Aurya ir-Aessus

A severed family

You stay close to me, they won't notice it

— Aurya

Aurya is a middle aged makarid belonging to the lineage of Aessus.
In their community in southern Kithanda, they were a renowned artisan and miyik specialized in wooden carvings and in the recording of the clan genealogy in carved walking sticks.
Seven years ago, while expecting their second child, they were captured and enslaved with all their family including their human husband and their toddler.
Despite their attempts at hiding the newborn and the lack of resonance ability of their spouse, first one, then the other were sottracted to them and sent to an unnknown fate.
Pushed by the desire to spare the remaining child from a life in slavery and the hope of finding their loved ones still alive, they started to secretly save fragments and dust of Nezil and include them inside rudimentary weapons built out of scrap material.
This went unnoticed to the eyes of the mining company supervisors, but not to those of the fellow resonators, who started to help in their effort of collecting the fragments and any broken utensil that could have been repurposed. Soon, what started as a single person plan to escape slavery, became the seed of an armed rebellion among the makarids trapped in the Sphatikhana mines.
Aurya, with the help of other miyiks from various clans, in secret taught the Dragon's chants to every makarid in the mines and built enough magically enhanced weapons to arm all the adults among them and most of the oldest children.

A fight for freedom

Keep the children behind!

— Aurya

In the summer of 1373, the 78 Resonators of Sphatikhana mines started chanting speed enhancing litanies instead of their basic detecting ones and charged towards the exit of the mines sparing little mercy to those on their path.
Keeping the children in the middle of the group, Aurya and the other miyiks led the rebellion towards the promised freedom.
They found little resistance until the exit where they were confronted by the company's mercenaries and three of them fell dead, while about 30 were recaptured to be sold back into slavery.
Wounded at an arm, Aurya was last seen escaping the scene of the battle with their child, but they disappeared from the records of any makarid house from that point onwards. Their whereabouts are currently unnknown, but it's assumed by many that they are in hiding under a different name to escape potential revenge.
The legacy of their intuition of using the shared knowledge of the makarids families and their resonating abilities, carries on in the numerous revolt attempts that are currently spreading in the whole continent.

by Simo Mereu with Artbreeder