“Auria, hurt, how?” I asked in broken baby-speak. Honestly denigrating, since I had a good idea how many words I was missing from forming a proper sentence. There seemed to be a general word to change a sentence into a ‘question’. “I hope that’s the correct interpretation. Otherwise I might’ve just told them that she’s hurt right now, which could lead to some very embarrassing misunderstandings.”

Moving my eyes around the table revealed that I had properly formed a sentence “Hurray~”. The general nervous fidgeting, increased interest of the tabletop and sounds of leather scraping against copplestone, indicated that my babybabble had hit a landmine. “Not gonna get an answer like this, let’s break a few baby-social norms… what’s left of the ones I haven’t broken already.”

I “menacingly”, cutely pointed at Phuma across from Auria and “inquired”, babbled: “Why?”

His face shifted from a patronizing grin to a look of shame, finally settling into a general frown. I waited for a few seconds for him to get his thoughts together. Finally, just when he opened his mouth, he was rudely interrupted by our second resident pyromaniac. “Do not trouble a child with the dealings of old men.” I smiled outwardly, but on the inside I was fuming: “Ah yes, Mr. Wisdom-out-of-my-ass, please continue to keep vital information out of my grasp. Wouldn’t want me to make a correct decision, would we? Nooo~, that would be terrible.”

“We will tell him when he is old enough to understand his role in this world.” - OldMcOldFace

“If you don’t shut your mouth, ‘my role in this world’ is going to be all about shoving a chair so far up your ass-”

“He is old enough to realize that there is something wrong, why not tell him at least what he can see.”

“Yes Phuma, keep going! I’ll even stop picturing you as Mittens from back home.”

“Do you wish to cause him undue worry?”

“If it’s going to worry me, don’t keep the information from me. That makes me even more worried, how am I supposed to stop worrying, when I don’t even know what I’m worried about. Back on Terra, we at least had ye ol’ faithful Thermonuclear annihilation to be worried about.”

“You are right, this matter can wait.” - Mittens wannabe

I was overcome with an intense urge to squish a cat, bully the tips of its ears for an extended period of time and feed it five minutes too late.

While contemplating my dastardly revenge, I wiggled around in Aurias grip until I no longer had to look at my two adversaries. Aurias hand descended on my head, making me tense for a moment, but she started petting me, making me relax in bliss. “I’m not a pervert, I just like the feeling of feminine hands moving through my hair. Definitely not a pervert. Fuck off Freud.”

I pressed myself into her paltry chest and wallowed in the feeling of unconditional affection.

“Once I’m old enough, I’mma put stones in their shoes, crumbs in their bed, move the furniture a tiny bit and store the stuffed furs used as pillows next to the fireplace.”

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Turned out that winter had far from reached its peak. The snow was covered in a massive layer of ice. It made it easy to walk, but extremely treacherous. Cracking the layer would make your foot crash through multiple layers below it. Eric had a painful experience that left a number of scrapes and cuts all the way up his leg. Auria had to put me down on the ice, just to help Phuma pull him out.

Our tower looks surreal. Frozen waves of snow greaming in the sunlight, shrubs peeking out of the ice, themselves covered in a thick layer of transparent ice. Even the sides of our tower had a thick hide of solid water protecting it from biting wind.

A single thread of smoke rising above it and dissipating abruptly.

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Lately Phuma has been unsuccessful in hunting large animals, mostly returning with small birds he shot with weird special arrows. I had seen him manufacture them shortly after my arrival, which means that this shortage of food is likely predictable.

“I hope we won’t have to dine à la communism or british Raj. I don’t care how tender babies are, that shit’s fucked! Especially considering I’d be the main course.”

Most of the others were spending their time preparing for spring. Eric was making a variety of stone tools, which had me confused. I guess we have no steady supply of metal, so flint tools are better than nothing. Sometimes Phuma would help him make rope from fibers they had stored in one of the makeshift add-on rooms. Bran would spend his time playing with his ball of bullshit, whenever Auria allowed it, he would teach me about ‘magic’. There are certain similarities between the words and movements that concern me. They seem entirely random, except for a few points where the timing lines up perfectly when performed correctly. This only happens when the correct pair of movements and sounds are used.

It eludes me how this helps cast ‘magic’, Bran does not seem to do anything besides silently mumble something whenever his glorified night-light materializes.

“I’m going to go along with his teaching, but if he’s training me wrong for his own amusement. I’mma cram his cane so far down his throa-”

Getting used to the mental blockage had been infuriating. It left me exhausted from silent fits of rage whenever it happened in quick succession.

“If I ever get my hand on those fucks, I’m going to string them up into [Redacted] beads. Try to bother me when you’re stuck in some degenerate’s backside!”

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My first time seeing the wolves of this place was funny and horrifying. Small earthbound birds no bigger than a cat. Long legs, huge gnarly claws in comparison to their body. A lot of birds here seem to be unable to fly.

These gray little bastards are vicious. Phuma came running, half-sliding up the hill, darting from solid snowdrift to snowdrift for better footing. A small group of birds in tow, around twenty. Looked amusing, until I heard that Aurias heart was beating rapidly, it made me look up at her. She had an abject look of fear. Not a normal reaction to a bunch of birds, so I slapped her on the arm to get her attention.

She snapped out of it, turned, ran inside, shoved me into Eric’s arms and vanished in one of the small additions to the main tower.

Eric just stood around trying to figure out how to hold a baby. Shifting my body around awkwardly. “Nice going dude, maybe try to not break my back?”

Auria stormed out into the glaring white snow, carrying butchered remains of one of the large white birds Phuma had hunted earlier.

She left a few drops of blood on the icy snow as Eric slowly followed her outside.

