| Background: | Minah was born on an uneventful month of an unremarkable year in a small farming village in Andor. Her early years consisted of helping her Pa with the animals and helping her Ma mend clothing and clean the house. She had a smattering of friends within the larger village area that she spent a great deal of time in the woods and hills with. She was particularly close to one of those friends, a young boy named Armin.
As she grew older, now into her early teens her life started to diverge from the quaint path it had been on. The village Wisdom had taken a liking to the young girl. It wasn't long at all before she officially became the Wisdom's Apprentice. Not even Minah herself was sure why the Wisdom had chosen her as an apprentice and she was only given vague answers in reply to that question. Over the years she stopped questioning it and her skills began to grow.
She took readily to life as a Wisdom and seemed to be particularly talented at it. She was bright, her mind agile and quick to remember facts. She learned the names and appearance of tons of different herbs and also what they were used for. She even learned more esoteric arts. She learned to listen to the wind, to foretell the seasons and the weather.
When she was nearing completion of her training as an apprentice her childhood friend Armin had come down with a severe illness that was sure to kill him. Atleast according to the Wisdom. She spent the night wailing over the boy, wailing for what could never be. She fell asleep lying next to the boy and in the morning his fever had broken. He made an almost miraculous recovery. Everyone attributed it to the strength of his will, and Minah fell terribly sick not a week later.
More and more strange events kept happening around Minah. Her father was terribly injured in a hunting trip. A boar's tusk had ripped the man nearly apart. The Wisdom thought for certain that the man would die, but somehow he stabilized within just a few days. Minah was again terribly sick, this time just days after her fathers recovery.
Things seemed to go along rather normally for a few more years. Minah was now about sixteen and she had really blossomed in the Wisdom's art. The Wisdom was now an aged woman and Minah was close to taking over for her. Minah was ready to do so, having completed her training. She was said to be the most accurate Wisdom in the region when it came to fortelling the weather.
And so it was that on the day she was to graduate and become the Wisdom a terrible illness besieged the town. There was no herb for this illness, no cure. Somehow only Minah escaped this terrible plague. She fled the town, vowing that she would return with a cure.
She travelled for days, slept in the dirt, slept in hedgerows making first for the city of Caemlyn. She was thoroughly rebuked there, finding nothing that could help her village so she moved on. She travelled all the way to Cairhien hoping that the nobles there would be able to help. Would have some level of knowledge that could help her village.
Cairhien was of little help as well so she went to the last place she ever thought she would go for help. She went to the White Embassy in Cairhien and plead her case. |
