The girl opened her eyes to see her brother Atreus sitting next to her. She was on some sort of island in a forest, looking behind her she saw the biggest tree she had ever seen. It was so big she didn’t think it would even fit inside a castle. A mouthwatering scent drifted from nearby, it smelled so good she could almost taste it.

“Hey you, you’re finally awake” Taylor said with a chuckle, “come sit and have some food.” He was trying his best to not laugh at his own inside joke. He couldn’t believe he actually got the chance to use that line.

The girl flinched away, cling onto her brother, and buried her face into his shirt. The poor thing was traumatized as was to be expected. Nobody would be okay after something like that.

“It’s okay Becca,” Atreus said softly, “he’s the person who saved you. He made you all better and brought you here to Gaia, the big tree.”

She slowly pulled her head out of his shirt and peeked over at where the voice had come from. She froze seeing a grown up, but he somehow looked familiar. She didn’t know why but there was something about him that reminded her of her daddy.

“Where’s mommy?” She asked her brother.

Atreus didn’t answer, his eyes immediately filled with tears as he did his best to not start bawling in front of his little sister. Taylor saw what was going on and had to do something. He was holding back tears of his own, god being away from his family sure made him emotional.

Getting up he slowly approached the pair and knelt down only five feet away from them, “Atreus, did the bad guys hurt your mom?” He asked.

He just nodded his head, “do you think she’s going to be okay?” Taylor asked hoping it was just a broken leg or something.

He shook his head no as he began to shake a little from trying to not cry. His breath getting the best of him. “O-our m-m-m-mom i-is gone for- forever. Just- just like our d-dad is.” He stammered out between shaky breaths.

Taylor held out his hand, “I know I won’t ever be able to replace them, but you can stay with me for as long as you’d like.”

They both looked at his hand with hesitance, taking it meant being with him for who knows how long. But he was nice to them, and he helped save Becca. Atreus took the hand first and nodded at Becca, she slowly reached out her hand to grab his as well and Taylor pulled them into a hug.

He gave them a tight squeeze being careful to not hurt them, and he rocked them back and forth. Letting go he looked at them both “good, now let’s go eat.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Holding Atreus’s hand and Becca holding her brother’s hand, they walked to the fire to eat the deer that had finished cooking.

* * *

Virginia stared at the paper trying to figure out what happened to her husband. He stepped on it, it glowed, and he disappeared. She tried putting a pencil on it but nothing happened. She wasn’t going to step on it, no way. Her girls couldn’t lose both parents.

Something was missing but she couldn’t figure out what. She punched the table and then immediately cradled her hand, “fucking shit! That was dumb.” She chided herself.

The girls were out in the back yard playing in her sight. She wasn’t going to let them out of her sight again, well besides school. And having her mom watch them while she went to work.

Things got a lot harder since Taylor disappeared, she had to pick up hours at work and was being supported by government programs since she was now a single mother. It hadn’t even been long yet. But she doubted things would get much easier.

* * *

It had been three years since the two elven kids had moved into the island. With Gaia controlling the weather there wasn’t really a need to make a house. Taylor had just made some hammocks to sleep in and they all loved it, especially Melody. She managed to tangle herself up in hers at first because she wouldn’t stop messing around in it.

The kids were playing what was essentially a water balloon war but with magic water balls. Becca was eight and had grown considerably as had Atreus. He was almost as tall as Taylor was now and still growing. Being fifteen made him interested in training his body more than his magic so he focused on that and was pretty well built because of it. Though he might’ve become a bit of a muscle head because of it.

Taylor felt horrible for not providing them a proper education but he did his best to teach them the basics. At least when it came to math and science he didn’t fail them too bad. But Taylor didn’t even know how to read so he was just as lost as they were. Without any books to practice with he didn’t even know where to start so he just taught them English.

A wayward water ball struck Taylor right in the face making Becca giggle. Tylor wiped his eyes and looked at Atreus who was grinning.

“Oh you want to play that game with me huh?” Taylor said summoning tendrils of water ten feet tall to rise out of the lake, “I’ll play that game”

He launched the first tendril at Atreus who dodged it easily, “too slow old ma-“ the second tendril slammed into him. It didn’t knock him over as Taylor made sure the water was still soft and not hard like he would normally do for combat practice.

Sputtering Atreus laughed, “okay you got me, but you do know that it was Becca who hit you with that water ball right?”

“Tattle tale!” Becca said flinging a ball at her brother.

Taylor dropped a large ball of water right on her head making her sputter just like her brother. “Not fair! You’re so much better at magic than us. You gotta go easy on me at least, I’m just a little girl.”

“Nah I think I’ll have some fun soaking a couple of brats for a little while” Taylor friend mischievously.

Next thing he knew he was in the air and he thought to himself, ‘how many times am I going to get thrown in the lake by this woman?’

Slamming down into the water he got up and wiped his eyes again and began the process of squeezing his hair that was now down to his butt. “How can a dragon be so damn sneaky?” He complained.

“I had to learn to be quiet to avoid the predators” she said simply.

“Predators?” Taylor laughed, “what could eat a dragon?”

She looked at him in a much more serious tone, “many things. When it comes to the food chain dragons are below humans and humans are only about the middle. Humans dominate because of tools and numbers but that’s it. It’s precarious at best but humans could be wiped out in an instant should one of the real predators want to.”

Taylor entered mana synch to look at Gaia for confirmation. “She’s right,” he nodded, “as it stands right now you with your power are above all of humanity. But there’s still a decent amount of monsters that could even kill you.”

Taylor mulled that over. He had stagnated in his magic studies. He had been too busy raising the elven siblings and teaching them magic to continue his own studies. Maybe it was time for a little free study time for them all.