Welcome to Gaia! ::

"No," the king shook his head sadly. "No. I should have raised them better. First Riordan ... and then Riordan ..."

He sighed. "Well. Done is done, right? I shouldn't linger on their memories." He tried to smile, but didn't quite make it. "I'm glad you're back, my dear. I'm very glad you're back."

He kissed Elnara on the forehead and hugged her again, calmly this time.




Earendil laughed at Lin and tossed her up into the air and then caught her again.

"Maybe he will," he agreed, his eyes sparkling. "Maybe he will. He does always seem to have such good ones, doesn't he?"

"Whee!" Lin cried out, not at all afraid of heights, though if she was she wouldn't have been able to get around as well as she did, "He does, and there's a lot to know," she agreed.

There always seemed to be something to knwo, or to learn about, but that was the way history and storytelling was.

"Yes, I should, I know," Reave frowned, "but it's cooler down here."

He sighed. "Yes, yes, no excuse, I know. Your grandmother reminds me of that fact every single day. There's just ... something about this room ... I can't bring myself to work anywhere else anymore." He shrugged.





Earendil laughed and tossed Lin up again. "Thirty-some-odd thousand years is a long time," he agreed, catching her again. "I know he showed us what the beginning of the world looked like, but I for one am curious about what it was like to live then. What about you?"

"Well... I guess I want to know is why things turn out like that, like...." Lin paused for a moment.

Not because she didn't know what to say or what she wanted to know but these were big things coming from such a tiny girl.

"There's another world, like yours and like Gaia, it doesn't have a name but everyone calls it the Second world, because that's where we come from and that's what we are. I wonder if one day that will be like here!"

She nodded thinking about that.

"It has day and night, I guess it has weather, but it never rains even though the grass is always green. It's never too hot or too cold," she shook her head, "There's no snow and only a breeze. It's like... always the same! Like someone pressed stop and said that's the way it's always going to be!"

"Pressed stop?" Earendil repeated, confused by the phrase. He had never heard it before, but he thought he could guess at its meaning.

"Well, from what I know - which, mind you, isn't a lot - there was no sun, no moon, no rain, no weather of any sort during the First Age," he told Lin. "SIr Valdemar would be able to tell you more, though."

Considering he had lived through it.




Reave smiled and put one hand on Elnara's shoulder. "Yes," he murmured, "you're right, of course. Forgive an old man his sorrows." He squeezed her shoulder tightly, then looked over at the others. "Well," he said, a bit more brightly now, "dinner should be any time, why don't we all go wash up a bit, hm?"

"I remember him telling me that, but I wonder sometimes why things change," Lin explained, "I know the trees disappeared now, but why did people change?"

That was the most difficult part, true there were Seconds that weren't so good, but they weren't ever enough trouble to really hurt someone, but here there always seemed to be people strong enough to be a problem.

Earendil shrugged. "I don't know," he admitted. "I mean, I sure wish things were like they were back then as well, but I wouldn't know the first thing to do to change it back, or if it's even possible."

They reached the door of Sir Valdemar's study, which was closed this time, and knocked.