Artifacts exist of a flourishing city-state known as Catari, dating back to the Eth Empire. Though the empire fell, the family line of the state’s sorcerer lords endured, continuing to produce some of the finest mages of Telara. The sisters Aurum and Asha Catari proved no exception to this tradition. The pair distinguished themselves among the pupils of Quicksilver College, though in very different ways. Aurum was the shining star of the academy, always performing to task and beyond standards of excellence. Asha, the younger sister, was just as gifted, but chafed under stringent curriculum of the college, questioning the effectiveness of century old methodologies. She was expelled in her third year for pursuing the arts of the warlock, a subject forbidden at the school. The scandal caused her father, Theo Catari, the representative of the southern races and High Mage in the court of Mathos, to disown her.
Unrepentant, Asha traveled to the southern lands of her Eth ancestors and joined the ranks of the Dragonslayer Covenant, an ancient organization dedicated to keeping the cults of the Blood Storm at bay. She quickly established herself as an adept of the first order, if a little green and reckless, and became their fiercest arcane warrior. It was on these merits that she was sent ten years later as their representative to the battle camp of Zareph Mathos, to warn him of the link between his brother and the Endless Court. Instead of returning to the Covenant straight out, she remained to fight with Mathos’s forces. When then the Shade was unleashed, Asha was among those destroyed in its dark power.
Beyond the veil, Regulos drew her spirit from the Soulstream and brought her before him. The Destroyer infused her with great power, a temptation to convince Asha to become his general on Telara. She refused. Enraged by Asha’s denial, Regulos attempted to destroy her, igniting the very energy with which he had embroidered her soul. But before Regulos could finish, Asha’s agonized spirit was pulled away as the dread god howled in frustration.
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Asha awoke, gasping for breath, within a machine in the Shadowlands. Orphiel Farwind, her mentor and friend, stood beside her, looking at her with an expression of triumph. He explained that he had used the technology of the ancient Eth to return her to life, and that she was merely the first of the warriors he planned to return. He asked her to be his champion and second in command, continuing the work they had done within the Dragonslayer Covenant. She agreed, but in agreeing she admitted much of her motivation sparked from a desire for vengeance on Regulos. Orphiel realized she was not the same young woman who he had sent to Zareph so many decades ago. Physically, she had changed; covered in glyphs of power that flared up on her skin. She was also calmer, quieter, and intensely focused. The headstrong, reckless girl was gone, and in her place was a being that was no longer quite human.
Orphiel’s other followers could feel the change as well, but were not as easily accepting. Asha’s planar powers, and eventual role in the fall of Port Scion made her a pariah to all but her closest comrades, but the unease of her fellow Telarans failed to concern her. Asha was intent on her cause, and, together with Orphiel, she would help form a new organization dedicated to saving Telara: the Defiants.
