Vesrik Taipor
Vesrik Taipor | |
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| Personal details | |
| Born | c. 1628 Vedkathna, Cadenza |
| Died | 9 May 1521 Monsa |
| Occupation | Explorer |
Vesrik Taipor (c. 1629 - 9 May 1661) was a Cadenzan ratafrë, or adventurer, who served the House of Giusti in the mid-seventeenth century. The circumstances of his extensive involvement at the Monsan court, where he became a trusted military and political adviser, are largely known from a surviving journal which was kept by Kaledro int'Gadanen, a member of Taipor's company.
Family background and early life
Vesrik Taipor was born c. 1629 to a landowning merchant family from Vedkathna. His family, who owned a warehouse in the capital, had long prospered in the flourishing Cadenzan grain trade. In 1641, however, their warehouse was destroyed in the Burning of Cadenza. Taipor's father used his remaining financial capital to commission a mercenary company which participated in the Cadenzan campaigns in Kelonna of 1645 and 1649.
Career
From the age of 14, Vesrik Taipor was apprenticed to a logistics agency in Cadenza. Although his father wished to keep his son out of the mercenary trade, by 1646 Taipor's duties included the assignment of escorts to colonial expeditions, and he developed numerous contacts among the ratafran and became absorbed in the mercenary industry, attending exercises and reading military textbooks. Nevertheless, by his father's death in 1655 he had never left the country. He took over administration of his family's mercenary company, which by this time was almost exclusively operating in and to Cadenzan Kamalbia. In late 1658 he joined his company's expedition to Tyúregar, with 79 men aboard his ship, but a January storm split the mainmast and he put in to Monsa for repairs.
In Monsa, Taipor was introduced to Prince Lucas II, who was instantly impressed with Taipor's charming demeanour and apparent professionalism. Taipor quickly became enamoured of the lavish lifestyle around the Monsan court and eagerly delayed his departure by several months. In April, he sold his company's contract in Kamalbia to a competitor passing through the city; by July, in the face of the mounting Exponential threat, he had entered Monsan service.
Taipor and his company became intimately involved in planning the defense of the city. When Exponential forces arrived in August, the Cadenzans fought in the streets against their bitter enemies with heavy casualties. Thirty-three of Taipor's seventy-nine men were killed at Monsa. As it became clear that the city was lost, Taipor joined the prince's household in fleeing to the port. His ship was one of only four to successfully escape Monsa for St. Barthélemy, Prince Lucas' last stronghold.