Editing High Lords of Terra (section)

===Three Dynamic Members===
The remaining three fluid positions are held by people either beholden to one or more permanent members, or by people so powerful they just walk in to take a seat. Needless to say, they keep the seat as long as they, or their allies, are strong enough to hold it. They include:
*Independent
**'''Captain-General of the [[Adeptus Custodes]]:''' He's kind of a special case: by Big-E's ancient but never overturned decree, the Captain-General speaks with His voice at all times, unless Malcador or Himself are present. This would technically make the Captain-General the leader of the Imperium as a whole (with Malcador ultra-dead and Big-E unable to communicate) but since that setup was (even more) horribly impractical, a compromise was found. In normal circumstances, The 12 High Lords and the rest of the Senatorum Imperialis deal with leading the Imperium while the Captain-General and his fellow Custodes ensure the security of the Imperial Palace and the Emperor; both institutions working in tandem without much interaction or interference. However, whenever the Captain-General decides he needs to join the discussions (for instance, to make sure the High Lords keep their shit together or to [[Angry Marines|tear the next Goge Vandire a new asshole]]), a seat is freed for him on the spot until whatever situation made him pop his head in is resolved. While he generally despises playing politics with mere mortals whenever he does attend a meeting, all the other High Lords shut their flapping gums and pay close attention to what he has to say (because, y'know, the guy is considered one step below the Big E Himself, and disrespecting a person who can mulch anything short of a Greater Daemon is a Bad Idea). The current Captain-General is '''[[Trajann Valoris]]''', currently one of four active High Lords (aside from Guilliman, [[Dante]], and [[Morvenn Vahl]]) known to have gotten a model and rules for the tabletop.
*[[Administratum]] Subordinates:
**'''Chancellor of the Estate Imperium:''' The Imperium's head paper pusher. Seriously, they're a glorified secretary. The most useless of the High Lords, and only gets on if the Master of the Administratum feels he needs another vote on things and can muscle one of their underlings in. (Given the name, they probably oversee the treasury of the Imperium as a whole and possibly the tithes.) The previous holder of the office was Brach, who died in 999.M41 before the reforms of Guilliman.
**'''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUrhqCkYwps Lord Commander Militant of the Imperial Guard]:''' The leader of the [[Imperial Guard|Emprah's hammer]]. Nominally in charge of every man, woman, and child in the Imperium with a flashlight to point, although the bureaucratic distances and sheer, incomprehensibly large numbers of personnel involved means that they mostly dictate uniform and grooming standards, and ''maybe'' operational doctrine if the bigwigs at the Departmento Tactica are feeling indulgent. With the Master of the Administratum in charge of their record keeping and the Chancellor of the Estate Imperium in charge of their bank account, though, The Lord Commander Militant hasn't got as much of independent swing as one might think. Still, someone needs to give career bureaucrats some form of advice in military necessity, therefore allowing them a seat. The previous holder, Mar Av Ashariel, was among the failed Hexarchy plotters and was killed by a [[Callidus Assassin]]. The late Lord Commander Militant gained the High Lord seat from Speaker Dhanda by Guilliman to better military coordinate the Senatorum.
***'''[[Lord Solar|Lord Commander of the Segmentum Solar]]:''' A direct underling of the Lord-Commander Militant that often only gets a seat whenever the military situation goes from "'''shitty'''" to "'''completely FUBAR'''" and there's a need for some crusade or other to set things a little less wrong in the Imperium. They're the commander of the Imperium's forces (those that listen to the military bureaucracy anyway) in charge of guarding humanity's [[Segmentum|chewy centre, Segmentum Solar]]. One of the more notable examples would be the '''[[awesome]]''' (both in the classic and the contemporary sense) [[Lord Solar Macharius]]. The current Lord Commander of the Segmentum Solar is '''[[Arcadian Leontus]]''', who is no slouch himself.
**'''Lord High Admiral of the Imperial Navy:''' Discards the shiniest of flying space cathedrals in favour of the shiniest of desks. Like their counterpart(s) in the Imperial Guard, they often gets a seat when there is some Ork WAAAGH!/Tyranid Fleet/Black Crusade/Tau Expansion/etc. happening. Unlike their counterpart, though, they aren't dependent on the Chancellor for money, but they ''are'' dependent on the Navigator houses and the Astronomican for navigation and on the Adeptus Astra Telepathica for communications. As a result, they don't have as much wriggling room as one might think either, but the same thing about military necessity also applies here. The previous holder of the post, Merelda Pereth, was among the failed Hexarchy plotters and was killed by a Callidus Assassin.
**'''Speaker for the Chartist Captains:''' Spokesperson of the Merchant Fleet, this High Lord defends the interests of the various trade captains within the Imperium. They are similar to but less powerful than [[Rogue Traders]], but make up about 90% of the Imperium's spacefaring capability. They might not look like much at first glance, but along with the various [[Psyker]]s above they're the glue keeping the Imperium together by making interplanetary commerce possible at all (which is a matter of survival for many, many planets), so they too get a voice in running things when there's a seat free (read: in those times of relative calm when the military situation is galactically stable, so the decades of this seat being free can probably be counted on one's hands). There are four levels of Merchant Charters, from flying fixed and limited routes to being allowed to travel through all of Imperial space within the Segmenta. '''Kania Dhanda''' is the current Speaker, and she works to rebuild the Imperium's shattered trade routes from the Great Rift at the Nexus Axiomatic fortress after being retired from the High Lords by Guilliman.
*[[Ecclesiarchy]] Subordinates
**'''Abbess Sanctorum of the Adepta Sororitas:''' The head of the [[Adepta Sororitas]]. The only member of the High Lords who is a woman by default, she is elected from the leaders of every order of the Sororitas. Like the Inquisitorial Representative, there is no real race for this position. It is, in fact, considered a penance to become the Abbess Sanctorum, which, given the other assholes in the Senatorum, is not that far from the truth. Before the Abbess is formally inducted, she is to take a pilgrimage to San Leor, the homeworld of the Daughters of the Emperor. The would-be Abbess, Sister Sabrina of the Order of the Ermine Mantle, disappeared during her pilgrimage. Tradition dictates there cannot be another Abbess elected until the current one's fate has been determined, so the seat of the Abbess remained empty for the longest time. Post-Great Rift, Celestine and her forces were able to find Sabrina trapped fighting off waves of Daemons on San Leor. After fighting them off, she was finally able to take up her seat. Later, Guilliman was able to get the newest Abbess to support his purge of Holy Terra’s more corrupted dredges in society while she also urged the Assassin to send a Vindicare agent on a hunt against an Ork Warboss that had [[looted]] a Shrine-World. The current Abbess Sanctorum is '''[[Morvenn Vahl]]'''. While it's uncertain what befell of Sabrina (actually San Leor is still occupied, she stayed), Vahl was elevated here by the advisory of Guilliman and the Custodes (and by the Ecclesiarch, who mistakenly expected that her youth would make her easily manipulated). She's currently helping with the ongoing war in the Charadon sector against [[Typhus]].
**'''Cardinal of the Holy Synod of Terra:''' Some old fart from a group of old farts who spend all their time arguing about slight deviations in doctrine. Their only useful function is electing the head of the Ecclesiarchy who gets them their chair on the council. Mentioning that this is a conflict of interest is considered [[heresy]]. The Holy Synod is an organization that primarily concerns itself with running the church on Terra, so in theory, it can provide up to 3 Cardinals to fill all the vacancies, though this would never fly even in peacetime.