Nightmare's Honor

This is my entry for the EVIL CREEPY SCARY AND COOL contest held over at. This is Rikash Moonsword--a Stormwing--not my character, but this picture is entirely based on how I imagine him in my head, not on anyone else's image of him. He is from the Immortals quartet by Tamora Peirce.
Here is a description of Stormwings put together from quotes from said quartet: "...combined a human head and chest with a birds legs and wings. Sunlight bounded off talons and feathers that shone like steel...."What are Stormwings?" "The Eaters." Onua wrapped the feather and put it away. "But they're legends. No one's seen them for three, four centuries. They lived on battlefields, desecrating bodies--eating them, fouling them, and scattering the pieces."

"Ages ago, a traveler in the mortal realms went from place to place and found only the leavings of war--the starving, the abandoned, the dead. It was the work of armies, fighting over grounds they soon lost again. That traveler sickened of waste--of death. She wished for a creature that was so repulsive, living on war's aftermath, that even humans would think twice before battle. That creature would defile what mortal killers left, so that humans couldn't lie about how glorious a soldiers death is. She dreamed the first Stormwing."

Back to me: Don't judge them by their actions, it's their nature, and some DO have honor--Rikash and the others in the Stone Tree nation of Stormwings. Oh, and (SPOILER ALERT) he is one of the characters that proves my theory that the badass characters always die--him and Remus Lupin, Ichimaru Gin, Greed, probably Murtagh, I don't know yet, etc.

Done with watercolor, colored pencil, and silver acrylic paint.

Rikash and quotes©Tamora Peirce