1.0 Introduction

"Good Morning!"

Szent greets Erika with a smile as he enters the dining room, a scene he has repeated for the last 12 years, ever since Roland took him in at the age of six. Taking his place at the table the young paladin bows his head for a quick and silent prayer before continuing to chat with the cook. "Any signs of the others? I'm famished!"

Only softs steps announce the arrival of Seneia Sorrow. It's difficult to decide whether she has been aptly or poorly named. Born a street urchin, she has not lived an easy life, but she seems to bear no obvious signs of it. Friendly and positive, a great admirer of all things beautiful, it's easy to think that no sorrows burden those slender shoulders.

"Good morning", Seneia says and sits down, immediately tilting the chair back, as she tends to do. She is dressed in her usual simple, loose-fitting clothes and her hair remains tied behind her head after her morning kata. Her rather big horns, curling down the sides of her head, have been painted in bright, seasonal colours.

Seneia watches the younger kids arrive and gives couple of them a smile and nod as they pass by. She's not good at getting to know such a large number of people, but there are few she gets along with really well.

She reaches behind her back and starts untying her hair. "So, any good dreams last night?" she ask. "I remember dreaming about the fall, and the scent of harvest. I hope Erika has some apples, I'd really like one after that."

"I had another dream about the faceless prince. We were chased by direwolves into a meadow, and together we fought them off with just sticks and rocks. I saved his life, in fact. Then I sang for him and he fell madly in love with me." I shrug. "I also had a dream that I was flying through the air and landed in a pile of orange feathers. I think I like your dream better. At least that's more likely to happen than my dreams. Plus I love apples. You know, your horns look lovely today, Seneia."

I look across the table at the others who are here. "Weyland, you ok? Your face is all scrunched up. Szent, doesn't his face look all scrunched up?"

Elden walks into the room with a bright smile on his face, and takes a seat at the table with his friends, "Good morning everyone! Sorry I'm a bit late, I had to finish some morning chores, took a bit longer than I expected."

Elden is a young man of 19 years, with sandy brown hair, tan skin, and bright green eyes. He always has a smile on his face and is well known in the orphanage for his tireless enthusiasm to help others. He is often seen with his head bowed in prayer or helping out at the temple of Lathander with Travis.

Weylan's face was scrunched up at the talk of dreams, as his dreams involved fire and abandonment, sense impressions of the loss of his tribal village as a child. He's embarrassed to show any signs of his disturbance to the others, especially to Alanya.

*Of course the prince would fall madly in love with her...* he thinks.

The stocky halfling is both fascinated and intimidated by Alanya: her training as a musician is so outside of his experience, it's like she's an exotic alien come to visit his world. He is similarly curious about Feylinde's artistic bent, but he relates more to Seneia's casual attitude about authority. He's closest to Elden and Szent, though: he instinctively trusts Elden as a cleric (they took him in and rescued him from the wilderness) and appreciates Szent's capacity with weapons. Weylan pulls out the seat next to him for Elden to join them.

(edit: formatting per game rules discussion)

Feylinde rose her eyebrows at Elden entrance, "Why are you shouting Elden? We're not deaf." Her serious face suddenly changed to cheerful as she started laughing.

Then Feylinde turned her attection to the halfling "What's up Weylan? You seems hadn't a good night."

Rufio sneaks over the back wall into the orphanage. Normally he would be doing this long before first light, but in last night's brawl he had gotten careless and had actually taken a beating and ended up sleeping it off behind the tavern's stack of firewood. Landing softly in the cabbage patch behind the orphanage's kitchen, Rufio considers sneaking into his room first to get a change of clothes but he heard the breakfast bells long ago and knows he can't afford any further delays. The 16-year old boy dunks his head into the rainwater barrel at the kitchen's backdoor and shakes the water out of his spiked, red-striped hair. He thinks he has washed off most of the caked blood from his knuckles. He dashes through the kitchen, weaving and dodging his way through cooks and servers, snatching an apple off of a basket for good measure. Glad that Roland and Travis aren't around yet, he makes a dash for the table where he sees his friends are already seated. With a wolfish grin and a playful punch on Weylan's shoulder, Rufio slinks into his seat. He glances in Miss Miranda's direction to check if she has noticed him sneaking in...

Weylan responds to Feylinde, nodding.

"Yeah, I had bad dreams again. I'd much rather have dreamed about Seneia and her apples."

It takes Weylan a few moments to figure out why everyone else is snickering at that, and then he blushes.

"I didn't!" and then, more quietly, I mean, I don't want to...! I mean...I'm sorry!"

He glances guiltily at Seneia, unable to meet her eye. He always seems to be messing up like this. He looks to Rufio for help. Rufio always seems like he's in control of the situation.

"About time, Rufio. Where have you been? You look terrible."

Rufio scoffs at Alanya's comment. "You should see the other guy!" He takes a bite out of the apple he filched and winks at Weylan before adding airily, "I had a disagreement with a gentleman about his lady companion's apples. The matter was settled to the satisfaction of all parties."

Seneia smiles a crooked smile that shows more than a hint of her infernal heritage. "I am glad to hear you appreciate them apples, boys. They are good for you. Perhaps one of you could go to Erika and ask her for some."

She scratches the end of her horn absent-mindedly. "I wonder when we can start. The longer we sit here, the more I feel like wanting something meatier than just apples."