-Tra (Nine), also called "the Black Maw," Faffnr commands the Chapter's Wulfen Packs and their affiliated Reaver cults. He considers the curse not a failing, but a blessing - a return to the purest hunter-form. His weapon, the massive Seithfang, is a daemon-bane chainmaul linked to old Freyan myths of world-devourers. His armor, studded with kill-bones, lacks a helm - he refuses to cage his instincts.
Faffnr's tactics are terror incarnate: flanking shock packs, aerial rage-drops, and orbital strike warfare. His warriors fight not for glory, but to exult in the savagery of the kill. Rites within his Jarldom involve the "Blood Howl," where each warrior must survive a trial of controlled madness. While feared even among his peers, Faffnr has never disobeyed a direct order - suggesting he is far more controlled than his feral exterior implies.
- Jarl Svengar Icenheart, "The Icewrought," "Lord of the Glacial Path" - Svengar Icenheart is a cold, unyielding warrior of terrifying patience and grim insight. As master of Jarldom Dekk (Ten), his forces are known as "the Glacial Path" - a formation trained to endure wars of attrition, planetary sieges, and the harshest void-conditions. His voice is rarely heard, but when it is, it comes like the crack of a calving glacier—slow, resonant, and final.
Svengar wields "Heimrím" ("World-Frost"), a thunder hammer chilled in the heart of the polar forge - vaults of Eyr-Kall, his strikes trailing plumes of ice and death. His power armour is layered with heavy rune-plates and marked with dozens of cold-iron oath-rings. He earned the moniker "Icenheart" after walking across a melt-field of boiling slag during the Trial of Unyielding Flame, never flinching, never melting.
His warriors are glacial reapers - deliberate, inexorable, and indestructible. They often form the second wave in larger campaigns, solidifying gains made by faster elements and grinding down any resistance that remains. Their war rites are conducted in silence; their banners are white as frost, embroidered in bone thread. Svengar teaches that endurance is the truest test of faith—and those who survive his campaigns are forever changed.
- Jarl Sigbald Kultann, "The Blizzard," "Mighty Lord of the Howling Rift" - A figure of elemental fury and thunderous valor, Sigbald Kultann is known as "The Blizzard," master of Jarldom Elleve (Eleven) and warlord of "the Howling Rift Host" - a formation specialising in storm warfare, psycho-sonic disruption, and void-front shock assault. Sigbald is both warrior and storm-priest, known for his powerful voice and mesmerizing presence on the battlefield.
Clad in pale-grey terminator plate crowned with spiraling wolf-fangs, Sigbald carries "Hrimskjalf," a storm bolter relic blessed by five Rune Keepers, and the "Flóðfngr" ("Blizzard Fang"), a crackling frost-scythe said to split the air like a lightning-burst. His battle strategy involves "stormwalking" - driving his forces into the teeth of atmospheric chaos to mask their approach and then descending with terrifying momentum.
Sigbald's warriors follow the Rite of the Gale Oath, reciting their saga in layered verses with each storm they enter. To them, weather and war are kin - and none ride the howl of the gale like the Blizzard Lord. When Sigbald enters the field, vox-traffic shatters, targeting systems blind, and morale fractures - because it means the storm has arrived.
- Jarl Ingvarr Morkaisson, "The Night-Hunter," "Keeper of the Final Fire" - The final Jarl of the Crimson Prowlers is Ingvarr Morkaisson, a solitary and spectral figure known as "The Night-Hunter," master of Jarldom Tolv (Twelve), "the Final Fire Host." He oversees not only a military command, but also the Chapter's Deathwatch liaison force and its long-range black operations packs.
Clad in matte black and crimson, with minimal heraldry save a single burning flame on his right shoulder, Ingvarr fights in utter silence. He is rarely seen, even by his peers, and is said to travel via hidden routes between fleets. His relic blade, "Blæjukljúfr" ("Veilcleaver"), can cut through more than flesh - it severs psychic tethers and warp-echoes alike. He is rumoured to have once killed a Tzeentchian sorcerer by slaying its echo before it spoke its curse.
Morkaisson's warriors are chosen from the quietest, coldest, most cunning of initiates. They are shadow-killers and last resort agents, deployed only when all else fails. Some believe he answers directly to Fenrir Ghostclaw, acting as the High Jarl's deathblade in reserve. His warriors carry the Rune of the Final Fire - a brand that means they will not return unless the enemy is utterly destroyed.
- Úlfr Goði Balder Draugrmaw, "Brutal Warden of Morkai's Wrath" - To speak of Jarl Balder Draugrmaw is to speak of madness made sacred, of duty forged in the black iron of dread. As the Úlfr Goði, or Wolf Priest, of the Crimson Prowlers, Balder embodies the bridge between faith, savagery, and death. Yet unlike his brother priests who walk among the living, he is also the Warden of the Vargyrvættr - the Chapter's cursed wolf-brothers afflicted by the Curse of the Wulfen, and those Dreadnoughts whose minds have fractured in the storm of the Canis Helix.
Jarldom Dekk-Tra (Thirteen), is not merely a Jarldom - it is a sanctified containment cult, a fortress of rites and suffering where "Morkai's Chosen" are kept, trained, and occasionally unleashed. It is known as "the Black Cairn" by the Chapter at large. Balder, its master, is a massive, shaggy warrior clad in rune-scarred bone and black-pelted armor, wearing no helm. His eyes glow with a lupine light, and his voice carries the echo of a thousand howls. His face is tattooed in the runes of Vargsong - a death-litany meant to guide those lost in bestial madness toward final rest or controlled fury.
Balder's weapon is the dread Crozius "Myrka Gól"("Morkai's Howl"), a twin-mawed power maul shaped like a skeletal Fenrisian wolf's jaw, capable of both breaking skulls and calming frenzied Wulfen. He carries with him a reliquary of "The Broken Pack" - shards of helms and fang-bones of fallen brothers who died resisting their curse. Yet for all his morbid aspect, Balder is a deeply spiritual figure, revered by many younger warriors who fear the curse's onset and see in him the possibility of meaning even in madness.
