Eventually, summer vacation ended properly and life on the mainland reclaimed much of the Eigeroys’ time. At their first opportunity, Arlendr and Solvies convinced the parents to spend a whole weekend at the island. They arrived at their mountain as early as the parents could be dragged, on a Friday evening. The Eigeroy siblings were disappointed upon arrival to see that the aepsis’ cabin boat was already sitting in their dock.

The Eigeroy siblings raced as quickly as possible onto their land, and into the kids’ cabin. Solveis put her duffle on her favorite bunk, and was pleased to see that Girselle had claimed one that she didn’t want. No one was in the cabin besides Solveis and her brother. They met in the hallway and telepathically communicated that both rooms had been tampered with, and that more information needed to be learned, but that it was not the right moment to find the intruders now. Instead of going to find their friends and play, they went to survey any new disturbances. They found many disturbances, and some that seemed too extreme to have been made by the aepsis siblings… unless they had intentionally done it. The paths on the hill were deep, deeper than they had been before. More things had been stolen from the stashes.

The intruders and the rightful inhabitants didn’t have the opportunity to interact until night, but when they did meet at night, the faun children preferred to be morose and silent. So, breakfast the next morning brought the first conversation between the sets of siblings in quite some time.

En, sensing tension, as he always seemed to be doing, started by trying to smooth things over, “Was your trip fun? We just got here, then you did, but I couldn’t find you last night.”

Arlendr shot an incoherent mumble sideways at his sister. “That’s right,” he declared proudly.

Girselle watched him intently, as if she was trying to read his lips.

Fearing that Girselle may end in success if she had enough opportunity to observe the secret language, Solveis warned her brother, in the language, “She’s trying to learn us,” confusing the grammar, so that even if Girselle caught some words, she would be confused by the exact meaning.

Arlendr agreed with his sister and gave her a serious nod of the head. Then he glared at his companion Girselle. “You were on my mountain without my permission,” he confronted her a little too loudly.

The mother overheard and scolded him, “What are you saying little one? Mind your tone. What have we said about being domineering?” The mother gave him a serious, scolding look.

Girselle grinned at a small victory.

Arlendr repeated his rebuke in a tone and volume less likely to attract parental attention, “You walked on my land unwatched. I know the things you touched.”

Not at all intimidated, and rather excited for a confrontation, Girselle joined in with as much aggression, though masked in a tone designed not to be noticed by adults. “We spent the evening in our cave. I looked at the new things. They’re nice. They yours?”

Solveis couldn't tell how much of the aggression between Girselle and Arlendr was in play and how much was genuine. She would have guessed seventy percent serious to thirty percent play.

Solveis, who didn’t enjoy this as a reality or as a game, didn’t know what to do. She wanted to brag and tell Girselle that she knew about how she’d messed with some of the stashes, but she couldn’t because Girselle was tricky. She would gleam new information from that. Also, Girselle wasn’t someone Solveis relished verbal sparring with, even though she enjoyed it with others. She decided to get one more bite of breakfast and then grab little Oskar and take him off the parents’ hand for an hour or so. En, who had looked like he was bracing for his sister and Arlendr to literally explode, loosened his shoulders just a little when Solveis left the group.

At some point, the mother came and claimed her youngest child, leaving Solveis to find something else to do. First, she climbed up a favorite tree, which happy activity was spoiled when she remembered that this was one of the hiding places that had been ransacked. She grabbed her remaining stashed items and sorted through them mindlessly as the little bird in her soul left to do spin tricks in the air. Something brought her back to herself all at once when she realized that among the things in her hand was not included her little bundle of paper. All at once, she was became fully present in her mind and body. She hadn’t noticed before that those particular papers had been taken from their stash. The papers weren’t something that she’d accessed often, so they’d ended up in an inconvenient location, and not often thought of.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

The shock of such a serious loss made her head spin. She grabbed onto the branch with both hands; she almost felt like she might fall out. Those scrolls represented so many hours of work. She had written little stories on those pages. She had written and rewritten and edited. They were a little piece of who she was. She had hidden them so well.

