It’s a good day to meet Annie Darkstone, both because day is Autism Awareness Day (but, please, also be aware of Autistic People the other 364 days of the year) and because we’ve kicked off The Treasure of Oake Island.
So, here’s your opportunity to get acquainted with Realmgard’s first autistic character and one of the major players in The Treasure of Oake Island.
Annie Darkstone
Just once in her life, she’d like people to actually listen to her attempts to educate them. It’s hard to be twice as smart but half as old as everyone else.
Age: 10
Occupation: child genius, honorary assistant professor
Likes: learning, books, her dad, rules
Dislikes: eye contact, heights, disregard for rules, most kinds of smells
Father: Professor Jonas Darkstone
Mother: Peri Darkstone
Cousins: The Sisters Darkstone
Half: Elf
All: Genius
Brain: Not like your brain
Regarded by most of her family as likely the smartest individual to bear the Darkstone name, Antiqua Melodia Darkstone — long for “Annie” — is the Half-Elf daughter of Professor of Archaeology Jonas Darkstone and dressmaker Peregrina.
Her keen intellect and her strange habits both quickly become apparent even after a short meeting with Annie.
Thanks to her father’s position as a faculty member, Annie has been visiting the University of Porthaven for as long as she can remember, and its library has been her favourite place in the world since she first started reading.
Annie has read more books in her ten years than some people own altogether, leading to the not entirely inaccurate claim that she spends more time at the library than at home. She has also displayed a remarkable ability to retain any information she has read.
Due to her young age, combined with her personality quirks — her aversion to eye contact, fondness for touching flat surfaces, and insistence that every must be just so (the fork goes on the left) — Annie often has difficulty being taken seriously, despite usually being right.
She’s learned to live with it.
And has learned to be magnanimous in victory when she is inevitably proven right.
When not following her various scholarly pursuits, Annie often spends her time assisting in the adventures of her cousins, Kat and Dunstana, avoiding eye contact all the while.
A quick reminder that I’ve writing a post in keeping with the spirit of Autism Awareness Day:
Also, you can start reading The Treasure of Oake Island, Annie Darkstone’s first Realmgard appearance here:
And you can read about the rest of the characters of Realmgard here:
And follow me here:
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