Exile to the miserable world of Sedh, the disgraced Necron Lord Oltyx is consumed with bitterness. Once heir to the throne of a dynasty, he now commands nothing but a dwindling garrison of warriors, in a never-ending struggle against Ork invaders. Oltyx can think of nothing but the prospect of vengeance against his betrayers, and the reclamation of his birthright. But the Orks are merely the harbingers of a truly unstoppable force. Unless Oltyx acts to save his dynasty, revenge will win him only ashes.

The Blood Angels Chapter of Space Marines is under threat. Having obliterated all human life in the Red Scar region of space, the largest tendril of Hivefleet Leviathan ever seen in the Imperium has converged and is making relentlessly for Baal. To face this awesome foe, Commander Dante has called upon the Successor Chapters of the ancient Ninth Legion. The Sons of Sanguinius gather in numbers not seen since the dark days of the Horus Heresy.

For Ianthe, war is all too familiar. A former soldier in the Astra Militarum, she now serves Inquisitor Covenant as an agent of the Throne. Her first mission sees her investigating a cult called the Children of Eternity. Falling foul of the local Enforcers, Ianthe soon learns that war in the shadows is seldom straightforward and that the local, angry law-keepers are the least of her troubles.

Inquisitor Greyfax and a retinue of incorruptible Grey Knights are sent on a mission by the reborn Primarch Guilliman to recover the Eye of Night, a fabled artefact of Ruin that could weaken the Great Rift. It will be no easy task as Greyfax – with the aid of a long dead inquisitor – must journey into the Eye of Terror itself and challenge a traitor of a truly ancient pedigree, the crone Moriana.

The eldar are an ancient race whose mode of war blends spirituality with a unique mastery of technology. In times of need, their entire race will rouse to war, led by terrifying, almost mythological figures - the phoenix lords, immortal beings that embody the warrior nature of the eldar. When a burgeoning ork empire starts to pose a threat to the eldar peoples, Jain Zar travels to the craftworld Ulthwé to warn them of the danger.