It was a mild day in the spring, the village was getting ready to celebrate the spring equinox. Flowers and streamers hung from the houses and the lamp posts in the village. The village was on the bank of a river just a few miles outside of a much larger city, and home to a race of humans that were different from other humans. 

They weren't immortal, but they were extremely long lived, with the oldest recorded person being around 800 years old. A few of these people were blessed with powers, marked by their purple eyes. 

A house sat just at the end of the village, under the shade of a large and ancient oak tree. It was a decent sized house, 3 bedrooms and a large kitchen and living area, and was home to a man, woman, and their daughter Amaya who was only 8 years old, and Amayas pet dragon Pythios which Amaya had found abandoned one day while on the road with her father to the city, and unable to tell his little girl no, and much to her mothers dismay, she brought the beast home and they’ve been inseparable every since.

Amaya was out in the woods just behind the village with Pythios, the beast was the size of a small dog, still a baby much like her.

As the two ran through the woods, the light breeze moved the trees and caused little beams of light to dance around the forest floor. Amaya jumped over gnarled tree roots that had made it above ground and ducked underneath low hanging branches. She was searching for something specific. A flower for her mother. It was a rare flower, special and native to the land she grew up in, and her mothers favorite. 

But she knew where a few happened to grow, under the overgrowth in the shade sat a deep blue flower, with white borders along its petals, roughly resembling a rose. 

Amaya had just picked the flower and stuck it into the messenger bag she carried for safekeeping until she was done playing in the woods, and then she heard a rumble in the distance coming from the village. Unnatural and sending panic through her as she raced back to the treeline, Pythios close on her heels. 

Giants stormed through her village. Larger than anything she had ever seen, armed with clubs and spears. Demolishing houses and shops. Houses were ablaze and the screams of her people could be heard, flashes of light from magic users could briefly be seen as they tried to fight back. Amaya picked up Pythios, holding him against her chest, his front legs and head draped over her shoulder as she ran towards her crumbling village, and towards that house under the oak.

She dodged falling crates and scrambling people as she zigzagged through the main streets. All the decorations were in shambles, the stage where there was supposed to be music and plays..all of it was gone. 

“Amaya!”

She heard the shrill scream of her mother moments before she was swept up into the familiar embrace of the woman, clutched close to her chest as they made their run through the final stretch, bursting through the door just as her father was gathering his weapons. Her father rushed over to them both as her mother sat her on the floor and began loading up a backpack full of food and essential supplies. 

“Amaya..listen to everything your mother says. I’ll see you soon, okay my little Sunbeam?” He leaned down to kiss her head and then gave her mother a quick kiss on the cheek before rushing out of the house. 

Her father didn't have magic, only the women were blessed with it, but her father was one of the best warriors in their village, and had once been in the army decades ago until he suffered a leg injury.

Amayas mother helped her put on the backpack, and then put a few extra things in the small messenger bag that hung off her body as well

“Mama..mama-” Amayas sentence was cut off

“I need you to listen to me Maya, okay?” Amayas eyes met the matching set of her mothers. Despite the panic outside, and the obvious panic her mother was experiencing, she never raised her voice or shouted. “Take these bags, and your little beastie and run. Out the back door and down the bank. Follow the river to that little cave at the base of the water and wait for me there. I will find you” 

Her mother pushed her towards the back door as she stood and grabbed her spear. An ancient spear made of Onyx passed down through generations. 

Amaya watched her mother run out and join the fight and out of pure fear she didn’t move. She wanted to help, but she also wanted to follow her mothers orders. Another large boom that rattled the trinkets in the house sent her running out the back door. Following her mothers instructions and leaving her crumbling village behind

Five days later…

Amaya and Pythios had crawled out of that small waterside cave days later. She had run out of the food she had, and wanted to search for her parents. Pythios ran alongside her and as they reached her crumbling village her eyes filled with tears. Her home was a pile of rubble and cinders as she ran through town and the corpses littering the brick street. She was searching for her parents, and was about to give up after hours of searching until she saw a familiar onyx spear laying on the ground in the grip of a charred corpse. 

The flames had burnt away the leather strips and the talismans that had once decorated the weapon, but there was no mistaking it.

Over the next few days, Amaya mourned her parents. She never found her fathers body, but still did her best to give them a ceremony fit for warriors who died in battle. But with limited strength and resources it was hard. With her dragons help she managed to drag her mothers corpse under the large oak tree, half burnt but still standing and she covered the woman with flowers. Laying the dried and dead remains of that special one she picked that awful day right over her mothers heart.

5 Years Later…

Amaya had grown, and so had her dragon. A large beast  just over 10 feet long. A muscular and lithe scaled body. When the dragon walked on all fours it would slink around like a large cat. The dragons color had gotten darker. Black iridescent, scaled shimmering shades of purple and green in the sunlight. The powers that manifested in that beast were even more impressive. Radioactive plasma blasts. If the blast and the blast radius didn't kill her opponents, the radiation poisoning would. Amaya had spent those 5 years after her parents deaths training. Everyday until she couldn't move from how sore and tired she was. 

10 Years later…

Word spread about the giant attacks, and while every kingdoms armies banded together to fight against them it was slow progress, until word spread of a giant killer on the back of a dragon. She was unknown to the public, but she was wiping out more of the threat every day.

Amaya ventured into cities and towns occasionally, accompanied by her dragon for supplies, food, and a nice hot bath at one of the inns ( her dragon stayed in the stables or wherever he’d fit much to the innkeepers dismay ). 

She had grown into a woman. A desirable hourglass figure with a lean physique and her long, thick hair hung to the center of her back. Most days she could be found in riding leathers made from the iridescent shedded scales of her dragon.

She lives a simple life now. Traveling and working as a mercenary when she wasn't hunting giants. Her mothers spear hadn’t left her possession since that awful day, now decorated with her own leather strips and talismans. Specifically the band of leather that was wrapped around the base of the spearhead with a design burned and painted into it. A deep blue flower with white bordered petals.

Amayas dragon Pythios