A week after I had been born, I was being carried by my mother’s arms. Enveloped in a cloth as a makeshift baby carrier. It was an uneventful week, all things considered. I just slept and ate. I also crawled from time to time. Which I still think it’s fairly weird. I know for sure (somehow) that I wasn’t an elf in my previous incarnation, but a baby crawling in their first week is extremely curious, to say the least. I also couldn’t crawl a lot, to be honest, my legs were like gelatin, and they hurt after a few minutes. Quirks of a newborn.

By the way, I mentioned a week had passed by though I didn’t know if the concept of week existed in this world. It just so happened that Mother decided to go outside with me after six sunsets. Sun? What’s a sun? I mentally and audibly sighed.

Also, this has been weirdly phrased. Time does exist, and it also did in the river, it just so happens I had no way to measure it. Now even if I can tell the passing of days through the cycle of day and night, I still didn't know how time worked here. A nudge in my mind whispered to me that time must flow differently. Reason? Unknown.

For Mother, my sigh of desperation sounded more like a giggle as she toyed with me a little.

The streets were crowded and rumbling with people. It was a picturesque sight. Not only the streets were decorated with elven silk awnings, but flora was also plentiful. Vines of blue, green, and pink hang on the walls. They didn’t seem to be intrusive plants, more like a well-thought decoration. Not a wall was left void, and I mean it. It wasn’t that the walls weren’t painted or anything, but blooming vines populated every surface.

Whether it was a cloth or a vine, it seemed like my elven compatriots didn’t like leaving the space undecorated. It made the city even more alive. Like if the very buildings were imbued with life itself, a place where its inhabitants and hearths were bright and vivid.

A great number of parterres filled the walk alongside the crystal-laden veranda. A myriad of flowers, a myriad of panels, and of course, a myriad of colors filled my view. Sure, this was a main avenue and not everything would be as well-looking as this, but that didn’t degrade its beauty. The glasswork showed a story of some sorts, and artwork embodied in glass. I didn’t have a good look at it before my mother took us elsewhere, but the most distinctive imagery was one of a staff.

Like any avenue, there were also trees. These felt alien to me, everything did, but this was an extra step. Their trunks curved like springs, their branches expanded as to cover the skies, and the canopy created an almost perfect umbrella. This happened with every single tree. Their trunks were ashen-white colored. And the leaves were a bright pink color that felt incredibly familiar. My childlike brain thought it would be quite fun to slide downwards from the top of the trunks, and I was actually looking forward to it in the future.

I couldn’t decide what was more beautiful; the mythical Lady of the River or the fantastical color-filled avenue. One was of impossible and erotic beauty, while the latter was of symmetry and nature. I don’t think they could be compared (though the Lady would win).

“Fuli en terre maya, Edrie?” Mother asked me. Even though I couldn’t comprehend the words, it felt as if she asked me if I like the sight. This was a stretch by all means; I was just working with the context.

I nodded in affirmation. If my message arrived, I didn’t know. What I did know is that Mother smiled at me. That god-blessed smile was the only thing that could take me out of my inner monologue trances, it was so pure and sincere I couldn’t just not watch it.

Her attire was simple. A white blouse, a long blue skirt, and a pair of azure moccasins. She also had tied her long white into a ponytail. That made her obscenely long ears look even longer. This decision was curious as her attire was pretty conservative —by my standards and those of the women I saw on the streets— and displaying her ears like that was… arousing? No, that isn’t the exact word. It was… appalling? It was difficult to describe. It was like, energizing, but definitely not arousing as… well… I doubt a newborn can even feel such emotions from a physiological standpoint. It may be different for elves, but I highly doubt it.

I hated when unknown knowledge filled my mind. Yet, what I despised more was the fact I couldn’t remember. I wanted to know more about myself.

Not sure about it, but it seems elves have a natural attraction toward ears, and I’m speaking through personal, though limited, experience. My mind kept wandering to her ears… Is this a maternal bond, or an elven one?

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And speaking of her elven purple ears, she wore two earrings. They were two crystal blue spheres that hung on her ears. They seemed cheap, yet they looked perfect on her. They could also be a lot bigger considering the sheer size of her ears to just have earrings the size of my fat baby fingers.

My mother kept walking around the avenue until she reached some stands. It was a market. People were less plentiful here, yet they had tenfold the energy and enthusiasm of those strolling in the main avenue. The stand where she stopped sold food and was run by a lady who also had a baby like me.

