Childhood
"I think my mother always knew I’d end up a scallywag."
Avariah “Avery” Raval was born to Arya Raval in the city of Cinduras in the desert country of Audun. A single mother from the day he was born, the two of them struggled to survive. Arya worked as much as she could; Avery took to pickpocketing as a young child in an attempt to lighten her load. Despite how often she was gone for work, Arya was a loving mother who wanted nothing more than a good, stable life for her son - so when he was caught stealing from a merchant docked in Oasis Harbor, she was not pleased.
The merchant, a man named Nakoa from the Shimmering Isles, took pity on the teenage boy, offering him a temporary job on his ship in exchange for not calling the guard to cart him off. This would be Avery’s first real job, one he was more than excited to take as he’d never left the desert before. Arya was hesitant to let her son go, but ultimately agreed in the hopes it would keep him on the straight and narrow.
What was to be a temporary job wound up becoming permanent; Avery thrived at sea, as if he was always meant to be there. He visited his mother whenever they were docked in Audun, of course, but a majority of their corresponded was through letters. Half of whatever Avery made was set aside for his mother, whether she needed it or not.
Adulthood
"People never acknowledge the good we do; they only see the blood on our blades and the gold in our pockets."
Over the years sailing with Nakoa and his crew, Avery developed a sort of father/son relationship with the captain. He was taught the ropes, both literally and metaphorically, of seafaring, and eventually, rumors began to spread that Nakoa was thinking of promoting Avery to his first mate.
Nakoa’s first mate, Rhodes, did not take kindly to the rumors. He’d been growing irritated under Nakoa’s rule for months, and this was the final staw. Rhodes gathered what crew members he could and staged a mutiny against Nakoa and the rest of the crew. A good number of them, including Nakoa, were killed in the ensuing struggle; Avery and a few others managed to escape on a small lifeboat.
With the rogue skills he’d had since childhood and the leadership skills imparted to him by Captain Nakoa, Avery and the survivors formed a new crew. They were small in number, much too small to properly take on Rhodes’ crew when they were able to hunt him down. So Avery did the only thing he could do: he reclaimed Nakoa’s merchant ship as Rhodes and his crew were reveling in Fairvale.
The ship was rebranded the Sunstroke, but that wasn’t the only thing to change; the merchant flag was replaced with a dark red flag emblazoned with a golden sun and a pair of crossbones, marking it as a pirate ship. While not exactly what his mother or Nakoa had in mind for him all those years ago, he annoints himself a guardian of those traveling by sea, of those needing an escape or a new home. And if they want to rob a merchant ship or spend a night drunk in a tavern reveling, that’s their business!
