"Did he not find you unguided, and then guided you?"  [Qur'an, 91:7]

Syeda continued her walk home. Public schools really were a nesting house for the cretinous and mundane. She'd used to go to a private institution, but that all changed when... her situation shifted.

Finally arriving at her home, Syeda unlocked the door and stepped in, closing it measuredly and hanging her coat.

"Assalamu-alaykum, Halima!" Syeda called. A brief wait, then a shuffle, as Halima made her way out of the mess in the kitchen. Had she been cooking?

"Wa-alaykum-assalam, Syeda!" Halima replied, smiling brightly, her afro curls in a wild halo around her head. "How was your day?"

Syeda removed her shoes and put them on the shoe rack near the door (for the love of the carpeted floor's cleanliness, there was a strict no-shoes policy enforced by Halima), put away her jacket, and stood there looking Halima straight in the eyes. Halima smiled good-humouredly; there was the little unsociable nerd she knew and cared for.

"How was it in the office today, Halima?" She queried. Halima raised an eyebrow; it had taken quite the while for the girl in front of her to learn that other people had lives worth asking about too (it still seemed strange to her that Syeda remembered this). She just hoped it extended to people aside from herself; thinking about Syeda's social life was a bit like a ready-made headache that she had got into the habit of not wanting to open. But she'd deal with that can of worms. Soon.

"Did anyone bother you again?" Syeda persisted.

Halima snorted. "No one bothers me, Syeda sweetheart." She responded too casually. Lackadaisically, it seemed to Syeda's practiced eyes.

But avoiding Syeda's steely gaze, however artfully, wasn't helping Halima's case. 

Syeda knew Halima had her own struggles at work, which she'd once verbally wrestled out of her. The explanation for those struggles, Syeda knew, she had been the primary cause of.

Ever since Syeda's father had disappeared, her doting aunt Maggie (who lived in Norway) had generously taken her in, with a maternal joy that had left a deep impression on Syeda's heart, and made up for the sudden move to a foreign country she barely remembered. 

But over time, the worsening health of her own ailing elderly mother had meant aunt Maggie had to drop her other priorities to tend to her mother, while occasionally still lending a hand in the family business.

But all the while the turmoil tore at her family, Syeda had stared out the French windows, dreaming of Brynnland.

It was a land she'd left behind, knowing she'd return. The land her father had disappeared in. Against all her scientific inclinations, she felt the force of fate pulling her there, just like it had her father so many years ago. 

Her destiny awaited. Her father awaited. Waiting to be found.

"Aunt Maggie, I have to go back." Her fourteen year old self had met with her aunt in the living room one dark evening, when Maggie had down come to check why Syeda was still not in bed at 12:00.

Syeda's serious lapis eyes were glimmering, her brown curtain of hair billowing from the gentle Norwegian wind that blew through the open window.

Maggie's eyes immediately understood. "Your father said the same to me on one same evening, skatten min. I won't be the one to stop you."

Syeda had then presented Halima's e-letter, in response to Syeda's entreaty for somewhere to say, and here they both now were. Her father's closest colleague had come through for her.

Syeda knew that Halima had had to move departments to work at one that was close enough to Syeda's old house. She knew her new colleagues treated Halima like dirt.

"You said everyone in your division was promoted, but you. When not one of them was as well qualified." Syeda continued looking at Halima, eyes focused, face still. Then her eyes narrowed. 

"Honey, honey." Halima waved her hands up and down, trying to cool her charge's tension. "Don't you worry yourself about that." Then she looked intently into Syeda's eyes, smiling sharply. "The general social climate just isn't in the favour of people like me at the moment, darling. None of this is your fault. I've been through way worse. The scariest thing in those offices, that department, heck, in this town," She narrowed her almond eyes until they were sharp-ended and catlike, "Is still me. As much as I don't like to wave this fact around, I'm worth too much in my workplace, with my eight years of research experience and double-pHD, for them to sack me." 

Her eyes narrowed at the little girl she'd once taken in, now so mature. Hell, she'd always been mature and creepily serious. "Darling, all I worry about is you. Your wellbeing, your health, your happiness... I worry about it all." Halima bent over from her 6" height to look at Syeda more intently. "So don't worry about me, dear."

Syeda raised an unimpressed eyebrow, before it sank back to normal. But still she said nothing. Until-

"Don't worry." She hesitated before adding, "My father used to say, God, Allah, He will help and guide you." She paused before continuing. "The NHS* says that people of faith have better emotional resilience. We can cope with bad things better because we have patience, and believe in fate. So people like you and I," she looked more intently at Halima, "We know He will help us. Innallaaha ma'assaabireen."

Halima was silent initially, but her smile was encouraging. And inside, she was bursting with pride. "Allah is with the Patient. Absolutely, darling. I couldn't have said it better." She enveloped Syeda in a tight, fierce hug, before holding onto her shoulders, grinning. Then she rushed off to the kitchen to tend to the simmering sound of the soup that had just started to make itself heard.

"You over-cooked it. By 3 degrees again?" Syeda noted absentmindedly as she picked up her school bag and made her way upstairs.

"Don't Masterchef me young lady, I'm an excellent cook!" Halima yelled back from downstairs.

"Just like I'm the Queen of Hawaii!" Syeda tossed back.

Then she realised the severity of what she'd done.

She'd joked. Terrible!

Shaking her head while smiling, she whispered 'Aunt Magdalene' to her phone.

The number started to ring. 

Two people circled each other in a ring. One walked deftly and confidently. One was already winded, out of breath. Both held tall, wooden swords as weapons. Both looked ready to strike.

Jack watched his opponent closely. Obviously he was preparing something, but was slow, weak, and hesitant. Good.

His opponent feinted towards him, thinking to get an opening to strike at his right by pretending to first strike at his left.

