18.A Father's Slow Return

It had been four months since Jack first woke in this unfamiliar world, in a body not his own, surrounded by people who wished he hadn't. His first month was a blur—rejection, humiliation, loneliness. Even now, three months into his assignment at Merriton, the capital still felt like a place full of cold shoulders and watchful eyes.

But there was one change, however small, that warmed the silence.

Laina.

Jack stood outside the garden courtyard of the Valorin estate, nervously rolling a polished stone in his hand. It had once been a toy he'd made from scrap wood for the village children in Merriton. Now, he hoped it would serve as a token to connect with someone much harder to win over—his daughter.

"Father?"

He turned to see her—Laina, standing at the archway. Her posture was firm, reserved. But there was no hostility in her voice. That was more than he could have hoped for a month ago.

"I was told you wanted to see me," she said.

Jack nodded, his throat oddly dry. "Yes. I… I wanted to spend time with you. If that's alright."

Laina didn't respond immediately. Instead, she stepped forward, eyes sharp, studying him like one of Elsa's soldiers might gauge a stranger on the battlefield.

"I don't remember you," she said at last, "but people say you were awful."

"I know," Jack said quietly. "And they're right. Whoever I was… he hurt this family. I don't want to make excuses. I want to make it right."

A beat of silence passed between them.

Laina looked at the wooden toy in his hand. "That's for me?"

He offered it out, unsure. "I made it in Merriton. It's not much, but—"

She took it, turning it over in her palm. A small smile tugged at her lips before she quickly wiped it away.

"I don't remember Mother," she said suddenly, her voice softening. "But they always said she was strong... like she never gave up. Maybe I'm just hoping I inherited a little of that."

Jack felt the air catch in his chest.

"I think you did," he said, carefully. "I see it in the way you stand, the way you think before speaking. You're sharper than most adults I've met."

That earned him a sideways glance. "Trying to flatter me?"

"Trying," Jack admitted with a half-smile.

They sat together near the rose arch. It wasn't a long visit. They didn't speak of deep things—mostly small talk, Merriton stories, her studies, his garden experiments. But for the first time, the silence between them felt comfortable.

As they parted, Laina stopped and turned. "They say something you grew in Merriton—a root—was used in Caelum's medicine. It worked when nothing else did."

Jack blinked. "I… I didn't know that."

"Well," she said, already turning away, "maybe you're not completely useless after all."

Jack chuckled, but the warmth in his chest lingered long after she left.

---

Inside her room, Laina sat at her desk, tracing the lines on the wooden toy.

She didn't know this man. Not really. But she remembered how people stopped whispering when he passed. How her grandparents once forbade them from going near him. How Serin still refused to speak about him.

But today, he listened. He didn't command. He just… existed beside her. It felt different. Maybe not safe yet—but different.

She placed the toy on her shelf beside her favorite books and wondered what tomorrow with him would be like.