Birth & Childhood[edit]
Yunari was born as a single child to her father Volker, and her mother Anselma. The latter was a weaver by trade, generations of her family having been proficient in the tradecraft. Some time after conceiving, she made a trip to Coerthas, picking up a few crates of rare leathers and clothes made from the hides and furs of beasts found solely in the northern reaches of the continent. While at the outpost where her trade was to take place, Anselma was treated with the barest of civility, many of the people present prior citizens of Ishgard, or descendants of such, and embittered toward other citizens of Eorzea. One person, however, stopped her on the day she was to leave, offering her a warm meal before her journey, as well as some for the road. Accepting the gracious offer, she stopped with this stranger at their encampment at the edge of the small settlement, only to discover upon entering the man's tupik that it was adorned with various runes, star charts, and crystals. The stranger, an Astrologian taught by those of the Sharlayan ways, spent time talking to Anselma, divulging only the basics of his craft at her curious urging, before offering to her a reading. Having scanned the stars and the cards the night prior, he did not understand what he read until now. He spoke to her of her own innate ability to spread knowledge, to teach in a manner that many accepted, and how she would aide the cause of those few Sharlayan Astrologians who wished to alter the thinking of those in Ishgard, and the few with natural talent for the craft, hidden and unawares across Eorzea. To drive his message to her home, as she seemed rather skeptical, he gifted her with knowledge of her coming child, estimating for her when the babe was to enter the world. He warned her that her child would suffer if without her father, but that otherwise would bring many kinds of fulfillment to it's mother's life. Thanking him for his time, as well as the warmth, interesting conversation, and food, Anselma offered one of her finest crafted robes for the stranger, who would not provide a name. Disrupting his protest, she stated she was willing to take the cut in her trade haul to gift the gracious man, and at day's end, she was on her way back to her home and her husband in a small village Ul'Dah.
Returned to the arms of her lover, the Hyur spoke to Volker of what had transpired while she was away, mentioning the Astrologian as a curiosity to her with a healthy amount of skepticism. Still, the foreboding tail of his message bothered her, but her mate urged her to forget it. Overjoyed at the idea that they were having a child, the man was understandably remiss to inform his wife that he had received a new assignment. Himself a mercenary, he had been offered a lucrative job to scout information about a band of raiders, and capture the head of their little group for an Ul'Dahn merchant whose pricey wares they had been regularly pillaging. He had been paid handsomely in advance, with a promise of more to come once the job was finished. Worried as she always was when her love was to away on a prolonged journey, Anselma spent the week with him before he set out with his newly assigned roster of mercs, constantly at his side until the time he left.
The remaining few months of her pregnancy came and went, finding Yunari's mother keeping in touch with letters dispatched by Chocobo porters, the messages short but at least reassuring her of Volker's safety. A couple of weeks prior to the predicted due date, the last correspondence received informed Anselma that her husband would be staying on for an extended time. No other details were given, and though she sent her reply with much haste, begging him to return to her side, she received nothing more by the time she was in the care of healers. Remembering the words of the Sharlayan stranger, all she wished was her husband at her side, the worry creeping into her mind, latching on even when assuring herself it was just words. Though her fears were unfounded during the actual birth of her child, Anselma's unease was realized when her newborn baby welcomed itself to the world in silence, without any air in its tiny lungs, and unable to draw precious oxygen. Separating mother and child, the healers laboured for several suns to keep the baby alive, and keep her mother calmed. On the third day of the child's life Volker, who had gotten word from a healer of his baby's emergence in the world, arrived, in time for Anselma to be told she could be reuinited with her newborn. Volker sung the praises of the healers, beaming with his wife as together with her, he awaited the return of what he assumed to be a son, to their arms. He proclaimed that clearly his child was a fighter, like his father, and excitedly spoke to Anselma how he would train his boy to walk in his footsteps, bringing the family much honour and coin. Finding the time to be appropriate, the fair woman expressed her distaste and fears to her lover at his long, unpredictable absences, the worry she constantly felt when he was away on dangerous jobs, and her desire to not have their child feel the same pain as it grew. She elaborated on her fears of his death in the last passing weeks, and implored him to find a new way to bring to the glory and coin that he sought to their home and family. Overjoyed just to see his wife's face and being told on arrival that his child was hale and healthy, the mercenary swore to his love that he would lay down his lordless banner and find a new way to pursue the kind of work he excelled at.