Phuma drew closer at a rapid pace. Every single step measured, seemingly slow, but the rate at which he propelled himself forwards revealed that to be a lie.

His face a blank mask of concentration.

His eyes found Auria and her cargo. His approximate route shifted subtly away from the entrance of the tower and intersected with her path.

I think Eric might be slightly nearsighted.

The dreaded birds had to get within a stones throw of Auria, before he jerked and started backing into our home.

Before the entrance closed, I saw Auria dump out the meat in her arms and start running back towards us.

Eric stood in silence, his muscles tensing and relaxing in indecision. A large number of facial expressions crossed his face, mostly different variations of fear.

What felt like an eternity later, the heavy leather serving as our entrance burst inwards. Auria, closely followed by Phuma, jumped inside.

Phuma immediately went for an unstrung bow leaning next to the entrance to his sleeping quarters and began trying to string it with shaking fingers.

Auria grabbed some chainmail, threw it over her head, grabbed her shortsword and placed herself in front of the entrance.

Phuma finally got his bow in working order. Grabbed a quiver of arrows with metal heads and hurried up the ladder into the upper part of the tower.

“Haven’t been up there yet, pretty hard to climb with a baby in your arms. I guess he can shoot the ‘dreaded birds’ from there. Pfff.”

My second-hand fear had abated and I was starting to think mockingly of my new family, for being scared of a few small birds.

The aftermath made me reconsider my initial assessment.

An entire area was bathed in blood. These gray birds had started attacking each other once Phuma’s arrows had felled a few. Massive gashes littered corpses without arrows. Trails of bloody spots leading away from our tower. I had no opportunity to examine a corpse closer, but one claw was longer than Aurias index finger. Only a single claw on each foot was gigantic. Still enough to easily gut an adult.

“Those beaks didn’t look like eagle-beaks or other birds of prey. Weird.”

My thoughts were interrupted by Eric unceremoniously dumping me onto Aurias bed.

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I managed to push my way into the room used for butchering. Calling it a room is a bit much. It consisted of a tall wooden roof, ropes hanging from the ceiling. The entire thing exposed to the elements, only a few wooden logs holding up the roof.

“It’s freezing out here, but I need answers. If our apex predators are massive flocks of tiny birds I’mma have an aneurysm.”

I got more information than I had hoped for. The birds had teeth. Teeth!

Sharp pointy teeth for tearing meat and grasping prey. There also seemed to be a few odd ones at the back, larger and dull, not sure what those are used for.

Their bodies are covered in a thin layer of proper feathers, underneath a thick layer of down keeps them warm. Head is significantly larger than a swan or goose of equivalent size. The massive claw seems to stick slightly upwards to not get in the way of their locomotion.

“Still have no idea if they waddle or jump. Based on the size, they’re probably forced to walk.”

The front of their head seemed flat, until I noticed why. Their eyes were entire front-facing, predatory eyes.

My fingers had become unusable from the cold and I had to scream at the door to be let back in.

A price in dignity worth paying. Better to know your enemy than to get ended by a flock of roided birds.

Auria did not let me out of her reach for a few days afterwards. This temporarily halted my lessons from Bran.

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Winter finally neared its end. Nobody could leave due to the melting snow. Eric got hurt again. He overestimated the stability of melting ice.

Him being prone to accidents had started to worry me a lot more than it should. I remembered in horror how Auria had handed me off to him. Dying due to someone else’s clumsiness, that would have been annoying.

Paradoxically he seems to be incredibly adept at butchering, birds at least, and passable at cooking. Bran complains a lot though. “Don’t really care how it tastes, I had to live on rye-flour once. The only thing that happens when eating bad food, is that it lowers the threshold for someone to lose their shit. Wouldn’t really matter in my current state.”

Phuma has been sharpening straight wooden sticks and placing them next to the entrance. Eric’s quietly been adding stone tips.

Both seem pretty upset every time they do anything in relation to those makeshift spears.

“Maybe they’re bitter about being saved by Auria, if they’re smart they’re just preparing for an alternative outcome to that situation.”

Foresight should be applauded. What seems paranoid today can save your ass tomorrow.

I think my meditating on Bran’s nonsense is actually paying off. Yesterday I managed to feel an icy spot in the back of my head. The instant I tried to influence it in any way, it burst into my body. Leaving me twitching in extreme discomfort with pseudo-ice flooding my veins.

Auria found me, was incredibly shocked for some reason and immediately carried me to Bran. Then she slapped him.

“Slapping old men. Auria, I expected better from you. I know he’s annoying, but come on. That’s not nice.”

Bran intently studied me, he spent a long time just looking at my eyes. Then he pulled out my least favorite radioactive stone and shoved it in my face. He got another slap from Auria. He deserved that one. I briefly saw a piercing bluish light refract in the crystal’s warm yellow glow.

“Really hope that wasn’t Cherenkov radiation inside my eyeballs. That would suck!”

I tried moving my hand in front of my eyes to check. Auria caught it mid-motion and presented it to Bran. “Oh, fark! Forgot completely about that.”

His jaw dropped at the sight of the complex silvery pattern that denoted me a mass-murderer. A lot of questions followed. None of which I could understand to a sufficient degree, to feel confident answering. Not that I would have told the truth.

He started an impromptu lesson in magic, Auria watching him with a judgemental gaze.

A lot of spiritual crap was mixed in this time. In summary ‘magic’ works by pushing that cold feeling into an imaginary image, moving it to a point on the body, finally you release it from that point. Incantations and movements assist apprentices until they figure out the right ‘feeling’ for each step.

When he started talking about the dangers of magic my knowledge of the language started failing me. “I’m pretty sure there was at least one instance of ‘bleed out’ or ‘exsanguinate’. I think Auria’s rage might be justified.”

When the cold feeling ebbed away, I was already asleep.

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