My name is Cecilia and I was born from a tree. My new father delivered me from the bark of my dying mother and thus my life began. But that was not my first time being born; it may not be my last either, for all I know. Before that, part of me was born to a barmaid and a thief; farther back yet I sprouted from the earth and lived among the spirits of the forest. But I had died in both of those lives. First, when the King's men came to our home to kill us, my sisters and I escaped a violent death by steel in favor of a slow but peaceful death rooted in the ground. Memories of that life are fleeting, but remnants exist in the bark of my skin, the ever-changing color of my hair, and the way the trees speak to me. Eight years ago, I died when my past father gave me up to a group of strangers. The only thing I kept from that life is my name and a straw hat. But yesterday, I received something else, a pendant that should have been buried. Now the spirit from my past life is restless and I must go forth to settle her unfinished business and put her back to rest.

Red leaves crunched under the hooves of a palomino mare through the coniferous forest. Strapped to the horse was a leather bag full of rations, torches, 50 feet of rope, and a few potions. Riding quietly was a teenage girl with hair as bright as the fall leaves spilling out from under an old straw hat. She wore a dark fur cloak which hid a pair of hand axes that she had crafted herself and a silver pendant around her neck that belonged to her father. As the horse trotted, she read a letter:

> Cecilia Brassbuckle,

>

> We are writing to inform you that your father, Liam O'Dunn, is being kept by us near the city of Ingdon. We captured him several days ago and are providing you with the opportunity to have him released for the price of 1,000 gold coins delivered to Lynch's Alehouse in Ingdon. If you do not arrive with the gold in a month's time, Liam will be killed.

>

> The Red Bandit

Her hands caressed the silver pendant—now brown with tarnish. Cecilia remembered it dangling from her father’s neck as he pickpocketed people while she shook a pair of copper coins in a jar. "It protects us from evil spirits" he told her as they counted their copper. But to Cecilia, it was nothing more than a silver coin--two weeks’ worth of food. Why fear stories of spirits when the real threat of hunger always hung over them? But Cecilia did not see herself as being any more rational. Why should she chase a figment of her past life? Why save what she had already buried? Her hand clenched around the pendant before moving to grasp the handle of her axe for comfort. She decided that she would save him. She would kill the Red Bandit and free her father, then she would tell him that her life was going much better now and that she had a new family. She would tell him to stay away, and then she would go home.

Cecilia closed the letter and stuffed it in her pack before prodding the horse's side with her boots and speeding up to a canter. Over the trees, she saw the top of the ivory wizard tower inhabited by the Minokawa. A bookish mage who had painstakingly taught her how to read and write. Only now was Cecilia old enough to appreciate the effort she put in to keep Cecilia in a chair with a quill long enough to learn something. She imagined the mage would be tending to her library right now, or perhaps teaching a morning lesson for the Adventurer's Guild. She considered stopping by to see if she needed any help before remembering her mission. She scolded herself silently for her lack of discipline in focus.

Soon she was passing through Krnslav, where the entire village was lively with the harvest season in full swing. Bulky blond-haired men hauled barrels full of potatoes from the field. An old woman with a scarf waved to Cecilia from her porch where she was skinning potatoes. She greeted her in an accent that one only ever heard in Krnslav, "Cecilia, it is good to see you again! Would you like some soup? It's almost ready."

She tugged back on the reigns, stopping the horse. "Thanks Mama Ania. But I'm going on a trip, and I need to get to Fydon before dusk."  

“A trip? Dear, you never spend any time at home—and so close to winter.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be back within a fortnight. I just have to meet with an old relative.” Cecilia replied.

“Well alright then.” Mama Ania said with a hint of worry. “Do you have enough food? I can send some potatoes with you. What about some vodka? We’ve already started bottling some from this harvest.”

“I can buy some food in Fydon. Thanks anyway!” Cecilia waved and began to trot off again. The old woman smiled and returned her wave.

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“Just keep out of trouble!” She yelled back before going back to her work.

Cecilia rode out of the village under the midday sun and took a drink from her waterskin before spurring her horse faster and keeping pace for the rest of the afternoon. She passed by Sone castle—its tall ivy-covered walls marked the edge of the forest and led her to a road through rolling hills left barren from the recent wheat harvest. As the sun started to set on her right, she spotted the wooden gates of Fydon on the horizon and felt the familiar sense of dread as she approached the town.

“Name and purpose of your visit?” The guard at the gate droned.

“I’m just passing through—looking to stay at the inn for the night—I’m headed to Ingdon.” Cecilia mumbled back.

