Eirlathion POV
When these children appeared before Eirlathion a bit over a month ago, he had been very much looking forward to finding out all that he could about them. What he didn’t expect though were for the Elven twin girls they were brought here for to hold almost as large a number of mysteries as the human boys. Although, there was one mystery that was easier than the others to solve, and Eirlathion was not liking the answers he was getting from it.
Shortly after he had seen their condition, he had gone to the girls’ mother and told her what he knew. Her response was not strange, she definitely seemed to have a haunted expression when told about how ill her daughters seemed to be, and when she was told about their sickly pale skin she began to start looking ill herself. The strangest reaction though came when she was asked to go into the nursery and see them. She absolutely refused.
Several of the villagers pleeded with her. With one of the girls violently expelling her mana in bursts and the other oddly lethargic, either one of them seemed like they could loose their connection to this world at any time. Most of the other elves in the village seemed to think she was distraught and not wanting to look at or become close to daughters who may only vanish from this world a short time later. However, with the time Eirlathion had spent with them, he was slowly coming to another fairly terrible suspicion.
The time she had come here, it had been after her own village was destroyed after having been attacked by devils. Corrupted elves to be exact. The members of their own kin tainted by the arcane energies. These ones were very well known to be the very most vicious of all the devil races, known as visions of slaughter and death by their very existence. The humans also had their own name for them. Dark Elves.
Eirlathion thought back to the sickly pale looking skin of the two girls. To others, one of them was very fussy and always lashing out, while the other was weak and always lethargic. However, for Eirlathion who had been watching them for over a month now, that was not what he had been seeing. He had seen the supposedly fussy one being quite active, a little ball of pure energy and strength, constrained only by her infant body. Meanwhile, the other, she did not look lethargic due to being sickly. He had seen her open her eyes and look about with an odd intelligence in her eyes that didn’t seem to fit a child of her age. In fact, there was a part of it that almost scared him at times. The faces she made were not those of discomfort or malaze. They were faces of boredom and scorn. Faces that were completely unbefitting such a small infant.
Eirlathion had had the most intimate contact of any elf in the village with these girls, so he truly felt he was getting to know them well. After he had given his report about his findings, it was decided to introduce them to solid food early in order to anchor their physical forms to this world. A normal elf could subsist on only the spirit energy of humans until the age of three when they are more capable of actually chewing their own food. However, for these infants he had to become creative, and smeared some juice from some berries on his finger before spreading it on their tongues. However, from the energy he saw from the both of them, and the disgusted faces from the calm one every time as though she wanted to kill him, he had been shaken and begun to doubt as to whether or not they even needed such a thing at all.
They were definitely not normal, and that wasn’t even counting the fact that they were twins born to an elf. However, if you discounted the part about them being twins and looked only at their skin color and how healthy they otherwise seemed to be despite it, and you also take the circumstances of their birth into account. ‘Grey elves.’ That seems to be the most reasonable conclusion.
They were born almost exactly two years after the date that their mother said their village was attacked. If they were a hybrid of dark and light elves, that would at least explain their skin color far better than the idea of them being sickly.
Eirlathion was haunted by this realization. If his suspicions of the girls’ parentage came out and was known to the rest of the village, he knew exactly what was likely to happen. After having invested so much time into caring for them, he simply did not have it in his heart to allow that to come about.
With these thoughts in mind, Eirlathion had continued to treat them as he would if they truly were ill. Until he could come up with a better solution, he would continue to hide his suspicions from the others. Fortunately, the only other people who interacted with the girls regularly were the humans who had been brought for them, and with the exception from the woman assigned as the caretaker it was almost a certain thing that the rest would not know about the matter of dark elves and grey elves. As for the caretaker, she would likely accept it on his authority that they were merely ill. However, in order to prevent her from becoming too suspicious, it was better that he make sure to be present as much as he can in order to minimize her own interaction with the girls.
Besides that, because of how close an eye he had been keeping on them, he had noticed something rather odd about the human boys as well. From time to time, the older children would also talk to them. However, the looks he saw on the boys’ faces told him they did not understand even a single word of what was being said to them. There was a suspicion at first that the effects of the enchantments on the food they were given did not work. This, their lack of ability to understand elven words, all but confirmed that suspicion. Had it worked normally, in addition to remodeling their soul to become dependent on the mana of the fey races, it would also give them an understanding of the elven language. However, for them, it was clear that no such understanding had come.
Intrigued by this, Eirlathion had asked the caretaker what was normally done to teach a language to children. She had told him it was as simple as taking an item and telling the children the word for it. This was before he had become suspicious of the girls’ parentage, at this time he was far more fascinated with the boys than he was the girls, the odd nature of their unusually dense souls and the mysterious language they spoke that was neither elven or the tongue of their parents.
