Blood Chapel

A Blood Chapel is the Clan term for a large edifice that was built to honor one of the 800 Bloodnames of the warriors who formed the original Clans of Nicholas Kerensky.

Description and History

Blood Chapels are described as large, compound-style structures that often seem to be pyramidal in design. They are usually composed of stone and other archaic materials, but are filled with all manner of technical equipment for the storage of genetic legacies. Blood Chapels were meant to serve as monuments to each of the Bloodlines of Kerensky's chosen. As such, each Blood Chapel was built in honor of a specific founder of a given Bloodname House. A Blood Chapel usually contained copies of the genetic legacy of the Bloodline's founder, as well as all other genetic legacies of the Bloodnamed warriors of the Bloodline. The precious genetic samples were kept in cold storage vaults, and were tended to by scientists and Keepers of their respective Clan.

Blood Chapels were most commonly encountered on Strana Mechty, though they could also be built on other worlds of lesser importance, as evidenced by Blood Chapels for the Osis and Howell Blood Chapels on Huntress. The largest concentration of Blood Chapels is in the large park and natural preserve called Svoboda Zemylya, in the area outside of the city of Katyusha. The Blood Chapels of Strana Mechty are reportedly interconnected with the Master Genetic Repository of the Clans. Located in the heart of Katyusha, this repository is said to be a tremendous structure, attached to the Hall of Khans complex in the heart of the city.

Wars of Reaving

In December 3071 the renamed 509th Wolf Solahma Battle Cluster and the 246th Wolf Strike Cluster, dropped on and around the Kerensky Blood Chapel in Strana Mechty. Led by Star Colonel Ramil Kerensky of the Clan Wolf Watch. He opened a challenge to all Clans to prove themselves worthy of the Kerensky Heritage by retaking the Chapel from his forces. This prompted several warriors to attack the Wolves, as the day wore on the numbers involved grew until ilKhan Andrews announced that whichever Clan could take the Chapel back would be awarded the Kerensky Bloodname. Chaos ensued as the Clans all vied for the honor with ninety warriors assaulting the entrenched Wolves over three days. Wolf Elementals destroyed the Winson Blood Chapel and as Ramil Kerensky fell he detonated the Kerensky Blood Chapel. This action provided the cover for a Wolf Watch team to penetrate the main genetics repository and destroy the master genetic files of Jennifer Winson, Nicholas and Andery Kerensky. The 509th was destroyed in this action.

Late in 3071, destruction rained down on Katyusha and Svoboda Zemylya, in the form of orbital bombardment, from Warships such as the CSV Perigard Zalman and the CFM Jungle Heat. Often errant, the barrage of fire from vessels orbiting above the affected areas added to the mayhem that would raze great swaths of Katyusha to rubble during the opening of hostilities on Strana Mechty. After the initial weeks of chaos, sporadic fighting took a toll on both city and the surrounding countryside as weeks and months turned to years. By accident and by design, many Blood Chapels were destroyed in the violence of ilKhan Brett Andrews' call for the Reaving of taint from the Clan Homeworlds.

The state of rebuilding and reconstruction of most Blood Chapels on Strana Mechty is not clearly known as of 3090. Though the eugenics programs of the Home Clans have restarted by this point, the state of much of their other infrastructure is not reliably known. In the wake of so many Clans destroyed or removed through Annihilations, Absorptions, Abjuration and the like, the status of surviving Blood Chapels belonging to names of Abjured or otherwise defunct Clans is currently unclear.

Bibliography

• The Clans: Warriors of Kerensky
• Freebirth (novel)
• The Wars of Reaving
• The Wars of Reaving Supplemental