Karina

Personality
She was a sweet one, that guardian. She loved talking and listening to people, boosting them up with praise and compliments, eagerly absorbing all their tales and calming them from their anxieties. She never cared about class, wealth, species or anything in between- a dragon was a dragon, and a dragon was always a friend. Her massive form is intimidating, but her personality didn't match at all! For most of her life. Most of it. Until her heritage drew in the trouble she never deserved. Now, she doesn't have the time or chance to give the same gifts of time to the drakes around her, nor to herself. She's visibly and audibly hardened to the world, skittish in the way a shelter dog gets a bite warning on the outside of their kennel, and never stays in conversation for long- as if always distracted, or always watching for something out of view and frustrated by the time small talk consumes.

Oh Dear "Sister" of Mine…
Family ties were supposed to be important little buggers, weren't they? Motherly love, like father like son, all that and more, and more, and more… sisters were supposed to back each other up, the older passing wisdom down to the younger and the younger being a loveable little pest in return. Those ties like beautiful ribbons to finish off the package deal of siblings, sisters, princesses, heirs. Ribbons so easily cut when one of the elders decides she has the importance and charm to leave the others to rot! Karina, the poor youngest, she was the easiest to trick and the easiest to test a theory on.
How did Hewa know that it was too much of a hassle to permanently secure her rule with a method of removal, anyways?

Backstory
Once upon a comfortable pile of cushions, a pile of siblings dozed the day away as hatchlings and adolescents, happy as could be together. Once upon a dream, Karina imagined that her and her sisters could break apart the notion of one singular monarch and establish a council, making decisions be truly fair with representatives and none of the pressure of a queen. She was excited and eager, thinking her sister's would at least be able to be swayed! Plus, she was always happy. The people under the royal reign loved her. Her mother loved her. And most importantly, her older sister loved her: Hewa.

Hewa and Karina were opposites in the way chocolate and vanilla blend perfectly, the younger always tagging behind the older for all her daily activities and loving every second of life. She'd be happily chatting with anyone and everyone on the street, quite intelligent and surprising the adults, while her older sister watched with a soft smile under her lips. Really, they were perfect until Hewa decided she had no shot at the throne at home, and came up with her own plans to try to get the power she craved. Karina was woken up with a *taptaptap* on her room's window, sleepily pushing it open to see her sister with a devilish smirk, proposing a secret nighttime adventure. Karina happily agreed! They hadn't done this before, and it sounded so fun! Hewa had been distant in the past week- maybe she could ask what was wrong, finally!

They flew together over the buildings, eventually landing in the forest a few miles out, Hewa saying she'd found an incredible clearing with patches of flowers. It was spring; this was fair, Hewa even suggested they race to the ground, and Karina taking the nosedive challenge with glee. Every day was wonderful with her sister!

The clearing was a blanket of soft moss, woven and twisted into one sheet, under which lay a pit of claw-carved wooden stakes.

Karina was never good at slowing down her flight.

Hewa left her to die.

She didn't. She screamed and cried out for the older sibling, yes, who had turned tail and fled to the castle before Karina had even fallen into this fate, but she wasn't helpless even when stuck in such an awkward and painful position, stuck through in so many places. One of her front legs had reached the ground, and her heart and head had missed the marks in the trap. She had the leverage to extract herself, inch by inch. One spike at a time. Bit. By. Bit.

She wasn't done by dawn, and the castle was in a panic trying to find her. Hewa saw the hassle she'd created, and realized it would be far too hard to pull this on her other less close and stronger siblings. She packed up, saying she was searching for her favorite sister, and flew off over the same forest to find another way to her ideal throne. Karina saw the shadow and heard the wing beats, saw her sister fleeing with a purpose. Karina was never found; pulling herself free, pulling herself through the forest in the wrong direction and pulling herself back together with anything she could find, pulling the plug on her kindness as one thing took over her head and future.

Oh, dear sister of mine… I will never let you get away with this.