Kaya's History
Kaya, a.k.a. the Ghost-Assassin, is a Planeswalker with a growing reputation as an accomplished ghost hunter. She is also the nominal guildmaster of the Orzhov Syndicate on Ravnica. Kaya has a family name, but for an undisclosed reason, she can't use it. On Kaldheim, she was called Kaya Far-Traveler and Slayer of the Bloodsky Sire. Kaya's homeplane is Tolvada, whose blue sky of is shot through with scintillating cracks, like a zig-zagging rainbow, and the world goes a little madder every year.. She was born in a village with less than a hundred inhabitants. She is descended from a noble lineage, though she and her kin had never stood on ceremony. Kaya's family relationships can be best described as "complicated". She once had a relationship with someone called Janah. She doesn't miss Janah, but she misses the feeling.
Kaya initially appeared on Fiora while taking an assassination contract for the ghost of Paliano nobleman Emilio Revari's mother. As she tangled with the spirit in its former home, she uncovered the reality that Emilio was directly responsible for his mother's death. Disgusted by this act of kinslaying, she ended her battle and led Emilio back into the house under the false pretense that the specter had been slain. Once the nobleman had been lured inside, Kaya revealed that she knew the extent of his crimes and left him to the wrath of his slain mother. With the Revari contract settled, she could now attend to a much larger payday. Her next job came through a contract from Marchesa to assassinate the ghostly King Brago. Utilizing her incorporeal powers, she successfully infiltrated Brago's dining room and plunged her rondel dagger into his spectral neck. In the aftermath of her triumph, Kaya was confronted by Brago's captain of the guard, Adriana. After several swings of Adriana's sword passed through Kaya's unharmed body, the ghost assassin retaliated with an elbow to the jaw. Kaya would leave Adriana otherwise unscathed, departing from the dining hall with remarks of Brago's tyranny.
Kaya resurfaced on Ravnica as part of the Orzhov Syndicate.
Nicol Bolas hired her to kill the Obzedat and become guildmaster of Orzhov in exchange for him helping her "troubled family". Promised the support of Teysa, Kaya worked with
Ral Zarek, Hekara and
Vraska in an attack on Orzhova. While the others distracted the Orzhov troops and thrulls with an attack of rot zombies through the sewers, Kaya passed through the Orzhov defenses of the catacombs mostly without a problem, although she has some difficulty defeating a couple of giants. When she found them, she killed the Ghost Council easily, but while doing it she suddenly felt all the Orzhov contracts physically weighing her down. Through a loophole in Orzhov law, she had become the new guildmaster of the Syndicate. In addition, she discovered that Bolas has maneuvered her in this position, and that she now had to do his bidding in return for aid to her broken home plane, as originally agreed, but also for extrication from her current predicament.
Most of the Orzhov refused to acknowledge her status or respect her authority. Despite Teysa warning against it, Kaya freed many people from the debts they owed the guild, particularly the bound ghosts. On the other hand, she also heightened the tithes on the population to compensate for the economic losses caused by forgiving so many debts, raising them from 10% of people's incomes to 40%. This quickly led to riots, which had to be quelled by Azorius forces; in order to pacify the masses, she brought the tithes down to 18%. Kaya's habit of forgiving debts and raising taxes made her even more unpopular and caused Teysa to end their partnership, further undermining her position.
Kaya and Teysa attended the guild summit on behalf of the Orzhov, and witnessed its dissolution after the murder of Isperia. Afterwards, she helped Ral Zarek engage the Golgari, to conquer a location that was needed for his manipulation of the Implicit Maze. During the attack, she was almost killed by one her own priests who called her a traitor. As he returned to Orzhova, she found that the hierarchs had pressured Teysa to arrest her. With the help of Tomik Vrona, who thought that Teysa was making a mistake, Kaya discovered that all the hierarchs owned debts to the true heir of Patriarch Karlov. She turned the tables, had Teysa arrested and offered the hierarchs a deal. Free of internal guild struggles, Kaya lead an army gargoyles to attack Dovin Baan's thopters, and to help Ral Zarek to enter the Beacon Tower in order to activate the Interplanar Beacon.
Ral Zarek activated the Interplanar Beacon to bring other planeswalkers to Ravnica for help, but it turned out that was exactly what Bolas was counting on. Once the Beacon was active, Bolas brought the Immortal Sun to Ravnica, trapping the planeswalkers there. Having become aware of Bolas' treacherous nature, Kaya defected from him for good.
