Welcome to Gaia! ::

"I try to do that," Earendil chuckled, "but sometimes I'm afraid I'm guilty of being too afraid to try new things."

"Aren't we all," Kaito deadpanned. "But in Gaia, that's easier to do - there's a huge variety of foods that you can choose from. Here, not so easy. Not as much variety."

"There are ways," Earendil commented. "Salt is one preservative, though it isn't necessarily a good one. There are some people with gifts that help with preserving things, like Haradhel: she can summon some extremely cold water, which she can use as an insulator around some types of containers."

He pulled up in front of Arwen and Roydon's house and dismounted. "Here we are."

Earendil chuckled. "Well, we're only going to be here a few days at most," he grinned at Miyuki, ruffling her hair affectionately. "Then we're going to be off again. Though the ship is like a really big house, kind of like the castle, so you'll enjoy that a lot more than this cart you've been in for four days."

"I'll stay with the horses for now," Kaito offered. "You guys go on in and talk to her."

Earendil nodded as Shea and Mikhail also dismounted. "Off we go then."

He took Miyuki's hand and held his other hand out to Lin.

"It will be," Earendil agreed. "It's been a while."

He stepped up to the door, then let go of Lin's hand to knock. He hoped they would be home, though if they weren't he was sure at least one of them would be at the shipyard.

"They'll have fish," Earendil chuckled. "Living on the river, surrounded by desert, it's the only source of meat they have."

Just as he finished speaking, the door opened, and a boy about Lin's height with grayish-tan skin and white hair stood grinning in the doorway.

"Earendil," he said warmly. "We have been expecting you. All of you. Come in."

"Thanks, Amalirahc," Earendil smiled. "Are you and your parents coming on the trip with us? I assume that if you're here, they must be as well."

"We're coming," Amalirahc agreed as everyone filed into the house.

Amalirahc squawked and fell over backwards, landing on the floor with Miyuki on top of him. He laughed and hugged her. "Hi, Mi'ki!" he grinned, also a mispronunciation left over from his childhood. "You're back!"

Leyenda and Arwen were both sitting in the living room, and they both laughed at the children's excitement.

"Welcome back, all of you," Arwen said warmly, rising from her chair and coming over to greet them. "We got your letter just two days ago, but we've been preparing things for the trip ever since."

"It looks like it," Shea teased his niece as he entered behind the others. "Sitting here and talking ..."

"Be nice," Leyenda giggled. "We've been working hard, we just finished cleaning up from lunch. It's our break time."

"You really have no idea how much Roydon, Celeb and Kelirahc together can eat," Arwen agreed. "It's like feeding an army."

"I can eat just as much as Ada," Amalirahc pouted up at his grandmother, hurt to be left out of the equation.

Amalirahc grinned as he stood up again. "Thanks. She's still kind of little, but she's a little heavy too!"

Miyuki was no elf, after all, and even if by Gaian standards she was light, by elven standards it was still heavy.

Leyenda laughed. "Come on, Amalirahc, back to work."

"But we have guests," the boy grinned at his mother. "It's not fair to make me keep working when our guests have just gotten here."

Amalirahc grinned at Miyuki. "Well, I'm almost seven," he told her proudly. "Ada says someday I'm probably going to be tall, like him! But for now I'm just a kid."

Leyenda chuckled, amused by how her son was paying attention mostly just to Miyuki now. "He was doing his lessons. Not much attention span for the written work, he would much rather keep it oral."

"No, he would much rather be at the shipyard with his father and grandfather," Arwen laughed.