The day had come. Daniel counted it as 336 days after the last one, which really pushed the different world angle if that made a year. The morning went as usual, then a couple of hours after lunch a change occurred. They were back in the upstairs living room since it was winter again, and it was a full house today.

Daniel was in his mother's lap, trying not to fall asleep, as she was sitting by the fire chatting softly with aunt number two. She was the least common attendee, and Daniel had been amused to discover he was part of the reason behind the awkwardness she often displayed. He could sympathise since he didn't know how to act around kids in either of his lives. Speaking of kids, uncle number one had all five of his there, two girls and three boys. Four of them were sat on the floor near one corner, watched over by their mother and grandmother while they played some game that involved throwing different colored beanbag-esque items around the circle.

Meanwhile, across the room, Daniel's father was sitting at one end of the long table reading a book by himself. Opposite him at the other end grandfather was telling a story to the two uncles and the missing eldest child, a boy of maybe thirteen or fourteen. From what Daniel had overheard, the story was about grandfather meeting an annoying man that morning, who was making unreasonable demands or something along those lines.

And then halfway through a sentence, grandfather switched to speaking English. "...you believe that? And to him, we should be glad to help!"

Daniel twisted around in shock at what he was hearing, staring across the room.

"Oh is it time?" his mother asked. The attention of the others turned their way, and uncle number two excitedly crossed the room and squeezed his way into sharing his wife's chair, earning himself a fondly exasperated smile from her.

"Mummy," Daniel's mother slowly enunciated. "Can you say Mummy?"

This gave Daniel the chance to watch her lips as she spoke. The timing and movement matched the English words coming out. Did the other language even exist? What language did they think they were speaking beforehand? Perhaps if he had thought to check at the time, he might have been able to catch some lipsync gaps. Somehow he doubted it. The idea seemed pretty stupid to him, but so did the alternatives. There was some definite malarkey going on here, and it meant he had just wasted a year trying to learn a phantom language.

Anyway, time was being wasted. He had run out of patience trying to come up with a word that said something profound about himself. Instead, he planned on using a funny-sounding English word partly so no one would understand it. Luckily that word might now serve a second purpose.

"Banana!" He declared. And then straight away had to struggle with the fact that his voice sounded like one of a little girl. He'd not seen a banana since he got here, and the blank looks he got in response made him think people didn't know what he was saying. Which was interesting. If someone found a banana, would they start using his word, or would his understanding change to the new name they gave it? Would he even be capable of perceiving the difference?

"Mummy. Try to say it after me," his mother told him, and then she started to sound out the syllables.

"Muh."

"Bah," Daniel responded with less confidence than before.

"Mee."

"Nana!"

"She's an idiot," a child of uncle number one said, only to quickly be scuffed over the head by his mother.

"She's not an idiot," uncle number two disagreed, placating an annoyed look on my mother's face. "She's a little goblin. That's probably a goblin warcry." His wife gave an amused snort at this, which only widened the smirk on his lips.

"Rory!" Daniel's mother said with a warning glance.

"What? She must be one!" The uncle formerly known as number two responded, sounding both offended and amused. "I don't even think I'm even allowed to come up with a different explanation."

"Enough!" Grandfather said with a note of finality. "Let it go."

Daniel tried to tune out the surrounding conversation and attempts to goad him into speech. Over the past year, he had grown comfortable at these family gatherings. Now for the first time, Daniel could feel pressure to actually participate instead of simply listening. It seemed resisting conversation was one more thing that had been easy in his past life but was now a struggle to cope with.

Testing his grip on his clothing, Daniel found that his strength had improved again. Plus his senses were sharper and he could speak now. Thankfully size growth seemed to be spread over the year, and then today his abilities had suddenly caught up. The change wasn't as stark today but he thought that was just due to how little he had to start with the first time.

With attention in the room turned to other things, Daniel stood up in his mother's lap. Leaning close to her ear, he whispered "Mummy."

"She said it," she announced happily, leaning Daniel back to get a look at him. "She said mummy!"

"Are you sure?" Uncle Rory asked doubtfully.

"Yes," she insisted. "Can you say it again sweetheart?" Daniel nodded, eager to please.

"Banana!"

This rewarded him with another round of prodding from the others to speak more that Daniel worked at ignoring. Eventually, his mother took notice of his discomfort and picked him up. Taking him across the room she set him down on his father's lap.

"Here take her. She can speak now but she doesn't want to. Just like her father. Maybe you can show her what you are reading."

