Under the desert moon,
The barest hint of sound,
Broke through the sandy dunes,
As two souls merge profound.
For bunch scant time had passed,
When it seemed fate had decried,
That two should come at last,
From the ones who merged that night.
Born unto the dragoness and the golden stallion were two fillies. Both were made of pure gold like their father, but only one took upon her skin the mark of the dragoness. From the beginning Illo was independent and unusual. She grew fierce from a young age, defiant of the constraints of her mother or the protective eye of her twin. The desert was what kept the filly busy.
They say that though she be but little,
She is fierce.
In her blue diamond eyes lay no riddle,
For they pierce.
It was not long before the golden filly grew tall and lean and proud. It was not long before she no longer returned to her mothers side before nightfall. In fact, her daily wanderings quickly became nights that trailed into days on end. Her days were spent roaming the endless desert, familiarizing herself with it's every minutest detail. The blazing hot sun was the only witness to the roaming.
Before she knew it she could not recall the last time she had seen her mother or her twin. She had wandered so far from home that the terrain itself began to seem unfamiliar. That was no pang of regret for the loss of connection, for in her mind their only bond had been through blood. Instead, the young filly grew curious of the new terrain and the new creatures she came across. She discovered the stirring within to know society and understand the drive of what drew others to cluster together in tight knit groups.
Edoni was the first acquaintance of her knew home. He lead a desert band known as Vigils. The Marwari stallion clearly considered himself a catch, for the mares did simper like fools beneath his iron gaze. Illo found herself quite unaffected. His personality seemed dull and he never did make the wisest decisions. His raiding of other lands became sloppy and foolish. Eventually Illo had learned that the more daring his attacks, the more attention the stallion curated from the mares of his band. Dissatisfied, Illo watched as he dared to snatch mares even from the clutches of Kings and Queens with holdings far beyond his small imagination. Eventually his time drew near.
Little did Edoni know that Illo had been no simpering fool or mindless foot soldier like the others who followed him. She held little desire to be held in high esteem by the stallion. Instead, while he partied and planned his raids Illo learned. She learned first of the barest of stirrings of the beast that lay within. At first the frailest stirrings of the dragon that lay trapped beyond the veil of magic she had not yet known she possessed, drew her attention.
Flashes of gold blinked across her minds eye. Golden scales and golden claws and the very same diamond eyes that her father had bestowed her, formed the image of the dragon that stirred within. She learned what connected her to the dragon and how call it forth for mere instances of time. When the dragons magic did not consume her time, she trained among the soldiers. Illo had never been one for courtly socializing. More practical things drover the young mare.
So it was that Edoni had chosen to lead a raid against the King of Ulkra. By far one of the most lethal opponents one could come across in their time, he was a formidable stallion who held within himself the power to mold time to his will. Edoni, either unknowing or uncaring of the fact, pressed into his lands without hesitation. A runner was dispatched to demand Edoni present himself to the King or leave his territory for good. It was then that Illo was both surprised and not by the gall of the reprobate. Thinking to soften the King's ire without conceding to either demand, Edoni decided to offer the King a gift.
"Tell King Rhune that I come baring only a gift for him. Perhaps one that he might even wish to repay me for?" The smile he flashed piqued Illo's suspicion. She knew he brought with them no gift. "A mare of pure gold with gemstones for eye. I should doubt your King has ever laid eyes on such a figure." He gestured to Illo and deep within her stomach the faint stirring of the dragons wrath bloomed forth. She held her ire inside, determined not to give herself away. With no argument she went with the runner as though she herself were a biddable young lady who wished only to please those higher than she.
Consumed with his own rage and not all caring for the gift bestowed, Rhune dispatched his troops to slay Edoni. Edoni, having caught wind, ran back to his desert abode and for some time only raided smaller herds on the outskirts. Illo, an awkward guest within Rhunes courts, soon became a friend to the King. She aided him with insight on affairs with the desert clans and theirs workings. It wasn't long before her desire to return to the desert curled across her mind. Illo could never be happy where she could not run among the sands or bask in the heat of the sun for hours long.
Called upon, one summer day, Illo presented herself to Rhune, thinking him in need of some advice to aid with his desert neighbors. Instead, however, he was not alone. With him were Cinicka, the queen of Kastille and Baron, the sovereign lord of the kingdom of Riking to the East. The 3 had come to the conclusion that it was time the desert be tamed. They intended to do so using Illo. If, they proclaimed, she could rid the desert of the rebel clans and organize the others, they would support her in staking claim to the newest Kingdom to spring forth in their lands.
It took no time at all for Illo to find herself back within her beloved terrain. The sand beneath her hooves was certainly a memory she had never been able to exactly match to the true sensation. Her first thought was to drive Edoni out. However, something told to wait. If she began expelling other rebel clans, it would not be long before he presented himself to her without her ever having to seek out his newest hiding place.
With the help of Rhunes men, Illo began the length process of tracking down and civilizing the clans of the desert. Before long, as she'd surmised, Edoni presented himself. He wished to know of the mysterious mare who would claim the desert for her own and drive out all who would not fall in line behind her. Though, when he entered her small and still forming city, he did not meet the same golden mare he had attempted to gift away. Instead, where she should have sat upon her throne, a golden beast quite larger than the mare herself sat. Their discussion, though riddled with his own protestations of her position, was short. He'd heard the rumors of the dragon who did not breathe fire. What then could it do to make it as formidable as those dragons of the West, who breathed great flames of red and orange when they transformed?
The dragon spewed forth a great billow of sand from between it's jaws, that quickly filled the room around them much as the sandstorms filled the desert on particularly nasty days. Laughter rang forth from the stallion and the dragon, incensed, blew forth another billow. This one, however, seemed far more precise and did not cloud the room as before. Instead, however, the sand funneled through the nooks and crannies between Edoni's eyes, lips and through his nostrils and ears. For too long this fool had run amuck across the desert and had insulted Illo in the deepest sense, for she was not property to be gifted to any. Not even a King.
It was then that the Kingdom of Basillica came to be. In part to honor the golden stallion that mostly remained a mystery even unto his own children. She ruled hectically. She ruled peacefully. She ruled until the day she awoke to find she no longer had a kingdom to rule, for she was no longer in Basillica anymore.