Chapter 16: 14: Planning and allies

Since we got here, that guy had been acting really different around us. Everything in his words and actions said that he knew he had screwed up and that he knew we were mad at him. He also seemed to be walking on eggshells to a rather extreme degree around us.

It did not go unnoticed that he was also no longer trying to give Gaerien and I our medicine. We asked him about this, and he responded that we didn’t need it anymore. Confusingly enough though, after that he made the comment that we probably never did, and he had a rather strange self-depreciating smile on his face when he said that.

Despite how much he tried to appease us and avoid doing any more harm though, any time we asked about going back to the nursery or having some of Rolwen and Levin’s family come over here, his answer was always [I’m sorry, I’m afraid I really can’t let that happen,] and every time one of us asked the question or pushed the issue he stayed firm in his denials while getting an increasingly pained look on his face.

With all of this going on, I was beginning to get a more and more clear picture that there was more to this than any of us knew. And, if I wanted answers, I was going to have to have to toss that guy an olive branch. I did not plan to make it easy for him though. I may wind up tipping my hand a little with what I had planned, but it was always impossible to get information durring a conversation without giving some information yourself. Besides, if I’m reading this correctly, we shouldn’t be in too much danger.

Well then, all that’s left is convincing the others. (I want to talk about something.) I said. I wish I could have given something to indicate a serious face or serious tone, but it was all impossible with this baby body. Fortunately, I was among people who could sympathise with my situation, so they were quite attentive.

(What is it?) Rolwen said while Levin adjusted me in his lap and looked down while Gaerien simply looked up at me. She seemed to be having a somewhat harder time of this though since she was no longer wrapped in her blanket and had to get by with just her neck muscles. That was another thing that had changed since getting here. Rather than constantly making us stay restrained in those blankets, that guy had given us some proper clothes. That was more or less an announcement that he was not going to wrap us like that anymore. It was probably about the right time for me, but it still seems it was a little bit early for Gaerien.

(I think that Ether guy is not telling us something.) I say to them.

(Yeah, of course.) Levin responds. (Those elves are always hiding stuff from us.)

(Wait, Ether guy?) Rolwen starts having a chuckle fit at my name for him. His laughing is infectious and Levin soon catches it as well. (I like it, that’s great!)

(Yeah, he has such a messed up name, I think Ether’s a better name for him.) Levin chimes in. (Wait, didn’t you always just call him “that guy” before?)

(Yeah, well…) If only they knew. I guess the fact that I had gone back to using my old name for him in my mind meant I had somehow already started to forgive him. Well, really it’s probably just mental preparations for what I had planned for him. I was going to have to at least on the surface look like I was not mad at him anymore after this is done. Of course, this doesn’t mean I wasn’t going to make him work for it. (Well, I think what he’s hiding this time is imp… ahh… imp-o)

“Imbortant?” Rolwen supplies the word I was getting stuck on.

(Yes, and I hate you.) Levin begins to have a snicker fit rivaling Rolwen’s chuckles from a moment ago at my simple little joke there, and I get a sort of sick satisfaction seeing Rolwen have to engage his past-life mind in order to realize that actually was a joke. I have begun to have something of an eye for when the others are more dominated by their current life or past life minds. It is someting that goes in and out for all of us. I have asked them about it before in the times we could get in these past few days, and it seems that while it happens for all of us and all of us are aware of it, I’m the only one who has assigned separate personalities for my current and past-life minds.

(so..) I say, moving on, (I think I can make him tell us what he’s hiding.)

(What do you mean?) Levin asks, (what do you think he’s hiding?)

(The real reason why he took us here)

(What? Wasn’t that because..) Levin trails off. I lay myself back in his arms so that I can look up at his face. These baby bodies and baby brains, or rather toddler bodies and brains in their cases, make it very hard for any of us to hide our emotions. Right now, the shock of realization is written all over Levin’s face, and that realization seems to turn to anger almost immediately. (He hasn’t been giving you medicine or anything to take care of you!!) He shouts, he is beginning to become restless too, like he wants to confront that guy right now about this.

