Welcome to Gaia! ::

The reason for this was because the house they had recently bought was enormous. Not just big, or huge, or giant, but enormous. Cerena had once gone off on an expedition to the kitchen and only managed to find her way back five hours later, unexplicably with a litter of kittens and a couple of rolls of toilet paper. To this day, she still refused to talk about it.

Dante's brother, a young self-absorbed Eden named Circe who made even the most vain of cats look modest, was currently pestering his sister. No, not Dante herself, but her 'half-sister' -- a young girl named Lethe who was firmly of the mind that she did not like this game.

"I give you stuff!" Circe whined, nearly slapping the older girl in the face with his tailfeathers.

Lethe looked insulted. "Cannot pay for art!" She insisted, "Art come from soul! Book says so! Circe have soul?!"

Circe considered this with all the depth of a young child who was more interested in candy than books. "No." He finally replied sulkily.

Lethe tilted her nose up at him, a gesture she had learned from picturebooks, and returned to her painting. This was soon made impossible -- much in part because Circe decided to 'kindly' relieve her of her paintbrush and run off with it like a mad cow (or some other furry woodland creature that she couldn't think of at the moment, 'cause cows didn't have green things sticking out of their butts.) She paused, just for a moment, trying to consider the best course of action, and decided that a Big Loud Noisy Fuss would best convey her sentiments of the "I am very upset that you have stolen my paintbrush. Please return it right away." kind.

Circe giggled madly and dashed off, often tumbling down to the wooden floors and having to get up again, and made his way deep into the heart of the grand castle (or so he liked to think of it as) that he lived in. That would show her, not doing what he wanted her to do!

He was quite surprised, though, when a sudden turn made him stumble into a room that had people in it that were neither his mother or his sister. He vaguely recognized the white one, but just barely. He squinted at the two and hid the paintbrush behind his back with one hand, just in case. "Maids 'n stuff?" He asked hopefully, recognition gleaming in his eyes.

Circe nodded understandingly -- the part about his sister (Lethe? But she wasn't here, he hoped!) and 'awnts' went right over his head, but he could understand the part about no dirty clothes at least. "Okay." He said agreeably, "Mum wash clothes."

He approached Koyuki, keeping his gaze on Dante as he circled around her and helped himself to her previous seat. "I'm Circe!" He said as if this explained everything, and in his mind, it probably did. "You are?"

Circe blinked at Koyuki and tried his best to look regal and Bigger Than You but this didn't work when he barely came up to her knee in the first place. He decided that something would have to be done about this later. He felt unexplicably proud of Dante though, for remembering that he was more important and all that, and decided that she wouldn't make a bad sister.

"Better than Lethe," He told her in a hushed tone of voice that seemed better suited for prophecies and royal decreements than games of favorites.

A high-pitched shriek from the doorway made him wince and scramble off the seat, instead choosing to hide behind Koyuki as she was not only bigger than him but bigger than the young girl standing in the doorway looking like someone kicked her puppy.

Circe might as well have.

"'Yuki-mama!" Lethe began to wail, catching sight of her 'other mother', "Circe take brush of Lethe! 'n now Lethe can't paint!" She made sure not to be too loud in her tantrum, because that usually led to time-outs. The key was to be tearful and to place as much blame on the other person as possible.

"Wouldn't listen to me!" Circe protested hotly, peeking out from behind the chair. "'n I'm keeng!"

"Lethe princess!" The Fa'e countered, "Just as good! 'Yuki-mama say so?!" She had paused, just slightly, in the middle of her retort to blink and almost smile in greeting at Dante, and then it was back to scrunched-up-face-and-looking-very-blue (literally.)

"Lethe." Circe confirmed with another wince, jabbing a finger towards the dark-haired Fa'e in the doorway. He also showed Dante the paintbrush, just briefly before hiding it away behind his back again.

He looked vaguely betrayed at Koyuki's sudden proclamation of her affiliation with Lethe. "I'll disown you!" He started to confusedly protest towards his older sister, before a sudden flash of gold caught his eye.

His crown.

His crown.

He immediately shrieked, louder than Lethe was previously if that was possible, and immediately chucked the paintbrush away and dived for it. How dare she--!!

Lethe quickly scrambled to pick up the paintbrush again, clutching it protectively to herself and taking a few steps closer towards her other-mother and the strange-white-furry-one. "'nk you." She said quietly to Koyuki, wiping at her eyes with a sleeve. Crying was more exhausting than she thought.

Circe squawked indignantly. First this mean person took away his crown, and now she was calling him a brat?! (He was not a hotdog!) Who did she think she was, his mother?! "Not mad at Mad'line." He protested hotly, before turning his attention to other things. Like conspiracy.

Lethe let out a few sniffs, just to prove she wasn't acting (though she was, for the most part, but she really was upset!) and slowly shuffled over to the young woman. "'Kee," She said agreeably, almost too perkily for someone who was just crying a second ago. "Who fuzzy white One?"

"Dante!" Circe proclaimed loudly, feeling superior -- even if only for a second -- for knowing something she didn't. "My sister! And Duchess!"

Lethe narrowed her eyes just slightly, imagining herself like one of those bigbadwulves in the books. "Sister of Lethe too, then."

Circe thought about this. "No, just mine." He decided, before suddenly shrieking at Koyuki, "Gimme back crown! Or... or..." He took a deep breath and puffed his chest out, spreading his tailfeathers as far as they could go in an effort to make himself look bigger. "Or... off with your head!" He proclaimed.

"DISCRIMINATION! DISCRIMINATIONNN!" Circe yelled back indignantly, finding that big words like that usually made the bigger people confused. He looked around for something to throw, absolutely refusing to apologize to Lethe (it was an honor to even be breathing his air!), and finally tugged his socks off and, wadding them up, launched them harmlessly at Koyuki and missing horribly.

...This was not good.

"Dante!" Circe burst out suddenly, deciding that he was more of a general than a soldier. "Must take back what is not-'Yuki's!" There was a pause before he shrieked out "CHARGE!" and then sat and waited.

"Is okay," Lethe said kindly, sensing that this girl was much more New than she was (Even though they looked to be the same age which was confusing, but that was okay 'cause she was whatever-Circe-was and not Fa'e.) "Is nice to meet Dante too." Formalities over, the young girl turned to watch Circe for a while, wrinkled her nose finally, and dashed over to stand in front of the young woman with arms spread out as wide as she could (which didn't exactly work, with the ribbons in the way and all.)

"Circe will have to go through Lethe!" She announced bravely and tried to look as princess-like as possible.