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Late evening, a warm fire, and the smell of Mom’s cooking soon to be ready. Faen liked to spend these times lying by the fire with a book. If she was lucky, her father would buy a new adventure story for her to read, and she would spend the next day running around the forest pretending to be some great explorer in search of lost treasure. Most nights she was left re-reading books she’d already gone through several times (and which definitely showed it) or her father would have her study magic theory in one of his many many tomes on the subject.
Tonight, she had something her brother and sister had put together for her. Well, Ivellios did most of the putting together, according to him and Mamma. Althea just gathered some of the plants and made snarky commentary on their brother’s handwriting. It was a little book of pressed leaves and flowers. They said it was to help Faen learn what was safe and what wasn’t since she tended to remember things better when she read them, as opposed to her older siblings telling her over and over. They were probably getting tired of that.
With her tongue stuck out one side of her mouth and black smudges on her fingers, Faen did her best to neatly trace one of the leaves onto another sheet of paper. Her hand was shaky, unused to writing in general, but moreso to the awkward girth of the burnt stick she was using for a pencil. She frowned at the result and held it up to show her mother. “It’s not very good, is it, Mamma?” She asked.
Naivara looked up from the pot she was stirring and gave her daughter a smile. “You’re getting better, darling. It might be easier if instead of one long line you do short strokes. Do you remember the sketches in your father’s book on familiars?”
“Uh huh,” Faen nodded, immediately hunkering down to try her mother’s suggestion.
“You might want to wait a bit on that though, Faen. The soup’s almost ready.”
“Oh, okay.” Faen sat up and gathered her things in a pile. “I’ll go get Papa!”
She ran off towards Paelias’ study tent with clear excitement. Any excuse to be in the same tent with all those books. Her father usually told her to keep out, since there were no shelves and some of the piles were so precarious that the slightest jostling could send them toppling down on Faen’s small form.
Faen wormed her way into the tent and plopped herself across her father’s lap, grinning up at him cheekily. “Mamma says dinner’s ready.”
“Oh, is that so? And how am I supposed to get some when you’re lying there like that?”
“You can’t! I have you trapped forever. You have to pay me a handsome if you wanna eat.”
“A ransom? What sort of ransom would you want to be paid?”
“Hmm...” Faen’s mouth twisted in thought. “I want wings!”
“You get into enough trouble with just your feet, I’m not giving you wings even if I could.”
“Then no soup for Papa. Eep!”
Paelias scooped his daughter into his arms and carried her back to the fire.
“No fair, you didn’t pay me ransom!”
“Ah, but you forget, my dear daughter, that I’m stronger than you.” He sat her down and gave her a pat on the head before accepting a bowl of soup from his very amused wife. “Remember, Faen, if you want someone to give you something, you need to have an advantage.”
“Better luck next time, sweetheart,” Naivara smiled indulgently. “Now eat up before your sister comes and eats the whole pot.”