(Wow! You’re right!) Rolwen is shocked as he realizes the same thing. Instead of anger though, the expression on his face is confusion.

(That’s because me and Gari are not sick.) I said, shortening Gaerien’s name due to my difficulty in pronouncing it with my unfused hard palate.

During all of this, Gaerien was just silently watching. I had discussed all of this with her before hand in far greater detail. Due to our ability to communicate mind to mind, it was far far easier for us to talk and explore things in more detail. Not only that, but when we communicated like that it seemed like both of us were 100% using our past life minds with zero interference from the baby brains to slow us down and make things difficult. She had already told me that she was going to stay out of this kind of difficult discussion. I was the better of the two of us at talking after all. She might join in if it’s just something casual, but this was too serious a subject to have her tripping all over her words.

The thoughts on her mind as this discussion passed were clear though. And that was… she seemed to actually be a little exhasperated about the whole thing. That was always something that bothered me a little bit about her. She never said it to me directly, but the looks she often gave the boys when they were having difficulty with a concept were not something that ever quite sat right with me. Then again, I had seen that kind of “what in the f’ are you doing” look on babies’ faces before, especially girls, so I’m hoping it’s nothing big.

At any rate, Rolwen and Levin seemed rather surprised to hear me say this.

(What!?)

(What do you mean?)

They both asked approximations of the same question. (Just that, we’re not sick! I feel really healthy. I think we’re fine.)

(Yeah, I think so too, but…) Levin begins, and then it is Rolwen who finishes up his thought for him.

(Everyone is always saying about your skin and stuff.) He says, and then looks down at Gaerien and holds his hand up to her face.

(Don’t do that!) She protests, pushing his hand away.

(Ahh! Sorry!)

(Well, I’m going to ask him!) I boldly declare to them. (But, I needed you guys to know, I need to do the talking for this to work. Don’t say anything and don’t yell at him when I start talking to him.)

(Ok, but… do you really think it will be that easy?) Rolwen asks.

(I’m not going to just ask him. I’m going to do an act, but that’s why I need you to be quiet or else it will ruin it. If this works, he will tell us everything about this.)

(What kind of act?) Of course, since they are children again as well, they’re not going to be satisfied until they have all the details. There is no way for me to be vague and have them just be satisfied with it. So, I wind up having to keep answering their questions and ultimately I exhaust myself telling them every last meticulous detail about what I’m going to do, what kind of effect doing that will have on him, how I have been watching and reading him over these past few days as well as, well, pretty much all my life when you get right down to it.

I was actually incredibly good at manipulating people into telling me things in my previous life. There is absolutely zero question as to whether or not I am able to get what I want to know out of him. The only challenge is how much information about myself and the rest of us I’m going to reveal along the way. It’s absolutely impossible to avoid giving the slightest tip of the hand that at the very least I am a bit unusual.

That’s the absolute bear minimum that will be revealed. Since they have decided to drag this much information out of me though, I decide to go ahead and pose the question as to whether or not they want to volunteer anything more than that. They seemed uncomfortable with the idea, so we ultimately decided to reveal no more than the bear minimum and we would make a decision on that later depending on what we hear from him during this confrontation.

-

Eirlathion POV

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Today was one of the rare days lately that Eirlathion was out of his house away from the children. It was clear that they hated him, but he had gotten used to them enough to know that they didn’t cause much trouble while he wasn’t watching them. He had heard that children often tended to get into all kinds of trouble if you didn’t keep a constant eye on them, but he had no such experience with these particular children. It was to the point that it almost made him doubt what others were telling him about how typical children behaved.

Despite how much leeway he felt he had with them though, he still rarely left his house since bringing them in. The last few days, he had been constantly working between cooking and trying to sew some new clothes for Aerien and Gaerien. Since babies were so infrequent among the elves, there were no such things as hand-me-downs here. Each article of clothing had to be made by hand.

