Emma Weston was born to Thomas and Joan Saunders. Thomas was a well off farmer who with a bit of luck managed to purchase the land his farm was built on.  Even though Thomas had his wealth he was worried that it would all be lost if his wife did not produce a male heir.  After Emma was born Thomas became overwhelmed with fear that all of his hard work would be lost. So Thomas devised a plan: he would find a poor and unwed woman who could produce a male heir for him. He would then pay her for the child and claim the child was born to his wife. This way he would have a legitimate male heir who could inherit his wealth. Convinced that this was the only way he would ever get the son he hoped for he went to the streets, perusing relations with questionable women, hoping that one of them could produce a son. But all of Thomas’ efforts went unrewarded. All he walked away with, after his many encounters, was a horrid case of the pox, which he graciously passed along to his devoted wife. Thomas was convinced that this was God’s way of punishing him for his deception. It didn’t take long for the disease to consume them both. Sadly they both passed shortly after, leaving everything to their only child Emma.

 In order to retain her parent’s land Emma had to marry and quickly. Her only suitor was a neighboring pig farmer, who hoped to merge the two farms through marriage. Luckily just as Emma was about to resign herself to marrying the retched pig farmer a salt merchant approached her. He had a son, a guard to the Viscount Montague, who he was looking to marry off. The merchant convinced Emma that his son was an upstanding young man just looking to advance his career through marriage. So the naive Emma agreed to the terms and married the merchant’s son.

And so Mistress Emma Weston joined the Viscount Montague’s household; lending her hand as a seamstress to the lords and ladies of the house.

But soon after they were married Emma realized her mistake. The now Captain of the Guard was a womanizing deviant who would often retreat to the seedier parts of town looking for companionship.  Realizing that she had been tricked into giving up her father’s land Emma was furious. Luckily Emma had made a friend in the Viscount’s household, a courtesan by the name of Dona Mia. Together they devised a plan to inconspicuously do away with the Captain so that Emma could obtain some of her father’s land and find a more faithful husband.