Well, like me was a bit of an overstatement. They had an ugly and stupid face, one appropriate for a baby. I wasn’t sure if I was doing this face. I need to see if there’s a mirror in our house. I hope I’m not ugly. I could live with it, but I doubt there even are ugly elves. Not talking through my unknowledgeable knowledge but through statistics. I haven’t seen anyone I could classify as ugly along our stroll. According to my standards, that is. I surely deviate from the elven common sense of beauty.

Anyways, Mother and the clerk talked to each other. They seemed to be friends, or at least, good acquaintances. They were talking too fast for me to make any sense. Words escaped me as they exchanged words at a vertiginous pace. Is this normal talking speed? I hope not. How can people talk this fast? Do they even understand each other?

The other baby cried a bit and moved their hands to their mom. As a fellow baby, I could understand what they wanted. And no, it wasn’t to stop their endless conversation.

“Fil ni per ni, sum te ensus.” The clerk lady told Mom with a slight blush. It sounded like she was excusing herself and said ‘wait a minute’. Maybe not those exact words, but I think I got pretty close overall.

Then she proceeded to open the buttons of her shirt and feed her child. No embarrassment whatsoever. It made sense; I mean. The only ones here were two babies and two mothers, none cared about breastfeeding. It still felt a bit uncomfortable to me. It was like I a was voyeur spying on the woman even if I myself was an infant and her very son.

After a brief chat and some light shopping, Mother and I departed away from the stall. Mainly a handful of unrecognizable fruits. Or maybe vegetables? What’s the difference, to begin with?

The marketplace was really alive, the scent of spices, the laughter of children, the damned chirps from the bird-selling merchant… What was that? I heard a lot of birds in my past life (I think) and that didn’t sound right. Like if someone had grabbed a child by the neck and started punching them in the stomach. Maybe too graphic of an analogy, but in my head it’s exactly who it sounded. Not even the souls in the river sounded like they were in such pain. One of the birds, a canary-looking thing with a longer tail than its body was the source of the noise. Who would want such a horrendous crying machine?

I was getting sleepy. The warm rays of the star and the swinging of my makeshift carrier soothed me. But I didn’t want to sleep. I wanted to see more of the place. I started moving around so to fight the drowsiness.

Mother noticed this. After she saw that I was uncomfortable, she left the shopping bags on the ground and embraced me in her arms. Then she began to rock me. No! Mother bad! I want to be awake, not sleepy! I want to explore the world beyond me, not be trapped in my mortal vessel!

I started to look for solutions around me. Then I saw a stand that sold, or what appeared to be, children’s toys. Dolls, wood carvings, string thingies, books… BOOKS. The ultimate form of knowledge. The key to ending my featureless suffering.

I moved my arms vigorously to the toy stall. I looked at Mom and giggled.

“Ir fini ten fira, Edrie?” She said, probably understanding what I was communicating.

I replied with, “Ahhh-“ A primitive grunt, typical of a baby. And yet, a universal method of affirmation. I love universal sounds, simple yet effective.

Mother approached the stand, to my greatest desires. She then looked at me.

“Edrie, tu ni jurani fol te?” And I think she asked me what I wanted. She pointed to a tower of building blocks and then to a… bird wood figurine? Not sure about that one.

Sure, the toys were cool. But you know what’s cooler? Knowledge. Yes kids, forgo your dolls and embrace the culture. Soak yourselves in the sea of wisdom!

I moved my arms to a book that looked like the common ‘which animal is this?’ book. I am a great orator, the greatest these lands have seen, so I put my ability to test.

“Ahh…” Googoogaga mother, I crave that book. I actually wanted to googoogaga her, but my tongue and vocal cords were too underdeveloped to even do that. Eh, I’m a week old what I even expected.

“Fir-ti ni del’fa, Edrie?” ‘Are you sure you want this, Edrie?’; or something like that. She was actually shocked by my response. There were a lot of flashy and colorful things on the stand, why would a mindless newborn pick a dull book over them?

To which I responded with “’El’aaaah” I tried to say ‘del’anar’ but to my undeveloped talking skills, it proved quite an impossible task. It was way better than before, so progress was definitely being made.

“Emeti ter ami ni desfala, Edrie?” I think she said if I could repeat that with a surprised face, or at least, that is what I understood.

I said it once more, “-El’anaaaah” now with added exaggeration and better pronunciation.

“Oh, Edrie, fanis to rim er!” She rejoiced. I think I saw a tear. “To ni fem Tel’am soko na.”

Oh, damn. I did just say my first words in my first week after being born, didn’t I? I may have screwed up very badly. Well, harm's done. Either way, she bought the book immediately and we returned home.