The story in short
Riven never knew her parents. Her father died in battle, her mother in childbirth, and she grew up on an imperial farm in Trevale. She wanted more than just getting by, and once she swore herself to the empire, she turned out to be a born soldier. Darkwill himself rewarded her with a runic blade of dark metal, heavier than a shield and enchanted by a pale sorceress at his court.
In Ionia, her warband was escorting another one, whose leader had hired a Zaunite alchemist to test a new weapon. Ionian fighters ambushed them in a storm, a burning arrow hit the wagon, and the chemical fire killed soldiers on both sides. The blade shielded Riven and no one else. She came to hate it for that, and eventually it broke. In exile she caused the death of a revered elder. In the end she turned herself in to answer for deserting, and went back to Noxus in chains.