Besides that, even if the parents of the next youngest elf who would be around 15 this year (equivalent to a human 6 year old,) still had the clothing from when their child was an infant, he could not ask them for it. He also could not ask someone else to sew for him. If he said anything of the sort, it would reveal that the girls were so strong and healthy that they were moving about on their own way before any elven child should rightly be capable of such a thing. Honestly, Gaerien’s growth rate was almost on par with that of a human, and even she’s behind Aerien.

At the rate things were going, it would only be a matter of months before the children even might start doubting any stories he could feed them about the girls being unhealthy. When that happened, they would start demanding to go outside. He had to find something he could do before that day came. This trip out was to try and start working on one plan that he had that might solve all of their problems.

“Túeth,” He called out to the only other person in the entire village who knew the girls’ secret and had proven herself determined to keep it.

“Eirlathion!” She turned and had a frightened look when she saw who was talking to her. She looked down with a difficult expression as he was closing the distance between them, but by the time he was next to her she was looking up at him with a weak smile. “So… how are the girls?” She asked him.

“Well, that’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Did… something happen?” She asked. Well, you could probably say that. Eirlathion had to suppress a groan when he thought about how angry the kids seemed to still be with him.

“Well, they are not settling in well after the move to my place.” He said, looking down and shaking his head. “But, there is something I really need to talk to you about in regards to them. I think we should probably go somewhere more private. Is your house acceptable?”

“Umm… yeah, umm… that’s alright.” She respons with some obvious hesitation. “This way.” She says in an almost mechanical voice. As she guides him to her house with nervous and stiff steps that occasionally scuff the leaves of the forrest floor, she repeatedly casts several nervous glances back to him. It is clear to Eirlathion what’s on her mind. She probably thinks that her worst fear has come true. In a way, she’s right. However, he hoped that in that he could also be something of a light of salvation for her. Well, he was hoping she would be the salvation to him and, more importantly, her daughters. As for her though, he may very well be the cause of the pits of the underworld seeming to open up beneath her feet and delivering her back into the hell she had previously escaped from.

He had seen no purpose in antagonizing her before this point, but as things were progressing he saw no other choice than to involve her. The mere fact that she had kept the girls’ fatherhood a secret until now indicated that she probably did not wish harm upon them, even if she wanted nothing to do with them. In this case though, he needed an ally. And, as the mother to those girls, so far as he was concerned it was her duty to ally herself to the cause of helping her daughters whether she wanted to or not.

After a while, they approached a large tree, one of several of its kind that could be found throughout the area. The trunk was fairly wide and sturdy, it would take around 40 people linking hand to hand in order to encirlce the entire base of the trunk. Its bark was a fairly distinct shade of lime green, and it had several large roots and great branches that jutted out from it.

Túeth approached the side of the tree when they got to it, and then she reached out and knocked on the firm bark twice, each time it let out a sharp and crisp sound that resonated throughout the area. Once she had done that, she stepped back as the solid wood she had just knocked on began to warp and twist until finally it formed an open hole in the side of the tree. On the other side of this hole was what looked like a fairly cozy home, if not a little lacking in decoration.

Túeth walked through the doorway that had just formed like she was condemned to death, and quickly took a seat at the table in the center of the room. Eirlathion followed behind her and stopped to place his hand on the outer wall of the house, and then he closed his eyes to concentrate briefly. In response to this, the wall immediately closed behind him. After he confirmed the door was closed, he reached for a pouch at his waist. From this pouch, he pulled a small piece of fabric, a square about 1 inch on each side.

Eirlathion held the fabric between his thumb and fore-finger as he made a tight fist, allowing the majority of the cloth to stick up, and then he brought his fist under his chin as he allowed his lips to touch the cloth for just a second, before letting out a breath that caused the square of fabric to flutter.

