#lilfluff

This is a lot of firsts all piled up on each other, Ken... The girl stood up straight, running a hand through her hair again, trying desperately to tame it. The red curls were not listening to reason, no matter how much she wanted them to. Her eyes, the grey tinted more toward the blue of her sundress today, glared at the reflection in the dirtied mirror. First job away from home...first time living away from home...first time up on the hill...first real chance to do something that will really help the family out. It's about time I found a way to pull my own weight.

Not that her parents acted as if she owed them anything. They were a farming family, and she'd more then pulled her weight with the work and the chores. She'd harvested, sold the wares, helped cook and clean, and served and built-in nanny for her siblings over the years – the latter being something her mother certainly thanked her for daily.

But now she had finally found a job – and one that would pay well. This was something that might actually patch the hole in the roof of the barn...and for longer than one season.

“Sweetheart?” Her mother's voice was soft at the door. The girl turned, sighing at the woman – which got an amused chuckle from the latter. “Katherine Mckenna Darling, you look like an absolute princess.”

“Sure, if Cinderella lived on a farm.” She sighed. “You know I hate my full name.”

“I know. But that's how you'll be presented to the Dawes', and that's the name your father and I gave you.” Her mother swept in, all the poise and presence Kenna desperately wanted evident in her movements, and touched her hair. “May I?”

Kenna gestured vaguely. “I can't make it do anything. May as well.” As her mother began braiding her hair, Kenna closed her eyes. “How did you do it, Mom?”

“Do what, love?”

“Live up on the hill?” Her mother, Madeline, had been the youngest child of one of the most wealthy families in Tesoro, the Sanders family – until she'd run away to marry Kenna's father, Morgan Darling. Morgan was the middle child of a family of farmers, living off the land and barely making enough to scrape by.

“Generally, rather unhappily.”

“But you were used to it,” Kenna insisted. “You grew up on the hill.” The way that the city of Tesoro was arranged, the wealthiest families lived on the one major hill in the landscape, with the merchants living in the foothills and at the bases of hills, and the farmers and poorest of the city on the plains around it. The geography didn't make a great deal of sense, but Kenna hadn't been interested in learning the reasoning behind why her city looked the way it did.

“I did. And I hadn't liked it from the get-go.” Madeline tugged on Kenna's hair lightly, and the girl made a soft sound of protest. “So when I was old enough, I packed up and ran away. You know the story.”

“I do.” Kenna had asked to hear the story about how her parents had met time and time again. She knew that Madeline couldn't be thrilled about her daughter returning to the hill, but when asked, all she'd said was that “it was probably time that a child of this bloodline returned to her ancestral ground to claim the hill again as hers.”

Kenna didn't know what to make of that.

Madeline tied off the braid and rubbed her daughter's shoulders. “Nervous?”

“A little.” The look exchanged in the mirror's reflection spoke the exponential difference. “What if they don't like me?”

“They're the Dawes family, dear. They don't like anyone.” Madeline kissed her daughter's hair. “But inasmuch as they like anyone, I'm sure they'll like you.”

“You're sure?”

“Promise, my little fire.” Madeline gave her daughter a light hug, trying to keep the dress from wrinkling any more than it already had. “Ready?”

“I guess.”

“Your brother will get your bags. Go find your father?”

“Yes, Mother.” She took a breath, and walked outside toward the barn.