Keyal

Keyal was still really young, when she got lost and couldn't find her way back home. Her family consisted of travelling merchants, which meant they were constantly moving - during one of their lunch breaks, Keyal noticed a beautiful butterfly nearby and started following it. Originally she just wanted to follow it a little bit, take a closer look, but when she noticed, that she went too far away from the caravan, it was too late already.
Of course the caravan was looking for her, but after searching for a whole day without finding her, they had to move on - they had wares to deliver to clans nearby, after all.
Keyal's parents asked each clan they crossed, if they had seen their daughter, but... no one did.

Keyal was still in the forest, the little butterfly had lead her into, trying to figure out where to go, to come back to her family, but no matter which way she went, she always ended up where she had been before and after running in circles for almost a whole day, she sat down, trying to think about a good way to get out.
Lucky for her another dragon was in the forest, collecting herbs, berries, roots and mushrooms, and said dragon stumbled upon her after a while.
Ourea - who was a witch - asked, what a child was doing out in the forest, alone, and after a bit of hesitation Keyal told her, that she followed a butterfly and got lost.
Apparently Keyal was not the first dragon to get lost in that forest, because Ourea let out a deep sigh, followed by „not again“.
The witch offered her, to take her out of the forest and Keyal accepted that offer, but... when they got out, the caravan was already gone, which actually made Ourea very, very mad. Not at Keyal, of course, but at the merchants, who abandoned a child over the opportunity to make even more money.

The young dragon had no idea, what she should do now - should she try to follow her parents, in an attempt to catch up to them? Following the road was easy enough, right? But what if she got lost again? What if they didn't even want her anymore? What if they were happy that she was gone?
Because of her anger, it took Ourea a while to notice the distressed expression on the young dragon's face - but as soon as she noticed, she sat down next to Keyal, wrapping one of her wings around her, in an attempt to comfort her.

Ourea offered Keyal, that she could just stay with her - maybe the caravan would come back at some point or they would at least send people to look for her, and thus it probably was the best thing to stay in one place, rather then wandering around.
Keyal hesitated, but... what else should she do? The witch probably wouldn't let her go alone, but she also couldn't come with her and there was no one else around that could go with her either. She went through all options that came to her mind in her head, but in the end she accepted the offer and went home with Ourea.
The cave inside the forest was decorated with all sorts of stuff, but really cozy, so Keyal felt at home really quickly. She helped the witch with collecting ingredients for potions and other stuff, and also helped her make said potions.
Ourea taught her a lot of useful skills for survival, but also just things that were neat and interested Keyal. She became the „cool older sister“ for the young dragon and they both enjoyed each others company.

Years passed by and Keyal was old enough to start travelling alone. After living with Ourea for so long, helping her with all sorts of stuff, she was hesitant to leave at first, especially since she feared she'd never find her way back to Ourea's cave... but the witch gave her a bun-bun, telling her, that the little guy would be able to bring her home whenever she asked him to do so.
Keyal had no doubt about that, she knew that the animals living around Ourea's home were different, kinda magical, and the same did count for that little bun-bun, that she lovingly named Marshmallow.
After packing all the stuff she'd need - mostly food -, she said goodbye to Ourea and set out with Marshmallow, to explore the world.

Of course growing up in a forest, with only a few people stopping by from time to time, that mostly traded valuable things for the potions (instead of treasure or gems), also meant that Keyal had no money on her.
At first that wasn't a problem - she did have food and she was able to hunt, but... she injured herself, badly, because she jumped in-between two dragons, that were about to fight because of something trivial.
Realizing what they had done, one of the dragons ran away, not wanting to deal with that, but the other dragon stayed and promised they'd go and get a healer, before vanishing as well.
But he kept his promise and came back with Nahlani, who expertly treated the wounds, but also made it very clear, that Keyal would not be able to hunt during the next time.
Pancake felt awful for what he had done, so he immediatly offered, that Keyal could stay with him for a while and he'd make sure she'd recover in a chill place, whilst he was getting food for her and Marshmallow.
For once Keyal did not hesitate and instead accepted that offer - not only did Pancake seem like he was a giant, gentle fluff (although apparently whoever the other guy had been, had managed to make him really, really angry), but he also was part of the reason why she was injured and... she had nowhere else to go.

After she finally recovered, Keyal promised Pancake to visit him again one day and left. Now, that it was almost winter, it was harder to find food and so Keyal slowly realized that she would need to get some stuff she could sell in a town, so she could buy something to eat during the cold months.
But barely anyone had interest in herbs or anything, that she was able to find, since barely anyone in the town knew how to make potions - and they also already had ready potions, so why would they bother getting the herbs and learning it now?
The closer winter came, the more desperate Keyal grew … and in the end, she stole food. Not much and only from merchants who had enough of it, but of course she got caught at some point, but managed to escape with the help of a young fae.
Her name was Coral and she introduced herself as a thief - and she offered Keyal, to train her.
At first Keyal wasn't sure if she should really accept the offer, but... what were her other options? She didn't have anything she could sell and she had no idea, what the people here even wanted to buy. And whenever she had asked people, if she could help them with something, she just got weird looks and no answers. Maybe she wasn't doing it right?
After thinking about it for a bit, she accepted Coral's offer.

At some point they parted ways again - Keyal learned a lot from the fae, including that a good disguise could work wonders.
It didn't take Keyal long to figure out, what disguise she could put on - fortune tellers apparently were really popular around here and she was absolutely certain, that most of them were scammers and didn't actually have any special fortune teller powers.
Not only that, but she also had learned a few tricks when she still lived with Ourea - the witch often was visited by really interesting people, including Arndell, who actually was able to read someone's future - just random things, but it was at least something!
He also taught her a lot of tricks, especially really flashy ones, that impressed people - because that was, what fortune telling often was about... simply impressing others. Most people he had met were just in for the thrill, not to actually know anything about their future.

So now Keyal is a travelling thief, disguised as a fortune teller - whilst she's doing all the flashy stuff, Marshmallow steals all the good stuff.
Of course they don't steal things from everyone - there's people, that don't have enough themselves, for example, but... those that have enough might lose their expensive ring or a fancy necklace.
They're not taking much from those, that come into their tent, but they're still taking enough to make a living.

She never met her parents - or the other merchants - again, since they're travelling, just like her, but who knows … maybe they will meet again one day in the future?


Petals x Blend x Peacock