Listening to the kids his age in the playroom the next day had made it clear he didn't fit in. They were further along with language than you might expect, but the same couldn't be said mentally. The difference was clear, but Daniel wasn't about to complain that others weren't bringing it up. Instead, he let his guard down further and took up the habit of impulsively asking questions. A lot of questions.

Sadly, he hit a barrier early on when it came to learning more details about magic. At age five kids went to church and were taught a bunch of things, including magic. The church had some principles about respecting the natural stages of growth, meaning the weird age-growth milestones, and didn't like it when people jumped too far ahead on their own. Apparently, plenty of people ignored them and did it anyway. Daniel generally favored deciding for himself over following the rules, particularly religious ones. But Dad said it was important to set an example and requested Daniel leave the subject alone. Daniel was pleasantly surprised to be asked instead of simply bossed around. Also, the rest of the family didn't say it outright, but Daniel could tell by the assorted bouts of scoffing and eye-rolling, that they thought Dad was being foolish. Which made Daniel want to help out, and he agreed to Dad's request and tried to keep to it. Much of Daniel's enthusiasm had been lost when learning the connection to the church anyway. Fantasy world religious lessons sounded awful, and he'd happily avoid the topic for as long as possible. But he was interested in magic presumably being another level to the thing, at age five. For all he knew, at age one hundred people grew face tentacles and went to live on the moon.

He had more success learning about his family members, including their names. Names that he had definitely not heard spoken the year before, something that made his eyes roll. The family name was apparently Laston, his grandparents were called James and Helen, and his parents were Laura and Marcus. He had quickly defaulted to using mum and dad. Previously he had avoided those terms since they seemed childish, but strangely once he started speaking mother and father felt pretentious. Mum and dad ended up winning the conflict by virtue of being shorter words.

Apparently, grandfather was not just the man of the house, but also the boss of the town. The town of Laston, which Daniel had yet to explore, was clearly a den of villainy that needed to be punished for name stealing. Dad worked as part of the town guard, and since the guard worked for grandfather that meant he was in the family business as well. He even had a sword that Daniel had been able to look at, but foolishly he was not allowed to play with or even touch it. He was pretty sure that was the only thing stopping him from mastering the blade in quick order and then moving on to slaying dragons. Sadly, if all the villages got burnt down by dragons then there would be none left for him to save once he became a fire mage. However, Dad didn't seem to do much actual guarding. His description of work mainly included endless drills and practice to polish his skills.

Daniel was less clear about what the women did for work. They would talk about helping someone out that day rather than having a profession. More questions led to a non-answer along the lines of 'it's complicated' It made sense to Daniel that there would be more than one topic people weren't happy to explain to a toddler. And he didn't mind having some things to work out on his own. He just hoped his mother wasn't the same as the elderly women who showed up in the daycare, with 'helping out' being code for visiting for tea and a natter.

Uncle Rory and Aunt Gemma worked together away from the town through most of the year. Rory claimed that unlike the rest of the family, their last name was Landtrust. And, that was also their job, but not really. He seemed to enjoy how the claim was making people uncomfortable, and his teasing manner made Daniel unsure how much of what he said was a joke. Further details were on top of the list of things people didn't want to talk about.

A few months later, Daniel sat with his mum in the living room. With no internet, no movies, no computer games, and still no books, he had fewer demands on his time than he was used to. Which left him both more interested in new things, and less bothered about wasting time. To be fair the adults did try to keep him occupied, and there were toys that he suspected were hand-me-downs from one of his cousins. But those were medieval, as in wooden, and worse were made for a young girl. Daniel found he had a child's enthusiasm for a lot of things, but he wasn't about to start playing with dolls.

Daniel's mum ran a comb through his hair, humming the same tune this activity always brought on. After a moment of hesitation, Daniel joined in. Gaining speech had left Daniel more vulnerable to childish flights of fancy, which he normally wasn't too happy about. Something about being a mute observer had helped to insulate his seriousness. But there were some upsides, such as finding it less daunting to try out new things. The chances of him joining in with a song as an adult had been near zero.

"My mother used to sing this song to me when I was little," she told him. Daniel shrugged at the idea of a maternal grandmother he hadn't met.

"Where is she now?" Daniel knew his grandfather on that side had died before he was born, but not much else.

"To the south, near the capital," she said with a strange tone of voice. Daniel started to turn to get a better look at her face but with a tutting sound, she grabbed the top of his head to stop him. "Hold still!"

With his hair reaching past his shoulders, his mother had made this part of their daily routine. Daniel had spent his entire past life with as short hair as possible, specifically to avoid any amount of daily time investment, however little. But this wasn't too bad, although he would probably lose the habit without someone else pushing it on him.

Or maybe not. He had the time to fill, and habits picked up as a kid could build into a pretty big difference later on. Daniel didn't want to abandon himself via reincarnation. But that didn't mean he couldn't pick up different hobbies this time around. Maybe he should think about what else he could be working on.

