The air was softer here. Getting colder this time of year, but nowhere near biting like the kind that clung to the high ridges around Snowpeak Sanctuary. Here, the chill carried the scent of loam and grass, the quiet rhythm of the meadows breathing under an open sky. Eve walked with her hood down, the faint breeze teasing strands of pale hair against her cheek, her single silver eye turned toward the horizon.
Isari padded beside her in steady silence, paws making no sound in the grass. The silver-furred fox's ears twitched now and then, attuned to the wind and the rustle of the world.
For Eve, the path home felt both endless and fleeting. She knew every curve, every stone and wildflower that marked the way, yet it all felt different now, smaller somehow. Or perhaps she had simply become someone else.
She inhaled deeply, letting the scent of the earth and sky anchor her. The air was clean and familiar, and for a moment it soothed the ache that had been sitting behind her ribs for weeks. But memory came with it too, unbidden, sharp, and tender.
It had been so long since she had walked this way. Not since before the enclave, before the ceremony that had marked her knighthood. The galaxy had shifted, and so had she, but here... Here the world seemed to remain the same.
A hawk wheeled above, its cry echoing faintly through the blue. Eve’s gaze followed it for a moment before lowering again to the meadow that rolled gently toward the rise ahead. Her heart tightened when she saw it, the small hill that crowned the land before her childhood home.
She slowed as she climbed, her boots whispering through the thinning grass. Every step seemed to carry the weight of years. At the crest, she paused.
There it was.
The homestead. Weathered by wind and sun, roof patched in places, the same crooked fence along the front. Smoke drifted from the chimney in a thin, gray curl. And there, on the porch, a tiny speck at first, stood her mother.
Mariana was waving.
Eve froze. The sight struck her with a force she hadn’t expected. It was the same image from a lifetime ago: her mother waiting by the fence, calling out to her little girl trudging back from town with a basket of vegetables or scraps for supper. For a heartbeat, Eve could almost see that child again, barefoot, laughing, hair tangled by the wind.
Her throat tightened. A single tear slipped free before she even realized it, cold against her skin.
Isari gave a small, inquisitive whine and pressed her head against Eve’s hand.
Eve blinked, exhaled slowly, and smiled down at her companion.
"Yeah," she murmured, voice soft with affection. "Home."
Then, she descended the hill, toward the only place in the galaxy that had ever felt utterly hers.
