Vonna was abandoned as a baby at the front gate of the Halls of Justice in Waterdeep. Hykros Allumen, Hammer Lord, took her in and raised her like his own daughter. He was a tough but supportive father figure. When she was old enough, Hykros encouraged her to start studying to become a magister. His dream was for her to preside over a court in Waterdeep, and be the arbiter of justice. However, Vonna was a rough and tumble tomboy always sparring with the lads. Inspired by the war stories she had heard from Hykros and others, she was more interested in becoming a Hammer of Tyr, the elite Tyrran paladins utterly devoted to upholding justice.
She began training in secret with a kindly Tyrran monk named Hlam. Eventually Hykros found out about her training and banished Hlam from the Halls of Justice, and forbid Vonna from continuing this path. Hykros said that Tyr saw great potential in her, but that the male dominated ranks would never accept her as a Hammer of Tyr. He said that if she was fully loyal to him, that he would ensure that she was one day a powerful figure in Waterdeep. She was to be a member of his inner circle, helping to oversee the vital bureaucracy of the city. He said to always consult him first if she had concerns.
Frustrated, Vonna would continue to sneak out and practice her martial skills when she could. She also met with Hlam once a week at sunrise near The Rise and practiced meditation. Hlam said that meditation could heighten her senses for combat, and even help her sense things "unseen". She began to take on pick pocketers and common thugs to help bring them to justice.
One day about 6 years ago, some of Hykros' men went out looking for Vonna and caught her meditating with Hlam. They brought her back to his office and he was scolding her when he was called away briefly for something urgent. He told her to say put. She was furious, but decided to practice meditation to calm herself and called out to Tyr for guidance. To her astonishment, she began to sense something out of place. She opened her eyes and with her heightened senses could see there was a cavity set into the stone wall behind Hykros’ desk. Vonna investigated and found that it was hidden by some kind of illusion. She reached inside and felt the heavy iron door of a safe. However, the door was unlocked. Unable to contain her curiosity, she opened it and extracted a folio of papers.
The papers appeared to be filings and financial records, associated with the “New Neverwinter Corporation”. The corporation had been receiving funding from the Waterdeep tax collections for a period of five years. Per the arrangement, 40% of Dagult’s newly imposed “Rebuilding Tax” was to be transmitted to the Hall of Justice, care of the New Neverwinter Corporation. It all seemed very official however, and the board of this organization was overseen by Dagult Neverember and several nobles. It even listed Hykros as treasurer. Apparently the whole arrangement had been approved by the Council of Masked Lords with the philanthropic goal of bringing stability to the ruined city to the north, and the region at large. The project was to rebuild the core government infrastructure in Neverwinter, reestablish the High Road, and bolster the armed forces.
The members of the board had provided seed funding totalling over $2 million. Vonna saw large sums contributed by the Casselanters, the Margasters, the Halls of Justice, and even from Dagult’s personal fortune. Some were in the form of loans, to be paid back by the tax collections over time, with interest of course. The corporate account was to be held at the Halls of Justice.
This all seemed within the realm of an ordinary oligarchy, until Vonna saw another odd record: the deed transfer of a property called Thornhold. It showed that it had been purchased by the Stoneshaft Clan from Dagult Neverember for $1 million gold.
Before she could read further she heard footsteps coming down the hall and stashed the files back where she found them. She endured some further scolding from Hykros, but this was nothing new. She didn’t bring up what she had found with him, still processing what she had seen.
Vonna asked around the Hall of Justice discretely and found that nobody seemed to know the full details of the New Neverwinter Corporation. They knew even less about Thornhold, other than it had been an old Tyrran base over a hundred years ago. Many told her to stop meddling and drop it. But one thing was for sure, the purchase price of Thornhold seemed very high, and it was odd that such a record would be in possession of Hykros. She ended up consulting with Hlam, who encouraged her to officially report it to the other leaders at the Hall of Justice.
Much to her dismay, the other Hall of Justice leaders sided with Hykros. He called Vonna and his leaders into his office. He gaslighted her, saying she didn’t understand what she was talking about. He even subjected himself to a Zone of Truth spell from one of the other leaders to clear his name. He confirmed his role as Treasurer with the New Neverwinter Corporation, and that the funds were managed at the Halls of Justice. He was vehement that all of the activities of the corporation were legal. However, he also very clearly stated he knew nothing about the Thornhold transaction. This was apparently not a lie? Had Vonna imagined things? When Vonna brought up the hidden safe, Hykros invited others to check, and there was no cavity in the wall after all… He told Vonna to drop it, and that it was clearly a misunderstanding.
This infuriated her, and she immediately went to the Waterdeep Whispers newspaper. They reluctantly took the lead after some prodding. They were able to find that the title to Thornhold had been bought only recently by Dagult from the Margaster family for $40k, and then he had indeed sold it to the Stoneshaft Clan for $1 million. The new Dwarven owners were unable to be contacted. The magister that had overseen the deed transfer had apparently died of old age soon after the sale. The resulting news story called into question the valuation of the property and alleged impropriety in the transaction.
Unbeknownst to Vonna, her leak was the last nail in the coffin for Dagult’s reign as Open Lord of Waterdeep. Despite his strong leadership, and many improvements to Waterdeep, the nobles’ patience for him had worn thin. In the end, they could not stomach his ceaseless self-promotion, his diverting of attention and resources to Neverwinter, and his thinly concealed self-enrichment schemes. Within a few months, the Masked Lords voted to remove him from his office, and he was effectively exiled from Waterdeep.
As for Vonna, Hykros publicly disowned her, and bid her never to step foot in the Halls of Justice again. She was ostracized by the other members, and ventured out on her own, taking up work as a sellsword and bounty hunter. She rented a small room in the dock ward and enjoyed a simple life. She was eventually recruited by the Red Sashes, and worked to root out corrupt guards and take down other criminals the law didn’t seem to want to touch.
One night she chased a Kenku cutpurse down into the sewers. She followed it through the dank tunnels, but was eventually ambushed by others, and taken captive. She was transported to a large cavern and held with several others, apparently in preparation to be sold into slavery.