Neverwinter Forest and what love we get, we have to pay for

papa!

four months old, reed is growing into a delicate sprite, a petite mimicry of her mother with oversized paws and her father's dark orange eyes. despite her tumultuous upbringing she is healthy, if scrawny (and most likely will remain somewhat stunted for the rest of her days), and carries herself with a confidence she believes befitting of someone like her. her father's abandonment, her lack of stable home -- these things have not impacted the princess' ego not one bit, surrounded as she is by the loving support of her mother and siblings.

most of her days she stays close to mama's side, but with age comes curiosity about the world around her. it is dangerous to wander alone, she knows, or so she's been told, but really, who on earth is foolish enough to mess with her? she is young and vibrant and has never learned fear.

she sneaks away from her family's camp, intrigued by a rather large beetle making its slow and steady way across the frosty forest ground. she hasn't seen anything like it before. it seems completely oblivious to her, which is baffling, but she isn't sure if it's prey or some sort of sentient plant. she follows it for a while but grows bored -- and then she realises she's not alone; there's a scent nearby that is strangely familiar and unfamiliar all at once. the witchdoctor had disappeared before she'd time to grow old enough to remember him, and so she cannot place the scent as belong to him (kind of), yet she still finds herself following it to the source. a man, a stranger, and again that sensation of unfamiliar-and-familiarity rises in her. it makes her uncomfortable. 

pulling herself to her full diminutive height, the child steps right up to the man and demands, "who are you?"