Natalay I Shiroko
Empress Natalay I Shiroko
Natalay I was the first of the Shiroko Dynasty to create massive flying Ilyannoi. These were made in order to assist in the combat caused by her husband/brother, Timof III Shiroko's, war against the former citizens of Braca. She ended the rebellion and brought peace to the empire again. Her most famous creations earned her the name Skyrider.
Mental characteristics
Personal history
Natalay was the fifth child of Svante I Shiroko and the first daughter in the family. This meant that she was trained from birth, like her older brothers Timof III Shiroko, Fedir, and Urari, to act as support for their brother, Kuza, when he was to take the throne. Also, as the first daughter, she was to become the tsudaeba (royal consort). However, plans changed when it was discovered that Kuza could not perform either light or heat essence magic. This left the succession to fall to Timof III and Natalay spent a great deal of time with her brother, eleven years her senior, in preparation for their marriage.
Through her childhood, her mother and father worked with her to provide an extensive education in international politics, military strategy, history, and magic. Her Attunement Test revealed that she was a pyr-esh, which was extremely good and she was immediately taught to make the Ilyannoi. She became extremely interested in flying creatures, particularly various birds, and spent a good deal of her free time researching insects, birds, and other flying animals. Through this, she became very well versed in biology, something that was necessary for Ilyannoi creation.
When she was seventeen, she and Timof III were married. While this was not adulthood in Eoion, parental permission granted the union. Through the early years of Timof III's reign, she acted as support along with her brothers and younger sister, Zora. However, she also spent time working on improving the Ilyannoi, which took up almost all of her free time when she was not working to run the empire. She also became a very stable presence for Timof III, doing her best to offset his increasing anxiety and fear of being replaced.
The two managed to have two children together before Timof III began to see even Natalay as a threat: Zora (536) and Catarin (537).
Unfortunately, her continued communication with their eldest brother, Kuza, and, more than that, her superior skill with the Ilyannoi, caused Timof III to grow distrustful of her and retreat into his own mind. Unable to do anything to draw her brother out, she focused on the internal affairs of the empire, working with whatever was left by the wayside, particularly the military. Through her efforts, the northern sea border's defenses were made more mobile and the transportation system for troops within the empire was streamlined. This would be of great assistance when Timof III began his war against the former citizens of Braca.
Despite the efforts of the family, Timof III unleased war on his own citizens and left for the battlefront in 560, leaving Natalay in the Gandenye to run the empire alone and keep other uprisings from happening in response to the war. For the next year, she managed to both keep the supply lines flowing toward her brother's fear fueled crusade and prevent Yzel from taking advantage of the chaos within the empire for their own gain. This earned her further respect from the nobility and they began going along with her plans more and more over those of Timof III, who many had started to see as a madman.
When word reached her in 561 that Timof III's anxiety and fear had caused him to starve to death, she immediately traveled to the front lines, despite the objections of the nobility. Instead, she left her older brother, Fedir, in charge and set off. As soon as she arrived, she began reorganizing the camps, calling back the Ilyannoi who had been terrorizing nearby towns, and beginning the construction of her own. With Timof III dead, she no longer felt the need to hold back her ideas.
From this came the first large flying Ilyannoni. They resembled enormous birds and were infused with a great deal of air magic. The combination of powerful muscles and the ability to create cyclones tore through the rebels and they soon surrendered. Along with this, Natalay used the spy network set up by Timof III, the Wenunùdzì, to gather information and then sent her own troops in to stop the attacks. Through this, she was able to direct the infiltration of the Bracan da Libre and capture their leaders, whom she had executed.
With the leaders dead and the power of the Ilyannoi reestablished, Natalay spent a year in the territory to put down any residual rebellions. She also rewarded those citizens who had turned in their fellows. Through these actions, she went about painting the Bracan da Libre as a terrorist organization threatening the stability of the empire. It was their fault that towns and cities had been hurt, their fault that people were dead. In the tradition of many Shiroko before her, Natalay was skilled in the use of propganda and successfully turned public sentiment toward the idea that she was a hero. However, she could not redeem her brother/husband's reputation and he would go down in history as Timof the Lunatic.
Once the war was won and the territory was stable, Natalay returned to the Gandenye and began working to make the emprie stabel again. The military had been depleted and she worked to increase recruitment along sith improving combat oriented Ilyannoi. On top of this, her work also extended to continuously reaching out to the citizens. A healthy fear of the royal family's creatures was good, but to have them terrified would lead to another revolt. To facilitate this, she began a day in which the citizens would be permitted onto the slightly more private areas of military garrisons and the Gandenye in order to interact more with the creatures. Her ambitions in this were to fix the destruction of the relationship wrought by Timof III's aggressive actions. In the long term, this became a holiday that is celebrated as a patriotic event.
Her greatest accomplishment, the flying Ilyannoi powerhouses, were, unfortunately, difficult to care for when not in battle and took up considerable resources and space. Thus, the first five made were the only generation and after they died, she did not make more. Only her tsirin, which she made according to tradition after ascending the throne, survived to the end of her reign. Hers was the most radically different of the tsirin as it included wings, which were never part of the original design. She wrote down her method to make the large birds were left in the care of the Shiroko family in case they were ever needed again for battle after their use in the Third Great War (571-573).
Natalay retired in 574, leaving the empire under the control of her eldest daughter, Zora I Shiroko, For the remainder of her life, she spent a great deal of time with animals and the Ilyannoi, continuing her innovations until her death in 579. After her passing, she was buried with the other monarchs in the mausoleum in the Gandenye. For her creations, she was known later as Skyrider.
Relationships
Life
513
579
66 years old
Birthplace
Place of Death
Spouses
Siblings
Timof III Shiroko
(husband/brother)
Children
Gender
female
Eyes
bright violet
Hair
past tailbone, heavily braided, dull white
Skin Tone/Pigmentation
pale, pink undertone
Height
5'7"
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