Story: Journeying - Village Witch #6

[nsfwords]

Getting back into the swing of things for 2022 with my 6th game session playing the solo TTRPG Village Witch. This story was also inspired by the "Path / Travel" square on my January Story Sparks Bingo Card!  463 words, this will join the five other stories I've wrote so far for the Village Witch Game (landing page HERE).

Journeying

Very little fanfare marked Edwina's departure from Llyne of Mossly Woods. Unlike the welcome banquet in the central meeting hall, only a quiet gathering of a few individuals had met at the large main platform to see her parting. Councilman Telvere had paid her a severance fee, Mrs. Fluery snuck a polished green pocket stone into her palm for good luck, Scout had eyed her with disdain from the far railing around the platform, and Telsa had given her a warm side hug, brimming with fondness and well wishes.

 

Edwina had trudged a mile under the dense summer canopy of the woods to take flight on her crank broom from the clearing she'd originally arrived in several months ago. A bittersweet relief filled her as she'd taken to the sky and left the woods behind. As she'd flown she'd turned her mind's eye inward, and known she'd never return to the Llyne. With only the one slender cord of budding friendship and expectation tying her to Telsa, her other frail connections to the townspeople snapped before she'd even flown half a day's ride away. 

 

Edwina followed the course she'd meticulously plotted into the Northern Queendom. Murkwell was a solid twelve hour flight from the Mossly Woods, and Edwina had cut her travel into two easier six hour chunks by spending an evening at a well-respected traveler's inn. Centuries old, it was built at the crossroads of the Seven Stars Road and the Fair Way, and had been tended by the same family for generations. A little costly if Edwina had to stay there too often; it was a welcome luxury on the way towards her next assignment as Witch-In-Residence. She'd passed the evening in her private room over a filling supper of pan roasted prairie bird with greens, finely ground wheat rolls, and honeyed custard. The rich fare had served well to fill the pit in her stomach dug by the magical exertion of a long flight.

 

Kicking off early the next morning had ensured that she arrived in Murkwell just as the sun reached zenith. What had greeted her was an unexpected surprise. About a mile off from where she knew the town to be Edwina had spotted the colorful pennant banners that marked a proper Broom Landing, blue with white bands raised highest to reflect the days sparsely clouded sky. Her research into Murkwell had revealed it to be a small village of perhaps only 300-400 fisherfolk who worked the boggy shores of the lake that shared the town's name. Murkwell shouldn't experience enough magical traffic to afford itself more than a small clearing like the Llyne had, so why had she found an entire official landing strip as she touched down on the springy soil of her new potential home?