Clarabella 'Claire' Cain was born to a loving family as the youngest of four brothers. Her parents owned a ranch where they primarily raised
Equus, an ancestor of the modern horse. Additionally, they also raised
Chalicotherium, and a variety of
Ornithopods. Being the youngest, Claire was mercilessly picked on by her older brothers and had to develop a thick skin at an early age. Her mother viewed the abuse as unnecessary, but her father saw it as a learning experience. He told Claire the only person she could completely, unconditionally rely on, was herself. Never depend on others to come to her rescue.
"If you can feasibly do it yourself, do it." He said. She could trust in others but never forget the only person she could control, was her. The next time her brothers came at her, she punched one of them in the nose, and broke a broom over another's back. The teasing didn't stop, but it forced all involved to think twice before starting anything.
Being a rancher's child, she developed an interest in animals at an early age. All animals were considered wild, even ones like cats and dogs who were normally domesticated.
"They should be viewed with equal parts fear and respect. Just because your brother raised that raptor from birth doesn't mean it won't take his arm just because it feels like it." Her father would say. She spent more time in the stables learning from the hired hands than she did learning how to be prim and proper from her mother. As she grew older, she found she was teaching the greenhorns more than the senior hands.
In addition to raising animals, the family maintained a plot of land for farming. Working the land was tough and time-consuming, and the family employed Woolly Rhinos as beasts of burden to help till the land. When one of the females died while giving birth, Claire's father permitted her to help raise it. Naming it Brutus, the calf quickly viewed Claire as a mother figure, and would go to any length to be by her side.
Like most ranchers, her family had several interactions with the natives. With any kind of actual protection far away the ranch had to also function like a military fort. Everyone on the premises knew how to fire a rifle, Clarabella included. A couple of the senior hands had formally served, and they were the only thing close to real soldiers.
One night, the natives launched a night raid on the property, and unfortunately one of her brothers was killed. Claire channeled her heartbreak, fear and anger into something destructive. One of the hands had taken the name 'Joseph', in place of his actual name, which was much harder to pronounce. Claire had heard that he used to be a deadly warrior from somewhere very, very far away, and she convinced him to take a special interest in training her.
As the years passed, one by one, Claire's brothers joined the army in skirmishes against the natives, leaving her, her father, and her mother to maintain the ranch. Although she grew frustrated with the day to day regulatory workings, she took comfort knowing that her father was proud of her. When they received the letter that a fort had been overrun and two of her brothers had been killed, Claire was driven to have revenge. But her father would not let her leave. Angry, she poured herself into training.
Seasons passed and her father showed no signs of getting better. He passed at night, leaving the ranch in the hands of Claire, her mother, and her remaining brother. The ranch began to decline. And in addition to laying off many of their hands, they were forced to sell most of their animals to make payments on the land. But the money was still tight, and eventually they could no longer make the minimum payments. Claire sent letters to her brother, but he never wrote back. Worried and angry, Claire tried to convince her mother to leave the ranch behind and travel with her to find her brother.
One day, the bank sent out a group of 'collectors' to retrieve the money they were owed. These men and women were little more than hired-criminals, who murdered the hands and pillaged the ranch. The battle was over quickly. Claire had been shot twice, her mother had her throat cut, and the remaining hands had either fled or been killed.
When Claire awoke to the sound of thunder and rain, she lay in a ditch. She crawled from her shallow grave on the outskirts of the ranch land, and began to make her way back to the red and yellow glow of her home. As she neared, 'Joseph' appeared and stopped her. He carried her to his homestead in the wilderness and tended her wounds until she could walk on her own. Her Woolly Rhino, Brutus, had fled with 'Joseph' and was wounded, but otherwise unharmed.
Claire had nothing to go back to, and told Joseph that he should move on, that he was no longer beholden to the ranch. Before she left, 'Joseph' told her where he was from, and that his people had stories of the dead coming back to life. He called them 'Jezisa', and that she was one of them. He begged her not to seek revenge, and that it would lead her no place good.
While searching the remains of her home, she came across a lockbox that belonged to her father. Inside was a letter that beckoned him to head west, but due to his illness he couldn't make the journey. With nothing but dead memories for her in the east, it was a simple decision to make the journey out west.