Perhaps he could gain some answers if the boys could communicate with him properly. With this in mind, he set to work teaching them the elven language as the caretaker had said, teaching them one word at a time. And then, it was because of his efforts to teach the boys their language that he got his next surprise in regards to the girls.
In the middle of his lesson one day, one of the girls spoke up. The boys identified her as Gaerien, the name meaning “child of the ocean” given to the older twin of the two. A fitting contrast to the name of her sister, Aerien, “child of the sea.” He was unsure the boys were really keeping the names of the girls straight, but it was likely better than he could keep track of them so he decided to take their word for it. At any rate, while the pronounciation was a bit off as could be expected for a baby, she had attempted to speak one of the words he was teaching the boys.
The boys immediately became excited, and began trying to teach her more words. Even more interestingly though, it didn’t take long at all for them to immediately begin trying to teach her their own language as well.
This was an unexpected but very very interesting gain. With this, he could even learn the language the boys were speaking, watching and learning from them as they taught it to Gaerien. However, this startling discovery could not simply be dismissed. There was definitely something very very unusual about these girls, and even the explanation of them being grey elves no longer explained everything he was seeing. Normally, an elf child does not begin to speak until the age of three. These girls were barely even a month old, and already one was saying her first words. It was not just babble either, she was actually repeating back words that were just said to her.
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He had been put at a bit of unease for the looks the calm one was always giving him. However, now, he also discovers the hyper one may even be the more intelligent of the two. And it wasn’t just that, just her being intelligent doesn’t even begin to describe how shocking it is for her to be speaking like this so early in her life.
No, the possibility of dark elf parentage really is no longer enough of an explanation. There was something very very unusual about these girls, and he was going to do what he could to get to the bottom of it.
-
The next day after Eirlathion had witnessed one of the two girls talking, or at least starting to, at the incredibly young age of 1 month, he decided he was going to start some expiraments to examine her. It was easy enough to get the correct girl, despite them being twins. This is because the boys always quite consistently hold the same one, as evidenced by the fact that it’s always the one the boy named Levin is holding who is exceedingly active and fussy while the one that the other boy, Rolwen holds, is the more calm and seemingly lethargic twin. Despite having the identities of the two straight though, the name is an entirely different issue as Levin is constantly changing the name that he calls each of them while Rolwen refuses to call either of them by name.
“Perhaps now that she’s talking, she can decide on her own which name is hers.” Eirlathion muttered to himself as he approached the children today. What he was about to do did slightly risk some of the elves figuring out he was not of the opinion the girls were as sick as they all thought they were, but his curiosity at this point simply would not allow him not to do this.
He had magically examined the girls several times in the past, but every time it was while they were in the arms of the boys. The best that a scan like that can tell him is how well they are feeding and what kind of mana output they are giving. Any more detailed information such as the structure of their souls would be largely obscured by the exchange of all the spiritual energies between them. From what he had seen, the more calm one was feeding normally. Or rather, considering it was these two boys who were the source of the spirit energy that was feeding her, it might even be said she was consuming an excessive amount for someone her age. The energy consumed from Rolwen was, by percent, about the same as would be taken from a normal human child. No, it even went beyond that. When Levin was near, she consumed it from him as well.
The more active child meanwhile, the same one who had shown excessively fast growth until now, seemed to consume very little spirit energy, and yet she kicked off far larger levels of mana than her sister. Now, seeing that she had come to start talking this early as well, Eirlathion was already beginning to suspect what he was going to find. Perhaps any other simple mage, even one among the elves, would not see the significance in this at all and even worry as the rest of the villagers had over them up until this point. However, having been among the faeries as much as he had, he was very much aware of what could likely be the cause of this. If it was true, he simply had to find out.
But first, to cover his bases. He told the children’s caretaker that he had to perform some “risky” tests, but he thought that the girls should be strong enough to handle them at this point. After this, he went to the boys as he usually did. “I’m sorry, I’m going to do something different today. I will have to take this one with me.” He said, reaching down and lifting the girl from Levin’s arms. She immediately seemed to grow very alarmed, and began twisting and turning around in his grasp. She pulled and worked her arm out of her blanket and began reaching for Levin.
“Now now, it’s going to be alright, I will have you back to him shortly.” He said in a gentle voice as he continued to walk toward a different room. However, she only started to cry when she realized he was not going to bring her back immediately.
Eirlathion simply let out a sigh and then walked into the small closet he had previously set up for his purposes. He set the wailing child down a small counter, and interestingly enough her crying seemed to quit down to small hiccups and sniffles. No, actually, more surprising than that was the fierce look she was giving him. But, even more surprising still, was the immense energies he was feeling washing off of her as she was giving him that intense glare. He hadn’t even started his examination yet, but he almost didn’t have to with what he was seeing. It was qute clear.
