Nathan Black

Born Nathan Marwon Black, he is the brother Felucia Black, and formerly the Royal Professor of The Spine.
Following an unknown series of events, he denounced Queen Sylvanas publicly and realigned his loyalty to that of the Rebel Spine. He was killed in the final attack of the Spine, and his worldly possessions have been split amoungst the victors.
==History==
The story of Nathan Black is long and strange. A prominent lord in possession of the fief of Pyrewood, and allergedly owning a large mansion just south of the town, he is subject to much speculation. Whether his claims are true or not is debated, however there is strogn evidence for both a mansion belonging to the Black, and the then small township of Pyrewood also being in that fabled family's possession. Even in death there is much controversy concerning Nathan. According to both death certificate and the Silverpine Census from the supposed age of death, he was buried in his family tomb in Northern Gilneas, and yet he was raised in Western Plaguelands by the Spine.
===Life===
====Poverty====
Born to Jeremy and Lucia Black, Nathan grew up to the age of five as an only child in the poor household of Black, a small apothecary's workshop in Gilneas City. He was described as a very asocial, yet highly intelligent boy, who was frequently alienated by children at his own age for reasons unknown. When he became old enough to talk and walk, he would assist his father with duties around the chemistry workshop and the house. Due to Lucia dieing in giving birth to Nathan, the two were solitary, and said to have grown a very tight connection.
When Nathan attained the age of four, Jeremy Black became married again to Lillie Storm during an arranged marriage which cost Jeremy most of his funds. Lillie gave birth a year later to Felucia Black, and after the birth died of pneumonia as a result of the poor sanitation in the poorer areas of the city.
The miserable life in poverty continued until Nathan reached his first decade. A week after his birthday, his father recieved a package from an undisclosed southern lord. The package held a flagon containing a then unknown culture of bacteria. Jeremy was asked to classify it, but seeing that the sample was extremely potent (following an accident in which a visitor ate a loaf of bread infected with the bacteria) Jeremy nutured and replicated it. When he had enough, he mitigated it and formed a dangerous toxin which he sold to the unscrupulous. The first stepping-stones of the Black Emporium where laid.
====Rise to prominence====
The next ten years are in obscurity, though it is known that on Nathan's twentieth birthday, he attained his first business - a small brothel in Pyrewood. Also during this time, Jeremy's own health deteriorated due to a forthcoming arthritis which disabled him quite severely, and restricted his travels to just one part of Gilneas City. At this stage, while still living in scanty conditions, they had amassed a fortune in the Gilnean Bank Association of what records estimates to have been past six hundred Gilnean gold - current currency conversion rates would have placed their wealth and past two thousand Stormwind gold. Therefore, somewhere towards the end of the year Jeremy invested half of his fortune in the erection of the Black Estate, a manor just south of the small settlement of Pyrewood.
The construction took two years to complete, and just in time - three days prior to the completion of the manner, Jeremy Black suffered from a heart attack, but due to miraculous circumstances survived*. Being a man of firm resolution, he did not postpone the move from Gilneas City and into the finished manor, and with the help of his son, established a presence in Pyrewood as the wealthiest.
Two years later, the Black Family established a marital alliance with the house of Storm, a lesser noblehouse to the North at where the Sepulcher is now situated. Felucia Black, now at the age of eighteen, would be wedded to Luciph Storm, a thirty-six year old fur-trader, the following year in order to cement relations with one of the prominent families of Silverpine at the time.
After their marriage, the Black family, now renamed to the Black Emporium, massively expanded their busienss in drugs, poison and remedies with the construction of a chemistry lab in the yard of the manor. They primarily dealt on the wrong side of law due to profits being so much higher than the legal side. Strangely, they were never apprehended. Bribery has been identified as their main source of keeping low, though there have been rumours of chaining the enforcement down using addicting drugs and threats of death.
The marriage between Felucia and Luciph did not last long nor did it end happily - Felucia killed her husband just after a year of marriage due to unknown reasons (but her recovered diary suggests that it was in jealousy of her family) and the ties between the Storm and the Black were severed. Fortunately for the Blacks, they were at no risk for action, due to keeping the entire area in control.
====Life as a noble====
At the age of thirty-four, Nathan's father moved from the manor and into Pyrewood, knowing that he did not have long until his death. And very right in that - two years later, he suffered another heart attack and did not survive. Being the only heir (Felucia was disinherited after the murder of Luciph, and was living in seclusion in the Capital), Nathan siezed an iron grip of the Black assets. He purchased the land on which Pyrewood was and converted it into a township, and with cash incentitives lured settlers to the town. In two years, Pyrewood changed from a two dozen to two hundred inhabitants, and the number was climbing rapidly.
The rest of Nathan Black's life is a mystery, because there exist no written records of anything apart from the common laws that he issued in Pyrewood as the self-entitled major.
====Death====
His death came very sudden. A month after his fourty-second birthday, his sister showed up at his manor, and after a brief talk about life had been, she suddenly produced a stiletto - the iconic weapon of the Black family - and stabbed him once in the stomach, and thrice in the throat.
