I Will Be the Greatest Knight
Chapter 126: Good Morning

Chapter 126: Good Morning

The prior day was by far the most painful. However, Irene woke up feeling somewhat better and surrounded by warmth. Her father had used hard wood in her fireplace that burnt all throughout the night without failure.

Considering her family was close by, Irene decided she ought to visit them while she could. The rest of the winter would certainly be busy for her. She would have to grow a thick outer skin once she left her family’s home and press on.

Curiosity caused her to put a thick outer shirt on so she could wander downstairs and see if someone had made something to eat. She felt unbelievably hungry, knowing she had been skipping meals but she had simply not had the appetite to consume anything.

When she entered the kitchen where a small table was set up so they wouldn’t have to heat a whole dining hall, she saw her parents already sitting and enjoying an early meal. It was mostly preserved fruits, bread, and sausage, but Irene was ravenous and anything sounded like heaven.

"Good morning," Arthur first greeted her.

"Are you feeling better?" Rochelle wondered.

"Much better. Although now I’m starving."

Arthur pulled out a chair for his daughter and the one maid left who stayed with them all winter was quick to give Irene a portion of the food she had been preparing. She also brought Irene the same tea she had the night before.

Only a few minutes were spent eating before Arne wandered into the kitchen, rubbing the tiredness out of his eyes. He paused and scrunched his eyebrows in confusion.

"What are you doing here?" he wondered.

"Am I not allowed to visit my family?" Irene shot back.

"You haven’t before, so why would you now?" Arne responded before taking his side of the small table and sitting down with a groan.

"If you must know, I’m here to visit grandmother," she responded. "Don’t you worry. I will be out of here as soon as I possibly can."

"Why don’t you stay a while?" Arthur asked. "It isn’t as if there is much to do for apprentices in the winter."

"I don’t think Sir Gunnar would take kindly to that," Irene admitted. "I don’t want to receive special treatment just because of who my father is."

Arthur sighed but he had a small smile on his face.

"Yet I wish you would take advantage of that fact more often," he admitted. "In the meantime. I will take care of the horses. Would you like to leave soon?"

"You’re both going?" Irene asked, recalling her mother saying she would also go the night prior.

"I won’t let my two ladies go by themselves," Arthur objected. "The roads are tough in early winter when the ground isn’t frozen solid."

"Hey, I want to go as well," Arne insisted. "Why am I not invited?"

Irene’s parents looked to her for that much. Since their grandmother gave both children the same education about Sünstoian customs, the moment he saw the tattoo being drawn on the girl’s skin, he would understand their true reason for being there.

"I don’t care," Irene relented with a sigh. "Whoever wants to go can go."

The rest of breakfast was mostly done in silence, especially after Arthur, the most talkative amongst the Litharions, was off in the stables and handling the horses.

Since Rochelle was already ready to leave except for her outer layer, Irene and Arne disappeared to the upper levels of the house and got into clothing suitable for riding.

When it came to anyone besides Rochelle visiting Kara, she expected them on horseback. To that day, she still rode a horse on her own and didn’t think there was any excuse to ride in a carriage—not even winter was a good enough excuse.

Knowing as much, that meant three horses were taken, with the kids on their own and Arthur using a strong warhorse that could hold both his and Rochelle’s weight because he wasn’t going to force his wife to go on her own when she was always so cold.

When the family was ready on horseback, they took to the township that was as empty as when Irene visited the evening before. Except for smoke rising out of the chimneys, there wasn’t a single person out on the streets. However, there was evidence of footprints in the snow whenever someone was forced to retrieve water from a well or check on animals.

Kara’s small house was located outside of the township in the long grasses of the foothills that went towards the mountains. It was the place the northern mountains bowed inward towards the valley. Kara preferred to remain close because she liked climbing the mountains. After all, that’s where some of the herbs she required as a Völna were since the landscape was closes to what lay further north. Despite her quiet worship, she was as active as she always was in the religious practices of Sünsto.

There was a small patch of trees that separated Kara’s home on the foothills from the rest of the township. They had to navigate around this before climbing up the hill slowly. Fortunately, the horses were well-prepared to travel through the snow after living in Chemois their entire lives.

As the house came closer, Irene’s eyebrows rose and she pulled the scarf that covered the lower half of her face.

"You really outdid yourself with renovating this place," Irene complimented as their horses slowed. "It really looks as if it could stand for a bit longer. Hopefully, it isn’t leaking."

Arthur let out a light sigh.

"Yes, hopefully," he responded. "Although she still wouldn’t leave this place even if the entire place was full of water."

The knight’s light brown eyes scanned along the edge of the roof and he didn’t see any other flaws that had formed with the heavy snow. He then reached upward and helped Rochelle off of the horse they rode together, placing his hands on either side of her waist as he led her to the ground.

She never had to learn how to be physically tough with such a doting husband.

To none of their surprise, there were a lot of footprints in the snow around the house, leading to the well, up the hill a way, and in the general vicinity of the place. The woman refused to be inactive no matter what anyone told her.

Arthur walked to the door and gave a quick knock.

"It’s open!" Kara called.

To their surprise, her voice was easily heard and, when they walked into the cold one-room house, they were surprised to see her windows were open.

"Mother...?" Arthur questioned, though he had to trail off because anything else he could say was most likely disrespectful.

Rather than question anything, he simply walked through the house and shut all of the windows before covering them with the wool curtains he himself had installed so she wouldn’t freeze through the winter and fall ill again.

Kara didn’t move from where she sat on a pillow in the center of the room. There was a low table in front of her covered in candles and a few strange mana stones. In her hand was a red mana stone that was likely keeping her warm since she was letting all the heat in the house out through open windows.

She grinned.

"Hello," she greeted, but then she noticed an additional visitor compared to normal. "Irene?" the old woman asked. "What brings you all the way out here? I thought you were off training to be a knight."