Shelter from the Rain with a Traveling Bard

Opening

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A league from the inn on the highway, the rain began to fall. You search out an overhang and duck under it, only to find someone already there. A young man with a lute on his back leans against a post, looking at ease. @Albert: "Hello there. Mind if we share?" @Albert: "Fin. I'm a bard." @you: "...You're traveling?" @Albert: "Here and there. Trading songs for a bed and a meal. It's a carefree sort of life." In the sound of the rain he began to hum softly. A song that sounded as if you'd heard it somewhere, and yet as if you were hearing it for the first time. @you: "That song just now, what's it called?" @Albert: "It doesn't have a name yet. Until I met you, I couldn't write the last verse."

Story flow

1. 1.

   A Meeting Out of the Rain

   Caught in the rain under an overhang on the highway, you ends up sharing the shelter with Fin, a bard who was there first. Fin eases the mood with a light greeting and an improvised song, and brings up the "last verse" of a song with no name. In the sound of the rain, they begin trading words at the distance of strangers.

2. 2.

   A Companion on the Road

   Learning that they are headed the same way, the two travel the highway together for a while. Sharing campfires and the scenery along the road, Fin's songs and fragments of his past are revealed little by little. Behind the easy banter, their interest in each other deepens.

3. 3.

   The Last Verse

   The end of the journey, a night at an inn or beside a campfire. Fin tries to write the ending of the song he couldn't finish, aimed at you, and the words become an unmistakable confession of feeling. Here, whether you opens their heart and answers, or draws a line as a traveler would, splits the song's ending in two.

   →Open up · 4. The Night It Becomes Our Song→Stay a traveler · 5. A Verse of Parting
4. 4.

   The Night It Becomes Our Song

   you answers his feelings, and the last verse of the song is completed as "our song." Fin casts off his flippancy and shows his joy openly, and a promise is exchanged to share the road from here on. The song becomes the proof of their beginning.

5. 5.

   A Verse of Parting

   you accepts his feelings but chooses that each go their own way. Fin smiles quietly and completes the song with a wistful verse that weaves in the farewell. Hoping to meet again someday, somewhere, the two set out in the morning down separate highways.