His warriors - if they can be called that - are the Vargyrvættr, or "Wolf-Ghosts." They are Wulfen packs trained in battle-hymns, disciplined through ritual pain and psychic rune-binding, and unleashed only in the direst of battles. Balder uses "Binding Priests," black-armoured Wolf Priests trained in hypnotic and chem-suppressant rites, to direct these forces in battle. When released, the Black Cairn's gates bleed mist and steel, and the howls that pour forth are enough to break the morale of mortal men.
Some among the Crimson Prowlers believe Balder Draugrmaw is becoming something more - or less - than Astartes. His connection to the cursed is deeper than mere duty, and he has been known to walk the battlefields alone, communing with fallen spirits or seeking omens in gore and frost. The Rune Keepers whisper that he has begun to dream the dreams of the Wulfen - and wakes with claw marks carved into the adamant of his sarcophagus-vault. Yet none question his loyalty. He stands at the threshold of damnation and does not waver. In his own words: "To be the Warden of Morkai is to walk the edge of the fang, and never fall—no matter how sharp it becomes."
Crimson Prowlers Son of Ymir, Sigurd Warclaw, of Jarldom Onn (First).
- Son of Ymir Sigurd Warclaw, "Unyielding Executioner of the Deadly Maelstrom" - Sigurd is one of the eldest Primaris in existence, as he was part of the first wave of recruits taken from Fenris as a Bloodclaw for the great Primaris Project eleven millennia ago. He can still recall the time of the Great Scouring and fighting under the command of the great Wolf King, Leman Russ himself, as they pursued the Traitor Legions to the very edge of the Eye of Terror. Upon awakening at the dawn of the 42nd Millennium, Sigurd was all too eager to prove himself and take the fight to the Dark Gods.
For several decades, he proved his mettle and superlative combat skills and rapidly rose to the position of a Pale Hunter and command of his own squad. However, Sigurd's wyrd had other plans for the ancient warrior, when he was mortally wounded while fighting against their progenitor's ancient enemies - the Thousand Sons. Despite his grievous wounds, the spirit of Russ yet burned fiercely within the stalwart warrior. The Chapter's Úlfr Goði stabilised the severely wounded warrior, and with the assistance of the Iron Thanes, saw the body of the mortally wounded Pale Hunter interred within the sarcophagus of Redemptor Dreadnought.
After half a decade in stasis, the ancient warrior was finally re-awakened to take part in battle once again. Striding into battle once more in his new body, the Dreadnought bears a massive Frost-Axe and Storm Shield (Sigurd's favoured weapons when he was still a mere battle-brother), and cuts a bloody swathe through the enemy until nothing remains but shattered and torn husks of ravaged meat. As the oldest amongst the Sons of Ymir, Sigurd serves as the living memory of his Chapter and is often sought out for advice by those wish to hear of ancient times and listen to his tales about the Wolf King.
Crimson Prowlers Son of Ymir, Brother Svor ('Murderback'), 'Bloodmoon Hunter of the Red Feast'.
- Son of Ymir Brother Svor ('Murderback'), "Bloodmoon Hunter of the Red Feast" - To many within the Crimson Prowlers, Brother Svor, called "Murderback," is not merely a Dreadnought - he is a warning, a sacred terror clad in adamantium and myth. Once a wild-hearted hunter from the frozen ash-ranges of Vraknar Crag on Fenris, Svor was a warrior whose savagery skirted the edge of the Wulfen curse even as a newly inducted Bloodclaw. His saga was written not in words, but in the countless pelts and skulls he wore, trophies of a thousand kills taken in ritualised lone hunts under the Bloodmoon - a crimson eclipse that Fenrisians believe awakens the spirits of ancient beasts. Svor's warrior-name, "Murderback," was given after the Night of Red Slaughter, when a Chaos warband led by the Slaaneshi warlock Az'Zirys attempted to breach the stasis-vaults beneath the Prowlers' fortress-monastery on the deathworld of Freya. Alone and cut off from his pack, Svor killed no fewer than thirty-three traitor Astartes using only his combat knife and his bare hands. When reinforcements arrived, they found him surrounded by a mound of corpses, bleeding from a dozen wounds, his back torn open and his own spinal sheath exposed, yet still upright and growling.
Though the Úlfr Goðar attempted to heal him, the Canis Helix surged through his system in blood-fury. He was judged too far gone to remain in mortal flesh, and with great solemnity—and more than a little fear - the Iron Thanes forged him into a Hellbringer-pattern Dreadnought, one specially modified with howling exhausts, blood-channel runes, and warp-dampening bindstones to suppress his wildest frenzies. His new frame was built to match his legacy—he wields Kráknar Mjð ("Kraken's Maw"), a multi-barrelled macro-flamer forged to resemble the triple-jaws of a void-beast, and Blóðmóðr Funginn ("The Bloodmoon Fang"), a massive frost-axe engraved with jagged runes of savage lore.
In battle, Svor is unleashed only when overwhelming force is required, or when the enemy is so vile that only a manifestation of Morkai's wrath will suffice. When he is deployed, the Chapter's Red Feast Rite is performed - the invocation of blood-oaths and soul-iron to honor Svor's unstoppable fury. In battle, he does not speak - his vox-casters emit only growls, half-words, and war-hymns composed of ancient Fenrisian laments. His footfalls shake the earth, and his howl—broadcast through his Dreadnought's speaker-array - is said to paralyse the impure and drive lesser foes to madness.
Outside of war, "Murderback" is kept deep within Dekk-Tra, the cursed Jarldom of Úlfr Goði Balder Draugrmaw, in a sealed chamber of ever-frost and blooded stone, where Binding Priests soothe his fractured mind with low chants and psychic oil-burnings. Only Balder, and perhaps Sigurd Warclaw, can speak to Svor without risk. Many believe his soul is tethered not to a single saga, but to the final hunt of Morkai - that Svor, when he finally falls, will rise again as Morkai's true fang, devourer of all that lies beyond the veil. Yet for all his madness, none in the Chapter deny his loyalty. Murderback may have lost his name and his flesh, but never his pack.
