Ivonne Albrecht

From Tehwiki

Revision as of 05:16, 15 January 2010

Appearance

In body, Ivonne isn’t what you’d expect from a mage, and most certainly not from a female. She has the brazen look of a warrior, a scar on her left cheek adding to this. her sandy brown hair falling to her shoulders but generally being tied back. Couple with a slender physique with a fair amount of muscle and a nearly flat chest, she could pass herself as a male if she had the desire. Her hair is normally tidy, the bangs parted so that they do not get into her eyes while she is casting. She allows a few strands to fall to her forehead, long as they are not a distraction. Her eyes are a vibrant seagreen, and reveal a demeanor of intelligence and toughness.

Ivonne prefers the typical clothing of a spellcaster on average days, even around the house. She wears a light gray tunic with a red cloth attached over it, and a green cloth belt tied around this. While the red piece extends downwards, stopping at her thighs, the tunic stops right above her pelvic area, and she wears a pair of dark gray trousers, which generally gather around tall, lace-up black boots. Over the ensemble, she sometimes wears a black drape, which has a hood that she can pull over her head if need be. Generally when travelling, she carries two packs, one full of supplies hanging from her hip, and the other is a backpack of easily-accessed tomes. When it’s cold, a simple hoodless black cloak will suffice. She will wear simple leather armour if necessary.

Personality

Ivonne has an insatiable desire to learn new things. To her, knowledge is power, and power is everything. She doesn’t like to sugarcoat anything, however, preferring to be to the point and blunt in how she speaks, and she can be rather forceful if need be. While she is a very talented magician, Ivonne lacks social prowess. People are, and always will be, odd to her. While she loves meeting new people, there is a part of her that fears it. She prefers to keep that part to herself. She loves her husband and her children, but sometimes considers them a burden, though Paul is and always will be her favourite and sometimes she can’t help but spoil him. Raising a family, carrying a child, and spending every moment her husband has free though is constricting to her, and she yearns for more freedom.

She has never been one to care for all the laguz hatred going around, and all of this incessant praise of Tomislav. While she is grateful for the king pulling them out of the dreaded Dietbrande era, she can see that, between him and the rebels, Daein is being ripped apart. Ivonne has had an urge to join the Resistance at times, but isn’t sure whether she is ready to commit herself to that, and certainly doesn’t wish to endanger her family. In addition, she just isn’t sure who she supports. Being a scholar and having read all kinds of books about all kinds of things, Ivonne does not discriminate by race, viewing all races with indifference. You are who you make of yourself, to her. Of course, none of these sentiments are shared with her husband, a loyalist who would go ballistic if he knew what his wife were thinking.

Ivonne can be perceived as quiet most of the time, though when she does speak her opinion on things, she’s speaking her mind with great enthusiasm. While she may seem aloof, she’s extremely sensitive to others and their tone of voice. Ivonne never likes being talked angrily to, but in socialising throughout her life, she has learned to deal with it. There is one thing she despises, however, and those are stinging insects. She’d much rather they burn and sometimes, when they get near her, she makes true this statement with a little fire spell. She loves all schools of anima, and is always yearning to improve her abilities.

Ivonne is organised in most everything she does. She is rarely spontaneous, and prefers a set schedule to an uncertain future. She only plans for the here and now, though, tending not to think about the future because she dislikes how uncertain it is.

History

Part I: Birth & Childhood

Ivonne remembers very little of her mother, the daughter of the mayor of Regenstadt, Daein who married a young noble named Carger Grinzheimer. Her name was Jolene, and the fact that she has no memories to draw upon, no mother’s soft touch, will forever haunt her. It may have been Jolene’s spirit that bonded with her daughter, because Jolene was a very accomplished thunder mage – and the brand she had was shaped much like a lightning bolt. But that is merely speculation which didn’t come until much later in Ivonne’s life. Her father treasured her despite the mark, and growing up, she never understood why she couldn’t show it. Then one day, she showed it to a friend. Her father was livid – and afraid – and the two of them moved to Nox. He was well-off, and there was a mansion nobody wanted since its previous owner had died. Father and daughter moved in, enjoying the chance at a discount of sorts, for its sellers really just wanted it sold. Adjusting to a much larger house was interesting for her, to say the least; there were so many places she could explore!

