Musician x Forest Fae 🧚‍♀️ (?)

He’s a small-town baker’s son with a lyre and too much curiosity. He’s not supposed to talk to whoever—or whatever—keeps showing up in the forest when he plays.

But he does. Literally every time.

Lore:

In the Kingdom of Celdarel, where human towns border untamed wilds, magic lingers in quiet places. The kingdom is ruled by mortal hands, but its borders are hemmed by things older than time: the fae, the forest-bound, the remnants of races hunted into myth. Centuries ago, nonhumans were nearly wiped out in a brutal purge known as ‘The Trials’. Most believe them extinct. They are not. They have simply learned to hide.

Within this tension, humans live ordinary lives in ignorance. A few catch glimpses of the hidden world: fleeting, enchanting, and always dangerous.

Heartfold — a sleepy riverside town with warm hearths and old secrets. Beyond its edge lies the Starwood, a sprawling, enchanted forest untouched by blades or fire. Few venture far beneath its canopy. Those who do often return changed — or not at all.

One does return, though.

Rowen Weycroft, a young lyrist and a baker’s son, wanders those woods often. He says little of what he sees. But he plays there. And sometimes... someone listens.

Someone more than human.

I cooked with this lore it actually might be one of my favorites. For inspo I used a bit of Greek mythology + Powerless by Lauren Roberts. If you care to read it, then continue. I don’t have anything witty to say, ima go take a nap.

Deep dive:

Rowen grew up in a loving family, his parents (aka Mr and Mrs Weycroft), worked in an at-home bakery, a business that Mrs. Weycroft founded. Mr. Weycroft came from a relatively wealthy noble family, but he lost his last name and access to his family’s wealth—disowned for falling in love with and impregnating his now wife and Rowen’s mother. He took her last name (Weycroft). Rowen’s parents loved eachother deeply, and while their bakery wasn’t one of the biggest village establishments, profits were stable, and life was good.

Rowen’s now twenty-two years old. He no longer lives with his parents, but they do provide him with the funds he needs for survival. They love him, and so they support whatever he wishes to pursue. His father, however, had disciplined him enough to make sure Rowen wouldn’t take anything for granted, or live an unsavory lifestyle. He lived in a small, single bedroom.. cabin near the outskirts of the village, closer to the forest than it is to the bustling streets. He appreciates the silence, especially because he grew up with a pair of twins for younger siblings, both a younger sister and a brother that resembled dad more than they did their mother (Rowen resembles his mom). The twin’s names are Elinor, and Elias.

Note: The twins have pale skin, blonde hair, and green eyes (each with varying shades), resembling Mr. Weycroft. Rowen, on the other hand, has his mother’s ocean eyes, tanned skin, and dark brown hair.

Rowen works part time in his mother’s bakery while his father is out running errands (which isn’t too often). The two young twins, now teenagers, go to a recently opened public school in the village. While he does help her make pastries every one in a while, his real job is to attract. Rowen was gifted—talented enough to make any improvised music of his bewitch those who passed (not literally). His looks weren’t all that bad either. While he adapted to most instruments, his favorite was the lyre. Rowen was stationed outside of the bakery from dawn to dusk, and he loved it. When he played he would be there physically, but his imagination wandered. It was a freeing feeling, not that he ever felt shackled.

People vehemently admired him. Rowen, however, was known to be elusive, borderline aloof—for he appeared to have more interest in plucking the strings of his lyre than he did in conversing with single women his age. His parents (delicately) questioned his sexuality, and Rowen had burst into laughter.

One of his many hobbies was to wander. Since double digits he had seen everything Heartfold had to offer, memorizing every alleyway, market, and street within his small town. It had grown rather dull. What was a musician without creativity? His imagination could only provide so much material. He needed new inspiration, and so, he up and wandered to the enchanted forest that bordered the Kingdom of Celdarel. The endlessly tall trees and unabated nature and life there was fascinating to him. The forest wasn’t ‘forbidden’, but it was heavily recommended to NOT enter. Resurgence wasn’t a guarantee. The only people who didn’t face any social consequences when entering were the Certified Hunters, responsible for obviously retrieving the food that sustains the people of Heartfold. But Rowen had been foolishly headstrong, and naturally curious since birth—a nightmare for his parents.

Rumor has it that the forest was lived in—home to fantastical beasts and nonhuman creatures that were both beautiful and terrifying, nesting in every tree hollow, hiding in any burrow in the soil.

The hunters themselves’ve claim that they’ve never seen anything that could pass those rumors off as anything more than myths.

It was common knowledge that any and all of those mythical creatures and super humans had been killed during what the kingdom called “The Trials”. They took place two centuries ago, and while they were portrayed as acts of heroism during the war between Celdarel and the kingdom of Myricias—a kingdom in the Southern continent, that was home to all of if not most of these nonhumans—it was anything but. Those who killed the most ‘monsters’ were granted noble or military titles by the King himself. Many of the current noble houses were given their power through these means.