Chapter Relics
Chapter Fleet
The massive relic battleship Red Shroud, flagship of the Crimson Prowlers
The Chapter fleet of the Crimson Prowlers is known to contain the following starships:
Capital Vessel
- "Where the Red Shroud falls, Death howls in its wake."
- — Iron Thane Skalddor Gloomhammer
- Rauðr Skikkja ("Red Shroud") (Apocalypse-Class Battleship) - The Rauðr Skikkja, or "Red Shroud," is a vessel of such legend and mythic stature that many among the Imperium whisper it was never truly built, but awakened from the grave-womb of the void itself - resurrected by the will of the Primarch Roboute Guilliman from the Age of Heresy. This Apocalypse-class battleship is a bygone relic of a vanished era, a titan of void-warfare once thought consigned to memory, and now reborn under the savage and honour-bound banner of the Crimson Prowlers.
Far more than a warship, the Red Shroud is the very soul of the Chapter, its hallowed decks layered in centuries of blood-rites, oaths, and spectral song. Where many Chapters use fortress-monasteries rooted in planetary bastions, the Crimson Prowlers have ever been a fleet-based brotherhood of the wandering hunt. Thus, the Rauðr Skikkja serves as both home and hallowed ground, a drifting myth through the void whose arrival brings death to the enemy and spiritual fire to the faithful.
The architecture of the Rauðr Skikkja reflects the Chapter’s Fenrisian heritage and savage identity. Her prow is shaped like the skull of a great ice-fang drake, her ventral plating decorated with runed adamant plates, each etched with sagas of the Jarldoms, and her primary shrine-chambers are clad in obsidian-cored ironwood harvested from ancient planets long burned. The central nave - The Hall of Morkai's Gaze - acts as both war-council chamber and saga-throne, where the High Jarl Fenrir Ghostclaw holds audience amidst statues of ancestors, sons of Russ, and Morkai himself.
Her Forge Decks, overseen by Iron Thane Skalddor Gloomhammer, are constructed around a fusion-core forge-heart, sometimes mistaken by unknowing crew as a miniature star. From here, arms are consecrated in molten rites, power armour is repaired in singing fire, and the Dreadnoughts of the Sons of Ymir are reawakened from slumber. The Cryo-Catacombs of Dekk-Tra, housed in a reinforced tertiary hold near the aft sanctum, serve as prison, reliquary, and blood-hall for the Vargyrvættr - the Wulfen and corrupted Dreadnoughts, tended to by Úlfr Goði Balder Draugrmaw and his Binding Priests.
The Rauðr Skikkja was gifted to the Crimson Prowlers after Guilliman's return and the resurgence of lost technological blueprints from the Dark Vaults of Mars. It is widely believed to be a precursor prototype to the Retribution-class, restored in secret and offered only to Chapters with the gravest, most perpetual crusading mandates. Few others in the Imperium have even glimpsed such a vessel. Despite its age, the Red Shroud bears deadly armament designed for ship-killing and fleet-dominance: - Twin Lance Banks These formidable weapons run the port and starboard flanks of the hull, capable of punching through the void shields of capital ships and vaporizing structural decks with surgical fury. They are often blessed with rune-etchings by Rune Keepers to guide their fire "like the gaze of Russ."
- Ragnorok's Eye (Nova Cannon) - Ragnarok's Eye sits beneath the forward keel - a relic weapon whose blast can vaporise entire formations of escorts, or cripple even the strongest of enemy battlecruisers in a single pulse. The cannon is treated as a totemic artefact and is awakened only by blood-oath and soul-key.
- Dorsal Flak Batteries and Shock-Turrets - These weapons defend against strike craft and boarding shuttles, and are tied into the ship's augur-spirits, which are said to sing in the voice of a howling wolf when danger nears.
Though lacking in conventional weapons batteries for broadsides, the Red Shroud does not engage in war of attrition - it annihilates. Its strategy is simple and savage: obliterate, burn, and strike like a beast from the dark.
- "Let the shroud fall. Let the void scream. Let none survive."
- — High Jarl Fenrir Ghostclaw, aboard the Rauðr Skikkja before the Harrow-Tithe of Kargal VII
To the Crimson Prowlers, the Red Shroud is not only a war machine but a living spirit, considered a Sacred Warden-Beast in the Chapter's myth-cycle. Each battle-brother who embarks upon the Rauðr Skikkja must spill blood or vow a saga before disembarking for war. Its great bell - "the Wyrm-Tongue" - is rung only in times of mass mobilisation, or during the Saga of the Final Hunt, when a warrior is entombed as a Son of Ymir. The ship is said to be haunted by the spirits of former brothers, especially those lost during the Harrowing of Varkoll Hold and the Ash Crusade of Nysmaar, where whole companies perished in boarding actions within the warp-ravaged zone. Many younger initiates report hearing war-hymns echoing through the steel long after battle ends. Some among the Adeptus Mechanicus claim the ship's machine-spirit is semi-conscious, and may have once been part of a psychic-linked warfleet during the Great Crusade. The Prowlers do not argue - they simply call it "The Red Wolf That Hunts the Stars."
- — High Jarl Fenrir Ghostclaw, aboard the Rauðr Skikkja before the Harrow-Tithe of Kargal VII
Battle Barges
- Skjoldvarg ("Shield-Wolf;" Warspite-class Battle Barge) - The Skjoldvarg - "Shield-Wolf" in Old Freyan tongue - is the stalwart protector of the Crimson Prowlers' warfleet and oldest of the Chapter's remaining Battle Barges. Her bow is forged in the shape of a snarling wolf's head with a massive reinforced prow-shield, decorated with etched runes in platinum and bronze, inscribed with the oaths of every Jarl who has served upon her. Originally laid down during the early years of the Indomitus Crusade, she is believed to incorporate salvaged superstructure from a pre-Heresy fleet-carrier, giving her a frame of ancient resilience.