What he was feeling was not just the mana naturally released by elves, it was also heavily laced with spirit energy that she was generating completely on her own without even the slightest contribution from any human child.
An involuntary sigh managed to escape his mouth as he was washed in this aura. No, there was no longer a need to examine her. He knew exactly what was going on now. He reached for the child once again, almost hesitating this time, before lifting her up far more tenderly than he had the first time and began to hold her as though he was afraid of harming her in any way. “Alright, now then, let me get you back to Levin, shall I? I’m sorry for taking you away from him.”
By the time he had gotten out of the room, he began to hear the sound of a baby crying once again. It took him a moment to realize that the baby crying this time was not the one he held in his arms, but her sister still being held by Rolwen. Apparently, her sister had somehow noticed her absence, and had become quite distressed over this herself. Well, perhaps that is only natural given what he had just found out.
-
The day I had said my first words in front of the “Ether” guy, he seemed to just watch us for the rest of the day as the boys excitedly taught me one thing after another. I had thought the “Ether” guy had dismissed the event as something unusual, but within the outer limits of reason. That is, until the next day came around.
The day after I had expiramented by showing off my ability to talk, “Ether” guy came around and the very first thing he did was lift me out of Levin’s arms, along with some words he had not taught us yet. Clearly, he was not actually just dismissing my performance they day before in any way at all. He clearly knew there was something strange about me at the very least. Yeah, I definitely overdid it with showing off my advanced development.
The only question is, what do I do now? Well, what he’s doing is probably not something that entirely bad, probably just a few magical tests or something like that. If elves existed, then sure, why not magic as well? I would imagine information based magic is likely among the easiest to cast, at least in terms of information at the level of the equivalent of a medical test. However, if he did those tests, what exactly would he find? I wasn’t sure I was entirely comfortable with this.
I decided I would try to fluster him in some way, maybe do something to make him re-think his actions. A baby crying in distress is probably the best tactic I have to affect his decision at this point, but simply crying when he picks me up will only show I’m a bit afraid of new people or something like that, or maybe it will even just be dissmissed at me being fussy from being woken up. It seems that for once all the crying I had done in the past is coming back to bite me. So, I’m going to need a little bit of an extra touch.
Working with all the skills I had developed wriggling out of the constraits of my blanket before, I managed to work an arm out in mere seconds and then began reaching a hand toward Levin, making it quite clear and impossible to misinterpret the meaning of my cries, before I started just screaming as loud as I have ever screamed as the tears ran from my face.
“Ether” guy seemed completely undeterred by this as he took me to a small storage closet with a light inside it. He put me down, and it was clear my performance had not worked. After he did this, he looked as thoug he was about to do whatever he intended to do. I, meanwhile, got myself ready to strike at his hand whenever it approached to hover over my body as he had done on the first day he showed up. It was completely illogical, but as I cried back there “over him taking me away from Levin,” I somehow arrived at the conviction that I absolutely did not want him casting any magic and finding out anything about me at all.
Honestly, even I don’t know what I was afraid of him finding out. Personally, I think it might have been just spite at this point. Part of it was due to the fact that part of me, I realized, wasn’t just acting earlier. I actually was legitimately upset at him for taking me away from my familiar environment and touching and holding me like that when it has always only been Levin and Ms. Sonaby, but her only on occasion. It seemed I had become a real slow to warm up kid somehow.
The other part, however, was because I still didn’t trust elves. They are the people who almost certainly kidnapped Rolwen and Levin after all, in order to essentially feed them to Gaerien and I. It’s true that I’m just as copable in this for being the one feeding on them in whatever form I do so, which I still didn’t completely understand the mechanics on. However, I’m just a baby, and it seems that this form of feeding is not something I even do by conscious choice. However, they are the ones who had a choice in the whole matter. And, in my case, I also felt disgusted that I was the one it was all done for in the first place.
Because of this, along with nothing else but the pure frustration I had been building up over not being able to act as a baby and finally having some degree of control over my body, I wanted to use this to unleash my frustrations just to spitefully ruin whatever this guy was going to do.
I watched for my opportunity to act, but after he stood there with a dazed look on his face for a while, he simply stepped forward and gently picked me up again.
‘was that it!?’ I screamed inside my own mind. It seemed like he was done. That would mean then that he had finished all of his tests and came to a conclusion. And now, he was picking me up to bring me back to the main room. This was really humiliating. Once again, I could do nothing of my own power to stop this from happening. As a baby, I could truly do nothing.
After that shocking event, I soon heard Gaerien’s crying voice. That wasn’t very common. Could she have somehow noticed I was missing? Well, I was making enough of a rackit on my way out that I’m certain that had to have woken her up, and so now she’s gotten quite grumpy over being suddenly woken up like that. Wouldn’t anyone?
At any rate, “Ether” guy returned me to Levin’s arms, and I imagine my face must have looked pretty aweful at that time.