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Roo loved her little slice of land. She probably said it every day, but she loved it. The quiet, the skies at night. It was nowhere close to being finished; the house was finished enough that she could live in it, but the barns needed work and her forge needed major updates. But it was all hers, and there was no one to bother her out here. Well, aside from her friends and customers.
Roo glanced at her paddock from her spot in the kitchen, hands deep in a soapy sink filled with dishes. She would admit, living here had softened her to the chores that came with owning your own house. She watched as Bow pranced around the paddock, tail flagging as she went. Logan stood, stock still and confused in the middle, watching as his pasture mate followed the fence line. Roo smiled while watching them, two extreme opposites interacting. A few clients’ horses moseyed around the second paddock. Her eyes landed on the grey horse standing at the edge of the paddock, eyes, and ears pointed towards the town. Her heart sank.
Cloud wasn’t miserable per se without Daine, but she knew the horse longed for his owner. He was making leaps and bounds in his recovery, but still, he wasn’t all there. Sometimes she would catch him calling out, his whinnies echoing across the flats.
Bow’s sharp whinny caught Roo from her thoughts, and she glanced over to the redheaded mare. The horse was stamping her feet at the gate, staring directly at the window. Roo glanced at the sky; dark clouds were rolling on the horizon.
“Fine, I’m coming,” Roo groaned, pulling her hands out of the water and drying them on her apron. Another domestic thing that crept up on her. This one was a gift from Louisa and Lisa, a plain cloth one as a housewarming gift. Roo had thanked them profusely but hung it away with no intention of using it. It was after she had soaked four shirts in a row cleaning that she gave up and started using it.
Roo hung the apron as she stood in the little mudroom, grabbing her jacket and stepping out into the yard. Bow whinnied again, this time to greet her. Roo flapped a hand at her horse, moving towards the barn to set up dinner.
Bow almost ran her over in excitement as Roo brought her in. Logan followed in a quieter excitement, not jigging like his counterpart but still walking faster than normal. Both ate their mash like they’d never eaten before, something Roo always teased her horses about.
Even though there was a shelter in the client paddock, as Roo had started to call it, she still brought Cloud in every night. He got his own stall, across from her two, which was larger than the other two. Roo wondered if the original owner of her land used to breed horses, but it did not matter. She preferred Cloud in the bigger stall since he was a bigger horse who was used to being outside for more of his life. She closed the big grey horse in, watching as he ambled to his feed bucket and delicately began eating.
“Daine will be back soon before you know it, I promise,” she told the horse. He nickered softly to her, and his sad eyes conveyed enough.
She finished tossing the last of the hay to the client horses, making sure the shelter was well stocked with water, before heading to her house. She grabbed an armful of wood as she made her way back, dropping it unceremoniously on the floor by the fireplace. Once her coat was hung up, she restacked the wood next to the fireplace, grimacing at the bark chunks all over her floor. She was going to have to sweep that up now.
Dinner was always her own quiet affair. Her cooking skills were better than they used to be; she was no chef, but she could hold her own. Roo sighed as she crumpled onto the sofa in front of the fire, a mug of coffee held tight in her hands. The storm had finally hit, rain lashing the north side of the house. The sounds of the rain combined with the crackling of the fire lulled her into a relaxed state. Her eyes lazily followed the fire in front of her, her mind wandering again.
A knock, sharp on her side door, startled Roo out of her mind. Roo glanced to the clock on the mantle before placing her coffee down and heading for her door.
“Linda?”
The dark-haired girl blinked behind her rain-splattered round glasses, and a smile grew on her face.
“What, miss me?”
Roo grinned and threw her arms around her visitor, disregarding how soaked she was.
“Miss you?! It’s been almost four weeks since your last letter.” Roo ushered Linda in, closing the door behind her. Linda hung her coat up beside Roo’s, raising an eyebrow at the state of Roo’s tiny mudroom.
“Never mind that, how is the case doing? I thought you had another two weeks before the judge settled?” Roo hurriedly ushered her to the parlor, making a mental note to clean her mudroom. Linda sat in the recently vacated sofa. Roo took the opposite end, curling her legs underneath her.
“It’s just, well, stuck.” Linda groaned, leaning back against the arm. “Dark Core left a paper trail a mile wide and long, so the trial technically hasn’t even started yet.” She toed off her boots, stretching her feet, and sighed at the warmth from the fire. Linda started pulling pins out of her hair, her tight and immaculate bun falling as she did so. Roo watched, transfixed by the movements, while Linda’s voice faded into the background. She remembered why she had fallen in love with this girl. The firelight set Linda’s eyes almost on fire, gold glowing in her irises. Her dark hair now flowed down her back, coiling and trying to return to its former state. Roo sighed, lost in thought again.
“...and without her, Dark Core can legally try to claim the lands of New Jorvik!”
Roo jolted back to reality, blinking at Linda, who was now up and pacing, her socked feet making no noise on the wooden floor. Roo leaned forward, eyes still following the lawyer.
“I’m sorry, without who?”
Linda spun easily on her heel, scoffing.“Anne Von Blyssen. She’s technically the heiress to the whole of New Jorvik. Her parents bought the land, allowing the townspeople to move and build here.” Linda had reached the other end of the room, and she spun, her skirts flying like a fan with the motion. “And her parents recently passed, which I highly suspect was planned, but no one can find Anne. So if no one can find her, the ownership of New Jorvik reverts to the largest landholder, and technically as of right now, Dark Core still owns a large portion of the land surrounding New Jorvik.”
