Return of the General's Daughter

After tidying up the space and sweeping away the dust left by time and absence, Lara moved quietly into the open-air kitchen, sleeves rolled and hair tied back. She had decided to take charge of dinner. The day’s hunt had been generous—Alaric’s men returned with rabbits, a plump jungle fowl, a dozen fish from fishpond nearby.

Lara set to work with practiced hands, skinning, slicing, seasoning. The scent of crushed herbs and slow-roasting meat soon began to drift through the glade like a soft invitation.

Freya, watching her daughter move with such quiet skill and purpose, felt a tug in her heart. She stepped forward, offering to help—perhaps out of habit, or perhaps to bridge the gap time had placed between them. At first, Lara gently protested, urging her mother to rest and enjoy the mountain’s peace. But Freya insisted.

And so, mother and daughter moved side by side in the simple kitchen, cleaning fish, chopping vegetables, stirring broth. There were no palatial kitchens here, no servant bells or polished silver, only the warmth of firelight and the sound of laughter mixing with the sizzle of meat on the pan. For a few hours, they weren’t a lost daughter and a distant mother—they were simply family.

That evening, the group gathered around a large wooden table beneath the hanging boughs of the ancient tree. As twilight deepened into night, fireflies blinked lazily in the dark, and the stars emerged one by one in the endless sky overhead.

After dinner, Freya insisted on sharing Lara’s room so Alaric could used Reya’s room. But that was an excuse. She just wanted to have more bonding time with her daughter.

Freya lay down that night with a strange and unexpected contentment. The room smelled of mixed herbs. Outside, the wind whispered through the leaves, and in the distance, the waterfall hummed its eternal lullaby. This place—untouched, serene, and cradled in the arms of the mountain—was unlike any place she had ever known. If given a choice, she thought, she would gladly leave the noise and weight of city life behind to live out her days here. There was peace in the wild.

Freya recoiled at first. The thought of wild animals—wolves, no less—sharing a room with her was enough to make her skin crawl. But then the pups whimpered softly, looked up at her with eyes so full of longing that Freya felt her resistance dissolve like mist in the morning sun. With a sigh, she sank back into the bed and murmured, "You may stay."

She drifted off to sleep to the warmth of the hearth’s last embers and the gentle breathing of the wolves beneath her.