Bolas' invasion began shortly after that, and the Eternals of the Dreadhorde marched forth from the dragon's Planar Bridge. She befriended Teyo Verada, a newly-ignited planeswalker who had just arrived on Ravnica. With the help of a Gateless street urchin named Araithia Shokta (nicknamed Rat), Kaya and Ral helped explain the situation to Teyo. Alongside many other planeswalkers and Ravnicans, Kaya fought against Bolas' forces.
She tried to rally the Orzhov Syndicate against Bolas, and she met with the Syndicate's ruling triumvirate, consisting of the human pontiff Armin Morov, the vampire tithe-master Slavomir Zoltan, and the angel warrior-executioner Maladola. She faced resistance from them, but the Syndicate's chief enforcer – the giant Bilagru – convinced them that Bolas posed an existential threat to all of Ravnica and, by extension, to the Syndicate's economic interests. (Unbeknownst to Kaya, Bilagru had been persuaded to help her by Orzhov representative Tomik Vrona.) Swayed by Bilagru's arguments, the triumvirate agreed to have the Orzhov Syndicate join the fight.
During the invasion, the trapped planeswalkers got together with Ravnican leaders to strategize. At
Jace's recommendation, they decided to split up into teams to focus on specific tasks. Kaya, Teyo, and Araithia were sent to persuade the guilds that still remained neutral (Selesnya, Gruul, Golgari, and Rakdos) to join the fight against Bolas. They received an audience Emmara Tandris, acting guildmaster of the Selesnya Conclave, who initially refused their plea for help. However, her decision was overruled when Trostani awakened and ruled in favor of helping the Gatewatch. The group then went to speak with Borborygmos of the Gruul Clans, and Araithia convinced the cyclops to support their cause.
They were joined by Ral, who accompanied them to the Undercity. In Vraska's absence, the other leaders of the Golgari Swarm squabbled for control of her throne, but Vraska returned and united them. Despite Ral and Kaya's suspicion of the gorgon, Vraska pledged the Golgari to the fight against Bolas. With the help of
Ajani and his team of planeswalkers, they were able to evacuate many civilians to the tunnels beneath the city, where they would be safe from the Dreadhorde.
After that, Vraska, Ral, Kaya, Teyo, and Araithia journeyed to Rix Maadi to negotiate with
Rakdos. The demon lord was initially hostile due to the death of his emissary Hekara, and the blood witch Exava ordered the group to leave. However, the Orzhov representative Tomik showed up with Hekara's corpse, and the Rakdos cultists resurrected Hekara as a blood witch. After defeating Exava in a fight, Hekara used her newfound authority as a blood witch to lead the Rakdos against Bolas.
Once all ten guilds were on board, Nissa performed a ritual at the ruins of the Embassy of Guildpact: with the help of a representative from each guild, she was able to repair the leylines that empowered the Living Guildpact (which had been disrupted when Bolas destroyed the Guildpact Chamber by opening his portal there). Kaya served as the representative for the Orzhov Syndicate. Using a device that
Niv-Mizzet had constructed before his death to preserve his consciousness, they were able to resurrect Niv and grant the power of the Living Guildpact to him. Niv came back to life just in time to save the others from the God-Eternal Kefnet: using his newfound power, Niv was able to completely incinerate Kefnet in a torrent of flame, although the strain of channeling enough energy to kill a god caused him to fall unconscious.
Kaya survived the battle and was present during the Planewide Celebration that followed. Seeking to atone for her past mistakes, she joined the Gatewatch. Later, she was confronted by Niv-Mizzet and the other guildmasters (with Tomik now representing the Orzhov Syndicate in her place). They decided to spare the planeswalkers who formerly worked with Bolas but defected before the battle, on the condition that they make amends by hunting down the planeswalkers who stayed loyal to Bolas or defected too late. As her penance, Kaya was assigned the task of assassinating
Liliana Vess, who the guildmasters had condemned to death for killing thousands of Ravnican citizens with the Dreadhorde.
Still bound by the debt contracts she inherited from the Obzedat, Kaya contemplated declaring all those debts forgiven. But she knew that such an act would destroy the Orzhov, and feared that the delicate balancing act that was Ravnica would topple with it. The contracts also prevented her from planeswalking away. However, Tomik Vrona discovered a legal loophole that allowed Kaya to temporarily transfer her Orzhov contracts and guild responsibilities to him. With Tomik now the acting guildmaster, Kaya was free to planeswalk away for short periods, and so Kaya and her entourage along with Jaya Ballard set out on their quest. Kaya used her necro-magic abilities to envelope and transport Rat on their journey. The group first traveled to Gobakhan to help Teyo Verada, as it was his first time to intentionally planeswalk. Afterward, Jaya guided them to Caligo on Dominaria in search of Liliana but soon left after refusing to go further.
