Tessara Arhuine
Elven Witch
Description: Tessara is average in height for an elf, with the lithe, slender build common to the race. Her face that is legendary with it’s beauty – a beauty marred only by the tiniest of scars across her cheek, faint but there. Pale blue eyes and full lips further define her facial features. Her style of dress is one that allots for freedom of movement, while showing off her assets at the same time – waist length white hair completes the look, enhancing her ethereal quality.
Bio: Tessara Lyari Arhuine is the youngest in a family unit of five, born to the Duke Lanliss and Duchess Merlara at an Ustalavian healers guild rather than at home, due to the midwives’ concern over the pregnant Merlara, as she had been ill. As she grew, she also grew in beauty, and it was often said that she must have been blessed at birth, for there in her very features was the epitome of elven beauty.
Childhood was relatively normal for Tessara. Her elder brothers were too old to play with much, and it was a constant in her household to hear her eldest brother praised to the heavens for being so gifted with magic, and her other brother being shunned for not being as gifted. She never did like that Amarandlon was praised while Lanliss never received attention for being magical….it didn’t seem right, somehow. She dwelt on it less when her own aptitude for magic became apparent.
It was around this time that she was blessed once more – this time, it was whispered, that her love affairs (when she grew older, of course) would never end with the death of her lover. This second blessing brought prestige to the family (or so her father had led her to believe). In her later childhood years, she met an adventurer by the name of Taliesin. He was human, a bard by trade and was taken by the young girl’s beauty. He vowed to protect her innocence, citing that nothing as young, pretty or intelligent should come to harm. He’d never planned to settle, but he did – becoming a most loyal friend and protector to her, until he died, not more than a year or so before she began adventuring herself once adulthood arrived.
In adolescence, she continued to blossom, somehow managing to avoid Amarandlon’s prankishness (despite arguing or fighting with him often, usually citing his lack of intelligence as the makings of a poor magic user). It was during this time that she grew closer to her other brother, Lanliss, as much as he would allow at least. She studied with Kish, an old hermit who was impressed enough with her intelligence to teach her some other languages. She also fell in love. His name was Isuldur; an elven bard of varied and considerable talent, he was one to stand out in a crowd due to how he dressed – always colorful, always different.
Until Isuldur, Tessa had never paid much attention to boys, always taking their flirtations and flatteries as desperation. Isuldur made her feel different – he somehow made everything special. She even gave up her virginity to him, unbeknownst to her family (as far as she knew, at least). They were together a few months before her heart was broken. Isuldur was not all he seemed; he was an assassin, and had used her as part of his cover story, to get close to his target. Tessa was heartbroken for a long time, and when she came around finally, she had a jaded look on love, and a casual outlook on sex. After all, sex wasn’t love, and why couldn’t she have the fun, feel-good part of a relationship without the actual relationship?
In her adult years, she attended university with her brothers, doing well in her studies despite the constant aggravating stupidity of her eldest brother (her parents continued to disbelieve that Amarandlon was anything but a prodigal), and the growing meanness in her other brother. She felt caught in a web, somehow, trying to be the threads that held her family together. Her studies began to suffer from stress, though she tried to never let on to anyone. She didn’t know it, but someone had been watching her, and had only recently worked up the courage to talk to her.
His name was Isar, a dark haired half-elf older than she by a few short years. He was a ranger, and patrolled the forests with his companion, a wolf who was quite well behaved. Gradually, she fell in love with him, and spent the next few years of her tenure as a university student with him. They had even briefly discussed marriage, and he promised to come out to her family home after she had graduated, to meet her parents.
That meeting did not go well. Her parents threw an absolute fit because he was not elven, nor did he use magic. The situation became so difficult that Isar simply left, although he promised to return for her, though he never did – she still doesn’t know what happened to him. She waited months for him, before finally giving up, shedding bittersweet tears. That’s when she decided to go adventuring with her brothers.
Upon making that announcement, her father sent along a servant – a grim fellow by the name of Ortiz. He disliked frivolity, and was sent along to ensure Tessa’s virtue remained in tact. Luckily, she and her brother’s managed to ditch him early on. Now she fights with them, defends them, heals them…that is her role, and she’s happy to have it….even if it means putting up with Amarandlon. Still, she often wishes it were just her and Lanliss.