Adding more Heroic Legends stories into the chronology

About a month ago, I wrote a post adding the first set of Titan Books' "Heroic Legends Series" of ebooks into Conan's life. I thought these were a decent curiosity at first, but I've come to really love them. Seeing as we don't have many options for new short fiction to be published in 2025, ebooks are a great place to do that. Plus, they're cheap.

Also, Brian D. Anderson, one of the writers of those ebooks showed up in the comments! I think he's the fourth Conan creative I've had comment here (Jonas Prida, Geof Isherwood, John C. Hocking, and Brian D. Anderson).

I recently read the rest of the Conan-related Heroic Legends titles, and they're below for chronologizing. I'll probably read the Belit ones eventually!

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"Lethal Consignment"
by Shaun Hamill

"Lethal Consignment" is a quick little river-borne jaunt for Conan aboard a ship called the Fortune's Dawn. To quote author Shaun Hamill's Twitter (god, I've got to get off Twitter), "Some wild shit is afoot." "Lethal Consignment" is a pretty quick story, only 24 pages long. The thing that vexes me is what's on the first page!

Similar to how "The Shadow of Vengeance" made explicit note that it took place three months after "The Devil in Iron," "Lethal Consignment" says that it is intended to take place before "The Tower of the Elephant." That's tough for us, chronologically-speaking. I know that basically no author is letting their story get dictated by the shaky, oft-debated, and meaningless chronology of Conan's life, but I don't think there's a ton of room prior to "Tower." You have the obvious beginning stories like "The Frost-Giant's Daughter," which almost can't be uncoupled from "Legions of the Dead" and "The Thing in the Crypt." Once Conan crosses south into Brythunia from Hyperborea in "Thing," it works really nicely that the thief stories begin with "The God in the Bowl." "Lethal Consignment" would pull him way over to the western sea in Kordava prior to that, which is a huge move across the map. The saving grace here is that Conan does end up heading kind of northeast at the end of it, which sends him in the right direction toward Numalia.

I tried to reach out to Shaun on some of his social media, so we'll see if he responds and I can update this with his thoughts.

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"Terror from the Abyss"
by Henry Herz

​"Terror from the Abyss" takes place during Conan's time with Belit aboard the Tigress, in the middle of "Queen of the Black Coast." With Belit being such an iconic character and "Queen" being such a great story, this is an episode of Conan's life visited frequently.

I really like that Herz adds some color to the costume worn by Conan in the original story. By the time the original picks up, Conan's been travelling the world for some time and has acquired quite the kit. Conan is described like this: "He saw a tall powerfully built figure in a black scale-mail hauberk, burnished greaves and a blue-steel helmet from which jutted bull's horns highly polished. From the mailed shoulders fell the scarlet cloak, blowing in the sea-wind. A broad shagreen belt with a golden buckle held the scabbard of the broadsword he bore. Under the horned helmet a square-cut black mane contrasted with smoldering blue eyes." Herz places each item from Conan's journey into cultural context: "A horned helmet from Nordheim crowned his head. Over a hauberk of Nemedian ring-mail, the battle-scarred warrior wore a finely crafted cuirass, gorget, and pauldrons from Koth. A great Aquilonian broadsword hung from a tooled leather belt."

Now, the real trick would be placing this story amongst the many stories that take place during chapters 2 and 3 of "Queen of the Black Coast" from the Conan comics!

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"The Halls of Immortal Darkness"
​by Laird Barron

We have arrived. I am not overselling it to tell you that this story fucks so hard. As far as I'm concerned, this is by far the best of the Heroic Legends series so far (with "The Shadow of Vengeance" as a second place finish). Barron's writing is so creative, really shining when Conan is bit by a desert asp and then writhes, hallucinating and having visions while his body fights the venom. It's incredibly engaging, and some of the tomb-raiding done at the end of the story feels very much like something out of "Black Colossus" or one of the better, original Howard Conans. It costs less than two bucks. What do you have to lose?

Unlike the last two in the series, there is no page prior to chapter 1 which gives away the placement (yay for me, now I get to figure it out!). This is a very late story in the chronology. "Immortal Darkness" makes explicit reference to both the events of "A Witch Shall Be Born" and Valeria from "Red Nails," which places it either at the end of or after Conan's third pirate period for the Barachans. 

I sure hope Barron gets more chances to write Conan, because I'll be there faster than a Zamorian thief through an open window. There are two new Conan novels coming this year, but neither is from Barron. 

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