An abrupt crash through the door woke me and Kristy up.

"Kristy, get up Aila is missing from her crib.  I need you to come help me find..." mom yelled until she saw me in Kristy's embrace.  "Kristy care to explain?" mom said to her.

Kristy looked away before answering.  "I uh... I took Aila out of her crib last night to sleep with her," she said nervously.

Mom took a large sigh and walked over to me and Kristy.  "Kristy, Aila is still too young for you to sleep with her.  You will have to wait until she is a little older.  Okay?" she asked.

"I'm sorry mommy, I just wanted to sleep with her," Kristy said with a lowered face.

"It is fine as long as nothing bad happened, and it was your birthday yesterday, so I won't be harsh on you about this matter, but do not do this again until Aila is older," mom said while picking me up.

"Yes mommy," Kristy said as she got up and started to get dressed.

Mom walked out of Kristy's room.  She walked across the hall and entered my room.  When she entered she started to do her usual morning routine with me.  When she finished she placed me in my crib; looked over me for a few seconds and left the room.

I thought about the events that had transpired last night and decided to get some rest.

***

Throughout the next six months, everything followed in a pretty routine fashion.  I would wake up and be fed and changed by my mother.  Kristy would come and play with me, though it was mostly her playing, but it was still fun to watch.  The servants would occasionally come in and check on me when my mother was not available.  During the evening's mom would come and feed me again and sing me to sleep. Dad would also come in periodically some nights and talk to me and take some pictures.

During the late nights, I would keep up on my mana sensing practice.  Progress on sensing my inner mana had become super slow as soon as I reached a third of my mana capacity.  I still continued to try to sense my mana even with the slow progress.  I ended up spending most of my day time thinking up solutions to how to further sense the mana.  I started thinking of trying to apply mana to all five senses in my body and try to completely visualize it.  I thought back to the magic dinner scene I saw six months ago.  My memory was very faint, but I still remembered the fact that mom, dad, Kristy, along with the servants making the scenery were all able to control the mana into a visible state with their wills.  I began to think of ways to will my mana into a clear sensation that I could easily feel, but it was very hard trying to do it.  I did not want to use mana outside of my body before I was taught how by my parents, so I stayed away from trying to do magic yet.  I did not matter much as I was having fun trying to sense my mana right now.  I was a challenge, a fun challenge that I felt would have many benefits.

Last month I started to pick up on the language a little easier.  Though I was not able to speak the words yet, I still began to understand a little of the language around me.  Because of this whenever I understood what mom said to me I would slightly respond with appropriate crawling around and picking up random items she called out.  She laughed and nodded her head whenever I got the item right.  I felt a great amount of pride from being able to recognize simple terms that I did not notice Kristy and dad watching me from the other side of the room with a film camera.  They taped the whole event and even played it on the tv in my room after I had finished playing with mom.  I was totally embarrassed to have been recorded doing this type of action.  I buried myself in my mother's chest and stayed like that until the film ended.  When the film ended mom carried me over to my bed and put me to sleep before leaving with dad and Kristy.

I continued to have fun days with my family as I continued to grow.  I started to join the family at the dinner table every night.  Although I was fed soft solids, it was still nice to experience the nice family atmosphere.  The foods I was fed were soft foods, but they were nice tasting and was a nice change from the usual breast milk.  It was nice and I was still receiving it every morning and every evening before going to bed, but eating different foods was great.

Mom began reading to me today.  She grabbed a fairly large picture book and read it while I was in her lap.  The story was about a little elf called Forlo who had gotten lost in the woods.  Forlo had traveled outside of his village during the day and had gotten lost.  He panicked for a while until a little fairy appeared.  The fairy spoke to Forlo, "Young elf you have lost yourself inside of these forests.  For you to return to your village you must pass three trials," the fairy said.  Forlo asked what the trials were and listened for the fairy's reply.  "The first trial is to find a forest animal and make friends with it.  Once you have completed this task I shall give you your next trial," the fairy said and then disappeared.  Forlo then started to walk the forest in search of animals to make friends with.  He passed by many birds and bugs.  He even passed some small rodents and rabbits.  He continued until he found a lone baby fox sitting in its den crying.  Forlo went over to the fox and asked what was wrong.  The fox turned its head towards the elf and spoke.  "I have lost my parents and have nowhere to go.  No one wants to take care of me," the fox said.  Forlo kneeled down next to the fox and patted its head.  "No need to worry young fox, I am lost too.  What do you say we take care of each other?" Forlo asked.  "Really?" the fox said.  "Of course," Forlo said.  The fox stood up and walked next to Forlo telling him to pick him up.  He did and the fox curled itself around Forlo's neck.  "Good job completing trail one," the fairy said as it appeared in front of Forlo.  Forlo was shocked and jumped back in response to the fairy.  "Now I shall tell you trail two," the fairy said as it flew circles around Forlo.

