Kabal of the Black Heart
Kabal of the Black Heart | ||
---|---|---|
Lead Archon | Asdrubael Vect, plus several other Archons vying for power. | |
Kabal Specialties | Large scale raids, siege warfare, counter-intelligence | |
Colours | Black, Silver, Red. Armor is Dark green. |
The Kabal of the Black Heart is the largest Dark Eldar Kabal in Commorragh. Its Archon is Asdrubael Vect, who styles himself Supreme Lord of the Kabal of the Black Heart, and recently as a Dark Muse.
Origins and Organization
The Kabal was formed as part of Asdrubael Vect's plan to gain power over the Dark City, continuously raiding Imperial worlds in the Desedrian Gulf until attracting attention from the Salamanders Chapter in M35. Luring the strike cruiser Forgehammer into Commarragh, the aristocratic houses of Commorragh immediately claimed the strike cruiser and its cargo of Space Marines for themselves, unaware a Librarian had sent a warning to Nocturne. While the houses were trying to subdue the Marines, the Salamanders battle-barge Vulkan's Wrath, along with strike cruisers from the Howling Griffons and Silver Skulls, managed to get into Commorragh. They eventually freed the Forgehammer and returned to real space, but not before all but wiping out the old Aristocracy. With the ensuing power vacuum, the Kabal of the Black Heart managed to establish dominance over the Dark City with Vect installing himself as Supreme Overlord of Commorragh.
The Kabal is the oldest an largest of any in Commoragh, and is effectively like the Mafia on hyper-steroids: It boasts hundreds of thousands of warriors, spies, thugs, has relationships with several influential and dangerous Kabals, Haemonculus and Wych Cults, and in general is so expansive and large that it actually requires multiple Archons to function properly, and each and every one of them are vying for power and for position against each other. But they have to do it as subtly as the Dark Eldar know how to, because all know that being in the Black Heart means that Vect is watching their every move, and no move, however small, escapes his notice. And as a result it motivates them to boldness in their raids, since they know the big cheese probably dictated the strategy for the raids, but also to keep in line, since fucking up will get Vect's attention. And that is a very bad thing to be in the sights of.
As of M41, the Kabal of the Black Heart has continued to maintain dominance of Commorragh for thousands of years, forcing a number of weaker Kabals to become vassals of the Black Heart, while fighting off ambitious rival Archons, some formed from remnants of the decimated aristocrats themselves.
Current Events
The Kabal of the Black Heart has had it as bad as any local Kabal had it when the new neighbors showed up and made an awful racket, causing the Gate of Khaine to shatter and let the rowdy fraternity from the immaterium flood Commoragh. In the initial fighting, Vect decides to piss off in front of pretty much everybody who matters, and instead of dealing with the daemons, they go and attempt to hunt down Yvraine, only to lose sight of her nearly every time he's close...and then [[Kheradruakh |that weird kid]] from the Mandrakes ends up dealing with the problem, shattering confidence in the Kabal's ability to control or defend Commoragh. Oh, and to make a bad situation worse...Vect died for a bit. He got better, and inevitably took control of the city, but now has to clamp down on pretty much every enemy he's ever made, including Yvraine and her new cohorts, and contend with the fact that his enemies know that he can in fact be killed, and every Kabal lost a ton of their own forces to Yvraine's machinations. And to top it all off, their favorite raiding grounds of the Vigilus system is now extremely crowded by Not-Mon-Keighs since it's one of the few places in the galaxy the Great Rift didn't bisect.