Temperance Blaise

Temperance Blaise was the Canoness Superior of the Adepta Sororitas' Order of Our Martyred Lady who commanded all of the Sisters of Battle forces regardless of their Order who fought on the world of Vigilus during the War of Beasts.

A fiery and extremely short-tempered individual, Blaise was so roundly feared that she was given free rein by the entire ruling Aquilarian Council to prosecute the Vigilus campaign as she saw fit. Beneath her was a network of trusted Canonesses and Celestian Superiors she had named "the Sacred Thorns," each of whom was entrusted with the defence of the Adeptus Ministorum's political and material interests in a different hivesprawl of the planet. When the Space Marines made planetfall upon Vigilus it was Temperance Blaise that dealt in person with the Chapter Masters.

In the first few solar weeks of the war, Blaise had taken the invasion of her planet hard, and had led many a counterstrike in person, taking out her righteous indignation upon every malcontent and coward she could find, as well as the xenos invaders that threatened her cordons. Only when the war ground into more of a stalemate did she resume her role as war leader, coordinating the defence of Hyperia with lethal efficiency, and leaving the killing to her sisters.

Used to all but ignoring the officers of the Astra Militarum, the Adeptus Astartes conversely worked closely with Blaise, for they saw in her a powerful ally with vital knowledge of each theatre of war in which they fought. Working together, they proved far greater than the sum of their parts. Though the Sisters of Battle kept largely to the hivesprawls, they held the line when even a whole regiment of Imperial Guardsmen would have been found wanting, defending the interior districts with Bolter, Flamer and Melta blast.