Welcome to Gaia! ::

"She reminds me of me," Ulani quipped with a grin. "When I was younger, of course, I'm not quite so ... fidgety anymore."

Aliya returned then with Ulrich in tow. As her father began to make breakfast with a groggy "Good morning", she jumped back into her chair and grinned at Cindy and Donovan as if they were dinner.

Oh boy, Ulani thought with a faint smile. Here it comes.

Aliya took a deep breath and burst out into questions. "Where did you guys come from? You said Gaia, but I don't know where that is. Where is it? What's it like there? Are there lots of you there? Does everybody have wings like that? Are your wings real? Can you fly with them? They're pretty, are they soft? What do they feel like? What does it feel like to have wings? Do you know magic? What kind of magic do you have? Do you learn fighting too? Mama's teaching me a bit but Father wants to wait until I'm a bit older to teach me other stuff. Have you ever been here before? Mama told me one time about people that came here from somewhere else but that was a long time ago and I don't really remember what she said. Do you -"

She cut herself off and blushed, then giggled. "Sorry. I go too fast."

"Uhm...." Cindy tilted her head trying to sort through all the questions.

It was really no different than having a recipe cited to her, but she wasn't sure wehre to start. Those were a lot of questions to be quite honest.

"Where would you like me to start?"

Donovan looked, slightly amused between Ulani and Ulrich, and wondered what it was about what he said that set Ulani off this time. Actually he was tempted to ask what happened, but he was not sucidial. NOt that he had much to fear from Ulani, but she didn't look happy.

"Oh," Aliya said softly, still looking at the wings. Her gaze shifted to Cindy once more. "Do you think maybe if they grow bigger that you'll be able to fly with them? How big do you think they'll grow? Mama says we had somebody here one time that had real big wings, but she couldn't fly with them either, but I never met her because that was a long time before I was born. I'm only nine years old, so it was a really really long time ago."

She stopped again to breathe and waited for Cindy's reply.

Aliya nodded in understanding (at least, she thought she understood). "I haven't grown in a long time either," she agreed, "but Mama says that any time now I could hit a growth spurt and get real tall real fast, maybe like her and maybe like Father. She says that's what happens when people get about eleven or twelve years old. That means I only have two more years to wait!"

She beamed proudly. She couldn't wait to grow!

"What about you?" she asked eagerly. "How old are you?"

Aliya blinked. "Huh?" She turned and looked at Ulani. "What's that mean, Mama?"

Ulani laughed softly and brushed a strand of her daughter's hair away from her face. "It means that she's already an adult, Aliya. A grown up. For her race, I guess that happens very ... very early."

"Oh!" Aliya brightened, then turned back to Cindy and giggled. "I thought you were just a kid like me, because you're smaller than me. But you're bigger than Adonai though! What kind of race are you? I can see he's human" - she pointed at Donovan - "but what are you? I never saw anyone with wings before!"

Not that she could remember anyways.

"Cinderella is actually the eldest of Kara's children," Donovan paused and thought about, "Well... actually no... Elnara is, but Cindy was before Elnara came along."

It was hard to think of it like that since for the longest time it was by the order of adoption.