See now, flowers do not grow from only the warmth of the sun. They require storms that will drown them out to let only the strongest grow.

Her history is not one of tragedy. It is not a tale that inspires bards to write tunes and share her tales of youth in hopes of riches and glory. In fact, many would view outwardly view her start to life as mundane and tasteless. She was born middle class, into a family who teetered between this and a lower standing far too often for her liking. She was raised with an amount of uncertainty that made her cautious of the world but not sour to it.

The oldest of four siblings, Brassa soon learned that her mother's bipolar disorder would leave her as the sole maternal figure for her younger siblings. While she struggled to navigate the harsh mood swings, she also had to learn how to grow up quick enough to shield her siblings from the chaos within their family. Scathing lectures and volatile slights would turn into declarations of love before mutating back into vile spittle. She was the one who sacrificed her dreams, aspirations, and opportunities to ensure her siblings had a place to live and that her family stayed within a respectable class. She worked tirelessly from the time she could start selling her labor to ensure a sense of stability for them while leaving herself open to the precariousness of life.

Her father drank to deal with his disappointment of failing to step into a paternal role and protect his children from their manic mother. While he was not a mean drunk, he did become an absent father, only useful for the check he would bring home to try to buy back the respect of his kids. She remained stuck in this vicious cycle until her youngest sibling had grown enough to marry away into a stable family and she left behind her hysterical mother and practically comatose father.

She had resolved to never have children out of fear that she would develop the mental handicaps of either of her parents and leave her children as they had left her. She grew terrified to form any sort of true romantic attachment as the only relationship she had grown up with was a toxic and dysfunctional one. She spent a couple of years just traveling different lands to collect friends, lovers, and tales in a desperate attempt to reclaim her lost youth.

One such journey had brought her to a foreign land that reeked of promise and had no knowledge of her upbringing. Brassa steeled herself to try to settle here in order to build a reputation and finally achieve her ambitions of grandeur and stability. She urged herself to stay in order to influence these lands and perhaps bring a little peace to her tumultuous misgivings.