Festen

Festen was a Mother in Faction Paradox's Ritual Wing.

She had her body surgically altered so she would appear permanently pregnant, in mockery of the Homeworld's taboo against breeding; however, this did not become fashionable in the Eleven-Day Empire.

She was the last Faction Paradox dignitary to visit the Broken Remote colony on Fallahal. The visit led her to say "there's no such thing as harmless entertainment" and to describe the Great Houses' destruction of the Remote's ambitions as "literally the worst crime ever committed against a race of humanity". (PROSE: The Book of the War)

Behind the scenes

• Mother Festen was further explored in Eddie Robson's rejected entries for The Book of the War. In those entries, she was exiled from Faction Paradox after she led a disastrous experiment on the planet Ostenthal, and she was ultimately murdered by Tanya Glassman.