Shurae is a Seldarine drow. You can pull a drow out of the Underdark, but you can't always pull the Underdark out of a drow - not at first, at least.
According to my headcanons, she's been on the surface for a long time. Having escaped her family with a paladin slave and her newborn niece, she conveniently dumped the child on her new friend and went off to study bardic arts. She was expelled from her bard school after attempting to poison her lover (Faustine), whom she fell in love with in the process (which didn't stop her). After this incident, she became a fire dancer and no longer tries to kill her stage rivals (except perhaps by slipping them a laxative to ruin their grand performance day).
Her sins, however, catch up with her – her paladin friend is killed, and her niece is recruited by the cult of Bhaal. But that's a whole other story.
Shuri is energetic, vain, sometimes rude, dramatic, but she is on the path to redemption and is not averse to helping those in need.