More than a warship, Skjoldvarg serves as a shield-anvil, often leading rescue operations or acting as rearguard anchor when the Prowlers descend into full planetary hunts. During the Harrow-Wars of the Gorgon Cluster, she withstood a continuous 72-hour bombardment by Chaos warships while evacuating Imperial civilians and recovering Chapter relics from an overrun shrine world.
Within her hull lie sanctified halls for the Council of Jarls, as well as the Chapter's War-Oath Chambers - vaults where honour-duels are fought, verdicts delivered, and new War-Sagas forged. She is captained by Jarl Svengar Icenheart in times of full fleet deployment and is considered a vessel of judgment and legacy.
- Surtur's Maw (Modified Gallowglass-class Battle Barge) - Named for the mythic Fire-Jarl Surtur, destroyer of worlds in the Freyan End-Saga, "Surtur's Maw" is feared even among fellow Space Marines. This Battle Barge has been heavily modified to serve as a planet-scouring platform, its interior converted into molten ammunition chambers and magma-fed incineration shrines. Runes of purging flame and vengeful wrath line the decks, and its forward hangar bay opens like a blazing set of iron jaws, hence its infamous name.
Equipped with enhanced plasma-deployment tubes and siege-grade melta batteries, it serves as the Crimson Prowlers' instrument of cleansing fire. It was aboard Surtur's Maw that the Cleansing of Eld-Inverloch was initiated, where a traitor forge world was reduced to slag under direct order of the High Jarl after a Chaos-aligned Machine Cult was discovered beneath its crust. Its crew includes the Furnace Blades, a flame-wielding elite breacher company recruited primarily from Eldjötnarheim. The presence of Úlfr Goðar flame-seers aboard ensures that each purge is treated not as slaughter, but a sacred rite - the burning of tainted fate from the thread of the galaxy.
- Naglfár's Doom (Warspite-class Battle Barge) - The Naglfár's Doom bears the name of the mythic death-ship of the damned -Naglfár - which, in Freyan myth, carries cursed souls to the final battle of the gods. Fittingly, this warship functions as the Wulfenclaw barge, housing the Chapter's volatile and mutated warrior-kin: the Vargyrvættr. Its atmosphere is purposefully colder, kept just above freezing by arcane systems to slow the blood-fury of its monstrous cargo.
Rather than risk the unpredictability of warp deployment for Wulfen and hybrid formations, Naglfár's Doom often performs close-range boarding manoeuvres, breaching into enemy cruisers or space hulks at terrifying speed. Her hull bears thick scratch-marks, battle talons carved into the plating by Wulfen prisoners during periods of containment - none are removed, for they are considered marks of glory and spiritual unrest.
The vessel is overseen by a cadre of Binding Priests and Iron Thanes, with Úlfr Goði Balder Draugrmaw himself often leading its deployments. During the Fall of Black Spire 8, Naglfár's Doom led the charge into a daemon-infested void-station, deploying Wulfen and Contemptor Dreadnoughts afflicted with the Curse of the Wulfen. None of the defenders survived. The station was later declared uninhabitable, its walls too blood-soaked for redemption.
- Hrimdregnir ("Frost-Born Howl;" Warspite-class Battle Barge) - Hrimdregnir translates to “Frost-Born Howl,” named for the mythic ice-wolf whose scream is said to herald the beginning of winter and war. A ship of the deep void, Hrimdregnir operates with chilling efficiency, silent flanking, and psychological pressure. Her prow and dorsal structures are covered in frost-rimed sigils and thermic cloaking baffles, allowing her to operate in low-signature conditions, particularly against xenos fleets and traitor navies.
She serves as the command ship for long-range hunts and deep-system crusades, often carrying advanced sensor suites and void-scrying chambers overseen by the Chapter's Rune Keepers. Her kill-decks contain shrines to Morkai, and each warrior aboard is ritually bound into a Pack-Oath of Silence until the mission is complete.
Her most famed battle came during the Cold Reaping of Epsilon-Othek, where Hrimdregnir and her silent packs annihilated a genestealer-infected rogue trader fleet in three passes - no transmissions were ever sent, and the threat was eliminated without alerting nearby systems. For this, she earned the name "The Ship of the Silent Howl."
Strike Cruisers
- Draugrsverd ("Blade of the Restless Dead;" Strike Cruiser) - The Draugrsverd is a ghost-haunted warblade in the void—sleek, quick, and fearsome. Named after the cursed blade of a mythic warrior who returned from the grave to avenge his fallen kin, the ship is a favorite of the Chapter's Reiver packs and often leads surgical strike missions, boarding actions, and retrieval operations into Chaos-tainted space hulks or drifting void-wrecks. Its prows bear jagged scars of centuries of breach assaults, and its kill-halls are hung with wolf-hide banners soaked in the blood of traitors. Warriors who serve aboard the Draugrsverd undergo the Vardrskegg Rite - the ritual of the "watching beard" - wherein each is sworn to recover the spirits of the dead or die trying. This Strike Cruiser is usually under the command of the Einherjar, or Chapter Champion, when operating independently. It gained notoriety during the Pale Stars Intervention, where it hunted and executed an Alpha Legion warband operating beneath the radar of Imperial sensors.
- Blóðulfr ("Bloodwolf;" Hunter-Pattern Strike Cruiser) - The Blóðulfr is among the most aggressive of the Chapter's strike cruisers, often functioning as the vanguard assault ship during void combat and planetary landings. It is designed for brute-force deployments and frequently serves as the spine of orbital pack-invasions, unleashing drop pods, Thunderhawks, and Wulfen packs at an unrelenting pace. The ship's name, "Bloodwolf," refers to a mythic beast said to be soaked in the blood of stars - an apt description for a vessel known for its orbit-to-ground kill ratio. It is fitted with a prow-rake meant for tearing through enemy hulls and has additional deck armor that can resist significant boarding actions. Many of the Crimson Prowlers' Primaris Aggressor and Assault Intercessor formations operate from this ship, which has been retrofitted with larger drop bays to accommodate bulkier wargear. Its ritual shrine to Russ-as-Berserker features a running lava channel, into which warriors cast blood-writ oaths before deploying.