His body was discovered by the house-servant, and he was buried in the same tomb as his father**.
===Undeath===
====Revival====
The revival of Nathan Black took place just two weeks after the death of Felucia Black, and he was raised to prevent anarchy in the Royal Apothecary Society subdivision in The Spine. This controversial action, formulated and carried out by the leadership only, sparked some unrest within The Spine, as there were more than a few Apothecaries capable of grasping the reins, and yet this heriditary powershift completely ruled that out.
Thanks to clever embalming techniques which are to this date a mystery to even the undertakers of Deathknell and Andorhall, Nathan's body was extremely well preserved. Despite having been in the grave for twelve years, he had rotspots only on his upper arms and shoulders, and due to the stab-wound in his abdomen which had damaged his lower spine, he had initially trouble walking. The sliced throat had not destroyed his vocal chords, so he was still capable of speech. But apart from that, and of course the lack of eyes and drastically slimmer posture, he was virtually intact. His mind was in the same state as when he died, which has been speculated as the cause of his consistent lack of faith in others, and his presumed feigned dogmatic praise of Queen Sylvanas.
====Humble beginnings====
The first month of Nathan's unlife was spent as a human man in an undead body. He had to become acclimatised with the entire new lifestyle and the culture of the Forsaken, and thus spent his time next to other instructers of the Spine as an apprentice of Unlife. It was during this that he met several of his latter friends, and acquired a flavour for leadership.
During this phase, he controversially enough was not subjected to the dogma and indoctrination that almost every New Forsaken (Forsaken raised after the acquisition of the Val'kyr) are subjected to - he was having the same prejudices as when he died. This may also explain his underlying hatred for the Orcs, and why he was so surprised initially to see the undead.
====Achievements and exploits during the loyalist Spine====
During his career as instructor of The Spine and overseer of the Brill apothecary, he achieved multiple feats of science and administration. He engineered many viruses, most of which are only rumours following the Uprising, and to much controversy, produced both Blight and Isiliosis samples, well hidden from the all-seeing eye of the Horde, and indeed the rest of the organisation. Fortunately, he never had a chance to use either of these brews.
In addition to that, he reshuffled the Apothecary hierachy and introduced many new polices and rules to a radical degree. While initially they sparked off much discontent (he was very rigid in his beliefs, and punishments were often), they nevertheless gave a reinvigorating uplift to the Apothecaries, which accomplished many successes previously thought impossible.
However, it was a well-known fact that he acted very much in self-interest - every new invention had to go through him first, and it was almost accepted that he copied, improved, and renamed samples made by others - which in turn produced a very mixed view of his leadership.
Aside from being an apothecary, he also acted as a battlefield tactician, a feat which took many by surprise due to the use of very unconventional warfare tactics. This trait was especially prominent during the Siege of Andorhal, where he as the sole commander managed to not just win back the town from the clutches of the occult Festerjaw, he also organised invasion forces and eventually destroyed the enemies in Northrend. However, again to much controversy, his intervention (while bringing ultimate success) cost the lives of countless Forsaken, and not once did he share his mysterious tactics with the High Command.
====The Uprising====
Main article 
During the Spine Uprising, he was generally viewed to be the orchestrator behind the plots and schemes of the terrorist faction. He was prominent in most major operations, and played the role of communicator between the Spine and the Horde, particular in the process of ransoming Relcha Kim'belore and Sorlain Amaran.
Not much else is known of him during the Uprising, only that he was killed during the final attack on Thunder Bluff.
==Controversy regarding the collection of information==
The collection of information regarding Nathan is scant and highly disputed. The sources from which it mainly comes are generally from here-say and written reports, so they vary a lot in subjectivity. Only official data can be fully verified and validified.
==Trivia==
*Nathan was a known sophisticate and cultured gentleman. In life his collection of painted art reached wide recognition in north western Lordaeron, and even in death he collected many prominent paintings and sculptures. His stash of these treasures have yet to be found, being rumoured to be somewhere in the forgotten ruins of the Capital City. He also had a well-trained taste for wine, a stock of which he would also keep close even in death where he couldn't taste them. Well-known is his love for Elwynn Red. During the uprising, his most quoted phrase is said to be "I do miss my wine", and he would display extreme joy when supply raids brought him any wine. On that note, he scarcely touched other alcoholic drinks, deeming them too savage and uncouth for his gentle, rotten tastebuds.
*While generally seen as a boisterous person and one to dismiss most greater questions in favour of science, he was in fact a deeply philosophical person with an aesthetic view of humanity. A common misconception of him is that he is a nihilist, when in fact he had extropian views of humanity (racism included).
*He was a known Casanova, a fact that he would often belittle other men with.
*Despite never been married in life, some accounts of him being a romantic does exist. In particular, it is rumoured that he had an elven lover in life, contrary to his blatant disrimination and hatred towards them.
*His humour was exceptionally dry, bordering on the unbearable, and he would fire a joke when he had the chance, no matter the situation. This often brought some very uncomfortable encounters upon him.
Category:Characters
Category:Forsaken
Category:Horde
Category:Apothecary
Category:Warlock
Category:Male
Category:Spine