Episode 1 of Magic: The Gathering’s Tarkir: Dragonstorm story picks up with Narset enjoying some down time in a busy tavern on Tarkir.
Despite her status as the newest leader of the Jeskai, Narset is able to remain mostly unrecognized among the crowd, especially with the majority focused on a pair of elaborately-dressed, masked entertainers on the tavern stage.
Narset watches on as the duo begins their performance. They start by addressing the audience, declaring their intent to “entertain and educate,” and in the blink of an eye, one of the entertainer’s masks changes into Narset’s beloved Ojutai – one of the five Elder Dragons that had previously controlled Tarkir.
Smoke then fills the stage, briefly engulfing the actors before they re-emerge wearing new masks, one of which is a visage of Narset herself, albeit expressionless. The duo recalls the events of Tarkir’s uprising, in which the five clan leaders united to bring an end to oppressive reign of the Elder Dragons.
It doesn’t take long before individuals from various clans begin to chime in – interrupting the performance by pointing out the “inaccuracies” of the story according to what they were told. Naturally, the conflicting opinions shift the attention from the performers to the arguing individuals, but as tensions escalate, a roar rings out and projections of the five Elder Dragons emerge from the stage, startling even Narset.
With the sudden interruption settling the crowd, the performers continue their retelling. They recall the times when the clans were prisoner to their respective Elder Dragon, forced to serve their every whim or be destroyed. Despite her fondness of Ojutai, Narset had done what was necessary to free the clans of Tarkir.
Before long, the performers reached the retelling of The Stormnexus Ritual, in which Narset and the other champions of the plane had risked everything to create a Dragonstorm that would summon the spirit dragons and ultimately rid Tarkir of their oppressors.
Reaching the climax of retelling, the crowd erupts with cheers of excitement, but the moment Tarkir’s leaders mounted their spirit dragons, an audience member once again interrupts the performance by asking an irrelevant question that ends up derailing the show beyond repair.
“Full-throated arguments shook loose across the tavern, as the patrons gleefully took to defending their own apocrypha. Narset glanced at the stage where the performers stood looking somewhat nonplussed, phantom dragons winging listlessly overhead. The illusionist gave his partner what Narset decided was a philosophical shrug and was answered with a rolling of deep umber eyes.”
Sensing there would be no recovering from this, Narset stands and addresses the crowd, breaking her anonymity for the sake of calming the crowd and setting the record straight with her first-hand retelling.
“Five glowing figures emerged from the dragonstorm. Five with the silhouettes of dragons but no features. They were simply power made incarnate, waiting to be called into being,” said Narset, feeling again how Shiko formed under her, how it had dug tether hooks into her thoughts, seeking a path to follow. “I was the first to leap onto one. Then the others followed, and we became bound to our spirit dragons, just as they became bound to us.”
Upon reaching the defeat of the Elder Dragons and what should have been the tale, Narset continues on, stating that “Though the dragonlords were vanquished, the dragonstorms remained. And they’ve gotten worse…” and “They’ve become strong enough to reshape the very land. There are places now where no one can go, let alone live. To say nothing of the wild dragons that have spawned. These new dragons are intractable beasts…”
Before she could continue her oversharing of the current events, Narset is interrupted by the tavern door being aggressively swung open followed by a man rushing in and calling out to speak with Narset.
Upon greeting the courier, the flustered man tells Narset that there is a woman with wings and glowing eyes who suddenly appeared and asked to speak with her urgently. After hearing the man’s message, Narset calms the man and tells him that the woman’s name is Elspeth, and “…if she has come seeking me on Tarkir, something terrible must have happened.”
Read the original article from Wizards of the Coast.
