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?))
Tobias glances at the cushion, his hand twitching slightly towards the knife at his belt. He would never admit to feeling threatened by an old woman, but something about her felt off to him. It put a knot of tension in his gut. "I'll stand."
"Suit yourself." The Hag smiles at him.
Despite how off the hag made Tobias feel, he saw no reason not to honor her request. To be rude was to invite trouble. "I am a hunter. A wildman from the north, north of Norland, where the air is cold and the land harsh."
"It is a far way to come then." The Hag comments.
"It is." Tobias agrees. "I come because I seek a better life. The cold, the hunt, the wilds..." Tobias looks down at his clenched fist inside his bracer. "It is no way to spend a life. My mother is a wildwoman to the bone. And her mother, and her mother before her. But my father... he was of Varhelm, a great city of Norland. He and my mother, their love was not approved of. I did not see much of him, but he taught me to speak with the Father's tongue. He taught me the faith of Red, the tenants of Strength and Honor. And one day, he stopped coming to teach me at all. I was young, I was weak, but no more. My mother needed me, but last winter the cold and fever took her. I will not spend my life living as an animal. Named to no clan, seeking only game to fill my belly and the meager warmth of a small flame. I would know the world and the peoples of it. I would seek honor in battle like my Father found in death. This is my quest, humble though it is. I would not live and die an animal. Not like my mother. I would live and die like my father, blood hot in my veins."
"Mmm," The Hag mused and nodded gently. "It seems you have much living to do then."
Tobias bared his teeth at the wyrd woman. "I do. Much to live and time is fleeting for my kind. I would see the stars and the towers of men and elves, the caverns of the dwarves and the hordes of the orcs. And yet, I know not even enough to navigate myself. Could you point me in the direction of the nearest city?"
