An exhausting day later...

It was already evening when Zander returned to his home, his body aching from having worked on the farm all day long. Lynne wasn't home yet, so he stripped all of his clothes and threw himself on the bath, starting to relax as soon as his body hit the water. It had been a long day, so the boy got started on washing the day's sweat off his body until he felt it was clean enough. When he returned to the house's living area, Lynne was there cooking up some food for them.

"Oh, hi, Zander!" the woman greeted him with a smile. "How did the harvest go?"

"Fine, I guess," he replied, dropping on a chair by the table. "Just the usual shit I have to endure from Tara's cousin."

"It's a good thing you are calm, nothing good would come from getting into a fight with him," Lynne said in a veiled warning tone, giving him a sympathetic smile as she started putting the food on the table.

"I know, it's just..., it's so frustrating sometimes," Zander sighed as he stared at the ceiling. "What about you, how was your day?"

Lynne grimaced at that. "Let's eat first, my day wasn't so good as well."

Zander nodded and they began digging in, all the while discussing his work and the comings and goings of Galern. Lynne was a youthful woman of thirty-six, with long red hair and green eyes; body-wise, she was slender, with large tits and a curvy rump. She worked as a shopkeeper at the local sundry shop for a few years now, and Zander wondered what could have happened in there that ruined his surrogate mother's day. Once they were done and cleaned up everything, Zander touched the subject.

"So, are you going to tell me what happened with you?"

Lynne sighed. "It's not a big deal, actually," she responded, sitting by the table again. "The men who were supposed to go and retrieve merchandise for the store in Aurum decided to join the hunters instead, so no one was able to go and Yozan got angry with me."

Zander frowned. "But it wasn't your fault."

"That's what I told him," Lynne said. "Now I'm supposed to find someone else."

Zander's gaze shifted to the table's wooden surface, a thoughtful look on his face. "Well, I could go."

The woman chuckled. "Nonsense, Zander, you have your job at the farm, and besides, it's at least a two-person job."

"Yozan pays better than the farm," Zander argued. "The two men who were doing it weren't exactly young, so I bet I can do it by myself, we would just have to get me a weapon."

Lynne cocked her head to the side, a pleading look on her face. "You and Tara are friends, won't she get upset if you left her father's farm to work somewhere else?"

"I can't listen to Shaul's crap again, I know he is not here all the time, but still!" the young man insisted before he put a hand over one of Lynne's. "Lynne, I want to help you. Hiring me will get Yozan off your back."

The older woman stared at her surrogate son for a few moments before she let out a long, suffering sigh. He was right, she didn't have anyone else she could contact for the job on so short notice, but she also didn't want Zander out there exposed to all kinds of danger. "Alright, let's do this."

Zander grinned, squeezing her hand. "Thank you!" he said before his expression grew somber. "Well, I need to get a weapon first."

"No, you don't, wait here," Lynne replied and then stood up and headed to her bedroom under Zander's questioning gaze. She came back a few moments later holding a sword, covered by a dark blue leather scabbard. His blue eyes widened up in shock.

"Where in Duskath's name was this?!" he inquired when she placed it on the table.

"Hidden under a floorboard," Lynne answered, and when she realized Zander was still looking expectantly at her, she elaborated. "I took this from a fallen soldier when I was fleeing Duskath with Baby You, I never really learned how to properly use it, but it was useful to down a few Kinwaldian soldiers on our way to the boat people were using to escape."

Zander stared at the sword in a mix of awe and stupor. "A sword from the Duskathian Army..., was it a Shadow Blade?"

Lynne shook her head sadly as it made her remember the day their home crumbled seventeen years ago. "No, a regular soldier."

Zander tentatively took a hold of the sword and pulled it a few inches out of the scabbard. It was gorgeous, a dark blue hilt, with the head of a black panther where the blade jutted out. He could never have acquired a sword and Lynne had an amazing, special one in their home all along.

"It's made of a special kind of steel, that's why it didn't rust over the years," she explained.

The black-haired teenager turned to her. "People cannot see me using this."

Lynne winked at him. "That's why you should only use it when you really need it, you hear me?"

"Yes," he whispered in response before standing up and hugging Lynne tightly, her tits flattening against his chest, but Zander was so excited with the sword that he didn't really notice. "Thank you for trusting me with this, I've never held something from Duskath before."

Lynne smiled, reaching up to ruffle his hair. "Wrong, you've held me several times in the past," she jested. "Now go to sleep. We have to speak to Yozan as soon as I go to work in the morning."

Zander nodded, untangling himself from his surrogate mother. "Good night, Lynne," he said, carefully picking up the Duskathian Sword before he headed to his bedroom. Tomorrow, everything would start changing in his life, he told himself.