"Mommy?" A small girl with red hair stood at the bedside, her hand clinging to the covers as he stared at the person laying down, the woman also had red hair and had similar looks, yet her face was pale and weak and looked emancipated.
"What is it dear?" The mother replied with a gentle smile.
"Where did Daddy go? He said he'd be back yesterday?" The little girl let off a worried look almost at the point of crying.
"He… He went away for a while; some work came up outside the village, so he had to go." The lady spoke reluctantly, she didn't know how to tell her child the truth.
"Work? But the other Dads came back home, but mine didn't? Hey, where is he?" The child was too sharp for her own good, she realised something was wrong but didn't know what.
"Nessa' you… Oh dear, come here" She held herself from crying, her half-assed lies weren't working, and she was almost breaking down from thinking of the truth, she pulled the small girl in to her embrace and hugged her tightly, though with her weak body it wasn't strong.
"You dad is… he's…" The words tried to travel to her mouth but stopped at the tip of her tongue, her heart felt like it was splitting in half as she tried to speak.
"Is Dad gone?" The red-haired little girl asked with bright eyes in her mother's embrace, surprising her like she'd taken an arrow through the heart, hearing the words she wanted to say easily roll off her daughters' tongue with ease gave her a slight fright.
She stared her daughter in the eyes and couldn't do anything else but nod while tears fell from her eyes.
"So, he's gone… The aunty next door said that when people went away, they were given another life full of happiness... I hope Dad is happy… but…" The little girl tried to smile but her face quickly fell into that of sadness.
"I- I didn't- didn't even get to say goodbye" She broke out in tears, the waterworks flooding her face like a broken dam as she moved into her mom's embrace to seek comfort, they both wept for an hour together as they tried to wash away their sorrows, after a good amount of time the mother moved the daughter in front of her.
She reached under her gown and her hand grasped the necklace hanging there, she held it out to her daughter before a wanting look passed over her face.
"Vanessa, my child, I want you to have this gem, you must look after it no matter what and if you have a child of your own one day, I want you to pass it on to them."
The little Vanessa looked at the clear red gem rolling about in her mothers' hand and grasped in her tiny palms before staring into it like she was enraptured.
"What is it?" The girl asked with wonder, she hadn't seen such a pretty gemstone before.
"I don't know" Her mother replied to her, leaving her bewildered, this was so important to her mom and yet she didn't know what I was?
Seeing her face full of confusion her mother smiled lightly and spoke: "We don't know where it came from, at least neither my grandmother nor my great grandmother had any idea, all we know is that our family has always held on to it as long as we can remember, and besides…" She lent forward and cupped the child's hands that were holding the gem inside hers.
"Don't you feel it? A connection to it, like it was part of you; It has to be something important!" She looked the girl in the eyes with a slight hint of flames in the depths of her gaze.
Feeling the gem in her hand, she felt like it gave off a slight warmth, her heartbeat at a steady pace and she could almost feel it resonating in her grasp which surprised her, she quickly tightened her grip and held it tight towards her chest.
"Mmm, it's warm" Vanessa replied while giving a little nod, as she gazed into the enchanting red the world seemed to blend together, fading to black.
When her eyes opened next what she saw was a wooden ceiling with dim light peaking in from outside, light rain pattered against the wooden frame of her house creating a peaceful echo.
She pulled herself up and realised the necklace was laying in her right hand, she had fallen asleep with it tight in her grasp, she sighed before holding it to her chest feeling its warmth like in her dream before placing it around her neck again and getting up while stretching.
She looked at the sky from the wooden slat window that was slightly open seeing the sun barely peeking over the horizon from behind the other buildings while rubbing her eyes.
'A little early, might as well gear up and go for a walk before my patrol starts' She thought, approaching the gear that was placed on the armour wrack at the side of the room before deciding to go wash her face since she had time.
She left her house and went to the pool next to it, all houses in the village had a pool of water with an active reservoir that spent minimal amounts of mana to gather water from the air due to the high humidity from the constant rain and mist.
Vanessa pooled the water between her palms and splashed her face, trying to wipe off the sweat from her sleep before pulling a crude towel from a storage unit near her and drying it, she wouldn't bother bathing until she returned from patrol since it took time to prepare a bath and even if she did, she'd need another by the time she returned.
After sitting by the reservoir and taking in the fresh morning air for a minute or two to clear her head she returned inside and started to gear up, the guard's armour was fairly standard leather with metal protectors over the heart and front of the head, she tied her wavy red hair in a side tail with a simple piece of string and let it hang over the shoulder before stepping towards the longsword that was mounted on the wall.
It was slightly longer and wider than your standard sword people would use these with a shield, about half a size larger; She grabbled the handle and lifted it off the mounting unit and easily shifted it to the unique sheathe on her back, it wasn't a traditional full body sheathe but one that used hooks and an open side so it could be drawn from her back easily, the sword was too long to hang from her waist otherwise.
After double checking all the fasteners on her gear and making sure her sword wasn't going to wantonly fall out due to bad placement, she left her house once more.
Rather than heading straight to the guard post she decided to take a walk around the outer district, it was still fairly early in the morning so it wasn't too lively but there were some people preparing to set up their stalls or business already, most of them older people since the young children usually live in the inner two sections with their families other than those in the guard.
She passed one of the bakers and smelt the scent of fresh bread wafting in to the street, she would grab a bite to eat but she was saving up her money for later on so she reluctantly dragged herself past, that is until a shout pulled her back.
"Hey! Little Nessa' aren't you up early today?" A moustached man spoke with a bright grin from the window of the bakery, this was Old Jose one of the best bakers in the village mostly coming from his countless years of experience.
Vanessa decided to have a walk over for a chat since she had time, she smiled and spoke: "Yeah I just felt like going for a walk in this wonderful morning" Putting her hand out and letting the light drizzle attempt to pool up in her palm before shaking it off.
"That's not good you know; you should be getting all the sleep you need when you have duty in the morning!" Jose said while flipping a piece of dough and slamming it on the chopping board.
"It's hard to sleep when something like 'that' happened only recently" She wryly smiled recalling what she could face today.
"Ah yeah, I heard about it; Terrible, but that old bastard had it coming to him eventually, he always kept dancing with fire rather than settling together with the rest of us" Jose replied with some distain, Redric wasn't ever really on the good side of the older generation so none of them really liked him.
"Even so for something like that to happen to him…" She hinted with a glimmer in her eyes.
"Pft, ever the fighter, aren't you? And here we all were wondering when you were going to settle down and start a family but now, I really doubt that will ever happen" He said jokingly, though he definitely didn't believe anyone in the village would be able to settle down with someone holding the title 'Fire under her feet'.
"Have you eaten yet?" He asked afterwards, striking her right in the weak point.
"Uh- No I-" She didn't really want to say she didn't have the money to spend on it since she felt it a bit shameful how much of a miser she was being.
"Don't wanna' spend the cash, eh? Don't worry we all know what you want to do, even if some people think you're crazy I say fuck em', do what you want girlie" Aggressively swearing at certain people in the village he turned back into his shop.
"Here, have some of this, it's a bit deformed but it's perfectly fine to eat, no need to pay you're risking yourself doing guard duty at this time, can't do it on an empty stomach!" He tossed a slightly deflated bun of bread towards Vanessa that she caught and stared at for a second and smiled brightly "Thanks Grandpa Jose!" She walked off towards her the guard barracks with a skip in her step.
"Don't call me 'Grandpa', at least make it 'Old Jose'! No wait that's just as bad, uncle, at least call me uncle!" He yelled from behind, he really didn't like being reminded of his age despite his nickname.