Claude Lemieux

Claude Lemieux was the artistic director of the Ballet National du Dementlieu in the decade prior to its tragic disappearence while on tour in Darkon. He was not especially well regarded in his professional capacity, but was well liked by most of his noble peers and was of a moderately well connected family.

The artistic directors' crowning moment proved to be most curious. He revived the project of staging Vacheq's Raven Field. He had always thought the work promising but in need of improvement. The death of its author afforded him considerable scope for doing just that. The result failed to impresss the audience on opening night. Indeed, Borcan aristocrats who had travelled to Dementlieu to attend the opening, stormed out in the middle of second act, accusing Lemieux of "desecrating a Borcan national treasure." Bizarrely, the following morning he was accused of having led a band of ruffians in an assault upon the Borcan ambassador as the latter returned home from the ballet. The ambassador not only demanded that he be hung, but implied that members of the government had orchestrated the affair, and insisted upon a personal apology from the Lord-Governor.

The official response was silence. The unofficial response was to repay the Borcans in kind. Lemieux's dubious variation on Vecheq was proclaimed by Dementlieuse critics to be a vast improvement upon the original. The proclamation was backed up by a sudden and insatiable demand for tickets. Hansom profits underwrote the bold plan of a tour of Darkon. And it was in Darkon that Lemieux and the national ballet, en route to Vilaki, vanished without a trace. There is unofficial speculation that the party responsible for the disappearance was none other than Vacheq himself.