Nadja Applefield
Nadja Applefield is a sunny, charming girl, with a talent for dancing and making friends wherever she goes. Even though she is very young, she shoulders responsibility well, often taking care of the children younger than her at the orphanage. On the other hand she's also prone to ditz fests, impulsive, naïve and too trusting, which leads others to take easy advantage of her kindness and even abuse it, if the right buttons are pressed. Her biggest dream is to someday be reunited with her mother.
Nadja was left to be raised at the Applefield Orphanage as a baby, her only possession at the time being an elaborated heart-shaped brooch. Nadja grew up at the orphanage believing her parents were dead; however, in the days before her 13th birthday, Nadja received a surprising gift in the mail: a trunk containing a party dress and a diary, both keepsakes belonging to Nadja's true mother. The gown was worn by Nadja's mother at her first ball, and the diary was her mother's colorful description of all the people she met and danced with at that ball. Nadja is amazed by this gift, and stunned to discover that her mother might actually be alive out there somewhere. When bad men arrive to steal the brooch away from Nadja, she leaves the Applefield Orphanage and begins a career as a dancer with the travelling Dandelion Troupe.