Aelmeh

AELMEH RUNESCRIBER

About My Character

   Human blood has given Aelmeh a few inches of height over her Silyandar ancestors. Not that she often has the chance to compare herself to them. Standing at 5'3", she hates crowds, being all too familiar with the back of human tunics and cloaks.
   She has a pleasant face, a broad forehead framed with solid brows, a strong straight nose, and a generous mouth. She might be beautiful if she cared about such things and took more pains with her honey-colored hair and rouged her cheeks and lips. The intense aquamarine color of her almond-shaped eyes and the points of her ears peeking through her long hair is a dead giveaway of her mixed ancestry.

   Pardef Runescriber, a bookbinder extraordinaire and mediocre wizard, raised Aelmeh in a tall, narrow townhouse overlooking the river running through the merchants' district of Alexandros. She never met her mother, and her existence was never discussed in the house. Until one cold winter evening, a visiting second cousin on her father's side, deep in his cups, revealed her birth story.
   It explained the fingers the other merchant-born children pointed at her leaf-shaped ears but not who her mother was. A scandal whispered about by the adults in the quarter and loftily ignored by her father.
   He had dallied with a Llranesi woman while away from the City on a buying trip (searching for rare pigments). Imagined he was in love, learned that love between a human and Sildanyar was far from easy, and left her with child. A fact that he didn't discover until a wailing bundle turned up on his doorstep some ten months later.
   Aelmeh was well-loved and taken care of, or as well taken care of as her distant father, awkward with children and occupied with his business and petty magic could be. So first, a wet nurse was hired, followed by a nanny who dealt with the messy business of raising a toddler and guarding her against stumbling into her father's workroom full of colorful inks and rare books. Then, when he could find the time, he taught her the rudiments of reading and magic. Finally, at the youngest age permitted, she was enrolled in a local temple school to further her magical studies. 
  Aelmeh thrived at the school, receiving attention unavailable at home. She developed a special connection to the Goddess Eluna, even considering following a religious calling. However, thinking she was better suited to becoming a wizard, teachers encouraged her to continue her magic studies as she had little difficulty adapting to various types of magic. Towards the end of her studies, she earned the notice of the Society of Progressive Arcanists, with whom she deepened her command of the magical arts.
  Now two years after repairing the roof and settling any of her father's unfinished business, she has temporarily closed the shop intending to leave the City to discover her mother.

Roleplay Hooks

• Interested in having a book bound, especially a spellbook or books on arcana or religious matters, needing special calligraphy or illumination?
• Interested in wizardly pursuits: needing spells cast? a war party buffed? a philosophical discussion on arcana?
• Interested in helping Aelmeh find her long-lost mother?