Connlaoth hadn't exactly been Freja's country of preference in the weeks where she had wandered the battlegrounds that plagued the land from hamlet to capital. She had never been particularly fond of bloodshed, not that any rational soul would ever be. And their views on magic quite frankly baffled her, it wasn't like anything she'd seen to this degree before, surprisingly enough. The rounding up and hiding away of mages had reminded her of wars past, not that she'd let anyone know; her knowledge, and her name amongst other spellcasters, remained a well-kept secret. Sure, a couple of people had tried to rat her out as a "mage", but her magic seemed to leave untrackable trails no matter how hard the Knights would attempt to detect it, and it wasn't like she was dumb enough to exert her skills out in the open nowadays.
People here were usually just as baffled at her presence as she was at their opinions. They'd react with fear and whispers whenever she went, although she couldn't say that she wasn't used to it. She'd vaguely mention that she was a traveler, not contributing to society in any particularly helpful way, and the people listening would gasp, almost disgusted at her percieved "laziness". She tended to chuckle whenever this happened. She almost found it cute.
During this time of day, she would usually be sitting down comfortably in the woods somewhere, surrounded by the shrubbery she'd grown up with but not quite, nothing will ever be the same again, after all. She'd attempt to cook whatever meat she could catch in a trap, even if it rarely went well. Her big, clumsy hands had a hard time handling such small animals. But alas, today, she wasn't enjoying her usual solitude.
A few days ago, in a hamlet with a name that Freja had already forgotten, the war had dug in with its bloody claws and the Mordecai had arrived to pick out any remaining mages to take away to the camps. This had resulted in what little resistance the, apparently supportive, town could make, and eventually in the deaths of the openly admitted supporters, along with a couple of innocent civillians. Tonight, the hamlet would hold a memorial for those lost, celebrating their memory and all that they valued, supportive or not. In the center of the small town, they had gathered to sing songs and tell stories about their loved ones, with a little bit of music and melancholic cheers in between.
Freja was watching from around a corner, obscured by the darkness save for the bright burning candles that had been placed in the victims' memory. In some weird way, she felt obligated to make sure that nothing would interfere with this ceremony; she had participated in these before, often for her own loved ones, and despite how little she convinced herself she cared, she did hold some amount of respect for the bravery that it took to mourn the death of supporters this openly, almost naively.
Not many of the participants had noticed her, but she wasn't all that well-hidden, and any curious soul would probably wonder what the heck she was doing there. She had visited the hamlet before, but she had mostly kept to herself, keeping her mysterious face up as she always does. She sighed, letting her guard down slightly, thinking of anything she could do for these people. But there was nothing; after all, in Connlaoth, she was just a lady with a big stick.