Her job done, Daniel's mum came around to his front and knelt down to address him.

"Just wait here like a good girl Anne. I'll be right back and then we'll see if they are here yet."

Daniel crossed his arms and pouted, instantly annoyed. But his mother just smiled fondly and booped his nose with her finger before leaving. This was the final name he learned, and the least welcome, that of Anne. That one really got under his skin, but there was nothing to do about it. It was confronting him with things he didn't want to think about. Becoming annoyed over something he couldn't change and wouldn't explain had felt pretty childish at first. But accepting that and acting his age somehow sidestepped the issue for him. So now he was enthusiastically sulking every time it was brought up.

His mother returned, stopping to brush a stray hair from the front of Daniel's kirtle before picking him up to go down the stairs. A kirtle was a knee-length tunic-type garment they had here. Clothing was another thing to follow along with birthdays, with his swapping after his second one. Thankfully clothing was unisex for children, and at least it was an upgrade on the white smocks the younger kids wore. Having not heard the word kirtle before, he distrusted its origins. He very much disliked the possibility of his thinking being affected by alien god translation magic. There were actual tunics that the adults sometimes wore, and he took some solace in not being instinctively clear on the difference between the two. He really needed a banana to show people so he could catch the auto-translate mid update.

For once, they went out the front door on the way to the garden, and Daniel tried to take in the opportunity to look around from a new viewpoint. In front was a small open yard, with a line of trees on the other side partially hiding a couple of small single-story buildings. To the left a stone wall ran fairly close to the house, a large wooden gate in the middle of it stood closed and blocking the view Daniel knew led into the town. They went right, around the corner of the house into the largest open part of the garden. Here he could see Dad and grandfather sitting talking on a wooden bench, and in the distance, grandmother was working away in the apron and gloves she wore for gardening. Lastly, just arriving to visit was Uncle Henry and his family, coming in through the sideways back gate in the wall across the lawn from the house.

Henry lived in the town with his wife Carissa and worked under Grandfather. He called himself a scribe, which Daniel took to mean he did administrative work. To Daniel, he had always seemed more of a blue-collar type, but maybe the same lines didn't apply here. Henry's eldest was a clear suck-up, being called James after his grandfather. After that, in age order, came Emory, Faye, David, and lastly the youngest at age six, the horrible Hannah.

Mum put Daniel down as they approached, and it was Hannah he tried to hide from behind his mum's legs. Unfortunately, he failed and she ran forwards towards them excitedly.

"Anne! Let's play!"

"Urk!" Daniel responded, hiding his panic with great poise.

Somehow Hannah had decided she wanted a little sister, or possibly a pet or Daniel-sized doll. Daniel's lack of consent had not stood in the way of him being awarded the position. The role entailed Hannah glomming onto him whenever she saw him, then leading him around holding his hand and narrating to her parents or any other nearby adult anything he did. Daniel didn't enjoy the attention much, finding the last part, in particular, to rub him the wrong way. The struggle was getting away from her without being mean to a kid. Making her cry would not help with avoiding excess attention. Lately, he'd been getting by with making a game out of trying to escape.

He waited until she went around his mum to his right, and then made a run for it to past her to the left. Or at least he tried to. He was sadly lacking in speed, balance, and form. On the other hand, running was about ten times more fun than it had been for him before. Daniel started to laugh with the sheer joy of it, and soon he heard Hannah joining in from behind him. As he reached the path beside the wall, he tried and failed at turning, his legs going sideways, the ground rushing up to meet the side of his head.

Quickly pushing himself to his feet, he turned to see Hannah running back to the others, calling out "Mum! Anne fell down!"

"I'm fine!" he called out, forcing his voice to sound it. As he brought his hand down from his head and wiped away the tiny smear of blood on his fingers, he told himself it was true. Just a small bump and a scratch, no big deal. But as he started walking back toward his mother he could feel his eyes watering and his face heating up. He should be fine but he couldn't convince his eyes to stop doing what they were doing. Slowing, he scrunched up his face to hold back tears, then swallowed, feeling the need to scrunch up his throat too. Finally, he stopped, his hands forming fists at his side, staring down at the ground, stuck. He should be fine but he wasn't. This is stupid, I'm not a little baby! It was one thing to take comfort from his parent's closeness or to accept their affection. But to go crying to his mummy over a boo-boo he would not accept.

A shadow approached and fell across him. He continued staring at the ground, conflicting emotions roiling against each other in his chest. He wanted to look up but resisted.

"I'm fine," he said quietly.

And then his Dad's arms were reaching across his vision, dragging him up into a hug. Daniel stubbornly tried to cling to resistance but quickly failed, holding on tightly as tears started to fall. His father rubbed Daniel's back gently as his chest heaved, managing at least to stifle his sobs.

"You're okay now."