Coirina

The societies of the wind flight are loosely arranged, no strict monarchies or heirarchy at all, other than of course fealty to the Windsinger. Coirina was born into this society, and quickly found ways to twist it to her advantage. Her parents were stereotypical Wind coatls--flighty and inattentive, with a poor grasp on responsibility--so she made her own network of friends and "family." She sought out dragons who were loyal, dragons who were rich--through gambling, heritage, or sheer luck--and dragons who wanted to be rich badly enough that it turned them loyal just the same.

She found weaknesses, regrets, desires in these dragons. She told them she'd been abandoned as an egg--half-true--that she'd struggled all her life, and once they pitied her, she plied them with food and drink and kindnesses until she knew their own hardships by rote.

She found all the right strings to tug on--appropriate for a dragon living in a city of kites, or perhaps more appropriate for a spider matriarch--and made threats and promises and offers until she had everything she could ever want, living at the top of Wind society with those she'd used as stepping stones barely aware of what exactly she'd taken from them, whether that be money, food, or status.

And when a dragon noticed that they hadn't been repaid, or had fuzzy memories of the promises they'd made, or more jarringly, found out exactly what rumors had been spread about them, and came looking for Coirina--they were met with tight-lipped bodyguards, dressed in the finest silks and toughest body armor, who told them in no uncertain terms that any problem had with Coirina was a problem had with them.

Coirina was at the top of the world, quite literally.

But it couldn't last.

She'd lived far longer than many dragons--she had the best medicines on hand for any illness, the best food and food-tasters, and even body doubles for those few assassins who got through her personal guard. She got old. She got lazy.

She'd curse herself for it as she fled the skies, her old wings that hadn't stretched in years struggling to catch the currents, her wealth left scattered behind her. She'd taken from the wrong person, an influential young imperial who hadn't been quite as drunk as she'd let Coirina believe, nor, likely, though it was a blow to her pride to admit it, half as enamored with the older dragon as she'd pretended.

Coirina made her a bad deal, the Imperial had her put it in writing, and soon the Imp had spread word and proof to all her friends in the Cloudsong, many of whom had parents who had had unfavorable deals with Coirina in the past. That night, they rushed her bejewelled kite in a storm to rival the Twisting Crescendo. Her guard couldn't stop them all--indeed some of her guard turned to join them!

They tore through her rooms, and there was no time for her to seduce, or spread illicit rumors about, or find out who her assailants wanted to impress--so, for the first time in a long time faced with true consequence, Coirina fled. Of her many fine pets, she took only a hardy wolf. Then, as the clamor grew louder around her, she tore a hole in the bottom of her kite, and leapt out into open air, everything she'd built torn away and scattered, appropriately, to the winds.


Coirina slipped onto the island without any of the others noticing, blending in with the ever-present fog. Her wolf companion walked with her on silent feet. The others found her resting fitfully in the island's small pine forest, wolf keeping watch, and quietly agreed to let her sleep as long as she needed. That was the island's purpose, after all.


























Shimmer
(Coirina - Unweaver - Glade)