Zalika was a Nubian slave woman who was badly mistreated by her slavers, ran away and found a cult of female mages at an old magical temple in the Egyptian desert over 450 years ago.

There, she and the female mages as part of an 'Earth Magic' cult learned the secrets of men's magic, especially those relating to control of dirt, rock and stone.  Sadly, the Mamluk rule of Egypt ended with the Ottoman Empire taking over the region. The Ottoman troops and mercenaries, upon discovering the 'witch sisterhood', hunted and hounded the sisters, burning them at the stake or torturing them to death. Eventually, after a final ferocious battle, resulting in the death of nearly a legion of Ottoman troops, all of the sisterhood's women/witches were killed...all except Zalika. She was able to escape, but sadly got caught by a nomad band of traders that took her abducted her intent on selling her into slavery. Knowing that if she used her powers, she'd be discovered and hunted by the Ottomans in full force. As such, she played along and eventually got sold to a rich European slave holder. In 1600, her master's economic prospects fell as industrialization hit Germany's tradesmen.

 

The nomads sold Zalika off to a Prussian Junker, who, within weeks of her starting work there, died of disease, leaving his house in disarray due to the Junker's only son being an undisciplined, drunken sot living hundreds of miles away. As such, Zalika took charge of the household staff and actually used her powers to help plant and harvest food, making a profit for the household and staff, saving them from financial ruin and possible starvation. The staff took to Zalika as a 'gift from God'...that is, until the Junker's drunken son returned.

 

Upon discovering that a black woman, nonetheless a slave, was the reason why the Junker's (now the son's) manor was saved threw the Junker's son into a fury, indignantly beating on Zalika for daring to do the duties of a noble (Junker). In defense of herself, Zalika used her earth powers to immobilize the man, warning him to stop his actions of she'd bury the whole manor and property down into a deep hole in the ground that she herself would create. The man laughed at maliciously at her instead.

 

Zalika did just as she said she would.

 

Zalika ordered the staff to run for the hills, as Zalika used her powers to create a massive sinkhole under the manor and its property. The manor's owner, still immobilized in a rocky prison, was buried alive with the sunken property. In the end, the grounds for a half a mile in all directions was nothing but a zone of destroyed rolling hills, broken and half-buried trees, jutting rocks and dishelved dirt everywhere, leaving no evidence that anyone had ever lived there.

 

For the next few years, Zalika tried to make her way back to Egypt, only to get herself into more trouble along the way, eventually earning a contingent of citizen 'witch hunters' all of whom were assigned to track her down and kill her. Sadly, Zalika was caught unawares by a small contingent of mystical knights called the "Knights Arcanus" (all of whom were not the citizen witch hunters) sent out by another sect; a secretive magic society called the Conglomerate.  These knights were sent out to stop another band of rogue witches calling themselves the Arcane Sisterhood'. The knights mistook Zalika to be one of these 'sisters' and caught her in her sleep. Ironically, Zalika was never part of this 'Arcane Sisterhood', yet was turned into an inanimate rock nonetheless. Thus Zalika remained, for the next few hundred years, as that rock, potentially forever...but as fate would have it, she would get freed from her transmutated rocky prison sooner that that.

 

A decade ago, a woman that actually once led the 'Aracane Sisterhood' (the one the Knights Arcanus thought Zalika was erroneously part of), Malconna, discovered Zalika's 'transmutated' state and turned her back into herself. The transmutation magics used by the Knights Arcanus mages disfigured Zalika, as had the same spells cast upon other Arcane Sisterhood members that Malconna had also freed.  Zalika was furious over losing her beautiful looks and swore vengeance against the Knights Arcanus and men in general. Malconna of course offered Zalika to become a sister in the sisterhood, and readily accepted the offer.

Over the next few years, Zalika attempted to recreate the 'Sisters of the Earth', but was only able to train/recruits but a dozen new adepts. Those adepts sadly fell in a Halloween battle in 2016 against an aggressive (and hungry!) man-eating plant owned by this century's new (and rogue) Knights Arcanus. In that same battle, Zalika was wounded, taking months to recover.

 

Today, Zalika is the only remaining 'Sister of the Earth' in the Arcane Sisterhood. She is even more vengeful that ever against the Knights Arcanus (and men!).  She doesn't always agree with Malconna's excessively detailed plots against their enemies, but follows her...at least until she can regain some of her lost strength and abilities to once again break away and restart her own 'Sisters of the Earth' cult once again, hoping to create their own female-centric society, bereft of man's influence.