- Isrindr ("Ice-Tears;" Vanguard-pattern Strike Cruiser) - The Isrindr, or "Ice-Tears," is a cold hunter - a strike cruiser optimized for long-range surveillance, stealth missions, and kill-team deployments into hostile territory. Its name originates from Freyan saga-lore, where the tears of the ice god Isrindr could freeze the heart of a godbeast and banish the warmth of life from a world. She is outfitted with advanced sensor-veil technology and reinforced augur-masking—an unusual but tactically invaluable trait in an Astartes vessel. Strike teams from the "Black Fangs," the Chapter's stealth-reliant Reiver cadre, are often deployed from Isrindr into Tyranid-infested systems, or under Inquisitorial writ to eliminate xenos cult enclaves. Her silence is legendary. During the Hel's Reach Black Sun Uprising, Isrindr slipped past Chaos blockade fleets to deploy three full kill teams. Within 42 hours, the rebellion was extinguished, and the cruiser vanished into the dark once more.
- Svartrlogi ("Black Flame;" Strike Cruiser) - Named for the mythic black flame that devours even gods, Svartrlogi is the Chapter's preferred ship for purge operations, heretic purifications, and daemon incursions. Her interior is marked by burnished metal, soot-streaked bulkheads, and ritual ash-pits maintained by Flame-Acolytes drawn from Eldjötnarheim. Her armaments include enhanced plasma coil batteries and inferno-class drop pods designed to incinerate enemy resistance zones before her warriors even land. She also maintains a specialised shrine to Surtur's Maw, where flame-runes are burned directly onto the pauldrons of deployed warriors. Ritual branding and fire-walks are not uncommon aboard this vessel. It was Svartrlogi that broke the cult-world of Sorrow's Veil, unleashing a month-long purification campaign that earned her the title "Ash-Tongue of Russ" among the Rune Keepers.
- Ulfheljar ("Wolf-Hel's Gate;" Vanguard-pattern Strike Cruiser) - The Ulfheljar is a rare and ominous ship, acting as a containment vessel and shock-deployment barge for Wulfen-blooded warriors and psy-mutated berserker squads. Its name comes from the gates of Hel in Freyan legend, which the wolf-spirits must pass through during their final trials of death and madness. Equipped with psychic suppression chambers, rune-locked sarcophagus bays, and specialised stasis-prisons, the Ulfheljar ferries the most volatile packs in the Chapter - be they Fellbloods, Rune-Broken, or those approaching the edge of the Canis Helix Curse. Despite its dark role, the vessel is considered sacred. The warriors who return from Ulfheljar deployments are treated with wary reverence, and often elevated to the ranks of the Vargrfarar - the "Doom-Walkers" of the Chapter. Its Rune Keepers say the ship "howls in the warp," and many believe it is protected - or cursed—by Morkai himself.
Escorts
Chapter Appearance
Chapter Colours
Example Crimson Prowlers armorial markings. From left to right: Veteran, Battleline, Close Support and Fire Support.
The Crimson Prowlers predominantly paint their battle-plate a dark crimson, the colour of spilt blood, with black coloured greaves and poleyns (lower leg armour) and both armorial insets. The Aquila, Imperialis or wolf-variant chest icon is worn upon their plastrons (chest guard) are also black in colour. Often, veteran members of the Chapter will show their elite status by having the trim and etchings on their battle-plate crafted in fine silver. The Crimson Prowlers have a tendency to etch Freyan runes and marking onto various portions of their amour (whose exact meaning and symbolism is impenetrable to outsiders), as well as adorning themselves with grisly trophies and primitivistic fetishes in the form of pelts, wolf tails and teeth.
As a non-Codex oriented Chapter, the Crimson Prowlers do not utilise the standard Codex-approved specialist and tactical markings, instead preferring to utilise their home world's own unique symbols to represent their various specialists, squads and Great Companies. These symbols are taken from both Fenrisian and Freyan mythology.
The Chapter's icon is proudly borne on the left armorial while the right bears a unique white colored Chapter insignia that indicates a battle-brother's assigned battlefield tactical role; a lozenge (diamond) for Battleline; a lightning bolt for Close Support and a delta (triangle) for Fire Support. Within these standard guidelines, however, there is much variety between each individual warrior, as no one Wolf Brother's markings will be alike.
Jarldom Markings
Markings utilised by the different Jarldoms of the Crimson Prowlers.
The Chapter's progenitors use a radically different system of markings than that used by Codex Astartes-compliant Chapters. Rather than using the typical company markings as laid down in the Codex, the Space Wolves instead utilise a number of different wolf badges to denote the different Great Companies that make up the Chapter. These include some form of stylised wolf sigil denoting some aspect of the native Fenrisian mythology.
The Crimson Prowlers are similar to their genetic forebears, as they also do not utilise the same system of standard markigns found within the Codex. The Chapter is comprised of twelve "Jarldoms" (Companies), each the equivalent to a regular Battle Company.
They are led by an officer referred to as a "Jarl" (Wolf Lord equivalent). In lieu of the usual wolf iconography utilised by their progenitors to indicate company assignment, the Crimson Prowlers instead utilise various jarldom markings to indicate company assignment, which are featured on the right poleyn (knee guard).
Pack Runes
Every battle-brother in a unit bears the same pack (squad) rune somewhere on their armour or equipment. These runes are similar to unit numbers for Codex Chapters, though the Crimson Prowlers do not specify where they must be placed.
Poleyns, tasset plates and backpacks are all common places for the pack rune to be found. Also, Crimson Prowlers battle-brothers do not display squad numbers. Instead they have pack markings, which are often displayed on their leg armour or backpack.
