FANfiction. My first time in the TRC fandom.
He lived alone at the edge of the village, a teenage boy with nothing but a bow, a knife, and a quiet smile. He'd been there for years, but no one knew exactly how or why. He only entered the village once a month, to sell game and furs, and spent the rest of his time on his small plot of land. It had belonged to an old woman with no children or family, so no one was bothered by his silent assumption.
No one knew how he spent his evenings. Other villagers spent them with their families at home, or with their friends in the small tavern in the center of town. They didn't have many visitors, but there were some now, three men and a girl. The smallest man--he couldn't have been more than a teenager--kept his head covered under the hood of a cloak. The other two were interesting enough to take the attention off of him anyway; one wore light colors and an eye patch, and the other wore nothing but black clothing and a scowl. The girl was lovely and sweet, and it was obvious that her companions adored her.
The boy-from-nowhere had been in the village the day the visitors had arrived. In fact, he was the first person they met, and--unknown to the villagers--the reason the young-man-who-was-visiting kept his face covered. People might become suspicious of the boy-from-nowhere if it were discovered that one of the strange visitors looked exactly like him.
He spoke to the visitors that day, told them where to go to find rooms, and then left the village. The visitors asked about him, but no one could tell them anything except that he seemed content to stay by himself in the small cottage. When asked about the original owner, the visitors were told about an old woman who'd never left the house she'd been born in. She lived with her brother and his lover, and they'd died only a year before her. Since neither she nor her brother had ever had any children--his lover had been male--there'd been no one to inherit the property when the last of the small family had died. They'd been old and had seemed content with their lives.
One old man had known the woman since she'd been a child; his own wife had been her friend. He told the visitors that she'd always seemed like she was waiting for someone. He supposed that that was why she'd never married, that she sensed that there was someone else for her.
That night, the young-man-who-was-visiting sat outside the cottage and watched through the windows. He saw the boy-from-nowhere talking to a girl his own age. She was lovely and sweet and looked exactly like the visiting girl. The young-man-who-was-visiting noted that she was also rather see-through.
Somehow comforted, he told his companions what he'd seen. They continued on their journey the next day.