House Manticos - Hand of the Traitor: Unable to fully corrupt a Knight House on her own, Alicia Dar Manticos began to look for allies. She did not try to directly corrupt her consort, the High King, nor did she approach one of the Chimaeros or Manticos Knights directly. Instead, she turned her attention to those minds that could be swayed by her arguments and did not follow the strict tenets of the Chivalric Code: the Tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus. In Xededia Dar Mechanicus, House Chimaeros' High Sacristan she found just such a mind, for the Magos' thirst for knowledge easily swayed him to the Cult of Tzeentch. In exchange for his support and influence, Alicia offered him freedom -- freedom to pursue his research outside the limitations imposed by the Cult Mechanicus.Through Xedediah and his unquestioning followers, Alicia gained the perfect vector to further spread her corruption, for the Nobles implicitly trusted the Sacristans to maintain their keeps, voidships and suits of Knight armour. Unable to corrupt the minds of the Knights directly, Alicia would distil her dark creed through the collective memories and neural interface sockets of each Knights' Throne Mechanicum. With Xededia's help, the Sacristan twisted the recipes of his holy oils and sacred unguents to Alicia's designs, adding powerful philtres of daemonbane and weirdroot designed to gradually open the minds of the affected Nobles to the temptations of Chaos. The full corruption of a Knight might well take Terran years, but Alicia Kar Manticos was patient enough to see this plan through. Yet, in the end, a dark twist of fate -- or a boon granted by the Architect of Fate -- would considerably further her plans.The Imperium of Man is a realm locked in a perpetual war for its survival. As some of its mightiest warriors, the forces of the Imperial Knights are often stretched thin by demand, for their military power is only surpassed by that of the Titan Legions and the Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. With their homeworld secured, the Imperium called upon the Adrastapolian Knights to fight in the Galhorm Crusade, a little-known campaign of which very few records have survived. Faithful to his oath, High King Gerraint Tan Chimaeros led a mighty host drawn from many Houses to war, not knowing that the victory would be a costly one.At the end of the Galhorm Crusade, many Knights had been slain, with House Chimaeros and House Draconis suffering the worst losses. For Gerraint Tan Chimaeros, the outcome of the Galhorm Crusade was nothing short of catastrophic, for amongst the dead lay his firstborn son and designated heir, Gedric Tan Chimaeros. With Gedric's death, Gerraint lost not only his son, but also the crown of the High King of Adrastapol, as the ancient laws of Adrastapol prevented his second son, Luk Tan Chimaeros, from being recognized as the potential heir to the throne and no monarch could serve without a blood heir. Wracked by the loss of his son and the crown, Gerraint Tan Chimaeros became an easily manipulated target for Alicia Kar Manticos. After the throne passed to House Draconis, Alicia turned Gerraint's grief and shame into a deep-rooted hatred for the Imperium, its institutions, the God-Emperor and even his former friend and newly-elected High King, Tolwyn Tan Draconis.With the leader of House Chimaeros now part of the conspiracy, Alicia's poison spread further and quicker to House Wyvorn and his leader, the callous Archduke Dunkan Tan Wyvorn. Yet, at the same time, Alicia was careful to maintain the ties of friendship linking them to House Draconis and its ruler. In the years after the Galhorm Crusade, both Houses interacted frequently with each other, as their heirs, Luk Tan Chimaeros and Danial Tan Draconis, became inseparable friends, and were consequently raised jointly by both Houses until the squires passed their Ritual of Becoming in preparation for the next big muster of Adrastapol's strength: the quelling of the Donatos Uprising.