Fionna Valspar's page

If the word "home" has any meaning, Fionna doesn't know it. Her foster family, a motley, mixed group of adventurers, tell her she was born to an Ekujae tribe in the Mwangi expanse that was wiped out by plague, and they rescued her. To her knowledge, since her birth she hasn't remained in the same region, much less the same country, for more than five years at a time. Her family brought her all over the world, from Irrisen to Minkai and the Crown of the World to Holomog, growing and changing as members joined, left, and died over the hundred odd years of Fionna's childhood. In all, she has fond memories of almost two dozen caretakers serving as parents, elder siblings, and in the case of one ornery old wizard, a grandfather.

It was from them she learned everything she knew about adventuring. Her "grandfather" taught her about magic, while the well-traveled halfling minstrel "uncle" taught her about the world. Her quick-fingered half-elf "brother" taught her to pick locks and pockets alike, although she's rusty on both skills, while her swordswoman "mother," one of her earliest caretakers, made sure she understood the basics of swordplay. It was her favorite "sister" Agatha, a dwarf who had been one of the very first faces she ever saw and who remained among the longest, who taught her to use her favored weapon, the whip, and instilled in her a lifelong interest not just in traveling and exploring but in learning the secrets of the past.

Unfortunately, few good things last forever. Agatha was already old by dwarven standards when the party adopted Fionna, and by the time she became an adult, the dwarven woman was ancient, barely suited for the adventuring lifestyle anymore. Indeed, the party had whittled down to just four members by that point, Fionna included. An adventure into a series of ancient Thassilonian ruins deep in the Varisian wilderness ended in chaos; a monster, all tentacles and teeth, awoken from a millenia old slumber rose from the depths and devoured one of their companions with a thought. The remaining three ran, desperate to escape, but Agatha was too slow, too stiff. Fionna tried to turn around and help her, but with a sad, parting smile, Agatha sealed the door between them shut, sacrificing herself so that Fionna could get away.

She couldn't say what happened to the fourth member of their party. They'd been separated in the wilderness. Frankly, she couldn't say that she cared. With the few remnants of her adoptive family in tatters, she wandered the countryside, using what money she had remaining from previous expeditions to sustain herself. In a fugue, she barely realized where she was going, until she found herself in Almas months later, snapped out of it by the sight of a flyer seeking adventurers of rare talent and experience for a colony.

A change of pace. A new scene. A new adventure. That, more than anything, was what someone like her needed.