Well, there is a Fantasia given for free once you've subscribed for a month (as in paid actively for a month; not the free initial month). Your friend could start today and swap into an Au Ra once that Fantasia is available, or just buy one straight up when Heavensward hits and use it.

That said it's not 100% confirmed whether Au Ra creation will be on the date of Early Access' release, but I suspect it will be, as will everything else.

I do highly suggest the start-now-and-Fantasia route though. Why? Because Early Access is going to mean the servers are going to be overloaded as hell with players. The character creation restrictions on servers are going to be on like crazy to try to keep certain popular servers from getting overloaded. Creating now and changing into an Au Ra later means they can create the character (and even have them mostly levelled!) now. They could also get around that by setting up a trial account right now and creating the character; they can come back to and Fantasia it once they get the actual game.