- Name: Larion Ursus
- Born: 167.M41
- Occupation:
- Head of the Ursus Dynasty (292.M41 - Present)
- Formerly
- Lord Governor of Sector Deus (officially Belisarian Regent) (292.M41 - 359.M41)
- Status: Resides at the Ursus Palace on Tachion Primaris.
Background[]
Larion Ursus
Not very smart or very efficient, but strong willed and stubborn enough to be used as a proxy by his powerful family, Larion Ursus once governed Sector Deus with a whip and revolver. An assassination attempt once cost him his left arm and in reply he executed the entire noble house responsible.
None of his subjects felt safe around him as whenever something was going not according to his orders Larion simply preferred to relieve the offending official of their duties, sometimes with a help of a firing squad.
While he could not act with such disregard for civilised manners with the higher tiers of nobility, he was known for sending entire noble families to exile or barring the doors into politics for new candidates he didn't like. This led to a very specific kind of stagnation in Sector Deus' government, but the High Lords of Terra tended to turn a blind eye to this as supposedly kept the Sector stable and secure.
Larion Ursus is married to Deidara Ursus and has a single child, his daughter Katriona.
History[]
Born the eldest son of the third brother of the Sector Lord, Larion had modest prospects within his Dynasty. In his youth he pursued martial interests including boxing and duelling, and was noted as a very talented boxer. He also underwent political studies in preparation to succeed his father as one of the Sector Lord's advisers. However after a series of unlikely deaths within the Ursus Dynasty - including the accidental killing of the Sector Lord during a hunt on Lemuria - Larion was propelled to the seat of Sector Lord and Patriarch of the Ursus Dynasty in 292.M41.
One of his first acts as Sector Lord was to recall his younger brother Drakkon - an Imperial Guard General - from his posting across the Segmentum and promote him to Lord General and Governor of Athena Prime. Larion kept his younger brother close as a very powerful ally with influence over the Sector Imperial Guard, and in 300.M41 he promoted Drakkon to Lord General Militant of the entire Sector after forcing the incumbent Lord General Militant Wilhelm Van Der Geist to retire.
He didn't seem to particularly like the Ghosts of Retribution when they first arrived to Sector Deus in 309.M41, most likely because he thought of them as intruders into affairs of his Sector. This changed after they swore to him their loyalty in 326.M41 in order to secure food shipments to their homeworld of Mormark. He used their loyalty to boost his prestige in political circles and requested Chapter Master to send him his two squads of best marines to serve as an Honour Guard to High Sector Lord.
Over the resulting decades suspicions over Larion Ursus' loyalty to the Imperium grew in the Chapter Master. During one of the Chapter Master's visits to the Sector Palace, Lieutenant Cagirates of Ursus' Honour Guard exchanged a secret message with the Chapter Master indicating that Larion was conspiring with non-Imperial entities, but was clearly unable to say any more. Acting on these suspicions, Scout Master Geron was sent to infiltrate Ursus' palace in 347.M41, where he learned many things.
It appeared that Deidara Ursus, Larion's wife, was very fond of mysterious "benefactors". Geron was unable to find out who they were, but over the course of the day she mentioned them on two separate occasions when speaking with important individuals from high society who secretly came to pay respects to her.
Geron also infiltrated Katriona's chambers, seeking to find some signs of heresy. What he found instead was Larion himself engaging in a consensual sexual relationship with his daughter,offering some explanation as to why Katriona had been unmarried for so long.
Geron also discovered that the household was full of minor xenotech. Geron recorded a wraithbone pendant, a Tarellian ritual sword, and a collection of Ork teeth. The Nobility is known for using xenotech as a form of rare and expensive commodity, but what interested Geron most was a non-Imperial human-made cogitator. He wasn't able to access it, as it was at all times protected by one of the Astartes in the Honour Guard.
The cogitator was soon stolen by the Ghost Company. Upon investigation by Seran and Magos Voughtius, it was learned that the cogitator allows the user to piggyback concealed messages onto an astropathic choir and had an 85% chance to have been built by the Styrian Triarchy. Allowing secret messages to be exchanged between parties. Managing to breach deeper levels of security, it was discovered that the cogitator is calibrated to direct messages towards Triarchy space, and their comms codes were learned.
Further investigation resulted in the Cogitator self-destructing. Fortunately the Eldar Ixadiel, who had recently been saved from the Ebon Host in Operation Wild Hunt, was able to scan the remains and download the incriminating contents onto a wraithbone amulet. In the messages were correspondence between Deidara Ursus and parties in the Styrian Triarchy, outlining the exchange of fringe worlds for continued peace and discussing mutual enemies, including a "raging green horde" (presumably orks), "overzealous warrior mutants" (likely Space Marines), "fanatical priests" (the ecclesiarchy) and "twisted servants of chaos" (self-explanatory). Both parties were interested in preserving the current status quo of Sector Deus.
In 355.M41 when Lieutenant Cagirates of the Honour Guard escaped from the Sector Palace and was recovered by the Chapter from the underhives of Hive Babelion, he revealed that Larion Ursus' court had a coven of Rogue Witches that were being used to control the space marines of his Honour Guard. One of these witches was used in an assassination attempt against Lord Admiral Tyrel Hagen, while another was Lady Anastasia Belladon.
One of the witches, named Larissa Mahian, was kidnapped by the Ghosts of Retribution with the help of the blank Xenya Smirnova. She revealed that she had been mindwiped and Deidara Ursus played a major role in controlling the coven. Larissa's - and many of the other witches' - powers were enhanced with Spook, and Larissa had a strong controlling presence in her mind. This was conclusive proof that Deidara Ursus was a heretic dabbling in sorcery and conspiring with non-Imperial factions.
In 359.M41 when, after years of suspicions and the discovery of damning evidence including Larion's foolish ignorance of his wife's heresy, the Coup against Larion Ursus was enacted and he was removed from the Sector Throne. He was succeeded by Gration Belisarius of the Belisarian Dynasty.
Deidara Ursus fled Imperial space following the Coup and Larion's social standing was irreperably damaged. His standing within the Ursus Dynasty was greatly diminished, to the point where his younger brother Drakkon - as Lord General Militant - could easily usurp him. Filled with concern for his remaining power, Larion cooperated with the new Sector rulers in luring Drakkon to the Sector Palace and keeping him distracted whilst he was demoted in Imperial records across the Sector.
Reduced back the Lord General, Drakkon was left unable to easily usurp Larion as head of the Dynasty. However he still had considerable political clout as Governor of Athena Prime while Larion's rightfully inherited position as Patriarch had no real political backing behind it - merely tradition. Furthermore Drakkon was extremely unhappy and took up heavy drinking, blaming Larion for his undeserved demotion & humiliation. Thus the Ursus Dynasty entered into a cold war of rising tensions between Larion & Drakkon, and the Dynasty's outside influence started to shrink as fears of a Dynastic Civil War grew.
Larion was relying almost entirely on the faith, respect & support of the other member's of his Dynasty to maintain his position as Patriarch. In 361.M41 it was reported that almost all of them began hiring large numbers of mercenaries, no doubt in fear of highly elite Athenian soldiers known to be loyal to Drakkon Ursus.