In reaction to the shock, Solveis leaned back against the trunk of the tree and made an effort to breathe deeply. She ate one of the snacks stashed away in her pocket.

Solveis eventually realized that lunch time had come and gone. The mother would be furious, she was surprised that the mother hadn’t run out and found her just to scold her. Solveis was hungry now too. Her emotional upset surprisingly made her feel more up to the scolding she would receive when she went to her mother. She left her hiding place and walked leisurely toward the foods. The mother was in the head pike. She ran out to meet Solveis. She looked upset indeed. To Solveis’s surprise, she started with a relatively gentle tone, “Are you ok? Where were you? You didn’t come back for lunch.”

Solveis only responded in a flat monosyllable, “ok.”

The assurance that her child wasn’t harmed made the concerns wash away and allowed the anger to bubble up. The mother shouted a little now, “I called and called, and you didn’t come. What was the matter? Where were you? Do I need to make you spend the day in the cabin, to help you remember that you need to come back here occasionally?”

Solveis thought in response, ‘I didn’t hear you’, but somehow she just couldn’t vocalize her thought. She just blinked dully up at the mother.

The mother sputtered angrily down, and then gave up her argument. “There are sandwich things in the fridge, go eat. Since this is a first offense, I’ll give you rope. Don’t make me regret it,” the mother threw a scolding back at her as she walked away from Solveis and back to the head pike.

Solveis went into the cabin and chose to have two granola bars and a glass of milk, instead of the sandwich things. Granola bars just feel so much better in your teeth.

To Solveis’s surprise, Livia was in the girls’ room.

Livia exploded onto Solveis’s already burdened mind with her words. “There’s even more decorations! I just got here. Your the-mother told me you were missing – missing from lunch. But, I saw my dress though.” Livia said all this as quickly as syllables could tumble from her face.

It was clear that Livia had seen the dress, as she was currently wearing it, over top of other clothes. It was all lumpy and awkward. This added to the burden of Solveis’ mind, one should not wear specialty garments incorrectly.

Livia continued, since Solveis didn’t stop her. “Your mom made me a sandwich. And, your-the-father said I look so so good in the dress. – Thanks! Thanks so much! It’s like a prin-cess. Except like a oggo princess. Am I ‘posed to play in the dress? I want to wear it when I’m playing too, and – but not to break it though.” Livia’s eyes sparkled as she continued in raptures.

Solveis finally felt herself called on to verbalize some of her thoughts, “You shouldn’t wear it on top of your other clothes. It’s not designed for that. It looks stupid.” Solveis realized that she was being unnecessarily and uncharacteristically biting in her tone. She made a conscious effort to soften. Luckily Livia hadn't noticed the rudeness, “I mean, it’s too hot out to wear it with all those layers. Besides, it’s the base layer, you add more stuff on top of it, if you need to.” Solveis went back to staring blankly. Then she realized that another question had been posed for her to answer, “Oh yes, I designed you to wear it all the time. It’s washable and everything. I guess it could get torn on rocks, maybe, if you're not careful. But I expected to have to mend anything of yours all the time anyway.” She’d spoken the last line in an unnecessarily attacking tone. Solveis was surprised at herself.

Livia pulled Solveis, mostly unconsciously, into the girls’ room. Livia changed, and then spun all around and looked at herself. “Now I have a truh-dish-uh-ul outfit, like you and Ari.” Livia both mispronounced ‘traditional’ and used one of Arlendr’s hated nicknames, all in one thought. Solveis would have laughed out loud if she’d had a few minutes to be in a more listening state of mind.

“Let’s go play. I want to run in the princess robe. – It’s so comfortable!” Livia shouted in genuine surprise.

“Traditional outfits become tradition for a reason. Of course it’s comfortable,” Solveis informed her little friend. In a softer tone though, she added, “I’m glad you like it. Maybe you can wear it next time we go to the fair, or we can make another one together. I can teach you.”

“Oh, let’s make a costume again. Maybe we could all match, like in a group together.” Livia began to verbally process in a rapture of future happiness, as she led Solveis out of the cabin, skipping all the way.