Pyali

While many dragons come to Clan LockCharge to flee danger or seek a new start, Pyali is one who has no idea where she came from. She merely remembers waking up one day on the shores of the Sea of a Thousand Currents with the tattered remains of clothing and a few small artifacts. Among them, a dwarfish pearl, which perhaps once belonged to a very young PearlCatcher. She feels an odd sort of attachment to the pearl and cannot bring herself to give it up, but if it isn’t hers, perhaps it once belonged to someone she cared for deeply. Since she was unharmed other than her memory, Pyali picked a direction, perhaps arbitrarily or perhaps driven by fate, and let her feet carry her where they would. She ended up, as many do, in Clan LockCharge, where the ground is dry and the dragons thirst for knowledge.

Years later, Pyali has not regained her memory, but she has gained something more: a family. Shortly after her arrival, a group of leviathans, fleeing the unsafe waters of the Sea of a Thousand Currents, sought sanctuary in the clan. The Aqueorrem were a group that inspired little friendliness, not the least because of their fearsome appearance, but Pyali only saw a group that was lost and lonely—not unlike herself. She quickly volunteered the empty dens close to her residence as a living space for them, and she did her best to make them feel welcome. Their common tongue was limited, but Pyali was more than happy to attempt to learn their language – a hissing, snarling, gurgling language more suited to life beneath the waves – and although her accent is thick and her words hesitant, they are pleased with her efforts. One of the pod, Chrysaor is completely deaf, but Pyali is happy to learn his version of sign language alongside the spoken Aqueorrem language.

When two of them, Cetus and Scylla, aspired to open a shop to sell undersea treasures and trinkets, Pyali was happy to help. Working alongside the Aqueorrem couple, she helps them decide how to price their items and at times, which pieces ought to be completely discarded. However, of all the Aqueorrem, Pyali is closest with their leader Euryale. Although the other dragoness is often overburdened by her duties as an ambassador for the pod, Pyali is happy to sit in the corner of Euryale’s den and assist wherever she can. Most often, this includes reading aloud to Euryale, as she asserts that when she does it herself, the letters feel overwhelmingly jumbled and disorganized. While Euryale is guarded and stoic, speaking only in a complete monotone, Pyali thinks her the best company in the world. Occasionally, she even solicits a story from Euryale – preferably one with many battles, or a shipwreck, or even buried treasure. Pyali has a weakness for stories, perhaps she feels that they fill the empty void where her own stories should be, and in her spare time, she is cultivating a library.

Pyali’s library is not so grand as the archives that Odin tends, but she prefers to fill it with transcriptions of local legends, nursery rhymes, and folklore. In doing so, she has created an identity for the clan, that all hatchlings can aspire to as they hear the stories of their people. Euryale and Scylla have agreed to contribute their own stories to the library, but those require rigorous translations that often fall short of the original tale. In addition to her work, Pyali has an eternal love for sea-shells. She cradles them to her ear and when she closes her eyes, she can almost feel the sea spray on her skin and taste the salt in the air. When Cetus and Chrysaor go out looking for treasures, they are happy to find a unique shell or two for Pyali’s collection, and they cherish the smile each one brings to her face, for it is a smile that reaches her eyes. The very best of her collection, Pyali fixes to her hide so that all may admire them.

Given her relative affinity with the Aqueorrem language and her love of their customs and stories, Euryale suspects that Pyali’s past may lie with an Aqueorrem pod or similar group. She as even informally adopted Pyali into their own pod, but when they return to the sea, they have no way of knowing if Pyali will accompany them or remain on land. The pod ardently hopes for the former, and in her own heart, Pyali suspects that she will stay with them, after all, one is not always born into their family, sometimes family finds them along the way.