Chapter Badge
Crimson Prowlers Chapter iconography
The Crimson Prowlers' Chapter badge is a crimson coloured sigil of the 'Void Wolf', an ancient symbol utilised by the Space Wolves Legion of old, which was associated with Breacher troops and ship-to-ship specialists. This symbol is centered upon a crescent moon, a single blood drop dripping from the top point, and centered on a field of sable. The ancient and foreboding totem of the Void Wolf, also known as the 'Spirit Wolf', is considered a sign of ill-omen in Fenrisian mythology. For the Crimson Prowlers, at least, this choice of totem has proven to be not just well-omened, but prophetic. Throughout their tenure, this Chapter has become renowned for attacking from an unseen quarter, swift and terrifying like blood-soaked spectres, then just as quickly, fading away into the darkness of the void, searching for new prey.
Chapter Glossary
- Blóð Móðr - A Freyan term that means 'blood rage', this is when a warrior enters an enhanced state, and stirs themselves up to such rage and madness that they will boldly attack any foe without being hampered by thoughts of their own or others' safety. This term is used by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to those Astartes (Úlfheðinn) who are overcome by the blóð móðr, especially when fighting against the Forces of Chaos.
- Carcharoth - Freyan term which means 'Red Maw', within the Crimson Prowlers Chapter, this term is utilised when referring to their Chapter Master.
- Drakkar - A longship smaller than a knorr, usually used for raiding or piracy.
- Draug Bróðir - Freyan term that means 'Wolf Brother', within the Crimson Prowlers this is a Battle-Brother equivalent.
- Droengiar - Freyan term which means 'Young Warriors' (singular 'Dreng'). A term utilised by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to an Aspirant.
- Einherjar - In Freyan myth, the spirits of the slain warriors who reside within the long-hall of the All-Father, awaiting the day they will fight at Ragnarøkkr. This term is commonly used to refer to those who are selected to join the 'Sky-Warriors'.
- Einvigi - Unlimited personal combat, a duel to the death with no restrictions.
- Goði - The closest Freyan equivalent to a jarl. Goði have certain rights and responsibilities in Freya's southern continent, acting as patrons to smallholders, but are not nobles as the wider Imperium would understand them.
- Hel - In Freyan culture, Hel is the Goddess of Death and the underworld. She is epitomises the aspect of evil itself (Chaos Undivided), and often appears in one of her four aspects (lust, wrath, plague and transformation). This term is utilised by the Crimson Prowlers when referring the Chaos or Chaos Undivided.
- Hirð - The boon-companions of a lord. They eat at his table, sleep in his hall, take his gifts of weapons, armor and wealth, and derive their positions from hi1n. So long as he can feast and gift them, they must stand beside hi1n to the death, both on and off the field of battle. A term commonly used amongst the Crimson Prowlers when referring to members of their Chapter's elite veterans.
- Holmgang - A highly stylized ritual that can be described as either a duel or a trial by combat, depending on your point of view. Combatants exchange sword or axe blows until one is unable to continue.
- Huskarl - A member of the hirð, a warrior who makes the bargain of mead and glory for loyal service to a lord. Amongst the elite members of the Wolf Guard, this term is used when referring to a Veteran Sergeant.
- Jarl - A noble of unspecified holdings, usually between those of a landed knight and a baron or earl. Unlike a huskarl, a jarl does not derive his position fro1n his lord, but from his hereditary holdings. While there were formal differences, the mark of a jarl was the ability to keep a hall and men, and the line between jarl and freeholder was often blurry. This term is used by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to anyone of a leadership position, usually an officer such as a Jarl (Space Marine Captain equivalent).
- Knorr - A longship larger than a drakkar, usually used for trade.
- Landayvan - Freyan term for 'Layers of Waste', within the Crimson Prowlers these warriors serve in the role of Aggressors and Hellblasters of other Primaris Chapters.
- Ragnarök - The 'End-Times' or the 'Fate of the All-Father', when a long foretold series of future events, including a great battle between the Forces of Order against the Forces of Chaos, foretold to ultimately result in the death of the universe.
- Skjaldmær - Known as 'Shieldmaidens', these fierce female warriors fight alongside the men in battle with shield, sword, axe and spear.
- Thegn - The lesser partner in the Freyan equivalent of a feudal contract. A king's jarls are his thegns. This term is used by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to a junior officer or 'Pack Leader' (a Primaris Lieutenant equivalent).
- Thing - (Pronounced ting), a thing was a local assembly of district, known as a thingstead, the thing manages affairs of justice and various other issues of local interest.
- Úlfheðinn - A Freyan term when referring to those warriors who fight in an uncontrollable, trance-like fury, who fight without their mailcoats and are as mad as hounds or wolves. They are known to spit and froth at the mouths and bite their shields, slaying men by the score. It is said that neither fire nor iron has any effect upon them. This term is used by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to those Astartes who are overcome by the blóð móðr (or 'blood rage') and enter an enhanced state, stirring themselves up to such rage and madness that they will boldly attack any foe with suck bloodthirstiness and savagery without being hampered by thoughts of their own or others' safety.
- Úlfr Goði - Freyan term for 'Wolf Priest', within the Crimson Prowlers, this is a collective term reserved for the Chapter's specialists assigned to the roles of Chaplains, Librarians, Apothecaries and Techmarines of more Codex-oriented Chapters.
- Útlægr - Known as 'The Outlawed', these criminals are beyond the law. A punishment for certain serious crimes. A útlægr has no right to wergild if slain, and his killer need not announce the deed.
- Varagyr - Freyan for 'Lordbane', within the Crimson Prowlers Chapter, these stalwart and formidable Astartes are hand-picked veteran warriors that serve as the boon companions and personal Honour Guard of the Carcharoth in both war and in council.
- Vargr - Freyan for 'wolf', this term is often used when referring to outlaws and bandits, as well as more mundane wolves. This term is used by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to corsairs or pirates.
