Minerva was born in the Free City of Greyhawk to parents who were merchants. Her upbringing was unremarkable. She demonstrated a talent with magic at a relatively young age, and her parents apprenticed her to a wizard of middling power. Minerva was not a talented apprentice wizard. While magic came naturally to her, the precise, orderly nature of wizardry did not. However, Hecate's apprenticeship was not a total failure, for it introduced her to a wider world. As a child of Greyhawk, she had considered herself cosmopolitan. As a wizard's apprentice, she realized there was much she did not know.
First came her initiation into the worship of Wee Jas, Goddess of Death and Magic. Wee Jas proved to be a keeper of secrets, and the place where Minerva proved herself best as a wizard's apprentice was in studying esoteric lore. She learned of Tharizdun's existence, and the existence of other entities, even stranger and more inimical to life than the Black Sun. There were things lurking in the Far Realms which mortal beings were not supposed to know. Minerva saw such ignorance as a chain, even as she recognized that these elder beings held no love for her. She resolved to break the chains which bound her, even if she would not follow their breaking into madness.
In her apprenticeship she learned of someone who might serve as an example for her, even if Natasha the Black's example was itself a cautionary tale. Minerva did not desire to follow Tasha into the Abyss or to become a consort of a Demon Lord, but she admired the wizardess' example of a life free from the bonds of convention. And Tasha pointed Minerva toward Baba Yaga and older, less orderly forms of magic.
So it was that Minerva left Greyhawk behind for a time and began to search for knowledge. She journeyed fey realms and forgotten ruins, at last coming to Baba Yaga's hut. There she began a new apprenticeship, learning witchcraft from the Mother of Witches, who had trained Natasha the Black first. She made a covenant with a being of power, gaining power over runes and auguries and receiving a familiar, who kept the shape of an owl.
For the last fifteen years, Minerva has wandered the Flanaess, learning many forgotten secrets. She still follows Wee Jas, but she makes sacrifices to Baba Yaga as well. She resents all who tell her that knowledge is lost or forbidden, and is determined to make her own destiny. She has used her magical arts to keep the appearance of age at bay, but she is now closer to forty than thirty. She is a woman with power, and she is hungry for more. Still, she does not delight in power to lord it over others, but because she delights in reshaping the world around her into a more enlightened place.
Minerva is tall for a woman, standing over six feet. Her brown hair is worn long and unbound. She tends to dress in shades of red, and her clothing is often covered by a voluminous red cloak. She is naturally attractive, and has used magic to further enhance her appearance. She knows that men still rule the world, and a woman's beauty is thus itself a form of power.
Minerva is reserved. She sees herself as above the squabbles of common people, and she cares nothing for politics. As a younger woman, she might have desired a seat on Greyhawk's Council of Eight. Now she seeks to make her own way. While she is indifferent to the methods required to gain knowledge, she does not delight in inflicting pain or cheating others. She sees the world around her as a puzzle to be solved. Others can find her cold or indifferent, but she doesn't particularly care what other people think about her.