Jennika Tan Draconis

Hailing from the Knight World of Adrastapol, Jennika Tan Draconis is the older sister of High King Danial Tan Draconis. The High King appointed her as First Knight of House Draconis' ruling council in recognition of the skill as a warrior she displayed during the Donatos War.

On Adrastapol, she is justly celebrated as the slayer of Gerraint Tan Chimaeros, the would-be usurper who led the Renegade House Chimaeros and House Wyvorn to betray the Emperor and to kill her father, High King Tolwyn.

As the first female Knight appointed to this prestigious position in House Draconis' history, Jennika takes her duties extremely seriously, hoping to inspire more female Knights to pass their Rituals of Becoming and join House Draconis' fighting ranks. As the High King's right hand and supreme military commander of House Draconis, Jennika Tan Draconis has led the Imperial Knights of Adrastapol to dozens of beleaguered worlds, turning the tide of battle in favour of the Imperium countless times.

When the Orks of WAAAGH! Killfist fell upon her homeworld, Jennika Tan Draconis reluctantly decided not to fight the invaders, instead attaching herself to Inquisitor Tane Massata who had arrived on the eve of this Second Ork War.

This decision ultimately saved Adrastapol from destruction, for her exemplary conduct during the Inquisitor's mission made him reconsider his judgement of Adrastapol as a world hopelessly corrupted by Chaos and abort the Exterminatus action he had already ordered unleashed upon the Knight World.

History
Jennika Tan Draconis is the first child of High King Tolwyn Tan Draconis and High Queen Polenna. As a female, Jennika was prevented by custom from serving as her father's heir, a fate that was cemented by the birth of her younger brother, the current High King of Adrastapol, Danial Tan Draconis.

Jennika's early years were spent in the company of her younger brother and his childhood friend, Luk Tan Chimaeros, the future Knight of Ashes. Such were the bonds of friendship forged in those years that even during the Second Ork War the three would blindly follow each other into the thickest fight. Perhaps it was ultimately this close proximity with the male heirs of House Draconis and House Chimaeros that guided Jennika's steps to pass her own Ritual of Becoming and become a fully-fledged warrior of House Draconis.

Like her brother, Jennika Tan Draconis was trained in the arts of war by High King Tolwyn's greatest warrior, his Herald, Markos Dar Draconis. Having bonded with the Knight Paladin Fire Defiant, Jennika fought in several smaller engagements that provided her an edge the younger Knights did not possess when the Adrastapolian Nobles were ordered by the Imperium to reconquer the rebellious world of Donatos Primus.

The Donatos War
By the time the Industrial World of Donatos Primus revolted against the Imperium, Jennika Tan Draconis had grown into a beautiful woman. As the daughter of the High King, her hand was coveted by numerous Nobles. Yet Jennika refused to consider marriage. Her skills as a warrior had been noticed by all, even her father, who had elevated her to his Exalted Court.

As Gatekeeper of the Draconspire, Jennika was tasked with the defence of the Draconspire, House Draconis' ancestral home and mighty fortress. Wishing to keep an eye on both his children, High King Tolwyn decreed that both Danial and Jennika would accompany him to Donatos Primus.

House Draconis was not the only Knight House to heed the Imperium's call, for the four other Houses of Adrastapol had also pledged their strength to service on Donatos, each House's lord traveling with his or her full Exalted Court and a sizable retinue of Knights and Sacristans. En route, the Adrastapolian Knights were joined by the promised Imperial reinforcements -- several regiments of the Astra Militarum, mainly constituted of Cadian Shock Troops and Mubraxis Dustdogs.

In accordance with High King Tolwyn's plan, the Loyalist forces landed on the Pentakhost Peninsula with the dual objective of capturing the freight terminal located on the shores of the Raekesh Ocean and using the peninsula's bottleneck to establish a clear beachhead for the coming Imperial invasion.

The Knights of Adrastapol used their Drop Keeps, larger and more heavily-armed versions of the Drop Pods commonly fielded by the Adeptus Astartes, to create a bulwark against any Traitor counteroffensive before clearing the peninsula from Chaos Cultists and Renegade Planetary Defence Forces.

Commanding her own lance, Jennika Tan Draconis deployed alongside several other Knights, including her mentor, the King's Herald Markos Dar Draconis, to watch over those young Knights entering combat for the very first time. She was particularly concerned about her younger brother Danial and their mutual friend, Luk Tan Chimaeros.

