Progression:  1.  Sketching in the flying dragons.  At this point, I can see that many are the same size, which normally would not happen in Nature.  I scan them into Photoshop to size and will rotate a few and resize a few.  The ones lower on the picture plane will be larger, the ones flying up to the character's hip will be the smallest.  All the while, I imagine what they might sound like.  Something like loud shrieking Amazons (parrots) in the Rain Forest.  A spiky noise.  I'm taking great care in the negative spaces between the parrots, I mean dragons, so that some are grouped and some overlap.  I'm also repeating a subtle pattern of diagonals in the wings that repeat the diagonals in the human sprite.
2.  I redraw the Sprite to make sure she flows, looks natural because the previous drawings lost the thrust of the original thumbnail sketch, which has so much more dynamics (doodled on Steve Irwin's thank you letter of a donation of $20).  I take even greater care to make sure the final drawing will have what the energy of the thumbnail began.
3.  Putting it together to check to see if the Sprite and dragons mesh.  Looking good, but I will  have to lower the dragons (cluster of dragons?  Flock of dragons?  Gaggle of dragons?)  away from fur vest for a better read.
4.  I spray a little atmosphere into the background, because at this age, the bright contrast of line work against sheer white is killing me and giving me a headache.  I higher that arm a bit  (cut and paste and reposition) and add a flying dragon about to roost on that outstretched arm.  Plus I ad a ghosting hint of a background, but not too much now.
5.  Tightening it up.  Going over lines with a more definitive line, "making it real", giving it volumne on trace paper.  Drawing with a blue Col Erase pencil which is unwittingly, 2 inches long.  Whoops.  Really short now that I keep sharpening it.   Praying and searching that I have another blue Col Erase pencil to draw in the characters.  Another small problem:  Paper is too small, so I tape and piece another paper to extend drawing surface.  Ok.  So I'm tired...