"Born for the mountains," he muttered, checking her little hat was still in place. It was. Sideways.

Tima reached out one small hand toward Steph, babbling a string of sounds that might have been a greeting or a song or perhaps instructions on proper hiking technique. Her fingers grasped at the air like she was trying to grab the very mist around them.

Steph reached back and let Tima's hand close around her finger. "Yes, yes, I see it too. Very mist-like. Very grey. Very damp." She glanced back at Papa. "She's building her critical vocabulary."

"She's definitely narrating something," Papa said. "No idea what."

They kept going.

Conversation came and went in gentle tides — gear, boots, tea flasks, that weird news article Steph had read about a sheep that had survived three weeks on a Welsh cliff. Papa told her about an old music venue he'd played at once, how the acoustics were so strange you could hear the conversation in the back alley through the speakers. Nothing heavy. Just walking talk. Breath and movement and the beginning of something that wasn't the inside of a cottage.

The path narrowed, flanked by drystone wall on one side and wild thicket on the other. The stones were grey with age and weather, lichen painting them in soft orange and sage green. Tima let out a long string of sounds — vowels and nonsense consonants — her voice rising above the wind like a song only she knew. She was playing with the sounds, repeating them, building on them.

"She's narrating the journey," Steph said, turning to smile at them.

"Or cursing in some ancient baby tongue," Papa added. "Either way, she's committed."

The wind shifted slightly, carrying with it the smell of stone and damp earth and something green and growing. It was cold on their faces, but not bitter.

Papa looked down at Tima, who was making a soft cooing sound now, almost musical. He thought about Peter — back at the cottage with Eira, probably arguing about breakfast with the determination of a tiny revolutionary. Peter had waved them off with characteristic firmness. "Go. Be away. Eira and I have projects." The man was steady as bedrock. Always had been.

"How's Peter with Eira?" Steph asked, as if reading his thought.

"He's better with her than I am with Tima," Papa said quietly. "More... confident."

"He's had practice," Steph said. "And he doesn't blame himself."

Papa didn't answer, but something in his shoulders shifted slightly.

When they stopped for water, Steph took Tima while Papa stretched his arms and looked up the winding path. His legs were starting to feel it — the climb building in his calves, the altitude pressing gently on his lungs. But it wasn't unpleasant. It was real. The only thing his body was doing right now was moving upward.

"How far?" he asked.

Steph shrugged, bouncing Tima gently. "Far enough that we forget to count."