It was by a stroke of luck that Henry heard of the passing of his great aunt Mildred. He’d only met her a handful of times. He remembered her as a somewhat unhinged woman; she’d been widowed early in life, and was never quite the same after. Her estate was to be sent to auction, as she had no one to inherit it, when Henry got word. Without a second thought, he packed his family up and moved them as soon as his offer had been approved.
They’d been staying at a friend’s home for the past few months, as they tried to make sense of the wreckage at Heartsong, and attempted to clear the desolate land. Henry knew it would be years before they’d be able to fully rebuild, not to mention crop the land and turn a profit from it. So he did what he had to do to keep his family alive, especially with their third child due in just a few weeks.
He took a mortgage out on Aunt Mildred’s estate-- just enough to cover the cost to get the fields going, furnish the place, and purchase a few animals. In just a few strong harvests, he’d have it fully paid off, he figured.Â
As he watched his two children chase each other in the yard, and his very pregnant wife absent-mindedly rub her belly as she surveyed the land that was now theirs, he was filled with a sense of hope, for the first time since their farm caught ablaze.Â
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