"Your second trial is to learn to trust and develop a bond with the fox you have befriended," the fairy said.  Forlo looked at the fairy in confusion and asked what it meant by developing a bond with the fox.  The fairy smiled and said, "I want you two to learn to fight the creatures of this forest, by learning to hunt other creatures will you be able to develop trust between you two.  It will also deepen the bond of friendship you have made with the fox," the fairy said and disappeared.  The two walked through the forest in search for small prey to hunt.  They soon found a small rabbit and both Forlo and the fox attacked it.  The rabbit hopped away as it saw the movements heading towards it.  Forlo and the fox saw their mistakes and started to think of a way to hunt the rabbits.  They decided on Forlo creating a trap and the fox leading the rabbit into the trap.  They soon found the next rabbit and set their plan into action.  They ended up catching the rabbit.  They skinned it and set up a small fire to cook the meat.  Forlo cooked his meat on the fire while the fox ate the leftovers off the carcass. They continued to hunt the rabbits every day and were able to trust each other better.  Their bond has also grown closer than before.  The fairy appeared in front of them again and started her third trial.  "Now that you have grown I shall bestow my third trail upon you.  Believe in yourself and find your way home.  If you can manage to complete this task I will grant you one wish for the trouble.  I wish you good luck in finding your way back home," the fairy said smiling.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Forlo and the fox continued to walk through the forest.  Forlo was now very calm inside the forest and was no longer afraid of being lost.  He felt like he could find the way he needed to go as continued to follow his instincts the find the village.  The fox smelled the air and said to Forlo.  "I smell people, that means we must have found your village," the fox said.  Forlo replied with a faint nod.  He was happy to return to the village and felt a sense of relief walking into the village, but he felt something was off.  He wanted his sense of excitement for exploring the unknown again.  He took a deep breath and yelled at the top of his lungs.  "Fairy grant me the ability to adventure the world, explore new places, and fight strong monsters with my trusted partners," he yelled.  The fairy appeared in front of Forlo and said, "That dream is not something you need to wish for.  It is something people work for and accomplish on their own.  There is no wish in this world, only the determination to work hard and accomplish your goals.  If you truly believe you want to adventure the world, then you will adventure the world," the fairy said as it flew around Forlo.  "I wander the world searching for people without a dream and I give them one that would suit them best.  I have already granted your wish and given you the dream you have always wanted.  All you have to do is work hard and achieve the dream in front of you.  Good luck," the fairy said as it disappeared.

Mom closed the storybook and I let out a large yawn.  The story was a simple children's story telling children to search for and pursue their dreams through hard work.  It was a good story I thought.  It left me tired near the end and mom put me in my crib so I could fall sleep peacefully.  She sang a lullaby to me and then left my room.  I quickly fell asleep afterward.

***

Another two months have passed by and I am now ten months old.

Currently, Kristy is playing with me in my room.  Now I am able to play with her.  She would usually play by herself with me watching, but recently I have started to play with her because I understood a little bit as to what she was doing.  Today we are acting as if we were magicians at a magic show.  Kristy is the magician because she can use magic while I am her assistant.  I am the one that gets the tools for her to perform little stunts with magic for the make belief audience.  She would make the audience roar whenever she did a magic trick and would show satisfaction on her face.  It was time for her last act and she walked up to me and grabbed my hand and pulled me over to the center stage, the coach, and started to announce her last act.  "Lady's and gentlemen, for the last act today I am going to cast a special spell on my assistant, Aila," she said as she pointed her finger towards me.  I then noticed a thin pink color start to glow all around me and I felt a tickling sensation all over my body.  I burst into laughter and could not contain myself.  I was starting to feel pain from the laughing and tried to tell Kristy to stop.

"K...Krs...Kristy...Sss...Sto...p," I finally said after a lot of effort.

