[History]
It was eighteen years ago that Laguna Loire, a Galbadian soldier involved in a war with Timber, ran off with two of his comrades to Deling City in mid-war. From there, he went to the Deling Hotel, his favourite place, to listen to a lady called Julia, play the piano. Intrigued by her faithful listener, Julia invited the smitten man up to her room and they talked (and she spawned the lyrics for 'Eyes On Me'). Then he got sent off to war, never to return and left behind a distraught Julia and a broken promise to come back. General Caraway, who at the time was an able, young, handsome general, happened to drop by the Deling Hotel and learn about the distraught pianist. Being good at heart, he decided to cheer her up, and when he encountered her beauty, fell in love and the courtship began. Soon after they got married.
Rinoa was born to Julia Heartilly and General Caraway in Deling City, on the 3rd of March. Her mother, Julia, was working as a pianist cum singer in the Deling Hotel at the time, and had married Caraway at the age of 23 out of gratitude as he took her out of her sorrowful pining of a lost love. Five years after Rinoa was born, her mother died in a car crash, leaving her to be brought up by her father. Something inside her made her blame her father for her mother's death, and so she kept a grudge against him ever since she was ten. From then on, she renounced her name as Rinoa Caraway and took her mother's surname instead (thus making her name Rinoa Heartilly).
Being born as the daughter of a high-ranking General of Galbadia, she learnt many skills and army ways as she grew up, and put them to good use when she headed the Forest Owl Resistance Faction of Timber, her mother's homeland, when she was sixteen (instead of becoming a good little daddy's girl). It was in Timber that she chanced upon Seifer Almasy and fell in love with him. It was he who told her where he lived and about Garden. The next year, she decided to seek out SeeD mercenaries from Garden to assist her in her plans. It was from that decision that she arrived at the very SeeD Inauguration Ball that celebrated Squall's initiation as a SeeD. And met him. *.*
After persuading and dancing with Squall, she spotted Seifer and left Squall alone. Seifer took her to see Cid, the headmaster, and she succeeded in hiring three SeeD recruits to assist her. It so happened that Squall and his two other comrades (Selphie & Zell), were the recruits. So along the way as they help her, many events occur and bring Squall and Rinoa closer together. ^.~