The dawn broke on a new day; the house was still standing; the infant hadn’t grown gnashing teeth or long claws, it really was a normal child far as they could see, still, Redmond couldn’t help but give him side-eye, he seemed to grow even overnight, its hair started to come in more fully, so light it could hardly be seen on his pale skin, and then Redmond’s thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door from his sister's room opening.

“You don’t need to look at him like that, he’s just a normal healthy little baby boy” Aida picked him up, almost glowing with joy over him still being there and not being some monster.

“We are gonna need to give you a name now don’t we, lets talk to your new daddy about that huh, that make you happy.”

The infant didn’t really understand her but being held close in her warm embrace still made him giggle. Aida put him in a sling she had fashioned the night before and carried him with her to the kitchen to start on breakfast

After the rest of the family awoke and dressed themselves, they started on the conversation, everyone wanted to have. “So what is his name then? How about Ava Jr? Since I’m not the baby anymore…” she still felt a little worried about her place as the youngest who was doted on by the rest of them.

“No, sweetie, we already have enough trouble with all the A names. I think we should go with an H for your father since he will be our little baby boy. ”

“Well, if you’re gonna give the honor to me… Hargrave?”

“It sounds like a mean man's name.” Amber chimed in.

“Harlow Jr.?”

“We don’t want to confuse anyone, daddy,” and finally Autumn

After 10 more minutes of back and forth about how he doesn’t have good sense for naming but none of the girls wanting to take the chance to name the boy from their father and some less than subtle ribbing from Redmond, breakfast was over.

“Harlan?”

Silence fell, then the whispering started, and then the girls all together agreed.

“Yeah, that's a nice name.”

“Well, with that done, you can all help clear the table now while your mother watches little Harlan.”

Groans across the table rang out while Redmond just smirked

“That means you too, dear brother.”

And with a final grumble the house went to work, Ava went to gather the eggs from the hens, Amber went to fill their waterers and troughs for the rest of the animals, and Autumn went to let the sheep graze in the woods with Redmond along to make sure she was safe.

“So Redmond… since as you said I’ll be a woman in a few years, does that mean you will teach me some magic finally?” after a little chin rubbing, he decided

“Alright, long as you don’t tell your mother I’ll say you’ve grown up enough to handle more than just pushing mana into items, lets start with learning how to sense mana, I’ll make a little earth wall so the sheep don’t wander while I teach you.”

In a little over 5 minutes, a series of 3-foot tall pillars were spaced out to cover 100 feet around them done, just enough to make the sheep think twice about running off into a wolf's mouth.

“Go sit over in the patch of grass in the sun there, and I’ll explain, for a start you are going to learn to sense mana and practice that until I visit next time, just sit down, cross your legs, and feel, the wind on your skin, the heat of the sun, the cold of the stone, the morning dew on still stuck to the grass, close your eyes to see the darkness, the nothing that is there, now don’t freak out but I’m gonna use some mud magic to cover your eyes and ears, it will help you to not think as much about what's far away, think only of the stuff that right here, that's touching you right now, I’ll watch the sheep and shake you when its time to head back.”

So she sat, the cool mud on her head made her anxious for just a short time, then she stilled and just… felt, the sun almost burning to her, the wind like little daggers, the stone felt like ice even in late spring, she felt almost drowned by dew, the darkness was closing in, she felt it watching her, like there was something just beyond her sight in there, stalking her, she wanted to scream but felt like she didn’t know how anymore and then… she heard something through even the layer of mud on her ears, she smelled burning flesh, she remembered how to scream then, she clawed at the mud on her head trying to get it off, only to see once her eyes were clear that she was underground… or not? A small dome covered her, her uncle's magic.

After a few minutes the dome crumbled and she saw what happened outside, 10 small bodies destroyed, if their torsos weren’t still attached to every one of them she would never know how many of them there really were, one missing half its head, clearly a rock was used on it, one eye far to large and dark to be human still dangling out of its socket, she vomited at the sight of it, then the full stench hit her and she lost her breakfast once again, 3 of them clearly burned, a fireball had hit in the middle of them judging by which parts of them were charred down to the bone, another with a pattern on its body, hit by lightning, she’d see it happen to a cow once, it lived though, this thing didn’t, finally her uncle spoke to calm her down.

“you’re safe now, They got one of the sheep with a sharp stone but that's all, really sorry about all this, I know the first time you sense can be hard and this doesn’t help, but the goblins showed up out of nowhere, must’ve been adapted judging by the skin.” he poked at the bark like grown on the tiny arm with a stick.

She would’ve thrown up again, but she was empty of all by acid, she knew they weren’t human, they were just monsters, she had seen her father take out a few of them with an axe once when they tried to take chickens, but seeing them like that after sensing for the first time was too much for a child only 10 years of age.

“Let's get you back home. You can ride on my back the whole way.”

She finally dried her eyes and headed back, thinking of how magic really was, of what her uncle really does out in the frontier.

Getting back home to her parents was easy and quiet. What followed was… less so…

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN TAUGHT HER TO SENSE OUT THERE, SHE’S TOO YOUNG, AND GOBLINS, REALLY?” after 5 minutes of Aida chasing Redmond with a wooden spoon and shouting at him little Harlan finally woke up and she stopped to calm him, yet another thing to blame on her foolish younger brother..

“It's not really my fault. She was completely safe. A group of goblins are nothing, and I saved almost the entire flock anyway.” before his sister could start yelling again, Harlow stepped in.

“Honey, it’s fine really. When she gets older she is gonna need to deal with goblins on her own at some point. Maybe an early start on magic and seeing what it really does to monsters will make her take it seriously.” Aida finally simmered down and Harlan finally went back to sleep.

“And also we get mutton to dinner tonight!” Aida nearly said something but then saw Autumn still shivering crack a small smile and decided to hold her tongue.

Aida stayed by Autumn’s side the rest of the morning while Harlow and Redmond finished her chores for her, by noon Autumn was finally calmed enough to at least help some with the sheep that died, making sure the goblin's rock didn’t have any of their makeshift poisons and that nothing inside the sheep ruptured and tainted the meat.

They had a nice hearty lunch and supper that night. The rest of the mutton was hung to dry. Redmond even helped pull some moisture out of it.

And the last 2 days of Redmond’s leave came and went with no more troubles, and like that they gave him a nice send off, back to the frontier, back to the place with all the stories he never told so he didn’t worry them any more than they already were, they wouldn’t hear of his participation in culling operations, where they were too late, the towns who put in the request was already gone, bodies left half eaten in the street, they wouldn’t hear of the orcs tribal warfare tainting lands with void, or the children playing in the woods stepping in their traps, he left behind the joking uncle, and returned to the hardened soldier, who only hopes he can live long enough to get to see his nieces and his dear sister again.