Born Lorta, she was a daughter of a trible elder and an apprentice to the shamans of the tribe. Later in life, after Count Strahd cursed her, she became known an Rupta or broken.
 
Rupta was born in the land of Barvoia to a small tribe of Lizardfolk that live in the Ivlis Marsh. The tribe had been brought to the land by the dark powers many generations ago. They no longer care why they had been brought to this land. They just want to live off the land and keep to themselves as they do not care much for other humanoids.
 
Rupta was a typical Lizardfolk child. She hunted for food along side the adults from a young age. One time hunting she was almost eaten by a snake. From that day on she had a great fear of snakes that manifest in a blind rage when she sees them. She attacks without holding back when she sees them and will eat them with tears in her eyes as she does it repeating over and over, “never again.”
 
She learned to fight with her own teeth and enjoys the “taste” of hunting along with the excitement of it. Mostly only using her skills with a mace to deal with the undead that roam the land as she does not enjoy the taste of their “flash” in her mouth. Later once she learned to harness the power of her dark gift, she enjoyed using her teeth even more because she was able to deal an even more painful and powerful bite by focusing the power of the death touch into her teeth. She also wears a golden tooth around her neck that was a gift when she started training as a shaman. This is a magic tooth that grants her the power of an insignia of claws.
 
Most of her childhood was relatively uneventful until Count Strahd sent woodsmen into the marsh to collect supplies. They needed more supplies to hep the village of Barovia make it through the winters that had been getting worse.
 
This interfered with the tribe’s simple life and fights broke out. Count Strahd would not put up with this and send his minions to deal with the tribal elders. A handful of them were captured.
 
This did not stop the tribe from fighting back against the humans. Rupta did not fully understand the emotions of these humanoids that revenge was needed when their families died at the hands of the lizardfolk. Why not just get supplies from another part of the marsh she wanted. Why try to wipe us out for just protecting our way of life. The tribe decided to raid their village to teach them a lesion. This outraged the Count who personally came to the tribe. He brokered a deal. He would no longer take from the marsh but there would be a price. All the shamans of the tribe would be cursed with the “touch of death.” After telling the trip this, the Count vanished and the shamans and their apparencies became victims of the touch of death.
 
Once again Rupta did not understand this emotional response by the Count. Why curse of before you leave us along. This caused her to start to fear the emotions of regular humanoids as it was so alien to her and her tribe. From this and later encounters with humanoids, she began to fear what she could not understand, emotions. She would become uncomfortable around others when they start to express their emotions. It makes her nervous and causes her to stress eat and pace around. If the stress becomes too much, she will use her touch of death to cause them pain in hopes to stop them from talking about their emotions anymore.
 
The touch of death. Her new curse. Later this would become her weapon but when she first got it, it was only pain for her. Every time she touches another living being spiders appear on them and bite them causing great pain. This alienated her from others in her tribe. This slowly pushed her away from others and over the next few years she left the tribe. She wondered the marsh hungry and alone until she ran into a caravan near the marsh. It was a small caravan and did not cause her anxiety like larger groups of people would cause her. As she traveled with this caravan she learned she has a fear of large groups of people and would often have to get drunk or be bridged with alcohol in order for her to enter large groups. Deep down she fears that she will hurt people with her touch of death when she is in a large group of people and cannot control who touches her.
 
Rupta was a little worried about travelling with the caravan. She explained her touch of death to them shortly after one of the older women of the caravan touched her. Despite this, they still let her travel with them, and she was able to see many other “domains” she did not know existed. She explored The carnival, Har’Akir, Tepest, and Valachan. She was most welcomes by an older priest of the morninglord, named Popa. She learned must from him and he talked her into becoming a cleric of the morninglord. After a year, they left the caravan with a strong warning to never revile what they saw “behind the curtains.”
 
Rupta entered to service of Popa and the morninglord. Rupta longed for a way to make up for the harm she has caused in life. She has a dark side of her. She does not fully understand most humanoids. Because of the bad things that happened to her and her tribe because of emotional humanoids, deep down she fears them. This fear turned into hate for most of them. Her respect for Popa and her ability to recognize that not all humanoids are bad has led her to wanting to do some good with her life. She pledged herself to the morninglord under the domain of life cleric. Popa explained she must try to make amins for what she had done in the past. For every wound she has opened in the past she must close up the wounds of others that the morninglord had placed under her care. Rupta explained she knows she will keep doing evil to those she does not understand. Popa stated that with time she might be able to do less evil. By the way of the life cleric is that of healing those the morninglord has placed in her care and she must do all she can to keep them alive.
From training with Popa, Rupta learned to channel the healing power of the morninglord into other. He gave her a wooden shield with the symbol of the morninglord on it as her holy symbol. She loves this shield and sees it as one of her most important possessions and will not let it out of her sight. She learned that the way of a life cleric is not just to heal wounds but to destroy that which might open wounds of those she has been given to protect. She begin to call on the power of the morninglord every time she attacks by saying some variation of, “feel the warth of the morninglord” just before she bites.
As she learned to channel divine power, her eyes turn black. She has no idea why this is happening. Could this be part of her touch of death curse? Popa told her that he had dealt with other with the touch of death curse and this did not happen to them. She wandered if it was because of her evil inside of her. Unknown to her the dark powers that rule over all the lands wanted to have fun with her for believing in the morninglord. The truth is they are the ones answering her prayers not the morninglord. They found it funny that one of the lizardfolk they brought to this land would turn to the morninglord. Even more funny that someone with such a dark heart would turn to the morninglord. So they wanted her eyes to reflect that darkness.
 
One odd thing that Rupta started to do was to touch faces when casting divine magic. Popa stated that divine magic is an intimate connection between the person using it and the person they channel it into. Rupta had problems with this idea as she does not like to be intimate in any way with other. She learned overtime that touching a person’s face was an intimate action. So she got into the habit of touching faces when she cast he spells to try to get a better connection with the person. She knows this will cause the spiders to appear on them and bite them. Deep down she enjoys the surprise of their face when this happens.
 
Rupta spent 2 years training under Popa before leaving the temple to find her own flock to protect.