NAME: ESKANDER DRAGMIRE

AGE: THIRTY-five

RACE: GERUDO

Were it not for the simple fact of his gender, Eskander would have been born a Gerudo of little consequence. The son of a warrior of no particularly great skill or social standing, Eskander was still, nevertheless, a male Gerudo, and was thus destined to rule as his people's king. Unsurprisingly, his nobody of a mother was not seen as being fit to raise the future king, and so Eskander was raised and educated by the most elder of the tribe's witches. It wasn't that he never saw his mother, or that he didn't know who she was, but they were a world apart, and grew only more distant as time passed. His upbringing didn't afford him the luxury of clinging protectively to his mother, nor of acting like much of a child at all. Instead, Eskander was raised strictly, educated and trained to his limits.

After all, a king was no lowly warrior. True, he needed to hone his body and his mind, and he spent many long hours practising swordsmanship, horsemanship and archery with the best his tribe had to offer, but that was, in the mind of his caretakers, the least important part of his education. After combat, there was sorcery. Fortunately, the male Gerudo had a naturally affinity for magic, though most of his talents seemed to lie in curses. Still, most importantly, at least in his opinion, came his education in how to rule. Logistics, strategy, tactics, diplomacy, decorum, subterfuge, law, public speaking; all these and more were what a king needed, and Eskander was a quick study. This all meant, by the time Eskander officially became king of the Gerudo at the age of sixteen, he was an untested but thoroughly prepared young man, with both a steely resolve to lead his people well, as well as absolute surety that it was his destiny to do so.

The first part of his rule was important, if not especially eventful. His first order of business was to ensure the the entirety of the Gerudo people were loyal to him; not the crown, or the title, and certainly not the witches who still tried to exert influence over him. No, he wanted their loyalty to be vested securely in him, and nothing else. He did this with a calculated mixture of generating both fear and respect; the competent, the skilled, and the bold were rewarded, and incompetence and disobedience were punished both severely and publicly. Naturally, his ambition did not extend to his people alone, and his gaze soon turned to Hyrule. The desert wastes that the Gerudo inhabited had made them strong, but few in number, while bountiful pastures went to waste beneath weak rulership. The civil war was an opportunity, and Eskander seized it. Despite enjoying some initial success, no matter who well-trained and disciplined his soldiers were, they simply did not have the numbers to seize Hyrule. Still, some defeats and the mere shift of momentum was not enough to complete dissuade Eskander, and careful tactics combined with ruthless ferocity kept the war raging, even when pushed back into Gerudo territory. The fighting was savage and costly for both sides, and, while surprising to the Hyruleans as well as the Gerudo, it did not take much convincing on Eskander's part to negotiate a treaty. Better than being wiped off the earth entirely.

For the next several years, Eskander set about rebuilding his territory, though the harshness of the desert slowed healing and recovery, and provided a harsh reminder as to how truly limiting his present domain was. Ten years later, with the recovery of the Gerudo well underway, Eskander made his way back to the fertile fields of Hyrule, to negotiate closer trade and diplomatic relations. As uneasy as some are, considering that ten years is not long enough for all wounds to heal, only time will tell if this will bring the two kingdoms closer, or drive a wedge between them.

Property of Zaddie
Pronouns he/him
Timezone GMT+9