Jarek

Jarek is the commandant of Firgaard's army and Asha's betrothed.

Appearance
Jarek is described as being large and muscular with dark hair and eyes. Many women regard him as attractive.

Personality
Jarek sports a heinous penchant for cruelty, possessiveness, and lecherousness. His temper is extremely volatile, and he has been known to pick violent fights for extremely petty reasons. He is not above using secrets and manipulations to achieve his goals, and being denied what he wants enrages him.

The Last Namsara
Asha is betrothed to Jarek, the commandant, despite the fact that she despises him. She suspects that Jarek, who has a firm grip on the military, fosters dreams of usurping her father. He found Asha after Kozu's attack on the village, which also killed his parents - the previous commandant and his wife.

At the beginning of the novel, Jarek is in the scrublands with Dax, who is attempting to negotiate with the scrublanders.

Upon her return to Firgaard from her dragon hunt, her father offers to exchange the head of the great dragon Kozu for her freedom from her betrothal - an opportunity Asha eagerly embraces.

During the party, Jarek attempts to force Asha to dance with him and makes sexual advances on her. He also heckles Dax and the scrublands guests, and he shoves Dax into Roa, causing him to spill his wine down her front.

When Asha collapses and Jarek's slave Torwin catches her, effectively circumventing a potentially dangerous head injury to the Iskari, Jarek responds not by thanking him or showing mercy, but by berating him publicly, then dragging him back to his house for a beating with a shaxa. After Asha awakens, Dax enjoins her to intervene on Torwin's behalf.

Asha visits Jarek's house and demands that he stop abusing Torwin, arguing that he prevented her from sustaining any further injury. Jarek sneers and cruelly taunts her, wondering aloud if he should expect her to carry on with slaves after their wedding. Asha overpowers him and renders him unconscious, but he falls on top of her and begins to suffocate her. Greta, another slave of Jarek's, rolls her master off the Iskari, then offers one of his mantles to her and Torwin as a disguise.

Jarek is present at Greta's arena fight and grips Asha's hand while forcing her to watch and whispering threats of revealing the events of the previous night and of harming Torwin once he is found. The king shoots Asha a concerned look, but does little to intervene.

Asha returns home to divert the public's attention from Torwin, but Jarek still captures him and forces him into the arena. This time Asha intercedes and helps drive back his attackers, with help from Safire and Dax. Torwin escapes on Shadow, but Asha stays behind to keep him safe and to finish her hunt for Kozu. Jarek wishes Asha to be imprisoned for her insolence, and her father ignores her pleas and assents when Jarek reminds him that he has faithfully guarded the king's secret for the last nine years. Asha begs her father to let her hunt Kozu, as only two days remain before the new moon. He agrees, but to Asha's dismay, he says she can hunt him after she is married to Jarek.

On the day of the wedding, Jarek presents his engagement gift to Asha. Asha seizes the opportunity to declare that her gift to him will be Kozu's head. Unwilling to lose face by defying tradition, the king permits her to hunt Kozu but dispatches Jarek and several soldiers to accompany her. Asha subtlely needles him with questions in an attempt to discover what power Jarek wields over her father. Asha summons Kozu with the old stories. Jarek and his men attempt to engage Kozu, but the great dragon overpowers Asha. Instead of killing her, however, Kozu imparts to the Iskari the true tale of her injury and the destruction of so much of Firgaard: Her father duped her into betraying Kozu, who loved Asha dearly, by setting a tail on her when she went to visit him; when the soldiers attacked him, he defended himself with his fire, but he was unable to stop a burst of it from hitting Asha, whose father left her to burn. Asha realizes that her father purposefully put her in harm's way and foisted the culpability upon Kozu with the intention of undermining and eventually eradicating the Old Ways. In return for the silence of Jarek, who witnessed the attack, the king offered Asha's hand in marriage to him.

On the night of their binding, when Asha is to be dressed in her wedding gown, he stations slaves in her room to aid her and threatens to hurt them if she does not comply. Before the ceremony, Asha hisses at her father, arguing that he should not wed her to Jarek because the latter has designs for his throne, but Jarek only displays befuddlement. Asha presses him, reasoning that he must be angry that the attack killed his parents. Jarek expresses indifference toward the deaths of his detached parents and he reveals that he does not lust for the throne, as he has everything he ever wanted thanks to the king. Horrified, Asha realizes that her father never intended to free her from her engagement and that he instead plotted to fulfill his pact with Jarek and eliminate the Old Ways in one fell swoop. A corrupted version of the vows is read; even though Asha does not complete her vows, the officiant declares the marriage binding and valid. Just as the farcical ceremony finishes, Torwin, riding on Shadow, breaks through the temple wall and whisks an all-too-willing Asha away.

Jarek partakes in the battle against the rebels, but it is his last: Before he can slay Asha, he is incapacitated by a group of rebels, and Safire stabs him in the face with a knife.