Much to his dismay, however, when the healers entered the small room the couple occupied, Anselma was handed not a tiny boy, but a baby girl. Biting back his disappointment, he nonetheless welcomed the life he had brought to Eorzea with his wife, and vowed to her to keep his word and strive to be present moreso in the life of his family. Keeping to this word, as he was at his core a man with a sense of honour, her laid low his title as a Merc, and instead began picking up different lines of work that utilized his fighting skills. For a time he was a gladiator in the Bloodsands, but the lovers both agreed that such a regularly dangerous job was only marginally an improvement to his prior work, and he switched to being a Guardsman around the streets of the city-state of Ul'Dah, and outlying settlements. As the years passed and his daughter grew, she showed interest in everything her father did, begging him for tales of his work as soon as she was able to speak. He indulged her, proud to share of his accomplishments, and seeing no harm in regaling her with the stories. As she aged further, she would often make passing remarks of wanting to be as he was when she aged, despite her mother's urging to follow Anselma's family traditions, but never did anything come of it, and she instead was taught the arts of weaving from her loving mother. It was a task that she attempted wholeheartedly, but could not seem to master, which eventually led to her abandoning the craft and assisting instead with associated tasks of her mother's trade as she matured.
Teenage Years[edit]
Yunari aged with health and vigor, never again suffering major maladies despite her difficulties at birth. As the years passed on, she continued to be taught the ways of the weaver by her mother, but still even into puberty, she did not prove to be adept at the craft, despite constant attempts to learn. All trials ended in Yunari's frustration, sometimes mounting in tempestuous flashes, and her mother calming her with soothing words and a pleasant, exotic meal. It was muttered among other workers that the latter was the only reason that she even continued to try, despite wasting many gil away to failed attempts on her own or at her mother's behest to weave together something of value, though these rumours only served to cut Yunari's fuse shorter and shorter as time passed by. Eventually, there came a day when she was to assist Anselma with a particularly expensive gown for the daughter of a noble, and though she did her utmost to replicate her mother's work on the opposing side of the garment, she instead ruined the piece entirely. In a fit of frustration, she threw it down, vowing never to work as a weaver again, and try as her mother did to calm her, she left, disappearing for two days before she meekly made a return home.
It was just the start of her disappearances, though, as often, she would be gone for hours, or on rare occasions, several days at a time. Her mother knew not to where she went, and her father was far too busy with his new work to pay true mind to her, if even he was home. Any attempts on either parent's parts to control her and keep her in the home were met with resistance, or else quiet submission and a repeat performance in the near future despite it. Anselma even went as far as to try to coax her daughter to reveal her whereabouts and activities with some of her favourite things, like new dishes with extremely rare ingredients, but to no avail. Eventually, she caught her child one evening and, eyes filled with tears from her worries and disappointments, she begged Yunari to either tell her to where and for what she traveled, or to at least stay home more during the times she was not assisting her mother's business. Unable to hurt Anselma any more than she already unwittingly had, the young Hyur agreed to her mother's terms, no longer being gone more than half a sun cycle at a time.
Ever still was she in awe of tales of her father's past and present, and her begging for stories eventually turned to begging for training. Her father, however, had growing disdain of the fact that he did not have a son. Ever since he and Anselma has decided to bear and raise a child together, he had always imagined a son to proudly wear his old greaves, to bear his shield and axe, and to bond with on a masculine level. This caused a rift to develop between Yunari and Volker, as he was convinced truly strong warriors were rarely found in women, and she was determined to be like the father she so admired. Over the years the tension built and the rift grew between the father and daughter, seeming to ever damage the relationship between them, despite any attempts Anselma put forth to mend the ill feelings and pain. This came to a head, however, in Yunari's thirteenth year.
When he changed his profession once more, no longer an everyman guard but a personal bodyguard to a member of the Sultanate, Yunari confronted her father, expressing to him her feelings that he had sold out in the name of coin and undeserved fame. She brazenly told Volker that now he was bringing shame to the family with dirtied money. The tempers of both of the Hyurs flared, the words between them becoming more aggressive in their ire, and instead of resolving the spat with words, to Anselma's horror, escalated to violence. Her husband, brashly informing his daughter that she would never understand as she would never be a true fighter and not hope to be half the person he was due to being born a daughter to him rather than a son, was introduced to the weight of Yunari's elbow as she threw it at his face. Blood gushing from his now nose, the man set to blows with his lineage, and a fierce fight ensued, ending only when the mother stepped in and stunned both with the blinding light of the heavens. Shocked, confused, and thereby calmed, the father and his child reconciled, begrudgingly, their attentions now turned to the confusing show of magicks that the fair and otherwise demure woman had displayed.