Facing only lightly equipped infantry, the Knights of Adrastapol easily vanquished their foes, clearing the Pentakhost Peninsula of enemy presence in a solar day and allowing the remaining Imperial troops to land safely.

With their base camp established, the army of High King Tolwyn pressed northwards. Because of the heavily urbanised terrain, the Knights' weaponry was ill-suited to driving the foe from cover without incurring massive civilian casualties. As such, the bloody business of clearing hab blocks and manufactoria fell to the men and women of the 454th Cadian Regiment, a unit that specialised in urban warfare.

A mutual bond of respect soon formed between the Nobles of Adrastapol and the Cadian infantry, though this affection was soon stretched to its limits.

Disaster at the Valle Electrum
After one solar month of continuous campaigning the enemy had been pressed back to the strategic location known as the Valle Electrum -- a valley whose mountainous surroundings had been further fortified to form a formidable line of defence. For any conventional army, the Valle Electrum would have been impregnable, but with the might of more than 300 Imperial Knights at his back, High King Tolwyn Tan Draconis was fairly confident of taking it in a single solar day with some aid from the Astra Militarum's artillery.

The Valle Electrum derived its strategic importance from the presence of two great conglomerations of Plasma Generators -- Generatorium One and Two -- which provided the northern hemisphere of Donatos Primus' defence network with energy. As long as the enemy held it, the fortresses and Macrocannon-batteries they controlled would hinder the Imperial campaign to reconquer Donatos Primus. If the Imperium achieved victory here, the rest of the planet would soon fall as well.

But as the Knights of Adrastapol stormed the enemy stronghold, calamity struck. The enemy's hordes of Chaos Cultists and Renegade Planetary Defence Force troops were suddenly reinforced by the very best fighters the the forces of Chaos could muster -- Heretic Astartes. This in itself was no surprise to the Imperials as their intelligence had already confirmed that the fanatic Word Bearers of the Scribed Blade warband were present on Donatos Primus. High King Tolwyn had warned his men and allies of what they would face, but what happened next took them all by surprise.

One of House Draconis' accompanying Sacristans -- Acolyte Haladexi -- discovered a ghost signal in the Noosphere. Before the Sacristans could properly identify it, the noospheric virus spread to all Imperial communication channels, attacking Vox-arrays and all sensors. One after another, the Cherubim of the Heavenly Host tasked with the Auspex-surveillance of the battlefield fell out of the skies, child-like winged bodies plummeting to the ground.

Larger vehicles such as Land Crawlers and Imperial Knights were less affected, but still the digital virus afflicted communications and made targeting systems unreliable. The only units unaffected were the Knights of House Chimaeros and House Wyvorn. The reason for this soon became all too clear when the lead Knights of House Chimaeros opened fire on their Draconis allies.

In a matter of solar minutes, the coordinated Imperial charge devolved into anarchy. Betrayed by their fellow Knights, the Imperials suffered dearly. Shot from behind by the Renegade Knights while their Ion Shields were still angled towards the enemy before them, several dozen Knights of House Minotos, House Pegasson and House Draconis were toppled. Virtually blind, surrounded on all sides and with their communication network still in tatters, the Loyalist Knights began to fight back.

For all the chaos which surrounded her, Jennika Tan Draconis was one of the few Knights to keep a level head, her battlefield instincts taking over. Jennika's first concern was the security of her brother, engaging those Renegade Knights trying to earn their lord's favour by killing the High King's son and heir.

Despite her efforts, one of the Chimaeros Knights got through to Danial, but the young Knight was able to best him. With the Vox-network still being unreliable, even at close range, it was Jennika Tan Draconis which first thought of to revert back to Squire's Code, a rudimentary sign language consisting of raising and lowering a Knight's autopennants to convey messages.

With a functioning communication network, the Loyalist Knights of House Draconis now had a fighting chance to get out of their miserable posture alive. Having rushed ahead of the battle-line as per their bellicose tactics, the Knights of House Minotos were perhaps faring the worst, unsupported as they were and with fresh Donatosian renegades starting to surround them. Previously tasked with long-range fire support, House Pegasson was trying its best not to get annihilated by the turncoats of House Wyvorn, panicked and intermittent Vox-messages relaying the dire news of the death of their House's ruler, the Marchioness Tan Pegasson.