Sthispa

As the sun slowly sank beyond the horizon, Sthispa waited atop the hill, a swarm of Chaos Legion troops gathered below. A trail of dead legionnaires littered the valley, denoting the path she had taken across it and ending at the bottom of the hill.

Three horsemen on black steeds watched her from a nearby rise. Sthispa pulled the last arrow from her quiver, notched it to her dragon-bone bow, and drew the string back. She inhaled, exhaled, and let it fly. It arced through the gray sky and fell, finding its mark in the chest of the middle horseman. He slumped forward and toppled from his mount.

The steeds of the other two horsemen reared. Their riders each raised a fist to the sky and, in unison, brought them down. A warcry went up from the Chaos Legion troops below as they charged up the hill. Sthispa lifted the dragon-bone horn that hung from her neck by a leather cord and pressed it to her lips. She blew, and the note was low and sonorous. The solitary cry of a dragon rumbled in the distance. One by one, others answered the call.

Sthispa unsheathed her scimitar and readied her dragon magic. As her enemies drew near, she coiled her body in anticipation. The final rays of sunlight glinted off her blade. She would not have to wait long.

Soon, the dragons would join her. When Sthispa was born in Sskah City, her gorgon den—the Stone Asp—labeled her a hideous mistake. Her father, Zhozaassikh, was a traveling Naga prince from Draykh-Nahka who fell in love with a common gorgon girl, Haseas. When their relationship was discovered, the royal family exiled the prince from the city, and poor Haseas was beaten by her parents and locked in their basement until the day she gave birth to Sthispa. After that, they proclaimed her to be spoiled wares, not fit to remain within the den, and threw her out.

She left Sskah City and ventured into the desert, seeking refuge in a nearby oasis. When bandits approached, she hid her child from them. They killed Haseas for no reason at all.

Nobody knows what happened to Sthispa after that terrible start in life. Nor does anyone know who heard her hungry cries in that oasis and rescued her. What they know is that, when Sthispa returned to Sskah City, she took bloody revenge upon her grandparents. After that, she hunted the bandits that murdered her mother, placing each of their heads on spikes in the same oasis where they'd made her an orphan.

With the business of vengeance out of the way, Sthispa set off in search of her father. She learned he had traveled to Centrum City in search of a new start, so that's where she headed. When she first arrived in Drayk-Nahka, the lack of attention her appearance drew shocked her. There were so many foreigners of so many shapes and sizes and colors. No one cared what she looked like.

Eventually, her search for her father brought her to an ancient draconic shrine deep within the Timber Lunta, the Wood of the Moon. There, she filled her satchel with the various dragon bones she found; they fascinated her, and over time, she carved them into jewelry, totems, and even a bow.

When she returned to Centrum City, she spent her free time watching the training of the Dragonsguard's archers. In the evenings, she practiced her skills at a makeshift archery range she set up outside the city. Over time, she became an expert marksman.

Her fascination with dragon bones eventually grew to encompass all things draconic, including elemental dragon magic. She took to the libraries of Centrum City, reading all she could about the elemental mana of dragons. She studied under dragon mages, who told her she had a natural affinity for the art.

Ultimately, Sthispa gave up hope of finding her father. Instead, she sought to advance her studies of dragon magic by studying under the greatest instructors of all: the dragons. The first time she saw one, the sight of it called to her. Years later, she found herself in the lair of an ancient wyrm. She has never revealed how she convinced the dragons to train her, but needless to say, Sthispa became one of the most powerful dragon mages in all the Splinterlands.

However, it wasn't until the Chaos Legion invaded Drayk-Nahka and Centrum City fell that she revealed her powers to the realm and stood against its oppressors.