After completing this action, Eirlathion pressed the square of fabric against the outer wall with a particularly intense look on his face.“Let no spirit nor soul nor tongue of man to er pass word of what is said. Guard these walls, and silence all ears.” After saying those words, the fabric immediately seemed to disolve, sublimating into the air as though it never existed.

When Eirlathion had completed this ritual, he let out a sigh and went to claim the chair on the other side of the table from Túeth, who was now looking at him with a look as though she was too afraid to even look scared anymore. Her fear had turned to nervousness, and it was clear that after seeing his actions her mind was arguing with itself over all manner of possibilities. However, there was one that Eirlathion was certain was central to all the other thoughts that might be going through her head at this time.

“That was a sound isolation spell, nobody outside will hear anything that is said in this room.” He says. “I think you know what I want to talk about.”

“Yeah...”Túeth responds.

“It’s about the girl’s father, I know the reason for their skin being that shade of grey is not because of some illness.”Upon hearing this, Túeth’s entire body seems to sink slightly, but a slight weak smile seems to float on her face as the nervousness is replaced by a look of resignation. “I have been trying with everything I have to prevent anyone else from being able to figure it out.” he adds.

Eirlathion watches the mother of the girls that have been in his care for several long seconds as silence falls over the room. Her face seems parylized, but her eyes seem to be dancing about quite rapidly, indicating the storm of thoughts that are running through her head at this moment.

“I know.” She finally says. “I.. I had alwasy been afraid, because you were always with them like that. I..”Eirlathion waves his hand lightly through the air, a signal that he does not need her to continue with her thought.

“There is something you should know. Those girls, their parentage is not the only thing that is unusual about them.”

“Wh.. what do you mean?”She responds.

“It’s Aerien. She.. she produces her own spirit energy.”Túeth’s head shoots straight up as though something had bit her when she hears this, and she immediately locks eyes directly with Eirlathion. “I think, with this, we could probably gain the help of the fey court. I was planning to go to them and ask for them to help. If we can get the support of the faerie royals on our side, there won’t be anybody who would try to hurt those girls.”

“H..how!?”Túeth asks with a shaky voice. “How is that even possible?”

“I have seen it before,”Eirlathion says, “but never in a child this young. Never in a child period for that matter. I really don’t know for sure how she could have gotten to such a level this early in her life. I did not sense spirit energy from her when I examined her for the first time, or at least I don’t think I did, but lately I have been noticing that it just gets stronger and stronger as she grows older. There is something about her that I absolutely do not understand, but.. at any rate, I am fairly certain the faerie queen herself may even take an interest in this when she hears about it. The fact that they are grey elves will no longer even matter. However, I am going to need your help for this.”

“Me? How?”

“Well, it’s really quite simple. I will be needing somebody to watch the children while I am gone, and given the circumstances I really can’t trust just anyone. I need somebody who knows about their secret, but will absolutely not tell anyone else about it.”

Túeth’s eyes fall upon hearing this, staring directly at the table between them. It takes a while before she can even work up the strength to meet Eirlathion’s eyes again after hearing what he expects her to do.

“It’s not going to be immediately, but the sooner it is the better. For now, I would at least like for you to come and meet the girls and let them become comfortable with you. I told you the most shocking thing about them just now, but there really is a whole lot more to it. Both girls are also very advanced and intelligent for their age to a point it’s almost frightening. You are going to have to get used to each other before we can set things in motion.”

“I.. I see.”Túeth responds. “Well, I guess.. yes. I will do what I can.”

Eirlathion gave a satisfied nod at her ascent. And with this, the confrontation both parties had been dreading but both knew had to happen at some point came to an end on a good note. From this point on, it would all just be a matter of working out the details.

Author's note.

The plot thickens. The next chapter will start in Eirlathion's perspective. I have noticed in the statistics that there are a few people who like to skip chapters that are in Eirlathion's perspective, but those of you who do this might want to stick around for this one. This one is not just going to be a re-hash of the same events from another person's perspective, so you are not going to be able to get away with skipping it.

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