Serena was raised by her mother a human (so far as Serena knows). Rhiannon Ikarys (the name she took when Serena was born) was a powerful
Metabeing , with the ability to suppress the powers of other metas and influence their minds through projective empathy. Serena was the product of an affair with a high ranking member of the Covenant.
Once Rhiannon became pregnant, Serena's father informed Rhiannon that Covenant policy demanded the termination of any half-blood pregnancy. They fought, and fearing what he might do, Rhiannon suppressed his vast magical power and, in a blast of psychic energy, scrambled his memories of their entire affair, leaving him in a coma, and escaped.
Rhiannon went into hiding, moving around often with Serena in order to make the two of them impossible to track in the event that Serena's father recovered. Eventually, they settled in
Terminal City when Serena was 10. Serena spent the happiest years of her childhood during this time; in spite of her mother's insistence that they make no close connections, it was the longest they'd ever stayed in one place, and the city's loose monitoring by Covenant forces made her feel relatively safe.
Unfortunately, when Serena was 13, her mother was struck by a mysterious illness, and after 9 months of wasting away, she died. On her deathbed, she revealed to Serena that her father had been a high ranking member of the covenant. Serena stormed off into the night, and as her mother's life force ebbed, manifested a flare of magical energy. Frightened, Serena returned to her mother's side, where her mother confessed that she had been suppressing Serena's gifts for fear of being discovered by the Covenant. Before Rhiannon died, she gave Serena the code to the house's safe (and in the safe deposit box whose key she found inside), Serena discovered that she was modestly wealthy.
After her mother's death, Serena immediately took her GRE and enrolled in online college, while studying as much magic as she could online. She also took to playing music on the street, which tended to manifest her magical energy and make listeners intensely interested in her music. During this time, she met
Aliena who attracted her attention by being immune to Serena's magical influence, as evidenced by pointing out that her guitar was out of tune. The two became friends, and despite each for their own reasons hesitating to admit to liking the other, have come to value each other's friendship.
It was also during this time that Serena attracted the attention of
Sleazeball , who booked Serena to play in his club, an all-ages bar, dance party, and performance venue whose back rooms famously host meetings of a large section of Terminal City's underground. Sleazeball became Serena's musical manager, and valued her ability to unconsciously keep everyone calm and compliant during her musical sets. During a private performance, one of Sleazeball's VIPs suggested that Serena could get much more personal than she was comfortable with. When Sleazeball and his patron wouldn't take no for an answer, Serena manifested by far the most powerful magical flare of her life, collapsing the interior walls of the (fortunately mostly empty) club.
Fearing that she had killed everyone in the club, Serena fled, and has told only Aeliana about the incident. Upon realizing that her friend had more than mild mind-influencing abilities, Aeliana insisted that the two of them attempt to fight crime together. It was during an early adventure together that the two of them met
Paladin , and in the ensuing battle with
Knightfall , Siren cracked Paladin's armor and threw Knightfall through a nearby warehouse filled with Covenant military equipment. The three repaired to Serena's house to hide and strategize.
Social