Kristy stopped everything she was doing when she heard my plea and dispelled her magic and stared at me wide-eyed.  "Aila?  Did you just speak?" she asked surprised.

I open my mouth and try to say something but it's hard to make many words so I just say Kristy again with a bit of effort.

"NO WAY!" she says as she runs out of the room as fast as she can.

I stare blankly at the entrance of the room for a while before I hear the door open again.

"Are you telling the truth, Kristy," mom says as she walks into the room with dad.

"I am mom.  I was playing with Aila and she called out my name," she said.

"Really," mom walks over to me and sits down.  "Aila, say, mommy, mommy," she says to me.

I look at her and open my mouth.  "m... mom...my" I say with effort.

"It's true.  Vail did you get that on camera?" she asks dad behind her.

"Sure did," he says as he kneels down in front of me.  "Aila, say, daddy, daddy," he says to me.

I once again open my mouth and say daddy with much difficulty.

Dad widens his eyes as slight tears come out and he stops the camera for a second to collect his composer.  When he is done.  Mom and dad both start making me say random words, some of which I did not even know.  They would point at objects in the room and ask what it was and then make me go retrieve it.  After dinner, they finally stopped.  Mom and I left the dinner table and made our way to my room.  When she got there she started to talk to me about random things while doing her daily routine for me.  She read me another story, and finally fed me and put me to sleep.

The excitement of me being able to speak died down quickly.  Dad went back to his daily schedule and Kristy would play with me as before, but now I could interject her statements occasionally.  Mom would continue to feed me in the morning and evening, but before I went to bed she would talk more and read to me.  She would talk about the house and the family as well as my two older brothers, Allan and Keith.  She would describe them in a way that made me want to meet them.  When I asked when I would be able to meet them, she said that near the end of the year the academy lets their students go home for three weeks to see their parents and have a small break outside of the school.Mom then explained that the three weeks this year fall between the last week of December and the first two weeks of January.

Mom then explained that the three weeks this year fall between the last two weeks of December and the first week of January.  I did not really know why this was important, but then mom said that my birthday was a week after they would leave to go back to school.  This made me a little sad because I would not be able to enjoy my first birthday with my entire family.

I thought for a while before thinking up a solution.  "W...hy ... no...t ... do ... ea...rly?" I said to mom.

"We were planning on doing that, Aila.  We wanted you to spend your first birthday with the entire family, so we have decided to hold your birthday dinner a week early with the entire family," Mom said.

"Tha...nk...y...ou," I said as I crawled over and hugged mom.

"Since this is your first birthday we want you to participate in a special event during your dinner, so I am going to teach you how to use mana," Mom says.

I look at her confused at why I would need to learn magic for a birthday dinner, but then I remember the special dinner that has happened a few times over the last ten months.  My eyes instantly widen as I remember each time the magical dinner event took place, and I look over to mom with enthusiasm.

"I think you may have guessed it," she said with a smile on her face.  "That being said I am going to need to teach you how to manipulate your mana to your will.  This is something that the faerian race naturally has access to, but it still needs some training to use your mana to its maximum capacity," she said as she started to let out some mana.  She condensed this mana into a small blue ball.  The ball started to change shape and turned into a long string.  With the string, mom started to move certain parts of the string and tied a knot into the string.  After that, the string condensed into a hand that could move its fingers separately and could even pick things up.  She condensed the mana again and made it cover her body.  The thin layer of mana was not restricting the movement of her body and instead fed a constant stream of energy into the cells which overall increased her power.  After the performance, she sat me down in her lap.  "Mana is not all about spell casting and fighting others, no, mana is the energy of the universe that is meant to be manipulated in anyway you wish.  It is your energy that you can bend to your will and what you do with it is to your desire.  Much like our magic dinner tradition, mana can be used in all ways outside of combat," she said to me.

After a while, mom told me that I will start mana manipulation training a week from now and put me into my crib.  She said goodnight and left the room.  I lay in my crib thinking over what mom just told me.  I was fascinated by the prospect of the uses of mana and just laid there thinking about all the ways mana could be manipulated.  I grew excited knowing that in a week I would be able to learn magic.  That excitement faded as a wave of drowsiness passed through me.  I turn to my side and hug the stuffed rabbit Kristy gave to me and faded into dreamland.

***