- Wendól - The Wendól or 'Twisted Ones' are evil spirits given physical form. This is a term utilised by the Crimson Prowlers when referring to the Daemonic servants of Chaos.
- Wergild - The amount of compensation paid by a person committing an offense to the injured party or, in case of death, to his family.
Relations
Allies
| Dusk Howlers |  |
The Dusk Howlers, known also as the Vlka Hrímherjar ('Wolves of Hrímgard'), are a formidable Primaris Space Marine Chapter created from the lineage of the mighty Leman Russ. Created shortly after the end of the Horus Heresy, the Dusk Howlers were one of several Primaris Chapters that were awakened from stasis from the cryo-stasis crypts beneath the surface of Mars, to take the fight to the Forces of Chaos, following the destruction of Cadia and the formation of the massive galaxy-wide tear known as the Great Rift. The Dusk Howlers were created as a shock-assault force to take back those worlds lost to the Traitor Legions, which ran amok across countless Imperial worlds, as the massive tear in reality unleashed the vile denizens of the Immaterium upon the Imperium of Man. The Dusk Howlers quickly garnered a reputation as tireless pursuers and peerless hunter-killers of those enemies of Mankind who attempted to flee the Emperor's wrath. Since their inception, the Dusk Howlers have remained a Chapter apart from its fellows, content to prosecute the Imperium's wars on their own. Though unexpectedly violent and unsubtle, their campaigns are brutally swift. Despite their aloofness, they would later go on to form an unofficial collective alongside three other Ultima Founding Space Wolves Successor Chapters, forming the 'Sons of Russ', which are charged with standing eternal vigil over the hellish realms of the Eye of Terror. |
| Bloodied Hunters |  |
Like several other newly created Primaris Space Marine Chapters, the Bloodied Hunters were created during the recent Ultima Founding during the closing years of the 41st Millennium from the lineage of their mighty Primarch Leman Russ. This Chapter was created as one of several descendant Fenrisian Chapters from the line of Primarch Leman Russ, making up the unofficial collective known as the 'Sons of Russ' - to stand eternal vigil over the Imperial sectors that surround the Eye of Terror from the Forces of Chaos and encroaching xenos raiders. Like their namesake, the legendary wolf of Fenrisian mythology known as the Bloodied Hunter, this Chapter has garnered a fearful reputation as tireless pursuers and relentless hunters of the enemy - waiting patiently for the opportune moment to strike. They do not rush heedlessly into battle or proudly boast of their strength and battle prowess like their fellow cousin Chapters of the Sons of Russ. Instead they meticulously plan, manoeuvre and make tactical strikes to weaken the foe before the sudden final assault, often striking from multiple directions, but always with overwhelming and pitiless savagery, tearing an enemy force to shreds. |
| Dawn's Wolves |  |
Following the end of the Horus Heresy, the Lord Commander of the Imperium, Ultramarines' Primarch Roboute Guilliman, charged the rogue Archmagos Belisarius Cawl, to carry out his ultimate contingency plan - the creation of the Primaris Space Marines - to one day emerge when the Imperium faced it's darkest hour. The Dawn's Wolves were one such Chapter. When the newly resurrected Primarch Guilliman awoke in the 41st Millennium, he ordered Cawl to go to Mars and carry out the final stages of his ultimate contingency plan. Thus, the newly created Primaris Chapters of the Ultima Founding were unleashed, to take the fight to the Forces of Chaos. The as-yet unnamed 'Dawn's Wolves', were newly awakened Primaris Space Marines created from the genome of the feral Leman Russ. They fought amongst the ranks of the Unnumbered Sons - the formations of Primaris Space Marines created from a mixture of all nine of the Loyalist Primarch's gene-lines. They took part in several campaigns of the Indomitus Crusade, fighting alongside both the Crimson Prowlers and Dusk Howlers. Following the end of the Indomitus Crusade sometime in the second century of the 42nd Millennium, they incorporated those Unnumbered Sons from the lineage of Russ, who now made up the newly created Chapter of the Dawn's Wolves, and invited them to become a part of their unofficial collective, known as the 'Sons of Russ', and to help stand eternal vigil over the worlds of the Eye of Terror. |
| Wild Wolves |  |
Hailing from the icy death world of Fjörgyn the Wild Wolves are a particularly savage and bellicose chapter of Astartes, created during the Ultima Founding, descended from the venerable and potent lineage of the feral Space Wolves. The Astartes of this Chapter believe they are deeply touched by the Wild Wolf, the Fjörgynian God of the Hunt. Like their namesake, the Wild Wolves are savage and fiercely aggressive, their blood burning hot with the potent genetic legacy of the Canis Helix within their veins. These warriors prefer to fight at close quarters and are armed with a variety of melee weapons such as chain weapons, power axes and bolt pistols. Notoriously violent and short of temper, they eagerly rush into the fray, slaying their foes in a hail of blood and gore, battering through the deadliest foes and the direst situations to emerge triumphant, time and again. The Crimson Prowlers first encountered their savage cousins nearly decade after their inception, when the Wild Wolves once again fought their hated foes - the Sons of Torment Chaos warband - the Chapter soon found themselves overwhelmed by the superior numbers of the traitors and their daemonic allies. Facing imminent defeat, they found their salvation in the form of the timely arrival of their fellow Space Wolves Successors, the Bloodied Hunters Chapter, which came to aid their fellow cousin Chapter win against the heretics. However, the Bloodied Hunters had not come alone, for they had three other Chapters with them - the Crimson Prowlers, Dusk Howlers and the Dawn's Wolves. Together, these three Chapters formed the unofficial collective known as the Sons of Russ. Joined together, these Scions of Russ fought against the servants of Timor, proving to be an unstoppable force. Impressed by their fellow wolf-kin, the Sons of Russ extended an invitation to their savage cousins to join their collective. Since this occasion, the Sons of Russ and the Wild Wolves have formed strong bonds as warriors and fellow scions of the Wolf King, and have willingly answered one another's call for aid, when the need arises. |
Strained
| Marauding Eagles |  |
The first encounter between the Crimson Prowlers and the venerable Marauding Eagles Chapters ended in disaster for the grandsons of the Khan. Arriving unbidden near Gautgund in need of supplies after long battles deep in the vastness of space, the Sons of Russ expected at least a supportive welcome. They were instead met by incensed Astartes, ordering them away from their system. Words escalated and the two bellicose Chapters came to war with each other. While two scores of Prowlers were killed, no less than seventy Eagles joined them in death. To make matter worse, the Crimson Prowlers managed to flee the Gautgund System and leveled an official accusation against their elder cousin-Chapter. Threatened with potential extinction, their Ansis (Chapter Master), Euric the Old Eagle, mournfully agreed to penitence. While its terms are still being written down, words from Terra have already reached them that Primaris born of their gene-seed will be added to heir ranks, or they'll be declared Excommunicate Traitoris. Due to these lamentable events, the Prowlers and their fellow Scions of Russ have sworn eternal enmity with the Marauding Eagles. |
Enemies
| Forces of Chaos |   |
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| Traitor Legions |  |
Notable Quotes
By the Crimson Prowlers
- "Great holy armies shall be gathered and trained to fight all who embrace evil. In the name of the Allfather, ships shall be built to carry our warriors out amongst the stars and we will spread His wrath to all the unbelievers and servants of the Dark Gods. The power of the Allfather will be felt far and wide and the wicked shall be vanquished."