“Name?” The guard demanded again.

She hesitated. The guard looked like he was about to speak again when she said “Cecilia. Cecilia O’Dunn”

“Okay Cecilia, head on in. You’re lucky, we were just getting ready to close up for the night,” She rode forward without speaking. As she entered, the guards pushed the gates shut behind her. The clop of her horse’s hooves on the cobblestone street was all she could hear in the silent town. She looked at the old winery with boarded up windows and an imprint of a sign that had been torn off. Next, she looked across the town square to the docks where a few old fishing boats rocked in the waves. People were quietly walking home from their work at the docks and the warehouses.

She hitched her horse in front of the Clumsy Harlot Inn, pulled her pack onto her back and walked inside. The inn was quite empty aside from a trio of fishermen playing dice at a corner table. The momentary silence as they watched it roll was interrupted by intervals of cheers from the drunk men. She approached the bar where a fat middle-aged man was cleaning a glass. “What’ll it be miss? Rooms are a silver, and an ale is two coppers.”

“I just need a room and something to eat.” She put four copper coins and a silver on the bar.

He slid the coins into his pocket. “Sure thing, I’ll fix something up for ya’” he went back to the kitchen. Cecilia set her pack at her feet and sat on a barstool. She looked around and took in the changes since she was last here. The tables had been rearranged, they stopped serving wine, and there was a slight bit more dust. Aside from that, it was the same visually. Nevertheless, it felt like a completely different place than where Cecilia spent a few short weeks of her youth in the care of barmaids as her adopted father, Thrax, traveled with his adventuring party.

The barman came back with a steaming plate of sausage and eggs. As he was pouring her a mug of ale she passed him a silver coin.  “Does the name Red Bandit mean anything to you?” He pushed the coin back.

“Can’t say it does. We try to distance ourselves from bandits around here, nowdays.” Cecilia nodded and ate quietly. When she was finished, she thanked the barman and went to her room, a small shack behind the inn with a straw bed. She took off her cloak, laid her axes carefully against the bedframe and laid down to sleep.

Cecilia’s green hair bellowed in the spring wind as she waved off Thrax and his party. “Come back safe, dad!” She yelled. When they were out of sight, she went inside the Clumsy Harlot where Fae and Misty, the prostitutes-turned-barmaids Thrax put in charge of Cecilia’s safekeeping, were cleaning spilled ale and serving unkempt men who had been spending the winter camped in the woods until now.

Fae noticed Cecilia in the doorway, “Cecilia dear, why don’t you head to the bar and pour some more ale for these men?”

“Okay!” she yelled with excitement and got to work after pulling a stool up to the bar so she could reach.

In those two weeks, she grew close with Fae and Misty, she learned that they too had been living on the streets until recently and they shared stories of stealing from pompous nobles and evading guards—leaving out the bad in favor of the funny parts. They stayed up giggling in the bunkroom after the inn had closed. One day Misty said, “we would all still be out there if it weren’t for mister Thrax. He truly is a good man. You should be proud to have him as your father, Cecilia.”

 Cecilia smiled. “I want to be just like him when I grow up!” The two women exchanged skeptical glances.

“You can do anything you want, honey.” Fae told her.

One morning, Cecilia was startled awake to a scream. She rushed downstairs in her nightgown to find a man in solid black armor standing over the bloody corpse that was once Misty. Fae, who was backed into a corner saw Cecilia starting wide eyed from the bottom of the stairs. “Run!” She yelled. “Cecilia, Go!” The armored man turned to see Cecilia and turned back to slice Fae’s throat. Cecilia watched as Fae’s blood painted her chest red and the man turned back to her. She bolted to the door, but as she pushed through to the outside, a cold metal arm wrapped around her.

“I caught the little shit!” The man yelled.

“Alright, lets get the hell out of this shithole” said the other. Cecilia kicked and squirmed to no avail as she was carried through the town. When she noticed the bodies littering the town she stopped and simply watched in fear.

As they approached the outer gate, a scrawny man approached them with a rusty short sword and a wooden shield. “Leave the girl!” He demanded, “take me instead! I know more than she does about this. She doesn’t have anything to do with this!”

“Silence bandit” said the man who killed Fae and Misty. He plunged his longsword into the man’s stomach faster than he could react—causing him to collapse.

As they started to leave with Cecilia, the wounded man spoke between gasps, “He’ll come to get her, it doesn’t matter where you go—he’ll find you!”

The man carrying Cecilia smirked under his helmet. “We’ll be waiting for him.”