Your character has just arrived in a swampy, dim town. As they look around, their gaze is met with shacks and cabins. It smells of rotted wood and wet moss. They duck and step into a tattered tent, illuminated by a series of candles suspended in the air. At the back of the tent, an old hag raises her head, “What brings you to this dingy town? She begins, then pauses to study your face—”Ah, it’s you. I’ve been expecting you. Sit,” she gestures at a cushion, “Tell me your story.”
((How do you respond?))
Arifel's eyes almost blur through the woman, the muscles around his eyelids tensing as he wrestles with her words. He swallows with effort and sits on the cushion. He glances once, then twice, at the hag as he rubs the callouses over his hands.
He sucks in a breath before, "I reckon you already know. I'm sick."
Arifel scans her eyes, looking for any hint of a reaction. A solution. A condemnation. Something.
She gives him nothing.
"I'm nothing special. My father is a carpenter. My mother is an apothecary. She couldn't fix me, only knew I was getting worse."
He scratches at the cloth wrapped around his forearm, relieving the ache of the rot that swelled there. His mind's eye followed the veins of grey and violet under his clothes that extended up his forearm, over his bicep, and had recently begun clawing at his collar. It hadn't yet spread downward to his hand, which he took small solace in - he could still use his hands without hiding his skin under coverings.
"The rot-or whatever it might be... No one knows what it is. The doctors won't help me. The holy people can only pray for me. Mother is working herself to death trying to fix it. I couldn't let her suffer over me any longer. The way she screams when an attack comes over me, it-" his voice trailed off, a small squeak slipping through the closure of his throat. His eyes burned with hot tears, begging to slip free from their ducts. "It hurts. It hurts so terribly."
The motion of his eyes up to the hag forced the tears to escape. His bottom lip trembled before he spoke.
"Please. Help me."
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