The Whitemantle Plot

**The Whitemantle Plot** was a successful plot to assassinate the High King Alexei Herminov by his two bastard children, Justin and Eliza Whitemantle.

## Events Prior to the Assassination

High King Alexei Herminov of Korevna was a notably bad king, mostly in his excess spending and whoring about the kingdom. Many were unsatisfied with his rule, especially in the waste of gold while the people starved through a few particularly bad seasons.

In 1748 or 49, Alexei met with the young Lady Iliana Whitemantle, a noblewoman from Higd, who he became smitten with. He fathered two children with her, the twins Justin and Eliza. When Lady Iliana became pregnant, the High King abandoned her, planting seeds of resentment that the twins would grow up learning. Several times they tried to make contact with their father but were unable to, further growing the hate for the king within them.

Around 1724 the two began to meet at the Stumbling Hunter Inn in Isgerdia, where they began planning ways in which they could get close to the High King. At first, they claimed they had not planned to kill the king, simply to get him in a place where he could not deny his part in siring them, with the final goal being to get him to legitimize them. However, as time went on, the plot twisted into a complex way to get Eliza close enough to High King Alexei to slip a poison into his cup.

In late 1724, they finalized the plan. High King Alexei was to throw a party for noblemen at his manor near the Vark River. Eliza was to come dressed as a maid, slip into the home, then drop a powerful Thacian poison into his cup. Justin was to wait outside with a horse so that the two could make their escape to Skjol, where they would live in the wilderness until the heat from the case died down.

## The Murder

On the night of the murder, the two arrived on the road some ways down from the manor by horseback. Justin dropped Eliza off on the roadside, both disguised in commoner's clothes. She walked the remaining way to the manor and was able to slip inside the servant's back entrance with a group of other maids. Inside, witnesses reported seeing Eliza doing menial tasks, most ending with her back in the kitchen. Eliza later said that she had not been allowed into the kitchen at first, and so she had to work her way there through performing such tasks.

Once she gained access, Eliza realized that there was no way she could have made it to the king's cup, as it was guarded intensely by two royal guards. Panicking, she considered poisoning the soup, but was concerned over the excess deaths such an act would cause. Instead, she continued to work within the kitchen looking for an opportunity to poison an item that would go directly to the king.

After about an hour within the building, Eliza gave up on the kitchen. Grabbing a small knife from the room, she left to wander the back halls. Eventually, she came upon the wash rooms. Inside, she decided to pose as an assistant and chamber lady. Later, she would claim that several of the noblemen who visited during this time had made advanced towards her and she obliged a few to keep her cover. Just when she had thought the plan was ruined, the High King himself stumbled into the room. He was quite drunk, being guided by a young page. He stumbled in, Eliza bowed, and told the young man that she would assist him to the pot and that he was free to go.

With her hand on the High King's left arm, she leaned in and whispered in his ear, saying later that her words were, "I am your daughter Eliza; do you remember me? Do you remember my brother, my mother?" The king, surprised at the words turned to look at her, but noticed the knife in her other hand. Before he could cry out, Eliza had begun to erratically stab at his chest. The page, the young Mikael Herminov, the King's own nephew, said that Eliza stabbed him about twenty times in only a few seconds. She became horribly sloppy and violent, ending with her sitting upon his chest and splattered with blood.

Mikael had ran from the room screaming for the guards, that there had been a murder most foul. Eliza said it took her a moment to regain her senses, but when they returned to her, she became horribly frightened. Fleeing deeper into the baths, she came to the actual bathing chamber, where she leapt through the massive stained glass windows, falling twelve feet to the ground. Upon landing, she twisted her ankle.

Stumbling through the back gardens, Eliza was able to make it to the back wall, where her brother was waiting on the other side. He through a rope over the wall, helped haul her over just as the guards made it to the wall. The two mounted their horse and rode south towards the Vark.

## Aftermath

Eliza and Justin were able to escape but found they could not cross the Vark River at any place but a bridge. By then, all the bridges in the area had been surrounded by guards and blocked with wagons. The two were caught near the old stone bridge northwest of Vilarde, now called Assassin's Bridge. Eliza and Justin were transported to Vilarde where they were kept overnight in caged wagons until the morning, where they were transported to Isgerdia.

While the twins were fleeing, the High King Alexei lay dying on the bathroom floor. Eliza had missed his heart, but had pierced his lungs in several places. King Lothar of Skjol cradled the High King's head as he lay dying, asking him several questions while one of the nobles, supposedly the Lord Kristoph of Little Rock, began giving him the last rites of Justainian kings. In his last moments, Alexei was said to have named his son Korvid II Herminov as king, something that shocked those in the room. He then sputtered through several questions with unintelligible answers until finally crying out, "A drink! A drink!" before dying.

When the High King died, King Lothar took charge of the scene demanding a man ride to Isgerdia at once to deliver the news to the prince. He had already commanded every able bodied man out to catch the perpetrators. Until the twins were caught, he stayed with the body, riding back with it and the captives to give his condolences to the widowed Queen.

Council was held upon arrival at Isgerdia. A decision was quickly come to and all unanimously agreed to execute the two twins through a combination of flaying and stretching. It was also decided to ignore the High King's wishes of his son Prince Korvid II being crowned king, instead declaring his eldest brother Crown Prince Alexei Herminov II High King. Prior to the execution, a scribe and monk called simply Harbald interviewed and provided religious services to the twins.

In 1725, the two siblings were brought to the steps of Palace Hill, where in that day there was a great stone platform for executions. Justin and Eliza were both set on racks and given their last rights. Justin was flayed first, so as to make his sister watch, while they stretched him upon the rack. After he died, they moved to Eliza, though thought it too cruel to do the same to a woman, so the executioner simply stretched her upon the rack until she passed out. A member of the crowd climbed onto the stage and stabbed her in the breast, killing her before the executioner. The executions were highly controversial, with the public out crying the unnecessary cruelty of it.

Witnesses claim that before she lost consciousness Eliza cried out, "Oh father, I see thee now!" Their bodies were buried in the St. Egon's Monastery outside Isgerdia.

## Controversy and Impact

Eliza and Justin became folk heroes of sorts, saving the kingdom from a disliked king, but plunging them also into several years of wavering turmoil. The successions following the Whitemantle Plot were quick and bloody, ending in Korevna losing a great deal of power. However, at the moment it became common to hear people venerate the two as martyrs. Unrest towards the government also flourished during this time, many crying out for the glory of the Whitemantles.

House Whitemantle became a pariah house, unable to marry other noble houses out of fear of the Whitemantle name. Eventually the house dissipated around 1640, with their last son marrying a Median woman, selling their ancestral home to another family.

After this assassination, the guards and security became much more intense for those within the royal family. No longer were peasants hired to work events, but specially trained and trusted members of the royal houses and staffs.

In the current year, the Whitemantle name continues to be ingrained in pop culture as a way to say that someone is untrustworthy, a revolutionary, or someone with modern ideas. Still, the cry for the Whitemantles is heard in many a rebellious chat, and several locations bare their names, such as the Assassin's Bridge.