As Anselma healed the broken wreck of Volker's nose and the wounds both Hyurs had inflicted upon their own flesh and blood, she would tell it that she had been working on learning the arts of Astromancy ever since the birth of her baby girl. Having before been skeptical of the words of the Sharlyan Astrologian, thinking him perhaps too devoted to his art or exiled for madness, she had taken it with a grain of salt, up until the words he spoke to her from his reading proved to be true. From that time, in the background of her weaving work, and teaching her curious daughter what she knew of culinary arts, she pulled texts from great caches of information, listened to whispers on the streets, and compiled whatever should could regarding the lost celestial arts. Having found about the Heavens' Gates, the night time walks she would often take were truly more for her to gaze upon the darkened skies, rather than catch fresh air under darkness. And over time she had learned she had within herself an innate affinity to feel the celestial workings, and while not strong, she had taught herself their healing magicks and opened several gates alone. She wished to spread the reality of Astromancy across the Realm after she was sure the family could function without her, but the disagreements between her only child and beloved husband were making it nearly impossible.
Ridden with guilt, as well as the love they still had for each other despite their differences, Volker and Yunari apologized on the spot, to each other and to Anselma, whom they held above all else. The two vowed to control their tempers and try to work past disagreements, and Yunari suggested her own idea. Why not, she mused, travel as a family, taking work as they went, to give her mother the chance to travel and teach what she learned to those that would listen relam-wide? Herself having a confession to make, she admitted that her ability to at all physically confront her father was due to her sneaking out. She was, in fact, heading out to watch fights at the Bloodsands, or to cook meals for soliders training in the camps of the Immortal Flames. Both situations afforded her to watch fighters from all walks of training at work, and while she was by no means highly skilled, that she was adept at all had come as a surprise to her father, who silently regarded her as she explained her own stories to her parents.
After explaining her own learned trade, Yunari posed again the question to her father that for years she had asked to negative response: would he train her in the arts he had cherished and excelled at all his life? Unlike his usual answer, he at least considered her, telling her that he would sleep on his reply. He and Anselma also agreed that the idea of traveling and working together, even if the goals were different, was the best course of action the three could take, and would renew and strengthen their bond as a family. Over the following months, Anselma closed her ties to the weaving company in Ul'Dah that she worked for, Volker resigned his post, with some difficulty, as the bodyguard for the wealthy Lalafellan noble, and Yunari continued sharpening her culinary skills while cooking for the Immortal Flames, and doing odd jobs to help her mother and father out. Their affairs in the Rose of the Desert tied up, their humble home sold off, and stocked with supplies, the family set off on the new chapter of their shared lives.
Nearly four years went by, during which time they traveled around the realm, doing the work that they had all set out to do. Anselma continued her weaving as a primary occupation, but spread the word of Sharlayan Astromancy whenever she felt it would not fall on deaf ears, in turn discovering more information of all types of the celestial arts, sometimes in the most surprising of places. Volker resumed his previous work as a mercenary, though, to ensure his daughter and wife would not worry much, only took jobs guarding people of less noteworthy backgrounds, posts in towns they would stop at, or bounties on beasts he could surely bring down. Yunari still assisted with non-weaving tasks to assist her mother, and as well would go out with Anselma to forage for herbs, fruits, and vegetables, or her father on occasional hunts, trapping meats and aquatic foods. Using these fresher ingredients she would often cook where she went, earning extra coin or at times information for her respective parents. If she was lucky, she would sometimes manage to convince a well-spirited soldier, gladiator, or warrior to impart upon her some knowledge of their art, though these occurrences were few and far between. All the while, they settled into a small home in La Noscea, only stopping there for a few weeks at a time between long journeys, thus becoming acquainted with Limsa Lominsa as their main source of trades, leads, and necessities. So it continued for those years until strange things began happening about the Realm. The second moon Dalamud seemed to grow bit by bit, taking more and more of the sky and blotting it out, Aetheryte crystals began morphing and spawning dangerous monsters unlike any that people had seen, and all manner of voidsent and beasts became wild, unruly, numerous, and incredibly dangerous. Perturbed as much as the next citizen of Eorzea, Anselma took to her readings furiously, an odd feeling never leaving her that the answers could lie in her most cherished work. So it was that she learned, one night, from an elusive sort of source, that there was a possibility of a yet unopened Heavens' Gate located in the skies over the distant land of Doma. Convinced as she had made herself that therein lay the key to answers surrounding the fell moon Dalamud and the rising crises across the lands, the bold Hyuran set off, with her family supporting in tow, from the ports of Limsa Lominsa. It was but one month later, when a trade ship bound for the lands finally arrived.
