story outline
Her name is Tatyana, he comes from a family of witches, her mother is a well accomplished witch and so are her sisters, even her baby sister is talented at reading the future in the patterns of mice, but her own magic is kind of... stunted, some times it doesn't even seem to exist, so she goes on a quest to find the witch who commands her covern, he's really powerful and she hopes he'll be able to fix her magic. Tatyana is a very bright and bouncy girl, roughly 17 (not made up my mind yet) but most of her apparent happiness is a cover for her feelings of ineptitude.His name is Marion, he was a soldier, there isn't any mysterious war going on in their story, which is a novelty for me, but there is discontent in some areas and he got injured in a riot and lost his leg, he was on his way home to his family when he met Tatyana and he told her he was scared that his wife would be disgusted by him or would think he was useless without his leg, and Tatyana talks him into going with her. Marion is shaken up by the loss of his leg and Tatyana helps him recover mentally from it.It's a bit of a Wizard of Oz story... Going on a quest and over coming stuff only for neither of them to actually get their wishes granted, only Tatyana does strengthen her magic by going on the quest, in the end Marion goes back to his family with him all happy that he's not useless thanks to what happened on the quest, but his wife doesn't see that and just panics that now he's just another mouth to feed that can't pull his own weight, and Marion leaves. Tatyana sees him trying to catch a train and goes back to his wife to find out what the hell happened, gives her a long lecture and goes after Marion.Eventually he finds a home with Tatyana's family helping the witches with their home business.
Personality notes
Tatyana: warm and caring, over compensates for her lack of magical skills, she feels inadequate and useless but acts happy-go-lucky to make up for it, she's the kind of person who just wants to help /everyone/ but sometimes gets so down over her lack of skill she doesn't realise there are other ways to help people. She's saddened by Marion's situation and spends a good deal of energy on keeping his spirits up, often at a cost.Marion: was in charge of a small group of men keeping tabs on an unruly part of a currently unnamed city, he lost his leg when there was a riot. Initially in shock he's still very quiet and almost mute when he meets Tatyana on the train home, he's brave but needs to be reminded of that fact, he's a doting husband and kind if a little stuffy and proper. He suffers from a reoccurring nightmare of the riot and is sinking into depression as he doesn't know how to support his family. He knows he's dragging Tatyana down, but it takes a lot for him to fight back and support her as much as she supports him, when he's finally able to it's really the start of them both recovering as now she has someone she can lean on when things get tough too, and being able to support someone again shows him he's not useless.He has a taste in dirty jokes that Tatyana blames on the army. His favourite animals are frogs, which is good when you're dealing with witches.