Ragnar Blackmane

Ragnar was born a barbarian of Fenris, a youth of the Thunderfists tribe whose life was shattered when a rival tribe fell upon his village and butchered his kin. Even as a mortal boy he fought with a berserk fury that cut down many of the raiders, and it was this raw, untamed talent that marked him out to the Space Wolves as worthy of the terrible ordeal that transforms a Fenrisian savage into a son of Russ.

His ascent through the Chapter was without precedent. Where most warriors spend long years climbing from Blood Claw to Grey Hunter and beyond, Ragnar leapt straight from the ranks of the reckless young into the Wolf Guard, an all but unheard-of honour won when he single-handedly slew an Ork warlord and the whole of his retinue. When his own lord fell to a champion of Chaos, Ragnar hunted down the killer and took his vengeance, and for this he was raised to Wolf Lord and given command of the Great Company that now bears his name.

He carries the frost blade Frostfang and a bolt pistol into war, and about his waist is bound one of the sacred Belts of Russ, while a cloak taken from a great wolf he slew in his Trial of Morkai hangs from his shoulders. So arrayed, he has fought across countless battlefields, and it was Ragnar who, at terrible cost to himself, struck the head from a mighty Ork warboss amid the carnage of a desperate battle.

For all his glory, Ragnar remains impetuous, his youth and fire a source of both his greatness and his peril. His fellow Wolf Lords temper their pride in him with wariness, for his boldness has carried him to victories no cautious commander would have dared, yet the same fire threatens always to consume him. In Ragnar the Chapter sees the promise of a hero for the ages, if only the wildness in his blood does not claim him before his saga is fully told.