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Magnus' main pageLord-Admiral Commander Farragut has several contacts amongst the ranks of the Rogue Traders, and Magnus at first found himself serving aboard the frigate
Glory Praises Him, on the command staff of Lord-Captain Eridon von Hex. The von Hex Dynasty is large but fragmented, with several members holding Warrants of Trade. Lord-Captain Eridon was en route for the Koronus Expanse, and passed into its unexplored vastness with all haste.
After a minor endeavour in which von Hex made millions of Thrones arranging for the sale of the mineral wealth of an asteroid ring that had lain undiscovered in a little-noted system along a warp route, the
Glory Praises Him picked up a psychic distress call with nonImperial origins. Investigating, they found a ship crewed by a xenotype which no Imperial eyes had ever seen before. Able to effect rudimentary communication through visual ciphers and telepathic image-reading, Magnus and Eridon learned that the species inhabited a nearby star system and were not themselves capable of Warp travel - this ship had been pulled lightyears off-course by what was later determined to be a freak Warp anomaly, possibly caused by the
Glory Praises Him's passage.
The species, which von Hex began to call the Serangians after the peculiar sound of their speech, were friendly and knew enough about stellar cartography to allow the
Glory to navigate back to their homeworld. They were not psychic themselves, but had developed a sort of arcanotechnical symbiosis with a particular example of flora from their world, an insensate kind of empathically active mushroom which they used for some forms of communication, as well as recreation. Apart from this, their technology was largely inferior to the Imperial standard, and von Hex was only able to load his holds with such trinkets as would amuse the more daring of the Imperial nobility, though he made a note to return and properly exploit the underdeveloped and grossly misshapen xeno at a future date.
As they made preparations to leave, three ships burst from the Immaterium. It was Lord-Captain Kormandus Volk, in his frigate
Reconciliation and escorted by the Volk raiders
Baleful Grasp and
Tremendous Valiance. By pure chance they had detected the same psychic beacon, and tracked the
Glory Praises Him to the system.
Volk and von Hex were old rivals. The
Glory was outgunned, but the two captains traded words at first, cutting the very void between the ships with their tongues. It was obvious that things could get bloody very quickly. Von Hex explained to Volk: the system had practically nothing of worth, and besides, it was already claimed by the von Hex Dynasty. Volk responded with the typical gloating of those who think they hold all the cards. Magnus - having sent an astrotelepathic message confirming the von Hex claim as soon as Volk arrived - decided to act. He knew that any psychic attack on Volk would doubtless be detected by his Astropaths, and so he moved indirectly. Gently he reached out and suppressed the will of Volk's own chief Astropath, then commanded the weaker psyker to plant suggestive guidance in his own master's mind. Nobody expected such a subtle attack on the bridge to come from within their own ship, and before anyone knew what was happening von Hex had managed to strike a deal with Volk: half of everything aboard the
Glory, and Volk would leave the system and the ship unharmed.
Snarling, Volk was bound now by his word - but in vengeance he demanded not just half of what was in the holds, but half of the crew as well. Left with no recourse, Eridon regretfully traded away half of his men, even half of his bridge crew - Magnus included.
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