Liliana was found outside the House of Vess working in a nearby garden and in a trance. While Rat went off to learn more about the mansion and its inhabitants, Teyo attempted to remove the gold collar from Liliana's neck which jolted her back to her senses. Liliana fought against Kaya and Teyo but was knocked unconscious by Rat. They discovered that an imposter Liliana Vess controlled the estate by wearing a choker with a blue sapphire amulet that contained a large and very powerful djinn. Liliana regained consciousness and agreed to let Kaya kill her in exchange for defeating her imposter and freeing her people.
During the fight, Rat stole the sapphire amulet and destroyed it which released the djinn named Zahid. Seeking vengeance, Zahid attempted to kill Teyo who had been using his shield magic to contain the entity. While Rat retrieved the Spirit-Gem and returned it to Liliana, Kaya tried to kill the djinn but was knocked across the room. Liliana then used the Chain Veil to subdue Zahid whose only request was to take Liliana Vess as his prisoner. Realizing Zahid was referring to the imposter, Liliana agreed, but Kaya killed the mistress out of mercy. Zahid was forced to leave empty-handed.
After the conflict, Liliana answered Kaya's questions and was allowed to live, although proof of a kill would be needed. Teyo suggested that Liliana give up the Veil, who reluctantly did so with a little help from the Spirit-Gem. Before returning to Ravnica, Kaya and her entourage promised to meet Liliana in Paliano on Fiora. Teyo used his shield magic to transport the Veil and delivered it as proof of Liliana's death.
As promised, Kaya, Teyo, and Rat traveled to Fiora and met with Liliana who had changed her name to Ana Iora. There they began to help Ana on her path to redemption. Asked where they would go next, Kaya explained that she had unfinished business on her homeworld of Tolvada.
A well-paying, but unknown, employer hired Kaya to hunt a hazardous monster on Kaldheim that had already caused destruction on the plane. This monster turned out to be none other than
Vorinclex, one of New Phyrexia's praetors. She joined up with Inga Rune-Eyes, the leader of the Omenseekers faction of humans on the realm of Bretagard and her crew. Reaching Aldergard forest, the party engaged Vorinclex who almost managed to defeat them if not for Asi, one of the members of the party revealing himself to be Alrund, God of the Cosmos. Alrund used his magic to create a mystical barrier between Vorinclex and Kaya's people and the praetor left Bretagard, with Kaya soon following by way of Cosima's longship.
eing steered to Gnottvold, Kaya didn't find Vorinclex. Instead, she found a gathering of trolls seemingly rallied to war by the god Valki.[7] She quickly saw through the disguise and revealed the planeswalker
Tibalt doing his dirty work. Tibalt set both the Hagi and Torga trolls up against her, and she only escaped them with the help of the just arriving Tyvar Kell. Meanwhile, Tibalt escaped, by creating an omenpath with the Sword of the Realms.
The pair followed Tibalt to Immersturm where they were accosted by a couple of demons. Because of this, they were unable to prevent Tibalt from creating a Doomskar before they managed to take the sword from him. Lead by Varragoth, thousands of demons streamed through a giant rift in space to attack another realm. Kaya felt defeated, but Tyvar persuaded her to stay and fight.
In Bretagard, Kaya, Tyvar, and the leaders of the Clans were advised by Alrund to take the Sword of the Realms to Halvar, so that the god of battle could end the Doomskar. Mounted on a giant raven, Kaya, Tyvar, and Arni flew toward Halvar, but near the destination they were attacked in midair by the demon Varragoth who wanted the Sword for himself. Kaya used her powers to save her companions from death, but they ended up falling close to the Dread Marn, Karfell's army. Arni stayed behind to slow the zombies while the two planeswalkers took the Sword. In the middle of the way, Tyvar heard the sound of the horn of Skemfar's army and separated from Kaya to warn his brother of what was happening. After separating from the elf, Kaya was attacked by Varragoth but was saved by Cosima. Even with the efforts of the goddess, the demon was only delayed. During the battle Kaya saw Koma enter into Bretagard after being expelled from Starnheim by the Valkyries and Niko Aris. The Serpent was responsible for closing Karfell's Omenpath and destroying several draugr (accidentally). At that moment, the Valkyries and Niko also arrived in Bretagard. Niko and Kaya ended up saving each other's lives during the battle. Near the location of Halvar, Kaya was attacked once again by Varragoth, but was saved by the elves. While Tyvar and the army of elves fought the demons and zombies, Harald helped Kaya to reach Halvar. Tyvar used his transmuting powers to strengthen his allies and hinder enemies and tried as hard as possible to stop Varragoth, but the demon was only stopped by Kaya who cut the demon's throat with one of the axes Tyvar had made for her. After the great battle and the end of the Doomskar, Tyvar met Kaya and praised her for killing Varragoth and promised that the skalds would not forget any detail of this feat when telling this saga. He told Kaya that he now was ready to walk the Multiverse and help those in need on other planes. Kaya met with Sigrid, Inga, Arni, Fynn, Niko and Harald after the battle. Sigrid said that they would have a lot of work to hunt down the delayed invaders that remained in Bretagard. Harald and the leaders of the Clans agree that elves and humans must live in peace until the elves manage to return to Skemfar. Inga asked about the monster Kaya was hunting and Kaya replied that he must be in other realms far away. Niko asked if one of these realms is called Theros. Kaya replied that they must talk.
