She was born under the waves of the Ruby Sea, a servant to the palace of the Ruby Princess, by the name of Kanako.
Surrounded by secrets and whispers, she quickly realised two things: First, that listening is one of the most valuable skills one can learn. Second, that if you're wearing a servant's garb and carrying a stack of laundry, nobody will pay you any mind.
She learned a great many things idling by thin partitions and half-shut doors, but there was something in particular that she was listening for. She had been told that her parents had been attacked by a beast and perished shortly after she was born, but no matter how much she asked, nobody would tell her more than that.
At first, she was "too young for such gruesome tales", then as she grew older, they started struggling to remember. They'd occasionally slip up tidbits, but they didn't quite fit together. It smelled fishier than the seafood the Kojin would bring.
By the time she found the truth, it was as she suspected. Her father was one of the very people she had been raised to serve. One night, he'd drank more than usual, and decided to have his way with a servant girl.
She left Sui-no-Sato that same night. A few liberated coins out of a rich man's pocket bought her passage across the Ruby Sea, to the port of Kugane. She talked her way in as a deck hand on a merchant's ship, her red eye hidden under her sideswept bangs, her only real thought to get herself far away from the Ruby Sea as she could, before anybody thought to come looking for her.
That the ship would be bound for Limsa, was a stroke of luck. A city of cutthroats and travellers, where nobody looks out of place and few questions are asked, was the perfect place to begin anew.
Not much later, she found herself staring at a registration form at the Adventurer's Guild, which asked her for her name.
A first name, she'd picked for herself already. A lady with hair as red as her own had caught her eye when she first got off the ship, and the woman at her side had called her Emi. But a last name - she'd never had one before; where she was from, they were reserved for those with power or status.
A sign in the corner of her eye provided her with a way out. "Hawkers' Alley", it read. She wasn't sure what that meant, but if somebody had named a road that, she figured, it had to be something good.
She put her quill to the page, and tried to hide a smile, as the messy ink marked the birth of her new self.
Emi Hawke, from Limsa Lominsa.