[piosenniel]

Cook had come out to the hen yard, a large green bowl held firmly in the crook of one arm. Today was the day she made her bread pudding and she had had the girls trim the crusts carefully from the stale bread before she cubed it for use. An now she had come into the yard to feed the hens the crusts – plump hens pleased her no end. She had an eye to stewing or stuffing the tasty fowl at a later date - best to keep them fat, happy, and succulent, she thought to herself.

She had just scattered the first handful into the yard, when she thought she spied a familiar figure standing in the yard. Wiping her hand on her apron, she shaded her eyes and looked toward where Derufin was chatting up what looked to be another stray. ‘For all his loss, that man has the softest heart,’ she said to herself, as she watched him draw the youngster out.

But there, standing near them, was someone she remembered. ‘Mistress Piosenniel’s little friend, if these old eyes don’t deceive me. Now what was her name?’ The sun caught the young woman’s hair, setting it aflame with flickering gold lights. ‘That was it!' Mistress Piosenniel had told them how the lass’s name meant golden – like the great tree from the old story from the West that the Elf had told them.

‘Laurie!’ she called out. ‘Mistress Laurie! Is that you come back to visit?’