Gwen doesn't remember her parents, or really much of anything before she was five.  Even her age is a guess by the man who found her and raised her.  He found her in a dirty alleyway late at night in Axetoll.  Dexter took the crying child to his home.  That he was an ardent follower of Noctem mattered little to the child; she loved him all the same.

She spends most of her time as a female, but to be honest, she is a fluid in her gender as she is in her appearance.  For her first few years with Dexter, she looked like a tiny female version of the human.  It was Dexter who gave her her name and encouraged her to be herself if at least in their home if not anywhere else he took her.  He would leave her with the priestess of their sect whenever he had a job to do and Gwen learned much at the old woman's hearth.

After her first mense, Dexter began to train her in earnest in his craft; that of an assassin in Noctem's name.  Even if she wasn't meant to be a true assassin, learning the roguish arts would stand her in good stead in surviving in their city.

As she grew up and grew older, she graduated from merely being Dexter's lookout, to his partner, then finally to doing jobs on her own.  But it was in the past few months that a feeling that something was missing grew until she pleaded with Dexter and the priestess.  "Let me take the Draught of Death."

The priestess demanded long hours of prayer and debate with Gwen before she relented.  The Draught was not to be taken lightly.  If Noctem did not approve of her, she would die.  But if she survived, Gwen would be a servant of Death.  Usually only those of the faith who became priests took the Draught.  But there were those rare souls who became Phantoms.

Gwen knelt before the altar praying; wearing nothing but a black death shroud that flowed loosely around her body.  She was alone in the temple save for Dexter; her beloved father figure. Again and again, the litany of her faith flowed between her white lips.

Soon enough the hour was upon her and the ancient priestess entered the room, chanting the prayer for the dead as she held the chalice before her.  Gwen lifted the shroud enough for her trembling fingers to accept the chalice.  She trembled not in fear of her life, but in fear that she wasn't worthy of Noctem's work.

Resolved non the less, she drank the Draught until there wasn't even a single drop left in the chalice.  She felt her body falling to the floor; the chalice clattering against the stone.  She heard Dexter call out her name as the blackness overtook her body.

When she awoke, there were tears in both Dexter's and the priestess' eyes, but they were smiling as well as they helped her to her feet and guided her out of the chamber to the celebration with the rest of their sect.

Of what she saw and hear on the other side, Gwen will not speak of it, except to say that Noctem is a loving and caring god.