Authoratrix Lamasu

The Firstborn Lamasu came into existence with unshakable conviction that she was entitled to rule all she surveyed. She admired Lumaya's embodiment of order and hierarchy, but was chafed by the Goddess' demand for mercy and restraint. Only Siroth could give her the dominion she knew she deserved, in exchange for eternal loyalty service. He recognized her mastery of warfare, combat and strategy. He wanted them on his side. Lamasu joined Siroth during the Great Divorce. She brought a legion of Firstborn enraptured by the aspect of dominance writ large upon her brow, carried in her voice, and in the majesty of her form. She was quintessentially graceful and perfectly elegant, with gleaming white wings. Though the banishment spell saw Siroth fail to conquer Teleria, in Anathraad Lamasu found the power and respect she felt she was due. While the rest of Siroth’s most powerful servants plotted and dared to dream of usurping him, Lamasu remained loyal. She knew she was the natural ruler of all Demons, regardless of their own perceived rankings. Schemes either against her or her liege she saw as the same. When she found the culprits, she punished them with awe-inspiring violence, without a mote of emotion. When the creation of Demonspawn was pioneered following the Sin of Dragons, Lamasu poured her essence into a captured Elf of great beauty and renown, and recreated her former body in grim and foreboding form: still beautiful, but terrible, wings turned black as her soul, her voice still enchanting but now cold and hard as steel. She plunged through the Brimstone Gate back into Teleria, and was furious beyond words when Siroth's hosts were driven back, chastising all Demonspawn for their weakness. Siroth, bitterly jealous and paranoid, trusts none of his Demon servants apart from Lamasu. Like a twisted mockery of Lumaya’s Arbiter, she became Siroth’s right hand, given the title of Authoratrix. When Siroth discovered how to create portals to Teleria she was among the first to charge through. Sieges are Lamasu’s specialty: vanquishing defenders and conquering a fortress is an unmistakable sign of her dominion over a place and its environs. When enemies assailed those captured fortresses, she strenuously defended what she saw as hers by natural right. Her armies are as unrelenting as her, formidably disciplined, and unwaveringly committed. Fighting in each of Siroth’s Great Wars, Lamasu won stunning victories over many proficient mortal generals – slaughtering the great Elven commander Kasimis and her honor guard with a perfectly executed night raid, and deploying Painsmiths to sap the citadel of Harkon’s Gap, crumbling it from below. There was nothing she would not do for victory. During the Second Great War, Lamasu laid siege to the Free City of Holmskurt, a thriving entrepot fortified with some of the mightiest walls in Kaerok. Towering higher than the largest redwoods, warded with protective magic woven into the very mortar, they had withstood the efforts of numerous Demonspawn generals and Lamasu was determined to show her superiority. For month after blood-soaked month, hell-forged siege engines battered the walls with flaming boulders and sickly green orbs of conjured acid. Swarms of Demonspawn scaled their sheer surface probing for weaknesses, keeping defenders exhausted and afraid. Nonetheless, the walls held. Lamasu redoubled her efforts. Soaring into the smoky skies, she directed her siege engines' fire, targeting hospitals, granaries, and mustering-grounds. She concocted a tarry mixture to seal the wall’s loopholes, reducing the defenders their capacity to fire upon the besiegers. She dispatched swarms of flying imps to circle over the city and shriek with unholy vigor, robbing the occupants of sleep and filling what little rest they snatched with nightmares. The defenders became so depleted and demoralized they could not hope to stop Lamasu’s final assault. She ordered her devoted army to concentrate into a dense mass and storm the wall. The Demonspawn clambered over one another, forming a living ramp. Those in the middle quivered and struggled to hold aloft the mass above them, and those forming the base were crushed – but the attack endured. The tower of monstrosities overtopped the battlements, and Lamasu sauntered up it triumphantly. More of her horde followed her and swarmed into the city. It was only natural for the Authoratrix to seize victory by treading upon the flesh and blood of her subjects. Lamasu all but dominates Anathraad today. Pretenders and plotters exist, but before them she is an unscalable wall. Teleria is not hers, however, for Siroth's schemes to take it have failed. Nonetheless she is determined. Though Teleria is riven with war, an assault from Anathraad would unite it. Patience is required. Besides, she has cultivated another goal. Lamasu doesn't just want to conquer Teleria. She wants the Halls of Eternity too. She would take Lumaya's place as Goddess, as she knows she deserves.