Upon this ship happened many occurrences that Yunari would carry with her for the rest of her life. Among them, and most important, was her requainting of Geisswolk Rhotgeimwyn. The woman was a Roegadyn, opinionated and a bit of a zealot, whom Yunari had once encountered in The Drowning Wench. That night, Geisswolk had been denouncing the names of the Sharlyan Astromancers, apparently having caught whispers of Anselma's words in the towns. Openly, she claimed them heretics to Ishgard, and lunatics following a dangerous path. Yunari, defending her mother's honour, asked that she stand down until she know more of what she spoke, but rather than acquiesce, the Roegadyn furiously proclaimed that it was the untrained, uneducated, and classless folk like the Oerbas that were bound to doom Eorzea to being beneath the attentions of the Holy See in the grand city of Ishgard. Snapping instantaneously, the Hyur flew at the Roegadyn, and they fought until The Yellow Jackets ripped them apart from one another, beaten, bruised and bloodied, spitting on the ground while cursing each others' names. The memory of this still fresh in their minds when they met again on the vessel meant that the only reason either held their cool were still further the remembrance of the night they spent across from each other in a dank cell-system beneath the rocky outcrops upon which the City-State rested. This occurred many a night over the course of the prior two years, often due to similar types of arguments and speeches at once another when they happened to cross paths for more than a quick passing. Thus, for the nights spent traveling, they observed each other with a silent ferocity, only speaking to hiss one another's name in feigned greeting as they passed when under watchful eyes of compatriots.
Besides the appearance of this violent figure from her days, Volker one night pulled Yunari aside as she was assisting the chef on the vessel with meals for the crew, attempting to learn the dishes they usually ate while bound by the tides and seawater. Upon the deck with soldiers hired to guard the crew and vessel in case of piracy, he proclaimed that he felt it was time he began to teach his daughter what he knew. At seventeen years of age, with nearly fourteen of that filled with relentless attempts to learn her father's skillset, and having seen both first and second hand what his untrained daughter could do in a fight, he could no longer deny that it was possible she make a good warrior of sorts. The least he could do if he could not sway her away from the dangerous path was to at least give her an advantage should she need it. Beyond exhilarated, the young woman threw her arms about her father, silently crying and thanking him, and for the first time in nearly a decade they embraced, a moment Anselma stayed out of, but looked upon with happiness shining in her eyes. At long last, it seemed the family could be truly whole again. Unfortunately, this heal in the rift was cut short.
The time in Doma, once they arrived, was short, as the unnerving occurrences across Eorzea were soon made apparent to not be localized to that Realm; rather, it seemed no area was left untouched, some having claimed, in their travels, seeing even Garlean forces arming troops and gathering defenses. A handful of nights were afforded as those upon the vessel departed for lands beyond after making their trades, and less than a fortnight went by before the Oerba family was on their return trip to Limsa Lominsa. Anselma, having been unnervingly quiet since finding and opening the Heavens' Gate over Doma, did not share what she found, even with her beloved husband and daughter. All they could move her to speak of was the fact that she had discerned the location of the gate through an unusual meeting with a Doman Priestess, trained in what she described as a very different, yet spiritually similar, atherically-tuned art. Clutching in her hand a tightly wrapped scroll, she insisted the family return to the shorebound city-state, and set out at once to attempt to contact the reclusive Sharlayans, and perhaps even, to Yunari's disdain, the Astrologians affiliated with their counters in Ishgard. But less than two suns from leaving the humble docks of the port nearest Doma, in the dead of night, every plan was forced to a grinding halt.
