Welcome to Gaia! ::

Nadya nodded. "I know she spoke of it with one of your brothers, Yukito I think it was," she said. "She told me that it helped her a great deal ..."

She led Lin around the corner of the house and swept one arm over the apparently empty landscape. "There it is," she murmured.

But when one realized that there was no building there, and only the ground, one would realize that there was something strange about the ground. There was a crater in the ground, about the same size as the present house, perhaps a bit bigger, and as deep as the house was tall. The hole was surrounded by scorch marks. In the bottom of the hole was a small tunnel - the steps to the old cellar, or what was left of it. Though it hadn't been touched in decades.

Nadya shook her head. "Attempted assassination. The war followed after Her Majesty Queen Regan was assassinated. The dwarfs were hired to destroy the house and make sure that certain people were dead."

She held one hand to her heart. "I thank the Valar that they failed."

Nadya watched Lin thoughtfully. "Do you remember ... no, you would be too young to remember. But have you heard stories of how Elnara was treated by Elrohir, and by Ruel and Riordan, when it was first discovered that she could shapeshift? How they refused to acknowledge her as family?"

Nadya nodded. "I'm not sure if you know that Elnara's father is also a twin," she said softly. "Or was, in his first life. Serenity was great friends with Princess Amalthea ... Queen Amalthea as she is now, when they were children. Prince Riordan did not care much for Serenity, she was not afraid of him as most commoners were. But when she was blinded, and rumours began to circulate, he hated her, and he, the protective older brother that he was, forbade the princess Amalthea to spend any time with her. Time passed, and his hatred for her only grew ... he did a marvelous job at making her life miserable."

She shook her head sadly. "But no one suspected that his hatred would be so intense that when she became his sister-in-law, he would pay to have her killed."

Nadya nodded again. "It took her a great many years to learn to trust again," she murmured softly. "Even to trust her own children. But that is behind us now, and we are living in much better days." She smiled. "Come, we should go inside for a drink. I'm sure everyone else must have beat us to it already."

And she turned around and started back towards the house, glancing over her shoulder to see if Lin would follow.

And indeed the others were inside. Ura was still upstairs in bed with a cold cloth on his face, little Regan was sitting in the middle of the sitting room floor and playing with some blocks that someone had dug out for her, and the others were sitting around the room sipping on glasses of cold wine. Shiro was the only other one not in the room, but he had stayed outside with Gion, it seemed, to learn more about the vineyard and life on the plantation.

"Wine, grape juice, or water?" Nadya asked Lin after she had greeted the others again.

Earendil budged over on the couch to make room for Lin. "A short while," he smiled at her. "We wanted to let you rest this morning, but on the other hand we also wanted to look around. I hope you weren't too disappointed."

It was after all his first trip away from the city, and it was his aunt and uncle's home. He simply couldn't resist exploring it all.

Earendil chuckled. "Well, we've got a few days here, so I'm sure you'll have your fill of everything," he grinned at her. "Unlike someone else ..."

"Shiro wants to learn," Aranel chuckled. "Let him. That boy's got more brains than anyone I know."