As an egg, Hemogoblin was stolen from her family, trafficked, and forced to compete in illegal dragon fighting rings. Her captors kept her chained underground for years, conditioning her at their leisure. When they weren't tormenting her, she lived in a relentless darkness that swallowed everything whole. There were others too, although she never saw them; she sometimes heard her captors descend, open doors, and unfamiliar voices would echo through the corridor beyond the length of her chains. But the doors would inevitably close and mute the sound again.

Her first fight was the worst. It was the first time she could remember going aboveground; she was blindfolded and afraid, but she couldn't deny her nervous excitement. Aboveground, finally, and traveling! Unsure of their destination, she obeyed her captor's instructions: keep the blindfold on and don't speak until she's told otherwise. Booming voices overlapping, cheering and jeering and cursing. She was in a pit, hot spotlights blinding and judging her from above. A boy, younger and smaller than her, his skin sallow and stretched over bone, glaring and bearing his teeth. He attacked. She never wanted this, but the decision was made for her—fight or die. She cried herself to sleep that night.

After some years, a fight left her damaged and close to death. Her captors called her a loss and dumped her body. Spite and anger were all she could feel. Sheer willpower carried her to safety. She suffered a chronic lesion—a crack in her capsule that weeps but never heals.

Every morning she changes her bandages in the mirror. She doesn't need to remind herself who's responsible for the pain. She knows she'll find her former captors, and they'll pay with their lives...