House Rasputin

**House Rasputin** is one of the Houses of the Guild of American Magicians. The youngest of the Houses, it wields little influence amongst the Guild, though by all accounts, the magicians sworn to the House are loyal and enthusiastic. The current Head of the House is Simeon Rasputin, and the heir is Alexandra Rasputin, his daughter.

## History

House Rasputin has a long lineage of magicians, but the family only started to gather notoriety in the 1800s.

The most famous member of the family is undoubtedly Grigori Rasputin. He became involved with the Russian Imperial Family in 1905, slowly befriending the Tsarina and being tasked with caring for the couple's only son Alexei. The young boy suffered from a rare form of hemophilia, a bleeding disease that he had inherited from his great-grandmother, Queen Victoria. Grigori used his magical skills to treat the boy, though he was unable to cure the boy of his illness. He was murdered by aristocrats on the night of 30 December 1916.

After the fall of the Romanov dynasty, several members of the family spent the next several months moving across the Russian countryside with the Imperial Family under house arrest. During the move from Tobolsk to Yekaterinburg, these members left the family and travelled through Finland to America. They joined the Guild of American Magicians, swearing to House Neumann.

The family began cultivating its technology in the 1950s following the Tokyo Incident, and by 1980, the family had gathered enough power and money to gain the rank of House within the Guild.

## Philosophy

The Rasputin family possesses advanced magical technology that they use adeptly in both combat and peaceful fields. The family possesses some of the most advanced genetic technology amongst any magical organization, and they control numerous businesses geared towards researching and producing magitech genetic solutions. However, the family zealously protects any breakthroughs as well as the genetic information of the main family members.

The House is known for their belief that humans can be enhanced solely through magical and physical modification. Although the family utilizes technology in its pursuit of this goal, they despise combining technology into the human body. It is this stance that has brought the House into conflict with House Dreyfus, who have the exact opposite position. The conflict started off relatively nonviolently, but soon the conflict became violent, causing the deaths of several members of both families.

## Romanov Family

The Rasputin family became tightly associated with the Russian Imperial Family during the early 1900s. Grigori Rasputin was key to treating the Tsesarevich Alexei's hemophilia, and he introduced some of the other members of his family to the Imperial couple. Despite Grigori's death in 1916, these members of the Rasputin family stayed with the Imperial family.

Following the abdication of the Tsar in 1917, the Romanov family was imprisoned by the revolutionary government. They were held under house arrest in the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoye Selo. Members of the Rasputin family joined them at the palace as part of their domestic staff. The Romanovs and Rasputins were moved to the remote town of Tobolsk for the safety of the family, but after the Bolsheviks seized power from the provisional government, the group was moved again to the regional capital of Yekaterinburg for the purposes of putting Nicholas on trial in Moscow. It was at this point that the various members of the Rasputin family departed the group.

It was there in Yekaterinburg that the family was executed in the early hours of 17 July 1918. The bodies were taken to nearby woodland, searched, and burned before the remains were soaked in acid and thrown down a disused mineshaft. Other members of the Romanov family were taken to another mineshaft and thrown in alive the following day.

The bodies of 9 people believed to be the Tsar, Tsaritsa, 3 of their daughters, and 4 non-family members, were discovered near Yekaterinburg by an amateur archeologist in 1979. However, in January 1988, DNA used into comparison to a living relative revealed that the 3 girls were not related to any of the adults, though the Tsar and Tsaritsa were positively identified. Furthermore, the bodies of a boy and young woman found near Yekaterinburg found in 2007 were also shown to not belong to the Imperial family either.