Marada comes from a fairly well-off merchant family. Her live was comfortable and predictable, tutoring and play with the promise of the Academy, as she showed much potential for the mystical arts.
Disaster struck one night as a fire broke out in the family home. The fire swept through the house with an unnatural ferocity, catching much of Marada's family unawares. Luckily for her , she'd been sitting on the balcony outside her chambers unable to sleep; she had her final Academy interview the next morn, and so avoided the firestorm that engulfed the inside of the house. Falling back from the infernal heat, she landed in the topiary surrounding her home. Rising groggily, she could hear the screams of her family, and through the smoke and heat she was certain she saw armed men beating back those inside trying to escape.
Retreating into the darkness of a nearby alley, Marada watched as her home slowly collapsed in upon itself, her family gone. Wiping tears from her cheeks, she turned and began walking to the Academy, waiting there for her interview, wearing only her night clothes. Though surprised by her appearance, the interview went ahead and Marada was admitted to the Academy as an initiate.
The legal wrangling that ensued over the Tel'Menaran fortune went on for some time, until finally much of it went to creditors and some relatives who suddenly appeared; conveintly connected with several rival merchant families. A portion was set aside for Marada as the last heir, but she was effectively denied her inheritance by a few well placed bribes.
Resigned to her fate, Marada dedicated herself to her studies for many years, until she found herself accused of a horrible crime. A friend confronted the accuser and the truth came out, a local crime lord, Gaedrun Lamm had made the man falsely accuse Marada for a murder to cover for his own thugs. Marada's occasional presence on the shore looking for a particular moss, had given Lamm his scapegoat. Though acquitted of any blame, the conservative administration at the Academy would brook no besmirching of their school's reputation and Marada was summarily expelled.
Facing a life on the street, Marada made the best of it. Taking her inheritance, she established herself among the more unfortunates in the city; assisting in "finding" lost items and people, using her father's teachings to deal with people and situations. Cut off from the library at the Academy, she could not continue her sorcerous studies, a personal library was out of reach for now. Instead she cultivated a relationship with several of the old crones that lived in OldTown, doing errands and favors for them until they agreed to teach her their "Common Magic".