Daniel was very interested in that, and he could even catch English words in extremely neat and even handwriting in the book. But then his father wordlessly closed the book and handed it to Daniel's mother. His father's arm finished its return journey by curling around Daniel's shoulders and holding him close. His mother took one look at the book then said "Maybe not," and pulled another chair close. Sitting down, she took Daniel's father's hand and held it, seeming to find their mutual silence endearing.

The man was often quietly off to one side, particularly when there were more people present. Which meant Daniel was less used to him than his mother. Still, more than once Daniel had found himself glancing across the room and catching a similar glance from his father. Different but matching instincts he supposed.

Daniel tried to ignore the close contact by working his mind through the mechanics of language swapping. Everything he came up with was still somewhere between weird and stupid. His best guess would be it was one out of magic, aliens, or god. Which were pretty much interchangeable in Daniel's book. Basically, it was something beyond his understanding. Getting annoyed at it because it didn't fit his view of how the world worked was like an animal getting angry with its reflection in a mirror.

Eventually, he decided it was time to try talking again. There was something about the quiet companionship between just the three of them that made things easier. And he'd rather avoid the attention that would come from leaving things for too long. His eyes went to the book his mother still held.

"Is there something I can read?"

"We'll have to think about it. Maybe later," his mother responded.

"The books we have are for adults," his father added.

Daniel considered this. Being reliant on parents was certainly easier without speech. The idea of asking for permission for things rankled. His parents hadn't reacted to a two-year-old forming a sentence, but still, it was probably a pretty stupid thing to do. Daniel had led a secretive life, often pointlessly private over trivial things. He naturally shied away from admitting to being reincarnated or outing himself as such. Acting out a cover story seemed smart, but a lot of effort, and the cat possibly already being out of the bag just gave him an excuse to not bother. Better to keep with his decision to focus on what he wanted rather than worry about if he was acting his age.

Which asked the question what did he want? He went back to alien god magic. A god was just a new type of person who felt you owed them something. Aliens weren't much better. Not something he wanted to have to deal with. Which left one thing that he was interested in.

Looking up and catching his father's attention, he asked "Can I learn magic?"

"Not till you are five."

Which meant it was possible! Daniel's mind came awash with images of himself as a fire mage, setting alight innocent villages in the name of peace, love, and justice. He raised his hands, making a burning sound effect in his throat as he imaged fire streaming from his palms. Purge the heretics! Hahahaha! All must burn!

"What are you doing?" his mother asked, raising an eyebrow with an amused look on her face.

"....friendship magic?" Daniel blushed, having gotten carried away with his imagination. He tried to remind himself that he shouldn't be acting like this. I'm an adult! I'm an adult! I'm an adult! But then instead he realised that children didn't need to be embarrassed for doing childish things. I'm a kid! I'm a kid! I'm a kid! No one cares about a kid's embarrassment! Thankfully he was getting better at thinking this way and it almost helped this time.

"Can you do magic?" Daniel asked. In response, his father raised a hand and held it in front of Daniel. A flame appeared there, big enough to fill his whole palm. Daniel was entranced, staring at it in open-mouthed wonder. It was normal at first glance, but there was no smoke coming from it. No heat either.

"It doesn't hurt?" His father shook his head. "Can I touch it?" A nod and a reassuring smile. Daniel reached out hesitantly with a single finger at first, jerking his finger away when he made contact. When no feeling of pain reached him, he returned his hand and held it fully in the flame. There was a feeling to touching it, but one Daniel had never experienced the like of before. Physical senses weren't supposed to return an abstract concept. The closest he could come to describing it would be a sensation of correctness, but it really needed a whole new word. He realised the flame simply went through his hand, rather than lapping around it. As if it wasn't even there.

"Can't it burn things?" Daniel asked feeling disappointed. He'd never save any villagers with flames that don't really exist.

"It can if he wants it to," his mother answered. "How do you think we light the fire in here?"

Daniel was surprised at that. They'd been cheating all along and he'd never even noticed. He supposed it was fair enough. Grandfather might think he was in charge around here, but Daniel felt he was the real king of the castle. It wasn't his problem how the little people did things, just that they got done. Queen of the castle. He forcibly rolled his eyes at the correction.

"Showing the size of your flame off to the ladies again Marcus?" Rory teased as he approached.

"Is that jealousy I hear Rory?" Daniel's mother replied.

"My wife over there can barely keep her hands off me as it is," Rory confided loudly with a grin. "Add something like that and it wouldn't be safe to be in public together."

Daniel withdrew his hand from the fire in front of him. As the novelty wore off, his tiredness returned and he checked out of the conversation. Public speaking could come another day. Leaning his head against his father, he closed his eyes and drifted away.