House Durovera
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House Durovera is the ruling noble house of the Prosperitas Sector and an ancient Rogue Trader house. The current Sector Governor is Hermione Durovera, the head of the House and the holder of its Warrant of Trade.
Rulers of the Prosperitas Sector
House Durovera is an ancient Rogue Trader dynasty, its Warrant of Trade issued in the dark history of the Imperium; it was a Rogue Trader House long before Jacinta Durovera took upon her the mantle of Warmaster. But it owes its dominion of the Prosperitas Sector to Lady Captain and, later, Warmaster, Jacinta Durovera, who re-discovered the Prosperitas Sector in early M41 and who led the Prosperitas Crusade until her disappearance in 101.M41.
Because of its blood ties, the scion-heirs of Jacinta claimed the Prosperitas Sector as their House’s rightful dominion, claiming the lion's share of the Prosperitas Sector as its territories. But since the disappearance of Jacinta Durovera, her relatives have done little to live up to her legacy.
In its hereditary homeworld, the Sector Capitol Duroverum, numerous Cadet-Branches and Vassal Houses fill the Court of the Sector Governor, and for much of the past five hundred years the House has grown fat and lazy. It has squandered its wealth, and left its Warrant to gather dust, becoming a Rogue Trader House in name only.
By 586.M41, it had spent years squandering its wealth on preserving the image of being one of the great noble Houses, with rising debt, dissatisfied vassal Houses and increasingly encroaching rivals diminishing its power. It had grown decadent and bloated with its own importance as a House, and its long squandered rights as a Rogue Trader dynasty had allowed rival Rogue Trader Houses to begin exploration and exploitation of the frontier.
In 569.M41, a succession crisis plunged the unprepared and generally considered ‘worthless’ Scion Armelius Durovera into the position of Sector Governor - after his eldest Sister, Hermione Durovera, took much of the House's fleet, and decided to not only invoke her rights under the Warrant to act as a Rogue Trader, but take the ailing family's warrant from its place on Duroverum before setting off into the frontier to make her fortune.
However, in 586.M41, Sector Governor Durovera survived an apparent assassination attempt - which seemed to have been a life-changing event. He began to claw back power, bringing the Vassal Houses into line and starting to clear up the family’s standing, taking also the dormant post of Warmaster. Thus, he reinforced his House's power, and began a ‘peace doctrine’ to reinforce the sector’s borders and stabilise the worlds under Imperial dominion within it.
Armelius’ popular rule lasted until 593.M41 when, after an apparent terrorist attack on Crusade High Command he became seemingly reclusive and rumours began to circulate of his death.
House Conflicts
Following the supposed death of her brother, Hermione Durovera returned to the Prosperitas Sector, seizing Duroverum with her fleet, and claiming the positions her brother held, as Sector Governor and Warmaster. Through writ of the High Lords of Terra, Hermione was given the Sector Throne, but was denied the post of Warmaster - a smarting denial that only hardened an already ambitious woman. But this was not to be the end of her troubles, as she had to face down challenges from within her own House, and from without by Rival Houses, tired of House Durovera’s rule. But her backing by members of the void-reavers of the Astartes Chapter known as the Void Hounds made her hard to challenge.
As Lady-Captain Autokrator, as she has styled her title as Sector Governor, Hermione Durovera’s rule has markedly changed the nature of her House: Durovera scions who show ambition and drive are rewarded above those who preferred the peaceful leadership of her Brother. She is a very different creature - more alike to her ancestor Jacinta then any leader of the House has ever been; brutal in her approach to rivals, she has seen off House conflicts with House Vilas-Lobo to secure her position despite the fear other Nobles have of her.
Under Hermione, the fleets of House Durovera ply the void once more, reclaiming extensive trade routes from the diminishment of House Majid. Hermione is growing powerful, and there are those who fear that unchecked she will evolve more and more into a tyrant. Some have, quietly, expressed concerns that the Prosperitas Sector might become a frontier haven for Rogue Traders where she will be styled closer to a Pirate Queen, than a Sector Governor.
Notable Nobles of House Durovera
Lady-Captain Autokrator Hermione Durovera, Sector Governor of the Prosperitas Sector is the holder of the Durovera Warrant of Trade and sister of former Sector Governor Armelius Durovera. She scandalised the Sector in 569.M41 when she took the Warrant and departed to make her fortunes in the Rimward Marches. Notable for her return, in 592, at the head of an Imperial Expeditionary Fleet following rumors of some great religious revelation or holy artefact discovered in the Rimward Marches, after which she left the Sector on pilgrimage to Holy Terra. Her flagship is the Mercury-class battlecruiser Will of Iron.
At the end of 593 she returned to the Sector supported by several gathered elements of out-sector Imperial forces including a cadre of Adeptus Astartes from the Void Hounds Chapter. Her forces launched a surprise attack on, and subsequent occupation of, Duroverum. This coup attempt saw her lay claim to the titles she previously renounced in 569 and sparked a short-duration civil war in the Sector. After securing her title as Sector Governor with the death of her brother and the assent of the High Lords of Terra, Hermione made a play to claim the role of Warmaster too - but was snubbed by the High Lords, who instead supported Sarina Khan to take the post. This is a slight that the Sector Governor has not forgotten, and she remains ever waiting for opportunities to secure power.
Many fear that, as a Rogue Trader first and a Governor second, Hermione wishes to see the Prosperitas Sector become a frontier haven for her kind with herself as a self-styled 'Pirate Queen' taking tribute from those Rogue Traders that operate in the region.
Armelius Durovera [deceased 594.M41] was head of House Durovera and Sector Governor. Never intended to inherit, he was thrust into the position in 569.M41 when his sister Hermione, the Heir, took the family’s Warrant of Trade and House Fleet but refused the Governorship. Initially dismissed as inept and unprepared for the position, Armelius’ fortunes appeared to change in 586, when, after surviving an assassination attempt, he successfully appealed to the High Lords of Terra for the position of Warmaster; he was confirmed in this position in 589.
Armelius' rise to power was rapid and marked with a turn towards a ‘peace doctrine’ which restricted the advance of the Crusade and ensured the safety of Imperial citizens and holdings in the sector. After a second assassination attempt in 593 which claimed the lives of much of the senior staff of the Crusade, the Warmaster entered seclusion, rumored to be suffering extensive injuries. He remained absent in late 593 when Hermione seized control of his House and Duroverum, with his flagship the Word of Despite passing to a key ally, Drusilla Vox of the Adeptus Arbites. In 594 he died aboard the St Sanguinius, in front of a number of witnesses, during the tragic events there, officially ending his rule. Agents of the Inquisition alone know the darker truth about Armelius' true identity in the last years of his life.
Lance Durovera, Flying Officer of the Cosmonautica Imperialis is a popular figure in Commissariat-sponsored propaganda holovids. Widely believed by most of the Sector population to be a fictional hero, his death-defying void-fighter antics are released in serialised form which allow the common people to follow the progress of the Crusade from the safety of their own habs. In reality Lance Durovera is a real scion of a cadet branch of the House, known to be serving the Crusade in some obscure capacity which rarely sees him able to return to his House's home planet.