Folan was not born with a sense of great gravity. His head always jetted forward, as if he was a hunchback. His mother always told him to stand up straight and tall, like a real man, but he couldn't. Not that he was physically restrained from doing such, but he did not like how awkward it felt to stand so strong and forward.

His older brother, Ruo, did walk like his mother loved. Ruo was a strong man —perhaps the strongest in the village— who loved the way how it felt when he clenched his fists, the veins that ran along his arms popped, and the power within him nestled into a profound feeling of dominance.

"T'oll you about it!" He exclaimed to his hobbling little brother.

Folan had stubbed his toe on the side of their bed while walking with firewood. Thinks too much, Folan.

"Fuck's sake." He threw the firewood under a large pot, in which he was brewing a broth. "Did'ya get the chick?"

"Nah, but I did get us some shrooms and tomatoes."

"Oh-oh so you want us to starve? Shrooms and tomatoes? What I looks like, a Crose?"

Ruo laughed. "Don't put cho lil' anger onto me. Wasn't me who bit yours toe."

"Aggghh!" Folan stuck his white tongue at Ruo who snickered all the way out the front door.

Folan sat down on the bed. Old and rusty, it was the only bed he had ever known. He'd reckon he was born on it. Made out of the fur of a fat Jiosen Ruo had caught, it was soft, but hardened from what only Uolos and maybe the emperors knew.

Folan lay back. He counted the scratches on the wooden ceiling. A small red hue danced across its little Skitch's.

From the fire, he thought. I wish I could dance like that. All free.

Next year, he'd be expecting his younger brother Harrison to come out of his mothers nest. Two more mouths to feed, as if he does any of the catching. Folan was a mere 15, Ruo maybe 2 and half more, but since his 2nd to last birthday, he was a man.

"Boy no more!" His grandiose mother yelled as she kicked him out of the house, all 2 pieces of clothing he had and all.

He cried a bit, not because he was a man, but because he didn't want to encounter the world.

It'd have been better if he could stay inside, amongst the enclaves of his walls, fed food by someone who cared, and could dream without disturbance, of lands far and far away.

THUNK.

Ruo burst in with a grin. He held a small green body, by its legs. Roundish in its lower, two feet only, gills around its face, and the face of a human.

"Found me a chick."

Folan groaned as he grabbed the chicken and looked for the dull knife to gut it. Ruo sat softly on the bed, watching gleefully as his brother cut, cut, cut away.

Orange and blue little balls that would be the dead beings organs were tossed over to Ruo who ate his favorite snacks.

Folan slowly lowered the chick into the now bellowing pot. It grumbled as it ate the last leg.

"Imma go outside."

Ruo didn't respond. Folan still felt a little tang on his foot, and was not feeling like letting it heal. He walked out of the front door.

Folan walked along the trail to the villiage. It was getting dark out, and some wolfs began to howl in the distance. If there was an event in where he was in danger, Folan had nothing on him to retaliate. He sighed. He felt so naked with just himself and thoughts, with only the trees and soft air around him to witness.

Folan was likely going to spend the rest of his life this way. Making grub, cutting trees, making pots or pans or make-shift beds. Maybe go to town and wife up one of Rirodeen's daughter's. A simple life. Then children and then death. That was how his father had had it, and his father and his father.

He sighed again as he began to see some houses, small lights of crackling fire peeking through their dirtied windows. The witch's house was in the middle of town, for she was the chief. The most powerful person was always in charge, and since before he was born, she had defeated every opposition in her way. A scary woman to some, not to all, and definitley not to Folan.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Folan liked her dominance, because it came from the fierceness within her. Her ulitmate reslience to not be swayed in any way and ability to live the way her will dicatated. Also she did healing for basically free. All he had to do was exchange something of value to him.

Folan made his way from the edge of the town, getting closer to the witch's domicile. He was welcomed by bright lights in the town square, to which he winced and put his right arm to block. Bustling with the smell of pigsty and herbs, it was a large welcoming area to visiting merchants from the other 4 nations that lay on the continent.

Soalos was a coastal country, which would have had made it a haven for trade, but its lack of interesting resources and small economy made it unfavorable for merchants. The villiage, Nieres, was not large, small, or entirely medium, but it was near enough the borders of the other 4 nations that it made it an easier spot to rest and sharpen some skills.

Folan was used to swindling beggars or down-on-their luck merchants who would try to make a false bargain. To be fair, he had gone through enough ‘counters, he thought he could do a good effort in doing their jobs.

But, he looked to the ground as he made his way, purposefully avoiding contact. Not nervous or particulary wary of other people, he was without real methods of exchange. He swayed a bit, his toe beginning to swell. Folan took a deep breathe, which he immediately regurgiated back due to the pungent smell.

Bad Idea.

He finally made his way out of the center, to which the first house he saw was none other, than the witch's.

A large feat of carpenting, it stood out. Made out of stone-bricks, but with a triangluar base, it rose to mighty 12 Ruo's by Folan's estimation. It had signs of burn-marks, times of hard cold on it's sides, and a handful of covered-up dents that marked it's upper floors, Folan stood in front of the house's two gallant doors. No swivels to beat, but a sign that read 

DO NOT KNOCK 

greeted him once again with it's urgency.

"Waddya want" The sign spoke.

"I'm hurt." Folan responded.

"Of what."

"A bit of this and that."

"S'not specific"

"It's bit embrassing."

"Not that I care."

"Fool's tongue. I hit my toe on ma bed and I think it's broken."

"Embrassing."

The doors opened wide inward, as Folan formed a scowl on his face. He entered to small fires laying inside of holes in walls, lightening every brick and tile in the marvel to a distinct yellowish hue. It was homely with a warmth that captured your body with smells of a dainty morning.

"Diers?"

The witch was sat in a floating tub above Ruo. She had her feet set on it's edges, bubbles falling from each. The tub descended slowly, coming in-front of Folan.

"You got the object?" Diers asked, looking at Folan with squinted eyes of annoyance.

He pinched a hair out of his head and shrugged. Diers sighed.

"How you get away with it, is only something you and Uolos know."

The tub turned so that Diers could grab Folan by his wrist. Folan breathed deeply, as he started to grow attached to his follicle.

Oh my beautiful son. Dark as a brooding night, sharp like a sword, and loyal like a knight. Detest my soul forever and ever for how I will go without you. 'Till we meet again.

That did the trick. A wave of adrenaline rushed into his body as his toe, which had stopped swelling, began to move in different directions, left, right, up, and down, until it finally stopped.

Folan smiled. Diers pointed to her growing fist.

And then his legs faltered, his eyes grew tired, and his head began to spin. Folan began to sway again, left to right, as Diers tried to jump from her tub. And then all was white.