Hidden among the rafters of the first floor were Noble and her youngest child.
Instantly, Blaze jumped from his perch to tackle his sister, but she stepped to one side. The boy glided to the couch under his mother's guidance.
Rain, on the other hand, was lifted into the air and found the waiting arms of the person she had come to see.
The young woman buried her face in Noble's wavy hair.
"Mom!"
Child of Promise held on to her daughter as if their lives depended on it.
"Rainy."
Noble held her breath, waiting for Rain's full reaction to her reappearance. Last time that the mother had been gone for an extended period, the reunion had been bittersweet.
This time, however, there was nothing bitter about it.
"I've missed you," Rain said quietly.
"Not as much as I've missed you," Noble assured her.
The younger woman accepted the words as fact, deepening the hug.
"I have a lot to tell you."
Noble chuckled softly. "Me too."
"Mom was just showing us her new Memory," Blaze pointed to the needles currently disappearing into a rain of sparks.
"New Memory?" Rain tilted her head.
Noble laughed as she lowered them both back to the floor.
"I got a couple of them on my journey."
"Your mission, you mean." The dark-haired girl narrowed her gaze. "We don't buy that it was a sabbatical. You would never leave us that long just for a rest."
Noble nodded. "I wouldn't, you are right."
"So you were on a mission!" Brock's eyes lit with excitement. "Oh! Was it dangerous?"
"About as dangerous as taking on a whole city full of Skinwalkers to save a man and his son. So, about average." The mother reflected on how
"Tell us all about it!" Brock pulled his mother back to the living room.
"The parts you can tell at least," Blaze added.
"I was still greeting your sister," Noble started, but Rain shook her head.
"It's fine, Mom. I want to hear it too."
Noble's stomach growled, and she covered it with her hand.
Fort took the cue. "Perhaps your mother can explain it over breakfast. It will be ready soon."
Sniffing at the air, Noble felt her stomach rumble again. She grinned. "Now that's a good idea. The last time I ate, the negotiations I was in were strained to say the least. I didn't get to eat much."
The family convened around the table, and Fort laid out the dishes for them to enjoy. Everything looked delicious!
"Sarai brought over some eggs yesterday—I assume you asked her to check on us while you were away—and the meat is from one of Rain's recent conquests."
The father dipped his head at Rain, who beamed.
"Oh?" Noble glanced at the food and then at her daughter.
"I have more back at my place. I'll bring it over later so we can have a proper celebration for dinner." The young woman nodded.
"You've been very busy while I've been away, then." Noble took a bite. "And found some high-quality meat too!"
"Rain has been bringing in quite the haul," Fort confirmed.
"I'll have to show you some of the things I've been working on. I've gotten much better at making traps." The young woman straightened her back.
"I can't wait to see what you have done. Maybe I'll learn a thing or two."
"Rain caught so much last week that Sarai's business partner bought some of her meat for their restaurant the other day."
While Fort might still occasionally struggle with how often Rain put herself in harm's way, he was immensely proud of the results of her labor. A mundane who regularly hunted and killed Nightmare Creatures was an inspiration. With people like his daughter pioneering the Dream Realm, the future held some promise.
"It was just a little money, hardly worth mentioning," Rain blushed.
She knew that she would get more money from bounties, but a side business in the meat market was an interesting proposition.
"If it's not worth mentioning, then let's get back to mom's adventure. Who did you save and how?" Brock spoke around a bite of food.
"It must have been quite an assignment to be gone so long." Blaze chewed his eggs eagerly.
"A lot of that time was traveling. While I cannot reveal names and places, I will say that I was sent to help three sisters…"
"What was so special about them that they needed you?" Brock was shushed by his elder sister.
Noble chuckled. "What was special? They had a lot of people depending on them for survival."
"Like the Song Sisters? Don't tell us you were helping the Song Sisters?!" Blaze imagined all the possibilities.
"Don't worry, I wouldn't tell you." Noble winked. "These sisters had a problem: a big problem where a darkness was taking over their territory. And the solution they found led to an even bigger problem. They unwittingly released an entire army of humanoid monsters…."
"So you had to fight them off?" Brock's fork suddenly became a stabbing trident.
"Are you going to let mom tell the story or not?" Rain huffed.
"It's fine," Noble patted her daughter's arm. "Yes, I had to fight them off, but thankfully I wasn't alone. I had capable fighters with me. We destroyed the object that was releasing the monsters, and we killed a dragon and a whole nest of spiders in the process. Oh, and before that, I killed a catlike creature. Helios is much more handsome, though."
Noble had also found a sweet sea, a Realm in the reflections of Bastion, and discovered parts of the Doom War.
That wasn't even considering what she had discovered about the Spell and the Dream Realm…
"And the sisters, they are alright now?" Rain could not forget the three women whom her mother had gone to help.
"When I left, two of them were reuniting. The third did not make it. Not all of our people did either." Noble felt Fort's emotions spike.
He grabbed her hand and squeezed it gently. She rubbed his fingers gently with her thumb. She would tell him everything later.
"Well, I am glad you made it out alive," Rain's dark eyes again shimmered with tears. "I'm not ready for you to go. Now or ever!"
"I'll drink to that!" Fort lifted his cup of water. "To my beautiful wife."
The rest of the family followed suit.
"To mom!" The children echoed.
The shadows by the window shifted, drawing Noble's eye. She smiled.
"Thank you. Thank you all."
The group dug into their food in earnest. Noble was happy to hear all the news.
Rain had three significant catches in the past couple of weeks. She was excited to try out a new trap very soon, though she was a little vague on her target.
Brock was training extra hard to get in shape. He dragged his twin along with him most mornings and had gotten buff enough that he was mistaken for some of the legacies, which pleased him greatly.
Blaze had been working hard on how geothermal power might work in the Dream Realm. Fort had assured him many times that the best minds were working on bringing electricity to this magical land, but Blaze insisted he needed to do his part. Fort had secretly passed off some of the calculations to the waking world to be looked over. The kid was ambitious, but that didn't automatically make his work wrong.
As for Fort, he had been keeping a watch on the development of Ravenheart. He had kept up his communications with Lena and sent the letters that Noble had prewritten in her absence until the matriarch had told him she knew that Noble wasn't home. That had been embarrassing.
But most often, he had spent his evenings checking the Memory Noble had left behind before going on her journey. As long as it was still present, his wife was still alive and would be coming home.
Now she was here.
Fort opened his mouth to tell her once again how glad he was to have her back when there was a knock at the door.
The family had a visitor.