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?))
"You've been expecting...me?", she repeated, the weariness in her voice underscored by a subtle defensiveness. The silence that followed made her want to curl in on herself. "I...um...." She smoothed down her worn skirt, a nervous habit. "Well," she began, her gaze flicking around the tent, avoiding hers for a moment. "There isn't much to tell, really." She finally met her eyes, offering a small, hesitant smile that didn't quite reach them. "My name is Lillian. I... I travel." A pause. "Alone, mostly." There was a slight stiffness in her posture, a guardedness that came from a lifetime of not quite belonging. "As for... me," she continued, her voice softening a fraction, "I try to be... helpful. If I can. It feels... right." She shrugged a little, as if dismissing something important. "And I suppose... I care about people. Even if they don't always..." She trailed off, a hint of vulnerability showing through the carefully constructed reserve. "Um...I like to be...nice." She said with a slight smile. The woman sitting across from her, silent and looking, as if she was waiting for her words to meet her expectations. She hesitated. This felt… personal. “For as long as I can remember, I've traveled alone” she admitted quietly. Her brow furrowed slightly as she tried to grasp at something beyond the fog of her early years. “There’s… nothing before that. No family. No… home...not in the way most people understand it. at least.” A faint shadow crossed her face, a familiar ache of not knowing. “I’ve… pieced things together, over time,” she continued, her voice a little stronger now, the need to explain overriding some of her discomfort. “Little things people have said, or… just a feeling.” She glanced down at her hands. “I think… I’m wood elf. That’s what some have called me, anyway. Pointed ears and all.” She touched the tip of one ear self-consciously. “But beyond that… it’s a blank. I've spent my life trying to figure out who I am." There was a pause, her eyes met hers. She looked as if she was still waiting for the "right" answer; like she knew she was leaving out something important. "I know I'm kind. And...strong. Slightly...um..reserved. But you could probably see that by now..." Her discomfort started to shift into nervous talking and fiddling with the ends of her skirt. “Though… being alone wasn’t always the case,” she added, the words tumbling out a little faster now. “There was… a time, a very long time ago, when there were others. My parents.” Her voice caught slightly on the word. “They… they went missing. When I was just a child. It’s all very hazy, like a dream half-forgotten. I remember… a rustling in the ancient woods where we lived, a strange, shimmering light, and then… nothing but silence.” A deep sadness washed over her, momentarily eclipsing her nervousness. “I’ve spent… well, my whole life, really, trying to find them,” she confessed, her gaze now fixed on the rough-hewn floor of the tent. “Following whispers, rumors of strange disappearances, anything that might lead me to them.” She hesitated again, a different kind of tension entering her voice. “There was… is… a sister. Rya.” Her jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. “She… she believes they left. That they didn’t want us. But I… I can’t accept that. Not my parents." She paused. "I think… something took them. Something… unnatural.” A shiver ran down her spine despite the humid air. She shook her head briefly, as if shaking the emotion and fog from her body. “Rya and I… we don’t speak anymore,” she admitted, the estrangement a fresh wound that still stung. “Our beliefs drove us apart. She chose bitterness. I… I have to hold onto hope. It’s all I have left of them.” She looked up at the old hag again, her eyes pleading. “So, yes, I travel alone now. But it’s not by choice. It’s because I’m still searching. Still hoping to find some trace of the family I barely knew.” Her voice was thick with emotion, the carefully constructed walls around her heart momentarily crumbling. “You said you were expecting me… do you know something about this? About my parents? About what happened to them?” The question still echoed with a deep-seated yearning, a constant hum beneath the surface of her days. But the years had etched more than just weariness onto her soul. Her expression fell. "Looking for them… it used to be everything," she admitted, her voice carrying a note of reflection. "Every step I took, every person I met, it was all filtered through the hope of finding a clue, a whisper. But somewhere along the way, something shifted." Her gaze softened as she looked around the tent, the flickering candlelight casting dancing shadows. "The search… it's still a part of me, a thread woven into the fabric of who I am. But it doesn't define the whole tapestry anymore. The years of wandering, the kindness I've encountered, the hardships I've overcome… they've shaped me in other ways. I've learned to rely on myself, to find strength I didn't know I possessed." She met the old hag's gaze, a quiet determination in her eyes. "I still long to know what happened to my parents, to understand that missing piece of myself. But I've also come to realize that I need to build a life, regardless of what I find. I need to discover my own purpose, something that isn't solely tied to a past I can't fully grasp. I want to find a place where I can contribute, where I can use whatever skills and kindness I have to offer. The search continues, yes, but now it walks hand-in-hand with a desire to find my own footing, to create a meaningful life of my own, not just for the daughter of the missing, but for the woman I hope to become."