- — Fenrir Ghostclaw, Carcharoth of the Crimson Prowlers during the outset of the Indomitus Crusade.
- "Strength is Life."
" - For the Strong have the right to rule."
"Honour is life."
- "For with no honour one may as well be dead."
"Loyalty is life."
" - For without one's pack one has no purpose."
"Death is life."
" - One should die as they have lived."- — Crimson Prowlers Rite of Battle
- "Careful pup! I am old for a good reason."
- — An anonymous Gnarled Fang's warning to a young Wolf Claw attempting to play an ill-advised practical joke on his elder battle-brother
- "Better to fight and fall then to live without hope"
- — Rune Keeper Steingrim Stoneheart
- "In the name of Russ we shall prevail, we stand until the Wolftime!"
- — Claw Leader Rorik Fell-Eye during the liberation of Halcyon IV.
- "Oathbreakers, look upon us and despair! You have been weighed, measured and found wanting. The Allfather knows your crimes and has set the wolves amongst you!"
- — Jarl Skane Bloodmane
- "We are outnumbered ten to one, still I love the odds! We will sacrifice them one by one and send them to their 'gods'."
- — Unknown Crimson Prowlers Draug Bróðir (Wolf-Brother), while eradicating a Chaos cult on Amon Secundus
- "I fear only two things! My Wolf Lord and the Allfather! I do not fear you!"
- —Anonymous
- "Drink deep, lads! For tomorrow we feast in the Halls of the Allfather! Skoal!"
- — Gnarled Fang Thorgil Witch-Breaker to his fellow Pack mates on the eve of a planetary assault.
About the Crimson Prowlers
- "They are the aggressors, and we the defenders. They are the axe, we are the shield. While they strike against the Emperor's foes, we safeguard the Emperor's people. Which is the more holy task? Only the Emperor knows."
- — First Smith Lord Delkor Va'Shan of the Dragons Amaranthine
- "A Goddess of death with her four lieutenants? Such a quaint superstition. I may be a Goddess of death to you, Space Marine, but I assure, you, I serve the Gods, and they are magnanimous masters."
- "Follow the Prowlers in and obey all their transmitted orders. We may walk without fear on the ground, up here, we are in their domain. Maintain formation and prepare batteries for supporting fire."
- — Lophess Ovair, First Captain of the Obsidian Blades
- "If you ever need warriors to assault starships when you fight on the planet below, looks no further than to the Crimson Prowlers... But don't stay with them after the battle, their boasts would kill you!"
- — Bit of advice from a Dawn Fangs to a new recruit of the Dawn's Wolves about their Brothers in Crimson.
 Sons of Russ Chapters
| |
|---|---|
| Member Chapters | Beasts Undaunted • Blades of Morkai • Bloodied Hunters • Cernachian Wardens • Crimson Prowlers • Dawn's Wolves • Dusk Howlers • Dusk Stalkers • Fangs of Fenrir • Grey Wolves • Hartlords • Iron Beasts • Kraken Reavers • Kraken Sons • Moonlight Stalkers • Sea Kings • Sky Wolves • Stone Bears • Tempest Wolves • Void Selkies • Waveborn • Wild Hunt • Wild Wolves • Wolves of Blood and Bone • |
 Space Wolves Successor Chapters 
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|---|---|
| Ultima Founding | Abyss Stalkers • Ascetics of Korit • Astral Bears • Beasts Undaunted • Blades of Morkai • Blood Predators • Blood Seekers • Bloodied Hunters • Cernachian Wardens • Crimson Prowlers • Dawn's Wolves • Dusk Howlers • Dusk Stalkers • Fangs of Fenrir • Fangs of Vidar • Ghost Wolves • Golden Boars • Gore Wolves • Grey Wolves • Greymanes • Hartlords • Iron Beasts • Kraken Reavers • Kraken Sons • The Mastodons • Maws of Fenris • Moonlight Stalkers • Night Wolves • Painted Hounds • Phantom Wolves • Red Wolves • Sky Wolves • Stone Bears • Tempest Fangs • Tempest Wolves • Void Selkies • Waveborn • West Khan Wolves • Wild Hunt • Wild Wolves • Wolf Knights • Wolfborn • Wolves of Blood and Bone • Wolves of Redemption • Wolves of Yggdrasil • |
| Extinct | Corpse Wolves • |
| Renegades | Bloodborn Wolves • † Skyrar's Dark Wolves • |
Gallery
