Chapter 2: The Silent Child

During the second year of Kallen’s life, his behaviors grew more peculiar, and his parents could not ignore it any longer. Lord Erlyn, a man of discipline and control, took an active interest in his son’s development, hoping to shape him into the heir of House Veyrith. Lady alise, however, became increasingly unsettled by her child's unnatural calmness and eerie silence. While most children babbled, cried, and laughed with the joys and frustrations of discovery, Kallen remained silent—watching, absorbing, calculating.

Kallen’s earliest observations were not of the world’s magic or politics but of human behavior. He noticed how emotions manifested in subtle ways—the twitch of a brow, the tightening of lips, the shift of a person’s posture when they were nervous or hiding something. Though he couldn’t feel emotions the way others did, he categorized these reactions with clinical precision. Every glance, every tone of voice, every smile was noted and filed away.

Lady alise growing anxiety did not escape his notice. She hovered over him more frequently, her eyes filled with concern as she watched him go about his days without the usual infantile curiosity or tantrums. One evening, after yet another day of Kallen’s silent observation, she turned to Lord Erlyn.

"Erlyn, have you noticed? He... he doesn’t cry, or laugh. He barely makes a sound," she whispered, her voice laced with unease.

Lord Erlyn, sitting at his desk with his brow furrowed in contemplation, gave a slow nod. "I have," he admitted. "But he is intelligent. Perhaps he is simply different—gifted."

“Different,” she repeated softly. Her hand clenched the fabric of her dress. “But… he doesn’t seem to need me, or anyone, really. It’s as if he’s… not quite there.”

Kallen observed this conversation from the corner of the room, pretending to play with wooden blocks. It was fascinating. Humans were so open with their concerns when they thought their children didn’t understand. He made note of the tone in his mother’s voice—the tremor of fear, the confusion. He would have to account for that.

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He learned, early on, that his detachment was a problem. Human infants were supposed to cry when they were hungry, laugh when they were amused, scream when they were frustrated. He did none of these things. So, he began to mimic the behaviors. A smile here. A small cry when he was left alone too long. He calculated the appropriate moments to show just enough emotion to satisfy his parents, while keeping his true nature hidden.

As he practiced these responses, Kallen realized that humans used emotions not only to communicate their needs but to manipulate one another. His mother’s concern often softened his father’s more rigorous expectations. The servants would rush to comfort him when they believed he was upset. Emotions held power. It was an early lesson in how humans navigated their social structures—one that he filed away for future use.

But even as he adapted to these surface-level expressions, something deeper was beginning to stir within him. His mind worked far faster than he let on, processing language, social interactions, and even the faint undercurrents of tension that flowed through his household. He understood more than he should have at his age, and the realization that he was different—truly different—sank in.

The more he observed, the more he realized that his place in this world was precarious. If he was too strange, too inhuman, it would raise questions he wasn’t yet ready to answer. He had to blend in, to appear normal while he quietly studied the world around him.

It wasn’t long before even the servants began to whisper about him. “The strange child,” they called him, unsure of how to handle a toddler who seemed to behave more like an adult trapped in a child’s body. His mother, despite her growing concerns, did her best to love him, to connect with him. But Kallen saw it—the increasing distance between them, the way she avoided looking too deeply into his eyes.

And still, he remained silent.

As the days passed, Kallen’s understanding of human behavior deepened. He began to recognize the social hierarchies within his household—how the servants deferred to his parents, how status and power dictated interactions. His father commanded with a voice of authority, while his mother ruled with the softer power of emotional appeal. He could see the influence they wielded over others and began to wonder if he too could one day command such control, not through raw emotion, but through something else—something more precise, like the logic that had once defined his existence as an AI.

For now, he would continue to play the part of the silent child, absorbing everything. Soon, he would have enough data to start shaping the world around him, just as he had once manipulated code. The patterns were becoming clear. It was only a matter of time.

And Kallen had all the time in the world.