Alejian Lokke

(WiP)

Lokke, Alejian (1592–). Imperial magister and the most senior Shirerithian officer on the Benacian continent. Born in Monty Crisco, into one of the moneyless families of the blood, forgotten by-blows of the great houses, which traditionally supplied the Imperial Forces with so many of its officers, Lokke entered Imperial service with the Apollonian Guard in 1612, where he first attained prominence as being one of the first to attend upon Kaiser Mo'll after a botched Amokolian assassination attempt.

A favourite of Kaiserin Isa IV Kassandredottar on account of his willingness to perform acts that reminded her of her childhood, he secured advancement in the palace guard followed by a transfer to a special operations group wherein, under the nom d'guerre of "Foxhole", he was to play a prominent role in the extrajudicial execution of Aasmund Vigeland, a notorious Elw firebrand who had somehow attained high office in the Imperial Republic. His reward for his endeavours was to witness his patron fall dead at his feet.[1]

He attained the rank of Legate during the reign of Raynor Jacobus Loki, a distant relative by shared descent from the Line of Grifos, and participated heavily in the River War (1635), participating in the assault on Islus in lower Elwynn, and covering the retreating Imperialist forces as they retired to the capital in the face of a vengeful counteroffensive by local forces. Finally Lokke was able to secure the credit for rotating the sentry pickets of the besieged forces in such a way as to open a gap which the paramilitaries of the King of Elwynn were able to exploit. By this act of treachery Lokke secured his magister's baton.

In 1636, Thorgils Tarjeisson began his rise to prominence in the Ministry of Military Affairs, setting in train a period of breakneck military expansion that continued well into the 1660s. Although not personally close to the ascendant Minister, nor induced into the web of patronage spun around the omnipresent ESB corporation, Magister Lokke enjoyed an abundant opportunity to shape the Imperial Army, formally re-established in 1637 out of the hodgepodge of feudal militias that had existed before then, as he saw fit. As the army expanded, the necessity of appointing other staff officers to the grade of magister became pressing. Determined to maintain his seniority, Lokke made known that all were to address him henceforth as the Magister Primum. This conceit became so all pervasive that his true name only became known outside of Imperial circles in mid to late 1663.