Laying on her back, staring at the stars on deck, and contemplating going within the cabins for warmth on the unusually cold eve, Yunari heard a strange series of sounds near the port side of the vessel. Alerted and used to piracy in the waters near Merlwyb's home, those meant to guard the boat, Volker included among their number, immediately set to investigate, spreading out along the side of the large ship to see what they could spy. Seeing nothing, though they checked for a time, they were just turning to give up when several pitched backwards, clutching at their eyes, black ooze blinding them as they scrabbled to free their vision. A moment later, tridents pierced the torsos of several other guards, and at the other side of the boat, nets landed over tops of some passengers who hadd also been perusing the deck in the night for air. Chaos broke loose as the attackers jumped on board, but before Yunari could even see the faces of them, a sharp pain overtook her, her back beaten and her shoulders and face slammed into the deck from her standing position, enough to shatter the wood board beneath into splinters. Numbed to the pain of it by her shock, she forced her head to side, seeing a shining, colourful, fleshy foot land besides her head, only in time to see in the distance her Roegadyn antagonist brandishing the lance of a downed solider against a humanoid with the characteristics of a fish. Turning and seeing Yunari at the ground and underfoot of one of these beastmen, Geisswolk yelled to Yunari to "make yourself useful, don't just die like the dog you are and let everyone fall with you!" as she skewered the body above her, forcing it off and kicking a shield across the deck. Blinding groping, the Hyur picked it up and, despite her confusion and what felt like a concussion, began to attempt to fend off the attackers. Only managing to pick herself off the floor and take a few steps forward, she shouted in vain to warn the white-haired Sea Wolf of a sharpened weapon hurled at her from overboard. Too late, it pierced the fighting arm of the Lancer, but no sooner had she dropped, writhing in agony, Yunari running to her side to at least try to deflect any further attacks with the shield, but a bright glow lit the darkened deck in the small space around her wound. Two lightly tanned hands wrapped around the wounds and lips murmured incantations forgotten to many as Anselma rapidly prevented the worst of the damage from cementing, despite bone exposed and bright in the night. Glaring to the Roegadyn, despite her mother's tendings, Yunari reminded her, "Remember this day that the 'ravings of a heretic' and the mother of 'no more than a street dog' were what prevented the loss of your precious fighting arm, Lone Wolf." Offering her a hand to attempt to take her below deck to safety with the assistance of her mother, and hearing Volker shouting to flee below the topside, she suddenly found her face against the now blood-stained wood of the ship, her vision blurring and darkening rapidly as a far sharper pain than before spreads at the back of her head. She faintly hears the cries of her mother and the yells of her father, drowned out by guttural roads and screams of the injured and dying, everything fading to nothingness as her vision slips to black.
When she finally came to, Yunari became very aware of the pains in her body, beaten as she had been in the attack. In a short time, she realized several pieces of information. The raiders were no pirates as all had initially presumed, but Sahagin, the aquatic Beast Tribe known to terrorize any who crossed the seas from time to time. Full raids like this were rare, but not entirely unheard of, save for the fact that the tradeship was of such an unusually large size for them to attack. Over months, spending day in and out in what could almost have been called a paddock enclosure made entirely of jagged rocks and corals higher than any one person could climb with ease, she also became aware that she was one of many who had been captured, and were being kept alive, or as much as one could call it such. Some were used for gruntwork day by day, forced to scrape barnacles and sea life from above-water corals in dangerous shoals, or carry various materials or catches that the fishmen gathered themselves, as though they were pack animals. The captives were all kept in a perpetually weakened state whether they were ones forced to work or not, over a dozen being in the webbed grasp of their attackers. Often, they were fed utterly unrecognizable slop that may not have even been food so much as refuse, and despite deaths slowly tolling, the prisoners were kept in a state of dehydration that often led to delirium under the burning rays of the sun. If not injured by the poor conditions, they were beaten for any sign of rebellion or unease, one such brazen individual, having been a solider on the ship, taking such blows that he was left bloody to die in the sands of the shore. Though she saw faces she did not recognize among her prisonmates, Yunari could not count the faces of her mother and father among them, and as many suns came and went, she began to lose her will, knowing in her heart that her family was dead and she would likely never see her friends again. Just as she was ready to give up hope, the wind gave her a gift.
Adulthood[edit]
Present Day[edit]
In current days in the realm of Eorzea, Yunari has devoted much of her time to rediscovering her place in the world. She seeks any traces she can of The Twelve, eager to have aide in her discovery through the guidance of her chosen deity, Oschon. This has led her to reside temporarily at Camp Bronze Lake, the nearest settlement to the infamous Wanderer's Palace, branded with the symbol of her God quite clearly. Between her introspective musings and assistance of the locals, she has begun to occasionally practice the arts of Astromancy, though the loss of her mother has made it difficult for her to even look at Anselma's cards. She never ceases to keep her culinary skills or her physical form sharp, however, cooking for travelers that come from distant lands, and training herself at the shores of the great lake, shadowed by the derelict temple. Aside from this, she has never forgotten her experiences with the beast tribes, nor the years of her life that she was, for all intents and purposes, lost to her own society, the thoughts produced by the events never leaving her mind.
