Time to get a story up for Areia! This was written before we stopped being a Warhammer LARP, and I couldn't be assed editing it to the new lore, so take this relic!
On Areia's birthday last year, so much was happening, and everything fell apart just weeks before her day. What is a party gal to do, when there's no one to celebrate with?
__________________________________
The college had remained open late that evening. A few mages bustled about, still keeping the building open for the night owls of Sudenburg. Areia had planned to stay late, writing more treatises for the ghyran mages of the Border Princes.
Areia felt the time pass slower. The seconds ticked closer to the first of May without any note of the thirtieth.
Her two-hundredth birthday.
The two people she had been so excited to celebrate with were... away.
One of her closest friends had been kidnapped by cultists. Her ride-or-die had left without telling her until she was already long-gone.
And the new friends she had made, it hadn't come up in conversation much since she'd arrived.
Areia felt helpless. Unable to do anything to assist in the crisis.
Her knife? She had faked knowing how to use it, threatening a stormcallee and shoving a weapon in her friend's face in the process. And her secondary wand had broken when she'd taken part in a battle earlier that year.
Perhaps being chosen for the White Tower instead of military service had done her a disservice.
Without her books, Areia felt weak. Unable to call upon power she should know. Her lack of power becoming too much to think about.
"What happened to that confident woman within the Tower? What happened to the one who graced her Ghyran classes with competition for top of the class?"
Awful intrusive thoughts plagued Areia, running amok, obstructing her ability to write.
She needed to focus. She shouldn't wallow in her thoughts.
But Areia couldn't exactly plan a party to ignore those thoughts anymore.
"This is selfish!" Areia thought to herself, trying to shoo the thoughts away.
The book in front of her, plants found in Sudenburg and surrounds, the penmanship familiar, became more and more boring, as Areia felt herself get more and more tired.
Giving up on her studies for the night, the ghyran mage's thoughts drifted to her friends again.
Her best friend had told her not to follow, and Areia wasn't about to go against her friend's wishes, especially as she couldn't exactly help the situation.
And her lightning mage friend. Alone- Cultists weren't people. Not anymore.
Areia shivered, as the last few wizards filed out for the night. But none of them paid her any mind.
There was no trumpet to regale the next hour, but it had to be past midnight by now.
Quietly, Areia whispered her herself, although it was a day late now;
"Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Areia, happy birthday to me..."
Was it selfish to want to celebrate, even when things seemed so bleak?
Swallowing the lump that formed in her throat, Areia told herself to toughen up.
"No use crying over something you can't control... just be better." Areia tried to recall a teacher's voice in her mind.
Her teachers. One having been lost to the same cultist thst kidnapped her friend. Areia regretted not paying more attention in their classes more than ever now.
She had been meaning to ask more about the leylines across the Border Princes, ever since that town meeting the year prior. Now that research would have to be done alone. Or perhaps her friends had some notes-
Down the dark corridor, footsteps, boots, came down, snapping the younger elf out of her saddened train of thought.
Areia stood up straight, before turning to face the other night owl.
Kitri's amber eyes almost seemed to cast a slight glow on their nosebridge.
"Oh, my apologies. I didn't realise anyone else was still in the College."