'Good grief." thought Jack sombrely. So by the book.

His opponent had left his own abdomen area open. 'Thanks for that.' he felt like offering, before he deftly swung his blade towards the exposed area.

His wooden sword, or bokkun, thwacked hard into the other guy's ribs and he fell with an 'Oof' that made seasoned onlookers wince and some rush to help.

The referee whistled, and with that, it was over.

What struck him today was that this was a guy who a year ago he couldn't have hoped to match. Who he had complained (actually whined) to his father that he could never hope to be on par with. Lee the Snake, the Sly, the Undefeated. But he himself had now become Jack the Wolf, with his strong, heavy-handed moves that aimed right for the vitals and his high stamina. He hoped his father would be proud. But if he ever was, he never showed it.

Jack may have won, but he couldn't help feeling sceptic. Compared to a real fight, this was just child's play.

All his life, he'd been training for one thing.

A Nyfe to rest in his hand, and a list of people to protect, or end, with it. 

Jack knew which one specifically they were training him for.

Syeda waited for her aunt to pick up, until, a good while later, Aunt Magdalene's voice finally rung loud and clear. 

"Hello skatten min (my treasure), sorry I took a while! A customer had a large order, takes forever to pack four cakes, it turns out. How was your day?"

"Good." Said Syeda, smiling, falling into ease while hearing her familiar voice, and removing her scarf and jacket, brown hair calculatedly falling on her back. This was the voice that had accompanied her childhood. "We had Physics, Biology, P.E, bleurgh, Art, yeurgh, and Geography. Everyone was boring. The school was pretty boring. I've already studied ahead in my sciences, I wish I could go back to my normal-" School, Syeda stopped herself from mentioning. Aunt Maggie had enough on her bakery's plate, without Syeda piling on her problems. "This school is actually really great though. I love it." 'Ish. Kinda. Maybe.' Syeda finished in her head.

"My sweet, sounds like you're over-stressing on your subjects, and not focusing on making friends or socialising! You should've seen your mother-" Maggie stopped, and then after a hesitant pause, as if debating thoughts, continued, quiet. "She was the life of all parties, those that she threw, and those that she didn't." Aunt Maggie's voice grew wistful. "Thirteen-year old me used to wish to be like her, to be her. She was so beautiful, Sarah (she always used Syeda's birth name) like an Enyel (angel)." Her voice turned brisk. "But anyway, you should be more social! Sadly, you've turned out like your pappa, God rest his soul."

"He's not dead." Syeda interjected quietly, eyes narrowed to slits.

"Of course dearest. But we haven't heard from him in, what is it becoming, near five years?" Aunt Maggie's voice turned quiet again. "You know your far (father) was involved in suspicious things, plotting against the government, while working in the heart of Brynnish security! He always took risks! First accepting a different religion, God have mercy on him, and then rebellion!" Syeda heard a tut-tut. But now was coming the good bit. Her favourite part. "But for all that, I loved him. He was my favourite broor (brother), nothing like Harald. I barely hear from him. But Olaf phoned me every other day-" Syeda knew that now, as usual, was a good time to interject, before Aunt Maggie got too emotional. After having her once burst into tears, Syeda determined that she wouldn't let their calls be a cause of grief for Aunt Maggie again, nor for herself. Not when she cherished them so much.

"How's Grandma Sophie? Is she better?"

"No dear, your Bestemoor still isn't looking any better. You may have to live with Halli-ma a while longer. It's because your father trusted her so much that I can leave her with you. It has been now, ten months, but skatten min, I don't think your grandma is getting better..." Aunt Maggie sounded tearful again. "I've taken over fully on your Bestemoor's role in this bakery, Harald won't help (only came over for fifteen minutes to met mamma last week), and Oscar is at school doing his important years, studying hard like you, I don't want to overburden him or for him to get distracted from his study... Poor Marie, my girl, is away at university as well, and only comes back for Christmas, which is soon." Aunt Maggie's voice sounded hopeful.

Syeda's heart ached for her aunt. But what could she do? She was away here in Brynnland, an ocean across from her only family. Sometimes, she wondered if this was what they called being selfish, staying so far away from the ones you loved when they needed you. 

But then she remembered the force that pulled her here, that made her stay if she dreamed of going back.

Her fate was tied to this place.

Her father's fate was tied here. The  father she was trying, failing, to find.

"Ah dearest, another customer is here. I can phone you back in the evening, my sweet-"

"It's okay Aunt Maggie, I don't mind, we've had a good chat already. Looking forward to speaking to you soon again. Haa de (goodbye)." Syeda smiled her goodbye; she phoned Aunt Maggie every week, so it wouldn't be long till she heard her voice again.

"Haa de, sweetheart. Take care of yourself!" With that, they ended their call, and Syeda was left in silence.

"Oh Syeda, there was something in the post for you." Halima called from outside Syeda's room, as she knocked gently, and then entered.

Syeda frowned as she was handed a brown envelope. Her address printed on it, but the envelope still looked somehow foreign. A shade of brown she'd never seen on common envelopes.

"By the way, your were right, my soup does taste terrible. Wanna help me fix it?" Halima's eyes pleaded, and Syeda nodded. Halima then whipped away, and she curiously opened the flap of the envelope.

She removed the small, filmy paper within. A photograph?

Before here was an image of a man, looking away from the camera. He had a short, professor-like bushy red beard, and a smiling face, with mirthful eyes to match. Syeda's eyes stayed paralysed as she flipped the photograph to see messy writing in black marker.

"Miss him?" 

* NHS - (UK) National Health Service

A/N:

Hi! Please let me know what you thinkkkk , my peeps! Your visible support is what encourages me to continue this story, and I always look forward to hearing from you! See ya next chapter!