They lived across the street from the Albrechts’, a happy couple that was even more well off than they were, and that was to say quite a bit, since they were all suffering under the Dietbrande, their horrid taxes, and the disgusting subhumans they allowed into the country. Anyway, they had a boy around her age; his name was Gerhard. He didn’t make any attempts to approach Ivonne, though his sisters did. And perhaps it was thanks to them that she learned she had magical talent. They were mages-in-training, and Rosalind especially loved to brag about her magical talent. As for Ivonne, all she had was a stupid mark on her chest that she had to keep hidden. One day, Rosalind pushed too far. The next thing she knew, a bolt fell down from the sky, and Rosalind jumped out of the way as it rammed into the ground, causing a small crater. Her eyes widening at the power, she ran away scared, as Ivonne stared at the crater. “I...I did that...?” she asked herself, yet she knew it was true.

She expected she would be grounded, but she was not. Instead, her father spoke with Degra, and both girls were to apologise. Degra agreed to personally tutor the girl in the ways of magic, now that she had shown she had potential. He gave her a basic education in anima and its schools, namely the thunder she had an affinity for, but to become a truly accomplished mage, she would have to attend a magical academy. But that would have to wait until she was older, and in the meantime, she learned a few low-level spells from him, a taste of what was to come. Around that time, Gerhard was being taught to use an axe; sometimes, he liked to show her the things he’d learned. He didn’t want to hear about magic, and she respected that, understanding because of his sisters.

Part II: Education

In addition, she and Gerhard were now schooling together, and were becoming close friends. When they had free time, the duo would act out scenes from books in the forest, which included great battles and events in history, namely that of Daein, partially because Gerhard’s family cared little about foreigners, due to the fact that what foreigners they met, were mostly the damned subhumans. Ivonne played the mage whenever she could; she was so excited about becoming one. They loved the forest, and what he found odd was that during thunderstorms she’d wander around in there, and stare up at the sky, waiting to see the flash of lightning and hear the resounding sounds of thunder.

It wasn’t long before she was sent off to a private school where they taught magic. Two years before Gerhard began his training in the military, she attended the Gristoff Academy of Magic. It was a very exclusive, and very expensive school, and she had to apply herself a great deal. The building they were taught in was old; it had survived many a harsh Daein winter and was situated near what they believed was a Ley Line. It was here that she truly felt welcome, and eventually, was able to reveal her Spirit Mark to them. They of course knew what a Spirit Charmer was, and she was finally educated on the subject. It was then that she began to believe it had something to do with her mother. It was then that she truly began to look at it more as a blessing than a curse, something of Jolene that Ivonne could truly treasure. But she knew that the gift was also a curse, and unless she wanted to be discriminated against outside of the mages’ school, she would keep it a secret.

Ivonne’s passion for learning manifested itself while she was at the Academy. A world of learning and discovery awaited her, and she wanted to master her craft. Maybe it was the connection to her mother that fueled her passion. Maybe it was the fact that she loved magic, and wanted to become the strongest mage there was. Or maybe it was a mixture of all of these. Regardless, she devoted her time to her studies – of both magic and other subjects they had young prospective mages learning – and it opened her up to a whole new outlook on things. Regardless, however, of the things she learned, she kept her faith in the Goddess. She learned not to judge things, however, before she knew everything she could know about them, and that was how she viewed most everything. This included laguz, which she had prior known as subhumans. It was something she kept to herself. The other pupils already envied – or scorned, depending on their individual thoughts on Spirit Charmers – her for her marking; she didn’t want a further for them to want to antagonise her.