Fian placed the parchment with the recipe next to the bread he had baked and surveyed the result. Yes, it looked roughly like the kind of thing he knew from the tavern. He checked a cupboard for a basket to carry everything in, lost in thought.
True, his paw was still hurting—the pain kept snapping him out of his reverie—but he was facing entirely different problems now. After all, who can really knead dough properly when… The thought actually made him chuckle at himself.
Hey traveler, before you ask, indeed, there is a German version…
To find it, follow this path 🙂
He was looking forward to sharing the result with her; under the circumstances, even baking the bread had been a real challenge. And considering that, what he’d managed to produce looked pretty good. Sure, there was always room for improvement—admittedly—but that wasn’t the main issue right now. And the best part was yet to come… The bread would have time to cool and firm up a bit on the way to the tavern. It would be perfect by the time… well, how exactly would it play out? Would she eat while he watched? Or would they eat together?
That raised a crucial question: what plates and cutlery should he pack—for one person or two? He smiled to himself. He probably should have asked that earlier, but he hadn’t. Still, he was looking forward to asking it now. Or would it be too bold to simply take out two plates? “It pays to be prepared,” he thought, so he decided to pack plates, cutlery, and drinking mugs for two. Nothing would be worse than showing up empty-handed.
Then came the trickiest question: Should he take his beloved willow lute along? He was on his way to… well, actually, he didn’t even know what he was on his way to. It was a completely different kind of stress he was experiencing. He had given it a try, and yet—he found he could play a little. Not quite like usual, but it didn’t sound half bad. So, he decided to head to the tavern with his wicker basket, his red cloak, and his lute. And yes, he knew exactly where… there were a few possibilities as to where she might be. He thought back. What had she said? At the eighteenth hour, by the tavern. There was only one spot: the place where they had first met.
So, he made his way to the tavern.
She was sitting patiently right where he had expected—outside the tavern, a little off to the side—waiting. When she saw him approaching, she lifted her head curiously and studied him. “Well, finally, … there he is. How’s the leg?” “Oh, actually pretty good—it just hurts,” he replied. Then she glanced at his lute. “Oh, a lute?” He set the basket down and scratched his ear sheepishly. “Well, I thought, you know…” She looked at him curiously with her blue eyes. “…Thought what? If you’d only thought about it, it wouldn’t be here now.” “Right—thought about it, did it—well, it doesn’t matter what I thought; I brought it along, in any case. I don’t even know why.” She looked at him for a moment longer, then shrugged. “Your choice. I’m more curious about what’s in the basket.”
He put down his lute and carefully handed her the basket. She looked at him, somewhat puzzled. What exactly is going on here? His ears flattened against his head. “… Well, the bread, you know, and… the recipe…” While he felt like sinking into the ground, she sat before him with enviable composure, looking at him, and after endless moments, said deliberately: “Yes.” She rested her head on her paws and looked up at him. After what felt like hours more, she finally asked: “And now? You aren’t trying to tell me you came all this way with a lute on your back and a basket containing—well, look at that—plates and cutlery … oh, for two… only to… do what?”
He froze under her expectant gaze. And she was right—he hadn’t thought that far ahead, and he was certain she knew it! He had just wanted to be prepared in case she said something. He swallowed and managed to say quietly: “Well, I thought… keeping you company? I mean, bread doesn’t taste as good when you’re alone as it does…”
She regarded him with cool eyes. “Keeping me company? You could have done that without the bread.” He tried to change the subject, but she pressed on in a calm voice: “By the way, I never said you should bake bread. I never said you should be here, either. And I’m curious: Why did you bake some bread? Why are you standing here? What do you want?” She rested her head on her paws and simply looked at him.
So there he stood facing her; she was watching him with a relaxed air, and somehow a feeling came over him… “Do you find this situation is somehow funny?” The words just slipped out before he could stop them. He felt ashamed afterward, but once spoken, words can never be taken back or undone.
For a moment, and with a hint of a smile, she let the words hang in the air before she answered: “In a way, yes—and do you want to know why?
A bard, a master of words, someone used to speaking and finding an answer for everything, armed with wit and experience. And there he stands, not knowing what to say hello to a girl he intended to visit in the evening. That’s either utterly humiliating or funny. I haven’t decided which yet…”
Then she took both plates out of the basket and set them down invitingly. “But I’m going to eat some of the bread and whatever else is in the basket now. I don’t know what you plan to do. Maybe I would appreciate discussing something like how you bake bread or play a lute with those sliced paws.”
Travellers, I tuned my lute for her, the white wolf, that breaks through the shadows and banished the night:
“The White Guardian (Fians Tribute)”
For anyone who has always wondered how Fian experienced and perceived that night by the campfire, when she entered his life…
(From the Album “Tales of Mistwood Forest”, Release Date Oktober 2026)
Inside the tavern, Germonde sat watching Fian and the white lady wolf, the huntress of the north—along with a few other patrons and guests—with interest through the closed window. After a moment, he frowned, picked up his tea, and raised it slightly in a gesture of greeting toward the pair. “Well then…” he said softly, “this realization is going to be interesting and painful at the same time.”
And he listened carefully to the conversations in the tavern while eating a little pear cake with cream.
