Ernest Roye

Daggerfall Covenant

**Ernest Roye** is a Breton priest and statesman. The Bishop of Wayrest, elected to the office in 2E 562, he belongs to the wealthy Roye Family. Ernest enjoys the privilege of a number of estates across the Kingdom despite being primarily confined to the capital, where he is afforded a grand manor as the high priest of Zenithar.

## **Biography**

His education that of a lawyer, Ernest was certainly not intended for the Temple. The youngest child of Hugues Roye, one of the two Roye Brothers, he was unlikely to have much of a hand in the family’s businesses - and a Roye lawyer was not an uncommon thing. Studying the trivium from an early age, his education was funded in its entirety by his father and uncle, and he was not required to find work; a fact that no doubt contributed to his sybaritic nature.

Matriculating to the University of Wayrest, and there studying a wide range of subjects from Law to Theology, Ernest developed what he would later describe as an *honest yet frivolous love for academia*. Attaching himself to one master, Anselme Talant, in particular, his memory of the place is a fond one. Graduating in 2E 554, he would, much to his father’s original horror, join the Temple of Zenithar.

Though his reasons for joining the priesthood remain clouded, in a sense even to himself, Roye has himself attributed his move to a sudden spiritual awakening. In his letters to his favoured teacher, he recalls a strange and indescribable pull towards the Temple. His detractors and critics accuse him instead of a number of things - some even claiming Roye was ordained a priest to avoid the scandal of some illegitimate child born during the latter part of his time at the University. Such accusations are baseless, however.

While publicly celibate, a pious yet optional undertaking, Ernest certainly has at least one illegitimate son; Gregory. Born some years after his ordination, Gregory is afforded neither the name Roye nor FitzErnest - though recognised by Ernest himself.

Come 2E 562, with the death of Bishop Gellin, Roye was to be elected as his successor. A controversial election, in part plagued by simony, Ernest was met with substantial opposition. A man considered young and impious, proven to be more extravagant than his many peers combined, many feared that he would reverse the work of his predecessors and bring the Temple into disrepute. Unwavering, the Bishop would meet his rivals and fiercely do away with them in the following years.

When, in 2E 563, the Knahaten Flu claimed the last of the Gardner Dynasty, a new king arose: Emeric of Cumberland. A man he was acquainted with, Ernest would lead the coronation of Emeric. As the Bishop of Wayrest, he imparted upon the King the blessings of Zenithar, declaring his divinely approved rule over the kingdom. Immediately seeking royal favour, Ernest would begin to advise the King as the realm’s chief religious authority. Ever remaining at the royal court, sometimes present daily, he began to politic.

Proving the concerns of his opposition to be true, Roye had by the outbreak of Ranser’s War largely undone the work of previous bishops. The model of his predecessors one of charity and humility, a sort of modesty before the divine, the Temple under Roye is one entirely different - even opposite. Regarding his predecessors, Ernest wrote, *‘Had these men the chance, (those) who for half a century brought the Temple low with a policy of bankruptcy, they would continue to do so for half a century more.’*

Regarding himself therefore as a saviour of the Temple, the Bishop is utterly confident of his legitimacy. During Ranser’s War, he was personally present for a number of battles, bestowing on Wayrestian soldiers the favour of Zenithar - the Provider of Ease. Returning to the capital, he performed an apology in defence of the King’s actions in Shornhelm. Declaring that *one cannot in good conscience praise their god while at the same time cursing their king*, formally forbidding priests to speak or write against the King’s *necessary and just actions*, he secured for himself a sort of alliance between King and Temple largely absent in the past.

The year following Ranser’s defeat, Ernest would be present for the formation of the Greater Daggerfall Covenant. He was a supporter the treaty, considering it to be a move towards a stronger Bretony; one led by Wayrest, its King, and its Temple. The peace that would ensue as a result of the Covenant would be of great use to Roye: a catalyst for the expansion of the Temple and the influence of the Bishop.

A cult primarily carried atop the shoulders of the burghers, the Temple of Zenithar found itself increasingly wealthy when mercantile profits grew. The Covenant giving way to secure trade, many looked to the Temple for blessings and safekeeping. The wealthiest amongst foreign merchants were called upon to invest in the Temple, thereby supporting its growth outside of Wayrest. Local temples and shrines would begin to appear across High Rock in the years following and since.

Looking still to empower the Kingdom, its Temple, and its Bishop, Roye remained unsatisfied even with the expansion of Zenithar’s influence. During the midsummer of 2E 568, just one year following the signing of the Daggerfall Covenant, the Bishop reestablished the long-dissolved Order of the Anvil: holy knights dedicated to Zenithar, charged with protecting the priests and the temples. These blessed paladins would be sent out across High Rock to guard the temples of Zenithar - a forward and unabashed move that would only serve to anger those in the other Temples threatened by this series of expansionist plays.

In the years following, Ernest turned his attention to domestic matters. Concerned by the seeming irreligiosity amongst some of the realm’s nobility; beyond the reach of the Bishop and irreverent of a merchant’s god; he would take a number of measures seeking to boost the Temple’s influence and importance in the Wayrestian country itself.

Establishing many shrines and temples, as he had begun to do elsewhere already, Roye would further expand on the role of the priesthood. Enlarging the existing Temple repositories, he presented the feudal nobility - and other landholders - with greater and more secure safekeeping options for their wealth. He also commissioned a number of religious tomes, seeing that they were copied and distributed across the Kingdom. These tomes would emphasise Zenithar as the god of work, calling on the nobility to partake and do good work. When preached, these works also served as a convenient call to the peasantry to do the same.

[Unfinished]