((Due to IRL circumstances, Izurich is dropping from the RP. Since it's still early on, I'll be retconning scenes involving Liese and the enchanted door of Dot's room, and slotting in a new character to replace them.))

[hr][center][img]https://i.postimg.cc/J05PXNPx/316501d78428889e71f59744c964d769.png[/img][hr][h2][color=#486AD0]Timeskip: The First Morning[/color][/h2][/center][hr]

The rest of the evening had passed largely uneventfully. Despite tensions between certain members of the group, most had been too occupied settling into their new quarters and feeding themselves to pick any more fights with one another, and even after returning to the dorm room, at least one of the contentious persons in question -- a small blonde who definitely wasn't just trying to avoid having to talk to her roommate at all -- had turned in early, so not much had happened.

Their squad's final member had arrived late in the evening -- a last minute addition to the roster, though whether this Elon fellow had been hand-picked based on his family's connections or his own talents with magic, who could say? Regardless, as fellow foreigners, it seemed he had been placed alongside Dot for the time being.

At any rate, most of their fellow trainees had seemed of like mind to the Baker boy -- turning in early in preparation for the start of their training on the morrow. A few stayed out a while later, mingling in the common room of the barracks, but for the most part, the night was quiet, save the distant rumbling of the falls.

...Then came the morning.

[hr]

Julian awoke in darkness, and for a moment, her heart sank. She'd been having a dream of some kind, and given the ache in her chest and her racing heart, it probably hadn't been anything good, though the details escaped her. That wasn't all, either -- not being able to see anything, hardly able to move without scraping against the wall of her cubby-like bed... it took her a moment to remember where she was before her momentary panic subsided, and she thanked her Stars that she hadn't screamed. This was seriously going to take some getting used to, and the last thing she wanted was her roommate knowing how afraid she was of this dark, cramped space.

Even so, she couldn't exactly get out of bed just yet. Moving quietly, she tried her best not to make any sound, so as not to arouse Nathaniel's suspicion as she blindly fumbled about with her hands in the impenetrable gloom, doing her best to re-tighten the bindings around her chest, then slipped out of her tunic and into the cadet uniform she'd snuck into her bunk the night before. She couldn't afford to change her clothes anywhere she might be seen, after all -- so this was her only chance to get herself dressed without blowing her cover.

Thankfully, she'd woken up early -- even moreso than she needed to. Upon opening the latch of the shutter covering her bunk and hopping down onto the cold wooden floor below, she peered out the window into the courtyard to see... pitch blackness. The moon's light could hardly reach between the walls, and the sun hadn't yet begun to crest the horizon. Even so, Julian found herself wide awake, and didn't feel any particular inclination to stuff herself back into her narrow bunk to get any more rest. So, she just headed out into the common room and tossed herself down on a large sofa. 

Maybe in another hour or so they'd be called to assemble, and then she'd have her first real taste of knight training. Would they be fighting with swords again, she wondered? Or maybe they'd practice with bows? Spears? The idea of learning how to fight seemed exciting regardless of the weaponry involved, and, though she still couldn't quite shake Nathaniel's contemptuous words from the prior afternoon, she awaited whatever surprises the day would bring with unshaken resolve and anticipation...