Monastery of the Seven Forms, Calistril 27, 4590 AR (part II)

He leaned his head against Lysa's chest and sighed softly. Now he felt much safer, she would protect him from the evil monsters. Ayalal was silent for a moment, and as she did not speak, he looked up.

“How can I protect you from your monster?”

She smiled at him affectionately. There were boys at the orphanage who had a brother or sister to live with. Lysa was that to him, an important, valuable person.

“You already protect me, Ayalal.”

The little boy pressed his lips into a crooked and unconvinced grimace.

“Was it the monster who did this to you?” he murmured, reaching out and lightly touching the scar on her face, his fingers sliding over the roughness the burn had left.

Lysa looked away, her expression closing.

“It was,” she murmured, remembering her monster. It was a shadow that hung behind her, chasing after her. Lysa held Ayalal with one hand, and took the other to his small hand, grasping it against her face. “It was my father. But now he is far, I ran away from him. It's just that many things in the past are hard to forget.”

Ayalal's lower lip curled a little, pouting.

“Fathers are bad...”

“There are many who are not,” Lysa said, giving him a tender kiss on the palm of his hand. “There are bad people and good people, and people who are both, and some that are none of this. Yours may not be bad. Neither your mother. Maybe... something happened to them and they thought you were better here, with me. Maybe they think you can protect me from the bad monster.”

Ayalal looked thoughtful for a moment and then nodded, more confident.

“Yeah, that was it. I'll ask master Yu to teach me things to protect you,” he determined.

Lysa laughed when she heard him say that. Yurdah almost jumped out of his skin the first time a crawling Ayalal had called him “mast'Yu”. They no longer visited him regularly, especially after she had managed to wean Ayalal of the milk with blood, which had been easier than she had ever imagined. However, he was still a small boy with little appetite and, therefore, skinny.

“What if we pay him a visit, after dawn? What do you think?”

“Yes!” he said, smiling.

“But first...” Lysa took him gently from her lap and rose from the bench. Ay followed her with the eyes, intrigued.

“What's it?”

The young woman went to a cupboard from where she returned with a little cloth bag, bound with a string. She sat down beside him and held it out to him.

“Happy birthday, Ay,” she wished.

The child's eyes rounded as she stared at the rough package.

“Is it today?”

“Hm-hm. And this is your gift. It's little, but I hope you like it,” Lysa said, watching him pick up the package carefully.

Ayalal toiled a bit with the tight knot, biting the inside of his cheek. When he finally managed to open the bag on his lap, it revealed three cupcakes that fit together in the palm of an adult's hand. His eyes flashed with happiness – candies were a luxury that did not enter the orphanage.

“Taste them,” urged Lysa. “I heard they're very good.”

Ay nodded and picked one up. He hesitated for a moment before reaching it out to her.

“Taste it, too,” he offered.

“I can’t, they're for you...”

He smiled in an almost mischievous way.

“If they're mine, I want to give one to you. Come on, eat it...”

Lysa finally accepted, because she knew that, if she didn’t do it, she would make him sad. Ayalal took a second cupcake and gave it a small bite, savoring it slowly, without saying anything else. When he had finished eating it, he placed the third on the table and, without a warning, he put his arms around Lysa waist, hiding his face in her belly.

“Thank you.” The muffled words came to her with difficulty. Gradually, her nightgown moistened where the child was leaning his face. “Thank you.”

And Lysa knew it was a thank-you that went far beyond the three little cakes she had offered him. Ayalal could not imagine how much that gratitude was mutual.