Name: Calliope Cross
Age: 17
Personality: Mostly Calliope comes across as an odd duck, given her dry humor and tendency to be a wee bit fidgety in new settings. However, once she has been around someone long enough, she proves to be a capable and honest individual, who is quick with encouragement and keeps a level head in times of conflict. Calliope's time living in the cathouse has erased any concept of personal space, and she sometimes makes people feel uneasy by standing too close.
Backstory: Calliope was born one bright, sunny day in summer and was then promptly discarded into the nearest alley way. Fortunately for her, this said alley was adjacent to an Edessa brothel and it did not take long for the headmistress to hear the tiny babe's caterwauling and for her to have mercy on the little one.
This is how young Calliope found herself spending her formative years calling a whore house in a southern Edessa border town home. She thought of most of the prostitutes as aunts and they treated her kindly, teaching her to read and write between clients. The headmistress also took a shine to Calliope and tutored her in maths as well as showing her how to barter and get the best deals from the local merchants. In return the young girl did chores around the place, washing bed linens, mending garments, and cooking for the girls during their breaks. As long as she lived here, she was never asked to take on clients and she never offered. While Calliope harbors no ill will towards those who embrace that line of work, it is not a life she would choose for herself.
On the morning of her sixteenth birthday, Calliope went to the local market to pick up the supplies for the week. As she made her way back to the brothel, a few people passed her briskly on the road.
"Are you alright?" she called after them.
They did not reply.
When her home came into view she saw that it was being ransacked by orcs and that the headmistress was lying in the dirt at the front of the house with her stomach split from navel to sternum. Calliope had little choice but to turn and flee the scene.
As she retreated toward the capital, Calliope met up with two Weldsmen who were also fleeing north. They agreed to let her travel with them if she did the cooking and mending. Over the next eleven months they taught her how to shoot a bow and skin animals. Their journey came to an end when a lone Orc attacked them in the night, killing her two companions, but not before one of them torn open the beast's throat with a dagger. As the Orc lay gurgling up blood, Calliope stabbed the creature through the chest repeatedly with an arrow until it stopped moving.
Calliope finally makes it to the heart of Edessa a few days after turning seventeen, just in time to board the last caravans heading north.
Skills and Abilities: Adept Housekeeper - After spending the vast majority of her life doing chores at the brothel, Calliope performs most cooking, cleaning, and mending with practiced ease.
Adept Barterer - Calliope isn't exceedingly charming, nor was she blessed with a silver tongue, but she has a good knowledge of common item worth and refuses to be swindled.
Journeyman Survival Skills - While living on the road for a year, Calliope has learned the basics of survival skills, such as fire starting, shelter finding/building, how to construct a basic snare, etc.
Journeyman Archer - She's only been shooting for a year, but she has great aim when she remembers to keep her breath steady.
Novice Animal Butchery - Calliope has only ever skinned rabbits and squirrels in her travels and would need guidance with bigger creatures.
Equipment: Recurve Bow, Wooden, Worn - this bow belonged to one of Calliope's traveling companions. It looks hand carved and appears to have been used frequently.
Quiver, Leather, Worn - Lifted from the same companion. It only has five arrows left in it.
Flaying Knife, Good Condition - Kept in rucksack and used for cleaning animals.