The Far Wilds

Part 1

It wasn't that Flame didn't like people. She just didn't like the drama people brought with them. She'd tried to make it work, but it never did. She was continually dragged into struggle after struggle; every time she tried to help, but every time things got too tumultuous for comfort and she slipped away in the dead of night. After a few years of this happening, she made a promise to herself: she would have friends, sure. But if anyone tried to get too close, she'd leave. She followed through on this promise for years, abandoning everything and everyone, retreating further and further into the wilderness, until, finally, she had withdrawn to the most isolated area possible- the Far Wilds, home of mercenaries, runaways, criminals, and everybody else who had nowhere to go. One day, she was working in her front garden, intently planting a row of carrots, when a voice said, "hello. Do you have a moment?"

She looked up to see that it was a man who had spoken, tall, with brown hair and piercing green eyes. Behind him were three other men- one wore a white mask with black eye holes and gold highlights around the edges, one had red, but not peeling, skin, and the third had a rotting cake for a head. She subtly scanned them for weapons. Only the masked and red-skinned ones wore armor, but all four were bearing swords. Whatever they were here for, they meant business. She stood up and looked back at the first man. "I suppose I do. What brings you here?"

"I'm starting a haven for souls hiding from the wars in the Inner Lands, and I was wondering if you were interested in running it."

She narrowed her eyes. "Why me?"

He waved at her entire area; the garden, the fish trap, the animal pen, and the hut tucked under a hill. "You clearly know what you're doing."

"Anybody could do this."

"You'd be surprised."

She changed tracks. "Who are you, anyway?"

"I'm Wolf, and this is Smevy, War, and Mold," replied the man who had been speaking, indicating the red-skinned, masked, and cake-headed men respectively.

"I'm Flame."

"A pleasure," said Wolf. "So? What will it be?"

She adjusted one of her bracelets, about to say no, when, suddenly, she felt as if her mind warped in on itself. It was like someone else was intruding on her innermost self, and it was as jarring as the word that sprang unbidden from her mouth.

"Sure."