Blightrose

The young Mirror, who was next in line to attempt the Blightrose moniker, did not act as if she were too burdened by such responsibility. She was energetic and strong, her scales forming a similar carapace against the elements and pox as her father's. Her defenses created quite the boon as she travelled from her home clan's nesting grounds to Rotrock Rim and then to the Wyrmwound.

Yet, when she reached adulthood and her trial finally began, the same strong scales that had bolstered her life had proven too stubborn to accept the Plaguebringer's touch. Or was it not an issue of her scales but her worthiness? As she watched the illness eclipse her sister's frame, she questioned why she was spared.

Paradoxically, spared equating a persistent healthiness in this land of Rot. Her misgivings had made her shudder more than the threat of disease.

04/12/18 At long last, a crackle of infection had taken to the Mirror’s leathery wing. It had been nearly a week into the Trial and it proliferated and burned the joints, giving the dragon a mottled appearance and odd gait. It was a burdensome affliction, and she tended to let her wings droop to the ground and trail her as a flamboyant, crimson cape. Her resistance, however, appeared to inhibit the infection from creeping past the fleshy skin of her wings, the scales of her body too resilient to foster the scourge assailing her.

In a fit of curiosity, she prodded a claw at a scale of her forearm, fabricating a scant weakness. By the next morning, her whole being was red with sepsis. She took small solace.

She was not incapable of blessing. Now, she merely intended to survive the affliction.[/columns]

4/17/18 The Mirror and her sister had absolved the Rot of its burden upon them. With their survival all but certain, their mother and grandmother left for home to announce their impending success, somewhat of a Necromancer tradition among her birth clan. Perhaps it would have been trying to watch them leave, yet the dragon determined to become Blightrose had hardly regarded their departure, too focused on her task and prayers by the Cauldron.

She only reflected momentarily on her trip to the Wyrmwound, venturing to recall their guidance. Perchance if she hadn't been so young when they first set out for the trials, she would have paid more attention to the advice her family had tried to impart on her along the way, but as much as she tried to remember the details of conversation, she only held memories of romping and hunting across the Plaguelands. Their mother, and even more so her grandmother, had remained stoic and aloof. At the time she had thought them boring, but as she matured she came to realize that perhaps it were a defense against the veracity that neither of them may return home from the Plaguebringer's touch. To be fair, she hadn't even earned a true name yet.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a claw at her back. She felt the sudden crux of Rot she had come to know well. Whipping around with the ink of disease readied on her breath, the coil of a snarl at her lips, she halted suddenly upon laying eyes on her sister. Perplexed, she waited for clarification.

"We must cure another creature other than ourselves," her sinewy sister offered. Her voice was willowy, contrasting with her formidable stature. "Or become a Necroservus."

The Mirror offered not a word of response. Instead, she let a raucous infection bubble and pool in her mouth, and with little more than a mutual trading of eyes, curled the ichor at her sister's face. The test of Contagion was upon them.

4/24/18 The journey back to her and her sister's birth clan was not as perilous nor long as she had remembered as a hatchling, a testament to her newfound power, authority that she liberally flaunted upon the beasts and barriers unfortunate enough to come before them.

Their homecoming was celebrated thoroughly with her mother leading the festivities alongside the clan's alpha dragons, Bonejack and Carulata. It was a colorful day full of sacrifices and pestilence. She received many gifts and offerings, and met her father's acolytes as well, who each requested her and her sister's blessings. As her father had done before them, they took turns marring the dragons with Rot before dismissing the disease from their bodies, revivifying them. It was a whirlwind of a day, that commenced well into the evening, the fervor insatiable. As the sun moved to set, however, her mother took her aside.

Necromantic Symbol Bones "A symbol of death, truth, enlightenment, austerity, and divination. Necromancers bearing bones often serve as shamans to their clans. They foretell the tides of dominance, dates of future plague outbreaks, and can interpret the will of the Plaguebringer through signs and omens."

"Blightrose," she spoke the name warmly. "You've succeeded where I was unable and have reclaimed Her gaze; I’m impressed," her voice quieted, "We must speak about your future. I wanted to inform you that Sporesong has been promised to a clan." Blightrose regarded the information mutely, and her mother continued. "After your grandmother and I returned to The Cell, word of you and your sister's survival roamed far. Not but a day later, a proud clan of Coatls brokered to meet with us about securing a Necromancer for their spiritual endeavors. We forged that agreement without knowing whether either of you would return victorious, yet they accepted the risk and went about their prayers to fortify Her favor." Blightrose nodded slowly. “Don’t dwell. Not all circumstances conceal deeper meaning; we promised them Sporesong for no other reason than she was firstborn.” As evening turned to night, she wandered back to the nesting grounds at which she and her sister were born. She gleaned fresh egg shells from the clutch that had come after her. Surprisingly, among the rubble, the bones that she had enjoyed crunching as a child still remained. She fiddled with them thoughtfully, and then with sudden fervor welling inside her, she smashed them with a mighty blow of her claws. She gathered the fragments and murmured a song to the Plaguebringer over top them. With a swift movement, she then tossed them against the cavern walls. They scattered before her and she moved to study them. There was a small skull that remained partway in tact, the frame of its eye socket facing her; the knob of a knee or elbow lay beneath it. The rest was nearly powdered and fell in two piles, one large and one small, about either side of the skull.