“So, without this Anne woman, Dark Core can take back New Jorvik?” Roo’s voice rose, the full weight of Linda’s words hitting her. Linda nodded, spinning again as she hit the opposite side of the room.
“Exactly. We already drove them out once, we can’t let them have it a second time.”
“So where the hell is this Anne?”
Linda shrugged, still pacing. “I’m not sure, honestly. She used to be friends with me and Lisa and another girl when we were kids.” Linda paused, and a faraway look crossed her face. “We were all best friends, used to take trail rides together when we were young,” she said softly. Roo stood and put a hand on her shoulder.
“What happened to her?” Roo asked. Linda gave her a hopeless look.
“I’m not sure really. She went to travel with her parents to survey more land, much to her disagreement, and there was a raid.” Linda turned away and wrapped her arms around her chest. “They took her and her horse, and they robbed Anne’s family. They barely made it back alive. Her parents set up a massive reward, but no one ever laid claim to it. The town sent out search parties, and they never found Anne, only her horse, who was badly injured. He didn’t survive.”
Roo reached out again, but this time Linda threw herself into Roo, wrapping her arms tightly around her.
“How much time do we have before the judge turns this over to Dark Core?” Roo asked, her chin resting on Linda’s shoulder. Linda sighed, her shoulders dropping with the released breath.
“Twenty days, even if we can find her. Roo, she’s been gone for almost five years; she’s most likely dead.” Linda pulled away and returned to her spot on the couch.
“Who looked for her the longest?” Roo moved to stand by the fireplace, resting an arm on the mantle. Her eyes lingered on the photo tucked to the side of her and her parents, a buck-toothed, plain-clothed 10 year old with braided hair. Her parents in their contrasting, elaborate outfits, still looking down at her fondly.
“Alex Cloudmill. They were the closest; she looked for three years before giving up.” Linda played with the pins in her lap absentmindedly. “She never believed Anne was dead.”
Roo nodded as she took in the information, memorizing the name before striding into the kitchen and putting on the kettle. She returned with a steaming mug of tea, which she shoved into Linda’s hands. The lawyer was a little shocked, and she practically squawked when Roo pulled her up and swept her arms under Linda’s legs.
“ROO!” Linda clutched her tea to her chest, watching it carefully so she wouldn’t spill the boiling liquid, and threw her other arm around Roo’s neck for balance. Roo walked to her spare bedroom and carefully deposited Linda on the bed. She put her hands on her hips, daring Linda to get up with her eyes.
“You need sleep; you rode all the way from Port Jor to here, and your case is mentally exhausting. There is a spare nightgown in the dresser, and there are extra blankets in the crate under your bed.” Roo leaned down to slide a crate out, showing the blankets. “Now, I’m assuming your horse is out in my paddock, so I’m going to go make sure he is comfy, and if you’re going to try to work on any of your case materials, I will slap you.”
Linda blinked in shock at Roo.
“When did you become a mother hen?” she asked. Roo stopped in the doorway, and her shoulders dropped.
“Since owning my own house and having people coming to me with their issues,” Roo mumbled, pushing loose strands of hair back from her forehead.
As Roo assumed, Meteor was huddled under the shelter with the other client horses. Roo grabbed his bridle and the two ran for the barn, rain pelting them with each step. It took Roo a moment to get the door open, but once it was, Meteor rushed in, and Roo slammed the door behind him. The horses inside sleepily nickered at the two of them, and Roo could hear Bow slamming her feed pan, already thinking it was dinner time again. Roo sighed at the noise. Her mare was ridiculous.
“Here you go, you old nag,” she muttered to her horse, tossing in a small handful of grain to satisfy the chestnut mare. Bow inhaled the small amount of grain faster than a horse should be able to eat it. Roo sat down in the hay. She picked a piece up and twirled it around.
The name Anne Von Blyssen rang a bell. A minor one albeit, but a bell.
“I still wonder where you get all this stuff , Willow,” Roo muttered, admiring some of the finer wares in the back of the store. Willow just smiled.
“I have friends in high places.”
The bell above the door rang, and her smile dropped. “Excuse me one moment.” Roo nodded, still caught up in admiring some of the newer materials. Willow swept gracefully to the front of the store, and Roo continued to search for new materials to add to her weapons. Maybe she needed a new carving knife.
She could hear a quiet , heated discussion behind her, but she knew better than to turn around and listen. Privacy was something Willow valued above all else.
“...Anne can shove it, I’m not some fancy wares dealer who can make elaborate dresses to satisfy a princess,” Willow hissed loudly. Roo paused at the unfamiliar name that dropped from Willow’s lips ; Anne wasn’t a common name around here. There was more rustling, and the bell jangled again. Willow returned, stuffing something into the apron of her dress.
“Now, where were we?”
Roo blinked at the memory, the pain returning hard and fast to her chest. Willow knew Anne. Of course! Roo leaped up, startling Bow in the process, and began to pace back and forth. Of course, Willow would have known of Anne; anyone would be blind not to see that Dark Core could have had a hand in kidnapping Anne. And if Willow had known of her, and talked about her—
“She’s still alive!” Roo whirled around to her horse, who snorted. “That’s it, Bow! If we can get the rest of the money to finish the forge and save Linda’s case!” Bow flattened her ears. “And Willow is the key! I gotta go pack!” Roo pressed a quick kiss to her horse’s nose, which she later realized she never would have done a year ago, and darted out of the barn.
She ran into the house, leaning her back to the closed door, her chest heaving.
“We’re going on an adventure,” Roo whispered to the empty room. Only the fire crackled in reply.