Mori is lost in her mind reliving everything even things she didn't know she remembered. Her mother's smiling face as she plays with her. A father that was happy and laughed, one that always had time for her even though he was working hard on building their new home, the cabin, and on getting supplies ready for winter.

She relives the times of gathering berries and other foods from their forest. Her mother teaching her even at her young age what was good and what wasn't.

These are the memories Mori had buried the deepest, the loving warmth of her parents it had all changed and in order to survive Mori couldn't handle the happy memories it would destroy her if she did.

When her mother died giving birth to her little sister her father was never the same. After he'd buried them under the large tree that overlooked the valley that she loved her father locked into himself. Which is preferable to what happened next, but to a frightened young girl of seven it meant her world had crumbled.

The abuse started when her father started drinking, Mori couldn't believe it when he had hit her for the first time. Her adored father had never done anything like that before, but then he'd never been drunk before either. It didn't take long for her to figure out that she needed to stay away from her father when he was in that condition.

She was just so confused though, he was very like the father that loved her when he wasn't drunk. But the older she got the less he was the old father and the more he drank.

At first the towns people still welcomed her, helped her. The women taking it upon themselves to teach her things she would need to survive picking up where her mother had left off.

But as the years wore on even the town people changed. When she was a teen the rumors started going around, she doesn't know who started them, that her father was sleeping with her.

Her father had become very abusive but he hadn't sunk that low, but he did go to the bar in town and pick up anyone willing to sleep with him.

It got to be a relief when he left to the bar because that meant that she wouldn't have to deal with him, but when he would come home he'd usually be in a foul mood and so she'd take herself elsewhere.

 There was always plenty to do. Mori became an excellent hunter and made sure that the town people didn't over hunt on their land. She wouldn't let them at all except her father would likely over rule her decision.

Mori has several bolt holes prepared for when she needs to escape the house late at night. She's even managed to hide money in them to keep her no longer adored father from stealing it. She no longer even wondered what her life would have been like had her mother lived. She could barely even recall her face or her voice anymore.

Mori next remembers when she had thought her father had left for town and so had been a little careless when she took her shower. She was drying off when her father walked in on her, she covered herself quickly but it didn't stop her father from staring at her.

There was something in her father's eyes that made her afraid of him in a way that she hadn't ever been before. She pushes past him and goes into the other room clutching her towel around her. Her father lets her go by and she's almost out of arm shot when he grabs her and pulls the towel away from her.

She'll never forget the look in his eyes as he inspects her and his smile. When he touches her though she breaks out of the paralysis his look has engendered. She struggles to free herself from him and only succeeds due to her muscles from all her hard work and his already drunken state. But she is thrown off balance from her struggle and is unable to take advantage of her freedom. They recover at the same time and it is only Mori's hand encountering the frying pan that saves her.

She smashes the frying pan on her fathers head, no longer caring if she kills him. After all the abuse he's given her she's not going to let him rape her as well. After she hits him she grabs her towel and runs out of the house in tears to one of her bolt holes. She cries to herself one last time and then she refuses to cry anymore.

She spends the night in her tidy little cave and returns home half expecting to find her father's dead body lying on the cabin floor, but when she enters the cabin is empty. Somewhat disappointed and relieved (she just wants the nightmare of her life to end) she goes about the business of the day.

As she is cleaning up after breakfast, relieved that her father still hadn't returned, she is interrupted by the local sheriff. 

Mori knew the sheriff well since her father was regularly picked up for drunk and disorderly charges, so she wasn't overly worried when she opened the door to him.

"Sheriff, can I get you anything?" Mori asks politely wondering what her father had done now to warrant the sheriff making a personal visit.

The sheriff smiles politely and declines, "Mori, I hate to have to tell this to you, but last night your father got into a brawl at the bar." Mori rolls her eyes thinking just how cliched her father has become. "He was killed."

Mori comes back to herself quickly with those words. "I'm sorry Sheriff, but could you repeat that once more please?" Mori can't believe she heard what she thought she heard.

"In the brawl you father was stabbed, gutted more like, and he didn't make it. I'm sorry Mori." Mori can only stare at the officer before her in shock, her only remaining family is gone.

"When can I have his body?" Is all Mori can think of. She can't even think of how she's going to bring his body home, but she knows where he'll be buried.

"I'll bring it by tomorrow morning. Where do you want me to take it?" The sheriff asks kindly, he'd known that she'd been abused they all had but no one had stepped in, he feels bad about that but that's all in the past.

"I'll have the grave ready next to mother's." Mori's voice is wooden and is more than a little shocky but the sheriff just nods and assures her he'll help her lower the body in. He knew there would be no funeral, nobody would come even if there was.

The only ones that would are the vultures hoping to take away the prime land from the newly orphaned girl. Maybe he'd failed her before but the sheriff promised himself that he'd make sure that Mori holds onto her land unless a lord claims it.

There were no tears for Mori as she puts the final shovelful of dirt over her father's body. Maybe he's finally found the peace he'd looked for all these years. Maybe she'd find some for herself as well, but that's even less likely.

Mori won her freedom in the courts having easily proven that she is capable of living on her own and maintaining her land.

When the most popular and eligible man in her town asked her out Mori couldn't believe it, but Tom was persistent and finally got her to say yes. He was kind and acted a gentleman, treated her with more respect than she's had in years so when he asked for another date she agreed. Although at the back of her mind she couldn't help but wonder just why he'd ask her.

She was starting to fall for him. It had been so long since she's allowed anyone into her heart that the feeling was nearly overwhelming.