Shadowejm

You’ve just arrived in a swampy, dim town. As you look around, your gaze is met with shacks and cabins. It smells of rotted wood and wet moss. You 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?))

Example:

"Well hello there miss Matilda" he says with a laugh as he turns the chair around before sitting in it. "Either I don't look the same as five years ago or your memory is going" he pauses to remove his peacoat smiling as his hands deftly separate the buttons from their holes "I suppose it could be a mixture of both. I of course mean you no offense." he begins to fold his coat brushing off some stray bits of dry leaves that the crisp autumn air had whisked into his carriage. He looks around the small shack without disdain or pity for the living conditions but instead with an air of curiosity. "Matilda I understand wanting to hide the fact that you were once a woman of well-being but don't you think this is excessive? I can't imagine a child of Mammon and lucre can live peacefully here; nor should you, what you do for my family makes you deserve the grandest estate one can imagine."

The hag exhales a sigh, whether from weariness or relief one could not be sure. "The work I do for your family is only to maintain a promise I made when I was foolish. I would have a harder time bearing the burden of my many peccadilloes if I experienced oppulence as a result of them. I must say this though. The request in your father's last letter was no mere peccadillo. It violates our contract and it seems to be a problem for you, not I, to correct." she momentarily pauses working on stitching a worn apron in her lap to look into Ethan's emerald green eyes "You are a man now, and if you wish to reap the harvest of your family's business you must be willing to thresh some wheat." She smiles, but her eyes plead for him to consider the affect this threshing could have on his conscience. "Do what is right Ethan, you could be the man who changes your family's legacy from a birthright of barbarism to beauty."

"Oh, I just, uh…" you stutter, tensing up. You eye the crone, then back outside the tent. For a moment, the air thickens with anticipation, until…