We went to check on Lyra. She was doing fine; the baby too which incidentally had the name Solin. Her family was with her, and soon all her friends arrived as well. I was surprised to see a whole bunch of new people.
They were hosting a party outside the house, in their backyard. Meat skewers were the main dish. And although they didn't have any alcoholic beverages, they were serving lemonades to basically everyone. Did people here not have gastric issues? Anyway… 'What about wine and stuff though?' They had some fruit at least so how come they didn't try fermentation? Maybe they didn't know? No, that didn't seem likely. Lots of kids around, so maybe that's why?
The meat sticks and lemonade weren't that bad though. Pretty good actually. Mom was too busy catching up with Lyra and her friends inside, so I hung out alone while sipping the juice.
Although I did see some humans, they were mostly scarce. And for some reason they were glaring at me. No. Not wasn't right. They weren't glaring at me with hostile intentions. It was more in the lines of… pity?
So, somehow, I snuck closer to one of them. "Pretty party," I said.
He nodded. Old fellow. Close to a hundred. Somewhat bald and droopy skin. But he was fine. He could stand, he could walk and judging by how he was dancing a few moments ago… yeah, he was fine. He didn't say a word though.
I guess he wasn't interested in having a conversation?
So yeah, I focused elsewhere and noticed Lia glancing at me across the field. She had company. About four or so boys. All tall and perky. Elves…. Pretty boys. Actually, everyone here was good looking. I guess if you keep good looking strong guys and killed the rest… you'd only be left with good looking people, so that wasn't very surprising. Kind of annoying, but not surprising.
She'd realized I was staring back and walked my way. Well, this can't be good.
"Did you try the skewers?" Lia wore a frilly white dress. Nothing fancy, nothing glittery. But she did look good… for a five-year-old. Meanwhile I was wearing just half pants and a weird shirt mother sew for me. Weird, because it didn't have any buttons and rather frilly.
I almost had the instinct to pat her head, but then I recalled something from the past and proceeded to eat up all the feelings.
"Yeah?"
"Nice. I helped." Lia hadn't come alone though. She'd brought her friends. "This is Jarb. This is Mack, And this is Tan."
"Sup." They crossed their arms and looked down me. Mostly because they were taller.
"Haloo."
"Bud."
Their attempts at intimidating me were awfully cute. "Soler Arnius. Nice to meet you."
They blinked amongst themselves. "Prodig?
"Genis!"
"Mater!"
"Mater!"
"Mater!~"
What the fuck was wrong with these kids?
Yeah… this was why I hated toddlers. Obnoxious brats. They were laughing, giggling and all that amongst themselves. Oh wait, they meant Master….
"Stop it!" Lia hissed.
Their smiles vanished and they all just stood there like children being scolded by their mother. Kind of fun to watch.
"Nice to meechu-" the tallest kid said. Apparently, Jarb.
I shook his hands. Mostly because he was the one who initiated the shake. So people do shake hands. Yet, I'd hardly seen anyone do that.
Then again, I never spent much time outside and the few people I'd made contact with, considered me a literal child. So… yeah.
"Arni, how old are you?" Mack, the fattest of the bunch asked. He was even chubbier than me! His cheeks were very pinchable. And wait, no one called me Arni before. Also, his speech was surprisingly good.
"Four and a half."
"How much is that?" Mack turned to his right, towards the shortest of the group. Tan. He was still taller than me though. Damn those Southern genes!
"Less by two months!" He chuckled. "Same age!" he proclaimed.
Uh-huh.
The kids kept on laughing and telling me stories about how Mack one time ate too much and farted juice all over the place. I had to try my best not to let out a disgusted snort but I was amazed how these kids found that funny. I mean, it was kind of funny but juice fart huh… heh!
Anyway. That out of the way, I noticed Mom walking out in a fury so I followed her.
"We're leaving!" She grumbled.
The fuck happened? I hadn't seen her that pissed… ever. Mom did an excellent job of suppressing her anger near me. I did see her lash out at Den every now and then. But only when I wasn't around. I did peek at them from outside the window but I had a feeling Den knew what I was up to. Oops.
Anyway- "What happened?" I grabbed her finger and trailed out of the place.
She did not say a word, no.
And so, before I knew it, we were back home and things moved as though nothing happened at all. Yet for some reason Mom didn't smile for the rest of the day.
***
A few days later Den got back and lectured me for a long, long while. But not just me, he also lectured Mom. Apparently, the cave was really dangerous and even adults didn't go in alone. He then proceeded to drag me out of the forest to the grasslands.
"But you did well to survive. Actually, you might have a knack for surviving. Maybe you were talented in something after all?"
He could have just told me that without dragging me out here though, right? So, what was he getting at?
"Pretty sure, I was just trying not to die Den," I said.
"Huh." Den came closer swung his foot straight at me.
I haphazardly rolled, barely dodging. "The hell you doing?"
"Trying to nurture that will to not die." He smiled, and then I saw it…
Demon.