Name: Lord Emile Urquhart
Age: 36
Gender: Male
Position: High Battle-Master of the Acherean Imperial Legions
Appearance: At a height of 6ft 3 inches, with a thick-set build and broad shoulders, Emile is an imposing presence in any company. The hair on both his head and face is coarse and close cropped, once all black but now sprinkled with grey. his eyes are a dark green, set close together either side of his crooked nose, that has been broken no less than four times. His skin is tanned and ruddy, with deep furrows on his forehead and at the corners of his eyes. Some men have known Emile Urquhart for years and never once seen him do anything but scowl (though in their cases it is probably because he despises them), and he walks around with the posture of a man who may never have relaxed in his life. Everything about Emile is big, but he does not look ungraceful for it, moving everywhere with a kind of bullish, martial elegance. You get the sense, watching him stride through the corridors of power, that Emile could trample lesser man under his heel and not so much as notice.
As far as dress sense is concerned, Emile would seem to wear full battle dress wherever he goes, intimidating some while causing others to scoff (though never to his face). This is a man who has known war all his life, and is only really comfortable when fighting, or at least when dressed ready for a fight. His armour is expensive, but not ostentatious. Steel plate from head to heel, enamelled black and polished to a shine. Through the few gaps in the plate you can see that he wears a shirt of silvery ring-mail underneath. The long cape that trails behind him is blood red satin, fastened over his shoulders to the upper portion of his breastplate, fashioned in the shape of a Valkyrie, its wings spread. He wears a bastard sword on his hip, and the great-helm that he often carries beneath his arm shows the visage of a demon, with horns spiralling out from the temples.
History: Over two centuries ago, the House of Urquhart was a proud, powerful and prosperous family, well within the folds of the Acherean political elite. Nothing lasts forever though, and a generation of bad investments by a weak and foolish family head, leading to bad debts and a fall out of Royal favour, led to one of the most rapid downfalls of any household in peacetime. In the space of a scant few decades, the Urquhart name went from being an outcast, to a laughing stock, to being so small and insignificant that it was worthy of neither. What surely did not help, was the epidemic of bastards and lesser branches of the family that sprouted from the less than proper activities of the Lords who presided over its waning days. In truth, Emile was born on the very outer reaches of one of the least and lowest-hanging branches. His claim to heredity is legitimate... though only just. There are nameless, base-born wretches scattered over the furthest reaches of Acherea with just as much Urquhart blood in them as Emile, a fact which the man himself is loathe to be reminded of.
A large boy, strong and hot-headed from the start, Emile was troublesome. Clearly, this was a man who could never be content with a simple, humble life. However, his connections to any sort of power were slim, and they were connected to a House that had all but slipped into irrelevancy. With not much in the way of prospects, and with his own family in no hurry to keep hold of him, Emile left their modest town house in the Imperial City, to ply his trade as a mercenary in the outer provinces and beyond. There, Emile rose high. Emile was one of the ones who survived his tenure as arrow fodder in various small campaigns long enough to become a Lieutenant, and later the Captain, of a notorious sell-sword company, colourfully known as the Ploughmen of Souls. He became their leader at the age of 17.
Even for a mercenary, it wasn't long before Emile garnered a reputation for being ruthless. He was not the sort of sell-sword that the Legion liked to hire to keep the peace in the more far flung, lightly held provinces. He was a warrior, and an absolute one at that. Throughout his career Emile brought hell down on opposing armies and innocents alike. When it came to 'Shock and Awe', he was something of a savant, and as a result attracted men of a similar calibre to his ranks. Whether you were a veteran soldier or a humble washer-woman, if you ever saw the banner of the Bloody Plough coming for you, you had best find a very, very deep hole to hide in. Those who would label him a Mad Dog though would be mistaken. He and his men wrought terrible atrocities, but Emile at least took no frenzied gratification from it. Neither, however, did he ever once show hesitation or remorse. On top of sheer ferocity, Emile also proved to be a rather skilled tactician. When he wasn't burning and pillaging towns, Emile was equally adept at winning battles even when significantly outnumbered, or else when holding the weaker ground before his foe.
Such was his success, that at the age of 26 Emile found himself on a ship back to the Imperial City, for an audience with Emperor Sigfried III himself, back when the man was closer to his prime. One of the distant provinces of Acherea had begun an open rebellion, that the loyalists were struggling to reconcile though any means. The Lords of this province, known as Halash Sekh, had not only taken up arms against the Legion, but had also paid off the Faith, who in turn had riled up the common folk against the Empire. The uprising needed to be quelled before such dissent could spread, and Sigfried recognised not only that the Legion needed reinforcements, but also that he needed men who could act under his orders, but still appear far enough removed from his authority that their actions would not reflect badly on him. As such, he had begun enlisting the help of all the mercenary companies that he could reach. When presented before the Emperor, and told of the planned campaign, Emile sensed an opportunity and chose to seize it. Striding up to the Royal throne, Emile took his knee (still leaving him at almost head-height with the Emperor), looked Sigfried right in the eyes and said to him...
"For gold, I can beat them. For gold and my birthright, I can make it so not so much as one poxxy serf ever raises a rusty pitchfork your way for a thousand years."
Emile was true to his word. To this day the campaign is known (only in hushed whispers) as the Rape of Halash Sekh. The separatist forces were crushed in every sense of the word. Their armies, worse than decimated, were scattered to the four winds. Entire cities were raised to the ground overnight, Temples of the Faith were sacked, and their inhabitants impaled on the spires of the buildings. The mighty castles of the rebel Lords were smashed, and had rivers redirected over their shattered shells, so that not even ruins would remain of them. What's more, Emile was meticulous in ensuring that, when the forces he commanded would descend upon their foe, that no man of them would ever escape to tell the tale. Outside of the province, rumours of atrocities were rife, but all anyone ever heard was of how the Imperial forces continued to fight valiantly, winning great victories for their leader. By way of reward, Emile received a small mountain of gold from the Imperial Treasury, was awarded the rank of General, a senior position in the Imperial Legions War Councils, and several medals of valour. Most importantly of all, he was legitimised by Imperial decree as the head of the House of Urquhart.
The sell-swords who had followed Emile to war became the precursors of his household, and he wasted no time in putting his new-found wealth to use. He set about restoring and reinforcing the dilapidated Urquhart holdings, as well as recruiting more and more men for his own private forces. He even married into the Royal Family (though only a second cousin) to gain access to even more wealth, power, and martial might Today, Emile's keep is possibly the most formidable fortress in Acherea. Between the Imperial Legions he commands, his own private militias, and his still-viable contacts in the mercenary world, Emile commands enough power to set all corners of Archerea afire if he so chooses. His next most imminent ambition is to acquire the Imperial Fleet, or else find a way to circumvent Imperial sanctions and build a fleet of his own to surpass it.
Emile is a simple man of simple tastes. He is not, however, an idiot. He knows who the players are, and detests them all equally. During such turbulent times, Emile is of the opinion that he could rule better than all of them combined, and what's more, he's not afraid to say it. However, in truth Emile could take or leave actually wearing the crown, especially if he'd need to cause a bloody coup to get at it. What he'd much rather do, is find whoever of the pretenders is most keen to back his own interests, and throw the support of the Legion behind that person.
