And then what happened?

Such is the question that propels a story forward. But I haven’t been able to answer that question yet, not in relation to The Dragon Destroyer. I haven’t even been able to answer that question in relation to Krystyn’s character story. Which frustrates me. I want to get into storytelling mode and figure out what happened in Krystyn’s life to shape her into the person she is when she makes her first appearance in The Dragon Hunter.

Instead, I have found myself asking a different question over the past few weeks: what happened before that? And what happened before that? And what happened before that?

The backwards question brought me to the beginning of the Destroyer Bloodline, and I had fun figuring out the origin of the Destroyers. When I then tried to jump ahead to Krystyn’s lifetime at the beginning of this week, I struggled to pick up her story. I couldn’t figure her out without understanding her immediate family and what kind of environment she grew up in.

So this past week, I spent time drawing a map of Tirza, the region where Krystyn grew up. I also got to know her family a bit. I learned her father was maimed by a dragon, leaving him with ugly facial scars and only one arm. Her mother was a sickly woman, and as the only girl, Krystyn was the one stuck taking care of her mother.

Krystyn is the middle of the seven. She has three older brothers and three younger brothers, one of which is her twin and younger by only two minutes.

Now that I have determined what kind of family Krystyn was born into, I can finally begin the process of discovering Krystyn’s story. So this week I will be diving into Krystyn’s life and asking one simple question over and over again: and then what happened?