Arlinn Kord[/c[ went to Ravnica to ask The Gatewatch for help in finding the Moonsilver Key. She explained Innistrad's situation to [c=35492]Teferi, Kaya and Chandra. The three planeswalkers agree to help Arlin and head to Innistrad. Together with the cathar Adeline they decide to go to Thraben to investigate.
The group arrived in Thraben, accompanied by a unit of cathars, only to find the city was destroyed and full of zombies. Kaya entered the city alone to scout the place. She found a clue in a book about the whereabouts of the Moonsilver Key. The Key should be in the possession of the Betzold family. Arlinn and Adeline knew a bishop of the Church of Avacyn with that last name. They located bishop Worrin Betzold amid the ruins of a church. The group made their way through the zombies until they reached the bishop. Arlinn interrogated the zombie bishop and was given a name, Dennick. The group moved to Gavony, where the family had a mansion. They discovered, when talking to an old lady, that the mansion was haunted. Kaya entered the ruins alone and killed the ghosts of the place, until she found the spirit of Dennick Betzold, who told the group the location of the Key. The Key had been given by an ancestor of Dennick to
Sorin Markov. At Markov Manor, Teferi and Arlinn waited with Sorin for the vampire to hand over the Key so they can help restore balance to Innistrad. The vampire refused and attacked Arlinn when she mentioned Avacyn. The second time Sorin would strike, Sigarda appeared, answering a prayer made by the group before entering the Manor, and stopped the attack. The angel said that the Key was in Sorin's quarters, and that she would fight the vampire to give the group a chance to get the Key.
The party returned to the Celestus in possession of the Key. At this moment, Tovolar launched his army against the Harvesttide festival, but the witches' magical protections managed to stop the werewolves' advance. Arlinn told Kaya to take the Key to Katilda. As Kaya did, the wards failed. Teferi cast a spell to delay the sunset and hence the transformation of werewolves into their wolf forms. Planeswalkers, witches and cathars began their battle against the invaders to defend the humans. During the battle against Tovolar, Kaya stood at the center of the Celestus, helping to protect the witches who initiated the ritual. After the battle, Arlinn went there with Chandra and Adeline. When Katilda, with Arlinn's help, would have finished the ritual, Olivia Voldaren appeared and interrupted the ritual by taking the Key with her. Thus, the Eternal Night began.
After the Harvesttide festival ritual fails, Kaya along with a group of people from Innistrad and Adeline, the planeswalkers Arlinn Kord, Chandra Nalaar, and Teferi decided to help humans in distress across Innistrad. That is until Arlinn decided to return to Markov Manor and ask Sorin Markov for help. In the crypt of the Manor, the group encountered Sorin who says that Olivia Voldaren "stole" his grandfather. They formed a pact with Sorin and travelled together to the wedding of Olivia and Edgar Markov at the Voldaren estate. When they arrived, all but Sorin were forbidden entrance.
Inside the manor, Sorin managed to disrupt the ceremony and attacked Olivia who dropped the Moonsilver Key. From it, Katilda’s spirit emerged and freed Sigarda who unleashed a blinding holy aura that shattered windows and broke the manor’s wards. The Gatewatch and their forces advanced and entered the manor after Chandra and Teferi burned down the main doors. Kaya went on to free many of the angry spirits imprisoned within the castle who quickly turned on their captors, including those trapped within Olivia’s wedding gown. Emerging victorious, Kaya and the others returned to the Celestus with the Moonsilver Key. The ritual was completed and the balance between night and day was restored.
